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Photograph by Melissa Farlow
It's not called a “tug” of memory for nothing: I’m outside Detroit’s railroad station, and I instantly recall my mother’s gloved hand pulling mine as we rushed through the vast atrium that was inspired by the imperial baths of ancient Rome. We are in a hurry to get somewhere, and Detroit is, too. Even a little boy in the mid-1960s notices the tempo. The Motor City is in motion. We build America’s cars. Thanks to Berry Gordy’s Motown, the world hums our songs. The city, fifth largest in the U.S. by population, is at the top of its game.
Today, Michigan Central Station still looks Roman, but it’s a Roman ruin. Closed since 1988 and stripped of valuables by vandals, or “scrappers,” the empty hulk symbolizes my old hometown’s decline, buckling beneath crime, corruption, and events such as the 1967 riots, the 1970s gas shortages, and the rise of Asian auto imports. My family, like others, moved away. A city of almost two million residents in 1950 shrank to 713,777 in 2010.
To visitors, Detroit’s attractions verged on the desperate: Three new casinos corralled gamblers inside windowless rooms; a desultory monorail circled downtown. The city’s collapse actually created a new business in “ruin porn,” as locals escorted tourists eager to experience the postapocalyptic atmosphere of decaying factories and abandoned offices.
But Detroit has been down so long, any change would be up. And “up” is why I’ve returned. Something’s happening in Michigan’s southeast corner. Call it a rising, a revival, a new dawn—there’s undeniable energy emanating from Detroit. America noticed it first at the 2011 Super Bowl. Chrysler debuted a TV commercial with rapper Eminem, star of the film 8 Mile (named after the road that serves as Detroit’s northern border). The ad crystallized the city’s spiky, muscular pride and won an Emmy, but Detroit was the real winner.
“This is the Motor City,” Eminem declared, “and this is what we do.” And, increasingly, Detroiters are doing: Working-class Latinos in Southwest, recent college grads in Midtown and New Center, and African-American professionals in Boston Edison are improving their neighborhoods. An expanding Detroit RiverWalk edges downtown, where corporations like DTE Energy, Quicken Loans, and Blue Cross Blue Shield have moved in thousands of workers. A favorite 1960s-era restaurant, the London Chop House, has announced its reopening. And that badge of gentrification, Whole Foods, plans to build a store in the inner city.
Even outsiders have started arriving, drawn by a sense of adventure. A new resident had told me: “If you visit Detroit, you’re an explorer. Be prepared for a rich, very soulful experience.”
A flashing red light jolts me back to the train station’s razor wire and rubble. A fire engine pulls up alongside me.
“Anything wrong, officer?” I ask, nervously. Maybe they think I’m a scrapper.
“Naaah,” says Ladder 28’s Capt. Robert Distelrath, with the backslapping, broad a’s of the Midwest. “Just checking things out. What are you doing?”
I tell him I’m here because I hear Detroit is coming back.
Distelrath grins. “There’s more to us than this train station. Go to Slows Bar BQ,” he says, pointing into Corktown, the neighborhood bordering the station. “The owner, Phillip Cooley, he’s at the center of a lot of things. He’s trying to bring Detroit back all by himself.”
It’s only 11 a.m., but Slows is full up for lunch. Customers crowd tables made of reclaimed timber. Waitresses serve sandwiches, the bun tops tilted backward to accommodate the pile of brisket heaped under them. Pints of beer and platters of waffle fries slathered in melted cheddar follow. No shy portions here.
“Detroiters don’t like fancy-pants food,” a local tells me. True that. It’s a town where you can still score a plate of eggs and hash browns for $2.50 (at Duly’s Place, a 24-hour diner on West Vernor), and where restaurants selling Coney Island hot dogs—invented in Michigan, despite the name—inspire intense loyalty.
Cooley isn’t around, but I can’t resist ordering a pulled pork. Afterward, I continue my search for the urban pioneer. I eventually find him down the street at a just opened coffeehouse called Astro.
Cooley, 33, is an unlikely city savior. The Michigan native and former Louis Vuitton model traded Milan’s fashion runways for Detroit’s pockmarked sidewalks to start a new life. He and his family opened Slows six years ago.
“We’ve got lots going on,” he admits. He’s lent his expertise to Astro and to Sugar House, a craft cocktail bar next door. He’s even helped finance and build a community parking lot.
Each new attraction becomes another beam for shoring up Corktown, a neighborhood of sagging factories, revitalized gingerbread Victorians painted in bright colors, and empty lots transformed into vegetable gardens.
“We’re a scoot-up-to-the-bar-we’ll-make-room sort of place. Everyone’s welcome,” Cooley tells me as we finish up our americanos. He’s talking about Slows, but he could be describing the city. “Detroit’s authentic,” he says. “It is a very unique city.”
I DISCOVER THE TRUTH OF COOLEY'S STATEMENT the next day, visiting Dearborn, the suburb that’s home to both automaker Ford’s world headquarters as well as a burgeoning Arab-American community. After touring the Arab American National Museum with my guide, Fay Saad, a native Michigander of Lebanese descent, I’m welcomed at Habib, a lavishly furnished Middle Eastern restaurant that does a brisk business in wedding, graduation, and birthday banquets.
“Our families are just like everyone else’s,” Saad says in the same hearty Midwest accent as fire captain Distelrath’s. She invites me to accompany her to Dearborn’s Islamic Center of America, the largest mosque in North America. She dons a head scarf as we enter the holy building. It’s quiet. Services aren’t being held. We head back downtown via busy Warren Avenue.
“It’s like a mini Beirut,” Saad says as we pass an Arab coffee roastery that fills the air with the smell of toasted beans. “And a mix of everything,” she adds, as I point to a sign touting the “Best Halal Pizza in Town!”
We stop at her favorite bakery, Shatila’s, where the counters groan with abundant varieties of baklava and honeyed dates and other sweets from Yemen, Syria, and Lebanon, and where the attendants chat sociably with the customers. Though many women wear head scarves and the conversation is often in Arabic, it’s as much Middle America as Middle East.
In fact, non-English migrants enjoy a long tradition here. Travelers often forget that Detroit was born as French as New Orleans. Founded in 1701 by Antoine Laumet de La Mothe Cadillac, Detroit shows its Gallic roots in street names such as Livernois, Cadieux, and Gratiot.
I visit another religious spot—the redbrick Ste. Anne de Détroit church, founded by Cadillac’s settlers and the second oldest continuously operating Roman Catholic parish in the United States. The church and its exterior plaza exude an Old World charm that mixes with the growl of the semis rumbling over the Ambassador Bridge to Windsor, Canada.
Such contrasts make up the Detroit terroir, the French concept for the characteristics of a region that impart a distinct flavor. Detroit is a welter of opposites—like Slows’s old-school smoked barbecue dished out in a hip setting. I visit Midtown, site of many of Detroit’s cultural gems, to tour the Detroit Institute of Arts. The DIA is a classical, white-frosted cake of a building that harbors Diego Rivera’s dynamic, colorful murals of the auto assembly lines. The murals were commissioned by Edsel Ford in 1932. Ford may have been a wealthy industrialist, but he hired a Mexican Communist to paint his workers.
While some of the city’s buildings are scruffy, others are gleaming again, especially the prewar skyscrapers. Detroit’s art deco towers make those in Miami’s South Beach look like anthills.
To get a feel for them, I take a tour with architectural historian Dan Austin. “Detroit has one of the largest collections of Roaring ’20s architecture anywhere in the country,” Austin says. “You’ll find them downtown, in the neighborhoods, in the suburbs.” He ticks off a series of greatest hits: “Fox Theatre, the Fisher Building, the Penobscot. And it’s not just art deco buildings, either—a town house development, Lafayette Park, is the largest collection of mid-century modernist Mies Van Der Rohe residences in the world.”
Austin is explaining this as we approach the 40-story Guardian Building. Built in a damn-the-expenses manner, this 1929 tower is machine-age bravado in stainless steel, marble, and nearly two million tangerine-colored bricks. “I like to call it ‘holy cow’ architecture,” says Austin, as we push through the heavy glass doors and enter the lobby. “You see it and say—”
“Jesus!” I gawk at the vaulted space rising five stories above the 60-foot-long lobby. This interior would not be out of place in Oz. The ceiling is finished in an Aztec-inspired design of Technicolor tile hexagons. The walls and floors are clad in rare Numidian and travertine marbles. A decorative metal grill with a Tiffany glass clock in its center separates the lobby from the onetime banking hall. I make a feeble attempt to capture the dazzling beauty on my iPhone’s camera. But not even Apple’s ingenuity can do this place justice.
Other architectural beauties are getting makeovers as well. DoubleTree by Hilton has reopened the Fort Shelby hotel. The revamped, 34-story Broderick will rent apartments to downtown office workers.
“It’s an art to update an old building yet stay true to the spirit of the original,” says Bradley McCallum, who helps manage the Westin Book Cadillac, one of Detroit’s premier hotels, which reopened in 2008 following a $200 million renovation.
McCallum and I are dining later in the day at Roast, chef Michael Symon’s restaurant in the Book Cadillac. I’m working on a Rock City burger, topped with bleu cheese, caramelized onions, and the restaurant’s signature savory “zipp” sauce, and keeping tabs on the hive of activity. An elegant couple, the woman in silvery lamé, swan past us to their table in the buzzing main room. Outside, on Washington Boulevard, a Hollywood film crew is shooting a scene. Klieg lights dazzle like diamonds. “I think New York has a bit of a crush on Detroit,” McCallum remarks. Hard to believe nightlife in this town was once so moribund visitors would drive to Grosse Pointe, a plaid-and-preppy suburb, for fun.
I end up at Café d’Mongo’s Speakeasy with McCallum and an ever growing crowd of hipsters, artists, and night crawlers. The bartenders serve up ribs and cocktails that mix Captain Morgan rum with Faygo, a local soda pop that Detroiters seem to guzzle with everything.
It’s the far side of midnight. Maybe it’s the rock-and-roll shaking the speakers, or maybe it’s the Faygo cocktail. I’m tired. I say my goodbyes and head for bed. I have a big day tomorrow. I am going to circumnavigate an emerald.
The jewel is Belle Isle, Detroit’s grandest, greenest park, designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, who also designed New York’s Central Park. I’m exploring Belle Isle’s 5.5-mile ring road by bike, an easy choice given the city’s flapjack-flat topography and the creative tours by Wheelhouse, a start-up bike shop located on the city’s new RiverWalk. Co-owner Kelli Kavanaugh rattles off the list of guided rides: “We do automotive heritage, haunted Detroit, architecture tours—did you know we were a huge station on the Underground Railroad? We’ll take you to historic districts like Indian Village on the east side. Detroit’s got great things, and it has problems. We show you both.”
I set off with 15 people around the 982-acre island, pedaling a tough single-speed Kona. Set in the middle of the Detroit River and connected to the city by a single bridge, Belle Isle looks a bit scrubby. Tour guide Pat Ahrens talks frankly about the park’s lack of money but also tells about the groups working to solve that. We glide past steamship enthusiasts coming to the Dossin Great Lakes Museum, South Asians playing cricket, and picnickers grilling their burgers to hip-hop. The island’s charms—a botanical garden and conservatory, an art deco marble lighthouse, the prestigious Detroit Yacht Club, and the stunning views of Canada and downtown—explain the draw.
Returning to RiverWalk, we take the Dequindre Cut Greenway, a 1.35-mile-long below-grade railroad track the city has turned into a bike path stretching from the river almost to Eastern Market. I make a note to myself to visit the market later, on a Saturday.
I was just a kid when I last saw Eastern Market, but it’s very much alive—thriving, in fact. But it’s no temple to precious foodstuffs; it’s a working produce and meat showroom, supporting 250 independent merchants and vendors whose offerings attract 40,000 shoppers every Saturday morning (and Tuesdays in the summer and fall).
It’s already crowded when I arrive at 9 a.m. The smells of melon and cider hang in the air as I weave my way past forklifts trundling bags of onions. Chalk-lettered signs tout smoked lake trout and white perch, Red Haven peaches, green wax beans, and sweet corn. As I walk past Dave Wilson, the hirsute flower seller in stall 468, he calls out in a voice so clear it cuts through the hubbub: “Good morning! Good morning! Oh yeeeaaah!”
Wilson sounds like a herald for a new city. Detroit’s problems are still big ones. I heard plenty about corruption and red tape, but it’s the context of the complaining that’s important. People are trying to get things accomplished, rebuilt, reborn.
In Detroit it seems natural I fall into conversation about these things with a friendly stranger in the market parking lot. Thomas Page, 62, is a retired Los Angeles cop wearing a T-shirt that says, “Detroit: The Fun Side of 8 Mile.”
Born and raised here, he left southern California to move home. After my discoveries, I’m not surprised when he tells me he hasn’t looked back.
“Detroit’s never going to have the weather,” he admits. “But in the last six months I’ve seen more change than what’s taken place in the last five years. We’re revving our engines. Detroit’s moving again.”
“Good morning!” I hear the flower seller, his voice rising above the din. “Oh yeeeaaah!”
New Orleans–based writer Andrew Nelson and photographer Melissa Farlow last teamed up for the feature “Tweet Me in Miami” in the April 2010 issue.
Shop National Geographic | <urn:uuid:88490834-40ac-477f-9e65-4abe8b9f3993> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/city-guides/detroit-traveler/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.929934 | 3,675 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Walnuts and Its Health Benefits
Come winter and markets are abuzz with nuts and dried fruits. Walnut is always associated with a small hammer my mom used to sit with and break the hard shells off this wonder food. The reason I avoided eating walnuts during my childhood days. I was more for pine nuts with thin and delicate shells.
Now that there is good quality of shelled walnuts available in the market, this health nut is a must in my pantry especially in the baking goodies.
Composition: The inside kernel of walnut with all the folds and curves, resembles the anatomy of human brain. The shell is hard or delicate depending upon the variety of walnuts.
- Omega 3 the key component present in this wonder nuts is what has made this nut a very sought after food. Omega 3 is a type of essential oil which our body cannot produce by itself.
- The presence of Omega 3 makes walnuts a great food for curing many cardiovascular diseases.
- Good against high blood pressure and type 2 diabetes.
- Omega 3 helps curing many skin diseases and is anti inflammatory in nature.
- The anti oxidant Ellagic acid in walnuts is good against cancer and improves the immune system.
- Walnuts are an excellent source of vitamin E.
- The other important minerals present in walnuts are calcium, copper, manganese, potassium, zinc, selenium etc.
- Walnuts have folate and Vitamin B6 in it.
- Another important health source in walnuts in the presence of monounsaturated fats in it. This in turn helps control the cholesterol levels and many heart diseases.
- Thus eating a handful of nuts can reduce weight gain.
Prudent ways to include walnuts in your diet;
- Easy and trouble free way is to have it straight from the shell, as it is.
- Roast the walnuts slightly in a skillet or oven and crush it. Sprinkle the same over your morning healthy breakfast porridge.
- Sprinkle crushed walnuts over you veggies salads to give a crunchy texture to it.
- Make a healthy breakfast by sprinkling the roasted and crushed walnuts over a cup of fresh yogurt and honey.
- Sprinkle them over sautéed veggies.
- Make a dip by grinding walnuts, herbs and some boiled lentils together.
- Walnut butter could be a great spread for sandwiches and pita bread.
- Add the nuts in the mixture for making granola for the kids.
- Baked recipes get a makeover with the addition of chopped and crushed walnuts. Bread, cakes, muffins and walnut cookies are a delicacy.
- Just a tablespoon of crushed walnuts over your favorite ice-cream or dessert can make it taste heavenly.
- The essential oil in the walnuts get rancid very soon. The kernels should be stored in a refrigerator for more shelf life.
- People allergic to nuts should take advice from their physician before consuming walnuts.
- Avoid walnuts which are stored for very long, as it may taste bitter.
- A handful of these nuts is good enough for getting the most out of this wonder food – Walnuts. | <urn:uuid:c8e39c10-99c9-45dc-bf28-185cfdbdcf3a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://litebite.in/walnuts-health-benefits/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930967 | 662 | 2.828125 | 3 |
Sometimes it can be difficult to see lemurs up close since they of course are 'wild' animals and most species tend to live high up in the trees. At Anja park, a small park close to Ambalavao, some families of ring tailed lemurs have been living around a local village for a long time. A fady (Madagascar taboo, which can be any kind of local rule) forbidding them to be hunted has protected them here and the villagers have now turned the area into a local visitor park protecting the animals even more and creating a good income for the village. Since the lemurs live close to the people in this forest, they are used to you roaming around and taking photos. It is a great chance to observe them for a longer time, eating and lounging in the trees and if your are lucky, sunbathing on the ground. | <urn:uuid:28eefc73-8a32-40b3-8370-d8fdbbed6154> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.globespots.com/places.php?country=madagascar | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00056-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960107 | 182 | 2.46875 | 2 |
Marketing Considerations for Consumer Acceptance of Stereo Audio for Television and Video
New product and businesses tend to follow traditional patterns of market development. During the early phases, a great deal of uncertainty exists which can result in the development cycle being perterbated in time. Market research and behavior of system operators, advertisers, distributors and users guides the development and timely refinements of the second and third generation products. Interpretation of user wants and conveniences provide feedback to the product planners and design engineers. This iterative process takes place in a dynamic, competitive marketplace which yields to the pressure of the buyers and users.
Click to purchase paper or login as an AES member. If your company or school subscribes to the E-Library then switch to the institutional version. If you are not an AES member and would like to subscribe to the E-Library then Join the AES!
This paper costs $20 for non-members, $5 for AES members and is free for E-Library subscribers. | <urn:uuid:117544c5-cebb-4f6f-8aa6-4010cd08d63b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.aes.org/e-lib/browse.cfm?elib=4678 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937297 | 203 | 1.59375 | 2 |
A digest of important news from sources selected by our local editors. Delivered weekday mornings.
Volta Industries launched a new program Friday with the goal of helping Hawaii nonprofit organizations to get the word out about their missions.
The program, called Awareness Powered by Volta, will give nonprofits free advertising space on Volta’s electric vehicle charging station kiosks — a marketing opportunity that many nonprofits today can’t afford on tight budgets.
“We are installing 10 new, free charging stations at locations around Oahu this quarter, and felt it only right to give back by offering some of this advertising space gratis to deserving community groups,” CEO Scott Mercer said in a statement. “Oahu has so many worthwhile nonprofits that operate on small budgets and marketing dollars are often non-existent.”
The program will give $3,000 worth of advertising space to one nonprofit and $900 worth of space to a runner-up.
Arden Penton, Volta’s director of marketing, said the company is looking to select nonprofits that show a strong dedication to giving back to the local community, whether its through labor services or environmental work.
Nonprofits can apply for the contest online by Feb. 22. Volta Industries will select three semi-finalists. From there, the public will vote for the final two winners on Volta’s Facebook page between March 1 and March 15.
“The nonprofits can compose their own ad so they have creative leeway,” Penton explained. “We will print them and install them. They’re going to be set-up for the short-term, but we’ve also talked about using them as fillers so they could potentially go out multiple times throughout the year.”
Is Honolulu Mayor Kirk Caldwell's approach to addressing the issue of homelessness by providing shelter before tackling problems such as substance abuse or mental illness the right way to go? | <urn:uuid:7b371da0-08de-4e63-b756-4530f7da17b8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bizjournals.com/pacific/blog/2013/02/volta-industries-to-give-nonprofits.html?ana=RSS&s=article_search&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+bizj_pacific+%28Pacific+Business+News+of+Honolulu%29 | 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 | 0.950254 | 402 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Architect: Francesc Daniel Molina
A fine nineteenth century square inserted into the fabric of the old town. The buildings with their identical facades have arcaded ground floors and ironwork balconies. Several entrances to the square lead the pedestrian through narrow passageways through the arcade and into the large central square. Antoni Gaudi is believed to have designed the lampposts in the centre of the square. | <urn:uuid:c046b4f6-e64b-4434-8898-26fe6ad25b32> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://archiseek.com/2009/1859-placa-de-reial-barcelona/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952893 | 85 | 1.671875 | 2 |
Topic review (newest first)
- 2005-06-09 21:44:23
Ha ... ha.
Actually I kinda like my solution. But because I invented it without a real deep understanding of Markov Chains I didn't want to say "trust me - this'll work".
maths_buff/kris was the owner of rover and has now gone bust and i blame rod
- 2005-05-28 18:27:04
No update as of yet....
Still working within the problem.
Hopefully other members will have some interesting ideas.
- 2005-05-27 23:14:32
It matters and it doesn't matter; after six years it doesn't matter because on average everyone will have a new car. But it terms of after 8 years, that the questionable part. Perhaps 99% of the population buys their car in that year.
Remember that we're only worrying about current large car owners who'll have a large car in eight years time.
I will try and fiddle with it because as long as the elements in each row add to 1, I can indicate what I did is correct.
I'll wait and see what other forum members say.
Once again, MathsIsFun, thank you!
- 2005-05-27 23:06:07
Indeed, if you are looking at one car owner, he will be on his "6 Year car" even after 8 years !
But we are looking at a large population here, I imagine, who are changing their cars every day.
Possible future for Large Car Owners (Year 0,3 and 6):
The question is for just one car owner, though. But it does not say how long the owner has had his present car.
So, he/she may exchange his car later today! Or not for 3 years.
- 2005-05-27 22:59:57
Here's another theory I have:
Large [ 0.60 0.40 ]
Small [ 0.25 0.75 ]
There are two possible ways for a large car owner to own a large car in six years:
A) Someone has a large car now, buys a large car after three years, buys another large car after six years
B) Someone has a large car now, buys a small car after three years, buys another large car after six years
Therefore the probability is P(LL)P(LL) + P(LS)P(SL) = 23/50 like I suspected.
Maybe it's wrong; maybe it's right. ???
- 2005-05-27 22:51:20
It's funny because there are two ways of doing it, viz:
Which one do you think sounds better?
- 2005-05-27 22:35:47
Just for Fun, I worked out that matrix "P" where
P^3 = [0.6 0.25]
It is (approximately):
So, what is P^6 ?
And P^8 is:
And P^9 is
There is some drift due to calculation accuracy, but if you worked P out more accurately you may have something workable. But there may well be a rigorous way to do this rather than my "hey, lets use Excel and see what we get" approach
- 2005-05-27 21:21:42
I can see your point MathsisFun, I can see it indeed.
But would that limit accuracy? Because I believe the transition matrix refers to three year intervals only. I will type the question word-for-word to clarify things.
"Market analysis in a certain region has established that, on average, a new car is purchased every three years. With respect to those changing cars, the buying patterns are described by the matrix:
Large [ 60% 40% ]
small [ 25% 75% ]
a) Rewrite the matrix as a probability matrix
b) Find the probability that a person who now owns a large car will own a large car in eight years' time."
- 2005-05-27 20:27:51
OK, well, we still have your "8 year" problem ...
... you could cheat and work out the probabilites at 6 and 9 and ratio in between.
Or, you could work out an equivalent matrix that works on 1 year intervals.
In other words, what is the Matrix "P" where:
P^3 = [0.6 0.25]
(This is just an off-the-cuff idea, may not be rigorous)
- 2005-05-27 20:25:22
Yeah, thank you very much. I had seen that some people did that, whilst other examples didn't.
- 2005-05-27 20:21:20
Markov chains are not my specialty, I am hoping that Milos or one of the other members is better versed in these than I am.
Having said that, I think your probability matrix needs to be transposed:
S = L [ 0.6 0.25 ]
S [ 0.4 0.75 ]
So, if someone owns a large car at time 0 we will have
x(0) =
at time 1 (3 years hence):
x(1) = [ 0.6 0.25 ] = [0.6]
[ 0.4 0.75 ] [0.4]
at time 2 (6 years hence):
x(2) = [ 0.6 0.25 ]^2 = [ 0.46 0.3375 ] = [0.46]
[ 0.4 0.75 ] [ 0.54 0.6625 ] [0.54]
(Which has the values you had already mentioned)
- 2005-05-27 19:59:00
After six years I know the respective probabilities are....
[ 23/50 27/50 ]
[ 27/80 53/80 ]
So after six years the probability of someone currently owning a large car and still owning one is 23/50 or 46%.
- 2005-05-27 19:38:13
I am enquiring as to a series of Markov Chains questions I have.
I have come across a question that says market analysis has established that, on average, a new car is purchased every three years. Buying patterns are described by the matrix:
Large[ 60% 40% ]
Small[ 25% 75% ]
Am I correct in saying that the probability matrix can be re-written as....
S = L [ 0.6 0.4 ]
S [ 0.25 0.75 ]
In addition, how would I calculate the probability of someone owning a large car still owning a large car in eight years' time, considering that the problem itself deals with car purchases every three years on average? | <urn:uuid:c37d58a7-92cc-4dba-b4ff-2c7ac3a56e4f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mathisfunforum.com/post.php?tid=712&qid=6470 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963123 | 1,446 | 1.765625 | 2 |
Iraq signed a Memorandum of Understanding in Baghdad with Royal Dutch Shell to make a technical and economic feasibility study to set up a huge petrochemical plant in Iraq.
“Iraq has a big vision to cope with the big leaps in the oil sector in the coming few years through the use of the natural gas reserves to develop the Iraqi industry and to benefit from these materials to produce the basic materials for the petrochemical industries,” Mohammad Abdullah, undersecretary of ministry of industry for companies affairs, said during the ceremony of signing the memo.
“There is a high level of coordination with the oil ministry regarding providing the raw materials necessary for the petrochemical industries and the nitrogen fertilizers,” he added.
“The project will contribute in offering job opportunities for a large number of people and will
decrease the unemployment rate,” the Iraqi official noted.
Iraq has ambitious plans to develop its huge southern oil fields – potentially the world’s biggest source of new oil over the next few years – and few oil firms dare risk being barred from such a bonanza by angering Baghdad. | <urn:uuid:58bbcd2d-bbaa-4f15-9016-f0c8dfb3310f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://iraqoil.biz/2012/04/17/iraq-signs-deal-with-shell-to-set-up-huge-petrochemical-plant/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941141 | 231 | 2.09375 | 2 |
Get flash to fully experience Pearltrees
Burn calories before you jump in the shower with this bodyweight circuit from Craig Ballantyne, C.S.C.S.
One-legged squats don't seem very tricky—after all, you did manage to pick up that cotton ball you dropped without putting your newly pedicured foot on the floor—but squatting on one leg seriously challenges your balance. It also activates your core and just about every other muscle in your lower body, including your glutes, hamstrings, and calves. Try it: Stand holding your arms straight out in front of your body and raise your right leg off the floor.
We offer a range of exercise training programs covering arms, legs, abs and shoulders.
Welcome to video two on watchp90xonline, this video will cover plyometrics.
Generally, fall is a time to put on that snuggling weight. You know what I mean, right? Those extra few pounds around the middle that we all say are to "keep us warmer," but are actually because we're not as active, we eat more, and we can easily hide behind those loosely-fitting fall clothes and big comfy sweaters.
The best type of exercise to burn unhealthy belly fat is aerobic exercise, according to a new study.
A great tip is an awesome thing.
Instead of Running (679 calories at a pace of 11 minutes per mile)...
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Lunges With your feet hip-width apart, take a large step forward with your left foot.
Each move in this circuit by Keli Roberts -- who's trained stars from Kirstie Alley to Cher -- tones several trouble spots at once.
Ab Exercise Tips
Everyone wants flatter abs, and a lot of people try to “spot reduce” by doing ab exercises to try to get them. The problem is, you aren’t going to lose fat from your midsection by doing 1,000 crunches. | <urn:uuid:0c8417b3-d586-40ca-a691-84ce7369911c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pearltrees.com/marissacullen/exercise/id3248514 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936792 | 441 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Facebook has acknowledged that it hired a prominent PR firm to promote a negative story line about Google. The bid backfired when journalists discovered that Facebook was the real promoter.
Facebook acknowledged that it hired a prominent public-relations firm to promote a negative story line about Google. It was supposed to be kept quiet that Facebook was the client behind the PR pitch.
The bid backfired when, rather than running with the story from PR firm Burson-Marsteller, journalists dug into the promotion and discovered that Facebook was the real promoter. The result: egg on the face, or worse, for a social-networking company that has already had its share of negative publicity. The incident also tarnishes Burson-Marsteller.
But beyond the immediate ruckus, the fouled-up media campaign points to a serious battle between fast-growing Facebook and Google over who will be the Web's preeminent domain.
Let's just say that Facebook hasn't pushed its "like" button for Google. And when Google recently launched its competing "+1" button, it wasn't with the idea of helping its users friend Facebook.
On the surface, the rivalry may seem needless. Facebook runs a social network. Google helps people search for online information. Each can be profitable in separate spheres, so can't they get along?
It's a little like the old "Oklahoma!" song that says the farmer and the cowman should be friends. Both companies do different things, but like farmers and ranchers, they also compete for resources. In this case, it's not land or water, but audience: the time people spend online and the advertising revenue that can go with that.
Google is a big provider of social services including e-mail, as well as a go-to source for content like news. Similarly, Facebook has become a major platform for people to share news and information and has launched partnerships designed to carve into Google's dominance in online searches.
Fairly or unfairly, Google enjoys the better reputation – although both have been criticized for eroding user privacy with little notice.
Facebook has fought back over the past year with policies to give users more influence over how much of their personal information becomes public.
The latest incident is a PR setback – even though, ironically, Facebook's goal was to draw attention to Google policies that it viewed as improper. Employees of Burson-Marsteller promoted the idea that a Google service called Social Search is mining people's personal information and sharing it without their knowledge or consent. (Google and some third-party analysts say the service doesn't tread on privacy.)
“No ‘smear’ campaign was authorized or intended," Facebook said in a statement given Thursday to the technology website Search Engine Land. "Instead, we wanted third parties to verify that people did not approve of the collection and use of information from their accounts on Facebook and other services for inclusion in Google Social Circles" – a feature of the Social Search tool.
For its part, Burson-Marsteller issued a statement of regret Thursday. "The client requested that its name be withheld on the grounds that it was merely asking to bring publicly available information to light and such information could then be independently and easily replicated by any media," the firm said. "Whatever the rationale, this was not at all standard operating procedure and ... should have been declined."
A recent Harris Interactive poll found that Google had the best reputation of 60 large companies. In the annual survey of US adults, Google moved from third place to first, while Facebook was ranked No. 31.
Then again, Facebook's effort at planting negative stories about its rival may not be rare in the fast-moving and high-stakes world of technology. It's not unusual, say high-tech insiders, for firms to seek to influence the news media to cast competitors in an unfavorable light.
"[W]hat stands out about this case is that Facebook went after Google in such an underhanded way over such a weak claim, and that it failed in its efforts so publicly," writes Eric Eldon for the news website Inside Facebook. | <urn:uuid:b30e87d3-faf4-497b-b02c-13010081b927> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://m.csmonitor.com/USA/2011/0513/Facebook-trashes-Google-why-they-don-t-like-each-other | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967168 | 840 | 1.765625 | 2 |
About a year ago, thanks to the kind introduction of our mutual friend, Bob Glazer, I was introduced Dr. Mindy Gewirtz. Mindy is an executive coach . . . plus a whole host of other things that will be revealed in the paragraphs that follow. Before I met Dr. Gewirtz, I had a very limited and stereotypical picture in my mind of “executive coaching.” I used to think about an executive coach as “Joe the Plumber” - fixing a leak and cleaning up a mess. I thought a coach was called in only when there was a significant hole in an executive’s performance or leadership that needed to be plugged.
Over the past year, as Mindy and I have met on a regular basis, I have begun to see executive coaching as an iterative process – a framework in which to discuss opportunities to be pursued, problems to be solved or dreams to be dreamed that were never before imagined. Coaching provides tools and strategies for making all of these possibilities a reality; it helps prune away the dead branches to make way for new growth. My coach teaches me to ask myself the tough questions, and to consider what I can do differently or more effectively. I now have the handles to open drawers that were shut tight and new hooks to safely hang my thoughts while I try on new ways to think about things differently. It is like “putting the cookies on a lower shelf,” so what I am feeling is then accessible. As a result, I now find myself thinking more strategically as I go forward - whether propelling my business or balancing my life.
So what does an executive coach do?
- S/he creates an interactive process which involves acting as non-judgmental sounding board.
- S/he provides accountability. Think of the process as an amalgamation of having a really good therapist, and a personal board of directors rolled into one.
- S/he provides a process that helps to integrate the person with the professional.
- The really effective coach gives permission to and empowers the executive to interject his or her humanity, personality, temperament and value system into the organization, thereby removing and breaking down artificial barriers.
Coaching is like painting lanes on the highway, to make the traffic of one’s life flow more effectively and with fewer unfortunate collision or traffic jams!
What are the characteristics of a good coach?
- There has to be good chemistry and fit.
- Look for authenticity, trust, unconditional positive regard and a willingness to ask searching questions in a non-threatening way.
- Someone who believes in your ability to change, to discover the ideas within you to propel you forward, in your business and your life.
What is the secret sauce that makes coaching so special?
- Coaches helps leaders to “get on the balcony” to gain perspective in context of business s/he is running, the transition process from one career to the next, the worry about the unpredictability of the economy.
- Your coaching relationship can be your safe haven to think about the long term, away from the day to day chaos. There can be almost a spiritual dimension that adds humanity to the professional persona.
- Think about having a partner to walk along side you, as you machete the unchartered territory in the rain forest of your dreams as you proceed on your internal treasure hunt.
As a reader of the White Rhino Report, how would I know if I am the right person to call Mindy?
- Whether you are in the military transitioning to the business world, or whether you are on Wall Street, or in a university or non-profit system there is a common thread of internal and external navigation: within yourself, your team and even across organizations.
- Are you in a new position of leadership?
- Are you leading others during this turbulent time?
- Are you now required to do something game-changing that is challenging to you?
- Is the current economic crisis forcing you to think differently about your career or business
- Are you ready to do something about where you are - not just talk about it?
- Would having a resource like this allow you to be less “frozen” and think more creatively and effectively about your business.
If your answer to one of more of these questions is a resounding “Yes,” then I encourage you to consider meeting with Mindy to assess whether establish a coaching relationship makes sense. To shift metaphors that come to us from the recent Presidential election and its aftermath, I no longer think of a coach as “Joe the Plumber.” I think of a coach as my personal “Transition Team,” helping me to line up resources to bring about needed change and a fresh approach to the governance of my enterprise.
Yes, we can!
Dr. Mindy Gewirtz | <urn:uuid:c8a59d38-d1ed-473a-a2ea-f36ab5cbb044> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://whiterhinoreport.blogspot.com/2008/11/what-does-joe-plumber-have-to-do-with.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96091 | 1,014 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Protests. I am hesitant to weave through the crowds at Town Hall after work, but I am curious. Patriotic music echoes. Head aches. Black and white corporates assembled. Signage in English, a language that a fraction of the population speaks. Who are these signs intended for?
No War Crimes in Sri Lanka, Look Elsewhere
Don’t Be Mislead by Terrorists, Listen to the People
All Sri Lankans Hate Violence.
Help Sri Lankans Live As One Nation
They are mostly young. Women in sunglasses fan themselves, shading their faces from the evening sun. Men in ties tote corporate banners photographing. They link arms and grin for photo after photo. Amateur photographers armed with camera phones click. Pose. Click. Pose. Click. New profile pictures are buzzed off into cyberspace. Such amusement, it could have been a cricket match. A confusion of slogans and Sri Lankan flags wrapped on their heads or shoulders as a sign of respect, perhaps?
A mockery of the three decades of life that was lost to the island unfolds. Its suffering reduced down to an ideological pissing contest between geopolitical overlords and Third World underlings. These puppets revel, they cry ‘NO to war crimes and NO to Western Conspiracies’. I wish I could ask them to define both.
Estimates of the war’s casualties range from 80,000-100,000. The numbers from its later phase remain hotly contested. Ranging from 40,000 as suggested by international observers to the government’s ever-fluctuating numbers between 0 – 1,400 – 3,500 – 5000. Perhaps, we will never know save for those of us who knew real loss then, of family or friends. Real people with names and faces, who were loved and mourned for.
In May 2009, when the government confirmed its military victory over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) following months of intense fighting, it also left an estimated 300,000 civilians displaced. Housed in welfare camps, Sri Lanka‟s internally displaced population faced a devastating humanitarian crisis riddled with critical predicaments of nutrition and sanitation. According to the United Nations’ Joint Humanitarian and Early Recovery Update as late as September 2011 (well over 2 years after the end of the armed conflict), 7534 internally displaced persons remained in camps waiting to return to their areas of origin, while 384, 401 people returned to the Northern Province (UNOCHA, 2011). A few thousand still remain suspended in the limbo of internal displacement. A bloodied past, a purgatorial present and an uncertain future.
They protest in vehement denial, so unabashed about their heritage, their pride, their arrogant patriotism. Sri Lankans, they roar! Yet I wonder what they have done to earn this glory besides hold up a placard, wrapping a flag around their heads and choosing sides in a game they have not even bothered to understand.
By denying the realities of the war they deny the existence, the humanity of those victims whose lives will forever be shaken in ways they cannot ever comprehend. They forget or ignore the uphill battle left in revising policy and discriminatory practices so deeply engrained in Sri Lanka’s social fabric. They deny thousands of fellow Sri Lankans equality of citizenship by decrying their tenuous present and horrific experiences are fictions concocted by the international humanitarian apparatus.
I wonder why such public gusto, such concern has not been channelled towards pressuring an internal mechanism for fostering reconciliation, to push through necessary policy documents that still stutter between ministries and attitudes towards inclusion, integration and the sustainable peace we as a nation owe to those civilians who fought and survived three decades of war.Not just those of us who were touched by a history of bleak news reports and the lurking fear of a bomb blast in the city, but those who have lost far too much for words or tears.
The LLRC even with its apologist contradictory wording and repetitive lip-service calls for changes that need speedy implementation. In the very words of the polemic resolution there exists,
‘.. The need to credibly investigate widespread allegations of extra-judicial killings and enforced disappearances, demilitarize the north of Sri Lanka, implement impartial land dispute resolution mechanisms, re-evaluate detention policies, strengthen formerly independent civil institutions, reach a political settlement on the devolution of power to the provinces, promote and protect the right of freedom of expression for all and enact rule of law reforms..’
Are these protestors denying the existence of these realities and the interlinked need for changes? How many of them even bothered read the LLRC, or even this resolution they are so opposed to?
The resolution passes and the sentiments pendulum between unapologetic apathy and ignorant rage. I am disgusted, as hate is spewed towards the United States and India. A cricketing rivalry with the latter turned vitriolic against its supportive stance on the resolution. India raised the LTTE, someone announces to cyberspace. Or perhaps it was such anger and ignorance directed at a section of our own people.
Implementation with technical assistance, the resolution calls. Sri Lanka is indignant, bitter, even. Its pissing contest against the galactic empire lost, even with the support of China’s rebel force.
The rage, the ignorance the horrific claims that clutter my virtual world sadden and disgust me as I see more protesters still uncertainly lurking at Town Hall.The conflation of anti-US sentiment with the purpose of the resolution thickens.
G.L Peiris states,
‘The most distressing feature of this experience is the obvious reality that voting at the Human Rights Council is now determined not by the merits of a particular issue but by strategic alliances and domestic political issues in other countries which have nothing to do with the subject matter of a Resolution or the best interests of the country to which the Resolution relates. This is a cynical negation of the purposes for which the Human Rights Council was established.
Many countries which voted with Sri Lanka were acutely conscious of the danger of setting a precedent which enables ad hoc intervention by powerful countries in the internal affairs of other nations. This is a highly selective and arbitrary process not governed by objective norms or criteria of any kind. The implications of this were not lost on many countries.
As far as Sri Lanka is concerned, our policy in respect of all matters will continue to be guided by the vital interests and wellbeing of the people of our country. It hardly requires emphasis that this cannot yield place to any other consideration.’
Perhaps what we as a Nation, should be concerned with instead is our grave need for introspection and realising what passive crimes occur each day through our own choice of ignorance, apathy and prejudice in the name of a misguided patriotism.
Knowing that I am not alone in my sentiments however, comforts me.
Perhaps there is hope? Perhaps. | <urn:uuid:42bbd90e-9a5b-41a3-94cf-6363076d8a0f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://laphantasmagorie.wordpress.com/tag/war-crimes/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00026-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947727 | 1,422 | 2.078125 | 2 |
California's state and local government pension funds saw a 12.4 percent increase in their assets during 2010, according to a new Census Bureau report, markedly higher than the national pension fund increase.
The increase, from $458.8 billion in 2009 to $516.1 billion in 2010, marked a return to positive growth after pension funds in California and elsewhere were battered by investment losses during the national recession.
Nationally, state and local pension funds gained 10.6 percent in value during the year, rising to $2.7 trillion. California, with about 12 percent of the nation's population, holds nearly 20 percent of public pension assets. The state's pension funds, including the California Public Employees Retirement System, hold $373.7 billion in assets while local funds account for the remaining $142.3 billion.
The Census Bureau report also reveals that during the 2010 fiscal year, California's pension funds earned $63.1 billion on their investments and received another $23 billion in contributions from employees and government agencies while paying out $35.2 billion, including $33.1 billion in benefits.
Virtually all state and local pension funds have unfunded liabilities for future pension commitments, but the size of these shortfalls are in dispute since estimates depend on assumptions of future earnings.
Pension funds generally assume future earnings ("discount rate") in the 7-plus percent range but critics say that's unrealistically high. Lowering the assumption would raise the unfunded liability and increase pressure for more contributions from governments and their employees. | <urn:uuid:bc5ea7fb-9658-4c76-b5ba-41d99ba32a85> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2012/04/california-public-pension-fund-assets-rebounded-last-year.html?mi_rss=Capitol%20and%20California | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00052-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95293 | 315 | 1.632813 | 2 |
New Sterile Lab Gives Tech Pharmacy Students an Edge
With the completion of a new sterile laboratory, the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC) School of Pharmacy will be able to offer its students a specialized type of training that no other pharmacy school in Texas can provide.
Dr. Mikala Conatser, an assistant professor of pharmacy practice at the school, will use the new facility to teach second-year pharmacy students in Amarillo how to perform sterile compounding, a process she describes as manufacturing medication products that will be introduced into a patient intravenously or through similar methods.
Because these types of medications must be produced in the cleanest possible environments by specially trained staff, sterile rooms must pass an air particle count, a bacterial growth test and meet other requirements specified by United States Pharmacopeia (USP) 797.
Conatser said she has been unable to locate a similar facility at any other pharmacy school in the country.
“Other schools do offer a sterile compounding course, but this new lab has really raised the bar,” Conatser said. “Each student has their own hood to compound in and they are taught with great detail the proper steps in the process. They garb, wash their hands, clean their hoods and new techniques/processes are introduced each week to help build their foundation as the semester progresses. At the end of the course students will be able to easily compound without risk or fear of needle sticks or contaminating products.”
Dr. Thomas Thekkumkara, regional dean for the School of Pharmacy in Amarillo, said the school paid $520,000 to convert the roughly 2,000-square-foot space from classroom to laboratory. The main room contains 26 individual workstations with hoods where students are taught to perform proper sterile procedures. The laboratory space is located at the site of a former classroom on the second floor of the main School of Pharmacy building on the TTUHSC campus. The classroom was moved to the school’s Pharmacy Academic Center when that building opened in 2010.
The School of Pharmacy in Abilene has also constructed a sterile laboratory to teach second-year students enrolled on its campus.
Conatser said the sterile laboratory provides Texas Tech pharmacy students with an advantage when they graduate and enter the work force.
“Students who are interested in a hospital-based career will already have a good base knowledge of the sterile compounding process and will be able to easily adapt that to their workplace,” Conatser said. “Students involved in a retail setting will also benefit from the process as they will become more at ease with using needles and pulling up medications, facilitating their ability to give vaccinations to their patients.”
Conatser said the lab reinforces important sterile compounding techniques that students previously could only simulate.
“I’ve talked to members of my own graduating class and other students who took this course before the new lab was built and they feel this facility will greatly improve knowledge retention,” Conatser said. “I believe the repetition of performing standard tasks and not having to pretend, but actually being able to sanitize their own work space and make sterile products in each and every lab will be very beneficial in the long run to our students and their future patients.” | <urn:uuid:8a103e8e-9462-4595-bb62-607331d17859> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ttuhsc.edu/sop/news/sterile_lab_feb_2013.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966707 | 693 | 2.09375 | 2 |
In Manchester we are introduced to the Bartons and the Wilsons, two working class families. John Barton reveals himself to be a great questioner of the distribution of wealth and the relation between the rich and the poor. He also relates how his sister-in-law Esther has disappeared after she ran away from home.Soon afterwards Mrs Barton dies, and John is left with his daughter Mary to cope in the harsh world around them. Having already been deeply affected by the loss of his son Tom at a young age, after the death of his wife, Barton tackles depression and begins to involve himself in the Chartist movement connected with the trade unions. (Summary from Wikipedia)
almost visibly fluttered into life; and the willows, which that morning had had only a brown reflection in the water below, were now of that tender grey-green which blends so delicately with the spring harmony of colours.
Groups of merry and somewhat loud-talking girls, whose ages might range from twelve to twenty, came by with a buoyant step. They were most of them factory girls, and wore the usual out-of-doors dress of that particular class of maidens; namely, a shawl, which at midday or in fine weather was allowed to be merely a shawl, but towards evening, if the day was chilly, became a sort of Spanish mantilla or Scotch plaid, and was brought over the head and hung loosely down, or was pinned under the chin in no unpicturesque fashion.
Their faces were not remarkable for beauty; indeed, they were below the average, with one or two exceptions; they had dark hair, neatly and classically arranged, dark eyes, but sallow complexions and irregular features. The only thing to strike a passer-by was an a
Worst book i have ever read. Can't believe this is a novel.
Almost alone among all major Victorian novelists, Ms. Gaskell deals with the lives of the poor and downtrodden - their lives, hopes, etc. While there have been better writers, few depict rural England in a more realistic manner than Elizabeth Gaskell.
A complex and troubled love story set amid the labor disputes of the Manchester, England, cotton mills in the mid-19th century, with many parallels to today:
As the earnings of the working classes drop and the price of their food rises ... "though it may take much suffering to kill the able-bodied and effective members of society, it does NOT take much to reduce them to worn, listless, diseased creatures, who thenceforward crawl through life with moody hearts and pain-stricken bodies."
It's a little slow moving in parts, but Gaskell's vivid descriptions and strong characterizations of the suffering, poverty-stricken workers, desperate women and arrogant wealthy "masters" are riveting. Throughout, the characters are multilayered and very human and the plot compelling. | <urn:uuid:e35054ed-26f6-4f4a-84da-09cf719b64c2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://manybooks.net/titles/gaskelleetext00mbrtn11.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979067 | 602 | 2.4375 | 2 |
For the past 50 years, Utah has been in the cross-hairs of the nuclear industry as the uranium mined and milled from our soils has returned to us as radioactive fallout and nuclear waste.
And while Utah has never fully recovered from the unique and painful legacy of our nuclear past, the industry is back at our doorsteps making the same promises of cheap, clean energy it did 50 years ago.
Arjun Mahkijani, a self-proclaimed "egghead," has worked tirelesly for decades to bridge science and democracy. His efforts to bring sound science to the nuclear debate continue to have a tremendous impact in this country, including here in Utah. Click here to learn more.
Earlier this month, the Utah Radiation Control Board was the first state agency to take a stand against EnergySolutions’ plan to import 20,000 tons of nuclear waste from Italy. Now we need you to make your voice heard, too. | <urn:uuid:9cb6d6e1-3954-457f-b10a-6a2e2aba37b5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://healutah.org/nuclearutah | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9627 | 192 | 2.0625 | 2 |
21 June 2012 World leaders, along with thousands of participants from governments, the private sector, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and other groups have come together in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to take part in the UN Sustainable Development Conference (Rio+20).
In our Seven Issues, Seven Experts series, UN officials tell us more about the key issues being discussed at the conference and how we can contribute to make our planet more sustainable.
In the seventh and final installment, the UN News Centre spoke with the Director of the Job Creation and Enterprise Development Department at the International Labour Organization (ILO), Peter Poschen, about how sustainable enterprises can help not only the environment in the long-term, but also be part of the solution to the current global economic crisis which has sparked high levels of unemployment.
UN News Centre: What do jobs have to do with sustainable development?
Peter Poschen: Jobs play an enormous social development function. Reducing poverty is basically not possible without people being in productive and well-paying jobs. Productive work is the driver of the economy – that is what creates value and increases the living standards of society and people. What is critical is that jobs also be part of this sustainable development path.
Over the past five years now, we have been emphasizing the notion of green jobs. We see that as an important component, an important part of that transformation towards an environmentally sustainable green economy. These are jobs that actively reduce the environmental impact of economic activity in an enterprise. They avoid greenhouse gas emissions, reduce waste, and increase the efficiency with which we use energy or natural resources. We see the creation of these jobs as a good way of linking our need to become more environmentally sustainable, create additional employment and generate value and growth.
UN News Centre: What do governments need to do to stimulate the creation and growth of sustainable enterprises and, through that, the creation of green jobs?
Peter Poschen: Well, enterprises react to the economic signals they receive. They react to demand and prices, so governments need to send the right signals to the private sector in order to avoid excessive use of natural resources, and direct growth into unsustainable directions.
We really need policies that bear economic, social and environmental dimensions in mind and do not treat them as separate. Something that stands out among the policy instruments that can be used by governments in order to move into a sustainable development direction is the eco tax, which punishes resource consumption and pollution by making them more expensive. It then uses that revenue to reduce the price of labour by investing in skills for workers and reducing the costs of social protection for them.
Eco taxes do not increase the economic burden on the economy, but favour positive outcomes as they help produce more jobs while also reducing negative environmental impacts. The ILO estimated that some 60 million additional jobs can be created through the use of this policy.
It is also important that governments stimulate green investments that encourage the use of energy efficiency in buildings, industry and transport, and that protect and restore natural resources – be that land, forest, water, fish, etc. In many cases this will require targeted support because these economic signals are not reaching important parts of society, so we need targeted measures, and public investments are an important element for this. For example, we still have 1.3 billion people in the world who have no clean energy at all. This has not gone away with the enormous increase in energy use we have seen in the world, so we need targeted measures to reach people who are not reached by the normal markets.
A group that is going to be particularly important in terms of employment creation is small and medium-sized enterprises. They represent anywhere between two-thirds and three-quarters of all employment in the world, so it is really fundamental that they play a central role in this shift towards a more sustainable economy, and that requires policies to be customized so that these small- and medium-sized enterprises can seize the opportunity of greening the economy and prosper.
UN News Centre: Could you give an example of an initiative succeeding in encouraging sustainable enterprises?
Peter Poschen: Well, the use of renewable sources of energy has been growing very quickly – at over 20 per cent a year in employment terms. This use is still led by a number of European countries, the United States, China and Brazil, but we see it spreading to more countries.
South Africa has initiated a new growth strategy that includes renewable energy as one of its components and it has targets to create jobs in this area, and then we have countries like Bangladesh, where we have a non-governmental organization that has taken clean electricity with photovoltaic panels to more than a million homes. They have created jobs directly for women who install, maintain and administer the electricity that is generated there, and there is the enormous spin-off effect in downstream employment from using the energy that is now available in the village.
UN News Centre: It seems that there are many employment opportunities in sustainable enterprises, yet there is a high rate of unemployment, particularly among young people. Is there a disconnect between the two?
Peter Poschen: Very much so, yes. Last year, the ILO published a report on the skills needed for the green economy and it shows that it is a bottleneck in many countries and in many sectors, and that the right qualifications are not available in the labour market for these sectors that are growing rapidly in the face of the economic crisis.
So, we have an ironic situation that, on the one hand, there is gaping unemployment, particularly among young people, [and] on the other hand, there are vacancies that have not been filled because people have not been trained. Adjustments in the national education and in the national skills systems are very important in making sure that we do not have these kinds of mismatches.
We have been developing a programme on entrepreneurship development and we have been training, over the past few years, young people who want to become self-employed and start their own business. This programme is called Green Business Options and it helps young people think of an environmental product or service as a central business idea.
We are already seeing some of these young men and women doing just that: a young woman starting a plastic recycling business in Kenya, a young college graduate in China starting an energy consultancy… so that is certainly something young people can do as entrepreneurs, but also by acquiring skills that will be needed in the greener economy.
UN News Centre: Is there a specific goal in Rio+20 regarding sustainable enterprises?
Peter Poschen: We are hoping that the Conference will decide that there will be the development of sustainable development goals so that we get the new picture of what we mean by development. It is no longer simply about economic growth as measured by gross domestic product, irrespective of whether that is actually positive or negative, or whether it is sustainable, but about whether it improves the lives of people and whether it really takes care of the planet.
We would hope that, amongst those sustainable development goals, we would see a goal around employment and decent work, because that is what helps people to get out of poverty. And we hope that there would be an element of green jobs because that would show how that the labour market is adjusting to contribute to environmental sustainability.
The second component that we think is really important is social protection as part of the sustainable development paradigm. Social protection has shown in the economic crisis how important it is to help people buffer the shocks that come into the system. This is true with the economic fluctuation if you lose your job, but it is also true if you are affected by climate-related disasters, or if you are affected by sudden surges of food prices as happens in many developing countries. Social protection can be a mechanism that helps people to absorb these shocks without them becoming destructive.
With social protection, farmers don’t have to leave the land if the harvest has failed because there is an income support until they can produce again in the next season, so we do not get a reduction of the agricultural production and internal migration on top of the problem that already exists with the lack of food.
We see how it can help to restore resources that are stretched. Brazil, for example, has introduced access to unemployment insurance for fishermen, who stop fishing during the period that the fish regenerate. They could not normally do that because they are poor and they depend on constant incomes, otherwise they cannot survive. So, in order to enable these fishermen to allow the resource to regenerate, the Government has given them access to unemployment insurance which then helps the resource to regenerate and have a bigger catch when they go back to sea, and it enables these workers and their families to stay afloat during this period.
UN News Centre: Is there anything members of the public can do to contribute to the creation of sustainable enterprises?
Peter Poschen: Absolutely. There are opportunities in many workplaces to contribute to environmental sustainability and to making enterprises more sustainable. There is also, clearly, a need to signal to policymakers that society demands a shift to a new and more sustainable development model. If policymakers have the impression that the population prioritizes jobs at almost any cost over the longer-term future, then we do not get this shift. Then policymakers are not enabled to adopt policies that really keep an eye on the future and that do not only look at this year’s unemployment rate, but also at what we need to do in order not to short-change future generations – that is clearly something that requires individuals as citizens to get engaged.
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U.S. ARMY COMMAND AND GENERAL STAFF COLLEGE C600-8
THE HISTORY OF WARFIGHTING: THEORY AND PRACTICE
Lesson 8. Interpreting Modern War¾ Jomini
Advance Sheet, Lesson 8
This lesson examines the theoretical writings of Jomini and the differences between his and Clausewitz fundamental perspectives on warfare.
CONDUCT OF LESSON
This eighty-minute lesson is at the staff-group level. The lesson author is Dr. Thomas M. Huber.
1. Analyze Jominis theory of war.
2. Compare and contrast Jominis and Clausewitz theories. Analyze the basis of their differences in perspective.
PROGRAM FOR JOINT EDUCATION OBJECTIVE
3. Explain how theory and principles of war apply at the operational level of war.
1. STUDENT REQUIREMENTS
a. Bring to class:
(1) C600 Term I Syllabus/Book of Readings.
b. Required reading:
(1) Introduction to Lesson 8, C600 Term I Syllabus/Book of Readings.
(2) Paret: John Shy, "Jomini, Part III," pp. 164- 76.
(3) Reading 8A: "Excerpts from Introductory Material to Summary of the Art of War," by Antoine-Henri de Jomini.
(4) Reading 8B: "Excerpt from The Art of War," by Antoine-Henri de Jomini.
(5) Reading 8C: "Napoleons Maxims on Command."
2. READING QUESTIONS
a. Do Jomini and Clausewitz differ fundamentally in their view of war? How?
b.Are Jominis and Clausewitz views contradictory or complementary?
c. Does Jominis understanding of what is required of a successful commander differ significantly from Clausewitz?
d. What weaknesses does Shy find in Jominis theories? Do you agree?
e.Do you agree with Shy that immutable principles have a strong appeal for professional soldiers who are "conservative by nature"? Do American officers rely too heavily on a "cookbook" approach to their profession?
f.How do Jomini and Napoleon compare in their views of what constitutes effective command?
3. RELATED CSI ELECTIVE
A699, The Evolution of Military Thought.
4. RELATED CSI PUBLICATIONS
Dr. Robert H. Berlin, Military Classics, Historical Bibliography No. 8.
5. CHRONOLOGY FOR LESSON 8
1779 Jomini born in Payerne, Switzerland.
1780 Clausewitz born in Burg, Germany.
1805 Napoleon appoints Jomini to be a staff colonel.
Jomini publishes Treatise on Grand Military Operations.
1806 Clausewitz is captured during Jena campaign and spends a year in France as a prisoner.
1810 Jomini becomes a brigadier general.
1812 Clausewitz serves with the Russian Army.
1813 Jomini serves as Ney's chief of staff.
Jomini joins the Russian Army as a major general and aide-de-camp to Czar Alexander.
1815 Battle of Waterloo. Clausewitz serves as a corps chief of staff.
1826 Dennis Hart Mahan, highest ranking graduate in the U.S. Military Academy class of 1824, begins four years of study in France.
1830 Jomini organizes the Russian military academy.
Mahan becomes an instructor at USMA.
1831 Clausewitz dies.
1833 Clausewitz widow publishes his On War.
1838 Jomini publishes his Summary of the Art of War.
1869 Jomini dies.
1870 Franco-Prussian War yields decisive victory for Prussia.
1873 First English translation of Clausewitz' On War is published.
INTRODUCTION TO LESSON 8
Thomas M. Huber
Although serious military thinkers today are more likely to refer to Clausewitz, in the Napoleonic age itself, Antoine de Jomini was more likely to have that distinction. It is probably fair to say that in general Clausewitz addressed the political and strategic levels of war and Jomini addressed the operational level. The two were born only a year apart. They held similar staff-officer positions in the Napoleonic wars, albeit in different armies. Jomini was by far the more celebrated thinker in his own lifetime.
Jomini was born in 1779 to a mercantile family in Switzerland and spent his youth working as an apprentice clerk in banking and commercial establishments in Switzerland and later in Paris. From the beginning of his career Jomini was preoccupied with military history and the military art. He read avidly about the campaigns of Frederick the Great in order to discover his methods and was especially influenced by Henry Lloyds historical accounts of Fredericks campaigns. In 1804 Jomini published his famous Treatise on Grand Military Operations, based on Fredericks campaigns. (Note that Jomini had acquired the essential principles of Napoleonic method the same way Napoleon had acquired them, by a close analysis of Frederick.) Jomini showed the manuscript to Marshal Michel Ney and in 1805 was accepted by Ney as an unpaid volunteer member of his staff during the Ulm campaign. After Austerlitz Jomini managed to get a copy of his work to Napoleon himself. At first Napoleon was alarmed that a book that perfectly revealed his system had been published so that anyone who wished could see it. Upon reflection, however, he became calmer and noted that old commanders would never read it and that young officers who might read it did not command.
Napoleon, impressed by Jominis service to Ney and with his manuscript, commissioned Jomini as a colonel in the French army and assigned him to Marshal Neys staff. Napoleon drew Jomini onto his own staff for the Jena and Eylau campaigns of 1806 and 1807. Jomini won the Cross of the Legion of Honor for his service at Eylau. After Friedland Napoleon made Jomini Neys chief of staff, and Jomini accompanied Ney to Spain. There, Ney, influenced by staff officers who were alienated from Jomini, asked for his reassignment. At this point Napoleon intervened and promoted Jomini to brigadier general and stationed him in Paris with the assignment of writing a history of the revolutionary wars and of Napoleons Italian campaigns. Jomini took part in the Russian campaign of 1812, mostly in rear area staff capacities, such as military governor of Smolensk. Jomini served as Neys chief of staff again in the south German campaigns of 1813, and after Bautzen Ney recommended him for promotion to major general. Berthier, Napoleons chief of staff, who had always disliked Jomini, at this point instead of promoting him ordered his arrest for failing to submit certain reports. Jomini was so dismayed by the unfairness of this that he resigned from the French army and accepted a commission in the Russian service. He held a Russian commission, albeit mostly inactive, for the next fifty-six years and was eventually promoted to the rank of lieutenant general. He retired to Switzerland temporarily rather than take part in the allied campaigns on French soil in 1814 and 1815. He later served as head of the committee to found the Russian Military Academy and advised the tsar during the Crimean War of 1853- 56. He advised Napoleon III at the time of his campaign in Italy in 1859.
Although Jomini held a commission in the Russian army, he spent almost all of his time after 1815 in Paris working as a military consultant or publishing works of military history, biography, and theory. As the premier contemporary interpreter of Napoleons way of war, he was much sought after and widely read. He made a good income from the sale of his voluminous works and may have been the first professional military theorist in modern Europe. Most read today is his Summary of the Art of War of 1838. Jomini died at Passy outside Paris in 1869 at the age of ninety, just in time not to witness the discrediting of the Napoleonic tradition of warfare in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.
Jominis thought was popular in his own day, and in various forms, it is popular still. Jominis approach to war was in extreme contrast to Clausewitz. Clausewitz served in an army that until 1813 always lost. His vision of war was skeptical and brooding. He saw war as balky, irrational, and always threatening to escape control. For Clausewitz war was tragic and Clausewitz is associated by some observers with the romantic tradition that emerged in philosophy and art after 1815. Clausewitz always lost and he tried to explain why war was so hard. Jomini, except for 1812, always won, and he tried to explain why war was so easy. His view of war was optimistic and rational. He saw war as subject to certain unchanging rules that anyone could master. For him war was heroic, though one might also be tempted to say prosaic. Jomini is associated by some observers with the rational Enlightenment tradition of philosophy that prevailed prior to 1815.
Jominis ideas really were not a theory of war: they were a theory of deployment. Jomini has been accused from time to time of merely offering a cookbook of war, this by persons who do not reflect on how extraordinarily useful a cookbook may be. His basic ideas, many of them influenced by his reading of Henry Lloyd, include interior and exterior lines, the decisive point, concentration of strength against weakness, annihilation of the enemy force, the primary importance of the offensive, surprise, and the potentially decisive role of logistics. The essential object of all this was to win a favorable result through the concentration of strength against weakness. Jomini felt these were fundamental, almost mathematical principles of war and that they were good for all time. These ideas were absorbed by Dennis Hart Mahan into the curriculum of the then-fledgling United States Military Academy in 1830, where Civil War leaders on both sides learned them. They have become part of the training of the U.S. Army today in the form of the Principles of War, which may be thought of as merely Jomini writ short. Most modern services today teach these principles in some form.
It is important to remember what Jomini is and what Jomini is not. Almost all of his work answers one question: how does one deploy units successfully in the main battle? For officers who must answer this question, Jominis ideas, the Principles of War, are extremely useful and extremely important. For officers trying to answer any other questions, Jomini is not so useful. A cookbook is all-important for cooks but not very helpful for anyone else. There is almost no treatment of politics, no strategy, no technological change, no strategic resource base, no psychology, no peoples war, no adversary, and indeed no unexpected adversity in Jominis work. The operator must remember that while the Principles of War are an essential tool, they are likely to be only one of the many tools he needs for victory.
Jomini as the classical theorist of deployment has had enormous influence on modern ground services as we have seen. Jomini would also influence later theorists of naval and air deployment in the use of technologies that in Jominis day had not yet been imagined. As we shall see later on, Alfred Thayer Mahan, Julio Douhet, and Bernard Brodie would eventually apply some of Jominis basic ideas to naval warfare, air warfare, and nuclear warfare respectively.
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Jazz at Lincoln Center with
Thursday, February 7, 2013 - 7:30pm
Feel the fusion of 15 of the finest jazz soloists and ensemble players today comprising The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra under the leadership of musical director, trumpeter, composer and educator Wynton Marsalis.
Jazz at Lincoln Center is dedicated to inspiring and growing audiences for jazz. With the world-renowned Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra and a comprehensive array of guest artists, Jazz at Lincoln Center advances a unique vision for the continued development of the art of jazz by producing a year-round schedule of performance, education and broadcast events for audiences of all ages. These productions include concerts, national and international tours, residencies, a jazz hall of fame, weekly national radio programs, recordings, publications, an annual high school jazz band competition and festival, a band director academy, jazz appreciation curriculum for students, music publishing, children's concerts, lectures, adult education courses, student and educator workshops and interactive websites.
Under the leadership of Artistic Director Wynton Marsalis, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra spends over a third of the year on tour. The big band performs a vast repertoire, from rare historic compositions to Jazz at Lincoln Center-commissioned works, including compositions and arrangements by Duke Ellington; Count Basie; Fletcher Henderson; Thelonious Monk; Mary Lou Williams; Billy Strayhorn; Dizzy Gillespie; Benny Goodman; Charles Mingus; Chick Corea; Oliver Nelson; and many others. | <urn:uuid:4444f1af-92e6-46a4-ae01-eaa24cfa38e4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://lutcher.org/wynton.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.904307 | 306 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Creator: Schlund, Michael W.; Cataldo, Michael F.; Siegle, Greg J.; Ladouceur, Cecile D.; Silk, Jennifer S.; Forbes, Erika E. et al
Description: This article discusses pediatric functional magnetic resonance neuroimaging. Background: Neuroimaging technology has afforded advances in our understanding of normal and pathological brain function and development in children and adolescents. However, noncompliance involving the inability to remain in the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanner to complete tasks is one common and significant problem. Task noncompliance is an especially significant problem in pediatric functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) research because increases in noncompliance produces a greater risk that a study sample will not be representative of the study population. Method: In this preliminary investigation, the authors describe the development and application of an approach for increasing the number of fMRI tasks children complete during neuroimaging. Twenty-eight healthy children ages 9-13 years participated. Generalization of the approach was examined in additional fMRI and event-related potential investigations with children at risk for depression, children with anxiety and children with depression (N = 120). Essential features of the approach include a preference assessment for identifying multiple individualized rewards, increasing reinforcement rates during imaging by pairing tasks with chosen rewards and presenting a visual 'road map' listing tasks, rewards and current progress. Results: Our results showing a higher percentage of fMRI task completion by healthy children ...
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Claa Cheung and Gum Cheng Yee Man, Wedding Engagement at the Demonstration, performance, July 1, 2004.
In the years of radical change during late 1980s and early 1990s, Chinese artists found that the more they used political motifs in their paintings, the better they could attract foreign eyes. Political suppression can help artists to obtain attention, but art production under political suppression is not necessarily as critical as one would suspect. If we look carefully at the classic works of Chinese “Political Pop” (works by artists such as Li Shan and Yu Youhan), we now have to ask, Did that pink and yellow likeness of Mao say anything explicitly good or bad about politics? Of course, when Western viewers saw it, they knew exactly what to think: “See, this is how the Chinese people criticize their government!”
This is how the problem of contemporary art in China is often oversimplified. During the Cultural Revolution, for example, the influence of politics was so great that it permeated every aspect of people’s lives. In other words, when politics is not far across the ocean but surrounding you, it becomes impossible for the individual to gain any distance from it. It becomes you, such that you cannot tell if you actually love it or hate it. Therefore, the shocking thing about Chinese Political Pop is not how courageous its practitioners were to paint Mao in pink in yellow, but the fact that they were courageous to paint their own disasters in pink and yellow. At that moment, these artists could already foresee that the political situation was taking a 180-degree turn, and they used painting to present this in an effective way. The war that art fights against politics is a long-lasting one, and art always loses. Art can hardly change politics, but it can use its creativity to change people’s conception of and attitude toward political issues. As long as we trust this, our pessimism toward art can be reduced.
Lock Lo Chi Kit, work at the Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) Conceptual Art Exhibition, May 2009.
C&G Artpartment is an independent art space founded in 2007 by two Hong Kong artists, Clara Cheung and Gum Cheng Yee Man. In their inaugural show Back to Basic (June 2007), they said, “This exhibit attempts to invite artists to make artworks based on their own understanding on the Basic Law, to use art to investigate its symbolic meanings, and to emotionally or rationally reveal the complex relationships between the Basic Law and themselves ever since the handover…Basically, the Basic Law will continue to rule over Hong Kong and let it remain 'unchanged' for another forty years.” (The "Basic Law" is the document which outlines how the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region is governed under the sovereignty of the People's Republic of China, a sort of post-handover constitution.) In this statement, it seems that C&G does not aim to fight against (not directly, at least) law or politicians, but more to show the response of art to social and political changes. In Carl Schmitt’s definition, politics is antagonism. It is the relationship of friends and foes. Classic political artists like Hans Haacke perfectly demonstrated how to use antagonistic methods to reveal the dark side of governments, large enterprises, and art institutions. As for C&G, although they also have intellectual consciousness and deep concern for social and political issues, I would say that they are using a new style that is completely different from Haacke’s. Let me elaborate this point with one of their representative works.
During the July 1st demonstrations of 2004 (annual demonstrations are held on July 1 in Hong Kong tocommemorate the territory's return to Chinese sovereignty), Clara and Gum put on traditional Chinese wedding gowns to join the march. They held their engagement ceremony during the demonstration. As a piece of performance art, this intervention served to overlay a historical moment of civil disobedience of Hong Kong people onto the most important chapter of their personal life. They did not only engage with each other, but with the whole society. Apart from this I think there is another point worth mentioning. When they talk about this act, they stress that to get engaged during the demonstration is to chongxi Hong Kong. “Chongxi” is a traditional Chinese concept. When bad things happen, like when a family member is seriously sick, a family might organize a happy event like a wedding to bring back joy and hope, as a way of getting rid of bad luck. Clara and Gum stressed the chongxi function of their act: on one hand it moderated the negative emotions in the demonstration and encouraged positive participation in this event. On the other hand, they used a Chinese family tradition rather than art theory to explain their act, thus blurring the boundaries between art, the personal, and society.
C&G Artpartment has so far organized eleven exhibitions, all of which are group shows. On average, six or seven artists participate in each show. Clara and Gum participate in every exhibition, but they try not to invite repeat artists (Chow Chun Fai is the exceptional case, having participated in two shows). To date, more than fifty Hong Kong artists have shown in C&G. I think this strategy has produced an interesting effect: as the exhibition themes of C&G always have a clear public sense, whenever more individualistic artists (there are a lot of this kind in Hong Kong) participate, the feeling is quite awkward. For example, how do you put an artist who loves to tell love stories in a show titled To Donald Tsang? To solve this problem, I think we have to focus on interpretation. Like Althusser says, consciousness delays, and the materialistic dialectic can wake up this delayed consciousness. This is to say ideology hides within an artwork. If an artwork is a cultural product, it is inherently a social product, and thus it is no longer about purely artistic issues, but conceptual issues. Art is a profound reference to social reality.
Are we taking the risk of misinterpretation? Luckily we have proof, in the clearness of the exhibition themes set by C&G. They ensure that the artists have no doubt in understanding what they are being asked to talk about. And therefore, I would presume that the more out of tune an artist is, the bigger the possibility we can discover new concepts, new viewpoints in his or her intervention at C&G. Of course these are fine words, the truth is that Clara and Gum have already forced many artists to rethink social reality.
Invitation card for Greedy? Conceptual Art Exhibition, November 2008.
Before founding the C&G Artpartment, Gum worked in a non-for-profit art organization for many years, taking care of both administrative and curatorial tasks. Such a workload is actually unbearable for a human. Through this job he saw the bureaucratism and self-censorship of the so-called “independent” art spaces. In the Greedy show (November 2008), Gum’s work To a Greedy Art Organization very clearly highlighted these issues. When Gum founded the Artpartment with his wife Clara, they decided not to apply for funding from the Hong Kong Arts Development Council. Instead they cover all their own costs by holding painting classes, allowing them to focus on making exhibitions free of external concerns. They are thus able to have the advantages of running an independent art space, the main one being immediacy. With less to worry about, they can organize exhibitions quickly, responding to new social issues as they arise. Obviously it is not easy to ask artists to make good and responsive works in such short time, but given these constraints, many Hong Kong artists actually are able to do produce simple but playful pieces. Take for example the Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) Conceptual Art Exhibition (May 2009), and within it the piece “Stock Price Fitness Device” by Lock Lo Chi Kit. This piece (above) aligns audience participation, art appreciation, and stock-market fluctuation in a single moment. Even if you don’t see the humor in it, you at least can do some exercises.
The second advantage of running an independent art space is, of course, freedom. One great thing about C&G is that they are always very open in terms of the topics of their exhibitions. To be exact, it means that they dare to base their exhibitions on all sorts of offbeat topics. I find this very admirable, and these weird topics are always very attractive to me. For example, without getting into the difference in context between Hong Kong's Prince Edward neighborhood (the area C&G calls home) and Venice, let's just compare the exhibition themes Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation Conceptual Art Exhibition and Making Worlds; the former is definitely more attractive to me. How can you imagine what weird things are showing in this CPR exhibition? From this point we can again see how C&G insists on the pleasure of art even when discussing about social issues. Compared to many places, the political problems in Hong Kong are actually not that disastrous, but there are certainly enough problems to produce discontent among the people. But honestly, no matter how you curse Donald Tsang, he will still sleep well. You’re just wasting your own time; if you keep thinking about the HKD $6,000,000 that the Hong Kong Museum of Art spent on the Louis Vuitton: A Passion for Creation exhibition when you actually need to figure out how to gather that HKD $2,000 for your next exhibition, then you will definitely go crazy. So the solutions to these problems actually lie in a simple twist of concept. To do that, humor is very important. And with cultural events in Hong Kong today, the funnier the event, the more the public gets involved.
Doris Wong Wai Yin, Free Chinese Medical Advice for Art Workers, poster for a performance, 2009.
In the Sick Leave exhibition (April 2008), Doris Wong Wai Yin did a piece entitled Free Chinese Medical Advice for Art Workers. She invited two doctors of traditional Chinese medicine to help people in the exhibition to check their health. Doris's work seems to say that we people taking part in this art event are all potentially sick. Of course it's not swine flu but something mental. Everyone in Hong Kong, especially those who came to see the C&G show, all have some problems, some knots in their mind. Art can reduce our anxiety. By turning the art space into a Chinese medical clinic, Doris’s work seemed to suggest that the belief and mission of C&G Artpartment is to provide healing to those whose spirits are suppressed and distorted.
Doris Wong Wai Yin, Free Chinese Medical Advice for Art Workers, photo documentation, 2009.
Left: Cover of Dennis Oppenheim, Public Projects, 2009. Right: Dennis Oppenheim, Garden of Evidence, 2008, water-jet-cut aluminum sheet, prefinished diamond-plate aluminum sheets, acrylic, translucent fiberglass, fiberglass grating, galvanized bar
A pioneer of Earthworks in the late 1960s, Dennis Oppenheim has pursued an adventurous career in sculpture and installation, film and video, and body and performance art, but he never stopped making outdoor work. For the past ten years, Oppenheim has concentrated almost exclusively on public art, which is documented in a new book published by Charta this month.
SOME PEOPLE WOULD SAY the age of experimentation in art has ended, but if it has, it’s also created an opening for a new camaraderie of artists working in architecture and public space, making work with people in mind. Functionality and design—once problematic for fine artists—are now where exciting things are happening. It’s a natural progression, but there’s still some resistance. I have fond memories of operating in a studio as a pure scientist, with absolutely no agenda other than to brainstorm art theory and develop new methods. I miss that. My public art does demand similar responses on my behalf to make it successful, but not at the level of penetration that studio work offers: what art can, should, and can’t be—all these heavy questions.
Public work has to be different; it has to be more like architecture. Public art also has to be fairly durable, and artists have to deal with certain characteristics, such as the democratic way the art is selected. That was never true with body art and Land art, which were often fragile, distributed randomly, and created without an audience. For me, venturing onto this new terrain, I’m often on unsteady ground.
Another reason I’m doing public art is to make a distinction between permanent work and the art I come from, which is partly installation art or ephemeral work. That period wore down, and I intentionally moved to the other extreme. Public art is still a frontier, like Alaska.
Working in public art has made me interested in architecture. Young architects, and those not so young, are doing extraordinary work in the built environment, and somehow they are getting away with it. Aaron Betsky, who directed the 2008 Venice Biennale of Architecture, said all the entries were temporary installations—no one will build a building. If you think about it, how else could it be? But that brings to mind installation art, which occurred more in the ’70s. Architects are looking very much like installation artists from thirty years ago. It’s also interesting how architects working with ephemerality, like those in the biennale, are growing in number, and they’re operating with many different kinds of social attitudes. I have a less social attitude than most of them.
Public art, in many cases, is not as structurally and theoretically advanced as contemporary architecture. Vito Acconci says that architects are more interesting to him than artists. There are sculptors out there who are pushing things, people like Thomas Hirschhorn, with all the masking tape—it’s perverse and wonderful. But there are probably more outrageous architects. Even as they take their cues from artists, architects don’t always need us.
Many of my commissions, such as Jump and Twist, 1999, Wave Forms, 2007, and Flying Gardens, 2005, have an opportunity to integrate closely to the site, which is what panels and municipalities want. In New York City, you can’t really do permanent work. That’s why funding agencies like the Public Art Fund sponsor temporary pieces, but work like that is a hybrid. Real public art is like architecture because it will be there for a while.
Public-art commissions, though, generally have a 20 percent success rate, and projects that get rejected are often shelved because they are site-specific. But you can still use them, present them, and keep them alive by talking about them—it depends on how good they are. Sometimes the best work is not accepted because it’s too radical or ambitious—that’s a paradox of public art. In the past, I’ve sometimes taken elements from a commission and shown them in a gallery—like I did with Garden of Evidence, 2008, a work for Scottsdale, Arizona—before installing them in a site. Funding for an exhibition is sometimes hard to get, so use your public-art commission to construct the work and then show it momentarily in a gallery. Cities don’t always like that.
Device to Root Out Evil, 1997, appears on the cover of the new book, which is partly a decision to retain a singular image because the disparity in my work makes it hard to rest on anything particular. When there is an opportunity to create a signature image, I do, and Device has been on the cover of a few books. But the work has since become discomforting. I donated one of three versions to Stanford University, where I went to graduate school, but after a controversy they gave it back. This upside-down church has been chased around the continent for several years. After Vancouver took it down, it moved to an obscure site in Calgary.
What people don’t realize is how acceptance of permanent work takes time. People have grown to love Antony Gormley’s Angel of the North, 1994–98, in Gateshead, in the northeast of England. I haven’t yet heard that about my work. | <urn:uuid:8b34692d-d782-48c9-bbca-30a6f076b41f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://artforum.com.cn/words/archive=200911 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968041 | 3,409 | 2.3125 | 2 |
The Blackfoot River, known to many through the book and movie "A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT," begins along the Continental Divide high in the Scapegoat Wilderness. Its cold, clear waters are home to native west-slope cutthroat and bull trout---its watershed home to elk, grizzly bear, goshawk, ponderosa pine, aspen, calypso and coralroot orchids, and countless other species. Not far below its headwaters lies the site of a proposed open-pit gold mine. The mine's permit application calls for an open pit a mile across, and for hundreds of acres of forest and sage grasslands to be buried beneath cyanide leach pads as tall as the Washington Monument. All this within a few hundred yards of the Blackfoot.
The Blackfoot Gold photo exhibit was produced in cooperation
with the Clark Fork-Pend Oreille Coalition (CFPOC). It has been
exhibited at seven different venues, and featured in publications such
as Big Sky Journal and Rivers magazine. Please consider
purchasing a print from the exhibit (proceeds benefit both Picture
Tomorrow and CFPOC), and visit
CFPOC's website to learn what you can do for the Blackfoot. | <urn:uuid:4f57fcf7-562b-4aff-ac0d-a3d2740f0f97> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.picturetomorrow.org/exhibits/blackfoot/blackfoot.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930406 | 260 | 2.953125 | 3 |
Next> | <Prev | ^ToC | End
[10, The Sambre to the Oise]
Sambre and Oise Canal Canal Boats
NEXT day we made a late start in the rain. The Judge politely escorted us to the end of the lock under an umbrella. We had now brought ourselves to a pitch of humility in the matter of weather, not often attained except in the Scottish Highlands. A rag of blue sky or a glimpse of sunshine set our hearts singing; and when the rain was not heavy, we counted the day almost fair.
Long lines of barges lay one after another along the canal; many of them looking mighty spruce and shipshape in their jerkin of Archangel tar picked out with white and green. Some carried gay iron railings, and quite a parterre of flower-pots. Children played on the decks, as heedless of the rain as if they had been brought up on Loch Carron side; men fished over the gunwale, some of them under umbrellas; women did their washing; and every barge boasted its mongrel cur by way of watch-dog. Each one barked furiously at the canoes, running alongside until he had got to the end of his own ship, and so passing on the word to the dog aboard the next. We must have seen something like a hundred of these embarkations in the course of that day's paddle, ranged one after another like the houses in a street; and from not one of them were we disappointed of this accompaniment. It was like visiting a menagerie, the Cigarette remarked.
These little cities by the canal side had a very odd effect upon the mind. They seemed, with their flower-pots and smoking chimneys, their washings and dinners, a rooted piece of nature in the scene; and yet if only the canal below were to open, one junk after another would hoist sail or harness horses and swim away into all parts of France; and the impromptu hamlet would separate, house by house, to the four winds. The children who played together to-day by the Sambre and Oise Canal, each at his own father's threshold, when and where might they next meet?
For some time past the subject of barges had occupied a great deal of our talk, and we had projected an old age on the canals of Europe. It was to be the most leisurely of progresses, now on a swift river at the tail of a steam-boat, now waiting horses for days together on some inconsiderable junction. We should be seen pottering on deck in all the dignity of years, our white beards falling into our laps. We were ever to be busied among paint-pots; so that there should be no white fresher, and no green more emerald than ours, in all the navy of the canals. There should be books in the cabin, and tobacco-jars, and some old Burgundy as red as a November sunset and as odorous as a violet in April. There should be a flageolet, whence the Cigarette, with cunning touch, should draw melting music under the stars; or perhaps, laying that aside, upraise his voice--somewhat thinner than of yore, and with here and there a quaver, or call it a natural grace-note--in rich and solemn psalmody.
All this, simmering in my mind, set me wishing to go aboard one of these ideal houses of lounging. I had plenty to choose from, as I coasted one after another, and the dogs bayed at me for a vagrant. At last I saw a nice old man and his wife looking at me with some interest, so I gave them good-day and pulled up alongside. I began with a remark upon their dog, which had somewhat the look of a pointer; thence I slid into a compliment on Madame's flowers, and thence into a word in praise of their way of life.
If you ventured on such an experiment in England you would get a slap in the face at once. The life would be shown to be a vile one, not without a side shot at your better fortune. Now, what I like so much in France is the clear unflinching recognition by everybody of his own luck. They all know on which side their bread is buttered, and take a pleasure in showing it to others, which is surely the better part of religion. And they scorn to make a poor mouth over their poverty, which I take to be the better part of manliness. I have heard a woman in quite a better position at home, with a good bit of money in hand, refer to her own child with a horrid whine as "a poor man's child." I would not say such a thing to the Duke of Westminster. And the French are full of this spirit of independence. Perhaps it is the result of republican institutions, as they call them. Much more likely it is because there are so few people really poor, that the whiners are not enough to keep each other in countenance.
The people on the barge were delighted to hear that I admired their state. They understood perfectly well, they told me, how Monsieur envied them. Without doubt Monsieur was rich; and in that case he might make a canal boat as pretty as a villa--joli comme un château. And with that they invited me on board their own water villa. They apologised for their cabin; they had not been rich enough to make it as it ought to be.
"The fire should have been here, at this side." explained the husband. "Then one might have a writing-table in the middle--books--and" (comprehensively) "all. It would be quite coquettish--ça serait tout-à-fait coquet." And he looked about him as though the improvements were already made. It was plainly not the first time that he had thus beautified his cabin in imagination; and when next he makes a bit, I should expect to see the writing-table in the middle.
Madame had three birds in a cage. They were no great thing, she explained. Fine birds were so dear. They had sought to get a Hollandais last winter in Rouen (Rouen? thought I; and is this whole mansion, with its dogs and birds and smoking chimneys, so far a traveller as that? and as homely an object among the cliffs and orchards of the Seine as on the green plains of Sambre?)--they had sought to get a Hollandais last winter in Rouen; but these cost fifteen francs apiece--picture it--fifteen francs!
"Pour un tout petit oiseau--For quite a little bird," added the husband.
As I continued to admire, the apologetics died away, and the good people began to brag of their barge, and their happy condition in life, as if they had been Emperor and Empress of the Indies. It was, in the Scots phrase, a good hearing, and put me in good humour with the world. If people knew what an inspiriting thing it is to hear a man boasting, so long as he boasts of what he really has, I believe they would do it more freely and with a better grace.
They began to ask about our voyage. You should have seen how they sympathised. They seemed half ready to give up their barge and follow us. But these canaletti are only gypsies semi-domesticated. The semi-domestication came out in rather a pretty form. Suddenly Madam's brow darkened. "Cependant," she began, and then stopped; and then began again by asking me if I were single?
"Yes," said I.
"And your friend who went by just now?"
He also was unmarried.
Oh, then, all was well. She could not have wives left alone at home; but since there were no wives in the question, we were doing the best we could.
"To see about one in the world," said the husband, "Il n'y a que ça--there is nothing else worth while. A man, look you, who sticks in his own village like a bear," he went on, "--very well, he sees nothing. And then death is the end of all. And he has seen nothing."
Madame reminded her husband of an Englishman who had come up this canal in a steamer.
"Perhaps Mr. Moens in the Ytene," I suggested.
"That's it," assented the husband. "He had his wife and family with him, and servants. He came ashore at all the locks and asked the name of the villages, whether from boatmen or lock-keepers; and then he wrote, wrote them down. Oh, he wrote enormously! I suppose it was a wager."
A wager was a common enough explanation for our own exploits, but it seemed an original reason for taking notes. | <urn:uuid:c50c9b1b-99fe-4623-a7cd-848a15518c38> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ibiblio.org/eldritch/rls/I10.HTM | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00064-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.985881 | 1,898 | 1.945313 | 2 |
Here are the latest developments on the British Petroleum waste discharge plan for Lake Michigan this year. See previous articles at L.A.W. for complete historical facts and figures.
DEVELOPMENT: Wednesday August 15th
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Regional Administrator Mary A. Gade convened a Lake Michigan Summit meeting in Chicago in order to provide an opportunity for major officials and interested parties to present BP representatives with their suggestions on minimizing discharges to Lake Michigan from the company's Whiting, Ind., refinery. Region 5 representatives showed up such as; BP Vice Chairman of America Stephen Elbert, Illinois representatives Biggert & Kirk plus Senators Durbin & Obama, Indiana officials such as Bay & Visclosky and Mr. Anderson from the Indiana Save The Dunes Council, Michigan representative Upton, Wisconsin representative Russ Feingold and a number of other interested individuals of environmental groups.
Due to the enormous amount of negative press, local resident petitions and congressional pressure against the dumping move, BP and Indiana regulators agreed Wednesday to reconsider a permit that allows the Midwest's largest oil refinery to significantly increase
the amount of toxic waste dumped into the lake. In order to keep the pressure in place, an environmental group called the Alliance for the Great Lakes also filed a formal appeal in Indiana asking a state environmental judge to block the permit from taking effect.
As reported in a detailed article last week by staff writer Michael Hawthorne of The Chicago Tribune, seven different ideas were given by the EPA to counter the current dumping measures at this meeting:
Finance projects that reduce pollution from other companies that discharge into the Grand Calumet River or Lake Michigan.
Divert all or some of the refinery's wastewater to nearly municipal treatment plants. The Hammond Sanitary District, East Chicago Sanitary District and Gary Sanitary District are options. Pay for sewer upgrades in neighboring towns to keep sewage and storm water out of Lake Michigan. Set aside money to filter pollution that seeps into the lake. Projects could include wetlands, shoreline restoration or storm-water retention ponds. Make additional upgrades at the refinery's water treatment plant to reduce the amount of pollution flowing into Lake Michigan. Spend more money to dredge contaminated muck from the Indiana Harbor and Ship Canal. Join Indiana to pay for other projects that remove contaminated sediment in the Grand Calumet River.
Divert all or some of the refinery's wastewater to nearly municipal treatment plants. The Hammond Sanitary District, East Chicago Sanitary District and Gary Sanitary District are options.
Pay for sewer upgrades in neighboring towns to keep sewage and storm water out of Lake Michigan.
Set aside money to filter pollution that seeps into the lake. Projects could include wetlands, shoreline restoration or storm-water retention ponds.
Make additional upgrades at the refinery's water treatment plant to reduce the amount of pollution flowing into Lake Michigan.
Spend more money to dredge contaminated muck from the Indiana Harbor and Ship Canal.
Join Indiana to pay for other projects that remove contaminated sediment in the Grand Calumet River.
Few in the meeting voiced any support for these creative proposals to offset the additional BP waste discharge pollution with other projects that would help clean up Lake Michigan. The group stayed focused on the need for BP to meet the long-standing goal of reducing and eventually eliminating pollution in the Great Lakes, the world's largest source of fresh surface water. Federal and state regulators contend they have no legal authority at this point to rescind the permit. Although the meeting showed all sides willing to take a look at things, neither BP nor the state of Indiana would commit to a specific solution at this time.
Chicago officials said they've found several technologies in use at other refineries that dramatically reduce ammonia and suspended solids. They pressed BP official Elbert to explain how more water treatment equipment couldn't fit on a site as large as the Whiting refinery. This was a question the Vice Chairman said could not answer at this time.
All left the meeting last week feeling warm and fuzzy, but with no definitive changes noted.
News flash to this week...
DEVELOPMENT: Thursday, August 23rd
BP announced today that it won't dump more pollution into Lake Michigan.
In a statement posted on British Petroleum’s web site, BP pledged to continue to meet its previous pollution limits once it completes a $3.8 billion expansion of its Whiting, Ind., refinery, 3 miles southeast of the Illinois-Indiana border. BP America today promised to operate its Whiting refinery to meet the lower discharge limits contained in the refinery's previous wastewater treatment permit.
BP America Chairman and President Bob Malone notes the following in today’s press release, “We have participated in an open and transparent permitting process with the State of Indiana and obtained a valid permit that meets all regulatory standards and is protective of water quality and human health. Even so, ongoing regional opposition to any increase in discharge permit limits for Lake Michigan creates an unacceptable level of business risk for this $3.8 billion investment." Malone flew to Chicago to deliver the news personally to Mayor Richard Daley, one of several politicians who said the company's initial plans were unacceptable to people who rely on Lake Michigan for drinking water and recreation.
During the next 18 months, BP advises citizens it will continue to seek issuance of other permits, continue project design and explore options for operating within the lower discharge limits. Furthermore, at the request of US Representatives Judy Biggert (R-IL) and Pete Visclosky (D-IN), and with the support of BP America President Bob Malone, scientists at Argonne National Laboratory and Purdue University Calumet will explore emerging technologies that could address wastewater treatment affecting the Great Lakes.
BP America notified the State of Indiana of its decision late yesterday afternoon and reiterated its dedication to the proposed refinery expansion.
"We are committed to this project. It is important for the nation, it is important for the Midwest, and it is important to BP and to the thousands of BP employees in the State of Indiana," Malone said. "We are going to work hard to make this project succeed.” He also noted, “We will not make use of the higher discharge limits in our new permit. We're not aware of any technology that will get us to those limits but we'll work to develop a project that allows us to do so. If necessary changes to the project result in a material impact to project viability, we could be forced to cancel it."
The exact press release letters by the Vice Chairman, President and congressional representatives can be viewed at: www.bp.com.
So fellow citizens of River City, West Michigan and the Great Lakes, a temporary victory appears to be in order. There will be no change in the refinery discharge to Lake Michigan until at least 2011. BP appears to be working toward new technologies that will lower their discharges before their permit is up for renewal in 2012 (their wise President might have wanted to consider that before the firestorm erupted earlier, but who says he gets paid for looking ahead, right? They’re advertised as “green” after all, not “brilliant visionaries”). There was no discussion about reducing the current limits of discharge still being allowed by the lakes largest polluter - good ole' BP. Current discharge levels, ok. Increased discharge levels, thumbs down. Reduced discharge levels, not an item up for discussion. One step at a time people, one step at a time.
Many will ask what happens after 2012? Well, that story is still to be written.
So, fish, swim, boat, drink the water and enjoy the bounty we have in our backyards. Lake Michigan is secure from BP additional waste discharge…for now.
Editor, The Local Area Watch | <urn:uuid:b111903e-fee7-4806-9b4c-75b52ef70945> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.localareawatch.org/2007/08/v-is-for-victor.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940122 | 1,590 | 2.203125 | 2 |
The zombie is dead. Long live the zombie.
The niche genre of the zombie apocalypse will soon make its major television debut with AMC's new series The Walking Dead, whose trailer was released last week. Based on the black-and-white comic series by Robert Kirkman and Tony Moore, and adapted for television by Frank Darabont, Walking Dead centers on Rick Grimes, a former police officer. Grimes awakens from a shooting-induced coma to find his wife and son missing and his hometown run amok with lumbering zombies. As Rick frantically searches for his family, his desperation to survive—and that of his companions—pushes him to do almost anything to stay alive.
While The Walking Dead seems like yet another provocative addition to AMC's already popular lineup (which includes Mad Men and Breaking Bad), the series is much more than a ratings grab. Darabont's take on the renowned comic may succeed in reintroducing the zombie genre to mainstream America, presenting the post-apocalyptic zombie narrative as it was originally intended.
You see, the zombie genre was never meant to be just about gore—the very best films also contain social commentary, a theme established by the work of George A. Romero, "Grandfather of the Zombie" and pioneer of the genre. Night Of The Living Dead, Romero's 1968 cinematic opus, was renowned upon its release not only for gruesome depiction of zombie cannibalism but also for the way it handled social issues. "This was Middle America at war, and the zombie carnage seemed a grotesque echo of the conflict then raging in Vietnam," wrote Elliot Stein in a 2003 retrospective in the Village Voice. "In this first-ever subversive horror movie, the resourceful black hero survives the zombies only to be killed by a redneck posse, and a young girl nibbles ravenously on her father's severed arm—disillusionment with government and patriarchal nuclear family is total."
MORE ON ZOMBIES:
Joshua Green: Inbred Jed
Jed Rowen: Hunting for Zombies at Comic-Con
John Hudson: How Zombies and Steampunk Explain Society
Romero's Dead sequels continued the trend. Dawn of the Dead (1978), which focused on a group of survivors holed up in a shopping mall, carried a scathing critique of American consumer culture and the perceived materialism and narcissism of the Baby Boomer generation. The same followed for Day of the Dead (1985), set in a giant bunker where military scientists attempted to domesticate and control the roving gaggles of zombies. While campier than the original, Day of the Dead touched on widespread anxieties about the military-industrial complex and human experimentation in a decade still reeling from Vietnam. Land of the Dead, Romero's 2005 installment to the series, retained the same sharp social commentary, this time with a focus on class warfare in the post-zombie world where the rich and aristocratic continued to exploit the less-fortunate, despite the ever-present danger of human extinction.
Mainstream zombie movies, while inspired by Romero, lack his brand of
social commentary. The modern zombie epoch, brought about by the dual
release in 2004 of Zac Snyder's remake of Dawn of the Dead and Simon
Pegg's self-described "rom-zom-com" Shaun of the Dead were more geared
towards commercial success. Either these films sought to replicate (or
outdo) the sheer gore of the original Night of the Living Dead (See 28
Days Later, Dawn of the Dead) or capitalize on the sheer camp
(Shaun of the Dead, Zombieland). While these films were all commercial
successes, they lacked the emphasis on the human condition that made
Romero's films so subversive, choosing instead to emphasize extreme
gore and leisurely onscreen hijinks:
There are a two main reasons why Darabont's adaptation has the potential to revive the zombie genre that Romero envisioned. First, the medium: while The Walking Dead may fizzle after its pilot season, the six episodes ordered by AMC leave more room for character and plot development than a two-hour bloodbath. This is primarily because the main characters have to persevere through the seasons rather than become some dead pedestrian's dinner to pick up the action. No wise-cracking shenanigans here, no miscellaneous deaths for the sheer horror of it; Rick Grimes and his fellow survivors are condemned by television to a long, uphill struggle to stay alive. And one can only stay sane in a world of death for so long.
Second, Darabont and co. aren't creating a zombie narrative from scratch. Kirkman and Moore's original comic ran for 76 issues, providing plenty of source material for AMC. Having read the vast majority of The Walking Dead during my tech-less stints as a camp counselor, I can honestly say that the comic represents a much darker iteration than other zombie narratives. Throughout the series, the personalities of the survivors gradually shifty to adjust to a constant cycle of fear, death and dread. The main characters stop sleeping; children are forced to grow up fast. Rape, dismemberment, arson, and other horrific acts outline the gradual descent into insanity by surviving humans, even with the undead kept at bay.
Sure, The Walking Dead as written by Kirkland isn't a frame-for-frame testament to Romero's zombie vision; critiques of race, religion, consumerism, and politics are absent as Rick Grimes' world descends into anarchy. But that's exactly the point: The Walking Dead examines the social and psychological transformation of average humans as they are plunged into a world where life is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. The Walking Dead explores the limits of humanity and the boundaries of insanity. While we'll have to wait until Halloween to get a glimpse at AMC's zombie apocalypse, chances are it will make Romero proud. | <urn:uuid:8b3d1760-9fca-4210-9cc3-6e964ce6555c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2010/08/can-the-walking-dead-revive-the-zombie-genre/62127/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00076-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941207 | 1,202 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Helmut Finckbein research in Baiersbronn, WuerttembergEdit This Page
From FamilySearch Wiki
For more than 40 years, Helmut Finckbein, an engineer living in Berlin, Germany, spent all of his spare time researching the area in and around Baiersbronn in the Schwarzwald area of what is now Baden-Wuerttemberg. His work was methodical, precise, and thorough; he became an expert on many of the families in the area including his own, the Finckbeiners. He frequently shared his research with fellow genealogists, both amateur and professional, and also contributed numerous articles to genealogical and local interest publications.
By the mid-1970s Herr Finckbein had compiled about 1,450 families exactly as they appeared in the original records, drawing, of course, from all available sources. Many researchers have benefitted from his work back into the 1950s, even though neither Herr Finckbein nor his family fully understood why he was doing this tremendous work.
For over thirty years I have been working with the family names from the Finckbein File. As the technology has changed and improved I have added much detail to those records, many of which now appear in new.FamilySearch.org and in Family Tree. Because new.FamilySearch.org permits the addition of notes through the synchronization process with software like Ancestral Quest, in recent months I have added notes to thousands of Finckbein File entries already on the database. In almost every case there were few or no notes available through new.Family Search; my efforts should help eliminate a great deal of the confusion that has developed as work has been duplicated time after time.
In the early 1980s Herr Finckbein gave me the entire Finckbein File, with all 1,450 families. I hope to complete the task of placing the entire Finckbein File onto Family Tree by the end of 2015. The primary lines of descent have been completed; most lines stop after the Thirty Years' War [1618-1648] and none proceed forward beyond about 1875. Much of what I am doing in 2012 involves making sure all names are synchronized with full notes and adding the remaining few (approximately 3,000-4,000 names not necessarily in direct line of descent, many of which came from or departed to places outside the Baiersbronn area.
Feel free to email me when you find my notes on new.FamilySearch.org or Family Tree.
- This page was last modified on 12 November 2012, at 18:06.
- This page has been accessed 92 times.
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In the FamilySearch Research Wiki, you can learn how to do genealogical research or share your knowledge with others.Learn More | <urn:uuid:9203dd05-8202-4ac4-be5e-b4d39b8622b3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Helmut_Finckbein_research_in_Baiersbronn,_Wuerttemberg | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966788 | 591 | 1.828125 | 2 |
Saruman tries to beguile Gandalf in the Parley
Event Type: Military/Strategic
Age: 3rd Age - Ring War
Date: March 5, 3019
An event in the Parley with Saruman in Isengard; see that entry for an overview:
'I know not why I have had the patience to speak to you. For I need you not, nor your little band of gallopers... Théoden Horsemaster.... Go back to your huts!
'But you, Gandalf! For you at least I am grieved, feeling for your shame. How comes it that you can endure such company? For you are proud, Gandalf — and not without reason, having a noble mind and eyes that look both deep and far. Even now will you not listen to my counsel?'
Gandalf stirred, and looked up. 'What have you to say that you did not say at our last meeting?' he asked. 'Or, perhaps, you have things to unsay?'
Saruman paused. 'Unsay?' he mused, as if puzzled. 'Unsay? I endeavoured to advise you for your own good, but you scarcely listened. You are proud and do not love advice, having indeed a store of your own wisdom. But on that occasion you erred, I think, misconstruing my intentions wilfully. I fear that in my eagerness to persuade you, I lost patience. And indeed I regret it. For I bore you no ill-will; and even now I bear none.... How should I? Are we not both members of a high and ancient order, most excellent in Middle-earth? Our friendship would profit us both alike. Much we could still accomplish together, to heal the disorders of the world. Let us understand one another, and dismiss from thought these lesser folk! Let them wait on our decisions! For the common good I am willing to redress the past, and to receive you. Will you not consult with me? Will you not come up?'
So great was the power that Saruman exerted in this last effort that none that stood within hearing were unmoved. But now the spell was wholly different. They heard the gentle remonstrance of a kindly king with an erring but much-loved minister. But they were shut out, listening at a door to words not meant for them: ill-mannered children or stupid servants overhearing the elusive discourse of their elders, and wondering how it would affect their lot. Of loftier mould these two were made: reverend and wise. It was inevitable that they should make alliance. Gandalf would ascend into the tower, to discuss deep things beyond their comprehension in the high chambers of Orthanc. The door would be closed, and they would be left outside, dismissed to await allotted work or punishment. Even in the mind of Théoden the thought took shape, like a shadow of doubt: 'He will betray us; he will go — we shall be lost.'
Then Gandalf laughed. The fantasy vanished like a puff of smoke.
'Saruman, Saruman!' said Gandalf still laughing. 'Saruman, you missed your path in life. You should have been the king's jester and earned your bread, and stripes too, by mimicking his counsellors. Ah me!' he paused, getting the better of his mirth. 'Understand one another? I fear I am beyond your comprehension. But you, Saruman, I understand now too well. I keep a clearer memory of your arguments, and deeds, than you suppose. When last I visited you, you were the jailor of Mordor, and there I was to be sent. Nay, the guest who has escaped from the roof, will think twice before he comes back in by the door. Nay, I do not think I will come up.'
The Two Towers, LoTR Book 3, Ch 10, The Voice of Saruman
Elena Tiriel 18May05 | <urn:uuid:d3576dac-a26e-4876-80c9-48a102a7813c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://henneth-annun.net/resources/events_view.cfm?EVID=862 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00033-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968551 | 831 | 1.9375 | 2 |
K-Town Youth Empowerment Network staff and volunteers help you find the services, skills and resources you need to take your next big steps toward independence. LEARN MORE
2013 Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day
Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day is a day of information, activities, entertainment, and learning for families. Our goal is to promote community awareness of family care and health-minded resources in a fun and informal way while strengthening families and our community.
The Children’s Mental Health Awareness Fair is on May 11th, 2013 at the Knoxville Zoo from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM. The Knoxville Zoo has also provided us with a great location, as our event will take place at the entrance to the Kid’s Cove. So all you will need to bring is your energy, and come out to hear about the great things going on for youth in the mental health community. The Knoxville Zoo has provided us with special half price ticketing on this day as adult prices are $10.00 and children’s tickets are $8.00, but you must register at our table for this special price.
So please come out to this community event, we look forward to seeing you!
This website is provided by K-Town Youth Empowerment Network to provide educational and public service communications related to K-Town Youth Empowerment Network, its community partners, and transition-age youth with emotional and behavioral needs.
© K-Town Youth Empowerment Network, 2010. All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:26395ee7-2290-4966-a759-97ddbbf8941a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ktownyen.org/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00052-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931414 | 319 | 2.078125 | 2 |
If Senator Kennedy had never uttered a word about a judicial nominee, he still would be among the most important U.S. Senators of the 20th century. But Kennedy did utter words about this topic, to the point that he is probably the most influential U.S. Senator in history (qua Senator) when it comes to the Supreme Court.
As Scott explains below, Kennedy played the lead role in derailing the nomination to the Supreme Court of Robert Bork. In my view, the distance between Judge Bork and Justice Anthony Kennedy, who wound up with the position, is probably the most important aspect of Ted Kennedy’s legacy.
The derailment of Judge Bork was almost surely decisive in the nomination of David Souter to fill a Supreme Court vacancy that arose during the administration of the first President Bush. At that time, the administration felt sufficiently constrained that it nominated someone whose conservatism was not demonstrable. Had Bork been confirmed, it’s almost certain that Bush would have nominated a real conservative instead of someone who was suspected to be conservative but wasn’t one.
In my view, the difference between Justice Souter and a real conservative jurist is probably the second most important aspect of Ted Kennedy’s legacy.
Thus, for better or for worse,Senator Kennedy mightily influenced both the U.S. Senate and the U.S. Supreme Court. And, as Scott has shown, he also helped radicallly transform the process by which the first body (and to some extent the president) determines who will populate the second.
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“Arise and take our stand for freedom as in the olden time.” Winston Churchill
“Proclaim Liberty throughout All the land unto All the Inhabitants Thereof.” Inscription on the Liberty Bell | <urn:uuid:5087447c-b722-4ff4-bdd7-21d04a858d48> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2009/08/024378.php?tsize=small | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00056-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946377 | 429 | 2.390625 | 2 |
Night at the Museum
It’s not every day that a museum exhibition opens up its vault and unloads a few covetable goods for sale. But on Friday, October 25, the nationally traveled “Design for a Living World” collection is putting pieces up for auction at the Coral Gables Museum in Miami — and several unique, eco-minded items are up for grabs.
Presented by the Nature Conservancy, the soon-to-close exhibit features nine highly-recognized designers that created one-of-a-kind art pieces from all over the world using only sustainable materials. These items include a gorgeous salmon skin dress (which looks like sequins) from Isaac Mizrahi, woven Bolivian handbags from former Kate Spade designer Paulina Reyes, Ted Muehling’s glossy geometric bracelets made from vegetable ivory in Micronesia, and even a pair of python heels made from the invasive Burmese python from the Everglades – all available for purchase at the auction to benefit The Nature Conservancy. Feeling Florida-bound? Details are below. (Pssst…there’s also an online auction portion if you can’t make the event. Check it out here.)
The Nature Conservancy’s “Design for a Living World” Auction
Friday, October 25 at 6:30pm
The Coral Gables Museum, 285 Aragon Avenue, Miami, FL
For additional info, visit coralgablesmuseum.org. | <urn:uuid:07d2416b-d832-4531-b442-74b1da7cf4e9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ecofabulous.com/events/night-at-the-museum/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.901231 | 311 | 1.625 | 2 |
The Florida Keys have a distinctive Caribbean flavor. Maybe it's the contrast with Miami's tropical sophistication, but once you hit two-lane A1A heading south, you can feel it. You are surrounded by water, and that island feeling takes over. But the Keys have their own claims to fame. There are Key lime pie, bonefishing, conch fritters, and let us not forget the king of Caribbean soul, Jimmy Buffett. But the crown jewel of the Keys is the John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park.
This park in Key Largo, Florida, was established more than 40 years ago, in 1963. The park is adjacent to the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, which covers 178 nautical square miles of coral reefs, sea grass beds and mangrove swamps. These protected reefs are also the only living coral reef system in the continental United States, so once again, man is charged with making sure that these reefs do not go the way of those that were unprotected and ravaged to extinction.
There are many places in the world where reefs are still being exploited to death. And it appeared that the reefs of the Keys would suffer the same fate in the early part of the 20th century. Fortunately, a group of marine scientists and avid environmentalists, including Miami newspaper editor John D. Pennekamp, took it upon themselves to pursue both public and private support in establishing the first portion of this extensive marine sanctuary and ending the harvesting of corals, sponges, seashells and marine life to be sold as souvenirs.
In 1960, after a three-year struggle, President Dwight D. Eisenhower declared the area a marine preserve. Three years later, the park opened to the public and has welcomed visitors ever since.
Dive shops around the country now make annual pilgrimages to Key Largo to dive one of the country's most popular marine attractions. Divers not only are able to explore the coral gardens and witness the prolific fish life, but also learn about the ecosystems that support the health of the reefs through environmental programs and educational exhibits at the park's visitor center.
The dive operation at John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park is a PADI 5-Star Gold Palm IDC facility that departs the docks from within the park twice daily for two-tank dives. One of the biggest attractions within the preserve is the Christ of the Abyss statue at Dry Rocks reef. This 9-foot statue of Christ reaching up with outstretched arms sits in about 25 feet of water. It was donated to the park in 1961 by Italian diving enthusiast Egidi Cressi (of Cressi-sub fame) and has become a very popular site not only for divers, but also for under-water weddings.
Molasses Reef is also a popular site. Healthy corals provide havens for the abundance of marine life that flourishes in theprotected waters, including eels, sea turtles, rays and occasionally sharks.
The sites within the sanctuary can also be reached by many independent dive operations from outside the park property. PADI 5-Star facilities in the Key Largo area include Horizon Divers (www.horizondivers.com), Ocean Divers (www.oceandivers.com), Amy Slate's Amoray Dive Resort (www.amoray.com), Aqua-Nut Divers (www.aqua-nuts.com), It's a Dive (www.itsadive.com), Paradise Charters Dive Center (www.paradisecharters.net), Paradise Dive & Snorkel and Sea Dwellers Dive Center (www.seadwellers.com). For a complete list of PADI dive operators in the Key Largo area, visit www.padi.com. | <urn:uuid:cf8dda22-6ba8-4f08-a960-595d42711150> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sportdiver.com/keywords/florida/made-usa | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942592 | 770 | 2.484375 | 2 |
Fighting Plagiarism :: Taking the Work Out of Homework
With the rise of the internet, schools are seeing an epidemicof cut-and-paste plagiarism. But the same technology that’s makingplagiarism easy is being used by teachers to catch copycats in the act.
IT WAS ONE of those assignments that Advanced Placement English students at Oak Park High School in Ventura, CA, love to get. The students had just finished reading Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, and their teacher, Roland Herberg, asked them to pair up and create brochures about the book. Herberg’s instructions were simple: Each brochure had to contain an essay about totalitarian tendencies in modern society, and all of the work had to be original. The rest of the design elements were up to the students; Herberg told the kids theycould be as creative as they wanted to be.
One pair of students, however, clearly wasn’t creative enough. Their brochure, titled “Religion Is Terrorism,” presented a fully integrated argument about the negative consequences of religion. Herberg, no stranger to the capabilities of 17-year-olds, was suspicious immediately. It’s not that the argument wasn’t strong; on the contrary, it was so sophisticated that Herberg felt it had to belong to someone else. Sure enough, when the teacher plugged the title phrase into Google, he discovered that the first half of the four-page brochure was almost completely taken from a bookon the same subject.
Herberg gave the students a C-minus on their project and confronted them. It became evident that one student was far more culpable than the other. The student became indignant when Herberg accused her of plagiarism, denying ever visiting some of the websites Herberg said he had found. Days later, when the confrontation had escalated to the counseling office, the student admitted she had plagiarized, but insisted the act was neither immoral nor unethical. To add insult to injury, the student then wrote Herberg a nasty letter, accusing him of “stiflingher creativity.” Herberg, understandably, was astounded.
“She understood it was plagiarism, but didn’t feel she had done anything wrong,” he says, still looking back on the experience with disbelief. “She had put a lot of time and effort into getting the sources from the internet. By putting all of it intoa different medium, she honestly thought it would be okay.”
Unfortunately, what happened at Oak Park is happening on campuses nationwide—plagiarism is on the rise. With veritable libraries at their fingertips, students see nothing wrong with borrowing a sentence or paragraph or page from something they find online. What’s more, the prevalence of e-mail and instant messaging makes sharing derivative material easier than ever before. On the flipside, teachers are far too busy to track down original sources unless the offense is obvious. The result is education’s own Wild West, in which ideas are stolen and repurposed without retribution, hurting those studentswho actually produce original work.
Educators are now beginning to fight back. Some, like Herberg, have assumed the role of Wyatt Earp and taken matters into their own hands, using free internet technologies to nab students in the act. Other schools have turned to vendors to help fight their battles—with solutions from companies such as iParadigms and Questia. Finally, a small group of academic experts has taken a more philosophical approach, rethinking key facets of the educational process and proposing to eliminate cheating by changing the nature of the assignments. All of the solutions have merit; the key for school district officialsis finding the one that works best.
CAUGHT! Questia offers access to what
it calls the world’s largest online library to
help educators nab student plagiarizers.
Plagiarism essentially is a matter of deceit: fooling a reader into believing that certain written material is original when it is not. In fact, you have just witnessed an act of plagiarism: The bulk of that previous sentence was plucked straight from the Wikipedia definition of plagiarism,with no citation.
Plagiarism certainly is nothing new and not confined to K-12; over the years, dozens of famous writers have been accused of it. Earlier this year, Harvard University sophomore Kaavya Viswanathan was fingered for plagiarizing entire passages of her debut novel, How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life, from another coming-of-age romance novel by a different author. Experts, however, say the most rampant plagiarizing occurs in the K-12 environment, where students are encouraged to use the internet to source their assignments. A national survey by the Rutgers University Management Education Center (see “Guilt-Free Cheaters”) found that 60 percent of the 18,000 responding highschool students engaged in plagiarism to get ahead.
“It’s a huge problem in the K-12 space,” says Ilan Barzilay, associate at the Boston law firm Wolf, Greenfield & Sacks, which handles a variety of copyright cases. “Students just cut and paste things and turn their work in. For them, the convenience far outweighs the likelihood of getting caught.”
Students aren’t only cutting and pasting from websites; often they buy the whole package. Some sites—known as term-paper mills—offer A-plus term papers for as little as $6.95 per page. One site, SchoolSucks.com, posts papers on subjects from workplace ethics to temperance champion Francis Willard, for free. While many educators assail the site for making it easy for students to copy entire homework assignments in seconds, SchoolSucks founder Kenneth Sahr has said that the papers housed on his site are meant to be used as research material, which is a curious thing to say in light of the banner scrolled atop the site, which exclaims, “Free homework website!” Ever the public servant, Sahr has also said that the poor quality of the essays he sells should be taken by educators as a warning about the level of student our school system is producing. (Sahr did not return requests seeking comment for this story.)
Regardless of how it’s carried out, plagiarism has a number of negative consequences. For starters, it’s against the law to use copyrighted material without proper citation, and any student guilty of it technically could face legal trouble. Secondly, the act shortchanges students who do it, denying them the benefits of thinking on their own. Finally—and perhaps most troubling— Herberg says plagiarism hurts those students who actually take the time to develop their own work; when a teacher mistakenly considers a plagiarized paper to be original, the bar gets raised to the point where legitimate papers may be docked in comparison. “If a teacher reads what he perceives to be an A paper and does not detect the paper is plagiarized, all of the students who wrote A papers on their own will suffer,” Herberg says. “The greatest crime is that no matter what happens to the students who are committing plagiarism, it inevitably hurts those students who are honest and ethical.”
SMELLS LIKE TEEN PLAGIARISM
Nancy Willard, executive director of the Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use in Eugene, OR, tells teachers to look out for these telltale symptoms of plagiarized work:
- Use of language inconsistent with the language a typical middle or high school student would use.
- Inexplicable changes in fonts, or the presence of underlined links to web pages.
- Portions of text that are formatted differently from the rest of the essay.
- Endnote or footnote annotations that do not correspond accordingly.
- A paragraph or sentence that appears in several students’ papers.
A Good Defense
As Herberg learned firsthand, the surest way to catch students in an act of plagiarism is to track down portions of their papers on the very internet whence they came. The easiest tools to use for this are Google and other popular search engines—the same websites to which students might look if they were planning on researching a project legitimately. Nancy Willard, executive director of the Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use in Eugene, OR, says that because most students commit plagiarism out of sheer laziness, sources for a plagiarized paper generally can be found on the first three pages of a search return.
Search engines, however, are not foolproof. Because they scan only the free internet, plagiarized work from subscription- based periodicals and other term papers will not show up on a standard search. With thatin mind, many schools recently have signed up for plagiarism prevention service from iParadigms, a software company based in Oakland, CA. The service, called Turnitin, specializes in the digital assessment of student work and vets documents for originality. It works entirely through a web browser; subscribing teachers have their students upload papers directly through the website, where the papers are instantaneously compared against the Turnitin database. The database consists of a copy of the free internet, commercial content (including most major newspapers, academic journals, magazines, and periodicals), and every paper that’s ever been run through the system. According to company CEO John Barrie, a search takes seconds and delivers discreet results to educators upon demand. Each paper is color-coded to show which sections, if any, are plagiarized and where the original material is from. A copy of the paper is then sent to the teacher, who has evidence to take action.
“In the past, instructors would say, ‘I know this is not your work. Tell me where you got these words,’” explains Barrie, who says the service receives more than 50,000 to 60,000 student papers every day. “With our service, they can say, “Please explain to me why 87 percent of your work is plagiarized.’ It’sa huge difference.”
STUDENT PLAGIARIZERS HAVE LITTLE REMORSE, SAYING THEY’RE SIMPLY FOLLOWING THE EXAMPLE SET BEFORE THEM.
The latest results of an ongoing national survey by the Center for Academic Integrity provide some pretty sobering facts about plagiarism in the K-12 environment.
- More than 70 percent of the 18,000 surveyed high school students admitted they had engaged in serious cheating; 60 percent admitted to plagiarism.
- More than half have plagiarized work they found on the internet.
- Most of them don’t see anything wrong with cheating.
Don McCabe, head of CAI’s survey and professor of organization management at Rutgers University, has been surveying student attitudes on cheating since 2002. He asked some of the respondents to list the reasons they cheat. McCabe told CNN he was surprised to learn that students find it easy to rationalize their cheating by saying they’re following poor examples set by their parents.
“I think kids today are looking to adults and society for a moral compass,” McCabe said. “When they see the behavior occurring there, they don’t understand why they should be held to a higher standard.”
Recent iterations of McCabe’s research have focused mainly on higher education. In 2003, for instance, the survey found that 38 percent of 18,000 college-age respondents said they had tried to pass off cut-and-pasted work from the internet as their own.
Another commercial option is offered by Questia, which bills itself as the world’s largest online library. The Questia feature isn’t a standalone service like Turnitin; instead, interested parties sign up for access to the entire Questia database, and can utilize standard search functions to scan the library for occurrences of a particular phrase. Anyone who works for a school or district that subscribes to Questia can consult the database todetect plagiarism.
Educators at Breckenridge High School in Texas put Questia technology to the test all the time, and last year, teachers in the English department managed to catch one would-be student plagiarizer. Jay Clack, chair of the department, remembers the student’s paper explicitly—a report on the loss of familyowned farms. Clack says the first few paragraphs of the paper were excellent, but the document came to a point where it did not “sound like” the student at all. Clack questioned the student and didn’t get a straight answer, so he put the passages into Questia for analysis. Sure enough, the system indicated they were lifted fromanother source.
“It makes it easy for me to track anything that is questionable, because I can enter a suspicious sentence or phrase, and Questia will lead me to the exact source of the material,” Clack says. “Because my students know that I am more likelyto check their work, I think they are less likely to plagiarize.”
BORROWER BEWARE Turnitin detects
plagiarized passages in student papers.
To some degree, Clack’s optimism about the efficacy of plagiarism deterrents is well founded. Since his school began using Questia, incidents of plagiarism have dropped precipitously. Barrie reports similar results from his iParadigms customers, adding that the more schools that have signed up and used Turnitin to frisk assignments for plagiarism, the larger the Turnitin database has gotten, bolstering its ability to smoke out copycats. Still, students continue to plagiarize—and get away with it. Unless school districts do something to step in and putan end to the practice, it will continue to run rampant.
One solution to the plagiarism epidemic is to fight back with education: Teach students how to source appropriately. Anthony Cody, consulting teacher with Peer Assistance and Review, a state-funded program in California to assist new and underperforming teachers, says that because a “certain degree” of copying is inherent in research, every teacher should start the school year with a lesson on what is and is not plagiarism, outlining the difference between citing a primary source and copying it, and explaining to students where the separationreally is.
“It’s a subtle distinction for a sixth-grader who does not understand why it’s acceptable to get the information but not okay to use the author’s exact words,” says Cody, who taught at Bret Harte Middle School in Oakland, CA, for 18 years before assuming his current job. “Teacherscan’t just expect students to know this stuff.”
Other educators suggest different strategies to fight plagiarism, from instituting policy that makes Google searches mandatory before grading to an SAT-like approach that requires students to write all essays in class. Doug Johnson, director of media and technology for Mankato Area Public Schools in Minnesota, offers yet another idea: changing the pedagogy so it’s impossible for students to copy at all. For Johnson, open-ended assignments are the biggest catalysts of plagiarism because the research process begs students to lift someone else’s work. By asking for a higher-order level of creativity and personalization, Johnsoninsists teachers can eliminate the threat of copycats altogether.
To explain his stance, Johnson offers an example in the social sciences. When studying the Olympics in ancient Greece, he says, most teachers would ask their students to write a report on the games and their cultural significance. A better assignment would be to have students choose their favorite athletes of today and predict how they would have performed in ancient Greece, then explain why. While the first question hinges only on research, Johnson’s approach combines research, synthesis, application, and thought. Work which incorporates that degree of originalthinking is nearly impossible to duplicate without detection.
“If you have an assignment that seems valueless, you can’t really justify kids plagiarizing, but you certainly can understand why they might,” he says. “All kids can be creative if we give them a chance, but it’s up to educators to take that leap.”
:: web extra :: For more information on this topic, visit www.thejournal.com. In the Browse by Topic menu, click onSecurity/Privacy.
Matt Villano, a writer and editor based in Half Moon Bay, CA, writes regularly for T.H.E. Journal and is a senior contributing editor to T.H.E.sister publication Campus Technology.
This article originally appeared in the 10/01/2006 issue of THE Journal. | <urn:uuid:97c8507c-56cf-4e8d-9d46-df43bfa43de0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thejournal.com/articles/2006/10/01/fighting-plagiarism--taking-the-work-out-of-homework.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9574 | 3,507 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Block Island is an anachronism. As you bike or walk its narrow roads, past lemonade stands and beach roses, you feel jarred by the occasional passing of a car. The birds you see—northern harriers, Savannah sparrows, barn owls—have all but disappeared from the Rhode Island mainland, just 12 miles away. There are more than 300 seemingly untouched ponds, and vast, hilly grasslands sectioned off by stone fences built by settlers in the 17th and 18th centuries. Since the 1960's, much of the land has been sold to conservation groups for a small fraction of its worth by islanders who would rather savor the shadbush than make millions on development. This no-nonsense attitude is typical here. The 850 year-round residents give Block Island—along with its well-cared-for inns and restaurants and shops—the kind of down-home air that its stylish neighbors to the east, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket, devote themselves to re-creating. The difference is that Block Island is not exclusive; there's something here for everyone. And, there's nothing "of the moment"—unless the moment you're referring to is sometime in the 1600's.
Several ferry services make daily crossings to and from the island in high season. The Viking Fleet (516/668-5700) travels between Montauk on New York's Long Island and Block Island's New Harbor. By night the boat is a casino; by day it's chastened, with green tarps thrown over the casino tables. If you want to bring a car, you'll have to travel from New London, Connecticut, or Point Judith, Rhode Island, with the Interstate Navigation Co. (401/783-4613).
New England Airlines (800/243-2460 or 401/596-2460) flies hourly to the island from Westerly, Rhode Island; the flight takes 13 minutes.
Block Island is only seven miles long and 3 1/2 miles wide, so nearly everyone bikes or walks. Rental cars are expensive and parking space is scarce. See What to Do for information on bike rentals, but be warned: the island is hilly. If you're not prepared for a workout, rent a car or moped for at least one day during your trip. Try Old Harbor Bike Shop (401/466-2029) for moped rentals. If you prefer to see the far reaches of the island by taxi, or would like a tour given by a charismatic insider, try Nat's Taxi (401/932-4165).
Many of the island's inns and hotels rent at least six months in advance. If you're planning a last-minute trip, or want to extend your stay once you're on the island, check out the chamber of commerce's list of cancellations (401/466-2982).
Atlantic Inn High St.; 800/224-7422 or 401/466-5883, fax 401/466-5678; doubles $140. The lobby, bar, and dining rooms here make you feel as if you could step out the front door and call for your horse and carriage. The 21 pleasant guest rooms are decorated with an eclectic range of antiques, and the restaurant is fabulous. From the veranda, you get an unbeatable view of the six-acre grounds (with tennis courts and a croquet lawn) and the ocean.
Seabreeze Inn Spring St.; 800/786-2276 or 401/466-2275; doubles $100, cottages $210. Staying in a room in one of the four guest houses here, you can live the New England seaside fantasy: you're in a simple cottage overlooking a wildflower meadow and within earshot of the ocean's waves. There are a lot of sun-bleached wooden steps meandering among flowering shrubs. Inside, you walk barefoot on painted wood floors and braided rugs. As the evening falls, you turn on your antique lamp and settle down to a book. Wake-up call: half the inn's 10 rooms share baths; they're best suited to groups or families. Among the three suites, the best is No. 10.
Eastgate House Spring St.; 401/466-2164; doubles $250. Here's where to stay if you want to live like a very fortunate Block Islander, in one of three tastefully designed and decorated guest rooms, each a mixture of modern convenience and antique style, in a rambling Cape-style house. The view from the Captain's Room — as well as from its private porch and Jacuzzi tub — is perfect. And whether you decide on eggs, pastries, or pancakes, breakfast will be one of the tastiest meals you eat on the island. Nancy Harris, who owns the inn with her husband Richard, will either leave you alone (if that's what you'd like) or give you priceless advice on how best to enjoy the island.
Hygeia House Beach Ave.; 401/466-9616; doubles $215, including continental breakfast. This house, with its stately mansard roof, was built in the late 1880's as the office and residence of the island physician. After a 20-year abandonment, it was rescued by new owners just last fall. The inn is almost a mile from downtown, on a hill overlooking New Harbor. The 10 well-renovated rooms are Victorian without being the slightest bit froufrou. Each of the rooms has original dressers and bed frames, a private bath, and an ocean view. In the main hallway the doctor's 90-year-old medical bag is displayed, with vials of elixirs, ointments, and various instruments.
Spring House Hotel Spring St.; 800/234-9263 or 401/466-5844, fax 401/466-2633; doubles $175. A throwback to another era, this grand place has rested on its laurels for many years. The food in the dining room, for example, is merely good, on an island that has some great restaurants. But the hotel makes up for it with vast, wonderfully old-world bars and sitting areas. The 49 guest rooms, studios, and suites were redecorated in the 1980's with wall-to-wall carpeting that hardly matches the reproduction Victorian light fixtures and furniture. But that's the price you pay for the feeling that you're a part of history, and for the chance to have your cocktail on a beautiful covered porch that can accommodate 100 without seeming the least bit crowded.
Hotel Manisses Spring St.; 800/626-4773 or 401/466-2836, fax 401/466-3162; doubles $165. The 17 Victorian rooms in this rambling 1872 manor on the edge of town are slightly stuffy. But the hotel has a nice spirit about it, and great service. Four of the guest rooms have whirlpools. The restaurant is excellent, and the bar is the place to be for cocktails. Take your drink and explore the grounds; it won't be long before you find the exotic animal farm, which includes llamas, emus, fainting goats, and a zebu.
1661 Spring Street; 800/626-4773 or 401/466-2836, fax 401/466-3162; doubles $165. Something between an inn and a hotel, this white Colonial inn and adjacent clapboard guesthouse are owned and run by Hotel Manisses. The nine rooms are decorated in a somewhat haphazard manner, but the staff is friendly and professional, and the hillside ocean views are breathtaking. | <urn:uuid:cb426fca-5a8f-4486-a19b-3d0145699b94> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.travelandleisure.com/articles/block-island-rhode-island | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949219 | 1,595 | 1.726563 | 2 |
Steve Ipsen, MSN and Dr. Marc Babitz
Within the Division of Family Health and Preparedness is a bureau entitled Bureau of Primary Care. This bureau is made up of medical and dental clinics and staff located throughout the state of Utah.
Health Clinics of Utah
The medical clinics are called Health Clinics of Utah (HCU). The clinics are located in Salt Lake, Ogden, and Provo. HCU plays a key role for the Utah Department of Health and Utah’s Safety Net of providers. The clinics are affiliated with Head Start, Foster Care, Utah Partners for Health, and Native American services. We also offer childhood and adult immunizations. The medical clinics are staffed with friendly, caring and professional staff. The clinics provide high quality medical care at the lowest cost to our valued customers. HCU accepts most forms of insurance along with, Medicaid, CHIP, PCN, and Medicare. The clinics also have a strong affiliation with PEHP. Please see the contact information for the phone numbers and locations of the clinics. Pre-registration forms are available to print and fill out prior to your appointment time on each clinic page.
In most cases you will be given an appointment the same day that you call. Both the Salt Lake and Ogden clinics offer urgent care hours each evening Monday through Friday. Normal office hours are from 8-5, M-F. Please call and get acquainted.
Family Dental Plan
Family Dental Plan (FDP) consists of three dental clinics and a mobile clinic operation which can be taken to various rural community locations throughout the state of Utah. Clinics are located in SL, Ogden, and St. George. Our mission is to provide cost-effective, high quality dental services in a patient friendly environment for patients on Medicaid, PCN, and CHIP and the uninsured on a fee-for-service (reduced rates) basis. Care is delivered by highly trained professional staff. We can take care of your dental needs and emergencies. FDP is affiliated with Sealants for Smiles, Head Start, Foster care, Centro de la Familia, CHEC, and Native American programs. We invite all Medicaid, CHIP and PCN qualified recipients to call and check us out. | <urn:uuid:c2d5dfef-d136-41f5-8a2e-ae1784d3d0e8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.health.utah.gov/clinics/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949572 | 462 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Hustings: A place where political speeches are made; more generally, the campaign trail. plural and singular. From Old English husting, “meeting, court”; adapted from Old Norse hus-thing, “house assembly.” A related word, Althing, is the name of Iceland’s general assembly. (This thing is analogous to the Latin legal term res: an issue or matter.)
“Hustings” is a word that appears only during political seasons in the US, and then infrequently: the synonym “stump,” which can also be a verb, often replaces it. The late language maven William Safire, in Safire’s Political Dictionary, said “hustings” was “archaic” and “often used semihumorously.”
One place “hustings” is taken seriously is the Wall Street Journal, where the word has appeared five times in the last two months. “Obama Hits Hustings on His Own” was the headline on an August 31 story.
In a September 18 blog post about the Romney campaign, “Time for an Intervention,” WSJ columnist Peggy Noonan addressed the candidate directly:
Wake this election up. Wade into the crowd, wade into the fray, hold a hell of a rally in an American city—don’t they count anymore? A big, dense city with skyscrapers like canyons, crowds and placards, and yelling. All of our campaigning now is in bland suburbs and tired hustings.
“Hustings” is used differently in the UK and Commonwealth countries (and ex-Commonwealth nations such as India), where it means the proceedings at a parliamentary election. It often appears as a modifier: “a hustings event.” The word has been used in many contexts since it first appeared in print in 1030; the modern British sense, according to the OED, comes from the term for the temporary platform from which Parliamentary candidates were nominated. | <urn:uuid:3a49f678-15aa-49ee-a0c6-540bf1674da0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://nancyfriedman.typepad.com/away_with_words/etymology/page/2/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00030-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966178 | 435 | 2.625 | 3 |
|The Armies March...
An Intro To Dust
|Dust | Published 19 November 2008||Rating||14 votes|
Dust is a strategy board game of conquest and control. Seize power sources and capitols, develop your infrastructure, and build and wield vast, high-tech armies in your bid for global domination!
Two to six players will take the roles of alternate-history superpowers. Each player will claim one of six capitols on the game board and establish their empire from there.
Players will probably recognize the map as that of Earth, but what they will not see are any borders or nations. In the world of Dust, the unending war and the new technologies have altered the political face of Earth beyond all recognition.
The game map is divided into areas, both land and sea. Each area is either a normal area, a power source, or a capital. (Capitals are found only on land, but power sources can be found either on land or at sea!) Normal areas have no special traits, but they can be enhanced with production centers that allow players to produce their troops and more easily defend their territory. Capitals are easier to defend than normal areas and provide victory points. Each player starts with one capital and they are the core to any strategy. Finally, there are power sources. Like capitals, power sources provide victory points. Even more importantly, power sources provide the VK necessary to power the advanced armies used by the nations of Dust. A player may build units using the production points generated by his factories, but he may only count as many factories as he has power sources towards this total. Unpowered factories cannot produce armies!
Each area on the map is connected to other areas by clearly-indicated lines, and some of these adjacencies go from the far-left side of the board to the far-right side of the board, so the world depicted on the game board is, in fact, round.
Cards and Special Abilities
At the beginning of each turn, players select a card from their hand. This card represents their strategy for the coming turn and to a large extent dictates the actions a player can take.
Each card has three values printed down its left-hand side: attack, move, and production. The attack value determines the number of attacks a player may make on that turn and also determines the initiative order for the turn (ties are broken by movement value). The movement value determines how many non-combat moves a player may make during his turn. The production value is a number that is added to the production points generated by a player's production centers and power sources.
Each card also bears a powerful special ability, depicted as a character from the Dust universe. Whether it's the mech-drop's ability to place a mech unit in any friendly region or Koschka's ability to interrupt another player's turn, these abilities can mean the difference between victory and defeat for the Dust commander.
Cards are not simply refreshed when a player's hand is emptied — players must purchase cards when they produce units. Since players may only play one card per turn, buying too many cards is a waste of resources, but buying too few will leave a player without sufficient options to control his destiny.
Production and Armies
On each turn, players count up their available production points. They gain six production points for each capital, as well as production points for the card they played at the start of the turn. They also gain three production points per production center they control, provided that they also control at least as many power sources as production centers. If they don't control enough power points, they gain three production points per power source they control. For this reason, it's very important to control power sources on the game map!
During their production phase, players will spend these production points to buy additional factories and units. Each unit has its own cost, ranging from two production points for a tank up to an impressive eight to buy a bomber, and players may spend their available production points however they wish. A player who does not spend all his production points does not “bank” them for the next turn - he must spend them all each turn or lose the excess. (Note that additional cards cost only a single production point, so a player should never be in a situation where he cannot spend all his production points.)
Each individual unit type has its own unique statistics and effects, so players will have to carefully consider the composition of their armies. Units have both a combat strength, indicating how many dice they will enable their controller to roll in combat, and a tactical supremacy score. The party in a battle with the highest tactical supremacy will roll his dice first, so tactical supremacy can mean the difference between victory and defeat. Also, cheaper units such as tanks and fighters can act as a screen for their more powerful allies, mechs and bombers. A mixed force will often prove the most effective.
Combat and Conquest
When battle begins, tactical supremacy scores are totaled for both sides, and the army with the highest tactical supremacy rolls his dice first (in the event of a tie, the defender has tactical supremacy). The Dust dice feature blank faces and hit icons, so combat is fast and simple. Dice are rolled equal to the combat strength of the army, and each hit eliminates an enemy unit. The player rolling the dice may choose which units are destroyed, but he cannot choose a mech unit until all tank units have been destroyed, nor may he choose a bomber until there are no fighters remaining.
The dice then pass to the next player in the battle, who rolls dice equal to his combat strength and inflicts damage in exactly the same way. Before each player rolls dice, he may choose to retreat up to half of his units from a battle, which can allow an overmatched defender to salvage some units or an unlucky attack to not devolve into a complete disaster.
Players alternate rolling dice and destroying units until one side has been eliminated (either due to casualties or retreats) or a cease-fire is declared. If the dice come up all blanks three times in a row (and neither faction takes any casualties), then a cease-fire is automatically declared and the attacker's units retreat.
At the end of each game round, players score victory points for power sources, capitals, and majorities they control. The player who controls the most land areas earns bonus victory points, as does the player who controls the most sea areas and the player who controls the most production centers. The first player to amass a set number of victory points (varying with the number of players in the game — 40 points for a three or four player game) while also controlling a capital is the winner.
The victory point track also serves another purpose. Because the world of Dust bears some similarities to our own, it takes a truly audacious superpower to attack an enemy's capital city. Only once a player has amassed at least half the victory points required to win has he secured enough support to dare escalate the war to that level and attack an enemy capital. Once the war has been so escalated, however, then all players are free to attack capitals and things can get very interesting very quickly! Remember that a player must control a capital to win, but it needn't be the one he started the game with. | <urn:uuid:78af76b7-5096-46d3-ba35-dfaac96e6234> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://new.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=182 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966609 | 1,493 | 1.921875 | 2 |
- MARKET TRENDS
- WEB EXCLUSIVES
- BUYER'S GUIDE
WFC couldn’t have done this without the help of Kansas farmers; the Home Baking Association; AIB; Kansas State University’s demonstration mill; the Farm to Market Bread Co., Kansas City, Mo.; and the Kansas Wheat Commission, Manhattan. Noted carbohydrate expert and nutrition educator Dr. Julie Miller Jones accompanied the safari and answered questions about gluten, the glycemic index, labeling whole grains and numerous other topics.
Our goal was to educate key influencers about wheat’s nutrition and healthfulness and spread the word for us. And it worked.
Asked what they learned, participants told us that “wheat is not just wheat, and flour is just not flour.” They learned about the six classes of wheat, their different end uses and how different types of flour yield different end products.
They were also impressed by the risks and challenges of farming. Just hours after visiting the Ken Wood Farm and combining wheat, the area experienced a significant rainstorm. Wheat safari participants were amazed to learn that the rain would likely have destroyed the crop had it not been harvested.
Even though most of the participants were registered dietitians, they learned new facts about the importance of grains as a source of fiber, energy and good nutrition. There was great discussion on how to identify whole grains and why gluten-free diets only make sense for those diagnosed with Celiac disease or nonCeliac disease sensitivity. The reason the Dietary Guidelines do not recommend only eating whole grains and the importance of enriched grains were also discussed.
The safari paid off in mega media impressions. Participants have blogged, tweeted, posted on their websites, written articles, pinned photos on Pinterest and conducted radio interviews about the event. An article with two wheat recipes ran in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette; a column appeared on HealthNewsDigest.com; a video was uploaded to YouTube; and a feature is scheduled [at press time] to appear on the website of Food & Nutrition magazine, which is published by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. The safari was also mentioned on KRVN radio in Nebraska and on the Dakota Farm Talk program, which goes to 12 radio stations in the Dakotas and Minnesota; in the Milling Journal, a quarterly magazine for the milling industry; on Grainnet.com; the High Plains Journal, a regionally weekly agricultural news magazine; as well as here in Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery, along with numerous blogs, tweets and websites.
Many of those reached by our participants are influencers in their own right, which will multiply our messages. We expect to see more impressions in the weeks and months to come, as we continue our relationship with these important health and nutrition influencers. | <urn:uuid:d67ceb3d-5e8d-463f-8683-7dba8eb37c15> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.snackandbakery.com/articles/85965-on-a-wheat-safari?WT.rss_f=The+Nutritional+Corner&WT.rss_a=On+a+Wheat+Safari&WT.rss_ev=a | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955707 | 586 | 1.984375 | 2 |
Too little too late? Depends who's asking. Late last week, the U.S. Federal Reserve Board finally launched another round of what it calls "credit easing" -- buying securities in the private market to improve the availability of credit -- and also committed to keep short-term interest rates low through mid-2015. Some people, especially certain presidential incumbents running for reelection, would have liked to see this happen earlier. But now the real question is whether it will matter at all.
The Fed committed to buy $40 billion a month in mortgage-backed securities issued by Fannie Mae and other government-backed enterprises, thus injecting a huge amount of new money into a long-term lending market. The hope is that long-term interest rates will fall as a result of the increase in the supply of money; it'll be easier for homeowners to refinance (giving them more cash) and for new buyers to get mortgages (creating more demand for housing).
Eventually -- it typically takes several months -- this cash injection is supposed to encourage companies to make new investments and hire more people. As a result, the Fed's action may only boost Barack Obama's chances of reelection through the spike in the stock market that followed the Fed's announcement. Of course, the people who own most of the nation's stocks don't spend every increase in their wealth, if they even live in the United States, so rising markets don't necessarily translate into higher consumption and new jobs.
Either way, the Fed's action will continue to depress the dollar against other currencies, and in the long run this may make the United States less dependent on foreign investors, help American exports, and create jobs. Even if American imports are affected by the exchange rate, a recovery here will still be good news for the global economy, as billions in income generated in the United States flow abroad. And if the Fed does manage to bolster employment, it will also transfer some wealth from savers to workers by lowering long-term interest rates in a bid to spur job creation today.
So why did the Fed wait to act until now? For months, its officials had been saying that the U.S. economy's growth was too slow but not slow enough to compel them to act. For one thing, they doubted the effectiveness of further easing because, quite simply, they didn't think companies had very good opportunities to invest. The uncertainty caused by political tribulations in Washington and the rolling snafu in the eurozone were probably holding back businesses more than interest rates, which were still at historic lows.
What changed? Some of that uncertainty finally went away. Two weeks ago, Mario Draghi, the president of the European Central Bank, declared that he would use extraordinary measures to support the euro if necessary, and -- perhaps because he was relatively new in the job and still had his credibility intact -- the markets believed him. Then, Mitt Romney reloaded his revolver and shot himself in the foot a few more times over his economic plans and foreign policy, leading even conservatives to say he had lost an election he didn't deserve to win, anyway. The chances that he and Paul Ryan -- who was unconcerned by the notion of the United States defaulting on its debt as chair of the House Budget Committee -- would win in November fell to about 30 percent in the prediction markets. | <urn:uuid:4053fc08-9dbe-4c78-b3ba-055d73793a7d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/09/17/the_fed_jumps_on_the_bandwagon | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979614 | 675 | 2.265625 | 2 |
How To Detect and Get Rid of Termites
How To Detect Termites
Unfortunately, infestations can go undetected for years, after substantial damage has already been done. Signs of activity are not always easily detected. However, watch for wood debris near wood surfaces, like window sills. Mud tubes or trails may be found along the foundation, leading up to structure. Swarming termites have two clear, evenly-sized wings.
What Do Termites Look Like?
Termites are white, translucent and are about the size of a cooked grain of rice. They differ from ants, aside from their color, in their body shape. Ants have an hourglass shape and three body segments. Termites have two body segments. Furthermore, termites have straight antennae while ants have bent or segmented antennae.
What Should I Do About Termites?
Colonies of termites are destructive to your home and property. Termites feast on wood and cause millions upon millions of dollars of damage every year. Contrary to popular belief, termites don't live in wood, they commute from their subterranean homes. Because they live underground and burrow into the wood, they are not always easily detected. If you suspect termites, have found evidence of them, or have not had a termite inspection in the past few years, you should call a professional termite inspector to assess the situation and provide you with a recommended treatment.
How To Exterminate Termites
Unfortunately, treatment is not a do-it-yourself job. You will need a professional exterminator to apply a treatment to destroy colonies and active infestations. Whole house treatments will eliminate active infestations. Additional treatment is required to shield your home from subterranean colonies.
Whole house treatments involve a tent that enshrouds the house. It is filled will a toxic gas, or it can be filled with hot air to heat the house until the timbers reach 120 degrees (F). This treatment eliminates the active termites in the home. The colonies living underground must be dealt with separately. Typically a toxin is injected into the ground to shield your home from the termites.
Spot control can be applied to active infestations. However, they do not treat infestations in other parts of the house. Even if there is no outward sign of a secondary infestation, it may exist and if left untreated, can result in structural damage. | <urn:uuid:b64ad9ab-6655-4fe4-b357-6a2cad7eee73> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.acmehowto.com/howto/pest/termites.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938316 | 498 | 2.59375 | 3 |
US President Barack Obama has imposed new economic sanctions against Iran's energy sector and two banks in China and Iraq for ‘facilitating oil sales transactions’ for Tehran.
In a statement released by the White House on Tuesday, Obama said the existing sanctions on Iran's oil industry were expanded "by making sanctionable the purchase or acquisition of Iranian petrochemical products.”
He said the new measures would be taken against firms that have dealings with the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), the Naftiran Intertrade Company (NICO) or the Central Bank of Iran (CBI).
Obama said that the US sanctions will apply to any financial institution that allows Iran to access the international financial system.
The sanctions also cut off China's Bank of Kunlun and Iraq's Elaf Islamic Bank from the US financial system for allegedly facilitating financial transactions for Iranian banks, which are under sanctions.
The new embargoes build on Iranian crude sanctions signed into law in December and approved in March that penalize other countries for buying or selling Iran’s oil. The sanctions took effect on June 28.
The US sanctions are meant to pile up pressure on Iran over its nuclear energy program, which Washington, Tel Aviv and some of their allies claim may include a military aspect.
Iran refutes the allegation and holds that as a signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), it is entitled to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes. | <urn:uuid:d1985860-59cf-4011-8ad9-9b02dc48d2c9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.presstv.ir/detail/253796.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956225 | 311 | 1.875 | 2 |
Now follow the traits of seekers of the second stage,
called the stage of thought.
He lives in the care of learned men who explain best what
listening, remembering, right conduct, contemplation –
dharana – and meditation are. Having acquired knowledge of such scriptures as are worth listening to, he efficiently discriminates between what is duty and what is not, and he knows well the division between a word and the thing it symbolizes.
His mind does not suffer from an excess of conceit, pride, greed and attachment, although externally they are apparent to some extent.
He gives up his external impurities as a snake casts off its slough.
Such a seeker acquires the actual
knowledge of all these things with the grace of the scriptures,
the guru, and the sages.
The first stage for the seeker is to create a milieu around himself of the feeling that the ocean is real and waves are just superficial surface phenomena. To live in that oceanic feeling is the first stage. This becomes the soil. Unless this milieu is there, there is no possibility of any growth into the higher realms of being. So remember this: you must be aware more and more of the center, less and less of the surface; more and more aware of the depth, and less and less aware of the circumference. The focus must change from the periphery to the innermost core.
If you continue being involved with the surface you cannot penetrate to the ultimate being, because the ultimate being, Brahman – or you may call it the truth or God or whatsoever you like – the ultimate being is the center of existence. And we exist on the periphery.
This is natural in a way, because whenever you come in contact with something, you come in contact with the periphery, the outermost. This is natural. But don’t remain there – move ahead, move further. Leave the periphery be-hind and go deep. With everything – with a rock, with a man, with a tree, with whatsoever – always remember that the surface is the outermost body, and this is not the whole. The whole illusion consists of thinking of the surface as the whole.
The surface belongs to the whole, there is nothing wrong in it; but when you get this impression, this identity that the surface is the whole, then there is no possibility of inner growth because then you have to stay with the surface – the surface has become the whole. Don’t allow the surface to become the whole. This is not something which is going against the surface; this is simply going with the truth, with the reality.
The surface will be there. When you have conceived the whole, the surface will be there, but in its right place. Nothing is to be eliminated, only a greater perspective is needed. And when your perspective has become total, everything will be there. This world will be there; whatsoever you have will be there, but in a new harmony, in a new gestalt. | <urn:uuid:fbeffe46-17f3-43ae-9db1-589f048866c3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.osho.com/library/online-library-oceanic-periphery-whole-8676abc6-259.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958327 | 618 | 1.882813 | 2 |
By Barbara Huber
Respected journalists David Brooks (New York Times), Peter Luke (Booth newspapers) and Evan Thomas (Newsweek) recently wrote of the current political stalemate we face.
In “Older Americans must fight for the young,” Brooks reported on a research study of the elderly which followed up on a group of people 50 years after they had been studied while young. This group reported being “more outgoing, self confident and warm” and able to adapt their brains to compensate for the effects of aging. Another citation reported that seniors thrive and are happiest when they provide for future generations, a virtue called “generativity” by George Vaillant of Harvard.
Brooks continued his essay by noting that seniors provide for their grandchildren, privately giving them “wonderful gifts and loving attention.” Simultaneously, however, these same seniors are publicly taking from their grandchildren because the federal government spends $7 on seniors and only $1 on children. Brooks challenges the senior generation to lead a change in health care and retirement spending “to make life better for their grandchildren.”
In “Benefits for retirees cost state's youth,” on Feb. 7 Peter Luke wrote of Michigan's “most generous tax treatment for retirees in the nation” which for a married couple “exempts $90,000 in pension and investment income from state income tax.” This income, sheltered tax free, means that the state of Michigan will not receive $700 million in revenue this year.
The Legislature's response to a massive shortfall was to cut the budget dedicated to those without a vote, the young, by cutting expenditures to pre-K and K-12 education and the promised reward to graduates headed off to college because of having achieved good grades.
Luke asks, Can Michigan “invest in its young” and “provide generous tax breaks for its retirees at the same time?”
In “We the Problem” Evan Thomas wrote about the “got mine” culture of entitlement that has developed over the past 50 years and the loss of “the most essential element of the art of governing — meaningful compromise” by the politicians we elect. We, the people aka “the problem,” elect representatives who will not ask us to “make short-term sacrifices for long-term rewards” in the form of higher taxes or cuts in Social Security and medical benefits.
In a thoughtful Gazette Viewpoint, Dan Clifton wrote of the need to “change the people we elect to public office.”
In my opinion, we must go further and that is to change ourselves. We are as much the “got mine” and “make no compromise” people as are those we elect. We must change ourselves because we benefited from the taxes and sacrifices of our ancestors who quite likely did this with as much grumbling as we do. However, they trusted that we would do the same and keep this a land of opportunity for future generations.
Private funding, from seniors to grandchildren or the Bill Gates and Warren Buffetts of the world, will never be enough to take care of the public needs of citizens.
Progressive taxes, sacrifices and compromise are necessary to provide for the common good. With our grandchildren and the common good in mind, are we up to the challenge of making short-term sacrifices for long-term rewards?
Barbara Huber resides in Texas Township, west of Portage, Mich. | <urn:uuid:8f230294-5569-4562-b84a-888796718df3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.mlive.com/readreact/2010/03/viewpoint_got_mine_generation.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968955 | 728 | 1.546875 | 2 |
- Making a lasting impactWhat happens when you live so far away from a city with health services that you can't afford to travel there? Maybe the doctors will come to you.
Global Brigades has been helping communities in rural Honduras for almost ten years now, sending in doctors, dentists and large amounts of medication to mountainous villages that otherwise may never have another chance at seeing health care. Powered by students all across the U.S., Europe and Canada, the organization aims to help communities holistically, starting with their most essential needs - physical ones. Students at Marquette University, the school that founded Global Brigades, break down the process of what a typical medical brigade looks like, and how it begins to set a community back on the track to health. | <urn:uuid:097dccaa-2be7-4166-8506-e8816e104851> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.behance.net/gallery/Global-Brigades-in-Honduras/3666923 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957514 | 154 | 2.359375 | 2 |
International Day of Action - Origin
The International Day of Action Against Dams: For Rivers, Water, and Life was inspired and mandated by the participants of the First International Meeting of People Affected by Dams that took place in March, 1997 in Curitiba, Brazil. Representatives from twenty countries including Taiwan, Brazil, Chile, Lesotho, Argentina, Thailand, Russia, France, Switzerland, and the United States decided that the International Day of Action would fall on 14 March, Brazil’s Day of Action Against Large Dams. One of the goals for the Day of Action is to build and strengthen regional and international networks within the international anti-dam movement.
The idea for the First International Meeting of People Affected by Dams originated during an annual meeting of Brazil’s Movement of People Affected by Large Dams (MAB). In September, 1995 a preparatory meeting was held in Brazil and an international organizing committee was formed headed by MAB and including International Rivers, India’s Save the Narmada Movement (NBA), Chile’s Grupo de Accion por el Biobio (GABB), and European Rivers Network (ERN).
The First International Meeting of People Affected by Dams was a successful first step in building and strengthening a global network of the dam-affected. Many of the participants reported an end to their feelings of isolation in their regional fights against governments, lending agencies, and corporations, as well as a renewed strength that they could carry back to their communities.
The International Day of Action Against Dams: For Rivers, Water, and Life is the next step in strengthening the international movement. Our aim is to raise our voices in unison against destructive water development projects, reclaim the health of our rivers and watersheds, and demand the equitable and sustainable management of our waterways. By acting together, we will demonstrate that these issues are not merely local, but global in scope. | <urn:uuid:4a7ed59d-ef97-4b61-8958-9a3327e13db8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.internationalrivers.org/background-material | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946941 | 394 | 3.390625 | 3 |
Kids have got stuffed toy bug
NOT many of us would want to cuddle up to E.coli and Streptococcus this winter, but that’s exactly what these cuddle toys are.
The bizarre creatures, designed to look like the bugs that cause common colds, sore throats and coughs have become the latest craze.
The fluffy GiantMicrobes are the same shape and colour as the real thing but one million times bigger.
They have been given human features such as eyes, a mouth and nose to make them more appealing to young children.
The Chickenpox microbe even looks a bit like a chicken.
The company that makes them says they “make great learning tools, as well as amusing gifts for anyone with a sense of humour.”
They have also become popular as a get well soon gift to people suffering from the condition the soft toy represents.
Each of the toys which sell for £6.95 comes with information about the microbe and a magnified image so people can compare the likeness.
The range of 75 toys includes stomach ache (Shigella), sore throat (Streptococcus), cough (B. Pertussis), flu (Orthomyoxvirus) and kissing disease (Epstein-Barr).
Parenting expert Catherine Hanly, who has a seven-year-old daughter, said the scientific theme combined with a friendly look meant they appealed to children and adults.
She said: “My daughter’s godfather is a research scientist and if he finds out he can buy her the giant fluffy toy representing penicillin or the common cold, it’ll probably be under her tree this Christmas.”
James Pritchard-Barrett, who distributes the toys in the UK, said the company was now looking to create a SpongeBob SquarePants-style cartoon featuring the characters.
He said: “Their popularity is spreading like a pandemic - not just among children but health professionals and medical students too. mpu
“Doctors find it breaks the ice when explaining conditions to patients and environmental health workers can show people the effects of unhygienic practices.
“Each GiantMicrobe comes with a card that explains what the microbe is, what it does and how it can be avoided.
“This year we have sold a lot of swine flu and E.coli toys because those viruses have been in the news a lot.”
Harvard University graduate Drew Oliver designed the first few toys as a get well gift that could be given to someone who was ill. | <urn:uuid:531e31ee-d2cc-4719-9989-2bf07b956cb8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2737269/Kids-have-got-stuffed-toy-bug.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956947 | 543 | 2.234375 | 2 |
Construction of a Bayonne windmill is back on track after the state Board of Public Utilities has agreed to give the project an $823,600 grant.
But that sum represents only a tiny fraction of the cost to build the $56 million wind turbine that will provide electricity to the Oak Street Pumping station that pumps sewage out of the city.
And that's the problem.
Bayonne Municipal Utilities Authority officials say the windmill is going to save the authority $7 million over the next 20 years. But it's costing $56 million to build!
Yesterday's poll, results | <urn:uuid:a8197ef2-6ff5-4104-a8ec-0ca65397f627> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nj.com/hudson/voices/index.ssf/2011/08/daily_poll_do_you_believe_wind.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.921665 | 120 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Children come into care for a number of reasons:
- a parent is unable to provide a safe home for the child;
- a parent is unable to provide the type of care the child needs;
- a parent dies without naming a guardian; or
- a parent decides adoption is the best option for his or her child.
Some may have special service or placement needs. They may be still waiting for adoption because they:
- are over two years old;
- are part of a sibling group;
- were exposed to drugs or alcohol in utero and may have behavioural and learning disabilities;
- have difficulty attaching to a new family; or
- suffered abuse or neglect and this has delayed their ability to learn and develop.
Most of the children available for adoption are between 3 and 12 years old and many are part of a sibling group. Others have prenatally been exposed to drugs and alcohol. Some have a diagnosis of Fetal Alcohol Effects/Syndrome or Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome, but many do not.
All of these children have some level of special service or placement needs. Parenting a child with special needs can be a difficult task; however, it can also be one of the most satisfying things you will ever do. | <urn:uuid:2bdeaeda-1a00-474a-8070-6be5c6cfa253> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www2.gnb.ca/content/gnb/en/departments/social_development/adoption/content/why.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968025 | 259 | 3.09375 | 3 |
Rates of infant and maternal mortality in indigenous communities are among the highest in the Americas, according to a new bulletin published by the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO).
In its most recent edition, "Healing our Spirit Worldwide"—PAHO's bulletin on indigenous health—notes that national averages often mask significant regional differences in these rates, citing the examples of Bolivia, Honduras and Guatemala. While overall maternal mortality in Bolivia, for example, stands at 390 per every 100,000 live births, in the department of Potosí, which has a larger indigenous population, the figure climbs to 496 per 100,000.
In Honduras, departments with large indigenous populations—including Colón, Copán, Intibuca, Lempira and La Paz—have maternal mortality ranging from 190 to 255 per 100,000 live births, while the national average is 147. In Guatemala, maternal mortality among indigenous women is 83 percent higher than the national rate.
The bulletin cites a number of factors, many of them cultural, which underlie these differences. They include:
- Health workers' lack of understanding of and sensitivity to traditional cultural practices.
- Poor communication between health workers and patients.
- Lack of emphasis in health policies on the need to expand medical coverage in indigenous communities.
To address such problems, PAHO is working with municipal organizations in the department of Potosí to carry out community programs that involve midwives and community leaders in efforts to improve sanitary conditions during childbirth and to identify high-risk cases and assure they are properly referred.
In a separate article, Aymara leader Martha Gonzáles explains how cultural barriers can come into play when indigenous women seek health services. | <urn:uuid:72d577d8-1a50-4c63-88b5-50c64779878b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.news-medical.net/news/2004/07/07/3143.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9234 | 346 | 3.140625 | 3 |
JERUSALEM—Iran has sent Syria a sophisticated radar system that could threaten Israel's ability to launch a surprise attack against Iran's nuclear facilities, say Israeli and U.S. officials, extending an alliance aimed at undermining Israel's military dominance in the region.
More on Iran
The radar could bolster Syria's defenses by providing early warning of Israeli air-force sorties. It could also benefit Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group based in Lebanon and widely believed to receive arms from Syria.
Any sharing of radar information by Syria could increase the accuracy of Hezbollah's own missiles and bolster its air defenses. That would boost Hezbollah defenses, which U.S. and Israeli officials say have been substantially upgraded since 2006, the last time Israel fought the southern Lebanon-based group.
The mid-2009 transfer was described in recent months by two Israeli officials, two U.S. officials and a Western intelligence source, and confirmed Wednesday by the Israeli military. Though they didn't name the system's final recipient in Syria, these and other officials described it as part as a dramatic increase in weapons transfers and military coordination among Iran, Syria and Hezbollah.
Iran and Syria both denied that a radar transfer took place.
The increased sophistication of the weapons transfers and military cooperation among the three signal an increased risk of conflict on Israeli's northern border. U.S. officials worry any new fighting would be more likely to include Syria, which hasn't directly engaged Israeli in combat since 1974.
The radar transfer could potentially violate a 2007 United Nations Security Council resolution that bans Iran from supplying, selling or transferring "any arms or related materiel."
Though officials say the transaction took place about a year ago, Israel and the U.S. haven't publicized it, a departure from years past when Israeli officials were often eager to trumpet Iranian arms transfers to Syria and Hezbollah as violations of Security Council resolutions.
Some analysts say Israel believes Iran wants to escalate tensions on Israel's northern border with Lebanon and Syria to divert attention from its nuclear program. Israel has shied away from publicizing the transfer, these people say, to avoid playing into Iran's hands by increasing domestic pressure on Israel's government to take military action.
The radar report is likely to place greater pressure on the Syria strategy of the Obama administration, which has aimed to tamp down tensions with Syria as it tries to rebuild diplomatic ties.
U.S. officials including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who sent a high-level trade delegation to Damascus in June, continue to argue that Washington has the best hope of altering Syrian President Bashar Assad's behavior, and weakening his alliance with Tehran, through diplomatic dialogue.
A White House spokesman declined to comment on the transfer.
Israeli officials confirmed in private the transfer of the advanced radar, but the military wouldn't release specifics in response to queries by The Wall Street Journal.
"Iran is engaged in developing Syrian intelligence and aerial detection capabilities, and Iranian representatives are present in Syria for that express purpose," the Israeli military said in a statement. "Radar assistance is only one expression of that cooperation."
Ahmed Salkini, the spokesman for the Syrian Embassy in Washington, called the report of the radar shipment "classic Israeli PR stunts aimed at diverting the world's attention from the atrocities they are committing in Gaza and other occupied territories, and we will not continue wasting our time" commenting on them.
Iran denied that it had sent sophisticated radars to Syria. "It is absolutely not true," said Mohamad Bak Sahraee, spokesman for Iran's mission to the United Nations. Hezbollah officials in Beirut declined to comment.
Syria, which has long struggled against Israel's superior military, has its own interest in acquiring advanced radar. Israeli fighter jets bombed a Syrian site in 2007 that Israelis say housed a nuclear reactor in the final stages of construction. Syria said it was a defunct military facility.
Some military analysts have suggested that Israel was able to slip into and out of Syrian air space during that raid by jamming older Syrian radar.
In the 2006 war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, "There was no opposition to our jets. We flew freely," said Cpt. Ron, an active duty Israeli F-16 pilot, who under Israeli security restrictions would allow himself to be identified only by his first name and rank. "In the next Lebanon war, we know it will not be like that."
Israeli officials have in recent months accused Iran and Syria of transferring to Hezbollah Syrian-made M-600 missiles, capable of striking targets in Tel Aviv within a few hundred feet of accuracy; advanced shoulder launched anti-aircraft missiles; and an arsenal of short-range rockets that Israeli officials say has grown to more than 40,000, from 12,000 in 2006.
U.S. and Israeli officials also say Hezbollah has received training in Syria on more advanced radar-guided, truck-launched anti-aircraft missiles, though they say it isn't clear whether those weapons systems have been transferred from Syria to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
In April, Israeli President Shimon Peres publicly accused Syria of transferring Scud missiles to Hezbollah, an accusation that U.S. officials privately affirmed.
The public accusation marked the first time Western intelligence agencies believe a state may have transferred ballistic missiles to a non-state militia that the U.S. and Israel consider a terrorist group. The missiles would give Hezbollah the ability to hit virtually all of Israel from Lebanon's Bekaa Valley.
Syrian, Lebanese and Hezbollah officials have denied the Scud transfer.
A radar deal stands to further shift the region's strategic balance.
Israeli and U.S. officials wouldn't say how they determined the shipment took place or discuss the radar's type or capacity.
But they say it would give Syria and its ally Iran improved visibility of Israeli air space and provide early warning of any imminent Israeli strike. Amid Iran's nuclear standoff with the West, Israeli officials have suggested they could strike Iran to prevent it from acquiring a nuclear weapon.
More advanced radar technologies would also likely increase the accuracy and lethality of Hezbollah missiles aimed at Israeli cities and incoming Israeli aircraft.
"An effective long-range radar is the kind of thing you'd need to make longer-range missiles accurate," said David Fulghum, an electronic warfare and radar expert. "Up till now, [Hezbollah] was just sort of lighting the fuse and shooting them to land wherever."
A clear picture of the skies above Israel and Lebanon would give Hezbollah greater freedom of movement during any conflict, since the group would know when its fighters were at risk of being bombed from the air.
"The Iranians have two interests," said a U.S. official who is familiar with the arms transfers. "They need Hezbollah to be a powerful threat against Israel, and they are interested in knowing what is coming to them from Israel."
Current and former U.S. officials who've worked on Syria said the U.S. and Israel have often had to trend lightly on the issue of Damascus's arms dealings for fear of stoking a broader Middle East war. President George W. Bush's administration was notified of Israel's planned 2007 attack on Syria.
For more than a half year, the U.S. kept secret its intelligence outlining the reactor's construction, fearing that publicizing it could pressure Israel and Syria into a conflict, said a former U.S. official who was part of the deliberations.
"We didn't comment on the reactor for six months" after Israel's attack, only then accusing the Syrians of building a reactor, this official said. "We wanted to find a way to use the situation for our advantage."
Indeed, former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert communicated to Mr. Assad through third channels after the attack that Israel remained open to peace talks.
Many Syrian and Israeli officials said the two sides made progress on resolving their dispute over the Golan Heights region before Israel's invasion of the Gaza Strip in early 2009 stalled the process.—Jay Solomon in Washington and Farnaz Fassihi in New York contributed to this article.
Write to Charles Levinson at firstname.lastname@example.org | <urn:uuid:0fccbbb4-da97-45be-928b-78b1c775a99c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703426004575338923106485984.html?mod=ITP_pageone_0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967755 | 1,662 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Get Involved with the Andrew Wade Visual Analytics Challenge Program!
In today’s digitized world, massive amounts of data are being collected every day – how do we make sense of and leverage the insights within so much data? The AW VA Challenge Program provides an opportunity for students to solve real-world data problems through the exciting new field of Visual Analytics. Visual Analytics leverages our powerful visual system in combination with interactive visual interfaces and automatic data processing, in order to explore, make sense of, and predict trends in data. It is a highly interdisciplinary field that brings together Computer Science, Psychology, HCI, Social Science, Statistics, Linguistics and Visual Design. Challenge students will learn about VA and the corresponding fields by applying Visual Analytics to different real-world domains like Healthcare, Aviation Safety, Transportation, and Social Media. No previous experience in VA, or in the fields mentioned above, is necessary to get involved. All that is required is a motivation to learn new things and tackle real-world problems.
The Challenge Program is based at UBC/SFU and students can get involved through volunteering, directed studies courses, internships with industry partners, or just by attending our regular meetings to learn what is happening. If you have questions or want to learn more about VA or the Challenge, please contact the manager, Kyle, at firstname.lastname@example.org. For more information on specific Andrew Wade VA Challenge projects, please visit https://sites.google.com/site/challengeva/.
The Challenge program is the student-focused branch of VIVA (www.viva-viva.ca).
The Cognitive Systems Society is a student-run organization, supporting students in the COGS program, and those with an interest in COGS-related fields such as neuroscience, artificial intelligence, human-computer interfaces, and robotics. We hold a wide range of fun events, including our popular licensed events (including the Welcome back BBQ, Robot Party, and Masters of Debate), and academic events (study sessions, Meet The Profs). We also have a lab space with a patio in the basement of the Friedman building if you ever want to study or just relax.
Volunteering for the CSS is a great way to meet fellow COGS students, contribute to lively campus life, and learn valuable leadership skills. Our student executive, which organizes events and promotes everything COGS, is elected every spring. However, if you prefer a looser commitment we’re always looking for fresh faces to help out at events and such. If you’re interested in seeing what we’re all about, join us for a drink at our weekly meetings during the school year, held at the Gallery Lounge (see website for times).
A hallmark of the Cognitive Systems program at UBC is the hands-on experience in research labs that is available to undergraduate students. In fact, it is one of the few programs with a research component in the degree requirements. As such, COGS undergrads are encouraged as early as possible to find a lab they find interesting and get involved with real-world University research! Not only is it a fun alternative to classroom learning, but it’s also a great way to get a feel for graduate school life.
Some labs that are associated with Cognitive Systems are:
Click on the following links to download job announcements and application instructions for current positions in Cognitive Systems. | <urn:uuid:fe32781b-8a49-43d5-a583-3db93405573d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cogsys.ubc.ca/get-involved/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00044-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930575 | 700 | 1.859375 | 2 |
Check out this video, posted by Scientific American, of timelapse photos taken from the international space station. You can see cities, roads, the Aurora, and lightening storms. Pretty cool. http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2011/11/14/the-best-video-of-earth-from-space-ever-made/
Author Archives: Eleanour
Check out this picture and article from the New York Times. Yes, a degree in geosciences can have you studying stuff in space too NASA Detects Planet Dancing with a Pair of Stars, NY Times, Sept. 15, 2011.
Geoscientists do really cool things. A scientific idea, born at the University of Texas, has come to fruition in an long term study that monitors the depletion of groundwater by using satellites that detect small changes in the earth’s gravitational field. This is high tech geology, folks, and it is applied to something really important. [...]
GeoFORCE surrounds kids in spectacular geology, encouraging them to pursue college STEM majors, especially in the geosciences.
Sophomores fly to Las Vegas, where we hurry past the one-armed-bandits and onto a bus. We’ll drive through Arizona and into Utah on day 1. Then the trip proceeds through Zion National Park, to Glen Canyon Dam, and into the Grand Canyon. We’ll travel most of that way by bus, and several miles in [...]
Seniors fly to Miami and then head out to the Florida Keys, the Everglades, the Gulf Coast, and Cape Canaveral. In addition to great geology, we’ll see all kinds of exotic wildlife including roseate spoonbills, alligators, and manatees; if we are really lucky, we’ll get to see a mama sea turtle laying her eggs. Let’s [...]
Juniors will fly in and out of Portland Oregon. In between they will cross the Columbia River into Washington State to visit Mt. St. Helens, then head up the river to Cascade Locks, climb Mt. Hood (not on foot, silly, in a bus to the timberline and a ski lift to the snow) descend to [...]
Incoming GeoFORCE students start out with a bus trip to Austin, where we will get to know each other and learn a little about geology. Students will stay at the University of Texas in dorms, and we’ll see the campus and the local geology. Then we hop a plane to Tampa Florida, head down the [...] | <urn:uuid:30eee1e0-0eb5-4112-a8ad-4874ea289583> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.jsg.utexas.edu/geoforce/author/eleanour | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.906116 | 540 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Pinterest has become a popular tool for organizing things of interest fround on the Internet and sharing it with others. Pictured above is a snapshot of the author's account.
It has been said many times that you’re likely to find inspiration in the most unlikely places. I must say from personal experience, this is very true.
I think I speak for everyone when I say that at some point we’ve all had a brilliant idea pop up out of nowhere—in the shower, the grocery store, etc. Somewhere you least expect it, inspiration will happen.
Recently, I’ve been finding myself thinking about spicing up our salads at home, using my homegrown kale in smoothies as opposed to making chips, and mastering the use of quinoa as a delicious side dish versus a high-calorie potato salad. Why?
Pinterest, that’s why!
Those familiar with this virtual pinboard know how useful this social media application for your mobile device or tablet can be. If you haven’t downloaded and used it, the website describes it as follows.
“Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes. Best of all, you can browse pinboards created by other people. Browsing pinboards is a fun way to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests.”
Since setting up my Pinterest account, I’ve created a 11 boards that enable me to collect “Must Try Recipes” shared by others for later experimentation, share pictures of my homemade creations from “The Kam Home Kitchen” in hopes of inspiring others, and most recently, started a “To Good Health” board to organize recipes, tips on healthy living and more that others have posted.
The great part about Pinterest is that it allows you to follow people whose values, lifestyle, and interests match yours. You can also tailor the experience to only follow certain boards, so if you aren’t into fashion or handbags (which I’m not), you can “unfollow” those specific topics, but continue to follow an individual’s food, home gardening and home improvement boards.
Many people think primarily about Facebook, Twitter and Instagram when it comes to social media, with a good amount of those people who don’t understand or see the value in using these online tools. I don’t blame them.
However, I will make the pitch to give Pinterest a try, especially if you’re one that has long enjoyed making vision or inspiration boards with pictures from magazines. It’s free to download, easy to use, and requires no glue. More than anything, it’s an informative and helpful tool, if used right.
Nathan Kam is a Honolulu public-relations executive, husband and a proud daddy of two incredible kids, Ensen (5) and Avery (2). He enjoys cooking, gardening, traveling, blogging and golfing. You can reach him via email, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via his personal Kam Family Blog. | <urn:uuid:8a70d932-848b-4293-b947-80e54e68efb9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.honolulufamily.com/blog/good-health/finding-inspiration-live-healthier-social-media | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939448 | 657 | 1.710938 | 2 |
BOSTON, Mass. (May 7, 2009) On the morning of Wednesday, May 13, an estimated 20,000 T riders will be rewarded for their environmentally-friendly decision to use public transportation. Volunteers from TransFair USA, the non-profit that certifies Fair Trade Certified™ products in the United States, will distribute free coupons to be redeemed for hot or iced Fair Trade Certified™ Green Mountain Coffee® at Bruegger's Bakery-Cafés, plus a coupon worth $2.50 off a package of Green Mountain Coffee at local grocery stores.
EMBARGO: 00.01 HRS GMT Friday, 17 April 2009 – A global survey released today demonstrates that support for Fairtrade is on the rise. Ahead of World Fair Trade Day on 9 May, this first ever global consumer survey on Fairtrade shows that shoppers increasingly expect companies to be more accountable and fair in dealing with producers in developing countries. The survey by GlobeScan was commissioned by Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International (FLO) with a sample size of 14,500 in 15 countries.
Research Study and Sales Figures Show that Consumer Interest in Fair Trade Certified Remains Strong
OAKLAND, Calif. (April 16, 2009) – With apologies to Mark Twain, reports of Fair Trade’s recession-induced death have been greatly exaggerated.
Partnership to Encourage Sustainable Agricultural and Business Practices Across Industry, Increasing Supply of High-Quality and Responsibly-Produced Coffee Raising Small Farmer Living Standards TransFair USA, Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International and Starbucks Encourage other NGOs and Government Agencies to Join Fund
ATLANTA; April 16, 2009 – (Nasdaq: SBUX) Building on their decade-long relationship, Starbucks, the Fairtrade Labelling Organizations (FLO) and TransFair USA will join forces to leverage a small-scale farmer loan program that is intended to grow to at least $20 million by 2015 based on current commitments from Starbucks Coffee Company. The Small Farmer Sustainability Initiative (SFSI) was designed to build on existing Starbucks efforts that help foster improved livelihoods, environmental stewardship and economic sustainability in the coffee industry. | <urn:uuid:4fc38961-aa3b-4cc3-b4b6-932b1f9ff62a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fairtradeusa.org/print/press-room/press_release?page=15 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00064-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9035 | 443 | 1.5 | 2 |
Persons aged 15 years and over who indicate in the Census they are employed are asked a number of questions about their job, including their occupation, type of industry they work in and the number of hours they work.
People who are not employed are asked if they are looking for work and available to start work. If they are, then they are considered to be unemployed. If a person is not employed and not looking for work, they are 'not in the labour force'. Those not in the labour force include for example, people who are retired and those involved solely in home duties.
The monthly Labour Force Survey (LFS) is the main source of information about the labour force of Australia's civilian population but this survey includes only a small number of Indigenous people. Therefore there is very limited data about the labour characteristics of the Indigenous population that can be extracted from the LFS.
Census 2006 is the main source of small area data on the labour force characteristics of Indigenous people.
Unless otherwise noted, content on this website is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Australia Licence together with any terms, conditions and exclusions as set out in the website Copyright notice. For permission to do anything beyond the scope of this licence and copyright terms contact us. | <urn:uuid:3ecb8bec-1d04-4e12-a5f9-c51d3d4dbb29> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://abs.gov.au/websitedbs/cashome.nsf/89a5f3d8684682b6ca256de4002c809b/7bb78a1aba968154ca25758b0011da02!OpenDocument | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957484 | 256 | 2.125 | 2 |
LONDON — Hospital authorities say they have treated a 3-year-old child for alcoholism.
The Heart of England NHS Trust that runs three hospitals in central England confirmed Tuesday that a child had been treated by medical staff after being given alcohol regularly. The trust revealed the data in response to a request made under the Freedom of Information Act by a newspaper, which requested data on underage drinking.
The case highlights a new low in Britain's struggle to control a binge-drinking culture which has seen alcohol-related deaths double in the past two decades.
Chris Sorek of the lobby group, Drinkaware, says Tuesday that any alcohol could disrupt a child's development.
Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. | <urn:uuid:6e38b2a6-ddc8-4476-b02d-5fd8da04b877> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nbcnews.com/id/42093182/ns/health-addictions/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950437 | 160 | 2.046875 | 2 |
Social media has changed how we communicate, learn, and share our lives with each other. From one vantage point, the emergence of social media has been a positive tool in our society. Unfortunately, there is a darker side to this medium. Anything good in the wrong hands can bring negativity, and in the wrong hands social media can cause harm to others, particularly young girls who are often the subject of cyber bullying. Where Did All the Happy Girls Go? Stanford University analyzed a ... Continue Reading
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The relationship that social media has with young girls can not be ignored. Although there are some positive effects, there are also some problematic issues that must be addressed.
Filed Under: Social Media Tagged With: adolescence, camfed, cool girl, digital media, educating, fueling, girl, girl power, girl scout, girl scouts of the usa, girlhood, happy girl, human sexuality, mediums, new media, online social networking, parenting, positive effect, social, social development, social issues, social media, social media training, social network service, teaching, young girls | <urn:uuid:4687539f-5adc-416f-8ea7-0f4e7ac8cf9d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.socialmoms.com/tag/fueling/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.911597 | 229 | 2.484375 | 2 |
Moore, Anne (1871 - 1961)
Genre: Children's Literature, Non-Fiction - Scholarly
Anne Carroll Moore (born Annie -- she changed her name in her 50's) was born in Limerick, ME. She was educated at Limerick Academy, the Branford Academy for Women in Massachusetts and the Library School at Pratt Institute. She designed the children's library at the Pratt Institute Free Library at the time when the concept of the children's library was in its infancy.
She was recruited to head the newly-established Office of Work with Children at the New York Public Library and became the pioneer in children's librarianship, developing the first children's story hours and borrowing priveleges.
In 1918 she published the first edition of Children's Books suggested as Holiday Gifts, a pamphlet which she published every year after until 1941.
She wrote children's literature reviews for The Horn Book, The Bookman, and The New York Herald Tribune. The Tribune also carried her column "The Three Owls" from 1924-1930.
She retired from NYPL in 1941 and went on to teach at the Graduate School of Library Studies in Berkeley, CA.
She received the Doctor of Letters in 1940 from the University of Maine and in 1955 from the Pratt Institute.
She died in New York City in 1961.
- Roads to Childhood : Views and Reviews of Children's Books (1920)
- New Roads to Childhood (1923)
- Nicholas : a Manhattan Christmas Story (1924)
- The Three Owls : a Book About Children's Books, their Authors, Artists and Critics (1925 - )
- The Bold Dragoon and other Ghostly Tales by Washington Irving, selected and edited by Anne Carroll Moore (1930)
- Knickerbocker's History of New York by Washington Irving ; edited by Anne Carroll Moore (1930)
- Nicholas and the Golden Goose (1932)
- Children's Books of Yesterday : an Exhibition from Many Countries (1933)
- The Creation and Criticism of Children's Books : a Retrospect and a Forecast (1934)
- The Choice of a Hobby : Unique Descriptive List of Books Offering Inspiration and Guidance to Hobby Riders and Hobby Hunters; a Springboard for Personal Adventure (1934)
- Seven Stories High (1934)
- Reading for Pleasure (1935)
- My Roads to Childhood : Views and Reviews of Children's Books (1939)
- A Century of Kate Greenaway
- Anne Carroll Moore; a Biography by Frances Clarke Sayers (1972)
- Maine Author Scrapbooks : a Collection of Newspaper Clippings Vol. 3 | <urn:uuid:22ebc7b9-e766-4714-9c4d-e26afe214b35> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.maine.gov/msl/maine/writdisplay.shtml?id=98057 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94857 | 558 | 2.296875 | 2 |
Research paper topics, free example research papers
Free research papers and essays on topics related to: moral majority
- 6 results found, view research papers on page:
- Death Penalty Herrera Vs Collins - 619 words
Death Penalty - Herrera vs Collins The Supreme Court addressed the constitutionality of executing someone who claimed actual innocence in Herrera v. Collins (506 U.S. 390 (1993)). Although the Court left open the possibility that the Constitution bars the execution of someone who conclusively demonstrates that he or she is actually innocent, the Court noted that such cases would be very rare. The Court held that, in the absence of other constitutional violations, new evidence of innocence is no reason for federal courts to order a new trial. The Court also held that an innocent inmate could seek to prevent his execution through the clemency process, which, historically, has been "the 'fail s ...
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- Freedom Of Religion And Speech - 713 words
Freedom Of Religion And Speech Two of Americas most valued freedoms are the freedoms of speech and of religion. Because they are such fundamental freedoms in this country, debates over their scope and limitations are often very impassioned. One such debate is the question of whether or not prayer should be mandated in public schools. This is not merely a religious or educational topic, however; it is also a hotly debated political issue. On one side are conservatives who believe that encouraging prayer will save the nations morality. On the other are liberals who fear enforced prayers would impede students religious rights. In the end, the controversy is for naught; the law already protects ...
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Marilyn Manson Marilyn Manson: Pushing the 1st Amendment Marilyn Manson is a name that has been a thorn in the side of society as a moral and ethical issue for the parents and kids of the generation X. He is one of the most controversial artists in the world today, one who chooses to express himself in a way that provokes in the most extreme methods possible. His methods are bizarre and shunned by most of society, as it cannot fathom what he is trying to accomplish. However, further research into his life and beliefs will explain that he is sending a very strong message to the world. A message that is firmly protect by the First Amendment in the American Constitution. This freedom has unleas ...
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- Same Sex Unions - 1,015 words
Same Sex Unions Book Review: Same Sex Unions in Premodern Europe by John Boswell The question of same-sex unions and their legitimacy in many different societies is a topic that has been hotly debated for centuries. One society in particular is pre-modern Europe. Noted author and historian Dr. John Boswell looks extensively at the topic of same-sex unions in his book Same Sex Unions in Premodern Europe. Dr. Boswell argues extensively in his book that the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches not only sanctioned unions between partners of the same sex, but actually sanctified them. This critique examines some specific aspects of the book, and analyzes them. Before an analysis of the Same Sex ...
Related: ancient greece, christian coalition, modern europe, punishment, relating
- Southern Voting Behavior - 1,619 words
Southern Voting Behavior Southern Voting behavior since the 1960s Voters in many areas of the U.S. are apt to vote differently as a whole from election to election. The nation has also had a decreased turnout rate for the presidential and local elections. The South has typically not followed these patterns that the rest of has seemed to be following. The Southern whites of the U.S. have typically followed and voted for the more conservative candidate and party. Where as the Southern blacks have typically (when they have been able to vote) voted for the more liberal party or candidate. The South was at one time a Democratic stronghold and has in the past 30 years become a typically conservati ...
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- The Antipornography Feminist Movement - 2,127 words
The Anti-Pornography Feminist Movement The Anti-Pornography Feminist Movement I dont need statistics to tell me that there is a relationship between pornography and real violence. My body remembers. This chilling testimony from a female rape victim to a grand jury in 1983 represents the evils that pornography represents in the United States. There are strong correlations between sex crimes and pornography that have divided feminists over whether free speech is worth the sheer magnitude of sex-crime victims. Free speech is protected by the First Amendment and most people have differing views on its meaning. One thing that cannot be ignored is the fact that 90% of sexual offenders have used po ...
Related: feminist, feminist movement, grand jury, civil rights, magazines
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For Clues on Teenage Sex, Experts Look To Hip-Hop
Hip-hop, with its suggestive lyrics, videos and dance moves, has long been criticized by public health experts and parents, who fear that it leads to risky sexual behavior among teenagers.
But it has never been clear whether there is something uniquely insidious about hip-hop or whether the problem is simply that most people over 40 just don’t understand it. After all, nearly every generation seems troubled by the musical preferences of the next; remember, Elvis’s gyrating hips were once viewed as a corrupting influence on the nation’s youth. To solve that riddle, public health researchers are deconstructing hip-hop culture, venturing onto club dance floors and dissecting rap lyrics. The hope is that by understanding hip-hop, experts can design more effective health messages — and maybe even give parents insight into the often confounding music embraced by their children.
“There’s definitely a popular opinion that hip-hop is music that is bad for you and makes people do crazy things,” said Miguel A. Muñoz-Laboy, an assistant professor in the department of sociomedical sciences at Columbia. “We need to try to see how youth understand their own culture without imposing our own adult judgments.”
Dr. Muñoz-Laboy spent three years studying the hip-hop club scene, talking to dozens of teenagers and watching them dance. While hip-hop music has been widely assailed as misogynistic, the researchers found that young women were the “gatekeepers” of boundaries on the dance floor, according to research published this month in the journal Culture, Health and Sexuality. Even during the highly sexualized form of dance known as grinding, in which bodies rub against each other, the girls in the study “were consistently vigilant about maintaining control over their bodies and space,” the study noted.
Most of the teenagers in the study were sexually experienced. But the researchers found that the overt sexuality of the music and dancing was not the main influence on sexual behavior. Rather it was the old standbys of alcohol, drugs and peer pressure that typically led them into sexual encounters.
The lesson for public health workers is that hip-hop is not just music but a support system and social structure that dominates youth culture, Dr. Muñoz-Laboy said. The language of hip-hop also may in fact be a more effective way to communicate with teenagers. One H.I.V. prevention ad that resonated with women, for instance, mirrored the sexualized lyrics of hip-hop, telling girls, “Don’t take it laying down.”
Questions remain about whether hip-hop’s explicit lyrics encourage early sex. Last year, the journal Pediatrics published research from the RAND Corporation concluding that degrading lyrics, not sexual lyrics, were the problem.
The researchers interviewed more than 1,400 teenagers over two years, asking them about the music they listened to along with factors like peer pressure and parental supervision. They found that adolescents who were exposed to the highest levels of sexually degrading lyrics were twice as likely to have had sex by the end of the study.
The researchers defined degrading lyrics as those that portrayed women as sexual objects, men as insatiable and sex as inconsequential. One example they cited was from the rapper Ja Rule, whose song “Livin’ It Up” includes the lyrics “Half the ho’s hate me, half them love me.” Notably, lyrics that celebrated sex, like those crooned by the band 98 Degrees — “I’m dreamin’ day and night of making love” — had no effect on sexual behavior, the study found.
It may be that teenagers who are most interested in initiating sexual activity simply gravitate toward songs with edgier lyrics. But the research suggests that parents should focus less on whether their children listen to hip-hop and pay more attention to the content. “We need to teach teens that these portrayals of women and sex don’t represent reality,” said Steven C. Martino, a behavioral scientist at RAND.
This year, another paper in Culture, Health and Sexuality titled “Representin’ in Cyberspace” studied the way black American girls used hip-hop terms like “freaks” and “pimpettes” to describe themselves on personal home pages. The research led the author, Carla E. Stokes, to form HotGirls (Helping Our Teen Girls in Real Life Situations), an Atlanta-based nonprofit group that holds workshops where girls talk about music, rewrite objectionable lyrics and even record their own music. “We’re trying to build on the empowering aspects of the hip-hop culture,” Dr. Stokes said.
In fact, many experts believe the keys to communicating with an entire generation of young people can be found in hip-hop. “That’s far more powerful than any negative influence the music may be having,” said Bakari Kitwana, an artist in residence at the University of Chicago whose book “The Hip-Hop Generation” is viewed as the leading scholarly work on the culture.
“Hip-hop is a generational phenomenon that has united young people,” Mr. Kitwana added. “If that’s not understood, you’re going to miss a lot.”
By Tara Parker-Pope | <urn:uuid:c6c8c54f-db72-432e-962e-e6cbad377622> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bakarikitwana.com/press/clues-teenage-sex-experts-look-hip-hop-0 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963008 | 1,150 | 2.5 | 2 |
A new audio message purportedly from Osama bin Laden says the kidnapping of five French nationals in Niger last month was in response to what he called France's unjust treatment of Muslims.
In an audiotape aired by al-Jazeera television Wednesday, bin Laden called on France to withdraw its troops from Afghanistan. He said France can not expect to, in his words, occupy our countries and kill our women and children and then wish to live in security and peace.
France has about 4,000 troops in Afghanistan.
Bin Laden also threatened retribution for France's plan, starting next year, to ban Muslim women from wearing full face veils.
A group called al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb took seven hostages - five French and two Africans - at a uranium mine in northern Niger last month.
According to al-Jazeera, bin Laden said, "As you kill, you will be killed. Just as you take prisoners, you are taken hostage."
A video posted last month to the website YouTube showed the seven hostages kidnapped in Niger. They are now believed to be in neighboring Mali. The speakers all named al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb as their abductors.
The group has carried out previous kidnappings in northwest Africa, including that of a 78-year-old Frenchman who was abducted in Niger in April and later killed.
The precise whereabouts of bin Laden, the mastermind behind the September 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S., are unknown.
U.S. General David Petraeus, the commander of the allied forces in Afghanistan, said in August that bin Laden is believed to be in the remote mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP and Reuters. | <urn:uuid:1a4cc5c6-5da1-40ab-bdad-b4849479436b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.voanews.com/content/bin-laden-says-niger-kidnappings-aimed-at-france-105863513/129092.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969329 | 352 | 1.5 | 2 |
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Accepting Tourism Responsibility, Doing Due Diligence and Setting Standards of Care
Sep 04, 12 | 12:04 am
By Dr. Peter Tarlow
One of the most frequently heard complaints in the world of travel and tourism is that when things go wrong, few people accept responsibility. Instead visitors are forced to hear a jet stream of excuses, or simply see a shrug of the shoulders or are simply ignored. In today's world travel and tourism are hard, and when travel and hospitality professionals simply look the other way or ignore a problem, a hard situation becomes both stressful and often intolerable. Taking responsibility is more than merely providing good service. Taking responsibility is the ability to attempt to fix the problem or to find reasonable alternatives to travel and hospitality problems. Remember that the only person who is satisfied with an excuse is the person who makes it! To help you deal with problems when things go wrong, here are some ideas for your consideration.
There is another aspect of tourism responsibility, the industry's responsibility to provide a sustainable industry that does more good for local communities than it does damage. That means thinking about tourism social and economic impact, how it changes the culture of a locale and what the industry needs to do in order to assure that a beautiful or culturally special location is not overwhelmed by not thought-out growth.
Empower your employees
One of the most frustrating things about tourism is when an employee cannot make a decision, then and there! For example, many hotels now provide a small budget for their employees so that they can solve issues on the spot. Not only does such a program lower tourism frustration, but also it serves as an excellent method to transform a negative situation into a positive one.
Know what is the industry's standard of care
All too often tourism and travel business do not know what the proper standard of care is for any particular subject. For example, where does a tour operator's responsibility lie, what is a hotel responsible for, or how liable is a travel agency. It is a good idea to consult a lawyer so that you are sure that you are operating within the proper standards. Remember that these standards are not set in stone. They liable to change, so update your information on a regular basis.
Consult experts not only in your own country but also in the countries in which you do business
Travel providers and travel agents, tour operators and travel insurance companies all need to know for what and to whom they are responsible both within their home country and within the countries in which they are doing business. That means taking the time to know not only what the legal things to do are, but also what is both moral and ethical. Remember that tourism is a business that can only be credible if we go beyond the letter of the law. Good customer service is all about treating our guests with more than respect, but rather it is about treating them with a sense of responsibility and care.
Take the time to consult national and international organizations to know what is expected of you. There is a great deal of information and standardization in places such as the World Tourism Organization, and national professional organizations. Take the time to ask insightful questions and to learn what is expected of you, then go beyond these standards and become a model for best practices.
Make sure you have check-off lists regarding standards of care
Then consult non-tourism and travel professionals whose expertise may impact your business. For example, you are not expected to be an expert in fire safety, but you are expected to consult those who are experts. Ask your local fire department what may occur and how you need to be prepared. Request that first responders inspect your locale from the perspectives, for example, of safety, security, health, and air quality standards.
Try to envision problems and then prevent them from occurring
The best way to solve a problem and to prevent a crisis is to stop it before it happens. It is essential to remember that when we travel all problems are seen as crises. The problem may be a small problem to the travel professional, but to his/her client it is not a problem but a crisis. Never forget that in tourism time is always of the essence. Thus the faster you solve a problem the less chance it has of becoming a major crisis in the eyes of your customer.
Remember you are responsible not only to your customers but also to the tourism community in which you work
Responsible tourism means taking the time to think about the impact of your tourism product on the host community. This means that tourism officials must consider the economic and social impact on the host community, what are the negative aspects of tourism and how does tourism act as a responsible agent within the total context of the community.
Being responsible means that tour operators need to provide full information, be that information about the environment or be it about safety and security. A major problem in tourism is that people need to be given full details. Tourists and visitors assume that there is someone else looking out for them. Often our guests do not even know which questions they are to ask. Being responsible means not only caring for the environment but also not leaving out information or finding ways to say something in a manner that no one can understand it.
Being responsible also means that it is our job not to tolerate irresponsible behavior. Tourism cannot afford either from a moral or financial perspective to allow criminal behavior to become part of the industry. When human trafficking, child abuse, use of illegal substances enter into the tourism system the system is bound to collapse. Tourism officials must always be upright when dealing with their customers, local customs and laws, and insist that to be responsible is to respect both our fellow citizens and the planet upon which we dwell.
Published with the kind permission of the author.
About Dr. Peter E. Tarlow
Dr. Peter E. Tarlow is president of Tourism & More and a well-known speaker throughout the world on topics of importance to the tourism and hotel industry. He also is the writer and editor or the free tourism e-newsletter Tourism Tidbits. Tarlow can be reached at firstname.lastname@example.org.
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In Wednesday's Tribune, we look at genetically modified foods and those trying to get them labeled as such or pulled from stores like Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods.
The subject of genetically modified crops is full of passionate voices on both sides. We covered the issue in Wednesday's story. Even so, some readers may still walk away with questions about whether to avoid them or how to do so if they wish.
These extra morsels may help make this huge subject more digestible:
How much do stores like Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods Market vet their products for eco- and health-conscious shoppers?
We had discussions with both stores for the story. Both companies are very attuned to customer concerns about GMOs, and say they are doing what they can to remove and reduce them in their stores. Representatives for the Non-GMO Project give high marks to Whole Foods Market for doing such things as getting their 365 Every Day Values store brand verified non-GMO -- and strongly encouraging suppliers of their other products to enroll in the non-GMO program.
In a statement, Trader Joe’s told us that "all products in Trader Joe's private label are sourced from non-genetically modified ingredients. Our efforts began in 2001, when we determined that, given a choice, our customers would prefer to eat foods and beverages made without the use of genetically engineered ingredients. Our process has been to identify any product containing ingredients that could potentially be derived from genetically engineered crops and work with our suppliers to replace offending ingredients with acceptable alternatives.”
So if Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s are working so hard to get GMOs out of the food they sell, why are they being targeted by the Organic Consumers Association for protest? Why isn’t the OCA going after mainstream grocers?
The OCA’s Alexis Baden-Mayer gets this questions all the time. Here’s her response:
“A lot of people ask ‘Why not Walmart?’ Well, we have action alerts about them, too, and will get to them eventually. But right now Whole Foods is in major cities and it’s in rich neighborhoods and they serve a certain demographic who trust them. We believe Walmart will get to it but they will follow Whole Foods. No one is going to do better than Whole Foods. They will always been the gold standard for meeting these consumer issues. They’re the leader.”
If government agencies think these foods are safe, why all the protest and resistance?
I was surprised to find during my reporting that the Food and Drug Administration has actually never declared that they are entirely safe for human consumption -— instead, they say that the food producers who make them believe they are safe for human consumption. That’s why the anti-GMO camp would like to see them labeled until we have scientifically controlled, long-term human and animal studies on their effects.
Why doesn't the U.S. require labeling of genetically modified foods when other countries do?
People have different answers for that. The GMO industry says it’s because labels aren't necessary, aren't wanted by consumers and would be confusing. Some consumer, policy and scientific groups say it’s because if Americans knew how much of their foods were genetically modified, they wouldn't buy them.
I’ve heard that genetically modified crops can boost yields, resist droughts and feed the world. Shouldn’t we use them to help solve hunger?
When I asked the Biotechnology Industry Organization if there are any genetically modified yield boosting or drought-resistant crops on the market, they said there were not.
Some commericially-grown, genetically-engineered crops have a repellent toxin in them, or are bred to resist a certain pesticide, commercially called Roundup. BIO also told me that there is a tiny percentage of special soy produced through selective breeding followed by genetic modification that has low-linolenic acid.
-- Monica Eng
Join Trib Nation in the social mediasphere for more of the how and why of Tribune journalism. | <urn:uuid:46f85908-70a5-4d06-a0c6-e54b4a74a3ec> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/tribnation/chi-a-qa-on-geneticallymodified-foods-20110525,0,4914034.story | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965751 | 846 | 1.992188 | 2 |
Rediscover how good it feels to have balance with your coach Nancy Marmorat
Nancy Marmorat’s DVDs are known the world over, and her experience as a personal trainer to people of all ages has prompted her to prepare a series of fitness exercises especially adapted for those who are in their 50s and 60s.
This programme is for all those in their 50s and 60s - or above - who are concerned about their balance. After a basic session, aimed at keeping in good physical shape, there are workshops which bring into play different reflexes: balance, speed of reaction, sensory information and floor contact.
The objective of this programme is the improvement of balance and the prevention of falls and their consequences.
This programme is divided into 2 parts:
• A basic session of around 25 minutes focused on work on flexibility and muscle strengthening, to be practised every day
• Seven specific workshops, of around 5 minutes each, dealing with balance and co-ordination. These are to be done after the basic session, a different one each day.
1, Displacement and balance
2, Getting down onto the floor and up again
4, Balance & manipulation
5, Displacement & balance
7, Balance on an unstable surface | <urn:uuid:ca4e19a8-8414-485f-add6-1139c8ad36b8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dukevideo.com/prd6892/Fitness-for-the-Over-50s-Balance-and-Coordination-DVD | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958113 | 260 | 1.734375 | 2 |
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Permaculture in schools
Is there anybody out there with experience in implementing
permaculture projects in schools?
If so, we would like to hear from you and learn about your
There are several schools with permaculture gardens in Sydney and a
substantial number around Australia.
On October 8 this year, the day after the end of the Permaculture
International Convergence in Perth, Western Australia, there is a
one-day workshop on permaculture in schools.
As a lead up to the workshop, I have been circulating a survey form
designed to glean what is being practiced as permaculture in schools,
what is working, where there are problems and what solutions designers
have developed to these problems.
Let's know if you would like to fill out a survey and I can post
(mail) a copy to you or email it as an attachment (you'll need
Pagemaker 6 for Mac to read it as an attachment).
We recently started work with two Sydney schools which want
These projects involve more than installing sheet mulched gardens.
They attempt to integrate permaculture into the life of the school -
into the curricula of different subject areas.This has been done in
other states in Australia.
Headteachers and some staff are enthusiastic. Dr Ted Trainer, who
lectures at the University of NSW, is supportive and instigated the
Hurstville South primary project. He has trainee teachers at the
A coalition of permaculture designers - people who, for the most part,
have completed our permaculture design courses in Sydney - and who
live in areas near the schools have banded together to assist the
project and to further develop their own skills.
Included in the projects will be food production, energy auditing and
conservation, water conservation and so on.
In related news, Fiona Campbell and myself - Russ Grayson - both of
Permaculture Extension Service, Angus Campbell (Institute for Local
Self reliance) and Mary Bell (Australian Museum educator) are working
on a small book on permaculture in schools for NSW-based environmental
education publisher, the Gould League. That should be ready in the
first half of 1997.
We really would like to hear from people who have experience
implementing permaculture in schools and in participative design with
school staff, parents and people from the community. Any advice would
be gratefully received.
PERMACULTURE EXTENSION SERVICES
Russ Grayson and Fiona Campbell
PO Box 446, Kogarah NSW 2217 AUSTRALIA
Phone 02-9588 6931 (IDD-61+2+9588 6931)
Fax 02 330 2611 (Mark fax: ATTN: RUSS GRAYSON - APACE)
Permaculture education, publishing, design.
NSW co-ordinator, Australian City Farms and Gardens Network. | <urn:uuid:b30932b8-c1a0-4c38-b65d-3e92c40de6ea> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ibiblio.org/london/permaculture/mailarchives/permaculture-mg.6/msg00023.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932757 | 630 | 2.484375 | 2 |
LA VERNIA -- City officials and members of the Planning and Zoning Commission and the La Vernia Municipal Development District (MDD) are pondering how the city can continue to maintain its small-town character and small-town charm, while meeting the growth and expansion of the future. The Texas rural and down-home country feel of La Vernia is something that is important to La Vernia residents as they have their eyes on the years to come.
This was the overriding theme of a meeting Nov. 8, which gathered members of the La Vernia City Council, MDD, and Planning and Zoning Commission. Participants joined together to examine and brainstorm a long-term vision for the community regarding land use, zoning, city expansion, infrastructure, investment, roads, and transportation, among other things.
The city leadership took a proactive, hands-on approach to the planning for growth, presenting three large city maps for participants to view. Area businessmen, property owners, investors, and residents were invited to gather around the tables and to draw and freely mark on the maps their collective ideas for the development and economic future of La Vernia.
Those in attendance pored over the maps, sharing their input and suggestions about where new residential areas should go, potential locations for new businesses, and where infrastructure is needed. Also discussed were roads and parks and recreation needs. | <urn:uuid:ffb4290d-dd03-4cc3-a897-31b9bb7f2aff> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lavernianews.com/article.php?id=177&n=community-news-la-vernia-plans-future-while-keeping-hometown-feel | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00025-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959139 | 277 | 1.585938 | 2 |
Out of hours press enquiries, call 07918 195 238.
Animal Aid response to proposed inquiry into primate research
Posted 23 March 2005
A prominent group of pro-animal experimentation research and scientific bodies* has announced a major study that will examine medical research using primates.
We fear, based on their track records showing a deep commitment to the use of all animals, that what will ensue is not a true and open assessment of whether or not primate research benefits human medicine, but merely a propaganda exercise designed to assuage public concern about whether the use of primates is justified morally and scientifically.
At a public inquiry in 2002 into Cambridge University's plans to build a new primate research centre, presided over by an independent Government inspector, evidence was submitted both for and against the use of primates in research. Animal Aid played a key role in coordinating scientific evidence against such research. The inspector concluded that the University had not substantiated its claims that the experiments would benefit human health nor that they were of 'national importance', and recommended that planning permission be turned down.
* comprising the Academy of Medical Sciences, Medical Research Council, Wellcome Trust & Royal Society | <urn:uuid:73c5d029-03cd-402c-8c2d-d1733c08aefc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.animalaid.org.uk/h/n/NEWS/pr_experiments/ALL/201/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00057-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946912 | 237 | 1.742188 | 2 |
Review Your Site's Usability
Try to look at your congregation's website with fresh eyes, and ask yourself the following questions.
- Is it obvious who you are?
Is your mission statement clearly visible on your home page? Don't bury this basic information on an "About" page—be sure your home page answers the most obvious question about you. Also review this basic checklist to make sure your site has all the essentials covered.
- Do you have an explicit welcome to newcomers?
Website usability studies show that "fluff" text tends to deter visitors (web users don't read—they scan to see if they can find what they're looking for, so you've got three seconds at most to convince someone to stay on your page). Don't waste valuable space with long text about how happy you are to welcome everyone, but do have some menu item or callout that specifically calls to newcomers and lets folks know where to start.
- Does your navigation offer clear pathways to additional information?
Analytics may help you consider the words you use in your navigation, to be sure you're using language that's natural to the people coming to your site—and to make sure that the things people are looking for most often are closer to the top of your navigation tree.
Navigation is not the place to educate or inspire—it's the place to be completely obvious, transparently clear, and almost stultifyingly boring. Once people find what they're looking for, your content can take care of the education and inspiration.
Optimal Workshop has some tools (which are free for small samples) that might help you do some card-sorting and tree-testing to come up with and then test a navigation.
- Do you avoid "insider" language?
We might know that Unitarian Universalist (UU) churches are well-known for their social action, so perhaps we can guess what a menu item like "Serving" means, but consider what your choice of words might mean to a person with no context.
- Do you follow basic accessibility rules?
Read some basics of web accessibility and be sure to test the readability of your color scheme.
- What are the things your visitors are most likely to want to do?
Find out how to visit? Review the "Sunday School" class schedule? Read sermons? Is it obvious how to accomplish those things?
Analytics can help you know and prioritize the tasks that most people are coming to your site to accomplish, and usability testing can help answer the question about how easy it is to do so.
For more information contact web @ uua.org.
This work is made possible by the generosity of individual donors and congregations. Please consider making a donation today.
Last updated on Wednesday, March 14, 2012.
- Chalice and UU Art
- Congregational Press Relations
- Civil Discourse
- GA Presentations
- UUA Monthly Bulletin | <urn:uuid:2a9eab98-474a-4aff-8cd0-3e079874f2b0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.uua.org/communications/websites/usability/198452.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00025-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943884 | 607 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Tar drums and tarpaulin are among the items Sheela Gowda uses in her large-scale installation for Artes Mundi 5.
Tar drums and tarpaulin are among the items Sheela Gowda uses in her large-scale installation for Artes Mundi 5. Ben Borthwick, artistic director of the award, takes a look at her work
SHEELA Gowda trained as a painter and has, since the late 1990s, been making large-scale installations for which she has become internationally acclaimed.
Using a wide range of unusual organic and industrial materials, she strikes a delicate balance between the visual and referential qualities of whatever material she is working with, from human hair to thread to cow dung. Each of these materials is sourced from everyday life and makes specific references. This reference to an external reality beyond the formal or visual properties of a material is always present in Gowda’s work, whether as the dominant subject or a background note that informs the artwork.
For Artes Mundi 5, Gowda has two pieces that, at first glance, seem very different. Heartland 2011 is a small painting over a newspaper photograph that refers to the long running insurgency in the vast forests of central India. It depicts a Maoist tribal rebel captured by the military.
The rebel wears an expression of such defiance that it is clear his conviction in his actions means far more than any criminal conviction the state could impose on him. The commitment to his cause and belief in his action seems unshakable, the kind of belief that drives liberation struggles or fundamentalism to violence. Individual belief is pitched against the might of the state, questioning the nature of personal and state ideologies.
In terms of scale, materials, and figuration, the juxtaposition of Heartland with the large abstract installation Kagebangara 2007 seems incongruous, but the ideas that unpin both works have strong resonance.
Kagebangara is the most ambitious work in a series of large-scale sculptures made using tar drums combined with other industrial materials, in this case blue and yellow tarpaulins, rolls of tar roofing, and sheets of the reflective mineral mica.
The drums are sourced from a gang of road builders in Bangalore where the artist lives. Road building in India is a seasonal activity for migrant labourers that fits around the monsoons, so accessing the materials was more complicated than simply placing an order. Gowda had to build relationships and trust with the different characters in the crew, negotiating the group’s hierarchy for different purposes. At a practical level, tracking the crew down from day-to-day was essential but could be challenging – depending on progress their itinerary could change with no notice, meaning her supply of materials could dry up at any moment. Acceptance by the crew became an essential part of her creative process.
For the workers, the drums are the currency in which they are paid. Once they are emptied and cleaned up they can then be sold on the black market or used to create the temporary structures they need for sleeping, cooking or showering. These structures can be collapsed and erected at short notice, a necessity for moving camp from day to day. Gowda’s treatment of the drums is informed by how the workers use them – leaving them whole or cutting them into sheets and flattening, building small structures, stacking the drums, finding a use for every last scrap. Gowda never changes their integral dimensions, using the drums or sheets in the basic standardised units that the workers keep them in order to sell on the black market. In some respect, she is true to the minimalist painter Frank Stella’s aphorism that he tried to keep the paint as good as it was in the can – except her interest is in the can itself.
Although Kagebangara is a room- sized installation, it also has a powerful connection to painting: its elements occupy the wall in the way that a composition fills a canvas. The arrangement of forms makes reference to 1930s modernist abstract painters such as Theo Van Doesburg of the Dutch De Stijl movement, particularly the layered planes and yellow and blue tarpaulin squares. As well as 1930s abstraction, the use of industrial materials makes strong reference to 1960s minimalism, and even a vague reference to a geometric landscape.
Within this grandeur, there are nooks and crannies that shift to a domestic scale. The interior of the ‘house’ structure has been modified by lining it with tar sheet that resembles glistening moonlight on the sea or, perhaps, a dreamscape left by a previous inhabitant.
Gowda’s work traverses the local and international, exploring how global phenomena like industrialisation or Modernism take on local characteristics and have different impacts related to wherever, and whenever, they come into contact with traditional cultures. While Gowda, like most artists, resists being positioned as a representative of national identity, her articulation of the tensions caused by the collision, or intersection, of colloquial and modernist culture speaks eloquently of the upheavals in Indian society caused by the rapid acceleration of economic development and globalisation.
The Artes Mundi 5 exhibition is at National Museum Cardiff until January 13. The winner of the £40,000 prize will be revealed on November 29. For full details visit www.artesmundi.org | <urn:uuid:cd13866a-7511-4c94-ae65-02554df09b40> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.walesonline.co.uk/lifestyle/showbiz/artes-mundi-5-profile-sheela-2016647 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00066-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96028 | 1,111 | 1.84375 | 2 |
By Lauren Ehrler and Noelle Smith
The current United States national debt is nearly $15 trillion and growing. Organizations like the Concord Coalition seek to educate the public about the causes and consequences of federal budget deficits.
The Concord Coalition brought their program to Drake University, students and community members assembled “super committees” to discuss the nation’s current unsustainable debt.
Executive Director Robert Bixby flew in from Washington to observe. He hopes people will realize the size of he budget problem, and what the realistic options are.
In the 70-minute exercise, groups were challenged to educate, negotiate, and persuade others on policy issues. But when a vote was called, majority ruled.
Groups worked through 37 policy options, calculating dollars and tallying votes. Many found the answer to be in a balance between revenues and expenditures.
As individuals considered their personal priorities, and even party affiliation, groups found discussion and time constraints tough.
George Ensley said his table spent too much time debating policy options at the beginning, and had to rush to finish.
The exercise challenged everyone to consider their own personal priorities and negotiate with team members. Some teams struggled to compromise while others were able to sucessfully reduce the deficit. In the end, citizens realized how difficult making cuts can be.
Organizers hope the exercise will encourage and inspire participants to become citizen activists.The Concord Coallition was founded in 1992 and is a non-partisan, non-profit agency that advocates federal fiscal responsibility. It facilitates multiple programs like this every month across the nation. | <urn:uuid:7621540a-8a63-4cdb-9dd9-050b8fb3ddba> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.drakejournalism.com/DrakeDigitalNews/?p=5252 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00064-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96118 | 320 | 2.828125 | 3 |
By Mark Cowen, Senior medwireNews Reporter
Results from a US study do not support an association between low birth weight and an increased risk for childhood asthma.
In a study of 3933 children born between 1976 and 1979 in Rochester, Minnesota, the team found no significant difference between low (<2500 g) and normal birth weight (≥2500 g) infants in the cumulative incidence of asthma during the first 7 years of life, after propensity score matching to address covariate imbalance.
"While environment, genetics, and their interaction are thought to increase one's risk of developing asthma, we now should not assume that low birth weight is associated with asthma," said study author Hyeon Yang, from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, in a press statement.
"This is an important finding as we continue to understand who is at risk for asthma and why," she added.
Overall, 6.7% of the 193 low birth weight children and 5.4% of the 3740 normal birth weight children developed asthma in the first 7 years of life.
However, there was significant covariate imbalance between the two birth weight groups regarding the number of prenatal visits, complications related to labor, induction of labor, maternal age at delivery, and marital status of parents.
To make the groups more comparable, the team used propensity scores, based on 16 covariates, to generate two matched groups of 109 low and normal birth weight children.
In these matched groups, nine (8.3%) of the low birth weight children and eight (7.3%) of the normal weight children developed asthma in the first 7 years of life - a nonsignificant difference.
Lead researcher Young Juhn, also from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, and team conclude in the Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology: "Our population-based study results indicate that low birth weight was not causally associated with risk of subsequent development of childhood asthma in the 1976 to 1979 Rochester birth cohort during the first 7 years of life."
They add: "We suggest that the propensity score approach may be a useful method to reduce covariate imbalance in observational studies concerning asthma epidemiology."
Licensed from medwireNews with permission from Springer Healthcare Ltd. ©Springer Healthcare Ltd. All rights reserved. Neither of these parties endorse or recommend any commercial products, services, or equipment. | <urn:uuid:aebe3f20-0747-4018-a2ae-e7bd8ecf4cff> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.news-medical.net/news/20130125/Low-birth-weight-not-linked-to-childhood-asthma.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943054 | 480 | 2.109375 | 2 |
For Immediate Release
October 16, 2006
Illinois observes National Bus Safety Week, Oct.
This Year’s Theme Highlights
Pedestrian Safety for Riders Nationwide
SPRINGFIELD – As part of National Bus Safety Week,
Oct. 15-21, Illinois is joining school districts statewide
and school bus industry officials nationwide in stressing
the importance of school bus safety and education.
“Although school buses are the safest way for
students to get to and from school, we always want to
minimize any risk—no matter how small—of
our students getting injured,” said State Superintendent
of Schools Randy Dunn. “By observing School Bus
Safety Week throughout Illinois, we have the opportunity
to call attention to the fact that our students are at
the most risk especially when they are getting on or
off the school bus.”
Celebrated the third week of October each year, School
Bus Safety Week promotes awareness and education on the
local and state level through poster and speech contests,
school bus safety community toolkits and events. School
districts throughout Illinois will be hosting activities
for parents, children and teachers to highlight the importance
of school bus safety both on and off the school bus.
The theme for School Bus Safety Week 2006 – I
See the Driver – The Driver Sees Me – emphasizes
the importance and benefits of school bus driver training
and encourages students across the country to obey school
bus safety rules while waiting at the bus stop and getting
on and off the school bus each day.
In Illinois, more than 1.1 million students ride the
school bus daily. Across the nation, 25 million children
ride the school bus each day. Nationwide, an average
of 33 school-age children die in school-bus-related traffic
crashes each year. Most of the children killed are pedestrians,
five to seven years old.
School Bus Safety Week was established in 1966 by the
National Association of Pupil Transportation, National
Association of State Directors of Pupil Transportation
Services National School Transportation Association and
supported by the NHTSA. The goal is to educate students,
parents and the motoring public about the safety of our
nation’s children who are transported daily on
yellow school buses. This week also recognizes the hard
work and dedication of school professionals, especially
the school bus drivers who ensure a safe journey for
our children each and every day.
The American School Bus Council offers the following
tips for school bus riders:
- Be alert to traffic. Check both ways for cars
before stepping off the bus.
- Make eye contact with the bus driver, and wait
for the bus driver’s signal before crossing the
- Walk in front of the bus; never walk behind
the bus to cross the street.
- While waiting for the bus, stay in a safe place
away from the street.
- Before leaving the sidewalk,
look for the flashing lights.
- Never go under the bus to retrieve something you’ve
For more information about bus safety and School Bus
Safety Week, visit ISBE’s school bus safety section
online at http://www.isbe.net/funding/html/bus_safety.htm;
or the National Association of Pupil Transportation’s
web site at www.napt.org. | <urn:uuid:b1e7aef2-c088-40cf-8359-2e3095155f20> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.isbe.state.il.us/news/2006/oct16.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.922814 | 713 | 3.015625 | 3 |
Jack Hitt writing in the NY TImes writes some thoughts on the way that online post-publication commentary and review are changing the authority of scientific statements: "Science and Truth - We're All In It Together". He takes as his theme the 2005 "sighting" of the ivory-headed woodpecker. Every piece of evidence that appeared to support this sighting was later debunked by serious naturalists and amateur birders, working in a loose network centered on a blog. Early in the public exposure of the story, more prominent scientists given fuller information than the public had privately expressed doubts, but held their tongues.
Take the case of the ivory-bill. The article in Science has never been retracted. Cornell still stands by its video. The federal Fish and Wildlife Service acted as though the ivory-bill existed, and, in 2008, it asked for $27 million to support recovery efforts. Here’s the thing: The ivory-billed woodpecker is the Schrödinger’s cat of contemporary media — dead to those who’ve looked inside Tom Nelson’s blog but alive to the professionals who can’t bear to. | <urn:uuid:334457fd-55ae-452c-846e-91e698b9f3ca> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://johnhawks.net/weblog/topics/meta/open/science-and-truth-hitt-2012.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00064-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957366 | 239 | 1.789063 | 2 |
A mobile cinema voter education outreach campaign that supports Africans in democracy building.
Imagine a movie theater on wheels that makes a journey through remote parts of Africa to share a film and an AFRICAN SUCCESS STORY. Welcome to A Political Safari, a project that uses creativity to bring African communities together to see the inspiring Sundance film, An African Election (view the trailer at here), an extraordinary documentary about the 2008 democratic presidential elections in Ghana, West Africa.
Starting in August, I will be driving a truck - mounted with a screen, projector, and generator - into marginalized communities in Africa where people might not have access to electricity, transportation, much less a cinema. These are communities that have traditionally been left out of the voting process in the country. Along with a comprehensive voter education program, we will use this film to inspire Ghanaians, Africans, and the International community with a message that Africa has positive examples of democracy and is able to conduct peaceful elections!
In this past week, the world has seen Ghana peacefully transition from one President to another following the sudden death of President Atta Mills. But, this is still a very delicate and important time for Ghana and Africa. This is why we NEED to bring communities together to support the next generation of African visionaries. Joining us will be local educational and electoral stakeholders and African artists who will work creatively with villagers to tell their own stories through art. Together, we will capture the lives of these vibrant communities on film, eager for self-expression!
WHAT CAN YOU DO?
This journey needs a beginning, as all journeys do… and it starts with you believing in it. We need to raise $32,000 to help fund this mobile cinema and get the film translated into 5 different local languages to effectively reach these rural communities. If we don't reach our funding, we lose it all. Please join our supporters and DONATE to this project. Help us SPREAD THE WORD: blog about this, tweet/Facebook about us, contact local organizations and news outlets, and tell your friends! The more people we get involved, the more likely we can succeed and the more communities we can reach in Africa. AKWAABA!
ABOUT THE FILM:
An African Election is a remarkable documentary that grants viewers unprecedented access to the anatomy of Ghana’s 2008 presidential elections. Capturing the intrigue of electioneering, the intensity of the vote-counting process, and the mood of the countrymen whose fate lies precariously in the balance, director Jarreth Merz’s coverage unfolds with all the tension of a political thriller, revealing the emotions, passions, and ethical decisions that both threaten—and maintain—the integrity of the democratic process. An African Election illuminates a beacon of hope for Africa and offers an inspiring example of the vitality of democracy today. To see the trailer, please visit www.anafricanelection.com
Have a question? If the info above doesn't help, you can ask the project creator directly.
pledged of $32,000 goal
seconds to go
Jul 14, 2012 - Aug 13, 2012 (30 days)
Pledge $1 or more
We'll mention you on the "special thanks" section of our website!Estimated delivery: Oct 2012
Pledge $10 or more
We’ll mention you on the “special thanks” section on our website AND Jarreth will email you a virtual high-five!Estimated delivery: Oct 2012
Pledge $25 or more
All of the above AND we’ll send you a signed poster of An African ElectionEstimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $50 or more
All of the above AND you’ll get a An African Election DVD!Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $75 or more
All of the above AND you’ll get a signed An African Election DVD with Bonus Features!Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $100 or more
You'll get the whole set of An African Election/A Political Safari merch PLUS a bracelet of traditional Ghanaian painted glass beads, handpicked by me...and you all know I do have taste ;)Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $150 or more
All of the above AND you’ll get a limited release An African Election T-SHIRT!Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $250 or more
You'll get the whole set of An African Election/A Political Safari merch, AND a compilation CD of African music from our friends at a Ghanian record label!Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $500 or more
You'll get the whole set of An African Election/A Political Safari merch and Jarreth will pick out a beautiful handmade Adinkra cloth from Ghana to send to you.Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $1,000 or more
All of the above AND we'll paint a short message from you/logo on the side of our traveling mobile-cinema truck. You'll get a series of photos of your words traveling through Africa while we're on the road!Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $1,500 or more
0 backers Limited (2 of 2 left)
All of the above AND you’ll get an exclusive piece of art (sculpture or mural) from the Ghanaian artist community at ACCRA [dot] ALT.Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $2,500 or more
You'll get the whole set of An African Election/A Political Safari merch, CD compilation of African Music, hand printed Adinkra cloth, your message/logo on the side of our mobile-cinema truck, AND an associate producer credit in this award winning film!Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $5,000 or more
An evening with Director Jarreth Merz in LA where he will host a screening, share tales from the road, and conclude with a live performance of traditional African drummers.Estimated delivery: Dec 2012
Pledge $5,100 or more
0 backers Limited (2 of 2 left)
Come on tour with us for a week and experience A Political Safari first hand. We will provide all accommodation, food, and local transportation. Just get to Accra, Ghana and we'll take you on a journey to remember! (Transport to Accra not provided)Estimated delivery: Sep 2012 | <urn:uuid:31bc8fb8-42a4-433d-a520-bed6297ae91e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/863893747/a-political-safari-featuring-the-film-an-african-e?ref=ending_soon | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.901268 | 1,333 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Wacom Inkling: A Sketch Artists Best Friend (video)
Digital pens that track your hand written notes are nothing new. In fact, we reviewed one a few years ago, and for the most part we liked what we saw. Our tests, though, were limited to writing and didn’t address those who spend a fair bit of time sketching or should we say drawing.
Enter Wacom’s Inkling. It’s a $200 device that digitally transcribes your handy work in real time. The pen uses a pressure sensitive tip (1024 levels) to track what you’re drawing and transmits the information in real time, via ultrasonic and infrared technologies, to the included receiver. The receiver attaches to the top of the paper, and given the aforementioned technology it must always have a line of site to the pen in order to work. No special paper is needed, just in case you were wondering.
Although paper size, or at least drawing size is limited to a standard sized piece of paper (8×11″), users can denote layers in their work. We can only assume its analogous to that of Photoshop, allowing you to adjust layers independently of one of other and separate your work or erase parts with ease as needed, once transfered to your computer.
And speaking of which, transferring your work to a computer is as simple as plugging it into a computer’s USB port. The files are compatible with Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator (CS3 or newer), as well as Autodesk Sketchbook Pro (2011 or newer). Alternatively, files can be saved in JPG, BMP, TIFF, PNG, SVG and PDF formats for use with other applications.
A compact case, which both the receiver and pen fit inside, charge both devices. Total battery life is about 3 hours depending on usage.
Wacom’s Inkling pen will be available mid-September. | <urn:uuid:eb60f87c-cff5-4656-9d41-187f3727851d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gadgetreview.com/2011/08/wacom-inkling.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00057-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955375 | 399 | 1.625 | 2 |
Acid is a word that scares people.
So when Hellertown officials meet next month to decide whether to permit an acid distillation plant in the former Champion Spark Plug Co. building, the safety of the borough's residents and its environment will be on their minds.
If the experience of municipalities in Northampton and Bucks counties with similar plants is a touchstone, Hellertown officials have nothing to fear.
But one only has to look as far as Dover, Ohio, to see that safety is important at an acid distillation plant. Last April, a plant there was rocked by five explosions that left only one wall of the building standing. The resulting fire burned the lone operator and forced the evacuation of 370 residents from a nearby mobile home park.
"We didn't know what all was in the smoke," Dover Fire Chief Fred Nixon complained.
The plant was also the site of several nitric acid spills that caused reddish-brown fumes when the acid touched metals. "It choked you," Nixon said.
In Hellertown, a local chemical distributor wants to invest $1.75 million in the Champion Spark Plug building he recently bought to construct a plant that would distill hydrochloric, sulfuric and nitric acids.
"I can say this, and I can say this very truthfully: This process, through experience and through engineering, has been made very, very safe," said Douglas Oliver, owner and president of International Marketers, Inc., in Center Valley.
However, Hellertown Manager James Sigworth said he will question Oliver to determine whether the borough would need an evacuation plan if the plant is permitted. The plant would distill 6 million pounds of nitric acid annually and 8 million pounds each of hydrochloric and sulfuric acids annually. In addition, it would have storage tanks capable of holding up to 50,000 gallons of raw materials and finished products.
"I would presume there is a potential for a large-scale spill," Sigworth said.
The Hellertown Planning Commission is scheduled to review Oliver's plans Dec. 11. The borough zoning hearing board, on Dec. 13, will consider Oliver's request for a special exception or a variance needed because the general industrial zoning does not permit such uses.
Oliver's proposal holds a strong economic attraction for Hellertown. When Champion pulled out its spark plug manufacturing operation two years ago, it was the largest employer in the borough. Oliver has said that his plant would occupy about a third of the 124,600-square-foot building and would employ 40-50 persons by 1986. Oliver expects to rent the remainder of the two-story, brick building at 1758 Main St. to an electronics assembly company, bringing total employment in the building to about 100.
Acid distillation is a $100-million-a-year industry in the United States, Oliver said. It supplies highly purified acids to the growing electronics industry to be used to etch microchip wafers and to the pharmaceutical industry for use in drugs.
At a special Hellertown Chamber of Commerce meeting Oct. 25, Oliver said his plant would be comparable to several local acid distillation plants, including one in Plainfield Township run by High Pure Chemicals, Inc.
Bob Szabo, sales manager of High Pure, said the company has been distilling hydrochloric and nitric acids at the Plainfield plant since 1974. The company also makes several acids there.
Plainfield Township Engineer Richard Rutt said High Pure complies with township, state and federal regulations.
"The operation of this plant, High Pure Chemicals in Plainfield Township, and at any other acid distillation plant are pretty much determined by the operators," Rutt said. "And in Plainfield Township we are lucky because we have conscientious operators. . . . They bend over backwards to meet the regulations and stuff."
Neighbors of the High Pure plant on Engler Road occasionally complain about the odor that results when injector pumps on smokestack scrubbers malfunction and the emissions are not neutralized to a salt. But, Rutt said, "We've had stack problems fixed five minutes after the complaint comes in."
High Pure built a a double-wall tank of fiberglass within steel after a tank of nitric acid burst six to eight years ago, Rutt said. High Pure also installed a water recirculating system when its plant well began draining neighboring wells.
"They responded to the neighbors and solved the technical problems for the neighbors," Rutt said.
Robert Tenges, chairman of the Plainfield supervisors, lives two blocks from the High Pure plant. Other than the occasional malfunctioning of the smokestack scrubbers and the resultant odor, he could not find fault with it.
"I myself have no problems with High Pure Chemical, as a neighbor or as a supervisor," Tenges said. | <urn:uuid:e309a8db-a3b4-42fc-9bd4-d2a3c6b89192> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://articles.mcall.com/1984-11-25/news/2443044_1_nitric-acid-sulfuric-hydrochloric | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967867 | 1,000 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Obesity in Middle Age Tied to More Rapid Mental Decline: Study
MONDAY, Aug. 20 (HealthDay News) -- People who are obese and suffer from high blood pressure and other problems linked to heart disease and diabetes may also see a faster decline in their mental abilities, according to a new study by French researchers.
Yet even obese people without these physical conditions experienced a faster decline in functions such as memory, the researchers noted. This finding belies the concept of being obese and healthy, they added.
"The prevalence of obesity is rising; 400 million adults were obese in 2005 and this number is expected to rise to over 700 million by 2015," said lead researcher Archana Singh-Manoux, research director of the Center for Research in Epidemiology & Population Health at INSERM, in Paris.
Obesity is known to be bad for health, she said. It is associated with a higher risk of early death and chronic illness.
"Our results add to this list of adverse health effects, showing poorer [mental] outcomes among the obese," Singh-Manoux said.
Having high blood pressure, high cholesterol or high blood sugar, or being on medication to control these conditions, are among the signs of metabolic syndrome. This cluster of symptoms is considered a forerunner for heart disease and diabetes.
For the study, participants with at least two of these signs were considered to have metabolic syndrome.
Participants came from the long-running Whitehall II study, which began in 1985 and follows British civil servants from middle age onward.
For the new findings, researchers followed more than 6,400 people aged 39 to 63 for 10 years. At the start of the study, they recorded patients' risk factors, including weight.
During the follow-up decade, participants also took tests on memory, reasoning and overall mental function at three intervals, according to the report published in the Aug. 21 issue of the journal Neurology.
People with metabolic syndrome who were also obese saw a more rapid decline -- 22.5 percent faster -- in their mental function than those who weren't obese and didn't suffer from the syndrome.
Moreover, those who did not have metabolic syndrome but were obese also saw mental function decline more quickly than participants who were not obese.
Obesity is a known risk factor for many adverse health outcomes, including dementia. It typically is accompanied by metabolic syndrome, Singh-Manoux said. This, however, is not always the case, leading to the concept of so-called "metabolically healthy obesity," she said.
"Some research suggests this type of obesity carries less health risk, but the evidence is far from clear," Singh-Manoux said.
"Our results show this not to be the case for mental function," she said. "Obesity, in those who were metabolically healthy and unhealthy, was associated with poor mental function at the start of the study and greater decline over 10 years."
Dr. Richard Lipton, professor and vice chairman of neurology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City, said that "this study suggests that taking the steps recommended to prevent heart attack and stroke in midlife, including controlling body weight, high blood pressure, diabetes and lipid profiles, may also have a beneficial effect on cognitive function late in life."
Although more studies are needed, people should heed the advice on how to protect their hearts, Lipton said, which will, in turn, protect their brains as well.
"Maintaining normal body weight while preventing or treating abnormalities in blood pressure, glucose regulation and lipids may provide a therapeutic twofer, protecting the heart and brain," he said.
To learn more about obesity, visit the U.S. National Library of Medicine.
SOURCES: Archana Singh-Manoux, Ph.D., research director, Center for Research in Epidemiology & Population Health, INSERM, Paris; Richard Lipton, M.D., professor, vice chairman, neurology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York City; Aug. 21, 2012, Neurology | <urn:uuid:536c0d8c-53c0-4e16-8f7c-bbe292a922f4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.heartofflorida.com/health-education/6,667806 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962916 | 835 | 2.484375 | 2 |
Losing a mate can be one of the most stressful events in a person’s life, and the grieving period that follows can be taxing for even the strongest among us.
Luis Orta, a clinical psychologist based in Miami, has worked extensively with people who have suffered loss, be it of a loved one, a job, or a home due to a natural disaster. Here are some of his observations.
Q: What happens when a head of household dies?
A: When a main figure dies, there’s a period of what I call “disbanding.” People are in limbo, but then comes the reorganization. How [the reorganization] happens depends a lot on the importance and influence of the person in the family. If the person was the official head of household in name alone but somebody else ran the show—in other words, he was just a figurehead—then everyday things may remain pretty much the same.
But if that person played an important role, there’s an initial period of confusion and readjustment. How long it takes varies and depends also on the nature of the family dynamics. If everybody was dependent on this person, it’s very difficult. There has to be somebody who will step up, who is more of a go-getter. Usually that happens automatically because some roles are assigned by the family from the get-go, and that person has already stepped up in other situations.
If the surviving spouse shared in the responsibilities equally, it’s an easier transition. There is still a grieving process as far as the emotions, but the functional process of what gets done, who does it, and when it gets done will be smoother.
Q: Do children grieve according to their ages?
A: In theory, the grief process is the same. However, it also depends on the individual, the relationship the person had with the deceased, how close they were, and how intense the relationship was. In most cases, the less interaction [the person had with the deceased], the easier.
But age may affect maturation level. In my opinion, the younger the child is the easier it is. If I've known you for five weeks, it's easier to recuperate from my loss than if I have known you for five years. It's different losing a parent at age 2 than at age 12. Each developmental stage has its own peculiarities. Some believe the teenage years are the most difficult, but I think each stage can have its own conflict and adjustment issues.
Q: Do Latinos deal with the loss of a partner differently because of culture, family ties, religion, or other traits?
A: Everybody’s affected by the loss of a loved one. Being a Latino, Anglo, or Martian doesn’t make it easier or harder. That said, the grief process might be easier depending on the ways it’s approached. The average Anglo—and I’m generalizing here—tends to be more pragmatic and will deal with this in a factual way. Latinos tend to rely more on their extended family, and they tend to be more codependent. It’s not good or bad; it’s just different.
And this close relationship with extended family could provide a good support system, but that can be a double-edged sword. There’s more dependency and more rumination. In the immediate aftermath it works to their advantage, but afterwards it may not, if there’s too much dependency.
Q: What advice do you give those who are grieving?
A: It’s all about time. Time is the determinant of when you begin to heal. Also, stay busy. Do things that are productive. Cry when you have to.
Q: What advice do you give to friends and relatives of those who are grieving?
A: Be there. Listen and genuinely offer help. Be proactive. Don’t wait for them to ask. But the most important thing is to be willing to listen. | <urn:uuid:efe9055b-5c5d-4cba-90d5-4ad8954d64b9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.aarp.org/relationships/grief-loss/info-10-2008/sj_dealing_with_grief.html | 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 | 0.963017 | 839 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Many of us have questions about Jesus, but did you know that Jesus has questions for us? Indeed, as Victor Shepherd points out in this book, Jesus spent much of his ministry on earth asking his disciples questions rather than answering the questions on their agenda. Instead, he used questions as a way of reshaping and redirecting his disciples towards the Truth. This is not to say that Jesus dismisses our questions as trite. Yet because our hearts are corrupt, we are often asking the wrong questions. In this book, Victor Shepherd reflects on twelve important questions that Jesus asked, challenging us to reflect on the significance of these questions for us today and bringing these truths to bear upon our everyday lives. A pastor for more than forty years, Victor Shepherd now serves as Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology at Tyndale University College & Seminary, Toronto, and professor ordinarius for the Graduate Theological Foundation, University of Oxford. | <urn:uuid:84b42c87-3aeb-4b74-8554-8606afee26c7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.amazon.ca/Love-Other-Questions-Jesus-Asks/dp/1894667697 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963851 | 189 | 2.03125 | 2 |
The British Academy Children's Awards will take place on November 24 2013.
The Children’s Awards are for content specifically designed for audiences under the age of 16.
Television programmes must have had their first transmission in the UK between 1 July 2012 and 30 June 2013 on terrestrial, cable, satellite or digital channels.
Web-based entries must have been available online between 1 July 2012 and 30 June 2013. You may not resubmit an entry from previous years unless it can be demonstrated that there are significant new levels of technology or innovation.
Films must have had their first theatrical screening in the UK between 1 August 2012 and 31 July 2013.
Games must have had their original release in the UK between 1 August 2012 and 31 July 2013.
Programmes, Films and Games that have been submitted into previous Children’s Awards ceremonies are not eligible.
Editorial initiative and control must reside with the UK producer, broadcaster or developer in all cases except in the following categories: Feature Film, International and Game.
The relevant voting constituency of the Academy casts its votes for all those programmes entered according to the aforementioned criteria.
Those programmes which have attracted the most votes from the Academy membership are then put up for further scrutiny by category juries, specially selected by the Academy's Children's Committee.
Each jury aims to be balanced in age, sex, experience, ethnicity and in broadcasting allegiances, with a track record of achievement in the genre and with no direct association with a short-listed programme, feature film, website or video game.
These juries decide upon the four nominations and the winner of the Awards.
AWARDS IN THE GIFT OF COUNCIL
Suggested recipients of the gift of council Special Award for outstanding contribution are put forward by the Academy's Children's Committee for consideration by the Academy's Council.
There are no nominations for these awards, nor are they voted for by the Academy membership. The Gift of Council award is presented at the discretion of the Academy. | <urn:uuid:4be1bbe5-e53c-4f3b-bfed-92bbef9d0956> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bafta.org/childrens-awards/eligibility-judging,52,BA.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965074 | 408 | 1.75 | 2 |
A Mongolian map of the Omnogovi region traversed by the Wall of Genghis Khan.
Known locally as "Wall of Genghis Khan", the Wall was constructed from blocks of basalt (top), thick saksaul branches and sand (middle and below). It is about 40 km north of the China-Mongolian border. James and William Lindesay / For China Daily
Saksaul used in the Wall of Genghis Khan was found growing in groves across the south Gobi region of Mongolia. James Lindesay / For China Daily
Beijing-based Briton William Lindesay led an expedition into Mongolia's Gobi Desert in search of 'The Wall of Genghis Khan' to make one of the greatest discoveries of his 25-year-long exploration and research career at the Wall.
What is the "Wall of Genghis Khan"?
After 10 hours of driving across the empty steppe, we reached Dalandzadgad, capital of Omnogovi, or the "South Gobi" province of Mongolia, where our expedition began.
Although the Gobi is notoriously heartless, ahead lay the heart of the Gobi - its widest tract.
Before taking the leap, we took precautions in loading up to the brink.
At the gas station, our tanks and two spare canisters per vehicle, gave each a 600-km range - double our estimated 300-km route.
Next came water, also from a station, sold by the bucket.
Finally, we called at the drinks store, for 160 liters of "Mirage of Gobi" mineral water.
We also procured liquid gifts for the army. We'd need their help to find what we were looking for - appropriately, we chose a few bottles of Genghis Khan vodka, because we would be meeting officers from the Mongolian Army and looking for what the Mongolians call "The Wall of Genghis Khan".
An atlas had put Mongolia "outside the Wall" at the top of my Great Wall research agenda.
All its maps featured a swerving red arrow, showing the journeys of one man.
Page after page, year after year, this arrow recorded hit-and-run raids for horses and women, attacks to subjugate surrounding tribes, sustained wars against arch enemies and protracted campaigns to topple kingdoms and empires.
All journeys occurred between 1162, when a boy named Temujin was born, and 1227, when "The Universal Ruler" as he'd risen to become, died.
Entitled The Genghis Khan Atlas, this geographical version of The Secret History of the Mongol told the life story of Genghis Khan, and it had seized my curiosity because it depicted walls throughout various parts of Mongolia. All of them were labeled: "The Wall of Genghis Khan".
Did the great man authorize the building of long walls?
How and why could a nomadic warrior be a conqueror and a defender?
And, if he had built walls, who was he attempting to fend off? Or, thinking "beyond the Wall" and its conventional defense uses, were they built for other purposes?
To simplify the geography of these mysterious structures, I marked them on a sketch map of Mongolia, in an attempt to work out if they bore any obvious cross-border relationships with the Great Wall in China.
Historical atlases of China showed that three dynasties - the Western Han (206 BC-AD 24), Liao (916-1125) and Jin (1115-1234) - had routed sections of Great Walls across land that today straddles the China-Mongolia border.
It was the Han structure, built 21 centuries ago, that aroused my strongest interest, as I had researched its finely preserved remains extensively at its western extremity in the vicinity of Yumenguan, or the Jade Gate Pass, in Gansu province.
By what I soon dubbed as the "jigsaw" theory, it seemed likely that the "Wall of Genghis Khan" in Mongolia's Omnogovi province might be part of the Han Great Wall, marooned outside today's China by the change in border locations over the millennia. However, I wanted to collect direct evidence with fieldwork, allowing comparative studies to have a say in consolidating that theory.
Although access to a sensitive no-go border region seemed impossible, I continued my research by asking questions.
Fortunately, a Dutch friend, Tjalling Halbertsma, an old Wall exploring companion from the late 1990s, had based himself in Mongolia's capital, Ulaanbaatar.
He e-mailed me a photo of the Genghis Khan Wall.
However, the image that I received showed a Mongolian accompanied by his wife and child on a motorbike.
I replied, advising he'd sent the wrong picture.
"But it's the right photo," he insisted. "The Genghis Wall is also called the Genghis Road since it's exploited as a landmark to lead people safely across the otherwise empty landscape."
Halbertsma made a real breakthrough years later, in 2011, finding Professor Baasan, an eminent geographer and specialist on desertification who was taking a growing interest himself in the origins and purposes of Mongolia's Walls.
Both gentlemen were prime movers in swinging the high-level government approval for the first international research expedition into the prohibited region.
With the last oasis of Dalandzadgad now behind us, Baasan sat upfront to navigate our Land Cruisers' cross-country passage across the Gobi.
With 50 years' desert experience, he looked at his map, took in the contours, glanced at his GPS, predicted the presence of sand dunes and gradient of inclines, and duly instructed his driver on the best way forward.
We were heading toward a precise destination.
My eldest son James, an emerging Great Wall enthusiast, and more comfortable with technology than myself, had used Google Earth to follow the Wall of Genghis Khan across Omnogovi province.
On his aerial traverse he had identified very occasional dark shadows underscoring the Wall's otherwise faint line. These, we considered, might indicate where the Wall stood higher, where it might be better preserved.
One of the most promising coordinates was fed into our GPS devices, and this also became our agreed rendezvous point with the Mongolian Army at 4 pm the next day.
Our campfire conversation that night tilted toward the question of how nomadic invaders from the northern steppe had negotiated this immense, intimidating Gobi, a natural barrier between themselves and China, the land of plenty, and why anyone would have built a wall here.
Prior to our expedition's departure from Ulaanbaatar, I'd met Professor Jack Weatherford, author of Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World. He explained that the building of any restraining structure such as a wall would have been considered an offense against divine law in Mongol culture, as they respected the flow and cycle of nature.
"That is why Ogodei, Genghis Khan's third son and chosen successor, confessed that his building of 'tamped walls and fences' to prevent the migration of wild beasts off his land was one of his four great misdoings - according to The Secret History of the Mongols."
The next morning, a herd of about 50 gazelles (Procapra gutturosa) easily outpaced us as we sped at 70 km per hour across a saltpan.
Gazelles were a valued resource of meat, skin and horn for the Mongols.
Batmunkh, one of only two bow-makers crafting the traditional Mongolian bow in the country today, had told me the accurate range of the composite birch and ibex horn bow was around 70 meters.
In that context, a barrier constructed to block the gazelles' path may have provided a hunting advantage.
Could the Wall of Genghis Khan have served as a platform for archers to await the approach of herds driven toward them by chasers?
The lead Land Cruiser stopped. Baasan got out and approached. "It's the Genghis Road!" he announced.
And it was here that we met Captain Enkbayer, a portly army officer, who checked our papers from Ulaanbaatar's ministries and then led us over the rise. There stood the Wall of Genghis Khan, several meters high.
Saksaul wood made up about 30 percent of its fabric, and the branches were highly variable in size, ranging from spindly twigs less than a centimeter thick to long, thick branches, and occasionally, logs.
I recovered two samples of wood and a tiny strand of braided rope from the structure, hoping that radiocarbon dating tests on my return to Beijing might enlighten me through scientific means as to the era when this Wall was built.
The structure was remarkably like the sections of reed- and tamarisk-built Han Great Wall around Yumenguan.
There was one glaring difference, however. The Wall of Genghis Khan was absent of watchtowers dotted along its line.
Since Yumenguan's towers - originally made of adobe bricks and built to great heights and thicknesses - constitute the best preserved components of the defense system there, I had to conclude that they had been omitted from the construction plan here - for one reason or another.
According to a leading Sinologist on the Han Dynasty, Michael Loewe, writing in The Campaigns of Han Wudi, the "North Desert Offensive" launched by Emperor Han Wudi in 119 BC against the Xiongnu nomads lasted six months and brought victory after a long cross-Gobi and steppe chase but at an astoundingly high cost.
Tens of thousands of Han cavalrymen perished, along with 100,000 horses. Huge payouts of gold were made to the victorious soldiers. It busted the national coffers.
It seemed possible that the Wall here was built to consolidate that military victory, but the cost of finishing it off, replete with watchtowers, might perhaps have proved to be problematic to a government in deficit and futile.
Unlike the commercially important Hexi Corridor out west, which was evolving into the Silk Road with prospering oasis towns, the land here was useless. There was no water, and no trade route. There was nothing to defend.
Could it be that, soon after its initial phase of construction, the Wall project through the Gobi's heart was deemed too heavy a financial burden, so they abandoned it?
The next day, we maintained the position of our camp, offloaded all unnecessary equipment and set off west, crammed into one empty vehicle, to economize on fuel.
Captain Enkhbayer's gestures predicted our route. Interpreting his hand and arm language suggested the Wall crossed the desert in a straight line and made what appeared to be an abrupt detour over a mountain.
At first we bounced along, stalking the Genghis Wall, a feeble scar at times, improving in height to a higher mound, sometimes strewn with rocks.
Then, as indicated by a drop in speed, clashing of shoulders and ribs among passengers, and the revving of the wheels in loose sand, we were "off road". Within minutes, the wide blue sky turned milky and then brown. A dust storm was blowing in.
Sandak, our driver remained unruffled and persistent. We reversed, turned and backtracked.
Slowly, and by sheer instinct, he wriggled us out of this siege of sand and sky.
Eventually, we reached the only place name on Baasan's map: "Khermiin Undur Uul" or "High Mountain with Wall", which is actually an extinct volcanic cone.
The storm had passed us and was en route south, toward China's Ningxia Hui autonomous region. In the calm clarity, a structure made of dark, angular blocks of basalt appeared like a petrified snake, as if it had been created by the solidification of a torrent of turbulent lava flowing from the summit vent. However, it was neither geological nor reptilian in origin but, rather, military.
Striding up along its side, with expanding vistas across the desert as I gained height, it was clear that the builders made a distinct effort to route the Wall up and over this mountain for one purpose: to command the most supreme vantage points.
At the summit, I surveyed the scene through my binoculars. In this 360-degree panorama, with improving visibility, I estimated that I could see a radius of 30 km, and a quick pi calculation informed me that from here the observer could survey an area of 2,800 square kilometers.
Astounding was my realization that the Wall below was the only manmade object that had ever dared to challenge nature here.
If Han guards had observed the approach of enemy Xiongnu warriors from this mountain lookout 21 centuries ago, might Ogodei's hunters have used this same viewpoint after the Wall was rebuilt some 12 centuries later, to look out for the dust kicked up by herds of racing gazelle?
The wind began to stir, and visibility once again started to fade. Shockingly, my radius of observation shrank to just a few kilometers within as many minutes.
We tethered our hats, gathered together, snapping some last shots in defiance of the dust-laden gusts and started our cautious decent over the sharp rocks to our Land Cruiser, a barely visible speck on the hazy plain below. | <urn:uuid:d96beece-263d-468a-9e5e-95712858af1c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.china.org.cn/travel/2012-03/08/content_24843175.htm | 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 | 0.963871 | 2,832 | 2.546875 | 3 |
Cake Theory: Ideological Divisions and the Future of the CCP
NPR’s Louisa Lim highlights the increasingly public ideological cleavage within China’s Communist Party, marked by the leftist Chongqing model and the market-driven Guangdong model, and assesses the debate’s implications for the party’s 2012 leadership succession and beyond:
Qiu of the Unirule Institute of Economics believes that the existence of the Chongqing model and the Guangdong model, with their different constituencies, has sharpened the debate.
“These two models have made people conscious of the factions. They will seriously consider which model they support,” Qiu says. “An even bolder prediction is that maybe the Communist Party could split along those lines, and become two parties: one for the middle class, let’s call it a Liberal Party; the other for the lower class, the Democratic Party.”
As China’s Communist leadership celebrated the anniversary of the 1911 revolution, it’s no longer monolithic. Nowadays the Communist Party is a seething mass of different — sometimes overlapping — interest groups. That means it could be harder for the next generation of leaders to make policy.
“My conclusion is I don’t think the Communist Party can settle upon one political program that everyone will follow,” Qiu says.
Last week, Chongqing’s Bo Xilai responded to criticism over his ideological campaigns and a style of governance that the rest of China has noticed but been hesitant to adopt. From The Wall Street Journal’s China Real Time Report:
In a presentation to a visiting group of editors of provincial newspapers attending a conference in Chongqing (in Chinese), Bo defended his governance of the municipality, saying that the media focus on revolutionary nostalgia (such as singing red songs) was “a total misreading” of what he was up to in Chongqing. Bo blasted back at doubters and dissenters in the Party, asking if perhaps “some comrades have misunderstood, feeling that development of the economy and improve people’s livelihood might be a contradiction?”
Bo insisted that his administration was focused on “people-oriented development,” and that the initiatives he had implemented had been “effective in improving people’s livelihood, not only by mobilizing the enthusiasm of the masses, but also by effectively promoting consumption and promoting development,” while “shrinking the wealth disparity between the rich and the poor.” Chongqing, Bo insisted, was attempting to “achieve the ideal of socialism by carrying out a specific and concrete exploration,” not something abstract or whimsical.
In light of a New York Times report last week on Chongqing’s plans to release a series of books and a “Godfather”-style movie to chronicle Bo’s 2009 anti-corruption campaign, The Diplomat examines the potential fallout in Beijing as Bo angles for a seat on the Politburo’s Standing Committee:
Corruption is certainly not an off-limits topic in Chinese politics. These days, top leaders routinely raise the issue in speeches, and the 2009 Chongqing trials weren’t especially politically dangerous – they were a purely local affair, while investigators in cases like the Chen Liangyu and Lai Changxing scandals reached officials at the ministerial level, requiring backing from powerful people in Beijing.
But, if the Times has described the coming series accurately, Bo has gone a step farther in a dangerous direction. Major corruption cases are often prosecuted harshly, but discussion is quickly hushed up and turned away from systemic failures within the Communist Party. By directing Huang to focus on the role of officials and opening secret archives, Bo has taken a major step away from the Party’s ordinary damage control methods – and departed from the President Hu Jintao pattern of modest deference to collective decision-making. While talking frankly about official corruption seems like a sure bet for making outspoken Chinese bloggers into Bo fans, taking on the Party’s problems independently is a terrible way to make friends at the top. | <urn:uuid:690e0ea4-8f0a-495d-b69a-4131b479a744> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://chinadigitaltimes.net/2011/11/cake-theory-ideological-divisions-and-the-future-of-the-ccp/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952689 | 864 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Marie and Hortense Mancini, two of five nieces of Cardinal Mazarin are gorgeous and affluent. Fresh from Rome, the girls amaze the French Court of the Sun King. Marie, the elder sister, catches the eye of the King. Their love is forbidden by her uncle and the Queen Mother. To help Louis forget Marie, she is sent to Rome to marry the Prince Colonna. Though the marriage is a happy one at first, it decays into a relationship fraught with distrust and tension. The dying Cardinal bestows the title of Duchesse of Mazarin on Hortense. But the title comes with a price, a boring husband. The unhappy couple take possession of Palais Mazarin, home to sumptuous quarters and one of the largest art collections. Hortense begins to cause a scandal in France, stemming from her desire to be rid of her husband and his fanatical behavior. Escaping France, she returns to Italy and her sister. The two quickly become the scandal of Rome. When the tension in Rome becomes unbearable, the two sisters begin their lifelong journeys around Europe, dodging jilted husbands, jealous women and the law.
These educated females became the envy of women everywhere. They fought the main stream conviction that women were subservient to men, deciding their own destiny and escaping for freedom. Marie seems more docile at first, but puts up a harrowing fight to preserve her life. Hortense, the wild child sister, never gives up or compromises. Even when she is out of options, she still fights. I have to say, while both sisters were relateable, I loved Hortense. Both lived fascinating lives, accomplishing many deeds. Both published memoirs in their own names, and fought for the right to live free of their husbands' will.This nonfiction book reads like fiction, as the sisters' antics keep the reader engaged. | <urn:uuid:30d99a39-e60b-4a84-9d4b-d343c09ca405> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://themusingsofabookjunkie.blogspot.com/2012/06/kings-mistresses-liberated-lives-of.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959457 | 384 | 1.601563 | 2 |
The summary for the Cooperative Agreement Notice Federal Grant is detailed below.
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Verify the accuracy of the data FederalGrants.com provides by visiting the webpage noted in the Link to Full Announcement section or by contacting the appropriate person listed in the Grant Announcement Contact section.
If these sections are incomplete, please visit the website of the government agency that is offering this grant.
County governments - City or township governments - Special district governments - Public and State controlled institutions of higher education - Native American tribal governments (Federally recognized) - Nonprofits having a 501(c)(3) status with the IRS, other than institutions of higher education - Individuals - For profit organizations other than small businesses - Small businesses
Additional Information on Eligibility
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The mission of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) in Kansas is to assist private landowners adopt natural resource conservation on their properties, including range and pasture lands. NRCS Kansas partners with other groups in the state with similar missions to leverage the resources and increase the effectiveness of each. One such organization is the Kansas Grazing Lands Coalition. The Initiatives mission is to provide high quality technical assistance on privately-owned grazing lands on a voluntary basis and to increase the awareness of the importance of grazing-land resources. Established in 1991, the Initiative is carried out through coalitions of individuals and organizations functioning at the local, state, regional, and national levels. The coalitions include livestock producer organizations, scientific and professional grazing resource organizations, conservation and environmental groups, and state and federal natural resource and agriculture agencies. The Kansas Grazing Land Coalition (Coalition) was established in Kansas following the direction of the Initiative at the national level. Providing opportunities for private landowners to attend educational events, receive one-on-one technical assistance, and the promotion of grazing lands as sustainable and economically viable land uses, has been a main focus of the Coalition. The group consists of private landowners representing livestock producer groups, and individuals representing the above-mentioned local, state, and federal natural resource and agricultural agencies. Quarterly meetings are held to prioritize events, activities, and to conduct Coalition business. The purpose of this Request for Proposals (RFP) is to obtain assistance for NRCS Kansas and the Coalition to achieve their shared goals of providing education, information, and technical assistance to Kansas grazing land owners. The specific tasks and deliverables required fall into the following broad categories: coordination of events and meetings, communications and publicity, organization of educational opportunities, and the development of educational information and tools. EVALUATION CRITERIA AND WEIGHTS Note: Applicants who do not meet these minimum requirements will not be considered. 1. Organizational Capabilities (25 percent). The adequacy of organizational resources and experience to successfully manage and perform the project within the required time frame. 2. Project Design and Personnel (25 percent). Provide a qualified staff person with grazing lands, range science, animal science, or natural resource education (B.S. or higher degree). This staff person will assist the Coalition or other designated committees with technical guidance for workshops and presentations. This staff person should have sufficient education and experience within the grazing lands of Kansas to maintain a working relationship with grazing-land owner/managers and operators. This staff person should have adequate abilities to manage and organize a budget for the identified projects to be delivered. Applicant will provide a resume for each person intending to work on this project with their proposal. Any substitution of staff during the project period will require a re-submittal of resumes to be pre-approved by NRCS and the Coalition. 3. Understanding the Intent of the Initiative Objectives (30 percent). The applicant should recognize the value and the need for the project and have experience with Coalition partners including the NRCS and the Kansas Association of Conservation Districts. 4. Ability to demonstrate past history and credibility of working with private grazing-land owners/managers within Kansas (20 percent). The applicant should possess previous experience with grazing lands including, but not limited to, rangeland. This can also include experience working with livestock and wildlife as they pertain to grazing lands. Available Funding: A cooperative agreement will be awarded for a one-year project. It is anticipated that there will be a minimum of $30,000 available for this program in Fiscal Year 2012. The available funding for subsequent years is not fixed and may vary considerably. Amendments to the agreement may be developed upon availability of funding in following years (approximately a five-year period). The NRCS anticipates awarding one cooperative agreement under this announcement. Agency Contract Person for Electronic Access Problem: Erin M. Riffey, Contract Specialist, Phone 785-823-4505, Fax 785-823-4540, E-mail email@example.com. | <urn:uuid:b6b55ff5-b9d8-4ff3-99e1-688b7a105e44> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.federalgrants.com/Cooperative-Agreement-Notice-31001.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925803 | 1,047 | 1.921875 | 2 |
Courts in the Classroom
Supreme Court of Indiana
Division of State Court Administration
30 S. Meridian Street, Ste 500
Indianapolis, IN 46204
Dr. Elizabeth R. Osborn
Public History and
2011 Outstanding Public
History Project Award
from the National Council
on Public History
Did you know that in 1816 the population of Indiana was 63,897? (Statehood required 60,000)
Did you know that the 1816 Constitutional Convention took place during the heat of the summer and that many of the discussions and debates took place beneath the cooling branches of an elm tree outdoors? (Now called the "Constitutional Elm")
Did you know that the "Constitutional Elm" died in 1925 of Dutch Elm Disease, but its trunk was saved by the State. They built a shelter around the trunk that is open on all sides. You can still visit when you are in Corydon.
Did you know that 34 of the 43 Constitutional Convention delegates who wrote Indiana 's first constitution in 1816 were not born in Indiana but were from states south of the Mason-Dixon line?
Did you know the oldest delegate was Charles Polk from Perry County? He was about 72 (born circa 1744). The youngest was Joseph Holman from Wayne County. He was age 28 (born October 1, 1788).
Did you know that the President of the Constitutional Convention, Jonathan Jennings, went on to be elected Indiana's first Governor? He beat out Thomas Posey, the former Territorial Governor, by a vote of 5,211 to 3,934.
Did you know that there were only 13 counties in Indiana when the Constitutional Convention took place in 1816? Knox County encompassed an area of nearly two-thirds of today's state.
Did you know that even in 1850, when the 2nd Constitutional Convention was held, only 13 of the 150 delegates were native-born Hoosiers?
Did you know that the population of Indiana soared from about 64,000 in 1816 to 988,000 in 1850?
Did you know that it took Hoosiers' voters fifteen times between 1820 and 1847 about calling for a convention to revise the state constitution?
Did you know that the 1816 Constitutional Convention only had 43 delegates while the 1850-51 Convention had 150?
Did you know that only 25% of the delegates to the 1850-51 Constitutional Convention were lawyers, while a full 42% were farmers, thus reflecting Indiana 's strong agricultural heritage?
Did you know that Frederick Rapp, business leader and spokesmen for the Harmonist Society as well as the adopted son of George Rapp of Harmonie (later New Harmony), represented Gibson County as a delegate? | <urn:uuid:2b2ccd4e-c793-4b99-8b11-2a4d5976916f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.state.in.us/judiciary/citc/3496.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976658 | 559 | 2.890625 | 3 |
Arcadia by Lauren Groff chronicles the rise and fall of a 1970s commune in upstate New York. While living in makeshift homes, a group of idealists calling themselves The Free People work together to renovate an old mansion where hundreds could coexist in harmony, sharing equally in manual labor and production of food. Though it was started by people looking for a life of freedom, equality, and communal living, it becomes clear over time that this utopian society isn’t all that was promised and dreamed of. People are often just cold and starving, but they keep waiting for life in Arcadia to get better at the encouragement of their charismatic but ultimately hypocritical leader.
We learn about Arcadia through the eyes of a five-year-old boy named Bit, the first child born in the commune. Bit lives in a bread truck with his hard-working father Abe and his deeply depressed mother Hannah, who was a ray of light in Arcadia until her miscarriage caused her to see Arcadia as it really was. Despite his age Bit is an astute observer of the good times and bad in Arcadia, and so his childlike lens is perfect for introducing this society. The story moves through the ups and downs of Arcadia’s history, visiting Bit and catching up on his life and the livelihood of the Arcadians when Bit is 5, 15, 35, and 50 years old.
My favorite thing about this book was Lauren Groff’s lovely prose. She makes it easy to become fully immersed in the world of Arcadia through the lush detail. Even the parts of the story that could easily come off sounding like cliches (everyone is vegan, the women wear flowing dresses and braids, plenty of illegal drugs are consumed) somehow transcend this because Groff’s rich writing and realistic characters keep this novel from turning into a series 1970s cliches.
Once I really got into this book, I couldn’t put it down. The characters were so compelling and real that I just had to know what would happen to Bit, Abe, Hannah, and Arcadia itself. Though I had a good idea of how things would turn out, the last quarter of the book took me to some unexpected places. Overall I highly recommend this book, especially if you’re interested in historical fiction or 1970s culture. | <urn:uuid:92db70a1-4088-4911-935b-abb4133656b4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.davenportlibrary.com/reference/arcadia-by-lauren-groff/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978108 | 482 | 1.578125 | 2 |
The success of last week’s International Anti-Street Harassment Week was astonishing. Organized by leading anti-street harassment activist Holly Kearl, founder of the well-known blog Stop Street Harassment, the week featured the work of the most cutting-edge activists in the field, including dance performances by Sydnie Mosley and her Window Sex Project and a viral video featuring Joe Samalin and other male allies telling men to just stop harassing women in both English and Spanish.
As part of the week’s events, two of my students, Grace and Emma, and I spoke at the Meet Us On the Street rally in New York. Grace shared a portion of the testimony that she read to last year’s New York City Council hearing on street harassment and Emma, who is also a SPARK blogger against the sexualization of girls and women in the media, shared her own vision for safer streets and communities not just for herself but also for her own sister.
I spoke about the importance of engaging teachers in the global movement against street harassment as an education and health issue for schools.
But the work doesn’t stop there. It’s important to show students that activism needs to be consistent, and not done in a flavor-of-the-month style. That’s why last fall, students in my high school feminism course partnered with other students at our school to create their own anti-street harassment public service announcement (PSA). Their goal: to educate their peers about the gravity of street harassment in their daily lives.
As part of the background work to create the video, I invited activists from Girls for Gender Equity, Hollaback!, The Line Campaign, Men Can Stop Rape, and Right Rides to talk to my students. Activist Shelby Knox also visited to talk about her film, The Education of Shelby Knox. Each of them shared their expertise, provided students with materials, and ultimately inspired them to create their PSA.
You can create your own PSA with your students too. Start, as I did, with educating your students about the issue by inviting activists to your classroom. Then have students envision a PSA that would be relevant and engaging for your school community. Screen the PSA at an upcoming assembly. Then join the revolution. See above for inspiration. | <urn:uuid:182c35d4-d521-432b-9bb1-690307232938> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://feministteacher.com/2012/03/26/create-an-anti-street-harassment-psa-with-your-students/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962424 | 472 | 1.914063 | 2 |
First of all, I've got to hand it over to Matt he really did a BBBIIIGGG favor to the CakePHP community by publishing his guide to advanced CakePHP Techniques. This guide / book will give a great insight into the framework to anyone who is a seasoned programmer and is picking up Cake for the first or so time. And I'm going to be floating ideas to compliment the advanced techniques and all in all promote good programming practices of what I'm aware of.
Now, I've seen a lot of shitty code when it comes to CakePHP. Yes, I've even seen mysql_query() calls in views ! ... yes, I've lived that day and kept my sanity in tact. But I can't blame the programmers too because obviously they were newbies and were under a lot of pressure to "get things going" by their blood sucking employers. Anyhoo ... this might be the subject of another post, BUT I really had to get it out of my system ... *phew* ... feel so light now
So, MySQL INNER JOINS ... when should you use them ? - simple answer: when you want to filter out data in your result set. And it's quicker than filtering out results in the "WHERE" clause. Don't have any metrics to show to support this conclusion right now, but I speak in the light of many tests I've conducted on large datasets. A more simpler theory is that the "WHERE" clause needs to filter out a lot more rows in a result-set obtained as a result of using "LEFT JOIN". CakePHP's logic however is sound to use LEFT JOIN as the intention is not to filter out the records, it's merely to include whichever records belongs to the conditions you supply. That's why it's "Containable" behavior is so cool (special thanks to Felix on that for maturing it and making a part of the Cake's core).
The more you familiarize yourself with Cake's datasource classes the better. The most excellent example was published on the bakery by Nate on how to use JOINs in CakePHP. I think this should be made part of the documentation too. This could actually make you get rid of "overriding" Controller::paginate() function. When you come to know about the flexibility offerred by the datasource class you love it even more - a simple example:
This is just a simple example of what you can achieve by adding simple joins in your Model::find() conditions and of course in the paginate part. I've stretched it a bit further. I've actually used sub-queries and sub-joins, really complex stuff when paginating some complex data sets. Thanks to the 'joins' I never had to override the Controller::paginate() method ever. Just for the sake of example, let's say I want to retrieve posts tagged in 'PHP' and 'CakePHP' written by users who have a rating above 3. Of course this can be done in other ways, here is one using a sub-query join in CakePHP elegantly:
And this will elegantly filter out the posts you need
Conclusion: you can really write any kind of a query and really devise a condition based system that would add filters auto-magically. (I will present such a system in another post) - Remember, CakePHP is all about auto-magic ! ... which is actually the culmination of "convention over configuration" so use it to the fullest ! | <urn:uuid:10e8e046-2c27-468c-a7bf-66d2f01a2e57> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://planetcakephp.org/aggregator/items/3544-using-mysql-inner-join-in-cakephp-pagination | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958684 | 732 | 1.742188 | 2 |
The Joint Commission recognizes laboratory professionals as part of National Medical Laboratory Professionals Week, April 22-28. National Medical Laboratory Professionals Week is an annual celebration of the medical laboratory professionals and pathologists who play a vital role in every aspect of health care.
Health care organizations are encouraged to submit real-world success stories of using health information technology to meet The Joint Commission’s National Patient Safety Goals or the recommendations of the National Priorities Partnership (NPP). The Health Information and Management Systems Society’s (HIMSS) Stories of Success program showcases outstanding accomplishments in the adoption and use of health IT to meet these goals.
The Standards Applicability Grid (SAG) chapter of the 2012 Update 1 of the Comprehensive Accreditation Manual for Hospitals includes some incorrect information. The applicability data for three services – Psychiatric, Surgical Specialty, and Long Term Acute Care – was transposed.
Since its launch on September 13, 2010, the Joint Commission Center for Transforming Healthcare’s Targeted Solutions Tool™ (TST) has collected almost 500,000 hand hygiene observations. Using the TST, users have significantly improved their hand hygiene by mirroring the work of the Center’s participating health care organizations – which include some of the nation’s leading hospitals and health systems – and achieving similar positive results.
The Joint Commission is interested in your thoughts about our website.
The prepublication standards for The Joint Commission’s new Advanced Certification for Comprehensive Stroke Center program are now available on the website. The program was developed in partnership with The American Heart Association/American Stroke Association (AHA/ASA) in order to improve the quality and safety of care for complex stroke patients. These prepublication standards will be available until the standards publish in late 2012. | <urn:uuid:616f57b1-ab83-4ea7-8838-eddbe49404dd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.jointcommission.org/issues/detail.aspx?Issue=2f6apUeyKdXdQ8qMsARdyBsKcy6VqhKRq4se606bIU8%3D | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.918981 | 370 | 1.632813 | 2 |
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Contacts: John Atwood, (202) 482-4085
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
WASHINGTON - U.S. Acting Commerce Secretary Rebecca Blank today announced a $1.2 million Economic Development Administration (EDA) grant to the city of Minnewaukan, North Dakota, to support the rebuilding of the city's water lines outside of a flood zone. The project is expected to save 146 jobs, according to grantee estimates.
"This $1 million EDA investment in North Dakota is an example of the Obama administration's commitment to helping rebuild rural communities impacted by natural disasters," said Blank. "The grant announced today will not only help rebuild critical infrastructure, but it will also save jobs and support local businesses in Minnewaukan and throughout Benson County."
"The people of Minnewaukan have battled the waters of Devils Lake for more than a decade," Senator Conrad said. "This funding is another important piece in the community's efforts to relocate away from the rising flood waters and will ensure the new community site has the infrastructure necessary to support the school and local businesses."
The city of Minnewaukan, situated on the western shore of Devils Lake in north central North Dakota, is the economic and tourism hub of its region and for the neighboring Spirit Lake Nation. The rising level of the lake has inundated the town and forced it to relocate vulnerable structures. The EDA grant helps fund the construction of a new water line, distribution system, and access roads for displaced businesses and a school.
About the U.S. Economic Development Administration (www.eda.gov)
The mission of the U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) is to lead the federal economic development agenda by promoting competitiveness and preparing the nation's regions for growth and success in the worldwide economy. An agency within the U.S. Department of Commerce, EDA makes investments in economically distressed communities in order to create jobs for U.S. workers, promote American innovation, and accelerate long-term sustainable economic growth. | <urn:uuid:aae10b54-ddfc-4b2b-a1cb-5029d7bea936> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://eda.gov/news/pressreleases/2012/07/11/minnewaukan_nd.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.928754 | 421 | 1.578125 | 2 |
While preparing my talk (video) for the last Italian Agile Day conference, I spent some time retrospecting on my past projects. As people who attended know, this retrospective step ended up completely thwarting the original purpose of the speech: looking back in the past I discovered more than I expected.
To be completely honest, some of the inspiration for the talk came from Alistair Cockburn closing keynote at JAOO 2007 , I rarely invent anything. Connecting the dots is my job.
My key factors for successful learning
(OMG, I wrote this title like I know this stuff... and I actually don’t) While retrospecting on my past projects, I didn’t focus on normal success conditions. I focused on the amount of relevant knowledge learnt during the project. This allowed me to look at the past with a different perspective, seeing things that I probably overlooked in the past. From the perspective of learning, the key factors that most influenced the outcome were:
- Team attitude
Team attitude is a tricky definition. Because it states 2 different things: that the attitude is relevant, and that I actually need a team. Of course I’ve learnt a lot also in projects where I was a lone consultant: I did some stuff, I solved some problems, I spent some time thinking about what I actually did. But the real massive amount of learning happened in projects where I had the chance to solve complex problems as a team.
Interestingly I couldn’t find any connection to the role I was playing at that time. Didn’t really made a difference if I was a junior developer or a project manager, or a senior architect. Didn’t really made a difference if I was supposed to be managed or managing (I hate this definition, but that used to be the past). Didn’t really made a difference if I was supposed to learn from the colleagues or to teach them something.
The one single thing that made a lot of difference was the attitude me and my colleagues shared in those difficult projects.
Learning attitude patterns
People made a lot of difference also in the business outcome of the project (yes, that boring on-time and on-budget part) but could give me from the very beginning a grasp about what I was going to expect. Let’s make some examples with somewhat stereotypical approaches.
“I know what I am talking about” that the kind of sentence often heard in organizations. To me, it means “I don’t feel any need to improve”. I’ve met some person like this, but luckily they were not in my team. Sometimes they were part of the organization we were supposed to work for, almost always they were part of the problem. I don’t want hem in my team. Plain and simple.
“That’s all clear to me” ... No. It isn’t. People that for some reasons pretend they’ve understood everything needed to solve the problem, are part of the problem as well. Quite often, under the surface they look for hints about what the boss said, and keep pretending that everything is fine. Walking timebombs.
“I have no clue about what we’re going to do” Now we’re talking! The most effective colleagues I’ve worked with always started the project with fear. They called me out for a one on one talk, and with fearful eyes told me “I know absolutely nothing about the topic of this project”, and - believe me - their faces were even better when I answered honestly “I have no idea about it either”. But that conversation was honest, we defined a common ground, and we started learning collaboratively assuming that we didn’t know all the things and that we needed to share information to solve a common problem.
Confront this profile with the previous two. Would you share information with those colleagues also? A lot less, ...they won’t need it anyway: they (pretended/assumed) that they already know the stuff. They basically shut themselves out from any possibility of collaborative learning. Ok, that’s basically Socrates statement: “The real wise man is the one that knows that he doesn’t know”. ...But not only.
Focusing efforts in the right direction
What’s striking me more and more, is that the attitude we had sometime towards learning new things as a team, was incredibly effective also because it was efficient. We din’t waste any time in pretending that we were better than we really were. We did have a massive amount of work to do, but we didn’t have any knowledge debt, and we didn’t spend a second studying things that people around me expect me to know but I don’t.
Don’t you smell something familiar here? It smells like your dirty little secret to me. Make me think about movies where one of the characters did something wrong in the past and lives in the fear of being blackmailed... Ignoring a key skill, it’s not as bad as committing a crime, but the mechanics in our mind are not that different. Our brain start working in “I can’t let them discover my secret" mode, which is a dangerous slope: it makes you feel like “I am not the person they expect”.
It doesn’t matter how bad is our secret, the mechanics are similar: shame and fear of humiliation (even if only at the coffee machine level) are powerful triggers, and would lead to the wrong behavior, and also to learn less in the long run. Because stress is preventing from effective learning, because one can’t enjoy collaborative learning, and because a lot of time won’t be dedicated to learning but just to cover-my-ass activities which are brain draining (how many brain cycles are you spending deleting compromising SMS from your phone or wondering if your girlfriend can actually see what you posted on that other girl's wall on Facebook?).
To be honest, in a software project, your fault (if we want to call it like that) is really little. Telling that you’ve actually never understood OOP, or that you’ve never actually shipped anything to production isn’t a fault, it’s just a honest starting point. Stating where you are exactly and honestly right now would save you and your team a lot of troubles in the future.
When is the moment of staffing the team for a new project. Now I know exactly what I want. I want people with the right learning attitude.
Only knowledge gap?
Not really. The more I look into the problem, the more I realize that the mechanics are the same whether it is knowledge or learning debt, technical debt or motivational debt. Failing to acknowledge where we really are only exacerbates the problem. But that’s a topic for a whole new post. I also didn’t say much about motivation and context... Stay tuned. | <urn:uuid:90c127d5-14ec-419a-b4ac-ad2a026712ad> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ziobrando.blogspot.com/2011/11/denial-won-help-you-learning.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96907 | 1,466 | 1.828125 | 2 |
DOE meets milestone on Corehole No. 8
The Department of Energy's contractors this week began the long-awaited, much-delayed excavation of the Corehole No. 8 site at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The notorious hot spot was created by leaks in an underground waste tank known as Tank W-1A.
John Owsley, the Tennessee Dept. of Environment and Conservation's Oak Ridge oversight chief, said DOE met a regulatory milestone by getting the project under way. The deadline was Oct. 15 for start-up. The milestone for project completion is June 15, 2012, Owsley said.
Work activities at the hotly radioactive site have been started before and aborted, but this time around officials seem confident that the planned approach is going to work.
Owsley noted that soil sampling first indicated high levels of contamination back in 1986. In 1991, gross beta contaminated groundwater was found in bedrock 50 feet below the surface, and drilling was stopped at Corehole No. 8 -- the name of the initial monitoring well -- because of beta contamination that registered at 500,000 picocuries per liter, he said.
"Excavation began in March 2001 but was halted in May 2001 when higher than expected levels of radiation were encountered and TRU waste was encountered," Owsley said.
Another effort to excavate the site was scheduled for November 2007, but due to budgetary restrictions, it was further delayed, Owsley said. "With the infusion of ARRA funding, it was once again possible to carry out the project," he said.
Interestingly, of course, the DOE is not able to use Recovery Act money to finish the project because of a change of contractors. But work is proceeding anyway. | <urn:uuid:fea556ab-8a4e-4364-a216-773ae1bfcc6e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.knoxnews.com/munger/2011/09/doe-meets-milestone-on-corehol.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976631 | 351 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Prostate cancer is a malignancy of the prostate. It is characterized by unregulated replication of cells creating tumors, with the possibility of some of the cells spreading to other sites (metastasis).
This article includes a discussion of studies that have assessed whether certain vitamins, minerals, herbs, or other dietary ingredients offered in dietary or herbal supplements may be beneficial in connection with the reduction of risk of developing prostate cancer.
This information is provided solely to aid consumers in discussing supplements with their healthcare providers. It is not advised, nor is this information intended to advocate, promote, or encourage self use of these supplements for cancer risk reduction or treatment. Furthermore, none of this information should be misconstrued to suggest that dietary or herbal supplements can or should be used in place of conventional anticancer approaches or treatments.
It should be noted that certain studies referenced, indicating the potential usefulness of a particular dietary ingredient or dietary or herbal supplement in connection with the reduction of risk of prostate cancer, are preliminary evidence only. Some studies suggest an association between high blood or dietary levels of a particular dietary ingredient with a reduced risk of developing prostate cancer. Even if such an association were established, this does not mean that dietary supplements containing large amounts of the dietary ingredient will necessarily have a cancer risk reduction effect.
Prostate cancer is the most common cancer among men in the United States. Although the cause is not known, most researchers believe that alterations in testosterone metabolism and/or bodily responses to testosterone are involved.
Throughout the world, autopsy reports show that evidence of microscopic prostate cancer is extremely common in older men. However, most men who have such microscopic disease are never diagnosed with, nor do they die from, prostate cancer. Unlike this dormant form of the disease, the incidence of potentially life-threatening prostate cancer varies greatly in different parts of the world. Researchers believe that some factors, possibly involving diet or lifestyle issues, determine the risk of having potentially life-threatening prostate cancer.
American men are at high risk of being diagnosed with such prostate cancer, and African-American men are at particularly high risk, for reasons that are not completely clear. A family history of prostate cancer increases the risk to a limited extent. Farmers, mechanics, workers in tire and rubber manufacturing, sheet metal workers, and workers exposed to cadmium have also been reported to be at increased risk. | <urn:uuid:08910f02-0cc2-480a-9c14-4472fdcd8c33> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.easycomforts.com/easycomforts/library.aspx?resource=%2Fus%2Fassets%2Fhealth-condition%2Fprostate-cancer%2Fvitamins-and-supplements | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00071-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94323 | 475 | 2.78125 | 3 |
High Rates of Congenital Syphilis in Russia Linked To Inadequate Prenatal Care
The incidence of congenital syphilis, which is largely preventable, is high in the Russian Federation.1 Because many infected pregnant women are treated inadequately or too late in their pregnancy, 64% deliver babies with presumptive or confirmed congenital syphilis. According to a review of records from five maternity hospitals in the Russian Federation, the odds of delivering a baby with congenital syphilis are elevated among infected women who go without prenatal care (odds ratio, 2.8) and among those who are first tested for syphilis at 28 weeks' gestation or later (4.0). Overall, 26% of the infants of women with untreated or inadequately treated syphilis die shortly after birth or in utero.
Women who were at least 20 weeks pregnant between January 1995 and October 1999 and delivered in maternity hospitals in two metropolitan areas (Moscow and St. Petersburg) and three nonmetropolitan areas (Novgorod, Moscow Oblast and Ryazan) were eligible for the study. (Deliveries included fetal deaths and induced abortions at 20 or more weeks' gestation.) A consecutive sampling of the hospitals' medical records yielded a sample of 850 women who had active syphilis, according to additional records from prenatal, women's health or sexually transmitted disease (STD) clinics. Active infections included new diagnoses during the index pregnancy and previous infections that had been untreated or inadequately treated (i.e., the woman was not given long- or short-acting penicillin within 30 days of delivery).
The researchers used results of clinical tests for confirmed congenital infection (physical examinations and serologic evaluations) and the World Health Organization definition of presumptive congenital infection, which includes any infant born to a woman with untreated or inadequately treated syphilis, to assess the rate of congenital infection according to maternal characteristics and pregnancy outcomes. They performed bivariate and multivariate logistic analyses to determine risk factors associated with congenital syphilis.
Most of the women (77-79%) were married, were aged 20 or older, and resided in the cities where they sought care. Thirty-six percent each were homemakers and were unemployed; 12% described themselves as professionals, 10% as manual laborers and 5% as students. Fifty-seven percent of the sample had had inadequate prenatal care: Forty percent had had none at all, and 17% had initiated care at 21 weeks' gestation or later. A substantial proportion of the women--45%--had first been tested for syphilis at 28 weeks' gestation or later; the same proportion had not received any antibiotic treatment for their infection. Further, 59% had not received the preferred antibiotic, penicillin G; the proportion not receiving it was 77% among women who had not received any prenatal care. Most of the infected women had an early latent infection (59%), whereas 34% were diagnosed with secondary syphilis and 6% with primary syphilis.
Overall, 64% of the infected pregnant women delivered an infant with presumptive or confirmed congenital syphilis. This proportion was significantly elevated among women who had not had any prenatal care (86%), who were nonresidents (83%) and who were first tested for syphilis at 28 weeks' gestation or later (83%). There were significant trends both toward increasing incidence with later prenatal care (41% among infants of women who sought care at 20 weeks or earlier vs. 63% among infants of women who obtained care at 21 weeks or later) and toward decreasing incidence with the number of prenatal visits (78% among infants of women who made three or fewer visits vs. 53% among infants of women who made at least four). Further, the incidence of congenital syphilis was significantly higher among babies of women with late latent syphilis than among those of women with primary or secondary syphilis (67% vs. 42-48%). Finally, the rate of infection differed significantly by the setting in which the mother was diagnosed (48% among infants of women diagnosed in an STD clinic, 60% among those of patients diagnosed in women's health clinics and 82% among those of women seen in other institutions).
Among all infected women for whom pregnancy outcomes were known, 65% had a live birth, 15% an induced abortion, 11% a stillbirth, 6% a late fetal death (at 20 or more weeks' gestation) and 2% a liveborn baby who later died. Among women whose infant met the case definition for presumptive congenital syphilis, 26% had an outcome of fetal or infant death--16% had a stillbirth, 7% a baby who died in utero at 20 weeks' gestation or later, and 3% a baby who was born alive and later died.
Results of the multivariate analysis, which controlled for the mother's age, residence and marital status, indicate that three factors independently increased the odds that an infected woman would deliver an infected infant. These were lack of prenatal care (adjusted odds ratio, 2.8), first being tested for syphilis late in the pregnancy (4.0) and having latent syphilis, as opposed to primary or secondary syphilis (3.7).
The investigators acknowledge that their study is limited by its retrospective design, the lack of data on substance abuse and a possible bias caused by the inclusion of women who were false positives (which would have underestimated the true incidence of congenital syphilis). They note that congenital syphilis "should be largely preventable" and that the "mainstay" of prevention--early diagnosis and appropriate treatment--needs to be strengthened among the range of Russian health care institutions that provide prenatal care. They conclude by noting that this recommended prevention strategy and infrastructure will also be essential for controlling perinatal transmission of HIV, which is expected to increase in the Russian Federation.--L. Remez
1. Tikhonova L et al., Congenital syphilis in the Russian Federation: magnitude, determinants and consequences, Sexually Transmitted Infections, 2003, 79(2):106-110. | <urn:uuid:2a45cbf6-4fac-47ae-9887-98e920a6dcaa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/journals/3519003.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00071-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973241 | 1,236 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Welcome to The North Eastern USA!
On these pages I have tried to pull together information about this area of the
USA. I have included links for weather (for skiers) and links to the
states in this area. I have also included some information about the history of
this area and history of the USA in general for study.
Additionally, you will find some photos of the North Eastern USA, mostly from
Southern Vermont and Salem, MA. There are pictures being set up from
Natural Stone Bridge and Caves from New York.
These pages were initially programmed in PERL. This evolved through ASP
programming to ASP.Net. In these pages, you will find resources for programming
as well as books on programming. In addition, there is a newsletter archive of
the initial process used to set up this web site.
Finally, you will find information about the Wiccan religion and the practice of
Witchcraft. This in cludes material on Witchcraft as well as the religion
of Wicca. The beliefs as well as links to other sites on Wicca and
Witchcraft are to be found on these pages. You will also find information about
the history of the craft and the history of the World in relation to the
practice of Wicca and Witchcraft, particularly in the North Eastern USA.
You can also find items to purchase related to the North East, photography, and
So welcome to the site and I hope you enjoy your visit to the North Eastern US.
Near Albany? Check in with
the folks of the Pagan Alliance Church
Near Salem, MA?
Visit the ATC Temple of Nine | <urn:uuid:20f749b9-c287-46f5-8dce-31d2ee6cd5c4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.neinfo.net/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943422 | 344 | 1.6875 | 2 |
DSG at Green Garage this March
March brings St. Patrick’s Day but DSG is focusing on another kind of green to start the month: a sustainable future for Detroit.
ABOUT GREEN GARAGE:
The Green Garage is actually three things: a building located in the Midtown area of Detroit, a business enterprise, and a community of people dedicated to Detroit’s sustainable future. The building dates back to 1920, when it was a showroom for Model T-based automobiles, and is on the National Registry of Historic Places (see building history). It was purchased in 2008 by Tom and Peggy Brennan, who, with a wonderful community of over 200 individuals, have completed a green, historic renovation. The renovation work can be seen on the construction page. Our principal business focus is helping triple bottom line businesses grow naturally.
Detroit Synergy Meet Up – at the Green Garage
Thursday, March 8, 2012 | 6:30 PM
Join us at 6:30 for an opportunity to tour this magnificent example of innovative and sustainable renovation. Click here for more event details. | <urn:uuid:c38879cb-2622-4dac-b353-1e957da725d7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://detroitsynergy.org/green-garage-detroit-march/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.927925 | 223 | 1.53125 | 2 |
They were mostly Greek and Italian immigrants that were called ''WOPS'.(Without Papers) They were Irish, and signs were posted that said "No Irish Allowed". They were African slaves who gained their freedom mostly through the political process that resulted in the13th Amendment----(This list could go 'On and On') We are rightfully proud to be the "world's melting pot". The purpose is simply to say that most, if not all were rated. But, after a little tweaking & acclimation, we were all Americans.
The nationality that arrived here first, and from where, is still up for debate.
Maybe we should ask the Native American people to decide the current issue.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The current 'rating' of immigrants stems from the fact that they are here because of an acceleration of our unsustainable social programs. This "unsustainable acceleration" can be traced to LBJ's presidency.
Eliminate the "Give-Away" programs and the illegal immigration problem will fix itself.
--"We have a budget that is wildly out of balance"--[/quote]
At your kitchen table----At City Hall--At the State Capitol---And--At Washington----------
A budget cannot exist until legitimate projected revenue (expected income) for twelve months equals "legitimate" projected expenditures for that same period of time.
Legitimate projections of revenue & expenditures must be based on the real history of each line item on the revenue & expenditure side of your financial statement. At your kitchen table that would be your checkbook and bank statement.
Our federal government has no budget. But what is really pitiful is that every one of the five hundred plus members of Congress know what a budget is. And they have known for years that no federal budget exists.
My uncle had a hundred or so acres of peaches during the war. German prisoners of war were provided for the labor intensive peach operation. I'm just wondering what my uncle would have done to get all those peaches picked if this decision had been made in '41.posted @ Friday, February 1, 2013 - 00:24
Obviously, Mr. Edwards ideal government is one whose role is mitigating the troubles of life. "We the people" need to fix "Mr. Edwards ideal government" the same way we fixed our cat.posted @ Thursday, January 31, 2013 - 09:25
News reports from reliable sources say 80% of illegal immigrants are Latin Americans.
I've lived in Georgia all my 65 years.
I was over forty before I ever saw a Latin American person in Georgia.
Now, and for several years, I see them everywhere--every day.
Obviously (To me), the issue is not 'They are here illegally, and--What are we to do about it?
The issue should be---Why are they here?, and---What have we done that created a market for them being here?
I believe most of us know--But where is the traditional American will and morality required to fix the problem(?
Very little investigation of "their actions" necessary for the forgiving of their 'success'.
Move over God--You've parked your derriere in Jim's seat again.
"tout compredende c'est tout pardonner"
Ed--Your last four words: "a revolution of values" is an excellent 'wrap'.
However, the problem is that the last fifty years have defined that "revolution of values". I fully expect a wreck of our republic will be the consequence of the recent tremendous acceleration of that "revolution".
"When the Himalayan peasant meets the he-bear in his pride
He shouts to scare the monster, who will often turn aside.
But the she-bear thus accosted rends the peasant tooth and nail.
For the female of the species is more deadly than the male."
EDUCATION---The entire affair we call 'Georgia Legislature' is corrupt.
The show now playing (Jim and Dick's subject) is just that.
Political influence--when boiled down--will always amount to:
"Money talks and BS walks"
There is not an inkling of reason to hope for any meaningful change.
Some of us need "Reasonable Gun Control". But, hopefully most God fearing responsible Americans don't need it. I need "control" simply because I can no longer 'draw a bead' without resting the barrel on something steady.posted @ Monday, January 21, 2013 - 11:54
Acceleration toward hell for these United States can be clearly traced to the culmination of Reverend King's life. I'll never accept any notion that his legacy resembles --in any way-- the lack of opportunities available in America today.posted @ Monday, January 21, 2013 - 09:12
Bein' a conservative, and "just a man"--I'm just glad you didn't shoot him.
'The Ten Commandments', written in stone by God's own hand--twice--are available. And we all know to "Love thy neighbor as thy self". But I can't say I've met anyone lately who can claim strict compliance with either.
Imperfect as the document may be, and imperfect as us [filtered word] sapiens are-----(ridiculous to edit [filtered word] sapiens)
--I spec' our Constitution is several car-lengths ahead of Mr. Seidman's illusions.
Shooting at liberal politicians & "drug crazed bad guys" sounds interesting.
But since they already out number us and they breed like flies--- I'm afraid the novelty of it would soon wear out.
"begin with hope"
---------------'OUR' FUEL TAX MONEY-----------------
I'm hoping these 233 legislators and Governor Deal understand that nine out of the twelve 'Regions' in Georgia rejected T-SPLOST.
75% of our legislature represent citizens who overwhelmingly rejected T-SPLOST.
I'm hoping these 37 "freshmen" and all of the legislature will realize that 75% of Georgia is counting on them to abolish all penalties that are a part of this failed legislation we called T-SPLOST.
--FOR INSTANCE: A 30% COST TO CITY & COUNTY GOVERNMENTS FOR ROAD AND STREET MAINTENANCE WILL BE DEVASTATING TO LOCAL BUDGETS ---AND WILL RESULT IN PROPERTY TAX INCREASES----
There is enough firepower available here to defend my home. But if any of you know the best product available for cleaning up the mess when "liberal politicians come for my guns" I'd be interested.posted @ Friday, January 11, 2013 - 22:29
[quote][b]harrumph[/b] - The federal agent[/quote]
Seein' as how there are about 400 million of us--- And at least that many firearms in the possession of citizens willing to defend your rights---
---I'd say "The federal agent" is not in an enviable position.
"We the people" possess the right to own firearms for the sole purpose of being equipped to shoot any agent of the government bent on compromising this "right" or any other "right" guaranteed by our Constitution.posted @ Friday, January 11, 2013 - 09:06
You folks make me tired--
---Suffice to say that Johnny's continuing kowtow posture (fiscal cliff vote) toward democrats will lead to whatever he is being preceeded by "former".
And congress will continue to fail. I believe the primary reason for failure is that our congress does not know their Constitutional duties & responsibilities.
The wretched result will "fundamentally change America".
Just trying to relate to the heading : "defined, defied culture"
Ed prob'ly had nothin' to do with the "heading".
Suffice to say "we have been "BLESSED".
--------Henry David Thoreau-------
Finally, an informative column on our government absent any assertion that we are somehow suppose to be a 'democracy'.
'PRAISE THE LORD' and Thank You Mr. Justice!
"COUNTRY MUSIC SINGS TO YOUR SOUL"
' Never had known the location of my soul--But according to Dink its located in whatever gland produces tears.
Want your business here? Contact Leslie Turner for more information.
Rep. Regina Quick, R-Athens, was one of two local delegates to score less than an "A+" in the Chamber of Commerce's annual legislative score card. She and I played phone tag Monday when I was reporting the story and I wasn't able to get her comments in a timely fashion. Instead, she sent over this statement Wednesday morning and she did not mince her words. (Links and italicized portions are my own; otherwise, it's as she wrote it.) Dear Friends: read more
The committee opted Tuesday night to put off deciding on the ordinance until, at the earliest, its next meeting. Of note: The Athens-Clarke County attorney highlighted that the proposed times are, in essence, placeholders for the commission to change or keep as it pleases. Full text of the Use of Public Right-of-Ways ordinance draft is below. read more | <urn:uuid:55368969-7d0d-4b66-a09b-b5d3b7439a6c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.athenstalks.com/user/549 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00024-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944963 | 1,923 | 2.203125 | 2 |
Does Matthew 26:38-39 deny the Crucifixion of Jesus?
"Then He said to them, 'My soul is deeply grieved, to the point of death; remain here and keep watch with Me.' 39 And He went a little beyond them, and fell on His face and prayed, saying, 'My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will (Matthew 26:38-39, NASB).'"
There are a number of Muslims who state that Matthew 26:38-39 teaches that Jesus was not crucified.1 They base their viewpoint by combining Matthew 26:38-39 and Hebrews 5:7. Some Muslims believe that Jesus prayed to be delivered from death with the words "let this cup pass" and God answered that prayer by delivering Jesus from the crucifixion.
I have already dealt with Hebrews 5:7 in a separate article (see: Does Hebrews 5:7 deny the Crucifixion of Jesus?) where I pointed out that (1) the text never says that God spared Jesus from dying on the cross, only that Jesus prayed to be delivered; (2) the context of Hebrews 5:7 is where the author quotes a Messianic Psalm (Psalm 22:24) which prophecies to the death of Jesus by crucifixion (Psalm 22:16) and His subsequent triumph; (3) Jesus was delivered from death in the greatest sense by triumphing over it through God raising Him from the dead, which was an answer to His prayer for deliverance; and (4) there are numerous passages in the book of Hebrews which teach that Jesus died by crucifixion (cf. Hebrews 2:9-10, 14; 6:6; 7:27; 9:11-28; 10:1-39; 10:10; 11:17-19; 12:2; 12:24; 13:12; 13:20-21). Therefore, Hebrews 5:7 does not teach that God spared Jesus from being crucified. Rather, God delivered Jesus from death by raising Him from the dead.
In order to understand the context of Jesus' prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane in Matthew 26:38-39, it is important to first understand the context of Matthew 26. In this chapter, Jesus makes some interesting statements about His coming death.
When talking to the disciples, He said, "You know that after two days the Passover is coming, and the Son of Man is to be handed over for crucifixion," (Mt. 26:2).
When the woman anoints Jesus' feet with a box of precious oil, Jesus says, "For you always have the poor with you; but you do not always have Me. 12 For when she poured this perfume on My body, she did it to prepare Me for burial.13 Truly I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be spoken of in memory of her," (Mt. 26:11-13).
When breaking the bread while He was performing the first Lord's supper, He said, "'...Take, eat; this is My body.'2 27 And when He had taken a cup and given thanks, He gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you; 28 for this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for forgiveness of sins," (Mt. 26:27-28).
Likewise, later on in the same passage, Jesus says, "You will all fall away because of Me this night, for it is written, 'I WILL STRIKE DOWN THE SHEPHERD, AND THE SHEEP OF THE FLOCK SHALL BE SCATTERED.' 32 But after I have been raised, I will go ahead of you to Galilee," (Mt. 26:31-32).
Therefore, from the context of Matthew 26, Jesus clearly believed that He was going to be crucified (Mt. 26:2), buried (Mt. 26:11-13), his blood would be poured out to forgive sins (Mt. 26:27-28), and he would be struck down and resurrected from the dead (Mt. 26:31-32). All of these statements by Jesus indicate that He knew that He was going to die by crucifixion.
The Garden of Gethsemane
In Matthew 26:38-39 Jesus is praying in the Garden of Gethsemane, being deeply grieved about the sufferings that He is going to face. The Gospels record that He sweat great drops of blood, a condition known as hematidrosis where blood can be secreted in the sweat due to tremendous amounts of stress.3
Since Jesus was a man, He despised having to endure the shame of the cross (Heb. 12:2). However, He surrendered His will to God's plan by saying "yet not as I will, but as You will" and willingly endured the cross. Jesus never says in this passage that He is not going to be crucified.
Why did Jesus pray to "let this cup pass"?
However, Muslims often wonder, if Jesus knew He was going to face crucifixion, why did He pray to the Father to not face crucifixion?4
In response, Jesus was both God (John 1:1; 8:24) and man (John 1:14). As man, he faced the realities of pain and suffering. As any normal human being, Jesus did not want to have to face the rigors of the crucifixion events, but He willingly accepted God's plan as the context of the Gospel of Matthew, the other Gospels, and the rest of the New Testament indicates. Furthermore, it is true that the disciples did not expect Jesus to be crucified since they wanted a reigning political Messiah who would triumph over the Romans. This was consistent with the Jewish Messianic expectations of the first century. However, Jesus radically departed from this norm and suffered in His first coming (cf. Is. 52:13-53:12).
The Gospel of Matthew clearly teaches that Jesus was crucified (Mt. 27:33-56). For a Muslim to argue that Jesus was not crucified does not make sense both with the context of Jesus' statements in Matthew 26, the rest of the Gospel of Matthew, the rest of the Gospels (see Mark, Luke, and John), the rest of the New Testament (cf. 1 Cor. 15:3-8), and various secular sources.5 This argument based on Matthew 26:38-39 is another failed attempt by Muslims to deny the crucifixion of Jesus.
See Related Articles
- 1. See: http://www.missionislam.com/comprel/crucified.htm for an example.
- 2. This is a symbol or representation. Jesus was not actually saying that He is the bread that the disciples were going to eat any more than when He says He is the door (cf. John 10:1), that we should look for a door with hinges on it. The Bible does not teach that the body and bread are the actual body and blood of Jesus. Rather, they represent the actual body and blood of Jesus.
- 3. http://www.doctortreatments.com/Diseases_Of_The_Skin/Class_VIII_Diseases_Of_The_Appendages_Diseases_Of_The_Sweat-Glands_Hematidrosis.htm
- 4. See the arguments of http://www.missionislam.com/comprel/crucified.htm for an example.
- 5. See Roman historians such as Josephus (Antiquities of the Jews, 18:3) – c. A.D. 90-95 and Tacitus (Annals, 15:44) – c. A.D. 115; also look at other secular sources such as Lucian (The Death of Peregrine, 11-13) – 2nd Century A.D.; Mara Bar Serapion (Letter at British Museum) – Late 1st to Early 3rd Centuries A.D.; and even the Jewish Talmud (Sanhedrin 43a) – c. A.D. 70-200
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at its essence, Pandora’s Seed is a cautionary tale regarding the history of the human race and the paths we have taken. Author of the popular The Journey of Man, Spencer Wells’ newest book encompasses a wide scope, all the major forks we have come to in our cultural evolution. The book attempts to cover how the choices made millennia ago deeply affect every thing from obesity and mental illness to climate change and religious fundamentalism. The scope is vast. The depth is, unfortunately, is not. While the book in its smaller scale is admirably comprehensible for the general reader, the in-depth study I wished for is missing. There really should be no diving signs posted around most of the chapters because I can easily see the bottom. I’m not saying this is necessarily a bad thing, but I would have preferred to plumb the depths of this topic more thoroughly. There is plenty of good solid information. I just rue the fact that there is not more.
The book wraps itself around the premise that human evolution selected for many characteristics in humanity that we no longer need, characteristics that are, in fact, detrimental to our current well being. It’s a story we have heard many times before. Millions of years of evolution shaped us to be hunter-gatherers, to live off complicated carbohydrates and meat, to survive in small social bands where everyone knew everyone else, where diseases were rare and not readily spread from clan to clan. Our self-alteration into an agricultural-based society rapidly changed these constants and thereby altered humanity forever — for good and for ill.
Sensibly, Mr. Wells never advocates a return to a primitive lifestyle. His work suggests more of a careful study of how our cultural evolution is affecting our health and well being today as individuals as well as the health of society in general and the planet we live on. Starting with diet, Pandora’s Seed marches us through humanity’s difficulty in adapting our biology to modern diets and behaviors. The rise in many chronic health concerns like diabetes, obesity and heart disease can be attributed to the change to agriculture some 10,000 years ago. The prevalence of many of our infectious diseases today was caused by our long association with domesticated animals and hence their diseases and our need as a farming society to settle in larger and larger groups allowing new diseases to spread easily and rapidly. These conclusions are well supported by the evidence and Wells does a fine job of arguing this case.
As the book progresses, however, it seems to become less scientific and more conjectural. I understand that this is due to the author’s entire purpose of the book which is to show how our decisions today will affect not only our children but our descendants for thousands of years. The purpose is admirable and lofty but the execution is less than stellar. I felt the need to remind myself of this purpose periodically while reading, but that thread should have been woven obviously and bluntly throughout the narrative. For instance, when he tells the tale of Mount Tambora exploding in 1815 ( A great tale which he tells well.) and drastically cooling the planet for the next year, I shouldn’t have to wonder why he’s relating this story. It should be more obvious.
I agree with the concept that decisions made 10,000 years ago affect who we are. And, of course, decisions we make today will influence our descendants for dozens, if not hundreds of generations. This theme should be central in the choices we make today, and Wells does try to get this across but with too loose of a narrative and questionable results.
It is not that I didn’t agree with what he was saying, or that I didn’t learn anything. Quite the opposite, in fact. It is just that each individual segment is well written, but taken as a whole, the work is not cohesive enough. It’s almost more of a series of essays than that a single work. A stronger thread should have tied these widely disparate sections together. Compared to Jared Diamond, the master of grandly unifying separate ideas, Wells’ book comes up as a distant second. Cohesion is difficult for many authors, myself included. I understand. But in works of this scope, differences in cohesion is the difference between average works like this and masterworks like Gun’s Germs and Steel and Collapse.
I give it six Blessed A’s out of ten.
As an aside, I must relate a discovery I made here. In the chapter on disease, Wells mentions a researcher at the NIH by the name of Deirdre Joy. This name rang something in my poorly contrived mind and after a few pages I had to turn back and look again. I knew a Deirdre Joy in the Peace Corps in the Central African Republic where I served. She was an amazingly competent and funny woman with a blistering wit which could wash away most opponents in a few short words. To be fully honest, I had a complete crush on her and followed her around rather pathetically until it was stated to me in a politely blunt fashion that she wasn’t interested. That did cool my ardor but not my admiration. Searching on Google (what in the hell did we ever do before that arrived on the scene?) rapidly proved to me that there is only a single Deirdre Joy of note and that I certainly knew her.
At the risk of looking like a stalker, I also must admit to looking for a picture of her. Now! Now! It’s not what you think! As hard as I tried, I just couldn’t picture her. Struggling mightily with my own brain gave me nothing. I could see her gestures and hear a few witticisms she threw out. But… Damn! This is a woman who I… lusted after… yet aside from blond hair, my mind was completely empty. Upon looking at her photo, however, the mental images came rushing back, but I must ask. Where the hell were they all that time? Obviously, the neurons holding that information in an iron grip had not died. Were they misplaced, sleeping, being coy? Were they shy? Sigh! If I could only call up all the shit I have stored in my head when I need it, I’d be a genius. But no, I end up wandering warped and twisted cerebral hallways for days looking for the mental equivalent of lost sock. If there is any better proof of not being designed by God, I have yet to hear it.
Anyway, I know it’s a bit rednecky but this is the first time I have read a book and found someone I actually knew in its pages. I’m so happy. | <urn:uuid:156947f1-9497-4909-811a-8effee003625> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blessedatheist.com/tag/pandoras-seed/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969848 | 1,388 | 2.390625 | 2 |
Today, FBI whistleblower Jane Turner issued a statement on the Penn State child sex abuse scandal. Jane Turner, a 25-year veteran Agent, blew the whistle on the FBI’s failure to provide protection for child sex crime victims on the North Dakota Indian Reservations. Ms. Turner reported the allegations to the highest level of the FBI, including Director Mueller. Her allegations included the FBI’s: failure to act on leads concerning a international long haul truck driver pedophile, cover-up of a rape of a 2-year old child by declaring her injuries to be a result of a car accident, and failure to follow-up on the direct evidence that a television personality was sexually molesting children on the Indian Reservation.
In retaliation for exposing FBI failures within its child crime program, Ms. Turner was removed from her position. She was forced to wage a 10-year legal battle to establish her right to blow the whistle. Ms. Turner eventually won her case in front of a federal jury in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Jane Turner issued the following statement:
Unfortunately, I witnessed first-hand the institutional inaction that often happens when someone reports child abuse. It takes enormous strength to put one’s moral integrity over your personal inclination to protect fellow colleagues who have committed malfeasance, or criminal activity. The FBI, like Penn State and the Catholic Church, are entities that allows their personnel to report allegations up a chain of command but those in positions of power or change, fail to take immediate or strong actions. It simply boils down to the fact that those in power have a stronger desire to preserve the reputation of their institution, then taking the road of truth or justice. Entities like Penn State, the Catholic Church and the FBI all share something in common; they operate in an insular world where rules or laws that apply to everyone else, do not apply to them. | <urn:uuid:1f886940-ae2c-41de-ab9a-3f90aa9d3ee4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.whistleblowersblog.org/2011/11/articles/fbi-whistleblower/jane-turner-issues-statement-on-penn-state-child-abuse-scandal/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00055-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953766 | 381 | 1.585938 | 2 |
|— Village —|
|Coordinates: Coordinates: 1|
|• Total||5.15 sq mi (13.34 km2)|
|• Land||4.61 sq mi (11.94 km2)|
|• Water||0.54 sq mi (1.40 km2)|
|Elevation3||597 ft (182 m)|
|• Estimate (20115)||14,126|
|• Density||3,031.5/sq mi (1,170.5/km2)|
|Time zone||Central (CST) (UTC-6)|
|• Summer (DST)||CDT (UTC-5)|
|GNIS feature ID||15607903|
According to the United States Census Bureau, the village has a total area of 5.15 square miles (13.34 km2), of which, 4.61 square miles (11.94 km2) of it is land and 0.54 square miles (1.40 km2) is water.2
The Village of Allouez was named after the French Jesuit priest and missionary, Father Claude-Jean Allouez.7 The Cadle Mission, a mission of the Episcopal Church for the Native Americans, was located in the village in the nineteenth century.
As of the census4 of 2010, there were 13,975 people, 5,432 households, and 3,580 families residing in the village. The population density was 3,031.5 inhabitants per square mile (1,170.5 /km2). There were 5,707 housing units at an average density of 1,238.0 per square mile (478.0 /km2). The racial makeup of the village was 89.7% White, 5.0% African American, 1.0% Native American, 1.8% Asian, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 1.0% from other races, and 1.5% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.7% of the population.
There were 5,432 households out of which 28.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 54.8% were married couples living together, 7.9% had a female householder with no husband present, 3.2% had a male householder with no wife present, and 34.1% were non-families. 28.0% of all households were made up of individuals and 12.5% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.35 and the average family size was 2.88.
The median age in the village was 41 years. 20.5% of residents were under the age of 18; 7.8% were between the ages of 18 and 24; 26.4% were from 25 to 44; 28.5% were from 45 to 64; and 16.7% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the village was 52.3% male and 47.7% female.
As of the census6 of 2000, there were 15,443 people, 5,397 households, and 3,815 families residing in the village. The population density was 3,338.8 people per square mile (1,287.8/km²). There were 5,512 housing units at an average density of 1,191.7 per square mile (459.7/km²). The racial makeup of the village was 92.07% White, 4.64% African American, 1.15% Native American, 0.84% Asian, 0.01% Pacific Islander, 0.62% from other races, and 0.67% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 1.29% of the population.
There were 5,397 households out of which 32.1% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 61.5% were married couples living together, 7.2% had a female householder with no husband present, and 29.3% were non-families. 24.3% of all households were made up of individuals and 10.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.45 and the average family size was 2.95.
In the village the population was spread out with 22.1% under the age of 18, 9.0% from 18 to 24, 31.0% from 25 to 44, 23.1% from 45 to 64, and 14.7% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females there were 115.5 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 117.4 males.
The median income for a household in the village was $55,850, and the median income for a family was $62,855. Males had a median income of $40,055 versus $26,822 for females. The per capita income for the village was $25,535. About 1.4% of families and 3.5% of the population were below the poverty line, including 3.2% of those under age 18 and 7.6% of those age 65 or over.
WIS 172 and WIS 57 go through the Village. Limited transit service is provided by Green Bay Metro.
- "US Gazetteer files: 2010, 2000, and 1990". United States Census Bureau. 2011-02-12. Retrieved 2011-04-23.
- "US Gazetteer files 2010". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved 2012-11-18.
- "US Board on Geographic Names". United States Geological Survey. 2007-10-25. Retrieved 2008-01-31.
- "American FactFinder". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved 2012-11-18.
- "Population Estimates". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved 2013-01-02.
- "American FactFinder". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved 2008-01-31. | <urn:uuid:57cdce94-489f-4137-bb40-34360eed7100> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dotleb.net/directory/index.php?title=Allouez,_Wisconsin | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972858 | 1,271 | 2.953125 | 3 |