text stringlengths 213 24.6k | id stringlengths 47 47 | dump stringclasses 1 value | url stringlengths 14 499 | file_path stringlengths 138 138 | language stringclasses 1 value | language_score float64 0.9 1 | token_count int64 51 4.1k | score float64 1.5 5.06 | int_score int64 2 5 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
A very limited quantity has been made for this fundraising effort so please place your order directly from our website HERE.
Help Spread the Word!
If you wish to help spread the word using the button link above, please cut and paste the entire code below to your blog, facebook or website:
Friday, January 15, 2010
Did you know that most of the chicken that you get from regular supermarkets these days are probably from a chicken that has been grown in cages too small for them to move? These chickens are usually kept in perpetual darkness to make them sleep more and fight less. They are fattened with cheap feed and growth hormones so fast that they cannot even stand up and walk.
And in all likelihood, the beef that we get from regular supermarket these days (and even at expensive restaurants) most probably came from a cow that spent much of its life standing in manure. Similarly, these cows are also fattened with cheap feed and hormones that they cannot even walk themselves to the slaughterhouse when the time comes.
If you have not watched this informative documentary, I would strongly urge you to as any summary I can give here will not do the documentary any true justice. If you would like to have an overview of the issues, see here.
Watching Food, Inc made me think really hard about my food choices for the family and how I should be more responsible in choosing food that is not only safe and healthy, but is also responsibly produced, priced and sold. Here are some useful quotes from the documentary.
“There is this deliberate veil, this curtain that’s drawn between us and where our food is coming from. The industry doesn’t want you to know the truth about what you’re eating because if you knew, you might not want to eat it.”
"When you add up the environmental costs, societal costs, health costs, the industrial food is not honest food. It's not priced honestly. It's not produced honestly. There's nothing honest about that food."
“Cows are not designed by evolution to eat corn. They’re designed by evolution to eat grass. And the only reason we feed them corn is because corn is really cheap and corn makes them fat quickly … The industrial food system is always looking for greater efficiency. But each new step in efficiency leads to problems. If you take feedlot cattle off their corn diet, give them grass for five days, they will shed eighty percent of the E. coli in their gut.”
You may think that we as individuals are at the mercy of what is sold to us. In fact, the exact opposite is true. If we choose not to buy food that is not fit for our families to eat, this will send a clear signal to the food producers out there to clean up their act. If you are convinced, like me, that the way our food is prepared and sold to us should be changed , here are 10 simple things you can do to start.
Labels: Thinking aloud
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
I recently received a Weego glass bottle for my girls to be used as test subjects. The bottle itself is a glass bottle, with a BPA free cap, nipple and a stylish silicone sleeve that is also BPA free. The sleeve is designed to protect the glass from breakage and also makes holding the bottle with wet hands and tiny baby fingers a lot easier.
I really love the look and feel of glass bottles and my 3 year old was so taken in by the funky bright colour of the bottle that just the thought of drinking milk from it made her so excited! For me, what really bought me over (other than the look) was the safety and practically of the Weego bottles. Frankly, I have tested other brands of glass bottles (also with rubber sleeves) before and got put off by when those bottles started to leak. I also found the rubber sleeves with some of the other cheaper brands a pain to remove and clean. With the Weego bottles, the sleeve was a breeze to remove and slipped out of the glass bottle easily in warm soapy water. And since the bottle was sent to me as a tester, I took the liberty of hurling it on the ground several times to see if it would break. It was a thoroughly liberating process doing so and needless to say, the bottles survived the test and my girls are still drinking from them.
This bottle is currently retailing on Pupsik Studio and comes in 6 six unique colors to personalize and identify your baby's bottle (pink, raspberry, orange, yellow, sky light blue, and ocean dark blue). I personally think the price of these glass bottles is reasonable, considering that you are avoiding all the potentially dangerous chemicals in plastics altogether and those boring-looking BPA-free plastic bottles also cost pretty much the same as these stunning glass bottles anyway. What is more, these weego bottles fits perfectly on a Medela Pump, with both the sleeve and bottle being able to go directly in the freezer for storage. All Weego bottles are also compatible with any standard size nipples. Neat!
Labels: Product Review
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Friday, January 8, 2010
If you are like me and love freebies, you will love this!! We are giving away a Pupsik Baby Pouch over at Der Nen's blog. What a better way to start the year than to win something for you and your baby! Even if you already have a pouch, no harm getting another one especially if it is free! It is a raffle so everyone has a chance of winning (+ there are ways to increase your chances! wink...)
Friday, January 1, 2010
Hello Everyone and Happy New Year!
I just wanted to start the year with a big thank you from the bottom of my heart to all of you who have helped Pupsik Studio grow over the past year. I never would have imagined that our little studio which began as nothing more than a personal dream would have grown to a full-fledged business in the course of a year.
As I crawl out of a very, very busy year as a mom and founder of Pupsik Studio, I have taken a pause to look back at our many adventures and lessons we have learnt in 2009. We do not take anything for granted and are grateful for everything big and small... Above all, we are thankful to customers like you who trust us and have chosen us, among so many online stores in Singapore, to shop for your precious little tots.
God willing, we will continue to improve and make the shopping experience at Pupsik Studio more exciting, fulfilling and fun for you. Rest assured, we are commited to making sure that you can look forward to more useful products and services that will make your journey as a parent easier and more beautiful every step of the way.
For all of your support and friendship in 2009, we can never say ‘Thank You’ enough. We hope and pray that 2010 will be a happy and fulfilling year for us all! | <urn:uuid:689c8061-4758-4772-b76d-0e1fd534ce9d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.blog.pupsikstudio.com/2010_01_01_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971373 | 1,469 | 1.554688 | 2 |
The Real Cost of Prisons Comix Ebook
Publication Date: September 2008
File Size: 32533 Kbytes
Restrictions set by Publisher:
- Text-to-speech feature is available.
- Printing is permitted.
- You can copy text from file.
- Free application Adobe Digital Editions, Aldiko reader, or Bluefire reader required .
( 22.47% savings )
- Check Supported devices and software requirements .
- Ebooks once downloaded are non-refundable. View return policy .
One out of every hundred adults in the U.S. is in prison. This book provides a crash course in what drives mass incarceration, the human and community costs, and how to stop the numbers from going even higher. This volume collects the three comic books published by the Real Cost of Prisons Project. The stories and statistical information in each comic book is thoroughly researched and documented. Prison Town:Paying the Price tells the story of how the financing and site locations of prisons affects the people of rural communities in which prison are built. It also tells the story of how mass incarceration affects people of urban communities from where the majority of incarcerated people come from. Prisoners of the War on Drugs includes the history of the war on drugs, mandatory minimums, how racism creates harsher sentences for people of color, stories on how the war on drugs works against women, three strikes laws, obstacles to coming home after incarceration, and how mass incarceration destabilizes neighborhoods. Prisoners of a Hard Life: Women and Their Children includes stories about women trapped by mandatory sentencing and the “costs” of incarceration for women and their families. Also included are alternatives to the present system, a glossary and footnotes. Over 125,000 copies of the comic books have been printed and more than 100,000 have been sent to families of people who are incarcerated, people who are incarcerated and to organizers and activists throughout the country. The book includes a chapter with descriptions about how the comix have been put to use in the work of organizers and activists in prison and in the “free world” by ESL teachers, high school teachers, college professors, students, and health care providers throughout the country. The demand for them is constant and the ways in which they are being used is inspiring.
Should you buy this Ebook?
We've put together a collection of resources to help you make a decision regarding whether you should buy this Ebook from us.
- We retrieve ratings from several sources on the web for your convenience. They are often good enough indicator of the work. In addition, you can also read Reviews.
- Is your device one of these? Ebook reading software will work on the following devices: Windows, Mac, Android 2.2+ Devices, IPad (iOS 3+), IPhone (iOS 3+), Kindle Fire. Several other devices are also supported by the software.
- Compare prices. Our price is $8.49. If you would like to research our competitors to see their prices. Here're some places to look:
Why should you buy Ebooks from onlinebookplace.com?
We've had 1000s of downloads so far and with over 300000+ Ebooks to choose from, onlinebookplace.com is becoming a favorite Ebook Store for many. Allow us to win you over with our competitive pricing, upfront policies and diligent customer service.
- Every Ebook page on onlinebookplace.com has information on restrictions that publishers have placed on the Ebook along with a clear indication of software required to read the Ebooks.
- If ratings for an Ebook are available from one of several sources online, then we've attempted to get those to help you make a better purchasing decision about the Ebook. Reviews from Goodreads (a popular reviews site) are provided on the same if they're available.
- In most cases, we've also attempted to get you links to the Ebook on our competitor's site so that you can compare prices with relative ease.
- We use McAfee to scan for any vulnerabilities in the system to ensure that any information that you give us does not fall into the wrong hands.
- We use Paypal, a trusted 3rd party payment provider to accept Payments -- your payment information doen't reside with us. Any information that does end up with us is safe.
Check below for device compatibility and any free 3rd-party software requirements. You should be able to transfer your purchase to more than one (usually between 3 to 6) compatible devices.
Windows/Mac PC or Laptop
Free app Adobe Digital Editions required. Note that this software is not the same as Adobe Reader.
IPad or IPhone
Free app Bluefire Reader required. | <urn:uuid:65691446-1a5b-4ce0-8216-41835a666444> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://onlinebookplace.com/the-real-cost-of-prisons-comix | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00032-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943732 | 979 | 2.078125 | 2 |
I suppose there are several reasons for this general aversion to using the M word at work. Some people may believe that business professionals should be excused from certain moral obligations universally recognized in aspects of our lives outside the workplace. This crowd might maintain that business is like a poker game, in which it is understood that the rules include permission to engage in otherwise "immoral" acts like deliberate deception. However, those who subscribe to such a view can't seriously maintain that such a "moral holiday" is absolute in business. Even the most Machiavellian business people would likely hold, for example, that it would be immoral for a competitor to bomb their factory and kill them and their families to gain a competitive advantage.
I think there is another more common reason why most people avoid using the M word at work. In our culture, the word is closely tied to religious doctrines. Religions of all kinds promote moral codes generally aimed at assisting believers to achieve such goals as avoiding sin, living a holy life, developing spiritually and winning eternal salvation. Such goals are at variance with those of most businesses, whose principal aim, of course, is to provide goods and services and to create value for their owners. In addition, because religious doctrines vary widely, businesses with employees from multiple faiths rightly operate on a secular basis. They welcome people of all religions but insist that employees not attempt to impose their beliefs on others in the workplace.
And so we avoid using the M word either because we think it has little place in business to begin with or out of fear that we may be perceived as grounding our business judgments on our religious convictions. Although it is essential for businesses to operate on a secular basis, if for no other reason than to avoid disharmony in the workplace, the fear of the M word is unfounded.
First, this phobia is based on an unnecessarily narrow understanding of the word. Morality is derived from the Latin word moralitas, meaning manner, character or proper behavior. It is synonymous with ethics, which is generally defined as the systematic study of what moral behavior is. So one should be no more averse to using moral at work than to using ethical. The two words relate to the same thing-proper behavior-and can be used interchangeably.
It is also important to recognize that religions are not the only source for defining or providing guidance on what constitutes proper behavior. Governments, communities and organizations of all kinds, including businesses, play a significant role in drawing moral lines for individuals subject to their influence. This, of course, is what laws and company policies are designed to do; they expressly attempt to define proper behavior and set penalties for improper behavior.
This is not to suggest that laws or company policies always draw the lines in the right places. History has shown time and again that this is not the case. Instead, the point is that when we talk about moral conduct in a business context, we are not necessarily espousing a religious position. Instead, we can be articulating our reasoned judgment based on a set of commonly held values espoused in the law, community norms and company policies.
Second, morality and moral reasoning clearly play an important part in making sound business decisions. Regardless of what language is used to describe the process, business professionals make moral judgments every day. Take, for example, routine business issues such as "How safe is 'safe enough'?" with regard to products or working conditions, "How clean is 'clean enough'?" with regard to environmental emissions and "What constitutes a fair wage?" All of these and myriad other issues that business people face require moral judgments. In such cases, people are trying to discern proper behavior while taking into account the facts and their ethical or moral obligations.
So, the next time you get a chance, use the M word at work. Don't be afraid. If you get raised eyebrows, help your colleagues understand that you are not expressing your religious beliefs. Instead you are merely providing your best business judgment based on the facts and relevant principles.
Of course, to demonstrate that you are not merely expressing a religious belief, you must be prepared to properly defend your moral judgments. To do this you must employ the one tool that is essential in making any moral decision-sound reasoning.
Judging by what we've gone through in the business community during the first nine years of this millennium, sound reasoning and more frequent use of the M word can't happen soon enough.
Jim Nortz is compliance director at Bausch & Lomb Inc. and is a member of the Rochester Area Business Ethics Foundation. The opinions expressed in this article are Nortz's alone and may not reflect those of Bausch & Lomb or the RABEF. For more information about the RABEF, go to www.rochesterbusinessethics.com. Nortz can be reached at (585) 260-8960 or email@example.com.
07/03/2009 (C) Rochester Business Journal | <urn:uuid:f0127d85-a84f-45bc-87fb-dc686f3a8399> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rbj.net/article.asp?size=3&aID=180757 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00069-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954547 | 1,018 | 2.203125 | 2 |
Facts about this animal
With a head-body length of 75 to 90 cm, an arm span of 1.5 to 1.8 m, and a body mass of 8 to 16 kg, the siamang is the largest of all species of gibbons. Females are slightly smaller, and not as heavy, as the males.
Apart from the eyebrows, which sometimes may be reddish brown, the siamang is uniformly black coloured. The hair is long, soft and shiny. Males have a prominent preputial tuft of about 15 cm long hairs.
The head is small and round. The face is essentially bare with a flat broad nose with big nostrils. The eyes are dark brown. The ears are hidden in the fur. There is a fairly large laryngeal sac, which enhances the siamang’s call, helping make it the loudest of the gibbons. The sac is hairless and puffs up when sounds are emitted.
Like in other gibbons, the siamang's arms are longer than their legs. Palms and fingers, except for the short, opposable thumb, are elongated. Webbing of the second and third finger is a constant feature and may extend to the terminal joint. Their feet have five toes. The big toe is opposable too. Siamangs can grasp and carry things with both their hands and their feet.
Siamangs are very territorial and live in family groups. Siamang pairs usually stay together for life. A siamang family group consists of one adult male and one adult female, along with two or three immature offspring that are only two or three years apart in age.
After a gestation period of 7-8 months usually one single young is born, which weighs about 410-600 g and is hairless except for a small tuft on top of the head. Infants can hold onto their mothers’ fur and cling to her belly soon after they’re born. The youngster is weaned early in its second year when it has reached a body-weight of 2.5 to 3 kg. The father does his share of raising the baby and takes over the daily care of the youngster when it is about one year old. The offspring stay with their families for approximately five to seven years. Then they venture out on their own to start their own family group.
About half of the siamang’s diet in the wild consists of leaves, and most of the rest is fruit, flowers and buds. In addition, insects and small vertebrates are eaten as well.
Did you know?
That siamangs can share territory with other gibbons? This is because they are largely leaf eaters and do not compete for much of the forest fruit other gibbon species depend upon.
|Name (Scientific)||Symphalangus syndactylus|
|CITES Status||Appendix I|
|CMS Status||Not listed|
Photo Copyright by
|Range||Indonesia (Sumatra), Malaysia (Peninsular Malaysia)|
|Habitat||Rain and monsoon forests|
|Wild population||Unknown, but numbers are decreasing|
|Zoo population||308 reported to ISIS (2007)|
In the Zoo
How this animal should be transported
For air transport, Container Note 33 of the IATA Live Animals Regulations should be followed.
Find this animal on ZooLex
Photo Copyright by
Why do zoos keep this animal
Without rain forest there are no siamangs. Being very vocal, acrobatic and agile and displaying brachiation, their main way of travelling through the rain forest for many hours a day, the siamang is a perfect ambassador species for the threatened rainforests of south-east Asia. | <urn:uuid:3f9af11a-a491-4cd8-99b2-ec730d6244fc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.waza.org/en/zoo/choose-a-species/mammals/primates/apes/symphalangus-syndactylus | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926554 | 783 | 3.296875 | 3 |
Simple intervention helps doctors communicate better when prescribing medicationsJanuary 15th, 2013 in Health /
When it comes to prescribing medications to their patients, physicians could use a dose of extra training, according to a new study led by a UCLA researcher.
In previous studies, Dr. Derjung Tarn and her colleagues found that when doctors prescribed medicines, the information they provided to patients was spotty at best, they rarely addressed the cost of medications and they didn't adequately monitor their patients' medication adherence.
The logical next step, Tarn said, was to devise an intervention aimed at improving how physicians communicate to their patients five basic facts about a prescribed medication: the medication's name, its purpose, the directions for its use, the duration of use and the potential side effects. And it appears to have worked.
Tarn and her co-researchers found that physicians who completed the training demonstrated a significant improvement in how they communicated this crucial information. Compared to a control group that didn't receive the training, these doctors discussed at least one additional topic out of the five—and they sometimes went beyond the basics, touching on other pertinent facts about medications that are important for patients to know.
The intervention is described in the January issue of the journal Annals of Family Medicine.
"We were pleasantly surprised to see that a simple intervention was effective in improving the content of discussions," said Tarn, the study's lead author and assistant professor of family medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.
The researchers conducted a controlled clinical trial between February 2009 and February 2010 with 27 primary care physicians and 256 patients. The training consisted of a one-hour interactive educational session that encouraged doctors to communicate the five basic facts about prescribed medications. The researchers also gave the participating patients a flier listing the five facts. In addition, they recorded the audio of the physician–patient interactions. The success of the physicians' communication of the key facts to patients was measured using the Medication Communication Index, or MCI.
The researchers found that the mean MCI for the physicians in the intervention group was 3.95 out of five, compared with 2.86 for those physicians who didn't receive the training. The intervention-group doctors also received higher ratings from their patients on how they communicated information about medications than did the physicians in the control group.
And, significantly, the training resulted in more than just better communication about the medications the physicians prescribed, according to the study.
"Interestingly, higher MCI scores also were associated with more reports of communication about topics not directly included in the intervention," the researchers write. "For example, the intervention encouraged physicians to discuss potential medication side effects with patients, but patients also reported better communication about the risk of experiencing side effects and what to do if side effects occurred."
The study has some limitations. Patients were predominantly white, most had at least some college education, and there were more Hispanics than African Americans. Also, having an audio recorder in the examination room may have enhanced communication for physicians in the intervention group more than for those in the control group, who were unaware of what the researchers were studying. In addition, the researchers didn't examine the doctors' style of communication, and they don't know if any additional time spent talking about new prescriptions might have detracted from conversations about other topics.
Still, the study suggests "that a brief, practical intervention can improve physician communication about newly prescribed medications in ways that affect patients," the researchers write. "The intervention should be tested for its clinical impact."
Provided by University of California, Los Angeles
"Simple intervention helps doctors communicate better when prescribing medications." January 15th, 2013. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-simple-intervention-doctors-medications.html | <urn:uuid:0cbfd887-613d-49fe-a81a-74ee2322a6bf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://medicalxpress.com/print277468966.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971896 | 773 | 2.734375 | 3 |
Room To Breathe is a surprising story of transformation as struggling kids in a San Francisco public middle school are introduced to the practice of mindfulness meditation. Topping the district in disciplinary suspensions, and with overcrowded classrooms creating a nearly impossible learning environment, overwhelmed administrators are left with stark choices: repeating the cycle of trying to force tuned-out children to listen, or to experiment with timeless inner practices that may provide them with the social, emotional, and attentional skills that they need to succeed.
Green Festivals: The Road to Rio +20 and Beyond goes live on Saturday morning from the Jacob Javits Center in NYC. Fund Balance, Green Festivals and the Huffington Post present the Main Stage of the Earth Day Green Festival in NYC and global sustainability and social enterprise content from around the world on the way to the Earth Summit in Rio this June.
President Obama is scheduled to meet Monday with Davis Guggenheim, the director of the new documentary "Waiting for Superman," and the five students featured in the film.
The president called the film "heartbreaking" for its portrayal of real-life students whose best chances for a good education are charter school lotteries. The film is quite controversial among progressives and labor unions,
There was a time when the American public education system was a model admired by the entire world. Today other countries are surpassing us in every respect, and the slogan "No Child Left Behind" has become a cynical punch line. Documentary filmmaker Davis Guggenheim (An Inconvenient Truth) explores
350.org is an international campaign that's building a movement to unite the world around solutions to the climate crisis--the solutions that science and justice demand.
Our mission is to inspire the world to rise to the challenge of the climate… | <urn:uuid:91a6f636-a6f1-49e2-80eb-1792533a2a45> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://awareguide.com/index.php/lifefeed/itemlist/tag/Education | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936069 | 361 | 1.804688 | 2 |
The European anthem
is taken from the Ninth Symphony composed in 1823 by Ludwig van Beethoven based on a poem by Friedrich von Schiller, the Ode to Joy, written in 1785.
This melody, the Union's official anthem since 1985, calls to mind, through the universal language of music, the ideals of freedom, peace, solidarity embodied by Europe.
The Ode to joy
doesn't replace the Member states' own national anthems; it celebrates their common values and illustrates the European motto "united in diversity". | <urn:uuid:1a9105ea-2d8e-445c-9693-0123e281e419> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.robert-schuman.eu/mieux_connaitre_eu.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00040-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.919341 | 111 | 2.484375 | 2 |
Hon. Benjamin L. Cardin, Chairman
Hon. Alcee L. Hastings, Co-Chairman
For Immediate Release
September 29, 2009
HELSINKI COMMISSION URGES GREATER REENGAGEMENT IN BALKANS
WASHINGTON--The U.S. should strongly reengage in the Balkans and European leaders should outline a clear path for integrating countries of the region in the European Union and NATO, bipartisan leaders of the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (U.S. Helsinki Commission) said today at a hearing on current challenges in the Balkans.
Commissioners gave credit to the Obama Administration for showing a commitment to stability in the region with a Vice Presidential visit to Bosnia and Herzegovina earlier this year, but agreed more aggressive follow up is needed. (Full statements available here. For photos, here.)
“Unfortunately, since Vice President Biden’s visit, Bosnia has lost ground,” said Senator Benjamin L. Cardin (D-MD), Chairman of the Helsinki Commission. “The country cries out for leadership and we don’t see that at present. The Commission takes this backward slide very seriously. Bosnia’s central institutions need to function effectively and no step should be taken that rewards nationalists who obstruct them. We should continue to work with Europe on Bosnia. The question is whether Europe shares our sense of urgency.”
“I don’t see the intense effort I would like to in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo,” said Co-Chairman Congressman Alcee L. Hastings (D-FL). I see the region as a tinderbox waiting to explode. The U.S. can lead, but our friends and allies in Europe must also show a clear plan for how the European Union will successfully integrate Bosnia-Herzegovina and other countries of the Balkans.
“I believe it is time for our government to exercise real leadership by re-engaging in Bosnia and promoting the only possible solution: a constitution providing for a one-person, one-vote democracy,” said Ranking Republican Commissioner Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ).
“On top of our diplomatic efforts, it is critical that we continue to support infrastructure projects, like the highway from the Albanian coast into Kosovo,” said Commissioner Congressman Robert A. Aderholt (R-AL). “Such projects benefit all the countries in the region and give them a shared stake in regional peace and stability.”
Commissioners heard from Stuart Jones, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs and Bjorn Lyrvall, the Director General for Political Affairs in the Foreign Ministry of Sweden, which holds E.U. Presidency. The hearing followed a series of events that have showcased the Commission’s longstanding advocacy for active engagement and decisive policy responses in the Balkans. The Commission has held hearings and briefings on Balkan topics as well as delegation visits to the region earlier this year.
Media Contact: Neil Simon
# # #
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Citizenship and Political Rights
Military Aspects of Security | <urn:uuid:2b25d1da-591a-4bbd-81ff-607492ec76a3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.csce.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=ContentRecords.ViewDetail&ContentRecord_id=810&ContentType=P&ContentRecordType=P&UserGroup_id=76®ion_id=76&year=0&month=0&Subaction=PressReleases&CFID=9556291&CFTOKEN=11358732 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.924854 | 647 | 1.65625 | 2 |
Wotcha! by Kevin Saunders
You set the price! 116690 words.
Published by M-y Books on February 6, 2009. .
About the book Wotcha - Watcher noun - a person who watches or observes somebody or something. A voyeur. Say WOTCHA! to Bart Raines, who s condemned forever to be a watcher after a childhood prank left his eyelid glued to his beloved telescope. Stuck with one eye that can't not see, he s turned voyeurism into a lucrative art form. | <urn:uuid:60e94ec1-1ebf-424b-a253-d0c4a7efba1a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.smashwords.com/books/tags/voyeuristic?adult=on | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946762 | 114 | 1.539063 | 2 |
The Art Institute of Boston is pleased to present ArtsFirst, a free, one-day career event, held specifically for young visual artists who are currently in their junior year of high school.
ArtsFirst will include hands-on visual art workshops with faculty from AIB and a pizza lunch followed by an alumni panel discussion.
Alums will highlight their experiences as art students and provide examples of viable career options in the arts following graduation.
Workshops are taught by top AIB faculty and department chairs who are professionals in their fields—design, illustration, photography, animation, computer graphics, and fine arts.
Download Application Form
May 22, 20139:30 am–10:00 am
Participant RegistrationAIB Gallery, 700 Beacon StreetParticipants pick up workshop registration and packets.
10:00 am-1:00 pmArtist Career WorkshopsParticipants choose one; descriptions below.Designers Make Things That Make Things HappenStill Life Re-examined and TransformedIllustration ToolboxPhoto StudioAnimation Festival
1:10 pm-1:45 pmPizza Lunch Social
1:45 pm-3:45 pmClosing EventAlum Panel DiscussionStudents receive participation certificates at conclusion of Closing EventApplication InformationApplication deadline:May 8, 2013Apply early! Space is limited!Download Application Form [pdf]Application requirements:
Mail application package to:ArtsFirst WorkshopsThe Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University700 Beacon StreetBoston, MA 02215-2598Location:The Art Institute of Boston at Lesley University700 Beacon StreetBoston, MA 02215map and directionsIf you have questions or would like an application mailed to you, please contact Linda Harris at 617.585.6724 or firstname.lastname@example.org.
Designers Make Things That Make Things HappenDesign is a way of thinking, a strategy for action, a method of doing that proposes new and different possibilities. It is how we accomplish change in the world, hopefully for the better. In this workshop we will learn techniques for generating ideas and expressing them so others can understand them and benefit from them. Using our brains, language, memories, imagination, and our shared minds to create ideas and concepts, we will sketch and diagram them, critique them and improve them until we have a coherent presentation of each concept. Then we will outline our strategies for making these things happen in the world.You will come away with a new goal for your mission of being a designer in this world, a means to achieve it, and hopefully the inspiration to pursue your study of design as a way of being in the world.Still Life: Re-examined and TransformedThis workshop will provide you the opportunity to explore the creative possibilities of working from still life: using still life as reference for working out ideas, exploring compositional relationships, and further sharpening your observational skills. You will have the chance to stage your own set-ups and/or work from examples provided. Ink, pencil, charcoal, paint, and collage materials will be provided, as well as a variety of surfaces to work on.Illustration ToolboxThis course will be a brief introduction to what it's like to be an illustrator. You'll be encouraged to let your mind fly, make stuff, and have fun. As a class we will be discussing a variety of concepts and techniques currently used in the field of Illustration and taught in the Illustration Department at AIB. Students will be using Photoshop to explore the use of a variety of exciting, cutting-edge media tools—including adjustment layers, brushes, floating objects—as they create illustrations based on an actual job assignments.Photo StudioPhotography and the still image are no less current or a part of our culture now than at any time since the 'discovery' of photography in the late 1800s. In our contemporary world, photographers work as artists, sell ideas and products, document events, and have a very immediate impact on how we understand ourselves and the world at large while making very personal decisions and choices.This short workshop will touch on the world of Commercial photography as a starting point for exploring the power of the still image. Setting up a simple studio environment and working with professional lighting and camera equipment to make portraits of workshop participants, we'll explore how seemingly simple choices affect the outcome of the finished image.Animation FestivalThe animation career day workshop will begin with a discussion about animation as an art form and a career. The students will view a variety of animations and hear about the various jobs people can get in the animation industry. This period will include a question and answer session and a class discussion about animation.Students will then get a mini lesson on some basic animation techniques and will then get to animate their own film using clay and stop motion as well as hand drawn animation on paper. A DVD will be made of all the student work done during the workshop and sent to the students later in the month.This program is made possible by the generous support of The Ralph Bradley Prizes, The Associated Grant Makers Summer Fund, the Clayton F. and Ruth L. Hawkridge Foundation, and the Fuller Foundation.
[back to top]
Schedules and Course Offerings
Young Artist Residency
Online Portfolio Workshops
News and Resources
AIB Alumni Portfolios
Directions to AIB
Ask an admissions counselor
“This is the best thing ever. I’d love to do this for the rest of my life. - Stephanie, 2012 Arts First participant
Read more about the Arts First Program
Our College Courses for High School Students host students from the Boston area as well as from around the world. Take a look at our Galleries to view student work. | <urn:uuid:e5141d81-e6fa-4647-b593-4fb89c245656> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lesley.edu/PageTemplate.aspx?id=8327 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.92216 | 1,171 | 1.726563 | 2 |
Norman Vincent Peale-"Positive Thinking For A Time Like This"-Prentice Hall-1975-5 1/2" X 8 1/2"-192 pages-Hardcover Book-With Jacket-Signed By Author.Norman Vincent Peale was one of the most influential clergymen in the United States during the 20th-century. Ordained in the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1922, Peale served as pastor at a succession of churches that included Berkeley, Rhode Island (1922–24), Brooklyn, New York (1924–27), and Syracuse, New York (1927–32) before changing his affiliation to the Dutch Reformed Church so that he could become pastor of the Marble Collegiate Church in New York City (1932–84). Peale's simple, optimistic, and dynamic sermons, in which he offered a positive outlook on modern living brought increasing numbers of parishioners and increasing fame to Peale. His sermons were regularly broadcast, first on radio and later on television. In addition, Peale published a weekly newsletter for businessmen, Guideposts, which reached two million subscribers at its apex. Peale also published several best-selling books, including The Power of Positive Thought (1952), The Art of Living (1937), Confident Living (1948), and This Incredible Century (1991). The book has been autographed on the title page by Norman Vincent Peale with a fountain pen in blue.......BOTH BOOK AND AUTOGRAPH ARE IN VERY GOOD CONDITION. | <urn:uuid:2b1aba20-3731-45b5-b770-f7301fff77b2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guaranteeautograph.com/penovipthfor.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940651 | 310 | 2.171875 | 2 |
Search tools are certainly becoming part of daily cyber life, the very first thing comes in our mind when we required information/knowledge is online search engine. In past people use dictionaries and encyclopedia, but in this modern computer world all the information in integrated electronically and is available to every one on World Wide Web. Search engines like Google, Yahoo and Msn are well known by majority of computer users. In this battle of revealing searched information to internet users Google holds best ranking and it is most commonly used around the world.
According to Alexa (The web information company) Google is the most usable search engine till 2010. Since Google Inc launched its search engine in late 1997, the company is on urge of continues improvement and making life easier for its users.
Lately, Google have introduced some incredible search tools targeting its vital users needs. These search tools which specialized in searching specific information form specific locations; some of these tools are Google squared, Google Blog Search and Google Books.
Let us highlight some features of Google Blog Search and Google Books and compare both search tools to identify which one work better for its target audiences. Search tools are commonly used by students for research work and assignments, Google Book allows users to search the required text/keyword within its entire digital books database and returns scan pages from different books.
I have found this Blog quite amusing www.booksearch.blogspot.com where author describe how useful Google Books is for a four year old child when it comes to finding history. Another important feature of Google books is it allows new authors and publishers to release their work online for knowledge sharing. Google Books share thousands of books from different languages.
Google Blog Search on the other hand plays a vital role in information sharing, it allows user to search through millions of Blogs indexes, Podcasts and RSS feeds. It is an effective search tool and allows user to search though fresh blog posts with details like dates and time of published, it’s a new way to share opinions and participate in public debates. Google Blog Search have many different features and it’s also smart enough to ignore inappropriate bloggers in its search results, alike Google Book it provides its users with new and valuable information this can be ideal for business people, politicians, and journalist.
Its not easy to compare these searching tools as they both satisfy their target audience with appropriate and valuable information, I guess now the question lies on number of users and nature of work, personally as a university student and in search of knowledge and research material online Google Books helps a lot when it comes to research, despite of some limitation, copyright and privacy issues Google books always points to the right information.
I also found some interesting blogs and article which shed more information in relation to Google Blog Search and will help readers to identify its best features. | <urn:uuid:b2ab1b08-c427-4d70-9d7b-c21c86d7dffa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ahmedbanirasheed.wordpress.com/2011/08/18/google-search-tools-do-they-make-life-easier/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.915114 | 565 | 2.328125 | 2 |
A volunteer firefighter died after an intense training exercise.
More than a dozen firefighter gathered and lowered the flag to honor the death of Capt. Neal Smith.
Smith is the first firefighter to die in the line of duty in the departments 34 year history
The five year veteran died and another firefighter was hurt Sunday at the 17th Annual East Texas Area Fall Smoke Diver School.
The course is designed to provide firefighters advanced survival skills when using a self-contained breathing apparatus.
The Texas Forest Service describes the course as extremely challenging and intensely physical in its sign-up forms.
Investigators have not released specific details on how the firefighters were hurt, but said their injuries were heat-related and happened during separate incidents. | <urn:uuid:e3906661-efdc-406f-aad7-8e069f42e354> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.click2houston.com/news/Firefighter-dies-from-injuries-at-training-facility/-/1735978/16629012/-/112u06r/-/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975794 | 144 | 1.890625 | 2 |
Abby Cliff/Graduate Student/SUNY Binghamton
It is a truth universally acknowledged that in polite conversation, whether in the eighteenth century or the twenty first, one does not talk much about chamber pots, privies, or any related topic. Chamber pots were an integral part of life in the 18th century—archaeologist Ivor Noël Hume estimates that over 300,000 were in use in London circa 1700—but are rarely discussed by historians, archaeologists, or museum curators perhaps because of a lingering prudish impulse or a dearth of information. For the past few weeks, I, a summer intern at Mount Vernon, have been compiling data from probate inventories, purchasing invoices and secondary sources, to discover more about these useful little pots.
The history of chamber pots dates to almost the beginning of time. According to the aforementioned Noël Hume, we can be pretty sure that whenever man discovered how to make pots he also discovered how they could be used at night and during illness to avoid having to do one’s business in the cold or rain or snow. While some Medieval woodcuts show handless basins under the beds of the ill and dying, it was not until 1519, in Portuguese West Africa, that vessels made specifically as chamber pots were recorded in a European context. The earliest earthenware chamber pot in Virginia, from about 1622 was found by Noël Hume at the Wolstenholme Towne site near Colonial Williamsburg. Settlers at this site not only used chamber pots for convenience, but as a way to avoid being killed or harassed by Native Americans during necessary night time excursions into the woods. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, chamber pot manufacturers used a variety of materials, from stoneware and earthenware to pewter and porcelain to fashion these containers. My survey of over 200 probate inventories revealed that stoneware chamber pots were by far the most commonly used by colonists in the Mid-Atlantic in the eighteenth century. Out of 508 chamber pots recorded, 300 were listed as some form of stoneware. In particular, Westerwald stoneware pots, named for a region in present-day Germany, quickly became popular in early America because of their sturdy form and nature. The picture at the top of this post shows three examples of Westerwald or Rhenish stoneware chamber pots from the South Grove Midden at Mount Vernon.
George Washington ordered several batches of chamber pots during his time at Mount Vernon through his London agent, Robert Cary & Company. Most of his orders were for blue and white stoneware but in 1771 he did order 6 “Dutch stone” chamber pots, likely of Westerwald origin. From household manuals of the day, we know that it was the housemaid’s responsibility to empty and clean the family’s chamber pots every morning; at Mount Vernon, a slave woman, perhaps the enslaved maid Caroline, would likely have the job.
Probate inventories of the time indicate that chamber pots were not merely possessions of the wealthy but were present in all social strata. The inventory of a Mr. George Gant of York County, deceased in 1779 and worth over 23,000 pounds, lists two chamber pots at time of death. In 1723, a York County man, Robert Innis, is recorded to have one pewter chamber pot at time of death worth two shillings and six pence and his estate is only valued at 36 pounds. In my research I found that stoneware pots, the most commonly used type, were by far the cheapest pots with an average price reaching only one shilling and six pence, meaning that even Mr. Innis with his 36 pounds could afford to buy one for his household.
Although any talk of chamber pots is likely to elicit adolescent jokes, one friend accused me of having a “potty mouth” when I told him of my research, they serve to give us a fuller picture of life. They reveal that even though eighteenth-century life could often be “nasty, brutish, and short” in comparison to the twentieth century, our forbearers found ways to live with as much dignity and comfort as they could manage. | <urn:uuid:4e64939e-bbf4-4b22-ae56-f67e5d217eb9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mountvernonmidden.org/wordpress/?p=796 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976361 | 880 | 3.03125 | 3 |
The small arthritis study, which tested just eight subjects, comes from the lab of UC San Diego neuroscientist V.S. Ramachandran -- who first used mirror-based trickery to treat phantom-limb pain in patients who have had an amputation. In those studies, pain perceived to come from an absent limb resolved when subjects saw what appeared to be their own missing limb moving smoothly and performing tasks without pain.
In the study presented by UCSD neuroscientist Laura Case this week in Washington, eight subjects suffering from severe osteo- or rheumatoid arthritis sat in front of a mirrored box and extended one of their hands. A researcher extended his hand over the subject's hand and asked the subject to move her hand slowly. The researcher, meanwhile, mimicked the subject's hand movement.
The subject, seeing only the researcher's hand in the mirror, saw a young, healthy hand performing movements fluidly and without pain or difficulty. And when asked about their hands' level of pain after the exercise, subjects rated their pain, on average, 1.5 points lower, on a scale of 1 to 10, than it had been at the outset. Some had a 3-point reduction in pain, said Case.
And there was more than one way to trick the brain's perception of pain, the researchers found. They also saw subjects rate their pain as lower when they held objects in their hands that appeared smaller and lighter than they actually were.
Case said it's not clear what trickery, exactly, made subjects feel less pain; it may have been the sight of "their" hand (actually, the researcher's) as a young, healthy hand with no arthritic deformities that made them feel better. It might have the appearance of the effortless movement that suggested a lack of pain. Then again, it may have been the exercise, which usually loosen's pain's grip, said Case.
Case and her colleagues are currently testing the mirror-based treatment on a larger population of patients with arthritic and other chronic pain. With roughly 50 million Americans suffering the pain and stiffness of arthritis, therapy that enlists the brain's willingness to see and feel a sick body as healthy -- even if it is an illusion -- could be an important treatment. Unlike non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), which come with a long list of short- and long-term risks, mirror therapy is non-invasive, safe and relatively cheap. All it takes is a mirror, a healthy body stand-in and a brain. | <urn:uuid:503ae7ad-26a6-4420-87d8-b3fd12300c85> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kwch.com/news/healthwatch/la-heb-arthritis-pain-illusion-20111115,0,2754964.story | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971182 | 524 | 2.46875 | 2 |
Rating: 0.00 Views: 133
Created by anonymous 284 days ago
Surrounded by many snakes
To see a rattlesnake in your dream, represents the passage of time. See also: Snakeof different sizes
To dream about the size of something, represents the importance we attach to objects and person. It also relates to the degree of power you are exerting and the power others have on you. According to Freudian school of thought, the size of an object, signifies the size of someone's penis, perhaps your own or your lover.and different colors.
Depression, sadness, despair. Some believe it symbolizes hidden sexual desires.They arent trying to harm me. They are friendly, gentle, familiar.
Share this dream | <urn:uuid:4653c814-29af-4e15-aace-f0190f82df03> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dreamcrowd.com/dream/74569/Friendly_snakes | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932916 | 155 | 1.53125 | 2 |
The El Marinero Chapter of the NSDAR is located in Marin County in Northern California. Organized in February 28, 1949, we currently have about 82 members. From 30 to 40 Daughters regularly attend our monthly meetings.
We hope you will attend our meetings as our guest so we may get to know you. We usually meet the second Saturday of each month and start at 10:00 a.m. We hold nine meetings each year from September to May. Starting October, 2012, we will hold most of our meetings at a local restaurant owned by one of our members. Some meetings occur at homes of other members, and we go on a few field trips in the area.
Highlights of last year's activities included serving a Christmas Tea to the women veterans in Yountville, making cookies for the local US Coast Guard and presentations by local speakers on the Witches Society, Cemeteries of San Francisco and Dressing a Nineteenth Century Lady.
More Information: If you are interested in joining our chapter, please send us an email. We will contact you, answer your questions and notify you of upcoming General and Genealogy Club meetings. We have a Regent's Welcome Reception for new and prospective members in August.
Membership: Information regarding membership in the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution is available on the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution web site.
An easy way to get started is to fill out the Prospective Member Information Request Form.
Application Assistance: To apply to the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution, you will work through a local chapter. Prospective members are welcome at our Genealogy Club, where we will help you learn how to find information to fill out your application.
This chapter founded a genealogy club that meets once a month (or so) in addition to our general meetings to share members’ interest in genealogy as well as to help prospective members learn how to research for their applications.
Topics already discussed are “Family Names, Dates and Places,” “The 1940 Census,” and “Organizing Our Genealogy Information.” Topics to be discussed during the next year are :
- Vital Records: Where to Look and How to Obtain Them
- Marin County Resources Available
- DAR Resources Available
- Geographical Development of the USA
- Common Name Spellings and How to Deal with Them
- You Too Can “Google”
- Completing your DAR Application Worksheet
- Genealogy Resources On-Line
- Getting Started on Your Genealogy
The DAR Insignia is the property of, and is copyrighted by, the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution.
Web hyperlinks to non-DAR sites are not the responsibility of the NSDAR, the state organizations or individual DAR chapters.
Last Updated: December 27, 2012
Contact our webmaster | <urn:uuid:dc701cdb-f1d2-492f-8c7c-d90c1124ec82> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://elmarinero.californiadar.org/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00071-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.920293 | 596 | 1.648438 | 2 |
In my grandfather's house there is a real live parrot, and when I pass by it, it greets me and says ‘al-salaamu ‘alaykum”. In this case do I have to return the greeting of this bird?.
Al-Fayyoomi (may Allah have mercy on him) said:
The babgha’ (parrot) is a well-known bird. The word babgha’ may be masculine or feminine, and the plural is Babghawaat.
Al-Misbaah al-Muneer fi Ghareeb al-Sharh al-Kabeer, 1/35
It seems that it is not prescribed to return the greeting of a parrot which has learnt how to say salaams, because saying salaam is an act of worship and a supplication which requires intention on the part of the one who said it, and there is no such intention on the part of this trained creature. So one should not return its greeting. The ruling is the same as that on a tape on which the greeting is recorded and can be heard. It is transmission of sound and does not come under the ruling on greeting when it is broadcast live, in which case returning the greeting is prescribed and is a communal obligation (fard kifaayah).
Shaykh Muhammad ibn Saalih al-‘Uthaymeen (may Allah have mercy on him) said:
Sometimes the greeting may be recorded and they put it on the tape and run it. If it is recorded then you are not obliged to return the greeting, because this is just transmission of sound.
Liqa’ al-Bab al-Mmaftooh, 28/229
See the rest of the fatwa and details on this issue in the answer to question number 128737.
Based on that, the parrot does not intend to give the greeting of salaam, because it does not possess the power of reason, and when it speaks it is just repeating what it has been taught, without meaning what it says.
Some of the scholars have stated that it is not prescribed to prostrate if one hears a verse from a parrot or from a recorded tape.
One of the conclusions of the book Bahjat al-Asma‘ fi Ahkaam al-Samaa‘ fi’l-Fiqh al-Islami by Prof. ‘Ali ibn Dhariyaan ibn Faaris al-Hasan al-‘Anzi (published by Dar al-Manaar in Kuwait) is:
The listener need not do the prostration of recitation if he hears it from a source that is not human, such as a trained bird like a parrot or hearing it from an echo. End quote.
And Allah knows best. | <urn:uuid:aa3cbb4e-25eb-4414-8396-9f0846c917c6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.islam-qa.com/en/ref/127136/doc | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945806 | 596 | 1.960938 | 2 |
Healthcare a hot topic at Oracle OpenWorld 2011
The healthcare track at the Oracle OpenWorld 2011 conference, held last week at the Moscone Center, saw a nearly 60 percent increase in attendees over last year -- jumping from 800 to 1,350 registered attendees.
"Making healthcare work" was the theme running through the 18 sessions specific to the industry. And the “resounding” issue attendees wanted to address was trying to break the cost curve, according to Marc Perlman, global vice president of healthcare and life sciences for Oracle Healthcare.
“It’s a global issue,” said Perlman. Industry stakeholders need to work together to develop the right workflow and share best practices. Some of the solutions to the healthcare system’s problems aren’t all technology based; however, technology is an enabler that will help drive efficiency in the system, as well as support the new models of care delivery that are coming to market, he said.
[See also: Oracle inks deal to purchase Phase Forward.]
“We’re in this together,” Perlman added. “Our idea is to share and connect people.” Oracle’s vision of connected healthcare involves breaking down the information silos and making IT systems interoperable. Data needs to be able to move securely, and healthcare stakeholders need tools in order to analyze the data and generate actionable information to impact chronic illnesses and other disease states.
“Oracle is in a great position," said Perlman. "As a technology company, we can use our solutions to drive new things together. Being open and sharing is vital for the industry at this point.”
Once data is made “liquid,” the Holy Grail is to be able to do “amazing things” by moving information to the right place and at the right time, Perlman said.
Putting information where it’s needed is the only way the healthcare system can scale, added Reid Oakes, director of technology solutions for healthcare and life sciences at Oracle Healthcare. The way to get to population health is to liberate and analyze the data, which would enable, for example, putting surveillance plans in place. “It’s very linear,” Oakes said.
For the last three years, Oracle has convened 20 healthcare executives, who represent trusted advisors and customers, to form an industry strategy council. Their sessions are meant to drive collaboration, said Oakes. “Building community in this way brought solutions to the market,” he said.
Perlman moderated a general session, “Healthcare That Works,” which included Karen Ignani, president and CEO of America’s Health Insurance Plans; Lord Patrick Carter, chairman of McKesson UK; and John Bigalke, vice chairman and national industry leader for health sciences and government for Deloitte LLP. The session identified opportunities and initiatives that worked. | <urn:uuid:38deb1fd-7506-424c-b655-2290efaab877> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/healthcare-hot-topic-oracle-openworld-2011 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939043 | 607 | 1.65625 | 2 |
The best design often comes out of a fun process. As a designer I enjoy what I do. I will readily admit that not every single second of design is going to be fun, those long hard slogs after the initial excitement of coming up with a great idea come to mind. However at the end of a project I like to think of it as a pleasant struggle, I love to able to look back with a sense of pride and smile about what I have achieved.
Below is some thoughts on how I believe a user-centred approach to design can create a more engaging experience for the audience. I hope you enjoy reading it.
“People should not have to think about an object when they are using it. Not having to think about it makes the relationship between a person and an object run more smoothly. Finding ideas in people’s spontaneous behaviour and realizing these ideas in design is what ‘Without Thought’ is about.”
Naoto Fukasawa, Without A Thought
I use empathic design techniques throughout my process in order to reveal the values and aspirations of users.
Everything has potential to be interesting and influential and observing everyday interactions often reveals subtle details about how we relate to the designed and natural world. By going into to context and observing people, using ideas such as contextual interviews and workshops and by keeping our eyes open to thoughtless acts designers can start to connect and empathise.
When we do this I believe that the things we design start to become intuitive to use, they become ‘without thought’.
Following An Iterative Design Process
An iterative design process goes hand in hand with using empathic design techniques. As designers we shouldn’t be afraid to go back in our process in order to achieve a more suitable final design.
Techniques such as personas and task models are great to measure solutions against, but designers should start to prototype early. Early prototypes don’t have to be flashy either, a white board full of post it notes or sketches is just as effective (often more so) and most of the time you will come to the same conclusion.
I try to involve the end users in the process as often as I can, this way you aren’t second guessing your audience. Often what people say and do is completely different, this is why observation and testing is important.
If I am creating a site map, I get the users to help using methods such as card sorting, then I test it. By doing this you are making your solutions intuitive to use. The earlier you test ideas the easier they are to re-engineer and adapt. Sometimes this might mean doing more research, or running more workshops, but the final design benefits hugely, and you will be happier as a result.
Often the problems we need to solve are complex and more than one skill set is required to really solve them. Design now days is often about being a hybrid thinker. We need to be able to connect the dots between what’s culturally desirable, technically feasible, and viable from a business point of view
A design team could spend months designing the perfect user focused website, but without a basic understanding of coding, how does anyone in the team know if what they are trying to achieve is remotely possible?
I have worked on a varied range of projects so far in my design career. My degree is in product design and I have often had work to understand different design methods. The great thing about this is that you discover how different disciplines approach design. A graphic designer, for example, will think about a project in a different way to a user experience designer.
“Innovation demands that you see the world through multiple lenses at the same time, and draw meaning from seemingly disparate points of data.”
Dev Patnaik, http://www.fastcompany.com/
As a junior designer it has been of real benefit to work in house and really get to grips with how businesses work and function. This has given me an understanding of how a company could actually implement what I am suggesting through first hand experience.
Finally, sometimes you can stuck in your own bubble, and being able to look at what you are doing from a different point of view can help bring new ideas into the open. Thats why workshops work, because you are involving people who have different educations, backgrounds and skills sets.
As designers we should not be afraid to use our intuition, sometimes we can do as much observation and user testing as we wan’t, but it is that one intuitive thought that makes a design great. After all designing things is what we do for a living, so we should be pretty good at it.
Find Out More | <urn:uuid:a6470e35-1962-4d77-a3d9-f9297486c63d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.drewhajduk.co.uk/index.php/my-design-process/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964234 | 966 | 2.046875 | 2 |
Solar cooking is being used to cook for large numbers of people. Below is a description of how this is being done around the world.
Build a number of smaller cookers
This is an effective strategy for refugee situations. the Iridimi Refugee Camp in Chad, thousands of CooKit solar panel cookers are being used to cook for over 17,000 people each day. These cookers are built by the refugees themselves. This method is also used by the Villaseca Solar Restaurant in Chile.
See Solar cooker plans.
Build larger panel cookers
More foil will cook more food or heat more liquid. If they are available, extra-large truck size windshield shades can be used to make cookers that will effectively handle up to two gallons of food or liquid (great for dishwater in camp) or cook at least 8-10 pounds (4-5 kg) of meat or poultry, bake full-size cakes, larger pans of rolls, brownies, cornbread, etc. An arrangement that allows for light to get under the pot makes it even more efficient.
Single thickness corrugated, unless of very good quality, might not stand up to the structural load of getting too much bigger than a CooKit or HotPot reflector, especially if gusty winds are a factor, but laminating/gluing two layers of cardboard with the corrugations cross-hatched might do the job. If it is too stiff to bend, cut apart and hinge with strips of cloth and glue. Thin plywood panels, hinged at the joints, are another possibility. One good way to foil them would be to trace and cut matching panels out of paperboard/poster-board, foil them, and then tape or clamp their edges to the plywood. Then, when the foil eventually dulls, it can be easily replaced without mess of old glue and shreds of foil stuck to the plywood.
Some pots and roasters of this capacity will fit in a turkey bag. Since little heat is lost through the bottom, it is often enough to just tuck the bag over the top and sides of the pot. Larger 24" x 30" (60 - 75 cm) cooking bags, made for the restaurant trade, will hold almost any two gallon (9 liter) pot or comparable roaster. These bags can be ordered in quantities of 100 or more from the Webstaurant Store. Solar Cookers International's online store is looking into offering them in smaller quantities.
A panel/trough hybrid might be possible using a 55 gallon (208 liter) metal drum cut in half lengthwise and foiled, possibly with an additional vertical reflector at the back. This might take two large pots.
Build a very large box cooker
Sun Ovens International makes a giant solar box cooker with propane back-up, which it markets as a village bakery. I think several hundred of these have been installed in various parts of the world. Some members of Rotary International have formed a project that seems to specialize in buying these cookers to donate to selected villages. The company is called Sun Ovens International, and the giant box cooker is called the "Villager" or Villager Sun Oven. They are large capacity solar cookers. The cost is somewhere around 11 thousand USD.
Others have build very large box cookers that can be used to cook large amounts of food or bake dozens of loaves of bread at one time.
- Institutional solar cooking
- Solar box cooker plans
- Temple Solar Project
- Dakota SunStove
- Sun Scoop
- Chari Solar Trough Cooker
Build a Scheffler Community Kitchen
Scheffler Community Kitchens can cook for hundreds or even thousands of people per day. There are specialists who design and install institutionalized solar cooking systems that cook for large groups. Several years ago, a system was installed near Mt. Abu in India that reportedly cooks for 30,000 people. The concept is called the Scheffler Community Kitchen, named after its creator, Dr. Wolfgang Scheffler. As with Mt. Abu, they can be made for extremely large kitchens or for smaller ones. I really don't know how small they can go before their cost-effectiveness deteriorates.
The basics of the system are as follows: One or more very large parabolic reflectors are built next to the kitchen, outside in the bright sun. These reflectors are equipped with motors that cause the reflectors to track the sun and focus the reflected light through a hole in the wall of the kitchen. The powerful beam of focused light is directed onto a reservoir that holds a liquid such as water or vegetable oil, making it very hot. Pipes distribute the heated fluid (in some cases as steam for steaming rice and vegetables) to various cooking stations in the kitchen, where the heat is used to cook food. If several of these large reflectors are used, it seems likely to me that you would need several holes in the wall and several places where the beams of light could heat up the reservoir containing the fluid. These systems are not cheap, and people have to be trained to maintain the reflectors and the equipment for tracking the path of the sun.
Build a Helios Array
Combine heat-retention cooking with solar cooking
Heat-retention cooking increases the amount of food that can be cooked in one day in a solar cooker because after food has been heated to cooking temperature, it is placed into an insulated box where it will continue to cook until it is done. Heat-retention cooking is often introduced along with solar cooking since it further reduces the use of traditional fuels such as firewood, and the use of this method allows much more food to be cooked each day in a solar cooker. This method of cooking is also known as retained-heat cooking, fireless cooking, haybox cooking, or wonder box cooking.
Heat-retention cooking is an age-old method that can be used to conserve energy not only during times of crisis, but anytime. Depending on the food item and amount cooked, the use of a haybox or insulated cooker saves between 20% and 80% of the energy normally needed to cook a food. The longer an item usually takes on a stovetop, the more fuel is saved. For example, with a haybox, five pots of long-cooking dry beans will use the same amount of fuel to cook to completion as just one pot cooked without a haybox.
Use a pre-heater
It is also possible to preheat one pot of food as another is cooking in the solar cooker. The illustration shows a simple preheater that can be made from one corner of a cardboard box.
See main article: Preheating | <urn:uuid:7bea2469-b909-4191-a542-b4079e82329a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://solarcooking.wikia.com/wiki/Solar_cooking_for_large_groups?direction=prev&oldid=51428 | 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 | 0.955717 | 1,386 | 2.796875 | 3 |
Discovery provides model for Alzheimer's breakthrough
25 September 2008
Sydney researchers have made a major breakthrough that will lead to a greater understanding of the causes of and treatments for neurodegenerative diseases.
At present neither Alzheimer's disease (AD) nor Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) can be cured. Therefore, it is important to model the human diseases in animals to determine what is causing them and to develop a cure for these debilitating diseases.
Exciting new work by Dr Lars Ittner and Professor Jürgen Götz from the University's Brain and Mind Research Institute, which is published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, goes some way to providing an answer to these problems.
The paper describes a novel mouse strain of Pick's disease, a form of Frontotemporal dementia, which reproduces, for the first time, Parkinsonism (resting tremor, muscle rigidity, bradykinesia, and postural instability) in a mouse model.
"The mice even show a reduced footstep length that is reminiscent of Parkinson's disease," said Professor Götz. The researchers could also show that a single dose of L-Dopa (which is used to treat Parkinson's patients) caused a marked improvement in the transgenic mice.
The researchers, who are based at the Alzheimer's and Parkinson's Laboratory of the Brain and Mind Research Institute of the University of Sydney, could show that it is impaired transport along the long axons of nerve cells, which causes the observed phenotype.
"Specifically, we could show that transport is not generally impaired but rather that specific types of cargoes are not transported properly from the cell body to the synapses," said Professor Götz.
Ittner and Götz are now in the process of developing strategies to overcome the transport impairment in their mice. The researchers are convinced that with their unique model of Pick's disease, FTD-associated Parkinsonism and memory impairment, they will be able to contribute to the finding of a cure of these diseases.
Contact: Jake O'Shaughnessy
Phone: +61 2 9351 4312 or 0421 617 861 | <urn:uuid:60124bdb-30db-46df-8f21-f372a498a0d2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://sydney.edu.au/news/84.html?newscategoryid=1&newsstoryid=2644 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944027 | 446 | 2.859375 | 3 |
This day in the history
of the Supreme Court of Canada
and in the legal history of Canada
Justice James Wilfred Estey, puisne judge of the Supreme Court of Canada, dies in office at the age of 66.
Edward Schryer is sworn in as Canada's 22nd Governor General. He is the first Manitoban to hold this office. | <urn:uuid:503a0d4e-3d0e-478c-b3f7-9032d7fd1b12> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.scc-csc.gc.ca/cal/cal-eng.asp?Date=1/22/2012 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00066-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925336 | 76 | 1.929688 | 2 |
The pilot program in San Antonio aims to get every high school senior to complete free applications for federal student aid, commonly known as FAFSA, according to the San Antonio Express News (http://bit.ly/TvE90W). The district has counselors help students with that effort.
District officials say it could be a model for the rest of the state following the implementation of House Bill 34, which was passed in 2011 and is one of several measures designed to increase students' financial competency as college tuition costs increase. A growing number of students are expected to need scholarships, grants and assorted loans to pay for college.
"I think we have more of a focus on college entrance and completion now for all students and awareness that the jobs for the future require more than just a high school degree," said Roxanne Rosales, executive director of academic support for the San Antonio Independent School District, who is overseeing the program's early stages.
For many, financial aid is the first step to college, Rosales said. She said that completing an FAFSA application is actually a better indicator of college enrollment than scores on entrance
The San Antonio district is still working on curriculum for the pilot program, but it saw a jump of 16 percentage points in high school seniors planning to enroll in college last year after hiring a team of part-time FAFSA counselors.
The district says 74 percent of students graduating in 2011 planned to enroll at a community college or had been accepted into a university. By 2012, the proportion had increased to 90 percent.
A recent report by the Institute for College Access and Success, an independent nonprofit that tracks student debt nationally, found that in 2011, graduates with student loans had an average debt of $26,600.
Eyra Perez, executive director of the San Antonio Education Partnership, said teaching students how to apply for FAFSA is only the first step.
Her organization and San Antonio's Financial Aid Council are developing financial literacy lessons in a partnership with SAISD that will debut next month in district economics classes.
The lessons are designed to take four or five days to teach and offer instruction on how to analyze financial aid packages, how best to estimate the real cost of college and what students can expect to earn in various career fields.
"Our ultimate goal is not just to have them fill out FAFSA, but for them to have the tools to really finance their education," Perez said.
Nine counselors hired by SAISD will be back in the district's high schools next month and plan to work through the summer.
Information from: San Antonio Express-News, http://www.mysanantonio.com | <urn:uuid:49f28390-370d-47b6-bfcd-da0eea2821e9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.elpasotimes.com/texas/ci_22296480/san-antonio-program-may-be-blueprint-state | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96878 | 542 | 2.40625 | 2 |
Character Designers Creating Identities
Title: Character Designers: Creating Identities
Length 45 min
Filmed on November 2010
Sponsored by the Creative Talent Network
Description: Join feature film creators Chen Yi-Chang, Joe Moshier and Jean Gillmore together in this rare appearance outside the large studio walls while they share their passion for “creating identities”. There are reasons why Feature Film character design is different then that for games or for TV animation, reasons why “The Illusion of Life” design model exists and reasons why the journey is what is is for “a creator” to develop never before seen characters that go on to become “classic” and timeless.
Moderator Tenny Chonin Director of Artist and Professional Development at Walt Disney Animation Studios, Tenny Chonin combined her teaching and artistic experience to develop programs designed to enrich the creative lives of the Disney artists.
Tenny led the department that conceived and produced all training and enrichment activities for the feature animation division.
Her group provided cross-training, new software training, daily art classes, workshops, seminars, production-specific events,
mentoring and much more. Tenny had the pleasure of working closely with Disney’s studio artists and trainees, apprentices and new hires. No wonder she proclaims that she had “the best job at Disney Animation.”
Tenny is currently consulting on projects that further the education of animators in film and television.
Motivated by her deep and continuing respect for the artists, Tenny has also created the first online art gallery exclusively representing non-Disney art by Disney artists. SUSPENDED ANIMATION GALLERY
Panelist: Character Designer Chen-Yi Chang is probably best known for his character design work for Walt Disney’s feature animated film “The Legend of Mulan”.
He has been in the animation industry since the age of 15 when he began working in his native country Taiwan for various productions for US companies. After graduation from CalArts, he joined Warner Brothers Animation, doing Character Design on “Batman, the Animated Series”. Later he joined Disney Feature Animation, working on animated features like The Legend of Mulan, Tarzan, Atlantis, Home on the Range, Bolt and many others as a character designer and story artist. He has been honored with many awards most notably the prestigious Reuben Award presented by The National Cartoonist Society for his design achievements, and an Annie Award nomination for his story work. He is currently working at DreamWorks as a story artist.
His film credits include:
How to Train Your Dragon, Kung Fu Panda II, The Croods, Monster Coin, Bolt, Joe Jump, Fraidy Cat, Atlantis, The Legend of Mulan, Tarzan
Panelist: Jean Gillmore began her animation career in the traditional 2-D world, working on network animated television shows (Hanna-Barbera, Marvel Productions) as a show model designer and/or supervisor for several seasons. She made the jump to theatrical animated features in 1989, where she worked 10 years as a staff visual development artist for Walt Disney Feature Animation.
More recent work has seen Jean illustrating books, creating orthographics of characters and costumes for CG direct-to-video projects and even designing a set for a (critically-acclaimed) one-woman theater piece, “The Dance of the Lemons”. Most recently in animation, however, she has worked as a CG COSTUMER for an animated feature development project at Blue Sky Studios on the east coast. Over her long career, she has also worked in the development of various puppet show costumes and sets, toy design, and with the merchandise/ publishing concerns of retail venues (Walt Disney Consumer Products). Jean works in a variety of media with numerous applications, and is always open to breaking new creative ground.
Panelist: Joe Mosier I’m from San Diego, originally. I guess I became interested in drawing pretty early, in seventh or eighth grade. I thought I’d be like a comic strip artist. I didn’t really think about animation, career-wise or as an option. Interestingly enough, I went to school called Bell Junior High and a friend of mine – his name is Ricky Nierva – and I used to join each other for the math drills we had in the morning! Now, he’s a pretty amazing designer at Pixar and it is quite interesting that he went Pixar and that I ended up going to Disney eventually! In High School, I furthered my studies in Art and a friend of mine mentioned Cal Arts. By the time I was in High School, I wanted to work in animation. I actually thought I’d be working at Don Bluth’s. Disney wasn’t as important at the time as I think Don Bluth’s studio was. So, my goal was to work there. But that friend of mine told me about Cal Arts. He said it’s Disney’s art school. I said: “What?!!” So, I researched it. I didn’t immediately go there.
I graduated in 1990 from High School and for about a year and a half, I worked in a studio in San Diego called American Film Technology. They primarily were a film colorization company, you know, when you take old black and white films and colorize them. But they had an animation division and I ended up becoming an animator on Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, a Saturday morning cartoon. After that ended, they laid most people off. They kept a few and I was lucky one of the few. We animated on an animated short. It was a spooky horror-type of story written by famous Playboy cartoonist Gahan Wilson called Dinah. Then I went to Cal Arts from 1992 to ‘94. After the second year, I felt ready to try to go out and see if I can get a job.
I applied to Chuck Jones internship. I worked at Chuck Jones’ studio for about four months, right after Cal Arts. Chuck Jones wasn’t around as much as you would think. He was there maybe once a week or once every two weeks. Maurice Noble was there and I got to meet him. He’s an amazing person! It was really good for me to have someone like him! I feel bad about it but I think that I committed to them to stay there as an animator for about a year and the next day Disney called me and asked me to take a test to be a rough inbetweener. They offered me the job, that was in September ‘94, and so, I kind of broke my promise to Chuck Jones’ studio. I feel bad about that, but my ultimate goal was to work at Disney. I left Disney in 2006 and have been working at DreamWorks Animation Studios ever since. | <urn:uuid:608f876c-958c-4aab-ab09-22ddbb5737f7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ctnanimationexpo.com/creating-identities/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00026-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975589 | 1,438 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Congizant aptitude 63
Congizant aptitude questions and answers
Shared by: pravin6
Index of Question Papers PAPERS CTS Paper(Yellow) Campus Interview Held at NIT Jamshedpur2003 CTS Aptitude Question paper(Yellow) 1. If all the 6 are replaced by 9, then the algebraic sum of all the numbers from 1 to 100(both inclusive) varies by Ans: 330 2. The total no. of numbers that are divisible by 2 or 3 between 100 and 200(both inclusive) are Ans:67 3. From a pack of cards Jack, Queen, King & ace are removed. the algebraic sum of rest of the cards is Ans:216 Freshersworld.com Then 4. The average temperature of days from Monday to Wednesday is 37 degree Celsius and that of from Tuesday to Thursday is 34 degrees. The temperature of Thursday is 4/5th of Monday. Then the temperature of Thursday is Ans: 36 degrees 5. Swetha, Tina, Uma and Vidya are playing a gambling. In this different people lose in different games-in the reverse alphabetical order. The rule is that if one loses she should double the amount of others. At the end of 4th game each of them have same amount of money (Rs.32). Which one of them started with the least amount? (6) Which one of them started with the largest amount of money? (7.) At the end of the 2nd game what is the amount of money with uma? Ans: Vidya, Swetha, Rs.8 8. A cube of 12 mm is painted on all its side. If it is made up of small cubes of size 3mm. If the big cube is splitted into those small cubes, the number of cubes that remain unpainted is Ans: 8 9. B is 50% faster than A. If A starts at 9 A.M. and B starts at 10 A.M. A travels at a speed of 50 km/hr. If A and B are 300 kms apart, The time when they meet when they travel in opposite direction is Ans:12 noon 10. A graph will be there. Inside the graph sheet there will be a Quadrilateral. We have to count the number of squares in the Quadrilateral. Freshersworld.com 11. You are having 31kg of rice. You are provided with a 1kg stone for weighing. In how many weights the 31kg of rice can be weighed. Ans: 5 12. A starts at 11:00AM and travels at a speed of 4km/hr. B starts at 1:00PM and travels at 1km/hr for the first 1hr and 2km/hr for the next hr and so on. At what time they will meet each other. Ans: 13. There are 80 coins, among them one coin weighs less compared to other. You are given a physical balance to weigh. In how many wieghings the odd coin can be found. Ans: 14. Dia of the circle 4cm. The shaded part is 1/3 of the square area. What is the side of the square. Ans: root of 3pi 15. A,B,C, can do a work in 8,14,16 days respectively. A does the work for 2 days. B continues from it and finishes till 25% of the remaining work. C finishes the remaining work. How many days would have taken to complete the work Ans:45/4 days 16. Raja went to a beauty contest .his wife was eager to know the result he told that the lady wear a yellow sari was winner. Miss. Andhra Pradesh Miss. Utter Pradesh, Miss. Maharashtra, Miss. West Bengal were the participants all the participants sat in a row. The conditions are (A) The woman wore yellow sari won the competition. (B) Miss. West Bengal was neither the runner-up or winner.(C) Miss. West Bengal was not at either ends.(D) Miss. Maharastra wore the white sari.(E) The women wore white sari and yellow sari sat at extreme ends.(F) The runner-up and winner did not sit together. [This was the passage given and the questions were easy] Freshersworld.com 17. The ratio of white balls and black balls is 1:2. If 9 gray balls is added it becomes 2:4:3. Then what is number of black balls. Ans:12 18. There are 10 coins. 6 coins showing head. And 4 showing tail. Each coin was randomly flipped (not tossed) seven times successively.after flipping the coins are 5 heads 4 tails one is hided the hided coin will have what. 19. Two cars are 500 cm apart. each is moving forward for 100 cm at a velocity of 50 cm/s and receding back for 50 cm at 25 cm/s at what time they will collide with each other. Freshersworld.com 20. People near the sea shore are leading a healthy life as they eat fish.but people at other part of the city are also healthy. Inference. 21. It is found from research that if u r a drunken then u have a less chance for chronic heart diseases. Inference. 22. true. A-B+c>A+B-C i) B is +ve, ii) B is –ve when it will hold Freshersworld.com 23. i) C.P is Rs 120 and profit is 30% ii) C.P is Rs 210 and profit is 20% we can find the S.P by using i)only ii)only both i &ii neither i&ii 24. How will u find distance between Nagpur and Mumbai? I took one hour more when I travel at 80 km/hr Freshersworld.com than at 90 km/hr. 25. 100 coins were collected by four persons each collected more than 10 each collected a different number each was an even number find what is the max possible no of coins, two more questions based on the same passage. 26. A car travels from B at a speed of 20 km/hr. The bus travel starts from A at a time of 6 A.M. There is a bus for every half an hour interval. The car starts at 12 noon. Each bus travels at a speed of 25 km/hr. Distance between A and B is 100 km. During its journey , The number of buses that the car encounter is 27. The ratio of the ages of the father and the son is 5:3, After 10 years it will be in the ratio 3:2. What will be their ages. 28. There was a Island. In that Island there was Rubys and Emeralds. Those were available in plenty. 0.3 kg of ruby is 4 lakhs and 0.4 kg of emeralds is 5 lakhs. Jayanth is buying 12 kg of Ruby and emerald. Choices will be given . Jayanth has to carry both ruby and emerald to the maximum profit. 29. Varun buys 8 books,10 pens and 2 pencils and Babu buys 6 books, 5pens and 5 pencils. Babu pays 50% more than Varun. What is the amount Varun spends in buying pencils. 30. Prakash and Revathi rent a fancy shop. Prakash imposes the following restrictions on Revathi for buying clips,stickers and lip sticks. The number of clips is twice the no. of stickers. The no. of lipsticks should be more than the sum of clips and stickers. Cost of clip is 1 rupee. Cost of lipstick is twice the clips. Cost of 1 lipstick is the cost of four stickers. Then What is the amount that Prakash spents for Revathi. Answer choices will be given. PAPERS Freshersworld.com | INTERVIEW TIPS | RESUME TIPS | GROUP DISCUSSION | COOL TESTS | Home | Hot Jobs| Careers | About Us | Sign Up | President's Note Copyright © 2003 Freshersworld.com, All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:1df2fba9-46d9-4e91-9c42-4947b1cb2fbf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.docstoc.com/docs/12135922/Congizant-aptitude-63 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942891 | 1,728 | 2.328125 | 2 |
Walmart makes $10 million commitment to veterans
Bentonville, Ark. As part of its ongoing support of our nation's military and veterans, Walmart and the Walmart Foundation will launch a five-year, $10 million commitment to the veteran community, with a special emphasis on supporting job readiness and training of returning servicemen and servicewomen.
The funding will allow Walmart and its foundation to further support nonprofits that assist veterans in their pursuit of higher education and enable them to more easily reintegrate into civilian life.
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, more than 250,000 veterans were unemployed as of March 2010. As one of the nation's largest private employers of veterans, Walmart made this $10 million commitment to address the alarming unemployment situation facing our veterans and create even more job opportunities for those who so bravely protected our country. | <urn:uuid:e5b80549-ab4b-41e8-b855-b8d9d3a9ff8b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://m.chainstoreage.com/article/walmart-makes-10-million-commitment-veterans?device=mobile | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954892 | 174 | 1.78125 | 2 |
The downtown San Diego bus yard being studied as a site for a new football stadium has been the subject of a county environmental investigation since 1986.
Leaking underground storage tanks and pipes have periodically discharged diesel fuel, gasoline and oil into the soil and groundwater 10 to 15 feet below the site’s surface, nine football fields northeast of San Diego Bay.
The environmental damage at the site, a few blocks east of Petco Park, could require an expensive cleanup that might mean delays for any development. It’s unclear who would pay for a remedy that could run into the millions of dollars.
Excessive cleanup costs could lead the Chargers to look elsewhere for a new stadium, said special counsel Mark Fabiani, who has guided the team’s search since 2002.
“You can certainly envision scenarios where the cleanup is a deal-breaker,” Fabiani said. “Once you undertake the financial obligation of a cleanup, there’s no telling where it stops and no telling how long it takes.”
At times, the level of petroleum contaminants and carcinogens such as benzene found during testing has exceeded safety limits, and monitoring continues, according to files at the county Department of Environmental Health.
Eight thick file folders outline 23 years of oversight at the northwest corner of 16th Street and Imperial Avenue, which is owned by the San Diego Metropolitan Transit System and houses its bus fleet and offices.
Records show that the 5-acre lot has operated as a bus fueling yard and maintenance facility for nearly a century. Calls to the Metropolitan Transit System were not returned yesterday.
The Chargers have retained Turner Construction Co. to review several issues at the site, including the contamination. A report could be ready next month.
Fabiani has said site cleanup would probably be part of the stadium project, but the extent of the damage wasn’t widely known until The San Diego Union-Tribune reviewed county records this week.
Who might pay for the cleanup and whether contaminated soil would be removed or covered by some sort of buffer are “open to discussion,” Fabiani said yesterday.
The San Diego environmental law firm Caufield & James LLP notes on its Web site, “As a general rule, the party responsible for an unauthorized release of contaminants or a substantial permit violation will also be responsible for remediation — including notice to affected parties, cleanup, restoration and assurance of adequate preventive measures.”
A new stadium could cost $800 million to $1 billion and has been on the Chargers’ wish list for seven years. It’s premature to say to what extent, if any, a stadium plan could involve public financing.
A downtown stadium, far from a sure thing, would require the assembly of several parcels of land, perhaps through eminent domain, and financing in a rough economy.
After long saying the city wouldn’t help the team financially, Mayor Jerry Sanders met with team President Dean Spanos in October, and last week the city’s downtown redevelopment arm, the Centre City Development Corp., paid $160,000 to study how to pay for a new downtown stadium. | <urn:uuid:fc51ab7d-aa6e-406c-8ac6-19680a4fbf2c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2009/nov/28/chargers-could-bail-bus-yard-over-fouled-soil/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963425 | 642 | 1.742188 | 2 |
Iran plans to hike domestic gas prices to encourage consumers to conserve and to help to free up supplies for export, officials said on Saturday.
“The decision is to be announced this summer or just after,” a senior government official said.
He was speaking at the third annual Ravand Institute conference, which brings together political and economic leaders and experts from Iran and abroad, and whose proceedings may only be reported under the cloak of anonymity.
Natural gas sells for only US$0.02 per cubic meter in Iran, compared with US$0.30 in neighboring countries, and the difference represents a subsidy of around US$40 billion a year, the official said.
The plan will be to raise the price to US$0.15 per cubic meter for industrial customers, the official said, but he did not provide a figure for individual customers.
Ironically, while Iran has the world’s second-largest reserves of natural gas, the country is a net importer because of a highly inefficient use of it in industry and profligate use on the part of private consumers.
An official from Iran’s gas sector said the country needed to economize to export, and that it is consuming too much.
But an executive from an Iranian gas company said it was ironic that with such high reserves, Iran “could not heat its houses” and forecast that “gas shortages are going to be with us for a long time.”
The senior government official said the “peak of consumption went above 500 million cubic meters a day last winter but our production did not reach that level.”
In January, Iran announced record production of only 460 million cubic meters a day.
The country has a 20-year plan aiming to hike production to 1.45 billion cubic meters a day, with 642 million earmarked for domestic consumption, 259 million for injection in oil production wells and 550 million for export.
But these projects need massive investment, hampered by a US economic boycott.
Sri Lanka raised fuel prices and Bangladesh said it planned a hike soon, the latest Asian nations to find they can no longer afford to shield consumers from soaring oil prices.
The two poor South Asian countries announced their steps to limit mounting losses at state-owned oil retailers yesterday, just a day after Indonesia raised fuel prices to cap ballooning fuel subsidies.
India, Asia’s third-largest economy and the world’s second most populous nation, is considering such a move.
Sri Lanka raised kerosene, gasoline and diesel prices by between 14 and 47 percent. In Bangladesh, the country’s state-run Bangladesh Petroleum Corp, the sole oil importer and distributor, has proposed fuel price increases of 37 percent to 80 percent.
Governments across Asia have tried to soften the impact of a global surge in food and energy prices on their populations by keeping domestic prices of fuel and food staples below international levels.
But with oil powering to fresh records almost every week, the last one above US$135 a barrel, several nations feel they can no longer fully subsidize consumers or cover soaring losses of state-controlled oil importers and retailers.
The chairman of Sri Lanka’s Ceylon Petroleum Corp said that this weekend’s fuel price increase would allow the company to only halve its losses from 175 million Sri Lanka rupees (US$1.62 million) a day.
“Even after the increase we are still in the negative ... what we have done is we basically brought it to levels that we can manage,” Ashantha de Mell said. | <urn:uuid:c884f88a-b87d-46a5-b679-96cb347da645> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/worldbiz/archives/2008/05/26/2003412964 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950536 | 739 | 2.078125 | 2 |
A(n) 563 kg elevator starts from rest. It moves upward for 3.18 s with a constant acceleration until it reaches its cruising speed of 1.96 m/s. The acceleration of gravity is 9.8 m/s 2 . Find the average power delivered by the elevator motor during this period. Answer in units...
When attachment capacity develops normally, the child gets pleasure from interacting with other people. The degree of pleasure is related to the degree of attachment-pleasing a parent brings more pleasure than pleasing a stranger. It is this very property that helps parents an...
what does research show about the child's relationship with the primary parental figure when the child has additional attachments to other people?
What multiplication fact can be found by using the arrays for 2×9 and 5×9?
a store has 8 boxes each of red and black pencils. 4 boxes of red pencils and 6 boxes of black pencils are sold. how many pencils are left?
What does the adage "Never declare your physician your heir" mean?
y - 2 = -2(x - 3)
For an essay for my honors English class, I am comparing the character of Roger Chillingworth to a knife. While I do have some ideas to write about, do you guys have any tips on ideas I could use? More importantly, to those who have read the book, what type of knife do you thi...
Its actually 65!
i think its a
For Further Reading | <urn:uuid:2c3b488d-d74f-4ea5-8a37-f5fa71ed1a1a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.jiskha.com/members/profile/posts.cgi?name=Nick&page=7 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931324 | 309 | 2.5 | 2 |
PLEASANTVILLE, N.Y. - You won’t see the Little Village Playhouse in Pleasantville holding auditions for popular shows like "Annie" anytime soon, said its founder Adam Cohen. That’s because his goal is to give his students a more well-rounded education in theater, and to do that he said they must be exposed to newer, more innovative work.
“We’re teaching people to appreciate theater." he said. "We want to say something that hasn’t been said over and over already.”
What you should expect to see are shows like "Sweeney Todd," "Into the Woods" and "Pacific Overtures," many of which have even been directed by Cohen.
The Tisch School of the Arts graduate also opts to produce more ensemble-style shows that give attention to each individual cast member rather than one lead character. That way, he said, they can learn to communicate on stage and develop confidence.
“Writers use their words and actors use their voice and body—those are the tools they use to express themselves,” said Cohen.
The Little Village Playhouse is the non-profit youth theater wing of ARC Stages and offers theater workshop classes for children and adults all year round.
Past performers have even gone on to Broadway as cast members for hit shows like "Hair" and "Wicked," but Cohen said he is just as proud of the students who graduate from his theater program and move onto careers in environmental science.
“Theater helps everyone. It teaches you to problem solve, improvise, speak and to be free in your own body,” he added.
This spring, the Little Village Playhouse will perform "Once on This Island" and "Little Shop of Horrors." Check back for more information. | <urn:uuid:4fedd1a1-fb6c-4baf-bc4c-92cabfa3dda2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mountpleasant.dailyvoice.com/neighbors/theater-company-founder-leads-pleasantville-act | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977919 | 382 | 1.679688 | 2 |
I decided to make this to try and shed light on the Israeli-enforced segregation of roads within the West Bank.
In the images of the map, the town on the right is my hometown of Deir Dibwan. On the left is Ramallah, the de facto capital of Palestine. The two are a little less than two miles apart. Two miles, not that far, right? Hell, there’s even a direct road joining the two!
Using the road joining the two cities, outlines in blue in the first picture, it’s a little over 5 minutes driving to get from one to the other.
Israel has, however, restricted access to the road for Palestinians in order to “protect” the illegal and racist Israeli settlement of Psagot, established on Palestinian-owned land, yet completely restricted to all Palestinians. The road is now exclusively reserved for Israeli settlers only, and any Palestinian vehicles found driving on the road are subject to arrest, or target practice by the settlers.
Because of this closure, Palestinians are forced to use a very complicated series of unmarked roads to reach Ramallah, which have been highlighted in green in the second picture.
In order for a Palestinian from Deir Dibwan [or any of the surrounding regions, including every town and city to the East and South of Deir Dibwan] to reach Ramallah now, they must drive through the Palestinian towns of Baytein, Ein Yabrud, Dura al-Qare, Jifna, Beir Zeit, Abu Qash, Surda, and Al-Bireh.
The road connecting Deir Dibwan to Ramallah is approximately 2 miles in length. The length of road Palestinians must now drive instead totals approximately 22 miles. What was originally a 5 minutes trip is now almost an hour long.
Ramallah houses most of the regions schools, as well as serving as a hub of jobs for those living within the Ramallah Governate. My brothers and I would drive an hour each way to get to school everyday, with frequent checkpoints often doubling that time. My brothers, as well as every other Palestinian in the region who goes to school in Ramallah, to this day continue to follow this same route to school daily.
Palestinians have, however, established a sort of “shortcut”, which I have highlighted in red in the second picture that cuts from Dura, through Jalazon, and into Al-Bireh.
This road has managed to cut down on the time it takes to get to Ramallah, making it around a 35 minute trip. The issue with this road, however, is that Israel deems it as an “illegal road”, and subjects it to frequent closures, despite the fact that it avoids any Israeli Settlement and is completely on Palestinian land, meaning that by taking this road, it may cut down on the amount of time it takes to get to Ramallah, or it may greatly increase it if the IDF happen to be in the area and turn cars around.
This is just one of countless segregated roads in the West Bank, with every road showin in yellow on the maps being off-limits to Palestinians. Israeli settlements have completely cut off Palestinian towns from one another. The cut-off is so severe that towns with historical ties have now grown so far apart to the point that they have developed their own dialects and accents.
“How does Israel know if a Palestinian is driving on an Israeli-only road?”
Israeli cars have yellow license plates
While Palestinian cars have green ones
So a green-plated car seen driving on an Israeli road is subject to being stopped and arrested, or simply shot at by Israeli settlers, while Israeli vehicles are allowed to drive on any roads they choose. They are allowed to enter Palestinian villages, while Palestinians are absolutely forbidden from even approaching Israeli settlements without the threat of being shot.
Israel: The only
country left practicing such a barbaric system of apartheid democracy in the Middle East! | <urn:uuid:0ae78a60-9e0d-451c-8a52-4263e2d4a8ff> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ryangrieves.tumblr.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962656 | 827 | 1.921875 | 2 |
Planting the Trees of Kenya by Claire A. Nivola
Fun picture book about the story of Wangari Maathai, first woman from Africa to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. As a child she remembers her home in Kenya with many farms and villages where people ate the food they grew. She was able to attend college in the US, where she studied biology in hopes to return to Kenya with her new knowledge. In those five years, though, Kenya had changed dramatically. The trees had been cut down for more plantation fields, which led to various problems. Wangari Maathai taught the women to grow trees from seeds. This turned out to be the best thing for the people of Kenya.
I thought the book was really good for younger children to learn about a person out making a difference in her home country. The pictures are colorful. | <urn:uuid:784910e8-1eb9-45f3-ad24-51c8c6947cf5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://fillinthegaps100.blogspot.com/2011/09/planting-trees-of-kenya-by-claire.html?showComment=1317621593473 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.984693 | 174 | 3.171875 | 3 |
Originally Posted by shel90
They have been in intensive speech training from birth to 5 years old...yet unable to develop speech skills. That is based on the speech assessments conducted by the speech therapists.
Why use precious time on something those kids have shown not to benefit from? We use the time with them on enriching their educational progress. I dont see how that is so bad?
Bilingual..kids are fluent in ASL and English.
It isn't bad, shel. But it would appear that attempting to expain bilingualism to a monolingual who doesn't want to understand is futile. | <urn:uuid:054a0330-b11f-4e2c-b945-9beb4b52aa24> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.alldeaf.com/923324-post238.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00059-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975921 | 124 | 1.75 | 2 |
Rorabaugh: Areas of Graduate Study
Professor Rorabaugh regularly offers the following graduate fields in
1. 19c US
2. 20c US
3. US Social
The exact content of the field must be negotiated between the instructor
and the graduate student. If the field is a student's primary field, it
will be both broader and deeper than if the field is a secondary field.
The field ought to complement but not unduly overlap other fields.
Normally, students are expected to take HSTAA 521, the 19c field course, as entering grad students, and this reading list, except for students doing a 20c field, forms the basis for a reading list for a field either in 19c US or in US Social History. The instructor usually offers HSTAA 590 each fall so that students might make further preparations in their specific field. Directed readings in the form of HIST 600 are also common for preparing a field. Occasionally, the instructor has allowed a student to construct a special field in US History apart from the regular fields in 19c US, 20c US, or US Social History. | <urn:uuid:ee738849-eb4b-4206-a2fe-3a290d30478f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://depts.washington.edu/history/studying/graduate/fields/faculty/rorabaugh.php | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.929945 | 235 | 1.648438 | 2 |
We are known as the Americans in our neighborhood. We're rather an anomaly in Tokmok because we're foreign but we don't live in a remodeled apartment or in one of the complexes built by the Christian organizations. So we're the token Americans on this end of Tokmok.
I don't like many things that the US represents, but I like being an America. And there are some great things that the US does represent that I do like. And even though the US is a comfortable and easy place for me to live, I prefer to live overseas.
But there are some things I really miss about the US. I love the western US and have lived most of my life there, but it wasn't till I read Wallace Stegner that I understood better how I really feel about it. I love the open spaces, the browns and yellows and golds, and especially the stories of the people who made the West home. All of my ancestors, and my husband's, have lived in the West for at least 150 years and it really is my home too. I think that Westernness that some of us have make us different sorts of Americans.
I don't feel as much a citizen of the US as I do a citizen of the world. I wish nationality were less important, if only because it contributes so much to dividing people economically. I can't believe that it's right for me to have so many opportunities simply because I was born within the boundaries of the US instead of the boundaries of the former Soviet Union (although, if I had been, it would be a lot easier to get those visas to Uzbekistan). I wish Americans were more interested in sharing what we have instead of worrying that we don't have enough.
I'm grateful to be an American and for the privileges it affords me, but there are so many other wonderful places in this world that grant some amazing privileges. | <urn:uuid:79582042-bc68-4063-8657-0a5cfe1faccd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://amiralace.blogspot.com/2011/07/americans.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.984035 | 391 | 1.546875 | 2 |
from stateside to seaside... and back again
|Ships launch missles and shoot off guns in a harbor on the island of Samar the night that it was announced that the Japanese had surrendered. That announcement ended World War II.|
Kobe. "One guy was really good at the game and there was a lot of money bet. He had literally thousands of dollars he had won. Not trusting anyone he buried the money in coffee cans in the ground some distance from the camp. One day the Japanese made a bombing raid, missed the base and instead hit his stash. He dug for days trying to find those coffee cans. He never found most of the money."
When the surrender of the Japanese came Kobe was soon on his way home. He landed in Seattle, Wash. and then went to St. Louis, Mo. Soon he was in Kansas City.
There he took a job with the YMCA but soon he wanted to return to college. A chief petty officer he knew in the Navy told him about Utah State University and a professor there he knew. Kobe conversed with the professor by mail and soon he and his wife were on their way to Logan.
"We rode the train to Ogden then took a bus to Logan," he said. "When we got there they told us they had no housing for us, but we were able to stay with family for a few days. Then the professor I had worked with to get to Utah State said he had an extra room in a house he was renting out. And was it some room."
|Jack Kobe stands behind a bunch of his buddies in front of their tent on the island of Samar in the Philippine Islands in 1944.|
Kobe says it was an upstairs attic room and it was a mess. He and Betty cleaned for a whole day, but eventually made it into a home.
"In fact I think we had the most comfortable bed I have ever slept in in that room," said Kobe.
He eventually got his bachelors degree from Utah State, and was immediately hired by a superintendent of the Inkom, Idaho schools to be a teacher and a coach.
"I lacked a couple of classes to be completely qualified, but there was a teacher shortage and they let me work around it by taking those classes during my first year as correspondence courses," said Kobe.
Kobe taught in Inkom until 1950 and then went to work at Pocatello High School. He had produced some very successful teams at the small Inkom High and he went on to start a tradition at Pocatello too, but after a year he decided he wanted to go back to school and get a masters degree.
Once he was done with his masters, he was offered a job at Green River High School in Emery County. He taught and coached there from 1951 until 1954, at which time he then came to Carbon County to where he taught at Notre Dame School for a few years.
"They were about to go from being a elementary-junior high school to a high school and they needed a coach so I said yes," he stated.
|Jack Kobe stands in front of his plaques which include induction into the CEU Hall of Fame and the Utah State Athletic Hall of Fame.|
In 1959 he went to teach at Wellington Junior High and then in 1967 he became a teacher and coach at Carbon High School.
"I had coached a lot of things in my life but I have always liked swimming," he said. "That was my chance to start coaching a swimming team so we began the swimming program at Carbon."
After 37 years of teaching, Kobe retired from Carbon School District in 1983.
|Jack Kobe in his teaching days.|
Kobe also talked about many of the coaches and sports writers he has known over the years. He brought up names like John Mooney (late former sports editor for the Salt Lake Tribune, Marion Dunn, (a sports writer for the same paper and later sports editor for the Provo Daily Herald) and Dick Rosetta, former sports writer, also from the Tribune.
"I used to go up to Tribune and talk to those guys all the time," he said. "There were some real good people there."
Presently Kobe enjoys life in his house in west Price and is active in the Veterans of Foreign Wars as well as the American Legion.
"Every once in a while I will hear from a former student or athlete I worked with," he said. "It's a good feeling when they call or come to see me and tell me how good their lives have been. Some even tell me that I was a big factor in that success. There is nothing better than that." | <urn:uuid:d67d5af4-61f0-46c3-957f-35ef9470b1e1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sunadvocate.com/index.php?tier=1&article_id=7065 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.995511 | 963 | 1.929688 | 2 |
NEW PALTZ -- On Wednesday, March 14, 2001 Anne Wilson will give a slide presentation in Lecture Center Room 112 at SUNY New Paltz. The lecture begins at 7:30 PM and is free and open to the public. The lecture is part of the Art Lecture Series, which is sponsored by the Student Art Alliance, a funded member of the Student Association.
For the past 19 years "what covers the skin - hair, fur - has been an essential aspect of Anne Wilson?s work? She has used it as a metaphor, in both natural and synthetic manifestations, for what appears on the surface, for what masks the underlying content of personal and social interactions." She has employed the use of linens and human hair through bodies of work that emotionally and intellectually evidence relationships between body and culture.
Anne Wilson is an artist and professor in the Department of Fiber and Material Studies at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She studied at California College of Arts and Crafts (MFA, 1976) and Cranbrook Academy of Art (BFA, 1972).
Her work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Art Institute of Chicago; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Cranbrook Art Museum, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan; and the M.H. De Young Memorial Museum, San Francisco, among others.
Essays and reviews of her work can be found in Art in America (Mar 99, Feb 92); Arte facto, Spain (Mar 95); New Art Examiner (Dec 98/Jan 99, summer 94); Artforum (May 94); and Fiberarts (summer 99, Sept/Oct 97). Her work is represented by Roy Boyd Gallery, Chicago and Revolution Gallery, Detroit and New York.
For more information regarding this and other arts events at SUNY New Paltz visit http://hawk.newpaltz.edu/artsnews or call 845-257-3872. A complete list of events is available online at http://hawk.newpaltz.edu/events.
Photographs and descriptions of selected works from Wilson's recent exhibitions are available online at http://hawk.newpaltz.edu/news/images/wilson.html. | <urn:uuid:94075a4a-1fc3-416d-b218-2fbaea7de100> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newpaltz.edu/artsnews/news.php?id=2692 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00047-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.928184 | 462 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Cookies are small text files placed on your computer and are common throughout websites across the internet. When used properly they are used to inform and encourage best practice by online websites and businesses, and to deliver and record timely and relevant information to users. We use them:
We do not store any personal information in our cookies that other web users could read and understand.
RateSetter uses three types of cookie:
We use session cookies for the following purposes:
To allow users of RateSetter to carry information across pages of our site – in particular to avoid having to re-submit security information or preferences. For example, we use session cookies to keep members logged in as they move from page to page. Our session cookies also ensure better security by logging them out of their account after a period of inactivity.
We use persistent cookies for the following purposes:
Third Party Cookies
We have relationships with third parties that serve cookies via our site. These are used for the following purposes:
You can configure your internet browser to warn you each time a new cookie is about to be stored on your computer so that you may make a decision whether to accept or reject it.
Please note that some parts of our website may not function properly if you reject cookies.
The Interactive Advertising Bureau is an industry body that has produced a series of web pages which explain how cookies work and how they can be managed.http://www.iabuk.net/policy/briefings/iab-fact-sheet-may-2012-internet-cookies
About Peer to Peer Lending
RateSetter is a trademark of Retail Money Market Limited (Company Number 7075792)
Retail Money Market is licensed by the OFT, a member of CIFAS and registered under the Data Protection Act
*Representative APR and AER based on the last matched rates on RateSetter. They include all fees. AER assumes full reinvestment
of repayments at the current last matched rates throughout the term and assumes any bad debt can be covered by the RateSetter Provision Fund.
Data from the RateSetter website (including market data) is protected by © and database rights. It may not be used for
any purpose without a licence. © Retail Money Market Limited. All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:419c65f6-a45d-4904-966d-3dd41186a4d5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ratesetter.com/help/cookies.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.909185 | 470 | 1.515625 | 2 |
The Sermon of the Beatitudes
James Jacques Joseph Tissot
You can have the Lord Christ or you can have the Tea Party… you can’t have both… God or the Dollar? What shall it be?
And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets.
But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation. Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger. Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep. Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets.
Beatitudes of the Sermon on the Plain
Let’s keep this short… the Tea Party approves of this massive redistribution of wealth to the oligarchs… full stop. The richest 1 percent of the population held 9 percent of the wealth in 1980… they hold 24 percent today. Where did this money come from? It was stolen from working and middle class families through such things as lower wages and cutting of benefits (15 percent of the population isn’t covered by health insurance due to the greed of the rich).
John Whiteford and Anthony Nelson claim to be priests of the Orthodox Church, yet they support a movement whose ideology is deeply anti-Christian and against the very teachings of the Lord Christ Himself. Just because the teabaggers are anti-abortion doesn’t mean that they’re pro-life. The Tea Party is nothing but an apologia for the rape of everything that’s intrinsically good by the richest segment of the population. It’s throwing your kids into the fires of Moloch’s temple, full stop.
The Tea Party says:
It’s a great time to be rich!
Our Lord Christ says:
But woe unto you that are rich!
I seem to notice that these two positions are mutually contradictory and exclusive of one another. You can hold one or you can hold the other, but you cannot mix the two, they’re fire and water… I have made my choice. I stand for Christ and His Truth without reserve… I reject the ideology of the Tea Party/GOP utterly and completely as it goes against and contradicts His Truth. I should mention that His Holiness rejects the Tea Party’s Mammon worship too. Where do you stand?
Thursday 16 December 2010 | <urn:uuid:ad180972-e3f7-4fa0-b22b-d86fa25b2c87> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://02varvara.wordpress.com/2010/12/16/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00059-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.912991 | 612 | 1.554688 | 2 |
Having experimented with various ways of linking out, it looks like the BBC may finally be using good old hyperlinks to send readers to external websites.
This was spotted by techchuff, via Twitter, which remarks that the 'Google juice is being sprayed like champagne at an F1 podium', and indeed, the links appear to be passing on PageRank, which hasn't always been the case with the BBC.
Evidence of this can be seen on this article on bloggers debating UK healthcare, I count 13 links in total to external websites.
That said, having clicked on quite a few other articles on the site, I can't find any more evidence of hyperlinks in news articles, so perhaps this doesn't signal a change of policy.
BBC.co.uk has been looking at the issue of external links for some time, and came in for criticism from the BBC Trust Review last year for its miserly external linking.
It also experimented with in-text links in the body of its articles, most of which didn't actually lead users to an external website, but opened pop-up windows instead.
These pop-up previews have not been seen since, so this could mean that the BBC has chosen the much simpler option of using hyperlinks like everyone else. If so, many will welcome the move, especially if they can get some valuable link juice from the BBC. | <urn:uuid:1c847897-3364-4bb2-b632-38149f456f5f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://econsultancy.com/uk/blog/4427-is-the-bbc-finally-using-hyperlinks | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964478 | 280 | 1.734375 | 2 |
Hormones are chemicals produced by glands, such as the ovaries and testicles. Hormones help some types of cancer cells to grow, such as breast cancer and prostate cancer. In other cases, hormones can kill cancer cells, make cancer cells grow more slowly or stop them from growing. Hormone therapy as a cancer treatment may involve taking medications that interfere with the activity of the hormone or stop the production of the hormones. Hormone therapy may involve surgically removing a gland that is producing the hormones.
Your physician may recommend a hormone receptor test to help determine treatment options and to help learn more about the tumor. This test can help to predict whether the cancer cells are sensitive to hormones.
The hormone receptor test measures the amount of certain proteins (called hormone receptors) in cancer tissue. Hormones (such as estrogen and progesterone that naturally occur in the body) can attach to these proteins. If the test is positive, it indicates that the hormone is probably helping the cancer cells to grow. In this case, hormone therapy may be given to block the way the hormone works and help keep the hormone away from the cancer cells (hormone receptors). If the test is negative, the hormone does not affect the growth of the cancer cells, and other effective cancer treatments may be given. Always discuss the results of the hormone receptor test with your physician.
If the test indicates that the hormones are affecting your cancer, the cancer may be treated in one of following ways:
- Treating cancer cells to keep them from receiving the hormones they need to grow.
- Treating the glands that produce hormones to keep them from making hormones.
- Surgery to remove glands that produce the hormones, such as the ovaries that produce estrogen or the testicles that produce testosterone.
The type of hormone therapy a person receives depends upon many factors, such as the type and size of the tumor, the age of the person, the presence of hormone receptors on the tumor and other factors.
Your physician may prescribe hormone therapy before some cancer treatments or after other cancer treatments. If hormone therapy is given before the primary treatment, it is called neoadjuvant treatment. Neoadjuvant treatments help to kill cancer cells and contribute to the effectiveness of the primary therapy. If hormone therapy is given after the primary cancer treatment, it is called adjuvant treatment. Adjuvant therapy is given to improve the chance of a cure.
With some cancers, patients may be given hormone therapy as soon as cancer is diagnosed, and before any other treatment. It may shrink a tumor or it may halt the advance of the disease. And in some cancer, such as prostate cancer, it is helpful in alleviating the painful and distressing symptoms of advanced disease. The National Cancer Institute states that although hormone therapy cannot cure prostate cancer, it will usually shrink or halt the advance of disease, often for years.
Hormone therapy may be used to prevent the growth, spread and recurrence of breast cancer. The female hormone estrogen can increase the growth of breast cancer cells in some women. Tamoxifen (Nolvadex®) is a medication used in hormone therapy to treat breast cancer by blocking the effects of estrogen on the growth of malignant cells in breast tissue. However, tamoxifen does not stop the production of estrogen.
Hormone therapy may be considered for women whose breast cancers test positive for estrogen and progesterone receptors.
Drugs recently approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, called aromatase inhibitors, are used to prevent the recurrence of breast cancer in postmenopausal women. These drugs, such as anastrozole (Arimidex®) and letrozole (Femara®), prevent estrogen production. Anastrozole is effective only in women who have not had previous hormonal treatment for breast cancer. Letrozole is effective in women who have previously been treated with tamoxifen. Possible side effects of these drugs include osteoporosis or bone fractures.
Another new drug for recurrent breast cancer is fulvestrant (Faslodex®). Also approved by the FDA, this drug eliminates the estrogen receptor rather than blocking it, as is the case with tamoxifen, letrozole or anastrozole. This drug is used following previous anti-estrogen therapy. Side effects for fulvestrant include hot flashes, mild nausea and fatigue.
Men who have breast cancer also may be treated with tamoxifen. Tamoxifen is currently being studied as a hormone therapy for treatment of other types of cancer.
With prostate cancer, there may be a variety of medications used in hormone therapy. Male hormones, such as testosterone, stimulate prostate cancer to grow. Hormone therapy is given to help stop hormone production and to block the activity of the male hormones. Hormone therapy can cause a tumor to shrink and the prostate-specific antigen levels to decrease.
The following are some potential side effects that may occur with hormone therapy. However, the side effects will vary depending upon the type of hormone therapy that is given. Every person’s hormone treatment experience is different and not every person will experience the same side effects. Discuss the potential side effects of your hormone therapy with your physician.
As each person’s individual medical profile and diagnosis is different, so is his or her reaction to treatment. Side effects may be severe, mild or absent. Be sure to discuss with your cancer care team any and all possible side effects of treatment before the treatment begins.
For prostate cancer, either the surgical removal of the testes or hormone drug therapy can improve the cancer. Both surgery and drugs may cause the following side effects:
- Hot flashes
- A loss of desire for sexual relations
- Male breast enlargement
For breast cancer, some women may experience side effects from tamoxifen that are similar to the symptoms some women experience in menopause. Other women do not experience any side effects when taking tamoxifen. The following are some of the side effects that may occur when taking tamoxifen:
- Hot flashes
- Nausea and/or vomiting
- Vaginal spotting (a blood-stained discharge from the vagina that is not part of the regular menstrual cycle)
- Increased fertility in younger women
- Irregular menstrual periods
- Skin rash
- Loss of appetite or weight gain
- Vaginal dryness or itching and/or irritation of the skin around the vagina
Taking tamoxifen also increases the risk of endometrial cancer (involves the lining of the uterus) and uterine sarcoma (involves the muscular wall of the uterus), both cancers of the uterus. There also is a very small risk of blood clots and stroke, eye problems such as cataracts, and liver toxicities. Tamoxifen should be avoided during pregnancy.
Tamoxifen is used to treat men with breast cancer as well.
Men may experience the following side effects:
- Nausea and/or vomiting
- Skin rash
- Decrease in sexual interest
Back to top | <urn:uuid:4ef15280-6d85-4035-a618-b3e4bef4ffbe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.massey.vcu.edu/about-cancer-hormone-therapy.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926697 | 1,470 | 3.53125 | 4 |
Law could allow for backyard chickens in Burr Ridge
Updated: December 3, 2012 1:34AM
BURR RIDGE — The Plan Commission has agreed to consider an ordinance that would allow residents to raise chickens on properties of 1 acre or more.
Chris Herringshaw raised the issue of allowing chickens on properties smaller than 5 acres so he can raise hens in his Steepleside Drive yard.
“I grew up on a farm in rural Michigan,” said Herringshaw, who wishes to raise three or four chickens for their organic eggs.
“I thought it would be a great way to expose my girls to that,” he said.
Burr Ridge allows livestock, including chickens, only on properties 5 acres or larger. Plan Commission members directed village staff to draft an amended law that would allow four chickens to be raised in the back yards of properties 1 acre or larger. The chickens must be for personal use only and housed in a fully enclosed, predator-resistant coop.
“This is a common allowance in zoning ordinances in other suburbs,” said Doug Pollock, community development director.
Western Springs, Winnetka and Evanston are among the suburbs where chickens are allowed.
The commission discussed whether neighbors would be bothered by noise or smell from nearby coops. Chris Cronin said he lives within a few hundred feet of Hanson Center and he is not bothered by their chickens.
To protect neighbors, the proposed ordinance will include rear- and side-yard setbacks.
The proposed ordinance will come back to the Plan Commission on Oct. 15. Its recommendation would then go to the Village Board for final approval.
If approved, Pollock said he doesn’t expect to see a lot of residents interested in raising chickens.
“I don’t think we’re going to see an onslaught of people,” said Pollock, who knows of no chickens in Burr Ridge other than those at Hanson Center. ~. | <urn:uuid:01ced2f9-c76f-4add-be0e-05ff2b4a3dc7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://burrridge.suntimes.com/15518585-781/law-could-allow-for-backyard-chickens-in-burr-ridge.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959866 | 409 | 1.757813 | 2 |
OTTAWA — Prime Minister Stephen Harper has named an envoy to deal with aboriginal opposition to resource development in Alberta and British Columbia.
That’s where First Nations opposition to the Northern Gateway pipeline has thrown the future of the project into question.
Doug Eyford will be working with aboriginal communities to address concerns about environmental impact, job creation and the sharing of economic benefits, Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver said in Terrace.
“It is essential that we work closely with First Nations communities in order to incorporate their knowledge and experience,” Oliver said Tuesday, according to a text of his speech.
“This truth exists independently of the Crown’s constitutional duty to consult on individual projects.”
Eyford is a Vancouver lawyer with a long history of working for the federal government as a negotiator on First Nations issues.
He will report directly to Harper, producing a preliminary report by the end of June and a final report by the end of November.
Eyford’s job is to hear aboriginal concerns about proposed pipelines, liquid natural gas plants, marine terminals and other energy infrastructure in B.C. and Alberta.
“The representative’s report will not replace negotiations between aboriginal communities and industry on specific projects, and is not intended to. It is meant to encourage and stimulate those discussions,” Oliver said.
“This will not be dialogue for dialogue’s sake, but dialogue in search of solutions. We don’t want another process. We want a product.”
It’s the first concrete step to come from a crisis meeting between Harper and leading chiefs in the midst of widespread protests in January.
The prime minister promised to empower top officials to deal with First Nations complaints about rights, treaties and the sharing of Canada’s natural resource wealth.
The Assembly of First Nations had long complained that a new process set out in January 2012 was going nowhere because the federal government was not consulting First Nations people nor had it given its bureaucrats a clear mandate.
Unrest boiled over in December, with a protesting Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence and demonstrators in the Idle-No-More movement demanding more government consultation and a larger role for First Nations and environmental protection in the government’s resource development agenda.
Meanwhile, some First Nations have abandoned federal hearings on the Northern Gateway pipeline from the Alberta oilsands to the West Coast, saying they can no longer afford to participate. And British Columbia has not yet sanctioned the project.
While many in Ottawa believe the Gateway project is dead, Alberta Premier Alison Redford told The Canadian Press this week that she believes the pipeline will eventually be approved. However, she stressed that regulatory approval alone is not enough.
“I think there is a lot of work to be done with respect to First Nations, to ensuring that there’s economic benefit for communities right through,” she said in an interview Monday.
“I think it would be wrong to think (Northern Gateway) has gone off the books and shouldn’t happen or won’t happen.
“But I do think that everyone is realizing that as the date of that decision gets closer, that there’s a great risk that it could not happen, and they’re now understanding what the consequences could be.” | <urn:uuid:f11560e1-8e6c-41e6-84ce-3c61de57c754> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.theprovince.com/business/Harper+names+envoy+deal+with+First+Nations+pipeline+energy/8120657/story.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949531 | 684 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Nov. 17, 1999 To gain a better understanding of the way life may have evolved on Earth, a team of scientists has begun a multinational airborne mission to study the Leonid meteors.
The Astrobiology mission began when two U.S. Air Force planes, the ARIA and the FISTA, lifted off from Edwards Air Force Base, Edwards, CA, on Nov. 13 at 11:15 a.m. (PT) enroute to Royal Air Force Mildenhall Airbase in the United Kingdom. During the mission, an international cadre of scientists will point their instruments towards the sky to study the Leonid meteors from the unique vantage-point of the aircraft.
"The planes provide a perfect platform for viewing the meteors," said Peter Jenniskens, chief scientist for the Leonids mission. "They lift us above the weather to ensure a fantastic view. By flying over 35,000 feet in the air, we are above most of the atmospheric water vapor, and our instruments get the best data possible."
The Leonid meteor showers occur each November when the Earth passes through the debris shed from periodic comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle. The meteors, named the Leonids because they appear to stream from the constellation Leo, are about the size of a grain of sand. Studying comets and meteors, which are made from ice and dust that existed when the universe was formed, may help scientists develop a better understanding of how life began on Earth.
"Comets and meteors are fascinating to study because they are a frozen record from the time when the universe formed," explained astrobiologist Dr. Scott Sandford of NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA. "Due to geological activity, all of Earth's materials have been reformed several times over, and we must study comets, meteors and meteorites to get an early view of our universe."
Most years, observers with ideal viewing conditions can see 10 to 20 meteors per hour during the Leonid showers. Every 33 years when the parent comet Tempel-Tuttle passes particularly close to the Earth, as it did in 1998, meteor storms with hundreds or thousands of meteors per hour are possible. In 1998, following Temple-Tuttle's pass by Earth, counts of 250 meteors per hour were recorded. Predictive models have indicated that, in 1999, it may be possible to see 200 to 5000 meteors per hour around the longitudes of Europe and the Middle East. The 1999 Leonid Multi-instrument Airborne Campaign (MAC), a mission jointly funded by NASA and the United States Air Force, has been designed to fly over these longitudes for three consecutive observation nights, Nov. 16-18.
Both aircraft being used for the mission have been specially outfitted with a variety of instruments, including spectrometers and cameras, to study the meteors. The FISTA, an NKC-135 aircraft, has been modified with 20 upward-facing viewing ports. The ARIA, an EC-18 airplane, has telemetry equipment that will allow researchers to send images and near real time data regarding comet flux, or counts, to the ground.
Research objectives for the mission involve taking many measurements that have never been done in airborne astronomy, including real-time meteor counts, spectroscopy (mid-infrared, near-infrared, ultraviolet and visible) and stereoscopic viewing of meteors using intensified high-definition television cameras. The stereoscopic view, obtained when instruments on both aircraft image a meteor, will provide the first-ever three-dimensional model of meteor trajectories.
About half of the scientists on the current mission participated in the 1998 Leonid MAC mission that flew over Japan. That highly successful mission is credited with observing more than 3,200 meteors, obtaining the first differential spectrometry data from meteors as they burned through the sky, and obtaining the first stereoscopic images of a persistent meteor train.
After departing Edwards Air Force Base Nov. 13, the planes flew to Mildenhall Airbase in the United Kingdom. During the night-time crossing of the Atlantic Ocean, scientists tested and calibrated their instruments and completed initial observations, including taking measurements of the Aurora Borealis.
The mission will begin Nov. 16 when the planes depart England and fly the scientists overnight to Tel Aviv. The following night, Nov. 17, during the expected peak of the storm, the scientists will fly from Tel Aviv to Lajes Air Base in the Azores. The final night, Nov. 18, the planes will fly from the Azores to Patrick Air Force Base in Florida.
The peak of the storm is expected to occur at 0200 (UT) Nov. 18 (9:00 p.m. ET, Nov. 17) over Europe and the Middle East. While the best viewing of the storm will be in these locations, it may be possible to see the Leonid meteors in the United States, particularly in the predawn hours of November 17 and 18.
For current information about the Leonid MAC Astrobiology mission, visit: http://leonid.arc.nasa.gov/
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead. | <urn:uuid:a77db6da-cc60-46e4-84ec-31b6f59d7f5c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/1999/11/991117051250.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.907379 | 1,106 | 3.8125 | 4 |
To combat the very real issue of water scarcity, which is an increasingly pressing concern as droughts in the Southern parts of the US continue and the global population keeps growing, biomedical engineer John Whear has produced a new paper on rainwater harvesting.
Whear, who works at the Cancer Therapy & Research Center at The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, examined various methods for pooling resources–not just water, but forests and fisheries as well–and looked at both modern and older methods of sharing scarce water in society, from pre-colonial India to modern Texas.
Creating what he calls a common pool resource (CPR) system for water by harvesting rainwater is beneficial in several ways. Most obviously, it reduces the strain on ground and surface water supplies, providing more water to more people for longer. Capturing rainwater can also reduce the risk of flash floods, which happen when sudden, heavy rainfall cannot be absorbed into the ground quickly enough.
But there’s another side to CPRs than just the technical. There is, Whear found, a very strong social aspect to rainwater harvesting. In his paper, he makes the claim that the only way for a CPR, which must be monitored and managed, to be successful is by way of the participation of the public. The public must have open channels of communication about the use, the economic aspects, and the logistics of the CPR. After contacting water management organizations, he realized there was more than engineering at the heart of water availability. “That’s when I learned that rainwater harvesting is as much a social issue as it is an engineering one,” he said.
EarthTechling is launching a weekly green deals service in October called Green Earthling Deals. Sign up for the weekly email by Monday, September 19th and you’ll be entered to win a custom iPad or iPhone case from the extraordinary designers at Grove. More details can be found on EarthTechling’s Contests page. | <urn:uuid:31fbf950-697f-4b1d-acb2-7f9ffe9b080a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.earthtechling.com/2011/09/how-being-social-can-combat-water-scarcity/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96354 | 408 | 3.25 | 3 |
Be the first to post a comment! To write a comment please log in or register.
Figge Art Museum
City: Davenport, IA
Country: USAAddress: 225 West Second Street, Davenport, IA 52801
Website: www.figgeartmuseum.org Uploaded artworks: 1 Uploaded artist: 1
The Figge Art Museum is an AIA award-winning art museum in Davenport, Iowa. The Figge, as it is commonly known, has an encyclopedic collection and serves as the major art museum for the eastern Iowa and western Illinois region. The Figge works closely with several regional universities and colleges as an art resource and collections hub for a number of higher education programs.
The museum opened on August 6, 2005, and is the re-named successor to the Davenport Museum of Art, which was opened on October 10, 1925, as the Davenport Municipal Art Gallery. The museum has its roots in the Davenport Art Association, which was founded before February 23, 1878, and was re-located on November 15, 1889, to the Bianca Wheeler art studio. The Figge Art Museum is one of the oldest art institutions in the country and is considered the first municipal art gallery in the United States.
The new building was designed by Stirling Prize winning Modernist British architect David Chipperfield. The Figge Art Museum gets its name from the V.O. and Elizabeth Kahl Figge Foundation, which donated $13 million towards its $47 million construction. The Figge family, a local banking family of Swiss origin, has a long tradition of philanthropy and cultural enrichment.
The first pieces of its collections were donated by Davenport community leader Charles Ficke (1850-1931), a successful lawyer and former mayor, who collected art from around the world. Robert E. Harsche, then Director of the Art Institute of Chicago, reported that to his knowledge no American public art gallery had "started out with so large a number of important paintings as a nucleus."
After logging in the following functions will be available:
- Uploading new artworks, artists and museums
- Posting exhibitions, glossary and library entries
- Adding comments, blogging, voting
- Adding new infos to objects
- Recording your game-scores to the Hall of Fame
You can also use TerminArtors Social Connect to log in. | <urn:uuid:877bfbe0-6bfe-40f9-89ee-9b6f24c8c9ec> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.terminartors.com/museumprofile/Figge_Art_Museum-Davenport_IA-USA | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00038-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962803 | 508 | 1.914063 | 2 |
Body wave are waves that travel from the interior of the Earth toward the surface,
they are compose by two kind of waves P waves and and S waves
“P” Waves, also called Primary Waves have elastic traveling characteristics as sound
waves, they can travel in gas, liquid or solids like on earth, These waves are the
first to be detected by seismographs and alarms. These are compression waves classified
as body waves, these waves travel from the inner Earth to the surface.
“S” Wave also called Secondary Waves travel with amplitude perpendicular to their
propagation direction, as showed in the picture, these are classified as body waves,
they also travel from the earthquake epicenter toward the surface, these waves are
more destructive than the primary waves but fortunately travel at lower speed.
Surface wave are waves that travel near or at the surface of the earth on a horizontal
path, waves in this category are Love and Raleigh waves.
Love waves are surface waves with a transversal and longitudinal component that travel
horizontally to the Earth surface, are produced by the circular motion of particles
on a clockwise direction. The particles do not travel, they do communicate the energy
in circular motion generating the waves as seen on water and liquids.
Raleigh waves are also surface waves in solids with transversal and longitudinal
components in which the wave is produced by an counter-clockwiseelliptic movement
of the particles, as opposite to the circular clockwise motion in the love waves,
these waves are highly destructive. | <urn:uuid:bc81a38a-f9dd-46d5-8bfd-de26f9b4eb96> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.engitek.com/earthquake-glossary2.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941076 | 326 | 4 | 4 |
Hunkered Down... Again -April 3, 2003
Anchored across from Rock Sound, in the calm before the storm
Rock Sound is the name of both an enclosed bay near the south end of Eleuthera Island in the Bahamas, and the town on the bay's northwest side. We first visited Rock Sound a little over three years ago. It was blowing hard and the bay offered one of the few secure all-weather anchorages on the island. We had also heard that the people of Rock Sound were very welcoming and that it was a good place to get supplies. Eleuthera is one of the only islands in the Bahamas where there's a semblance of commercial agriculture. For years, it was famous for its pineapples.
On that first visit to Rock Sound, however, we didn't get a chance to sample the pineapples. In fact, we didn't go ashore. The island had been swept by hurricanes the summer before and was still being rebuilt. The docks in front of the town had been reduced to piles of broken concrete and jagged re-bar. We looked at the wind-driven breakers crashing along the waterfront and decided not to risk a dinghy landing. Instead, we took "Little Gidding" over to more protected waters on the opposite side of the bay. We anchored in the company of a couple of other cruising boats and left two days later after the wind subsided.
We arrived in Rock Sound for the second time a few days ago after a blustery sail from Little San Salvador (see last week's log entry). We entered the harbour shortly before sunset. The winds had calmed down and we dropped the anchor in front of town. The conditions the next day were beguiling - clear skies and only a light breeze. The weather forecast, however, warned of a nasty cold front coming off the Florida coast and headed our way.
We took the dinghy to shore and tied up at a brand new wooden dock. Stories of Eleuthera's hospitality hadn't been exaggerated - everyone we met in town greeted us and many inquired if they could assist us with anything. We asked some school kids for directions to the "famous Rock Sound Water Hole Park", which had been written up in one of our guide books. It's pretty difficult to get lost in a place as small as Rock Sound, but they followed us to their community's contribution to the wonders of the world, just to make sure we didn't stray off course. It was a nice swimming hole, but not quite in the same league as the Grand Canyon or Mount Everest as far as natural spectacles go.
We bought ice at Dingle's service station and asked Chris, the proprietor, about the Eleuthera Pineapple Festival which, according to our Bahamian calendar, was supposed to be happening around now. "Well," he said, "you don't see too many pineapples growing down this way, but you might check the grocery store."
We didn't find any pineapples in the grocery store, but managed to buy some Florida oranges and Washington apples. David walked across the street and picked up a bottle of rum at the liquor store. "We need to be adequately provisioned in case we get stuck on the boat again," he explained.
By the time we got back to the boat, most of the other cruisers in the harbour had crossed over to the opposite side of the bay. They had been listening to the same weather reports. With a sense of deja vu, we followed and set two anchors, anticipating a wind shift with the pending frontal passage.
Now it's a well known fact that nasty weather rarely strikes during daylight hours. Sure enough, the front arrived with a vengeance at three o'clock in the morning. The boat shuddered with each gust and the wind powered generator screamed like a banshee, but our anchors held firm. David stuffed a towel under the hatch that was dripping on his side of the berth and swore that he would replace the gasket, something he has been threatening to do for at least six months whenever it rains hard.
The grey morning light revealed a bay full of angry white caps. It just happened to be the last day of lobster season. Eileen got a book out while David - forever an optimist - assembled his snorkelling gear. He spent the remainder of the day glumly watching the dinghy dancing wildly at the end of its painter behind the boat. Finally, at five in the afternoon, he sighed, put his spear pole away, and turned on the radio. The offshore weather report promised at least two more days of strong winds and big seas. David got out the rum and ice. "Well, at least this time we managed to go ashore and see the town, even if it was only for a few hours," he said.
Eileen looked up from her book. "And the next time we visit, we might even get some pineapples," she added. | <urn:uuid:8f11b081-3271-4cb0-9c57-0743cb7eb42d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.boatus.com/cruising/littlegidding/200304-03.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982182 | 1,020 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Air pollution is not something parents should take lightly. If adults are affected by it, then imagine the damage it can cause babies.
A study conducted by Dr. Göran Pershagen and his team of researchers from the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm, Sweden reveals that the effects of air pollution can stick with a child for years on end. Recently featured on MedicalNewsToday.com, the study involved collating data of over 1,900 children who were regularly monitored for eight years. Information came from questionnaires given to parents as well as several health check-ups given to the young participants.
A specific mathematical formula was used to calculate every child’s probable exposure to air pollution based on the locations of the participants' homes, schools, and day care centers. The researchers discovered that children who were most affected by air pollution during their first year were more likely to develop weaker lungs. This condition seems to be more prevalent in boys than in girls and to those who have been more exposed to food and air allergens in their younger years.
Dr. Pershagen concludes, "Our study shows that early exposure to traffic-related air pollution has long-term adverse effects on respiratory health in children... These results add to a large body of evidence demonstrating the detrimental effects of air pollution on human health."
It’s hard to avoid air pollution. The best that we can do for our children is to arm them with the proper food and supplements that can help boost their immune and respiratory systems. Vitamin C can help reduce the effects of airborne allergens, so stock up on fruits such as lemons, oranges, and even strawberries. For other tips on how to protect your children’s health, visit GIRLTalk for opinions of other FNite mothers.
(Photo by Jeffery DelViscio via Flickr Creative Commons) | <urn:uuid:f0a2060a-5294-4a39-8757-0f7e5d30ee78> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.femalenetwork.com/health-wellness/air-pollution-may-have-lasting-effects-on-children | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966761 | 378 | 3.390625 | 3 |
Theocracies are typically defined as "states governed by a deity or a priesthood," but in today's modern society even some people of faith also subscribe to another almighty: Science! It, too, is often perceived as infallible, omnipotent, and the cause of earthquakes and plagues. But the following things threaten to shake people's core scientific beliefs:
It's a disembodied hand that can think for itself. Need I say more?
- The Thing
He's a man made of rock who, when he died, was resurrected by God. Need I say more?
- Thing 1 and Thing 2
They have wild, natural blue hair and hang out with a talking cat. Need I say more?
- Time-Traveling Tyrannosaurs
What's that? Dinosaurs are actually from the future? Fossils are the result of time-travel missions gone awry? Biology and geology, you're officially on notice.
- The T Party
No, not the Tea Party; they're hardly a threat. I'm talking about the rabid fans of Mr. T, who are fervent believers in pitying the fool. Thus, they always vote to fund idiots who spread incorrect scientific information, which will cause the public to distrust science more and more every year.
- Toothless, Tongue-Tied Thespians
Because the success of Cats with an all-gum cast is in direct opposition to Darwin's theory on natural selection.
- Tool Time's Tim Taylor
With his incessant grunting, his poor grasp of language, and his propensity for smashing things, once the reruns start playing on Nick-at-Nite, people will soon realize evolution is a myth.
A highly-respected member of the scientific community, under oath, will admit in the next inning of the steroids scandal that we still know next-to-nothing about almost everything. Whether steroids can help you hit a baseball, what causes cancer, the secrets of DNA, proper nutrition, weather forecasting, what's keeping Dick Clark alive... it's all guesswork.
- The Truth Theorem
This theorem posits that science is a fad and will soon die out on account of its constant need for proof.
- Ten Thousand Teeming Tapirs
Swarms of pig-like mammals from out of nowhere. Explain that, science.
This post is part of the Blogging from A to Z April Challenge, hosted by Karen Gowen and seven others. Go check out the other participants! | <urn:uuid:263c8c4b-f4b7-4f91-b3be-d1b06d78c02c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://wheelisonfire.blogspot.com/2011/04/top-ten-things-that-threaten-to-topple.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948007 | 517 | 1.945313 | 2 |
We are a FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) team - we compete in FIRST Robotics Competitions (FRC).
FIRST is an organization that aims to inspire children and teens to think, create, and enjoy the fields of science, engineering, and mathematics. FIRST also encourages good sportsmanship, confidence, and gracious professionalism. "Especially this year", says Dean Kamen.
Gracious professionalism was coined by FIRST Advisor Dr. Woodie Flowers and is constantly promoted in all competitions. Gracious professionalism means that all teams strengthen and encourage one another, despite the obvious competition. Everyone wants to win the game, but we want no one to lose. All the teams we have come in contact with have been extremely generous and considerate when other teams are in need of assistance or advocacy. FIRST creates a competitive and supportive atmosphere, treating all teams, from first year rookies to seasoned veteran, as equals. | <urn:uuid:b123809f-1e95-4ab1-a154-5629a2e5d826> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.robokong2493.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965446 | 187 | 2.390625 | 2 |
OLYMPIA, Wash. -- Election day is less than a week away, and while controversial measures about same sex marriage, charter schools and marijuana legalization have been covered, some measures slip under the radar.
Dave Ammons, the Communications Director for Washington State Secretary of State's Office and the spokesperson for the Washington Election division, helped break down the details in the guide. Joint Resolutions 8221 and 8223 are pretty standard according to Ammons. "Both passed through Olympia quite easily, so they're non controversial," he explains.
8221 would slowly reduce the amount of debt Washington can accrue from 9% now to 8.5% by the year 2014. "If you reduce the amount of money you commit to pay off debt, then those dollars are freed up to spend on higher education, or K-12 or other purposes. Because right now all of the bond debt is taken off the top. That's the very first decisions that get made because they are protected. If you reduce that amount of money that goes for that purpose, then it will be available for other purposes," said Ammons.
8223 is would allow Washington State University and University of Washington to invest their funds in the stock market, something that's currently not allowed, but currently being done for our state's pension system. "You have to weight the risk versus benefit. It would actually put the actual investment process up to our state investment board, which handles such things for the state pension system," said Ammons.
Then there are two brand new advisory votes in the pamphlet as well. Those votes don't actually change any law, but they give feedback to lawmakers, who can see if the people agree with what they've passed. They are part of Tim Eymans' previous I-960 that passed. While the results on both are non-binding, "you're given the opportunity to tell the legislature what you think of what they did on those two revenue bills," says Ammons.
Advisory vote one, reads complicated, but Ammons explains that if you vote to "maintain" it, you are supporting the legislative move to stop giving big out of state banks a preferential business tax rate, making them pay at a higher rate than local banks and credit unions. He says that measure helped us add $18 million to our state treasury, at time Washington was having a hard time balancing a multi-million dollar budget gap.
Advisory vote two passed with flying colors with law makers, extending the small tax on each barrel of petroleum that finances our state's oil spill program. So the tax rate actually decreased, but it got spread out over a longer period of time and creates revenue, explains Ammons.
Another big one is Initiative 1185, which would extend the requirement of a two thirds legislative majority in both chambers to approve any tax increases. It's also sponsored by Tim Eyeman, a political initiative activist in Washington. Ammons explains passing 1185 would make it more difficult for law makers to pass any sort of tax increases for the state.
To read more on Dave Ammons blog on initiatives, click here.
To see the voter's pamphlet, click here. | <urn:uuid:efdf1775-4e41-4aa6-bf26-2ca4a7f46b93> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kndo.com/story/19969983/simp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96686 | 645 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Where the boys are: Ormondale School accommodates "boy-heavy"
third-grade group with all-boy classes.
From the start, the third-graders at Portola Valley's Ormondale School set records. A larger-than-usual group when the children arrived at the school as kindergartners, the class was unusual in another way: The boys outnumbered the girls on a scale never seen before, at least in recent recollection, in the Portola Valley School District, according to Superintendent Tim Hanretty.
Now, with about 20 students more than the other grade-level cohorts at Ormondale, the third-grade class is made up of 70 boys and 36 girls — a 66 to 34 percent ratio.
With the start of the new school year, Ormondale is using a fresh approach to teaching the 106 students at that grade level: When school began on Aug. 29, third-graders were divided into five classrooms, two of which were made up of boys only.
The idea for the change to boys-only classrooms, and the decision to go forward with it, didn't happen overnight. Ormondale Principal Jennifer Warren and the school's teachers have pondered methods of better serving students in "boy-heavy" classes from the beginning, Ms. Warren said.
"Year after year, a lot of little things have happened" to adjust teaching and supportive strategies, she said. But this year, with the backing of the school board, and with enough parents willing to have their sons in boys-only classes, the school created single-gender classes for the first time ever.
"Parents had the option," Ms. Warren said. "We would not have moved forward without (parental) consent."
Before the classes were launched, "there was a period of diving into the research" on single-gender classes, Ms. Warren said. Affected teachers and other staff members spent time with staff at the Town School for Boys in San Francisco, for example, picking up ideas and information that might help smooth the way for Ormondale teachers and administrators involved in the new project.
There is ample research pointing to learning differences between boys and girls, and teachers of the all-boys classes are using methods that accommodate some of the differences, Ms. Warren said. For example, she said, "boys need kinesthetic ways to learn. They need more movement breaks, opportunities to move around in the classrooms." One example of accommodating this need for movement, she added, is to allow them to practice spelling exercises while skipping rope.
Ms. Warren said the preponderance of boys in the third and other grade levels at the school has led staff to "look at our entire literacy library" in general, and offer changes in the third-grade classes in particular. For example, whereas "Little House on the Prairie" by Laura Ingalls Wilder, which has a female protagonist, has been a staple for classroom reading, a switch to "Farmer Boy" has been made for third-grade boys. That book, written by the same author, has a male protagonist.
Ms. Warren stressed that the changes for third-grade students are designed to serve the needs of both boys and girls. And, she added, much time, energy and thinking is being devoted to the first-time project to monitor its progress and results. The school's counselor is involved on an ongoing basis, and is available as a resource for the teachers, she said.
In addition, a research assistant has been brought in to collect data in all five third-grade classes so that when the district considers whether to continue the class groupings in fourth and fifth grades, there will be solid information "to make a thoughtful recommendation to the board," Ms. Warren said.
Although this year's third-grade class is the most "boy heavy" in the district, it merely reflects the high end of an astonishing trend. Ormondale's student body is currently 65 percent male, Ms. Warren said.
Superintendent Hanretty noted that the district's fourth- and fifth-grade classes reflect the boy-heavy trend. First- and second-grade classes are even more heavily male, he added, though not as much so as the record-breaking third-grade class.
But whether this year's kindergarten class, which Mr. Hanretty said is "fairly balanced" between boys and girls, indicates a reversal of the trend won't be known for some time to come.
Other all-boy classes?
Although there are a number of private schools that offer single-gender classes, the state Department of Education doesn't track public schools that have such classes, according to Stephanie Papas, a department consultant.
Ms. Papas said public schools are allowed to teach single-gender classes, with a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in the 1990s supporting that option. She noted that within the last 10 years, the federal education department also backed that option, though it emphasized that placement in a single-gender class must be voluntary. | <urn:uuid:d478fa3f-6b7c-4fc5-b8cb-2ec176536cf0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.almanacnews.com/story.php?story_id=11665 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971851 | 1,032 | 1.96875 | 2 |
Curtains are usually installed on windows, doors, or the interface between the rooms. One function of the curtains is a barrier to activity in the room is not visible. Other functions of curtains can also prevent the entry of sunlight into the room. Sun can interfere with our comfort as occupants in the room can also damage the surrounding furniture. To obtain a specific mood or feel of the room, we can choose the model, motif and color matching curtains. Price or budget to buy curtains are also a consideration. In determining the price depends on the material chosen curtains, curtains accessories and complementary models.
There is a wide selection of materials that can be used as curtains. Each material has its own characteristics. In determining, the material usually depends also with models that want to be made and the desired function of the curtains. Do we want a flexible curtains, light or dark impression and be able to bury the sound. Some materials are often used in making curtains, like a Lamborghini with the bending properties. Lightweight materials of curtains such as cotton, satin, linen or polyester. Another type of curtains is velvet, organza and paloma heavier and can make sound proofed and absorb sunlight. | <urn:uuid:a8996f78-ded1-4e24-a01a-f82506349023> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://designindoor.com/2012/08/smart-choice-for-choosing-curtain/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00059-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941122 | 242 | 2.125 | 2 |
Massachusetts Congressman Edward Markey, the first candidate to jump into the race for the Senate seat that will become vacant when, as expected, John Kerry is confirmed as Secretary of State, has twice passed on chances to make a bid for the upper chamber.
The 66-year-old Democrat has served in the House since 1976. He sat out the 2010 special election to choose a successor to the late Edward Kennedy. The eventual Democratic nominee, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley, then proceeded to lose in an upset to Republican Scott Brown, depriving Democrats of the 60th vote they needed to overcome Republican filibusters.
In 1984, after nearly eight years in the House, Markey also had an opportunity to run for an open seat when Democrat Paul Tsongas retired. He declined to go for it. The Democratic nominee and eventual victor? John Kerry. | <urn:uuid:f665f898-7a9b-4c13-adfa-edd36c809f98> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://go.bloomberg.com/political-capital/2012-12-27/third-time-the-charm-for-markey/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961537 | 175 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Researchers disprove reported jellyfish increase
An international team of researchers say they have established a pattern in jellyfish blooms that disproves a reported increase in the creatures in recent years.
The Global Jellyfish Group was established several years ago to examine a widespread perception that jellyfish numbers had spiked.
The committee of 30 scientists, including UWA Professor Carlos Duarte, scoured historical records and media reports over centuries and concluded jellyfish numbers increase and drop sharply every 20 years.
Professor Duarte says while it's not clear what causes the cycle, the information will assist northern Australian communities manage the risks posed by deadly stingers.
"It has not been recognised before and in fact no-one had done a global analysis and synthesised all the reliable records to date, so I think it was something that was well overdue to be attempted," he said.
"I think this research will help shape our perceptions around how jellyfish abundance in the sea changes and also help us prepare for the next time a rising phase is due to come up." | <urn:uuid:ddcce46d-3cba-447d-9da2-1f7a0e7b7a56> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-01-21/researchers-disprove-reported-jellyfish-increase/4475500 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966744 | 212 | 2.765625 | 3 |
JERUSALEM (AP) — An Israeli defense technology company says it has successfully tested an anti-missile system designed to protect commercial passenger jets.
Elbit Systems Ltd. on Wednesday said its C-MUSIC system to protect large jets against shoulder-launched missiles from the ground passed tests. Elbit said it proved effective a number of times in protecting a Boeing 707 aircraft.
In 2002, militants fired two surface-to-air missiles at an Israeli charter plane shortly after takeoff in Mombasa, Kenya. The missiles missed their target but spurred an Israeli effort to improve countermeasures.
Elbit says the new system can be applied to any aircraft. It says it integrates advanced fiber laser technology with a thermal camera to protect against missiles fired from the ground. | <urn:uuid:652083ea-b654-4a01-93e9-c629a1c736d3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mail.com/business/economy/1824378-israeli-company-anti-missile-system-passes-tests.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931029 | 160 | 2 | 2 |
Last week I had an interesting Twitter conversation regarding a popular rhetorical strategy surrounding maker-spaces, New Librarianship, participatory culture, and the other assorted “big ideas” for the future of libraries. Now, I think makerspaces are pretty cool and I certainly don’t want anyone to think I want to be slagging on making/hacking/tinkering but, even though makerspaces are rad, they’re being marketed with some pretty suspect rhetoric. Let me give you a few examples:
“We believe the library of the last century is the library of consumption, an institution that reflects the broadcast era of media, the place where you watch, read, and listen passively from an armchair. The library of this century is the place where new social relationships are forged and knowledge is created, explored, and shared.” (Nate Hill & Jeff Goldenson, “Making Room for Innovation”, Library Journal, May 16, 2013 [link])
“Librarianship is not about artifacts, it is about knowledge and facilitating knowledge creation. So what should we be spending our precious resources on? Knowledge creation tools, not the results of knowledge creation.” (Dave Lankes, The Atlas of New Librarianship, p. 43)
“So what does it mean for libraries to give our communities the tools, access, training, and permission to make, hack, and tinker instead of simply consume?” (Laura Britton, “The Makings of Maker Spaces, Part 1″, Library Journal, Oct. 1, 2012 [link])
“By bringing makerspaces into libraries, we can adapt to changing student needs and supporting knowledge creation in addition to knowledge consumption.” (Erin Fisher, “Makerspaces Move into Academic Libraries”, ACRL TechConnect, November 28, 2012 [link])
“Based on the idea that libraries are for creation, not just consumption, maker spaces don’t just upend the normal programming model—they have the potential to reinvent the public library.” (Brian Kenney, “Meet Your Makers”, Publishers Weekly, Mar. 29, 2013 [link])
“The consumption library, to me, is the library that sort of sits back and waits for people to come inside of its doors, to discover what they have, to take it home, to consume it in the privacy of their own home, to consume it one as a time as individuals. Whereas the creation library is the library that sort of embraces that idea of imagination and begins to redesign even its physical space in terms of creation.” (Ken Roberts, “The Future of Libraries”, Dec. 6, 2012 [link])
Did you catch it? The common thread and the favored tactic in the literature surrounding libraries and maker-spaces is to draw a sharp distinction between the consumption of knowledge and the creation of knowledge. By ‘knowledge consumption’ most writers seem to mean reading; by ‘knowledge creation’ most seem to mean hacking, tinkering, building, making, or collaborating. And the way the conversation is being shaped by this rhetoric, it’s clear that knowledge consumption is old and in the way and what we really need is to forge ahead into a bright future of knowledge creation. Yes, some librarians make the case that we need both creation and consumption (e.g., “…in addition to knowledge consumption”), but the rhetorical device is still in play: knowledge can be either consumed or created, and the library of the future is weighted towards creation.
And, so, I tweeted:
This sparked a long discussion of creation vs. consumption, but as is usually the case with Twitter, it was sort of all over the map. So, I figured I should explain my reasoning here on the blog. Put simply, the rhetoric of knowledge consumption versus knowledge creation equivocates over the concept of knowledge, forcing an adversarial false dilemma. What’s worse, if we try to clarify the equivocation, it quickly becomes apparent that it makes absolutely no sense to contrast knowledge consumption with knowledge creation because, in the context of a library, they’re the same damned thing. Allow me to explain…
First of all, there are two wildly different senses of ‘knowledge’ at play in the consume/create rhetoric. Start with the type of knowledge in “knowledge creation”: what is getting created? Well, makerfolk surely aren’t talking about printing knowledge on a Makerbot. At least, I hope they aren’t, because that would be some next-level craziness. No, makerbrarians are most likely talking about creating a certain type of new beliefs, which brings us to the first type of knowledge: epistemic knowledge. And all we mean by creating epistemic knowledge is something along the lines of coming to new justified, true beliefs. It’s like, “if you tinker with an Arduino, you will acquire knowledge” and there’s nothing wrong with that at all. We acquire new beliefs and new knowledge all the time: it’s called learning.
But, what about the type of knowledge in “knowledge consumption”? Can we consume beliefs? That is, can we consume mental states? Ummm, no; your psychic vampire otherkin friend is just delusional. But, we can consume recorded knowledge. Someone knows or believes something, they want to share it, and so they write it down, film it, paint it, and so on. That recorded knowledge is now something consumable: you can read it, watch it, view it, and so on. And we consume recorded knowledge/belief all the time: it’s called information.
So, when I hear makerbrarians proclaim that traditional libraries are about knowledge consumption and future libraries are about knowledge creation, I make a mental substitution: traditional libraries are about information, future libraries are about learning, and so libraries must move away from information in order to facilitate learning.
This may come as a shock, but libraries have been places of learning for quite some time. It’s kind of our schtick. On the flip side, it’s not clear what a pure creation space would be in the absence of information “consumption.” I’m pretty sure that you need to manipulate some information to make that 3D print of Chewbacca riding on a TARDIS, or whatever it is that 3D printers do.
Anyway, it should be pretty obvious that, when taken literally, the knowledge creation vs. knowledge consumption distinction is simply bad rhetoric. If anything, consumption and creation–understood as information and learning–are inseparable: you need one to achieve the other. So, saying that we need to replace one with the other is, for lack of a better term…dumb. But, of course, it’s just sloppy rhetoric; the participabrarians don’t really mean to imply that libraries have never been about knowledge creation. Perhaps they mean something more like this…
Traditionally, libraries have invested mostly in the collection, preservation, and provision of access to certain types of information and certain types of cultural objects (i.e., literature) all for the purposes of self-directed learning and/or enculturation. But, in the future, libraries will need to invest more heavily in providing their communities with the tools needed to create technologically-mediated cultural objects and information. It’s not that creation and consumption are opposed to one another, rather, the balance is simply shifting away from collecting information and shifting towards collecting the tools required to process information.
Is that better? Closer to the intent of the consume/create distinction? I think it probably is. But, even the watered down version is still problematic because it highlights a rather sizable lacuna in the maker movement manifesto: what makes learning to build a small computer or learning to design and 3D print a small plastic object a greater social good or more intrinsically valuable than the myriad other types of learning available in the library?* Is learning how to make your iPhone open your garage door a more valuable skill than learning a new language? Is there something available in the Thingiverse to help patrons study for finals? For the GED? For the citizenship exam? Is there an app for storytime? Sure, geek elites like Cory Doctorow will argue that making and hacking are absolutely critical to the future of information literacy (“If computers are on your side, they elevate every single thing we use to measure quality of life. So we need to master computers — to master the systems of information, so that we can master information itself. That’s where makers come in” [link]). But, we’re not all technological determinists like Doctorow and it’s a hell of a category mistake to assume that understanding a piece of hardware is necessary for information literacy. It’s like saying that you have to be able to make a paintbrush to appreciate art (or to be a painter). Other fablabrarians make vague pronouncements about improving communities, like, “instead of building better bombs, emerging technology can help build better communities” [link]. Again, I’m sure you can improve a community through tinkering, but you can also improve it through promoting literacy or providing information about sustainability or literally a million other activities. So, it’s still not clear how the future of libraries is in tinkering.
I’m not saying that the things you can do in a maker space aren’t cool, useful, and important. They absolutely are. I’m completely okay with saying that makerspaces have a place in the library because they do address certain, important information needs. But, I’m not sold on the thoroughly Whiggish rhetoric that makerspaces are the inevitable future of what libraries should be and, moreover, I am uncomfortable with rhetoric that pits makerspaces against other library offerings. Even if the makerbrarians concede that the consume/create distinction is just a catchy soundbite or elevator pitch to throw out when we need to show the “continued relevance” of libraries to potential funding sources, all that implies is that non-maker services somehow aren’t relevant. Put another way, not only is the consume/create distinction a false dichotomy, and not only does it avoid questions of social value, but it’s also unnecessarily adversarial. A library patron who wants to read a book is not “simply consuming.” Story-time can also “embrace imagination.” The “results of knowledge creation” are often cherished parts of a community. Let’s change the rhetoric and treat all of our community and patron needs with respect, not just the needs that can be met with ABS and LEDs.
* I should acknowledge that some makerspaces also include activities like sewing, crafting, bicycle repair, and other non-digital offerings. Some rent tools or guitars. Some will even show you how to butcher a hog. These are all awesome. Shoot, I’d love to be able to take a bike tech class. And, if you squint hard enough, you can probably come up with a story that all learning is, in a way, making. But, generally speaking, when librarians talk about makerspaces they’re talking about the 3D printing/hacking/app-building/Arduino programming sort of digital makerspace. | <urn:uuid:dfb446c6-c175-48c2-9593-d92afaf57c13> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://senseandreference.wordpress.com/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933729 | 2,403 | 1.882813 | 2 |
Trailrunner7 writes in with a story about a iOS security guide released by Apple. "Apple has released a detailed security guide for its iOS operating system, an unprecedented move for a company known for not discussing the technical details of its products, let alone the security architecture. The document lays out the system architecture, data protection capabilities and network security features in iOS, most of which had been known before but hadn't been publicly discussed by Apple. The iOS Security guide (PDF), released within the last week, represents Apple's first real public documentation of the security architecture and feature set in iOS, the operating system that runs on iPhones, iPads and iPod Touch devices. Security researchers have been doing their best to reverse engineer the operating system for several years and much of what's in the new Apple guide has been discussed in presentations and talks by researchers. 'Apple doesn't really talk about their security mechanisms in detail. When they introduced ASLR, they didn't tell anybody. They didn't ever explain how codesigning worked,' security researcher Charlie Miller said." | <urn:uuid:8da33666-9305-42a7-a61c-54b1e0c18f3f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://it.slashdot.org/story/12/05/31/2249256/apple-releases-ios-security-guide?sdsrc=nextbtmprev | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975019 | 210 | 1.953125 | 2 |
One of the questions that should keep any funder awake at night is: are we doing the best that can be done with the money?
Answering this naturally leads any funder to ask how do we measure our success?
On one level they can obviously reflect on the work of the projects they fund or partner with. After all, a core measure of success is what happens with the money. But in a wider sense, funders work in different ways and so to understand their effectiveness there has to be an understanding of the strengths or weaknesses of their funding model. For example, are they all about supporting the continuation of work by existing organisations? Or are they an early stage investor who tries to get new ideas off the ground? In this case, how do you measure success when you're starting up new projects?
One of the key things that you often hear mentioned is that funders want projects or models that can be taken to scale, and projects or models that are sustainable. Seems sensible. There's a story there that the project was supported by the funder at the start, so when it gets really big the funder can point to it and say, there's our success. But recent conversations have made me reflect on that in a whole new light. And in particular, that taking something to scale often doesn't quite work like that.
To start with ‘taking something to scale’ is a bit of nebulous phrase. What are you scaling? The principles behind a programme or project? The approach and methods a programme employs? A digital platform? A lot of literature on innovation reminds us that it’s very hard, indeed some might say impossible, to replicate a model in a different context to the one it was designed in. Different local contexts have different needs and our understanding of a model is rarely complete enough to be able to transfer it effectively to another setting. In this case trying to slavishly replicate a project to other settings would, frankly, be a waste of time and valuable money, whereas adapting the approach for another environment might be the way forward.
Understanding that scale is not about replication leads you to ask how do you know what aspects of a project are the things to scale? What are the funder’s processes that allow individuals to dump the bits that don’t work and carry on with the parts that do, often under a different guise or even different organisation? Traditional funding models fund a project idea, but are stuck to it. There’s not the flexibility to work with individuals as they shape and morph the idea to be the most effective it can be.
Within this context, what does sucessful sustainability actually mean? Traditional thinking would be an organisation (big or small) has a great idea, creates it, makes it available to a wide audience (scale) and has a revenue stream to continue that availability. But if we are saying that the model will inevitably morph and shift, what does the sustainability actually sustain? The organisation that’s done the work? The model (in an organisation or not)? The individual(s) who developed the idea and hold the knowledge? This is especially pertinent when we consider that in today’s world it’s not just organisations that are coming up with great ideas to address social challenges. Often it’s small groups of loosely affiliated individuals who come together temporarily for a purpose.
Traditional funding models work in some situations, but not in all. What are the alternative funding models that can cope with the changing reality of these new solutions and ways of working to address social challenges? We’re busy thinking about it. But we’d certainly like your help... | <urn:uuid:5d775018-5f6f-43bd-b00e-5c65f0d5d8c6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nominettrust.org.uk/knowledge-centre/blogs/how-do-funders-measure-success-especially-when-traditional-funding-model-just?to=y | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956839 | 751 | 1.5625 | 2 |
Most Active Stories
KRWG.ORG-The Region's Home Page
Wed May 27, 2009
Congressman Harry Teague Announces New Bill Aimed at Addressing PTSD
By Evan Woodward
Las Cruces, NM – New Mexico's 2nd District Congressman Harry Teague was in Las Cruces today/yesterday to announce a new bill intended to address the issue of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD among military personnel and combat veterans. As KRWG's Evan Woodward reports, the legislation would make mental health screenings mandatory for military personnel upon introduction into the military, before and after deployment and before discharge. | <urn:uuid:84ff8b80-05a8-40f8-ad8f-7d66e267e151> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.krwg-tv.org/post/congressman-harry-teague-announces-new-bill-aimed-addressing-ptsd | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.904343 | 128 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Now no longer in existence, Borley Rectory was known as the most haunted house in England. It stood on the border between Suffolk and Essex and even now, more than seventy years after it burnt down in a fire in 1939, it is still a subject of heated debate between believers in the paranormal and the sceptics.
Many books have been written about the alleged hauntings, which include a nun, a little old man and a sixteenth century recusant knight. And it was this knight and my interest in him which sparked my passion for gay historical romances and stories.
It was in March 2009 when I last visited Borley and found the inspiration for a story about one of
the alleged ghosts.
I was accompanied by my two nieces, Linda and Heather on this trip and it was a chance
remark by Heather which gave me the title for the story. She had been studying the map for directions and informed her sister and I that, with junctions and turn offs etc, there were Twenty Three Steps to Borley.
And there it was, the title for my story. But it was to be another two years before it made it onto paper, or more accurately, lap top screen.
But what of who, I wondered, was my story going to be about. Oh, the possibilities were endless of course thanks to the village’s past and it’s reputation as a hot spot for ghosts and apparitions. But should I write about the nun, the little old man, (presumably a long dead gardner) the Reverend Bull and his family, who lived there in the nineteenth century. Or perhaps the neurotic Marianne Forster who’s name was scribbled on the wall by an unseen hand. (see illustration below)
In January, 2011 my Muse made an appearance bringing with him (yes, my Muse is a fella) Sir Edward Waldegrave, squire of Borley.
Top, Borley Rectory in the 19th century
Centre, The River Stour nr Borley
Above, The Writing on The Wall
All images by Google Images.
To see more about Borley see here; | <urn:uuid:ce5aef97-ef40-4409-815d-e698e26f1cd6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://jessielansdel.wordpress.com/about-me/from-ghosts-to-gay-romance-and-how-i-arrived-there/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977341 | 450 | 1.515625 | 2 |
May 29, 2009
"If the Americans are doing it, and they're not accountable, then who's going to come to your rescue?"
-Moazzam Begg, Detainee #558 in Guantanamo Bay.
Moazzam Begg's statement, made after years of detention without charge, echoes the sentiments of many Americans and much of the world who have traditionally viewed the United States as a pillar of the rule of law.
The documentary TORTURING DEMOCRACY tells the story of how the United States government circumvented tradition and law to adopt torture as official policy. The film, produced by award-winning filmmaker Sherry Jones, draws on interviews, archival footage, and recently declassified documents to piece together the development and dissemination of torture tactics from Bagram in Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib -- and the document trail leads right to the top of the chain of command.
PLEASE NOTE: Due to rights restrictions we will not be able to stream TORTURING DEMOCRACY online.
You can watch the entire film at the TORTURING DEMOCRACY Web site.
Also on the TORTURING DEMOCRACY Web site, explore a timeline of events, read related articles, and delve into the archive of official documents.
Sherry Jones is an award-winning producer with dozens of television documentaries to her credit. Based in Washington, D.C. she heads Washington Media Associates, an independent production company.
Jones' films have won eight Emmy Awards, three duPont-Columbia Awards for Excellence in Broadcast Journalism, three George Foster Peabody Awards for significant and meritorious achievement in broadcasting, two Robert F. Kennedy awards for outstanding coverage of the problems of the disadvantaged, three Edward R. Murrow awards from the Overseas Press Club of America, and two consecutive Silver Baton awards from the American Bar Association.
In addition to a 28-year collaboration with Bill Moyers, she has produced more than 20 films for the PBS documentary series, FRONTLINE. She has also produced dozens of other programs for PBS including the Emmy-winning WATERGATE PLUS 30: SHADOW OF HISTORY; six documentaries based in the former Soviet Union including the award-winning FRONTLINE special, RETURN OF THE CZAR; and three specials for ABC NEWS, including PETER JENNINGS REPORTING: THE MISSILES OF OCTOBER, the story of the Cuban missile crisis from the points of view of all three countries involved; HIROSHIMA: WHY THE BOMB WAS DROPPED, broadcast on the 50th anniversary of Hiroshima; and, in June 2004, PETER JENNINGS REPORTING: GUANTANAMO. That film, which was broadcast on the eve of the historic Supreme Court decision in Rasul v. Bush, was the first long-form television investigation into the Bush administration's detention and interrogation policies.
In September, 2004, she produced 9/11: FOR THE RECORD, a NOW WITH BILL MOYERS special. Jones also produced DEAD WRONG: INSIDE AN INTELLIGENCE MELTDOWN, an examination of pre-Iraqi War intelligence which first aired in August, 2005, as a special edition of CNN PRESENTS.
Her most recent production was MOYERS ON AMERICA: CAPITOL CRIMES, a 90-minute expose of the Jack Abramoff/Tom Delay scandals, broadcast in October, 2006, on PBS.
Sherry Jones is a Fellow of the National Security Archive, and has been honored as a "Woman of Vision" by Women in Film and Video. She holds a Masters degree in Journalism from Northwestern University, and is a member of the Medill School of Journalism's Hall of Fame.
Published May 29, 2009.
Guest photos by Robin Holland | <urn:uuid:9681a5e3-7ceb-4388-8f21-43d957e03abf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/05292009/profile.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933368 | 795 | 2.03125 | 2 |
At 60 feet below the surface of the ocean, I was virtually powerless to escape the great creatures which ruled the sea. My heart stopped as the magnificent barracuda slinked into my vision. Its perfectly streamlined body moved in one continuous flow, displaying its four feet of beauty and mystery. As long as I did not interrupt these creatures, they would continue to welcome me into their world.
This was only the beginning. Twenty-six students and I had landed just a few days before on the Grand Cayman Island. With biologists as our guides, we were about to spend six of the most intense weeks of our lives, both physically and educationally, in the water and on land, as part of Northfield Mount Herman Summer School's Caribbean Marine Biology and Scuba Program.
Each day began a new experience and a new discovery. A two-hundred yard snorkel swim to our diving destination awakened each student to the reality that this was not summer camp. While the transformation from outside air to the cool compressed tank air occurred, we forgot our weariness.
As I separated into my small group, I had to be alert at all times, to make certain my "buddy" and group members were safe. It is easy to clear your mind among the coral-munching parrot fish and the fluorescent sponges. I had seen so many fins accidentally strike a head of coral or grab the branch of a gorgonian coral for support, causing irreparable damage.
Later there was time to begin work on my project in the lagoon. The individual project was the dividing line between learning the scientific process through books and teachers and the application of the scientific process itself. On my own, I was faced with the challenge of choosing a subject to research, and then prove or disprove a hypothesis. As I was snorkeling one day, an idea struck me. Before me lay the perfect patch reef. It was minuscule in comparison to those patch reefs around it, yet it supported nearly every small fish I could imagine. I now knew on what I would base my project: the populations of fish on patch reefs.
Every day my observations became more fascinating as I began to come closer to proving my hypothesis that the number of species of fish was not necessarily greater on a large patch reef than on a small one. I knew that even if my hypotheses were incorrect, I would finish the project knowing ten times more than when I began!
While studying the patch reef, I realized how incredible it was that so many different species of fish inhabited such a tiny patch. The patch reef could keep itself alive because every organism depended on the others for survival. Everything I had seen was a member of the marine life cycle.
Learning from an underwater hands-on experience taught me more than any book could have. I discovered how the marine world operates and that it should never be taken for granted. I have become more aware of how to protect the sea and I now realize how valuable it is. L
This piece has been published in Teen Ink’s monthly print magazine. | <urn:uuid:4487ea43-bbdd-45c0-aa3e-8d872372325c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.teenink.com/summer_guide/program_reviews/article/16972/Marine-Biology-Scuba-Program/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00072-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.979398 | 629 | 2.359375 | 2 |
From at least the advent of the homepage, the words used to describe online places have been explicitly architectural and urban. If online organizational structures and real-world architecture have anything in common, this set of similarities has nothing to do with the qualities of form, space, and material that are usually appreciated in buildings. To speak in terms of information architecture, or cyberspace, is inadequate to describe the ways in which all of these structures, built or unbuilt, are produced and sustained by the social and economic systems that surround them.The piece is, in many ways, a companion to an older article, from 2006, written as the result of a semester long research project in social media, enclosure, and architectures of control: "You must be logged in to do that!":
In the newer piece for Interactions, I'm particularly grateful to be able to reference some unpublished work by two friends and colleagues: Kio Stark's recasting of 'users' as 'constituents' returns the production of place into a more humanistic and democratic context; and Eric Leshinsky's usage of the term 'cultural containers' condenses the essential isomorphisms in the way spatial enclosure operates, both online and off.
One does not escape the physical body into a noncorporeal cyberspace as a jailed man escapes from a prison into the wide world. If a body is recomposed as information, it is all the more subject to the specialized techniques of control: distributed surveillance, data aggregation, and the continuous modulation of production and access. | <urn:uuid:ce892d49-17f7-4d9e-842d-61d143a58d3e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://765.blogspot.com/2010/07/adaptive-reuse.html?showComment=1292483198577 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943028 | 314 | 2.0625 | 2 |
The Economist: Don’t Expect Driving Rates to Rise Again
This whole “peak car” may be more than just a sustainability nut’s fantasy. We’ve seen time after time that young people are souring on car culture and finding other ways to get around and connect with friends. We know that the suburban sprawl that fueled the rise of the automobile is in decline. And now The Economist – no treehugging lefty publication – is listing off reason after reason why the trend of declining driving — “peak car,” they call it — is here to stay.
First, let’s be clear: Driving rates are plateauing and even dropping in developed countries, or what The Economist bluntly calls “the rich world.” Developing countries are a few decades behind and are just entering a car acquisition stage. According to a study conducted earlier this year, 20 developed countries show a “saturating trend” on driving. The results are the same for all three measures of saturation: total distance driven, distance per driver and total trips made. “After decades when each individual was on average travelling farther every year, growth per person has slowed distinctly, and in many cases stopped altogether,” the article states.
Is it just the recession? High unemployment? Stubborn gas prices? The Economist, like many analysts before, says the trend goes deeper than those temporary factors. Here’s why:
Generational shift. The generation that went cruising around town in tail-finned Chevys is in retirement now. More American retirees have drivers licenses than ever before – and “more than 90 percent of people aged 60-64 can drive, a larger share than for any other cohort,” the article states. “New generations of drivers will replace old ones rather than add to the total number.” Older people tend to drive shorter distances than younger ones.
Meanwhile, throughout the developed world, young people are less eager to start driving and they’re getting their licenses later. Studies show that people who learn to drive later in life continue to drive less. Gordon Stokes of Oxford University found that people in Britain who learn in their late 20s drive 30 percent less than those who learn a decade earlier.
Geography. The growing preference for urban living, fueled in part by a desire to walk more and drive less, also reduces VMT. In wealthy countries, car use is still stable or increasing in rural areas, but that’s not where the future is. “The OECD, a rich-country think-tank, expects that by 2050, 86 percent of the rich world’s population will live in urban areas, up from 77 percent in 2010.” Nature magazine recently mapped the urbanization trend, noting, “The United Nations predicts that cities will absorb all of the world’s population growth — of around 2.3 billion people — in the next four decades.” [emphasis mine]
The preference to go car-free in cities has been on the rise since long before the recession or $4.00 gas prices. Better public transit and new car-sharing services like Zipcar help make this a viable preference.
Sprawl. The Economist article points out that “the car has become a victim of its own success.” For decades, auto-centric development sprawled outward from cities, as newly-built highways allowed people to commute to the city quickly. But the more people opted to get cars and move out to the hinterlands, the more crowded those highways became. Given that the maximum time people are willing to take on is generally unmovable at 30 minutes each way, the maximum distance you can live from your job increased with highway expansion and shrunk again with congestion. The Economist calls it a “sprawl wall.” It’s one of many reasons that more than half of U.S. cities are seeing more growth in the core than the periphery.
Result: Driverless Cars or Better Policies? The Economist takes stock of the growing desperation among automakers about the state of the U.S. market and concludes that they’re going to bet on driverless cars to take them into the future: “If buyers are less interested in driving, then cars will require less driving from them.” Driverless cars would bring a host of other factors to bear: They could cut congestion somewhat because they can travel closer together without safety concerns — though if people opt for driverless cars over mass transit they could dramatically increase congestion. And the article says driverless cars could “strain the already weakening link between driving and identity and the sense of driving as an expression of self and skill.”
But a far more meaningful outcome of this trend would be for smart governments to revolutionize their transportation policies to accommodate greater transportation options in the future. The Economist notes that “urban planning, in particular, has for half a century focused on cars.”
America built 64,000 kilometres (40,000 miles) of interstate highway to get the country moving after the second world war; since 1980 it has built more than 35,000 new lane-kilometres a year. If policymakers are confident that car use is waning they can focus on improving lives and infrastructure in areas already blighted by traffic rather than catering for future growth. That is already happening in London, where cars pay to enter the centre and ever more space is dedicated to buses and cycles. At Canary Wharf, a business district in east London, 100,000 jobs are supported by only 3,000 parking spaces.
By improving alternatives to driving, city authorities can try to lock in the benefits of declining car use. Cars take up more space per person than any other form of transport — one lane of a freeway can transport 2,500 people per hour by car, versus 5,000 in a bus and 50,000 in a train, reckon Peter Newman and Rob Salter of Curtin University in Australia.
The transportation bill that passed a few months ago in this country didn’t go nearly far enough in envisioning a future beyond car dependence and endless sprawl. That means the country is preparing for a future that isn’t expected to happen. The dip in driving isn’t a flash in the pan. Given the significant societal factors that have contributed to it, we should expect it to stick around for a while. | <urn:uuid:99508443-6f17-4fdb-8038-cf1b97eec318> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dc.streetsblog.org/2012/09/25/the-economist-dont-expect-driving-rates-to-rise-again/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950175 | 1,324 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Activist Groups Urge Obama to Reject Boy Scout Honor
From Fox News:
Activist groups, including Scouting for All, urge President Obama not to accept the honorary Presidency of the Boy Scouts of America until they stop discriminating.
Scouting for All is a 100% Volunteer 501-(c)(3) Nonprofit Organization. Every dollar donated goes toward our education and advocacy programs, and is tax deductible.
What You Can Do
Scouting For All's National Campaign
Scouting for All's historic “National Day of Protest” on
August 21, 2000, marked the beginning of a new era in
our national campaign to end the discrimination by the Boy
Scouts of America against gay and atheist* youth and adults.
When he was a 12-year-old Life Scout, Steven Cozza, who
is now an Eagle Scout, wrote a letter to the editor of his local
newspaper in which he stated that the BSA does not practice
its own Scout Law when they discriminate against gay youth
and adults. On January 22, 1998, Steven called a press
conference and launched his national campaign in the form
of a petition drive to place pressure on the BSA to rescind its
discriminatory policy of exclusion.
This courageous action by Steven has been the inspiration for
the current Scouting for All movement. Steven has dedicated his
efforts to the memory of Robin Reed a gay, 15-year-old Petaluma
High School student who killed himself because he felt rejected,
and to the memory of all gay youth who have taken their own
lives because they felt like they didn't belong. We will no longer
tolerate our gay youth having to remain “invisible” out of fear.
We will continue to work toward the creation of a society in
which our gay youth feel safe and in which they live their lives
as the blessed individuals they are meant to be.
Steven and others who stand with him against the social
injustices of a program he loved, namely the Boy Scouts of
America, have allowed themselves to feel the pain of the
Robin Reeds in this life, and decided to take a stand. The real
tragedy to date is that the national leaders of the Boy Scouts of
America have not allowed themselves, as an organization, to
feel the real pain which they are causing our gay youth, their
families and friends, and to all individuals who believe in
justice. The BSA's immoral, discriminatory, and exclusionary
policy should offend all people who truly value social justice
and human rights. Their discriminatory policy of exclusion
is extremely harmful to the Scouting movement in the United
States and internationally, and to both gay and straight youth
alike, as well as being fundamentally contrary to the precepts
and principles upon which the worldwide Scouting movement
was originally founded.
We are dedicating Scouting for All's “National Day of
Protest” as a new beginning in our continued effort to get
the BSA to end their discrimination. The light of hope will
shine brighter than ever in the name of human rights. We are
launching a heightened national and international campaign,
calling upon individuals and groups to take positive action
on the side of social justice and human rights. Therefore,
Scouting for All has renamed our “National Day of Protest”
to be our “Annual National Rally and Recognition of Gay
(GLBT) Youth and Gay and Atheist Scout Month.” It is
held each year the month of October.
*Includes Nontheists and other Free thinkers
1. Individuals who believe in justice for all It is everyone's responsibility to speak out against social
injustice: in this case, the social injustice of the Boy Scouts
of America. We must not turn our backs on those who are
being discriminated against. We encourage parents and
guardians to have their children participate only in those
youth organizations which value the diversity of the human
family, which have inclusive policies, and which abide by
those policies. In fact, the BSA is the only youth organization
in America that discriminates against gay and atheist youth
We suggest you send a letter to your local BSA council
and to the BSA's national headquarters in Irving, Texas
to inform them that you will not allow your child to
join the BSA until it rescinds its discriminatory policy
of exclusion. Alternative, nondiscriminatory youth
programs include the following: Boys and Girls
Club, 4-H, Campfire USA, and Girl Scouts USA.
2. BSA members, scout units, sponsors, councils Through the Scout Oath and Scout Law, the Boy Scout
Handbook, and the various merit badge booklets on
citizenship, we can see that scouting teaches its members
to help make the world a better place. Discrimination and
bigotry have never been a part of Scouting. Those in Scouting
have an ethical and moral obligation to stand against the
discrimination and bigotry of its current national leaders.
If you are an individual BSA member (adult leader,
scout), a BSA scout unit, or a scout sponsor (i.e., charting
organization, e.g., religious groups, service clubs, etc.),
insist that your BSA scout unit adopt an anti-discrimination
statement and send it to the BSA's national headquarters
in Irving, Texas, and also to your local BSA council.
3. Financial Contributors, e.g., United Way & Businesses We call upon all businesses and organizations, such as some
United Ways who fund BSA councils and programs such as
the BSA Learning for Life, to follow their own businesses'
and organizations' anti-discrimination policies. Donate or
contribute funds only to those youth organizations that do not
practice discrimination. Inform the Boy Scouts of America
that it must end its discriminatory policies which exclude
gay and atheist youth and adults, or else be terminated as a
beneficiary of your business' or organization's funding.
4. Schools & government agencies This includes the military; municipalities; schools; police
and fire departments; PTA's; and city, county, state, or federal
government agencies; etc. We ask that these organizations reexamine their relationship with the Boy Scouts of America
in light of their own anti-discrimination policies, and insist
that discrimination be prohibited by any group that uses their
services or facilities. We ask all local school districts to think
about the harmful message that they are sending to both their
gay and straight students if you allow organizations, such as
the BSA, which discriminate against gay and atheist youth,
to use their school facilities and allow adult BSA leaders to
recruit in their schools. Just think about the harmful message
that you would be giving to both gay and straight students in
your schools if you allow this discrimination to be practiced
in your district.
For helpful aids on working with schools in helping
your local school district or school to deal with the
BSA's discriminatory policy of excluding gay and atheist
students, please check out GLSEN, the Gay Lesbian Straight
Education Network, at their web site: www.glsen.org or
www.glsen.org/pages/sections/bsa/. You can also contact
Scouting for All at firstname.lastname@example.org for assistance.
Scouting for All asks all local school districts throughout
the United States to support GSA (Gay Straight Alliance)
clubs by granting permission for their students to
establish such clubs in their districts' high schools.
Gay Youth often experience deep feelings of rejection and
loneliness. GSAs offer gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgendered/
questioning youth the support that they need, and straight
youth a way to develop their own understanding and
acceptance of their GLBTQ friends. Scouting for All has
dedicated its efforts to the memory of Robin Reed and to
all gay youth who have taken their lives because they felt
rejected, like they didn't belong. In the year 2000, Eagle
Scout Steven Cozza, along with his sister Anne, established
a GSA at Petaluma High School, where they were students
at the time. This is the same high school Robin Reed had
attended. If Petaluma High School had a GSA in 1995, the
year in which Robin Reed took his own life, Robin might still
be alive today. GSAs are saving lives! Lets embrace all of our
youth by establishing GSAs in every high school in America.
The power for healing change is in our hands; together let's
make it happen!
For information on how to start a GSA at your
local high school, go to www.glsen.org
5. Religious congregations and organizations Scouting for All advises, as a minimum, that all chartering
(i.e., sponsoring) organizations within your faith communities
adopt nondiscrimination policies. Also insist that any group
or BSA scout unit that uses your facilities, sign a similar
nondiscrimination statement. Your heritage of strong faith
and belief that all human beings have inherent worth asks
this of you: that you be lights of hope, beacons of courage and
love, and defenders of the disenfranchised.
|Scouting for All has initiated the
following strategies to implement
this new era of our National
Campaign to End Discrimination
by the Boy Scouts of America
1. We will continue to use the www.scoutingforall.org
web site to rally support, educate, advocate, and to
help mobilize our volunteers and members across the
country and internationally. We will also continue using
“Steven's Petition” to help educate and rally support.
2. Scouting for All's Alliance for Human Rights
The “Alliance” consists of individual grassroots
organizers, community based organizations and national
organizations which are committed to getting the Boy
Scouts of America to end its discriminatory policy of
exclusion that is harmful to both gay and straight youth.
The Alliance's members are joined by a common bond
and spirit that social justice and human rights should be
for all to experience. The Alliance was established to
create a network for mobilizing and supporting efforts
across the country and internationally. The Alliance is a
bright light of hope for both gay and straight youth, that
they may someday live in a society that values social
justice, acceptance, and cherishes the diversity of the
For further details on the Alliance click
on “Join the Alliance" on the menu to the left.
3. Scouting for All's regional and state directors
We ask that you contact the regional director
They will continue to help mobilize and network to support
the implementation of our national campaign throughout the
United States. We have divided the country into the following
five regions: Midwestern, Northeastern, Northwestern,
Southern, and Southwestern, with each region having a
regional director. The national headquarters of Scouting for
All is responsible for generating international advocacy and
support as well as coordinating and supporting our regional
and state directors.
for your region by going to the Scouting for
All web site's home page to the Contact Us
menu and click your region on the map.
Approved by the Scouting for All Board of Directors on
8/26/00, amended 3/30/01, updated 7/04/04 | <urn:uuid:9519f207-2af7-4f94-8f18-1d446dcc4486> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.scoutingforall.org/data/layer02/nationalcampaign.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937578 | 2,422 | 1.742188 | 2 |
|Partnership minimum tax|
The partnership minimum tax applies to tax years 2009 and forward. A partnership must pay the $150 minimum tax if:
- The partnership was doing business in Oregon during the year (see below), and
- It is required to file an Oregon partnership return (see below).
Change in accounting
partnership who files a short year return because of a change in accounting
periods, only owes a portion of the tax. Check the accounting period change
check box on Form 65 to indicate that your short year return is for a change in
accounting periods. Short year returns due to technical terminations, other
changes in ownership, or termination of the business don't qualify to prorate
the partnership minimum tax.
Here are the prorated tax amounts for this exception:
Example: Trees R Us LLC has gotten
federal permission to change from a calendar tax year to a fiscal tax year
ending in September. To change the accounting periods, a short year return is
required from January 1 to September 30. They will
file a short year return and owe $112 in tax on the due date for that short
year, January 15.
|Doing business in Oregon|
|"Doing business" means being engaged in any profit-seeking activity in Oregon. A partnership having one or more of the following in this state is doing business in Oregon: |
For more information and examples regarding which partnerships owe the $150 partnership minimum tax, read our Oregon Revenue Bulletin, ORB #2010-02. Our website also has examples and explanations for corporate taxpayers that a partnership can use to determine if it is doing business in Oregon.
- A stock of goods.
- An office.
- A place of business (other than an office) where affairs of the partnership are regularly conducted.
- Employees or representatives providing services to customers as the primary business activity (such as accounting or personal services), or services incidental to the sale of tangible or intangible personal property (such as installation, inspection, maintenance, warranty, or repair of a product).
- An economic presence through which the taxpayer regularly takes advantage of Oregon's economy to produce income.
|Which partnerships must file an Oregon partnership return?|
Exception: Publicly traded partnerships taxed as corporations.
- Every partnership having income derived from or connected with sources in Oregon.
- Every partnership having one or more Oregon resident partners.
Use Form 65 to report partnership income and Schedule AP to apportion income between Oregon and other states.
If filing for a short tax year, Oregon follows federal filing requirements. Just like the federal return, if the forms for the tax year are not yet available, file using the prior year forms.
Example: ABC Properties LLC is classified as a partnership and uses a calendar tax year. The LLC has a technical termination on February 20. The federal and Oregon returns for the tax year from January 1 to February 20 are due June 15. The Oregon partnership minimum tax is also due June 15. The LLC will use prior year forms to complete their federal and Oregon returns applying any laws for the current tax year.
NEW Oregon Schedule K-1:
Oregon has created a Schedule K-1 that can be completed with the federal
Schedule K-1 for individual owners of a partnership or S-corporation. The
purpose of this schedule is to help individuals correctly report their Oregon flow-through
income. It's not required at this time, so it doesn't need to be filed with
the Oregon partnership return.
|Amending or requesting a refund |
If the partnership filed a return and checked ‘Yes’ for question 1 and has now determined that the correct answer is ‘No’ or there are other errors on the return, they need to file an amended partnership return. To do this, send a corrected partnership return and check the box labeled ‘Amended Return’. Attach an explanation of the reason for amending.
If the partnership sent in a payment and has now determined that no tax is owed, they need to file or amend. Partnerships who sent in a payment, but checked ‘No’ for question 1 on Form 65, will be issued a refund unless their return is adjusted during processing.
|Federal Depreciation Disconnect|
|Important! Oregon is not tied to the bonus depreciation and increased IRC section 179 expense allowed by federal law after December 31, 2008 for tax years 2009 and 2010. |
If you expensed business property under IRC section 179 or claimed the 50-percent bonus depreciation or the $8,000 additional depreciation allowed under IRC section 168(k) in tax year 2009 or 2010, use the Oregon Depreciation Schedule to see if you have an adjustment.
See the Oregon Depreciation Schedule for more information.
|Partners may qualify for the following tax credits on their individual income tax returns even though the costs were paid by the partnership. The credits generally flow through to the partners based on their ownership percentage.|
- Biomass production or collection.
- Business energy.
- Child care fund contribution.
- Crop donation.
- Diesel engine replacement, repower, or retrofit—carryforward only.
- Electronic commerce zone investment.
- Employer—provided dependent care assistance.
- Employer scholarship.
- Energy Conservation Project.
- Farmworker housing.
- First Break Program.
- Fish screening devices.
- Individual Development Accounts (IDA) donation.
- Long-term care insurance premiums.
- On-farm processing machinery and equipment.
- Oregon Cultural Trust donation.
- Oregon Production Investment fund.
- Political contributions.
- Pollution control facilities.
- Reforestation of underproductive forestlands.
- Renewable energy development contributions.
- Renewable energy resource equipment manufacturing facility.
- Reservation enterprise zone.
- Residential energy.
- Transporation projects.
- University venture fund.
|TriMet and Lane Transit District self-employment taxes|
|Self-employment earnings of taxpayers doing business or providing services within the TriMet and/or Lane Transit Districts are subject to these taxes. A partnership may elect to file and pay the transit district self-employment tax on behalf of any or all the individual partners. Use the partnership's net self-employment earnings (including partners' guaranteed payments) to figure the tax. Generally, any TriMet or Lane Transit District self-employment tax return (Form TM or Form LTD) filed by a calendar year partnership is due by April 15, the following year. Fiscal year partnerships must file Form TM or Form LTD by April 15 of the year following the calendar year in which the fiscal year ends. |
Additional transit self-employment information:
District boundary information
TriMet boundaries: 503-962-6466.
Lane Transit District boundaries: 541-682-6100 .
|Other filing requirement|
Partnerships, as well as other
pass-through entities, with nonresident owners may have additional filing and
payment requirements related to these nonresident owners. See instructions for Form OC and Form OR-19 for more information.
|Payment and extension information|
|Payment due date: |
- Calendar year filers—the $150 minimum tax is due by April 15.
When the due date is on a weekend or holiday, pay by the next business day. Estimated payments aren't required for the partnership minimum tax.
- Fiscal year or short year filers—the $150 minimum tax is due by the 15th day of the fourth month after the end of the partnership’s fiscal or short tax year.
To make a payment:
- Make the check or money order payable to "Oregon Department of Revenue."
- Write a daytime telephone number, the tax year, and "Partnership Tax" on the check.
- Don't send cash or a postdated check.
- Complete Form 65-V payment voucher and include it with the payment.
Extension of time to file
Extensions must be filed by the due date of the return and are for the same length of time as federal extensions (usually 5 months). A valid federal extension is a valid extension for Oregon. Calendar year returns are due by April 15. Fiscal and short year returns are due by the 15th day of the fourth month after the end of the partnership’s fiscal or short tax year.
If the partnership files an extension and needs to make a payment, mail the payment with Form 65-V to the address below by the payment due date and check the box marked “Extension." This voucher is in the Form 65 instructions.
If the partnership doesn’t pay the tax when due, interest will be owed on any unpaid tax. If the tax is not paid within 60 days of the date of our billing notice, the interest rate applied increases.
The partnership will owe a 5 percent late-payment penalty on tax not paid by the payment due date. Other penalties may apply.
|Mail partnership returns and payments to: |
Oregon Department of Revenue
Note: If there are more than 10 owners, we prefer Schedule K-1s or other supplemental information on CD. The Oregon and federal partnership returns must be printed. If you are mailing Schedule K-1 or other supplemental information on a password protected CD, don’t include the password with the CD. Mail the password separately to the address above or e-mail the password to firstname.lastname@example.org. Please include the partnership name, tax year, and federal employer identification number or Oregon business identification number on the CD and with the password.
PO Box 14260
Salem OR 97309-5060
|Voluntary Disclosure Agreement|
If your business isn't in
compliance with Oregon tax laws, we encourage you to voluntarily come forward
to register and pay prior tax obligations. Our Voluntary Disclosure Program is
designed to help resolve prior tax liabilities.
If you haven't been contacted by us or the Multistate Tax Commission, you may
ask to enter into a voluntary disclosure agreement (VDA). You may make this
request anonymously by going through a third party, such as an accountant or
lawyer. All entity types follow the same procedures.
Your VDA request must be in
writing and include:
- A description of the company including
entity type and business activity conducted in Oregon.
- The date business activity
began in Oregon.
- Reason(s) for not filing tax returns
- The approximate level of activity in
Oregon compared to total activities (percentage of property, payroll, and
receipts attributable to Oregon activities for the last three years).
- Potential or estimated tax
liability to Oregon for the last three years.
- The company’s year-end date (calendar
or fiscal year).
- Specific statement of relief requested
or proposal being made.
- Statement indicating whether the
company or an affiliate has been contacted by the Multistate Tax Commission or
the Oregon Department of Revenue regarding the tax for which the company
is requesting a voluntary disclosure.
- Statement indicating why the company
didn't apply for Oregon's Tax Amnesty program that concluded November 19, 2009
and applied to tax years 2007 and earlier.
As policy, the Department of Revenue doesn't waive interest charges. However, a VDA may specify that penalties and
charges for the underpayment of estimated tax will be waived.
Note: The Oregon tax amnesty program ended on November 19, 2009.
If your company didn't apply for tax amnesty at that time, VDA requests for
tax years 2007 and earlier will be subject to the 25% post amnesty penalty
imposed under Section 4, Chapter 710, Oregon Laws 2009 (Senate Bill 880). Some
exceptions may apply.
Send requests for participation in a VDA to:
Oregon Department of Revenue
Corporation Audit Section
955 Center Street NE
Salem OR 97301-2555
If you have nexus in more than
one state where you haven't filed tax returns, the Multistate Tax Commission
(MTC) can help. They will contact the states for you to fulfill your filing
requirements. You will remain anonymous until requirements are met. For more
information, see www.mtc.gov.
For specific questions relating to nexus or the voluntary disclosure process,
please e-mail email@example.com.
We will answer most inquiries within two business days. | <urn:uuid:3af61bf2-5ca3-491c-a282-161c622b1ecd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.oregon.gov/dor/pertax/Pages/partnership.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.914082 | 2,608 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Goal Program News
Fall 2012 Brings New Classes to Program
Students beginning the GOAL program in fall 2012 will be required to complete a new course, LIB 301 Research Skills. The purpose of the course is to develop the student's information literacy skills: the ability to recognize when information is needed and to locate, evaluate, and effectively use that information. Students who successfully complete the course will receive one hour of academic credit. The course will be delivered online. LIB 301 must be taken during a student's first semester; but, no later than the second semester of the student's GOAL program. There is no substitute or transfer course that will meet this requirement.
A new math course, MTH 320 Math for Liberatl Arts, has been added for those in the Human Services, Religious Studies, and Criminal Justice programs. The purpose of this course is to give an introduction to and an appreciation for the ways quantitative and geometric reasoning inform problems encountered across a wide range of human activities - from politics and economics to social networking and games. Additionally, the course is designed to introduce the quantitative, computational and problem solving skills necessary for applying that reasoning. MTH 320 will be delivered in both face-to-face and online formats. This course will be optional to the MTH 316 Probability and Statistics course in meeting GWU's math requirement for the Human Services, Religious Studies, and Criminal Justice programs. | <urn:uuid:e5645480-1e85-4642-afe9-241366ccf45e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gardner-webb.edu/academics/degree-completion-program/program-news/archives/fall-2012-new-classes | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.913828 | 282 | 1.914063 | 2 |
Date of Award
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Professor Kenneth Cruikshank
In the second half of the nineteenth century the six Ontario suburban communities of Yorkville, New Edinburgh, London West, London East, Parkdale and Brockton were incorporated. In general suburbanites opted for incorporation because their increasingly urban concerns were not being met by the governance ofthe rural townships of which they were a part. Although the municipal status of these suburbs lasted for varying periods of time, and only overlapped briefly in the early 1880s, they had much in common. All six municipalities attempted to develop as alternatives to the cities they neighboured. Suburbanites and their local governments worked hard to create local identities and, at least for a time, stave off amalgamation with the neighbouring cities, which were increasingly anxious to expand their boundaries. All the while the suburbs were forced to balance the development of infrastructure and the need to keep taxation low in order to keep their communities viable and attractive locations for householders and businesses. The creation and maintenance of expensive infrastructure was often poorly handled, and led to massive expenditures and soaring suburban debts. This fiscal chaos within the suburbs ensured that the amalgamation question would be much debated by both suburb and city. While the ratepayers of each of the suburbs ultimately endorsed amalgamation, they did so only after what were often long and protracted debates. If anything, the struggle over amalgamation illustrated that suburban solvency and responsibility had to be weighed against questions of suburban agency and independence.
Stott, Gregory Kenneth Russell, "Suburban Dilemmas: The Development and Amalgamation of Ontario Suburban Municipalities 1853 to 1897" (2004). Open Access Dissertations and Theses. Paper 1568. | <urn:uuid:fbc48a64-23f7-4c14-a640-d61dcbfa87b9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://digitalcommons.mcmaster.ca/opendissertations/1568/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00072-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966618 | 354 | 2.359375 | 2 |
Wojciech BogusławskiArticle Free Pass
Wojciech Bogusławski, (born April 9, 1757, Glinna, Poland—died July 23, 1829, Warsaw), leading playwright of the Polish Enlightenment, a period of cultural revival much influenced by French writers such as Voltaire and Rousseau.
After studying singing, Bogusławski joined the court of the bishop of Kraków. He subsequently became a soldier and then, in 1778, an actor. Between 1783 and 1814, he directed the Polish National Theatre in Warsaw; later he worked in Lwów [now Lviv, Ukraine] and toured with his company, performing both Polish and foreign plays.
Bogusławski is considered by many to be the father of the Polish theatre. He wrote more than 80 plays, mostly comedies adapted from writers of western Europe, and he is also credited with introducing Shakespeare to Polish audiences with his translation of Hamlet (1811). In his own best comedies he used English models, as, for example, in Szkoła obmowy (1793; The School for Scandal). His best-known and most popular original play is Cud mniemany, czyli Krakowiacy i Górale (1794; “The Pretended Miracle, or Krakovians and Highlanders”), a patriotic comic opera based on national folklore. As a theatrical director Bogusławski improved the situation of the acting profession, elevating actors from entertainers to professionals recognized as artists.
What made you want to look up "Wojciech Boguslawski"? Please share what surprised you most... | <urn:uuid:8766b7bd-894e-4fa7-acfe-b7eb6473e2a9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/71513/Wojciech-Boguslawski | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966643 | 365 | 2.71875 | 3 |
Debt management has over the years become a specialist job and administrations the world over have resorted to branching this activity under a separate authority. In the US, debt management falls within the Treasury's domain, while the Federal Reserve, the US government's central bank, deals with monetary policy. Most of the jurisdictions worldwide, like UK, Sweden, Brazil, have a separate entity managing debt and in-charge of raising and managing debt for the respective administrations.
Presently, the Reserve Bank of India carries out both the debt management and the monetary policy implementation functions, for the central government. Therefore, a case for a separate DMO is being made out mainly on the ground that the central bank is conflicted when it acts both as the government's banker trying to borrow as cheap as possible, and also as the prime authority responsible to enforce the monetary policy with the prevalent interest rates.
Contrary to popular belief, a separate DMO is unlikely to increase in forced mopping of government securities (G-Secs) by public sector banks anymore than already be. With ever-decreasing global interest rates, higher yield of Indian public debt anyways remains very alluring.
Importantly, the development of the G-Secs market is essential for any economy to come of age. It requires dedicated professional management and carving out a separate DMO may be the correct approach. Another factor to consider is India's debt rating that is just about investment grade or thereabouts. A dedicated approach towards debt management will help in improving the disappointing debt rating.
With the Indian government taking on its biggest public debt raising exercise till date of approximately close to $ 90 billion or Rs 4.5 lakh crore, the presence of a vibrant and dynamic debt and G-Secs market involving participation from all class of investors (and not only from a few institutional players, as is the case now) has become paramount. Due to the severe global credit crisis, the Indian government, like most other governments the world over, was pushed to walk the path of an expansionary fiscal policy.
The Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act, 2003, which lay policy targets for both the fiscal deficit and the revenue deficit up to 2008 and aimed at institutionalising fiscal management to bring about greater fiscal discipline, had to be consequently put in suspension. Taxes were lowered and expenditure increased to stimulate (a) the sagging economic sentiment; and (b) increase the money flow to thwart the adverse effects of credit crunch which has resulted in India's present fiscal deficit reaching alarming levels.
Therefore, the need for a sound public debt management strategy has become even more pressing. It is the need of the time to lower the cost of public borrowing, while balancing it with extant monetary policy initiatives and refinancing risks inherent in any government borrowing plan.
Is there a downside? Absolutely, every change has the potential to be catastrophic. It is contended that there exist three pre-conditions to separation of debt management, namely, (a) reasonable control over fiscal deficit; (b) development of financial market; and (c) legislative changes.
The first two pre-conditions are moot as they pose the chicken and egg problem. The third one is entirely achievable. There are some issues that must necessarily be addressed during the process of setting-up the DMO. The seamless integration for efficient debt management and coordination of the DMO with the other limbs of the Indian government is the pivotal concern. | <urn:uuid:bafede92-f387-4be1-ae7e-596fd5e3c412> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2009-08-11/news/27661239_1_debt-management-public-debt-dmo | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955786 | 692 | 2.125 | 2 |
Hurricane Sandy created a number of heroes, as well as a few social media villains.
The actions of several corporate communication departments during and after the storm fell into both categories, carving out an unlikely place in the headlines for PR and marketing folks as Sandy walloped much of the East Coast.
The bold actions and unfortunate missteps of these organizations—among them retailers, PR firms, and government agencies—provide lessons for people working in the PR and marketing field when a disaster strikes.
Avoid pitching reporters nonessential or overly advantageous stories.
The topic of “newsjacking”—which refers to angling a pitch to a news story—became a hot topic after a handful of public relations bloggers offered advice for doing so during Sandy. Many commenters online found the advice distasteful.
At least one New York Times
reporter also commented about PR pitches after Sandy made landfall. Stuart Elliott, the longtime advertising and marketing reporter for the Times
The tweet drew a chorus of approvals from Elliott’s followers, including a number of people in the PR industry. In an interview this week, Elliott told PR Daily that a PR pro “who was coming on fairly strong” about a pitch inspired the tweet.
“Somebody had been emailing me at work before the storm, trying to get me to cover something,” he explained. On Tuesday morning, as Elliott worked from home, the PR professional tweeted a message to him, saying: “Good morning Stuart, hope you are safe from Sandy. When you get a moment I have sent you an email.”
Unless the information you’re sending to reporters is pertinent to the disaster, ditch the email and phone pitches. The reporters in the areas effected by a disaster are working through the event, while also dealing with their personal travails (a flooded or collapsed home, and so on). An inbox full of pitches about a product launch or game-changing redesign will only alienate—perhaps irrevocably—the very people you’re paid to appeal to.
Exercise caution when marketing, particularly online.
One of the major business headlines to emerge from the storm concerned companies’ igniting social media anger over promotions tied to Sandy. American Apparel, for example, offered a 36-hour Hurricane Sandy Sale, while the Gap cheerfully suggested that people shut in during the storm shop on its website.
At the same time that Gap and American Apparel took their lumps for the ill-advised messages, other companies with less promotional or cheery tones faced criticism. For instance, Sears, which advertised generators and cleaning products to its Twitter followers, saw some people question its motives.
Ultimately, companies need to approach their social media efforts carefully—at all times, though especially during a disaster when emotions are running high.
Use clear, straightforward communication to convey essential information.
Corporate communications is notoriously packed with jargon. It’s not necessarily the fault of the people assigned to write the press releases, blog posts, and newsletters—that blame usually rests on the executives—but it’s important to understand when to drop the buzzwords and opt for clear, direct language.
New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) nailed the direct approach when it informed riders and residents about the state of its subway system. MTA Chairman Joseph J. Lhota issued a statement saying
“The New York City subway system is 108 years old, but it has never faced a disaster as devastating as what we experienced last night. Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on our entire transportation system, in every borough and county of the region. It has brought down trees, ripped out power and inundated tunnels, rail yards and bus depots. … Our employees have shown remarkable dedication over the past few days, and I thank them on behalf of every New Yorker. In 108 years, our employees have never faced a challenge like the one that confronts us now. All of us at the MTA are committed to restoring the system as quickly as we can to help bring New York back to normal.”
Similarly, the National Weather Service issued a warning to residents
in coastal New Jersey that didn’t mince words. It said in part:
3. IF YOU ARE RELUCTANT, THINK ABOUT YOUR LOVED ONES, THINK ABOUT THE EMERGENCY RESPONDERS WHO WILL BE UNABLE TO REACH YOU WHEN YOU MAKE THE PANICKED PHONE CALL TO BE RESCUED, THINK ABOUT THE RESCUE/RECOVERY TEAMS WHO WILL RESCUE YOU IF YOU ARE INJURED OR RECOVER YOUR REMAINS IF YOU DO NOT SURVIVE.
There were at least a few people who questioned the NWS’s approach, suggesting it would cause a panic by using such language. It’s true that corporate writers should avoid hyperbole, but in life-or-death situations, clear, direct language is essential.
Understand that your crisis plan doesn’t cover everything.
Companies must have a crisis communications plan, and many do—especially the PR firms that were in the path of Hurricane Sandy. However, even the best crisis plans don’t account for everything that could occur during a disaster.
In New York, for instance, the power had not been restored to residents and businesses south of 40th Street in the days after the storm. That was something that folks at the New York offices of Edelman PR did not anticipate.
“Fortunately, we do have a recovery and contingency plan, and 50 to 70 percent of this we could plan for,” Russell Dubner, the head of Edelman New York, said in an interview on Thursday. “The things we couldn’t plan were things like how widespread the power outage was going to be.”
Edelman, like a number of PR firms across the effected areas, created an ad hoc network of satellite offices—in apartments, houses, and other businesses with power and Internet access—where employees could work. They also enabled staffers to work from home if possible.
As they’ve shown, along with so many other people and businesses along the East Coast, crisis plans are of great importance, but the ability to collaborate and consider a range options beyond the plan is essential in any disaster. | <urn:uuid:0c785ac7-61ce-4bc5-8d7f-f2ed905a5fd8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.prdaily.com/Main/Articles/13069.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956888 | 1,310 | 1.648438 | 2 |
A security patch issued as part of Microsoft's routine monthly updates started freaking out about google.com. The patch was for Microsoft popular freebie security tool, Microsoft Security Essentials, but also for users of Microsoft's enterprise security product, Forefront.
It warned users that Google.com was a malicious web site infected with a piece of malware known as calledExploit:JS.Blacole.BW, otherwise known as the Blackhole Exploit Kit, Softpedia reports.
Customers flocked to Microsoft support forums to complain. Many said they were blocked from Google with every browser they used.
To its credit, Microsoft listened to complaints, admitted the problem and corrected it today.
In the ultimate irony, Microsoft was crowing yesterday about its 10-year anniversary of its security program. One of its senior security program managers, Dustin Childs, even went so far as to explain why Microsoft's Patch Tuesday, which is the second Tuesday of each month "is what we live for.”
Very funny, Microsoft. We all feel much safer knowing you are protecting us from malicious sites like Google. | <urn:uuid:2b638e92-3d3b-4bd9-a290-7d7faa408a6f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.businessinsider.com/hey-microsoft-this-isnt-really-the-best-way-to-get-people-to-use-bing-2012-2 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95372 | 226 | 1.554688 | 2 |
|Polk County Enterprise - Local News
Copyright 2011 - Polk County Publishing Company
Extension expert: Time to sell cattle
COLLEGE STATION — With little to no grazing and hay, should livestock producers continue to try to buy feed, move cattle to another state or just sell out? “It would be much less expensive to just get out and come back later,” said Dr. Larry Redmon, Texas AgriLife Extension Service state forage specialist. “And that’s the message that we’re trying to convey.” Polk County Extension Agent for Agriculture Mark Currie says producers in this area may want to hold their horses — er, cattle, at least the best animals in the herd — just little longer. Currie was reached while in the middle of moving a load of cattle to greener pastures near Winnie. “It looks like springtime here everything is green,” Currie said. “There’s quite a bit of hay here.” Currie also planned to round up a few contacts that have hay for sale at a price Polk County cattle raisers can tolerate. Shorty Clamon, owner of the Livingston Livestock Exchange also advises local cattlemen to hold on if they can. “It’s going to rain. It always has,” Clamon said. Clamon said producers should cull older cows and any calves that weigh 250-300 pounds to reduce stress on the mothers. “The market is good, but it’s going to be a lot better for the one that can hold on,” Clamon said. “I handle cattle all the time for these packing houses and we’ve sold out several little bunches (in Polk County) and I hate to see that,” Clamon said. “If anyone needs help, all they got to do is call us at the sale barn. Rex (Clamon) and I can help them hustle hay or do whatever we can to help,” Clamon said. Many livestock producers have already tried to cut feeding costs by extensively culling their herds, but have held onto enough cows to rebuild their herds if the drought passes, Redmon said. In some dry years, that might be a good strategy, but not this one, he added. “It’s unprecedented,” he said. “(We’ve had) the 12 driest months in Texas history, and there’s just not many ways to combat that.” With grazing and hay supplies next to non-existent in many areas of the state, it’s getting very expensive to buy feed. On average, it’s costing producers “somewhere around a $100 a month to have these animals (cows) stay in the pasture and feed them,” he said. Another choice is to move cattle elsewhere, most likely another state during this drought, and lease land where there is grazing, Redmon said. “It could be western Mississippi; it could be eastern Louisiana; or it could be maybe Missouri,” he said. “I haven’t talked to anybody this year, but in the past couple of years people have called me from other states and they’ve quoted prices of $20 to $22 per (cow/calf) pair per month. Even assuming that’s $25 or $30 that’s still a far, far cry from $100 a month.” Of course, one has to add the cost of hauling a trailer load of cattle to the leased grazing, but even with that added cost it’s still cheaper than trying to buy hay and feed at today’s prices, he said. “It’s probably going to be $3 to $3.50 a loaded mile —something like that,” he said. “If you just put all that together — the savings could still be tremendous if a person could find a place to put those animals.” But completely selling out makes more sense yet, Redmon said, given there’s no guarantee this drought will end anytime soon. “Some people would counter and say it’ll cost more to come back into the business later because conditions will have improved, and more people will be getting back in,” he said. “That’s true. But again, looking at the difference in what it would cost to buy cows and come back in at some later date — versus what they would spend trying to go through this drought — mathematically, it’s just a no-brainer.” More information on the current Texas drought and wildfire alerts can be found on the AgriLife Extension Agricultural Drought Task Force website at http://agrilife. tamu.edu/drought/. AgriLife Extension district reporters compiled the following summaries: The 12 Texas AgriLife Extension Service Districts. Central: Northern parts of the district received from 2 to 5 inches of rain, but conditions remained largely unchanged. Sale barns were full each Saturday. Cattle were getting thin. All livestock producers were heavily feeding. Hay and water was in short supply. Farmers continued to harvest crops worth harvesting. Many crops were being zeroed-out for insurance purposes. Coastal Bend: Though light showers were reported in some areas, extreme drought conditions persisted. The cotton harvest was ongoing. Livestock producers continued to sell off herds due to lack of forage. Most watering ponds were dry. Some water wells were also going dry, and some producers were drilling new ones. Many trees were dying or showing signs of drought stress. East: No rain was received, and the drought worsened. Water levels in stock ponds and creeks were dangerously low. Many trees were dying or going dormant early. Hay was no longer being harvested. Producers were searching for hay to buy. Out-of-state purchases were becoming more common. Ranchers continued culling and selling off herds. Livestock began to show signs of obvious weight-loss. North: Soil moisture was very short over most of the area. Daytime highs of 100- plus degrees and nighttime lows in the mid-80s continued to be the norm. A few areas received some rain, which might improve pastures if they are not overgrazed and given time to regrow. Without rain, most pastures continued to go downhill. The corn and grain sorghum harvests were nearly complete with yields reported to be slightly above average. Soybeans — those that survived the drought — were also being harvested. Some soybeans were cut for hay and the rest were being plowed under. Corn and milo stalks were being harvested as hay and shipped all over the state. Where there was hay, it was being sold before it was cut. Once baled, hay was being loaded on trucks and shipped out before the baler got cold. Most livestock producers were feeding hay and supplements to cattle. With heavy supplemental feeding and short hay supplies, producers continued to cull their herds and were scrambling to find hay for immediate feeding and for winter. Some livestock producers were selling out. Water was becoming a major concern as ponds were getting very low. Hay producers hoped for late August or September rains so they could possibly produce one more cutting. Trees were dying from the record heat and lack of rain for over 60 days in most areas. Rangeland and pasture conditions were very poor. Panhandle: Most of the region received scattered showers and cooler weather. Accumulations ranged from a trace to 1.5 inches. The rain and cooler weather was welcomed, but it was not enough moisture to help the very thirsty crops. Soil moisture levels remained very short. Irrigators were watering full swing trying to keep up with water demands. Gray County received hail along with the rain, which stripped the leaves off some cotton and corn. Also, high winds toppled six pivots in that county. The rain greened up some pastures, but more was needed to really make a difference in the very poor conditions. However, the cooler weather did ease water needs and heat stress on cattle. Supplemental feeding of livestock continued. Producers who were trying to hang on to their cattle were buying hay form other states, with hauling costs running $20-$30 per ton. Rolling Plains: Rain! But the amount varied greatly from county to county. Throckmorton County received from 0.5 inch to 3 inches of rain, while Stephens County received from 0.5 inch to 5 inches. Haskell County received as much as 2.8 inches. Other counties received from 0.1 to 0.8 inch. The rain was no help for cotton producers, though it did help wheat growers who would like to plant in September. More moderate temperatures, especially nighttime lows, helped relieve stress on livestock. Cotton was fruiting, but even under heavy watering, fields still looked weak. Producers were weaning and selling calves. Some producers are selling or shipping their cows to out-of-state grazing. Hay was scarce and expensive when available. A few hay producers hoped to have a latesummer cutting. Large trees were beginning to show the effects of too little moisture. South: Record-high temperatures continued. In Webb County, temperatures of 104 and higher were reported. Some daytime highs reached 108 or even 110 degrees. Rangeland and pastures further declined, forage supplies and stock-tank water levels dropped. Many livestock water tanks had already completely dried out. In Live Oak County, there were record numbers of livestock sales at sale barns. The heaviest livestock culling was taking place in Webb and Zavala counties, where ranchers have completely run out of water resources. Also, feed sources in those counties were very scarce. The western portion of Frio County received 0.5 to 1 inch of rain. Also in that Frio County, the corn harvest was completed, the cotton harvest began and the sorghum harvest was ongoing. Most crops in Jim Wells County were harvested, and fields were ready for fall and winter preparations. In Zavala County, farmers were preparing land for cabbage and spinach planting, and pecan producers were irrigating orchards in the critical kernel-development stage. In Hidalgo County, the cotton harvesting was winding down. In Starr County, farmers were planting sugarcane and fall vegetables. In Willacy County, harvesting of late-planted cotton continued. South Plains: Some areas received as much as 3 inches of rain. Others got none. The remaining cotton is from two weeks to a month ahead of schedule; and the final stages of flowering or in cut-out. In other areas, cotton was shedding bolls and squares from lack of water. Of the 42,000 cotton acres planted in Garza County, only 8,000 remained. Many producers were planning on an early harvest. High temperatures dropped into the 90s. Most counties were still under burn bans. Some growers chose to dig and harvest peanut vines for hay due to the low pegging rate. White grapes in Yoakum County were harvested, and red grapes were expected to be ready by the end of August. Cattle producers were selling off herds because of shortages of grass, hay and water. Southeast: The extreme drought did not budge. July closed with a nearly 22-inch rainfall deficit for the year in some parts of the region. Some areas had scattered showers. Grain sorghum and rice fields were being baled and sold for livestock forage. Early July had brought some light rains that allowed for regrowth of grain sorghum. But tests showed very high prussic acid levels. People feeding this forage to livestock were cautioned to test all sorghum grass species before grazing or feeding as hay. Pond levels continued to drop. The condition of cattle continued to decline. Cattle sales were up. Southwest: Sporadic showers brought 1 inch to 2 inches of rain to some areas, but most of the region remained completely dry. High afternoon winds created dust storms. Record high or near-record high temperatures of over 100 degrees aggravated the drought. The region remains in wildfire-alert status. Many stock tanks were dry. Forage availability remained well below average for this time of the year. The cotton, watermelon and cantaloupe harvests were all ongoing. Some farmers planted sweet corn for an early fall harvest. Peanuts, pecans and landscape nursery crops continued to make good progress wherever irrigation water was still available. Ranchers were providing supplemental feed for livestock. West Central: Extremely hot, dry conditions continued. Wildfire dangers remained very high. Some areas reported scattered showers, but not enough moisture was received to make a difference. The heat has destroyed almost everything planted, including gardens. Rangeland and pastures were in poor condition. Trees in pastures were dying at an alarming rate. Stockwater tanks were very low or completely dry. Ranchers were hauling water to most livestock. Hay supplies were very limited. Producers continued to cull livestock herds. More and more livestock producers are selling out. | <urn:uuid:ff25e370-e67a-42f6-89ea-4ecd38e5104a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.easttexasnews.com/Enterprise/News/Ind/August2011/story4.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983924 | 2,698 | 1.617188 | 2 |
The rod-shaped object near the bottom of the image is a bacterium Tullis Onstott's team found in water samples obtained nearly two miles underground in a South African gold mine. This type of bacterium, approximately four micrometers in length, has survived for millions of years on chemical food sources that derive from the radioactive decay of minerals in the surrounding rock, making it one of the few creatures known that does not depend on sunlight for nourishment. Photo by Tullis Onstott.
Two miles underground, strange bacteria are found thriving
Posted October 20, 2006; 03:35 p.m.
A Princeton-led research group has discovered an isolated community of
bacteria nearly two miles underground that derives all of its energy
from the decay of radioactive rocks rather than from sunlight.
According to members of the team, the finding suggests life might exist
in similarly extreme conditions even on other worlds.
The self-sustaining bacterial community, which thrives in nutrient-rich groundwater found near a South African gold mine, has been isolated from the Earth's surface for several million years. It represents the first group of microbes known to depend exclusively on geologically produced hydrogen and sulfur compounds for nourishment. The extreme conditions under which the bacteria live bear a resemblance to those of early Earth, potentially offering insights into the nature of organisms that lived long before our planet had an oxygen atmosphere.
The scientists, who hail from nine collaborating institutions, had to burrow 2.8 kilometers beneath our world's surface to find these unusual microbes, leading the scientists to their speculations that life could exist in similar circumstances elsewhere in the solar system.
"What really gets my juices flowing is the possibility of life below the surface of Mars," said Tullis Onstott, a Princeton University professor of geosciences and leader of the research team. "These bacteria have been cut off from the surface of the Earth for many millions of years, but have thrived in conditions most organisms would consider to be inhospitable to life. Could these bacterial communities sustain themselves no matter what happened on the surface? If so, it raises the possibility that organisms could survive even on planets whose surfaces have long since become lifeless."
Onstott's team published its results in the Oct. 20 issue of the journal Science. The research group includes first author Li-Hung Lin, who performed many of the analyses as a doctoral student at Princeton and then as a postdoctoral researcher at the Carnegie Institution.
"These bacteria are truly unique, in the purest sense of the word," said Lin, now at National Taiwan University. "We know how isolated the bacteria have been because analyses of the water that they live in showed that it's very old and hasn't been diluted by surface water. In addition, we found that the hydrocarbons in the environment did not come from living organisms, as is usual, and that the source of the hydrogen needed for their respiration comes from the decomposition of water by radioactive decay of uranium, thorium and potassium."
"We know surprisingly little about the origin, evolution and limits for life on Earth," said biogeochemist Lisa Pratt, who led Indiana University Bloomington's contribution to the project. "Scientists are just beginning to study the diverse organisms living in the deepest parts of the ocean, and the rocky crust on Earth is virtually unexplored at depths more than half a kilometer below the surface. The organisms we describe in this paper live in a completely different world than the one we know at the surface."
That subterranean world, Onstott said, is a lightless pool of hot, pressurized salt water that stinks of sulfur and noxious gases humans would find unbreathable. But the newly discovered bacteria, which are distantly related to the Firmicutes division of microbes that exist near undersea hydrothermal vents, flourish there.
"The radiation allows for the production of lots of sulfur compounds that these bacteria can use as a high-energy source of food," Onstott said. "For them, it's like eating potato chips."
But the arrival of the research team brought one substance into the underground world that, though vital to human survival, proved fatal to the microbes -- air from the surface.
"These critters seems to have a real problem with being exposed to oxygen," Onstott said. "We can't seem to keep them alive after we sample them. But because this environment is so much like the early Earth, it gives us a handle on what kind of creatures might have existed before we had an oxygen atmosphere."
Onstott said that many hundreds of millions of years ago, some of the first bacteria on the planet may have thrived in similar conditions, and that the newly discovered microbes could shed light on research into the origins of life on Earth.
"These bacteria are probably close to the base of the tree for the bacterial domain of life," he said. "They might be genealogically quite ancient. To find out, we will need to compare them to other organisms such as Firmicutes and other such heat-loving creatures from deep sea vents or hot springs."
The research team is building a small laboratory 3.8 kilometers beneath the surface in the Witwatersrand region of South Africa to conduct further study of the newly discovered ecosystem, said Onstott, who hopes the findings will be of use when future space probes are sent to seek life on other planets.
"A big question for me is, how do these creatures sustain themselves?" Onstott said. "Has this one strain of bacteria evolved to possess all the characteristics it needs to survive on its own, or are they working with other species of bacteria? I'm sure they will have more surprises for us, and they may show us one day how and where to look for microbes elsewhere."
Other authors of this work include Johanna Lipmann-Pipke of GeoForschungsZentrum, Potsdam, Germany; Erik Boice of Indiana University; Barbara Sherwood Lollar of the University of Toronto; Eoin L. Brodie, Terry C. Hazen, Gary L. Andersen and Todd Z. DeSantis of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, Calif.; Duane P. Moser of the Desert Research Institute, Las Vegas; and Dave Kershaw of the Mponeng Mine, Anglo Gold, Johannesburg, South Africa.
Pratt and Onstott have collaborated for years as part of the Indiana-Princeton-Tennessee Astrobiology Institute (IPTAI), a NASA-funded research center focused on designing instruments and probes for life detection in rocks and deep groundwater on Earth during planning for subsurface exploration of Mars. IPTAI's recommendations to NASA will draw on findings discussed in the Science report.
This work was also supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Energy, the National Science Council of Taiwan, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) and the Killam Fellowships Program.
More information about the discovery can be found at http://newsinfo.iu.edu/news/page/normal/4229.html and http://www.carnegieinstitution.org/news_releases/news_2006_1019.html
Long-Term Sustainability of a High-Energy, Low-Diversity Crustal Biome
By Li-Hung Lin, Pei-Ling Wang, Douglas Rumble, Johanna Lippmann-Pipke, Erik Boice, Lisa M. Pratt, Barbara Sherwood Lollar, Eoin L. Brodie, Terry C. Hazen, Gary L. Andersen, Todd Z. DeSantis, Duane P. Moser, Dave Kershaw, and T. C. Onstott
Geochemical, microbiological, and molecular analyses of alkaline saline groundwater at 2.8 kilometers depth in Archaean metabasalt revealed a microbial biome dominated by a single phylotype affiliated with thermophilic sulfate reducers belonging to Firmicutes. These sulfate reducers were sustained by geologically produced sulfate and hydrogen at concentrations sufficient to maintain activities for millions of years with no apparent reliance on photosynthetically derived substrates. | <urn:uuid:23f34848-566c-4fc3-ba12-466d8d7bf663> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S16/13/72E53/index.xml?from=2010-02-01&to=2010-03-01 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932858 | 1,710 | 3.78125 | 4 |
Syria: US condemns 'brutality and violence'
The US has strongly condemned Syria's "outrageous use of violence" against anti-government protesters.
The White House said the government was leading Syria down a "dangerous path" and called for "an immediate end to the brutality and violence".
Activists say at least 32 people were killed in fresh clashes on Friday.
The violence came as government forces moved into the town of Jisr al-Shughour, where it said 120 security personnel had earlier been killed.
Hundreds of civilians have fled north into Turkey to escape the assault.Assad 'unavailable'
In a statement, White House spokesman Jay Carney repeated calls for the Syrian security forces to exercise restraint.
An eyewitness to some of the events in north-west Syria on Friday said that Syrian troops used tanks to attack a village near Jisr al-Shughour.
He said the attack began at six in the morning when people were still in their beds. He said his village is 4km from Jisr al-Shughour and lies high on a hillside. The attack he saw was on the village beneath his own.
Forty tanks, he said, went into the village. They were surrounded by soldiers holding guns. The tanks fired at the houses and he said people were killed but he couldn't say how many. He said the soldiers then burnt the wheat crops around the village and ripped up the olive groves.
Thinking his village would be next, he decided to flee and with his wife, 10 children and four horses. He walked to Turkey. The journey took four hours and he says he left his family on the Syrian side of the border while he sees whether it will be possible to move the horses into Turkey.
"The Syrian government is leading Syria on a dangerous path," he said.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, meanwhile, described the use of military force as "unacceptable".
A spokesman for Mr Ban said he was "keen to speak to" Syria's president, but that Bashar al-Assad had repeatedly been "unavailable" in recent days.
Syria has prevented foreign journalists, including those from the BBC, from entering the country, making it difficult to independently verify reports from there
In the most serious of Friday's incidents, anti-government activists said about 15 people had died in the northern province of Idlib.
They said most of the deaths were in Maarat al-Numan, where tanks and helicopters are said to have fired on protesters who had taken to the streets after prayers.
State TV and opposition figures said police stations in the town had been attacked by protesters.
Correspondents say it is the first reported use of air power to quell protests in Syria's three-month uprising.'Mutiny'
Both state media and activists on the ground also reported troops and tanks advancing on Jisr al-Shughour.
Most residents are believed to have abandoned the town.
The government blamed "armed groups" for the deaths of 120 security personnel in Jisr al-Shughour earlier this week, but some reports said the troops were shot after a mutiny.
Syrian TV said troops had reached the outskirts of the town after securing nearby villages, and that they had killed or captured a number of armed men.
Activists said they had blasted the town with tank fire, but the BBC's Jim Muir in neighbouring Lebanon says there is little indication as to how much resistance the troops are facing in an area whose population has largely fled.
Witnesses said troops had been bulldozing homes and torching crops and fields.
"They said they even killed animals," one man who had fled Jisr al-Shughour told AP news agency.
"The people have no weapons, they can't defend themselves. The only thing they can do is escape."
The Syrian government says local people requested military intervention to restore order.'Slaughtered like lambs'
There were reports of large demonstrations against President Assad in many parts of Syria after prayers on Friday.
Security forces are reported to have opened fire in some areas - activists said there were deaths in the coastal town of Latakia, in Deraa in the south, and in a suburb of Damascus.
Friday protests have become a regular event since March, but government efforts to quash them have escalated in recent weeks.
Human rights groups say more than 1,300 people have died in the crackdown, mostly unarmed civilians. The government denies this and says about 500 security forces have died.
More than 3,000 Syrians - mostly women and children - have crossed the border into Turkey to escape the violence, many of them from Jisr al-Shughour. An unknown number of people are thought to have fled to other locations within Syria.
"People were not going to sit and be slaughtered like lambs," one refugee in Turkey told Reuters news agency.
Some of those arriving at the temporary camps have serious gunshot injuries - including a Syrian Red Crescent worker who said he was shot in the back as he tried to help the injured in Jisr al-Shughour.
With the unrest showing no sign of abating, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has set up a new camp in Turkey capable of housing up to 5,000 people.
Send your pictures and videos to firstname.lastname@example.org or text them to 61124 (UK) or +44 7624 800 100 (International). If you have a large file you can upload here. | <urn:uuid:c36030bb-d457-4b45-85b0-31bb86006b14> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-13736665 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.987188 | 1,144 | 1.875 | 2 |
The 2012 drought has resulted in one-half of all of U.S. counties being declared federal disaster areas, a number that is likely to grow as the drought worsens. More than 80 percent of corn and soybean crops are in drought-affected areas. Crop losses for 2012 are likely to be catastrophic, and economists are predicting that the resulting crop insurance payouts to those farmers that hold policies could top $40 billion.
Dairy and livestock farmers who lack such insurance policies are faced with impossible choices between buying increasingly expensive and scarce feed, or selling off their livelihood into a sinking, captive market. Food prices are likely to spike in the coming months as speculation and price gouging take hold of the market.
The drought doesn’t respect borders. Countries around the world are experiencing the same extreme weather patterns. The force of Mother Nature combined with global warming brought on by industry has called the bluff of half-hearted responses to climate change. The time for change is past due. | <urn:uuid:a83e5920-27d7-4ff9-b7d6-43457829e5fb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.iatp.org/issue/drought | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960574 | 201 | 2.859375 | 3 |
One of the great privileges of living in the United States of America is that we have the opportunity to voice our opinion and concerns at will. Many times, we find ourselves in a situation where we have the opportunity to voice our opinion, but for various reasons, choose not to. I am exercising my right at this time by voicing my concerns over a potential new facility that is being considered in my neighborhood.
I live on School Road in Three Rivers, across the street from the Little League Field. It is my understanding that a new housing facility is being contemplated across from my home and the Little League Field. School Road has always been a busy road with school traffic. High School students use that road to travel to their lunch destination. Many kids walk from the school to their homes and travel that road alone. Youth practicing for athletic events often run that road alone. School Road is not only used to get from Hwy 72 to the school, city pool and Little League Field, now it is often used to bypass Hwy 281 traffic.
My concern is that if a new Man Camp or Oilfield Trailer Park is allowed to open at this location, it has potential of putting our youth in danger. Not only will it increase the already high volume of traffic that is using School Road, but it will also put many transient workers in close proximity of unsupervised youth. I realize that often these workers are screened for drug use, but how many of them are actually subject to a background check? How many sexual offenders might we have living in our midst, down the street from the school or public pool, or across the street from our homes and the Little League Field? The land in question is at most 50 feet from the Little League Field. I, for one, am not interested in putting my son or any other child in a potentially dangerous environment, when it can easily be avoided.
I understand that everyone wants to take advantage of our local economic situation, but, I am not willing to risk the safety of our youth so that someone else can benefit. I am hoping that others that feel this way will also voice their concern in hopes that this housing facility be moved to another, more suitable location. Although the land in question has not been annexed, I would also hope that our elected officials would hold the safety of our children in the highest regard if this matter should come before them. | <urn:uuid:53b56fc5-d84f-4a12-9296-7ccff9e1c80f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.mysoutex.com/pages/full_story_progress/push?article-Citizen+concerned+about+planned+new+man+camps+%20&id=18724477&instance=news_special_coverage_right_column | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00025-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974517 | 480 | 1.53125 | 2 |
A report titled, "Saving Windows, Saving Money: Evaluating the Energy Performance of Window Retrofit and Replacement," concludes that upgrading windows (specifically older, single-pane models) with exterior storm windows and insulating shades can result in substantial energy savings across a variety of climate zones.
The study was commissioned by the Preservation Green Lab and funded by The National Park Service's National Center for Preservation Technology and Training.
It analyzes decades of research about the performance of double hung windows, comparing the relative energy, carbon and cost savings of various choices in multiple cities across the United States.
"A number of existing window retrofit strategies come very close to delivering the energy benefits of high-performance replacement windows -- at a fraction of the cost," said Mark Huppert, technical director of the Preservation Green Lab. "From weather stripping and sealing, to installing exterior storm windows or interior cellular shades, almost every retrofit option offers a better return on investment than outright replacement."
These findings have important environmental and economic ramifications for consumers. Residential buildings are responsible for approximately 20% of total U.S. energy use and carbon dioxide emissions. Many of these buildings are single-family homes where heating and cooling represent the largest uses of energy, and where windows are an important factor in home energy efficiency. Americans spend over $17 billion annually on heating and cooling.
"Homeowners and designers who want to upgrade existing windows have many choices: from simple, low-cost, do-it-yourself solutions to complete replacement, which can cost tens of thousands of dollars," said David Brown, executive VP and chief preservation officer of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. "This report provides the context and data to help budget conscious consumers make sound decisions."
Research support for the study was provided by Cascadia Green Building Council and Ecotope, a consultancy focused on energy efficiency and sustainability.
The full report and an overview of key findings are at preservationnation.org/saving-windows-saving-money. | <urn:uuid:69956544-e66d-4738-93bf-ec2f8fc24a04> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://homechannelnews.com/print/258271?ad=green-central | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925321 | 408 | 2.65625 | 3 |
Following a two-year hiatus the Douglas Police Explorers are looking to start up again.
What is a police explorer program? It is a training program that educates young men and women on the purpose, mission and objectives of law enforcement agencies. It also provides an opportunity for service, practical experiences, competition and recreation in addition to helping individuals become better citizens and community members.
Candidates must be between the ages of 14-20; maintain a 2.0 cumulative grade point average; have no prior conviction for criminal offense or serious traffic offense; be alcohol and drug free.
There are accommodations for those with special needs and financial difficulties.
A yearly registration fee of $25 will be required,
The program is working in conjunction with the Boy Scouts of America.
Anyone wanting more information on the Police Explorer Program may contact Officer Barrios, Officer Cuevas, Officer Ortega, Officer Villa or Officer Watson at the Douglas Police Department at 417-7550. | <urn:uuid:70fdffd9-48ea-47c9-9cfb-5bb18cb3352f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://douglasdispatch.com/articles/2012/11/28/news/doc50a4073ca5752379304245.txt | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933308 | 198 | 1.648438 | 2 |
Stephen Hawking: Master of the Universe
A voyage through space and time with Professor Stephen Hawking. The series charts Professor Hawking’s quest for a ‘Theory of Everything’.
This ‘holy grail’ hypothesis could explain everything from the mysteries of unimaginably vast phenomena such as supernovae, black holes and dark matter, to the secrets of an infinitesimally small sub-atomic world.
A portrait of the most famous scientist in the world, Prof Stephen Hawking, and an attempt to explain his work to non-scientific types.
This excellent documentary from Channel 4 does very well to convey the basics of quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity in an easy-to-understand manner, as well as to acquaint viewers with Prof Stephen Hawking’s extraordinary life, mission and character. A thoroughly enjoyable, inspiring and enlightening watch!
Watch the full documentary now (playlist – 1 hour, 37 minutes) | <urn:uuid:f035a786-4a99-45a4-b2f6-bce9e7816262> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/stephen-hawking-master-of-the-universe/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.915513 | 195 | 1.648438 | 2 |
New Girl in Town (Musical)
New Girl in Town is a musical with book by George Abbott, based on Eugene O'Neill's play Anna Christie. The music and lyrics are by Bob Merrill. The musical tells a story of Anna, a prostitute, after she returns to live with her father who is unaware of her lifestyle, her love for a sailor, and the results on their finding out. It was set in New York City at the turn of the 19th century.
Anna was played by Gwen Verdon, her father by Cameron Prud'homme, the sailor by
George Wallace. Thelma Ritter played the part of Marthy, an unsavory friend of her father. The music, although well received, did not catch on, with the exception of "Flings", a light song, later recorded by Carol Burnett & Martha Raye. This was probably due to the lyrics "Flings are meant to be flung ..../As a girl, you start seethin'/Over guys just finished teethin'/Now, if they're alive & breathin'/That's enough".
New Girl in Town started at the 46th Street Theatre on 14 May 1957 and ran for 431 performances.
Guinness Who's Who of Stage Musicals - editor Colin Larken ISBN 0-85112-756-8
Playbill of 46th Street Theatre | <urn:uuid:ea1b0964-89a0-476c-9282-d9831e07aca3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://showsdata.stageagent.com/index.php?info_type=3&id=1096 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968315 | 285 | 1.898438 | 2 |
There are no words to describe my disappointment and disgust with a recently installed “major multi-use path” along the Bayview extension, but I’ll try.
According to the Toronto Bicycle/Motor-Vehicle Collision Study (2003), cyclists who ride on the sidewalk are more likely to be involved in crashes and collisions. To those who commute by bicycle daily, or are “avid” bicycle riders, this risk is immediately apparent. Riding on the sidewalk makes a rider less visible to motorists and the rider’s behaviour cannot be easily predicted. A driver has to ask themselves, “Is that cyclist on the sidewalk coming to a stop at a storefront? Are they heading into a park or driveway? Are they just looking for parking at an empty post an ring?” And, if that same bicycle rider is completely overlooked by the parallel driver, then an even larger problem arises, especially once their paths inevitably cross.
When and where the cyclist may or may not enter a road from a sidewalk cannot be determined by simply watching them. On roads, we have painted lines and signalled or signed intersections, all designed to increase the predictability of all road users. This lack of predictability is the major danger a cyclist entering a road from a sidewalk and into a crosswalk faces. On the road a cyclist’s behaviour is more predictable as many riders will conform to street directions and make turns at expected areas and while collisions do occur they are less frequent in these cases.
However, to more novice bicycle riders, the risked posed by cycling on the sidewalk may not be as easy to recognize. Sidewalks are separated from faster moving vehicles and curbs prevent motorists from driving on sidewalks at high speeds. To a novice cyclist the sidewalk appears to be a safe haven.
Recently, the City of Toronto has undertaken a project to connect the isolated Evergreen Brick Works for pedestrians and cyclists. An almost unknown section of the Don Trail has been repaved, a bridge resurfaced and jersey barriers are to be installed to separate this major multi-use path from high-speed traffic as it follows Bayview Avenue between Rosedale Valley Drive and Pottery Road. The path is bi-directional and approximately 3 metres across in width to allow pedestrian and cycling traffic to pass safely.
Access into the Evergreen Brick Works site from this extended path is further improved by dedicated cycling traffic lights and a new traffic lighted intersection on Bayview. All of these improvements are much needed as pedestrian and cycling traffic was previously forced onto this high-speed road or left to travel along narrow, crumbling shoulders.
As the 2003 study mentioned above identified, intersections are a major area of concern and recommendations were made to improve infrastructure to make cycling behaviour more predictable to motorists. Improvements like the Bike Boxes installed on 2 major downtown routes address the problem of right hooks and work to improve cyclist visibility.
With a knowledge of the dangers sidewalk cycling and intersections can pose to cyclists and with a trail expansion in an area more likely to attract novice, weekend cyclists (the hills entering and exiting the Don Valley make this route less enticing and longer for daily commuters) then imagine my surprise to find out that at the intersection of Bayview and Pottery Road, the major multi-use path ends well before the intersection and quickly becomes nothing more than a regular, narrow sidewalk.
The extension of the existing stretch of the Don Trail adjacent to Bayview has been part of a larger construction project in the area. Pottery Road dives into the Don Valley and until this year the pavement was crumbled and pothole infested. A narrow path previously ran along Pottery Road, though a connection to the stretch of the Don Trail that runs on the east side of the river was mostly non-existent. The construction project reduced Pottery Road to two lanes and has widened and connected this path from the intersection of Pottery and Broadview down the escarpment to the Don Trail.
The newer, wider path ends here. When I took my concerns to the City of Toronto Cycling Facebook page I was informed that the bridges at the lower end of Pottery Road are heritage designated and that there were no plans to integrate any cycling infrastructure either over them or beside them. In light of this obstacle the City choose to simply do nothing, ending the path before it had an opportunity to connect to Bayview.
While bridges are an expensive piece of infrastructure (one this city only values if it is for cars and trucks) I can understand the problem posed here when it comes to creating a connected cycling and pedestrian route. What I can’t understand is why, when faced with this problem, the course of action taken was to not only ignore cyclists completely, but to also create a major conflict area in accessing the newly installed multi-use path on Bayview.
It is these vital connections that are the most important part of any cycling and pedestrian network. The straightaways are great but even when installed poorly are rarely the site of serious injury or death. Intersections, time and time again, have proven to pose the most risk to our most vulnerable road users, walkers and cyclists. As the current administration plans on installing 100 km of off-road bicycle routes then we must demand that they address intersections first and foremost. The increased safety of a separated path is only valuable if the route is connected and visibly represented in areas that provide the most risk of conflict. Never mind the idiom that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, in Toronto our current “chain” of cycling routes is completely missing links and the strength and security these could bring.
From the City’s current cycling map. Pottery Road and Bayview intersection is coloured with yellow boxes as a “Suggested On-Street Route” defined as “Quiet residential streets.” Since when has the Bayview extension ever been a quiet residential street? The speed limit is 60 km/h here.
UPDATE: Work along Bayview and at Pottery Road appears to have completed. The cycle path is not separated from high speed traffic on Bayview as expected and the intersection of Bayview and Pottery provides no clear routes for both cyclists and pedestrians. If you are concerned for your safety and want answers as to why this intersection is so poorly designed, I urge you to contact the local city councillor Mary Fragedakis firstname.lastname@example.org, Daniel Egan, Manager of Pedestrian & Cycling Infrastructure degan | <urn:uuid:7c27e405-ab5a-47ba-8af8-3eabb6b7e5f2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bikingtoronto.com/duncan/a-failure-to-address-the-intersection-problem/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96149 | 1,321 | 1.929688 | 2 |
Immigrants make up roughly the same share of the U.S. population today as they did a century ago.
But changes in the global economy, and in U.S. immigration law, have dramatically shifted where U.S. immigrants are coming from.
A century ago, U.S. immigrants were overwhelmingly European. Today, Latin America and Asia are the big drivers of U.S. immigration, and Europe accounts for just a small fraction of the whole.
Correction: A previous version of the first graphic displayed an incorrect number for 1960. | <urn:uuid:d36a2a80-1840-447d-8eaf-7e35314da9b2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2012/08/21/159026833/100-years-of-immigrants-in-america-in-two-graphs | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934736 | 113 | 2.71875 | 3 |
Black Forest Cake
in Diana's Recipe Book
(total ratings: 8)
[Read reviews] [Post a review]
History of Black Forest Cake
Black Forest gateau (also commonly called Black Forest cake in the USA and Australia) is the English name for the southern German dessert Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte (literally "Black Forest Cherry Cake"). It originated in the Black Forest region of southern Germany, but it is a popular dessert throughout Germany, Austria, and the world.
Typically, Black Forest gateau consists of several layers of chocolate cake, with whipped cream and cherries between each layer. These layers are topped with additional whipped cream, maraschino cherries, and chocolate shavings. In some European traditions sour cherries are used both between the layers and for decorating the top. Traditionally, the cake is saturated with Kirschwasser (cherry brandy), although other liquors are also used (rum is common in Austrian recipes). In the USA, Black Forest gateau is most often prepared without alcohol.
A filling of cherries and kirsch-flavored whipped cream is standard in this classic German cake. To poach the cherries, in a small saucepan over medium heat, bring 1 3/4 cups water and 1/3 cup granulated sugar to a boil, stirring occasionally. Add 1 cup fresh pitted Bing or other dark sweet cherries, reduce the heat to low and cook until soft, about 10 minutes. Let the cherries cool, then drain; discard the syrup. Frozen or jarred cherries may also be used. Cook the frozen cherries as directed above. Jarred cherries have already been poached.
For the Cake:
1/2 cup cake flour
1/2 cup Dutch-process cocoa powder
6 eggs, at room temperature
1 tsp. vanilla extract
3/4 cup granulated sugar
8 tbsp. (1 stick/4 oz./113g) unsalted butter, melted and cooled to room temperature
For the Sugar Syrup:
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup water
For the Filling and Frosting:
2 1/2 cups heavy cream
2 tbsp. confectioners' sugar (icing sugar or powdered sugar)
1 tsp. kirsch (cherry liqueur, cherry brandy or plain brandy may be used)
Poached cherries* (see note above)
Semisweet (plain) chocolate curls
Preheat oven to 350°F/180°C. Line the bottom of a 9 x 3-inch round cake pan with parchment paper.
To Make the Cake:
Sift together the flour and cocoa powder onto a sheet of waxed paper; set aside.
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the eggs, vanilla and granulated sugar on high speed until tripled in volume, about 5 minutes. Remove the bowl from the mixer. Sift the flour mixture over the egg mixture in 2 additions and carefully fold in with a large rubber spatula. Fold a large dollop into the melted butter, then fold back into the egg mixture.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the top. Bake until the cake is puffed, 30 to 35 minutes. Transfer the pan to a wire rack and let cool completely.
To Make the Sugar Syrup:
In a small saucepan over medium heat, combine the granulated sugar and water. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally until the sugar dissolves. Remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature.
To Make the Filling and Frosting:
In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the cream and confectioners' sugar until medium-stiff peaks form. In a small bowl, combine the kirsch and the sugar syrup.
Run a table knife around the edge of the pan and unmold the cake onto a work surface. Turn the cake right side up, leaving the parchment paper in place. Cut the cake horizontally into 3 equal layers. Put the top layer, cut side up, on a serving plate. Brush with some of the syrup, then spread with about one-fourth of the whipped cream. Strew the cherries over the cream (reserve 1 cherry for garnish), leaving a 1/2-inch border of cream around the edge. Position the middle cake layer on the cream. Brush with some of the syrup and spread with another one-fourth of the cream. Position the third cake layer, cut side down, on the cream and peel off the parchment paper. Brush with the remaining syrup. Spread the remaining whipped cream on the top and sides of the cake.
Press the chocolate curls onto the top of the cake. Put the reserved cherry in the middle. Refrigerate cake until ready to serve.
Makes 8-10 servings.
|Date: February 7, 2009|
Just made your Black Forest Cake recipe for my partners birthday, so haven't tried it yet. But what a fun little recipe. Pots everywhere, dishes i'll have to do later. Yes, like other reviews I did have some problems, none of which are the fault of the recipe. My mix master is about to die so it actually took me one hour and 15 minutes before the eggs were to an o.k standard, which was a bit lucky, because I only had two cake tins. But can I say, thanks for this recipe. I have learned a few things along the way, like the gelatin in the cream. I have never done this before, but I'll keep it up my sleeve. I know it will come in handy when I least expect it. Thanks again.
Thank you.Your recipes helped me very much.They're beautiful.I love them and thank you so much.
The cake turned out to be too thin to make layers. Maybe because I used All-purpose flour, but I made the substitution by removing 1TB of flour. It's going to have to be damage control now. My sisters birthday is today and this is quite the problem.
Another review after the damage control. I made another cake and put it on top to make the layers, and some other changes, but all in all it was very much loved and the cake cut real nicely as well. It was quite the success :) Thank you!
Okay... I normally don't follow recipes but I'm not much of a baker so I decided to be a stickler with this one as it is the cake for my son's birthday. Maybe it would have turned out better if I hadn't followed the directions.... I used Swan's Down cake flour; it did not rise. The cake is ONE layer, about frisbee height, dense as clay. The whipped cream turned from "soft peaks" to "brick-laying mortar" in the fourteen magical seconds that it took me to put in the sugar, vanilla and cocoa. When I tried to frost the cake, the whip pulled up the surface of the cake. Yes, the cake had cooled. I'm just a baking debutante but I am literate and therefore, can follow directions exactly. We haven't yet eaten it so I may add another review if warranted. *sigh*
I make this kind of cake every once in a while and I never use the electric mixers. That not only helps me control how well the eggs are beaten, it makes me feel worth doing all the job when I eat it. And it doesn't take much time at all for me to do it by hand. This recipe is perfect for me. By the way, one possible reason to a thin cake could be the under beaten egg whites. When doing by hand, due to the lower speed, sugar is to be added into three separate times, thus putting in more air, helping the cake rise. | <urn:uuid:08a30ade-0b20-4720-87d2-976109725948> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dianasdesserts.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/recipes.recipeListing/filter/dianas/recipeID/6109/Recipe.cfm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945931 | 1,619 | 2.140625 | 2 |
Bonds of the Dead: Temples, Burial, and the Transformation of Contemporary Japanese Buddhism, A talk by Mark Rowe
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
3:00 PM - 5:00 PM
243 Royce Hall, UCLA
Taking a page from one of McMaster University’s more notorious MA students, this talk will consider the rather peculiar preference for a certain view of Japanese Buddhism as a tradition in perpetual decline. Starting with a discussion of how images of ideal priests are created and disseminated in the surveys and studies of sectarian intellectuals, I will then compare these to ways in which temple priests actually talk about themselves. The talk will include material from my first book, Bonds of the Dead, as well as preliminary findings from my current project, Biographies of Non-Eminent Monks, which includes interviews with over 225 temple priests of every stripe from all over Japan.
Mark Rowe is Associate Professor of Japanese Religions at McMaster University. He is an ethnographer of Japanese Buddhism who has written extensively on temple Buddhism and changing burial practices, He is currently writing a manuscript on temple realities and priestly training based on interviews with 226 Buddhist priests from across Japan. His first book, Bonds of the Dead: Temples, Burial and the Transformation of Contemporary Japanese Buddhism, was published by University of Chicago Press.
Cost: Free and open to the public | <urn:uuid:14ccd21a-a3bd-44b4-9e93-5ebf3fe15c89> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://international.ucla.edu/asia/events/showevent.asp?eventid=9717 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956814 | 277 | 1.59375 | 2 |
It’s been a while since I last blogged here — part of the reason is that I didn’t feel I can contribute as much in the efforts to change education as the rest of my Coop friends, but part was my feeling I need to focus on my family and my own health after the crazy hours put in the making of TEDxKids@BC back in September. The time I had for myself have been burdened with lots of questions about life, my own parenting skills, the value I hope to bring up my two daughters with, the mentorship support I want to provide to the youth I am working with as part of the TEDxKids@BC team, etc. With this post I hope to ask some of those questions to my Coop friends and readers as I feel a dire need to start answering some of them before going crazy!
Last summer, I met Sir Ken Robinson in Vancouver and I asked him if he can answer a question that has been bothering me for a while: How can you learn to be free, if you’ve been brought up to be compliant throughout childhood? I was struggling with the notion that freedom (in its true idealistic form) is incompatible with any form of society we have tried to create through human history as one underlying expectation for all of them is that the people should conform to certain standards by complying to the established norms and obeying the accepted laws. Sir Ken paused thoughtfully and commented that it is an interesting question that he will need to think about and maybe write his thoughts on his website. Unfortunately I am not aware of him writing anything to answer my question yet — which may simply mean he forgot or maybe was not able to come up with an answer — but my thoughts have since evolved and now I am starting to question some core beliefs about life (at least one in which people are part of a society).
At first I thought that the incompatibility is in the core meaning of the words like established norms and accepted laws. I thought that if something is established and accepted by the older generations, then the new generations must be mould to fit the societal expectations by learning the rules and sticking to them without too much questions. I thought that our schools are a great example of one such system that has been working well to maintain the society that was shaped by the industrialization over 200 years ago.
Looking at my own daughters, I was able to make many observations about how they use imagination during play — by creating their own little worlds they actively engage in them by choosing different roles for them that let them have different experiences and learn new perspectives. I ran few experiments to see how quickly they learn when given control over a situation — when making my honest trust in their abilities visible they’ve been able to rapidly acquire new skills and their confidence levels skyrocketed beyond my imagination. I also had a chance to observe the role of emotions on building a trusting relationship between us — when acknowledging their emotions and listening or gently inquiring instead of rationalizing why they should stop crying even the worst tantrum or screaming episode would quickly dissolve and let us reflect on what upset them in the first place.
Let me pause and acknowledge that I’ve been influenced a lot by authors like Alfie Kohn and his Unconditional Parenting, Chris Mercogliano and his In Defense of Childhood, A.S. Neill and his autobiography and A Dominie’s Log. They had a profound impact on my perspective as a parent and in what I am looking for in the youth around me to understand their drives, emotions, values and expectations.
All these thoughts have brought deeper questions behind the original I asked Sir Ken about:
- Can imaginative and creative kids be free in a society built on norms and laws they didn’t participate in creating?
- Can we teach freedom? Or the only way to learn it is to live it?
- Can we honestly claim that we treat kids as equals if we rob them of their inner wildness and control everything in their developing years, including when, how and with whom to play?
- Are imaginative kids always going to be seen as attempting to stay outside the lines defined by the system?
- Aren’t we ultimately killing the wholeness of the kids when we put them into institutions to deal with their head and ignore emotions?
- Is freedom an emotion? If yes, by focusing solely on the head, are Western societies by definition non-free?
- Can modern human life be seen as existing outside society? If no then can there be room for internal spirituality and reflection?
- Can we imagine a society embracing engaged, creative, emotional citizens that are allowed to participate in shaping and reshaping the very basis of the society they are involved in without the consequence of isolation or rejection?
- Is society paradoxically incompatible at its core with the basic values of free life?
- Is morality the very essence behind this potential paradox as illustrated by Phineas and Ferb in the video below?
I don’t know the answer to any of these questions — can any of you help me to get anything close to an answer for some? | <urn:uuid:1d958a92-a8fc-4433-ad6d-f0e3648ec41a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://coopcatalyst.wordpress.com/2011/12/29/is-society-incompatible-with-imagination/?like=1&source=post_flair&_wpnonce=18b5244a97 | 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 | 0.978074 | 1,053 | 2.078125 | 2 |
E. Cobham Brewer 18101897. Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. 1898.
A sort of picture-frame. The middle is cut out to the size of the picture, and the border or edge is embossed, so as to present a raised margin. The passe-partout and picture, being backed and faced with a glass, are held together by an edging of paper which shows on the glass face. The word means something to pass over all.
A master-key is also called a passe-partout (a pass through all the rooms). | <urn:uuid:e73c6bc6-88e1-4f3c-bc85-01da9929ddbe> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bartleby.com/81/12842.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949288 | 122 | 2.578125 | 3 |
Samantha Ettus, Contributor
I write about the business and lifestyles of working moms.
Every day I meet people who ask me why they should be active on Twitter and every day I see Twitter friends try to hide their frustration over those that don’t understand their attachment. Here are 9 great ways to use Twitter:
1. To Create a New World
Imagine following only the people who interest you; a world not made up of all of the people you have ever met – like you have on Facebook – but instead a community of people that you have handpicked and would like to know.
2. To Do Research
Twitter’s search engine is a portal for up-to-the-second information on your industry and your interests. There is no better tool for getting data on what people are thinking and saying.
3. To Broaden Your Network
You will meet new people and forge real relationships without leaving your home. As entrepreneur Melissa Stewart puts it, “The more I tweet, the more I learn, the more connections I make, and the more opportunities come my way.”
4. To Keep an Eye on the Competition
You can check out your competitors without sneaking. BakeSpace Founder Babette Pepaj uses Twitter to understand how competitive companies, “position their message and interact with customers.”
5. To Get Corporate Attention
Recently I had a bad experience with Capital One rewards. I tweeted once and they made it more than right by responding immediately with a phone call and a generous solution. When I fell in love with online toy store Magic Beans, I tweeted the owner to thank her for the great selection and free gift wrapping.
6. To Find Curated Content
Twitter allows you to identify thought leaders in your field and gain access to their content – what they are reading, seeing and whom they interact with.
7. To Stay on Top of the Latest
Whether you are a solopreneur or a corporate mogul, you are more valuable when you are on top of the latest news in your industry – and the world. As Harvard Business School Professor Andrew McAfee explains, “Twitter gives me a great idea of what’s new, what’s important, what’s hilarious and what’s generally not to be missed.”
8. To Access Recommendations
Why limit hearing about the latest great book, movie or food trend from your In-Real-Life friends or Facebook friends when you can access the world on Twitter.
9. To Be a Thought Leader or Curator
If you have original thoughts about your industry or have an eye for information, don’t keep them all to yourself. Twitter is a great way to broaden your audience fast.
Samantha Ettus coaches working moms through her nationally syndicated weekly radio show, best selling books, regular keynotes and television appearances. Connect with her on Twitter here. | <urn:uuid:d57f661c-4e29-4732-8244-655172b73274> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.forbes.com/sites/samanthaettus/2012/12/12/9-ways-you-should-be-using-twitter/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925954 | 605 | 1.609375 | 2 |
English Language Proficiency
Applicants who are non-native English speakers and who have not earned at least 56 credits including a grade of "C" in English Composition or a degree from a U.S. regionally-accredited college or university must demonstrate a satisfactory level of English proficiency as part of the application process. This policy applies to both degree seeking and non-degree seeking students, regardless of citizenship or visa status. Official score reports should be submitted directly to the Offices of Admission.
Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL):
A score of 550 or higher on the paper-based test (PBT) or 79 or higher on the internet-based test (iBT) is required for undergraduate, graduate and law LL.M program admission. TOEFL information is available at
and from the Educational Testing Service, P.O. Box 6151, Princeton, NJ 08541-6151, USA. University of Baltimore's school reporting code is 5810.
International English Language Testing System (IELTS):
An overall band score of 6.0 or higher is required for undergraduate and graduate admission; a band score of 6.5 is required for admission to Law School LL.M. programs. IELTS is jointly managed by University of Cambridge (UK) ESOL Examinations, the British Council, and IDP Education Pty Ltd. Australia. IELTS information is available at
http://www.ielts.org. An institutional school code is not required.
The University reserves the right to require additional English language instruction of any student.
The University of Baltimore does not offer English as a Second Language (ESL) courses. | <urn:uuid:3e4457b5-4bab-44cb-93bc-f4784a3813d2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ubalt.edu/admission/international/english-proficiency-toefl.cfm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.908444 | 348 | 1.539063 | 2 |
The European Committee of Social Rights delivers a decision on the inadequate housing conditions of Roma in Portugal
European Roma Rights Centre (ERRC) v. Portugal, Complaint no. 61/2010
decision on the merits
of the European Committee of Social Rights with regard to the case European Roma Rights Centre (ERRC) v. Portugal,
Complaint no. 61/2010, became public today
The complainant organisation alleged that the situation in Portugal was in violation of Articles 16, 30, 31, alone or in conjunction with Article E of the Revised Charter, for failure to ensure the provision of adequate and integrated housing solutions for Roma.
The ERRC considers that re-housing programmes have failed to integrate Roma and often, in fact, have resulted in spatial segregation and inadequately sized dwellings in areas with poor infrastructure and limited or no access to public services. It considers that the approach of the Government to the housing situation of Roma points to, at least, indirect discriminatory practices, which keep Roma excluded and marginalised through residential segregation and substandard quality re-housing.
In its decision , the Committee concluded unanimously that there was violation of Article E
(non discrimination) taken in conjunction with Articles 31§1 (adequate housing), Article
16 (the right of the family to social, legal and economic protection) and Article
30 (right to protection against poverty and social exclusion) and invites the Committee of Ministers to recommend that Portugal pay the complainant organisation a sum of € 2,000 as compensation for expenses incurred by the procedure.
on the merits | <urn:uuid:7f0fbff5-8faf-4715-948b-c77cd08176d3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/monitoring/socialcharter/NewsCOEPortal/CC61Merits_en.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917704 | 315 | 1.914063 | 2 |
A worldwide network of young active people
Junior Chamber International (JCI) is a voluntary, world-wide personal development organisation for young professionals and entrepreneurs in their twenties and thirties. The mission of JCI is to provide development opportunities that empower young people to create positive change.
Active participation in JCI provides members with the opportunities to:
- Enhance their career prospects & add new skills to their CV
- Develop their leadership ability
- Expand their professional and social contacts locally and across the globe
- Increase their self-confidence
- Gain practical project management experience in a safe and supportive environment
By organising events and taking part in projects during their free time, JCI members (affectionately referred to as Jaycees) develop leadership skills and make a positive contribution to their local community. The overwhelming characteristics of Jaycees are their energy, creativity and determination to develop themselves whilst having a lot of fun.
What makes JCI stand out against other personal development and networking organisations is that it does not just focus on just one area of opportunity but five: business, training, international, community and social.
We’re not a networking organisation....but through us you’ll build a network of ambitious future leaders and friends that will last you a lifetime.
We’re not a public speaking organisation....but through us you’ll get training in public speaking and presentations and the opportunity to practice in front of a variety of audiences locally, nationally and internationally.
We’re not a CPD organisation...but through us you’ll get professional and personal development cheaper than with any other comparative organisation.
We’re not a charity...but through us you can take part in projects which make a positive impact in the local community. | <urn:uuid:49d3031e-a2ba-4cd5-97fc-1e22771e31e9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.jcilondon.org.uk/about-us/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941007 | 363 | 1.515625 | 2 |
October 18, 2012 - At the request of the Right Honourable Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada, the Honourable Andrew Scheer, Speaker of the House of Commons, will lead the all-party Canadian delegation attending the canonization mass for Kateri Tekakwitha on October 21, 2012, at the Vatican. Kateri Tekakwitha is the first North American Aboriginal person to become a Catholic saint.
The Honourable Denis Lebel, Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, and the Honourable Peter Penashue, Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, will also be part of the delegation taking part in the canonization mass at the Vatican.
“The story of Kateri Tekakwitha is pious and it is powerful,” said Speaker Scheer. “Her elevation to sainthood is a momentous occasion for Canadian Catholics and many First Nations people, as well as a deep honour for Canada.”
Kateri Tekakwitha, known as Lily of the Mohawks, was born in 1656 to a Mohawk father and Christian Algonquin mother in present-day New York State. Shortly after her baptism at age 20, she moved to a Christian Mohawk village in present-day Kahnawake, Quebec, located on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River across from Montréal. She died there at age 24. Since her death, many miracles have been attributed to her, making her a beloved figure in the Catholic Church, notably for First Nations in both Canada and the United States. Her tomb is located at the St. Francis Xavier Mission in Kahnawake.
Kateri Tekakwitha was declared venerable by Pope Pius XII in 1943 and beatified in 1980 by Pope John Paul II. She will be made a saint by Pope Benedict XVI.
- 30 -
For further information, media representatives may contact:
Foreign Affairs Media Relations Office
Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada
Follow us on Twitter: @DFAIT_MAECI | <urn:uuid:0d7afd7c-a851-4b5f-a854-b97e59e6e807> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.international.gc.ca/media/aff/news-communiques/2012/10/18a.aspx?lang=eng | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95365 | 417 | 2.46875 | 2 |
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Steal this Music
VU's release today: "...First-year students in the 'Stealing in Music City' seminar at Vanderbilt University must devise a workable system for distributing music that delivers content for a reasonable price and allows songwriters, artists and other stakeholders to get paid. “We are challenging the students to re-invent the music industry for a fair model of music distribution to compensate artists, consumers and labels,” said Holling Smith-Borne, director of the music library at Vanderbilt’s Blair School of Music..." On Nov. 12, also, Gov. Phil Bredesen signed into law a copyright-protection bill intended to discourage illegal downloading and sharing of content. | <urn:uuid:2f2c05b9-7cc7-4a3b-9e01-6cada2d63333> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://venturenashville.blogspot.com/2008/11/steal-this-music.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.910295 | 152 | 1.757813 | 2 |
Why such a loooooooong name??? There are so many nice small names out there right? Look how the big guys did it: ebay, amazon, yahoo, google. And now with the web 2.0 phenomenon there are so many good names...like schoolr or acamy or whatever else sounds like a new, fresh and fancy Internet startup company.
But it´s not! And I´m a big believer in changing the status quo when it´s the hardest thing to do. Let me tell you that I don´t believe in doing so for the sake of it. I just can´t stand those names any looooonger! It´s like listening to all these Britney clones at the time when she was hot. Urrrghhh!
So I chose the name Supercool School for this project because I think it captures perfectly the spirit of "changing the world while having fun" and I wanted to have a name that would be easy to understand and remember for people from ALL around the world. I didn´t wanted a sproodle doodle noodle name because we are different. And we are supercool ;-) !
But who am I to know? Read Seth Godin´s blog post about the rules of naming. He knows what he´s talking about although I hate the name squidoo. But I guess Seth can live with this fact...hahaha...in fact he will probably never know ;-)
Well, time will tell if it was a good idea to name this project Supercool School. I can only tell ya that it feeeeels good! So if I have anything to say about brands and naming it would be this: it has to do nothing less then to feeeeel good for you :-)
Steli Efti, Supercool Principal | <urn:uuid:350b3728-b2c8-4b9a-9895-1da163aeee7b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://supercoolschool.typepad.com/blog/2007/03/breaking_the_br.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00024-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9297 | 379 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Take a peek at the recent New York foreclosure auction.
This week, there’s plenty of commotion in the New York area but no, it isn’t because of fashion week or the Westminster dog show. The auction company Real Estate Disposition Corporation managed to gather hundreds of bidders to avail of bargain homes that have been foreclosed. But it seems there’s another outrage outside the auction house.
The company has been obviously taking advantage of the crisis. In their press releases, we’ve found out that in October last year, they’ve sold 1,214 foreclosed homes in Florida and Northern California with a combined value of $165 million. In the following months, this was followed by successful sales in Chicago and Las Vegas worth $57 million for 600 homes, in Kansas City with 95 houses and Denver with more than 80 properties. Bidders are requested to register online first, pay a visit to their desired properties from the company’s online listing, issue a $5,000 check as an earnest money deposit (usually done to make sure that they are serious bidders), and bid on the property that they choose once the auction begins.
On the other hand, there’s nothing enormous that the BailOut the People movement can do to halt foreclosures other than hold protests as seen on the video. In fact, there’s another demonstration slated on April 3 and 4 in Wall Street. In our opinion, they hold a strong point against bailed out banks that do not take measures of holding on houses on the brink of foreclosure. In their working paper, the organization states, “Considering the unprecedented intervention that the government has made to rescue the financial system that created the housing crisis, it is incomprehensible that a simple moratorium on foreclosures and evictions has yet to be enacted. All of these measures have two things in common; one, they all involve persuading bankers to find some ways to slow down the evictions instead of forcing them to stop evictions and two, none of these measures has put a dent in the head-spinning rate of foreclosures. The Moratorium Now! Campaign is fighting to force the government at every level to declare a moratorium on foreclosures and evictions.”
But who’s listening? We highly doubt it would be Tim Geithner. There’s more bank bail out needed if you ask him. But we’re still waiting for the details though.
Realty.com is a real estate search portal, dedicated to connecting home buyers and sellers to trusting real estate services. Follow the Realty.com blog for up to date housing news and trends. And monitor local mortgage rates at RealtyGadget.com. | <urn:uuid:3de7820e-ea6e-4caa-8218-754023653f34> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://realty.com/housing-news/its-a-buyers-market/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00055-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949403 | 567 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Important notice about the analog video format
This is an important notice about the analog video format. It relates to the phasing out analog media and analog players (VCR, Laserdisc [LD] and slide projectors) in the classrooms at Middlebury College. Please review the next sections for information on the reasons behind this and the approach that LIS plans to undertake.
Summary of the analog sunset plan
Analog media (VHS, Betamax, U-matic, etc.) and certain digital media (LaserDiscs) have become obsolete – new media are not being produced, nor are replacement players. For LaserDisc and VCR technology, better, higher quality, and easier to use digital technologies have emerged. By removing these media players players and slide projectors from classrooms, and by replacing these older formats with digital ones, we can ensure that our classrooms will continue to be functional, easy to use, and easy to support, both now and in the near future.
The media and computer industries have chosen to retire certain older audio and video technologies and move to newer digital audio and video formats. This means the imminent death of VHS, LaserDisc, 3/4″ tape and, eventually, even our beloved VGA (and possibly even 16mm and 35mm film, but we don’t know that quite yet). BluRay (using a newer connection type – HDMI) and streaming Internet video are the newer formats intended to replace all of the aforementioned older media formats. The DVD format remains alive, for now.
LIS has developed a plan to address the obsolescence of these older formats and support for the new ones. The process is guided by a combination of technology options, copyright law, and input from our user community. The Copyright and Fair Use Guidelines section of the Handbook outlines some of the copyright intricacies. If you currently have a VHS tape, Laserdisc or 35mm slides that you use for class, you should be developing a strategy for migrating the class material to a different media for use inside and outside of class (see What can you do to prepare.)
- Phase I – Beginning January 1, 2013 LIS will no longer add VHS players to new or renovated classrooms. Current status: VHS players were not added to any of the Warner classrooms after the renovations in January, 2013.
- Phase II – Beginning January 1, 2014 LIS will begin removing VHS, LaserDisc, and slide projectors from all classrooms except for the main auditoriums (Sunderland Dana, Alexander Twilight Auditorium, and Axinn 232). We need to preserve as many of these devices as possible for spare parts and archival purposes.
- Phase III – Onward and upward. LIS will continue to move forward with digital technology, including investigating reliable streaming options, and strive to accommodate any emerging technologies for the future.
What we are doing to prepare
- Over the past two years, LIS has replaced a large amount of analog and obsolete media (VHS & LaserDisc) placed on Library Reserves with DVD or Blu-Ray media. Last winter, a large LaserDisc deselection project reduced our holdings by almost 90% and was lauded by staff and faculty as a strong step forward. In the past year we’ve been turning our attention to the VHS collection, targeting those items which have never circulated, which reduced our holdings by over 35%. We are currently in the process of removing VHS copies of works for which we also have DVD and/or Blu-Ray versions.
- Other VHS titles have not circulated at all in the past seven years (i.e., since our migration of MIDCAT to the current platform), and we are reviewing those titles with faculty input and assistance. Individual departments should check their collection of media titles for VHS items. If any are crucial for teaching or research, LIS can attempt to purchase new copies in modern format (DVD or Blu-Ray) if we do not already have them. If these formats are not available, we will retain the VHS. All other VHS will be removed from the collection.
- Our classrooms will continue to have the option of bringing in an analog or obsolete digital device (VCR, LaserDisc player, slide projector) for the foreseeable future. LIS maintains an inventory of VCRs, LaserDisc players, and slide projectors in functional condition available for check-out from the Library circulation desk. However, there is no guarantee that we will be able to maintain and repair these devices indefinitely, as new supplies dwindle.
- We are following similar steps with our collection of aging audio cassettes. Cassettes that have never circulated in the past seven years are being reviewed. Cassettes that have been put on reserve or that have circulated will be replaced, retained, or migrated to a newer format.
- Please place individual requests to purchase replacements VHS/LaserDisc media at go/requests.
What can you do to prepare
If you currently have a VHS tape, Laserdisc or 35mm slides that you use for class, you should be developing a strategy for migrating the class material to a different media for use inside and outside of class. Look for DVD, Blu-Ray or (legal) Internet video replacements for any VHS, LaserDisc, 3/4″ tape, or Betamax titles in your personal collection. The Library (go/requests) or your liaison (go/liaisons) can assist you with this. If a commercial digital copy is available we will attempt to purchase a replacement; processing times will vary based on availability. Before any in-house conversion of analog or obsolete digital formats is done, however, we need to determine the legality of the duplication request. Expect about 5 business days for the copyright question to be resolved (this can be a somewhat complex issue) and another 5 business days for the actual conversion.
Your input is needed!
We are looking for feedback on the plan, the process and our communications. You can reach out to your LIS liaison or contact me (Petar Mitrevski) directly. You can also post a response right here on the blog and start a lively discussion.
We emphasize the analog sunset whenever we receive a report that a VCR player or VHS tape is broken. We have shared this plan with the Faculty LIS Advisory Group (FLAC) and are working to incorporate their feedback. LIS liaisons will continue to work with each academic department to share this plan and engage in discussion. We have talked about the analog sunset in our December Quarterly Update, April Quarterly Update, and in the context of the recent classroom renovations in Warner. But we need more input from our community. Thank you!
You can read the entire plan at http://go.middlebury.edu/analog. In addition, we’ve developed an FAQ section based on questions from our community. You can also check what other schools are doing to address the issue. | <urn:uuid:2680ea39-9a11-4424-855a-f804c6d2da07> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://sites.middlebury.edu/middblogs/author/pmitrevs/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.924032 | 1,428 | 2.109375 | 2 |
hundred miles of railroad track separate Gardner, Kan., from
the seaports of Southern California. But through the miracle
of global trade, Gardner will soon be transformed into a Los
the next decade, an “intermodal and logistics park” will be
built on the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railway at the southern
edge of Gardner. It’s needed to handle goods imported from
Asia via the Los Angeles and Long Beach seaports. Gardner
could eventually find itself playing host to as many as 30
freight trains per day, each a mile and a half long, along
with thousands of big-rig trucks.
of 16,000, just across the state line from Kansas City, Mo.,
eventually will be sandwiched between 7 million square feet
of warehouses in the logistics park to the south and 4 to
5 million square feet in an industrial park to the north.
The total warehouse floor space easily exceeds that of all
the housing in Gardner.
Hobby, who’ll be living about three-fourths of a mile from
the new facility, can already feel the burn of diesel fumes
in his nostrils. The pollution will be growing thicker over
his neighborhood with each passing year, but he’s trying to
keep his sense of humor. He says, “They talk about making
Kansas a smoke-free state, but it looks like Gardner’s going
to be the designated smoking section.”
environmentalists devoting most of their efforts in recent
years to sounding the alarm on global climate change, local
pollution isn’t always getting the attention it deserves.
But if you share your neighborhood with the sprawling—and
growing—infrastructure that moves imported goods from seaports
to retailers, you can’t help paying attention. You don’t need
to be reminded that air pollutants, even when they’re not
warming the planet, can threaten your health and even your
bureaucrats, and investors rejoiced in late August when the
Commerce Department announced that U.S. exports in June were
up sharply, $28.8 billion higher than June 2007’s exports.
The Department made less noise about the rising tide of imports,
which were up $26.4 billion.
aside that portion of the increased import bill that was due
to rising oil prices, the nation’s seaports, airports, railways,
and highways were still faced with moving an additional $40
billion worth of stuff in and out across our borders, on top
of the $330 billion worth of stuff that’s already going in
and out each month.
consumer and industrial goods, not oil—continue to dominate
over exports in America’s trade equation. Hunger for imports
keeps rising, and the nation’s capacity to manufacture those
products keeps shrinking. So hauling, sorting, and delivering
foreign-made goods has evolved into a fast-growing, high-tech,
Association of Port Authorities says the nation’s seaports
are now handling 1.4 billion tons of goods annually and that
waterborne container traffic will double by 2020. These days,
as every shopper knows, a big share of that traffic is coming
across the Pacific from Asia.
and Oakland handle some of those Asian goods, but most enter
the United States through the twin seaports of Los Angeles
and Long Beach. Together, they comprise the third-largest
container-handling facility in the world, receiving 40 percent
of all imports entering the United States. Traffic through
the two ports is expected to triple within 15 years.
cargo bottlenecks where ships, trains, and trucks converge,
the air can kill you. Oceangoing ships burn the lowest of
low-quality diesel oil, and the fuel used by locomotives isn’t
much better. Trucks burn a greater quantity of fuel per ton
hauled, with correspondingly high emissions. According to
L.A. and Long Beach authorities, the movement of cargo through
their ports was responsible in 2005 for emissions laden with
6,000 tons of particle matter—soot, smoke, dust, organic matter,
and other microscopic flecks that can invade deep into the
lungs—and more than 46,000 tons of nitrogen and sulfur oxides.
near the world’s ports and coastal sea lanes, emissions from
oceangoing vessels cause 60,000 premature deaths annually,
according to a study released last year by a team of U.S.
and German scientists. With increasing trade, the number of
such deaths is projected to increase 40 percent by 2012. Ships’
crews, dock workers, truckers, other port personnel, and local
residents are all vulnerable.
matter produced by burning diesel has been associated with
lung cancer, asthma, chronic bronchitis, cardiovascular disease,
coronary heart disease, decreased lung function in children,
and infant mortality.
according to the California Air Resources Board (CARB), a
relatively small community of 50,000 people living on the
fringes of the L.A. and Long Beach ports suffers 25 new cases
of cancer each year because of diesel pollution from ships,
trucks, and dock equipment. Similar cancer risks were found
for people living around nearby rail yards. Within a “several
mile” radius of the ports, estimated CARB, the air pollutants
kill about 75 people per year.
the rate at which shiploads, trainloads, truckloads, and planeloads
of goods have been arriving from abroad in the past eight
months, 2008 is on track to set an all-time record for imports,
topping $2 trillion for the first time. (Not counting oil,
imports will amount to more than $1.8 trillion, also a record).
Clearly, recent economic pain and soaring diesel-fuel prices
have not diminished Americans’ appetite for imported merchandise.
merchandise never sits in one place for long. It’s moved out
of the ports, sorted at sophisticated warehouse complexes
known as “logistics facilities,” and distributed throughout
the country as quickly as possible. In recent years, California’s
Inland Empire, lying east of L.A. in San Bernardino and Riverside
counties, already has seen construction of logistics warehouses
covering 330 million square feet.
a mental picture of the massive extent of roofing and concrete
that requires, imagine 7,300 football fields paved and enclosed.
Similarly vast acreages surrounding the warehouses are paved
as well. And remember, goods traffic in the area could triple
in coming decades.
2006 commentary, Andrea Hricko, associate professor at the
University of Southern California’s Keck School of Medicine,
cited an example of a doll, made in an Asian sweatshop and
destined to sell for $9.97 at one of Chicago’s big-box discount
stores. By the time the doll reaches Chicago, notes Hricko,
“she has traveled more than 8,000 miles—on diesel-burning
conveyances the whole way.” And she will have left a dark
trail of pollution in the ports and communities she passed
doll, more than likely, arrives at the L.A. or Long Beach
port and rides the BNSF railway to the Elwood, Ill., intermodal
terminal outside Chicago, where it is transferred to a truck.
Once the intermodal facility in Gardner goes into operation,
the doll may end its train journey there and, after a quick
rest in a warehouse, take a truck ride past Claud Hobby’s
house on its way to Wal-Mart somewhere in the nation’s midsection.
From there, it will land in a child’s bedroom for a while
before going to the basement or garage and, eventually, a
visited Elwood last year to get a glimpse of his own future,
and it wasn’t pleasant: “With so many trucks in the area,
they had three police officers on the roads directing traffic,
and it still took me 30 minutes to drive one mile.”
a rising tide of imports from China and other countries choking
the ports of Southern California and the roads around Chicago,
the goods-transport system is looking for alternate routes,
and Mexico stands ready to help. In contrast to the “NAFTA
superhighway” of Internet legend, the rail lines from Mexico
are very real, and they’re humming. Month by month, more Asian
goods are making landfall at the port of Lazaro Cardenas on
southern Mexico’s Pacific coast and riding the Kansas City
Southern railway northeast for 2,200 miles.
merchandise at the other end, the railway and its corporate
partners will be developing yet another intermodal hub, south
of Kansas City and east of Gardner. It will have the potential
for 23 million square feet of warehouse space on its 970 acres
City Star reported in March that the developments at the
intermodal hub are “all part of the railroad’s strategy to
encourage companies and ocean carriers to ship goods from
Asia to Lazaro Cardenas and on into the United States.” According
to a transportation analyst quoted by the paper, “More than
two-thirds of intermodal shipments are consumer goods. They
[Kansas City Southern] have to convince the Wal-Marts, the
J.C. Penneys and Home Depots to use the Mexico-U.S. corridor.
. . . The longer the haul, the better the margins and the
greater the revenues [for the railway].”
of Los Angeles and Long Beach have announced a “Clean Air
Action Plan,” characterized as “the most comprehensive strategy
to cut air pollution and reduce health risks ever produced
for a global seaport complex.” The goal is to reduce emissions
of diesel pollutants by almost 50 percent in five years.
of the program, starting Oct. 1, trucks entering either of
two big Southern California ports will have to comply with
new rules on emissions and safety, and older trucks with poorer
pollution controls will be banned. On top of that, the L.A.
port has decreed that only drivers who are employees of trucking
firms, not independent contractors, will be allowed to enter
the port. The American Trucking Associations (ATA), which
represents most of the nation’s trucking companies, has sued
to block the new rules.
the ATA is employing in its effort to overturn the Action
Plan is the interstate commerce clause of the United States
Constitution. That clause, it is claimed, prohibits states
and localities from interfering with interstate trade. Economist
John Husing of Redlands, Calif., who has done analyses of
the region’s goods-transport industry under contracts with
the ports and the Southern California Association of Governments,
believes that the industry’s constitutional argument will
Husing, “The trucking companies don’t want every Podunk city
in America to be able to say, ‘You can’t drive through our
town!,’ and the courts will agree.”
clause is having an impact in Gardner as well, where a city
clean-air ordinance prohibits truck drivers from letting their
engines idle for more than 10 minutes. “But that’s just window
dressing,” says Claud Hobby. “We can’t do anything about trucks
on railroad property [in the intermodal park].” There, the
commerce clause rules, and Gardner residents will just have
to live with the drifting smog.
says Jane Anne Morris, author of the book Gaveling Down
the Rabble: How Free Trade is Stealing Our Democracy,
it is important to challenge all attempts by corporations
and the federal courts to use the clause as a weapon against
environmentally essential laws. “We would not have the problems
we have now if thousands of good, promising, strong laws had
not been declared unconstitutional under the commerce clause
since 1879,” she says.
Resources Defense Council (NRDC), with headquarters in Washington,
D.C., and an office in Los Angeles, has filed a “motion to
intervene” in opposition to ATA’s lawsuit. Other groups, including
the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the Owner-Operator
Independent Drivers Association, are part of a coalition with
NRDC to support the new environmental regulations at the Southern
spokesperson Jessica Lass makes the case this way: “We support
the plan because more management oversight is needed at the
ports, to improve efficiency. Trucks need to be fully loaded,
to minimize the number of trips in and out. And we need to
be sure they are fuel-efficient and well-maintained.”
pollution from oceangoing ships will be even more difficult
than regulating trucks. Ninety percent of the bunker-fuel-burning,
fume-belching vessels coming into the L.A. and Long Beach
ports are foreign-owned and -flagged. “Ships are under international
control, and that’s the hardest problem to solve,” laments
Protection Agency (EPA) has a voluntary program under which
some ships will use better grades of fuel in their auxiliary
engines (which they switch to when they’re in and around ports),
reduce their speed near ports, and plug into shore-based power
sources when at dock. NRDC hails the program as a step forward,
but Husing doesn’t see it going very far: “We regard EPA as
useless. What they are doing is lame at best.”
volume of imports, growing by the day, threatens to overwhelm
all attempts to clean up the environment along trade routes.
The value of goods being imported nationwide has risen 68
percent just in the past decade; that’s after adjustments
for inflation, and it excludes oil imports.
that growth or even making deep cuts in imports would not
only help clear the air, it would make it easier to clean
up the toxic water pollution that accumulates in sea lanes
and ports. Halting growth would curb the noise pollution that
can do serious damage to human health and interfere with communications
among marine mammals, and it would stop the headlong rush
to pave more land for logistics parks.
imports would address those and a host of other environmental
and human-rights problems created by overproduction and overconsumption.
But with an increasingly fragile economy that depends so heavily
on consumer spending, politicians and economists continue
to call for more trade, not less.
certainly the case on the 2008 campaign trail. The presidential
candidates express concern over imports only when urging “independence
from foreign oil.” Republican John McCain, a committed free-trader,
saluted June’s strong trade report, saying that it “provided
an important reminder of the role that exports play in our
candidate Barack Obama’s campaign Web site says, “Obama believes
that trade with foreign nations should strengthen the American
economy and create more American jobs.” In practice, he appears
to vacillate between advocating mild trade regulations (for
which critics repeatedly brand him as a “protectionist”) and
flirting with “strong dollar” policies that would bring in
even higher volumes of imports.
of the flow through our ports seems almost circular—trade
for the sake of trade. In some of the categories that the
U.S. Census Bureau uses to tally trade, such as “pleasure
boats and motors,” “toiletries and cosmetics,” and “medicinal
equipment,” the dollar values of goods coming in and going
out are strikingly similar.
activity, both inbound and outbound, generates profits along
with the pollution. As a consequence, no one on either side
of the battle over pollution control around ports, roads,
and railways seems to be urging a rollback of imports.
Husing, in his economic analysis of goods traffic in California,
urges aggressive expansion of the industry as the only viable
job-creation strategy. He explains, “In this region, 44 percent
of the population has a high school education or less. People
need blue-collar jobs without barriers to entry. Manufacturing
is in decline. Construction’s in the toilet. But logistics
and distribution is growing fast. With tracking technology,
it’s an information-intensive sector and pays at least as
well as manufacturing, better than construction.”
Husing, “For a while there I was Public Enemy No. 1 in the
environmental movement’s eyes. They are concerned about people’s
health. I argued that poverty is a public-health issue, and
they didn’t like that. But they seem to be coming around.”
issue of ports and distribution centers, environmentalists
are focusing on pollution control, while assuming that consumption
of imported goods will continue to grow. Asked if the root
of the problem is simply that we’re importing too much stuff,
NRDC’s Jessica Lass changes the subject back to efficiency:
“We don’t want to stand in the way of progress. We need a
way to expand our ports in an environmentally sustainable
manner and create more jobs.”
too, the debate is over how to deal with the surge of imported
goods, not how to curtail it. Claud Hobby says that the Burlington
Northern facility should be built in an area 14 miles farther
south of Gardner, where there’s plenty of open land: “We’ve
had this thing thrown into our backyard. Instead, they should
put it where growth can move toward it. Then any people or
companies who don’t mind being near this thing can buy land
and move in around it.”
recession or depression could disrupt the “purchase-driven
life” that fuels the American economy. Until then, it appears,
the quest for more efficient methods of importing ever-greater
tonnages will continue.
economy that can thrive on less production and less importation
of consumer goods would look very different from today’s economy.
It may be out there somewhere in the future, but it’s hard
to see through the clouds of diesel exhaust.
Cox lives in Salinas, Kan. and is the author of Sick Planet:
Corporate Food and Medicine. This article first appeared
on Alternet.org. Source: Featurewell.com. | <urn:uuid:0b424c8e-1878-4080-b3ea-3d1416f050c1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://metroland.net/back_issues/vol31_no38/features.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00035-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.924092 | 4,066 | 2.09375 | 2 |