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They say losses have three times the emotional impact of gains and because of that, most investors find it three times harder to take a loss than they do to take a gain - the complete opposite to the traders' mantra: ''Take your losses quickly and let your profits run.''
If the market goes down again, here is a series of arguments designed to persuade you to sell. If you're ever having trouble taking a loss, are caught in the headlights, are getting emotional, and the offending stock is still in your possession, read this list. You will have put the sell order on before you get to the end.
If a stock is going down, it is far more likely to continue going down than it is to turn on a sixpence to suit you.
The further a stock falls, the more intense the selling becomes as higher losses cause more selling decisions, so sell early: an early loss is the smallest loss.
If you sell 10 falling stocks, as any technical trader will tell you, it will be the right thing to do in nine cases, but you will only remember the other one.
If you sell now, you are no longer exposed and the pressure disappears. All you have to do is come to terms with the loss.
If you sell now, you can always buy it back and, who knows, you might buy it back for less than you sold it.
If you sell now, you enter the eye of the storm. All becomes calm. You can watch from a distance and think. You can always choose to enter the storm again, and if you do, you will be thinking more clearly and be armed with a plan.
If you are making a loss on a stock, think to yourself, ''If I had cash, would I buy this stock now at this price?'' No? Then why are you holding it? Sell it. (Most people begin to irrationally ''hate'' the stocks they lose money on, so this argument always works.)
Your state of mind has value. What would your spouse (or you) pay to have a carefree you on the weekends, instead of one who's ripping the kids' heads off? Look after yourself, there are not that many weekends in the year - or your life. Don't ruin too many of them by keeping risky loss-making positions until Monday because you didn't have the guts to sell them on Friday.
Averaging down is a mug's game. If you have money to invest, you should be putting it in the best investment in the whole world. Do you really think that is going to be the very same stock you have already bought at a higher price and that's falling at the moment? Very, very unlikely. You already have an exposure as well, why do you need more of something that has already proved itself to be a dog? Do you really want to turn a short-term trade into a long-term loss? Every day you see it in your portfolio and every day it will be flashing ''You idiot''. There is value in avoiding that.
The quickest way to become a long-term investor is to make a short-term trade and get it wrong.
There is no logic in being emotional about losses. Create an Excel spreadsheet to monitor the total worth of all your shares using live prices. Up $500; down $500. This figure is the only truth. This is what the shares are worth. What you paid for the shares is irrelevant, so why care about whether it is a profit or a loss? It is an amount of money. If it's gone, it's gone. What you paid has no bearing on the next price.
Most clients who have loss-making stocks will tell you they ''hate XYZ''. So why hold it? Far better to put the cash into something you want to wake up to in the morning than something that depresses you. If in doubt, sell it - it will crystallise a capital loss and you can always buy it back.
Hopefully you'll never make a loss, but when you do, read this again and see if you can get to the bottom before you've put that sell order on.
Marcus Padley is a stockbroker with Patersons Securities and the author of sharemarket newsletter Marcus Today. His views do not necessarily reflect those of Patersons. | <urn:uuid:19e38326-17a3-4c72-afb6-c477cee66994> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.standard.net.au/story/425279/winning-the-mind-game-is-all-about-learning-how-to-lose/?cs=24 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97146 | 892 | 1.53125 | 2 |
"Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow.”
Two thousand and eleven feels like it will be remembered largely as the year in which humanity’s integrity and honour fell by the wayside and everything in the world seemed to be off kilter as a result of the great precipice created in our world. It was a year filled with company destroying financial revelations, country-crumbling debt crises, leadership failures and big economic disappointments. It was a year when honesty and transparency seemed in short supply, everywhere. Many of the revelations were sadly, not so much shocking as simply removing the thin veil that barely hid what we already knew to be true for some years now.
It was also the year when some of the most oppressed people in the world stopped fearing their governments and started to rectify this equation to finally make government fear the people. The Arab street locked arms, raised voices, gave lives, but in the end succeeded in striking down the tyrants that used fear, torture and censorship to shackle them for decades. It was the year of the Arab Spring or Awakening, as the longstanding and brutal dictatorships of Egypt, Yemen, Libya and Tunisia all fell and the ones still left standing are on the brink of revolution. All this ignited by a single act of frustrated defiance by Mohamed Bouazizi, a fruit seller, on the streets of Tunisia. He set himself on fire to protest police corruption and continuous harassment by government employees, and his martyrdom set in motion a chain of events that the most brilliant analytical minds at the CIA, Mossad and Pentagon had not foreseen in any of the scenarios they have spent their lives exploring and building. There were even simmers of discontent in China with the short-lived Jasmine protest and now we are seeing it engulf mother Russia. Last weekend saw the largest demonstrations held in the streets of Moscow and other cities since the fall of the old Soviet Union. People came out in the hundreds of thousands to protest voter fraud and demand the resignation of Vladimir Putin.
Meanwhile, the great democracies of India and the US also saw their share of people power, albeit without much turmoil or disruption so far. In India, Anna Hazare’s movement to create Lokpal or citizen ombudsman bill to fight corruption was passed by the Lower House this week and is currently being debated in the Upper House. The bill was first introduced in 1968 but never managed to see light of day. In the United States we saw the beginnings of a something that had all the power and popular support to grow into a force with clout and sway. But sadly, Occupy deteriorated into a homeless-filled, feckless orgy of sex, drugs and alcohol. The day Occupy announced that it would be a leaderless movement is that day I believe America stopped caring about them and went back to burying their frustration in their office cubicles. However, the discontent with Capitol Hill and Wall Street is not going away anytime soon. It will continue to fester across the nation until some real and meaningful change takes place, and some real prison sentences handed down for the fraud perpetrated by many executives.
Even as the world seemed starved and desperate for leadership nobody was able to step up to the plate and deliver. Instead it seemed the opposite was true with the Former Israeli President, Moshe Katsav, being sentenced to seven years in prison for raping a former employee while he was president. The former French President, Chirac, was found guilty of corruption and given to a two-year suspended prison sentence for diverting public funds and abusing public trust. The head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, had to resign after he had sex with a New York hotel maid. His wife stoically stood by him even as he admitted to having had consensual sex with the maid. Meanwhile Europe was in turmoil with the constant fear of the impending disintegration of the European Union and Euro zone hanging over the markets like a dark cloud for the better part of the year. Every day we heard about another country on the brink of default on their loans, from having lived beyond their means for more than a decade. It was not just the smaller and developing economies of Iceland, Ireland or Greece that faltered, but also the fully developed and large ones of Italy and Spain that are teetering on the edge of that debt cliff. Had one of these big countries gone it would have taken the whole Euro zone down with it. They say that in the times of great crisis, great leaders emerge; I guess they got it wrong. Instead of leadership and fortitude, we had Angela Merkel and Nicholas Sarkozy pussyfooting around the problems, relying on German coffers to shoulder Europe’s’ self-created woes, and finally asking private banks to write-off loans and thus share the public burden. The one good thing that did come out of this was that Silvio Berlusconi had to finally resign, giving the Italians a fighting chance to keep their country alive with the “developed world” label still intact. It is also true that while the US’s troubles are much deeper and more worrying, the dollar was saved not by anything the US Federal Reserve or the government did to shore up investor confidence, but by the fact that the only other option – the Euro did a phenomenal job of making itself look worse and even less secure than the weak dollar.
Back on the sub-continent, Indians witnessed the uncovering of one scam after another. Dirty politicians, unscrupulous businessmen, even corrupt officials in The Indian Space Research Organization. Sadly even the once revered Indian army was not left unsullied. Each new scam unearthed was bigger, more daring and conducted with greater fearlessness and abandon than the last one; in the end leaving no Indian institution unscathed. It seems that the ruling Congress Party had made a decision to make hay while their electoral sun shone, and pretty much everyone from Sonia Gandhi to the bottom layers of the party had their hand in the taxpayer’s cookie jar. It was only after a prolonged public outcry, major media coverage and really bad International press that a single arrest was made. One has to wait and see how many years these cases drag on and if there will ever be a single politician prosecuted for any wrongdoing. I still see all the disgraced politicians smiling and looking shameless and plucky, as if they know of enough skeletons in other closets to ever be prosecuted by their peers. We shall see.
In America, too, it was the year of uncovering scams pulled off by all the major retail and investment banks, as well as unethical if not illegal business practices by many large and iconic companies. Curiously, though, not a single corporate executive was prosecuted or even indicted for this wrong doing. Instead settlements were made with all the companies, forcing them to pay seemingly large fines but also allowing them to admit “no wrongdoing.” Perhaps I am a little slow but I don’t understand this logic – you commit a crime and instead of prosecution you agree to pay a large sum of money; which happens to be no more than 25% of the total amount you illegally and unethically made, and you get to say you are not guilty of doing anything wrong – how exactly does this serve as punishment and more importantly as a deterrent?
I guess we could look back at two thousand and eleven and conclude that the Mayan prophecy about twenty-first December two thousand and twelve being the end of the world, could quite possibly be true. Talk to anybody and they will tell you they think the world feels like it is going to hell faster than we can say the word. I am sure every generation felt this sense of hopelessness and despair at some point in their journey; what we also know is that each of these generations managed to find a way through the Plague, Hitler, Hiroshima, Jallianwala Bagh and Apartheid. So while our world has for some time now felt tilted towards the majority of people seemingly driven entirely by selfishness, greed and unethical behaviour, I want to offer an alternative point of view on the Mayan prophecy. This prophecy maybe correct about the end, but not in terms of the four horsemen or fire, brimstone and volcanic ash, but as an end to a chapter. Perhaps this year will mark a new beginning, closing this long and dark chapter of unethical behavior, lack of regard for our fellow human beings and the selfish rot that seems to have overtaken the majority of people and begin to shift the balance back. Maybe we have sunk to our depths and it is time to rise once again; finding within us the very same things that have made us more united and more connected than ever before in the history of the world. The same kindness and compassion of neighbours that saw America through the Great Depression, the solidarity and selfless resolve that drove the mighty British out of India and a strength and never say die resolve that ended Apartheid. Perhaps this is what the Mayan Prophecy foretells and for what two thousand and twelve will be remembered. | <urn:uuid:ac3661fe-4d2f-4efc-bab1-1e407511150c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.vaishwords.com/2011_12_01_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976294 | 1,841 | 1.679688 | 2 |
I look forward at the beginning of every quarter to receiving the Quarterly Outlook from Hoisington Investment Management. They have been prominent proponents of the view that deflation is the problem, stemming from a variety of factors, and write about their views in a very clear and concise manner. This quarter's letter is no exception, where they once again delve into the history books to bring up fresh and relevant lessons for today. This is a must read piece.
Hoisington Investment Management Company (www.hoisingtonmgt.com) is a registered investment advisor specializing in fixed income portfolios for large institutional clients. Located in Austin, Texas, the firm has over $4-billion under management, composed of corporate and public funds, foundations, endowments, Taft-Hartley funds, and insurance companies. And now let's jump right in to the essay.
Nearly everyone I talk with has the sense that we are at some critical point in our economic and national paths, not just in the US but in the world. One path will lead us back to relative growth and another set of choices leads us down a path which will put a very real drag on economic growth and recovery. For most of us, there is very little we can do (besides vote and lobby) about the actual choices. What we can do is adjust our personal portfolios to be synchronized with the direction of the economy. The question is "What will that direction be?"
Today we are going to look at what I think is a very clear roadmap given to us by Dr. Woody Brock, the head of Strategic Economic Decisions and one of the smartest analysts I have come in contact with over the years. This week's Outside the Box is his recent essay, "The End Games Draws Nigh." For those who have the contacts in government, I urge you to put this piece into the correct hands so that Woody's very distinct message gets out. I think this is one of the most important Outside the Box letters I have sent out.
Woody normally does not allow his work to go beyond the circles of his clients, but I suggested to him that this piece was quite macro in cope and important for both individuals and policy makers everywhere to understand. In my own simple terms, trees cannot grow in some unlimited manner to the sky. Families cannot grow debt without limit beyond the growth of their incomes. And countries have the same constraints. While growth of debt in the short term is viable, growth of debt faster than the growth of GDP is not viable over the long run. This is not debatable. It is a simple fact. Therefore, as Woody says, it is important that you get the growth side of the equation right as you increase the debt side. Without the proper balance, you are heading for disaster.
From his intro:
"We weave these three concepts together so as to make possible an extension and generalization of "macroeconomic policy" as normally understood. Central to this extension is the need for policies that drive down the nation's Debt-to-GDP Ratio over time. Accordingly, we identify 15 policies that jointly reduce the growth of federal debt and increase the growth of GDP over time. Doing so not only points to a new set of policies for exiting today's quagmire, but also permits an appraisal of the Obama administration's current policy proposals. Regrettably these proposals do not fare well with respect to growth. Furthermore, the extension of macroeconomics we propose applies not only to the US economy, but to most all others as well. It should thus be of interest to readers everywhere."
This is longer than the usual Outside the Box, and will require you to put on your thinking cap. But you need to digest this, and especially the conclusions. But it is very important that you understand the principles and concepts Woody discusses. We are at a very critical juncture, and the paths we choose will have profound impacts on our lives and fortunes. I cannot overemphasize the point. If we choose a path of growing debt faster than we can grow GDP, the negative implications for many traditional asset classes are enormous.
Let me again thank Woody for allowing me to send this on to you. And for those who post this letter on various sites, just be sure to include a link to Woody's website, www.sedinc.com. For those interested in his subscription service you can contact Woody at email@example.com or visit his website.
There is a reason I call this column Outside the Box. I try to get material that forces us to think outside our normal comfort zones and challenges our common assumptions. And this week's letter does just that. I have made the comment more than once that is it unusual for two major bubbles to burst and for the conversation and our experience to be rising inflation and not a serious problem with deflation.
Van Hoisington and Dr. Lacy Hunt give us a seminar on why they think it is deflation that will ultimately be the problem and not inflation we are dealing with today. This week's letter requires you to think, but it will be worth the effort.
Now, if you put all of the various inputs together, Hoisington and Hunt show that theory suggests we will soon be dealing with deflation. It's counter- intuitive to what we hear today, which is why the Bank for International Settlements used the stagflation word in a recent report. The transition that is coming will not be comfortable.
Hoisington Investment Management Company (www.hoisingtonmgt.com) is a registered investment advisor specializing in fixed income portfolios for large institutional clients. Located in Austin, Texas, the firm has over $4-billion under management, composed of corporate and public funds, foundations, endowments, Taft-Hartley funds, and insurance companies. And their track record over the last 20 years suggests we should pay attention. And now let's jump right in to the essay. | <urn:uuid:07c07239-d7f0-4785-b4fa-701b31e97686> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mauldineconomics.com/outsidethebox/tags/tag/Government-Debt | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958628 | 1,212 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Twitter became popular because of its 140 character restriction, orginally designed to fit an SMS.
This restriction promises the follower that everything will be easily digested, but perhaps more important is the benefit to the writer.
Often someone starts a blog, but then quits when every post becomes too long. Too ambitious. Twitter frees the writer of such pressure.
Pressure to be concise is great, but I propose that the 140 char limit is too limiting to express anything interesting. Tweets are dumb.
Instead of microblogging, I propose #milliblogging. You must constrict yourself to (maybe?) 1000 characters - the length of 7 tweets.
Would you join such a site? Would you rather it be an extended Twitter-client or a new community?
#Milliblogging - for people with something to say.
(This post was also tweeted by me on http://www.twitter.com/fnedrik )
Google shows developers how to hack Glass and run Ubuntu
3 minutes ago | <urn:uuid:2e827a46-ec2f-4140-a337-98f247a69e6f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://fakeguido.blogspot.com/2010/08/milliblogging-essae-in-7-tweets.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945037 | 211 | 1.710938 | 2 |
On March 26, 1998, at 0405 central standard time, a Cessna 310R, N3700G, U.S. Check flight 291, operated by Airnet Systems, Inc., collided with the terrain during a gear-up landing at the Joe Foss Field, Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The 14 CFR Part 135, cargo flight was operating in visual meteorological conditions. The pilot was not injured and the airplane received substantial damage. The flight originated from Des Moines, Iowa, at 0253 cst. Use your browsers 'back' function to return to synopsisReturn to Query Page
The pilot reported he checked the weather conditions 15 to 20 minutes prior to reaching his destination airport. The winds at that time were being reported as gusty and variable, favoring runway 21. He continued to report that upon reaching the airport, he entered a left downwind for runway 21 at mid-field. He reported he adjusted for the crosswind condition, but his corrections were not enough. This resulted in him making a single 180 degree turn from downwind to final approach. He reported, "By making a single turn to final, I broke out of my usual habit of lowering the gear on the base leg. Once on final, I was occupied with correcting my flight path to attain runway centerline and the proper glide path (as per VASIs)." The airplane was landed with the landing gear in the retracted position. The pilot reported he did not recall hearing a landing gear warning horn when he retarded the throttles. | <urn:uuid:e26d6f32-db7e-4ff3-af43-122d236863be> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ntsb.gov/aviationquery/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20001211X09645&ntsbno=CHI98LA113&akey=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964502 | 307 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Monday, February 18, 2013
SARATOGA SPRINGS — New York state is facing a shortage of more than 1,200 doctors that threatens to impact planned health care reforms, according to a recent report.
About one-third of the demand is for primary care physicians.
Findings are in the Healthcare Association of New York State’s report, “Doctor Shortage: Condition Critical.”
“We’re facing a physician shortage that’s going to surprise a lot of people,” said Angelo Calbone, Saratoga Hospital president and chief executive officer. “Other industries look attractive to some of our really bright kids.”
Educational demands of becoming a doctor are long and expensive, and physicians might have to answer calls at all times of the day and night.
The 1,200 doctors needed does not even include the anticipated demand in New York City, the report says.
“As thousands of New Yorkers are expected to gain health insurance coverage during the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, our hospitals and health systems already indicate a dramatic need for primary care physicians throughout the state,” said HANYS President Daniel Sisto. “New York state must have a comprehensive strategy to address this shortage and ensure all New Yorkers have access to care.”
Sisto added that while HANYS supports the Department of Health’s creation of the Office of Primary Care, the Medicaid redesign process and 1115 waiver, more programs, such as Doctors Across New York, must be appropriately funded to attract the hundreds of physicians needed in under-served areas.
In addition to primary care doctors, physicians of all specialties are needed, the report says. Thirty-two percent of facilities surveyed had to reduce or eliminate services because of the shortage, and 75 percent of respondents north of New York City indicated that at times their emergency departments had no coverage for certain specialties, meaning patients had to be transferred to other hospitals.
HANYS’ annual survey was developed in collaboration with Iroquois Healthcare Alliance, Nassau-Suffolk Hospital Council, Northern Metropolitan Hospital Association, Rochester Regional Healthcare Association and Western New York Healthcare Association.
To view the report go to www.hanys.org. Under the heading, “Publications,” click on 2012 Physician Advocacy Survey. | <urn:uuid:fb497e35-1c37-42ce-804a-1a8791ed05fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.troyrecord.com/articles/2013/02/18/news/doc512283b7c2e3d866006046.prt | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957373 | 487 | 1.65625 | 2 |
By Teresa Rivas
Earlier today, BofA announced that it had reached an agreement with Fannie Mae (FNMA) over disputed mortgages. The $11.6 billion settlement includes a $3.55 billion cash payment and $6.75 billion in buybacks of mortgage loans gone bad. Additionally, BofA will spend $1.3 billion to cover fees related to its role as a loan payment processor for Fannie. The loans in question date from 2000 to 2008 and were made by Countrywide, which BofA bought in 2008. Fannie Mae argued that the loans did not meet proper underwriting standards.
The bank, which has set aside $44 billion to cover litigation related to bad loans, said it would take a $2.7 billion pretax charge in the fourth-quarter related to the agreement.
The news comes as BofA and nine other banks signed agreements totaling $8.5 billion to settle claims of home foreclosure abuse brought by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and Federal Reserve last year.
After the housing bubble, when many homeowners were unable to pay their mortgages, banks found themselves with a great deal of foreclosure-related paperwork, and falsely claimed that thousands of individuals cases were looked over by an employee, when in fact they were ‘robo-signed.’
Among other big names, JPMorgan (JPM), Citigroup (C) and Wells Fargo (WFC) also signed onto the agreement. (On a related note, Citigroup late Friday said it would ask regulators to approve a stock repurchase plan, its first buyback since 2007.)
Yet even as banks move to clear up such problems from the financial crisis, regulators have relaxed rules intended to lessen the impact of future crises. Yesterday, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision said that it would amend legislation that had been drafted to ensure that large banks would not face liquidity shortages during future financial crises, amid loud criticism by the banking industry. The new benchmarks will be easier for banks to meet, and will not be fully implemented until 2019.
Banks argued that requiring them to have so much capital on hand would cripple lending activity; moreover, as each country can choose how to apply regulation, some nations may choose to be even more lax in their execution of the rules. Regulators say that the rules, even though modified, should still be able to avert a future crisis. | <urn:uuid:f8d19fb9-fbfa-4135-aa6b-d72943c4c385> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.barrons.com/stockstowatchtoday/2013/01/07/bofa-settles-with-fannie-big-banks-come-to-robo-foreclosure-agreement/?mod=BOLBlog?mod=BOL_article_full_blog_stw | 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 | 0.97754 | 492 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Gigabyte GA-EX38-DQ6 ReviewPropane - April 10, 2008
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One thing that can really make or break a board, no matter how good its specs are, is the BIOS. If you plan on overclocking your board much at all, you will be in and out of the BIOS all the time and you will want it to be easy to use and powerful. Gigabyte chose to use an Award BIOS and included a feature called M.I.T. which stands for Motherboard Intelligent Tweaker. The M.I.T. will allow you to do pretty much whatever you want to the voltages and clock speeds in your system and will be covered in depth soon. Very detailed instructions on this BIOS are included with the manual, but I will give a brief overview of all the features here. If you have further questions about the BIOS, you should consult the included booklet.
Standard CMOS Features:
The first option when you enter the BIOS is also one of the most basic. Here you can set the time, a few boot options, and hard drives. While drive detection is automatic, if you have a need to manually set up a hard drive, you have that option.
Advanced BIOS Features:
The advanced BIOS features allow you to set up boot disk priority, which is very useful when you want to reinstall your OS and need to boot up from your optical drive instead of your hard drive. Also, you can set up the S.M.A.R.T. settings for your hard drive and what is displayed when you first turn on your computer.
In this section, you can control a lot of the board's hardware functionality. You can turn on and off things like USB, onboard LAN, Firewire, and set up LAN boot. This can be done for several reasons, such as to free up some system resources (although small amounts) and can allow older hardware work with your DQ6.
Power Management Setup:
In this area of the BIOS, you can do some pretty cool things. For instance, you can make your computer turn on every day at a certain time, make it so all you have to do is press a key on the keyboard to turn on your computer, or a multitude of other things. You might think that this is where all that power saving comes into play that was so heavily advertised on the box; however, all that is done in software which we will look at later.
Now for the tab that is probably the most uninteresting. Here there are just two settings that control how the PCI hardware interacts with the motherboard. You really won't be needing to poke around in here unless you have some specific situation involving compatibility.
PC Health Status:
In here you can find a lot of information about how your computer is running in regard to heat. When you go into this set of settings, you are presented with actual voltages for the different rails and operating temperatures. Also, if your fans have an RPM reporting feature, this will let you know their speed. You can set up warnings here to let you know if your CPU passes a certain temperature or if any of your fans start to fail. As a bonus, the alarm system can be exploited if you want to bug your friends.
Load Fail-Safe Defaults & Load Optimized Defaults:
These two features are a nice thing to have included with any BIOS. If you happen to mess up something and can't remember where you went wrong, loading the fail safe defaults will likely get you back up and running, even though some of the features might not be available. The optimized defaults are there so when you flash your BIOS you can be confident that nothing will go wrong.
Also included is a Q-Flash utility which allows you to flash the BIOS without using a Windows program to eliminate as many failure points as possible. This is just in place so that you don't mess up your computer. | <urn:uuid:1405abb9-5940-49ae-9a00-550dc68d5829> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/gigabyte_x38_dq6/5.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948151 | 811 | 1.765625 | 2 |
During one of my recent presentations on Grandparents as Caregivers, I discussed ways to turn power struggles, between parents and grandparents, into empowering alliances.
As parents, we all have skills, values, ideas, and a vision we bring to the table. When parents elect to invite grandparents to be caregiving partners – or when grandparents elect to step up and in as caregiving partners – the skills, values, ideas, and visions can create a deluge of over-the-topness.
The parents and grandparents love and are committed to the child/children in these caregiving situations, but without the proper strategy or plan – the caregiving ideals become too concentrated causing parents and grandparents to dig their heels in and hoard power or control.
Parents and grandparents have to be open and honest about the way they envision and see their caregiving partnership playing out. They have to be willing to own and express their apprehensions about joining this caregiving partnership. They also have to be clear on how their needs mesh with that of the parents, grandparents, and the child/children.
This may sound scary, complicated, and un-fun – but it doesn’t have to be. We all know parenting can be challenging and rewarding. When parents and grandparents are empowered in this caregiving partnership, their collaborative efforts can inspire and motivate each other. They can tap into their inner wisdom and share ideas from a place of openness and love – instead of from a place of power and control. The caregiving partners can tap into their unique energy to positively impact the daily life of the child/children – as well benefiting from the byproducts of teamwork (between the parents and grandparents) as they grown, learn, and nurture their connection to the child/children.
In order for empowering alliances to work effectively, the following should be in place:
Set some norms. No one likes to be blindsided when they are in a caregiving partnership. Creating norms for communication, scheduling, compensation…and whatever criteria you need on your list, should be established right away. The list of norms does not have to be long. The norms have to be specific and doable. They need to empower the caregiving partners to be safe while building and nurturing the empowering alliance.
Be clear about roles and responsibilities. The worse thing caregiving partners can do is be well intentioned while tripping over each other and then wondering what happened. Make a list of what the partners feel are their best parenting/caregiving talents and strategies. Decide which talents and strategies are needed at the time – for the caregivers and the needs/age of the child/children . Then create a roles and responsibilities checklist or poster.
Meet regularly. Meetings can be face-to-face, conference all style, or virtual (email, skype, etc.). Select what works best for your caregiving partnership.
In our multigenerational nest, we have a caregiving partnership meeting 1-to-2 times a month (2 times when things are bit busier and more likely to cause a rift). Our meetings involve hubby, my mother-in-law, and me. They take place after dinner and don’t involve my children. We discuss upcoming events, needs, and any changes we need to make to keep things flowing smoothly. If there are any conflicts or grumblings – based on our norms – we have agreed to speak in “I” statements and then work to find a solution to the grumbling. We don’t focus on who caused it – we focus on how the grumbling surfaced and what to do to alleviate it.
Cross train. In some caregiving partnerships, you may have 2 parents and 2 grandparents – or 1 parent and 4 grandparents – or 2 parents and 1 grandparent. The point is, the make-up of who is on your caregiving team can look a variety of ways. Based on this, it is important the caregiving team members know and understand the roles of all the caregiving partners. Leave room to create ways for information flow and caregiving apprenticing to take place. This will keep the caregiving team functioning well and the empowering alliance will grow stronger.
Celebrate often. Caregiving is not always easy. It’s also not always easy for parents to share their parenting role or for grandparents to rethink their parenting role. As you develop and build your empowering alliance – celebrate small and large successes. Acknowledge what is working and thank each other for a job well done. Celebrate what makes your caregiving partnership unique and vibrant. Notice the daily joys and empowerment that radiates through your caregiving partnership. | <urn:uuid:d156f7ab-1718-47b5-a16d-29d9b1920624> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.boldlivingtoday.com/2012/07/11/building-alliances/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944342 | 952 | 1.773438 | 2 |
Sales of the hormone supplement androstenedione have risen dramatically since Major League slugger Mark McGwire came clean about using it. Andro is a steroid hormone manufactured by the gonads and the adrenal gland, and it is the biochemical forerunner of testosterone. It's great for bulking up because it speeds recovery so lean muscle mass can build up faster.
Men on anabolic steroids that derive from testosterone may feminize as they grow stronger, developing shrill voices, shrinking testicles and enlarged breast tissue, since the body converts testosterone into estrogen. Women popping steroids may see their breasts shrivel, hear their voices get deeper and observe male pattern baldness on their heads. The supplement Creatine is a safer bet, one used by many athletes, including McGwire.
How-to Guide for Bulking
There are two traditional alternatives for a bulk: the all-out approach, which consists of gorging yourself with all things that look like food, and the "clean bulk," during which one eats at a level only a little above maintenance, and all calories come from "clean" food.
The bulking diet is an art. Before you use it, it's essential that you know the fundamentals of muscle growth and how calorie surplus helps you gain muscle. On a bulking diet you can eat high calorie meals, such as breakfasts consisting of eggs, milk, oatmeal and sometimes a protein shake.
This is because protein is the only macromolecule that is used to synthesize muscle tissue. Your muscle tissue is actually broken down when you lift weights. Amino acids, which come from your dietary protein intake, are then used to synthesize new muscle tissue. Anecdotal and scientific research suggests that you need about 1 gram of protein per pound of bodyweight daily.
The key to a fit body and the foundation for adding muscular weight is nutrition. It is an easy method: consume the correct quantities of protein, carbohydrates and fat, do exercises with weights until the muscle is burned out or catabolized, give muscles an opportunity to take a break and mend, and the product is more and bigger muscles. Take any of the components away from this method and the result is injury and muscle loss.
To work out your calorie maintenance level, you can use a lot of fancy equations that involve body weight, fat, age, etc., but the best way to do it is to keep a diary of what you eat and its effect on your size. Many bodybuilders try to gain muscle by eating too far above their calorie maintenance level. To make things worse, they get these extra calories from junk food.
There will be a lot of times you want to quit and eat that cookie or ice cream, but you need to think about how important those abs are to you during your moments of weakness. You work out in the gym day in and day out and it would be a pity to lose your well-deserved gains. A healthy diet must include:
1. 5-6 meals per day
2. 5-6 liters of water per day
3. Lots of fibrous vegetables
4. Lean quality proteins
5. Essential fatty acids
6. Complex carbohydrates
There is a right and wrong way to bulk like everything else. Gaining muscle, not fat is the purpose of bulking. A lot of serious bodybuilders appreciate that the body cannot gain muscle and lose body fat simultaneously, and because of this several of them go through bulking and cutting stages in their routines. However, there have been incredible advances recently in the idea of influencing nutrition partitioning, and this area of study may be the key to doing what we once considered unworkable, i.e. lose body fat and gain muscle simultaneously.
Record your "girth" in several places (biceps, chest, quads, waist, shoulders) with a soft tape measure. Take a "before picture," and then try and take a "progress picture" at least once a week. To avoid any visual irregularities between your photographs, use the same lighting and preferably the same camera lens at the same distance; the only thing you want changing in your photos is your body.
Weight gainers are a popular source of calories for a lot of thin bodybuilders trying to gain weight. They are high-priced, costing twice as much as regular whey protein, and the only real difference between the two types of protein is the sugar. Weight gainers contain fructose, but the sugar you need post workout is dextrose, which can be bought cheaply online and easily added to a quality protein source.
Bulking Up Naturally
The correct type of bodybuilding contest is one of the few things that can motivate a full-grown man or woman to drink gallons of distilled water, and honey out of a bottle or eat masses of boiled chicken. Such diets have to be borne to get ready for the Natural Utah Cup, a semiannual affair backed by the National Physique Committee. Competitors are required to vie naturally – free from steroids or other augmentation drugs and be tested to make sure they're qualified.
Milk for Bulking
Old timers used milk all the time for bulking. If you have a hard time gaining milk is like magic. Just limit the whole milk because of the fat content. Or, you can add nonfat dry milk to whole milk to double its protein power.
The Bottom Line
Nourish a muscle with high-quality protein, pressure it with heavier and heavier weights, and let it rest. The muscle will restore itself bigger and bigger to meet the stress of more and more weight. Heredity decides muscle size and growth, but anybody can add muscular weight.
Bulking Up or Cutting
Bulking Up Programs
To Bulk Up or Not
to Bulk Up? | <urn:uuid:791f66dd-92a8-463a-a4ea-b861212fc5a6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.illpumpyouup.com/articles/bulking-up.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952181 | 1,187 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Logan Airport in Billings, Montana, is the scene of a wonderful exhibition of kites, on view through March of next year. As proof that the East, in this case Japan's Kumamota state, and the West, represented by host Montana, do after all meet despite the Kipling injunction, and exhibition titled Sky, Wind and World has been mounted in the air facility. Two million passengers are expected to view it.
Kumamota and Montana are sister states and this exhibit is the latest manifestation of their friendly partnership.
On behalf of the East, Kumamota shows many kites made by Tadakazu Funasaki, 62, a master of the craft. The West responds with an array from top U.S. and Canadian builders. | <urn:uuid:fcad5cde-826c-41a7-b512-a521f185bc70> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.drachen.org/print/898 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971819 | 157 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Published Fri, Nov 16, 2012 4:28 pm Dateline
Opponents of hydraulic fracturing will converge in Athens this weekend at an "action camp" hosted by the group Appalachia Resist.
Nate Ebert, spokesperson for the group, said he expects 40 to 50 people to attend the camp, which is aimed at gearing up local residents and others throughout the state to fight fracking and injection wells.
"The camp will have workshops; everything from basic fracking 101 workshops to talking about geology, talking about media messaging, talking about navigating the [Ohio Department of Natural Resources], talking about strategic direct action and long term strategy," he said.
Ebert said the camp begins Friday evening in Athens with a panel discussion featuring an attorney, an OU faculty member and a local activist.
The workshops will take place on Saturday and Sunday at an Amesville elementary school.
Ebert said one of the workshops will be about civil disobedience.
"We're talking about what to expect in civil disobedience legally and what kind of things you should consider and good ways to go about that and be safe," he said.
Ebert said the number of participants in the action camp suggests people are upset about hydraulic fracturing and the harm it can do to the environment.
"They feel like they haven't been heard. They feel like they've filed their grievances through the proper means and through our government and elected officials and representatives, and they're not being heard," he said. "I think people are willing to start new strategies and new tactics to stop this shale gas development and injection of toxic wastes into our ground."
Appalachia Resist was formed just a couple of months ago to stop fracking and fracking related waste disposal.
"It's certainly important to have discussions and talk about things but what we're really seeing here is that direct action does get the goods. Unfortunately, it seems to be the only reason that people will listen to you. It seems to be, from our experiences, what is actually getting the ODNR to start moving on some of these things," he said.
Earlier this week, state regulators approved permits for new waste injection wells in Athens and Washington counties. | <urn:uuid:19ac5089-8847-4575-975c-d35ab4f145bf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://woub.org/2012/11/16/fracking-opponents-travel-athens-action-camp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971239 | 440 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Wednesday, the Moss-Bradley Residential Association presented a written plea by actress Diane Keaton to preserve local buildings. Organizer Tom Dries says Keaton will also auction a copy of her recent book to raise money for the cause.
Dries says its a great step to get people passionate about saving local pieces of history.
"I think its a positive evening and think it we take it in this way, we can revisit it and make things happen. I mean Peoria's, it's important. And it goes back hundreds of years. And we have to protect it," he said.
Also, representatives for Carl Sandburg College in Galesburg announced the launch of a new historical preservation arts program. Classes will start this spring, and it was partly inspired by the historical homes in Peoria. | <urn:uuid:c4bca6d6-111e-4660-b4d9-1a25559519e6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://centralillinoisproud.com/fulltext?nxd_id=271102 | 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 | 0.961895 | 164 | 1.695313 | 2 |
From the Super Mario Wiki
The city of Mythis seems to be largely Greek inspired, with large, circular pillars decorating the fields of Mythis. Additionally, various fountains, pedestals and statues are also abundant in Mythis.
The extremely powerful Great Balls of Fire are also located in Mythis, atop an acropolis, where they are guarded by the legendary hero Hercufleas. The main mode of transportation in Mythis appears to be chariots, which are pulled by Ostros. | <urn:uuid:965dacef-b625-49cb-9078-6eac4f382cc4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mariowiki.com/Mythis | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951261 | 104 | 1.507813 | 2 |
It's All Politics
Fact-Checking The GOP Debate: What The Candidates Said On National Security
Bill Adair, editor of PolitiFact.com and Washington bureau chief for The St. Petersburg Times, wrote about about how candidates at Tuesday night's GOP debate rated on PolitiFact's Truth-O-Meter for PolitiFact.com and It's All Politics:
The CNN Republican debate on national security Tuesday night had some of the most lively and substantive discussion of the campaign. The eight candidates answered questions posed by policy experts from the American Enterprise Institute and the Heritage Foundation.
The result was some fresh insight into how the candidates agreed and disagreed on style, diplomacy and military strategy.
Asked about his plans for dealing with Iran, Texas Gov. Rick Perry said he planned to close the country's main bank. "When you sanction the Iranian Central Bank, that will shut down the economy." We checked that claim with experts and found a mixed reaction about whether it would have that big an impact. PolitiFact Texas rated it Half True.
Mitt Romney repeated a claim we've heard a few times before, that President Obama "apologizes for America." We've looked in detail at Obama's speeches and found that's not true. We've rated it Pants on Fire.
In a discussion about the need to attract more skilled immigrants, Michele Bachmann said that Apple CEO Steve Jobs had told Obama he had to build a factory in China because it had the 30,000 engineers that were needed. Bachmann's account matches a description in the new biography of Jobs by Walter Isaacson. We rated her claim True.
Newt Gingrich touted his proposal for overhauling Social Security, which he said is based on a pair of private-sector retirement-security programs — one in the South American nation of Chile and one in Texas. He said, "In Chile, for example, they have 72 percent of the GDP in savings." We initially gave that a rating of False. But we've gotten some additional information about the claim, so we'll be publishing a revised item soon at PolitiFact.com. | <urn:uuid:b8e67940-4ac0-426a-ad13-d65d3075596f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kalw.org/post/fact-checking-gop-debate-what-candidates-said-national-security | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961083 | 431 | 1.5 | 2 |
Without doubt, it is still hard to come up with safe conclusions about which will be the dominant format for the next generation HD content. The various pieces of information coming from the HD DVD and Blu-Ray camps is almost always biased and full of hype, making it difficult for industry observers to get to the real crux of the matter.
The situation is also rather confusing for consumers, and the last thing they need is another set of incompatible formats to sort through, and a heap of money spent on devices in order to use them.
The key to the success of either format appears to be which will secure the support of the movie industry. Although this was an argument for the HD DVD camp some time ago, a recent survey made by the New York Times indicates that studio support is evenly divided between both formats. The Blu-Ray Association has also published the results of another survey, showing that consumers have more readily embraced the Blu-Ray format. According to the results, 58% of people asked, said that they prefer the BD format over rival HD DVD, 26% was undecided while only 16% showed preference for the HD DVD format. The Association claimed that "..the reasons consumers preferred Blu-Ray is the ability to play them in mode CE devices, PC, gaming consoles, its backward compatibility with DVD media and the high capacities it offers for storing video and data..."
However, someone might argue that only the increased capacity of the Blu-ray format is a plus, while a corresponding survey, if it were to be carried out by the HD DVD camp, would almost certainly lead to totally different conclusions.
So, what's the story? Let's see it from the manufacturing side. The current stance of the optical disc replication industry could give us a better indication about the overall progress in this format duel.
It is true that the manufacturing process for HD DVD is similar to that for DVD and theoretically, upgrading the current manufacturing equipment used for DVD is more straightforward. However, it is also true that not all the DVD replication equipment is directly compatible with HD DVD and success is strongly dependent on the quality, accuracy and tolerances of the equipment.
In any case, currently most optical media manufacturers are investing on DVD lines that will be ready for manufacturing both HD DVD and DVD media. This is true of most small replicators, who must wait since they do not know which format will eventually dominate, before investing on the corresponding equipment. For the moment, HD DVD/DVD equipment is a safe way for them to proceed.
Keeping in mind that the specifications of the HD DVD-Video 1.0 have been recently finalized, M2, Unaxis and Singulus have already sold HD DVD replication machines, which offer cost-effective manufacturing of DVD9 and double layer/single layer HD DVD.
Moreover, Japanese Memory-Tech, the biggest supporter of HD DVD, has also installed 7 lines Of DVD/HD DVD replication and believes that their cost is comparable to those of DVD.
On the other hand, big replicators have the chance to invest in both formats simultaneously. Currently, they are negotiating installing new equipment for Blu-Ray, although it seems that they will also play with a single manufacturing line for each format.
Sony claims that major replicators such as Technicolor and Cinram have already installed Sony's Mastering System for BD. With the BD-ROM 1.0, BD-R 1.0 and BD-RW 2.0 expected to be finalized in October, the company believes that the upcoming BD Movies and music videos will accelerate Blu-Ray disk demand.
Philips is also optimistic about the Blu-Ray and expects the first CE devices to be launched early 2006. A PC triple recorder (BD/DVD/CD) has also been scheduled for early next year.
However, both the protection and application layers of the Blu-Ray format have not yet been finalized.
Considering that the production of both recordable HD DVD-R and HD DVD-ROM is similar to DVD, it's possible that some might concede HD DVD a 3-month head start on the market. So we could see an early lead for HD DVD and a possible catch up from Blu-Ray later on, due to its extended capacity roadmap.
The first pre-recorded HD DVDs are expected later this year, available in Japan and the US. | <urn:uuid:32997e36-ec09-444b-b4b8-1f2a5c7277ee> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cdrinfo.com/Sections/News/Print.aspx?NewsId=15093 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954567 | 883 | 1.523438 | 2 |
The lord of the south sea was Abrupt; the lord of the north sea was Sudden. From time to time Abrupt and Sudden got together in the territory of Primal Unity, and Primal Unity treated them pretty well.
Abrupt and Sudden planned to repay Primal Unity’s kindness.
They said, “People all have seven openings, through which they see, hear, eat and breathe; Primal Unity alone has none. Let us make openings for Primal Unity.”
So every day they gouged out a hole. After seven days, Primal Unity died.
- Just a poem by Chuang-Tzu (I dreamed I was a butterfly) (todoelorodelmundo.wordpress.com)
- Promoting Unity (myheartsmission.com)
- Victory in Unity (cornerstonediscipleship.wordpress.com)
There will be peace in the world one day. It will require a major evolutionary, spiritual and dimensional shift in all of humanity. You can contribute to this process by beginning this shift within yourself, right now. Find serenity in this moment, and spread it to others. Find gratitude in every breath, and share it with the world. Open your heart to love and let it flow throughout the cosmos. These emotions are extremely contagious. Spread them abundantly.
Solar flares unleash ever higher frequencies, raising the vibrations of everything they encounter. You have a choice to accept these vibrations or fight them. You can choose to open your heart to the higher vibrations of love and gratitude. This is your chance for spiritual progress — to live with peace and serenity. | <urn:uuid:6ea8b366-0971-406c-9419-31bb01f3466b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://tinmaddog.wordpress.com/tag/human/ | 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 | 0.932095 | 338 | 1.6875 | 2 |
HIV/AIDS is a major contributor to the growing number of orphans and vulnerable children in Ethiopia. Many of these orphaned children live on the streets in Dessie, Ethiopia, without much support, and chance to live in a home or receive an education. A Peace Corps Partnership Project funded the construction of a telecommunications center that the street children operate as an income generating activity. The older children operate the center, performing photocopy, fax, and telephone services used by local offices. This photo was taken two years after my service ended, on a visit to Ethiopia. It captures me with some of the beneficiaries of the telecenter, which had expanded since we completed the construction in 2009. | <urn:uuid:9cda456b-9a58-4688-8cb7-2571c84e20b9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://collection.peacecorps.gov/cdm/singleitem/collection/p9009coll11/id/4129/rec/553 | 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 | 0.956785 | 138 | 1.835938 | 2 |
Guest curator Pedro Alonzo, with assistance from ICA curatorial associate Bridget Hanson, has assembled more than 60 works made since 2003. Dr. Lakra’s earlier drawings (not here) were more like folksy doodles or traditional tattoo sample sheets. He seems to have begun drawing on magazines (some blown up to poster size) in the late 1990s, but sometime around 2003 is when the art world really took notice of his tattoo-style work in ink, ballpoint pen, and white paint on vintage images of pin-up girls and wrestlers. Here you also see that he’s turned his tattoo gun on a grimy plastic hand, a Kewpie doll, and an anatomy model, to deliciously creepy effect. It’s a catchy formula, sure, but how many hipster pictures of girls tattooed with devils and spider webs and swastikas can you look at before they all start to look the same?
There’s a bit more going on if you get out your decoder ring. The tattoos drawn on a woman in a 2007 piece include a snake strangling an eagle. It reverses the Aztec myth that the people would find the site of their capital when they came upon an eagle devouring a snake. “Possibly,” according to the ICA, “suggesting a state of unrest due to Mexico’s drug-related turmoil.”
La última y nos . . . (2003) depicts a zonked woman in her underwear drinking wine and covered with tattoos that include a swastika between her eyebrows, traditional Tibetan designs, and the word “Buda” — as in Buddha — on her left hand. The ICA would have it that Dr. Lakra is trying to reclaim the swastika symbol — which dates back to ancient times and symbolizes universal harmony for Buddhists — from the Nazis. Maybe. Or maybe it’s a cheeky reference to the swastika tattooed on murderer Charles Manson’s forehead.
X8 controla (2005) fills an image of a man’s face with Los Angeles gang tattoos: “MS” for the Mara Salvatrucha gang and “18” and “X8” for the 18th Street gang. In real life, having the insignia of both gangs on your face could be hazardous to your health.
Elsewhere, Dr. Lakra covers an old magazine portrait of former Brazilian president Getulio Vargas with moko — traditional tattoos of the Maori of New Zealand. In this case, it’s the wide swirling designs that decorated the faces of chiefs and elite warriors. The ICA suggests we should be prompted to compare Western and non-Western representations of power. “It’s not really defiant,” Alonzo explained during a press preview. “It’s affirming. He’s challenging how we look at power.”
Or maybe Dr. Lakra is using warrior tattoos to call Vargas a gangster. Vargas is often described as a dictator. He seized power during a 1930 revolution and later dissolved parliament and banned political parties and trade unions. Forced out by the military in 1945, he was elected president again in 1950, and he served till 1954, when, after being implicated in a failed assassination attempt on an opposition leader, he put a bullet in his heart. But even knowing all this can’t keep the initial electric fizz from going flat. | <urn:uuid:36a65f94-6b7e-4e59-9635-2bf2a327f05e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thephoenix.com/Boston/arts/100871-cheap-thrills/?page=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951556 | 730 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Who carried out the Lahore attack?
By M Ilyas Khan
BBC News, Islamabad
There has been much speculation over the gunmen's identity
Who could have done it?
Details of the attack in Lahore are still sketchy, but the video footage is a stark reminder of the November attacks in the Indian city of Mumbai, in which about 10 suspected militants held the city hostage for three days.
On Tuesday, a similar number of men staged an equally audacious attack. They ambushed the bus that was taking the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team to the stadium for a match with Pakistan.
Though the targets of the two attacks were vastly different, the attacks themselves were both spectacularly staged against high-value targets and made international headlines.
The style of these attacks is also reminiscent of an attack by a group of militants on the Indian parliament in the winter of 2001.
The Indian authorities blamed that attack - and the Mumbai assault - on a Pakistan-based militant group, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT).
The shooting began near the Gaddafi stadium
After some procrastination, the Pakistani authorities also endorsed the Indian claim in relation to the Mumbai attacks, saying at least nine men affiliated with LeT had sailed out from its southern port city, Karachi, to attack the Indian financial hub.
It has arrested several top LeT leaders in connection with that attack.
Could it be, then, that the LeT has turned back on Pakistan to even scores?
LeT is one of a number of militant groups that are believed to have been raised, trained and funded by the Pakistani security apparatus to fight Indian troops in the disputed region of Kashmir.
It is generally considered to be sympathetic to Pakistani security interests in the region - and analysts doubt that it would try to destabilise a Pakistani government unless it had been given a nod from within the security establishment.
That establishment has been blamed in the past for using militants, especially sectarian outfits, to destabilise civilian governments during the 1990s.
The attack in Lahore has happened at a time when a civilian government is in power after eight years of military rule.
The government has made some diplomatic concessions to India which the military - which considers India as the enemy - may not like.
Cricketers Thilan Samaraweera (L) and Tharanga Paranavitana were injured
In addition, the air of reconciliation that was born at election time a year ago is giving way to political discord, with anti-government agitation brewing in the Punjab province, where the attack took place.
So, have the suspected "rogue" elements in the security establishment decided to rock the boat for a government that appears increasingly vulnerable to the threat posed by militants?
Some in international quarters have suggested that Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers separatist group could possibly be involved in the attack.
The Tigers have been conducting an insurgency in the northern parts of Sri Lanka since the mid-1980s and are currently losing ground to the Sri Lankan army.
In recent weeks, the Tigers have seen key towns fall to the military, prompting many to speculate that it is the beginning of the end of their insurgency.
But could the Sri Lankan rebel group make a desperate move like this one to stage a comeback?
Analysts say they are not known to have operated in Pakistan in the past, and do not have the kind of logistics and network in the region that they would require to stage an attack of this nature.
Besides, they are unlikely to blow up the entire Sri Lanka team - as the attackers tried to do by lobbing grenades under their bus - because it also includes ethnic Tamils.
Another potential suspect are the Pakistani Taleban, or Islamist militants who are conducting a bloody insurgency in the north-west of the country.
They have been blamed, or claimed responsibility, for a number of equally spectacular attacks in Pakistan in the past.
One of the groups was even accused by the government of having carried out the December 2007 assassination of former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
But they largely depend on suicide attacks or remote-controlled improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and their targets have been either state officials or members of rival sects.
Al-Qaeda, which many believe to be an umbrella organisation of most militant groups active in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir, appears to have had a role in planning previous attacks against high-profile targets in Pakistan, such as foreign dignitaries.
Many security analysts suspect its role in a number of bombings against restaurants and foreign missions in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad.
Analysts say al-Qaeda considers an Islamic Pakistan as essential to its pan-Islamist ambitions. It has been at odds with successive Pakistani governments because of their "pro-West" policies.
Meanwhile, many Pakistani ex-military security analysts claim that Tuesday's attack might be the handiwork of the Indian intelligence service, Research and Analysis Wing (Raw).
Some of them, such as former intelligence chief Lt Gen Hamid Gul, also blame Raw for the Mumbai attacks. There is no evidence to support such a claim.
Gen Gul and others point out that both these attacks have put Pakistan in a bad light and eroded its ability to withstand international pressure in matters pertaining to its national interests.
This, they believe, is part of a plot by India to undermine Pakistan.
Pakistan has ordered a high-level investigation into the Lahore attack, with President Asif Zardari pledging that the perpetrators should be revealed.
If this happens, it would be unprecedented.
Militant attacks in all parts of the world have been investigated and solved, but Pakistan is yet to solve even one out of the hundreds of attacks it has suffered since the 1980s.
|Liveleak on Facebook| | <urn:uuid:cca8f20a-4810-4116-94f2-0132d5b38222> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=f1f_1236101722 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973075 | 1,182 | 1.8125 | 2 |
The Institute for Green Business Certification (IGBC) announced today that Baleco Ecosolutions, a manufacturer and distributor of environmentally-friendly cleaning products in the city of Montreal, province of Quebec, has passed a comprehensive green audit and achieved the Institute’s “Green Business Certification”.
Baleco Ecosolutions, founded by Anie Rouleau, provides a full line of eco-products that are both efficient and price competitive. Their on-site refill stations not only provide continuous access to high quality eco-friendly cleaning products, they also significantly reduce the use of plastic containers thus helping to lower the use of plastic. Baleco believes that, for the industrial and the commercial markets, the sustainability efforts should be communicated to customers, employees and shareholders. For the residential market, it is a simple way to make a big difference.
Philippa Settels, IGBC’s Eastern Canadian representative, said it is amazing to see products being formulated without the use of harsh chemicals, such as the traditional triclosan, ammonia and bleach, found in most cleaners, which have been related to many health and environmental issues. Philippa said she is very pleased that the second Eastern Canadian business to complete IGBC’s green audit and achieve certification is located in her hometown of Montreal, Quebec. “People here are becoming increasingly conscious of the environment and the need to live in a more sustainable and eco-friendly way – and I’m sure that many businesses in the region will soon follow the example of Baleco Ecosolutions to gain their green certification,” she said.
IGBC President, Garry H. Peterson, compliments the company for their high standards and commitment to the community’s environmental health and well-being, and he congratulates them for achieving Green Business Certification. “Baleco Ecosolutions is a leader in the environmental movement and the survival of our world,” Peterson said.
The Institute for Green Business Certification (IGBC) – with offices around the world – is the first international organization of its kind to certify businesses’ environmental practices. It uses a comprehensive Green Audit that is becoming a model for what it means to be a “green business”. The Green Audit evaluates a business in 10 different categories. IGBC’s certification process has been used by small, medium and large companies alike.
IGBC does not offer or sell products or training courses, and does not charge for its literature. It provides consulting to businesses and organizations regarding environmental management and sustainability. IGBC is accredited with the Better Business Bureau. For more information about IGBC, please visit: www.gbcertified.ca | <urn:uuid:a459068d-3863-4a72-8280-319a863d2c84> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fourgreensteps.com/cerwire/awards | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950595 | 546 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Volkswagen's New Beetle, a smash hit in the United States that seems to appeal to everyone from graying Baby Boomers to Generation Yers who haven't started shaving, rolls into 2000 with a handful of new features.
Rumors of a New Beetle convertible are true, but the ragtop won't arrive until the 2001 or 2002 model year. Until then, the hardtop two-door hatchback continues as the lone body style. The New Beetle debuted in 1998 and has enjoyed more success in the United States than in Europe. It was named 1999 North American Car of the Year by a panel of automotive journalists. It also had the highest projected residual value of any 1999 vehicle.
The bubble-shaped roof gives the four-seat New Beetle a strong visual link to the original, but it infringes on rear headroom. Legroom is limited in back, too, so this isn't the best choice for a family car. There is 12 cubic feet of cargo space at the rear, and the split rear seatbacks fold for additional room.
All models have a new theft-deterrent feature that immobilizes the engine unless a key with the proper electronic code is used in the ignition. Heated seats formerly were available only with leather upholstery, but now the "bun warmers" are part of a less-expensive Cold Weather Package.
As a modern interpretation of the original, the New Beetle is a one-of a-kind sporty hatchback in a world filled with cookie-cutter sedans and coupes. Whereas the original had an air-cooled rear engine and rear-wheel drive, the New Beetle is based on the Golf/Jetta platform and has a front engine and front-wheel drive.The New Beetle won't get squashed like a bug in minor collisions. It suffered the least amount of damage in a series of four bumper tests conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, performing much better than several larger cars.
Under the Hood
Three four-cylinder engines are available. Base engine is a 115 horsepower, 2.0-liter. A turbocharged 1.8-liter with 150 horsepower (also used in the Audi A4) is available on GLS and GLX models. The GLS TDI model uses a 90-horsepower turbocharged direct-injection diesel. Manual and automatic transmissions are available with all three.The traction control system on models with the 1.8-liter engine adds a new feature that applies the brakes to one front wheel at a time when needed instead of both all the time. All models have standard anti-lock brakes and side-impact airbags for the front seats.
From the cars.com 2000 Buying Guide
Closest Dealers Listing this Car
Featured Services for the Volkswagen New Beetle
- Sell your current car quickly and easily on Cars.com. | <urn:uuid:8534b9ce-a669-4283-97ba-89f2dd48d430> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cars.com/volkswagen/new-beetle/2000/expert-reviews/?revid=46238 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943884 | 588 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Black Achievers Hold Sessions on Campus
The YMCA of Central Kentucky Black Achievers program held sessions for middle and high school students on motivation and life skills on Transylvania’s campus in February. Though Transylvania has previously had ties to the Black Achievers program, this is the first year that events have been held on campus.
“We’ve partnered as far as scholarship money with students who graduate from the program and come to Transy,” coordinator of multicultural affairs Vince Bingham ’98 said, “and we’re pleased to have a greater involvement this year.”
The aim of the program is to connect seventh through twelfth grade students with positive adult role models and provide exposure to career, educational, and social opportunities that enable the students to make informed decisions and develop the skills necessary to compete successfully in life.
The primary activities take place on the second and fourth Saturdays of the month throughout the school year and offer two types of sessions: general sessions designed to provide guidance and motivate students, and cluster sessions that expose students to specific life skills. Cluster sessions that took place include Arts and Culture, Business, Computers, Engineering, Medical, and Communications.
“Many of our alums are Black Achievers,” Bingham said. “This is a program that ignites students’ thirst for knowledge.”
The Black Achievers program culminates with an awards banquet at Lexington Center in April. In March, Bingham accepted the Service Award on behalf of Transylvania at the Urban League Young Professional Gala in recognition of work done with the Leading and Impacting Futures Today Conference and Black Achievers. | <urn:uuid:84830a91-e570-4dae-bfdc-1adbb556a145> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.transy.edu/magazine/2008/spring/around_campus/black%20achievers.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940272 | 355 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Snow and ice are expected, though accumulations are not expected to exceed 6 inches and would more likely be 2 to 4 inches in central and northern Connecticut.
"Any snow or ice would make driving and walking difficult," the National Weather Service reported on Wednesday morning. "When temperatures are below freezing, motorists need to be especially careful on bridges and overpasses where slippery spots can easily develop."
Those traveling for the holiday should be extremely cautious if heading north. Accumulations in Massachusetts and Northern New England could be significantly more — up to 16 inches in spots — the weather service said. | <urn:uuid:2ab2d3d5-5a51-4fe5-a87b-e76091ba2429> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://manchester.patch.com/groups/editors-picks/p/winter-weather-advisory-in-effect-for-hartford-tollanf60b4fd156 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952726 | 119 | 1.539063 | 2 |
NEWPORT, R.I. (AP) -- If the Crawley family of "Downton Abbey" were American, they'd summer at Newport.
The wild stateside success of the British period drama about post-Edwardian aristocrats and their live-in help has piqued interest in the life of servants in the Gilded Age mansions of the seaside city. The nation's wealthiest families built Newport "cottages" in the 19th and early 20th centuries and would move their households here --servants, silver and all -- from New York and elsewhere in the summer to enjoy the ocean breezes and society scene.
Just as the Downton servants develop relationships downstairs -- think the frustrated love triangle of kitchen maids Daisy and Ivy with footman Alfred-- servants in Newport carried on a lively social scene of their own. Many of their stories have begun to emerge after digging by researchers at the Newport Preservation Society, which owns several mansions. Newly discovered photographs, documents and family histories have inspired the creation of a tour about servants in one of Newport's most picturesque houses, The Elms, becoming one of the society's most popular tours.
Many mansions have been open to the public for decades, but with a focus on the wealthy families who lived there. Newport's grandest mansion, The Breakers, in recent years incorporated some information about servant life in its audio tour. But the new guided tour at The Elms centers squarely on servants and allows visitors into rarely seen parts of the mansion, including servants' quarters, the kitchen and the massive boiler room, where coal would be brought in through a tunnel that goes under the garden wall.
Meg A. Watt, a "Downton" fan from Stroudsburg, Pa., took the tour last spring, not long after it was started. The owners' side of the house is opulent with marble and gold. Just steps away, hidden behind doors, are plain hallways and rooms for use by the servants, she said.
"It gives you a completely different perspective," Watt said.
The Crawleys' own American grandmama, played by Shirley MacLaine, owns homes in New York and Newport. The city is even mentioned on the show from time to time, including by Lady Mary Crawley, who considers fleeing to America to wait out a scandal involving the death of a Turkish diplomat in her bed.
"It'll be dull but not uncomfortable," she remarks to her lady's maid, Anna, who asks to come with her.
They end up staying at Downton Abbey. But if they had gone to Newport, they might have found a house much like The Elms.
Completed in 1901, it was built as a summer home for Edward Julius Berwind, a coal magnate, and his wife. It was the first home in Newport that was completely electrified, boasted modern amenities such as an ice maker and telephone, and was even featured on the cover of Scientific American. The Elms was used as a residence until 1961.
The tour begins at the servants' entrance, which is covered by an arbor and therefore hidden from view so residents upstairs wouldn't see deliveries. The guide then leads people up five flights of stairs to the servants' quarters, leading visitors to wonder how someone like Downton's war-wounded Mr. Bates could manage such exertion several times a day. (An elevator is now available for those who need it.)
One servant's bedroom is furnished as it might have been at the time. One displays census records that show the names, occupations and countries of birth of the Berwind household's domestic staff: around a dozen maids, footmen and others from countries as varied as England, France, Germany and Sweden, a difference from the servants at Downton, who are mostly English, save a few including the Scottish housekeeper, Mrs. Hughes, and Irish chauffeur turned son-in-law, Tom Branson.
Another includes the story of the dismissal of the entire staff in 1902 after they asked for more time off, said John Tschirch, director of museum affairs at the mansions, who did much of the research on which the tour is based. The Berwinds replaced them with new servants brought up from New York.
Other bedrooms display photos of servants, as well as journals and other documents, many provided by servants' descendants. One shows a maid standing next to a rocking chair on the home's roof, which was a de facto porch for the staff. In the window next to her are flowers in pots.
In another photo, the Berwind household's longtime butler Ernest Birch, who married the cook, sits on a chair outside the mansion surrounded by footmen. One, much like Downton's footman-turned-valet-turned-assistant butler Thomas, seems to be throwing a little attitude.
Census records from 1895 show that around 10 percent of the population in Newport was domestic servants. Tschirch said staff would have "kitchen ratchets," parties in the kitchens of the different mansions, with food galore.
"That's where all the gossip was," he said. "You think of a social summer resort, the stories the servants could tell about each other, the people in town, the fashion."
Much of the information has come from servants' relatives who heard the Preservation Society wanted to hear from anyone who had lived or visited there, not just the owners. Tschirch said all kinds of family lore has surfaced, including a story about the cook, Mrs. Birch, whose finger was clawed by a lobster and had to be removed.
They're still looking for more, he said.
"The descendants," Tschirch said, "are beginning to feel that these houses are part of their family histories, too."
If You Go...
THE ELMS SERVANT LIFE TOUR: Newport, R.I.; http://www.newportmansions.org/plan-your-visit/servant-life-tour . Tour schedule varies by season. Adults, $15; ages 6-17, $5. | <urn:uuid:1a1dcf13-6c82-47b2-b876-51f39a1292b2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.tnl-news.com/ap%20travel/2013/02/15/a-glimpse-downstairs-at-america-s-downton-abbey | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97713 | 1,270 | 1.828125 | 2 |
Ostracus writes "The latest request from the Pentagon jars the senses. At least, it did mine. They are looking for contractors to 'develop a software/hardware suite that would enable a multi-robot team, together with a human operator, to search for and detect a non-cooperative human subject. The main research task will involve determining the movements of the robot team through the environment to maximize the opportunity to find the subject ... Typical robots for this type of activity are expected to weigh less than 100 Kg and the team would have three to five robots.'" To be fair, they plan to use the Multi-Robot Pursuit System for less nefarious-sounding purposes as well. They note that the robots would "have potential commercialization within search and rescue, fire fighting, reconnaissance, and automated biological, chemical and radiation sensing with mobile platforms." | <urn:uuid:8db6fe9b-1984-42d5-8244-788ff8d6bf4b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/08/10/24/2245238/packs-of-robots-will-hunt-down-uncooperative-humans | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942312 | 174 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Pilots Ridge Aero Plantation is a small subdivision of houses arranged along a privately owned airport that allows residents to taxi their planes out to the runway in much the way that most folks drive their cars from a driveway into a street.
It’s located at 716 Pilots Ridge Road, Wilmington [Map this], off Carolina Beach Road south of Wilmington.
At one time, it was just a grass airstrip used by small planes that towed advertising banners behind them while cruising over local beaches.
In 1983, developer Don Hobbs bought the airstrip and surrounding property and began marketing the fly-in community.
Today, there are 14 privately owned houses in the subdivision and a total of 29 lots arranged along a paved 2,750-foot runway.
“Most of the people here are experienced pilots with thousands of hours of flight time,” said Lin Brown III, president of the Pilots Ridge Homeowners Association. Most of the homeowners are full-time residents, he said.
Brown, an architect, uses his plane to travel frequently to visit with clients. He said the community attracts other residents who also used private aircraft for business travel.
The airport is privately operated and receives no tax dollars, Brown said. Access is limited and pilots must get permission to use the airport.
Date posted: February 16, 2010
User-contributed question by: | <urn:uuid:c30e1392-260d-435d-b904-09f5cfd80493> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.myreporter.com/?p=5785 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971761 | 281 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Tax Winners And Losers Under Obama's Deficit Plan
Originally published on Mon September 19, 2011 7:20 pm
If enacted, President Obama's deficit-reduction plan would increase tax revenues by about $1.5 trillion over the coming decade. The wealthiest taxpayers could see significantly higher taxes, but the vast majority of Americans would pay less, at least through 2012.
These are some of the groups that could see higher tax bills starting in 2013:
-- Investment fund managers: Obama wants Congress to require investment fund managers to pay at least the same percentage in taxes as middle-income Americans, who currently face ordinary income tax rates of 23 percent to 33 percent.
Investment fund managers typically pay less, as a percentage of their income, because their money comes from gains in investments, which get taxed at just 15 percent. Obama is proposing an approach that has come to be known as the "Warren Buffett rule." That's because billionaire investor Buffett has often said that he pays less in taxes, as a percentage of his income, than his secretary.
-- Individuals making $200,000 or more per year (or $250,000 for couples): The George W. Bush-era temporary tax cuts that help affluent households would be allowed to expire in 2013, and there would be a limit to how many deductions affluent households could take.
-- Corporate-jet owners: They would have to pay a $100-per-flight fee on corporate jets and other turbine-powered planes that use the air traffic control system.
-- Airline passengers: The federal security fees would double from $5 to $10 for a nonstop round-trip flight and triple to $15 by 2017.
-- Energy companies: Obama's plan would limit companies' ability to claim domestic manufacturing deductions for oil and gas drilling. The plan also would eliminate some tax breaks related to coal exploration costs.
These groups will have lower taxes:
-- Wage earners: Workers who have payroll taxes deducted each paycheck. Until last year, wage earners had to put 6.2 percent of their income into payroll taxes for Social Security.
As part of a plan to stimulate the economy, Congress would cut the payroll tax to 4.2 percent for 2011. Unless Congress acts again, the rate will go back up to 6.2 percent. But Obama is calling on lawmakers to lower the payroll tax again, down to 3.1 percent for 2012. That change would be worth $1,550 to a family earning $50,000 a year in wages.
-- Employers: Employers also contribute to Social Security, paying 6.2 percent of each worker's wage. Obama wants lawmakers to reduce the tax on the employers' side to 3.1 percent on the first $5 million in payroll. In addition, he would push the Social Security contribution down to zero for any payroll increases up to $50 million next year for any employer of any size. | <urn:uuid:617f8b1f-b9c6-4be4-bb96-dc7fc975ddb7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kunc.org/post/tax-winners-and-losers-under-obamas-deficit-plan | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969997 | 593 | 1.8125 | 2 |
Hints: Where is Hugo Chavez in the Big Picture?
Next December, for the first time, Venezuelan voters will select a candidate from a pool including an incumbent president. Hugo Chavez is running for re-election.
"The most serious thing about this situation is not only the use of (public) economic resources for campaigning, but also the use of the whole state apparatus" for such purposes, said Leopoldo Puchi, secretary general of the opposition MAS party.
Secretary-General César Pérez Vivas labeled as abuse the president's "unleashed political activism." He underscored there was evidence of the "whole state machinery used for political activism. It is a commingling of state and party assets, of state goals and the goals of a political sector. They [President Hugo Chávez electoral campaign] are using all the society's resources to remain in office in an illegitimate, immoral manner.
"CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez warned supporters on Sunday that the United States could try to sabotage his upcoming re-election bid, his latest salvo in a new row with Washington over alleged U.S. spying. Left-wing Chavez, who frequently accuses the Bush administration of seeking to overthrow him, has presented what he calls the U.S. "empire" as his principal adversary in the December election.
President Hugo Chávez Sunday forecast 2006 would be one of the hardest years of the Bolivarian revolution because "the empire will risk all" in order to prevent his re-election in December 3rd presidential polls. In a completely self-serving claim, Chavez has often suggested the U.S. will invade Venezuela, a proposition that would allow him to declare a state emergency and retain the presidency without election.
Hugo could as easily forecast that Venezuela will be swarmed in a UFO visitation. What is interesting is that more people are buying his prediction of the U.S. invading Venezuela than of UFOs swarming Caracas. Look for a UFO swarm in mid-September. -Molten Eagle | <urn:uuid:da8e0aea-fca8-4eef-a03d-11e75e49d8a0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://aquilinefocus.blogspot.com/2006/02/hints-where-is-hugo-chavez-in-big.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961324 | 427 | 1.648438 | 2 |
tim.peters at gmail.com
Mon Dec 13 16:17:52 CET 2004
> I don't see why starting a thread as a side effect of importing is
> bad thread practice. Sure python doesn't cater for it, but IMO
> that seems to be python failing.
Obviously, it's bad practice in Python because it can lead to
deadlocks in Python. It's nearly tautological. Import is an
executable statement in Python, not, e.g., as in many other languages,
a declaration directed at the system linker. With that power comes
opportunities to shoot yourself, although they're generally easy to
avoid. Come up with a practical design that doesn't have this
limitation, and then perhaps your characterization of the current
design as "a failing" would be both credible and constructive.
Apart from that, ya, I do think it would *uisually* be poor practice
to start a thread as a side effect of importing anyway. It's too
mysterious, and IME has caused trouble even when it didn't lead to
deadlocks. The fundamental purpose of import in Python is to add
useful names to the importer's namespace, and users of a module
generally think of it as doing no more than that.
Note that the OP's example had a module that, upon the first attempt
to import it, ran an infinite loop (even if it hadn't deadlocked), and
it's clearly severe abuse of import's purpose.to write a module M such
that "import M" *never* returns. Indeed, that's the other half of how
deadlock occurs: not only that the imported module spawn a thread as
a side effect of importing, but also that the imported module refuse
to allow the import to complete.
The current design actually supports spawning all the threads you like
as a side effect of importing, provided you ensure also that the
import ompletes. The easiest way to avoid trouble remains not to
spawn threads as a side effect of importing to begin with, although a
programmer determined to demonstrate their bad taste <wink> can easily
enough make it work.
More information about the Python-list | <urn:uuid:a4b742f0-1b22-4b67-ba39-7dc0fee9c3e0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-list/2004-December/253906.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940895 | 471 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Media at PH Events
Hosting a support group meeting or a special event is a great way to raise pulmonary hypertension awareness in your area. You can multiply your impact by working with reporters to get your event covered by local media.
Getting publicity isn’t complicated, but it does require advance planning and some persistence. Your story is already attractive because it highlights a local event, local community members and a good cause, but when and how you approach the media can influence whether your event gets coverage. These tips will help by showcasing your event in ways that are appealing and helpful to the media:
- Start early. Plan at least 6-8 weeks ahead of your event. Remember that some places your story could be mentioned are seen only once a week – such as weekend event calendars. This means journalists plan farther ahead and need more advance notice to publish your information. Always have dates, times, costs, phone numbers and other essential information ready to share before you contact any media.
- Seek advance coverage and follow-up coverage. Advance coverage promotes wider attendance at your event and therefore better chances to raise more money. Coverage at the event or after the event may not raise funds, but it still helps more people become aware of PH.
- Tie the event to a larger theme about PH that can become the basis of stories in the media. This will help you differentiate your event from the many others media could choose to cover. Some examples of themes might be: pediatric PH, early diagnosis, inspiring stories of how PH patients cope and adapt, caregiving, the impact of PH on the family, and long-term survivors. The theme will be especially strong if it relates to something newsworthy because it is just happening -- the anniversary of a patient achieving a health milestone, for instance, or something people in the community are doing in honor of a patient.
- Tell personal stories from the local community. Seek permission first from those whose stories you want to tell. Be sure to ask if they mind being public about their experiences and being photographed or filmed.
- Line up medical professionals such as physicians, nurses, or respiratory therapists who can explain PH to the media. Have their contact information ready to share with journalists.
- Use PHA materials and resources including our media kits, "Understanding PH" DVD, public service announcements for radio and television, the "Let me Breathe" video and the Sometimes it's PH website.
- Approach a variety of news outlets including print, radio, television and online. Online media may include local bloggers and highly localized news websites such as Patch.com in some communities. Print and broadcast news organizations also have their own websites. Sometimes these sites carry additional content beyond what was in the paper or on the news broadcast. Some of these sites also allow you to post your own community information. When working with media, remember that several news organizations can carry the story on the same day, so if you can, pitch to more than one.
- Pitch your story to multiple contacts at each news organization. Think of your story from different angles such as health story, feature/human interest story, charity events, entertainment events, community news, etc. Emphasize health to the health reporter, human interest to the feature editor, community news to the calendar editor and so on. The more people you can approach, the more likely you are to find one who says yes.
- Use social media to promote attendance at your event. Post information on your Facebook page or other social media sites and have your friends and fellow event organizers do the same. Send these messages out regularly in advance of your event with varied themes as the event gets closer. For instance: After an initial announcement of the event, make a second posting that adds a few lines about PH or a local PH patient, then a third posting updating people on things like new auction items or the latest registration numbers for the event, etc. Try to add a new detail or vary the headline to emphasize different elements of the event so the postings aren’t repetitive.
- Widen your social networks through support groups or other groups you participate in such as book clubs, sports teams or church groups. Ask a local support group leader to share information about the event with group members through email or social media. Even if each member shares the information with just a few others, your audience will multiply.
- Get extra mileage when stories get coverage. Share them with supporters, volunteers and participants in your event, even after the event is over. The stories will be a way of showing your event has had an impact. Showcase media coverage on your website, fundraising page, in email correspondence, etc. If you do your event again, the existing coverage may help you in the next round of fundraising or media outreach. Journalists often react well to seeing how a story has been covered in the past so that they can envision their own approach.
We love seeing the results of your hard work and letting others in the PH community know of your successes, so share your victories with PHA! Contact Elisabeth Williams at PHAware@PHAssociation.org or 301-565-3004 x753. | <urn:uuid:43718c2c-180b-415a-b89f-bc53b42ecfc6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.phassociation.org/page.aspx?pid=1460&chid=135 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939666 | 1,049 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Posted: Nov 9, 2011 12:02 PM by Russell Jones
Updated: Nov 9, 2011 3:31 PM
WASHINGTON - A fee on Christmas trees that was scheduled to go into effect today has been delayed by the Obama administration, after backlash against the program from organizations who called it a tax.
The program would have charged some growers 15 cents per tree to pay for nationwide advertising that would promote the fresh-cut Christmas tree industry. The fee was requested by the National Christmas Tree Association in 2009 and approved by the Department of Agriculture. It would have been levied against growers that sell 500 or more trees, which would have paid the fee in February.
Yesterday, the conservative Heritage Foundation posted a story calling the program a "tax" on Christmas trees because it assumed the costs would be passed onto consumers.
Today, White House spokesperson Matt Lehrich told ABC News that the Agriculture department delayed implementing the program and would revisit the issue.
News 2's Rachel Frost will have local reaction about the program coming up tonight on News 2 at 6 p.m. | <urn:uuid:b2b4234e-e6d5-453b-87d2-04be0bc606a2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wbrz.com/news/proposed-tree-fee-delayed-by-dept-of-agriculture/ | 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 | 0.972762 | 214 | 1.53125 | 2 |
The most obvious inspection you make will be the first. This can be as simple as taking an initial walk through the property at an open house or an individual showing. This initial inspection will determine your interest in the home. If you decide to purchase the home, sometime before closing you will need to have a detailed inspection of the home. A detailed inspection covers all aspects of the house including all of the home systems and structure elements. Inspections can also be made for radon(RAY-DON), asbestos(ASS-BESS-TUS), lead, and chemicals. You can contact your state's environmental protection office to see if the area you are considering has any history of problems. For more information on types of inspections, contact an inspection or real estate professional. | <urn:uuid:d6a6b6ad-1daa-422a-9de2-e57c4e9c5c5b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newschannel34.com/guides/home/realestate/story/Different-types-of-inspections/2EbEZYoPHEie2CAbYfo1bw.cspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932852 | 154 | 1.75 | 2 |
2nd Byzantium-style building planned by church
The Westside is known for buildings with historic character, but only one so far is in 12th century Byzantium style. That's the distinctively domed sanctuary for the
Saints Constantine & Helen Holy Theophany Orthodox Church at 2770 N. Chestnut St.
Church leaders are planning to add another building in that style (featuring a use of arches and a corrugated tile roof), which will be a dining hall. Although shorter (19 feet at its peak) and without domes, the new facility's 3,220 square feet will actually be more spacious than the 3,068-square-foot sanctuary. In addition to an eating area, the hall will house an accessory kitchen area, restrooms and a small storage space, plans show.
The location will be behind (just west of) the sanctuary. “It should match and complement the existing structure,” commented the church's minister, Father Anthony Karbo, in a recent interview.
The project requires approval from City Planning for what's technically described as a “major amendment to an approved minor development plan” for the property.
The application to the city includes a request for a non-use variance to allow a 20-foot building setback from Mesa Valley Road where 50 feet is required, the church application states. Based on the plans, the setback need is partly caused by the triangular shape of the 1.75-acre property (resulting from the way Mesa Valley Road intersects Chestnut Street).
Closer to that intersection is the original sanctuary - now used primarily for offices and storage, with the basement serving as a dining area - which Saints Constantine & Helen constructed in a 20th century style when it came to the site in 1978.
Currently, when meals are served in the basement, it's a tight squeeze, Karbo said. The Sunday service is particularly significant in this regard. Attendees fast beforehand, so the post-service lunch represents an “earthly meal after the heavenly meal,” he said.
Offering a form of Christianity especially familiar to Eastern Europeans, the church has about 160 regular attendees, the priest said. The sanctuary's main dome, or “globe,” as he defined it, “symbolizes the heavens and eternity.” Inside the church, looking up 46 feet to the top of the globe, a large image of Christ can be seen, while along the walls at successively lower levels are iconographic illustrations of angels, prophets and saints. A fresco project continues to add religiously symbolic paintings to all the interior church walls, Karbo pointed out.
He has been the priest for 14 years. Using patterns from ancient churches in Greece and Russia, he also led the construction of the sanctuary in 2001. In the years since, he has sought out art and objects to develop a building that, on the inside and out, would “look, sound and smell” like the Orthodox churches in eastern Europe, he explained.
Westside Pioneer article | <urn:uuid:25397039-4679-4c4c-8895-59177893e83b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.westsidepioneer.com/Articles/071708/Church.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947927 | 631 | 1.84375 | 2 |
James Christian, vice president and head of global corporate security for Novartis, has been tracking down counterfeiters and security leaks for almost two decades. Pharm Exec talks with the security chief to find out what Novartis is doing to secure its supply chain.
So, do you have the fun job?
I have the fun job. The phone rings, and it’s never good news.
It has been a few years now since FDA allowed pharma to test new serialization technology such as RFID. Has it panned out as a security effort?
I don’t personally have much confidence in RFID at all. Back in 2004, the FDA task force was looking for an answer to satisfy Congress and they didn’t really have one. So they came out and said RFID will solve all our problems in a couple of years. And it hasn’t and it won’t. It’s an inventory management tool.
That’s true, but it can be used for tracking and tracing a product through the supply chain.
Other industries have used it and had problems. In some instances RFID had about a 30 percent failure rate. What we have to realize is high tech does not mean high security. Everybody thinks that if it’s data-based, computer-based, high tech then it’s going to be high security and that often is not the case. So, I think we’re looking for something that is not available yet.
So, how do you prove that your drugs are indeed your drugs? Are you looking at on-dosage security?
There’s a number of things coming down the line but you still have to take a pill, a capsule, a tablet and you take it into the lab and you destroy it and after you’ve destroyed it you say, “Yeah, that pill capsule or tablet was genuine.” It doesn’t mean the other [drugs] in the same container are. One of the famous counterfeit cases in the US was with Lipitor, where the genuine product from the UK was mixed with counterfeit product from Latin America. One day you were taking a counterfeit product and one day you were taking a genuine product.
I’ve heard testimony from congressmen and senators saying we can have somebody on the Canadian border and they can reach in and take a sample or do a field test and then if that’s okay then the truckload can come in, and that’s ludicrous. Even a field test doesn’t tell you anything because maybe about 20 percent of the counterfeiting has the active ingredient but they generally have it in the wrong dose.
What is the main strategy right now from pharma to make sure things are secure technology-wise or non-technology-wise?
Technology-wise you have to monitor what’s out there. You have to listen to what people have. You have to sit through some God-awful presentations so that you’re familiar with what’s available, what’s coming online, and what has potential.
What security strategies is Novartis using?
We have a multi-pronged approach. Wherever there’s a counterfeit problem, even if it’s not our products, we try and develop some intelligence sources. And we monitor what the other companies are doing and the problems they’re having because if somebody’s having a problem in a particular country, we can guess that we’re going to have a problem eventually.
We develop contacts with the law enforcement, the regulatory and the health authorities so that we’re not strangers when we walk in the door when there is an issue. In addition to that, we’re trying to support the judiciary all the way through because the worst thing that a company can do is walk away after the arrest or the seizures and not worry about the prosecution. So we try and hold their hands through the whole process. We had a major case in the Middle East recently and we got them convicted after a major effort and everybody’s congratulating themselves and then [the criminals] got three month sentences.
Are counterfeit drugs a financial problem for Novartis?
It’s not a financial issue for us, but it could become one. One guy [from another drug company] stood up at a meeting and said, “This product of ours is a $5 billion product of which we have $1.7 billion and the counterfeiters have the rest.” Obviously, they have a health problem but they also have a severe financial issue.
Is there a primary area that pharma is still having a tough time with?
Well, obviously the biggest problem is China because they’re making products that pop up all over the world. The China stuff appears virtually everywhere and a lot of it’s going off on the Internet.
There’s an ongoing case now where [seven products from five major companies] were manufactured in China, shipped by truck into Hong Kong, flown to Dubai, held in a duty-free area in Dubai, and then shipped to the Bahamas via London Heathrow. The product was used to fill prescriptions that were ordered over the Internet from a Canadian Web site. Then they just bulk ship it back to the UK, break it down, and then ship [the product] individually to the US.
Have you seen a spike in counterfeit sales since the Internet became more prevalent?
Oh, absolutely. Back in 2004 when Giuliani was running his consulting business his group went out to Kennedy airport and out to Dallas airport with Customs and FDA and they found that both airports were getting about 40,000 packages a day that contained some kind of medical product. They opened 1,500 in both locations and found that 86 percent of them were illegal in the US.
What people are taking and what people are getting sick and dying from, you don’t know. One of the congressmen said, “Where are all the bodies in Canada?” Well, you wouldn’t know them if they were there. And we don’t know them here for the most part. Usually people die of the disease they had, whether it’s heart disease, hypertension, cancer, or whatever. The family comes back from the funeral home and takes the unused prescription drugs and dumps them down the toilet. So you don’t really know what the numbers are.
Is the US supply chain as safe as it has every been?
There’s some wheeling and dealing going around and there are distributors who, to save a half cent on a dose, will buy products from unknown sources. Overall, you go to the pharmacy, you’re 99.9 percent assured right now. But there’s constant moves in Congress to change things and to allow a lot of [drugs] to flow in from the outside and that’s a very dangerous thing to do.
Small Caribbean islands were ordering 50,000 doses or something when they had 10,000 citizens and it was sold at 80 percent off and then they sit in the hot sun on a dock on the island for two months and then come back in [to the US], virtually worthless. But they were accepted by Customs as American goods returned. | <urn:uuid:e58acc5f-2e09-4f2b-92f0-4fac64ca5557> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pharmexec.com/pharmexec/Article/Security-Spotlight-QampA-with-James-Christian-Nova/ArticleStandard/Article/detail/571251?contextCategoryId=45283 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971216 | 1,518 | 1.75 | 2 |
As I drove away in the dusky light, I kept seeing the tailored rows of graves, those tiny repositories of stories that are hardly remembered, all those sad and broken boys resting in the velvet lawn of St. Mihiel, forever. Almost one hundred years of resting there, enough time to be forgotten, the lives that continued after theirs ended having now filled up the space that opened up when they died, so their absence now has been lacquered over, smoothed out, almost invisible.
What lasts? What lingers? What is snagged by the brambles of time, and what slips through and disappears? What leaves only a little dent in the world, the soft sunken green grave, the scribble on a scrap of paper, the memory that is bleached by time and then vanishes bit by bit each day?
Could it be that we fill out our lives, experience all that we experience, and then simply leave this world and are forgotten? I can't bear thinking that existence is so insubstantial, a stone thrown in a pond that leaves no ripple. Maybe all that we do in life is just a race against this idea of disappearing. Having children, making money, doing good, being in love, building something, discovering something, inventing something, learning something, collecting something, knowing something: these are the pursuits that make us feel like our lives aren't flimsy, that they build up into stories that are about something achieved, grown, found, built, loved, or even lost.
I appreciated Orlean's musings on this topic of what lingers, what lasts, and the substance of life. Her thoughts ask questions some of us answer, to some extent, by searching for our ancestors, by recording our family history, by writing our own memories, by keeping journals. Many of us wish that so much more had been snagged by the brambles of time. We’d have an easier go of discovering and making sense of the lives of those who came before us. For me, family history is about remembering those who have gone before, about noticing the ripples that circle from their lives to mine.
No, our lives are not flimsy or insubstantial. I believe the substance of our lives is this: the things we do and experience will affect us and others with whom we come in contact. Our experiences, along with the things we learn, become part of who we are – in fact, shape who we are – and will go with us through eternity. For me, life is not a race against disappearing. If it's a race at all, it's a race about becoming better than I was yesterday, about doing something positive and worthwhile whether anyone else remembers or not (though it is pleasant to be remembered). One day in the near or distant future my body, too, will rest under a velvet lawn and though my mortal life will have ended, the substance of my life will continue in another sphere. | <urn:uuid:e33a8cfd-461d-4b4f-be41-7e3a361bd39f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://nancysfamilyhistoryblog.blogspot.com/2012/02/what-is-snagged-by-brambles-of-time.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972368 | 608 | 1.75 | 2 |
Blog Posts by Forbes.com
By Susan Adams
You probably get a little nervous before you go into a job interview. Even if you've copiously prepped, you figure the interviewer will hold all the cards. She knows everything about her company and the job you want, and she's got a vision of the perfect employee that doesn't exactly describe you.
Not so, says David Couper, a Los Angeles career and executive coach and the author of Outsiders on the Inside: How to Create a Winning Career ... Even When You Don't Fit In. In reality, most interviewers are ill-prepared and distracted, he says. "They usually just wing it based on their own experience."In Pictures: 10 Job Interview Myths Debunked
1. The interviewer is prepared.
At one interview of a potential sales staffer, Couper was called in at the last minute because another human resources manager had canceled and three bodies were required at the interview table. "I hadn't seen the applicant's résumé," he recalls. "I didn't even know what the job was."
Another time Read More »from Job Interview Myths Debunked
- Forbes.com | Work + Money – Thu, Oct 13, 2011 6:44 PM EDT
By Jacquelyn SmithRead More »from Big Mistakes Job Seekers Make and How to Avoid Them
There are a lot of ways you can go wrong during your job search. You can fail to devote enough time to it, but you can also get so involved you become isolated from family and friends. Those are among the most common mistakes job seekers make, according to a 2010 study published in the Academy of Management Journal.
Three researchers, Connie Wanberg, Jing Zhu and Edwin A. J. van Hooft, wrote a paper titled "The Job-Search Grind: Perceived Progress, Self-Reactions, and Self-Regulation of Search Effort." The study also found that signs of progress can make you relax too much and that you should diversify your search tactics.
In Pictures: Big Mistakes Job Seekers Make and How to Avoid Them
The three scholars asked 233 participants to complete a baseline survey and then follow up online every Monday through Friday for three weeks. Participants tracked their emotions, the time they dedicated to their job search and the level of confidence they felt about finding an
By Forbes StaffRead More »from How to Get More Done at Work
If you're reading this article instead of calling a client or crunching a spreadsheet, chances are you could be more focused at work. You're not alone.
According to a recent survey by Salary.com, the average employee admits to wasting about two hours of each eight-hour workday, not including
lunch or scheduled breaks.
The Internet doesn't help. Like the college roommate who keeps asking us to hang out when we know we have to study, the Web (and e-mail) provide so much distraction on a minute-by-minute, hour-by-hour basis that we can find it nearly impossible to give our full attention to higher-level tasks. And with few defined edges to many projects, we end up living in an endless jumble of work and life. We can book a trip to Turkey while participating in a conference call; we can send work e-mails from a towel on the beach in Cancun.
As the economy ebbs along with our focus, we have more to do and less time to do it. Enter the productivity experts. Their guru is
The best years of life are also among the most expensive. Choose with care.
Our annual ranking of the 650 best undergraduate institutions focuses on the things that matter the most to students: quality of teaching, great career prospects, graduation rates and low levels of debt. Unlike other lists, we pointedly ignore ephemeral measures such as school "reputation" and ill-conceived metrics that reward wasteful spending. We try and evaluate the college purchase as a consumer would: Is it worth spending as much as a quarter of a million dollars for this degree? The rankings are prepared exclusively for Forbes by the Center for College Affordability and Productivity, a Washington, D.C. think tank founded by Ohio University economist Richard Vedder.
For the second year in a row, Williams College, a small, western-Massachusetts liberal arts school, has been named as the best undergraduate institution in America. With totalRead More »from America's Top Colleges 2011
Tech-savvy singles abound in these metros.
There's lots to do if you're single and live in Boston. You can search for your soulmate at one of the area's 70 museums or 200 art galleries. Go buy someone a drink at a bar in a hip neighborhood like Jamaica Plain. Or mingle with Red Sox fans at Fenway Park.
It turns out, though, that Bean Town singles who are serious about dating might be best served staying home and turning on their computer. Boston is the best city in America for online dating, according to data provided by OkCupid, a free matching service. They analyzed their 1.51 million active users to find the cities where the highest percentage of the adult population had active profiles on the site within the last year.
Boston's bustling student presence is one reason it scores high for online dating, says Sam Yagan, cofounder and CEO of OKCupid. Metropolitan Boston is home to more than 50Read More »from The Best Cities for Online Dating
The best public and private colleges and universities, from the student's point of view.
The best college in America isn't in Cambridge or Princeton, West Point or Annapolis. It's nestled in the Berkshire Mountains. Williams College, a 217-year-old private liberal arts school, tops our third annual ranking of America's Best Colleges. Our list of more than 600 undergraduate institutions is based on the quality of the education they provide, the experiences of the students and how much they achieve.
Williams rose to the top spot on our rankings, which are compiled with research from the Center for College Affordability & Productivity, after placing fourth last year and fifth in 2008. It's a small school (just over 2,000 undergrads) with a 7-to-1 student-to-faculty ratio, affording students the chance to really get to know their teachers and have a unique college experience.
In Pictures: America's 50 Best | <urn:uuid:80f5e6fe-2ea4-443c-b884-4d615378f38a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://shine.yahoo.com/blogs/author/ycn-1208713/archive/3.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956872 | 1,325 | 1.609375 | 2 |
“I hope I die before I get old (Talkin’ ’bout my generation)”…
[TotH to Tyler Hellard, aka Pop Loser]
As we prepare to explore the teenage wasteland, we might spare a thought for Sophia Cecelia Kalos (who later became much better known by her stage name, Maria Callas); she died on this date in 1977. The pre-eminent bel canto soprano of the Twentieth Century, Callas was known by her legion of fans as “La Divina,” (“The Goddess”), a superlatively-specific appropriation of the approbation reserved by opera aficionados for the very finest female singers. The term “diva” (while it dates back to the late Nineteenth Century as a descriptor of a “fine lady”), emerged among Callas’ following as a shorthand for “divina”– making her the first singer who was a diva. | <urn:uuid:90521097-d1e2-4764-884d-06274316301f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://roughlydaily.com/2012/09/16/i-hope-i-die-before-i-get-old-talkin-bout-my-generation/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960193 | 215 | 1.8125 | 2 |
The Kenyan economy is growing and demand for skilled human resources is on the rise. At the same time poverty is preventing many young people from getting basic education. Hatua's goal is to help young people from poor families gain the skills and credentials they need to contribute to and benefit from Kenya's growing economy.
A student from a poor family might never be able to attend secondary school because of the cost of school fees and will therefore never have access to higher paying jobs that require a secondary school diploma. But with a scholarship from Hatua Likoni, weekly mentoring, career guidance, followed by a college/university scholarship, this student has a chance to enter the workforce or become an entrepreneur.
Our team is mostly Kenyan and all residents of Likoni, so we are knowledgeable about Likoni and the kinds of programs that are needed and will be effective. We also make decisions at a local level, enabling us to involve those affected by our choices in the decision making process. These advantages help us create programs that empower our neighbors to pursue their goals and provide for themselves and their families while helping to uplift our community. | <urn:uuid:048521b3-8a56-481b-b6e8-96e928dd7eaa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.hatualikoni.org/hatua/hatua_likoni/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972664 | 229 | 1.75 | 2 |
Not Feeling the Glow?
How to cope when you don't love being pregnant
Don’t be afraid to ask for help>
Many pregnant women think they don’t have a right to ask for help for their discomforts. Nina Hernandez, 32, of Los Angeles downplayed the severity of her migraines when she mentioned them to her doctor, and she was dismissive about the fainting spells and nausea she was experiencing. “I just thought, ‘Well, everybody goes through this. Legions have done this before me, and many more will follow. What right do I have to complain?’”
When she began experiencing discomfort in her lower abdomen, Hernandez decided to tell her doctor. “He told me it was caused by the weight of the baby on my pelvis and that it was perfectly normal, which really put my mind at ease,” she says. “He reassured me that nothing was wrong.”
You don’t have to be a martyr for your baby. If any of your pregnancy symptoms are painful, tell your doctor. “A healthy and happy mother is what’s crucial to the development of a baby,” Robbins says. “And rest assured that doctors won’t prescribe anything that is harmful to your baby.”
Focus on your baby>A few reminders can help you keep your perspective and look forward to the happiness that’s to come:
Focus on the positive Kerns and her husband have developed games to help her through the difficult times: They talk about their favorite memories from childhood and enjoy the anticipation of creating them for their baby. They also imagine what kind of personality and looks their baby will have. “We try to look at things both forward and backward,” she says.
Get a glance of what’s to come Kerns has found that the most effective tactic is to visit moms with new babies. “It’s been really helpful to see them and hear them say it was all worth it,” she says.
Educate your partner Inform your spouse about the physical and emotional difficulties that may arise in pregnancy so he is prepared to support you if they occur. “If you feel isolated, it increases stress and the physical symptoms become worse,” Patterson says.
Go easy on yourself If you find yourself wishing you weren’t pregnant, it doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be a bad mother. As Patterson says: “It’s not a sign of disturbance unless it persists.”
>>>find out more
Whether it’s caused by physical symptoms run amok or another factor, many women suffer from the blues during pregnancy. Here are a few resources to help you if you’re feeling down.
> Beyond the Blues: A Guide to Understanding and Treating Prenatal and Postpartum Depression, by Shoshana S. Bennett and Pec Indman (Moodswings Press, 2003) | <urn:uuid:186b77e9-389b-4bf4-82ed-7054cac25d1c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fitpregnancy.com/pregnancy/health/not-feeling-glow?page=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973915 | 626 | 1.539063 | 2 |
by Jeet Heer
Friday, February 18, 2011
Gary Groth twitted: “The greatest artists who worked n commercial comics? My vote (in order); Carl Barks, Jack Kirby & Harvey Kurtzman (tie), John Stanley.” The list seems on target but the ranking can be argued with. These are all superb cartoonists and as such, their writing/art needs to be seen as an integrated whole. Still, some of them are stronger on the writing front, others as visual artists. And of course Stanley, Kirby and Kurtzman all did a lot of collaborative work, including some of their best work.
So if I were ranking them as visual artists I’d say Kirby, Kurtzman, Barks, Stanley. If I were ranking them as writers I’d say Stanley, Kurtzman, Barks, Kirby. But what if writing and art can’t be separated? What if I had to rank them simply as cartoonists? A really tough choice. Purely a personal matters but I’d say Stanley, Kirby, Kurtzman, Barks. But that’s a ranking that could easily change at the drop of a hat. Fun factoid: three of these cartoonists (Stanley, Barks, Kurtzman) were doing their best work at the exact same time, circa 1950-1955. That was the real Golden Age of commercial comics. | <urn:uuid:48ebab8b-cd1e-4d14-a93a-7b6e052d1608> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://comicscomicsmag.com/author/jeetheer/page/2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973072 | 293 | 1.523438 | 2 |
My definition of Easter would be a superstitious ritual that has no place in modern times. Whats your definition?
Week long vacation, lots of fun in pools and beaches and relax in the middle of the year!
I love the idea of chocolate rabbits and bilbies and eggs usurping the story of a bloke nailed, tortured, on a cross. Eating chocolate is much more fun.
We atheists often subvert the religious holidays to something non-religious. For example, I think the idea of a time of year to reconnect with family through gift-giving is, overall, a good idea. So, yes, I celebrate Xmas (as opposed to Christmas). I don't pay a lot of attention to Easter, though, except that I have grandkids, so colorful cookies, chocolate bunnies, etc., but no catechism.
I think it is the same as all the other similar holidays.As an open Atheist people often ask me why i still celebrate Christmas and my answer is always the same, Christianity has a habit of squatting on good things sourrounding and pre-dating it. Mid-winter celebrations long out live christianity. Christmas trees too (they were pagan) and just because i am an atheist does not (contrary to what many religious people will tell you) make me immoral. Why would i not want to spend time with my family, see the joy on their faces when we switch gifts. I go against religion because of the evil it spreads, but there is a lot of good in there too that is not religious but has been adopted by them, we shouldn't throw the baby out with the bath water. Easter, like christmas is no longer a religious holiday, it is (generally) about chocolate and easter egg hunts and time to spend off work with family. Lets get rid of the evil in religion, not the good parts(Interesting book on the subject: Religion for Atheists: Alain de Botton.[don't be put off by by the title, it is an atheist book!)
isnt it a wiccan or at least pagan holliday celebrating their god Esther who is the god of fertility in the wiccan religion i think, which is where the bunnies and eggs come from, however my definition is just another excuse to get people to buy stuff they dont need, much like every other hallmark holiday.
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Started by Mercedes in Welcome to Think Atheist. Last reply by archaeopteryx 8 minutes ago.
Posted by Robert Karp on May 21, 2013 at 10:34am
June 29, 2013 to June 30, 2013 – Dublin, Ireland
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For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
Note 6 at Ro 8:2: Ro 7:15-24 describes the hopelessness of those attempting to overcome the law (see note 5 at Ro 7:23) of sin and death in their own ability or holiness (see note 1 at Ro 7:15). But Ro 8, and specifically this verse, brings people the good news that what could not be done by human effort has been done through the power of the Holy Spirit. Christians are no longer slaves to the law of sin and death.
According to Ro 6:23, death is the wages of sin (see note 3 at Ro 6:23). Therefore, this phrase, "the law of sin and death," is referring to the influence of sin and the resulting wages of that sin. Another way of saying "the law of sin and death" is "the law that when we sin, we receive death instead of life" or "when we sin, we reap the curse instead of the blessing."
De 28:1-14 lists the blessings that come if we keep the whole Law. De 28:15-68 lists all the curses that come as the wages of not keeping the Law. Because the law of the Spirit of life has set us free from the law of sin and death, we no longer reap De 28:15-68, even though we haven't kept every precept of the Law. Christ redeemed us from these curses of the Law (Ga 3:13). Praise God that we don't have to receive the wages of sin, which is death.
Not only have we been redeemed from the curses of De 28:15-68, but also, through Jesus, we have the righteousness of the Law fulfilled in us (see note 9 at Ro 8:4) so that the blessings of De 28:1-14 are now ours. So, through Christ, we receive what we don't deserve (the blessings of De 28:1-14), and we don't receive what we do deserve (the curses of De 28:15-68). | <urn:uuid:22ab9574-df35-4f46-b9ed-b57ec1083408> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.awmi.net/bible/rom_08_02 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942182 | 441 | 1.804688 | 2 |
Determine Whether a Social Media Post Is Protected by the NLRA
- Employers must be aware that an employee's social media posting (Facebook, Twitter) may constitute protected activity under the National Labor Relations Act. Even though the employee's posting may be seen by all "friends" including non co-workers, the posting may constitute protected activity if it addresses a term or aspect of employment and is read by fellow employees on the social media site.
- If an employer permits employees to use social media sites on employer equipment and on employee property, it is likely the employer may not prohibit employees from using such sites to send pro-union messages.
- Employers may argue against the protected aspect of the social media posting by showing that it was malicious, reckless false or an individual complaint rather than a complaint on behalf of his fellow co-workers. As this is an ever-evolving issue, employers are advised to seek counsel as every posting will be unique and will require an appropriate response. | <urn:uuid:4ccc19ac-aeed-4270-95b2-6089b553357c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.xperthr.com/tasks/determine-whether-a-social-media-post-is-protected-by-the-nlra/6292/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950082 | 202 | 1.648438 | 2 |
There are 191 articles in this category.
Two-time Olympian Chad Vaughn details four areas of focus if you really want to add weight to your snatch and clean and jerk.
Most athletes dive into the Olympic lifts without considering what really allows someone to lift the heaviest loads and move efficiently through high-rep workouts.
I have four keys to lifting the heaviest weights and moving well in the snatch and clean and jerk. They… Continue Reading
Alongside CrossFit Media’s Carey Peterson, two-time Olympian Chad Vaughn dissects his 315-lb. clean and jerk via slow-motion footage.
“Really the same for the snatch,” he says of his set-up. “I’ve just locked myself in here. I’m looking at the tension in the back, the back-angle maintenance, the shins coming back out of the way.”
With the shins vertical as the bar passes the knees, the clean becomes easier, says… Continue Reading
May 01, 2013
Pull it higher or pull yourself under? Bob Takano explains how to get under heavy bars fast.
There are two components involved in getting a bar overhead or up to the shoulders from the ground.
The most commonly conceptualized component is to lift the weight up to the required height. The second component is to lower the body under the bar. In the sport of weightlifting, both components are combined simultaneously by… Continue Reading
Chad Vaughn repeatedly tells Kayla Baumgardner to get comfortable in the bottom of her overhead squat.
Vaughn, a two-time Olympian, can tell being so low is an unfamiliar position for the 22-year-old, who is scheduled to compete at the Northern California Regional this year.
April 14, 2013
Bob Takano recommends five drills perfect for anyone learning the snatch and the clean and jerk.
If we think of drills as exercises or activities performed to learn and refine technique, then it is appropriate to discuss those exercises, but it’s more important to know how and when to implement them into the technique training of a weightlifter.
It is perfectly natural and normal for many coaches to address their own… Continue Reading
In B.C., Canada, 71-year-old Dieter Stamm invests in the sport of weightlifting and the young athletes he coaches.
It’s a Saturday morning at Semiahmoo High School in White Rock, B.C.
It looks like an ordinary day at a weightlifting club. A dozen or so athletes, aged 9 to 25, are cleaning and snatching in a very unspectacular, almost beat-up weight room. The white walls are nearly barren, the weights… Continue Reading
Alongside CrossFit Media’s Carey Peterson, two-time Olympian Chad Vaughn dissects his 285-lb. snatch via slow-motion footage.
As he settles into his start position for his heaviest snatch of the day, he’s thinking three things: build tension in the back, feel the shoulders in front of the bar, and be aggressive on the extension. As he takes a deep breath and locks in his back, he feels the tension he’s created, he says.
“My… Continue Reading
March 24, 2013
Bill Starr explains the technique for the Olympic-style press, which helped set records but ultimately ushered the lift out of competition.
In the ’60s, Tony Garcy of the York Barbell Club invented a technical style of pressing that required a high degree of timing, quickness, coordination and—most of all—balance. Previously, Olympic lifters used brute strength to elevate their presses. Tony’s version was a high-skill movement… Continue Reading | <urn:uuid:5c291fe6-e73f-4494-a343-2c6278077d40> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://journal.crossfit.com/olympic-lifts/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938557 | 778 | 1.507813 | 2 |
No. Paul was advocating kicking him out of the Church, not killing him.
The fact that it means to kick the person out of the Church is clarified in verse 12: (Emphasis added.)
12 What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are
you not to judge those inside? 13 God will judge those outside. “Expel
the wicked person from among you.”
The way I understand it is this: The idea is to not turn a blind eye to sin, but to confront it and deal with it, particularly within the body of the Church. To turn a blind eye to sin does nothing but encourage it. To confront it and make it clear that it is not to be tolerated within the Church is better, because it forces the sinner to either acknowledge the sin and repent, or leave the Church, where they will not pollute it further.
A person cannot repent if they are put to death, so this clearly cannot be stating that we are to put the sinner to death.
There is a nice version of this verse here that clarifies the meaning of the original Greek word that is translated as "the flesh". Due to language difference and cultural differences, the original meaning often gets lost in translation.
1 Corinthians 5:5 In contexts like this, the Greek word for flesh
(sarx) refers to the sinful state of human beings, often presented as
a power in opposition to the Spirit. | <urn:uuid:aa60397f-63af-468d-a950-c32859a2ea60> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://christianity.stackexchange.com/questions/3498/was-paul-advocating-killing-a-man-because-of-sexual-immorality/3500 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956444 | 302 | 1.742188 | 2 |
'Basketball Pyramid': David Huffman's mixed-media piece is among the drawings on exhibit at the di Rosa.
By Brett Ascarelli
'There's a lot of young blood tonight!" gushes a staff member at the di Rosa Preserve's opening of "Graphic: New Bay Area Drawing." Later, I ask another staff member about the evening's hipster quotient.
"Well, with this kind of show . . ."
"Yeah," she answers.
Enough said. Indeed, drawing is the hip, young thing of the art world, forging its own trail in the last decade among its more august cousins, painting and sculpture. Last year, Art News devoted its entire January issue to drawing, and even the most important international art fairs have been crammed with simple media like pencil and pen.
Bay Area artists have turned out a variety of drawings for the di Rosa exhibit. One pen, gouache and watercolor repeats tiny patterns that resemble rice grains falling from one Smurf's hat into another. Further on, a dark landscape of ink splatters, skeletal trees and orange basketballs references the modern baroque style of a recent Urban Outfitters ad campaign.
Looking at the iconic, flat and insanely precise works, one is reminded of modern Japanese, American and Swedish commercial aesthetic sensibilities. But this is art, not design. Or is it?
Michael Schwager, di Rosa curator and progenitor of this newest exhibit, stands apart from the food table. This is the second drawing exhibit he's curated since works in this medium wowed him at the Art Basel: Miami Beach art fair in November 2005. What's driving the aesthetic?
"Cartooning and graphic novels are a huge influence, I think, on a generation of twenty- to forty-somethings," says Schwager. "A more informal way of making an image, like cartoons, is becoming more accepted, whereas in the '50s, most artists worked towards making huge, abstract expressionist paintings.
"It's very different today. There's a different aesthetic goal in mind; every generation is different. Pop art commented on consumer society; the '80s drew on art history. The influences of today are often in popular culture," says Schwager.
Nevertheless, he cautions, "these artists have much more aesthetic concerns than graphic design. The work comes from a more personal place or from popular culture."
In fact, Schwager clarifies that the word "graphic" in the show's title has "no relation to graphic design, whatsoever--I was just thinking graphic in terms of images on paper."
Dean Smith, 45, has two large-scale drawings in the show. The drawings look like staggered starbursts filled in with thousands of teensy strokes. The pattern they make is not dissimilar to the hairs of his salt-and-pepper beard, only more numerous. Like his drawings, Smith's personal aesthetic tonight is monochromatic.
"The works are centering devices: centering one's attention, consciousness and perception," says Smith, who stopped painting about 12 years ago to focus on drawing.
Are there any pop cultural influences on his work?
"Absolutely zero!" he responds hotly.
But pop culture seeps into our psyches, and it reaches us through the catchy branding of design. Today's ubiquitous icons can't help but rub off onto artist's pads, even if the artists don't admit it.
Artist Ala Ebtekar does admit it--and happily. His digital prints of cartoony warriors are a highlight of the show. To make them, he scans his original drawings, then works on them with Flash and Adobe Illustrator. The resulting images are Transformer-like men carrying traditional heroic attributes--and hip-hop gear.
In an e-mail from Paris, where Ebtekar is currently staying, he describes why he chose his computer aesthetic. "Most importantly, [these pieces are] really a reflection of NOW," he writes. "I could have used the medium I am more familiar with--in my case, drawing or painting--but after coming up with the idea of what I wanted these characters to be, and how I wanted them to be read, using the computer as a tool to convey that seemed only obvious. I think that sleekness, and the idea that they could be mass-made (and not a one-of-a-kind art object), is something that appealed to me."
As current trends in graphic design incorporate handmade typefaces, scribbles and crafts, art itself is doing the reverse. Graphic design is finally coming home to roost--boosting the art form that created them.
'Graphic: New Bay Area Drawing' is on view through Wednesday, March 10, at the Gatehouse Gallery in the di Rosa Preserve, 5200 Carneros Hwy., Napa. 707.226.5991. For complete details on the Preserve, go to www.dirosapreserve.org.
Museums and gallery notes.
Reviews of new book releases.
Reviews and previews of new plays, operas and symphony performances.
Reviews and previews of new dance performances and events. | <urn:uuid:cca8f702-5d0d-4e5e-b6b5-539fadfb65cf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bohemian.com/northbay/art-imitates-design/Content?oid=2181478 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956911 | 1,081 | 1.632813 | 2 |
RMS Rhone, BVIsThe RMS Rhone is one of the most popular wreck dives in the British Virgin Islands. Photograph by Jeff Yonover.
My Ann, British Virgin Islands
A bloom of saucer-shaped moon jellyfish is bobbing near the water’s surface when we giant stride in off West Dog Island — my photographer buddy settles underneath the jellies; he’s trying to capture their delicate, translucent domes gorgeously lit by sunlight. Then we descend — we’re on our way to Joe’s Cave, a triangular opening in the rock face of the island. A bit of surge greets us as we enter, but it’s worth the two-kicks-forward, one-kick-back finning we do to reach a small chamber that is often filled with glassy sweepers. If it’s just you and your buddy, it makes for a perfect Instagram moment, and you’ll get another photo op once you turn to exit. Light rays filtering down from the crack in the cave’s ceiling illuminate the coral-encrusted walls, and huge boulders are scattered along the bottom. It’s pretty magical.
Outside the cave is a shallow reef known for its intricate underwater topography, like many other sites in the BVI that we’ve been diving from the luxury crewed sailing yacht My Ann. In fact, after we snorkel and poke around at the Baths, a world-famous maze of colossal granite boulders that form grottoes and pools on a Virgin Gorda beach, we realize that many BVI dive sites are submerged versions of this geologic wonder.
Mainly arrayed on either side of the protected waters of Sir Francis Drake Channel, these emerald islands are beloved by yachties for their sail-billowing trade winds, easy-to-navigate waters and scenic anchorages. For divers, sites in the BVI are as varied as the variety of blues found in the Caribbean — lush coral gardens on sloping reefs and mini walls, seamounts that rise from the seafloor, and an underwater armada of sponge- and coral-covered wrecks.
Maybe best of all: I get to experience both sailing and diving aboard My Ann. One photo of the gleaming catamaran was all it took for me to sign up for this unique, all-inclusive live-aboard experience offered by the Moorings, a company that has a fleet of motorboats and sailboats, and specializes in arranging bareboat (skipper-your-own) or crewed vacations. I am doing the latter — both crew members are PADI Instructors who combine cooking gourmet meals, sailing to secluded coves, handing out fluffy towels and mixing Painkillers (a concoction of rum, pineapple juice, orange juice and cream of coconut), and giant-striding in as divemasters on the best sites the BVI has to offer, including formations like Thumb Rock, wrecks like the Rhone off Salt Island and shallow reefs like Cistern Point.
You work hard for your vacation dollars, so why not splurge and treat yourself to a little pampered luxury? — Patricia Wuest
For More Info >> My Ann | <urn:uuid:5c56b930-9fb0-4687-b6a0-fbdf5d99bcc5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sportdiver.com/getaways-caribbean-live-aboards?page=0,1&pnid= | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937795 | 679 | 1.625 | 2 |
When are you too old to be a programmer?
As an old guy, my perspective is skewed. That’s OK; all of our perspectives on all issues are skewed by who we are. But is there an answer that ‘makes sense’?
According to a new study, older people might actually make better programmers than younger ones. This is a seismic shift in the way the topic has long been discussed, and in conflict with something I asked about a few years ago; might older people be too set in their ways to use SmartPhones? | <urn:uuid:85e7ae74-ba94-468f-b5e1-381a8fb01510> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://answerguy.com/tag/programming/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966374 | 114 | 1.671875 | 2 |
- Life Style
On 30 June, President Mohamed Morsy was attending a ceremony organized by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces at the Central Military Area, also known as Hike Step, to celebrate the handover of power to Egypt’s elected leader. At roughly the same time, Egypt’s national football team was playing against the Central African Republic, in a crucial match to determine whether Egypt would qualify for the Africa Cup of Nations, to be held in South Africa in 2013.
However, Egypt’s national team, commonly dubbed the Pharaohs, was unable to qualify for the tournament after the two teams drew 1-1. In order to qualify, Egypt needed to win by two goals, after it had lost to the same team 3-2 at home in June.
The national team’s failure to qualify was rather disregarded by a media once obsessed with the most popular sport in the country. For sports media, normally accustomed to reveling in criticizing the national team and its coaches, to receive the news with such apathy was odd to many.
That attention fell to politics rather than to football stands in stark contrast with the February 2006 drowning of Al-Salam ferry in the Red Sea, which cost 1,100 passengers their lives and was associated with regime corruption. That accident also coincided with Egypt’s hosting of the Africa Cup.
“At the time of that catastrophe, state media rearranged the public’s priorities through unprecedented, extensive propaganda for the championship, urging high turnout at stadiums. So the state managed to diminish public attention to the incident,” says Emad Shahin, professor of political science at the American University in Cairo.
With today’s more dynamic political scene now taking the attention away from the game, questions are being raised about the level of distraction once engineered by the regime.
“The balance is being reset. The former regime used some sources of entertainment, such as football, to ensure people were distracted from politics and allow them to transfer their need for political affiliation, to an Islamist or leftist party for example, to certain football teams, such as Ahly and Zamalek,” Shahin says.
Ayman Abou Ayed, head of the sports department at the state-owned newspaper Al-Ahram, says Egypt’s national team played four official matches over the past few weeks that were all overshadowed by the presidential election.
The busy political landscape has also outshone the team’s declining performance. Egypt, which has won the Africa Cup of Nations seven times, has not achieved a single football success over the 18 months of the interim period following the 25 January revolution.
Egypt currently ranks 42nd in the monthly FIFA World Rankings, slipping from a respectable ninth place in July 2010.
Continuous interruptions have marred both the 2010-2011 and 2011-2012 seasons. The former was put on hold for three months following the outbreak of protests in January 2011. The 2011-2012 season started six weeks behind schedule in mid-September. That season came to an abrupt end in February when a match between Ahly and Masry in Port Said left 74 people dead, after clashes between fans of the two clubs.
Prime Minister Kamal al-Ganzouri ordered the dissolution of the Egyptian Football Association (EFA) in the aftermath of the bloody match, appointed a temporary one and called off the league.
The incident turned football into a political conversation, in which the country’s military rulers and their security apparatus were charged with failing to prevent the massacre.
“This was the first time in the history of Egyptian football that victims have fallen after a football match. This match has fanned the flames of conflict between revolutionaries and the SCAF,” says Ayed.
The match sparked protests in Cairo and Port Said that were met with staunch resistance from the security apparatus. Ultras Ahlawy and Ultras White Knights, which support Ahly and Zamalek respectively, staged several marches across Egypt calling for the downfall of the SCAF and accusing it of involvement in the incident.
The protests demonstrated how hardcore football fans were becoming increasingly involved in politics, an issue that the revolution had highlighted since ultras were among the first to take to the streets in January 2011, demanding an end to the repressive practices of the police apparatus.
“The violence that erupted after the [Port Said] match is one of the most important reasons why people have lost interest in football,” Ayed says.
Meanwhile, the Interior Ministry has decided that all official matches for Egypt’s national team and other Egyptian teams be played without spectators until political conditions in the country improve.
Khaled Bayoumy, a football expert, says, “The absence of spectators is one of the reasons why people are apathetic about football. Playing regular matches at the local and African level reflects the restoration of security.”
From sports to politics: The media shifts
In the same way that political interruptions have taken the public’s attention away from football, sports media have followed suit.
After the revolution, all sports talk shows have dedicated at least a segment or more to politics. For one, former presidential candidate Ahmed Shafiq, the last premier under toppled President Hosni Mubarak, appeared on the Modern Sport channel.
Khaled al-Ghandour, a former player for Zamalek in the 1990s and a sports presenter on Dream TV, says certain issues cannot be ignored. Even a sports presenter is interested in commenting on the presidential election, he says.
“It is now necessary for me to allocate at least five minutes of the show’s one hour to politics,” he adds.
The political orientation of football icons has also become central to public opinion, rather than their usual business of sport. Ahly football star Mohamed Abu Treika was one of the first to declare support for a presidential candidate publicly. Abu Treika appeared in a YouTube clip before the first round of elections held in May and announced his support for Morsy. His decision to announce his choice for president left his club in an awkward situation, particularly since Ahly’s TV channel had been broadcasting Shafiq’s campaign commercials for free in support of his bid.
Commenting on Abu Treika’s move, Ghandour said, “Any football star has admirers who may be influenced by his choices. That is why I would have preferred that every player keeps his choice for president secret.”
Meanwhile, the support that Shafiq got from Ahmed Shoubeir, Ahly’s goalkeeper in the 1990s, and Magdy Abdel Ghany, a presenter on Modern Sport and another former Ahly player, also grabbed attention. Both Shoubeir and Abdel Ghany were entrenched in politics before the revolution, being MPs from the formerly ruling National Democratic Party, in 2005 and 2010 respectively.
“Several sports media professionals brown-nosed the former regime by giving the audience a large dose of sport to divert their attention away from politics. Today, the opposite is happening,” says Bayoumy.
Back to normal?
The Interior Ministry on Sunday announced that league matches would not resume for the 2012-2013 season, citing security concerns.
The suspension has cost the league heavily, with losses estimated at LE1.2 billion, according to a report issued by the board of directors of the EFA.
They include an average of LE570 million in annual sums payable by clubs to players, LE210 million in lost sponsorship contracts, LE200 million for TV commercials, and LE270 for contracts with satellite channels that broadcast the tournaments.
Meanwhile, the new EFA elections are due to begin at the end of August. Three electoral lists of candidates are competing for the board and its chairmanship. The first list includes members of the dissolved board, who are considered part of the former regime. The second list comprises footballers who have Islamist orientations and receive the support of the Freedom and Justice Party. The third includes reformists in the field who are associated with neither the old regime nor the increasingly powerful FJP.
This piece was originally published in Egypt Independent's weekly print edition. | <urn:uuid:39f41173-abe5-409f-a014-086505dd2448> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.egyptindependent.com/news/offside-egypt-s-transitional-politics-shows-football-red-card | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974531 | 1,692 | 1.648438 | 2 |
According to the international cosmetics application supplier, the development is the first on the market to provide complete protection of mascara products, 'The package provides preservative protection, and the silica allows for a 40 per cent - 70 per cent reduction in use of petrochemical resins.'
"Creating a mascara that has no preservatives, yet is still safe to use, is revolutionary," says Taiki CEO Jim Perry.
“It made sense to introduce EcoG+ for an eye product as risk of eye infections has a negative impact on mascara sales and some common preservatives can be irritating," he adds.
EcoG+ is said to be a new form of plastic resin, whereby the base can be comprised of many different forms of plastic polymer, then added to a dominant ratio of glass and an antimicrobial agent. When combined successfully and processed, Taiki says the new plastic will kill the majority of bacteria, mold, fungus.
“We have long worked with ionic silver including zeolites as a way to provide antimicrobial protection to plastic, but using this method had little antimicrobial effect until now," company rep, Stacey Calhoun told CosmeticsDesign-Europe.com.
“As the different approaches were shared, it was realized that using a special form of silica and antimicrobial ionic silver achieved the results as an effective antimicrobial resin,” she adds.
Expanding into other areas...
Taiki is also set to introduce EcoG+ in lip gloss tubes, jars and functional containers for make-up and skincare use in other areas of the sector. | <urn:uuid:96601479-6ea8-4dcd-9482-662e4c32d97e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cosmeticsdesign-europe.com/Packaging-Design/Taiki-claims-industry-first-in-resin-that-eliminates-preservatives-in-mascara-formulas | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942413 | 329 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Review to be emailed:
Small White Scar
Audience: 5th Grade - 8th Grade
Will has always had to take care of his twin brother, Denny, who has Down syndrome, while helping out on his family's ranch. They each have a small, white scar on their fingers from the time they became blood brothers, as well as twin brothers. Will loves his brother, but feels that Denny is standing in the way of his dreams. Will runs away to the rodeo, hoping to win some money and get a job as a professional cowboy. However, Denny catches up with Will and won't go back home. While Will is trying to figure out how to get Denny home safely, Denny almost drowns and gets bitten by a rattlesnake. Will and Denny ride to the house of a doctor, who's a friend of their father, where Will learns just how much he has meant to Denny and Denny to him. As for the rodeo and Will's dream for the future, read the book to see if Will is as good as he thinks he is.
Date read: 6/24/2009
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Copyright © 2004-2013 St. Charles Public Library. All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:174d82b1-5e6c-4ae0-b942-adb97fb1a66e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://stcharleslibrary.org/ygtrt/email.asp?BookID=690&returnURL=%2Fygtrt%2Fdefault.asp%3FCategory%3D6%26grs%3D0%26gre%3D9%26Page%3D24 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976689 | 297 | 1.53125 | 2 |
September 13, 2009
If you have teenagers, then you are in for either the best time of your parenting life or the worst! I’m not sure at what age your fun-loving kids turn into hormonal blobs in angry, frustrated, adult-sized bodies with no concept of maturity and the mentality of a ten-year-old, but this can be prevented! The things you do with your kids when they are young will spill over into what they become when they are teenagers, and subsequently when they are adults.
It is so important for both parents to spend real time with kids putting as many opportunities in front of them as humanly possible: sewing, building, cooking, welding, reading, writing, hiking, or any of the million and one real opportunities and adventures our wonderful country has to offer. Keep your kids away from pacifiers for your convenience, such as TV, friends, computers, hand-held electronics, anything that does not require family interaction.
Give a kid a plot of dirt, some shovels, and some string to plant a garden. Take them to the beach and let them feel the breeze in their hair while looking for treasures. Memories from fun activities build the foundation of interests. Make time for your kids, and they won’t go looking for worthless, time-wasting things to do, and they won’t look for love and acceptance in the wrong type of friends! When you build a real foundation for children, they will turn into interested teens!
How many teenagers do you know who have interests in healthy things, or even have any interest at all except in their My Space page? I have met so many teens who look at me with their goat eyes, and after a few words with them I find that they have nothing to look forward to in life. Most of them have been spoiled beyond belief and feel there is almost no hope for a bright future, although I can usually dig deep and bring to the surface a little glimmer of something they were inspired by at some time in their lives.
Be a hero for your child and be interested in everything for them, so they can be inspired by you. Let them know that life is full of endless opportunities, not endless dead ends.
Listen to Dianne's Syndicated National Talk Show: “Everything That Matters Radio Show”
© 2009 Dianne Linderman - All Rights Reserved
For the past 5 years, Dianne Linderman has been a nationally-syndicated talk show host on Radio America with her live, call-in show, “Everything That Matters, In Life, Business, Parenting and Cooking.
Meet Dianne Linderman: A passionate speaker, award-winning author, teacher, counselor, publisher, and serial entrepreneur who believes that simple dynamic parenting can save our country’s kids! “Let’s teach our kids to be entrepreneurial and help give them self-respect and self-reliance and character!” Dianne’s unique, funny and natural personality, innovative business ideas, parenting skills, and simple healthy cooking segments are a hit with her listeners.
Over the past 30-plus years, Dianne, along with her husband and best friend, David has worked as a counselor for troubled teenagers, owned her own restaurants, built a multi-million dollar company, owned a dozen businesses, started a publishing company, helped build a private school, raised two incredible kids, and consulted for large companies. She has also written a series of award-winning children’s books including, “How To Become An Entrepreneurial Kid,” that promote financial literacy and entrepreneurial skills and attitudes for readers of many ages in a time when economic realities demand that kind of savvy and skill set.
Now she is about to launch her own magazine, “Everything That Matters” to accompany her nationally-syndicated radio show. Dianne has appeared on national television, dozens of national radio talk shows, and has been a speaker for the 2004 Republican Convention representing entrepreneurial moms and women.
Dianne lives in Oregon with her husband, David, and their two children, Luke age 14 and Alexandra age 12. Both children have their own businesses.
Web site: www.everythingthatmattersradio.com | <urn:uuid:76baef8d-1ce8-4763-8374-64acb00fb5fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newswithviews.com/Linderman/dianne102.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96092 | 867 | 1.625 | 2 |
SOURCE The European Crop Protection Association (ECPA)
BRUSSELS, March 15, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --
ECPA recommends proportionate, evidence-based approach, as Standing Committee delivers 'no opinion' on neonicotinoids
Member States have failed to reach a qualified majority in a vote potentially leading to a ban on the use of neonicotinoid based pesticides on crops attractive to bees. The European Commission's Appeal Committee will now decide the fate of this important agricultural technology.
Friedhelm Schmider Director General of the European Crop Protection Association commenting after the Standing Committee on the food chain and animal health (SCFCAH) vote:
"ECPA would like to highlight that the proposal to ban neonicotinoids did not receive a qualified majority at the Standing Committee. This shows that Member States are doubtful about the proportionality of the measures proposed by the Commission. The measures would clearly have an impact on expected yield, economic growth and jobs with no improvement on bee health."
"Secondly Member States are aware that scientific evidence from countries where realistic field monitoring was done and risk mitigation measures are implemented showed that neonicotinoids can be safely used without unacceptable effects on bee colonies. The bee health decline is a multifactor problem as recently confirmed by scientists where pesticides are the last of their concerns."
"We fully understand and support concerns over bee health and need to ensure that pesticides do not have any negative impact on them, we believe that the current review process was seriously flawed and that no suspension should have taken effect on this basis."
The current process and the Commission's proposal would have set a very negative precedence in the application of the legal framework set out in Regulation 1107/2009, and contravenes the principles of predictability, consistency proportionality and legal certainty.
"Therefore as an industry we would suggest going for a more risk based approach that would include further risk mitigation measuresand implementation of a comprehensive monitoring to ratify the safety of the products, as data from certain Member States' monitoring has already indicated. This would require a full review of all the available monitoring data" - Friedhelm Schmider continued.
In the meantime, the crop protection industry is willing to collaborate with EU and national authorities to address all the perceived data gaps as well as to continue our investment in stewardship measures to protect pollinators.
"We will continue to work with all relevant stakeholders to understand and develop solutions to the bee health problem" - Friedhelm Schmider concluded.
For online version please follow the link:
NOTES TO EDITORS:
1. Risk Management for bee health, Laddomada, Head of Unit G2 Animal Health, Directorate-General for Health and Consumers
European Commission, Brussels http://www.ebcd.org/pdf/presentation/304-Laddomada.pdf
©2012 PR Newswire. All Rights Reserved. | <urn:uuid:00e5d4f8-9374-4cba-8c41-efcb62129e51> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kxnet.com/story/21652856/european-crop-protection-failure-to-reach-consensus-on-important-pesticides-in-eu-committee-vote | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94143 | 594 | 1.6875 | 2 |
Washington is blocking $53 million in arms sales to Bahrain because of unfulfilled security sector reforms as clashes between riot police and anti-government protesters increase on the eve of the first anniversary of the uprising.
U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland says the Obama administration is concerned about security forces breaking up demonstrators trying to reach Manama’s Pearl Roundabout – the symbolic center of last year’s protests.
“We want to see demonstrators demonstrate peacefully,” she says. “We want to see security forces exercise restraint and operate within the rule of law and international judicial standards.
U.S. officials say the government has taken “some initial steps” to begin implementing the recommendations of the Bahraini Independent Commission of Inquiry into last year’s violence including dissolving the State National Safety Courts and granting greater autonomy to the Inspector General of the Ministry of Interior.
U.S. officials are encouraged by Bahrain’s transfer of investigations and prosecutions of human rights violations from criminal courts to civilian courts and by a memorandum of understanding with ICRC to provide access to detainees.
But those changes do not go far enough to warrant lifting a block on the sale of military equipment that “would significantly enhance their military capacity,” including TOW missiles, Humvees, tear gas, and small arms.
“We are not going to go forward until we see more progress,” Nuland says.
In addition to more extensive security sector reforms, Washington wants to see the reinstatement of workers unfairly dismissed during the unrest, the resolution of ongoing court cases against doctors, journalists, and former lawmakers “which appear to be based, at least, in part on criticism of government action,” and the creation of a media environment conducive to free expression and a free press.
Vote now and explain in the comments how you think the U.S. relationship with Bahrain should change or reasons it should remain the same.
See February 14 protests unfolding NOW on LULU LIVE.
Scott Stearns is VOA's State Department correspondent. He has worked as the Dakar Bureau Chief, White House correspondent, and Nairobi Bureau Chief since beginning his career as a freelance reporter in the Liberian civil war. He has written for the BBC, UPI, the Associated Press, The Jerusalem Post, and The Economist. Scott has a Bachelors and Masters in Journalism from Northwestern University. | <urn:uuid:6a5af5fb-392d-4371-89de-33df1794ed51> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://middleeastvoices.voanews.com/2012/02/breaking-poll-us-blocking-weapons-sales-to-bahrain-over-lack-of-progress-on-security-reforms/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947538 | 502 | 1.703125 | 2 |
My first post on my journey into wine!
i am determined to learn as much as I can about wine and have been told the way to go about this is by tasting as many wines as possible.....shame.
I have been noticing that when I take the first sip of a wine it tastes very different to a couple of sips later. (This is not because I've drunk lots of it either!)
I find this especially with highly tannic reds. having just opened a bottle of 2007 Bordeaux (after breathing) the first sip is tannic and quite tight. Initial impressions were not good but after 3 more I am really enjoying it.
If at a tasting, how are you supposed to determine which wines are good if you are only taking a sip or two of each one? Will this develop over time?
Wine flavors definitely change when allowed to air out over time. It is the introduction of oxygen that releases flavor, and some reds, especially French, might release some odorous gas that should quickly disperse upon opening. Also, naturally, your palate will adjust to what you've just had. If you drink orange juice before tasting, for instance, your palate will be terribly thrown off for the first couple sips, and will then adjust. You might just need a warm-up, per se.
"Good" is a relative statement that depends on each person's individual palate. What most professional Sommeliers are doing when tasting a wine is to, in essence, to pinpoint quality. They will taste a wine and compare it to past experiences to see how well the wine excels at displaying the characteristics of the grapes, how complex and layered these flavors are, how well the wine displays the terroir of the area in which the grapes are grown. Quality also relies on the skill of the winemaker to showcase those characteristics.
Ἐν οἴνῳ ἀλήθεια
En Vino Veritas
|Powered by Social Strata| | <urn:uuid:d15fc4cf-261f-423e-b682-72e822aa78f3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://forums.winespectator.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/456102303/m/5077009922?r=7027042332 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968541 | 422 | 1.546875 | 2 |
As several hundred protesters threw fire bombs at police and smashed plate glass windows, Pena Nieto marked the return of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, with a 13-point plan heavy on old-party populist handouts but with reforms designed to boost the economy and modernize the education and justice systems.
"México has not achieved the advances that the population demands or deserves," Pena Nieto said in an inaugural speech unusual for its heavy emphasis on policy. "It's time for us together to break the myths and paradigms and all else that has limited our development."
Inaugural events were marred all day by protesters opposed to the return of the PRI after a 12-year hiatus.
Inside and outside the congressional chambers where he took the oath of office, his opponents called his inauguration an "imposition" of a party that ruled for 71 years using a mix of populist handouts, graft and rigged elections. At least four demonstrators and four officers were injured as protesters clashed with tear-gas wielding police, and 65 people were detained.
Vandals smashed windows of stores, banks and a hotel and made bonfires of furniture dragged into the streets. One downtown bank office where all the windows were broken had the words "Welcome Pena" painted across the facade in green.
Pena Nieto countered with a speech full of specifics, from creating an integrated crime prevention program to ending the patronage and buying of teacher positions that rule the public education system.
He said he will put security at the center of all policies for Mexicans and their families and will work to ensure that roads and cities are again "peaceful areas where Mexicans can travel safely without fear of loss of their liberty or life."
Mexico has suffered a spike in violence since outgoing President Felipe Calderon launched an offensive against organized crime upon taking office six years ago. Some 60,000 people have been killed by drug violence since then, according to some estimates. While officials first said most of the victims were involved in organized crime, the killings and kidnapping spread to innocent civilians as drug gangs came to rule entire towns and even parts of some states.
Pena Nieto turned to his usual style of result-oriented governing with the list, having started his term as governor of Mexico State with 608 projects that he promised to complete.
The tone of his speech was conciliatory, an attempt to alleviate fears about a return to the PRI's autocratic past.
"I will respect every voice," he said. "I will run an open government that speaks with honesty, seeks opinion, listens to its citizens ... I will be a president who is close to the people."
Many of his proposals harkened back to the old populist PRI, promising pensions for the elderly, life insurance for single mothers to support their children through college, a program to end hunger and a new system of passenger trains.
Political analyst Jesus Silva-Herzog Marquez marveled at the specificity.
"It was as if the president took a pencil and drew the train route and how much it would cost to Toluca," Silva-Herzog said. "It was very concrete, very practical, zero ideology ... this is Pena Nieto. I think Pena Nieto is not a person who thinks in abstract terms."
Many remain to be convinced.
Before he took the oath of office, leftist congressional members inside the chamber gave protest speeches and hung banners, including a giant one reading "Imposition consummated. Mexico mourns."
"One word sums up Dec. 1: The restoration. The return to the past," said Congressman Ricardo Monreal of the Citizens Movement party.
Pena Nieto, who assumed office at a midnight ceremony at the National Palace, campaigned as the new face of the PRI, repentant and reconstructed after being voted out of the presidency in 2000.
Before his public swearing-in at mid-day, hundreds of opponents banged on tall, steel security barriers around Congress, threw stones, bottle rockets and firecrackers at police and yelled "Mexico without PRI!" Police responded by spraying tear gas from a truck and used fire extinguishers on flames from Molotov cocktails. One group of protesters rammed and dented the barrier with a large truck before being driven off by police water cannons.
"We're against the oppression, the imposition of a person," said Alejandro, 25, a student and protester who wouldn't give his last name, saying he feared reprisals.
"He gave groceries, money and a lot more so people would vote for him," the student added, referring to allegations that the PRI gave voters gifts to encourage them to cast ballots for Pena Nieto.
Protesters trailed the new president from the Congress to the National Palace, shouting, "Murderers, murderers!" and trying to break down the barriers set up in the Zocalo, Mexico City's giant central plaza in front of the palace.
"The president is like Salinas: 'I don't see you, I don't hear you,'" said Aurelio Medina, 64, referring to PRI President Carlos Salinas de Gortari.
Lines of riot police closed down streets around the Fine Arts Palace near where Pena Nieto gave his speech. Police arrested a few protesters who were throwing rocks or pieces of wood. Windows of a Sears departmental store were smashed and its outside walls splashed with white paint.
Despite the protests, the atmosphere inside Congress during the swearing-in ceremony was far less chaotic than six years ago, when a Calderon security unit literally had to muscle him past blockades and protesters to get him into the building so he could take the oath of office after a razor-thin, disputed victory over a leftist candidate.
Associated Press writers Adriana Gomez Licon, Michael Weissenstein, Carlos Rodriguez and Juan Diego Quesada contributed to this report. | <urn:uuid:f1274c15-e9e9-4e20-8f4b-12500fb9ff5d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.vivacolorado.com/ci_22106380/mexico-old-guard-has-new-face-return-power?source=most_viewed | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973512 | 1,204 | 1.734375 | 2 |
This patron would like to know what kind of paint was used on US Navy subs between 1976-1979.
[Name & phone number]
Now that's how I like to start off my Wednesdays.
I didn't think I'd be able to find this just laying around the internet, but just in case, and to possibly give the patron more leads, I wanted to see what else I could find. The Navy's website had a very easy-to-find Contact Us form, and even though I thought it was a long shot, I told them who I was and what the patron was looking for. I figured if I heard anything back from them, it would be interesting to the patron.
Next it occurred to me that if the Navy has a library, I might get lucky and find a reference librarian who could direct me to a useful resource. I wasn't even sure if the Navy had a library, but a general Google search for "navy library" found that there is in fact a Naval History Library in Washington. But, wouldn't you know it, their reference desk is closed on Wednesdays.
However, that same Google search also turned up the United States Naval Academy Nimitz Library. They were open, and also listed a phone number, so I gave them a call. The phone was answered on the second ring, and when I told the librarian who I was and what I was looking for, she just laughed and said
That's not exactly the kind of information we have here at our fingertips.
However, she took my name and number and said she'd check around. About an hour later she called back with some interesting information (also: I don't know that I've ever spoken to a nicer or more helpful person on the phone - she was wonderful). First she told me that she had found some information in a database called DyNet, but that database was restricted to military personnel. There is also a civilian version of the database called National Technical Information Service.
She did a search in NTIS for "submarine paint" and found quite a few matches. Unfortunately, it's just a bibliographic database, and the full text reports are only available for purchase from NTIS. I wasn't sure what kind of paint the patron was looking for, so we weren't able to get too far with this, but it looked like it was what the patron needed.
I called the patron back the next day with what I had found, and he was delighted. He said he and his lawyer had been searching online for months and turned up nothing. Then he explained why he was looking for this information: he said that when he was in the Navy, it was common to be sent to a drydock in Spain to sandblast the hulls of subs and then repaint them. He suspected this took place in Spain to avoid OSHA standards and oversight, because now he was developing health issues and is researching the paint to see if there is a connection.
A couple days later I got an email back from the Navy in response to the message I sent in from their website. They said they'd be able to help, but needed to know more specific information, such as what class of submarine, etc, and I forwarded this to the patron to follow up.
For what initially seemed an unanswerable question, I was happy to find the Navy so open and prompt in responding to a civilian request. The other thing that made me happy was that, at no point in course of asking what kind of paint the Navy used did someone say, "why, Navy Blue, of course." | <urn:uuid:31091ee5-cef6-464c-bb40-b8361ea11ab4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.swissarmylibrarian.net/2009/04/04/reference-question-of-the-week-32909/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.991254 | 741 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Despite the recent upswing in the auto industry, the failure of Canadian auto parts makers to diversify their business in recent years has seen the country fall out of the top ten list of global exporters in the sector, according to a new report from Scotia Economics.
Canadian auto parts makers have posted impressive double-digit gains in the opening months of the year as new vehicles flew off dealership lots. That is lifting auto parts volumes to an annualized pace of $20-billion, their highest point since 2008 before the economic crisis gutted the industry, said Carlos Gomes, Scotiabank senior economist, who authored the report.
That has seen payrolls increase 3%, and 8% since their trough in mid-2009. Much of the positive momentum has stemmed from the need for more fuel-efficient vehicles as pump prices rise, which have lifted auto sales to an annualized rate of 1.67 million units in Canada at the end of March, and 14.3 million units in the United States.
But the restructuring of the industry in recent years has seen Canadian parts makers left in the dust as vehicle manufacturing increasingly moves to low-cost geographies, Mr. Gomes said.
“The Canadian auto parts sector has been losing market share globally, with the industry still searching for a strategy geared to benefit from the rapid growth occurring outside of the mature auto markets of North America and Europe,” Mr. Gomes said.
He noted that 96% of the parts made in Canada are still destined for vehicles to be assembled in the U.S. or Canada, which is pretty much in line with the average of the past decade. The issue is that both the U.S. and Canada have seen their share of global vehicle production fall to just 13% from 30% in the late 1990s as auto manufacturing increasingly moves to lower-cost geographies.
“Export markets outside of the United States are still virtually non-existent,” Mr. Gomes said. He noted that only about 4% of the output from the Canadian auto sector are exported outside of the U.S., down from 5.4% in 2007, and that only 1% are destined to the rapidly growing auto markets in Asia and Latin America. He noted that Canadian parts exports to those two regions amounted to less than $200-million annually since 2009, less than half of what they were just three years earlier.
“The inability to make inroads in the fast-growing markets of Asia and Latin America is undermining Canada’s position as a major auto parts producer,” he said.
While he said some of the decline may be attributable to Canadian-owned parts plants being opened in these regions, he said Canadian suppliers continue to have a “limited presence” in these regions.
Mr. Gomes said Canadian parts suppliers contribute only about $40 for each vehicle produced outside of North America and Europe, compared to $1,500 for each one produced in North America.
And while their U.S. counterparts have started to recognize the importance of Asia and Latin America as export markets, Canadian parts makers have even failed to diversify within North America, with 65% of their exports destined for the traditional auto markets in the Great Lake states, such as Michigan and Ohio. Those states have seen their share of U.S. assemblies fall in recent years as that work increasingly finds its way down to the southern U.S. The South now accounts for about 40% of U.S. vehicle assemblies, but only 20% of Canadian auto parts exports.
As a result, Canada’s position as a major auto parts exporter has fallen from sixth place in the world in 2007. | <urn:uuid:19bb94a9-c016-46f7-86e3-253a35e5e86d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.driving.ca/microsites/autoshow/othercities/Canadian+auto+parts+makers+lose+export+status/6518108/story.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967069 | 756 | 1.65625 | 2 |
South Asia: ADRA continues multi-country tsunami response
ADRA's office in Sri Lanka is distributing World Health Organization emergency kits, which will provide a one-month supply of medicine for 90,000 people in Colombo. These three tons of medicines, provided through ADRA Germany, arrived with a team of medical specialists. Formula, valued at nearly $16,000, is also being provided for 1,000 vulnerable infants. Water specialists are arriving from South Africa to rehabilitate the bulk water supply. Nearly 200,000 one-liter bottles of drinking water and 50,000 water purification tablets have been provided. Last night, 70 tons of additional emergency medical aid also arrived in Sri Lanka.
ADRA Indonesia began distribution of 15 tons of rice and 800 boxes of instant noodles this morning in the towns of Lhokeseumawe and Biruen. Tomorrow, ADRA Spain is planning to airlift soymilk, tofu, breakfast cereals with nuts, 500 blankets and 40,000 water purifying tablets. These items, valued at $80,000, will be distributed in Banda Aceh, Indonesia. The Government of Spain is providing the airlift. This evening, 708 personal care kits and nearly 250 pounds of toilet paper will arrive in Indonesia. These items were provided through ADRA Czech Republic. The government of the Czech Republic provided the airlift.
In India, ADRA has distributed dry food valued at $10,000 and is providing a 10-day supply of food for 7,250 people including rice, dal, cooking oil, suji (cream of wheat), and water. The project, funded by ADRA International, the Adventist church in Southeast India, and the Adventist church's regional headquarters for Southern Asia, is valued at more than $10,000. ADRA is also providing other non-food relief items such as shelter materials, blankets, drinking water, water containers, chlorine tablets, and mosquito nets.
In Thailand, care packages that include items such as rice, instant noodles, Ovaltine, soap, toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo, water, medicine, and clothing have been provided for 3,000 people in Phuket Province. The kits, valued at $10,000, were funded by ADRA Thailand, ADRA Asia, and ADRA International.
In the Andaman Islands ADRA is distributing non-food emergency items such as blankets, clothing, and shelter materials.
ADRA has set up a crisis command center in Bangkok, Thailand to coordinate its network-wide response.
ADRA International urgently solicits emergency donations for this response. Only monetary donations are being accepted. Donations can be made to the Asia Tsunami Crisis Fund online at www.adra.org or by calling 800-424-ADRA (2372).
12501 Old Columbia Pike
Silver Spring, MD 20904
Phone: 800.931.ADRA (2372) | <urn:uuid:bee71420-e653-446c-8f57-5e026a53061e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://reliefweb.int/report/india/south-asia-adra-continues-multi-country-tsunami-response | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93492 | 598 | 1.640625 | 2 |
- In 1962, Newmont revolutionized the gold mining industry with the world’s first discovery of submicroscopic or “invisible gold.”
- Newmont helped found the ICMM, promoting sustainable development and social responsibility in mining.
Recent Features :
Wish Granted to Newmont Director’s Recovering Son
For most boys, their fifth birthday involves jumping, running and climbing; birthday cake and ice cream; monster blasters and toys designed to gross-out adults.
But for John Paul Phillips, the blonde-haired, blue-eyed son of Newmont's director of Capital Planning, Kent Phillips, the days immediately following his fifth birthday were marked with flu-like symptoms and a high heart rate.
When his illness did not improve, tests were conducted and John Paul was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a cancer of the white blood cells that exist to fight infections. The diagnosis marked the beginning of a journey that would involve three years of chemotherapy, thousands of miles of travel for treatment and a dream meeting America's most famous business tycoon.
At age 10, John Paul is now fine, thanks to three years of aggressive treatment. However, his fight for life was not an easy one. Among other things, he suffered from pneumonia at the onset of his chemotherapy, lost his hair, endured a daily ritual of oral medications, and received numerous injections into his spine and through a medi-port surgically implanted into his chest.
"You'd never know today what John Paul has been through," Phillips said. "He showed a lot of toughness and maturity. He didn't let himself get down."
John Paul's oncologist, Dr. Timothy Garrington, was amazed by his resiliency and nominated him to be a candidate for the Make-a-Wish Foundation. The nonprofit provides hope, strength and joy to children with life-threatening medical conditions by granting them their special wish, whether it is a trip to Disneyland, meeting a celebrity, traveling to Hawaii to swim with the dolphins, or other requests.
Perhaps it is John Paul's fighting spirit that attracted him to wanting to meet real estate mogul Donald Trump. He asked to meet the billionaire in 2008.
"His desire to meet Mr. Trump took us all by surprise," Phillips said. "As a family, we watched Celebrity Apprentice, and John Paul enjoyed the show and was inspired by Trump." Although logistics made the request difficult to fulfill initially, John Paul was patient and said he'd wait.
The 2010 season of Celebrity Apprentice, Trump's show, presented the opportunity. Maria Kanellis, a female wrestler with World Wrestling Entertainment and one of the show's apprentices this season, won $20,000 for her favorite charity as part of the show's weekly challenges. Coincidentally, the Make-a-Wish Foundation was her charity, and when the Foundation learned of the win, plans for John Paul to meet Trump were set into motion.
Within a week, the Make-a-Wish Foundation arranged a surprise trip for the boy and his mother to fly to California and meet Kanellis. The wrestler turned over the $20,000 prize to John Paul and announced the Foundation had arranged for him to attend a New York taping of the show's season finale in May and to meet Donald Trump. John Paul was speechless.
A few months later, the entire Phillips family found themselves in New York, being chauffeured around town in a limousine and mingling with celebrities. On May 22, they visited the set for rehearsal, where a nervous, yet excited John Paul met Trump for the first time.
During the rehearsal, John Paul was able to chat with Trump (a scene captured on film and shown as part of the Celebrity Apprentice finale) and to exclaim Trump's famous line, "You're fired!"
Following rehearsal, it was time for photos with the star-studded cast. Each of them knew who John Paul was and the hardship he had endured.
"Some of the celebrities asked John Paul for his autograph," Phillips said. "I assumed some would be aloof, but they were all very nice and engaging. It'll be an experience he'll always remember."
On May 23, after visiting the Statue of Liberty, the family returned to the studio for taping of the season finale. During the wrap party, one of the show's producers handed John Paul an envelope, explaining that it was from "a friend of Mr. Trump."
Inside was a $500 gift certificate to FAO Schwarz®, the fantastical toy store. John Paul spent the next morning using the gift certificate to buy a variety of special toys and gifts for his siblings before boarding a plane back to Denver.
"I can't say enough about the generosity of the people we met and the Make-a-Wish Foundation," Phillips said. "The work that they do is phenomenal and its representatives who accompanied us in New York made the experience seamless. What made the wish so special for all of us was that it was something that we, as parents, could never have accomplished for John Paul on our own. I'm extremely pleased Newmont continues to support Make-A-Wish, including sponsoring the Foundation's August golf tournament in Denver. It's a very worthy cause." (The golf tournament raised nearly $24,000, which will fund a Disney Cruise, two trips to Disney World and trip to Sesame Street Beach in Jamaica for four children).
While John Paul won't be considered fully "recovered" until age 13, five years after his final treatment, physicians expect a full recovery. He is now monitored quarterly to ensure his leukemia remains in remission. Since his chemo treatments ended, the boy has swam competitively, played basketball and football, fished, snowboarded, and networked with "The Donald."
His family expects happier adventures for him in the next chapter of his young life.
Editor's note: John Paul appears with Trump in episode 911 of Celebrity Apprentice 2010. Visit the show's website to view the program.
September 15, 2010 | <urn:uuid:4cbfdd58-9509-4687-af39-b463ef53152b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newmont.com/features/our-poeple-features/Wish-Granted-to-Newmont-Directors-Recovering-Son | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977996 | 1,251 | 1.625 | 2 |
THE NIGHTMARE IN TURKMENISTAN
HON. CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH
OF NEW JERSEY
Mr. Speaker, November 25 will mark the one-year anniversary of events in Turkmenistan that turned that already bizarre autocracy into an even more nightmarish kingdom. According to the official version, opposition groups led by former high-ranking officials tried to assassinate Saparmurat Niyazov, the country's President-for-Life. The attempt failed, the plotters were found, tried and imprisoned, and in the eyes of Niyazov's regime, justice has been done.
What actually happened that day is unclear. There may well have been a coup attempt against Niyazov, who has turned himself into virtually a living god. Or, as some opposition activists in exile maintain, the whole affair may have been staged by Niyazov to crack down even harder. Since no outsider has had access to those arrested in connection with the events, the truth may never be known.
Whatever happened, it is easy to understand the desperate frustration among Turkmen. Niyazov has made Turkmenistan the only one-party state in the former Soviet space, where one man decides everything, no opposition is permitted, all media are totally censored and the populace is forced to study the "rukhnama"--a dictator's rantings that purport to be a one-stop religion, national history and morality lesson.
What is clear is that Niyazov's response to November 25 has trampled on civilized norms, even if his allegations are true. In the wake of the arrests, all opposition--real or imagined--has been crushed. Quick show trials of the accused were broadcast on television, after which they received long prison sentences with no access to relatives or international organizations. Some of the opposition leaders have already died in prison. One individual who was arrested, an American citizen named Leonid Komarovsky of Massachusetts was eventually released, as a result of pressure from Washington. Upon gaining his freedom, he told the world of the horrible tortures people suffered at the hands of Turkmen security forces. The stories rival any we used to hear from the Soviet Union or Saddam Hussein's Iraq. In addition, relatives of those deemed "enemies of the people" have been targeted for persecution. The luckier ones merely are fired and thrown out of their apartments onto the streets; others have been arrested and tortured in prison or forced to watch their loved ones being tortured.
In response to this crisis, the OSCE invoked the Moscow Mechanism, a rarely-used tool to investigate particularly appalling human rights violations. But Niyazov refused to cooperate with the OSCE, whose officially designated rapporteur was denied a visa. Nevertheless, he was able to compile a comprehensive dossier of horror, which documents as well as possible without access to prisons, the mistreatment and abuse of those arrested and the persecution of their relatives. The rapporteur also forwarded to the Government of Turkmenistan recommendations to move towards reform. Niyazov has dismissed them as "offensive" and "interference in internal affairs."
Niyazov has also refused U.S. officials entry to his jails. Recently, Ambassador Stephen Minikes, head of the U.S. Delegation to OSCE visited Ashgabat, but despite his explicit request, was not allowed to check on the health of one of those arrested: former Turkmen Foreign Minister and OSCE Ambassador Batyr Berdiev. There are persistent rumors he has died in prison.
One year after the events of November 25, Saparmurat Niyazov remains in power. He continues his crackdown, and the country's downward spiral accelerates. Niyazov has reintroduced exit visas, a legacy of the Soviet past we thought had been definitively overcome. Just last week, he instituted new laws harshly restricting freedom of religion, which is trampled upon daily in Turkmenistan; groups brave enough to meet risk home raids, imprisonment, deportation, internal exile, house eviction and even torture. The new provisions further empower regime agents to squash religious practice. Now, individuals caught more than once in a year acting on the behalf of an unregistered community can be fined between ten and thirty months of wages, or be sent to hard labor for up to one year. Of course, registration is in effect impossible to obtain, leaving religious communities and their members in a highly vulnerable position.
A recent Niyazov decree on NGO activity makes it punishable for most Turkmen to interact with foreigners. Representatives of non-Turkmen ethnic groups, such as Uzbeks or Russians, face discrimination in education and employment. Niyazov has not only reestablished and strengthened the environment of fear, he has deliberately isolated his country from outside influences. Under his rule, Turkmenistan has no chance of developing normally.
As November 25 approaches, we recall that when a political system centralizes all power in the hands one man, offering no possibilities for participation to anyone else, people may be tempted to change that system by any means. And we have occasion to consider the eternal validity of Lord Acton's dictum: "Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely."
Unfortunately, the U.S. response to Turkmenistan's blatant disregard for human rights has been shamefully weak. In August, although Turkmenistan violates freedom of emigration by requiring exit visas, the Administration made the astonishing decision to exempt Turkmenistan from Jackson-Vanik requirements on the free movement of citizens.
Our leverage on this particular dictator may be weak but we have opportunities to express our outrage about these ongoing abuses and to align ourselves with the forces of freedom and democracy. In addition to ending the Jackson-Vanik waiver, the State Department should designate Turkmenistan a "Country of Particular Concern" under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998. The regime's well-documented record of "particularly severe violations of religious freedom" unquestionably meets the statutory threshold envisioned when we passed the Act of "systematic, ongoing, egregious violations of religious freedom."
The United States and the international community must condemn the actions of Niyazov's regime and continue working to bring Turkmenistan back towards civilized and democratic norms. Any other approach betrays our own principles. | <urn:uuid:1519a311-02b1-4f9c-b3bb-67be6429472d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.csce.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=ContentRecords.ViewDetail&ContentRecord_id=208&ContentType=S&ContentRecordType=S&UserGroup_id=53®ion_id=53&year=0&month=0&Subaction=Statements&CFID=9098727&CFTOKEN=80717269 | 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 | 0.962564 | 1,295 | 1.515625 | 2 |
By Brent Davis
Finding humor in situations that aren’t necessarily meant to induce laughter often times will bring forth heartfelt chuckles. This is not a task easily mastered. An individual must first possess a sense of humor slightly off center.
It is a skill that can be nurtured, but is most effective when it is gifted by heredity.
I do my best to hone this skill, but it is a work in progress. There have been several instances lately where practice has resulted in at least a giggle for me.
I will recount several of the experiences now. Names and situations may or may not be altered via dramatic license in order to protect those who may otherwise be embarrassed by their unknowing participation.
I attended a gathering recently in which a silent auction was part of the festivities.
A wide array of items from a cake to paintings to gift certificates from local merchants was available for bidding. One item in particular caught my attention. On the table before me was a large rubber container normally used for storage. The lid was off the box and inside were items including a flashlight, small games, a blanket, bottled water and other necessities to use in the event of an extended power outage.
Given our county’s recent struggle with such an outage, I thought this would be a popular item for bidding. The bid sheet was laid out next to the bucket. Indeed, bidders were eager to claim the prize. At this moment, I noticed the sponsor of the item - a company that supplies electric power to areas of the county. I smiled and laughed right there on the spot. I’m not sure anyone else understood my actions. I explained the situation to my wife, Laura, later that evening when I came home from the event. I waited for the laughter.
Here is what she said. “That’s a great prize. You should have bid on it.” My mouth open, I struggled to understand her failure to find the irony of the situation. I responded, “Think of the message it sends. ‘Hi. We are your electricity provider. Your power will go out. Here are some things to do while you wait.’ Get it?”
Crickets chirped. Time stood still. I was alone in looney land. I see her point.
I will give her credit. She is the first to laugh at those moments when her words get jumbled and the message she intended bears no resemblance to those that she meant. Her infamous statement during a meeting at work when she said someone was “shooting from the rear” instead of “the hip” is legendary.
We were shopping for the weekly groceries and as we pushed the cart passed the health and beauty section, we both noticed a young woman who had positioned herself near the bottom shelf to compare items. Unfortunately for her, the bottom hem of her shirt was not of sufficient length to reach the waistline of her pants. With as much stealth as she could muster, Laura leaned over to me and with an attempt at ventriloquism, she said “I see China. I see Japan.”
I do not have the strength of self-control to hold at bay my laughter in such situations. I broke into laughter without conscious effort. Laura joined me in the chuckle, but not for the same reason. She thought I was laughing along with it, not at her.
“Bless your heart.” I said to her. “It’s ‘I see London. I see France.’” The moment presented her the opportunity to laugh at herself once again and, as expected, she did. What a great quality to have.
The world would be a better place if this were contagious.
Brent Davis is editor of the Saline Courier. He can be reached at email@example.com .View more articles in: | <urn:uuid:5f7b514e-ae91-43c7-bc13-634bd63476e8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bentoncourier.com/print/6819?quicktabs_2=0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974623 | 816 | 1.609375 | 2 |
What started as a hacking bid four months ago, ended as the biggest brawl in internet history this week, when Google routed its 140 million Chinese visitors from Google.cn to their “Uncensored” Hong Kong site.
Google officially claimed to have uncensored its “Search services” – web search, news and images. Yet, the retreat is only partial, as Google shall retain most of its existing operations including its research and development team, local sales force and continue to operate the online maps and music services.
Knowing that Technically, it’s still very easy for the Chinese government to continue blocking Google’s services, Google conveyed that they are closely monitoring such activity and that such actions will directly impact Google’s remaining local employment in Mainland China.
Google announced its decision with carefully chosen words, balancing the sentiments of Chinese netizens on grounds of Google’s mission to free speech and yet avoid a possible Chinese government’s backlash on their local officials.
Contrary to popular belief, “Censorship” is NOT the prime reason for Google’s exit. After all, while entering the Chinese market in 2006, Google had themselves agreed to such compromising conditions, in their race for capturing an exploding internet population. The systematic and targeted hacking of Gmail accounts, theft of their source codes , accusations of spying on behalf of CIA, lack of intent in the actions of the government against such crimes and most importantly – a clear inclination of the government towards homegrown players, over a prolonged period of time culminated to such a major decision.
So, how does this impact Google Inc. ?
- Revenue:- Google’s $ 250 – $ 600 million revenue in China, is a fraction of their $ 24 billion global revenue. Google would’ve spent a bomb setting & running local operations anyways.
- Market share:- Google’s share in the Chinese search market is just one third, with the local player – Baidu still holding the lion’s share at 58%. i.e. 140 million of the 400 million Chinese internet subscribers. Baidu and Bing will definitely see an upside with this development.
- Immediate Impact:- Already, in the last three months, Google’s stock price has fallen by 1.5% as against Baidu’s rise of 15%.
- Opportunity loss:- Some analysts’ feel the opportunity loss for Google in the next 5 years is estimated to be about $ 400 million revenue income from China, which is quite insignificant against their overall global plans. Their may be a blip in Google’s Android handset launch in one of the fastest growing telecom markets in the world.
- Chinese User behavior:- Unlike trends in many “Free” internet markets, the Chinese internet users are basically NOT searching for information but Lifestyle. Gaming, Social networking, shopping, music & entertainment are the real drivers that constitute China’s $ 11 billion annual internet revenue income (2009).
Thanks to Baidu‘s strength in China, they stand in the 3rd place in worldwide internet search with 7% share, only after Google (67%) and neck to neck with Yahoo (8%). Microsoft sites are at a distant 4th position with 3% share (which is now gaining traction with Bing).
Google’s decision to quit China understandably affect Google’s shareholder’s, as one can easily feel jittery leaving out the most populous country in the world. However, Google’s fundamentals are strong. The Google success story was never about China. With the recent global economic turmoil, Google has just about scratched the surface of the immense potential advertising revenue it can get when company’s migrate from traditional to digital means of advertising in rest of the world. Also, Google has only done a “Partial” retreat. Their plans for Android, etc. in China are yet unchanged.
- Credibility & Sovereignty: China’s stance on the topic is very clear. To preserve their culture and control on public information, all media in China (by law) is censored by the government and Google is no exception. After all, how would the US react if one fine day Yahoo Corporation were to stand up and say they did’nt care about US cyber laws? The problem is that China goes to any extent in meeting such objectives, which includes but does not limit to the use of force, stealth & mercenary tactics even. They are also highly nationalistic while dealing with foreign players in their country (Especially US corporations).
- Internet & mobile user base:- China has a 28.9% internet penetration with a whopping 400 million subscribers. A large quantum of these (140 million) are Google users. ‘China Mobile Ltd. – the world’s biggest phone company by subscribers, with 527 million accounts, also uses Google for mobile search and maps.
- Local players & their impact:- Tencent (Instant messaging), Alibaba (B2B trade), Taobao (Ecommerce) & Baidu (local search) are already leading business players. With Google’s departure, Baidu will grow stronger in internet search. As Youtube exits, Youku and Tudou will gain advantage… But, without global competitors, they will never become World class.
- Local Entrepreneurs:- Another significant impact of a Google departure could lie behind the scenes, where many small Chinese companies, & entrepreneurs, rely on its AdWords advertising service, Gmail e-mail and documents services.
- Unemployment:- With an explosive population in Mainland China & growing unemployment, such steps will isolate the country from the Global economy and limit the country’s economic growth.
- Curiosity amongst Chinese Netizens:- It may be easy for the government to allow Google to shut shop, but telling 140 million people to suddenly change their behavior because the government wants to hide information from them, will not be a cake walk. China may have to deal with great tact to contain the growing curiosity amongst such a vast population. What if they were to find out? My belief is that China will not unplug Google- Hong Kong’s access, but continue censorship and deteriorate their speed & quality such that users gradually migrate to alternate options.
- Rampant Piracy:- Interestingly, Google (in a Chinese JV) also runs Top100.cn – which provides free music downloads across many labels in an unlicensed manner. There are doubts on the company’s future operations too. Top100 has been instrumental in reducing the Piracy in China which could suffer a dent for the industry as “Piracy thrives on censorship”.
The numerous chocolates, flowers & parting notes left on the Google’s signboard in Beijing office expresses a popular sentiment. Google’s dramatic exit from Mainland China, is no longer a clash between two rivals, but a more symbolic moment in history, which is bound to have an economic, political, technical and fundamentalist impact in the world over in coming times. This could even become a turning point in China’s communist policies, as well as a revision in defining “A Free World”… and each one of us will feel it. | <urn:uuid:57022cbb-abd7-44f9-8963-e29aef4c651b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://sahaye.com/2010/03/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93375 | 1,489 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Diplomat Solitaire Rules
Diplomat is a two-deck solitaire which requires a fair amount of skill to play, but which, once learned, is rather easy to conquer.
The game is somewhat similar to the one-deck "Beleaguered Castle" and "Streets and Alleys" solitaires, except that in those games, the entire deck is dealt out in the initial layout. In Diplomat, only part of the deck is on the table at the start of a hand, and the remainder appears as the game progresses. This allows for greater freedom of movement, and ultimately makes the game easier.
Morehead and Mott-Smith list the odds of winning at 2 out of three games, which seems pretty reasonable.
Number of Decks: 2
Initial Layout: Deal eight piles of four cards each, all cards face up. The cards may be arranged as eight columns with space for eight foundations above the columns (as shown above), or as four rows of four columns each, with the left and right wings containing the intial deal, and the two inner columns used for foundations. After the initial deal, the remaining cards for the stock.
Object: The object of the game is to build the eight foundations up in suit from ace to king.
Play: Turn cards from the stock one at a time, onto the wastepile. The top card of each tableau pile, the top card of the stock, and the top card of the wastepile are available for play. Cards within the tableau may be built downward in sequence, regardless of suit. Cards may only be moved from tableau to tableau one at a time; cards may not be moved as a group. Spaces in the tableau may be filled with any card. As aces appear, move them to the foundations, and build these up in suit to king. Turn cards from the stock until the stock is empty. There is no redeal.
Variations: For a bit more challenge, only allow kings to be moved into empty spaces.
Other Sources of Diplomat Solitaire Rules
Note: All rule links open in a new window.
Games Featuring Diplomat Solitaire | <urn:uuid:712c6045-dc30-493d-8437-25f2c6298f9d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.solitairecentral.com/rules/Diplomat.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934897 | 447 | 1.742188 | 2 |
November 9, 2011
Tips for keeping your horse slick and sleek all winter.
For most people, long-haired horses aren’t such a bad idea.
It’s natural for livestock to grow thick coats when the days get shorter and cooler, and the extra hair keeps them safe and warm, protecting them from chill and sickness.
If you show horses, however, there has probably been at least one frustrating season where your horse got a little fluffier than you would have liked. And goodness knows, a shaggy horse just doesn’t sparkle when he stands next to a slick horse in the show ring.
Gigi Bailey says she remembers a day when the wind-chill factor at her De Pere, Wisconsin, farm plummeted to minus 92 degrees Fahrenheit. With winter weather as frigid as that, it’s a wonder that Gigi’s barn was full of short-haired horses – and they usually stay that way all winter long.
Part of Gigi’s short-hair recipe is standard: Make sure the barn stays warm, make sure the horses are kept warm, and keep the barn lights on for 16 hours a day. But, as she says, “Winning is 100 little things,” and sometimes you’ve got to be willing to take the 100 extra steps to help your horse maintain a slick hair coat.
“You can lose a good hair coat so fast,” Gigi says. “All it takes is one good chill – in the trailer or at a horse show or wherever – to lose it.”
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Start with a warm barn
Gigi explains that an insulated barn keeps horses warmer in the winter and cooler in the summer. Her show barn was constructed with this in mind. The building’s walls have a 14 R-factor; the ceiling has a 20 R-factor (R-factor refers to the energy efficiency rating of a structure.) She keeps the thermostat at about 64 degrees in the winter, and ceiling fans constantly circulate warm air throughout the barn.
“At 64 degrees in the wintertime in the barn, the horses typically wear a sheet and a heavy blanket, and they wear a light hood or a slinky at night,” Gigi explains.
Away from home and on the road
“Feel the day,” Gigi suggests, when discussing whether or not to haul horses with blankets. “Before we take a trip, we stand around and take a poll. ‘Should we haul in heavy blankets and light hoods? Just sheets? Sheets and blankets? Nothing?’ I prefer to put more blankets on the horses and open the windows up a little bit, mostly because I just think the circulation is healthier for the horse.
“When we’re at a show, we check blankets all day long,” Gigi continues. “We feel under the blankets at their withers and on their backs. We want them to be toasty – but not sweating.”
To body clip, or not to body clip?
While many trainers and barn managers prefer not to body clip a horse – because the buzzed hair often is duller and a different color than a normal short hair coat – there are times when it becomes necessary.
“If I do have to show one that grows long hair, I usually clip it,” Gigi says. “I think body clips are fine as long as you keep that horse’s hair as healthy as you can before you clip it.”
If she is unable to body clip the long-haired horse for some reason, Gigi makes certain that every other aspect of the horse is in pristine condition before she steps into the show ring. Every day throughout the chilly season, her show horses are curried and vacuumed, followed by a spray coat conditioner. She expects each horse’s grooming to be impeccable – just like a halter horse.
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A matter of health?
Maybe you’re doing absolutely everything you can think of to keep your horse’s hair coat nice and short, and he still fuzzes up. Unfortunately, it happens. Some horses just naturally grow more hair. But if the hair coat is dull, or if it is difficult to get the horse to shed throughout the winter, have your veterinarian run some routine health tests.
“When I see a horse’s hair go bad, I try to determine the cause,” Gigi says. “That little alarm will go off in my mind that says I may have a health problem – which routinely is anemia or a low thyroid. It doesn’t hurt to pull blood to make sure we’re OK.”
13 Comments on “Short-Hair Secrets”
Add a Comment | <urn:uuid:1e85fe7e-7917-46f5-a5e6-96dbb205333c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://americashorsedaily.com/short-hair-secrets/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949499 | 1,076 | 1.828125 | 2 |
Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi talks about Buddhist Global Relief’s “Walks to Feed the Hungry”
Not long ago, we brought you news about Buddhist Global Relief‘s 2012 Walk to Feed the Hungry fundraising events. This is the third year for the events, which seek to raise funds for the organization’s programs that provide relief to communities around the world afflicted by chronic hunger and malnutrition. So far, walks have in total raised over $120,000 to support BGR’s humanitarian efforts.
All the walk events in 2012 will take place this month in the following cities: Ann Arbor, MI (October 13), Chicago, IL (October 13), New York, NY (October 13), San Francisco, CA (October 13), San Jose, CA (October 14), Los Angeles, CA (October 20), and Escondido, CA (October 25). Walks have already taken place in Seattle, WA, and Yorkshire, UK.
Buddhadharma News reporter Danny Fisher caught up with the Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi — the well-known translator of Pali Buddhist texts into English, and the founder of Buddhist Global Relief — to ask him about the walks. They talked via email; read the interview after the jump.
Bhante, for the benefit of those who don’t know anything about them, what are Buddhist Global Relief’s Walks to Feed the Hungry? Also, why walks in this context?
The Walk to Feed the Hungry is an event that BGR has been holding for the past three years as a means to raise funds to sustain our projects, which center on providing relief to people worldwide who lack adequate nutrition. The idea of holding these walks started in 2010. In May of that year, for fun and exercise, I took a long walk through New York together with a couple of my students. Starting from Fort Lee, New Jersey, we crossed the George Washington Bridge, and then walked down the length of Manhattan to Grand Street at the lower end of the island.
When I told our BGR team members about this walk, one member suggested that we hold a walk as a fundraiser, and this set our plans in motion. Since then, the Walk to Feed the Hungry has become an annual event. In the first year, 2010, we held one walk, in South Orange, New Jersey, and the participants were almost all people living in the greater New York area. In 2011 three BGR walks took place: in New York City, near Ann Arbor in Michigan, and from San Jose to Palo Alto in California.
This year, more people around the US and even abroad have organized BGR walks. We now have ten walks scheduled in this country, due to take place in middle and late October. A BGR walk by supporters in England was already held on September 29. And to our delight, two Asian communities that we support, in Cambodia and India, have held walks in their own countries to express appreciation for the help we give them. For the past two years, one of our New York supporters, Dan Blake, a professional jazz saxophonist, has organized benefit jazz concerts close to the time of the walks. So these have become an integral part of the season.
The walk provides a very convenient opportunity to raise funds. Participants in the walk can set up their own First Giving fundraising pages on the BGR website and raise funds from their friends and relatives. Others can give to walkers to support their walks or simply donate to support a walk in any location of their choice.
Of the various causes that could have been primary, why has hunger become the central focus of Buddhist Global Relief?
We originally founded Buddhist Global Relief for the purpose of combating poverty, but we saw soon enough that this mission was too broad. We needed a more specific point of focus. Reports I read online continually hammered home to me the vast amount of suffering in today’s world due to chronic hunger and malnutrition. I had learned that close to a billion people suffer from malnutrition; that another two billion subsist on inadequate diets; and that ten million people a year die from hunger and hunger-related illnesses, most of them women and children. I found this shocking! I thought that in a world where food is still abundant, especially in a country where mountains of food go to waste each year, such a situation is utterly unacceptable. I felt that, out of compassion and a sense of social justice, we had to do something to alleviate the plight of those afflicted with chronic hunger. This commitment, moreover, squared well with the Buddha’s stress on the benefits of giving food.
Our emphasis, however, has not been on providing emergency relief to communities hit by catastrophe. That type of relief, to be effective, requires a budget in the multi-millions, and we don’t have anything in that range. Thus, we had to adopt a more modest and realistic approach. What we do is to partner with organizations already working in the countries where we decide to launch projects. Our projects focus on helping people use small-scale, ecologically sustainable methods of cultivation to acquire more food for their families and communities. We also support projects that educate people about right nutrition and healthier dietary practices. And, to tackle the roots of poverty and malnutrition, we provide food assistance to poor families so they can permit their daughters to continue their education and to give women the chance to launch right livelihood projects by which they can earn more to support their families. Readers can find much more detailed information about our history and our projects on our website.
I’ve interviewed you before about your work with Oxfam, CIFA, and the White House on large, cooperative poverty initiatives. Would you say something about you as an individual Buddhist and the organization Buddhist Global Relief cooperating with other religious and secular organizations on large-scale efforts? This seems like it has been a priority for you and BGR.
As a small organization run entirely on a volunteer basis, we do not have the funds or personnel to operate in the countries that need the type of assistance we can provide. As I said earlier, the way we work is by forming partnerships with organizations working in those countries, which range from Cambodia and Vietnam, through India and Sri Lanka, to Kenya, Niger, and Malawi in Africa, and Haiti and the US. In this way we can take advantage of their greater expertise, yet we can enter into active partnerships by which we look at their specific needs and help them to formulate specific projects. So far our partners have been mostly secular organizations, though we have also linked up with a few fellow Buddhist partners such as Dharmagiri Outreach in South Africa and Bodhicitta Foundation in India. Some of our partners are larger organizations such as Helen Keller International, but most often we collaborate with smaller, locally based organizations such as Lotus Outreach and Rachana in Cambodia, Ecology Action in Africa, and the What If Foundation in Haiti.
The part of BGR’s website devoted to the walks quotes something you have said: “We’re living at a transformative moment of history when humanity is faced with a critical choice: either we continue to flow with the currents of greed and ignorance and risk devastating the earth, or we adopt a scheme of values that gives pride of place to compassion, care, and social justice.” In a broad sense, what do you think practicing Buddhists can do to promote movement toward the latter option?
Buddhism already gives pride of place to such values as compassion, kindness, and generosity, so stressing these values would not be teaching Buddhists something they are not already familiar with. However, traditionally these qualities are esteemed as personal values conducive to one’s own spiritual growth and beneficial to those in one’s immediate sphere of influence. Today, however, aggressive and destructive forces, relentlessly bent on profit and domination, have put in jeopardy the very survival of human civilization as we know it. Thus, in my opinion, compassion and kindness as purely personal values are no longer adequate to the demands of the era in which we live.
There is also, in Buddhism, a tendency to treat such qualities as love and compassion as purely subjective states, to be cultivated in meditation and personal relationships. This would be a type of compassion that is like a piece of classical art: beautiful and praiseworthy but inert. What we need, in my view, is a kind of love and compassion that can gush forth and reshape our social milieu. This would be a compassion conjoined with a wider global vision and spurred on by the courage to engage the hard, even brutal reality of greed, militarism, lust for power, and heartless exploitation so rampant in the modern world.
To respond effectively to our contemporary crisis, I believe we must elevate the sacred Buddhist values of love and compassion to the position of guiding principles that can drive the choices we make on matters of social, political, and economic policy. Further, while I think the idea of social justice is implicit in the Buddhist tradition, it has not been articulated as clearly as it has been in modern Western political theory. Quite independently of what the Buddhist scriptures might say, I feel that it is necessary for contemporary Buddhism to incorporate principles of social and economic justice into our thinking and programs of social action. The commitment to social and economic justice, and the mobilization of a common will to implement this commitment through courageous nonviolent action, is something that Buddhists can learn from the West, especially from the civil rights and antiwar movements of the 1960s.
How can those who would like to participate or donate help?
To learn more about the walks, how to register for a walk near you, and donate to support the walk, please see the BGR website: www.buddhistglobalrelief.org. All the information you need is right there. But please don’t delay, because the walks in the US will begin on October 13. | <urn:uuid:3af458cc-bb0e-4082-881a-11ef9bde504d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://shambhalasun.com/news/?p=38784 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958897 | 2,041 | 1.515625 | 2 |
Lexer and parser generators using CTFE
Marco.Leise at gmx.de
Wed Feb 29 23:54:35 PST 2012
Am 29.02.2012, 02:30 Uhr, schrieb Piotr Szturmaj <bncrbme at jadamspam.pl>:
> CTFE code can be much slower than native one, and I would like to see
> some kind of compiler cache for such code.
I second this. As a fan of clean optimizations this is one of the things I tossed around my head for a while. It could use a cache file or the compiler could be started as a daemon process keeping a memory cache. All code that is called through CTFE would go into the cache, indexed by the internal representation of the function body and parameters.
But there are a few open questions, like how seamless this could be integrated. Is it easy to get a hash for function bodies and parameters? How should the cache be limited? N functions, n bytes or maybe one cache per module (together with the .o files)? The latter case would mean that if a.d uses CTFE, that executes code from b.d the results of CTFE would all be cached together with a.o, because that was the entry point. And if there was a module c.d that does the same as a.d it would duplicate the b.d part in its own cache. The benefit is that the cache works with both single module and whole program compilation and it doesn't need any limits. Instead the caches for each module are always refreshed with what was last used in the compilation.
In addition to the last compilation, the caches could be aware of versioned compilation. I usually want to compile debug versions and Linux/Windows release versions at least, so I wouldn't want to invalidate the caches. For 32-bit vs. 64-bit I assume it is the best to just cache them separately as it could prove difficult to distinguish two versions of code that uses (void*).sizeof or something else that isn't declared wrapped in a version statement like size_t is.
More information about the Digitalmars-d | <urn:uuid:4d70e5dc-80c7-4dd2-aaa2-c74a8c57b86f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://lists.puremagic.com/pipermail/digitalmars-d/2012-February/125417.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939435 | 457 | 1.625 | 2 |
/ Home / Your Council / News / News Releases / 2009 / May
Tain CCTV (27/05/09)
A community consultation carried out in Tain recently gave locals the opportunity to comment on what improvements the community think should be made to the CCTV camera system in Tain.
The majority of those responding supported the option to upgrade the current cabling to the system with fibre optic cabling and to replace eight of the cameras with more up to date technology.
Replacing the cabling will enhance picture quality and minimise video loss at the operations room. It may also allow other organisations/businesses to benefit from the technology in future with the increase in capacity of the cabling.
The suggestion to move one of the cameras to a new location did not receive much support so officials won’t be recommending its location is changed.
Councillor Alasdair Rhind, who lives in Tain, said he and his fellow Ward Councillors have been following the consultation and the work of the review group closely and also support the recommendations being made.
“These recommendations, along with the community’s preferences will now be put to the Resources Committee for the final decision on spending money on improvements,” he said.
“If the decision is approved it is hoped work will carried out in the autumn,” he added.
The Tain CCTV system was originally installed in 2003 following a successful funding bid by the Tain Initiative Group. The system aims to help prevent and detect crime and anti-social behaviour; to create a safe environment for the public by attempting to reduce crime and the fear of crime; and to provide high quality evidence to the Police if crime occurs. | <urn:uuid:e07d9e81-3f10-4108-93c2-c07f2319051f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.highland.gov.uk/yourcouncil/news/newsreleases/2009/May/2009-05-27-01.htm | 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 | 0.952524 | 350 | 1.539063 | 2 |
If Detroit leases Belle Isle to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources as part of the city’s consent agreement with the state, visitors would most likely be required to buy a state recreation passport.
That’s according to a recent report from the Detroit Free Press.
April 8, Freep: “(DNR director Rodney) Stokes stressed that no plans are final yet on the funding or state spending on the 985-acre park that is one of Detroit's major jewels. He hopes to meet with city officials in the next 30 days to review annual costs and map out which infrastructure improvements are needed.”
State recreation passports are a $10 add-on to a license plate fee that gives a residents access to 99 state parks.
Last May, City Councilman James Tate proposed a $2 or $3 vehicle entrance fee and allowing private companies to operate a carnival, but neither idea panned out. According to the Associated Press, past attempts to approve a fee for the park in the Detroit River have failed as well.
Opponents of an entrance fee have argued it would takeaway from residents' choices for free recreation, which they already pay taxes to use.
Last year, what some consider a major win for the city and Belle Isle, Chevrolet and city officials announced a three-year agreement with the Penske Corp. and Indycar to bring back the Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix as the Chevrolet Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix.
More than 100,000 fans attended the Grand Prix in both 2007 and 2008, pumping an estimated $50 million annually into the regional economy. But organizers indefinitely postponed the event in 2009, citing a lack of sponsorships resulting from a sluggish economy.
The first Chevrolet Detroit Belle Isle Grand Prix will be held June 1-3, 2012 -- the weekend after the Indy 500 -- at the 2.1-mile raceway at Belle Isle Park road course. | <urn:uuid:41163307-5349-4c48-8699-4e681000e8df> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mlive.com/news/detroit/index.ssf/2012/04/report_state_takeover_of_belle.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948824 | 388 | 1.59375 | 2 |
A list of Judge Victor Valdivia's influences would include things that are either illegal or unsavory.
Zappa under the influence.
Maybe it's not possible to make a truly enthralling DVD about a musician's influences. Maybe delineating how those influences shaped an artist, while an interesting intellectual exercise that could lead to a good essay, isn't particularly visual or dramatic. That's apparently the only reason why Frank Zappa: The Freak Out List is so uninvolving even though it's crafted carefully and thoughtfully. The producers have gone to the trouble of licensing music from Zappa and other key artists, they've interviewed knowledgeable sources, including former members of Zappa's bands, and they've assembled these interviews, music, and archival footage into a structure that's informative and easy to understand. Even so, however, it's hard to imagine that even the most devout Zappa fan will want to watch this DVD more than once.
The idea behind this DVD is simple. On the liner notes to Freak Out!, the 1967 debut album by Zappa's original band the Mothers of Invention, Zappa listed some seventy-two names on the liner notes and cited them as influences. The Freak Out List intends to explore who these artists are and what influence they had on Zappa's music. This listing encompasses all sorts of music, from classical composer Edgar Varese to R&B star Johnny "Guitar" Watson to jazzman Eric Dolphy to flamenco guitarist Sabicas. By mixing footage and songs by some of these artists and comparing them to some of Zappa's music, the DVD explains how it's possible to hear their influence on his music. You can hear for instance, how the esoteric classical influence of Varese shaped Zappa's long-form epics like "Lumpy Gravy" or how Dolphy's instrumental prowess led Zappa to incorporate jazz-fusion on albums like Weasels Ripped My Flesh! (1970), which even included a song titled "The Eric Dolphy Memorial Barbecue." Interviews with various Zappa biographers and music historians as well as musicians George Duke, Ian Underwood, and Don Preston, all of whom played in the Mothers at one time or another, help add additional context.
This is all well-presented. Nonetheless, it's not especially scintillating. Much of the problem is that there aren't really any revelations here. Anyone who studied Zappa's music and career already knows who his influences were because he cited them constantly, both in the press and onstage. It's also easy to trace his musical influences because Zappa frequently made music that deliberately called attention to them. Cruising with Ruben and the Jets, his 1968 album, pays tribute to Zappa's love of doo-wop by presenting Zappa and the Mothers making straight-up doo-wop music. Similarly, Zappa also made clear his reverence for avant-garde classical music by making avant-garde classical albums like Orchestral Favorites (1979) and Thing-Fish (1984). It's not that the DVD is badly argued or presented, but Zappa fans will already know much of this information and Zappa newcomers will find many of the references and stories too obscure and insular. MVD Visual's previous Zappa DVD, Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention in the 1960s, was full of rare and interesting footage and stories, but this one doesn't really add anything to Zappa's legacy, making its appeal questionable.
Technically, the DVD is decent. The full-screen transfer and stereo mix are both satisfactory, even with all the archival footage. The only extra of note is a tiny featurette, "Frank Zappa's Desert Island Discs" (4:37), which discusses a couple of classical albums that Zappa cited as his favorites. It's pretty disposable and adds nothing to the DVD. Consumer note: though the liner notes promise "Extended Interviews," there are none anywhere on the disc.
Ultimately, what The Freak Out List proves is that even with impeccable research and production coupled with an artist whose influences were numerous and clear, it's hard to make one of these DVDs all that interesting. It's far superior to Eagle Rock's Down the Tracks series, which attempted the same idea with both Bob Dylan and Led Zeppelin, since this disc, unlike those, licenses crucial music and interviews people who actually have something to say. Even then, however, it's hard to imagine that even the most devout Zappa fan will get much out of this, let alone viewers unfamiliar with him. To get this story, you could do just as well to read a Zappa biography and simply listen to his music instead.
Guilty of not really saying anything new.
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Scales of Justice
Studio: MVD Visual
Review content copyright © 2010 Victor Valdivia; Site design and review layout copyright © 2013 Verdict Partners LLC. All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:99ba8820-d773-4995-8ec1-3e67e47ff01c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dvdverdict.com/reviews/freakoutlist.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961906 | 1,056 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Potato Chips & Root Beer (8/30/12)
A little boy wanted to meet God. He knew it was a long trip to where God lived, so he packed his suitcase with a bag of potato chips and a six-pack of root beer and started his journey.
When he had gone about three blocks, he met an old woman. She was sitting in the park, just staring at some pigeons. The boy sat down next to her and opened his suitcase. He was about to take a drink from his root beer when he noticed that the old lady looked hungry, so he offered her some chips. She gratefully accepted it and smiled at him. Her smile was so pretty that the boy wanted to see it again, so he offered her a root beer. Again, she smiled at him. The boy was delighted! They sat there all afternoon eating and smiling, but they never said a word.
As twilight approached, the boy realized how tired he was and he got up to leave; but before he had gone more than a few steps, he turned around, ran back to the old woman, and gave her a hug. She gave him her biggest smile ever.
When the boy opened the door to his own house a short time later, his mother was surprised by the look of joy on his face. She asked him, "What did you do today that made you so happy?"
He replied, "I had lunch with God." But before his mother could respond, he added, "You know what? She's got the most beautiful smile I've ever seen!"
Meanwhile, the old woman, also radiant with joy, returned to her home. Her son was stunned by the look of peace on her face and he asked, "Mother, what did you do today that made you so happy?" She replied! "I ate potato chips in the park with God." However, before her son responded, she added, "You know, he's much younger than I expected."
Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around. People come into our lives for a reason, a season, or a lifetime! Embrace all equally!
Have lunch with God.......bring chips. | <urn:uuid:8415250a-71d9-47e7-9a6b-d41901a9aa0e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://wqbe.com/blog/alwoody/potato-chips-root-beer-83012 | 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 | 0.99357 | 483 | 1.671875 | 2 |
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The Seattle Times reports some enlightened thinking at the WA DOC:
Washington state is at the forefront of a national re-examination. Instead of facing nothing but forced solitude, Washington inmates in solitary units — called Intensive Management Units, or IMUs — are increasingly being let out for hours to attend classes, see counselors or hit the gym.
It is a clear move to the left in prison management, but one that Washington prison managers say is rooted in data. More emphasis on rehabilitation appears to calm behavior in the prison, and cuts violent recidivism on the streets, experts say. It is also a cost-saver: Solitary confinement costs about three times as much as keeping a prisoner in general custody.
Let us hope other states follow the example.
Photo by Bettina Hansen/Seattle Times. Caption: Earnest Collins says he’s open to change after fights twice landed him in the Intensive Management Unit at Clallam Bay. “If you’re not mentally strong, it’ll drive you crazy,” said Collins. “You hear a lot of crazy things in IMU.”
Request: “I would like to see the downtown Chicago or the lake of Chicago it will bring me happiness to see a real nice picture of the downtown. Please! A good place to eat! Nice cars! I been locked up for 17 long years!”
Last week, I asked Where Are All The Photographs Of Solitary Confinement? In terms of evidential imagery, the question still stands. A very different but equally interesting angle to take in the inquiry into images from within solitary is to consider the imagined and idealised images that persist within the minds of prisoners.
FROM LOCKED DOWN MINDS TO TANGIBLE PRINTS
Tamms Year Ten (TY10), a Chicago-based activist group campaigning to close down the controversial Tamms Supemax in Illinois, is not only finding out what the precious images are in the minds of men in solitary, they are going out into the world and making those images a reality – making files, prints to be mailed to each man, and prints for awareness-raising exhibitions.
TY10 asked scores of men in solitary, “If you could have one picture, what would it be?” The requests can be anything in worlds real or imagined. Once made, the images are opportunities for prisoners to see what they want to, what they used to, or perhaps what they may never see again.
Tamms prisoners never leave their cells except to shower or exercise alone in a concrete pen. Meals are pushed through a slot in the cell door. There are no jobs, communal activities or contact visits. Suicide attempts, self-mutilation, psychosis and serious mental disorders are common at Tamms, and are an expected consequence of long-term isolation.
The U.N. Committee Against Torture considers such conditions to be cruel, inhuman and degrading, and when the isolation is indefinite – as at Tamms – to be form of torture. Last year, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on torture Juan E. Méndez called for a global ban on solitary confinement in excess of 15 days.
This year, Governor Pat Quinn announced his plans to shut down the prison but closure has been halted because of lawsuits by the prison guards’ union, AFSCME.
FRAMEWORK FOR CONSIDERING THESE IMAGES
Below are a selection of the requests and resulting images. They are a hodge-podge collection of styles and approaches and clearly many of the images do not meet the standards of fine art aesthetics. But, those standards are not by which these images should be judged.
The images originate from the minds of men who exist in environments of severe sensory deprivation. Each image is conjured from the absence of imagery.
Process trumps product in the TY10 Photo Requests From Solitary project. These images connect and educate people across supermax divides – the most opaque divides of prison regulation. The Photos From Solitary Project - one of the many TY10 efforts to engage the public on the issue of cruel and unusual detention - was conceived of to capture the eyes and ears of people and draw them in to protest and resistance.
The processes in making these images buttress, and spread, committed social justice activism; that is their worth.
Active in the project are artists and photographers Greg Ruffing, Oli Rodriguez, Jeanine Oleson, Rachel Herman, Claire Pentecost, Colleen Plumb, Tracy Sefcik, Harry Bos, Chris Murphy, Billy Dee, Lindsay Blair Brown, Karen Rodriguez, Sue Coe, Danny Orendorff, Lloyd Degrane and others.
Requests remain open and you can get involved too. Contact firstname.lastname@example.org
Request: “If you please, send me photographs of laser-printed image on white paper or the 10 most-dangerous land animals in the world. If you do not find it onerous and unreasonable, send me pictures of the land animals too, with a description of each animal.”
Photo montage by Mark Cooley; research and text by Stephen F. Eisenman.
Request: “I want a photo of the whole block of 63rd and Marshfield, on the south-side in the Englewood community – the 6300 block of south Marshfield is where I’m from. I would like it taken in the day time, between two and four o’clock p.m. It’s a green and white duplex-like house – the only green and while house on the block – that my Auntie “Gibby” lives in. I want the picture taken from the sidewalk (that leads to the T-shape alley going towards Ashland and 63rd) in front of the alley, facing slightly towards 64th Marshfield. But, make sure majority of the west-side of the block gets pictured.”
Request: “I would like my own picture done with an alternate background from the IDOC picture. I have no pictures of myself to give my friends and family. This would mean a great deal to me. If this is not able to be done. Then I’ll leave the picture for you to decide. If you can place my picture on another background. Nothing too much please. Something simple like a blue sky with clouds or a sunset in the distance would be fine.”
Request: “I would like to see a picture of a beach with the clearest water, and palm trees and birds with colorful plume, and maybe with the sun setting low on the horizon. The only instruction I have would be for you to create this photo with imagination and serenity.”
Request: “It’ll be great to get a picture of the chicago skyline at night, with all the big buildings (Willis Tower, etc) and lakefront. really I would just like pictures of the city, the x-mas tree down town, mag-mile, Mill park the places people come to chicago to see. Hey, you’re the photographer, just do what you do!”
Request: “Jennifer Lopez music videos with her ex Ben Affleck on the boat with her butt showing. I will like to see her butt.”
Request: “I would love a photograph of a woman setting by a lake fishing, with an empty chair next to her, with a cooler of beer. And in the empty chair have a sign with FreeBird on it! And have a Harley Davidson motorcycle in the background! I’d prefer the photographer take the photo from a boat out in the lake! Also, I’d prefer a woman that’s over 40!”
Request: “At 66 yrs. of age I try to use a little humor. I want a picture of a trash-can with the lid half off, with two eyes peeking out of the half-open lid. The trash can is rolling down the hill toward an incinerator with the caption: ‘I seem to be picking up speed I must be headed towards a bright future.’ I was in Florence, CO. So if you could get a picture of me in the Feds and in the state Max joints you could caption both: ‘From Max to Max and no end in sight’.”
Request: “A lovesick clown, holding a old fashioned feathered pen, as if writing a letter. From the waist up, in black and white. As close up as possible with as much detail as possible, and with the face about four inches big.”
Request: “I would like this picture drawn my ID as is. Don’t add a thing. Just the face will do. Thank you for this blessing. I don’t have any pictures of myself; they all were confiscated, years back, when I was at Pontiac. So I would like to know if you could get a picture of me off the internet or the ID photo that I believe you have. Don’t worry I still don’t smile or laugh it’s been years since I smiled, but thanks to your offer I will be smiling if I get the picture your offering. I believe you could get my mug shot off the internet. The picture is to be sent to my mother in Puerto Rico.”
Request: “Cast of the Kidd Kraddick in the Morning Show: Kelly Rasberry; Big Al Mack; Jenna; Psycho Shannon; Kidd Kraddick; JS.” [This is the cast of the radio show he listens to every day. He has been in isolation for 12 years.]
Request: “A picture of the stone archway in the back of the yard’s neighborhood located at 40th and Exchange St; between Halsted and Racine Streets on the South Side. It’s the last remaining thing from the Union Stockyards. I used to climb up on this structure as a kid; a few angle’s of it taken from different directions. I am not limited to any photo amounts.”
Request: “I would like a photograph of Madison and Ashland looking West towards the United Center, and if you could, I would like a full frontal view of the Michael Jordan statue in front of the United Center. THANK YOU!”
Request: “A photo of my deceased mother standing in front of a mansion, or big castle with a bunch of money on the ground and a black Hummer parked in front of it. I truly appreciate this a lot. I have been trying to get a picture of this, for a long time now. Please send the picture back when you are finished. We can’t receive Polaroids, just regular pictures that is 15 pictures, but 10 per envelope. I’m sending you two poems I wrote. I would truly appreciate it a lot from you helping me out, especially as I don’t have nobody out there. Now I know somebody out there in the world cares about us in here.”
Request: “I would like to receive a photograph of a “8×10″ Puerto Rican Flag. Thank you in advance! This could be taken in the Humboldt Park neighborhood in Chicago.”
Request: “I would like a picture of downtown Waukegan, IL located in Lake County, IL. The best place to photograph would be Genesse St.”
Request: “Photographs of Tamms Year Ten – that is, if they are not prohibited. :< I’d just like to be able to put the faces to the names we’ve seen over the years so the humanity of each can shine forth – a name on paper at the end of the day is still just a name on paper!”
Request: “The Bald Knob Cross in the Southern area of Illinois with someone of the Christian faith going there praying for me with the Grand Cross in the picture praying that I am released from Tamms and that I make parole. I’ve been locked up 36 long years, and time in Tamms is hindering my chances of making parole. I am asking for intercession prayers for my release from Tamms by this personal Bald Knob Cross and the chain will cause my family and others to go there too. Be sure to include the Bald Knob Cross in the picture and to pray for my release from Tamms and to make parole. My family and church will also finish linking the chain of this event. Persistently offering prayers combined with solemn earnest efforts and devoted work to change things. God + Tamms Year Ten + dynamic team!”
TY10 note: We coordinated with the management at Bald Knob Cross, gathered his family members and others, drove six hours to Bald Knob Cross and held a beautiful litany with prayer, song and verse and every family member speaking. The next day we took family members to visit Tamms. Willie was transferred from Tamms the day before the prayer vigil! This summer - after 37 years in prison - he got parole. Willie was put on a Greyhound bus and was back in Chicago the next day. We had a Welcome Home party for him and he talked about this photograph.
Request: “A photograph within a photo of me + the lake front. A photograph within a photo of me + Navy Pier. A photograph within a photo of me + wild lions. A photograph within a photo of me + wild wolves. A photograph within a photo of me + Chinese Dragon. For next Christmas mailing of cards. Please place me in the right, upper corner of the photo within a photo and make copies of them 5 each. Thank you very much and many blessings. Get my photo off the Tamms, prison profile website.”
Request: “A photo of the Christmas tree downtown.”
Request: “I don’t know if this like an artist drawing a picture if so I got into the whole superhero thing and I had this idea where two major comic Marvel/DC. It’s a mural with Thor, Captain America, Wolverine, Venom, Iron Man, Hulk teamed up with Superman, Green Arrow, Flash, and Batman against Two Face, Joker, Magneto, Dr Doom, Saber Tooth, Kingpin, and Green Goblin. A battle of good-vs-evil theme.”
Request: “I would like to receive an image laser-printed on regular white paper photograph a myself off the internet without my criminal convictions or other information attached to the photo. I would like the three photographs I am sending to you copied onto digital paper that can be used in a computer enhancement. If someone can do this for me, I will appreciate it very much and thank you. If you can not do it send my photos back, please. ”
TY10 Note: We completed this one and the IDOC censored it and returned it to us.
Request: “I would like a photographer to capture the image of a little boy and girl, sitting side by side, on a piano bench, the two of them playing together, with a single bright red rose on the piano keys. If possible, make sure the kids are anywhere from 3-7 years old, dressed in sunday best. It shall be a romantic photo, which I hope to give to my wife. 8×10 copy of the completed photo.”
TAMMS YEAR TEN & PHOTO REQUESTS FROM SOLITARY
The exhibition Photo Requests From Solitary is on show until the 21st December, at the Tamms Year Ten Campaign Office, Sullivan Galleries, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, 33 S. State St., 7th Floor, Chicago IL 60603.
The Tamms Year Ten Photos Requests From Solitary is supported by an Open Society Documentary Photography Audience Engagement Grant. In partnership with the National Religious Campaign Against Torture, the project is to expand to supermaxes in California and Virginia.
Tamms Year Ten is a grassroots coalition formed in 2008 to persuade Illinois legislators and the governor to reform or close Tamms supermax prison. Follow them on Facebook.
Isolation exercise yard, Security Housing Unit, Pelican Bay, Crescent City, California, a supermax-type control, high security facility said to house California’s most dangerous prisoners. © Richard Ross
Solitary confinement is in the news … for lots of reasons – a lawsuit brought by prisoners against the Federal Bureau of Prisons; a lawsuit brought by 10 prisoners in solitary against the state of California; a June Senate hearing on the psychological and human rights implications of solitary confinement in U.S. prisons (which included the fabrication of a replica sized AdSeg cell in the courtroom); an ACLU report pegging solitary as human rights abuse; a NYCLU report showing arbitrary use of solitary, a NYT Op-Ed by Lisa Guenther; the rising use of solitary at immigration detention centres; and the United Nations’ announcement that solitary is torture.
Recently, journalists from across America have contacted me looking for photographs of solitary confinement to accompany their article. I could only think of three photographers – one of whom wishes to remain anonymous; another, Stefan Ruiz is not releasing his images yet; which leaves Richard Ross‘ work which is well known.
Stefan Ruiz’ photographs of Pelican Bay State Prison, CA made in 1995 for use as court evidence. (See full Prison Photography interview with Ruiz here.)
With a seeming paucity, I went in search of other images. I found an image of a “therapy session” by Lucy Nicholson from her Reuters photo essay Inside San Quentin. A scene that has been taken to task by psychologist and political image blogger Michael Shaw.
Rich Pedroncelli for the San Francisco Chronicle.
Pelican Bay has been hosting media tours and welcoming journalists in the past year – partly due to public pressure and partly through a strategic shift by the CDCR to appear to be responding to public outcry. Maybe the courts have had a say, too?
© Lucy Nicholson / Reuters. Prisoners of San Quentin’s AdSeg unit in group therapy. (Source)
© Shane Bauer. Pelican Bay SHU cell. (Source)
© Shane Bauer. CA CDCR employees show investigative journalist Shane Bauer the Pelcian Bay SHU “Dog run.” (Source)
Correctional Officer Lt. Christopher Acosta is seen in the exercise area in the Secure Housing Unit at the Pelican Bay State Prison near Crescent City, Calif., Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2011. State prison officials allowed the media to tour Pelican’ Bay’s secure housing unit, known as the SHU, where inmates are isolated for 22 1/2 hours a day in windowless, soundproofed cells to counter allegations of mistreatment made during an inmate hunger strike last month. Photo: Rich Pedroncelli, AP/SF (Source)
The amount of visual evidence still seems limited. It’s not that reporting on solitary confinement is lax or missing. To the contrary, I’ve listed at the foot of this piece some excellent recent journalism on the issue form the past year. We lack images.
Look Inside A Supermax a piece done with text and not images is typical of the invisibility of these sites. National Geographic tried a couple of years to bring solitary confinement to a screen near you. ABC News journalist Dan Harris spent the “two worst days of his life” in solitary to report the issue.
Why do we need to see these super-locked facilities? Well, depending on your sources there are between 15,000 and 80,000 people held in isolation daily (definitions of isolation differ). My conservative estimate is that 20,000 men, women and children are held in single occupancy cells 23 hours a day.
Gabriel Reyes, prisoner at Pelican Bay SHU writes about his experience for the San Francisco Chronicle:
“For the past 16 years, I have spent at least 22 1/2 hours of every day completely isolated within a tiny, windowless cell. [...] The circumstances of my case are not unique; in fact, about a third of Pelican Bay’s 3,400 prisoners are in solitary confinement; more than 500 have been there for 10 years, including 78 who have been here for more than 20 years.”
Solitary confinement is a “living death”; an isolating “gray box” and “life in a black hole.” Imagine locking yourself in a space the size of your bathroom for 23 hours a day. As James Ridgeway, currently the most prolific and reliable reporter on American solitary confinement, writes:
“A growing body of academic research suggests that solitary confinement can cause severe psychological damage, and may in fact increase both violent behavior and suicide rates among prisoners. In recent years, criminal justice reformers and human rights and civil liberties advocates have increasingly questioned the widespread and routine use of solitary confinement in America’s prisons and jails, and states from Maine to Mississippi have taken steps to reduce the number of inmates they hold in isolation.”
The over zealous and under regulated use of solitary confinement to control risk and populations within U.S. prisons is a cancer within already broken corrections systems. I’m posting a few more image that Google images afforded me – but I urge caution – these are just a glimpse and may not be indicative of solitary/SHU conditions. Windows are a rarity in solitary despite three images below showing them.
The main reason I’m posting here is to ask for your help in sourcing all the photography of U.S. solitary confinement we can. Please post links in the comments section and I’ll add them to the article as time goes on.
© Alice Lynd. Front view of cell D1-119. Todd Ashker has been in a Security Housing Unit (SHU) for more than 25 years, since August 1986, and in the Pelican Bay SHU nearly 22 years, since May 2, 1990. “The locked tray slot is where I get my food trays, mail.” (Source)
A typical special housing unit (SHU) cell for two prisoners, in use at Upstate Correctional Facility and SHU 20.0.s in New York. Photo: Unknown. (Source)
Bunk in Secure Housing Unit cell, Pelican Bay, California © Rina Palta/KALW. (Source)
Solitary Confinement at the Carter Youth Facility. Since the arrival of the girls’ program at Carter, the administration has created a new seclusion cell. This cell contains no pillow, sheet, pillow case or blanket. In fact, there is nothing in the cell other than a mattress, which was added after numerous requests from the monitor. Girls are routinely placed in this room for “time out.” Photo: Maryland Juvenile Justice Monitoring Unit. (Source)
© Rina Palta, KALW. “More than 3,000 prisoners in California endure inhuman conditions in solitary confinement.” This photo, taken in August 2011 of a corridor inside the Security Housing Unit (SHU) at Pelican Bay State Prison, illustrated Amnesty’s report. (Source)
© National Geographic. In Colorado State Penitentiary 756 inmates are held in “administrative segregation” alone in their cells for 23 hours a day. 5 times a week they are allowed into the rec room where they can exercise and breath fresh air through a grated window. (Source)
Eddie Griffin, prisoner in s Supermax prison in Marion, IL writes about “Breaking Men’s Minds” [PDF.]
Boxed In NYCLU campaign and report with resources and video against use of solitary confinement. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
The Gray Box, an investigative journalism series and film about solitary across the U.S., by Susan Greene. (Dart Society) HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
ACLU – Stop Solitary Confinement - Resources - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
ACLU _ State specific reports on solitary confinement
Andrew Cohen’s three part series on “The American Gulag” (Atlantic)
Atul Gawande’s take on the psychological impacts of solitary confinement (New Yorker)
Sharon Shalev, author of Supermax: Controlling Risk Through Solitary Confinement, here writes about conditions. (New Humanist)
The shocking abuse of solitary confinement in U.S. prisons (Amnesty)
SOLITARY ELSEWHERE ON PRISON PHOTOGRAPHY
Interview with Isaac Ontiveros, Director of Communications with Critical Resistance, about Pelican Bay solitary and community activism.
The invention of solitary confinement.
RIGO 23, Michelle Vignes, the Black Panthers and Leonard Peltier
Chilean Miners, Russian Cosmonauts and 20,000 American Prisoners
Robert King, of the Angola 3, writes for the Guardian
You’d think after 26 months in an Iranian prison, Shane Bauer would not be interested in seeing the inside of another cell. Think again. As I’ve noted before, Bauer is a journalist with human rights at the core of his stories.
Since his return to the U.S. he has been increasingly involved in describing the real problem we have with our approach to corrections. From Bauer’s Mother Jones feature piece:
I’ve been corresponding with at least 20 inmates in SHUs around California as part of an investigation into why and how people end up here. While at Pelican Bay, I’m not allowed to see or speak to any of them. Since 1996, California law has given prison authorities full control of which inmates journalists can interview. The only one I’m permitted to speak to is the same person the New York Times was allowed to interview months before. He is getting out of the SHU because he informed on other prisoners. In fact, this SHU pod—the only one I am allowed to see—is populated entirely by prison informants. I ask repeatedly why I’m not allowed to visit another pod or speak to other SHU inmates. Eventually, Acosta snaps: “You’re just not.”
Bauer excavates the policy and the logic, if you can call it that, used by the CDCR in their categorisation of prisoners and how those policies lands individuals in solitary. Pelican Bay State Prison, the oldest state-built Supermax, is Kafkaesque in its imprisonment of prisoners classified as gang affiliated. Bauer describes the *evidence* used by the CDCR in its case tying Dietrich Pennington to gang activity.
In Pennington’s file, the “direct link” is his possession of an article published in the San Francisco Bay View, an African American newspaper with a circulation of around 15,000. The paper is approved for distribution in California prisons, and Pennington’s right to receive it is protected under state law. In the op-ed style article he had in his cell, titled “Guards confiscate ‘revolutionary’ materials at Pelican Bay,” a validated member of the Black Guerilla Family prison gang complains about the seizure of literature and pictures from his cell and accuses the prison of pursuing “racist policy.” In Pennington’s validation documents, the gang investigator contends that, by naming the confiscated materials, the author “communicates to associates of the BGF…as to which material needs to be studied.” No one alleges that Pennington ever attempted to contact the author. It is enough that he possessed the article.
Getting out is a Catch-22 that is best described by Bauer than I.
For the longest time, there was a media blackout in California prisons and very few journalists got in to the SHU. I have heard from a few reporters and photographers this year who have visited Pelican Bay’s SHU but on a very tightly controlled media tour. Ultimately, Bauer wants to decode what purposes are served by solitary confinement. The CDCR argues it keeps prison violence down, but …
Prison violence fluctuates for myriad reasons, among them overcrowding, gang politics, and prison conditions. It’s impossible to say for certain what role SHUs play; what is clear is that in states that have reduced solitary confinement — Colorado, Maine, and Mississippi — violence has not increased. […] Since Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman released 75 percent of inmates from solitary in the mid-2000s, violence has dropped 50 percent. CDCR officials claim California is different because the gang problem is worse here, though they don’t have data to confirm this.
Bauer goes on to compare the correspondences he received as a prisoner with the letters he receives from Californian prisoners during his investigation. He describes the extreme psychological stress of solitary confinement and possibility of less labyrinthine regulation of SHUs with forthcoming CDCR policy changes (which may or may not transpire.)
He also offers readers to chance to contact the prisoners in the article.
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UPDATED: Oct 23rd, 2012
I feel I’ve tried and fallen short in elucidating the core of the matter as regards solitary confinement. When I watched The Gray Box, by freelance journalist Susan Greene and DAX Films, I knew it was something I had to share.
The Gray Box speaks as I never could; it has voices of experience. You’ll be awed by the psychological terror they describe and by the activities isolated prisoners employ to remain sane.
Of all the many battles at hand for prison reformers, it is felt that the campaign against the over-use of solitary confinement in American prisons is an issue that currently resonates enough with the public to effect some policy change.
The anti-Solitary bloc has simplified its message saying that solitary confinement does permanent damage to the mind of he or she imprisoned; a view backed up by medical science.
Publics are also more educated about isolation – and the manipulation/interrogation techniques associated with it – because Guantanamo prison has been regularly discussed in the media for over a decade.
Essentially, the knowledge that solitary destroys people is knowledge that anyone on the political spectrum can understand and oppose. From the hardcore secular ACLU to coalitions of churches, the voices in opposition to solitary confinement are wide and varied. Even so, we do still see some prisons such as Rikers Island which are bucking the trend and pushing for the to use of more solitary confinement.
Furthermore, the few actions of what we might refer to as prisoner resistance include calls to curtail the use of solitary confinement. (This is something Isaac Ontiveros covered when we discussed the California hunger strike).
Solitary confinement is not an issue I feel I’ve adequately discussed here on the blog. I’ve brought up it’s historical genesis; I’ve discussed isolation in and out of prisons; and I’ve referred you to stories about infamous U.S. prisoners such as Robert King and Leonard Peltier who served and are serving time in isolation.
Truly, if you want to know about the abusive use of solitary confinement in US prison’s follow James Ridgeway’s vital journalism at Solitary Watch.
Ridgeway, a voice you can rely on, says about the film and of Greene’s article The Gray Box: An Investigative Look at Solitary Confinement:
This is one of the most comprehensive articles ever written about solitary confinement in the United States, and is particularly noteworthy for including the voices of prisoners, obtained through correspondence with those buried in isolation. It is also passionate and personal.
James Ridgeway was interviewed by the Dart Center and talked about the murky statistics and exchange of (mis)information about American prisoners in solitary.
The Dart Society Reports distributes journalism about trauma, violence and human rights. | <urn:uuid:0f6a1d43-0ef9-45c0-a27f-886b66c7be41> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://prisonphotography.org/tag/adseg/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949699 | 6,731 | 1.515625 | 2 |
The U of T’s Innis Hall plays host this Saturday to the sixth annual Joe Shuster Awards for Canadian Comic Book Creators, a series of awards that recognize and promote Canadians who make, publish, and sell comic books, web comics, and graphic novels. Kevin Boyd, Executive Director of The Canadian Comic Book Creator Awards Association, the organization that oversees the awards, has been involved with the Canadian comic book community for many years. Kevin recently spoke to Torontoist’s Dave Howard via phone and email about Joe Shuster, this year’s inductees into the Canadian Comic Book Creator Hall of Fame, the Gene Day Award (for self-publishing), and the French Canadian comics scene.
Dave Howard: What are the Joe Shuster Awards trying to celebrate?
Kevin Boyd: Well we’re trying to celebrate the fact that Canada has a large and diverse collection of creators that live here, and we’re trying to encourage more interest and activity in Canada among our creators. This will be our sixth year, as we started organizing in the fall of 2004. The first ceremony was in April 2005.
Because Canada has a rich tradition of supporting our national arts communities with awards that recognize the achievements of our citizens (such as the Genies and the Junos), we felt that it was important to do something similar for comic books.
Howard: Would you mind giving a bit of a summation of Mr. Joe Shuster and why this award is in his honour?
Boyd: Joe Shuster is well known as the co-creator of Superman, and Superman is one of a select group of characters that everybody around the world knows. He was born here in Toronto, delivered the Star here, and developed his love for comics reading the paper. For business reasons his father moved the family to Cleveland, and it was there that he met into Jerry Siegel, who lived just a street and a half over from his house. They went to school together and shared their love for pulps and comics and started writing fantasy stories, like many boys did at the time. They started writing science fiction stories, and Joe used to do the covers and illustrations that accompanied them. They tried to sell them to various pulp publishers with little success. When they started adapting their stories as comic strips they had better success selling their work (like Slam Bradley) to publishers like National. And from there they were able to sell the first batch of Superman newspaper strips to National as a single story for publication in Action Comics 1 in 1938.
Now, there were a whole bunch of things that came into play as far as their role with National (later known as DC). Unfortunately it was not unusual at that time period for creators to sell stories as work-for-hire (a practice still prevalent in mainstream comics). The creators were paid a flat fee for the character rights, for which they had no control. In some cases it’s a reasonable gamble to get published, but in the case of Jerry and Joe, it meant that they had signed away the rights to the most profitable character the fledgling comic book industry had seen – Superman created so many knock-offs that he spawned an entire genre of comics that still dominates the Direct Market today. They did get some compensation as the character moved into other media like radio, cartoons, television. But they tried to sue for the rights back in the late 1940s and lost the case, which was devastating to the men, emotionally and financially.
Howard: How long did it take for them to win it back?
Boyd: Well it’s been a long fight and I think it’s still one that’s ongoing, one that their families have picked up, as they have both passed on. The Siegel family is in the position to—because Jerry has living heirs—to sue DC comics for the rights of that character back. And there’s been some back and forth over the rights of some other characters like Superboy that were developed at a later time and sold as separate concepts. The DC lawyers argue that it’s an extension of the initial contract and that they should still continue to own the rights of those ancillary characters.
I believe 2012-13 is an important time, as that’s when the Shuster family can get involved in the legal action as well. These cases are important in defining the roles of the creator and the publisher. Right now I think they still receive a certain amount of money from DC comics annually as thanks for creating Superman. A pension, in a sense, that’s carried over to their heirs.
Howard: Is that something they won legally, or just as a kind of gift?
Boyd: That was something that the DC lawyers brought in, in the mid to late 1970s, when the Superman movies were coming out. There were stories that Jerry and Joe were living in poverty, and a lot people like Neil Adams and Jerry Robinson sort of stepped forward to say that with DC and Warner Brothers ready to make millions of dollars from the motion picture, it wasn’t right that the men who created the character are forgotten and not getting anything out of it. So someone actually agreed with them at the upper levels, and started issuing an annual payment cheque to them as thanks, and the amount increased as time went on.
Howard: What are the protections in place today for creative people who are involved in the comic book industry?
Boyd: I still think it depends on the contract that you sign and the agreement that you’ve made with your publisher. Generally most writers and artists working in mainstream comics are given royalty rights for the stories they create when they are reprinted, but few receive the character rights back or payment for their usage. If you create a character for Marvel or DC, you don’t own the copyright on it. But there are a lot more deals coming through where creators are asking for and receiving more rights. For instance, if I came up with a character, I can sell that to the publisher, but if I want to retain the rights to that character, they publisher is often allowing that. These creator-owned lines have been around since the 1980s in one form or another.
Howard: For the Joe Shuster awards, someone is inducted into the Canadian Comic-Book Creator Hall of Fame. Who’s getting inducted this year?
Boyd: Six people are getting in, though normally we do three to four.
This year, because it’s the 35th anniversary of the publication of Captain Canuck #1, we decided we would honour the three gentlemen whose names are most associated with the character, including co-creator Richard Comely, who was also the publisher and writer and artist on some of the books, and George Freeman, who really developed the style of Captain Canuck over the initial run as series artist, and has since gone on to do a number of great works for various publishers and also helped to found the Digital Chameleon Studio in Winnipeg, which was one of the studios that revolutionized colouring in comics in the 1990s. They’ll be joined by Claude St. Aubin, who was the anchor on the original series and who did some of the back-up stories. He has since gone on to have a very long and varied career as an inker, an artist, and a colourist, and he currently draws a series called R.E.B.E.L.S. for DC Comics.
The other three people we’re inducting this year are Deni Loubert, formally Deni Sim, the originally publisher of Aardvark-Vanaheim. She and Dave (Sim, creator of Cerebus) formed the company back in 1977 and launched Cerebus, the best known independent comic of the 1970s and 1980s. She’s encouraged a lot of Canadian talent through Aardvark-Vanaheim, and when she and Dave split up she started Renegade Press, taking the non-Cerebus titles from Aardvark-Vanaheim under that umbrella. Creators like Dave Derrigo, Arn Saba, Bill Messner-Loebs, Bob Burden, and Jim Valentino all came out of the A-V/Renegade Press group of titles. Finally, we’ll be inducting Quebecois cartoonist and animator Serge Gaboury, one of the great creators that got his start cartooning for Croc magazine.
Howard: And you have the Gene Day Award?
Boyd: Yes, we’re really excited about the Gene Day Award. We give $500 to the winner, and try to encourage people to go out and self-publish and follow that path, like Gene Day and Dave Sim did. There’s so much amazing work that’s being done now. Just walking around TCAF a few weeks ago, you can just see a lot of the same creative spirit is flourishing.
Howard: There’s a huge scene in Toronto, and all over Canada. I’m always shocked to see how much we have.
Boyd: Yes, it’s amazing. Organizations like TCAF and stores like The Beguiling, and to a lesser extent what we do at Fan Expo, we’re encouraging people to come out and get their work into the eyes of the public and getting interest from publishers to distribute that work or hire the artists for new projects. I think we’ve got maybe five or six creative hot spots in Canada: Toronto definitely, but also Vancouver, Halifax, Calgary, and Montreal. I think that’s the great thing about Canada is that we have that sense of community, and I just don’t get that sense of that in the US at conventions.
Howard: You and I spoke a little bit at the Doug Wright Awards about French comics. We know that Quebec comics are not really seen for the most part in English Canada, though they’re often read in Europe, but some publishers are starting to translate and bring Francophone artists to English Canada. Tell me about the French Canadian scene.
Boyd: I think that because we now have some great English language publishers (Drawn and Quarterly, Conundrum Press) based in Montreal, they are seeing the work of the amazing Quebecois scene (published by companies like La Pasteque, les 400 Coups, Glenat Quebec, et al.) and realize that these great comics deserve to be seen by other parts of Canada.
Howard: Can you tell me about Canada’s French-language publishers?
Boyd: Yes, there’s five or six really quality French publishers in Quebec. There’s La Pastèque, Les 400 Coups, Glénat Québec (which is a European publisher that set up a Quebec division, which encourages Canadian creators to produce works for the European market), and Boomerang (who do great kids books). It’s an interesting group, very self-contained, with the books distributed in Quebec, France, Belgium, and other French-speaking territories. One of the reasons we got rid of the language restrictions for the awards was to raise awareness of this work in English Canada. I think every year we’ve had French language nominees at the top of the nominations list. You never know how things are going to turn out this year as far as winners go.
Michel Rabagliati with his Paul series is some of the best cartooning in the world at the moment. Francis Desharnais, Pascal Blanchet, Guy Delisle, Jean-Louis Tripp and Regis Loisel, Philip Gerard. We’ve got amazing people working on adventure comics like Jacques Lamontagne and Djief Bergeron and Marc Delafontaine’s cartoony style on Les Nombrils (now being reprinted in English as The Bellybuttons). It would be great if those creators can get more exposure in the North American market as well. It was really nice to see a bit of that cross over at TCAF as well—I hope to see more in future years. | <urn:uuid:01fe6f75-7c4f-4a41-a745-4f7d169246a0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://theexcerpt.com/2010/06/an-interview-with-kevin-boyd-of-the-joe-shuster-awards/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976598 | 2,510 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Longmont, Colorado was given the title as one of the "Best Places to Live" in 2006 and 2008, and was also awarded "All-American City" in 2006. Named for its panoramic views of Longs Peak, Longmont is conveniently located 16 miles from Boulder and 37 miles north of Denver. With a population of approximately 82,000, this fantastic city offers many diverse employment opportunities, especially in the high-tech industries with companies like IBM, Seagate, Xilinx, and Maxtor.
Outdoor and recreation enthusiasts can enjoy the seven greenways (sanctuaries) throughout the city, over 1500 acres of parks and open space, and six golf courses in or near the city. The newer Longmont Recreation Center offers many wonderful programs and features for just about everyone. Real estate is also diverse in Longmont. From affordable starter homes, to lovely golf course communities, to charming and historic Old Town Longmont, one should easily be able to find the perfect home for their needs. One of Longmont’s “jewel” neighborhoods is Prospect New Town, a new urbanist project, which is the first of its kind in Colorado and was designed by renowned architect Andres Duany.
More Information about Longmont
At an elevation of
5,017 feet sits the city of Longmont, Colorado. The approximate population of Longmont is
86,270 residents. There are currently
647 properties for sale in Longmont, CO.
Longmont residents have a median household income of
$62,828; compared to the surrounding county’s median household income of
$67,104, and the national median household income of
The median age for residents of Longmont is 36.6 years.
less family-centric than the surrounding county. In Longmont, 35.35% of households contain married families with children; compared to 36.14% in the surrounding county.
fewer single residents than the national average, with 9.24% compared to the national average of communities with 12.73% of single residents.
The average high temperature in July for Longmont is 89 degrees. The average low temperature for Longmont in January is 11.9 degrees. Longmont sees an average rainfall of approximately 13.4 inches per year, and a snow accumulation of 34.2 inches per year. There are an average of 247 days of sunlight each year in Longmont; compared to an average of 253 days across the state, and 205 days across the nation.
RE/MAX Alliance Colorado offices in or near Longmont
Nobody in the world sells more homes than RE/MAX. Nobody in Colorado's Front Range sells more homes than RE/MAX Alliance. Thanks for reading the bottom of the page! Don't forget, if you ever need to talk to us, we're a phone call, email, tweet, instant message, or smoke signal away. | <urn:uuid:41063c61-a27c-4022-b760-189d3ba2c782> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.homesincolorado.com/CO/Longmont | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951259 | 598 | 1.671875 | 2 |
What measures do you take to stave off an imminent system failure? Generally, it is recommended to stop all the user-generated processes, quit running applications, and wait until system resolves all the deadlocks. Going through such a lengthy procedure to take unload apps, services, and other threads off the memory blocks may reinstate your system back to normal, but what if there are issues with system related services. How would you tackle problems related with core system services, prefetch files, registry settings etc? A simple yet effective solution is provided by RefreshPC. It is a small tool which not only refreshes the system but attempts to resolve issues by resetting Windows services, cleaning Temp folders and prefetch files and by optimizing only system specific registry keys.
All that is required is to launch the application and click Refresh My Windows 7 Settings. It will attempt to resolve issues by resting Windows System Services and Windows Registry Settings to default settings and by cleaning Temp and Windows Prefetch data. Moreover, according to developer, it can also reduce errors in Windows Event viewer and fix other service misconfigurations which may be causing slow boots.
Once it’s done with refreshing and cleaning process, a restart prompt will pop up, click OK to reboot your system. Hopefully, you system will start behaving normally. If you are trying to restore your system back to original factory state, we would recommend using this app after following our guide on how to reset Windows 7 to original factory settings.
RefreshPC works on Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. Both 32-bit and 64-bit OS are supported. | <urn:uuid:e30c5339-84cf-41c0-bac1-2b618344d58a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.addictivetips.com/windows-tips/refreshpc-restore-system-back-to-factory-state-to-fix-all-issues/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935463 | 326 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Design of the Times
Graphic designers can diversify their talent and inspiration from various tools available in today’s market. Which ones do you use?
Creative minds can often find design interests in various career paths. For those interested in becoming an invitation designer for those special occasions read this veteran’s advice on how to succeed in this specific industry.
Modern industrial design continues to invent innovative new eco-friendly products and initiatives for greener hotels. Here are some examples of why this transition is important for consumers and businesses alike.
Drag and drop software has become one of the most popular features in current web design trends. Many web design companies offer DIY software suites to accomodate the every day internet user. Publishers who update their software are not only able to communicate more efficiently with their viewers, but spend less time on the developer side of things and get to enjoy the sun every once in a while. Find out more on where you can find these DIY web design software's and decide which is best for you and your audience.
The rise in online media and communications continues to demand expertise in marketing strategies. One proven technique is the use of colors and the psychology behind the choices that trigger audience interest in web design and graphics.
The internet is constantly changing and the top-notch quality designs you see today will soon be replaced by more advanced designs that you didn't think existed. The upcoming web design trends to look out for in 2012 include responsive interface designs, over sized icons, and modal pop up boxes.
Image by MAX CHERNITSOV via Flickr
Internships are excellent for college students and even a wise investment for professional adults who are considering a change in careers. With Design of the Times' new feature on Internships and Apprenticeships, we thought it would be a good idea to describe what you can expect from an internship within the world of design.
There was a time when it seemed every young artist scrambled to become a comic book artist in that golden hey day when the industry was booming, churning out title after title in a roiling sea of diamond-cut foil covers, when mainstream and independent companies alike were running strong. Roughly around the time the Internet became a household staple, things changed dramatically: comics started going online and sale of paper books dropped. Already cutthroat, the industry became a feeding frenzy of genuinely talented individuals scrambling to make a dream into reality. As in any field of entertainment, the competition became fierce for paying jobs and what was once an over-saturated market became a boneyard of dead story lines. Times changed for distributors, major companies shaved their offered titles and the search for work turned many artists away.
Architectural internships are rather plentiful which bodes very well for the prospective architect cum intern. Almost all require very good written and verbal communication and AutoCAD skills; most seek interns who are self-starters with excellent follow-up abilities. After choosing which city you'd like to study in, shine up the resume or CV and tailor it to your internship of choice.
Image via Wikipedia
If you think you have the drive and talent to become a seamstress, internships are an excellent way to spend experience the lifestyle and work environment of a chosen career field.
Always write a polished and succinct cover letter highlighting your talents and experiences in the field. Explain why you’re interested in the position and what you could bring to the table. Also sparkle up that résumé and tailor it to the internship. Make sure there are no grammatical, spelling or factual errors.
If you have a portfolio of designs and dresses, you may wish to include it. Then scour the internship possibilities online and in your local area. Seamstress internships tend to be seasonal with interns needed for summer launches. If any position is closed, make sure to bookmark it and check it again in the winter. Be one of the first to apply for best chances. | <urn:uuid:14ee691a-4968-447a-816a-185b103c4dce> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.design-training.com/blog/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955216 | 806 | 1.796875 | 2 |
RUSH: It's Dave in Detroit. Great to have you on the program, sir. Hello.
CALLER: Hello, Rush. Thanks for having me.
RUSH: You bet, sir. Thanks for calling.
CALLER: My question for you was in regards to a fiscal cliff. You know, Boehner and the Republicans keep giving 'em taxes but we don't hear anything from the Democrats, and they don't give at all. I'm curious why that is.
RUSH: Are you asking me why that is?
RUSH: Well, um... (big sigh) Well, uh, the Democrats won the election.
RUSH: I mean, that's basically the answer to the question: Democrats won the election.
CALLER: And Republicans don't have any leverage?
RUSH: Obama doesn't want to cut spending. He wants to grow spending. He wants to spend more. The Republicans don't think they have a way to get Obama to agree to cut spending, and so Boehner has come up with Plan B. Here's Plan B. Plan B is... See, everybody's taxes are scheduled to go up on January 1st. Everybody's. Everybody's income taxes are gonna go up on January 1st. Boehner's Plan B is a proposal that says only people who earn a million dollars or more will see a tax increase; nobody else will.
RUSH: Because Boehner believes that Obama doesn't want to go over the cliff, and the Republicans don't want to go over the cliff. Because if we go over the cliff, everybody's taxes go up and then Obama will come along and propose tax cuts like January 2nd and get credit for tax cuts that he allowed to go up in the first place. The Republicans are trying to corner Obama into accepting a tax increase on the rich, which is what Obama says he wants, but exempting everybody else. No tax increase.
There are no spending cuts in the deal 'cause Obama has said that he's not... Well, this gets confusing, 'cause Obama's claiming there's almost $1.2 trillion in cuts in years nine and ten. (laughing) There won't be a year nine or ten. But, basically, Republicans don't think they have any leverage. They don't think they have any way to pressure Obama into compromising with them, and so what they're trying to do is prevent everybody's taxes going up so that they don't get blamed for it.
That's really the impetus.
But there's more to this.
A lot of conservatives are pushing Plan B, and I want to tell you how they're doing it when we come back.
RUSH: Here's the latest on the fiscal cliff and Plan B. Boehner met with the media about 40 minutes ago or so, maybe a little bit longer than that. And he said that Obama and the Senate Democrats haven't done much of anything, that their Plan B is to slow-walk us over the fiscal cliff. Jay Leno had it best: "Boehner has Plan B. Obama's using Plan F and Plan U," and that's what we're dealing with here.
Now, a couple hours before Boehner spoke today, Mitch McConnell, who's the Republican leader in the Senate, said that Obama really wants the fiscal cliff. He wants to go over the cliff. He wants everybody's taxes to go up to pay for his big government. He wants to soak everybody. McConnell said it should be perfectly obvious now. And it is, and I hate to say, "See, I Told You So," but I think it's been the easiest thing in the world to conclude that Obama wants to go over the fiscal cliff.
Now, those of you who listen to the program regularly have heard the reasons why I think that. Very briefly, I'll just repeat it. Obama is seeking to be a transformational president. Not just transform the country; he wants to be seen as a transformational president. One of the things... This is pure politics. It has nothing to do with governing. It has nothing to do with your life or making it better or worse. It has nothing to do with the country.
This is pure, pure politics.
What Obama is doing is attempting to secure from the Republicans a concession that tax cuts have caused all these problems that we face. The Reagan tax cuts, the Bush tax cuts -- which, by the way, were only for "the rich," if you listen to Obama, which is not true. Reagan and Bush cut taxes for everybody that pays taxes. But Obama and the Democrats continue to call them "tax cuts for the rich." But what Obama's after is for the Republicans, by virtue of agreeing with him on policy...
They don't expect Boehner to stand up and say, "I confess my policies have led to the problem." They want Boehner's actions to signify that. What Obama is after is for Boehner to agree to raise taxes, even just on the rich. That will do. If Boehner agrees to raise taxes on the rich, then the Republicans are conceding that that's the problem and that deficit reduction and debt reduction can be addressed by raising taxes on the rich.
Obama and the Democrats are desperate to get that concession from the Republicans. They're desperate for it, in a pure political sense. There are many people on the right who do not see that. Many people on the right, on their blogs, are disagreeing with me vehemently, although not by name. They're not using my name, but they're saying things like, "This is the most ridiculous thing I ever heard, that what Obama wants is to destroy the Republican brand of being for low taxes."
Ha! I don't know what's so hard to see about it. Obama is about destroying his political opposition. Any good politician is about that! The Republicans are not about that. The Republicans are into this mode that we gotta get along with them, because that's what they think low-information or independent voters want is everybody getting along. The evidence that the independents don't care about that and nobody else cares about that, is that Obama and the Democrats have a search-and-destroy mission on every Republican opponent.
And they never pay a price for it. They win! So the Republicans are living in a dream world if they think a majority of Americans want us all to work together in a bipartisan way. So while the Republicans are out trying to make that happen, they're being erased. And Obama's got the eraser. And that's his objective. And if he can get the Republicans to agree with his premise that the rich aren't paying their fair share, then the Republicans are giving up a lot of what they're known for.
That's what he's after here.
"But, Rush! But, Rush! Going over the cliff would raise taxes for everybody."
Yeah. And I guarantee you, I don't care what you make, your taxes are going up if this guy's president. I don't care what he says now. I don't care what he said four years ago. Everybody's taxes are going up. They're gonna have to go up to pay for what this guy intends. There isn't gonna be a single person who escapes tax increases in this country. I don't care who you are, I don't care where you live, I don't care how much money you make.
But this deal, the politics of this deal. We go over the cliff, and January 1st everybody's taxes go up. Including the middle class. Now, McConnell is right. Obama wants everybody's taxes to go up, but here's what else Obama wants. He wants, after those taxes go up, to be the guy who proposes tax cuts after blaming the Republicans for everybody's taxes increasing because they wouldn't go along with him.
"They wouldn't agree. They wouldn't raise taxes. They wouldn't agree to raise taxes on the rich, so everybody's taxes went up. Republicans were protecting the rich. Everybody's taxes went up!" That's what's gonna be said. Then Obama gets to be the hero. He gets to come in and, very soon, propose tax cuts. Then he owns the tax cut issue, or if he doesn't own it he's certainly gonna benefit from it.
He's gonna get the credit for it from people, and the low-information voter isn't gonna know the difference. Now, how's Boehner trying to counter that? Okay, Boehner's Plan B is to agree to a tax increase on everybody making over a million dollars a year. Now, this is a tax cut on a lot of rich people. But Obama's number is $400,000 now. He moved up from $250,000 to $400,000. That means people who make between $400,000 and $999,999 would not see a tax increase under Boehner's Plan B.
There's a lot of money in there that Obama wants. Yesterday in his press availability, he made it sound like somebody making $999,999 is Warren Buffett. And they're not paying their fair share, either. He doesn't think they ought to be getting away with it without paying their own tax increase. Now, to many people, Boehner's Plan B is a cave. To some people on our side, it's a cave, because it's exactly what Obama wants.
It's Boehner, the Republicans agreeing to raise taxes on the rich under the premise that the problems exist because the rich got their tax cut in the first place and therefore haven't been paying their fair share. Obama does... I guarantee these low-information people, they do believe that we have a deficit and a national debt and an economy in a mess because the rich aren't paying their fair share. Now, you may think nobody's that dumb. I'm telling you, they believe it.
That's what all this means!
That's what Obama's after, an agreement that his claim is true, that tax cuts for the rich caused all this, not his spending. Not the Democrats' spending. Not any spending. Spending is not the problem here. Too many rich people aren't paying their fair share. So Boehner, "Okay, you want a tax increase on the rich, here you go, but only on people making a million dollars a year or more." Now, there are some conservatives in the conservative media who are supporting this. And let me tell you how they're doing it. It's right out of the baseline budgeting manual of persuasion. The law of the land right now is that everybody's taxes go up on January 1st.
Everybody who pays income taxes will see a significant increase in their income tax rate, their percentage, on January 1. It has been calculated that over ten years, these rate increases will produce, in a static economy, $4.1 trillion. So it is being said that on the books, the law of the land, fiscal cliff, law of the land, January 1, taxes go up $4.1 trillion. Boehner comes along, proposes that everybody under a million dollars gets no tax increase. The conservative media that I have seen selling this is saying, "How can any conservative oppose a $4.1 trillion tax cut?" Goes like this. Law of the land, January 1, everybody's taxes go up to the tune of a total of $4 trillion over ten years. If Obama signs Plan B, agrees to Boehner, then taxes won't go up $4 trillion. Everybody's tax rate will stay the same. That is being called a tax cut.
Your tax rate staying the same is being called a tax cut in order to sell Plan B. And it's persuasive to some because the law of the land is that on January 1 you're gonna get a tax increase. But if Plan B is signed, you won't. Therefore, since your taxes aren't going up, then they're gonna be cut. But nobody's taxes are being cut. Nobody paying what rate they're paying today is going to see their rate go down. Nobody is going to see their rate get smaller. But it is true that everybody's rates could go up or would go up on January 1 if there is no agreement. So now what's happened is that, in order to sell Plan B among the conservative intelligentsia, it's being touted as Plan B equals a $4 trillion tax cut. The end result is that your taxes won't change, as opposed to go up.
And it is a tax increase if your taxes go up on January 1, and if they don't go up, then, yeah, you might say your taxes are not going up. It's playing with the language to say you're getting a tax cut, because in order for you to get a tax cut the taxes would have to go up and then somebody would have to come in and lower the rates again, which is what Obama wants to do. Obama wants to offer a tax cut for a certain number of people that live in the middle class after everybody's taxes go up. He can be the guy riding in on the white horse to save the day from the evil Republicans who saw to it that everybody's taxes went up while they tried to protect the rich. That's the line Obama can't wait to use. In fact, he's already using it now.
So that's where this thing stands. So the pressure is on conservatives in the House and Republicans in the House to support Boehner's Plan B on the premise that Boehner's Plan B is a $4 trillion tax cut. Now, at some point next year everybody's taxes are going up no matter what happens here on Plan B or the fiscal cliff, and then at some point this argument really isn't even about taxes anymore. It's about liberty and freedom and the kind of country we're going to have and us serving government rather than government serving us. All of this is serving to establish that everything we do is for government and that everything we own and produce is government's, our income, our property. And whatever we end up with is because of their good graces and their benevolence, allowing us to keep X of what we produce, rather than us agreeing they only get to take X-amount of what we produce. That's a major transformation, a major thing that's underway. It's happening regardless of what happens with the fiscal cliff and with Plan B.
Now, let me ask you, Mr. Snerdley, I've just spent a good 14 minutes explaining it. Do you think any low-information voter who might have been listening has learned anything? They left after the reference to baseline budgeting and tax rates and fiscal cliff and... right. Yeah. Now, if I had related it to Snooki and her baby's income, then maybe I could have attracted their interest. Or one of the Real Housewives of wherever. But regardless, I just want to tell you, we've gotten to the point now where even Republicans are touting tax rates staying the same as a tax cut. And arguably everybody's taxes would go up on January 1, with the cliff.
By the way, one more thing. Boehner's Plan B is exactly what Pelosi and Schumer suggested in the last six months and two years respectively, and both Schumer and Pelosi are walking it back (imitating Schumer and Pelosi), "Oh, no, no, no. Those proposals were made under entirely different economic circumstances. I don't support what I proposed six months ago." Pelosi said, "I was just making a political maneuver. I didn't really mean it." So all the Democrats who support Boehner's Plan B are running away from it because they all want to go over the cliff, folks. They all want your taxes to go up. They want your money and they want to spend it as their own. They don't want you keeping it.
RUSH: Folks, here's something else along the lines of the fiscal cliff and the tax deal. A story from CNNMoney.com, the headline: "Lack of AMT Fix Could Delay 100 Million Tax Returns." We get a story like this every year. Every time there is a budget dispute, we get a story. It says here: "As many as 100 million taxpayers may be unable to file their returns until late March --" Means you won't get your refund. "-- and would face refund delays if Congress fails to reach a fiscal cliff deal by Dec. 31."
See, here's more pressure being brought to bear on you. "AMT fix? I'm not gonna get my refund? To hell with that." And you're supposed to call Boehner and the Republicans and tell them to cave so that you get your refund. Every time there's a budget story, every damn time, we get a story like this from the Drive-By Media. It mentions here in passing: "Without a patch, $45,000 for joint filers and $33,750 for single taxpayers is exempt from the AMT." They go on to tell you all these numbers and so forth. Your world is gonna end, basically, if the Republicans don't cave. You're not gonna get a refund. You won't be able to file. You may get late penalties, because of the Republicans. That's what the story is. | <urn:uuid:0be1a5d3-2e35-4311-a9aa-259a26b32a52> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2012/12/20/the_latest_on_the_cliff_and_plan_b | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.98099 | 3,568 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Here at KFBK, we work hard to bring you the most entertaining, newsworthy and talked-about stories of the day. But sometimes it doesn't all fit into an hour.
Our goal with this page is to expand on some of those stories and bring you some of things we find behind the scenes. Check this page for dramatic video, entertaining pictures and interesting stories.
The answer to the question that has long puzzled Simpson's fans for years has finally been revealed. Every occasional viewer knows that Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie live in Springfield. But which Springfield has never been revealed...until now.
The show's creator, Matt Groening, told the Smithsonian Magazine that the town is based on Springfield, Oregon.
The only reason is that when I was a kid, the TV show “Father Knows Best” took place in the town of Springfield, and I was thrilled because I imagined that it was the town next to Portland, my hometown. When I grew up, I realized it was just a fictitious name. I also figured out that Springfield was one of the most common names for a city in the U.S. In anticipation of the success of the show, I thought, “This will be cool; everyone will think it’s their Springfield.” And they do.
In the article, Groening also talks about the development of the show and talks about how it became such a big success. | <urn:uuid:7c8c30df-0248-44ec-8b2e-a98c07a6be70> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kfbk.com/pages/scotmurdoch.html?article=10023812 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978818 | 298 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Thanks to the author of the article, Russ Jones, ReligionToday.com mentioned this blog post made last week–“What Should We Make of the ‘God Particle’ Discovery?”
Regarding the amazing find of the Higgs Boson particle, many people see it as a way of disproving God. The idea that any aspect of the physical universe we can’t explain naturally must by necessity be “God” explained has been the false presumption by many theists. Therefore, new discoveries such as this are yet backfiring to such theistic claims–furthering the idea that there must be no God. However, this situation simply expresses the flaw of many theists who argue God’s existence in the gaps of our scientific finds–only showing atheism to be the perspective for those who wait for a better natural answer, while theists are shown to be the anxious ignorants. The problem is that our idea of God is all wrong–completely even! If there is one unique aspect of the Gospel message, it is that God is not the cop-out answer for that which we don’t know, He is the God of revelation. He isn’t the God of the gaps, but the God of completion.
Christians shouldn’t be scared of anything that seems to prove God out of the picture. We shouldn’t have such a narrow mind in our theology or understanding of His creations, that we are frozen when anything arrives to demolish our framework of interpretation. I commend these new discoveries as feats in the human grasp of all that essentially belongs to God. We should be ready to applaud the efforts of those who invested time and effort into making the discoveries such as this that help us see the beauty in God’s creation and how it works. If there is one quality that should stand out most is how finely tuned our universe is that this particle exists for an extremely necessary purpose. Our view of God should grow, in fact, with this amazing news, as should the position that the universe requires design by the Creator.
The Reasons to Believe organization already two days ago had some anticipations for this news.
Check out the Los Angeles Times article on the discovery. | <urn:uuid:5d39633f-36a0-4521-a49a-c3b2b07bf8fe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://unapologeticapologist.wordpress.com/2012/07/05/the-god-particle/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947323 | 458 | 1.796875 | 2 |
The Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service said Monday that Director George Cohen called the meeting of the International Longshoremen's Association and the U.S. Maritime Alliance before the Dec. 29 expiration of the dockworkers' contract extension. It said the parties have agreed to attend the meeting but wouldn't elaborate.
Talks between the dockworkers and the shipping companies broke down Dec. 18, just weeks after a critical West Coast port complex was crippled by a strike involving a few hundred workers. Issues including wages are unresolved, but the key sticking point is container royalties, which are payments to union workers based on cargo weight.
Port operators and shipping companies, represented by the Marine Alliance, want to cap the royalties at last year's levels. They say the royalties have morphed into a huge expense unrelated to their original purpose and amount to a bonus averaging $15,500 a year for East Coast workers already earning more than $50 an hour.
The longshoremen's union says the payments are an important supplemental wage, not a bonus.
The union represents 14,500 workers at more than a dozen ports extending south from Boston and handling 95 percent of all containerized shipments from Maine to Texas, about 110
The New York-New Jersey ports handle the most cargo on the East Coast, valued at $208 billion last year. The other ports that would be affected by a strike are Boston; Delaware River; Baltimore; Hampton Roads, Va.; Wilmington, N.C.; Charleston, S.C.; Savannah, Ga.; Jacksonville, Fla.; Port Everglades, Fla.; Miami; Tampa, Fla.; Mobile, Ala.; New Orleans; and Houston.
Retailers fear another strike could have catastrophic effects and have asked President Barack Obama to intervene.
The National Retail Federation wrote to Obama last week and asked him to use "all means necessary" to head off a strike.
"We foresee this as a national economic emergency, to be honest," said Jonathan Gold, the group's vice president of supply chain and customs policy.
Billions of dollars in commerce at businesses nationwide could be affected, from auto manufacturers awaiting parts to the truckers who deliver them, Gold said. | <urn:uuid:5e1d9c0c-4a03-496b-a20b-0b8df1ea9c10> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.contracostatimes.com/nation-world/ci_22256348/meeting-shippers-east-gulf-dockworkers-called | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95404 | 441 | 1.578125 | 2 |
A strong low pressure system was slowly moving eastward through the Central U.S. on Saturday.
The cold front associated with this low pressure system was expected to sweep over the Mississippi River Valley. This system was obtaining ample moisture from the Gulf of Mexico, and was forecast to be capable of triggering some heavy rains with strong downpours.
Rainy conditions were expected to stretch from Illinois and Indiana down the Mississippi River Valley into the Gulf states. Expected rainfall totals ranged between 1-2 inches in most areas.
The northern side of this system was forecast to keep pulling cold air in from Canada. As this system takes what was expected to be a more northeastern path, it was forecast to bring more snow to the Upper Midwest.
A winter weather advisory was issued for parts of Minnesota and Wisconsin, as snow accumulations may range between 5-8 inches. This was forecast to bring dangerous road and travel conditions throughout the day as slow and continuous snowfall was expected. Highs in the Midwest and Northern Plains were forecast to remain in the 30s, while the Southern Plains were expected to see highs in the 50s and 60s.
In the East, or ahead of the front, southerly flow was expected to keep pushing in some warmer air. Thus, the East Coast was forecast to remain slightly warmer than seasonable on Saturday. High pressure was expected to prevail so another sunny day with highs in the 60s was forecast across New England.
Out West, another trough of low pressure in the Pacific Ocean was pushing a cold front over the Pacific Northwest. This was expected to trigger more showers over Oregon and Washington, with snow developing across the Northern Rockies. Snowfall totals were forecast to be light, with near an inch likely.
Temperatures in the Lower 48 states Friday ranged from a low of 3 degrees at Alamosa, Colo., to a high of 82 degrees at Port Isabel, Texas. | <urn:uuid:fa59e4f7-eeb8-4dfb-84ba-4a9828d29c2b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.vcstar.com/news/2010/nov/13/the-nations-weather/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983874 | 388 | 1.742188 | 2 |
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said its top priority on intellectual property issues is pushing Congress to pass a law that tackles online copyright infringement and trade in counterfeit goods, setting up a potential clash between business interests and free-speech advocates.
Chamber officials also want to ensure that any U.S. free-trade pacts contain strong protections for U.S.-made goods and that the White House gets additional resources to fight copyright crime, according to letters that Chamber officials sent to the White House and Congress today.
Some members of the nation’s powerful business lobby — from record labels to Hollywood studios to the pharmaceutical industry — are ailing because of online copyright infringement and the sale of counterfeit goods on the Web.
Topping the Chamber’s IP priority list is for lawmakers to pass legislation this year aimed at shutting down websites that offer pirated goods or infringing content. The group supported Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy’s Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act, which the committee approved last fall but which was not brought to the floor. The COICA would allow federal authorities to seek court orders to shut down websites with infringing content by seizing their domain names.
The bill, however, was thwarted by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who echoed public interest group concerns that the measure would chill free speech online.
Chamber officials said some members of the House and Senate are interested in renewing attempts and that the timing may be in their favor this year, given that some of the thornier legislative battles over health care and taxes are out of the way.
“In a year where megabills were dominating the agenda, it’s harder for some of these things to get time to be considered in Congress. But this is a year where Congress can really focus on getting these really important pieces of [intellectual property] legislation done,” David Hirschmann, president of the Chamber’s Global Intellectual Property Center, told POLITICO. “It’s a real opportunity.”
With the next round of Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations kicking off this month in Chile, the Chamber also wants the White House to ensure the trade agreement mirrors the same strong IP protections in the South Korea trade deal that President Barack Obama recently signed.
“The bar should be there or higher,” Hirschmann said.
In addition, White House IP Chief Victoria Espinel needs permanent staff and funding to implement the governmentwide IP enforcement strategy released last June, the Chamber argued.
“We’re not doing a good enough job protecting the consumer, protecting jobs and protecting IP,” Hirschmann said. | <urn:uuid:3b882f0c-272e-46ed-8960-0a3db6940a84> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dyn.politico.com/printstory.cfm?uuid=0C25C86B-B156-B54D-D06190161EA78E06 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936618 | 549 | 1.5625 | 2 |
Asylum problem 'out of control'
A majority of Britons believe the Government's immigration and asylum policy is too lax, according to a new poll.
The YouGov survey for The Sun newspaper found that 82% of those questioned thought the Government's policies on immigration and people who sought asylum in Britain were "not tough enough".
Only 8% considered the balance "about right", while 6% considered the Government's approach "too tough" and 4% did not know.
The poll showed growing concern about the issue among the electorate. Asked which are the most important political issues facing the UK, 39% identified immigration and asylum seekers, compared with 32% who cited law and order, 9% who said the war on terrorism and the 6% who focused on the euro.
Some 80% of those polled agreed with the statement that "the problem of asylum seekers is out of control".
And asked whether all immigrants should be tested for infectious diseases as part of the immigration process, an overwhelming 86% agreed, with only 7% disagreeing.
YouGov questioned 2,309 voters online from across Britain between August 11 and 15. | <urn:uuid:607e2976-789a-482b-80f5-437bc454268c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-192729/Asylum-problem-control.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963718 | 231 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Beagles are also among America’s top 10 favorite breeds of dogs according to the American Kennel Club (AKC.org). They are very intelligent, high spirited, and sometimes very vocal dogs. Famous beagle dogs include the cartoon character, Peanuts “Snoopy”, Garfield’s friend, “Odie”, “Gromit” of Gromit and Wallace,”Mr. Peabody” (from Rocky and Bullwinkle) “Lou” from the movie “Cats and Dogs” and, of course, “UnderDog”.
Besides being in cartoons and movies, Beagles do play an important role with Homeland Security and Department of Agriculture. As reported in Urban Paws Magazine (www.urbanpawsmagazine.com), the “Beagle Brigade” is a team of Beagles that has made an estimated 75,000 seizures a year of prohibited items while working at airports, borders, ports, post offices, and international shipping companies inspecting luggage and packages.
The Beagles sharp sense of smell helps it tell the difference between illegal and legal items and will alert the handler when they find the prohibited items. “Sophia”(pictured to the right) is a Beagle from Houston that made the Beagle Brigade and you can read more about her story in this months urbanpawsmagazine.
So, next time you go through the airport and spot a beagle sporting a navy blue vest, they may just belong to the “Beagle Brigade” | <urn:uuid:d83fd0d7-4f47-451d-8e28-c3d549508bd5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://luvurdog.com/tag/department-of-agriculture/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936796 | 331 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Sanford Police photo via gzlegalcase.com.
(CNN) -- A photo posted online Monday shows George Zimmerman with blood on his nose and lips. His attorneys say it was taken the night unarmed teen Trayvon Martin was killed in Sanford, Florida.
Zimmerman says he shot Martin in self-defense. Martin's attorneys say he was shot and killed "in cold blood."
Prosecutors have charged Zimmerman with second-degree murder for the February 26 killing.
The picture, posted Monday on Zimmerman's defense website, was taken by a police officer, Zimmerman's attorneys wrote.
The state had previously provided a black-and-white copy of the image, the attorneys wrote on the website. "This high resolution digital file was finally provided to the defense on October 29."
A police report from the night of the incident said Zimmerman was "bleeding from the nose and back of his head."
The 28-year-old volunteer neighborhood watchman was driving through his gated community when the incident occurred. Martin was walking through the neighborhood to his father's girlfriend's house.
Zimmerman has claimed that after the two exchanged words, Martin charged at him, knocked him to the ground and banged his head repeatedly against a concrete sidewalk.
Martin's family says Zimmerman attacked the teen, who had done nothing wrong.
Martin's death sparked nationwide protests and inflamed public passions over race relations and gun control, as well as Florida's controversial "stand your ground" law, which allows the use of deadly force when a person perceives a threat to safety.
In August, a new judge was named to oversee the case, after an appeals court agreed to a request from Zimmerman's defense team. The attorneys had argued the previous judge had made remarks putting Zimmerman in reasonable fear of an unfair trial.
Photo Gallery: Trayvon Martin photos
More Trayvon Martin stories:
"Fake" Trayvon Martin picture circulates on the web
911 calls released
Racial slur uttered during call?
Trayvon Martin's death renews Stand Your Ground debate
Who is George Zimmerman?
Shooter in Florida teen's death fears for his life
New Black Panther Party touts reward, revenge
Father: Trayvon "saved my life"
Bubba the Love Sponge comments on Trayvon Martin
Obama: "If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon"
Geraldo: Hoodie to blame for Trayvon's death
Thousands attend Sanford rally | <urn:uuid:8c735f71-65fc-4905-b1d4-c92a17262721> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wtsp.com/news/topstories/article/285312/250/New-Zimmerman-photo-surfaces | 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 | 0.978274 | 501 | 1.5 | 2 |
The Job Interview
- leaving positive impressions (verbal & non verbal)
- proper protocol (the before, during & after)
- inner confidence
- the dos and don’ts of being a good conversationalist
- the critical importance of a bright and engaged expression
You can’t afford to present yourself as anything but your very best. Most however are unaware of the habits that cause them to leave poor impressions; they don’t realize that in the professional world you need to bump it up and exude an air of warmth, confidence and authority with an ability to thoughtfully listen while thinking and speaking improvisationally.
Through an interactive discussion of best practices, drills, role playing as well as homework, this program breaks down what are often deeply ingrained bad habits. Participants practice in-class and on their own, doing various exercises to develop poise, polish and confidence. Role play exercises are video recorded so students can see how they look and sound. Sessions also cover the before-interview research and preparation and the post interview follow-up.
In the program job seekers see how they can replace the awkwardness, anxiety and insecurity they can feel in promoting themselves with an understanding of how to confidently and effectively present themselves.
They will learn how to articulate their individual differentiators, past business successes and desirable personal traits and develop several compelling narratives that would impress a recruiter. They are challenged to come up with strong answers to real life interview questions.
Participants come away equipped to leave strong positive impressions that will make them stand out and offset any shortcomings they may have in their resume.
Instructor can work one-on-one with those who wish personal attention. The program can also be presented before a group of an optimal size of around a dozen people.
Depending on scope, the program consists of three to six one-hour weekly sessions. | <urn:uuid:b4cd1aa0-d16c-4783-8204-d790d70e51a9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.billmollercommunications.com/offering-3.html | 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 | 0.954479 | 383 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Motor Control Centers, Panels and Switch Gear
Staybright Electric (SBE) understands that unscheduled downtime can be one of the most costly events commercial and industrial businesses face. SBE has the people and equipment in place to minimize that downtime if and when your Motor Control Center, Panels, Switchgear or Main Breakers fail. A more proactive approach would be to predict when your electrical equipment is going to fail and fix the problem before any downtime occurs.
A thermographic study can highlight parts that are running outside normal operating limits, which can predict an impending failure. An integrated panel may be able to alert the facility that something is not operating as it should be.
The more electrical work that is done as preventative maintenance versus reactive maintenance and emergency services can save your company thousands of dollars in downtime costs. | <urn:uuid:9e3291ac-6bf2-4b4d-a54a-aedaf4b618c9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.staybrightelectric.com/commercial-electrical-services/motor-control-centers-panels-switch-gear.php | 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 | 0.941151 | 166 | 1.5 | 2 |
Q Berkeley's Gilman Street is a major path to Interstate 80 and one of the streets that leads to the Golden Gate racetrack. No stoplights. Only stop signs and a first-come, first-served honor system manages traffic flow. Amazingly, there have been no major accidents or fatalities that I know of, but you sense driving through this car maze that it's just lurking in the shadows.
Why has there not been movement to set up a signal light system there? I travel there quite often for shopping, doctor's office, walking parks, etc., each time crossing the intersection with bated breath.
A I wish I could, but we need help from our legislators in Sacramento.
Q I am encouraged that studies are under way to add a northbound lane on Interstate 680 over the Sunol Grade, as I am sure so many others are.
A I'm not.
Q Bring on more BART through the East Bay? I don't think so, now that Alameda County's sales tax for transportation failed to get the two-thirds vote required. What a shame.
A This is frustrating. My back is aching today, so that's my excuse for turning cranky.
The two-thirds margin needs to be lowered. It's ridiculous that roughly 3 in 10 no votes can defeat the wishes of nearly 7 of 10 voters.
Here's where the Legislature needs to jump in -- and put on the ballot a measure to lower the threshold to 55 or 60 percent. These county sales taxes have provided more than 50 percent of the money for road and rail improvements throughout the state since 1984, when Santa Clara County became the first to approve the spending of county funds to build state roads (highways 85, 101 and 237).
Look around. The gas tax won't be increased. Better mileage rates will lower the dollars that come in from the existing gas tax, and federal funds will likely be scaled back.
The alternatives are more toll lanes and county sales taxes.
This isn't only an East Bay issue. Commuters on these roads are headed to the South Bay, Peninsula and San Francisco. If we want to tax ourselves, so be it. But state voters should be asked if they want to level the playing field or remain at a two-thirds threshold.
And there is a chance, says Kurt-the-VTA-Legislative-Watcher:
"This has been something that has been talked about for quite some time. However, there hasn't been the possibility of getting the two-thirds vote in the Legislature that is needed to put it on the ballot because there weren't enough Republicans willing to go for it, and the stakeholder groups didn't believe they could raise the money it would take to both qualify it for the ballot and finance a campaign.
"With the Democrats on the cusp of having a two-thirds supermajority in both the Assembly and Senate, we may see a serious effort in the Legislature to put it on the ballot in 2014."
That's all I ask.
Q When I hear traffic reports about stalls, etc., on the freeways and they refer to lane one, two, three and four, I wonder: Is lane No. 1 the inner or fast lane or slow lane?
A No. 1 is the fast or far left lane; No. 4 on a freeway with four lanes in one direction is the slow or far right lane. And if the sales tax rules are not relaxed, we all may be in the slow lane for a long time. | <urn:uuid:42c8019b-5a6b-42a7-985e-3aecdacf5a4d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mercurynews.com/mr-roadshow/ci_22081853 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962396 | 724 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Record your story about the place you call home as part of the "Door to Door at DCPL" oral history collaboration between the DC Public Library and WAMU 88.5.
"Door To Door at DC Public Library" brings us inside the neighborhoods that make up our diverse city. We talk with residents about the history, geography and culture of their communities, and find out what makes them unique.
Radio journalists will be on hand to record interviews with members of the public at the Watha T. Daniel/Shaw Library story time room from 1 - 5 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 19. Come with family and friends, photographs and your stories!
Select interviews will air on WAMU 88.5's Metro Connection, and all recordings will be archived in the Washingtoniana Division of the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library.
Most interviews will take around 15 minutes. Walk-ins are welcome, but if you would like to reserve a specific time slot, call Anina Ertel at 202-727-0971.
This project is funded through the Library Services and Technology Act and sponsored by the Institute of Museum and Library Services. | <urn:uuid:aebd0091-5bdb-4fc5-be77-0cab5ea2f602> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://wamu.org/events/door_to_door_at_dcpl | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934729 | 239 | 1.734375 | 2 |
April 13, 2010, 5:01 PM — The focus on security has shifted from network security to enterprise information protection, where the main point is simple: data is the focus for both the offense and the defense, and the cost of defense grows more quickly than the cost of offense.
This imbalance is not going away, and as a planning input it is dominating regardless of whether you are on the one side or the other. As the cyber world is a world of interconnections, a defensive failure outside of your view or scope may propagate to you. The most skilled opponents rely on such propagation, and they are persistent, their technology is advanced and the result is threatening.
That adds up to an advanced persistent threat (APT). While appropriate, the APT term -- which has its root in the military sector -- is messy because in the fall and winter of 2009 APT in one form or another began to show up in various marketing efforts, which watered it down. Let us define the term for the purpose of this article as follows: A targeted effort to obtain or change information by means that are difficult to discover, difficult to remove, and difficult to attribute.
Note that we use the word "and" in that definition. If the so-called APT is to be sufficiently different to be a separate species of cybercrime, it has to have the collection of all three difficulties. APT is to typical cybercrime as an elephant gun is to an ordinary rifle -- a matter of degree, but an important matter of degree. Not everyone who is a possible target is worth the expenditure of work by the attacker or the implicit exposure of closely held attack tools.
An aspect of sane risk management is to not invest more in protection than an asset is worth. This goes for car insurance, door locks and access control. It goes for many things, and its counterpoint for the offensive side is to not bother using arbitrarily powerful tools when the data can be gotten with simple throwaway tools.
In that sense, offense and defense calibrate each other, and if an APT is in play inside some enterprise, it is because the value of the data there warrants the risk and investment by the offense. The defense has to calibrate its defensive effort by the data's value as well, but the strategic asymmetry enjoyed by the offense means that as data value rises, a greater share of the total effort has to be expended by the defensive side.
It is natural for CIOs and other leaders to know something about this threat, but to have every incentive to provide the least expensive fix to the most present danger -- least expensive measured not only in coin, but also in process.
Given that the offense has the advantage of no legacy drag, the offense's ability to insert innovation into its product mix is unconstrained. By contrast, the CIO who does the least that can be gotten away with only increases the frequency of having to do something, not the net total work deficit pending. | <urn:uuid:c4233f84-9c3c-45b0-b46d-c21b3ace772d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.itworld.com/security/104307/advanced-persistent-threat | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96814 | 606 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Hypertension The Link Between Stress and High Blood Pressure
How To Reduce Blood Pressure
Meditation - this helps to calm your head down while you learn the art of detachment as well as the skills associated with focussing with what's important in the greater general scheme of things.
Garlic can be included in the natural ways to aid lower high blood pressure. Garlic known to aid in promoting blood movement. There is a question on the efficacy of garlic oil when consumed raw associated with cooked form. Some say is it is most beneficial when consumed raw, although some say it's best that you make the garlic cloves to release natural oils. If you don't like the style of garlic cloves, there are garlic oil pills you can purchase your local local pharmacy. Just be very careful when taking garlic capsules when you are having any type link of medication. Consult your medical doctor to know if this really is ideal for an individual.
On 29th Goal, 2011 this BBC had the particular headline: Doctors cause a finally of tenacious high blood pressure. They reported that 37% regarding 8,295 patients believed to have obstinate or immune hypertension actually had "white coat" high blood pressure levels.
Until you may learn adjust your lifestyle, there are lots of supplements which will help. My fresh focus can be to guide you to mix products that help your health demands. Combination backpacks are designed to offer you a synergistic mixture of nutrients which usually target your unique challenge. Synergy is like including 1+1+1 and getting 5 not really There is something to be said for your power inside numbers. Using just one ingredient like Garlic cloves to lower your blood pressure may possibly work for several of you, yet not all of you. The following are some of the widely used "single" ingredients you may find in Blood Pressure products:
There are a number regarding problems with blood pressure (Blood pressure) reducing medicinal drugs however. They don't cure the reason for high blood pressure but merely cheaper it while the drugs stay in your system. Which means people usually have to take prescription drugs daily for the rest of their life in order to preserve their blood pressure with an acceptable stage.
These scientific tests provide extraordinary optimism concerning the beneficial purpose of whole milk protein proteins in the operations hypotension of high blood pressure. Consequently, individuals with high blood pressure can not only match their necessary protein requirements with help of whey and casein, but they also may also decrease their blood pressure. People who have high blood pressure should seek advice from their doctor about these kind of milk necessary protein supplements to end up being included in their own diets.
Are you searching for the fastest means to reduce high blood pressure? You most likely know by now that drugs aren't the solution. Drugs are created to control blood pressure not really eliminate it. You probably also realize that the best way to understand this condition out of your life is to create changes in your lifestyle.
By seeing the two atmosphere pressures the location where the pulsation starts in addition to stops, we have now noted your systolic and the diastolic pressure with the artery.
High blood pressure sometimes can be inevitable. That is brought about by several factors the other of these is heredity in which we simply cannot run away from it. When we remained young, we sometimes are used to various vices including alcohol as well as smoking, not knowing that sooner we would endure its effect such as high blood pressure levels. | <urn:uuid:39ebea8e-e24d-468c-8abd-6a2834eae829> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://journals.fotki.com/alf78f9fga/micheal-sharps/entry/wftskgwfbffr/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964443 | 701 | 1.59375 | 2 |
|Dancers Angelina Sansone & Geoffrey Kropp. Photographer Steve Wilson.|
Choreography: Karole Armitage
Music: Einojuhani Rautavaara
Lighting Design: Kirk Bookman
Costume Design: Lily Walker
The music for Arctic Song by Einojuhani Rautavaara combines a recording of arctic birdsong with an orchestra. I was intrigued by this remarkable piece of music because it is unusual and very beautiful. It is melodic while its deep structure is conceptual in a very contemporary way. This allowed me to make a dance combining the classical ballet vocabulary with many other influences and to organize group movement that draws upon nature for inspiration. One important influence is Japanese calligraphy. Western dance has typically been vertical and horizontal in its shape and dynamics. The idea of calligraphy led me to make movement that traces the air in a sinuous, curvilinear mode. This applies not only to individual dancers but also to the duets where, in a call and response-like interaction, a circle in the arm in one dancer might turn into a hip circle for his partner. The mirroring and dialogue of movement is rooted in the ballet tradition, but is done here in ways that draw also upon the influence of street dance. In hip hop the sequential passing of a wave of movement down ones own body and then on to someone else is used here in a lyrical, sensuous way.
Typically when eleven women are dancing together they are all doing the same movement at the same time facing the same direction. In Arctic Song this is rarely the case. I used images drawn from nature as a way to create both harmony and individuality for the group. When animals engage in the same activity, such as flying, they are each doing it in their own way in their own rhythm. I wanted to bring this shared intention and freedom to the stage. Each dancer is doing the same dance step in their own, unique way. This becomes like a forest of movement - each tree has its own unique shape and can be seen from every angle. All are beautiful. This spills into a democratic way of seeing the world as it alludes to the fact that all of the dancers are interesting in their own way.
Nature is deeply rooted in the Japanese aesthetic upon which I draw, but the balance in Rautavaara’s work is exceptional. The music has very strong bursts of sound and great intensity as well as gentle lyricism. The movement reflects this by combining a lyrical flow with intense, almost violent accents. The rawness and beauty mirror our own experience. Tennessee Williams used the image of man as a bird without wings. The music allows us to fly.
- Notes by Karole Armitage | <urn:uuid:4e0e8543-22ca-448d-82a1-83418b381400> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kcballet.org/aboutus/repertory/arcticsong.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953703 | 563 | 1.625 | 2 |
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Fri September 14, 2012
PHOTOS: Muslims in metro Detroit hold vigil in response to attacks in Libya
Metro Detroit Muslims held a vigil last night in downtown Royal Oak, in memory of those killed in an attack on the U.S. Consulate in Libya Tuesday.
U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens, along with four Americans and many civilians were killed in Benghazi.
Zanah Ghalawanji is a Syrian American.
"The Muslim community absolutely does not support anything that occurred in Libya. Violence is against our religion. Our religion is all about peace," said Ghalawanji.
Candles burned as Ghalawanji gave words of condolence to the Stevens family.
"We are deeply thankful for the courage and selfless dedication that so many of the U.S. diplomatic corps have shown in Libya, Syria and throughout the region during this turbulent period," said Ghalawanji.
The violence was sparked by a video that makes fun of Islam, and the Muslim prophet Mohammed.
David Sawulski didn't participate in the vigil. But he had a front-row sit at a nearby cafe.
"I think it is great. They're supporting the American ambassador and the U.S. by standing here and giving support for some body who has killed who was assisting those people. The ambassador was obviously loved by the Libya people," he said.
The controversial video has sparked violence in several countries. | <urn:uuid:66384db9-afbe-49e9-a7dd-154fc8f2dfc8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://michiganradio.org/post/photos-muslims-metro-detroit-hold-vigil-response-attacks-libya | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975701 | 373 | 1.515625 | 2 |
Summer Reading: Rutgers Faculty and Staff Share the Titles They Can’t Wait to Tackle
Khaled Hosseini, Kate Atkinson and Sherlock Holmes make the cut for 2013....
Rutgers Computer Scientists Receive Google Grant to Develop Personalized Data Search System
Computer scientists Amelie Marian and Thu D. Nguyen received a grant from Google to develop a personal data search system that draws from social media pages, personal calendars, bank account information, email, Skype conversations and work documents, among other things.
- Life Sciences;
- Life Sciences / Neuroscience;
- University News;
- University News / People;
Rutgers-Newark Researcher Paula Tallal Named Inventor of the Year By NJ Inventors Hall of Fame
Co-Invented Ground-breaking Software to Aid Children With Learning Disabilities
September 25, 2012 -- Through her cutting-edge research, Paula Tallal, Rutgers Board of Governors Professor of Neuroscience, has helped to bring positive change to more than three million children and adults who struggle with language and literacy. Fast ForWord, a revolutionary technique and series of software programs she co-developed, assists people in more than 40 countries by establishing and strengthening the neural networks for language development.
Next month, Tallal’s achievement with Fast ForWord, as well as her body of research, will be recognized when she is named an “Inventor of the Year” by the New Jersey Inventors Hall of Fame. Tallal is one of only four inventors being honored Oct. 18, as the Hall of Fame acknowledges a number of researchers for their “inventive achievements which have had a positive effect on society.” Tallal, co-director of the Rutgers Center for Molecular and Behavioral Neuroscience , has been on faculty since 1987.
"For scientists, our life goal is to discover things of importance. That my scientific work contributed to inventing Fast ForWord, a series of individually adaptive computer games that enhance children's cognitive, language and literacy skills, is beyond my wildest dream,” stated Tallal. “It is my hope that being named the Inventor of the Year by the NJ Inventor's Hall of Fame will result in getting Fast ForWord programs to even more children who can benefit from them."
Rutgers-Newark Interim Chancellor Phil Yeagle describes Tallal as a “giant at the center of dramatic advances in understanding the learning process. Her ‘Fast ForWord’ invention is revolutionizing learning for ever expanding populations.”
“Dr. Paula Tallal is one of the talented innovators who help make New Jersey a powerhouse of creativity and ingenuity. Through her pioneering work helping learning-disabled children, she is keeping alive the legacy of New Jersey inventors such as Thomas Edison,” stated Les Avery, president of the New Jersey Inventors Hall of Fame.
Tallal’s more than three decades of research into the connections between auditory processing, attention, memory and language learning has found that timing is critically important for learning language and reading. The central problem for many children who struggle with language, including those with dyslexia, is that their brains have difficulty perceiving the rapidly successive acoustic changes that differentiate the speech sounds within words (phonemes), such as the difference between "da" and "ba." In order to become a proficient reader a child must become aware that words can be broken down into smaller units of sound (phonemes) and that it is these sounds that the letters represent
Tallal and her co-researchers hypothesized that the brain’s neuroplasticity could be used to rewire neural networks to increase processing speed and hence improve language and literacy skills – or to "fire and wire" as she describes it. Neuroplasticity refers to the fact that the brain, rather than being molded and set, is able to reorganize itself in response to new situations or changes in the environment.
In 1996, Tallal was a cofounder of Scientific Learning Corporation, a neuroscience company that produces the Fast ForWord series of training programs. Fast ForWord improves language and literacy skills by training the brain to handle increasingly complex perceptual, cognitive and language information. Her co-founders include Michael Merzenich, professor emeritus, University of California, San Francisco, and his research colleague William Jenkins, and Tallal’s research colleague Dr. Steve L. Miller.
Tallal was nominated by Richard Mammone, associate vice president for innovation in the Rutgers University Office of Technology Commercialization, New Brunswick,
and her selection was made by the Hall of Fame’s Board of Trustees.
Two other Rutgers researchers, both from the New Brunswick campus, will be honored by the hall Oct. 18, Dr. Marco Gruteser and Dr. Richard P. Martin.
The New Jersey Inventors Hall of Fame, founded in 1987, promotes the role of invention in the state’s development and the role of inventors in improving society and changing lives. To qualify for nomination to the Hall of Fame, an inventor must have lived in the state during the period of his or her inventive project, or worked for a company in the state that sponsored the work. Candidates are ranked on several measures, the most of important of which is how well the invention or its patent was commercialized or used, as well as the significance of its impact on society. New Jersey is the only state which celebrates technological innovation through an Inventors Hall of Fame.
Rutgers University, Newark is home to the Newark College of Arts and Sciences, University College, the Graduate School-Newark, Rutgers Business School-Newark and New Brunswick, the School of Law-Newark, the College of Nursing, the School of Criminal Justice, the School of Public Affairs and Administration, and extensive research and outreach centers, including the Center for Molecular and Behavioral Neuroscience. Approximately 12,000 students are currently enrolled in a wide range of undergraduate and graduate degree programs offered at the 38-acre downtown Newark campus.
Media Contact: Carla Capizzi | <urn:uuid:c8eb364f-8133-40da-87e2-fb0629a6bd3c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.rutgers.edu/medrel/newark-2012/rutgers-newark-resea-20120925/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947489 | 1,262 | 1.789063 | 2 |
Ballot-box legalization will prompt real-time state, federal policymaking
On Nov. 6, Colorado voters gave their blessing to make recreational use of marijuana legal in the state. With the historic vote, though, comes no small amount of regulatory housekeeping – to say nothing of legal wrangling – before the landscape for pot users becomes clear.
It offers a rare opportunity to watch policy take shape through a number of avenues likely to include all three branches of government, as well as local, state and federal entities. It could result in a giant mess or an unprecedented achievement – or both.
Amendment 64 made legal the sale and possession of up to 1 ounce of marijuana for those ages 21 or older in Colorado, and also gives the state, through legislative action, the right to regulate the industry – from cultivation to sale – including levying taxes. The amendment further gives local entities the right to regulate or prohibit cultivation, testing or retail facilities, as well as dictates that the first $40 million in taxes collected from marijuana sales each year be used to fund public school capital construction needs. These provisions invite lawmakers at the state and local levels to involve themselves in enacting the amendment, but they also invite attention from federal law enforcers, who are bound by a different understanding of how marijuana should be treated: as a Schedule I controlled substance.
As such, there is an inherent conflict set up between Colorado and the federal government – one that has been neatly danced around up to now with the state’s tightly regulated medical marijuana laws. How the broadening of the state’s embrace of marijuana use will affect federal action remains to be seen. There is speculation that a federal injunction will be issued against Amendment 64 until the legal issues are resolved, and there is a decidedly unenthusiastic feeling about the amendment among Colorado’s top lawmakers. Gov. John Hickenlooper and Attorney General John Suthers have both made their opposition to the measure well-known.
Nevertheless, voters have spoken strongly and the law now says that marijuana possession and use are legal in the state. The state’s regulatory framework that has made the medical marijuana industry work so well in Colorado could provide a useful model upon which to build the recreational regulatory structure. That system closely monitors and accounts for all the marijuana legally grown, processed and sold in dispensaries across the state. In so doing, the state has avoided a marijuana free-for-all and instead has created a clear, navigable system by which growers and distributors can structure their operations.
This system does not consider the moral or social implications of marijuana use, nor should it, though that is ultimately what underpins much of the argument around evolving marijuana laws. With the passage of Amendment 64, Colorado seems to be moving beyond that question and is well on its way to working out the mechanics. What remains to be settled is how the federal government will respond, and which entities’ feelings on the subject take precedence. | <urn:uuid:5c500fb4-2f0d-4b2a-8682-c15fd72f892e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cortezjournal.com/article/DU/20121114/OPINION01/121119769/0/politics/Marijuana | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960677 | 602 | 1.679688 | 2 |
[Aki Korhonen] wanted to tighten up his macro photography setup. He already had the camera for the job, but wanted a fully adjustable target platform that he could easily light. What he came up with is a jig to hold the camera and fine tune the subject of each photo. It uses a frame with a piece of glass whose distance from the lens is adjusted by turning a knob. Below the glass a reflective surface redirects light from an LED flashlight up through the platform, lighting the snowflakes he’s shooting. A fixed LED source is in the plans for the next rendition.
Take a look at the overview of his setup in the quick clip after the break.
[via Hackaday Pool] | <urn:uuid:9bcd0ee9-f680-4c47-9177-730072d0c06e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://hackaday.com/2010/12/21/macro-photos-using-an-under-light-rig/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966115 | 148 | 1.65625 | 2 |
The consequences are hard to imagine. Only the most cold-blooded haters are actually rooting for it to happen. But if The Boston Globe, facing what seems to be a terminal case of lost advertising in its printed version, does cease to exist someday soon, what will it mean for Dorchester?
There will be a huge crater in the region’s news-gathering capacity, a deficiency that could have long-range impacts on democracy and civil society. And there’s the hard-to-quantify morale blow of seeing a Boston institution deep-sixed by its New York master.
This kind of damage, at least, will be spread out across the Globe’s expansive circulation turf — from Fitchburg to Falmouth. And it’s likely that other news outlets — some existing, others yet to be conceived — will move to fill some of the void.
Dorchester, though, stands to take a singularly tough hit if the Globe sinks. Although the paper has been loathe to acknowledge it loudly, it is, after all, a Dorchester-based concern. The mothership property on Morrissey Boulevard—valued at $36 million by the latest city count—is an economic engine that spins out consumers, jobs and, yes, residents.
“The talk about the Globe is a scary proposition,†says State Rep. Marty Walsh. “Most of the jobs there are blue collar: the drivers, the press people, even delivery routes.
“We have a ton of people here who depend on the Globe for their livelihood,†says Walsh. “It would be devastating to the local economy.â€
The Munroe family on Pope’s Hill is a prime example. George, 65, left the paper two years ago after working there for 42 years, starting as a messenger and working his way into the photoengraving unit where he served as a journeyman and a manager. His wife Gerri worked part-time at the Globe in the same profession, splitting her hours between Morrissey Boulevard and the Herald’s shop, from which she retired. (Many union members routinely shift off between the two dailies.)
Their son Scott, 33, and his wife Donna met at the Globe. Scott works there now a union pressman while Donna is a journeyman mailer, following in her dad’s footprints. Despite the Globe’s reputed anti-nepotism rules, the Munroes say that their story is a common one.
“These jobs have always been a way up for people from Southie and Dorchester and the city neighborhoods,†says George. “It used to be that once you got a job at the Globe, you were set for life. Most of these folks there don’t have any other trade skills outside of a newspaper. Now there’s no place to go. They’re not going to get a job doing what they were doing.â€
As New York Times and Globe managers huddle with union reps this week seeking $20 million in contract concessions, the mood in the Munroe family is a mix of disappointment and anxiety. Scott has worked the presses on Morrissey Boulevard since he was 18 and is now contemplating a new career. Like his union colleagues, he will likely accept less money and a cut to benefits to stave off an imminent closure. But, he says, the writing is on the wall. He doesn’t expect the paper to last long, even with the cuts.
“I appreciate everything the Globe has done for us over the years,†he says. “I guess I feel more disappointed than anything. I’m lucky in a way, because I’m young enough to do something else. I have friends in their 50s with kids in college. Those are the guys I worry about.â€
There is anger, too, most of it directed at the New York managers who made decisions years ago that the Munroes believe hastened the paper’s decline. The New York Times has operated as an “absentee landlord†and lost touch with local advertisers, George says.
“The Taylor family had been in the business for 100 years. They had the foundation that gave so much back. They had lunch every week with the big advertisers. The new owners, they didn’t take care of community ties that they needed to.â€
He blames the bosses, too, for “giving up†on finding a business model that would prevent the free content delivery of the Internet from undermining the ad base — the fundamental driver of the company’s fiscal crisis. George believes that the Times simply wants to do away with the Globe product and take over the remaining circulation for its own interests. Parts of a Times-owned printing plant in Billerica — due to close later this year— are being reconstituted in the Dorchester plant to ready for such a plan, Munroe says.
“When we started printing the New York Times a dozen years ago, I said that in 20 years we will probably just be the New York Times-slash-Boston edition. Just one newspaper. There’s a lot of benefit to that from the Times’ perspective. Their national circulation would jump by 100,000 readers and they will be able to charge more for their ads.â€
The best possible outcome at this stage, the Munroes believe, will be for a new, local ownership group to take over. The consensus among employees there now, Scott says, is that the recent brinksmanship with the unions is a Times’ effort to “clean things up†for such a sale. Even if such a shift were to preserve the paper, as media critic Dan Kennedy writes this week in a column for The Guardian , “After this week…the Boston Globe will never be the same.â€
That reality unnerves even those who admit to harboring a longtime “love-hate†relationship with the city’s broadsheet.
In the 1980s, Savin Hill resident Bill Walczak was a harsh critic of the paper’s coverage of Dorchester news. He organized meetings with Dorchester actvists and Globe editors to confront the paper over what he and others saw as a “bias†against the neighborhood.
The Globe has improved substantially, Walczak believes, and contributes to the civic health of the neighborhood in ways that are hard to quantify.
“There are so many different levels of wrong that will happen if the Globe fails,†Walczak argues. “Having some Globe reporters living here – who experience the same things we do – that’s been so important. Not being able to explain ourselves to the outside world is very harmful.â€
Walczak doesn’t like to contemplate life here without the Globe as a viable news outlet. Still, even before the potential shut-down made headlines last weekend, Walczak and other neighbors have anticipated the Globe’s eventual passing. A city-sponsored task force on the future of Columbia Point, which has been meeting for the last year, has included guidelines for the re-use of the Globe property in its draft recommendation plan, still being ironed out through a series of public meetings. Under the present plan, neighbors would prefer the Globe property to be developed into a mix of retail, housing and office space.
Don Walsh, a Savin Hill man who chairs the task force, says that while no one on the group wants the Globe to die, they were forced to take that possibility into account.
“By no means are we trying to get rid of [the Globe],†Walsh said. “But everyone’s aware that newspapers are in trouble and something could happen.†| <urn:uuid:9dfe5473-3844-4be6-87bd-726c00118d26> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dotnews.com/print/2569 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960973 | 1,756 | 1.523438 | 2 |
PRESQUE ISLE, Maine — Now that the City Council has approved preliminary financial and construction documents, officials at the Mark and Emily Turner Library are moving forward with a major expansion project that is going to open the facility to an even broader range of consumers.
Sonja Plummer-Morgan, librarian at the Second Street facility, said Wednesday that councilors recently approved the project budget and scope and authorized City Manager Jim Bennett to sign an escrow agreement between the city and a California woman who donated $1 million to fund the expansion project.
“We are very excited,” said the librarian. “We are now working on a timeline of the project for the council and are beginning to do some additional fundraising to make this happen for us.”
Last month, library officials, members of its board of trustees and city officials announced that Mary Barton Akeley Smith, a California resident with ties to the community, had made the generous donation.
Smith’s gift came after she visited the library during a trip to the city. Plummer-Morgan said Smith came into the library to use a computer sometime in the past year. While on the computer, she overheard another patron who was using the phone to call potential employers to whom he had sent resumes in order to make sure they had received them.
After she overheard him, she realized how important the library is to the community and its residents, according to the librarian. She then decided to donate $1 million to the facility.
Smith’s ties to The County are strong. Her grandmother Beulah Barton Akeley was the librarian in Presque Isle from 1932 to 1945. Her father and mother were born and raised in Aroostook County.
The library first opened in 1908. The community uses the library not only for access to books, computers and the Internet, but also to obtain notary public and passport services.
The expansion will add more space for books, computers and other materials and will make the facility more compliant with the Americans With Disabilities Act. Library officials are hoping to install an elevator in the building to make the three floors of the facility more accessible.
Plummer-Morgan said more computers are needed to meet the growing demand of its patrons, as the library’s computers were used at least 103,000 times last year.
As part of the expansion, more programming space will be created and the children’s area will be enlarged to allow for more services for teenagers.
The gift will cover the bulk of the $1.5 million expansion project, and the board of trustees also has voted to allocate $250,000 for the project.
Smith said it was important to her that the city offers a financial contribution, Plummer-Morgan said, so library officials have spoken to the City Council about using city funds for the project.
“I believe that the city will be making a financial contribution, but I don’t know how much that will be just yet,” she said Wednesday. “There hasn’t been detailed talk of an exact figure.”
No matter what the city gives, she said, the bulk of the extra money that is needed for the project will be generated through fundraising.
“We are talking about ideas for fundraising right now, and we believe that we are going to see more donors come forward,” said Plummer-Morgan. “We are hearing very good feedback about this project from the community. They are happy that this is getting done and that the library is going to be an even bigger resource for this community.” | <urn:uuid:119815d5-2b08-4fe8-a9f6-933e36107d97> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bangordailynews.com/2010/07/22/news/presque-isle-library-project-moves-forward/?ref=relatedBox | 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 | 0.970565 | 742 | 1.585938 | 2 |
Dragons. They are slightly important to Guild Wars 2…being as the plot basically revolves around trying to stop them from destroying the world. When it comes down to it, we don’t know much about the dragons themselves, though. We know how many Elder Dragons are threatening Tyria – five – but we still lack the name of one, the deep sea dragon (nicknamed “Bubbles”). We know that they have minions, as well as each having their own champion.
Or at least, they each did – Primordus’ original champion was the Great Destroyer, who was destroyed in Eye of the North, delaying Primordus from awakening. His second, the Destroyer of Life, was destroyed by Destiny’s Edge. But has he created/procured himself a new champion? My guess is that it would be another particularly large and powerful Destroyer, but as of yet, we don’t know. Perhaps it’s something that we won’t know for a while, since Primordus lurks underground, but even so.
And that of course raises the question – just how is a dragon champion created? Glint had been Kralkatorrik’s champion for centuries of years; her ability to see into minds caused her to turn against her master and hide in the Crystal Desert. GW2 Wiki says that she was created with the goal of protecting her master, but…just how was she created? Morgus Lethe, Zhaitan’s former champion, was “corrupted” by Zhaitan, but we don’t know much about this corruption other than sylvari are immune to it.
So far that we know of, both Zhaitan and Kralkatorrik have replaced their defeated champions, their new ones being Tequatl the Sunless and the Shatterer. The fact that both are dragons themselves (champions do not necessarily need to be dragons) brings about the question of just how many dragons currently exist in Tyria? In GW1, undead dragons in certain Krytan areas were…not quite common, but not uncommon either. Cantha had Saltspray Dragons. There were also creatures that were classified as dragons, but the resemblence was less – Drakes and Bonesnap Turtles for example. These lesser ones were more common, but somehow I doubt they would make suitable dragon champions. Tequatl could be a reanimated undead dragon (think Rotscale, but nastier), made to fight for Zhaitan.
The Shatterer is a bit more of an enigma. There were no dragons living in/around the Dragonbrand that we knew of in GW1, except for Glint herself. So where did this dragon that Kralkatorrik corrupted come from? And would any random dragon work, or would it need to be a crystal dragon, like Kralkatorrik and Glint themselves were?
And connected to that…Glint had a child, the baby crystal dragon that we protected from Destroyers during Glint’s Challenge in Eye of the North. We don’t know the fate of this baby dragon – if it’s still alive, if it was corrupted by an elder dragon or not, or where it is.
Jormag’s champion was destroyed; as of yet we don’t know if he has a new champion, or what it is. Nor do we know what happened with the dragon frozen within Drakkar Lake in Eye of the North, or why Jormag had created the Dragonspawn instead of awakening his old champion.
And then there’s Bubbles, which we know almost nothing about, including its name. It’s an underwater dragon, its awakening coincided with the krait invading the quaggan lands, and it can create creatures from the water but…that’s about it. We don’t know what kind of champion it has, or if it even has one.
I’d love to see some more lore and information about the dragons themselves; how they work, how they create or select a champion, what sort of lesser dragons exist and how many…there’s so much potentially interesting info here we don’t yet know. I’m sure most we’ll find out in game, but that doesn’t help the curiosity much
…also, I totally want to see an NPC in-game refer to the sea dragon as “Bubbles”. Just sayin’. | <urn:uuid:ae756ee4-3c9b-4165-80d8-732f338c20ac> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thepaletree.net/2011/09/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973235 | 947 | 1.65625 | 2 |
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