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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Amy Chua, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother
A parenting style that’s either confoundingly nuts or refreshingly sane
Amy Chua’s parenting style is either confoundingly nuts or refreshingly sane, depending on your perspective and also how far into Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother you get. “Chinese parents have two things over their Western counterparts,” she begins. “1) Higher dreams for their children and 2) higher regard for their children in the sense of knowing how much they can take.”
Chua falls on the Chinese side of the parenting spectrum that she posits, and her strategies for child-rearing include literally forcing her daughters to play instruments, drilling them on the full complement of arithmetic operations while their classmates are still playing with beads, and rejecting unsatisfactory birthday card efforts as “garbage.” No kidding. Of course — thankfully — Chua hedges, noting that she doesn’t want her daughters “to end up like one of those weird Asian automatons who feel so much pressure from their parents that they kill themselves after coming in second on the national civil service exam.”
Inspiring and scary by turns, Chua is never less than totally engaging as she narrates her own book. Is she an outlier on the parenting scale? Sure, but in the case of this much-discussed book, you’d better believe the hype. | <urn:uuid:b4940fea-0b41-42d0-9c6f-36312cb2c143> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.emusic.com/book-news/review/book/amy-chua-battle-hymn-of-the-tiger-mother/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959883 | 302 | 1.75 | 2 |
Cuba and Venezuela
If Hugo goes
Raúl Castro searches for other lifelines
JUST when they were beginning to get used to the daunting prospect of life without Fidel Castro, Cubans are now being forced to consider another, even more daunting, possibility: life without Hugo Chávez. Venezuela's president may well make a full recovery from the cancer for which he was operated on in Havana last month, but he has been reminded that he is mortal. And he may not remain in power beyond a presidential election next year (see article). Venezuela apart, nowhere would his departure from office be felt more strongly than in Cuba.
Mr Chávez subsidises Cuba to the tune of around $3.5 billion a year, by sending it an estimated 115,000 barrels of oil a day (around two-thirds of its consumption). Cuba pays in kind, in the form of 40,000 doctors, intelligence and security experts and other workers stationed in Venezuela. In addition, Mr Chávez is putting up money for infrastructure projects on the island, such as the expansion of an oil refinery at Cienfuegos. Venezuela is also Cuba's top trading partner.
Venezuelan aid has been the biggest single factor in helping the communist island emerge from the catastrophic slump that followed the demise of its previous sponsor, the Soviet Union, in 1991. Adult Cubans remember the early 1990s as a traumatic time of food and fuel shortages. Might such penury return?
Were Mr Chávez's opponents to take power in Venezuela, they would almost certainly cut aid to Cuba, not least since they face pressing needs at home. Cubans could expect widespread shortages. But things would not be quite as bad as in 1991. Then Cuba had become dependent on selling sugar to the Soviet Union at an inflated price. Now the economy is more diversified: the island is producing more oil; and tourism, nickel and remittances from Cuban-Americans have all become important sources of foreign exchange.
Raúl Castro, who succeeded his brother as Cuba's president in 2008, has shown signs of wanting to be less dependent on Venezuela. Whereas Fidel and Mr Chávez are close friends—the two were photographed talking, both dressed in convalescent tracksuits, after Mr Chávez's surgery—Raúl, a quiet and orderly man, seems ill at ease with the boisterous Bolivarian. In 2009 Raúl sacked Carlos Lage, Fidel's prime minister, who was particularly close to Mr Chávez (in 2005 Mr Lage had declared that “Cuba has two presidents, Fidel and Chávez”).
Cuba has recently sought investment from visiting delegations from China (which has offered a multi-billion-dollar credit line), Brazil and India. Raúl is trying to cut food imports by leasing land to private farmers. His other reforms, under which at least 221,000 licences for small businesses have been issued since October, may make the island more attractive for Cuban-Americans to visit or retire to.
But Cuba's main hope of economic independence is the Scarabeo 9, a $750m drilling rig built specially in China with no American parts (to avoid falling foul of the United States' economic embargo against the island). It is due in Cuban waters by the end of the year, contracted by Spain's Repsol to drill an exploratory well.
The United States Geological Survey, a government scientific body, reckons that the seas around Cuba hold 4.6 billion barrels of oil. But they lie under very deep waters. Repsol struck oil there in 2004, but decided extraction would not be profitable. Any new discovery would take years to exploit. If Raúl's reforms gather force, by then Cuba may be a rather different place. | <urn:uuid:579bdb99-6600-468f-9d17-6d0a7ad41e2c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.economist.com/node/18928494 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.969858 | 774 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Tonight is the night; Halloween.
Just as the sun starts to set and nighttime falls, kids of all ages will be roaming through Ahwatukee Foothills decked out in costumes and on the hunt for candy.
In the event that your kids happen to collect enough bubble gum and lollipops to last them through Christmas, some dental offices are collecting candy in exchange for cash, then sending the candy out to soldiers in war zones.
“This takes a lot of the sugar out of kids’ hands and over to the troops overseas,” said Dr. Rahul G. Kode, of Dental by Design in Ahwatukee.
Through Operation Gratitude, Dental By Design, among others, will be offering $1 for every pound of unopened candy up to two weeks after Halloween.
Kode said the office, located at 4855 E. Warner Road, was able to send more than 150 pounds of candy to the organization last year.
Operation Gratitude sends 100,000 car packages annually to troops in the military. The care packages includes food, entertainment items and even personal letters. The organization’s Halloween Candy Buyback is also a national program.
Ahwatukee Family Dental, 11022 S. 51st St., is accepting candy from 5 to 6:30 p.m. on Nov. 1. This is the office’s first year doing the buyback program, and staff has high hopes to continue it next year.
“Come one, come all,” said staff member Mindy Smith. “We’ll take whatever they bring.”
Dr. Walter J. Rapacz and his staff at 3646 E. Ray Road were able to send more than 260 pounds of donated candy last year.
Rapacz, along with Ahwatukee Family Dental, will be giving the kids goodie bags during the buyback events this Halloween.
“It’s special because the troops also hand out the candy overseas to civilians,” Smith said.
For more information on the candy buyback program, visit halloweencandybuyback.com.
• Contact writer: (480) 898-4903 or email@example.com | <urn:uuid:a25fa35b-31de-453f-bfda-06ebf67054cf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ahwatukee.com/news/article_c61522da-221c-11e2-8a1c-0019bb2963f4.html?mode=story | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939199 | 476 | 1.601563 | 2 |
One of the first questions frequently asked upon encountering the Brahma Kumaris is, “Is this a women’s organisation?” The answer is “no”. Although primarily administered by women, it is an organisation in which both women and men participate equally.
The Role of Women
In October 1937, Brahma Baba formed a Managing Committee of eight young women and in February 1938, he surrendered all his property and assets to a Trust administered by them. The soundness of his decision to choose women and young girls as administrators and spiritual teachers has been born out by the Brahma Kumaris World Spiritual University (BKWSU) becoming a respected global institution under their leadership. Brahma Baba also correctly foresaw that core values based on traditionally feminine qualities – patience, tolerance, sacrifice, kindness and love – would increasingly become the foundation of progress in personal growth, human relations, and the development of caring communities.
Brahma Baba’s vision of the future world was one of harmony between the sexes and of partnership rooted in spirituality, for spirituality is the key to trust and respect. Today, although women head the organisation, there are many men coordinating centres and playing other key administrative roles.
Current Spiritual Leaders
Administrative Head – Brahma Kumaris
As Administrative Head of the Brahma Kumaris, Dadi Janki provides a working leadership model for all women and men who are seeking to integrate both male and female qualities into their personal and professional lives. Dadi Janki lovingly engages people of all faiths and walks of life to be true to their spiritual self; to undertake their unique and individual part in the play of creating a future world worthy of the generations to come. In short, Dadi Janki calls us all to our potential.
Dadi Hirdaya Mohini
Additional Administrative Head – Brahma Kumaris
The name Hirdaya Mohini means ‘The one who attracts the heart’, and perhaps because she attracts the hearts of one and all, Dadi is popularly known by the name Gulzar, which means ‘rose garden’. At the age of eight, Dadi Gulzar was one of the original members of a boarding school set up in Sindh in 1937 by Brahma Baba. Her concentrated training in spiritual principles and practice has continued ever since. Dadi Hirdaya Mohini became a member of the committee of women that administers the Brahma Kumaris and, in doing so, paved the way for many other women to develop leadership skills.
Dadi Ratan Mohini
Joint Administrative Head – Brahma Kumaris
Dadi Ratan Mohini wears several administrative ‘hats’ in addition to being Joint Administrative Head of the BKWSU. She is also the Director of the Personnel Department of the Madhuban campuses at the University’s headquarters in Mount Abu, Chairperson of the Youth Wing of the Raja Yoga Education and Research Foundation, Director of Teacher Training Programmes in India, and Zonal Head of Brahma Kumaris services in the state of Rajasthan. Yet this “most beautiful jewel”, as her name connotes, always appears light and tension-free. Known for her dedication to fostering spiritual and moral excellence in young people, Dadi, even in her eighties, is herself lively and young at heart. | <urn:uuid:3a3e19c2-cd25-4c1d-971a-71792dd6c357> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bkwsu.org/afr/senegal/whoweare/spiritualleaders | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95815 | 695 | 2.3125 | 2 |
PhilosophySeeking the truth is no simple task. It involves the exploration of controversial questions and examination of conflicting viewpoints. If you relish logic and enjoy the give-and-take of debate, you may be a philosopher at heart.
As a student of philosophy, you build the capacity to identify problems, analyze alternative approaches and find suitable solutions. In other words, you learn to see the world through the lens of critical thought and to reason your way from complex question to appropriate response.
At St. Norbert College, you can earn a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy. Or you may minor in the field.
A Philosophy Degree at Work
Philosophy teaches you to examine an idea from every angle to arrive at the most sound conclusion rather than accepting it at face value. Employers and graduate school admission officials prize these critical-thinking skills.
As a philosophy major, you might put your analytical and investigative abilities to use in a variety of careers:
- Congressional staff member
- Public relations expert
- Business manager
- Systems analyst
- Political campaign manager
- Issue advocate
- Technical writer
Fortify Your Philosophy Degree
Faculty from St. Norbert College and the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay collaborate to offer Philosophers’ Café. This series of public forums at local coffee houses and pubs engages students and community members in philosophical dialogue.
As a philosophy student at St. Norbert College, you may be eligible for the need-based James D. Madden Scholarship. Deep intellectualism and moral commitment also may qualify you for the Thomas Phelan and James Regan Award for Excellence in Philosophy.
You can enrich your philosophy education through St. Norbert College’s extensive study abroad program. Research collaborations with faculty also can give you a richer experience in the field. | <urn:uuid:1fd61a63-743f-4562-9b0f-38b69d45e889> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.snc.edu/philosophy/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.912447 | 369 | 2.109375 | 2 |
First, some common sense:
Let's assume self-interest explains the formation of beliefs about climate change by ordinary members of the public (I'm very happy to do that). In that case, we should expect the economic impact of climate change & proposed climate change policies on the public's perception of climate change risks to be 0.00, and the impact of cultural identity to be [some arbitrarily large number].
What the ordinary member of the public believes about climate change won't have any impact on the threat it poses to the environment or on the policies society adopts to repel that threat. The same is true about how he or she votes in democratic elections or behaves as a consumer. As an individual, he or she just isn't consequential enough to matter.
Accordingly, there is no reason to expect much if any correlation between, say, economic class, etc., and climate change risk perception.
In contrast, what an ordinary individual believes and says about climate change can have a huge impact on her interactions with her peers. If a professor on the faculty of a liberal university in Cambridge Massachusetts starts saying "cliamte change is ridiculous," he or she can count on being ostracized and vilified by others in the academic community. If the barber in some town in South Carolina's 4th congressional district insists to his friends & neighbors that they really should believe the NAS on climate change, he will probably find himself twiddling his thumbs rather than cutting hair.
It's in people's self-interest to form beliefs that connect rather than estrange them from those whose good opinion they depend on (economically, emotionally, and otherwise). As a result, we should expect individuals' cultural outlooks to have a very substantial impact on their climate change risk perceptions.
(For elaboration of this argument, see CCP working paper No. 89, Tragedy of the Risk Perceptions Commons.)
Second, some data:
I have constructed some regression models to examine the impact of household income (hh_income) and cultural worldviews (hfac for hierarchy and ifac for individualism) on climate change risk perceptions (z_GWRISK; for explanation of that measure, see here). The data come from a nationally representative survey of 1500 US adults conducted by the Cultural Cognition Project with a grant from the National Science Foundation. To see the regression outputs, click on the thumbnail to the right.
The analyses show, first, that differences in income have a very small negative impact on climate change risk perceptions (B = -0.07, p < 0.01) when consdired on its own (model 1).
Second, the analyses show that cultural worldviews have a very large impact -- a typical egalitarian communitarian and a typical hierarchical individualist are separated by about 1.6 standard deviations on the risk perception measure -- controlling for income (model 2). When cultural worldviews are controlled for, income turns out to have an effect that is practically nil (B = -0.02, p = 0.56).
But wait: the third thing the analyses show is that income does have a modest effect -- one that is conditional on survey respondents' cultural worldviews. As they become wealthier, egalitarian communitarians become slightly more concerned about climate change, while hierarchical individualists become less (Model 3).
Bottom line: economic self-interest doesn't matter; cultural identity self-interest does. | <urn:uuid:455e8473-5354-4675-875c-4f8dec6ab160> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.culturalcognition.net/blog/2012/3/3/does-economic-self-interest-explain-climate-change-skepticis.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00030-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944931 | 698 | 2.328125 | 2 |
Is there anything parents can do before the child begins potty training?
Host: Is there anything parents can do before the child begins potty training? Rene Hackney: There are things you can be doing early as young as 12 to 18 months, letting children observe you going to the bathroom. I know that sounds really uncomfortable for a lot of people, but children are designed to learn best from modeling and so if you can allow them to come in to the bathroom with you and watch that process and you are comfortable talking about the process with them, they are going to that much ready to pick it up. Other things you can do is read out the story books, there is lots of good story books on the market about going to the potty or videos. There are several good videos on the market about the potty training process and getting kids excited about potty training. So you can mix those in with your other story books and with your other videos at other times. Another thing, that is suggested is that before you start potty training that you are using the correct terms with children for their body part being label a vagina and a penis rather than, what families tend to do, the funny names, they tend to make up. The problem is for young children when they are potty training is that if they use funny names, they may not be able to communicate with everybody around them, their babysitters or their pre-school teachers and you want everybody to understand the child and lessen that sense of frustration. If parents though are already using family names, when they start potty training they do not want them to correct it then because that just adds more confusion by changing the names in extremes so. | <urn:uuid:6e29ffd6-7b8b-4314-bfc8-4e621afa121c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://videos.parentdish.com/before-you-begin-potty-training-155908400/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00026-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.977714 | 345 | 2.515625 | 3 |
Scotland’s socialist Party has condemned moves by Nationalist MSP Roseanna Cunningham to table amendments today which could effectively block gay couples from adopting children.
Ms Cunningham argued ahead of a Holyrood debate today, that moves to allow the Bill to proceed would be “against nature’s design.”
Solidarity party members have called on Ms Cunningham to accept SNP commitments to equality or resign.
Solidarity Co-Convenor Rosemary Byrne said: “During wars, whole generations of children have been raised in homes where
two women manage the household – mothers and grandmothers, aunts, sisters – all have worked efficiently as a family unit, producing well adjusted and well cared for children. It is a nonsense to argue that what those two women may have done in their sexual lives should have any bearing on the well being of the children in the household.”
Solidarity member and manager of the Glasgow LGBT Centre, Ruth Black, called on the SNP to deal with Cunningham’s attack on equality: “The SNP clearly state, on their website, that they believe in “equal rights for all, regardless of race, gender, age, sexuality, faith, belief, ability, status or social background”. We call on SNP members to ask Roseanna Cunningham to accept this fundamental plank of the SNP’s belief’s or to resign from the party and the parliament.”
Currently only 400 children are adopted in Scotland every year, while 6500 remain in care.
The Catholic Church, still a powerful voice in Scotland, has led the campaign to try to stop the new law.
Ms Cunningham, the MSP for Perth and a former candidate for SNP leader, denies she is homophobic.
“This is not about gay rights, this is about children and for me the evidence shows that children do best in what we call a traditional family setting.
“That’s what we should be seeking to replicate for children who have lost their parents,” she told the BBC.
The SNP, while a marginal force in Westminster politics, are the second-largest party in the Scottish Parliament. The rest of the party are expected to vote for the new adoption arrangements.
The Scottish Green Party said it would support the rights of gay and lesbian people. Green MSP Patrick Harvie told the BBC: “Children brought up in a loving relationship do better, children brought up in a stable family environment do better – that’s very clear – but that doesn’t mean that marriage is the only acceptable model.
“The question for the state and for society is how best do we support all families to do the best job they can.
You don’t do that by simply saying that some families are second class.”
The bill will be debated today and is expected to pass. | <urn:uuid:5a3b5fa5-6b2c-48d0-9c6b-f9a100c9ac58> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2006/12/07/socialists-urge-msp-to-resign-over-gay-adoption-view/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962489 | 592 | 1.5 | 2 |
SAN MARINO, CA.- The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens
has added to its holdings a newly identified painting by prominent 17th-century French painter Philippe de Champaigne (16021674). Selected for acquisition by The Huntingtons Art Collectors Council at its spring meeting, Portrait of Jean de Thévenot (16331667), painted between 1660 and 1663, had been misattributed to Dutch artist Gerbrand van den Eeckhout (16211674), but with the discovery in 1990 of a related painting in a private collection, it was established as a remarkable addition to Champaignes body of work. This year, with a comparison to an engraved portrait in a journal written by Orientalist and traveler Thévenot, the identity of the sitter was determined. The sitter was previously identified as French linguist and archeologist Antoine Galland (1646 1715), to whom the picture, however, bears little resemblance.
Portrait of Jean de Thévenot goes on view today in the Huntington Art Gallery, providing an art historical bridge between works of 16th- and 18th-century European art. It will be a centerpiece in the gallery of 17th-century art to be reinstalled sometime next year. In the meantime, it will be on display in the upstairs gallery of Renaissance paintings and bronzes. It is a superb and visually captivating example of the work of one of Frances most important Baroque painters. Moreover, the identity of the sitter, a man of letters and science, resonates with other aspects of The Huntington and its mission.
This painting is not only a superb example of an important artists distinctive style, it is a discovery, and as such is important for reasons of artistic and historical scholarship, said John Murdoch, Hannah and Russel Kully Director of the Huntington Art Collections. Furthermore, the representation of a man who was a botanist and scientist as well as a traveler and linguist is particularly apt for The Huntington, with its renowned botanical gardens and rich holdings of material on the history of science.
The paintings attribution to Champaigne resulted from the discovery of a painting in a French private collection of the same subject and composition. It was not unusual for the artist to make two copies of the same painting, with variations in size or composition. The subject was identified while it was in London by the striking resemblance of the sitter to the engraved portrait that serves as frontispiece to de Thévenots journal, which was written during his travels to the Middle East and published in 1664 as Relation dun voyage fait au Levant. The Huntington Library owns an early English translation of this volume.
Measuring 23 ½ by 17 inches, Portrait of Jean de Thévenot depicts the subject in sumptuous Turkish costume, wearing a tasseled silk turban and sash and a cloak of gold threaded brocade. Thévenot wrote extensively about his journeys to Turkey and elsewhere and was a gifted linguist, natural scientist, and botanist. He stands before a large swath of drapery that partially conceals a pillar surmounted by a column with his left hand resting on the finely ornamented and jeweled hilt of a sword. This theatrical presentation creates a dramatic shift between the subject and the dreamy pink- and blue-hued structure in the distance. Composed of domes, the structure brings to mind Turkish architectural monuments of the 16th century such as the Sultanáhmet Mosque in Istanbul. Champaigne took obvious pleasure in rendering the lavish fabrics and almost translucent complexion of the striking and exotic figure.
The intense observation of material detailsuch as the veined and pinkish coloration of flesh and the textures of fabricsrecall Champaignes Flemish training, and the majestic solemnity brings to mind the classicism of Nicolas Poussin, with whom he collaborated, said Catherine Hess, chief curator of European art at The Huntington. However, in this case, Champaigne uses his own gravity and penetrating naturalism to depict a remarkably vivid, striking, and unusual subject.
Philippe de Champaigne was a successful painter of religious subjects and the greatest portraitist of his time in France. After training in his native Flanders, Champaigne traveled to Paris in 1621 where he met the young Poussin (15941665), whose rational classicism was to have great impact on his style. Champaigne collaborated with Poussin on decoration for Marie de Medicis Luxembourg Palace in Paris, and by 1627 he became the Queen Mothers official painter. He gained the favor of King Louis XIII and of the kings chief minister, Cardinal Richelieu, for whom he painted numerous portraits. In his last years he reserved his efforts for portraits of his family and friends as well as for religious subjects. Portrait of Jean de Thévenot is one of these late works. | <urn:uuid:332f96d5-b077-42f7-a941-acec4bb950d3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=2&int_new=38018&int_modo=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96056 | 1,017 | 2.515625 | 3 |
Nearly 3,000 acres of Sierra Nevada peaks, meadows and forests atop Donner Summit will be preserved from development under a deal announced Monday.
A coalition of environmental groups said they had reached an agreement to buy the Royal Gorge Cross Country Ski Resort, which became available after would-be developers defaulted on their loans.
It's one of the most high-profile acquisitions to date by land trusts in California that have set out to acquire property slated for development. The real estate crash brought considerable bargains for those conservation groups that still have the money to act.
"I think it's the most significant conservation effort in the recent history of the Sierra Nevada," Perry Norris, head of the Truckee Donner Land Trust, said of Royal Gorge. "It's Donner Summit we're talking about."
The summit has long been a gateway to Northern California, with the routes of Native Americans, emigrant wagon trains, the transcontinental railroad and Interstate 80 crossing the mountains, he said. The community of Serene Lakes, where many Sacramentans own vacation homes, is nestled in the midst of Royal Gorge.
"We came awfully close to losing this landscape," Norris said.
In 2005, Bay Area developers bought the property for a reported $35 million from Royal Gorge co-founder John Slouber. The resort, opened in 1971, introduced downhill-style ski amenities to cross-country skiers and billed itself as the largest cross-country ski resort in North America.
The developers, Kirk Syme and cousins Todd and Mark Foster, proposed building 950 condos and single-family houses on the summit. Their plan raised a howl of opposition from conservation groups and local residents, including owners at Serene Lakes.
The plan ultimately fizzled. The developers defaulted on a $16.7 million loan from Armed Forces Bank in June 2011, and a judge placed the property in receivership.
The receiver, Douglas Wilson Cos. of San Diego, recently agreed to sell the 3,000 privately held acres of the ski resort to conservation groups Truckee Donner Land Trust, The Trust for Public Land and the Northern Sierra Partnership.
The purchase price: $11.25 million.
"It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get the last well-known piece of the Sierra at what is really a very good price," said Tom Mooers, head of Sierra Watch, a group that fought the proposed development and has helped broker purchases of other large properties.
Now the groups have until December, when escrow closes, to raise the funds.
Leaders expressed confidence in their ability to put together the purchase price and then some. They're aiming to raise $13.5 million to cover needed upgrades, including trail improvements and forest maintenance. They intend to keep the ski area open under management by the nearby Sugar Bowl resort.
Already, said Norris, the buyers have secured a $1 million pledge from Northern Sierra Partnership, which includes The Nature Conservancy and other conservation groups as members. Several donors have pledged $250,000 each, he said.
Serene Lakes Property Owners Association President Ken Hall said residents have raised $1.4 million, and pledged $3 million, to keep the quiet of their community, which forbids power boats.
"I've never seen the community respond so positively and enthusiastically to a fundraising drive," Norris said.
The Truckee Donner Land Trust was one of the groups involved in the $23.5 million purchase in 2007 of the Waddle Ranch. The 1,500-acre property in the Martis Valley, south of Truckee, had been slated for hundreds of homes, a shopping center and golf course before conservationists bought it and preserved it as public open space.
It's a model of conservation that has taken off in the past three decades as the number of national, state and local groups buying and protecting land has proliferated.
There are about 1,700 such groups nationwide, according to the Land Trust Alliance, a Washington, D.C.-based group that conducts its National Land Trust Census every five years. Together, those groups had preserved about 47 million acres by the end of 2010. California had the most land trusts with 197, the group said.
Darla Guenzler, executive director of the California Council of Land Trusts, puts the current number of active land trusts here at 120. The groups, which range from local farmland trusts to mountain and coastal preservation groups, have protected about 3 million acres, sometimes using funds from voter-approved ballot measures.
"Acquisitions have been down during the recession," due to fundraising losses, Guenzler said, but there "are still some going forward."
The Royal Gorge agreement and Tahoe-area purchases are among the "charismatic" efforts that draw attention to the cause, she said. "A lot of people vacation there." | <urn:uuid:3eaa5138-128a-43f8-b173-2e41e0107a2e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sacbee.com/2012/08/07/4699786/environmental-coalition-agrees.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963021 | 1,003 | 1.640625 | 2 |
California voters saw through a lot of the high-priced hype this election, but not all. NBC Bay Area believes the initiative process has to change.
Viewers shared their frustration with us: ”Why is this on the ballot? We already passed this law!"
And they’re right! The initiative system, approved a hundred years ago to give citizens the power to write law and fight government corruption, has been – on many fronts -taken away from the “little guy” and taken over by big money.
Today, we have multi-national corporations writing California law - not for the people, but for themselves.
With a new governor and a revamped legislature headed back to Sacramento, now is the time to call for full transparency so voters know who stands to gain from each measure. | <urn:uuid:152b9aeb-8811-43fe-b779-9924ff4e1a5e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nbcbayarea.com/on-air/as-seen-on/editorialTake-Back-The-Initiative-Process-106795553.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954741 | 165 | 1.5 | 2 |
As most readers of this blog know, there has been quite a furor over new results demonstrating mutations in H5N1 influenza strains that are both deadly and highly contagious in mammals. Two groups, led by Ron Fouchier in the The Netherlands and Yoshihiro Kawaoka at The University of Wisconsin, have submitted papers to Nature and Science describing the results. The National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) has requested that some details, such as sequence information, be omitted from publication. According to Nature, both journals are "reserving judgement about whether to censor the papers until the US government provides details of how it will allow genuine researchers to obtain redacted information".
For those looking to find more details about what happened, I suggest starting with Dorveen Caraval's interview with Fouchier in the New York Times, "Security in Flu Study Was Paramount, Scientist Says"; Kathleen Harmon's firsthand account of what actually happened when the study was announced; and Heidi Ledford's post at Nature News about the NSABB's concerns.
If you want to go further, there is more good commentary, especially the conversation in the comments (including from a member of the NSABB), in "A bad day for science" by Vincent Racaniello. See also Michael Eisen's post "Stop the presses! H5N1 Frankenflu is going to kill us all!", keeping in mind that Eisen used to work on the flu.
Writing at Foreign Policy, Laurie Garrett has done some nice reporting on these events in two posts, "The Bioterrorist Next Door" and "Flu Season". She suggests that attempts to censor the results would be futile: "The genie is out of the bottle: Eager graduate students in virology departments from Boston to Bangkok have convened journal-review debates reckoning exactly how these viral Frankenstein efforts were carried out."
There is much I agree with in Ms. Garrett's posts. However, I must object to her assertion that the work done by Fouchier and Kawaoka can be repeated easily using the tools of synthetic biology. She writes "The Fouchier episode laid bare the emptiness of biological-weapons prevention programs on the global, national, and local levels. Along with several older studies that are now garnering fresh attention, it has revealed that the political world is completely unprepared for the synthetic-biology revolution." As I have already written a book that discusses this confusion (here is an excerpt about synthetic biology and the influenza virus), it is not actually what I want to write about today. But I have to get this issue out of the way first.
As far as I understand from reading the press accounts, both groups used various means to create mutations in the flu genome and then selected viruses with properties they wanted to study. To clarify, from what I have been able to glean from the sparse accounts thus far, DNA synthesis was not used in the work. And as far as I understand from reading the literature and talking to people who build viruses for a living, it is still very hard to assemble a functioning, infectious influenza virus from scratch.
If it were easy to write pathogen genomes -- particularly flu genomes -- from scratch, we would quite frankly be in deep shit. But, for the time being, it is hard. And that is important. Labs who do use synthetic biology to build influenza viruses, as with those who reconstructed the 1918 H1N1 influenza virus, fail most of the time despite great skill and funding. Synthesizing flu viruses is simply not a garage activity. And with that, I'll move on.
Regardless of how the results might be reproduced, many have suggested that the particular experiments described by Fouchier and Kawaoka should not have been allowed. Fouchier himself acknowledges that selecting for airborne viruses was not the wisest experiment he could have done; it was, he says, "really, really stupid". But the work is done, and people do know about it. So the question of whether this work should have been done in the first place is beside the point. If, as suggested by Michael Eisen, that "any decent molecular biologist" could repeat the work, then it was too late to censor the details as soon as the initial report came out.
I am more interested in the consequences of trying to contain the results while somehow allowing access to vetted individuals. Containing the results is as much about information security as it is biological security. Once such information is created, the challenge is to protect it, to secure it. Unfortunately, the proposal to allow secure access only by particular individuals is at least a decade (if not three decades) out of date.
Any attempt to secure the data would have to start with an assessment of how widely it is already distributed. I have yet to meet an academic who regularly encrypts email, and my suspicion is that few avail themselves of the built-in encryption on their laptops. So, in addition to the university computers and email servers where the science originated, the information is sitting in the computers of reviewers, on servers at Nature and Science, at the NSABB, and, depending on how the papers were distributed and discussed by members of the NSABB, possibly on their various email servers and individual computers as well. And let's not forget the various unencrypted phones and tablets all of those reviewers now carry around.
But never mind that for a moment. Let's assume that all these repositories of the relevant data are actually secure. The next step is to arrange access for selected researchers. That access would inevitably be electronic, requiring secure networks, passwords, etc. In the last few days the news has brought word that computer security firms Stratfor and Symantec have evidently been hacked recently. Such attacks are not uncommon. Think back over the last couple of years: hacks at Google, various government agencies, universities. Credit card numbers, identities, and supposedly secret DoD documents are all for sale on the web. To that valuable information we can now add a certain list of influenza mutations. If those mutations are truly a critical biosecurity risk -- as asserted publicly by various members of the NSABB -- then that data has value far beyond its utility in virology and vaccinology.
The behavior of various hackers (governments, individuals, other) over the last few years make clear that what the discussion thus far has done is to stick a giant "HACK HERE" sign on the data. Moreover, if Ms. Garrett is correct that students across the planet are busy reverse engineering the experiments because they don't have access to the original methods and data, then censorship is creating a perverse incentive for innovation. Given today's widespread communication, restriction of access to data is an invitation, not a proscription.
This same fate awaits any concentration of valuable data. It obviously isn't a problem limited to collections of sensitive genetic sequences or laboratory methods. And there is certainly a case to be made for attempting to maintain confidential or secret caches of data, whether in the public or private interest. In such instances, compartmentalization and encryption must be implemented at the earliest stages of communication in order to have any hope of maintaining security.
However, in this case, if it true that reverse engineering the results is straightforward, then restriction of access serves only to slow down the general process of science. Moreover, censorship will slow the development of countermeasures. It is unlikely that any collection of scientists identified by the NSABB or the government will be sufficient to develop all the technology we need to respond to natural pathogens, let alone any artificial ones.
As with most other examples of prohibition, these restrictions are doomed before they are even implemented. Censorship of information that is known to exist incentivizes innovation and rediscovery. As I explored in my book, prohibition in the name of security is historically a losing proposition. Moreover, science is inherently a networked human activity that is fundamentally incompatible with constraints on communication, particularly of results that are already disclosed. Any endeavor that relies upon science is, therefore, also fundamentally incompatible with constraints on communication. Namely developing technologies to defend against natural and artificial pathogens. Censorship threatens not just science but also our security. | <urn:uuid:5a754f16-8628-44b8-b04a-f5321808794f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.synthesis.cc/2012/01/censoring-scientific-publication-is-detrimental-to-security.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960054 | 1,664 | 2 | 2 |
Little more than a century ago, Steveston was the salmon capital of the world. The world’s fastest, tall-masted, clipper ships docked at canneries that lined the Fraser River as tonnes of canned fish were loaded into their holds.
It’s hard to imagine what it looked like then. All that’s left on Cannery Row is the remains of a single one — the Gulf of Georgia — and it’s a national historic site. Few traces remain of the fishermen’s shacks, bars, opium dens and brothels from the early 1900s. Among the only remnants of the era is the Hepworth Building at the corner of Moncton Street and 2nd Avenue. Built in 1913 using red bricks carried as ship ballast, it was used for Dr. William Hepworth’s drugstore and medical practice. It was the only building to survive the 1918 fire.
As recently as the 1960s, Cannery Row still thrived. As a child, my guide Gordon Kibble remembers a whistle blowing three times a day – 8 a.m., 4 p.m. and midnight – to mark the shift change at the canneries. He recalls tired, Japanese women clad in green kerchiefs, aprons and boots walking slowly down Moncton and Chatham Streets at shift’s end.
Even now, despite declining salmon stocks and the last cannery closing in 1996, fishing and Cannery Row sustain Steveston.
The commercial fleet still ties up at the government docks and men and women with calloused hands and weathered faces sell fresh and frozen catch off the boats. They’re a picturesque backdrop for the tourists who crowd gift shops and restaurants and for the condo owners with million-dollar waterfront views.
We start our walk at the Gulf of Georgia Cannery, heading west to Garry Point Park and its unsurpassed, 360-degree view of Georgia Strait, shipping traffic, the river delta and the mountains.
Irate residents saved the site from development, winning a court battle in 1981. After that, the City of Richmond bought the land, using it first as a sand storage site and later a park. We pause and pay our respects at the Fishermen’s Memorial with its giant net needle.
“I look at some of these [engraved] names and I remember standing here, waving goodbye and a few days later they were gone forever,” says Kibble, who has worked on fishboats as a deck hand, researcher and photographer.
As we walk back toward the cannery, which residents battled for a decade to preserve, Kibble talks about the early 1900s. “It was wall-to-wall buildings along here. People lived here, mended nets, stored their fishing gear. There was a boardwalk in front and a maze of boardwalks and trails behind.”
We pass Chatham and Moncton streets, a tribute to the New Brunswick birthplace of Manoah Steves. One of the first white settlers, Steves bought 700 acres of land on Lulu Island in 1877.
Before the settlers came, there may have been as many as 2,000 Musqueam living in cedar-planked longhouses at Garry Point and another site about a kilometre upriver. Their numbers swelled as much as tenfold during the fishing season. But by 1914, they were all gone.
The first cannery opened in 1882. By 1905, there were 23 of them and they attracted fishermen like Tomekichi Homma. He arrived at 18, helped establish the Japanese Fishermen’s Association, the Fishermen’s Hospital and the Japanese Language School. After becoming a Canadian in 1896, Homma won voting rights for Japanese-Canadians in the B.C. Supreme Court only to have that decision overturned by the British Privy Council.
When we arrive at the government dock, Kibble pulls a rusted can out of his backpack from one of the long-gone Steveston canneries. The label reads: Capital Brand salmon. One side has a drawing of the Parliament Buildings in Victoria; the other, a salmon.
Then, he pulls out a set of four glass vials that hold varying stages of salmon – from eggs to fry. We peer into the water trying to spot some live fry, but find nothing.
Kibble points out the different boats – seiners, gillnetters and those rigged for crabbing. He points to the Lloyd B. Gore, now the Ku’ulakai. It’s a Mikki class tug used by the U.S. navy during the Second World War to tow damaged ships from the Pacific back for repair. Later, it was used by drug runners in the South Pacific. Across from it is the Western Star, a former mine sweeper.
We stop for lunch at Pajo’s, a floating fish stand whose popularity nearly sank it a few years ago when too many people crowded on to the float. The fish and chips come wrapped in a cone that fits neatly into round holes bored in the plastic tables.
Over lunch, Kibble tells me how Steveston Island a.k.a. Shady Island just across the river began as a sandbar and grew as it was loaded up with material dredged from the shipping channel. It’s now important habitat for salmon and dozens of bird species including bald eagles. It has no human settlers yet, but Kibble worries that may not last.
From Pajo’s we go one dock over to the fish sellers, stopping to look at the bench memorial to Tony Cupadouca, only the second person to sell fish off his boat.
A few minutes later at the Moncton Street post office, we run into Pat Westman. She was Canada’s first female harbour manager and it was Westman who said yes when Andy Kormedas was the first fisherman to ask to sell fish from his boat down at the wharf.
Behind the Moncton Street museum, we pause at another memorial. This one is to Big Red, a rambler who had to be frequently bailed out of the pound for roaming unleashed. A red setter, he was the village’s unofficial mayor. He died in 1989 and at the funeral other setters served as an honour guard.
From there, Kibble takes me to what he calls one of Steveston undiscovered gems. Down one of the alleys off Moncton Street, we peer over the back fence into Kay Sakata’s garden filled with flowers, bushes, trees and vegetables.
A few years ago, the city offered to give her garden heritage status, but the family refused.
“In Japan, Kay Sakata would be considered a national living treasure and she should be one here,” says Kibble. “She shows that even in a commercial area you can still enjoy the beauty, majesty and wondrous enchantment of nature.
“This garden came out of love, life, inspiration and a mind that seeks to strive and not yield, to create the perfect setting for the soul ... This is her masterpiece.”
Sakata, who is in her 90s, has lived in Steveston for years except for the terrible period of internment during the Second World War that ripped the village in two. In 1942, after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941, Canada ordered all citizens of Japanese descent living along the coast to go either to an internment camps or to Japan.
Japanese-Canadians had long been an integral part of this community. Still, the fear was that they might use their special knowledge of the coast against Canada’s security. Once the war ended, some – but not all – returned to Steveston and other communities, including Sakata and her family.
We head back to the river and walk along the boardwalk past the sites of Imperial Cannery, which was the world’s largest cannery. We go past a sign that says a new residential-retail development is coming soon; past the old Phoenix Cannery site; and, past an abandoned launching ramp from the old Kishi Boat Works, the last of the wooden boatbuilders that closed in 1985.
At the Britannia Heritage Shipyard, we pass the Murikami house and the Chinese bunkhouse. Kibble takes me into one of the restored stilt houses that he helped rescue and bring to this site. The Franciscan Sisters of the Atonement lived in the house for many years and Kibble’s connection to Steveston began with the nuns. Even though he isn’t Japanese, he went to the Japanese kindergarten that the sisters started in the late 1800s. Earlier this month, the sisters closed their last convent in British Columbia.
As we head back, Kibble tells me his dream is for a riverside “estuarium” – a combination research lab/aquarium/educational centre.
He tells me about the people who live here: “They’re like driftwood,” he says. “They just float in here and if they fit, they stay.” | <urn:uuid:63831d5c-c20d-43d0-92ee-6de3ddb6cd60> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.househunting.ca/victoria/home-renovating/Steveston+community+honours+fishing+past/5258228/story.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962714 | 1,921 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Q: I found this interesting saw on eBay. What can you tell me about it? —Paul Cooper, Yorktown Heights, N.Y.
A: Interchangeable blades allow this tool to morph from a crosscut saw (far left) to a pruning saw to a backsaw (for making dovetails) to a jab saw (for cutting holes in drywall). Getting four saws for the price of one seems like a good deal, but only if a solid connection can be made between the handle and each of the blades. Otherwise, it's just an unusual, and not very useful, artifact. | <urn:uuid:fbb73049-ad36-451d-9406-a18ba3dcad45> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thisoldhouse.com/toh/photos/0,,20467021_20913852,00.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00035-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94984 | 127 | 1.515625 | 2 |
Nearly 5 million patients in the U.S. have Heart Failure (HF), and approximately 500,000 to 900,000 new cases are diagnosed each year. Heart failure is the most common Medicare diagnosis, and more Medicare dollars are spent for the diagnosis and treatment of HF than for any other diagnosis. The scope of the Heart Failure measure set is limited to patients 18 years of age and older because the clinical treatment of younger patients is handled substantially differently.
Heart failure is a condition where the heart muscle is not able to pump blood as well as it should. As a result, extra fluid collects in the legs, feet, ankles or abdomen (leading to swelling) and sometimes in the lungs, making it difficult to breath. Often the heart muscle becomes enlarged as it tries to pump out blood. The overworked heart muscle can't pump as well as healthy heart muscle.
N / N = No patients needed this treatment.
CHS data timeframe is 1st Quarter 2013.
National and State Averages obtained from National Quality Alliance latest reporting timeframe is 4th Quarter 2011 through 3rd Quarter 2012.
*The percentages include only patients whose history and condition indicate the treatment is appropriate.
>> See previous 12-month period data chart
To encourage patients to be partners in their own care, all patients being discharged home from the hospital should receive written discharge instructions or educational materials about:
- activity level
- follow-up care
- weight monitoring
- what to do if symptoms worsen
Left Ventricular Function Assessment
The left ventricular function assessment measures how well the left side of the heart is able to pump blood to the organs of the body.
ACE Inhibitors / Angiotensin Receptor Blockers
A patient whose heart is not pumping strongly benefits greatly from receiving an angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitor or an angiotensin receptor blocker. These medications help to keep you out of the hospital, improve your chances of living longer and make you feel better. | <urn:uuid:513ec60e-6383-44b0-9b22-8639972cb7fa> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cottagehealthsystem.org/AboutCottage/ClinicalQuality/MeasuresofQuality/ProcessesofCare/HeartFailure/tabid/593/Default.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.923572 | 401 | 2.703125 | 3 |
Laparoscopic testing has long been used to test for endometriosis, but a new less invasive and nonsurgical test has been proven to be just as effective. If the method is approved by the FDA after further study into its effectiveness it may in fact replace laparoscopy. This could be good news for women facing endometriosis as the sooner the disorder is diagnosed the sooner treatment can begin. Normally it takes about 6-10 years to verify if the disorder is present in sufferers, delaying treatment and allowing the effects of the disorder to take root, deteriorating quality of life.
There are some negative aspects to this method however as women who are receiving hormone treatment can’t use it since the endometrial tissue fibers the test looks for may not be present in those who have been using hormones. Biopsy technique is also terribly important to getting the correct results in the method. Overall however the testing could help many women to diagnose and treat the disorder before it can begin to do damage to the body by progressing. | <urn:uuid:86732f95-dd21-4f2a-84a7-c010e4ee4813> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://hometestingblog.testcountry.com/?tag=fibers | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968208 | 210 | 2.140625 | 2 |
Its “blueprint” for reform focuses on streamlining standards and their enforcement, expanding education and training, and upgrading real estate data.
- By John Caulfield - John Caulfield is senior editor for Builder magazine.
A “dysfunctional” appraisal system can be fixed only if its regulatory framework is streamlined, its credentialing standards are made uniform, and the criteria used to ascertain real estate valuations are based on a combination of cost, income, and sales comparisons.
Such are the findings of a white paper released by NAHB on January 24, which spells out the association's “blueprint” for appraisal reform including a host of recommendations formulated last year by a working group comprised of builders and officials from the financial and appraisal sectors.
The goal of reform, NAHB states, is to “rebuild the nation’s housing finance system …, restore confidence in the real estate market, and establish a foundation for sustainable growth in the U.S. economy.”
The working group broke down its recommendations into four areas:
- Regulatory framework and oversight.
- Data and technology.
- Professional standards.
- Practices, processes and procedures
Click HERE for the complete article | <urn:uuid:95803707-f49f-47fa-80a4-c7273fb82ce4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://appraisalnewsonline.typepad.com/appraisal_news_for_real_e/2013/02/nahb-calls-for-overhauling-the-appraisal-system.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941916 | 253 | 1.515625 | 2 |
VIRTUALLY EVERY ASPECT of the war on terror has been met with a lawsuit. Recently the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the ACLU sued the federal government over the NSA's surveillance of international phone calls involving persons inside the United States. They seek court orders ceasing and disclosing the surveillance.
Last week, the Bush Administration asked the courts to dismiss the suit pursuant to the State Secrets Privilege, a doctrine under which the courts decline to require the disclosure of evidence involving secret national security programs, often resulting in outright dismissal of the cases. (A redacted version of the government's motion is available here.)
CRITICS HAVE CHALLENGED the legitimacy of the State Secrets Privilege on a number of grounds: that the privilege was a discredited relic of the Cold War; that it was born not of U.S. law but rather of Britain's monarchy; that it is "undemocratic." None of these criticisms withstands scrutiny.
The history of the State Secrets Privilege. In attacking the Bush administration's motion, the Wall Street Journal reported that "[t]he state-secrets privilege stems from the Cold War." So did the Washington Post. As did Shayana Kadidal, one of the CCR attorneys leading the legal challenge to the NSA program, who cited U.S. v. Reynolds (1953) as the privilege's foundation.
It is true that in U.S. v. Reynolds the Supreme Court held that the Truman and Eisenhower Administrations could not be forced to disclose certain Air Force accident reports--and this established the modern multi-step process for successful invocation of the doctrine. But the privilege's roots long predate the 1953 case. Twelve years earlier, then-Attorney General Robert Jackson explained in an official opinion letter that judicial recognition of the State Secrets Privilege was no new invention:
The courts have repeatedly held that they will not and cannot require the executive to produce such papers when in the opinion of the executive their production is contrary to the public interests. The courts have also held that the question whether the production of the papers would be against the public interest is one for the executive and not for the courts to determine. [emphasis added]
Among the Supreme Court and lower court cases dating back to 1803, Jackson cited Chief Justice John Marshall's opinion in the 1807 treason trial of Vice President Aaron Burr, wherein Marshall recognized that a presidential privilege could prevent litigants from securing evidence.
Also among Jackson's citations was Totten v. U.S., a case predating Reynolds by over 75 years. There, the Supreme Court flatly refused to let proceed a claim against the government arising from the plaintiff's alleged contract with President Lincoln to spy on Confederate forces: "It may be stated as a general principle, that public policy forbids the maintenance of any suit in a court of justice, the trial of which would inevitably lead to the disclosure of matters which the law itself regards as confidential, and respecting which it will not allow the confidence to be violated."
Among those confidences, the Court declared, were those government confidences necessary to the proper functioning of the national security apparatus. The Supreme Court recognized the continuing validity of Totten as recently as last year, in Tenet v. Doe.
The reason Kadidal and other Bush administration critics tie the privilege to Reynolds is because, they argue, recent developments show that the privilege was abused in Reynolds. In 2000, the Reynolds secrets were declassified and, according to critics, they were shown to contain no secret information. But this criticism misses the point: The government sought to protect this information in 1953 because the mission itself was "highly secret," and that "any disclosure of its mission or information concerning [the aircraft] would be prejudicial to [the Air Force]." Critics today may look at the unclassified information and see nothing noteworthy, but the issue in Reynolds was the value of the information in 1953, not 2005. The Court's deference to the Air Force in 1953 was justified both then and now.
The grounding of the State Secrets Privilege in American Law. Another criticism of the State Secrets Privilege is that it is grounding in British, rather than American, law. In the words of CCR's Kadidal, "[e]ssentially our Supreme Court imported the state secrets privilege from British law." (Or, as he blogged elsewhere, "Conservatives, take note: IT CAME FROM FOREIGN LAW!") The suggestion is that because the privilege is the legacy of monarchical rule, it fails to pay due respect to the coequal legislative and judicial branches' power to supervise the executive.
But this view also stems from the misconception that the privilege originates with Reynolds. Reynolds cited a variety of U.S. cases (including Totten and Burr) and afforded British law only a couple of mentions.
Reynolds noted that a version of the British privilege received "authoritative expression" in the Burr trial, but there Marshall himself recognized "the many points of difference which exist between the first magistrate in England and the first magistrate of the United States," and he calibrated his analysis accordingly, as have the myriad subsequent cases. To suggest that the American version of the privilege was taken from British law is no more or less accurate than saying that any aspect of American law in 1806 was taken from British law. By the time the Court heard Reynolds, the privilege was as American as apple pie.
Is the State Secrets Privilege "Undemocratic"? Kadidal charges that the privilege is "undemocratic," but such criticism turns the nature of litigation and national security on its head.
U.S. courts afford the individual an awesome power: the opportunity to wield the very power of government against his opponent, even when that opponent is the government itself. Nowhere is this more clear than in litigation seeking the vindication of rights, where elections are irrelevant.
But the courts are well aware that abusive litigation of national security issues could (to again quote Robert Jackson) "convert the constitutional Bill of Rights into a suicide pact." To avoid this "dilemma to a free people," the courts have constructed a number of doctrines, rooted in the Constitution's provisions creating the courts specifically and the separation of powers generally, that prevent dangerous judicial usurpation of control over issues entrusted to elected leaders. These doctrines include "standing" (which bars the courthouse doors to all but those who are actually injured by government action) and "the political question doctrine" (which instructs the courts to dismiss cases inherently unfit for judicial resolution), among others. The State Secrets Privilege is yet another one of the constitutional and pragmatic safeguards against inappropriate judicial involvement in matters not properly resolved by the courts.
Such a safeguard is needed nowhere so much as in the nation's self-defense. In the CCR complaint, the plaintiffs' request is nothing less than that the court "enjoin any further such warrantless surveillance" and order that the government disclose all surveillance of their communications. For six plaintiffs to demand that the elected government cease a needed surveillance program is the epitome of undemocratic action.
THE STATE SECRETS PRIVILEGE is neither novel, nor undemocratic, nor foreign. It is a democratic principle deeply rooted in our national experience. And just as it protected national secrets of the Civil War and Cold War, we can only hope that it will continue to serve the nation in the war confronting us today.
Adam J. White was recently a clerk on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. His article on Justice Jackson's draft opinions in the Korean War-era Steel Seizure Cases will appear in the Albany Law Review later this year. | <urn:uuid:390148d7-3b9c-40c1-8867-c9dc4fc241ee> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://archive.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=4167 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955344 | 1,571 | 2.40625 | 2 |
Most long-term care policies will pay a preset amount of an insured's long-term care costs when the insured is certified by a licensed health care practitioner as a "chronically ill individual." To be certified as a chronically ill individual the insured must either (1) require substantial supervision to protect himself or herself from threats to health and safety due to severe cognitive impairment and/or (2) be unable to perform at least two or more activities of daily living (ADLs). The activities of daily living are: transferring, bathing, toileting, dressing, eating and continence. Once a long-term insurance policy's benefits are triggered, the policy will continue to pay benefits for a preset time period, or until the insured no longer needs long-term care.
Most, but not all, long-term care policies can help cover costs incurred during a nursing home stay, assisted living residency, in-home care, informal care, custodial care, care provided in Alzheimer's facility and hospice care. Some insurance companies will even pay benefits for care provided by family.
Long-term care insurance can help pay for a variety of home and community-based care services, including: physical, speech, and occupational therapists; home health aides and visiting nurses; adult day care, and hospice care. (Note: Generally, skilled care refers to round-the-clock treatment by a registered nurse under a doctor's supervision. Intermediate care refers to occasional nursing and rehabilitative care under the supervision of skilled medical personnel. Custodial care primarily meets personal care needs in activities of daily living such as help in eating or bathing.)
Please note: Long-term care insurance policies vary in coverage and benefits and can vary by state. Be sure that you clearly understand what is covered under any policy you consider.
New York Life Insurance Company
Rating: 0/0 (0 votes cast)
|What Does Long-Term Care Insurance Cover? SD| | <urn:uuid:c64b601c-1cda-42e3-ac1c-c519d8798710> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newyorklife.com/nyl/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=778ae62f139d2210a2b3019d221024301cacRCRD | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947531 | 396 | 1.601563 | 2 |
Overcoming ‘pre-ride faff’ syndrome
Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome. – Samuel Johnson
Just do it - Nike
Do that hard workout
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit. – Aristotle
It was a high counsel that I once heard given to a young person, “Always do what you are afraid to do.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go. - T S ElliotThings that hurt, instruct. - Bejamin Franklin
Go and train!
You cannot plough a field by turning it over in your mind.
Don’t dream your life, life your dream. – Anon.
Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do. – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Be better than the rest
You just can’t beat the person who won’t give up. – Babe Ruth
You are never a loser until you quit trying. – Mike Ditka | <urn:uuid:da235c28-53b1-4802-944c-46b58b3c1432> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://alicemiller.co.uk/extras/quotes/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917883 | 235 | 1.59375 | 2 |
The Andromeda Strain
Description: The Andromeda Strain is a deadly extraterrestrial virus. It is brought to Earth when a research satellite crashes near a tiny Arizona town. Everyone in the community dies within days, except for a baby and an insulated drunkard. Recruited from labs all over North America, doctors Charles Dutton (David Wayne), Jeremy Stone (Arthur Hill), Ruth Leavitt (Kate Reid), and Mark Hall (James Olson) don radiation suits and race against time to isolate and destroy the virus. The film is based on a novel by Michael Crichton.~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Movie summaries and listings powered by Cinema-Source
Sign up for our free email newsletters and receive the latest advice and information on all things parenting.
Enter your email address to sign up or manage your account. | <urn:uuid:39fcdd87-8617-4704-ba05-3b0aab113cc0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://fun.familyeducation.com/movies/the-andromeda-strain/37960 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.903477 | 170 | 1.507813 | 2 |
June 19, 2012
Is Facebook a Fad? Will Our Grandchildren Tweet?
Social media have changed the way people interact: young women in India protect their marriageability by being discreet on Facebook, while in the U.S. family members often feel the sting of learning about estranged loved ones through a screen. These networks are not just personal, of course; they are also political. Thomas Friedman recently wrote that although Facebook and Twitter may have been able to ignite a revolt in Egypt, they have failed to supply the “brick and mortar” needed to sustain real change.
Are social media part of a long-term shift in how people interact, like the telephone? Or, especially after Facebook’s worrisome I.P.O., do these networks look like a fad that will become less attractive the longer it lasts?Read the Discussion » | <urn:uuid:6af98c73-4e8c-4f4c-a389-dca734dc675b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/06/19/are-social-networks-just-a-fad-6/?ref=technology | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958065 | 176 | 1.898438 | 2 |
From disposable cameras that use reels of film to digital cameras that use tiny storage cards, the face of photographic technology has changed dramatically over recent years. You can find digital cameras almost everywhere today, while disposable cameras have been fading in popularity. This change in the tide represents several key advantages digital cameras hold over their disposable competitors.
Ease of Use
For everyone from a beginner to an expert, digital cameras have a much lower learning curve than disposables. For those who don't know very much about photography, digital cameras provide ease of use for "point and shoot" type photography without requiring very much technical knowledge. For experts, digital cameras offer an easy way to change the shutter speed as opposed to having to carry around a variety of disposable cameras loaded with different speed films.
Number of Pictures
Digital cameras can hold far more pictures than a disposable camera. While disposable cameras limit themselves by how much film they can hold, digital cameras only meet their limits in data storage on removable SD cards. Once the SD card fills up, it's easy to replace it with another card. A disposable camera may hold enough room for anywhere from 12 to 48 pictures, depending on the model and brand. A digital camera with a 1GB SD card can hold hundreds of pictures -- possibly thousands depending on the quality of the images.
Control Over Images
Digital cameras offer many aspects of control over images. With digital cameras, you can copy and duplicate the same picture over and over again, which you won't find as easy with a disposable. You can also instantly delete images that didn't come out well, whereas with a disposable, you're stuck with the picture. Digital cameras also let you pick and choose which images to share with friends, to post online and to email far easier than its competition. While it's possible to do this with disposable cameras, you'll have to pay a photo lab extra money to put your pictures on a CD.
At first glance, digital cameras seem far more expensive than disposable cameras. The savings, however, shows up over the life of the camera itself. Unlike a disposable camera, you can reuse the digital camera over and over again and don't need to buy another unless it breaks. The digital camera doesn't require repeated film purchases, which benefits you since you can only use film once. Beyond the initial purchase of a removable SD card, you can reuse that card over and over again, saving its contents to your computer and then replacing it within your digital camera. Digital cameras also allow you to choose which pictures you want to print, unlike disposables, where you must print all pictures at once through a photo lab.
- Jupiterimages/Brand X Pictures/Getty Images | <urn:uuid:d208d019-976d-4ad9-b214-c0e7e8571635> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://science.opposingviews.com/benefits-digital-camera-over-disposable-camera-12296.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947036 | 542 | 2.640625 | 3 |
On March 11th 2011 a magnitude 9.0 earthquake developed off of the northeastern coast of Japan. The quake triggered a massive tsunami which devastated Japan with massive waves. The death total has surpassed 8,000 with nearly 3,000 injured and 13,000 missing. Along with the human devastation the tsunami ravaged 125,000 buildings, most notably the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plants.
The Fukushima Power Plants were built in 1971 and are operated by the Tokyo Electric Power Company. When the earthquake struck Japan’s coast the plants nuclear reactors were automatically shut down to prevent damage, but the tsunami’s massive waves flooded the plant and disabled its emergency generators. With the generators down the plant was unable to run pumps to cool the reactors. The reactors continued to overheat and through the subsequent days evidence of a nuclear meltdown was documented along with explosions and fires. The effects of a possible melt down are not yet known, but a debate over the safety and risks of nuclear power is certain.
Are nuclear meltdowns scary? Of course. The thought of explosions and harmful radiation polluting air and causing cancer and deformities is very scary. Yet I believe that the positive capabilities of nuclear energy outweigh the negative possibilities.
I have always been an advocate for alternative energy be it solar, wind, nuclear, or hydrogen and I see these industries as an economic stimulant and as the future of American industry. If such energy can be successfully harnessed, America can break its dependency on foreign oil, improve the environment, and create thousands of new jobs.
More over, annual cancer and death rates caused by nuclear reactors seem insignificant when compared to the cancer and deaths derived from the burning of fossil fuels. Nuclear energy is clean and extremely powerful when used correctly and modern reactors are believed by experts to be more efficient, safer, and stronger than those used at Fukushima.
Nuclear power may not be future of American energy, but just because it has failed us in Japan, Americans should not be deterred. So often one failure leads to a united effort against change and I hope that this freak tragedy will not will not turn Americans against the development of alternative energy. Instead, this incident should serve as a wake up call to all of us, pushing us to improve our technology and work towards a clean and efficient future. | <urn:uuid:a80dc5b6-8467-4927-b7cc-16356b9b74b7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.timesunion.com/highschool/date/2011/03/page/5/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953536 | 462 | 2.765625 | 3 |
Obama thinks big in budget
Six weeks in, Obama calls for sweeping reform in 2010 budget proposal. Next week, administration officials and lawmakers discuss the details.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- President Obama last week -- his sixth in office -- showed his hand on how he hopes to shape the government's federal budget and the U.S. economy along the way.
In a speech that bore the hallmarks of a state of the union address, Obama on Tuesday told Congress about the challenges facing the economy while also saying that "we will recover."
"Now is the time to act boldly and wisely to not only revive this economy, but to build a new foundation for lasting prosperity," he said.
Two days later, Obama added details of his ambitious agendas for energy, health care and tax policy in a 10-year budget outline.
Under the terms of Obama's budget plan, tax breaks for high income earners would expire while low and middle income Americans would see some tax relief.
The administration expects the budget deficit, already above $1 trillion, to swell to $1.75 trillion this year. Obama has pledged, however, to cut the deficit in half by 2013.
Among the new programs created under the budget is a $634 billion health care reserve fund aimed at making coverage more universal and reduced insurance premiums.
This coming week, Obama has called for a health care summit with lawmakers, industry groups and academics to discuss ways to reform health care policy.
In addition to the summit, two top administration officials will testify before Congress on the budget proposal.
On Tuesday, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner goes before the House Ways and Means Committee, and Peter Orszag, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, will address the House Budget Committee.
Orszag returns to Capitol Hill on Thursday for a hearing on accountability and transparency in the administration's $787 economic stimulus bill with the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
Also next week, Obama's $75 billion foreclosure prevention program officially gets underway. The effort, announced last week, is aimed at helping 9 million Americans suffering from falling home prices and unaffordable mortgage payments.
100-day scorecard: Week 6
CNNMoney.com will continue to track Obama's first 100 days in office and keep score of the government's unprecedented efforts to fix the ailing economy. (Last week's article is available here.)
Bold action: In his first speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, Obama sought to reassure Americans that the dire economic challenges facing the country will eventually be overcome.
Obama said the administration has identified $2 trillion in government spending cuts that can be made over the next decade. But he also discussed plans to invest billions in renewable energy, education and health care reform.
He reiterated his commitment to holding accountable executives of any banks receiving taxpayer funds.
"This time, CEOs won't be able to use taxpayer money to pad their paychecks or buy fancy drapes or disappear on a private jet," Obama said. "Those days are over."
Budget blueprint: After setting the stage in Tuesday's speech, Obama unveiled the details of his fiscal 2010 budget proposal on Thursday.
While Obama has pledged to halve the $1 trillion-plus deficit he inherited over the next 5 years, the administration said it expects a deficit of $1.75 trillion in fiscal 2009.
The proposal calls for $3.6 trillion in spending in 2010, and estimates that $2.4 trillion in revenue will be collected.
On the spending side, the plan sets aside $250 billion for additional money to stabilize the financial system and $634 billion for a health care reserve fund.
To reduce the deficit, the plan would phase out tax cuts on high income earners by 2011. The White House estimates letting the cuts expire could raise $637 billion over 10 years.
Additionally, it would allow the capital gains tax rate to return to 20% from the current 15% rate. | <urn:uuid:7e81d32c-50ec-4342-b013-b48c11f09b03> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/27/news/economy/obama_week_six/index.htm | 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 | 0.940876 | 817 | 1.539063 | 2 |
Bioequivalence, safety, and tolerability of imatinib tablets compared with capsules.
ABSTRACT Imatinib (Glivec) has been established as a highly effective therapy for chronic myeloid leukemia and gastrointestinal tumors. The recommended daily dosage of 400-600 mg requires simultaneous intake of up to six of the current 100-mg capsules. Due to the need to swallow multiple capsules per dose, there is a potential negative impact on treatment adherence; therefore, a new imatinib 400-mg film-coated tablet has been developed. To improve dosing flexibility, particularly with regard to the pediatric population and the management of adverse events, a scored 100-mg film-coated tablet has also been introduced.
A group of 33 healthy subjects were randomly assigned to one of six treatment sequences, in which they received imatinib as 4 x 100-mg capsules (reference), 4 x 100-mg scored tablets (test), and 1 x 400-mg tablet (test). Blood sampling was performed for up to 96 h after dosing, followed by a 10-day washout period prior to the next sequence. After the third dosing, subjects were monitored to assess delayed drug-related adverse events. Pharmacokinetic parameters were assessed using concentration-time curves for plasma imatinib and its metabolite CGP74588.
Median Tmax was 2.5 h for capsules and tablets. Mean AUC((0-inf)) values were 27,094, 26,081 and 25,464 ng.h/ml for 4 x 100-mg capsules, 4 x 100-mg tablets, and 1 x 400-mg tablets, respectively. Cmax values were 1748, 1638 and 1606 ng/ml, and t(1/2) values were 15.8, 15.9 and 15.7 h. The test/reference ratios for AUC((0-inf)), AUC((0-96) (h)), and C(max) were 0.98, 0.98 and 0.95 for 4 x 100-mg tablets versus 4 x 100-mg capsules, and 0.95, 0.95 and 0.92 for 1 x 400-mg tablet versus 4 x 100-mg capsules. The 95% confidence intervals were fully contained within the interval (0.80, 1.25). Eight mild and one moderate adverse event considered to be drug related were reported. These events showed no clustering by type of dosage form and were of little to no clinical significance.
Film-coated 100-mg (scored) and 400-mg tablet dose forms of imatinib are bioequivalent to the commercial 100-mg hard-gelatin capsule, and are as safe and well tolerated. | <urn:uuid:d48896dd-cf0c-41e6-9d98-bb90609b4d3f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.researchgate.net/publication/8573872_Bioequivalence_safety_and_tolerability_of_imatinib_tablets_compared_with_capsules | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94563 | 563 | 2.03125 | 2 |
With the Women's World Cup underway, now is a good time to remind FIFA what it should be doing.
Sports fans are an indulgent lot with our obsessive statistics, our gang colors, and our willingness to entertain a well-told fable, like the one about Paul the octopus who could flawlessly forecast game outcomes. With the recent kick-off of the Women’s World Cup, I have another, less fantastic story to tell, and it’s one that just might help you with your match predictions.
The equation of women’s athletics with latent lesbianism is nothing new, and soccer is ground zero for salacious locker room tales. There’s an old joke that asks how to avoid sleeping with everyone on your soccer team. The answer: Join a men’s league.
The truth is that there are lesbian soccer players at every level of the sport. For those of us playing in our queer city leagues it’s a non-issue, and to witness the numerous athletes in various sports who have come out as gay in the past several months it would seem to be a non-issue at almost any level. But this is professional soccer.
For the rest of the sports world, late 2010 and early 2011 was all about supporting an anti-homophobia agenda. High-profile basketball, cricket, and tennis players came out, and straight “allies” including Hudson Taylor (wrestling) and Ben Cohen (rugby) embarked on very public campaigns to speak out against anti-gay bullying. The San Francisco Giants agreed to make an “It Gets Better” video to support LGBT youth, with other franchises following suit.
But not everything's coming up rainbow in soccer. Homophobia underlies the fan culture, and organizing bodies like FIFA and the UEFA have been discouragingly ineffective in handling the issue. Though both associations have anti-discrimination policies (and in the case of the UEFA, a partnership with anti-homophobia organization The Justin Campaign which is named after the late footballer Justin Fashanu who hung himself eight years after he came out in the press), neither has made substantive policy changes. In fact, in early 2011 both organizations reconfirmed Vlatko Markovic for a fourth term as president of the Croatian Football Federation despite the fact that he told the press in late 2010 that “[a]s long as I’m president [of the Croatian Football Federation] there will be no gay players. Thank goodness only healthy people play football.” To date, aside from Fashanu, only one high-profile football player has come out of the closet: Swedish defender Anton Hysén.
It is crucial to note the underlying sexism in the previous sentence. When anti-homophobia advocates make this statement, we are really talking about male athletes. “High-profile” is euphemistic, and it’s this systemic disparity that contributes both to the lack of support for women’s athletics, and to homophobia in the game.
Let me get on the record with this: There are out LGBT professional soccer players. For starters, meet Ursula Holl and Nadine Angerer from Germany’s national team which beat Canada 2-1 in the official opening match of the 2011 Women’s World Cup. The other Cup game today went to France, who beat Nigeria 1-0, which brings me back to the story I was telling.
This year’s Women’s World Cup has been gripped by a kind of lesbian panic, the result of which has been both ridiculous (the United State’s sexy-nurse uniform) and chilling (Nigeria’s lesbian “witch-hunt”).
Nigeria’s coach Eucharia Uche recently boasted that she had cleansed the Super Falcons, Nigeria’s national women’s team, of lesbianism with the help of priests, and by expelling some players. The players were removed “not because they were not good players, but because they were lesbians,” said James Peters, former technical assistant for the Nigerian Football Federation. The story’s been widely reported in the mainstream press recently, but it’s actually old news. The blog New African Press ran an article on it back in March.
At right around the same time, German Football Association president Theo Zwaniger told the Congress of the European Football Association (UEFA) that he “… would find it brave and welcome, if a football player would come out. He (sic) [would have] the support of the DFB and from me.”
I believe that this – respect conferred or withheld – is the tournament’s Paul the octopus, and that the consequences will play out on the scoreboard. The teams that compete with the support and respect of their management, their governing associations, and their fans will certainly enjoy more focus and energy than those laboring under discriminatory scrutiny and fear. It’s not a perfect system, but surely it’s as reliable as a hungry octopus?
Homophobia and sexism are entwined. The women’s game deserves better than it gets, and that begins with recognizing the skill and dedication of the athletes – and refusing to be sidelined by nonsensical diversions. A player’s sexuality and her “attractiveness” are not important; whether or not she can help her team put the ball in the net is. As fans, we can honour our teams by demanding equality at the every level of the game, from the stands to the executives.
Regarding the blatant discrimination on the part of the Nigerian Football Federation, FIFA has been characteristically lazy in its response. LGBT equality advocacy group AllOut has started an online petition to pressure the organization to condemn Uche’s actions. Support women's soccer, and sign it. | <urn:uuid:4d95590a-6762-4066-8cf9-d3f9cd21a974> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://inbedwithmaradona.com/journal/2011/6/27/womens-football-deserves-better.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964561 | 1,213 | 1.820313 | 2 |
- Psychology & the public
- What we do
- Member networks
- Careers, education & training
Lads' mags may echo hostile sexist attitudes
Hostile sexist attitudes are sometimes legitimised through magazines aimed at young men, new research has suggested.
The study, to be published in the Society's British Journal of Psychology, showed that many people cannot distinguish between the rhetoric used in 'lads' mags' and comments made by convicted rapists.
In addition, the investigation, which was carried out by psychologists from Middlesex University and the University of Surrey showed the majority of males identified themselves more with the language expressed by the sex offenders.
Dr Miranda Horvath, a Chartered Psychologist said: "These magazines support the legitimisation of sexist attitudes and behaviours and need to be more responsible about their portrayal of women, both in words and images."
She noted these types of publication can give the expression that being sexist is a normal and acceptable way to behave, when in fact it is a topic that needs to be challenged and rejected.
- Most Read
- Most Comments
- Register of Applied Psychology Practice Supervisors
- Raising awareness of adult autism | <urn:uuid:094bec3f-5356-436f-9985-75ae7f035088> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bps.org.uk/news/lads-mags-may-echo-hostile-sexist-attitudes | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00025-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943483 | 241 | 2.4375 | 2 |
|Wildlife Overpass, Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada. In Banff National Park, there are currently 41 wildlife crossing structures (6 overpasses and 35 underpasses) that help wildlife safely cross the busy Trans-Canada Highway. Since monitoring began in 1996, 11 species of large mammals—including bears, elk and cougar—have used crossing structures more than 200,000 times. [ link1, link2]|
Friday, June 29, 2012
Wildlife overpasses, green bridges, and ecoducts all refer to structures that have been built over roads to allow wildlife to cross safely to the other side of the road. The bridges are for the animals; the animals walk over the road, and the vehicles go through the structure. Most of the structures are between 10 m (30 ft) and 60 m (180 ft) wide. They typically have soil, litter, and vegetation on top to provide suitable habitat for a range of different species and species groups. The larger structures are typically intended for large mammals ranging from ungulates (e.g. deer, elk, moose) to large carnivores (e.g. black bear, grizzly bear, Canada lynx, wolverine, wolf). Here are pictures of some of the most beautiful and interesting wildlife overpasses in the world. [link]
Sunday, June 24, 2012
A footbridge or pedestrian bridge is a bridge designed for pedestrians and in some cases cyclists, animal traffic and horse riders, rather than vehicular traffic. Footbridges complement the landscape and can be used decoratively to visually link two distinct areas or to signal a transaction. In many developed countries, footbridges are both functional and can be beautiful works of art and sculpture.
1. BP Pedestrian Bridge, Illinois, USA
Monday, June 18, 2012
Rare are the countries that do not have mountains in their territory. The inhabitants of these countries, if want to hikers or to engage in winter sports have to go abroad. In this list we will deal with countries that have the largest area among the countries with no mountains.
9. The Gambia
|Agricultural field in the Gambia link|
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Some islands were used for military purposes, for the construction of individual buildings or for permanent settlements in which people lived for centuries. However, loss of strategic position, natural disasters, nuclear tests or simply wish to live in civilization, led to the abandonment of these islands. This is a list of abandoned islands, where time has stopped, where homes, buildings and streets standing untouched for decades.
1. Hirta, Scotland, UK
|Abandoned village on the island of Hirta (in the picture can be seen a few renovated houses used by scientists) link|
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Nature never stops to amaze us with its magnificent phenomenon just like these inexplicable holes in the ground. These holes may be formed gradually or suddenly, and are found worldwide. This is a list of beautiful natural holes from around the World, which have become popular tourist destinations.
1. Dean's Blue Hole, Bahamas | <urn:uuid:b23fc1f2-6bfb-44d6-ab7e-2eea35c2530a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.theworldgeography.com/2012_06_01_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951625 | 651 | 3.265625 | 3 |
June 19, 2011 Men are sometimes criticized for being unwilling to ask for directions when they travel, but they can benefit from looking for help as they begin their journeys as fathers, according to a researcher on fatherhood at the University of Chicago.
Along the way, they should not shy from asserting their roles, said Jennifer Bellamy, an Assistant Professor at the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration.
"Sometimes dads feel like they don't get the same level of support that moms do when they become parents, but I think dads should seek opportunities from the beginning to be involved with their children," said Bellamy, who worked on a research project in Texas on fatherhood and has published on the subject.
"Fathers should, for instance, try to go to visits with the pediatrician and ask questions about their child's development," she suggested. She also said fathers should seek out groups in their communities that provide support and encouragement for fatherhood and visit websites devoted to fathering for tips on their role. Such resources can help fathers develop their distinctive strengths as parents.
"We know that fathers play with children in a different way than mothers do, they are more physical, and that benefits the children. That physical activity actually helps the children's development," she said.
The 2010 U.S. Census showed that were 70.1 million fathers across the country and 25.3 million of those are in married couple families with children under age 18.
The Census also showed some dramatic changes for fathers; 1.8 million fathers head a single-parent household. The 2010 Census showed that men headed 15 percent of single-parent families, three times the percentage reported in 2000. In contrast, the 1970 Census showed that men headed only 1 percent of the single-parent households.
The School of Social Service Administration is a leading research center for the study of fatherhood. It provides field placements for its students in social service agencies serving young fathers, and the school's faculty is among the nation's leading scholars in family and fatherhood issues, particularly among fathers who need help from social workers.
Some of Bellamy's fieldwork, for instance, has been done with low-income never married parents and their children. In her work with the Texas Fragile Families Initiative program, Bellamy and her colleagues have been able to show how effectively interventions help young fathers.
"Birth was often a 'magic moment' for the young fathers, many of whom reported becoming more responsible individuals in response to the feeling of attachment they had for their children," she said.
Successful programs were able to help connect young fathers with training and employment programs. The study found that school-focused programs, team-parenting programs, and community- based fatherhood programs were most useful in helping young dads develop.
Young fathers in effective programs were less likely to face criminal or substance abuse problems and were more willing to ask for parenting help. An evaluation of successful programs also showed they seemed to reduce repeat teenage births.
Working in the Texas program was something of an eye-opener for Bellamy. "I had never really thought about fatherhood issues. The literature I was exposed to as a master's student in social work did not really discuss fathering, but working in the program made me realize what an important field it is," she said.
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead. | <urn:uuid:879452a3-d95b-49bb-8629-d13dd5071551> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/06/110615103222.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983109 | 700 | 2.546875 | 3 |
You should contact your district council if you have any problems
- air pollution
- street cleaning and litter
- food safety
Air pollution in Kent has been acknowledged as a problem for a
number of years.
The quality of the air we breathe has an impact on our health,
as well as the environment.
Pollution and congestion affect all of us, whether we walk,
cycle, use public transport or our cars. Traffic is the fastest
growing contributor to poor air quality in the county.
Since 2000, traffic flows in Kent have increased by 7% and
further growth is likely with further development.
All district councils are required to periodically review air
quality and in some areas of Kent, Air Quality Management Areas
have been declared where air quality is poor and is above the
standards and objectives set out in the National Air Quality
There are currently 32 Air Quality Management Areas in Kent,
which are primarily alongside motorways including the A2, M2, A20,
M20, A25, M25, M26, A28 and A228 corridors as well as parts of
Canterbury, Dartford, Dover, Gravesend, Maidstone, Tonbridge and
Tunbridge Wells town centres.
Air Quality Management Areas have also been declared at Dover
Eastern Docks due to shipping emissions and Northfleet industrial
area. Action plans have to be produced for these areas setting out
measures to reduce air pollution.
For further information, please contact your district council.
The Kent and Medway Air Quality Monitoring Network was
established to understand pollution in the county. For more
information on the network or pollution levels in the county,
visit the Kent and Medway Air Quality
There are a number of different sources of noise pollution such
as loud music and noisy machinery. For further information, visit
Protection UK website or contact your district
Street cleaning and litter
Litter is unsightly and can be an environmental health risk.
From rats and mice to cockroaches and fleas, pests can be a risk
to public health or food safety.
Environmental Health Officers are responsible for food safety
issues such as food hygiene at premises and foreign bodies in food.
Standards are responsible for food composition and best before
Flytipping has an impact on our local environment and how we
view it. It can include general household waste, fridges, garden
refuse, abandoned vehicles and commercial waste. For more
information, visit the Clean Kent website. | <urn:uuid:26f69bc8-75e2-41b9-9c2e-bcc1d4091f68> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kent.gov.uk/environment_and_planning/environment_and_climate_change/environmental_health.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.921922 | 520 | 2.859375 | 3 |
According to a report in the Detroit Free Press, GM North America President Mark Reuss has suggested that Buick might be revising its “tri-shield” logo, which dates to the 1950s. The current all chrome version has been in use for the past decade or so.
Buick has been using a shield in its logo since the 1930s. The tri-shield was introduced in the late 1950s and is said to represent the LeSabre, Invicta and Electra models, popular then but discontinued at the present.
The change could involve a return to the red white and blue color scheme that the shields used to wear. As seen in the picture above, the Buick logo has a long and confused history, where proponents of spelling the name “Buick” (or “BUICK”) wage war with friends of medieval heradldry. Sometimes, an eagle soars as a compromise, only to be shot down for Red, White & Blue shields. With China a big part of Buick’s (GM sells 4 times as many cars with a Buick brand in China than it does in the U.S.), one might think that the Detroit automaker would be reluctant to wave the colors of the American flag on its products there. But it’s not as it seems – knee-jerk reactions often reduce us to jerks on knees.
Ironically, China is where the initiative for the red white and blue Buick logo seems to be coming from. In China, Buick never gave up the Red White & Blue.
The red white and blue Buick logo is a familiar sight in China, as this badge on an all chrome Excelle, sighted at last year’s Shanghai Auto Show, proves.
All this just goes to show how much influence China wields on GM. So much that it might even reintroduce the Red White & Blue to America.
Ronnie Schreiber edits Cars In Depth, a realistic perspective on cars & car culture and the original 3D car site. If you found this post worthwhile, you can dig deeper at Cars In Depth. If the 3D thing freaks you out, don’t worry, all the photo and video players in use at the site have mono options. Thanks for reading – RJS | <urn:uuid:b0afad6a-f38e-4b9f-a16f-34db58825482> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2012/11/buick-bringing-back-the-red-white-and-blue-from-china/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947021 | 479 | 1.6875 | 2 |
Amsterdam has much to offer the lovers of history, science and art with its myriad museums catering to each field. Here's a quick snapshot of some of the museums you can expect to see in Amsterdam.
High on the list is Rijksmuseum, which hosts a collection focusing on art, craft, and history, including pieces that feature the Dutch Golden Age and a large collection of Asian art. Located on the Museumplein, a new building was established where visitors find even the design of the building to be artistic and reflective of Dutch history thanks to the efforts of artisans who submitted ideas in response to several contests for this purpose. Works by Jacob van Ruysdael, Frans Hals, Johannes Vermeer and Rembrandt and Rembrandt's pupils can be viewed at this museum. Rembrandt's The Night Watch is exhibited among other masterpieces in the Philips wing.
The Van Gogh Museum focuses on the works by the famous painter himself. Reputed as the bearer of the largest Van Gogh collection in the world, this museum hosts pieces that follow Van Gogh through the various stages of his life, from childhood to death, as well as the various emotional phases that he experienced. Some of the best known pieces include The Potato Eaters, Bedroom in Arles, and one of the Sunflowers paintings.
For something a little more cutting edge, check out the Stedelijk Museum—targeted at modern art aficionados. Artists such as Mike Kelley, Neo Rauch, David Goldblatt and Atelier Van Lieshout are represented amidst the myriad collections and exhibitions. Science lovers can check out the NEMO science museum for hands-on displays, computer simulations, and numerous experiments.
One museum that is not to be missed is the secret wartime home of Anne Frank. Rescued from demolition in the late 1950s and later donated to the Anne Frank Foundation, the museum has drawn thousands of visitors from around the globe, giving them a view of life in the Secret Annex. None of the original furniture and few personal effects remain since these were seized by the Dutch officers when the family was arrested. Only a few personal belongings were rescued by friends of the family prior to the clearing of the annex and later given to Otto Frank, the only surviving member of the Frank family. Some of these rescued items as well as photographs from the period are on display at the museum. In addition to the collection featuring various aspects of Anne Frank's life, including the original diary that made her famous, the museum hosts a collection that highlights persecution and discrimination.
Also dedicated to history lovers is the Amsterdam Historical Museum. Offering a full in-depth encounter of the history of Amsterdam, the museum—which is housed in what was once the city orphanage—displays paintings, prints, marquettes, historical objects, porcelain and silver items, and archaeological discoveries.
Those who plan on visiting more than five museums in a year in Amsterdam would be best advised to purchase a Museum Card from a small museum. The Museum Card is relatively cheap and offers free access to 400 museums across the Netherlands, of which 29 are in Amsterdam. The Card is especially useful for avoiding long queues at the entrance of the most popular museums. | <urn:uuid:f16ddf0a-52ab-47ac-88bb-ef761a1a36da> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.traveldir.org/articles/europe/netherlands/amsterdam/a_guide_to_the_museums_of_amsterdam.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963367 | 665 | 1.992188 | 2 |
A joint tenancy is often used by people looking for an inexpensive way to avoid probate of real estate. This section of our guide deals with how joint tenancies are used and the pros and cons of using them.
What is a Joint Tenancy?
A joint tenancy is way of titling an asset in the name of more than one owner. At the death of one of the owners, the real estate passes automatically to the surviving owner (or owners), without the need for probate. This feature is known as a right of survivorship.
Joint tenancies are often used to hold title to real estate owned by a married couple. This allows the property to pass to the surviving spouse on the death of the first spouse. The surviving spouse will need to file the deceased spouse’s death certificate in the land records, but probate is not required to clear title to the real estate.
Pitfalls of Using Joint Tenancy to Avoid Probate
Joint tenancies are relatively inexpensive. Most attorneys would charge a few hundred dollars to prepare a deed to joint tenants. For do-it-yourselfers, online deeds may cost a little less. But, as is the case with many situations, the cheapest route isn’t always the best. In fact, it can be dangerous to rely on co-ownership alone to avoid probate. Here’s why:
- Each owner has immediate rights to the jointly-owned assets. For example, each owner of a co-owned bank account can withdraw the entire account. This doubles the risk to the account.
- Titling the assets jointly opens the door to claims of co-owners, their creditors, and, in the event of a divorce, spouses of the co-owners. In places the assets in jeopardy if one of the owners incurs significant debts or is involved in a lawsuit.
- Joint tenancies can make it hard to coordinate a person’s affairs at death. If most of the assets pass automatically to the surviving owner(s), there may not be enough left over to pay taxes or debts or settle the affairs of the deceased owner.
- Joint tenancies can have bad tax consequences. The act of naming another owner is usually considered a gift if the tenancy is not revocable. Unless the other owner is a spouse, this gift is potentially taxable. For personal residences, adding someone other than a spouse as a co-owner can forfeit income tax exclusions that are available upon the sale of the home.
- Titling an asset as a joint tenancy can cause you to forfeit state and local homestead exemptions.
- If you live in a community property state, joint tenancies with someone other than a spouse can cause you to lose your tax basis step-up at death, resulting in a built-in tax liability attaching you’re your asset.
- Joint tenancies can make it difficult to deal with real estate in the future. Because the signatures of all joint tenants are generally required to transfer real estate, an uncooperative or incapacitated joint tenant can make it difficult to sell or mortgage the real estate.
- Joint tenancies don’t avoid probate as much as postpone it. Probate is postponed at the first owner’s death because there is a surviving joint tenant. But the last joint tenant to survive will hold the property in his or her name alone. Unless something is done to change this arrangement, probate is usually required after the death of the surviving joint tenant.
For these reasons, joint tenancies are usually not the best tool for avoiding probate. Because a living trust provides the probate avoidance benefit while avoiding these pitfalls, it is usually a better choice for avoiding probate. | <urn:uuid:025cb0df-8833-4b80-9b4f-c1ee2ea6dac8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.fortenberrylaw.com/joint-tenancies/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00024-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949507 | 764 | 1.898438 | 2 |
Online learning at Lesley emphasizes collaboration, active engagement and faculty accessibility, all of which contribute to Lesley's extraordinarily high online program completion rate.
As students of all ages increasingly pursue online study, they are discovering in Lesley's programs a sense of community that is uncharacteristic with most distance learning offerings. Faculty with deep experience teaching online are essential to creating this dynamic, as are online technology tools that create a virtual world that supports collaboration and conversation among faculty and classmates. Students in all of Lesley University's online programs enjoy benefits including:
"Not only are the professors incredibly engaged and invested in their students, the format and forums of the online program have allowed me to feel connected to my fellow classmates."
- Eileen Kielty, Online B.A. Psychology student
Brenda L. Heiman
Graduate Education Degree and Certificate Programs Undergraduate Programs
See which courses are available and how to register
Graduate School of EducationFaculty, staff, and alumni will be available to discuss program formats, courses, and career options.June 6, 2013 | 6:00 pm–8:00 pm | <urn:uuid:ec18adc9-e1bd-4b50-bb33-c4f238b02417> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lesley.edu/online/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.927442 | 228 | 1.632813 | 2 |
Good enough to be Criminal
You can see it on just about any street corner in New York City and on thousands of websites on the internet – people selling “knock off” watches, handbags, shoes and any other hot trends in fashion. These items usually look good enough to pass as the real thing, but rarely measure up to the quality standards of the original items. Generally speaking, most shoppers know that what they are purchasing from street vendors isn’t really an authentic Rolex watch or Gucci bag, but they don’t mind because they want to have the look for less.
Though this practice can hurt the manufacturers of the original products, the sale of these items usually doesn’t hurt the consumer because the he or she is most likely already aware that they aren’t buying an original, but in the case of jewelry this situation could conceivably be very different.
There are many cases reported each year where a consumer purchased what was marketed as a natural diamond (or other valuable gemstone), but what they received was, in fact, a lab created gem.
It’s more than just a shame that shoppers can get duped out of their money by unscrupulous individuals, but it is a true testament of the quality of most lab created gems that they can effectively pass as their natural mined counterparts. If the quality of loose cz and other lab gems wasn’t so high and if they didn’t look so incredibly close to natural gems, this would probably never be an issue.
If you are looking to save money, but still look fabulous you don’t have to shop for sales that look to good to be true with natural gems – because as the old saying goes, “if it looks to good to be true, it probably is.” You can eliminate any confusion about what you are going to get by simply buying jewels crafted from cz in the first place. You can get an ultra high quality piece of jewelry for the lowest possible price, and only you will know that it isn’t a natural diamond. | <urn:uuid:d63553c4-fce2-4d93-8327-6a974c351698> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pehnec.com/blog/good-enough-to-be-criminal | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968138 | 427 | 1.585938 | 2 |
To turn the former dining room of a 1880s Copenhagen apartment into a kitchen, the conventional built-in approach wouldn’t work. The room’s wood-paneled walls give it preservation-protection status, so the number of holes drilled had to be kept to an absolute minimum.
Lesson: Every element is freestanding. The maple furniture pieces, by Hansen Kitchen, cast a light complement atop original oak floors, and the 19th century wall panels and ceiling details continue to steal the show. Lesson: There’s always another way.
Wall oven, microwave, and two refrigerator units—all by Atag—are contained in a maple armoire, by Hansen Kitchen, eliminating the need to attach the units to the wall paneling. The height of the armoire fits neatly below the molding at door height throughout the room. Roll-out shelves lie behind the maple doors that fill out the unit.
Lesson: Think of appliances as part of a furniture piece, rather than part of the room.
Easy access makes drawers the choice of professional chefs, so why not give the home chef the same advantage? A hand-sized notch makes it easy to open the drawers and eliminates the need for knobs or pulls. Here, deep drawers under the Hansen Kitchen sink bring pullout accessibility to an under-utilized area. Drawers in the island go from shallow near the counter to deep near the floor.
Lesson: Maximize storage with a variety of drawer depths.
Go with the Pros
The homeowners’ love of cooking compelled a desire for a Molteni stove, a French product found in restaurants worldwide. A glass panel serves as backsplash, and the exhaust fan is contained in a stainless steel shelf secured to the wall above the height of the wood paneling.
Lesson: Sometimes only the best will do.
Light the Way
A variety of light fixtures provide both function and aesthetics. Two industrial-style pendant lamps by Castaldi hang above the eight-foot-long island, which is topped by a black African granite stone called Nero Assoluto. Egg-shaped pendants by Flos hang over the dining table, a maple piece by Hansen Kitchen. Halogen task lights are mounted above the 13-inch-shallow pantry, on the sections of wall between the original transom windows.
Lesson: Choose each type of light for the exact area it will serve.
The maple drawers by Hansen Kitchen, which all feature tenoned joints, contain built-in dividers to keep flatware in its place.
Lesson: Make a list of all your kitchen contents ahead of time so you can plan drawer built-ins precisely.
Anyone who has spent timing emptying out a kitchen drawer and turning it upside down to remove every bit of dirt can appreciate the utility of kitchen drawers with a perforated steel bottom. Dust, dirt, and crumbs don’t accumulate; rather they fall through the perforations to be easily swept up. In food drawers, the perforation ensures air circulation, keeping mold at bay.
Lesson: Try different materials to reap rewards.
Stainless steel rods with hooks are fit into the side of the appliance armoire, making use of the furniture framework. The hooks keep often-used utensils right at hand, a timesaving feature.
Lesson: Look around your kitchen and visualize spots where a set of hooks would do the most good.
In Plain View
A magnetic knife rack keeps the chef’s most valuable possession out in the open. The rack is mounted in the flat area between the paneled sections of a door, an acceptable place to drill a hole because it can be repaired without trace; also it is convenient to the prep area.
Lesson: Look for storage options based on convenience versus convention (a door isn’t always a door). | <urn:uuid:f7b9b687-0a82-4dad-9cf3-0db4dfd73f46> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.elledecor.com/home-remodeling/the-freestanding-kitchen | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.914301 | 808 | 1.578125 | 2 |
So it turns out the springs won't cut it. I decided to haul the board with me one rainy day and ride it between classes. Pretty poor idea. First of all, the wide tire surface and the slickness of running water caused the board to hydroplane down some fairly steep slopes. The worst part was knowing it would happen. As I coasted down the hills of Georgia Tech, the board would oscillate violently. Turns out the springs were too soft and too responsive so a small semblance of a turn would soon be amplified to full extensions in a short period of time. I bailed off several times.
I put the board away for a few weeks and tacked other important things in the mean time. The finished Longpack for example.
I am a big fan of the blue shrink wrap. What I thought was really cool was how I could actually use the range on top of my stove to heat an area. It made me feel much safer than running a lithium battery under a flame.
The boards are in! Xo placed the order with Advanced Circuits and we received them as a strip of boards. I took a few of them with me to the Invention Studio one morning and cut them to size with the dremel tool.
The slot was also made through the ground plane to facilitate the edge of the nunchuk.
I also added some hall effect sensors to the hub motors. Three per hub motor, 120 degree spacing, attached to the tooth.
I'm not adventurous enough to try the flipped tooth method that Charles uses, although it would be much more convenient as I found out in the process.
Enough of that. THIS BOARD NEEDS TO HAPPEN NOW! I grabbed the deck and started prototyping resistive methods.
This plastic clip made from UHMW proved to be promising. The issue is that the truck angle is about 45 degrees, which means there is a 1 to 1 ratio between the person's movement and the trucks movement. With a person placing their weight on the edge of the deck, this means the resistive plug needs to exert 200-300 pounds of force without breaking or permanently deforming. Not an easy task.
Fortunately, these little guys did the trick.
These are also made from UHMW, but are taller and have additional bolt holes for more support. The older versions (also in the picture) have only two bolt holes, which twisted and widened after continual use.
What's left? Well next up is to solder the components to the boards. This should happen on Monday. My goal is to have this riding on Tuesday. How sweet would that be if I took the motor board to my meeting with Dr. Forest? =D | <urn:uuid:6cc15605-2240-46d4-ba01-a5475b796017> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thevariableconstant.blogspot.com/2010/11/hardboard-death-metal-m.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00064-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980006 | 553 | 1.851563 | 2 |
The University of Sydney’s Compass – find your way to higher education
(‘Compass’) program encourages primary and secondary school students to participate in higher education.
It is a partnership between the University of Sydney, the NSW Department of Education and Communities, and selected secondary and primary schools in Sydney. This partnership will also expand to regional areas of NSW during 2012.
Since the launch in 2009 Compass
has engaged over 30,000 students, teachers and parents both in their schools, communities and here on campus. The
program also collaborates closely with all faculties and businesses across the University.
Compass is funded by grants from the Department of Industry, Immigration, Science, Research and Tertiary Education and donations to the University of Sydney.
News & Events
Last week, the University of Sydney welcomed the first cohort of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander high school students to visit the University through its partnership with the South Sydney Rabbitohs.
The University of Sydney's iconic front lawns became a giant outdoor classroom for 700 eight- and nine-year-olds yesterday.
The University of Sydney hosted 270 parents of students from schools as a part of the Bridges to Higher Education initiative, where they learned about university education. | <urn:uuid:43e07394-d1f3-4937-93fe-e00c9529f896> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://sydney.edu.au/compass/index.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960931 | 253 | 2.09375 | 2 |
A collection of starlings is called a “murmuration.” A couple of kayakers in Ireland came across a murmuration. Nature never ceases to amaze and remind us of the importance of curiosity and discovery.
Here’s an excerpt from a study of the phenomenon:
“Bird flocking is a striking example of collective animal behaviour. A vivid illustration of this phenomenon is provided by the aerial display of vast flocks of starlings gathering at dusk over the roost and swirling with extraordinary spatial coherence. Both the evolutionary justification and the mechanistic laws of flocking are poorly understood, arguably because of a lack of data on large flocks… We investigated the main features of the flock as a whole (shape, movement, density and structure) and we discuss these as emergent attributes of the grouping phenomenon. Flocks were relatively thin, of various sizes, but constant proportions. They tended to slide parallel to the ground and, during turns, their orientation changed with respect to the direction of motion. Individual birds kept a minimum distance from each other that was comparable to their wing span. The density within the aggregations was nonhomogeneous, as birds were packed more tightly at the border than the centre of the flock.” | <urn:uuid:a2ce472c-a6ea-4a62-8a56-664536ce07f8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://einztein.com/user/GMM/einztein-feedback-62/page.14/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00008-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952688 | 254 | 3.46875 | 3 |
Jan. 20, 2009 Blast overpressure is generated from the firing of weapons and this may cause brain injury. The brain may be injured by the noise, which is produced when, for example, an anti-tank weapon (Bazooka, Karl Gustav) or a howitzer (Haubits) is fired. Scientists at the Sahlgrenska Academy demonstrated mild injury to brain tissue.
In response to this, the Swedish Armed Forces restricted the number of rounds per day Swedish personnel can be exposed to.
A number of reports, which have appeared during the last few years, have shown that the brain is sensitive to blast. This study determines whether the occupational standards for the highest levels of blast exposure were valid enough to avoid brain injuries. Traumatic brain injury is very common among war veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan and the majority has been exposed to explosions. The soldiers have symptoms of disorders of memory, mental processes, emotion, sleep, speech, vision and hearing. The symptoms may be similar to those of post traumatic stress syndrome, which may be caused by factors other than combat experience.
Brain may be affected by the blast, which is generated during firing of weapons
The Swedish Armed Forces sponsored a study, which has been carried out by scientists at the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. They have examined the effects of noise after the firing of a Haubits, an anti tank weapon (Karl Gustav) and an automatic rifle and by the detonation of plastic explosives underwater. The study was done on anaesthetized pigs and rats.
“We examined the maximal peak level of the blast in the brain transmitted from the blast in the air, as well as, brain tissue changes that were detected with the microscope, says Annette Säljö, one of the scientists who conducted the study.
The noise produced by the firing of both the haubits and the anti-tank weapon exceeds the occupational standards for highest levels of blast exposure. The scientists found that the maximal peak levels of the blast were unexpectedly high in the brain, i.e. that skin and bone appeared to protect the brain poorly. The results suggest that the degree of transmission of a pressure wave from air or water to the brain depends on the dominating frequencies in the frequency spectrum of the noise; low frequencies are transmitted considerably better than high frequencies.
Blast overpressure may result in haemorrhages in the brain
The microscopic examination of the brain showed that the blast from certain weapons produces small haemorrhages (bleeding) in the brain tissue and the meninges (lining of the brain). The examination also suggested that blast exposure leads to the development of brain edema, i.e. increased fluid content. The scientists were later able to support this finding with other measurements. The results are in agreement with findings in the brains of soldiers who had been injured or died after being exposed to explosions in wars, from WW1 to the war in Iraq.
Swedish Armed Forces have restricted their safety regulations
In summary, the study shows that the maximal peak levels of blast generated by the firing of certain weapons led to a small but measurable effect on the brains of pigs and rats.
The study also showed that this effect on the brain becomes worse with increasing maximal peak blast levels. The results poses the question as to whether exposure to even lower levels of blast than previous thought injurious might be contributing to the large numbers of mild traumatic brain injuries in American military personnel.
“This is of course an occupational question for Swedish Armed Forces. In light of the results of the study, the Swedish military has instituted restrictions in the number of firing rounds a person is allowed to be exposed to in a single day”, says Annette Säljö.
Direct studies on humans are difficult to perform, since biomarkers of injury in cerebrospinal fluid or blood and imaging studies such as computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) do not appear to be specific or sensitive enough to detect mild brain injury.
Other social bookmarking and sharing tools:
Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.
- Annette Säljö, Fredrik Arrhén, Hayde Bolouri, Maria Mayorga and Anders Hamberger. Neuropathology and pressure in the pig brain resulting from low impulse noise exposure. Journal of Neurotrauma, (in press) DOI: 10.1089/neu.2008.0602
Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead. | <urn:uuid:cd152195-605c-4a7e-984c-155badfbd07f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090119091112.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948802 | 945 | 3.21875 | 3 |
The Search for Trouvadore: Mission Statement
July 8 – July 22, 2006
Donald H. Keith, Ph.D.
Toni L. Carrell, Ph.D.
Ships of Discovery
During a helicopter reconnaissance trip to East Caicos, Turks & Caicos Islands, in February 2003, at least three shipwrecks were seen on the reef. During a 2004 survey, one massive debris field of an iron-hulled ship, several anchors and chain, ballast stones, an iron mast, a small wooden ship, and a modern wooden yacht were found. How can we identify any of these as Trouvadore’s remains? What specific artifacts might we expect to find?
In 1841, "wrecking" was a well-established practice in the islands, and extensive salvage was undertaken by local salvors. Recovered items included sails, rigging, chain cables, and personal effects. What might remain today are items of little value at the time, but they might help identify a wreck as a slave ship.
The construction of the ship itself will provide important clues. At this stage we know very little about Trouvadore other than that it was described as a brigantine and that it set sail from the coast of Africa with more than 200 slaves and a crew of about 20. A typical 19th-century brigantine was a two-masted, square-rigged ship with a gaff sail aft of the main mast and stay sails on both the main and fore masts. In order to carry a cargo of 200 or more slaves, Trouvadore was approximately 30 m long with a 10 m beam, a typical mid-sized ship of the day. Hull remains alone, however, will not be the best identifier. Brigantines and schooners were both used in the slave trade; the main difference between them was their rig, not their hulls. To further confuse things, only a slight difference in rigging could turn a schooner into a brigantine, so other artifacts associated with the ship will be of more help in its identification.
A list of “paraphernalia” derived from the “equipment clause” in the Anglo-Dutch anti-slavery treaty of 1822 may prove the most useful in identification of the wreck. The presence of the items in the equipment clause–even when slaves were absent–was considered sufficient evidence of a vessel’s involvement in the slave trade. As such it was subject to capture and condemnation. This equipment included extra bulkheads and spare lumber, iron manacles and chains, oversized iron cooking cauldrons and mess tubs, large quantities of victuals, extra water casks, grated instead of closed hatch covers, and an overabundance of firearms and otherweapons.
Absent the preservation of these items, the best clues to the identity of Trouvadore will be glass and pottery. The ship sailed from Spanish ports with a Spanish crew, later replaced with Portuguese sailors when their numbers were drastically reduced by illness and death. The ship’s destination was the Spanish colony of Cuba. The belongings of the crew and the containers that held the ship’s stores should reflect their origin and ports of call.
Several archival documents refer to Breezy Point and/or East Caicos as the wreck location of Trouvadore. It is assumed this is a reference to modern day Breezy Point, a prominence on the north shore of East Caicos that extends out almost to the reef fringing the north coast of the island.
There is a prominence approximately 2.5 km East of Breezy Point called Thatch Cay, and another about 2.5km to the West called Black Rock. It is also reasonable to assume that if Trouvadore had wrecked closer to one of these points, those locations would have been mentioned instead of Breezy Point. This narrows the search for Trouvadore’s remains to the area between the reef and the shore around Breezy Point.
The search area is approximately 5.5 kilometers long by 800 meters wide. The water depth in the lagoon is a maximum of 23 feet (7 m). Scattered large coral heads dot the lagoon and finger reefs extend shoreward from the fringing reef. Outside the fringing reef, which is often visible at low tide, the water depth slowly drops off to 60 feet (20 m) before plunging several thousand meters. The maximum water depth in the search area outside the reef is approximately 30 ft (9 m).
During our 2004 survey an innovative high-low tech approach proved extremely effective, and will be employed again this season. The control of the paths of the search boats and the locations of wreck sites and debris fields was accomplished with hand-held, data-logging GPS receivers in conjunction with highly detailed, digital, “geo-referenced” aerial images of the north coast of East Caicos. Geo-referencing is a technique that imposes map grid coordinates on an aerial image so that it can be used like a map: all measurements and directions taken from the image are true and tied into standard mapping conventions. We used the Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) grid convention, which facilitated distance calculations.
During our 2006 survey, the team will use a combination of high and low technology to locate ships and debris fields in the underwater search area. The high tech approach will employ a remote-sensing package consisting of a magnetometer and Differential Global Positioning System (DGPS) to survey the area outside the fringing reef.
A magnetometer is a passive device that can detect concentrations of ferrous material, such as iron anchors, cannon, or ships’ fittings, all of which produce a variation, or anomaly, in the earth’s magnetic field. This makes magnetometers a highly useful tool for shipwreck searches and studies.However, a magnetometer must be towed relatively close to the object to detect it. For example, a site with iron ballast and fittings can be detected at 80 to 100 meters, an isolated anchor at 30 meters. Generally, shallow-water surveys are done at close lane spacing, on the order of 30 to 50 feet.
The magnetometer is integrated with a highly accurate DGPS providing sub-meter accuracy for the location of any target or anomaly. Specialized navigation software will allow the survey team to design and delineate survey areas, process and edit the data, and generate final products such as contour maps and plotting sheets.
On the reef top and in some areas in the lagoon the shallow water and numerous reef outcrops make deployment of towed equipment problematic. In those areas a low-tech approach is most appropriate. This will be accomplished using mostly towed divers but will also include the use of diver propulsion vehicles (DPVs), which will facilitate speedy coverage of large areas.
In both situations, as sites are identified they will be buoyed and divers will be dispatched to begin the documentation process (photography, mapping, and limited sampling as appropriate). Divers will also use underwater metal detectors as an aid in determining site limits. All sites and finds will be entered in the Turks & Caicos National Museum’s archaeological database, adding to the nations growing inventory of underwater cultural heritage.
Sign up for the Ocean Explorer E-mail Update List. | <urn:uuid:e4688efa-ab28-43d9-9238-7247ddb42161> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/explorations/06trouvadore/background/mission_statement/mission_statement.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00056-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947645 | 1,526 | 3.453125 | 3 |
Summary: We are excited to present to you, BIOLOGY, written by Dr. Rob Brooker, Dr. Eric Widmaier, Dr. Linda Graham, and Dr. Peter Stiling; it is the next step in majors biology. In addition to being active researchers and experienced writers, the author team has taught majors biology for years.
The goal in launching a new text is to offer something better--a comprehensive, modern text featuring an evolutionary focus with an emphasis on scientific inquiry. We invit ...show moree you to take a few moments to learn more about the many different ways this text is the next step in biology. ...show less
More prices and sellers below. | <urn:uuid:85217400-cfbd-4e6b-83b4-2aa476b8dc56> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.textbooks.com/Biology-08-Edition/9780073268071/Robert-Brooker-Eric-P-Widmaier-Linda-Graham-and-Peter-Stiling.php?mpcond=New | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940274 | 139 | 1.835938 | 2 |
In Act IV Scene V of King Lear, the deranged Lear tells the blinded Gloucester: "Get thee glass-eyes, and like a scurvy Politician, seem to see the things thou dost not." This line always gets a laugh, for it is indeed (as Edgar comments) "reason in madness". Never has a politician furnished a better example of such glassy-eyed hypocrisy than the Leader of Her Majesty's Opposition. Addressing the Labour Party Conference in Manchester last month, Edward ("call me Ed") Miliband made a great show of stealing the Conservatives' clothes by invoking Benjamin Disraeli's celebrated Manchester speech of 1872, given in the nearby Free Trade Hall. The Labour leader declared: "We must be a one nation party, to become a one nation government, to build a one nation Britain."
One must first ask: had Mr Miliband actually read Disraeli's speech before he delivered his own? I prefer to believe that he left this task to his aides — for if he did read it, he is a fraud. Disraeli begins by defending constitutional monarchy and church establishment, causes alien to Mr Miliband's professed atheist and socialist principles. Still less can one imagine the Labour leader resisting Lords reform by defending, like Disraeli, the hereditary principle against the then novel proposal of life peerages, by arguing that a peer whose children may inherit his title has more to lose by ignoring public opinion.
Disraeli then announces his own radical idea — in Latin. He adapts the Vulgate — "vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas" — to coin his new slogan, "sanitas sanitatum, omnia sanitas", without bothering to translate it. "The first consideration of a Minister," he explains, "should be the health of the people." Disraeli's proposal, though, is not for a national health service, but for legislation to improve public sanitation — in other words, for the state to take on the modest role of enforcing minimum standards, rather than of providing monopoly services that eliminate competition. He discusses what Victorians called "the condition of England", but his conclusions are the very opposite of Mr Miliband's politics of class envy. Disraeli tells his audience: "You have created a society of classes that gives vigour, variety, and life to the nation, and yet there is no class that has a privilege; all are equal before the law."
As for the working class, Disraeli surveys their "immense results", their gains in prosperity and political rights over the 40 years since he had entered politics: "Their progress has not in any way been inferior to that of any other class." But, he insists, while legislation to improve sanitation and other public goods was indeed necessary, in future economic progress "much depends upon the working classes themselves". Disraeli was alive to the danger of creating a culture of working-class dependency — far more so than Mr Miliband, who has before him the melancholy evidence of half a century of welfare-driven decline. Victorians cared passionately about relieving poverty, but they thought it no business of the government to abolish inequality.
Disraeli's most famous words in this Manchester speech, though, had nothing to do with social justice. Unlike Mr Miliband, he spoke at length on the terrorist threat, then posed by Irish Fenians rather than Islamists, on defence and foreign policy. But his most wounding charge against Gladstone's government was that "extravagance was being substituted for energy". Disraeli's mordant wit showed the Liberals no mercy: "As I sat opposite the Treasury bench, the Ministers reminded me of one of those marine landscapes not very unusual on the coasts of South America. You behold a range of exhausted volcanoes. Not a flame flickers on a single pallid crest." The shaft hit home: within two years, Disraeli was returned to office. Can one imagine Mr Miliband delivering such a killer blow to the present coalition?
Disraeli nowhere mentions "one nation" in his Manchester speech — or, indeed, anywhere else. The notion was later extrapolated from Sybil, subtitled The Two Nations — a book which Mr Miliband shows even less sign of having read than the speech that it preceded by 27 years. In this, the best-known of his political novels, the young Disraeli warns of riots unless the rich and the poor cease to be "inhabitants of different planets". As leader of the Young England wing of the Tories, he saw the remedy for discontent in a romantic alliance of monarch and people, not in punitive taxes or big government. Just as Marx was predicting the collapse of capitalism, Disraeli was ensuring its survival by extending the franchise and expanding the empire.
Disraeli concluded Sybil with an appeal: "The claims of the Future are represented by suffering millions; and the Youth of a Nation are the trustees of Posterity." His social reforms engendered a new phenomenon, the working-class Tory — now an endangered species. Disraeli may have been ruthless in his ascent of "the greasy pole" but he was too honest with his public about what he saw in the industrial slums to be one of Lear's "scurvy politicians". In disposing of his elder brother David, Ed Miliband acquired the mark of Cain; his ruthlessness, though, has been to no obvious purpose. His policies would recreate the two nations, by deepening the division between private and public sectors, between those who pay taxes and those who spend them. If Mr Miliband had listened less to the glassy-eyed Marxists, his father Ralph or his mentor Eric Hobsbawm, he would not now behave as if it were a crime to be bourgeois. | <urn:uuid:fcf4a442-4898-4040-a0d1-f308095a43d3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://standpointmag.co.uk/manchester-square-november-12-thoroughly-modern-mili-daniel-johnson-ed-miliband-benjamin-disraeli | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971762 | 1,175 | 1.898438 | 2 |
Shipwreck diving off Knysna
Did you know?
The Knysa seahorse, at only 7 centimetres long, is one of the smallest in the world.
Scuba diving in Knysna is a great adventure for anyone interested in shipwrecks. The Paquita, a German vessel, sank on the eastern side of the Knysna Heads way back in 1903.
The wreck, which is easily accessible to qualified divers, remains in excellent condition. Its iron plates still glimmer brightly and its anchors are clearly visible, despite sitting at the bottom of the ocean for over a century.
Various dive operators offer both day and night dives at this site and they're highly recommended by those in the know. In a review on a scuba diving website, www.wannadive.net, Michael Holthuysen wrote: 'The wreck is in beautiful condition with anchors clearly visible and many other delights to discover'.
According to various sources, the sinking of the Paquita was premeditated – an apparent attempt to bamboozle insurance brokers. Because the ship sank in the calmer section of the lagoon, far from the more dangerous port entrance where strong currents could genuinely cause sailing difficulty, the insurance company concerned did not pay out.
Divers exploring the Paquita wreck can go as far as 16 metres below the surface. The visibility of the water at the site is graded as moderate, with divers able to see up to 10 metres in any direction.
In addition to the wreck, divers will experience a variety of marine life, such as monster-size garrick (also known as leerfish), small sharks, cuttlefish and an assortment of colourful sea anemones. There is even a chance of spotting the rare Knysna seahorse, believed to be the most endangered variety of seahorse on the planet and indigenous to the Knysna Lagoon.
The Knysna Tourism Association can recommend dive operators who will provide equipment and qualified dive guides.
Travel tips & Planning info
Who to contact
Tel: +27 (0) 44 382 5510
Knysna Elephant Park
Tel: +27 (0) 44 532 7732 | <urn:uuid:2e5318fa-c208-4050-9230-5658ee2e7f88> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.southafrica.net/trade/en/articles/entry/article-southafrica.net-shipwreck-diving-in-knysna | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926834 | 462 | 2.53125 | 3 |
Laurens van der Post
The extraordinary life of Laurens van der Post is not easily capsulized. Author of many books, farmer, soldier, prisoner of war, political adviser to British heads of state, educator, humanitarian, philosopher, explorer, and conservationist are titles that barely indicate the depth and breadth of this rare individual. Born in 1906 in the interior of southern Africa, he lived among the people who created the first blueprint for life on earth, becoming the principal chronicler of the Stone Age Kalahari Bushmen. He was also one of C.G. Jung's closest friends for sixteen years. Van der Post dedicated his life to teaching the meaning and value of indigenous cultures in the modern world, a world he felt is in danger of losing its spiritual identity to technology, prejudice, empty values, and a lack of understanding of the interconnectedness of all life on earth. Awarded a knighthood (the C.B.E.) in 1981, Sir Laurens died after his 90th birthday, in December, 1996.
Coincidences have never been idle for me, instinctively, but as meaningful as I was to find they were to Jung. I have always had a hunch that they are a manifestation of a law of life of which we are inadequately aware and which in terms of our short life are unfortunately incapable of total definition, and yet however partial the meaning we can extract from them, we ignore it, I believe, at our peril. For as well as promoting some cosmic law, coincidences, I suspect, are some sort of indication to what extent the evolution of our lives is obedient or not obedient to the symmetry of the universe.
-- Laurens van der Post, Jung and the Story of Our Time, p.47
In the late winter of 1996 i began reading a story of Sir Laurens spanning 2 volumes, A Story like the Wind and A Far Off Place. These had been given to me more than a year before by Dr. Kenneth Graham, an osteopath who had helped with an injury to my sternum i'd experienced back in 1991. At that time i was gripped by a powerful sneezing and coughing bout from allergies and apparently had torn either a ligament or a tendon between my left fourth rib and the cartilage connecting it to the sternum. As coincidences go, there was much about this injury, its proximity to my heart, and where its aftermath has led me, that has bestowed much grace upon my spirit and blessings upon the life expressing itself through me.
i had gone to Kenneth's house on Saturday for an extra healing session. We had already discovered an area of mutual interest in the works of Krishnamurti and David Bohm. He had a stack of both books of Laurens' on a bureau and before i left gave one of each to me. It was clear this story was very significant for him and i was grateful for his generosity in giving me a set. But back at my house, they lay on a shelf unopened for more than a year. Intuitively i knew they were important. But inwardly i had not allowed myself the feeling of leisure to even think of "spending time" exploring them as i had been as caught in the trap of the "i'm too busy" dis-ease as so many of us feel on such a desperate level in this epoch.
When i did begin to wade into A Story like the Wind, i was initially very circumspect and non-committal about the idea of even reading it all the way through. However i came, by degree, to have a deepening sense of François, the story's young protagonist, as being some sort of long-lost especially dear and close friend, who, while engaged in the act of reading, was consistently restored life-size and vital to me inwardly in such a way that i cannot recall when i last felt as connected to so rich a sense of life through the act of story telling.
Since that time Laurens' perceptions -- his experiences in life and tremendous gift for articulating something elementally ineffable and of such inestimable value concerning the nature of life, the nature of what it means to be human, and our relationship to the infinite world within, as objectively factual as that of the world without -- have deeply and indelibly enriched my own being and experience of the meaning of life. The more of his stories i read, the more i feel each book is but a chapter in a larger book of magnificently vast proportions -- as vast as the mystery each of us manifests within our human overcoats and the unknown depths we contain and express and live out here at this time, in this place.
The revitalization and sense of meaning in my own life has manifested to such a significant degree, i feel compelled to do what little i can to call attention to the extraordinary legacy and body of work his life took in, digested, metabolized, synthesized, and then expressed through the medium of books as well as films and video and audio recordings.
At the present time (May 31, 1998) i am grateful to be able to present the following to people who may likewise find a re-engagement of meaning and wholeness in their own lives as i have felt renewed with from drinking in what i have so far been able to find of Sir Laurens' works. Of all his books and stories i've read and listened to, the 48-page testament of Witness to a Last Will of Man is unique and singular in both its concise as well as extraordinarily wide-ranging articulation of the real source of lethal illness daily consuming the human spirit. It also provides great healing insights and illumination. --Can't recommend this highly enough!
Book Excerpts :
- Witness to a Last Will of Man, from Testament to the Bushman, 1984
Late, partial and hurried as it was in the doing, [this testament] will make those who ponder its fragmentary bequests nonetheless rich because they are all he had left to bequeath of the wealth and natural spirit out of which in his own day he gave so abundantly with all the grace, willingness and fulness of which he in his time on earth was capable.
gzip'd PDF and PostScript and txt formats are also available
- Race Prejudice as Self Rejection,
An Inquiry into the Psychological and Spiritual Aspects of Group Conflicts
a consolidation of lectures presented at the Workshop for Cultural Democracy, in New York City, December, 1956.
- The Psychological Origins of
a talk given in San Francisco, October 1, 1961, under the sponsorship of the Analytical Psychiatry Club of San Francisco and the Society of Jungian Analysts.
- List of Published Works by Sir Laurens van der Post
An incomplete ( but attempting to amend this ) list of books, booklets, films on video and audio tapes, with brief synopses from book jackets so far located.
- The New Myth For Our Species: The Creation of Consciousness
ratitor's Corner, September Equinox, 2001
Celebrating ratical's 6th revolution around SOL, Chapter 1 of Edward Edinger's book, The Creation of Consciousness, Jung's Myth for Modern Man is included to convey something of the growing understanding for the need in human society of a new central living myth, grounded in the creation of more and more consciousness. Such a fact of the creation of more consciousness provides, as Edinger explains, a tangible "meaning for every experience and gives each individual a role in the on-going world-drama of creation." Many relevant quotations of Laurens are included and discussed.
- ratitor's Corner, September Equinox, 1997
In celebration of the completion of ratical's 2nd revolution around SOL, the ratitor takes this occasion to step through some excerpts of Laurens' perceptions centering on the transcript of the talk from 1961 as well as excerpts from some of his other books.
- quotations of Laurens van der Post, from texts and recordings
- The Freedom to Choose Between Truth and Error
(from A Walk With A White Bushman)
It may be that there are other worlds with forms of being, with a greater awareness of this responsibility than we have, but this is what is on our doorstep and knocking so powerfully to be allowed in. For the moment this is our unique role. We have already got power enough to destroy the whole of human life; but we have not yet got the moral obligation, the sense of good and bad, to match it and follow it as our instrument of metamorphosis. We have not yet accepted that every act of knowledge, every increase of knowledge, increases our responsibility towards creation. We have been induced into believing that we are completely helpless in the grip of powerful new forces and that we are caught up in a process that is meaningless, and just sweeping us along like the swine of a new Gadarene. But we have the power to be creative if we turn back to what I can only call `the dreaming process' in ourselves, and we put our imaginations and our lives into this area where the dream occurs; then we can `do', and we can change life.
But the message is clear: the power which does not corrupt comes to man not in multitudes, it comes to him as an individual man, as it came to the man alone with his cattle, his natural self in the Forest of the Night and which, by his failure to recognize it, lost him his soul. It comes first to the individual alone: the individual who has to guard his individuality in an aloneness that is not loneliness but, as the Zulus say, a house of dreams. There he can discover the greatest of freedoms, to live out his own gift of life without diminishing or imperilling, but enriching his association with the society of man. And the dreaming to which I refer is not some lush, comfortable, pink marshmallow kind of concept. It is a voice of steel, calling us to live and fight for truth not in hate but love, for love. But it calls in a language to be decoded, since it is -- as someone I know in America, who left his church to do just this, put it -- `the forgotten language of God'. We have no excuse any more, and it is the greatest scandal of our day that neither religion nor science acknowledges it, that we have the code to read the ancient instructions inscribed in our dreams -- and we do not use it.
- PostScript (from The Night of the New Moon)
. . . The conduct of thousands of men in war and in prison with me confirmed with an eloquence which is one of my most precious memories of war, that the spirit of man is naturally a forgiving spirit. I was convinced that if the cancellation of the negative past which is forgiveness could take its place, it would automatically be followed by the recognition that men could no longer change the pattern of life for the better by changing their frontiers, their systems and their laws of compulsion of judgement and justice, but only by changing themselves.
- The `Wind of Change' in 1926 for European Empire Around the World
Many more stars were about to fall out of their courses, he warned me, and that, he stressed, was how and why he had been called on to prophesy and warn, for that was all a prophet could do. But warn to what effect? It was not for prophet or man to say in an age, he declared tragically, when no-one spoke any more of Umkulunkulu, the great first spirit. His praise-names were forgotten, and men now spoke only of things useful to them. How could I, a child of the same Africa, myself have failed then to conclude that no year for centuries had been of so meaningful a transition as this year of our absent Lord, 1926?
- A Japanese Story Teller (this and the previous both from Yet Being Someone Other)
Somehow I seemed to know him and his function before Mr Tajima whispered to me, "He is a travelling and professional story-teller."
I knew it because the look in his eye and the tone of his appearance, despite dress and dissimilarity of circumstances and place, were familiar and dear to me. I had met it on the faces of men charged to pass on the stories of Africa from one generation to another without help of the written word, in the belief that, if their story were ever to be forgotten, they and their peoples would lose soul.
- Jung's Understanding of the Meaning of the Shadow (from Jung and the Story of Our Time)
. . . The dark, rejected forces massing in the shadow of the unconscious, as it were, knife in hand, demanding revenge for all that man and his cultures have consciously sacrificed of them in the specialised conscious tasks he has set himself, are real and active enough to keep us too busy for academics and scholasticisms. They show how all our history is a progression on two levels: a conscious and unconscious, a manifest and latent level. . . .
That is why all men tend to become what they oppose, why the New Testament exhorted us not to resist evil because what follows logically is that ultimately the dark, dishonoured self triumphs and emerges on the scorched level of the manifest to form another tyranny as narrow, producing another swing of the opposites of which Heraclitus spoke. The answer, as Jung saw it, was to abolish tyranny, to enthrone, as it were, two opposites side by side in the service of the master pattern, not opposing or resisting evil but transforming and redeeming it. These two opposites in the negations of our time could be turned into tragic enemies. But truly seen psychologically and again defined best perhaps in the nonemotive terms of physics, they were like the negative and positive inductions of energy observed in the dynamics of electricity; the two parallel and opposite streams without which the flash of lightning, for me always the symbol of awareness made imperative, was impossible.
Containing those two opposites, putting the light of the superior functions at the service of the dark, bearing all the tensions induced thereby, the individual could grow into a resolution of the two into a greater realisation of himself. One says greater because the self realised thereby is more than the sum of the opposites, because in the process of their resolution the capacity of the individual to join in the universal and continuing act of creation wherein his own life participates enables him to add something which was not there before. | <urn:uuid:6cea35d8-5543-48b9-99ed-11017be75817> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ratical.com/many_worlds/LvdP/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97382 | 2,998 | 1.890625 | 2 |
Many people assume they can protect their trademark simply by using the mark in commerce. It is true that you are not required to register a trademark to achieve some level of protection and that one establishes common law rights simply by using a mark in commerce.
However, having a federally registered trademark on the USPTO's principal register provides several advantages:
- Serves as constructive notice to the public of the registrant's ownership of the trademark
- Establishes a legal presumption of your ownership of the mark and your exclusive right to use the trademark nationwide on or in connection with the goods and/or services listed in the registration
- Allows the registrant to bring an action concerning the trademark in federal court
- U.S registration can be used as a basis to obtain registration in foreign countries
- Can be filed with U.S. Customs to prevent the importation of infringing foreign goods
Federal registration also allows you to use the ® (the "Circle-R") symbol. Any time you claim rights in a trademark, you may use the TM
(trademark) or SM
(service mark) symbol to alert the public to your claim, regardless of whether you have filed an application with the USPTO. However, you can only use the federal registration symbol ® after the USPTO has actually registered the trademark, not without an application or while an application is pending. Following registration, you can only use the ® symbol on or in connection with the goods and/or services listed in the federal trademark registration. | <urn:uuid:fbe62e7e-a869-4dc3-8352-f6d36a5478e6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.legalzoom.com/trademarks-faq/benefits-registered-trademarks.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.92571 | 311 | 2.21875 | 2 |
The theme was “Great Spaces in Different Places - A Mixed Use Space to Live and Work.” Students were challenged to design a mixed-use commercial/residential addition, incorporating above grade concrete into the design. Students were also asked to blend in other creative building elements such as energy-efficient items and environmentally-conscious products.
The structure had to be designed for a young professional couple who wanted an architecture office on the first floor and residential space on the second floor. The students were told to model the building after Crocker Park or a work/live space in a downtown city area.
Student entries included a floor plan and elevation drawings, as well as a scaled model home. They were judged in 15 separate categories, including design, planning and innovations, energy-conserving features, drawing presentation, model presentation, and exterior design.
Duane VanDyke, principal of VanDyke Architects, judged the construction of the models.
“I was very impressed by all of the entries. Everyone put a lot of time and energy into their projects. The students learned about designing a building, meeting deadlines and the criteria of the client, and selling the idea to the client,” said VanDyke.
Eric O. Pempus, AIA, LEED GA, risk manager of architects and engineers services for Oswald Companies, judged the overall quality of the projects’ drawings and models.
“What stood out the most was the tremendous effort exhibited by the students and their introduction of electronic technology to supplement the assigned drawings and models. They used computer animation to conduct walk-by and fly-by presentations, which was a highlight for me” said Pempus. “The students learned how to come up with a design solution and learned how to communicate their designs with drawings and models. The competition, itself, empowered the students to exercise their creativity.”
Kevin A. Cieszykowski. principal architect with Kevin A. Cieszykowski & Associates, LLC, judged the design of the building. He looked at topics like curb appeal, the character of the building, efficient traffic circulation patterns, and the feasibility of design.
“This year, the students did an outstanding job of designing spaces that functioned well. They created buildings that fit into their surroundings, while remaining unique,” Cieszykowski said. “They had to create a mixed-use building in an urban environment. It gets the students thinking a little more than if it were just a house on a lot. It also addresses a growing real-world trend that exists in today’s real estate market.”
Jim Pinter, LEED AP BD+C, with ADA Architects, Inc., judged creative/innovative concepts.
“This is a great subject to judge because it encourages kids to go beyond the structured portion of the project and explore the limits of creativity,” he said. “What I enjoyed most was the opportunity to observe all of the different means and methods that the students applied to solve the same problem.”
Enzo Perfetto, manager of Enzoco Homes, judged for bonus points.
“What stood out the most was the design of some of the projects. They really had concepts that were very innovative. There was a great use of computer aided drawings, and some of the projects actually had a continuous loop of an actual walk-through of the home. The students also had very efficient designs,” he said.
Cieszykowski feels that students learn a great deal from these competitions. “They learn how to draft detailed technical drawings and also have to think about the social, economic and environmental issues that come with a project like this.
“This entire process is very hands on. From the first day until the very end, it is a never-ending exercise in problem solving. These students learn more than architecture. They learn the importance of communicating ideas effectively, and that is an invaluable skill in just about any profession,” he said.
Pempus feels that students get to experience what it would be like to have a career in the construction industry.
“The students learn to dig deep within themselves to create a solution that they didn’t even know existed before,” indicated Pinter. “You start with this amazing problem, and by the end you have an equally amazing solution. There’s always some magic in finding that solution. Exercises like this help students become independent thinkers. It forces them to find their own solutions and to innovate through imagination not imitation.”
For VanDyke, competitions like this help to bring along the next generation of architects, engineers and designers. “These are people who are working to creatively solve the different needs of how people live and work. I see some tough competition coming down the pike,” said VanDyke.
After the awards ceremony, the top four teams had the opportunity to share their thoughts about winning and their entry.
“The winning entries were those projects that went beyond the normal parameters and explored innovative and creative solutions. The students found a way to balance creativity with innovation to create an overall effective solution,” said Pinter.
“The top four winners showed effort well beyond the minimal requirements. As an example, the project assignment gave the option of providing extra drawings, such as electrical, HVAC, and plumbing plans. These students did the extra work,” said Pempus.
The first-place team and winners of the Best CAD Drawings and Architectural Design of Merit Awards included Jacob Hoffman, Jacob Lemanowicz, and Theodore Poulos of Westlake High School’s Technical Design Program.
According to Jacob Hoffman, the team created a design with one central, circular staircase from the first to the third floor.
“Windows surround the staircase, which allows a lot of passive light to enter the stairwell and the home. There’s also solar panels to reduce heating and cooling expense. We included a third floor, which was not a part of the original specifications, which offers open outdoor living space. We presented two different second-floor plans in case the couple wanted a different configuration. One offered more wide-open living space,” said Theodore.
The students spent 150 hours working on the project, and they all agreed that they learned how to manage time.
Second Place: Westlake High School
The second place team included Westlake High School students Katherine Garruto, James Lydon, and Avery Starin.
According to James, their model was unique because it had a curved roof that spanned the entire length of the home. “It included green features, including ICF-Insulated Concrete Form walls, which are cheaper, better and faster. It has solar panels that heat hot water, which is used to heat the home through radiant floor heating. There are skylights in every room to bring in the natural light, and it’s an open floor plan,” he said.
Katherine thought that building the model was the most challenging. “The rooftop deck was very difficult.”
Avery found the detail drawings challenging. “The full wall sections and the construction specifications were hard to draw because they were so detailed and small,” he said.
The group made a three-dimensional computer animation of the building process from the ground up, which it submitted with its project.
They learned a lot about time management, keeping on track, and documenting their work. “If you document as you go along, it makes deciding what you’re going to do next a lot easier,” said James.
Katherine hopes to go into architecture, James into industrial design or commercial building, and Avery into biomedical engineering.
Third Place: Westlake High School
Westlake High School’s team of Cal Craven, Pierce Gleespen, Loren Kreider, and Sam Peplin took third place.
“One of our biggest challenges was the solar light tube. It’s a glass tube that runs through the center of the building that provides natural light throughout the building,” said Sam.
According to Cal, the group went to the Home Builders Association of Greater Cleveland’s SMART Home Tour and saw a home with Astroturf on the roof. “It absorbs rain water and turns it into usable water for the home. We liked that idea, so we made a rooftop balcony that was very green,” he said.
Pierce felt that a very strong point of their design was the research they did and the technical components that they blended into the design.”
Loren felt that one of the most challenging things of the competition was generating ideas. “We had a really good idea for MEG panels in the home, but it turned out to be challenging to turn the idea into a model. We spent tons of time in the basement trying to build the model, which would have cost untold millions of dollars,” indicated Loren.
Each of the team members put in about 50 separate hours on the project since November. They are Level 2 in the Tech/Drawing Program.
Fourth Place: Maplewood Career Center
Maplewood Career Center’s team included Jessica DiTirro and Johnathan Smith, and they named their company J&J Architecture.
“We didn’t want to have a square building; we wanted to make it different. Our building has a modern look with a stone frontage and interesting angles,” said Jessica. “We blended in a lot of windows to bring in natural light, as well as Energy Star appliances. The kitchen is open to the rest of the home so that the homeowners can interact with guests in the other room.”
“We added solar panels to the roof to generate power for the home,” indicated Johnathan.
The most challenging, according to Jessica and Johnathan, was determining the size of the rooms and doing the layout of the home.
“The home has easy traffic patterns and an easy flow,” indicated Jessica.
“We tried to make it as open as possible,” said Johnathan.
The students also did computer simulations that took you through the kitchen, residential area, foyer, and hallways.
Jessica and Johnathan are in the Computer Aided Engineering Program.
A complete list of winners will be published in next Sunday’s Real Estate section. | <urn:uuid:bce59e9b-ce18-40a6-b8de-e1ff3bb4760b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cleveland.com/pdrealestate/plaindealer/index.ssf/2013/02/16th_annual_student_model_home_design_contest_winners_showcased_at_the_great_big_home_garden_show.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00024-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973123 | 2,183 | 2.109375 | 2 |
First, thanks to all of you for voting in my poll. I really appreciate your interest in what I write here; it means a lot to me. You voted that you wanted to read and talk some more about some of crime fiction’s trends and possible future directions, so here goes . I find the topic of what’s happening in crime fiction really fascinating and I’m glad you do, too. Crime fiction has evolved and continues to evolve; if it didn’t it would become far too stale to win and keep fans. Here are a few more of my ideas on some of the changes crime fiction has gone through in the last years.
Motives For Murder
In classic and Golden Age crime fiction, motives for murder tended to be extrinsic. Murderers in those novels kill for gain, out of fear or anger, or sometimes for revenge or love. For example, in Arthur Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson investigate two deaths. Enoch Drebber and Joseph Stangerson are American visitors to London, staying at a rooming house. Drebber is murdered and at first it seems as though his landlady’s son Arthur Charpentier is the culprit. Charpentier’s innocent, though, and the police have to look elsewhere for the criminal. Then, Stangerson is murdered. Holmes finds out who the killer is and what the motive is. In this case, it’s revenge for an old sin.
Gain is the motive for the poisoning murder of Emily Inglethorp in Agatha Christie’s The Mysterious Affair at Styles. In that novel, the victim has a large fortune to leave and several relations who would be only too glad to have it. Hercule Poirot and Captain Hastings work together to find out which one of the people in Emily Inglethorp’s life was desperate enough to kill. Lots of other Golden Age novels and stories are also built around motives of gain, fear, revenge, or some other extrinsic motive, and even today, lots of novels feature that kind of motive. Mine do.
But in the last hundred years or so, we’ve learned quite a lot about the way the human mind works. Beginning with the work of people like Sigmund Freud, we’ve begun to learn more and more about psychology. That knowledge has found its way into crime fiction. Today’s crime fiction features quite a number of psychological motives for murder. For example, Ruth Rendell’s A Judgement in Stone begins this way:
“Eunice Parchman killed the Coverdale family because she could not read or write.
This is a novel about, among other things, the effect of “being on the outside.” It explores psychology in a way that early crime fiction didn’t. So does 13 Steps Down, another of Rendell’s standalones. Rendell’s certainly not the only one to explore psychology in her novels. Martin Edwards does the same with his Lake District series featuring DCI Hannah Scarlett and Oxford historian Daniel Kind. Many other authors do, too.
Today we even see novels that explore mental illness such as bi-polar disorder, depression and PTSD. I see this trend continuing as we learn more and more about the way the human mind works. In a way, that adds an interesting dimension to the genre. On the other hand, our interest in psychology has also been part of the motivation behind the proliferation of serial killers in today’s crime fiction. Some of them work quite well, but it’s very, very difficult to do that successfully.
Early crime fiction and a lot of Golden Age crime fiction tends to be almost clean-scrubbed in its depiction of life. Of course there are exceptions but as a rule, the detective fiction of the time is fairly sanitised. For example, in Dorothy Sayers’ Strong Poison, mystery novelist Harriet Vane is tried for the murder of her former lover Philip Boyes. She’s got a motive, too, since they’d quarreled shortly before his murder, and since she had arsenic, the murder weapon, in her possession. Lord Peter Wimsey attends the trial and, smitten by Vane, determines to clear her name. He gets his chance when the jury cannot agree on a verdict and Vane is granted a new trial. Wimsey interacts with several people in this novel as he searches for the real killer, including people who don’t live in very reputable parts of town. And yet, we don’t get dark, seamy descriptions of life there. Nor are we given a real description of what life in prison was probably like for a woman at the time this novel was written.
With the advent of the “hardboiled” genre from authors such as Raymond Chandler and later, John D. MacDonald, we begin to see grittier descriptions of neighbourhoods and people. For example, we get a very uncompromising look at Glasgow in Denise Mina’s Garnethill trilogy. We get also get a very harsh, uncompromising and gritty look at Melbourne in Peter Temple’s Jack Irish series. Those series have lots of differences, but what they have in common is that the author does not take pains to “scrub up” the setting, the people, the motive for murder, or much of anything else. We even see this grittiness in some lighter novels, although it’s less marked. In Marth Grimes’ The Anodyne Necklace, for instance, some of the action takes place in London, but it’s hardly the London that the tourists see. Inspector Richard Jury and his friend Melrose Plant visit some very seedy homes and pubs, and Grimes doesn’t mince words in describing them, although it’s also fair to say that she also doesn’t get as gritty as descriptions we see in some other series.
Along with the increased grittiness we see in more recent crime fiction, there’s also a lot more explicitness. Perhaps this trend started as readers wanted crime fiction that was more realistic.
In early crime fiction and much Golden Age crime fiction, for instance, there are essentially no mentions, other than in oblique terms, of physical intimacy. Certainly there aren’t graphic descriptions of it. There are also essentially no explicit, graphic depictions of violence, including murder. For example, in Josephine Tey’s The Man in the Queue, an unknown man is stabbed while waiting with a group of other people to see a play. We know the man’s been murdered, but we don’t get every gory detail. And in Dorothy Sayers’ Strong Poison, we know perfectly well that Harriet Vane and Philip Boyes had an intimate relationship. Yet the details of it are not described.
With the advent of noir and other “hardboiled” crime fiction, we begin to see more descriptions of violence. Certainly the violence in Dashiell Hammett’s The Thin Man is more explicit than it is in Tey’s work. We also begin to see more explicit description of physical intimacy in this kind of crime fiction than in earlier crime fiction.
In some of today’s crime fiction, both violence and physical intimacy are described in sometimes very graphic detail. And even crime fiction that doesn’t dwell on those scenes sometimes includes them. For instance, we see both in Deon Meyer’s Blood Safari. That particular novel works well because neither the violence nor the intimacy overtakes the plot. And that’s perhaps the key. Including explicitness doesn’t have to ruin a novel; in fact sometimes it falls out naturally from the plot. It’s when those scenes are gratuitous that they take away from a novel.
What’s ironic is that these scenes, and the treatment of formerly taboo topics such as rape, are increasingly common while at the same time, certain things such as pejorative terms and “isms,” which used to be perfectly acceptable in crime fiction, no longer are. Those developments give an interesting perspective on how our views of what is and isn’t acceptable have changed.
Will this trend towards explicitness and the treatment of very taboo topics continue? In the short run they probably will, as books with this theme sell well. I am hopeful that in the long run, it’ll be the quality of the plot and characters rather than explicitness that people will want. People may in fact become bored with books that offer nothing but relentless explicitness and those books will stop selling. In closing, let me just share what Agatha Christie had to say about this same topic back in the mid-1930’s. In Death on the Nile, we meet once-popular novelist Salome Otterbourne who’s has increasingly lost her audience, mostly because of the themes of her books. She and her daughter Rosalie are taking a cruise of the Nile when the real-life murders of fellow passenger Linette Ridgeway Doyle and other characters prove far more gripping than anything Otterbourne’s written: Here’s what Rosalie Otterbourne says about her mother’s declining sales:
“People are tired of all that cheap sex stuff… ”
What do you think? Do you see changes in motives for murder, realism/grittiness and more explicitness? Where do you see the genre heading from here?
*NOTE: The title of this post is a line from Bon Jovi’s The More Things Change. | <urn:uuid:e2e0d7aa-0ded-404f-9844-db880c9f69da> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://margotkinberg.wordpress.com/2012/02/04/its-the-same-old-story-but-its-told-a-different-way/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00043-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959382 | 2,026 | 2.0625 | 2 |
WASHINGTON – Congress approved the RESTORE Act legislation Friday that will direct billions of dollars in BP oil spill fine dollars to Louisiana and the rest of the Gulf Coast states.
The RESTORE Act was included in a multi-billion-dollar transportation and highways funding bill that also includes the plan to keep interest rates low for federal student loans, the five-year extension of the National Flood Insurance Program, or NFIP, and part of the RAMP Act by U.S. Rep. Charles Boustany, R-Lafayette, to direct more federal funds to river dredging and port projects in Louisiana and the rest of the nation.
But a late addition to the omnibus bill this week also cuts more than $650 million in federal health care funds for Louisiana’s poor that will slice Medicaid reimbursements for many hospitals and providers. State also officials said the loss of the funds would eliminate Medicaid programs for services like breast and cervical cancer screenings, foster care, adult dentures, hospice care and more.
President Barack Obama is expected to sign the bill into law.
The bicameral transportation conference committee managed to squeeze everything into one bill with federal transportation funds set to run out and with student loan interest rates to double after Saturday. Also, the NFIP expires after July. The U.S. House vote of 373-52 and the U.S. Senate’s 74-19 approval came Friday afternoon just before the congressional Fourth of July break.
The entire Louisiana congressional delegation voted for the bill. | <urn:uuid:f4d8d442-a9e8-4985-8f04-855c62bd464a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://theadvocate.com/home/3226408-125/congress-approves-billions-in-restore | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953936 | 311 | 1.585938 | 2 |
Today the kids were making ornaments to decorate the new Christmas tree that we got for our kitchen. (What, don't you have a tree in your kitchen?) (OK, so I may or may not have purchased the tree as incentive* for the kids to do something that I wanted them to do) (and I like having a tree** in the kitchen) I had planned to decorate the tree with chili peppers or something like that, but today the offspring*** were too excited and decided to take matters into their hands and use a case of printer paper to make ornaments for the new tree.
They made tons of snowflakes, a big paper chain and a really cool star for the top.
Max is an amazing kid, if he has access to a bunch of paper, scissors, tape, crayons and a stapler, there is no limit to what this kid can create.
Earlier today, Max was working on a new creation for the tree when it appeared that he needed some tape. He asked everyone if we knew where the tape was.
Due to the fact that Max is generally the only one who uses tape, none of the rest of us knew where it was.
I even checked in my super secret tape hiding place, and there wasn't any tape there. (apparently, Max discovered my super secret tape hiding place)
Max was continually growing more agitated, and kept asking us where the tape was. (because everyone knows that asking someone the same thing over and over and over will make them know the answer)
"Where is the tape?"
"Who hid the tape?"
"Why won't anybody help me find the tape?"
"Why am I the only one looking for the tape?"
"IT'S NOT FAIR THAT I'M THE ONLY ONE LOOKING FOR THE TAPE!!!"
I calmly suggested that he look in his room because he WAS the last one to use the tape.
"IT'S NOT IN MY ROOM!!! SOMEBODY TOOK IT!! I NEED THE TAPE!! WHY ISN'T ANYBODY HELPING ME LOOK FOR THE TAPE? IT'S NOT FAIR THAT NOBODY IS HELPING ME LOOK FOR THE TAPE!! WHERE IS IT? WHERE IS IT? WHERE IS ............
Then he spotted the tape sitting on the kitchen table right next to where he was standing. "Oh there it is." he said simply, then grabbed it and walked away.
Here is what the tree looked like when the kids were finished. I actually like it! (The huge decorations kind of cover the fact that the tree is incredibly scrawny) The big square snowflakes were made by Max.
*Some people prefer to call it bribery, however, I feel that bribery is such an ugly word.
Bribery is when someone says "I'll give this to you if you do something for me" and incentive is when someone says "Do this for me, and I will give you this"
See, completely different.
**And I use the term "tree" very loosely. It was $20 at Wal Mart
***The boys actually wanted to drape the tree with cords and cables from multiple electronic devices. | <urn:uuid:1faec7d6-8400-4e1e-b6de-70fcfd7c4132> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://andimeanit.blogspot.com/2011/12/reason-why-someone-will-be-getting.html?showComment=1323195485911 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.97134 | 670 | 1.5 | 2 |
New Faculty I
Transplantation of hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) derived from blood or bone marrow is a frequently used procedure for treatment of blood disorders including cancers and immunodeficiencies due to chemotherapy. However, restoration of blood cell production does not always work, because of 1) incompatibility of donor and host cells; and 2) the limited quantities of HSC that can be obtained from adult donors or umbilical cord blood. Since in cell culture, hESC lines are capable of developing into a variety of tissues, including blood cells, and because they can be expanded indefinitely, hESC may serve as an alternative source of transplantable HSCs. While it has been possible to differentiate hESC into cells that resemble HSCs, when they were tested in animal models, they had limited ability for long-term reconstitution of blood cells. Thus, current protocols for generation of hHSCs from hESCs require further development. In vivo, the fate of HSC is determined by the local cellular environment, which is termed the “niche”. We have demonstrated that a complex sugar called hyaluronan (HA) regulates the fate of adult HSCs in the niche. We have also found that HA is required for differentiation of human ESCs into HSCs in culture. Thus, in this grant application we propose to test the hypothesis that HA is an important factor for production of HSCs from hESC in culture. We will study the cellular and molecular mechanisms mediating the effects of HA on differentiation of hESCs into HSCs. This will allow us to develop new culture techniques for the generation of transplantable HSCs. We will further compare the HSCs derived from hESCs with clinically accepted HSC preparations. We will use a variety of methods for this comparison, including in vitro hematopoietic assays and a 3-dimensional flow chamber device that we developed. This novel device will allow us to study the interactions between HSCs and the vasculature under conditions of physiological shear stress. Through these experiments we will discover the similarities and differences between HSCs derived in a culture dish from hESCs and clinically accepted HSCs. We will use this information to guide our further experiments, which will involve testing the regenerative potential of the hESC-derived HSCs in laboratory animals. Overall, the research project will determine whether HSC derived from hESC can be used as an alternative source for the HSCs that are currently so valuable for treatment of human blood disorders.
Statement of Benefit to California:
The concept of stem cell based therapy implies that damaged tissues can be repaired by tissue-specific stem cells that generate mature functionally active progeny. Among the variety of tissue-specific multipotent stem cells, only hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) have been routinely used in clinical practice for over than 30 years. In currently used protocols, HSCs are isolated either from adult sources (bone marrow or mobilized peripheral blood) or neonatal (umbilical cord blood) and used to regenerate hematopoiesis (the production of mature blood cells) in patients with genetic disorders of hematopoietic system and in cancer patients. Despite of the obvious success of the HSC transplantation approach, there are obstacles for the effective HSC-based therapy: due to a shortage of HLA-matched donors and the technical limits for in vitro expansion of HSCs only one third of patients receive the required HSC transplantation. Thus, alternative sources for HSCs are needed, and the pluripotent human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) theoretically might be a good source. Since the overall concept of using HSC for therapy has been proven, adult or neonatal HSCs can serve as an excellent reference to define whether the hESC-derived HSCs are useful and safe, thus representing “a low hanging fruit” project. Current knowledge on generation of HSCs from hESCs suggests that the properties of hESC-derived HSCs, including multipotency, regenerative capacity and survival, depend on culture conditions used to differentiate hESCs. Based on our knowledge of the adult hematopoietic regulatory microenvironment (i.e. the niche), which determines the fate of HSCs, and new findings generated in our laboratory, we propose to test the hypothesis that the complex sugar called hyaluronan (HA) may improve differentiation of hESCs toward HSCs. Thus, the short-term benefits for Californians are 1) translation of our knowledge on adult HSCs biology into the hESCs field; 2) obtaining new theoretical knowledge on generation of HSCs from hESCs; and 3) determination of whether hESC-derived HSCs resemble adult and neonatal HSCs qualities. If proven successful by in vivo and in vitro homing and engraftment studies, the next ultimate step will be evaluation of efficacy and safety of the hESC-derived HSCs in non-human primates, hence approaching a “low hanging fruit”.
SYNOPSIS: This is an application for support to test the hypothesis that hyaluronic acid (HA) plays a determinative role in differentiation of human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) into hematopoietic lines. Preliminary data of the PI suggests that HA addition improves HSC generation. Based on this, she proposes to study the nature of the effect, including the signaling pathways involved. Discovery of the effects of varying sizes of HA polymers on undifferentiated hESCs and mesodermal derivatives is included in the research plan, along with testing the ability of hESC-derived hematopoietic stem cells to engraft into bone marrow of immune-suppressed mice. STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES OF THE RESEARCH PLAN: The overall significance of this work relates to the possibility of obtaining true hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) from hESCs, which would improve the prospects for bone marrow transplantation and other regenerative medicine approaches. Additionally, understanding the influence of abundant extracellular matrix components in cell migration, signaling and differentiation is a fundamentally important problem in hESC differentiation. The proposed work, if successful, would extend our knowledge about hematopoietic differentiation of hESCs, on cellular and mechanistic levels (Aims 1 and 2). This knowledge can be applied to the reconstitution of hematopoiesis (small animal model in Aim 3, possible extensions in future). The experimental design is developed around the hypothesis that HA is required for hematopoietic differentiation from hESCs, and the goal to establish culture conditions for the derivation of hematopoietic cells suitable for in vivo use. The studies described are clear, rational and have some innovative qualities in the overall multilevel approach and experimental methods. A discussion, however, of potential pitfalls and a plan if HA does not successfully stimulate a mesodermal fate or hematopoietic differentiation of a high percentage of hESCs is lacking. The preliminary data demonstrate only modest effects on in vitro hemaotpoietic colony assays. These effects could be either direct or indirect, but an effect at the HSC level is questionable. Much of the rest of the application rests on the likelihood that HA is a critical component. If it is not, the proposal rapidly falls and the entire project will have to be revised. One reviewer felt that even if HA is important, it is likely only one of many components of the niche for HSCs. This is a major concern, and an increased risk for the project as a whole. Three specific aims are proposed: Aim 1 will determine whether HA stimulates a mesodermal fate for stem cells on the road to hematopoiesis, or whether HA can only act on cells already mesodermal in character; and whether or not levels of HA influence cellular response. Aim 2 includes a series of experiments to distinguish effects of low molecular weight HA versus high molecular weight HA, which receptors are being influenced, and what downstream effectors are involved. This aim also includes determining the effect of blocking endogenous HA production by inhibitors of HA synthase, the enzyme that lengthens the molecule. Aim 3 includes functional studies of HSCs derived from hESCs by exposure to HA. The investigators will attempt to engraft in vitro derived hematopocytes into bone marrow of immune-suppressed mice. They will also expose HA-differentiated stem cells to a flow chamber invented by the PI that mimics physiological shear stresses within blood vessels. The team of investigators appears capable, roles are clear, and interactions are well described. Overall, the application addresses a significant area of study and presents a logical plan of research by a qualified investigator with clear institutional commitment. A very significant weakness, however, is the dependence of the entire proposal on Aim1. QUALIFICATIONS AND POTENTIAL OF THE PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: The PI received MD (pediatrics) and PhD training in Russia and then moved to the La Jolla Institute for Molecular Medicine in 1999,and was appointed an Associate Member at the Torrey Pines in 2007. Her PhD in Clinical Immunology from the Russian Academy of Science focused on the biology of hematopoietic stem cells. She has continued her commitment to understanding hematopoiesis. She has considerable experience in the hematopoietic assays needed for her studies and has formed a strong team of investigators that collectively has the knowledge and skills necessary for successful completion of research. The PI has a good publication record germane to the proposed research (30 publications, all of which in the last 10 years), although for the most part her publications are in second to third tier journals. She is 14 years post-PhD and in her 6th year as an independent investigator. She has an NIHR01 grant on nicotine and hematopoiesis. The PI developed a strong and specific career development plan around the anticipated CIRM award, with specifically stated goals and milestones. A detailed timetable for the studies and her career goals for the next five years are included. She maintains strong ties with her mentor at the Burnham Institute, and is enthusiastic and committed to her own teaching and mentoring responsibilities. INSTITUTIONAL COMMITMENT TO PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: There is a strong letter of support for stem cell research from the Chief Operating Officer of the Torrey Pines Institue for Molecular Studies. The insitutional letter of support states that it will match 50% of the funds of this application, if awarded. It appears that Dr. Khaldoyanidi is the first faculty member recruited, although they have become part of the San Diego stem cell consortium. The institution has a good track record in supporting young faculty. The PI is getting a lot of support and mentoring, along with the growing responsibilities in research and leadership, and the institution seems commited to support her carreer development. Facilities and equipment are available for this project. DISCUSSION: Reviewers felt that the research proposal is weak and largely dependent on the success of the first research aim. If the aim fails there is no project. The preliminary data presented did not provide confidence to the reviewers of success in this aim. Despite this, one reviewer commented that useful information could result from the proposed experiments. The reviewers felt the candidate was clearly an expert in the field of hematopoiesis, but they did not believe the applicant to be strong scientifically when compared to other applicants. The host institution is developing a stem cell science program and is very supportive of the candidate. | <urn:uuid:3a5ed0d5-a3c4-4723-b680-17118505e248> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://GAPComments@cirm.ca.gov/node/12685/review | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941148 | 2,436 | 1.710938 | 2 |
I first learned about the "water wall" concept from Jenny over at Let The Children Play and have been noodling it around for some time. I knew I could build one all by myself, but I was attracted by the idea of seeing if we could come up with a way for the children to make it their own.
Not only that, but I was hoping to replace the fun of climbing onto a step ladder to pour water into this contraption we have lashed onto our beach hut.
The kids have hardly tired of climbing atop the step ladder with buckets of water to pour into the funnel. This has resulted in both regular flooding of our construction area (creating something of an soggy-shoed work environment) and a bit of a safety concern (the fall-zone is mostly asphalt and the shorter kids were forced to use the top step of the ladder, which is a poor safety practice for anyone). If we were going to build a water wall, I wanted one that still got the kids up on the ladder, but in the sand pit instead, where concerns about flooding and a hard fall zone were minimized.
We'd saved the framework from an old set of Ikea shelves we dismantled last year which seemed like a likely starting point. We also have a lot of peg board left over from another project and a nice collection of sawed off soda bottles and tubes that we use for indoor, sensory table water play. Several months ago, I'd purchased a package of very inexpensive zip ties with nothing particular in mind. It was with only a general idea of how these elements would go together that I turned the concept over the Charlie L.'s mom Shelly and Anjali's mom Reshma yesterday. My main instruction was, "Start making it and see if you can draw the kids into helping." I then moved on to other things.
When I retuned a few minutes later, Shelly and Reshma were managing an excited group of kids, wearing safety glasses, through the process of nailing the peg board to the frame. Honestly, I would have been thrilled if that's as far as they got yesterday.
When I returned again, the kids had attached their first pop bottle funnel to the top of the peg board using the zip ties and were discussing what should happen to the water after it got poured into the top. Honestly, I would have been thrilled if that's as far as they got yesterday.
Each time I returned to the scene they had made more progress until they pronounced it complete and marched it over to the sand pit to install it against a wall. I'm still floored that they built this whole thing in about a half hour. I'm even more impressed that this adult managed, child directed project was created under the tutelage of Shelly and Reshma, two parents who have told me that they are a little uncomfortable working in our construction area.
As you can see the water goes into the top, then immediately
diverts into one of two directions.
The water that flows into the container with the yellow rim
is then dispersed like a shower through a dozen tiny holes poked
in the bottom and ultimately into a 2-liter bottle with a
few holes poked in the side to allow it to eventually drain.
The water that flows in the other direction, down the long
tube goes through a series of funnels and then directly into
For the next half hour kids stood in line with their full buckets awaiting their turn to climb to the top of the step ladder and try it out.
We have another section of shelving frame, more peg board, zip ties, tubes and cut up soda bottles. I think we'll try to make a companion water wall on Wednesday. | <urn:uuid:24961fcd-81ec-4960-9f9a-bca709670ac6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://teachertomsblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/our-own-water-wall.html?showComment=1273626938608 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981444 | 761 | 1.710938 | 2 |
Disaster survivors are often overwhelmed by stress and uncertainty after a loss caused by fire, earthquake, flooding, tornado or other type of disaster. The upheaval and displacement that accompany severe damage to their home and local surroundings may be severe.
The Red Guide to Recovery was created to address such stress and uncertainty by providing the information and tools survivors need to cope with a disaster. Its mission is to guide survivors through the recovery process, to walk them step-by-step through the many decisions that must be made at a difficult and emotional time in the survivors’ lives. In short, it helps answer the question asked by all disaster survivors as the first responders depart: “Now what?”
If you are reading this book as a disaster survivor, we are hopeful you received it directly from first responders. It is in to their hands we sought to place the book so they can aid in its distribution to those who need it, when they need it. After all, their mission, like ours and like the mission of the book itself, is to be of service in the first crucial decisions that follow a disaster. | <urn:uuid:b640145a-1c24-414a-a8e4-ec06d32134fb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.theredguidetorecovery.com/the-red-guide/mission-statement/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00032-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975041 | 225 | 2.109375 | 2 |
If you’re juggling more than one project, you know it can be easy to lose track of some of the details. Your projects will be sailing along smoothly and then BOOM! there’s a crisis on every single project all at the same time. So, how do you stay sane when your projects are going crazy?
You can’t be in more than one place at a time, so your best defense against a major project blowout is a good project plan. This includes figuring out — before your begin your project — the project goals, deliverables, schedule and resources. It won’t stop disasters, but will help keep you on track when there’s a blip in your project.
Your project goals will be established through discussion with your stakeholders. The project won’t be a success until they say it is, so getting a list of wants and needs from them and setting up a prioritized set of goals is critical.
Your goals will determine what your deliverables will be from the project. You can identify these from discussions with your stakeholders. Make sure you get buy in from them.
Based on your planned goals and deliverables, prepare a realistic schedule for getting things done. You’ll want to identify the what, who and how much — what will be done, who will do it, and how much time it will take. Make sure you sync this up with the expectations of your stakeholders. If the stakeholder has set an imposed timeline that is not realistic based on your estimates, you will need to negotiate this up front.
Identify all risks in the planning stage too. These could be things like budget issues, turn around time, resources or scope creep to name a few. Set up a mitigation plan so you’re not thrown for a loop when an issue occurs.
So there you go. What other suggestions do you have for staying sane when juggling multiple projects? | <urn:uuid:e7d47ba9-b8a4-47cb-9e50-1f091c0a5fcd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://quickbase.intuit.com/blog/2010/09/10/how-to-stay-sane-when-your-projects-are-going-crazy/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00030-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933751 | 397 | 1.8125 | 2 |
An article about our project, and the book “On a Dollar a Day” was published in this week’s issue of Macleans Magazine (basically the Canadian version of Newsweek)…enjoy!
Additionally, our friends over at Food Democracy Now sent us another message this week:
The evidence is in: America’s food system is broken. Every week we read about record-breaking food safety recalls, a spiraling childhood obesity epidemic, and the continued loss of independent family farmers.
All of these problems can be traced back to one thing: excessive consolidation by Big, corporate food. But change may be on the way. Recently, the Departments of Justice and Agriculture held their first joint workshop here in Iowa to gather evidence of antitrust violations in food and agriculture.1 We were encouraged by the workshop, the first of five to be held this year,2but also concerned that the same companies that have caused these problems were well represented on the panels, while the family farmers most negatively impacted by corporate food monopolies were only given the opportunity to speak after public officials had left the building.
Even though these workshops are an important first step, real family farmers must have a seat at the table. It will take all our voices to ensure that the Justice department holds giant agribusiness accountable.
The aisles of most American grocery stores give an overwhelming illusion of choice when it comes to our food. A closer look, however, quickly reveals that most of the meat, grain, milk — and even the grocery stores themselves — are all owned and controlled by just a few corporations.
The figures are startling:
• A single company (Monsanto) controls the seeds of 93% of soybeans and 80% of the corn grown in the U.S.3
• 4 companies (Tyson, Cargill, Swift & National Beef Packing Co.) control 83% of the beef packing industry4
• 4 companies (Smithfield, Tyson, Swift & Cargill) control 66% of the pork packing industry
For too long now, food and agricultural production has been consolidated into the hands of a few agribusiness giants. These companies dictate to us how our food is produced, how much farmers are paid for their crops and livestock and how much consumers pay for food.
Food Democracy Now! participated in last week’s workshop. We heard Attorney General Eric Holder talk about the “reckless deregulation that has restricted competition in agriculture” and promise that the Department of Justice, under his watch, was committed to “vigorous enforcement” of U.S. antitrust laws.
But given the power of the companies on the other side, we know that the change we need will not come easily. We must stand together and make our voices heard in favor of a fair and democratic food system!
Please support Secretary Vilsack and Attorney General Holder as they move forward. Join them today in pushing for real enforcement of U.S. antitrust laws and an end to America’s food monopolies. It only takes a moment. And after you’ve signed the petition, please ask your friends and family to do the same. | <urn:uuid:b513569c-508a-43a1-90d0-6ea73520647c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://onedollardietproject.wordpress.com/tag/groceries/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9644 | 654 | 1.945313 | 2 |
As one of 52 members of the National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program, the Oregon Space Grant Consortium (OSGC) strives to attain the goals and missions set forth by NASA regarding education, research, and public service. We have established strong collaborative partnerships with schools and universities, state and local government, and the aerospace industry throughout the state.
OSGC maintains a diverse array of programs to support space science and engineering education from middle school through graduate school. Through educational and community outreach opportunities, Oregon Space Grant aims to help develop a strong science, mathematics, and technology education base at all educational levels.
Our blog is designed for easy access to both affiliate members and the general public. We hope that you will find the site useful. You may also want to visit our primary website at http://spacegrant.oregonstate.edu for more information regarding many of the programs administered by the Oregon Space Grant Consortium. | <urn:uuid:1a954227-8bbb-4e42-9be9-29084beb6e5c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.oregonstate.edu/oregonspacegrant/about/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934054 | 184 | 1.851563 | 2 |
Tokyo is one of the most exciting destinations to visit in the world and well deserving of it’s hyperactive, adrenaline fuelled and non-stop reputation. It’s is a place where innovation and new ideas are actively encouraged and if you’re lucky enough to get the chance to visit you’ll realise it’s super friendly people also have a very unique outlook on life. Trends and originality are fully embraced in this modern metropolis and we personally believe this is one of the reasons why this city is so special. Here are our ten reasons why we think Tokyo is the coolest city in the world:-
Hayao Miyazaki & Studio Ghibli
Hayao Miyazaki is the Godfather of Japanese animated feature films and a national treasure; he is Japan’s answer to Walt Disney. Miyazaki co-founded Studio Ghibi in 1985, the animation studio responsible for mega-bucks grossing films such as Spirited Away and Howl’s Moving Castle. Tokyo is home to the engaging Studio Ghibli Museum – a meticulously thought out interactive visitor’s attraction. The museum (which is unsurprisingly a mecca for anime fans) is designed by Miyazaki himself and has the motto ‘Let’s get lost together.’
Most people know that the Japanese are obsessed with futuristic technology, especially robots. You would probably expect nothing less from the country that created ASIMO – a freakishly realistic humanoid robot that can run, walk, climb the stairs and bring you your tea. Now the Japanese are developing robots to look even more human like and the newer versions have the ability to express emotions and even smile and blink. One of the latest robots is an attractive female humanoid that is programmed to walk down a catwalk. There are also robots in Japan that can take the place of pets, help the elderly and even become a lonely child’s best friend.
If your only experience of karaoke is a ropey microphone and TV set up in a dodgy back room bar then you really must give karaoke in Tokyo a try. Karaoke is a billion dollar industry in Japan and the bars are often an impressive 10 stories high and packed with hundreds of futuristic pod-like rooms. Book a room and sing your heart out accompanied by a sound-activated laser show and then order food and drink using the high-tech touch screen remote control. An experience not to missed (even if it is to hear a hundred Japanese men murder a Bonnie Tyler song…)
Japan is famous for it’s harmony-loving culture and the Asian country is often thought to have one of the most polite societies in the world. Customs and social etiquette are very important here and the extreme politeness of the people will probably leave quite an impression on you. In Tokyo it’s not uncommon to see stooping station masters greeting you at the underground entrance or shopkeepers continuously bowing you out of a shop after making a purchase.
Getting dressed up as your favourite manga or anime character is the thing to do in Tokyo and ‘Cosplay‘ (a type of performance art trend) is now catching on in many other countries around the world. If you happen to be taking a stroll around Harajuku in your normal casual weekend attire you might feel more than a little under-dressed amid all the gothic rock stars, lolitas, french maids and shiny video game characters.
Love hotels cater to just about everyone and anyone who feels the need for a pay by the hour (or a night) hotel. Rooms are quirkily themed and decked out to look like anything ranging from a subway train carriage to a prison cell. Other rooms are cuter and more light-hearted and in open-minded Tokyo not all Love Hotels have a seedy reputation. Most provide ‘equipment’ such as toys, karaoke machines, game consoles and more unusual stuff. Great for trying out – even if it’s just to have a funny story to tell when you get back home…
The Japanese take their trains and their train network systems very seriously. The trains and railways in Tokyo are second to none for cleanliness, efficiency and time keeping – you could literally set your watch by them. Okay so they might be crowded, but in off-peak times the trains are a joy to travel on and will probably leave you wondering why your own public transport system is so rubbish in comparison. The iconic Bullet train which travels at speeds of up to 300 km/h is an essential ride and the journey from Kyoto to Tokyo is especially recommended for the incredible views of Mount Fuji.
In Tokyo you can’t walk more than a couple of steps without passing a ultra cute Hello Kitty toy, Totoro, Gloomy bear or miniature plastic sushi. The Japanese are infatuated with Kawaii (which literally means cute, loveable and adorable) and Tokyo’s fondness for all thing cute just adds to it’s coolness.
Okay they might not be for everyone but Tokyo’s maid cafes are a thriving industry. Here customers can grab a coffee and cake and be served by waitresses dressed in maid costumes. The ‘maids’ act as servants and treat customers as masters (and mistresses) just like they would in a private home. Increased competition in the cafes means that many of them are trying to outdo each other in the crazy stakes – which probably means even more interesting cafe experiences in the future. Female travellers might want to try one of the butler cafes…
When night falls in Tokyo the city really comes to life – gigantic neon signs and advertising hoardings adorn every available space on Tokyo’s multi-storey buildings. For total neon immersion head to the wealthy shopping area Ginza, crowded Shinjuku or Akihabara (otherwise known as ‘Electric City’). Recreate a scene from Blade Runner by picking up barbecued skewered chicken on a trip to Shinjuku’s Memory Lane (Omoide Yokocho).
Written by Becky and Graham. | <urn:uuid:71965058-c1a3-4930-b097-caf5cae087cf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.globalgrasshopper.com/destinations/asia/top-10-reasons-why-tokyo-is-the-coolest-city-in-the-world/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946243 | 1,254 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Publications (2)1.72 Total impact
Article: Complete mitochondrial genome sequences of the three pelagic chaetognaths Sagitta nagae, Sagitta decipiens and Sagitta enflata.[show abstract] [hide abstract]
ABSTRACT: The complete nucleotide sequences of the mitochondrial genomes were determined for the three pelagic chaetognaths, Sagitta nagae, Sagitta decipiens, and Sagitta enflata. The mitochondrial genomes of these species which were 11,459, 11,121, and 12,631bp in length, respectively, contained 14 genes (11 protein-coding genes, one transfer RNA gene, and two ribosomal RNA genes), and were found to have lost 23 genes that are present in the typical metazoan mitochondrial genome. The same mitochondrial genome contents have been reported from the benthic chaetognaths belonging to the family Spadellidae, Paraspadella gotoi and Spadella cephaloptera. Within the phylum Chaetognatha, Sagitta and Spadellidae are distantly related, suggesting that the gene loss occurred in the ancestral species of the phylum. The gene orders of the three Sagitta species are markedly different from those of the other non-Chaetognatha metazoans. In contrast to the region with frequent gene rearrangements, no gene rearrangements were observed in the gene cluster encoding COII-III, ND1-3, srRNA, and tRNA(met). Within this conserved gene cluster, gene rearrangements were not observed in the three Sagitta species or between the Sagitta and Spadellidae species. The gene order of this cluster was also assumed to be the ancestral state of the phylum.Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology Part D Genomics and Proteomics 03/2010; 5(1):65-72. · 1.72 Impact Factor
Article: Genetic diversity and cryptic speciation of the deep sea chaetognath Caecosagitta macrocephala (Fowler, 1904)[show abstract] [hide abstract]
ABSTRACT: We investigated genetic diversity and structure of the deep sea chaetognath Caecosagitta macrocephala collected in the western North Pacific (Sagami Bay) and eastern Central to South Atlantic. All of the 52 specimens analyzed had unique haplotypes in their mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I (mtCOI) gene sequences. Four distinct lineages of the mtCOI gene sequences (mtA, mtB, mtC, and mtD) were revealed by phylogenetic analysis with robust statistical support. The specimens collected from the Atlantic Ocean comprised three of the lineages (mtA, mtB, and mtD). All specimens of the remaining lineage (mtC) were obtained from Sagami Bay. The outgroup node was placed between the mtA lineage and lineages mtB, mtC, and mtD. Two specimens from each of the four lineages were randomly selected and the nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer 1 (nITS1) region sequenced, resulting in ten forms, two of which were shared by all eight individuals. Phylogenetic relationships estimated from these sequences further supported the independence and reproductive isolation of the mtA individuals from the other lineages, while no phylogenetic structure was found in the mtB, mtC, and mtD lineages. These results indicate the presence of at least two cryptic species in C. macrocephala. Interestingly, these cryptic species were collected primarily from different depth layers (meso- and bathypelagic), suggesting speciation of the bathypelagic species from a mesopelagic precursor.Deep Sea Research Part II: Topical Studies in Oceanography. | <urn:uuid:73ed1fec-d299-412b-8091-82c38ed49f3a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.researchgate.net/researcher/35886615_Hiroomi_Miyamoto/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.904301 | 785 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Updated 01/31/2013 10:59 PM
Water receding in Sylvan Beach
It was a hectic afternoon for neighbors and emergency personnel in Sylvan Beach. An ice jam caused one neighborhood to flood there. A number of people had to leave their homes to escape the rising waters. Our Iris St. Meran was there and tells us how crews were able to get people to safety.
To view our videos, you need to
install Adobe Flash 9 or above. Install now.
Then come back here and refresh the page.
SYLVAN BEACH, N.Y. -- This Sylvan Beach neighborhood has flooded before. Mary Cooper has lived here for more than 25 years and remembers well. But she says there was much more water this time.
Cooper said, "It's higher than it was the last time. The last time it only came up to my fence in the back yard. Now the whole fence and my garbage cans are out there floating."
This was all caused by an ice jam. Wednesday's warm temperatures allowed snow to melt. That runoff created an ice jam where the Fish Creek meets the Barge Canal. Neighbors and emergency crews then dealt with rapid rising water on streets and in homes.
Sylvan Beach Second Assistant Fire Chief Rick Johnson said, "Some we know are six, seven, eight feet under water. And some haven't been touched yet."
As a precaution, power was shut off and at one point in the day, more than two dozen people and their animals had to be evacuated from their homes and stay with loved ones or at the municipal building. The fire department, with the help of other agencies, had to use various resources to get people to safety.
"Right now, we have a pickup truck we're using. We're taking boats right now. We have four boats down there. The boat behind us will be the fifth. That's just our backup boat in case something happens," Johnson said.
Luckily nothing else did. Power was eventually restored. The ice on the canal was broken up so the water could flow. In the flooded areas, water levels receded and now residents are home, but their work isn't done just yet because they have to clean it all up.
For people who are still traveling in that area, officials are urging caution because many parts of the area will be slippery. | <urn:uuid:ba1698f4-5090-4042-90eb-bcb885ed4c32> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://centralny.ynn.com/content/all_news/635148/water-receding-in-sylvan-beach/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980542 | 486 | 1.734375 | 2 |
Concrete industry official pitches benefits of material for Nanaimo
Spencer Anderson, Daily NewsPublished: Thursday, November 29, 2012
A representative for Canada's concrete industry met with Nanaimo officials Wednesday morning to pitch the benefits of concrete over asphalt as a building material, but the information will be considered in the long-term rather than spur any short-term changes.
Michael McSweeney, president and CEO of the Cement Association of Canada, met with Mayor John Ruttan and Nanaimo engineering and public works director Susan Clift to discuss the environmental and long-term benefits of concrete for use in city roads and buildings.
McSweeney has visited nine B.C. municipalities to argue in favour of making concrete the building material of choice for towns and cities, the industry's biggest customers.
"We're talking to municipalities about the concept of life-cycle assessment," he said.
The CAC represents eight companies across the country, including two firms in B.C.: Lehigh Hason and Lafarge.
McSweeney said that new advances in the production of cement, the key ingredient to concrete, have allowed manufacturers to produce a new brand, Contempra. This type of cement is produced with 10 per cent fewer greenhouse gas emissions during the production phase without sacrificing the traditional strength of Portland cement.
Across the country, that could make a difference of 900,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions each year, according to the CAC.
"Our industry wants to be part of the climate change solution," McSweeney said.
Concrete also has a better track record when it comes to longevity, he said. Asphalt pavements tend to last between 10 to 15 years, depending on the amount of wear and tea they receive. By contrast, concrete pavements can last anywhere between 35 and 50 years.
That longer life means municipalities will also have to spend fewer resources on replacing roads and pavements, which will also mean less construction and pollutants. That's a factor local governments need to take into account when they make long-term infrastructure plans, he said.
"Governments need to look at all the sectors of the economy and pull together and take this challenge of global warming (on)," he said.
Most of Nanaimo's streets are made from asphalt, and Clift said that while concrete has its advantages, she still considers asphalt a cheaper short-term and long-term option.
She said asphalt, which is softer material, is easier to replace in an urban environment where infrastructure upgrades and changes are common. Concrete is more durable and has advantages in other applications, she said.
"Highways are a good example - if you build it once and you build it right and if you don't have to make changes, it's a great material," she said.
Staff will present a long-term asset management plan to council before the end of the year. Rut-tan said he found McSweeney's presentation interesting, but didn't anticipate any immediate changes to the city's policy. | <urn:uuid:ecd45d3c-0bf2-43e7-af2f-545973270ba7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www2.canada.com/nanaimodailynews/news/story.html?id=1d3ee302-963b-45f2-a887-751634933125 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955927 | 623 | 2.015625 | 2 |
Night Gardening by Michael Palmer
A reader writes to complain
that there are no cellphones in my poems,
so here is one,
its body chrome,
its face a metallic blue.
It’s neither transmitting nor receiving.
A woman from Duluth requests
that I cease sending secret messages
to her in my poems.
This I will do forthwith.
And the blackbird at evening.
She says, You have misrepresented the river
there where it turns
by the holm oak and the bed
of winter hyacinths.
This I will correct.
A recent letter unsigned:
You’ve mangled the citations from Hölderlin,
and none will mistake your skies
for those of Dominikos Theotokopoulos.
Opines a good citizen, concerned parent,
Your nefarious syntax
has infected my first-born—
have you a heart of stone?
And the poem, from its homeless home,
writes of blindsight and silence,
the blackbird at evening,
nothing you can see.
— from Company of Moths
(New Directions Books, 2005)
MICHAEL PALMER is the author of numerous collections of poetry, including Notes for Echo Lake; At Passages; Promises of Glass; and most recently, Company of Moths. He will give a public reading of his work on Wednesday, November 29 at 7:30 p.m. in the Soda Center. This fall he won the Wallace Stevens Award from the Academy of American Poets. This semester, Michael Palmer is serving as the MFA Program’s Distinguished Poet in Residence. | <urn:uuid:3bd3bc83-e8a3-4cc8-83dd-8d00b2e2ae4c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.stmarys-ca.edu/endnote-3 | 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 | 0.911777 | 347 | 1.609375 | 2 |
HALLECK ASSUMES COMMAND IN THE FIELD -- THE
ADVANCE UPON CORINTH -- OCCUPATION OF COR
INTH -- THE ARMY SEPARATED.
GENERAL HALLECK arrived at Pittsburg landing on the 11th of April and immediately assumed command in the field. On the 21st General Pope arrived with an army 30,000 strong, fresh from the capture of Island Number Ten in the Mississippi River. He went into camp at Hamburg landing five miles above Pittsburg. Halleck had now three armies: the Army of the Ohio, Buell commanding; the Army of the Mississippi, Pope commanding; and the Army of the Tennessee. His orders divided the combined force into the right wing, reserve, centre and left wing. Major-General George H. Thomas, who had been in Buell's army, was transferred with his division to the Army of the Tennessee and given command of the right wing, composed of all of that army except McClernand's and Lew. Wallace's divisions. McClernand was assigned to the command of the reserve, composed of his own and Lew. Wallace's divisions. Buell
Questia, a part of Gale, Cengage Learning. www.questia.com
Publication information: Book title: Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant. Volume: 1. Contributors: Ulysses S Grant - Author. Publisher: Charles L. Webster. Place of publication: New York. Publication year: 1885. Page number: 371.
This material is protected by copyright and, with the exception of fair use, may not be further copied, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means. | <urn:uuid:832196ca-0ff3-4296-86d3-457844a042a0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.questia.com/read/94013891/personal-memoirs-of-u-s-grant | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.935007 | 354 | 2.84375 | 3 |
The Federal Trade Commission mailed 17,213 refund checks to consumers who were deceived by an operation that charged an up-front fee for bogus mortgage relief services and posed as a government mortgage assistance program. Under a settlement entered by the court in 2011 as part of the FTC’s continuing crackdown on scams that target homeowners who are behind in their mortgage payments or facing foreclosure, the Residential Relief Foundation defendants were banned from selling debt relief services.More than $1 million is being returned to consumers, each of whom will receive $62.50. Consumers who receive the checks from the FTC’s refund administrator should cash them within 60 days of the mailing date. The FTC never requires consumers to pay money or provide information before refund checks can be cashed. Those with questions should call the refund administrator, BMC Group, at 1-8662246718, or visit www.FTC.gov/refunds for more general information.
The Federal Trade Commission works for consumers to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices and to provide information to help spot, stop, and avoid them. To file a complaint in English or Spanish, visit the FTC's online Complaint Assistant or call 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357). The FTC enters complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to more than 2,000 civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad. The FTC’s website provides free information on a variety of consumer topics. Like the FTC on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and subscribe to press releases for the latest FTC news and resources. | <urn:uuid:a17fa527-3032-4f15-85e6-ce08cd973e0a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ftc.gov/opa/2013/03/residential.shtm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.928697 | 334 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Conservatives say that "America is broke."
They say that Social Security, Medicare, Public employee wages and benefits, and social spending are the cause of our debt.
America is not broke. The value of all goods and services produced in the U.S. is almost 16 trillion dollars. We produce and sell almost double that of China, 2.5 times that of Japan, 8 times that of India, and about equal to all European countries combined. In fact the U.S. produces about 25 percent of all the worlds' wealth.
2012 corporate after tax profits totaled 1.7 trillion dollars. After dipping during the great recession, corporate profits have sailed past their pre-recession levels.
Despite massive profits, corporations are adding more jobs overseas than they are in the United States and paying one of the lowest effective tax rates in the developed world. Corporate profits have never been higher. So America is not broke, national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and private corporate profits are at record levels.
Gross Domestic Product and corporate profits are at record levels because American workers are the most productive in the world. American workers work longer hours than their counterparts in Europe and most other rich nations, and we produce more per person over the year. We also get more done than everyone except the Norwegians, according to a United Nations report, which said the United States "leads the world in labor productivity." U.S. productivity grew twice as fast in 2009 as it had in 2008, and twice as fast again in 2010. With the workforce down and output up, no wonder corporate profits are up 22 percent since 2007.
If GDP is double that of China and even higher when compared to the rest of the world, and American corporations are making more profit than at any time in history, where is all of the money going?
We know it's not going to working families. Since 2000 productivity has grown 22.8 percent, but real compensation has been stagnant. Average hourly earnings when adjusted for inflation haven't increased in three decades. So basically you haven't had a raise in 30 years! Wages and benefits have been stagnant because the economy, as structured by the rules in place, no longer ensures that workers'; pay increases in tandem with productivity.
CEO overcompensation hurts average Americans. It transfers wealth upward from employees and shareholders to already rich top executives. The CEO of an S&P 500 index company made, on average 380 times the average wages of U.S. workers in 2011. In comparison Japanese and German CEO's made 12 times the average worker, in the United Kingdom it was 22 times average workers' wages, and Canadian CEO's made 20 times average workers' wages.
We have no culture of shame about excess in America. In fact people adore the lives of the rich and famous. Unfortunately this disparity takes billions of dollars out of the economy. We have seen two economies in America since the mid 1970's. CEO's and people with lots of money invested in the stock market have done very well.
Meanwhile working class Americans have to contend with stagnant wages, rising job insecurity, and burdensome debt.
America is not broke! The country is loaded with wealth and cash. It's just not in your hands. For 155 years (1820-1975) for every decade productivity increased, as productivity increased so did workers' income. That was the "social contract." If you worked hard, you shared in the increase of productivity and our nation's increasing wealth. Today productivity continues to increase, but workers' wages flat lined.
If we as Americans want to live the American Dream, then we must organize and unite together. Labor unions are the answer. Unionism is so much more than just collective bargaining for members, it is a social movement based on justice, equality, respect and fairness. It is a movement whose goal is increasing the quality of life for all people.
Joining or organizing a union isn't easy, but as great Civil Rights leader Frederick Douglass said,
"If there is no struggle there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, want crops without plowing the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and never will." | <urn:uuid:75ff9bfb-520d-4522-a835-4e0a0bde0f39> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.timesleaderonline.com/page/content.detail/id/544824/Not-broke.html?nav=5007 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962568 | 918 | 2.203125 | 2 |
Henry VIII's attacks on the Church, his assumption of supremacy over it and the dissolution of the monasteries outraged many of his people.
In the autumn of 1536, he faced the worst crisis of his reign - the rebellion that became known as the 'Pilgrimage of Grace'.
That old-time religion
The first uprising was in Lincolnshire, and the revolt then spread quickly across the north of England. Under their banner of the Five Wounds of Christ, noblemen and peasants joined together, demanding the return of the old religion, the restoration of the monasteries and the sacking of Thomas Cromwell, whom they thought (rightly) was behind much of what they objected to. A number of monks and priests played leading parts, preaching incendiary sermons and even wearing armour.
The rebellion was led by Robert Aske, a London barrister with Yorkshire roots. He and a band of 9,000 followers occupied York, and by the time they reached Doncaster, the insurgents held much of the north.
Success and betrayal
On 26 October 1536, at Scawsby Leys near Doncaster, the rebels halted. They numbered 30,000, with another 12,000 in reserve at Pontefract - the largest army that England had seen since the Wars of the Roses. They faced a mere 8,000 not-very-willing southern recruits, captained by the aged duke of Norfolk, who had only arrived at 2am. The pilgrims were overwhelmingly strong - yet they chose to negotiate.
And that was their undoing. Norfolk managed to broker a deal and the northern army dispersed, with promises from Henry that their demands would be met and all the rebels pardoned. But within weeks, Henry reneged on his promises, arrested the ringleaders and exacted a savage retribution. All across the north of England, hundreds of men and women were dragged from their homes and hanged on the slightest suspicion of having been involved.
Henry's supremacy of the Church, which had begun in the name of freeing England from the papal yoke, was turning into a new royal tyranny, to be enforced by bloodshed. | <urn:uuid:20c8a602-2550-4e31-870f-28518a3f14b4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.channel4.com/programmes/henry-viii-the-mind-of-a-tyrant/articles/the-pilgrimage-of-grace-1536 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.983885 | 441 | 3.65625 | 4 |
Above, two cartoons concerning the Post Office using the Interstate Commerce Commission, to limit private carriers of packages, out of fear that such competition would drive the Post Office itself out of business. Much, much later, this competition was allowed. Since, the Post Office has survived but struggled (only to next come head-to-head against electronic transactions…). Cartoons are by Rollin Kirby and Frank Michael Spangler.
Click on the above & below pictures, to view the cartoons in detail, and read their captions.
Above, the new Republic of China, coming up against Russian aggression concerning Mongolia. Below, an openly racist cartoon from the Cuban publication, Havana Discusión, showing white or light-skinned Cuba, rejecting the “Colored Independent Party”.
Above, Kaiser Wilhelm depicted by cartoonist Charles Henry Sykes, knocking at the door of the Ananias Club. “Ananias Club” — named for a man who fell dead when he lied to the apostle Peter — was understood in the day to be a round about way of calling someone a “liar”.
Below, Charles Lewis Bartholomew (“Bart”) and others, regarding tariffs. | <urn:uuid:a4a378c4-8cdf-405e-837f-f6c1bf455941> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://superitch.com/?p=27255 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.92341 | 252 | 2.109375 | 2 |
Make a Difference in the Lives of Children
What Will Volunteers Do?
The focus of this project is to improve the lives of impoverished children, supporting their education, diet, families and communities. Volunteers are required to help run the kindergarten/day care centre, getting involved in activities such as teaching (English, maths, remedial reading, etc), computer classes and sports education. Volunteers are also needed to help teach English to children who attend the public elementary school. Volunteers work side by side with an experienced TESL certified teacher. For those interested, there is also the possibility of;
- Working at a local orphanage
- Helping with remedial reading and maths
- One-on-one homework support
- Creative expression workshops (art, music, drama, writing, etc).
There is no cost to participate but volunteers are responsible for covering their living expenses. Most volunteers stay in a beach house which costs between £17 – £26 per week. Volunteers purchase and prepare their own food. Volunteers can also opt for home-stay or private accommodation
The volunteer receives a range of benefits in exchange for their work, including the possibility of accompanying the owners on one of their tours when space is available.
Do you accept non UK citizens?
Do you accept applicants with disabilities?
Volunteer Latin America provide information on free and low cost volunteer work in Central and South America. We enable people to volunteer for free or at minimal cost by connecting them to organizations that provide affordable (or free) volunteering opportunities. | <urn:uuid:da63801b-1fac-4769-892e-4fdd25c9af45> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gapyear.com/volunteering/orphanage/make-a-difference-in-the-lives-of-children/120914/120914/product | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960433 | 309 | 2.390625 | 2 |
Google Chrome Is Now The World's Top Browser
Google's Chrome has been in a roller coaster ride competing to be the number one browser with the likes of Microsoft Internet Explorer and the Mozilla Firefox, until today.
According to a report, Google Chrome had overtook Internet Explorer to become the most popular and the most used web browser on the planet.
This latest browser ranking came from StatCounter, one of the most popular and one of the leading web analytics company on the internet today.
But what is the main difference between the Google Chrome and the Microsoft Internet Explorer, anyway?
Well, Google Chrome is a web browser developed by Google that uses the WebKit layout engine and application framework. It was first released as a beta version for, get this, Microsoft Windows on September 2, 2008. The public stable version got released on December 11, 2008.
Whereas, Internet Explorer is a group of graphical browsers that have existed since 1995, when Microsoft developed them. It holds the distinction as being the most recognized browser in the world. However, IE usage and its popularity has been somewhat declining in the past few months.
I'm sure the Google management would be ecstatic to hear and read about this news. It always feels great to be the number one. The big question is, how long can Google hold on to the number one spot? We'll just have to wait and see. | <urn:uuid:b23317e0-09bd-42d8-a1e3-3caacdaa6651> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://technorati.com/technology/article/google-chrome-is-now-the-worlds/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+tr-technology+%28Technology+articles+at+Technorati%29 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949355 | 280 | 1.90625 | 2 |
But the term "theocratic" can also be used to characterize views advanced by certain non-Catholics on the Christian right. However, non-Catholics on the Christian right usually base their theocratic claims on their understanding and interpretation of the Christian Bible.
By contrast, the views advanced by the U.S. Catholic bishops regarding sexual morality are usually not based exclusively on the Christian Bible. Instead, their views are usually based on the Catholic tradition of thought known as "natural law" moral theory, in which straightforward philosophic reasoning may be supplemented at times with theological understanding.
One of the favorite mantras of the Catholic bishops and their Catholic apologists involves the claim about supposedly "timeless truths." But are there timeless truths? Roman Catholic bishops, including the bishop of
Now, the claim made by the bishops to have figured out certain supposed timeless truths contrasts sharply with the so-called marketplace of ideas. The bishops do not see themselves and their supposed timeless truths as competing in the so-called marketplace of ideas. On the contrary, they see their supposed timeless truths as existing in a realm that is independent of the so-called marketplace of ideas. Granted, Catholic apologists might undertake to refute ideas from the marketplace of ideas. But this exercise in Catholic apologetics is designed to reinforce the idea that certain truths that the bishops claim are timeless truths are indeed truly superior to any ideas advanced in the marketplace of ideas. End of story.
Now, we might wonder what could be the opposite of timeless truths. For example, we might wonder if there may be non-timeless truths (i.e., truths that we do not claim to be timeless truths), which presumably would be time-bound truths, as distinct from timeless truths.
Let us consider the expression that Thomas Jefferson used in the Declartion of Independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident."
As a thought experiment, let us imagine that he had written instead, "We hold these timeless truths to be self-evident." However, because he did not actually write this, we could argue that the truths he went on to articulate are time-bound truths, not timeless truths. Indeed, I, for one, would argue that he did articulate time-bound truths based on Western cultural conditioning up to his time, which still continues to be our Western cultural conditioning up to the present time. But Western cultural conditioning is not the same as the cultural conditioning in non-Western parts of the world, so it is not exactly surprising that the import of the self-evident truths that he articulated has not always and everywhere made inroads in non-Western parts of the world down to the present time.
First of all, let us note that the wording "We hold" seems to allow that the truths referred to are contingent, even though we are claiming that they are indeed truths and that they are indeed self-evident truths. But the wording "We hold" seems to acknowledge that not everybody holds these truths to be self-evident. Thus the word "We hold" seems to invite a parting of the ways between those people who voluntarily join in holding these truths and thereby voluntarily make themselves part of the "We" in the subject slot of the sentence, and those people who do not hold these truths to be self-evident. In effect, the wording "We hold" advertises the contingency of the truths that are proclaimed.
By contrast, when the Catholic bishops and Catholic apologists claim that the Catholic bishops have used reason alone to figure out timeless truth of the so-called "natural law," they usually mean that the supposed timeless truths are not contingent. This is why the supposed timeless truths advanced by the Catholic bishops are supposed not to be part of the marketplace of ideas. In the view of the Catholic bishops, the marketplace of ideas is for contingent and time-bound truths, as distinct from their supposedly timeless truths as well as the personalist and subjectivist dimension of holding these supposedly self-evident truths. After all, if these truths are supposedly self-evident, then why should we have to hold them? Are there people who deny that these are self-evident truths? If there are, then it would appear at the very least that these truth are not self-evident to the people who do not hold them.
Now, in the Catholic thought-world of the Catholic bishops, everything in the secular marketplace of ideas that is not in compliance with their supposed timeless truths represents contingency and relativism. Thus the Catholic bishops and their Catholic apologists imagine that their supposed timeless truths are somehow above and beyond and free of contingency and relativism. From their standpoint, they imagine contingency and relativism not to be good. By contrast, they imagine their supposed timeless truths to be good.
We might note that many of their supposed timeless truths do not seem to be winning over the hearts and minds of many non-Catholics. We might also note that some of the supposed timeless truths advanced by the Catholic bishops do not seem to be winning over the hearts and minds of certain American Catholics. For example, many American Catholics are evidently not persuaded by the supposed timeless truths that the bishops have deployed to ban artificial contraception on the grounds that it is supposedly intrinsically evil.
Once the Catholic bishops have claimed that their supposed timeless truths lead them to conclude that something is intrinsically evil, they are not likely to change their position. In this regard, the bishops are going to join the spirit of Thomas Jefferson's statement suitably paraphrased to fit the bishops' claim: "We Catholic bishops hold certain truths to be timeless truths."
Next, I want to discuss the imagery involved in the expression "timeless truths." As I mentioned in passing above, the imagery involved in this expression seems to suggest that certain statements of propositions (i.e., predications of a supposed truth) are somehow above time and free of time and thereby of all contingency associated with time.
But why would the claim that certain supposed truths (i.e., predications of specific truths) sound more appealing to certain people by also claiming the truth in question is supposedly timeless? Put differently, why would the supposed quality of timelessness make the supposed truth in question sound more appealing? When Catholics live in a Catholic thought-world, do they like to imagine that they are somehow living in a timeless thought-world, even as they walk and talk in the non-timeless everyday world?
But isn't the supposed timeless Catholic thought-world of the Catholic bishops and their Catholic apologists an alternative reality?
1 | 2 | <urn:uuid:dd68c351-133a-4ae7-a861-03dbd81918db> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.opednews.com/populum/page.php/The-Supposed-Timeless-Tru-by-Thomas-Farrell-121201-767.html?f=The-Supposed-Timeless-Tru-by-Thomas-Farrell-121201-767.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00072-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976773 | 1,337 | 2.046875 | 2 |
(Waco) — This week, April 13-19, is National Crime Victims Rights Week, and students at Texas State Technical College Waco will be marking the event with a special Client Portfolio presentation.
A complete media package – billboards, Web site, public service announcements and more – will be presented to the Coryell County Crime Victims’ Office free of charge to help the agency mark the week.
The media kit is part of an annual class assignment where Digital Media Design students and Web Design and Development Students work together to develop media materials based on what they’ve learned in class. The kit will be used for a public service campaign to draw attention to the client’s (in this case, Coryell County) mission.
A formal presentation of the materials will take place at 10 a.m. on Friday, April 18, with The Coryell County Crime Victims’ Office Coordinator Amy Perkins and her Administrative Assistant Trinity Huntsman, as well as special guests, fellow students, faculty and others in the John B. Connally Technology Center Auditorium.
The public is invited to attend.
Texas State Technical College Waco, part of the only state-assisted technical college system in Texas, offers specialized, hands-on instructional courses in over 100 different programs leading to Associate of Applied Science degrees and Certificates of Completion. TSTC Waco also offers classes at the WCJC Fort Bend Technical Center in Richmond and the Texas State Marine Education Center at Palacios. Visit www.waco.tstc.edu or call (800) 792-8784 or (254) 867-3371 for more information. | <urn:uuid:21fcbe22-7c1d-4ee6-a77d-3eef680fd194> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.kwtx.com/news/iwitness/headlines/17933994.html?site=mobile | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.90388 | 340 | 1.5 | 2 |
|Home | Contact us | Links | Archives|
Coping with Humpty Dumpty
January 24, 2007
As I get older, I have come to appreciate more the wisdom that we learn from our elders in the early years of our earthly lives. Some of those lessons are imparted explicitly in the solemn moments of our youth, while others are inculcated implicitly by what Samuel Huntington calls our “core culture.” Of the latter, perhaps no expression has been as elemental as the English nursery rhyme which, passed down from generation to generation, has been the bearer of both the language and history of those who first raised the flag of liberty on these shores.
As a toddler, one of the first that rhymes I learned at the WASPish preschool my assimilation-eager immigrant parents enrolled me in was the sad tale of Humpty Dumpty: “Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall / Humpty Dumpty had a great fall / All the King’s Horses, And all the King’s men / Couldn’t put Humpty together again.” I have since learned that, pace Lewis Carroll, the original Humpty Dumpty, was not a person, but a huge cannon deployed by the Royalists in their defense of Colchester during the English Civil War. The gun was put on a critical, but hastily erected, bastion constructed along the buttresses of medieval St. Mary’s Church. A month into the siege of the town during the summer of 1648, the gun emplacement took a direct hit from Roundhead (Parliamentarian) artillery, causing the massive cannon to tumble to the ground. Humpty was so heavy that the laws of physics took their toll: neither Charles I’s Cavaliers (“King’s Horses”) nor any of his engineers (“King’s men”) could salvage their principal weapon. As a result, the strategically important royal stronghold fell to the rebel forces of Oliver Cromwell.
All this points to a very inconvenient truth of international politics that is just as fundamental as the principles of physics which spelled Humpty Dumpty’s doom: like other material objects, including the Colchester cannon, states can sometimes be cobbled together from component parts. Similarly, come a strong enough blow to their foundations, some will take a tumble from which it is useless to try to put them back together—and that assumes that they should have been so constructed in the first place.
In last week’s column, I discussed how the defeat of the radical Islamist forces in Somalia was a victory in the global struggle against terrorism. In an earlier contribution to the online edition of The National Interest, I outlined the tasks that lay ahead in reconstructing the ravaged country and preventing a recurrence of the just-overcome threat. While there is no doubt that the lands inhabited by the Somali-speaking peoples affected by the recent conflict need to be reconstructed, I want to raise a different, perhaps more significant, question concerning whether “ Somalia” itself should be restored as a single unified state. Although I will confine my observations to Africa in general and Somalia in particular, these considerations certainly can be applied to other conflict arenas around the world; specifically those areas where I believe the fundamental error of Bush administration’s policy of democracy promotion is not its advocacy of more liberal and participatory governance structures, but rather its attempt to get nation-states to adopt democratic institutions when their nationhood—to say nothing of their statehood—is notional at best.
In what was once the Somali Democratic Republic, as well as throughout most of Sub-Saharan Africa, the most formidable obstacle to stability, the rule of law, development, democracy, and the other goods we in the West take for granted has been neither poverty nor any other material factor. It has been the questionable legitimacy of the state itself, legitimacy being understood not as a normative judgment about juridical right or moral virtue but in the social and political sense of whether or not the structures of a given polity have evolved endogenously within a society and its institutions that it can claim some historical continuity. While Africa has a rich social, cultural, and political history, modern African states are not rooted in this past. The present-day borders and national compositions of African states are colonial legacies, emerging directly from the often arbitrary ways that the great powers delineated their respective spheres of influence during the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
The survival of these artifices has not been contingent so much on internal legitimacy—by and large, non-existent—but due to international recognition. Without any organic ties such as shared language, culture, and history binding them to a historic nation-state, many post-independence rulers used the “sovereignty” awarded them by that legal recognition to pillage national resources with their cronies and resorted to massive human rights abuses to prevent protests from those excluded from the spoils. Despite the damning evidence of the wholesale failure of the juridical states they inherited from the former colonial patrons, African elites have persisted in their canonization of the status quo. The precursor of the present African Union (AU), the Organization of African Unity (OAU), formally declared the received borders a “tangible reality” and required that its member governments pledge themselves “to respect the frontiers existing on their achievement of national independence.”
In the case of the Somali-speaking peoples of the Horn of Africa, while they are united by a common language and share ethnic similarities, they have been divided by clan-based polities since they made their appearance in history around the tenth century. These divisions continued during the colonial period when the French controlled a enclave in the northwest (the present Republic of Djibouti), the British both a northern coastal area (the present, albeit unrecognized, territory of the Republic of Somaliland) and a southern zone (now the North Eastern Province of Kenya), the Ethiopians a western area (the Ogaden region of Ethiopia), and the Italians the eastern coast. With the exception of the period when Somaliland and the former Italian trust territory were held together first by a union soon regretted by the former and then by the iron grip of the brutal dictator Muhammad Siyad Barre—hardly an episode to be repeated given not only the abuses against the ruler’s subjects, but his expansionist “pan-Somali” wars with his neighbors—“Somalia,” to paraphrase Prince Klemens von Metternich, has never been more than a geographical expression.
And yet now, despite all the evidence that the exercise is doomed to failure if not tragedy, the United States and the international community have decided to throw their weight behind the fantasies of Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government (TFG) about forging a unitary state. In an address last week at Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazier listed mobilizing support for the self-appointed TFG as the first U.S. priority for Somalia. One can only hope that Dr. Frazier was only being diplomatically polite since, as Hans J. Morgenthau once put it, “it is not only a political necessity but also a moral duty for a nation to follow in its dealings with other nations one guiding star, one standard for thought, one rule for action: THE NATIONAL INTEREST.” In the case of Somalia, our interests are, as I previously argued, first and foremost, sweeping up the remnants of the al-Qaeda-linked terrorists, and, secondly, assuring ongoing regional security and stability—neither of these objectives necessarily requires the TFG nor are they likely to be satisfied by that feckless gaggle of scavengers whose only claim to legitimacy is the self-anointing they administered to themselves during a 2004 conference at a Kenyan resort, the bill for which kaffeeklatsch is being borne by Western taxpayers.
As of last weekend, TFG “President” Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmad—who is, in any event, much less popular in the capital than “Prime Minister” Ali Muhammad Ghedi, a scion of the Mogadishu’s dominant Hawiye clan — is in hiding after the “presidential” villa was shelled by rivals. Unfortunately, the TFG kapo did not go to ground before making incendiary remarks about Somaliland, the one part of the former Somalia that has not only been an island of stability, but also successfully created a legitimate democratic (and secular) political order. (Officially, Abdillahi was closeted in deliberations with the United Nations special envoy, François Lonseny Fall, a former Guinean prime minister whose having helped lead a faltering country—which last week was, coincidentally, beginning its second week of violent strikes—to the precipice (see my column last fall predicting this turmoil) no doubt qualified him for his current state-building assignment in the eyes of the UN bureaucracy which, in any event, never thought to ask what it might imply about the man if the country Monsieur Fall led was rated by Transparency International as the “most corrupt” in Africa).
As for the yet-to-materialize African stabilization force whose deployment was described as America’s second priority by Dr. Frazier, so far only Uganda has firmly committed itself, with President Yoweri Museveni offering 1,500 troops. Even if U.S. and European envoys manage to cajole other countries into contributing the rest of the 8,000 peacekeepers to take the place of the withdrawing Ethiopian intervention force, it is beyond delusional to think that such a modest contingent of Africans can succeed where the infinitely more robust UNITAF and UNOSOM II forces, with their 37,000 and 28,000 personnel respectively, failed barely a decade ago.
Without even bothering to move to the capital of Mogadishu from their camp-out at a former warehouse in the provincial outback of Baidoa, the TFG’s legislature has fallen yet again into bickering with members of the rump parliament (nearly half defected to the then-ascendant Islamists or fled during the recent conflict) voting to sack speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden while the latter was traveling in Europe soliciting even more Western money. The deposed speaker’s crime? He has been a voice for the very outreach to non-radical Islamists and other stakeholders whose inclusion in the regime Assistant Secretary Frazier listed as the third and final policy priority of the U.S. with respect to Somalia.
My point is that U.S. interests in the critical regions like the Horn of Africa require security and stability, neither of which will be achieved by shoring up inherently illegitimate and, in fact, destabilizing regimes constructed at some international conference center. If one seeks the domestication into international society of the former Somalia, recognize well-deserving (and de facto independent) Somaliland, encourage developments in promising (and already semi-autonomous) Puntland, allow the rest of the land to coalesce as its inhabitants see fit, and definitely give up the idea that the “international community” can somehow impose a state structure that has even the slimmest chance of long-term success. (Not surprisingly, this prospective division is not dissimilar to the patterns of political organization found by Sir Richard Burton in his celebrated 1854 visit to the Somali coast.)
In short, let reality, common sense and legitimate aspirations of indigenous peoples—so long as they are viable and do not threaten their neighbors—prevail over theoretical constructs and elaborate schemes for “dialogue” when there is nothing to be said and “reconciliation” when there was never any real union in the first place. Over the long term, organic developments yield legitimacy which, in turn, provides an anchor of stability amid volatile conditions. While this proposal may not be politically correct—the mandarins UN and their AU counterparts would certainly squeal—it conforms to the proven wisdom of the venerable rhyme cited above and is, moreover, far more realistic than latter-day fantasies about being able to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor J. Peter Pham, Ph.D., is Director of the Nelson Institute for International and Public Affairs at James Madison University, and an adjunct fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies. He has written for a variety of publications, and has testified before the U.S. Congress and conducted briefings or consulted for both Congressional and Executive agencies.
Source: The Family Security Foundation, Inc | <urn:uuid:46806aad-4c27-4fbf-a645-f7ee419197c2> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://somalilandtimes.net/sl/2006/262/080.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.956764 | 2,636 | 2.03125 | 2 |
Staunton played a pivotal role during the Civil War years when the Shenandoah Valley served as the "Breadbasket of the Confederacy." While most battles were being fought north or west of the town, it was the presence of the Virginia Central Railroad that provided a vital link between the Valley and eastern Virginia, making Staunton an important supply depot for the Confederacy. Visit such sights as the Railroad Station Area, Trinity Episcopal Church, Thornrose Cemetery, Stuart Hall and Staunton National Cemetery. Learn about the Stonewall Brigade Band, organized in 1855 and still performing free concerts in Staunton's Gypsy Hill Park, Monday evenings from June through August. Study Jed Hotchkiss, mapmaker for Stonewall Jackson. Or just come to see it all by exploring Staunton's five National Historic Districts.
Last Updated: 4/21/2008 10:50 AM | <urn:uuid:2b92b79a-2a7d-4d98-a39c-0044e06e11cc> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.virginia.org/Listings/HistoricSites/CivilWarErainHistoricStauntonVirginia/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953953 | 183 | 2.921875 | 3 |
If you work a lot with children who have Asperger’s and other autism spectrum disorders, you have seen the following: A child listens to your words for a short time, and then their brain hits a kind of inner mute button, and your session or lesson is effectively finished.
There can be a number of reasons for this. We might be using boring words, speaking too fast, using language that is too complex, or neglecting to reference the child’s preferred interests. But a common reason for “losing your audience” in social skills training with kids on the autism spectrum is that many kids with ASD seem to learn better in a visual modality. Temple Grandin is a well-known example of a person with autism who learns visually. She articulates this beautifully in this quote: “When I think about abstract concepts such as relationships with people, I use visual images such as a sliding glass door. Relationships should be approached gently because barging forward too quickly might shatter the door.” (From Teaching Children with Autism, by Kathleen Ann Quail )
There are certainly many children with autism who do not learn in a visual manner like Temple Grandin. But for the ones who do, I believe is important to keep on hand a variety of engaging and meaningful props for your social skills learning activities. Here are a few examples.
For many kids with ASD, our frequent verbal prompts regarding nonverbal factors just become part of the unwanted noise they tune out. But when you keep on hand pictures of eyes, hands, a face and a ruler, and use these as visual prompts during social skills activities, you can get much better attention and retention.
Children with ASD can tune out our words after years and years of verbally prompting to talk less, talk more, stop talking about that, and so forth. For individuals who might be withering under all this scrutiny and badgering, try a social skills teaching approach. This toy balance, available for about 15 dollars online, is terrific for social skills activities to teach reciprocity in conversation and relationships. (Detailed instructions about these techniques: http://bit.ly/zoFpVJ )
Here is another visual prop for social skill teaching with children on the autism spectrum. I spent about a year photographing trains to create these hands-on visuals for teaching beginning, middle, end, “on track” and “off track” in conversation. It’s available as a kit on the website. There are some free train downloads for you to try it out with your own students/clients with ASD: http://bit.ly/zv5OHg
I invite you to explore dozens of other visual-based, engaging autism social skills training methods on this website. | <urn:uuid:fc09ac69-3755-4ba9-bc40-5655fef13edf> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://autismteachingstrategies.com/autism-strategies/talk-less-and-show-more-many-kids-with-autism-need-fewer-words-in-social-skills-teaching/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945201 | 568 | 3.03125 | 3 |
Guest Author - Megan Faulkner
Advocates for breastfeeding may be quick to tell you how natural breastfeeding is, but what some leave out is that natural does not mean it will always be easy! Being prepared for challenges and having a support network in place can help you and your baby get off to a great start.
Breastfeeding in public is becoming more common and many of those mothers make it look so easy. It is less common to see the struggles of getting the baby to latch, dealing with mastitis or other breastfeeding ailments, or the baby who frequently lets go and sends milk flying across the room! In the early days of breastfeeding your infant, these may be part of your reality. If that is the case, I want you to know that this is normal, it won’t be this way forever, and there is help.
As an expectant mother, it is likely you will prepare for the birth of your child by meeting with a doctor, doula, or midwife. Maybe you will join a pregnancy support group or join online forums. You may have magazines about pregnancy arriving at your door so you can read up (and see all the cute babies). The arrival of your upcoming baby is likely to be in the forefront of your mind, as it should be! What an exciting thing to be bringing a baby into your life! While you are doing all of these things, be sure you are also preparing for breastfeeding. This means finding a finding a lactation consultant or other professional, join a breastfeeding support group or forum, subscribe to a magazine for breastfeeding mothers, spend time learning about what to realistically expect in the early stages of breastfeeding.
If you hire a midwife or doula, it is likely that she can help you start your breastfeeding relationship and answer any questions you may have. If you deliver in the hospital, you will likely have access to a lactation consultant who will be there to help you as well. Utilize these resources as often and as long as you need to! In some cases, the lactation consultant is available for you as long as you are checked into the hospital. Be aware of policies like these before you deliver your baby and take full advantage of these services. That is why they are there!
Don’t let people pressure you into leaving before you are ready or make you feel insecure for needing more help. I was in the hospital for 2-3 days with my last baby, primarily due to breastfeeding challenges. Once I checked out, I continued daily appointments with the lactation consultant until we had worked out all of the kinks and my baby’s weight was back up to where we felt comfortable. Luckily my insurance covered this, but not all will, so be sure to look into it!
Another resource that may be available to you is a WIC consultant. WIC (Women, Infants, and Children) consultants help new and expectant mothers learn all about healthy nutrition for themselves and their babies, and this includes breastfeeding! If you have concerns and feel that you may need their support, let them know that before you deliver. They can help you and your baby overcome any challenges you may face and they can often provide women with free breast pumps if they are struggling with low milk supply.
Probably one of the most well known resources for breastfeeding mothers, Le Leche League, provides support groups in many communities and also has tons of information and links on their website. Sometimes new mothers are intimidated by such groups, which have gotten an unfair reputation of being too pushy or judgmental. In my experience, there may be a group member who feels that they are a better mother than their non-breastfeeding friends. She is not the majority. Most of these women will be nice and supportive, as will the group leadership. I would recommend getting in touch with a group leader and getting a feel for what the group is like. Even if you do not decide to attend any group meetings, the leader can serve as a resource for you and answer any questions that may arise.
This may seem unnecessary to some people and not everyone may feel they need the extra support, and that is fine. However, if you have any reason to believe you may want some support, it is much better to have these resources in place before your little one arrives. Even as a second or third time mother, you may want to have some support in place because all babies are different and your breasts may respond differently. If you feel confident that you could overcome any and all breastfeeding challenges that may come your way, you may want to consider becoming a resource for another mother who may really need and appreciate the support. Those early days of motherhood can be challenging enough, but with support in place, everything can run a little more smoothly for mother and baby. | <urn:uuid:3f443a99-7cd0-45f3-ab70-f8176f2b1981> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art70422.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972216 | 979 | 1.695313 | 2 |
Date: February 1862
Creator: Moore, Henry S.
Description: Letter from Henry S. Moore to Charles B. Moore discussing the latest military news, the possibility of being able to stop by Charles's house and swap horses, money, enlistment extensions, and other news from his camp. The letter was started on February 16th and finished on the 17th. The address appears on the left side of the front. It is addressed to Charles B. Moore, Rocky Bayou, Izard Co., Arkansas. There is a handwritten note to the left of the address that says "from H. S. Moore of Capt Throckmorton's Co. Stone's Reg. Texas Cavalry McCulloch's Brigade, received February 28, 1862."
Contributing Partner: UNT Archives | <urn:uuid:3a4aa45f-ff78-4624-831f-fc4a09917521> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://texashistory.unt.edu/explore/collections/CWADP/browse/?sort=date_d&fq=untl_decade%3A1860-1869&fq=str_location_county%3AIzard+County%2C+AR | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950214 | 161 | 1.835938 | 2 |
In February, days of torrential rain flooded the village, bringing a river of mud and cutting off 50 homes, where 200 people live. In March, volunteers visited the village, to survey what kind of assistance the people needed; it was an arduous, three-hour journey from Santa Cruz, over poor and bumpy roads. Because of its remote location, the village is largely cut off from the world. So the residents were delighted to see these visitors, who promised to return with the aid they wanted. The return visit in April was to deliver the aid. They brought two tons and distributed it in packages of 18, 27 or 35 kilograms, each containing both food and drugs.
It was a warm, sunny day; the residents queued up in orderly lines to receive these necessities they badly needed. It was a day also to exchange warmth and love -- to show the people of Carmen they are not alone in facing their hardships and that the Tzu Chi volunteers bring them spiritual as well as material help, a sense of hope.
- Volunteers Prepare to Help Survivors of Rio Janeiro Floods
- Volunteers Help Survivors of Mexican Earthquake
- Chilean Quake Survivors Welcome Tzu Chi’s Aid
- Foundation Conducts First Major Distribution in Chile
- Tzu Chi Volunteers Visit Chile after Earthquake
- Tzu Chi Relief Assessment Team Is in Chile
- Tzu Chi Assists Food, Stationery to Poor in Buenos Aires
- Tzu Chi Takes Part in International Women’s Day at U.N. | <urn:uuid:28b92f73-3419-428c-8033-3aa31a3e7595> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.tzuchi.org.tw/en/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=547%3Avolunteers-return-to-isolated-village-in-bolivia&catid=76%3Aamerica&Itemid=205&lang=en | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.963553 | 308 | 1.851563 | 2 |
Sandy River Conduit Bridge
The Portland Water Bureau (PWB) is seeking a home for a 115 year-old steel pin-truss historic bridge.
The Sandy River Conduit #2 and #4 Bridge once crossed the Sandy River in rural Clackamas County. Until recently, it was the oldest bridge in Oregon that performed its original task—carrying the drinking water conduits that supplied water to a quarter of the state’s population.
The conduits have been removed and placed under the Sandy River in order to reduce their vulnerability to human and natural hazards. That leaves a historic bridge ready to be put into use elsewhere.
The Oregon State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) has determined that the bridge is eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places. This designation, under state and federal law, finds that the removal of the bridge from its current site constitutes the loss of a historic resource. In order to mitigate the effect of having the Bridge removed from its current location, the Portland Water Bureau (PWB) and SHPO have agreed that it is in the public interest to attempt to find an organization or agency that will use the bridge in a new location. Under SHPO requirements, if the bridge has not been relocated and reused after three years, the PWB may recycle it as scrap metal.
The 300-ft. long, 14-ft. wide bridge is in good condition and can be reused for pedestrian and bike use with prudent upgrades. The bridge has been determined to be eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places. Due to the historic nature of the bridge, the PWB is carefully disassembling the bridge so that it can be reused in a new location. This bridge is an integral part of the PWB’s history and the agency is motivated to preserve it for future generations at a new location.
As part of the bureau’s efforts to educate potential users of the bridge, the PWB has developed a package of information, all of which can be downloaded by clicking on the links below. A CD containing all the documents is available as well.
Frequently Asked Questions about the bridge disposition.
For more information on acquiring this piece of Oregon's history, contact Kevin Larson, Engineering Services Group, at 503-823-7210. | <urn:uuid:0e6d39a1-5130-4515-8d27-d74f9094fb00> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.portlandoregon.gov/water/article/329307 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00032-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944093 | 471 | 2.28125 | 2 |
Mental Health - Never Before Revealed Information
- Add To Basket
Instant Download from jelita, digital version
Never Before Revealed Information!
Date: Monday, May 10, 2010
Behind the walls of the mind stands a very complex issue that is in constant study. We have people of all sorts, including mentally ill, so-called normal minds, geniuses and so forth. The mind has been known to play tricks on us, let us down, skip to another level and so forth. It seems with the battle between the brain and self there is never a winning ticket.
At least thats what I thought just a few years ago. Even though I thought I was doing all the things I needed in order to be mentally healthy, I knew that I still wasnt well. I didnt feel well and my life didnt seem reflective of someone that was well. The problem was that I simply didnt know what was wrong with me and neither did anyone else. Something had to change!
I knew I had to do something.
Thats when I decided I had to find out the right way improve my mental health. I knew I owed it to myself and my family to get a handle on this once and for all!
What I discovered completely changed my life!
How did I do it?
I would love to share my secrets with you and my new special report on mental health does just that!
So if youre ready, let me introduce you to my mental health manual...
Mental Health Manual
Everything you need to know about mental health is included in this special report:
Questions to Ask Mental Health Experts
Mental Health Symptoms
Relating to Others with Disabilities
Understanding Mental Illness
You even learn about specific mental health situations like these:
Mental Health and Schizophrenia
Cognitive Mental Health Disorders
Psychogenic and Dissociative Amnesia
Sexual Disorders and Mental Health
Dangerous Personality Disorders Explained
Multiple Personality Disorder and Posttraumatic Stress
Impulsive Behaviors in Mental Health
Somatoform Mental Disorders
I leave absolutely nothing out! Everything that I learned in order to understand my own mental health I share with you.
For example; did you know mental health is essential for everyday life? There are many signs that illustrate mental illness and often people disregard these symptoms as a misconstrued level of understanding on the patients part.
So how do you determine the signs of mental illness? I reveal how in my special report!
This is the most comprehensive report on mental health you will ever read! Not only does it include detailed information about numerous types of mental illness but it also includes tips on how to relate to individuals with mental illness.
This comprehensive special report covers the following topics:
Mental Health and Traits
Mental Health Secrets
Antidepressants in Mental Health
Medicines in Mental Health
Therapeutic Strategies in Mental Health
No stone is left unturned in this comprehensive report!
What is diagnosis? Many people dispute mental illnesses claiming the mental illnesses do not exist. Counselors are often diagnosing individuals every single day, and to understand the symptoms and diagnosis you must understand the underlying and overlying controversies that fall in between. For years professionals, researchers, philosophers and many others have examined mental health searching for answers of existing disabilities.
I show you the tools, tips and strategies you need to achieve better mental health!
You wont want to miss out on this! Learn the secrets to mental health. Look at everything covered in this report:
Alcohol and Drug Abuse in Mental Health
Behind the Walls of the Mind
Entertainment and Mental Health
Education and Mental Health
Detailed information about numerous mental health conditions.
I am so confident that you will love this special report that I am offering my ironclad:
100 Money Back Guarantee
If you dont agree that this is the most eye-opening, impactful and practical information you have ever received on the subject of mental health, simply e-mail me and I will refund 100 of your money on the spot, no hard feelings, no questions asked. Thats how confident I am that you will love Mental Health ! In fact, I will even extend this guarantee for an entire 90 days. Thats right!A 100 90 day Money Back Guarantee!You cant beat it! You get to use and benefit from this unique and exclusive report for an entire 90 days or else receive an immediate refund. Even if you decide to request a refund, you still get to keep the three bonuses as my free gift to you just for giving this a try.
You dont want to miss out on this one! In fact, I cant even guarantee how long this special price is going to last. This is one honey of a deal! Remember this is a limited time offer. The price could go up dramatically in the future and this is your chance to get a copy of Mental Health now at a reduced price.
More Files From This User
- Unraveling Alzheimers Disease - Everything you need to know
- Golf Swing Secrets - How To Play Golf Like A Pro
- Dirty Marketing Playbook - How to Make Money Online
- Get Paid To Golf - How To Make A Living Playing Golf
- Super Simple Money Saving Tips
Healthy Eating for Adults Most American and European adults face obesity and health related problems. With changing lifestyles, adults fail to pay attentio......
Stress Survival Super Strategies
Do you ever feel down, stressed, or anxious? Millions of Americans struggle with stress, anxiety, or mood problems. They can wear and tear on your body leavi......
Increase Your Energy In 7 Days
Have You Lost Your "Get Up and Go?" Is Fatigue Costing You Relationships, Job Opportunities and Your Social Life? Do you want to do something about it ........ | <urn:uuid:6b0a28e5-061f-492c-b2e8-84e6cacc54c0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.tradebit.com/filedetail.php/99094558-mental-health-never-before-revealed-information | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930767 | 1,194 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Unaware of what was disrupting the transport network that morning and forcing legions of would-be Tube passengers to travel overground, the driver had made a diversion.
Following protocol, he announced this to his passengers, advising those whose destinations were nearby that they might be better off walking.
Between 30 and 50 hopped off – unaware that their driver's advice may have saved their lives.
In a statement released after he gave evidence, he said: "When I am asked to talk about July 7 2005, what immediately comes to my mind is all those innocent fellow citizens who lost their lives in such a gruesome and barbaric way while simply going about their legitimate business.
"I also remember the innocent men and women who suffered such horrific injuries."
July 7 evokes unpleasant memories for him, he said, but also memories of "supreme human solidarity, unselfish altruism and solicitous unity from the citizens of our glorious capital".
He added: "The good spirit of London routed the evil spirit of darkness on that terrible day." | <urn:uuid:991c3ee1-82af-4b80-b0ad-97c79faedf1f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newsvideo/8260595/77-inquests-bus-driver-salutes-London-spirit.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00059-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.982013 | 210 | 1.585938 | 2 |
There may be an easier way to eat your bitter greens.
A new compound reported in March at the American Chemical Society’s National Meeting and Exposition in Anaheim, Calif. could be added to foods and beverages to make them taste better.
The flavor blocker, known as GIV3616, blocks taste buds’ ability to detect bitter flavors and results in a more palatable taste. Researchers say the compound aims to help consumers eat healthier by making them more open to trying different diets. It also targets children and seniors to help them swallow bitter tasting medications.
GIV3616 is not the first compound capable of hiding bitter tastes. GIV3727 is another compound that enhances the taste of artificial sweeteners. Researchers say GIV3616 is more potent and dissolves more quickly in food and beverages. | <urn:uuid:a9edebfb-e4a4-4c99-9b20-fe8ddc1599ad> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://running.competitor.com/2011/05/nutrition/new-flavor-blocker-makes-food-seem-sweeter_28155 | 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 | 0.933331 | 166 | 2.578125 | 3 |
Latvian National Opera
Enjoy true Latvian heritage at the Latvian National Opera. Since officially opening its doors in 1912, the opera house has showcased a wide variety of operatic masterpieces new and old, and is also home to the Latvian National Ballet, Latvian National Opera Chorus and Latvian National Opera Orchestra.
Today's programme comprises classical and romantic operas and ballets, while also embracing contemporary forms of expression - with modern opera, children's performances and original Latvian works.
During the season, which runs from September to June, over 200 performances can be seen, and are accompanied by educational events, talks and tours.
History of the Latvian National Opera
In 1893 the German-speaking Riga Deutsches Theatre put on Jēkabs Ozols' "Spoku stunda" or "The Ghostly Hour", a Latvian production and the first attempt to create a national opera.
The Latvian opera was founded in 1912 by Pāvuls Jurjāns, only for the troupe to be quickly evacuated to Russia following the outbreak of WW1. The Latvian National Opera was restarted by Jāzeps Vītols, founder of the Latvian Academy of Music, and on 23rd of January 1918 the troupe gave their debut performance of Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer.
The building itself was constructed by Ludwig Bohnstedt in 1863, and was reconstructed in 1882 following a fire. In 2001 a modern annex was added, faithful to the original design, and added a new 300-seat hall for performances.
Visiting the Latvian National Opera
Only 5 minutes' walk from the hotel and close to Riga Central Market, you will find the opera house in a prominent location in the city near the canal.
Taking a stroll from the Radisson Blu Hotel, Riga has much to offer, and you can call ahead to the opera house to arrange for champagne and hors d'oevres upon arrival. | <urn:uuid:c05b963f-5e38-4988-a547-154eb008d919> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.radissonblu.com/elizabetehotel-riga/location/latvian-national-opera | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947143 | 427 | 1.71875 | 2 |
Almost a hundred years ago, W. S. C. Copeman defined rheumatology in a textbook that addressed in one place a variety of diseases that had been the subject of articles and monographs defining the specialty. After Copeman's third edition, Hollander added immunology and produced the first US edition in 1940; later, Kelley created another that had a more international flavor. This is its eighth edition.
The 2 volumes are divided into 18 parts: initially, the anatomy and physiology of the joints and connective tissue are discussed. The chapters by the Goldrings are especially complete and useful, but all are important for understanding the affected structures. The second section, “Cells Involved in Autoimmune Diseases and Inflammation,” defines the cells that participate in the diseases; the third section, “Effector Mechanisms,” explains how they function. The next section, “Broad Issues,” details the judgment that comes into play, and the section following that evaluates generalized and local symptoms. The chapter on fibromyalgia, in which Wolfe and Rasker tactfully handle the issues and come up with a soundly reasoned explanation, is particularly impressive. The next section, “Differential Diagnosis of Regional Pain,” is especially useful for patient appraisal, and the diagnostic tests that comprise the section that follows are the linchpins for the students investigating these disorders. Therapy is then addressed and, like the rest of the 2 volumes, the discussion is as contemporaneous as that presented in current journals. In fact, unlike some journal discussions, the text defines the rationales for treatments. Nutrition, rehabilitative medicine, and self-management are addressed, as is how to subdue disease expressions. | <urn:uuid:b2e07b80-6cff-4e85-83f3-b56ca339fe7c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=184439 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00035-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9538 | 354 | 2.65625 | 3 |
Learn how to choose the appropriate architecture in MS Visual Studio 2005.
Tags:.net framework 2.0,architecture,integrated development environment,microsoft visual studio,microsoft visual studio tutorial,microsoft windows,ms visual studio 2005,total training
Grab video code:
As a developer or architect, the first thing you need to do before writing a single line of code is to decide what type of system you are building. You have many different choices in Visual Studio 2005. In order to determine the architecture that is best for you, you will first need to understand what your options are. Let us take a moment to review the different options. Later on, we will write code and develop these types of applications in Visual Studio 2005. One option when choosing an architecture is the web based architecture. You would build a web based architecture when you would like a browser based application that reaches many users.
One major advantage to web application is that your code is centralized in one place. This makes maintenance and code updates much easier than a desktop application. With Visual Studio 2005, you would use ASP.net 2.0. ASP.net 2.0 uses the system.web name space in order to work with web forms. You would choose ASP.net when you would like a thin user interface with most of the logic on the server. You would also choose this one you want the browser to be the container for your application.
ASP.net is best suited for a connected environment. Most of the time, all the user need is a browser to work with your application, another architectural choice is a services oriented architecture. Visual studio uses web services for building services oriented architecture. Web services, levered ubiquitous technology such as XML and HTTP. In order to build web services that are standards complaint, be sure to use the add in to visual studio called web services enhancements or WSE for short.
Now keep in mind, there has been a lot of press about web services and be careful not to use them ubiquitously. One of the number one reasons for using web services is when you are working with the head or genius environment. A good indicator of when you should use a web service in a particular situation is when you encounter the word cross, cross platform, cross language, or cross firewall. When you encounter the word cross, it generally means that your data should be submitted in a standard space format such as XML. This is what web services do.
Be judicious when using web services are they are serialized. This means amble sending and receiving points, the data is streamed in and out of text based format. On each endpoint, this will take a little bit of time. If you know that your application do not require the serialization or if they do not require standard XML based format, then consider using binary transfer of your data and set.
Another architectural choice is the desktop application. Visual Studio 2005 uses Windows form 2.0 for these types of applications. Why would you want to use a desktop application? You would use this when you want to robust user interface or a performance user interface. This is because Windows form is able to catch data on the local machine. That way, you can avoid costly around trips on the network to retrieve data. This is especially important if your server is remote.
By leveraging the cashing and the power of the desktop, you can guarantee optimal performance of your desktop applications. A desktop application is best suited for intranets or internal corporate networks or anytime when you can actually control the user base. This is because you will need the .net framework to run your windows forms components.
Another choice is a device application. With Visual Studio, you would use the .Net compact framework 2.0 to work with device applications. The .Net compact framework 2.0 is used for PDA and telephones or any other type of Windows mobile application.
Windows mobile applications can run on all device that include the compact framework, this include pocket PC devices as well as cell phone that are running the Microsoft Smart Phone Platform. Another choice is the smart client application. This is actually a very popular choice these days and many companies are opting for this model. There is a variety of different technologies you can use to build a smart client application. These include Windows forms, the compact framework and Visual Studio tools for office.
A smart client application is basically a highbred of both the web application and a desktop application. It combines the best of both worlds so you get the distribution and the greatest reach that the web offers as well as harnessing the power of the desktop.
Another advantage of using a smart client application is the fact that it is self healing. Think of your instant messaging program, when update is ready, you will see a popup that says new updates are ready for your install. This is because the smart client, the IM program has a handshake with the server. It knows when updates are ready on the server. Once the updates are ready, it either notifies the user or silently installs these updates on the local machine. This is exactly how smart clients work.
The goal of Microsoft is one day to no longer had add remove programs in your control panel and no longer have any panes or messy, uninstalls or reinstalls. An important consideration when choosing a smart client architecture is like the desktop, you will need to have it done, that framework installed. | <urn:uuid:1d7e0ef7-bda8-4805-b6c0-22cad16b26f9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://on.aol.com/video/how-to-choose-the-best-architecture-in-visual-studio-2005-85453949 | 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 | 0.927843 | 1,099 | 2.890625 | 3 |
I was a late bloomer when it came to knowing the rules of football. I learned the basics (four downs, touchdown is six points, etc.) from NFL Blitz
when I was 15; a few years back I started to understand positions and audibles when I came to college and started watching our football team and going to the games.
author Felix Gillette, the intricacies of football were made clear via Madden 2007
. In this interesting narrative, Gillette examines how more minor details in televised football have become understandable as a result of a few Madden
As Gillette concludes, "in the years to come, people who grew up learning about football via Xbox will expect broadcasters to give them more complex information." Has video games provided a means by which one can learn complex rules in an entertaining environment? How might this process be applicable for, say, quantum mechanics? | <urn:uuid:f08e3ed5-ca4e-4702-b1d0-fda2d3edef02> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.joystiq.com/2006/09/06/slate-author-madden-taught-me-football/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.971585 | 176 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Date of Original Version
Abstract or Table of Contents
With the widespread adoption of smartphones, mobile applications have gained mainstream popularity. However, the potential privacy and security risks associated with using mobile apps are quite high, as smartphones become increasingly integrated with our lives, being able to access our email, social networking accounts, financial information, personal photos, and even our cars and homes. To address this problem, we introduce AppScanner, an automated cloud-based service based on crowdsourcing and traditional security approaches to analyze mobile applications. Considering the large and growing number of mobile applications, our envisioned service builds on crowdsourcing, virtualization, and automation to enable large-scale analysis of apps. AppScanner provides end-users with more understandable information regarding what mobile apps are really doing on their devices. This paper offers an overview of our vision for building AppScanner, as well as work to date in specific components, including automated traversal and monitoring of mobile applications, and interactive visual presentation of app traversal results. Armed with transparent and descriptive information regarding app behavior, users can make better decisions when installing and running apps. | <urn:uuid:08782159-be3c-4b05-874e-a7a252c85fca> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://repository.cmu.edu/cylab/99/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.92885 | 224 | 1.945313 | 2 |
Baylor University Libraries Join the HathiTrust Digital Library Consortium
Nov. 29, 2010
The Baylor University Libraries joined the Library of Congress and a group of over 50 leading research universities in a partnership with HathiTrust (www.hathitrust.org), a collaborative digital archive initiative that will dramatically enhance research resources available to the Baylor community.
HathiTrust was established in 2008 when the Committee on Institutional Cooperation, the libraries of the University of California system and the University of Virginia established a repository to archive and share digital collections. The HathiTrust Digital Library already includes over 7.2 million volumes digitized by Google, Microsoft, partner libraries and other organizations, and the collection will continue to expand as member institutions add their digital collections to the repository.
"This partnership with the HathiTrust Digital Library will expand the depth and breadth of our collections because we will share resources with other top research universities in the nation," said William B. Hair, Associate Dean of Libraries. "We are excited to join such a prestigious organization and to collaborate with them as we all work to support the academic success of this and future generations."
The mission of HathiTrust is to "contribute to the common good by collecting, organizing, preserving, communicating, and sharing the record of human knowledge." By integrating the digital archives of its member institutions, HathiTrust will, over time, create an international digital library available to researchers in perpetuity at member institutions worldwide.
"Our strong efforts in digital preservation will contribute to this consortium and strengthen our partnerships with other premier research universities," said Dean Pattie Orr. "I commend Associate Dean Bill Hair and Baylor library faculty for their leadership which allowed us to secure this valuable position in HathiTrust for the benefit of our academic community."
By virtue of the Baylor University Libraries entering into this international collaborative digitization effort during the first wave of HathiTrust's expansion, they will participate in a "constitutional convention" in 2011 to define the next phase of governance of this effort and shape future directions for the partnership of HathiTrust members.
The Baylor University Libraries connect people with ideas in support of teaching, learning, scholarship and academic distinction. Its central libraries (Moody Memorial & Jesse H. Jones) and special collections libraries (Armstrong Browning Library, The Texas Collection and W. R. Poage Legislative Library) are home to nearly 2.5 million volumes, over 60,000 serials, and over 500,000 e-books, e-journals, digital collections and other online research resources. The Baylor University Libraries provide access to a wealth of academic resources, online and in person reference assistance, and technology-rich, flexible, comfortable 24-hour learning environments. | <urn:uuid:b1b41511-35a0-4d3a-b9e5-5c358187a71e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.baylor.edu/lib/news.php?action=story&story=84867 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.918406 | 554 | 1.960938 | 2 |
I flipped a switch that said die. Not choosing death for me, but choosing to punish evil. I chose death for him and in that I found a new life.
I didn't think about how he would die when I hit the button. I watched his body liquefy in front of me. I watched him scream in agony. But I had also watched my father die in front of me. That's why I flipped the switch.
I woke up in a cage. I had no idea where I was or even how I got there. I was terrified and when I realized my mother was there, I started to freak out for real. Then we saw the video, the... I'll call them the Instructions. The rules of the game. The JIGSAW TAPE.
When my father died it was like the universe got smaller, darker, and angrier. It was horrible that he died at all -- but the fact that he didn't have to die, the fact that he was murdered -- that made it all the worse. Nothing can make you feel more helpless, insignificant, weak. My mother blamed herself. I blamed myself. We knew he had been murdered and we couldn't do anything about it.
And it's clear to me that he was murdered. Some people have tried to tell me otherwise. They have tried to tell me that it was a system that it was a mistake that it was the way the world works. William Easton was not a system, and he did not make a mistake. He deliberately created a process that would murder my father and others like him.
So I flipped the switch.
This is how the world works: if you do evil, if you hurt others, something -- some one or some force -- will arise and it will take you down.
I chose death for Easton and it brought me life -- I am no longer helpless. No longer weak. | <urn:uuid:1af99210-dde8-4f26-91fb-ddc54750a9c6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://survivorsofjigsaw.blogspot.com/2010/10/flip-switch.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.992252 | 392 | 1.578125 | 2 |
Washington, D.C. - In the wake of the Obama - Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) being sued in federal court for allegedly conducting illegal human experiments - exposing people to concentrated high levels of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and diesel exhaust - Senator James Inhofe (R-OK), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, wrote a letter to Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, to request that the committee hold hearings to get to the bottom of what exactly happened at EPA.
"It is extremely disturbing that EPA may have conducted illegal human experiments, exposing people with conditions such as asthma and metabolic syndrome to concentrated high levels of substances like fine particulate matter and diesel exhaust," Senator Inhofe said. "EPA has repeatedly said that these substances can cause cancer and lead to death so if these allegations of human experiments are true, it just validates the problem that the Obama-EPA's mission is not about public health.
"I am calling on Senator Boxer to hold hearings on this matter immediately when Congress returns. As the Committee of oversight over EPA, it is crucial that we get to the bottom of this and hold EPA accountable." | <urn:uuid:6f92123f-b59d-412b-97c0-70e882447201> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.PressReleases&ContentRecord_id=1da6f5ea-f333-fc38-acc0-7dd4993b23e5&IsPrint=true | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00033-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943682 | 252 | 1.734375 | 2 |
- Focus Today
- On Demand
- Word For You Today
- Contact Us
Fire Hits Roadless Area in Southeastern Oregon
Firefighters in southeastern Oregon are battling a blaze in a roadless area near the Nevada border where the grass and sagebrush has been dried out and moths have killed vegetation.
The fire, named Water Tower, is in an area of about 2 square miles south of Steens Mountain. The federal fire coordinating agency reported that lines have been drawn around half the fire. Lightning was listed as the cause.
The fire was reported moving north-northeast Thursday morning, but it could threaten three homes and a power line if the winds push it south.
A spokeswoman for the fire team, Tara Martinak, said the firefighters were making good progress Thursday morning. | <urn:uuid:7e497d2e-931b-4997-bd73-c74b6743f3f9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thedove.us/news/2012/07/26/fire-hits-roadless-area-southeastern-oregon?page=154 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.964762 | 162 | 1.625 | 2 |
Clean Water - It's Right Above Your Head
A women using her water storage tank in Guinnee-Bissau. Photo: Paul Akkerman
Rain falls unto roofs and then runs off. And then? You could catch it and drink it. Any suitable roof surface -- tiles, metal sheets, plastics, but not grass or palm leaf -- can be used to intercept the flow of rainwater and provide a household with high-quality drinking water. Rainwater harvesting systems have been used since antiquity, and examples abound in all the great civilizations throughout history.
The groundwater level may be too deep, groundwater may be contaminated with minerals and chemicals such as arsenic or salt, surface water may be contaminated with faeces or chemicals. Rainwater falls on your own roof, and is almost always of excellent quality. It enables people to manage their own water supply and provides the luxury of "water without walking," relieving the burden of water carrying, particularly for women and children. This convenience is available at every house on which rain falls, whether on a mountain top or an island in a salt sea. It is a truly great idea.
Once you catch the water from the roof (or other hard surfaces), you have to store it somewhere. Ferro-cement tanks, made with a layer of cement with steel-wire reinforcement, are usually the best and cheapest option, and can be made locally. When a tank is below ground, it is called a cistern. No idea why, really.
Roof rainwater is usually of good quality and does not require treatment before consumption. The most important thing to ensure water quality is a good lid, keeping out light and insects, and a filter, keeping out all kinds of dirt.
The cheapest tank of all is to use the ground beneath your feet. This is called groundwater recharge, and is simply accomplished by letting rainwater infiltrate in the ground, instead of letting it escape and flow away. When you need it, you pump it up.
As small or large as you want
A rainwater harvesting system might be a 500 cubic meter underground storage tank, serving a whole community. Or it might be just a bucket, standing underneath a roof without a gutter. Each 20 litre container of clean water might save a kilometers long walk to the nearest source of clean water, and as fetching water on cold, wet and slippery days is particularly unpleasant, even this small yield is highly valued. In Uganda and Sri Lanka, rainwater is traditionally collected from trees, using banana leaves or stems as temporary gutters.
It is a technology which is extremely flexible and adaptable to a wide variety of settings, it is used in the richest and poorest societies on the planet, and in the wettest and driest regions of the world. Let's build more gutters!
Author: Mark Tiele Westra, Editor Akvopedia.
- Other blogs in this series
- For more low-cost water and sanitation solutions, visit Akvopedia, part of akvo.org
- Indian movie by CSE (www.cseindia.org) promoting use of rainwater harvesting
- Akvopedia article on rainwater harvesting
- Wikipedia article on rainwater harvesting
- Download the book "Roofwater Harvesting: A Handbook for Practitioners" from the IRC website
- Rainwaterharvesting.org, Indian website on rainwater harvesting | <urn:uuid:2dbbbdcc-8c95-4317-900a-accaeb6c214d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://liveearth.org/fr/node/4597 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00029-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926702 | 702 | 2.84375 | 3 |
Located in the southwest part of the island these preserves which abut each other are comprised of upland shrub, meadow and morainal grassland habitats. This land is some of the highest land on the island with beautiful panoramic vistas to the west and south. This area is owned and managed by The Nature Conservancy and its partners the Block Island Conservancy and Block Island Land Trust.
This area has the largest state endangered northern blazing star population in Rhode Island. Other plants found on the preserves include the state endangered bushy rockrose, shadbush, winterberry, black cherry, arrowwood, and many types of wildflowers.
An important area for migratory birds to rest and refuel. The state-threatened northern harrier and barn owl feed here, and the federally endangered American burying beetle can be found on the property. | <urn:uuid:cc3969d4-a6e3-4a28-90ab-91b852a46079> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/unitedstates/rhodeisland/placesweprotect/nathan-mott-park.xml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937418 | 175 | 2.6875 | 3 |
Preschool | Roman Catholic |
Based on 2 ratings
The Community Rating is the school’s average rating from its community members (e.g., parents, students, and school staff). The highest possible rating is five stars; the lowest is one star.
Every day is a new adventure. My son looks forward to going to school. Good manners, self-esteem and good citizenship is the foundation of a great education at Holy Cross. Kids are allowed to learn at their own pace and their is a very individualized program for learning with actual one on one time with a teacher. There is a wealth of materials in the classroom and the small class sizes give a very intimate learning experience. There is always something to look forward to at Holy Cross, Pajama Day, the indoor skating rink, field trips, group lunch experiences, sledding. the sensory tables, art stations and books are always changing with the season and subject. Since starting at Holy Cross my son pushes in his chair at home and he says please and thank you, he asks what words mean in books and he picks up books and works on reading them. As a parent I feel as I have team support and I know what I need to work on with my child and get guidance on what might help solve both educational and emotional challenges my child faces. Holidays are celebrated and learned about here. There is both Christmas and Hannakuh celebrations not "winter solstice". Most importantly my son loves school.
There is a lot more than meets the eye at this school. The teachers are very well trained, master teachers with great credentials. The school is definitely not merely a drive by, inside is much more impressive. Good manners is part of the curriculum and the students are both happy, engaged and well behaved. There are alot of unique aspects to this school that just cannot be described. This is a Catholic based school but a non catholic student would not be initmidated by the atmosphere--especially one who has grown up with any concept of God. They have some very cool approaches to individuallizing curriculum and there is a wealth of materials to engage any young mind. Not quite a montessori, not quite your traditional preschool, rather a nice mix of several learning environments. If you know what you are looking for in a school and have not quite found one that fit your needs you might want to investigate this one further.
Community ratings and reviews do not represent the views of GreatSchools nor does GreatSchools check their accuracy or verify the reviewers' identities. Use your discretion when evaluating these reviews.
my daughter will be attending hillside from weston... (1 reply)
Looking for feedback on both public and private... (3 replies)
Got a question about Manchester schools? | <urn:uuid:43945c66-8c7f-4160-bf93-650fbb7f163f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://pk.greatschools.org/school/parentReviews.page?id=824&state=NH | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973634 | 563 | 1.609375 | 2 |
Monks have the ability to do many things, as long you have completed the relevant research, which is accessed via Education, Arts, Theology, then Ordination in the research tree.
Monks can help a player to win or lose stewardship of a parish by influencing election votes; this may be done by either increasing or decreasing the number of votes available to a player in a parish in which s/he holds a village. This is a basic skill, and requires no additional research. One monk will create one vote.
Monks are also able to cure disease in a capital; the number of disease points removed is dependant upon the number of monks despatched, as well as the level of your research into Baptism.
TIP: Removing disease points also generates honour for the player sending the monks.
Monks' other abilities are: Blessing, Inquisition, Interdict, Absolution, and Excommunication. For more information, please see below.
Monks also cost Faith Points and gold - the amount of which is dependant upon the number of monks you are able to create for each village.
TIP: Monks are one-use only - they do not return after completing their mission.
TIP: Unlike troops, monks cannot be recalled, so ensure you use them wisely.
Along with gold, monks require a number of Faith Points before they can be despatched. Faith Points are gained by researching Theology, and by and erecting religious buildings in your village and parish capital.
Religious research is located within the Education section of the research table.
Theology (Level 3) Ordination (Level 5) (Allows the creation of monks) Pilgrimage (Level 1) (Increases the speed of monks)
Theology (Level 3) Baptism (Level 7) (Gives access to Restoration) Allows Monks to remove plague from a parish capital.
Marriage (Level 8) (Gives access to Blessing) Allows Monks to increase parish popularity.
Confirmation (Level 9) (Gives access to Inquisition) Allows Monks to decrease parish popularity.
Eucharist (Level 10) (Gives access to Interdict) Allows Monks to prevent attacks on villages by putting them under interdict. Interdicted villages are unable to attack other villages without breaking their interdict and thus, losing their protection.
Confession (Level 12) (Gives access to Absolution) Allows Monks to reduce the time of excommunicated villages.
Extreme Unction (Level 13) (Gives access to Excommunication) Allows Monks to remove church powers and therefore stop the excommunicated player from using monks.
The following types of religious buildings are available:
Small Shrines Cost no gold to build and each gives one (1) Faith Point per day.
Large Shrines Cost no gold to build and each gives four (4) Faith Points per day.
Small Church Costs gold to build and gives eight (8) Faith Points and three (3) Honour Points per day.
Medium Church Costs gold to build and gives 15 Faith Points and eight (8) Honour Points per day.
Large Church Costs gold to build and gives 100 Faith Points and 26 Honour Points per day.
Why isn’t my monk moving any faster after research?
Research only affects monks which have not yet been despatched; therefore if a monk is already moving across the map when the research is completed, it will not be affected. | <urn:uuid:461b00a5-a743-44ad-89a4-d8f6c816f261> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://help.strongholdkingdoms.com/index.php/FAQ:Religion | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00030-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936171 | 722 | 1.984375 | 2 |
By Richard Matthews
The melting Arctic ice is causing huge quantities of methane gas to be released into the atmosphere. Concerns about climate change-inducing greenhouse gases are often centered on carbon dioxide (CO2), but methane is a greenhouse gas that is 20-30 times more potent than CO2. Each methane molecule is actually about 70 times more potent in terms of trapping heat than a molecule of carbon dioxide, however, methane breaks down more quickly in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide.
The sub-sea layer of permafrost traps methane, preventing it from escaping, but as it melts it allows the methane to rise from underground deposits. According to scientists, large releases of methane gas can cause rapid climate changes.
There are historical precedents to back-up this assertion. Scientists believe that long ago, sudden releases of methane were responsible for rapid increases in global temperatures, dramatic changes to the climate, and even the mass extinction of species.
The Paleocene/Eocene thermal maximum (55.5 Million years ago) is a period with drastic climate change due to massive releases of methane. It has also been suggested that large temperature swings during the last glacial period have been caused by abrupt releases of methane.
Hundreds of millions of tons of methane gas are locked beneath the Arctic permafrost, which extends from the mainland into the seabed of the relatively shallow sea of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf.
Researchers at the Russian Academy of Sciences, the University of Alaska and Stockholm University have been surveying the seabed of the East Siberian Arctic Shelf off northern Russia for nearly 20 years. Early in December, they reported dramatic and unprecedented volumes of methane being released from the Arctic seabed. They estimate that eight million tons of methane is currently leaking into the atmosphere every year.
Vast amounts of methane have been seen bubbling to the surface of the Arctic Ocean. There are fields in the Arctic where the release is so intense that the methane does not have time to dissolve into the seawater but rises to the surface as large bubbles.
In an exclusive interview with the Independent, lead scientist Igor Semiletov said that he has never before witnessed the scale and force of the methane being released from beneath the Arctic seabed. Dr Semiletov made his findings public early in December at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco.
"Earlier we found torch-like structures like this but they were only tens of metres in diameter. This is the first time that we've found continuous, powerful and impressive seeping structures, more than 1,000 metres in diameter. It's amazing," Dr. Semiletov said. "I was most impressed by the sheer scale and high density of the plumes. Over a relatively small area we found more than 100, but over a wider area there should be thousands of them."
Recent observations suggest that previous surveys may have significantly underestimated the amount of methane being released into the atmosphere from the Arctic seabed.
This new information was recorded in late summer 2011 by Dr. Semiletov and his team of researchers. The scientists onboard the vessel Academician Lavrentiev conducted an extensive survey of 10,000 square miles of sea off the East Siberian coast. The scientists made their observations with the help of four highly sensitive seismic and acoustic instruments that monitor the methane seeping from the ocean floor.
"In a very small area, less than 10,000 square miles, we have counted more than 100 fountains, or torch-like structures, bubbling through the water column and injected directly into the atmosphere from the seabed," Dr. Semiletov said. "We carried out checks at about 115 stationary points and discovered methane fields of a fantastic scale – I think on a scale not seen before. Some plumes were a kilometre or more wide and the emissions went directly into the atmosphere."
Expeditions in the Laptev Sea in 1994 did not detect elevated methane levels. However, since 2003 a rising number of methane "hotspots" have been detected.
Research prepared for publication by the American Geophysical Union in 2008 by Dr. Orjan Gustafsson of Stockholm University in Sweden indicated that anomalies were recorded in the East Siberian Sea and the Laptev Sea. These preliminary findings were uncovered by scientists aboard the research vessel Jacob Smirnitskyi. At the time, Gustafsson was quoted as saying:
"The conventional thought has been that the permafrost 'lid' on the sub-sea sediments on the Siberian shelf should cap and hold the massive reservoirs of shallow methane deposits in place. The growing evidence for release of methane in this inaccessible region may suggest that the permafrost lid is starting to get perforated and thus leak methane… The permafrost now has small holes. We have found elevated levels of methane above the water surface and even more in the water just below. It is obvious that the source is the seabed."
In 2011, the scientists aboard the vessel Academician Lavrentiev revealed much higher concentrations of methane covering thousands of square miles of the Siberian continental shelf. These researchers found Arctic seabed methane up to 100 times background levels.
According to Natalia Shakhova, of the International Arctic Research Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, "The concentration of atmospheric methane increased three times in the past two centuries from 0.7 parts per million to 1.7ppm, and in the Arctic to 1.9ppm. That's a huge increase, between two and three times, and this has never happened in the history of the planet."
The Arctic is warming faster than any other region on earth. As a whole, the Arctic has experienced an average temperature increase of 4C over recent decades. The World Meteorological Organization said that northern areas like the Russian Arctic experienced the greatest increases in temperature in 2011. They also report that since 1970, the Arctic has warmed at a rate twice as fast as the rest of the globe.
Scientists predict that over the next thirty years 45 billion metric tons of carbon from methane and carbon dioxide will seep into the atmosphere as the permafrost thaws. By the end of the century it is expected that about 300 billion metric tons of carbon will be released from the thawing Earth.
Adding in that gas means that warming would happen "20 to 30 percent faster than from fossil fuel emissions alone," said Edward Schuur of the University of Florida. "You are significantly speeding things up by releasing this carbon."
The release of trapped methane will cause higher temperatures, leading to even more melting of the permafrost and the release of yet more methane. This troubling trend of melting permafrost on the floor of the Arctic Ocean is accompanied by a dramatic decline in summer sea ice covering the surface. The loss of sea ice will further accelerate the warming trend because open ocean absorbs more heat from the sun than a reflective ice surface. This represents a strong positive feedback that amplifies anthropogenic warming.
Scientists have estimated the amount of methane stored beneath the Arctic to be greater than the total amount of carbon locked up in global coal reserves. Subsea permafrost is losing its ability to be an impermeable cap and models suggest that if even only one percent of the methane were released from the ocean floor, it would radically accelerate global warming.
Richard Matthews is a consultant, eco-entrepreneur, green investor and author of numerous articles on sustainable positioning, eco-economics and enviro-politics. He is the owner of THE GREEN MARKET. a leading sustainable business blog and one of the Web's most comprehensive resources on the business of the environment. Find The Green Market on Facebook and follow The Green Market's twitter feed.
Image credit: WorldCulturePictorial.com | <urn:uuid:5ab8c995-8763-4a6f-a424-32f90c9e1763> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.planetthoughts.org/?pg=pt/Whole&qid=3328&src=xref | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949935 | 1,580 | 4.21875 | 4 |
If Both the Mother and Possible Father Agree to Genetic Testing
Child Support Services will schedule the genetic tests. Both parties will be sent a letter indicating the time and place of the test.
If Either Person is Not Willing to Take a Genetic Test
Child Support Services can order them to participate in testing. Genetic tests are scheduled and each person is notified of the time and place of the test. If the possible father does not show up, this is considered a “default” and Child Support Services then asks the court to name him as the father and order child support. Child Support Services may also ask the court to order him to pay for the genetic tests and legal fees.
After You Receive Genetic Testing Results
After you receive the genetic testing results and know who the father is, you and the other parent may establish legal fatherhood by signing an acknowledgment form from the Idaho Bureau of Vital Statistics or Child Support Services will ask a court to establish legal fatherhood and order child support.
About Genetic Testing
With the exception of identical twins, everyone has different DNA. Everyone receives half their DNA from their mother and half from their father. Genetic tests analyze a child’s DNA and determine which half came from the mother and whether the other half came from the possible father.
Because of the unique nature of an individual’s DNA, genetic tests are extremely reliable. In most cases, genetic tests indicate with a “probability” of more than 99 percent certainty whether a man is a child’s father. If a man is NOT the father, genetic tests show this with 100 percent certainty.
Whenever possible, the mother, possible father, and child are tested to determine whether the man is the father. If the man is deceased or unavailable, his close relatives may be tested, since they share similar DNA.
Genetic tests are simple and painless. A cotton swab is brushed inside each cheek of your mouth, collecting DNA from your saliva. The samples are then sent to a laboratory for testing. Results are sent to Child Support Services and each parent within a few weeks. | <urn:uuid:ade93661-7bc9-493d-a0a6-5bdc89d131a3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.healthandwelfare.idaho.gov/Children/ChildSupport/Paternity/GeneticTesting/tabid/365/Default.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938746 | 430 | 2.1875 | 2 |
Prominent Russians: Andrey Tupolev
The Russian aeronautical engineer and army officer Andrey Tupolev was the leading designer of large and heavy aircraft in the USSR.
Andrey Tupolev was born into a large family on 10 November 1888 in the village of Pustomazovo near the city of Kimry in Russia’s Tver Region. His father Nikolay Ivanovich Tupolev was a notary at the Tver Region District Court. His mother Anna Vasil’evna Lisicyna was a housewife. She spoke fluently French and German.
After graduating from the Tver gymnasium Tupolev was admitted in 1908 to two Moscow universities at the same time. One was the Institute of Connecting Lines (engineering). But he preferred to study at the leading technical university of the Russian Empire at that time – the Imperial Moscow Technical School that is now known as the Bauman Moscow State Technical University (BMSTU).
Young Andrey Tupolev showed a great interest in aviation from an early age. While performing his studies at the university in 1909 he started attending an aeronautics group under the command of Nikolay Zhukovsky, a famous Russian scientist and founding father of modern aero and hydrodynamics. Young engineer Tupolev constructed his first sailplane and performed in it his first time flight in 1910.
In 1911 his successful scientific studies were interrupted. He participated actively in antigovernment riots and handed out illegal brochures. Tupolev was expelled from the university. He left Moscow to return to his native village in the Tver Region and stayed there under police supervision. Shortly before WWI broke out he was admitted back to the university and continued his studies.
During 1916-1918 Andrey Tupolev, in cooperation with Nikolay Zhukovsky, worked on the development of aerodynamic tunnels. Graduating with honors from the university in 1918 young Tupolev with professor Zhukovsky founded TsAGI (the Central Aero Hydrodynamic Institute). Tupolev was the head of the aviation department. One of the major innovations brought by Tupolev to the Soviet aircraft manufacturing industry was replacing wooden parts of the planes with duralumin. This upset the wood producing industries. But Tupolev overcame the wood lobby and insisted on using duralumin in aircraft construction.
The results of the work were the ANT-5 (1927) and the ANT-4 (1925) also known as the TB-1 heavy bomber. By building these aircraft and by consistently using duralumin
Tupolev determined the future development of the aircraft manufacturing industry. Tupolev's design approach defined for many years the trends of civil and military heavy aircraft development. Aircraft designed at TsAGI at that time had outstanding flying performance and range. With these aircraft it was possible to fly from the USSR to the USA via the North Pole. One of the symbols of that time was the Tupolev ANT-20, also known as Maxim Gorky - an 8-engine aircraft, the largest in the 1930s. It could cover outstanding distances.
On 22 October 1922 the famous OKB Tupolev (Tupolev design bureau) was founded. It was also known as OKB-156, with the design office prefix Tu. It was home to more than 300 different projects. More than 100 of them were built. About 70 were in serial production. Among these were world known civil and military aircrafts such as Tu–95, Tu-160, Tu-154 and Tu-144. More than 78 world records were set with these planes.
Andrey Tupolev’s scientific interests were not limited to aircraft design. He took much interest in related scientific spheres. He could always foresee the future development of aviation and always implemented the most cutting-edge innovations in aircraft design. His many-sided approach to the challenges that faced his OKB was noticed and highly appreciated by the Commissar of Soviet Heavy Industry. Andrey Tupolev was appointed as head engineer of the Soviet aircraft building industry. He started numerous projects in experimental spheres of aviation. Tupolev also tried to modernize building factories, using the most innovative western technologies. These actions gave an unprecedented impulse to Soviet aviation underlined by the slogan “catch up and surpass the western aviation industry.”
But Andrey Tupolev did not work for long as the lead engineer of the Soviet aircraft building industry. During the Great Purge in 1937 Tupolev was groundlessly accused of espionage and sent to jail. Almost all TsAGI aircraft designers were jailed with him. Andrey Tupolev stayed in prison for one and a half years and was later transferred to KB-29, which was fully under NKVD command (the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs).
This plant was also known as Sharashka (an informal name for secret research and development laboratories in the Soviet Gulag labor camps system). Tupolev worked together with other ex-TSAGI employees. The Sharashka then moved to Moscow and was dubbed “Tupolevka” after its most famous prisoner.
In 1939 Tupolev received the challenging task of building a new dive-bomber with tactical capabilities that would exceed all other dive-bombers. In 1941 Tupolev and his crew came up with the Tu-2 (NATO reporting name “Bat”).
It was a twin-engine high-speed daylight bomber. Designed to challenge the Ju-88 Junkers, the Tu-2 proved comparable, and was produced in interceptor, torpedo and reconnaissance versions. For developing this plane Tupolev was awarded with a state prize.
He was released from prison on 27 June 1941, five days after the start of the Great Patriotic War. Stalin couldn’t but understand the vital importance of Tupolev’s experience in aircraft designing. At that time the air fleet of the USSR needed new airplanes to meet the challenges of the time. Andrey Tupolev perfectly coped with the problem providing the Soviet army with new innovative fighters and bombers.
After the end of WWII Tupolev remained one of the leading Soviet aircraft designers. He was the founder of Soviet reactive engine powered civil aviation, coming up with the idea of Tu-104 in the 1950s.
A natural leader and head of one of the most cutting-edge innovative research centers (TsAGI), Andrey Tupolev was able to attract young talented engineers to work with him. Pavel Sukhoi, a founder of OKB Sukhoi and the developer of Su fighter Jets was among them. Tupolev could make people enthusiastic about solving technical challenges. Though he was a leading constructor he never made significant decisions without debating them first with his colleagues. “An airplane is a collective product of different people,” he used to say. He was highly praised by his colleagues and followers.
Working at TsAGI and OKB Tupolev, Andrey Nikolaevich was able to raise a new generation of aircraft designers. One of them was his son – Aleksey Tupolev, who took over from his father as the head of OKB Tupolev.
Andrey Tupolev died on 23 December 1972, leaving a rich legacy behind him. This was the man who changed aviation and influenced it like no other.
The most well known aircrafts by Tupolev
Aleksey Tupolev successfully continued his father’s projects. Some of the best-known projects of OKB Tupolev were Tu-95, Tu-160, Tu-154 and Tu-144.
The Tupolev Tu-95 is a large, four-engine turboprop powered strategic bomber and missile platform that has the NATO reporting name “Bear.” Built to defeat any targets via cruise missiles in the enemy’s rear area at any time and in any weather conditions, it became one of the symbols of the cold war. It remains the fastest mass-produced propeller-driven aircraft and the only turboprop-powered strategic bomber to go into operational use.
The Tupolev Tu-160 is a supersonic variable geometry heavy bomber that has the NATO reporting name “Blackjack.” Russian air force pilots named it the “White Swan.” Despite carrying deadly weapons and being outstandingly
powerful, the plane is unbelievably elegant in the air. It is similar in configuration to the American B-1 Lancer but is significantly larger and faster than the B-1B with a greater combat range and payload capacity. It is both the largest variable-wing and largest combat aircraft ever built. It is part of a nuclear triad of the Russian Federation.
The Tupolev Tu-154 with the NATO reporting name “Careless” is a medium range trijet civil airliner. It became one of the notable civilian aircraft of its era and was often referred to as a Soviet “workhorse.” It serviced well for several decades for Aeroflot (the main Soviet airline) and its subsidiaries. It was exported to more than 17 countries.
The Tupolev Tu-144 with the NATO reporting name “Charger” was the world’s first supersonic transport aircraft, a competitor of the Aerospatiale-BAC Concorde. It had a number of innovative solutions for a civil aircraft of that time. The Tu-144 first broke the speed of sound on 5 June 1969 and on 15 July 1969 it became the first commercial transporter to exceed Mach two. It remains the fastest airliner.
But the development of the program of Tu-144 suffered dramatically after an airplane crashed at the Paris Air Show on 3 June 1973, killing six people on board and eight on the ground. The plane undertook a violent maneuver. Pulling out of the subsequent dive, the Tu-144 broke up and crashed.
The cause of this accident remains controversial. But the main reason is believed to be a French chase plane “Mirage” that apparently was on an espionage mission trying to get pictures of the landing airplane. The tragedy was the result of an attempt to avoid a collision.
Written by Leonid Laparenok, RT | <urn:uuid:c198687b-66a0-496b-ac50-217829584194> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://russiapedia.rt.com/prominent-russians/science-and-technology/andrey-tupolev/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.980292 | 2,117 | 3.21875 | 3 |
Click on a label to read posts from that part of the world.
Photo of the Day (10.12.10)
If you're feeling the need for a little underground adventure, October is the perfect time of year to visit the Karst region in Slovenia. Ranking as one of the largest underground canyons in the world, Slovenia's Škocjan Caves stretch for 5.8km at depths of 250m below ground. Why October? Travelers headed this way in the autumn months can skip the summer crowds and take leisurely tours before the unpleasant bitterness of winter sets in.
This rare picture was captured on the sly by Flickr user StrudelMonkey in the Škocjan's final cavern. Here, visitors can peer at the Reka River which flows just 50m beneath the carefully marked paths. Taking photos isn't permitted in the caves (hence the blur in the picture), so follow StrudelMonkey's lead and turn your flash off if you want share your memories with the folks at home.
Do you have epic (or prohibited) tour photos shot from the hip? We want to see them! Upload your best to our Gadling Flickr pool and it could be our next Photo of the Day! | <urn:uuid:b59db573-a32b-40ab-b785-ab6989333e4f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.gadling.com/2010/10/12/photo-of-the-day-11-12-10/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933268 | 257 | 1.84375 | 2 |
Achieving an 8-10 Stop Dynamic Range
This article from 1999 has now been
superceeded by a newer one that
three different blending techniques that are more appropriate for digital photographers.
Colour transparency film has a useful dynamic range of about 4-5 stops between the lightest area with any detail and the darkest. Beyond that is found featureless black or transparent white. Colour negative film has a couple of additional stops and B&W film another stop or so. But, nature can present the landscape photographers with scenes having a dynamic range of 10 stops or more double that which slide film can handle.
Most landscape photographers, myself included, use split neutral density filters to bring the dynamic range of a scene down to the range that film can handle. Occasionally I've found myself without a set of split NDs, faced with a challenging exposure. Below is one such example and the technique that I used to overcome it.
On a Spring 2000 8-day rafting trip on the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon I took the above photograph after a long, wet and arduous climb. Because of the difficulty of the hike I was traveling light and had left my set of split neutral density filters, along with a lot of other gear, back in the raft a long way below. (You can read about the making of this photograph here).
Using the Canon 1V's spot meter I found that the scene had a range of at least 10 stops from the rocks in the upper right to the shadow areas under the foreground rocks. What to do?
The exposure above was a compromise, set by splitting the difference between the two spot readings. While this photograph captures the scene it satisfies neither the need for highlight nor shadow detail. A 2 stop split ND set across the middle would have been the solution. The image above is a simply a poor compromise because the filters weren't available, but it is the best that I could do.
I realized at the time though that if I took two additional frames, one exposing for the highlights and another for the shadows (in addition to the compromise exposure above), I would be able to combine them digitally. Thus I could create an image that would render what I saw, but could not capture at the time on a single frame of film.
Light (shadow) Exposure Dark (highlight) Exposure
The frames above tell the story. The first two are the raw separate exposures for the shadows and highlights. The larger center one below them is the blended image created in PhotoShop, using the technique described below.
This technique is explained using PhotoShop 5.5. It probably can be done with most image processing software that utilizes Layers. (See Note #1 below regarding another approach.)
Here's how it's done.
You can experiment and learn this technique using the example light and dark pictures above by right clicking your mouse and using Save Picture As... Then, skip to Step 4 below. (They are already aligned). Otherwise, this series of steps is described generally for you to use with your own two exposures.
Scan the two exposures as you normally would except with the following alterations to your technique....
Scan each frame with identical scanner settings. Don't let your scanning software alter the exposure between scans.
Include a black border around the frame. You'll need it to ensure correct alignment, as seen below.
At this point you want to load the scans into PhotoShop. But, since you'll be doing a lot of experimentation, it can be tedious and time consuming to do so at full resolution. Resave each of the scans at about 7"X9" size and 72 DPI. Use these low resolution files to experiment with and then when you have the technique well in hand return to the full-sized files and redo what you've learned.
Load the two files and using Window / Tile display them side-by-side on screen.
Press TAB and ensure that all required palettes are displayed. Now, click on the Foreground / Background squares and ensure that they are Black and White, with Black on top.
Turn on the rulers using View / Show Rulers and then using the Move Tool drag rulers onto each of the pictures. Using the black frame edges as your point of reference use Image / Rotate Canvas / Arbitrary to ensure that both pictures are straight. This is necessary because it's almost impossible with most scanners to align the film exactly the same for each frame. Another method of aligning the two images is to temporarily set the opacity of the top layer to a low amount and then zoom in.
Select the Dark frame and then use Select / All and Edit / Copy. (If you're working on a large file you can now delete the Dark frame to free up memory and make PhotoShop work faster).
Select the Light frame and use Edit / Paste. (If you are working with digital files you can skip ahead to step #12).
Select the Layer Palette and set Opacity to between 40% and 50%. This will allow you to see both layers at the same time. (Layer 1, the dark layer should be highlighted).
Now the hardest part. Using the Move Tool move the dark layer so that it exactly overlaps and matches up with the background, or light layer. Magnify the image so that you can clearly see what you're doing. If you find that it doesn't match exactly everywhere just ensure that the match is as close as possible at the point where the two images will be blended. In the example above that point is where the dark foreground rocks meet the brighter rocks in the background. (Remember, you can use the arrow keys to move the images in small increments).
Return Opacity to 100%
Now use Layer / Add Layer Mask / Reveal All.
Choose a fairly large brush and select the Paintbrush Tool. Start painting over the dark part of the image (the lower half in the example above). You are removing the dark layer and revealing the light layer underneath. Don't worry about overdoing it because once the upper (dark) later is removed the process stops. Be careful not to get too close to the light area with the large brush. Also, make sure that you don't miss any areas.
(NB: You can use Add Layer Mask / Hide All instead, combined with White foreground & Black background squares. This allows you to erase the light areas rather than the dark. Depending on which area is larger this may be a more convenient way of working.
Change to a smaller brush and increase the magnification to actual pixels. Very carefully erase the dark layer along the edge of where the light area meets it. If you make a mistake, use the History Palette to go back.
When done doing the above, use Layer / Flatten Image and save the file as .PSD PhotoShop format file.
Now, proceed to use all of the normal image processing techniques that you would normally apply, including Unsharp Masking, spotting using the Cloning Tool, Levels using an Adjustment Layer, and so forth. You'll also want to crop the black edges.
Don't forget that you can do colour adjustments and the like on each separate layer before flattening, further adding to your ability to create an image that matches your perception. (You may also be interested in having a look at my tutorial titled Instant PhotoShop for some basic yet powerful techniques.)
Compromise Single Exposure Blended Exposure
I find this technique to be very helpful when the use of a split neutral density filter in the field isn't possible. This may be because one isn't available, or because the area between highlight and shadow is too irregular.
Of course you must take two frames that are identical, except for exposure. A tripod is therefore a must. Also, I find that exposures with a spread of about 2 stops yields very good results.
Finally, like most techniques using PhotoShop, there are usually a number of different ways of accomplishing the same thing. If you have an alternative method, or a suggestion on how to improve this one, please let me know. | <urn:uuid:ea399a66-e422-4b0e-a632-6fd54f00bd04> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/blended_exposures.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00025-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930035 | 1,657 | 2.0625 | 2 |
The Concept of Eco-town
The Eco-Town Project was created in fiscal 1997 under Japan's Ministry of International Trade and Industry (currently the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, or METI) and the former Ministry of Health and Welfare (project was later transferred to the present Ministry of Environment).
It was founded on the basic concept of "zero-emissions." In essence, this concept is about ultimately reducing waste generation to zero, by taking the "waste" arising in citizen lifestyles and industrial activities, and utilizing it to the greatest extent possible as raw materials in other industries.
The Eco-Town project has two objectives:
- To stimulate local economies by nurturing the growth of environmental industries that take advantage of the industrial capabilities in each region
- To create integrated systems that are in harmony with the environment, and to involve industry, the public sector, and consumers, with the aim of creating a resource-recycling society in a given region.
Eco-Towns have a number of key features such as (a) strong legislation, shifting the market towards a sound material-cycle society, (b) national and local governments are spearheading the drive to bring together industry clusters to be more sustainable, (c) increasing product research and development – in both public and private sectors, including universities, (d) large and rapidly expanding eco-business market, domestically and internationally, (e) strong focus on environmental technologies and ESTs, and innovative/cutting-edge solutions to solve environmental problems, and (f) focus on energy conservation, material development and integrated waste management are also features of Eco-Towns.
As of 2006, 26 areas in Japan have been approved by the government as Eco-Town projects. | <urn:uuid:992f0023-5950-423d-b435-9bf585ab2823> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.unido.org/what-we-do/environment/capacity-building-for-the-implementation-of-multilateral-environmental-agreements/the-stockholm-convention/post-nips/japan/eco-towns.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950359 | 352 | 3.09375 | 3 |