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Around the Nation
Sun October 28, 2012
A Save Haven For The Printed Word Turns 200
Originally published on Wed October 31, 2012 12:37 pm
Back in the 1700s, there was a young printer's apprentice who lived in Boston. His name was Isaiah Thomas and he became one of the first newspaper publishers in the country. He also founded the American Antiquarian Society, which celebrates its 200th birthday this week.
Located in Worcester, Mass., the American Antiquarian Society houses the largest collection of materials printed in the United States. Its library has books, newspapers, letters, even board games dating from 1640 to 1876. Its members include some notable characters, including 14 presidents.
Ellen Dunlap is president of the American Antiquarian Society. She says that the society elects its members and they come from all sorts of fields. Politicians, historians, book collectors and regular people interested in the society are all among its members.
Historian Jill Lepore is one of those members. Her latest book, The Mansion of Happiness, was inspired by a board game she found at the American Antiquarian Society. To her, the Society is a citadel of sorts.
"Maybe even, I love it more with each passing year," she says. "The more digital we get, the more I love paper. I mean, the more precious it is that there are these places — like the Library of Congress and the National Archives, the American Antiquarian Society — that save paper for us.
These days, Lepore reads a lot of her research online — even old books. But nothing compares to her experience of going to Antiquarian Hall in Worcester and calling up actual books, some from as far back as 1730. Books so old they might fall open to a particular page all on their own.
"Because that's where someone had left it open on their desk for a long time once, centuries ago," Lepore says. "And it's a meaningful page. That doesn't happen in Google books; that's a really precious gift that the archive has for readers." | <urn:uuid:a882e219-5239-40c6-a014-6d1db901fbe5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ktep.org/post/save-haven-printed-word-turns-200 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974073 | 427 | 2.046875 | 2 |
BBC correspondent Nick Bryant says he wishes the rest of the world could be more like New Zealand.
New Zealand is "one of the great lifestyle superpowers of the world" according to the BBC's Sydney correspondent Nick Bryant, who wonders in a post on bbc.co.uk why the rest of the world can't be more like little ol' Aotearoa.
Bryant's thoughts, penned following a recent visit to our shores, were prompted by an encounter with "a middle-aged customs official with a sense of humour", the discovery that New Zealand has a 24-hour rugby channel, our "funky" arts scene and the "quaint fastidiousness" which still sees cricket commentators convene on the boundary during the tea break to enjoy - of all things, a pot of tea.
He points out too, that New Zealand can be "edgy and forward", citing the fact we were the first country in the world to give women the vote and the impending launch of the "world's most comprehensive emissions trading scheme to curb greenhouse gases".
"Best of all, perhaps, is how non-indigenous New Zealanders live in such harmony with their indigenous compatriots," writes Bryant, whose piece is among the most-read articles on bbc.co.uk today.
"Next year [New Zealand] hosts the Rugby World Cup," he concludes, "but for now I will leave this country with my usual parting thought: 'Why can't the rest of the world be more like New Zealand?'"
Earlier this year, an index compiled by International Living magazine ranked new Zealand as the fifth-best country in the world to live in.
The index ranks 194 countries, taking into account cost of living, culture and leisure, economy, environment, freedom, health, infrastructure, safety and risk, and climate.
New Zealand's "pristine landscapes", the Auckland waterfront and the Southern Alps were singled out for special mention.
Last year's UN Human Development Report, which calculates the well-being of people in 182 countries by taking into account life expectancy, literacy, school enrolment and GDP per capita, ranked New Zealand 20th.
However not all recent coverage of New Zealand in the international media has been positive.
Last November, Guardian columnist Fred Pearce said New Zealand was promoting itself as "clean and green" despite having emissions which were "60% higher than those of Britain, per head of population".
"In recent years a lot of Brits have headed for Christchurch and Wellington in the hope of a green life in a country where they filmed the Lord of the Rings. But it's a green mirage," Pearce wrote.
What they said about New Zealand
"There's a real purity in New Zealand that doesn't exist in the States. It's actually not an easy thing to find in our world any more. It's a unique place because it is so far away from the rest of the world. There is a sense of isolation and also being protected." - Actor Elijah Wood
"Fiordland, ladies and gentlemen. What a spectacle. Earth Destination Number One... To throw words at such a spectacle would be like throwing meringues at a charging rhinoceros. Fruitless. (Unless it's banana pavlova). - Actor Stephen Fry
"I find that the girls [in New Zealand] are so like, beyond warm and polite. I don't know, do you guys have haters? America's all about haters. I don't feel that here... I always wanted to come to New Zealand, because the terrain is like, insanely gorgeous." - Host of America's Next Top Model Tyra Banks
"Last, loneliest, loveliest, exquisite, apart." (About Auckland) - Author and poet Rudyard Kipling
- NZ HERALD STAFF | <urn:uuid:bb8a1697-d80e-4c0b-b15e-77a66ee060ac> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://1426.blogspot.com/2010_05_17_archive.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 | 0.950194 | 786 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Brain Injury and Neuropsychiatric Problems
There is substantial psychological and neuro-behavioral evidence available to support the fact that traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a risk factor for subsequent psychiatric disorders. In the Journal of Brain Injury (van Reekum R, 1996). The study revealed high rates for post-TBI patients of major depression, bipolar affective disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, borderline and avoidant personality disorders. A large epidemiological study in Australia, following 7,485 patients, showed that reassessment 22 years later indicated that a history of TBI was a risk factor for continued psychiatric problems of increased depression and anxiety and suicidal ideation and that these problems go on for several decades subsequent to the TBI (Anstey KJ, 2004). There is also a connection between mild traumatic brain injury and psychiatric conditions (Mooney G, 2001). Those patients who had some form of preexisting psychiatric difficulty prior to the trauma made a much poorer recovery than those without preexisting psychiatric difficulties.
Unfortunately, the long term outcome of brain injury patients suggest that TBI may cause decades-lasting vulnerability to psychiatric illness in some individuals. Traumatic brain injury seems to make patients particularly susceptible to depressive episodes, delusional disorder, and personality disturbances. A 30 year follow-up study undertaken in Finland (Koponen S, 2002), said that between 48% and 61% of those patients developed psychiatric difficulties after TBI, including major depression, alcohol abuse with dependance, panic disorder, phobias, or psychiatric disorders. On noting that major depression is a frequent psychiatric complication among patients with TBI, a recent study found major depressive disorder observed in 33% of the patients during the first year following a TBI. These patients were more likely to have a personal history of mood and anxiety disorders than patients who did not have major depression. (Jorge RE, 2004). They found that these symptoms were associated with executive dysfunction and prominent anxiety symptoms. As to the biology of the changes phenomena, they found that the changes produced by TBI lead to deactivation of lateral and dorsal prefontal cortices and increased activation of ventral limbic and paralimbic structures including the amygdala.
The National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation research did a multicenter investigation on depression after traumatic brain injury (Seel RT, 2003). To determine the frequency of depression after TBI and the factors contributing to develop this mood disorder. They found that patients with TBI are at "great risk" for developing depressive symptoms. They noted that unemployment and poverty may be substantial risk factors for development of depressive symptoms. They noted that certain factors were significantly related to the depression - time after injury, injury severity, and post injury marital status. Therefore, the degree of initial injury, be it mild, moderate, or severe, can all lead to crippling depression.
The increased probability of decades of psychiatric difficulty following TBI may explain, in part, a recent multicenter analysis of re-hospitalizations of patients five years after brain injury (Marwitz JH, 2001). The study of 895 rehabilitation patients followed 1 to 5 years following TBI, they found that there remained a relatively high rate of hospitalization in the long term after TBI. The incidents of readmissions for seizures and psychiatric difficulties was substantially increased. They noted that the costs of these re-hospitalizations over the long term should be considered when evaluating long term consequences of injury. | <urn:uuid:bc43bd62-a74b-4e9c-b3f6-7f99aed36975> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.braininjury.com/neuropsychiatricproblems.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945175 | 694 | 2.46875 | 2 |
A publication of the Archaeological Institute of America
Latrine, Johnson's Island Civil War Prison Hospital, Sandusky Bay, Lake Erie, Ohio
Bone, probably from a cow femur; bristles (missing), probably from a boar
Sometimes archaeology can speak as eloquently as the words of a diary or letter in expressing a prisoner-of-war's craving for the comforts of home. Take the case of a Confederate officer's toothbrush.
In late 1861, the Union chose Johnson's Island, Ohio, along the western shore of Lake Erie, as the site of a POW camp for captured Confederate officers. From April 1862 to September 1865, more than 10,000 men passed through the camp's housing units, mess hall, latrines, and hospital. The prisoners held at Johnson's Island endured harsh winters, food and fuel shortages, and disease, and as many as 300 never made it out alive. They, and those who survived, left behind a wealth of archaeological material that I have been excavating for the past 19 years (see interactive.archaeology.org/johnsons).
Along with physical discomforts and deprivations, the POWs experienced anguish over the well-being of their families and concern for their own futures. Keeping or restoring routines of daily life--establishing a sense of normalcy in the face of the unknown--is an important way to cope with stressful situations. So naturally the prisoners clung to any personal objects they were allowed to keep: a photograph, a harmonica, a pocket watch, and this elaborate toothbrush.
Every feature of the toothbrush had been made by hand, from the carving of the handle to the drilling of no fewer than 88 holes for the boar bristles, which were secured to the base with linen thread. Brushing teeth was not common during the mid-nineteenth century, and only elite members of society typically used toothbrushes. Such a fine example reflects the high status of the Confederate officer who owned it.
Found in a latrine, it was probably dropped by accident or fell out of a pocket rather than being deliberately discarded. Its discovery reminds us how POWs strove to maintain regular activities and pre-war standards of living even under--and perhaps in reaction to--the conditions of a Civil War prison camp. | <urn:uuid:ec09243c-9cd0-4aa9-ada4-590803c5b4a2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://archive.archaeology.org/0801/etc/artifact.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961938 | 475 | 3.40625 | 3 |
Dear Miss Behavin': I want to use "time-outs" for when my dog Max is too excited. I am rewarding Max with attention when he doesn't jump on me. However, when he begins to jump, he will start mouthing my arms. What are the steps to a successful time-out?
A: Time-outs involve taking away a reward for unwanted behavior. For example, Max jumps and you stop giving him the reward, which is your attention. The good thing about time-outs is they don't cause your dog to become fearful or aggressive like other forms of punishment. You cannot use time-outs for when you are frustrated. It should be a behavior you can easily identity like the feeling Max's teeth on your arms.
Here are a few tips to help with your time-outs.
Check that your time-out area is barren -- void of anything Max can play with. It doesn't make sense to send him into time-out if he can easily engage in something that interests him.
Timing is critical. If Max jumps and you feel teeth, time-out is immediately followed. Delays of a few seconds can ruin its effectiveness.
Also, time-outs must be consistently delivered every time the unwanted behavior occurs. Hence, it's best to set up training sessions so you can catch Max doing the jumpy-mouthing, then implement the time-outs. Finally, time-outs should be no more than 2-5 minutes. The longer the time-out, the higher chance Max will get confused.
The first few times, the time-out mechanics need to be
This is the time-out sequence: Offer a warning cue ("Don't do it") when you suspect Max will jump. If Max continues the unwanted behavior give the time out cue ("Too Bad") then immediately take him to his timeout location. Do not say another word. Walk away and ignore Max for the 2 minutes in time-out.
After time-out ends, let him out and recreate the scene. Now if after you give the warning cue Max stops the undesirable behavior, tell him "THANK YOU!" and reward with attention. He'll pick up that the warning cue leads to the time-out if he doesn't stop the bad behavior.
Terri Wong is the Behavior Coordinator at the Peninsula Humane Society & SPCA. For more information, visit WWW.PHS-SPCA.ORG or call 650-340-7022, ext. 317. | <urn:uuid:c5742ca2-5bb6-4b0e-a58e-76a3b860a8b1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mercurynews.com/opinion/ci_22650682/how-make-time-out-training-effective | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958308 | 515 | 2.140625 | 2 |
Genealogy News from the Hayes Presidential Library
26 November 2004
An e-mail update to new genealogical resources and services
January 12, 2005 - Computers and Genealogy
March 19, 2005 - Beginning Genealogy
New Data on Heritage Quest
I just logged on to Heritage Quest here at Hayes and found that they now
have Revolutionary War Pension Records online. They have scanned and
digitized selected records from the Revolutionary War Pension and
Bounty-Land-Warrant Application Files of the National Archives. These
records are from an estimated 80,000 files based on the participation of
American military, naval, and marine officers and enlisted men in the
Revolutionary War. Most of the records are dated between 1800 and 1900.
Back in the 1970''s, when I first started doing genealogy, I sent for
several of my ancestor''s records from the National Archives and after
waiting several weeks, was delighted by the packet of photocopies I
received in the mail from Washington, DC. The details in these original
documents were so exciting, I was hooked by the genealogical bug and 30
years later, I can still be thrilled, as President Hayes was, by the
study of family history. Here is what Rutherford wrote to his uncle
Austin Birchard in May 1874.
"You know I am given to antiquarian and genealogical pursuits. An old
family letter is a delight to my eyes. I can prowl in the old trunks of
letters by the day with undiminished zest."
Here is your chance to prowl in the old trunks of documents online if
your ancestor was a Revolutionary War soldier.
If not, try one of my ancestors. I highly recommend Moses Holmes. Don''t
miss page 4 of his case file.
Instead of waiting many weeks or months for the National Archives to
respond like I had to in the 1970''s, and paying over $30 for the copies,
you can have them instantly on your home computer or here at Hayes.
You can access at Heritage Quest for free at the Hayes Presidential
Center Library or if you are a member of HPC at the $45 level or higher,
In case you need a refresher, here is my spiel on how to become a
Christmas is Coming!
It is time to tell your friends or kids or parents what YOU want from
Santa - a membership to the Hayes Presidential Center! You all know by
now that the $45 plus membership means that you can have access to
Heritage Quest at home.
For gift subscriptions, it is best to call or write. 1-800-998-7737
This subscription database gives you access to ALL the US Census and to
25,000 genealogy and local history books, become a member of the Hayes
Presidential Center at the $45 level and have one year''s access to
If you are not a member and would like to become one and not wait for
Christmas, you can join online. Go to
and add your order to the online shopping cart. For those of you who
have ordered obituaries online, the form will look familiar. It is the
same shopping cart.
Remember to join at the $45 level or higher level in order to get
Heritage Quest online at home - whether you live in Fremont, Iowa or
If you do not like to shop online, you can print out the forms online
and mail a check for the proper amount to
Hayes Presidential Center
Fremont, OH 43420
Not only will you get a great genealogical resource at home with
Heritage Quest, but you will also be supporting the Hayes Presidential
Center and receive all the benefits of membership which are listed on
the above website.
Becky Hill and the Hayes Library Staff
Hayes Presidential Library
Fremont, OH 43420 419-332-2081 Comments/suggestions? email@example.com | <urn:uuid:758bbffb-a640-443e-a46e-ad3f52d67c60> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rbhayes.org/hayes/libnews/genealogy_display.asp?nid=8&subj=libnews | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925202 | 838 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Did you know that more people become millionaires faster than ever before?
But why are so many people burdened down with financial problems? Why are so many people experiencing a lack of money on the other hand? The reason is the Law of attraction. Most people do not know about this universal Law of Attraction.
But it is true whatever situation you may find yourself in, is because the way things are working in this universe. You may have attracted debts into your life on an unconscious level. True nobody desires to have money problems – but the way we think about money conscious or unconsciously will bring us the matching results.
So here is how you can start in the right direction by attracting more money into your life.
It is not always necessary to get more employment and work extra hours to have more money. To attract more money into your life starts with the way you think about money.
You may think that you never will be a rich person no matter what, or you may think that rich people must be doing something wrong to get the kind of money they have. Some people think if they just have enough to pay their bills is good enough for them.
Everything in nature however is plentiful. There is enough for everybody to live the life they desire. It is not only there for a few it is whatever you are making out of it. The secret is inside of you. Whatever you are thinking you are creating. This can happen knowingly or unknowingly. Our subconscious mind has been programmed from a very early age on. Many times we are not even aware of the way we think about money. We may have heard phrases like for example: “The root of all evil is the desire of money, or this person is filthy rich, or rich people are crooks, we a re not the Rockefellers” and so on.
It is important therefore first to change the way we are thinking about money in order to attract more into our life.
You can make a list for example and write down all the good things money can do for people. Think how money has helped people after natural disasters to rebuild their homes and lives. How many people are helped everyday because of hospitals that are only possible because there was money to build them.
Many children are saved every day because there is money to help. So there
are literally thousands of ways to help people because of money. So money
does a lot of good in this world. We are living in a World surrounded by wealth.
After finishing your list you can use this list and read over it a few times per week to remember that money is good and it is an exchange for value. There is nothing wrong with having money. Only a person that has can contribute to others.
As you train your mind to change the way you think about money you can use affirmations that are positive and that will help you to attract more money with the Law of Attraction.
Here are just a two examples of what you could say when doing your affirmations:
I attract money into my life, money is good and I am a money magnet. Mney flows to me from everywhere. Important is you BELIEVE what you are telling your subconscious mind. The Law of Attraction works with emotions. You need to feel good and tell yourself you are surrounded by wealth. Look at the beautiful things ou have in you life and let the Universe know you appreciate them very much.
Remember the Law of Attraction will respond to feelings and vibrations. If you feel good it increases your vibration, which tells the Universe what you desire. If always attract what you think about – You are in control of your thought and your Life -
Attract the money that you want into your life with the power of your feelings and thinking and let the Law of Attraction to their magic. Don’t make the mistake to tell the Universe how you would you like to get your desire. Remember, your mind and vision shown as only 5% of what happen – 95% is off your radar screen – and that is where the Universe is doing the magic.
To Your Success, | <urn:uuid:7ecea821-e16a-462c-9ec5-886f87c012dc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://manifestabeautifullife.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969514 | 840 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Horace Greeley (1811-1872) was a prominent American newspaper editor and founder of the New York Tribune. He was the first (and last) presidential candidate of the short-lived Liberal Republican party in 1872. Greeley was also officially endorsed by the Democrats, but many of them refused to support him in practice, since he had long spoken out against many issues that their party embraced.
Initially ambivalent about the Civil War, Greeley soon became a vigorous Union supporter. He didn't think that Lincoln should be so conciliatory toward the border states and pushed for emancipation in the pages of his newspaper. During Reconstruction, he supported black suffrage and total amnesty for all southerners. When Greeley co-signed the bail bond to release Jefferson Davis from prison in May 1867, he lost half his subscribers to his Weekly Tribune. Greeley initially supported President Ulysses S. Grant but came to resent him for his ties to corrupt associates, including Roscoe Conkling's political machine in New York. He campaigned strenuously to become president but was savaged as a traitor and a crank in the press. Driven insane by his overwhelming defeat and his wife's recent death, Greeley died just weeks after the election in November 1872. | <urn:uuid:8f251305-8412-4270-a938-fc1d97ed3eb7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.shmoop.com/reconstruction/horace-greeley.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.990293 | 258 | 2.328125 | 2 |
Hunger by Jackie Morse Kessler
“Hershey’s Kisses, the Thin voice said. Twenty-five calories.
The Thin voice whispered, Brown rice, one hundred thirty-five calories. Steamed broccoli, two cups, fifty calories. One bite of chicken, thirty-six calories. Two hours on the exercise bike.
A diet is temporary, the Thin voice said knowingly. Being thin is forever.”
The Thin voice won’t go away. It is constantly there to remind Lisabeth Lewis that she is a failure. Everyone is thin, why not her? Life deals another twist of cruel fate when Lisabeth makes a deal with Death himself. Her new job? She is now Famine…as in one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Lisabeth must now face hunger in a way that she never thought of. She is slammed face first into a world were millions go without food every day, not because they are on a diet, but because they are on the brink of starvation and death. Lisabeth must learn to use her new power to not only help fight the injustices of the world and keep balance, but also the personal demons that live inside her.
Jackie Morse Kessler uses the historic story of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the current epidemic of eating disorders to create a story that will suck you in. As the Thin voice plagues Lisabeth into a world of despair, you are completely enthralled at the ironic twist of her being forced to be Famine. Kessler’s unique writing style is sharp, refreshing, and completely addicting. Given the fact the Hunger is only 177 pages, Kessler is able to create a storyline that is well developed, but quick to the point. Hunger is the first installment of the Riders of the Apocalypse series. Rage, the second in the series, was released in April of 2011 and the third installment in the series, Loss, was released in March 2012. Once you start this series you will not want to put it down. | <urn:uuid:7fd571f6-01f3-4c62-ac6c-135d8e059e8b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.homewoodpubliclibrary.org/node/3798 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954152 | 417 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Saint Jude is a busy saint. Along with Saint Anthony of Padua and the Blessed Virgin Mary, he hears a lot of novenas. It's not surprising, of course, that Catholics turn to him; after all, he is known as the patron saint of lost causes, a worker of miracles, and the help of the hopeless.
This short novena to Saint Jude and the Sacred Heart of Jesus is traditionally prayed nine times per day (all at once or spread throughout the day) for nine days. It is then published—an act which can be as simple as sending it to your friends by e-mail or posting it in an online forum, posting it in the classified section of a newspaper, or printing up copies to leave at your parish church.
Novena to Saint Jude and the Sacred Heart of Jesus
May the Sacred Heart of Jesus be adored, glorified, loved, and preserved throughout the world, now and forever.
Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us.
St. Jude, worker of miracles, pray for us.
St. Jude, help for the hopeless, pray for us. | <urn:uuid:45cc42b0-21d2-4f4e-82a8-28e1de38f901> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://catholicism.about.com/od/novenas/qt/Novena_to_Saint_Jude_and_the_Sacred_Heart.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94789 | 234 | 1.953125 | 2 |
Making the cloud work: The federation connection
Getting Google Wave or any mega-sharing, browser-based application work for government boils down to trust
- By Chris Bronk
- Feb 03, 2010
In my previous column (“Google Wave Could Crush the Competition,” Jan. 11), I raised some questions about how Google’s Web applications, principally Wave, fit with policies regarding ownership and custodianship of data. Of information stored in Wave’s piece of the Google cloud, I asked, “Will it commingle with nonfederal data? Is that OK?” Surprisingly enough, someone at Google took the time to write me a response. It’s not every day in academia that someone reaches out and answers your questions.
I was sent a pointer to the Google Wave Federation Architecture white paper, a straightforward, high-level concept piece on how Wave's server-to-server communications will work. The company realizes that most organizations will not want to simply toss their information on Google’s server or one maintained by a random service provider. That is especially true of the federal government. Agencies operate under the provisions of the Office of Management and Budget’s Circular A-130, which contains guidance about data custodianship. With Wave, Google understands that some folks — for instance, the federal government — might want their own Google boxes, appliances or services that live someplace other than Google’s data centers.
Making Wave or any other mega-sharing browser-based application work for government or most other large organizations essentially boils down to the issue of trust. People inside and outside government might want to work together and share information, but they have to trust one another to do it. Technologists and policy-makers view trust differently. Google’s white paper has the right technical pieces to make a computer engineer or information systems director happy. Wave’s network protocol is largely borrowed from the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol, a set of Extensible Markup Language technologies used by Apple iChat and Jabber. Transport Layer Security handles authentication and encryption of connections. Those and other well-understood protocols allow Google’s engineers to say they have thought about a federated model for the control of information.
But what does that mean in practice? Let’s dig out information security’s favorite cardboard cutouts. Alice and Bob, who work at different organizations, can create waves, with the component wavelets each of them produces sitting on their server and replicated to others. Wave has a good idea of what Alice or Bob wrote or added and where each resides by assigning lots of unique ID numbers and tying them to Alice's or Bob’s Wave server. The behind-the-scenes server-to-server connection allows them to communicate while keeping out that ever-malicious Eve, who’s had a bad rep since the days in the Garden.
Government approaches the issue of trust a bit differently. It’s also thinking about federation — the problem of how trustworthy folks can share information and work together. But instead of thinking in terms of computer code, it’s more about that other code, the legal stuff. The good news is that people in the U.S. government are thinking about it. The bad news is that it’s complicated. More on that in next month’s installment.
Chris Bronk is a research fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy and an adjunct instructor of computer science at Rice. He previously served as a Foreign Service Officer and was assigned to the State Department’s Office of eDiplomacy. | <urn:uuid:d37ec983-89c0-4e91-a482-0b381d690e1b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://fcw.com/articles/2010/02/08/comment-bronk-googlewave.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925877 | 753 | 1.804688 | 2 |
You might think it’s some place like New York, but actually Vancouver has a population of just under 3 million. The weird thing is that it’s only Canada’s third largest city, behind Montreal and Toronto.
It also has the warmest climate in Canada. Vancouver is divided into several self-governed municipalities, with the Vancouver city itself only having about half a million residents. The “3 million” number is applied to “Greater Vancouver,” the general term for the municipalities collectively. 35% of Vancouver’s population is also foreign born, which is the highest figure in the world.
That means the city is even more multicultural than New York (though if the recent article on Little Italy is any indication, that might not be such an impressive feat). Another cool thing about Vancouver is that it’s often called Hollywood North (along with Toronto) because it is the third largest film production center in North America.
That’s due to the cheapness of filming there, the year round mild climate, and the wide variety of locales in a relatively small area. | <urn:uuid:f0432955-94b7-425e-9d0b-a7b8f6bb5c9d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.omg-facts.com/Other/Vancouver-Is-The-Most-Densely-Populated/51575?fromTN | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00041-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955776 | 232 | 2.203125 | 2 |
Programmed cell death as signalled by the nuclei in normally functioning human and animal cells when age or state of cell health and condition dictates.
-I can't quite make out what Billy wrote down in his biology notes....ahhh, apoptosis. Of course.
when cells get depressed that there are too many of them and kill themselves.
Tom (cell 1): I hear cell population is skyrocketing!!!
Johnny(cell 2): I know, I hate myself.........*POOF*
Tom (cell 1): JOHNNY?!?!?!?!?!?! NOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! | <urn:uuid:601b8aa4-54ad-4a9b-b9eb-3ef696ba8790> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=apoptosis&defid=1048159 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.900798 | 125 | 1.742188 | 2 |
What is Montessori Education?
Maria Montessori, Italy 1952.
Developed more than a century ago, Montessori is an educational philosophy based on the work and observations of Dr. Maria Montessori. Based on the principles of independent discovery, hands on learning, and a respect for the learning pace of each individual child, the Montessori method serves children from birth through adolescence in schools all over the world.
The method recognizes that the mind of a child during the first six years of life is especially absorbent. Guided by universal developmental periods, children acquire order, controlled movement, spoken and written language, refinement of their senses, and mathematical thinking almost effortlessly. The method highlights the crucial importance of providing children with a rich and diverse learning environment suited to their natural needs in order for them to develop to their highest potential.
A Montessori Environment, USA 1927.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. Why should I send my child to a Montessori school?
A. Most educators and psychologists today agree that the single most important period in the development of a persons' intelligence occurs between birth and age six. A child's mind is extremely absorbent and his curiosity is at a peak during these early years. When properly nourished and stimulated, the child's mind forms patterns for learning that will serve him well throughout his life. The Montessori system of education has proven to be one of the most effective and fastest growing methods of guiding a child through these critical years.
Q. Who is the Montessori method designed for?
A. The Montessori method is an approach to learning and as such has no distinctions of class or intelligence. It has been used successfully in all parts of the world and in all types of programs, i.e. Head-start, gifted children, children with disabilities, public school, etc.
Q. What is the best age to start a child in a school?
A. Maria Montessori outlined various periods of sensitivity. During these times a child is more capable of and interested in learning specific concepts. At age 3 a special sense of order, concentration, coordination and independence begin to emerge. This time is ideal to begin a child's training in Montessori as he is at the perfect period to build a strong foundation for future learning.
Q. How is a Montessori preschool different from other preschools?
A. In most preschools, children are taught educational concepts in a group and are expected to all learn at the same pace. In a Montessori classroom, the children are given individual lessons with each material. The special nature of the materials allow the children to continue to practice the lesson independently until the lesson is mastered. The adult stands back and observes the children making their own discoveries with the material and records their progress. Children can advance very quickly through the different curriculum areas when they are not limited in their learning. A slower learning pace is also respected and the child is observed by the teacher and she may isolate his difficulty and re-present the lesson in different ways until the child has mastered it. Montessori emphasizes learning through all five senses, not just through listening, watching, or reading.
Montessori education places children in three-year age groups (3-6, 6-9, 9-12, and so on), forming communities in which the older children spontaneously share their knowledge with the younger ones.
Q. How do children transition from Montessori into other schools?
A. Montessori children are unusually adaptable. They have learned to work independently and in groups. Since they have been encouraged to make decisions from an early age, these children are problem-solvers who can make choices and manage their time well. They have also been encouraged to exchange ideas and to discuss their work freely with others and good communication skills ease the way in new settings. Research has shown that the best predictor of future success is a sense of self-esteem. Montessori programs, based on self- directed, noncompetitive activities, help children develop good self-images and the confidence to face challenges and change with optimism.
Q. Are Montessori children successful later in life?
A. Research studies show that Montessori children are well prepared for later life academically, socially, and emotionally. In addition to scoring well on standardized tests, Montessori children are ranked above average on such criteria as following directions, turning in work on time, listening attentively, using basic skills, showing responsibility, asking provocative questions, showing enthusiasm for learning, and adapting to new situations.
Q. Is Montessori good for children with learning disabilities? What about gifted children?
A. Montessori is designed to help all children reach their fullest potential at their own unique pace. A classroom whose children have varying abilities is a community in which everyone learns from one another and everyone contributes. Moreover, multi-age grouping allows each child to find his or her own pace without feeling "ahead" or "behind" in relation to peers.
Famous people who have attended Montessori School...
Larry Page and Sergey Brin - founders of Google
Jeff Bezos - founder of Amazon.com
Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis - former First Lady (John F. Kennedy)
Julia Child - author, chef, TV cooking shows
Gabriel Garcia Marquez - Nobel Prize winner for Literature
Katherine Graham - ex-owner of the Washington Post
Anne Frank - author, diarist from World War II
Prince William and Prince Harry, English royal family
Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia
George Clooney, Academy Award-winning actor
What the World is saying about Montessori...
Montessori Madness- Introductory video of Montessori Education
Google Founders Talk Montessori, CBS 60 Minutes
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN- "Children Prosper under the Montessori Method"
BBC NEWS- "Learning the Montessori Way"
THE NEW YORK TIMES- "Public Schools Stake their Future on the Montessori Way"
THE WASHINGTON POST- "Montessori, Now 100, Goes Mainstream"
Beautiful Sun Montessori School
Balashi Web 6, Aruba | <urn:uuid:bb1d69b7-77b2-464c-988f-c748530d36b6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://montessoriaruba.com/montessori | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00032-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947549 | 1,275 | 3.234375 | 3 |
Our Clergy have been receiving a good deal of emails from
people who are seriously worried and scared about the end of
the world as foretold by the Mayans and the Mayan Calendar. Probably
because of the new movie that is about to be released "2012" from Centropolis Entertainment and starring John
There is of course a ton of information about the Mayan's
and their Calendar out there on the web. The trick is trying
to separate the hysteria from some of the good academic research.
Is it 2012 or 2220.
The first discussion from the world of academia is the accuracy
of the original translation of the calendar and what methods
were used to determine it's correlation to the Gregorian calendar
we're all used to. The originally accepted translation put the
date of the end of the world at December 23, 2012. But new research
and updated information based on modern era discoveries have
called that date into question.
The Mayans used what today is known as a "Long Count
Calendar", which when applied to what we know about the
Mayan Calendar extends their calendar to December 2220. There
are several very good articles on the web about this subject
by the scientific community who actually know a thing or two
about the Mayans. Here are a few to check out:
Beyond the confusion of the translation, even the idea that
the Calendar makes a prediction of the end of the world is false.
The Calendar itself makes no predictions what so ever. There
are no texts associated with the Calendar that says plant crops
here, gather extra harvests there, or plan the end of the world
on this date. Once again charlatans who scream the loudest to
stir up fear and separate you from your money are shouting louder
than the actual facts.
The frauds have made an assumption (and it's a big one) that
because the calendar ends, it means the Mayans know the world
will end and there's no reason to count the days beyond that
period of time. Not so. The Mayans created an approximately 2000
year calendar and probably decided that's far enough; we'll update
it for the next 2000 years later on. One would think that if
the Mayans were so good at predicting the end of the world nearly
2000 years into the future; why couldn't they predict the demise
of their own civilization just a few decades into their own future?
NPR recently published a short story about 2012 and the doomsday
theories currently prevalent out there on the web. The article
is seemingly tongue in cheek, but when you read about the eMails
NASA scientists and we Clergy are receiving from truly terrified
people; you realize it's not so funny after all.
According to numerous sources on the Internet, in 2012
a planet called Nibiru will collide with Earth, resulting in
the extinction of the human race. Or the Earth's magnetic poles
will flip, causing the rotation of the planet to reverse, resulting
in the extinction of the human race. Or the Earth will fall into
something called a "dark rift"in the Milky Way
resulting in the extinction of the human race.
So, what's NASA doing about it?
"NASA has nothing to do with the Planet Nibiru, because
it doesn't exist,"NASA astrobiologist David Morrison tells
NPR's Guy Raz. "What I am doing is trying to answer all
these people who are really scared, and see if we can't get some
facts out to counteract the mythology on the Internet."
Morrison writes a column called "Ask anesthesiologist" on NASA's
Web site. Some years ago, he started receiving questions from
people genuinely worried about what may happen in 2012.
The questions aren't as funny as you might think. "I've
had three from young people saying they were contemplating committing
suicide," says Morrison. "I've had two from women contemplating
killing their children and themselves. I had one last week from
a person who said, 'I'm so scared, my only friend is my little
dog. When should I put it to sleep so it won't suffer?' And I
don't know how to answer those questions."
Morrison now maintains a 2012 FAQ, where he debunks the doomsday scenarios.
Magnetic poles flipping? "The Earth reverses its
magnetic polarity once every 400,000 to 500,000 years. There's
no reason to think it will happen now, [and] no reason to think
it will cause a problem if it did," he says.
Dark rift? "The dark rift is just a place where there
are dust clouds in the Milky Way. I can't imagine where someone
decided to be afraid of that."
The only real proof for many 2012 believers will come
on Jan. 1, 2013 but Morrison says that won't be the end
of doomsday hoaxes.
"The Planet Nibiru was predicted to hit the Earth
in May of 2003," he says. "As far as I know, it didn't.
And someone just pushed reset, and now it's coming in 2012. So
I don't think we'll ever be rid of apocalyptic stories about
Planet X and the end of the world."
It's a shame we can't save all the misguided people in the
world. But perhaps those of us who take the time and effort to
conduct research from legitimate sources can share what we learn
in order to ease the fears of those who seem to fall into this
I strongly recommend that those who
are interested in this top follow the link to NASAs 2012 FAQs.
You'll learn about the history of these fables, where and how
they started and the real facts behind the history.
The bottom line to those who are truly scared,
"Please don't be scared or worried;
these prophecies are false." | <urn:uuid:d27d72c5-073d-4ff9-929a-c7f6568f9091> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://springshaven.com/news/2009-11.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953146 | 1,242 | 2.40625 | 2 |
Where might extraterrestrials live? The first step is figuring out what other planets out there have conditions like our own.
Scientists using NASA's Kepler space telescope are working hard to find candidates for inhabitable planets. So far, it seems that for approximately every two stars in the galaxy, there is one possible planet, NASA's William Borucki said Saturday at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting in Washington.
Researchers have found some 1,200 candidate-planets and, of them, about 54 are earth-size candidate planets in habitable zones - in other words, perhaps at a distance from their stars that may be suitable for life. Earlier this month officials at NASA announced the discovery of five probable planets about the size of Earth, as well as six larger than our planet that are orbiting a single star. But bear in mind that Venus is also considered an "Earth-sized planet," and clearly no lifeforms live there (as far as we know).
Scientists on the Kepler mission revealed Saturday that you're probably going to have to wait until at least 2012 to find out anything substantial about the habitability of what appear to be Earth-sized planets. That's because scientists need to be able to see three transits of a planet around a star in three years before they'd be willing to say too much about them, and the project has only been going since 2009 (after all, our planet goes around the sun three times in three years).
And even then, Kepler wasn't designed to look at individual planets. But it might identify some that the James Webb Space Telescope, which will launch in 2014, can probe in further detail, looking at atmospheres and such. And note that the probability of having found our own particular planet using Kepler technology is only 12%.
And we won't be traveling to meet our potential new neighbors anytime soon. The stars about the size our sun that Kepler has been looking at are about 1,000 to 3,000 light years away, where one light year is about 6 trillion miles.
But there have been some fascinating surprises from the Kepler mission. One of them is that there appear to be a remarkable number of planets about the size of Neptune, which has a diameter four times that of Earth, said Sara Seager, physicist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The planet Kepler-10b, shown in the photo above, is a particularly interesting find because it likely has no atmosphere, but does have liquid oceans that are essentially lava lakes, she said.
The existence of many small planets in the galaxy that Kepler has found also amazed scientists, because there was a possibility that they would have been destroyed by larger planets long ago.
"It was a wonderful surprise to see this large number of small planets we have found," Borucki said. | <urn:uuid:255b710a-e2a0-40d3-95f9-d561bf7e2953> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/02/19/scientists-pleasantly-surprised-by-number-of-earth-sized-distant-planets/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00026-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969697 | 569 | 3.734375 | 4 |
Re: If god exists, what created god?
Kim Pugh (email@example.com)
3 Aug 1995 03:07:44 -0500
greg clements (firstname.lastname@example.org) wrote:
=>The question "who created him/her?" assumes that God needs to be
=>created. It seems reasonable to me that the God who created the universe
So who says the _univererse_ had to be created? A self-generated
universe is as reasonable as a self-generated diety.
Robert "Kim" Pugh | DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed are *strictly*
<email@example.com> | those of the last person I talked to. | <urn:uuid:6eb15542-f60b-4a3a-a8e8-f57801f42609> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://unauthorised.org/anthropology/sci.anthropology/august-1995/0178.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934282 | 161 | 1.742188 | 2 |
Since 2009 I have been working as Project Manager on the Library’s most ambitious digitisation project to date. The project aims to digitise 2 million pages of the Library’s holdings of out-of-copyright newspapers and periodicals – generally those originally published in Wales up to 1911.
Digitising these popular collections will mean that existing readers and new users will be able to discover and access this magnificent record of everyday Welsh history wherever and whenever it is convenient to them. Worldwide audiences will be able, for the first time, to search for words, names and dates across 2 million pages simultaneously and hopefully stumble across countless nuggets of genealogical information, forgotten incidents and interesting miscellany that would otherwise remain hidden within the covers of heavy and dusty volumes at the Library.
This will be the largest body of digital images and searchable digital text relating to the history of Wales and this project will significantly advance the Library’s ambitious vision to digitise the entire printed memory of Wales.
This 3-year project began in 2009, thanks to additional funding of £2 million from the Welsh Assembly Government’s Strategic Capital Investment Fund, and the Library aims to launch the new digital collection on its website from 2012.
Building the capacity to undertake a digitisation project of this scale has been a significant achievement – for me personally and for more than 30 project staff – and over the next few weeks I hope to give an insight into the many challenges that we have faced as the Library has scaled up its digitisation activities.
Alan Vaughan Hughes | <urn:uuid:bd39abc0-d449-4eff-9d7f-33eb7c4dfe22> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.llgc.org.uk/blog/?p=283 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00033-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9297 | 316 | 1.75 | 2 |
Whack Your Butterfly Bush to the Groundtesttest
It’s never too late to whack that buddleia down to the ground, even though it is flushing new growth. One of my butterfly shrubs was getting so large that in early March I cut the stump close to the ground with a chainsaw. Already the new growth is 18 to 24 inches tall with an abundance of young shoots coming from the roots.
While I was lecturing to a garden club, a member asked me how to prune buddleia. I told her to prune it back as close to the ground as possible. But, she said, her buddleia was putting out new growth. I repeated, Prune it as close to the ground as possible. She turned on her heels and told the person standing behind her that I did not know a damn thing about pruning.
Pinch Your Bedding Plants
Want more flowers on those zinnias and petunias and all your bedding flowers? Give them a gentle pinch. Pruning back the top quarter of each stem will stimulate many more branches to form from the base of the stem and from the crown. However, don’t pinch the tops the same day that you transplant them in the garden. Allow a week to 10 days for the plants to become established before pinching back the tops. This allows the remaining stem to generate more branches than if you had pinched at transplanting time.
I do. Prune it as close to the ground as possible.
At a gathering at Upakrik Farm this Easter, friends asked me how to prune forsythia. I informed them that if the plant has not been properly pruned in the past couple of years, now is the time to cut all of the stems as close to the ground as possible. One guest insisted that would kill the plant. I responded that horticulture is a science, not based on intuition. I guided them outside to a forsythia I had pruned just a few days earlier. You should have seen the expression of shock on her face.
I find interesting the degree of resistance people have when it comes to pruning plants. Many species of woody ornamentals need periodic rejuvenation through proper pruning to keep them healthy and productive. Allowing them to grow without proper pruning often results in a decline because the old stems inhibit the growth and development of new stems from the ground. Forsythia, buddleia, weigela and abelia are members of that group of plants that need to be pruned near the ground to remove the older stems. This allows new stems to grow.
Believe me. Whack them down.
Ask Dr. Gouin your questions at email@example.com. All questions will appear in Bay Weekly. Please include your name and address. | <urn:uuid:439fa500-8ef3-4be2-9528-69e5a5bb9974> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bayweekly.com/articles/bay-gardener-dr-francis-gouin/article/whack-your-butterfly-bush-ground | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00032-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969429 | 591 | 2.515625 | 3 |
Published in AIDS Weekly, January 17th, 2000
The advent of HAART in the past few years has provided researchers with a wealth of information on the interaction between HIV and the human immune system. Data on posttherapy patterns of viral load decline, as well as changes in CD4+ T-cell population structure broaden the knowledge base of heterogeneity in within-host viral replication and immune system reconstitution.
Want to see the full article?
Welcome to NewsRx!
Learn more about a six-week, no-risk free trial of AIDS Weekly
NewsRx also is available at LexisNexis, Gale, ProQuest, Factiva, Dialog, Thomson Reuters, NewsEdge, and Dow Jones. | <urn:uuid:7adf6607-6194-4532-b592-bf72b6f1fcef> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newsrx.com/newsletters/AIDS-Weekly/2000-01-17/200001173331AW.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00052-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917834 | 150 | 1.929688 | 2 |
The KETV NewsWatch 7 I-Team has learned of proactive steps being taken by Omaha police to keep children safe in schools, with plans in place long before the tragedy in Connecticut.
Investigator Ryan Luby discovered, if ever needed, law enforcement has floor plans for most schools ready for officers to use and police have requested floor plans they do not yet have. But one lawmaker feels Nebraska needs to standardize what schools provide.
For all officers of the law, if not all adults, protecting children will forever and always be a top priority, at schools in particular. Security guards and cameras have become obvious tools in that fight. Another tool is not as obvious: the floor plan.
Nationally, school floor plans have been in the news in recent weeks. For example, in Cleveland, reports have surfaced that dozens of Ohio schools submitted floor plans to law enforcement that are almost impossible to read. That state requires school submit floor plans to police.
In Nebraska, schools don’t have to. Still, the I-Team discovered most Omaha metro area school districts already share floor plans with law enforcement.
In Bellevue, plans come in booklet form. Acting Bellevue Police Chief Mark Elbert told Luby the booklet contains floor plans for every school in the city. Every officer has one and has for years.
“It just helps you plan,” said Elbert. “It helps you be more prepared.”
In Omaha, floor plans are electronic, stored on a highly secure, custom piece of software. Omaha Public Schools Safety Administrator Roddie Miller says those plans mean everything for emergency responders.
“It’s critical response information that they need,” said Miller.
Officers, like Bryan High School Resource Officer Marcos Lopez, agree, saying the plans matter when seconds and strategy count. | <urn:uuid:22bd8b06-cdb7-46b7-a560-b814769f8862> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ketv.com/news/local-news/Police-put-new-safety-plan-in-place-in-schools/-/9674510/18116986/-/eu28qdz/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951324 | 376 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Nvidia has its own grand scheme for Netbooks, the tiny laptops that have gained wide acceptance running on software and hardware from Microsoft and Intel, respectively.
At the giant Computex conference starting Tuesday in Taiwan, Nvidia will be showing hardware running on its Tegra processor and Windows CE, the version of Windows used most prominently to date in business-use handheld computers. And, down the road, Nvidia has high hopes for devices based on Google's Android.
Tegra is a system-on-a-chip that integrates a processor based on a design from U.K.-based ARM and Nvidia's GeForce graphics silicon, among other functions. The goal is to bring robust PC-like graphics to small devices such as Netbooks and handheld devices--the latter also referred to as mobile Internet devices.
In a break from Computex tradition, Nvidia will have phone companies in tow. "We're bringing the carriers in. I've got 100 people showing up from carriers at Computex," Michael Rayfield, general manager of Nvidia's mobile business unit, said in a phone interview Friday.
Tegra will be shown at the trade show in devices that manufacturers "are about ready to release into production," Rayfield said.
"The Internet is all about (Adobe) flash and HD (high-definition) now so we've built a platform that can do that," he said. "There are two operating systems we support. Microsoft Windows CE and, as it becomes more interesting for large screens, (Google) Android," Rayfield said.
"We do Android for smartphones and we're working to do hardware acceleration on Android as it goes to larger displays," Rayfield said. In February at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Nvidia announced that it is working with Google and the Open Handset Alliance to get its Tegra processor into phones based on Google's Android operating system.
Android will likely appear commercially in larger devices, such as Netbooks, by the middle of next year, Rayfield said. "Android, as it stands now, does not do hardware acceleration," he said, referring to graphics-based acceleration of video and other multimedia applications. "We've already got 720p acceleration on Android internally," he said. 720p is a lower-resolution standard for high-definition video.
Rayfield continued. "Android has got a roar ahead of it but I think it's three of four quarters from a large-screen device. And the market wants something interesting before that." … Read more | <urn:uuid:6184abb8-2397-4f67-bf74-859f08a6ed25> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cnet.com/8300-5_1-0.html?keyword=soc | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00055-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963172 | 509 | 1.679688 | 2 |
When my wife Sue and I were first married, we knew we wanted to have children. But it seemed such a daunting responsibility. It would change our lives forever. What if we didn't turn out to be good parents? What if our kids didn't turn out to be good people? And so we "waited a while," which is a euphemism for putting it off.
Today our three children are the joy of our life. It's a funny thing. Raising kids is a lot more work than I ever thought it would be. But the rewards are far greater than I ever hoped, coming in all sort of ways that I never could have imagined.
If we were to do it all over again, we probably wouldn't wait as long. But who's to know these things? It's only through the experience that we become acquainted with the subtle benefits of each new adventure.
Lots of chosen new experiences are like that. You never truly understand what's to be gained until you've done it. What's more, a lot of the things you worry over going in don't turn out to be the main issues at all.
But what do kids have to do with manufacturing? A lot of shops go through similar tribulations when it comes to applying new techniques and technology. They worry and wait. They worry both that life--and competition--may be passing them by, but also about the responsibility of making a new way work, that it will turn out to be everything they hoped. And they wait for a clearer course of action to present itself, for a better time to implement change, and sometimes for change to be thrust upon them.
You can put off the big things. Buying machine tools. Implementing new management systems. Nurturing the workforce to move in different ways. Or they can be small. Trying a new tool. Fixing an outmoded procedure. Asking someone what they really think, and listening to the answer.
All of these things are easy to delay because we know that they won't just force somebody else to change, they'll force us to change too.
But it all comes back to a lesson that most nervous parents eventually learn, or should. On the front side, when you're contemplating the big change, all you're really thinking about is you. But once you're into it--once those children have been brought into the world--it's no longer about you at all. It's about them. Then the satisfaction comes in seeing those creations take hold, and make their own way in the world.blog comments powered by Disqus | <urn:uuid:a08aa151-0da0-4eed-bf21-27fc94af151f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mmsonline.com/columns/it39s-never-what-you-thoughtit39s-better | 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 | 0.980109 | 529 | 1.851563 | 2 |
View Full Version : Connecting PSP to a secure wireless network
03-25-2005, 11:42 AM
I need to connect my PSP to my wireless network in my house, but I don't have the WEP password to do so. Where on my computer would I find this WEP password, and what would it look like?
03-26-2005, 05:39 PM
It depends on your router, mostly. You are going to need to refer to your router's manual (if you do not have it, they will be posted online by the manufactuer).
Most likely, the key will be found by logging into the router and then checking under the appropriate column.
03-27-2005, 05:47 AM
Is the router under someone else's control? If they don't want you have the encryption key you could ask them to enter it on the PSP for you sinc eit shouldn't be visible as plain text after it's entered.
If you know all of the needed setting to get the router set up again you could always reset it to the default settings. This usually involved holding down a reset button for a minimum period of time. Check the manual for the router for full details. | <urn:uuid:3813b39f-195a-4618-b647-71372f32a528> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cheapassgamer.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-45302.html | 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 | 0.93569 | 252 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Today, I'm featuring what may be the biggest win in BoostCTR's brief history. It's certainly the biggest win that's been featured in a Win of the Week column.
Since the difference between the two ads is so big, it should be easy to pick the winner, right? Well, maybe. Looks -- and gut-level responses -- can often be deceiving. Nevertheless, take a look at the two ads below and see if you can pick the winner.
To help make your decision, suppose for a moment that you were a college student looking to rent some college textbooks. Which ad would you be more likely to click on? Which one reaches into the mind of the college student and gets her to click?
In this case, ad number one is the winner. It was written by "ctrmaven," and it increased CTR by an astounding 581%. Where the original ad was getting 1 click, the new ad is getting 6.8 clicks.
So why did the new ad win? And why did it win by such a large margin? Here are a few reasons why...
1. Most students are broke. They don't want to spend money on textbooks. The winning ad capitalizes on this by emphasizing "cheap," "low, low prices," and "low prices." All three of these words/phrases appear in the winning ad. The repetition makes it nearly impossible to miss this overarching message.
2. The unusual title of the winning ad stands out. When viewed next to other ads, the hyphenated title jumps off the page. Not only that, "Textbooks-Fast-Cheap-Easy" contains two more benefits than "Rent Bargain Textbooks."
3. Why use two words when you can use three? All kidding aside, it is best to say what you want to say in as few words as possible. "Low Prices" is a much better, shorter phrase than "Marked Down Textbooks."
4. Here's where it gets interesting... The winning ad packs in three benefits on the second line of body copy:
- Fast service
- low prices
- easy return
One character is saved by using "Service" instead of "Delivery." The word "and" is eliminated, which saves 5 characters (3 letters plus 2 spaces). The phrase "Easy Returns." (with a period at the end) is truncated to "easy return", thereby saving 2 more characters. And instead of using a comma-space construction (which uses 2 characters), a hyphen is used to separate phrases (which only uses 1 character). And so the winning ad is able to squeeze in "low prices" in between "Fast service" and "easy return".
It's not quite as pretty, but it gets more attention -- and WAY more clicks.
5. Surprisingly, neither ad uses an exclamation point! In fact, the winning ad uses no punctuation at all. No periods, no commas, no exclamation points. The losing ad does use a period at the end of the second line -- but its placement precludes any benefit from Google's extended title format. I point this out because 1) not all winning ads use the ad-writing rules of thumb and 2) the winning ad might get an additional bump from an exclamation point at the end of the first line of body copy.
The bottom line: The new ad wins because itreiterates the core benefit three times (low prices) and uses unconventional formatting to get attention and pack more benefits into the same amount of space.
What's your takeaway from this admittedly unorthodox winner?
By the way...
The BoostCTR writers have collectively spent thousands of hours improving pay-per-click ads on both Google and Facebook. They increase CTR and conversions by 30% on average. Go ahead and put 'em to work... risk-free for 30 days!
About the Author: Ryan Healy is a direct response copywriter and BoostCTR writer. Since 2002, he has worked with scores of clients, including Alex Mandossian, Terry Dean, and Pulte Homes. He writes a popular blog about copywriting, advertising and business growth, and has gone as far as offering Netflix public business advice. | <urn:uuid:fe2b07b3-9b7b-4be3-ac68-7737189aaa9a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2011/09/21/breaking-rules-boosts-ctr | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958439 | 872 | 1.796875 | 2 |
Bliss Intelligent Technologies, India is doing research on Artificially Intelligent Software Technologies. 21st Century is a century of Fifth Generation Software Technologies. BLISS has taken an honest step towards the revolution in Intelligent Technologies. BLISS is trying to develop various intelligent software like Text To Speech Synthesizers, Speech To Text Systems, Automatic Speech Recognition Systems, Speaker Recognition Systems, Computer Vision, Intelligent Interactive Voice Response Systems, Business Solutions and Web Enabled Applications
We are fully committed to the mission of helping our customers and society to realize their full potential. We constantly update and improve our products, knowledge and techniques. We want to continually evolve our organization to be in the best position to accelerate new technologies which is useful for the business organization, other institutions and society.
Some of our expertise are as follows :
Speech synthesis is the artificial generation of human speech. A piece of programming code called engine used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or hardware. A text-to-speech (TTS) system converts normal language text into audible speech. Speech synthesis is a process in which input text is analysed, understood and then rendered into the speech. The quality of a speech synthesizer is judged by its similarity to the human voice and by its ability to be understood.
Speech Synthesis can be helpful in the Computer Telephony, Mobile Computing, Screen Reading, Automobiles, Gaming, Edutainment etc.
We have developed World’s first Hindi Text To Speech System. We are also working on Marathi, Tamil, Bangla, Telugu, Gujrati and other Indian Text To Speech Systems.
Bliss has completed so many projects of repute for the European partners to develop Customized Text To Speech Systems for their native and ancient languages. Bliss has worked on Latin, Ancient Greek and so many other Indo European languages.
Speech recognition converts spoken words to text. Speech recognition is a broader solution which refers to technology that can recognize speech without being targeted at single speaker—such as a call system that can recognize arbitrary voices. Speech recognition applications include voice user interfaces such as voice dialing, call routing, domotic appliance control, search, simple data entry, preparation of structured documents, speech-to-text processing, and aircraft. BLiSS is trying to develop Hindi Speech Recognition. We have got success in deciphering of Hindi Alphabets without the need of individual training. The work is going on for the running words and sentences to be recognized.
Optical Character Recognition
Optical character recognition is the mechanical or electronic translation of scanned images of handwritten, typewritten or printed text into machine-encoded text. It is widely used to convert books and documents into electronic files, to computerize a record-keeping system in an office, or to publish the text on a website. OCR makes it possible to edit the text, search for a word or phrase, store it more compactly, display or print a copy free of scanning artifacts, and apply techniques such as machine translation, text-to-speech and text mining to it. OCR is a field of research in pattern recognition, artificial intelligence and computer vision. BLiSS is trying to develop Hindi Optical Character Recognition System.
Computer vision is the science and technology of machines that see, where see in this case means that the machine is able to extract information from an image that is necessary to solve some task. As a scientific discipline, computer vision is concerned with the theory behind artificial systems that extract information from images. The image data can take many forms, such as video sequences, views from multiple cameras, or multi-dimensional data from a medical scanner. Bliss is working on Hindi OCR and Finger Print Matching algorithms.
Telecommunication is the transmission of information, over significant distances, to communicate. Bliss is working on intelligent IVRSs, Voice XML gateways and VoiceXML Interpreters. In telecommunications, IVR allows customers to interact with a company’s database via a telephone keypad or by speech recognition, after which they can service their own inquiries by following the IVR dialogue. IVR systems can respond with prerecorded or dynamically generated audio to further direct users on how to proceed. IVR applications can be used to control almost any function where the interface can be broken down into a series of simple interactions. IVR systems deployed in the network are sized to handle large call volumes.
VoiceXML (VXML) is the W3C's standard XML format for specifying interactive voice dialogues between a human and a computer. It allows voice applications to be developed and deployed in an analogous way to HTML for visual applications. Just as HTML documents are interpreted by a visual web browser, VoiceXML documents are interpreted by a voice browser. A common architecture is to deploy banks of voice browsers attached to the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) to allow users to interact with voice applications over the telephone. VoiceXML assumes a voice browser with audio output, audio input, and keypad input. Audio input is handled by the voice browser's speech recognizer. Audio output consists both of recordings and speech synthesized by the voice browser's text-to-speech system. Bliss has launched Hindi VoiceXML Interpreter and Hindi VoiceXML Gateway.
Business software is generally any software program that helps a business to increase productivity or measure their productivity. BLiSS is working on Enterprise level software applications, such as enterprise resource planning, enterprise content management (ECM), business process management (BPM) and product lifecycle management. These applications are extensive in scope, and often come with modules that either add native functions, or incorporate the functionality of third-party software programs. BLiSS has a broader range of products for small or medium enterprises ranging from accounting, groupware, customer relationship management, human resources software, outsourcing relationship management, loan origination software, shopping cart software, field service software, and other productivity enhancing applications.
Web Enabled Applications
Web application is an application that is accessed over a network such as the Internet or an intranet. Web applications are very popular due to the ubiquity of web browsers, and the convenience of using a web browser as a client, sometimes called a thin client. The ability to update and maintain web applications without distributing and installing software on potentially thousands of client computers is a key reason for their popularity, as is the inherent support for cross-platform compatibility. Bliss has provided numerous websites and web enabled applications for so many Small and Medium Enterprises, Corporates, PSUs and Government Sectors. | <urn:uuid:03c65578-7d86-4cb7-a4dc-43d5d89d92c0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.blissit.org/research.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00025-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917234 | 1,345 | 1.992188 | 2 |
Explosion at Mexican oil giant Pemex HQ kills 25
Mexico City, February 1, 2013
A powerful explosion rocked the Mexico City headquarters of state-owned oil giant Pemex on Thursday, killing at least 25 people, injuring more than 100 and trapping others inside.
The mid-afternoon blast in a neighboring building shattered the lower floors of the downtown tower, throwing debris into the streets and sending frightened workers running outside.
A government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a preliminary line of investigation was that the blast came from a gas boiler that exploded in the adjacent Pemex building. But the cause was still being determined, the official added.
The explosion at the building complex, where thousands of Pemex employees worked, was the latest in a series of serious safety problems to hit Mexico's national oil monopoly.
Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio Chong said the blast killed at least 25 people, injured over 100, and that the number of casualties could rise.
Rescue workers were still searching for employees trapped inside the Pemex skyscraper on Thursday night. At least one person had been rescued alive, Osorio Chong said.
Mauricio Parra, a paramedic at the scene, said that as many as 100 people could be trapped at the offices of Pemex, a national institution that President Enrique Pena Nieto's administration has pledged to reform this year.
Police quickly cordoned off the building, and television images showed the explosion caused major damage to the ground floor and blew out windows on the lower floors of the tower.
"You could feel it all through the building," said Mario Guzman, a Pemex worker who was on the 10th floor of the building, which is more than 50 stories high.
First mistaking the blast for an earthquake, Guzman, who said he escaped after running down the stairs, feared the building would collapse on top of him and his colleagues, "and that we would end up like a sandwich."
Pemex said initially the tower was evacuated due to a problem with its electricity supply. It then said there had been an explosion, but did not say what caused it.
The Pemex blast occurred shortly before many workers were due to end their shifts at the complex.
The company said its business would not be affected by the incident and that it would continue to operate normally.
FORCE OF LAW
Earlier in the evening, Pena Nieto, who took office in December, went to the scene and said the explosion would be thoroughly investigated. He vowed to apply "the force of the law" if anyone was found to be responsible for it.
Mexican media reported that after the blast, security officials carried out a precautionary search of Congress for explosive devices, but found nothing.
Asked about this, Osorio Chong said normal security procedures were being followed, but added that "additional care" was being taken while the blast was being cleared up.
Helicopters buzzed around the building and lines of fire trucks sped to the entrance, while emergency workers ferried injured people through wreckage strewn on the street.
Search-and-rescue dogs were sent into the skyscraper, a Mexico City landmark that sports a distinctive "hat" on top.
Some families of people working in the tower were impatient for news about missing relatives.
Gloria Garcia, 53, herself a Pemex worker who was not in the building during the explosion, came to see if she could track down her son, who worked in one of the floors hit.
"I'm calling his phone and he's not answering," Garcia said, weeping as she called repeatedly on her phone. "Nobody knows anything. They won't let me through. I want to see my son whatever state he's in."
Pemex has experienced a number of deadly accidents in recent years and lesser safety problems have been a regular occurrence. In September, 30 people died after an explosion at a Pemex natural gas facility in northern Mexico.
More than 300 were killed when a Pemex natural gas plant on the outskirts of Mexico City exploded in 1984.
Eight years later, about 200 people were killed and 1,500 injured after a series of underground gas explosions in Guadalajara, Mexico's second biggest city. An official investigation found Pemex was partly to blame.
Alberto Islas, a security analyst at consultancy Risk Evaluation, said the explosion at the Pemex offices was another blot against the company's safety record.
"We've seen this time and again at Pemex. They don't have a well-integrated policy," Islas said, noting it would probably take several hours before investigators would be able to determine the cause of the explosion.
Pemex, a symbol of Mexican self-sufficiency since the oil industry was nationalized in 1938, has been held back by inefficiency and corruption and by the burden it shoulders of providing about a third of federal tax revenues.
Pena Nieto has pledged to open up the company to more private investment to improve its performance. – Reuters
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- Putin, Obama face off over Syria issue | <urn:uuid:325becdd-a99b-41c0-bc48-f8df0d58fef9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://tradearabia.com/news/INTNEWS_229976.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979291 | 1,165 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Even though George Orwell was a “democratic socialist” – or even a communist – his accurate prescience regarding the growth of totalitarianism, what it required to acquire and maintain power, and what it would do to men makes him unique among all other leftist writers who also wrote dystopian novels. His writing style, which stressed clarity and intellectual honesty in any kind of writing (his essays on this subject are marvelous), redeems him.
It is not for nothing that when the Obama administration proposes taking over the Internet, or when courts uphold the idea of “hate speech” or endorses the regulation of speech in schools and businesses and even in government itself, no one thinks it is Aldous “Huxleyian” or Thomas “Hobbesian.” It is immediately dubbed “Orwellian.” In terms of totalitarian methods and ends, Orwell literally wrote the book.
So when I first read of U.S. District Court Judge Gladys Kessler’s recent ruling on Obamacare, in which she states, among other things, that “mental activity” can be treated as “commerce,” even if that activity does not lead to observable, demonstrable action, and that no distinction can be made between the actions of one’s mind and physical actions, I immediately recalled a statement in Orwell’s novel Nineteen-Eighty Four:
Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime IS death.*
Judge Kessler, a Clinton appointee, has thus, whether she knows it or not, endorsed the notion of thought crime, or “crimethink.” The “thought crime” she is endorsing, which is not choosing to buy government-mandated health insurance after private consideration (or none at all), will not entail anything as severe as execution by the state. Instead, it would entail a hefty penalty (a special “tax”) on the recalcitrant, or even prison. Of course, paying the fine and/or serving time in prison may lead to one’s death, or at least to one’s reduced financial circumstances, but that is beside the point.
The details of the invidious fraud that is the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act are not the subject here. The particulars and mechanics of that scam have been written about extensively in other venues. What concerns us here is the attack on the mind, on the means of man’s survival.
Kessler’s ruling has been excoriated, mocked, and shredded by The Wall Street Journal, The American Spectator, Fox, and other leading news outlets. Five plaintiffs brought action against Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr., Kathleen Sebelius, secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, and Timothy F. Geithner of the United States Department of the Treasury. They argued that the individual or compulsory mandate of Obamacare would cause them financial hardship, that it was beyond the power of Congress to enact or unconstitutional, and that it reduced God to second-fiddle in terms of the deity guaranteeing their health and well-being.
The paragraph that invited the well-deserved fusillade appears on page 45 of the 64-page ruling:
As previous Commerce Clause cases have all involved physical activity, as opposed to mental activity, i.e. decision-making, there is little judicial guidance on whether the latter falls within Congress’s power. See Thomas More Law Ctr., 720 F.Supp.2d at 893 (describing the “activity/inactivity distinction” as an issue of first impression). However, this Court finds the distinction, which Plaintiffs rely on heavily, to be of little significance…It is pure semantics to argue that an individual who makes a choice to forgo health insurance is not ‘acting,’ especially given the serious economic and health-related consequences to every individual of that choice. Making a choice is an affirmative action on, whether one decides to do something or not do something. They are two sides of the same coin. To pretend otherwise is to ignore reality.
Words, to Kessler, mean nothing. They are merely “pure semantics” whose meanings will be what those with guns and laws mean them to be.
Avik Roy in Forbes shines a heat-intensive arc light on Kessler’s ruling:
The idea that you can pass an unconstitutional law to remedy a problem created by a prior act of Congress makes no sense. The more straightforward remedy is to repeal the old law, or fully fund it. If a dumb federal law drove New York’s newspapers into bankruptcy, would it be okay for the government to force you to subscribe to the New York Post?
Indeed, according to Judge Kessler, if Congress passed a law requiring restaurants and hotels to provide their services free of charge, it would then be okay for Congress to pass a second law forcing individuals to eat out and stay in hotels.
Whether or not “forgoing” health insurance can be defined as “not acting” or as a form of “acting” is irrelevant. Thinking about whether or not to purchase it is indeed “mental activity”; it may move one to purchase it, or it may stay one’s hand. Not buying it, according to Kessler’s illogic, comes under the aegis of the Commerce Clause in the Constitution. But what business has the government to begin assuming that one has or has not “thought” about it, and more, that it may, on the most specious and nearly laughable illogic, regulate this “mental activity”– indeed, punish it for not conforming to the individual mandate and just obey? That is, for not acting blindly?
The only way to avoid or escape punishment for nonfeasance – that is, a failure to do one’s duty and buy health insurance and help to spread the risk around and fulfill one’s office as a loyal, responsible citizen – is to literally not think, and purchase it. Snuck into this decision is the phenomenon of thought control. Why think about the issue at all? There are no other non-punishable options possible to a conscious mind. Thinking about it will just lead to sorrow. Congress and the government may “regulate” your thinking to the extent that you do not think, that is, if you engage in no “mental activity.” Heads you lose, tails you lose — your freedom.
Fox News summed up Kessler’s brainstorm this way:
The judge is saying this: “Anytime you make a choice not to act you are ‘acting.’”…Are you thinking about blogging about this subject now too? DANGER! YOU COULD BE REGULATED AND TAXED STOP!
And in not acting, you are acting, and therefore your non-action/ action may be regulated, and, if necessary, punished. In Kessler’s anti-Aristotelian universe, A may be non-A at the same time.
Let us concretize this illogic: After paying income taxes, sales taxes, all sorts of government fees and excises, you are able to set aside some money which you put into a savings account, or the money market, or an insurance policy, or some other rewarding venue. That is, you choose not to spend it. You are not acting to spend your money. You invest it and forget it. Your money earns interest. But, the interest you managed to earn by the end of the next year by not acting – is taxed.
In this instance, you choose not to spend money on a health insurance policy you don’t want or need and save money. The money not spent will be taxed. The IRS beat Kessler to the punch decades ago in the real realm of tangible wealth. Kessler has moved into the realm of the mind.
That is Kessler’s non-action/action in action. She is now proposing that this horrific scheme be applied to one’s mind in the realm of socialized medicine. This is not only an assault on epistemology and reason. It is a denial of metaphysics. Kessler is the last person in the world to accuse anyone of “pretending” to ignore reality.
A Congressionally “regulated” mind under the Commerce Clause is one that simply agrees with anything an advocate of Obamacare says about it. On the other side of Kessler’s coin are the three slogans of Orwell’s totalitarian state: War is Peace. Ignorance is Strength. Freedom is Slavery.
To which Judge Gladys Kessler has added another: Meaning is Meaningless. Never mind what the Framers “meant.”
*Orwell’s Nineteen-Eighty Four: Text, Sources, Criticism. Ed. by Irving Howe. (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1963), p. 20. | <urn:uuid:75c16c77-bf63-44a1-800b-2fe8298ea781> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://capitalismmagazine.com/2011/03/court-endorses-thought-crime/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947404 | 1,873 | 1.554688 | 2 |
[Editor's note: Fun visual narrative guide to the Federal Reserve system and it's roll in the U.S. economy.]
Republished from Mint.com and WallStats.com.
The Federal Reserve steers the American economy and yet it remains a system that is shrouded in mystery. Few understand the logic behind its policy decisions, decisions that have a profound effect on the US economy. And over the years it has operated seemingly independently of the more democratically elected arms of the US government. Its public stance, generally lacking in transparency has fueled conspiracy theories. Some even suggest its formation lead directly to the Great Depression.
So just what is the Federal Reserve? Why was it formed in the first place? And how does its monetary policy affect the lives of everyday US citizens? Here we do our part to demystify the Federal Reserve. | <urn:uuid:a48f4d2b-f0be-4f79-a3ea-8f0e9021e249> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kelsocartography.com/blog/?tag=demystify | 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 | 0.959941 | 171 | 2.625 | 3 |
It is reminiscent of a kid i knew who loved to proclaim that wearing a seatbelt in a car isnt safe because he knew someone who might have survived a crash if they had been thrown from the car. Mostly he just wanted attention and to demonstrate via his outlandish claim that he was therefore "an independent thinker". Others recoiling only seemed to support his sense of how wisely independent he was.
I hear that all the time too. He's not wrong, technically, sort-of. People have died due to injuries caused by a seatbelt (though, I'd venture to say that any impact so great it could cause your seatbelt to kill you, would have been more than enough to kill you without it). People have also run off of bridges, been trapped in the water, and because of panic, unable to get their seatbelt off and drowned. HOWEVER, a whole lot more people have avoided death by wearing it. We know from numerous studies, some basic logic and understanding of what happens in an accident, AND many many statistical understandings, that you are more likely to survive with a seatbelt ON. Again, if you don't wanna wear it that's none of my business, but don't tell me you are doing it for SAFETY. That's just an excuse people use because they want to justify it!
Statistics can be manipulated, but I don't think any of these statistics are an out-and-out lie. Unemployment is an oft manipulated statistic because of how it's recorded. For example, after two years of being out of work, you are no longer unemployed. A person being laid off of a $50,000 a year factory job who then finds work for $12,000 a year part time, is no longer unemployed. Sometimes we can get a false sense of what's going on thanks to those statistics. That's why it's important to look at EXACTLY what is going on. What EXACTLY is being recorded.
People always throw out anecdotal stuff to somehow debunk years of studies. I met a guy once who claimed NOT wearing a helmet saved his life. He wrecked, and he slid into a lawn mower deck in a guys yard face first and broke his jaw in several places and knocked out most of his teeth. He figured that his bones 'breaking' lessened the impact, whereas if he had a helmet on, it would have snapped his neck from the impact. What he evidently wasn't aware of, is A) There really aren't recorded cases of neck injuries caused by a helmet. and B) That's how a helmet works! If he had a full face on, then the chin bar would flex with the rest of the helmet to dull the impact, and the internal liners would crush. If he had a 3/4 or half helmet, then, it would have been the same outcome!
"8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us."
Romans 5:8 (NIV)
2006 Vulcan 900 Classic LT "Couch-a-Saki/Mini-Bagger" Fire and Steel Highway Bars w/ pegs, Mustang seat, Harley-Davidson King TourPak, Mutazu MU Hard Bags, Rick's Stator, and more to come!
2011 Honda Shadow Aero 750 (Wife's) Memphis shades windshield, and one happy new rider!
Member of the Christian Motorcyclist Association
Patriot Guard Rider
In my younger days (80's thru 90's) I kayaked whitewater rivers. Strangely enough, I never questioned running a river without a PFD or helmet. There were no requirements that I had to wear either, but I did. Of the thousands of people I've seen in kayaks I never saw one without their gear on. Maybe because it was implied that you were at some point going to be upside down banging your head off of rocks and you might need to stay conscious for self rescue. Anyway - I do the same each time I or my wife and I take to the bike. FF helmets and textile wear head to toe. People have asked how can you stand wearing gear like that when it's hot (actually, I feel pretty comfortable) out? I tell them, the only time I need to wear it; is when I'm in a crash and leave it at that.
No matter how hot, law or no law, I will still wear a helmet. The last thing I heard when I was side-swipped by car was the CRUNCH of my helmet as I hit the road. Other body parts were not so lucky but eventually healed.
2011 Vulcan Voyager 1700
Kuryakyn black ISO grips
Vance & Hines Twin Slash slip-ons
GPS holder // Garmin C580
RAM cup holder // Trunk Rack
Scala Rider G9 ProSet
I wear a bell Revolver Modular. If I get hot, I ride with the visor up and the shades down. I open the front at intersections or low speed. What it boiled down to for me was 1st: I am ugly enough without a bunch of road rash or a caved in face. 2nd: When I was 14, I was hit by a car on my dirt bike when my brakes failed and I could not stop on the trail and went into the road. My Helmet saved my life because it first hit the car, then the pavement. All I ended up with was bruises and 6 stitches in my ankle. Never ever will I consider riding without a helmet. I also got real serious about the face shield after a 55mph bumble bee won the battle with my face. Bike got a windshield too!
To each his own...I bounced off enough trees and dumped enough blood & skin while growing up trailing so I NEVER even take a short jaunt to the store without ALL my gear ("HAT", glasses, leather coat and boots). But as said here "to each his own"...I have a full face, a 3/4 and a skull....for me it depends on what the weather is like as to what I wear that day...Grew up with the habit and when I started street riding it just came natural to gear up to go with a better chance of returning in the same shape as when I left....lots of my bud's ride bare and some even tease me about how I look...but I just give them that same old smile and they know what it means without saying a word...
In IL, there's no law. It's a perfect example of why we don't need laws on books: you chose to follow a suggestion or not. No guarantee anything bad will happen, but if it does you know that wearing a helmet is better than not. Any NFL fan knows what happens when you hit your head at much slower speeds with something far softer than a tree.
Any Twins fans here? Justin Morneau was out a year+ from bumping his head into another guys KNEE. Not tree, knee.
I like my brain and my face. I'm a pretty, pretty man. No need to let some mean old asphalt ruin what my mama worked so hard to create.
2007 Vulcan 900 Custom - black and debadged
Cobra dragster pipes
Kaw sissy bar | <urn:uuid:cb8943b1-6cee-41c7-a695-e6486c0b2b73> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.vulcanforums.com/forums/showthread.php?p=271735 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978107 | 1,504 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Spacewalking Cosmonauts Upgrade International Space Station
Expedition 25 Flight Engineers Oleg Skripochka (left) and Fyodor Yurchikhin, both Russian cosmonauts, work outside the International Space Station during a Nov. 15, 2010 spacewalk that lasted about six hours.
CREDIT: NASA TV
Two spacewalking cosmonauts ventured outside the International Space Station today (Nov. 15) and sped through a veritable laundry list of orbital maintenance jobs, with only a stubborn TV camera preventing them from completing their work.
Veteran spacewalker Fyodor Yurchikhin and first-timer Oleg Skripochka, both of Russia's Federal Space Agency, spent about six and a half hours floating outside the space station to install a new staging ground for future spacewalking crews along with several other maintenance tasks.
All went relatively smoothly until their last task, when the cosmonauts were to move a TV camera from one spot to another on one of the station's Russian-built docking modules. Insulation around the module blocked repeated efforts to secure it in place.? [Graphic: The International Space Station Inside and Out]
Russian mission controllers decided to postpone that job for a later spacewalk since the cosmonauts were running out of time and needed to go back inside.
"Now we have a clear understanding of what is going to be done next," Mission Control radioed.
Another minor hiccup came earlier in the Russian-managed spacewalk when the cosmonauts saw an object floating away and worried that a tool may have escaped in space. They will have to double check their tool bags to make sure they have everything. If an item isn't secured at all times to a spacewalker or the spacecraft, it can easily get lost in microgravity.
Despite starting about a 30 minutes late, at around 9:53 a.m. EDT (1453 GMT), Yurchikhin and Skripochka worked at breakneck pace and were often ahead of schedule.
In fact, the spacewalkers were speeding through their work so fast that at one point mission controllers had to force them to take a break.
When Skripochka appeared overeager to continue working, Mission Control radioed, "We asked you not to work. I can see how he's moving to the handrail. Oleg, you have to stop, you have to rest."
Yet that was easier said than done.
"It is not as easy as it seems to be," Skripochka said, complaining that it was tough to be still. "I think I'll get cold if I stay without movement any longer."
Altogether, the spacewalkers completed a bevy of tasks, including installing the new workstation designed to aid in future maintenance work, removing an old experiment to test an Internet-based control system for the station's robotic arm, and collecting samples from the insulation of an oxygen-generation machine to look for signs of microorganisms there. They also attached a new science experiment to test the effects of the space environment on a series of materials.
The spacewalkers are two of six crewmembers living aboard the International Space Station now as part of the Expedition 25 mission. NASA astronaut Doug Wheelock is commanding the mission, while Skripochka, Yurchikhin, cosmonaut Alexander Kaleri and NASA astronauts Shannon Walker and Scott Kelly are serving as flight engineers
- Life on a Space Station: Q&A With NASA's Chief Astronaut Peggy Whitson
- Graphic: The International Space Station Inside and Out, ISS: By The Numbers
- Video Show - Inside the International Space Station, Construction Photos
MORE FROM SPACE.com | <urn:uuid:b0e9cf5f-4c17-4fd9-8d6b-bc6a0a933628> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.space.com/9532-spacewalking-cosmonauts-upgrade-international-space-station.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94802 | 771 | 2.5625 | 3 |
Two Brigham Young University grads are on Potty Patrol. Tait Eyre and Tim Fuhriman are marketing a new diaper that helps junior learn the basics of where and when to go. When junior does something in a Potty Patrol diaper, an alarm goes off and plays "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star." Eyre and Fuhriman are both fathers. They say while Potty Patrol costs a little more, it can help get youngsters out of diapers sooner. A local paper (Daily Herald) reports the diapers are now being test marketed in Utah.
See how it works by clicking HERE.
According to the company's website PottyPatrol.com:
Potty Training Alarm Diapers are designed to notify you and your child when wetting occurs, so that you can place your child on the toilet immediately. Being placed on the toilet while the event is still fresh in your child’s mind helps them make the connection between cause and effect more quickly and effectively. Potty Patrol reduces the need for random sits on the potty! Many children interpret this as punishment, because they don’t understand why they are confined to the potty for extended periods of time. Worse yet, if they don’t need to go to the bathroom at that time, they may feel they have failed, because they are unable to meet their parents’ expectations. Potty Patrol encourages success, because it ensures that children go to the bathroom for one purpose…to use it! | <urn:uuid:5badd562-0f36-47a2-88ef-194906032e3b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.clickondetroit.com/lifestyle/family/Potty-Patrol-Diapers-armed-with-alarms/-/2300348/15618870/-/14sk734z/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00057-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950344 | 306 | 2.15625 | 2 |
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS)
The Weill Cornell Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) Program at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical College offers a new, safe and effective option for patients suffering from major depression whose symptoms persist despite prior treatment attempts with antidepressant medications.
Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) is designed for adults, 18 years of age and older. TMS involves the administration of a small magnetic field over the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, one of the areas implicated in depression. TMS therapy has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of depression in individuals who have not achieved satisfactory improvement despite the use of antidepressants. Using very short pulses of magnetic energy to alter the activity of nerve cells in the brain, TMS involves no radiation or electrical stimulation, and requires no anesthesia. Patients remain awake and alert during the procedure. The standard outpatient treatment typically lasts for 40 minutes, and is performed under the supervision of a psychiatrist. The number of sessions recommended is based on the individual patient's need and response to treatment. For most patients, treatment is administered daily, for four to six weeks.
Weill Cornell Medical College faculty from the Department of Psychiatry provide expert evaluation of patients and consistent monitoring throughout the course of treatment. Co-Executive Directors George Alexopoulos, M.D. and Stephen Ferrando, M.D. oversee the TMS site located in Manhattan. Bruce Leuchter, M.D., board certified in Psychiatry and trained, as well, in Neurology, serves as the TMS Program Director. Staff physicians include Marc Dubin, MD, Vassilios Latoussakis, MD, Nabil Kotbi, MD and Darlene Mitera, MD.
To make an appointment or referral to the TMS Program, or to learn additional information, please contact the TMS Treatment Coordinator at 212-746-3793 or e-mail to TMSinfo@med.cornell.edu
Follow us on: | <urn:uuid:62905311-6775-488b-963f-e2d8889e64fc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://weillcornell.org/practice/TMS/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.902375 | 424 | 1.835938 | 2 |
"Granted: I'm an inmate in a mental institution…" So begins Oskar Matzerath, narrator of Günter Grass's 1959 debut. With the help of one of his titular drums, Oskar recounts – not always reliably – the extraordinary events of his first 30 years: arresting his own physical development on his third birthday by throwing himself downs the stairs; "singshattering" glass with his otherworldly voice; impregnating his father's second wife; his key role in the deaths of his parents; finding independence as a stonemason, then later an artist's model and recording artist in the German postwar economic miracle.
Set primarily in Grass's native Danzig, the shadow of Nazism hangs heavy over the first two-thirds of the book, with Kristallnacht, the fall of Poland and ultimately the Soviet capture of the city all refracted through Oskar's eyes, as is the plight of German refugees struggling westwards ahead of the Red Army.
But it's Grass's dazzling use of language that sets The Tin Drum apart, as he spins a dense verbal web alive with wordplay and innovation. It's no coincidence that Oskar enjoys a stint with a jazz band, as there is an uninhibited, free-flowing musicality to the telling of his life story.
To mark The Tin Drum's 50th anniversary, its publishers around the world have commissioned a series of new translations, overseen by Grass himself. Breon Mitchell has reinstated much of the rhythm of the German original, as well as restoring some overtly sexual references thought too shocking for British audiences half a century ago. Given Grass's close involvement with this new translation, it is fair to call this the definitive version of arguably the most important German novel of the postwar era. | <urn:uuid:a654095e-60d9-41d0-a569-dbd2bc0484a7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/nov/08/tin-drum-gunter-grass-review | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972421 | 367 | 1.875 | 2 |
The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) is a federal law that gives individuals access to federal agency records. You can ask to review most federal records, except those that are protected from public viewing.
healthfinder.gov is a service of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. If you wish to file a Freedom of Information Act request related to this Web site, you must follow the
Department's FOIA guidelines.
For a general overview of the Freedom of Information Act, visit the
U.S. Department of Justice's FOIA Home Page.
Before submitting a FOIA request, please review the about us section of
healthfinder.gov to learn if the information you are looking for is available on this Web site. | <urn:uuid:ac969901-d5e9-4dc6-85fb-4890f0c18a64> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.healthfinder.gov/AboutUs/FOIA.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.918181 | 150 | 1.867188 | 2 |
Industry driven by water power
In 1859, a blacksmith named Christian Zinck opened a hammer works in the old Godthaab paper mill south of Aalborg. Together with his son Niels, he developed the hammer works into a business that was famous throughout Denmark for producing tools and equipment for…
Study trip – or early industrial espionage?
Christian Zinck was a self-taught blacksmith. Before opening his small water-powered hammer works in Sejlflod in 1845, he went on a study trip to Grejsdalens Hammer Works. The smith is said to have walked all the way from North Jutland to Vejle to sneak a look at the work's water-powered blacksmiths hammer. In 1859, Zinck bought the old Godthaab paper mill and transformed it into a large hammer works. His son Niels trained in Copenhagen but was summoned home. His father met him with a question: Have you any money, Niels?" Niels had to loan his father 50 rix-dollars to get the paperwork in order. That worried him more than a little. But before long, the waterwheel at the hammer works was turning steadily and money was flowing in. "
Contribute to Godthaab Hammer Works
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Contribute with links | <urn:uuid:988eff87-e8c9-4b4e-be8a-fa6a9efcad14> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kulturarv.dk/1001fortaellinger/en_GB/godthaab-hammer-works/stories/study-trip-or-early-industrial-espionage | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968673 | 292 | 2.34375 | 2 |
Bush Pleased With Progress, Expects Iraq to Treat POWs Humanely
By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, March 23, 2003 President Bush is pleased with progress the military is making in the early stages of the war to rid Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction, he said during a press availability at the White House.
Bush said it is going to take awhile to achieve the objective, "but we're on course, we're determined, and we're making good progress."
The president indicated he didn't know all the details of the Americans being taken prisoner in Iraq. Iraqi television videotape of soldiers being questioned was broadcast on al Jazeera a satellite news network based in the Persian Gulf.
It "appears likely" that the American soldiers were captured, Bush said, adding, "I do know that we expect them to be treated humanely, just like we treat any prisoner of theirs humanely."
Bush observed that Iraqi prisoners "are surrendering gleefully" because they know they will be well-treated.
He said Saddam Hussein is losing control of Iraq and that the coalition is achieving its objective. "It's important for the American people to realize that this war has just begun," the president stated.
"In terms of the overall strategy, we're just in the opening phases, and we're executing a plan that will make it easier to achieve our objectives and spare innocent lives."
Bush said he is proud of the coalition troops in showing their bravery and skill. "Most of the south is in coalition hands," he said, adding the air campaign is going well, and there is progress in the western part of Iraq.
"We have a game plan and a strategy to free the Iraqi people of Saddam Hussein and rid his country of weapons of mass destruction, and we're on plan," the president said. | <urn:uuid:aef25ee6-0248-4481-983c-ad924d78d977> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.defense.gov/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ID=29246 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975124 | 377 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Monday, June 21, 2010
In what must have seemed like a scene right out of the film 8 Heads In A Duffel Bag, Southwest Airline cargo workers in Little Rock Arkansas recently made a grisly discovery. Imagine your typical baggage handlers tossing around luggage and boxes and things in the cargo warehouse when all of a sudden a human head rolls across the floor. I don't know if it happened that way or not but somehow workers discovered 40 to 60 whole and partial human heads.
WTF? Yep, and after a little tete-a-tete they contacted the authorities. Now the airline would normally ship "human specimens for medical purposes" but in this instance it seems the cargo of craniums wasn't packaged properly. They were in plastic containers closed with duct tape as opposed to being vacuum sealed. Huh! Well, sure, that's a no-brainer.
Now, for me, this story raises a couple of questions. Number one is where the hell do the heads come from? Do people donate their heads to science? Not that I'm aware of. Didn't guillotines go out with the French revolution? And partial heads? Does somebody chop whole heads into pieces because they can get more for the parts? And where do they do this work? In a "head" shop?
The heads are destined for "a doctors' continuing education program". I guess when they learn their patients come with a whole body to be treated they'll think they were better off a head.
This story certainly gives new meaning to getting ahead.
Oh and if you haven't seen 8 Heads In A Duffel Bag with Joe Pesci, here's the trailer from the 1997 film... | <urn:uuid:217112a7-3636-4651-a19c-66e7af568e3f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://nonamedufus.blogspot.com/2010/06/getting-ahead.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968264 | 347 | 1.835938 | 2 |
In the early morning hours of 31 May 1936, Margaret Jacobs was awakened by a “lumbering in the kitchen.” She awoke to find the lights blown out and exclaimed, “Lord, have mercy! There is a ‘reefer’ man in here.” She saw someone going out the back door, and “he whirled right around then and ran though the front of the house, and then the gun fired twice.” That’s when she heard her son, George Collins, yell out “Lord, have mercy! I am shot.” Margaret Jacobs sought help from her neighbors, calling out, “Somebody come here. A ‘reefer’ man has been in here and shot George.” George later died at the Petersburg Hospital from sepsis as a result of the gunshot wound. Neither George Collins nor Margaret Jacobs knew who the shooter was, but a witness was able to identify a man he saw coming out of the home, who had earlier been to his house asking for George. Witnesses believed the shooter to be James Hines, alias Slim, but police were never able to connect Hines to the crime.
While processing Petersburg (Va.) Coroners’ Inquisitions, 1807-1947, I found these references to the “reefer man” intriguing. Early in Virginia’s history, the Jamestown Colony made cannabis cultivation mandatory because hemp was viewed as a critical crop for rope, clothing, and canvas. After the formation of the … read more » | <urn:uuid:3994aeaf-889c-434b-bd80-d30d7977e0f9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.virginiamemory.com/blogs/out_of_the_box/tag/reefer-madness/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969408 | 323 | 2.25 | 2 |
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- German automaker Volkswagen is flipping the on switch for a new solar park at its Tennessee assembly plant.
The 33-acre array has a capacity to produce more than 13 gigawatt hours of electricity per year. That's the equivalent of the amount of energy used by 1,200 homes in the Chattanooga area each year.
Volkswagen says the new solar park will meet about 12.5 percent of the plant's electricity needs during full production, and will power all of its operations during off-peak periods.
The solar park will be owned and operated by Silicon Ranch, a company run by former aids to ex-Gov. Phil Bredesen, who played a key role in persuading Volkswagen to select the site for the assembly plant.
VW will buy the power under a 20-year purchasing agreement.
Designed by Gray Digital Media | <urn:uuid:f508e2bd-c3ae-4bc4-9f9f-d67a5c2365c8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.local8now.com/news/state/headlines/Tennessee-Volkswagen-plant-powers-up-solar-park-188074321.html?site=mobile | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948853 | 183 | 2.03125 | 2 |
Having no electrical, gas, water, and/or sewer capability for a building.
1. Relocate all persons within proximity of building to an alternate location.
2. Notify campus safety or physical plant regarding the specific problems.
3. Make appropriate arrangements to accommodate the duration of interruption.
4. Housing – use Recreation Center – take beds from Garbee to the Rec Center.
5. Food – Provide transportation to and from the elementary school for student meals.
6. Utilities – Physical plant will contact appropriate utility company to work on restoring capability as soon as possible.
As you exit a damaged building be aware of the structural damage, exit a building only if it is safe to do so. If not then remain where you are at and call out for help. Again do not move injured individuals unless there is a life-threatening situation.
Assisting those with Disabilities, Evacuation Guidelines
It is recommended that for residents of Garbee Hall, Lee Towers and Hofmaster apartments a “Buddy System” be implemented. A volunteer along with alternate volunteers be paired with a person with disabilities to assist them with evacuating the building, staff personal should be made aware of these arraignments. For all other buildings on campus a “Buddy System” can be implemented as well along with staff and faculty assistance.
Persons with Visual Impairments
Inform the individual of the nature of the emergency, offer to guide him/her. As you evacuate the building advise the individual that you are with where you are at, where you are going, obstacle in the way and any other important information. Do not take the individual that you are guiding by the arm, offer your arm instead.
Persons with Hearing Impairments
Writing a note telling the individual of the danger and the safest evacuation route
Tapping the person he shoulder or turning the light switch on and off to gain attention, then indicating through gestures, or in writing, what is happening and what to do. A visual alarm will be installed in the dorm room of a hearing impaired student as well.
Persons Using Crutches, Cane or Walkers
If the individual is having trouble exiting the building in a quick and safe manner then they may be carried out of the building. Options such as the fireman’s carry, two-person locked arm carry may be used. Also the person can be carried out while simply sitting in a chair.
Non - Ambulatory Persons
If assistance is needed remember lifting someone in this state may be painful and may cause injury. Frequently, non-ambulatory individuals have respiratory complications. Remove them from smoke or fumes immediately. Always consult with the person that is being evacuated so to their preference with regard to:
1. Ways of being removed from the wheelchair.
2. The number of people necessary for assistance.
3. Whether to extend or move extremities when lifting because of pain, catheter bags, braces, etc.
4. Whether a seat cushion or pad should be brought along if he/she is removed from the chair.
5. Being carried forward or backward on a flight of stairs.
6. After-care, if removed from the wheelchair.
7. Once outside you are not to re-enter the structure for any reason.
Once the emergency personnel are on the scene they will be in charge of the scene. The emergency personal will determine when or if it is safe to return to a building. The emergency personnel will also be the one to turn the scene back over to the university.
If there are casualties then the following area will be used as the triage area, providing that the building is still structurally sound and there are no other dangers getting in and out of the building the order of the area of usage is in this order:
1. Recreation Center
2. Dorman Gym
3. Auditorium in Colgrove Walker
4. Tennis Courts
The designated landing zone for the life flight helicopter will be as follows:
Primary: Football practice fields on the East side of campus.
Hazard Note: On the West side of the fields is a power line
Secondary: The oval area on the North side of campus.
Hazard Note: On the East side of the oval is a very tall flagpole
First Aid Kits
First aid kits are located in the following areas:
- Garbee Hall: Cabinet in the security office
- Andres Building: Housekeeping room 127
- Alexander Dickman: Registrar’s office
- Colgrove Walker: Roadrunners lounge
- Library: Circulation desk
- Baker Hebron: Chemistry lab
- Dorman Gym: Training room
- Parker Fox: Front desk
- Professional Building: Lounge
- Rec Center: Front desk and through out the building attached to the wall
- Edgar Fine Arts: Ceramics studio room 103
- Facilities & Management Services: Office & grounds
Sodexho Campus Services will provide cold meal bag lunches; meals may also be prepared on university grills. Bottled water will be brought in for drinking. The University will provide a generator for Sodexho for refrigeration purposes. Porta Potties will be brought in for the waste matters. Students may be housed in Dorman Gym or the Recreation Center as needed.
The 1-800 phone number will be designated as the emergency 24-hour hotline number that parents may call.
The Incident Management and Communications Team will notify parents of the situation and the status of their child.
There are several different options that are available to Upper Iowa University in regards to counseling. Upper Iowa University has on staff Laurie Kirkpatrick who is the Director of Counseling Services. Staff members of Student Development will also be available. The following local clergy are available as well: Abundant Life Christian Fellowship 425-3511, First United Methodist Church 425-4126, St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church 425-3184, Grace Lutheran Church 425-3544, Fayette Community Church 425-3551. Also available is the North East Iowa Mental Health Center and Alcohol Related Problem Center 1297 S. Frederick Avenue Oelwein, Iowa 50662 1-563-283-5774 or 1-800-372-6744
All media related questions or concerns need to go through the office of Dr. Edward Ogle, office number 425-5284. The alternate to him is Don Aungst, office phone number 425-5286.
Assisting Those with Disabilities | <urn:uuid:c4db88ac-9b5b-4b94-913d-3577e921598a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://uiu.edu/emergencypreparedness/fayettecampus/poutage.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.915324 | 1,342 | 2.546875 | 3 |
Hundreds of students and some staff at Cal Poly Pomona were being warned today that a student may have exposed them to tuberculosis.
According to the university, public health officials notified campus administrators that a student might have become infected with tuberculosis, although the diagnosis had not yet been confirmed.
Health officials urged anyone who had close contact with the student to have a TB test.
About 375 students and 20 faculty and staff who may have had repeated contact with the student have been identified, according to a notice posted on the university’s website.
The student’s name was withheld for privacy reasons.
Email notices were sent to the potentially impacted students and faculty members, and the campus Student Health Services center was offering free TB testing for students.
Affected faculty and staff were urged to get tested through their regular health care providers.
“The student did not live on campus,” according to the online notice. “He attended classes in physics, engineering, computer science and ethnic and women’s students during the fall and winter quarters. He has withdrawn from his classes this quarter and is receiving treatment. His prognosis is good at this time.” | <urn:uuid:f8b581a9-3843-4c02-bb66-9de5bed47974> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.swrnn.com/2013/03/08/tuberculosis-scare-at-cal-poly-pomona/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00035-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.988326 | 240 | 1.859375 | 2 |
If you are a reader of the Internet (as you’re reading this online I’ll assume you are) then you know all about blogging and how interesting, educational and informative it can be. Have you ever thought about the content that you are reading when you read a blog? Did you know that there is such a thing as content articles that people put in their blogs to help attract readers to their site? It’s true—and if you have a blog, you can make use of content articles to help boost the popularity of your blog.
When you add good quality content articles to your blog, you can attract more readers to your blog in a variety of ways. Here are a few reasons why content articles are a good idea if you are looking to boost your readership.
Keywords are important: Nothing will attract more readers to your site faster than keywords. When a person puts in certain words in an Internet search sites, websites that contain those words will show up first. For example, if you are a small business owner that sells latex balloons, then you can have content articles that contain the keywords “latex balloons”. When a reader or potential customer types in those words, your site (providing a web crawler has found it) will pop up.
Informative and educational: Content articles are informative, educational and yes, entertaining. If you are not good at writing, you can easily find web content writers to help you fill your blog with content articles. Your readers want to read something that pertains to them-they do not want to waste his or her time reading garbled information that have no value or use to them. Content articles can help you solve this problem by giving them what they are looking for.
Update often: When you use content articles on your Internet blogs, you can easily update your information whenever you see fit. This means that if you want to provide your reader with updated content articles every day or every other day, your readers will not get bored reading the same content day after day. In fact, if you make use of a good content article writer, you can order several articles on various topics at the same time. Then, you can post when you feel it is necessary. You will never run out of information and you can be sure that your readers will appreciate the regular updates.
More hits: When you have a library of content articles on your website and blog, you will soon find that you get more hits to your blog. This is important because that means that you are reaching a wide audience and you are building reader loyalty. When they come to your blog, they know they will have something that will keep them coming back for more. This is an extremely effective marketing tool for businesses, as loyal readers will soon become loyal customers. Having fresh content each day will ensure that these readers will come back and might even recommend your site to others.
So, if you are just dabbling in the world of blogging, you can certainly increase the traffic to your website by using good content articles. Whether your write the articles yourself, or you hire a writer to do it for you, your readers will enjoy your blog more. When you start posting content articles, make sure you take the time to find information that is pertinent to you and your business (if you are a business owner) and your readers. Blogging is a big business and content articles can help your blog succeed. | <urn:uuid:c5662f63-66d3-4421-8b7b-bc6cd228fb92> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://traffikco.com/why-content-articles-help-boost-your-seo/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943265 | 700 | 1.742188 | 2 |
- Hits: 10596
Where is Cobourg?
The Town of Cobourg is one hour East of Toronto via Highway 401 and is on the shore of Lake Ontario, in Ontario, Canada. Go to Google for a map on how to get here. Additional maps - current and historical - can be found here.
More on Living in Cobourg.
The History of Cobourg has been well documented and now a large amount of this is on the web - see the site CobourgHistory.ca.
The major feature of Cobourg is the waterfront on Lake Ontario where there is a Marina (run by the Town of Cobourg), Yacht club, very popular sandy beach and an extensive Park area. The photo at the top of each page on this site shows the Harbour Entrance.
See our Photo Gallery
Performances by many groups and Events (such as the annual Waterfront Festival) keep residents and visitors entertained.
One of the legacies of the boom in the mid 1800's is Victoria Hall (above). After restoration in ~1980, it now plays a key role in the town with a Council meeting room, Art Gallery and Concert Hall. More.
And of course, being in the heart of UEL territory, the Canada Day parade is a big affair and is led by the Cobourg Concert band. The history of this band goes back a long way (more) and every year, they participate in joint Historical re-enactments in Plattsburg, New York.
In 2011, according to the Census, Cobourg's population was 18,519 and English was the mother language for 93% (in 2006) of us.
For a list of web sites based in Cobourg, see Cobourg on the Web.
For the latest information on Fares, route and schedule, click here.
See our new page which tells you how to find what's on in Cobourg.
If you live in Cobourg you might want to know what's happening - road works, major store closures and openings, changes in Parks planning and overall planning and more. Updated regularly. Municipal Information.
Business Support in Cobourg
There is a good network of organizations both municipal and private to support business in Cobourg. We are a business friendly town. More here.
21st Annual Waterfront Festival
The weather for the 2012 July 1st weekend was perfect (again) - sunny and warm but not hot. As usual, the Lions, Rotary Club and the town staged the annual Waterfront Festival. The slide show above gives you a feel for it.
July 1st saw a Canada Day parade (photos below) then for the 3 days of the weekend, the Lions had their fine art display and the Rotary Club had their upscale Arts and Crafts tent. In addition, the Lions organized the popular beer tent and miscellaneous vendors in Victoria Park. The crowd on the magnificent beach was large (as usual) and there was entertainment in the bandshell all weekend. (Festival site here for more).
Photos below, clockwise: Polar Bear Dip Feb 16; 2012 Canada Day Parade - float and kids watching; RCMP Musical ride in June. Click any photo to enlarge then scroll through all four. | <urn:uuid:623b3be4-ee65-4d28-8605-3e3e9796f3e9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cobourginternet.ca/about-cobourg | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940899 | 675 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Shelly Gehshan, Director, Pew Children's Dental Campaign
September 15, 2011 — An unemployed, 24-year-old Ohio man died in late August after a tooth infection spread to his brain. An emergency room physician had prescribed an antibiotic for Kyle Willis but he had no dental insurance and couldn’t afford to fill the prescription.
Adults without dental care often lacked care as children. The Ohio incident recalls the tragic death of Maryland 12-year-old Deamonte Driver, who died in 2007 of an untreated toothache because his mother could not find a dentist to treat her Medicaid-enrolled son. Nationwide, more than 16 million children go each year without seeing a dentist. Pew’s Shelly Gehshan discusses the gap in care.
Q: Stories like that of Kyle Willis or Deamonte Driver generate national attention. But what do they tell us about the overall dental care system in the country?
A: People need to know that we can fix this problem. We can fix it partly by educating people about prevention and how and when to seek care. But we also have a system that doesn’t work well for certain populations. If you’re in a rural area, if you’re low-income, if you’re uninsured, you are going to have a lot of difficulty accessing dental care as it is currently structured. The safety net system consists mostly of federally subsidized clinics, and they’re effective, but they only reach about 10 percent of the underserved. We need to expand the safety net so it reaches the people who need the care before crises occur.
Q: In 2010, the Affordable Care Act was enacted. Will the new law help to improve children’s access to dental care, especially for low-income populations?
A: The policy community scored some important victories with health care reform, and one of them is that all children will have dental coverage by 2014. That is good news, but it also presents a challenge. About 5 million more children will have dental coverage than have it now, and we already have access problems. Our advice to states is, get ready, expand your system, do as much prevention as you can, look at your dental workforce and get moving. Because we’re not prepared to take care of what is going to be a huge influx of children who need and deserve care.
Q: What can states be doing between now and 2014 to ensure they are better prepared to serve all of the children who will have dental coverage under the new health care law?
A: States have a lot of options. About a dozen are looking at new types of dental providers they can develop. There are several different models. One is adding new training for hygienists, so they can perform a broader range of services. Another model allows community health workers to perform different types of dental services. A third model uses what’s called a dental therapist, which is a primary care provider who can do routine care, similar to a nurse practitioner or a physician’s assistant. Minnesota passed a law that established two new types of providers. A number of other states are also looking at how to use the existing workforce, meaning hygienists and dental assistants, to expand the capacity of clinics and dental practices.
Q: Pew has been working with the American Academy of Pediatrics and Voices for America’s Children to get pediatricians more involved in oral health. What impact has that made?
A: What we have done together is increase the number of states where Medicaid agencies reimburse pediatricians for providing preventative dental care to young children. We went from 28 states having approved reimbursement in 2008 to 44 now adopting this policy. For example, Oklahoma decided in August to reimburse pediatricians for administering fluoride varnish, which is a huge victory.
Most young children don’t see dentists—they see pediatricians. Those pediatricians can educate families, they can look in a child’s mouth and they can put fluoride varnish on the teeth to prevent decay. Getting pediatricians involved is a good thing, and we’ve been honored to partner with those groups and get that policy change moving.
Q: What can states do in these tough fiscal times to meet the need for better access to dental care?
A: The best thing they can do is make sure their water is fluoridated because that’s a cost saving measure, as well as a proven preventative measure. For most cities, one dollar spent on fluoridation saves $38 in treatment costs.
The second thing they have to do is make sure they have an adequate workforce to take care of under-served children. Most states have a serious shortage of dentists. We’ve got the lowest dentist to population ratio we’ve had in 100 years. We also need new types of providers who can work with dentists and hygienists and augment the care that is available.
The third thing states should do is seriously look at expanding dental sealant programs for low-income kids. They certainly shouldn’t cut back existing programs. Just last week, the Georgia Board of Dentistry voted against a proposed rule that would have restricted hygienists' ability to apply dental sealants in public health settings. Sealants are a proven, effective public health measure, and right now the kids who need them most are the least likely to get them. If Deamonte Driver had gotten a $40 sealant on his tooth, perhaps he’d be alive today.
Read more Q&As. | <urn:uuid:4d649226-7557-4fbd-998c-fcf4cfde0b68> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pewtrusts.org/our_work_report_detail.aspx?id=85899363955 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967827 | 1,148 | 2.625 | 3 |
MADRID (AP) - Spanish shepherds have led a flock of more than 2,000 sheep through central Madrid in defense of ancient grazing, migration and droving rights threatened by urban sprawl and modern agricultural practices.
The right to use droving routes that wind across land which was open fields and woodland before Madrid grew from a rural hamlet to the great metropolis it is today has existed since at least 1273.
Every year a handful of shepherds defend the right and, following an age-old tradition, on Sunday paid 25 maravedis - coins first minted in the 11th century - to city hall to use the crossing.
Shepherds have a right to use 78,000 miles (125,000 kilometers) of paths for seasonal livestock migrations from highland pastures in summer to warmer grazing in winter.
Copyright 2013 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. | <urn:uuid:c2a5013a-b03e-4aaf-981c-ec8aaa398d8e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kolotv.com/news/oddnews/headlines/2000-Sheep-Led-Through-Streets-of-Spains-Capital-176171311.html?site=full | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.920983 | 199 | 3.109375 | 3 |
Funny and engaging if somewhat embarrassing dares. The dares outlined here can be used alone to play the game or can be used as a launching point to create your own challenges. These Dares are designed to address groups of teens through adults. There is no blatantly adult content but it is not suitable for younger players.
I dare you to ...
See how many ice cubes you can fit in your mouth at one time.
Perform an interpretive dance without the aid of any music.
Have another player paint the toenails on only your left foot. (if no nail polish is available use something else like pen, marker, or ketchup)
Cluck like a chicken every time someone says your name. Continue this for the rest of the game.
Proclaim your undying devotion to the next person who walks into the room.
Sing everything you say for the next 5 minutes.
Remove your shoes and trade each show with another player.
Get down on your knees and pray for the group.
Sing the theme song from any TV show.
Abandon your inner monolog and say everything that comes into your mind for the next ten minutes.
Dress up like a boy scout. Be creative about the uses of items and props to approximate the boy scout uniform.
Take a marker and draw a circle around your physical feature you are the most self conscious about.
Do three different yoga positions. Get input from the group on your form and stance.
Boomerang Dare. For the rest of the game you must perform any dare you challenge another player with.
Call Wal-Mart and ask if you can use their dressing room to try on a pair of jeans you received as a gift.
Pretend you are a ballerina for the next 10 minutes.
Do the hokey pokey in the middle of a circle of players and sing the song that goes with it.
Pick a player and make them laugh by whatever means you can. If you cannot make them laugh in 30 seconds you perform a second dare.
Do a head-stand or a hand stand for 60 seconds.
Have another player style your hair. Be sure to be generous with the hairspray.
Do an impression of another player. Continue until someone is able to guess who you are impersonating.
Begin everything you say with the phrase "your mom says." Continue this for the rest of the night.
Peel a banana with out using your hands.
Call someone for your past that you have wronged and apologize to them. | <urn:uuid:c37bcbe8-c0b3-4b1e-a5d6-109afcab7ae1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gettoknowu.com/Truth_or_Dare/Dares_for_Truth_or_Dare_03.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00072-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930034 | 528 | 1.5625 | 2 |
A Theory of Justice
by John Rawls
Harvard, 607 pp., $3.95 (paper)
I think that this book is the most substantial and interesting contribution to moral philosophy since the war, at least if one thinks only of works written in English. It is a very persuasive book, being very well argued and carefully composed, with possible objections and counterarguments fairly weighed and considered: at the same time it conveys a moral vision and a ruling idea, and a strongly marked personal attitude to experience. Although the book is firmly within the traditions of analytical philosophy, and has the virtue of this kind, there is no pretense of a degree of precision that the subject matter does not admit; and this has probably been one cause of the dullness of much analytical philosophy in this field.
Professor Rawls often remarks that any moral theory that is enlightening and not trivial will be an approximation to the truth at some points, and will not fit perfectly all possible cases and situations. In this field, as in so many others, one obtains instructive generalities only at the cost of some looseness of fit in peripheral cases. If the moral theory is a good one, it does clearly distinguish the central cases of justice from the peripheral ones, and it does bring the central cases into a fairly precise and intelligible relation to each other, when before they had seemed a heterogeneous collection without any center at all.
The point of a moral theory, and so of philosophical ethics, is to find some very general guiding principles that explain the apparently unconnected moral beliefs that constitute a prevailing morality. Rather as a linguist and philologist may look for the general principles that determine word order and the structure of sentences in English, so the philosophical moralist looks for the general principles, or the single principle, that explain the apparently diverse arrangements that we would consider unjust and therefore wrong. If we do succeed in finding such principles, which fit the facts of our ordinary moral beliefs fairly well except in a few marginal cases, then we can use the principles as a guide in doubtful cases; just as we would use general principles of grammar as a guide in doubtful cases when our intuitions fail us or are uncertain.
But there is an even more important gain: if our moral beliefs on many subjects, and in many very different situations, are shown to be instances of a few general principles at work, then we have an assurance that our moral beliefs have a rational foundation. At least they are not just a chaos and a jumble: there is a reason why we hold the various beliefs that we do. There is a unitary policy at work, and, in spite of appearances, we are not in our moral judgments just zigzagging from one disconnected prejudice to another.
At most periods in the history of Western thought the fear that moral beliefs may have no rational foundation has been expressed, and expressed with strong feeling. Moral skepticism, familiar from Plato’s dialogues and in Thucydides, is perpetual and natural: in some periods and places it becomes an orthodoxy; usually it is a heterodoxy, but it is always there. Sometimes philosophers, for example Hume, and thinkers of lesser claims, have either overcome or have domesticated the fear by embracing the conclusion, and then trying to rejoice in it. The skeptic may proclaim that in practical matters and the conduct of life we are governed by the heart and not by the head, and that it is better so: our moral sentiments, our immediate repugnances and sympathies, secure our adaptation to an overcrowded environment and have been developed over a long history of socialization.
To look for an underlying consistency across the range of a man’s moral attitudes and judgments is, in the view of such skeptics, to mistake the sense and purpose of moral attitudes. Moral attitudes have the same kind of consistency that a man’s aesthetic and artistic preferences have: they express a particular temperament, and a particular range of feeling, which are both characteristic of their time and place and which also have features that are common to civilized men at most places and times. But there is no rational structure behind the judgments that a man makes: the explanation of the judgments is to be found not in some general principles of rational policy but rather in the largely unknown deep psychology of the sentiments.
After a long history, skepticism became an orthodoxy once again among academic philosophers influenced by logical positivism before the last war, and immediately after it. Wittgenstein had suggested that a man’s expressions of his moral opinions (as I would call them) should be interpreted as expressions of emotion; others suggested that the use of language in moral exhortation should be thought of as the emotive use of language. The word “emotive” had originally been given currency by Professor I.A. Richards as part of a theory of poetic meaning. The habit of dismissing moral arguments, and arguments about the proper ends of action, as delusive and futile was a lingering habit of social scientists also, who were strengthened by the authority of philosophers.
Professor Rawls has been one of the few analytical philosophers who, by the example of their inquiries, have effectively undermined this skeptical orthodoxy. Twenty years ago, in the heyday of what came to be called Oxford philosophy, and while Wittgenstein’s later philosophy was becoming widely known, ethics was still considered an intellectually barren subject, in which no major discoveries were to be expected and no new lines of inquiry could be opened. Professor Rawls’s prolonged inquiries into the nature of justice, and into utilitarian theories of justice, first became well known through articles in philosophical journals about ten or fifteen years ago; they represented a return to the classical, nonskeptical tradition, and yet the method of argument could not be criticized as lacking logical rigor and precaution.
If no account of the virtue of justice can be given that is consistent with the principles of a utilitarian philosophy, no account that systematizes our reflective beliefs about what is just and unjust, then the utilitarian philosophy must be rejected: that was his argument, and it presupposes an underlying consistency as a requirement of rational opinion in ethics. Professor Rawls’s writings on justice are part of a recent movement of thought among philosophers away from the skepticism about rationality in ethics, and therefore in politics, a skepticism best expressed in Professor Charles Stevenson’s Ethics and Language.
The revival of philosophical jurisprudence, associated principally with Professor Herbert Hart in Oxford, together with the pressure of political events in America, has made the search for rational structure in ethics both more widespread and more urgent. Under what conditions is a war a just war? How far may the state justly require a citizen to play his part in a war which he considers unjust? What are the degrees of moral outrage by a government which justify resistance by violent, and also by illegal, means?
These questions have all been rationally debated in the last few years, and must therefore be rationally debatable. The disputants did not in fact fall back on saying: “It is all a matter of how you feel, and there is no point in discussing our different attitudes, once we have clarified the facts.” On the contrary they thought it appropriate, and even necessary, to look for guiding principles very much as lawyers would in arguing, and finally settling, their difficult cases. And this pursuit of rational structure is not only a social necessity, holding together the disputants in a liberal society by common allegiance to methods of argument, even if the methods are ineffective. It is also felt to be a necessity by individuals for their own sake. They feel the need of knowing precisely what stand they are taking, and what general principles they are invoking, particularly when the course of their lives will be disrupted by their moral convictions. They need to make clear to themselves what their action is intended to be, to fix accurately the description, and the banner, under which they are acting.
Rawls’s book is intended to show the kind and form of principle that is involved when a moral stand is a reasonable one; for he who writes about the nature of justice, and attempts some kind of definition of it, is taken to be offering a scheme of rationality for morality in general, because he is proferring such a scheme for the first of the moral virtues. So it was in Plato’s Republic and so it is again in Professor Rawls’s.
In the manner of a traditional theorist of social contract, Rawls considers the choice of a social order that would be made by a sensible and reasonable man who was ignorant of the particular endowments and opportunities, advantages and disadvantages, that he himself would possess in that social order. This imagined ignorance of his own particular situation serves to ensure that the imagined choice will have a general and representative character, as being the choice of an indeterminately characterized Everyman; and yet no special altruism, or disregard of self, need be attributed to this ideal, abstract person who chooses. Lacking any bias derived from a particular known position in the social order, he will, Rawls argues, reasonably choose a method of distribution of advantages and disadvantages that will be fair to all, and that can be agreed to be fair by all, whatever their particular position may be.
By eliminating other possibilities, Rawls shows that fairness can be realized only if two principles are observed: that each person has an equal right to the most extensive equal liberties compatible with similar liberty for all, and secondly, that all inequalities in liberty be justified only as being an advantage to the least advantaged. An enactment of a less extensive liberty must; if it is to be permissible, strengthen the total system of liberty shared by all; and an unequal liberty must be rationally acceptable to those citizens with the lesser liberty. The same double principle of distribution applies to other primary goods, such as opportunity and wealth, as well as to the first of the primary goods, liberty.
The root idea of Rawls’s theory is that an injustice is an arbitrary inequality in the distribution of good things, and primarily in the distribution of liberty. Inequalities of rights and liberty, and inequalities in the distribution of good things generally, are arbitrary from a moral point of view, Rawls argues, if they cannot be shown to produce a benefit in which all the least fortunate have a preponderant share. Aristocratic and plutocratic societies are unjust because their social orders incorporate that arbitrariness in the allocation of liberty and of other benefits which is to be expected in nature. | <urn:uuid:93fcdb60-d1cf-4384-9e61-f1de13a2ff0a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1972/feb/24/a-special-supplement-a-new-philosophy-of-the-just-/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963865 | 2,163 | 2.015625 | 2 |
How To Be A Referee
A referee's appearance sets the respect for their authority as soon as they appear on the field. Referees are expected to dress in a proper uniform on their game field...the referee shirt/black shorts and black knee socks with three white stripes pulled up to your knee. A referee should never wear a hat or any jewelry. A referee should also bring their watch/whistle/pencil/paper/coins and water to their assigned game.
Once you receive your certification you need to notify the Wellesley Referee Assignor who will put you on the list of referees who wish to referee in Wellesley. You do not need to live in Wellesley to referee for the Wellesley United Soccer Club. At the start of every season the referee assignor will notify every referee on the list and ask what they would like to referee that season. During the soccer season the assignor will weekly either e mail or talk to every working referee to assign the next weekends games. The assignments are then electronically assigned through the BAYS website by the assignor. The referee must check their e mail and accept the assignment electronically. After the game the referee is responsible for entering the score of the game through the BAYS website.
- Safety is your first priority! Check the goals ...check the goal anchors - if the goals need sandbags... are they in place. Check the field for line placement - also look for any holes..rocks..sticks or glass.
- Arrive at the game field early(15-30 minutes). Check player's equipment and collect the coaches cards (pass cards also if the game is Div 1 or 2) early enough to get started on time. Remember there is no jewelry...no earrings...no casts...no exceptions. If the previous game is not finished then check the teams and have the coin toss on the side of the field.
- Bring play under control early - let everyone know what you are calling with a LOUD whistle ... strong arm signals and a clear voice. Players will be testing your control of the game early so blow the whistle and stop foul play.
- Never allow play in thunder and lightening. Treat all injuries as serious and stop play as soon as you can.
- Report to the referee assignor if you had to issue a red card. Also report immediately any BAYS Zero Tolerance violations ...no one except the players,is to speak to the referee during or after the game. Exceptions: Coaches may ask questions before the game, call for substitutions and point out emergencies during the game or respond to the referee if addressed.
Questions? Contact our Referee Coordinator and Field Scheduler Judi Lucarelli | <urn:uuid:894225e4-0c5a-4ed3-bf26-7c6cb736d3ff> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wellesleysoccer.org/node/3144 | 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 | 0.949901 | 557 | 1.828125 | 2 |
Online Guide for Newcomers to Prince Edward Island - Canada
In Canada both men and women can serve as police officers, and they should be treated with equal respect.
In Canada, the police officers work to enforce the laws, keep the order and peace in communities, and protect the general public. Everyone should expect honesty and fairness from the police.
Law Enforcement in Canada and PEI
In Canada there are three levels of police forces: municipal, provincial and federal. All but three provinces, PEI included, contract out the provincial law enforcement responsibility to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), the national police force.
In PEI, Charlottetown, Summerside, Kensington and Borden-Carleton have their own police departments. The rest of the province is policed by the RCMP.
Sheriffs' offices in Canada are primarily concerned with court services such as security in and around the courts, post-arrest prisoner transfer, serving legal processes, fine collection etc.
Security guards do not necessarily enforce the law. They are usually hired to protect a property and make sure nobody gets injured on that property. Sometimes they do have extended duties. For example, the security officers at the University of Prince Edward Island (UPEI) handle parking regulations and enforcement, operate emergency phone numbers, etc. They are also authorized to conduct criminal investigations on campus.
The police are accountable to the public, but they cannot keep communities safe and free of crime on their own. They need cooperation from the people in the communities that they serve.
For this reason the police forces in Canada often use a community policing approach to their work. This means that they collaborate with the residents of a specific community to prevent crimes and deal with safety issues. Police do this by setting up committees and neighbourhood watches, working with community organizations like Crime Stoppers and Child Find, and educating the public.
If you are Stopped, Questioned or Arrested by the Police
If you find yourself in a situation where you are stopped or questioned by a police officer, you should:
- Address the police officer properly by calling him or her 'officer'.
- Accept the police officer's authority -- do not argue.
- Be ready to show your identification if the officer asks you for it. If you are stopped by the police while driving a vehicle, the officer will probably ask you for your driver's licence, proof of insurance, and vehicle registration.
- Only tell the officer the facts about what has happened. Do not offer your own opinion.
- Never try to bribe a police officer by offering money or other things in order to get out of being fined or arrested. This is a serious crime and you could get in even more trouble.
- Police officers in Canada are not authorized to take money from offenders. If you have to pay a fine, you will be given a ticket and pay at a specified location. If a police officer asks you for money, do not pay. As soon as this happens, you should report it to their supervisor.
- If you are arrested, you have the right not to answer any questions, other than stating your name and address, until a lawyer is present or you have talked to a lawyer. The right to have a lawyer present after arrest does not extend to the police interrogation room.
If the police arrest you, they must:
- tell you who they are and show you their badge number
- explain why they are arresting you and tell you what your rights are
- allow you to call a lawyer right away -- If you do not have a lawyer, they must give you the phone book to find one or the Legal Aid telephone numbers and let you call.
If you are witnessing a life-threatening situation or another situation that needs immediate police intervention, call '911' for help. An emergency to which the police should respond could be a:
- car accident
- physical violence
If you need to contact the police to report a crime which does not constitute an emergency, or to get information related to law enforcement, you can call the police non-emergency phone number. [See Related Resources] | <urn:uuid:6d3c4998-f7ad-415b-a896-5accf4439c32> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.peianc.com/content/lang/en/page/guide_law_police | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960545 | 847 | 2.953125 | 3 |
Family friendly festival starting at 11am, with 12 hours of music from local artists, a large selection of local ales, delicious local food...all in the beautiful Shropshire countryside.
Chef Simon Smith, of Thrales Restaurant in Lichfield, Staffordshire, is helping to organise the first Lichfield Food Festival in September. He is inviting local food and drink producers to take park.
A one day course providing a basic knowledge and understanding of the importance of HACCP as a preventive food safety management system, which can be applied to all sectors of the food industry.
This course ensures that the company’s Internal Auditors carry out thorough and productive audits that have a positive benefit for the company.
This course is a must for anyone preparing for a BRC audit, whether they are new to the BRC Standard or need to refresh their knowledge of the subject. A great confidence builder.
Food and Food Festivals in a Recession. This year, at a time of economic unrest, the conference will explore issues relating to food and food festivals in a recession.
Details of speakers have now been published.
Search by a specific date on the calendar | <urn:uuid:6f82ad81-d24d-42e9-82fb-1d241d0d6170> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.heff.co.uk/List.aspx?dt=23%2F09%2F2012&c=9080311e-ae5f-4617-b7ae-781adcff3e52&month=true | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.920835 | 240 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Georgia has some of the best maintained roads in America.
Vance Smith on Wednesday, January 19th, 2011 in a budget presentation
Georgia roads are among America's best, state officials say
Vance Smith, the plain-spoken commissioner of Georgia’s Transportation Department, had an interesting story to tell state lawmakersabout the condition of the Peach State’s roads.
Smith said he was at a conference a year or so ago,sitting quietly near the back of the room, when a top transportation official from Missouri told the audience how they are trying to improve their roads -- mentioning that they measure themselves against a certain state from the South.
"At the top, there was a long, red line, and as I looked, it had the word ‘Georgia’ besides there," Smith said during a Jan. 19 state budget hearing at the Capitol. "It made me feel pretty good in a conference that this gentleman is trying to reach this baseline and the baseline was the state of Georgia."
So are Georgia’s roads really that good?
GDOT officials have boasted in some cases, like a January 2010 press release, that "Georgia’s
highways have consistently been rated among the nation’s best maintained highways."
GDOT spokesman David Spear told us that Georgia’s roads are "some of the best maintained" in America.
Other motorists, particularly in the Atlanta area, may raise their eyebrows at GDOT’s claim. Shirley Franklin created a "pothole strike team" during the early days of her first term as Atlanta mayor to deal with the tire nuisance that seemed to be on virtually every city street. WGCL-TV in Atlanta has a reporter, Harry Samler, who searches for potholes and presses the public officials in charge to fill them.
So should we really all go out and burn rubber?
We asked Smith’s office about what is Missouri using to measure itself that ranks Georgia at the top.
Spear pointed to a couple of organizations that conduct research on road conditions by each state. The most recent report was completed in September 2010 by the conservative-leaning Reason Foundation, based in Washington, D.C. The foundation’s report ranked Georgia ninth in overall performance, using data from 2008. Interestingly, Missouri, the state Smith recalled that was trying to catch up to Georgia, finished one spot ahead of the Peach State in the overall rankings.
The Reason Foundation researchers used data that compiles how much money each state spends, on average, to maintain its roads and bridges. It used information sent by each state to the federal government about the percentage of its interstate and rural roads in poor condition, traffic congestion, the percentage of bridges in bad shape and fatality rates.
The Reason report, and others, focus primarily on road conditions on interstate highways, state roads, bridges and other busy thoroughfares. The lumpy lanes in some subdivisions don’t count.
Georgia was tied for first in three categories: rural interstate pavement condition, rural principal arterial condition and urban interstate condition. The Peach State scored its lowest (39th) in capital spending on bridges, was 37th in total disbursements per mile and was 31st in urban interstate congestion -- although the foundation observed that Georgia had improved in that area from the prior year. Georgia was 15th in the percentage of its bridges that were deficient or obsolete.
Spear said money for road maintenance has been a problem in recent years.
"Frankly, as our financial resources have declined steadily in recent years, it has become problematic for the department to maintain that high level of maintenance, particularly on the secondary road system," Spear said. "We simply don’t have the resources."
Georgia fared well in another rating system of road toughness: the International Roughness Index. The index uses a formula created by the United States National Cooperative Highway Research Program that was continued by the World Bank to measure road quality.Each state conducts research of its roads and sends the findings to the Federal Highway Administration. The findings are measured against prior data to measure for consistency. In 2008, the most recent data available, more than 90 percent of Georgia’s rural, urban minor arterial and urban collector roads were considered good or smooth. Georgia was the only state to finish above 90 percent in each category.
Frank Moretti, director of policy and research for TRIP, a national transportation research group based in Washington, D.C., believes the research about Georgia. He said one reason why most Georgia roads are in good condition is because of the climate, which damages state roads less than in most states.
He added: "The state in the past has tried to use materials and designs that were longer lasting. The challenge is to keep them in that condition with the dollars being stretched further and further."
TRIP and the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials released a report in 2009 on the nation’s roads. It found Georgia drivers spend less ($44) than motorists in any state on additional vehicle operating costs due to rough roads.
Georgia, Moretti said, has fewer urbanized roads, which helps the Peach State score well. Georgia’s population growth, particularly in metro Atlanta, may make it tougher for it to remain high on the list.
"I think traffic congestion is the greatest challenge the state faces to maintain a level of mobility that is going to maintain economic development," he said.
OK, where does this leave us?
Georgia is tops in some road maintenance categories. Its score in the Reason Foundation report was weighed down by data that found Georgia spends less money than most states in some road maintenance areas. Traffic congestion, where Georgia scored lower than most states, does result in more wear and tear on its roads. Spear, the GDOT spokesman, contends that congestion is important but does not address the overall condition of the road.
Georgia does rank high in nearly all measures of road maintenance. We rate the commissioner’s comments about Georgia’s roads as True.
Published: Monday, February 7th, 2011 at 6:00 a.m.
Georgia Department of Transportation, state budget hearing, Jan. 19, 2011
E-mail from Georgia Department of Transportation spokesman David Spear, Feb. 4, 2011
Federal Highway Administration, Table HM-63, Highway Statistics 2008
Reason Foundation, 19th Annual Report on the Performance of State Highway Systems, September 2010
Telephone interview with Frank Moretti, director of policy and research, TRIP, Feb. 3, 2011
TRIP & AASHTO report, "Rough Roads Ahead, Fix Them Now Or Pay for It Later," 2009
We want to hear your suggestions and comments. Email the Georgia Truth-O-Meter with feedback and with claims you'd like to see checked. If you send us a comment, we'll assume you don't mind us publishing it unless you tell us otherwise. | <urn:uuid:a4e35076-0148-46ee-a827-1729fb6fd346> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.politifact.com/georgia/statements/2011/feb/07/vance-smith/georgia-roads-are-among-americas-best-state-offici/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966859 | 1,425 | 1.703125 | 2 |
Educational Technology - Career & Professional Opportunities
Graduates of the Fairfield Educational Technology program are well-regarded and much in demand in K-12 education around the state. Many graduates have had successful careers in higher education and corporate and non-profit educational multimedia settings as well.
21st Century educators of all disciplines are discovering that understanding best practices for technology in the classroom enhances the learning and teaching experience. Advanced study of Educational Technology at Fairfield University will introduce you to:
- Useful applications of educational technology, both in the classroom and online
- Rich electronic educational resources
- Methods to help students prepare for 21st century technologically-driven careers
- Best practices for infusing technology into teaching methods and lesson-planning
Those pursuing degrees and/or certification in the area of School Media Specialist will find that the technology, teaching, and collaboration skills they develop are increasingly sought after. Fairfield University is highly acknowledged in Connecticut for our merits in Media Specialist preparation.
The Educational Technology program also offers courses that concentrate on video and multimedia production and, as a result, a number of graduates hold positions in the instructional/training and multimedia departments of major corporations and production houses.
Candidates have access to the state-of-the-art resources at the University Media Center, which features television production and post-production facilities, including two television studios and portable production and editing equipment. Desktop video editing is also available. Additional resources include:
- Multimedia computer laboratories
- Video postproduction
- Digital still-picture cameras
- Portable video cameras and recorders
- A host of other media equipment
Internships and Research
Candidates have opportunities to complete internships for credit in school library/media centers, television and multimedia production companies, and at the Fairfield University Media Center. You can also undertake independent study projects, often conducting research in consultation with a faculty member. Recent projects have focused on children's safety on the Internet, English as a second language resources on the Internet, developing young people's critical awareness of TV, and school webpage design.
Teaching Internship Program (Paid Internship Available - School Media Specialist Track)
Paid, year-long internships (non-credit) are available to matriculated candidates to gain valuable experience and to defray a significant portion of the cost of study. These internships include a range of responsibilities, from small group activities, to substituting, to assisting tenured faculty in school settings. In return for the intern's service, the school district deposits $12,000 with Fairfield University. This amount is banked for interns to draw upon for courses taken toward their degree or certification (download the Teaching Internship Program Application). Deadline for applying for upcoming academic year is June 15th.
Learn more about how the University's Career Planning Center can support your post-graduate goals, and how Fairfield's tight-knit alumni network can build career and mentoring opportunities that last a lifetime. | <urn:uuid:db727e01-4a46-460a-8b79-482b07c227bc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fairfield.edu/gseap/maet_careers.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942322 | 603 | 2.109375 | 2 |
Wednesday, February 1, 2006
Swing Thoughts That Really Work
Think your way to a better golf swing now
Old-school golf instruction is full of imagery that was originally created to help players make what were perceived as the the proper moves in the swing. In those days, many of the technical aspects of the golf swing werent completely understood, largely due to the lack of video technology that exists today. Instead, players mostly relied on feel, natural talent and repetition to hone their technique and overall game. Not surprisingly, the average scores of recreational golfers barely ever improved significantly, other than what was delivered by technological advances in equipment and golf course conditioning.
Today, good golf instruction should combine an understanding of the proper mechanics of the swing with an emphasis on creating an athletic, natural motion. To help accomplish this task, Ive come up with some simple but effective thoughts that can help your swing become more natural, athletic and repetitive. Give them a try both during practice and when youre on the course. After a while, whatever mechanical swing thoughts you might have developed over the years should be replaced with these simpler, more effective ones. Once your mind is free from distraction, youll be surprised how much easier it is to make good swings.
Grip Like You Are Holding A Bird
Like most golfers, Ive never held a small bird in my hands, so this advice doesnt do much for me. I prefer thinking of the tension youd apply when throwing a ball—its more athletic, and makes more sense. Think about it—when you throw a ball, you hold it tightly enough so it doesnt fly out of your hand when you cock your arm, but loosely enough to create speed.
Hold The Tray
The waiter position is one to forget—you dont want your palm facing directly skyward at the top of the backswing. Instead, your palm should be on a 45-degree angle to the ground, which puts the clubface in a square position and maintains the width of the backswing for maximum swing arc.
To create a more athletic setup, imagine your shoulders, hips and knees in a level position with your weight spread between your feet evenly.
The importance of a solid setup position cannot be denied—if you start out poorly youll have little chance of making a solid swing. Some key thoughts for a good setup are stay level and be athletic.
Many golfers handicap themselves at the outset by making mistakes like kicking in the right knee, dropping the right shoulder or flaring only one of their feet. In the photo at right, notice how my shoulders remain nearly level, with the right only slightly lower than the left. My knees are bowed a bit outward and both feet are flared. This is a key for creating an athletic swing—one thats rotational rather than a lateral, sliding motion that stresses the back and leads to an ineffective impact position. Equally important is the feeling of being bouncy in the legs, with flexed knees and relaxed muscles.
At The Top
The golf swing is an athletic motion that must be made with a dynamic base. Rigid legs cant provide the same athletic platform as those that are flexed.
The obvious differences in the pictures to the left are powerful evidence of what can happen if the wrong swing thought occupies the mind during the backswing. At the left, Ive lost all the angles I set at address and any chance to create a leveraged, dynamic attack into impact. Notice how much more athletic I look in the picture on the right. Both knees are flexed, my core has dropped slightly lower and my body is poised to spring into action. This position creates a direct route for my arms and club to the ball from the inside, encouraging a more rotational move with my body all the way to the finish. The thought of squatting is key for creating this type of move.
Page 1 of 3 | <urn:uuid:ff758665-97a0-4faa-89c9-44cb82e75d37> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.golftipsmag.com/component/zine/article/31-swing-thoughts-that-really-work.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951878 | 794 | 1.640625 | 2 |
Recent News Articles
Economic Outlook: It only looks like jobs
By some accounts the presidential election pivots on the jobs report released Friday morning, the U.S. Department of Labor pegging unemployment at 7.9 percent.
It hardly matters what the rate is, however. What”s important is that it moved higher, which is fodder for Republicans, a bit like syrup on their pancakes.
Legitimate explanations will likely get lost in the din of political rhetoric. With economists predicting the rate would climb from September”s 7.8 percent, both Republicans and Democrats no doubt tested out responses through the night to find one that sounded convincing to voters.
It is highly unlikely that the president or GOP contender Mitt Romney will delve into the data deep enough to explain there were 154,000 fewer “discouraged workers” in October than there were in October 2011. This points to more people looking for work — after all, the unemployment rate is a percentage of something, is it not?
Is there any place for irony in a political campaign? Financial Times economics editor Allen Beattie mused Thursday — or maybe it was mumbled cantankerously — that both Democrats and Republicans are shill artists, anyway, neither one willing to tell the truth about the economy.
The most pervasive deceit, apparently, is duping voters into believing presidential policies actually make a difference one way or another.
“Herds of peaceably grazing policy wonks have been left shaking their heads in dismay,” at the campaign rhetoric, Beattie wrote in one of the more lyrical laments of the year.
Back to the irony of the day: While candidates club the unemployment data into palatable pulp, few will explain that most of the lowering of the unemployment rate in recent months has been due to “discouraged workers,” who skewed the data by giving up on finding a job.
They are defined as workers who return to school or decided to take care of an invalid relative or an infant, leaving out the possibility that these were choices made under the duress of being unable to find work.
The second irony is the point that a lower unemployment rate has the tendency to lure these “discouraged workers” back to looking for work again. So the data is shifting in part because the horses ran back into the burning barn and the data keeps reflecting the dysfunction rather than anything that looks like progress.
In international markets Friday, the Nikkei 225 index in Japan rose 1.17 percent while the Shanghai composite index in China gained 0.6 percent. The Hang Seng index in Hong Kong climbed 1.33 percent while the Sensex in India added 1.04 percent.
The S&P/ASX 200 in Australia was flat, rising 0.06 percent.
In midday trading in Europe, the FTSE 100 index in Britain gained 0.3 percent while the DAX 30 in Germany climbed 0.57 percent. The CAC 40 in France rose 0.62 percent while the Stoxx Europe 600 gained 0.55 percent.
Copyright 2012 by United Press International | <urn:uuid:f7547cac-568d-4e89-beef-5c0f8d92c3c5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.onlinejournal.com/business/economic-outlook-it-only-looks-like-jobs/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00076-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95155 | 641 | 1.890625 | 2 |
The Oglala Sioux elders have filed a lawsuit in the district court of Nebraska, targetting Anheuser-Busch InBev Worldwide, SAB Miller, Molson Coors Brewing Company, MillerCoors LLC, and Pabst Brewing Company. The Oglala Sioux Tribe are asking for $500m for healthcare, social services and child rehabilitation.
The lawsuit also names the nearby town of Whiteclay, Nebraska, which has four beer shops that sold nearly five million beer cans in 2010 despite having only about a dozen residents.
Alcohol is outlawed in the reservation, but one out of four children suffers from foetal alcohol syndrome... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-16976700
As laughable as the lawsuit can seem, if you believe in free will and the ability of self control, there is a structural problem underneath.
Today it seems clear that there is a strong genetic factor behind alcoholism. Twin studies and studies of adopted children have confirmed this. There is also an interesting pattern when you look at the prevalence of alcoholism in different regions. In the areas that first started to produce and consume alcoholic beverages, and where it has been around for thousands of years, ie the Mediterranean area and the Middle East, alcoholism is pretty rare. I've heard a number suggesting 2-3% of the population. In areas where alcohol has been present for centuries, but not quite as long as the previous group, eg in Northern Europe, the prevelance of alcoholism is much higher, some where around 10%. And then when you look at "first nations", aboriginal groups that have only had access to alcohol for perhaps a century or so, you see some groups that have a 40-50% alcoholism rate. It can also be noted that drinking used to be far worse in Scandinavia in the 17th through 19th century.
There is a theory that this is because the longer alcohol has been present, the stronger the Darwinian impact has been. Alcoholics are less likely to form stable families and raise children that do well, and over time this means they have relatively less offspring than those who do not have the genetic predisposition for alcoholism. Now, if you have the gene, but never touch alcohol, there apparently is no serious down side to the gene, seeing as it is so common among people that have never encountered alcohol. But when a society like that gets access to alcohol - it's a disaster. And that is what has happened to many tribes/first nations in North America. The same thing can be seen in Australia and Greenland is just as bad, if not worse.
Since the tribal elders have done what they can to combat alcohol - banning it within the reservation, educating people, etc, I guess I can see some logic in them now wanting to sue those who keep providing the poison that makes their society rot from within.
A bit like the USA blaming Colombia for drug abuse in the USA.
It doesn't help to make it illegal when some one else keeps making sure their is easy access to it just the same. | <urn:uuid:ceb2ace9-d548-4486-a5fe-cb01686c721e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.canuckscorner.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=126100 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969292 | 633 | 2.546875 | 3 |
By Dr. Anis Ansari
Stroke is one of the most devastating illnesses that can affect people.
Due to its major disabling features, it is the least preferable of any of the major diseases. During stroke patient may lose control of their arms, legs, ability to talk, eat or to see properly. Large stroke can cause death. Other can leave long term complications which are difficult on patients and their families.
Stroke is the third leading cause of death in the US and second worldwide in both men and women. There are 200,000 cases of death due to stroke and 795,000 new and recurrent cases of stroke every year in the US. Cardiovascular diseases (stroke and heart attack) cost staggering $444 billion in terms of medical care and lost productivity.
There are 5.8 million adults living with long term disability in the US.
Stroke (brain attack) is a medical emergency which occurs when blood supply to a certain part of brain is completely cutoff or greatly reduced. Strokes are of two types. Ischemic strokes makes up 80% of cases while hemorrhagic stroke 20%. Cardio embolism (clot from the heart) is responsible for 20% of all ischemic strokes.
Symptom depends on the area affected.
Definition of the stroke is sudden onset of focal neurological deficit lasting more than 24-hour period. It is called transient ischemic attack (TIA; mini stroke) if symptoms are resolved within 24 hours.
Symptom of stroke includes sudden onset of facial droop, arm and leg weakness, slurring of speech, inability to talk, inability to eat, difficulty seeing with one eye or both eyes, confusion or alteration of their mentally status, and trouble walking as well as balancing.
People who have history of hypertension, atrial fibrillation, diabetic mellitus, high cholesterol, family history of stroke are at high risk this problem. Aggressive treatment of hypertension is very important in reducing the risk of a stroke. Med-wire News on September 29, 2011based on meta-analysis of 12 studies involving more than 500,000 patients showed that pre-hypertension (systolic BP 130 to 139 and diastolic BP 85-89) are at increased risk of having stroke.
Workup of stroke includes Doppler ultrasound of the carotid arteries in the neck. If blockage is more than 70% then surgery is needed to bypass the blocked area. Cerebral angiography is the gold standard for identifying the blockages inside the brain arteries. Balloon angioplasty can be done and stent can be placed if necessary.
Aspirin is usually used to prevent stroke. If stroke occurs while on aspirin then stronger ant-platelet drug like Plavix is prescribed.
Preventive measures includes dietary modification, exercise, control of hypertension, diabetic, cholesterol and smoking cessation.
In terms of treatment, time is of the essence. After sign and symptom of a stroke is recognized, 911 should be called. Patient should be transported by paramedic who can assess their ABC (airway, breathing and circulation). They can provide much-needed oxygen and an intravenous access.
On arrival, the Emergency room physician will quickly assess patient, order lab tests, emergent CT scan of the head and activate the stroke team if available. Onset of a stroke is determined before any decision is made to administer the clot busting drug (t-PA) transminogen plasma activator. They must reach ER within 3 hour and meet certain criteria before being eligible for above medication. There are some patient who can qualify for this medication up to 4.5 hour of the onset of symptom unless their age is more than 80, are diabetic , have prior episode of ischemic stroke, and taking oral anti-coagulation regardless of INR.
Long term complication will include skin breakdown, depression, and aspiration pneumonia, difficulty in learning, concentrating and memory.
Some patient requires comprehensive rehabilitation where physical (walking), occupational (strengthening) and speech therapy (speech, memory, and balancing check books) are provided. A video swallow study is performed to determine the type and consistency of food they will be able to tolerate.
US government officials have announced an initiative to Prevent 1 million heart attacks and stroke during the next 5 years. Naturally, up to date protocol and public education is a very important part of the same process. Early recognition and rapid response will prevent a large number of death and disability.
Anis Ansari, MD, Chairman, Department of Medicine, Mercy Medical Center, Clinton, Iowa. | <urn:uuid:e2784ab6-9dfb-4d0e-8487-3b613c53e94b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://muslimmedianetwork.com/mmn/?tag=onset | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00042-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939849 | 945 | 3.328125 | 3 |
My investigation, for the people of Croydon, representing the Young People's Party, to get to the bottom of the staggering number of misadventures in a thriving town full of enterprising and hard working folks, is starting to produce fruit. It has nothing to do with the good people who live and work there.
Last week when I first stood outside Allders, I deduced this was yet another collapsed pyramid scheme as they all are eventually, including the wider economy. I hear you, this is amazing and hard to believe. Read on and think very carefully about this ...
Let's see how this multi level market ran, starting from the bottom:
- The 'staff' who worked in Allders were tenants of Harold Tillman, their landlord
- Harold Tillman was a tenant of Minerva the property developer, his landlord
- Minerva is a tenant mortgaged to Deutsche Post * a German 'bank', their landlord
- Deutsche Post is the ultimate and absentee landlord in another country. God of Allders essentially
The Croydon department store was not really a department store. It was a shopping mall. Each of the counters was an independent trader, disgracefully called a 'concession' as if they owed their masters a tribute for being allowed to work and be enterprising.
Handing over ALL their takings to Tillman each day and 'maybe' getting some of it back at the end of the week to pay wages and keep up stock. In economic terms these takings are called RENT. 200 years ago this practice was know as rack renting.
It was futile for Tillman to ask for a business rates holiday from the Council. Daft to think it would make a difference. Business rates tax already comes out of the total rental value of the property. A free gift there would just mean Minerva could raise their rent by the amount of the subsidy.
This is a perfect exposition of how the world really works, on a micro scale. The ones at the bottom, the workers and real businesses, truly fleeced. The ones in the middle bribed just enough to vote against a better system. The ones at the top smoking cigars and laughing at you the people of Croydon. The government you elect with your vote, wholly in the pocket of the bank now moving on to their next adventure.
Is this happening elsewhere in Croydon? Yes! Look close by at the Whitgift Centre. The landlord there is partly a 'charity' to boot! There will be many more, especially in those big skyscrapers over there. This is how the world really works.
But people of Croydon - Is this the kind of world you want to bring your children into? Our future. How well do you think your enterprise will fare in this rotten environment, no matter how hard you work, how skilful your art and industrious your colleagues? You are being robbed. You keep voting for it.
What are Labour, Conservative and Libdem offering you... That's right, the opportunity to climb on to the next pyramid. Remember, that opportunity produces only one winner. Dead politics.
The Young People's Party have a simple and radical policy and we mean to see it fully adopted. We will abolish these pyramid schemes. Fully. The Rent Seekers at the top will have to start working for a living again. And you the people of Croydon will finally receive the full reward for your hard work and enterprise... and a far better life.
To find out exactly how we will do this I will be in Croydon daily. Call me.
* I've not checked to see if the finance for the land actually comes from another level above Deutsche Post yet | <urn:uuid:ecae6309-ec55-456c-861a-fc16c490fc7a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://gco2e.blogspot.se/2012/10/croydons-giant-pyramid-selling-scam.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96819 | 763 | 1.75 | 2 |
I suppose I’ll follow suit and begin this post with a quick introduction. I’m an English major, though I haven’t officially declared it yet. I love poetry, which is a big reason for why I’m in this class. I was raised on trashy sci-fi novels and I’m a big fan of their bad movie equivalents on the scyfy channel. On top of that, I really just like the feeling of a good pen. I want to think a little bit about the sword in “Meditations in Time of Civil War” and Yeats’ portrayal of history, so I’ll preface it with one further point, which is that I love the simple thought of history itself, how we interact with and transform it.
As an emblem for art, the sword seems to be a very deliberate choice. Yeats sets it up as an icon of the heroic past which some Japanese man, despite his “country’s talk/for silken clothes and a stately walk,” had the good sense to preserve during the wave of industrialization that swept through Japan. So is W.B. Yeats some kind of Irish Tom Cruise fighting for the samurai (or the Irish equivalent) and their glorious heritage? What does it mean, after all, that at a time of horrific violence and civil war Yeats chooses an object whose own personal history is steeped in the bloodshed and feudal warfare of medieval Japan? Certainly, such swords are beautiful works of art but at the time of their creation, I would be curious to know how they were understood. Though they may have been prized possessions and family heirlooms, they were also manufactured instruments made with a specific purpose.
unfortunately I don’t have the time or expertise to photoshop Yeats’ head onto this
I’m unsure at this point (and I would welcome anyone else’s thoughts) but it seems that by describing the sword as “changeless” Yeats initially casts it as an immortal artifact, an object that stands outside of time and thus represents the past in its purest form, unmediated by history. After likening it to the moon, however, and pointing out the moon’s transformative cycle—“if no change appears/No moon”—it seems that Yeats is suggesting the sword is in fact just as transitory; “only an aching heart” would conceive of a piece of art as changeless. Similarly the soul only “look[s]” unchanging. If history is not just a study of the past but a way in which the present is transformed into the past, then nothing, not the sword, art, nor the immortal soul, can escape history and hold off change. On one level, the sword, which appears to be a timeless work of art, has already been transformed from a weapon into art.
This could be Yeats reflecting on his own aching heart. He believed in an Irish heritage, large family houses passed down through generations, the preservation of the language, and he was fascinated by Irish folklore and myth. Perhaps in this period of cultural upheaval he knew that heritage could survive unchanged. On the other hand, I think he knew it would endure in some form. Though the moon moves through its cycles it is a constant and familiar presence and has been before there were even people to bother talking about how poetic it was. | <urn:uuid:da97f06b-a636-4807-9f6f-b12d86fffdae> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.haverford.edu/celticfringe/2011/01/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97813 | 717 | 2.609375 | 3 |
We, imperfect humans that we are, are always seeking self-definition. By our actions, by our choices, by our beliefs, by our tribes, by our appearance – all seeking to give us a sense of self.
I am this and not that.
The choices we make coalesce, slowly, into something grand and magnificent. A person. A hero. A hero of many stories, but most importantly, our own.
We head out into the world, seeking. We try new things, try to to find purpose and meaning amidst the struggle for survival. We experiment. We find things that work, and things that do not work, and hopefully we learn the difference.
We may fail. We may go astray, fall victim to despair and chaos. We may surrender to our dark impulses. We may redeem ourselves.
Or we may not.
We learn that there are many perspectives, many voices, many sides. We have to choose. We learn that there are some choices, once made, which cannot be undone.
We learn that there are other choices which never mattered in the first place.
Sometimes, we don’t know the difference.
Each day, we arise, and wonder in what way will today call upon us to be a hero. Every day brings a new opportunity, a new chance, a new story. Sometimes we succeed. Often we fail.
But we can never go back and rewrite what has come before.
Then one day, we realize that we were seeking ourselves the entire time. That the journey itself defined us, that we are naught but the sum of our desire to define a sense of self.
No more, no less.
I am this, not that. This is my story.
And it is the story of a journey. | <urn:uuid:5836f152-004c-4430-ba2e-59fa50d434a5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://cynwise.wordpress.com/2011/11/26/on-the-hero-with-a-thousand-faces/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95094 | 370 | 1.914063 | 2 |
In the process of Doing the Math as part of a journey towards crafting me own mobility, the progress became impeded by the void of simple tools to aid in seemingly simple calculations. Therefore I am resolved to fill that space as time allows with (hopefully) useful wizards and calculators. The first offering is called:
The Archimedes-Winding Calculator
Given a length and diameter of wire, this application will plot out an Archimedes Spiral and return the number of Turns and the resulting OD. Two additional parameters are optional: ID and AirGap between the windings. These can be remitted in mm, meters, inches, and feet.
This Silverlight application executes from a webpage, or it can be installed onto your desktop; it lives in the "sandbox" and is quite benign. Please PM me if it misbehaves and I shall work up an FAQ
Example of Use:
If you know the flux density of the potential motor then it’s possible to calculated the length and size of the conductor required to achieve a particular output. If you know the inside perimeter of your potential winding you can math-out a simple circle by the following equation:
- Perimeter = Circumference (C) = 2 r À -> C/ À = 2r = ID (theoretical)
The application is perfect for Coreless Motor designers and students of general electromotive understanding. The calculator would not meet the expectations for Iron Core stators as they require more complex modeling.
Why Built It?
Because the other calculators that I found gave me Length after I estimated the ID and OD of the winding, or I had to provide ID and number of Turns, or with ID and OD, the Turns could be calculated based on the wire cross-section. In short – I found the approach of the resolution to be a little hokey and inaccurate.
I am keen to get 3-Dimensional with the winding calculations in the next version and include other factors to better gauge heat and current effects. Other wizards and calculators are possible. I will announce releases here on this thread. | <urn:uuid:b39535b3-a11c-404c-aa0e-363c085efe23> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=21352&p=310989 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.923195 | 465 | 2.640625 | 3 |
JERUSALEM, Israel -- Israel recently celebrated its 62nd anniversary. Since its founding in 1948, few people have witnessed the span of Israel's modern history. But one man has not only witnessed it, he has chronicled that history with a camera.
More than 60 years ago, Israeli photojournalist David Rubinger began his career, just before the birth of the state of Israel.
"That gave me a chance that very few photographers have to cover a story, an entire story from A to Z," Rubinger said.
Through My Lens
Rubinger told his story - and Israel's - in a book called Israel Through My Lens. He documented those early historic days like the day in 1947 when the United Nations voted for the establishment for a Jewish state.
"People were dancing in the streets," Rubinger said. "The young kids on the morrow of the UN decision to establish the state of Israel climbed up on board a British armored car with the British police number on it and a British driver and a hand painted flag."
He began as a freelance cameraman and later worked for years as Time-Life magazine's photographer. He showed Israel's first years, its fight for independence, and the joy of Jews returning to the promised land from all over the world.
"The idealism, the feeling striving for equality," he said. "Social justice. Ashamed not to work."
During his career, he has photographed nearly all of Israel's leaders: from Jerusalem's legendary Mayor Teddy Kolleck, to its future Prime Minister Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Golda Meir at the Knesset and in her kitchen, Yitzak Rabin and his wife Leah having breakfast, then Israeli Gens. Rabin and Moshe Dayan during wartime and Israel's first Prime Minister David Ben Gurion.
"Oh, his face was something," Rubinger said of Ben Gurion. "I have it on one of the covers of my book. Like granite. Strong like a rock."
He covered Israel's triumphs, capturing the jubilation after the successful raid on Entebbe. He showed Israel's suffering through its many wars.
"One of my dearest pictures is one taken in Aswan in 1980," Rubinger added. "Very, very intimate between two leaders after four wars and such intimacy."
Most Memorable Image
But Rubinger's most famous photograph came during the 1967 Six Day War. For the first time in nearly 2,500 years, Israeli paratroopers captured Jerusalem's Old City and the famous Western Wall. When paratroopers came to the wall, Rubinger was there.
"In order to get any sort of perspective I had to shoot from the ground and I was lying down on the ground and shooting and these soldiers that walked by," he said. "I got three frames that were nearly identical."
Years later, Rubinger photographed those same three paratroopers back at the Western Wall. The men and their country have grown up.
"Grown up is the word," he said. "Gone is the beauty of childhood. The idealism of youth."
Since 1967 Rubinger feels Israel has made unwise decisions. He is very critical of many of Israel's policies, but as Israel celebrates one more anniversary, he says it has been a remarkable history.
"Summing up 62 years you still can not avoid realizing one thing," Rubinger said. "I think it's unprecedented in history that people did in 60 years what this country did."
*Originally broadcast on April 23, 2010. | <urn:uuid:ff2338fd-cb4d-4049-8fcf-5df0593676c3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/insideisrael/2010/April/Photojournalist-Recalls-Israels-Modern-History/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00042-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.98118 | 734 | 1.84375 | 2 |
Sarah Sentilles opens A Church of Her Own by proclaiming that 11 o’clock on Sunday morning is “the most sexist hour” in America. Drawing on interviews with an undisclosed number of ordained women, Sentilles exposes the disregard and exclusion that women have suffered at the hands of other Christians and the disappointment and pain that results.
A number of studies document the structural obstacles that women clergy confront. Newly ordained women wait longer than their male counterparts for their first assignment, with African-American women waiting longer than white women. Female clergy are paid less than male clergy and are disproportionately assigned to serve as associate pastors or to lead small, struggling congregations. Even after some 40 years of women’s ordination, the stained-glass ceiling remains. | <urn:uuid:2648eaae-fdc6-44ab-86f2-fb58f14c3918> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.christiancentury.org/reviews/2008-09/church-her-own-what-happens-when-woman-takes-pulpit | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00066-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956267 | 153 | 1.695313 | 2 |
EU likely to exceed Kyoto carbon-cut target
European Union governments will probably reduce emissions outside the bloc’s carbon market by 8.8 per cent more than required under the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, according to projections published today on an EU website.
The oversupply of reductions among the 15 older members of the bloc will amount to 1.03 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent in the five years through 2012 compared with a limit of 11.8 billion tons, according to the data. That includes 419 million tons of United Nations offset emission credits those nations are buying for compliance in the period, the data show.
Kyoto Protocol rules state that countries can use emission credits from the Clean Development Mechanism and Joint Implementation programs to help them meet targets. The EU began its carbon market in 2005, covering about half the economy, to help it meet its Kyoto goals and protect the climate. Nations with surpluses can sell credits to countries with shortages or to factories and power stations in the market.
Of the 15 older EU members, 10 are using offsets, according to the data. Of those, Italy is the only nation that will undershoot its reduction target, with a shortfall of 58.5 million tons in the five years, the data show. That’s after the nation buys about 10 million tons of offsets.
Luxembourg’s purchases of 14.5 million tons of credits will allow it to meet its target almost precisely, according to the projections.
Eight nations have bought 69.5 million tons more offsets than they will probably need in the five years, the data show. Spain, which is buying the most offsets at 194 million tons in the period, will overshoot its target by 7 million tons.
The nation with the biggest surplus of credits in the period will probably be the Netherlands, with 14.5 million tons, followed by Belgium with 14 million tons, according to the data.
Ireland, Portugal and Finland probably won’t need any of the 20.5 million tons of credits they are purchasing, the projections show.
December Certified Emission Reduction credits from the so- called CDM dropped as much as 22 per cent today to 76 euro cents ($0.95) a ton on the ICE Futures Europe exchange in London and were at 78 cents at 1:21 p.m. Emission Reduction Units for the same month from the JI plunged 15 per cent to 63 cents a ton, having slumped 91 per cent in the past year. | <urn:uuid:d20e5ffd-d7a5-49f7-9b0a-3f65530ea34a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.canberratimes.com.au/environment/climate-change/eu-likely-to-exceed-kyoto-carboncut-target-20121025-286kt.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948178 | 509 | 2.734375 | 3 |
Created more than 50 years ago, in the middle of the Normans fields, this family owned company has made its success by making yogurts, desserts and other kind of dairies using the milk from its own cattle.
The Ferme des Peupliers manage all the chain of production of the yogurts, from the feeding of the cows to the final product. The farm produces most of its own cereals and feeding for the animal, which is a security against GMO. The farm has more than 120 cows who graze in the meadows around the dairy... Such a location (see picture of the cows going to the dairy) reduces shipping and handling of the milk to the minimum and optimize the control of all the milk transformation processes. All the cows have an I.D for a good follow up of the animal and also to avoid any contamination of the milk if they have received a treatment.
Yogurts and desserts are all made with the daily milk production. To preserve all its natural qualities, the milk is used in a very short time (only few hours between milking and final product) and, unlike industrial products, milk is not homogenized nor standardized, only pasteurized once (when usually the milk for yogurts is pasteurized 3 times). This artisanal method, in association with traditional recipes, gives to al the dairies a particular taste and smoothness, synonym of autentism.
Besides of the yogurt itself, the Ferme des Peupliers has a very strong specifications for the fruit jams and for all the ingredients they need like GMO Free, without any colorants or additives...
Then the know-how and the passion of the good product make the yogurt exceptional.
The range of yogurts and desserts is pretty wide for an artisanal company:
3 differents plain yogurts (125g glass jar):
11 whole milk fruit flavours and 3 low fat milk fruit flavour (125g glass jar)
- Mandarine "Délice d'Agrumes"
- Fruits of the Forrest
- Morello Cherry
We count 10 desserts in 2 categories: Jellified Milk and Semolina Pudding, and to complete all the range, we can provide fresh cream and butter.
All of these steps bring Ferme des Peupliers to be one of the most awarded company for yogurts and desserts. As far as I can remember, since 2005, each year, between 2 or 3 medals have been given by the "Concours Général Agricole" to Ferme des Peupliers. The "Concours Général Agricole" is the most important recognition in France
Once again the yogurts and desserts have been awarded:
Gold Medal for "Délice Café"
Silver Medal for Raspberries Yogurt
Bronze Medal for Cherry Yogurt
Bronze Medal for Pear Semolina Rice Pudding
Come to see us and taste our products at Hotelympia London form 26 February to 1st March on stand 2933S (French Pavillion) | <urn:uuid:3cdfb271-3dc6-4aa3-a0ae-1fc1c52eb9f7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rungisqualityfoods.com/2012/02/ferme-des-peupliers.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917872 | 640 | 1.867188 | 2 |
Negotiations are continuing on Capitol Hill to try to reach an agreement on spending levels for the 2011 federal government budget. House of Representatives Speaker, Republican John Boehner says he did not reach an agreement on the budget with President Barack Obama in talks at the White House Tuesday. Later talks between Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid were described as "productive," but with no indication of a breakthrough. A temporary resolution to fund the U.S. government expires at the end of the week. If no spending bill is agreed to by Congress, there will be a partial government shutdown that will affect services for millions of Americans.
Lawmakers have debated this year's government-spending levels for months, with Republicans demanding major cuts in domestic discretionary programs championed by Democrats, including some social programs for the poor and aged, and cuts in grants to college students from low-income families.
President Obama said Tuesday that Democrats have already met Republican demands for spending cuts, and that Republican lawmakers should not let ideology get in the way of preventing a partial government shutdown that could jeopardize the nation's economic recovery.
Mr. Obama called on Speaker Boehner and Senate Majority Leader, Democrat Harry Reid to get the 2011 budget issue resolved, saying that if not, he would ask them to come to the White House on Wednesday.
"It would be inexcusable for us to not be able to take care of last year’s business - keep in mind we’re dealing with a budget that could have gotten done three months ago, could have gotten done two months ago, could have gotten done last month - when we are this close simply because of politics," said President Obama.
Boehner said that the talks are continuing, but he denied that any agreement had been reached on cutting $33 billion from the budget.
"We have made clear that we are fighting for the largest spending cuts possible," said Speaker Boehner. "We are talking about real spending cuts here, no smoke and mirrors [no attempt to disguise the issue]. We have also made clear that there was never an agreement at $33 billion, that we are going to continue to fight for again the largest cuts possible."
The Republican-controlled House has passed a budget with $60 billion in spending cuts, but it failed to pass in the Democrat-controlled Senate. Several fiscal conservative Tea Party Republicans are rejecting any compromise on spending cuts, putting House Speaker Boehner in a difficult position.
The president, Boehner and two other congressional leaders reportedly discussed domestic spending cuts in the range of $30 billion - close to the amount Boehner had originally requested.
A partial government shutdown would mean that millions of federal employees deemed nonessential would not report to work until the budget showdown is resolved. National security would not be affected, but services such as visa and passport services would likely be suspended.
Most Democratic lawmakers and many advocates for working families say Republicans want to reduce the national debt on the backs of the poorest and most disadvantaged Americans, including children and the elderly.
One of them is Children's Defense Fund President Marian Wright Edelman:
"They are taking food out of the mouths of weak babies and weak mothers," said Edelman. "I mean what kind of country that is the richest in the world would take food literally out of the mouths of babies while giving tax cuts to billionaires and millionaires."
Republicans say government spending is out of control, and point out that Democrats failed to pass a budget last year when they still had majority control of the House of Representatives. Lawmakers have spent so much time debating the current year's budget, that it is now colliding with efforts to begin discussions on the 2012 budget.
On Tuesday, Republican Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Committee on the Budget, introduced his party's 2012 budget proposal, which includes more cuts in government spending and an overhaul of popular government healthcare programs for the poor and elderly, Medicaid and Medicare.
Ryan says he believes that reducing the national debt is a moral imperative.
"For starters, we propose to cut $6.2 trillion in spending over the next 10 years from the president's budget," said Ryan. "We reduce the debt as a percent of the economy, we put the nation on the path to actually pay off our national debt. Our goal here is to leave our children and our grandchildren with a debt-free nation."
Senate Democrats are likely to reject Ryan's proposal, but experts say it will help frame the long-term debate on tackling the biggest parts of the federal budget - Medicare, Medicaid, social security and defense spending. | <urn:uuid:0eea87f0-b30f-4322-9096-ee2de3660fad> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.voanews.com/content/obama-meets-with-boehner-for-budget-talks-119268994/174629.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967913 | 921 | 1.726563 | 2 |
Over the next few months, a handful of states will take early steps to try to solve a problem that’s become a by-product of the digital age: navigating the flood of student data.
Right now, all sorts of student data are being kept in everything from testing programs and instructional software to grade books and learning management systems. But the data are often trapped in the program and not easily extracted or combined with other data on the same student, creating the educational equivalent of the Hotel California: data can check in any time it likes, but it can never leave. Or be used effectively by teachers.
So a new initiative, supported by state education leaders and funded by prominent foundations, plans to provide a place in the cloud for each state to store all data for every student, using “free” open source software. And, in the process, student achievement information will be connected to instructional apps and web resources. That is, as long as the effort can address concerns about technology, privacy, and whether enough education companies will want to build products for a system that could undermine parts of their own businesses. | <urn:uuid:b4c57791-d393-4a3d-8860-d3ffc3d2dabd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.kqed.org/mindshift/tag/shared-learning-infrastructure/ | 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 | 0.953956 | 226 | 2.609375 | 3 |
The development of MOOCs inaugurates an exciting and unprecedented moment in education. For the first time, we can really speak about global learning and global education in actual terms. The chance for leading scholars to reach and teach virtually anyone interested in a topic creates intellectual dialogue never before seen on earth. The promotion of ideas emanating from leading universities in the free world give hope to those less fortunate, and as the details of credentialing are ironed out, the chance for significant advancement for even the most physically isolated person who has access to a computer is tremendous.
IESolutions applauds the development of MOOCs, but continues to promote residential college and university learning for those fortunate enough to be able to access this total learning environment. The experience of living and studying in a community of ideas and with people who share a love of learning continues to be the greatest total educational delivery system ever developed. Those who are able to attend such a college or university lead lives enhanced forever by this experience.
Sarah C Reese, IESolutions firstname.lastname@example.org
- MOOC Mania (myiesolutions.wordpress.com)
- Ten Reasons To Attend a College (Instead of learning online via a MOOC!) (myiesolutions.wordpress.com) | <urn:uuid:18a31072-4232-4bd6-8069-c4b18f440b71> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://myiesolutions.wordpress.com/2013/02/08/final-thoughts-on-moocs-from-iesolutions/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933455 | 255 | 1.976563 | 2 |
After posting my entry on happiness, I realized that I probably should have acknowledged some of the noise that has been generated by recent studies reporting that women are less happy then men, including one study concluding that women were unhappier than they were 35 years ago.
Two of my colleagues have reported (and received extensive comments) on this new research by Justin Wolfers and Betsey Stevenson. So rather than repeat it, I will direct you to David Leonhardt’s original column, “He’s Happier, She’s Less So,” and Steven D. Levitt’s post, “Why Are Women So Unhappy?” on the Freakonomics blog (followed by “The Debate on Female Happiness Heats Up,” posted yesterday).
Both writers posit a few reasons for women’s apparent decline in happiness even as they (we) seem to have experienced advances on many fronts.
The biggest reason, which gets mention in the articles and postings and in many of the comments from the readers, boils down to some version of the classic “second shift” argument: regardless of the advances women have made in the workplace, they still seem to face the (often self-imposed) pressures of doing more at home than their male counterparts.
I talked about this with Virginia Rutter, a sociologist at Framingham State College, who studies gender issues. and Ms. Rutter confirmed that these findings are, in fact, big news from a sociological perspective. What’s important, she said, is that “trends in happiness are giving us a chance to talk about the costs of women getting ahead.”
While we’re talking about it, I suggest that we women start dropping the ball a bit where we can get away with it. It’s what I call imperfectionism. I haven’t had a manicure or picked up an iron in years, and no one’s noticed. I delete most e-mails when I get home from a vacation (I use an autoresponder that says to e-mail me again after a certain date). Geesh, some days I don’t even manage to finish The New York Times. | <urn:uuid:83b152e6-2395-41d0-8f57-670321fb6e13> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://shiftingcareers.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/04/happiness-revisited-with-a-gender-twist/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972651 | 467 | 1.828125 | 2 |
The unsustainable situation in Cabrera reaches the European ParliamentAll Press Releases…
MEP Raül Romeva questions the current management of the Cabrera National Park in the European Parliament
February 8, 2013
Contact: Marta Madina ( email@example.com )
On the basis of Oceana’s claims, MEP Raül Romeva, of the Verdes/ALE group, has addressed as Parliamentary question to the European Commission on the unsustainable situation in the Maritime-Terrestrial National Park of the Cabrera Archipelago. It also refers to the ineffectiveness of the current park Trust, a body created to enable society’s involvement in all matters concerning the protected space.
The Executive Director of Oceana in Europe, Xavier Pastor, says: “The management of the park and the sea surrounding it carried out by the regional government of the Balearics in recent months breached not only national law, given that this emblematic location was declared a National Park, but also EC legislation, more specifically the Habitats and Birds Directives. The question made by MEP Romeva should draw the Commission’s attention towards the lack of management of the protected space, and now the Commission must investigate, reach a conclusion, and issue a response”.
Oceana has repeatedly denounces the current unsustainable situation in the National Park, which has worsened in the last year after the drastic cutback in that staff, maintenance, and research and monitoring budgets. Moreover, the organisation has stresses the ineffectiveness of the public involvement body, the Trust, given that it has not performed any of the duties assigned to this type of public body.
Learn more: Cabrera | <urn:uuid:62d0465d-dea5-49b4-a71e-851190a555d4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://oceana.org/en/print/eu/media-reports/press-releases/the-unsustainable-situation-in-cabrera-reaches-the-european-parliament | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00056-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.921438 | 346 | 1.734375 | 2 |
My Adventures in Roots-land with 50 Cent
A couple of years ago, I set out to trace the ancestry of the gangsta rapper 50 Cent for a VH1 television program. The basic idea was to connect the “genealogy chic” movement with a younger audience than watches Henry Louis Gates’s ancestry shows on PBS, and to bring hip-hop-generation African-American stars face-to-face with the legacy of slavery. 50 Cent, whose real name is Curtis Jackson, was willing to give the process a whirl, and the result is 50 Cent: The Origin of Me, which airs on VH1 this Monday, May 23, at nine p.m.
It’s happenstance that the show is airing now, in the very spring in which we’re observing the 150th anniversary of the beginning of the Civil War, but 50’s ancestral history turned out to be very much entangled in that of the Confederacy. (50, by the way, is what he likes to be called—pronounced “Fifty” rather than “Fiddy.” Curtis is also acceptable.) My research took me from the borough of Queens in New York City, where Jackson was born and raised, to the small town of Edgefield, South Carolina, from whence his maternal family came.
Edgefield is no ordinary small town. It was, long, long ago, a nexus of the Palmetto State aristocracy, sending 10 governors to the state house in Columbia, the last of whom, Strom Thurmond, served from 1947 to 1951 before becoming an eight-term U.S. senator. Edgefield also had a reputation in the antebellum era for violence—not the interracial kind, but white-on-white violence in the name of honor: duels, beefs, and brawls over perceived slights.
As a matter of fact, this Sunday marks the 155th anniversary of a notorious act of violence committed by a native Edgefieldian: the brutal beating on the U.S. Senate floor of Charles Sumner, a senator from Massachusetts, by Preston Brooks, who represented South Carolina as a congressman. Sumner, a fervent abolitionist, had delivered a speech that Brooks took to be insulting toward his cousin, the U.S. senator (and fellow Edgefield native) Andrew Butler. On May 22, 1856, during a lull in Senate proceedings, Brooks approached Sumner, who was sitting at his desk, told him that his speech was “a libel on South Carolina,” and proceeded to beat Sumner to a pulp with his gutta-percha cane. The attack so incapacitated Sumner that he did not return to the Senate for three years. It also turned Brooks into a folk hero back home.
In Edgefield, I found a welcoming and cooperative group of historians and archivists who helped me delve into Curtis Jackson’s ancestral past. We determined that one of 50’s great-great-great-grandmothers, a slave named Jane Jenkins, had been owned by a prominent citizen of the town named R. G. M. Dunovant. Dunovant was a significant player in the Civil War’s opening act, the Battle of Fort Sumter: the brigadier general who commanded the Confederate forces on Sullivan’s Island, site of Fort Moultrie.
Dunovant also happened to be married to a woman named Ellen Brooks, who came from a still more prominent family. One of her brothers was none other than … Preston Brooks.
This was startling enough: discovering how readily the family narrative of Jackson, the ghetto-raised “In Da Club” hitmaker, converged with those of the Confederacy’s (literal and figurative) heavy hitters. More startling still, though, was seeing how alive this history remains once you get on the ground in Edgefield.
Last year, Bob McDonnell, the governor of Virginia, caught flak for declaring April 2010 to be “Confederate History Month” in his state. But in Edgefield, whose picturesque square looks much as it did in the 1860s, every day is Confederate History Day. There’s nothing coy or subliminal about the area’s embrace of its Rebel heritage. In the square stands a 32-foot-high obelisk that was dedicated in 1900 to the memory of the area’s Confederate war dead. The sports teams of the local high school, named for Strom Thurmond, call themselves the Fighting Rebels. (I saw a picture in the local paper, the Edgefield Advertiser, of Strom Thurmond High’s football squad, a group of mostly black kids in jerseys with the word rebels across the front—normal to them, loaded with head-hurting layers of cognitive dissonance to me.)
Another town attraction is Oakley Park, a museum housed in the former mansion of Martin Witherspoon Gary, like Dunovant a brigadier general in the Confederate Army. After the war, Gary was instrumental in the formation of the Red Shirts, a paramilitary group that, through violence and intimidation, suppressed the voting rights of black freedmen and their Radical Republican allies.
You might think that parachuting 50 Cent and a film crew into a place like this would have resulted in fisticuffs and histrionic arguments—especially when you consider that this was for VH1, home of Rock of Love, Mob Wives, and Sober House with Dr. Drew. But you’d be wrong. What transpired when we filmed there in May 2010 was much more nuanced and revelatory.
There were moments approaching rapprochement, as when a descendant of R. G. M. Dunovant confessed to Jackson that the historical connection that had brought them together “makes my skin crawl.” There were also, inevitably, some uncomfortable moments. Oakley Park is administered and staffed by the United Daughters of the Confederacy, and 50 bristled when a docent there blithely insisted to him that the Civil War was about states’ rights rather than slavery, and that the slaves who had lived on the property’s grounds had been treated well, among other curious assertions:
“She’s offering her truth, what she’s accepted as the truth based on information given to her. But I don’t agree with it,” 50 told us. Still, he took pains not to condemn the woman. “I don’t blame her for having pride in her heritage,” he told me off-camera. “She’s acting on the natural instinct to be proud of who your grandparents were, who your great-grandparents were.”
The most pronounced conflict, in fact, was one that occurred between 50 and us, the filmmakers. (I worked with the director Ron Yassen and the writer-producer Sacha Jenkins, both of the production company Roadside Entertainment.) We were interested in exploring the notion that, perhaps, the trip-wire violence with which 50 Cent and his peers grew up in urban Queens was a twisted inheritance from the white Old South.
Could it be possible, we wondered, that Edgefield’s violent code of honor had hopped cultural and geographical boundaries—first from masters to slaves, and then from southern freedmen to northern gangstas? In all seriousness: did Preston Brooks’s beef with Charles Sumner somehow indirectly inform 50’s long-simmering beefs with Ja Rule and Rick Ross? (Like 50, a former drug hustler whose face and body are pocked with bullet wounds from an ambush in 2000, Brooks carried a souvenir of a gun-related incident: a permanent limp from having been shot in the hip in an 1841 duel with Louis T. Wigfall, another hotheaded Edgefieldian of renown.)
But 50 wasn’t having it. He’s not a “root cause” kind of guy. In fact, he got so frustrated with our pursuit of this angle that he asked for the cameras to be turned off at one point. “I don’t necessarily see a connection between stuff that happened 200 years ago in Edgefield and stuff that happened to me on the south side of Jamaica, Queens,” he said. “Some people just choose to be bad.”
It was an unexpected twist: the kid from the ’hood rejecting the idea that he bears the psychic scars of slavery, while we were protesting to him, “No, really, pal, you do!”
Yet it was merely a point of contention, not a big fight. To me, disagreements like these were a vital part of the experience. By delving into 50’s backstory, we unlocked bits and pieces of family history and national history, and, in so doing, prompted some thoughtful discussions about how the Civil War and its surrounding issues resonate with us today.
I won’t pretend that there were tidy resolutions to these discussions. But that we could so peaceably engage in them, Edgefieldians and visitors both, was a sign of progress. As was our discovery that every kid at Strom Thurmond High School—black, white, or otherwise—knows exactly who 50 Cent is. | <urn:uuid:7d6c44da-6341-45ee-a363-bd7377da8d2a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2011/05/50-cent-201105.print | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968423 | 1,943 | 2 | 2 |
March 1, 2012
Reliving NYC's First Big Plane Crash
Micheline Maynard, New York Times
March 1, 1962, was the first sunny day in New York in weeks. People from across the city were streaming onto Broadway for a ticker-tape parade to honor the astronaut John Glenn.
But the city’s mood was spoiled shortly after 10 o’clock on that Thursday morning by the crash of American Airlines Flight 1 into Jamaica Bay. The accident happened after the plane took off from Idlewild Airport, killing all 95 people aboard.
On Sunday night, the crash was the centerpiece of an episode of “Mad Men,” the series on the AMC network that is set in the 1960s and explores the lives and loves of the staff at the Sterling Cooper Agency.
In the episode, one of the victims of the Boeing 707 accident is the father of one of the “Mad Men.” Within...
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XML and content management systems
With the rise in popularity of both XML and content management systems (CMS), there are an increasing number of tenders specifying “CMS must be built using XML”.
What does this mean in practice? This article explores the role of XML in the context of content management systems, focusing specifically on the business issues.
This is a complex area, and one that is evolving rapidly. This article does not aim to provide a complete answer to all questions. Rather, the goal is to ‘demystify’ the area, and provide organisations with more information on which to base their CMS selection processes and criteria.
What is XML?
The eXtensible Markup Language (XML) is an industry standard for capturing and communicating information in a structured way. In essence, it is a “language for creating languages”, where each language is designed to represent a specific information set in an effective and powerful way.
In the context of this article, it is important to recognise that, while XML provides many benefits, it is not a “silver bullet”. While two products may use XML to represent the content in their CMS, if they aren’t using the same dialect, there is no interoperability.
This issue will be revisited a number of times throughout the article, and it represents the key challenge facing XML in the context of content management systems.
For more on XML, see the supplement published by Standards Australia titled An Introduction to XML for Knowledge Managers.
The use of XML in content management systems is still rapidly evolving
XML and CMS
There are a number of key areas in a content management system where XML has a role to play, including:
These will be explored in the following sections, starting with the simplest aspects, and working through to the more complex issues.
There are a number of widely-used ‘syndication’ formats, designed to support the flow of information between organisations. These include Rich Site Summary (RSS) and NewsML, and all are based on XML.
With the growth of these formats, many content management systems provide support as part of their core product. Overall, there should be a decreasing need to customise CMS solutions to handle these syndication formats.
If your organisation has a business requirement to either accept outside ‘news feeds’, or to publish information for the use of others, specify this in your CMS tender.
It is also reasonable to specify which specific syndication formats the CMS should support.
Single-source publishing is one of greatest potential benefits
The use of the XML Stylesheet Language (XSL) grown extensively since it was released several years ago.
With the increasing maturity of this technology, and the widespread availability of programmers skilled in its use, there are potential benefits to using XSL as the basis for CMS publishing systems.
There are, however, a number of other non-XML publishing technologies which have similar (or better) capabilities.
XML has the potential to offer real benefits in providing ‘single source publishing’. By separating the presentation from the content, the same piece of information can be rendered differently depending on how it will be used (eg. on the web, wireless, print, etc).
To enable this capability, the content must be captured in a structured way (see the section on authoring).
If your organisation has a commitment to an XML-based publishing environment, or has in-house programmers skilled in XSL, then specify this in your CMS tender.
If there is a need to support multiple published formats, then XML may also be relevant.
Beyond this, the use of XML in publishing systems should not be a major consideration when selecting a CMS.
To a large extent, what happens within a content management system is invisible to the business. As a “black box” solution, a CMS is generally free to be coded in any way that meets business requirements.
In principle, there would be benefits to using a standard XML language to capture site content and structure. Unfortunately, at present, there are no standards in this space.
Without these standards, while two CMS products may use XML to store their content, their use of different XML dialects will eliminate most benefits in terms of migration or interoperability.
At present, vendors should implement XML within their CMS if it produces concrete business benefits, or supports additional functionality. This is a technical implementation decision.
For customers of a CMS, there is little benefit in specifying that a CMS should use XML internally, unless there are clear business reasons.
When XML standards are developed for representing site content and structure, this situation will change.
A content management system is but one of a number of information systems that exist within most organisations.
Increasingly, there is a recognised need to connect these systems together, to provide a seamless information environment.
In practice, this often means connecting a CMS to systems such as:
- document management systems
- records management systems
- e-commerce platforms
In this area, substantial work has been devoted to the development of ‘web services’ platforms, such as Sun’s J2EE or Microsoft’s .NET.
While there is considerable impetus behind these initiatives, these are very low-level standards designed to facilitate web-based communication.
Little has been done to directly address the needs of content management, and there are no implemented standards that manage the content or structure of a site.
With this being the case, it is currently more important that the CMS solution provide a documented API (application programming interface) than to offer XML capabilities. This API can then be used to develop customised interoperability code (which may use web services).
Interoperability is limited by the lack of standards
Determine the specific ways in which the CMS will need to be interconnected with other information systems within your organisation.
Explore how prospective CMS solutions would meet these interoperability needs, and focus on the provision of a fully-documented API.
If your organisation has a widely-deployed web services platform (such as .NET or J2EE), the CMS should be able to interact with this.
Content must be captured in a structured form for XML benefits to be realised
To realise many of the benefits offered by XML in a CMS, content must be captured in a structured way.
This means moving away from unstructured information sources, to an environment where the content is authored in a more controlled way.
This is a complex and evolving area, but a few key realisations have become apparent:
- Organisations must move away from using tools such as word processors to author content, as there is no automated way to convert unstructured sources to XML.
- There are benefits to be gained by having authors use an XML-aware editor as part of a CMS.
- The users must not be exposed to the complexity of XML. The fact that the content is stored as XML should be invisible to authors and editors.
- Capturing content as HTML is not desirable, as this severely limits the potential benefits delivered by XML elsewhere in the CMS.
- While some systems claim XML-compliance through the use of XHTML (the XML version of HTML), this provides no practical benefits over using plain HTML.
A number of vendors have developed solutions around the use of XML-based editing environments, and these show promise. There is, however, no consistent approach, and most XML-based solutions are relatively immature.
Progress has been slow in this area, and it is expected that several more years of practical experience will be required before the best business solution becomes apparent.
When assessing potential CMS products, explore how the use of an XML-based authoring environment will provide concrete business benefits.
Focus on the usability and simplicity of the authoring tools, and ensure that the authors will not have to replace their knowledge of HTML’s intricacies with a technical understanding of XML.
Use scenarios as part of the selection process to determine how the use of XML will work in practice, and what benefits and costs it will bring.
Focus on business requirements first, XML second
This article has only explored the most common uses of XML in a content management system.
In general, organisations should determine their specific business requirements, and list these in the CMS tender. If there are specific requirements for XML capabilities, these should be outlined in detail.
Without the further development of XML standards specifically relating to content management, the use of XML to support interoperability is currently limited.
Overall, it is therefore not meaningful to specify that a CMS should “support XML”. At present, it is more important to select a product that meets all the organisation’s business requirements, than to choose a system that offers XML features.
(For further information regarding the evaluation and selection of a CMS, download the Content Management Requirements Toolkit.) | <urn:uuid:d2bd22a0-7540-47b4-ac4d-11bd433ae270> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.steptwo.com.au/papers/kmc_xmlandcms/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.921245 | 1,839 | 2.578125 | 3 |
Well-known financial economist and Durango resident Robert A. Haugen died Sunday, Jan. 6, 2013, at his home. He was 70.
Known as “Bob,” he was born to Raymond and Caroline Raab Haugen on June 26, 1942, in Chicago.
Mr. Haugen graduated from Lane Tech College Preparatory High School in Chicago in 1960. He attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, graduating magna cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in finance and going on to receive his doctorate in finance from the same institution.
In 1968, Mr. Haugen became an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin at Madison where, continuing his collaboration with a professor from graduate school, A. James Heins, he began examining historical stock data from the Center for Research in Security Prices.
“Using data from 1926 through 1971, they were astonished to find that in both equity and bond markets, the relationship between risk and return was negative, contradicting a basic tenet in the field of finance,” his family said. “This finding was not well-received by the academic community.”
Dr. Haugen eventually held endowed chairs at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, the University of Illinois and the University of California at Irvine.
In the early 1970s, Mr. Haugen served as an expert witness in the precedent-setting legal and environmental battle known as the Reserve Mining case. Reserve Mining and the other defendant companies were disposing of thousands of tons of taconite tailings into Lake Superior. Mr. Haugen determined that the companies could afford to use alternate means of disposal without bankrupting their operations, which helped restore the health of Lake Superior.
“A vocal critic of the efficient market hypothesis and the capital asset pricing model, Dr. Haugen’s professional legacy includes scores of supporters and admirers, a prolific body of published research, 15 books on finance and the stock market available in seven languages, and the respect and appreciation of professional investors worldwide who converted his theories into profitable investments,” his family said. “Recently ranked among the Top 20 most-published academics in the top finance journals, his academic work has inspired thousands of professionals to question long-held tenets of the academic establishment.”
In 1992, he founded Haugen Custom Financial Systems.
Mr. Haugen is survived by his wife, Jan Bowler, of Durango; daughters Wendy Haugen of Durango and Sally Haugen Ellingsen in C’oeur d’Alene, Idaho; siblings Marilyn Larson and Richard Haugen, both of the Chicago area; and numerous nieces, nephews and extended family members.
A memorial service will be held Saturday, Jan. 19, 2013. For details, email firstname.lastname@example.org. | <urn:uuid:645de363-386d-4d5e-9217-ed011f7575b0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.durangoherald.com/article/20130108/NEWS07/130109611/0/20121008 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00024-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974684 | 589 | 1.757813 | 2 |
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Thread: Sands of war
01-19-07, 07:15 PM #1
Sands of war
Sands of war
Pacific islands harbor relics
By MEG JONES
Posted: Jan. 20, 2007
Chuuk Lagoon - The cockpit of the Zero had seen better days. Though the joystick still moved, the seat had rotted away until only the metal was left.
The Japanese writing on the dials was still visible, but some of the glass that protected the speedometer and altimeter was gone. Considering the Japanese fighter plane was in the No. 2 hold of the Fujikawa Maru and the Japanese freighter had been at the bottom of Chuuk Lagoon for more than six decades, the Zero was in remarkably good shape.
Zero fighters, the fast planes that bedeviled American pilots high above the Pacific Ocean and took part in the raid on Pearl Harbor, are quite rare. Only a handful are on display in museums and even fewer can still fly. But on the bottom of the lagoon in this group of Micronesian islands, scuba divers can see one up close, swim into the cockpit and sit down for a unique sight few others - aside from those who pulled on Japanese uniforms - can experience.
Though it's easier to get around Europe to visit World War II battlefields, the South Pacific offers an interesting perspective of the battles that shed so much blood but eventually turned the tide in the war with Japan.
Intrepid travelers and World War II history buffs willing to hopscotch islands via air and sea are rewarded with war relics both underwater and on land, interesting museums, battlefields and now-pristine beautiful beaches that more than six decades ago were scenes of brutal combat.
Ironically, since islands like Guam and Saipan are fairly close to Japan, many of the places that were ferociously fought over by the Allies and Japan's imperial army and navy are now popular among Japanese tourists. In fact, Guam has thriving businesses that focus on moderately priced weddings and scuba instruction for the Japanese.
Many Americans come to visit, too. Because Guam, a U.S. territory that is home to American military bases, and many of the islands use U.S. currency, there's no foreign exchange rate to worry about. English is widely spoken.
Guam is the main starting point for visitors intent on seeing World War II battle sites in the central Pacific. It's the main airport hub for daily flights to islands such as Saipan, Tinian, Palau and Chuuk. Continental Airlines is the main carrier with connections from the United States through Honolulu, though there also are smaller regional airlines connecting the islands.
One day after the U.S. Pacific fleet was devastated at Pearl Harbor, the Japanese attacked and invaded Guam. Today the beaches where Americans launched their invasion to retake the island in July 1944 are dotted with plaques describing the carnage that unfolded as GIs stormed ashore against unrelenting fire from Japanese artillery and Japanese soldiers firmly entrenched in caves in the countryside. There are six "War in the Pacific" historic parks filled with war relics to visit.
Some Japanese soldiers were more entrenched than others. One soldier - Sgt. Soichi Yokoi - hid in the jungles of Guam until 1975, clueless about the end of World War II. He was a minor celebrity in Guam until his death a few years ago; some of Yokoi's possessions, such as his handmade clothing, are on display in a museum.
Among the shipwrecks in Apra Harbor are the Tokai Maru, a Japanese freighter sunk by torpedoes fired from a U.S. submarine in August 1943, and the German merchant ship SMS Cormoran that was scuttled by its captain before it could fall into the hands of the American military. The Cormoran preceded the Tokai Maru to the bottom of Guam's harbor by 26 years, though.
The ships ended up right next to each other, and divers can put one hand on the 440-foot Tokai Maru and another hand on the 290-foot Cormoran. It's the only place in the world where divers can visit wrecks from World War I and II at the same time.
The best place to see World War II shipwrecks, though, is Chuuk. Officially called Truk until recently but still commonly known by that name, Chuuk Lagoon's natural harbor prompted the Japanese to settle a significant number of its fleet in this group of Micronesian islands during World War II. It was the base for Japanese operations against Allied forces in New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.
In sort of a reverse Pearl Harbor, Allied planes sank more than 50 ships, planes and submarines in bombing raids over the atoll in 1944 during Operation Hailstorm. Now it's a submerged maritime museum. The wrecks are not marked and can be reached only through registered dive guides who ensure relics are not lifted by visitors.
So divers can swim through a ship's galley and see a large wok still on the stove or tools still hanging on nails in engine rooms or crates of sake bottles, many still filled with the rice wine, in the holds of ships. There are piles of bullets and artillery shells, bicycles, bathtubs filled with bright orange rust particles, trucks, delicate blue and white tea cups and tanks.
Decades after the war ended, the Japanese government removed skeletons and bones of military members killed when their ships sank or planes crashed in the lagoon.
Divers can visit some of the islands during surface intervals between dives and see ruins of Japanese communications centers and barracks on Chuuk.
While the shipwrecks and sunken planes are fascinating, none are well-known to historians. However, divers who travel to Palau can see a Japanese trawler sunk in 1944 by President George H.W. Bush when he was a young Navy pilot.
During World War II thousands of Japanese troops were stationed on the islands of Palau. Though there were numerous air battles, only one of the islands was the scene of much fighting. The Marine invasion of Peleliu in September 1944 was brutal, with more than 12,000 Americans and Japanese losing their lives during the two-month battle for control of the airstrip, which can still be seen today on the tiny coral island.
Divers can see small tanks and other military equipment in the waters that lie off the beaches that served as landing zones for Marines. Much of the equipment is difficult to see though, since marine life has taken over with beautiful colored plants now attached to gun barrels and turrets.
On Peleliu a small ceremonial shrine marks the ground where thousands of Marines who lost their lives while trying to take the island were initially buried. They were later disinterred for burial in the U.S. A tour of the island includes Japanese bunkers, a cave where hundreds of soldiers were buried alive, war relics and a small museum filled with rusting helmets, Coke bottles and gas masks, as well as paintings and photos depicting the battle of Peleliu.
Fighting was also fierce on Saipan. Now the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. commonwealth, Saipan was taken over by Japan in 1914, which developed businesses and taught its language to schoolchildren. So when American Marines and soldiers - aided by Navajo code talkers - stormed the beaches, they were not liberating an island, like Guam, that had been invaded only a few years earlier by the Japanese.
The response by hundreds of Saipan natives was to commit suicide by jumping off what's now known as "Suicide Cliff" and "Banzai Cliff."
Tourists can visit the mountainous area in central Saipan where the Japanese military made its last stand and the spot where Lt. Gen. Yo****sugu Saito committed suicide.
Local legend has it that Amelia Earhart was captured by the Japanese in 1937 while on her around-the-world flight and held in a Saipan prison. Tour guides sometimes show off the now-abandoned cell where she supposedly was held. Of course, there is no evidence that Earhart was on Saipan, but it's a nice yarn nevertheless.
Pieces of Japanese artillery and other rusting war relics are on display not far from the Saipan harbor where American ships now dock and U.S. sailors come ashore to see the battlefields portrayed in the film "Windtalkers."
About half an hour ride by boat from Saipan is Tinian, the island known only for its two airfields and the two planes that took off from the concrete strips in August 1945. This is where the Enola Gay and Bock's Car left on their secret missions to drop atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. There's not much to see on Tinian because the airfields are now overgrown, though visitors can see the concrete pits where the bombs were loaded onto the planes.
Right before the U.S. military left Tinian, it got rid of lots of equipment by simply dumping it into the sea. Divers now can see mounds of empty bottles of Coke drunk by GIs stationed on the island.
IN LOVING MEMORY OF MY LATE HUSBAND, SSgt Roger A. Alfano, USMC
ONE PROUD MARINE
Once a Marine...Always a Marine
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Santa Monica, CA -- California environmental group Heal the Bay today affirmed a series of preventive actions it is taking to reduce the scourge of marine debris in anticipation of a report scheduled for release next week by the state Ocean Protection Council.
Heal the Bay has consulted extensively with authors of the report, a draft of which lays out ambitious goals for eliminating plastic bags, polystyrene food packaging, cigarette butts and other items from local waters. The growing amount of trash in our oceans is choking marine ecosystems, local economies and quality of life along California shores.
Under the umbrella of the Pacific Protection Initiative, Heal the Bay has worked successfully over the past two years with a number of municipal leaders and state legislators to enact legislation that significantly curbs the amount of manmade debris entering our taxed seas.
“We expect this report to be a significant boost to the environmental community’s ongoing fight to rid our seas of unsightly and harmful trash,” said Dr. Mark Gold, president of Heal the Bay. “Our organization will continue to use our resources to help turn this plan into a reality that all Californians can be proud of.”
Mirroring OPC recommendations, this week Heal the Bay conferred with Los Angeles city council members who unanimously endorsed a policy to eliminate plastic bags at local retailers by 2010 if a statewide fee on their use is not imposed. It also consulted with the cities of Santa Monica, Malibu and Manhattan Beach on similar policies.
On a statewide level, Heal the Bay is sponsoring AB 2058, which sets a 25-cent fee on the use of any single-use plastic shopping bag if waste diversion targets are not met. The group’s legislative team continues to lobby various state and municipal bodies, with the ultimate goal of eliminating California’s 19-billion-bags-a-year addiction.
The OPC report also urges plastic manufacturers and users to be more diligent about keeping materials out of waterways. Manufacturers of nurdles – the preproduction pellets that are the building blocks of most plastic products – are now required by law to eliminate harmful discharge of these materials, under a state law passed last year with Heal the Bay’s sponsorship.
This year, the group is sponsoring SB 899, a bill designed to identify areas that are plagued by derelict fishing gear. Abandoned equipment can ensnare and kill marine mammals, as well as pose safety hazards to ocean users.
For Immediate Release
Among the other recommendations in the OPC report:
Implementation of a producer responsibility program for items commonly found as marine debris, for example a required take- back program similar to car battery manufacturers.
Increasing the enforcement of anti-litter laws. The report recommends an escalating fine for multiple littering violations, starting at $2000.
Establishing a litter fee assessed on the sale of products commonly littered in California.
Conducting a study to determine which plastic additives are most threatening to the marine environment, educating the public about these additives, and preparing a plan for their possible prohibition.
While the draft report sets aggressive abatement goals, it unfortunately provides few implementation strategies to achieve them. Based on the recommendations, Heal the Bay has set out a legislative action plan, as well as community outreach programs to drive implementation.
About Heal the Bay Heal the Bay is a nonprofit environmental organization dedicated to making Southern California coastal waters and watersheds, including Santa Monica Bay, safe, healthy and clean for people and aquatic life. This year it will host Coastal Cleanup Day in Los Angeles County, mobilizing more than 12,000 volunteers to remove debris at 60 locations on Sept. 20.
About the OPC Established under a 2004 state law, the Ocean Protection Council coordinates activities of ocean-related state agencies to improve the effectiveness of state efforts to protect ocean resources within existing fiscal limitations. | <urn:uuid:f4451c10-b233-4253-b76a-1e0113f7ea5e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.healthebay.org/%5Bmenu-trail-parents-path-raw%5D/state%E2%80%99s-marine-debris-report-sets-lofty-goals | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925187 | 788 | 2.109375 | 2 |
DESPITE the hype and claims, there aren't too many magic bullets in nutrition.
But Dr David Richards from Iluka Wellness Centre said new research on genetic testing had shown certain foods had the ability to switch on and switch off both good and bad cells in the body.
Dr Richards said he had recently read an exciting new book by Brisbane-based nutritional biochemist Christine Houghton on nutrigenomics which explained how certain foods could "talk" to our body's cells.
The book, Switched On, details the findings of new research that showed a chemical compound called sulforaphane, which is found in raw cruciferous vegetables such as broccoli, held the key to switching on the body's cellular defence system.
The book also talks about the value of gene profiling which gives people an opportunity to identify their susceptibility to certain diseases.
"(The research is showing that) for those of us who want optimal health, we can make lifestyle choices according to certain components of our genes," Dr Richards said.
"They've found that sulforaphane switches on your own ability to fight things and switches off inflammation.
"A lot of the diseases we see these days are a result of inflammation not being switched off - diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease and rheumatoid arthritis.
Dr Richards said the findings were yet another tool available to people who were proactive with their health.
"The other huge benefit I can see (with gene profiling) is for our kids," he said.
"With things like bowel cancer or diabetes, if you know you have the gene that pre-disposes you to it, you may be able to help your kids avoid it."
Dr Richards said he would soon be undertaking a course that allowed him to issue gene profiling kits.
He is encouraging other clinicians in the Clarence Valley to do the same for the benefit of their patients.
He said the course was also available to others in the medical field, such as naturopaths. | <urn:uuid:aae03aae-d9c9-48ef-8ae0-021a0f91d7c0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dailyexaminer.com.au/news/how-to-switch-on-your-bodys-cells-david-richards/1397244/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970168 | 412 | 2.359375 | 2 |
Major Histocompatibility ComplexFebruary 2005 Molecule of the Month by David Goodsell
doi: 10.2210/rcsb_pdb/mom_2005_2 (PDF Version, ePub Version )
Viruses are insidious enemies, so we must have numerous defenses against them.
Antibodies are our first line of defense. Antibodies bind to viruses, mobilizing blood cells
to destroy them. But what happens if viruses slip past this defense and get inside a cell?
Then, antibodies have no way of finding them and the viruses are safe...but not quite.
Each cell has a second line of defense that it uses to signal to the immune system when something goes wrong inside. Cells continually break apart a few of their old, obsolete proteins and display the pieces on their surfaces. The small peptides are held in MHC, the major histocompatibility complex, which grips the peptides and allow the immune system to examine them. In this way, the immune system can monitor what is going on inside the cell. If all the peptides displayed on the cell surface are normal, the immune system leaves the cell alone. But if there is a virus multiplying inside the cell, many of the MHC molecules carry unusual peptides from viral proteins, and the immune system kills the cell.
Like many proteins used in the immune system, MHC is composed of several functional parts connected by flexible joints. The structure shown here, PDB entry 1hsa, only shows the part found on the outside of the cell. The large chain colored orange has a groove at the top, which binds to the peptide, colored red. A smaller chain, colored pink, stabilizes the structure. In the whole protein, the orange chain extends down and crosses the cell membrane at the bottom, attaching the protein to the surface of the cell. This portion of the molecule, however, is too flexible for study by x-ray crystallography and was removed for the analysis.
MHC in Action
Our itchy reaction to poison ivy is caused by the MHC system. The resins on poison ivy leaves react with proteins in the skin. These poisoned cells then break the proteins into pieces and display them using MHC molecules. The itchy rash is caused when the immune system attacks the problem. Even more serious, MHC is the cause of tissue rejection during skin grafts and organ grafts. This is how the protein got its name: the term histocompatibility refers to the difficulty of finding compatible grafts between a donor and a patient. Each person has their own collection of MHC molecules. There are hundreds of different kinds, but each person only has four types (two from each parent). If you graft a piece of skin that has a different collection of MHC types, they will trigger the immune system to destroy the cells. So the trick is to find a compatible donor, such as a relative, who has a similar collection of MHC molecules.
The Cancer Connection
There is growing evidence that the MHC system is also important in the natural fight against cancer in your body. Cancer cells, like normal cells, display pieces of their own proteins on their surface. So, if any of these proteins carry recognizable cancer mutations, this provides a signal to the immune system that something is wrong.
Types and Terminology
Two major types of MHC are used in your body. Class I MHC is found on the surface of most cells, where it protects us from viral infection. An example is shown on the left, from PDB entry 1hsa. Class II MHC, on the other hand, is found in specialized antigen-presenting cells that have the job of picking up proteins around the body and stimulating the immune system when they find a strange peptide to display. Like class I MHC, class II MHC is found tethered to the cell surface and it has a pocket that displays small peptides. It is different, however, in a few details. Both chains of class II MHC have portions that cross the membrane and the binding site is formed in a groove between the two chains. An example is shown here on the right from PDB entry 1dlh. As is often the case in science, there is also some terminology to watch out for: human MHC molecules are often named HLA, for human leucocyte antigen.
A Family of Folds
Many immune system proteins are built of a similar folding unit, composed of a
sandwich of beta sheets (shown with the blocky arrows) locked together with a disulfide
bridge between two cysteine amino acids in the center (shown with spheres). This
common domain structure shows up again and again as you look through the immune
system proteins in the PDB. Three examples are shown here: on the left, the T-cell
receptor (1tcr) which has four of these domains; in the center is an antibody (1igt) with
12 of these domains; and on the right is MHC (2hla) with two of these domains. The
similarity of the amino acids that form these tight units indicates that many immune
system proteins have evolved from a similar ancestor protein.
For more information on MHC from a genomic perspective, see the Protein of the Month at the European Bioinformatics Institute.
Exploring the Structure
The entire MHC system poses a problem: each cell has thousands of different peptides to
display, but each cell only builds a few types of MHC. The solution to this dilemma was
revealed in the early structures of MHC with different peptides. The two structures shown
here, entry 2vaa on the left and entry 2vab on the right, have peptides from two different
viruses bound to the same MHC. Another similar series can be found in PDB entries
1hhg, 1hhh, 1hhi, 1hhj, and 1hhk. Looking at these structures, you can see that the
peptide, which is nine amino acids long, is held in an extended conformation in a groove
between two long alpha helices, as shown in the upper pictures. The MHC protein grips
the peptide at each end and at a tyrosine in the
middle, as shown by the yellow stars. Notice that these three positions are similar in the two structures. The
peptide is anchored to MHC at these points, but the other amino acids extend outward,
away from the protein. Next month, we will look at how the immune system recognizes
these exposed portions of the peptides.
These illustrations were created with RasMol. You can create similar pictures by clicking on the accession codes here and picking one of the options under View Structure.
Additional reading on MHC
S. Sell (2001) Immunology, Immunopathology and Immunity. ASM Press, Washington,
K. Natarajan, H. Li, R. A. Mariuzza and D. H. Margulies (1999) MHC Class I Molecules, Structure and Function. Reviews in Immunogenetics 1, 32-46.
I. A. York and K. L. Rock (1996) Antigen Processing and Presentation by the Class I Major Histocompatibility Complex. Annual Review of Immunology 14, 369-396.
M. Matsumura, D. H. Fremont, P. A. Peterson and I. A. Wilson (1992) Emerging Principles for the Recognition of Peptide Antigens by MHC Class I Molecules. Science 257, 927-934.
© 2013 David Goodsell & RCSB Protein Data Bank | <urn:uuid:45022483-0cc5-4e95-9de0-720e0b634bb9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rcsb.org/pdb/101/motm.do?momID=62 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931638 | 1,596 | 3.8125 | 4 |
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Apr 20, 2010, 11.23 AM IST
Suzuki Motor Corp will increase its engine output capacity in India by about 30 percent to more than 1.25 million units a year by setting up a new line dedicated to low-pollution models, the Nikkei business daily said.
Suzuki will invest nearly 10 billion yen (USD 108.2 million) to install a production line capable of churning out 300,000 units annually at a manufacturing base near New Delhi this year, the paper said.
The line will be dedicated to producing so-called K-series low-emission models, which are mainly mounted on small cars with 1 to 1.2-liter engines, the Nikkei said.
The investment, which will lift production capacity of low-production engines in India by 60% to 800,000 a year, is in response to stricter emission regulations adopted the country, the paper said.
Tags: Suzuki Motor Corp
May 22 2013, 11:25
- in FII View
May 22 2013, 10:44
- in Economy | <urn:uuid:737620e2-da25-4590-bc0b-ebebf4a28ef9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/suzuki-to-raise-engine-outputindia_452474.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925919 | 236 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Ghana Jurist in Residence and Clerkship Programs
The Virtue Foundation Institute for Innovation and Philanthropy in Ghana launches the Ghana Jurist in Residence Program in New York, New York and the Ghana Clerkship Program in Accra, Ghana.
Investing in women and girls has an incredible “multiplier effect” for community economic and social advancement. Virtue Foundation and its partners recognize the important role that judges, especially women judges, can play in strengthening the rule of law both through their contributions to an impartial judiciary as well as through their role in the implementation and enforcement of laws, particularly those that provide access to justice for women and girls. The Women Judges in the Pipeline Initiative supports women judges who are strong leaders and agents of change toward improving access to justice, rule of law, and sustainable development. In particular, this Initiative seeks to identify obstacles and offer practical solutions to increasing women’s participation in judiciaries throughout the world, including in Ghana.
Ghana Jurist in Residence Program
As part of this Initiative, the Virtue Foundation Institute for Innovation and Philanthropy in Ghana, in collaboration with the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School and the Office of Court Administration of New York, is implementing a five-week training and shadowing program for five selected Ghanaian women judges. This Program is a unique opportunity to access the resources of a world-class research facility and to participate in best-in-class training with U.S. colleagues to gain invaluable knowledge and skills. Training topics include: legal research and writing, case management, fair trial rights, ethical issues, gender and the judiciary, and issues of vulnerable groups in the courts. In addition, judges are receiving training on the theory and practical implementation of problem-solving courts. Judges are also spending a week shadowing U.S. judge counterparts who are working in problem-solving courts. The goal is to adequately prepare participants to plan and implement an innovative model Family Justice Center in Ghana.
Ghana Supreme Court Clerkship Program
In addition, the Office of the Honourable Chief Justice of the Republic of Ghana, with support from the Virtue Foundation Institute for Innovation and Philanthropy in Ghana and in collaboration with the Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at Fordham Law School, is launching the Supreme Court Clerkship Program in Ghana. The Program aims at providing Supreme Court Justices with the needed research resource and support in their challenging function while affording an opportunity for mentoring and ultimately nurturing talents for the Ghanaian Bench. By attracting exceptionally bright and motivated women law graduates, the Program intends to provide a platform for the training of highly promising young women whose research, academic excellence and practice would be furthered by working under distinguished Justices of the Supreme Court of Ghana. The Program is selecting three clerks annually who would be assigned to work under specific Justices for one year, subject to renewal for a second year based on performance.
|1040 First Ave. Suite 116
New York, NY 10022
|New York: 212-355-2227
Los Angeles: 310-384-5000 | <urn:uuid:acf531db-e711-43ec-89fc-b70e9b81cf13> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.virtuefoundation.org/cms/front_content.php?idart=379 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943278 | 645 | 1.804688 | 2 |
My son, 4 years old, doesn’t listen. At home, there are times when I have to ask him to do something (or not do something) several times. His preschool teacher says the same thing. She will call him two or three times from the play yard and will finally have to walk over and get him. This concerns me since there may be situations where I will need his immediate attention (e.g. crossing the street or an earthquake), and I’m afraid that he will not listen at a critical time. We have tried time out, yelling, whispering — you name it, we’ve done it. This is also starting to rub off on his three year-old sister. What do you suggest?
Dr. Greene’s Anwer:
Now that you have had time to digest my answer to your question, and to apply the concept of bi-empathy to your relationship with your son, it’s time for some practical tips on communication.
When communication gets stuck, consider a humorous approach. Humor is fun; kids love fun. Laughing and playing are part of the wonder of childhood. When you can use a light touch, and inject humor into a situation, bi-empathy naturally happens. You bring your perspective about what needs to happen, and your child brings his (which usually includes fun!). As you combine both perspectives, a richer view of the situation, and a richer relationship, emerges for both of you.
Kids also have a strong sense of what is, or is not, fair. They view the world through ‘fairness glasses.’ Demonstrate respect for your son, his belongings, and his desires. Expect the same back from him. He will understand this. Remember, just because he is a kid, doesn’t mean his desires are less important than your adult desires. Your son may not be going to an important business meeting at a specific time, but he may have just as strong feelings about getting home in time to watch his favorite TV show. I am not suggesting that you let his desires set your agenda, but I am urging you to see and understand his point of view. When he feels understood, it will be easier for him to understand your adult perspective. Again, putting yourself into your child’s world, and helping him to see into your world, creates a more constructive dialogue.
Avoid using commands. Nobody enjoys being bossed around; kids are no exception. Children need direction, but instead of telling your child what to do, you can give structure by offering choices within certain limits. “Would you like to put on your blue sweater or your green one?” This gives him some freedom, while still communicating that he needs to get dressed now. By listing alternatives, or by giving information about situations, you enlist your son as an ally rather than making him into an obedient (or perhaps a rebellious) little soldier. Instead of saying, “Get moving! Put on your socks and shoes!” try, “It’s 7:45 and we have to leave in 5 minutes or you’ll be late for school. You still need your socks and shoes.” Instead of saying, “Be quiet, or you will get in trouble!” whisper, “Libraries are places to be quiet.” Explain the situation to your son, and what the situation demands, rather than barking commands. Save commands for issues of urgency or safety. If you use commands too frequently, your son will start to ignore them. If you use them only in important moments, they will have a high impact.
Avoid repeating yourself. If you said something, and didn’t get a response, your child may be tuning you out. It is better to try a different approach than to repeat yourself (you know how easy it is to tune him out when he repeats Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom…). Try asking him, “Billy, what did I say to you?” “You said to stop jumping on the sofa.” “Exactly, so let’s not jump on the sofa.” Get him to acknowledge he has heard you rather than droning on and on. If he says he hasn’t heard you, you will now have an opportunity to get your message across.
Take the time to explain to your child how you feel about the situation. “Mommy feels sad right now and needs a hug. Remember how you felt when you didn’t get to go to the party because you were sick? You were disappointed and sad. That’s how Mommy feels right now. Let’s sit down close together and read a book instead of running around the house.” By explaining how you feel, and comparing it to something your son can relate to, you are teaching him to have bi-empathic vision. In this way, you are preparing him to be an outstanding father.
Last reviewed: May 07, 2008 | <urn:uuid:ec55b540-17c5-4214-addf-6fe81888d124> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.drgreene.com/qa-articles/when-communication-gets-stuck/?pagination=2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9739 | 1,038 | 2.859375 | 3 |
By Scott Burris
Phil Coffin and Sean Sullivan have published a cost-effectiveness study of interventions that equip heroin users and others to administer naloxone in the event of a witnessed opioid overdose. Naloxone is the standard antidote, and can easily be administered by lay people with a minimum amount of training. Family members and friends of opioid users can quickly get the drug into an overdosing user via injection or a nasal spray. In an accompanying editorial, top brass at NIDA and FDA sum up the news like this: the study
“represents a significant step in the evolution of the science in this area: a detailed analysis of the cost-effectiveness of overdose intervention with naloxone administration for heroin abusers. The authors suggest that lay naloxone administration is likely to be highly cost-effective in this setting, a robust finding that holds up under various assumptions. Future analyses that extend their findings to the setting of prescription opioids would be welcome.”
The editorial flags one of the major legal issues that gets in the way of wider naloxone distribution – its status as a prescription drug approved for use by injection. Changing this is a torturous regulatory process. In the short term, though, lawmakers can do a lot to get distribution going where it is needed. As of July of 2012, eight states had passed laws to clearly authorize or otherwise reduce legal barriers to the prescription of naloxone to drug users and other potential good Samaritans. That leaves 42 states where programs may have trouble operating out of concerns related to prescribing a drug for a lay person to administer. LawAtlas covers the law and has examples of the legislative approaches these states have taken.
One more thing: evidence that naloxone distribution looks to be cost-effective ought to motivate lawmakers to consider these programs. Many places don’t have them at all: a study published last year in MMWR reported, among other things, that “Nineteen (76.0%) of the 25 states with 2008 drug overdose death rates higher than the median and nine (69.2%) of the 13 states in the highest quartile did not have a community-based opioid overdose prevention program that distributed naloxone.” In others, programs are operating but with little or no public funding to purchase naloxone, whose price has been rising precipitously (that’s another story about our creaking system for producing essential medicines). | <urn:uuid:ec55fbb8-3921-4143-9d24-fdb84ed81d8c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/billofhealth/2013/01/01/researchers-to-lawmakers-naloxone-distribution-to-prevent-overdose-death-is-cost-effective/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937597 | 503 | 2.25 | 2 |
Solar Energy Society
Renewable energy sources have been the latest concept catching on to the growth of the economy. These sources are very valuable as they do not require any investment for the source and the only investment required is for the equipment and location. One of the most popular renewable energy’s is solar energy. Since there is a lot of sunlight, availability is not an issue but its harnessing is. The improvements in technology will ensure that we can enhance the amount of energy that we can harness. The best way to ensure that there is an increase in this sector is by not only increasing the importance given to renewable resources but also to educate the masses on this issue is through the internet or through social messages. By using these sources of energy we on one hand are trying to get more energy from other available sources and are also protecting the environment from the harmful effects produced by fuel emissions. Solar energy is popular due to the availability of sunlight and is often chosen over wind energy which requires the presence on winds blowing at certain speeds to generate electricity. Also wind turbines require a lot of space and are therefore not the best option in an urban community.
The Solar Energy Society of India has been set up to help the country produce enough energy to meet its demand. Though it was set up in 1976, the growth of its technology has come to light only in the last couple of years. They not only focus on the harnessing of solar energy but have also branched out to include other sources of energy. They have also established research labs to find new and better methods of harnessing solar and other renewable sources of energy. India has a population of over a billion people which creates an enormous demand. The supply of electricity is concentrated more in the urban sectors while the rural sectors have a lot of power cuts. This body concentrates on enhancing the lives of the rural sector by helping them set up solar energy harnessing units so they are able to make the best use of the resources available to them. The farmers in many rural areas have realized the benefits of harnessing renewable energy resources as they do not have to depend on the erratic government supply of power and are able to sustain themselves without looking to outside help.
Most people have viewed this as a hobby, as it is called Ham or Amateur Radio operator is an enjoyable and a very interesting to way to pass views to would be listeners, there so many ways to achieve as a Ham Operator, it may sound like a... | <urn:uuid:79146756-6c13-4e53-ad48-6fd0d0f7a3e0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.roughneckchronicles.com/energy/solarenergysociety.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969022 | 496 | 3.046875 | 3 |
Founded on the idea that abstinence is the bedrock of any recovery from drug or alcohol addiction, Hazelden will now incorporate anti-addiction medications in its rehabilitation programs.
Treating drug addiction is as much about addressing why people become hooked on substances like alcohol, painkillers or illegal drugs as it is about weaning them off of their habit— at least that’s the core of the Hazelden recovery approach. From its founding in a Minnesota farmhouse in 1949, the program has championed the 12-step method, with its roots in the principles of Alcoholics Anonymous. That philosophy is anchored by the belief that true recovery can only start with addicts admitting they need help from others. Abstinence from all potentially addictive substances has always been the cornerstone of this strategy, which has become known as the “Minnesota Model.” Some 90% of American addiction counselors rely on Minnesota Model principles.
But for the first time, Hazelden will begin providing medication-assisted treatment for people hooked on heroin or opioid painkillers, starting at its Center City, Minnesota facility and expanding across its treatment network in five states in 2013. This so-called maintenance therapy differs from simply detoxifying addicts until they are completely abstinent. Instead, it acknowledges that continued treatment with certain medications, which can include some of the very opioid drugs that people are misusing, could be required for years.
“This is a huge shift for our culture and organization,” said Dr. Marvin Seppala, Hazelden’s chief medical officer, who pushed for the new practice. As the program’s first adolescent patient, and someone who has been in recovery from multiple drug addictions for 37 years, Seppala is keenly aware of how dramatic this decision is for the organization, which once debated whether or not coffee was acceptable in its abstinence-based program. “We believe it’s the responsible thing to do,” he says.
Driving the need for change is the sobering reality of what happens to patients addicted to prescription pain relievers— a growing segment of those in need of drug recovery— once they leave the Hazelden program. Within days of leaving the residential treatment facility, most were relapsing— and at least half a dozen have died from overdoses in recent years. It was time, Seppala argued, for a radical change.
In the coming months, Hazelden will begin to prescribe the drug buprenorphine (Suboxone) for some people addicted to opioids — the class of drugs that includes prescription pain relievers like Oxycontin and Vicodin, as well as heroin. At low doses, buprenorphine acts like methadone or heroin, which helps addicts to avoid severe withdrawal. But at higher doses it prevents opioids from working. That means it’s much harder to misuse or to overdose on buprenorphine, making it safer than methadone, the other commonly used anti-addiction medication.
Making The Case
Using the appropriate medication to treat addiction is an idea whose time has certainly come, at least according to the latest research, which has documented the effectiveness of such strategies for decades. But it’s taken longer for the leading treatment providers in the community, including Hazelden and Betty Ford, to accept the idea that giving drug addicts medications similar to those to which they were addicted can be part of recovery.
The science, however, is getting harder to ignore. Studies show that people addicted to opioids more than halve their risk of dying due to their habit if they stay on maintenance medication. They also dramatically lower their risk of contracting HIV, are far less likely to commit crime and are more likely to stay away from their drug of choice if they continue maintenance than if they become completely abstinent.
The first maintenance drug, methadone, was introduced in 1964 after studies supported its effectiveness in fighting heroin addiction. Based on that data, leading health organizations — including the Institute of Medicine (an independent U.S. body of experts authorized by Congress to study health-related issues), the World Health Organization and the U.S. “drug czar’s” office — recognized the importance of medication-assisted treatment for opioid addiction.
“The evidence shows much, much better outcomes,” says Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse.
But to a treatment program based on the 12-steps of Alcoholics Anonymous—whose first step involves admitting “powerlessness” over one’s addiction— the idea of maintenance on a potentially mood-altering drug has always been suspect. For an alcoholic, substituting vodka for gin or even beer for wine wouldn’t really represent progress: so why would replacing an illegal opioid like heroin or non-prescribed painkillers with a legal one be better for recovery?
The answer lies in the different ways that opioids and alcohol act on the brain. In alcoholism and other addictions, pleasure areas in the brain get misdirected as addicts continue to chemically activate the system in order to achieve greater “highs.” The repeated behavior leads to tolerance, and over time, larger and larger doses are needed just to feel normal, let alone “high.”
But where drinking alcohol is always accompanied by some degree of physical impairment— like loss of motor coordination and reduced cognitive ability, with opioids, there is no significant mental, emotional or physical impairment if someone regularly takes the exact same dose. In fact, research shows that patients addicted to opioids who are on maintenance doses of anti-addiction drugs like buprenorphine can drive safely, work productively and engage emotionally like those who aren’t addicted.
“For most people using opioids daily, they are no longer getting high, even when they are still using. It’s just become maintenance,” Seppala says. The effect is similar to the tolerance people experience with caffeine. “If you drink caffeine on a daily basis, after a while, you don’t notice the effect of one cup of coffee,” he says, “But if you drank two, you would.”
Still it wasn’t until the FDA approved buprenorphine in 2002 that Hazelden even began considering lifting its ban on medication-assisted recovery. Unlike methadone, buprenorphine can be prescribed by family doctors (although there are still some limits on the number of prescriptions physicians are allowed, in an attempt to prevent “pill mills” from dispensing the drug without proper supervision). Like other medications, it can be picked up monthly at pharmacies, not daily at clinics.
Watching many Hazelden patients leave the facility only to overdose soon afterwards, Seppala realized change was needed. “This is a place of healing,” he says, “To have people die after treatment is just horrible.” Buprenorphine, he realized, might help to avoid some of those deaths.
To his surprise, he found far less resistance than he expected when he approached Hazelden officials to consider using buprenorphine. Over a period of 10 months, the facility’s experts analyzed the available data and in September, the group’s full board approved a plan for change, which involved integrating medication-assisted therapy thoroughly into treatment, not just handing out drugs.
Hazelden will start using buprenorphine maintenance cautiously at first. The drug will not be provided to people who have been addicted to opioids for less than a year and complete abstinence will remain the ultimate goal for most patients, even as the program recognizes that years or even lifetime maintenance on the drug may sometimes be needed. And the rehab will now consider people who are taking maintenance medications in their program as being “in recovery” from the day they start these drugs and stop taking non-prescribed drugs. The program will define relapse as any drug use outside that provided by medical advice. Those changes will be integrated into the counseling and even the 12-step meetings offered onsite.
And because clinicians expect that a single treatment strategy won’t be enough to address the recovery needs of all of those addicted to opiates, for some patients the program will also provide Vivitrol, a time-release injection of naltrexone that prevents opioids from from being effective for about a month. Although this approach may seem like a better option than maintaining people on an opioid medication indefinitely, studies so far have not shown that naltrexone reduces mortality in opioid addiction in the same way that maintenance drugs like methadone and buprenorphine do. The National Institute on Drug Abuse is currently conducting the first trial to compare Vivitrol directly with opioid maintenance to determine its long term effectiveness.
As for Hazelden, “We will never change from being a solid, 12-step based program,” Seppala says. “But I am a physician and we look at the research and want to use evidence-based treatment.”
The reaction among academic addiction experts to the change has been, not surprisingly, positive. “I was delighted,” says Volkow of Hazelden’s decision. “This was a change that I’ve been waiting for. I would predict that as data emerges as to how this change improves the outcome of their patients, then others may realize that this is beneficial for patients and not harming them in any way.”
The ultimate test, of course, will be with the patients, whom Hazelden will study closely. And already, they have been encouraged by a success story. J, who failed to overcome multiple addictions during seven different attempts at rehab, including at Hazelden, finally took the first steps toward recovery after a doctor prescribed buprenorphine. J’s mother, Cheryl, a former heroin addict who recovered at Hazelden and became a counselor and supervisor there, witnessed the difference that the anti-addiction medication made for her daughter, and realized that recovery, and recovery treatments, have to be flexible.
What worked for her, she now knows, may not work for everyone. Now free of illegal drugs and alcohol for more than a year, J has regained custody of her son, which she had lost due to her addiction. “I’m as proud as I can be of her,” says Cheryl, “She’s responsible and reliable. I don’t get these calls any more where she has frantic mood swings or is feeling so down and desperate that she is threatening suicide. Without that Suboxone, I don’t think my daughter would ever have been able to develop these sober living skills. The oldtimers are just going to have to accept it.”
MORE: How to Find the Best Drug Treatment for Teens: A Guide for Parents
Maia Szalavitz is a health writer at TIME.com. Find her on Twitter at @maiasz. You can also continue the discussion on TIME Healthland’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIMEHealthland. | <urn:uuid:20359f20-2e8b-416c-9ea4-c7bccaf29c7e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://healthland.time.com/2012/11/05/hazelden-introduces-antiaddiction-medications-in-recovery-for-first-time/?iid=hl-main-belt | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957467 | 2,325 | 1.945313 | 2 |
The Virgin Islands consists of the main islands of St. Thomas, St. Croix, and St. John. The islands are 133.73 square miles and are between the Caribbean Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean, east of Puerto Rico. As of July, 2008 the population was estimated to be at 109,840. The main industry in the Virgin Islands is tourism. The Virgin Islands are the most popular vacation destination in the Caribbean. St. Croix is also the home of one of the world's largest petroleum refineries. Tourists will find that the island's clean beaches, clear water and ethnically diverse culture are enchanting. | <urn:uuid:4f8cbc9c-7528-40a0-a8c5-3d0eccfca854> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.officespacelocal.com/rent-offices-in-Virgin%20Islands | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935971 | 128 | 2.53125 | 3 |
Ciência & Saúde Coletiva
Print version ISSN 1413-8123
SCHWARTZ, Talita Dourado; FERREIRA, Josilda Terezinha Bertulozo; MACIEL, Ethel Leonor Noia and LIMA, Rita de Cássia Duarte. Family Health Strategy: evaluating the access to SUS from the perception of the users of the health unit Resistência, in the region of São Pedro, Vitória, Espírito Santo State. Ciênc. saúde coletiva [online]. 2010, vol.15, n.4, pp. 2145-2154. ISSN 1413-8123. http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1413-81232010000400028.
Family Health is a re-orientation strategy of the assistance model. One of its guiding principles is the establishment of a link between the health teams and the SUS users. The purpose of this research is to evaluate user access to the Family Health Unit (FHU) and the local problems faced. It is an exploratory, qualitative research, developed at the FHU Resistencia of São Pedro, located in the Greater Vitória, Espírito Santo State, with data collected individually through a semi-structured survey. It was found that the main needs of the population are incorporated in the services provided by the FHU, and the users face many difficulties with access. The main criticism is related to access to the specialized services. The majority of the participants of the survey showed satisfaction with the access to the services, and were not intimidated to express the difficulties faced. The work developed by the Family Heath Strategy (FHS) at FHU Resistência has been contributing to the improvement of the quality of the services offered by FHS to the users served, although many problems have been identified, which demonstrates the great challenge in redefining the assistance model, as proposed by this public policy.
Keywords : Access; Family Health Strategy; Basic attention; Use. | <urn:uuid:61eac6eb-0d01-4d22-b476-9718397560e6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.scielosp.org/scielo.php?script=sci_abstract&pid=S1413-81232010000400028&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en | 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 | 0.923406 | 443 | 1.742188 | 2 |
From late September 2002 through early 2006, HiLobrow’s Joshua Glenn wrote THE EXAMINED LIFE, a weekly three-item column for the Boston Globe‘s Ideas section; and from late 2006 though mid-2008, he wrote BRAINIAC, an Ideas section blog that was repurposed as a three-item weekly column in the paper. This series reprints a few Q&As from Glenn’s two Ideas columns. [Brainiac image via 4CP]
March 6, 2005
In Everyone’s Pretty (Soft Skull), Tucson-based writer Lydia Millet’s kaleidoscopic new satire of America’s quietly freakish office workers, one particularly graceless character muses: “Who could be noble with fluorescent [lighting]? It was the wrong Atmosphere.” The author of such previous books as George Bush, Dark Prince of Love (2000) and the PEN-USA Fiction Award-winning My Happy Life (2002), as well as a forthcoming farce about the cult following of America’s atom-bomb scientists, the 36-year-old Millet, currently teaching at Columbia, has given voice to a wide variety of life’s unbeautiful losers — and made them sing for us. In a recent email interview, I asked her about her fierce partiality to less than sympathetic characters.
IDEAS: You’re from Canada, but weren’t you born in Boston?
MILLET: Yes, my father’s family is from the area back to the 17th century. There’s a bust of my great-great-uncle, [the painter] Frank Millet, in Widener Library — mostly because he had the bad fortune of perishing on the Titanic [with fellow Harvard graduate Harry Elkins Widener]. My father was an Egyptologist, teaching at Harvard when I was born, but we moved to Canada when I was 2.
IDEAS: The main characters in Everyone’s Pretty aren’t particularly sympathetic, are they? Bucella, the awkward, romantic statistician, for example, collects Precious Moments figurines and indulges in cringe-inducing fantasies about a time when “there were Martyrs and Queens and Pageants.”
MILLET: I think there’s something profoundly authentic in the cringe response. Why do we love Larry David in Curb Your Enthusiasm, or the BBC show The Office? The cringe is a powerful instinct, one that comes out of a painful recognition and identification — it allows us to see something about ourselves suddenly and poignantly illuminated. Bucella is a naif and an idealist, however misguided. She wants pure and simple adoration, she wants a companion, she wants a city of God. She doesn’t know the way there, but she’s looking… I hope there are thousands of Bucellas out there.
IDEAS: Bucella’s misanthropic coworker Alice finally tells herself that “People were alone, and not only the elegant, the well-balanced, and the lovable. No matter who they were, you had to keep them company.” Is she articulating your own worldview here?
MILLET: Alice finally sees that empathy is the key to being happy, that the possibility of changing anything beyond herself… will not exist without her first learning to rise above her misanthropy and feel for other people instead of feeling her apartness from them. I think in this culture individualism, though it’s given us much, has also isolated us in life and made us more afraid of death than we need to be. So yes, with Alice I subscribe to the idea that… the path to enlightenment lies in being able to imagine the emotional life of others and live, somehow, as though we are more than ourselves.
IDEAS: So you’d have us empathize with unsympathetic characters?
MILLET: So-called sympathetic characters are vastly overrated… I like complex and multiply flawed characters partly because really most of us are them — most of us are not Barbies and Kens but Shreks.
READ MORE essays by Joshua Glenn, originally published in: THE BAFFLER | BOSTON GLOBE IDEAS | BRAINIAC | CABINET | FEED | HERMENAUT | HILOBROW | HILOBROW: GENERATIONS | HILOBROW: RADIUM AGE SCIENCE FICTION | HILOBROW: SHOCKING BLOCKING | THE IDLER | IO9 | N+1 | NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW | SEMIONAUT | SLATE | <urn:uuid:710f4f92-a9dc-49e1-805d-975c8f8f44fe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://hilobrow.com/2012/11/17/brainiac-qa-15/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00047-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944986 | 989 | 1.53125 | 2 |
|what is this?
Sep 12, 2005
For the past couple of months I have had some questions for my dr. and they always tell mw that it is just saliva collecting around my mouth, but I am not quite sure that is true. In the morning it seems that I have thick white saliva around the edge of my lips. There are no bumps or lesions or anything and my dr. says that my mouth could have always been this way and I am just now noticing. But I was wondering what this sounds like to you? Please give me some kind of reassurance that whether they are right or not. I have anxiety problems and this is really beginning to upset me.
| Response from Dr. Conway
It is hard to say for certain, but your doctor may be right. Other considerations would be early oral candidiasis (it may be worth taking a swab) or some inflammation of your salivary glands (it may be worth talking to your doctor about this quite specifically). Other things are possible, but if you are otherwise well, it is hard for me to imagine that this is anything more serious or life-threatening...
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This forum is designed for educational purposes only, and experts are not rendering medical, mental health, legal or other professional advice or services. If you have or suspect you may have a medical, mental health, legal or other problem that requires advice, consult your own caregiver, attorney or other qualified professional.
Experts appearing on this page are independent and are solely responsible for editing and fact-checking their material. Neither TheBody.com nor any advertiser is the publisher or speaker of posted visitors' questions or the experts' material. | <urn:uuid:f8461064-d77a-47d3-aff1-f8780b774a99> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thebody.com/Forums/AIDS/SideEffects/Q168105.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 | 0.95609 | 354 | 1.6875 | 2 |
The thought that every passing day we are moving away from our friends and family prompted me to be as happy as possible. The thought that after some time I won’t be able to spend time with my loved ones urged me to cherish their company and spare them unnecessary hurts by me due to foolishness.
My young one was sick for the whole week. We all were tired after few days and tiredness is accompanied by boredom and monotony. But what to do when a child is sick and it has to be protected from too much activities and excitement? After a while, story books, coloring and cartoons lose their charm. I along with my kid needed change but in a protected environment.
We all know that camping is the best way of spending time with family and friends. Camping brings us closer to the nature and teaches kids many fun activities. Knowing or unknowingly we try to get closer to mother nature. I heard no one saying, This sky is so boring, This tree is so monotones, I am sick of looking at this pond/river/sea, I don’t like the feel of breeze on my face. Viewing sunrise or sunset is so uncool? I think no one has head such sentences in his/her entire life.
Why nature has the power to decrease our stress level? Probably we are a part of nature and not of concrete, girdles or mortar probably that’s why we want to connect with mother nature. Or a mother’s lap is always soothing and secure that’s why we want to revisit nature. Though experts offer some other explanation. Richard Louv, http://www.suite101.com/content/camping-with-children-a198904 author of Last Child In the Woods (Algonquin Books, 2005), says there is a connection between nature and rates of attention deficit disorder (ADD), obesity, and depression in children. The more time a child is outdoors the happier and healthier they can be. Young children and adolescents both benefit from spending time in nature frequently.
But what should I do? I am almost surrounded by concrete jungle. Should I wait for the kid’s vacation? Should I wait for the right, day, right time, right place, right vehicle, right tour and travel package? These options are very palatable but completely impractical at this time. I was fanatically thinking of new ideas. Then I remembered that my nephew had built a house in the terrace for his little sister. So what’s wrong with my balcony? NOTHING.
So I set up a camp right there with my young one. The whole process was so exciting and pleasant. I fished out some old unused bed sheets. Tied it at three places to make our “tent” and threw in lots of cushions and pillows to sprawl upon. We did take our pets along with us. They too should enjoy camping in the balcony. A nice breeze was blowing and sky was looking so blue and unspoiled.
If you want to do something why wait. Just go ahead and do it and be happy. | <urn:uuid:9524f90f-00fe-4443-abae-8ad7c5c6d857> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.alkadwivedi.net/category/health/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968104 | 647 | 1.820313 | 2 |
If you are driving in Australia, there is a chance that a police officer will ask you to stop and have a breath test unlike in the US or the UK where such actions are only conducted to those who are suspected of having taken drugs or alcohol.
In Australia, two types of charges are possible when it comes to drunk driving like for instance Prescribed Content Alcohol or Driving Under the Influence and each is distinct according to the type of offence and the driving history of person being charged. Comparing the two, PCA is more common these days because DUI is actually a dated type of the drunk driving case thus less number people are being subjected it. If the court convicts a person with such offence like PCA, his or her driver’s license will be immediately suspended however the ruling is still appealable.
According to drunk driving lawyers, before somebody can be accused, the authorities must perform and complete a test of his or breath first and in the event that person will not consent to it, then he or she can be arrested and will be forced to go through analysis. The prima facie evidence in the case will be the certificate issued by an authorize officer.
A Prescribed Content Alcohol case can be further classified in a number of ranges. The said offences are specifically applicable to the one driving or the one occupying the seat of the driver who wants to drive the vehicle.
If you are facing PCA or DUI charges, the skills and experience of drunk driving lawyers will be crucial since they can give you competent representation to argue your case in court or file an appeal and also deal with police matters.
Having an attorney will enable you to better understand the key elements of the drink driving charge and you will be guided as to what proper action to do next. Part of the major information that you could learn from the drink driving case include the likelihood of mandatory suspension or disqualification of your license to drive, possible levels of penalties, and many other details that are essential and relevant to the charges. Among the said relevant issues or matters are your character, whether you’re a first time or repeat offender, and the circumstances that surround the case. Those relevant details could result to penalty or sentence that is more merciful.
Drink driving lawyers usually would look into the result of blood analysis of the driver and argue before the court that in actuality, the level or concentration of alcohol on the blood of the person charged was lower when he or she was driving compared to the moment the analysis was conducted by the authorities. This may be supported by studies which have shown that a person’s blood alcohol concentration increase during 30 minutes to 1 hour after he or she had the last glass of alcohol. | <urn:uuid:ffb76262-4e21-4ab7-990a-765abfea9524> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bajde.net/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97235 | 547 | 1.5625 | 2 |
Look, Kar Yang (2006) Theory and Simulation of Incipient Instability in Gas-Solid Fluidization. Masters thesis, Universiti Putra Malaysia.
The mechanism of incipient instability in gas-solid fluidized bed was investigated by using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulation – FLUENT version 6.1.18. The Finite Volume Method (FVM) is employed to simulate the complex flow behaviours and heterogeneous structure of the gas-solid fluidized bed. Fluidization of Geldart group A, B and C particles were simulated. The formation and development of the plumes during incipient fluidization were studied. Different fluidization behaviours of Geldart group A, B and C particles were observed from the contours of gas volume fraction and velocity vector. The observations agreed well with characteristics and behaviours of particles in gas-solid fluidized bed as reported by Geldart (1973). A theory of transient instability adopted with the principles advanced by Tan and Thorpe (1992 and 1996) was proposed to calculate the theoretical transient Rayleigh number (Rac) for the onset of incipient instability. The mobilization of the particles occurred once a critical value of transient Rayleigh number was exceeded. Different type of particles exhibited different Rac values. However, the Rac is almost independent of the superficial velocity. The incipient instability of gas-solid fluidized bed was first identified when the initial stable air diffusion became distorted and particles began to move chaotically. The fluidization parameters such as gas volume fraction, bubble rise velocity and bed pressure drop were used to determine the critical time for onset of incipient instability. The simulated critical onset time (tc) and transient Rayleigh Number (Rac) for the incipient instability of gas-solid fluidized bed were then investigated. A correlation between Rac and permeability was derived, which provides a convenient and simple way to estimate the Rac. The predicted values of Rac were found to agree fairly well with the literature data.
|Item Type:||Thesis (Masters)|
|Chairman Supervisor:||Assoicate Professor Thomas Choong Shean Yaw, PhD|
|Call Number:||FK 2006 93|
|Faculty or Institute:||Faculty of Engineering|
|Deposited By:||Siti Khairiah Yusof|
|Deposited On:||16 Oct 2008 05:12|
|Last Modified:||02 Apr 2012 17:09|
Repository Staff Only: item control page | <urn:uuid:eeceef28-3dd4-47e2-ad36-7b226929d37a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://psasir.upm.edu.my/597/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.907602 | 512 | 1.734375 | 2 |
In a Request for Proposal (RFP) issued by the Department of Communications (DoC) on Friday (27 July 2012), it stated that digital TV decoders subsidised by government must include “return path” functionality.
This is according to the South African Communications Forum (SACF), an industry association which had advocated for the inclusion of internet access capability in the RFP.
These decoders, or set-top boxes (STBs), are needed to convert digital television broadcasts to the analogue signals which South African TVs understand.
South Africa is set to begin its migration from analogue to digital broadcasting in Q3 2012, though a new cut-off date for the existing analogue signal has not been specified.
The SACF noted that a requirement for a fully functional USB 2.0 port “for support of external communication devices (e.g. 3G, 4G RF modems for return path capability)” is included in the compliance matrix appended to the RFP.
In a press statement issued today (2 August 2012), the SACF applauded Minister of Communications Dina Pule and the DoC for including these requirements in the RFP, saying that it is expected to have dramatic impact in bridging the digital divide.
“These internet connectible set top boxes will be subsidised to provide entry level access to the internet for the poorest South Africans in urban and rural areas,” the SACF said.
“Now the next challenge to be faced by industry and government is to ensure that broadband is rolled out as swiftly as possible in rural areas to bring greater accessibility and utilisation of the internet access to be provided on the set-top box” said Loren Braithwaite Kabosha, CEO of SACF. | <urn:uuid:4e28168e-8f65-4aae-9d9a-9b5a25f92ebc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mybroadband.co.za/news/broadcasting/56447-digital-tv-set-top-box-return-path-welcomed.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00056-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946275 | 370 | 1.71875 | 2 |
After teaching band students for 27 years, I think I have finally developed an idea of what I'm supposed to be doing. Itís not putting on concerts for parents. Itís not raising money to buy music stands. Itís not any of those things that appropriate so much of my time. It is teaching students music through performance on wind and percussion instruments. For them to have a meaningful experience through performance, they must learn the fundamentals of music in an orderly fashion. For this reason, Iíve developed a list of priorities with regard to fundamentals and developed some (in my humble opinion) effective ways of teaching them.
Iíll tell you what they are and why I have placed them in this order. Then, with a little luck, explain how I go about teaching them.
Gift #1 - Rhythm. Faulty rhythm will make a band performance fall apart! Wrong notes will not do this. Bad hand position will not do this. Uncharacteristic tone qualities will not do this. Good rhythmic understanding is an absolute necessity for group performance. I guess if youíre always going to play by yourself, you can skip this area.
Gift #2 - Tone Quality. If you play with good tone quality and good rhythm, people will enjoy hearing you play. Good rhythm with bad tone is a performance that only a mother would love.
Gift #3 - Right Notes. With good rhythm, characteristic tone and right notes, the performance starts to be one that your mother AND your friends will like. This is where most kids get "hung up"...but more on that later.
Gift #4 - Articulation. Accurate and correct articulation gives your performance clarity of meaning. It allows you to express yourself in a manner that others can understand.
Gift #5 - Dynamic Control. Control of dynamics allows your performance to have clarity of meaning and allows you to explain how you "feel" about what you are saying.
It would be folly to think that all of these items are separate and indeed, they all are related when it comes to music performance. However, as a teacher of beginners who has also been responsible for very advanced performing groups, I have realized that these areas of performance, in this order, seem to cause the most problems. We have to have an understanding of arithmetic before we can get to mathematics.
So...Letís begin with Gift # 1... Rhythm.
As I read through the many, many articles on starting beginners, I find that almost all concentrate on tone production with great emphasis on embouchure, hand position and correct fingerings. While these areas are, of course, very important, I think that often an error of omission occurs. There are two gifts that the teacher of beginners can give a student that will almost ensure his success as a player. The first gift is not tone production. The first gift is rhythm. Tone production is a very close second.
Rhythmic understanding is the basis of music reading and good technique. As a teacher of beginners for many years, I can testify that the most common error a player makes is not to play a wrong note; rather it is to play the right note at the wrong time. In ensemble performance, a wrong note will make the group sound bad. Faulty rhythm will make the group "fall apart". Indeed, faulty rhythm is the reason for most performance catastrophes.
It is critical that the teacher impart to the beginning students the importance of feeling a pulse and the internalization of that pulse. Until a student can feel the beat, it is impossible for the student to divide the beat as necessary for accurate rhythmic realization.
Step 1 - Feeling the Beat. I am a strong believer in the foot pat. While the sound of many little feet patting in a professional group or an advanced high school group might be annoying, the sound of all those feet patting in a beginning band says that these students are developing an understanding of rhythm. The only argument against foot patting is its effect on the aesthetic of performance. I contend that performance is a very small part of the beginner experience and that the importance of a strong internalization of rhythm far outweighs the minor annoyance of feet patting during a concert.
So, how do we get them to feel the beat? We play music for them and have them pat their foot along with the music. We play with a metronome (loud enough for them to hear) much of the time. We spend time just practicing patting the foot along with the metronome. It is important to teach them exactly how to pat their foot. When learning to feel a beat, it is important to stress a very distinct motion of the foot dividing the beat into two parts... (down & up)... and that each beat is divided that way. (This will pay off greatly when teaching dotted notes later) No talk yet of time signatures... only the "beat" and the fact that the beat has 2 parts... 6/8 and swing come much later.
Step 2 - Count it Aloud. After the students can pat their feet along with a metronome and with simple/duple music, it is important to teach them how to write a realization of rhythm so that they can verbalize the rhythm. After many years of many different things, Iíve finally decided on Ralph Haleís "Down-Up" system of counting as the best system for students to understand quickly and easily. It eliminates all of the "nonsense" syllables used in other counting systems and replaces them with "Down" and "Up". The system uses the foot pat as its basis with notes occurring either on the down part of the foot pat or the up part of the foot pat. ( = ). Because of this basis, we use the eighth note as the primary note value and all other notes are related to it, i.e. ( = or , = , = , etc. Students count aloud by saying "down" on the down pat and "up" on the up pat.
You might say... "What about time signatures where a quarter is not the Ďbeatí note?" The answer is actually simple. We stress from the beginning that we are counting the beats and not the notes. If you were asked to count a pile of apples and a pile of oranges, you would not use a different system of counting for each. You would simply be counting apples or you would be counting oranges. By the time other time signatures are reached, the problem doesnít even come up. We just say... "Now a = , etc." From my experience, it is actually easier to make this adaptation with this system than with traditional counting systems. A rest becomes a note that you donít play (we usually begin by saying "rest" on a rest).
I have noticed that some students have a problem with long notes and this is the only time I use numbers in the counting. For instance, when a student is counting a whole note in 4/4 time they say "Down, 2, 3, 4" to count all of the "downs/beats" in the note.
What about triplets and 6/8? Well, slow 6/8 is counted like any other time signature with "down & up" = ). Fast 6/8 and triplets are counted as either 2 3 or as . Iíve used both and both work. The actual key is explaining that now the foot pat is a smooth motion up and down, rather than a distinct down/up. This gives a much better feel for the triple meter. By the time this comes up, it is not a problem. Complex meters (5/8, 7/8, etc.) are counted using a combination of the duple meter and the compound meter .
The primary advantage of this system is that every beat in the measure is counted the same and students do not concern themselves with which beat they are on. Iíve discovered that this one factor alone eliminates many problems with rhythmic realization (they donít have to remember which number is next).
Step 3 - Write it Down. A most important step in the realization of rhythm is having a system of writing a symbolic representation of the rhythms in question. This helps the student better understand the rhythm and allows them to slow things down for practice. We use many written exercises from many different sources and test often on studentsí abilities to write rhythmic realizations.
Step 4 - Play It. This is, of course, the ultimate goal. However, doing this before the student understands what they are doing is little more than rote teaching. They have to be taught what "their counting" becomes when it is actually performed on an instrument. I use exercises from several sources for counting. Among them are: "Winning Rhythms", Ayola, Neil A. Kjos Music Company; "Teaching Rhythm", Joel Rothman, J.R. Publications; "Rhythm Slides", Ralph Hale, Southern Music; and "14 Weeks to a Better Band - Jr. High Edition", Maxwell, Barnhouse. | <urn:uuid:7bf63ba2-5e7b-4fb6-bdcf-dbace56a86de> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.saxontheweb.net/Learning/BeginnersCorner11.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962601 | 1,861 | 2.3125 | 2 |
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The Mexican Institute for Social Security (IMSS) is the third largest public buyer of goods and services in Mexico and the single largest purchaser of pharmaceutical products and other medical supplies.
Buying effectively and avoiding bid rigging are therefore key to generating savings for IMSS users and Mexican taxpayers and promoting more competition in public procurement.
In 2011, after making significant efforts to improve the effectiveness of its procurement strategy, Mexico decided to step up its fight against bid rigging by signing an agreement with the OECD to work together on implementing tighter public procurement processes.
Prepared in partnership with the Mexican Competition Authority and the IMSS, this OECD report:
- analyses the existing legal framework of public procurement in Mexico
- lists areas in current laws and regulations which restrict the scope of action for the IMSS and other public agencies and their ability to obtain the best value from their purchases
- issues over 20 recommendations in specific areas on how to improve procurement procedures to avoid collusion amongst suppliers
- identifies limitations and drawbacks in the current Mexican legal framework for public procurement | <urn:uuid:40b7f4b0-874e-47e4-8b94-8b994bb25a20> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.oecd.org/fr/reformereg/secteurs/fightingbidrigginginpublicprocurementinmexico2011.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.908625 | 243 | 1.578125 | 2 |
REM Sleep Behaviour Disorder (RBD) is characterized by vigorous sleep behaviors which may result in repeated injury to oneself or others. These behaviours are often violent and occur during the period of sleep called Rapid Eye Movement or REM sleep. Normally during this phase of sleep, we dream and our muscles are usually without any tone. However, in RBD, there is no loss of this muscle tone and patients usually are able to move their bodies and thereby act on their dreams.
REM sleep behavior disorder (RBD) is characterized by episodes of vigorous speech or shouting, and violent movement or behaviour. It may cause injury to the self or to the bed partner. Dream recall is vivid and the dream content is often violent. Polysomnography is useful in disclosing the violent episodes occurring only during REM sleep. However, this disorder is often misdiagnosed and has not frequently been reported in the United Kingdom | <urn:uuid:bacfddd9-5060-4966-8ee4-d3a2905fc120> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sassm.org/sleep-disorders/rem-sleep-behaviour-disorder.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977359 | 181 | 3.296875 | 3 |
WASHINGTON – An Air National Guard unit based in Niagara Falls will soon be directing unmanned drones on missions around the globe, and that unit also may get to keep at least some of the four C-130 cargo planes that the Air Force was threatening to take away less than a year ago.
That victory for the Niagara Falls Air Reserve Station – and particularly for the Air National Guard’s 107th Airlift Wing that’s based there – comes in a fiscal 2013 defense authorization bill that a House-Senate conference committee finalized Tuesday.
Both houses of Congress are expected to approve that measure by the end of the week, setting the structure for the U.S. military for the coming year and giving new life and a cutting-edge mission to a local Guard unit that the Air Force proposed shutting down earlier this year.
Under the bill, the 107th will eventually fly remotely piloted aircraft, or RPAs. The bill does not specify exactly which kind of drones the unit will fly. It’s expected that the craft will never actually land at the local base, but instead be piloted remotely by Guard members based in the Falls.
“I am pleased that Niagara retained the RPA mission, which will keep our base at the forefront of the military,” said Sen. Kirsten E. Gillibrand, D-N.Y., who serves on the Senate Armed Services Committee and who was intimately involved in the deal to save the Niagara unit. “In addition, most of the C-130s nationwide were restored, which is critical for Niagara.”
The new mission for the Niagara base is a huge win for Rep. Kathleen C. Hochul, D-Hamburg, who pressed the Pentagon and Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta relentlessly to find a new mission for the Falls unit.
Hochul, who lost her re-election bid to Republican Chris Collins in November, said she was proud to have worked with her colleagues to help the air base. “The Niagara Falls Air Reserve Station is critical to our region’s economy and our nation’s security,” she said. “I am encouraged by reports that the Air Force will bring a new mission to the air base. This is a positive step in our ongoing effort to ensure that NFARS continues to play an important role in national defense and homeland security.”
The House-Senate agreement does not specify what kind of drones will be flown by the Niagara unit, but sources close to the Pentagon believe that it will likely be one of two aircraft: the MQ-1 Predator, which can used for surveillance missions and can carry missiles, or the MQ-9 Reaper, which can do the same things but is faster and can carry a heavier payload.
It often takes a year to 18 months for the Air Force to shift a unit’s mission, meaning that the 107th could continue flying C-130 cargo planes through 2013 – and perhaps beyond.
Under the bill, the number of C-130 cargo planes to be flown by the Air National Guard will shrink to 60, from 65. The bill does not specify which units will lose those planes, leaving the decision up to the Air Force.
New York’s senators said they will fight to save the 107th’s four C-130s, one of which is on loan to another base, saying they are critical to disaster response in the Northeast. If the planes could be saved, that would mean the 107th would not lose personnel and might even be able to add some.
The House-Senate conference report “brings us closer to securing the brand-new unmanned aerial drone Remote Split Operations Squadron that could bring in hundreds of new jobs,” said Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y. “And while the fight to preserve Niagara Falls’ C-130s is still ongoing, this conference report bolsters the longevity of the program at NFARS and will ensure that our troops can continue to rely on these aircrafts that help our heroes in uniform defend our freedom at home and abroad.”
There’s no guarantee, though, that the 107th will be able to keep its four C-130s while also getting a new mission. The fact that the local unit won a new mission could also give the Air Force an argument for removing some, if not all, of the C-130s from the 107th.
The other unit at the base, the Air Force Reserve’s 914th Airlift Wing, will continue to fly its eight C-130s under the House-Senate agreement on the defense authorization bill.
Some veteran advocates of the local base have strongly pressed for the 107th to keep flying C-130s, too. But federal lawmakers have been pushing for a drone mission for the unit because it’s the Air Force’s fastest-growing and most secure type of mission.
And any new mission at all for the 107th is a huge improvement from what the Pentagon proposed in February, which was the elimination of the unit and its 845 employees, including 580 part-time Guard members.
“Kudos to the congressional delegation that has worked so hard to make this happen, along with the state,” said John A. Cooper Sr., vice chairman of the Niagara Military Affairs Council, which has successfully fought to save the base and its units time and again over the last two decades. “To have something positive after where we were in February is just wonderful.” | <urn:uuid:30d807ba-d670-4d68-b043-db5165572cca> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.buffalonews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20121218/CITYANDREGION/121219167/1010 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00033-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955622 | 1,143 | 1.796875 | 2 |
REPORT OF VISIT TO PARIS, SEPTEMBER 6TH - 8TH, 1936.
We left Plymouth on Saturday 5th, and reached Paris on Sunday evening. We left Paris on Tuesday afternoon.
We made contact in Paris with:
Officers of the L.S.I. ( Adler ) and I.F.T.U. ( Stolz )
French Socialist Party Office ( Severac )
C.G.T. ( Jouhaux )
French Foreign Office ( Vienot and Comert )
De Los Rios ( at Spanish Embassy )
Paris Correspondents of "Daily Herald" and Manchester Guardian"
The impressions which we gained from all these talks agreed very closely, though De Los Rios naturally approached the problem from a somewhat different angle from the rest. We have, therefore, succeeded in forming a pretty clear picture of the situation, which we shall try to convey.
Blum, on the Sunday night, made an important speech at Luna Park of which we have a verbatim report. Points from the speech are given below.
There is no doubt that Blum personally is a passionate supporter of the policy of non-intervention in present conditions. He spoke very clearly and courageously at Luna Park. He believes that his policy, if the embargo is effectively applied, will help the Spanish Government more than the alternative of free supply of arms to both sides. He believes that before the embargo was agreed to, the risks of a general European war were very imminent and grave.; that the acceptance of the embargo has greatly diminished the risk and that there is no evidence that since they accepted, Germany or Italy have broken their word. | <urn:uuid:ea97cf11-87a7-40c6-8f18-e67ba35d3973> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://contentdm.warwick.ac.uk/cdm/compoundobject/collection/scw/id/9193/rec/34 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947398 | 344 | 1.726563 | 2 |
A New 'Chapter' In Spaceflight Has Been Written... But Its Not The Entire Book
By Wes Oleszewski, ANN Space Correspondent
Although I am a big fan of SpaceX, I am a bit more reserved than many who have followed the COTS 2/3 mission.
Rather than saying that this is THE future of spaceflight, I'd rather think of it as a whole new chapter in the spaceflight story - a REALLY fun to watch and exciting chapter that reflects back to the grand old golden era of spaceflight with those all-liquid fueled boosters launching from Cape Canaveral, going into orbit and then splashing down to be recovered.
It's something that some of us who grew up with Mercury and Gemini and Apollo have always longed to sort of see "come back" in some form. With the Shuttle now gone, this makes a great chapter to "get into" and follow and cheer for. It's also the excitement of vehicle development. Personally, I cannot wait for the next step, the next glitch, the next fix and the next success; I love it!
Does the success of SpaceX mean that we should defund NASA and hand the whole basket of eggs over to "commercial space"… of course not. In large part, it is exactly that sort of de-developmental thinking that was the death-stroke for the Space Shuttle and has put America's human spaceflight program on life support. Rather, what is desperately needed at this moment is exactly what SpaceX is poised to offer; robust, reasonable cost, frequent access to the International Space Station. Thus far, SpaceX is on the doorstep of being able to provide that for cargo -- both going to the ISS and -- quite importantly -- from the station as well.
Critics of SpaceX and "commercial" spaceflight efforts may look at the recent COTS 2/3 mission's successes and scoff that what was accomplished only got as far as about 1965 on the spaceflight ruler. My reply would be, "and what's wrong with 1965?"
Gemini flights were lifting off from the Cape about every two months, there were great strides in spaceflight technology and new hardware was being flown, rung out and adapted for use on nearly a daily basis. With SpaceX and the other "commercial" participants, we are seeing the same basic trend. It is not just important, but critical, to keep in mind that every single time we fly anything in space we peacefully advance the technology of our civilization.
Frankly, I would be delighted to see SpaceX mirror 1965.
Let us also keep in mind what is currently planned is for the "commercial" side to take over the low earth orbit part of spaceflight while freeing up NASA to take on the task of advancing us beyond low earth orbit. I've heard some who smirk and claim that the success of SpaceX is going to lead to the cancellation of NASA's Space Launch System thereby leaving everything to "commercial." We should all hope that this scenario never comes to pass. Where NASA insanely overloads everything with masses of paperwork, private companies cut corners and wink at their own procedures and rules. And if you think it doesn't happen, sit down with any FAA inspector or NTSB investigator and have a serious talk. If you are dreaming of a pure commercial space program- be careful what you wish for, we just may get it.
Another mindset that I have often encountered is the one that seems to hold that SpaceX is now on an ultra fast-track to flying crews aboard Dragon. Indeed; the crew aboard the ISS reinforced this by stating that they would be comfortable inside the spacecraft.
It was a casual comment that many folks have latched on to. The fact is, that although SpaceX has made fantastic strides in the COTS program recently, they are still a good ways from actually flying a crew. A good yardstick for this is the requirement for launch abort capability.
Although SpaceX has done some static firing of their proposed abort motor, the SuperDraco, the roadway to using it in an integrated system will require actual flight testing. If they intend to use it in an operational manned vehicle, in anything resembling the near future, they need to be flight testing that system now. Additionally, SpaceX states that they intend to use those motors as a recovery and landing device -- and that will require a great deal of testing. This is not to say that SpaceX cannot do it, it is simply a valid yardstick by which to measure the reality of operational hardware against corporate hyperbole.
The bottom line is that, yes indeed, the events of the COTS 2/3 mission have made for an historic event.
Yes, SpaceX has accomplished a magnificent series of engineering and technical feats.
Yes, they have innovated a new way of doing many tasks in spaceflight and streamlined the process.
Yes, NASA should take many pages from their book.
And yes, this was indeed a great day in spaceflight.
But, this historic event is not everything in spaceflight. SpaceX, although a terrific company, is not the do-all, be-all of spaceflight from now on. What we saw here was not the entire book -- it was simply a new and exciting chapter in the story. For those of you who choose to bathe in the SpaceX ideal, go right ahead - enjoy the moment, savor the success, cheer on the team; this is big stuff. For the rest of us, I would advise that we take in this chapter and look forward to what the amazing people at SpaceX have in store for us in the future. Yet, please do so with a healthy dose of reality - this is still spaceflight, and it is not easy, even when they make it look that way. | <urn:uuid:e6dd2794-3d8a-4e16-9716-a0ff216070a8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://aero-news.net/bannertransfer.cfm?do=main.textpost&id=86720054-1c40-4dba-b219-a69f1191f2e7 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962045 | 1,169 | 1.695313 | 2 |
At Elkin Elementary School, when fourth-grader Luke Norman saw a girl in need, he decided to make a difference.
Elkin Elementary School student Hope Swaim has limited use of her body and is physically fragile.
Last school year, Swaim had the opportunity to access a special adaptive tricycle that gave her much more mobility, allowing her to pedal around on her own. However, the tricycle was on loan and only available through the school. After seeking other ways of obtaining the tricycle, it was also found that Swaim’s insurance would not cover the funds.
After seeing the joy it brought the little girl, Norman went home and told his mother, Emily Norman, about the dilemma. Luke decided that he wanted to raise money so Swaim could have her very own tricycle, at home as well as at school.
“Life’s not always fair to people like Hope,” said Emily Norman. “That doesn’t mean nothing can be changed.”
Norman and his mother began immediately spreading the word about Swaim’s tricycle, naming the campaign “Wheels for Hope.” The first steps involved setting up an account at Wells Fargo Bank, which was open for anyone to make donations.
From there, the effort spread by community connections and word of mouth. Emily Norman and her husband, Rodney, sent out emails to coworkers and friends explaining Swaim’s need, and they in turn sent messages to their friends, creating a domino effect. Emily Norman also took advantage of social media like Facebook to gain donations for the tricycle.
Luke Norman even prepared his own message to broadcast on WELK, which is Elkin Elementary School’s daily televised news program, and reached out to students and staff for their help. The response of teachers and students was great. Donations were taken up in classrooms, whether it was in the form of checks or loose change.
“We were so blessed with all the overwhelming support, and it mattered so much to Luke that he saw Hope finally get her tricycle,” said Emily Norman.
Due to all of the contributors to Swaim’s charity, the funds were available to purchase the special tricycle in the early winter of 2012, but Swaim was hospitalized and unable to enjoy her gift.
After a long recovery period, she was finally able to enjoy her own tricycle at home in the spring.
Emily Norman says her son also received a great deal from the experience.
“The best thing about this whole process was how everyone was connected in supporting Hope, even people who didn’t personally know her,” she said. “We were so blessed from all the support, and the lessons that Luke learned from his show of compassion will stay with him forever.” | <urn:uuid:a0be9997-9174-4e87-aa70-6c1161ef20fe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://elkintribune.com/pages/full_story_myown/push?article-Fourth+grader+raises+money+in+%E2%80%98Wheels+for+Hope%E2%80%99+campaign%20&id=20410870 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00033-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.986817 | 588 | 1.898438 | 2 |
This new report commissioned by the Environment and Finance Group of the Nordic Council of Ministers continues the tradition of reviewing the use of economic instruments in environmental policy in the Nordic countries by providing a comprehensive overview. At the same time, this report extends the country coverage and content of the report. The application of economic instruments is not only discussed for the five Nordic countries, but also for the three Baltic countries. In addition, a discussion on the opportunities and shortcomings associated with the use of economic instruments in the field of environmental policy has been undertaken.
The report is a follow-up of the previous five reviews – the last was published in 2002 (TemaNord 2002:581) – and discusses the latest development of the application of economic instruments covering the time period 2001-2005. | <urn:uuid:4fc075a7-21ad-475b-8a77-4f2e661ae161> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.norden.org/da/publikationer/publikationer/2006-525/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932364 | 155 | 1.757813 | 2 |