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In its 2013 budget proposal, the Pentagon has underestimated how much its five-year spending plan will cost by $123 billion, or 4.7 percent, according to a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report.
To reach its conclusions, CBO assumed Congress would undo many of the Pentagon’s budget-cutting proposals.
“CBO’s analysis makes clear that if Congress blocks proposals to achieve cost savings contained in the department’s 2013 budget, particularly efforts to address skyrocketing personnel costs, we will risk violating the strict spending caps that Congress itself imposed on the department in the Budget Control Act,” Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said at a July 12 briefing.
CBO assumed Congress would reject the Pentagon’s plans to increase military healthcare fees and would increase soldiers’ pay above levels proposed by DoD. It also assumed DoD would not be able to curb acquisition cost growth.
If automatic defense cuts are triggered in January through sequestration, as mandated by the Budget Control Act of 2011, DoD’s budget authority would be reduced by about $52 billion each year.
“Even with that cut, however, DoD’s base budget in 2013 would still be larger than it was in 2006 (in 2013 dollars) and larger than the average base budget during the 1980s,” CBO said.
CBO’s conclusion “is generally no different than the prior years’ reports, though the gap is a bit higher based on differences in personnel assumptions,” according Byron Callan, a financial analyst with Capital Alpha Partners in Washington. | <urn:uuid:864dc4b9-0579-4629-bb3a-205e64078ba9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.defensenews.com/article/20120713/DEFREG02/307130007/CBO-Pentagon-Underestimates-Spending-by-4-7-Percent?odyssey=mod_sectionstories | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967329 | 331 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Times Higher Education, 06/05/10. Professor Derrick Crook of the Department of Clinical Laboratory Sciences has won a National Institute for Health Research grant for a research project looking at polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based diagnostics for gastrointestinal pathogens and direct sequence typing of Clostridium difficile.
Article on the danger from fake anti-malarial drugs notes that the head of the Wellcome Trust-Mahosot University Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Programme in Vietnam, Dr Paul Newton, recently stated that the cost of fake drugs is nearly impossible to estimate.
A UK research group dedicated to work on a rare genetic condition that turns muscle to bone will be established thanks to a donation to the University of Oxford. Dr Alex Bullock of the Structural Genomics Consortium will be supervising the new research projects along with Professor James Triffitt of the Botnar Research Centre.
We are pleased to announce that the Head of Department, Professor Peter Ratcliffe, has been awarded one of the Gairdner International Awards for his laboratory’s work on Oxygen Sensing, and that Professor Nick White received the new Gairdner Award for contributions to Global Health.
Two gene regions that influence a baby’s weight at birth have been identified by a large international team of researchers, including scientists from Oxford University. One of the genes is also associated with type 2 diabetes, which helps to explain why small babies have higher rates of diabetes in later life. Professor Mark McCarthy participated in the study.
Chunks of DNA that can frequently be duplicated or missing in our genomes are unlikely to play a major role in many common conditions, a study of the genetics of diseases including diabetes, heart disease and bipolar disorder has found. This type of genetic variation had been proposed as a possible source of some of the inherited risk of developing these conditions. Professor Peter Donnelly participated in the study.
Scientists in Oxford are looking for help in their research on how dementia affects language use. They hope in the future to be able to develop sensitive tests for the early diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease, and are asking for people to get in touch with examples of their writing, such as letters and diaries. Dr Celeste de Jager of the Oxford Project to Investigate Memory and Ageing (OPTIMA) at Oxford University is interviewed about the effect of Alzheimer's on language.
The results of the first study designed to find ways to slow or halt the development of diabetes and heart disease in those at risk of the conditions have been announced. Professor Rury Holman participated in the study.
Obesity and alcohol both increase the risk of liver disease, researchers from the Universities of Oxford and Glasgow show in two separate studies published in the British Medical Journal. Dr Bette Liu of the Cancer Epidemiology Unit at Oxford University led the study.
‘It’s hard to think back and remember how we worked then. We were scrabbling around in the dark,’ says Professor Mark McCarthy of the Oxford Centre for Diabetes, Endocrinology and Metabolism, recalling how research on the genetic causes of disease had to be carried out before the human genome was sequenced. | <urn:uuid:f1d9ed96-02ab-4955-92e6-8586277860bb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ndm.ox.ac.uk/latest-news/15 | 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 | 0.94839 | 644 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Wonders do not cease with this: His knowledge of physics and mathematics has left engineering students baffled. Having already penned three books, Rajesh is now looking forward to some research work.
"I did not take him seriously for a few months but on Republic Day, while the students were reciting poetry before the entire college, Rajesh took the mike and addressed the gathering in fluent English. This left us almost shell-shocked," says Shishu Pal.
Rajesh’s mother Omkali and 16-year-old brother Kaluwa are daily wage labourers who earn just enough to manage two square meals a day. His father Sompal is mentally-challenged. Asked how and when these changes came into Rajesh, Omkali said that it happened almost a year ago when Rajesh was helping Kaluwa erect a wall.
Source: Times Of India
Tags: india fluent english | <urn:uuid:aa95189e-6253-4d5c-a17e-a5d107f0a078> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fundistraction.com/2007/07/village-boy-forgets-hindi-and-suddenly.html | 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 | 0.978586 | 192 | 1.59375 | 2 |
The congressional scorekeeper's analysis could fuel further debate about the legislation, which could come to a vote in the US House of Representatives on Tuesday .
CBO said the fiscal year 2013 deficit would be about $330bn higher than if Congress fails to act and lets $600bn in higher taxes and spending cuts take effect.
It comes as senior House Republican Eric Cantor said he opposed the fiscal cliff bill, while House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi called for a "straight up or down vote" on the proposals.
Earlier on Tuesday, Barack Obama hailed the last-ditch deal to avert the 'fiscal cliff' and called on the House of Representatives to vote for the deal as it prepared to meet on Tuesday.
The Senate passed legislation early on New Year's Day to neutralise a fiscal cliff combination of across-the-board tax increases and spending cuts that kicked in at midnight.
Senate passage set the stage for a final showdown in the House of Representatives, where a vote was expected later on Tuesday or perhaps Wednesday.
Republican Tom Cole said the House should vote on Tuesday, adding it was important to act before the markets open.
President Obama called for the House to act quickly and follow the Senate's lead.
"While neither Democrats nor Republicans got everything they wanted, this agreement is the right thing to do for our country and the House should pass it without delay," he said in a statement, reported by Reuters.
"There's more work to do to reduce our deficits, and I'm willing to do it. But tonight's agreement ensures that, going forward, we will continue to reduce the deficit through a combination of new spending cuts and new revenues from the wealthiest Americans," Obama said.
The Senate's vote moved the US economy back from the edge of a so-called fiscal cliff, but the deal could still face stiff challenges in the House of Representatives.
Under the deal voted for by the Senate, some taxes on the wealthy will be raised while low taxes on the middle class, which have been in place for a decade, were made permanent.
But the measures did little to rein in huge annual budget deficits that have helped push the US debt to $16.4trn.
The agreement came too late for Congress to meet its own deadline of New Year's Eve for passing laws to halt $600bn in tax rises and spending cuts which strictly speaking came into force on Tuesday.
But with the New Year's Day holiday, there was no real world impact and Congress still had time to draw up legislation, approve it and backdate it to avoid the harsh fiscal measures.
That will need the backing of the House where many of the Republicans who control the chamber complain that President Obama has shown little interest in cutting government spending and is too concerned with raising taxes.
Members were thankful that financial markets were closed, giving them a second chance to return to try to head off the fiscal cliff.
But if politicians cannot pass legislation in the coming days, markets are likely to turn sour. The US economy, still recovering from the 2008/2009 downturn, could stall again if Congress fails to fix the budget mess. | <urn:uuid:9826abc2-74fe-4ed4-81d0-5ce349340288> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/9774716/Fiscal-cliff-deal-will-add-4-trillion-to-US-deficit-says-CBO.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970783 | 635 | 1.734375 | 2 |
Trailer for Che:
On November 26, 1956, Fidel Castro sails to Cuba with eighty rebels. One of those rebels is Ernesto 'Che' Guevara, an Argentine doctor who shares a common goal with Fidel Castro - to overthrow the corrupt dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista.
Che proves indispensable as a fighter, and quickly grasps the art of guerrilla warfare. As he throws himself into the struggle, Che is embraced by his comrades and the Cuban people. The film tracks Che's rise in the Cuban Revolution, from doctor to commander to revolutionary hero. | <urn:uuid:4509f627-b98b-4014-a949-94d946d26184> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://video.tvguide.com/Trailer/2538161?primary=&primaryvalue=Che%202 | 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 | 0.949076 | 118 | 1.664063 | 2 |
A pilot hired to make traffic reports for a local radio station became the news himself when he made an emergency landing on the busy New Jersey Turnpike.
The Cessna single-engine airplane joined the morning rush hour in the most unexpected way after developing engine trouble, but landed safely, said Joe Orlando, chief of staff for the New Jersey Turnpike.
“There were no injuries, no vehicles involved. The pilot did a fantastic job,” Orlando said. “We have 600,000 to 700,000 cars on the road every day and the guy managed to find a safe enough opening to land the plane.”
The accident occurred at 06:46 am (1146 GMT) but fortunately not in the northern section of the Turnpike, near New York, where the traffic is most dense.
The pilot, who was broadcasting live traffic reports for Philadelphia radio station KYW, managed to get his crippled aircraft to the side of the road, although he still created a 1-1/2 mile (2.4 kilometer) tailback.
“He did an extraordinary job,” Orlando said. “But if I was a reporter, I’d be thinking about trying not to create the news.” | <urn:uuid:fb01c2d9-5c4b-4b46-bc07-af59d5e9685f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://alindenauer.wordpress.com/tag/cessna/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968707 | 260 | 1.632813 | 2 |
By Nidal al-Mughrabi
GAZA (Reuters) - Israel eased restrictions on Gaza fishermen and farmers on Saturday, Palestinian officials said, advancing a three-day-old truce brokered by Egypt after a week of fierce fighting.
Gaza's children also headed back to school in their hundreds of thousands, in another indication normal life was returning after eight days of fierce cross-border fighting in which 166 Palestinians and six Israelis were killed.
Nonetheless, senior Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar showed how fragile the ceasefire remained, with defiant remarks to reporters of how the Islamists would go on smuggling in weapons "by all possible means", including via Israel's arch-foe Iran.
A statement from the office of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh said Egypt had notified them that "Israel has allowed Palestinian fishermen to fish in Gaza's waters at a distance of 6 miles, up from 3 miles".
The Egyptian-brokered truce deal agreed on Wednesday calls on Israel to ease curbs on coastal Gaza, which it has largely blockaded since Hamas, which rejects the Jewish state's right to exist, took power there in 2007.
Israel had formally barred Gaza fishermen from heading more than 3 miles out into the Mediterranean Sea for about 3 years, its gunboats often enforcing the rule, a measure Israel said was intended to prevent weapons smuggling.
Murad Al-Issi, a member of a fishermen's group, told Reuters his colleagues had already ventured out to the 6-mile limit on Saturday, undisturbed by Israel.
"The Israeli army naval boat which used to fire and torch Palestinian boats that sailed beyond a 3-mile distance watched without doing anything to prevent them," Issi said.
Palestinians say the Israeli restrictions had hampered the amount and variety of fish they could catch.
Inside Gaza, Palestinian farmers tended land along the testy frontier with the Jewish state without incident, signaling Israel was easing restrictions of the past 3 years barring Palestinians from coming within 300 meters of a border fence.
The change took place a day after Israeli troops killed a Palestinian man at a Gaza border fence, saying protesters there threw stones and tried to breach the barrier.
Palestinians denounced the shooting as a violation of the ceasefire and Egypt intervened to restore calm.
On Saturday, a Reuters photographer saw farmers in the Khan Younis area working close to the Israeli frontier fence.
Hamas security officials were on patrol and Israeli soldiers looked on without interfering, but for a brief verbal exchange between one soldier and a Hamas guard, witnesses said.
Israel had no comment on whether it had eased conditions for either the fishermen or farmers.
Zahar, the senior Hamas leader, sounded a triumphal note despite the death toll and damage the Israeli offensive caused in Gaza, where many saw the truce as a victory for having forced Israel to modify its blockade of the territory and help both sides avoid a potentially deadlier ground assault.
Zahar said Hamas would continue to arm itself with the help of Israel's arch-enemy, Iran, though the truce signed in Cairo calls for a cessation of rocket fire at Israel, which Israel gave as its reason for launching its attacks in mid-November.
"We have no choice but to continue to bring in weapons by all possible means," Zahar said, adding that he expected Tehran would "increase its military and financial support to Hamas".
"We have a right to take money and weapons from Iran. They (Iran) give to us for the sake of God, no conditions attached, and I am a witness to that," Zahar told reporters.
In a rare phone call to Hamas' Gaza leader Haniyeh, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad praised what he called Palestinian "resistance and perseverance" against Israel, which he said must now "bow" to Palestinian rights, IRNA news agency reported.
Zahar said that after Hamas's rain of rocket fire that reached as far as Tel Aviv and paralyzed swathes of southern Israel, "the Jews will think twice before" attacking Iran, as Israel has earlier hinted it might do to stop a nuclear program the West fears is destined to produce atomic weapons.
Some analysts say otherwise, however, pointing at how the Israeli military inflicted serious blows to Hamas's weapons arsenal, showing the world it has cutting-edge technology, particularly when it comes to missile defense.
(Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan; Editing by Alison Williams) | <urn:uuid:08dcac32-7ee5-4163-90b1-614ce18686a5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://wdez.com/news/articles/2012/nov/14/top-hamas-commander-killed-in-israeli-airstrike/ | 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 | 0.968019 | 904 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Author and social critic Dr. Vinoth Ramachandra of Colombo, Sri Lanka, will present "Unmasking Idols: The World Church as a Prophetic Community" through the World Christian Lecture Series of Hope College on Friday, Feb. 18, at 7:30 p.m. in Winants Auditorium of Graves Hall.
The public is invited. Admission is free.
Ramachandra is secretary for dialogue and social engagement with the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students. His work includes promoting inter-disciplinary public dialogues in universities in various parts of the world, and helping Christian students, professors and graduates engage theologically with the social, cultural and political challenges they face in their national contexts. His numerous publications include the books "Faiths in Conflict? Christian Integrity in a Multicultural World" and "Subverting Global Myths: Theology and the Public Issues Shaping Our World."
"Given the stunning expansion of Christianity in the global south documented by Philip Jenkins in 'The Next Christendom,' this year's World Christian Lecture Series offers us a critical opportunity to hear a preeminent public intellectual, author, social critic and theologian," said Dr. Mark Husbands, who is a member of the lecture series' planning committee and is the Leonard and Marjorie Maas Associate Professor of Reformed Theology at Hope. "His lecture will be of immediate relevance and interest to people interested in globalization, theology, culture, economics, international relations, and the promise and perils of multiculturalism."
Commenting on Ramachandra's book "Subverting Global Myths," theologian Dr. Stanley Hauerwas of the Duke Divinity School faculty said that "Ramachandra exposes the idolatry often masked in so much current discourse on globalization," adding, "I have read few books from which I have learned more."
The World Christian Lecture Series invites recognized Christian thinkers and practitioners who are leaders in their respective disciplines and areas of expertise to join with the Hope and Holland communities in exploring issues, themes and ideas that face Christians in the world. The annual series, which debuted in 2008 and is coordinated by the college's campus ministries office, features a mix of speakers that can include Christian scholars, artists, preachers, politicians, and industry and church leaders.
"Our hope through the series is to provide intellectually charged events that engage our deepest questions," said Dr. Trygve Johnson, who is the Hinga-Boersma Dean of the Chapel at Hope. "We're honored to have Vinoth Ramachandra come to campus and speak into our community from a context other than our own as we seek to understand our place in the world as people of faith."
Born in Colombo, Ramachandra went to England for his college education, completing bachelor's and doctoral degrees in nuclear engineering at the University of London in England. He returned to Sri Lanka in 1980 initially for a year before intending to conduct research and teach in the United Kingdom or United States, but became involved with a group of young graduates interested in developing a Christian ministry at the university level. He remained in Sri Lanka, and became the first general secretary of the newly formed Fellowship of Christian University Students from 1983 to 1991.
He joined International Fellowship of Evangelical Students in 1987 as the regional secretary for South Asia. IFES is a global partnership of more than 130 autonomous, indigenous university student movements around the world. As regional secretary, he worked with programs in India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Myanmar. In his current role he is a member of the IFES Senior Leadership Team.
Ramachandra has been involved for many years with the civil rights movement in Sri Lanka, as well as with the global Micah Network and A Roacha, a worldwide biodiversity conservation organization. He has served as a lecturer at colleges, universities, theological seminaries and conferences around the world, including delivering a plenary address during the International Conference on Peace & Reconciliation in Seoul, South Korea, this past November.
In addition to "Faiths in Conflict? Christian Integrity in a Multicultural World" and "Subverting Global Myths: Theology and the Public Issues Shaping Our World," his six books are "The Recovery of Mission: Beyond the Pluralist Paradigm," "Gods That Fail: Christian Mission and Modern Idolatry," "The Message of Mission" and "Church and Mission in the New Asia: New Gods, New Identities." He is also the author of numerous journal articles and chapters and essays in books.
He lives in Sri Lanka with his wife, Karin, who is a trained counselor and Bible teacher.
While on campus, Ramachandra will also speak during the college's Chapel service on Friday, Feb. 18, at 10:30 a.m. and "The Gathering" worship service on Sunday, Feb. 20, at 8 p.m., both in Dimnent Memorial Chapel. The public is invited to both events.
Graves Hall is located at 263 College Ave., on College Avenue between 10th and 12th streets. Dimnent Memorial Chapel is located at 277 College Ave., on College Avenue at 12th Street. | <urn:uuid:fd090c60-c328-43b8-b661-89d11f791ae0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.hope.edu/print/1565 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960441 | 1,058 | 1.53125 | 2 |
[Enter PHILARIO, IACHIMO, a Frenchman, a]
[p]Dutchman, and a Spaniard]
- Iachimo. Believe it, sir, I have seen him in Britain: he was
then of a crescent note, expected to prove so worthy
as since he hath been allowed the name of; but I
could then have looked on him without the help of
admiration, though the catalogue of his endowments
had been tabled by his side and I to peruse him by items.
- Philario. You speak of him when he was less furnished than now
he is with that which makes him both without and within.
- Frenchman. I have seen him in France: we had very many there
could behold the sun with as firm eyes as he.
- Iachimo. This matter of marrying his king's daughter, wherein
he must be weighed rather by her value than his own,
words him, I doubt not, a great deal from the matter.
- Iachimo. Ay, and the approbation of those that weep this
lamentable divorce under her colours are wonderfully
to extend him; be it but to fortify her judgment,
which else an easy battery might lay flat, for
taking a beggar without less quality. But how comes
it he is to sojourn with you? How creeps
- Philario. His father and I were soldiers together; to whom I
have been often bound for no less than my life.
Here comes the Briton: let him be so entertained
amongst you as suits, with gentlemen of your
knowing, to a stranger of his quality.
[Enter POSTHUMUS LEONATUS]
I beseech you all, be better known to this
gentleman; whom I commend to you as a noble friend
of mine: how worthy he is I will leave to appear
hereafter, rather than story him in his own hearing.
- Frenchman. Sir, we have known together in Orleans.
- Posthumus Leonatus. Since when I have been debtor to you for courtesies,
which I will be ever to pay and yet pay still.
- Frenchman. Sir, you o'er-rate my poor kindness: I was glad I
did atone my countryman and you; it had been pity
you should have been put together with so mortal a
purpose as then each bore, upon importance of so
slight and trivial a nature.
- Posthumus Leonatus. By your pardon, sir, I was then a young traveller;
rather shunned to go even with what I heard than in
my every action to be guided by others' experiences:
but upon my mended judgment—if I offend not to say
it is mended—my quarrel was not altogether slight.
- Frenchman. 'Faith, yes, to be put to the arbitrement of swords,
and by such two that would by all likelihood have
confounded one the other, or have fallen both.
- Iachimo. Can we, with manners, ask what was the difference?
- Frenchman. Safely, I think: 'twas a contention in public,
which may, without contradiction, suffer the report.
It was much like an argument that fell out last
night, where each of us fell in praise of our
country mistresses; this gentleman at that time
vouching—and upon warrant of bloody
affirmation—his to be more fair, virtuous, wise,
chaste, constant-qualified and less attemptable
than any the rarest of our ladies in France.
- Iachimo. That lady is not now living, or this gentleman's
opinion by this worn out.
- Iachimo. You must not so far prefer her 'fore ours of Italy.
- Posthumus Leonatus. Being so far provoked as I was in France, I would
abate her nothing, though I profess myself her
adorer, not her friend.
- Iachimo. As fair and as good—a kind of hand-in-hand
comparison—had been something too fair and too good
for any lady in Britain. If she went before others
I have seen, as that diamond of yours outlustres
many I have beheld. I could not but believe she
excelled many: but I have not seen the most
precious diamond that is, nor you the lady.
- Iachimo. What do you esteem it at?
- Iachimo. Either your unparagoned mistress is dead, or she's
outprized by a trifle.
- Posthumus Leonatus. You are mistaken: the one may be sold, or given, if
there were wealth enough for the purchase, or merit
for the gift: the other is not a thing for sale,
and only the gift of the gods.
- Iachimo. Which the gods have given you?
- Iachimo. You may wear her in title yours: but, you know,
strange fowl light upon neighbouring ponds. Your
ring may be stolen too: so your brace of unprizable
estimations; the one is but frail and the other
casual; a cunning thief, or a that way accomplished
courtier, would hazard the winning both of first and last.
- Posthumus Leonatus. Your Italy contains none so accomplished a courtier
to convince the honour of my mistress, if, in the
holding or loss of that, you term her frail. I do
nothing doubt you have store of thieves;
notwithstanding, I fear not my ring.
- Posthumus Leonatus. Sir, with all my heart. This worthy signior, I
thank him, makes no stranger of me; we are familiar at first.
- Iachimo. With five times so much conversation, I should get
ground of your fair mistress, make her go back, even
to the yielding, had I admittance and opportunity to friend.
- Iachimo. I dare thereupon pawn the moiety of my estate to
your ring; which, in my opinion, o'ervalues it
something: but I make my wager rather against your
confidence than her reputation: and, to bar your
offence herein too, I durst attempt it against any
lady in the world.
- Posthumus Leonatus. You are a great deal abused in too bold a
persuasion; and I doubt not you sustain what you're
worthy of by your attempt.
- Posthumus Leonatus. A repulse: though your attempt, as you call it,
deserve more; a punishment too.
- Philario. Gentlemen, enough of this: it came in too suddenly;
let it die as it was born, and, I pray you, be
- Iachimo. Would I had put my estate and my neighbour's on the
approbation of what I have spoke!
- Iachimo. Yours; whom in constancy you think stands so safe.
I will lay you ten thousand ducats to your ring,
that, commend me to the court where your lady is,
with no more advantage than the opportunity of a
second conference, and I will bring from thence
that honour of hers which you imagine so reserved.
- Posthumus Leonatus. I will wage against your gold, gold to it: my ring
I hold dear as my finger; 'tis part of it.
- Iachimo. You are afraid, and therein the wiser. If you buy
ladies' flesh at a million a dram, you cannot
preserve it from tainting: but I see you have some
religion in you, that you fear.
- Posthumus Leonatus. This is but a custom in your tongue; you bear a
graver purpose, I hope.
- Iachimo. I am the master of my speeches, and would undergo
what's spoken, I swear.
- Posthumus Leonatus. Will you? I shall but lend my diamond till your
return: let there be covenants drawn between's: my
mistress exceeds in goodness the hugeness of your
unworthy thinking: I dare you to this match: here's my ring.
- Iachimo. By the gods, it is one. If I bring you no
sufficient testimony that I have enjoyed the dearest
bodily part of your mistress, my ten thousand ducats
are yours; so is your diamond too: if I come off,
and leave her in such honour as you have trust in,
she your jewel, this your jewel, and my gold are
yours: provided I have your commendation for my more
- Posthumus Leonatus. I embrace these conditions; let us have articles
betwixt us. Only, thus far you shall answer: if
you make your voyage upon her and give me directly
to understand you have prevailed, I am no further
your enemy; she is not worth our debate: if she
remain unseduced, you not making it appear
otherwise, for your ill opinion and the assault you
have made to her chastity you shall answer me with
- Iachimo. Your hand; a covenant: we will have these things set
down by lawful counsel, and straight away for
Britain, lest the bargain should catch cold and
starve: I will fetch my gold and have our two
[Exeunt POSTHUMUS LEONATUS and IACHIMO]
- Philario. Signior Iachimo will not from it.
Pray, let us follow 'em. | <urn:uuid:d8f4ed5c-e268-4a76-afbc-1995765f466c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/play_view.php?WorkID=cymbeline&Act=1&Scene=4&Scope=scene&LineHighlight=336 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939397 | 2,082 | 1.585938 | 2 |
The 24th annual Chaos Communications Congress in Berlin is already off to a great start. The first talk we attended was [Antoine Drouin] and [Martin Müller] presenting Paparazzi – The Free Autopilot. Paparazzi is an open source hardware and software project for building autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles. The main hardware board has an ARM processor and GPS. It uses inertial and infrared sensors to determine orientation and altitude. The four infrared thermopiles measure the air temperature. The ground is warmer than the sky and if you compare the temperature in the direction of each wing tip your can tell what angle the airplane is at. It’s really that simple.
They did a pretty amazing live demo. Using the network connection they controlled a UAV flying in France and another in Germany. Both planes were streaming live video from belly mounted cameras. One relaying through a home DSL connection and the other through a UMTS cellphone. They were able to change way-points on the fly and issue flight pattern commands. There is a ground crew at each location with a security pilot that will switch the controls to manual if things get out of hand. | <urn:uuid:108451fd-2732-4c34-9c90-14bd73edac74> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://hackaday.com/2007/12/27/24c3-build-your-own-uav/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=836876f408 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947562 | 237 | 1.734375 | 2 |
How we organize determines how effectively we can define results-oriented “gates." Traditionally, IT teams have organized in silos, working on abstract slices of the business goal (as opposed to the end-to-end). When we organize in silos, we assume that what teams create independently will work together with little effort. When it doesn’t – and that’s the case more often than not – our economies of scale are completely obliterated. Consider the Airbus A380: teams working in complete independence of each other discovered after their sections were "complete" that they couldn’t connect up the electronics.1 Were the independent sections of the plane “complete” according to the project plan? Yes. Was the plane nearer to completion by virtue of those sections being done? No. It’s entirely possible that Airbus could have built those sections entirely from scratch (to consistent wiring specs) in the time it took to integrate the finished units they had. The lesson learned is that no matter how well we think we define our APIs, no matter how disciplined we think we can work in a silo, integration is never free.
In addition to how we organize, we also need to have some means by which to execute and therefore measure our progress that is directly rooted in the context of the asset. Functionality that is coded and tested is the best measure of "results" that we have.
To act on this, we need requirements expressed as small, actionable statements of business functionality. Agile Stories lend themselves very well to this. Stories are small, granular statements of business need. For the PMO, Stories provide us with the best measure of progress: a Story is either done, or it’s not done. It’s not partially done or kind-of done. If Stories are written in terms meaningful to the business, and if we track progress to Stories, we can assess progress in terms of results. Compare this to how we measure progress in traditional IT: there are long delays between functional deliveries, so the PMO has to rely on surrogates such as timesheet data and collections of technical tasks. Hours spent and completion of technical tasks are measures of effort. Effort doesn't necessarily translate into results. Stories are a measure of results.
The fundamental true/false nature of a Story's completeness lets us measure progress in some very simple but information rich ways. The most common way is the burn-up chart.
These example charts show that scope (in terms of Stories) may expand or contract as new discoveries are made and work is reprioritized. The projected rate of progress through the Stories - that is, how quickly the team is expected to render business needs code complete - is rooted in a simple formula that includes capacity, distraction management, and estimate weight (complexity, etc.) relative to the team.
By tracking progress through Stories, we're measuring accomplishment of meaningful results. With each iteration, the PMO knows the specific functionality that an asset possesses and how much it cost to get it to that point. We also know what functionality the asset does not have and we have a pretty good means by which to forecast how much it's going to cost to complete that functionality. Best of all, in near real-time we can see if a project is showing signs of trouble, we can see almost immediately the impact of changes that we make, and we can communicate all of this in business (as opposed to IT) terms. Traditional IT cannot provide this level of transparency.
The burn-up is meaningful only if we know that it has integrity. Nothing prevents us from defining and tracking technical tasks. If we do that, we're really no better off than we are in current IT practices: it’s just a burn-up of effort, but not of results achieved. We have to make sure teams are relentlessly focused on satisfying business need, from the time a requirement is captured to the time software is certified as production ready. By writing well formed Stories, we're writing the "completion gene" into the DNA of a project team. This aligns the interests of the business (the buyer), the PMO (the buyer's agent and de-facto underwriter), and the development team.
This gives us direct line-of-sight from the unit of measurable work all the way through to the project reporting level, so that when we report upward we know that there is integrity in what we’re reporting. This is deceptively simple, but is the critical component to the Agile PMO: we know what is done, and what isn’t done, not in IT terms but in the terms of what it is we're buying. By extension, we know our investment yield to date and what returns further investment will yield.
The proliferation of Agile Project Management tools, such as Mingle from ThoughtWorks Studios, make it far easier for the PMO to get project performance data from in-flight projects. We don't need to transcribe data from what a PM has told us into what the project sponsors need to know. We're not e-mailing spreadsheets around. We're drilling into a project dashboard to see what’s going on, and we know what’s going on in very granular terms that relate back to the state of the asset.
The combination of team organization and Story-based requirements allow us to work and measure in terms of results. But the results we're looking for go beyond “completed Stories.” We must also have some appreciation for the quality of the solution delivered. Progress – even in “functionality” terms – may be completely hollow if the expected level of quality (e.g., maintainability, technical quality, etc.) isn’t baked in at the same time. This means we are at risk of over-stating our results. In our next installment we’ll have a look at how we can align quality metrics to get a complete picture of solutions delivered, and we’ll look at how to automate capture to make this simple. Once we’ve done that, we’ve defined the fundamental tools necessary for an Agile PMO.
1 Hollinger, Peggy."In a tangle: How having to wire the A380 by Hand is hampering Airbus." Financial Times. 16 July 2008. | <urn:uuid:676d0ba4-7f53-4f63-83a4-44d95e67f9b6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rosspettit.com/2009/01/agile-pmo-results-based-execution.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96068 | 1,311 | 1.773438 | 2 |
- Urban Oasis
Reykjavik is known worldwide for its wonderful amalgamation of unique boutiques and shops. A sense of fashion is central to the charm of the city, and the creative products that consistently originate from Reykjavik ensure that is remains at the cutting edge of art, culture and style.
THE CITY NAME
Reykjavik means "steamy bay" in Icelandic. It received this moniker as a result of the geothermal steam witnessed by the country's first settler, Ingolfur Arnarson.
Where else can you stay out all night and never see the sun go down? Summers in Iceland are known for their "light nights" when darkness occurs for only few hours and bar-hopping in Reykjavik is done at an even more frenetic pace.
- 61% of Icelandic population lives in the Reykjavik area
- There are 180 licensed pubs in Reykjavik | <urn:uuid:75aada04-e457-4562-a694-3d9a8153c110> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.66north.com/us/discover-66north-in-iceland/reykjavik/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940937 | 193 | 1.765625 | 2 |
In a rare bipartisan move, Congress approved a deal to extend the payroll tax cuts. This was a 2 percent temporary holiday on FICA withholdings — money that goes to fund Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid — programs that are going broke. President Obama believes it is wise, in this election year, to give working Americans a tax break. To the average family it will mean about an extra $1,000 in savings, money that will hopefully be spent to help sustain the weak economic recovery. This short term infusion might do that to a small extent, but there is no mention of the long term detrimental effect it will have on our popular entitlement programs.
Social Security’s long-term unfunded liability is now more than $22 trillion, with the shortfall growing by more than a trillion dollars annually. Medicare has an unfunded liability north of $25 trillion and a shortfall that grows by almost $2 trillion a year. Holy deficit! How in the world can these programs be targeted for tax breaks? One possible clue: These colossal gaps do not show up in our national debt. And that only sweetens the temptation — the prez and Congress desperately want to appear to be magnanimous, bestowing favors on working Americans — but when these programs go bust, Americans will be the ones holding an empty bag.
Don’t count on the solution lying in better management. Last week Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Attorney General Eric Holder got really excited about recovering $4.1 billion in health care fraud in 2011, but as you can see, that’s like spitting into the hurricane. Kudos to their record-setting enforcement efforts but, sorry, it’s just not going to move the dial. And when billions won’t move the dial, it means real trouble afoot.
Republicans originally wanted to hold out for federal spending cuts in exchange for the payroll tax break extension. In the end they caved, not wanting to look like the party against tax reductions. Democrats are rejoicing and spinning this as a victory for Obama, but none of our elected officials can be proud of a deal that decimates our FICA programs and, at the same time, does nothing to address our bloated federal bureaucracy.
So it’s kinda upsidedown. Democrats retain their crown as the party of big government spending, but are they also making a move to be the party of tax breaks? Certainly Obama has insisted on passing this cut as a means of stimulating the economy. What? Wait a minute! Money in the hands of Americans can do that? Instead of giving it back, why wouldn’t he take the payroll tax money and spend it on something that might really make a difference? Like solar power research. Or free cell phones for the unemployed. (Oh yeah, he already did both of those). No matter — we can all have confidence in his ability to find some other boondoggle to finance with taxpayer money.
About 77 million baby boomers are starting to retire. Many who have lost jobs and cannot re-enter the employment roles are tapping Social Security early, putting substantial additional pressure on the system. And unfunded liabilities in federal and state retirement systems — teachers, police, firemen, congressmen, postal workers, et al, is measured in mega trillions. There is no money to pay the piper. For this tax break both parties deserve credit — as consummate can-kickers and knuckleheads. In an election year, real leadership is nowhere to be found.
Columnist Michael Raymond can be reached at email@example.com. | <urn:uuid:aa5782cd-936a-4c25-bb48-41d391230f14> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.blufftontoday.com/bluffton-opinion/2012-02-22/theres-rainy-day-coming | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949154 | 740 | 1.507813 | 2 |
The Religious Affiliation of Famous French Painter
Paul Cezanne is regarded as one of the greatest and most popular artists in history.
Paul Cezanne was a Catholic.
Webpage created 5 December 2005. Last modified 5 December 2005.
We are always striving to increase the accuracy and usefulness of our website. We are happy to hear from you. Please submit questions, suggestions, comments, corrections, etc. to: firstname.lastname@example.org. | <urn:uuid:969e415a-d0b5-4003-86c7-6f4254a76fd5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://adherents.com/people/pc/Paul_Cezanne.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9494 | 96 | 1.59375 | 2 |
The Bigger Picture: Visual Archives and the Smithsonian
Posts tagged with: Cities/Places
Does the jovial fellow riding Ambika the elephant look familiar? It's Fred Rogers, leaving his neighborhood for a visit to the National Zoological Park in the spring of 1982. The host of the children's show Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood met giraffes, tigers, and lions as well as pachyderms Ambika and Shanthi; Keepers Jim Jones and Barbara Bingham were featured guests.
Despite rainy conditions, everything went smoothly until the elephant ride. According to The Torch:
As soon as Mr. Rogers was perched atop Ambika's back, she decided she wanted a bath and lumbered eagerly towards the pool. While zoo keepers headed her off, "little" (4,000 pound) Shanthi's curiousity was piqued by the cameraman and his fascinating equipment. As she set off to investigate, our fleet-of-foot staffers quickly foiled a farcical finale.
The episode filmed at the zoo was titled Mr. Rogers Talks About Pets, broadcast on June 4, 1982. You can a find a synopsis at The Neighborhood Archive.
Shanthi and Ambika still live at the National Zoological Park, enjoying their new home, the Elephant Trails exhibit. Now Shanthi is up to 9,000 pounds!
- Record Unit 371 - Office of Public Affairs, The Torch, 1955-1960, 1965-1988, Smithsonian Institution Archives
Summertime in Washington, DC usually brings a few things to mind for me: the United States Department of Agriculture farmer's market, tourists, buses, Jazz in the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden, and the Smithsonian Folklife Festival. First started in 1967, this year's festival focuses on the following:
- Hungarian Heritage: Roots to Revival
- One World, Many Voices: Endangered Languages and Cultural Heritage
- The Will to Adorn: African American Diversity, Style, and Identity
Running from June 24-26 and July 3-7, the schedule of activities, programs, and performances is incredible. So if you'll be in Washington, DC during this time or live nearby, please come out to learn from and experience the Smithsonian Folklife Festival.
I was visiting South Carolina recently, and passed through Beaufort. It turns out this beautiful southern town has a surprising connection to the Smithsonian.
In November 1861, when Union troops occupied Beaufort, one of the principal treasures of the town was its outstanding library - which had been incorporated in 1807 and encompassed several thousand books, many having been brought back from Europe by wealthy Carolinians. With the arrival of the troops, landed Beaufort-area residents had fled and the town was in the hands of those left behind: enslaved people from the Sea Islands plantations.
General Isaac Stevens, the Union commanding officer, ordered that the library, called "the pride of the town," be arranged for the use of the troops. Within a few months, however, a treasury agent appeared, demanding the books be confiscated as war booty. The books were sent to New York, where they were put up for auction.
This caused an immediate outcry. The New York Times editorialized against it; and a letter to the editor urged them to continue the fight (or as the writer wonderfully put it, "ventilate" the subject!). Within a day, Salmon Chase, Lincoln's Treasury Secretary, allegedly declared "the Union does not make war on books," and put a halt to the proceedings. The books were then deposited for safe keeping at the Smithsonian. They were to be returned at the conclusion of the war. (Salmon Chase became a Smithsonian Regent in 1864, after Lincoln successfully nominated him to be Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and he continued in that role until his death in 1873.)
Saved from auction, the books were placed in the fifth floor of the South Tower of the Smithsonian Building (the Castle - then the Smithsonian's only building). The war dragged on; in 1864, two years after the seizure of the books, newspapers reassured the South that the library remained safe and sound.
Tragically, on January 24, 1865, fire ripped through the Castle building. The Beaufort Library collection was completely destroyed, along with many other collections and papers - including almost all of the relics of the Smithsonian's founder, James Smithson, which were being kept a few floors below in the Regents Room.
Beaufort eventually received some token compensation for their loss. Today the Beaufort County Library is a thriving place. Happily, the book collection lost in the 1865 fire wasn't the last connection between Beaufort and the Smithsonian. The library hosted a Smithsonian traveling exhibition in early 2012.
- Smokin' Smithsonian, The Bigger Picture blog, Smithsonian Institution Archives
The Reference team gets more than 5000 – yes, thousand – inquiries per year. They come from all over the world and cover everything from soup to nuts. I’ll save the nuts for another post, and focus on the soup or, more specifically, tea and how refreshments are vital to a successful volunteer effort.
One of our perennial topics of interest is, Operation Moonwatch. Moonwatch was initiated in 1958 by Dr. Fred Whipple at the Harvard-Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory during the International Geophysical Year (IGY).
Operation Moonwatch created an international network of dedicated and enthusiastic volunteer sky-watchers of both genders (women made up about a third of all observers) and from every walk-of-life. These citizen-scientists joined professional astronomers to track and report on satellites travelling through the night sky. Often we hear from old "Moonwatchers" or, increasingly, genealogists that have learned through family lore or old paperwork about a relative's participation in the project and are eager to learn more.
Recently I received an email from Greg Roberts of Johannesburg, South Africa, a former Moonwatcher who had been corresponding with some of his fellow observers. Greg wanted to track down details on several South African observation teams operating out of Johannesburg and Blomenfontein. Luckily we have great records documenting the Moonwatch program in Record Unit 255 where I could find what he was looking for.
The report from the Blomenfontein observation station, on Naval Hill near the old Lamont-Hussey Observatory, was detailed and complete. It also included photographs of the observational set-up and drawings diagramming the layout of the entire observation station. What I enjoyed best, though, were the detailed organizational lists. These provided names of volunteers, their occupations, tasks and responsibilities and descriptions of nightly activities.
As I read through the report's detailed description of the locality and how well-suited it was to the task, it became clear that the proximity of the telescopes to the canteen – and its' "pepping-up" the volunteers – made the whole arrangement "most satisfactory" for all involved.
That made me smile, but I don't think you'd see that sort of personal touch in reports covering a partnership like Moonwatch today. And that's too bad. I mean, what a great recruiting tool – a night out, under the stars with others who share a common interest and cake, too. Heck, I'm all over that!
For more information about Operation Moonwatch, check out, Keep Watching the Skies: The Story of Operation Moonwatch and the Dawn of the Space Age by Patrick McCray. Dr. McCray made extensive use of Record Unit 255 for this book.
- Record Unit 255 - Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory Moonwatch Division, Records, 1956-1975, Smithsonian Institution Archives
On this day in 1987, the Enid A. Haupt Garden, named for the American philanthropist and publisher, officially opened to the public. The Haupt garden, which is located adjacent to the Smithsonian Institution Building, sits above a three-story underground complex, known as the Quad, that includes the National Museum of African Art, the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, and the S. Dillon Ripley Center. A few times a year, the colorful flowers displayed in the garden are changed to reflect the foliage currently in bloom.
Click through the slideshow for photos of construction of the Quad and the Enid A. Haupt Garden!
- 1 of 57 | <urn:uuid:59ad3698-a232-4d16-9aad-74ffe2682c2b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.siarchives.si.edu/blog/tag/citiesplaces | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959204 | 1,716 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Tinsley, Eleanor, 1926-2009;
City council members -- Texas -- Houston -- Interviews;
School integration -- Texas -- Houston -- History;
Houston Community College (Houston, Tex.) -- History;
School board presidents -- Texas -- Houston --...
Eleanor Tinsley talks about her years as president of the board of the Houston Independent School District, and as member of the city council.
She was involved in the school integration movement and was instrumental in the creation of the Houston...
Born in Lenders, Texas, Truett Latimer entered the insurance business in Abilene, Texas after graduation till 1955. During that time, he won a seat in the Texas House of Representatives, and was elected four times as a State Representative. He...
Panoramic of new bridge over the Brazos River going to the Gulf of Mexico located in Freeport, Texas. New steel bridge, couple in buggy about to cross, crane in right corner, and construction material.
Baseball coaches--United States;
Baseball players--United States.
Wayne Graham is one of the most distinctive coaches in Baseball, and is credited with more than 1400 wins as a Collegiate Head Coach. He played 11 years as a professional with the Philadelphia Phillies and New York Mets, and was named Texas Minor...
David Goldstein and Jill Jewitt interview former Mayor Louie Welch. Louie served as Mayor of the city of Houston from 1964 to 1973. Prior to that he served on the City council from 1950 to 1952, and then again from 1956 to 1962. | <urn:uuid:e19c1ff6-9be5-4f7f-9ea9-ec84df66a1fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://digital.houstonlibrary.org/cdm/search/searchterm/new/mode/all/order/subjec/page/37 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959202 | 318 | 1.765625 | 2 |
I'm an 18 year old, first year university student. I was thinking about my future today, and I realized, although I fully intend to get a good education and a decent job, I don't want to expel most of my life resources on intensive education to get an intensive job. I don't think being a doctor, lawyer, or professor is my calling.
I'm more the kind of guy who'd rather get an interesting and rewarding job with a more easy going schedule, such as a therapsit or a marrage counsellor, and spend free time pursuing wealth in other ways.
From what I know, DIY is a great way of pursuing wealth in other ways. You don't get a paycheck, but you do get a boost in your lifestyle, a feeling of peace and pride in you work, and the opportunity help out your friends and family.
When I own a home, I'd like to have a big room in my basement devoted to things like:
-Brewing my own beer and liquor.
-Growing my own tea leaves.
-Tailoring repairs in my family's clothes.
-Making my own incense. (incense is similar to scented candles)
-Making my own perfumes and colognes.
I was also thinking I'd love to change my own oil, air filters, and windshield wipers on my car. I don't know how to do these things yet, but it just seems kinda silly to pay someone else to do it when it's quick and easy to do it yourself.
Anyway, I thought I'd like to share my thoughts to a likeminded group of people and hear what others suggest I could also do to make DIY part of my life.
What are your thoughts? | <urn:uuid:1f7c3dd7-3bc6-4243-9a44-2b368712f98e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.diychatroom.com/f38/18-year-old-looking-diy-ideas-94266/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972206 | 363 | 1.609375 | 2 |
HIMALAYAN NEWS SERVICE
KATHMANDU: Senior justice of the Supreme Court, Ram Kumar Prasad Shah, today blamed politicians and lawmakers for introducing a constitutional provision on the establishment of a separate Constitutional Court to serve the interests of international non-governmental organisations.
He remarked that leaders and lawmakers started advocating for the Constitutional Court after visiting European countries with funds provided by UNDP and other
INGOs. Shah maintained that CC will trample on the independence of the judiciary and land the judiciary in chaos. Two weeks ago, political parties had agreed to form a separate Constitutional Court with a five-year tenure to look into disputes among provinces. This is
the first time a senior justice of the SC has spoken
against the CC.
While delivering his hourlong speech at a programme on Constitutional Court in the New Constitution, organised by the Supreme Court Bar Association with support from the UNDP, the senior justice urged the lawyers to save the judiciary. “Constituting a body like the Supreme Court is against the principles of separation of power and checks and balances among state organs. The move is intended to weaken the judiciary,”
Shah said, pointing that countries where there was threat of autocracy had
constitutional courts. “If constitutional courts are supposed to look into disputes among provinces, the US and India would have formed them,” he argued. | <urn:uuid:44d6a893-1e20-4e26-8b1c-c88e0f1fedd4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thehimalayantimes.com/fullNews.php?headline='Plot+against+judiciary'+&NewsID=330637 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951806 | 281 | 1.835938 | 2 |
Are your passionate about helping kids and families live healthier lives?
Group sessions: We need energetic volunteers for our 12-week program. to work with children ages 2-18, teaching healthy lifestyle habits from the program manual, such as how to read food labels and avoiding too much TV. The program includes one hour of class time and one hour of physical activity.
Volunteers must be able to attend each Monday from 4 to 7 p.m. for 12 weeks. Experience with education, nutrition, physical education and Spanish are excellent but not necessary.
Annual Bike Drive: Each year, Healthy Hawks collects gently used bicycles for our annual bike drive. With the help of our community partners, we collect, repair, and gave away bikes to over 100 children each year!
We are also seeking volunteers who have experience making bicycle repairs. If you would like to volunteer your time to help repair donated bikes, please contact us. | <urn:uuid:97af3851-477d-4360-8533-488622f8c4fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kumc.edu/school-of-medicine/pediatrics/programs/healthy-hawks/volunteer.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961181 | 188 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Feb 28 2013
Proposal would extend incentives for offshore projects in Delaware and across U.S.
WASHINGTON – Today, Sens. Tom Carper and Chris Coons and Rep. John Carney (all D-Del.) introduced the Incentivizing Offshore Wind Power Act to provide critical financial incentives for investment in offshore wind energy. This legislation would provide the offshore wind industry with enhanced stability by extending investment tax credits for the first 3,000 Megawatts of offshore wind facilities placed into service, which is an estimate of 600 wind turbines. These tax credits are vital for this new clean energy technology because of the longer lead time for the permitting and construction of offshore wind turbines, compared to onshore wind energy. Once awarded a tax credit, companies would have five years to install the offshore wind facility. Companies would not be able to receive other production or investment tax credits in addition to the offshore wind investment tax credit.
"Developing wind energy off our nation's shores, especially in places like Delaware, is a critical part of boosting American energy independence and jumpstarting our clean energy economy," said Senator Carper. "Offshore wind is a true 'win-win-win' – it is cleaner for our environment, reduces our dependence on fossil fuels and foreign energy, and helps create jobs. If we want to harness this untapped, domestic energy source, providing investment tax incentives for our country's first offshore wind projects is essential. Our bill would do just that. Additionally, it would help spur an industry that can be an engine for new, good-paying jobs in manufacturing, construction, maintenance and production. I look forward to working with my colleagues to pass this legislation and encourage the growth of the American offshore wind industry."
"Wind energy generated off our shores has the potential to strengthen domestic energy production, lower energy costs, and create jobs," Senator Coons said. "This bill will help get turbines moving and, in conjunction with other policies, could help get the first generation of offshore wind projects providing clean, sustainable electricity to our communities."
"As Congress works to responsibly reduce our deficit, we need to continue to maintain important investments in areas critical to economic growth, like renewable energy, manufacturing and job training programs," said Congressman Carney. "Offshore wind power is a rapidly growing industry around the world. By incentivizing companies to develop offshore wind operations in the United States, we will reduce our dependency on foreign oil, while creating good-paying manufacturing jobs right here in Delaware. I look forward to working with my Democratic and Republican co-sponsors in both the House and Senate to pass this important piece of legislation."
The legislation defines offshore facilities as any facility located in the inland navigable waters of the United States, including the Great Lakes, or in the coastal waters of the United States, including the territorial seas of the United States, the exclusive economic zone of United States, and the outer Continental Shelf of the United States.
Offshore wind offers enormous potential for producing clean domestic energy and helping create good jobs in areas located close to large population centers along the coasts. Because offshore wind blows faster and more uniformly at sea than the wind on land, it is a huge untapped resource for clean American power. According to the University of Delaware, the winds off the Atlantic Coast have the potential of generating 330 Gigawatts of power. That is enough power to replace about 300 dirty, large coal plants and enough power to support nine states from Massachusetts to North Carolina. Additionally, building and operating these wind farms would create economic opportunities along our coasts. Learning from European countries, who have seen over 50 offshore wind projects deployed since 1991, we know an offshore wind project can create up to 1,500 jobs in construction and operation and maintenance alone.
A number of proposed offshore wind projects are moving through the development process, including projects in Delaware, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey and Maine. Projects have also been discussed off the shores of Maryland and the Great Lakes states.
Joining Sens. Carper and Coons on the Senate legislation as cosponsors are Sens. Susan Collins (ME), Frank Lautenberg and Bob Menendez (NJ), Sheldon Whitehouse and Jack Reed (RI), Sherrod Brown (OH), Angus King (ME), Kirsten Gillibrand (NY), Elizabeth Warren and Mo Cowan (MA), and Ben Cardin (MD).
In addition to Rep. Carney, Reps. Bill Pascrell, Jr. and Frank LoBiondo (NJ) are cosponsoring the House legislation. | <urn:uuid:5446837e-e495-4ad5-8db9-e44258dd6958> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.carper.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ID=c2b7700d-e30f-446a-888b-b87aed22a117 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940767 | 916 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Now, several sites designed for active duty military members, veterans and their families are being used to help with things such as job searches, keeping in touch with fellow service members and even documenting military history.
Google recently launched VetNet. The site is a collaboration of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Hiring Our Heroes program, the Institute for Veterans and Military Families and Hire Heroes USA. The site joins Google's existing Veterans Job Bank, which includes more than 1 million veteran-preferred positions.
VetNet serves as a clearinghouse of sorts for all types of veterans' resources. It has three tracks - basic training, which includes resume writing and job search skills; career connections track that serves as a networking site; and entrepreneur track, where you can take classes on starting your own business.
In an article for Veterans United Network, Elissa Essner said there were several other smaller sites designed to help military members and their families.
Rally Point is a new site that allows current and transitioning troops to network with other professionals. Essner said Rally Point lets users grow their professional network and search for civilian jobs. The site is only for active-duty or retired military personnel and Department of Defense employees.
Hire a Hero is a traditional job search site for veterans.
It's searchable, too, by location, company name, and field or job title. The
site is a project of the Armed Forces Support Foundation. According to the
site, it has 337,000 registered members. It's a part of Google's VetNet as well.
Other sites are designed to help veterans keep in touch with their fellow service members, as well as document their military history.
Vet Friends is an online veterans registry that links service members from all branches of the military. It currently has more than 1.3 million users and you can search for military members by name or unit. Essner said it's designed to be a Facebook for the military world. There are also discussion boards and a place to post reunion stories.
Together We Served is a repository for those wanting to document their military memories. It has different pages for each branch of the military and also allows for veterans to connect with each other. There are also discussion boards and users can create a virtual storybook of their time in service. | <urn:uuid:e40fb594-9119-452b-8398-17782f371314> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.al.com/breaking/2012/12/social_media_sites_connect_ser.html | 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 | 0.968748 | 473 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Her hands running with sultry precision down her teen curves, she sashays across the stage, her bikini-sized jean shorts stretching just barely below her bottom. Pop sensation Turbo Music is so young she still has braces on her teeth, but that doesn't stop myriad middle-aged men from clawing at her legs and private parts, eager to put paper bills anywhere their fingers might reach.
This is modern Thailand: a nation home to the first-ever airline staffed by ladyboys, the highest number of sex-change surgeries worldwide and a seeming openness to sex rarely seen – or enjoyed – anywhere else in the world. But ask a local teen how to put on a condom, or the ways in which HIV is contracted, and you will likely be met with a blank stare and shy giggle. Despite an education system that has created one of Asia's highest rates of literacy, Thailand has the second-highest number of teen pregnancies in the world, the highest rate of HIV/Aids in Asia, and year-on-year increasing rates of STD infection among its youth.
The country's "top-down control of thoughts and behaviour" in its schools is partly to blame, says Bangkok-based blogger Kaewmala, author of Sex Talk, which analyses Thai culture and sexuality. "Sex isn't always a taboo subject in Thai culture ... [But] what is 'appropriate' is often narrowly and strictly defined by those who aren't always in touch with reality."
Last year it was Turbo Music's single Itchy Ear that drew attention to the divide between Thailand's hyper-eroticised image and its surprisingly conservative culture. With lyrics describing a bodily "itch" desperate for a scratch and a YouTube video watched over 17m times, the band – and its message – attracted a flurry of criticism about "amoral Thai behaviour" and the "taboo nature" of sex in Thai culture.
This year, it was an claim by the National Economic and Social Development Board that Facebook was partly to blame for the country's unwanted teen pregnancies, citing seducing messages and video clips as an issue.
Then there was a nationwide health exam for high school students that asked: "If you have a sexual urge, what should you do?" Optional answers included: a) Ask friends if you can play football together; b) Consult family members; c) Try to sleep; d) Go out with a friend of the opposite sex; or, e) Invite a close friend to watch a movie together.
The correct answer, according to Dr Samphan Phanphrut, director of the National Institute of Educational Testing Services, which oversees the exam, was (a): Ask friends if you can play football together, whether the exam taker was a boy or girl. The question, he told local media, was intended to verify students' ability to recognise – and act – on their sexual impulses.
Copies of the test posted online quickly attracted messages of outrage and chagrin, with commentators lamenting the lack of parent-child dialogue on sex and the state of the country's education system – sentiments that some politicians echo. Dr Pusadee Tamthai, of Thailand's National Commission for Women's Affairs, says the indirect wording of the question, coupled with its many possible answers, only proved educators' inability to reach their students.
"Children are growing up so much faster today than in the past, but because sex is taboo in Thailand, they seldom learn about sex from their parents or family, so they depend on magazines, the internet and their friends for information," she says. "When they do learn about sex at school, the way that students communicate with their teachers is hierarchical and [therefore] not very open, because in our culture of respecting the elderly there's an emphasis on taking care of what you say rather than talking freely and without judgment."
Luckily, there are some educators in Thailand who are listening. Maytinee Bhongsvej, executive director of the Association for the Promotion of the Status of Women, has launched a frank approach to sex education in the capital, where a comprehensive programme – encompassing self-esteem, bodily and emotional changes, gender rights, STDs and intercourse – has been rolled out to some 100 schools around Bangkok. The course, she says, far surpasses the "sperm and ovary" biology focus of the national curriculum and – despite being highly controversial – has met with great success anecdotally.
"People think that if you talk about sex, you encourage them to have it. But if you keep preaching 'Maintain your virginity', you don't prepare kids for reality," she says. "We believe that kids should be fully informed because then they can avoid situations that would lead them to problems."
Tamthai, who hopes to see a programme like Maytinee's as part of the national curriculum one day, is restrained in her hope. "That starts with being honest with each other," she says, "and that's a lot to do." | <urn:uuid:6b87efa6-466d-42ce-9982-58b24392c770> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/20/thailand-struggles-teach-sex-education | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965849 | 1,027 | 1.570313 | 2 |
One of the first things adventurer Aaron Linsdau did after returning to San Diego from Antarctica was shave his “scary guy beard” and get his long hair cut.
The reflection in the mirror showed a face that was gaunt from severe weight loss and scarred from frost burns. So why did that face show a broad smile?
“I was pleasantly surprised I didn’t have more damage,” he said during a phone interview.
And besides, as he wrote on the blog that chronicled his epic journey to the South Pole: “Scars are good stories.”
Linsdau’s Antarctica story started in the summer of 2011 when the former resident of Carlsbad and Temecula — he still owns a home here that he rents out — decided to trek to the South Pole — and back — without the aid of a kite, dogs or snowmobile. Just a man and his skis. For 1,400 miles, the equivalent of walking from Temecula to Reno and back in -40 degree weather.
To be the first American to pull off the feat, Linsdau trained for months, pulling a tire sled around Carlsbad in his spare time, and putting in serious hours in the cold and damp of Jackson Hole, Wyo., his familial stomping grounds.
He landed in Antarctica in late October, touching down with a clutch of supplies that included duffel bags filled with butter: high-calorie sustenance he was planning to wolf down over the course of the trip to stay energized in the freezing cold.
Leaving the coast, Linsdau spent the next 20 days getting pounded by Antarctic blizzards, 75-mph gusts of wind carrying ice chunks that would make moving forward — much less putting in serious mileage — almost impossible.
On one of the days, the wind was so fierce that Lins-dau was forced to hunker down in his tent, wasting almost an entire day waiting for a chance to venture out. Other days found the trim 39-year-old effectively buried by snowdrifts.
“If it’s going to be like this forever I am toast,” he remembered thinking.
To help get some sleep in the harsh conditions, Linsdau built up a six-foot-tall snow wall to protect his tent. But the chunks of flying ice ended up turning the wall into “Swiss cheese” and the pounding made it sound like he was living in a tom-tom drum.
The software engineer had hoped to ski about 17 miles a day. That pace proved too optimistic, as 6 miles a day ended up being a stellar outing during the early portion of what would turn into an 80-day excursion.
Ratcheting up the difficulty level was his equipment. Writing on his blog, Linsdau said his towing harness began to cut into his waist, “causing incessant trouble with my right hip.”
“An adjustment of an inch was the difference between pain and relative comfort,” he wrote on his blog.
During the phone interview from his family home in Jackson Hole, Linsdau said his hips still hurt and he is experiencing some off and on numbness in his fingers. His toes also are torn up from the intense skiing. | <urn:uuid:36df8c1f-025c-4417-9992-b4c31250f39c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/feb/26/tp-man-returns-from-south-pole-adventure/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982296 | 695 | 1.679688 | 2 |
EMERGENCY lending from the ECB to banks in Ireland fell in December, the first decline since January 2010, but only because the Irish Central Bank stepped up its help to banks.
ECB lending to banks in Ireland fell from €136.4bn in November to €132bn at the end of December, according to the figures released by the Irish Central Bank yesterday.
At the same time, the bank increased its emergency lending by €6.4bn, bringing the total it is owed to €51bn.
The latest data does show a levelling off in demand for the loans. Emergency lending to banks shot up €16bn in November, but overall demand for the loans only increased by €2bn in December when ECB and Irish Central Bank figures are combined.
However, the figures also provide the latest evidence that responsibility for funding Ireland's broken banks is being pushed increasingly back on to Irish taxpayers. The loans are recorded by the Irish Central Bank under the heading "other assets".
A spokesman for the ECB said the Irish Central Bank is itself creating the money it is lending to banks, not borrowing cash from the ECB to fund the payments. The ECB spokesman said the Irish Central Bank can create its own funds if it deems it appropriate, as long as the ECB is notified.
News that money is being created in Ireland will feed fears already voiced this week by ECB president Jean-Claude Trichet that inflation is a potential concern for the eurozone.
However, a source at the ECB said the European bank is comfortable that the amounts involved are small enough not to be systemically significant. The ECB has been lending money to banks in Ireland at just 1pc, as long as the banks can put up acceptable collateral.
The volume of those loans surged from €95bn in August 2010 to €136.4bn in November, as Irish banks repaid their bondholders without being able to refinance in the private sector. The ECB loans prevented banks that could not raise funds from the private sector running out of cash after repaying their own lenders and meeting deposit withdrawals.
December's fall in ECB lending was the first decline since January 2010. The ECB total includes loans to Irish banks and banks operating out of the IFSC.
Around 66pc of the ECB loans have been made to domestic Irish banks, according to Michael Cummins of Glas Securities. The ECB is known to be keen to wean Irish banks off its loans, but the increase in lending from closer to home shows banks are still not able to access funds in the private sector.
The data released by the Central Bank of Ireland included details of a €12.3bn "fine-tuning operation" by the bank. The data suggests the €12.3bn has been loaned out by the bank on a short-term basis.
It was the first time any such transaction has been recorded over the December period since 2003. A spokesman for the Central Bank said the transaction had been flagged by the ECB in September.
He said the ECB said it would carry out three "fine-tuning operations", including one on December 23. These operations are aimed at smoothing out any disruption that might occur when the ECB's regular six-month and 12-month lending deals with banks end and have to be refinanced.
People in the market said the large scale of the latest "fine tuning" is likely to be down to the difficulty of rolling over large amounts of debt over Christmas. | <urn:uuid:fd05c64d-552d-40a4-a1a6-c1e8b6293bc6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/central-bank-steps-up-its-cash-support-to-irish-banks-financed-by-institution-printing-own-money-26614131.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97659 | 703 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Watch VideosPlay Wong Video Play Davis Video Play Stone Video Play West Video Play Tucker Video Diversity at Notre Dame
November 17, 2011 •
A new, unprecedented national survey of African American Catholics by University of Notre Dame researchers reveals several significant insights into individual religious engagement and identifies several notable demographic trends facing the church. The survey was sponsored by the National Black Catholic Congress and Notre Dame’s Institute for Church Life and Office of the President.
Notre Dame social scientists Darren W. Davis and Donald B. Pope-Davis, who co-authored the report, set out to test the validity of anecdotal accounts that African American Catholics were becoming increasingly disengaged from their religion. Read More
July 08, 2011 •
Stephen Ponzillo, director of community services and public policy for United Way of Tampa Bay in Tampa, Fla., has been appointed director of the University of Notre Dame’s TRIO programs, which currently include Talent Search and Upward Bound. Read More
April 05, 2011 •
Executives from McDonald’s, Kellogg’s, Bank of America and other major companies will be talking about what diverse individuals and teams contribute to their businesses when they address the fourth annual Notre Dame Diversity Conference April 8 and 9 (Friday and Saturday) at the University of Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business.
Organized by Notre Dame MBA students and presented by ACS, a Xerox company involved in business-process outsourcing and IT services, the conference is free and open to the public. However, attendees must register online, and the deadline is April 6 (Wednesday). Read More
March 22, 2011 •
For more than 40 years, the Department of International Student Services and Activities (ISSA) at the University of Notre Dame has hosted International Festival Week, a celebration of international heritage and culture. International Festival Week 2011 will take place from March 25 through April 2. Read More
January 20, 2011 •
Indiana Minority Business Magazine (IMBM) has honored Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., president of the University of Notre Dame, with a 2011 Champion of Diversity Award. Father Jenkins was one of 14 individuals, institutions and companies recognized by the magazine at a ceremony Jan. 14 in Indianapolis.
Father Jenkins and the other award recipients were cited as “leaders in their respective fields, not only because they excel at what they do, but also because they are inclusive,” according to Shannon Williams, president and general manager of IMBM. Read More
January 13, 2011 •
Martin Luther King Day will be observed at the University of Notre Dame with a prayer service Monday (Jan. 17) at 11:30 a.m. in the Main Building rotunda.
Notre Dame’s president, Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., will lead the “Prayer Service to Honor the Legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.” Other participants will include Rev. Hugh Page, dean of Notre Dame’s First Year of Studies and associate professor of theology and Africana studies, and community leaders from the Michiana area. Music will be provided by Notre Dame’s Celebration Choir and members of the Notre Dame Folk Choir. A reception will follow the event, which is open to the public. Read More | <urn:uuid:bebd9b09-7931-41fb-b1b8-b8e5024a746c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://diversity.nd.edu/news/archives/2011/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939705 | 680 | 1.554688 | 2 |
|"He wasn't in Great Wizards of the Twentieth Century, or Notable Magical Names of Our Time [...]"
The subject of this article does not meet our notability standards. Although it is based on canonical/valid information, it was suggested it does not merit its own article and, as such, is to be either deleted or merged with similar articles.
If you disagree with either of these actions, please explain why at Category talk:Non-notable articles or improve the page and remove this tag.
|Unidentified Death Eater|
This individual (d. 2 May 1998) was a Death Eater, who fought during the Battle of Hogwarts. He fought in the onslaught at the Viaduct against the Suit of armour. He later witnessed the believed death of Harry Potter in the Forbidden Forest at the hands of Lord Voldemort. But after Harry revealed that he was alive in the Viaduct Courtyard, he cast Confringo at Voldemort's pet snake, Nagini, to kill her, since she was Voldemort's last Horcrux, but because of her Horcrux protection, it rebounded on this Death Eater and several other Death Eaters, killing them. | <urn:uuid:668a57ed-9711-4db6-b702-3242102a2778> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Unidentified_Black_Death_Eater_at_the_Battle_of_Hogwarts | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958042 | 242 | 1.78125 | 2 |
From that article, "cut firearm suicides by 74%... no evidence of substitution of method of suicide in any state.
You're leaving out the "based on modeled statistical estimates" part, which means this isn't an actual reduction, it's a guess based on lots of assumptions.
The point was, the wikipedia article you cited did not support your claim, it showed that the numbers in Australia (where the baseline measurement was rather low to begin with) are poorly understood.
In addition, the argument that taking away someone's gun prevents them from committing suicide is a bad one. If I want to commit suicide, that is my right and you do not have a right to interfere with my choice.
Wierd. Right after the word "state." in the part you quoted, it said that it reduced homicides similarly. Guess you missed that.
FWIW, I agree with you on suicides. But it would be much safer for everyone around you if you could go to the pharmacy and purchase a cyanide cap, to be consumed only on the premises (so you didn't take it home to poison someone else). I'm thinking that, even if they had to provide a little annex for you to occupy and a free can of pop to wash it down, it would still be cheaper than a gun, and certainly less hazardous to those around you.
I don't know whether reducing the accessibility of guns reduces murders, it's entirely possible that if you sit down and think "I'm determined to kill Bill, but how?" you'll find a way, even if it's not as easy as a gun. But I'm pretty sure that it reduces homicides. I'd expect that it would reduce unplanned, spur-of-the-moment, and accidental killings, killings by small children, etc. by a lot. | <urn:uuid:fc8d1f7f-33cf-4ddf-854a-8f310e82de6d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://slashdot.org/~number11/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977877 | 375 | 1.625 | 2 |
Managing-Director of the National Iranian Oil Refining and Distribution Company (NIORDC) Ali Reza Zeiqami said Monday that Iran and Iraq had reached an agreement to expand cooperation in developing joint fields, the refining section, and the exports of oil and gas products.
According to the agreement between Iranian and Iraqi officials, Iran will export $1.7 - 1.8 billion of petroleum and Associated Petroleum Gas (APG) products to Iraq per year, Zeiqami said.
He added that petroleum products such as oil, gas, and kerosene would be exported to Iraq by sea via the Mahshahr and Bandar Abbas ports and through three land routes.
Zeiqami said Iran had also agreed to cooperate in the construction of a refinery in Iraq and to share its technological knowhow in this field with its neighbor.
Based on current studies, Iran and Iraq share 23 joint hydrocarbon fields which are divided into exploration, developmental and production categories. The two Muslim neighboring nations share five major oil fields which include Naftshahr, Dehloran, Paydare Gharb, Azadegan and Yadavaran.
Iran shares oil and gas fields with most of its neighbors, including Persian Gulf littoral states such as Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar and Oman, as well as it northeastern neighbor Turkmenistan.
Meantime, during a three-day visit to Iraq by Iranian Oil Minister Rostam Qassemi, the two neighbors reiterated their cooperation in various areas such as refining, increasing exports of oil and gas products as well as development of shared fields.
Following his visit to Iraq, Qassemi stressed that good coordination and exchange of opinions were made about "oil product exports, construction of Iran's gas export pipeline to Iraq and training of Iraq's technical personnel".
Qassemi traveled to Iraq's holy cities of Najaf and Karbala on Thursday and held meetings with senior Iraqi officials, including his counterpart, in Baghdad on Friday and Saturday. | <urn:uuid:e4981345-544a-4464-9e77-3a89ab1efa08> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://english.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=9103080894 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977058 | 410 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Breathing in sights and styles
Aggieland wonder derives from abandoning technology
Published: Thursday, February 16, 2012
Updated: Wednesday, July 25, 2012 19:07
Mind-boggled students rush to class each week day without regard for anything else, except to check off a to-do list bullet. More than 50,000 Aggies populate Texas A&M's gigantic campus, caught up in their own set of thoughts, chasms or studies. Distractions cause us to forget how precious our University is.
Walking to class one day, I carried my computer and iPad in my Kenneth Cole messenger bag. With my iPhone 4 in hand and camera strapped to my body, I was in my everyday groove of updating my LinkedIn, tweeting for two Twitter handles, snapping a photo for my Instagram profile and crafting a witty post for my Facebook.
Looking up to take a breather from almost choking on my social media indulgence, I noticed it was a wonderful day after having rained. The sky was light blue filled with fluffy clouds, which was perfectly contrasted with the historical buildings close by.
Then I made the daring decision of putting my phone away, forgetting about each of the four technological powerhouses I possessed.
Something wonderful happens when your mind is clear and your eyes simply absorb the sights around you. Being at our University, there are many details to notice, but we may not notice them because we're drowning in digital technologies. Instead of carrying an electronic device, which directly attaches you to the ubiquitous Internet, carry something that will not distract you. Holding a cup of coffee or tea allows you to breathe and enjoy our University's scenery.
Take Michaella Walton, senior communication major, for example. I spotted her holding a cup of tea as she briskly walked to class. What initially caught my attention was her Lucky Brand leather messenger bag (as I'm a huge fan of bags). The fact that the camel-leather complimented her Etienne Aigner riding boots sparked me to ask for a picture of her style.
"Fashion is fun," said Walton. "And putting together new combinations to see people's reactions is always enjoyable."
Walton's navy and white stripped Ellen Tracy sweater reminded me of the elegance directly from Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week runways in New York City. Her dark-washed skinny jeans aided in bringing out the color in her aforementioned boots. Walton's Michael Kors "Boyfriend" watch was the perfect, subtle accessory for her style compilation.
"I enjoy looking nice on days where I'm not stressed for time," said Walton. "It makes me feel more professional and productive."
Perhaps more Aggies would dress up if they weren't stressed for time.
Here's the challenge: Take the time to clear your mind and be aware.
There are many angles of Aggieland that are waiting to be seen. There are many styles to compliment. There are also many clothing get-ups to wear so you can share who you are. The way you dress non-verbally displays such insights.
"Fashion is a way to try a new perspective without saying a word," Walton said. "It allows others to pick up on what you're thinking before you even open your mouth. How great is that?"
Notice details of our University's campus you have never noticed. Keep your phone in your pocket, walking with your hands free and allowing your fingers to feel the air breeze through them. With graduation nearing, soak in Aggieland before venturing through the rest of your life. Remember, it's not too late.
Jason Syptak is a senior marketing major and The Battalion's style spectator. | <urn:uuid:94fb90d1-e523-4298-a0be-c9eb3aafcd84> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thebatt.com/blogs/breathing-in-sights-and-styles-1.2785290?cache=03D163D03D163Dp%3A%2Fhe3D03Dn63Fres466 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949115 | 752 | 1.65625 | 2 |
What is a Short Gap?
A gapyear.com guide to the concentrated gap year experience
You know the feeling. Your feet are itching, you dream of remote destinations and you're desperate to escape the daily routine and enjoy the buzz and excitement of going somewhere new. The problem is you don't have the time or budget to go away for months or years; all you have is a few weeks. How can you do a gap ‘year' in such a short time?
This is where the short gap comes in. The short gap is a concentrated gap year; an independent travel experience that's squeezed into a fortnight or month, but that's every bit as exotic, hedonistic and adventurous as the traditional gap year! On the short gap you can still find hostel dorms, street food, wild night outs and like-minded people with a drive to explore another country and culture.
The short gap has grown in popularity over recent years as people face a combination of obstacles to backpacking, like not being able to take time off work, having limited time during school or university holidays or just the simple worry of not being able to afford a long round the world trip.
The brilliant thing about the short gap is that it fits perfectly into university or school holidays or - if you're working - into annual holiday. Gapyear.com member Chilli-Stu agrees, saying: "Gap years aren't just for those between A-levels and Uni. A lot of us have also done a few months during Uni holidays." Plus as the short gap requires relatively little time away, you don't need a huge amount of cash saved up either!
The gapyear.com community has shown an increasing interest in short gaps, and experienced site backpacker Ambermarie argues that it's a great option: "You can do loads in two weeks! You just need to choose a destination."
Also, with so many great travel opportunities out there, some people prefer to spread their travel experiences out over multiple short gaps rather than take one big round the world trip. Gapper BroadlandBen even says: "I think it can sometimes be better to go somewhere for a short trip!"
There's also a growing number of people taking short gaps in preparation for a longer round the world trip, to see how they get on with independent travel; to have a practice attempt before taking the bigger plunge.
The feel of the short gap tends to be different from the classic holiday. The short gapper may move around a country more independently; roughing it, without a set base, exploring as much as they can. Or, if they have a base, they're involved in different activities such as volunteering or learning a language or skill, or just chilling out and seeing where the wind takes them!
Short gap traveller -a.d.a.m- took an epic 22-day trip through Europe with mates, hitting up 11 countries along the way. He loved it, and explained that the pace was "mostly a fly by visit, hitting the cities and finding out the main attractions… Doing that in the day and out for a night on the town at night… Sort of like a smash and grab!"
So what can you actually do in a short gap? Here are some of our favourite suggestions to cram in as much as you can into your short gap…
South East Asia
Get right into the heart of Backpackerland by heading straight to South East Asia for your short gap. The options for what to see and what to do are almost unlimited depending on your timeframe, what you're into and your budget.
Highlights of South East Asia include: stuffing yourself with delicious street food in chaotic Bangkok; the inspiring temples in Siem Reap; stunning Thai tropical beaches; chilling out on a traditional junk in Halong Bay; tubing in Vang Vieng and so much more!
South East Asia offers something for everyone, and with direct flights to most of the major hubs you'll have no problem arranging the perfect short gap of two to four weeks!
Our country experts have created some fabulous guides to South East Asia, so before you do anything else check out Adam Lunn's Guide to Thailand, Louise Denton's Guide to Cambodia and Hannah Simmons' Guide to Vietnam.
Give Something Back
Gone are the days when volunteering was a year-long commitment; now anyone can get involved with volunteering and have the chance to do their bit to make a difference.
Volunteering is an ideal way to spend your short gap; getting to know the local community and people, learning new skills and, of course, doing what you can to make a difference. There are numerous voluntary projects available, with popular activities including conservation work, building and refurbishment and community outreach / support work.
See the fantastic volunteering guide here for more information on finding a suitable placement and what volunteering entails.
There's no need to travel far for your short gap; avoid long-haul flights and jetlag and take advantage of what's on your doorstep by exploring Europe. For a trip off the beaten track, why not consider the short hop to beautiful Romania where you can learn the truth about the legend of vampires, go hiking in the Transylvanian Alps and explore quaint ancient cities with a wild party scene!
Then hop across the border into Bulgaria for stunning coastline, water sports and, for the culture buffs, check out the capital, Sofia, for museums, an extravagant cathedral and cool art galleries.
Still have time to wander? Keep heading south and visit Turkey, a country divided into two by Europe and Asia. Shop to your heart's content in Istanbul, step back in time in Ephesus and enjoy the stunning Mediterranean or Aegean coastlines for some beach-side relaxation.
This is perhaps one of the best ways to cram loads into a short period while not having to worry about logistics, and being guaranteed to meet fellow travellers along the way! There are numerous options for overlanding worldwide. What's overlanding, you ask? Check out the fantastic guide by Mary Malyon.
The overland tour is perfect for the short gap because once you've done your pre-trip prep - like jabs, insurance and packing - all the logistical arrangements are sorted for you before you get there! Just find your perfect trip that suits your timeframe, meet your fellow overlanders (usually between 5-20 of them aged from 18 and upwards!) and muck in with the group to enjoy the road trip of a lifetime!
There are so many destinations visited by overland trucks, from just a few days to many months but the trips generally take the format of epic cross-continent adventures through more than one country, where people will leave and join throughout.
Another way to give back is through a charity challenge. This relatively new concept takes charity fundraising to a new level!
You sign up for an epic adventure, usually something tough like trekking the Inca Trail, climbing Kilimanjaro or hiking through the jungles of Borneo, to raise money for charity and all your travel expenses are covered; you just have to raise the sponsorship required!
Most charity challenges are designed to fit into a two to three week period so this is the ideal way to spend a short gap!
On the Rails
What's better than a trip where the mode of transport from A to B is as much a highlight as the destination itself? Where else could a journey like this begin? Russia, of course! Take the train from Russia to China on the classic Trans-Siberian railway, stopping along the way to see some sights!
This journey is as authentic as it gets, as you enjoy one of the world's most iconic train journeys across some of the most remote and beautiful places on the planet. And then there's the vodka! Oh, so much vodka!
There are a few organisations that can help you arrange your train tickets, accommodation and local help at your stop-off points or you can just wing it and book your train tickets and hostels as you go for a real adventure. The Trans-Siberian railway really is the perfect place for your short gap.
Adventure and Animals
Want to enjoy a slower pace of life? Fancy seeing some of the world's most notorious predators and bagging one of the world's highest continental summits? Get yourself over to Africa and uncover the jewels of Tanzania.
Fly into Nairobi and take the bus overland into Moshi, Tanzania - your base in the shadow of Mount Kilimanjaro - where you can push yourself to the limit attempting to summit this awesome 5,895m peak!
After enjoying one of the most incredible trekking peaks in the world, take some time to enjoy the other highlight of Tanzania with a safari. If your budget allows, head out to the Serengeti, the National Park that connects with the Maasai Mara in Kenya and is famous for the migration!
After being bowled over by baboons and having fallen in love with lions take a trip to Zanzibar for some well-deserved relaxation on white sand beaches, crystal clear seas and as much seafood as you can handle!
Take a Hike
Fancy doing something really different on your short gap? Pushing yourself to the limit, getting off the beaten track, being dirty, sweaty and experiencing some of the world's most inspiring scenery while you're at it?
There are hundreds and hundreds of great treks you can do all over the world, from the Annapurna Circuit in Nepal to the Inca Trail in Peru, and from the Camino de Santiago in Spain to The Narrows in the USA - there is a trek for every ability, every climate and every duration!
Want to go further? Read this guide on planning your short gap.
Need more info? Check out our short gap section.
About the Author: Lexi Quinton
Lexi Quinton works for Different Travel, a charity challenge organisation based in the UK and part of her job includes leading charity challenge expeditions overseas.
Lexi is a gapyear.com moderator, and a very experienced traveller. She's visited more than 40 countries since she started travelling in 2000. Lexi's favourite trip to date is her first gap year, aged 18, when she spent three months living and working in Kenya and is where she fell in love with Africa.
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CONSIDER the figures: In 1980 only 60 hotels and resorts offered spa programs in the United States. During the 1980s, that figure doubled. By 1999, more than 400 hotels offered some form of on-site spa facility, according to Spa Finders, a company specializing in booking spa trips.
"In recent years, spas have become to hotels and resorts what swimming pools were in the 1960s and golf courses were (and are) in the decades following," says Mary Tabacchi, PhD, professor of nutrition, wellness, and spa management at Cornell University's School of Hotel Administration. "In fact, spas are one of the fastest-growing segments of the hospitality industry."
It seems that every hotel worth its mineral salts is building or expanding a spa. And many properties catering predominately to meetings and incentives are convinced that a spa is another draw for this market. What is behind this trend--and is it really appealing to meeting attendees and planners, or just to leisure travelers?
STRESS Reducers The major reason for the surge in spa facilities is stress, Tabacchi believes. As people become increasingly concerned about the havoc stress can wreak on their physical and mental well-being, they are looking for ways to reduce that stress. Golf, traditionally the most popular business sport, is not always a stress reliever, notes Tabacchi, especially when a player is trying to decide how to lose to the boss without being obvious about it, or an executive is just having a bad day on the course.
"We had a meeting at a conference center/spa last week," reports Joan Eisenstodt of Washington, D.C.-based Eisenstodt Associates. "The group, all women who work in the field of economic development, thoroughly enjoyed and appreciated the opportunity to work in an atmosphere that allowed them to relax and not fight the elements."
Certainly the increasing number of businesswomen has been a factor in the popularity and proliferation of spas. But men are also contributing to the cause as they quickly catch on to the spa phenomenon. According to the International SPA Association (iSPA), 35 percent of the resort spa market is made up of men.
Indeed, as Generation X grows up, golf may diminish as the be-all and end-all of business meeting networking and entertainment. Says Nancy Robbins, of Massachusetts-based NDF Communications, "The younger groups are more experiential and health-conscious."
Elizabeth Zielinski, president of Virginia-based Meeting Horizons, concurs, adding, "The boom in the dot-coms has led to a younger clientele. This group does not see golf as the only way to skin a cat. Younger executives simply aren't inclined to squander more than four hours out of a valuable day making contacts on the golf course. It's not worth the return on investment as far as their time is concerned."
She adds, "Spas are a wonderful alternative that can provide opportunities for personal relaxation, stress reduction and networking through recreation, regardless of someone's age, gender, or background."
OVERCOMING Challenges Nonetheless, many business travelers still believe stereotypes when it comes to spas, thinking of them as "fat farms," featuring a regimen of carrot sticks and strenuous exercise. And many in the business world are interested in working out--not getting worked on, says Bonnie Weiss, director of pharmaceutical sales for Hyatt Hotels & Resorts in Old Greenwich, Conn.
But nowadays, "There is such a wide variety of spas to choose from. Some are European in nature, with luxurious decor and familiar treatments such as facials, body wraps, and Swedish massages," says Laura Gydesen, national sales manager for KSL. Others have a more holistic, Eastern feel, and some focus more on recreation than relaxation. "Because each spa has a different personality, you need to get a sense of what each one is about to choose a facility that matches your business culture," she says.
And where spas were once destinations in and of themselves, the trend is for spa development within existing properties. The spa is not the focal point, but one more important amenity available to guests.
"For the meeting planner, the presence of a spa becomes a qualifier," says Judy Singer, president and co-owner of Health Fitness Dynamics Inc., a spa-consulting firm in Pompano Beach, Fla. "A spa allows another option to help balance the conference agenda."
BENEFITS Abound "Business travelers are looking for ways to create balance in their lives. They want to learn lessons that they can apply in their everyday lives," says John DeFontes, spa director at The Centre for Well-Being at The Phoenician in Scottsdale, Ariz. That's why elements such as meditation, yoga, personal growth seminars, and stress management workshops have been added to many spa menus.
While many of these activities may seem individual in nature, all can be adapted to a group setting. And the creative meeting planner can work with a spa director to develop other active group exercises ranging, including wellness seminars and nutrition workshops. At The Centre for Well-Being, spa employees often lead "energy breaks" during meetings--five- to 15-minute sessions of stretching and breathing exercises designed "to wake everyone up and move the blood around," DeFontes explains.
Whether the transition between work and workout takes place during a business session or after hours, Judy Singer says the payoff is "greater focus, leading to more alert meeting attendees and more productive meetings." | <urn:uuid:9ed63f69-d0f8-4a23-8c64-e7349d9c4fe3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://meetingsnet.com/financialinsurance-meetings/spa-scene-0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964829 | 1,141 | 1.585938 | 2 |
The Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, has urged his Syrian counterpart, Bashar al-Assad, to reform or leave office – the first time the allies have publicly diverged during Syria's six-month uprising.
The surprise statement, reported by Russian news agencies, came as Turkey – a former ally of Damascus – said again that it would consider all options in dealing with the ongoing violence in Syria.
When pressed on what those options were, the Turkish foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, conceded that military measures would be considered if the situation threatened his country's security.
"Every domestic crisis in Syria will affect Turkey, Iraq, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine and Jordan. It affects the whole region," he said. "In this regard, there is no other country more important than Syria today. So, when an internal conflict in Syria poses a risk to Turkey, we will take all necessary measures."
Turkey has been weighing a response to the Syrian crisis, which its leaders now say is being caused by a regime crackdown on protesters, some of whom have taken up arms.
Ankara has said it will impose a range of cultural and economic sanctions on Assad's regime, which insists it is battling terrorists backed by foreign states.
The latest Russian intervention has added to mounting pressure on the Syrian leader.
Earlier this week Moscow helped to veto a US-led resolution before the UN security council, which had threatened further sanctions on Damascus.
Furious lobbying by the US, Britain and Syrian opposition figures appeared to have done little to sway Russia, which has maintained a strategic relationship with the Ba'athist state since the cold war.
"If the Syrian leadership is incapable of conducting such reforms, it will have to go," Medvedev was reported to have said. "But this decision should be taken not in Nato or certain European countries. It should be taken by the Syrian people and the Syrian leadership."
Meanwhile, activists claimed 21 people were killed across Syria on Friday.
Protesters in Homms said Syrian security forces were targeting mosques in an attempt to stop public gatherings from forming. Friday prayers have acted as a lightning rod for anti-regime dissent for the past six months and there were clashes on most Fridays throughout the summer.
A Kurdish leader and member of the newly formed Syrian National Council, which sees itself as an alternative government to the Assad regime, was reportedly shot dead by security forces in the northern town of Qaboun.
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September 02, 2008, 12:19 PM — Started in a dorm room four years ago, the social networking site Facebook now claims to be the fourth most-trafficked site in the world. Ninety million active users pound on 10,000 servers every day, uploading millions and millions of pieces of information in a given month. For example, "friends," who socialize in 21 languages, add 500 million photos per month.
At last count, Facebook stored 6.6 billion photos total, more than any other photo site. Roughly 400,000 developers and entrepreneurs have built 25,000 applications for the platform and about 140 new applications are added per day. (For more on Facebook's application user interface appeal, see Why Microsoft Should Bring a Facebook-like Look to SharePoint and Web 2.0: Companies Gain Competitive Edge with Social Networking Tools).
Overall there are 25 terabytes of cached data available to help Facebook's 2,000 databases serve up user requests.
Yeah, the infrastructure fairly boils over with activity and Jonathan Heiliger is the lucky VP of technical operations who gets to stir the pot. Heiliger, who has run technology for several start-ups and advised venture capitalist firm Sequoia Capital, also directed site engineering for Wal-Mart's website. He joined Facebook in October 2007 to oversee its technology set-up, which many of its 600+ employees tinker with continuously. Whew! It's a good thing Heiliger lists as an interest (on his LinkedIn profile!) "anything 24 x 7."
CIO Senior Editor recently interviewed Heiliger to talk about his work at Facebook.
CIO.com: You've done a lot of startups in the past. What lessons from that experience do you bring to Facebook?
Jonathan Heiliger: The decisions you make early on tend to leave a lasting impression. It's difficult to change the way a startup is started. One of the challenges or opportunities that drew me here was going from a purely engineering-driven culture-writing software for users [for] sharing information-to now operating this truly large infrastructure. Those are two very different things. [Early on] you make tradeoffs in IT to speed development that often can lead to disaster later when you have to operate five years later.
Jonathan Heiliger, Facebook's VP of technical operations
What was the first thing you wanted to accomplish when you got to Facebook?
Heiliger: I spent the first three months coming up to speed. It was the longest coming-up-to-speed process I'd been through because most of my prior experience was at much younger companies. When I joined Facebook, there were 300 employees. [In the past] typically, I was among the first 10 employees. I knew where the bodies were buried, what cultural challenges there were. At Facebook, I had to figure it out.
What did you figure out?
Jonathan Heiliger: There's not a lot of formal process and structure in place. Here, [the culture dictates that] you can't dip a toe. You have to dive in headfirst and wrestle crocodiles. My first mission here was to build credibility and explain what technology operations does. Until that point, it was ambiguous what engineering, IT and operations each did.
How did you draw the lines between them?
Jonathan Heiliger: We're constantly looking at the lines. It's not static at Facebook. Most IT organizations love to control change. I threw that out when I came. We're not going to try to control change, but speed it up. We trained people to be pushers. We do a major release once a week and minor releases every few days. Recently, we did some underlying changes- to photo gallery layout, for example, or starting using more Ajax calls on the site so the page refreshes are more seamless.
We created a 24x7 team in operations to be the stewards of cyber liability. Instead of calling them a NOC or help desk, we called them the "cyber liability group." If someone wants to do something dumb or push bad code, the team can revert it. There are 20 people, split between Palo Alto, Calif., and London, to follow the sun. No one has to work graveyard shift.
One thing we try to balance is, since Facebook is first and foremost a technology company, we don't want to stifle change and innovation. We'd rather innovate and have a little mess to clean up than run something reliable but stale. That's tough to do at a bank, I imagine. The IT organization at a large bank wouldn't have that flexibility-there's other people's money at stake, regulatory oversight.
What's an example?
Jonathan Heiliger: Over the last two years, we have had a concerted effort to improve the push tool so site updates are seamless to users. Every couple of weeks, someone checks in some bad code or there's a bad database call or we fail to do full design review and push it into production and see user impact. The site might start running slower or a geography of users will have issues. Cyber liability isolates the problem, reverts the component or reverts the whole thing back to the previous known good state.
At Wal-Mart, we had the belief that we only roll forward, never back. Once you make schema changes in the database, it's difficult to pull back. If you pushed buggy code into production, you had to fix it in production. With user impact covered in the press.
Here, it's the opposite approach. We know there's going to be broken things that happen fairly regularly. We are ready. We have emotional shields for them.
You changed the basic Facebook interface a few weeks ago. What sort of things happened with that rollout?
Jonathan Heiliger: That's a massive change. Similar to how we rolled out Chat, we turned the new interface on gradually, some percentage of users at a time.
How did you roll out the chat feature?
Jonathan Heiliger: We had the technology running for about a month [detecting who was online] before we had the user interface visible. We turned it off several times, found a bunch of bugs that way. You can't discover that in a QA environment. You need millions of people pounding on it every day. But the actual rollout is gradual.
Is gradual rollouts an approach enterprises should take with big software rollouts?
Jonathan Heiliger: That control, that knob, gives operations and development organizations a lot of confidence. You can turn up the heat and if there are issues, only a certain percentage of employees have been affected. It's a mentality shift. In some large enterprise apps, you can't necessarily control technology changes to a subset of users. They all have to be using the same iteration at the same time. But in other instances, you can.
What's going on at Facebook to keep the company and culture flexible?
Jonathan Heiliger: The product we've built encourages people to be open and share information. A lot of decisions here-design reviews, PR strategy, what servers to buy-are often open for informal debate and input from across the employee base.
We built tools on top of the Facebook platform, including one called Ideas. Any employee can create an idea by category-social, office, product. There's a discussion tool with a star rating. One star is a really bad idea. Five stars is "I'm gonna quit if we don't do this." Ideas are anything from, "I think we should have a chat feature on the site" to "Can we replace sodas with juice in the fridge?" We encourage public comment.
We also live-blog. There's a person who transcribes any large company meeting, monthly presentations from different departments and weekly Q&As with the management team.
There's a combination of management's willingness and desire to continue to push to openness and creativity.
Why did you build these tools rather than buy them? There's no shortage of blog and chat tools out there.
Jonathan Heiliger: A couple good reasons and not so good reasons. We're a technology company and we like to write software. But really, these tools are integrated with the Facebook interface, so it makes it that much easier for employees to use. One thing I've seen at a lot of other companies is they have a pea soup style-lots of tools and Web forms and e-mail in-boxes. It's difficult for an employee to know, if they have an HR question, do I e-mail or walk over? Do I have to fill out a comment form? For us, it's all Facebook. Employees use Facebook every day. They don't have to launch a browser window to go to different URLs to communicate.
What does your infrastructure look like?
Jonathan Heiliger: Our entire Web site is run on free software. That varies from a large MySQL site-we're second or third to Yahoo, which is No. 1. And we are also a PHP site. We have half a dozen open source projects. Another is the Memcached project. I've taken over stewardship of that project with some of our developers here.
What have you contributed lately?
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He keeps all his bones: not one of them is broken.
ContextTaste and See the Lord is Good
1I will bless the LORD at all times: his praise shall continually be in my mouth. 2My soul shall make her boast in the LORD: the humble shall hear thereof, and be glad. 3O magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt his name together. 4I sought the LORD, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears. 5They looked to him, and were lightened: and their faces were not ashamed. 6This poor man cried, and the LORD heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles. 7The angel of the LORD encamps round about them that fear him, and delivers them. 8O taste and see that the LORD is good: blessed is the man that trusts in him. 9O fear the LORD, you his saints: for there is no want to them that fear him. 10The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they that seek the LORD shall not want any good thing. 11Come, you children, listen to me: I will teach you the fear of the LORD. 12What man is he that desires life, and loves many days, that he may see good? 13Keep your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking guile. 14Depart from evil, and do good; seek peace, and pursue it. 15The eyes of the LORD are on the righteous, and his ears are open to their cry. 16The face of the LORD is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of them from the earth. 17The righteous cry, and the LORD hears, and delivers them out of all their troubles. 18The LORD is near to them that are of a broken heart; and saves such as be of a contrite spirit. 19Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivers him out of them all. 20He keeps all his bones: not one of them is broken. 21Evil shall slay the wicked: and they that hate the righteous shall be desolate. 22The LORD redeems the soul of his servants: and none of them that trust in him shall be desolate.
Parallel VersesAmerican Standard Version
He keepeth all his bones: Not one of them is broken.
The Lord keepeth all their bones, not one of them shall be broken.
Darby Bible Translation
He keepeth all his bones; not one of them is broken.
King James Bible
He keepeth all his bones: not one of them is broken.
Young's Literal Translation
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Employment will continue to grow in the second quarter of 2013, but applicants are set to face stiff competition in the jobs market, with 45 applicants chasing each low-skilled job.
This is according to the latest Labour Market Outlook data released More...13 May 2013 00:01
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The Reed Job Index figures highlighted a 2% drop in employment opportunities during April, but More...01 May 2013 13:34
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The report, The changing labour market: delivering for women, delivering More...24 April 2013 16:58
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After a period More...17 April 2013 15:21
The number of unemployed people in the UK rose by 70,000 in the quarter from December to February, according to the latest labour market data published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
This means that 2.56 million people were out of wor More...17 April 2013 14:00
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Consultant editor Darren Newman looks back at the employment law position in 1979 when Margaret Thatcher came to power, and the legacy left by her Government on the workplace.
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The UK jobs market grew further in March, continuing the upward trend seen throughout the rest of the first quarter, and resulting in 9% more job opportunities compared with the final three months of 2012.
This is according to the latest UK jobs dat More...02 April 2013 16:07
An employment lawyer has criticised plans - under which immigrants would be required to pay a deposit upon entering the UK to introduce a security bonds system - designed to reduce the risk of entrants staying in the UK illegally.
Last week, De More...25 March 2013 11:56
The Chancellor, George Osborne, might have chosen a better day to deliver his fourth Budget statement to Parliament. For months now, each set of official labour market figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has shown falling unemployment. More...21 March 2013 09:22
This Personnel Today webinar, in association with Learndirect , originally shown online on 25 March 2013, examines the various ways in which organisations can employ young people and look at the raft of government initiatives that have been la More...18 March 2013 14:00
The Public Sector People Managers' Association (PPMA) exists to promote the best HR practices across the public sector. Martin Rayson, PPMA president, explains the current issues affecting the public sector during these times of economic restraint. More...06 March 2013 10:52
February saw a 12% monthly rise in job opportunities, marking the highest number advertised since 2009. This is according to the analysis of job advertisement trends throughout the UK, conducted by recruitment agency Reed.
Of the 33 sectors analyse More...04 March 2013 15:21
Employment will continue to grow during the first quarter of 2013, which will mark the fourth consecutive quarter of growth. This is according to the latest Labour Market Outlook report from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIP More...18 February 2013 13:12
There was an increase on the number of people who found jobs in January, as well as a rise in the number of employers on the lookout for skilled staff, according to the latest Report on Jobs, published today by the Recruitment and Employment Confed More...08 February 2013 13:24
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The number of graduate vacancies is predicted to rise by 9% in 2013, according to the latest survey carried out by the Association of Graduate Recruiters (AGR). The winter edition of the AGR's twice-yearly research into graduate recruitment, re More...24 January 2013 16:05
Another month, another set of mixed official figures on the UK labour market. Those who know me are aware of how desperate I am to see a return to full employment. But unlike commentators with a political or commercial vested interest in talking th More...23 January 2013 16:01
John Philpott, freelance economist and former chief economic adviser at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, comments on the latest job figures from the Office for National Statistics.
It's freezing outside and quite Christmass More...12 December 2012 17:07 | <urn:uuid:0a398b36-e808-4bbd-a9ae-96c22209fcb7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.personneltoday.com/articles/list.aspx?topics=112&excludeids=50472&navigationid=69 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959481 | 1,131 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Posted on Tue, Feb. 01, 2011
last updated: June 19, 2013 11:01:38 AM
WASHINGTON — Despite 30 years of having a major role in training Egypt's military officers, the United States has had limited exposure to the Egyptian army's inner machinations, making it difficult, U.S. officials concede, for them to predict what it will do in the current crisis.
With President Hosni Mubarak announcing Tuesday that he'll step down this fall, the military — as the institution most identified with Egyptian nationalism — is likely to become a crucial arbiter in the outcome, especially if demonstrators continue to mass seeking Mubarak's ouster.
Pentagon officials have maintained close contact with their Egyptian counterparts in recent days, with Defense Secretary Robert Gates talking again with his Egyptian counterpart Tuesday, the second phone conversation between them in three days.
Despite those contacts, U.S. officials say their understanding of the Egyptian military — its leaders and its possible motives — is shallow. The relatively limited interaction has left the Americans without deep contacts below senior officers, who either tacitly or overtly support Mubarak.
The Americans haven't had to develop more extensive contacts because Egypt generally has obliged U.S. requests in key areas: providing tougher security along Egypt's border with Gaza, granting permission for U.S. military aircraft to fly over Egyptian territory and providing expedited passage for American military vessels through the Suez Canal. Egypt receives $1.3 billion in military aid from the United States annually.
"The Egyptian military has purposely remained a cipher to their American donors. This has been allowed to happen because the Egyptians have continued to do what the Americans need them to do," said Jon Alterman, the Middle East director for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a research center in Washington.
So in this time of crisis, the U.S. doesn't have a clear view of the political beliefs of the military's majors and colonels, whether they'd support opposition groups or even, if the crisis were to deepen, whether they'd undertake a coup d'etat.
Mubarak has kept the U.S. military at a distance, giving the Americans enough contact to satisfy their needs and not much more, Alterman said.
"I don't think the United States knows the colonels, and I think that is because the Egyptians don't let them know the colonels," Alterman said.
At the Pentagon, officials have said they're impressed with the Egyptian army's professionalism and restraint in allowing demonstrations to unfold around its tanks in the streets without attempting to suppress them. Whether that restraint will continue and how the Egyptian military feels about it, however, are largely unknown.
A U.S. military official told McClatchy that the recent conversations have stayed away from suggesting what actions the Egyptian military should take. Instead, they were intended simply to receive updates on what the military has done.
"We are talking to our peers, and they are saying all the right things," said the official, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity in order to talk candidly about the American military's assessment of the Egyptian army.
The Pentagon refused to release any details of Tuesday's conversation between Gates and Egypt's defense minister, Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, including who initiated it and how long the defense chiefs spoke.
Every president since Egypt won its independence from the British in 1952 has been from the military. Mubarak himself was the air force chief of staff during the 1973 Yom Kippur War against Israel. Mubarak's new vice president, Omar Suleiman, is an army general and head of the president's intelligence agency, and the new prime minister, Ahmed Shafiq, is a former commander of the air force.
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McClatchy Newspapers 2010 | <urn:uuid:d5e7d896-5845-41e2-98b1-9fd6c700e13e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/02/01/v-print/107898/despite-close-contacts-us-in-dark.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968026 | 787 | 1.585938 | 2 |
Thursday, February 21, 2013
The history of every country begins in the heart of a man or a women." Willa Cather
A country is merely a bunch of land with borders. Or is it, a country is made up of the great people that came before us the presidents, settlers and the American Indians all made this country great. I think it is, because otherwise we would not have Thanksgiving and Presidents day and Veterans day and the Fourth of July, where we celebrate the great people that came before us to make this country great.
A church is not but a building but a group of people that come before God and pray together.
SparkPeople is not just a weight loss site. It is a community that comes together to try to lose weight, eat right, and just plainly have a better life. It is led by our great founder Spark Guy and his great staff. It has recently been the number one weight loss site in the country. It's been proven that the more active you are on this site the more weight you lose.
Why because of the great people here , the friendship, the knowledge , the giving each other a hand or a hug. Together we are stronger fitter and will succeed. Together we share our triumphs and our mistakes . Together we try new ideas and get new insights from each other . One heart, one hand . one heck of a weight loss sight, SparkPeople. | <urn:uuid:a11d9058-0be1-4b14-976d-6d609ed79f3f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sparkpeople.com/mypage_public_journal_individual.asp?blog_id=5258292 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963829 | 289 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Bipolar Catherine Zeta-Jones insists she is 'not a victim' and is 'sick' of talking about mental condition
Talking out: Catherine Zeta-Jones appearing on Good Morning America on Friday morning
Last year Catherine Zeta-Jones bravely went public about her bipolar disorder - and said just recently she hopes she can help remove the stigma from the mental condition.
But during an interview on ABC's Good Morning America on Friday, the Welsh-born actress insisted she is tired of talking about the illness.
Catherine, 43, was treated in a psychiatric hospital last April for manic depression over the stress of her husband Michael Douglas’s battle against cancer.
At the time her publicist confirmed she was receiving help for the mood-altering illness.
Despite being very open about her condition since, during her interview today the mother-of-two insisted she 'never wanted to become the poster child' - and does not want to be seen as a victim.
She said: 'You know what? I’m sick of talking about it because I never wanted to be the poster child for this [bipolar].
'I never wanted this to come out publicly. It came out,' she added emphatically.
Talking about how she copes with the illness she went on: 'I dealt with it in the best way I could and that was just saying: "Hey, I’m bipolar." Everyone has things going on and we deal with them as best we can.
SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO...
Over it: Zeta-Jones said she was 'sick' of talking about her bipolar disorder and never wanted to be the 'poster child' for the condition
Matter of fact: Catherine insisted she was not a 'victim' and that 'we all have issues in our life'
Very matter of factly, Zeta-Jones continued: 'We can’t go jump from the rooftops shouting about I have this, look at me, victim. No.'
'We all have issues in our life and I’m really lucky that I have great friends, great support and that’s all I can do.'
Catherine suffers from bipolar II, which unlike bipolar I, means the 'up' moods do not reach full-on levels of mania.
Rather than descending into deep depressions, patients can be very outgoing, functional and often more productive than normal, one reason why it often goes undiagnosed.
suggesting her reluctance to talk about her illness, Catherine spoke in
detail to the U.S. edition of InStyle this month about her diagnosis
'It's been an intense time, in good ways and bad,' Catherine said.
'You find out who you really are and who you are married to. You find things inside yourself you never imagined were there.'
'I've gained an appreciation for little things, like tea outside on a terrace and a beautiful afternoon like this.'
Ready for the cameras: Catherine was spotted leaving her New York City apartment on Friday on her way to the television appearance
has been married to Hollywood star Michael Douglas for 12 years and the
couple have two children together, son Dylan and daughter Carys.
It was reported last year that the brunette beauty spent five days in a mental health clinic recovering, which lead to the diagnosis of bipolar disorder.
She also told the magazine that she hopes she can help others suffering with the condition.
not the kind of person who likes to shout out my personal issues from
the rooftops but with my bipolar becoming public, I hope fellow
sufferers will know it is completely controllable.'
'I hope I can help remove any stigma attached to it, and that those who don't have it under control will seek help with all that is available to treat it.'
Solid couple: Catherine, pictured in September, was diagnosed with bipolar last year after suffering manic depression over husband Michael Douglas's cancer battle, who has since gone into remission | <urn:uuid:cc583ba7-40d7-40b7-a3f2-c775c3bc8cd8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2244643/Bipolar-Catherine-Zeta-Jones-insists-victim-sick-talking-mental-condition.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971518 | 829 | 1.554688 | 2 |
FORT MEADE, Md. (AP) — An Army private charged in the largest leak of classified material in U.S. history said Thursday that he sent the material to WikiLeaks to enlighten the public about American foreign and military policy and that he didn't think it would harm the United States.
Pfc. Bradley Manning gave a detailed explanation of his actions in a military courtroom Thursday as he entered guilty pleas to some charges.
"I believed that if the general public, especially the American public, had access to the information ... this could spark a domestic debate on the role of the military and our foreign policy in general," Manning said. He said he was troubled by counterinsurgency strategies that seemed to ignore "the complex dynamics of the people living in the environment."
A judge is weighing whether to accept Manning's guilty plea to reduced charges on 10 counts, which carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. But even if the plea is accepted, prosecutors can still pursue a court-martial on the remaining 12 charges. One of those is aiding the enemy, which carries a possible life sentence.
Manning, a 25-year-old Oklahoma native, admitted Thursday that he sent hundreds of thousands of Iraq and Afghanistan battlefield reports, State Department diplomatic cables, other classified records and two battlefield video clips to WikiLeaks in 2009 and 2010 while working as an intelligence analyst in Baghdad.
The slight, bespectacled soldier read from a 35-page statement for more than an hour, speaking quickly and evenly, with little emotion, even as he described how troubled he was by the material he leaked.
The battlefield reports were the first documents that Manning decided to leak. He said he opted to send them to the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks after his efforts to give them to The Washington Post and The New York Times were rebuffed.
Manning said that, in his experiences, the battlefield reports were not treated as especially sensitive, particularly after the events they documented faded into the past.
He said he was concerned about leaking hundreds of thousands of sensitive State Department cables but that he ultimately decided they would not be harmful since they were so widely distributed within the military.
"I thought these cables were a prime example of the need for a more open diplomacy," Manning said. "I believed that these cables would not damage the United States. However, I believed these cables would be embarrassing."
The Obama administration has said releasing the information threatened valuable military and diplomatic sources and strained America's relations with other governments. The administration has aggressively pursued individuals accused of leaking classified material, and Manning's is the highest-profile case.
Manning's statements before the hushed courtroom dovetailed with the position taken by his supporters around the world — that leaking the documents was an act of conscience. Manning has been embraced by some left-leaning activists as a whistleblowing hero whose actions exposed war crimes and helped trigger the Middle Eastern pro-democracy uprisings known as the Arab Spring in 2010.
Manning said he was appalled by a combat video that showed an aerial assault that killed two employees of the Reuters news organization.
"The most alarming aspect of the video to me was the seemingly delightful bloodlust the aerial weapons team happened to have," Manning said, adding that the soldiers' actions "seemed similar to a child torturing ants with a magnifying glass."
WikiLeaks did not immediately return a text message seeking comment on Manning's statement. The group has always been careful never to confirm or deny whether Manning was the source of its cache of leaked U.S. documents, and the secret-spilling site didn't deviate from that approach Thursday.
On its Twitter feed, WikiLeaks called Bradley Manning an "alleged source" and noted that he was detailing "what he says" were his interactions with the online organization.
But WikiLeaks made no secret of its admiration for what Manning said was his decision to expose the documents to the world. A message posted to Twitter by the Manning supporter Nathan Fuller and retweeted by WikiLeaks said: "Bradley Manning pleaded not guilty to aiding the enemy. Aiding the public is not aiding the enemy."
Associated Press Writer Raphael Satter in London contributed to this report. | <urn:uuid:b3f576e3-24e8-4f9c-a740-fb93175e6d97> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wavy.com/dpps/news/us_news/manning-offers-pleas-to-judge-in-wikileaks-case-nd13-jos_5647382 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976673 | 857 | 1.5 | 2 |
Last Friday, I talked a man off of the ledge. He was suicidal and somehow, called my number at work, by mistake. I spent over 30 minutes convincing him that there was hope. I told him that if he chose to end his life, then it would be on my shoulders for not helping him to see that there was hope. I spoke to him today and he is getting help. (I will continue to check on him.)
We need to stand up to all that is going on in our homes, in our families, our friends and in our neighborhoods. We need to say, "This isn't going to happen in my house." It's so easy to dismiss things as "Not a big deal" but it is...a big deal, that is.
My bonus baby is almost 15 (in a couple of more weeks). I have forgotten how hard it is to be a teen and to raise teens. When my daughters were in their teens, I wasn't afraid to say, "Nope, that's not acceptable!" but today, it seems like parents are afraid to put their foot down.
We can't expect kids to treasure family time if we are so plugged into electronics and the tv that we have no clue what is going on around us.
We can't expect our kids to make good choices in friends if we are so busy enabling the people around us, being afraid to really say what we think.
We can't expect our kids to eat right and get out and enjoy the world around them, if we make poor eating choices and buy the junky foods that they crave.
We can't expect them to love reading when we don't pick up books to read ourselves.
Kids learn what they live and what they learn mainly comes from those around them.
But, who is in control???
We have got to take a stand and stop trying to be "parent of the year".
Speak up when their friends aren't treating them respectfully.
Speak up when they aren't living out their potential.
Speak up when they are disrespectful and inconsiderate.
Love on them when they need to know they are loved but speak truths in their lives too.
Build a support system that will be there when times are tough.
Set boundaries and not allow those boundaries to be crossed.
Never be afraid to admit when you are afraid.
Be a warrior! | <urn:uuid:402b45cc-6f84-4197-b11d-186332aa4ccf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://chocolatecovereddaydreams.blogspot.com/2012/10/being-warriors.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.988849 | 493 | 1.546875 | 2 |
The Francisco Grande Hotel during its Giant years. (Original photo source Francisco Grande Hotel, as posted on the Phoenix Magazine web site.)
The two legendary minor league complexes in Angels history are Holtville and Mesa. The Angels were in Holtville from 1966 through 1981. They were in Mesa from 1985 through 2005.
Inbetween, there was Casa Grande.
The March 2009 issue of Phoenix Magazine tells you all you need to know, so no reason for me to regurgitate it here. It’s mostly about the Giants years, but it does briefly mention that the Angels camped there from 1982 through 1984.
The Angels’ major league camp was in Palm Springs where Gene Autry lived, but the park formerly known as the Polo Grounds had little room to handle so many players, major and minor. Palm Springs also had many temptations for young hormonally raging ballplayers. That was why they started a separate camp in Holtville in 1966; the major leaguers reported there in late February, then when they moved to Palm Springs in early March for exhibition games the minor leaguers would move in.
Just why they left Holtville, I’ve yet to discover, but I’ll be researching more in coming days. In any case, they moved on to Casa Grande, which was just as isolated as Holtville but had a hotel on the grounds called Francisco Grande.
Click Here to visit the hotel’s web site. There’s a nice 3½ minute video on the home page that reviews its history and shows how it looks today.
When we leave for Florida on Thursday, we’re going to stop in Holtville at lunch to tour the museum and determine what’s available in their archives. Then it’s on to Casa Grande, another 200 miles down the road on the I-8, to spend the night at the Francisco Grande hotel. I’ll try to shoot photos and/or video at both. | <urn:uuid:acfb45de-2fd6-489c-bcf7-c65478349b5f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://futureangels.mlblogs.com/2009/05/24/casa-grande/?like=1&_wpnonce=cb13afa090 | 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 | 0.966877 | 410 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Allegiance is an epic story of love, war and heroism set during the Japanese American internment of World War II, following the story of the Kimura family in the weeks and years following Pearl Harbor, as they are relocated from their farm in Salinas, California to the Heart Mountain internment camp in the rural plains of Wyoming.
Their story reflects the deep conflicts of a nation and a people divided, as younger brother Sammy strives to prove his loyalty and patriotism, while older sister Keiko comes to resist their internment and treatment by the government. The Kimura’s conflicts mirror the larger rift between the Japanese American Citizens League, which urged cooperation with the internment and unwavering loyalty to America, and the draft resisters of Heart Mountain, who steadfastly refused to serve a country that had put them in concentration camps. This universal story sheds new light upon a dark, under-explored, and wrenching chapter of American history. Through the remembrances of Old Sam, the painful past is revisited, and at long last, redemption and understanding begin to heal decades-old wounds.
Allegiance sheds new light upon a dark chapter of American history. One of the first Asian musicals in more than a decade, with a stunning and moving score, Allegiance connects the audience with universal themes of love, family and redemption.
Allegiance had its World Preview at The Old Globe theater in California in 2012, one of the largest and most highly-respected regional theaters for development of new musicals in California and in the United States.
In fall of 2008, we were seated by complete coincidence by George Takei and his husband Brad at an Off-Broadway show, where a brief conversation revealed a mutual love of theater. By a second and truly divine coincidence, the very next day we were seated again by George and Brad at the Broadway show, In The Heights. At intermission, we approached George, curious as to why he had been so emotionally affected by the father’s song in which he laments his inability to help his daughter in her time of need. George explained to us that it reminded him of his own father’s frustration at his inability to help his family during their internment at the Rohwer Relocation Center in Arkansas. Over the course of that intermission, George recounted his personal experience as a child in the internment camps of America, and we immediately recognized that what we had just heard was the seed of a profoundly human, great American story that had yet to be told on the Broadway stage.
Allegiance takes place behind the barbed wires of Heart Mountain Relocation Center, an internment camp in the wastelands of Wyoming named for the iconic mountaintop peak that overlooked it. Japanese-American Sumi-e artist Drue Kataoka conceived the original logo, an “A” as two simple sumi-e brushstrokes forming a mountain. The entire original art was realized as a traditional brushstroke painting. | <urn:uuid:d84aed06-9aad-419d-a4c1-730c502223e8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.theohmybook.com/show | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968127 | 612 | 1.679688 | 2 |
By Jayne Clark, USA TODAY
KUTA, Bali Two years after terrorist bombs killed 202 nightclubbing revelers in this party-hearty corner of paradise, Paddy's Pub, rebuilt and relocated after the blast, is going strong. (Photo gallery: Bali: Revisiting paradise
The pulsing bass of techno-funk filters into the street, mixing with the crystalline sounds of traditional gamelan music wafting from a shop across the street. A sign outside announces, "Drinking Contest Thursday Night!" It's just a warm-up to Friday's advertised "Back to Bali Party."
Visitors are returning to this archetypal paradise, a perennial on "best" lists in glossy travel magazines. In the past, it has annually lured up to 80,000 U.S. visitors halfway around the world to experience its sybaritic pleasures. August was the second-best ever for tourist arrivals. New luxury hotels and villas have opened. Still others have been renovated, further signaling Bali's tourism comeback.
But for much of the past two years, the al-Qaeda-linked blasts on Oct. 12, 2002, coupled with the outbreak of SARS elsewhere in Asia, decimated tourism. The bombings targeted visitors in this densely populated seaside town, a haunt of Australian and U.S. budget travelers. That such violence would occur on an island that is as regarded for its harmonious ways as its natural beauty shocked residents and visitors alike. Headlines around the world asked, "Paradise Lost?"
The short answer is no. The spirituality and artistry that imbue everyday life is unshaken. The majority of its 3 million residents are Hindu, making the island culturally distinct from the rest of predominantly Muslim Indonesia. Balinese Hindus believe the gods are everywhere; their daily offerings to them — bits of rice, fruit and flowers arranged on leaves like three-dimensional still lifes — are ubiquitous, from sidewalks to dashboards to shop counters. Terraced rice paddies plowed by oxen glimmer like emerald sculptures throughout the island. Worshipers dressed in their best sarongs congregate at temples (there are thousands of various types) on frequent holy days.
"The people are wonderful: happy, pleasing, generous. They're smart. They're curious. And they live a really rich life," says April Armstrong, an administrative law judge from Butte, Mont., over coffee at the sprawling Le Meridien hotel on the island's west coast. It is her fourth trip here in just two years, and each time, she hires the same $45-a-day driver for forays around the Delaware-size island.
"Everybody asks me why I come back," she says. "I really don't know. But there's something magical here." That word is often invoked by habitués struggling to characterize Bali's allure.
"People say there's something mystical and magical here," says Trent Munday, general manager of the new Uma Ubud hotel in the interior highlands. "There are so many layers to Bali: the architecture, the sense of community, the spirituality."
Shortly after arriving, Munday came to realize just how pervasive that spirituality is. When a number of glitches occurred as the hotel was nearing completion, a Balinese employee pointed out that appropriate blessings and offerings hadn't been made. The rituals were performed. The trouble ended.
"We've had blessings of the rooms. Blessings of the mountain bikes. Blessings of everything," Mundy says. "There are logical reasons for everything, and you can question (the effectiveness) of the blessings. But at the end of the day, they believe. So it's very powerful."
Just west of Ubud in the village of Sayan, John O'Sullivan, general manager of the island's two Four Seasons resorts, relaxes on the terrace of the Sayan hotel, perched treehouse-style high above the rugged Ayung River Gorge. He boasts that not once in his tenure has an event been rained out, thanks to the employment of professional Balinese "rain stoppers" who, it is believed, have the power to redirect storms. Though O'Sullivan doesn't claim to understand the phenomenon, he doesn't quibble with success.
Occupancy at the architecturally spectacular hotel, where rooms start at about $400 a night, dipped after the bombing but is gradually climbing. In August, 80% of the accommodations were filled vs. 49% a year before.
Posh hotels and gorgeous scenery notwithstanding, Bali's real draw is its people.
"Bali is a lot of things to a lot of people. The Australians come to surf. Others come for the spa resorts. Some come to find themselves," O'Sullivan says. "But the reason Bali affects (visitors) is because of the people."
Its beauty also lies in the small moments that make up a tourist's day. It's in walking down a darkened street and hearing the sounds of the flutes, metallophones and drums of the Indonesian gamelan orchestra emanating from a nearby temple. It's in the almost nightly performances in which elaborately costumed dancers portray the cosmic struggle between good and evil.
It's in the street vendor who notices a flaw in the bag a customer has selected and insists she take another. (To do otherwise would be bad karma.) It's in the massage therapist who goes overtime in a superb $8, hour-long treatment, then seems genuinely surprised to receive a tip. It's in the service at a warung, or refreshment stand, where a cold drink is presented along with a cool, scented cloth.
And it's in the way the Balinese, with their tightly knit social structure and respect for tradition, have deflected the more corrupting elements of tourism.
Not that the place is perfect. Traffic is treacherous. In populated areas, the island's narrow two-lane roads are clogged by box trucks, tour buses and legions of motorbikes — sometimes carrying a family of four — mingling in clouds of blue exhaust. Bali could benefit from an anti-litter campaign. And beer-and-testosterone-fueled tourists rule in Kuta.
The cognoscenti make tracks to the lush, hilly countryside and artisan villages around Ubud; to the upscale lodgings of Jimbaran; the solitude of east Bali; or the planned seaside tourist enclave of Nusa Dua in the south, where large Western-branded hotels line a wide, manicured boulevard.
But even tourists disdainful of Kuta's commercialism will come to the island's most densely populated tourist mecca. Its narrow streets are lined with budget hotels and eateries, and Western icons such as the Hard Rock Hotel, Starbucks and storefronts bearing high-end designer names that may or may not be selling the real thing.
Kuta is Bali's Tijuana. It's also Bali's Ground Zero. The Sari Club, once the hottest nightspot in a town of nightspots and the scene of most of the carnage, was leveled. It's gone but not forgotten. The lot where it stood is surrounded by an iron fence festooned with tinfoil wreaths, bouquets, messages and Xeroxed photos of the dead.
But if paradise wasn't lost after the bombings, some innocence was. Islanders are more watchful of outsiders. At better hotels, guards check the undercarriages of vehicles. At least one resort, the sleek new Conrad Bali, has a bomb-sniffing dog on staff. And at Paddy's Pub, the crowd trickling in for the Thursday night drinking contest casually submits to a metal-detecting wand.
Still, for the Balinese, life goes on.
"Culturally, the Bali bombing was finished quickly," says Conrad general manager Michael Burchett. "After feeling they were being punished, they made their offerings, said their prayers and moved on."
And nowhere is that more apparent than on Kuta Beach, where the sellers are once again out in force. A phalanx surrounds a tourist, variously offering jewelry, massages, sarongs and pedicures. The tourist throws off her shoes and sits for a shoulder massage. The women settle down alongside her, delivering such cheerful banter that it's hard to distinguish the hucksterism from the fellowship.
Suddenly, they're shaken by movement from deep within the sand.
"Earthquake, earthquake, earthquake!" They cry in unison. After the 5.5 tremor subsides, they begin to chant another word that, roughly translated, means "alive."
Then, as suddenly as it began, the drama is over. They return to their banter and negotiations. Their world has been rocked, but only temporarily. They've uttered their prayers and now they move on. | <urn:uuid:99075144-41d5-4e08-83ad-50250b8d245a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/travel/destinations/2004-10-14-bali_x.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961781 | 1,846 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Eilat Class, Israel
In the early 1980s, the Israeli Navy awarded a contract to Northrop Grumman Ship Systems (formerly Litton Ingalls Shipbuilding) to supply three Sa'ar 5 Class corvettes for the Israeli Navy. The first of class, INS Eilat, was launched in February 1993, followed by INS Lahav in August 1993 and INS Hanit in March 1994.
In July 2006, while taking part in the Israeli Navy blockade of Lebanese ports, INS Hanit was struck by an anti-ship missile fired by Hezbullah. Four crew members were killed. A fire resulted from the attack and the ship was able to return to Ashdod port under its own power. Following repairs, the vessel was reported to have resumed its combat role in August 2006.
Command and control systems
The unified combat system is integrated by IAI (Israel Aircraft Industries) MBT division, with Elbit (combat data systems) and Tadiran (communications systems) as major subcontractors. The ship's combat system provides multiple offensive and defensive capabilities. Target, weapon status, and threat evaluation information is available to all fire control and launcher systems via the ship's databus.
El-Op's MSIS electro-optic surveillance and fire control system is fitted on the Eilat, which contains an 8–12-micron thermal imager, TV camera and laser rangefinder. El-Op received a contract in January 2003 to upgrade the MSIS. The upgraded system will include a new third-generation thermal imager with increased sensitivity and resolution.
Barak and harpoon missiles
The ship's anti-air capability is based on the Barak missile system developed by IAI and Rafael. Two 32-cell vertical launch systems are installed on the raised gun deck at the bow of the ship. The range of the Barak missile is 10km and it is armed with a 22kg warhead. It also has an anti-surface target capability.
anti-air capability is based on the Barak missile system."
The ship has two four-cell Boeing Harpoon missile launchers. The Harpoon surface-to-surface missile has a range of up to 130km. The speed is high subsonic and the warhead weighs 227kg.
The ship's short to medium-range anti-ship missile is the IAI Gabriel II. There are eight launchers for the Gabriel II missile which uses dual mode semi-active and active radar homing with a 100kg warhead. The range is from 6km to 36km and missile velocity is 0.6 Mach.
The ship is equipped either a Raytheon / General Dynamics mk15 Phalanx close-in weapon system (CIWS) or Oto Melara 76mm gun.
Phalanx has a 20mm gun which can fire at 3,000 rounds/min and Ku-band search and tracking radar. Range is 1.5km.
Alliant Techsystems mk46 torpedoes
The ship is fitted with six 324mm mk32 torpedo tubes for ATK (Alliant Techsystems) mk46 torpedoes which have active and passive homing. They are armed with a 44kg warhead and range is 24km. The launch tubes are mounted in the superstructure about halfway along the length of the ship.
Airborne anti-submarine warfare capability is provided by the ship's helicopter. The ship's helicopter hangar can accommodate an AS565 Panther, Kaman SH-2F or Sikorsky S-76N helicopter.
Countermeasures include the AN/SLQ-25 Nixie towed torpedo decoy system from Argon ST of Fairfax, Virginia, which seduces approaching torpedoes away from the ship. The Sa'ar 5 corvette's radar warning receiver Elisra NS-9003/9005 is also installed on the Israeli Navy Sa'ar 4 and Sa'ar 4.5 patrol craft. Three Elbit Deseaver stabilised chaff rocket launchers are mounted on the forward and aft towers.
Eilat vessels are fitted with the Rafael Wizard (wideband zapping anti-radar decoy) passive RF corner reflector decoy system, effective against anti-ship missiles with chaff discrimination algorithms.
The air search radar antenna is installed on the aft tower. The Elta EL/M-2218S air search radar operates in E/F bands. The 2D/3D radar antenna, the fire control director and the I-band navigation radar antenna are installed on the forward tower. The fire control radar is the I/J/K-band EL/M-2221 GM STGR from Elta.
The Sa'ar is equipped with type 796 hull-mounted search-and-attack sonar, which operates at medium frequency and is supplied by EDO of New York. The ship's towed sonar array is supplied by Rafael.
The ship's propulsion system is in a CODOG combined diesel or gas configuration. The two MTU 12V 1163 TB82 diesel engines are rated at 6,600hp. The GE LM 2500 gas turbine system is cross-connected and provides 30,000hp. The propulsion system drives two shafts.
The propulsion system provides a maximum speed of 33kt. The cruise speed on the diesel engines is 20kt and the endurance is 4,000 nautical miles. A large twin rudder provides manoeuvrability at high speed and controllable reversible pitch (CRP) propellers at low speed. | <urn:uuid:0afbbf50-7f0f-4164-94d7-705381fabd86> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.naval-technology.com/projects/saar5/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937437 | 1,133 | 1.78125 | 2 |
“People cast shadows. Objects cast shadows… But they would flay the surface of the earth for the fantasy of bare light.”
In “Master and Margarita,” Strawdog Theatre’s noteworthy ensemble plays with shadow and light like a gleeful game of cat’s cradle. The best and worst about a single person or an entire city, private histories, momentous shifts in history, all are knotted into a web of satire, magic, and tragedy that is dizzying to behold.
Kemp’s adaptation of Bulgakov’s novel is orderly and clever, and the cast members seem to delight in their multiple roles and costume changes. Their faces are mostly made up like a ghastly combination of corpse and clown; the brightest colors belong to the demons. The set, with its benches, table and telephones serves by its simplicity both as Ancient Rome and 1930’s Moscow.
Parallels in this play are drawn between the tyranny of Caesar and that of the Soviet Union, between a gentle prophet and a fevered playwright. From there, it is no great leap for an audience to ask: “Why this play? Why now?” Strawdog’s motto is to provoke and inspire. In an age of sensational media, fear and intolerance, we hear the voice of reason from a madman: “They’re angry because they’re writing what they don’t believe,”
The first act moves like lightning, its highest point the magic show. The second act is slower, culminating in a freakishly cool masquerade, but quieting down for a long denouement that releases us too soon from the tensions that suspend our disbelief.
All in all, Master and Margarita was another doozy. It will as soon incite a snort of laughter as a stricken sob. As a nearby audience member exclaimed over intermission, “This is it. This is the real thing.” The Devil may be in Moscow, but Strawdog brings his Moscow to us. | <urn:uuid:bfec6d98-8bb1-4831-984f-24061dca2c5d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.centerstagechicago.com/theatre/shows/10800.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956772 | 431 | 1.648438 | 2 |
While employment numbers nationally may be improving, Missouri lags behind other states when it comes to putting people back to work.
The Show-Me State needs a gain of 161,000 jobs to get back to the pre-recession employment level in the state, according to research by economist Ernie Goss at Creighton University.
Out of nine states he tracks in the region, Missouri needs to add the highest number of new jobs, increasing employment by 6.1 percent.
"Among the nine Mid-America states, Missouri has lost more jobs to the recession and subsequent economic weakness than any other state," said Goss, who releases data monthly.
"While Missouri's manufacturing sector is recording solid improvements, other industries, such as telecommunications, continue to experience pullbacks in business activity."
Fewer layoffs, lower unemployment
Missouri was one of 25 states across the country with a decrease of more than 1,000 claims.
While the weekly initial unemployment claims provide more of an immediate economic gauge of the job market across the state, the monthly unemployment and payroll numbers provide more details.
Despite a fall in payrolls, unemployment across Missouri dropped to 8 percent in December.
In the St. Louis metropolitan area, unemployment fell to 8.3 percent in December compared to 9.4 perecent during the same month in 2010, according to a report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. However, unemployment increased month-over-month from 8.1 percent in November.
Payrolls in St. Louis increased 1.4 percent from 1.43 million to 1.45 million year-over-year. | <urn:uuid:b8d77f88-69ec-4100-883a-a60e70e4e151> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://stpeters.patch.com/blog_posts/missouri-needs-at-least-161000-new-jobs | 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 | 0.941438 | 334 | 1.804688 | 2 |
MySpace now has 72 million users. That is larger than the populations of 213 countries. Perhaps we could deal with the social online networks thing if we thought of it for what it is — MyNation. This is their digital nation. They are citizens, and they’ve never been taught digital civics.
(see the post for notes)
Might librarians also be thinking about teaching digital civics? I think so! | <urn:uuid:706d9fbf-56c3-4d02-95e6-c56d6f35c9a3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://tametheweb.com/2006/06/15/the-digital-nation/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963053 | 90 | 1.515625 | 2 |
Residents speak out against New Berlin Walmart
Supercenter proposed for Greenfield Avenue
New Berlin - During three hours of speakers giving opinions to the New Berlin Plan Commission about a Walmart supercenter proposed for 15205-15375 W. Greenfield Ave., not one person favored it.
There were at least four recurring themes. One was that traffic is already bad there while another focused on worry that the area already has flooding problems and adding a big store with a big parking lot has the potential of making things worse. And even though the nearest subdivisions are some distance away, many complained about the lights that would be on 24-hours a day seven days a week and the noise of cars and trucks going in and out. Increased crime also was brought up as a concern.
The Plan Commission held the hearing because Walmart needs a rezoning. It also needs a change in the city's land use plan. The Plan Commission will vote on whether to recommend the changes at its Feb. 4 meeting.
The supercenter is proposed for land about a block east of Moorland Road where the zoning for all but the Charcoal Grill restaurant is for single-family homes. Walmart is asking for B-1 zoning for the entire 15-acre tract, including the restaurant which already has a different type of business zoning. The Charcoal Grill would be torn down as would a home that is set far back from the road.
While zoning is single-family, the city's comprehensive land use plan calls for some multifamily residential as well, except for the Charcoal Grill site.
Even so, business zoning is appropriate, given the city's plan to have business at the corner of Greenfield and Moorland Avenue and because Brookfield has a lot of commercial development just across the street, argued attorney Deborah Tomczyk, representing Walmart.
"This corridor is already a commercial corridor," Tomczyk said.
But all that was known only three years ago when New Berlin adopted the citywide comprehensive plan after two years of study with neighborhood meetings and surveys, pointed out Mary Hiebel.
"What's changed?" since the city decided on residential uses for nearly all that land only three years ago, she asked
Now the city has a development proposal that it needs to hash out, said Greg Kessler, director of community development.
Traffic was a thorny issue, especially since Kessler confirmed that Greenfield and Moorland cannot take the Walmart traffic. But he said, Walmart officials are working with the state Department of Transportation to improve the intersection so that it would be able to take on more traffic.
While Walmart's traffic studies are not finished, the supercenter would add 5 percent to the traffic that's already there, Tomczyk said.
But when the total number of cars is in the thousands, 5 percent more is still a lot of cars, one neighbor said.
Not only that, the Walmart traffic studies may not take into account the additional traffic that would be generated by a hotel and waterpark already approved for that intersection, Kessler acknowledged. Neither does it focus on how streets farther away will be impacted. Sunnyslope Road, for example, is strangled already at rush hours, one woman said.
What should have been good news for those with flooding problems in the area was greeted with skepticism. Tomczyk said runoff during storms would actually be less with the store than it is right now with woods. That's because the plan is to hold rainwater below ground and release it after the storms into storm sewer under Greenfield Avenue and then west to Deer Creek.
However, it was unclear how big a storm that system could handle. Would it work well in a big storm where the runoff would be substantial from a big building and a big parking lot?
Some residents who live west of the site said they already have flooding problems and don't want to take the chance.
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- New Berlin names its tallest spruce tree
- News and Notes
- Police Notes: May 20
- Walmart is now in the zone for development in New Berlin
- Police report: May 20
- Carp shoot May 25 on Little Muskego Lake, two carp worth $500 each
- Newsweek names New Berlin schools to 'America's Best High Schools' list
- Waukesha Police Report
- Stumbling block cleared for proposed New Berlin Walmart
- News and notes | <urn:uuid:07afe92d-af04-48fa-bad5-fbeda6e30a64> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newberlinnow.com/news/residents-speak-out-against-walmart-o089kh1-186029261.html?page=1&_escaped_fragment_=page=1%26pageSize=10%26sort=oldestfirst%26comment=110851221 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965518 | 933 | 1.578125 | 2 |
The Polymorphic Pluralistic Succah
By Arye Leib
I think that everybody must have a friend like Larry. He is one of those people who seem to live in another world and just walks through reality like some one who is going from his bed to the bathroom.
Larry is into thought. Jewish thought to be specific - how about Talmud to be even more specific.
He built a succah and invited me over. Fine, I thought, haven't seen him in a while. Let's see what he is up to now. As long as he has a cold beer or a shot of bourbon, it can't be that bad. So I gave him a back up excuse, just-in-case type talk, that I will be happy to come, but I have to leave early, I told him, like I have to meet some one. Some times with him, you need an escape latch.
So there he was sitting in his succah smiling like a new father about to show you some twenty-eight pictures of his new son. The 'I gatcha captured' grin.
He motioned me to sit down in a chair a specific chair opposite of him, not next to him.
"Wanna hear something interesting?" he asked as if I had a choice.
"Yea, sure," I said, like what was I to say. He had some peanuts and a cold beer waiting for me, so what the heck, what ever was on his mind was okay with me.
"What do you know about Succot?" he began.
"You sit in it on Succot. Right?" I knew that was not the answer he was looking for, but in all cases, I felt it a safe reply.
"Ah, I am referring to the construction. Do you know that the average Succah has three sides?"
Hmmm, I thought, this boy has been reading the Guinness book of Jewish records.
"Do you know that there is kosher s'chach and non-kosher s'chach?"
"I kind of figured that our on my own." I said smugly, carefully pouring my beer into my glass. I like foam, but too much makes it hard to sip.
"Look a succah can have three walls, just like this one." He moved his arms and my eyes began to pan the space around me.
"What you don't know is that there is a limit of non-kosher s'chach that you can have on top of your succah that can ruin your succah."
"Why would I want non-kosher s'chach on the top of my succah?"
"Why, is not the question, the question is how much is too much"
"Dunno." The conversation was not quite intriguing to me, but Larry always had weird ideas so let him go on.
"Four tefachim - which is about twelve inches - of non-kosher s'chach can ruin a succah. If you have a long patch of non-kosher s'chach that runs from one wall to the other wall and is four tefachim wide, it spits the succah in half.
"Since it runs parallel to the middle wall, the area bounded by the middle wall, the two side walls becomes one succah area, extending from the middle wall to the non-kosher s'chach. The area on the other side of the non-kosher s'chach becomes another separate succah area."
"So?" I munched on his peanuts, nice, crunchy and salty; they go great with cold beer, especially on a hot day. He was getting a bit too technical for me, but the beer was refreshing.
"The problem is that although both areas are large enough to be separate succahs, yet the area that is by the entrance, like where I am sitting, only has two walls enclosing it. The third wall, by your back, cannot help me since the succah is split in two by non-kosher s'chach." He pointed with his finger upwards, leading my eye to the s'chach above our heads.
"See there, in the center of the succah, there is a long piece of metal, non-kosher s'chach that is four tefachim wide, twelve inches. It goes from side to side splits the succah into two pieces. I know I put it there on purpose."
"What the heck for?"
"I want to show you something interesting."
"Like I told you, you are sitting with your back to the wall, so you are sitting under the kosher part of the succah, but me, I am sitting here, under kosher s'chach, but with only two walls. That is because the non-kosher s'chach interrupts the unity of this succah and divides it into two"
"Well, why do you have to sit there? There is room here on the kosher side for you too. Move over here."
"Oh no! That would spoil everything."
Man, I thought, this is going to be one of those crazy evenings again. But like the beer was cold and the peanuts salty, and I have an excuse to leave, but let him go on.
"There is such a law, a special rule, that is called the rule of the 'dofen akumah'. The dofen akumah is 'the rule of the bent wall'. If, for instance, this non-kosher s'chach was instead of in the middle, on the side, next to the wall, we would say that the succah has a bent wall and it is as if the wall of the succah 'leans' over an touches the kosher s'chach this gives the succah the ability to unite kosher s'chach with a wall that is distant from the s'chach. In effect it makes the non-kosher s'chach into a wall!"
"But you must not eat or sleep under this 'bent wall'; since it is now considered a wall. It is like you are under a leaning wall - not a wall that goes up and turns. This rule actually comes from Moses; when he explained the Torah to the Jews after he came down from Mount Sinai, he explained this and it has been part of the Talmud ever since."
"Nu?" I was wondering where this conversation was leading to.
"Where you are sitting is next to the middle walls. You have three walls, two on the sides of you and one behind you. That is great it makes a kosher succah. But the non-kosher s'chach interrupts this flow. I am sitting on the other side of the succah, on the other side of the non-kosher s'chach. Since the non-kosher s'chach interrupts the succah, in effect I am sitting in another succah but my succah only has two walls! It cannot be kosher.
"Now listen, this is the great part. You think that I am sitting in the part of the succah which is not kosher, correct? And you think that you are sitting in the kosher part of the succah, right?"
"Well, didn't you just tell me that yourself?"
"Right! But at that time, I did not tell you about the power of the dofen akumah, the rule of the bent wall. I, being the owner of this succah am using the rule of the bent wall to change this succah. I hereby declare that I want the dofen akumah to extend from the wall behind you, to include the non-kosher s'chach! This means that I now have three walls: the two on the side of me, plus the dofen akumah, the extended wall from behind you extends all the way from behind you to be my third wall. You, kiddo, are no sitting under a wall and that is not kosher!!"
"I kid you not"
"So, that isn't very nice. Why do you invite me over and have me sit in the non-kosher section of succah?"
"Sneaky, aren't I?" I could see by his grin that he was enjoying this. "It is either you are in the kosher succah or me. But I am the owner, right, so I want to enjoy the legal rule of the dofen akumah. What do you say?"
I raised my eyebrows, wondering what should I say. I knew that he was not finished. Should I just get up and move over to his side, the kosher side, or just wait it out for the out come of Larry's succah fun?
"Ha ha," he laughed at seeing my displeasure with the thought of eating outside of the succah. "Don't worry, it is OK, the law of the dofen akumah only comes to kasher the succah, but not to invalidate it. Therefore we both can sit in the succah together even though we are separated by non-kosher s'chach, which should really invalidate my part."
"So, we are both O.K?"
"Right, no problem both of us sitting here on opposite sides. Even though it looked as if each of us would disqualify the other, it is not so, we both can validate not just ourselves, but the other side too.
"You see that the rule that Moses brought down from Mount Sinai comes to give validity to a succah, but not to disqualify part of it. You can sit on your side and me on mine. It may look as though if you are under the kosher side, then I am under the non-kosher side, but that is not true. We are both O.K. We are both sitting in a kosher succah.
"Hmm," interesting I thought. Larry always has something interesting to say. Perhaps there is more in this than meets the eye.
"That is the greatness of the succah. It comes to include people not to exclude them. Even though you have a different perspective than me, still we can share in the same succah with out disqualifying the other."
* * * * *
Perhaps what this tells us is that really this is a principle in life: When two people choose two different venues to serve G-d, sometimes it may seem like one person's way invalidates the other. If my way is correct, then your way must be invalid. Conversely, if your manner of serving G-d is correct then my way is invalid.
Nothing can be further from the truth. There is more than one way to serve G-d. One manner does not invalidate the other. This is the lesson we learn from the succah. Let us all just be sincere in our manner of serving G-d and we will all eventually merit to sit in the great succah that G-d Himself will construct for the righteous.
from the September-October 2007 Edition of the Jewish Magazine | <urn:uuid:56710a00-a166-4fdb-9021-e01e75c97878> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://jewishmag.com/117mag/dofenakumah/dofenakumah.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975105 | 2,333 | 1.84375 | 2 |
(MENAFN Press) The Swedish insurance industry is highly competitive, and has one of the highest densities in the European region.
However, Sweden's insurance penetration as a percentage of GDP was lower than that of the UK and France in 2011.
Domestic insurance companies dominate Swedish insurance, with a few large companies and groups accounting for most of the industry.
A small share of the industry is distributed among a large number of smaller insurers.
The Swedish insurance industry experienced a period of uncertainty with the economic slowdown in 2008. However, it was considered an attractive insurance market prior to this.
Despite the uncertain economic conditions in the EU, insurance companies are showing an interest in investing in the Swedish insurance industry in 2012, led by the development of the Swedish economy and the propensity of the Swedish population to invest in insurance.
The Swedish insurance industry grew at a CAGR of 4.2% during the review period, primarily supported by the life insurance segment.
The financial crisis, the European debt crisis and changes in regulatory structure are expected to force Swedish insurance companies to reassess pricing of policies and make efforts to expand their consumer base over the forecast period.
Individual pension and endowment categories lead the way for the life segment
Individual pension products accounted for a large share of the Swedish life insurance segment in 2011, followed by endowment products, which played a major role in driving the overall life insurance segment during the review period.
The most popular mode of saving for the Swedish population is life insurance products, which accounted for around 45% of overall household savings in 2011.
Swedish endowments recorded substantial growth during the review period, growing at a CAGR of 16.9%, and are expected to be the leading life insurance category over the forecast period. The growth of endowment products is expected to be at the expense of pension products.
Increasing demand for home insurance products
The Swedish non-life insurance segment's growth was primarily supported by property and motor insurance, the two largest categories in the non-life segment.
Around 95% of the Swedish population in the 16’84 age group are covered by home insurance, which is typically a package of non-life policies that protect the policyholder's belongings in the event of theft or fire.
The policies also often provide travel insurance, insurance against assault, and third-party liability insurance.
Decline in quality of public healthcare supporting private health insurance
The Swedish public healthcare system is one of the best in Europe. However, issues such as lengthening queues and inconsistent care supported the growth of private health insurance in the country.
Health insurance provided by employers also contributes a major proportion of private health insurance in Sweden.
Private insurers focus on group health insurance business, which is also expected to support the growth of personal accident and health insurance over the forecast period.
Swedish insurance industry remains concentrated with high competition
The Swedish insurance industry is concentrated, as the top five insurers accounted for 84% of the industry in 2010.
Both the life and non-life segments are concentrated: in the life segment, the top ten insurers accounted for over 80% of the segment in terms of gross written premium, while in the non-life segment the top 10 companies represented a 93.14% segment share in 2011.
To purchase the full version of The Insurance Industry in Sweden, Key Trends and Opportunities to 2016, please click here
Timetric is an independent economic and business research firm providing critical intelligence on emerging economies and key global industries.
It provides detailed economic and sector intelligence, business insights and independent authoritative commentary.
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These reports draw on in-depth primary and secondary research, proprietary data, and high-quality modelling and analysis to give deep insight into global market dynamics and economic trends.
If you are interested in purchasing this research, please click on the following link: | <urn:uuid:8d5d1250-bcac-4e50-af6e-343403ab7d10> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.menafn.com/menafn/1093593603/The-Insurance-Industry-Sweden-Key-Trends-and-Opportunities-to-2016 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949817 | 805 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Just as Ryan Budney pointed out, instead of ambient isotopy one may consider a weaker equivalence relation on spatial graphs, namely the one generated by isotopy and IH-moves (also known as Whitehead moves). With this definition of equivalence, two knotted graphs are equivalent if and only if they admit isotopic regular neighbourhoods. This equivalence relation has been already considered, for example, by Kinoshita in 1958, and it was named ''neighbourhood equivalence'' for obvious reasons.
Of course, the study of graphs up to neighbourhood equivalence reduces to the study of knotted handlebodies. There exist several invariants of knotted handlebodies. Among them, I have recently become interested in the quandle coloring invariants defined by Ishii in his paper
Moves and invariants for knotted handlebodies
Algebraic & Geometric Topology 8 (2008) 1403–1418
In a joint paper with R. Benedetti
"Levels of knotting of spatial handlebodies"
we have exploited (among other things, like the Alexander invariants of the complement) these quandle coloring invariants in order to distinguish different levels of knotting for handlebodies.
Just as in the case of knot theory, a good invariant for a knotted handlebody is its complement. However, while Gordon-Luecke's Theorem ensures that a knot is determined by its complement, there exist inequivalent handlebodies whose complements are homeomorphic
(this is one of the reasons why I would compare the theory of knotted handlebodies of genus g with the theory of links with g components, rather than with knot theory). On the other hand, Kent and Souto exhibited here
a spatial handlebody whose complement admits a unique embedding in the 3-sphere up to isotopy. Also observe that, due to Fox's reimbedding Theorem, every compact submanifold of the 3-sphere admits a reimbedding as the complement of a finite union of handlebodies in the 3-sphere itself. Therefore, a complete understanding of knotted handlebodies should provide an understanding of spatial domains in general. | <urn:uuid:9c58a96a-54f1-4f65-99ea-f310c6383360> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mathoverflow.net/questions/79488/is-there-a-knot-theory-for-graphs/79527 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936623 | 459 | 1.664063 | 2 |
"What is The Best Cardio For Weight-Loss"
Hopefully by now you all understand the difference between losing weight, and losing fat. Losing weight is indicated purely and simply by a number on a scale, and can be achieved by losing your muscle or dehydrating yourself just as easily (if not easier) than it can by burning fat.
The Motivation To Get Fit And Healthy
Putting the Finishing Touches on Pre-Season Prep
There's that famous saying that goes something along the lines of "the definition of madness is doing the same thing every day and expecting a different result', and unfortunately most people fall in to this trap with their training. Let's be honest, the vast majority of the population are either out of shape, unfit, unhealthy, or a combination of all of the above, so if we follow what everyone else is doing we're destined to end up like them. | <urn:uuid:6a7c583a-9642-41df-a48a-075ce413d0bb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.recreate.co.nz/blog/?url=/blog | 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 | 0.959005 | 185 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Four Chicago firefighters have been injured while battling a fire in the city’s West Englewood neighborhood Thursday night according to news media outlets. The fire was located within a 1-1/2 story wood frame residential occupancy in which fire suppression operations were underway.
Fire companies operating within the attic area with attack lines operating, experienced rapidly degrading conditions in which published reports indicated the “room lit up” suggesting a possible flashover condition. It was reported that vertical ventilation had been completed on the gable style roof and that coordinated company operations were well established both on the number one floor, within the attic and on exterior support operations.
Research indicates the house was built in 1905 and has 990 square feet of space. Constructed of balloon wood framing, the 1-1/2 story single family residential occupancy is typical of this vintage style housing.
A series of links and videos are attached;
- ABC WLS-TV HERE
- Chicago Tribune, HERE
- Chicago Tribune Photo Gallery, HERE
- USFA Report: Attic Fires in Residential Buildings Report
- CommandSafety.com: Roof and Ceiling Collapses DCFD and Gary FD
- NIOSH: Career fire fighter dies after being trapped in a roof collapse during overhaul of a vacant/abandoned building – Michigan
Chicago’s fire commissioner credited the quick response of rescuers after firefighters were hit by a flash of flames while working in the attic of a home in theWest Englewood neighborhood. “It’s a matter of seconds before we would have had a different outcome,” Fire Commissioner Robert Hoff said at Loyola University Hospital, where two of the four firefighters injured in the blaze remained hospitalized.
As reported by the Chicago Tribune (HERE) The fire started in the basement of a 1 1/2-story home in the 7000 block of South Justine Street and spread through the walls to the attic, Hoff said. As firefighters ventilated the roof and worked to extinguish the blaze, they were not aware of fire burning inside the walls behind them, Hoff said. Flames suddenly “lit up on them,” he said. “This is an example of how extremely dangerous and unpredictable this job is,” said Tom Ryan, president of Chicago Firefighters Union Local 2. “There is no such thing as a routine fire.”
The two firefighters still hospitalized are a 52-year-old captain who suffered burns to his ears and back of the neck; and a 31-year-old firefighter with burns to his left hand and forehead. They suffered the burns when their masks were knocked loose as they tried to escape, Hoff said. Both are from Engine 54 and are stable, Hoff said.
A third firefighter who was taken to Loyola was released early this morning, and a fourth taken to Mount Sinai Hospital Thursday night. Fire Officials credited the Fire Department’s five-person rapid intervention team — which is routinely called to fires — for responding so quickly.
View more videos at: http://nbcchicago.com.
Construction Insights for Typical Gabled Roof Attic with enclosed knee wall voids (typical examples) Occupied or Storage Attic Space Enclosure
Also on CommandSafety …
- Nothing is Ever Routine: Residential Fire-Chicago LODD – November 3, 2012
- Chicago Fire Department: Everyone Goes Home (official version) – December 28, 2011
- Still and Box for CFD: Near Miss Stairwell Collapse in Chicago – April 13, 2013
- Three Alarm High rise Fire: FDNY Bronx – April 13, 2013 | <urn:uuid:597d7197-2d06-45d5-82fd-5e5775a90428> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://commandsafety.com/2011/08/chicago-attic-fire-firefighter-maydays-four-injured/ | 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 | 0.965216 | 745 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Sacred, life-giving milestones in the Catholic faith are called Sacraments, outward signs instituted by Christ which point to inward reception of God's grace. Reciprocally, secular society has milestones to which many people feel great loyalty and expect unfettered access. Certain restrictions exist to protect public money from funding violations of human dignity still viewed as illicit, but many of them are practically de riguer in adult life.
Let's be intellectually honest and recognize the tenets of the American Left as the framework of a nihilistic faith tradition. Through this lens it becomes clear that our federal government, which must remain secular in order for our republic to survive, has its disciples well-trained by age eighteen and expecting no less than utter redemption through good service.
Pastimes, medical care and education are personal decisions with complex factors, and criticism of neither is my goal. Clarity is my goal. Catholics have been carrying on for milennia without need or desire of our sacramental lives being funded by anyone but ourselves; we wouldn't consider it. And we give.
Nanny-state tyranny, however, demands ever-increasing public dollars for the narrow agenda of its lobbyists and death merchants. Here are the broad strokes of such an egregious presumption, contrasted against the Sacraments of Initiation, Healing and Communion. | <urn:uuid:e9b5e719-bb45-409d-b6e0-6bee745f5dc5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://loxpopuli.blogspot.com/2012/02/pimp-my-free-ride.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964939 | 270 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Multiphase flowmeter market growing fast
Multiphase flowmeters are an evolving technology and the fastest growing flowmeter type, outpacing ultrasonic and other new-technology flowmeters, according to a new study from Flow Research, The World Market for Multiphase Flowmeters. The study found that the multiphase flowmeter market totaled $240.0 million in 2011. The market is projected to increase at a compound annual growth rate of 14.5 percent through 2016 until it reaches $472.2 million. While the bulk of these revenues are from multiphase meters, some also come from dual phase meters manufactured by multiphase meter suppliers.
Multiphase flowmeters determine the percent of gas, water, and oil that makes up the fluid as it comes out of an oil or gas well. They then use other values to determine the flowrate of each fluid. This information is very valuable because it tells the operator how much of each type of fluid is coming out of the well before the fluids are separated. Multiphase flowmeters also yield valuable information about the condition of the oil or gas well where the drilling occurs.
—News brief courtesy of Automation.com | <urn:uuid:9d587ed9-b3df-4ebc-8ea5-f72d34679988> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.isa.org/InTechTemplate.cfm?template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=91322 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930621 | 246 | 1.828125 | 2 |
Skies turn mostly cloudy today, after a sunny and warm Mother's Day weekend, with a 50 percent chance of showers, according to the National Weather Service.
The daytime high temperature in southwestern Connecticut is expected to reach the upper-60s, with a south between 6 and 9 mph.
Showers are likely tonight, with patchy fog moving in after midnight. The temperature will dip to a low around 60 degrees, with a south wind around 9 mph.
Tomorrow, showers and possibly a thunderstorm are possible, with the NWS warning the storms could trigger heavy rainfall. The high temperature will be in the upper-60s, with a south wind between 10 and 13 mph. More precipitation is possible tomorrow night as the temperature dips to the mid-50s, the NWS says.
On Wednesday, the stormy trend continues with showers and thunderstorms possible through daytime, with high temperatures about 70 degrees. There remains a slight chance of showers before 9 p.m. as the temperature registers a low in the mid-50s.
The outlook for Thursday, the weather service says, is for sunny skies and a temperatures rising into the upper-60s. | <urn:uuid:e58c6f70-cd2a-48f1-bd81-08b88be1c00d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fairfieldcitizenonline.com/news/article/Fairfield-forecast-Clouds-showers-moving-in-3556249.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947142 | 239 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Need help with symmetry
I need make a symmetrical lines concave around circle.
But it draws convex stroke on the back part of the model and flat on sides..
Any suggestion? Thank You very much!
Your mirror symmetry is not activated. Under the transform pallet, you see X, Y, Z, M, and R. M is your mirror, which, if on, will transform all strokes equally instead of pulling the mesh out in one direction.
no no, this is something else... my mirror symmetry is ON..
Originally Posted by Skadalilama
it just draw in one direction( not to the center of the model
- Thank You!
make sure u have the right symmetry axis' on.. and for what you're trying to do your best bet is to use masks and transpose... if you mask out the shape u want to etch in all sides and then set a transpose from the center of the bracelt outward.. u can move the indentation exactly as far in or out as you want and get nice clean lines
Thank for good advice, this is a nice way to do it. but I try to find why this not working as I did it in 3.5 version..
Originally Posted by dapharmer | <urn:uuid:681e0416-b2cb-4e66-a872-05835e289b12> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.zbrushcentral.com/showthread.php?157424-Need-help-with-symmetry&mode=hybrid | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937105 | 263 | 1.6875 | 2 |
The group was not hateful (vague), did not threaten anyone, was not obscene, and attacked no individuals or groups. It was for the positive advocacy of Black Nationalism, African-American independence, African secession and autonomous self-rule for African-Americans and Africans.
It’s not just white people that Facebook discriminates against. If you stand up for nationalism, or the definition of nations by ethnicity, you are going to get shut down. Why? Probably because that idea offends our modern notion that with democracy, propaganda/education, and consumerism we’re all going to be OK. There’s no need to actually address problems like diversity or class warfare — just tolerate them. And keep buying stuff. | <urn:uuid:a437f32b-589f-4a44-9097-774e4727966e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.amerika.org/technology/facebook-racist/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94547 | 150 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Big-name websites Gawker, Gizmodo, The Huffington Post, and BuzzFeed experienced outages on Monday after a Manhattan data center apparently lost power due to Hurricane Sandy.
All four sites are hosted by Datagram, an internet service provider and web hosting operation based in New York. According to a message posted to BuzzFeed at about 7 p.m. PDT on Monday, DataGram was without power after its basement flooded and a fuel pump broke.
As Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on the East Coast — and particularly the New York region — some of the high-profile data centers powering the country’s websites and businesses were at risk. According to Data Center Knowledge, many put emergency plans into action, but at least one went down, toppling over several other online operations like dominos.
As of 8:45 p.m. PDT, we here at Wired still had trouble reaching Gawker and Gizmodo, though they were intermittently available earlier in the evening after going down in the late afternoon. Both are owned by the New York-based Gawker Media.
Buzzfeed and The Huffington Post were reachable as of 8:45, but they were often slow to respond to requests and some BuzzFeed pages continued to return errors. BuzzFeed said that it was able to get its site back online with help from Akamai, which operates a “content delivery network” across the globe that lets companies host portions of their site on servers that are relatively close to the world’s web surfers.
At 4:15 p.m., a post to the official Huffington Post Twitter feed said that: “Due to #Sandy we’re experiencing technical difficulties.” That’s how social media types refer to Hurricane Sandy.
Reach via Twitter this afternoon, Gawker Media’s Greg Takayama pointed out that Gawker’s sites are hosted by DataGram. “Not looking too hot – phone calls to them aren’t going through,” he said.
Wired was also unable to reach DataGram when calling the company’s main number.
Robert McMillan contributed to this story. | <urn:uuid:d4384bfc-0086-4c6d-a251-dc530ba88dc7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/tag/gizmodo/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970683 | 447 | 1.585938 | 2 |
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With the national unemployment rate hanging around 9% and the economy acting like a drugged three-toed sloth, barely moving at all, the immediate prospects for employment are challenging for everybody, but particularly for our returning veterans.
Statistics are notoriously frustrating as they are often used to promote particular perspectives. You can make them do what ever you want them to do. Knowing this I searched for recent unemployment rates for the current Gulf War veterans and found a range of stats given by various news outlets and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The general unemployment rates for Gulf War era veterans ranged from 10.9% to as high as 14.7%. The unemployment rates for veterans between the ages of 18 and 24 were listed in April of 2011 at 27%, as compared to non-veteran 18- to 24-year-olds who came in at 17.4%. In any case, the unemployment rates for veterans today are considerably higher than those of the non-veteran populations.
Given the economy and the current political environment, these rates may very well get worse in the near future. With this in mind I think we need to be much more creative and focused in trying to turn things in a more positive direction for our returning veterans, and for the general economy. I recently came across a marvelous example of this creative entrepreneurship and job creation that I would like to share with you here. The best part of this story is that it is a Marine Corps veteran who is the creator of this example.
Lavish Laines Vineyard is the start-up business venture of Marine Corps veteran, Josh Laines. He did two tours in Iraq, and started his adventure in the wine business in 2007 after leaving the Marine Corps at the age of twenty-five.
Josh Laine started his wine business in an old, rusty van, making about twenty-five cases a year. In order to cut his costs, he manages vineyards for other wineries. Those vineyard owners, in return, give him grapes to make his own wine. Since 2007 he has also acquired about ten acres of his own land near Livermore, California and has begun growing his own grapes.
Here's the great part of the story. Josh Laine considers the wine business a family business. For him, his family is his fellow veterans. They are his brothers and sisters. The wine business, then, is the means he uses to meet his vision of creating jobs for veterans. So far he has hired some thirty Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, from all the military branches, to work with him in this intimate business.
The veterans who work for him find a place of peace and acceptance to make a living in. They find the old comradeship that they had known in the military, and they get to work in the peaceful environment of natural beauty. On top of that, they receive a good paycheck to boot. The Lavish Laines Vineyard is now producing some 3,000 cases of wine annually and the business is growing. Laine wants to expand into Nevada and Oregon. This is good for his business and for more of our returning veterans.
Laine says that veterans don't need micromanaging. They know how to act responsibly and independently. He says that, "A lot of them have a lot of things to talk about. They don't talk to family, definitely not spouses, moms or dads, because they don't want them to worry."
I've been writing about the need for jobs for veterans over the past year. I've also suggested that we, as a society, need to be more creative and entrepreneurial about doing this. Well, here is a veteran, a former Marine, who has found a way to be both creative and entrepreneurial, and he is making a difference for veterans, giving them the opportunity to make a decent profit together. This is a veteran taking the bull by the horns, and turning a dream into a reality for himself and his fellow veterans. We can learn from him.
Use Josh Laine as a model for your own creativity, your own entrepreneurial ideas. This is what the economy needs and what our veterans need. I hope that Josh Laine and his Lavish Laines Winery grow into one of the more productive and well known in the industry. I hope so for him and for the veterans that are helping him in the effort. They have found a home and a place to work with the soil, in the wide open spaces of nature. They have found healing, and a means of making a decent living.
Josh Laine says, "I've been shot, blown up and stabbed. So I've had it all, but you know what? I'm still here, still alive." We say, "Amen to that!" This is a great story. | <urn:uuid:efecf4ea-b3d9-462e-ba5f-8cc302974cfe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thehungersite.com/clickToGive/vet/article/Jobs-for-Veterans380 | 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 | 0.985738 | 989 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Sunday, May 23, 2010
Time: 10:00 p.m.
Location of Sighting: Over Trudeau International Airport, Montreal, Qc, Canada.
Number of witnesses: 1
Number of Objects: 1
Shape of Objects: Triangle.
Full Description of Event/Sighting: I work on the ramp at the Montreal International Airport. It was a quiet night so I had taken the golf cart out near the taxiway to relax under the stars and watch the planes. At exactly 10:00pm I spotted the UFO directly overhead as it was making a high speed flyby over the airport. The UFO consisted of exactly 3 large, spherical, white lights in a perfect triangle moving in unison.
The triangle was oriented with one light facing skyward and the other two in the plane of the UFO's west to east trajectory. The lights were clearly distinguishable from normal aircraft lights and stars. They were very 'fuzzy' or phased out as if they were vibrating and traveled in a visible wave-like path instead of a straight line.
The UFO took no more than 8 seconds at a sustained speed to pass from directly overhead until it faded into the light pollution of downtown Montreal over the eastern horizon. It passed in complete silence and there was no air traffic landing or departing the airport at that time. The altitude and size of the UFO was hardest to judge: It appeared to be the size of a constellation against the stars and appeared to flyby extremely low due to it's size.
Throughout my life I have seen thousands of strange flying objects. Satellites, Meteors, Weather Balloons, Hot Air balloons, Skydivers, Hang-gliders. You name it. In fact 99.99% of the flying objects that have ever caught my attention I had successfully identified to be one of these terrestrial occurrences. The only objects that had ever proved to me they were genuine UFO's was the Black Triangle UFO flyby I witnessed last night and a small Geol. Scoutship I saw 11 years ago.
If you have seen anything like this in the same area please be kind enough to contact Brian Vike at: firstname.lastname@example.org with the details of your sighting. All personal information is kept confidential.
Sightings.com website: http://www.sightings.com/ | <urn:uuid:60bdca02-6c28-4d29-9476-c07eab9d0091> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://canadaufo.blogspot.com/2010/05/black-triangle-ufo-over-trudeau.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961442 | 476 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Believe it or not, pinball
(that most beloved of nerd pastimes) hasn't always looked this way -- a familiar field of bumpers with a pair of forward facing flippers at the bottom. That particular design originated with the 1948 title Triple Action
, the work of Steve Kordek who died this week at the age of 100. Kordek is credited with a number of innovations to the analog arcade games, including multi-ball mode and drop targets. All told, the pioneer designed well over 100 different machines for Genco, Bally and Williams -- some of the biggest names in the pinball pantheon -- over the course of his roughly 60 year career. So, it is with a heavy heart that we bid farewell to a man that provided us with hours of entertainment and cost us plenty of quarters. | <urn:uuid:79888035-4d3c-435a-8d4b-246d5622721c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.engadget.com/2012/02/25/pinball-pioneer-steve-kordek-dies-at-100/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944893 | 168 | 1.515625 | 2 |
Motorola Brings Completely Useless Wireless Technology To Baseball
from the push-to-what? dept
There's a practical reason why NFL coaches need wireless headsets, as they pace along the sideline it's a problem to be tethered by a cord. Now Motorola, which supplies the NFL gear, is promoting the fact that they'll do the same for baseball by giving push-to-talk phones to the Chicago Cubs as a replacement for the current system of communication between the dugout and the bullpen. But while the NFL arrangement actually has some value, this is a completely pointless technology for baseball; it accomplishes nothing that the current communication system can't handle. There's a reason that baseball hasn't already adopted this technology, given that it's been available for years. It's plainly a Motorola publicity stunt, made worse by the fact that representatives from the Hall of Fame will be in attendance at its inception, whereupon they'll bring the device to Cooperstown to be enshrined. There's probably some money involved for Major League Baseball, but it seems likely that they'll pay by cheapening their hallowed institutions. | <urn:uuid:ca38cc7f-b406-48bf-b814-7c1cce8340ff> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20060612/124231.shtml | 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 | 0.975895 | 228 | 1.640625 | 2 |
We are very pleased to announce the 31st session of ShamansCave classes will start in the week of April 27th, 2013!
Beginning level classes offered this session are:
Advanced classes are listed in the member forum for continuing students!
How does a place get haunted? What is haunting?
First of all, ghosts are real, but they aren't real in the sense held in the popular imagination.
Let's take a house that is, say, one hundred years old. Families, relatives, friends, etc., occupy the house over time. Something happens that creates a tear in the energy; most often, someone croaks it in a bad way.
Stress that hits the digestive, stomach, head, shoulders, and neck areas usually has to do with anger and the inability to express it for whatever reason.
Sometimes breaking your reaction patterns with people in your life creates a place where anger at the previous position tends to ball up. That creates a pocket where you would normally have stretched out anger at someone, but now you find that it is still being created but has no place to go.
Twilight threw shadows up the hills like dark bony fingers. Watching the growing, slowly moving shadows, he saw them creep into the edge of the trees like a dark hand insinuating itself into a living glove.
The darkness seemed to grip the earth, seizing it away from the sinking sun, stealing the light, carrying it into the forgetful sleep of an approaching night. He settled back slowly on his heels, feeling the first coolness of the approaching evening flit about his face in the light breeze.
The day had been hot, hotter than most. He shifted his position to sit more comfortably on the flat stone he had perched on to rest. He took off the rough gloves and looked thoughtfully at his hands, inspecting the new blisters and old calluses, which the gloves were supposed to prevent, but somehow never seemed to do.
Once you're in the maw of the beast, very little will work except to just grab on with all four sets of nails and your teeth and ride the bastard out.
How do you combat depression? It's the little things that count first. I know, everyone wants the big stuff, the whole enchilada, let's save the universe, etc.
That always reminds me of the Chinese prayer I have been mindful of all these years: "Lord, please reform the world, starting with me." Depression starts in small ways - you just don't notice it until it looms up and smacks you in the head. | <urn:uuid:1e94596f-2534-42c9-804e-e8a0e683e438> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.shamanscave.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968195 | 530 | 1.773438 | 2 |
Postedon Dec 11, 2012 at 01:00 pm
Today, Freedom to Marry joined with Immigration Equality and more than 50 other LGBT and immigration organizations in signing a letter to the White House asking President Barack Obama to put immigration cases involving binational same-sex couples on hold until the U.S. Supreme Court announces its rulling on the freedom to marry.
Postedon Oct 10, 2012 at 10:45 am
This week, the Department of Homeland Security issued new written deportation guidelines for U.S. immigration officials that specifically clarify that discretionary relief will be extended to immigrants in same-sex partnerships or marriages with U.S. citizens. The memorandum clarifies that same-sex relationships that rise to the level of "family relationships" are long-term, same-sex relationships.
Postedon Jul 26, 2012 at 01:00 pm
While the DREAM Act would benefit an array of undocumented youth, many LGBT individuals are leading the immigration movement - and that's not a coincidence. Many heterosexual DREAM Act-eligible youth have been able to get married and adjust their immigration status through sponsorship from a U.S. citizen spouse. But because of DOMA, undocumented youth in same-sex relationships don't have this immigration option. For them, the DREAM Act is that much more important.
Postedon Aug 30, 2011 at 12:43 pm
Anthony and Bradford, a legally married binational couple from San Francisco, talk with MSNBC's Thomas Roberts about their struggle to stay together due to the so-called Defense of Marriage Act.
Postedon Aug 17, 2011 at 09:21 am
This Friday, Violeta Pando will find out whether or not she will be separated from her wife, Sujey, who faces deportation back to Mexico. Although Violeta and Sujey are legally married, the federal government will not allow Violeta to sponsor Sujey because the so-called Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) keeps the government from recognizing their marriage for the purposes of immigration.
Postedon Aug 11, 2011 at 10:42 am
CNN interviews Anthony John Makk and Bradford Wells, a married bi-national couple fighting to remain together in the U.S.
Postedon Aug 09, 2011 at 11:59 am
Anthony and Bradford, married for 7 years, may be forced to separate after losing an immigration battle to gain permanent residency for Anthony, and Australian citizen.
Postedon Mar 02, 2011 at 11:25 am
The New York Senator says, "For me it comes down to the very simple principles that every American should be able to marry the person they love." | <urn:uuid:6f6f3f5c-8778-4395-8c78-040c720ed085> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.freedomtomarry.org/blog/c/immigration/www.theseattlelesbian.com | 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 | 0.943884 | 537 | 1.578125 | 2 |
The Student Success Summit kicks off Foundations of Excellence at the University of New Mexico on Wednesday, Sept. 19, 8 a.m.-noon. UNM is one of several colleges and universities selected by the John N. Gardner Institute for Excellence in Undergraduate to participate in the yearlong project. At the summit, participants will receive data regarding retention and graduation rates, learn about the Foundations of Excellence process and find out how to become involved.
The Foundations of Excellence project is designed to help campuses evaluate and improve the overall experience of first-year students. The Gardner Institute, based in Brevard, N.C., is a nonprofit higher education research/policy center established in 1999. The institute helps both two– and four-year institutions of higher education enhance new student learning and retention through systematic appraisal and improvement of programs, policies and institutional procedures. Since the project began in 2003, more than 500 two– and four-year colleges and universities have participated either in developing the model or completing the self-study process.
Registration is appreciated but not required. Register at Learning Central. Visit the Office of Student Academic Success for more information and to view a video recording after the summit, or call (505) 277‑7763 for questions.
Media contact: Sari Krosinsky (505) 277‑1583; email: firstname.lastname@example.org | <urn:uuid:a297d6bd-1f5d-4571-a9b9-9bcf37892d0e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.unm.edu/2012/09/student-success-summit-kicks-off-foundations-of-excellence/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930649 | 279 | 1.578125 | 2 |
An Ohio college has been sued over its decision to punish a philosophy professor for divulging his Catholic beliefs to students.
The suit filed against Lakeland Community College accuses the school of violating the First Amendment, due process, and equal protection rights of Professor James Tuttle. His attorney, Jeff Brauer, says Lakeland substantially reduced Tuttle's course load, demoted him, and assigned him to classes the administration knew he did not want to teach simply because the professor disclosed his religious views in class. (See: Catholic Philosophy Prof Punished for Expressing Religious Beliefs)
“We would like to see Dr. Tuttle returned to his position,” Brauer explains. “We would like to see [an end to] the interference that he has faced in teaching an Introduction to Philosophy class. We believe that the topics he decided to discuss were his to decide and not the college's to censor.”
The school, Brauer says, must not be allowed to silence an instructor simply because he or she has views that are in conflict with the institution. “Nothing less than the soul of post-secondary education is at stake,” he states.
According to Brauer, Professor Tuttle was not attempting to indoctrinate students. “He talked about it as the perspective he came from,” he says. “He was open to any student's perspective and he's had students of every religious viewpoint be complimentary of him and positive of him.”
Tuttle, the attorney says, was not out to convert anyone. “This is a person who simply wanted to make it clear what he knew about,” Brauer says.
James Brown, the dean of arts and sciences at Lakeland Community College, is the individual who stripped Tuttle of his seniority. Brown would not comment on the lawsuit.
(This article courtesy of Agape Press). | <urn:uuid:b1ba1994-a3e3-44af-87b6-e89a9acf4653> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://catholicexchange.com/professor-demoted-for-expressing-personal-religious-views-sues-employer/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.984971 | 391 | 1.796875 | 2 |
I’ve got to say that the title of this post is probably among the most boring titles I’ve ever come up with. My apologies. However, as most you of know, success in the business of photography is rarely about exotic adventure, groundbreaking techniques or fancy equipment. Instead, it’s about the simple things you do day and day out that help you make money. Creating a well-written usage license for images you share with your clients and collaborators is just one of those things that keeps the money train going. So here goes!
I was actually inspired to write today’s post after reading about Dina’s experience with photographic thief Shepard Fairey. The reason she was able to achieve a settlement with Fairey was because she wrote down in email form what both she and Fairey agreed to. Nothing fancy – just a summation of the conversation she had with Fairey about how and where he could use her image of a cancer survivor. But, whether she realized it at the time or not, that little summary is what served to define the license that she granted Fairey. When he violated the terms of the license, she was able to go after him.
Before we talk about writing a license, we should first know what one is. In it’s simplest terms, a license is defined as permission. As the copyright holder of an image, it is you and you alone who can give permission to others to reproduce your image. The terms of that permission are what constitute a usage license. So however you want to structure your license is up to you; it can be ten pages of legalese or a simple sentence of common sense language.
Most licenses consist of five components:
1 – Size of the image to be reproduced in the final layout – i.e. will it be small within the ad (or published page) or will it be the “hero” as in full page or close to it.
2 – Nature of publications - Will the client be using the image one time in a marketing brochure or multiple times in newspapers and magazines? Images that are used in a consumer magazine or billboard ad campaign are worth much more to the client than one used in a 1/4 page inhouse brochure.
3 – Geographical area of publication - Will the image be used in a local publication like a neighborhood newspaper? Or a regional magazine? Or a series of national magazines? An image can be used throughout North American or even worldwide. Obviously, the greater the geographic distribution, the greater the value of the image to the client.
4 – Duration of use - Does the client need the image for six months? One year? Or even unlimited time?
5 – Exclusivity - Does the client not want competitors to use the image? Do they want exclusivity within their product category, a given country or worldwide.
It may go without saying, but I’ll say it anyways: any license that you create should address all five points. Knowing that, let’s look at a license that you might write up for a client who wishes to use a 1/2 page image for use in a company brochure.
“Image of boy and girl playing for non-exclusive use by Acme Manufacturing in Swingmaster brochure only. Size not to exceed 1/2 page. For distribution in North America only. No use by third parties. Duration of use: One Year.”
Hopefully you’ll agree that there was nothing fancy in this license. Note how all five usage components were addressed in this brief paragraph. I’ll also point out two very powerful words here: only and no. By using the word “only” you make clear that no other use is allowed other than that specified in your license. Use this word liberally!
The other word that comes in handy is “no.” In the license above, I referenced “no use by third parties” to make clear that the client could not allow anyone else to use the image (as often happens with manufacturers working with distributors and customers). If the client requested a broader license that might include other marketing materials, I’ll often specify “No paid for media advertising including magazines, newspapers and web ads.”
By using the words “no” and “only,” you remove ambiguity from your license -which is critical should you be required to enforce your rights under your license and law.
More and more these days, clients are requesting unlimited use of the images you create for them. But not all unlimited use is created equally. Perhaps the client only needs unlimited use of the images for brochures, inhouse marketing materials, catalogs and company website. Few clients need unlimited international use in billboards, magazine ads and product licensing. So why include that? Furthermore, they rarely need the images for unlimited time. All images have a lifespan after which they become tired and out of date to the client – but not necessarily to you.
Here’s an unlimited use license that I’d create for a client who doesn’t want to have to contact me for every single use, but at the same time doesn’t need expansive unlimited use:
Unlimited, exclusive to exercise and sporting goods industries only use of images by Powergroup Inc only for inhouse marketing materials including brochures, sell sheets and presentations, trade show posters, catalogs, and company website. No use by third parties. No paid for media advertising. Duration: Two years.
When creating a license, try to be as specific as possible. I know it’s tempting to be vague because you don’t want to upset the client. Far better to be clear with the client up front though because enforcing something that the client didn’t think they agreed to is just going to make a mess of the relationship. For the most accurate language, you can refer to the useplus.com website. It’s a free site that will generate license terms for you based on your parameters.
Before you can accurately draft a license, it helps to ask a lot of questions of the client. It’s rare that the client provides you with all the information you need. When you’ve got a client on the phone, you need to be prepared with all the right questions so you can fairly price the job and set its parameters. Also, many of license terms should be included in the terms and conditions of your contract (usually on the back of your main page). For example, things like the start date of the license period, what happens if the client doesn’t pay, changes etc should all be covered in either your assignment estimate or your stock photography invoice.
When it comes to what terms and conditions to use, if you’re a member of the American Photographic Artists (formerly the Advertising Photographer’s of America) or the ASMP, they offer contracts for use by their members. You may also purchase my Commercial Photography Contract Kit from the Photographer’s Toolkit which includes an Assignment Agreement, Stock Invoice, Change Order and a list of 50 questions to ask so that you can accurately estimate a job. Regardless of what terms you use, every single image that leaves your studio should be accompanied by your terms and conditions along with a clearly defined license.
So the next time a fellow artist, book author, client, wedding coordinator, store owner or even your mom asks for a photo, give ‘em your photos with a smile – and a license! | <urn:uuid:af480d3c-7652-43ba-9c2e-abfb844146a0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://photographersbusinesscoach.com/2012/03/14/how-to-write-an-image-use-license/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948239 | 1,562 | 1.625 | 2 |
Reporting Mike Xirinachs
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) — New York’s Fifth Avenue was awash in the blue and white of the Israeli flag for Sunday’s Celebrate Israel Parade, whose mood reflected rising tensions in the Mideast this year.
“We’ve always been saying, we’re ready to negotiate,” said Yuli Yoel Edelstein, Israel’s minister of information and diaspora, and grand marshal of this year’s march. “But the Palestinians have a unilateral approach; this is not the way you reach statehood.”
The thousands of marchers who stepped off at 57th Street late Sunday morning included New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, followed later by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, and U.S. Sens. Kristen Gillibrand and Charles Schumer.
Notably absent was U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner, who has attended in past years. The Democratic congressman has had a rough week while struggling to explain how a photo of a man’s crotch in boxer briefs had been posted to his Twitter account and sent to a 21-year-old female college student in Seattle.
1010 WINS’ Glenn Schuck reports: Students Take Part In Israel Celebration Parade
“I’m a very good friend of Congressman Weiner’s and I think he’s making his own decisions,” Gillibrand said during the parade.
“The impact on the congressman and what it means to people, we’ll wait and see,” Cuomo said. “It’s going to be up to the congressman how he handles it and then people will have an opinion when they actually have the facts.”
Schumer declined to comment on Weiner’s absence.
Organizers say the annual parade, which started in 1964, is the largest in the world celebrating the founding of the Jewish state in 1948.
In recent months, “Arab Spring” uprisings and the formation of a Palestinian unity government that includes Hamas dimmed hopes of renewed peace talks.
WCBS 880′s Mike Xirinachs reports: Spectators Cheer At Celebrate Israel Parade
“While the vast majority of Israelis want a two-state solution, too many Palestinians – and too many in the Arab world – do not,” Sen. Schumer told CBS 2′s Derricke Dennis.
Sen. Schumer said that he believes, unfortunately, that violence between Israel and Palestine will continue.
“Until they come to the realization that there has to be two states in the Middle East, we won’t have peace,” he said.
On Sunday, Israeli troops battled hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters who tried to burst across Syria’s frontier with the Golan Heights, reportedly killing 20 people. Scores more were wounded in the second outbreak of deadly violence in the border area in less than a month.
“We must be conscious of what’s going on overseas,” said city Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, who stood at the side of Fifth Avenue, overseeing a strong police presence that stretched to the end of the parade route at 79th Street.
“My job is to make sure everything goes well,” the commissioner said.
Behind police barricades were thousands of observers, some carrying signs criticizing President Barack Obama’s policy speech last month on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The president said Israel’s boundaries before the 1967 Mideast war should be the starting point for negotiations on any future borders.
“The Palestinians should have some territory, but not the 1967 borders, which would make Israel indefensible,” said one parade observer, Paul Abad, 22, a New York college student who said his father is Arabic from Cuba, and his mother a Jewish New Yorker.
He was wrapped in an Israeli flag, wearing a T-shirt that said, “Israel Defense Forces.”
One Fifth Avenue sidewalk was filled with two groups of protesters who have appeared each year, both critical of Israel: anti-Zionist ultra-Orthodox Jews who oppose Israel’s existence, saying only the Messiah can establish a Jewish state; and supporters of a Palestinian state who hoisted their red, black, white and green flags.
Did you join in the celebration at the parade? Let us know in our comments section.
(TM and Copyright 2011 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2011 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.) | <urn:uuid:4866a383-d37b-47c9-ab8c-8777e842a6ef> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/06/05/annual-nyc-parade-celebrates-israel/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940355 | 1,004 | 1.632813 | 2 |
The ordeal of a young Japanese artist framed for selling drugs in Indonesia is the subject of this melodramatic prizewinning novel by the author of Still Lives (1987).
The tale is narrated in alternating chapters by Tetsuro (“Tez”) Nishijima, an itinerant painter long estranged from his family, and by his younger sister Kaoru, a “coordinator-interpreter” who works for a Parisian documentary film company. The story charts Kaoru’s education in reality as she navigates the intricacies of legal procedure and cultural contrast in Bali (where Tez has been imprisoned), while detailing through flashbacks Tez’s travels and misadventures throughout Southeast Asia, particularly his contrasting relationships with an amorous Vietnamese woman and free-spirited Scandinavian culture vulture Inge, “a witch sent from Europe to lure me away from my path as an artist” by hooking him on heroin (he is in fact guilty of drug possession, though innocent of criminal facilitation). There’s almost a lot going on in this earnest novel, including the shedding of most of Kaoru’s illusions, a discursive piecemeal history of Japanese-Indonesian relations, a briefly suggested parallel between Tez’s “story” and a tale from the classical Indian epic Mahabharata, and a surfeit of climactic plot twists. But little of this is developed. Nor are the possibilities of the suggestive title (denoting a prizewinning painting of Tez’s for which Kaoru had posed) explored in any depth. Ikezawa dutifully records the physical symptoms and emotional fallout of heroin addiction, but Tez’s aesthetic sensibility is declared rather than rendered, and his reality as a character is undercut by Ikezawa’s stagy use of second-person narration in which Tez directly addresses himself, and overreliance on emotionally charged rhetorical questions (e.g., “Everything’s designed to lead you to heroin—why leave the embrace?”).
It all feels like a book Ikezawa felt obliged to write. Plodding and undistinguished. | <urn:uuid:2ee576f6-76be-45aa-bae2-c6d7b8db853b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/natsuki-ikezawa/a-burden-of-flowers/print/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953961 | 459 | 1.6875 | 2 |
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Bloemfontein - The Free State’s economic structure was limiting the creation of jobs, Finance MEC Seiso Mohai said on Wednesday.
“We must create and sustain the value adding production sectors in mining through beneficiation, (and) in agriculture through agriculture processing,” he said.
Mohai was speaking during a debate on economic transformation in the Legislature.
He said the whole country was abuzz with talk of transformation and the public discourse about meaningful transformation was intense.
It was time for economic power relations to be radically changed in order to advance the country’s social transformation project into a higher trajectory.
“The old economic power relations that remain intact are becoming dangerous to the stability of our hard-won democracy.”
Mohai said the existing structures of the economic productive system have to be changed in terms of ownership, social participation, management, employment, skills and in geography.
He said rural areas should be integrated into the modern productive system.
Mohai said the new system of resource distribution must benefit all South Africans inclusive of race, class, gender and geography.
For the Free State, transforming and developing its main industries such as mining, agriculture, manufacturing, tourism and infrastructure would be crucial.
“We must develop and expand the manufacturing beyond the dominance of petrochemicals to include textiles and food processing as large portions of the manufacturing sector,” he said.
ANC member Mantwa Thoabala said the character of those taking part in the economy must change for successful economic transformation. Not just those politically connected should benefit.
She said better education, by not lowering standards, would also be an important step.
“Empowerment will come if we give our youth better education.”
Thoabala said the ethics of hard work, dedication, spirit and guts as seen during the struggle years should be restored.
“Hard work could not be legislated.”
Local Freedom Front Plus leader Abrie Oosthuizen said the economy had no colour.
Any region in the world’s economy was measured by its growth rate.
“This is the important component that needs attention, meaning a drastic increase in productivity.”
He said the government needed to set an example on work ethics, but looking at municipalities, this was not happening.
“Cadre deployment and affirmative action are probably reasons for the current state,” he said. - Sapa | <urn:uuid:5e8bc9f4-5c4e-49e6-af46-9f5201ad5869> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.iol.co.za/news/politics/fstate-debates-economic-transformation-1.1349286 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958888 | 524 | 1.648438 | 2 |
As Mahendra Singh Dhoni returned to the dressing room after his unbeaten 206 on Sunday, an innings that will definitely be classified as a timeless classic in years to come, he basically managed to split the world of cricket in two groups. The first group comprised those who cherished every moment of Dhoni’s brilliance at the MA Chidamabaram Stadium or live on television, the other group comprised those who had missed the innings and were waiting to catch the newspapers the next day.
Millions opened their newspapers next morning and were greeted by a rude shock. The reports were there all right, but not photographs of Dhoni’s innings. It was almost unbelievable the way press all over the world were denied the right to capture during the India-Australia series. There was no picture of Dhoni’s savage attack or display of rare emotions.
The sense of loss is somewhat comparable to another unfortunate incident almost 30 years back. When the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) cameramen went on strike on June 18, 1983, no one really bothered that the India-Zimbabwe World Cup match at Nevill Ground, Tunbridge Wells, will not be televised — or worse, recorded. As a result there is no video footage of Kapil Dev’s 175 not out — an iconic innings by any standards.
The incident itself has been saddening and frustrating for cricket fans all over the world. However, since it was a strike by the cameramen, cricket authorities could not really do anything about it, and cannot be held responsible for the episode. It was not BBC or English & Wales Cricket Board (ECB)’s fault that generation that followed will have to rely on text reports and scorecards for description of Kapil’s epic innings.
This time it’s different, though.
It is not a strike by the employees this time. It is a conscious decision taken by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to retain the photography rights to itself, putting a blanket ban of sorts on photographic agencies (Getty Images and Action Images, for example), thereby denying people all over the world from access to photographs of the Test.
BCCI had earlier put similar restrictions on the India-England and India-Pakistan series earlier this winter. As a result, BCCI has managed to monopolise the photographs of the three series – thereby crippling the lesser organisations severely, and resulting in an inevitable quality drop in the collection of images available due to lack of competition.
Of late, however, BCCI has taken things to the next step. ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) has pulled out of the India-Australia series. The ABC said in a statement prior to the series that it could not afford the broadcast rights fees demanded by the BCCI, which are supposedly much higher this time around than previous Australian tours. This means that the Australian fans will have to do without audio commentary of the series. When we thought that things could not get any worse, STAR (the official broadcaster of the series) has stated of late that BCCI holds the exclusive rights to the scores of the series as well. This restricts on online scores, ball-by-ball text commentaries and SMS updates of scores.
By refusing to accept DRS, and by threatening to pull out of any international series if DRS is used, the BCCI has already shown that it can flex its muscles to any limit to show its power — even if it comes at the heavy price of reducing the quality of cricket. With the restriction on photographs taken by independent photo agencies, the BCCI has shown that it can stoop to any depths for a thicker purse.
Cricket historians, statisticians, and fans worldwide have perpetually faced the problem of the older series and matches not being documented worldwide on a consistent basis. Their sore eyes have frantically searched archives for every bit of text or image, or video available. With the advent of the internet, the records had finally become consolidated, and the world of cricket had taken major steps towards the organised archiving of cricket records, photographs and footage.
The BCCI has been successful to take cricket documentation a step backwards, releasing only the amount of data they feel like distributing, and holding back whatever they do not want to. Their seemingly unending lust for power and money is already affecting contemporary cricket journalism, and will hit cricket-lovers of the future even harder when they will struggle to find documents of any format.
It does not really matter to the BCCI that News Media Coalition (NMC) has been vocal against their decisions and is being supported by more and more organisations with every passing day. It does not matter to them that no Australian newspaper has carried a single picture of the India-Australia series, or that there is a general boycott by reputed agencies like Thomson Reuters, Agence France-Presse, and Associated Press to publish even match reports.
Even as the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has stepped in and has asked the ICC to intervene, the BCCI remains adamant on its stand. They are boosting their ego and bank balance in the process, and are taking long strides to brutalise the sport in every conceivable way for the sake of it. They have forgotten the simple fact that their existence depends on the cricketers, media, and fans, and it is not the other way round.
If the BCCI has decided to take the joy out of the game, the day is not far when the world will sooner than later find a way around the organisation to enjoy the sport. In fact, they have already started to do so: free online cricket audio commentary channels like Test Match Sofa have been able to satiate the Australian audience, among others. The cricketers have started to post copyright-free photographs on social networking websites that have been acquired and used by various websites. And the fans are playing their role in providing everyone with live scores, match reports and personally taken pictures on their websites and blogs, or via social networking media.
Clearly, BCCI is heading into big trouble by angering the entire cricketing world with unmistakable arrogance and scant respect for age-old traditions.
(Abhishek Mukherjee is a cricket historian and Senior Cricket Writer at CricketCountry. He generally looks upon life as a journey involving two components – cricket and literature – though not as disjoint elements. A passionate follower of the history of the sport with an insatiable appetite for trivia and anecdotes, he has also a steady love affair with the incredible assortment of numbers that cricket has to offer. He also thinks he can bowl decent leg-breaks in street cricket, and blogs at http://ovshake.blogspot.in. He can be followed on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ovshake and on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/ovshake42)
First Published: February 26, 2013, 11:59 am | <urn:uuid:eda73014-3a05-45c6-a4a8-96c0c7efd7b5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cricketcountry.com/cricket-articles/BCCI-s-restrictive-practices-has-denied-Dhoni-s-iconic-innings-its-rightful-global-due/23486 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965706 | 1,411 | 1.507813 | 2 |
High winds and high tides created a mess around Western Washington Monday, bringing down trees and power lines and flooding some waterfront areas at high tide. But as the wind died down Monday afternoon, forecasters were predicting snow in some areas overnight and into Tuesday.
KING 5 Meteorologist Jeff Renner said cold air moving in behind the Monday storm could drop the snow level down to near sea level for a possible rain and snow mix or snow showers overnight and into Tuesday morning.
Some slushy accumulations in the showers will be possible, generally a trace to three inches. In the heavier showers, the snow level could drop as low as 200 to 300 feet, especially on inland hills (5 or more miles inland from the Sound).
Another 4-to-8 inches of snow was expected between noon and Tuesday night in the Olympics and west slopes of the Cascades. An avalance warning was posted for both mountain regions above 4,000 feet.Latest pass conditions
As a warm front approaches Wednesday, the presence of cold air near the ground could cause precipitation to begin as snow or a mix of snow and rain. A few inches of local accumulations will be possible, but then melt as the precipitation changes to rain late Wednesday morning or afternoon.
A number of areas along the waterfront, including West Seattle, Dash Point and Hood Canal reported flooding Monday due to high winds combined with high tide. The West Seattle Blog posted this video of flooding at Statue of Liberty Plaza.
Thousands of customers across the region were reported to have lost power Monday.
PSE asks that outages be reported by calling 1-888-255-5773.
Seattle City Light encouraged people to prepare for power outages. If outages do occur, call (206) 684-7400 to report them and visit www.seattle.gov/light/sysstat or their mobile site http://m.seattle.gov/light for outage information. Additional preparedness tips are available at www.takewinterbystorm.org . | <urn:uuid:b4f6241d-aae0-4e08-b279-1902658eac47> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nwcn.com/news/183934971.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937689 | 409 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Last week, The Writer talked about how she missed the art of letter writing. Today her rant will be about the loss of grace. Grace is an undervalued trait. Most people don't miss it because they don't know what it is. Grace in publishing (and other businesses) means tending to the niceties. It's not just about being courteous. It's how people present themselves in general.
I can see this is going to be tedious. What does this have to do with writing?
Here's an example. In the old days if someone wanted The Writer to come speak, she would call. The Writer could either come or not. Either way it was a pleasant exchange with The Writer saying she was flattered to be asked and the other person saying maybe they could work out a visit at a later date. Flash forward to 2008: The Writer gets an e-mail from someone, asking if The Writer is available for a certain date. The Writer writes a courteous response, expressing her regrets if she isn't able to come on that day, but is willing to try for another date. No response to her response. No small reply thanking The Writer for considering the visit or whatever.
Lack of grace isn't limited to people asking The Writer to come speak. It's across the field: editors, salespeople, bookstores, agents . . . people are too busy to take an extra two seconds to finish a conversation properly, to wrap up a transaction or event.
If everybody did that, they'd keep writing emails forever, never "wrapping it up."
You know what I mean. A simple "thank you" is all that's needed.
Are you through now?
Next week on Writing Monday, The Writer will revise the Miss Manners column-- | <urn:uuid:e08f1926-7a4c-4f83-9e84-f2388a1e0349> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ellsworthsjournal.blogspot.com/2008/10/writing-monday-old-days-part-ii.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975823 | 367 | 1.601563 | 2 |
The company I work for may soon engage in a project where some level of speech recognition or acoustic analysis might be necessary. We are seeking for advice from someone who has practical experience in that field to:
- Point us out the *open source* software/library that would best suit our requirements.
- Provide us (through a Skype session) an overview of how it works and how the development process would look like.
- The application aims to teach users how to pronounce Te Reo Maori words. It will play a sample utterance of a single word and record the user pronouncing it back. It must compare the user's utterance against the sample pronunciation and provide a score indicating how close/good that was.
Assumptions and constraints:
- We've only got one sample pronunciation of each word (male and female versions) available at the moment. We don't envisage investing more time recording more pronunciations.
- Only open source software and libraries are acceptable.
- The application will only deal with isolated utterances and must be speaker independent. We don't envisage having a training process in the application.
- Comparison could be done either through voice recognition algorithms or acoustic analysis (i.e. formants, frequency, pitch, etc.), as long as the score provided is good/realistic.
We appreciate expertise in the area and are able to contribute financially, to acknowledge the time involved.
If you think you can help us and is interested in doing it, please get in touch with me at teolupus.ext [at] gmail.com.
If not, but you know someone who might be the right person to support us, could you please send this message through?
--- (Edited on 10/4/2011 4:10 am [GMT-0500] by Visitor) --- | <urn:uuid:a152e695-3452-42fb-8ef2-d5479609e813> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.voxforge.org/home/forums/message-boards/general-discussion/speech-recognition-/-acoustic-analysis---consulting | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935563 | 379 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Rockingham China Works; Brameld & Co.
English, active 1820–1842
Dessert plate, c. 1826–1830
3.4 x 25.7 cm
Collection of the Winnipeg Art Gallery; Acquired with funds from the Cavendish Investing Ltd. donation in memory of Mr. and Mrs. R.H.G. Bonnycastle
The Rockingham China Works (located on the estate of Earl Fitzwilliam, Marquess of Rockingham) was not known by this name until 1826 when, under the ownership of the Brameld family, the factory began producing porcelain with the goal of attracting the upper-class market. Rockingham was quickly recognized for its high-quality bone china of wonderful translucency. Unfortunately, while the Bramelds stressed artistic excellence, commercial realities were ignored; by the late 1830s the pottery was in chaos and the factory closed in 1842. Rockingham’s range of shapes and patterns were extensive, though dessert service shapes following natural forms such as the WAG piece are rare. The best-known example is the primrose leaf, seen in this plate, dating c. 1830, Brameld’s finest production period.
Tuesday through Sunday 11am - 5pm
Friday 11am - 9pm
Closed Easter Monday, Labour Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas Day | <urn:uuid:f8570974-619c-4e68-8bab-9f4882729876> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mhyatt@wag.ca/art/art-search/display,result/47204 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937253 | 287 | 1.789063 | 2 |
Japan: New HIV Cases Hit Record Number as Funds Are Cut
June 17, 2011
The number of new AIDS cases in Japan rose to a new high of 469 last year, mostly among men who have sex with men, according to last month's report by the Health and Welfare Ministry. The 1,075 new HIV diagnoses last year were also an increase, 54 more than in 2009. A leading complaint from activists is that the government is reluctant to do much analysis with this data.
"The problem is a tendency to view the issue as a foreign one, leading to the denial of an effective national solution," said Abbey Freu, a counselor at the grassroots AIDS Network Yokohama (ANY). "Japanese authorities release statistics based on tests, a system that creates a false sense of security because the figures are small. The result is less public awareness that has pushed HIV and AIDS to remain an underground issue."
Though diagnoses increased, uptake of free HIV testing actually declined, from 150,000 in 2009 to 130,000 last year. Condom use has declined by about two-thirds from what it was a decade ago, experts said. The government, however, has announced it is slashing funds to HIV/AIDS organizations.
More needs to be done at the nongovernmental level, said Dr. Tsuneo Akaeda, a gynecologist and leading advocate against youth STDs/HIV. "AIDS awareness is a key prevention strategy and this can be done successfully, starting with peer counseling in schools led by teachers and parents," Akaeda said, though this has yet to happen.
"Sex is a taboo subject in Japanese society," said Akaeda. "Naturally, HIV testing is something people dread in this kind of society because it will lead to social ostracism."
To work within social constraints, ANY combines its prevention information with awareness and defense against sexual predators, Freu said.
Inter Press Service
06.15.2011; Suvendrini Kakuchi
This article was provided by U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is a part of the publication CDC HIV/Hepatitis/STD/TB Prevention News Update. Visit the CDC's website to find out more about their activities, publications and services.
Add Your Comment:
(Please note: Your name and comment will be public, and may even show up in
Internet search results. Be careful when providing personal information! Before
adding your comment, please read TheBody.com's Comment Policy.) | <urn:uuid:b69a0fab-dd23-48ca-9953-ec2c7345f882> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thebody.com/content/62602/japan-new-hiv-cases-hit-record-number-as-funds-are.html | 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 | 0.959484 | 516 | 1.71875 | 2 |
Media Contact: Shelly Han or Mark Kearney
(Washington) – Helsinki Commission Chairman Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Co-Chairman Rep. Christopher H. Smith (R-NJ) welcomed the decision by Russian authorities to suspend the extradition to Uzbekistan of 13 Central Asian refugees who have been granted refugee status by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
Senator Brownback and Representative Smith recently urged both the Russian courts and the Office of the Procurator General to prevent the extradition of these refugees, 12 of whom are Uzbek nationals and one of whom is a national of the Republic of Kyrgyzstan.
“I welcome Russia’s decision not to return these individuals to Uzbekistan, a country widely recognized for its egregious violations of basic rights. Perhaps this is a hopeful sign that Moscow takes its international obligations seriously and will lead by example in this and other cases involving human rights,” said Chairman Brownback.
“The forcible return of refugees to Uzbekistan, an egregious human rights abuser, would be unacceptable,” said Co-Chairman Smith. “I hope the Russian Government, currently chair of the Council of Europe, will stick by this decision to halt extradition and work with the UN to resettle these individuals.”
According to the U.S. State Department’s Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2005, Uzbekistan’s security services “routinely tortured, beat, and otherwise mistreated detainees to obtain confessions or incriminating information.” A 2003 report by the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture stated that the practice of torture in Uzbekistan is “systematic.”
Under the nonrefoulement obligation of the UN Refugee Convention, to which Russia is a signatory, Contracting States must not forcibly return individuals to situations where their life and freedom would be threatened. Russia is also a signatory state to the 1984 Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, Article 3 of which prohibits the extradition of individuals to destinations where they are likely to be tortured.
The Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, also known as the U.S. Helsinki Commission, is an independent agency of the U.S. Government charged with monitoring compliance with the Helsinki Final Act and other commitments of the 56 participating States in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). | <urn:uuid:9ff08c2f-c84b-4a81-8c85-3f78f7df3239> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.csce.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=ContentRecords.ViewDetail&ContentRecord_id=522&ContentType=P&ContentRecordType=P&UserGroup_id=58®ion_id=58&year=0&month=0&Subaction=ByDate&CFID=9165044&CFTOKEN=78430451&IsPrint=1&activeTab=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930145 | 495 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Another Tax and More Politics: The ETS Proposed for Australia December 12, 2008Posted by honestclimate in Carbon Trading.
Tags: australia, climate change, ets, global warming, Jennifer Marohasy
Another Tax and More Politics: The ETS Proposed for Australia
By Jennifer Marohasy, December 11, 2008
I am the Chair of The Australian Environment Foundation and we are planning an Internet campaign to oppose the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) proposed for Australia on the basis:
1. An ETS will not change the global temperature;
2. Will force many clean and green Australian industries overseas; and
3. Will make Australians poorer; while it is generally richer, not poorer nations that are better able to protect their natural environment.
We have a fundraising target of A$30,000 and already we have already raised just over $11,000 from donations. So we need another A$19,000.
The campaign website will be designed to help build a large online community; providing a place for action as well as information. Those who log on will be able to source information quickly as well as find their local MP so they can send him/her a message.
The website will be designed so that more than one campaign can be running at a time – and old campaigns can be archived. The campaign opposing the ETS will be just the first. The Australian Environment Foundation wants to be able to take a stand, and importantly help its members and supporters be heard, when decisions are being made against the weight of evidence.
So far donations have ranged from $25 to $2,000. Please make a contribution.
If you can make a financial contribution, please go to our website and donate through the PayPal facility using your credit card. http://www.aefweb.info/ .
If you prefer to use Internet banking: Australian Environment Foundation, BSB No: 013 308 Account No: 4978 00416.
Alternatively, send a cheque to the Australian Environment Foundation, PO Box 274, Deakin West, ACT 2600.
There is nothing honest or clever about the proposed Emissions Trading Scheme. It is just another tax and more politics. | <urn:uuid:982ece03-ccc9-4f94-9953-3a8d78059b8f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://anhonestclimatedebate.wordpress.com/2008/12/12/another-tax-and-more-politics-the-ets-proposed-for-australia/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932899 | 452 | 1.640625 | 2 |
On Friday, I shared a guest response to a reader question about life insurance. Many GRS readers rightly complained that it didn't do a good job of answering the question. One reader — Mike from Four Pillars and ABCs of Investing — took it upon himself to write this response.
One of the most common issues that people with any kind of dependents face is, "How much life insurance do I need?".
This is a tough question to answer in a simple equation; there are quite a few variables which affect the amount of insurance needed. First off, I'm only going to discuss term insurance. For most people, that's the only type of insurance to consider.
One of the key factors to consider is what kind of lifestyle you want your family to have if you pass away. How much financial impact will your death cause to your family? Do you want them to be filthy rich if you die? Do you want your partner to continue to work? Do you want them to be debt free? Is it important that they keep the same house? Will they be fine without any insurance?
The amount of insurance you might need/want will vary widely depending on your current financial situation. Let's look at two general situations.
Situation one: You want enough insurance to cover a specific use and don't need any insurance to provide future income for your spouse.
This might be the situation where both spouses are working and making decent money and have no kids. In that case, they might decide to get enough insurance to pay off all debts, at which point the survivor should be fine since they'll keep working.
This calculation is pretty easy. Just add the amounts of debts and whatever other costs you want covered, and that's how much insurance you need. The problem, of course, is that the amount of debt you have now and the amount of debt you have in 10 years will be quite different. (Hopefully, you'll owe less in 10 years!)
There isn't a lot you can do about this other than buy different terms of insurance. For example, you might buy $100,000 for 10 years and $100,000 for 20 years. You can also cancel insurance at any time, so one strategy is to insure for the entire amount necessary and, if you end up debt-free, then just cancel the insurance. Life insurance needs are very inexact so sometimes you just have to pick a reasonable amount and go with it.
Situation two: You want insurance which will provide future income for your spouse/kids.
This is a bit more complicated since you're now dealing with a lot of future assumptions. Regardless, for this situation an incorrect amount of insurance is a heck of a lot better than no insurance at all, so let's continue.
In this case I'd suggest that you start with all current debts and assume you need enough insurance to cover that amount. That's the first part of your insurance needs. The second part will provide an investment portfolio large enough to provide the desired annual income. To do this calculation, you can use the 4% withdrawal rule to be conservative.
The amount of insurance you buy will be the sum of these two numbers.
You can see from this example that future income is expensive! Using the 4% rule is fairly conservative. You might want to consider using a 5% or even 6% rule if the income needs are for a shorter term (i.e., if the insurance is only to cover a 10-year income gap before retirement age).
Other facts to consider when looking at future income:
- Retirement savings. If a couple is in their 50s and has a good retirement portfolio built up then the survivor might only need income until they reach 65 at which point they can live off the retirement savings.
- Pensions. This is probably more applicable to older people, but if Social Security and/or other private pensions are in the not-to-distant future then they should be factored in as well.
In summary, ignore all rules of thumb and insurance salespeople, and sit down to figure out how much insurance you need/want. Think about what it would be like financially if you or your spouse died and there was no insurance. Think about what you would like things to be like financially, and calculate how much insurance is necessary to fill the gap. Another approach is to pick specific insurance amounts and then apply those amounts to your situation. For instance, if you had $500,000 of insurance and you died tomorrow, what would your spouse do with the money and what would their financial life be like?
Post continued below ...Don't get hung up on details. It doesn't matter how accurate your estimate is because things will change and then you'll be over- or under-insured. I did a case study on myself only a couple of years ago where I went through the process for determining how much life insurance I needed. Things have changed so much in the last two years for me (I can't believe how much) that I'll have revisit this calculation: We have two kids now, our debt is less than half of what it used to be, my business is doing extremely well, and I don't think I'll keep my day job as long as I'd originally thought. (I get a lot of my insurance through work.)
Too much insurance is expensive. It's easy to just get a large amount of insurance (just to be safe), but the reality is that if you are over-insured, then you're paying a lot of extra money over 20 years. Plus, you don't want to give your beneficiaries any extra incentive to bump you off! :)
J.D.'s note: Another way to come up with a coverage amount is to use this handy online calculator from the nonprofit LIFE Foundation.
This article is about Insurance
SEARCH FOR RECENT ARTICLES | <urn:uuid:b2efd7ef-d66a-4d1d-95d2-261b4d1db290> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2010/03/01/how-much-life-insurance-do-you-really-need/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975151 | 1,203 | 1.742188 | 2 |
Minoli was one of the first companies in the UK to embrace the new technologies used in the manufacture of porcelain tiles in the 1980‘s, working closely with the leading porcelain tile manufacturers from Italy and Spain.
On a practical note, over natural marble and stone, porcelain tiles are stronger and more durable, less prone to corrosion or staining, more slip and water penetration resistant, do not require sealing or polishing and are ultimately more cost effective.
In terms of aesthetics, being man made, porcelain tiles convincingly emulate the beauty of organic stone but come in a wider range of colours, a variety of larger sizes, are more consistent in tone and texture and, as such, less likely to show wear and tear.
Most porcelain tiles are virtually free of maintenance, other than the regular typical cleaning requirements of a home, office or work place. Because porcelain is virtually impervious it is ideal for use in places where hygiene is essential, such as kitchens, bathrooms, laboratories and hospitals.
Porcelain has very high resistance to abrasion, is not likely to chip under normal circumstances and is highly durable for commercial installations, such as car showrooms and workshops.
Porcelain tiles are the backbone of Minoli’s contemporary collections and demonstrate the latest advancements in production, as well as featuring Ecolabel certification – the European mark of environmental quality. | <urn:uuid:4331aea9-cf6b-4a45-a90a-5e561dc09ead> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.minoli.co.uk/thesurface-within/info-porcelain-tiles/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948125 | 292 | 1.679688 | 2 |
Group countering Tea Party movement growing in strength
Mar 04, 2010
NEW YORK - Just when the conservative Tea Party movement appeared to be spreading across the United States, a radically different vision of America has emerged, courtesy of Facebook.
Its title might not be imaginative, but the Coffee Party USA is making waves. In just one month, its Facebook page has more than 50,000 fans; and supporters of this left-of-centre alternative were logging their interest at a rate of a thousand an hour as of Tuesday.
Ms Annabel Park, a documentary filmmaker, started up the Facebook page in response to the growing number of "Tea Party" coalitions, made up largely of Republican voters who have been speaking out against President Barack Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress.
Democrats have watched in horror as Tea Partiers have surged to prominence by advocating fiscal discipline, reducing the role of the federal government and opposing Mr Obama's health care plans as financially ruinous.
Now, the Coffee Party is calling for its supporters to "Wake Up and Stand Up". Its mission statement declares that the federal government is "not the enemy of the people, but the expression of our collective will, and that we must participate in the democratic process".
Local chapters are planning meetings in cities from Washington to San Antonio to Los Angeles.
The party is planning nationwide coffee houses for March 13, where people can gather to decide which issues they want to take on and even which candidates they want to support.
"We're not the opposite of the Tea Party," Ms Park said. "We're a different model of civic participation, but in the end we may want some of the same things."
Like the Tea Party groups, it is using Facebook and Twitter to spread the word and to encourage individuals to form local outposts. Already some 45 Coffee Party chapters in at least 30 states have been set up.
The coffee metaphor helps: "It's unfortunate that Tea is no longer soothing," posts one supporter on Twitter.
"It now makes me tense." AGENCIES
Coffee Party Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/coffeeparty#!/coffeeparty?v=info | <urn:uuid:9e420c62-2213-4363-bcd2-b55625a8617e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://swampbubbles.com/blogs/wolfman/20100304/coffee-party-wakes-us-radicals | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956237 | 446 | 1.625 | 2 |
There is a lot of confusion in the world about Time Out. What it is, how to do it, and how to make it work. I am here to help demystify the time out.
Here are my qualifications - I've got an almost-two year old, I worked for two years in a residential facility for kids with Mental Retardation and Behavioral Disorders (the toughest behavior cases out there) and lived to tell about it, and I went to school to be a Special Ed teacher (and took Applied Behavioral Analysis and other courses to learn how to deal with kids).
The most common misconception I read/see/hear is that a time out is for punishment. It is not. The time out serves two purposes. 1) It removes the misbehaving child from whatever stimulus or situation is causing the misbehavior (so, if little Sally is hitting little Johnny, it removes Sally from Johnny's presence, which interrupts the hitting behavior). 2) It reestablishes parental authority (in other words, it reminds the child who is in charge).
I think a lot of people think that the time out is a punishment because it has been touted as an alternative to spanking (which is a punishment). However, if you use Time Out incorrectly, as a punishment, you're defeating the actual purpose of the time out and making your job, as parent, much harder.
The recommended guideline for the duration of a time out is one minute for every year of age. So, a two year old gets a two minute time out. (I recently saw a time out bear, which I refuse to link to because it's a bad idea, but it had a timer that went up to 60 minutes, and I kept wondering if there were parents out there giving their kids' grandparents time outs, too... Then I thought it might not be a bad idea. You hear that Dad? I'm coming for you with the time out bear if you don't behave yourself... Nevermind that you're 56 years old. The timer will work for you for 4 more years!!)
Anyway, we started with time outs for MG when she was one. This also happened to be when she started needing them. We reserve time outs for egregious behavior - in the beginning it was only for things that could hurt her or someone else (i.e., tormenting the dog, jumping on the couch, biting, etc.). Now we've started to use it for property destruction infractions, too, but I'll get to that.
This is how it should work:
Child is misbehaving. Parent says, "Child, if you do not stop doing X, you're going to get a time out." Child continues to misbehave. Parent says, "I'm sorry you're choosing to do X, you need to come take a time out."
You then remove the child to the time out area. We started with the crib, but now we do them at the bottom of the stairs (on the lowest step or on the rug in front of the stairs - and you all just thought I was weird for having a bath mat at the bottom of the stairs!!). I don't believe in having a single place (like a "Naughty Chair") to take time outs. First, because if you say, "You will sit THERE" you get into a power struggle. If you say, "You can take your time out here or there," you're still allowing the child choices, and you're less likely to get into a senseless power struggle. Second, because if the child is used to a single chair, what do you do when you go out? Take it with you? Stairs and rugs are common enough, though, that you can find them virtually anywhere, and having multiple locations makes it easier for the child to generalize when you're at Grandma's, say, and you have to do time out on a chair instead of a step.
Assuming that the child goes willingly (I'll get to unwilling children in a second), you start a timer and say, "Good job. You've got two more minutes." If the child wants to scream and cry and freak out, that's ok. In addition to removing them from the situation that causes the misbehavior, allowing them to scream and holler allows them to release some of the frustration/tension that the situation has caused. This is healthy. The place where I worked required the children to be "calm and compliant" before the time out countdown started, but I think that's crazy. I don't care if MG cries the whole two minutes, as long as she is on the step or the rug.
Anyway, you sit there for the two minutes with them, giving comfort with your presence but not talking to them (except to maybe remind them to stay in the time out area, or say, "It's ok," or "You're doing fine," or "Calm down," occasionally). This is not the time to have a discussion about what happened. Just give them that two minutes to get control of themselves. Be encouraging and supportive, but not too much. A word or two here or there is all you need. A lot of parents talk too much, in general. That's another post...
When the timer beeps, get down on the child's level and give her a hug. She needs reassurance that you still love her, no matter what she did. Then you explain, in terms that she can understand, why she got the time out. "Child, you did X, so I had to give you a time out. Next time when you feel Y, instead of doing X, you could try doing Z instead." (Next time you feel frustrated, instead of hitting your sister, you could try walking away, instead.) You are Teaching here, not punishing. You want them to understand what you expect. So tell them, and use small, understandable words. "You got a time out because you ran out into the street without looking both ways. Next time you want to cross the street, you need to wait for me to hold your hand, and look both ways." You don't need to use scare tactics "A big truck could squash you!!!" You don't want to create fear. You simply want to instruct the child on what's expected. If the child is old enough, have them repeat back the situation and the behavior to you. Say, "Now, next time you get frustrated, what are you going to do?" and encourage the child to say, "Walk away." This may take time to get right, and is over the head of little kids, but you can ask the question and then answer it for him. Eventually he'll understand what you want to hear. Repeating it to you will help him internalize the correct behavior.
You always want to end a time out positively. "I love you," or "Good job," and then, the most important step, "Let's go do something else!" Redirect the child to an appropriate activity, NOT the activity that caused the problem to begin with. If the kid threw a block at his sister's head, you don't want to send him back to play with the blocks. Give him something soft! :)
Just as it takes a dozen exposures to a new food before a child will like it, it often takes a dozen time outs for the same offense before a child "gets it." This is why parents everywhere have said, "I've told you a thousand times...." (and then groaned because they sound just like their own parents!)
It will also take more than a dozen tries before your child understands what a time out is. That's ok. You're teaching. Rome wasn't built in a day.
What do you do if the child won't take his time out? You suspend all attention, fun, and most interaction until he does. If he talks to you, you say, "I will talk to you after you take your time out." If he says, "I want some water," you say, "You can have a drink of water after you take your time out." If he says, "I need a clean diaper," you say, "You can have a new diaper after you take your time out." I'm not kidding. The universe stops until the time out is over. If the child goes off and plays by himself, fine. The greatest currency you have with your kids is your attention. So you withhold it until he's taken his time out. We're only talking about two minutes, here. It isn't child abuse to sit in a wet diaper for two minutes. It isn't child abuse to withhold dinner for two minutes. If the child CHOOSES to make it two hours instead of two minutes, well, fine. That's his choice. Children aren't harmed by one missed (or delayed) meal or drink. Oh, and try to keep it positive. You CAN have X after you take your time out, instead of, you can't have X until you've taken your time out. I'm not sure why, but it makes a difference.
Try to be as neutral as possible. You're going to be frustrated. You'll want to say, "It's just two freaking minutes, will you take your time out already so we can GO???" Don't show it. If you say that, he'll know that you want to go, and that by not taking his time out, he can needle you. He can "win." Don't show your hand. Don't let him know what your currency is. Be as calm and neutral as possible (always, not just with time outs). I know this is impossible. Just last night, MG was driving me crazy, and I lost my cool. Luckily her Dad was home, so he could be the good cop while I chilled out. (It's a natural reaction when your toddler sticks her hand onto the cutting board where you're cutting carrots to freak out a little. She's really lucky I didn't cut off her fingers... Argh.)
I didn't think that Time Outs were working with MG, because she screamed like a crazy person every time I gave her one at home. Then we were at Grandpa Ben's farm, and she colored on the TV with a crayon (property destruction). I gave her a time out and braced myself for one of those scenes that you don't want your kids to have in front of your in-laws, no matter how cool and understanding they are... But damned if she didn't march right over and sit down on the step and take her time out like a little angel. I was absolutely stunned. It was one of my proudest parenting moments.
I would be happy to elaborate or answer any questions you may have about time outs, or discipline in general. I hope that this has helped you understand how to use the time out correctly and effectively!
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By Dan Holtmeyer
FORT MEADE, Md. — Oklahoma would not be able to issue more bonds to fund repairing the Capitol or completing other unfinished state projects — at least, not until some of the current debt is paid off year — if legislation approved by the state House on Thursday becomes law.
The proposal from Republican House Speaker T. W. Shannon would restrict state debt in bonds and leases to 28 percent of general revenue, which is at least $5.3 billion for the current fiscal year, according to estimates from the Board of Equalization.
The state currently holds about $1.5 billion in tax-supported debt, which means Shannon's plan would leave little leeway for additional bonds until current bonds are paid off. The bonds are used to fund major, one-time public projects.
Supporters described the legislation as a fiscally responsible move, saying it would limit future debt to current levels. But opponents said it was an unnecessary limit on future bond issues.
Rep. Mike Reynolds, R-Oklahoma, went further by saying the Oklahoma Constitution prohibited any debt without voter approval.
"The cap should be zero percent, not 28 percent," Reynolds told his colleagues before the vote. "Is there anything in committee for a proposal to send a bond issue to the vote of the people? Because that would solve the problem."
Senate Republican leader Brian Bingman also voiced concerns, saying after the vote that imposing a limit would harm Oklahoma's bond ratings and increase service payments. He pointed to Sen. Josh Brecheen's proposal to limit debt service payments — basically interest payments on bonds — to 4.5 percent of the previous five years' average general revenue.
Brecheen's bill was scheduled for a vote Thursday but it didn't come up, likely pushing the vote to next week.
Jim Joseph, Oklahoma's state bond advisor, has said Brecheen's proposal would allow enough new debt to fund several pending projects, including renovation and repair of the state Capitol building, estimated to cost $150 million, and the still-unfinished American Indian Cultural Center and Museum in Oklahoma City.
Joseph told The Associated Press he hadn't had a chance to study Shannon's bill imposing the percentage limit, but said if it worked as its supporters claimed, it would indeed be more restrictive than Brecheen's measure.
The House passed the bill 78-17, sending it to the Senate. | <urn:uuid:59ae0d05-203c-43c4-8435-85087f85d4f1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://enidnews.com/state/x564666228/State-House-approves-measure-to-limit-bond-debt/print | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969757 | 491 | 1.703125 | 2 |
|Augusta National's members-only sign means something totally different today. (Getty Images)|
For the first time in its 80-year history, Augusta National Golf Club has female members.
The home of the Masters, under increasing criticism the last decade because of its all-male membership, invited former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and South Carolina financier Darla Moore to become the first women in green jackets when the club opens for a new season in October.
Both women accepted.
"This is a joyous occasion," Augusta National chairman Billy Payne said Monday.
The move likely ends a debate that intensified in 2002 when Martha Burk of the National Council of Women's Organizations urged the club to include women among its members. Former club chairman Hootie Johnson stood his ground, even at the cost of losing Masters television sponsors for two years, when he famously said Augusta National might one day have a woman in a green jacket, "but not at the point of a bayonet."
The comment took on a life of its own, becoming either a slogan of the club's resolve not to give in to public pressure or a sign of its sexism, depending on which side of the debate was interpreting it.
Payne, who took over as chairman in 2006 when Johnson retired, said consideration for new members is deliberate and private, and that Rice and Moore were not treated differently from other new members. Even so, he took the rare step of announcing two of the latest members to join because of the historical significance.
|Augusta National Timeline|
"These accomplished women share our passion for the game of golf and both are well known and respected by our membership," Payne said in a statement. "It will be a proud moment when we present Condoleezza and Darla their green jackets when the club opens this fall. This is a significant and positive time in our club's history and, on behalf of our membership, I wanted to take this opportunity to welcome them and all of our new members into the Augusta National family."
A person with knowledge of club operations said Rice and Moore first were considered as members five years ago. That would be four years after the 2003 Masters, when Burk's protest in a grass lot down the street from the club attracted only about 30 supporters, and one year after Payne became chairman.
Moore and Johnson are close friends, both with roots in South Carolina and banking, and the person said Payne and Johnson agreed on the timing of a female member. The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the club typically does not discuss membership issues, said it was important to Payne to be respectful of the membership process. The person said prospective members often are not aware they are being considered.
Augusta National, which opened in December 1932 and did not have a black member until 1990, is believed to have about 300 members. While the club until now had no female members, women were allowed to play the golf course as guests, including on the Sunday before the Masters week began in April.
The issue of female membership never went away, however, and it resurfaced again this year after Virginia Rometty was appointed chief executive of IBM, one of the Masters' corporate sponsors. The previous four CEOs of Big Blue had all been Augusta National members, leading to speculation that the club would break at least one tradition -- membership for the top executive of IBM or a men-only club.
Rometty was seen at the Masters on the final day wearing a pink jacket, not a green one. She was not announced as one of the newest members.
Moore, 58, first rose to prominence in the 1980s with Chemical Bank, where she became the highest-paid woman in the banking industry. She is vice president of Rainwater, Inc., a private investment company founded by her husband, Richard Rainwater. She was the first woman to be profiled on the cover of Fortune Magazine, and she made a $25 million contribution to her alma mater, South Carolina, which renamed its business school after her.
Moore was mentioned as a possible Augusta National member during the height of the all-male membership debate in 2002. She and Johnson worked on South Carolina's $300 million capital campaign in the late 1990s.
"Augusta National has always captured my imagination, and is one of the most magically beautiful places anywhere in the world, as everyone gets to see during the Masters each April," Moore said. "I am fortunate to have many friends who are members at Augusta National, so to be asked to join them as a member represents a very happy and important occasion in my life.
"Above all, Augusta National and the Masters Tournaments have always stood for excellence, and that is what is so important to me."
Rice, 57, was the national security adviser under former President George W. Bush and became secretary of state in his second term. The first black woman to be a Stanford provost in 1993, she now is a professor of political economy at Stanford's Graduate School of Business.
"I have visited Augusta National on several occasions and look forward to playing golf, renewing friendships and forming new ones through this very special opportunity," Rice said in a statement released by the club. "I have long admired the important role Augusta National has played in the traditions and history of golf. I also have an immense respect for the Masters Tournament and its commitment to grow the game of golf, particularly with youth, here in the United States and throughout the world."
Rice recently was appointed to the U.S. Golf Association's nominating committee.
Johnson regarded the membership debate as infringing on the rights of a private club, even though every April it hosts the Masters, the most popular of the four major championships, which brings in millions of dollars through television rights for the highest-rated telecast in golf.
In a 2002 interview with the Associated Press, Johnson said the makeup of the club was more about four members-only parties each year than who plays the course.
"Our club has enjoyed a camaraderie and a closeness that's served us well for so long, that it makes it difficult for us to consider change," he said. "A woman may be a member of this club one day, but that is out in the future." | <urn:uuid:33a2df7a-460b-4a29-8aca-40f0f197234d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cbssports.com/golf/blog/eye-on-golf/19834496/augusta-national-announces-for-the-first-time-in-clubs-history-two-women-members-admitted | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983516 | 1,283 | 1.726563 | 2 |
Storage Planning for Virtual Infrastructures -- More Than Just Managing Latency
Storage planning for virtualized systems requires some careful thinking about the issues that will impact users. One major tradeoff of virtualizing systems is that you are trading local bandwidth for network bandwidth. In a nonvirtualzaed environment, each user has local storage for at least booting his system and very often for his data as well. On a virtualized system, the user boots up over the network and accesses applications and data over the network. Here, network performance and, more importantly, network latency is critical. We all know that the seek+latency on a standard enterprise SATA drive is around 4.16 ms for seek and between 8.5ms (read) and 9.5ms (write) depending on the drive manufacturer. This is not going to change, so latency must be considered.
One key issue is the latency on your network and to the storage that the virtualized user will be accessing as compared to the local storage. However, that is far from the only issue. These four issues are paramount and must be considered as well:
- Storage contention
- Storage bandwidth
- File system data and metadata fragmentation
- File system free space
1. Storage Contention
If you are the only user on the system, you have full, un-contested access to the disk drive. You might be running applications in the background, but most likely you and the application you are running in the foreground are consuming most of the disk drive. You have 8 MB, maybe 16MB or even 64MB, of disk cache, and the disk you are using can likely support 100 random IOPS. Not bad.
In contrast, if you are on a virtualized system, you are very likely contending with many other users. Your application does not have a dedicated disk drive, and the total number of IOPS for all the users running MIGHT be less than the 100 you had. Of course, in most virtualized systems you are running on storage controllers often with large caches, which can make a big difference. Contention can be mitigated, but it is difficult to fully determine the contention without a good understanding of the cache usage.
2. Storage Bandwidth
The bandwidth to storage is also something to consider when planning for virtualization. The average disk performance for a Seagate Enterprise 2.5 inch 10K drive is about 130 MB/sec, and a Seagate 3 TB 3.5 inch enterprise SATA/SAS drive is about 112 MB/sec. For each local disk you are getting more than 100 MB/sec if you are streaming data. Of course, file systems do not necessarily allocate data and sequentially stream it, and very few applications that run locally must sustain more than 100 MB/sec, but I think it is important to understand what users need as well as the total required bandwidth across systems to be virtualized. Having a RAID controller with, for example, 5 GB/sec of bandwidth is not going to work if 200 users need 200 different datasets simultaneously and want 30 MB/sec (200*30=6000 MB/sec and the controller does 5120 MB/sec). Of course, this is not seriously oversubscribed, but if everyone is trying to stream HD video you are going to get a large number of complaints. It is pretty easy to oversubscribe the bandwidth of a storage system in a virtual environment.
3. File System Data and Metadata Fragmentation
I am not a big fan of the Windows NTFS file system given the performance I have seen, and given the data and metadata allocation algorithms and the lack of high-speed streaming I/O bandwidth support. It is very likely that local disk performance is going to be nowhere near the theoretical performance of the drive, given that the data will not likely be allocated sequentially. More than likely, the local disk is not going to have significant contention from many applications accessing the same drive. That will likely not be the case in a large RAID environment where data is allocated across the storage by the volume manger, file system and the RAID controller. More than likely, the data is not sequentially allocated, and there is far more contention at the drive level. That means the number of seeks and the latency will likely be much higher than using the local drive. That does not even include the network latency, which should also be considered.
4. File System Free Space
Finding free space for new files in a virtual environment is often more CPU-intensive and takes longer than on a local file system. On a local file system, you can just allocate the space as you own the whole drive. That is not the case on a virtual system. You often must traverse many software layers over a network to get new space. Clearly, this is not a problem if the user is using the space that has been allocated to her, but it is a problem if users are regularly exceeding their allocations. This is not a major problem, but certainly something to consider. | <urn:uuid:65b905fd-82a6-44db-85a4-001abde2ceff> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.enterprisestorageforum.com/storage-management/storage-planning-for-virtual-infrastructures-more-than-just-managing-latency.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951782 | 1,025 | 1.65625 | 2 |
By Michael Rosenbaum
It’s difficult to think of clipboards as an innovative training tool, but a visit to a local tire store reminded me that even the most basic tools can deliver strong impact.
In this case, the training system employed a roles-based management (RBM) style, a deceptively simple management training process employed by Discount Tire Company. I encountered RBM while researching the company for my book “Six Tires, No Plan,” a biography of company founder Bruce Halle.
Halle founded the company in an old plumbing supply store in Ann Arbor, MI, in 1960. Today, the $3 billion company has more than 800 stores, and Halle is ranked 96th on the Forbeslist of richest Americans. Discount Tire has never reported a decline in annual revenue, has never implemented a layoff—during five decades of growth—and continued store expansion over the last four years of economic challenge. Clearly, the company is doing something right.
One thing the company is doing right is training at the store level. Management of a tire store can appear simple on the surface, but staffing, scheduling, inventory management, and other details can take time to master. Discount Tire applies its roles-based management system to ensure that each assistant manager gains important expertise on the way to earning the keys to a new store.
The roles-based management system gives each assistant manager enhanced training opportunities by focusing each, in turn, on specific aspects of store operations. One assistant manager, for example, might be responsible for all scheduling, while another focuses on marketing. As each assistant rotates through the different management roles, each becomes more expert at his job and is, thus, a more effective manager.
At first, RBM appears to be very basic as a form of management training. Breaking tasks into individual segments can help employees focus on each aspect more intently, leading to long-term mastery of the total process. Giving people responsibility for managing and tracking a process will enhance organizational and planning skills. Reflecting the overall simplicity of the management training system, assistant managers at one store I visited kept track of progress on clipboards that anyone could view.
Looks can be deceiving, however, and the surface simplicity of this management training tool can mask a much more significant value for the employee and the company. I found that impact when I talked to some of the assistant managers about the process.
Each person I met spoke with pride about his part of the business, the part he controlled. Each spoke as if he were the owner of scheduling or of marketing—affirming the ownership mentality that is the Holy Grail for many motivational gurus.
Here, the training tool serves not only to provide skills, but also to motivate the employee. In a very real sense, each segment of the training can be seen as career advancement, even if the person’s title does not change. As each person cycles through the various RBM roles at Discount Tire, specific skill sets are enhanced and overall store operations will benefit.
The most impactful training programs go far beyond the fundamentals of skills enhancement. For truly farsighted companies, the direct goals of training are stronger staff commitment, enhanced operating performance, and lower turnover…even if those goals require investment in a handful of clipboards.
Michael Rosenbaum is founder of Quadrant Five (http://www.q5works.com), a consultancy that focuses on the core strengths that drive sustainable profitability and customer loyalty for his clients. He has consulted with C-suite officers at more than 150 companies and is the author of four books. His fifth book, “Six Tires, No Plan,” available in bookstores and online, is the biography of Discount Tire founder Bruce Halle. For more information about the book, visit http://www.sixtiresnoplan.com. | <urn:uuid:896f3bbb-7ebe-42a3-a7ad-0fae002dd3cc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.trainingmag.com/content/fostering-ownership-mentality?page=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956473 | 788 | 1.617188 | 2 |
I'm embarrassed to say I missed this last week, but when Microsoft announced its proposal to let EU customers choose a browser via a so-called ballot screen, they also provided an image of what that screen could look like. Here it is.
Under our new proposal, among other things, European consumers who buy a new Windows PC with Internet Explorer set as their default browser would be shown a ‘ballot screen’ from which they could, if they wished, easily install competing browsers from the Web. If this proposal is ultimately accepted, Microsoft will ship Windows in Europe with the full functionality available in the rest of the world. As requested by the Commission, we will be publishing our proposal in full here on our website as soon as possible.
The icons above were no doubt the inspiration for Opera's newest complaint, that icons should not be used because IE's blue "E" logo is, to many people, the Internet. I suppose a more valid argument could be made about the order in which the browsers appear. In the shot above, the browsers are listed by usage/market share, with IE first. | <urn:uuid:4e1360c8-a0be-40b6-9b81-b094b1cc255c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://winsupersite.com/blog/supersite-blog-39/news2/microsofts-proposed-browser-ballot-screen-138841?cpage=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957135 | 226 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Syrian rebels launch broadest push yet for Aleppo
BEIRUT (AP) -- Rebels on Friday pressed their broadest assault yet to drive President Bashar Assad's forces out of Syria's largest city, activists said, with fierce fighting erupting in an Aleppo neighborhood that is home to Kurds, an ethnic minority that has mostly stayed out of the civil war.
In Washington, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said intelligence suggests Assad has moved some of Syria's chemical weapons to better secure them. Panetta said the main sites are believed to be secure, though his comments indicated that there are lingering questions about what happened to some of the weapons.
On the diplomatic front, top representatives from Western nations and Middle East allies met Friday at the U.N. to urge Syria's fractured opposition to unite. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told the Friends of Syria group that the U.S. would deliver an additional $15 million in non-lethal aid and $30 million in humanitarian support, on top of more than $175 million already given to political opposition.
Diplomacy has been largely sidelined in the 18-month-old Syria conflict because a key tool -- U.N. Security Council action -- has been neutralized by vetoes from Assad allies Russia and China.
The military battle for control of the country has also been locked in a stalemate, most visibly in Aleppo, a northern city of 3 million. Since a rebel offensive on Aleppo two months ago, each side has controlled about half of the city and has repeatedly tried -- but failed -- to capture the rest. Aleppo would be a major strategic prize, giving the victor new momentum.
Late Thursday, rebels forces launched what they said would be a "decisive battle" that by Friday had spread to wide swaths of the city. "The city is witnessing one of the most violent days. All fronts are on fire," Aleppo-based activist Baraa al-Halabi said.
Heavy clashes were reported Friday, with regime troops firing tank and mortar shells, and rebels using heavy machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades, said Aleppo activist Mohammed Saeed.
Amateur video broadcast by the Arab satellite TV station Al Jazeera showed a group of rebel fighters, identified as a single unit by their white headbands, marching through a rubble-strewn street. Others fired assault rifles from behind barricades of cinder blocks and sandbags.
Syria's state-run news agency SANA confirmed battles in a number of Aleppo districts, reporting that dozens of rebels were killed. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an activist group, put the day's death toll in the city at 23.
For the first time, rebel fighters entered one of Aleppo's Kurdish areas, amid conflicting reports about whether some of the local residents fought alongside regime troops or stayed out of the battle.
Since the outbreak of the uprising against Assad in March 2011, Kurds have been split in their loyalties, some siding with the regime while others joined opposition protests.
Syria's state TV said regime forces had help Friday from local residents, a claim also made by the Tawhid Brigade, the largest unit of rebel fighters in the city. However, Rami Abdul-Rahman, the head of the Observatory, and Saeed said Kurdish fighters withdrew from the streets when the fighting began.
Kurds are Syria's largest ethnic majority, making up at least 10 percent of the country's 23 million people. Most live in Syria's northeast, near the border with Turkey, but Aleppo and the capital Damascus also have large Kurdish-dominated neighborhoods.
Since the start of the uprising, both the Syrian government and opposition forces have reached out to the long-marginalized Kurds, whose support could potentially help tip the balance in the conflict. Many in Syria's power elite, including the Assad clan, are Alawites -- followers of an offshoot of Shiite Islam -- while a majority of Syrians are Sunni Muslims. Christians are another large minority.
Syria's civil war is increasingly tearing apart ethnic and religious communities, putting members of the same group on opposite sides of the conflict, said Fawaz A. Gerges, head of the Middle East Center at the London School of Economics.
"The longer the conflict continues, the more fragmented Syrian communities will be," he said. "This does not bode well for the post-Assad Syria."
Since the regime began bombing from the air a few weeks ago, the number of casualties and the scope of destruction have increased sharply. In one such air attack Friday, a warplane bombed the northern town of Azaz near the Turkish border, killing at least four people, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Amateur footage posted by opposition activists showed frantic residents clawing with their hands through the rubble of a bomb-flattened home in Azaz. A dust-covered man climbed out of a crater carved by the blast, cradling a dead toddler in his arms. The child's tiny arms and legs flopped as the man carried the limp body to a pickup truck, as shocked bystanders shouted "God is Great."
Syria imposes tight restrictions on foreign journalists, and the authenticity of such videos cannot be verified independently.
In Geneva, the U.N.'s top human rights body stepped up efforts to gather evidence against members of Assad's regime. The Human Rights Council appointed a renowned U.N. war crimes prosecutor, Carla Del Ponte, to its independent panel probing alleged war crimes in Syria. Such evidence could be used in a future war crimes tribunal hearing -- although none is planned so far.
The council also extended the panel's mission, due to expire by the end of September, by another six months. Last week, the investigators submitted a confidential second list of suspected war crimes perpetrators to the U.N. human rights office.
There has also been concern that a desperate Assad could unleash chemical weapons on his opponents. It is widely believed that Syria possesses extensive chemical and biological weapons stockpiles and it has threatened to use them if the country comes under attack.
Panetta, the defense secretary, said Friday that there have been multiple "limited" movements of chemical weapons, but that Syrian officials were relocating the stocks in order to better secure them.
"There has been intelligence that there have been some moves that have taken place. Where exactly that's taken place, we don't know," Panetta told reporters. "I don't have any specific information about the opposition and whether or not they've obtained some of this or how much they've obtained and just exactly what's taken place."
Asked if some of the weapons have fallen into the hands of the rebels or Iran's Revolutionary Guard, Panetta said he has no "firm information to confirm that that's taken place." He said the U.S. has monitored the main sites and determined that they are still secure.
President Barack Obama has said the threat of chemical or biological warfare in Syria is a "red line" for the U.S., and has warned that Washington will not allow the weapons to fall into the wrong hands. He said there would be enormous consequences if the U.S. sees any movement or use of the weapons. | <urn:uuid:9ad1196a-b89f-4920-881b-ea33aac9bcb8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www1.whdh.com/news/articles/world/middle-east/12008655554167/syrian-rebels-launch-broadest-push-yet-for-aleppo/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966222 | 1,480 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Prez Trying to Trick Latino Voters with Texas Speech
The president knows that immigration reform isn't going to pass in the runup to the 2012 elections, particularly now that there's a more patriotic congress. Then why did he stoke immigration emotions in Texas today?
The gold mine of votes for Obama is the trove of millions of eligible but unregistered Latinos who could help tip states like Arizona into his column — but only if they can be persuaded that his efforts on their behalf are worth backing.
A big unknown is whether Latinos will be more impressed by Obama’s good intentions on the immigration issue, or more discouraged by the lack of progress toward enactment of a comprehensive bill, including a path to citizenship for those living in the United States illegally.
So why is the president risking angering Latino voters? Eliseo Medina, the secretary treasurer of the Service Employees International Union, explains.
“Clearly with immigration reform and any other kind of reform that would benefit the Latino community, we have to make sure that our voices are heard in the ballot box. There are approximately 23 million Latinos that are eligible to vote, yet only 10 million voted in 2008.”
The goal of the White House? Rile up Hispanics in order to boost turnout in 2012.
A recent analysis of the 2010 elections by the Pew Hispanic Center found that Latinos continue to underperform on Election Day: fewer than 7 percent of voters were Latino, even though more than 16 percent of the U.S. population is Latino.
Since Democrats don't generally win the white vote, they pander to minority groups for votes. Sometimes, that means pushing policies that are patently un-American, like refusing to secure the border. | <urn:uuid:84a18705-0125-42d4-8f8f-b646ff852aa8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wrko.com/blog/todd/prez-trying-trick-latino-voters-texas-speech | 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 | 0.966906 | 348 | 1.664063 | 2 |
|Established||1926-27 NHL season|
|Current holder(s)||Ryan Miller|
|Awarded to the||National Hockey League's top goaltender who is "adjudged to be the best at this position"|
The Vezina Trophy is awarded every year to the National Hockey League's goaltender who is chosen as the best goaltender. At the end of each season, the 30 General Managers of the teams in the National Hockey League vote to determine the goaltender who was the most valuable to his team during the regular season. Before 1981, it was awarded to the goaltender(s) of the team allowing the fewest number of goals during the regular season; now, the William M. Jennings Trophy is awarded under this previous definition.
The Vezina Trophy was named for Georges Vézina, a very good goaltender with the Montreal Canadiens. Vezina felt sick during a game in 1925 because he had tuberculosis. When Vezina died, the trophy was given to the League by the former owners of the Montreal Canadiens, Leo Dandurand, Louis Letourneau and Joe Cattarinich. It was first awarded at the end of the 1926-27 NHL season.
Until the 1980–81 season, the trophy was awarded to the goaltender(s) of the team that gave up the least goals during the regular season. However, it was recognized that this system often meant the trophy went to the goaltender of the better team rather than the individual and hence the change was made to offer the William M. Jennings Trophy to the goaltender(s) playing for the team with the fewest goals against. Since 1981, the Vezina Trophy has been awarded by the NHL General Managers to the most outstanding goaltender. Billy Smith of the New York Islanders was the first winner of the Vezina under the current system.
There have been numerous instances of players receiving the trophy many times in different years, and players tying for the trophy. Jacques Plante holds the record for winning the most Vezinas with seven, trailed by Bill Durnan and Dominik Hasek both of who have won six. Hasek has won the most under the current system of honouring the best individual goalie. Players for the Montreal Canadiens have won the Vezina 28 times. Under the original definition, there would often be multiple winners from the same team during one season. In the 1973-74 NHL season, Tony Esposito of the Chicago Black Hawks and Bernie Parent of the Philadelphia Flyers finished tied for the fewest goals against, the only time that there would be a tie between two players from different teams. There are only three players that have won both the Vezina and Hart Memorial Trophy for the same season: Jacques Plante, who won both trophies for the 1961–62 season; Dominik Hasek who won both for the 1996–97 and 1997–98 seasons; and Jose Theodore, who won the Vezina and Hart for the 2001-02 NHL season. Two other Vezina winning goaltenders have also won the Hart Memorial Trophy: Roy Worters and Al Rollins. Chuck Rayner was the only goaltender to win the Hart Memorial Trophy, but never the Vezina.
The voting is conducted at the end of the regular season by the 30 general managers of the teams in the National Hockey League, and each individual voter ranks their top three candidates on a 5-3-1 points system. Three finalists are named and the trophy is awarded at the NHL Awards ceremony after the playoffs.
When introduced, the Vezina Trophy was awarded to the goaltender, or goaltenders, of the team that gave up the fewest goals in regular season play.
The NHL adopted the current criteria for the Vezina Trophy beginning in 1982. The William M. Jennings Trophy was created as a new award for the goaltender(s) of the team that surrenders the fewest goals in regular season play.
Player is still active
Note 1: For the 1973–74 season, there was a tie between Tony Esposito of the Chicago Black Hawks and Bernie Parent of the Philadelphia Flyers. It is the only time when two players from two different teams tied.
- "Vezina Trophy history". NHL.com. http://www.nhl.com/trophies/vezina.html. Retrieved 2008-06-05.
- "Vezina Trophy history". LegendsofHockey.net. http://www.legendsofhockey.net/html/silver_splashvezina.htm. Retrieved 2008-06-05.
- "Vezina Trophy history". canadianencyclopedia.com. http://thecanadianencyclopedia.com/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0008355. Retrieved 2008-06-05.
- "Hart Memorial Trophy history". NHL.com. http://www.nhl.com/trophies/hart.html. Retrieved 2008-06-05.
- Jon Dolezar (April 20, 2003). "Foppa shows the most Hart". SI.com. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/inside_game/jon_dolezar/news/2003/04/01/dolie_insider/. Retrieved 2008-06-05.
Other pages [change] | <urn:uuid:cc2debc8-1ff4-4ac5-8ff2-b73b3a3cbe79> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vezina_Trophy | 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 | 0.955076 | 1,118 | 1.6875 | 2 |
1985 Dodge Ram Repair Question
What would you like to know?
17,324 answers provided
thanks for your offer to help!
i have a car radio i am trying to get to work. The radio goes on , but all the speakers i try seem to either not yield sound, or if they do yield sound, they burn up.
If i had pin outs for the connector, that'd be cool. also, if i had an idea on how to select the right speaker, that'd be cool too.
1 question asked
I sell and repair oem radios at the nation's second largest old car show and get a lot of requests for the pin diagrams so I printed up a bunch of little handouts. Here's a copy of the two 7-pin plugs you will have.
Keep in mind that all 8 speaker wires will have 6 volts on them. If you run one wire to a speaker and the second speaker wire is grounded, you will only get half of the audio signal and that 6 volts across the speaker will cause the voice coil to overheat.
If you understand an audio signal and how it is alternating current, most home audio amps have two stages for each speaker. One stage amplifies the positive half of the signal and the other stage amplifies the negative half. If only one stage is working, you will have very severe distortion. That's not how the car systems work. In their systems both stages amplify the entire signal. When one stage is dead you will get half the volume, but depending on how that stage failed, you might have 0 volts on that speaker wire. There will be no distortion from the signal, but you could hear distortion from the voice coil being extended to the end of its travel. That will damage speakers too. So, the bottom line is no speaker wires can be grounded.
I have the audio output ICs for this model but they very rarely fail.
Your radio is actually a '92 model. There were a lot of different model numbers that all look the same on the front. I had the older version in my '88 Grand Caravan. About the only thing I ever ran into with this model is a slipping belt for the cassette player. It takes the highest torque to run the eject mechanism. When the belt would slip, it wouldn't cycle through the eject sequence so the tape / radio switch wouldn't switch back to radio.
Your radio is also an Infinity model. That means it came with speakers that had amplifiers bolted to them. Newer cars often use a remote-mounted amp in the trunk, under a rear seat, or behind the right front kick panel. All Chrysler radios run speakers directly. Unlike the confusing GM and Ford systems that must be used with or without an amp, depending on the model, you do not HAVE to use the amp with any of the Chrysler radios. Their amps do not increase volume or power. They are specifically for tone conditioning for the shape of the vehicle. The difference between the Infinity and non-Infinity radios is a dozen parts in the audio output circuitry that affect tone response. Infinity radios put out less bass. It is made up in the amplifiers. If you use your Infinity radio with regular speakers, you will find yourself turning the bass up most of the way. If you had a non-Infinity radio in a car with amplified speakers, there would be too much bass unless you turned it down most of the way.
In these connectors, the left one is the gray plug. The first wire is usually pink and gets connected directly to the battery for the station presets and clock memory. If you're using this for a shop radio and are turning on a power supply instead of a battery, you can connect it to the next wire in the plug, a red one for the switched 12 volts. The radio will play fine but it will start at 12:00 each time you turn it on, and you'll have to retune to the station you want. It will start out at 530 AM.
You don't need the third and fourth wires. The fourth one connects to the tail lights and tells the display to dim when the head lights are turned on. The third one connects to the dash lights and tells the display how much to dim. You also won't use the last one, "Mute", in the gray plug. That was used on the cars with talking dashboards or factory-installed cell phones.
The fifth and sixth wires, along with the first six wires in the black plug on the right are for the four speakers. Use the RF- and RF+ for one speaker. The last wire, "Ant", is a switched 12 volt that turns on when the ignition switch and radio are turned on. In other words, the radio is playing. That wire will turn on a power antenna relay or the relay that turns on the remote amp(s). You don't have to connect anything to it. I use it on my display board at the car show to run tiny bulbs that show which radio is playing.
17,324 answers provided | <urn:uuid:494fd906-4564-4452-b8a1-fb789cbb61ef> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.2carpros.com/questions/1985-dodge-ram-radio | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955748 | 1,033 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Voters overwhelmingly believe that California’s prisons and jails are overcrowded and want more alternatives to incarceration for non-violent offenders, according to new poll released today. Support for the shift is truly bipartisan and consistent across the state, explained researcher Ben Tulchin of Tulchin Research.
According to the poll:
Opinion is nearly unanimous that jails are overcrowded and California should find other ways to deal with non-violent offenders (87 percent agree, 61 percent strongly agree).
Most voters statewide (70 percent) favor reducing the punishment for possessing a small amount of drugs, such as heroin, cocaine or methamphetamine for personal use, including nearly half (43 percent) who strongly support this reform. This proposal draws broad backing across party, ethnic and regional lines as voters see this reform as an effective way to reduce overcrowding in jails, save money, help balance the budget and protect funding for other services.
As part of voters’ desire to see a shift away from incarcerating non-violent drug offenders, California voters overwhelmingly favor allowing drug offenders to avoid jail time if they complete drug treatment (87 percent favor, 61 percent strongly favor).
Senator Mark Leno authored Senate Bill 1506, which proposes to revise the penalty for simple drug possession under state law from a felony a misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year behind bars as well as fines and probation. The Legislative Analyst’s Office estimates that the law would save counties about $159 million annually, in addition to yearly state savings of $64.4 million. Savings would total $1 billion in just five years.
The savings to the state and the counties will provide an opportunity to reinvest in health, education and the social safety net after years of painful cuts, and to provide more people with drug treatment, Sen. Leno explained.
“Voters across the state, both Republicans and Democrats, recognize that long prison sentences are doing little to deter or limit drug abuse in our communities,” said Leno. Convicting drug users of felonies and incarcerating them without drug treatment does nothing to help them overcome addiction and denies them career and educational opportunities when they are released.”
The federal government already classifies simple drug possession – including cocaine and heroin – as a misdemeanor, as do 13 states. Those states have slightly lower crime rates than felony states, slightly higher rates of people entering drug treatment and lower rates of illicit drug use.
“One year in county jail for a possession offense is a significant and substantial penalty,” said retired Contra Costa Judge Harlan Grossman. “Making simple possession offenses misdemeanors would be more equitable and should lead to quicker resolution of cases, freeing up scarce criminal justice and court resources.”
David Moss, an actor and playwright who grew up in Oakland, has long struggled with an addiction to cocaine that landed him in jail 14 times for being under the influence. He often wonders how much money was wasted sending him to jail time and time again and how that money could have been better spent.
“In grade school, no one raises their hand and says ‘I want to be an addict when I grow up,’” explained Moss. “Treatment gives us a chance to connect the dots to what fuels our addiction. That gives us the opportunity to create a positive ripple effect, instead of causing collateral damage.”
Senate Bill 1506 will be voted upon in state senate before the end of the month.
SB 1506 is co-sponsored by the ACLU of CA, California Attorneys for Criminal Justice, California NAACP, Drug Policy Alliance, Ella Baker Center for Human Rights & the William C. Velasquez Institute. | <urn:uuid:66ef6f44-49fa-4c99-a961-9dc9642037ef> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ellabakercenter.org/in-the-news/new-poll-confirms-70-support-for-revising-ca%E2%80%99s-drug-laws-across-party-and-geographic | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944418 | 754 | 1.578125 | 2 |
It has been nine years, but I remember like it was just yesterday. I migrated with my parents and three siblings from Oaxaca, Mexico to the United States trying to escape the violence of narcotic traffickers and the poverty that is prevalent in Latin America. Once in the United States, we lived in a small, uncomfortable garage. At night, I shared a mattress on the floor with my three siblings and my parents slept directly on the floor. Our financial needs forced my siblings to drop out of high school to work to pay our basic bills. Throughout my youth, my parents and I faced struggles because of our resident status. During my freshman year, my brother was deported. I can still see and feel my mother's tears on my shoulder as I tried to comfort her, a task that was impossible to do. When I learned to speak English in school, our lives improved because it allowed me to communicate and translate for my parents. We were able to get into a one room apartment because I could help my parents communicate enough to make an appointment and sign a lease.
I come from a dangerous neighborhood in South Central Los Angeles where every night you hear gunshots. My reality is too often watching my peers serve time in prison instead of graduating from high school. I face gang violence every day, I've seen gang members and innocent people get shot, and I have even been robbed by a mob of gangsters coming home from school. I can vividly remember one of the gang members pulling out a gun and pointing it at my forehead demanding me to give him everything I had. Afraid as I was, I gave him everything but he gave me something even more valuable, the resolve to work towards a better life for me and my family.
Being undocumented is an obstacle that I still haven't been able to overcome. While working on a community service project this summer, the supervisor rejected me because I was illegal, telling me that "people like me did not have the right to obtain an education in America". Knowing that I am undocumented makes me feel transparent, makes me feel insignificant. My parents, also undocumented, can't find decent jobs, they are exploited, working 12 hours a day at minimum wage. I want more! I want a chance to have a job that is a rewarding career, rather than a job whose sole goal is to provide for basic necessities. I want the opportunity to attend college and continue to law school and become an immigration lawyer. I know the road ahead will not be easy but armed with this education, I want to be able to prevent families like mine from being ripped apart and to help fight for the civil rights of other discriminated minorities. Learning English allowed me to help my family, college and law school would allow me to help so many more.
( I dont know if my first paragraph has any transition to my 2nd.) | <urn:uuid:6af7ab30-d29b-49da-92fe-e48a7eb52f40> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.essayforum.com/undergraduate-essays-2/come-dangerous-neighborhood-south-central-la-uc-prompt-33048/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9806 | 574 | 1.726563 | 2 |
CureSearch for Children's Cancer funds and supportstargeted and innovative children's cancer research with measurableresults, and is the authoritative source of information and resourcesfor all those affected by children's cancer.
18 hikers from the Los Angeles area gathered at beautiful Big Bear Lake on October 8th for the 26 mile Ultimate Hike - Los Angeles. The hike took place along Southern California's Pacific Crest Trail. An unexpected storm two days before left a dusting of snow on the trail.
Despite the snow, the hikers had extra motivation going into the Hike after hearing the experience of hiker Malanie Edward's family in their fight against children's cancer. In 2008, her nephew, Nathan, was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor. Despite his diagnosis, Nathan made sure to live every day to the fullest. He wrestled in school and traveled to Hawaii where he learned to surf. Malanie noted that, "Nathan became quite the spokesperson for an active teen living with cancer. He spoke at church, on the radio, and even had a segment on the evening news about having chemotherapy," Malanie told the group, "I'm here because I believe that it's my responsibility to honor Nathan's memory and to 'pay it forward'."
All 18 hikers worked as a team throughout the day and encouraged each other to cross the finish line. The Hike had an especially strong showing from the Children's Hospital Los Angeles, whose team included social worker Rosalind Grushkin and nurse Stana Bogojevic. In total, the 18 hikers raised more than $73,000 for children's cancer research.
Shelby GosnellCommunications Manager Email Shelby(240) 235-2205 | <urn:uuid:31466709-cbfb-4b96-a1e9-090638a98f86> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.curesearch.org/ArticleView2.aspx?id=9934&l=8814&c=7eb54f | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97005 | 347 | 1.75 | 2 |
Within hours, Eric could barely move. He was hospitalized, first at Kennedy Health System in Washington Township, then at Temple University Hospital.
After three months of chemotherapy, steroids, antibiotics, and other treatments - including a recurring procedure resembling dialysis, but for his lungs - Eric was discharged in May.
He returned to work at the Corps office in Center City (but not to the emergency response team) in August. And while there's no cure for HLH, Eric believes he's got it on the run.
"You can't be self-pitying," he says, walking slowly, but without the cane he despises, in the rural Gloucester County home he shares with Amanda, a geographic information system specialist and fellow Rowan University grad.
These days, the couple spend much of their spare time raising awareness of histiocytic disorders like HLH, in which the body so overproduces white blood cells that organs are damaged and tumors form.
Amanda maintains a website, www.ericsjourney.org, that's packed with information and inspiration and includes Eric's heartfelt blog. Family, friends, and organizations, including clubs at Rowan, are pitching in as well. Recent events sponsored by student groups within the College of Engineering raised $800.
"We're doing this . . . to support our recent civil engineering graduate, as well as to raise awareness of this rare disease," says Jacyln Navara, 22, a Rowan senior from Old Bridge, Middlesex County.
On Monday, a volunteer crew organized by Sarah Getting, 21, of Runnemede, arrived to repair the Majusiaks' kitchen floor. Rowan's College of Engineering is like family, and the Majusiaks "are very nice people," says Getting, also a senior. "It's incredible how well [Eric] is doing now."
"We are proud to be able to assist an alumnus in need, and provide knowledge about this disorder to the community," Steven Chin, interim dean of Rowan's College of Engineering, says via e-mail.
Jeff Toughill is president of the Histiocytosis Association ( www.histio.org) in Pitman.
"Eric's an amazing guy. He's what we call a 'histio warrior,' " Toughill says.
He and his wife, Sally, founded the organization in 1986 after their daughter, Bethany, developed the disease. She's now 30 and doing fine, but many histio disorders are fatal.
They're also rare. Only one in every 200,000 children develops Langerhans cell histiocytosis, the disease's most common form. Money for research is scarce, and "that's why raising awareness is so important," Toughill says.
When I visit the Majusiaks, I also meet their dogs, Buttercup and Bella. Tiger, the cat, stays out of view, but on display in the family room are hunting trophies and a duck decoy Eric was able to finish carving recently, now that he's gotten back the use of his fingers.
Their ordeal has taught the couple "to live life to the fullest," Amanda says.
"Don't let the little things bother you," adds Eric. "Don't let big things bother you. You don't know what's going to happen tomorrow.
"Today," he adds, "is a beautiful day."
Eric Majusiak talks about efforts to raise awareness of the disease that almost killed him: www.philly.com/eric
Contact Kevin Riordan at 856-779-3845 or email@example.com, or follow on Twitter @inqkriordan. Read the metro columnists' blog, "Blinq," at www.phillynews.com/blinq. | <urn:uuid:56f0c736-916c-47d4-a8fc-b8e8611e5edd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://articles.philly.com/2012-10-10/news/34343870_1_rare-disease-organs-disorder | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963394 | 796 | 1.625 | 2 |
Related: Theme Parks: Singapore - the Lion City roars in 2010/ ‘Live Park’, World’s First 4D Avatar Theme Park, Success In Korea/ Hong Kong: IAAPA's Asian Attractions Expo Reaches New Heights
By Thibault Paquin
Thibault Paquin (left) is the founder and principal of Celebrating Life Asia, an independent consultant and development company for the leisure & entertainment industry. He is also the managing director of iVenture Card Asia, which is operating attractions passes in Hong Kong, Macau and Singapore.
Originally from France Thibault holds an MBA from HEC Paris; he is an expert in hospitality and leisure development in Asia where he spent the last 10 years, partly with Accor Hospitality, between Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, South Korea, Vietnam, Singapore and Hong Kong.
All eyes are turned to Asia. A growing middle class and regional travel made easier foster a strong growth of the attractions industry. Now we take a closer look at the two regional magnets of Singapore and Hong Kong: how do they compare, compete and what role their attractions play in building two of the world’s top tourist destinations?
Singapore, the island state, managed a superb shift from what was once considered a ‘boring’ destination to one of the most exciting in Asia, with attractions playing a pivotal role. Back a few years ago the government decided to put tourism at the forefront of economic development. Huge budgets were allocated to build superior infrastructure (MTR, airport), promote the destination (advertising, events e.g. F1 Grand Prix) and develop its attractions: Singapore Flyer, Singapore Zoo, Sentosa all received government help. More recently Singapore used incentives to get private investors develop new world-class attractions, and there is no better incentive than a casino license! The result: arrivals to Singapore increased by 35% between 2006 and 2011 and Singapore’s attractions welcomed almost 50million visitors in 2011.
Bustling Hong Kong, on the contrary, never feared of being boring but had to manage a soaring increase of visitors from mainland China since 1997.The government decided to build two massive family attraction-destinations, Ocean Park and Hong Kong Disneyland, both with huge capacity and strong marketing appeal. HK$9.1billion (US$1.2billion) were spent in the last 5 years to expand both parks. Whether they ran out of budgets or thought that was enough (Hong Kong has many non-gated attractions/sights, e.g. The Peak, Victoria Harbour) the government did not support the development of smaller attractions made otherwise impossible due to the exorbitant real estate prices. The result: Hong Kong’s 2 theme parks welcomed 13million visitors in 2011 (of which more than 50% from Mainland China) but on the other hand the Hong Kong Association of Attractions and Amusement Parks formed earlier this year has only 7 founding members, so few for a city welcoming over 40million visitors!
Different visitors origins and different tourism development strategy produced two very different sets of attractions in Singapore and Hong Kong. When it comes to selling the destination as an ‘experience’, which seems to be the recent trend in destination marketing, Singapore will put forward a unique combination of star attractions along with star restaurants and retail outlets/shopping malls whereas Hong Kong will promote a more wholesome city experience based on neighborhoods, sightseeing and street shopping with theme parks as complementing family activities. Two very compelling ‘experiences’ indeed but the difference shows in the bottom line: average tourist spending was 40% higher in Singapore than Hong Kong last year!
The more the merrier
One thing the 2 cities have in common is acute competition, which results in healthy attendance growth. In the city-state of Singapore over 40 attractions managed to reach, through competition (or maybe is it coopetition?), a total of nearly 50million visitors in 2011. In Hong Kong, the ‘war’ between Ocean Park and Disneyland boosted overall theme park visitor numbers from only 3million before the arrival of Mickey to 13million in 2011.
Singapore has adopted an attractions hub strategy where it facilitates the concentration of attractions in identified precincts giving them more visibility and building sub-brands within the main Singapore brand: Mandai Lake with the famous Singapore Zoo, Night Safari, new River Safari coming soon and plans for hotels and other facilities; Sentosa with over 15 attractions, the new Resorts World Sentosa including Universal Studios Singapore, the Maritime Experiential Museum and Marine Life Park and a 2015-2020 master plan expected to take the island to a whole new level.
Further north, Hong Kong’s interpretation of hubs is a little more extreme with everything concentrated in two sprawling theme parks. Together with the Peak (where Madame Tussauds Hong Kong is located) they are the only world-class attractions really! Things might change as the Hong Kong Tourism Board is trying to promote Lantau Island as a sub-brand with Disneyland as an anchor. Also, on Hong Kong Island, the MTR station being built for Ocean Park will generate more consolidation opportunities.
Out with the old, in with the new?
Obsession with modernity on the one hand: first Disneyland in Asia for Hong Kong, first integrated casino resorts in Asia for Singapore, 2 new picture-perfect landmarks with Sky100 Hong Kong and Singapore Flyer proudly standing in the cities’ new skylines. Nostalgia and celebration of the ‘good old days’ on the other hand: Ocean Park opens the very popular Old Hong Kong bringing back the many fond memories of life in the '50s -'70s, Singapore Flyer adds old food carts, and more heritage-inspired attractions are in the planning (e.g. project at Ngong Ping 360 Village in Lantau and redevelopment of Images of Singapore in Sentosa).
So what to think? Are heritage and modernity aimed at pleasing different markets or is it maybe the sign these two destinations are established, proud of their identity/heritage but resolutely modern and forward thinking. Take the Louvres pyramid, a classic example of a modern twist on Paris ‘grande dame’ of museums.
Speaking of museums, it is interesting that both cities each have a very ambitious defining museum project. Hong Kong chose British architect Norman Foster to build the M+ Museum, which will “focus on 20th and 21st century visual culture, broadly defined, from a Hong Kong perspective and with a global vision”. Singapore went for French architect Studio Milou to build the National Art Gallery, which aim is to “strengthen Singapore’s role as a regional and international hub for visual arts”. It is not only about heritage; it is a race to take a regional and global leadership role in arts and culture. New York, Paris, London, watch out!
With tourist arrival growth of 13-16%, who would not be envious? So naturally both neighbours want a piece of the action. With Legoland Malaysia opening in September 2012 and Zhuhai (China) Ocean Kingdom opening its first phase in 2013 just 15min drive from Macau, it’s serious competition on the doorstep.
The question is how healthy this competition will be. If internal competition seemed to have worked and experts even refer to the beginning of an ‘Orlando’ phenomenon in Singapore, we can only wonder if it will work in a two-country environment. Is it in Singapore’s interest to push for a multi-park experience: Universal Studios Singapore + Legoland Malaysia? Will it increase the average tourist spend in Singapore? Is there a real potential of Orlando-style family tourism in Asia?
What’s in the future?
According to a report by the Association of Singapore Attractions (ASA) local residents made up 53.1% of the 50million attractions visit in 2011. It is the variety (over 40 attractions in Singapore) and quality of attractions that make them popular among local residents. There is something for every age and style; going to an attraction is a usual week-end/holiday activity and that makes good grounds for new operators to come in with innovative offering. Maybe this is where Hong Kong needs to start, with the local residents, if it wants to develop new attractions. The potential is there: 2.4million Hong Kong residents went to Ocean Park in 2011, that’s 34% of the total population!
On the tourist side, both Singapore and Hong Kong attractions are fighting for the same markets, which offer significant growth potential: China, South East Asia, India, etc. It is important that they differentiate and ‘stick’ to the destination for a sustainable impact.
- Home-grown - Take Singapore Zoo/Night Safari and Ocean Park, some of the most popular attractions in Asia; they are local darlings and they ‘personify’ the destination overseas. They have been built over time with strong local support and pride. They cannot be copied and that makes them great tourist assets. We want to see more of these in existing and future attractions hubs: Mandai Lake (River Safari), Sentosa, Jurong Lake in Singapore and Island South, Lantau in Hong Kong.
- Nature-based - Amazing lush island settings and increased global environmental awareness provide good grounds for nature-based attractions. What is coming next after the opening of Singapore’s Gardens by the Bay? With Marine Life Park and a water-based master plan for 2015-2020, we’d better watch towards Sentosa… As for Hong Kong, will the government change attitudes towards National Parks to allow for attractions? There’re operators ready with great concepts!
- Heritage - Celebrating the heritage of a place and its people has always been at the heart of every tourism development strategy. If it has recently taken a slightly more ‘nostalgia’ path, multiple other forms remain to be explored. We want to see more world-class and tourist oriented museums as well as cultural shows and new food-related concepts.
Hong Kong – Singapore: two fascinating attractions markets servicing two booming destinations. They compete, they build, they innovate, they thrive! Could we be looking at the next Paris – London? We quickly drew a parallel and found some staggering facts: giant Ferris wheel + numerous midway attractions + brand new studio attraction for London/Singapore vs. observation tower + numerous state-run museums + Disneyland for Paris/Hong Kong. Did we not say all eyes turned to Asia? | <urn:uuid:d696d523-9cbf-4dc1-abff-4c0a3a0e9a4a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.blooloop.com/Article/Singapore-v-Hong-Kong-Thibault-Paquin-Discusses-Asia-s-Attractions-Markets/339 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937143 | 2,174 | 1.71875 | 2 |
THERE are arguments for and against Bible studies at schools in Namibia. Those who are against Bible studies in Namibian schools are arguing that the constitution classifies Namibia as a secular State, therefore it is argued that it will not be appropriate to have the schools teach Bible studies.
They believe that teaching bible studies in schools will violate Article 1 (1) and Article 21 (b) (c) of the Namibian constitution and it will also not be acceptable to those who do not believe in any religion.
Those who are advocating the reintroduction of Bible studies are basically arguing that such studies will be necessary to help to prevent moral decay in the society.
They argue that such studies will minimize escalating crime as well as promote good behaviour among the citizens of this country.
Without going into the pros and cons of the two above arguments I would like to approach this issue from a different angle and argument.
There are many things that are told in schools the world over for pedagogic and academic purposes. Some subjects are taught in schools and universities not because people want to follow or introduce new ideas in the society, but as a reality of the situation and a recognition that some things did indeed happen as historical fact and reality.
For example a students may be taught about slavery and feudalism not because such practices are being taught with the intention to reintroduce them in the society.
No one can deny the fact that there was in the history of mankind a period of slavery and by teaching people that there was slavery, does not mean that the country wants to reintroduce slavery therefore in the case of Namibia the state is violating Article 9 of the constitution.
Religious belief has been accepted and practiced among the people of the world for thousands of years and nobody can deny that.
Namibia being a secular state does not mean that the religious beliefs ended with the coming into force of the Namibian constitution.
The doctrines of religion have been there since time immemorial, so are the churches and by not teaching such doctrines does not mean they will cease to exist.
The Bible has been there and is there whether anyone wants or not and so are the churches.
To teach what is in the Bible is to teach, among others, the reality of the existence of the faith of human beings, of human history, the belief of people in God.
One might not believe what is written in the Bible, but that will not make the Bib-le cease to exist or do away with people’s beliefs and faith.
Being a secular state does not mean that the Bible is outlawed or criminalized and as a historical reality the Bible is here to stay.
Since the Bible is not outlawed or criminalized in the secular Namibia there is nothing wrong in teaching what doctrine is contained in the Bible.
It is up to the individual to believe or not. If anybody believes what is written therein it is his or her freedom to do so.
If someone does not believe it is equally a free choice of that individual.
No one will be forced to believe or not to believe in the doctrines of the Bible in accordance with Article 21 (b) and (c) of the Namibian Constitution.
That is the essence of secularity but that does not mean that the historical existence of the doctrine of the Bible should be denied and people should not to be told what is written in the Bible.
I personally studied in the former USSR, among other countries, and I studied religious studies in the USSR as a historical subject although religion was not practiced in that country.
Some of the professors who were teaching us the history of religion were members of the Communist Party and did not believe in the Bible, but we were taught that subject as a historical reality and that there is a book called the Bible and such and such a doctrine can be found in it.
Therefore, the mere fact that the Bible can be taught in school does not turn the school into a church, but an academy where the existing historical reality is taught.
As I have said earlier, slavery is prohibited by Article 9 of chapter 3 of the constitution but as a historical reality and fact students can be taught about the fact that slavery did exist and that does not mean that such studies should not be permissible in schools.
As to the morality of the doctrines contained in the Bible – that is indeed, a subjective issue, based on principles concerning what is perceived to be good, right or wrong under the circumstances and should best be left to the judgment of the individual in a secular state.
It is indeed a subjective feeling of individuals based on and influenced by the acceptable and permissible patterns of behaviour of members of the wider society, a behaviour which ought to be in line with what is not offensive to the wellbeing of the people of that society.
Therefore I do not see that the mere fact that Namibia is a secular state as per the constitution, that there are any legal impediments to the teaching of Bible studies as a subject in schools and such teaching in schools should not be interpreted or considered to mean that people are forced to believe in what is written in the Bible.
It should be considered as teaching the existing reality that is above all, not criminalized - neither by the constitution nor by the laws of the country.
It will be up to the individual to be convinced or not to be convinced of what he/she is being told.
The consequence of whether one is convinced or not will be judged elsewhere! | <urn:uuid:86f9d221-7d25-4f77-a8ab-263227203994> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newera.com.na/articles/46836/The-issue-of-Bible-studies-in-schools | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974405 | 1,118 | 1.75 | 2 |
African Wildlife: Lions
Before going to Africa the first time, it was always my dream to take pictures of a lion in the wild. Taking pictures of lions is fun as they are very social and are the only big cats that remain together as family groups (prides). Lion photos can be interesting as a male or two will protect his pride against rogue males who are looking to take over a pride. If the rogue males succeed, lion pictures can be disturbing as they will kill all of the cubs, putting the females in estrus so they can produce their own offspring. Female lions hunt as a team and provide for the entire pride including the males. The males aren't always in immediate proximity of the pride, but when they are, they eat first and leave what is left over for the females and the cubs. Lion photos of the pride can provide a lot of interaction pictures between the adult lions and cubs. The interacton is great as I'm always looking for the ultimate lion picture.
I hope you enjoy my lion pics. These lions photographs were taken in South Africa and the Masai Mara.
Blogs from photographing lions in the Masai Mara: | <urn:uuid:ad4fb472-b2aa-4004-bff0-5a88ca776b4f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://harveywildlifephotography.ca/contents/African%20Wildlife/Lions/ | 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 | 0.968449 | 238 | 1.554688 | 2 |
The Rudd Government’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) will offer little help for the Central Queensland or Manufacturing industries, compared to their European counterparts, according to The Nationals Senator Ron Boswell.
Speaking in Mackay today, Senator Boswell said that “the European Commission’s recently stated position on carbon leakage will cause serious damage to Australian jobs and industry, especially in Central Queensland”.
“While Kevin Rudd and Penny Wong play their political games, Europe is quietly stabbing us in the back with their sham ETS, effectively handing out up to 100% free permits across 164 industrial sectors and sub-sectors.”
“Some of the sectors and sub-sectors which pursuant to Article 10a (13) of Directive 2003/87EC, are deemed to be exposed to a significant risk of carbon leakage include –
• Mining and agglomeration of hard coal
• Manufacture of cement
• Mining of chemical and fertilizer minerals
• Aluminium production
• Manufacture of steel tubes.”
This is just a sample of the industries which are being protected in the European ETS while their costs go up under the Australian ETS. It is easy to see who the losers will be.”
Senator Boswell said that “he worries about coal towns like Mackay, Dysart, Blackwater, Middlemount and Moranbah especially with the dour predictions this week by the Australian Coal Association that 16 Coal mines will close and more than 9000 direct and indirect jobs lost in the first nine years of the ETS.
“Already the Bowen Basin has lost 3,500 jobs in 12 months and Rockhampton has had a Cement Works mothballed. Central Queensland can’t afford to lose any more jobs.”
“Labor’s ETS is about closing down coal and running the economy on renewable power. It costs $40 per kilowatt hour to power a factory with coal, but it costs $100 per hour to power a factory with wind and $200 per hour to power a factory with photovoltaic cells. How on earth does Australia compete with those cost disadvantages?”
“The latest Newspoll shows that the Coalition’s two Party preferred vote outside capital cities has jumped to 51% which is higher than that vote at the last election.”
“Coalition Senators and Members in regional areas have been explaining how the ETS will hurt the regions and the message is getting through.”
“The ETS is finished in the bush and Labor politicians like James Bidgood, who supports it, risk losing their seats at the next Federal election.”
“The ETS represents damage to jobs and businesses particularly in regional areas and are rightly fearful of what it will mean to their jobs, families and communities.” | <urn:uuid:4bccc2d9-a2c2-460c-ae90-4e68980f7c66> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ronboswell.com/regional-communities/3136-rudd%E2%80%99s-ets-offers-little-help-for-cq-mining-or-manufacturing-5 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948956 | 588 | 1.703125 | 2 |
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