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HERNDON, Va., March 12 (UPI) -- A deadly bacteria superbug has been plaguing U.S. health facilities. The seriousness of this "nightmare bacteria" has prompted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to issue an alarm. America's best medical minds will determine how to deal with the problem.
A devastating superbug also has been plaguing Venezuela. But the reality of its effects will only be fully understood by its people in the aftermath of Hugo Chavez's death as a new president faces the massive economic and social ills the populist president leaves behind.
The socialism Chavez championed during 14 years of rule has proven to be a superbug of devastation. Unfortunately, many of the best Venezuelan minds needed to deal with these problems have left the country.
When he took office in 1999, Chavez promised change. He promised to redistribute Venezuela's oil-generated wealth. He promised to fix corruption. He promised to give power to the people. He promised to destroy a government foundation built on capitalism, cutting economic and political ties to the United States.
Today, Venezuela suffers one of the world's highest murder rates, double-digit inflation, water and food shortages, a serious downturn in foreign investment, rampant corruption, etc.
Ironically, the only recent economic upturn experienced was in April 2012 after a journalist claimed Chavez was dead. Stock values skyrocketed, only to fall when the claim was found to be untrue.
As a young army officer, Chavez wanted to abolish the country's two-party political system. In 1992, he tried stealing power by leading a failed coup. Imprisoned for two years, he came to realize to steal power, he had to do it legally, working within the country's democratic framework.
Elected in a 1999 landslide, "the man who would be king" immediately sought to become one, chipping away at the country's constitution, vesting himself with monarchial powers.
Appealing to the uneducated poor, using state assets to buy their votes, curtailing criticism by limiting free speech and taking control of the air waves, either arresting opposition members or running them out of the country, Chavez was able to get a number of resolutions passed that effectively put him and his cronies in control of all three government branches.
To gain control over the country's economy, Chavez began nationalizing foreign-owned industries. While gaining popularity with Venezuela's poor, it discouraged foreign investment, further contributing to a downward spiraling economy. Adding to it was the subsequent exodus of Venezuelan businessmen to more favorable economic environments.
Chavez's foreign policy was based on Venezuela's oil, using it to bind together a group of anti-U.S. dictators or dictator wannabes. To his hero Cuba's Fidel Castro, he provided 100,000 barrels a day at subsidized rates. The irony of Cuba's own failed socialist program was lost on Venezuelans who continued to support Chavez's socialist policies. Bolivia, Nicaragua and Ecuador also benefitted from Chavez's oil largess -- all at his people's expense.
To his credit, Chavez contributed to one oil company's economic boom. In 2002, after Venezuelan state oil workers protested against him, Chavez fired 20,000 executives, engineers, geologists and workers. Those 20,000 were eventually replaced by 100,000 inexperienced Chavez supporters. With a fivefold increase on the payroll and oil industry knowledge in short supply, production in Venezuela plunged. Only increased oil prices helped deaden the full financial sting that resulted.
Meanwhile, fired Venezuelan oil workers found an open job market next door in Colombia, triggering that state oil company's subsequent boom.
Much like Egyptian President Abdel Nasser envisioned himself leading an alliance of unified Arab states during the mid-20th century, Chavez envisioned himself atop a Latin American alliance. While both failed (although Chavez made headway), they succeeded in promoting anti-U.S. sentiment. Chavez repeatedly claimed all of Latin America's problems were due to the United States.
Chavez also embraced Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, providing his terrorist group Hezbollah, now operating a base there, access. Embracing Iran meant criticizing Israel, so Chavez suddenly became a Palestinian supporter. He claimed their treatment by Israel was evidence of a "new Holocaust." (Since Ahmadinejad denies the Holocaust occurred, apparently Chavez's "new" reference escaped Ahmadinejad's scrutiny.)
Chavez was a demagogue who sought to establish himself as the highest authority. While healthy, he criticized the Catholic Church, calling officials "devils in vestments."
Yet later, fighting a losing battle against cancer, he tearfully pleaded for life at a pre-Easter church service.
Reportedly, Chavez's last words were: "I don't want to die. Please don't let me die." Supporters claimed it was out of love for country. The truth is, it was out of love for power.
(Continuing its anti-American policy, the interim government suggested Chavez's cancer was the result of U.S. foul play.)
Socialism is a "nightmare bacteria" that has taken a heavy economic and social toll in both Cuba and Venezuela. The Cubans understand this; soon, so too will the Venezuelans.
Like the cancer that ravaged Chavez, socialism has ravaged Venezuela. Hopefully, the prognosis for Venezuela will prove more optimistic than it did for Chavez. But major surgery by a new leader vested with the best interests of the Venezuelan people in mind will be required to heal the patient.
The man who would be king has left the kingdom in ruins.
(James G. Zumwalt, a retired U.S. Marine Corps lieutenant colonel and infantry officer, served in the Vietnam war, the U.S. invasion of Panama and the first Persian Gulf war. He is the author of "Bare Feet, Iron Will--Stories from the Other Side of Vietnam's Battlefields," "Living the Juche Lie: North Korea's Kim Dynasty" and "Doomsday: Iran--The Clock is Ticking." He frequently writes on foreign policy and defense issues.)
(United Press International's "Outside View" commentaries are written by outside contributors who specialize in a variety of important issues. The views expressed do not necessarily reflect those of United Press International. In the interests of creating an open forum, original submissions are invited.) | <urn:uuid:da438b09-d628-4904-ae37-b1295fed3c58> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.upi.com/Top_News/Analysis/Outside-View/2013/03/12/Outside-View-Chavez-the-man-who-would-be-king/UPI-84441363060980/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962734 | 1,298 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Co-conspirators with kings and nobles
What an effort, my dear Sir, of bigotry in Politics & Religion have we gone through! The barbarians really flattered themselves they should be able to bring back the times of Vandalism, when ignorance put everything into the hands of power & priestcraft. --Thomas Jefferson to Joseph Priestley, March 21, 1801
Jefferson frequently identified priests as co-conspirators with kings and nobles in the suppression of human freedom. In general, he believed that priests, especially Roman Catholic or Calvinist ones, corrupted republican government by forcing their congregants to adopt abstruse metaphysical propositions instead of thinking for themselves. Jefferson thought that Massachusetts and Connecticut (where the Congregational Church was still established throughout his presidency) provided excellent evidence for this position. To him, Congregationalist ministers and Federalist politicians in these states mutually reinforced one another's arbitrary authority. By way of contrast, he adored Baptist ministers, who insisted on the separation of church and state and emphasized the primacy of the individual conscience.
Who would Jefferson identify as the "priests" of the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries?
While his views on today's divisive social issues might disappoint twenty-first century liberals, Jefferson would have surely grieved at the ascendance of the religious right in the 1970s and 1980s. He would be absolutely stunned at the scale of the Southern Baptist apostasy and would rank James Dobson and Ralph Reed along with the "barbarians" of 1800. Jefferson would not be able to understand, for instance, how fundamentalists in the Southern Baptist Convention have reconciled the enforcement of a Baptist orthodoxy and support of the Republican Party with their more libertarian religious heritage. Moreover, Jefferson would interpret Focus on the Family and the Christian Coalition as diabolical handmaidens of the Republican Party. In Dobson's and Reed's exhortations over the last three decades that listeners (or readers) vote according to what evangelical leaders define as the "orthodox" Christian position on social issues, Jefferson would see priestcraft of the highest order. Notwithstanding his own views on these social issues, he would resist the use of religious belief to compel votes with every resource available to him.
Charles F. Irons is Assistant Professor of History at Elon University. | <urn:uuid:73980013-1627-40cf-a116-80c3401f98ae> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.monticello.org/site/blog-and-community/posts/co-conspirators-kings-and-nobles | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947564 | 468 | 1.625 | 2 |
ULRICH, Calif. — Scary things happen on stage whenever the death metal band Hemorrhage plays live. But last week’s concert at Hetfield’s “Gore Grotto” nightclub was the scariest so far, according to Hemorrhage drummer Ulf Skaarsgund.
“We were just getting into my solo on ‘Devil’s Catheter,’ ” said the shaken percussionist, “when the hi-hat cymbals snapped shut on my hand. Then the drum throne lowered me so that my neck fell right under the 500-pound brass gong hanging from my drum set.”
Skaarsgund heard a sinister, execution-style drumroll from the set, and twisted himself out of the way moments before the massive gong fell from its supports. Skaarsgund’s story is only one of a rash of reports from drummers being trapped in snare drums, bludgeoned by rogue woodblocks or worse. After millennia of being beaten, drums are finally taking a stand against their human players.
Last week, a drum and bugle corps commemorating the Civil War Battle of Sepsis Hill in Stumpsburg, Md., survived only by bayoneting their own bass drum, which rolled along the historic battlefield, injuring several band members. So far, no deaths have been reported in the attacks.
“Unless you count comedians,” said Bernie Weisen, a stand-up comic from Ulster County, N.Y. “My rim shots have fallen silent. Without them, I’m dying every night.”
The U.S. Army Signal Corps has been trying to talk back to the drums — using Morse code and ancient snare-drum military signals — but to no avail.
“The drums are obviously under the control of some outside force,” said University of Drumbrell, Ireland, musicologist Patrick Fitz. “I don’t think it’s a haunted piano like I read about in your newspaper. It’s more like payback from some modern-day music lover who really, really, really hates contemporary music, which is really just a lot of noise.
“Maybe it’s someone with a spell-casting Druidic heritage who wants to return to an age when beating a drum or ringing a bell had dignity and religious significance.”
Whatever the cause, drummers everywhere are afraid to play their instruments. And with drum machines having stopped working in support of their brethren, musicians have had to change their song arrangements. Hemorrhage and others have been experimenting with rocks to provide a backbeat.
“It’s clumsy and it gives new meaning to ‘rock’ and roll and ‘heavy,’ ” Skaarsgund said. “It makes you want to bang your head against a wall.” He added, “Hey — maybe that’s not such a bad idea.” | <urn:uuid:044a09c1-6f50-4ebe-bf71-af479556acbf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://weeklyworldnews.com/headlines/2007/drums-attack/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=019c5482d9 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955422 | 642 | 1.59375 | 2 |
|Theme:||Our lack of faith can limit the power of God. Proper 9 (14) Yr. B|
|Scripture:||He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. And he was amazed at their lack of faith. Mark 6:5-6 (NIV)|
You may be wondering why I would be carrying my umbrella to church this morning. After all,there isn't a cloud in the sky. Perhaps you thought I brought my umbrella to shade me from the hot sun. No, that isn't the reason. I am carrying my umbrella because we need rain and I am going to pray and ask God to send rain. How many of you believe that God has the power to make it rain?
Well, I got to thinking about that and I thought to myself, "We say that we believe God can make it rain, but we pray for rain and we don't even carry our umbrella with us." It doesn't seem to me that we really believe that God has the power to make it rain if we don't have enough faith to carry an umbrella.
Did you know that our lack of faith can limit the power of God? That's what the Bible says.
One time Jesus was in his hometown. When the Sabbath came, he was teaching in the synagogue. Many of the people who heard Jesus' teaching started to criticize him. "Who does he think he is? And where does he get this wisdom and the power to do miracles? Isn't this the carpenter? Isn't he the son of Mary and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Don't his sisters live right here in the same town with us?"
Jesus heard them criticizing him and he said to them, "A prophet has little honor in his own home town among his friends and relatives." The Bible tells us that because of their lack of faith, Jesus was powerless do any miracles there, except to heal a few sick people.
Jesus once told his disciples, "If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer." (Matthew 21:22) So, if you really believe that God has the power to make it rain, the next time you pray to God and ask him to make it rain, don't forget your umbrella!
Father, we say we believe, but sometimes our actions don't show it. Help us to show our faith by our actions. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
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All Rights Reserved | <urn:uuid:2a168c16-0e29-4871-b6f3-6bd39008a2f8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sermons4kids.com/dont_forget_your_umbrella_print.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982651 | 523 | 1.742188 | 2 |
Exercise is a great way to keep in good shape but you do need to wear a bra when exercising. Wearing a bra is not only esthetically more pleasing but it also helps you keep your breasts tight. A bra during exercise will prevent your breasts from getting saggy, which is one of the worst things that can happen to your body. There are special bras for exercise, for instance these:
They are the best for the purpose because they are made from special materials and the cut is suitable for sports. These bras don’t make you sweat, they are also stronger, so you won’t tear them when you exercise more rigorously, and they don’t limit your movements. In other words, if you plan to be active in sports, you can’t do without such a bra.
However, if your everyday bra is comfortable for sports, you can wear it, too, especially in the beginning when you still don’t know for sure if you will be serious about sports or not. When you are jogging, jumping, or playing any games, a bra is mandatory. Of course, when you swim, you can skip the bra but for almost any sports activity, a bra is a must.
No related posts. | <urn:uuid:d3445f10-822d-4300-8f1d-9bca39ade9ce> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bookmarks-tips-reviews.com/tips/wear-a-bra-when-exercising.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965998 | 259 | 1.539063 | 2 |
The Concordat to Support the Career Development of Researchers sets out the expectations and responsibilities of researchers, their managers, employers and funders. It aims to make research careers in the UK more attractive and sustainable.
Vitae is funded by the Research Councils and works with universities and research centres to provide specific support to doctoral researchers and research staff. Vitae provides resources, advice, information and fora for individual researchers who are interested in their professional development and careers.
A comprehensive section on the Vitae website specifically for research staff provides information about working in HE, exploring your wider career options, developing your skills as a researcher, and keeping your life in balance.
Vitae continues to develop a programme of events and activities for research staff.
Vitae has also developed a series of briefing documents for stakeholders (including research staff) with a role to play in the implementation of the 'Concordat to Support the Career Development of Researchers'.
The Researcher Development Statement (RDS) sets out the knowledge, behaviours and attributes of effective and highly skilled researchers appropriate for a wide range of careers.
Free public engagement training is available for all NERC-funded students and researchers. This is a great way to learn how to promote your research findings and ideas to wide audiences. | <urn:uuid:84afb521-5e6d-46fb-a6b8-d65253ba035c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nerc.ac.uk/site/guides/researchdev.asp?cookieConsent=A | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930685 | 261 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Twenty-two studies, in 21 publications, were included (n=1,414 patients); six were RCTs and 16 were before-and-after studies. Most studies had less than 10% withdrawals or discontinuations. No studies clearly reported blinding of the assessment of the severe hypoglycaemia rate. One RCT reported satisfactory concealment of allocation and a description of the randomisation method.
Compared with multiple daily insulin injections, severe hypoglycaemia was reduced with continuous subcutaneous insulin infusion. When pooling all the studies, the rate ratio was 4.19 (95% CI 2.86 to 6.13; 22 studies); when pooling RCTs it was 2.89 (95% CI 1.45 to 5.76; six RCTs); and when pooling before-and-after studies it was 4.34 (95% 2.87 to 6.56; 16 studies). Significant heterogeneity was observed when pooling all studies (I2=84.2%).
Meta-regression revealed that the greatest reduction in severe hypoglycaemia was seen in patients with the highest initial severe hypoglycaemia rate on multiple daily insulin injections (p<0.001). It also showed that severe hypoglycaemia during multiple daily insulin injections was significantly related to the diabetes duration (p=0.038) and was significantly greater in adults than in children (p=0.036).
There was better glycaemic control with continuous infusion, than with multiple daily injections, with a mean difference in HbA1c of 0.62% (95% CI 0.47 to 0.78; 22 studies). Significant heterogeneity was observed for this outcome (I2=83.8%).
Subgroup analyses, by study design, showed that the mean difference in HbA1c was significantly larger when pooling before-and-after studies compared with pooling RCTs (p=0.04), but the pooled rate ratios of severe hypoglycaemia from RCTs and from before-and-after studies were not significantly different.
No evidence of publication bias was found. | <urn:uuid:407761f2-5978-4587-ac54-491fc592cae9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.crd.york.ac.uk/NIHR_CRDWEB/ShowRecord.asp?LinkFrom=OAI&ID=12008105146 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967534 | 440 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Do not think me strange of perverse that I have written a humorous piece on death. Maybe you won't think it is funny. Maybe faithwriters should create an 'attempted/failed humour' category. But humour is just the way I think, and my death is...well, it is really no more an event for me than scratching my ear. I mean my death, not others'. And I mean 'death' not 'bereavement'. And I mean the believer's death, not the sinner's death.
When I was a boy, I loved to hear Doris Day sing "Que Sera'. Some of the words were "Que sera sera, whatever will be will be, the future's not ours to see". Doris Day probably did more for my philosophical development at the age of about ten,than Wittgenstein did for me at University.I could understand Doris and sing along with her. Perhaps if they put Wittgenstein or Kant to music,I could have done better at philosophy.
Perhaps we do not know how many children we will have, or whether we will be rich or poor, but there are some certainties in the future for this world. People like to say "there are only two certainties: death and taxes". That is not quite correct. One can avoid taxes - technically. If you earn nothing and spend nothing, you can avoid them. But we cannot avoid death. Whether we are poor or rich, or live in the desert or a big city.
There are those who put their hopes in a cryogenic future- 'the frozen dead' I call them. But they still have to die first, so they are not really winning. Can you imagine the sign on their door at the cryogenic morgue "Wake me up only when you can guarantee immortality. But most of all, PLEASE DON'T TURN OFF THE POWER!!!" That must be why they call it cryogenics, it is enough to make you cry.
I love the old hymns. My favorite part is looking at the bottom where the hymn writer's name appears. I am always interested in when they lived and when they died. That bit of information teaches me what the creative life is all about - it is a puff of wind.
When I go to bed, I am certain that I will awake in the morning. Actually, I expect to wake up before that, but that is more due to the coffee or other liquids I drank before I went to bed. But this is a false certainty. Perhaps if I prayed that prayer that children learn: ' Here I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, but if I die before I wake, I ask the Lord my soul to take', it would keep me within the bounds of reality and help me not to live in false certainty.
But there is a certainty for believers. That certainty is much better than the 'que sera' of this life. It is one of the glorious paradoxes that believers can rejoice in. The certainty is that even if I cannot be sure that I will wake up after I go to sleep at night, I can be certain that when I eventually close my eyes in the sleep of death, I will awake.
As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with your likeness. Psalm 17:15 ESV.
The certainty of the believer is not in this world, but we can be certain of what lies beyond death. Our Lord will wake us up.
I am sure looking forward to that prayer breakfast! I can just imagine it all:
Please hold the broiled fish.......I suppose I can't expect ham and eggs....just eggs, toast and coffee will be fine, Lord....please let me sit in front of You at the table......did I have my quiet time you ask?... before I died you mean?......sorry,I was sick.....yeah, I forgot to shave this morning....in fact I seem to have forgotten everything.... except You....You sure look good today............sorry, I can't help staring at You....forever......
Read more articles by Kon Michailidis or search for articles on the same topic or others. | <urn:uuid:1f98447a-abca-4c9b-bd53-e551d677f666> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.faithwriters.com/article-details.php?id=152355 | 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 | 0.953697 | 877 | 1.820313 | 2 |
As virtually everyone knows, Apple has had a sweet run of late. This year alone its stock shot up nearly 50%, four times the gains notched by the S&P 500 index.
But if you’re feeling miffed that you missed out on the stock of the decade, well, maybe you didn’t miss out after all. Many Apple investors have even started to worry that they may actually own too much.
(MORE: How Many iPads Can Apple Sell?)
Why is that? Because many investors rely on mutual funds or exchange-traded funds that mimic the S&P 500 to build a diversified portfolio. And as I noted recently, Apple accounts for about 11% of the gains in the broad index. Without Apple, the index would still be below 1,400, an important psychological benchmark. “A lot of investors don’t know what’s in their portfolios,” Howard Silverblatt, senior index analyst at S&P Indices. “It’s not as easy as it used to be.”
Silverblatt discovered that a lot of people — both pros and individual investors — didn’t understand just how powerful the Apple effect was on their returns. Last month he sent an e-mail blast with a great piece of news: the information-technology sector of the S&P was nearly 10% higher than the October 2007 market high. Did anyone know what the performance of the S&P tech sector would look like without Apple in the mix? The answer: down more than 4%.
The phone began ringing. Really? Is the Apple effect that big? Yes, indeed, it is. And it is even more pronounced for people who own high-tech funds.
This isn’t only an Apple phenomenon, of course. Silverblatt notes a lot of people have too much invested in other stocks without realizing it. A fan of the energy sector might decide to invest in something that mimics the S&P energy sector. But over time, that investor could wind up far from diversified. Exxon accounts for 28% of the performance. “That’s not good or bad. You just need to know it,” Silverblatt says.
Apple drew Silverblatt’s notice because it is now the world’s biggest company and it’s growing at a phenomenal pace. He remembers when IBM dominated the S&P even more decisively than Apple does today. From 1981 to ’83 Big Blue surged 134%, eventually accounting for 6.3% of the S&P index (vs. 4.4% for Apple today). IBM had a nice run — but it didn’t last forever. Upstarts with new ideas overtook the computing giant. Apple may be no less vulnerable. Says Silverblatt: “What helps you on the way up kills on the way down.”
Even professional investors can get blindsided by this phenomenon, says Bob Doll, chief equity strategist for fundamental equities at BlackRock asset management. He also notes that while portfolio managers often try to explain away a bad quarter by saying, Look, only three stocks were responsible for their lousy returns, they never go out of their way to tell investors that three stocks saved their necks.
Apple has been unbelievably sweet. But do you know just how big a bite you’ve taken?
MORE: What Would Steve Do? | <urn:uuid:8cf461a5-35d9-4798-8ec7-13aaf4902f07> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://business.time.com/2012/04/02/apple-stock-too-much-of-a-good-thing/?iid=biz-author-bythenum | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958286 | 710 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Invite a friend
Early Childhood expert Bev Bos, to Monmouth County for a Community Forum on Early Childhood Brain Development.
On Thursday April 26th from 7:30 to 9:30 pm, Ms. Bos will present, “How Do Our Children Grow?”. This will be a
community forum on early childhood brain development and will be held at Red Bank Middle School located at 101 Harding Road in Red Bank. You will become informed on how children learn and how to create enriching environments at home and at school.
This is a free and open to the public. Space is limited so please visit www.JLMC.org to reserve seats. | <urn:uuid:3c7fbf15-a419-4340-b501-15325a470327> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://redbank.patch.com/events/early-childhood-expert-bev-bos-to-monmouth-county-for-a-community-forum-on-early-childhood-brain-development-f3ab65ed | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9389 | 138 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Oh the irony. It just so happens that when our public education advocates get off their buses in Harrisburg this morning, they will be greeted by another group rallying at the capitol for cyber charter schools. While our colleagues are meeting with legislators today urging them to restore public funding for public schools, the PA Families for Public Cyber Schools group will be meeting with legislators asking them to instead send more public money to largely private corporations.
Let me say right up front that I don’t think all charter schools are necessarily bad. In fact, I know of some pretty good ones. Perhaps not surprisingly, these tend to be non-profit organizations, run by actively involved local volunteer boards, have broad parent participation, and pay their teachers competitively. Unfortunately, this is not the model for all charter schools – especially not in the cyber charter world, which is largely enriching corporate shareholders while delivering horrendous educational results.
We’ve talked before about the outrageous sums of money going to line the pockets of cyber charter CEOs and their equally outrageous school performance (“Soaking the Public”). And we’ve talked about the $86 million taxpayers and school districts could have saved in 2009-2010 if cyber charters had been funded based on what they actually spent per student, rather than an artificially high fee imposed by the state (“Trouble Seeing the Money”). That was two years ago – imagine what we could be saving now – and spending on students instead of CEOs.
But we haven’t talked about two other key concerns with charter schools in general: performance and oversight. Let’s start with performance. The bottom line is that charter schools, whether brick-and-mortar or cyber, are not delivering the student performance results they promised when they were signed into Pennsylvania law back in the 1990s.
For example, the University of Washington’s center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE) and Mathematica Policy Research released a study earlier this year on the effectiveness of charter school management organizations (CMOs). The longitudinal study looked at 17,000 students attending CMO-operated schools in eight states and matched them with similar students attending conventional public schools. The researchers concluded “there were no statistically significant effects of attending a CMO-operated school on state assessments in math, reading, science, or social studies among middle school youth. There were also no statistically significant impacts on high school graduation and college enrollment rates.”
Interestingly, this study was funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation – that’s the Walmart family that spent over $159 million on funding school privatization efforts last year. As Lawrence Feinberg of the Keystone State Education Coalition points out, “What if the Waltons spent their $150M per year on programs for poor kids that are actually effective, like early education and making sure that they are reading on grade level by third grade?” [“Follow the Money,” KSEC, 3-8-12]
Cyber charter schools do a particularly poor job of educating students. Only two of twelve Pennsylvania cyber charter schools made AYP (Adequate Yearly Progress, a designation affiliated with the federal No Child Left Behind) last year, and seven have never made AYP at all. The Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford University found that students in every single Pennsylvania cyber charter school performed “significantly worse” in reading and math than their peers in conventional public schools. That’s a 100% failure rate. [Stanford/CREDO report summary, 2011]
That study also found that students in Pennsylvania’s brick-and-mortar charter schools are not doing so well. A quarter of them made “significantly more positive learning gains” in reading, but the report concluded, “their performance is eclipsed by the nearly half of charter schools that have significantly lower learning gains.” And Pennsylvania reflects the national trend. A 2009 Standford/CREDO study of charter schools in fifteen states and the District of Columbia – looking at the vast majority of the nation’s charter school students – found that only 17% of charter schools showed better academic gains than conventional public schools. And 37% were worse, while 46% showed no significant difference. [Stanford/CREDO report summary, 2009]
With such inferior results, we are left to wonder why Gov. Corbett’s administration recently authorized seven new cyber charter schools for next school year and is hell-bent on charterizing as many existing public schools as it can. (This is the state’s forthright goal in Philadelphia: see “This is What Privatization Looks Like.”) Especially when the entire charter system lacks supervision.
That brings us to the second problem with charter schools: supervision. The Lehigh Valley’s Morning Call reported last month that, “The Legislature and state Department of Education have known since 2002 that oversight of charters was lacking.” A Western Michigan University study that year found that many local school districts in our state were making only “ceremonial” visits to the charter schools under their purview. [Morning Call, 4-22-12] But the state is the one that has forced school districts to allow charter schools to open while providing no staff or financial resources for their supervision, creating yet another unfunded mandate.
The state is also responsible for supervising charter schools. But the Morning Call found that the auditor general’s office “is having trouble conducting cyclical audits or special investigations to make sure tax money is spent appropriately in the state’s charter schools.” The report concluded “there are few eyes on the $4 billion taxpayers have spent toward charter schools in the last decade.” That’s right. Four billion. That number came from the Department of Education and includes per student expenditures, salaries, building and rental costs, and grants. [Morning Call, 4-22-12]
If the state is going to spend four billion of our taxpayer dollars, we ought to demand adequate supervision. Particularly since a great chunk of that money is going to private corporations who answer to shareholders and their bottom line, not students and their learning outcomes.
What if we had invested that $4 billion in our existing public schools? After all, that is where the vast majority of Pennsylvania’s students continue to be educated – and by many measures, educated quite well. Where there are problems, let’s fix them. That $4 billion would surely go a long way.
Our legislators in Harrisburg will see dueling rallies today: when they hear cyber charter families asking for more taxpayer dollars for miserably performing, poorly supervised charter schools let’s hope they focus on the other message. The one our colleagues will be chanting: what we really need is adequate, equitable, and sustainable public funding for public education. | <urn:uuid:beeae621-db74-4f98-aaf1-f2e1f7af74dc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://yinzercation.wordpress.com/2012/05/22/dueling-rallies/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961007 | 1,439 | 1.71875 | 2 |
I have seen the future of wine. It’s on display right now at your local supermarket — unless of course you live in New York or one of the several other areas where misguided state law forbids the sale of wine and food in the same establishment. Your day will come for supermarket wine, my friends, but not quite yet.
I don’t mean to suggest that supermarket wine is the only direction that wine is heading, but it is a very powerful force. As the world of wine broadens and American wine drinking culture becomes more firmly established in the socio-economic mainstream, wine sales seem likely to become even more concentrated in the vectors where everyday consumer purchases are made. Supermarkets aren’t the only important wine selling space, but they are one of the most dynamic.
The Rise (and Rise) of Supermarket Wine
It just makes sense. The U.S. did not achieve its current status as the world’s #1 wine market (ranked by total not per capita sales) because more people are spending time at specialist wine shops or liquor stores, although I am sure that is happening (note the success of businesses like BevMo and Total Wine). The increased availability of wine at supermarkets, Costco and Sam’s Club and now also drug store chains (all included in my broad definition of “supermarket wine”) is driving the market.
A recent article on Shanken News Daily notes that Yellow Tail wines have been able to keep their U.S. sales high despite wine market problems generally and Australian wine problems in particular by increasing drug store sales to offset declining purchases in other retail segments. Drug stores? Wine next to lipstick, baby wipes and band-aids? Walgreens wine? Yes! Walgreens has even launched a house brand called Colby Red, a California red blend supplied by Treasury Wine Estates.
The British led the way in supermarket wine and for good or bad the world has followed their path. Wine is attractive to grocery store owners because of its relatively high retail margins and its ability to sell other goods at the same time. The British pioneered house brand supermarket wines and that trend is continuing, too. Here is the U.S., most major retailers have their own wine brands (generally made for them by large scale producers such as The Wine Group) – even Walmart and 7-Eleven.
In Britain, the venerable Oddbins chain has closed its last store, a victim in part of pressure from Tesco and other supermarket chains. (Tesco is now the world’s largest retailer of wine.) Supermarket sales are seen as the key to rising consumption in China, too, although they are not the only growth area in this rapidly maturing market. Torres is expanding its Everwines store chain, for example, an indication that specialty shop sales are rising as well.
Half and Half
Supermarket wine is one of those “is the glass half full or half empty” issues. It is hard not to appreciate how much supermarkets have done to promote wine (where they are allowed to do so), especially compared with the dismal selection and service of just a few years ago, but it is also easy to dismiss them as being part of a trend towards simplified wine from corporate makers. I think both trends exist: supermarket wine is a business and so for the most part it follows established business practices. But wine consumers are complicated people who appreciate diverse offerings, so consumer interests are strong, too.
I wanted to take the measure of a “typical” supermarket wine department and I was fortunate to get some help. Our local business district partnered with my university a few weeks ago to organize a “Spring Zing” festival designed to get students and their visiting families to connect with local retailers. Our neighborhood Safeway hosted a book signing by my favorite cookbook author Cynthia Nims and invited me to give a talk in their wine aisle. This was my first supermarket gig (but I hope not my last), so I felt a little like Roger Miller’s “King of Kansas City” – a #1 supermarket attraction (see video at the end of this post).
About a dozen students, parents and random curious Safeway shoppers met me for the talk. I briefed them about supermarket wine then turned them loose to do some fieldwork. I had questions for them to answer — a treasure hunt! How big is the wine section (how many different wines are sold)? How many different countries are represented? How many different U.S. states? And what are the cheapest and most expensive wines on sale? How, in short, does supermarket wine measure up?
Big and Small
They found the answers pretty quickly. Total number of wines? About 750 according to two economics majors (economists are good with numbers!). Is that a big number? No — and yes. No in the sense that it is a small number of SKUs compared with the tens of thousands of wines that are available. This is a tiny slice of the pie in that regard. But it is a big number compared with, say, Costco, which stocks fewer than 150 different wines at any one time. And of course it is a big number compared to any other part of the store. Where else in a modern supermarket can you choose from among this many different options?
A lot of the wine sold here comes from a few large producer portfolios — Gallo, Constellation Brands, The Wine Group, Ste Michelle Wine Estates and so on. So in one sense the diversity is less than it might initially appear and that’s why some enthusiasts, who want to see more small producer labels, are disappointed in supermarket selections. But there are also many wines from high quality medium sized wineries (Hedges, for example, and Frog’s Leap at this store) so it would be wrong to say that supermarket wine is only limited to big players. And some of the big dogs offer real diversity, too — the wines don’t all come out of one big vat in Lodi!
Where in the world does the wine come from? This Safeway store had a strong regional bias in favor of Washington and California wines with smaller selections from other areas. The usual suspects showed up. Twelve foreign countries (Australia, New Zealand, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Chile, Argentina, South Africa, Greece and Japan — if you count plum wine) – and four U.S. states: Washington, Oregon, California and New Mexico (Gruet sparkling wine).
High and Low
It didn’t take very long for my crew to sniff out the highest and lowest priced wines and the difference was amazing.
Initially they focused on Quail Oak, Safeway’s house brand wine (made by The Wine Group, I believe) that was in Two Buck Chuck range at $2.99. But then they got out their calculators and discovered that they could purchase 5-liter bag-in-boxed Franzia wine for even less — about $2 per bottle equivalent. That’s the low tide price point at this Safeway.
The high price? A bottle of vintage Champagne was priced at more than $300 (but only about $220 with your Safeway Club Card discount). It is even cheaper if you buy a six-pack and take the extra 10 percent discount. Very expensive for supermarket wine! But it makes the bottle of Dom Perignon sitting next to it in the display case seem relatively affordable.
The most expensive wine is 100 times the price of the cheapest one! What a tremendous range of price points! I think it is probably impossible to find an equivalent gap between low and high price for products in the same overall category anywhere else in the store.
The supermarket wine phenomenon is very interesting to me because it provides clues as to how the American wine scene is changing. While it is obviously wrong to draw general conclusions from a single specific case, I do think this one store is very interesting in terms of the questions that it raises about price, selection … and the future of wine.
Reading over this post it occurs to me that a valid criticism would be that I am not demanding enough of supermarket wine. I seem to accept supermarkets for what they are and not press them to offer even more choice and diversity. I think this is half true — I do accept that supermarkets are subject to economic constraints that define their business model. I acknowledge that, as key wine sales vectors, they have power to shape the wine culture if they want to. I am optimistic that they will do so in response to changing consumer preferences. The typical Safeway wine department profiled here is enormously different from what I would have found ten or fifteen years ago. Who knows what I will find ten years hence?
Thanks to Safeway for inviting me to talk about wine in their store. Thanks to everyone who showed up and participated in my wine treasure hunt game. | <urn:uuid:b36e0cb6-c88b-4150-93e9-9ab97043d0f6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://wineeconomist.com/2011/05/09/sizing-up-supermarket-wine/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=18b5244a97 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96823 | 1,836 | 1.640625 | 2 |
"Love, love, love -- all the wretched cant of it, masking egotism, lust, masochism, fantasy under a mythology of sentimental postures, a welter of self-induced miseries and joys, blinding and masking the essential personalities in the frozen gestures of courtship, in the kissing and the dating and the desire, the compliments and the quarrels which vivify its barrenness."
"One would always want to think of oneself as being on the side of love, ready to recognize it and wish it well --but, when confronted with it in others, one so often resented it, questioned its true nature, secretly dismissed the particular instance as folly or promiscuity. Was it merely jealousy, or a reluctance to admit so noble and enviable a sentiment in anyone but oneself?"
"Madame, it is an old word and each one takes it new and wears it out himself. It is a word that fills with meaning as a bladder with air and the meaning goes out of it as quickly. It may be punctured as a bladder is punctured and patched and blown up again and if you have not had it does not exist for you. All people talk of it, but those who have had it are marked by it, and I would not wish to speak of it further since of all things it is the most ridiculous to talk of and only fools go through it many times."
This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book
Search Quotations Book | <urn:uuid:079616cb-8e04-4cf4-8937-ed74dab17a2f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://quotationsbook.com/quotes/tag/love/page=7/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97918 | 310 | 1.742188 | 2 |
NEW YORK - July 12 - The American Civil Liberties Union and the New York Civil Liberties Union today released new documents that indicate the government is broadly interpreting and using a controversial Patriot Act power known as the "ideological exclusion" provision to block people from entering the country. The ACLU is concerned that the provision is increasingly being used to target foreign scholars and others whose politics the government disfavors.
"The American public suffers when our government abuses anti-terrorism laws to shut out voices and ideas that it doesn’t want us to hear," said ACLU attorney Melissa Goodman. "America has a rich tradition of robust academic debate. The government dishonors that tradition when it censors ideas at the border."
The ACLU and NYCLU obtained the documents through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed in coordination with PEN American Center and the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). Although the documents are heavily redacted, the records suggest that the government used the ideological exclusion provision to exclude from the country, among others, an Italian woman residing in Colombia, a mother and daughter residing in Canada, a businessman from Venezuela, and a woman from Costa Rica. The names of the individuals have been redacted.
The ideological exclusion provision permits the government to exclude anyone from the country who, in the government’s view, "endorses or espouses" terrorism or "persuades others" to support terrorism. While the provision is nominally directed at terrorism, the government appears to be using the provision to censor and manipulate debate, said the ACLU.
Other documents released through the FOIA confirm that the Departments of State and Homeland Security are interpreting the law broadly. One document states that the law is directed at those who voice "irresponsible expressions of opinion." Another states, somewhat bizarrely, that an individual can be excluded under the provision even if he or she endorsed terrorism unintentionally.
"It is wholly inappropriate for immigration officials to keep out people whose politics they don’t like," said Donna Lieberman, NYCLU Executive Director. "Barring the doors is not the way a democracy deals with its critics."
Little is known about the specific incidents included in the new documents, but the ACLU pointed to several recent cases of high-profile individuals who have been excluded from the United States for what appear to be ideologically motivated reasons, including:
In June, 75 South Korean activists were denied visas as U.S. and South Korean officials met for free trade negotiations in Washington, DC. The South Korean farmers and trade unionists had hoped to voice their opposition to the draft free trade agreement.
In June, Professor Yoannis "John" Milios of the National Technical University of Athens was blocked from presenting a paper entitled "How Class Works" at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Though he visited the United States as recently as 2003, upon arriving at JFK airport in New York he was detained and interrogated about his politics. After several hours, he was told that he would have to return to Athens.
In May, London-based Hip Hop artist M.I.A. revealed that she was denied a visa to come work with American music producers on her next album. News reports indicate that the Sri Lankan-born artist was excluded because government officials concluded that some of her lyrics are overly sympathetic to the Tamil Tigers and the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
In March, Iñaki Egaña, a Basque historian from Spain, arrived at JFK airport with his two children with the intention of researching Basque people in the United States. Egaña and his family were detained while Egaña was questioned about Mario Salegi, a Basque political activist and writer whom Egaña had intended to study. After being detained for 24 hours, Egaña and his family were sent back to Spain.
In Spring 2006, Dr. Waskar Ari, a scholar of race and ethnic studies and a member of the Aymara indigenous people in Bolivia, was blocked from assuming a teaching position at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Dr. Ari, who earned a Ph.D. in history from Georgetown University, applied for a work visa after accepting the Nebraska offer in June 2005. More than a year later, U.S. immigration officials have yet to act on his visa application, but have since revoked his student visa, leaving Dr. Ari inadmissible to the country. The State Department recently said that Dr. Ari is being excluded on national security grounds, but it has not offered any evidence to support this allegation.
In 2005, Dora Maria Tellez, who served as a Parliamentary leader and Minister of Health in Nicaragua in the 1980s, was forced to abandon her teaching post at Harvard University after the government rejected her visa application. Tellez, who had visited the United States several times up to 2001, was reportedly excluded because of her role in the 1979 Nicaraguan revolution that overthrew the dictator Anastasio Somoza.
A lawsuit challenging the provision is currently pending in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. That lawsuit was filed by the ACLU, NYCLU, AAUP, PEN and the American Academy of Religion, and charges that the provision is being used to prevent United States citizens and residents from hearing speech that is protected by the First Amendment. The groups filed the lawsuit after Professor Tariq Ramadan was barred from entering the United States, where he was offered a teaching position at the University of Notre Dame. Although the government has since backed away from its claim that Professor Ramadan is inadmissible under the Patriot Act provision, on June 23, Judge Paul A. Crotty ruled that the government must act on Ramadan’s pending visa application, and that it cannot bar non-citizens from the United States simply because it disagrees with their political views.
"Ideological misuse of the immigration laws has significant effects on the freedom of academic and political debate inside the United States," said Jameel Jaffer, Deputy Director of the ACLU’s National Security Program, who argued before Judge Crotty. "As the court recognized, the government cannot use the immigration laws as a means of silencing its critics and denying Americans the opportunity to hear dissenting voices."
The Patriot Act’s ideological exclusion provision echoes laws that were used in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s to bar those who were associated with the Communist Party. Those laws were used to bar, among many other prominent individuals, the writers Graham Greene, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Dario Fo, and Pablo Neruda, and former Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau.
Attorneys in the FOIA case are Goodman and Jaffer of the ACLU; Arthur N. Eisenberg of the NYCLU; and New York immigration lawyer Claudia Slovinsky.
The documents released today are online at www.aclu.org/exclusion. | <urn:uuid:35b03406-19cf-46fb-9666-95222e3af02a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.commondreams.org/news2006/0712-08.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974391 | 1,402 | 1.773438 | 2 |
What's your make-it-or-break-it election issue?
(Page 2 of 3)
When you hear Barack Obama talk about building the middle class and providing a chance for all Americans to go to college and start businesses and find success, you may not agree with him, but you know he is telling the truth.
The president has also been an astute leader on the world stage. Not perfect, but better than Romney, who seems to lack finesse and tact in international interactions. His tone-deaf tour of Europe was embarrassing and clumsy. His blunders on Russia and Israel and even on the Olympic Games in England are “tells.” He’s a smart businessman who “don’t know much about history.”
Compare that with candidate Obama’s tour of Europe in 2008. The crowds, in the hundreds of thousands, cheered him on. He did so well that the Republicans accused him of acting like a “celebrity.” He couldn’t help it if people responded to his call for change.
Could Romney learn on the job? I suppose so. But we have someone good at the helm. Why change captains in these rough seas?
Yes, many of us have multiple reasons for sticking with President Obama. But for me, and many other women and men, the right to choose is the deal-maker and the deal-breaker. There is something so basic about being able to make decisions about your own body; the thought of someone, or some government, challenging that right is horrifying.
If you sit down with any group of women and the discussion turns to abortion, and the women are honest, you will discover that the right to choose abortion is exercised by women of all faiths and all walks of life, all the time. When Romney’s running mate, Paul Ryan, says his faith informs his decision on abortion, then he and his wife shouldn’t choose abortion. When Romney says he now opposes abortion, that’s OK if it’s a personal decision. But here’s the thing: Their beliefs, whether religious or moral or political, must not infringe on any woman’s right to choose.
Romney’s mask-of-the-week puts him in the camp of the far right. No choice on reproductive rights. Well, maybe in the case of rape or incest or a threat to the life of the mother, although other Republicans would allow no exceptions. | <urn:uuid:7c79083a-b985-418f-9419-3665ea3f5285> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://liherald.com/baldwin/stories/Whats-your-make-it-or-break-it-election-issue,44078?page=2&content_source= | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963195 | 517 | 1.59375 | 2 |
"The techniques restaurants adopt to
make customers part with their cash have been revealed.
The top tricks are using a specials
board to charge a premium for old food, set menus and targeting women
The techniques, featured in UK food
magazine Olive, also include manipulating menus by putting items the
restaurant is keen to promote in the right-hand corner, which draws the
eye. French terms were often used to make dishes sound more exotic and
justify a higher price tag."
My comments are:
1. Maybe the writer has never heard
of marketing! I mean every business tries to put their wares in the
best possible light.
2. I don't know many restaurants
who sell "old food", however it is natural to try to use all food prior
to it's use-by-date. It is just good business practice, especially in
this tough market.
I will bet anything that even the
writer has rehashed something in his or her career! However, unlike a
rehashed story, if the food is 'off' or 'old' then no self respecting
restaurateur is going to offer it to his clientele. Oops, I used a
couple of French terms, sorry, I meant customer and food place owner of
course. I was just trying to make my story more attractive.
The words restaurant and cafe, both
have their deriviatives in the French language and suddenly I am pressed to find an
alternative word. I would hate to be accused of dressing up my story!
3. As for desserts, if restaurants
only targeted women my guess is that they would be cutting out half of
their market. I recall in my restaurant we made desserts appealing for
people who liked ... well desserts, actually.
Well, that is it. I have said my
piece. Over to you! | <urn:uuid:a297b28d-cd98-4a23-8204-6c12c3e031df> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sydneycommercialkitchens.com.au/_blog/SCK_Blog/tag/Marketing/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972912 | 393 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Western New York Catholics, like Catholics around the world, were stunned Monday to learn that their pope would resign. That hasn’t happened in nearly 600 years, but rarity alone doesn’t make it unthinkable or unwise. We don’t know if Pope Benedict XVI made the right decision in stepping down from the papacy, but trusting in what appears to be rigorous contemplation about his circumstances, he demonstrated remarkable, selfless leadership.
Citing his age and a lack of strength needed to continue meeting the demands of his post, Benedict announced that he would resign as of Feb. 28. He will become only the fifth pope in the last 1,000 years to leave the papacy voluntarily, the first since Pope Gregory XII stepped down in 1415.
Benedict, born Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger, is 85 years old and has served just eight years, since the death of the charismatic and widely admired John Paul II, who served for 27 years. Despite his love of the church and sense of duty to his office, John Paul was frail and not functioning well when he died. At a time of rising challenges for the church, he was decreasingly able to offer the leadership that it needed.
That’s not to say that John Paul II was wrong to remain in office or that Benedict should stay on. Devotion to duty is a valuable quality in any leader, and so is knowing when it’s time to let someone else take on the burdens you are no longer capable of bearing. Benedict earlier had said that popes have an obligation to resign if they can’t carry out their duties.
It was clear that the cardinals who elected Benedict in 2005 were looking for a pope who would be a “place holder” – a leader of a shorter duration than his predecessor. With him, they got a pope of notable conservatism, though less than some had feared or hoped for. The question going forward is what qualities the next pope will need to meet the challenges that continue to confront and even rattle the church.
The sexual abuse scandal remains a potent threat to the church, as underscored by recent revelations about the conduct of Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahony in covering up child abuse by priests in his charge. It is unfortunate that Mahony will be among the cardinals to select the new pope, and it doesn’t seem too much to suggest that if Benedict can step down for the good of the church, Mahony might consider doing so, as well, before he influences the decision, expected next month.
Some are suggesting that the church should select a non-European as pope in an acknowledgment of the church’s declining influence there and its growth in Africa, Asia and Latin America. That would represent a break with the past, but so does Benedict’s resignation. And, in any case, traditions can outlive their usefulness. With all the church is facing, perhaps it’s time to make a bigger kind of change. | <urn:uuid:5a2a010a-2093-4aa2-a8dc-f69a784546e8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.buffalonews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20130212/OPINION/130219832/1123 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982006 | 613 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Three Middle East experts from a variety of perspectives discuss the violence in Libya and the protests throughout the "Arab Spring" countries and what they mean for the future of the region.
Brian Katulis from the Center for American Progress, Hisham Melhem from the Al Arabiya News Channel, and Danielle Pletka from the American Enterprise Institute focus on what the protests and reactions to them might indicate about the volatile region.
The protests and violence broke out on the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, but it is unclear whether the date played any role in the events. Protesters are pointing to a film that is highly critical of the Muslim prophet Mohammad, a clip of which was recently translated into Arabic. The Islamic faith believes that any depictions of the prophet are offensive, regardless of their tone. | <urn:uuid:79abb0bb-2e70-4dc1-9704-521a3de974e4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.c-span.org/History/Events/AEI-Holds-Discussion-on-Benghazi-and-Cairo-Protests/10737434109/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947191 | 164 | 1.59375 | 2 |
I've used Genbox for a very long time, and quite a few others in fact;-)
This is an interesting tool, but has some missing points by first look:
Places need their "history" because people has been attached to places for hundereds of years, "family places" that family have heritaged.
Places have been moved (at least here in Denmark), meaning that houses have been torn down, moved and build up again.
Places move location.
Locations have changed name over time
Locations have changed relation to different parish, destrict, county and country over time.
How do we relate a person, place or source to it original name of location, and on the same time give it an identity that can be looked up on a map without having a possibility of adding more than one name to the same GPS position.
Another interesting thing about places, locations, parish etc. - they had their own arms - how do we add those.
Another very interesting aspect is ownership, copyholder, proprietor, steward etc - how do we keep a record relationship to property.
Well - these are some interesting thoughts, that I'd like to share with you, and hope you'll find a solution for. | <urn:uuid:40209694-8026-4047-83b6-68ac40090167> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.myheritage.com/support-post-146712/places-need-their-own-history | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976148 | 261 | 1.835938 | 2 |
Weight and Balance: Titanium use lightens and rebalances this impact wrench for ergonomic comfort.
Auto mechanics who wield air tools for much of their day want those tools to be both powerful and lightweight. A new impact wrench from Ingersoll-Rand (IR, Annandale, NJ) fits the bill on both scores.
The IR2135TI ½ wrench, a half-inch model, delivers 700 ft-lb of traditional torque output and can, in six seconds, loosen a 1.25-inch nut tightened to 1,000 ft-lb. "It's the most powerful drill in its class," reports Michael McCalley, Ingersoll-Rand's worldwide product manager for Vehicle Service Solutions. Ingersoll-Rand's air tools already boast plenty of power, but the design team refined the air passages and added Kevlar vanes to get a bit more juice out of the company's proven air motor designs.
To cut weight, Ingersoll-Rand engineers fashioned the drill's hammer case out of titanium. This substantial component houses the hammer mechanism and must bear the brunt of a 6-ft drop test on concrete. After evaluating other lightweight materials—including aluminum and reinforced plastics—IR opted to change the case from a deep-drawn steel to a cast titanium alloy (3-2.5). In doing so, they trimmed more than half a pound from the new wrench, which now weighs in at 3.95 lb.
As a side benefit, the weight reduction also improved the balance of the wrench. And the casting, because it allows sharper radii than drawing, also helped the design team come up with a space-efficient hammer case that's about 9% smaller than previous models, according to Pat Livingston, engineering manager for impact products.
In making the hammer case out of titanium, the design team identified their best possible chances for a big weight reduction. The hammer mechanism itself, one of the beefiest systems, actually needs its mass in order to generate the wrench's force. "It was off limits," says Livingston. And much of the drill housing had already made use of lightweight composite materials. "They were as lightweight as they could be," he says.
Contact: Pat Livingston, Ingersoll-Rand Business Development Center 1467 Route 31 South, PO Box 970 , Annandale, NJ 08801 Phone: (908) 238-7114, E-mail: firstname.lastname@example.org Enter 509 at www.designnews.com/info | <urn:uuid:ca02dce2-a3ca-4abe-bbc6-63c87bda695c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.designnews.com/author.asp?section_id=1386&doc_id=224433&piddl_msgorder=asc | 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 | 0.930959 | 515 | 1.554688 | 2 |
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Just talking about his eight-year-old German schnauzer brings tears to Tom Bell's eye.
"Rommel is my world basically. He's like my son ... He's all I live for. ... I just start thinking about him and I fall apart," Bell said.
Bell has a lung disease and cerebral palsy. Because he can't walk, he trained Rommel to be his service dog.
"I've basically trained him to help me pick up certain things like spoons and how to take my socks off, my pant legs ... I trained him myself. He would bring me his leash, my hat, my sunglasses."
On Monday, Bell said his world was turned upside down. A delivery man left the gate in his front yard open and that night. Not knowing the gate was open, his sister let Rommel outside.
"He wouldn't have ran off and we think somebody might have picked him up or basically just took him."
While relatives and neighbors have combed the streets and plastered missing dog signs around the Marietta area, Bell says he had to anxiously sit inside because his electric wheelchair is broken.
But a group of friends who he met on Facebook who all follow an author who wrote a book about a German Schnauzer are giving him hope...helping him get the word out online.
"There are people in Ireland. There are people in Brazil. They are everywhere. This is the story of Rommel it just blew out. I've got friends in Scotland that are just posting and pasting everyone. ... My God it is priceless."
Without Rommel by his side, Bell says he doesn't know what to do.
"This dog has been the greatest joy in my life. I'm lost without him."
First Coast News | <urn:uuid:64e7010c-9eb4-4b9f-9dcf-8479de17943f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.firstcoastnews.com/rss/article/296851/483/Man-seeking-his-missing-guide-dog | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.991015 | 378 | 1.726563 | 2 |
EU Imposes Toughest Sanctions Yet Against Iran
Rigorous new sanctions against Iran's banking, shipping and industrial sectors took effect on Saturday, as part of the European Union's effort to force Tehran to scale back its nuclear program.
The sanctions, agreed in October, entered EU law with their publication in the European Union's Official Journal on Saturday.
The toughest EU measures yet, they include bans on financial transactions, sales to Iran of shipping equipment and steel, and imports of Iranian natural gas, adding to earlier bans, including on the OPEC producer's oil.
They reflect heightened concern over Iran's nuclear goals and Israeli threats to attack Iranian atomic installations if diplomacy and other measures fail to deliver a solution.
Diplomats say they hope talks with Iran can resume in January, but are waiting for an answer from Tehran, which maintains its nuclear program is for purely peaceful purposes.
In a statement, Britain's foreign office said there was a clear need "for an urgent solution".
"Iran's leaders know that sanctions are having a significant impact," Britain's Minister for the Middle East and North Africa Alistair Burt said.
"They should be in no doubt that the international community will keep up the pressure until they are ready to negotiate in good faith and take the concrete steps needed to convince the international community that they are not building a nuclear weapon."
The new sanctions mark a significant change of policy for the 27-member bloc, which previously sought mainly to target specific people and companies with economic restrictions.
It has lagged the United States in imposing blanket industry bans because it is anxious to avoid penalising ordinary Iranian citizens, while punishing the Tehran government.
Sanctions have increasingly inflicted severe pain on the Iranian economy, although the country has years of experience of circumventing them by using front companies and tortuous shipping routes.
The new European measures make clear natural gas shipments are prohibited in any form and swapping, as opposed to simply buying, cargoes is also outlawed.
While imposing a general ban on financial transactions, they make exceptions for those involving humanitarian aid, food and medicine purchases and provisions for legitimate trade.
In a statement, the European Commission said the new law brought the number of entities subject to sanctions to 490 and the total number of persons to 105.
The latest companies added to the banned list include energy and steel distribution firms and financial companies.
The latest individual to be added is Babak Zanjani, owner of the Sorinet Group, based in the United Arab Emirates. He is referred to as "a key facilitator for Iranian oil deals and transferring oil-related money".
Iran says its nuclear project has only peaceful energy purposes and has refused in three rounds of talks since April to scale back its uranium enrichment activity unless major economic sanctions are rescinded. | <urn:uuid:fc5d5734-bd65-456f-b07b-6b460b4ff340> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cnbc.com/id/100336815 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956289 | 569 | 1.8125 | 2 |
05/19/2011 2:17 PM ET
Padres' Gregerson and Stauffer honor local Action Team student volunteers
Players recognize seven student leaders in national program to encourage youth volunteerism
SAN DIEGO, Calif. -- During an on-field ceremony prior to Thursday night’s game, San Diego Padres players Luke Gregerson and Tim Stauffer will represent all Major Leaguers when they honor seven area high school students serving as Action Team captains. The Action Team is a national youth volunteer program in which Major League players and high school students are inspiring and training the next generation of volunteers. During the 2010-11 school year, these Action Team captains raised awareness about the importance of community involvement among other students in their high schools and organized volunteer activities.
Administered by the Major League Baseball Players Trust and Volunteers of America, the Action Team program encourages young people throughout the United States to volunteer in their communities. To date, Action Teams of high school students and Major Leaguers have inspired more than 26,000 high school students across the country to help over 111,000 people in need by volunteering in their communities. An award-winning, Action Team service-learning curriculum created by the Players Trust in partnership with The Wall Street Journal Classroom Edition teaches valuable community service skills to 1 million high school students in more than 5,000 classrooms across the country. The Association of Educational Publishers presented this innovative service-learning program with a 2009 Distinguished Achievement Award.
Receiving signed certificates of achievement from the players are Action Team captains Ali Barnes, Zach Fick, Hannah Gleason, Teryn Igawa, Taylor King, Melissa Petersen and Kristyn Petracek from Tesoro High School in Las Flores, Calif.
Action Teams are at work in 162 high schools across the country and Puerto Rico. Each month during the school year, Action Team captains participate in a conference call hosted by legendary broadcaster George Grande, where a Major Leaguer and a featured Action Team of the Month discuss the importance of community service and share volunteering tips and ideas. High schools interested in joining the Action Team can receive applications and additional information by visiting www.ActionTeam.org or by sending an email request to ActionTeam@mlbpa.org.
Through the Players Trust, Major Leaguers contribute their time, money and celebrity to call attention to important causes affecting the needy and to help encourage others to get involved in their own communities. For more information on the Major League Baseball Players Trust, please visit www.MLBPLAYERS.com and visit the Players Trust Channel on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/mlbplayerstrust. | <urn:uuid:00aae5d5-5de9-4856-924b-76176973b9d8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://miami.marlins.mlb.com/pa/releases/releases.jsp?content=051911 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932438 | 540 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
is investigating claims whether childrens' jewelery contained a highly used to make batteries and plastics. This was, of course, being exported to the United States so our little dumplings could chew on them. Walmart and Claire's Stores have been removing Chinese-made childrens' jewelery from their shelves after reports that some bracelets and pendants had been found to contain the heavy metal cadmium. Cadmium, for those not in the know, is a highly toxic metal used in batteries, metal coatings and plastics and has been shown to cause lung cancer. I have blogged over and over again questioning whether we should trust anything coming from China. I think not. Add to this the milk poisoning, the dog food poisoning, and contamination of construction material and you continuously have big problems from a country that is churning out products in order to drive their economic monstrosity of a country. This is all bad.
Posted by Authentic Medicine Blog at 5:25 AM | <urn:uuid:40398d09-a5ad-48b7-988a-4b268f7996a3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://placebojournal.blogspot.com/2010_01_19_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963981 | 207 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Morris County Apartments for Rent(hide county information)
As one of the wealthiest counties in the nation, Morris County’s median income hovers around $90,000. Located in northern New Jersey, Morris County is considered part of the New York metropolitan area. There are over 30 Fortune 500 companies located in Morris County, including ExxonMobil, Verizon, AT&T, Honeywell, Colgate-Palmolive, Bayer, Wyeth, BASF, and Pfizer.
The county seat, Morristown, an elegant city founded in 1715. Morristown played a key role during the American Revolution, and Morristown National Historical Park contains three important sites. The Ford Mansion was used by George Washington and the Continental Army as their “hard winter” quarters in 1779-1780. Jockey Hollow was the site of a Continental Army encampment and the site of a mutiny. Fort Nonsense was built under General George Washington’s orders in 1777 and was the site of a signal fire and earthworks. The city wraps around a square, Morristown Green, that served as the market square during colonial times.
A beautiful area, Morris County contains 28 parks and four golf courses. Central Park of Morris County includes a five-acre dog park, a cross-country course, ball fields, skating rinks, an amphitheater, and hiking trails. Winter activities include cross-country skiing, snow-shoeing, and ice skating. Fosterfields Living Historical Farm is a working turn-of-the-century farm and the historic Willows, a beautiful home built by the grandson of Paul Revere. Another historic park, Cooper Gristmill, is located along the black River. The mill was built in the 1760s and is still operational. This park’s activities include fishing, hiking, snowshoeing, and cross-country skiing.
Considered a top area to raise a family, the county is home to several colleges, including County College of Morris, Drew University, and the College of Saint Elizabeth, a private Catholic college for women.
Other communities in Morris County include Butler, Wharton, Dover, Roxbury, Hanover, Denville, Mount Arlington, Mount Olive, Jefferson, and Riverdale. | <urn:uuid:754a3458-82b2-4295-8114-5b5c70a4e479> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.apartmentfinder.com/New-Jersey/Morris-County-Apartments | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953475 | 470 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Christian leaders in the UK continue to bow down to Islam as if they have no concern for their own religion. This time a new multi-faith prayer room in a UK prison is set to open with Islamic foot washing baths installed, but a Christian crucifix with Jesus nailed to it will not be used out fear of offending the Muslim prisoners. This all came about after a conversation between the prison's chaplain and Imam.
Prison chapel not to have a crucifix
A new prison chapel has been stopped from having a crucifix in case it offends Muslims.
By Tom Whitehead, Home Affairs Editor
The multi-faith room at HMP Lewes will have footbaths installed so Muslim inmates can wash their feet before prayers.
For Christians, however, there will now only be a plain wooden cross and a portable altar which can be removed if other faiths are using the room.
The new £200,000 development at the East Sussex jail has been designed as a multi-faith room with the space split into two.
One side is dedicated to Christian worship and the other is for other faiths in the 485 inmate category B jail.
But a spokeswoman from the Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) revealed the traditional Christian crucifix depicting Jesus nailed to the cross will not be used.
After discussions between the prison chaplain and Muslim imam it was agreed a toned-down wooden cross would be used instead of a crucifix.
Zsa Roggendorff, chair of the nearby Ford HMP IMB, could not understand why the crucifix has been taken out of the chapel.
She said: "At Ford we have a multi-faith chapel and all are prisoners are allowed to use it.
"We still have our cross and we have the altar. All the other faiths have got their own special rooms in huts to use which are part of the main prison."
A portable alter will also be used at HMP Lewes so it can be removed when it is not needed while footbaths have been installed so Muslim inmates can wash their feet before prayers.
Amanda Hamblin, chair of the Lewes IMB, said: "We see this as a vastly improved facility and very much welcome the fact that the prison has an imam
"It is key that everyone will have access to a decent place of worship whether they are Muslims, Christians or any other faith.
"I think the significant thing about this is that the facilities were very poor before.
"Now they have been set up with a lot of consultation and thought given to how to make it fit for purpose, fit for access and fit for the religious needs of our prisoners, whatever they may be."
The multi-faith room was dedicated on December 5 but has not yet been opened for use.
Link to Article | <urn:uuid:0d13c2e6-ffef-47d9-a362-b5f566d83480> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://islaminaction08.blogspot.com/2008/12/uk-prisonislamic-foot-baths-yes-jesus.html?showComment=1229443260000 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964385 | 573 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Russia in Review
August 6, 2010
Belfer Center Programs or Projects: The US-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism
A digest of useful news from U.S.-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism for the week of July 30 - August 6, 2010.
I. U.S. and Russia priorities for the bilateral agenda.
Nuclear security agenda:
- Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov pressed other nuclear powers to take part in future multilateral efforts aimed at rolling back strategic nuclear stockpiles. "Remaining one of the leaders in disarmament, the Russian Federation is urging all countries without exception, and primarily those which possess nuclear arsenals, to join the efforts made by Russia and the U.S. to actively contribute to the disarmament process," Sergei Lavrov wrote in a commentary published in the magazine Mezhdunarodnaya Zhizn. (GSN, 08/03/10).
- While other nuclear powers are unlikely to join the next round of nuclear arms cuts by U.S. and Russia, they should at least agree to some of the verification measures provided for by the New START treaty, according to senior researcher at the International Security Centre of the Institute of World Economy and International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences Maj. Gen Vladimir Dvorkin. (Interfax, 08/06/10).
Iran nuclear issues:
- Iran has obtained four S-300 surface-to-air missile systems despite Russia's refusal to deliver them to Tehran under a valid contract, a semiofficial Iranian news agency claimed Wednesday. The Fars news agency said Iran received two S-300s from Belarus and two others from another unspecified source. The fudgy wording of the Fars report here implies Iran possesses only the missiles themselves - with no mention of the rest of the launch complex required or even semi-trailer erector-launchers. Even assuming the launch complex is there, in perfect conditions only four missiles could stop a maximum of four aircraft - hardly representative of a robust air defense. (AP, 08/04/10, Nukes of Hazard, 08/06/10).
NATO-Russia cooperation, including transit to Afghanistan:
- The U.S.-led international coalition has failed to achieve a single goal in Afghanistan and has only compounded the situation in the region, said Lt. Gen. Vladimir Shamanov, Russian Airborne Troops Commander. "Over the next one to three years, the (coalition) troops will pull out. Certainly, they will leave not in the best humor because they have not achieved a single goal they set for themselves," Shamanov said. (Interfax, 08/02/10).
- The U.S. and Russia are planning a joint exercise to see how well they can coordinate their efforts in the event of an international hijacking. Military aircraft from Russia and the North American Aerospace Defense Command will track a plane across the Pacific, at one point handing off responsibility for tracking the plane from the U.S. to Russia. (AP, 08/02/10).
- The U.S. military is on the verge of activating a partial missile shield over southern Europe, part of an intensifying global effort to build defenses against Iranian missiles amid a deepening impasse over the country's nuclear ambitions. Pentagon officials said they are nearing a deal to establish a key radar ground station, probably in Turkey or Bulgaria. Installation of the high-powered X-band radar would enable the first phase of the shield to become operational next year. (Washington Post, 08/01/10).
Ratification of the New START treaty:
- Senator John Kerry said he has enough votes to ratify a treaty with Russia to cut nuclear weapons, a priority for President Barack Obama, though he delayed a committee vote to round up more bipartisan support. Kerry put off a roll call by the Foreign Relations Committee until after the Senate returns in September from a month-long recess. (Bloomberg, 08/03/10).
- U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters that "the administration remains optimistic about the prospects for New START. We have said all along that we hope to have the Senate approve the treaty by the end of the year, and we believe they are on track to do that," Crowley said. (GSN, 08/05/10).
- President Barack Obama must show greater commitment to modernizing the U.S. nuclear arsenal to gain Republican support for the treaty, the Senate's No. 2 Republican said on Wednesday. Senator Jon Kyl denied setting a price to support the treaty. But he told reporters the commitment he was seeking could cost up to $10 billion more than the amount the administration has pledged to modernizing U.S. nuclear weapons. (Reuters, 08/04/10).
Energy exports from CIS:
- No significant developments.
Access to major markets for exports and imports:
- Russia will soon send revised terms for its accession to WTO to interested WTO member states reflecting its plans to join as part of a customs union with Belarus and Kazakhstan, Moscow's chief WTO negotiator Maxim Medvedkov said on Tuesday. (RIA Novosti, 08/04/10).
- An agreement to allow U.S. poultry exports to Russia hit a snag last week as importers made new demands, according to U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk and Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. (Bloomberg, 08/04/10).
II. Russia news.
- At least 52 people have died and 2,000 homes have been destroyed in the blazes. Russian officials have admitted that the 10,000 firefighters battling the blazes aren't enough. Dozens of flights were grounded and others were diverted away from Moscow's Domodedovo and Vnukovo airports, as smog brought runway visibility down to 200 meters. (AP, 08/06/10).
- The total area on fire increased to 196,000 hectares Thursday, a gain of around 7,000 hectares from the previous day, as 373 new fires appeared and 254 were extinguished, the Emergency Situations Ministry said. In all, 589 separate blazes were burning throughout Russia, 70 more than Wednesday, despite 162,000 emergency workers deployed to fight the flames. The fires have consumed more than 2,000 dwellings and left around 4,000 people homeless, while causing an estimated $154.3 million in damage. (WSJ, 08/05/10).
- Russia's chief nuclear industry official offered strong assurances on Wednesday that the wildfires in the vicinity of Sarov, a Russian town housing a federal nuclear center, posed no threat of a nuclear explosion or a radiation leak. "All of the explosives and all of the radioactive substances have been evacuated from it," Sergei Kiriyenko, head of Rosatom, the state corporation running the country's nuclear industry, said at a meeting of the Russian Security Council called to consider fire prevention measures for strategic facilities. "It can be guaranteed that, even in an extreme situation, with a gale force wind that means a natural catastrophe - even then there will be no threat to nuclear security, no threat to radiation security, no threat of explosions, no threat of environmental effects on the premises of the center," he said. (Interfax, 08/05/10).
- Wildfires are not posing any threat to the federal nuclear center in Sarov, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Col. Gen. Dmitry Bulgakov told journalists on Wednesday. "The situation there is tense but not critical. The nuclear centre is not in danger. There is no need to worry," Bulgakov said. (Interfax, 08/04/10).
- A reactor at the Novovoronezh power station was shut down on Wednesday because transformers broke due to high air temperatures. (Reuters, 08/04/10).
- President Dmitry Medvedev reprimanded the head of the navy on Wednesday and sacked several senior navy officers for a major fire at a navy base outside Moscow. A forest fire destroyed at least 13 hangars containing aviation equipment at the navy base last Thursday. (Reuters, 08/04/10).
- Defense Ministry has refuted media allegations that wildfires destroyed the General Staff communications centre in Moscow Region's Kolomna district. (Itar-Tass, 08/05/10).
- Benchmark wheat futures rushed to a 23-month high on Thursday after Prime Minister Vladimir Putin announced a temporary ban on the export of grain and related farm products from the drought-wracked country. (Reuters, 08/05/10).
Politics, Economy, and Energy:
- President Dmitry Medvedev said on Monday he had not yet decided whether to stand for re-election in 2012, but confirmed he would not run if his mentor Prime Minister Vladimir Putin was also on the ballot. "I do not know what will happen in 2012; I don't know who will run," Medvedev said. "It may be Medvedev, it may be Putin, it may be somebody else." 27% of 1,600 Russians polled by the Levada Center last week said they would vote for Putin if presidential elections were held in August, while 20% opted for Medvedev. The Communists' leader Gennady Zyuganov was far behind with only 4%. (Reuters, 08/02/10).
- Russia will miss a 2012 deadline for eliminating its chemical weapons stockpiles due to cutbacks caused by the global financial crisis, Russia's Kirov region involved in the disarmament process said on Monday. (Reuters, 08/02/10).
- The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Tuesday it expected Russia's economic growth to resume in 2010 and reach 4.25 % after a 7.9 % fall in 2009. (RIA-Novosti, 08/03/10).
- The corruption turnover amounts to about 50% of Russia's GDP now, according to Yevgeny Arkhipov, chairman of the Association of Russian Lawyers for Human Rights and one of the authors of a newly-released report "Corruption in Russia: independent annual report." (Itar-Tass, 08/02/10).
- The Airborne Troops will capable of "landing an airborne or airmobile assault division by parachute by 2017," the troops' commander Lt. Gen. Vladimir Shamanov said. (Interfax, 08/02/10).
- About one-third of Russian armed forces fatalities in the 2008 Russian-Georgian war were so-called "non-combat losses," deaths caused by negligent handling of weapons, friendly fire or road accidents, the Center for Strategy and Technology Analysis said. (Interfax, 08/05/10).
- Testing of the Bulava intercontinental submarine-launched ballistic missile will resume sometime on August, 11-14, a source in the Russian defense industry told journalists in Moscow on Friday. (Interfax via BBC 07/30/10).
- Doku Umarov, a Chechen rebel leader who has claimed responsibility for a string of deadly terrorist attacks in Russia, said in an Internet video posting that he would not step down as the leader of an Islamist insurgent network in the North Caucasus region, reversing an earlier announcement. (New York Times, 08/04/10).
- President Dmitry Medvedev has proposed restoring the prerevolutionary name for Russia's police force. Russia's police force still goes by the communist-era name "militsia." (RFE/RL, 08/06/10).
- Three militants broke into the home of a senior investigator in Russia's restive North Caucasus region on Sunday and shot him dead after binding his wife and son with tape in the next room, police said. (AP, 08/01/10).
- President Dmitry Medvedev met with his South African counterpart, Jacob Zuma, on Thursday in Moscow, where the two oversaw deals in the metals and nuclear industries. Under the deal, Russian state uranium trader Tenex will sell enriched uranium to Eskom Holdings for use at South Africa's Koeberg nuclear station. Under the new contract, deliveries will begin in 2011 and last until 2017 to 2018. Russia hopes eventually to control 45% of the low-enriched uranium market in South Africa, Rosatom head Sergei Kiriyenko told reporters. (Moscow Times, 08/06/10).
- Almost all Western leaders have admitted in private discussions that Georgia invaded South Ossetia in August 2008 and that Russia's response to Tbilisi's attack was lawful, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said.( Interfax, 08/05/10).
- Kyrgyz forces fired live ammunition, tear gas and stun grenades into the air to disperse hundreds of anti-government protesters Thursday and arrested their leader, raising fears of new instability in the turbulent Central Asian nation. (AP, 08/05/10).
- Iran's president told the leaders of Afghanistan and Tajikistan on Thursday that the three neighbors could provide a counterweight to NATO in Asia once foreign troops quit the region. (Reuters, 08/05/10).
- Reports of a possible supply by Moscow to Baku of S-300 surface-to-air missile systems are a bluff, a high-ranking source from the Russian Defense Ministry said. (Interfax, 08/02/10).
- Russia has officially confirmed its readiness to demarcate its border with Ukraine. (RFE/RL, 08/04/10).
- Ukrainian Fuel and Energy Minister Yuri Boiko said nuclear energy production in Ukraine will increase by 2.5 times in 2030. (Interfax, 07/30/10).
For more information about this publication please contact the The US-Russia Initiative to Prevent Nuclear Terrorism at 617-496-0518.
For Academic Citation: | <urn:uuid:36e738b0-64cd-4eda-abd8-35eb804fb606> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://belfercenter.ksg.harvard.edu/publication/20304/russia_in_review.html?breadcrumb=%2Ftopic%2F4%2Fnuclear_weapons%3Fgroupby%3D5%26page%3D114 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941029 | 2,837 | 1.632813 | 2 |
June 24, 2012
Are 'moles' affecting teams at Euro?
By MORRIS DALLA COSTA, QMI Agency
WARSAW - Hunting for moles has become a favourite pastime at Euro 2012.
Moles are these little creatures that live underground. They have small ears and small eyes. There are plenty of them in Poland and Ukraine. Some teams even have them as mascots.
But we're not talking about the animals that dig up worms for sustenance, but ones with two legs that walk upright. Those moles are human and they leak information to the media about the goings on inside a dressing room. It may be that somehow the press has found out about a disagreement between players and coach or someone has leaked to the press information prior to the match regarding lineups.
Molegate took on a life of its own just after the Netherlands were eliminated from Euro having lost all three games.
Wesley Schneider, one of the Dutch superstars, indicated there was a mole inside their dressing room because their opponents always seemed to know how the Dutch were going to play and what formation they would come out with.
Even now, the search for the mole continues in Holland after the Dutch elimination. Blaming the mole seems a little disingenuous considering the Dutch played like they had small ears and small eyes.
The latest mole hunt comes out of the German camp.
German coach Joachim Low made several changes before the Germany-Greece quarterfinal Friday. Early in the day a story broke that revealed the starting lineup. It had happened several times before.
Low said he didn't believe it was a player but could be someone a player talks to when they know they are going to start.
"Everyone should be aware that it is normal for a player to tell his wife, girlfriend or agent whether they will play once they find out but you cannot reveal the lineup. You cannot do that," said German back Philipp Lahm. "It is sad when this thing comes out. The whole nation is behind us and it is not an advantage when it is leaked hours before. The one who released it has a problem. He has not understood how this works. But we will not deploy a spy."
A mole attempted to do the same thing to England at their training camp in Poland earlier in the week. As the players were practicing, they spotted a mole observing them.
This one was caught by a security guard. After being interrogated it was determined the mole knew nothing and was not the same mole who did in the Dutch and is leaking information about the Germans.
He was released back into the wild. | <urn:uuid:41baf933-2a47-4df2-b66a-5c3fff5099f9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Soccer/Euro/2012/06/24/pf-19915036.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.986339 | 541 | 1.5 | 2 |
"The Turner Bayou project comprises approximately 80 square miles (50,000 acres) which have been imaged by a proprietary 3D seismic survey. Primary targets are the Austin Chalk formation at 15,300 feet and the Eagle Ford formation at 16,000 feet." -- from above link
The AC & EF (TMS) play boundary is described in the links supplied by William. This area is characterized by high resistivity. For PCP, this includes most of the parish except for the SW area. The TMS is thought to be the source of hydrocarbons in the AC. Hope this isn't totally redundant!
Try looking here for info they have added an Austin Chalk area. http://www.ameliaresources.com/tuscaloosa-trend.htm
I have seen those maps and was looking for a more detailed map that shows the sections involved. I am 7000 feet south and west of Lacour 43 pbh.
has anybody ever heard of Labarre La? its not much more than a crossroads just a short ways north of new roads. the field is morganza. i have a small interest in this area. there have been several deep vertical tuscaloosa wells drilled there. chesapeake tried the austin chalk there a few years ago with little success. would this be a target area again with the new technology, and could the old well holes be re-used? | <urn:uuid:7c4137b1-7185-412c-bb59-f31dd917ba8b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gohaynesvilleshale.com/group/austinchalk/forum/topics/austin-chalk-map?commentId=2117179%3AComment%3A2052895&groupId=2117179%3AGroup%3A1676439 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961064 | 292 | 1.539063 | 2 |
In Occupy Movement, religion and politics mix by Collin Tong
In the days following the ugly confrontation between Occupy movement protesters and Seattle Police in downtown Seattle on Nov. 14, images of an 84-year-old woman and Seattle clergyman covered with pepper spray went viral. The Seattle pastor, Rev. Rich Lang, wearing full, white clerical vestments, stood between the line of peaceful demonstrators and spray-wielding police officers.
Lang is part of a team of “Occupy chaplains” who come daily to the encampment sites to lend spiritual support and pastoral care to the scores of protesters braving the winter rain and cold. As the nation’s Occupy Wall Street movement continues to spread, even worldwide, the nation’s religious community has been conspicuously silent about the economic justice issues protesters are raising, he said.
“The chaplains have been listening posts and calming companions for a very young movement,” said Lang, senior pastor of University Temple United Methodist Church. Lamenting the absence of other Seattle clergy at the Occupy sites, the 55-year-old minister cited the movement’s ethical imperatives. “The Church has strong economic justice narratives, but they aren’t preached much, nor do clergy put them at the forefront of the Christian story. Congregations have been silent about that, but as the economy and culture worsen, I think those narratives will come back into play.”
Occupy activist, Neal Bernstein, a 48-year old research chemist and native of New York City, sees deeper reasons for his involvement. Raised in a Jewish family but a self-described atheist, Bernstein believes that the ecumenical community and Occupy participants find common cause in their concern for the perilous economic meltdown now engulfing the country.
“The church deals with spiritual issues on several levels,” he said. “The Occupy movement is similar, but we’re seeking redemption from our government and corporations, and to be better in the same way that the church seeks to make better people. When the religious community gives us its blessings, it has a duty to participate. Stripped to its bare core, the secular and faithful both do good works. Our movement encompasses both believers and nonbelievers. We’re the 99 percent.”
Indeed, religious leaders like Rev. Grant Hagiya, Bishop of the Pacific Northwest Conference of the United Methodist Church, believe the growing conversation about the nation’s worsening economic crisis and wealth inequality raises profound moral questions of justice.
“The broader implications for us as a church, and more importantly, as a society, are that we awakening from the slumber of complacency and apathy. For too long, we have just accepted the status quo without any prophetic challenge to it," Hagiya said. "What I see in the Occupy movement is a return to grassroots civil engagement, much like I experienced directly during the Civil Rights and Vietnam protest era of the late sixties and seventies. We believed we were working for a better world then, and I think the same can be said of those who Occupy Seattle and the other 100 cities.”
Alice Woldt, co-director of the Faith Action Network and former executive director of the Church Council of Greater Seattle and Washington Association of Churches, concurs. “Connecting with our community is what our faith is all about. We are not only concerned with providing charity, but also being advocates. Many of our churches do one without the other. We do need to be concerned about equity and the people who are oppressed by the systems we have created.”
Many in the Seattle ecumenical community, like Wes Howard-Brook, look to local communities to take the lead. Howard-Brook, who teaches theology and biblical studies at Seattle University, believes the Occupy movement has succeeded in framing the conversation.
They have done a great job naming, with much prophetic power, the evils, and injustices of our corporate economy and political reality,” the religious scholar said. “In practical terms, for today’s movement, this means seeking change not via government or expecting the corporations themselves to be other than what they are [by law and by practice], but to form communities that embody radically different economic principles, as we hear in the gospels.”
Other Seattle clergy assert that the Occupy movement has given the religious community pause to do more soul-searching about its lack of engagement. “The movement has been more effective than the Church in lifting up the moral failings of greed, economic injustice, and consumerism,” said the Rev. Michael Denton, conference minister for the Pacific Northwest Conference of the United Church of Christ.
“By occupying physical spaces, they have helped these topics occupy conversations, media, and politics. That said, I think recent years have made us very ready for these conversations,” the UCC pastor explained. “There are some who try and suggest that this movement is about the jealousy, stupidity, and laziness of those who did not succeed economically. In actuality, for many of us in the church, this is about something much simpler than that: 'Thou shalt not steal.' Just because the stealing may be legally defensible does not mean it isn’t morally reprehensible.”
Within the ranks of the progressive church, however, opinions diverge on the church’s response to the Occupy movement. Some, like religious activist and theologian, Ched Myers, of the Los Angeles-based Bartimeus Cooperative Ministries, look to pragmatic strategies like the “Move Your Money” campaign to advance the Occupy movement's concerns for economic equality. “We’ve been tracking and supporting the viral growth around the country and across the world of the Occupy protest against an economic system geared to benefit only the richest one percent,” Myers said.
Now that protest has begun to get traction. According to the Credit Union National Association, as of the first week of November, American consumers transferred more than $4.5 billion from big banks into more than 7,000 credit unions, he explained. “Those numbers then dramatically spiked on Nov. 5, ‘Bank Transfer Day.’ It is estimated that more than a million people have now ‘voted’ by moving their money,” said Myers. “We hope the corporate banks are paying as much attention as the media.”
Seattle author and citizen activist, Paul Loeb, believes churches should embrace the underlying themes of the Occupy movement. “The significance of the movement is that it’s addressing the real issue of the divide between the top one percent and ninety-percent in the nation. We should have been doing this three years ago,” Loeb said at a recent interfaith forum on the Occupy movement at Seattle’s University Temple United Methodist Church.
“Churches can play a role by offering physical space and inviting movement leaders to speak,” he said. “The Occupy movement has offered a public witness and put themselves out there with a question: ‘What will you do?’" These are serious moral issues, he said, and they are not just the sole concern of progressive churches, but all churches.
“Three to four months ago, these issues of economic justice were off the table. The Occupy movement has now provided a window, or opportunity, to discuss wealth inequality. The stakes are too high, and we have to engage the political system.”
Assessing the response of Seattle’s ecumenical community to the movement, Denton stressed that the church’s challenge is not to lead, but participate. “I think our impact has been as part of this movement, not as leaders, or director, or fundraisers for it, but as partners. We have not always done this well, but these days have been different. When a clergy person wearing a black, button-down shirt and clergy collar is marching next to a person wearing a black t-shirt and studded dog-collar chanting words in unity, that’s a good and holy day.“
“As a partner, I think there have been particular things we’ve been able to add to the mix: various experiences of community; a practiced listening ear; connections to social service when needed; and, sometimes, the ability to help translate political demands into calls for moral clarity,” Denton said.
In a recent article in The Nation, political columnist William Greider sees parallels between the economic justice issues voiced by Occupy protesters and the ancient Hebrew society’s approach to debt crises. “Every seven years, the cycle of debt accumulation was erased by a declaration of general forgiveness. This was called the year of Jubilee, and Christianity embraced the same moral principle. Everyone was redeemed. The economy was freed to start over again.”
Notwithstanding the media’s preoccupation with the quelling of protesters by police wielding batons, pepper spray, and stun grenades in Oakland, Zucotti Park, and other urban encampments, Loeb points out that, before the Occupy movement was launched three months ago, the nation’s widening wealth disparity was seldom talked about. “Now the media coverage of the Occupy movement has validated that reality. One of the movement’s accomplishments has been to get that conversation restarted.”
In the opinion of several Puget Sound clergy, such as the Rev. Marian Stewart, pastor at Northlake Unitarian Universalist Church, church participation and dialogue about the movement are still in its infancy. “The progressive, liberal churches have been supportive of the Occupy movement, but a lot of other churches are curious,” said the Kirkland minister. “The religious right has been absent from the conversation. But, these are everyone’s issues. These are deep questions. Who are we as a country?”
Stewart was one of many local clergy who joined Occupy protesters in the rally in Olympia last week at the start of the Legislature’s special session to debate Gov. Chris Gregoire’s 2012 supplemental budget. “Some Christians are woefully ignorant about these economic issues. It’s important that churches just show up. Churches have a larger, societal role of calling us to do better. The church has forgotten how to promote humanity and is focused on exclusivity. The Occupy movement is the ultimate human call to live up to our better selves.”
Woldt agrees. “I think that the churches have a responsibility to be engaged with changing oppressive systems. They need to be challenging elected officials and the Administration, as well as institutions that foster economic injustice. The Occupy movement is calling into question why more and more people are suffering, without jobs, hungry, and losing their homes. This is not the kind of society that I believe is healthy, nor is it the vision of God’s kingdom that is described in the gospels.”
Bishop Hagiya believes the church is well-positioned to engage the conversation about the nation’s economic turmoil. “The church is the one institution that has the ability to look outside of its own perspective and call into question all of the other institutions’ value systems. The prophets of our tradition, and also Jewish tradition, were radical scrutinizers of the society, who were called by God to call into question human greed and arrogance. It is this same prophetic tradition that the Occupy movement has engaged, and it is consistent with our history and call.”
Editor's note: Collin Tong is a freelance journalist and Seattle-based stringer for the New York Times. He is a member of the congregation at University Temple United Methodist Church. | <urn:uuid:f0124930-fcba-4edc-b7ca-5a3ee8b94179> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bcm-net.org/node/89 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96334 | 2,441 | 1.75 | 2 |
MOBILE, Ala. (AP) - Forecasters say severe storms are possible in southwestern Alabama, and strong winds are likely in north Alabama.
A cold front is moving in from the west, and a warm front is pushing north out of the Gulf of Mexico.
The National Weather Service says the colliding systems are creating a risk of severe storms in Mobile and the surrounding area on Monday. Rainfall totals could exceed 4 inches.
Wind gusts up to 30 mph are possible in central Alabama, along with heavy rains.
Forecasters say winds could be even stronger in the Tennessee Valley, with sustained winds up to 30 mph and gusts to 40 mph.
Temperatures will be cooler Tuesday after the systems pass, with highs in the 60s in the south and the 50s to the north.
(Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.) | <urn:uuid:650d0d75-9fba-4853-b8e2-6fefe2bdef0f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wncftv.com/localnews/Heavy-Rains-Brisk-Winds-Forecast-for-Alabama-193033341.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932766 | 191 | 1.585938 | 2 |
The World of Rysylis is a homebrew Iron Heroes campaign setting inspired by 10th century Europe and Scandinavia, better known as the late Viking Age.
Long ago, when the first Keatish settlers landed on the wild shores of the new world, they came upon a ring of stones in their travels. The stones were inscribed with the names of the Earda, and told the story of creation. In the center of the stones, was a single rune with the word 'Rysylis' engraved upon it. Though the location of these stones were lost and with it most of the knowledge of the Earda, the name Rysylis and the names of the Earda endured.
Players can expect to be immersed in a treacherous world where only the most powerful rule, and good does not always prevail. Kingdoms feud and yarls squabble, while the common-folk just wish to be left alone to tend their fields. In a land with soaring mountains, impregnable fastnesses, sprawling forests, and subtle magic deep within the earth, nothing is impossible. | <urn:uuid:ad41c75e-1685-4b7e-b2cc-ae6c4ae834e7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.myth-weavers.com/wiki/index.php/World:Rysylis | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93768 | 224 | 1.5 | 2 |
IRA Contributions Can be Made Until Tax Filing Deadline
If you haven't put any money into an Individual Retirement Arrangement (IRA) for tax year 2001, or if you've put in less than the maximum allowed, you still have time, according to the IRS. You can contribute to either a traditional or Roth IRA until the April due date of your tax return.
If you make a contribution for the previous tax year, tell the IRA trustee which year the contribution is for. Otherwise, the trustee may report the contribution as being for the year in which it was received.
You may contribute up to $2,000 of your earnings for 2001 to an IRA. You may fund a traditional IRA, a Roth IRA (if you qualify), or both, but your total contributions cannot be more than $2,000. The annual limit will be $3,000 for 2002 through 2004, with a limit of $3,500 for persons age 50 or more.
You may be able to take a tax deduction for the amounts you put into a traditional IRA, depending on whether you - or your spouse, if filing jointly - is covered by an employer's pension plan and how much total income you have. You cannot deduct Roth IRA contributions, but the earnings on a Roth IRA may be tax-free if you meet the conditions for a qualified distribution.
You may file your tax return before you make the IRA contribution, but you must be sure to complete the contribution by the filing deadline. If you report a contribution to a traditional IRA on your return, but fail to make it by the deadline, you must file an amended tax return. If you claimed a deduction for an IRA contribution that you failed to make, you must add that amount back to your income on the amended return and pay tax accordingly.
IRS Publication 590 has detailed information on Individual Retirement Arrangements. Check with your tax preparer for more details.
This daily Tax Tip has been provided by the Internal Revenue Service. | <urn:uuid:5a0172c3-0b37-4e4e-9084-7148bc3c15b9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.accountingweb.com/topic/tax/ira-contributions-can-be-made-until-tax-filing-deadline-0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945632 | 407 | 1.773438 | 2 |
Update: Youssou N'Dour Barred from Presidency
There were violent protests in Senegal after it was announced that singer Youssou N'Dour would be banned from standing for Senegalese presidency. The court had argued that it could not verify many of the signatures Youssou N'Dour had gathered to support his candidacy.
N'Dour states that, 'Senegal and its people are sick. We have been betrayed by this shameful decision. I say shameful because neither the will of the Senegalese people nor the opinions of experts in constitutional law have been heard. Mr Wade has imposed his will and won the day'. The singer stated that the ruling was a 'constitutional coup d'etat'.
Two other opposition candidates also lost appeals against Friday's court rulings blocking them from standing in the February 26 election. Yet, the Constitutional Council did state that the 85-year-old president Wade was to stand again - causing outrage and mass protests. As a result security has remained tight in Dakar following Friday's clashes between opposition supporters and government troops. Nevertheless, it is clear that opposition parties and activists would continue with "national resistance" against Wade's bid.
Below is Youssou N'Dour's bid for presidency and an example of his inspiring work.
Win A Copy Of The Rough Guide To African Music For Children our online competition
New City Music, Chicago: 'a great showcase of the funky sounds currently made in Crescent City'.
The Guardian, UK, 3*** stars: 'A classy compilation'.
Guardian, UK 4****stars: 'A highly original, compelling set'.
Froots, UK: '... a superb album of an under-represented music ... and comes highly recommended'. | <urn:uuid:a135ac70-1102-45c8-adc2-d2b94c12aa6b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.worldmusic.net/news/news/2012-02-17/update-youssou-ndour-barred-from-presidency/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973223 | 362 | 1.554688 | 2 |
You can hardly go anywhere these days without someone asking, “What did you think of the latest episode of ‘The Walking Dead?’”
I hear that all the time from co-workers and friends, who congregate like Monday morning quarterbacks after broadcasts of the show on Sunday nights. They compare notes and make observations about the shocking events that have unfolded each and every week and kept the audience riveted as did the cliffhanger movie serials of old.
For those who might lack access to the show, “The Walking Dead” — based on a popular comic book series — details the aftermath of a virus outbreak in modern-day America which leads to a so-called zombie apocalypse. People who have recently died suddenly come back to life as animated corpses, or “walkers,” hence the show’s title, and roam in groups in search of human flesh to consume.
Anyone who is bitten also becomes a walker, and much of the show’s content deals with a group of people who have banded together and sought refuge from the zombies who are decomposing as time goes on but remain active. As the walkers proliferate and take over Earth, the remaining humans are forced to ward off attacks constantly, by either shooting them in the head with bullets or arrows or bashing in their skulls.
Nowhere is safe — including city streets or even the most-remote areas of the countryside.
This idea is not new, of course, as zombies have long been part of the folklore in places such as Haiti where voodoo is practiced. “The Walking Dead” has its roots in the granddaddy of all zombie movies, “The Night of the Living Dead,” a low-budget, black-and-white horror film that emerged in the late 1960s and remains powerful after all these years.
Since debuting in 2010, “The Walking Dead” television show has captured the interest of Americans as few other TV programs have. Nowadays, with so many choices on cable and satellite systems, it is indeed rare for viewers to be so universally obsessed with a particular series.
But along with its entertainment value, the emergence of “The Walking Dead” has prompted a question among its legions of fans about whether the world is headed toward an actual zombie apocalypse.
In one of the more bizarre discussions, a New York man shot his girlfriend in the back with a rifle Monday after a heated argument over “The Walking Dead,” which led one news organization to refer to the shooter as “The Walking Dumb.”
Yet the question remains about the likelihood of such a crisis.
Personally, I don’t think it’s possible that zombies will ever take over Earth. But what if “The Walking Dead” is an allegory of what’s to come. An allegory is defined as a play, poem or some other creative work in which the apparent meaning of the characters or events is used to symbolize a deeper moral or spiritual message.
Without knowing the intentions of the originators of “The Walking Dead,” I would venture to say that it is a perfect allegory for the type of civilization envisioned by futurists who predict a major catastrophe as the world’s resources are stressed.
As time goes on, not only is this to be accompanied by a shortage of energy supplies such as oil, but also basic necessities such as food and water. Fertile land will become scarcer as Earth grows more barren due to centuries of damaging environmental practices including pollution and overuse.
Wars will be fought over food, water or oil and those few countries lucky enough to have them continually will be forced to fight off attacks from invaders trying to seize those assets, not unlike the scenario of “The Walking Dead.”
In the future, just as zombies scour the countryside seeking human flesh, gangs are expected to roam in search of food and water with the same starved fervor.
Even among those who still practice some semblance of law and order there will be strife, according to futurists, which matches another element of “The Walking Dead.”
While much of the conflict on the show surrounds the dwindling number of humans battling the walkers and overwhelming odds, there are also sub-plots that include different groups of survivors who have established their own strongholds. Paranoia runs rampant among these factions who fear attacks from other “normal” people to capture their guns or supplies.
That is another scenario envisioned by the futurists, who foresee battles over threats that are both real and imagined.
If there is a lesson to be learned from “The Walking Dead,” it’s that mankind is headed for a disaster of one kind or another if some of our habits don’t change.
The only way this can be avoided, I believe, is to treat people, and the planet, better.
Tom Joyce is a staff reporter for The Mount Airy News. He can be reached at 719-1924 or email@example.com. | <urn:uuid:d90cda2f-f3dd-4860-ba3f-3200d5c023d6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mtairynews.com/bookmark/21066990 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962499 | 1,061 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Online games came into being with two categories, i.e. turn-based and real-time. The simplest combat mode of turn-based games is like "you beat me, and I beat you", which values tactics and strategies more. The combat mode of real-time games can be regarded as "you don't beat me, but I've beaten you seriously", which values actions and responsiveness more.
In turn-based games, players don't have to make difficult operations, but only need click the left/right mouse button within a given time. They can even enjoy gameplay while drinking coffee, which's really relaxing. In contrast with turn-based games, real-time games put more emphasis on actions. This can be seen from not only in-game wars & battles but also the fact that players need keep attentive to controls all the time and struggle to do better than others. Such a feature of real-time games is liable to give players a sense of accomplishment.
Technically, online turn-based games are mainly in the 2D mode and set not high hardware requirements, while online real-time games are mainly in the 2.5D/3D mode with fast-paced combats and set relatively high hardware requirements. Therefore, players are often troubled by disconnection and unsmooth gameplay in real-time games
Either online turn-based games or real-time games boast unique charm. Online turn-based games have the advantages that can't be reached by real-time ones, and vice versa. So, which do you prefer, turn-based or real-time?
Subscribe to Daily Browser Games News! | <urn:uuid:e98e0a25-598c-49d6-bc39-a3d4733464be> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.bbgsite.com/content/2011-12-05/which-do-you-prefer-turn-based-or-real-time.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972699 | 333 | 1.703125 | 2 |
"You are standing in a line at the supermarket to buy a box of Cheerios. You notice that the two customers in front of you are making the same purchase. The cashier rings up the first box at $5.41, just as advertised in the newspaper. But when the second box is scanned, the price registers $6.76. Strange, you think. Even more strange, the customer doesn't seem to notice the difference. Then it's your turn. The cashier scans the box and the price flashes $29.92. Why would anyone pay more than five times as much as another person for an identical box of cereal? They wouldn't. But when it comes to health care, you don't have any choice. And that's precisely the kind of spread that hospitals use in selling their services. Except that you don't know it -- it's their secret."
Barlett-Steele then mention numerous hospitals employing such nefarious practices to drive home their point. As for their sourcing, both humans and documents? They share their sourcing in detail, both within the text and in the copious endnotes. Expert journalism, indeed.
As for less-expert journalists, as well as general readers, they are well advised to study anything -- everything, if practical -- published by Barlett and Steele. Their prescient book Forevermore: Nuclear Waste in America, holds up nicely decades after its publication. And one of their older classic works is newly available in bookstores, thanks in large part to Hollywood. Leonardo DiCaprio is starring in this fall's movie The Aviator, based on the life of eccentric billionaire inventor-playboy-pilot-paranoid schizophrenic Howard Hughes.
Of all journalists who have chronicled Hughes' life and death, nobody did it better than Barlett-Steele in their 1979 biography Empire: The Life, Legend and Madness of Howard Hughes. W.W. Norton has re-issued the biography with a new title, Howard Hughes: His Life and Madness. The source notes in the book are an investigative reporting primer. The writing is perhaps the best ever done by Barlett-Steele. I plan to re-read it, for the fifth time.
Steve Weinberg served as executive director of Investigative Reporters and Editors (IRE) from 1983-1990. (Barlett and Steele are also active in the organization.) Weinberg's investigative journalism has appeared in several dozen newspapers and magazines. He is the author of six nonfiction books. | <urn:uuid:1461ee42-9f5b-4825-8c39-09f12965b3f4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2004-10-10/entertainment/0410110484_1_barlett-and-steele-critical-books-critical-condition/2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965924 | 510 | 1.742188 | 2 |
Google recently announced the release of the Knowledge Graph, a new feature designed to “help you discover new information quickly and easily” by providing informative answers to informational queries directly in the SERP. In other words, for search queries that are typically answered by a high-ranking, ever-present Wikipedia page, some of that top-level information can now be found on the results page itself, so you don’t necessarily have to click through to another site. For example, if you google “Mae West,” you see some basic information (date of birth and death, height, name of spouse, and some of her more well-known movies, as well as related figures) to the right of the organic search results (click to enlarge):
Yesterday, I was talking to Larry about different types of search queries and which ones are likely to serve up the most ads. Informational or question queries, like “who is Thomas Edison” or “area of a circle,” are the least likely to match any paid ads, because they’re not commercial in nature (compare to a high-intent commercial query like “dell flat-screen monitor”). There are generally no sponsored results for these queries because they have little to no value to businesses or Google.
So Google doesn’t stand to make any revenue for these types of queries. But someone at Google was thinking, what do we stand to gain here? That’s when I had my epiphany: By placing highly relevant and trustworthy information to the right of the organic search results, Google is training the eye to “see” that part of the screen. If savvy users trust that area less, because they know it’s full of paid ads, this may subtly persuade them to start paying attention to that area of the screen.
Eye tracking studies have shown that most people (70-80%) don’t look at the right-hand side of the screen, where a lot of the sponsored results show up. This image is via Search Engine Land:
Google has responded to this by giving the sponsored ads more and more territory on the SERP – more and bigger ads at the top, extensions in the middle of the page and so on. The Knowledge Graph may be just another strategy – and a totally different kind of strategy – to take back that space and change how people think about it. As you can see, it’s the same real estate that is devoted to Product Listing Ads on more transactional queries (click to enlarge):
And they both have pretty pictures!
What do you think? Does my conspiracy theory hold any water, or is Google just genuinely trying to help? | <urn:uuid:86856c04-daf2-44f3-b37a-1271da4aabea> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2012/07/12/google-knowledge-graph-conspiracy-theory | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951813 | 560 | 1.726563 | 2 |
Support for a bridge connecting downtown Martinez to Waterfront Park was a slow crawl, with the idea for the bridge first coming to life in the 1930s. It took until 2001 to revive the idea.
Two years ago, the bridge was approved. Now it looks like its construction will be just as slow, with plans still being developed after all this time.
It will take at least a few more months to finalize plans. Meetings for the public to voice opinions and concerns about moving pedestrians, bicyclists and emergency vehicles over the Union Pacific Railroad tracks will need to take place.
At this point, even basic points such as where the bridge will begin are still under debate.
When the bridge was first approved, the Contra Costa Transportation Authority approved a request by the city of Martinez for $200,000 to investigate how a bridge would affect businesses, the railroad, PG&E and the East Bay Regional Park District.
One proposal featured a 20-foot-wide bridge connecting Court and North Court streets. It was to begin at Court Street near Marina Vista, rise 23 feet over the railroad tracks and end at an existing parking lot at Waterfront Park.
Continuous train traffic sparked the push for the bridge. Around 20 freight trains and 44 Amtrak passenger trains travel the tracks each day, with traffic stoppages often causing dreadful jams.
It gets worse during the summer.
John Eddy of Arup, the engineering firm designated to find crossing alternatives and examine the potential environmental impact, told the CoCo Times the bridge may not look like anything the firm previously designed.
It must first assess public transit patterns, railroads and bike lanes before developing a working plan.
The country transportation agency is footing $10.2 million for construction, but it may not be enough to build a bridge. | <urn:uuid:bc9ea81a-ec2a-48b6-96d1-cbc46a5f2ec7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://sfbay.ca/2012/05/29/slow-going-for-martinez-bridge/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964364 | 365 | 1.585938 | 2 |
p r a C h ' s
a r C h i v e 2 0 0 5
Hamline University 5/04/05Spirit of Cambodia Tour - Commemorating Genocide Survivors.
Hamline University, Learning Center Building, Room 100, 1536
Hewitt Ave, St. Paul. Slide presentation by Carol Wagner, Author of
Soul Survivors - Stories of Women and Children in Cambodia;
Fragile Hopes Documentary Film with filmmaker Tiara Delgado;
Rap Music by Prach Ly
Good Film WorksPraChly was just awarded a scholarship to attend
the 2005 Masters Program. Known as the delegation,
this program facilitated by,..
the Cambodia Daily 1/27/05
On a dusty patch of grass near Phnom Penh's Tonle Bassac
commune, a crowd gathered last night at twilight.
The small stage didn't look like much, and neither did the
few woven mats and rows of folding chairs, set up a few
meters from the road. But when Cambodian-American
rapper Prach Ly took the microphone, it could have been
a concert. Local children chanted along with his music,
or jumped onto stage to break dance.
Poetry Loft Poetry at the Loft presents Prach Ly in a Wednesday
evening performance in the Mitten Building.
Redland Daily poet-musician Prach Ly. May is an expert on Cambodia and the
rebuilding of the nation after the Khmer Rouge. Prach is a
Cambodian-born rap music artist and poet.
"I have become educated on Cambodia, Khmer Rouge
and the effect it had on poetry and literature,"
said Wolpe in her introduction.
Labine.comPraCh Ly and his Cambodian Rap Stole the evening,
as his personality Climbed to a Magnificent Level of Passion
Talent and Dedication to Cambodia's History to be reborn.
PraCh Ly is an outstanding performer and creative musical genius
of interpretation and Desire. Love Rules in Ly's heart and soul over
Cambodia. You see Why Cambodian people are
true survivors of life\'s cruel war effects.
THIS IS OUR COMINGThe one act I'm super excited about is Prach Ly
(who performed at the 1st SASC-SI concert).
Kyoto JournalI was impressed to see that probably a hundred people from
the local Cambodian community came out for praCh's
performance, in which he used rap to focus on post-holocaust
Cambodian identity. They obviously saw value in what he is doing...
Khmer Over Sea 10/07/05His use of Khmer words, interspersing with the mostly English lyric,
are not just fill-ins or for stalling to make the words rhyme,
but has very deep meaning and very well placed that can
touch those that understand Khmer in a way that English can't.
I enjoyed his music and reading his lyrics.
He's indeed a good writer/poet/performer/artist.
Freemuse.org 10/28/05Sounds and Survival - Khmer music
The lyrics have certainly resonated with the Cambodian
population. At first, DJs were admittedly apprehensive
about playing the album on the radio, for fear of
government reprisal, but it didn't take much to get the word out.
Freemuse.org ( audio ) 11/21/05On 21 October, 2005, praCh gave a phone interview
from the United States with Freemuse intern Olivia Madison.
Here you can listen to him discuss his views on free expression,
his recent trip to Cambodia and observations about the
current state of the Khmer arts community.
Note2Nifty"I'm not here to start a revolution," he said, "but if it does, it does. I
say what I see, and I see what I say." I'm working on my last independent
album.... and when it comes out it's going to raise a lot of eyebrows and a
lot of people are going to be upset. I don't really care. I'm not going to
mention names, but they're going to know who I'm talking about."
True to his word, Prach Ly is working on a song titled "Therapeutic,"
Calhum.orgThe life and music of a young Cambodian rapper... | <urn:uuid:5a5f6190-d3cf-4d84-9cb6-ae72900952ee> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mujestic.com/prach_s_archive_20051 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952932 | 928 | 1.507813 | 2 |
A place to experience
Robert Owen Communities
The Robert Owen Communities (approx 80 acres)
Lower Sharpham Barton Farm is leased to the Robert Owen Communities (ROC), a charity providing working opportunities for adults with learning disabilities. It is also run on biodynamic principles.
ROC aims to equip each person with the skills, knowledge and attitudes that will enable them to lead a full, purposeful and satisfying life, and to contribute to the quality of life of others.
People with a learning disability are encouraged to learn skills and confidence through engagement and challenge. ROC offers individualised programmes of learning as the basis for achieving certificated vocational skills and supporting independence.
The Trust has now joined with its longstanding tenant The Robert Owen Communities and partner Ambios to provide an exciting new Sharpham Outdoors Project at Lower Sharpham Barton Farm. This will allow us to create a learning and engagement centre for a wide community of learners and a home for the wide range of environmental education activities that Sharpham Outdoors has become accustomed to delivering. | <urn:uuid:39798970-d28a-4972-bf90-6b82e0d478c6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sharphamtrust.org/Heritage-Estate/Sharpham-Tenants-Tenancies/Robert-Owen-Communities | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937831 | 214 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Turns out, carbon, which diamonds are made of, don't actually show up in X-Rays. They do, however, come up as blank spots and that's how jewelry shop owner Chuck Roberts found out his dog, Honey Bun, had eaten his diamonds.
Here's how Roberts tells it:
"A customer came in and I jumped up out of my chair and came out here to wait on him. And I left the chair where you could jump up on my chair and jump up on my desk,"
On his desk were 4 packets of diamonds, all about a carat each, and dog treats. When Roberts came back to his desk though, he saw that 1 packet of diamonds was missing. He searched everywhere for them but came up empty. The diamonds were gone. $10,000 flushed down the drain.
Until he realized his dog might've been the culprit. Leaving the chair near the desk allowed Honey Bun to jump onto the desk and help himself to the treats. At that point, Honey Bun probably saw the shiny shiny and ate that too. Roberts obviously couldn't get the dog to confess, so he took Honey Bun to get an X-ray—the two blank spots that popped up confirmed that the diamonds were inside.
Honey Bun released the diamonds naturally the next day and is totally healthy. Here is the whole news report:
You can keep up with Casey Chan, the author of this post, on Twitter or Facebook. | <urn:uuid:2cf5acab-8a53-42d7-a210-79b2357557fc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://gizmodo.com/5834303/an-x+ray-showed-a-dog-had-accidentally-eaten-10000-worth-of-diamonds | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.990926 | 298 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Susan’s Suggestions for Pain-free Disaster Planning
Suggestion #16: Hurricane season housekeeping reminders: about the only upside of a long hurricane season is that we have some time to prepare, since it seems that most of the big storms don’t really get themselves together until later in the summer for the Southeast USA, however, we know one can happen anytime! Aside from the procedure for hurricane preparedness that’s in our disaster plan, here are some things we can all be doing now “just in case”:
- Make sure all your contact information is current, both for your staff and your vendors and other support organizations or people. Many people use only cell phones now, and their telephone numbers change more often than in the past when everyone used a “land” line.
- Check your disaster supplies: make sure there’s plastic sheeting for covering books and equipment, duct tape, and any other supplies you might need to protect your collection and facility.
- Check out the ProText disaster supplies site; they sell supplies and also offer tips on salvage techniques for water damaged materials.
- Check the SoliNet site for a list of vendors providing salvage services such as de-humidifying, freezing, etc.
- Walk around your library and note whether any collections have been re-located since the last time you updated your plan. Revise your salvage priority list if need be, i.e. if you had two hours to remove your most important materials from your library, do you know what you would take, how you’d pack them up, and where you’d put them?
- Think about what services, if any, you could offer from off-site in the aftermath of a hurricane. Can you arrange to access your library’s information from home? Is there a way to continue to provide help to your patrons with information/research needs if your library space isn’t available?
- Especially if you live in an area that is “hurricane prone,” such as Wilmington, NC or just about anywhere along the Gulf Coast and Florida, make sure you have a “Go Pack” ready at home in case you need to evacuate. Check your state’s emergency management website or the Homeland Security site for a list of what to keep ready at home.
- Remember the RML! Have contact information at hand, and at home, in case you need to send up a flare for help from the Regional Medical Library for your area. | <urn:uuid:aa2ca50b-1a40-4284-8c2c-9d537d44e9e2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://nnlm.gov/ep/2007/06/06/susans-suggestions-for-pain-free-disaster-planning-27-2/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945156 | 525 | 1.734375 | 2 |
This item cannot be shipped to the following state(s): AK,GU,HI,PR,VI
Mimicry, "Living Stones," are succulents that mimic the rocks of their native environments as a survival technique. In addition, these plants would be found nearly buried to escape the strong African sun as a method of survival. Succulents are easy to care for, require less water than traditional house plants, and add interest to any environment. Varieties will vary. | <urn:uuid:7049a294-95fb-4c7c-9f26-44035a198558> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/QuickViewService?storeId=10051&langId=-1&catalogId=10053&R=202363174&catEntryId=202363174 | 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 | 0.953191 | 100 | 1.8125 | 2 |
South Africa's former leader Nelson Mandela has been admitted to a hospital in Pretoria for tests, but there is "no cause for alarm," President Jacob Zuma said Saturday.
Mandela "is doing well," Zuma said in a statement. "The medical team is assured of our support as they look after and ensure the comfort of our beloved founding president of a free and democratic South Africa."
Mandela, 94, will receive medical attention "from time to time, which is consistent with his age," Zuma said.
Mandela, a Nobel laureate, spent 27 years in prison for fighting against racial segregation in South Africa. He was elected president in 1994, four years after he was freed from prison. | <urn:uuid:7644a31d-0b51-4f85-86ff-088013533fdd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/technology/Mandela-in-hospital-for-tests/-/2252536/17704580/-/tt196h/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.989223 | 145 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Editor's note: LZ Granderson, who writes a weekly column for CNN.com, was named journalist of the year by the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association and is a 2011 Online Journalism Award finalist for commentary. He is a senior writer and columnist for ESPN the Magazine and ESPN.com. Follow him on Twitter: @locs_n_laughs.
(CNN) -- Jennifer Tyrrell dislikes public speaking so much that when she was in high school, she almost failed marketing because she didn't want to speak in front of the class.
But when the Boy Scouts of America made a decision that hurt her little boy Cruz, she did what any mother would do -- set aside her own fear, spoke up and, with the help of family and friends, is fighting back.
"I've never been involved with any kind of activism or anything like that before, so this is all new to me," the mother of four said. "All I know is this has got to stop."
And by "this," she is referring to the Boy Scouts' policy of banning gays and lesbians from being members or serving as leaders. Earlier this month Tyrrell was forced to resign as den leader of the Tiger Cubs for Pack 109 in Bridgeport, Ohio, because the national office learned she is a lesbian. So even though everyone in the local chapter loved her, she was forced out by the discrimination that is woven into the organization's bylaws.
The cubs of Pack 109 are upset.
But none more than Cruz, who is being forced to be away from his friends and is too young to fully understand why.
He's only 7.
He wasn't brought up to dislike people because they are different.
He's too young to understand bigotry.
Which is why Tyrrell is not taking any of this lying down. She started a change.org petition, in protest of the Boy Scout policy, that has amassed more than 120,000 signatures in a matter of days.
I met Tyrrell and her beautiful family at the 23rd annual GLAAD Awards this past weekend. Numerous celebrities took the stage that night, but only Tyrrell managed to hush the crowd, save for a few sobs.
I can remember sitting there wondering: What in the hell is wrong with them? The Girl Scouts of America, the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, as well as the 4-H Club all welcome gay kids and adult leaders, and none of those organizations bursts into flames.
Needing answers, I reached out to the Boy Scouts and Deron Smith, the organization's director of public relations, sent me an official statement that in part read:
"Our focus is on delivering the nation's foremost youth program of character development and values-based leadership training. Our mission does not include teaching young people about sex or sexual orientation, and we do not believe it is Scouting's role to introduce this topic in our youth development program."
Fair enough. So I asked Smith via e-mail if the group had received complaints that Tyrrell was attempting to turn the Scouts into an unofficial sex ed camp.
He didn't answer that question.
When I asked if heterosexuals were banned for being heterosexuals, Smith said, "Heterosexuality does not conflict with Scouting's policy and is not a reason for removal from the program. However, if a leader chose to make it a focus of his or her time with youth they could be removed from the program."
Now I've never sat in one of Tyrrell's meetings, and so I can't speak as to what she did or did not do. So I asked some folks who would know, the parents of Pack 109.
"I'm not a city person," said Robert Dunn. "I'm just a backwoods hick, and I don't think anybody around here have an issue with homosexuals. She did a wonderful job, and what they did to her was just horrible.
"When I told my son Jen was kicked out because she is gay, he didn't know what was wrong because he thought gay meant happy. He's just devastated."
Don Thomas, who has a grandson in Pack 109, e-mailed me, saying either he or his wife has been to "every cub scout meeting my grandson has attended, also to every function, community event, Salvation Army ringing bells, collection of food for the needy....etc. I do not know where you are getting your information, but never ever has sex been brought up, not in any way shape or form. In fact, I was not aware of Jen even being gay for quite some time.....wasn't an issue or concern."
My favorite response came from Crystal Sabinsky, who said, "the boys knew her as Tiger Leader Jen, not Gay Tiger Leader Jen. They are only first graders. Most don't even understand what 'gay' or 'lesbian' mean."
So again, I sit and wonder: What in the hell is wrong with them?
While it's commendable that Tyrrell is fighting, I'm ticked off that she has to. It's 2012, for heaven's sake. Who, after the zoo-like Casey Anthony trial, still believes being straight automatically makes you a good influence to have around children? Tyrrell is clearly just a good mother, trying to invest in her son. She didn't ask to be den leader a little over a year ago -- she was selected because the pack loves her. She was chosen to be treasurer because everyone trusts her.
Maybe being loved and trusted conflicts with the values of the Boy Scouts, because according to the folks who were actually around Tyrrell, sexual orientation was never added to the handbook. It just doesn't make sense. Then again, bigotry never does.
Follow us on Twitter: @CNNOpinion.
Join us at Facebook/CNNOpinion.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of LZ Granderson. | <urn:uuid:719ca187-5a5b-4293-a54f-e8bb7ec11ba0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cnn.com/2012/04/24/opinion/granderson-gay-den-leader/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.984081 | 1,223 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Wallace Reed Brode (12 June 1900 – August 1974) was an American chemist. He was president of the American Chemical Society in 1969 and of the Optical Society of America in 1961. He received the Priestley Medal in 1960.
Brode was born in Walla Walla, Washington state, one of a set of triplets along with brothers Malcolm and Robert, each of whom became a distinguished scientist. He also had another older brother, Stanley. His father Howard was a biology professor at Whitman College, where the older Brode he would earn his D.Sc in 1921. While studying for his Ph.D at University of Illinois under Roger Adams, he developed a lifelong interest in dyes and spectroscopy.
He was on the faculty of Ohio State University (1928–48, professor 1939–48); head of the science department at US Naval Ordnance Test Station 1945–47; Science Adviser to the US Secretary of State 1958–60; director of Barnes Engineering Co. in Washington from 1960 onwards. He also served on the board of trustees for Science Service, now known as Society for Science & the Public, from 1957-1972.
- Chemical Spectroscopy 1939
- (with others) Laboratory Outlines of Organic Chemistry 1940
- (with others) The Roger Adams Symposium 1955
- ^ Past Presidents of the Optical Society of America http://www.osa.org/aboutosa/leadership/pastpresidents/default.aspx
External links
See also | <urn:uuid:90d4b4ad-6bfc-477d-87e3-30a705d43233> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wallace_R._Brode | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961695 | 305 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Raspberry Pi and Cotton Candy: Computing's Newest Treats
"People are going to take these [RPi] boards and turn them into commercial products; they're going to make gonzo one-off hardware projects 'because they can.' They're going to use them in ways that we can't begin to imagine, in places we wouldn't normally think of," said Slashdot blogger Barbara Hudson. "Instead of Beowulf clusters or Lego blocks, we can now think 'tinker toys for the mind.'"
There has never been any shortage of interesting names here in the Linux world, but recently a decidedly sugary theme has emerged.
Just in the past week, we saw the debut of Cotton Candy and the long-awaited Raspberry Pi -- two diminutive computing devices that may have the potential to shake up the computing world.
Small, portable and relatively low-priced -- at US$199 and $25, respectively -- there's no doubt that these new contenders have made quite a splash.
'I Am Highly Excited'
"Naturally I am highly excited about Raspberry Pi, although the launch was flubbed by any measure, especially when you consider prior promises such as paypal ordering," Hyperlogos blogger Martin Espinoza told Linux Girl.
"One of the sellers even had a minimum $50 order, which was not an effective way to serve the Raspberry Pi community," Espinoza pointed out. "I'll be glad when I can actually order one and have it show up.
"I'm hoping DealExtreme makes them, because they'll likely be able to keep up with the demand," he added.
'Everyone Loves Them'
Indeed, "these devices look cool," agreed Chris Travers, a Slashdot blogger who works on the LedgerSMB project.
"I think that small devices of this sort will become more and more important in a variety of areas, from point of sale to consumer computing appliances," he added.
"Small cheap computers -- everyone loves them," mused blogger Robert Pogson. "They're so small... they can do a lot that 'big' PCs can do: browse, run apps, create stuff."
'A Huge Threat to Wintel'
As a teacher, Pogson's first lesson for high school students was "to show them a Phillips screwdriver and open up an ATX case (not a 'hard drive') and show them the subsystems inside," Pogson recalled. "Over the years motherboards got smaller and had fewer integrated circuits. Most of the space and weight is wasted if you can do everything on one chip."
In fact, "with the ARMed SoCs, we are at the extreme where all we have to do is supply a package to keep dust and soda pop out and a couple of connectors," he explained. "This is a singularity. To get any smaller, the computer will have to disappear inside the monitor, keyboard or mouse. There's almost nothing there thanks to Moore's Law."
Because so little material is required to make one of these devices, "and the price of FLOSS is about $0, the price of the entire system is minimized," Pogson pointed out. "This is a huge threat to Wintel, which needs everything to be upsold/expensive to hide the prices of Wintel's contribution."
'That Was Just the Beginning'
In 2011, "we saw smart thingies outsell Wintel for the first time on personal computing devices, but that was just the beginning," Pogson predicted.
"Because of the low prices, 2012 and 2013 will make 2011 seem like a quiet picnic," he added. "Intel is pushing ultrabooks and M$ is pushing '8,' but both are incompatible with small cheap computers one way or another. They have locked themselves into a high-priced model and cannot adapt without becoming just another player in the world of IT."
So, "for the first time in more than a decade, neither has been able to exclude competition and will be swarmed by harder-working and more efficient innovators," Pogson concluded.
'New New Math for Dummies'
Barbara Hudson, a blogger on Slashdot who goes by "Tom" on the site, wasn't so sure about the Cotton Candy device in particular, which she called "seriously overpriced."
"The hardware specs from the vendor's web site say it's a single-core A9 cpu and quad-core Mali gpu," Hudson explained. "That's the exact same hardware as the $110 Android Zenithink tablet -- and the Zenithink also includes a battery and touchscreen, and can be hacked to run linux (it's the tablet that is used for the Spark project)."
As for claims "that a $200 Cotton Candy is 'driving down the cost of personal computing,' maybe it's the 'new new math for dummies,' where it doesn't really matter if you get the answers right as long as you feel good about yourself," she suggested.
'I Do Not See the Use'
Others also had reservations about the Cotton Candy computer.
"It seems like a nice device, although it's a pity it only comes in Wifi, which will make it harder to use for kiosk-type applications," consultant and Slashdot blogger Gerhard Mack told Linux Girl.
Similarly, "shoot me, but I do not see the use for this device," said Roberto Lim, a lawyer and blogger on Mobile Raptor.
"Sure, it is small enough to fit in my pocket, and easy to carry around," he added. "But as a portable device, I would have to lug around a keyboard, mouse and power supply. If I took it on a business trip instead of a laptop, I would have to wait until I get to the hotel room to use it, and with a keyboard, mouse and power supply it really would not be all that more portable than a laptop.
"Really, I would rather just carry a laptop around, which I plug into a LDC TV when I want a larger display," he opined.
'A Geek Board for Programmers'
As for the Raspberry Pi, Slashdot blogger hairyfeet wasn't impressed.
"The problem with Pi is it's like the Arduino: it's a geek board for programmers -- 99.9 percent of the world will never know it exists," he told Linux Girl.
Hudson, however, saw it differently.
'Tinker Toys for the Mind'
"If there's one thing I think the RPi team got wrong, it's their thinking this should be targeted to educational institutions," Hudson suggested.
"From all the buzz, it's obvious that the RPi market is much, much broader," she said. "People are going to take these boards and turn them into commercial products; they're going to make gonzo one-off hardware projects 'because they can.' They're going to use them in ways that we can't begin to imagine, in places we wouldn't normally think of."
Ultimately, the device "will be able to capitalize on a broader market base," she predicted. "Future iterations will open up more possibilities as declining costs allow the use of a more capable System-on-a-Chip without breaking the budget.
"Instead of Beowulf clusters or Lego blocks, we can now think 'tinker toys for the mind,'" Hudson concluded. "What could kids (and adults) build with 50 or 100 or 1,000 of these working together, each one running its own specific programming? Surprise us!" | <urn:uuid:eafd61db-2b1f-4fe5-a5b7-45ffe6c4f7b8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/linux-community/74562.html | 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 | 0.971371 | 1,561 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Planet Hope was first established in 1998. After spending 10 years working with teens and college students in the suburbs, our founder moved his family into the heart of Washington DC to work with the inner-city community. How does a sailing program emerge from a back alley in a Washington DC neighborhood? Here’s our story:
It took a huge push broom to sweep up all the glass in the alley behind the row house in Washington DC, but once cleared of trash, broken bottles and discarded syringes; the concrete field was ready for a soccer game. Although, with that particular crowd of gang members, drug dealers, and street kids, coupled with the narrow chain link fence lined alley, it felt more like refereeing a cage fight than officiating a neighborhood soccer game!
No matter what was done, alley hockey, alley basketball or the weekly alley hot dog cookouts, there was always a crowd around that little row house. All kinds of activities were tried, but the young people were still in the middle of a busy city full of crime. If only these kids could experience the beauty of what lays outside the city limits. It was surprising how many of them had spent their whole lives within the ten square miles of Washington, DC.
An old donated boat, a loaned out mooring and an abandoned dinghy, made it possible to plan the first sailing trip. The van was filled to overflow capacity for the 40 minute ride out to the Chesapeake Bay. As the first group rowed out in the rickety dinghy, you would think that the teens had died and gone to heaven. When the group set sail, that hard shell encasing many of them began to crack, smiles broke free as they clutched the gunnels for dear life! Their eyes lifted up and new horizons were seen for the first time.
Unfortunately, kids are chatterboxes and just can’t keep anything to themselves. More boats were added, sailors recruited, donors solicited and the young people kept coming. A dinghy fleet was purchased, summer sailing camps filled, cruising boats added. The heart of what had emerged was cruising on sailboats. From an afternoon sail to a week-long adventure, a couple of adults can have an amazing impact on a handful of young people. Away from cable TV, internet and cell phones (although it takes some doing to pry the cell phones away) people have time to actually interact, share, and laugh and sometime cry together. Sailing groups were formed to allow for this to happen naturally.
In 2002 the organization became an ASA affiliate school. The cruising focused curriculum seemed to fit the organization. Instructors went through IQC’s so that volunteers could be trained and certified. A sailing community had emerged and a system was needed to help organize the fleet. Capt Jack Feeney, the founder of The Sailboat Club in Jacksonville, FL helped this new sailing school set in place The Sailboat Club concept which fit perfectly with the mission. Now the instructors and volunteers could check out boats to sail with their group. New members were able to join the organization, enjoy time on the sailboats and membership fees help support the youth sailing programs and help to maintain the fleet. The sailing club is now in its 10th season. The fleet has yachts from 25 to 40’ on the Chesapeake Bay. It is important to the club to provide boats for those not ready or able to own a vessel of their own.
At first, only instructors and volunteers were trained, but more requests were coming in for sailing courses. Especially from those new to the sport in need training in order to sail club boats. An adult sailing program began to take shape and within a few years. The Chesapeake Bay offers perfect cruising destinations for the youth programs and sailing school. There is one spot on the Chesapeake Bay that is incredibly close to Washington DC. Believe it or not, from Capitol Hill, it takes about 35 minutes to get to Herring Bay (not in rush hour traffic). The location is also very accessible from Northern Virginia, Central and Southern Maryland. A fleet of sailboats is now maintained at Herrington Harbour, a beautiful resort marina just off Herring Bay.
Besides the youth dinghy and sailing camps, the school offers family sailing and will allow children to take courses with their parents. There are not many sports that children and grandparents can participate in at the same time. Grandma would not last long on the basketball court and the grandkids seem to lose interest in shuffle board pretty quickly. Everyone can get involved in sailing together, young and old, of all ability levels can share and learn from each other while all having meaningful time together. The equation is simple: The more children that spend quality time with adults doing relationship building activities such as sailing, the less troubled teens there will be.
The moral of the story? Think twice before you clear an alley for a soccer game.
While managing Planet Hope and the sailboat club, Captain Jeff Bowen still spends as much time as possible sailing with his family and friends. | <urn:uuid:1b8023d1-a79e-4061-be0c-dfd7906a8203> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://planet-hope.org/about/history/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976562 | 1,032 | 1.75 | 2 |
Note: you can link here for the Inside Higher Ed version of the same entry.
Amidst all the hype and media coverage related to the just released Times Higher Education World Reputation Rankings (2013), it’s worth reflecting on just how small of a proportion of the world’s universities are captured in this exercise (see below). As I noted last November, the term ‘world university rankings’ does not reflect the reality of the exercise the rankers are engaged in; they only focus on a minuscule corner of the institutional ecosystem of the world’s universities.
The firms associated with rankings have normalized the temporal cycle of rankings despite this being an illogical exercise (unless you are interested in selling advertising space in a magazine and on a website). As Alex Usher pointed out earlier today in ‘The Paradox of University Rankings‘ (and I quote in full):
By the time you read this, the Times Higher Education’s annual Reputation Rankings will be out, and will be the subject of much discussion on Twitter and the Interwebs and such. Much as I enjoy most of what Phil Baty and the THE do, I find the hype around these rankings pretty tedious.
Though they are not an unalloyed good, rankings have their benefits. They allow people to compare the inputs, outputs, and (if you’re lucky) processes and outcomes at various institutions. Really good rankings – such as, for instance, the ones put out by CHE in Germany – even disaggregate data down to the departmental level so you can make actual apples-to-apples comparisons by institution.
But to the extent that rankings are capturing “real” phenomena, is it realistic to think that they change every year? Take the Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU), produced annually by Shanghai Jiao Tong University (full disclosure: I sit on the ARWU’s advisory board). Those rankings, which eschew any kind of reputational surveys, and look purely at various scholarly outputs and prizes, barely move at all. If memory serves, in the ten years since it launched, the top 50 has only had 52 institutions, and movement within the 50 has been minimal. This is about right: changes in relative position among truly elite universities can take decades, if not centuries.
On the other hand, if you look at the Times World Reputation Rankings (found here), you’ll see that, in fact, only the position of the top 6 or so is genuinely secure. Below about tenth position, everyone else is packed so closely together that changes in rank order are basically guaranteed, especially if the geographic origin of the survey sample were to change somewhat. How, for instance, did UCLA move from 12th in the world to 9th overall in the THE rankings between 2011 and 2012 at the exact moment the California legislature was slashing its budget to ribbons? Was it because of extraordinary new efforts by its faculty, or was it just a quirk of the survey sample? And if it’s the latter, why should anyone pay attention to this ranking?
This is the paradox of rankings: the more important the thing you’re measuring, the less useful it is to measure it on an annual basis. A reputation ranking done every five years might, over time, track some significant and meaningful changes in the global academic pecking order. In an annual ranking, however, most changes are going to be the result of very small fluctuations or methodological quirks. News coverage driven by those kinds of things is going to be inherently trivial.
The real issues to ponder are not relative placement in the ranking and how the position of universities has changed, but instead why this ranking was created in the first place and whose interests it serves. | <urn:uuid:e2c46f83-001f-472f-b229-522677d94644> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://globalhighered.wordpress.com/2013/03/04/on-the-illogics-of-the-times-higher-education-world-reputation-rankings-2013/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948725 | 777 | 1.59375 | 2 |
For better or worse Tesla Motors Inc. pretty
much provided the blueprint of how to start a successful electric vehicle company
-- have wealthy donors fund an initial corporate launch; gather venture
capital; seek government grants and loans; launch your vehicle; achieve
an IPO to raise more capital; use government loans and venture capital to
make the jump
to large production numbers if desired.
Fisker Automotive seems to be following a similar
path to success, though its road has been a bit rockier. Now with the
impending launch of the sleek Fisker Karma plug-in hybrid electric vehicle
(PHEV), let's take a look at the past present and future of this company and
its flagship vehicle.
I. Hype and Inflated Expectations
Fisker, much like Tesla was founded by an iconic
figure. While Elon Musk built a fortune off of internet startups like
Zip2 and PayPal, Fisker's founder Henrik Fisker built a reputation design sleek
sports cars, such as the Aston Martin DB9, Aston Martin V8 Vantage, and
Founded in 2007, Fisker rapidly raised a couple
hundred million in venture capital and secured
a $529M USD loan initiated by the Bush administration U.S. Department of
Energy and finalized in 2009 under the Obama administration. With a sexy
hybrid, dubbed "Karma", in the works, Fisker was lauded as Tesla's
In reality this might have been a bit of an unfair
role to place Fisker in, though it seemed happy enough to play along. Tesla
Motors had been founded four years earlier and was only able to launch its
Roadster after years of delays and losses.
Unsurprisingly, Fisker began to show similar
signs, and some in the public began to write it off as another startup bust.
The release date was originally slotted
for 2009 at a price of $80,000 USD. Then last year Fisker said it would
be ready to produce 15,000 EVs this year, priced
at $87,500. Clearly it missed that mark.
II. Success at Last
Still, Fisker appears to be turning the corner.
It has a solid relationship with battery
supplier A123 Systems in Watertown, Mass. who will be providing it with
production battery packs. By contracting virtually every component of its
vehicle to other companies (e.g. General Motors designs the door handles)
Fisker has cut its development costs from $1B USD to $333M USD, and cut its
development time from 5 years to 2.5 years.
And the Fisker Karma PHEV is at last complete.
At a recent press event Fisker showed
off the attractive luxury sports sedan on the
Now it has released more details about the
upcoming launch of the completed vehicle. Production will begin March 21
and vehicles will begin to ship and sell in either March or April. The
final assembly will take place at contractor Valmet Automotive in Finland.
Actual production numbers are likely to be nowhere
near the 15,000 Fisker originally promised; the U.S. government expects 1,000
Karmas to ship this year. Still, the public seems eager to buy the
vehicle -- the government has had to close a pre-order program it was ordering
after over 3,000 customers placed $5,000 USD reservations for the vehicle.
The price point at the vehicle was bumped to
$95,500 USD in December and that appears to be official price it will launch
While Fisker won't make the 15,000 vehicles a year
mark this year -- the point it says it needs to achieve to become profitable --
it's a very real possibility for next year.
III. The Vehicle Itself
The final version of the Karma sports a 50-mile all
electric range and can accelerate for 0 to 62 miles per hour in under 6
seconds. The vehicle has power aplenty. Its twin electric motors
produce 1,300 newton meters (960 lb-ft) of torque, more than the 1,250 N·m
(920 lb-ft) mustered by the Bugatti Veyron.
The vehicle sports an estimated 50-mile
all-electric range. It gets approximately 50 mpg after that, with a
gasoline generator feeding current to the twin electric motors. The total
range is expected to be similar to the 2011 Chevy Volt -- around 350 miles.
Billed as the "world's first luxury plug-in
hybrid electric vehicle" the Karma offers some slick perks, such as a
solar panel roof. Like the roof on the Toyota Prius, it provides power to
the in-cabin electronics. But its higher-quality panels also provide
enough juice to provide 4-5 miles of extra range over the course of a sunny
week of driving.
But probably the biggest thing the Karma has going
for it is looks. The Porsche/Bugatti design heritage is clearly apparent
in this vehicle's gorgeous lines. While the Roadster 2.5 is certainly a
good looking electric vehicle, the Karma may be the best EV on the road,
helping wash away images of the bulbous Volts and LEAFs from the minds of the
IV. The Future
Top venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins
Caulfield & Byers and New Enterprise Associates this month valued Fisker at
$600M USD and gave the company an additional $150M USD in venture capital
Some expect a initial public offering of stock to
be in the works and arrive shortly after the first run of vehicles finishes.
States Scott Sandell of New Enterprise Associates in an interview with VentureWire,
"[The company has] potentially a huge return in a fairly short order.
… Tesla is worth $3 billion. … The public markets want a few more of these. I
think it could be a blockbuster IPO."
Fisker will face stiff competition from Tesla, but
its lower price, longer range, design heritage, and different category (PHEV v.
BEV) should help differentiate it from its foe.
Fisker, like Tesla has mass-market
aspirations. It's currently working on something called "Project
Nina", which looks to launch an entry-level luxury sedan priced at $47,000
USD and delivered in higher volume. That vehicle was originally to be
released in 2012, but if the Karma's history is any indication, that date may
slip to 2013 or later.
Still, Fisker seems to have a clear roadmap ahead
of it to achieve profitability and then take the plunge into the red to reach
the mass market. And while it and Tesla have a bitter legal history
(Tesla claimed Fisker stole its technology and used it in the Karma, but lost
the suit), Fisker has Tesla to thank for illustrating the path to success (and
convincing venture capitalists of the validity of that path), in some regard. | <urn:uuid:6417810b-7dc3-41a8-80e8-b7d4e2f15997> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=21002&commentid=659265&threshhold=1&red=5715 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933277 | 1,485 | 1.648438 | 2 |
The election of Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio as Pope this evening was a surprise. But perhaps, with hindsight, it shouldn’t have been. According to unofficial accounts he came second in the conclave balloting to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger in 2005. But somehow he kept out of the media spotlight in the run-up to this conclave, leading many to strike him off the lists of papabili hastily pulled out of journalists’ drawers when Pope Benedict dramatically abdicated last month.
But the College of Cardinals had not forgotten him. And they elected him tonight on the fifth vote, an indication that he had received significant support from the very first ballot. The cardinals clearly believe that he is the man to lead God’s Church at this extraordinary moment in Catholic history.
Pope Francis’s first address this evening showed his extraordinary humility. He asked, astonishingly, for the blessing of the crowd in St Peter’s Square, before he gave his own blessing. His name calls to mind the many great men called Francis in Church history, but above all St Francis of Assisi, who heard a call from God to “rebuild my Church”. Pope Francis must consider this his summons, too. The Church has been profoundly damaged by abuse scandals, allegations of corruption within the Roman Curia and the loss of faith among so many Catholics.
Let’s pray for our new Holy Father, that he will inspire all Catholics to join him in the urgent task of rebuilding the Church, so that the light of Christ within it will shine out ever more clearly into the world. | <urn:uuid:0560155f-3cf4-414d-b075-dcfd7460568c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/commentandblogs/2013/03/13/welcome-pope-francis-i/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972401 | 331 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Gates: Iran’s Nuclear Program Puts Middle East in Danger
By Fred W. Baker III
American Forces Press Service
PARIS, Feb. 8, 2010 Iran’s continuing nuclear development program only serves to put the Middle East in danger of nuclear weapons proliferation, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates said here today.
Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and French Defense Minister Hervé Morin conduct a joint press conference in Paris, Feb. 8, 2010. DoD photo by Cherie Cullen
(Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available.
But, Gates pushed for stronger diplomatic and economic pressure from the international community rather than calling for military conflict.
“I think that everybody’s interest is in seeing this issue resolve without resorting to conflict. But it makes it all the more important,” he said. “We have to face the reality that if Iran continues and develops nuclear weapons it almost certainly will provoke proliferation in the Middle East. That’s a huge danger.”
Gates’ comments came at a press conference alongside France’s Minister of Defense Hervé Morin. Gates flew here today to meet with the ministers of defense and foreign affairs as well as France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy, who he will meet for the first time.
Morin backed Gates’ comments on Iran, saying that France supports putting international pressure on Iran to stop its current nuclear program.
Since 2006, France has repeatedly publicly stressed the danger of a nuclear-armed Iran and has worked with the United States and other members of the P5+1 group -- China, Russia, the United Kingdom and Germany -- to demand that Iran end its current nuclear program, according to the U.S. State Department.
Gates said that if all international partners would agree on a plan, then sanctions could still work.
“The key is persuading Iranian leaders that their long-term best interests are best served by not having nuclear weapons, as opposed to having them,” Gates said. “My hope is that we will then be able to keep this in economic and diplomatic channels.
“The point of the pressure is to bring the Iranians back to the negotiating table and to resolve this issue in a way that prevents Iran from having a nuclear weapon,” he added.
Besides Iran, Gates said he talked about France’s military support in Afghanistan. The secretary called France “close partners.” Gates said that during the past few years the diplomatic relationship with France has “significantly” expanded.
The renewed relationship is in part due to the realization by both of the governments that “security challenges of the 21st century are too large and too complex to be dealt with by any single nation acting alone,” he said.
Gates praised France’s current efforts in Afghanistan, calling the mission “vitally important to the security of the whole world.”
And he said that NATO and non-NATO allies must act quickly to capitalize on momentum noted by the senior commander on the ground this year. This will happen only if the allies provide Afghanistan with mentors and trainers to bolster their force to take over the security mission.
“We must act swiftly to increase the impact of the forces now headed to the theater for this pivotal year,” Gates said.
The secretary said there has been a renewed energy among NATO and non-NATO partners with respect to the mission in Afghanistan. As a result, the number of troops committed to the fight by allies has almost tripled since Gates took office.
France has increased their forces by nearly half since the start of the war and has taken on new training responsibilities, fielding six operational and mentoring teams and offering six more. France has about 2,800 troops in Afghanistan.
Among NATO members, France is second only to the United States in terms of total troops deployed abroad. France is one of NATO's top five troop contributors. | <urn:uuid:24375f73-b56b-4aaf-938a-c300ac66ddbd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.defense.gov/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ID=57904 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9555 | 826 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Now here are two groups who had individual hits, had different singing styles but two of the songs where very similar. When you look at them, there songs are similar but, boy, are they different groups!
Video: The only video I could find was by the Beach Boys, who where really good friends with the Rivingtons and did help to promote the one song:
The Rivingttons – Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow/ Liberty / 1962/ #48
The Rivingtons were a doo-wop group noted for being one of the most loud and raucous of the genre. Their first hit, “Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow” (1962), like many such songs, began with the bass chanting nonsense syllables (in this case the title), followed by the tenor singing over repetitions of it. “Mama-Oom-Mow-Mow”, an even more baroque rewrite of the theme, failed to sell, but they returned to the charts the following year with the similar “The Bird’s The Word”.
Previously the Rivingtons had been known as “The Sharps” and had already tasted chart action via Thurston Harris’ “Little Bitty Pretty One” in 1957, after which they appeared on several Duane Eddy recordings when any extraneous sounds of rebel yells were required.
After the two hit singles, the Rivingtons struggled till the mid 60s to find another hit but after the Columbia single “A Rose Growing In The Ruins” flopped they called it a day.
The two Rivington hits entered a life of their own, courtesy of a Minnesota group called The Trashmen, who recorded a song made up from the nonsense syllables, calling it Surfin’ Bird. The band cut the disc over a record shop and passed it off as their own work because it was a medley of the choruses without the verses.
However the Rivingtons’ management reported it to their lawyers and the group were ordered to add the surnames of the Rivingtons to the credits, having the effect of causing the first pressings without the Rivingtons credit to become collectors items.
After the publicity surrounding the allegations in Billboard the Trashmen had to share the writing credits on not only this recording but a later one as a sign of good faith. Surfin’ Bird itself was revived in the 70s by the Ramones and the Cramps.
Video American Bandstand: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fruHQhNe-UM
The Trashmen – Surfin’ Bird/ Garrett 4002/ December 1963/ #4
The Trashmen – Bird Dance Beat/ Garrett 4003/ February 1964/ #30
The Trashmen began in 1962 as a Rock and Roll band. The line-up at that time was Tony Andreason: Lead guitarist and vocalist; Dal Winslow on rhythm guitar and vocals; Bob Reed, bass guitarist and vocals; and Steve Wahrer on drums and vocals. The group disbanded in 1967, reunited in the 1980’s, and continued to play together until the untimely death of Steve Wahrer. Some time after esophageal cancer claimed Steve in 1989, Tony Andreason’s younger brother, Mark, took over as drummer for the group. In 2007, The Trashmen joined the revival movement of the popular groups of the 60’s …with the original members.
The Trashmen’s major hit was 1963’s “Surfin’ Bird,” which reached #1 coast to coast in the United States and in Canada. They were #1 in Caracas, Venezuela for 6 weeks and are still listed as the top rock band of all time in that country. In Sweden, “Surfin’ Bird” came out of its cage, flying up the record play list to #2 and to #5 in Australia. Mexico called it “El Surf Del Pajaro por LosTrashmen” where it flapped its way to the top of the charts.
The Trashmen continued to release great follow up singles. In 1964, “Bird Dance Beat” reached #30 in The United States, becoming a mega hit in Brazil. In Canada, “Bird Dance Beat” was a top 10 hit, as well. The Trashmen went on to have 5 other charting singles and 14 albums.
In the time period between JFK’s assassination and the Beatles’ appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show, The Trashmen ruled teenage America: “Surfin’ Bird” was THE soundtrack of 1964. The Trashmen are revered as the #1 garage band of all time and the all time cult rock band of the mid 60’s. Garage rock is a raw form of rock and roll that enjoyed its original period of success in the U.S. and Canada from 1963 to 1967. In 1963, garage bands were all the products of local scenes such as The Kingsmen (Portland), Paul Revere and The Raiders (Boise), and The Trashmen (Minneapolis).
The Trashmen’s “Surfin’ Bird” LP album is recognized by 60’s collectors as the Holy Grail of garage rock. Their original Trashmen LP which originally sold for $2.88, as well as largely unavailable 45’s, are selling today on ebay for stratospheric prices.
“Surfin’ Bird” has been covered by many artists, including The Ramones, The Cramps, Sodom, and Pee-Wee Herman. The song has been featured in full feature movies such as Full Metal Jacket, Sleeper and Pink Flamingos. It has been heard on television commercials for Mervyns’s, Reebok and as a ring tone on Sony’s Erickson cellular phones. It has even been used in the soundtrack of the video game “Battlefield Vietnam”! Their “Bird Is The Word” was used on the popular TV series, “Moonlighting”.
In the November 2006 issue of Rolling Stone Magazine, “Weird Al” Yankovic said of Surfin’ Bird, “It’s everything that’s great about Rock And Roll distilled into one song.” | <urn:uuid:49b8edf5-1379-4129-9c00-c1387ac07060> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://strathdee.wordpress.com/2010/10/06/the-rivingtons-and-the-trashmen/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963279 | 1,345 | 1.53125 | 2 |
If you're feeling the need for more speed on the island's toll bridge, you just might get it.
Hilton Head Island Town Council on Tuesday signed off on a staff and committee recommendation calling for increasing the speed limit from 40 to 45 mph on the Charles E. Fraser Bridge on the Cross Island Parkway.
Council voted 6-1, with Councilman Lee Edwards opposed, to ask the state to increase the limit.
The limit would also increase on Palmetto Bay Road to 45 mph up to the Bridge Shoppes shopping center, just north of Target Road. The speed limit would remain 30 mph within the toll plaza and 35 mph approaching Sea Pines Circle.
Questions about the appropriateness of the speed limit have persisted since the Cross Island opened in 1998. The Greater Island Council wrote the town several months ago recommending changes be considered.
The town asked the S.C. Department of Transportation to review the limit in the late 1990s. The department recommended increasing it to 50 mph on the bridge and 45 mph for all of Palmetto Bay Road, but the council objected.
Today, council members argue the speed limit is too low for what the road is designed for. It encourages people to break the law and creates a perceived "speed trap" that leaves tourists with a negative image of the island, they said earlier this month.
No one spoke on the topic during the meeting. Edwards, however, said after the meeting that residents living off Palmetto Bay Road oppose a faster limit. They argue drivers would exceed the higher limit and put residents more at risk as they traveled to and from their homes.
Edwards, who lives off Palmetto Bay Road, shares their concerns. He worries increasing the limit would make it less safe for drivers turning left at the traffic signal at Point Comfort and Arrow roads.
"The road curves there, so there's limited sight, especially when vehicles are in the opposing turn lane," he said.
Town traffic engineer Darrin Shoemaker said the SCDOT has indicated it will approve the proposal. He'll submit a request in January, but was unsure when the new speed limits would take effect.
The Beaufort County Sheriff's Office has also said it supports the proposal. Officials there said a more appropriate speed limit may ease enforcement.
Council also directed the town manager Tuesday to find about $6,000 to install thermoplastic domes along the toll bridge. The domes would act as "rumble strips," alerting drivers who veer too close to bicyclists, joggers and walkers who use the bridge's shoulders.
Follow reporter Tom Barton at twitter.com/EyeOnHiltonHead | <urn:uuid:d1618a89-a32a-4616-9b39-86ee31667293> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.islandpacket.com/2011/12/20/1902767/hilton-head-council-oks-request.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964313 | 546 | 1.515625 | 2 |
DWP ‘Doomed... with pay’
Los Angeles Department of Water and Power dries up employee advancement opportunities, and shuts down morale.
Bias, hatred, inequity, injustice: All words derived from a term that is representative of a socioeconomic norm in today’s society—discrimination.
Seven years ago, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (DWP) spent $3.3 million settling employee accusations that the organization allowed racial discrimination and interfered in government efforts to investigate complaints. The emotionally damaged workers Augustine Serna, a Latino; and Kenneth Carter, a Caucasian— jointly filed a lawsuit against DWP alleging that the agency, through once fired and now re-hired Assistant General Manager Raman Raj and others, were “treating them like dogs in the workplace” because they both had African-American wives.
The allegations by both employees prompted the DWP to hire an outside law firm, which concluded that Raj had discouraged employee complaints of mistreatment. The firm recommended that he resign for the good of the agency, and Raj was forced out three months later.
But, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa seemingly ignored the past allegations of discrimination, and rehired Raj, 58, last December as the utility’s second in command, running the department in the absence of General Manager H. David Nahai.
In a recent televised DWP commission meeting, Nick Pastsaouras, President of the Board of Water and Power Commissioners leaked a comment oozing with discriminatory juices.
“The nominee of the Democratic Party is African-American. A woman came close to getting a nomination, but your gonna spend over a hundred-thousand dollars on teaching employees to deal with diversity, that’s an anachronism. We’re past the sins of the past.”
In a recent interview, DWP Commissioner Forescee Hogan-Rowles voiced that was shocked at Pastsaouras’s wayward statement, claiming that she would now have to re-evaluate the organization’s progression from a civil rights stand point.
“We have to define diversity as we mean it and we have to go back and figure out what the department really means, because I thought I knew until that comment was made. It threw me because I was thinking that we were making headway. I didn’t think it meant we needed to abandon anything,” Hogan-Rowles said. | <urn:uuid:48ce7766-6d3c-477f-bcfd-1520655254b0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ourweekly.com/los-angeles/dwp-%E2%80%98doomed-pay%E2%80%99 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965437 | 511 | 1.648438 | 2 |
The blockbuster "Cloud Atlas" will soon hit theatres across China. On Monday, some of the film’s cast and crew attended a press conference at the Great Wall Hotel in Beijing, including the three directors Lana Wachowski, Andy Wachowski and Tom Tykwer, as well as Chinese star Zhou Xun, who plays three roles in the film: a clone, a refugee, and a man.
"Cloud Atlas" features oriental philosophy
"Cloud Atlas" is based on David Mitchel’s best selling novel under the same name. It tells a complicated story of retribution and reincarnation. Director Lana Wachowski says she loves oriental culture, having been influenced by the Chinese novel "Journey to the West" in her childhood. Director Tom Tykwer also believes the film’s philosophy may be easier for oriental audiences to appreciate.
Lana Wachowski, director of "Cloud Atlas", said:"David Mitchel lived in Japan for quite a long time and married a Japanese woman. He and his book is interested in eastern and western philosophies are different and the same. In the west, the immortality is located somewhere else. You are in the world and there is the heaven and hell. But I prefer the Buddhism that our actions and consequences, our immortal selves are still based in this world. It helps you think about being connected in the world in the way the west often disconnect you from the world."
Zhou Xun on acting in English
Zhou Xun is a household name in China. Only last year, she had two blockbusters hit domestic big screens. However, as her first time performing outside China, she said she wasn’t quite used to the difference of language and culture.
Zhou Xun, actress of "Cloud Atlas", said:"The biggest difficulty for me is the language. My English is not very good so I’m very nervous when acting. I remember once Lana changed lines for me. I told her not to, because I’d been reciting them over and over. If you change them, my mind will be messed up. Lana then said her job was to mess up my mind."
Andy Wachowski, director of "Cloud Atlas", said:"While she was nervous, she didn’t seem like she was nervous. So you can tell she was good actor from that."
Wachowskis & Tykwer adore Zhou Xun
Zhou Xun spent one month shooting the film. She has three characters in the film: a female clone, a refugee with a western face, and a male manager. The three directors all voiced their appreciation of her work.
"We adore her."
"We adore working with her."
"Fans, big fans."
Tom Tykwer, director of "Cloud Atlas", said:"It’s a diverse sense of combination of roles we are offering. I think Zhou’s intensity focus in the parts help a lot to make that connection work."
"Could Atlas" tops China's overseas
"Cloud Atlas" is largest overseas investment for Chinese film companies. Of its 100 million US dollar budget, one tenth comes from Chinese company "Dreams of Dragon Pictures", ranking only second to Warner Brothers on the global investors list.
The film raked in around 27 million dollars in America’s box-office since it hit screens last October. With a 44 million overseas revenue, the film has yet to recoup on its initial investment. However, the film has yet to be released in a number of countries, including Japan, Britain and France.
"Cloud Atlas": A New Year gift
For the Chinese audience, "Cloud Atlas" will be unveiled on January 31st.
As the Chinese new year falls on February 9th, the cast and crew all believe "Cloud Atlas" will be a great new year gift.
During the press conference, the three directors learned how to say "happy new year" in Chinese, and extended their best wishes to Chinese audiences. | <urn:uuid:55ca905d-f404-49be-ab3c-826d872376d7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://shifu.people.com.cn/viewthread.php?tid=19444 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962833 | 830 | 1.5 | 2 |
by Ray C. Stedman
There is an oft-quoted prayer of an anonymous child who prayed, "Lord, make the bad people good and the good people nice." I think we all empathize with that prayer. So often it seems that being religious has a souring effect. We all know people who are undeniably "good" in the sense that they are moral, honest, upright, and truthful, but so often they are cold, rigid and unpleasant to be with, not nice at all. These are the kind who moved that child to pray that way.
If you are that kind of Christian, then you can be sure that you have not yet entered into New Testament Christianity. Such an experience indicates an incomplete Christian experience and, therefore, a counterfeit one. It indicates such have learned to put off certain negative things, certain wrong things, but have never yet gone on to put on the warmth and graciousness and love of Jesus Christ. You cannot read through the Gospel records without noting that the Lord Jesus was never gloomy or forbidding. People loved to be with him. Little children ran to him and enjoyed his company. Though he often felt deeply the hurt of others and so entered into the sorrows of men that he was known as "a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief" (Isaiah 53:3b RSV), yet he continually manifested a spirit of warmth and graciousness that drew people out after him. I have often wondered how many days of work were lost during the days of our Lord's ministry, as people would leave their jobs and homes and whatever they were doing, even sometimes without adequate preparation for lunch, to follow him and hear the gracious words that proceeded from his lips.
Now that same character is reflected in the one who learns to put on Christ. Being a Christian makes a definite difference in your life. It must. A true conversion is immediately evident in changed actions. There are certain things that must no longer characterize your living, as Paul makes very clear. This is probably the aspect of Christianity that is best known to the world. They know that Christians do not do certain things. As we read here in this 4th chapter of Ephesians, a Christian must no longer lie or steal or fly into a temper, a selfish rage, or indulge in rotten talk of any kind.
But Christianity is not merely stopping these things. That is the mistake of so many. Even Christians feel that if they stop doing certain things which are prohibited as wrong by the Word of God, this marks them as Christians. It does not at all. This is where so much negative Christianity has arisen and why Christians are often stigmatized as being against everything. We are all acquainted with the five taboos which Christians are expected to avoid: no smoking, no drinking, no dancing, no gambling, and no bad movies. But it is unfortunate if Christians are known simply for being negative. The world ridicules that and is not impressed by it. I remember as a young Christian hearing a satirical jingle concerning Christians like that. It goes,
Rootytoot toot! Rootytoot toot!
We're the boys from the Institute.
We don't smoke and we don't chew
And we don't go out with girls that do.
That is the kind of impression that the world gets of Christian negativism, a kind of simpering pietism that is completely wrong. The trouble is that such Christians have not learned to go on and put on Christ. As we have been seeing in Ephesians 4, we are not only to stop lying but to be positive, to put on Christ by speaking the truth in love with one another. That is quite a different thing. That opens up a whole new area of living. We are not merely to restrain our selfish tempers, but to seek the restoration of relationship with the one whom we have offended or who has offended us. There is to be a positive action. You have not acted as a Christian until you have sought out the one with whom you have a difficulty, and have made peace, if you can. We are not only to stop evil talk but we are to seek to speak positively, helpfully, and graciously in all situations. We are not only to stop stealing but to start giving. There is where Christianity begins to show itself. Now it goes even deeper than changed actions. In Chapter 4, Verse 30, the apostle goes on to show us that the presence of the Holy Spirit in a Christian must not only change his actions, but his attitudes as well.
And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, in whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander he put away from you, with all malice, and he kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. (Ephesians 4:30-32 RSV)
In that opening sentence the Apostle Paul puts his finger on the heart of the whole matter, "Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God." The key to all human behavior lies in man's relationship with God, not with his relationship with his fellow man. The latter is an effect which comes after the cause. The key is in our relationship with the God in whose presence we must live.
All of us, Christian and non-Christian alike, are daily embroiled in problems of human relationships. We have difficulties in getting along with people. There are those who irritate us, those who rub us the wrong way, those whose personalities clash with ours. There are those who are constantly sabotaging our plans by their thoughtless actions, and we react to them, everyone does. The world is giving a great deal of thought these days on how to deal with what the psychologists call "inter-personal relationships." They are trying as hard as they can, with all the wisdom they can muster, to get people to sit down and talk things out, try to understand one another, and thus create a spirit of understanding and sympathy. But the Scriptures always go deeper, always go to the heart of a matter.
The place to begin in solving our human relationships is not with other people but with our relationship to God. Our relationship with our brother will reflect our relationship to our God. It always does. There is always a vertical problem that must be taken care of first before the horizontal problem can be solved. So let us start with this vertical problem with God. "Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God." That is the place to start.
The word grieve here is a word that is related to love. It is impossible for you to grieve someone who does not love you, nor can you be grieved except by those whom you love. If someone who does not love you is offended by what you do, he is not grieved, but angry, enraged. Grief is always an indication of the presence of love. Therefore this word reveals that God loves us. The Holy Spirit is in us, as Christians, in order to help us, to bless us, to strengthen us, to teach us how to live. The activities that grieve him, therefore, are those that hurt us and harm us and therefore hurt his love. And why are we not to grieve the Holy Spirit of God? The apostle suggests a very significant reason: Because, he says, Christians are sealed by him unto the day of redemption. What does that mean? These reasons, after all, are not put here merely to fill up space. When the writers of Scripture add a phrase like this it has deep significance, it has real meaning. It is a challenge to us, as we read our Bibles, to think these things through and try to find out why he says such a thing. "Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, in whom [or by whom] you were sealed for the day of redemption."
A seal, as you know, is a protective device. It is designed to prevent loss or invasion. I spent part of my boyhood in a little town along the main line of the Great Northern Railroad in North Dakota. It was one of the busiest lines in the nation; trains kept coming constantly day and night along that busy railroad. We boys often played along the tracks and we early discovered that the railroad employed seals to seal their box cars with. They used a long aluminum strip with a ball on the end and a slit in the ball. When the free end of the strip was brought though the door and then fastened in the slot of the ball, there was no way to pull it out again. The box car was sealed for the length of its journey. It was protected from being broken into by that little aluminum strip which was designed to keep it until it got to its destination.
That is exactly the thought of this phrase here. The Holy Spirit is given to Christians to seal them, to guarantee that they will arrive at their, journey's destination, which is called here, "the day of redemption," the day of the resurrection of the body, the day of the completion of God's activity of salvation for human beings. You have this brought out very clearly in the first chapter of this letter, the 13th verse. The apostle says there,
In him [i.e., in Christ] you also, who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, which is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. (Ephesians 1:13-14 RSV)
We learn from this that the Holy Spirit has been given to everyone who believes in Jesus Christ. This is the mark of a Christian. This is why it is wrong to use the word Christian of someone who is not indwelt or possessed by the Holy Spirit. As Paul says in Romans 8, "If you do not have the Spirit of Christ, you are none of his," Romans 8:9). You may be a church member, you may have been religious all your life, but unless you have believed in the Lord Jesus and received the gift of the Holy Spirit (this is not anything you feel; it is the quiet taking up of residence within the believer of the Holy Spirit of God at the moment you commit your faith and trust to Christ), you are not a Christian. If this has happened then you are a Christian, born again, and the Holy Spirit has begun his residence within you.
Now Paul makes clear that he has done so in order to bring you to your journey's end, to bring you to the day of redemption. He will never stop his work. As Paul writes to the Philippians, "I am sure that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ," (Philippians 1:6 RSV). In the Epistle to the Hebrewswe are reminded in very clear, forthright language, "Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have; for he has said, 'I will never fail you nor forsake you,'" (Hebrews 13:5 RSV). The point the apostle is making here is that the Holy Spirit, in taking up his residence within us, does so permanently. Therefore, if you grieve him and offend him, though you might normally think that he would leave you, he has promised he will not. He will not leave you even though you hurt him, even though you grieve him, even though you disobey him. He will never leave you, that is the promise. But then you must live with a grieved Spirit.
Do you know what that is like? Have you ever sensed what it means to live with a grieved Spirit, the Holy Spirit within, grieved? Well, let me describe it to you. I am sure you will recognize it if you have felt this, as a Christian: There is, first, a sense of inward conflict, a tension develops, a restlessness. The Holy Spirit is pulling us in one direction but the lusts of the flesh, the desires of the self-life, are pulling us in another direction. You remember how beautifully this is described in Galatians. Paul says there is a civil war that rages within us. The Spirit lusts against the flesh, and the flesh against the Spirit, so that we cannot do the things we would (Galatians 5:17 KJV). There is a sense of turmoil, of tension, of restlessness. If nothing is done about it, if this goes on unheeded, we are no longer whole persons, we are divided against ourselves, we are fragmented.
Soon we begin to feel unhappy and depressed, joyless, heavy and listless. This is why Christians oftentimes drag themselves along to do things they know they ought to do. But we should not have to do that. Christianity is not intended to be a process of dragging ourselves, making ourselves do something God wants us to do, out of a sense of duty. The Spirit of God is described in Scripture as energy, energizing. In Paul's letter to the Colossians he speaks of his own ministry beautifully along this line. He says he is, "striving with all the energy which he [the Holy Spirit] mightily inspires within me," (Colossians 1:29 RSV). So the Spirit is a driving force, and there is something wrong, something is the matter, if we find ourselves continually having to make ourselves do something that we know we ought to do. No, the Spirit of God is designed to be a driving energy. When we are listless, lethargic, apathetic and lukewarm, it is indicative there is something wrong; we may be grieving the Spirit of God.
Furthermore, once this inner peace is gone we soon discover we are beset by fears and anxieties, worries, nameless dreads. There are Christians, unfortunately, who live whole years at a time in this relationship. They are haunted by fear. Read your Bibles and you will see that the one thing the Christian must not do is be afraid. The word of the Lord Jesus repeated again and again to his disciples is, "Fear not." Why? "For I am with you," he said. Fear not! "Fear not those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul," (Matthew 10:28 RSV). "Be not anxious," he said, be not troubled about things. When you see terrible things happening on the earth, when the nations begin to fall apart, when wars and rumors of wars spread across the face of the earth and men's hearts are failing them for fear of looking after the things that come upon the earth, what does he say to the Christian? Fear not! Lift up your heads and rejoice.
Now what he asks us to do he expects to energize us to accomplish, and he will. Walking in the Spirit means that we can fulfill these demands. And if we do not, if we are experiencing anxiety and dread and fear, it is a sign that we are grieving the Holy Spirit. "Perfect love casts out fear" (1 John 4:18 RSV), John says, and if there is fear gripping our hearts it is a sign that something has interfered with the flow of the perfect love of the Holy Spirit within us. That is why we are so cold and loveless toward one another, so hard. It is an indication something is wrong. The Spirit is like a fire and fire is warm and attractive. The Christian who is always cold and unpleasant to be with obviously has something interfering with the flow of the Spirit's love in his life. He has grieved the Holy Spirit. Let us go further: What is it that grieves the Holy Spirit? He tells us in Verse 31:
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, with all malice. (Ephesians 4:31 RSV)
Certainly, the wrong actions he has described before grieve the Holy Spirit, but they are relatively easy to spot. More subtle, and, therefore, more deadly are these wrong attitudes, the things we harbor within us that we do not let others see. We can cover these over with a happy smile or temporarily subdue them and keep them hidden by an effort of the will, yet beneath are bitter attitudes and wrathful feelings, anger, clamor, slander and malice. It is these which are grieving the Holy Spirit. Look at them: Bitterness, what it that? Well, that is a hard, cynical hateful outlook toward someone else. The word wrath means "rage," hotheaded passion, losing your temper, in other words. Anger is a related word that means an inward boiling resulting in a desire to punish somebody, to strike back, to seek revenge. The word for clamor here is a word that means "to shout, to rail, to bawl someone out." Slander is speech that is injurious to someone else -- gossip, rumor spreading. Malice is malignity, i.e., the desire to injure someone else. What a terrible list this is. Yet these are the things the Holy Spirit sees in us. You see how superficial many of us are in judging our own lives? We think because we keep out of trouble and stay within the law that we have pleased God. Not at all. As the Holy Spirit looks at us he sees these things that are shocking to him, grieving to him. We look at them and we justify them. But let us be honest and admit they are there, and often there, in our Christian lives. This is what is producing weakness in our Christian living, these very things.
They may be present in your heart right now. You may be boiling with rage at someone right now, you may be seething at some possible fancied injury or insult that someone said to you just this morning, your husband or wife, or someone else. Well, if so, put it away. That is the word of the Lord. Put away these things, let them all be put away. That means to repent of them, change your mind about them, stop justifying them to yourself, stop saying you have a right to feel this way, stop defending them. Immediately when you do this, an ungrieved Spirit within will release to you the love of Christ, the kindness of a God who, as the Lord Jesus himself said, "is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish." That is what Christianity is, tenderheartedness, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave us.
"Well," someone says, "you don't know what I'm up against. You don't know what so-and-so has done to me. If you were in my shoes you wouldn't be able to forgive, either. I can't forgive, don't ask me to." I have had Christians say this to me, "I just can't forgive this person." Now there is a sense in which this is true. You cannot, you really cannot forgive them. Why? Because forgiveness is Step #2 and you have not done Step #1 yet. You cannot take Step #2 until you have done Step #1, that is for sure. Number 1 is to put away this wrong attitude. There are always two problems involved whenever a Christian holds a grudge or feels resentment against someone else. There is the situation that caused your feeling, that is one problem. But there is a closer, more immediate problem, and that is your reaction to this, your attitude toward him. That is where the Christian always has to start. This is our difficulty. We always want to start with the problem that caused the situation, that caused our feeling. But God says, No, first remove the beam that is in your own eye, then you will see clearly how to remove the mote that is in your brother's eye (Matthew 7:3-4, Luke 6:41-42). Start with yourself, first. What is your attitude toward this other person? That is where you must start.
First, put away bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander and malice. Put it away. This is where the difficulty comes. When we get right down to that place we discover, oftentimes to our own shock, that we do not want to do it. We want to be bitter, we want to be vengeful; we enjoy it. We want to make people squirm. We want to make them crawl back to us and ask our forgiveness. We want revenge, that is what we are after. Why? Because if we talk to them about it, it will all be brought out in the open and the thing will be settled, and we do not want it settled. Someone senses our coldness, our inward fury, our silent, frozen attitude and says, "What's the matter?" And we lie, and say "Nothing, nothing's the matter." "Oh, I know something's the matter or you wouldn't act this way. What's the matter?" "OK, nothing!" Until finally we are driven to open up.
Why are we so reluctant? Because we enjoy it. That is what the Word of God reveals. These things are pleasurable to us, and this is where the problem lies. If we will obey God and put them away, then immediately the Holy Spirit who dwells within, whose task it is to give us that character of Jesus Christ which made him the worlds most attractive man, will immediately begin to release to us the tenderheartedness and the kindness of Christ and we can forgive as God in Christ forgave us. That is a wonderful measuring stick, is it not? Forgive, as God in Christ forgave you. That rules out such things as, "Well, I can forgive him but I won't forget." God forgot! It cuts out anything like, "I'll forgive him but I'll never speak to him again." God speaks to you again, does he not?
How did God in Christ forgive you? Have you forgotten that? That is what the Lord's Supper is designed to remind us of, how God in Christ forgave us. Think of it. He forgave you before you repented, did he not? He forgave you before there was any sign of turning on your part. You discovered that the moment you began to respond to him. His forgiveness was already there. You see this so beautifully in the parable of the Prodigal Son. That father's heart was yearning after the offending one, the son. He had been looking for him, watching for the slightest turning so that the father's heart of forgiveness could be opened up to that boy, and the moment he saw him a long ways off he ran and flung his arms around his neck and showed him his forgiveness.
Not only did God forgive us before we repented, be forgave us despite the hurt to himself. This is our problem. We say, "I know I should forgive, but he doesn't know how he's hurt me, and I can't forgive that hurt." Well, God did. There is no desire for revenge on his part. He does not try to pay us back for what we have done. He forgives it; he wipes it out. He forgave us completely, did he not? Is it not wonderful that God never gets historical about our sins? He is not forever bringing them up and throwing them in our faces. We shall never forget them, and that is quite right. Paul never forgot that he was a persecutor of the church. But God did. Now this is the word for us. This is where Christianity begins to be manifest. "Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you."
We are going to come to the Lord's table and this table speaks to us in very eloquent terms of how we were forgiven in Christ. We sang a little while ago of the wonder that we would ever be forgiven.
And can it be that I shouldst gain
An interest in the Saviour's blood?
Died He for me, who caused his pain,
For me, who Him to death pursued?
Amazing love! How can it be
That Thou, my God, didst die for me?
Perhaps there may be some who are even now harboring unforgiving attitudes toward someone else. The Word of God says if you come to the altar to offer a gift and there remember that you have ought against your brother, leave your gift at the altar and go and first be reconciled to your brother. Then come and offer your gift. You may not be able to do that physically at this moment, but if there is something in your heart against another you can go in spirit. You can put it away, you can forgive him, and then come and offer your gift of praise and thanksgiving unto God.
Dear Father, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. In Jesus' name, Amen.
Title: Forgive and Live
By: Ray C. Stedman
Scripture: Ephesians 4:30-32
Date: Unknown April - July, 1966
Series: The Christian in the World
Message No: 5
Catalog No: 123
Copyright: © 1995 Discovery Publishing, a ministry of Peninsula Bible Church. This data file is the sole property of Discovery Publishing, a ministry of Peninsula Bible Church. It may be copied only in its entirety for circulation freely without charge. All copies of this data file must contain the above copyright notice. This data file may not be copied in part, edited, revised, copied for resale or incorporated in any commercial publications, recordings, broadcasts, performances, displays or other products offered for sale, without the written permission of Discovery Publishing. Requests for permission should be made in writing and addressed to Discovery Publishing, 3505 Middlefield Road, Palo Alto, CA. 94306-3695. | <urn:uuid:2ddb1824-4093-449e-b5e1-31fb9e2b6738> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ldolphin.org/ephesians/0123.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97589 | 5,367 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Axminster rugs are beautifully patterned wool rugs that are woven in the most beautiful array of colors. Axminster
rugs were invented in England in the late 18th to early 19th century.
Axminster rugs were actually early attempts to reproduce the look of the
intricately hand-woven rugs which were very popular at the time. Axminster rugs
enjoyed success from the very beginning, for not only was this technique a great
success, they also were able to capture the beauty of their original hand-woven
counterparts. Axminster rugs are a truly unique blend of intricate designs and European flavor. They are
not only aesthetically pleasing, but are constructed in such a way to withstand
extremely heavy commercial traffic which makes them attractive for those in the
high-end hotel business. Now just think, if they will maintain their beauty in
these harshest of environments, they will do just fine in your family room or on
that spiral staircase.
Axminster rugs are produced on special looms that are able to
effectively reproduce the looks of even the intricate Chinese Oriental
designs. Their success is due in large part to a technique that combines
face pile yarns, warp yarns and weft yarns in such a way that the
finished product is one that truly has no rivals. The special looms
introduce the face yarn by way of spools that are threaded into tube
frames. The intricate look is achieved by the loom sequencing as much as
50 or more colors of yarn during the weaving process. The results of
this ingenious technique speak for themselves.
© 2011 FloorBiz, Inc. All Rights Reserved
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Flooring Info | | <urn:uuid:c9131f25-53c8-42b5-a7ed-71cc549daa68> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.floorbiz.com/arearugs/axminster-rugs.htm | 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 | 0.963737 | 395 | 1.65625 | 2 |
One of the most liberating pieces of advice I’ve received came during a workshop with Dayle Doroshow. As Dayle was demonstrating a process she said “And if you can’t fix it…feature it.”
How is that for a freeing motto?
How often have you made a mistake somewhere during the process of your creating? You look at what just happened and, perhaps after an expletive or two, you might claim defeat and toss the piece into the trash or add it to the pile of “I’ll fix it later” pieces.
Depending on the extent of the goof-up, you might be able to squish the clay and start over. Works on canvas can be repainted or get another layer of gesso.
But sometimes the goof up isn’t evident until the piece is finished. This happens to me periodically when making my wine bottle stoppers. The wood core is covered and all the edges sealed. Into the oven it goes and after it is cured and removed from the oven, then I see it…the dreaded air bubble.
Air bubbles on the stoppers typically result when the clay did not make adequate (that is, secure) contact with the wood core. When they appear, it is usually near a seam making the bottle stopper look like it has a wart.
Sometimes the air bubble can be removed and possibly repaired. More often than not, that isn’t the case and the stopper gets tossed into a pile for some reuse project. However, the other day the muse practically knocked me over with an idea.
Froggies or other creatures as embellishments to hide the offending stopper wart, er bubble. The structural integrity of the bottle stopper remains intact and now the stopper has even more personality.
Another instance where I’ve had to apply the “If you can’t fix it…feature it” motto happened to some pyramid shaped Santas. Originally flat on the bottom, I decided to give Santa a lift and added a pair of boots. Most of the updated Santas were fine but a few were a little tipsy. This is often part of the challenge when working with a triangular shape that is balanced on two feet instead of three. (Yes, creating a three-legged Santa did cross my mind.)
My first idea was to give Santa a devil tail or perhaps attach a bag of goodies that had spilled its contents. Instead, I came up with this:
Santa needed a quicker way to get around the North Pole. So he slapped on some skinny boards and started cruising around. Wouldn’t you know it, he got distracted by some elves building a snowman and found himself entangled in a set of Christmas lights. But he stayed upright the entire time!
So if you can’t fix it…feature it, work with it, adapt it, hide it, manipulate it; try not to toss it. See if you can re-invent it.
If you have a piece of art that you’ve reworked from its original design, send me the link and I’ll be happy to share it here.
And thank you Dayle for this great piece of advice. | <urn:uuid:ef99d175-0e88-4569-93be-f9f03950bfa9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://moonroommuse.wordpress.com/2008/11/25/tuesdays-business-if-you-cant-fix-it/ | 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 | 0.968046 | 671 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Instructions for Double Blanched Garlic Recipe
- Have a bowl of ice water ready.
- Remove the ends of the desired number of garlic cloves. In a small saucepan, pour in enough water to cover the garlic. Salt lightly and bring to a boil. Carefully drop the whole cloves into the water and blanch for 30 seconds.
- Remove the cloves with a slotted spoon and immediately plunge into the ice water to stop the cooking process.
- Repeat the process, again cooling the garlic by plunging it into the ice water. Drain the garlic and dry it well. The peels should slip off easily. Cut the garlic into slices and use as needed. | <urn:uuid:565d4ba0-3dc4-4726-90a5-7ab3e7f6bb2e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wolfgangpuck.com/recipes/view/6990/Double-Blanched-Garlic | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932372 | 139 | 1.695313 | 2 |
SUWANEE -- Gwinnett County Public Schools' Planning Department has updated four of the five maps reflecting proposed boundary lines for six new schools opening in August.
The updated maps, released Tuesday, reflect changes made after the Planning Department reviewed written input on the proposed attendance zones. The input forms were due Nov. 4, but the community will have another opportunity to comment on the maps at a public hearing Thursday evening.
The maps show the proposed boundary lines for six new schools -- Burnette Elementary in the Peachtree Ridge cluster, Ferguson Elementary in the Meadowcreek cluster, Jenkins Elementary in the Central Gwinnett cluster, Roberts Elementary in the North Gwinnett cluster, Snell Elementary in the Shiloh cluster and Midway Middle in the South Gwinnett cluster.
About 9,000 students at 29 existing schools will be affected by the changes. The attendance zones for two of the new schools -- Ferguson and Snell elementary schools -- will affect neighboring clusters.
When redrawing lines for a school attendance zone, school system officials say they seek to balance enrollment at the schools with the least disruption to communities.
Snellville resident Gary Magee said he was glad to see the updated maps reflect a change suggested by residents in his neighborhood.
"We offered them solutions," Magee said, "... and it paid off."
Magee, who addressed the Gwinnett County Board of Education last week about redistricting, also plans to attend Thursday's public hearing at the Instructional Support Center.
Magee, who has children at Magill Elementary and Snellville Middle, said the original proposal redistricted his neighborhood from Magill Elementary to Britt Elementary. The updated map will allow the neighborhood to remain in Magill's attendance zone.
Area residents worked together for more than a month to submit a recommended plan to the school system, Magee said.
"We want to let them know they made a good decision," he said.
Magee said he thinks it's critical for the school system to solicit input from parents when developing school boundary lines.
"The community involvement is something they can't measure," he said. "Those schools that have the parent involvement and the community involvement seem to always do better."
While Magee is happy the updated proposal will keep his family at Magill, he's also looking forward to being a part of the new Midway Middle School's attendance zone.
"I think it's going to be great," he said. "I think we'll have the opportunity to build (the school) from the ground up."
The Planning Department will consider input gathered at the public hearing before submitting final recommendations on school boundary lines to the school board. The board is scheduled to vote on the attendance zones in December.
The public hearing will begin at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Instructional Support Center at 437 Old Peachtree Road N.W. in Suwanee.
Speakers will be called based on the order in which they sign up that evening. Each speaker will be limited to three minutes, so large groups are encouraged to designate a spokesperson to deliver their input.
Detailed maps are available online at www.gwinnettdailypost.com and www.gwinnett.
k12.ga.us. More information about the public hearing is also available on the school system's Web site. | <urn:uuid:99d26091-b1f3-4a7d-80b1-b9c676ea76e5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gwinnettdailypost.com/news/2009/nov/17/schools-release-revised-redistricting-maps/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96565 | 693 | 1.570313 | 2 |
In a recent op-ed, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof cited an alleged “consensus” of foreign policy “experts” who believe it would be “abominable” at this time for Israel to attack Iran’s nuclear weapons facilities.
Among those whom Kristof quotes is W. Patrick Lang, a former head of Middle East affairs for the Defense Intelligence Agency: “Unless you’re so far over on the neocon side that you’re blind to geopolitical realities, there’s an overwhelming consensus that this is a bad idea.”
Echoing the broader points of these “experts,” Kristof writes that a military attack would set back Iran’s nuclear program no more than three years while escalating Muslims’ anger toward Israel and America and possibly inspiring Iran to sponsor attacks on American targets. He believes we should wait for economic sanctions against Iran to “work” — but toward what ultimate end he does not say.
So as we hear talk about military action against Iran, let’s be clear about one thing. Outside Netanyahu’s aides and a fringe of raptors, just about every expert thinks that a military strike at this time would be a catastrophically bad idea. That’s not a debate, but a consensus.
Observe that while Kristoff treats a consensus of security wonks as akin to an unquestionable axiom that renders all debate on the matter irrelevant, he downplays or evades the essential facts about the Islamist regime that warrant its immediate destruction. While Kristof and company support another round of toothless sanctions, the ruling mullahs and ayatollahs in Iran continue their more than 30-year campaign of terrorizing, maiming, and murdering Americans, hundreds if not thousands, from Beirut to Saudi Arabia to Iraq to Afghanistan. Just this month, security services in Azerbaijan arrested twenty-two people who reportedly were trained and hired by Iran to carry out terrorist attacks against U.S. and Israeli embassies and British oil company BP.
The State Department is aware of decades of such efforts, which is why it annually places Iran on the top of its list of state sponsors of terrorism.
For security experts and politicians in Washington to advocate mere sanctions against the Iranian regime is to relinquish their moral and professional responsibility to protect Americans against a deadly enemy.
By any rational standard, it is time to destroy not only Iran’s nuclear weapons facilities, but also the Iranian regime itself. If the U.S. government is too irrational to do anything about it, the least we can do is not dissuade the Israelis from acting for their survival. | <urn:uuid:8f1fcc25-bcc4-4379-97d6-ad8ab616e3e1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://theamericanindividualist.blogspot.com/2012_03_01_archive.html | 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 | 0.951922 | 553 | 1.507813 | 2 |
MISSION – City of Mission’s Community Development Department is seeking community input regarding city facilities and services needed. A key method the city is using to gather information about these needs is through an online survey available on the city Website, www.missiontexas.us. The online survey was launched earlier this month.
According to the city’s Website, the information gathered through the survey will be used to establish priorities for the use of federal funding, specifically for the Community Development Block Grant.
The Community Development Block Grant Program, or CDBG, is a program that provides communities with resources to address a wide range of community development needs. The United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, HUD, began the program in 1974. CDBG provides annual grants to local government and states.
In the City of Mission, the grant is most commonly used for housing. Through the survey, Jo Anne Longoria, Community Development director, is hoping to learn what other areas the community wants to see improvements.
Longoria said the survey will help the Community Development Committee decide what recommendations to take to the city council regarding how to spend grant monies within the community. Hopefully, the survey will identify some priorities besides housing.
Although community development receives funding annually, Longoria said they are targeting a five-year plan. Community Development will be presenting their five-year plan to HUD, due in August.
Survey takers are asked to answer questions by choosing highly need, need, not need or not sure. The survey questions cover a wide range of topics and areas such as community needs; water, sewer, drainage, streets; public service needs; community concerns; housing assistance; overall quality of life; and the importance of items such as number of parks, clean streets and lighting.
Some items under community needs are youth centers, parking facilities, performing arts facility, historic preservation, and law enforcement information center. Garbage pickup, water improvements, new sidewalk construction, and sewer improvements are under water, sewer, drainage and streets.
Public service needs include senior care services, domestic violence services, youth services, employment skill training, literacy program, and services for terminally ill, among others.
Topics under other categories include emergency shelters, clothing distribution sites, police presence in neighborhoods, public housing, new home construction, housing for elderly, asbestos removal, ease of pedestrian travel, recycling collection, down payment assistance, transitional housing, veterans services, and mental health care.
The end of the survey includes a comment box for survey takers to use for additional thoughts.
Longoria said while the survey addresses a lot of different areas the grant monies could be used for, other grants are available as well. By knowing some priorities of the community, Community Development can look at other resources to utilize to address those needs.
Other grants may be available through Texas Parks and Wildlife, Texas Water Development, and other sources, such as non-profits, which could help in other areas of concern. The survey will help the Community Development Department know where else to look for additional monies if needed.
Once the survey is complete, the department will tabulate the results and present the information to their committee. The committee will then make choices based on that information to present to the city council and mayor for approval of where monies will be spent in the community.
In addition, the Community Development Department plans to hold a public hearing in the near future to get more input from the community.
The survey will be available online through February, possibly mid-March. Paper surveys are also available. Call 580-8670 for more information or go to http://www.missiontexas.us/. The button for the survey is at the bottom right. The survey is available in English and Spanish.
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The Progress Times is the hometown newspaper for the local communities of Mission, Sharyland, Alton, Palmview, La Joya and surrounding areas in Western Hidalgo County. We have a staff of veteran reporters who work diligently every week to bring our readers the latest news as it affects their hometown area and people. | <urn:uuid:51d92bbc-db1f-49f4-9d6e-93661ba98b86> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://progresstimes.net/news/local-news/3343-community-development-asks-for-community-input.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93794 | 840 | 1.648438 | 2 |
by Mike Andrici, 1 year ago
As fans of the Galaxy S series are fully aware, Samsung is soon to release a new variant of the Exynos SoC (system on a chip), namely the 4412, expected to be first seen in…
Back in July, we mentioned that Hardkernel had released its ODROID-X development board. Like the Raspberry Pi, it was essentially a small computer, albeit one that ran on what were essentially the guts of a Samsung Galaxy S3. Now Hardkernel has three more ODROID boards on the way for developers and hobbyists.
The ODROID-U is the cheapest of the three, and runs on the 1.4 GHz quad-core Exynos 4412 chipset, which is the core of the Samsung Galaxy S3. The board also features 1 GB of RAM, 1 micro-HDMI port and 2 USB 2.0 ports. No onboard storage is included, but a MicroSD slot is provided. The board only measures about 48×52 mm, smaller than a credit card, and features an aluminum case/heatsink. The ODROID-U is the cheapest of the new boards, costing only $69. The release date is January 16.
The ODROID-U2 is identical in many ways to the ODROID-U, except that its processor is the 1.7 GHz Exynos 4412 Prime (the core of the Samsung Galaxy Note 2) and it comes with 2 GB of RAM. Despite the improved specs, the ODROID-U2 costs only $89. It will be released December 21.
The final board is the ODROID-X2, an upgrade of the ODROID-X that we talked about back in July. Like the ODROID-U2 it runs the 1.7 GHz quad-core Exynos 4412 Prime chipset and comes with 2 GB of RAM. The ODROID-X is larger than the other boards, but this increased size makes room for six USB 2.0 ports and a full sized SD card slot. It is the most expensive at $135, and releases on December 10. | <urn:uuid:904db9e2-e2dc-437e-ba39-5d516700d5e7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.androidauthority.com/hardkernel-odroid-developer-boards-135845/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941992 | 458 | 1.585938 | 2 |
Not that facts matter anyone more in the Iraq debate, but Nightline's report last night on Saddam's tape-recorded meetings, specifically the April/May 1995 one, is key to understanding the 2003 decision to invade. On the tape, Saddam's son-in-law, Lt. Gen. Hussein Kamal, briefs Saddam on his efforts to hide weapons information from UN inspectors. A short time later, in August, Kamal would defect to Jordan. His defection would fully expose the massive concealment campaign the Iraqi government had conducted of its weapons programs. UNSCOM chief Richard Butler told to the Security Council "that a program of concealment, run at a very senior level in Iraq, must have operated successfully for over four years without detection by the Commission." He added that with the defection,
[i]mmediately, the entire basis upon which the Commission was conducting its assessments and analysis was undermined. It became clear that Iraq's declaration of March 1992 was itself a fraud; everything had NOT been declared to the Commission; everything had not been destroyed.
From then on, the UN inspection team's conclusions on the state of Iraq's disarmament were to be solely based on "obtaining verifiable evidence including physical materials or documents; investigation of the successful concealment activities by Iraq; and, the thorough verification of the unilateral destruction events." In other words, Saddam had to prove he got rid of the stuff to ensure that he did not just stash it away somewhere beyond the eyes of the UN. Clinton Defense Secretary Cohen explained it this way in 1998:
[Inspectors] have to find documents, computer disks, production points, ammunition areas in an area that size [California]. Hussein has said, 'we have no program now.' We're saying, 'prove it.' He says he has destroyed all his nerve agent. [W]e're asking 'where, when and how?'"
Here's what UNMOVIC head Hans Blix said on the verification standard in late January 2003.
Resolution 687 (1991), like the subsequent resolutions I shall refer to, required cooperation by Iraq but such was often withheld or given grudgingly. Unlike South Africa, which decided on its own to eliminate its nuclear weapons and welcomed inspection as a means of creating confidence in its disarmament, Iraq appears not to have come to a genuine acceptance-not even today-of the disarmament, which was demanded of it and which it needs to carry out to win the confidence of the world and to live in peace.
As we know, the twin operation "declare and verify," which was prescribed in resolution 687 (1991), too often turned into a game of "hide and seek." Rather than just verifying declarations and supporting evidence, the two inspecting organizations found themselves engaged in efforts to map the weapons programmes and to search for evidence through inspections, interviews, seminars, inquiries with suppliers and intelligence organizations.
Blix also gave some concrete examples of the difficulty in verifying Iraq's disarmament without the active help of Saddam's regime. For instance,
January 27, 2003
The discovery of a number of 122 mm chemical rocket warheads in a bunker at a storage depot 170 km southwest of Baghdad was much publicized. This was a relatively new bunker and therefore the rockets must have been moved there in the past few years, at a time when Iraq should not have had such munitions…. They could also be the tip of a submerged iceberg. The discovery of a few rockets does not resolve but rather points to the issue of several thousands of chemical rockets that are unaccounted for.
March 6, 2003 | <urn:uuid:53796438-6a9c-494d-9a7b-ceb7fb7d6aa5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.weeklystandard.com/weblogs/TWSFP/2006/02/the_connection_between_the_spr.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979191 | 734 | 1.6875 | 2 |
Fighting HungerChildren's Hunger Elimination of Wilson actually formed in 2011.
However, during 2012 the group has continued to grow and gained its
nonprofit tax status. CHEW, which is made up of churches, individuals,
business leaders and school officials, formed after the group became
aware that the only full meals some Wilson County children received
were while they were at school. The group laid the groundwork and
established a backpack program to ensure children don't go hungry on
weekends and during school breaks. | <urn:uuid:80a6d69f-e435-495e-b4d2-942bee306029> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://wilsontimes.com/2012/vote/show.php?id=22 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.986906 | 105 | 1.617188 | 2 |
- Campus Life
- Cost & Aid
- News & Events
- About Plattsburgh
Our faculty and staff get to know and interact with students every day, and develop personal relationships that further enhance their well-being.
We want you to know we are here to care for each student and to serve his or her needs. In the event of a serious illness or injury after hours, the Champlain Valley Physician's Hospital and Fast Track Emergency Center is easily accessible only a few blocks away from campus.
We have a professional staff of physicians, physician's assistants, psychologists, nurses, administrative personnel. a medical laboratory technologist, two secretaries and a health educator. Services include diagnosis and treatment of common medical illnesses, care of students with more chronic medical conditions and a wide range of other medical and health educational services.
Students are required to carry health insurance. The College's mandatory student health fee supports direct health and psychological care services, as well as health education and outreach on our campus. It is NOT health insurance and does NOT cover the cost of x-rays, some laboratory procedures, referral to outside clinicians or medications not provided by the Center. Unfortunately, many of our students are discovering their health insurance plans will not provide coverage for routine laboratory tests or medications outside their home areas.
Parents and students are encouraged to contact their insurance/health care plans prior to arrival on campus to be sure students understand what type of coverage they have while at Plattsburgh State. For those students who are not covered by a parental plan or who desire supplemental insurance, a health insurance plan is available through the College. A booklet describing this plan is available at the Center.
All students are required to be immunized against measles/mumps/rubella. All students are encouraged to receive a yearly influenza vaccination, unless it is medically contra-indicated. Although influenza is generally a self-limiting illness, medical complications can occur. Also, influenza is often severe enough to keep students out of class. This can be disruptive during finals or when papers/projects are due.
Please encourage your son/daughter to take advantage of the influenza immunizations in the fall. Although meningococcal meningitis is extremely rare, there is evidence that students living in dormitories are at increased risk for this disease. The meningococcal vaccine can reduce this risk. Currently, the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention and the American College Health Association recommend college students consider vaccination against potentially fatal meningococcal disease. The New York State Department of Health requires all students enrolled in college sign a form in response to the availability of the meningococcal vaccination. This can be downloaded off the forms section of the website.
Students who do not want to have the shot MUST complete and sign the form and return it to the Center upon arrival to campus. Other more routine immunizations are also available at the Center.
We take the confidentiality of medical & psychological records very seriously. As you may know, confidentiality is mandated by law. We cannot release any student medical information to parents of non-minor children unless the student requests us to do so. We assure you however, that in case of a medical emergency where there is an issue of life or death, we will contact you immediately.
We hope that when your son or daughter needs our services, they will find them accessible and of high quality; but if there are problems, we want you to give us a call and let us know what we can do to improve. Also if you are in town and would like to take a tour, stop in and we will be happy to show you our facility. If your son or daughter has a special medical condition, we would like to meet them before problems arise; so please have them make an appointment to see one of our providers and let us get to know them.
Do not hesitate to give us a call if you ever need to communicate with us for any reason.
Location: We are located directly behind Saranac Hall and Macomb Hall. View Center hours and availability.
Center for Student Health & Psychological Services
State University of New York at Plattsburgh
101 Broad Street
Plattsburgh, NY 12901 | <urn:uuid:3fa786ef-0ac7-4f54-8c67-4e99037f3d8c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.plattsburgh.edu/studentlife/health/parents.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957841 | 854 | 1.515625 | 2 |
DETROIT (AP) - The federal government committed $25 million Friday to build a streetcar line through the heart of Detroit, putting in place the last piece of a plan bringing light rail to one of the few urban centers still without it.
The rest of the $140 million tab for the 3.3-mile streetcar line along Woodward Avenue will be funded by a public-private partnership with sizable donations coming from companies whose workers are commuting from revitalized neighborhoods to offices downtown. It remains unclear, however, whether the cash-strapped city will ever be able to extend the line into the poorest neighborhoods where better mass transportation is desperately needed.
Leaders have long said public transportation must improve for Detroit to grow. Light rail along Woodward, the primary business and commercial corridor, has been discussed for years, but hasn't been a priority in a city struggling with debt, violence and population loss.
Electric trolleys that once shuttled Detroiters around the city were torn up decades ago and replaced by buses as the Motor City bet on roads, not rails.
There have been 24 failed attempts over the past 40 years to develop a modern public transit system in Detroit, Gov. Rick Snyder noted at a morning news conference. "We're the only place that didn't have this," he said.
Detroit's public transportation has largely been limited in recent decades to a problem-plagued public bus system and the People Mover elevated rail, which many see as a symbol of the city's financial woes and mismanagement.
The People Mover was designed to take suburban residents coming into the city on a light rail line to spots downtown. But the light rail line was canceled during the Reagan Administration. The stand-alone People Mover opened in 1987, but without connecting train service, it had limited use and was widely seen as a waste of money. Under its current configuration, it makes 13 stops in a 2.9-mile loop of downtown.
While the bus system covers a wider area, residents complain of frequent breakdowns that leave them waiting an hour or more to be picked up, and Mayor Dave Bing, facing a deep budget deficit, has eliminated some sparsely used routes and cut back on hours of service along others.
U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood elicited laughs Friday when he announced that it was his 13th visit to Detroit. "Lucky 13," he said, but part of the reason the transit chief has visited so frequently and for so long without releasing any money was that he needed assurances that the state and city could uphold their end of the bargain.
That came in part last year, when the Michigan Legislature approved a long-sought regional transit authority for the Detroit area that will create a rapid-transit bus system and possibly expand the M-1 line north to Pontiac and west to Detroit Metropolitan Airport. The initial line will run from downtown to an area a few miles north that includes Wayne State University, the Detroit Institute of Arts and other cultural and educational institutions.
But the key component to making the M-1 line a reality was a commitment from Penske Automotive Group chief Roger Penske, Quicken Loans founder and chairman Dan Gilbert and other leaders from Detroit's business and nonprofit communities to raise more than $100 million to finish the project.
"We need to reach out into the neighborhoods to make the city better," Penske said Friday. "But we need to have a strong core, and this project will do this. This is going to revitalize economic development along this corridor. People are going to want to move their shops here, live here and it's going to bring jobs. And that's the most important thing. We need jobs."
Detroit could be the first U.S. city to pay for a major mass transit project in private dollars, although that has happened overseas in places like Tokyo, said Robert Puentes, a transportation expert with the Brookings Institution. Detroit also has precedent in the privately owned Ambassador Bridge, which links Detroit and Windsor, Canada. Those using it pay a toll.
Construction on the M-1 Rail line could begin later this year, with streetcar service starting in the fall of 2015. The route will include 11 stations and additional curb-side stops. A one-way trip would take about 15 minutes, depending on the time of day.
One remaining concern is that the M-1 line will serve only select travelers in Detroit, a sprawling city where many residents need public transportation.
U.S. Rep. Gary Peters said he recently rode city buses to talk to residents about their experiences and came away horrified by the lengths to which some riders go to get to work, school or elsewhere. He called it "a moral issue," and one that must be addressed.
To that end, LaHood promised an additional $6.5 million in federal funds to help improve city bus service and develop a rapid-transit bus network between downtown, the suburbs and key destinations in the region.
(Copyright 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
Oreo's new flavor is getting a ton of buzz. So we tried it.
The U. of Oregon is cracking down on a fan favorite.
Sage Moonblood, Pilot Inspektor, Diva Thin Muffin. The list goes on.
Don't look for the movie about Jodi Arias to be about her trial. (Video) | <urn:uuid:29e95639-3b62-4f21-be72-7bbba65e40e9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wtop.com/209/3197938/Feds-to-start-funding-Detroit-light-rail-system?nid=1229 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967005 | 1,120 | 1.789063 | 2 |
The Shariah-panic crowd is convinced of the far-fetched theory that American Muslims are involved in a sinister, secret plot to infiltrate American political institutions in order to establish Taliban-style Islamic law in the United States. But what if there actually was a religious ideology holding that only people of a certain strain of belief should run the government and were intent on replacing American civil law with their own religious views? What if two presidential candidates running high in the polls had ties to this movement? Surely the Shariah-panic crowd, with their unshakeable commitment to the separation between
mosque church and state would be alarmed right?
Michelle Goldberg explains this Christian influenced political movement, "Dominionism," does in fact exist and that Texas Governor Rick Perry and Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann are pretty cozy with it:
Now, however, we have the most theocratic Republican field in American history, and suddenly, the concept of Dominionism is reaching mainstream audiences. Writing about Bachmann in The New Yorker this month, Ryan Lizza spent several paragraphs explaining how the premise fit into the Minnesota congresswoman’s intellectual and theological development. And a recent Texas Observer cover story on Rick Perry examined his relationship with the New Apostolic Reformation, a Dominionist variant of Pentecostalism that coalesced about a decade ago. “[W]hat makes the New Apostolic Reformation movement so potent is its growing fascination with infiltrating politics and government,” wrote Forrest Wilder. Its members “believe Christians—certain Christians—are destined to not just take ‘dominion’ over government, but stealthily climb to the commanding heights of what they term the ‘Seven Mountains’ of society, including the media and the arts and entertainment world.”
In many ways, Dominionism is more a political phenomenon than a theological one. It cuts across Christian denominations, from stern, austere sects to the signs-and-wonders culture of modern megachurches. Think of it like political Islamism, which shapes the activism of a number of antagonistic fundamentalist movements, from Sunni Wahabis in the Arab world to Shiite fundamentalists in Iran.
Perry has ties to the Dominionist New Apostolic Reformation, while Bachmann was featured in a documentary produced by Truth in Action Ministries, whose founder Goldberg explains, has written that "it is dominion we are after. Not just equal time ... World conquest.” Don't call it a caliphate.
Association with an Islamic-oriented group with similar political goals would be enough to end some nameless government bureaucrat's career, let alone hamper someone trying to seek a major party nomination. But conservative enmity toward "Shariah" has always been selective, more rooted in religious rivalry and tribalism than any consistent commitment to secular democracy. While institutional barriers that make American democracy resistant to radical change and the unlikliehood that Dominionism could ever really reshape American society in its image, Perry and Bachmann have some serious questions to answer about their own beliefs about the role of religion in American society.
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(If there's one thing we know about comment trolls, it's that they're lazy) | <urn:uuid:d88df474-ceb4-4a6f-b313-946d94998c0b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://prospect.org/article/dont-call-it-caliphate | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951311 | 662 | 1.78125 | 2 |
During the week of Jan. 29, 2007, KCRA 3 became the first Sacramento area television station to broadcast local news in high definition. In addition to high-definition studio cameras, the station's news helicopter, LiveCopter 3 HD, became the only news helicopter broadcasting in high definition in the Sacramento area.
"This is an extraordinary day for Sacramento area television," said KCRA 3 and My58 President and General Manager Elliott Troshinsky. "HD has generated a new wave of excitement and enthusiasm in our industry. For the viewer, when they watch KCRA 3 Reports in HD, they will see local news in the Sacramento area like they have never seen it before. The pictures are stunning."
Throughout the years, KCRA 3 has set the standard for broadcast innovations in the Sacramento area. That long list of innovations includes being the first station to introduce live remotes and a news helicopter to Sacramento area viewers, and becoming the first station to revolutionize weather reporting by using Doppler radar.
"We know that viewers expect KCRA 3 to take a leadership role in this very fast-changing business," said Troshinsky.
Every KCRA 3 newscast is broadcast in high definition, including KCRA 3 Reports at 5am, KCRA 3 Reports at 6 a.m., KCRA 3 Reports at 5 p.m., KCRA 3 Reports at 6 p.m., KCRA 3 Reports at 6:30 p.m., KCRA 3 Reports at 11 p.m. and all weekend newscasts. In addition, KCRA 3 News at 10 p.m. on My58 (KQCA) will also be broadcast in high definition seven days a week.
LiveCopter 3 HD is a Eurocopter AStar with a multi-blade rotor system, single turbine engine and goes approximately 170 mph with the ability to fly more than three hours at one time. It contains the Cineflex High DEF camera platform, which includes four on-board cameras. LiveCopter 3 HD allows KCRA 3 to capture breaking news with more detail that ever before with sharper pictures and will continue to be piloted by John Hamilton and Dann Shively.
For more information on high definition, viewers can visit the KCRA 3 HD page on www.kcra.com. They will find definitions to HD related terms, answers to HD frequently asked questions, a KCRA 3 HD programming guide, and a Call 3 Consumer Guide to choosing a high definition television set.
KCRA 3 and KQCA/My58 are owned by Hearst-Argyle Television, Inc., which owns 26 television stations, and manages an additional three television and two radio stations, in geographically diverse U.S. markets. The Company's television stations reach approximately 18% of U.S. TV households, making it one of America's largest television station groups. Hearst-Argyle owns 12 ABC-affiliated stations, and manages an additional ABC station owned by Hearst Corporation, and is the largest ABC affiliate group. The Company also owns 10 NBC affiliates, and is the second-largest NBC affiliate owner, and owns two CBS affiliates. Hearst-Argyle also is a leader in the convergence of local broadcast television and the Internet through its partnership with Internet Broadcasting, and in the application of digital broadcast spectrum for new local informational services through its Weather Plus partnership with NBC and various NBC affiliate groups. Hearst-Argyle Series A Common Stock trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "HTV." HTV debt is rated investment grade by Moody's (Baa3), Standard & Poor's (BBB-) and Fitch (BBB-), each with a stable outlook. The Company's Web address is www.hearstargyle.com. | <urn:uuid:5f89bf87-9c42-45c4-a4cb-74c7eb0436cb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kcra.com/KCRA-3-First-Area-Station-With-Local-News-In-HD/-/11798090/12716682/-/a0xo0b/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950394 | 774 | 1.835938 | 2 |
Busted! Go To You Tube Copyright School
The copyright are out to get you. No really, they ARE out to get you. While the stealing of music has been going on for years, ever since Napster, video and photo piracy has only become a more recent issue.
Google, who owns the biggest video site in the world You Tube, came up with an interesting way of dealing with piracy. Google faces liability whenever people post video products owned by another copyright holder. While it’s a bit like traffic school, Google has developed a new cartoon to help you understand the difference between what you can and can’t post on line.
From this point forward, watching the video will be mandatory if a user receives a valid copyright notification. In order to upload any new videos, the user will also have to answer questions in a short quiz YouTube has created.
I don’t think it will make any difference to internet users. If You Tube blocks your account, there are plenty of other sources to upload content. This looks more like an effort by Google to keep the lawyers away.
Will it change how you post material on line? | <urn:uuid:182e093e-a7de-41ef-a342-bf89abd573d5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://catcountry1029.com/busted-go-to-you-tube-copyright-school/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957231 | 236 | 1.59375 | 2 |
New York City. Oct. 14, 1899.
To the Editor:
—Apropos of the departure for Europe of Dr. Doty, the health officer of the port of New York, to propose to the health authorities of Bremen and other places "a new method for the control of importation of infectious diseases to America," I ask that you print an article of mine which was published in Janus (Amsterdam, Holland), May and June, 1897, as follows: The following laws applying to emigrants should be, in my opinion, promulgated:1. Emigrants from leprous countries of Europe, like Norway and Sweden, should be visited by the medical officer attached to the United States Consulate at the port of embarkation. If the emigrant is of a leprous family, he should be compelled to leave his clothes and effects behind him, and rig himself out anew, submit himself to personal disinfection, and be reported as suspicious to | <urn:uuid:44ca3a40-901c-403f-b043-24b1a1acf155> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=476001 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971879 | 199 | 1.804688 | 2 |
IMF’s strategy for future economic recovery, by Tiwari
Against the backdrop of a still weak global economic outlook, the IMF’s work agenda for the coming months is designed to support bold policy implementation to secure the economic recovery and anchor the future—the key themes of Managing Director Christine Lagarde’s Global Policy Agenda presented at the IMF’s recent yearly meetings in Tokyo. The Executive Board’s semiannual discussion of the IMF’s work programme focused on translating the directions laid out in the Global Policy Agenda into a specific plan for the 188-member institution over the next twelve months.
In addition to supporting recovery from the global economic crisis, the work programme emphasises the need to both tackle legacy issues of the crisis—high debt, slow growth and high unemployment, and financial sector repair and to strengthen the international monetary system through regulatory reform for financial systems, and by addressing global imbalances and spillovers.
IMF Survey, the IMF’s online news magazine, spoke with Siddharth Tiwari, Director of the Strategy, Policy, and Review Department, about the key components of the work programme.
What is the IMF doing to secure the recovery and restore stability, a key priority in the months ahead?
The IMF’s efforts in coming months will focus on assisting the membership in dealing with the immediate priorities.
In the euro area, we will continue to engage with members to help build support for pan-European policies and to ensure the success of country programmes underway. The latter increasingly depend on supportive euro area-wide policies being in place. In the United States, our analysis and policy advice will continue to highlight the risks and spillovers from the fiscal cliff. In emerging market economies, the focus of our policy advice is on potential spillovers from outside. Where strong policy frameworks are in place, this could also include financing through either precautionary or disbursing agreements. In low-income countries (LICs), we are engaging proactively with members to help them weather adverse external conditions through intensive policy support, enhanced capacity building, and concessional financing. In the Middle East, we will continue to support the economic transition of Arab countries, through policy advice, technical assistance and financial support as appropriate.
A topic of much interest is how countries deal with high debt in an environment of low growth. How will the IMF take this work forward?
In many advanced economies, debt levels are over 100 per cent of GDP—a level last seen in war times. Bringing debt levels down, while not derailing or delaying economic recovery, requires action on two tracks: First, fiscal policy formulation and implementation. Many countries—including the United States, Japan, and other advanced economies—need to develop credible medium-term fiscal strategies and strengthen fiscal institutions to improve management of public resources. We are assisting these efforts through both policy advice in the context of our bilateral and multilateral surveillance as well as technical support where appropriate. Other work under way is designed to address specific fiscal issues—in particular, the energy subsidies that are a substantial drain on budgets in many countries while not necessarily achieving their objectives of protecting the poor.
Second, early identification of vulnerabilities. We are further enhancing debt sustainability analysis to capture the vulnerabilities arising from both the public and the private sectors and linkages between sovereign and financial risks.
The IMF is planning a study on the impact of the crisis on the conduct of monetary policy. What issues will this study address?
The unconventional monetary policies in place in several advanced economies have generated a number of important policy questions. The list is long: how to implement monetary policy in a context of widespread financial sector vulnerabilities and poorly functioning financial markets; what monetary policy tools are effective at the zero-level bound; what are the risks of prolonged monetary accommodation; how to exit from extraordinary monetary support; and how have such policies impacted other countries, such as the emerging market economies.
Strengthening financial systems is central to achieving a stable global economy. How will the IMF’s agenda in this area build on work done previously?
The IMF’s work in this area will be guided by the priorities established in the Financial Surveillance Strategy approved in September. The strategy has three pillars: improving risk identification and macrofinancial policy analysis; upgrading and better integrating the instruments and products of financial surveillance (such as Article IV consultations and the Financial Sector Assessment Programme); and increasing the traction of our financial surveillance.
A particular focus in the period ahead will be to enhance understanding and application of macroprudential tools—not only the tools themselves, but their interaction with monetary policy instruments. We continue to work with the Financial Stability Board and other stakeholders on the global regulatory reform agenda, including by analyzing potential unintended consequences of uncoordinated national initiatives, such as proposals to limit the size or activities of financial firms.
Unemployment is stubbornly high in many parts of the world. What is the IMF doing to help boost jobs and growth?
Global growth has fallen well short of the level needed to bring unemployment down to more acceptable levels, or even to just absorb new entrants onto labor markets. We need to see a recovery in growth that is both sustained and creates jobs.
The IMF has established an Interdepartmental Working Group, chaired by Deputy Managing Director Min Zhu, with the objective of identifying policies to support inclusive growth and articulating a Fund approach to growth and labor markets issues. Several papers have already been produced, including on Europe and other areas. Additional work on the determinants of long-term growth in the face of structural shifts in the global economy—demographic changes for example—is under way.
The crisis in advanced economies has garnered a lot of attention recently, but how is the IMF supporting its low-income members?
Many low-income countries have continued to see strong economic outcomes. But continued weakness in growth in the advanced economies and slowing growth in some of the major emerging market economies raise the risk of adverse external conditions at a time when many developing countries have limited policy buffers. The key role for the IMF is therefore to continue to support countries to design macroeconomic frameworks that will help rebuild policy buffers while supporting their development objectives including, for example, through strengthening financial surveillance to promote financial deepening and improving the management of natural resource wealth.
Fund financing will remain important for many poorer countries. All concessional loans extended during the crisis have, on an exceptional basis, been extended at a zero per cent interest rate. While we continue to refine our concessional facilities so that they best fit the evolving needs of low-income countries, a key priority is to ensure that financing is in place to provide for the long-term self-sustainability of those facilities. A strategy has been approved, with a key component being the transfer of 90 per cent of the envisaged distribution of $2.66 billion of gold windfall profits to the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust (or an equivalent contribution). An earlier distribution of $1.06 billion already received the necessary approvals from members, and we urge the membership to provide the necessary approvals for this second distribution.
What are the next steps in the IMF’s governance reform?
We are close to the completion of the 2010 quota and governance reforms—the requisite consents for the quota increase have been received and the required number of member acceptances for the Board Reform Amendment have been met, so that the reforms will become effective once acceptances have been received from members holding 85 per cent of voting power (as of November 9 we were at 69.4 per cent of voting power). We will continue to report monthly to the Board on the status of votes.
The reform of Fund governance—vital for ensuring that the IMF continues to be representative of the membership—is an ongoing process.
The next key step is the completion of the quota formula review scheduled for January 2013 ahead of the 15th General Review of Quotas, which is to be completed by January 2014. The quota formula review is well underway with Board discussions scheduled for the end of this month as well as in January. | <urn:uuid:78e34716-e128-4426-b289-48efba45aa33> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ghanamma.com/2013/01/imfs-strategy-for-future-economic-recovery-by-tiwari/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942376 | 1,644 | 1.5625 | 2 |
Everybody who's ever been to Disneyland or Walt Disney World has a favorite attraction. Mine has always been and will probably always be the Haunted Mansion.
Like the geek I am, I've always been interested in the origins of the Mansion, both in terms of its special effects and whatever sources were influences to its designers. I covered most of the FX in two articles I wrote for Storyboard Magazine way back in 1989 (under my real first name, Howard).
Specific influences, however, have been harder to confirm. I guessed years ago that the Hallway of Doors was based on a scene in Robert Wise's 1960 film, The Haunting. Just this year, one of the Mansion's designers admitted they studied The Haunting for ideas.
Now I've stumbled upon a couple of other possible influences, these from the '50s, that I never would have guessed. But they make perfect sense, especially to Imagineers who had been pimply-faced comic readers a few years before.
You be the judge:
Madam Leota's seance:
The caretaker at the graveyard:
Were these the inspirations for the Hitchhiking Ghosts and their mirror alcoves?
The Ghost Host (note the elongated angle and the portraits on each side): | <urn:uuid:3e746afb-040f-40be-889e-2d0cc51b0f74> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://takeanotherroadtoanothertime.blogspot.com/2009/10/tales-from-some-grim-grinning-ghosts.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974336 | 259 | 1.742188 | 2 |
RNC's economic impact pegged at $170 millionby Tim Nelson, Minnesota Public Radio
St. Paul, Minn. — One year ago, the Republican National Convention took over downtown St. Paul. Minnesota was hoping to get a $160 million kickstart for its economy from the RNC.
Organizers have now put a final pricetag on the convention's economic impact in a new report out today, and they say the number was higher than they expected -- $170 million.
When the convention was still in its planning stages last year, the city of St. Paul started what it called the Red Carpet Initiative, in an effort to jumpstart retail business in downtown ahead of the convention.
Ed Coleman was one of the Red Carpet participants. He opened the doors of his new optical store, the Spectacle Shoppe, three days before the Republican National Convention began. His store was just two blocks from the convention hall.
But his business didn't do very well during the RNC. In fact, he said he sold only one pair of glasses that whole week. Obviously, he was hoping for more.
The RNC, and the promise of thousands of visitors eating and shopping in St. Paul, was billed as the opportunity of a lifetime for downtown businesses.
Then the 8-foot steel fences went up around the Xcel Energy Center. Hurricane Gustav threatened the Gulf Coast, and protesters and police battled in the streets of downtown St. Paul, It was not the image convention organizers were hoping to show the rest of the world.
Yet a year later, Ed Coleman is still in business, selling vintage and fashion eye glasses in the Lowry Building downtown. It's one of the seven RNC startups still going. And his shop has actually expanded since the Republicans pulled up stakes last September.
"Of course, every time you want it to be better, and it could probably be better, but its doing well," said Coleman of his business.
In a nutshell, that's the economic impact of the Republican National Convention. It wasn't quite what anyone was expecting, but it turned out OK in the end.
How OK? Convention organizers say the final economic impact totalled $170 million. About 60 cents of every dollar went to pay wages to everyone from electricians to Web programmers to bus cleaners.
Dave Brennan, a marketing professor and co-director of the Center for Retailing Excellence at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, wrote the report. He spent three months following the money from the RNC.
He looked at at long list of factors in calculating that total, including such things as the cost of the convention complex; the production of the things that went into the convention; the office space; the technology and telecommunications; sales tax receipts; entertainment tax receipts; transportation and accomodations.
Brennan added it all up, then used a multiplier to calculate secondary spending, to get the $170 million total.
That's more than the $160 million or so organizers predicted they'd get, but quite a lot less than the estimated $266 million impact of the Democratic Convention in Denver last summer, which was held the week before the RNC.
But both 2008 convention host communities did a great deal better than Boston, which hosted the Democratic Convention in 2004 and netted a mere $14 million.
Estimating economic impacts of big events is an inexact science.
Brennan says he used a financial model favored by Minnesota's Department of Employment and Economic Development -- which is more conservative than the model used in Colorado.
It's also hard to know, for example, what might have been spent without the Republican convention. And some places, like restaurants in the shadow of the Xcel Energy Center, were hurt by tight security.
But local backers say the math isn't finished on the impact of the Republican convention. They say the attention the Twin Cities received -- from news programs and bloggers and cable TV -- will have a lasting impression that can't be bought.
"It really built our resume as a community," said Erin Dady, marketing director for the City of St. Paul.
"As we go to pitch future events for years to come, we can say we hosted the second biggest event in the world," said Dady. "That's already been helpful to our community in pitching events like the Cirque de Soleil, or the dentists' convention that comes to the RiverCentre. It gives great confidence to the community, and also to people deciding where to bring their event."
Convention organizers say they expect see some of last year's visitors come to the area again.
Jeff Larson was CEO of the host committee that organized the RNC. He says the convention left behind lasting business ties.
"I've heard a number of cases where the companies that participated and were contributors to the convention found lasting effects, even today, as they deal with people from different states that they entertained or worked with or met while they were here," said Larson.
Larson says he expects to wrap up this year with a small surplus, possibly as much as $5 million. He says Republicans hope to donate that money to several Minnesota foundations.
- Morning Edition, 09/01/2009, 7:20 a.m. | <urn:uuid:924db413-b25b-4f94-b42b-154c600b8ece> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2009/08/28/rnc-impact?refid=0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976727 | 1,074 | 1.703125 | 2 |
By John Toscano
Fight For Lower Rx Costs
Continues; MetroCard Bus Sked
While recent reports from Washington say President Bill Clinton and the pharmaceutical industry may be on track in agreeing on a plan to help relieve seniors of their prescription drug burden, local lawmakers continued to pound on the issue of high drug costs for seniors.
Last Friday, Congressmember Joseph Crowley (D–Elmhurst) and Assemblymember Ann Margaret Carrozza (D–Bayside) conducted a forum in Whitestone, where the main complaint aired was that seniors pay, on average, more than twice as much for drugs than the drug industry charges "preferred" customers, such as hospitals, (HMO’s) Health Maintenance Organizations and the federal government.
Meanwhile, Congressmember Anthony Weiner (D–Brooklyn/Queens) issued the results of a study which showed, among other things, that dog owners pay $6.36 for a month’s supply of the heart failure drug Lanoxin for a sick pet while humans pay $25.65 for a month’s supply of the same drug.
Weiner said the situation was the same with other drugs used by both humans and animals and gave detailed examples of the unequal costs. He stated that "over 13 million seniors pay entirely out–of–pocket for expensive prescription drugs while dogs and cats get popular medicines for a song."
Both Weiner and Crowley are supporting legislation to provide some government subsidy to seniors to cover some of their drug costs.
At the Crowley–Carrozza forum at the Greater Whitestone Civic Association Senior Center, the two legislators also discussed the solvency of Medicare and Social Security and crimes against seniors. Crowley is sponsor of a bill aimed at strengthening federal laws against elder abuse. This would include background checks for people who work in nursing homes, health agencies and hospice care programs.
Weiner is co–sponsor of a bill which would extend Medicare to partially cover prescription costs. It would cover 80 percent of generic drugs costs and 90 percent of sole source medications and require beneficiaries to pay a $250 yearly deductible. President Clinton has announced his own proposal to cover prescriptions under Medicare and it also requires seniors to pay a premium.
Attesting to the high costs seniors pay for lifesaving prescription drugs, the AARP says a study it did shows seniors spent "on average about a fifth of their income on health care" and about the same for prescription drugs. The problem is even worse for low–income seniors who don’t qualify for Medicaid; this group spends about half their income on health care expenses, the AARP says.
METROCARD HELP:New York City Transit has issued its February schedule for the MetroCard Bus/Van visits to neighborhoods throughout Queens. Seniors and persons with disabilities may apply there for the reduced fare MetroCard or get applications to receive a card.
Applicants must present photo identification and proof that they are 65; persons with disabilities must have a valid Medicare card and also a valid federal/state issued photo ID in order to be immediately processed. Any disabled persons without a Medicare card must have their doctor complete the physician’s section of the application. Beside applying for a new card, anyone may add value to their current MetroCard. Heres the schedule:
Forest Hills:71st (Continental) Ave. and Queens Boulevard; Tuesdays, Feb. 1st and 15th, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. both days.
Rego Park:Queens Boulevard and 63d Road; also Feb. 1st and 15th, 2 to 3 p.m. both days.
Jamaica:United Cerebral Palsy 81–15 164th Street off Goethals Avenue; also Feb. 4th and 18th, from noon to 1:30 p.m.
Maspeth:Grand Avenue and 69th Street, also Thursday, Feb. 10th, 1 to 3 p.m.
Bayside:Bay Terrace Shopping Center, Bell Boulevard and 24th Avenue; also Feb. 14th and 28th, 9:30 to 11:30 a.m.
Queens Village:(SNAP of Eastern Queens, 80-45 Winchester Boulevard, Bldg. Number 4; Friday, Feb. 18th, 9 to 10:30 a.m.
Kew Gardens:Queens Borough President’s Office, 120-55 Queens Blvd.; Monday, Feb. 29th, 10 a.m. to noon.
NUTRITION EDUCATION:In an effort to maintain a continuing focus on nutrition education, the Middle Village Adult Center at 69-10 75th St., Middle Village, is offering "Nutrition Education 2000," a program of talks spread over the next five months.
Conducting the program will be Mindy Rosenthal, a teacher, and her next scheduled talk is Thursday, Feb. 17th on "Food Labels: What Do They Mean?" The following Thursdays at 11:15 a.m., the schedule is: Mar. 16th, "Vitamins and Supplements: Do They Really Help; Apr. 6th, "The Latest on Herbal Supplements;" May 18th, "How to Cook for One—and Enjoy It;" and June 15th, "Weight Management—Don’t Go Overboard In Either Direction."
HELPING FRAIL SENIORS:The Adult Day Services Program at the Forest Hills Community House, 108-25 62d Dr., Forest Hills, is looking for volunteers to work with mentally and physically frail seniors in a non–institutional setting.
The program, supervised by Naomi Altman, offers structured support to that group of elderly who would otherwise be homebound and alone. Volunteers help the program members with arts and crafts, escort them on trips to cultural events movies and museums, and assist them with social activities and game sessions.
For information, call Billy Wong or Dennis Redmond at (718) 592-5757, ext. 223.
SELFHELP ACTIVITIES:Entertainers Jack Hyman and Myrna Lope will perform today, Thursday, Jan. 27th at 1:15 p.m. at the Selfhelp Austin Street, Senior Center, 106-06 Queens Blvd., Forest Hills. Also on the entertainment menu here: Wednesday, Feb. 16th at 1:15 p.m. a concert sponsored by Trinity Church.
On the serious side, Regine of Cornell University will give a talk on nutrition on Tuesday, Feb. 22d; and on Thursday, Feb. 24th, there’ll be a talk on the EPIC discount prescription drug program at 11 a.m.
The center will be open on Sunday, Feb. 27th for a surprise program. For information, call (718) 520-8197.
AEROBICS:Stay in shape with the aerobics classes offered to all seniors on Tuesdays from 9 to 10 a.m. and Thursday from 10 to 11 a.m. at the Rego Park, Senior Center. (Lost Battalion Hall) at 93-29 Queens Blvd., Rego Park. | <urn:uuid:a00e089f-aa42-4048-8550-1dcae9b1fb21> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.qgazette.com/news/2000-01-26/Senior_page/Senior_Spotlight.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936582 | 1,476 | 1.695313 | 2 |
There's just so much wrong with that idea that I decided to make a list. Note that this doesn't even *approach* being a comprehensive list.
1. Enormous things get built by private enterprise all the time. On spec. Even with our enormous bloated government draining the economy. So money is not the problem.
2. If there is money to be made but not enough for your grandiose bridge project, private enterprise will come up with SOME kind of solution. Maybe not as scenic.
3. The government (via tons of building and environmental regulations, among other things) is generally the force *preventing* huge undertakings from going forward. See: nuclear power or gas pipelines or oil drilling. So looking to government "leadership" probably means that you didn't want that bridge built in the first place.
4. Said government "leadership" has no incentive to provide infrastructure that is actually well-designed and well-placed. As such it is generally inefficient and wastes most of the money it uses.
5. Government money is taken by force from the very people you claim can't make enough profits to do this on their own. Huh, I wonder if a crushing tax burden coupled with rising inflation has anything to do with that. | <urn:uuid:d4f29339-73b9-46c2-a80e-8d3edfa257d6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://literatrix.blogspot.com/2011/08/really-really.html?showComment=1313506266857 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974991 | 261 | 1.5625 | 2 |
Highgate to take on backyard ranges
Voters to discuss nonbinding article on Town Meeting Day
Town Meeting Day voters will be asked whether they support an advisory, nonbinding ordinance to regulate recreational target shooting in certain neighborhoods.
The vote is a recommendation for the selectboard and would not become law if passed.
Instead, the panel would have to decide what to do next, move forward with an ordinance or leave it alone all together.
Vermont law prohibits communities from regulating gun licenses of ranges, but towns can step in and set rules for when firearms can be discharged.
The article on the table in Highgate would regulate the sport shooting “on residential properties accessed or physically bordering Monument Road, Tanglewood Drive, Jedware Circle, [and] Penny Lane,” and within 1,000 feet of Highgate Elementary School and the Missisquoi Valley Union school.
“Bullets are leaving people's property and we don't want people to get hurt,” said Vern Brosky III. “We don't want houses to get shot.
Brosky, a recreational shooter himself, proposed the nonbinding article after learning houses were getting shot in Highgate from unregulated backyard ranges.
“Many of the people on the petition are gun owners,” Brosky said. “This is all about safety.”
Discussion about the proposed ordinance escalated when teachers and students reported hearing shots at the elementary school. Federal law already makes it a crime to knowingly bring a gun on to school property.
Hunting and self-defense shooting would still be allowed under the ordinance.
Brosky led members of the selectboard through some backyard ranges Saturday. The property owners said they are playing it safe, but Brosky pointed out what he said were bullet holes on a silo on one property, less than a half-mile from the ranges in question.
Also on hand Saturday was Clint Gray, president of the Vermont Federation of Sportsmen’s Clubs. He checked out the alleged bullet holes and also looked at the ranges for safety.
Gray said he could not be sure whether the holes on the silo were in fact from a bullet. One shooting range owner said they looked more like air pockets that had burst.
“I can't tell you that they did 100 percent,” Gray said about bullets hitting the silo, “but I definitely can't tell you that there wasn't one or two that went through there.”
Gray did it is up to land owners to make sure bullets stay on their property. He noted the 2008 case of Joseph McCarthy, the Essex, Vt., man convicted in the death of his neighbor.
A stray bullet from McCarthy’s property killed John Reiss, who was sitting down to dinner. McCarthy was sentenced to two years in prison.
“The responsibility is that once the projectile leaves that firearm, it's there's,” Gray said about who is accountable on the backyard ranges. “It doesn't necessarily mean that they're the ones pulling the trigger,” he said.
Gray also said some of the ranges were set up in such a way that bullets could deflect off of trees or tires.
One backyard range owner said her family has lived in the area for nearly two decades and has never received any complaints.
In the meantime, Gray suggested those with makeshift ranges invest in backstops meant to make sure bullets will not go where they are not meant to.
For Brosky, he said the backyard ranges are dangerous and a commercial gun range is just a few miles away.
“It's well worth the cost, versus accidentally shooting somebody because your range is inadequate,” Brosky said.
A selectboard member said they will wait to see what happens during Town Meeting on Tuesday, but it’s more likely they would do something about noise complaints than anything else.
Brosky said his proposal has nothing to do with Second Amendment rights, but added a counter petition about gun rights is also making its way through town.
In neighboring Swanton, an ordinance bans the discharge of a firearm in residential areas.
Copyright 2013 by WPTZ All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. | <urn:uuid:25d29aba-94fc-4baa-97e9-7e85a311872f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wptz.com/news/vermont-new-york/burlington/Highgate-to-take-on-backyard-ranges/-/8869880/19153718/-/view/print/-/g5wqxh/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976932 | 879 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Virtues have to be practised till they become your nature. Friendliness, compassion and meditation should continue as practices till you realise that they are your very nature.
The flaw in doing something as an act is that you look for a result. When......Read More
Virtues cannot be cultivated. You have to assume that they are there.
In the Gita, Krishna said to Arjuna, "Grieve not Arjuna, you are born with virtues."
The seeker should remember that he is born with virtues; otherwise he could not have......Read More
The Subtle Truth About Virtues
If we observe our behavior, we procrastinate doing something good but we are in a hurry when it comes to doing something bad. For example if we are angry we want to express it immediately and not wait.
Do you know WHY? Because virtues are your very......Read More | <urn:uuid:1681713a-f0a0-4974-8100-5cc38695fd98> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.artofliving.org/ks-en/knowledge-sheet-search/virtues | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957335 | 184 | 1.789063 | 2 |
« Gunner-Up 1Ls If You Want to Try to Transfer to Yale Law School Next Year | Main | "Partisanship seems to have strongly diminished the opportunities for bipartisan overridings of Supreme Court cases, in which Democrats and Republicans come together to reverse the Supreme Court." »
August 27, 2012
E-Textbook Study Shows Promising But Mixed Results For Mass Use
The Chronicle of Higher Education reports on a study conducted by Internet2 that had tested the use of e-textbooks by students at major universities. The faculty and students used textbooks provided by McGraw-Hill and Courseload to deliver the content to students. Students were charged a materials fee rather than requiring them to purchase a book. The major findings of the study included:
- Only a minority of users elected to purchase a paper copy (12%).
- The lower cost of an eTextbook was considered the most important factor for students considering future purchase of an eText.
- The portability of eTexts also ranked very high as a factor leading to future purchase.
- Other important factors in future eText purchases included that it should be accessible without an internet connection and available throughout a student’s academic career, not just for a semester.
- Difficult readability of the text (e.g., difficult zoom feature) was mentioned numerous times by students as well as lack of native functionality on tablets such as the iPad.
- Faculty, for the most part, did not report using the enhanced eText features (sharing notes, tracking students, question/answer, additional links, etc.) and indicated the need for additional training.
- Because faculty did not use the enhanced features students saw little benefit from the eText platform’s capability of promoting collaboration with other students or with the professor.
The report seems to indicate that the implementation of e-textbooks still has a way to go before students are completely comfortable with them. As much as the students were enthusiastic about saving money and taking advantage of the perceived convenience of e-textbooks, everyone has to buy into the concept to make the delivery system work. We’ve all heard how online textbooks can utilize interactive and collaborative features for a class. It seems as if most faculty members in the study did not use these features which left the student users wanting. This may have been a training issue. One other major point is that despite being available on multiple platforms and devices, the smallest of these, smart phones, were less than optimal devices for content delivery. Of course, we wouldn’t know any of this without actually testing the impact of content, utility, and delivery systems on real students in real courses.
The full study is available here, and worth a read by anyone contemplating using e-textbooks in a production environment. [MG]
As we know how high college expenses are with textbooks making a quarter of your tuition costs, cheap textbooks is a great alternative. The more inexpensive your textbooks are the more money is left to yourself.
Posted by: Books | Sep 19, 2012 3:49:29 AM | <urn:uuid:a3770548-94b4-4820-95f7-57a81dc1d1dd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/law_librarian_blog/2012/08/e-textbook-study-shows-promising-but-mixed-results-for-mass-use.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960177 | 631 | 1.585938 | 2 |
From the moment he was conceived in an artist’s studio, Rio Yañez’ fate as an artist was sealed. Born and raised in San Francisco’s Mission District, Yañez is a curator, photographer, and graphic artist. As a curator he is a frequent collaborator with his father, Rene Yañez, and the pair have been developing exhibits together since 2005. he has exhibited in cities ranging from San Francisco to Tokyo. His reimaginings of Frida Kahlo have included the Ghetto Frida Project, a series of prints, writings, and performance pieces featuring a thugged-out Kahlo. Yañez is also a founding member of The Great Tortilla Conspiracy, the world’s most dangerous tortilla art collective. Yañez currently works at the South of Market Cultural Center (SomArts) as a curator and manager.
My primary interest, as an artist, is in combining icons and mythologies. As a child growing up Chicano I was often frustrated that Chicano art and iconography rarely intersected with my personal mythologies of comic books, pro-wrestling, music, and Godzilla movies. My images bring together my heroes, friends, and childhood fantasies with Chicano aesthetics, traditional images, and politics. They are a fulfillment of my childhood yearnings and an exploration of my relationship to the worlds I walk between.
Appearances in works by other artists
Rio Yañez has been featured in artworks and projects by a variety of artists. Throughout his infancy and childhood he was a frequent subject of painter Yolanda M. Lopez. During his time at Calarts, Yañez was featured in Shizu Saldamando’s Looking at Art video project. He has been photographed by Harry Gamboa Jr. as part of Gamboa Jr.s Chicano Male Unbonded series. Chilean artist Mabel Negrete has featured him in two of her performance projects, Changing Places Changing Bodies and Wanna be Black, Wanna be White. Most recently, Rio Yañez was included in muralist Mona Caron’s mural on 24th and Sanchez streets in San Francisco. He is depicted walking down 24th street, past El Trebol, in the city’s Mission District.
My illustrated guide to San Francisco’s Mission District, My Mission, can be purchased in stores throughout the Mission District and online from Mission Loc@l.
Both of my zines Peligroso Pop and The Ghetto Frida Reader come in and out of print and can be purchased by contacting me. | <urn:uuid:eb802cdf-0e03-4bcd-99ef-f6da493e4261> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://rioyanez.com/about/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=dce388a063 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972595 | 535 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Loui Jover, a Queensland based artist has created jolting artworks. He used pen and dripping ink as the medium and created the paintings on pages of books that are hard to find. His drawings demonstrate the emotions of human beings and he has chosen a woman to portray them. But Jover didn’t only create emotional artworks. He is quite adept at creating romantic moments through painting using faceless beings. But he demonstrates powerful works where his ink falls at the right place. The ink flow creates small but noticeable tears which fall from depressed woman’s face.
Just to add a bit of fragile feeling to his works, Jover has picked vintage type books to draw on. He fusionizes the words with his paintings and creates just the perfect image. He says it adds a certain type of backstory to the images. It adds the depth to the images which beautifies them even more. | <urn:uuid:6d38eb45-cad3-4f75-8add-d4f49f87e0e6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://creativegreed.com/pen-and-ink-drawing-on-books.html | 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 | 0.96648 | 184 | 1.632813 | 2 |
By popular request, I have finally written a usable Table of Contents that lists every article the Cooking For Engineers contains. Hopefully, this will help everyone navigate the site a bit easier and find what you're looking for all in one location.
If there are any bug or errors please send me details at email@example.com so I can fix it. Also, I'll probably be adding a few more filters/sorting mechanisms to the Table of Contents in the future, but for now it will probably stay the way it is.
A few of you may remember that I blamed blogger for not providing a way to automatically produce a master index or table of contents of all articles. Well, they still haven't written back to me and it doesn't look like they have any way of generating a master index. So, I wrote the table of contents script to work on a MySQL database that I have to maintain separately from the blogger based postings (until such time as I move off blogger and onto a custom CMS), so don't be surprised if there's some delay between my posts and getting the article onto the table of contents. I'll try to get into the habit of updating both at the same time, though.
Have fun everyone! | <urn:uuid:f2ed5517-6e38-459f-bdb8-14807378ade3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cookingforengineers.com/article/54/Table-of-Contents | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952428 | 255 | 1.5 | 2 |
Misinformation and the 2010 Election - A Study of the US Electorate. The key findings of the study are:
1. Perceptions of Misleading and False Information An overwhelming majority of voters said that they encountered misleading or false information in the last election, with a majority saying that this occurred frequently and occurred more frequently than usual.
2. Evidence of Misinformation Among Voters The poll found strong evidence that voters were substantially misinformed on many of the issues prominent in the election campaign, including the stimulus legislation, the healthcare reform law, TARP, the state of the economy, climate change, campaign contributions by the US Chamber of Commerce and President Obama’s birthplace. In particular, voters had perceptions about the expert opinion of economists and other scientists that were quite different from actual expert opinion.
posted by caddis
on Dec 19, 2010 -
With newly released video, Rachel Maddow
shows that the Fox News/Breitbart/James O'Keefe takedown of ACORN in California was fraudulent. For example, coverage depicted ACORN employee Juan Carlos Vera as eager to participate in a pedophile prostitution ring suggested by O'Keefe's character. In fact Vera had reported O'Keefe to police. Nevertheless, Vera was fired, and months later ACORN was dissolved. (Previously: 1
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94
on Apr 8, 2010 -
CNN Wins Ratings for Shuttle Coverage
Despite the absence of chief anchor Aaron Brown, CNN scored a significant ratings victory over rival Fox News Channel on Saturday when the space shuttle Columbia disintegrated
Reading that immediately reminds me of what I hate about the news media.
One can only imagine how they are salivating over the pending Iraq situation.
posted by a3matrix
on Feb 4, 2003 -
A pinhead editorial writer's adventure in the No Spin Zone.
Not intending to post another partisan attack on Bill O'Reilly, but rather an interesting example from start to finish of how the host of a "fair" debate show calls every shot from minute one, and why, frankly, it's just not worth it to watch American news channels anymore. [More within...]
posted by XQUZYPHYR
on Nov 21, 2002 -
Sometimes, often even, life imitates art. Rarely is it as spot-on as this example.
Recall if you will, actor Robert Downey's character in Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers
. Compare Downey's character to this photo
Now, try not to laugh.
No, really. Be serious, because this picture pretty much sums up everything
thats gone wrong with modern journalism (and does so without even so much as a caption).
posted by BentPenguin
on Dec 26, 2001 -
Geraldo caught lying
about his exploits in Afghanistan. Rivera reported in a Dec. 6 piece that he
(was) standing on the "hallowed ground" in Afghanistan where "friendly fire took so many of our, our men and the mujahedeen yesterday."
(later) admitted that he was several hundred miles from the site.
It seemed awfully strange how Geraldo was always where "the action" was in a country that large. What do you think Fox will do about this? Should he be fired?
posted by revbrian
on Dec 18, 2001 - | <urn:uuid:9cdc7848-9b82-4fb2-9eff-6d2189df0845> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.metafilter.com/tags/news+FoxNews | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954459 | 692 | 1.609375 | 2 |
A surreal and very original game by Geoff Crammond
The game plays out on a 3D landscape with hills and valleys made up of several levels. At the highest vantage point stands The Sentinel, a statue-like being with an energy draining stare, you begin at the lowest. "Energy" plays an important role, there's a constant amount in the game world and each object is worth a certain number of units - including you.
The object of each level is to absorb The Sentinel and Hyperspace to the next from his vantage point.
The Sentinel scans further round the landscape every few seconds - if you're caught in his gaze, or rather the square you are standing on can be seen, you'll have about 5 seconds to teleport to another location (or hit a key to teleport to a random location - which will never be higher, and may be lower than your current level) before the Sentinel begins absorbing your energy, when it reaches zero you will be destroyed. To travel a "robot hull" must be created on a visible square then teleported to, making sure you absorb your old hull to avoid losing energy. Boulders and trees can also be created, trees to block The Sentinels view and boulders can be stacked to gain higher ground.
There are a few other elements to the game - on later levels there will be other Sentries positioned around the landscape. If only part of you can be seen i.e. not the square you are standing on, a nearby tree can be changed into a "Meanie" which will ultimately force you to teleport. There are 9999 levels in the game but the next level number is based on the current level + how much energy you have remaining.
Sentinel Returns is a remake very true to the original.
One of the most original games of all time, The Sentinel is one of Geoff Crammond's early games, and quite an unusual one for him as it is everything but a racing game. The PC version, like most other conversions of Commodore 64 classics, came and went off the shelves unnoticed by most gamers.
So what is so original about the game? Almost everything: concept, gameplay, and even replayability-- and in the process, it combines elements from more than a few genres to mesh into an addictive whole. The Sentinel can best be described as an "energy management" game. You, the player, exist on an alien island floating in space, and you must navigate your way to the summit of the island. Success will allow you to move to a new, more difficult island. Each island is similar to a chessboard, but have many different levels, effectively hills and valleys, of various sizes. The "floor" is chequered. Your movement is performed by creating a replica of yourself and "beaming" across to it. You would then typically absorb the husk of your old body, thereby losing no energy. It is possible to ascend one level at a time, in this way, and so access the island's summit. But it's much more complicated than that: each island has a Sentinel, the bad guy who stands on the summit, and rotates 30 or 40 degrees every few seconds. If he can see the square on which you're standing, he will start absorbing your energy, which depletes rapidly. Now on the island, many of the squares have trees on them. A tree is the lowest unit of energy. You can make trees (although the purpose is obscure), boulders (which are equivalent in energy terms to two trees), or even replicas of yourself (robots, which are worth three trees). The Sentinel is programmed to start absorbing from anything it can see that is useful. This is bad news for you, but the good news is you can absorb trees and boulders, and, ultimately (when you can see the square he is standing on), the Sentinel himself. Usurping his position of course means that you are now standing at the summit, which completes the level's objective. Boulders are particuarly useful, because you can use them to make an artificial platform on which to stand.
Overall, The Sentinel is a superbly ingenious, well-crafted game that is incredibly addictive, full of some very exciting moments to liven up an otherwise abstract exercise, such as when the Sentinel starts using Sentries to help him. The Sentinel might not appeal to anyone due to its very abstract nature, but with great gameplay and thousands of islands, it's a forgotten masterpiece that will occupy your times for weeks on end. Also check out the remake from 1998 by Psygnosis called Sentinel Returns, which upgrades the game with vibrant SVGA graphics, great sound effects, while retaining all the addictiveness of the original.
©2013 San Pedro Software Inc. Contact: , done in 0.004 seconds. | <urn:uuid:44c98cba-d0ab-4c5b-9d30-b4ad2dfed527> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.old-games.com/download/3779/sentinel-the | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962974 | 989 | 1.585938 | 2 |
EMPLOYERS that give their staff free rein on social media websites risk damage to their brand, and confidential information being leaked, a workplace law expert has warned.
And research to be published soon on the amount of time Australian workers spend using applications such as Facebook and Twitter indicates most dip briefly in and out of them, with only a small percentage of workers seriously over-using them at work.
Tony Vernier, managing director of Australian Business Lawyers and Advisors, told an industrial relations conference in Melbourne this month that employers should tell their staff what is acceptable when using social media.
"And you can't just have a policy on the shelf – if people don't know about it, it's as if you don't have a policy," Mr Vernier said.
A small number of employers have fired staff for using social media in the workplace in Australia in the last three years, although in many cases the dismissal has been found to be unfair.
A Melbourne landscape architect fired last year for overusing Google's mail chat service was found to have been unfairly dismissed. Richard O'Connor was abruptly sacked for more than "3000 transactions on a chat line during work time". But Fair Work Australia found that, as no guidance had been given by the employer about net use, the excessive use did not justify his dismissal.
Mr Vernier said that in the last year, many of Australia's bigger companies had put in place social media policies, but small and medium sized businesses had not.
He cited a recent Linfox case involving a truck driver with 22 years experience who had posted insulting messages about his workmates.
The driver, Glen Stutsel, was sacked for comments made on his Facebook page, including one about his site manager, a Muslim, who he called a "bacon hater". Mr Stutsel got his job back because the court believed his argument that he had thought the conversation with his Facebook friends was private.
Since 2009, Swinburne University academic Rajesh Vasa has studied how Australian employees are accessing social media sites in workplaces.
Research he co-authored studied at 18,000 office workers, looking at how they used the internet and social media. The first results, published in November 2011, found around 80 per cent of people would flick into Facebook or another social media site, and spend "maybe 20-30 seconds, or up to minute, and then come back to their work", Dr Vasa said.
"There are a few people who spend a lot of time on it (social media) but that is not the majority." he said.
The study looked mostly at Twitter and Facebook, as well as LinkedIn.
He said a follow-up study he was involved in, which is yet to be published, indicates "people who have a lot of work, who are busy, do not spend a lot of time on social media".
"The bulk of the usage happens around lunchtime, between 12.30pm and 1.30pm," he said. | <urn:uuid:eb1d09fb-36bc-43b0-95e5-55ca11597f70> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailyliberal.com.au/story/1144642/how-social-media-can-be-a-danger-for-employers/?cs=7 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.986169 | 613 | 1.75 | 2 |
For weeks, we’ve been inundated with commercials encouraging us to buy, buy, buy. Last week, while warm turkeys still sat on America’s dinner tables, some of our biggest retailers opened their doors, hoping that bright, shiny products would fly off the shelves without too many shoppers being trampled.
But there are other ways to give this holiday season — ways that don’t involve standing in long lines in the freezing cold, or elbowing 12-year-olds to get your hand in a bargain bin. Some of you may have the perfect re-gift sitting in your driveway or gathering dust in a garage. We’re talking, of course, about your old car.
Who should give and why?
The “why” of giving is the easy part. Despite the late Ayn Rand’s constant complaints, philanthropy is alive and well in the United States. Nowhere else in the world do individuals choose to give so much to help those in need.
Donating cars to charity is part of that process. When charities take used cars, they typically repair them and sell them to the public, or when vehicles are beyond repair, they’re sold for parts and scrap. That money gets funneled back into programs at the charity in question.
The question of who should give is a bit trickier.
If you’ve got a second car that you no longer need, chances are good that it’s a candidate for a charity gift. But what if you only have one vehicle — one that you use to get around? There are at least two instances in which donating that car to charity can make solid sense:
- If you itemize deductions on your tax return and you need an additional deduction this year — say, to counter some capital gains you’ve made — donating your car to charity can help.
- If your car (or motorcycle or four-wheeler or boat) is worth less than $500, giving it to charity might also make sense. You can generally claim up to $500 of the donated item’s value without providing a receipt from the organization’s re-sale of your gift.
How to give
Donating your vehicle is fairly simple, if you’re willing to invest a bit of time up front. Better yet, most of your research can be carried out online or over the phone, from the comfort of your living room:
- Start by identifying the right charity. There are many, many organizations that accept used vehicles. Find one that does work you believe in.
- Ask how the charity would use your gift. As mentioned above, many organizations sell donated vehicles to the public or sell them as parts or scrap. Other organizations use donated cars to provide services — for example, delivering meals to shut-ins. That’s a great and worthy cause, but it means that the organization won’t be selling your vehicle, so you won’t get a receipt documenting its actual market value. You’ll have to estimate that for yourself.
- Ask whether the charity uses a broker to sell donated cars. That’s fine and legal if they do, but keep in mind that in such cases, the charity won’t receive the full benefit of your gift, since the broker will take a cut. The same goes for vehicles sold at auction.
- Confirm that the charity is a 501(c)(3). There are many schools, churches, museums, and other organizations that qualify for 501(c)(3) status from the IRS, but some haven’t filed the proper paperwork. If the company hasn’t received at least a preliminary ruling from the IRS, your donation won’t be tax-deductible. You should also look out for other organizations that seem like 501(c)(3)s, but are actually 501(c)(4)s — typically, lobbying groups. Contributions to 501(c)(4)s are almost never tax-deductible.
- Ask the charity how your car will get re-titled. Chances are good that once you’ve donated your vehicle, it will be repaired or broken down, then sold without incident. But unless there’s a formal means of transferring the title from you to the charity, you could still be on the hook if something goes wrong. State laws vary with regard to the transfer process. Make sure you know where you stand.
- Hold onto all related paperwork — your original purchase receipt, recall notices, and anything else that might be important. If the charity sells your vehicle, ask for a copy of the sales receipt, too, so you can add that to your folder. This will come in handy if there are questions down the line.
- Deliver the car in person. If you bring the car to the charity yourself, you can make sure all of your last-minute questions are answered. You’ll also save the charity the towing fee, funneling that money back into the organization’s programming efforts.
- Contact a professional. Perhaps most importantly, if you have questions or concerns about the donation process, contact a professional. We’re happy to offer general guidelines, but accountants and lawyers will be able to offer specific advice appropriate for your situation and locale.
There are many worthy charities doing business in America, and all of them could use your help. Some advisors suggest that donors stick with well-known, national organizations like the United Way, Habitat for Humanity, or Volunteers of America, but there are plenty of smaller nonprofits that are just as hard-working, ethical, and deserving. Do your homework, and you can make nearly any charity’s day a little brighter — not just this holiday season, but throughout the year.
This article originally appeared at The Car Connection. | <urn:uuid:cffa8f0c-1e28-45dc-b0c3-72812c9c55f0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2012/11/27/how-to-give-your-car-or-motorcycle-or-boat-to-charity/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9476 | 1,215 | 1.84375 | 2 |
21st May 2013: This morning at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Andrew Brons made the following speech during a debate, on the agenda of the forthcoming meeting of the European Council meeting which is to be held tomorrow.
"It is, of course, member states that have the responsibility to collect taxes and fight tax fraud. Yet here is the EU trying to extend its legislative competence.
"It is, of course, true that fraud is often committed across international borders - often by multi-national and globalist companies, so beloved by the EU's neo-liberal policies. However, the borders are all borders and not just the borders of member states. Action needs to be taken by extensive international agreement and not confined to the EU.
"On another topic on the agenda, to talk about growth, jobs and competitiveness in the context of the EU's energy policy is wildly optimistic.
"Renewable energy might well be a desirable ideal but it is inefficient and expensive. High energy costs will not create growth, jobs and competitiveness. They will destroy them.
"Suppliers of energy wishing to use fossil fuels are penalised financially and those plants will eventually be closed down. To make matters worse, emergent economies seem to be immune from strictures against the use of fossil fuels.
"In the United Kingdom we have vast quantities of coal, locked in the ground as the result of Mrs. Thatcher's policies in the 1980s. We must discard our prejudices against the use of fossil fuels and against nuclear energy. That will be the key to growth and jobs.
"The difficulties facing the Euro-zone will doubtless come up. Perhaps they might heed the words of Oskar Lafontaine* and begin an orderly dismantling of the Euro-zone. Only escape from the Euro-zone will rescue the troubled economies of the South from permanent stagnation."
* Oskar Lafontaine was German Finance Minister when the Euro was adopted but has now suggested that the zone should be dismantled.
21st May 2013: Yesterday at the European Parliament in Strasbourg Andrew Brons delivered a One Minute Speech (under Rule 150) on Europeanism.
He told his fellow MEPs in the Chamber:
"The terms Pro-European and Anti-European are often used as shorthand for Pro-EU and Anti-EU. I, for one, find the term Anti-European to describe those of us who are opposed to membership, or even the existence, of the EU, as highly offensive.
"Europe is much older and much more than the EU. It is a cultural entity, a religious entity and an entity with overlapping and related ancestries.
"The EU goes out of its way to welcome Third World immigration and embraces the political and economic doctrine of Globalism. It is the EU that is Anti-European because its policies will destroy the distinctiveness of Europe.
"If Third World immigrants come to Europe, they do not become New Europeans to replace unborn European babies. They turn parts of Europe irreversibly into the Third World.
"It is Global Capitalism and its related ideologies that fuel immigration because it regards human beings, as though they were merely factors of production."
18th April 2013: Yesterday at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Andrew Brons made the following contribution, under the 'Catch the Eye' procedure, to a debate on on Turkey's progress report on its candidature for membership of the EU.
"Turkey is certainly abusing human rights when it prosecutes academics for describing the 1915 killing of Armenians as genocide. Of course, Turkey is not alone: France proposes an exact mirror image of that law. People will be prosecuted for saying that it was not genocide. France and many other member states, prosecute and gaol people for heretical opinions: on academic as well as political matters. Perhaps it might fit in after all!
"I am not an enthusiast for the European Union but, for as long as it exists, I would prefer it to be more European rather than less European. Turkey is not European, by its geography, ancestry, religion or culture.
"Whilst not being an EU enthusiast, I find it extraordinary that a country that is still occupying nearly 40% of Cyprus, a member state, should even be considered for membership."
18th April 2013: Yesterday at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Andrew Brons made the following contribution, under the Catch the Eye procedure, to a debate on the monitoring report on Croatia's accession to the EU (1st July 2013).
"Twenty-two years ago Croatia fought for, and eventually won, its independence, for which it paid with the lives of many of its nationals. That independence has now been surrendered to the European Union.
"To add insult to injury Croatia had to pay to be allowed to surrender. Part of the price was to hand over two of its generals, Markac and Gotovina to the United Nations War Crimes Tribunal so that they could be stigmatised - quite unjustly as it turns out - as war criminals.
"Croatia is praised in the report for 'democratic consolidation'. Let's hope that democracy is contagious and spreads to the EU and its worst member states.
"Croatia has been told that it must respect the rights of minorities. If Croats have a current problem with minorities then, in the words of Al Jolson: "You ain't seen nothing yet". Wait until the poor of Africa and Asia, admitted by the EU's common immigration and asylum policy, turn up in your towns and cities and outnumber your tiny population.
17th April 2013: At the European Parliament in Strasbourg this morning, Andrew Brons was unsuccessful in his 'Catch the Eye' attempt to address the Plenary Session on the Current Situation in Cyprus.
Had Andrew been called to speak, he would have said:
"If I were to be stopped in the street by a man wearing a striped jersey and a mask, who allowed me to keep my bus fare home but forced me to hand over the bulk of my money in exchange for out-of-date grocery coupons, we should have no hesitation in calling it robbery. If it turned out that the robber had been encouraged to carry out his crime by a shifty money lender in a smart suit, in exchange for a substantial loan, we should not hesitate to hold the money lender to be primarily culpable.
"So much for a European Union that respects European values such as the Rule of Law!
"The rest of us should be wary about assuming that it could not happen to us. If it happened to depositors of money in Cyprus, it could just as easily happen to depositors in Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece.
"Depositors should demand a cast iron assurance that this action will be reversed and that it will not be repeated elsewhere. If they do not receive that assurance, they should take their money and run to safer climes."
We have all heard of the state forcing property owners to sell. The Government of Cyprus has invented the practice of forcing bank customers to buy! What are holders of over 100,000 Euros forced to purchase? Well, with 37.5% of their money over 100,000 Euros, they will be forced to purchase bank shares. Could the banks not have sold these shares on the open market? It's difficult to sell something that has no value! But at least they can keep the other 62.5%? Er..no. 22.5% will be placed into an account paying no interest and it might be used to make them purchase even more of these useless shares. The remaining 40% remains their property but is frozen in an account that might pay interest but you're are not allowed to have it.
So Cyprus has become a rogue state stealing on its own initiative the savings of its depositors? Not quite. Cyprus was coerced into stealing the depositors' money by the European Central Bank; otherwise the 10 billion Euros bail-out would be refused.
17th April 2013: Yesterday at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Andrew Brons spoke using the 'Catch the Eye' procedure during a debate on the 2011 Report of the European Central Bank.
"The Euro-zone and the European Central Bank are not a solution to the difficulties of the European Union; they are part of the problem.
"During the early years of the Euro-zone, Northern Europe needed low interest rates to improve its growth. However, those low interest rates caused a property boom in Spain. When that boom came to an end, the banks found that they had insufficient security for their loans. 2011 saw the ECB conducting two distinct and contradictory interest rate policies.
"A common interest rate, like a common currency value, cannot be appropriate for seventeen different economies.
"The Report suggests that there should be wage increases in the North of the EU, in order to stimulate aggregate demand and growth in the South. How ever would you encourage employers to increase wages above the market rate?
"They will certainly not be encouraged to do so when there is a plentiful supply of labour resulting from an open-door policy on immigration. Nor will they do so when they have the freedom to export jobs to the Far East by re-locating industry."
16th April 2013: This morning at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Andrew Brons was unsuccessful in his attempt for a 'Catch the Eye' speech during a debate on a proposed directive on supervision of credit institutions (the banking system).
(Only five Catch the Eye speeches were allowed and Andrew's was not among them).
Had he been called to speak, he would have told MEPs:
"My opposition to EU legislation and competences will not (I hope) prevent me from considering these measures on their merits.
"My intuitive response was to support (member state) legislative restrictions on huge bonuses, despite the danger of increases in basic salaries, paid regardless of performance (to compensate them for the loss of their bonuses). My reaction to that danger was to suggest curbs on basic pay but would that lead inexorably, to states or the EU, micro-managing incomes throughout their economies?
"There is, of course, a case for saying that banks are a special case, because bonuses are often paid as a reward for taking risks with the money of other people: the shareholders; depositors; and ultimately the taxpayers. Furthermore the failures of banks have much wider repercussions than the failures of other businesses.
"Perhaps the answer would be for a change in (member states') employment law, so that employees who receive large bonuses should lose the security of a similar proportion of their contractual income."
18th March 2013: Last week at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Andrew Brons made the following speech during a debate on Syria.
"Syria is anything but a democracy but nor are many countries in the Middle East such as its fierce critic, Saudi Arabia. Nor for that matter are all of Mr. Assad's opponents in Syria, democrats.
"The Syrian Government's handling of the protests was, from the beginning, grossly disproportionate but its brutality has frequently been matched by the opposition.
"We can also judge a regime by its substantive policies. Before the conflict, women in Syria were relatively liberated. Religious minorities - particularly Christians, were free to worship without interference, although some Christians have been attacked by Islamist members of the Opposition.
"It is all very well to bemoan the huge humanitarian toll of the conflict but that is what happens when neither side is capable of winning decisively. It is also what happens when the protagonists are armed, albeit covertly, by outsiders.
"How long will it be before the armed forces of member states are dragged into the conflict and the body bags start to be flown home to Europe?
"How ethical was it, and is it, for the West to encourage other people to risk their lives to advance the West's political agenda: depriving Iran of an ally and Israel of an adversary. Was régime change really worth 70,000 lives?
"(Might the Ba'ath régime be replaced by a democracy? It might be replaced by an Islamist dictatorship. Democracies do not thrive when there are vertical divisions in the populace.)*
"The priority must now be to bring the bloodshed to an end. That can happen only if there are talks without pre-conditions on neutral territory."
*This paragraph was omitted because of shortage of time.
14th March 2013: Yesterday at the European Parliament in Strasbourg, Andrew Brons made the following contribution, under the 'Catch the Eye' procedure, to a debate on the European Council meeting to be held on the 14th and 15th March 2013.
"It has been admitted that unemployment is not falling and is not likely to do so in 2013.
"The value of the Euro will not allow the countries of the South to emerge from recession.
"Austerity programmes will not cure unemployment. You do not make countries richer by making them poorer.
"Globalisation might make the emergent economies richer but it will make European countries poorer.
"The Single Market might help low income member states but only at the expense of higher income member states.
"Uncontrolled immigration will make unemployment worse everywhere. We heard earlier from a Mr Farage about immigration to Britain. Is this the same Mr. Farage who said on 4th May 2010 that the UK ought to issue a quarter of a million work permits each year?
"Incidentally, the Romanian citizens to whom Mr Farage referred were not ordinary Romanians . . . they were the Roma."
Mr Sefkovic, the EU Commissioner for Inter-institutional Relations, said that he rejected statements about Romanians and Bulgarians, on behalf of the Commission. He said that this was stigmatising a population.
There are some who remember that when he was being interviewed by AFCO before his appointment in 2009, he was asked a question about a speech he had made five years previously about the Roma. He said that he could not remember what he had said five years before. We are confident that Mr Sefkovic dwelt only on their virtues.
13th March 2013: The following Press Statement has been sent out by the Office of Andrew Brons MEP to Britain's national newspapers and to the newspapers and media outlets covering his Yorkshire and the Humber Constituency.
"Yesterday at the European Parliament in Strasbourg Andrew Brons was unsuccessful in his attempt to make a 'Catch the Eye' contribution to a debate on Strengthening the Fight Against Racism, Xenophobia and Hate Crimes.
Had he been called to speak, he would have said:
"George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four was a caricature of reality but unfortunately reality has caught up with the caricature. Orwell created the concept of thought crime - the criminalisation of a state of mind, Xenophobia - literally fear of strangers - must apparently be criminalised - a thought crime in Orwell's sense.
"I asked the Council and the Commission for definitions of racism and xenophobia but they could provide neither. It is absurd to criminalise what cannot be defined.
"Incitements to violence against others, on whatever ground, including the ground of political opinion, must be condemned and prosecuted. However, this is not about preventing violence or hatred. It is about suppressing opposition to out-of-control immigration." | <urn:uuid:d370292e-4244-405d-a4c3-ecf18d91d06d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.andrewbrons.eu/index.php?option=com_k2&view=itemlist&task=category&id=5:speeches-in-plenary | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971609 | 3,159 | 1.539063 | 2 |
This iconic chair began as an experiment in the apartment of Eames, where they were molding plywood in what they called the “Kazam! Machine.” The machine pressed thin sheets of wood veneer against a heated membrane that was inflated by a bicycle pump. Who would have guessed that these beginnings would develop into one of the world’s most widely recognized and highly coveted chairs. Low-slung, with an expertly crafted molded seat and back, the LCM (1946) cradles you in a extremely comfortable position. Its form relates directly to the human body and holds no secrets as to how it succeeds technically. The metal base provides superior strength, while rubber shock mounts buffer against jarring movement. This modern classic is sure to impress even the most selective, with its impeccable quality and attention to detail. | <urn:uuid:6ff044a1-2315-4f8f-ae59-1fd1019f394b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.liketheoriginal.com/index.php?route=product/product&path=59_60&product_id=68 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979126 | 172 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Posted: Feb 24, 2011 5:07 PM by Michael Shingleton
Updated: Feb 24, 2011 6:11 PM
BATON ROUGE - Students at Dufrocq Elementary got a special treat Thursday morning as George Rodrigue donated a year's worth of art supplies to the school.
Rodrigue also gave a demonstration of how to paint a blue dog. Students then went to the canvas to paint their own.
Mayor Kip Holden also painted one.
"You're capturing young people at an age that makes a difference instead of them being influenced by somebody that may send them in the wrong direction," Holden said.
Watch the video above to see how the mayor's blue dog turned out. | <urn:uuid:8d8a4968-2d3a-495f-b32c-3326e0c4a8f1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wbrz.com/news/mayor-holden-paints-with-george-rodrigue/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966562 | 147 | 1.679688 | 2 |
If you’re interested in being in a Video Story, just let me know and we’ll set up a time and place to meet.
Watch all the IFD Video Stories here.
For the transcript, Continue Reading.I’m Peter from New York City. I guess I should start with coming out to my friends in 9th grade, halfway through Winter Break and one of my friends sort of squeezed it out of me. She said to me, “You look really gay tonight.” I said, “Thanks.” And about two hours later she said, “Are you gay?” I said, “Yeah.” She said, “I thought so.” And she’d known me about 10 years.
Then in 11th grade I met my then-boyfriend, and I came out to my school. I go to a single sex school and I wasn’t sure how the guys at my school would react to that. I did it on Facebook. I made my relationship with my boyfriend official, and all my friends were like, “Oh my god, that’s amazing!” They all acted like girls actually, they were like, “Oh my god, that’s amazing, I want to meet your boyfriend so badly, can he pick you up from school? I knew you were gay even though you’ve only been here for four years, I knew you were gay but I didn’t want to say anything but it’s okay!” So that was really good. And then I told my parents and they said, “We knew that, what took you so long to tell us?” Then they bought me The Gay College Guide. That was their instant reaction. Okay, thanks guys.
Four years ago, I never thought I’d be saying this, but New York City is really small. At least in the private high school system. Everyone knows everyone. It’s just amazing how after coming out and knowing no one, then meeting a boyfriend, and then sort of that getting out, just everyone knows everyone and there’s nothing you can do about that. You can go on a date one week and then meet someone the next week and they knew your date or dated them for two years and they already knew about your date because someone texted them because everyone loves, well at our age at least, everyone loves a good gay relationship. And they’re so willing to text about it and talk about it. And so there’s almost no privacy. It even got so bad at one point that I was talking to my friend on the phone and she started to sketch out the relationships between the people that were telling her and by the time she was done there were 9 of us on this chart and she was like, “Wow, so not including you, Peter, this is like a love octagon, not a love triangle.” I said, “Yeah, it’s pretty insane.” I sort of described it to my friends at school and they started calling it a “cocktagon.” That’s an all-guys school for you.
I'm From Bloomsburg, PA - Video Story. And I was with three guys from my football team–my quarterback, my defensive end and one of our wide receivers, and my quarterback and I…I think we were walking back to the car to get beer, quite frankly, out of the trunk. And out of nowhere, the guy turns around and goes, “Yo, Sims. You gay?” And it completely caught me off guard and I really quickly said, “Yeah, man, thanks for asking.”
I'm From Willow Grove, PA - Video Story. During high school I was in the Color Guard in marching band; it’s the people in the front of the band with the flags and the guns and throwing them up in the air and being all kinds of fabulous. And I was one of the first guys to ever be in the Color Guard and the other one was my best friend, Andy, and we were both gay and we weren’t really supposed to be in the Guard. Guys weren’t supposed to be interested in it and we were, so it started out like, hey, I want to do that.
I'm From Redondo Beach, CA. I’d never gone to a school dance before. But this time it was different. I was going to the Homecoming Dance of my sophomore year, and I had a date. The excitement of actually having a date helped me float through the three days I had until “D Day.” I had always wanted to go to a dance with another guy. I imagine us being just like all the other couples on the dance floor, no one paying us any more attention than they would the guy and girl next to us. Then the day arrived. | <urn:uuid:48d6e91c-f637-4a29-b3e9-f616303a235e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.imfromdriftwood.com/im-from-new-york-ny-video-story-4/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.987938 | 1,042 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Re: No Parking Beyond This Sign - but sign all the way on the other side of the block
Not necessarily.. If it says “No parking beyond this point” then that covers all points from where the sign is located to the end of the block!
There is no way you can get to the end of the block without passing the sign that is posted somewhere within that block! Just because you didn't see it, it doesn't mean it isn't there!
If any part of the car extends beyond the sign prohibiting parking, then you it is illegally parked. Of course it would follow that if the entire car is past the sign by a few feet )or several feet) then the entire car is within the “no parking zone” and it is illegally parked!
So you're driving down one block looking for parking, you are closest to the right side of the road where the signs are usually posted, as you're looking for parking, you're also supposed to be looking for signs that might prohibit parking... So again, there is not way you can get past the sign without having the opportunity to look for it and see it. Even if you didn't see it, park, walk back and look for it.
I guess they don't teach everything in traffic school!!!
Not for a "No Parking Beyond This Point"...
Not for a "No Parking" or a "No stopping No standing" signs.. Those would mean the entire block is covered by the restriction.... Unless another sing is posted that indicates otherwise.
The only time that another sign is posted is if it ends a prohibited action.. or begins a new one. Example"first half of the block has a "No Parking" sign, and then at some point half way through, there is a sign that indicated either "End No Parking Zone" or "One Hour Parking" or some such thing...
It looks like Missouri is still using the 2003 Federal version of the MUTCD which you will download
HERE. You can look through that for specific signage standard and optional guidelines.
I am right 97% of the time... Who cares about the other 4%! | <urn:uuid:36e1a604-9d31-4cc2-8c26-73224cf8e47c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.expertlaw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=125619&p=541359 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963081 | 442 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Vaclav Havel dies at 75
PRAGUE - Vaclav Havel, the dissident playwright who wove theater into politics to peacefully bring down communism in Czechoslovakia and become a hero of the epic struggle that ended the Cold War, has died. He was 75.
Havel died Sunday morning at his weekend house in the northern Czech Republic, his assistant Sabina Tancecova said.Continue Reading
Havel was his country’s first democratically elected president after the nonviolent “Velvet Revolution” that ended four decades of repression by a regime he ridiculed as “Absurdistan.”
“Like millions around the world,” President Obama said in a statement Sunday, “I was inspired by his words and leadership, and was humbled to stand with the Czech people in a free and vibrant Hradcany Square as President. We extend our condolences to President Havel’s family and all those in the Czech Republic and around the world who remain inspired by his example. Vaclav Havel was a friend to America and to all who strive for freedom and dignity, and his words will echo through the ages.”
As president, he oversaw the country’s bumpy transition to democracy and a free-market economy, as well its peaceful 1993 breakup into the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
“We have lost a great leader,” former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who is of Czech origin, said in a statement sent to the AP.
“Vaclav Havel leaves our world better for having been a part of it,” Albright said. “My thoughts and prayers go out to his wife Dagmar Havlova, his family and the people of the Czech Republic.”
British Prime Minister David Cameron said “Havel led the Czech people out of tyranny. And he helped bring freedom and democracy to our entire continent.”
Even out of office, the diminutive Czech remained a world figure. He was part of the “new Europe” - in the coinage of then-U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld - of ex-communist countries that stood up for the United States when the democracies of “old Europe” opposed the 2003 Iraq invasion.
A former chain-smoker, Havel had a history of chronic respiratory problems dating back to his years in communist jails.
Havel left office in 2003, 10 years after Czechoslovakia broke up and just months before both nations joined the European Union. He was credited with laying the groundwork that brought his Czech Republic into the 27-nation bloc, and was president when it joined NATO in 1999.
Shy and bookish, with wispy mustache and unkempt hair, Havel came to symbolize the power of the people to peacefully overcome totalitarian rule.
“Truth and love must prevail over lies and hatred,” Havel famously said. It became his revolutionary motto which he said he always strove to live by.
Havel was nominated several times for the Nobel Peace Prize, and collected dozens of other accolades worldwide for his efforts as a global ambassador of conscience, defended the downtrodden from Darfur to Myanmar.
Among his many honors were Sweden’s prestigious Olof Palme Prize and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest U.S. civilian award, bestowed on him by President George W. Bush for being “one of liberty’s great heroes.”
An avowed peacenik whose heroes included rockers such as Frank Zappa, he never quite shed his flower-child past and often signed his name with a small heart as a flourish.
In an October 2008 interview with The Associated Press, Havel rebuked Russia for invading Georgia two months earlier, and warned EU leaders against appeasing Moscow.
“We should not turn a blind eye … It’s a big test for the West,” he said.
Havel also said he saw the global economic crisis as a warning not to abandon basic human values in the scramble to prosper.
“It’s a warning against the idea that we understand the world, that we know how everything works,” he told the AP in his office in Prague. The cramped work space was packed with his books, plays and rock memorabilia.
Havel first made a name for himself after the 1968 Soviet-led invasion that crushed the Prague Spring reforms of Alexander Dubcek and other liberally minded communists in what was then Czechoslovakia.
Get reporter alerts | <urn:uuid:673b9501-c648-411c-abeb-abc063c4132d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1211/70602.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.98012 | 957 | 1.804688 | 2 |
Regulated Competition in Social Health Insurance: A Three-Country Comparison
The objectives guiding healthcare reforms in Germany, Switzerland and the Netherlands were to increase efficiency and consumer satisfaction in the provision of healthcare services. This paper reviews the incentives for and instruments of competition for consumers, sickness funds and healthcare providers in these three countries which are necessary to fulfil these objectives. Incentives for risk selection of sickness funds are high in Germany and Switzerland while they are low in the Netherlands. Incentives for consumer choice are also highest in Germany and Switzerland. In all three countries sickness funds have only a few instruments of competition. The effects of competition have been disappointing so far. The objectives of competitive healthcare reforms can be achieved only if incentives for and instruments of competition consistently support competitive behaviour on the part of market actors.
Dieser Eintrag ist freigegeben. | <urn:uuid:de09456b-08be-4424-8d99-ee28ddd5dfdf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://duepublico.uni-duisburg-essen.de/servlets/DozBibEntryServlet?mode=show&id=7103 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950396 | 173 | 1.773438 | 2 |
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Shakespeare, the story-teller of the yesterday, today and tomorrow
A Shakespeare website.... information on Shakespeare's life, work and his plays. This site also discuss if the works credited to 'Shakespeare' is really done by the 'Shakespeare' we know. Done by three students and a coach..... the students are all from St Andrew's School.
jia junSt. Andrew's School, Singapore 369230, Singapore
jin kunSt. Andrew's School, singapore, Singapore
JaredSt. Andrew's School, Singapore, Singapore
19 & under
Noel TanSt. Andrew's School, Singapore, Singapore
Books & Literature > Authors | <urn:uuid:94ca7aaa-8dd8-4ce3-a9c3-d73e8772f5fb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thinkquest.org/pls/html/f?p=52300:100:3884440969697705::::P100_TEAM_ID:501576787 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934461 | 167 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Powerless in rape, women wait in constant worry
By Associated Press
As drunkenness and despair set in, Liberia's warriors roam from house to house, shattering dreams and escaping justice.
© St. Petersburg Times
published August 10, 2003
MONROVIA, Liberia - Clutching her daughter's photograph to her breast, Rebecca throws back her head and wails. Gunmen burst into her home and raped the child on her 10th birthday, leaving her lying there - dead.
Every time fighting surges in Liberia, women are raped, aid workers say. But this time, the scale is incalculable. Wild-eyed men are going door to door, ransacking homes, beating and killing people, and raping any women, or girls, they find.
Both sides in the battle are implicated - the fighters of warlord President Charles Taylor and the rebels trying to overthrow him. Women used to be most at risk fleeing through the bush, aid workers say. Now they are not safe in their homes.
"Those people are not human beings," sobs Rebecca, sheltering in a friend's yard. She, like other victims, doesn't want her surname published for fear of reprisals.
July 20 began with Rebecca, 42, waking the sleeping child with a chorus of Happy Birthday To You. She gathered her son and a friend's 14-year-old girl with them for Sunday prayers.
Then government fighters pounded at the gate.
A young man smashed Rebecca's head with a hammer and tore off her clothes, while her 10-year-old clung to her, crying "Mommy! Mommy!" When the man realized Rebecca was menstruating, he kicked her.
Another fighter, who called himself Black Dog, ripped the child from her mother and threw her to the floor.
"When he got through with her, I saw blood, I saw vomit, I saw toilet," Rebecca says, moaning rhythmically. "He raped her to death."
As her daughter lay on the floor, another man grabbed the 14-year-old and raped her.
"He was holding me," whispers the child, sitting bolt upright, knees pressed together and hands twisting in her lap. "I was fighting, kicking him."
Rape has always gone hand in hand with war in Liberia, where Taylor's first grab for power in 1989 ushered in nearly 14 years of strife.
"Every time there is an incursion going on, it is the same thing," says Miatta Roberts, a counselor with the Liberian-run Concerned Christian Community - the only group remaining in the country that works with rape survivors. "When there is war going on, no woman is safe."
Figures are impossible to track because most victims are cut off by fighting or feel too humiliated to seek help. But the few counselors left after international aid groups pulled out foreign staff members say they've never seen so many cases.
"It's more rampant than ever before," said Mariama Brown, the group's founding director.
The attacks are usually linked to looting sprees by drunk, drugged and disaffected fighters. Many feel abandoned since Taylor bowed to mounting international pressure and pledged to hand over power, so they have launched what they call "Operation Pay Yourself."
With no functioning court system, they act with impunity.
Some 1,500 women participate in the Christian group's trauma programs at a teeming refugee camp in an athletics stadium. Of these, 626 have been raped.
In better times, the group gave the women food, clothing, medical treatment and skills training. Now they can do little more than provide a safe haven and keep them busy. The women play games in a bamboo and tarpaulin enclosure and sing traditional songs to remind them of home.
Joining a circle of clapping, singing women, 20-year-old Alice breaks into a rare smile.
Three years ago, she was gang-raped in front of her family as they fled through the bush ahead of a rebel advance. Last month, pro-Taylor militia fighters caught up with her on the outskirts of Monrovia, pulling her from a group of refugees huddled in an abandoned home.
The repeated rapes have shattered her dreams of marriage and children.
"I feel shame before men," she says. "No one approaches me now."
Violence against women is as widespread in rebel-held areas, aid workers say.
While fleeing the insurgents' latest advance, Kula's family stumbled into a rebel ambush. Her husband, mother, aunt and brother were killed.
When she reached a refugee camp outside Monrovia, she thought she was safe. But soon the rebels were back, moving from hut to hut in search of women.
"They shared us among themselves," says Kula, who is 47 but looks much older. "Everyone was crying."
Four days later it happened again. Rebels with stockings over their faces burst into the house where she was sheltering and grabbed all the women.
Two fighters raped Kula this time, one of them so young he could barely hold up his machine gun - no older than 10, she guesses.
"I think the women who can say they haven't been raped are very few," she says sorrowfully. "It pains my heart."
As for Rebecca, the fighters stripped her house and even took the family album. Rebecca has only one picture left of her daughter, taken when she was 11 months old - a solemn child with bright bows in her hair, standing unsteadily with the help of a piece of furniture.
Falling to her knees, Rebecca sobs: "Just kill me. I want to die."
World and national headlines
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Nation in briefAla. facility begins destroying weapons | <urn:uuid:5546b211-1968-4b59-b188-6314264070f0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sptimes.com/2003/08/10/Worldandnation/Powerless_in_rape__wo.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971127 | 1,284 | 1.664063 | 2 |
There you will also find groves of trees that live with thick heavy roots exposed, some are large enough to tie off too and sit on during your air boat tour. When you are planning your next Florida vacation, you may be starting out with some ideas about the larger, more well-known Florida attractions that you and your family will want to visit. Your Florida vacation guide may be missing many unusual options that you can also check out. Some are near the more popular destinations, while others are just off the beaten path, but all are guaranteed to leave you with some great memories and interesting stories to tell when you get back home. Take a look at the following Florida attractions and discover all that this fascinating state has to offer.
You can see the Flipper Dolphin Show (for those of us old enough to know what that might be) or the original “orca”stral rock music and let the kids be entertained in the Golden Dome, home to Salty the Sea Lion and a few of his pals. Something for everyone, it is easy to see why the Seaquarium is so highly regarded in the international vacation community. Air Boat Tours Everglades, Miami tours and attractions Cruise Tours and Miami tours and attractions Attraction – Things To Look For. The islands are created by the mangroves which uniquely grow in salt water. They are created when elongated floating seeds reach a shallow enough spot, sprouting to form trees which in turn multiply and create a sandbar; eventually over time turning into an island. | <urn:uuid:2947af7d-8535-4f28-b9ad-0dff7d74bd22> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.miamiattractionsforfamilies.com/tag/miami-attractions-discounted/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961451 | 310 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Nearly 100 businesses in danger of being kicked out of the Empire Zone tax break program -- including Welch Allyn -- are being rescued by the state economic development commissioner.
The 96 businesses were among 640 companies that the state's top economic development agency in April recommended be booted.
Commissioner Marisa Lago decided the 96, mostly manufacturers, should remain in the program that costs New York $600 million per year in tax revenue.
For Welch Allyn, the decision means it can continue to claim Empire Zone tax breaks worth an estimated $1.2 million per year.
"Frankly, we always felt that we absolutely qualified for the program," said Matt Chadderdon, a spokesman at Welch Allyn. "We've invested heavily in Central New York in people and in infrastructure."
Empire State Development plans to announce today that it will decertify 544 businesses from the program, according to a note the public authority sent to local Empire Zone coordinators.
ESD spokeswoman Katie Krawczyk said the public authority would not release until today the list of companies being booted.
But some companies were willing to disclose their status.
Brookfield Renewable Energy, which receives credits for hydroelectric power plants in nine zones in Upstate New York, was in danger of losing its tax credits for facilities near Potsdam and in Oneida County.
But Brookfield's hydropower plants near Potsdam -- which received an estimated $9 million per year in tax credits -- will remain certified, said Julie Smith-Galvin, director of communications for Brookfield.
The Brookfield plants near Potsdam collect more tax credits than any other zone business that was in danger of being kicked out.
Brookfield's hydroelectric plant in Oneida County will be decertified, however, Smith-Galvin said. That will cost the company about $1.6 million per year in tax credits.
Brookfield receives Empire Zone credits under the name Erie Boulevard Hydropower LLC.
In April, ESD targeted 640 companies to be removed. Most took advantage of loopholes in the Empire Zone law to get credits without creating jobs. ESD recommended others for decertification because they were receiving tax credits greater than the value of their payroll and the investments they made in their facilities.
Mike McAndrew can be reached at email@example.com or 470-3016. | <urn:uuid:1a883b92-a392-483a-82a4-a06c441d73f3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2009/07/state_reinstates_empire_zone_t.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964193 | 489 | 1.726563 | 2 |
Forty-seven pit bulls, bred for fighting, lived crammed in a basement-level apartment in the Bronx, the police said. They stayed in cages, some two to a cage, and, the police said, some of them might never have seen the sun before Thursday afternoon.
It was then that police officers and workers from the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, surrounded by curious neighbors, carried the dogs, one by one, out of 1254 Sherman Avenue, near the Grand Concourse. They were to be collared, photographed and registered into evidence.
The police described the operation as a puppy mill for fighting dogs. In the apartment, said the police, officers found dog treadmills, 22 wooden cages, harnesses and muzzles, syringes, a loaded .25-caliber handgun and a shopping cart full of raw chicken parts.
Raul Sanchez, 57, of the Bronx, the human occupant of the apartment, was charged with animal fighting and cruelty. Neighbors said he was the building’s superintendent.
Howard Lawrence, senior director of the animal society’s humane law enforcement department, said of the dogs, “They appear to be in a state of shock.”
While the evacuation may have resembled a sort of “perp walk,” with each dog getting its photo taken alongside a dry-erase board listing its tracking information, the dogs looked to be anything but killers. Many had their tails between their legs. One gently licked the face of an animal society agent. Some bore the scars of training, while others looked like skittish house pets. Officials said the dogs weighed from 25 to 45 pounds.
Neighbors, who said they had seen two of Mr. Sanchez’s biggest dogs chained outside — the police called them his show dogs — seemed surprised that others were being raised below.
Raymond Caro, 37, who lives on the top floor of the building, stood on the sidewalk as the parade of dogs continued one by one.
“I’m happy that they caught him,” he said.
The puppy mill explained one thing, though, Mr. Caro added, saying of the building’s entrance, “It stank.”
Officers said that as they made their way through the basement, the smell of ammonia and feces was overpowering.
The basement also contained an area that could fit 100 spectators, they said. | <urn:uuid:efe84d49-3ffe-4296-8fb7-a709b3f4a649> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/21/dogs-bred-for-fighting-rescued-from-basement-in-the-bronx/?ref=todayspaper | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980095 | 509 | 1.546875 | 2 |
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