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Coverage of Phoebe Prince's bullying (ours included) has told the story of a clique of evil kids systematically tormenting an outcast. But now one reporter says this isn't accurate — and the bullies are victims too.
In an exhaustively researched and frankly pretty disturbing series of articles for Slate, Emily Bazelon questions the dominant narrative (again, promulgated in this space as elsewhere) of South Hadley High School mean girls and their erstwhile boyfriends hounding Phoebe Prince to death. Her basic points:
— Prince was depressed and troubled before the bullying started. She missed her absent father, engaged in self-mutilation, and had tried to commit suicide once before, in response to the breakup of a relationship (with senior Sean Mulveyhill, now charged with a civil rights violation and statutory rape in connection with Prince's death).
— Though it led to tragedy, the bullying Prince suffered was neither systematic nor organized (one teen actually stopped when school officials told her to, yet still faces criminal prosecution), and was not extraordinary for teens — several students called it "normal girl drama."
— The six students charged in Prince's death face prosecution not because their actions were so heinous, but because South Hadley has an overzealous district attorney with a history of seeking excessive punishment.
Of these, the last is the most upsetting. In 2007, South Hadley DA Elizabeth Scheibel slapped a 17-year-old kid who had Asperger's with charges carrying a maximum 60-year sentence, all for making YouTube videos of himself lighting explosives in a field (he was acquitted). And there's evidence, according to Bazelon, that Scheibel was punishing the bullying teens for their school's negligence. Bazelon writes, "Scheibel and her staff stepped in because they thought South Hadley High mishandled the lead-up to and the aftermath of Phoebe's death. Does that amount to penalizing teenagers because the adults failed to do so?" Maybe — especially if it's true that, as Bazelon says, their bullying was far less organized and far shorter in duration than Scheibel claims. And certainly the teens, who could face up to 10 years in prison, are being much more harshly punished now than they ever could have been by their school.
This new take on the Prince case exposes two serious and related problems. One is how catastrophically bad schools are at identifying and helping at-risk kids. Bazelon writes that Phoebe's mom told the school that Phoebe had suffered bullying in her native Ireland and was on antidepressants, but the school didn't mount any sort of concerted effort to help her, or notify administrators of her troubles — even after her first suicide attempt. The principal even said "she seemed to be doing pretty well when she came back" from that attempt, and didn't seem in need of further monitoring. But all the while, Prince was, according to Bazelon, "asking for help from older boys who seemed ill-equipped to provide it." In a heart-wrenching statement, one such boy told police,
She lifted up her hoodie and showed cuts on her chest above her bra and all the way down to her hips. I really didn't look too long. I found it to be very painful. This was someone I cared about and she was harming herself. Phoebe asked for help healing them. I told her to use Neosporin but I wasn't too sure.
And these boys lead into the second problem that contributed to Prince's death: slut-shaming. Phoebe's bullying back in Ireland also had to do with her seeing older boys, and an anonymous adult says of her troubles at South Hadley, "In the end you can call it bullying. But to the other kids, Phoebe was the one with the power. She was attracting guys away from relationships." Not all the boys Prince has been linked to were actually in relationships at the time she was seeing them, but regardless, the claim that she "attracted them away" is a bit slut-shaming in itself. A fellow student seems to understand the situation better: "Each person had his own conflict with Phoebe-that's what no one outside our school seems to understand. The girls found out she'd been with the boys, and true to high-school girls, they got mad at the girl instead of the boyfriend."
That's how society seems to work too, not just high-school girls, and it appears Prince got caught in a vicious cycle. No adults stepped in to help her, so she turned to older guys, which only made other girls madder. There's no excuse for the way some of these girls — and allegedly Sean Mulveyhill as well — treated Prince. Bazelon doesn't dispute that the teens called Prince a "whore" and a "cunt" and harassed her in school on at least two occasions. But it's not clear that this behavior deserves a ten-year prison sentence, especially since throwing the book at the teens may obscure the systemic problems that led to Prince's death in the first place. Nothing Bazelon has uncovered excuses bullying — but it does expose how deeply incompetent schools are at protecting troubled kids and preventing slut-shaming, and how endemic such shaming is both here and, apparently, in Ireland. To pretend that Prince's death was solely caused by a few kids who were simply evil is to ignore these very serious problems — and potentially to keep other kids like Prince from getting the help they need.
Image via Slate. | <urn:uuid:1b128491-b7f5-428c-9abc-133ccd4d9ab2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://jezebel.com/5592655/was-bullying-really-behind-phoebe-princes-suicide?tag=phoebe-prince | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983767 | 1,147 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Every weekend when I can I do an interactive live video chat on Google+ where people can ask me questions about space and astronomy. I call it Q&BA, and it’s always fun to hear what questions are on people’s minds.
Apropos of my recent post about Saturn’s moon Enceladus, I got this question: "Which moon has the best chance for life: Titan, Europa, or Enceladus?" This is a common question, and worth exploring! Here’s what I said:
Mars is still an interesting place to look for life, but those moons — all three — are very, very enticing. I’d love to see us launching future space probes with some icy targets in their sights.
[P.S. The aspect ratio of the video is stretchy for some reason; the video looked fine before I uploaded it to YouTube. I'll try to track this problem down.]
I have an archive of Q&BA links and videos. Take a look and see if there are other ones that tickle your imagination.
- Q&BA: Can we build a space habitat?
- Q&BA: The Science of Science Fiction
- Q&BA: How does a gravity slingshot work?
- Q&BA: Why spend money on NASA?
- Q&BA: What happens if you are exposed to the vacuum of space?
[Over the past few weeks, I've collected a metric ton of cool pictures to post, but somehow have never gotten around to actually posting them. Sometimes I was too busy, sometimes too lazy, sometimes they just fell by the wayside... but I decided my computer's desktop was getting cluttered, and I'll never clean it up without some sort of incentive. I've therefore made a pact with myself to post one of the pictures with an abbreviated description every day until they're gone, thus cleaning up my desktop, showing you neat and/or beautiful pictures, and making me feel better about my work habits. Enjoy.]
With planetary pictures, angle is everything. If you have your back to the Sun and face your target, it’s fully lit, and looks like a disk. But if you go around to the other side, and put your target between you and the Sun, it becomes a crescent. Get the angle just right, and that crescent gets very thin…
… which is a view of Saturn’s moon Enceladus we can never get from Earth, but one that the Cassini spacecraft gets all the time. And it’s way, way cool:
[Click to encronosenate.]
But there’s an added bonus here, one that makes this picture that much more amazing: that fuzz at the bottom? Those are enormous geysers, towering sprays of water blasting out of cracks in the surface of the moon and reaching upward for hundreds of kilometers!
We’ve seen the geysers before, and in fact Cassini has flown through them to find out what they’re made of (turns out water laced with lots of organic goodness like acetylene, formaldehyde, and much more). They’re very dim, but easy to see when backlit by the Sun like this.
So we know Enceladus must have liquid water under its surface, to feed these geysers. But is it local, like a subsurface lake, or is the ice of the moon floating on a global ocean? New studies of the cracks from which the geysers emanate seem to indicate the water is everywhere! The geysers are formed from gravitational stress when the moon nears Saturn in its orbit, and the size and shape of the cracks really make it look like the water source is a global ocean, like Jupiter’s moon Europa.
Isn’t that amazing? We can learn a lot about a tiny, icy, backlit world, just by tasting its water.
Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
We’ve known for years that Jupiter’s moon Europa almost certainly has an ocean of liquid water deep under its frozen surface. For one thing, the surface is almost all water ice. We also know that it’s covered in thousands of cracks that look very much like the type we see in ice floes floating on liquid water here on Earth. And we have a heating mechanism: tides from Jupiter as well as from the other moons flex Europa, causing its interior to warm up.
A nagging question has been how thick is the solid ice shell over that ocean: is it many kilometers thick, or much thinner? Evidence supports both arguments, which is maddening. However, that problem may now be solved: astronomers studying Europa’s terrain think the ice shell is generally very thick, but — and this is the cool part — may have vast underground lakes of water!
This picture is from observations of Europa made by the Galileo spacecraft, which orbited Jupiter for many years. It’s a combination of optical images and photoclinometry — using pictures to measure the heights of surface features. Purple and red is elevated terrain, and you can see that this looks like a depression in the surface. It’s filled with what’s called "chaotic terrain" for obvious reasons. Most of the surface of Europa has larger scale structure, and is more organized, as you might expect from a thick shell of ice. But these smaller regions are a mess, and it looks like this is from pockets of liquid water under the surface, giant lakes the size of North America’s Great Lakes, completely buried in the ice.
This artist’s view shows how this works; the lake is completely embedded in the ice shell. In general, the ice is very thick, explaining the usual look of Europa’s surface. But in some spots, just below the ice, the ice has melted. The ice above this underground lake is much thinner, perhaps only 3 km (about 2 miles) thick, explaining the chaotic surface in those localized spots.
That’s pretty nifty, but why is this so important? Read More
Mike Brown is an astronomer, specifically one who studies Kuiper Belt Objects, those giant frozen iceballs that haunt the solar system out past Neptune.
In fact, Neptune’s biggest moon Triton has a lot of characteristics similar KBOs — it may be one captured by Neptune — so observing it gives an interesting opportunity for a compare-and-contrast study. So this past weekend Mike was using the Keck telescope in Hawaii to observe Triton along with its (adoptive?) parent planet, and took this fantastic image of the pair:
[Click to poseidenate.]
This false-color image shows the two worlds in the infrared, specifically at a wavelength of about 1.5 microns, twice what the human eye can see. Methane strongly absorbs this color of light, so where Neptune (in the upper left) looks dark you’re seeing lots of methane clouds, and where it’s bright there are clouds higher up, above the methane. Triton is in the lower right, and is bright because it’s covered in ice which is highly reflective.
Now this is all very pretty and interesting and sciencey, but if you know me at all you know there’s more to this story.
Mike tweeted about the image, and I oohed and ahhhed at it, of course. But then he tweeted again, saying he was also observing Jupiter’s moon Europa, but it was too bright to get good images using the monster 10-meter Keck telescope. It "saturated the detector" which is astronomer-speak for "overexposed".
That’s funny, I thought. Neptune looks fine in the image, and the random noisy grain in it makes it clear Mike wasn’t anywhere near saturating the image. Now I know Europa is closer to the Earth, so it should look brighter, but geez, it’s a moon, and a lot smaller than Neptune. How could it be too bright to image?
It turns out my all–too–human and all–too–miserable sense of scale has failed me again. Math to the rescue!
I love anaglyphs (3D pictures) and I love astronomy animations and I love Jupiter, so how much do you think I love this anaglyph animation of Jupiter?
[Note: the embedded version here shows it as two separate animations. Go to the YouTube page and you'll see a 3D label at the bottom of the player. Click that, and you can set the animation to be red/green or lots of other options. Currently, I can't seem to embed the video that way, so again I urge you to go to the YouTube page.]
This is from Chris Owen, an amateur astronomer equipped with a 25 cm (10″) Newtonian ‘scope (the same kind I had for about 20 years!). The animation shows Jupiter over the course of about 2.5 hours, with one exposure taken every five minutes. You can also watch Europa and Io, two of Jupiter’s big moons, orbiting the planet as well. He created the animation straight, then converted it to 3D. You can see the original on his DeviantArt page — that’s a 3 Mb image, which is why I didn’t embed it, but click it to see because it’s cool.
I like the 3D version; you really get a sense that Jupiter is a ball, and it’s nifty to be able to see the two moons as being farther away than the planet itself, proven positively by seeing Europa physically go behind Jupiter as it orbits. Note too that these observations were made last year, before the Southern Equatorial Belt disappeared.
While these animations are a bit of fun, I suspect they will actually give people more of a sense that these objects aren’t just points of light in the sky, but worlds. I’m a fan of things that give people a deeper connection to the Universe, so I really like these anaglyphs!
Four hundred years ago tonight, a man from Pisa, Italy took a newly-made telescope with a magnifying power of 33X, pointed it at one of the brighter lights in the sky, and changed mankind forever.
The man, of course, was Galileo, and the light he observed on January 7, 1610 was Jupiter. He spotted "three fixed stars" that were invisible to the eye near the planet, and a fourth a few days later.
Here is how he drew this, 400 years ago:
He noted the stars moved around Jupiter as they followed it across the sky, and so was the first to figure out that other planets had moons like our own. It wasn’t an easy observation; his telescope was still small, the field of view narrow (so not all the moons were visible at the same time), and the moons faint next to Jupiter’s brilliant glare. But Galileo persisted, and figured it out. We call these four the Galilean moons in his honor: Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
Here’s how we see them today:
The image above [click to embiggen] is from the New Horizons spacecraft as it shot past Jupiter in early 2007, showing all four moons. Each is scaled to show its true relative size to the others. It’s impossible not to wonder what Galileo would have thought, knowing that just shy of 400 years after he made his first observations, we would fling our robotic proxies out into the solar system and get close up views of the objects he discovered.
Think of it! For all of time before, Jupiter was just a light in the sky. And then, forever after that night forty decades ago, it was a world, surrounded by more worlds.
[See more pictures of Jupiter and its moons in a gallery over at 80 Beats.]
Galileo went on to observe craters on the Moon, spots on the Sun, and the phases of Venus. It was that last that may have been his crowning achievement, because the way Venus showed phases meant it could not possibly orbit the Earth, and that it must orbit the Sun. The geocentric theory had held sway for over a thousand years, but Galileo proved it was wrong almost overnight. Of course, the Church wasn’t thrilled with this, though I suspect they might have rolled with it if Galileo hadn’t been such an arrogant jerk and published a manuscript insulting the Pope, a man who used to be his friend and supporter.
If there is a lesson in there, I leave it to my readers to suss it out.
Now, all these years later, a lot of legends exist over the man. He didn’t invent the telescope, he wasn’t the first to point it at the sky, and he wasn’t even the first to publish his drawings. But he was a merciless self-promoter, and because of that we do remember him now (again, any lessons learned here are up to you). And it’s not entirely unfair to do so; he was a tireless observer, a wonderful artist, a great inventor (he may not have been the first to build a telescope, but he made his far better than its predecessors) and a brilliant scientist who, even if he hadn’t done so much for astronomy, would still be remembered today for his other work.
Tonight, just after sunset, Jupiter will be a glowing white beacon in the southwest. I have a Galileoscope, an inexpensive telescope created as part of the International Year of Astronomy 2009, an effort to get as many people on Earth to look up as possible. I think perhaps it would be fitting if I brave the subzero temperature outside, maybe for just a few minutes, and take a look at the mighty planet. Tonight’s display is better than Galileo himself had it: all four moons will be perfectly arrayed, two on each side of Jupiter’s face.
I’m not a very religious man, nor am I a very spiritual man. But I know there will still be a sense of connection, a sense of wonder that I will have tonight that I will share with a man long dead, but whose life and achievements still echo through time. | <urn:uuid:df7e431b-4863-4c83-82b3-b254ed6a4b91> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/tag/europa/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958876 | 3,022 | 1.773438 | 2 |
Long-held dream becomes realityWritten by Julia Merchant
It’s a project that’s been years in the making, and on Saturday the scores of Jackson County residents who gathered to watch the groundbreaking for the county’s new library couldn’t stop beaming.
The excitement and pride was palpable as — one after another — speakers at the ceremony had their remarks met with whoops and cheers.
“A few said this community would never be able to raise the funds,” said County Commissioner Chairman Brian McMahan. McMahan said he had just one thing to say to those who doubted the project: “Yes we can!”
Librarian Dottie Brunette dedicated her words “to all those in the community who have made sure all their wishes were heard and heeded.”
Indeed, it was largely the community that made the push to turn the historic Jackson County Courthouse, built in 1912, into the library’s new home. Plenty of roadblocks were thrown up along the way during the process as naysayers deemed the site unworkable. The board of commissioners was long split on the library location, and even went as far as to purchase another piece of land for the library.
But the community persevered and promised to raise funds for furnishings and equipment once the county chose the old historic courthouse site.
The Friends of the Library, the group that spearheaded the fundraising campaign, committed to raise at least $1.6 million to purchase furnishings and equipment for the new library facility, said June Smith, the group’s president.
“As of today, I’m proud to announce $1,023,153 has been raised,” Smith told the audience, a declaration that was met with cheers and applause.
Speakers commended not just the library, but the role the facility will play in preserving the county’s best-known landmark.
Howard Allman, chair of the Jackson County Library Board, called it, “a beautiful fusion of our past and our future.”
“(We’re) not just building a library, but saving and revitalizing a treasure of our past,” Allman said.
Boyce Deitz, a representative of Rep. Heath Shuler’s office, said Jackson County leaders of yesteryear would be proud of the effort.
“It’s a shame all the people who walked these halls couldn’t be here,” Deitz said. “I know they would be proud to know this was being preserved.”
After the speakers finished, the crowd migrated over to the site of the groundbreaking behind the old courthouse. County commissioners Brian McMahan, Mark Jones, William Shelton and Joe Cowan donned hard hats and grabbed shovels for the groundbreaking. Dr. John Bunn gave a moving speech just beforehand.
“It’s infrequent that we have the opportunity where the past, present and future come into focus at the same time,” Bunn said.
Bunn dedicated the library “to the minds, hearts, and people of this community .... that their lives may be enriched.” | <urn:uuid:ae22efc5-6f93-429f-bc23-144552a21043> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.smokymountainnews.com/archives/item/2410-long-held-dream-becomes-reality | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966488 | 669 | 1.625 | 2 |
The battle of Silicon Valley vs. Hollywood continues.
Google filed a brief earlier this month in federal court in Florida defending Hotfile, an Internet locker service that the Motion Picture Association of America accuses of acting as a clearinghouse for pirated films.
The MPAA filed suit against Hotfile a year ago, arguing that the cyberlocker has made a business out of offering a stash box for people to store their pirated movies. At the time, the MPAA said, "In less than two years, Hotfile has become one of the 100 most trafficked sites in the world...That is a direct result of the massive digital theft that Hotfile promotes."
That marked the first time a group of Hollywood film studios filed a copyright lawsuit against a cyberlocker, and just two weeks ago the MPAA asked for a summary judgement against Hotfile, effectively trying to shut down the site.
Google argues in an amicus curiae that Hotfile is protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Google writes that YouTube, Facebook and Wikipedia all thrive because of they are protected by the DMCA, and that the movie industry's case arguments would in fact thwart such businesses.
According to the brief:
The safe harbors have helped facilitate the development of the Internet as a robust and revolutionary platform for free expression, creativity, and economic opportunity. A wide variety of online services--including Amazon, eBay, YouTube...have all been held protected by the DMCA against potentially crippling infringement claims.
Google, which wasn't immediately available for comment, obviously has good reason to protect the DMCA.
You can read the whole filing below. (Hat tip to TorrentFreak.) | <urn:uuid:c14f241f-19f5-400f-b267-9ddd2651c95d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57400361-93/google-defends-hosting-site-under-attack-by-mpaa/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945903 | 337 | 1.765625 | 2 |
While Newsday announced it’s going to start charging for Web content (making the blogosphere snicker), and Google News lost its advertising virginity (making the journosphere quake in fear), big media outlets dipped their toes into outsourcing to local news sites. And the Times dipped its toe into local citizen journalism. Hearst will do the same. Connecticut outlets wrestled over local ownership. And Minnesota papers got a $238,000 grant to retrain their journalists.
Should the Times monetize its platform by sharing it with other outlets? Could kitemarks offer an answer to the monetization problem? Does it all come down to supply and demand?
Everyone was all a-Twitter about microblogging. We talked about how we’re sick of talking about it. And then we talked about it some more. And then we got advice from it. BriWi mocked it. Mark McKinnon felt betrayed by it. And a new twerncalular is emerging. But don’t use those twerms too often: using Twitter probably means you’re narcissistic. Or insecure. Or both. | <urn:uuid:030253f4-c08b-4d58-8986-ebc2e4c6acd9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cjr.org/behind_the_news/the_week_that_was_in_which_we.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930588 | 228 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Programs Tagged With "GE"
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Effective Communication Skills for Women
Effective communication is important within the corporate world and a skill that can make or break a career. For women, it becomes even more important due to differences in gender communication styles.
This program will help you navigate the personal and professional path that you truly desire, while helping you avoid the common pitfalls and unconscious mistakes that often sideline even the ... (MORE)
Practical Leadership Strategies for the Successful Manager and Business Owner
During challenging economic times, it’s important to stay aware of trends, upgrade your skills to meet the new environment, and make yourself invaluable – whether you’re holding down a job or seeking employment. Here’s the real deal: In most companies, leaders are generally considered more valuable than their followers. They’re paid more, have more control their own schedules and are giv... (MORE)
Dealing with Angry, Confrontational, and Disruptive People in the Workplace
Are angry or confrontational customers becoming a problem for your agency? Studies show that the number has greatly increased in the last few years, and the problem is only expected to get worse due to budget cutbacks and service reductions. And who doesn’t get irritated at those annoying telephone trees?
Unfortunately, customers often take their frustrations out on front-line staff members... (MORE)
Do YOU know which one YOU are? If you are a Manager, do you know what your people REALLY are?
This Program helps both the salespeople and their managers to determine which category the SALESPERSONS each fall into: CLERK or SALESPERSON. Many won't like what they learn, and many will validate which they are, not what they believe, but the actual, internal reality of their "being."
This presentation is participatory and is both fun and educational for the participants. NO two presentations... (MORE)
The Power of Being You
You will leave fully charged and motivated to engage in your life fully and authentically. Based on her new book 'Soar with Vulnerability - Eleven Insights to the Full Enjoyment of Your Life, Suzanne will challenge you to step out of your comfort zone and take the first step in creating a life in authenticity. The Insights will teach you exactly what the word itself means - to see from within. ... (MORE)
Leaving a Legacy of Performance & Excellence
Coaching for Leadership is an intensive coaching skills program for experienced managers seeking to further develop and refine their personal coaching skills. This session draws on examples of excellence in leadership and intensive workshop activities as a means of building capabilities at all levels of leadership within organizations.
*Increase understanding of different coach... (MORE)
Team building for results
Teamwork Is More Than Just T-Shirts: How to Inspire Commitment, Teamwork, and Cooperation
Simply giving out team hats and shirts does not make a team gel – but having the right management and communication skills do. All too often people think throwing a bunch of people together and calling them a team will get better results. Usually what happens is the dedicated, hard workers end up doing m... (MORE)
Working With Stakeholders. Collaborations, Partnering and Joint Venturing. Executive Leadership.
Hank Moore has conducted Ethics and Community Responsibility audits, plus Performance Reviews, for many corporations.
Hank Moore is well-versed in speaking to audiences about non-profit, community stewardship and public causes. He has done so for 40 years, by virtue of advising 200+ non-profit, NGO and public sector organizations. In the business world, he is one of the leading gurus, as an a... (MORE)
25 Tips For Delivering a Winning Sales Meeting
John Mayfield has authored a book on real estate and business sales meetings, and loves to talk about how to effectively lead, prepare and present sales meetings. This session has been offered for the National Association of REALTORS and many other organizations to rave reviews. (MORE)
Being ordinary is dangerous, frustrating, and risky. Success is all about being unforgettable.
John Hersey is a master storyteller who inspires, educates, entertains and then returns your people back to the office with a mission, a new sense of purpose, a commitment to be unforgettable leaders. Prepare for a corporate culture change! John will fire up your entire company and arm you with practical information and specific steps to take towards cultivating contagious leadership.
Being an ... (MORE) | <urn:uuid:d15973c9-74b8-42bf-af1e-0df048fe7d5c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.speakermatch.com/keywords/GE/?from=240 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944333 | 948 | 1.617188 | 2 |
By ROBERT M. MOORE,
Back in the December, 2008, at a community board meeting regarding a truck route on Craig Avenue, the residents of Craig Avenue raised the concern of speeding city buses and the hazards they present.
We brought up concerns for our children, damage to our houses and water lines from vibration as well as presenting ideas for a bus turn-around on Hylan Boulevard.
We were told this was a separate issue and it would be “looked into.”
Well they looked and decided that adding Atlantic Express to the mix was the right call.
WRONG! On Feb. 9, we had a city bus collide with a lady pulling from her driveway. The car was hit and turned over on its side.
Thankfully nobody was killed — this time.
What will it take to change this unnecessary use of Craig Avenue as a bus route?
There are other options. We invite the MTA, DOT, local politicians and Mayor Mike to see for themselves what an unsafe situation this is. | <urn:uuid:11f0d15f-7c1c-4cff-b36e-fba1e2c46549> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.silive.com/opinion/letters/index.ssf/2010/02/accident_shows_using_craig_ave.html | 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 | 0.974828 | 210 | 1.625 | 2 |
Literacy Council offers workshop for Bay County parents to better help with homework troubles
BAY CITY, MI — Learning doesn’t stop at the school doors; a Bay County organization is offering a workshop to aid parents with their children’s homework.
The Literacy Council of Bay County is hosting a “Parents as Tutors” workshop on Saturday, Oct. 20 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at McKinley School, 407 W. Ohio.
The workshop focuses on how parents may eliminate the frustrations that come with doing homework and make it a more rewarding experience, with early elementary skills, learning styles, positive reinforcement, parent-teacher relationships and eliminating the “I can’t do this” attitude.
All materials are free and lunch is included. Parents must call to register for the workshop; call 989-686-8700. | <urn:uuid:f1b2acc5-61cc-47c4-81de-d76c28f32e42> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mlive.com/news/bay-city/index.ssf/2012/10/literacy_council_offers_worksh.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955564 | 184 | 1.8125 | 2 |
Now that he’s officially campaigning for re-election, the President's put out a seven-minute video of his accomplishments. I guess there wasn't enough to make it an even ten? He’s revealing his one-word campaign slogan, "Forward."
Have a taste:
Narrator: “The President's stimulus plan saved up to 4.2 million jobs, including teachers, construction workers, police and firefighters working to build a stronger America.
Pres. Obama: I believe America is on the way up. Thank you, God bless you, God bless the United States of America. [Vis: Forward]”
I've got a much better slogan for the President: Backward.
That's his economic policy in a nutshell. What do you call raising taxes in the middle of a recovery?
He's signed 21 tax hikes into law in the last three and a half years.
And the worst of them haven't even gone into effect yet.
And that doesn't count the expiring tax cuts this President has vowed to not renew.
What's the impact? Our growth last quarter was a paltry 2.2%.
Unemployment stuck above 8%. And it doesn't stop there.
The President's sliding backward on health care. You remember his promises on what Obamacare would do:
“Our approach would preserve the right of Americans who have insurance to keep their doctor and their plan. It would reduce costs and premiums for millions of families and businesses. … our approach would bring down the deficit by as much as $1 trillion over the next two decades.”
While in reality the cost of Obamacare is rising.
And the cost of your health-care premiums have only gone up since it was passed!
Over two thousand dollars for the average family.
Finally, the President is backward on energy.
Gas was a $1.84 when Obama took office.
Today it's $3.82.
It's more than doubled!
All the while millions of barrels of oil are off-limits in ANWR, off the coasts, in the Gulf of Mexico.
Instead of common-sense solutions like approving the Keystone pipeline, the President throws away hundreds of millions of dollars on green energy failures like Solyndra.
But there is one way the President is very "forward" thinking: the national debt. It's up nearly 47% since the President took office.
He's going to pay for all these programs by pushing the bill forward, onto our children, our grand-children.
But beyond this, there's one more "forward" connection you might not have thought of.
The great leap forward.
China's clever branding for a country trying to make the transition to modern society.
But Mao Zedong's government takeover of farming back in 1958 was disastrous. Millions died.
"Forward" just isn't a good rallying cry.
At least we told you about it.
Forewarned is forearmed. | <urn:uuid:4357d202-ff53-4b9c-9bf6-0f1f60bc08b1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.foxbusiness.com/on-air/willis-report/blog/category/Forward | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969557 | 616 | 1.585938 | 2 |
One of the privileges and fascinations of being the biographer of a living person is observing, close at hand, how that person changes over time. If the relationship is open and forthright, which mine with Bishop Gene Robinson has always been, you come to know them and learn how they think and react, but you never know exactly how that person is going to grow and change after the book is written and their life goes on. You, and the people close to the subject, can make educated guesses about future behavior, but human beings are fallible under pressure: some break, and some grow stronger.
In my book about Gene, I tried to show, especially in the final chapters, a man was not only accepting the particular role he has been called to by God, or history, or fate, but who was growing daily in willingness both to serve, and to lead. The pressures on him have been enormous, and they have certainly taken a toll. Seeing him recently I was struck by how much older -- healthy and energetic, but older -- he looks than when we met.
Around the time of his election, he used to say how much he looked forward to the day when he could "just be the bishop of New Hampshire." That day never arrived. Instead, he has chosen to adjust his entire life to the fact that he has been called to serve both as the Bishop of New Hampshire, and as a worldwide symbol of hope, courage, and integrity -- or sin and division, depending on who is doing the judging.
Gene has had to draw upon everything that has made him -- his education and training, his past experience and challenges, his close relationships with family, friends and colleagues, and especially his prayer life -- to find the strength to shoulder his place in history. He's grown from someone who made the hopeful and naive statement I just mentioned, to an outspoken worldwide religious leader who is unafraid to call it like it is, and to challenge the institutional church to literally practice what it preaches - a Gospel of love, integrity, inclusion, forgiveness, and honesty. People listen to him not because he is a "great man" but because he is so clearly a humble human being whose story contains elements of their own. Like many great men, he has come to realize that by risking everything, he has nothing to lose -- and it's given him the courage to take on the "powers and principalities" - which of course include his own institution, the Anglican Church.
Our cathedral in Montreal is hosting its annual OutMass tonight, as part of the city's Gay Pride celebration. Last year, Gene was the preacher at the first OutMass; tonight, the Anglican Bishop of Montreal, Barry Clarke, will be speaking. I'm very sorry I can't be there. But I was thrilled to read an article this morning in the London Times quoting recent remarks Bishop Robinson made while in London, calling on the Church of England to end their two-faced attitude toward gay clergy:
Speaking in an interview in London, Bishop Gene said: "I have met so many gay partnered clergy here and it is so troubling to hear them tell me that their bishop comes to their house for dinner, knows fully about their relationship, is wonderfully supportive but has also said if this ever becomes public then I’m your worst enemy.
"It’s a terrible way to live your life and I think it’s a terrible way to be a church. I think integrity is so important. What does it mean for a clergy person to be in a pulpit calling the parishioners to a life of integrity when they can’t even live a life of integrity with their own bishop and their own church? So I would feel better about the Church of England’s stance, its reluctance to support The Episcopal Church in what it has done if it would at least admit that this not an American problem and just an American challenge. If all the gay people stayed away from church on a given Sunday the Church of England would be close to shut down between its organists, its clergy, its wardens.....it just seems less than humble not to admit that."
Isn't this exactly what needs to be said? I'm proud to call this man my friend, and to pray for his continued health and strength along with all the people who work for justice and compassion in this unjust and often cruel world. Those of us in the laity need to repeat his message; speak out and insist upon progressive change in our parishes, dioceses, and society; and strongly support the clergy who agree but are often in a more difficult position than we are to press for change. | <urn:uuid:2491c412-9c5f-4509-8df2-850e8a9e14fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cassandrapages.com/the_cassandra_pages/2007/07/gene-robinson-a.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.987586 | 954 | 1.6875 | 2 |
Protest Oprah's Giving Away KFC Chicken Meals
Oprah made this offer to her millions of viewers on yesterday's show (May 5). She said she was
helping everyone during this recession by collaborating with Kentucky Fried Chicken in offering
a free meal to all who download the coupon from her website.
Please contact Oprah at https://www.oprah.com/plugform.jsp?plugId=220 and tell her what you think. Below is some information for this lady whose "commitment" to farmed animal welfare and human health appears to need a recharge: Eating Misery: Contamination and Cruelty are Linked in Chickens Raised for Food
By Karen Davis, PhD
Chickens raised for food are treated horribly and they are very unhealthy. They are crammed by the thousands into filthy, dark buildings loaded with bacteria, bird flu viruses, toxic funguses, and poisonous gases that burn their eyes, their skin and their lungs. With no sunshine, fresh air, or normal activities, chickens develop painful skeletal deformities, soft watery muscles, pus-filled lungs, and heart disease. Their immune systems cannot cope with the toxic load. Some people argue that when we eat the flesh and eggs of creatures who are treated so badly, we assimilate something of their experience and carry it forward into our own lives. The possibility that a chicken's suffering could somehow persist, invisibly, in the body tissues and "juices" is frightful. But is it fanciful?
Once bacteria and other microbes were just a "theory." We could not see them, yet they existed. Historically, the United States government did not mandate inspection for disease microbes in animals slaughtered for food. However, poultry product contamination is not just the result of an inadequate inspection system. Disease organisms are ubiquitous in poultry-producing facilities throughout the world, and poultry is the most common cause of food poisoning in the home.
In 2005, the Food and Drug Administration ordered the poultry industry to stop using the antibiotic Baytril, because its use was preventing its human-label counterpart, Cipro, from treating people with Campylobacter infections resulting, very frequently, from contaminated chicken and turkey products. The poultry industry counters that limiting antibiotics in birds raised for food actually increases Salmonella and Campylobacter contamination, adding to the human health risk.
Campylobacteriosis - which causes severe abdominal cramps, nausea and diarrhea and can cause a paralytic disease in people with fatal nerve damage known as Guillain-Barre syndrome - has increased dramatically in the past 25 years. Retail chicken products and packaging have been found "literally dripping with campylobacter."
In 2007, Consumer Reports announced that tests on chickens purchased from U.S. supermarkets and specialty stores in twenty-three states showed 84 percent of chickens contaminated with Campylobacter and Salmonella bacteria - a substantial increase over 2003 tests showing 49 percent of chickens infected.
In addition, 84 percent of the Salmonella and 67 percent of the Campylobacter bacteria showed resistance to antibiotics. Bacteria samples from contaminated chickens tested for sensitivity to antibiotics showed evidence of resistance "not just to individual drugs but to multiple classes of drugs." People sickened by poultry products might therefore "need to try several antibiotics before finding one that works," Consumer Reports observed.
Foodborne bacteria such as Salmonella and Campylobacter don't necessarily just "go away." They can migrate from people's intestines to other body parts - blood, bones, nerves, organs, and joints - to cause seemingly unrelated diseases that emerge later in life, such as arthritis.
Plans are not underway to reduce the crowding, filth and stress that sicken birds and humans alike. Chickens have been and will continue to be rendered genetically infirm in order to meet mass-marketing demands. Chicken houses are larger and more densely crowded than ever, and they cannot be made clean. Every part of the house as well as the bird's own body is a haven and breeding ground for disease organisms.
Now as in the 1990s, only superficial solutions are promoted - food irradiation, chlorine - the most commonly used carcass and equipment disinfectant in the poultry industry - and other fake fixes. Government-industry assurances notwithstanding, consumers of poultry products risk significant health problems from handling and eating products derived from sick, overwhelmingly stressed birds. Nor are infectious diseases the only illnesses to worry about. Bladder, respiratory, and skin cancers have been linked to growth-promoting arsenic compounds in chicken feed. The solution, in the opinion of many people including myself, is to enjoy wholesome and compassionate all-vegetarian (vegan) foods.
Karen Davis, PhD, is the director and founder of United Poultry Concerns, a nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of domestic fowl. Karen is the author of several books including, most recently, Prisoned Chickens, Poisoned Eggs: An Inside Look at the Modern Poultry Industry (Book Publishing Company, 1996; Newly Revised Edition, 2009). All of the information in this article can be found fully documented in this book. This article was written for a forthcoming issue of Total Health Magazine (http://HealthMediaMarketing.com).
Karen Davis, PhD, President
United Poultry Concerns | <urn:uuid:0fe3f617-9ede-423f-ae80-ba73099dfd37> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://upc-online.org/alerts/090506oprah-kfc.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950282 | 1,091 | 1.742188 | 2 |
By Eric Peterson
As a certified domestic violence professional, Ruby Nava today can recognize her own abusive relationship as a nearly textbook case.
But as with so many others, even family and friends couldn’t help the now-Streamwood resident recognize her situation for what it was while she was in the thick of it.
Not until her former husband’s jealousy became so intense that he struck her on the back and head when she turned away to cradle their crying infant son did realization dawn.
“That jealousy toward my son is what turned on the light for me,” Nava says. “It occurred to me that he didn’t love his son. I thought if he doesn’t love his son, he’ll never learn to love me.”
Nava — who has since remarried and uses her married name — will share her story and the lessons others can learn from it Thursday, when Roosevelt University and the Northwest Suburban Alliance on Domestic Violence host “Break the Silence on Relationship Violence,” organized to mark Domestic Violence Awareness Month.
The event is from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. at Roosevelt’s Schaumburg campus.
Nava is both a member of the alliance and a full-time student at Roosevelt, where she’s completing her psychology degree.
She wants to become a counselor focused on domestic violence issues.
The relationship, which began in 2000 at a West suburban high school, seemed almost too good.
“Abusers tend to be Prince Charming in front of you and your friends,” Nava said.
But little by little he became more controlling, until the friends who initially warned her about the changes were virtually excluded from her life.
Her mother’s advice — that exposing him to their non-abusive family would change him — reinforced her own bad instincts, she says.
Nava’s mother even supported their decision to marry in December 2001 when Nava was 16 and he was an 18-year-old high school senior.
Nava graduated a semester early the following year — two months before her son was born. Once during her pregnancy, her husband kicked her in the stomach.
Nava never pressed charges.
She filed for divorce in 2005 and was granted an order of protection that was later revised and extended.
She initially got help from an agency that moved her into a shelter.
But her then-husband learned the location of the shelter on her first night there, from a relative.
During her divorce, Nava worked in a currency exchange behind protective glass.
Even so, he would stand in the lobby and shout at her.
Her husband was in another relationship by the time their divorce became final in 2006, and he now lives downstate.
And only in the past couple months have they been able to see each other face-to-face when exchanging custody of their 8-year-old son, she said.
Police change tactics
Nava found that police in the various towns she lived in did little to help.
Her husband showed no respect for authority, and police left it up to her whether to pursue charges.
Today, however, Schaumburg is among the communities that are approaching domestic violence differently.
Police Chief Brian Howerton said in years past, the police policy on domestic calls was to merely separate the parties.
They didn’t even document the call if the victim didn’t press charges. As a patrol captain in 1998, however, he ordered officers to start documenting every call of domestic abuse.
Later as chief of operations, he rewrote the department’s policy to say that an officer “will” arrest — not just “may” arrest — the offender in any domestic violence call.
He believes this policy is what has caused the number of repeat offenders in the village to drop dramatically. Today there are only two or three homes that officers have visited five or more times in the past six months, he said.
More significantly, there has been only one Schaumburg domestic violence death in the past eight years — and that was the tragic case of the mother convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the death of her adopted 6-year-old son.
Responding to domestic violence calls is considered among the least glamorous aspects of police work, but Howerton tries to keep his officers’ morale up by telling them, “Effective domestic violence intervention results in homicide prevention.”
A public response
Despite statistics that 1 in 3 women and 1 in 7 men will be victims of an abusive relationship at some point in their lives, Nava says that for too long society has tried to make domestic violence a private issue.
That’s why Roosevelt University felt it had a role to play, given its institutional mission to foster social justice, Schaumburg Campus Provost Doug Knerr said.
In fact, he’d like to see the campus eventually develop a center on domestic violence for either political action or scholarly research.
“That’s what a university can do,” Knerr said. “That’s what distinguishes this from just a place to go for classes.”
But as much help as exists, Nava said the hard truth is that it won’t be used until victims recognize for themselves that they’re in an abusive relationship.
All her personal and professional experience can’t expedite that process for someone else by even one day.
“I believe everyone comes to the truth in their own time, in their own way,” she said.
430 S. Michigan Ave.Chicago, IL 60605(312) 341-3500
Directions & Maps
1400 N. Roosevelt Blvd.Schaumburg, IL 60173(847) 619-7300
Directions & Maps | <urn:uuid:0ac92e5e-2d1a-4f63-bcbf-6b8bb92e9008> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.roosevelt.edu/News_and_Events/News_Articles/2011/20111029-Nava.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97445 | 1,228 | 1.523438 | 2 |
IBM's Budding Innovators
Changes are afoot at IBM. In August, the company offered a glimpse of the future at its Industry Solutions Lab in Hawthorne, New York, where budding researchers are hard at work in the Extreme Blue internship program. IBM brought roughly 200 business and technology students from around the world to its research labs, drawing from about 6,000 applicants. In a matter of weeks, the interns produced dozens of new computing applications.
"As a company, IBM is leaning much more towards innovation," says Paul T. Baffes, Extreme Blue's projects manager, "and a key part of innovation is fresh talent."
At the Extreme Blue Technology Showcase, IBM unveiled four of the intern-designed applications and introduced the young researchers who built them. The tool with the broadest appeal is a desktop application called Total Recall (see the photo), which instantly retrieves computer documents you've viewed, whether they're Web pages, e-mails, spreadsheets, or Word files.
"When you think about all the e-mails, PowerPoint presentations, Web pages, and other documents you deal with weekly, you can see that there's a problem. How do you search and manage all this information?" says Mariano Pelliza, an MBA student at the University of North Carolina. With Total Recall, you simply key in a word or phrase you'd like to search for, and the application brings up a list of matching documents. You can then easily narrow the search to a particular time frame or document type.
Another Extreme Blue group, headed by Duke University business student William Streit, demonstrated an application called eLumination, which lets you capture real-time transaction data and transform it into visual business information. "There's an old business adage: If you can't measure it, stop doing it," says Streit. "eLumination is a framework for evaluating the success of real-time transaction data." Interns also demonstrated applications for business supply chains and the health-care industry.
Will these applications ever reach the marketplace? Maybe. But the goal is to groom new products and new people to produce them.
blog comments powered by Disqus | <urn:uuid:ee968f06-c1ed-4a8c-a839-688b10e8407a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,1265760,00.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930799 | 445 | 1.757813 | 2 |
One of St. Augustine Beach’s focal points is getting a life extension as workers repair the 26-year-old structure.
The St. Augustine Beach pier could last up to 10 years more thanks to concrete repairs and other improvements, St. Johns County Director of Construction Mike Rubin said Tuesday.
He said that was just a “guesstimate” based on the better-than-expected condition of the concrete and rebar that workers are repairing.
“It wasn’t nearly as bad as we anticipated,” Rubin said. “The (concrete areas) they have repaired look brand new now.”
County Commissioners in November approved $300,000 for the repair work, which includes more extensive work planned for the next couple of weeks.
So far, the project is coming in at around $275,000 to $285,000, Rubin said.
Though construction has been going on for eight weeks, the pier hasn’t had to close, Rubin said.
The shutdown will come in about three or four weeks, he said, and will last about two and a half weeks.
That’s when workers are to remove the pier decking and replace three longitudinal beams that are badly damaged and close to shore, Rubin said.
“We have to rip up that whole bay to get those beams out of there,” Rubin said. “We have to get a crane and it has to sit in the parking lot and reach out to that first and second bay. They are very heavy so it is going to be a ginormous crane.”
City of St. Augustine Beach Mayor S. Gary Snodgrass said the city was “pleased the county is moving forward with making repairs to the pier, which is an important and widely used structure where people can fish from and take pleasure strolls to view the ocean.”
“Pier Park is the crown jewel of St. Augustine Beach,” he added.
The commission approved the pier repairs after an ultrasound showed the pilings could be repaired effectively.
The current pier, built in 1986, cost $1 million, according to archives.
It replaced a 1,000-foot pier built in 1984 that was designed incorrectly and was consequently torn apart by a storm.
Insurance money from the engineering design firm paid for the current pier, according to Rubin and archives.
A new pier could cost as much as $5 million, according to St. Augustine Record archives. | <urn:uuid:4343d8c1-ebea-4213-9d54-7eaaed572563> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://staugustine.com/news/local-news/2012-03-06/pier-renovations-under-way | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971448 | 521 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Great article in the Tuscon Weekly, on Arizona cases:
Thank You for Not SharingComplete article
Arizonans are being forced to defend themselves against high-dollar illegal-music lawsuits filed by the Recording Industry Association of America
By MARI HERRERAS
Deborah Weed would rather not be talking to a reporter or having her photo taken. The single mother would rather be focusing on her family, which she supports by working for a Phoenix construction company, surviving paycheck to paycheck.
Weed says she'd prefer to enjoy time with her daughter and granddaughter. Instead, much of her time is dedicated to a legal fight with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).
In 2005, Weed and about 30,000 other Americans became part of what the RIAA calls its "tough-love" campaign, targeting music lovers who have allegedly shared or downloaded music illegally using the Internet.
Keywords: digital copyright law online internet law legal download upload peer to peer p2p file sharing filesharing music movies indie independent label freeculture creative commons pop/rock artists riaa independent mp3 cd favorite songs intellectual property | <urn:uuid:a6106afb-bed7-4976-87af-bb24ad2eb394> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://recordingindustryvspeople.blogspot.com/2008/02/excellent-article-on-arizona-cases-in.html?showComment=1204521060000 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935538 | 232 | 1.546875 | 2 |
An End To Unencrypted Digital Cable TV and the HTPC?by Ryan Smith on August 27, 2009 12:00 AM EST
- Posted in
- Ryan's Ramblings
For those of you with cable TV service, for some time now you've been witnessing the slow transition of cable TV from a pure analog service to a pure digital service. With cable systems finally at their limits for bandwidth, within the last year the cable companies have finally begun what has been dubbed the "analog reclamation" - removing analog channels from their service and replacing them with digital versions that require 1/6th (or less) the bandwidth. Because the reclamation involves removing analog versions of most for-cost channels (what's commonly called the Expanded Basic tier), the reclamation has been tied with the deployment of Digital Transport Adapters - low-cost cable boxes that are little more than a basic QAM tuner attached to an RF modulator. This has allowed cable companies to reclaim this space without deploying otherwise very expensive Set Top Boxes to every TV at an affected household.
A side effect of this has been that computer TV tuner users, such as HTPC owners who in the analog age were accustomed to getting access to the EB tier on their computers with a simple analog TV tuner, were able to access those same channels in their digital form using ClearQAM-capable tuners. This is because the FCC mandated that the security mechanism be separate from the STBs, which gave rise to the continually problematic CableCARD. In the name of cost, DTAs do not have the ability to use CableCARDs, and as such do not meet the separable security requirements. Ultimately this required cable operators to put the digital versions of their EB tiers in the clear if they wanted to use DTAs, and this is why ClearQAM tuners can exist in a useful manner.
That age, however short it was, looks to be coming to a close. DTAs may be little more than a basic QAM tuner, but that "little more" is that they support a very basic form of encryption - a 56bit DES-based cypher known as Privacy Mode - which would allow them to receive and decrypt lightly encrypted channels. The FCC separable security mandate has previously prevented Privacy Mode from being used, but we have known for some time that cable companies and device manufacturers were looking to get a waiver for DTAs. In effect they have been soliciting the FCC for permission to encrypt all EB tier channels with Privacy Mode, so that reception would be limited to DTAs and CableCARD devices.
The ramifications are two-fold. For the cable companies, once they implement this Privacy Mode across the board they will no longer have to install and maintain expensive signal traps to keep customers on lower tiers such as Limited Basic from accessing additional channels. For computer/HTPC users, this is an end to being able to directly receive EB tier channels with any kind of commonly available digital tuner. Privacy Mode is not open for licensing, and CableLabs will not license CableCARD for any kind of open (read: not locked down to hell and back) tuner. This means ClearQAM tuners made by ATI, Hauppauge, SiliconDust, and others would no longer be useful for receiving EB tier channels.
For pure digital reception on computers/HTPCs, what would be left would be two things. One would be fully licensed systems that implement head-to-toe DRM, the only way that CableLabs will license CableCARD for computers. This is not cheap, and brings with it all the disadvantages of not building your own system. The other would be utilizing the Firewire output of some STBs, but such STBs can be hard to acquire and the FCC allows broadcasts to include a copy-never (5C) flag that disables this output.
The last option would be to take advantage of the analog hole left by the component video output of STBs, using devices such as Hauppauge's HD PVR that can redigitize the output of STBs for importing into a computer. The drawback of this is a loss of quality due to an analog generation being included in the process, and whatever pitfalls that come from using the STB such a device would be attached to. None of these options are as simple and cheap as things stand today with a ClearQAM tuner.
At this point there's no reason to believe that cable companies won't deploy Privacy Mode across their networks, so it's a matter of "when", not "if" this will happen. It goes without saying that if you're currently enjoying the use of a ClearQAM tuner to receive EB tier channels, you'll want to enjoy what time you have left, and look into other solutions for the long-haul. At this pace, it looks like cable TV and computers will soon be divorcing.
On a final note, the loss of ClearQAM access is likely going to be followed by the loss of some fraction of the HTPC market, where users will not find as much value in a device that can no longer watch or record live TV from their cable company. Because of this potential nosedive in the HTPC market, I would be very surprised if Microsoft stayed entirely mum on the issue. They've put a lot of effort into Windows Media Center as a TV viewing platform and HTPC suite over the years, and this drives a stake right through that given the low adoption of CableCARD systems. Microsoft has been diversifying their TV operations over the years by getting satellite companies on-board and making some investments in IPTV/Internet TV, but cable TV is too big to ignore if Microsoft wants to keep pushing WMC. What this may lead to is anyone's guess, but unless they're going to drop the emphasis on TV viewing with WMC something will need to happen to keep WMC relevant in the cable TV space. | <urn:uuid:c76b9ecd-7994-43e1-b072-2fe5b834fdc1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://anandtech.com/show/3570 | 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 | 0.965593 | 1,221 | 1.789063 | 2 |
US Officials Pin Bank Hack Attack on Iran
Today in international tech news: U.S. officials point to Iran as the source of a bank hack attack, BlackBerry's app store contains pirated apps, Apple's Tim Cook goes to China again, India targets Nokia over unpaid taxes, and officials in the UK fret about the nation's vulnerability to cyberattacks.
U.S. government officials and security experts are convinced that a recent cyberattack on American banks was executed by Iran, according to The New York Times.
The U.S. has not yet divulged any evidence to corroborate their accusations, but The Times reports that security experts say the attack displayed a level of sophistication not possible for an amateur. The style of the attack, which aimed to disrupt services as opposed to thieving money, was another earmark of state-sponsored attacks.
The Times quotes Carl Herberger, vice president of the security firm Radware, who said that the attacks were unprecedented in "scale, scope and effectiveness."
The attacks were reportedly of the DDoS variety, which directs excessive amounts of traffic to a site until it collapses.
A hacker group called "Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters" -- say that three times fast -- took to the Web claiming responsibility for the attacks in what they say was retaliation for the anti-Islam video "The Innocence of Muslims." The group vowed continued attacks unless the video was removed from the Internet.
American intelligence officials, however, aren't buying it. The say the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Cyber Fighters are simply covering for Iran.
BlackBerry App Store Contains Pirated Apps
The app store for Research In Motion's BlackBerry, BlackBerry App World, was found to be housing pirated Android apps.
Reporting on a tip culled from Reddit, Cnet reports that the apps were packaged as BlackBerry PlayBook and BlackBerry 10 apps. In other words, they were passed off as legit BlackBerry items despite being patently pirated.
The Reddit poster claimed to be a developer whose apps had been downloaded from Google Play, converted and published for Blackberry in the guise of being the pirate's own.
A RIM spokesperson is quoted by Cnet saying that, upon being notified, RIM will immediately remove all pirated content from its app store.
Apple's Tim Cook Again in China
Apple CEO Tim Cook is meeting with partners and government officials in China, according to Reuters.
Apple's previous CEO, Steve Jobs, never visited China, a storyline which acted as the backdrop for Cook's first visit there less than a year ago.
China is Apple's second-biggest market, currently accounting for roughly 15 percent of the company's annual revenue. Reuters reports that Apple sold more than 2 million iPhone 5s in China within three days of the December release.
Apple's long-term success in China may depend on its ability to parent with domestic giant China Mobile, the nation's top telecommunications carrier, Reuters reports, citing analysts. It is not clear, however, whether Cook will be meeting with China Mobile.
India Targets Nokia Over Taxes
A Nokia factory was raided by Indian tax officials who are reportedly trying to recoup more than US$500 million in unpaid taxes, according to the BBC.
The raid on Finland-based Nokia, which has been in India since 1995, comes days after Indian tax officials asked UK-based Vodafone to cough up more than $2 billion in back taxes, according to the BBC.
Parliament Worried About Cyberattacks
Members of Britain's Parliament have voiced concern that the UK's armed forces are vulnerable to a cyberattack.
The Guardian reports that the concerns are rooted in the military's use of "technology that has no proven back-up." In what The Guardian described as "a withering critique," a parliamentary committee urged the government to more thoroughly address the pitfalls of the nation's cybersecurity.
The committee claims that it is not clear who would be in charge should the UK be hit with a sustained cyberattack, and that the Ministry of Defence is totally reliant on cybersystems that, if attacked, could leave the armed services "fatally compromised." | <urn:uuid:df314bcd-0baf-49cc-9acc-2c11c2f3489e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.technewsworld.com/story/hacking/77041.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964642 | 859 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Faced with a Supreme Court decision Thursday upholding President Barack Obama’s signature domestic achievement, Mitt Romney reacted in exactly the same way he’s handled nearly every challenge to his 2012 presidential campaign.
He dug in.
The former Massachusetts governor, who has repeatedly and stridently accused Obama of enacting an unconstitutional health care law, declared in Washington, D.C., that his view of the Affordable Care Act was unchanged. Obama’s law is still a violation of personal freedom, Romney said, and it’s still bad for the economy.
And in the eyes of Romney’s campaign, it’s still a winning political issue for the presumptive GOP presidential nominee. By midday, the homepage of Romney’s website had changed to a resolute-looking photo of the candidate over a banner reading, “Obamacare Upheld. Elections have consequences.”
(Also on POLITICO: Obama wins big in ruling)
“Obamacare was bad policy yesterday. It’s bad policy today,” Romney declared at an event in Washington. “If we want to replace Obamacare, we have to replace Obama.”
If the Supreme Court ruling was a grave disappointment for the conservative legal community, Republican political operatives are considerably less sure that it’s a loss for them and their national standard-bearer. The Romney campaign claimed the ruling caused an influx of donations online, announcing that more than $1 million came in from conservatives devoted to overturning the law.
To the Romney campaign, the ruling left the ACA looking like a richer target than ever: The justices upheld the law — leaving its unpopular provisions intact as a campaign issue — but did so on the grounds that the mandate requiring all Americans to purchase insurance is a “tax,” a traditionally easy target for Republicans.
One strategist aligned with Romney called that “the best-case scenario of it being upheld: It’s upheld as nothing but a massive tax hike.”
“President Obama just turned GOP intensity amps up to 11,” the strategist said.
The court’s decision also spares Romney, to some degree, the burden of outlining immediate, specific proposals to fix the health care system. Had the ACA been gutted, Republicans would have felt intense pressure to propose a law replacing it. As it is, Romney spoke about the law mostly in generalities, such as the politically uncontroversial imperative to protect consumers with pre-existing medical conditions.
The ruling presents complications as well for Romney, who signed a state-level universal health care law with many of the same provisions, including the individual mandate, as Massachusetts governor. In fact, liberal-leaning Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg cited Romney’s law in her opinion on the ACA, noting that “Congress followed Massachusetts’ lead” in mandating insurance coverage.
Romney can no longer argue — as he has in the past — that the major difference between “Obamacare” and “Romneycare,” is that only the Massachusetts law is constitutional. To the extent that Romney wants to attack the ACA as a tax-raising measure, he’s far from immune to attacks on that count himself.
But in the calculus of the Romney camp, the 2012 election is a referendum on the president. If voters want to get rid of the health care law, they now have only one viable alternative: replacing Obama.
Phil Musser, a former Tim Pawlenty adviser who worked on Romney’s 2008 campaign, said the ruling would help make health care one of the “clear and defining choices” of the 2012 election.
“[It] gives 60 percent of Americans who dislike Obamacare a second whack at the apple with respect to getting rid of it, and it’s pretty clear which candidate will do that and which candidate won’t,” he said.
“Today’s decision is bad for policy but presents a huge opportunity for Gov. Romney,” said Nick Ryan, a strategist for the independent GOP group the American Future Fund, and an adviser to one-time Romney foe Rick Santorum. “The court made it clear that the only way this very unpopular legislation can be reversed is to elect Gov. Romney as president along with a Republican House and Senate.”
Within hours of the ruling, Republicans were preparing their heaviest artillery to mount a renewed assault on the ACA, but this time in the political arena.
The GOP independent-spending juggernaut Americans for Prosperity plans to launch a $9 million, 12-state ad campaign lashing the ACA as a huge financial burden on the American people and arguing that only a change of power in the White House can halt its implementation.
“This now becomes the biggest tax increase in world history,” said AFP President Tim Phillips, who dismissed concerns about Romney’s own health care record as “ancillary.”
“This is all about the president. It’s not about the position of any candidate. It’s about what the president did. He passed the biggest piece of social welfare legislation in more than a generation,” Phillips said. “The public is just not looking at what Gov. Romney has proposed, or House Republicans. They are looking at this as a law. That’s a big difference from some state proposal a decade ago.”
Other members of the Republican political universe weren’t as confident. Several senior operatives said — in candid, anonymous conversations — that they expected Romney to face renewed questions about his standing as an opponent of Obama’s health care overhaul, giving his record in Massachusetts.
Polling released in advance of the court’s decision was inconclusive: 28 percent of voters in an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll said they’d be pleased if the court upheld the law, while 35 percent said they’d be disappointed. The ACA continues to have more detractors than fans: 35 percent of respondents in the same poll said they thought it was a good idea, while 41 percent said it was a bad idea.
GOP leaders in general feel strongly that health care remains a winning issue for them, but several strategists suggested it would have been even more helpful to the party if Obama had been stripped of his core legislative achievement and exposed to the charge of being an utterly failed president.
Instead, the law is now more firmly glued in place — as a measure still stocked with fodder for GOP attack ads, but perhaps also as a law with greater legitimacy in the eyes of the public.
“This is a bad decision for America. Some Republican political operatives are suggesting that this decision will boost our electoral chances this fall. I completely disagree with that,” GOP media strategist Curt Anderson said. “It would have been far worse for President Obama if his crowning achievement, such as it is, had been invalidated.”
Anderson added: “It does help, however, that the court did call Obamacare what it really is: a tax increase.”
One Republican strategist who asked to speak anonymously called the ruling a “momentary boon for Democrats,” but questioned how much it would actually change the overall 2012 landscape: “Both sides will raise significant sums of money off of this decision and the base on both sides will be fully engaged going into the election, but I don’t think that was ever in doubt.”
“Health care, I think, now becomes a harder issue to fight for the right, because now we are taking something away from people — always a harder thing to do,” said another top Republican. “The key is to play this out, get to the fall still close and get back to the economy.”
In his remarks Thursday, Romney was already shifting back in the direction of a message focused on jobs, declaring that the health care law has been an impediment to economic growth and vowing to change that on the first day of his administration.
To the extent that Romney wants to embrace a tear-this-law-down message, Democrats — for the first time in a while — responded with a bit of swagger.
“They’re talking about going backwards, which is basically the frame we’d like to have Mitt Romney in,” Democratic strategist Jonathan Prince said. “It’s not swing [voter]-persuading.”
Former Republican National Committee official Jeff Berkowitz countered that the decision fits neatly into the GOP’s frame for the 2012 election: that Obama has been an economic flop who has repeatedly broken campaign promises and fallen short of what voters expected.
“The court confirmed that Obamacare breaks two major Obama 2008 campaign pledges: no mandate and no higher taxes on the middle class,” Berkowitz said. “The ruling does nothing to change the reality that the law is flawed policy that makes health insurance and health care more expensive and less accessible to the American people.”
Ginger Gibson contributed to this report. | <urn:uuid:deeef71c-4a07-4e21-993a-dae0517d8616> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=BBD18481-C6D5-440F-855C-A99CAA80B3D5 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967536 | 1,881 | 1.609375 | 2 |
The world now wants to know, Is hair replacement safe?
With the newly outed reports of Wayne Rooney getting a hair transplant, there has been a flurry of questions from others about the procedure and whether it is a safe alternative to letting it all go.
The human beauty is important to many, and the effects of hair loss can have a devastating effect on one’s self image. Many have begun to ask experts about the procedure that Wayne underwent and if it is right for them.
Though the procedure is not for the light in the pocketbook, it has been deemed safe by most experts and can have dramatic results with little interruption to ones lifestyle. But even as it is safe and effective, it is not the only option out there. There are several different options for people losing their hair, and surgery should be used as a last resort, and does have some qualifiers involved.
The other options available are usually more effective in the earlier stages of hair loss, and include over the counter medication, prescriptions, and topical ointments. In recent years, Rogaine, Minoxidil, and other prescription medications have been shown to regrow hair for this purpose. Taken either orally or as a topical solution, these are essentially hormonal treatments used to stimulate the growth of hair that is already there, but dormant in growth. Usually applied on a daily basis, they are cheaper and less intrusive than surgery, but do require a concerted effort on the part of the patient to continue treatment until effective. Though effective on many, it can be frustrating to try to conquer the problem in this fashion on a mental basis, as they take time and constant application, and impatience may begin to wane the excitement of the patient, or even lead to frustration at the slow outcome.
The truth is that people will get different results depending on the extent of the damage and the individual. It may work well for some people and backfire on others. The effects vary a lot from one individual to another. People should be careful to weigh their options so that they are sure of what they want from the treatment.
It is very important that a person weight all of the possible outcomes of a treatment before they embark, as no treatment is 100% effective. As in the case of surgery, topical solutions and medications also may have side effects, higher or lower success rates, and be more productive for people with certain criteria. Even surgery has some pre-qualifiers. Mark Rooney is a case in point. With plenty of hair on the back and sides of the head, he was an excellent candidate for surgery as there was plenty of alternative landscape for hair to be taken from for replacing on the top.
Certain types of male pattern baldness will not allow for this, and a topical or medication may be the only choice. Some medication has been shown to affect potency in some cases, or even psychological changes in some users, while surgery does not on a hormonal level. It is advised that if you or someone you love is experiencing hair loss and are looking for possible solutions, to overlook as much material on the subject as possible, and try the least intrusive options before taking drastic measures, like spending 30,000 pounds for an outpatient procedure before medication of topical ointments that might be just as effective for a fractionof the cost and discomfort.
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I think I have Johnsongrass invading my back lawn. I has sprayed the usual Crabgrass/lawn grassy weed killer on it and it is still taking over my entire lawn. What can I do?
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Here is a link to Johnson grass control from University of Missouri Extension. The excerpt below on control emphasizes an integrated approach, that is using many different methods to manage the Johnson grass, there is not a silver bullet but an integrated pest management approach to deal with this weed.
link to the article is http://extension.missouri.edu/publications/DisplayPub.aspx?P=g4872
Preventing johnsongrass from becoming established in new areas is the best available control method, because the weed spreads in so many ways. Because johnsongrass is a perennial weed, single cultural control measures or herbicide applications rarely provide adequate control.
Johnsongrass control programs should
* Prevent spread of rhizomes from infested to uninfested areas.
* Kill or weaken established plants and their underground rhizome system.
* Control seedlings originating from shattered seed.
* Prevent production of seed and its spread to new areas.
* Use fall tillage to bring rhizomes to soil surface, where they may be killed by winter conditions.
These objectives are closely related and are equally important to the success or failure of a control program. In limited infestations, it is possible and desirable to use herbicides to kill the weed and prevent seed production. The critical time to kill johnsongrass is while the weed is becoming established and before it has spread over the entire field. For sites with established infestations, a fall application of Roundup or Touchdown will kill emerged tissue and often developing rhizomes.
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- I live in East Murray, West Holaday, Salt Lake County. We have a large pine tree and want to plant some flowers under/near it. The plants would be along a fence that runs to the east of the tree. Some, very little west sun in the evening. Any suggestions? I would love some long lasting flowers.
- We have a weed in our hay field that is choking out the field in quite a large area. The weed has a hard stem with heart shaped leaves about 1/4 to 1/2 inch in size around the stem leading to seed pods that look like flowers that are hard and have a seed in them. The seed is red and the husk around them is green when the seed leaves the husk is white, stem is hard green and stick like.
- We have a scrub oak that has been growing between a pine and an aspen, which has made the oak very lop-sided. The aspen is gone now. How much purning can we do to the oak to try and even it's growth?
- I had to cut down a large Globe Willow tree in my back yard as it was growing into the power line. I have heard that it is dangerous to burn the wood from a Globe Willow in a fireplace as it emits toxic fumes. Is this true?
- When is the next date for spraying apple trees for codling moth?
- I have some cucumbers I bought from the nursery in a small container about 3 weeks ago. I transplanted them to a larger container. I move them in the garage at night and back out to the driveway during the day. The leaves and stems are turning light green and have dry white places on them. Are they getting sun scalded, am I watering them too much, not enough fertilizer?
- My neighbors Aspen trees are sending roots into my yard. Is there anyway besides a barrier to discourage this growth?
- I planted four Patmore Green Ash trees in my yard and they all have circular hole bite marks on all the leaves. I cannot see any insects on them. Do you have any idea what might be eating the leaves and how I can get rid of them? | <urn:uuid:7092eae5-97c6-4d3a-853d-7b3eb925fc75> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://extension.usu.edu/htm/faq/faq_q=3590 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961448 | 846 | 1.804688 | 2 |
The following exchange between former New Jersey Govs. Brendan T. Byrne and Tom Kean took place in a recent teleconference:
Q. How does acting Gov. Donald DiFrancesco's proposal to gradually phase out Garden State Parkway tolls affect GOP gubernatorial candidate Bret Schundler, who wants to end them all at once? And does it affect Democratic candidate Jim McGreevey's position?
BYRNE: In a political season, the cost-benefit formula becomes just a benefit formula. People don't want to deal with cost. We're starting to see this in this campaign. The Star-Ledger ran an article on how much this is really going to cost, and neither candidate has responded to that. Schundler says he can save a billion here and a billion there, but both you and I know that's easier said than done, Tom. So I think the Parkway tolls, if they're going to be phased out, it realistically must be done with a rise in the gas tax.
KEAN: The cost-benefit ratio is the question. The Parkway is a mess, particularly in the summertime, as those of us who have stood in long, long lines trying to get to the Shore know. Government has a duty to try to correct that. E-ZPass is the right step forward. Eliminating tolls? Only if the public is willing to pay the costs. But it's wrong to say it can be done without cost.
BYRNE: And if they're removed, the Parkway will be maintained the way the state highway system is maintained, and people ought to give that a lot of thought.
KEAN: That's right. One result will be that more people will use the Parkway if tolls are removed. Second, the maintenance of the Parkway will not be as good as it is at present.
Q. President Bush's sanctioning of limited stem-cell research raises the question of whether the federal government can, by executive edict, slow or halt scientific progress. How much impact, in practice, will Bush's decision have?
KEAN: Government cannot halt the march of science, and any effort to do so will always fail, but it can slow it down. If the U.S. government is not behind this research, it might take a year or two longer, but it will happen. President Bush moved on the issue. We now have a certain amount of stem cell research going on. Some say it will not be enough, that it has to be expanded. I hope we will listen to the best scientific minds as we move forward.
BYRNE: If the President really wanted to choke off research, he could do it. He could do it by taking away any funding from a hospital or school engaged in any research project. The president has a lot of clout. Fortunately, President Bush hasn't taken that route. He's going to sort of back into this research commitment. He's eased the trauma with his first announcement, and I think he'll now let it take its course and expand it without causing the kind of backlash the right wing might provide.
KEAN: What impressed me was the time the President took and the extent of knowledge he now has on the ethical and scientific problems. One New Jersey scientist told me just recently that this has the potential to be the greatest scientific discovery in the last 100 years. If that's correct, and the research turns out to be extraordinarily promising in curing Alzheimer's, cancer and multiple sclerosis, the stem cell research will accelerate. Then it ought to be expanded based on that success.
Q. Given some recent obstacles, can DiFrancesco realistically expect the proposed Newark arena to be part of his legacy? Or, as Schundler has said he believes, should New Jersey be getting out of the sports business altogether?
BYRNE: I think the Newark project does get the state out of the sports business. It has been presented as an opportunity to let private enterprise run the arena. The state's involvement is in providing infrastructure, which we would do for any business coming into Newark. So the plan is consistent with Schundler's evaluation of the situation.
KEAN: I believe it has to be part of Gov. DiFrancesco's legacy, because the Newark project in particular cannot wait for a new governor. The bill that's being talked about would be an entertainment and jobs-creating bill involving the project in Newark, which is essential for the city's revitalization, and in the Meadowlands, which is essential for its economic viability; and some projects in southern New Jersey, also in the sports and entertainment areas, which would enhance that area. I believe strongly that the state has an obligation to help with projects that increase the quality of life for people who live in New Jersey. And things like the sports complex, the science center in Jersey City, and the arts complex in Newark, and the theater projects in New Brunswick have been very important economically to those regions. In the long run, the right projects will always bring New Jersey more dollars than they cost.
BYRNE: But there aren't many people who support spending state money on sports. On a referendum it would lose.
KEAN: I think you're probably correct. And yet the evidence is very much there that if you do these projects correctly - and not just sports, but other projects - they create jobs and enhance cities. But you have to proceed at the lowest possible cost to the taxpayer, and I believe that's the way this bill is structured.
BYRNE: If they'd add a little money to get a good basketball team, it would help. They're spending money like crazy on the Nets, and it's for naught.
KEAN: As the Dodgers used to say, "Wait "til next year."
Q. Was President Bush justified in leaving Washington to spend a month-long vacation at his Texas ranch?
BYRNE: When I was in the Army, the ultimate punishment was to be sent to Waco, Texas. It was an incentive to do well, so you wouldn't get sent there. Apparently, George Bush hasn't done well.
KEAN: It is hard to understand why somebody would want to spend August in Texas. But, having said that, the President doesn't get a vacation, no matter where he is. In this electronic age, communications at his ranch are pretty close to what they are in the White House. So if he's more comfortable there, God bless him.
BYRNE: I remember being at a press conference with candidate John Kennedy, when he was asked to comment on Eisenhower's golf vacations. He refused to comment. I thought that was a sign of class. | <urn:uuid:c5735263-aeec-4ead-b554-eb9498a2f6d2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.nj.com/njv_kean_byrne/2001/08/parkway_tolls_facing_the_costs.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97453 | 1,380 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Shots - Health Blog
Wed June 13, 2012
Disabled Woman Dies While Awaiting Second Chance At Kidney Transplant
At Misty Cargill's funeral, the minister called her an advocate for other people with intellectual disabilities. She was — although a reluctant one.
Cargill became an advocate when NPR did a story about her fight to get a life-saving kidney transplant. Misty, 30, died in her sleep on Saturday. She was on a list to get that transplant when she died.
In 2006, at the time of the NPR story, the transplant center closest to her, Oklahoma University Medical Center in Oklahoma City, turned her down, saying a woman with a mild intellectual disability did not have the mental competency to make an informed decision to choose a transplant.
"Lurking below the surface is the more likely reason for denial: Someone determines that people with intellectual disabilities are inferior, human beings of lesser value, the last priority," wrote Tim Shriver, chairman of the Special Olympics, in an op-ed in the Washington Post on Christmas Day. "They're put last in line because they're thought not to matter quite as much as other people. For Misty Cargill, like another vulnerable person who is being celebrated today all over the world, there is no bed available. And for Cargill, being turned away may well cost her life."
Shriver was one of many listeners who heard the NPR story and was outraged. Officials at a hospital in Galveston, Texas, offered to put her on their transplant list.
Shortly after the story ran, Cargill's kidney function improved and she was no longer in need of a transplant. But in recent years, her health declined and in the last year she was placed on a waiting list by another Oklahoma City hospital.
My story about Cargill noted that about 60 percent of transplant centers reported they'd have serious reservations about giving a kidney to someone with a mild to moderate intellectual disability. Kidneys are in short supply and doctors must determine who is most likely to thrive with one. Often medical professionals figure that someone with an intellectual disability will not be capable of doing things like faithfully taking all the medications required for a lifetime after receiving a transplant.
But in the 2006 story, I quoted Steven Reiss, a professor of psychology at Ohio State University, who'd studied the issue and found some surprising results. When people with intellectual disabilities get transplants, they have results just as good, or better, than anyone else. One reason is that people like Misty often live in group homes where there's staff to drive them to their doctor's appointments and make sure they take all their medications.
Cargill led a full life, which was clear from the crowd friends said filled the Chisholm Trail Church of Christ in Duncan, Okla. on Tuesday. Along with her family and boyfriend, there were friends from the factory where she packed meters for the oil fields, friends from church and from her bowling league — including the owner of the bowling alley. Friends from the group homes and apartments where she'd lived were also there, according to Robin Arter, executive director of Duncan Group Homes.
They talked about how Misty, despite her declining health, enjoyed being around family and friends, how she loved babies, and doted on her young nephews and nieces. "She always had a hug for everybody and a compliment," says Arter. "She was a sweet, sweet lady." | <urn:uuid:5d4c9633-4fb7-4945-bba3-292079e00005> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kasu.org/post/disabled-woman-dies-while-awaiting-second-chance-kidney-transplant | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982958 | 712 | 1.679688 | 2 |
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Personal Business: Potables
A RICH BOUQUET OF BELGIAN BREWS
No one really knows how many kinds of beer Belgians make. Estimates range as high as 800, but even conservative guesses of 400 are impressive for a country of just 10 million people. Raspberry beer, wheat beer, red beer, golden beer, 12%-alcohol beer, beer made with grapes, beer made in abbeys, beer laced with spices, dark Christmas beer--you name it, and Belgium seems to brew it. As Englishman Michael Jackson, who has written extensively on Belgian beer, puts it: "The reverence reserved for wine in most countries is in Belgium accorded to beer."
Some of that reverence is now being imported to the U.S., the new boom market for Belgium's 100 breweries. But in America, don't look for common pilsners, such as Stella Artois or Jupiler, the leading brands in Belgium, where pilsners account for 70% of the sales. Belgian brewers don't like to go head-to-head with such established pilsners as Heineken. But the main reason is that the real hot sellers in New York, Chicago, San Diego, San Francisco, and other U.S. cities are "specialty" Belgian beers--typically $10 a six-pack.
ALE AND HEARTY. If you're happy with Budweiser, Miller, or other watery, mass-produced U.S. pilsners, Belgium's specialty beers may not be for you. But if you see beer as an aperitif, an accompaniment to dessert, an alternative to brandy, or a tasty ingredient in such dishes as steamed mussels and braised beef, Belgium has the brews.
America's appetite for Belgian beers has been sparked in part by the rise of U.S. microbreweries and the growing popularity of quality domestic beers such as Samuel Adams, says Don Feinberg, who runs Vanberg & DeWolf in Cooperstown, N.Y., one of a growing number of importers of Belgian beer. Feinberg says his job of selling to distributors has gotten easier, as Americans have become less rigid in their taste.
If you want to take the plunge, a primer on Belgium's leading beer types may help. Lambic is wheat beer, rather than one made from the traditional hops-and-barley recipe. It is fermented in small breweries in the Senne valley just south of Brussels, where airborne wild yeast is allowed to float into the wheat mash through the roof slats, promoting spontaneous fermentation. Straight lambic beers, sold under such names as Belle-Vue, have little or no carbonation and are very dry.
Gueuze, such as Alken-Maes' Mort Subite brand, is a blend of young and old lambics made with two or more fermentations. Kriek, made by breweries such as Liefmans, is a blended lambic that has had cherries, strawberries, or raspberries added. It's often served in champagne flutes as a before-dinner drink. In fact, each brand uses a special glass, which Belgian bartenders can supply. Rodenbach's Grand Cru red beer takes a stemmed glass like that used for Burgundy. Orval's abbey-style Trappiste is served in a chunky-style goblet, similar to those used by monks in the Middle Ages.
Faro beer contains sugar or caramel for a "sweet and sour" taste. White beer such as Interbrew's Hoegaarden has an aroma like honey, derived from its combination of wheat, oats, Curaao orange peels, and coriander. Brown beer like that made by Liefmans is close to an old English ale. Saisons are low-alcohol, orangy beers made in the Wallonia region of Belgium in the summer or harvest seasons. Golden ales such as Duvel have an 8.2% alcohol content by volume, so don't be fooled by the pale-gold color into thinking you're trying just a standard 4.5% pilsner.
RAFT OF DRAFT. For beer lovers who visit Belgium, a must stop is the museum at the Brewer's House, No. 10 on Brussels' famous Grand Place. Less formal and more fun might be a visit to a typical Belgian bar, where you'll find dozens of brews on tap and sometimes more than 100 in bottles. Brussels' Moeder Lambic (68, rue de Savoie) has 28 draft pumps.
For more information, scan some books by Michael Jackson. Impmrter Feinberg, who would like consumers to make the connection between the sophistication of wine and that of beer, sells about 5,000 copies a year of Jackson's The Great Beers of Belgium ($28; Coda, Antwerp). Also look for Jackson's The New World Guide to Beer ($23; Running Press, Philadelphia). As Feinberg says about Belgian beer: "The more you know, the better it tastes."Patrick Oster | <urn:uuid:3fb885c6-44d6-4f37-848f-46d2140f8510> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.businessweek.com/stories/1994-08-14/a-rich-bouquet-of-belgian-brews | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95183 | 1,067 | 1.585938 | 2 |
Monday, March 02, 2009
Convection oven RO300FC also suitable for solder at aluminium cores
Press release, February 24, 2009
The convection oven RO300FC of the Suisse supplier Essemtec AG is one of the world wide mostly sold oven for small and medium sized capacities of number of pieces. The oven heats by convection solely and is applicable for the various tasks in the SMT, especially for the reflow soldering of non-leaded solder pastes or for the hardening of adhesives. In the customer service at the LED lamp manufacturer AUTEV AG the oven has demonstrated his abilities at soldering at an aluminium core.
The RO300FChad been repeated awarded and convinces by its very good price-performance ratio. Particularly, the small machine space is attractive for customers. “We very often sell the oven to customers, which are cramped in space. Here, the RO300FC offers very good possibilities. By this, particularly the performance parameter convinces, which is only rarely believed to be capable to an oven of this size by customer side,” states Wolfgang Stöllger, distribution region East-Germany of the Essemtec AG.
With the dimensions of 2'000x710x1'200 mm, the RO300FC belongs to the smallest convection ovens, which can be used in line. It is favourable in purchasing and maintenance and can be used in productions with continuously fabrication efficient as well as in a lowest-lot production. The vertical hot-air flow reaches every place at the printing board. By the high air volume the warmth will be distributed to all components and the printing board even. Therefore, neither local overheating nor warmth shadows can occur.
The temperature of the hot-air will be measured and regulated single in every zone. By a curtain of air between the single heating zones an expected temperature profile can be adjusted exactly. “This had been important for our application, in particular and the RO300FC had fully convinced with it”, so Tim David, Head of Division Lighting/Business Development of the AUTEV AG. “With the oven we have managed it unproblematic to solder LED’s at our aluminum core printing boards. This is necessary as the LED’s are heat up extremely at operation in the final product. Therefore they are soldered on an aluminum plate, which functions as first heat sink.” explains Tim David the necessity of the placement at an aluminum core.
RO300FC at AUTEV AG facility
Since two years the AUTEV AG and the HarzOptics GmbH work on the development of an ecological compatible LED street lamp. With the AuLED, available from March 2009, the market for street lamps shall get revolutionized. The lamps show a distinct lower current consumption as customary sodium and mercury lamps; moreover they are special insect friendly because of the light pulsating and minimize the light-smog due to flexible adjustable LED wings. Present, the first demonstration plants will be installed.
For the non-leaded solder of the LED’s temperatures of 260°c over a period of 20 – 40 seconds are necessary. Especially at the solder the aluminum plate picks up to much warmth, which may prevent a strong connection of LED and aluminum plate. In this connection, it is especially important, that the oven provides the necessary temperature for the declared period.
„The performances of the oven are convincing. The test results of the Essemtec AG are reflected in the real application in our domestic. The oven is excellent suitable for solder of our LED’s at an aluminum plate,” summarizes Tim David the application of the RO 300FC up to now. | <urn:uuid:f4567331-95f5-44e3-a4ed-543c4fe15af6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.essemtec.com/news.asp?setCountry=US.en&SelectedCountry=46&id=10248 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933977 | 759 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Within This summer time the Economist reported newspapers Everything dies comic in wealthy nations is lowering as individuals are being able to view and talking about information through internet sites including YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Google. However various digital models rose to teach site visitors to pay for digital copies from the favorite newspapers. These models include pay walls enabling them limited utilization of articles and becoming digital copies available through the monday to friday so on to print weekly.
Books, movies, and music are facing competition from torrent sites Everything dies comic together with other illegal setting up platforms. The comic marketplace is facing lowering monthly sales due to options of entertainment as well as the ongoing fight with internet piracy. You are prepared to revaluate the cost-effective and digital models for your comic industry.
The Everything dies comic Printing Posting Model
The Direct Market signifies the comic stores which is founded on Everything dies comic selling plenty of comic copies around the relatively handful of number game game titles. While die-hard comic fanatics are interested with tangible copies they could read, collect, and savor their value within the secondary market. Comic fans want the collectability aspect back in their books to ensure that they notice becoming an investment to take a position their.
To enhance a lucrative secondary market, comic companies need to publish game game titles with quality writing and art. With different meeting with former Editor-In-Chief Jim Shooter for brand new you are able to city Graphic Authors.com, because he was running Valiant in 1992 the business was making two million dollars pre-tax profit monthly with only eight books, while Marvel was fighting and flooding industry with 164 books. Flooding the areas with 164 books in a single author cuts down on the standard in the books and cannibalizes their particular game game titles. Site visitors don’t wish to switch cash for garbage.
After Jim Shooter departed from Valiant, the business elevated their game game titles from eight to 16. The conventional from the tales familiar with no creative input of Jim Shooter and customers dropped and before extended they reduced their game game titles to eight books shipping them bi-weekly. Learning a lesson within the the 19 nineties, growing the quantity of game game titles affects sales once the standard of each and every book is low.
Comic companies also needs to stop posting second printings when digital media is becoming available. John Hibbs of Savage Critic thinks overproduction is hurting the Direct Market as overprints and second printings create undesirable inventory for retailers. Second printings are cannibalizing the comic areas – staying away from through second printings when you’re able to offer digital copies and possess first printings. Any second printings connected having a comic diminish the requirement for their first printings. Comic companies must encourage late arrivals to purchase digital copies, buy the comics within the secondary market, or wait for collected edition. This could increase interest within the title and generate greater sales for that organization with time. The increase in the secondary market cost in the comic alone is enough marketing itself to produce interest within the title.
Everything dies comic Digital Posting Model
Digital site visitors compared to print site visitors desire to read an account just like a temporary distraction and move one. An Amazing Spider-Guy comic costs $3.99 enabling a enjoyable read not under 25 minutes of distraction. While Amazon . com . com.com offers the least costly one hour Television show at 99 cents. Obtaining the cost of digital copies lower is the best way to compete against different sorts of entertainment.
An Amazing Spider-Guy comic by Everything dies comic getting a typical monthly print run of 60,000 would be capable of increase its circulation of digital copies once the cost was 99 cents. Lowering digital copy would encourage more site visitors for the series monthly. Amazing Spider-Guy could easy break 100,000 copies between both print and digital copies.
Recently Marvel implemented their Point One comics presenting new site visitors for his or her figures early this year nonetheless this program has not elevated their sales. Electricity Comics takes it one step further by renumbering and relaunching all their game game titles in September 2011 supplying exactly the same cost for digital copies at the time that since they’re released for $2.99. Following a first four days digital copies will drop to $1.99. Depending how these comics are marketed – clients either can discover their whereabouts just like a gimmicks or value-added memorabilia.
Online site visitors are employed to reading through through material on the internet totally free. What makes them thinking about buying a $3.99 or $2.99 Everything dies comic digital copy? Tailoring digital copies for his or her proper audience increases audience by decreasing the cost of digital copy. Eventually digital medium will exceed the printed comics nonetheless the amount it’ll bring may likely boost profit for the comic entrepreneurs. | <urn:uuid:25435f7d-7942-488f-a71e-2d08a2e85c26> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.everythingdiescomic.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9437 | 977 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Altars of Power and Grace: The Evolution
From "Altars of Power and Grace: Create the Life You Desire" by Michael & Robin Mastro
Posted by: Robin Mastro
Since the dawn of civilization people have created altars and shrines in sacred places where they invoked the spirits, prayed to their deities, and expressed their devotion to the mysterious forces that guided their lives. In the Western world, shrines were memorials erected in homes or at wayside crossings to commemorate saints and ancestors and to honor the dead. Altars, where spiritual ceremonies took place, were usually found in churches and temples. The services and rituals performed in these places were considered the province of established religions. In recent years, idea of having private altars has gained increasing popularity.
In this book are innovative steps, based on the ancient science of Vastu Shastra, to create empowering and transformational altars. These altars are designed as a sacred space where you can ask for Divine inspiration, grace to infuse your life, and help make your dreams come true. This system was developed over several years of extensive study of both Feng Shui, the ancient Chinese art of placement, and Vastu Shastra, the primary system of sacred architecture used in India for more than seven thousand years.
For many years my husband, Michael Mastro, and I have taught yoga, meditation, and other spiritual awareness techniques as part of the Art of Living Foundation, a nonprofit, humanitarian organization whose purpose is service to humanity. Michael, a meditator for more than 35 years, traveled extensively in India with the renowned spiritual teacher, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
During the last 30 years, Michael has become one of the leading Western experts on the art and science of Vastu Shastra. In the mid-nineteen-seventies, as a graduate architecture student, Michael was asked by the Maharishi to design spiritual centers in India, Europe, and the United States using the principles of Vastu Shastra. He then began to apply this ancient Vedic system of placement in his work to build and create living environments in harmony with nature, including using the science to determine the environmental orientation of the first Microsoft building.
Although Vastu Shastra had enormous appeal to me, I felt it was too complex and difficult for Westerners to integrate into their busy lives. However, I also knew that the benefits this system offered to harmoniously align our personal space with the powerful energies of the Universe, were too important to set aside.
I decided to find a way to simplify the complexities and to extract the most potent aspects of Vastu Shastra.I knew there were tangible benefits in this ancient art that would point the way to an evolving system adaptable to the realities of today’s world.
At that time, I was completing a graduate degree at Antioch University in the new field of Whole Systems Design, which simply stated, teaches how to think systemically, operate holistically, and design creatively. We had also purchased a home that conformed to the general outline recommended by Vastu Shastra, and were busy remodeling it in accordance with Vastu principles.
After we moved in, our lives changed dramatically. Our health improved, our family relationships blossomed, and our finances improved –even our pets benefited from the change. I was convinced of the great advantages the system offered.
Shortly after moving into our home, we were invited to travel throughout India with the founder of The Art of Living Foundation, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. Wherever we went in India we saw altars: they were placed at roadside rests, in people’s homes, and in meditation halls. The Divine seemed ever-present in this culture. Ceremony and common daily rituals went hand-in-hand. By using altars, there was a tangible connection with the Divine apparent and this was the essential piece I had been looking for to define my graduate work. I had gone to India knowing that Vastu would be the subject of my graduate project, but I hadn’t known how a system derived from it would emerge. I thought perhaps the answer was to create small areas in a home or office where these principles could be incorporated, even if they could not be applied throughout the dwelling. From listening to peoples’ concerns about how to integrate Vastu, I knew it needed to be not only aesthetically appealing, but simple enough to understand and powerful enough to impact their lives.
Upon returning home I developed a model for creating altars based on Vastu and incorporated it into my graduate work. Along with my husband, I worked on the design, taking into account directional influences and the placement of each of the five elements, to create the results that were inherent in the science itself. Anyone could assemble such altars in their homes or offices, whether or not their environment fulfilled the requirements of this ancient system. This book teaches you how to create dynamic altars based on principles of Vastu Shastra as seen through the lens of Whole Systems Design. Michael and I have taught classes and worked with clients for several years to create altars based on this new understanding of an ancient art. Reports from people who have assembled altars have been outstanding, and in some cases truly amazing. In this book we present examples of altars to demonstrate different ways they can be coordinated with various decors and lifestyles.
We believe, and our experience has demonstrated, that by following the simple directions presented here, anyone can create altars that attract spiritual empowerment and manifest positive results. I hope that you will find the inspiration in this book to create your own altars -altars which please you aesthetically, open you to Divine energy, and help you to attain the desires of your heart.
Home & Garden, Altars, Vastu | <urn:uuid:29a1a928-2b43-4409-87e3-87c66c0fbb43> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailyom.com/library/000/000/000000006.html | 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 | 0.972358 | 1,206 | 1.632813 | 2 |
288 U.S. 325
53 S.Ct. 388
77 L.Ed. 812
INDIAN TERRITORY ILLUMINATING OIL CO.
BOARD OF EQUALIZATION OF TULSA COUNTY, OKL. SAME v. BOARD OF COUNTY COM'RS OF PAYNE COUNTY, OKL.
Nos. 356, 357.
Argued Jan. 17, 18, 1933.
Decided Feb. 13, 1933.
Mr. John H. Miley, of Oklahoma City, Okl., for petitioner.
Mr. Hugh Webster, of Tulsa, Okl., for respondent Board of Equalization of Tulsa County, Okl.
Mr. Ernest F. Jenkins, of Stillwater, Okl., for respondent Board of County Com'rs of Payne County, Okl.
Mr. Chief Justice HUGHES delivered the opinion of the Court.
These cases present the question of the validity of ad valorem taxes upon crude oil belonging to petitioner, Indian Territory Illuminating Oil Company, and held by it in its storage tanks in Tulsa County and Payne County, Oklahoma. In each case, the tax was challenged upon the ground that the oil was exempt because in its production petitioner was operating as an instrumentality of the United States. The Supreme Court of Oklahoma sustained the taxes (13 P.(2d) 585; 14 P.(2d) 929); and the cases come here on writs of certiorari. 287 U.S. 594, 53 S.Ct. 223, 77 L.Ed. —-.
The facts are shown by agreed statements. The oil in question was assessed under the general laws of the State for annual ad valorem taxes as a part of the personal property of petitioner within the respective counties. It constituted petitioner's share of oil which petitioner had produced from restricted Indian lands in Seminole County, Oklahoma, under leases which had been approved by the Secretary of the Interior pursuant to the Act of Congress of May 27, 1908, 35 Stat. 312. In the Tulsa County Case (No. 356), the assessment was for the year 1929 and included 51,630 barrels of crude oil which had been produced from the restricted lands above mentioned during the period from March 31, 1927, to June 16, 1927. This oil on production had been commingled with oil from petitioner's 'commercial' or unrestricted leasehold properties in Seminole County and had been immediately piped into petitioner's storage tanks in Tulsa County where it had remained. At the time of the removal of the oil, petitioner paid to the Superintendent of the Five Civilized Tribes for the lessors the agreed royalty of 12 1/2 per cent. of the gross proceeds, and the Indians owned no part of the oil in storage on January 1, 1929, the date of assessment, nor will they receive any part of the proceeds when the oil is sold by petitioner. In the Payne County Case (No. 357), the question concerns 383,307 barrels of crude oil produced from the restricted lands prior to January 1, 1928 (the assessment date) and piped, with other oil, into petitioner's storage tanks in Payne County and there held.
In Jaybird Mining Company v. Weir, 271 U.S. 609, 46 S.Ct. 592, 70 L.Ed. 1112, an ad valorem tax upon ores mined under a lease of restricted Indian land and in the bins on that land on the assessment date was held to be invalid. The tax 'was assessed on the ores in mass, and the royalties or equitable interests of the Indians had not been paid or segregated.' Id., page 612 of 271 U.S., 46 S.Ct. 592, 593. In these circumstances the tax was regarded as an attempt to tax an agency of the federal government. That decision is not controlling in the instant case. Here, payment had been made for the share of the Indian lessors and they had no further interest in the oil. It had been commingled with other oil, had been transported from the restricted lands to petitioner's storage tanks in the taxing counties, and was there held exclusively in the interest and for the convenience of petitioner.
There is a recognized distinction between a non-discriminatory tax upon the property of an agent of government, albeit the property is used in, or has relation to, the business of the agency—where there is only a remote, if any, influence upon the exercise of the functions of government—and a tax which is deemed to impose a direct burden upon the exertion of governmental powers. McCulloch v. Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316, 436, 4 L.Ed. 579; Thomson v. Union Pacific Railroad Co., 9 Wall. 579, 590, 19 L.Ed. 792; Union Pac. Railroad Company v. Peniston, 18 Wall. 5, 33, 36, 21 L.Ed. 787; Baltimore Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co. v. Baltimore, 195 U.S. 375, 382, 25 S.Ct. 50, 49 L.Ed. 242; Choctaw, O. & G.R. Co. v. Mackey, 256 U.S. 531, 536, 41 S.Ct. 582, 65 L.Ed. 1076; Willcuts v. Bunn, 282 U.S. 216, 225, 226, 51 S.Ct. 125, 75 L.Ed. 304; Susquehanna Power Co. v. State Tax Commission (No. 1), 283 U.S. 291, 294, 51 S.Ct. 434, 75 L.Ed. 1042; Fox Film Corporation v. Doyal, 286 U.S. 123, 130, 52 S.Ct. 546, 76 L.Ed. 1010; Broad River Power Co. v. Query, 288 U.S. 178, 53 S.Ct. 326, 77 L.Ed. 685, decided February 6, 1933. In this instance, the tax is not on the oil leases (Indian Territory Illuminating Oil Co. v. Oklahoma, 240 U.S. 522, 530, 36 S.Ct. 453, 60 L.Ed. 779), or upon the privilege of extracting the oil or upon the income derived therefrom. Choctaw, O. & Gulf R. Co. v. Harrison, 235 U.S. 292, 298, 299, 35 S.Ct. 27, 59 L.Ed. 234; Gillespie v. Oklahoma, 257 U.S. 501, 506, 42 S.Ct. 171, 66 L.Ed. 338. See Burnet v. Coronado Oil & Gas Co., 285 U.S. 393, 399, 52 S.Ct. 443, 76 L.Ed. 815. Such immunity as petitioner enjoyed as a governmental instrumentality inhered in its operations as such, and being for the protection of the Government in its function extended no further than was necessary for that purpose. The holding of the oil in question, which had been segregated and withdrawn from the restricted lands as petitioner's exclusive property, awaiting disposition at petitioner's pleasure, was for its sole advantage and cannot be said to be so identified with its operations as a governmental instrumentality as to entitle it to exemption from the general property taxes imposed by the State in return for the protection the State afforded. With respect to these taxes, this oil was in no different case from that of the other oil of petitioner with which it was commingled. | <urn:uuid:cde12d35-05d0-4049-bdd4-c26c6f3db03c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://openjurist.org/288/us/325 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950285 | 1,563 | 1.609375 | 2 |
In the last two weeks of 2012, total loans and leases at commercial banks in the US surged by $82 bln. That was sharpest two week increase in four years. What is happening here? One likely explanation is that vendors and other recipients of government payments may be getting bank loans to cover day-to-day operating expenses as government payments slow to a crawl under the debt ceiling. This is resulting in a temporary surge in bank credit as seen here and it could, potentially, dampen some of the negative impact of the current fiscal stalemate. However, you see how government "saving" is now just translating into non-government dissaving (debt growth). Too bad the clowns in Washington don't understand this. | <urn:uuid:ec62f106-3088-43c1-92e4-16d1d46d62bc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mikenormaneconomics.blogspot.com/2013/01/loan-demand-surges-as-govt-spending.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975512 | 148 | 1.5 | 2 |
Maternity-leave laws aside, now is a pretty awesome time to be a new parent.
Anyone with the Internet can get advice, connect with other parents and share photos and updates with interested parties in real time. (Think about it: Twenty years ago, it'd be much easier to feel isolated when you were at home all day with a little blinking infant who couldn't do much other than sleep, poop and cry.)
"Reaching out to your social network can help you feel connected to other adults, which can be a saving grace," says Erin Bried, author of "How to Rock Your Baby" (and mother of one of the most adorable children of all time). "That said, there is such a thing as over sharing. Social media is a conversation, and no one likes a person who monopolizes the conversation or brags."
Honestly, there's a lot that can go wrong when you put a proud mama or daddy in front of a keyboard. In our excitement and eagerness to share our offspring with the world, Rafiki-holding-up-Simba-style, we can lose sight of the fact that our children's entire natural lives will be documented online.
That embarrassing footage of your eighth-grade operetta, safely relegated to a decaying VHS in your basement? Nowadays, that kind of thing goes straight from Flip cam to YouTube.
Overly detailed updates your mom used to give your grandma about your action hero du jour? Today, that's a 140-character tweet (with an Instagram photo to boot).
A 2010 study found that 92 percent of U.S. children have an online presence by the time they're 2. That means modern parents have a responsibility to broadcast their kids' lives in a way that won't make the children hate them a decade later (at least, no more than normal adolescent angst dictates).
With that in mind, here are some tips for garnering more Awww's than Ack's on your social media channels.
Start a mommy (or daddy) blog.
Here's the wonderful thing about blogs: They're empty canvases on which you can go on as long as you want, and only people who type in the URL have to see it. That means they're lovely ways to tell the full story of your Saturday trip to the zoo, during which your 3-year-old decided that he's a penguin and now eats his food by flopping forward onto the table, arms glued to his sides, and nibbling at it with his "beak." | <urn:uuid:cb5924b4-4803-4ef4-959b-dda82acce9a6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wcvb.com/news/money/technology/Baby-pic-overload-Social-media-advice-for-parents/-/9848656/12956568/-/jxf8s3/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965623 | 524 | 1.515625 | 2 |
It's not a career path followed by many. On Friday, the Right Reverend Justin Welby, a former oil executive, was confirmed as the next archbishop of Canterbury, and as such will become head of the 77 million-member worldwide Anglican Communion.
Although Welby has been a bishop for just less than a year, his experience beyond the pulpit may be what has given him the edge over his rivals for the top job.
He will take over from Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, who has headed the church for more than a decade, in March.
Welby faces the challenge of holding together an increasingly fractured Communion as it wrestles with the issues of homosexuality and women bishops, as well as tensions between the shrinking Western provinces of the Anglican Communion, including the United States and United Kingdom, and the exploding growth of the provinces in the Global South, many of them in Africa and Asia.
These questions over homosexuality and the ordination of women caused public tension and deep division within the Anglican Communion during Williams' tenure, and that pattern looks set to continue.
Welby's appointment may reflect a desire for compromise within the church, as he is in favor of women bishops but against gay marriage -- positions that put him in line with the bulk of mainstream opinion within the Church of England, which is expected to vote on allowing women bishops later this month.
He voiced those views again in a news conference to announce his appointment, and in an interview with CNN. While he supports the Church of England's opposition to gay marriage, Welby stressed that homophobia was unacceptable and that he would "listen attentively" to the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender, or LBGT, community.
Gay marriage is "a very, very major issue in the life of the church, but it's not what defines the church, and there are obviously very tough differences of opinion," he told CNN.
He also said that he was "very much an advocate" of women bishops and that it looked likely the Synod would approve their ordination.
Welby described his nomination as "both astonishing and exciting," adding that he had never expected to be in this position. | <urn:uuid:af904342-a9f7-4d9d-bc04-02a42e423288> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wpbf.com/news/nationalnews/Ex-oil-exec-named-archbishop-of-Canterbury/-/8788944/17340454/-/6wr4l9/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.986945 | 450 | 1.59375 | 2 |
I have a few friends that are working to virtualize their entire computer infrastructures. They work in large and small companies, but there is a constant push to avoid the bare metal installation of any operating system onto physical hardware, making every Windows or Unix machine a virtual machine on top of a hypervisor. I was surprised to hear that companies were being so aggressive, but the cost benefits can be huge, and when virtualization is done in a smart way, performance doesn't suffer.
However virtualization can change security, especially when you have VMs that are allowed to move from physical host to physical host. The state of New Mexico embarked on a similar project, and were concerned over security of the virtual machines. Their department had dismissed some employees because of a security breach a few years earlier and security was on the forefront of their minds. Additional security as well as network controls were used in their project, and I hope they also implemented strong auditing procedures.
As we move to newer infrastructures that include virtualization, physical security becomes more important, and additional controls are needed. The ability for someone to potentially move a VM outside of a data center, or even to a less secure remote data center becomes a point of concern. Moving the storage itself might be an even bigger problem as virtual storage becomes more commonplace.
Ultimately, however, we can't all have dedicated security employees, nor can we expect every DBA, sysadmin or even security officer to be able to protect against and mitigate all attack vectors. Auditing is ultimately the best way to handle breaches. We can't prevent all of them, but responding quickly, learning, and perhaps more importantly informing the appropriate people to be ready to respond to the information disclosure.
The Voice of the DBA Podcasts
The podcast feeds are available at sqlservercentral.mevio.com. Comments are definitely appreciated and wanted, and you can get feeds from there. Overall RSS Feed: or now on iTunes!
Today's podcast features music by Everyday Jones. No relation, but I stumbled on to them and really like the music. Support this great duo at www.everydayjones.com.
You can also follow Steve Jones on Twitter: | <urn:uuid:74ec17a7-3187-4a88-97f7-55cc7858003d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Editorial/75620/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973982 | 451 | 1.679688 | 2 |
You know the delegitimization campaign targeting Israel has reached new heights of absurdity when the rallying cry against the Jewish state is now being waged with the help of the chickpea. What a low blow — Israel’s enemies are hitting where it really hurts: hummus.
Hummus, that pasty spread without which pita has no purpose, is the subject of anti-Israel boycott efforts. In Philadelphia, pro-Palestinian activists are urging local supermarkets to pull two brands of hummus from their shelves.
The anti-hummus campaign has also spread to college campuses. At Chicago’s DePaul University, there are demands to stop the sale of Sabra hummus on campus. At Princeton, boycott supporters sponsored a student referendum that would have called on the school’s dining services to provide an alternative hummus alongside Sabra’s brand.
Ironically, Sabra isn’t even an Israe .li company — it’s based in Queens and Virginia. It is co-owned by PepsiCo and the Strauss Group, an Israeli firm that reportedly provides financial support to the Golani brigade in Israel, which some have accused of human rights abuses.
Good news for falafel-lovers everywhere: So far, the anti-hummus campaign has been a bust. The Philadelphia boycott was parried with a hummus “buycott” from pro-Israel shoppers. At Princeton, students voted solidly to reject the call for an alternative hummus. Perhaps they didn’t believe that Israel should be singled out. Or maybe they just really liked Sabra’s hummus.
The war on hummus is the latest salvo from a global boycott, divestment and sanctions movement that aims to turn Israel into a pariah state. British academic unions have called for boycotts of Israeli scholars. Israeli sports teams and athletes have been met with game cancellations and sometimes violent protests. A number of musicians, including Elvis Costello and Carlos Santana, have canceled Israeli concert dates. A food co-op in Olympia, Wash., has decided to boycott Israeli products.
With so much cultural condemnation and so many threats of economic divestment, it seems as if the enemies of Israel have finally reached the point where they are drawing a line in the hummus. What will be the next target? Grapevine dancing?
There’s nothing wrong with a good principled boycott in the name of human rights. But why then are such displays of righteousness directed so overwhelmingly at Israel? After all, Israelis want peace, and most know that a two-state solution with secure borders is the price they will have to pay to maintain their liberal democracy and Jewish continuity. The trouble is that when Israel withdrew from Lebanon and Gaza, it ended up in wars with Hezbollah and Hamas, which is hardly a good omen for secure borders.
Meanwhile, in the rest of the Middle East, elections are stolen, corruption is rampant and religious freedom for anyone other than Islamic zealots is often as elusive as a desert mirage. In some countries, homosexuals and women face lashings and the threat of stoning or hanging. Beheadings and dismemberments are not uncommon either.
Where are the principled human rights advocates when it comes to the moral crimes of the Arab world? Boycotts and divestments, we are told, are essential game changers. Yet advocacy groups and college students won’t apply them equally wherever human rights abuses are found.
Why aren’t the activists who criticize Israel calling for a boycott of Persian rugs from Iran? What about Egyptian cotton, oil from Saudi Arabia and whatever it is that Syria makes other than trouble?
Now activists are busy using hummus to spackle over the double standards that are abundant when it comes to the Middle East.
Delegitimization can take many forms — some serious, like the denial of Israel’s existence; and others bizarre, like accusations in recent years by some Lebanese that Israel has stolen their traditional hummus recipes. Apparently, Israelis have no authentic connection to the chickpea, which is just a short culinary step away from saying that they have no connection to the land.
Maybe the boycotters of Sabra are protesting not its hummus, but its name.
Thane Rosenbaum, a novelist, essayist and law professor at Fordham Law School, is the director of the Forum on Law, Culture & Society. | <urn:uuid:1a294a19-6bd2-4e62-a7a8-4d61f24930dd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://forward.com/articles/133810/a-boycott-spreads/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957235 | 912 | 1.734375 | 2 |
Who Runs the Authority?
The Park Authority Committee consists of 22 members:
4 Parish members;
6 County Council appointed members;
6 District Council appointed members; and
5 Members appointed by the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to represent the wider, national viewpoint.
The above membership ensures that a balance of interests and skills are brought to the day-to-day running of the National Park Authority.
How are the Members appointed?
Local Authority members must be serving councillors of their appointing local authority. The Environment Act requires the local authority to have regard to the desirability of appointing members who represent divisions or wards situated wholly or partly within the National Park boundary. They should also have relevant experience and close links to the National Park. Councillors must stand for re-election to their council every four years.
Six members are appointed by the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and are selected for their ability to represent a wider national viewpoint and for their specialist experience in relation to the particular character of the National Park. These Secretary of State appointed members are usually appointed for a period of four years but can be re-appointed, usually up to a maximum of ten years in total. Details will be included on the website when Secretary of State members are proposed to be appointed.
Four Parish members are also appointed by the Secretary of State, they are elected by Parish Councils in the National Park. Parish members must be either a Parish Councillor or the Chairman of a Parish Meeting. The elections are administered by the Association of Exmoor Parish Councils. The successful candidates are then nominated to the Secretary of State for appointment. Parish members are appointed to ensure that local people are involved in the running of the National Park; they are representatives of the local people in the National Park as a whole not just their own parish. Their term of office usually ends when parish council elections are held (every four years) unless there is a casual vacancy in the meantime.
Members' Code of Conduct: The Authority is required to promote and maintain high standards of conduct and to establish a Code of Conduct with which each Member must comply whenever acting in his/her official capacity.
Members' Interests: Under Exmoor National Park Authority’s Code of Conduct, Members are required to register personal interests, for example: membership of bodies to which the Authority has appointed them; membership of bodies exercising functions of a public nature (eg Parish, District or County Council); membership of any organisation directed to charitable purposes; or membership of any organisation whose principal purposes include the influence of public opinion or policy or which might create a conflict of interest in carrying out the duties of a Member of Exmoor National Park Authority.
Under national rules, Members are also required to register their disclosable pecuniary interests, ie their business interests, for example their employment, trade, profession, contracts which they or any company with which they are associated have with the Authority, and wider financial interests they might have (for example investments and assets including land and property within the National Park). Members have a disclosable pecuniary interest if they or their spouse or civil partner has a pecuniary interest as described above; however there is no requirement to differentiate between those pecuniary interests that relate to the Member personally and those that relate to their spouse or civil partner. The declaration of pecuniary interests ensures that the public can have confidence that Members are putting the public interest first and not benefitting the financial affairs of themselves or their spouse or civil partner.
The full Register of Members’ Interests is available for inspection at the Authority’s offices at Exmoor House, Dulverton, Somerset. For further information please contact the Corporate Support Officer at firstname.lastname@example.org or 01398 322229. A summary of the Register of Members' Interests can be viewed here.
Members' Allowances: Members receive an allowance and the Local Authorities (Members’ Allowances) (England) Regulations 2003 require the Authority to adopt a scheme of allowances before the start of the each financial year: Scheme of Members' Allowances 2013-14. | <urn:uuid:cfcb4c06-80ba-4562-ae97-0bb7c56deff4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.exmoor-nationalpark.gov.uk/about-us/who-runs-the-authority | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967447 | 863 | 1.632813 | 2 |
As soon as Mr. Ness had left, Miss Monro went to her desk and wrote a long letter to some friends she had at the cathedral town of East Chester, where she had spent some happy years of her former life. Her thoughts had gone back to this time even while Mr. Ness had been speaking; for it was there her father had lived, and it was after his death that her cares in search of a subsistence had begun. But the recollections of the peaceful years spent there were stronger than the remembrance of the weeks of sorrow and care; and, while Ellinor’s marriage had seemed a probable event, she had made many a little plan of returning to her native place, and obtaining what daily teaching she could there meet with, and the friends to whom she was now writing had promised her their aid. She thought that as Ellinor had to leave Ford Bank, a home at a distance might be more agreeable to her, and she went on to plan that they should live together, if possible, on her earnings, and the small income that would be Ellinor’s. Miss Monro loved her pupil so dearly, that, if her own pleasure only were to be consulted, this projected life would be more agreeable to her than if Mr. Wilkins’s legacy had set her in independence, with Ellinor away from her, married, and with interests in which her former governess had but little part.
As soon as Mr. Ness had left her, Ellinor rang the bell, and startled the servant who answered it by her sudden sharp desire to have the horses at the door as soon as possible, and to tell Dixon to be ready to go out with her.
She felt that she must speak to him, and in her nervous state she wanted to be out on the free broad common, where no one could notice or remark their talk. It was long since she had ridden, and much wonder was excited by the sudden movement in kitchen and stable-yard. But Dixon went gravely about his work of preparation, saying nothing.
They rode pretty hard till they reached Monk’s Heath, six or seven miles away from Hamley. Ellinor had previously determined that here she would talk over the plan Mr. Ness had proposed to her with Dixon, and he seemed to understand her without any words passing between them. When she reined in he rode up to her, and met the gaze of her sad eyes with sympathetic, wistful silence.
“Dixon,” said she, “they say I must leave Ford Bank.”
“I was afeared on it, from all I’ve heerd say i’ the town since the master’s death.”
“Then you’ve heard—then you know—that papa has left hardly any money—my poor dear Dixon, you won’t have your legacy, and I never thought of that before!”
“Never heed, never heed,” said he, eagerly; “I couldn’t have touched it if it had been there, for the taking it would ha’ seemed too like—” Blood-money, he was going to say, but he stopped in time. She guessed the meaning, though not the word he would have used.
“No, not that,” said she; “his will was dated years before. But oh, Dixon, what must I do? They will make me leave Ford Bank, I see. I think the trustees have half let it already.” | <urn:uuid:3f206c24-90d1-4a70-9e7a-3f1337fd3ef1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bookrags.com/ebooks/2522/80.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 | 0.994672 | 747 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Samsung isn't letting a little thing like losing a billion dollar verdict to rival Apple disrupt its mojo. Rather than sit around and feel sorry for itself, Samsung today surprised everyone by announcing the Ativ S, the world's first Windows 8 smartphone, edging in front of Nokia and every other Microsoft partner that's planning to launch devices of their own. Ativ S is one of a handful of devices in Samsung's newly branded Ativ Windows 8 product line.
Handheld consoles don't seem to be the hot commodities that they used to be back before everyone owned smartphones, but don't tell Archos there isn't a market for such a thing. Not only does Archos believe there is, the company is betting big on it by launching its Android-powered 'GamePad' device with a 7-inch capacitive display and physical gaming control buttons and analog sticks.
Just because Apple scored a sweeping victory against Samsung in its patent trial in the U.S., which led to the nine panel jury awarding the Cupertino company more than a billion dollars in damages, it doesn't mean the whole matter of Android versus iOS is settled. Far from it, in fact. Days before the verdict was reached, Google's recently acquired Motorola Mobility division filed a patent suit of its own against Apple, one in which it will try to ban Apple imports in the U.S. Interestingly, Apple appears willing to go to trial, especially with the Samsung case under its belt, but in Germany, the company caved and reached a licensing deal with Motorola.
T-Mobile has never been invited to the iPhone party, and that's probably not going to change when Apple unveils the iPhone 5 next month. Instead, an internal company memo leaked to the Web suggests T-Mobile is working on a strategy for "Selling Against the iPhone," which would be an awfully awkward thing to train its employees to do if, in fact, the wireless carrier was receiving iPhone devices.
The Curiosity rover on Mars isn't the only thing NASA is busy with these days. According to reports, NASA is getting ready to send a pair of cube-shaped nano-satellites weighing just over 2 pounds into space, but just as interesting as the size and weight is the fact that they're powered by Android smartphones. It's part of a nifty project called PhoneSat overseen by the agency's Small Spacecraft Technology program.
Rumor has it the iPad Mini -- a smaller, 7.85-inch version of the iPad tablet -- is real and nearly ready to ship. It's the type of device the late Steve Jobs never approved of, having once unaffectionately referred to 7-inch tablets as "tweeners," and slides into a trending category of mobile products currently led by Amazon's Kindle Fire, Google's Nexus 7, and Barnes & Noble's Nook Tablet (not necessarily in that order).
It was a close call, but rather than leave the 5.8-inch market untouched, Samsung has come out with a media player that fills the void. The 5.8-inch category, if we can call it that, is one of the few screen sizes Samsung had been ignoring, a situation it addressed by announcing its new Galaxy Player 5.8 -- phew! It's the largest size Galaxy Player yet and is sure to test the elasticity of your pants pocket.
Apple scored over a billion dollars in damages from Samsung in what can be considered a sweeping victory over patent infringement claims in the U.S. and was quick to gloat. In a statement provided to The New York Times, Apple spokeswoman Katie Cotton said her company was "grateful to the jury" that found Samsung guilty of ripping off the look and feel of iPhone and iPad devices. Samsung also provided a statement, saying the "verdict should not be viewed as a win for Apple, but as a loss for the American consumer." Google, meanwhile, was eerily quiet in the aftermath of the trial, until now.
With Google's recently launched Nexus 7 tablet encroaching on what had been Amazon's territory led by the Kindle Fire, the e-tailer is busy beefing up what it hopes will prove a trump card. You can't stream Amazon Prime Instant Video to the Nexus 7, but you can on the Kindle Fire (provided you didn't root the device and feed it Ice Cream Sandwich), which will now enjoy access to an even larger catalog courtesy of an expanded content licensing agreement with NBCUniversal and New Media Distribution.
Exactly two weeks from today -- September 6, 2012, if you don't want to consult a calendar -- Amazon will hold a press conference in Santa Monica, California, according to invitations it sent out to members of the press. It's a safe bet Amazon will launch a new wave of Kindle products during that time, and if the e-tailer plans on releasing a full size Kindle Fire tablet, could there be a better time? | <urn:uuid:1d4b988e-1b90-43a4-b3c1-b9b75bffd842> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.maximumpc.com/taxonomy/term/14149/%252Freviews/tags/article/features/how_sideload_android_apps?page=12 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965317 | 1,000 | 1.710938 | 2 |
On the same day that Australia takes the 'next logical step' of banning logos on cigarette packs, the colour red became the latest victim of anti-smoking hysteria.
Leading doctors are demanding an immediate government inquiry into “subliminal” tobacco advertising on Ferrari’s Formula One cars, and the company’s $1 billion relationship with the maker of Marlboro cigarettes.
The red, white and black bar code emblazoned on Ferrari’s racing cars and its drivers’ overalls is designed to remind viewers of a packet of Marlboro cigarettes, it is claimed.
Er, yes. It's uncanny isn't it?
Dr John Britton—a man who is happy to spout any old rubbish about secondhand smoke without checking the facts—is "stunned" by this audacious combination of white, black and red.
John Britton, a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and director of its tobacco advisory group, said: “The bar code looks like the bottom half of a packet of Marlboro cigarettes. I was stunned when I saw it. This is pushing at the limits."
The phrase "swivel-eyed obsessive" springs immediately to mind. Yes, these are the colours of Marlboro—albeit a completely different shade of red. They also happen to be the colours of this blog. They are, for that matter, the colours of my football team, and Middlesbrough even sounds a bit like Marlboro. Is there no end to this conspiracy?
Gerard Hastings, director of the Centre for Tobacco Control Research, said: “I think this is advertising. Why a bar code? What is their explanation?”
Why not a bar code? The Marlboro logo isn't a bar code. What is the connection? As the Ferrari spokesman has pointed out, if anyone has a claim to the colour red, it is the car maker.
"The premise that simply looking at a red Ferrari can be a more effective means of publicity than a cigarette advertisement seems incredible: how should one assess the choice made by other Formula 1 teams to race a car with a predominantly red livery or to link the image of a driver to a sports car of the same colour? Maybe these companies also want to advertise smoking!
"It should be pointed out that red has been the recognised colour for Italian racing cars since the very beginning of motor sport, at the start of the twentieth century: if there is an immediate association to be made, it is with our company rather than with our partner."
Once again, the increasingly nutty complaints of these groups says far more about their fevered imaginations than it does about the issue. They only serve to confirm what their critics have long said—that they are fanatics in the true sense of the word. Meanwhile, Philip Morris must be delighted to be receiving worldwide media coverage and countless mentions of their leading brand. All courtesy of the anti-smokers. Nice work, guys. | <urn:uuid:a0195e9c-cf75-490a-b104-a35420710f3f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://velvetgloveironfist.blogspot.de/2010_04_01_archive.html | 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 | 0.955755 | 620 | 1.726563 | 2 |
The Bipartisan War on Liberty
Liberal and conservative elites agree on one thing: Americans are too free for their own good.
A. Barton Hinkle | November 18, 2011
To outward appearances, it might seem as though the left and right have never been more at odds. And for the average man in the street, drawn to the Tea Party on one side or the Occupy movement on the other, this might be true. But it is not so true for elite opinion. The nation's high and mighty may be divided about many things, but on one point they often agree: Americans are still too darn free.
For example: Not enough people exercise their right to vote. Problem, right? Well, William Galston of the Brookings Institution has a solution: Force them to. The other day he took to the pages of The New York Times to explain why we should be "Telling Americans to Vote, or Else." (It doesn't seem to have occurred to Galston that making people exercise a right takes that right away, by turning it into an obligation.)
Galston is hardly alone. Mitt Romney considers it a problem that many foreign nationals enter America without a government permission slip. His solution: Force every U.S. resident to carry a biometric ID card. (Just the thing to present at the polls when meeting your mandatory-voting requirement, eh? Great minds think alike.)
One of Romney's GOP primary opponents, Michele Bachmann, laments that many Americans—53 percent of them—pay no federal income tax. So she proposed forcing everyone to do so, even if they don't have any income to pay taxes on. That'll show 'em.
Time magazine proposed forcing every American into national service. A federal advisory board has decided, to much applause, that we should force boys as well as girls to receive the HPV vaccine. Proponents of ObamaCare believe the government should force everyone to buy health insurance.
The Obama administration also has lots of other bright ideas about how to bend the American people to its will. Last year Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told those at a National Press Club that the administration's "livability" initiative "is a way to coerce people out of their cars." The administration also wants to force insurers to pay for birth control and abortifacients, and to force consumers to buy more fuel-efficient cars.
Voices outside the administration, however, fret that it is not being forceful enough. In a recent Washington Post column, Dana Milbank advised the president to emulate the ruthless tactics of JFK. Milbank recounts how Roger Blough, chairman of U.S. Steel, raised prices in defiance of the president's wishes. "'You have made a terrible mistake,' Kennedy told him. Subpoenas flew, FBI agents marched into steel executives' offices, and Kennedy spoke about IRS agents examining 'hotel bills and nightclub expenses [that] would be hard to get by the weekly wives' bridge group out at the country club.'"
Ahh, the good old days. When J. Edgar Hoover pulled stunts like that, liberals considered it proof that the dark night of fascism was descending across the land. But when their own guys do it, they call it getting things done. Nary a word from Milbank about what business the president has dictating steel prices, by the way.
Yet Milbank is a piker in the thuggery-worship category, at least when compared with The New York Times' Thomas Friedman. In 2009, Friedman penned a column about how China's one-party autocracy was better than America's two-party system: "One-party autocracy certainly has its drawbacks," he wrote, "but when it is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people . . . it can also have great advantages. That one party can just impose the politically difficult but critically important policies to move a society forward." He went on to list some of China's critically important policies, which were—surprise!—policies of which he personally approved.
Well, anyone can write a stinker of a column now and then (heaven knows!). But a year later Friedman was still at it, relating on Meet the Press how he has "fantasized" about "what if we could just be China for a day?" Then "we could actually, you know, authorize the right solutions." He didn't actually want America to "be China," mind you, he just wanted "my democracy to work with the same authority." That way, Friedman could impose his will on everyone else, and life would be grand.
This is what power fetishists always do: assume the power will be used in ways they like. (And since the ends are noble, they surely must justify the means, right?) Sometimes it is. But power changes hands, and the inheritors may be a rather different sort. The people pushing for more government power never seem to think of that—until it's too late.
A. Barton Hinkle is a columnist at the Richmond Times-Dispatch, where this article originally appeared. http://reason.com/archives/2011/11/18/t ... on-liberty | <urn:uuid:ebfe7628-61aa-4fac-83da-9de40d338524> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lionbacker.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=15282&view=previous | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963396 | 1,061 | 1.515625 | 2 |
HIPAA: Understanding the Impact on Government Agencies
If you are a current government agency counsel it is likely you have heard something about a new federal law entitled the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA). However, it is equally likely you have not had the opportunity to review this far-reaching legislation to determine how it might affect your agency and clients. This article provides a brief primer on HIPAA. The goal of this article is to help public-sector lawyers determine whether they need to learn more about HIPAA and to assess its potential impact on their government clients. I. Introduction The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 is a comprehensive federal law that affects the health-care industry. It consists of two main sections. Title I — the portability provisions — provides employees and their families the right to keep their group health insurance when they change or lose their jobs. Title II — the administrative simplification (AS) provisions — standardizes the format of electronic health-care claims and other electronic transactions and establishes new requirements for the privacy and security of health-care information. The health-care industry implemented the portability provisions of HIPAA with little fanfare. However, the implementation of the AS provisions has not been so easy. Administrative simplification is a multi-year project involving not only major one-time modifications to health-care computer systems, but also permanent changes in health care entities’ internal operational processes and workforce culture. The industry is in the midst of this process now with significant HIPAA compliance deadlines looming in 2003. II. Toward a more simplified system The purpose of administrative simplification is to reduce health-care costs by encouraging providers to conduct health-care transactions electronically rather than on paper. The federal government estimates that a health entity that conducts claims electronically rather than on paper will save substantial amounts of administrative costs associated with processing claims. In fact, estimates place the savings at $1 per claim for health plans and $1.49 per claim for health-care providers. While HIPAA does not require providers to submit claims electronically, it does make it much easier for them to do so. Today, many providers avoid processing claims electronically because insurers impose different formats and requirements on electronic submissions. With administrative simplification, however, providers will be able to use the same format to submit a claim to all insurers. This ease is expected to encourage providers to submit their transactions electronically, and the cost savings will multiply. The federal government estimates that administrative simplification will save the health-care industry a total of $29.9 billion over 10 years. However, the capital investment that will be required to enact HIPAA is not insubstantial and is the subject of much debate. The official federal estimate is that it will cost the health-care industry $6.7 billion to implement administrative simplification. However, one large insurer disputes that estimate, placing the actual costs closer to $43 billion. III. The benefits of simplification Administrative simplification will permanently and dramatically change the way health care does business. The AS provisions require that health-care entities transmit electronic health-care information in legally mandated formats. This provides strong privacy protection for that information in every stage of the information life cycle — from creation to disposal, from use to disclosure and from storage to transmission. The positive ramifications of these changes will impact the entire business community. Naturally, the AS provisions of HIPAA are of particular importance to the private regulated entities. These entities come in three categories: health plans (entities that pay for the cost of health care); health-care providers (entities that provide health care to individuals); and, health-care clearinghouses (entities that process transactions for another entity). Yet the impact of HIPAA on government agencies must not be ignored. IV. The applicability of the AS provisions to government agencies In general, if a government agency acts as a health plan, health provider or health clearinghouse, it will be a “covered entity” and must comply with the AS provisions of HIPAA. As such, many government agencies are covered entities because they function as either a health plan or health provider. However, there exists an important exception for government agencies that might otherwise meet the definition of “health plan.” A government-funded program is excepted from the definition of “health plan” if any one of the following three conditions apply: (1) its principal purpose is not providing or paying the cost of health care; (2) its principal purpose is the direct provision of health care to persons; or (3) its principle activity is making grants to fund the direct provision of health care to individuals. Under the exception, programs such as the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC), the Food Stamp Program, the Ryan White Comprehensive AIDS Resources Emergency Act, government-funded health centers and immunization programs will not be “health plans” for purposes of the AS provisions. Nevertheless, some of these may still meet the definition of “health-care provider.” V. The government agency as plan, provider or clearinghouse Before embarking on an AS compliance program, a government agency must determine whether it is acting as a plan, provider or clearinghouse because different requirements apply to each role. This may not be a simple answer. For example, a government agency might find that only one part of its business acts as a plan, provider or clearinghouse under the HIPAA definitions. In that case, the agency would be a “hybrid entity” and must maintain organizational controls between the covered sections of the agency and the non-covered sections. Alternatively, a government agency might find that one of its departments acts as a plan while another acts as a provider. In that case, the agency would be a “covered entity with multiple covered functions” and must ensure that each different department complies with the rules applicable to its function. VI. Government agency compliance with HIPAA A government agency that is a covered entity must comply with three major AS regulations: the Transactions Rule (Health Insurance Reform: Standards for Electronic Transactions, 45 C.F.R. 160 and 162); the Privacy Rule (Standards for Privacy of Individually Identifiable Health Information, 45 C.F.R. 160 and 164); and the Proposed Security Rule (Security and Electronic Signature Standards; Proposed Rule, 45 C.F.R. Part 142). A. Compliance with the Transactions Rule The Transactions Rule requires all health plans and clearinghouses to have their systems ready to send and receive HIPAA compliant transactions by October 2002, or October 2003 for entities that request a year extension of the compliance date. To accomplish this, government agencies that are health plans will need either to make major changes to their existing computer systems, or purchase special software known as a “translator.” The Transactions Rule does not require health-care providers to be compliant if they choose not to conduct electronic transactions, but it does require that any who do so be sure that those transactions are in the legally mandated format. Government agencies that are providers may find, like other providers, that the easiest way to comply with the Transactions Rule is to hire billing intermediaries who will conduct standard electronic transactions on their behalf. The Transactions Rule, issued in final form in August 2000, sets standard formats for eight common health-care transactions, including health-care claims, eligibility inquiries and enrollment information. It incorporates by reference standards that have already been adopted by certain private Standard Setting Organizations (for example, the American National Standards Institute). It is well accepted throughout the industry that the transaction standards are an evolving requirement. The Standards Setting Organizations identified in the Transactions Rule will issue updated and new standards as necessary, and those modifications will then be automatically incorporated into the Transactions Rule. This construct is interesting in that private industry organizations are acting, in effect, as lawmakers. B. Compliance with the Privacy Rules In many ways, compliance with the Privacy and Security Rules may be more difficult for health entities. The Privacy and Security Rules closely regulate how health-care entities store, transmit, use and disclose the protected health information (PHI) in their possession. As a result of these rules, health-care entities will permanently change their day-to-day ways of handling data, many of their operational processes and even their entire workplace cultures. The Privacy Rule has had an interesting procedural history. The Clinton Administration issued the proposed Privacy Rule in November 1999 and the final Privacy Rule in December 2000. In March 2002, in response to the health-care industry’s dissatisfaction with certain aspects of the Privacy Rule, the Bush Administration issued proposed modifications to the final Privacy Rule. These modifications alter neither the basic structure of the rule nor the compliance date of April 14, 2003, but propose changing a number of specific provisions such as the consent requirement and the definition of “marketing.” The final version of the Rule, issued in August 2002 by the federal Office of Civil Rights, had the effect of easing certain compliance burdens and was hailed by the health-care industry as an
improvement. The final version of the Privacy Rule still imposes many changes on the day-to-day operations of covered entities. Covered entities are allowed to use and disclose PHI without patient consent only for routine health-care purposes — treatment, payment and health-care operations. For non-routine uses, such as marketing, fundraising and most research, covered entities must obtain prior specific patient authorization. The Privacy Rule imposes strict requirements for "deidentifying" data and for releasing data to researchers. It requires covered entities to impose certain contractual requirements on any vendor to which they disclose PHI, to keep a log of all non-routine disclosures of PHI, and to provide a “Notice of Privacy Practices” to all of its patients or members. The Privacy Rule also grants individuals important rights, including the right: (1) to access their PHI; (2) to request that their PHI be amended; (3) to request that the use of their PHI be restricted; (4) to request alternative means of communications; and, (5) to complain about an entity’s PHI protection procedures without fear of reprisal. C. Compliance with the Security Rules While the Privacy Rule regulates how a covered entity uses and discloses PHI, the Security Rule regulates how a covered entity stores and transmits PHI. The goal of the Security Rule is to protect the confidentiality, integrity and availability of PHI and to guard against unauthorized access. As of this writing, the Security Rule is not yet final: the industry has been waiting for a final version since the current rule was published in August 1998. For several reasons, however, most health-care entities are taking steps to comply with the Security Rule in its current form. One reason is that industry experts believe that the final Security Rule will not be substantially different than the proposed rule. Another reason is the generic nature of the rule. Although the Security Rule requires that an entity use 24 specific security features (i.e., password policies), it does not specify what exact technology must be used or how extensively the feature must be employed. Rather, it requires health-care entities to assess their own security needs, identify their own unique set of risks and adopt appropriate security devices to meet their own particular business requirements. Thus, the Security Rule embodies what most security experts believe to be current good business practice. The third (perhaps most important) reason that health-care entities are taking steps to comply with the proposed Security Rule is that Title II of HIPAA includes explicit security requirements applicable to covered entities. Specifically, the statute requires covered entities to “ensure” the integrity and confidentiality of PHI; to protect against any reasonably anticipated threats or hazards to the security or integrity of the information; and to otherwise ensure compliance by officers and employees. These statutory provisions impose very high standards on the industry and are in effect now. Finally, the Privacy Rule and the Security Rule have certain common requirements with respect to internal processes. For example, both rules require health-care entities to develop and maintain privacy and security policies; to train their workforces in the requirements of the Rules and the contents of internal policies; to impose sanctions on any member of the workforce who does not comply; and to appoint officials to ensure compliance with the rules. VII. How HIPAA affects government agencies that are not covered entities Many government agencies that are not themselves covered entities may regularly receive PHI from covered entities. The Privacy and Security Rules will likely affect whether and how the covered entity can continue these disclosures. A covered entity may release PHI to a government agency without authorization only in certain situations, including if the disclosure is for the purpose of the covered entity’s operations, if law or regulation requires the disclosure or if the disclosure is made to health oversight agencies or law enforcement officials. Counsel for government agencies who receive PHI from covered entities should review the Privacy Rule to determine the authority under which covered entities may continue the data release. Moreover, even when a covered entity can properly release the PHI to a government agency, it often will be required to keep a log of that disclosure and inform the individual, upon that individual’s request, about the contents of the log. An individual’s right to receive this information can be temporarily suspended if a law enforcement or a health oversight agency provides the covered entity with a written statement that revealing the PHI disclosure would impede its law enforcement or health oversight activities. Counsel for government agencies that are law enforcement agencies or health oversight agencies should review the Privacy Rule for the details of this procedure. Finally, a government agency that is not a covered entity will be indirectly affected by the Privacy Rule if it is a business associate of a covered entity. Business associates are entities that perform a function for a covered entity that involves the use or creation of PHI. Any government agency that is a business associate of a covered entity, whether or not that covered entity is also a government agency, will be required to execute “business associate agreements” with the covered entity. These business associate agreements will contain language requiring the business associate to comply with certain portions of the Privacy Rule and specifying exactly how the business associate may use and disclose the covered entity’s PHI. Counsel for government agencies who perform functions for health plans, providers or clearinghouses should review the business associate provisions of the Privacy Rule for details of these new contractual requirements. VIII. Conclusion The importance of this primer is to raise awareness of HIPAA and its impact on government agencies. For more information regarding HIPAA and the AS provisions, the reader is encouraged to review the Department of Health and Human Services Web site at http://aspe.os.dhhs.gov/admnsimp. For further information pertaining to the Privacy Rule, the Office of Civil Rights has more detailed information at its Web site: http://www.hhs.gov/ocr/hipaa. | <urn:uuid:92650bbb-de2f-48d5-ac0c-0c755faa73cc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.massbar.org/publications/section-review/2002/v4-n3/hipaa-understanding-the-impact-on | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941964 | 3,022 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Careers in the health sciences are some of the hottest in the country right now. Physician assistants can expect an average entry-level salary of $52,727, and mid-level salary of $61,493.
The average salaries for other health care jobs are $22,266 for medical assistants, $34,131 for clinical dietitians, $36,244 for registered nurses, $50,000 for nurse practitioners, $51,584 for pharmacists, and $80,000 for optometrists.
Internship programs provide students with the opportunity to apply their academic training to real world experiences. More than just a part-time job, students learn from professionals in the community while building valuable relationships with prospective career employers. | <urn:uuid:339da176-5216-4be3-bc63-0c900e79f848> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.corban.edu/academics/health_science/career_outlook.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949288 | 151 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Spain's rightwing government came under pressure on Thursday to apply for rescue funds from Brussels after it became clear that the estimated €100bn (£80bn) bailout of the country's banks had failed to prevent Madrid's borrowing costs from hitting new highs.
The interest rate on Spain's benchmark 10-year bonds rose as much as 25 basis points to a euro-era high of 7.02%, breaching the level that triggered a collapse in confidence in Portugal, Ireland and Greece.
Italy's flagging economy was also under the microscope after panic among international lenders at an auction of three-year bonds pushed the price of borrowing to 5.3%, up from 3.91% last month.
Rome has succeeded until recently in convincing investors that a mix of austerity and economic reforms have put the country in a better position to weather the eurozone crisis, but political stalemate over deregulation of several markets and resistance to labour reforms, coupled with the longest double dip recession among the major eurozone countries has undermined the confidence of many investors.
Stock markets fell on the news, with the FTSE 100 index dropping 26 points to 5457 at lunchtime. The German Dax was down 22 points at 6130 and the French Dax slipped 9 points to 3020.
The jump in Spain's borrowing costs followed a downgrade by the ratings agency Moody's of three notches from A3 to Baa3. The cut in Spain's sovereign debt puts its credit status alongside Croatia and Azerbaijan with a rating just above "junk".
Moody's said the downgrade followed the offer from eurozone leaders of up to €100bn to prop up its failing banking sector, which the ratings agency believes will add considerably to the government's debt burden.
The downgrade will hurt Spain because organisations such as pension funds are mandated not to invest in assets with such a low score.
Moody's said the Spanish government's ability to raise finance on the world's markets was being hindered by high interest rates, a situation which had led it to accept funds to recapitalise its debt-burdened banks.
Some details of what the bailout might look like have emerged after European officials said they were considering selling off bank assets as part of the plan to prop up the Spanish banking sector.
Brussels also sought to make it clear that Spain was likely to pay an interest rate nearer 8.5% on the loans under one plan under discussion, which is much higher than the 3% outlined in initial reports of the deal.
Eurostat, the European statistics agency, said earlier in the week that it was unclear how much the country's deficit would rise, because it depended on how Brussels lent the money to Spain's banks. | <urn:uuid:ed086552-8a79-4a17-8d0b-c009ae56d0ef> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/jun/14/spain-eu-rescue-funds-borrowing-costs?newsfeed=true | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970816 | 549 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Haiku Project Announces Availability of Haiku R1/Alpha 1
The Haiku Project is proud to announce the availability of Haiku R1/Alpha 1, the first official development release of Haiku, an open source operating system that specifically targets personal computing. The purpose of this release is to make a stable development snapshot of Haiku available to a wider audience for more extensive testing and debugging. This will help the Haiku development team identify and address bugs, and thus improve the quality of the system as development keeps advancing towards the subsequent development milestones. Bugs found in Alpha 1 should be reported to the Haiku bug tracking system at http://dev.haiku-os.org
This first alpha release of Haiku comes approximately eight years after the project kicked off, and is the direct result of the dedication of many volunteer contributors from all over the world. Special thanks go to former Project Leader Michael Phipps, as well as to the small but very resilient group of core developers who stuck with the project throughout the years.
Alpha 1 will be followed by additional development milestones, eventually leading to the long-awaited final release of Haiku R1. These subsequent official milestones will be announced as the release dates are defined by the Haiku development team. | <urn:uuid:989ee3ca-14c4-4980-9fa5-1f146fe96895> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.powerdeveloper.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=463&start=15 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942402 | 254 | 1.507813 | 2 |
How to welcome all ages & agilities
Published: January 21, 2010
|Is your getaway hard to get to? Often, the very features we seek – proximity to lakes or peaks, great views, privacy – pose barriers to access. Sure, climbing hills or sidestepping boulders is all part of the wilderness experience. If you’re young and fit, that is. But for those of us facing physical challenges, disabilities, the limitations that may come with old age or just plain old creaky knees, the cabin landscape can seem more like an obstacle course. |
But roughing it doesn’t have to be rough on a body. With a little ingenuity, a cabin can welcome all ages and agilities. Modifications like incline trams, ramps, easy walkways – even the Gazeboat – can help level the playing field.
As you’ll see from the following examples, a cabin’s recreation opportunities can be open to all without compromising the site’s natural beauty, or screaming “accessible!”
Steve Reiman and his first wife fell in love with a ramshackle camp on Lake Iroquois, Va., in 1970. The land plummeted about 60 feet to the camp from the end of a bumpy dirt road. “It was rough,” recalls Reiman. “Roots, rocks, then three steps to an awkward side deck.” From the camp, rickety boards doglegged another 50 feet down to the shore.
Over the years, Reiman has made major improvements, with an eye toward the future. “We thought about making it accessible to us as we got older – as well as for our kids and our parents.”
The first things to go were rotting side and back decks. Reiman built a bigger, stronger deck and added a back porch.
His wife, Lessie, was the activities director at a retirement home. To facilitate resident outings, Reiman replaced the entry steps with a ramp.
Wide, flat-threshold sliding glass doors can now accommodate wheelchairs and walkers. One set beckons guests from the deck to the porch; a second invites folks from the porch into the camp. “We love to have them out for lunch,” says Reiman. “They can roll right in.”
The next phase improved lake access. Reiman added a handrail rope and laid tons of fill and gravel to form an L-shaped path.
Today, the Reimans host loads of friends and family, including grandchildren and elderly in-laws.
Is it a pontoon boat? Or is it a gazebo? It's actually a bit of both. Gene Luoma invented this "Gazeboat," as he calls it, to make life easier for himself, his daughter Kim and his son Brian, all three of whom have muscular dystrophy. Now family and friends all enjoy fun and fishing on the craft. Pictured: Gene, center, with two family friends who were helping Gene with yardwork before they took a fishing break.
Photo by Kathie Luoma
Look! Out on the lake! It’s a boat! It’s a deck! It’s a … floating gazebo?
Gene Luoma’s patented Gazeboat may not be faster than a speeding yacht. But the motorized craft is powerful enough to carry 20 or so family and friends onto little Lake Bernice. You won’t find Bernice on a map, though.
“In Minnesota, lakes this size don’t have names,” says Gene. He dubbed the 10-acre, 25-foot deep pothole on his property in Minnesota’s Arrowhead region in honor of wife Kathie’s Norwegian mother. “She was always fishing,” he recalls. Kathie, not so much.
But Gene likes to fish, as do son Brian and many of Gene’s nine siblings and 45 nieces and nephews. Kathie’s five siblings and their families enjoy the water when they visit, as do the Luomas’ older son, Kevin, their daughter, Kim, son-in-law, Doug, and granddaughter, Karsen.
So when the Luomas wanted to add a gazebo by the lake, Gene got an idea. Why not put the gazebo on a floating deck so it could be on the lake, too?
Over the winter of 2006, Gene designed an 18-square-foot deck that would support a 10-foot hexagonal gazebo. His brother, Rudy Luoma, owner of a construction company, scraped the ice flat on the frozen lake and started building. By spring 2007, the Gazeboat was afloat.
The deck is level with the Luomas’ dock, allowing Gene and two of his children, Brian and Kim, to drive right on with their electric scooters. The three family members have muscular dystrophy. Brian, who lives next door to his folks and is a co-owner of a printing company, gets around by scooter. Gene and Kim still walk, but rely on scooters to cover any distance.
As if a day on the water in pleasant company wasn’t enough, the Gazeboat offers a fringe benefit that the real Bernice would have loved.
“One thing nice about a large platform: When you take it out and anchor it, after a half-hour, or so, the fish congregate,” says Gene. “Fish like to be under stuff. All you have to do is drop a line over the side.”
After years of vacationing on Burntside Lake in the Upper Midwest, Pat and Virgil Leih found their dream retreat in 1989. The 20-acre plot atop a peninsula offered spectacular views of the north arm and the main lake with its rocky ledges and islands. “Once we had seen this site, it was hard to look at something else.” says Pat.
Surrounded by water and state and federal lands, the only access to the 20 acres is by boat. But the lack of roads was not a deterrent. Nor was the 110-foot climb from the shore to the lot. “My husband said, ‘It’s worth the extra work,’” recalls Pat, “even if it means a tram.”
But the Leihs had to consider their young daughter. Corbin is unstable on her feet. The first thing Virgil did was build a deck so Corbin could walk over the rocky shore.
The tram came next. Virgil poured concrete piers, laid down I-beams turned on their sides, and developed a car to roll over the steel rails. A few years ago, the couple called on a tram company, Marine Innovations, to retrofit parts and build a new winch to move the 5-passenger car up and down. The car ascends to a long platform leading into a walkway that goes directly into the cabin.
Twenty years later, the Leihs still feel it was worth the extra work. Corbin, now 25, participates in the Special Olympics. Thanks to the walkways and tram, she can invite her teammates up to share in the fun. “Our daughter just loves this place,” says Virgil. “It was designed around her needs from the beginning.”
The accommodations also allow the Leihs to host family reunions on both Pat’s and Virgil’s sides. “We celebrated Virgil’s mother’s 90th birthday with a family reunion,” says Pat.
Frequent contributor Fran Sigurdsson joins the Cabin Life staff in extending sincere sympathies to the entire Luoma family for their recent loss of Rudy Luoma (the builder of the Gazeboat shown on page 54).
Photo by Roger Wade
Some other ideas for making your cabin accessible:
- Large covered patio or deck areas for outdoor seating.
- Walkway lighting.
- Chair-height transfer benches let wheelchair users stretch out and sunbathe.
- A hydraulic seat can ease folks into a hot tub.
- Z-shaped paths achieve the necessary rise without becoming too steep.
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Receive useful tips & inspiration from Cabin Life | <urn:uuid:55c4bfc4-daf1-49a9-b724-6bd7d82e263a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cabinlife.com/en/Dream%20Cabins/Design%20and%20Style/2010/01/User-friendly%20Cabin.aspx | 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 | 0.950788 | 1,778 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Imagine a political party that truly cares about Vermonters and their families ó their struggles, their triumphs, their health and happiness, their economic success and prosperity; one that truly believes in individualism, individual liberties and personal responsibility; and one that protects our childrenís welfare and best interests.
Imagine a party that believes government has an important role to play ó a critical role of providing security and safety, of investing in infrastructure, and of ensuring programs and resources are in place to help those in need. But this same party also believes that such a role should be limited ó that government cannot, and should not, do everything.
Imagine a party that truly cares about the careful stewardship of our environment, and one that puts the needs of Vermonters ahead of special interests and political supporters.
Vermont once had a political party that defined and lived all of these characteristics. Not long ago, Vermont had a party that fought for these values.
That party was the Republican Party, and itís time to bring it back.
In recent years, proposal after proposal has been put forward that strip away our personal liberties and individual rights, and relegate personal responsibility to the back burner. At the same time, our state government has grown into something unrecognizable to our predecessors.
We need thoughtful, intelligent debate on the proposals put forward by others, yet instead of intelligent opposition, we sound lifeless and uninspiring ó and sometimes idiotic, angry and petty.
Of course, similar faults can be found in the Democratic Party, but thatís not my focus. I am a proud Republican and am no longer content to watch our party drift toward oblivion and become irrelevant in the discussions about the direction of our great state.
It is time we join together to reinvigorate, reinstitute and revive the Republican Party in Vermont.
These are important times, and we have serious issues to address. The Republican Party ó and its traditional values of caring for those in need, believing in the free-market system and individual liberties, caring about the environment, and ensuring all of our children have the best opportunities available ó must be part of the discussion and solutions.
In order to do so, however, we need to change.
We need to understand that government is not the enemy of our ideas or of the people. Government is, and should be, an instrument of the people, put in place to help those in need.
The other party has convinced Vermonters that its vision and ideas are better. I disagree.
Economic liberty and free enterprise, personal liberty and personal responsibility, and a limited, noninvasive government are the very ideals that help everyone and are the ones proven to work.
Vermont Republicans have a proud and accomplished tradition. But itís time to embrace the 21st century landscape.
Itís time to start anew; to break down and rebuild ourselves around our core, timeless principles of liberty and responsibility.
Itís time to acknowledge the demographic shift in Vermont; to understand Vermontersí priorities are different and their needs more complex.
Itís time to become leaders. Letís open our hearts and minds and listen to the voices of Vermonters. Letís speak out when we witness injustices. Letís work together, within our party, and with those in other parties, so that the very best policies for our great state are enacted. And letís do it with compassion and understanding.
As a political party, we are down. But our voice is necessary and our ideals sound. This is not about the Republican Party. This is about the state of Vermont and the needs of its people.
This is our moment. Letís embrace it.
Heidi E. Scheuermann represents Stowe in the Vermont House.
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- MEDIA GALLERY | <urn:uuid:294bcb9a-fee1-48e3-8dca-d8fa612d5c39> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://timesargus.com/article/20121124/OPINION02/711249961/0/RSS05 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948658 | 794 | 1.578125 | 2 |
1. Govt borrows 40% of all monies spent each year. It gets bigger each year. Unstainable.
2. Middle income peoples who do most of the actual work in the US is losing their buying power. Gas, Utilities, FOOD all a major portion of wages.. And it will get worse.
3. All emerging and upward countries have inexpensive energy. Technology is not where we can not have oil and coal supporting our energy needs. Policy (regulatory czars) making energy much, much more expensive causing increases in prices that are making middle income smaller and smaller.
4. Obamacare, largest tax without representation in the history of the US. So, you are telling me there are people that can not get free medical care if they can't afford it? | <urn:uuid:252c8494-3073-41bb-b313-866b3460050a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://townhall.com/social/usercommentprint/5173422 | 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 | 0.954833 | 162 | 1.640625 | 2 |
|By Lori MacVittie||
|December 19, 2012 09:00 AM EST||
Is SDN a concept, or a concrete architectural construct? Does it really matter?
A question – specific to F5 technology – was raised during the panel session I moderated at Gartner DC 2012 that for me, at least, raised an interesting question. Well, actually it wasn't just that question, but rather the question was the icing on the cake after hearing commentary from enterprise IT attendees on the subject of SDN.
Yes, there's already a spate of SDN-washing, similar to cloud-washing, that's going on in the market. While ONF certainly laid out a set of characteristics defining SDN, those characteristics are not a concrete list of requirements. It's not, after all, an RFC, with an easy to evaluate list of "MUST NOT, MUST, SHOULD NOT, and SHOULD" requirements. As Captain Barbosa said, "…the code is more what you'd call "guidelines" than actual rule."
The questions and commentary raised by IT attendees at the conference can be summed up in two questions:
1. What is SDN?
2. What problem is it trying to solve?
This is really the heart of the debate for IT. Adoption is not going to occur (one person out of the 50 attending the session had one guy, in a lab, playing with OpenFlow, for example) until at least the second of these questions can be definitively answered by those selling SDN solutions.
The answer to that question seems to center around a concept – agility. Agility, however, is also one of those broad terms that can mean anything from adaptability to flexibility to extensibility. Any of these concepts – and they are concepts – can be implemented in a variety of ways, some of which may fit the criteria set by ONF for SDN and some that may not. That's what leads to "washing" solutions; criteria using language and terminology that can easily be interpreted in a number of ways.
Let's refresh our memories, shall we?
“In the SDN architecture, the control and data planes are decoupled, network intelligence and state are logically centralized, and the underlying network infrastructure is abstracted from the applications. As a result, enterprises and carriers gain unprecedented programmability, automation, and network control, enabling them to build highly scalable, flexible networks that readily adapt to changing business needs.” [emphasis added]
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By HDN Staff
It's unfortunate when a school can't offer all activities students and community members would like to see it offer. Sometimes that's the way it has to be.
With enrollment declining, and funding also declining because of the lower enrollment, Dr. Kirk Miller, superintendent of public schools in Havre, recommended that the board of trustees not add any new athletic activities to Havre High School. With regrets expressed by one board member, the trustees unanimously approved Miller's recommendation.
Miller made valid points that now is simply not the time to add new activities. While public testimony has made the point that boys' cross country would be relatively inexpensive to add, under the Ridgeway Agreement, if a boys' activity is added a girls' activity must be added as well. Unless the board is willing to challenge Ridgeway in a higher court, the system cannot add just one boys' sport.
Now is not the time to start adding these activities with budgets being reduced. As Trustee Dave Milam said at the meeting, maybe sometime in the future.
Another problem is that with enrollment declining, if more activities are added there will be fewer and fewer students to participate.
The only justifiable way to add new sports would be to eliminate other activities to free up funding and reduce the number to split students among. Public testimony at previous hearings has shown that is not what most community members want.
Miller and the board made the right decision. Until enrollment and funding are at a level to support such an action, adding a new athletic activity at the high school should be put on a back burner. | <urn:uuid:1368fd0d-0d05-4fe2-ac95-df3795c82684> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.havredailynews.com/cms/news/story-82769.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970648 | 327 | 1.546875 | 2 |
By now, pretty much everyone is familiar with the reported Chris Brown-Drake scuffle that allegedly involved flying bottles and out-of-control behavior at Club W.i.P. in New York City.
In other news this week, we learned of a Brooklyn eighth grader who was left blind in one eye after bullies viciously beat him in school. That eighth grader, Kardin Ulysse, will be at National Action Network (NAN) this weekend to appeal for peace.
How did we get to this point? While the investigation into the Brown-Drake incident continues, we do know that several people were injured in the fracas as the glass flew. If these are the folks that our young people look up to, should we be surprised when they themselves start fighting, bullying and acting out in increasingly troubling ways? Violence only begets violence. And if we care at all about our future, our children’s future, we have to establish some sort of national intervention and a national movement.
On June 29th, NAN, in conjunction with Youth Move, will be convening a National Youth Summit in Atlanta. In the midst of the country’s highest gang membership increase in the past 40 years, and an unbelievable statistical jump in gun violence, our youth leaders and I will gather to address the concerns of their generation. NAN’s National Youth Director, 14-year-old Mary-Pat Hector, is the organizing force behind this event that begins at 9 a.m. at Grove Park Recreational Center. The summit will focus on three areas: relationship enhancement, peace building and methods to increase the “pay it forward” ideology. Rev. Al Sharpton, Erica Ford (“I Love My Life” Foundation), T.I. (a/k/a Clifford Harris of the T.I. Foundation) and others are scheduled to speak as well.
Entertainers of all kinds tell the world that the violence in their movies, music, TV shows and elsewhere is just that: entertainment. But when our children, who admire these people beyond belief, see them fighting, throwing bottles or shooting each other in real life, what kind of example is that setting? And how can we tell them that violence should never be the answer when grown adults are acting a fool over nonsense? From all the reality TV shows where throwing punches is almost guaranteed, to shoot-outs in almost every major movie, kids today are literally growing up in a culture of violence.
There’s no denying that the epidemic of guns in our neighborhoods has reached a staggering level. In one weekend alone, the city of Chicago saw some 40 people shot. There is absolutely no excuse for such behavior. With parents now having to work two, three, or more jobs to make ends meet, many children are growing up with popular culture as their role model, and the areas they live in as their only environment. All of us — entertainers, parents, educators, everyone — need to take a serious pause and think about what we’re doing to save our children.
Please join us in Atlanta on the 29th. We face a national crisis; it’s time for national action.
Originally seen on http://newsone.com/ | <urn:uuid:8a9d5315-f82a-4968-90be-fa1094629de2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://theyolandaadamsmorningshow.com/195886/when-celebrities-brawl-our-kids-are-watching/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957781 | 672 | 1.75 | 2 |
The Prodigal Daughter
October 27, 1993
Barbra returned to the old neighborhood on October
27, 1993. The occasion was to stump for David Dinkins who was
seeking reelection as Mayor of NYC. Dinkins, who was severely
lagging in the polls behind Rudy Giulliani called on friend, native
Brooklynite and staunch Democratic supporter Barbra Streisand to help
give a boost to his campaign. I was there along with a few
hundred others that evening to witness this unique event in NYC
Staging a Barbra Streisand political event in downtown Brooklyn - at
The Brooklyn Academy of Music no less - should have been the perfect
prescription to inject desperately needed life into the lackluster Dinkins campaign: the prodigal
daughter returning to the town of her
birth to lend a hand. It was
a political coup of brilliance designed to garner a massive infusion
of votes for Dinkins.
made an impassioned political speech blasting Giulliani in her plea
for voters to reelect the mayor. She and Dinkins arrived
promptly at 6 PM - along with Marilyn and Alan Bergman in tow (Barbra
was in town collaborating with the Bergmans and preparing for her
upcoming New Years concerts which were only eight weeks away).
Barbra's speech lasted about a half an hour.
Oh yeah. Giulliani
beat Dinkins in a landslide. The rest is history. | <urn:uuid:96dba79a-4281-4bf5-b562-c452bfad4b8b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://barbratimeless.com/2009bam.htm | 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 | 0.943234 | 307 | 1.507813 | 2 |
08/27/2007 - The U.S. Department of Agriculture reports that its Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service "is reviewing several proposals for the production and delivery of 1.5 million radio frequency ear tags that are compliant with the National Animal Identification System (NAIS) standards.
"These ear tags will be used to uniquely identify U.S. livestock that are part of current animal disease programs, in particular within geographic regions where bovine tuberculosis testing and the brucellosis calfhood vaccination program are most active."
08/27/2007 - "National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell pulled the curtain back on previously classified details of government surveillance," wrote the AP.
"McConnell confirmed for the first time that the private sector assisted with President Bush's warrantless surveillance program," it said. "Offering never-disclosed figures, McConnell also revealed that fewer than 100 people inside the United States are monitored under FISA warrants. However, he said, thousands of people overseas are monitored," the story further noted.
08/23/2007 - Brian Michael Jenkins is one of the world’s leading authorities on international terrorism, currently serving as senior advisor to the president of the think tank RAND Corp. He recently published Unconquerable Nation: Knowing our Enemy, Strengthening Ourselves, and Security Management. Assistant Editor Joseph Straw talked with him about the book, terrorism generally, and private security’s role.
08/23/2007 - It stands to reason that California’s Silicon Valley would lead the country in establishing a network of interoperable communications for first responders. And it does—but not for the technological reasons you might think.
08/22/2007 - The recently declassified executive summary from the Central Intelligence Agency's own inspector general report confirms the intelligence failures documented by the 9-11 Commission: the CIA made critical mistakes leading up to the terrorist attacks of 9-11.
08/22/2007 - This December, the U.S. intelligence community will unveil a new peer-to-peer social networking site modeled off of MySpace.com for its intelligence analysts and spies, according to MSNBC.
08/21/2007 - The Department of Homeland Security will partner with the state of Vermont to develop a driver's license that will negate the need of Vermonters to show passports during border crossings to and from Canada. | <urn:uuid:3ac6e12a-aa6a-4aa9-903a-2316f7fc4245> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.securitymanagement.com/site_map/term/86/all?page=90 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93165 | 480 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Ruiz said he and his wife bought their house about two years ago near Fleming Street and Butterfield Road. They were told it would be years before the state would increase the 71 from a four-lane expressway to an eight-lane freeway.
Plans call for initial work beginning in 2023 and the project being completed by 2030.
However, the project may qualify for funding through a state public-private partnership program. If secured, the widening project could be moved up by about eight years.
"I didn't think it would impact the houses," Ruiz said in Spanish.
Pomona, Caltrans and the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority officials have to update environmental studies, refine preliminary designs and conduct financial analysis before they can apply for the funding, said Lan Saadatnejadi, executive officer with the authority's highway program.
Widening the 71 between the 10 and the 60 freeways would bring several benefits to the city and the region, Saadatnejadi said.
"It would improve safety and relieve congestion," she said.
Last week, Ruiz and about 100 other residents living near the 71 learned about some of the changes at Westmont Community Center.
Attendees studied maps presented by Caltrans and peppered officials with questions.
The meeting gave "the community an
The meeting, which was organized at the request of the Pomona City Council, also aimed to informed residents on efforts to secure revenues that could move up the widening of the 71.
Some attendees said the 71 needs to be widened, but expressed concern that they will be affected negatively since existing stop lights along the freeway would be eliminated and existing crossings would be closed.
Concerns were also expressed about the placement of proposed bridges connecting the neighborhoods on either side of the 71 in addition to the placement of soundwalls.
Xavier DeGuchy said he would like to see some of the proposed bridge locations in different places.
"This is not just to benefit me. It'll benefit the neighborhood," DeGuchy said.
Laura Romero, who lives along Grier Street, said she is concerned that the elimination of street lights along the 71 will make it harder for residents to travel within the neighborhood without driving or walking long distances.
"The freeway needs to be done, but, for residents, they're blocking us in," she said.
Residents' comments will be reviewed by Caltrans engineers and discussed with city representatives in order to try to make adjustments where possible.
The original plans called for building the freeway below grade, but plans now call for constructing it at ground level, which reduces the needs for property acquisition and reduces costs, Saadatnejadi said.
At one time, plans called for acquiring part or all of about 160 properties to complete the widening project, Caltrans engineer Andy Liao said.
That number has dropped.
"Right now, it's less than 40," said Liao, adding that close to 12 full properties will be needed.
Ruiz said he had questions related to the state acquiring his home for the freeway widening.
"I'll have to wait to see what they say," he said. | <urn:uuid:cfc293e0-3d91-42ee-b5b7-fefdce4a9b6f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailybulletin.com/marijuana/ci_22029413/neighbors-71-freeway-learn-how-future-freeway-widening | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980735 | 654 | 1.523438 | 2 |
This is a classic song from the classic movie Mayabazaar, created first in Telugu and then dubbed perfectly into so many other languages.
Like many beautiful love songs, it can apply to a human or to the divine!
The “priyadarsini” that Sasirekha, Balarama’s daughter, is looking into is much like a modern video phone except that it only shows what’s dear to you. No spam, no “boss calling”.
And her dear ‘bava’ (cross-cousin) Abhimanyu, the son of Arjuna अर्जुन, has no priyadarsini, and knows he is being called, most certainly by his beloved Sasirekha, but he can’t be too sure.
So when Sasirekha opens the priyadars’ini and sees Abhimanyu,
” Is it you who have thought of me? Is it you who have called me?
Is it you who stand in my mind and distract me?
” It is you who have thought of me! It is you who have called me!
It is you who stand in my mind and distract me!”
“Like waking in a dream and like dreaming in that wakefulness,
In that confusion where I don’t know if it is a dream, wakefulness or Vaishanava Maya (Vishnu‘s Illusion)..
.. is it you have thought of me…?”
“Having lit my eyes with moonlight, and having made jasmine flowers bloom in my mind,
Having melted my eyes and manas (mind), having made me forget myself and distracted (charmed) me,
… it is you who have thought of me..!”
I used to offer honey and milk to Vishnu till I realised that it was He who had arranged the honey and milk for me. I know that I did something for society and they gave me some money which I gave back to society to “buy” the milk and honey. But actually all I have done is exchanged labour with other humans. We did not make the bees or the honey or the cows or the milk!
And then suddenly, when I thought of Vishnu as giving me the milk and honey, I thought, may be it was He who was calling me all along!
He was who was in my mind distracting me, He who was like wakefulness in a dream and a dream in that wakefulness, so that I don’t know if that call is wakefulness or a dream or His illusion, He who has a lit up my mind and made flowers bloom there, who has melted my heart and made me forget myself and charmed me.
It is He who is thinking of me, His dear one, and me who is delighted and confused. This thought made me very, very happy!
Authorship and Copyright Notice : All Rights Reserved : Satya Sarada Kandula | <urn:uuid:69c07fbf-6201-47a3-ba0b-b1e1fc27f6ac> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ancientindians.wordpress.com/2011/06/29/bhakthi-romance-mayabazaar-neevena-nannu-talachinadi-is-it-you-who-thought-of-me/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974578 | 645 | 1.703125 | 2 |
About 840 gallons of heavy fuel oil spilled into Port Angeles Harbor Wednesday.
The spill happened while a fuel barge was being filled at the Tesoro Port Angeles Terminal, according to Curt Hart with the Washington Department of Ecology.
An oil spill containment boom was already out while the barge was being filled.
"Fortunately in the State of Washington, whenever we have these large fuel transfers over water, we make sure that oil spill containment boom is placed before the transfer starts," said Hart.
Hart said it's unlikely any oil escaped the containment boom, but ecologist will fly over the area to assess the spill.
"We're concerned about all of the ecosystem in that area, from water quality to birds to marine mammals to fish," he said.
The area where the spill occurred is in a relatively calm area, protected by shoreline and perhaps preventing the spill from spreading.
The Department of Ecology is working with the U.S. Coast Guard, the Marine Spill Response Corporation, and Global Diving & Salvage to clean up the spill. | <urn:uuid:a8391313-5e05-473e-8216-aa2c05873bbf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.krem.com/news/northwest-news/177722141.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964979 | 215 | 1.671875 | 2 |
On Friday. Voting in Copenhagen begins at 5 p.m. -- that's 10 a.m. in Chicago. If Chicago is eliminated in one of the early rounds of voting, we'll learn then. But if it's one of the final contenders, word won't come out until the announcement ceremony, scheduled from 11:30 a.m. to noon Chicago time.
For the first time, there are no IOC meetings in the days leading up to the vote just an opening ceremony. That means less chance for host city finalists to lobby. Most IOC members won't arrive until the day before the vote.
On Friday, the voting process in Copenhagen will work like this:
*In an expected three rounds of voting, the 106 eligible members vote secretly by pressing numbered buttons (one for each candidate) on machines.
Members in a country with a candidate cannot vote until that city is eliminated. That means there will be 99 eligible voters in the first round, since Brazil, Japan and the United States each has two IOC members, while Spain has one.
*Until one candidate gets a majority of the votes, the lowest vote-getter in each round is eliminated. That is announced publicly before the next round of voting. Not since the vote for the 1988 Olympics, when winner Seoul vied with Nagoya, Japan, has a Summer Games ballot lasted only one round.
*The process happens so quickly it is nearly impossible between rounds for any lobbying to occur. Bid committees have no contact with the voters, and even those IOC members also on bid committees have no time to lobby. Candidate cities already have lobbied to become the second choice of some IOC members known to favor a rival.
Before the voting begins, each city will tell its story for the final time in 45-minute presentations with another 15 minutes for IOC members' questions the morning and afternoon of the vote.
In an order determined by drawing lots last year, Chicago goes first, followed by Tokyo and Rio before the members' lunch break. Madrid's presentation comes after lunch in Copenhagen. The vote follows Madrid's presentation.
Want to learn more? Olympic correspondent Philip Hersh wrote about it.
Where can I watch?
Daley Plaza downtown, where the official Chicago 2016 party at Washington and LaSalle streets will begin at 9 a.m. And there are also a number of places around Chicago and the suburbs. Among them:
-- Rufino Tamayo Charter School on Southwest Side: This school run by UNO (United Neighborhood Organization) at 5135 S. California Ave., will hold a viewing party starting at 10:30 a.m. The event will include a message by UNO Charter School Network President Juan Rangel broadcast from Copenhagen. Rangel served on the Chicago 2016 Outreach Committee.
-- Washington Park on South Side: A group of aldermen is sponsoring an "Olympic Watch" in Washington Park, proposed site of the temporary Olympic Stadium. The UniverSoul Circus will conduct its normal morning show from 10:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the big top, and as the decision nears, the circus acts will pause and spectators will watch JumboTrons.
-- Downtown Naperville: A Naperville Backs the Bid street festival will take place from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. along Chicago Avenue between Main and Washington streets. The fest will include music and dancing.
-- Concordia University Chicago in River Forest: A viewing party will start at 10:30 a.m. in the north Geiseman Gymnasium, 7400 Augusta St. | <urn:uuid:4c0b4184-65cf-4797-958e-85cb25288d12> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-olympics-faq,0,5386482.story | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942899 | 738 | 1.570313 | 2 |
how so, ashe?
sorry to come back to this so late...
anyway, i think the story about the bhikuni who tried to learn to see with her ears even though her eyes worked perfectly fine is a good analogy.
people in the IS crowd have vilified the soft tissue a bit i think. but the soft tissue is part of the body and is part of how the body works (i.e. that's the nature of the human structure).
so what if there's some
tension in the soft tissue during effort? what matters is the balance between tension and relaxation. too much tension and you become stiff and unable to change. too loose and you have no power. that's tai chi. the balance between yin and yang, not only yang. | <urn:uuid:8aa29d10-d6d4-4b1a-bff6-aff2e772613e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.aikiweb.com/forums/showpost.php?p=255954&postcount=34 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977168 | 166 | 1.507813 | 2 |
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Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has fallen silent since undergoing surgery in Cuba two weeks ago.
Speculation in Venezuela is growing over President Hugo Chavez’s health, two weeks after he underwent surgery in Cuba for what was said to be a pelvic abscess.
Chavez, known for his frequent public speeches and normally an enthusiastic user of Twitter, has been largely silent since the operation. There were no new posts on his Twitter account for more than two weeks, until this weekend when posts appeared about visits from family members.
And he has not been seen apart from in photos given to the media that show Chavez being visited in hospital by Fidel and Raul Castro.
Some Chavez supporters fear that he could be seriously ill, the Associated Press reports.
On Friday, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro said that Chavez was in a "great battle" for his health.
Chavez, 56, underwent emergency surgery in Cuba on June 10 while visiting the island on an international tour. There is no indication of when he will return to Venezuela.
His extended absence has raised questions about a possible successor to Chavez, the AP reports. It is unclear who would succeed Chavez if he had to step down.
According to Venezuela's constitution, vice-president Elias Jaua would take the president's place during "temporary" absences of up to 90 days, and would serve the rest of Chavez’s term if he were to die or resign.
Jaua on Saturday worked to dampen speculation that Chavez is gravely ill.
"The national and international press are rubbing their hands and rejoicing about the state of the president's health,” he said, according to Al Jazeera. | <urn:uuid:a1ea183b-6a06-4bd6-9915-b7da0b6d2a8d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/americas/venezuela/110626/venezuela-hugo-chavez-cuba-health-surgery-successor | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969352 | 351 | 1.617188 | 2 |
NEW YORK The Oracle Ridge copper and silver mine in southern Arizona has been cleared for reopening by Pima County officials after 16 years of dormancy.
Vancouver, British Columbia-based Oracle Mining Corp. expects to secure all environmental approvals by early 2013 and to begin construction immediately thereafter, according to chief executive officer Doug Nicholson.
"Metal markets are good right now, and Oracle Ridge stands out," Nicholson told AMM. "Its a high 2.3-percent-purity copper mine with not an insignificant amount of silver."
On Wednesday, Oracle executives signed a memorandum of understanding prepared by the Pima County Board of Supervisors, agreeing to 15 conditions involving job creation, environmental stewardship and cooperation with local regulators. The supervisors then voted unanimously to approve the project.
The mine in the Santa Catalina Mountains operated on and off from the late 19th century until 1996, when it shut down completely due to low copper prices.
Nicholson said the junior mining firm has secured an air permit, submitted an aquifer protection application for technical review, and has a special-use permit pending with the U.S. Forest Service. Oracle is also drilling for samples at the site for an ongoing feasibility study.
The company has arranged a $70-million loan from Credit Suisse to fund the project, Nicholson said.
Nicholson anticipates an annual production of 25 million to 30 million pounds of copper, as well as about 360,000 ounces of silver, with a mine life of 11 years.
The Pima County board is also involved in the approval process for Augusta Resource Corp.s proposed Rosemont copper project (AMM, July 9). | <urn:uuid:659bb1bc-d674-4c42-9492-5dd306229bc4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.amm.com/Magazine/3059985/Article/3136851/Quote.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951222 | 337 | 1.515625 | 2 |
- Development & Aid
- Economy & Trade
- Human Rights
- Global Governance
- Civil Society
Sunday, May 26, 2013
- Tuesday’s attacks by alleged radical Islamists on key U.S. diplomatic posts in Libya and Egypt propelled foreign policy, however briefly, to the centre of the presidential race that has been dominated to date by the state of the economy.
Pointing to the killing of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other U.S. officials in the assault on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, President Barack Obama pledged that “justice will be done” against the attackers, while his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney assailed the administration for the second day in a row for allegedly “apolog(ising) for our values”.
He was referring to a statement issued Tuesday by the U.S. embassy in Cairo when it was under siege by several hundred protesters that denounced a privately produced video-tape that mocked the Prophet Muhammad and that apparently triggered the demonstrations in the Egyptian capital.
The video-tape, whose production was claimed by an obscure Israeli-American real estate investor whose actual identity became a source of much speculation here Wednesday, was promoted by Terry Jones, a Florida pastor whose past threats to burn Qurans had provoked riots in Afghanistan and other Islamic countries in 2010 and 2011, and by a prominent anti-Muslim U.S. Copt, Morris Sadek.
“America will not tolerate attacks against our citizens and against our embassies,” Romney said Wednesday during a press conference in Florida. “We’ll defend, also, our constitutional rights of speech and assembly and religion.
“Apology for America’s values is never the right course,” he stressed, adding that U.S. “leadership” was needed “to ensure that the Arab Spring does not become an Arab Winter”.
For his part, Obama himself repeated that his administration “reject(ed) all efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others” but, speaking of the attack on the Benghazi consulate, emphasised “there is absolutely no justification (for) this type of senseless violence. None.”
He also stressed that Washington would remain engaged in Libya whose security forces, he said, had tried to repel the fatal attack by an alleged Al-Qaeda-affiliated group, Ansar Al-Sharia, and helped some of the diplomats to safety. “(T)his attack will not break the bonds between the United States and Libya,” he declared.
The embassy assaults took place on the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and also came amidst growing tensions between Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu over the latter’s increasingly hostile demands that Washington issue an ultimatum to Iran over its nuclear programme. They confirm that, to the extent foreign policy will play any role in the Nov. 6 election, the events in the Middle East are likely to be the focal point.
Romney and the Republicans have long charged that Obama has shown insufficient leadership in the region, both with respect to influencing the outcome of the “Arab Spring” – which they have mocked as “leading from behind” – and to failing to adequately support Israel in its confrontation with Iran, or, in the campaign shorthand, “throwing Israel under the bus”.
At the same time, however, polls have shown consistently that a majority of the electorate has more confidence in Obama as the steward of U.S. foreign policy and national security than in Romney.
More comprehensive surveys, such as one issued earlier this week by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, also suggest that Obama’s more cautious and less militaristic approach to the Middle East specifically and overseas developments more generally enjoys broad public support, as opposed to the more interventionist policies advocated by neo-conservatives and other hawks who dominate Romney’s foreign-policy team.
Until now, and particularly since his gaffe-ridden trip to Britain, Israel and Poland in July, Romney has shown some reluctance to make foreign policy a major issue in the race, preferring instead to dwell on the alleged shortcomings in the president’s economic record.
But that appeared to change Tuesday, when he declared that the Cairo embassy’s denunciation of the video was “disgraceful”, and his main foreign-policy spokesman, Richard Williamson, described the assaults as “part of a broader scheme of the president’s failure to be an effective leader for U.S. interests in the U.S.”
At the time, no one knew about the fate of Stevens, a career foreign-service officer who had served as Washington’s chief contact to the U.S.-backed insurgency that ousted long-time dictator Muammar Gaddafi last year, and his colleagues.
After it became known, both Democrats and some Republicans blasted Romney’s statement as a blatant attempt to inject politics into a national tragedy, but the candidate doubled down on the issue Wednesday, winning praise from Weekly Standard editor William Kristol, an influential leader of the neo-conservative faction of the party.
“Romney is right to bring home the weakness of the Obama administration,” he wrote, adding that he should use this as the moment to focus his campaign more on foreign-policy issues.
But some independent analysts said they thought Romney had miscalculated. “I think it will backfire,” said Stephen Clemons, an influential analyst at The Atlantic magazine, “both because it will be seen as using an assassination of an ambassador for political purposes and because this incident will remind many people that there are real costs to the kind of interventionism that Romney and the neo-con crowd are promoting.”
Indeed, the reaction by some Congressional Republicans to the attacks was precisely to reduce U.S. engagement in both Egypt and Libya. Several were quoted in the press as calling for sharp reductions in economic and military to both countries.
And at least one right-wing commentator, the National Review’s Victor Davis Hanson, who is normally aligned with neo-conservatives, said the incidents should make Washington more cautious about any intervention in Syria or supporting popular forces in the region.
Indeed, a number of Middle East experts worried that Washington could overreact. “It would be a tragic mistake to allow the images from Cairo and Benghazi to undermine American support for the changes in the Arab world,” wrote Marc Lynch, a regional specialist at George Washington University, on his blog on foreignpolicy.com.
“The aspirations for democratic change of many millions of Arab citizens must not be delegitimated by the violent acts of a small group of radicals.”
Isobel Coleman of the Council on Foreign Relations also stressed that the two incidents should be seen as quite separate. The siege in Cairo, she said, capped several days of denunciations of the media by religious leaders and some media organisations of the video, while the Benghazi attackers were heavily armed and completely overwhelmed the local security forces.
The administration, she said, had already sent surveillance drones over Benghazi to seek out possible Ansar camps, and she expected U.S. officials work closely with the government in Tripoli to apprehend or confront the perpetrators.
*Jim Lobe’s blog on U.S. foreign policy can be read at http://www.lobelog.com. | <urn:uuid:1df63c33-b533-4aa9-b5cc-52c0cebc41ed> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ipsnews.net/2012/09/libya-egypt-embassy-attacks-fuel-u-s-presidential-race/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964606 | 1,544 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Pinellas County is hosting an online town hall meeting at 7 tonight to talk to residents about how they can help improve water quality.
Panelists will talk about how interconnected the water system is and how something as simple as not picking up after your pet can affect the water quality in the bay. Residents can ask questions during the interactive online event. To view the live streaming, go to www.pinellascounty.org/etownhall or tweet your question using hashtag #pinellaswatershed. You can also call (727) 464-8696 to ask a question or make a comment during the one-hour event.
The conference room at the Pinellas County Communications Department, 333 Chestnut St. in Clearwater, also will be open during the event to provide access to a computer, TV and phone. | <urn:uuid:5d7a1242-fd11-49d7-8391-a19243923bfe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.tampabay.com/news/localgovernment/pinellas-to-host-online-town-hall-meeting-on-water-quality/1263623 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944459 | 171 | 1.625 | 2 |
There's a portentous news article on Page 8 of this week's SN. It cites the prediction that in the next five years or so, as much as 15% of all grocery product sold in conventional supermarkets will be natural and organic product.
That would represent quite an increase, given that less than a decade ago such product constituted just 1.2% of product sold. Today, it's about 6.4%. Connect the dots, and you'll see a line that's pointing straight up.
Predictions such as that were backed by a large-scale consumer study commissioned earlier this year by SN. Results of the study, published in the March 1, 2004, issue, show that 61% of food shoppers say they purchase natural and organic product in supermarkets. The reverse side of that is that nearly 40% of shoppers remain to patronize such product, if they're given a chance.
It was with thoughts such as these in mind that SN's editors have been working in recent weeks on the inaugural issue of the new publication you'll find bagged with this week's SN. It's SN Whole Health, which will publish four times a year starting in 2005.
Let's take a look at WH, and at the intent behind it, starting with its mission statement: "SN Whole Health is first in supermarket retail for comprehensive business coverage of the categories devoted to health and wellness." (See the WH table of contents on its Page 3.)
So that's it in a nutshell. WH is intended to examine the supermarket-business side of product that's variously called natural or organic, or product that has a health and wellness dimension. How that intent is addressed in the current issue of WH, and will be in those to follow, can be seen by taking a look at the type of information it contains.
Let's look closer: News pages come first and include articles like increased competition faced by organic farmers, new labels being launched, and the growth of organic pet food. Trends pages come next, with articles about fair trade coffee, health claims for omega-3, and a gluten-free bakery. A consumer focus follows, which offers findings about what directions consumers are going with regard to relevant product. Next is the cover story about the fastest-growing element of the natural and organic category: beef. That feature profiles what's happening at Marsh Supermarkets. Farther back in the publication is another store feature based on King Soopers and its response to vertical natural and organic stores. Following the Marsh feature is a category report about the growth of healthy grab-and-go items, then a feature about supermarket pharmacies. Finally, the publication is rounded off with articles about supply, logistics and technology considerations, together with a products review, a guest column and quite a bit more.
SN editors hope you'll find much of value in WH, and look forward to bringing it to you again next year. We welcome your comments about the publication, which can be directed to me or the editor identified on WH's Page 3. | <urn:uuid:3e2dcc65-a306-4f22-9845-187519e6784b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://supermarketnews.com/archive/retails-fastest-growing-food-group-has-new-book | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97116 | 614 | 1.742188 | 2 |
THE shocking rise will see an £80 increase on some annual bills despite companies having posted massive profits.
FEARS that more households will be plunged into a "long, cold winter" were fuelled today after two major energy companies hiked their prices.
British Gas put an extra £80 on to its typical annual dual fuel bill after an average increase of 6per cent affecting 8.5 million customers from November 16.
Rival Npower followed with an average rise of 8.8per cent for gas and 9.1per cent for electricity.
Both companies blamed rising costs largely outside their control, but with food and some mortgage costs also on an upward path there were fears about how the elderly and hard-up will cope with the latest rises.
The pre-winter move from British Gas comes months after parent Centrica posted a 23per cent rise in half-year profits at its residential arm to £345 million.
Unions and consumer groups attacked British Gas and called on the Government to take urgent action to tackle rising fuel prices.
Unite general secretary Len McCluskey said: "With winter approaching, low-waged people will now be terrified about how they are going to find another £80.
"Money from the poor is going to the pockets of Centrica shareholders. This is further shameful abuse by out-of-control, greedy fuel companies, sitting on piles of profit."
Consumer Focus recently said six million households in England were planning to cut back on their heating this winter because of cost worries.
It has encouraged customers "to do what they can" to cut their bills by switching tariff, payment method and supplier.
Its director of energy Audrey Gallacher said no-one has managed to convince consumers of the necessity for price rises in the context of wholesale prices and company profits.
She added: "We need much more focus on the big steps that Government and the regulator can take to insulate consumers from the effects of growing energy costs."
Consumer Focus said today's price rise from British Gas will see the company's average annual energy bills reach almost £1265 for direct debit customers and £1347 for cash and cheque customers.
The rise from npower comes into force on November 26 and according to Consumer Focus will result in a typical dual fuel customer paying £1252 by monthly direct debit. The figure for cash or cheque is £1357.
The supplier has 6.5 million residential gas and electricity accounts.
SSE, which trades as Southern Electric, Swalec and Scottish Hydro, has already said it will increase tariffs by nine per cent on average on Monday, hitting about five million electricity customers and 3.4 million gas customers.
Mike Jeram, of Unison, said: "It will be a long, cold winter for many pensioners, the unemployed and for low paid workers and their families.
"Just days ago we learned that the cost of fruit and vegetables have gone up by a massive 50per cent in the last year. Any increase in energy prices is likely to tip more families into debt and into the hands of unscrupulous pay-day loan companies."
British Gas put gas and electricity tariffs up by 18per cent and 16per cent respectively in August 2011, blaming higher wholesale costs, but this was followed by a drop of five per cent in electricity tariffs in January when prices eased.
British Gas managing director Phil Bentley said: "Britain's North Sea gas supplies are running out, and British Gas has to pay the going rate for gas in a competitive global marketplace.
"Furthermore, the investment needed to maintain and upgrade the national grid to deliver energy to our customers' homes, and the costs of the Government's policies for a clean, energy-efficient Britain, are all going up."
Centrica said prices in the wholesale market for gas this winter are around 13per cent higher than those paid for the same period last year.
Assuming normal weather conditions and despite today's price rise, Centrica said British Gas Residential profits for the second half of 2012 are expected to be around 15per cent lower than for the same period of 2011.
Centrica estimates its residential margins after tax in 2012 will be 5p in the pound - a similar level to last year and lower than the prior year.
Mr Bentley said: "Unfortunately, we cannot run our business sustainably on lower margins and still make the investments in jobs and future energy sources that Britain needs, especially if the country is to grow its way out of recession."
Attention will now switch to the other big suppliers - EDF and Scottish Power - while E.ON has guaranteed a price freeze for 2012.
Further utility bill increases will play havoc with the Bank of England's inflation forecasts, which predicted a gradual slide in the consumer price index rate towards the end of the year and into 2013.
While inflation has fallen from 5.2per cent in September last year to 2.5per cent in August this year, many economists expect the rate to rise again as droughts in the United States and poor summer weather in the UK have meant higher food prices.
Energy and Climate Change Minister Greg Barker said this winter's Energy Bill, which will be the biggest shake-up of the industry since privatisation, and extra teeth for regulator Ofgem will improve energy markets.
He added: "We are also rolling out the Green Deal this winter. This is the biggest ever energy efficiency programme, that will help millions improve their homes so they are better insulated.
"We have also brought in the Warm Home Discount, which will provide an extra £130 for two million of the most vulnerable households this winter." | <urn:uuid:b293a060-b95c-4c58-b0d8-373602c6c105> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/fury-as-energy-firms-british-gas-1374117 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959515 | 1,149 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Langer, Bernhard - Autographed Photo
Born: August 27, 1957 in Anhausen, Germany
As the leaders made the turn on Sunday at the 1985 Masters, it was Curtis Strange's tournament to lose. And lose he did. As Bernhard Langer plodded along, Strange made watery bogeys at 13 and 15 and finished with a bogey on the 18th. Langer continued to work toward the clubhouse; a birdie at the 17th gave him all the cushion he would needed. Langer posted 282, 2 strokes ahead of Seve Ballesteros, Ray Floyd and Strange.
The 1993 Masters began with some early nostalgia. Arnold Palmer birdied his first three holes, and Jack Nicklaus held a share of the lead with a opening round 67. As the tournament wore on, the unflappable consistency of Bernhard Langer would give him his second green jacket. Langer eagled the 13th hole in the final round and cruised to a one stroke victory over Chip Beck.Golf Links To The Past is proud to guarantee the authenticity of every autograph we sell. In addition, we provide appropriate documentation from official licensees who have commissioned private signings or we employ the services of the two leading independent autograph authenticating companies — James Spence Authentication (JSA) and/or PSA/DNA.
This 8" x 10" autographed photo has been authenticated by JSA. | <urn:uuid:08498706-bfa9-484c-b7ce-1b546f7ffe66> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.golfspast.com/sale.html?page=shop.product_details&flypage=flypage.tpl&product_id=989&category_id=60&vmcchk=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949257 | 295 | 1.71875 | 2 |
Our center is a place where students can find understanding, acceptance and practical help. We are counseling professionals trained and experienced in addressing the needs of university students. Gonzaga students from every school and college, undergraduates, graduate, law and professional students use the Counseling Center.
Most students come to the Counseling Center for assistance with some identifiable academic, personal, or career related concern. When you make an appointment to see a counselor, that time is specifically reserved for you. During your first session, the counselor wants to get to know you and assess the best way the center can serve you. Succeeding sessions will be devoted to finding ways of achieving the goals you established with your counselor.
We have a variety of career and objective psychological inventories to help clarify questions students have about themselves. These can be helpful when students are experiencing uncertainty about career choice, difficulty with academic performance or emotional discomfort. You or your counselor may suggest the use of one of these inventories to better understand your concern.
We are committed to protecting your privacy. Your identity and any disclosures made in the course of the counseling relationship, will be regarded as confidential. Confidential information will not be shared with anyone outside the center without your expressed written consent, unless there is a clear and imminent danger to yourself or another. Visits to the center are not part of your academic record. | <urn:uuid:027ded99-14f4-4ea8-8cc6-f04eb2e0f62e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gonzaga.edu/student-life/Counseling-Center/default-print.asp | 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 | 0.952097 | 275 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Welcome to the Thumb Rural Health Network (TRHN) website!
TRHN is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization established as a network of 13 health care service providers to address the health care needs of Huron, Sanilac and Tuscola County residents.
Its organization was originally initiated in 2003 by four Critical Access Hospitals - Harbor Beach Community Hospital, Deckerville Community Hospital, McKenzie Memorial Hospital and Scheurer Hospital. Current membership includes seven critical access hospitals, one sole provider hospital, two tertiary hospitals, and three county health departments.
TRHN strives to work collaboratively to improve the health status and health access of area residents. In 2004 the organization contracted with MSU to develop a study to assess the health status issues in the three counties. That study, along with TRHN Strategic Planning, identified the areas of improving health status and increasing health access as priority areas.
Initiatives in progress include an update of the Thumb Behavioral Risk Factor Survey (BRFS), TRHN website development, the evaluation of the Thumb Steps-Up program, and a pilot Access Healthcare Project to address the needs of the uninsured in the Thumb area. | <urn:uuid:2e6145e4-5482-4bd0-926c-e15c767a122c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.trhn.org/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932822 | 245 | 1.625 | 2 |
With the average life expectancy exceeding that of any other generation prior many people are now fitting into what is known as the sandwich generation. Generally aimed at the middle-aged sector of society, these people are still working full time and caring for not only their children, but their elderly parents as well. With this in mind, a community workshop entitled “Planting a Seed – Grow your Knowledge,” has been organized by local elder care providers to provide attendees with basic information and key points about senior care and aging. Registered nurse Christina Philippi will provide resources to guide the caregiver and senior through the care coordination process and education about putting a plan in place. Kathleen Devlin of All About Home Care will explain what can be done to help seniors stay safely in their home. Key legal documents will be explained by attorney Cristina Offenberg and information about funeral planning will be provided by Leo Dube Jr. of Memorial, Hambly and Connors Funeral Homes.
The resources shared in this program will also help attendees plan for their own future. The presentation will be followed by a question and answer session. The cost to attend is $5 per person. For information or to register to attend, call Jeannine Carrubba at All About Home Care, 846-0727.
When: May 30, 5 to 7pm
Where: Sweet Berry Farm, 19 Third Beach Rd., Middletown
newportFILM will host an informative and thought provoking screening of the film The Last Ocean May 23 at the Casino Theater. The film, which will be preceded by cocktail and hors d’oeuvres, will focus on man’s recent efforts to fish in the Ross Sea in Antarctica, a concern raised among environmentalists. The Ross Sea is the most pristine stretch of ocean on earth, described by scientists as our last “living laboratory,” offering a place that can teach man about the workings of all marine ecosystems. The fishing industry has recently found its way into these waters, targeting the Antarctic Toothfish, and, unless stopped, the nature balance of this ecosystem will be lost forever. For information, visit newportfilm.com
When: May 23, 6pm cocktails; 7pm screening
Where: Casino Theater, 9 Freebody St., Newport
Newport yachting scenes will be featured in an exhibit held in conjunction with the International Yacht Restoration School’s graduation and launch day events June 1. Included will be artwork done in different mediums from the 19th Century to contemporary times to give both residents and visitors alike a look at the rich and varied history of yachting in this New England city. The exhibit will be located in the Aquidneck Mill Building on Thames Street. For information, visit moy.org
With the spring season finally rolling toward summer activities, the Four Corners Arts Center has stepped up its activities.
The Wednesday Film Series returns May 22 at 7:30pm with People Sunday. Directed by Robert Siodmak and Edgar G. Ulmer, this black and white film was made in 1930 and is 73 minutes in length. Films are always free and open to the public.
Other activities scheduled include the 2013 Garden & Herb Festival, May 25, 10am to 4pm; a picnic concert featuring 6-DIGG-IT, June 9; the 2013 Sculpture Park; and a concert featuring Abbey Rhode July 21. The Arts Center’s 20th Anniversary Gala will be Aug. 18. Events for children and families include a Children’s Theater Performance, a Youth Poetry Workshop, Fact Finding Workshops for Kids in the Sculpture Park and Children’s Theater and Art Camps.
When: Throughout the summer
Where: The Meeting House, Tiverton Four Corners, Tiverton
Kick off the Memorial Day weekend with some laughs while helping support Child & Family’s Elder Service Program.
Spreading it Around is a light-hearted comedy about a wealthy widow in a retirement community who is tired of handing out money to her unappreciative children. She decides to start the SIN (Spreading It Around) Foundation to give to those truly in need. This terrifies her greedy son and his shopaholic wife who decide to have her committed.
The performance will be held May 23 at Newport Playhouse and include a buffet dinner. There will also be a fun filled cabaret and a drawing for prizes. Tickets are $60 each and can be purchased at 848-4100 or by stopping by Child and Family’s Community Center, 31 John Clarke Road, Middletown.
When: May 23, 6pm
Where: Newport Playhouse, Connell Highway, Newport | <urn:uuid:f3ac3153-71ea-4631-9d5f-44cb2ae3f4a4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://getanewportlife.tumblr.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942773 | 967 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Eighteen years old, October eleventh
Drunk for the first time in her life,
she tossed her head in a horsey laugh
and that new opal gift sailed off her sore earlobe,
in a graceful parabola,
pinged twice on the stone porch floor,
and rolled off to hide behind the rose bushes.
It gathered dust and silt for two centuries.
The mansion came down in a war.
For twelve thousand years
the opal hid in dark rubble, unmoving.
An arctic chill worked down through it, and deeper,
and glaciers pushed the rubble thousands of miles,
very fast, as opals measure time.
After millions of years (the Sun just measurably cooler)
a female felt the presence of a stone,
and waved away yards of snow and ice;
waved away dozens of yards
of frozen dirt and crushed rock,
and held, in what resembled a hand,
this bauble of gold and rainbow stone:
felt the sense of loss in that silly girl,
dead as a trilobite;
felt the pain that had gone into penetrating
the soft hyperbolic paraboloid of cartilage
that then displayed the decoration;
felt its sexual purpose:
to attract a dissimilar pattern of genes
to combine and recombine a trillion trillion times,
and become herself.
She briefly cherished the stone,
and returned it to its waiting.
(This poem won the Rhysling Award for the best short science fiction poem of the year.)
Copyright © 1990 by Joe Haldeman | <urn:uuid:7615d439-892a-4e00-b411-0be136e95d88> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sff.net/people/joe.haldeman/poem1.html | 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 | 0.933765 | 336 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Last year I spent some time with mountain safety, and it really opened my eyes to a lot of the problems occurring on the slow trails. This year I have been noticing even more careless incidents, and some people need to be made more aware of what they are doing. It is not that these people have bad intentions; these things can be easy to do. I can relate to a lot of these skiers and riders, having made a few mistakes with my skiing in the past. I am not trying to vilify any of these skiers, but simply trying to educate them.
A problem many skiers and snowboarders have is knowing when to back off their speed coming into the slow zones at Whistler Blackcomb. Less than 10 per cent of all the terrain here is considered a slow zone or green run. Green runs are for beginners and itís not fair to have others whipping by them at high rates of speed. The rule of thumb when youíre in slow zones is to go the same speed as everyone else even if youíre on the side of the run. Try to remember when you first started riding how difficult it was. Beginners get scared when you go by them too quickly.
We as locals do not spend our days riding the slow area trails. Weíre more experienced so we can ride one hundred per cent of our mountains. The tourists are the ones that play on green runs and they pay our wages. It is really not that bad of a deal, give the beginners their bit of space and the rest of us can have the huge amount of the remaining terrain to ride.
With a bit of knowledge of the mountain itís often not hard to avoid these runs all together. On all of the other runs you can go fast, jump off cliffs, and ski however you like without anyone minding. There are some times when you do have to ski on the slow trails, but chances are that you wouldn't be on them for all that long, so just take it easy for that little bit of time. Maybe help a tourist with a pointer or two; the tourists will be thankful and you might make new friends.
Nik Van Scoyk | <urn:uuid:0e560a89-703d-46fb-9526-02bc2a225b80> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.whistlerquestion.com/article/20130124/WHISTLER07/301249972/WHISTLER/change-can-come-from-breaking-the-law | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973616 | 444 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Air traffic growth may shrink by 2.5% in 2012-13
“We expect total passenger traffic to decline by 3.2% year-on-year in the second half of FY13. In 2012-13 as a whole, the passenger traffic growth is expected to fall by 2.5%,” city-based Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) said in its report. Even the DGCA data for the January-November period, released recently, shows a 3% negative growth during the period.
According to the DGCA data, the total number of passengers carried by the domestic airlines in the first 11 months of the fiscal stood at 534.14 lakh, marginally less than 550.33 lakh fliers during the corresponding period of the previous year. Domestic passenger traffic accounts for almost 72-74% of the total air passenger traffic.
Observing that the air traffic scenario is expected to remain dull in the coming months, which happens to be the lean period for the domestic carriers, the CMIE report said the factors such as higher air fares, capacity reduction due to the suspension of Kingfisher Airlines’ licence are likely to have their impact on the growth in the second half of the fiscal.
Quoting the data put out by the Airports Authority of India, the report said air traffic growth in April-September period reflected a 1.8% fall at 77 million passengers compared with 78.4 million passengers handled by the country’s airports in the same period a year ago. CMIE attributed this
Be the first to comment. | <urn:uuid:5a12dbf1-e6e0-45a2-b3a9-e605cf31cf74> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.financialexpress.com/news/air-traffic-growth-may-shrink-by-2.5-in-201213/1052166 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948915 | 324 | 1.5625 | 2 |
Chia seed pudding is a delicious, quick and healthy raw food recipe. Made with wild or organic chia seed it is a powerful superfood.
The tiny seeds have been used since 3500 BC and were one of the most important crops for the Aztecs. These ancient people prized them so highly that it was often used as currency. Their warriors could run a whole day on just a handful.
Chia seed - also called salba when they are white - has extraordinary nutritious power. Dr. Oz said: "These things may be the best food around." And according to one manufacturer chia/salba seeds contain (gram for gram):
But maybe most important, chia seeds form a gelatinous layer inside your intestines that is a preferred home for probiotics and other beneficial bacteria.Therefore it is excellent food for people with intestinal problems such as crohn's disease or irritable bowl syndrome. It is also perfect for babies and children as it creates a optimum start for their internal environment.
Chia seeds look like poppy seeds. They have a neutral, mild taste. Just like flax seeds, they become jelly like when you soak them for 30 min or more.
You can eat them as a pudding or add some to your smoothie. (My kids prefer them over flax seed in smoothies because the flavor is more neutral.)
You buy organic chia seed in most health food stores and online. They cost about 15 USD a pound. (Salba seeds a little more. Some claim salba seeds are better than chia seeds, but I haven't found any proof on that).
Below you'll find a simple and easy raw food recipe: chia seed pudding
2 tbs Chia or Salba seeds
1 cup filtered water
1/3 tsp raw vanilla powder or few drops extract
1 tbs goji berries (or other dried fruit)
2-4 drops liquid Stevia
This content on your website or in your E-zine? You can, as long as you include this: "Esme Stevens is the president of Raw Food Europe and has the number 1 website for starters of a raw food diet: thebestofrawfood.com." | <urn:uuid:d116c12b-49e1-4a18-a0a8-b4297d3dedb5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thebestofrawfood.com/raw-food-recipe-chia.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950467 | 452 | 1.820313 | 2 |
April 8, 2011 at 01:43pm
March 17, 2011 – Thursday
WORD FOR THE DAY "Erin" (n.) (AIR-en) – 1) “Ireland;” 2. “peaceful.” It’s origin is Gaelic. Example: The Erin I know is named after two islands – the “Emerald Isle” of Ireland and Belle Ile (Brittany), just off the coast of France, which means “beautiful island.”
ERIN. What’s in the name?
The Erin I know is named after two islands – the “Emerald Isle” of Ireland and Belle Isle, just off the coast of France, which means “beautiful island.” This wasn’t planned by her parents; it’s just a coincidence. “Erin” also means “peaceful.” However, it’s a stretch to look at any teenage girl and have the expectation of peacefulness. She is a mixed bag of potential and preciousness and pluck!
In some respect, this precocious 14-year-old is an “island” unto herself. As a young teen, she’s sometimes introspective and quiet. (Adults may call it “moody” or “hormonal.”) However, it’s very normal for a girl to look at herself in light of her transition from child to young adulthood. As an observer and, if she lets me, a participator in her development, I often wonder what’s percolating behind those beautiful eyes with the long, full (“to-die-for”) eyelashes. How is she doing in high school? Does she have a special friendship? Are the young men responding to her? How are the grades? Where does she want to be in five years?
(Really, how DOES one strike that delicate balance between support and pressure, love and nagging, advice and a big turn-off?)
She has aspirations of becoming a nurse, but she could easily be a drummer in a band, she’s that quick with rhythms. She has an athletic, petite dancer’s body, and now, after resisting efforts by adults to keep her in dance lessons, she wants to learn ... (Hurray! It’s not too late.) There’s a big difference when it’s her decision. If she puts her mind to a task, she’s committed. (Independently, she’ll get to the exercise room and run on the treadmill, or she’ll make sure she completes her hundred sit-ups each night.) Supported by adult encouragement, she’s improved her grades, knowing Math and Science are important for a career. But, she’s also still a kid, thinking up inside jokes with her best buddies, defying teachers if she feels "disrespected", and refusing to eat the vegetables on her plate, even tho’ she knows they’re good for her.
She’s a social gadfly, flitting around between her texting, Facebook visiting, IPod listening, and her friends. (Really. Is school supposed to be a place for learning?) Sometimes, it’s difficult to get her attention or for her to concentrate on what’s happening in the world around her. (I guess there’s a little more time before she needs to become so aware of the world’s issues, problems, and whether she’s be able to collect Social Security benefits when she’s 65!)
You know, I could go on with more of the wonders that describe my Erin, the girl with the two names, each meaning an island. Today, she is “green.” She is beautiful. She is an island, surrounded by turbulent waters, sometimes by tranquil. But, ALWAYS, she is surrounded by LOVE. And, isn’t that what gives real meaning to living?
Discover Ireland. Go to: http://www.discoverireland.com/ for photos of this green jewel.
Discover Belle Ile. Go to: http://www.belle-ile.com/ The website is all in French. However, click on “Venir” for a drop-down menu. Click on “Belle-ile” for a slide show of the sites. | <urn:uuid:f9db660c-fe70-485b-935b-769092b6c3a8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wordingforyou.com/Blog/WORD-FOR-THE-DAY--/ERIN-Whats-in-a-name/ | 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 | 0.959073 | 940 | 1.679688 | 2 |
Police Chief Greg Graham was talking this week about red-light enforcement cameras plus a mobile camera or two to catch speeders.
The cameras, ten or so, will be in place in Cedar Rapids by early summer.
The chief can go on about how he’s bringing the enforcement cameras to the city to reduce the number of crashes here.
He cites studies that show cities that use enforcement cameras can cut crashes by 20 percent. In 2008, he said the Cedar Rapids Police Department worked 5,000 crashes, taking up countless hours of police work. The number of hours worked on accidents far exceeds the number of hours the department is now devoting to patrolling neighborhoods, he said. And then there is all the gnarled metal; the motorist hospitalizations; the insurance claims.
Graham dismisses any suggestion that the cameras are all about revenue. Even so, the cameras are projected to bring $750,000 a year in ticket revenue into the department’s coffers. And that is just the department’s share. A private company will own the cameras, install them and maintain them and even collect the revenue.
It’s hard to imagine the cameras can generate that kind of revenue until Graham keeps talking.
Firstly, the chief, who came to Cedar Rapids from Ocala, Fla., last June, says people run a lot of red lights in Cedar Rapids. In fact, Graham, who always wears his police uniform, has handed out red-light tickets to people himself.
Secondly, Graham hinted that an individual ticket might cost some money because the vendor’s fee may be added to the ticket amount not included in it.
And thirdly, he suggested that a mobile camera designed to catch speeders might work spots on Interstate 380, including the curves through the downtown. It sounded like a revenue gold mine.
Graham challenged residents to prove him wrong so the Police Department gets no revenue from the cameras.
“How great would that be?” he said. | <urn:uuid:890d1ace-8849-43d8-9959-82bc723c5e9c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://rickmsmith.wordpress.com/2009/04/10/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960147 | 410 | 1.515625 | 2 |
Dennis Doyle, director of the county planning board, introduced the organizational meeting, explaining that the Main Street Project began about four years ago, with partial funding from the Catskill Watershed Corporation. The project is designed to help Ulster County communities, as well as the Route 28 corridor, find ways to attract business and compete successfully to improve local economic conditions. The process has already begun in Pine Hill and in Shokan, where committees have been formed to propose and implement town projects. Doyle said the county can help communities find funding to get their projects going, although once underway, local entities are expected to keep going under their own steam.
The board’s deputy director, Jennifer Schwartz Berky, then took over, commenting that the attendance was the largest she’s seen yet at a Main Street meeting. In addition to many hamlet business owners, attendees included representatives of the Phoenicia Library, Phoenicia Rotary, Shandaken Theatrical Society, Shandaken town board and planning board, and other local organizations.
The process begins, she explained, with assessing the community’s internal strengths and weaknesses as well as external opportunities and threats. One of the goals is for participants to agree on an image for the community that can be used to “sell” it to potential customers.
“We need a Main Street business plan,” Berky stated. “We’re competing as a community with things that are far away — a mall or big box store. We have to think of how we can do it as a group.”
Doyle received mostly blank looks when he asked whether local businesspeople had made any efforts to link up through Facebook pages or had embarked on joint advertising ventures. Later, however, Michael Mills of the Shandaken Theatrical Society said his group had raised $18,000 through a combination of direct appeals and a Facebook page, and he invited other businesses to link to the page, a possible source of hits for their sites.
Consultant Peter Fairweather presented data that he said could help Main Street businesses make decisions through identification of markets within 15, 30, and 70 minutes of the hamlet. Data provided by Esri, a California research and mapping firm, identifies four consumer profiles that fit the Phoenicia market, such as “rural resort dwellers” and “cozy and comfortable.”
“They prefer modest living, have simple tastes, are interested in home remodeling and improvement, cooking and canning, and they participate in community activities,” said Fairweather. “This is a picture of a customer. But is this accurate? We can provide data that helps with the planning process, but you bring a richer information source, because you live and work in the hamlet every day.”
He pointed out that nearby communities may have different customer profiles. Boiceville, for example, has many “prosperous empty nesters.”
“They put a high value on physical and mental well-being, on their investments,” he said. “Each geography has a different set of opportunities, and there are 150 different categories.”
Tommy Rinaldi of Flying Cat Music pointed out that knowing the profiles of tourists coming to the community might also useful, and Fairweather said that information could be provided. He said the data show that “‘cultural heritage’ tourists do most of their vacation planning once they get there. They show up and look for things to do. To take advantage of that, you must have an information center or train customer service people to answer questions, have an events calendar by the cash register.”
Berky said the planners would be conducting local business surveys to supplement the Esri data.
Brian Powers, former Phoenicia Times publisher, asked the presenters to define the county’s role in the revitalization process. Doyle replied, “We think our role is technical assistance, bringing data to the table that you haven’t seen before. We’ll give you a commonality for discussion.” He said the data could help businesses obtain loans, and the county could open discussions with the Ulster County Development Corporation on funding such efforts as infrastructure upgrades that might support town business.
Powers and David Pillard of Tender Land Home revisited the 1999 visioning process, which resulted in the construction of the Tanbark Trail on Tremper Mountain, planting of flowers at the entrance to town, and purchase of tubs for flowers on Main Street, later successfully maintained by Phriends of Phoenicia. A more ambitious project, creation of a Riverwalk along the Esopus, never obtained adequate funding, although a design was made. A town logo contest resulted in a design that was adopted, but the printing of banners to display it was never funded. However, Bob Kalb of the Rotary said later that his organization is currently engaged in printing town banners.
Tom Fraser of the Phoenicia Belle asked whether it might be time to revive the Phoenicia Business Association, which was responsible for erecting the decorative sign at the town entrance but declined around the same time as the visioning project lost steam. Michael Kroger of Mama’s Boy Market said he had recently put out feelers with the goal of starting such a group, and Berky said she would disseminate his information to those who signed up with the Main Street project.
One participant expressed worry about the strife than can arise in such community decision-making processes. “Strife is not bad,” responded Fairweather. “It means people are invested. It can be messy, but it’s good for progress.”
Berky said the county will work with the Phoenicia group for a year. She is seeking a core group of eight people to put in about five hours a week. Much of the work can be done over the Internet, using online learning software supplied by SUNY Ulster to provide information and facilitate online discussion. She encouraged anyone interested in participating, either as a core member or at a more casual level, to sign up at ulstermainstreets.ning.com. She will put information on the website for participants to download and read before the next meeting, which will take place in early January. Future meetings will occur about every six weeks. ++ | <urn:uuid:bfa57819-40d6-41fb-b6d5-0e84741fb480> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ulsterpublishing.com/view/full_story/10364343/article--Revitalizing-Phoenicia-Tools-are-defined-at-visioning-session- | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967469 | 1,318 | 1.726563 | 2 |
New Delhi, Dec. 28 -- The work to lower the road below the 18th century Tripolia Gateways in north Delhi, which began recently after much delay, is being carried out in clear violation of a three-year-old Delhi High Court order, posing a danger to the monument. Using JCB machine, digging has been done right up to the wall and the foundation of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI)-protected monument. Marks of the JCB machine gnawing the corners of the gateway are fresh.
Disposing off a petition by the Maharana Pratap Bagh residents welfare association (RWA), the Delhi High Court had in November 2009 said: "All construction work to be carried out in terms of the proposal (lowering of the road) will be carried out by the MCD under the supervision of the ASI. A distance of at least three metres will be maintained between any proposed construction/excavation, so as to avoid any damage/danger to the monument in question."
When HT visited the site on Thursday, the machine was digging out earth near the monument. While soil below two of the three arches was pulled out, work was on for the third (central) arch.
The North Delhi Municipal Corporation is carrying out the work under the supervision of the ASI. "In clear violation of court orders, they are using JCB machine right up to the monument's wall. If the levelling is not aligned properly with the deep drainage system beside it, water logging below the monument will damage it," said Anil Chandi, RWA's general secretary.
While civic officials were unavailable for comments, ASI sources said they were getting reports of the work from the conservation assistant. "When we came to know that the foundation of the monument was exposed, we asked the digging near it to be stopped," said DN Dimri, ASI's Delhi circle chief.
Asked why despite the court order JCB machine was taken near the monument, Dimri said, "Civic officials informed us that it was manually impossible to remove layers of road and concrete below the arches."
Published by HT Syndication with permission from Hindustan Times. | <urn:uuid:9538523a-33d5-42c9-a279-6c3501e75964> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://cricket.yahoo.com/news/tripolia-gateways-violates-high-court-order-183000079.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963656 | 448 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Posts Tagged ‘wholesale prices’
The producer price index, which measures price changes before they reach the consumer, fell 0.7 percent in April from March, the Labor Department said.
The producer price index fell 0.6 percent last month compared with February, the Labor Department said Friday.
The producer price index grew a seasonally adjusted 0.7 percent in February from January, the Labor Department said Thursday, up 0.2 percent from the prior month.
by The Associated Press Published: July 13, 2012
Tags: consumer spending, Economy, employment, energy prices, Federal Reserve, food, gas prices, inflation, jobs, pickup trucks, Price index, The Labor Department, unemployment, wholesale prices
U.S. wholesale prices rose only slightly last month, as higher costs for food and pickup trucks offset another drop in energy prices. But overall inflation stayed mild, leaving the Federal Reserve room to take steps to boost the economy. The Labor Department said Friday that the producer price index increased 0.1 percent in June from [...]
Wholesale prices in December posted their biggest increase in nearly a year, lifted by more expensive energy and food costs. But most other prices were largely well behaved, suggesting inflation isn’t spreading through the economy. The Producer Price Index, which measures price changes before they reach consumers, rose 1.1 percent in December, the Labor Department [...]
Wholesale prices rose last month for the first time since March on higher costs for food, autos and pickup trucks. Still, the increases were modest and show that the weak economy isn’t spurring widespread price rises. The Labor Department said Tuesday that the Producer Price Index, which measures price changes before they reach the consumer, [...]
Prices at the wholesale level plunged in February by the largest amount in seven months as a big drop in energy prices offset higher food costs. The Labor Department said Wednesday that wholesale inflation dropped 0.6 percent in February, much larger than the 0.2 percent decline economists had expected. Excluding food and energy, prices edged [...]
Wholesale prices dropped sharply in July, and over the past 12 months fell by the largest amount in more than six decades of record-keeping. The Labor Department said Tuesday that wholesale prices dropped 0.9 percent last month. That’s triple the decline economists had expected and was driven by big decreases in both energy and food [...]
Higher energy prices rippled through the economy in June, helping to drive a bigger-than-expected gain in retail sales. The sharp rise in wholesale prices — as well as “core” prices that exclude food and energy — could fan investors’ fears about inflation. Economists viewed the energy cost hikes as temporary and not the beginning of [...]
Wholesale prices dropped sharply last month as the cost of food, gasoline and home heating oil plummeted, fresh evidence that inflation appears to pose little immediate threat to the economy. The Labor Department said Tuesday the Producer Price Index, which measures price changes before they reach consumers, fell by 1.2 percent in March, compared to [...] | <urn:uuid:2484ba60-1aa5-474f-992c-7daf855d6788> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://libn.com/tag/wholesale-prices/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964372 | 631 | 1.703125 | 2 |
David Irving protests to Jack Straw at any Attempt by the British Home Office to enforce Germany's Laws for the Suppression of Free Speech
December 22, 1997
The Rt. Hon. Jack Straw, PC, MP,
Straw and Mr Irving both attended the same
Brentwood, Essex, public school in the 1950s.
pending a full reply, however, Simon Watkins, head
of the "Organised and International Crime
Directorate," acknowledged receipt of both letters
on March 18, 1998); Straw has not replied as of the
end of 1998.
Mr Straw and Mr Irving both attended the same Brentwood, Essex, public school in the 1950s. pending a full reply, however, Simon Watkins, head of the "Organised and International Crime Directorate," acknowledged receipt of both letters on March 18, 1998); Straw has not replied as of the end of 1998.
London, December 22, 1997
THIS LETTER is a formal request that the Home Office will refuse, as it is entitled to (see below), and as the facts set out require it to, to tender mutual legal assistance to the German embassy or other authorities in the event that they renew their attempts to serve on me their purported indictment under German law for a historical lecture which I delivered in Weinheim, south-western Germany, in 1990. (The Germans have gone berserk, introducing various laws for the suppression of free speech, though under other guises, which your predecessor Mr Howard rightly refused to see introduced in the U.K. as being incompatible with our country's traditions; they appear however to be perfectly compatible with Germany's well-known past.)
It is plain from the internal papers of the German judiciary - documents passing between the court in Weinheim, the provincial Minister of Justice (ugh!) in Stuttgart and his political master in Bonn, the Federal Ministry of Justice (ugh! ugh!), that the Germans quite candidly regard this intended prosecution of myself as being of a political and not a criminal nature.
I am enclosing pages from the court file which make this plain. The first is a letter dated June 25, 1997, from the Court in Weinheim to the provincial Ministry of Justice in Stuttgart, expressing anxiety lest the British government detect the political nature of the legal action against me and accordingly decline to assist the German government under the Europe Community's convention on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters. The penultimate paragraph of this German court document reads in translation:-
"In view of the political background of the trial I request you to examine, and inform me, whether the co-operation of the British authorities is to be expected in serving the summons by the route of Mutual Legal Assistance."
Upon receiving this, the provincial ministry in Stuttgart wrote on July 14 to the Federal Ministry in Bonn, expressing the same fears; the last paragraph reads:-
"We request - as soon as possible, given the proximity of the court hearing date - a ruling on whether there are any misgivings from your ministry's view. We should moreover appreciate information whether on the basis of your own experience it is to be expected that the British authorities, should they be advised of the political nature of the misdemeanour, may decline to serve the summons."
Mr Straw, please take this letter as formally bringing to your notice the political nature of the alleged misdemeanour.
The significance is that the German authorities, in calling upon your good offices, are relying on the European Convention on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters, adhered to by Britain on November 27, 1991. This convention sets out under Article 2, that
"Assistance may be refused:
IT IS WORTH noting that the German Federal Intelligence Service (Bundesnachrichten-dienst) has secretly refused to get dragged into this dirty affair. I received from an anonymous friend a photocopy of a two-page letter, signed earlier this year by the head of the BND, protesting to the head of the German Federal Parliament's law reform committee, at the latter's attempts to involve him and the BND in the "notorious" David Irving affair. He protests that my person and the entire matter involving me are outside the remit of the BND, and the BND therefore asks to be kept out of it. The BND chief writes:-
"My personal appreciation is however, that not only would the facts which the BND may have garnered overseas, if they were to become public, inevitably do a disservice to the interests of the present Federal government, but they would actually seriously damage them."
The BND, to whom I of course supplied a copy of this document, have not denied its authenticity.
To summarise, I am being politically persecuted in Germany for my political beliefs as an historian, and not for criminal offences (and certainly not for any recognised as such under British law); I have no criminal record in Germany. I am enclosing with this letter a legal document issued by Germany's central criminal records office in Berlin, which formally certifies that there is no criminal conviction recorded against my name.
Under German law, it is not permitted to offer any defence to the allegations: the facts disputed have been declared offenkundig by their supreme court in Karlsruhe ("a matter of public knowledge," or roughly the equivalent of a court taking "judicial notice" of something) and no defence is permitted, either by witness statement or documentary evidence.
This is something which no British court would tolerate, and I hope that the Home Office will not oblige me to obtain an order of a High Court judge to back up the admittedly lay opinion that your Office must refuse to render any assistance to the Germans in their endeavours to suppress free speech, however camouflaged.
I am also advised that in the premises and under these circumstances should the Home Office or its servants or agents, including police officers, attempt to serve on me again the documents (or similar) which the German embassy has already requested you to serve, I would have grounds to claim substantial damages inter alia for trespass and assault.
Please inform me of your decision in this matter at your earliest convenience, as I shall have to instruct Counsel in good time in the event that your advisers - a Mr Simon Watkin is evidently the nigger in the woodpile - do not see things the same way as I do.
Buchladen | Auschwitz | Irving-Verzeichnis | -Hauptseite | -Bücher | Action Report | Weitere FP-Autoren | <urn:uuid:2fd63e5c-2359-47ba-aad1-ff8861bef525> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fpp.co.uk/Germany/docs/Straw221297.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959184 | 1,344 | 1.507813 | 2 |
In 2006, even though he could barely type, China's most famous artist started blogging. For more than three years, Ai Weiwei turned out a steady stream of scathing social commentary, criticism of government policy, thoughts on art and architecture, and autobiographical writings. He wrote about the Sichuan earthquake (and posted a list of the schoolchildren who died because of the government’s "tofu-dregs engineering"), reminisced about Andy Warhol and the East Village art scene, described the irony of being investigated for "fraud" by the Ministry of Public Security, made a modest proposal for tax collection. Then, on June 1, 2009, Chinese authorities shut down the blog. This book offers a collection of Ai's online writings translated into English--the most complete, public documentation of the original Chinese blog available in any language.
The New York Times has called Ai "a figure of Warholian celebrity." He is a leading figure on the international art scene, a regular in museums and biennials, but in China he is a manifold and controversial presence: artist, architect, curator, social critic, justice-seeker. He was a consultant on the design of the famous "Bird’s Nest" stadium but called for an Olympic boycott; he received a Chinese Contemporary Art "lifetime achievement award" in 2008 but was beaten by the police in connection with his "citizen investigation" of earthquake casualties in 2009. Ai Weiwei's Blog documents Ai's passion, his genius, his hubris, his righteous anger, and his vision for China.
About the Editor
Lee Ambrozy is the Editor of artforum.com.cn, Artforum's Chinese language website.
“In terms of illuminating the dynamics of protest in our understanding of one of global culture’s most percipient commentators, this text is highly recommended” —Alex Ross, THE
“This work is invaluable as a critical perspective and chronicle while also being an extraordinary contributor to...the contemporary Chinese political landscape.”—David Roberts, Building Design
"Blogging produces reality rather than simply representing it. Ai Weiwei is among our very best guides to this new terrain: one of the greatest living international artists and a fighter for more freedom. Ai Weiwei's daily blog entries, gathered here, will make the reader see the world in a different and startlingly original light."
Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Co-Director of Exhibitions and Programmes and Director of International Projects, Serpentine Gallery, London
"Ai Weiwei is a widely acclaimed artist, an innovative designer, an influential architect, a visionary urbanist, a competitive cook, and even a great hairdresser. He is also a compelling and disputatious writer who knows how to address and to rally a wide audience, voicing his own dissatisfaction, and that of his fellow countrymen, at being confronted on a daily basis with the alarming glibness of a rampant Chinese society and its disquieting political representation."
Chris Dercon, Director, Tate Modern
"The works and words of Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, who lived in New York during formative years of his artistic development, seem to arise not only from the venerable cultural traditions of his homeland but also from those commenced in colonial America with the 'Common Sense' political activism of Thomas Paine, further fused with the trickster antics of the Native American Coyote character and the lingering specter of Andy Warhol's media savvy. It remains to be seen what will become of this broadly transnational artist amidst the turbulent global culture of our time, but he is not easily ignored."
Jock Reynolds, Henry J. Heinz II Director, Yale University Art Gallery | <urn:uuid:31216180-1e37-4d66-9d68-3116b3ef787b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mitpress.mit.edu/books/ai-weiweis-blog | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953281 | 764 | 1.8125 | 2 |
So new research shows that spanking children doesn't work and can actually thwart long-term development.
Well that explains a lot. If by development they mean success and if by success they mean lots of money, then I'm still waiting for my three 7's to come up in the slot machine of life. If I understand this correctly, I'm cleaning out my garage of returnables for beer money because I was spanked as a child.
According to the researchers, the act of spanking makes the child feel resentful. Really? You think? When my mother pulled down my pants in public and swatted my bare butt, you're darn right I was resentful. That was the point. She wanted me to feel resentful so I wouldn't act like an idiot again.
Disciplining kids has been debated ever since cavemen boys played chicken with the neighborhood T-Rex. And if someone happened to get eaten, I can't imagine the punishment for the rest of the kids would be a time-out in the cave corner.
When I was a kid, the threat of punishment typically was enough to keep me in line. My mother's favorite line was pasek vi dupa, which to me translated into "run like hell." Because in English, it meant belt to butt.
One of my most frightening encounters with my mother was when I was about 5 years old and decided to walk home from the gas station where my dad was getting his oil changed. When I walked into the house, I could tell from the expression on my mother's face what would happen next.
So I did what any smart kid would do: I ran. But she caught my arm and held on. While we twirled in circles in the kitchen, she swung the other arm at my behind as the neighbor lady yelled at my mom to not hit me while I was screaming in fear and my mom was yelling at me for crossing the street by myself. It was chaos.
Naturally, that spanking taught me a good lesson: That the neighbor lady, who ended up being as close to me as a grandmother, was my protector. So anytime I got into trouble, she was my o-u-t. I simply fled to her house.
Did those spankings have a long-lasting effect on my life? You bet. I still have a fear of crossing streets.
Did I become more aggressive over time because I was physically punished? Please. Just ask my kids.
Sure, I spanked the boys when they were little. I think it was twice. And both times I had to stop before I was done administering the punishment because they couldn't stay still long enough to take their medicine since they were laughing so hard.
One time in particular, I got so mad because they wouldn't stop farting at the dinner table, which I didn't appreciate.
The yelling obviously didn't do any good because they just kept doing it and cracking up. Real funny.
Finally I blew up and started swinging, but the little buggers were quicker than me and it was chaos all over again as I yelled "pasek vi dupa!"
I really doubt those instances had any long-term effects on the boys. Unless they hurt themselves from laughing too hard.
You can reach Ray Kisonas at 242-1100, ext. 319, or by e-mail at firstname.lastname@example.org. | <urn:uuid:b80330b0-b70e-4394-a3eb-af298ec98edd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.monroenews.com/news/2012/feb/12/not-spared-and-definitely-not-spoiled-column/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.988747 | 704 | 1.75 | 2 |
Most Active Stories
Fri March 8, 2013
South Dakota Governor Signs Law Allowing Guns In Schools
South Dakota on Friday became what's "believed to be the first state to pass a law that specifically allows teachers to carry firearms," as The New York Times writes.
Gov. Dennis Daugaard (R) signed the "school sentinels" bill that gives districts the right to "create, establish, and supervise the arming of school employees, hired security personnel, or volunteers." In some other states, less specific provisions in current laws could give school employees the right to carry arms. As NBC News has reported, 18 states "allow adults to have a loaded gun on school grounds, usually as long as they have written permission."
South Dakota's Argus Leader writes the the law signed today was "hotly debated this legislative session ... it was pitched as a way for small schools without nearby law enforcement to protect themselves against shooters or other dangers."
The Rapid City Journal says the law has been enacted "despite opposition from the education community." Don Kirkegaard, superintendent of the Meade School District, tells the Journal that "I just wish ... everybody would have talked a little bit together before we started passing legislation."
The law's passage and signing follows, of course, the Dec. 14 school shooting in Newtown, Conn., that left 20 students and six educators dead.
Under the new law, before creating a sentinel program a school district must "obtain the approval of the law enforcement official who has jurisdiction over the school premises."
The law goes on to state that:
-- "Any person who acts as a school sentinel ... shall first successfully complete a school sentinel training course as defined by the Law Enforcement Officers Standards Commission."
-- Districts may not require any teacher or school employee to arm themselves, and "no individual teacher or other school employee may be censured, criticized, or discriminated against for unwillingness or refusal to carry firearms pursuant to this Act."
-- "The failure or refusal of any school board to implement a school sentinel program does not constitute a cause of action against the board, the school district, or any of its employees."
-- "A decision by a school board to implement a school sentinel program pursuant to section 1 of this Act may be referred to a vote of the qualified voters of the school district by the filing of a petition signed by five percent of the registered voters in the school district."
-- "Any person, other than a law enforcement officer or school sentinel acting pursuant to section 1 of this Act, who intentionally carries, has in his possession, stores, keeps, leaves, places, or puts into the possession of another person, any firearm, or air gun, whether or not the firearm or air gun is designed, adapted, used, or intended primarily for imitative or noisemaking purposes, or any dangerous weapon, on or in any elementary or secondary school premises, vehicle, or building or any premises, vehicle, or building used or leased for elementary or secondary school functions, whether or not any person is endangered by such actions, is guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor.
"This section does not apply to starting guns while in use at athletic events, firearms, or air guns at firing ranges, gun shows, and supervised schools or sessions for training in the use of firearms. This section does not apply to the ceremonial presence of unloaded weapons at color guard ceremonies."
We asked in December whether teachers who have "concealed weapons" permits should be allowed to have guns in schools. Nearly 58 percent of those who answered said yes; about 42 percent said no. | <urn:uuid:b2853d99-d42f-4d95-8317-3d1a64062123> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ketr.org/post/south-dakota-governor-signs-law-allowing-guns-schools | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958751 | 742 | 1.84375 | 2 |
USB 3.0 is being weaved into the marketplace one motherboard and notebook at a time. My last three motherboards have included at least two USB 3.0 ports and my new Lenovo mobile workstation also includes a single USB 3.0 port. Next year we should see the eradication of USB 2.0 all together; a move that I support not only because it will give me more products to write about, but because transferring data five times as fast saves everyone a lot of time.
At the same time USB 3.0 is gaining market share, solid state drives and their spin off products are being adapted by users for their superior reliability, speed and robust construction. Like USB 3.0, SSDs are superior to their predecessor technology by an order of magnitude.
OCZ Technology has taken both USB 3.0 and solid state to a new level by combining the two and delivered a product worthy of the SuperSpeed namesake. The OCZ Enyo is a sleek portable storage product that is small enough to hide in your shirt pocket, but is large enough to store up to 256GB of data, or the equivalent of 32 full on DVD rips.
Let's take a look at the OCZ Enyo and see how OCZ successfully merged two emerging technologies to make one super storage product that can change the way you access your data.
Specifications, Pricing and Availability
It might not look like it, but there is actually quite a lot to talk about on the graph above. OCZ has three models on the market at the time of writing; 64, 128 and 256GB. All three use the same configuration; an Indilinx controller, 64mb cache module and sixteen flash modules. Indilinx was able to squeeze more performance out of their larger drives, so we see the 128 and 256GB drives reading at 260MB/s and writing data at 200MB/s. The 64GB model reads at 225MB/s and writes at 135MB/s peak with a sustained of up to 40MB/s. These numbers look nearly identical to the SATA II drives we tested all last year with the Indilinx Barefoot controller.
You may notice that OCZ is making some specific motherboard recommendations in their spec sheet. Later in this article you will see why. Let's come back to that one and talk about the GIGABYTE USB 3.0 logo and work our way back. GIGABYTE isn't the God Father of USB 3.0, but it is the hit man that fired the machine gun that started the assault on USB 2.0. GIGABYTE has done everything humanly possible to get USB 3.0 in your hands just short of coming to your house and swapping your motherboard for you. Every motherboard GIGABYTE now sells includes USB 3.0; this is a top down strategy that leads all the way to the sub 100 Dollar products.
If you are not aware, USB 3.0 is currently implemented by an NEC USB 3.0 to PCIe chip, but many motherboards run short on the number of PCIe lanes available. That means some motherboards are getting USB 3.0, but may not be getting the number of PCIe lanes sent to the NEC USB 3.0 bridge chip to achieve maximum performance. Our GIGABYTE X58A-UD7 is limited to around 200MB/s, a number just short of OCZ's 260MB/s and the reason why OCZ choose to make the disclaimer about performance.
When it comes to pricing and availability, we were able to find the OCZ Enyo 64GB drive at Newegg for 179, the 128GB drive that we are reviewing here today for 285 and the massive 256GB drive for 696 USD. The cost may appear high, but once you start to consider the research and development costs, the lack of competing products on the market and quality of craftsmanship, the numbers start to come full circle.
Let's take a look at the OCZ Enyo and see if the dollars involved make sense for you to upgrade your portable storage.
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Further Reading: Read and find more Storage content at our Storage reviews, guides and articles index page.
Do you get our RSS feed? Get It! | <urn:uuid:1e3d17a3-ba24-492c-a982-f6e2e624bb9e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/3525/ocz_enyo_128gb_usb_3_0_external_solid_state_drive/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946515 | 876 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Come, Holy Spirit. We say these words during communion. Make us one body. Give us one heart. Teach us to love.
Come, Holy Spirit. Weekly, we gather together and pray for God’s guidance and that God’s will might be done on earth as it is in Heaven.
Come, Holy Spirit. We celebrate when we baptize another person into the family of God and pray that the Holy Spirit will lead him/her into knowledge and faith, fear of the Lord, and wisdom and understanding.
Come, Holy Spirit. Do we really know what we are getting into when seek to be filled with the Holy Spirit?
In Annie Dillard’s book Teaching a Stone to Talk she writes this, “On the whole, I do not find Christians…sufficiently sensible of conditions. Does anyone have the foggiest idea what sort of power we so blithely invoke? Or, as I suspect, does no one believe a word of it? The churches are children playing on the floor with their chemistry sets, mixing up a batch of TNT to kill a Sunday morning. It is madness to wear ladies’ straw hats and velvet hats to church; we should all be wearing crash helmets. Ushers should issue life preservers and signal flares; they should lash us to our pews. For the sleeping god may wake someday and take offense, or the waking god may draw us out to where we can never return.”
Come, Holy Spirit.
The work of the Holy Spirit does not fit into a tiny, neat, well-organized file marked, “Plans of the Holy Spirit.” In fact, we find that there are disagreements about what the work of the Spirit even looks like, at times. Not only can it seem confusing, it can be downright upsetting.
I learned a lot about the Holy Spirit while in seminary. I remember several conversations in seminary as we tried to understand how we were going to be assigned to synods to find jobs. We kept hearing that it was best to trust the work of the Spirit and that we would be assigned where we needed to be assigned. Right. More than one comment was heard about the work of the Spirit versus the work of the Bishops. What exactly does the work of the Spirit look like?
Our denomination has come through a rough couple of years and we may not be completely through with the conflict. Biblical interpretation has been seen in multiple ways. Assemblies of believers have gathered to talk and make decisions, and the prayer of those gathered was that all might hear the voice of the Spirit. So at the end of the day, we have this group that hears the Spirit speaking this way, and that group that hears the Spirit speaking that way… What does the voice of the Spirit sound like?
There is a man with whom I attended seminary. He is well thought of by many, many people, but we, he and I, were not friends. I can not speak for him, but for my part, I often went out of my way to avoid him. I have a feeling he felt the same way about me. In my entire time of seminary study, I never doubted that I was on the right track until I met him. And after being in classes with this man for over a year, I finally asked God, “How can we both be hearing the voice of your Spirit calling us to serve your church? There is either something wrong with his hearing or with mine because I am pretty sure that there is not room in your church for the both of us.” How can we be sure of what the Spirit is calling us to?
Come, Holy Spirit?
It is not a new thing, to have different experiences of the same Spirit. Today, we read in Scripture, two very different experiences of the Holy Spirit. In Acts 2 there is the chaotic excitement of a large group of people speaking in many different languages all at once and everyone being able to understand each other. Peter is inspired to preach—now I realize that may not sound that exciting to you who are veteran sermon listeners, but if you have ever had to write one, you would know how exciting it is when the Spirit inspires you, especially at 9 pm on a Saturday night!! Later on in this chapter we read that over 3,000 people were moved to conversion by the power of the Holy Spirit. Amazing!! Then we pop over to John 20. The Spirit comes quietly with words of comfort to people who are afraid; with peace from a friend who once was dead. In one story, the Spirit is bold and mighty and awesome in power. In the other it is calm and quiet, bringing a small group of people closer together.
Come, Holy Spirit!
Last week was the Sunday of the Ascension. I love medieval paintings of this event. It was the tradition of the medieval era to paint this event with just the feet of Jesus showing from a cloud. All you can see are the feet of Jesus hanging in the air and gathered around on the ground are the disciples. I find these pictures adorable--probably not what the artists were going for, but adorable, nonetheless. What I love most about these pictures are the faces of the disciples. Sometimes there are disciples who are gazing calmly and saint-like towards the heavens; smiles on their faces and confidence in their eyes. But my favorite disciples are the ones looking up at Jesus' toes with worry and confusion as Jesus disappears into a cloud. Huh? You’re leaving? You just got back! What do we do now?
Today is supposed to be the answer to that question. Today we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit given to us to guide and direct, to inspire and instruct us. Four weeks ago I attended a preaching convention. There were over 2,000 preachers from 37 different countries and many different denominations. It was a wonderful time of learning and inspiration. But I realized that we in the Church, are still wandering around looking up in confusion and worry wondering "What do we do now?"
The Spirit is supposed to guide and direct us? Well, we seem to be going all different directions. Did we take a wrong turn and the heavenly GPS failed to recalculate? The Spirit is supposed to inspire us? How come the same 20% of the people are still doing 95% of the work? The Spirit is supposed to instruct us? Why don’t we all get the same set of instructions?
Come, Holy Spirit.
There is more to this Holy Spirit than we often want to give credit. At Pentecost we are reminded that we are part of a reality that is much bigger than our own. The Spirit of God is beyond our imagining and yet we are constantly trying to fit her into that neat little file marked “Plans of the Holy Spirit.” Today we are reminded that, in the words of Annie Dillard, we have no idea the kind of power we are trying to invoke. We are talking about the Spirit of God. Not the spirit of our own understanding and personal agendas but the Spirit that moved over the waters at Creation, that rested on the prophet Isaiah when he said, “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me…he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to the prisoners.” It is the Spirit that calls each of us to ministry in different ways. The Spirit calls us all and it takes a mighty Spirit to call us…we who argue about scriptural interpretation, we who wonder about what God is doing in the Church, we who are asked to leave behind what we know and love so that we might start on a journey that will change our lives and bless the world.
Come, Holy Spirit!
Pastor Charlane Lines
418 W. Main St.
Sidney, MT 59270 | <urn:uuid:d565749f-dbfe-42bd-a69e-790d854777ee> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pellachurch.net/sermons/2011%20Sermons/6-12-2011.htm | 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 | 0.972199 | 1,631 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Arctic Research Federal Funding Update for FY 2012
Witness the Arctic provides information on current arctic research efforts and findings, significant research initiatives, national policy affecting arctic research, international activities, and profiles of institutions with major arctic research efforts. Witness serves an audience of arctic scientists, educators, agency personnel, and policy makers. Witness was published biannually in hardcopy from 1995-2008 (archives are available below) and is currently published online 3-4 times annually, depending on newsworthy events.
With the Spring 2009 issue, ARCUS changed the format of Witness the Arctic. To provide more frequent updates and reduce printing and mailing costs and associated environmental impacts, the newsletter is now distributed online in three or four shorter issues per year, depending on newsworthy events.
The Obama Administration's fiscal year (FY) 2012 budget request, released on 14 February 2011, would provide $7.8 billion for NSF, an increase of 13% above the 2010 enacted level. This request includes $477.41 million for NSF's Office of Polar Programs and $112.94 million for the Arctic Sciences Division, 5.8% and 6.2% increases respectively over the level enacted for FY 2010. (Note: a full-year continuing appropriations act, enacted on 15 April 2011, funded NSF at $6.8 billion for FY 2011, a 1.5% reduction from the FY 2010 enacted spending level. FY 2011 ended on 30 September 2011.)
The President's proposed budget for NSF's Division of Arctic Sciences would include funds for the new Discovery and Understanding in Polar Oceans program; the NSF-wide Science, Engineering, and Education for Sustainability (SEES) activities; and the NSF-wide Cyber-Infrastructure Framework for the 21st Century (CIF21) initiative. Also included are investments to enhance the efficiency, safety, and environmental footprint of activities at Summit Station in Greenland.
The polar icebreaking program operates under the Department of Homeland Security. The President's FY 2012 budget includes $39 million to support operation and maintenance of the Coast Guard Cutter (CGC) Healy and to prepare for the operational reactivation of CGC Polar Star. The Coast Guard plans to decommission CGC Polar Sea in FY2011 and transition her crew to the Polar Star facilitating her return to operations in FY 2013.
On 6 September 2011 the Senate Committee on Appropriations forwarded to the Senate floor their FY 2012 appropriations bill for the Department of Homeland Security, which includes $39 million for the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker program. On 15 September 2011 the same committee passed a recommendation to fund NSF with $6.698 billion, approximately $162 million less than the level enacted for FY 2011 and $1.069 billion below the Administration's budget request.
In June 2011 the House of Representatives approved its appropriations committee's FY 2012 Homeland Security bill, which included $39 million for the Coast Guard's polar operations. In July 2011 the same committee recommended funding NSF at approximately the same level as enacted for FY 2011. The report's authors noted, "Compared to the amount requested by NSF for FY 2012, the funding level in the bill would lead to 2,200 fewer NSF grants and 26,000 fewer graduate students, undergraduate students, and teachers supported."
On 4 October 2011 Congress passed a second continuing appropriations act to keep government operations funded at FY 2011 levels until 18 November 2011 while it completes action on all appropriation bills for FY 2012. As of 3 November 2011, the Senate committee has completed work on 11 of the 12 bills required to fund federal agencies during FY 2012 and the House of Representatives had completed work on 9 of the 12 appropriation bills, recommending them for further action.
For more information, see the NSF Budget Division website: www.nsf.gov/about/budget. | <urn:uuid:0bf23e74-ff21-418d-9ed2-94df698988c4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.arcus.org/witness-the-arctic/2011/3/article/1770 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93431 | 781 | 1.710938 | 2 |
World leaders tackled the bloody 18-month crisis in Syria on Wednesday. Chinese and U.S. diplomats met, Turkey's prime minister spoke and Egypt's president said, "It's time for a change."
Here are the latest developments:
Clinton, Chinese foreign minister discuss Syria
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi huddled over what Clinton called "the evolving situation in Syria" and urged support for "transition" in that country.
"With respect to Syria, it is no secret that we have been disappointed by Russia and China's actions blocking tougher U.N. Security Council resolutions, and we hope to continue to unite behind a real path forward to end the violence in Syria," Clinton said at a joint news conference with Yang in Beijing.
The secretary of state stopped in China during a visit to Asia.
The United States believes in a "peaceful political transition" in a Syria currently ruled by Bashar al-Assad's regime and wants to work for that goal with China and other nations, Clinton said.
"We haven't agreed on how to handle Syria, but we haven't stopped talking about what should be done, because the violence continues," she said.
Yang called the situation complex.
He stressed China's neutrality and said, "Any solution should come from the people of Syria and reflect their wishes. It should not be imposed from outside."
"China has been emphasizing all along that the various parties should arrive at a cessation of fire and an end to violence, and the various parties in Syria should begin a political dialogue. And like many countries, we support a period of political transition in Syria."
Egyptian leader says it's time for a change
Egyptian President Mohamed Morsy called for a transitional phase in Syria and for al-Assad to leave power.
"The Syrian people made their decision, and it is time for change. Let the Syrian leadership learn from the recent lessons of history. Change is due, now," he said.
Morsy made the comments while addressing a meeting of Arab League foreign ministers in Cairo.
Morsy's support of the Syrian opposition reflects his solidarity with the people who took to the streets during the Arab Spring, the popular label for the democratic movements that swept across the Middle East and North Africa last year.
Turkey: "Pre-election situation" may be impeding U.S. initiative
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the United States might be holding back on stronger action against Syria because of this year's presidential elections.
"Maybe it's because of the elections -- maybe it's because of the pre-election situation in the States. Might be the root cause of the lacking of initiative," he told CNN's Christiane Amanpour. "Nobody has spoken to us about their reasons, and they are not obliged to state anything. We are very thankful and pleased they have stated that they're against this regime."
Erdogan has called on the U.N. Security Council to declare a no-fly zone along the Turkey-Syria border, but the council is frequently divided between the interests of Western countries and Russia and China.
Dozens killed in Syria's largest city
The battle for Aleppo raged, with at least 115 people killed there, opposition activists said.
The fatalities are among at least 258 people killed across the country, the Local Coordination Committees of Syria said.
Elsewhere, shelling killed three children in Homs and a sniper shot dead a teenager in Deir Ezzor. Shelling, blasts and gunfire also rang out in Damascus and its suburbs.
Regime forces and the rebel Free Syrian Army battled in Deir Ezzor and the Damascus suburbs, the LCC said. | <urn:uuid:87d7ddb6-4593-451f-8e40-b6955427f848> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ksat.com/news/Syrian-civil-war-rages-as-diplomats-meet/-/478452/16486476/-/absvqn/-/index.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 | 0.969649 | 763 | 1.789063 | 2 |
MORGANTOWN (AP) - The regional grid operator for West Virginia and 12 other states says there may no longer be a need for the Potomac-Appalachian Transmission Highline.
The State Journal (http://bit.ly/N5Hmmr) says analyses by PJM Interconnection may not support construction of the $2 billion transmission line from West Virginia to Maryland.
PATH was proposed in 2007 to address predicted problems with grid reliability but was suspended last year. PJM spokesman Ray Dotter says testing no longer shows voltage flow problems in the mid-Atlantic.
Other conditions have changed, too. The economy has slowed, and more generation has become available. More large users have also committed to curtailing power use during peak periods.
Dotter says planning staff will make recommendations to the board that will decide whether PATH continues. A decision should come this fall. | <urn:uuid:624040d0-489d-4d71-b642-9ce88d024d84> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.journal-news.net/page/content.detail/id/581713/New-analyses-show-PATH-project-may-not-be-needed.html?nav=5222 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937803 | 183 | 1.515625 | 2 |
|Fr. Jaroslav Nicola von Lobkowicz , LC|
“Before having formed you in the womb I knew
you, and before you were born I consecrated you: I
made you a prophet to the nations” (Jer. 1:1-5).
born in Paris on the 15th of July of 1974,
of a French mother and a Czech Father. My Father
was a political refugee; he had fled from the communist
regime of Czechoslovakia and had gone to Germany, where he
was taken in by his parents. My mom, a student
in Paris, was a good friend of my dad’s cousin.
They met in Munich (West Germany) and, when they finished
their studies, they got married and stayed to live there.
were the only family that went to Mass…
I have a
brother who is one year older than me and another
who is seven years younger. We lived our childhood and
youth in a small flat in the middle of the
city, surrounded by Turkish and Italian neighbors. We were the
only family that went to Mass every Sunday, which provoked
surprise among our Muslim and non-practicing Christian neighbors. My mother
supported various families of the workers that didn’t know German,
helping them with their bureaucratic procedures, such as the inscription
of their children in schools, declarations before the authorities, etc.
She helped them a little as well paying for their
children’s education and, thanks to that, some of them were
able to go to college.
My schooling began with French
kindergarten in Munich, followed by primary school which lasted for
four years. After failing the entrance into the German Lyceum
(Gymnasium) I inscribed into the European Lyceum in the French
section, in which I stayed almost two years and a
half. I tried again and was admitted into the Dante
Outside of the classical school curriculum as boys we sang
in the choir of the state theater. Being in theatrical
representations and earning a little money motivated us. The other
side of the coin was that we had to spend
various weekends trying out opera, which awoke my liking for
We brought them the basic needs.
our Christmas and Easter vacations in Czechoslovakia and in France
visiting our relatives. We brought the basic necessities that our
relatives were lacking while retained in a communist country: salads,
fruit, and soups. The atmosphere of religious persecution was always
apparent. My cousins in school were looked down upon for
going to Mass and some of my uncles were suffering
humiliations in their work for being Catholics. At the same
time, in the middle of it all, I saw among
the families of Czechoslovakia, a lot of joy and an
example of living faith and trust in God. An aunt
of my father was a “clandestine” religious and this “crime”
costed her12 years in jail and forced labor. The uncle
of my father was a priest working in rural parishes
of the country, in those that had only a few
faithful. Every three years they would change places since they
were used to being visited by “parishioners” (that is government
agents) who would ask indiscreet questions. My father’s brother, Franti¹ek,
obtained state permission to enter the seminary and he exercised
his ministry in circumstances similar to his uncle’s. Another of
my dad’s brothers, Zdeòek, remained celibate, while his two sisters
got married. With the fall of the totalitarian regime in
1989, to the surprise of all of us, Zdeòek was
ordained a priest. He had been a clandestined seminarian. A
little later Franti¹ek was consecrated a bishop.
|Fr Jaroslav greeting the Holy Father during the Ad Limina Apostolorum visit of Czech bishops in 2005. The group of bishops included his uncle, the bishop of Ostrava.|
In France, on the
other hand, we observed a process of very subtle dechristianization,
a “silent apostasy”- as some have called it- with vestiges
of democracy and tolerance and with the banner of relativism.
We, who knew up close the reality of a country
that denied God, were seeking to live our faith in
the midst of this adverse atmosphere. Our participation in the
Catholic movement of the Boy Scouts, who were very zealous
in this country, helped us a lot. Here we learned
to speed sail in the bays of the Atlantic Coast.
The boats were given to us by the National Marina.
There were two uncovered ships with masts; the captain of
our group was a seminarian and he also taught us
how to pray.
My Heart Burned
In the years of my
adolescence, at times it was tough to be the only
practicing Christian in my class and in that school of
950 students. Sometimes they went after me with “intolerant” because
I wanted to remain faithful to the teaching of the
Pope: to many it appeared that the Pope was preaching
an irrational morality and that it was also the principal
cause of the demographic explosion.
Thanks be to God I had
a great spiritual sensitivity, and the testimonies of many saintly
priests and religious that I knew, or the stories that
I read really impressed me. I had a habit of
dedicating a moment each night to talk to God, using
the traditional prayers and also in a more free form,
as our mother had taught us. When I was 16,
in a time of prayer on a very ordinary day,
an idea, a conviction, an irresistible yearning hit me in
my inner self: the love of Jesus Christ crucified. I
arose, I went to the oratory of the room and
I took the crucifix to adore the Lord: I understood
that Christ loved me personally, so much that he had
given his life for me and for all men. My
heart burned; that experience surpassed the emotive realm and touched
my entire being.
In my last year in preparatory school one
day in the house there was a curious phone call
and I was the one who picked up the phone.
It was a certain Father Kelly from the Legionaries of
Christ. I had never heard the name, and when he
said that Brother Paul Habsburg, one of my older brother’s
classmates, had entered the novitiate, I asked myself into what
sect the poor man had fallen into.
“Are you a
Catholic?” I asked Father Kelly.
“Of course”, he answered, “We
are recognized by the Pope and we have the special
mission of promoting his doctrine.” This answer took away all
suspicion and we invited him to dinner in our house.
His visit was a revelation. For my mother and brothers
and for me, his example of faith and dynamism aroused
a great enthusiasm. My father’s reaction was not so enthusiastic.
friend recommended that I visit the novitiate.
A friend had
recommended that I visit the novitiate and so I met
the Legionary communit for the first time. The atmosphere of
prayer, joy, seriousness and charity, with which I could identify
from the start, made a deep impression on me. And
as well I began to realize that having a Legionary
vocation was a real possibility for me and probably God’s
will, even though I was not yet ready to leave
After getting the diploma, I began studying to be
a civil engineer, with the desire to be an apostle
in the university atmosphere. With a group of friends, I
helped organized retreats in the mountains and Father Kelly came
to preach. When I eventually joined Regnum Christi I grew
in the living of my faith: I went to confession
with greater regularity, I began to rely more on the
support of spiritual direction and I would visit Christ in
the Eucharist. And so my conviction matured that one day
if God called me, it would not be something that
would keep me from being fulfilled or make me a
less happy person. On the contrary, following his plans, I
would find a greater self-realization than that which I would
obtain following my own plans. My mother supported me fully
in my vocation; my father on the other hand, sought
to dissuade me which, paradoxically, confirmed for me that I
had a vocation.
My life in the Legion
The discernment stage
was an important moment: an end and a beginning. For
the summer of 1995 my family moved to Prague, Czech
Republic, with my younger brother, while my other brother stayed
in Munich. The separation was especially hard for Philippe who
was 14. He lost his two brothers and his friends
and was going to a country whose language he didn’t
understand; and all ended up in family dissent for my
I entered the novitiate in Bad Münstereifel, close to
Bonn, in October of 1995: the initial enthusiasm that I
felt after putting on the cassock quickly cooled off as
autumn came to an end. The demands of learning the
ways of the religious life were my daily bread and
it cost me a lot of sweat and sacrifice. The
closeness of the superiors and the balanced program of prayer,
manual labor, sports, classes, and the example of the other
brother novices helped me to overcome my first difficulties and
to take advantage of them to grow spiritually,
After two years
of novitiate, I did my first profession of vows and
was sent to Spain to study classical humanities. After that
I went to Rome to study philosophy for two years.
In the Holy Year of 2000 I began my internship
in France, where I helped a Legionary priest in youth
ministry: we formed youth clubs of faith education, culture, and
sports. We organized adventure camps, skiing, languages, and pilgrimages to
After those three years I returned to Rome to study
for the license in philosophy and the bachelor’s in theology.
I continued supporting as much as possible the work in
France and Switzerland.
After receiving the bachelor’s in Theology at
the end of 2008 I began doing ministerial work in
the region of Lyon, France. I hope here to contribute
to the building of the Kingdom of Christ and the
foundation of a civilization of love, of peace and justice,
according to the charism of the Regnum Christi. I thank
God in the first place for this mystery of love
with which we have been redeemed, the miracle of the
priestly vocation, and for the gift of perseverance in his
Father Jaroslav Lobkowicz was born in Paris on
the 15th of July in 1974. After receiving his diploma
in the lyceum of Munich, the Dante Gymnasium, he studied
two years to become a civil engineer in the Technical
University of that city. He entered the novitiate of the
Legion of Christ in Bad Münstereifel, Germany, on the 2nd
of Febuary of 1996. He has a license in philosophy
and a bachelor’s in theology from the Pontifical Regina Apostolorum
College. Since the summer of 2008 he has been exercising
his ministry as chaplain of adolescents and students in the
region of Lyon, France. | <urn:uuid:7446076f-c82d-417d-baf7-f12bf0022eef> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.regnumchristi.org/english/articulos/articulo.phtml?id=22443&se=359&ca=84&te=844 | 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 | 0.9744 | 2,506 | 1.78125 | 2 |
By Eric Stam & Gretchen Knowlton
These are uncertain times. Our country’s economic future is uncertain. The future of the CSBG is under harsh scrutiny and at risk of falling victim to deficit reduction. Policymakers and the American public want to know how to get the biggest bang for their federal dollars. In an effort to make a stronger case for the impact of the CSBG Network, NASCSP is launching a significant review of current research on anti-poverty interventions and what works. This includes an assessment of how best to explain the CSBG National Performance Indicators (NPIs). NASCSP hopes this important project will continue building on the collective knowledge of effective interventions for moving people and communities towards economic security as well as an understanding of tools that could help evaluate the impact of CSBG. The project will be led by Progress Resources Incorporated in conjunction with Temple University and Economic Opportunity Studies.
This is a two-phase project. Phase one is a review of the literature on anti-poverty interventions. The project will develop a rating system that can be used to categorize findings by scientific quality and level of scholarship as well as by level of impact on poverty.
The results of the literature review will inform phase two, which includes an evaluation of the NPIs and the types of information needed to truly understand the impact and effectiveness of CSBG. This review will also help the CSBG Network focus its efforts and resources on the highest impact interventions and policies.
The federal government’s commitment to evidence-based research and practice makes this type of research and evaluation critical for our network. While the CSBG Network has a robust and cutting-edge reporting and measurement system in Results Oriented Management and Accountability (ROMA), this system is a management tool and not an empirical research model. The Network needs to communicate its accomplishments and impact, with increasing urgency. ROMA data forms the foundation for this effort to more fully understand existing research models for anti-poverty work. The findings will further strengthen the CSBG Network’s ability to tell its story. This review will not only identify promising practices and research, but will also provide a structure to support ROMA in the process.
Targeted, meaningful, and evidence-based investments in economic security are much easier to identify and implement when the right information is available. The results of this project and recommendations for application for the CSBG Network will help create a path to prosperity – for the nation and for those most often left behind – low-income Americans. This research will refine and target our efforts so that communities and the nation get the most bang for their CSBG buck. | <urn:uuid:78f9e386-b9b4-4942-b9a8-7163ce86d9ce> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thestateofpoverty.org/2012/01/07/are-you-getting-the-biggest-bang-for-your-csbg-buck/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949632 | 537 | 1.5 | 2 |
A range of services is offered for children and parents involved in the adoption process. These include the evaluation of the child’s needs prior to placement, and arrangements for care of the child prior to the child’s adoptive placement and to the approval of the adoptive family. Also, special activities are provided to help adoptive parents and children adjust to the new family situation. Payment is provided for legal services associated with the freeing of a child for adoption. For special needs children, costs are underwritten by the state through the Missouri adoption subsidy program (MASP), for legal, medical, dental, psychiatric, psychological, and/or integrative serves for the child both before and following adoption. For an adoptive family to receive an adoption subsidy, an agreement must be negotiated between that family and CD.
To assist in location homes for children, CD operates an Adoption Photo Listing of children waiting for an adoptive family and a Foster-Adoptline which may be called without charge: 1-800-554-2222
Who Is Eligible?
Children in the custody of CD who are legally free for adoption. Any family (parent at least 21 years of age) or single person (21 and over) in Missouri may be considered as a prospective adoptive family.
- Interstate Compact on Adoption and Medical Assistance
- Missouri Adoption Subsidy Program
- Adoption Home Assessment Application
Foster Care Information
There are many reasons why people consider becoming a foster parent – wanting to give back to the community, the desire to help children, biological children are grown and miss the day to day parenting, etc. Whatever your reason may be, there is some basic information you should have to help you make your final decision. The Foster Care Information page provides information regarding foster parenting and the foster care program. | <urn:uuid:68e0d9d3-50c6-48a8-b3f4-66919649e014> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dss.mo.gov/cd/adopt.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938718 | 366 | 1.664063 | 2 |
For the small-government hardliners in the tea party, the only palatable way to increase the debt ceiling is to implement the Cut, Cap and Balance Amendment. And tea party-favorite Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C. agrees.
In an op-ed for USA Today, DeMint says the amendment is the “only way we can guarantee that Washington will stop spending more than it’s taking in and avert the coming debt crisis.”
Cut, Cap and Balance does what it says. It allows for an increase in the debt limit on three conditions: the budget must be cut next year; there must be a spending cap over the next decade at historical averages; and there must be a constitutional amendment sent to the states to force Washington to balance the budget.
The proposal may pass in the House this week, but would certainly be dead on arrival in the Senate. Still, bringing the amendment to the floor may pave the way for House Republicans to eventually support a Plan B, most likely one being crafted by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
DeMint, however, says that President Obama's proposal and the Reid-McConnell plan, which would give the president more power to raise the debt ceiling on his own, are both unacceptable.
“The 'big deal' that President Obama is seeking never balances the budget; it simply makes the debt bigger,” he writes. “It actually spends $6 trillion in new debt over the next decade and contains no long-term spending reforms. Worse, the new 'fallback plan' being discussed by Senate leaders gives the president a blank-check debt limit increase with the fig leaf of another commission that will be ignored like the last one.” | <urn:uuid:4bc6d981-e7a2-4351-b1f8-b2981f46307b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nationaljournal.com/budget/demint-cut-cap-and-balance-is-the-best-plan-20110719 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937089 | 373 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Published in Clinical Oncology Week, November 21st, 2005
According to recent research from the United States, "We detected circulating PCs by flow cytometry in 302 patients with newly diagnosed MM by gating on CD38+CD45- cells. The number of circulating PCs per 50,000 mononuclear cells was reported."
"In 80 (27%) patients, no circulating PC were seen; 106 (35%) patients had 1 to 10 and 115 (38%) patients had more than 10 circulating PCs. Median overall survival for the 302 patients was 47 months. Patients with 10 or fewer circulating PCs had a median survival of 58.7...
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NewsRx also is available at LexisNexis, Gale, ProQuest, Factiva, Dialog, Thomson Reuters, NewsEdge, and Dow Jones. | <urn:uuid:aad20fd4-83b2-4a69-ad7b-b36c506a5bad> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newsrx.com/newsletters/Clinical-Oncology-Week/2005-11-21/112120053335CO.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94786 | 201 | 1.6875 | 2 |
The laughter echoed down the hall, from the auditorium to the elevators. “Ho-ho-ho-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” Inside the auditorium Wednesday morning, 16 people clapped their hands from side to side, mirroring the instructor on stage.
They were practicing a special type of yoga called Laughter Yoga. Started by a physician in Mumbai, India, Laughter Yoga is an exercise routine that has spread to more than 60 countries. It combines playful laughter with Yogic breathing under the concept that laughter is contagious.
“Laughter really alleviates a lot of stress and anxiety and isn’t harmful or judgmental in any way,” said Laurel George, the instructor. “You can laugh anywhere anytime. I laugh when I wash my hair in the shower. That motion makes me laugh, and it starts the day off making me happy.”
In bright blue Converse tennis shoes and a straw hat with a flower bouncing from the top of it, George told the class early on that it was time to make a mid-morning snack: milkshakes.
She held an invisible cup in her left hand. “Yoop!” she said, arching her right arm sideways over her head and then letting it fall back to her side. “Yoop!” she said again, repeating the motion with her left arm, as if she were mixing together the ingredients of a milkshake. Then leaning back, she laughed as she poured the concoction into her mouth.
The students—a mix of seniors from the community and employees—followed her lead. Their laughter grew as they watched each other, and the room quickly filled with hearty “yoops” and laughs.
Certified in 2008 by the American School of Laughter Yoga, George held her first session at Weiss during the WISE Senior Center’s annual Springfest in April. She ran this most recent session for anyone interested—community members who had heard about it through the Senior Center, patients and their families who had seen fliers in the hallways, or employees who had read about it in the weekly e-newsletter.
Beverly Defries joined the session after her physical therapy appointment. She had heard about it in the WISE Senior Center but was wary at first. “I thought it was the yoga where you had to sit in different positions,” she said.
However, a friend who had attended the Springfest explained the concept. “I enjoyed it a great deal,” Defries said after the session. “I felt the movement and felt I was relaxing. It just took my mind completely away from everything for awhile.”
And that was George’s goal. “It’s good for you, good for your mind. There’s so much ickiness in the world, you need some laughing.”
Science backs up George’s assertions. In one study, researchers had children stick their hands in ice—a generally shocking and somewhat painful experience. They showed half of the children funny television shows beforehand, while the control group watched nothing.
When the time came to stick their hands in ice, one of the groups had a noticeably lesser reaction: the children who had watched comedy first. “It doesn’t deaden the pain, but those kids had been laughing and experiencing joy,” George said.
As the class went on, the students dangled imaginary floss through one ear, pulled it out the other and flossed their brains. They held their “paws” in the air, stuck out their tongues and roared like lions. And they fluffed each other’s auras, laughing for nearly 30 minutes straight.
“I think we should breathe just a little bit now,” George said. She lifted her arms, reached skyward, took a deep breath in and then exhaled, bending forward. “Get all that nasty, stale air out of there,” she coached the students.
Afterward, they went into a visual meditation, and then George encouraged people to shout out whatever they were thankful for.
“I’m thankful that I don’t have to take any pills,” one woman yelled. “I’m 90, and I don’t take any pills!”
“Yeah!” the others cheered.
“I’m thankful that I’m not at my desk,” an employee called out.
George’s appreciation takes form in the people right in front of her, smiling and laughing. “People are going to take this with them today wherever they go. I think that’s why it’s important.” | <urn:uuid:e47132bc-0c33-4c3b-84e6-2e5f1ff308b9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.weisshospital.com/news-classes-and-events/blog_article/10-07-22/The_Best_Medicine_Laughter_Yoga_at_Weiss.aspx?BlogTagID=03ac0f2f-351d-44cf-a848-8830caefdbaf | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978278 | 1,007 | 1.609375 | 2 |
2008-07-26 06:22:59 GMT 2008-07-26 14:22:59 (Beijing Time) Xinhua English
VLADIVOSTOK, Russia, July 26 (Xinhua) -- Russian president's representative in Far East showed up at "Ocean," a children's center in the area, to visit the 364 students convalescing here from China's quake-hit southwestern Sichuan province.
Alex Safonov asked staff about the students' daily life and urged them to provide the best service to those students. He joined the students in Ocean's activity rooms.
In the pottery room, he met Zheng Xiaopeng, a 13-year-old student from the city of Shifang in Sichuan, who extricated a schoolmate buried under the debris. Safonov praised his bravery and rewarded him with a pen. In return, Xiaopeng gave Safonov a self-made pottery rose.
In the video room the Russian official enjoyed the "red sailing boat," a Russian folk song performed by the Chinese students in Russian. They were rehearsing for the "China Day" due on July 27.
He also went to the skating field and skated with the 20 students having class there. Students said they were delighted to skate with the president's representative.
At the invitation of Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, some 1,000 students from China's earth-affected provinces have arrived in the country since July 17 for their three-week rehabilitation.
Safonov told Xinhua that the Chinese students convalescing in Russia will remember the country and its people. Children from the two nations can make friends here, which will contribute to the development of Sino-Russia relations. | <urn:uuid:48fb9bfd-6530-4f75-b79b-228410a3cc32> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://english.sina.com/china/1/2008/0725/173347.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973469 | 360 | 1.5 | 2 |
by Toya Richards Hill
Worship and the arts will converge this week at Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary (LPTS) during a conference designed to help participants stretch their liturgical imaginations.
The 2008 Worship and the Arts Conference, which begins July 9 and runs through July 12, will bring together a diverse group, including pastors, worship leaders, artists, church members, and seminarians, to explore creative approaches to worship planning and leadership.
“The desire is to create a dialogue between arts and worship,” said Dr. Claudio Carvalhaes, assistant professor of worship and preaching at LPTS. The idea is “to help people have experiences and encounters with God in many different ways and possibilities, mediums and styles.”
The goal also is to empower people and offer them tools to use at home to help people from their churches discover and rediscover their own gifts, he said. “We want to encourage conversations with local artists, to break down this wall between religion and arts,” Carvalhaes said.
LPTS, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s Office of Theology and Worship and the Society for the Arts, Religion, and Contemporary Culture are sponsoring the conference, which has as its theme “The Body.”
“The Body is the body of Christ and the church, but also our own bodies as a site for God’s revelation,” Carvalhaes said.
Conference keynote speaker Mark A. Torgerson will address the topic in three lectures. Working under the umbrella of Celebrating the Body: Seeking Fullness in the Arts and Worship, he will speak on Inhabiting the Body: Ambiguity and Ecstasy, From Walking to Running: Uncovering Artists in our Midst, and Growing and Building: Integrating the Arts with Excellence in Worship.
Torgerson has been working and teaching in the areas of theology, worship, and the arts for 15 years. He recently authored An Architecture of Immanence: Architecture for Worship and Ministry in the Twentieth Century, which examines the development of theological, liturgical, and architectural influences in relation to church design.
Workshops led by liturgical artists and teachers on dance, drama, music, visual arts, and writing also will incorporate the conference theme.
“Our hope is that in these workshop participants will encounter new ways to engage the word … that they will find models for doing that through the workshop leaders,” said the Rev. David Gambrell, the Presbyterian Church (USA)’s associate for worship in the Office of Theology and Worship.”
Creative worship services additionally will be a major component of the event, with the final conference chapel service on July 12 planned completely by the participants.
“The people will create the worship service” for Saturday, said Carvalhaes, noting liturgy in Greek means work of the people. “It will be a creative process.”
Presbyterians tend to focus on the words, which is wonderful, Gambrell said. Yet, “we want to supplement that and … grow in new dimensions by using our other senses in worship.”
“We are trying to engage people’s senses in as many different ways as possible,” he said. | <urn:uuid:74e040f4-5564-4574-b054-0a96423963e1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lpts.edu/news/2008/07/07/arts-and-worship-converge-at-louisville-seminary | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962377 | 699 | 1.5 | 2 |
Posts for January, 2011
Leon Walker (pictured above) suspected his wife was cheating. So he checked her e-mail and discovered that she was indeed having an affair with her ex, a man who once beat her. Now, Leon is facing five years in prison because it’s a felony to read someone else’s e-mails. Leon could serve more time than someone who assaults a spouse. The judge should throw out this case or expect his court to be filled with hundreds like this in the future.
Although it was the season to be jolly, Marty Beil, executive director of the Wisconsin state employees’ union, was not. His mood was Grinch-like. Why? Because the labor contract that was supposed to grease through the lame-duck legislative session stalled in the Senate. Russ Decker, the erstwhile Senate majority (and Democratic) leader, didn’t follow the script and cast a vote against the contract. Mr. Beil responded by calling Decker a “whore.” No doubt disappointed, it still seems that Beil could have thought of saying something more in keeping with the holiday spirit.
Gov. Scott Walker promised during his campaign for governor that he will develop a plan for creating 250,000 new jobs and 10,000 new businesses by 2015. We plan to hold him to that promise. And yet such a promise always raises an essential question: How much can a governor really do to promote job creation – especially during such a nasty downturn?
How much credit – or blame – should a politician get for the economy at any time? Especially a state politician?
Let us know what you think. And then take our poll nearby.
Instead of increasing school choice, perhaps increasing school stability should be the goal. Open enrollment and school choice, in addition to school closings, mergers and divisions have created a lack of stability. Many students have an intolerable level of instability in their lives already, from parents who are not a constant presence, or from parents with varying partners, or from constantly moving. Schools have an opportunity to be a much-needed stabilizing force in the lives of students, but this opportunity is squandered when the educational landscape changes with the breeze.
Iranian authorities sentenced Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani to death by stoning for committing adultery. Then they arrested two German journalists for daring to enter the country on tourist visas and interviewing Ashtiani’s son and lawyer, who also have been arrested. Ashtiani’s sentence is on hold, but there is still something fundamentally wrong with a government that so blatantly violates basic human rights. Axis of evil? Maybe not. But oppression? Absolutely.
Milwaukee Public Schools won’t sell even one of (only!) 27 empty school buildings to St. Marcus Lutheran School or Milwaukee College Prep, both “high performing” charter schools because the school would be operated “in competition” with MPS. I thought MPS was a public entity, put there by the citizens to educate its children, for the public good, not a private corporation, fighting its “competition.” Which “public” is MPS serving by denying the sale of a building, paid for by taxes, to a buyer who is educating the public’s children? This isn’t the “public” talking. I smell a union. Did you forget why you’re there, MPS?
Reports of a shot fired. Mayfair Mall shuts down. Displays inside Boston Store are knocked over. A fight ensues. Nine teens ages 13 to 17 are arrested. One teen tells a reporter that they “just wanted to have some fun.” An MPS teacher said in an e-mail to me that if I thought the Mayfair melee was bad, imagine what it’s like teaching kids who don’t want to learn. Point taken. A solid education and involved parents are key — at school, at the mall, everywhere.
Congressman David Obey said a mouthful on the way out the door. Obey was complaining about the current congressional trends and money in politics. He talks about newly elected officials being pulled to the right and the left. He thinks the pork he brought home was overlooked, or at least will be missed. What he doesn’t say is that he defined the problem in Washington. Holding a congressional seat for more than 40 years is the problem. Term limits weaken the influence money can buy. It brings new faces and ideas to a true representative democracy. Term limits can help create an atmosphere in which a vote is for the public good, not power preservation.
Ask any teenager, and they will tell you that cell phones have become the indispensable tool for them to communicate.
But do teens really need them?
According to the Pew Research Center, about 75% of 12-17 year olds now have a cell phone, up from 45% in 2004.
We know times have changed and that cell phones allow parents to keep up with their children’s busy lives, but we have to ask the question: Does anyone under the age of 16 really need a cell phone?
We'll be writing about this in tomorrow's print editions.
Tell us what you think.
The new sanitized version of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” the great Mark Twain classic, does an injustice to Twain and to history. The new version replaces the “N” word with “slave,” and “Injun” with “Indian.” Both of Twain’s usages are hurtful artifacts of another time. But that’s part of the point. Teach Twain in context. Learn from his biting commentary — and from the mistakes of the past. We do no one any good by covering them up.
Nationwide and within the Wisconsin delegation, the new year brings a new majority party in the U.S. House of Representatives, promising to hold down government spending. We’ll see. Our military budget approaches half of global arms spending; we are 5% of all people. Our forces’ main engagement for years now is a struggle that the generals themselves say has no military solution. Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times reminds us, “The U.S. military now has more people in its marching bands than the State Department has in its foreign service - and that is preposterous.” Will you take this on, new majority?
Flash mobs — where people arrange via e-mail or social media to assemble suddenly to perform a specific act — aren’t by definition bad things. Think of the YouTube videos you’ve seen of flash mobs at shopping malls singing Christmas songs or doing a synchronized dance. What’s bad are participants being destructive or disorderly, as reportedly was the case Sunday at Mayfair Mall. As with cruising, what could be harmless recreation for young people is marred by those choosing to cause trouble.
This month, a new law went into effect requiring police to document the race of everyone pulled over in Wisconsin. It’s to try to assess whether racial profiling occurs. Since victims are regularly ignored, disbelievers are the only ones who would appear to benefit from the law’s findings. However, I question how accurate the results will be – and ultimately the effectiveness of the new law - without stringent measures that ensure officers are recording this correctly. Seems like we’re bound to do just as we do now and simply rely on the word of the officer.
The debate of whether health care reform means government-run health care was sparked anew by a national PolitiFact finding that it is not. To which the other side says, it may not be — yet. Right, just like the income tax, the draft, the Trilateral Commission and Social Security were for-sure foreshadowers. “You can see it from here” is an iron-clad argument. The problem: Fear of what’s distant — induced by nearsightedness — isn’t necessarily visionary.
Milwaukee Public Schools has many empty school buildings with a total maintenance cost of more than $1 million per year. Moreover, they are estimated to be worth $34.7 million. But MPS doesn’t want to sell the buildings to interested voucher schools because they are the competition. Superintendent Gregory Thornton says, “Our strategy is fill them with kids that are part of the MPS family.” Wrong answer, Dr. Thornton. Henry Tyson of St. Marcus Lutheran School has the right answer: “The goal here from a community standpoint isn’t to save MPS; the goal is to serve students.”
In an editorial in Tuesday's print editions, we'll argue for reinstating a ban on assault weapons, which expired several years ago. Such a ban would have covered the type of weapon used by the alleged shooter in the Arizona killings last weekend.
A 22-year-old Tucson man is charged in the assassination attempt on the life of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and the killing of a federal judge and five others. Giffords is fighting for her life in a Tucson hospital. Thirteen others were wounded.
In our editorial, we warn not to try to place the alleged actions of Jared Loughner into a political context. There may be no coherent motive.
We believe, though, that the debate that has arisen over political rhetoric is a discussion worth having. If any good comes from this terrible tragedy, it might be, at least for a while, a more reasonable political dialogue.
Unemployment dipped to 9.4% in December, the lowest rate since May 2009. Great news, right? Not if you’re black. White males benefited the most from the dip as their jobless rate dropped from 9.1% to 8.5%. Black male unemployment fell from 16.6% to 16.5%. Black female unemployment increased from 13.1% to 13.2%. The unemployment gap between blacks and whites has widened. Closing this gap is essential to fixing the economy. And it starts and ends with jobs.
Congress on the Street Corners was the program being run in the parking lot of a Safeway Grocery in Arizona when the tragic shooting of 20 individuals occurred on Saturday. Congress on the Street Corners is a fantastic idea, designed to connect ordinary citizens with politicians and the political process in public. The public aspect is critical to the Street Corners idea, because anyone can stop and listen for a bit. This differs from the town hall meeting because citizens must plan to be at a certain place at a certain time to participate. I hope public speaking by elected officials is not another casualty of this tragic event.
Government should be run more like businesses? OK, Milwaukee Water Works has the corner on a product and has rising costs and expenses. It raised its rates — just like a business in the same situation would. But, of course, government isn’t business. So, how about we jettison the tired government-as-business trope? Even if water wasn’t a utility, you can’t really mean it anyway. If you did, you wouldn’t complain about garbage fees, fishing licenses or other fees.
Bruce Katz’s “The next Milwaukee economy” in Crossroads last month offered an optimistic, energetic, seemingly solid plan for economic health and growth in Metro Milwaukee: exports, low carbon, innovation, opportunity, along with the leadership and vision to turn ideas into reality. But will plans, leadership and vision be able to overcome the dark reality lurking in the shadows? An increasing number of respected economists are going on record with dire warnings about the virtually inescapable economic disaster due to our fatally out of control national debt, and its looming consequence: the collapse of the dollar. What’s our plan for that scenario?
The angry tone of the country’s political discussion is troubling, but lowdown attacks are nothing new. Jefferson was savaged in opposition newspapers; Lincoln was pictured as an ape. The difference today is that 24/7 media, including social networks, provide more channels and amplify some of the worst of the vitriol. Still, I’m optimistic. Even with all the red meat, the debate has never been more robust. And I trust the people to know what’s reasonable and what’s not.
Among those slain in the recent Tucson shooting was John Roll, chief federal district court judge there. I knew him from having litigated a case against him years ago. He struck me then as a man of unquestionable integrity, and based on what I read that never changed. Roll leaves behind a wife, three children and five grandchildren. The others who died, including a 9-year-old girl, also leave behind grief-stricken family members. And, the long-term outcome for Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords remains uncertain. There is a danger that the political finger-pointing that has ensued will divert our attention from these profound personal tragedies. That would be a tragedy in itself.
Since 2005 in Wisconsin, people buying cold medicine with pseudoephedrine have had to show ID and are limited to how much they can buy. But an AP analysis of federal data shows that state laws meant to curb the meth trade have done something else. They’ve created a vast black market, with people from the homeless to college kids buying the pills to sell to meth producers at an enormous markup. So while law-abiding people adapt to new obstacles put in their path, so do the lawbreakers — and the original problem goes on.
Of the many opinion writers whose columns about the Arizona shootings appeared in this paper, David Brooks did better than most. After a rundown of the evidence that something like schizophrenia is fact one about accused shooter Jared Loughner, Brooks said, “Contemporary punditry lives in the world of superficial tactics.... It is unprepared when an event opens the door to a deeper realm.” Yes, Mr. Brooks, it is wrong to pin this all on overheated campaigning, and right to see complex forces at work. But to simply blame mental illness says nothing about why this year a deranged person would target a congresswoman.
I’ve never followed football, but I’m trying to get into it. With this new journey, I’ve noticed one major positive. Albiet on a micro level, sports help to unite our fragmented society at a time when economic crises, political issues, etc. are pulling us in separate directions. I don’t mean to put sporting events on a pedestal, and I recognize there are extremists who take their love too far. But, I also acknowledge that games and team loyalty help to spark a bond that’s blind to politics, money and race. And even in Wisconsin, this Chicagoan can cheer for the Bears and still not be hated. At least not too much. Go Bears!
Acting Milwaukee County Executive Lee Holloway should get out of the real estate business. In the latest episode, a security guard who worked for him allegedly went to one of his troubled properties. A tenant claims the guard ransacked her place and told her to leave. Holloway’s comment: “We’re evicting her ass...she’s been a terrible tenant.” Well, he hasn’t been the best landlord, either. I hope he doesn’t use the same bullying tactics to get county work done.
PolitiFact Wisconsin this morning asked the question: "Are we really more uncivil?"
The piece by the Journal Sentinel's Tom Kertscher was prompted by comments from former Wisconsin congressman David Obey who said in a statement Jan. 9, "We are now reaping the whirlwind after years of wild anti-government, anti-politician, simplistic political vitriol." But most of the Wisconsin professors Kertscher spoke with thought otherwise. They said political rhetoric had been more overheated in the past.
What do you think? Let us know. Then take the poll.
In my Sunday column, “MPS suspends too many kids,” readers took me to task. They told me that kids are “out of control.” I was even told to visit a school to see for myself. FYI, I visit schools all the time. I could not find anyone willing to justify the district’s suspension rate, among the highest in the nation. Critics all pointed their fingers at parents. Blaming parents alone does not fully address the problem, but it is all the more reason these kids should be in school.
Now that the uproar over a high-speed railroad to Madison has abated, some may want to give the whole topic a rest. That would be a mistake. A proposal by the Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce for upgrading the rails to Chicago deserves our attention. According to the Journal Sentinel, a national organization recently ranked the Milwaukee-Chicago route as being in the top 1% of 7,870 possible routes for ridership potential. If Gov. Scott Walker is serious about luring Illinois businesses north of the border, creating stronger rail links with the country's third largest city ought to be part of his strategy. Let's fast-track this proposal.
If you describe your own side as revolutionary and patriotic and the other as tyrannical and godless, it shouldn’t surprise anyone if passions are inflamed beyond reason. That this hyperbolic vitriol has been a feature throughout U.S. history does not make it any less damaging today. And it is damaging even if no one is caned, knifed, shot or bombed. The other side simply becomes the dreaded “other.” Then, all we share as Americans is the disdain and disgust we feel for each other.
The Common Council’s approval Wednesday of the Marriott Hotel proposal on E. Wisconsin Ave. is a big step forward for downtown economic development and for common sense. The council wisely rejected a setback requirement imposed by the Historic Preservation Commission and overwhelmingly voted to support the project. The commission does important and often thankless work, but this time it seemed to go too far in its oversight role. Credit goes to a lot of people, especially Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett and Common Council President Willie Hines Jr. for supporting the project and doing the necessary behind-the-scenes work to get this done and to make sure it gets done right. And now that city officials have done their part for progress, it’s up to the developer to fulfill the potential of this project.
We wouldn’t get much work done if we vetted all the “shocking” comments from the radio talkers in Wisconsin. Not our job.
But John “Sly” Sylvester crossed a line this week with his sexually laced comments about Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch on WTDY AM-1670 in Madison. And last week, Mark Belling, over at WISN AM-1130, brought up the religion of several business people involved in the dustup over whether a Marriott hotel should be built in downtown Milwaukee. We supported that project, by the way.
Sylvester made fun of Kleefisch’s attempts to attract businesses from Illinois, saying in a mock Kleefisch voice that she had used sex to get the nomination for lieutenant governor. He then crudely brought up her colon cancer diagnosis. Later, he employed the same, “classy” style when the discussion turned to high-speed rail.
Tasteless. But, of course, that may be a compliment in Sylvester’s mind.
In discussing opposition to the Marriott project last week, Belling said: “The fact that majority of them are Jewish may be neither here nor there.” So why bring it up?
State officials and business leaders are fair game. It goes with the territory. But Sylvester and Belling slid well over the line of good taste and common sense.
In all the debate about civil discourse, there’s little talk about common sense. Don’t speak to or about strangers in a manner that would disappoint your mom. Don’t call people names you wouldn’t want to be called yourself. Wishing harm to an opponent does not further your cause. People can disagree passionately without ugliness (e.g., Tip O’Neill and Ronald Reagan). Both sides take part in the vitriol, and we all know it. Of course, the worst offenders are also those least likely to change their ways.
It frustrates me when people don’t take responsibility for their own actions. We aren’t perfect, so we are destined to say or do something silly, wrong or inappropriate. When that happens we need to fess up to our faults instead of only blaming others. And as it’s hard to see our own imperfections, we need to embrace others’ feedback. At the very least, this will help us to become better individuals. The latest person who’s fallen victim to the “blame game” is the Pennsylvania woman who walked into a mall pond while texting. It’s embarrassing of course, but I think it’s more embarrassing that she’s now suing the mall for her carelessness.
“Jeopardy” wunderkind Ken Jennings has met his match — Watson. That’s IBM’s latest supercomputer. In a practice round of the popular TV game show, the all-time “Jeopardy” champ, Jennings, and another human player lost to the silicon-based life form, er, computer. Can’t say I care much. Never much liked that know-it-all Jennings. Reminded me of the kid behind me in high school economics class. But I do wonder what’s next: “Survivor: Silicon Island”?
President Barack Obama will deliver his State of the Union message to a joint session of Congress Tuesday night, and we'll comment on it for Wednesday morning's newspaper. It's likely Obama will spend a good portion of his time talking about the economy - as he should. But what else should the president talk about? Health care? Energy? Immigration? Take the poll and let us know what we missed.
I am bereft and adrift. The dates associated with the signs of the zodiac have changed. The Earth has realigned and the stars have shifted, and this has nothing to do with the election. Other “experts” say this doesn’t change your sign if you were born before 2009. I’m unconvinced but think I’ve found the silver lining. If someone calls me out on some egregious behavior, my fallback will be, “No, a Gemini would do that. I’m a Taurus. Must’ve been some other guy.”
Here’s a little reminder from history and the Constitution: A person’s or group of people’s religion generally should carry no weight in the discussion of secular public policy issues, and assigning blame to religion can have dire consequences. Religion is generally a private matter and doesn’t play a role in matters such as, say, the placement of hotels in downtown areas. Where someone worships is simply not relevant to the discussion, and those who raise such issues risk being seen as bigots.
For all its soaring rhetoric, we thought President Barack Obama’s State of the Union fell flat. We were hoping for more of an emphasis on deficit reduction. We got lip service but not much in the way of a specific plan for moving forward on this vitally important issue.
But what did you think? Given the season, we’re using football metaphors. Was he tackled for a loss? Or was it an 80-yard touchdown strike?
Take the poll and then comment below.
Jack LaLanne was known as the father of modern fitness. He died Sunday at 96. At 60, he swam from Alcatraz to Fisherman’s Wharf — shackled and towing a 1,000-pound boat. At 70, he towed 70 boats with 70 people on a long swim. In his 90s, he worked out two hours a day. The obesity rate for adults in Wisconsin is 29%, and nearly half of all blacks in the state are considered overweight. LaLanne’s legacy should be for all of us to get moving. So put that doughnut down and get started.
The people of Manitowoc weren’t the only ones to welcome President Barack Obama to their fair city Wednesday. Businesses, too, got in on the act. The Shipbuilder’s Credit Union near downtown welcomed the president and thanked him for his visit on its electronic sign. The Culture Café offered the greeting: “Mr. Obama, Yes we can.” The Super 8 motel’s sign said “Welcome President Obama. We do big things.” And Saucy’s inn suggested the president should “Stop in for a drink.” But Rummele’s Fine Jewelry may have best captured the entrepreneurial spirit of the day with: “Welcome Mr. President. We have what Michelle wants.” Look Thursday for a take on the mood of the people of Manitowoc with the start of Editorial Journal, an occasional feature written by members of the Editorial Board.
U.S. Senate negotiators are said to be nearing a deal on how to prevent the minority party from being able to gum up the works. They should just adopt a previous proposal by Iowa Democrat, Sen. Tom Harkin, that would have that magic cloture number cutting off filibuster decrease incrementally from 60 to simple majority as the weeks of debate progress. Filibuster was meant to delay, not kill, legislation. That 60-vote requirement is not check and balance. It’s block and block.
As someone whose neat penmanship as a child eroded into chicken scratch as an adult, I’m torn that cursive handwriting may be on its last legs in America. Wisconsin is among 41 states that have adopted Common Core State Standards, which don’t require cursive (it’s optional). The rationale is that teaching keyboard skills is more crucial than time-consuming cursive. Yes, we must adapt to the times. But I fear that kids who don’t learn to write cursive won’t be able to read it as well. And that would be a shame.
MPS superintendent Gregory Thornton has identified several major reforms he would like to see implemented or, at least, discussed. The president of the Milwaukee Teachers’ Education Association adds that the union supports “any kind of change that will help teaching and learning in Milwaukee.” But he then lets the other shoe drop: the union won’t tolerate altering seniority rules. Problem is, that is one of the changes Thornton wants to talk about - and he should. Seniority is all about teachers’ years of service (good or bad) and nothing about teachers’ level of performance. Stay the course, Dr. Thornton.
If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, did it make sound? This age-old philosophical question could also be asked of voter fraud in Wisconsin. If voter fraud is happening but there is no way to measure it, is it really happening? Under the current system of same day registration and no ID required, there seems to be a strong potential for fraud. I applaud the Legislature for trying to close loopholes. Oh, and the answer to both questions above is "yes." The falling tree does make a sound and voter fraud is happening.
Instead of increasing school choice, perhaps increasing school stability should be the goal. Open enrollment and school choice, in addition to school closings, mergers, and divisions have created a lack of stability in the educational environment. Many students have an intolerable level of instability in their lives already, from parents who are not a constant presence, or from parents with varying partners, or from moving from place to place. Schools have an opportunity to be a stabilizing force in the lives of students, but this opportunity is squandered when the educational landscape changes with the breeze.
Nearly 30% of Americans still believe President Barack Obama was born elsewhere. Obama supporters have introduced a bill that would allow anyone to get a copy of his birth records for $100. The idea is supposed to end skepticism over Obama’s birthplace and raise money to cut into the massive projected budget deficit. What’s more American than charging an exorbitant amount of cash for something that should only cost a few bucks?
With opposition groups calling for a million people to take to the streets in Cairo today, the Obama administration continues to walk a fine line between supporting the fledgling democracy movement and alienating an old ally - Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. We'll have our own recommendations for the administration in an editorial scheduled for tomorrow's print editions. In the meantime, what do you think? Should the administration get tougher with Mubarak? Take the poll, then tell us in the comments section. | <urn:uuid:333f1a28-cfbf-452f-8f9c-af9aff7d4ea5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/archive/?startDate=01-01-2011&startDate=01-01-2011&blogID=29840414&blogID=29840414&endDate=01-31-2011&endDate=01-31-2011&archive=y&archive=y | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96215 | 6,093 | 1.585938 | 2 |
kaleidoscope – time in colour
With the display of time so ubiquitous today, the watch is less necessary for its time keeping function. A watch is really animated jewelry and a symbol of our taste, personality and status.
Three coloured gradients turn against each other to abstract time into an ever changing kaleidoscopic pattern.
The telling of real time becomes secondary to the engaging and decorative quality of the display.
Although possible to tell the time with the small dot and ring of the hours and minutes; we are interested to find out if users would learn to tell the time just from the pattern and arrangement of colours?
‘Kaleidoscope’ combines the reassurance of a known watch typology with a startling and provocative display of time.
bodyclock – up close and personal
Exploring intimacy, the ‘Bodyclock’ concept addresses the physical impact of wearing a watch.
In order to make the watch more seamless and streamlined, the buckle - a necessary but often annoying detail - has been moved from its normal position below the wrist, to be incorporated with the watch face.
The adjustment crown is unobtrusively hidden below the ring when the watch is worn, and the soft polymer strap is tailored to the owner’s exact size by cutting it to length.
The largest components are clustered towards the center, allowing the edges of the face and strap to be ultra-fine and an almost seamless extension to the body.
Rather than designing a thin watch as an end in itself, this concept incorporates thinness as one of the qualities necessary to make a watch feel more intimate.
wake-up – from wrist to night table
This concept explored the bedside context where we place both our watch and alarm clock. The ‘Wake-Up’ watch merges the two objects into one; extending its usefulness to 24 hours a day.
During the day it is a comfortable watch, emphasizing readability of the time and date.
During the night it is an alarm clock, with a visible but not overpowering display. The side button activates the alarm and inverses the display from day to night.
Inspired by wooden bracelets and elasticated children's toys, this simple solution allows the strap to stretch around the wrist and to pull it square on a night table.
timeline – the bigger picture
Inspired by a car odometer, the ‘Timeline’ Watch puts time into its bigger context.
It shows years, months, days, hours, minutes and seconds in one long, lineal display.
Highlighting only the hours & minutes with colour, gives a ‘you are here’ reference to time.
Rather than the traditional division between time and date as separate entities, it represents them more naturally as one long unfolding sequence.
work & play – not always rush, rush, rush
This double-sided watch highlights two very different attitudes to time - work and play.
Work time; the world of work is pressured and serious, where minutes matter. The face uses a chronograph typology to highlight our obsession with the exactness of time.
Play time; play is unthinking and relaxed, where hours can pass. The numerals, minute and second hands have been removed to leave only a vague indication of time.
The design is symmetrical and can be worn with either face outwards depending on circumstance. This highlights the duality in our modern lives - a desire to do more in less time, with the need to slow down, reflect and relax.
showtime – time on demand
We are confronted with time everywhere we look today.
‘Showtime’ only politely reveals the time when you sweep the face with your fingers. It brings the Japanese concept of Teinei (meaning courteous) to the way watches present time.
The gesture is appropriated from lifting your sleeve to see the time.
When the face has been swept with a finger; the time appears as fine points of light, remains briefly, then fades back into the milky white face.
A flowing side profile and domed glass face invite touching and suggest the required gesture.
‘Showtime’ focuses on the way modern sensing technologies can provide a more subtle and poetic experience than its analogue counterparts.
This additional analogue version further enhances the theatre of revealing time. It uses a smart glass face to switch between opaque white and transparent. The concave face below completely surrounds the hands and makes them appear to float magically in space.
lifetime – a new culture of time
Imagine a watch that keeps its own time, oblivious to requirements for regularity or a need to be read.
This concept presents a provocative idea of time by replacing the mechanics of a watch with a growing organic culture.
Trapped in a sealed glass enclosure, a bacterium grows at its own pace and marks time by reproducing itself. Feeding on a culture, and warmed by its host, the speed it spreads is controlled by factors we cannot measure.
This concept takes the abstraction of a time-piece to its extreme. By removing any pretence of accuracy or regularity it enables us to look more holistically at time as the measurement of a life. | <urn:uuid:4a0613e0-d016-4fd5-b173-04e66863e190> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.grodesign.com/index.php/portfolio/once-upon-a-time-watch-study/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931193 | 1,073 | 1.640625 | 2 |
Below is an excerpt of an article that originally appeared in 1074 from March 19, 2009. This issue and the rest of the Rolling Stone archives are available via Rolling Stone Plus, Rolling Stone's premium subscription plan. If you are already a subscriber, you can click here to see the full story. Not a member? Click here to learn more about Rolling Stone Plus.
It should have been enough, even for Bono. Lincoln behind him, Obama to his right, a crowd of 400,000 stretched to the Washington Monument. A chance to quote the "I have a dream" speech from the very spot where Martin Luther King Jr. delivered it. "Not a bad gig," U2's singer says with a grin, shaking his head afterward in the band's cramped backstage trailer. Bono's eyes are hidden under orange shades; his close-cropped hair has a section shaved to the scalp on each side, like racing stripes for his brain. "That crowd! I suppose the fact that I thought I could bond with every single one of them is early — or later — signs of megalomania."
But Bono can't help thinking about his original plan: King on the video screens, his 1963 speech ringing out again on the National Mall — and when the crowd heard "Thank God almighty, we are free at last," U2 would have slammed into "Pride (In the Name of Love)." Instead, the song got a muted intro from Samuel L. Jackson. "They pulled the speech last night," sighs Bono, still wearing a black scarf from his stage outfit, with a Rilke poem about God and nature printed on it. "We were out with [David] Axelrod and Rahm [Emanuel] and the Obama team, and they said it was a modesty thing. They thought it was presumptuous. Do you get that? I mean, it's great that they're being cautious — but it would have been great for the King family to see that."
The Edge, uncharacteristically giddy after the performance's adrenaline blast, chimes in. "I can see how they were thinking," he says. "I'm not sure I agree. Obama is a modest guy, and he's really careful about being presumptuous and self — lionizing." The guitarist pauses and smiles, eyes gleaming beneath his black ski cap. "We don't suffer from these problems. We just go for it."
A few weeks earlier, U2 finished their 11th studio album, No Line on the Horizon — which fuses the spiritual uplift of their Eighties work with the future-shock sonics of their Nineties albums. The result is some of the most moving, adventurous music of their career, from the churning polyrhythms of the title track to the ghostly minimalism of the closer, "Cedars of Lebanon." And despite living in a time where, as Bono puts it, "only teenage girls and very, very honest people" pay for music, they spared neither time nor expense in pursuit of their vision.
"It is now easier and more affordable to record a song than at any other time in the history of recorded music," says bassist Adam Clayton. "Unless you're U2." It was a superstar album-as-art project, with no deadlines on the horizon: During two years of scattered sessions, they recorded in France, London, New York, Dublin and Fez, Morocco. Longtime producers Daniel Lanois and Brian Eno were along for the ride, with the pair emerging as full songwriting partners for the first time — it was Lanois, for instance, who came up with the chorus melody for a key track, "Moment of Surrender."
On their first two albums this decade, U2 reclaimed their core sound and their mass audience — but along the way, they started to feel like they were playing it safe. So despite the successes of the past eight years, the band went into these sessions feeling like everything was on the line. "We were fighting for our relevance," says the Edge. "We felt like we can't really afford not to be innovative."
Adds Bono, "There is the defying — gravity aspect of it. There's this fear that this might be the one where the nose of the plane starts to dip down. It's very hard when you see talents and prolific imaginations that are so great, and wonder, 'Where'd it go?' And then you think, 'That can happen to us! In fact, it's likely to. And what might stop it?'"
Bono rounds a corner onto a narrow Dublin street, boots crunching on old cobblestone, sleek, black double-breasted overcoat flapping in the January breeze. The street's only occupants, a flock of fat pigeons, wobble into the air to get out of his way. Bono stretches an arm to try to touch one of them as it flutters overhead. "One beak to another," he says with a laugh. His enthusiasm and charisma are such that it's hard not to laugh with him, even if you don't quite get the joke. "The Dublin walk, by the way, is called 'the pigeon,' " Bono says. "You probably haven't seen it yet." He demonstrates, breaking into a thuggish pimp strut, and laughs again.
He's running late for his next appointment, which is not unusual in what must be one of the most overstuffed lives on the planet: "part-time" rock stardom; global advocacy for Africa's poor that's won him nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize; various multinational business and charitable ventures; an op-ed column for The New York Times; and four kids with Ali Hewson, his wife of 26 years. "I find it very hard to leave home," he says, "because my house is full of laughter and songs and kids."
Earlier, he had also been late for lunch. "My wife is out of town with her clothing line, and I had to get the kids off to school," he apologized. Of his multitasking, he says, "I wanna squeeze every drop out of the day. But it's also the tyranny of good ideas, y'know, because if you spot one, or if you have one, then you think you have to follow through on it. And that might be a psychosis — I may have to get that fixed."
Psychotic or not, he's in an ebullient mood. This is his town; these are his streets. And with the Obama inauguration looming, he's hopeful about the future — though he is as worried as anyone about the global financial crisis, which is hitting Ireland hard. "Very serious matter," he says. "I get really nervous when some of the smartest people I know — some of the smartest people in the world — don't know what's about to happen. I believe, in the end, creativity thrives in difficult conditions. I think we'll see some amazing things come out of this, though my heart goes out to people losing their jobs.
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Is there anything like the word "bedtime" to strike simultaneous euphoria and fear in a parent's heart? Thrill at the prospect of having some time to oneself, yet fear of what will happen when the little natives rebel and do all in their power to thwart the bedtime efforts?
I'm going to go out on a limb here and offer some suggestions about this most pivotal of parenting moments: Bedtime. Why pivotal? Because she who gets the sleep controls the world.
First, kids need sleep--lots of it--and nowadays they aren't getting enough. Most sources say 10-12 hours for a school-aged child is necessary but with working parents who don't get off work until five or six o'clock it's difficult to get all of the chores done in time to get kids off to bed before nine or ten o'clock. Add to this that if you've been at the office all day, putting the kids to bed the second you get home makes you feel as if you don't get to see your children at all.
However, kids need sleep. Regardless of the adults' schedules, kids still need sleep and all the caffeine-enhanced vigor in the world can't change that. So doing the math, if my kids have to be up at 6:30 am in time for school they need to be heading to bed around 7 pm. I know it sounds odd but our kids have always had bedtime at 7 pm, since they were around six weeks old. More on that in a moment.
Second, adults need kids to sleep. I'm not telling you anything you don't already know but adults need time away from the children, time to rejuvenate, time to be together or be alone, they must have a chance to punch-out and go off the clock if they're going to wake, bright and early and ready to face the pagan hordes fresh in the morning.
So if I've convinced you that children sleeping peacefully is a good thing (and I'm sure I'm really twisting your arm on that one) what are my suggestions in promoting this most blissful of familial environments? Here's my seven-step program:
* Pick a time as early as possible.
* Try to have all children go by that time, regardless of age (hold on, I'll explain).
* Be firm.
* Be very firm.
* Don't give in.
* Not even if they scream and holler.
* If they argue, use weekends as leverage.
In our house we've picked 7 pm and that's Bedtime. That means toothbrushing, potty breaks, drinks of water, chores, all done by 7 pm. No exceptions. Well, okay there actually are several exceptions: weekends, camping, vacations, family activities lasting longer than 7 pm . . . but generally we aim for 7 pm and are fairly consistent.
However, the younger children--such as Lillian, age 5--go to sleep at 7 pm while David and Spencer (ages 8 and 10) get to read quietly in bed until 8 pm and Grace (age 13) can read until 9 pm. Rule is that they read quietly in bed, door closed, no coming out until the morning light and generally it works well for us.
Starting the kids out young is the way to make this the easiest but if you want to give it a try with your older children just remember you may be in for some tough de-tox before they get used to the new rules. Be patient, be firm, they'll get used to it eventually, if they balk at it and won't obey take away weekend time where bed time is a little later. You're the one holding the power (at least I hope you are) so use it. I'm betting it will be good for them and I know it will be good for the adults in the house.
Early bed time means you can watch your own t.v. shows, read, work on projects--you could even go out on a date and it'll make it much easier to get a babysitter when the kids are already in bed or are reading in their room (plus they can't charge you as much if you've already put them to bed too!) You'll be more inclined to go out if the kids are already quieted down and ready for sleeping.
Just think, if we all put our kids to bed at 7 o'clock, it would be impossible for our children to whine that life is unfair because little Millhouse down the street gets to stay up until ten. Parents all over the world would thank us--we could liberate millions of adults across the globe and create a New World Order where sleep deprivation has ceased.
Yes, the ramifications are enormous. Give it a try and let me know what you think.
Using my Custom Search Engine I've found some other posts on the subject of getting children to bed:
* Parent Hacks' idea of how to keep small children in bed until morning.
* Another Parent Hacks idea about keeping kids in bed.
* Mama Blogga's bedtime routine that helps small children get the hang of things.
* Mom Blog asked her readers about their tips for getting kids to bed, check out their comments.
* A Familiar Path has a first-person account of bedtime with a growing toddler.
* Notes from the Trenches has a post that asks about getting kids to bed.
* SouleMama has a clever Bedtime Bag idea, complete with a tutorial.
* Daytipper has thoughts about baby massage before bed.
* Littlemummy goes in a different direction and gives tips for when it's necessary to keep the kids out past bedtime.
* Dooce's experience on healthy sleep habits.
* Let's Talk Babies with tips on getting more sleep.
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Friday, April 20, 2012
Read Something (printable word art)
On 4-23-12, my son, daughter and I are going out for World Book Night to hand out copies of The Stand by Stephen King. World Book Night is a literacy project with a focus on encouraging adults to read fiction for pleasure. They offered a list of 30 books including lots of wonderful titles, you picked 3 that you had read and enjoyed. They tried to give everyone their first picks. I chose The Stand because it's my husband's favorite book. One he picks up time and time again, and knows so well he'll open it at random and start reading from there. It is an "old friend" book.
While working with ideas for a teeshirt to make for my kids and I, one of my rejected ideas was a bunch of quotes about reading. The reason I rejected it is because the quotes are too small for a teeshirt, but I think you might enjoy it to print and hang. PDF format- READ SOMETHING!
Here are some of the quotes in it.
Wear the old coat and buy the new book. - Austin Phelps
The ability to read awoke inside me some long dormant craving to be mentally alive.- Malcolm X
He that loves a book will never want a faithful friend, a wholesome counselor, a cheerful companion, an effectual comforter. By study, by reading, by thinking, one may innocently divert and pleasantly entertain himself, as in all weathers, as in all fortunes.-Barrow
Life-transforming ideas have always come to me through books. - Bell Hooks
All the best stories in the world are but one story in reality -- the story of escape. It is the only thing which interests us all and at all times, how to escape. - Arthur Christopher Benson
The habit of reading is the only enjoyment in which there is no alloy; it lasts when all other pleasures fade. - Anthony Trollope
Books are incredibly important to me. I read a lot, both the books reviewed here and fiction.
My favorite writer is Robert Heinlein. His books are my "old friend" books, the ones I grew up with and know so well that I can open them to any page.
My favorite fiction release this year is Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway. It's absurd and clever and I laughed almost all the way through it.
If you have tweens or teens, I recommend Rick Riordan's books, like the Harry Potter books, my whole family read the Percy Jackson books and discussed them. My daughter is a big fan who is very excited he's coming up to do a book signing next month.
If you like fantasy and fairies, you might like Tam Lin by Pamela Dean, set in a small liberal arts college in Minnesota in the early to mid 70s, it's a beautifully written modern retelling of the ballad of Tam Lin, with lots of Shakespearean references.
My family's tastes run strongly to science fiction and fantasy. | <urn:uuid:b7825d52-6722-40df-bc69-1555c2de030d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.donteatthepaste.com/2012/04/read-something-printable-word-art.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963615 | 625 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Artists from across Aberdeenshire will be on hand this weekend at Loch of Strathbeg to help members of the public tap into their creative side.
As well as activities, there will also be an exhibition of wildlife depicted in art featuring local talent such as Karen Hartnell. There will also be work from Kath Hamper and Elinor Grieve.
Diana Spencer, Visitor and Publicity Officer at RSPB Loch of Strathbeg, said: “Everyone has a bit of creativity in them, whether that’s building something or drawing a picture, and we’d love to see what people can create after being inspired by the wildlife around them.
“On Saturday, you can explore the reserve and bring anything you find back to the visitor centre where you can create a fantastic natural sculpture, collage, bird feeder or bug house to take home.
On Saturday, March 9 the morning activities of building natural sculptures, collages, bird feeder or bug home starts at 11am until 1pm and an afternoon session runs from 2pm until 4pm. An exploration of the reserve collecting finds along the way is encouraged to incorporate these into your craft and the suggested donation for both activities is £5 per family.
Sunday March 10 is a chance to draw some art alongside other artists as part of our Wildlife Sketching Workshop from 11am until 3pm. In the morning the group will explore the reserve collecting and sketching natural materials and after a short break they’ll be drawing and painting either inside or outside, weather permitting.
Basic materials will be provided but you should also bring along your own paints and pencils; there is a suggested donation of £10 per person.
If you are an experienced or professional artist and would like to exhibit your work or help us give advice to our visitors then please get in touch on 01346 532017 or e-mail: firstname.lastname@example.org.
Year of Natural Scotland 2013 is a chance to promote Scotland’s stunning natural beauty and biodiversity, and promote ways in which visitors can enjoy our beautiful landscapes, wildlife and heritage responsibly.
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Weather for Peterhead
Friday 24 May 2013
Temperature: 3 C to 13 C
Wind Speed: 14 mph
Wind direction: North east
Temperature: 6 C to 13 C
Wind Speed: 12 mph
Wind direction: South | <urn:uuid:f6f32dab-719b-4c81-b71d-e5d3208de557> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.buchanobserver.co.uk/news/local-headlines/crafty-weekend-at-nature-reserve-1-2824680 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937038 | 508 | 1.625 | 2 |
There’s nothing more interesting than watching a movie about a person I knew nothing about. I didn’t know a thing about Oskar Schindler when I saw that. I was surprised at how entertaining and moving it was.
Leopold Socha is a lot like Schindler. He helped Jews during the Holocaust (although a lot fewer). He was a flawed guy that started out profiting by helping them, but ended up doing the right thing.
It’s based on the story of a ghetto in Lvov, Poland, where sewage worker and petty thief Leopold Socha helps 12 Jews hide underground.
The movie got an Oscar nomination for best foreign film. I was sadly disappointed by so much about it.
I wasn’t a big fan of Inglourious Basterds, but at least the opening scene with Christoph Waltz is so well-done and different. This movie gave us nothing new about the Holocaust. Oh wait, it did. Lots of nudity and sex scenes, which were totally out of place and unrealistic.
I’m supposed to believe a woman would pleasure herself in a room with a group of others hiding in an attic, while fearing she could be shot any day? Or once the folks start living in the sewers – and talk non-stop about the horrible smell (one kid even puking) – that the second day down there a couple would go at it? Come on!
I liked that director Agnieszka Holland (Europa, Europa) made this hero such an interesting man to watch. When he’s negotiating with people (including his wife), it’s interesting to watch. I just wish she wouldn’t have made the other characters so flat.
We get the expected fights over – lack of space, food rationing, and the rat problem (not sure why Holland had to have them squeaking non-stop).
Among the Catholics, we get two different characters finding out for the first time that Jesus was a Jew.
There were a lot of sex scenes that seemed forced and really out of place. Other scenes would've been more powerful had we not seen similar ones in other films of this nature.
An early scene showed naked women running in slow motion, and we hear them being slaughtered by machine gun fire. It doesn’t work (just as the slow motion scene of nude people running in the recent Wanderlust didn’t, but for different reasons).
The biggest complaint I have with the movie is that it’s two and a half hours long and I was bored. I’m rarely bored watching films; although I am curious to read the book the story is based on – In the Sewers of Lvov by Robert Marshall.
I was bothered that there were a handful of really great scenes in this movie that made me long for a better film. I especially enjoyed the edits that showed the sewers, and what was happening on the streets above.
I could give this movie a little bit of a pass because they wanted to stay true to the real story and not give you a Hollywood, sensationalized version of the events that unfolded. Unfortunately, that also made for a long movie that was boring at times.
It gets 2 stars out of 5. | <urn:uuid:5d787937-be30-4fb8-9c17-f0ed96e803c4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.courant.com/entertainment/movies/kswb-foreign-film-oscar-nominee-in-darkness-20120307,0,6841686.story | 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 | 0.979033 | 684 | 1.546875 | 2 |
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The 2013 Superbowl notably featured several artists of color with tremendous talent. Jennifer Hudson emphatically opened the game singing "America the Beautiful" with the Sandy Hook Elementary School chorus while Alicia Keyes sang the Star Spangled Banner live while playing the piano. Fans nationwide waited eagerly for a Beyoncé's mind-blowing halftime performance, which featured Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams, Queen Bey's former Destiny Child bandmates -- in style. The time couldn't have been better: two weeks after President Barack Obama's inauguration and the dawn of Black History Month, America got to see how far black women have come.
It wasn't just about Beyoncé headlining the halftime show or performing at during one of the largest moments of her musical career -- it was about the outstanding union and camaraderie that was displayed throughout the event. Kelly and Michelle's support of Beyoncé by singing their own rendition of "Single Ladies" was the epitome of sisterhood, while Jennifer Hudson's heartfelt opening (along with the ironic similarity of her own tragic loss to gun violence) exemplified the internal strength and grace that exists within the African-American female's heart. Even Queen Bey co-signed on the fact that last night was a memorable one for women of color:
Source: Clutch Magazine | Liane Membis | <urn:uuid:dfc254fe-5c45-435c-bbd3-16f6714e06e5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.blackchristiannews.com/news/2013/02/why-the-super-bowl-was-historic-for-black-women.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940661 | 280 | 1.828125 | 2 |
William Blake, 1757-1827, is not a person who is usually mentioned in a 21st century music review. He was a noted English poet and painter who was an early advocate of free love. He also had a spiritual side but was a staunch critic of the organized church.
Martha Redbone is of combined Native American and African-American descent. Recognized as a leading lady of contemporary Native American music, she has shared the stage with such artists as Bonnie Raitt, Pete Seeger, Rita Coolidge, and George Clinton.
They may seem like an unlikely pair, as they are separated by two centuries, but their talents unite on Martha Redbone's Roots Project, The Garden Of Love: Songs Of William Blake. It was her vision to write music for some of Blake's poetry and adapt it to her brand of Appalachian roots and folk music. It may sound like an odd project but the result is one of the more interesting and creative albums of the year.
Essential to the project was Grammy Award-winning producer John McEuen who also co-wrote the music and contributed his talents on a variety of instruments including banjo, guitar, dobro, fiddle, mandolin, autoharp, and lap dulcimer. Other key musicians include keyboardist David Hoffner, guitarist Mark Casstevens, bassist Byron House, and percussionist Debra Dobkin.
Redbone has a voice that reaches out and grabs you. It is a powerful instrument that conveys passion and emotion. It is comfortable in folk, rhythm & blues, and gospel settings. It can soar, seduce, and just entertain according to the needs of the song.
Blake had a philosophical side to many of his poems and they have adapted surprisingly well to an American roots format. The topics of life, death, celebration, suffering, and love fit well into Redbone's Appalachian folk and Piedmont blues sensibilities.
The title track is about freedom, and Redbone's vocal brings a poignant quality to it. "Hear the Voice of the Bard" is a vehicle for her voice to soar. "I Rose Up at the Dawn of Day" finds her transforming romantic poetry into a gospel sermon. "I Heard an Angel Singing" is a mournful presentation of a spiritual journey.
The Martha Redbone Roots Project has issued a very unique album that takes the poetry of William Blake in a direction that even a free-thinker like Blake could not have possibly envisioned. It's an album that deserves a good listen. | <urn:uuid:1a9fcd44-6740-4f02-b4d4-9edcdc83dd2c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.seattlepi.com/lifestyle/blogcritics/article/Music-Review-Martha-Redbone-Roots-Project-The-4218196.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976409 | 520 | 1.789063 | 2 |
Gibson Guitars: An Overview
When it comes to rock 'n' roll instruments, Gibson guitars are an American standard. The Nashville-based company manufactures acoustic and electric axes that are coveted by rock legends as well as guitar geeks who can actually afford one. Perhaps most iconic of all the Gibson Guitars is the Les Paul, first released in 1952, which has been famously played by Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page and Slash (to name a few). Other Gibson guitars, including the SG, the Flying V and the double-neck EDS-1275 are among the most recognizable instruments in music. Flip through our gallery of some famous Gibson guitars below. | <urn:uuid:df77c1a1-0a79-4711-98bf-81a45ecb6928> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://m.aol.com/music/blog/spinner/2009/10/20/gibson-guitars/?icid=music_spnr_art | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972804 | 136 | 1.8125 | 2 |
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