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Questions from the past, answered by George Q. Cannon in the pages of the Juvenile Instructor –
Q. Who has the authority to excommunicate members from the Aaronic Priesthood? Does this come under the jurisdiction of the Bishopric or not?
A. The Bishopric has authority to excommunicate from the Church lay members, or those who have received only the Aaronic Priesthood.
Q. How far can members of the Aaronic priesthood, who are transgressors, be handled by their respective quorums?
A. The quorums of the Aaronic Priesthood can only deal with their members who are in transgression to the extent of withdrawing from such transgressors the fellowship of the quorum. The quorums have no authority to deprive them of their membership in the Church.
Q. Would it be right for a member of the Melchisedek Priesthood and one of the Aaronic Priesthood to take part in administering to the sick?
A. Any member in the Church would be committing no sin to lay his or her hands upon the head of one who is sick, and bless or pray for the individual. Members of the Aaronic Priesthood may act in this way under the direction of and in connection with the Melchisedek Priesthood when called upon to do so by those holding the Melchisedek Priesthood.
It is, however, perfectly proper and advisable for the sick to use oil for their afflictions, and God will sanctify the anointing to their good. All the Saints should be careful, however, to not overstep the rights which belong to them as members of the Church or members of the priesthood.
Q. There seems to have been a discussion among members of a Theological class in one of our Sunday schools concerning the right of an Elder or Seventy to baptize members into the church. There was some question as to whether a man holding this priesthood was authorized to exercise it in this direction unless he was set apart for a mission.
A. It is certainly the right of either Elders or Seventies to baptize and confirm members into the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day Saints, but they should not do so in any regularly organized branch or Ward of the Church without first consulting with and obtaining the permission of the presiding authorities in said branch or Ward. There is order in the Church which every man should strictly observe. This requires that Saints be amenable and labor under the direction of the general or local authorities. Therefore, whatever rights a man may possess through receiving the priesthood, should be exercised only in consonance with the feelings and wishes of those in whose care the various portions of the vineyard are placed.
Q. An esteemed correspondent asks us several questions concerning round dancing. From what she says it seems to be the practice in the ward to which she belongs for the musicians at a ball to play a number of waltz tunes, and she inquires whether it is proper for this temptation to be placed in the way of the young people and they be expected to resist it.
A. In reply we say that the playing of such tunes ought to be avoided if it be the design to have the young people refrain from waltzing. There certainly is no necessity for the playing of such tunes and exciting the desire on the part of those who can waltz to join in the round dance.
Q. Next, she asks: Is the responsibility of stopping round dancing equally upon the shoulders of the young men and the young ladies, or chiefly upon the latter?
A. The responsibility rests equally upon both sexes; but the greater responsibility rests upon those who have the party in charge, whether it be the Bishop or a committee.
Q. Again: Are the Latter-day Saints permitted to dance two round dances in an evening, or are these dances forbidden entirely?
A. We understand that some years ago, when round dancing was freely indulged in, and an attempt was made to check the practice, permission was granted for two round dances only during an evening. It is better, however, inasmuch as round dancing is not considered as decorous and proper for young people to indulge in as square dancing, that round dancing be entirely dropped.
The objection to round dancing will suggest itself to very person who looks on and sees the manner in which it is conducted. A husband and a wife, a brother and a sister, or two young ladies, might dance a round dance and there would be no impropriety in their doing so; but if such persons indulge in waltzing, others would think that they also should have the same liberty. and when persons of both sexes dance promiscuously there are those who will take advantage of the familiarity which the found dancing affords, and evil is likely to result therefrom. Is not this plain? Innocent girls may not be aware of the danger to which they may be exposed in this style of dancing; but older persons of more experience perceive it. They know that there is danger of sinful temptation following the familiarity which this kind of dancing permits. It is for this reason that objection is urged, by the leading men of the Church, to the practice of round dances. They would like all the young people of the Church to understand the reasons they have for using their influence against waltzing. it is not for the purpose of curtailing their enjoyment to keep them from indulging in a form of amusement which might lead to serious and dreadful consequences. For it should be the aim of every virtuous person of both sexes to avoid the familiarity which the clasping of each other in the round dance admits of. Besides, it is scarcely to be supposed that all who frequent balls are so pure as to be above temptation. There are some, doubtless, who obtain access to such gatherings who are ready to take advantage of the liberty which the round dance affords to accomplish evil ends. For this reason, if for no other, this form of dance should be avoided.
Q. If an aged man is brought up before the bishop and his council to be tried, and he is a man that is not fully capable of explaining his own position, is there anything in the laws of the Church to prevent his having a man belonging to the Church act as his spokesman at the trial?
A. There is nothing in the laws of the Church against one of the brethren acting as spokesman for another in a case of this kind. But, of course, there would have to be great care taken in granting permission of this character, for the reason that there are so many would-be lawyers who would like to get an opportunity to argue cases before the Bishops’ Courts, and make themselves disagreeable, and perhaps offensive. But for one man to speak for another in the spirit of the gospel and in a way to explain fully to the Bishop’s Court the position of the other man who is up for trial, there can be no objection to it – that is, if the accused is a man not fully capable of explaining his own case.
Q. We are asked whether terrestrial and telestial beings will inhabit this sphere after it is celestialized, or whether they occupy another sphere.
A. The revelations of the Lord have not explained this in sufficient plainness to permit an answer to be given that is entirely definite. Still we can imagine that it is quite possible for beings who enjoy a telestial and terrestrial glory to dwell on a celestial sphere. It is not the place that constitutes the glory so much as the power and the blessings enjoyed in the Celestial Kingdom. This is illustrated in this life. There are degrees of glory in this life. Freedom and bondage co-existed in the United States a generation ago. masters were free and enjoyed great honor and distinction, while their slaves breathed the same air and had the same surroundings, but they were slaves and subject to their masters.
Q. Which is the proper way of the may ways that are practiced of asking the blessing upon the sacrament?
A. Our correspondents say that in some instances those who are administering kneel upon both knees, while others kneel upon one; some hold up the right hand, while others the left, and again, some hold up both hands, and perhaps others none at all.
The usual custom, and one that is appropriate, is for the person asking the blessing upon the Sacrament to kneel on both knees, and not lift the hands; but there is nothing imperative about this. | <urn:uuid:86510a33-acc3-410f-9f76-33bc654a3467> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.keepapitchinin.org/2011/01/05/i-have-more-questions-1894/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974401 | 1,734 | 1.851563 | 2 |
|a Eurasian plant, Oxalis acetosella, having trifoliate leaves, an underground creeping stem, and white purple-veined flowers: family Oxalidaceae|
|a children's mummer's parade, as on the Fourth of July, with prizes for the best costumes.|
|a scrap or morsel of food left at a meal.|
any plant of the genus Oxalis, numbering several hundred species, within the family Oxalidaceae. The name is chiefly used for O. montana, a stemless trifoliate (i.e., with three leaflets) herb native to North America from southern Canada southward to Tennessee and westward to Minnesota. It grows about 15 cm (6 inches) tall, has pink-tinted stems, and white or reddish flowers that appear from May until August.
Learn more about wood sorrel with a free trial on Britannica.com. | <urn:uuid:111d620a-de8a-486e-82d3-b8e42cbf4c02> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/wood%20sorrel | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.905962 | 192 | 2.90625 | 3 |
06-08-2012, 01:36 AM
Aparecium Deletrius Legil
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: The Soprano State
Oil and Obama
If the U.S. is now an oil exporter, why $4 gas? - The Term Sheet: Fortune's deals blog Term Sheet
Today's high gasoline prices prove that drilling for more oil in the U.S. doesn't lower energy costs. We have Wall Street to thank for that.
FORTUNE -- The U.S. is now selling more petroleum products than it is buying for the first time in more than six decades. Yet Americans are paying around $4 or more for a gallon of gas, even as demand slumps to historic lows. What gives?
Americans can be forgiven for doubting the U.S. is producing more oil today than anytime in the last eight years – a fact President Obama has hammered home again and again in his latest rounds of campaign stumping. Meanwhile, Republicans point to the rising price of gas, which seems to indicate a less-than-plentiful oil supply.
Despite all appearances, Obama is telling the truth. The U.S. is enjoying an energy boom. In North Dakota alone, shale oil drilling over the past year led to a greater volume of crude oil production than at least one OPEC country.
Americans have been told for years that if only we drilled more oil, we would see a drop in gasoline prices. (Speaking to voters last month, Newt Gingrich made the curious assurance that more oil drilling could drive down gasoline prices to $2.50 a gallon, prompting the White House to accuse him of "lying.")
But more drilling is happening now, and prices are still going up. That's because Wall Street has changed the formula for pricing gasoline.
Until this time last year, gas prices hinged on the price of U.S. crude oil, set daily in a small town in Cushing, Oklahoma – the largest oil-storage hub in the country. Today, gasoline prices instead track the price of a type of oil found in the North Sea called Brent crude. And Brent crude, it so happens, trades at a premium to U.S. oil by around $20 a barrel.
So, even as we drill for more oil in the U.S., the price benchmark has dodged the markdown bullet by taking cues from the more expensive oil. As always, we must compete with the rest of the world for petroleum – including our own.
This is an unprecedented shift. Since the dawn of the modern-day oil markets in downtown Manhattan in the 1980s, U.S. gasoline prices have followed the domestic oil price (which, for the most part, has been more expensive than oil from the North Sea, a slice of the Atlantic between Great Britain, Germany, Scandinavia, Belgium and the Netherlands).
However, heightened drilling in the U.S., combined with the flood of oil from the tar sands in Canada, has consistently pressured the U.S. oil price below its counterpart in the North Sea. The two types of oil once traded in lockstep, but have recently deviated so much that many do not believe they will trade neck-and-neck again. In the past year, U.S. oil prices have repeatedly traded in the double-digits below the Brent price. That is money Wall Street cannot afford to walk away from.
To put it more literally, if a Wall Street trader or a major oil company can get a higher price for oil from an overseas buyer, rather than an American one, the overseas buyer wins. Just because an oil company drills inside U.S. borders doesn't mean it has to sell to a U.S. buyer. There is patriotism and then there is profit motive. This is why Americans should carefully consider the sacrifice of wildlife preservation areas before designating them for oil drilling. The harsh reality is that we may never see a drop of oil that comes from some of our most precious lands.
With the planned construction of more pipelines from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, oil will be able to leave the U.S. in greater volumes. This may eventually smooth out energy prices globally, but in the short term it will probably mean more of our North American petroleum products will be lost to competition from abroad.
Demand for oil in the U.S. has eased with this year's higher prices – a situation dubbed "demand destruction" by industry insiders – but overseas demand has not cooled. That means America will have to fight to keep oil on its shores instead of seeing it shipped to another country – by paying dearly for that privilege.
Energy independence may be within our reach. But it comes at a price.
- Don't forget to buy Jiro's Special Edition Sunglasses for $19.95 | <urn:uuid:ff4ba682-07d2-4e87-b1d0-3ebe6aeaf0b0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.alldeaf.com/current-events/101724-oil-obama.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00075-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961984 | 987 | 1.835938 | 2 |
12/17/2010: "How Cool Is This? But It Has A Serious Side"
In a recent news report on the need for improved oil spill protection (see story to the left) there was a LINK to real time tracking of shipping traffic in the Salish Sea.
There is a surprising amount of shipping traffic in the waters off of San Juan County, and that has resulted in a number of actions to address safety issues:
Current events related to marine shipping safety in the Salish Sea
1. The December 7, 2010 Report of the Canadian Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, which identified that Transport Canada and the Canadian Coast Guard are ill-prepared to deal with a major oil spill.
2. The December 7, 2010 release of the Public Comment Draft of the Stakeholder Workgroup Review of Planning and Response Capabilities for a Marine Oil Spill on the U.S./Canadian Transboundary Areas of the Pacific Coast Project Report which identifies many areas for improvement.
3. A November 2010 internal audit by the Canadian Coast Guard identified that the agency lacks the training, equipment and management systems to respond to oil spills.
4. The September 15, 2010 Canadian Pacific Pilotage Authority Interim Operating Rules for Loaded Crude Oil Tankers in Excess of 40,000 DWT for Boundary Pass and Haro Strait offer significant safety improvements for transiting tankers. We are especially pleased to note the new requirement for escort tugs.
5. The December 7, 2010 Canadian federal court ruling that the Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) has failed to adequately protect the critical habitat of British Columbia’s resident killer whales. Among other points, the ruling states that the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and the Minister of the Environment are required under section 58 of the Canadian Species at Risk Act to provide legal protection against destruction for all components of the Resident Killer Whales’ critical habitat. This means that the Government of Canada is legally required to address the most significant threats to their critical habitat, such as the impacts of shipping, which include toxic contamination risk from oil spills, and physical and acoustic disturbances.
6. New US Coast Guard regulations for maritime salvage and firefighting for oil tankers transiting to and from US ports came into effect on January 22, 2010 as a result of Congressional direction in the Oil Pollution Act of 1990.
7. The BP Cherry Point Refinery Marine Terminal North Wing Extension Environmental Impact Statement will soon be released. It will include a state of the art vessel traffic risk assessment developed through a George Washington University leading-edge computer simulation program that incorporates existing and projected shipping information for Puget Sound, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Haro Strait and Boundary Pass. | <urn:uuid:d47e5f50-b2d4-40e5-bf6e-3e51f3826882> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.islandguardian.com/features/archives/00001029.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936398 | 559 | 2.75 | 3 |
Interesting write-up from John Quiggan at Crooked Timber: The end of the global warming debate. I especially liked this part:
Finally, the evidence has mounted up that, with a handful of exceptions, “sceptics” are not, as they claim, fearless seekers after scientific truth, but ideological partisans and paid advocates, presenting dishonest arguments for a predetermined party-line conclusion. Even three years ago, sites like Tech Central Station, and writers like Ross McKitrick were taken seriously by many. Now, anyone with access to Google can discover that they have no credibility. Chris Mooney’s Republican War on Science which I plan to review soon, gives chapter and verse and the whole network of thinktanks, politicians and tame scientists who have popularised GW contrarianism, Intelligent Design and so on.
There’s a process to doing good science, and it’s very much not the same thing as selling your a priori opinions as Truth. As with the evolution debate that took place in the 1800s, the scientific community has looked at the evidence and reached a consensus. Those who want to continue arguing that particular issue aren’t doing science. | <urn:uuid:675ce007-4476-4511-9558-01f7a2d8f992> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lies.com/wp/2006/01/08/quiggin-the-global-warming-debate-is-over/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965392 | 246 | 1.5 | 2 |
Diamond/Ceramic 4 Rod Turn Box
The Turn Box family is a very stable and compact knife sharpening system. It works well in the kitchen and it quickly breaks down for storage in a drawer. The turn box family of knife sharpeners is also great for outdoorsmen on the go because it is lightweight and stores easily into a backpack. It only takes a few swipes to maintain an edge (a bit more if you have a really dull knife).
There are two pre-set knife sharpening angles in the wood block 20 degree & 25 degree
25 Degrees - This is used for most kitchen knives and provides a sharp, durable edge.
20 Degrees - This is used for those desiring a very sharp edge. Some examples would be for filet knives or cutting tomatoes. Lower degrees result in sharper knives, but require more regular maintenance.
This 2-Stage Knife Sharpening System features a hardwood turnbox with internal rod storage in the base, two 5" long medium diamond rods, and two 5" long fine ceramic rods.
Four Rod Diamond/Ceramic Turn Box Instructions
Lansky Turn Box Sharpeners can be used for both 1-stage or 2-stage sharpening. The silver Diamond Rods are for sharpening, and the white Ceramic rods are for polishing.
Always begin by placing the turn box on a stable and flat surface at a comfortable working height.
For 1-stage sharpening, simply choose the angle at which you wish to sharpen (20º or 25°) by placing the sharpening rods in the appropriate holes. Hold the base firmly with one hand as far away from the rods as possible while still maintaining a firm, controllable grip on the base. With the knife in your other hand, place the heel of the blade (closest to the handle) an inch or more below the top of one of the rods. Holding the blade straight up and down, draw it down the ceramic rod and towards you; as though you are slicing bread. Be careful, do not rush. Now repeat this action on the other rod. Continue alternating from rod to rod until you have achieved the desired sharpness.
For 2-stage sharpening, begin by placing the rods in the 20º angle holes and follow the sharpening instructions as listed in the 1-stage sharpening above – except do not sharpen to a “finished” edge- use only about 10-12 strokes on each rod. This 1st stage of sharpening is designed to “thin” the blade slightly. After “thinning” the blade, move the rods over to the 25° angle holes for the 2nd stage sharpening to put the “finished” edge on the blade by sharpening the knife as described in the 1-stage sharpening instructions above.
Be Smart, Be Safe and Stay an Edge Above the Rest! | <urn:uuid:c98cdba8-7e04-4c89-bf47-0ecd027f5af7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://lansky.com/index.php/products/4-rod-turn-box-copy/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.913034 | 598 | 1.679688 | 2 |
The Panorama Factory 64-Bit Edition
The Panorama Factory x64 Edition has finally been released. 64-bit processing enables The Panorama Factory to create images that are nearly 1000 times larger than the maximum under Windows XP on a 32-bit processor. This version runs on single- and multi-processor computers, delivering improved stitching speed on multi-processor systems (including multi-core systems) by performing image computations in parallel.
The x64 Edition runs only on 64-bit processors with the x64 architecture such as AMD Athlon 64, AMD Turion 64, AMD Opteron, Intel Xeon with EM64T or Intel Pentium with EM64T.
You may download the x64 Edition here.
The Panorama Factory V3, by Smoky City Design, LLC, creates high-quality panoramas in an automated fashion from a set of overlapping digital images. It transforms (warps) the images in order to join them seamlessly into panoramas up to 360 degrees. You can add image hotspots, export to VR formats and create web pages that link your images into virtual tours. The software also corrects for lens-induced distortions and creates either cylindrical or spherical image projections.
Applications like The Panorama Factory are restricted by 32-bit architectures (such as the Pentium) that limit the amount of virtual memory available to the application. However, when ported to the x64 architecture, The Panorama Factory breaks the 32-bit barrier to create images that are essentially unlimited in size.
Many digital imaging applications, including The Panorama Factory, allocate a single, contiguous block of virtual memory to hold each uncompressed image during processing. As a consequence of running on a 32-bit architecture, the Windows operating system places a limit on the size of individual virtual memory allocations.
Under Windows 95, 98 and ME, the limit is approximately 254 megabytes. Under Windows NT4, 2000 and XP, the upper limit is slightly less than 1 gigabyte. In practice, as virtual memory becomes fragmented during the running of an application, the limit is often substantially lower than this, especially when two images must be held simultaneously in virtual memory.
When a user attempts to create a panoramic image whose size exceeds the capabilities of the Windows edition, they are informed that the software is “out of memory”. There is no doubt that the number of users with this problem is on the rise. The percentage of customer support requests about the "out of memory" problem has doubled in the past 12 months! This is a worrisome trend.
Under Windows XP, customers using 6 mega pixel cameras seem to begin having difficulty with the "out of memory" problem when stitching somewhere between 20 and 40 photos, depending on how they use The Panorama Factory. Customers using 12 or 14 mega pixel cameras can have problems with as few as 10 to 20 photos.
Digital camera resolution appears to be following a variation of Moore's Law, doubling every few years. However, the (theoretical) maximum capacity of consumer workstations has not increased since the introduction of 32-bit processors and 32-bit operating systems a decade ago. Digital photography in general and panoramic photography in particular are stretching the limits of the 32-bit architecture. Within a few years, photographers who purchase new prosumer cameras may find it impossible to make panoramas on a 32-bit computer!
In order to match the resolution increases in digital photography, applications like The Panorama Factory must either (1) implement their own paging schemes within the 32-bit architecture (a significant programming task) or (2) make the move to a 64-bit architecture.
The customer base for The Panorama Factory consists largely of people who
use a single computer for digital photography and also for less demanding
applications. It is doubtful that many of these customers would purchase a
64-bit computer that did not also support legacy 32-bit applications.
The Panorama Factory 64-Bit Edition is a native 64-bit application that runs on x64 processors. It makes use of the full 64-bit addressing available on these processors. Windows XP x64 Edition provides for a 1 terabyte (1000 gigabytes) addressing space. This permits The Panorama Factory to create images that are nearly 1000 times larger than the maximum under Windows XP on the Pentium.
The Panorama Factory x64 Edition breaks the 32-bit barrier to create images that are essentially unlimited in size!
Revised: January 16, 2011
© 1999-2011 Smoky City Design, LLC and John Strait | <urn:uuid:b0c8693b-6ace-408c-899c-69f1ab5546c5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.panoramafactory.com/pfactory64.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.911098 | 937 | 1.695313 | 2 |
About 70 elementary students came to city hall on Thursday, and they wanted answers.
Who is Doug Craig? What does he do? Does he even like his job?
The visit involving students in Grades 6 to 8 from St. Francis Catholic Elementary School was part of Junior Achievement Dollars with Sense financial literacy program and coincided with Local Government Week in Ontario.
The day began with a lesson delivered by TD Canada Trust that helped students create their own budgets. The trip to city hall in the afternoon was intended to teach them about budgeting, money management and investment on a much larger scale. And, it served as a window – perhaps a first glimpse for many – into the inner workings of a municipality.
“It’s like the living room of the community,” said Mayor Doug Craig, referring to council chambers. “It’s where we meet, discuss and make decisions.”
Students got to occupy the chairs usually taken up by council members and city staff, though there was a clear line established by Craig from the outset.
“We do what the federal and provincial government don’t do,” he said. “We balance the budget.”
To do so, it often means setting priorities and making tough decisions, explained Linda Fegan, director of corporate communications and marketing.
“It’s like choosing whether to buy a new shirt when you really need to save up for an IPad,” she said.
While kids can’t run for mayor, Craig said they can get involved on the city’s youth advisory committee that was responsible for such ideas as a new skateboard park.
The new BMX bike track at Riverside Park is another example of how kids can have an impact, Fegan noted.
“We actually got you to vote on what design you like the best. We let the kids in the community decide what that’s going to be.”
Craig stressed that anyone is able to come and speak at city hall.
“If I wanted to save money by shutting the arenas and pools down, you could come here and tell me what you think,” he said. “I’m no different than anyone else, except I make decision on behalf of the city…We’re all people.”
Grade 8 teacher Jacqueline Ward hoped that the day would serve as an eye opener for her students and encourage them to be part of the public process. Many are already involved with student council and are passionate about the issues facing the city, she said.
“They hear about all the things going on in Kitchener and Waterloo and they want Cambridge to have them, too.”
While the group constituted the largest tour Fegan has ever guided, she said that dozens of classes and community groups come for tours of city hall throughout the year. | <urn:uuid:60a75354-d5f2-40ad-86f4-e77804c5347d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cambridgetimes.ca/news/local/article/1521277--students-come-to-city-hall-looking-for-answers | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972472 | 597 | 2.140625 | 2 |
"Spot electroplating" for art projectMay 10, 2012
Q. I want to electroplate a small area of a large bronze item. If I seal off a circle of it (about a foot square), fill that area with the salt-solution and run a current from one side to the grounded point at the furthest end, will it work.
A: will the placement of the cathode (i.e., the whole surface, in and out of the sealed area) matter? Will I need to move it around as it reacts? Or will it disperse the current?
I planned to tape it just outside the furthest point on the circle from the anode
B: on that scale will a 12V Sealed lead acid battery work?
How long will I need to get a nice even heavy surface. Will I need a significant amount of solution for that surface area, is solution volume an issue? 2L?
Masters Student, Electronic Art
A. Hi Oliver.
There are scientific rules that govern how electroplating works. Some of the science is very complex and poorly understood, but some of it is very straightforward -- and that part you should probably understand before you try to get into the construction details. Just the old saw that the science must precede the engineering :-)
Electroplating is governed by Faraday's Law of Electrolysis, which in brief, says that plating thickness is proportional to time and current. What you are actually doing in electroplating is getting atoms to move from the anode to the cathode, and the way you do it is by using a battery or DC power source to force the electrons of those atoms to flow through the wiring from the anode to the cathode, which in turns forces the nuclei to migrate through the solution as charged ions from anode to cathode to catch up. There are numbers associated with Faraday's Law, like 96,400 coulombs (ampere-seconds) moves one gram equivalent weight from anode to cathode.
Another thing you know about electricity is that, slightly simplified, it follows the path of least resistance. So, when you combine these two facts, the plating follows the path of least resistance. That is to say that the plating is going to be very heavy on the area of the cathode that is close to the anode, and thin or non-existent on the areas of the cathode which are far from the anode. So, no, it will not disperse the current; and, yes, you would have to move the anode around.
The more difficult part of the science is that the metal doesn't just cleanly deposit in a "nice even surface" as you wish. Considering again the "path of least resistance", as soon as you have a tiny asperity, that's where the current wants to flow, and wants to build a lump :-)
My suggestion is that you investigate "brush plating" and get a brush plating kit and proprietary plating solution (which contains additives to counteract the "lumping"). I think you'll find that 12 volts is much too high, and 1-1/2 to 3 volts is more appropriate. Good luck.
Ted Mooney, P.E. RET
Brick, New Jersey | <urn:uuid:66226a44-6ae6-403e-97c2-1a67fb797a39> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.finishing.com/585/23.shtml | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957216 | 681 | 3.203125 | 3 |
Large-scale offshoring of IT and business processes is seen by many as the way government departments can cut costs, but the ineffective procurement of the past could mean there is an alternative way to reduce budgets.
In the government spending review last month, chancellor George Osborne outlined spending cuts of £81bn over four years.
Although the government will use IT to help cut costs across the public sector, Whitehall departments and their suppliers will be forced to offshore to reduce the amount of money spent on technology, some experts believe.
Sarah Burnett, analyst at Ovum, says demand for offshoring will increase as a result of the government's negotiations with IT suppliers to deliver the same for less. Business process outsourcing (BPO) is the area most likely to move overseas. "Offshoring is one way for suppliers to deliver the requisite cuts in prices," she says.
Indian outsourcing companies are already positioning themselves to take a slice of the UK public sector market. Suppliers such as Mahindra Satyam, Wipro, TCS and HCL Technologies have declared their intent. "We can deliver twice the service quality and at half the price [of current providers]," says Vineet Nayar, CEO at HCL.
Doubts over offshoring
Public sector IT chiefs recognise the need to outsource but are less certain about offshoring work.
David Wilde, CIO at the City of Westminster, says outsourcing is likely to increase to maximise the benefits of large virtualised environments as well as helping to establish more shared services.
But he says government bodies should not treat outsourcing as a blanket approach to reducing costs. "It really depends on the specific service, and offshoring should not be looked at as an end in itself, just one of a number of business options," he says.
"I think there is a fundamental question about the extent to which offshoring actually does cut costs."
Many public sector outsourcing contracts have come under fire for proving too costly, with the government having lost billions in project overspends, delays and cancellations in the past. But the complexity of those projects could end up being a reason not to offshore, and to cut costs instead by improving what has come before.
Jos Creese, president of public sector IT user group Socitm, says offshoring is not always the best option. "Offshoring can work well for a clearly defined service or product, but the greater the complexity, the less likely remote delivery will result in a satisfactory outcome," he says.
Robert Morgan, director of consultancy Burnt Oak Partners, says, "Outsourcing is absolutely not the only way to meet spending targets. The waste is within the old system."
David Cameron's visit to India, where he declared that the UK was "open for business" suggested that the government has already positioned itself to outsource more of its contracts, says Mark Lewis, head of outsourcing at law firm Berwin Leighton Paisner.
But the issue of UK jobs vanishing overseas remains politically sensitive, he says. "The government will be looking at offshoring providers that have an onshore presence. Tata Consultancy Services, for example, has well over 5,000 staff in the UK and HCL also has several thousand. To talk about offshoring as an option is not just about seeing jobs disappear from the UK. And, of course, that is something the government can mandate on," he says.
Big businesses have been offshoring IT in increasing volumes for at least a decade. Although the government is the biggest business of them all, it is a different beast. Sending work offshore makes business sense, but it might not make political sense.
Examples of IT waste in government
- Contract value: £1,033m
- Supplier: EDS
- Costs soared from £1,033m to £2,426m, a 135% increase between 1994-2000. The increased costs were due to new work and projects (£533m), capital expenditure (£409m) and post contract adjustment (£203m).
Swansea City Council
- Contract value: £83m
- Supplier: Capgemini
- IT was outsourced in 2005 and the council decided the second phase call centre was not affordable only two years into the 10-year contract. The full contract cost £40m more than its normal IT budget over 10-year period. | <urn:uuid:1f404a92-ebf7-4796-8c47-3ba6d61bcf13> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.computerweekly.com/news/1280097245/Is-IT-offshoring-inevitable-to-meet-government-cuts | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9676 | 908 | 1.914063 | 2 |
by C. Markus on July 21st, 2012 at 9:17 am
Ancient physicians such as Hippocrates believed and understood the benefits of physical exercise. However, during the 20th century, an opposite view began to form. In fact, patients of heart attack were prescribed bed rest!
“…At the time of the 100th boat race between the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, UK, in 1954, the senior health officer of Cambridge University undertook a study to investigate the alleged dangers of exercise by comparing university sportsmen with intellectuals.” 1. As we know now, these beliefs are ridiculous, but were widely held until 1953 when Jerry Morris began the first studies to disprove that exercise is harmful.1 Since then, countless studies have been done that prove the benefits of exercise. Nevertheless, despite this knowledge, much of the world remains inactive.
It’s well known that lack of physical activity can lead to many health problems, but did you know it is the cause of 1 in 10 deaths around the world? 1 This means that lack of physical activity is as deadly as smoking. A new study published in the British journal the lancet has found inactivity to be of epidemic proportions. The researchers of this study estimate that “If inactivity were not eliminated, but decreased instead by 10% or 25%, more than 533 000 and more than 1-3 million deaths, respectively, could be averted every year.” 1. These numbers are astounding, and should be a cause for concern for inactive people around the world.
Findings from the study show that increased physical activity in adults can reduce rates of:1
- All-cause mortality
- Coronary heart disease
- High blood pressure
Ecoslim™ Helps maintain a healthy weight & balanced metabolism, plus assists slimming programs*
Lee ScD, I-Min, Eric J. Shiroma, Felipe Lobelo MD, Pekka Puska MD, Steven N. Blair PED, and Peter T. Katzmarzyk PhD. “Effect of Physical Inactivity on Major Non-communicable Diseases Worldwide: An Analysis of Burden of Disease and Life Expectancy.” The Lancet (n.d.): n. pag. Effect of Physical Inactivity on Major Non-communicable Diseases Worldwide: An Analysis of Burden of Disease and Life Expectancy : The Lancet. Effect of Physical Inactivity on Major Non-communicable Diseases Worldwide: an Analysis of Burden of Disease and Life Expectancy, 18 July 2012. Web. 19 July 2012. <http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(12)61031-9/fulltext>. | <urn:uuid:ce04e41b-922c-482b-b0bd-10c9c41c9798> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.nativeremedies.com/the-harmful-effects-of-inactivity/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94595 | 563 | 2.953125 | 3 |
Advocates hope to preserve Pennhurst complex
EAST VINCENT — Minorities, women and Native Americans are not the only ones underrepresented among the preserved historic places of the nation.
The former Pennhurst State School and Hospital outside Spring City might be the most important historical property in the country that represents the history, struggles and change in attitude toward the developmentally disabled.
At least that is how the Pennhurst Memorial and Preservation Alliance views it.
Opened in 1908 on 1,400 rolling acres as the Eastern Pennsylvania Institution for the Feeble Minded and Epileptic, Pennhurst was a self-sustained campus of 25 buildings that included workshops, a firehouse, a fully functioning farm and a barber shop, among other things.
Intended to isolate its residents from the rest of society, it house 3,500 patients at its peak occupancy in space federal regulations later determined to be habitable for just 700.
Eventually it became famous for unsanitary conditions and the degrading and abusive treatment of its patients.
Alerted to conditions there by reporting in The Pottstown Mercury, an NBC investigative report in 1968 brought the plight of Pennhurst patients to the attention of the nation and sparked a series of lawsuits which culminated in a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling that forced institutionalization of disabled people was unconstitutional.
Now regarded as the epicenter for the modern disability rights movement, Pennhurst closed in 1986 and its remaining 460 patients were discharged or transferred to other facilities.
A non-profit organization, the Alliance had Pennhurst named as an “International Site of Conscience, part of a worldwide network of “Sites of Conscience” – historic sites specifically dedicated to remembering past struggles for justice and addressing their contemporary legacies,” according to the group’s web site.
Pottsgrove High School graduate Nathaniel Guest founded the group and is also teaching two classes on “the ethics of preservation” at Cornell University. Continued...
He said that like the stories of the roles minorities and women played in the nation’s history, the story of the intellectually and developmentally people who lived at Pennhurst is one that must be preserved — and preserving some part of Pennhurst is the best way to do it.
“If Pennhurst is gone, there is no physical
“So often the decision about what to preserve or what to let go is made at a time when the understanding of the historical importance of a site has not yet gelled,” Guest said.
Which is to say that “in some ways, historical preservation has matured,” said Guest. “The decision about what not to save has become as important as the decision about what should be saved.”
“Consider the homes of the slaves. They were, in all likelihood taken down at a time when their contribution to the historical narrative of their time was not considered significant,” he said, adding “obviously, we would not make that same choice today.”
So when asking whether Pennhurst should be preserved, Guest argued, we should be asking whether the story of what happened there has “gelled” yet.
“Pennhurst is a contested landscape,” Guest said.
The establishment two years ago of a haunted Halloween attraction at the site created a controversy and, ironically, may have raised awareness of the story Guest thinks needs to be told about Pennhurst.
In 2011, Urban Partners consultants produced for Pennhurst Memorial and Preservation Alliance a financial feasibility analysis of whether the finances of preserving some or all of Pennhurst could work.
It concluded that with the help of $10 million in grants, 10 of the 25 buildings could be converted into 286 one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments with rents ranging from $1,325 to just under $2,000 per month. Continued...
Guest said a site the size of Pennhurst makes complete preservation impractical.
“It’s impossible to turn the entire site into a museum,” he said.
“But some attempt should be made to preserve the physical fabric, but it has to happen in a planned, phased way,” said Guest.
Turning some of the buildings into apartments as a away to preserve the campus and the “physical fabric” is one way to ensure the story of Pennhurst is told with a level of integrity.
“The issue that has to be addressed is how do we re-use many of these buildings in a may that we don’t whitewash if and so that the understanding of its significance in the future is not compromised,” he said.
Guest said is the owner of the property is “open to preservation” being done there and added that he presented the owner with a copy of the Urban Partners analysis.
Attempts Friday to interview Tim Smith regarding the future development Pennhurst were unsuccessful.
The Pennhurst campus is eligible for the National Register of Historic Places. Recognizing Pennhurst’s significance and the serious threats to its future, Preservation Pennsylvania named it one of the Commonwealth’s most endangered treasures for 2008.
And, in its annual publication — “Pennsylvania At Risk” — Preservation Pennsylvania highlighted Pennhurst as one of Pennsylvania’s historic resources that are “at risk.”
“Finally, there is an opening for a creative developer to restore this place, so long a white elephant on our landscape and our collective conscience. Reusing these buildings is, of course, a preservation win with all of the environmental and economic benefits that entails,” Guest said in the publication. Continued...
The Alliance “hopes that a portion of the property will be used as a Center for Conscience, to preserve the lessons and stories of those forced to live at Pennhurst,” according to “Pennsylvania At Risk,” which added that the Alliance “hopes to create a modest memorial and museum on the campus, while reusing the property in a manner that provides economic and environmental benefits to the region.”
Follow Evan Brandt on Twitter @PottstownNews
Location, ST | website.com
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Your daily wake up call with updated traffic, weather and few fun things to get you through the morning.
Presenting Chester City's news and views to Delco Times web visitors who want to know more of what's going on in the City besides the stories they read in the paper.
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Cliff Wilson served as chairman of the Delaware County Democratic Party for 16 years (1994-2010). He will write on politics and other issues he feels strongly about.
Offers timely health advice for pets, behavioral tricks of the trade, follow-up success stories, and more. Updated regularly by ACDC's all-volunteer staff that includes long-time foster parents and pet owners who have years of experience.
Kent Davidson covers local politics, events, and goings-on in the borough of Media, PA. | <urn:uuid:13dada74-2f43-402f-861c-61224394c248> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.delcotimes.com/articles/2013/02/04/news/doc510fd0272d4c2641458442.txt | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955626 | 1,746 | 2.703125 | 3 |
Undergraduates may apply for TAP for the summer*, fall, and spring semesters, and may receive TAP for up to four years of study (eight semesters). Binghamton University's TAP code is 0880.
TAP provides undergraduate students who are residents of New York State and meet financial and academic criteria with grants from $500 to $5,000 per academic year. Limits for minimum and maximum awards are determined by the New York State Legislature. Click here for TAP estimator.
Effective with the 2010-11 academic year, graduate students are no longer eligible for TAP.
*NOTE: Using TAP during a summer session will reduce one of the 8, full-time semesters depending on the number of credits in summer. Students are discouraged from using TAP awards during the summer as they will need full TAP awards for full-time enrollment during the regular academic year.
How to apply for TAP
• Complete and submit the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).
• After completing your FAFSA, begin your online TAP application immediately using the link on your FAFSA Confirmation Page.
• If you miss the TAP link after finishing the FAFSA, you must wait 3-4 business days, until your FAFSA data is received and processed by HESC. You will then receive an email directing you to the HESC web site to complete the TAP on the Web application.
• If you received TAP in the previous year, you will still need to complete the TAP application via the link emailed to you after completing the FAFSA. Your information will be pre-filled from the prior year.
What is APTS?
APTS is a New York state grant program for students pursuing an undergraduate degree on a part-time basis.
How much aid is available?
Eligible undergraduate students can receive up to $2,000 per year to assist in paying tuition expenses.
To be eligible for APTS, New York state requires you to:
Students must also meet the following income guidelines:
How to apply
New York State students may be eligible for a variety of scholarship and award programs to help pay for college. Click here to learn about eligibility requirements and application information.
If you have been awarded one of the following scholarships, you must notify the Higher Education Services Corporation (HESC) via the “Tap Application Process” :
Last Updated: 2/21/12 | <urn:uuid:08969121-e0c7-420e-80d3-123c81e5e177> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www2.binghamton.edu/financial-aid/types-of-aid/grants/new-york-state-grants/index.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938899 | 515 | 1.523438 | 2 |
Top 5 Tips to Prevent Theft at College
College theft is now so prevalent that some consider it a natural rite of college like gaining 15 pounds your freshman year.
With an array of i- products from iPhones to iPads, young people's most valuable possessions are increasingly portable and easily stolen.
And when one of these devices is stolen, you not only lose the device, but you also lose all the information contained in the device like your personal information and passwords. This makes you an easy candidate for identity theft.
However, students are not completely vulnerable to college theft, and these five tips from the Wall Street Journal can help you protect your valuables.
- Leave valuables at home. You don't always need to take your gadgets with you everywhere you go. Leave the laptop at home if you're not going to use it. And consider cleaning out your wallet, so that you only carry the necessary items.
- Take inventory. Make a list of what you take with you to school. Students are usually the last ones to report theft, because it usually takes them weeks to realize that something is missing. Have a list of your valuables and make sure to check it every once in a while to account for what's missing.
- Don't leave items unattended. If you study in the library or spend time in common areas, make sure you take your belongings with you when you go to the restroom or make a telephone call outside. You can also ask your friends to keep an eye out.
- Keep financial documents in a safe place. Any document that contains important personal information like your credit card statements should be stored and put away properly. These documents offer a treasure trove of information to identity thieves.
- Be careful about online information. Young people have a tendency to share everything on social media sites like Facebook. You will want to exercise discretion when posting any personal information on a public site.
If you fall victim to college theft, make sure you notify the authorities. If you lose personal information, you may want to update your passwords and take steps to avoid identity theft. | <urn:uuid:0a812966-a11d-4e28-bb21-1be79e068481> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://commonlaw.findlaw.com/2012/08/top-5-tips-to-prevent-theft-at-college.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00018-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930849 | 426 | 2.078125 | 2 |
It’s Christmas Eve Day, not actually an official holiday for many people, and definitely not one for those of us who don’t believe that little Jewish kid from Bethlehem was the messiah. But you know that the Gay Uncle always sides with the women (and particularly the mothers), so he’d like to note something important about the date. If we accept that the Little Baby Jesus (LBJ) was born on December 25, then it’s proper to assume that his virginally pregnant ema (that’s mom, in Hebrew) spent at least some portion of December 24 in massive contraction-based pain. (Unless magic pregnancy by God results in an agony-free birth.)
So in honor of mommies everywhere, Gunc would therefore like to propose a little festive nomenclatural switcheroo. Since 98% of people already confuse the name of the celebratory long weekends that bookend the summer–the ones that land at the end of May and the start of September–the G.U. suggests that these both henceforth be referred to as Memorial Day. This would not only lessen the tedious problem of recalling which is which and be a more honest reflection of our true feelings on these dates (we’re Memorializing the start and end of summer, period), it would free up the title LABOR DAY for utilization on the day before X-mas, where it really belongs. Being a Union member (UAW Local 7902), the Gay Uncle wouldn’t want to lose this synonymical meaning for the word, so he’d leave it be–Workers and Mothers of the World, Unite! But the connection to childbirth would help draw attention to the unpaid work many women do inside the home. Think about that as you wrap your presents and chug your eggnog and otherwise steel yourself against the emotional torment of spending time with your family. (This precursor to the pain and disappointment that always accompanies Christmas Day could also be seen as a form of labor.) And enjoy your holiday. | <urn:uuid:260b1667-fc76-46c2-b5b2-8c7da816eb42> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://brettberk.com/2009/12/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959397 | 424 | 2.03125 | 2 |
Mastitis pathogens: Part 2
This month I’ll continue discussing bacteria that cause mastitis. As you may remember, we covered the Gram-positive bacteria last month, so this month we’ll cover the Gram-negative bacteria, which are usually referred to as coliforms. Gram-negatives are common in a cow’s intestinal tract. Because of this, they are everywhere in the cow’s environment. Infections by this family of bacteria can range from mild to very severe.
There is probably not a farmer out there who hasn’t experienced the devastating effects of a severe coliform infection in his or her herd. Common signs of acute infections are high temperature, depression, dehydration, weakness, severe swelling of the infected quarter and watery milk. As the bacteria die, they release an endotoxin that causes many of these symptoms.
Severe coliform infections can be devastating to the cow’s milk production for the current lactation and future lactations. Let’s review the more common Gram-negative bacteria.
Escherichia coli (E. coli): Infections in the cow range from mild to extremely severe, and can even result in death. The source point of infections is any environment that has come in contact with manure.
Antibiotic therapy in the quarter does not work very well. Supportive care with fluids and anti-inflammatory medications are the therapy of choice. Vaccines commonly referred to as the J-5 vaccines target the cell wall of the bacteria and help alleviate the severe sickness. Since these vaccines are commonly used, we do not have to treat nearly as many sick cows anymore.
Klebsiella species: These bacteria cause severe mastitis that is unresponsive to antibiotics. The source point of the infection is the environment. The major environmental source is bedding material, with sawdust being the most common. High numbers of Klebsiella in recycled sand and manure solids used for bedding also have been reported.
Mastitis from Klebsiella tends to be more severe and chronic than that caused by E. coli. It does not seem to respond to the same J-5 vaccines that help E. coli infections.
Enterobacter aerogenes: The source point is manure-contaminated environments.
These bacteria cause many of the same symptoms as the other coliforms. Response to antibiotics is poor. Basic control involves keeping cows clean and dry.
Serratia species: The source point of this infection is soil, water or even teat dip. Nolvasan-based teat dips that become contaminated have been implicated in several outbreaks of Serratia mastitis.
Basic control is good environmental sanitation. Treatment response is very poor, and animals often get culled once they contract Serratia.
Pasteurella species: These bacteria infrequently cause mastitis. The origin is thought to be from the respiratory tract, so the spread of infection could be cow to cow.
This mastitis responds poorly to treatment. If several cows become infected, the producer should look for a common source of the infection.
Pseudomonas aeruginosa: These bacteria infrequently cause mastitis. The source point of infection can be any part of the environment, but it is most commonly water, contaminated teat dips or common infusion products.
Infections tend to be severe, with treatment outcomes poor. These bacteria are resistant to certain sanitizers and antibiotics.
Proteus species: The source point of these infections is the soil, so they spread from environment to cow.
This infection is very rare as a pure culture, so if it does come back from the lab, do a resample of the infected quarter. Treatment is unsuccessful.
From this list you can see a common theme: Coliforms can cause severe mastitis with poor outcomes to antibiotic therapy. Financial losses can be large with a high number of mastitis cases. Clean environments and strict attention to udder hygiene are key to controlling infection rates. It is best to work closely with your veterinarian to develop treatment protocols and control programs for coliform mastitis.
Monty Belmer, DVM, is a veterinarian with the Waupun Vet Service in Waupun. To Ask the Vet, e-mail your questions to: firstname.lastname@example.org, or mail them to: Wisconsin Agriculturist, 102 E. Jefferson St., P.O. Box 236, Brandon, WI 53919.
This article published in the April, 2010 edition of WISCONSIN AGRICULTURIST.
All rights reserved. Copyright Farm Progress Cos. 2010. | <urn:uuid:6b356b24-1c8f-4f21-b5f9-014d17a1daeb> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://farmprogress.com/indiana-prairie-farmer/library.aspx/ask-vet-73/74/290 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.927287 | 965 | 3.609375 | 4 |
May 3, 2012 -
(MANCHESTER, CONN.) “Staying well means staying connected” just got a whole lot easier for those who use the health care services of Eastern Connecticut Health Network (ECHN). ECHN is excited to announce that it has launched its very own official iPhone app, called MyECHN. Patients and their families can now keep track of their medications, find a physician and stay connected with news and events at ECHN while on the go.
“Mobile technology today is changing the way we communicate and offers tremendous opportunities in health care,” said Adam Jeamel, Director, Corporate Communications and Marketing at ECHN. "This new app is like having a portable directory of ECHN and our doctors in your pocket.”
The new app, which is available in the iTunes App Store as a free download, will allow patients to manage all of their important health information right from the palm of their hand through MyDoctors, MyMedications, MyInsurance, MyAllergies and MyAppointments.
Finding a doctor will be even easier as users can search by name, specialty or distance. Once found, the doctor’s office can be contacted with one click or added to the user’s MyECHN folder for future reference.
“This new app will also help patients find an ECHN health service that is conveniently located near their home,” said Jeamel. “ECHN is a health system with a number of facilities throughout our 19-town service area. The locations function allows patients to view all ECHN facilities, search by distance and get directions from their current or other location.”
Other functions of the new app include health news and videos about ECHN’s departments, programs and other health-related topics directly from physicians, nurses, and patients.
Over the past year, ECHN worked with Griffin, York and Krause (GY&K), a marketing innovation company located in Manchester, NH, in developing the new iPhone app. GY&K also revamped ECHN’s website and launched the health system into social media — Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ECHNSocial; Twitter at http://twitter.com/ECHNsocial; and Foursquare at https://foursquare.com/echnsocial — to effectively interact and share information with patients, employees, volunteers, donors, and local businesses.
”Social media is a great way for hospitals to connect with their respective communities and receive instant feedback to help us improve the patient’s experience,” said Jeamel. “These are exciting times and another great way to stay connected.” | <urn:uuid:902f0ddb-0e9a-4ffc-b79f-23c2b521e814> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://echn.org/News/News-Articles/ECHN-Launches-New-iPhone-App.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00035-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942812 | 567 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Mesangial Damage and Repair: The Role of Stem Cells. A 6D Living Cell Model.
Jiamin Teng, Elba A Turbat-Herrera, Guillermo A Herrera. Nephrocor, Tempe, AZ
Background: In light chain deposition disease and AL-amyloidosis, mesangial cells are injured by GLCs resulting in MC apoptosis. However, the changes that occur in the mesangium are diametrically different. In AL-amyloidosis, mesangiolysis occurs whie in light chain deposition disease, the matrix increased and changes its compostion. Repair mechanisms of the affected mesangium are poorly understood. Stem cells may play an important role in repairing the damaged mesangium, especially since not many mesangial cells typically remain after the damage.
Design: Rat MCs were cultured on Matrigel loaded glass bottomed multi-well plates with 10% FBS/RPMI 1640 until confluence. MCs were then made quiescent by incubating them with 0.5% FBS/RPMI for 48 hours and then treated with LCDD and AL-AmLCs (10 ug/ml) purified from the urine of patients with renal biopsy proven conditions. Rat mesenchyma stem cells (RMSCs) are then stained with PKH-2 fluorescence or with Lysotracker Texas Red and placed 96 hours later into the wells of GLCs treated MCs for 2 weeks. The entire process is carefully monitored with sequential photos every 15 minutes using a 6D living cell model. This allows to observe the process of mesangial damage and how stem cells repair the damage.
Results: MCs treated with LCDD-LCs produced large amounts of matrix and formed nodules and those treated with AL-Am LCs engaged in the production of amyloid. MSCs cleaned up apoptotic MCs and eventually replaced injured cells becoming the majority of the cell mass. The amount of matrix material and amyloid decreased proportionally to the number of MSCs replacing the original MCs.
Conclusions: The reported observations with the 6D living cell imaging system demonstrated that the GLC-induced alterations are not irreversible and highlight a crucial role for MSCs replacing injured MCs and re-establishing mesangial homeostasis. In light chain deposition disease the process is complicated by the need to initially completely break down the abnormal accumulated matrix. These results suggest a therapeutic role for MSCs in repairing glomerular damage.
Category: Kidney (does not include tumors)
Monday, February 28, 2011 1:15 PM
Platform Session: Section H, Monday Afternoon | <urn:uuid:17edeea6-c290-449f-8405-23da316bbb82> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.abstracts2view.com/uscap11/view.php?nu=USCAP11L_1496 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00032-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.924488 | 563 | 1.515625 | 2 |
ADMINISTRATION OF THE GOVERNMENT (Chapters 1 through 182)
Records and reports of purchases and sales; investigation, examination and search
Section 11. Each retailer shall keep within the commonwealth complete and accurate records of all cigarettes purchased or otherwise acquired. Such records shall consist of written statements to be delivered by each wholesaler as provided by section five. Every owner of, or tenant occupying, premises where a vending machine is located shall keep a record of all cigarettes sold through the vending machine so located on his premises and the amount of commission paid by the person operating the cigarette vending machine. Such records shall consist of written statements to be given by each person operating vending machines for the sale of cigarettes as provided by section five. Such records shall be safely preserved for a period of three years in such a manner as to insure permanency and accessibility for inspection by the commissioner or his authorized representative. The commissioner may require any retailer or any owner or tenant occupying premises where a vending machine for the sale of cigarettes has been installed to make reports as often as the commissioner deems necessary to enable him to determine whether the excise imposed by this chapter has been fully paid. The commissioner and his authorized representatives may examine the books, papers and records of any retailer in the commonwealth, for the purpose of determining whether the excise imposed by this chapter has been fully paid, and may investigate, examine and search any premises where cigarettes are possessed, stored or sold for the purpose of determining whether the provisions of this chapter are being obeyed. | <urn:uuid:1bc4dffb-9b2a-4540-ba76-b88dfd36562f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleIX/Chapter64C/Section11/Print | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.949915 | 308 | 1.5 | 2 |
TransOptions wants to hear about your “Green Trip.” The local non-profit is hosting Share Your Story, an Earth Day contest encouraging northwest New Jersey residents and commuters to share how they traveled around town, to school or to work in a way other than driving or riding in a car.
All stories will be reviewed by TransOptions. Our favorites will be highlighted on TransOptions’ website on April 22, 2013 to honor the 43rd Earth Day and receive an Environmental Gift Bag containing earth-friendly items and a $25 gift card.
If you’re wondering how to have a Green Trip there’s lots of ways! Do you take the train to work, ride the bus to school, carpool with a relative or co-worker, walk or ride a bike to the store, or telework? All of these qualify!
“Every Green Trip helps the environment by decreasing the amount pollution going into the air, reducing traffic congestion, lowering stress and usually saving money, too,” comments John F. Ciaffone, TransOptions’ President. “We hope that Share Your Story engages commuters and residents and motivates them to take a Green Trip as a regular occurrence,” he adds.
Share Your Story entries can be submitted as articles, photos with a caption or as videos to info@TransOptions.org or posted on TransOptions’ Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/TransOptions. Entries must be received by 5 p.m. on April 15, 2013.
As the northwest New Jersey’s Transportation Management Association, TransOptions’ free programs make Green Trips easier. The non-profit is a local resource for commuters, residents, employers and municipalities interested in carpools and vanpools, train and bus schedule information, Park & Ride locations, renting bicycle lockers at Morris County train stations as well as bicycle and pedestrian safety programs and environmental education programs.
Learn more about TransOptions’ free programs at TransOptions.org, on Facebook or call (973) 267-7600 | <urn:uuid:c4158fcc-c237-41fb-ad7a-d07168d13ac6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://thealternativepress.com/articles/non-profit-hosts-earth-day-contest-to-spur-green | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.912934 | 430 | 1.632813 | 2 |
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By Akhtar Badshah, Senior Director of Corporate Citizenship at Microsoft and Board Member of the Foundation for a Digital UN
Information and Communications Technology (ICT) is playing a central role in development work around the world. United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon believes in the power of ICT as a strategic enabler and in the opportunity it provides to transform the UN, creating a more effective, efficient and transparent organization.
The Foundation for a Digital UN is being launched under the support of the United Nations and it strives to provide knowledge, technology and resources that can be leveraged and mobilized to further the goals of the United Nations around the world. The Foundation will focus on how ICT can support the UN’s goals and strengthen its global program activities. The UN’s global mandate is vast, spanning peace and security, economic and social development, humanitarian assistance, human rights, international law and additional diverse issues such as climate change.
We have already seen the impact of technology at the United Nations. Very early on, Microsoft and its employees helped develop a people registration and tracking system for refugees for UNHCR. The impact of this system has been to help re-unite thousands of families as they stream into refugee camps. Most recently through Skype we have been able to connect refugees to their families from camps in Dadaab in Somalia and Kenya.
Rather than focusing on specific technologies, the Foundation for a Digital UN seeks to solve problems that may span many United Nations programs and provide the opportunity to function cooperatively and efficiently for the benefit of everyone. Under the motto “perfect information to aid an imperfect world”, the Foundation will leverage technology to enhance communication, knowledge sharing, and improve decision making on a global scale. It will support the Millennium Development Goals through more adaptable, nimble and innovative solutions that complement existing UN Program activities and other public-private partnerships.
The United Nations operates within long-term planning and budgetary constraints which at times limit its ability to offer solutions that leverage cutting-edge technology, affecting its ability to deal with urgent global problems as they arise. The time has now come when, to achieve truly high impact and better results, it needs additional support. That is where the Foundation will play a key role, by providing sound strategic guidance and contributing expertise, technology and financing. Through this support the Foundation will be able to increase knowledge sharing; speed the delivery of aid in the most optimal manner; increase the use of mobile technology; and reunite families in the times of crises.
Microsoft along with the other partners including Intel, Cisco, Landmark Ventures and Global Partnerships Forum are joining in this effort. We believe that there is an urgent and unmet need to leverage the power of technology to address global issues and invite other organizations to consider getting involved with the newly launched initiative to address these opportunities for global social innovation. Contributing to global well-being will put you on the side of those partners that are socially responsible citizens of the world, doing their part to advance the human condition. United, we will be able to push forward key initiatives that will help the United Nations deliver their mandate.
Please join us at www.DigitalUN.org. | <urn:uuid:4118d037-b400-4dbf-8842-fb6997acfea8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoftupblog/archive/2012/05/31/get-involved-in-building-a-foundation-for-a-digital-un.aspx | 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 | 0.93765 | 652 | 1.914063 | 2 |
Paper on Islam and Democracy
Islam and Democracy
Morocco is a conservative country which religion is Islam; however, its political system is based on democracy due to its influence by Europe. Hassan II said: "Morocco is a tree, the roots of which are planted firmly in Africa but which has its branches in Europe."(Hassan II, 1976).
In fact, Morocco is a country which is open to modernity; it is what Moataz Abdel Fattah names a “modernist Islamist society” and defines as being a society that deduces its principles from the holy book and perceives democracy as a modern extension of the great Islam rules. (Moataz, 10) So what is the real meaning of democracy? According to Abraham Lincoln, democracy is a “Government of the people, by the people, for the people.” (Lincoln, A. qtd in democracy-building).
In another source, it is defined as the following:
“Democracy is by far the most challenging form of government - both for politicians and for the people. The term democracy comes from the Greek language and means "rule by the (simple) people". [ …]. Yet the theory of modern democracy was not formulated until the Age of Enlightment (17th/18th centuries), when philosophers defined the essential elements of democracy: separation of powers, basic civil rights / human rights, religious liberty and separation of church and state.” (qtd in : democracy-building.info)
We can notice that many people claim that Islam does not allow democracy to exist and that modernization and democracy are hindrances to the good practice of Islam. Throughout this paper, we will discuss the consequences of the misunderstanding of Islam, to explain the poor modernization of the Muslim world and by conducting a research on the Muslim world, focusing on Morocco, we will manage to prove that in the contrary of what people may think Islam does not prevent democracy from existing but, it relies on it.
Modernization, democracy and Islam
Many people think that modernization and democracy can disturb the good practice of Islam. This idea is generated because of many reasons that may seem logic. This focuses on the secularist side of democracy which is in fact present in almost all democratic society. Therefore, religion is isolated from politics, and make, in this case, Islam less powerful. However, Islam remains omnipresent in people’s lives even if it is not applied in politics, as confirmed by Moataz Abdel Fattah: “Holy texts do not tell Muslims much about how to run their societies. Holy texts are excellent sources of aqeeda [creed] and ethics but not politics and economics.” (Moataz, 19)
Democracy is in fact a part included in the process of modernization, and modern societies do not encourage Islam to exist. They can seem somehow contradictory while modern societies are based essentially on material values such as money and appearances whereas Islam is mostly about spirit. Living in a modern society may lead people, especially young ones, to focus on the carnal side of life and reject boundaries, while living in a Muslim one would inculcate them spiritual values such as helping poor, being generous and honest, and that life is only temporary, whereas the after-life lasts forever, that if they are good persons they would end up in heaven, otherwise they would be put in hell. Religion make people live for a special goal, it gives sense to their lives and creates a certain stability; making them aware of the importance of being a good person. In modern societies and secularist ones, people live with no limits, with no goal and no belief and this does not make them feel the obligation of being good persons. Besides the formal part of religion, modernization can be a sort of prevention from the substance of religion. Therefore, the main problem with democratization in the Muslim world is mostly about modernization and less about Islam (Voll, 171).
Various understandings of Islam:
There are various understandings and interpretations of Islam, some are incompatible with democracy and prevent their coexistence to be possible, and others contrariwise, make their coexistence not only possible but necessary. “Traditionalist Islamists […] searched for what they perceive as an Islamic government, which is contradictory to what most contemporary academicians and democracy students label democracy. Thus, they fully reject democracy on Islamic grounds. Modernist Islamist individuals […] search for a modern (democratic) government that is compatible with Islam. They usually call it “Islamic democracy.” (Moataz, 9)
Islam has been for a long time and remains the subject of many several discussions, linking it to democracy positively as well as negatively. In fact, it has different interpretations which vary from incompatible with democracy to compatible with the latter. Looking at those interpretations, we can distinguish fundamentalist Islam, modernist and traditionalist one. Modernist Islam believes in the possible coexistence between Islam and democracy and tries to establish a modern society whose principles are based on tolerance and acceptance. It considers right to work with democratic principles as long as Islamic context is conserved (Moataz, 17) and perceives democracy as a modern extension of the shura (great Islam rules). (Moataz, 10). One of the main examples of societies in which Modernist Islam is applied is Morocco, a Muslim country relying on democracy. In fact, bases of democracy are respected while people have the right to vote, to choose their leaders and therefore to govern themselves by themselves. Tolerance is also clearly apparent in Moroccans’ way of life; people from different religions (Muslims, Jews and Christians) and different races (Arabs, Berber) live together in perfect harmony.
Fundamentalist Islam focuses more on the appearances than on Islam Values. It literally follows the rules of the Shari’ah and considers it not only as being perfect, but also as being enough to cover all Muslim lives’ aspects. It rejects whatever comes from western societies because it blames them for problems Muslims are facing. (Ganji, 96-97). Traditionalist Islam is a combination of modernism and traditionalism. It does not encourage the liberty of thinking, however; unlike the fundamentalist, it considers shari’ah as a tool to the blossoming of the spirit not as an end in itself. It rejects westerns’ culture because it is considered as being a weak culture, which is against Islam’s principles but does not blame them for the problems that are present in Muslim societies. (Ganji, 98-99) “Muslims are susceptible to the belief that Christian theologians aim only to weaken Islam and the Islamic world.”(Ganji, 103)
We can notice the poor modernization of Muslim countries. Some scholars tried to explain this phenomenon by advancing that Islam’s goals are purely spiritual, it does not aim in solving material problems, others believe that the fact that westerns are that developed compared to Muslims is because they have given up the religious part of their lives to devote themselves entirely to material progress. Muslims therefore limit their efforts in progressing materially because they think that if they do so, they will neglect religion the fact that is unthinkable. (Ganji, 105-106) This poor modernization is expressed by:
First, gender inequality: women in Iran have less access to health care than men; furthermore, boys in traditional families have more “value” than girls because in the shari’ah the blood money for a man is twice that for a woman. Iran’s traditional religious culture considers that a woman is not the owner of her body, but that it belongs to her husband. The latter has every right to hit her and she can never complain. “The law can even punish a woman for resisting.”(Ganji, 51) A man can be punished for raping a woman who is not his wife, not for defending the woman, but to protect the husband of the woman who has been raped because she is considered as being his property. (Ganji, 50-51)
Second, terrorism/ lack of freedom: Modernists have accepted the accomplishments of the westerns and have tried to make good use of it by trying to adapt it to their culture; traditionalists have rejected it but never came in to violence. Fundamentalists, contrariwise, have been using everything they could, including violence, to reject westerns. Al Qaeda, the Taliban and the Iranian clergy have been threatening disciples and students and afflicting horrible things to them because they strongly believe that western culture is the expression of Evil. (Ganji, 108) This is against democracy because it does not allow people to practice or study what they want to, they have to hide to do that, otherwise; they would be killed and tortured.
According to the two points we discussed in the previous parts, we will deduce the possible coexistence between Islam and Democracy, and then try to show if they coexist or not in Muslim societies and see what could be done. “[…] democracy is genuinely compatible with Islamic principles of shura.” (Moataz, 61) One of the basics of Islam is the principle of Shura, which consists of asking people and discussing with them, before applying any new rule. The prophet himself, used to work with Shura for every decision he had to take, consult Muslims as well as non Muslims as confirmed by Moataz Abdel Fattah who sets in his book that the prophet Muhammad was known take into consideration everybody’s point of view, including women and non-Muslims( Moataz, 60).. Therefore, if we consider democracy in its large sense as the governance of people by the people and not as the concept of being free to do whatever we want without taking into account others feeling, Islam clearly appears as a democratic system. So, according to the definitions of both Islam and democracy that we work with, the compatibility differs. However, the coexistence between both remains possible, and even necessary in some cases to the good practice of Islam. Meryem Marzouki came up with the same conclusion after studying the process of democratization in Casablanca; she clearly stated that Islam is absolutely not an obstacle in front of democracy, and therefore can coexist with no difficulties with it.
Unfortunately, this coexistence is not always respected in Muslim countries; many societies reject it while others strongly believe in its importance. Therefore, Muslim countries can be divided into four categories: High support of Democratic norms and low support of democratic institutions, Low support for Democratic norms and institutions, Moderate support for democratic norms and institutions and High support for democratic norms and institutions.
“The first category of Muslim culture [high support for democratic norms and low support for democratic institutions] is best exemplified by the United Arab Emirates, Oman and Libya.” (Moataz, 89). In these countries, the incidence of discrimination toward foreign people is really high, followed by discrimination of males toward females. However, women remain self-confident and believe in their capacities to do as well as men in different domains. (Moataz, 90). The second category is the less tolerant one, and Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Tajikistan, Sudan, and possibly Pakistan and Nigeria represent the best examples of it, refusing all kinds of democracy, rejecting its values and principles in order to maintain political stability. (Moataz, 90). Then comes the third group, the average one that begins to accept democracy and apply it but still not completely democratic. It is , as the author well describe it “[…] the average Muslim cultures: those that demonstrate greater tolerance of sociopolitical differences and are more accommodating to democratic institutions and procedures but not yet reached high levels of support for democracy. These cultures include eleven groups of Muslims and most notably two minorities: Lebanese Muslims and Muslims of European countries.” (Moataz, 99). And finally, the last category and the most impressive is the one that combines tradition and modernity, Islam and democracy, and make both coexist in perfect harmony. This category includes Morocco, the best example of the Muslim democratic society. Effectively, in addition to the right of voting and the power of the people, Morocco remains one of the most tolerant Muslim countries: “The pooled data suggest that tolerance toward Jews is much less than tolerance toward Christians in all Muslim Countries, except for the case of Morocco […] there was no statistical in the ways Moroccans perceive Christians and Jews.” (Moataz, 105).
Nevertheless, many things can be done to make Muslims more comfortable with democracy; “First, advocates of democracy in the Muslim world should make more efforts to Islamize democracy rather than democratizing Islam. Islamizing democracy is a philosophical, theological, and juristic endeavor that aims at finding Islamic roots for democratic norms and praxis. Many sayings and actions of the Prophet Muhammad can be endorsed as the Islamic roots of majority rule, the moral and political equality of women and non-Muslims, obligatory shura, and the eradication of apathy and “dictatorship, but …” culture.” (Moataz, 130). Then try to change people’s way of thinking to create an atmosphere more and a mindset more ready to accept democracy, to “create a fertile soil” for it. (Moataz, 131), and try to obtain the support of influent political parties (Moataz, 131).
There are also specific solutions for each problem:
To stop corruption : moral courage, change in vision and behavior, dedicate themselves to the truth whatever sacrifices it implies, mustn’t be timid or small minded, think of moral victory. Make the fight for freedom possible, make it real, not a product of imagination. (Ganji, 40-41)
“It is possible to remain a muslim and a shia and to believe wholeheartedly in the reforms advocated by the democratic movement.”(Ganji, 29) Muslims should stop seeing westerns as enemies but as partners in changing the world view and spirit. (Ganji, 110)
As we can notice, the actual state of Muslim countries is different for one society to another; there are some that handles perfectly this called problem of coexistence between Islam and democracy and others that are not yet ready to live with it. However, they are doing many progresses and “are on the path of democracy.” (Moataz, 144).
People often rely on prejudices and on what is told to them, they do not make the effort to look deeply for the meaning of concepts. They settle for what is told to them and consider it as being a general truth as it is the case for western societies that consider Islam as being bad and non tolerant.
Islam has a very bad reputation because many Muslims do not understand it well and therefore exaggerate some rules and neglect others. They interpret wrongly Islam laws and opt for violence when it comes to solve problems while Quran only tolerate violence when it is used for defense. They also ignore issues as lack of democracy and gender inequality whereas Islam insists on the importance of evenness.
Those two issues create a gap between western and Muslim countries and that makes each society reject the other’s values. This explains the non acceptance of democracy and modernity by Muslims because they believe it is a part of western culture whereas it is before all a part of theirs as Islam first introduced it to the world. It is also the reason of the non tolerance toward Islam. We can conclude that some believe Islam is bad because they heard it somewhere. And others are scared of democracy because they think it may change their faith. This leads to put a hollow between some Islamic societies and the rest of the world whereas Islam and democracy are strongly connected.
Solutions to those problems exist and are given above but they may not be sufficient for the following reasons: first, it is possible that Muslims are not ready to accept modernity and accept democracy. Second, it may not be easy to change the image of Muslims towards the rest of the world after all this time. | <urn:uuid:eb810f60-cfc4-4830-9706-e63bb4cb8fe3> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.freetopessays.com/content/paper-islam-and-democracy | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00044-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961982 | 3,326 | 2.8125 | 3 |
Image credit: sxc.hu
On August 12, 1985, Kyu Sakamoto boarded Japan Airlines Flight 123. Just twelve minutes into the flight the plane experienced difficulties and signalled there was a problem. Approximately twenty minutes later the plane crashed. Before the aircraft hit the ground, Kyu Sakamoto was able to write a farewell note to his wife.
View: Full Article | <urn:uuid:2a7c9daa-625a-480c-8153-a88b5a460399> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=195732 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00076-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96756 | 77 | 2.265625 | 2 |
Attempts at diplomacy were returned with an increase in violence. Whether a thousand miles away or a few kilometers from rocket attacks, sorrow is shared between enemies.
The Egyptian Prime Minister tried to quiet violence between nations that have been fighting for decades. As the diplomatic journey ended, attacks only intensified.
Israelis blame repeated and unprovoked attacks in civilian areas for the recent combat. Retaliatory air strikes in Palestinian territories have claimed the lives of soldiers and civilians.
For the first time in over 30 years Tel Aviv is a target. Technological advancements and harsher tones have many people fearing all out war.
KSEE24 spoke to people in Israel who described feeling rocket blasts close to their homes. Both Israelis and Palestinians are well prepared for attacks due to the extensive history of the conflict.
We also met up with a local Muslim who has family in Palestine. He spoke of feeling anxious and helpless about not knowing if his family is okay.
Everyone KSEE24 spoke with expressed a desire for the violence to end. We reached out to numerous Jews and Muslims, living locally and abroad. Both sides also expressed a reluctance to give an interview because they didn't want to inflame an already tense situation. | <urn:uuid:8208daaf-0242-4feb-8ebb-0c93be97ab37> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ksee24.com/news/local/Israel---DRU-179740491.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962803 | 243 | 2.046875 | 2 |
Blue Bottle Flies
After doing a lecture at a gated community, concerning the care of some “sick” Live Oak Trees (Quercus Virginiana), in the community of Port Charlotte Florida, I was invited to lunch by a county employee. We decided on a well known restaurant in Punta Gorda Florida. About half way thru an excellent lunch I discovered the fly swimming in my gravy!
There are several species of blowflies all have very pretty metallic colored thoraxes of one color or another and are called Black, Green or Blue flies depending on their color.
The blowflies are usually associated with animal manure, and they lay eggs in meat, fish and carrion BUT they are also attracted to garbage including rotting vegetable matter. When found in homes they are usually associated with dead animals in the attic or walls.
In the case of my Blue Bottle fly visitor, I traced him to an often dumped but never washed commercial dumpster outside the restaurant.
- William “Doc” Pickhardt, B.C.A. | <urn:uuid:fa002272-70ef-41ad-8370-150ab1b99b8e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.organicpestcontrolmichigan.com/askthedoc/2009/06/ | 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 | 0.966379 | 217 | 2 | 2 |
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama is launching three manufacturing hubs and is asking Congress to create 15 more that can create locations with partnerships between the private sector and the federal government to create high-tech jobs.
The proposal is a central element of Obama's plan to spur manufacturing, which has been a bright spot in the U.S. economy. Manufacturing expanded at a much faster pace in January compared with December.
Obama said the government could help accelerate that trend.
He specifically cited companies that are creating jobs in the U.S. that had been overseas, including Caterpillar, Ford, Intel and Apple.
He called for continued spending on science and innovation. | <urn:uuid:f7fc384d-9efd-4e0f-8970-fc455a4af194> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.nwcn.com/news/business/190955421.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975525 | 136 | 1.976563 | 2 |
Wealthy Zarita has enjoyed a cosseted life as the daughter of the local magistrate; Saulo’s life has been dogged by persecution, danger and poverty. An unlucky accident causes their paths to cross as the officers of the Inquisition arrive in their small town seeking out heretics with an unquenchable thirst. Zarita must remain, struggling to survive the brutality and trickery of the Inquisitors and to observe the courtly intrigue of Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand while Saulo, banished to be galley slave, faces shipwreck and pirates before encountering Christopher Columbus. Large in its scope, this is a thrilling story deftly told in two voices which vividly capture the extremes of the time.
|Random House Children's Books| | <urn:uuid:a28aef71-46fb-49fe-8752-bf52ff365b55> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guardianbookshop.co.uk/BerteShopWeb/viewProduct.do?ISBN=9780552560740 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.914011 | 153 | 1.75 | 2 |
Recommendations for the quality of colonoscopy services are summarized in Table . The following describes the basis for these recommendations.
Elements of Quality of Colonoscopy Services with Operational Definitions
1. Elements of the Colonoscopy Report
We listed six basic descriptors of what was done and what was found during the colonoscopy based on earlier work by Task Group8
. Each of these descriptors is necessary to interpret the clinical significance of findings and plans for follow-up.
- Depth of insertion is related to the proportion of the colon examined and thus the percent of adenomas and cancers that could have been found. Confidence in a report that the cecum was reached should be supported by a clear description of anatomic landmarks (appendiceal orifice and ileocecal valve) and photo documentation if it is available.
- Quality of bowel preparation. Poor bowel preparation results in missed lesions and follow-up examinations scheduled sooner than the usually recommended interval. The quality of bowel cleansing is a subjective measure, but efforts are under way to increase reproducibility and validity by establishing a common measure across endoscopists8 and to anchor judgments in an objective phenomenon such as “adequate to detect polyps >5 mm”8.
- Patient tolerance of the procedure is important information for the clinician who coordinates the patient’s care over time. For example, syncope during the bowel preparation or procedure may signal cardiovascular risk and require evaluation; bleeding from the procedure may cause anemia, which should be diagnosed and treated.
- Description of polyps. The number, size, location, morphology (pedunculated, sessile, or flat) and histology of adenomas has been related to recurrence rate and this, plus completeness of polyp removal and biopsy results are the basis for planning surveillance intervals10.
- Pathology results for any biopsies. Recommendations for follow-up and surveillance depend on information from both the procedure itself and the pathology report. Despite logistic challenges in obtaining pathology reports promptly, referring clinicians should expect that the colonoscopist will promptly communicate findings from the procedure itself, the pathology, as well as recommendations both to them an directly to the patient.
- Recommendations for follow-up and/or surveillance need to be explicit so that referring clinician, as well as the patient, know what the endoscopist has recommended. Recent, evidence-based guidelines, relating surveillance interval to risk factors for subsequent advanced neoplasia, are summarized in Table 11. If the recommended interval differs from guidelines, the reasons should be made explicit.
Recommended Surveillance Intervals After Polypectomy in Average Risk Patients (From 11)*
Physicians in practice say they often choose shorter surveillance intervals11
than recommended in clinical practice guidelines. Because some risks and substantial costs (measured both in financial and human terms) are at stake, and the clinical benefit of short-interval colonoscopy surveillance after initial polypectomy is low for most patients12
, the surveillance interval is an important decision for everyone involved with the patient’s careFamily history information gathered at the time of screening as well as some colonoscopy findings (such as a malignancy or advanced adenomas at a young age) may suggest that other family members are at increased risk and should have earlier than usual screening with colonoscopy. In the case of Lynch Syndrome, they are at increased risk for other cancers as well. The endoscopy report should include recommendations for colorectal cancer screening in family members when appropriate. The endoscopist and the primary care clinician have a collective responsibility for encouraging patients to notify family members if they are at increased risk, and for recommending that these family members talk with their own primary care clinician about colorectal cancer screening.
2. Cecal Intubation Rate
Clinically-important adenomas and cancers occur throughout the colon and will be missed to the extent that the entire colon is not examined. Reports of consecutive screening colonoscopies have established that cecal intubation rates of over 90% are achievable13–18
, especially in patients without clinical reasons for incomplete colonoscopies such as severe colitis, poor preparation, severe diverticulosis, vital sign instability during the procedure17
. Several expert groups have set a quality target of 90% or higher for cecal intubation rate7,19
. Screening guidelines recommend that if the cecum cannot be reached other imaging procedures (computed tomographic colonography or double contrast barium enema) should be used to complete the examination1
.We concluded that an average cecal intubation rate of at least 90% was achievable after excluding examinations that were terminated for clinical reasons and those for which full colonoscopy was not the original intent. Rates are lower in some settings6,20,21,
but there is evidence that rates can be improved by quality improvement programs21
. We recommend that all endoscopists should aim to meet this target, regardless of specialty, training, or experience.
3. Adenoma Detection Rate
The prevalence of adenomas at age 50 years is estimated to be 15% in women and 25% in men, increases with age in both sexes7
, and the majority of adenomas are detected by colonoscopy22,23
. It is not feasible to measure the proportion of adenomas found for individual colonoscopists against research standards, (a second colonoscopy and computed tomographic colonography) so we chose adenoma detection rates as a crude metric for the proportion of adenomas found at colonoscopy. Adenoma detection rate during screening colonoscopy has been shown to be inversely related to the risk of interval cancers24
. We confined this quality measure to first colonoscopies because prior polypectomies can change the prevalence of adenomas, making polyp prevalence lower and detection rates more difficult to interpret.
4. Safe Setting
Colonoscopy can cause clinically-important complications such as bleeding, perforation, and cardiovascular events during bowel preparation or endoscopy. The procedure can also spread infection if equipment is improperly cleaned and disinfected. Although the great majority of colonoscopies occur without incident, complication rate is an important aspect of quality. However, we chose not to include complication rates in the quality measures because events occur too infrequently to allow stable estimates of rates for individual colonoscopists, unless he or she has performed an unusually high volume of procedures.Instead, the panel recommended that safety be assessed by a surrogate measure, characteristics of the setting in which procedures are done. Among these are adequate cleaning and disinfection of equipment, well-maintained equipment, well-trained endoscopist and staff, and the ability to react to emergencies that might arise during the procedure25
.While some states and professional societies have guidelines for safe settings and requirements for accreditation, primary care clinicians cannot always rely on external review to decide whether the colonoscopy setting is safe. At this time, there is no single, overall mechanism for credentialing that applies to all specialties that do colonoscopy and in all settings in which it is done. | <urn:uuid:dbe28d94-eaf4-4525-8bd4-a8adeba861d7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://pubmedcentralcanada.ca/pmcc/articles/PMC2947628/?lang=en-ca | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.94571 | 1,495 | 1.882813 | 2 |
Date: 10 November 2005
The challenges and opportunities faced by fisheries managers in conserving habitats for wild salmon will be addressed by leading expert Prof. John Armstrong of Scotland's Fisheries Research Services Freshwater Laboratory, Pitlochry in the Minerva Suite of the Royal Dublin Society at Ballsbridge, Dublin next Tuesday, 15th November, starting at 6.30 pm. The event is being organised by the RDS as part of its prestigious "Buckland Lecture Series" in collaboration with the Marine Institute to celebrate the 50th anniversary of their Newport research laboratory, which specialises in salmonid studies.
John Armstrong's research has focused on the behaviour and ecology of Atlantic salmon and brown trout as a basis for developing sound management models including the impacts of predators, hydroelectric installations and habitat modifications on salmon populations. An illustrated summary of this work, concentrating particularly on experimental studies over a range of situations from onshore tanks, to trapped and opens river systems, will form the basis of his lecture. The results of his work are highly relevant to Irish fisheries and will provide valuable insights into how problems of declining stocks might be tackled in Ireland.
"Many anglers and netsmen have first hand experience of substantial declines in salmon stocks during their own fishing lifetimes", says Prof. Armstrong. "The mood is no longer complacent expectation of a bountiful harvest, but one of concern. In the last century, the virtual extinction of salmon has been seen in some parts of its natural range and we are in no doubt about the need to act fast and in concert to protect other stocks. On a brighter note, with the cleaning up of some rivers in recent decades we have seen how stocks can recover and prosper given effective management."
The Buckland Lectures are named after Frank Buckland, one of the best-known Victorian writers on natural history subjects. Although strongly opposed to Darwin's theory of evolution, he was a forward-looking pioneer of modern fishery research. He became a most influential Inspector of Salmon Fisheries in England and also undertook a number of groundbreaking enquiries into the state of English marine fisheries. On his death he bequeathed a sum of money in trust to fund the annual appointment of a Professor of Fish Culture who should deliver three public lectures and provide the text for publication. This year (2005) that honour falls to John Armstrong.
For further details please contact: Dr. Ciaran Byrne at 01 – 2407217 or at ciaran.byrne @ rds.ie.
Dr. John Joyce – Marine Institute – 087 2250871
NOTES TO EDITOR
JOHN ARMSTRONG'S CVJohn started fisheries research examining habitat use and feeding of pike in the lochs of Aberdeenshire Deeside. The programme ultimately developed miniature heart rate detectors to relay back second-by-second information on feeding habits of the fish to shore-based receiving stations. He then studied deep-sea fish with research groups at the University of Aberdeen and Scripps Institute of Oceanographic Science in California using robot probes deployed to depths of up to 6100m, where they photographed and tracked movements of fish. John also joined an expedition to the Comoro Islands in the Indian Ocean to test fish tracking methods for application in establishing conservation strategies for coelacanths. John moved from deep-sea research back to studying Scottish upland systems when he started work at the Fisheries Research Services Freshwater Laboratory in 1992. Much of his research at the laboratory has focused on establishing a good understanding of the behaviour and ecology of Atlantic salmon and brown trout as a basis for developing sound management models. Particular interests have included impacts of predators, hydroelectric installations and habitat modifications on salmon populations. John has collaborated extensively with Scottish and international fisheries managers and university scientists to bring together interested people with a wide range of skills to tackle the problems of conserving and managing salmon stocks.
FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF THE NEWPORT FACILITY
The Salmon Research Trust of Ireland was established near Newport, Co. Mayo in June 1955 as a result of an initiative taken by Sir Hugh Beaver, the MD of Arthur Guinness & Co. Ltd. and Dr Arthur Went, scientific adviser to the Minister for Fisheries. It was located on the Burrishoole river system, which was originally owned by Major C W Roberts but purchased by Guinness in 1965. In 1980 the Roberts family gifted the fishery, the fishing rights, property and other tangible assets to the Trust. Throughout the 1980's Guinness gradually phased out its involvement and the facilities were donated to the state. On the 1st January 1990 the Salmon Research Agency took charge of the facilities on behalf of the Minister for the Marine. In July 1999, the Salmon Research Agency was transferred to the Marine Institute. Since then the facilities have been upgraded and developed to cope with the growing demands from the scientific community and from industry. Since the formation of the Salmon Research Trust some 50 years ago, extensive research has been undertaken and progressed in a wide range of aspects of the Burrishoole system: stock dynamics of salmon, sea trout and eels; salmonid genetics; environmental and hydrological studies; catchment management studies as well as extensive research into the rearing of salmonids for stock enhancement, ranching and fish farming. A series of high profile EU funded national and international collaborative projects have also been supported in the facilities. The results of this research have been reported in a series of 50 detailed Annual Reports and in over 200 scientific publications. The Marine Institute has been celebrating the 50th Anniversary of this unique facility through a number of public seminars on fisheries and environmental issues. The last of these "Burrishoole – Past, Present and Future", takes place in the new Newport Hotel, Newport on Thursday 17th November at 7.30 pm. | <urn:uuid:bd2d8b40-71d5-41a9-85fd-5b6a625176ad> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.marine.ie/home/aboutus/newsroom/PressReleaseArchive/2005/PressReleaseConservingsalmonhabitats.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954319 | 1,174 | 2.390625 | 2 |
AS BOMBINGS killed up to 100 people near the Pakistan city of Quetta last Thursday January 10, a group of 15 men and women from the area were on their way to Cooma courtesy of the United States aid organisation USAID.
The Monaro welcomed the group from the Balochistan province in Pakistan who were in Australia as part of the Balochistan Agricultural Project.
Lead by International Marketing Specialist with the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations Grant Vinning, their aim was to learn skills and farming practices they could take back to their communities.
The Monaro proved to be the perfect learning ground for a group who come from an area that relies heavily on agriculture- particularly sheep.
"Seventy per cent of the population would earn there income from agriculture," Mr Vinning said.
"Sheep in our area are mobile banks. People actually use the animal as a store of wealth. People keep them because it's often their only form of income.
"I'm talking about people who are living on 50 cents a day and this is poverty like you've got no idea. It's pretty damn tough.
"With the sheep the first thing [they get] is the milk, then the meat then the wool. And the wool is to some extent a throw away product."
Mr Vinning said the aim of the mission was to improve the farming practices so the locals could get more money from their product.
He explained that current practices for shearing meant the sheep became stressed, the wool would get dirty and the wool was uneven so the farmers would get little money for their product.
"We want to improve the welfare of the animal, improve the wool, improve getting the wool off the sheep and then doing better things with the wool and basically trying to turn the wool from a waste product to a value added product," Mr Vinning said.
While in Cooma the group of 10 men and five women visited farms and learned more efficient shearing techniques, went to Jemalong Wool to learn about wool handling and Monbeef to learn about halal slaughtering. They also visited the local cattle and sheep sale to see how livestock is sold in Australia, and spent time at Past Times at the Four Mile to learn about weaving, knitting and felting.
The group has been split in two- one, made up of the women and two men, to focus more on the wool and products that can be made from the wool and the other to focus on the sheep and shearing.
With wool donated by Gordon Litchfield Wool, Monaro Wool Services and Jemalong Wool Pty Ltd the women spent three days at 'Past Times' Ashford Australia learning new skills from members of the Monaro Fibre Artists Group on how to improve the income from wool.
"Our project takes the view that, women tend to be the ones who look after the animals and the women tend to be the ones that have the most deprived conditions," Mr Vinning said.
"So if we can do something to improve the sheep, the wool and the products from it we are doing something directly with income related back to the women."
The women all have a university degree and are employed full time by the program.
They are called "community development market facilitators" and each have about 15 to 20 communities in their area that they will disperse their newfound skills to when they return home.
Owner of Ashford Australia Rewa Nolan said it was a privilege to host the Pakistani women.
"We were delighted how quickly they picked up the new skills and am very excited that they plan to take these skills back to Pakistan and teach other women," Mrs Nolan said.
"Our cultures are very different and the environment we live in is also worlds apart but when you sit and weave alongside these women you realize that you share something special and that has been a very memorable experience for me."
The project, funded by the United States aid organisation USAID and the Australian aid organisation AUSAID, started about 10 years ago when the area was suffering from severe drought. The project became a food security and poverty alleviation program and grew from there.
The program employs 160 people with most of them local Pakistani's and covers and area of about 50,000 people.
Mr Vinning said the group, some of whom had never left their province and lived in parts of Pakistan not even he was allowed to enter because it was too dangerous, had an amazing experience in Cooma.
"They are astounded," he said.
"You can't fake this level of enthusiasm. The reaction has been highly fulfilling and uplifting and very encouraging.
"The shear pride of what they are doing has been so good for them."
After their time in Cooma some the group was heading the Charleville in Queensland where conditions are comparable to Quetta while the other group were going to Melbourne to visit the Australia Wool Exchange. | <urn:uuid:f4999050-ca0d-4e5f-b37a-f738b1728c6a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.coomaexpress.com.au/story/1253829/monaro-is-perfect-agricultural-learning-ground/?cs=574 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978759 | 1,006 | 2.390625 | 2 |
Sack of wood flour (finely powdered wood or sawdust) used to make substitute bread. The official ration of this "bread" for Soviet prisoners of war was less than 5 ounces a day. Deblin, Poland, 1942 or 1943.
Instytut Pamieci Narodowej
The Treatment of Soviet POWs: Starvation, Disease, and Shootings, June 1941–January 1942 » | <urn:uuid:66b1b104-09e1-464d-9666-800447e50a0b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/media_ph.php?MediaId=5814 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.908656 | 85 | 2.921875 | 3 |
Earlier this week, Beacon Power, a company that builds systems to stabilize solar and energy power, declared bankruptcy. The company's Massachusetts plant will continue to operate at full capacity, but its finances will be restructured. This is big news mostly because Beacon Power received $43 million in Department of Energy loans, and because it follows the recent closure and bankruptcy of Solyndra, which got $534 million from DOE.
These developments have tongues wagging -- some see it as a symbol of government excess while others repeat the old myth that renewable energy just can't work. These critics are overlooking one important fact -- if our strategy for building new energy markets is having the federal government bet on winners and losers, then that is exactly what we are going to get: winners and losers.
Winners and losers happen all the time in the marketplace. Remember that adorable sock puppet from Pets.com? The company went bankrupt in 2000 after having received more than $50 million in private investment. Over $185 million from the likes of Coca-Cola and GE went into a company called Digital Convergence to create a personal bar-code scanner that flopped.
But putting government in the business of picking winners is not good policy. Neither is it good policy for government to turn its back on clean energy, particularly as China, Korea, and Europe are adopting policies that help their businesses grab more and more of the $2.3 trillion global market for renewable energy technologies.
Instead, I'd like to see our government investing in new energy infrastructure that welcomes participants into the marketplace, and promoting policies that diminish the need for subsidies and make all investments in renewable energy -- public and private -- a better bet. We've seen government play this role before -- just think about what the federal-funded interstate highway system did to boost American business in the 1950s, or what the government-backed Internet does for virtually every business today.
We need federal intervention again to transform our electricity grid from an outmoded obstacle to innovation, into an open platform that allows all energy resources -- renewable and fossil-fuel-based -- to compete on an equal footing.
For those who want to end government subsidies, for those who want less regulation, and for those who want to see the promise of clean, renewable energy fulfilled, the overarching goal should be to maximize opportunities for the private sector to do what government cannot: win, lose, and learn without risking taxpayer dollars. Meanwhile government should focus on creating the conditions that breed success, rather than trying to actually participate in it.
Follow Gwen Ruta on Twitter: www.twitter.com/EDFbiz | <urn:uuid:f1fd8339-cdd9-4b5c-8e8b-b40f79dc5e8d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gwen-ruta/beacon-power-bankrupt-bailout_b_1074188.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00038-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958711 | 531 | 2.015625 | 2 |
Top 5 Green Cars of 2012
One of the big motivators for buying a “greener” car the next time you are in the automotive market is the reduction in harmful greenhouse gases and unsightly smog that can be downright stifling in big city traffic jams. But even if you don’t feel particularly passionate about your ability to save the planet, green cars, that is, cars that run on a hybrid mixture of electricity and gasoline, could really save a family some green (as in the money kind) in an economy where gas prices are approaching the four dollar mark. Early hybrid models often shared two factors beyond their partial electric motor. First, they were ugly as sin. It was as if the marketing campaign wanted to buyers to think, “I am so concerned with the earth that I will drive the ugliest car on the road if that’s what it takes.” The second factor that these early hybrids had in common was an outrageous price tag. Saving the earth came at a premium. Luckily neither of these factors apply to the new model hybrids of the past few years. This is good news for both consumers and the environment.
While prices have definitely gone down over the years from the early model hybrids, the total cost of ownership for a hybrid can still be difficult to keep at a minimum versus conventional gasoline burning cars. In fact, of 27 hybrid cars released in the past year, only three have a total cost of ownership over the next five years that is lower than their conventional gas guzzling counter parts. The electric Mitsubishi i-MiEV, which starts at just over $29,000, is the top rated green vehicle this year by the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy. Buyers do get to take advantage of a one-time $7,500 tax credit currently being given to electric car buyers, but that is quite a premium to pay when considering that the comparable standard fuel-efficient cars such as the Hyundai Accent start at around $12,545. On top of that, there is also the added cost of the installation of a dedicated charging station to accommodate an electric car. There are several options available, however, that can make environmental consciousness a bit more fiscally palatable.
Toyota Prius c
Toyota continues to impress with the Prius c. With 53 miles per hiqhway gallon, the Prius is the best in breed for fuel efficient hybrids. The five seat hatchback makes this an excellent choice for most families looking to save both kinds of green.
The Nissan Leaf can get between 73 and 100 miles out of a single charge, making this fuel efficient sedan tough to beat. Interestingly, it’s made from recycled materials from old car parts, appliances and plastic bottles.
This is the least expensive of the 2012 hybrids, and is also the newest on the scene. Mitsubishi claims a 62 miles per gallon range. Given the tax break of $7500 this year, this hybrid is clearly the best option for the budget consumer and starts at $29,500.
The first American domestic model to make the list, the Volt provides the user with options: she can either fill the tank at the pump or charge at the pole. With its small gasoline engine on standby to generate electricity should the batteries run out, this is the best of both worlds.
The Honda Civic boasts of 40 miles to the gallon, no matter which engine option you choose. It is now available with engines based on gasoline, gas/electric hybrid, and natural gas. Whichever way you choose, it’s a winning scenario.
- America’s Problem with Solar
- PV @ $0.37 per watt in 2017?
- Fuel Cells in Outer Space!
- Electric Vehicle Wireless Charging is Here
- New York City Gets 25 Solar Streetchargers
- Will Electric Racers dominate at Pikes Peak?
- Improving Solar Cells with Quantum-Dot Microscopy
- Reduce Your Global Footprint and Energy Consumption
- Solar on Breweries Across the U.S
- How Green Windows Provide Energy Efficiency
- Solar + Cloud Computing: Google’s Project Loon
- Wood as a Green Material
- In Focus: Green Engineering Advancements
- The Electric Vehicle Market in 10 Years
- Panasonic: 100M Li-Ion Tesla Batteries Ship This Month
- In Focus: India’s Energy Ties with Iran
- New Renewable Energy Projects Approved by Obama Adminstration
- The Solar Robots are Coming! | <urn:uuid:7222ec16-ef9b-4068-99d1-ca77978391d0> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.solarfeeds.com/top-5-green-cars-of-2012/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934854 | 937 | 1.773438 | 2 |
I have been taking photos everyday--sometimes twice a day--of the mind-boggling flooding, along with what seems like half of Chittenden County that has been pouring the down hill to take photos of the waterfront--even ECHO's parking lot. I've been watching people snap the classic landscape flood shot, the artsy drift wood close-up, and the "I was there when it happened" photo but no one seems to be looking at all of the the garbage that has also colored our waterfront. The mix of natural materials with manufactured garbage will make cleaning up after the flooding expansive, very expensive, complex and I fear smelly as the days warm.
There is garbage mixed in with all of the driftwood. I did a quick inventory while policing ECHO and aside from the random broken flip-flop and old leather shoe, most of the trash was plastic. This is no surprise since plastic floats, it is made into nearly everything and takes forever to break down--almost literally. But where is all of this garbage coming from? Neighborhood streets, yards, parking lots, river banks...you name it. Wherever trash is not thrown in a garbage can or recycled, it gets carried by the rain and snow melt into rivers, streams, creeks and makes it's way into Lake Champlain. Now with the record shattering flooding, it is coming back to haunt us like ghosts from an earlier time. Unlike watching a scary movie, we can change the ending of this ghost story.
Daily we all can make purchasing decisions to buy products with less packaging or with biodegradable packaging, and simply buy less stuff. We can make sure we recycle all that we can and make sure our garbage and recycling is secured so that it does not blow away and add to the problem. And we can also participate in Green Up Vermont Day on May 7, 2011, visit www.greenupvermont.org for more information. I've been cleaning up garbage with family and friends along road sides, in parks and on the Burlington waterfront for almost as long as Green Up Day has been around, but this year the flooding throughout Vermont will really change this years events. But will it change people's behaviors?
Photos by: Julie Silverman/ECHO (C) | <urn:uuid:e7ca12a0-f98e-456d-92d6-2dc595de0bcd> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://blog.echovermont.org/2011/04/flooding-redefines-vts-green-up-day.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965652 | 464 | 1.953125 | 2 |
A draft of a White House immigration reform bill leaked to USA Today on Saturday puts pressure on the Senate to deliver with its own package of comprehensive legislation.
The draft features an earned path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, so long as they meet certain requirements. Qualifying immigrants would be able to apply for a green card within eight years, according to USA Today. The bill also contains provisions related to border security and a mandatory system to make sure businesses check the work eligibility of their employees, USA Today reported.
On Saturday, a spokesperson for the Obama administration stressed that the administration bill was neither final nor an attempt to derail a reform effort by a group of Democrats and Republicans in the Senate.
"We continue to work in support of a bipartisan effort, and while the president has made clear he will move forward if Congress fails to act, progress continues to be made and the administration has not prepared a final bill to submit," White House spokesman Clark Stevens told USA Today.
Still, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a leading voice in the Senate group working on a bipartisan bill, said in a statement that it was a "mistake" for the White House to draft its own legislation without seeking GOP input. As a result, he said, President Barack Obama's bill would be "dead on arrival in Congress."
"The President's bill repeats the failures of past legislation," Rubio said. "It fails to follow through on previously broken promises to secure our borders, creates a special pathway that puts those who broke our immigration laws at an advantage over those who chose to do things the right way and come here legally, and does nothing to address guest workers or future flow, which serious immigration experts agree is critical to preventing future influxes of illegal immigrants."
The draft obtained by USA Today did not include what will likely be an important and contentious part of any immigration reform package -- how to alter the legal immigration system to better handle future flows of immigrants. Such changes could potentially include the addition of a guest worker program or an expansion of visas for certain workers.
The exclusion of that section isn't necessarily surprising. The Senate working group, for its part, is hoping that labor unions and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce will be able to come to an agreement on how to handle future influxes of immigrants before drafting that part of the congressional bill. As of last week, the two groups said they were continuing to negotiate despite rumors that talks were collapsing.
Since winning reelection in November, President Obama has made immigration reform a top priority, and has made it clear that he'll take the lead if Congress fails to act. He told Univision in late January that he believed Senate could have a bill ready by March, and last week, he met with Senate Democrats to check on the status of the legislative effort.
Whether or not the White House leak was intentional, the administration is using the moment to send a reminder to Congress that the president could move forward on legislation in the coming months if a bill in the Senate fails to materialize.
"He [Marco Rubio] says its 'dead on arrival' if its proposed. Well let's make sure that it doesn't have to be proposed," White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough said Sunday on ABC News' "This Week." "Let's make sure that that group up there, the gang of eight, makes the good progress on these efforts as much as they say they want to." | <urn:uuid:6d405fc7-f0d6-488a-bb91-ba3ac48b0f60> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://abcnews.go.com/ABC_Univision/Politics/leaked-white-house-immigration-bill-puts-pressure-senate/story?id=18524947 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970411 | 697 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Table of Contents
In this chapter, we won't focus on producing music yet, but rather on understanding the way that computers and Pd handle data. We will be working with practical listening examples as often as possible to avoid unnecessarily abstract and dry technical explanations. However, the precise way in which computers produce sound will not be explained until Chapter 3. You should build the sample patches yourself in Pd. This first-hand experience will help solidify the concepts presented. Starting in Chapter 3, larger patches can be found at www.kreidler-net.de/pd/patches/patches.zip.
Once you have started Pd, the main Pd window appears on the monitor. Open a new programming window by clicking the File menu and then New.
A new window opens. Add an object box under Put Object, or with the keypad, using the listed key command: Ctrl-1 (this is for Windows; other platforms may have different key commands).
... you should see a blue box attached to the mouse cursor ...
Then click somewhere on the blank white surface in the new window to decouple the mouse from the object box. Type this into the box: "osc~ 440".
To accept what you have typed into the box, click anywhere outside the box on the white surface:
(The sign "~" means "tilde"; you'll need to use this often in Pd.)
You now see a rectangular box with little black rectangles in the top and bottom corners. The upper rectangles are called "inlets", the bottom rectangle is an "outlet".
If you place the cursor onto the outlet rectangle, it changes to a circle (which resembles an open socket for a cable).
Now click on the rectangle and move the mouse while keeping the mouse button pressed. This draws a line that can be thought of as a cable.
But because you haven't created an object to which you can attach this cable yet, the cable vanishes when you release the mouse button. Make another object just as you did the previous one and call it "dac~". Position it below the "osc~" object by clicking it once so that it turns blue and moving the mouse with the mouse button held. Then start a cable from the outlet on "osc~" and connect it to the left inlet on "dac~". The cursor changes into a circle when it is over the inlet.
Release the mouse button. The "cable" now connects "osc~ 440" to "dac~". You should hear a tone. If not, verify in the Pd main window that there is a check next to "compute audio" (in Linux: check if the field is red). If not, check the box with a mouse click:
(The "compute audio" function allows you to program in Pd without generating sound. This can save the computer much unnecessary processing power — though this is probably a non-issue with most computers these days.)
We hear a tone. To be specific, it is A4 (a' in the German system), also called the A440, the standard concert tuning pitch that has a frequency of 440 Hertz (the meanings of "Frequency" and "Hertz" will be explained later). Now connect the outlet from "osc~ 440" with the right inlet of "dac~" as well.
You should hear sound from both of the computer's speakers. Now create a number box (Put Number or with key command Ctrl-3) and attach its outlet to the inlet on the object named "osc~". Then you need to change into what is called "Execute mode" (Edit Edit mode, or with key command Ctrl-E; the cursor turns into an arrow). Click on the number box, hold the mouse button, and move the mouse up and down:
This changes the numbers and the pitch. The value should be at least 100; this range can be more finely adjusted by holding SHIFT while clicking and moving the mouse as described above.
Another way to enter values into the number box is to click on the number box, enter a value on the keyboard, and press ENTER.
Now change back to the other mode, the "Edit mode" (Edit Edit mode, or key command Ctrl-E). Move the cursor, which should have changed back to a hand, over the connection between "osc~" and "dac~". The cursor becomes an X. Click on it, which will turn the cable blue.
Then go to Edit Cut or simply press BACKSPACE. This terminates the connection. Cut the other connection to "dac~" as well. Now create a new object where the cables used to be: "*~ 0" and connect it to the other objects as shown:
Let's make some more room: Enlarge the window by clicking on its lower right corner, holding the mouse button, and pulling it down and to the right.
Then click on the lower right part of the white background near the "dac~" object, hold the mouse button, and draw a rectangle that includes the "dac~" and the "*~" objects.
This is how you select a part of a patch. (You can also delete boxes this way. After selecting a portion of the patch, go to Edit Cut or simply press BACKSPACE.)
When you release the mouse button, both objects appear in blue. Click on one of these selected objects, hold the mouse button, and pull them down to free up more space.
To deselect these objects, just click anywhere on the white background.
Then create two "Message" boxes (Put Message or Ctrl-2) as below and enter "0" in one and "1" in the other.
Change back to execute mode (Edit Edit mode or Ctrl-E) and click on the two message boxes in turn: clicking 1 turns the sound on, clicking 0 turns it off.
The previous example covers most of the elements in Pd. Let's take a closer look at them – we used three different kinds of boxes: Object, Message, and Number.
Object boxes are rectangular, message boxes have an indentation on the right side, and number boxes have a flat upper right corner.
All of these boxes have inlets and outlets. The inlets are always on top, the outlets on bottom. You can always connect an outlet to an inlet (in this order). There is an edit mode and an execute mode. Edit mode is for programming and execute mode is for running the program. You can tell which mode you're in by looking at the cursor:
Let's take a closer look: There are two kinds of "cables", thick and thin. A thin cable connects the number box to the "osc~" object and a thick cable runs out of the "osc~" object. Thick cables transmit signals, while thin cables transmit only control data. With "compute audio" in the Pd main window, we determine whether the signals should be sent by marking or removing the checkmark. Moreover, all objects that produce signals or that work with signals as an input (input = that which goes into an inlet; output = that which comes out of an outlet), have a tilde ("~") after their name; other objects don't have this! These two levels are called the "control level" (where only control data flows, also called the "message domain") and the "signal level" (where signals flow, also called the "signal domain").
The first object you created was "osc~ 440", which is an "oscillator", and you heard a sine tone at 440 Hertz (the meaning of "Hertz" will be explained later). Then you made a number box and entered new values there, which caused the frequency of the tone you heard to change. That is the basic structure in Pd: an object has a name (if it produces signals, a tilde follows the name), then there is a space, and then one or several arguments follow (in this case, the initial 'argument' was "440"). With most objects, the arguments can be replaced with new values that are connected to the inputs (unlike with the "osc~" object here, the changed value usually goes into the far right inlet).
If new values are entered this way, the argument written in the object box is ignored (in this example, 300 instead of 440).
We can enter information in number boxes or message boxes. Message boxes also allow letters, which are called symbols. All of this information is referred to as atoms. An atom appears in a message box or in a number box (for more on atoms, see 2.1.5).
Another important term: The program that you write is called a patch. A patch first appears as a blank white background on which you write a program. This white background is also called a canvas.
There are two modes: Edit mode and execute mode (you switch between them with Ctrl-E or under Edit Edit mode). You program all the parts of a patch in edit mode and start all operations and sounds in execute mode.
Within a patch, there is the control level and the signal level (control objects do not have a tilde after their names and are connected with thin cables; signal objects have a tilde at the end and are connected with thick cables). The signal level is only active if "compute audio" has been activated in the Pd main window.
The elements of a patch are objects, messages, and numbers.
An object often has one or several arguments (a.k.a. "creation arguments"), which can be changed using an input.
A message is a fixed value in execute mode and is stored with the patch. When a message box is clicked, its contents are sent to all objects connected to its outlet. In contrast, number boxes can be altered in execute mode and their values are not saved.
A few additional things that can make your work in Pd easier:
If you click on the white surface ("Canvas") with the right mouse button and open the Help menu, a list with all Pd objects appears.
If you right-click on an object, a pull-down menu opens where you can select the help file for that object for a detailed explanation.
You will soon find it quite helpful to duplicate parts of patches. To do this, select an area so that the selected boxes appear in blue (as described under 2.1.1 in the context of making more space) and go to Edit Duplicate or Ctrl-D. This duplicates the selected area and the copy appears as a selected area that you can move (click on a selected box, hold, move to desired location with the mouse, release).
It is much faster and more comfortable to work if you use "keyboard shortcuts". Many functions that you can select in the pull-down menus are also available as keyboard shortcuts. These key commands appear next to the function in the pull-down menu.
Programming can get complicated fast. To help remind you of the meaning of a certain patch, it is recommended that you add comments to your patch. Comments can be added under Put Comment (or with Ctrl-5). Here you can write whatever you like to explain your patch.
If you've understood everything thus far, then you understand the essential fundamentals of Pd's user interface. Now we can get into the structure of programming itself.
A message for an object has two parts: a method designation (selector) and zero, one, or several values (arguments). For example, if the message is "5", then the actual message is "float 5" and is comprised of the atoms "float" and "5". The message "bang" is comprised only of the selector "bang" and contains no arguments. The message "1 2 3 4 5" is actually the message "list 1 2 3 4 5".
There are three kinds of atoms: a number (programming language = "float") with a 32-bit value, a symbol, which is a string of letters, or a pointer, which is a kind of address (this will be covered in Chapter 5.2.3).
The message "float 5" is composed of the two type designations symbol and float. The type symbol has a value of "float" (a string) and the type float has a value of "5".
The selector is always a symbol. Since objects can react differently to different messages, the selector first makes a more precise preliminary determination. | <urn:uuid:13d8e015-3629-4d5b-8fc3-040809c9c561> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://pd-tutorial.com/english/ch02.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.918171 | 2,620 | 3.28125 | 3 |
Call for Papers
Society of Architectural Historians
64th Annual Meeting
April 13-17, 2011
New Orleans, Louisiana
Session: ARCHITECTURE AND GASTRONOMY
Architecture and food have long held analogies. Both can be characterized by words such as ‘tasteful’, ‘bland’, and most prominently in recent years – ‘organic’. Their synergy is embodied by the Latin word colere (‘to till, tend’), which is also the root of our modern term ‘to cultivate’. Importantly, cultivation can reference both pragmatic and symbolic phenomena. Cicero notably fused the concrete and figurative inflections of the term, proposing that the human mind must be cultivated in order ‘to fruit’. During the Enlightenment this analogy was widened into architectural theory when J.F. Blondel defined ‘taste’ as the ‘fruit of reasoning’. Just as chefs designed recipes for fine cuisine, architectural theorists began to devise rules for good architecture.
While both architecture and gastronomy are disciplines that espouse fundamental principles and standards, neither can be wholly controlled by absolute prescriptions or rigid formulae. They rely on a combination of intuition, inventiveness, and even wonder. This session aims to illuminate and clarify the reciprocity between building and eating, paying particular attention to the role of gastronomy in the expression and interpretation of architecture. Proposals can be from diverse approaches, and those that reassess the metaphorical relationship between taste and architecture are particularly welcome. Speakers may also wish to present case studies that address how the built environment, including landscape, participates in the experience of a meal. Possible questions to explore might include: What is the underlying significance of the terms like ‘setting’ and ‘service’ within architectural discourse? How do food markets contribute to the character of a city? In what ways does architecture structure certain forms of dining, such as ritual meals and communal feasts? How can tastes and smells help define the memory of particular places? The session is also open to presentations that examine emerging dialogues between building and eating, such as how vernacular architecture and regionalism have been aligned with contemporary movements like Slow Food and Edible Schoolyards.
The deadline for receipt of paper proposals is 14 August 2010. Please submit proposals to the session chair: Dr Samantha Martin-McAuliffe, University College Dublin School of Architecture, Richview, Clonskeagh, Dublin 14, Republic of Ireland. +353.1.716.2757 firstname.lastname@example.org
Any questions about the session can also be sent directly to the chair.
Further details about the conference and requirements for submitting a proposal are available on the SAH website: http://www.sah.org/index.php?src=news&srctype=detail&category=News&refno=83
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Mrs. Obama wants states to pass legislation or take executive action allowing veterans to receive professional credentials or licenses based on their experiences in the military. Administration officials said that would allow veterans to apply for jobs more quickly rather than having to take courses for skills they already have.
Mrs. Obama will announce her proposals Monday during remarks to governors who are in Washington for their annual meeting. President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden will also address the governors during the event at the White House.
The veterans' initiatives are part of Mrs. Obama's "Joining Forces" program, which aims to help veterans and their families. The program has focused in particular on assisting military personnel find civilian jobs, an effort that is expected to take on more urgency as more than 60,000 U.S. troops return home from Afghanistan by the end of 2014.
Mrs. Obama will ask states to focus in particular on making it easier for veterans to obtain credentials and licenses for commercial driving, nursing, and emergency medical services, administration officials said. The White House has outlined suggested legislative language states can use for implementing the changes.
Officials did not have an estimate for how much it would cost states to implement the credentialing programs. But they suggested the programs could eventually be a cost-saver by keeping veterans off unemployment.
Mrs. Obama has previously called on states to help military spouses transfer their state-specific credentials when their families move due to changes in deployment. Seventeen states have passed such legislation over the past year, joining 11 states that already had laws on the books.
The officials requested anonymity in order to speak ahead of Mrs. Obama's announcement. | <urn:uuid:97513f2f-e81e-4b3e-80be-5fb2fe80dae7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.cedartownstd.com/pages/full_story/push?article-First+lady+to+press+governors+on+veterans-+jobs%20&id=21808999 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00026-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973823 | 331 | 1.828125 | 2 |
The Navsari Agriculture University (NAU) in Gujarat has standardised a process of manufacturing high value paper from Banana fiber, which it claims has the property of making currency notes lasting for about a century. The paper has been tested in the Central Institute for Research on Cotton Technology. During the research, it was found that paper made out of this fiber has shelf life of over 100 years as it is the strongest of the long fibers ever found amidst natural fibers. It can be folded for as many as 3,000 times. According to Dr B N Kolambe, a scientist at Navsari Agriculture University this fiber has the potential to find application in making of the paper required for the printing of currency notes and other valuable documents".
Dr B N Kolambe said that according to references in few leading journals, he found that Japan uses Banana fiber to manufacture the paper required to print its currency Yen. He said the commercial application of Banana fiber is viable as its availability is not a constraint. It is generated from stem of the plant which usually goes as waste and has no other application". Dr. Kolambe said, we estimate that from one hectare of Banana cultivation about 600 to 800 kilogram of fiber shall be available.
The university has filed five different patents from various usage of Banana plant, which includes making of yarn for textiles, paper and candy. The NAU has submitted the findings of its research on Banana plant to the National Agriculture Innovation Project (NAIP), quoting the reference from journals on Japan using Banana fiber to manufacture its currency Yen.
Banana is one of the most important fruit crops grown in India. After harvest of fruit, huge quantity of about 60 to 80 tones per hector of waste biomass (pseudostem, leaves, suckers etc.) is generated. Presently, this biomass is discarded as waste. Present project envisages development of effective value chain for efficient utilization of each and every component of banana pseudostem. Considerable work has been done in the field of direct use and product development from banana fruits. However, not much attention has been focused on effective utilization of the huge biomass generated in the form of pseudostem, leaves, suckers etc.
In India, presently this biomass is dumped on roadside or burnt or left in situ causing detrimental impact on environment. Though, the technologies for extraction of fibers and paper making from pseudostem are available, yet it has not been adopted by the industries mainly due to high transport cost. However, there exist a vast potential of extracting fibers from pseudo stem. The quantity and quality of fibers show wide variability with cultivars. The fiber extracted from banana pseudostem could not command proper market owing to its restricted use in cottage industries. There appears to be good scope of profitable use of this fiber in textile and paper industries on commercial scale.
Yogesh Panday, AIR correspondent, Ahmedabad | <urn:uuid:57a0f9b1-25b4-4e8b-ab9b-3f4b35c8f86e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.newsonair.com/banana-fiber-paper-for-lasting-currency-notes.asp | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952973 | 586 | 2.984375 | 3 |
Marlene Brenner, secretary of the board, said that Girard, a free tuition and room and board school in Fairmount, closed out the last fiscal year in August with a $1.2 million deficit.
"There has been a decline in the interest rates as it affects bonds in their investment portfolio," Brenner said. "Costs have continued to rise and income has leveled off."
She said that the soft real estate market in Center City has also meant that the Girard Estate has not been earning as much money from its real estate holdings.
For the 1991 fiscal year, income generated by the estate for the school totaled $12.1 million while expenses came to $13.3 million. She said income during the previous fiscal year had totaled $12.4 million, compared with expenses of $12.1 million.
Brenner said she could not provide a detailed explanation for the $1.2 million increase in Girard expenses last year. However, a new contract for Girard's 68 full-time teachers and counselors, which was ratified in June, was responsible for a portion of it.
David Murawski, former president of the teachers' union, said the contract called for an average pay increase of about 6 percent for the first year of the four-year pact. Since the previous contract had expired on Aug. 31, 1990, teachers received their retroactive pay increases for the 1990-91 school year in lump sum payments last summer.
Wages increased 5.5 percent this year and will increase 5 percent in each of the last two years of the contract.
Girard teachers generally earn less than their counterparts at most public and nonpublic schools. A beginning teacher with a bachelor's degree will earn $15,500 this year at Girard, compared with $20,650 at high schools operated by the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and $26,000 for new teachers in Philadelphia public schools.
Girard College is an unusual boarding school that provides a free, college- preparatory education for qualified low-income students from throughout the region and across the country.
Although it educates students from first grade through high school, it is called a "college" because that is the term that Stephen Girard, the merchant-banker, used in 1831 when he bequeathed the bulk of his $7.5 million estate to establish a school for white male orphans.
Admission criteria have been broadened over time to include minorities, girls and children from single-parent households.
This year there are 505 students living and going to school on Girard's 43- acre campus on Girard Avenue. Students who meet admission requirements also receive free clothing and health and dental care. The school is said to spend about $26,000 per year on each student.
Brenner said the 12-member Board of City Trusts had studied the financial problems at Girard for months before the job cuts were made.
SUPPLIES, SERVICES CUT
As part of the general belt-tightening, Joseph T. Devlin, Girard's director of education, said funds for supplies and services were reduced last month by 10 percent.
"The instructional program has not been affected in any way," he said.
However, a member of the student-life staff, which supervises children away
from the classroom, said children are feeling the impact of the cuts in other ways. Funds for trips are no longer available and heat has been turned down in the buildings.
But Brenner said the children were not being shortchanged.
"The board would never do anything that would have any effect on the children and their safety," she said. "This was studied very thoroughly for many months before this decision was made."
She also said it was impossible to calculate the worth of the Girard Estate, since it includes coal mines as well as real estate holdings both in and outside the city. But the residual fund, which is used to operate Girard
College, is worth approximately $179 million, Brenner said.
REAL ESTATE HOLDINGS
Aside from the 43-acre Girard College campus, the Girard Estate's largest holding in Philadelphia is known as Girard Square. That is the Center City block bounded by Market, Chestnut, 11th and 12th Streets.
That property is worth at least $60 million, according to an appraisal reported a few years ago at a meeting of the Board of City Trusts.
According to the annual report for the 1990 fiscal year - the most recent available - U.S. government bonds accounted for 11.4 percent of Girard
College's residual fund investment. Corporate bonds and notes accounted for the largest share of the fund - 27.8 percent; 25.7 percent was devoted to common stocks and 21.8 percent was held in mortgage-backed sercurities.
Brenner said no decisions have been made on further cutbacks. She said that only Louis J. Esposito, president of the Board of City Trusts, could discuss whether further cuts might be made. He was out of the country and could not be reached for comment.
Although no full-time teachers or houseparents have lost their positions yet, employees say they are braced for the possibility of another round of layoffs next month.
"It is not very conducive to doing a good job," said one employee who asked not to be quoted by name. "It's like Alcoholics Anonymous. We're living day by day." | <urn:uuid:5ec8e537-477e-42db-9e00-43315fb1a50a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://articles.philly.com/1992-02-28/news/26039807_1_girard-college-stephen-girard-teachers | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.984134 | 1,133 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Long Beach, CA, January 20, 2010 – F.S. “Bicycle” Jones began selling bicycles and wheeled toys in Long Beach in 1910 at 6th and Long Beach Boulevard (then called American Avenue). In the 1930's, he moved his store to 16th and Long Beach Blvd. He was a hero to hundreds of boys and girls who delivered the Press Telegram during the Great Depression because they could buy a bike on time from Jones for as little as 50 cents down and 25 cents every payday. He managed to guide his business through the Great Depression, World War I and World War II. Frank Samuel Jones passed away in 1961 at the age of 77 years.
In 1959, Ben Lawee purchased Jones Bicycles, growing it from a single store into a multi-store chain in six years. He established the store located at 1628 Long Beach Blvd. Disillusioned by the lack of brand options available to retailers, he left retailing and began importing Bianchi and Legnano
Jones Bicycles in 1969 after adding skiing
Jones Bicycles in 1969 after adding skiing
In 1965, Robert Olson purchased the Long Beach Blvd location from Lawee, also growing from a single store to a multi-store chain. He added skiing equipment to his inventory to expand his business. However, he was not without hardship either.
He weathered major economic recessions in the 1980’s and early 1990’s. During the Los Angeles Riots in April, 1992, looters stole more than 700 bicycles from the Long Beach Blvd. store. After 82 years of retail presence on the Blvd., the store closed in July, 1992 unable to recover from the event. The iconic “Jones man” sign, battered and rusty, still looms over the building today. Olson continued to operate two remaining stores on Katella Avenue in Los Alamitos and on 2nd Street in Long Beach, eventually selling both stores in the early 90’s and retiring from the bicycle industry.
The remaining Jones Bicycles location at 5327 E 2nd Street continued to thrive, moving from a smaller location across the street to 5332 E. 2nd St., former location of Pat’s Ski and Sport – another Long Beach landmark. Olson sold the business to his employees, John and Lisa Genshock in 1994, a husband and wife team, eager to grow and expand the business, despite the global recession occurring at the time.
At the time their main competitor had secured the top bicycle brands, leaving the Genshocks no choice but to purchase less popular brands. They developed a strong affiliation with former Jones Bicycles owner, Ben Lawee and his value-oriented Univega brand. They also aligned with Giant Bicycles, now a desirable brand worldwide and the Genshock’s main bicycle line.
John possesses a unique talent for creating a retail environment that is comfortable, friendly and amusing. He understood that, in order to effectively compete, he had to expand inventory and utilize the unique mezzanine layout of the store to create a unique shopping experience. He is one of the first retailers on 2nd St. to utilize neon lighting for a modern look. He is the first bicycle retailer to install a four-story bicycle display rack. He has scoured antique stores for unique curiosities to add interest to the shopping experience., including eclectic bicycles, unique art, a drone missile, custom painted Porsche, a crane game and rotary game from the Long Beach Pike and fun odds and ends tucked in virtually every corner. He also knows how to purchase wisely and offer the very best deals to his customers; the best example is Jones Bicycles’ “Buy One Get One Free” sale which customers eagerly await each year.
Lisa’s talent is managing the administrative and financial part of the business. She is a self-taught bookkeeper and has built one of the best reputations in the industry for her company’s credit worthiness. Steadfast during hardship, she managed the financial recovery of the 2nd St. store after a devastating fire in 1997 that forced the
1995, they opened a second store in San Marino, California and in 1998, they began a successful Ebay business, selling difficult to find vintage bicycle parts and shipping them all over the world. The Lakewood store venture was unsuccessful and closed in 1999. John and Lisa deviated from their merchandising model of creating a store with character, and they learned a valuable lesson from it. The customers said it didn’t reflect Jones Bicycles’ unique identity and fun feeling.
In 2001, they expanded the 2nd St. store to include skateboards. Now, they boast one of the best selections of long boards in the Southland and a display of vintage decks that would be the envy of any collector. Their ability to react to trends quickly have allowed them to weather the 2000 recession and the current economic climate. Their latest venture is importing bicycle parts from Taiwan under their own brand name, F.U.B.A.R. They attribute their success to their teamwork, solid business relationships, and wiliness to try new ideas. | <urn:uuid:531449e1-06d6-4497-9c3d-5c69459c2af5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://jonesbicycles.com/about/our-100-year-history-pg472.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968071 | 1,065 | 1.710938 | 2 |
The Louisiana Highway Safety Commission says new data show that drivers 75 or older are more likely to die, if they are involved in a crash. Officials say older motorists also have increasing issues with yielding when making turns.
The Louisiana Highway Safety Commission says older drivers have higher death rates when involved in a crash than younger age groups.
Spokeswoman Elaine Rogeau says figures from last year show the fatal crash rate for 75 to 84-year-old drivers was 21-percent higher than the fatal crash rate for 55-to-64 year-old drivers.
Rogeau says driving abilities often decline gradually and family members, along with close friends, can look for signs of unsafe driving.
"Common errors may involve failure to yield right of way or see oncoming traffic and a greater tendency toward improper turns or lane changes," she explained. "Left turns at intersections are among the most frequent places where crashes involving older drivers occur." | <urn:uuid:455ca923-964c-49cc-ba74-3adaa754319e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wwl.com/Older-drivers-dying-more-in-crashes/15706481 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00005-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961846 | 189 | 2.09375 | 2 |
The Moon and I
by Betsy Byars. (HarperCollins, 1996. ISBN 9780688137045. Order Info.) Nonfiction. 112 pages. Grades 4-9.
With a light and humorous touch, Ms. Byars tells of the way she writes her books. Throughout the account, she also tells of her relationship with a snake, Moon, which she found near her cabin. Her need to learn more about snakes in general and Moon in particular became an obsession that, for a brief time, dominated her existence. That obsession, the reasons for it, and the ways in which she conducted her research are so interesting and helpful that you'll want to read the brief book aloud at the outset of a research project.
The Snake Scientist by Sy Montgomery. Illustrated by Nic Bishop. (2001, Sandpiper. ISBN 0618111190. Order Info.) Nonfiction. 48 pages. Gr 4-8.
This was the first of the amazing "Scientists in the Field" series of nonfiction books. In this volume writer Sy Montgomery and photographer Nic Bishop follow herpetologist Bob Mason to Manitoba, Canada to study the red-sided garter snake. We watch, step by step, as he conducts his experiments. The photographs are beautiful and the writing that accompanies them gives us background on snakes in general as well as the specific information of this species mating, migration, and hibernation habits.
Rattlesnake Dance: True Tales, Mysteries, and Rattlesnake Ceremonies by Jennifer Owings Dewey. (2000, Boyds Mills Press. ISBN 9781563978777. Order Info.) Nonfiction. 48 pages. Gr 3-7.
Here's an interesting way to convey information. Three anecdotes from the author's childhood revolve around rattlesnakes. In the first, she is bitten and nearly dies. In the second, she observes a Hopi snake ceremony and in the third she observes two rattlesnakes in combat. Around these tales, insets give extensive information about the species.
Verdi by Janell Cannon. (1997, Harcourt. ISBN 9780152010287. Order Info.) Picture Book. 56 pages. Gr PreK-3.
Verdi is a proud yellow snake who relishes his life and his bright yellow skin. He dreads becoming lazy boring and green like the older snakes. When he spots a patch of green on his yellow skin, he nearly kills himself to get rid of it. He soon learns the valuable lesson that age is more than skin deep and that he can become a fun-loving elder snake.
- Snakes by Seymour Simon. (2007, Collins. ISBN 9780061140952. Order Info.) Picture Book. 32 pages. Gr 2-9.
Leave it to Simon to make the subject of snakes fascinating to every comer -- even if snakes weren't among your favorite creatures. With his eye on both the curious child and the fascinating species, Simon knows exactly which photographs will grab the eye and offer the most information and which sentences will do the same.
Related Areas Within Carol Hurst's Children's Literature Web Site | <urn:uuid:27d8d04a-c3e9-450d-95f9-ccee27bacab7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.carolhurst.com/titles/moonandi.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00057-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.929162 | 643 | 2.1875 | 2 |
Pregnancy Weeks 19-24 - Page 1
The halfway point of pregnancy is a significant milestone for you and your unborn baby. This stage is a time of feeling good, eating well, and planning for the rest of your pregnancy. As you read through this issue, you'll learn about the opportunity during these weeks to see your baby's first images through the use of ultrasound technology. And, you'll find information and tips on selecting a pediatrician who will provide care for your newborn.
Click here to view the
Online Resources of Pregnancy, Birth, and Baby Center
Disclaimer - This content is reviewed periodically and is subject to change as new health information becomes available. The information provided is intended to be informative and educational and is not a replacement for professional evaluation, advice, diagnosis or treatment by a healthcare professional. © 2009 Staywell Custom Communications. | <urn:uuid:c13116af-01e3-49f1-b657-38ae3667b6ab> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.reshealth.org/yourhealth/healthinfo/default.cfm?pageid=P07577 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945404 | 172 | 2.140625 | 2 |
Pickles add a lot of flavor to our food. They are a must for spicing up your individual food. But commercially made pickles tend to have preservatives in them and sadly are often very high in salt or sugar content as well. It is worth trying to make pickles at home the way we like them. It is not difficult, so we can give it a try.
Steps below will help in making pickles at home:
- Type – Before you set out to make pickle it is important that you learn about the various types of pickles there are and also their shelf life. This will help you to choose the type of pickle you want to make. There are fresh pack pickles that last for a few days, and no more. Then they are the fermented ones which last for about a month or 6 weeks and usually are soaked in vinegar or brine. Refrigerated dills are soaked in salt and brine for a week and then can be kept in the fridge for two month or so. Some pickles are soaked in vegetable oils and these can be stored for a year and sometimes even more. You choose your pickles depending on the shelf life you desire.
- Ingredients - When it comes to pickles one has to follow the recipe to the exact T just as in the case of cakes. It is always better to get the recipe of the pickle that you want to make and then measure the various ingredients to the exact weight and set aside. If you are attempting to make pickles for the first time do not alter the recipe at all since this may effect the taste. Make sure the ingredients are fresh and properly cleaned. Fresh ingredients ensure that the pickles lasts you longer and taste good too.
- Equipment – The next step to making the pickle is to organize all the equipment you will need for the process of pickling the ingredients. Clean and dry jars in which you intend to store the pickle. Bring out all the pots, pans, spoons, rings and even mixers if you so require and place them in a ready to use position. Once the equipment is in place you can begin the pickling process by following the recipe instructions.
Making pickles at home also allows you to alter the recipe according to your own personal needs. So if you like it sweeter or hotter you can do so. Keep in mind that some pickles are made using fresh ingredients and in others you may need to cook the ingredients together. The cooking time is important in this case since if you under cook there might be some bacteria left over, which can make the pickles go bad. In the case of fresh pickles you will need to wait before the pickle is ready to be eaten. | <urn:uuid:31809494-86f7-4232-9d9f-6636726a331b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.singlemom.com/making-pickles-at-home/comment-page-1/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00051-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967726 | 558 | 1.84375 | 2 |
Scene from Christchurch's Avon River, from the rebuild plans
The efforts and resources being put into rebuilding Christchurch's central city should also be showered on the city's shattered suburbs, says a group representing red zone residents.
The blueprint for a compact, low-rise Christchurch CBD with separate cultural, sporting and retail precincts - surrounded by green space - was unveiled on Monday night.
Wider Earthquake Communities Action Network spokesman Reverend Mike Coleman commended the job done on the CBD blueprint, but questioned why the same efforts had not been put into the suburbs, where he said 28,000 of the most damaged houses had not been touched.
It would be up to eight years before some people had their housing problems resolved, and some elderly residents could die in that time, he said.
"There's a lot of anger in the suburbs. You try to explain it to (rebuild minister) Gerry Brownlee and he just doesn't get it," he told NZ Newswire.
Mr Coleman said Mr Brownlee had denied there were major problems with health, housing, insurance and EQC.
"He just seems to have his head in the sand, it's stunning really."
Mr Coleman said there needed to be an insurance tribunal with major statutory powers to make the insurance companies and EQC accountable.
The CBD rebuild and wider city rebuild needed to go "hand in hand", Mr Coleman said.
"It's absolutely vital the CBD is rebuilt, but you don't do it at the expense of the suburbs."
However, the head of the team that created the blueprint, Warwick Isaacs, says the central city was where people worked and it would take years for it to be rebuilt. The residential areas had not been forgotten, he said.
Mr Coleman was at the protest at the blueprint launch on Monday evening, and managed to get a glimpse of the "incredibly lavish" launch.
"I find it a little bit obscene, to be honest, when there are so many people struggling across the city and they are putting on those kinds of functions."
The Christchurch CBD rebuild plan was welcomed by Labour MP for Christchurch East Lianne Dalziel and the Green Party.
Ms Dalziel told NZ Newswire the blueprint is an important milestone for the city and she's excited by the plans.
"I think that's going to offer a lot of confidence to people, both in terms of the confidence for the central city, but also the confidence for investors coming in and investing in the rebuild," she said.
"It should be a real boost."
The Green Party has broadly welcomed the plan and says it's a strong basis for creating a more sustainable city.
"The Government's purchase of land to the south and east of central Christchurch to 'frame' the city's central core is sensible and a good move towards rebuilding Christchurch as a modern green city," Green Party Christchurch spokeswoman Eugenie Sage said.
The blueprint has also been praised by the tourism industry.
Christchurch and Canterbury Tourism chief executive Tim Hunter says the plan puts Christchurch on track to become one of the greatest cities in Australasia.
"Now that we have certainty about the way the city will develop we can go out and promote the new and evolving Christchurch on the world stage," he said.
"We now have a serious business case for tourism investment in Christchurch. With this blueprint I'm confident we can attract the replacement hotel, hospitality and retail investment we urgently need." | <urn:uuid:0ce2fbd3-6c3c-4402-b540-e1e644c0a23c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rebuildchristchurch.co.nz/blog/2012/7/3news-co-nz-vision-for-christchurch-welcomed | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976938 | 718 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Gefilte Fish Recipe
Learn to make homemade Passover Gefilte Fish, the fish balls traditionally served at the Seder (ritual meal), during the Jewish holiday of Passover.
Springtime brings blossoms, buds and lush greenery. It also is the time when people of the Jewish faith celebrate Passover, an eight-day commemoration of the Exodus from Egypt. During Passover, no leavened products are eaten, and many special dishes are prepared.
On the first two nights of this holiday, a ritual meal or “Seder” is served and the story of Passover is told. Various foods are eaten which symbolize parts of the story, and Gefilte (pronounced “geh-fill-ta”) Fish is a welcome addition. These are balls made from ground fish, chopped onions, eggs and seasoning. Gefilte Fish is low in fat and cholesterol (only one egg per pound, or four balls of fish), and is simply delicious!
While Gefilte Fish is sold in jars or cans and can be found in most grocery stores, the best type is homemade. Preparing Gefilte Fish from scratch is an undertaking of tradition and love, and almost a lost art. The following recipe is an authentic version, handed down for over five generations, and yields Gefilte Fish just like Grandma used to make!
To make forty pieces of fish, you will need two very large soup pots and the following items:
10 pounds ground fish (50% Whitefish, 20% Pike, 20% Trout, 10% Buffalo)--retain heads (eyes removed) and bones for flavor
8 pounds onions, whole
4 onions, chopped
2 pounds carrots
8 ounces seltzer water
Purchase 20 pounds of the above fish at a fishery or at the fish counter of the local grocery. Have fish ground at the store or grind yourself, and make sure the skin is not included. This should produce the 10 pounds of ground fish needed for this recipe. Ask the store associate to package separately 4 heads (eyes removed) and all the bones, as these will be placed in the bottom of the pot for flavoring and to create a fish gravy called Yuch (pronounced “yoo-kh”).
Arrange 2 heads and half of the bones in each soup kettle. Peel the 8 pounds of onions and scrape and cut the carrots into 2-inch pieces, and divide equally between the pots. Add cold water until the pots are ½ to ¾ full then sprinkle in salt, pepper and a generous amount of paprika. Cover and bring to a boil, and then reduce the fire.
Place chopped fish in a wooden bowl and using a hand chopper, chop in one egg at a time and the 4 chopped onions, alternating with seltzer water. Add salt, pepper and paprika to taste.
Make fish balls and drop into the water in the soup pots. Dipping hands into a bowl of cold water in between forming balls will keep fish from sticking to your hands. Sprinkle more paprika on top of the fish and leaving the pot uncovered, bring the water back to a boil. Reduce fire and simmer 35 minutes covered and 35 minutes uncovered. Shake the pots a bit as they cook so the balls don’t stick together.
Cool the fish and remove carefully with a spoon, so as not to break the balls. Pour the liquid gravy (Yuch) through a strainer, remove the carrots and save them. Mash the bones and onions and press through the strainer into the Yuch.
Yuch may be stored in separate containers and fish in aluminum foil pans, covered. To prepare for serving, pour some of the Yuch over the fish, cover and bake at 325 for one hour. Cool and serve cold, garnishing with the carrot pieces. Gefilte fish may be eaten plain or accompanied by grated horseradish, matzah farfel (pieces) and Yuch. | <urn:uuid:17c58a06-18ab-40c4-8464-35ec370f0af1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.allsands.com/food/recipes/food/recipes/gefiltefishrec_rdg_gn.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.922455 | 832 | 2.65625 | 3 |
What is in this article?:
- Emergency regulations begin with HLB in California citrus
- USDA and CDFA confirm the first case of Huanglongbing (citrus greening) disease in California found in a residential pummelo tree in Los Angeles County.
- State and federal governments initiate emergency response plans to remove the infected tree and plant material.
- “There is no threat at this time to California commercial citrus,” says John Leavitt of the California Department of Food and Agriculture.
Results from USDA-APHIS tests conducted on the first confirmed case of the citrus tree-killing disease Huanglongbing (HLB), found March 22 in a California residential citrus tree in a Los Angeles County residential area, have state and federal governments in emergency response mode.
(For more, see: Huanglongbing citrus disease confirmed in California)
The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) March 30 confirmed HLB in plant tissue from an 8-foot-tall pummelo tree in the Los Angeles community of Hacienda Heights. HLB, also called citrus greening, was also found in a single Asian citrus psyllid (ACP) insect found on the same tree in a CDFA pest trap.
During a conference call with reporters, CDFA Plant Health and Pest Prevention Services Director Robert Leavitt said, “We’re asking for expedited review of emergency regulations to establish quarantine and eradication authority in the area and statewide for this disease.”
“Once the emergency regulation is approved and in place, we will remove the infected tree material,” Leavitt said. “This is the best way to get rid of the reservoir of the citrus disease and hopefully eradicate the disease before it threatens the rest of the residential trees in the area and commercial citrus groves in California.”
This past weekend, CDFA and USDA planned to place hold notices on all citrus nursery stock within five miles of the detection site. It is basically a stop sale and a stop order.
A public meeting will be held April 5 in the Hacienda Heights area on CDFA’s immediate plans.
Leavitt said, “We (CDFA) will treat all property within 800 meters (about one-half mile) of the psyllid find to stop the spread of the disease.”
Backyard citrus treatments will commence April 9 with two insecticides approved by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The treatments will include the foliar-applied product Tempo for the immediate knockdown of ACP adults. The soil-applied Merit product will follow for residual control.
Leavitt added, “We have an investigative unit that will try to figure out where this particular tree came from in case it came from out of the country or a pathway for this disease in California which we don’t know about.”
The California Research Board (CRB) found the HLB during routine laboratory screening. A test called real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) conducted at the CRB lab in Riverside, Calif. confirmed the sample as HLB positive.
A second battery of USDA-ARS lab tests included real time PCR and two other tests. The tests confirmed the CRB’s original HLB-positive diagnosis. | <urn:uuid:2e400322-d9fd-4b45-893a-b80aa63e00ba> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://westernfarmpress.com/orchard-crops/emergency-regulations-begin-hlb-california-citrus | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925043 | 697 | 2.515625 | 3 |
Authorities have arrested three people believed to be responsible for a September heist of at least $1 million in precious gems and gold from a mining museum in the Sierra Nevada foothills.
The California Highway Patrol says on Tuesday state and local law enforcement officials arrested 41-year-old Jonathan Matis, 43-year-old Matthew Campbell and 40-year-old Edward Rushing III in connection with the robbery of the California Mining and Minerals Museum in Mariposa.
A CHP spokesman says Matis and Campbell were arrested on suspicion of robbery, while Rushing was taken into custody on suspicion of multiple felonies, including drug charges.
The arrests come after a brazen Sept. 28 robbery when robbers, armed with pickaxes, robbed the museum while it was opened for business.
Initially officials said the thieves stole about $2 million in gems and gold, but the CHP on Tuesday said the amount was more than $1 million.
The Associated Press | <urn:uuid:8ecf2636-bc2e-464e-a4dc-f0337661bb4a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2012/nov/13/3-arrested-in-connection-mining-museum-heist/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00040-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96362 | 196 | 1.53125 | 2 |
|Click Thumbnails to Enlarge
Established as a national park in 1971, the Puerto Princesa Underground River has been visited since the middle of the 19th century. Forming part of the core zone of the Palawan Island Biosphere Reserve and inscribed as a World Heritage site in 1999, it continues to attract thousands of visitors each year who never cease to marvel at what Mother Nature has offered on display. From the awe-inspiring limestone formations and the actual 8.2km Underground River itself, to the amazing diversity of both fauna and flora, it is truly a remarkable place.
Its variety of habitats gives the Park a high degree of biodiversity. At least 140 vertebrates, including 90 bird species, 30 kinds of mammals, 19 reptiles and 10 amphibians have been found in the Park. All of these are endemic to Palawan; they exist nowhere else on earth. There also are a number of endangered bird species like the cockatoo, the blue-napped parrot, the Palawan peacock pheasant and the Palawan owl. Threatened animals in the Park include the scaly anteater and binturong.
The vast forests surrounding the Underground River and its buffer zone are among the few remaining examples of unspoiled forest in the Philippines. The mangroves in the park and around Ulugan bay are still pristine. They contain unique and superlative tree formations that provide an important habitat for marine life and endangered bats. A daily spectacle is the soaring of thousands of bats from the caves of the Underground River at dusk and flying toward the mangroves, where they feast on the flowers.
In spite of similar sites in the country, the Park and its buffer zone is the Philippines’ only model of sustainable management of environmental resources successfully undertaken by a local government unit in close partnership with the resident community and the Protected Area Management Board. The outstanding landscape found in the park and the river makes it a world-class destination and a rich source for scientific study.
Come see for yourself! Click here to see the Panoramic view | <urn:uuid:b9bc570e-a547-4c1b-aa25-329f4259d20e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.daluyon-resort.com/content/cave | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00071-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.927684 | 425 | 3.1875 | 3 |
City officials in Moscow in northern Idaho are considering an ordinance prohibiting discrimination in housing and employment based on sexual orientation or gender identity. The city's Human Rights Commission and the Fair and Affordable Housing Commission are working together to make a joint recommendation to the city council. Ken Nagy of the housing commission tells the Moscow-Pullman Daily News that there are discrimination protections based on race, creed, gender, age and religion, but that sexual orientation and gender identity are not protected. The Idaho Senate declined to consider adding sexual orientation and gender identity to the state human rights act earlier this year. Ken Faunce of the city's Human Rights Commission says that means cities have to find a solution themselves.
President Barack Obama is urging the Illinois General Assembly to legalize same sex marriage in his home state as lawmakers are poised to take up the measure as early as this week in Springfield. "While the president does not weigh in on every measure being considered by state legislatures, he believes in treating everyone fairly and equally, with dignity and respect," White House spokesman Shin Inouye told the Chicago Sun-Times on Saturday. "As he has said, his personal view is that it's wrong to prevent couples who are in loving, committed relationships, and want to marry, from doing so. Were the President still in the Illinois State Legislature, he would support this measure that would treat all Illinois couples equally," Inouye said. The lead sponsors of the "Religious Freedom and Marriage Fairness Act," state Senator Heather Steans (D-Chicago) and state Representative Greg Harris (D-Chicago), intend to put the measure up for a vote during the upcoming January lame-duck session. The toughest challenge for gay marriage backers will be winning passage in the Illinois House. Prospects for approval in the Illinois Senate (where Obama once served) are brighter. The practical impact of Obama urging his home state to legalize gay marriage is to prod (and give political cover to) reluctant Democrats from conservative suburban and Downstate districts. Both chambers in Springfield are controlled by Democrats. Republicans cannot be depended on for widespread same sex marriage support. Sun-Times Springfield Bureau Chief Dave McKinney has reported that Steans and Harris predicted there would be some Republican backing. Illinois passed a civil union law effective June 1, 2011. When lawmakers took up civil unions, only one Senate Republican voted for the bill - current Illinois Treasurer Dan Rutherford. While Obama rarely gets involved in statehouse battles, he has voiced support for gay marriage measures in the past year, issuing (through his re-election campaign) statements of support for gay marriage ballot questions up last November in Maine, Maryland and Washington. Those initiatives won, and a Minnesota referendum to ban gay marriage (which Obama also publicly opposed) lost. Obama himself endorsed gay marriage in May after grappling with the issue for several years. "At a certain point I've just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married," Obama told ABC's Robin Roberts. The leading Democrats in Illinois, Governor Pat Quinn and Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Obama's former chief of staff, are urging lawmakers to send Quinn a same sex marriage bill he can sign.
The Washington Post reports that Kelly Costello and Fabiola Morales had a storybook wedding in the summer of 2011, with 12 bridesmaids and matching white gowns. Their fathers gave them away at a Unitarian ceremony in the District, and both extended families were on hand for dancing and champagne afterwards. But because of a law that denies federal rights and benefits to gay spouses, the Potomac couple could soon be forced to live 4,000 miles apart. Morales, a registered nurse with two U.S. academic degrees, is a native of Peru. If she were a man, Costello could automatically sponsor her for a green card. But because they are both women, Morales could become deportable as soon as her student visa expires next year. “We love each other. We want to share our lives and raise a family and be happy like everyone else,” said Morales, 39, who came to the United States six years ago and has since been hopping between work and student visas. “Our families are very supportive. We are good people and we have worked hard to make a contribution. We deserve equality.” Morales and Costello, 30, an elementary school teacher of English as a second language, are among a growing number of binational gay couples who are caught between state laws that allow them to marry and federal laws that bar the U.S. citizen spouse from sponsoring the immigrant spouse for legal residency. Advocates estimate that more than 36,000 such couples are in the same situation. The 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, known as DOMA, defines marriage as the legal union between and man and a woman. It denies gay spouses a long list of federal benefits, including access to pension and inheritance funds after their partner dies, as well as blocking their right to immigrate through marriage. However, 10 states and the District have moved to legalize gay marriage since DOMA was passed. As the concept of same-sex legal unions has gained more public acceptance, a legal and political movement against DOMA has grown. Lawyers for the Obama administration have found that portions of the law are unconstitutional, and federal courts in eight cases around the country have agreed. Two weeks ago, the Supreme Court announced it would hear arguments on the law’s constitutionality this spring, based on a challenge by the American Civil Liberties Union in which Edie Windsor, a widow whose same sex spouse died, was forced to pay $363,000 in federal estate taxes that a husband would not have had to pay. If the high court rules in favor of Windsor, it will wipe out the same section of DOMA that denies immigration rights to gay foreign spouses. In the meantime, a coalition of national rights groups and some lawmakers have asked the Obama administration to defer all pending green card petitions for gay spouses until the Supreme Court rules. “This law hurts same-sex couples in many ways, and immigration is one of the cruelest,” said Ian Thompson, a legal adviser at the ACLU in Washington. He noted that when DOMA became law, it was mostly symbolic, because no states allowed same sex marriage. “Today, you have thousands of couples whose legal marriages are not recognized by the federal government,” he said. “Now the harms are tangible.” Maryland residents voted to legalize gay marriage in a referendum last month, and Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), a supporter of the measure, met with Costello and Morales recently. Last week, he sent an open letter to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano asking that the couple’s green card application be set aside pending the high court’s decision. Van Hollen described the two women as a hard-working couple who have “contributed greatly to our community.” Forcing Morales to leave the United States, he wrote, would bring special hardship, in part because Costello is expecting twins and in part because Morales suffers from multiple sclerosis and is receiving experimental treatment at Georgetown University. “The emotional trauma they would face is both extreme and obvious,” he said. Somewhat surprisingly, conservative leaders of Maryland’s movement against illegal immigrants have not criticized the effort to extend green-card rights to gay spouses. Brad Botwin, who heads Help Save Maryland, a group that strongly opposed Dream Act legislation for undocumented immigrants, said his group was content to wait and see what the Supreme Court decides on DOMA. “Every situation has opportunities for abuse, but this is not really an immigration issue,” said Botwin. He noted that his daughter is engaged to a man from England and will probably apply for a green card for him. “The question is, which should have more legal standing, that a person got married or that the person is an immigrant? We need to let the legal process play out.” On a national level, more than 50 organizations — including gay rights groups and Hispanic and Asian-American advocates — appealed this month to President Obama to allow all pending immigration petitions for gay spouses be “held in abeyance” until the high court rules. Immigration Equality, one of the groups, filed the green card petition for Morales and Costello and also filed suit on behalf of several other gay binational couples, arguing that DOMA violated their rights to equal protection under U.S. laws. “Pablo and I have been together for more than 20 years. We never wanted to break the law or create any problems. We just want what’s fair,” said Santiago Cortez, 57, a retired school psychologist in the New York borough of Queens whose partner Pablo Garcia, 52, is a native of Venezuela. The couple married last year in Connecticut. “We fulfill every requirement for his green card but one,” Cortez said. “We are both men.” Despite its own stated concerns about DOMA, the Obama administration appears unlikely to grant the requests for a blanket “abeyance” on green-card applications. Although U.S. officials have leeway to suspend individual deportations on humanitarian grounds, they say they are required to enforce DOMA and do not possess the same legal flexibility to tinker with federal benefits such as green cards. In a statement Thursday, the Department of Homeland Security reiterated that “the Defense of Marriage Act remains in effect” and that the department “will continue to enforce it unless and until Congress repeals it, or there is a final determination that it is unconstitutional.” For Costello and Morales, who met through friends in 2007, life has been good in many ways. Their immediate families have embraced their relationship and rallied to their cause. Both women have built solid careers, and Morales, who earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in nursing from Georgetown University, has been able to parlay her studies and skills into a string of work and student visas. The two live a quiet life in the affluent Maryland suburbs, staying with Costello’s parents to save money. Morales’s Peruvian relatives, who live in Miami, often visit for Christmas and other holidays. The women love to show visitors their wedding album and the sonogram with the twins Kelly is carrying, due in July. But now, their excitement is tinged with tension and worry for the future. “We were made for each other,” Morales said, taking Costello’s hand nervously as they sat on a sofa in the family’s spacious Potomac home. “She is my best friend, my motivation in life. Our future as a family is here, together. Why should I have to choose between her and another country?”
In the United Kingdom, the Government's proposals to legalize same sex marriage could have unforeseen impacts on children, a leading Roman Catholic archbishop has warned. In a pastoral letter to churches and chapels throughout the Archdiocese of Birmingham, the Most Reverend Bernard Longley claimed the Government could not predict the impact of its legislation on children. In his letter, being read to worshippers Sunday to mark the Feast of the Holy Family, the Archbishop of Birmingham said: "Government policy cannot foresee the full consequences, for the children involved or for wider society, of being brought up by two mothers without a father's influence or by two fathers without a mother's influence. We first learn about diversity and acquire a respect for difference through the complementarity of our parents." Archbishop Longley went on: "The complementary love of father and mother is a precious gift that we should wish for every child. We know that many single parents courageously and generously look after their children and often struggle to give them a fine upbringing. If it had not been for the understanding of St Joseph, our Lady herself might have had to face the difficulties of being a single parent. Even so, the experience of growing up with our father and mother to teach and guide, to console and love us unconditionally is an invaluable blessing in life."
Harry Styles (working a must-have Burberry pea coat) spotted at Heathrow Airport, en route to New York City and Taylor Swift, Styles having shown up for an earlier flight without his passport. | <urn:uuid:50c2b72e-aa32-47d1-9956-070be0449602> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://aguynamedbrian.blogspot.com/2012/12/moscow-idaho-city-officials-consider.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973201 | 2,529 | 1.9375 | 2 |
John's dad has said of John's birth, "He had a hard time to come out." It hardly seems like a memorable quote, those ordinary words, so slightly syntactically off. But something about the expression on his Dad's face, his eyes squeezed shut, his head shaking slightly no from side to side, his hands squeezed into fists at his sides, made the difficulty of John's 10-pound, large-headed entry into the world so real. John and I used to say that to each other when we were dealing with something difficult, "This is a hard time to get through," "I'm having a hard time to deal with this," and so on. I wish John were here today so that I could say it to him, so that he could help me with my hard time, because I am, indeed, having a hard time of it right now.
I make no excuses for my hard time. Plenty of other people out there are having harder times, or would at least like a change of pace in the difficulties they are experiencing. I have my health, I have Maddie and Riley, I have a gorgeous new house, and I have a great job. I have lots of friends, I don't struggle financially, and the sun is shining.
Things are just hard lately. Work is overwhelming. There are projects and people and changes, to the point that it is hard for me to focus when I'm there and it invades my brainspace when I'm not.
It affects my parenting. I don't feel like my best self. Maddie and Riley continue to not sleep enough; they have dark circles and crabby attitudes and whiny voices. Melatonin has been a mixed bag; it seems to help Maddie go to sleep, which is good, but it has no effect on how late they do (or don't) sleep. I'm tired, too. We're all tired, and we take our crabby attitudes out on each other with our whiny voices.
Riley is engaged in an experiment called Truth versus Lie. More accurately, it's called Lie All the Time about Totally Dumb Stuff. Some of it is funny, like when he talks as though he's an expert on some totally random subject, but all of it is disturbing on some level. It's crazy frustrating to me to say, "Riley, did you dry your hands on a towel?" get the reply, "Of course, Mama," then look up and see that his dripping-wet hands by his sides. To my knowledge, he hasn't lied to me about anything big, but I feel like I can't trust his answer on anything, and it's an awful feeling. I've tried to talk to him about it, but he's unable or unwilling to articulate why he is doing this, and I'm flummoxed as to what it's all about. Attention-seeking? Maddie does tend to dominate my time, by sheer force of will. Normal, five-year-old experimentation and button-pushing? Maybe. Something else entirely? Could be, or a combo. It's exacerbated by the fact that my reaction to it appears to be out of line with what is happening, insomuch as it makes me fly off the handle and completely lose my cool.
Meanwhile, Maddie is very clingy and demanding with me. Despite the fact that, to my knowledge, I have never given her reason to doubt that I will return from anywhere I have been, she is obsessed with the idea that I might leave or not return. After she went to bed the other night, I took a bag of trash out to the can outside our back fence; when I got back inside (after an absence of under a minute, with the door left open) she was downstairs, panicked, looking for me. She'd heard me unlock the door and thought I was leaving her and Riley alone. She can't get enough of me; Riley, too, to a certain extent. After spending their whole lives in daycare and/or school, they both in the past month or so beg me to stay home every day.
I don't think it's any coincidence that all of this behavior coincides with our trip to family camp almost a month ago. We spent a week up on Orcas Island in the San Juans, doing nothing but spend time together. We slept in a sweet little cabin, ate meals in the dining hall, went to the beach every day, played games on the lawn, did crafts, stayed up late for campfire, and took naps every afternoon. We'd never in our lives had time like that together before. No work, no chores, no obligations. The night we got home from camp was miserable; I had a migraine, we were all super-tired, and on some level, we all knew that the next day was back to the endless logistical machine of life that seems to allow us little time to enjoy each others' company.
As a person, it can be hard for me to be in the moment; I'm always thinking about the chores that need to be done, what's coming next, what appointments need to be made, what food needs to be cooked, how I can prepare for what the next day will bring. Being a single parent exacerbates this tendency as I'm, for the most part, the only one who can take care of these things. Don't get me wrong: Zulma, family, and friends help out a lot. But the logistics of life fall to me, and Maddie and Riley get the short end of the stick. I'm constantly multitasking and trying to make chores fun. While this is not inherently bad, it does mean that I rarely feel like I give the twins my full attention, and often the attention I do allocate to them is not my best self.
This is not me beating myself up. This is simply an acknowledgment of our imperfect reality. And, to a certain extent, my wish that I could shift to an alternate, if equally imperfect, reality. I'm at a point where I wish I could be home more. As the kids start full-time school, I wish I could be the one who dropped them off and picked them up each day. I love the thought of taking them to their lessons and sports practices, of having more than 20 minutes to cook dinner together on the nights we don't have something else scheduled, of just getting more breathing room than the two hours at night and the two hours in the morning. I don't doubt that part of the reason they get up so early is that they want to spend more time with me. It saddens me that they crave that time even though I'm not much fun at that hour, despite my best efforts.
It's just a hard time to get through. We all seem to be unhappy with our current arrangement, but I haven't taken the space to see how I can try to fix it. My hairdresser said to me last night, after acknowledging similar struggles with her kids, that her mom has called this age the "I hate you, don't leave me" age. Yes, they can be sweet as pie, but they also seem to simultaneously not want you to go anywhere, but want to use you as their outlet for negativity. The literature would say that this is because they feel safe. Great. Age appropriate, perhaps. Combined with other forces, likely. It's just a hard time, a hard time. | <urn:uuid:b70aa23e-ecdf-4209-a000-401d94871b95> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://snickollet.blogspot.com/2011/08/struggling.html?showComment=1312662855740 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00042-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.987819 | 1,538 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Two Dutch sailors were rescued this week in rough conditions and at great risk to the rescuer when their yacht was damaged in gale force winds. They were approximately 75 miles west of the Isles of Scilly, off Land’s End, the southwestern tip of England, when the life-threatening drama occurred.
The crew set of their EPIRB, and because of the correct registration of the EPIRB, Falmouth Coastguard were able to establish that the yacht was registered to a Swedish 36ft yacht called Andriette.
Falmouth Coastguard immediately contacted merchant vessels in the area and a message was relayed from another yacht which had encountered the Andriette on Wednesday and reported that she had suffered some damage but had continued on her passage from the Azores to Malmo in Sweden.
The Rescue Helicopter from Royal Navy Air Service (RNAS) Culdrose located the damaged yacht at 10.40pm which was without steering, lying stern to the wind in heavy seas. With winching over the deck impossible in the conditions, the two men on board were instructed to abandon their yacht, get into their liferaft and move away from the yacht to give a clear passage for the winchman.
A spokesman for RNAS Culdrose said:
“Sergeant Russell recovered the first yachtsman to the safety of the helicopter and returned to find and rescue the second man, who was now nowhere to be seen. After searching the area around the liferaft Sergeant Russell then dived under it to check if the second yachtsman was trapped there. He duly located him but then had to deal with the yachtsman desperately clinging to him while he released himself and his survivor from the various ropes and lines now tangled around them.”
For the complete story, go to www.sail-world.com. | <urn:uuid:ee077a76-e984-4d71-b9d7-2fe0379a31a9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bwsailing.com/cc/2011/07/19/dutch-cruisers-saved-in-daring-rescue-off-britains-coast/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.986791 | 381 | 1.648438 | 2 |
World Bank Ombudsman scrutinizes investment project in Aguán Valley, Honduras because of human rights abuses
International organizations welcome the World Bank Ombudsman´s initiative to scrutinize an investment project of the International Finance Corporation due to allegations of human rights violations of peasant communities in the Lower Aguán valley, Honduras, and demand immediate halt to the project. The statement (attached in Spanish and English) has been sent today to the Compliance Advisor Ombudsman (CAO) of the World Bank Group and was signed by the following 17 organizations and networks:
Food First's executive director, Eric Holt-Giménez speaking on land sovereignty at the Land Grabbing II conference
Land has become a refuge for surplus capital. Many of these land grabs are not for production, but rather for short-term financial speculation and much of this speculation is happening at the hands of local global elites.
José Graziano da Silva, Director General of the FAO, joined the conference by video on October 19, 2012 to discuss the FAO’s stance on global land acquisitions
This video conference with the head of the FAO was part of the Global Land Grabbing II, An International Conference on Large-Scale Land Deals held at Cornell University on October 19, 2012. You can view this presentation and additional videos from the conference at www.cornell-landproject.org/2012/10/19/graziano/. You can also read the complete text of the director general's remarks.
Microcredit has often been presented as an archetypal tool for addressing rural poverty. By placing small loans directly into the hands of women, proponents have argued that microcredit is able to achieve two feats simultaneously. First, it tackles poverty by unleashing the entrepreneurial abilities of the rural poor. Second, it breaks down patriarchal barriers by empowering women. Portrayed as a simple, progressive and effective development intervention, there seemed little to dislike about microcredit.
By Kelly Limes-Taylor
I have always been what my father would call “oversensitive,” “gullible,” “too caring.” The world is a hard, hard place, I was often told.
Bad things happen to people. Get over it. Toughen up.
Published by Friends of the Earth Paraguay, June 25, 2012
Read the original article.
By Idilio Méndez Grimaldi*, June 24, 2012
On Friday June 15, 2012, police officers were sent to Curuguaty in the department of Canindeyú, Paraguay near the Brazilian border, to evict a group of peasants peacefully occupying a parcel of land. Upon arrival, another group of police snipers ambushed the officers and peasants, killing seventeen people: 6 police officers and 11 peasants, with dozens of people seriously injured.
By Eric Holt-Giménez, Executive Director, The Huffington Post, June 21. 2012 | <urn:uuid:56267af0-2e48-4a41-91d3-65b5c3b85555> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.foodfirst.org/en/taxonomy/term/4 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930332 | 601 | 1.65625 | 2 |
The Swami knew his end was nearing. All his actions during the last days were deliberate and significant. He said that smaller plants cannot grow under the shade of a big tree. On 4 July 1902, he meditated from 8 to 11 in the morning, rather unusually. In the afternoon, he went out for a walk with Swami Premananda and explained his plan to start a Vedic school. In the evening, he retired to hi room and spent an hour in meditation. Then he lay down quietly and after some time took two deep breaths and passed into eternal rest.
He had renounced his mortal body, but his words uttered in 1896 to Mr. Eric Hammond in London remained to reassure everyone of his immortality: 'It may be that I shall find it good to get outside my body to cast it off like a won-out garment. But I shall not cease to work . I shall inspire men everywhere, until the world shall know that it is one with God'. | <urn:uuid:7ed25071-7a9f-44ba-a9b8-87ab5ad40887> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ramakrishnamission.blogspot.com/2007/04/death-of-swami-vivekananda.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00069-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.990394 | 199 | 2.0625 | 2 |
When it first appeared in 1967, the Diesel Spotter's Guide by Jerry A. Pinkepank brought much-needed organization to the sport of diesel spotting in North America. Subsequent guides have covered the evolution of the diesel-electric, including Diesel Era's The Contemporary Diesel Spotter's Guide, 2000 edition. Now, more than 40 years after the original guide was published, authors Louis A. Marre and Paul K. Withers have teamed again to update The Contemporary Diesel Spotter's Guide, putting a Diesel Era "spin" on the newest edition. The year 2008 edition will help you identify diesel locomotives from such spotting features as hood shape, truck type, and the location and number of fans, louvers, and doors. Offered in our standard 6" x 9" size for easy carrying in the field, this 248-page perfect-bound book contains more than 500 color photographs. It is a must for railfan and model railroader libraries alike. | <urn:uuid:c579397a-ff1d-4e08-8209-34b43d05de27> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.internethobbies.com/wipucodispgu.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917286 | 200 | 1.5 | 2 |
Reform Judaism Prize for Jewish Fiction Annual Prize Carries $5,000 Award
The Reform Judaism Prize for Jewish Fiction was created in 2003 by Dr. Alexander Mauskop, a Larchmont, New York neurologist, to encourage young Jewish fiction writers. To be eligible, writers must be under the age of 45 and have published a novel or short story collection on a Jewish theme. To qualify for the prize, the writer must have authored a novel or collection of short stories on a Jewish theme published originally in English in the United States or Canada. Additionally, the writer must not have received a major book award, such as the Pulitzer Prize, Booker Award, or National Book Award, prior to the June 1 application deadline.
The first winner of the award was Dara Horn for her first novel, In the Image. Subsequent winners were David Bezmozgis (2004), Jonathan Rosen (2005), Tamar Yellin (2006), Scott Nadelson (2007) and Margot Singer (2008).
The prize is currently on hiatius and will not be awarded in 2009.
The Union for Reform Judaism is the synagogue arm of the Reform Movement in North America, and represents 1.5 million Reform Jews in more than 900 congregations in the United States and Canada. The Union services include youth camps, music and book publishing, outreach to unaffiliated and intermarried Jews, adult education programs, and the Religious Action Center in Washington, DC.. | <urn:uuid:75d4ab38-e54b-44c6-a526-43ecbc3ef989> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://urj.org/about/union/pr/2007/rjprize/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95581 | 298 | 2.15625 | 2 |
Homeland security is chiefly concerned with preventing terrorist attacks, minimizing the consequences of such attacks, and speeding recovery from terrorist attacks that do occur. That broad mandate includes aviation and border security, emergency response, anticounterfeiting measures, the protection of federal infrastructure, and cybersecurity. CBO analyzes policy proposals in these areas.
Use this menu to filter CBO's publications by topic. From January 2011 forward, all the agency's products are categorized by topic. Cost estimates released prior to the 112th Congress are not categorized by topic. | <urn:uuid:1885635d-150a-4dd8-ba33-ea63f41d66ee> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://cbo.gov/topics/homeland-security/images | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.937477 | 106 | 2.03125 | 2 |
Buying a car is definitely going to be one of the big ticket decisions of your life. A car does not come cheap and most people don’t have the money to buy one outright. Getting a car loan becomes necessary. In these times of recession when the whole world is going bankrupt getting a car loan is not easy. But as we all know, tough times call for tough measures. So if you have decided that you really want a car loan, its best you start hunting for it the right way. Read the tips below and know how you can qualify for a car loan during this financial crisis.
1> Get your credit history right. If you already have a stellar credit history you needn’t be worried as there will be quite a few lenders who would be willing to give you a loan. In case you have bad credit, prepare to search hard for that loan. In case you are a college graduate with no credit history finding a car loan would be pretty tough in these times.
2> For people with bad credit and no credit, asking a parent or a relative to cosign with you is an excellent idea. If the cosigner has a good credit history, your rate of interest will also be lower.
3> Learn to pay bills on time. At least six months before you plan to buy a car, make sure you don’t make any late or missed payment. This will reflect nicely on your credit history.
4> Buying a car at the right time of the year should be your priority. When each buck is important, choose a time when the variety of cars is the highest and the rates of interest lowest. When dealerships get new models of cars that is the right time to apply for a loan. Usually the best time you could choose is between August and November.
5> With the financial gloom looming all over the world, the sales and marketing persons are perhaps one of the worst hit. Prepare to be hit hard by them when you shop for a car loan. The lenders will be very eager to get your business whether you shop online or in a real-world situation. You should never ever bow under pressure.
6> If saving money is a priority, you can opt for a used car. Thought the rate of interest may be a bit higher than a new car, you can save a lot in total payment. But remember, you won’t be able to find a loan for a car that is more than 5 years old.
7> Make sure you make a down payment of at least 5-10% of the total price of the car. This will make the lender believe that you are responsible and serious.
Plan well before you apply for a car loan and you are sure to qualify even in this financial crisis. | <urn:uuid:d9fc0814-121f-44c3-bd5a-bacf7f696b40> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rapidcarloans.net/How_to_Qualify_For_a_Car_Loan_During_This_Financial_Crisis.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968185 | 570 | 1.507813 | 2 |
Born: c. 1700 B.C.
Died: c. 1700 B.C.
Best known as: The Hebrew matriarch who gave birth at age 91
Name at birth: Sarai
Sarah and her husband Abraham were the progenitors of the Hebrew people, according to the biblical book Genesis. Various strains of thought honor Sarah as the matriarch of God's chosen people, a beautiful, persevering wife, a strong, active partner with Abraham, and even the bearer of a lost non-patriarchal religious system. Sarai, as she is known at the start of her biblical story, marries Abram in Ur, Babylonia (modern Iraq). God promises to make of Abram "a great nation" and sends them on an adventurous Middle Eastern journey. Unable to conceive and worried about God's promise, Sarai gives Abram her young slave, Hagar, who bears his first child, Ishmael. Soon God renames Abram and Sarai and, though she is 90, promises the two of them a child. A year later their son Isaac is born, beginning the biblical line of God's promised "great nation" of Israel.
Extra credit: The name Isaac in Hebrew is a play on the words "laughed" and "laughter," echoing Abraham's and Sarah's reaction to God's announcement that they will have a child. "God has brought laughter for me," Sarah says after Isaac is born. "Everyone who hears will laugh with me."
Copyright © 1998-2013 by Who2?, LLC. All rights reserved.
More on Sarah from Fact Monster:
Information Please® Database, © 2007 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved. | <urn:uuid:d32635a7-d85d-4886-81b6-17b012a4a54f> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.factmonster.com/biography/var/sarah.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00004-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.96017 | 347 | 2.5 | 2 |
On April 10, 1999, at 0755 central daylight time, a Piper PA-28- 140, N5416S, operated by Horizon Aviation, Mora, Minnesota, collided with trees following a loss of control while taking off from the Mora Municipal Airport. The student pilot received minor injuries. The airplane was substantially damaged. The 14 CFR Part 91 solo instructional flight was operating in visual meteorological conditions without a flight plan. The local flight originated at the Mora Muncipal Airport shortly before the accident occurred. Use your browsers 'back' function to return to synopsisReturn to Query Page
The student pilot reported that he had practiced four short field takeoffs on runway 35 (3,998' x 75', paved) just prior to the accident takeoff. He then decided to practice a soft field takeoff. He stated he is 99% sure that he applied 20 degrees of flaps for the takeoff. He then held the yoke back and applied full power. He reported he felt the nose lifting and he "...failed to keep it from going too high and felt the back end raise." He stated the airplane got out of ground effect without enough airspeed to remain airborne. He reported he held the airplane "...steady but I was losing altitude and heading towards a tree line to my left side." The airplane contacted trees in a wooded area off the left side of the runway. The student reported the local winds were from 010 degrees at 10 knots gusting to 15 knots. | <urn:uuid:1b6d9309-dfb9-41d5-8c12-7a95ad2d2c9d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ntsb.gov/aviationquery/brief2.aspx?ev_id=20001205X00435&ntsbno=CHI99LA125&akey=1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962304 | 299 | 1.828125 | 2 |
There’s a misconception that the most successful business leaders achieve greatness because they’re insanely smart—geniuses, even.
But the truth is different. Most highly successful leaders really aren’t the smartest people in any room. Rather, they have something that sets them apart. That something is sponge and stone. I’d argue that for any entrepreneur or leader, sponge and stone is the critical differentiator that defines his or her likelihood of success. (And I’d take success over smarts any day.)
In the business world, a sponge is someone who is tirelessly driven to seek and absorb new information. In general terms, this means someone who is highly curious, possibly even somewhat obsessive, about gathering data and learning from it.
A business leader must also be a stone. There are two main characteristics of stone behavior: First, these determined individuals aren’t the smartest people in the room, but they work harder than everyone else. Secondly, stones have incredible strength of conviction. They are tough-minded and believe in whatever they are pursuing or doing, regardless of the challenges, hurdles, naysayers, and failures they encounter. | <urn:uuid:766d7875-9ee5-40f9-8393-ab9c8ccdf1a7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://briannegarcia.tumblr.com/tagged/forbes | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957307 | 239 | 2.078125 | 2 |
Creating a Hunger-free Bangladesh
Forty percent of Bangladesh's 150 million people live below the poverty line. The country faces enormous challenges of gender discrimination, high population density, youth unemployment and climate change. And, according to Hunger Project Vice President and Bangladesh Country Director, Prof. Badiul Alam Majumdar in a recent radio interview, “hand outs and foreign aid have created a mindset of dependency.”
That’s where The Hunger Project (THP) and its capacity-building work make the difference. Badiul shared, “Ours is a homegrown strategy. It’s grassroots based, women focused and because of that, it is likely to be sustainable...THP does what is missing: unleashing the human spirit; unleashing leadership.” (Listen to the full interview.)
Since 1990, The Hunger Project-Bangladesh has become the largest volunteer organization in the country, and is recognized as a leading voice for the rights of girl children. More than 260,000 volunteer animators and youth leaders are now mobilizing millions of others to take self-reliant actions. They are initiating projects such as education campaigns for safe drinking water and sanitation; forming self-help groups for income-generation; and advocating for an end to violence against women. Check out a video of one such animator in action.
Throughout the month of June, during an awareness-building and fundraising tour throughout the United States, Prof. Majumdar shared with hundreds of people how The Hunger Project difference can be seen throughout the villages of Bangladesh. Volunteer animators are deciding on their own priorities, mobilizing their communities to take action and creating a new future: a self-reliant and hunger-free Bangladesh.
You can join us and take action to create a new future by investing now to train and empower the volunteer animators and youth leaders of Bangladesh. | <urn:uuid:dae0fc79-05bb-4439-8a1e-6ce517a09b68> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.thp.org/learn_more/news/latest_news/creating_hunger_free_bangladesh | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939074 | 385 | 2.390625 | 2 |
Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, known to Jews as Rambam and to the world as F1, became the most famous physician of the medieval world. Born in 1135 in Cordoba, Spain, his 14-volume magnum opus, Mishneh Torah, stands as perhaps the greatest explication of Talmudic law and wisdom ever written and is still a centerpiece of Jewish scholarship. Maimonides is also credited with one of the earliest medieval revivals of Aristotelean philosophy.
It is not clear how or from whom Maimonides obtained his medical training, although he modeled himself in medicine after the writings of Hippocrates, Galen, and Aristotle. Maimonides did not seriously practice medicine as an occupation until after the tragic death at sea of his beloved younger brother, David, in approximately 1170. Maimonides plunged into what undoubtedly was a major depression. Abraham Heschel quotes Maimonides’ description of depression:
When a man with a powerful frame, a sonorous voice, and a radiant complexion hears sudden news that greatly afflicts him, one can see his face turning pale, the glow dimming, the body hunching, the voice faltering, and when he tries with all his might to raise his voice, he is unable to do so, his strength is weakened. Indeed, he often trembles with feebleness, his pulse slows down, his eyes move back in their sockets. His eyelids grow so heavy that he cannot move them, his body becomes cold, and his appetite vanishes. (1, pp. 127–128)
From this melancholic depression came a profound conviction of the connection between mind and body and the necessity to minister to the "soul" in order to maintain physical health.
Maimonides wrote 10 major treatises on medicine. The Regimen of Health, written in 1198 for the eldest son of Saladin the Great, a man who apparently also suffered bouts of depression, is, according to Fred Rosner, "perhaps…the first description of psychosomatic medicine. He indicates that the physical well-being of a person is dependent on his mental well-being, and vice versa" (2, p. 10).
Maimonides put the treatment of mental illness on equal footing as that of physical illness, insisting, for example, that the physician provide immediate psychiatric care following a suicide attempt. He ruled that fear and anxiety needed to be assessed before invasive medical procedures are considered. He recommended a kind of exposure therapy to remedy some aspects of the "sick soul" and explained that treatments of mental anguish and maladaptive behavior, such as melancholy or excessive anger, should only be undertaken by sages specifically trained to deal with such ailments.
Maimonides believed passionately that doctors are only instruments of God’s will. Yet he demanded that medical practice be guided by careful empirical observation. In an era of not infrequent hostility between science and religion, it is refreshing to read the works of a great scholar and physician who seamlessly combined medicine and religion into daily life.
Address reprint requests to Dr. Gorman, Department of Psychiatry, New York State Psychiatric Institute, 1051 Riverside Dr., New York, NY 10032. Image courtesy of the New York Academy of Medicine. | <urn:uuid:0ac20dd3-3801-4dea-802f-2f8f191bf43c> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/article.aspx?articleid=174641 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.966763 | 670 | 3.609375 | 4 |
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|This article describes a commodity traded on a commodities exchange. View articles referencing this commodity.|
Lumber, timber, or trees cultivated and harvested for commercial purposes, is used in a wide range of industries. Timber's end products are among the most basic yet widely used goods in the world and include lumber, paper, cardboard, and various containers and packaging materials. In addition to these staple goods, timber has recently been used in the production of cellulosic ethanol, a promising source of renewable energy.
The timber industry is unique in several important ways. First, different end uses require different types of trees. Geographic location largely determines the types of trees timber companies produce, which can limit the industries to which a company can sell its timber. For example, a timber company that operates in just one region where only paper-grade trees grow would be unable to do business with lumber companies. A second notable feature of the timber industry is that its products continue to grow until they're harvested. Unlike other goods from living sources, trees have an extremely long shelf life, allowing the timber industry to weather periods of poor market conditions with relative ease.
Due to its role as a supplier to many different industries, the timber industry itself is subject to a number of external market forces. Conditions in the markets for paper, lumber, or other timber products largely determine the demand, and therefore pricing, in the timber industry as a whole. In addition to events specific to individual markets, general changes in macroeconomic conditions, such as an interest rate increase, can have implications for the timber industry.
Lumber Futures contracts are traded on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange under ticker symbol LB and are delivered in January, March, May, July, September, and November of ever year. (For more information on commodity tickers, check out the commodity ticker construction page.)
The largest end market for timber products is the construction market, particularly the residential construction market. An average new home built in the U.S. contains over 14,000 board feet of lumber. As such, conditions in the housing market can have a significant impact on lumber-grade timber prices. Increases in residential construction would increase demand and prices for lumber, while housing slumps can put downward pressures on prices as demand declines.
Interest rates can impact timber prices in several ways. Rising interest rates can have a negative impact on consumer spending, especially in the housing market. As interest rates rise and it becomes more expensive to purchase a home, residential construction will likely slow, decreasing demand for lumber. This would likely lead to lower timber prices. Falling interest rates, on the other hand, could stimulate the housing market and increase residential construction by making it more affordable for people to buy houses. The increased demand would drive prices upward as a result.
Declining demand doesn't necessarily lead to lower prices. Timber companies can somewhat offset lower demand by reducing production capacity, thereby tightening the supply of timber goods as well. Due to the organic nature of its products, the timber industry has a particular incentive to cut production and wait out periods of low demand. Instead of harvesting more trees and producing more end products to compensate for lower prices, timber companies can reduce output and wait for market conditions to improve. By the time demand for timber products increases again, the companies' timberlands will have grown in both size and value. Though it requires patience and a belief that the timber market will rebound, many companies take this approach, as it maximizes per-tree profitability.
Chinese timber companies, however, have not scaled back production in times of low demand. They have instead increased production capacity, building more plants and mills despite declining global demand. The Chinese demand for timber goods, particularly paper products, is currently stronger than in the global market, and much of the extra production is consumed domestically. In spite of this, the fact that China is importing less paper from other countries exacerbates the already-decreasing demand facing U.S. timber companies. Increased Chinese production capacity can put downward pressure on timber and paper prices around the world.
Perhaps the paragraph above was true when written but it is highly doubtful now. China has a serious shortage of timber at a time when it's domestic demand for lumber for housing is increasing dramatically. Historically China has imported logs and done the conversion to lumber. This, too, has been changing rapidly and today China is shifting and more lumber is being imported. This is a significant trend reversal. "Softwood lumber imports to China have increased by 81% in 2009. It is not inconceivable that China will import more lumber than Japan in 2009, a historical first. Canadian sawmills have been the major beneficiaries of this new fast-growing market, reports the Wood Resource Quarterly."
Timber prices can be significantly impacted by natural disasters. Domestically, timber-producing regions are located in several parts of the country, exposing them to various natural disasters, including forest fires in the West and hurricanes in the East and Southeast. The risk of damaging insect infestations can also pose a substantial threat to timber companies across North America. For example, an estimated 17 million acres of lodgepole pine trees in British Columbia, Canada, have been destroyed in the last fifty years by the mountain pine beetle. These events can all decrease the supply of available timber. In the case of hurricanes and wildfires, demand for timber is likely to increase as well because of the need to replace or repair damaged property, pushing timber prices even higher. Interestingly, all three of these natural disasters are more likely to occur at higher temperatures, indicating that global warming might be a growing factor in the price of timber products.
Environmental conservation groups often criticize the timber industry, claiming that its logging practices are harmful to U.S. forests. These groups lobby for increased legislation governing the actions of timber companies and protecting certain areas of forest lands. About one-third of the forestland in the United States is publicly owned and has been withdrawn from production. Of the remaining 500,000 acres, 29% is publicly owned and contributes very little to the Nations timber output. The timber industry is always at risk of increased governmental regulation, though there have been few instances of this happening in recent years. A Democratic victory in the 2008 presidential election could spur a rise in the number of bills aimed at conserving forests. Legislation such as this would likely decrease the size of commercially harvestable timberlands and drive timber prices upward.
TIMO: Timberland Investment Management Organization | <urn:uuid:4379ce4a-ba9d-453c-9737-98249f035629> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.wikinvest.com/wiki/Lumber | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947531 | 1,429 | 2.609375 | 3 |
The Policy of Obesity
My story is about how we start to reshape our thinking around obesity/weight issues - Obesity is not just an individual's struggle
with food or a lack of willpower; poverty, stress, unsafe neighborhoods, poor or no access to healthy food options and food
deserts are all systematic issues that lead to obesity.
Additional Photo Credit: Malingering | <urn:uuid:6b72f6f1-4328-4450-9305-74b9e9e1ca1d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mappingvoices.org/story/video/policy-obesity | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00007-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933669 | 78 | 2.015625 | 2 |
God's Plan of Salvation
Humankind struggles with a problem: sin. For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, Romans 3.23. The Bible tells us that everyone has sinned and that the wages of sin is death, Romans 6.23. The solution to the problem of sin is found in Jesus Christ, through whom we are able to have our sins forgiven, be saved from everlasting punishment/hell, and have the hope of eternal life with God in heaven. Do you believe that He is the Son of God and able to save you from your sin?
How Do I Become a Christian?
People who became Christians in the New Testament believed in Jesus, repented of their sins, confessed Jesus as Lord, and were baptized into Jesus. If you have done these things to become a Christian, then you have become a Christian the same way people were saved in the time of Christ.
- Do you believe that Jesus is the Son of God and able to save you form your sin? (Hebrews 11:6; John 3:16).
- Will you commit to a new way of life, leaving your old way behind? (Acts 17:30).
- Will you confess that Jesus is the Lord of your life? (Matthew 16:16; Romans 10.9-10).
- Will you die with Christ by surrendering to Him in the water of baptism? (Acts 2:38; 22.16; John 3.5; Romans 6.3-6).
We invite you to come and worship with us. We offer personal Bible studies at your convenience. We are here to help you with your spiritual needs. | <urn:uuid:8b84bda2-903c-48b4-b92d-12c658635706> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.ketteringchurch.com/beliefs/gods-plan-of-salvation | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00068-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961735 | 345 | 1.539063 | 2 |
An erotic dance craze sweeping Jamaica has been blamed for a number of pelvic injuries and now faces a government crackdown.
“Daggering,” a lewd dance style where couples simulate dry sex in various positions to the beat of the music, is characterized by over-the-top gyrating, heavy pelvis-thrusting and daredevil leaps.
Many couples have taken the “rough” daggering dance from the club to the bedroom, with disastrous consequences. Jamaican doctors were prompted to issue a warning on the dangers of daggering when presented with a range of fractured penises caused by rough intercourse.The number of cases tripled in the last year.
The rising popularity of the new dance — and subsequent public protests — has prompted the Jamaican government to ban songs and videos with blatantly sexual content. The videos have been making the rounds on YouTube and other video-sharing sites.
Jamaica’s Broadcasting Commission defines daggering as a “colloquial term used in dance hall culture as a reference to hardcore sex, or what is popularly referred to as ‘dry sex,’ or the activities of persons engaged in the public simulation of various sexual acts and positions.” | <urn:uuid:3c68ca1b-060e-4115-ad41-964eb5ec3eee> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.dancehallusa.com/2009/06/doctors-blame-erotic-dance-craze-daggering-for-increasing-number-of-pelvic-injuries/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.933027 | 252 | 1.671875 | 2 |
You may not know it, but Johnny Depp is unable to see 3D movies. Read more about that here. But that hasn’t stopped him from producing Hugo, the best breakthrough 3D movie I have seen since Avatar. Directed by the renowned Martin Scorsese, I can only suggest you run (not walk) to a theater and see this movie.
Many of my friends and relatives recently have stopped going to 3D movies, citing visual dullness, drab conversions, and minimal negative parallax, but this powerful film demonstrates the type of creativity that will certainly bring the doubters back. This film, based on the Caldecott award winning book, The Invention of Hugo Cabret, employs 3D for distinct artistic and visual advantage, a remarkable feat. It features extraordinary 3D portal views, multiple layers of positive parallax, and positive parallax that is almost as good as negative parallax. And one more thing. The movie successfully revives, after an uncomfortable drought, the beauty and importance of negative parallax.
In the film, one of the lead characters reminisces that movies are “like seeing dreams in the middle of the day.” The artistic use of 3D in this film makes that statement an even truer observation. Incidentally, this movie was so enthralling that the audience sat quietly and listened to the closing score well through the credits. The audience, young and old, was too stunned and enchanted to unseat themselves. (There is some research evidence that 3D visual effects are greatly enhanced by a rich audio experience.)
This movie shows what is possible for the future of 3D, and for the future of 3D in education. I will write about that in a future post. For now, take time to be delighted. See the movie. | <urn:uuid:2ca2b207-cd35-4044-ac0d-196dc46ecf86> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://edtechfuture-talk.blogspot.com/2011_11_01_archive.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00021-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952262 | 375 | 1.617188 | 2 |
The torch is on the home straight now. From Clissold Park, where the torch passes on Saturday, it is only four miles as the crow flies from the Olympic Village. Until now the Olympics has been an abstract in London life: omnipresent, in the blur of tube posters and the endless stream of schoolchildren trailing egg-carton-and-Frostie-packet stadiums out of the school gates, but still intangible. By Saturday evening, when it reaches Hackney Marshes, the torch will be within sight of the velodrome; before that it passes through Shoreditch, Hoxton, Dalston, and Clissold Park in Stoke Newington.
I have lived near Clissold Park almost my whole life. I splashed and shrieked in the paddling pool until my teeth chattered when I was tiny; as a teenager I climbed trees to smoke illicit cigarettes and talk about boys. The very first time I left the house with my first baby, it was for a walk around the Clissold Park ponds.
The park has been transformed during this time. From being rundown and dowdy, with algae in the New River and teardrops of grease in the cups of tea, it has come into a Lottery windfall and been spruced into an urban planner's fantasy vision of communal space, all landscaped imaginative play and salted-caramel ice cream.
But gentrification is not the point; not at all. In the early 1990s, when it was scarred by burned out benches and graffiti, Clissold Park was still beautiful. The candles on the horse chestnut trees – especially the huge pink one, that stands in the centre of the southwestern lawn – are just as glorious, come late April, in the bad times as in the good. When blanketed under a lawn of white snow, or heady in the glow of a heatwave, the park has always been magical.
The park has been through dramatic swings of fortune; in the late 19th century it was snatched from the jaws of developers to become a public space. An ancestor of Virginia Woolf inhabited Clissold House, now the park cafe, when it was a private home. After visiting the park in 1937, she wrote in her diary of the contrast between the life her family would have led there when the house was an elegant private home in which "Grandpapa studied The Times while [his wife] cut roses", with the noise and bustle of 1930s "Clissold Park mothers; & cakes & tea; the smell – unpleasant to the nose – of democracy". Her use of mothers, cakes and tea as an image to conjure bad smells and undesirables jars now, in an age where the yummy mummy is derided as a figure too frivolous for our age of austerity.
How times change. And yet, some things don't, and one constant is the way in which green spaces are at the heart of urban life. This sounds like a contradiction, but it's not, because urban life is all about embracing contrast, about accepting light and shade as the right and proper way of the world. Woolf also wrote about life in London that in the "street outside, one catches a word in passing and from a chance phrase fabricates a lifetime". From these overheard conversations, she suggested, it was possible to "penetrate a little way, far enough to give oneself the illusion that one is not tethered to a single mind, but can put on briefly for a few minutes the bodies and minds of others".
She was writing about London, but the same is true of city life anywhere, of course. On the street or the tube these other lives rush by in a hurry, but in the park they linger cheek by jowl with yours. You see someone else's child do their first wobbly, triumphant bike ride and you share beaming smiles with their proud dad; you share a park bench with strangers, absentmindedly eavesdropping as you finish your sandwich. The boundary between public and private blurs, just a little.
Fortunes rise and fall, and each era leaves its mark. People say that the stately giant terrapins which live in the ponds are the result of the long-gone Ninja Turtle playground craze. Cute, inch-long terrapins were briefly popular as pets; when the creatures outgrew their tanks, parents smuggled them to the park and tipped them into the river, where they grew to the size of footballs and can be seen sunbathing on warm days. Virginia Woolf, skater kids, Bugaboo mums and Ninja Turtles: there's something for everyone in this park.
Jess Cartner-Morley is the Guardian's head of fashion | <urn:uuid:dedc47e2-207d-403a-8b89-00d739e9b598> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/jul/21/olympic-torch-day-64-clissold-park | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00016-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.970844 | 980 | 1.757813 | 2 |
The life of notorious Harlem drug kingpin Frank Lucas may have gotten the epic, big-screen treatment with American Gangster, starring Denzel Washington as Lucas. But if you ask documentary filmmakers Ron Chepesiuk and Al Bradley, there was another black, New York capo named Frank that made Lucas look like small potatoes.
Chepesiuk and Bradley collaborated on The Frank Matthews Story: The Rise and Disappearance of America's Biggest Kingpin, which will be playing Friday at the Hayti Heritage Center in Durham. It's a fast-paced, investigative chronicle of Matthews, the Durham-born drug dealer who ended up controlling all the heroin dealings up and down the Eastern Seaboard in the early '70s. The only black drug lord to have direct ties with the famed French Connection drug pipeline, his Brooklyn-based operation stretched across 20 states, making him a target in the eyes of both the feds and the Italian Mafia. In 1973, Matthews went from gangster to fugitive when he jumped bail, supposedly taking with him $15 million–$20 million and a beautiful girlfriend, and hasn't been heard from since.
"I came across Frank Matthews and I was just fascinated by this story," says Chepesiuk, 56, a Canadian-born, true-crime journalist and author who has spent five years researching Matthews. "You know, a young, Southern kid goes north and makes it big as a criminal. And not only that—it follows some of the usual patterns—but he becomes an international dealer. And perhaps, I would say, the first, big, African-American drug dealer in history."
Chepesiuk got together with documentary filmmaker and music-video director Bradley (also known as "Al Profit") last fall to collaborate on the film. "For me, the crime story is interesting," says native Detroiter Bradley, 36, "but also the history of Durham and just looking at the conditions in America that allowed the stars to align in the late '60s and '70s—with the rise of drug use and the civil rights movement, etc.—all kind of coming together to allow this creation of the black super-gangster of the early '70s."
The pair traveled to New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Durham, snagging interviews with friends and confidants, fellow black mobsters who did business with Matthews, and law enforcement officials who were (and still are) on the hunt for Matthews. They found that Matthews' legend has turned him into a real-life Keyser Söze, with those who knew Matthews—especially folks from Durham—not wanting to say much. Says Bradley, "You almost get the impression in Durham that people think he's on the outskirts of town, waiting to hear something bad about him and he's gonna come in and do something."
Even law enforcement officials gave cooperative but limited support. "They didn't want to give us too much information, and they certainly didn't want to give us and pictures or anything," says Bradley. "Whereas, you know, I did a documentary on the Detroit Mafia and one of the federal prosecutors gave us a box with, like, a hundred pictures in it and said, 'Do what you want. I don't care.'"
"He's an urban legend," adds Chepesiuk, "and that's one of the reasons why I thought it was important to do this project."
Bradley and Chepesiuk hope that these leery people will see the film (which is also available for sale and digital download at www.frankmatthewsmovie.com) and perhaps contribute to a second, more personal volume of the Matthews story they're planning to do. "We're hoping that once people see what we did with the first documentary," says Chepesiuk, "they'll step forward and be willing to volunteer information and to help us out to do a follow-up documentary, which would be even more comprehensive than the one we just did."
Of course, they also hope that this doc will get a certain someone out of hiding. Jokes Bradley, "Maybe Frank will show up [at Hayti] to defend his honor."
The Frank Matthews Story: The Rise of Disappearance of America's Biggest Kingpin plays Friday at 7 p.m. at the Hayti Heritage Center. Bradley and Chepesiuk will be in attendance for a post-screening Q&A. Admission is $5. For more details, call 683-1709 or go to www.hayti.org. | <urn:uuid:9e546cf3-01fd-48bb-b19d-f015f8d99948> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.indyweek.com/artery/archives/2012/03/22/documentary-filmmakers-investigate-frank-matthews-1970s-east-coast-heroin-kingpin-and-durham-native | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968256 | 937 | 1.695313 | 2 |
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Lettris is a curious tetris-clone game where all the bricks have the same square shape but different content. Each square carries a letter. To make squares disappear and save space for other squares you have to assemble English words (left, right, up, down) from the falling squares.
Boggle gives you 3 minutes to find as many words (3 letters or more) as you can in a grid of 16 letters. You can also try the grid of 16 letters. Letters must be adjacent and longer words score better. See if you can get into the grid Hall of Fame !
Change the target language to find translations.
Tips: browse the semantic fields (see From ideas to words) in two languages to learn more.
|Police of the Generalitat of Catalonia - Mossos d'Esquadra
Policia de la Generalitat de Catalunya - Mossos d'Esquadra
|Common name||Mossos d'Esquadra|
|Logo of the Police of the Generalitat of Catalonia - Mossos d'Esquadra.|
|Preceding agency||Esquadres de Catalunya|
|Legal personality||Governmental: Government agency|
|Operations jurisdiction*||Autonomous Community of Catalonia, Spain|
|Map of Police of the Generalitat of Catalonia - Mossos d'Esquadra's jurisdiction.|
|Governing body||Generalitat de Catalunya|
|Constituting instrument||Act 19/1983|
|Overviewed by||Directorate-General of Police|
|Headquarters||Egara Central Complex, 08206 Sabadell|
|Regional Minister (Conseller) responsible||Felip Puig i Godes, Regional Minister for the Interior|
|* Divisional agency: Division of the country, over which the agency has usual operational jurisdiction.|
The Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan pronunciation: [ˈmosuz ðəsˈkwaðɾə]; "Troopers", literally "Squad Lads") are the police force of Catalonia, one of the autonomous communities of Spain. It is the oldest civil police force in Europe, founded in the 18th century as the Esquadres de Catalunya to protect the people of Catalonia.
They were originally men-at-arms who had fought as irregulars in the War of the Spanish Succession, and were brought together by the mayor of the town of Valls near Tarragona between 1719–1721. The corps became institutionalised and constituted a militia, which intended to provide security to trade routes and fairs, exposed to constant dangers. They were constituted as a complement to the regular troops of the bourbonic army, which had to confront the Miquelets, who persisted as an insurgent redoubt of supporters of Archduke Charles. It was manned by locals, who had to speak Catalan and be familiar with the paths, caves and hiding places in the area. They were eventually placed under military jurisdiction but were less centralised than the Spanish police force (then known as the 'Intendencia General de Policía') formed in 1817, or the yet to be established ‘Guardia Civil’, both of which were systematically deployed away from their regions of origin, and were thus strangers. Throughout the centuries it has passed back and forth from Catalan authority to Spanish military command several times. They were dissolved in 1868 by General Prim after the fall of Queen Isabella II of Spain, since the Mossos had always been royalists.
They were reinstated in 1876 under the reign of Isabella's son king Alfonso XII of Spain, but only in the province of Barcelona. Under his son Alfonso XIII of Spain, the Mossos were not well regarded in Catalonia, specially by the Commonwealth of Catalonia, who paid them but had no control over them. They flourished, though, under Primo de Rivera's dictatorship. When the Second Spanish Republic was proclaimed, however, the Mossos sided with the Generalitat de Catalunya. After the Spanish Civil War, the last Mossos left Catalonia with the President of the Generalitat and the corps was dissolved by the Francoist authorities.
On July 21, 1950 the Deputation of Barcelona was authorised to create a section of Mossos d'Esquadra. These new Mossos were a militarized corps with little similarity to the earlier incarnations, with limited attributes and few in number.
With the return of democracy to Spain, the Mossos d'Esquadra grew in number and attributions. Since October 25, 1980 the force has been under the authority of the Generalitat de Catalunya (regional Government of Catalonia).
The current incarnation of the Mossos d'Esquadra was created by a law of the Generalitat of July 14, 1983, basically re-founding the previous corps into a modern police force. They are no longer a military force, but a civilian one. Since then, the Mossos have gradually grown in both number, skills and responsibilities.
The Mossos d'Esquadra have now replaced Spain's Policia Nacional and Guardia Civil within the territory of Catalonia. This process of substitution began in 1994 and was completed in 2008. In November 2005, the Mossos took full duties in the city of Barcelona.
The Mossos d'Esquadra are a police force of the Spanish state placed under the authority of the Generalitat de Catalunya, within the territory of the autonomous community of Catalonia, and in accordance with the principles of the Spanish constitution and all legal provisions therefrom derived, such as the Statute of Autonomy of Catalonia and the laws therefrom derived. The Policia Nacional and the Guardia Civil, on the other hand, are commanded directly by the Spanish ministry of the interior. They keep some officers in Catalonia to handle terrorism, identity documents, immigration and other limited responsibilities of the central government.
The Mossos are trained in the Institut de Seguretat Pública de Catalunya (Public Safety Institute of Catalonia), which also trains local police officers. | <urn:uuid:8d71ac3f-4499-426c-a7f0-9ead50fd7c56> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://dictionary.sensagent.com/Mossos_d'Esquadra/en-en/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00074-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.917033 | 1,435 | 1.75 | 2 |
They're the ones thinking outside the space capsule.
- By James Oberg
- Air & Space magazine, November 2003
NASA Langley Research Center
IN 1964, MOST VIEWERS OF TELEVISED SPACE "SHOTS," AS THEY WERE CALLED THEN, knew what it took to protect a spacecraft from the fire of reentry. It took big, heavy shields bolted to pressurized metal vessels. One of the most nerve-racking moments of the early space program had been the final minutes of John Glenn’s 1962 Mercury flight, when Mission Control waited to learn whether his shield had remained attached to the Friendship 7 capsule during the violent return.
Two years later, on June 10, 1964, another, much lighter vehicle entered the atmosphere with no one on board. In engineering terms it was nearly as daring as the Mercury flights had been. Launched on a sounding rocket to an altitude of 96 miles over New Mexico, the craft dove back toward Earth at a speed of more than 5,000 mph. Being so light, it didn’t generate as much heat from atmospheric friction as Glenn’s capsule had, so it had only a thin coating of thermal protection—no shield. Odder still, it was inflated like a balloon in a Thanksgiving day parade.
The contraption was called IMP, for Inflatable Micrometeoroid Paraglider. It was developed by a team at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Virginia, led by a young project manager named Bill Kinard. Now 71, Kinard is still at Langley as a senior scientist. His paraglider, though, is all but forgotten.
Now engineers on both sides of the Atlantic hope to see a distant descendant of IMP fly. A European-Russian team has built and tested, not altogether successfully, an inflatable reentry vehicle, and has scheduled another test for next spring. So far, their cone-shaped spacecraft appears capable of protecting an instrument capsule on the return to Earth. Designers have big plans for the invention, which has been dubbed Inflatable Reentry and Descent Technology. First, it would return cargo from the International Space Station. Eventually—if formidable technical and even psychological hurdles can be overcome—it could serve as a personal escape pod for astronauts forced to bail out from orbit.
With IRDT, the idea of inflatable spacecraft is experiencing, if not a renaissance, at least a curious second look after decades of false starts and periodic bursts of hot air. “Technically, inflatables are feasible,” says retired NASA futurist Joe Loftus, who once headed the advanced planning office at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. “The question is: What is it that will make them desirable?”
Back in 1962, Bill Kinard thought he knew the answer. His goal was simple: Get something large, light, and cheap up above the atmosphere for just a few minutes, then return it to Earth safely. Scientists wanted to refine their models of meteoroid and micrometeoroid density in space so engineers would know how much protection to install on space vehicles. “We were interested in exposing large areas in space” to see how much bombardment they could withstand, Kinard says.
Rigid metal structures were too heavy and expensive, so Kinard’s team turned to unconventional approaches. Langley had already come up with the inflatable Echo balloon, which had an aluminum-coated Mylar surface that in 1960 was used to bounce radio signals back to the ground. Another group at the center was looking at using a modified Rogallo wing (the famous prototype of the hang glider) as an alternative to parachutes for gently landing a Gemini capsule. To reduce weight, the engineers replaced the wing’s metal struts with long cylinders made of tough fabric, which were inflated with gas until rigid.
Kinard’s team liked that idea, and started working on a paraglider that would be inflated with compressed nitrogen and would have a large surface area that could be covered with sensitive electronic meteoroid detectors. After launch, the paraglider would separate from its carrier rocket, inflate, spend about five minutes getting pelted by meteoroids, then fly back through the atmosphere for a desert landing at the Army’s White Sands missile range in New Mexico. | <urn:uuid:b9a88425-3053-42a6-99e0-99a0d0a9f797> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.airspacemag.com/space-exploration/cit-oberg.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965883 | 897 | 3.390625 | 3 |
Virginia House Republicans are poised to vote this week on a surprise Senate redistricting proposal that could give the GOP control of the state Senate for years to come, but also cost Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell his legacy.
House leaders repeatedly put off action last week on a plan that would redraw Senate boundaries to give Republicans an advantage in the 2015 statehouse elections. The Senate passed the plan by one vote on Jan. 21, when Republicans put it up for a quick vote in the evenly divided chamber while one Democrat, Sen. Henry Marsh of Richmond, was attending President Obama's inauguration in Washington.
The maneuver garnered attention from late-night comedians, who mocked Republicans for making such a power grab while Marsh, a civil rights icon in Virginia, was attending the inauguration of the nation's first black president on Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
But furious Democrats said that if the redistricting plan is approved, they would derail McDonnell's transportation funding initiative, which the Republican governor hoped would cement his legacy in his final year in office.
It's the second time in as many years that McDonnell's fellow Republicans have put him in the difficult position of balancing his pragmatic legislative agenda with the ideological principles of conservatives in his party. Last year, Republican lawmakers pushed through a slew of social bills that loosened gun laws, restricted abortion and curbed gay rights despite McDonnell's warning not to overreach.
"He's trying to make the GOP in Virginia a guidepost for national Republicans, and Republicans in the General Assembly are having none of it," said Craig Brians, a political science professor at Virginia Tech. "Every time he's tried to do something, he's been thwarted by his own party."
The stakes are much higher in 2013, McDonnell's final year in office. He has outlined an aggressive transportation reform package centered around raising the sales tax and abolishing the gas tax. The House will take up his proposal this week.
But Democrats, who share control of the Senate, won't play ball if the redistricting proposal is still on the table. While McDonnell has criticized the manner in which the redistricting bill was passed, he has not yet said if he will veto it. House Republicans delayed action until Tuesday at the earliest.
Republican leaders insist the measure merely corrects the flawed map that Democrats passed in 2011, and said they have worked to keep the controversial social battles of 2012 at bay this session.
"Name one bill that's come out of committee that's a social bill," said House Speaker Bill Howell, R-Stafford. "You can't."
But Democrats said the bad blood remains, and in a short, 45-day session, it's unclear whether McDonnell's term-defining transportation plan will advance.
"Not only are we behind the eight ball in terms of timing, now we're behind the eight ball in terms of trust," said Del. Vivian Watts, D-Annandale. "It's very hard to work in that climate." | <urn:uuid:403dae33-5109-458c-9cb4-b1c2a104a077> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://washingtonexaminer.com/article/2519761 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968079 | 604 | 1.664063 | 2 |
Full Speed Ahead on Combination GLP-1/Basal Insulin Therapy!
GLP-1 agonists (for example, Byetta, Victoza, and Bydureon) were first approved in 2005 and stimulate the body to produce insulin only when blood glucose levels become too high. Lately, the concept of using a GLP-1 agonist with a basal insulin (such as Levemir and Lantus) has received more attention; the use of this combination to treat type 2 diabetes offers a number of advantages. One advantage is that GLP-1 agonists and basal insulins act in complementary ways to lower blood glucose, meaning that the use of both therapies together may well improve blood glucose control more effectively than either therapy alone. A major advantage of combination GLP-1/basal insulin therapy is that treatment with a GLP-1 agonist can lead to reduced food intake and weight loss, which may help overcome the weight gain typically observed with basal insulin therapy. Moreover, basal insulins act slowly and over a long period of time to cover background insulin needs, while GLP-1 agonists stimulate insulin secretion only when blood glucose levels are high. This makes GLP-1 agonists effective therapies f0r post-meal glucose spikes without increasing the risk for hypoglycemia.
April marked an exciting month for combination GLP-1/basal insulin therapy, with three notable announcements made. The first announcement was that the GLP-1 agonist Victoza was finally approved for use with any basal insulin in the US. The approval was based upon a study that looked at the safety and effectiveness of treating people with Levemir, a basal insulin, who were already using Victoza and metformin. Over 52 weeks, those treated with Levemir achieved an additional A1c reduction of 0.5% over those who were not. The risk for hypoglycemia was higher among those receiving Levemir, although the risk was still low (0.228 episodes per patient year vs. 0.0034 episodes per patient year). Finally, it was shown that the use of Levemir had a minimal effect on weight. Victoza’s approval for use alongside any basal insulin in the US follows the US approval of the GLP-1 agonist Byetta’s use with basal insulin Lantus last October (see new now next in diaTribe #37). In comparison to Byetta, Victoza offers the convenience of fewer injections (once per day vs. twice per day) and the freedom to use with any available basal insulin. To date, no trials have compared the effectiveness of Victoza and Byetta when used with a basal insulin, although some scientists have argued that shorter acting GLP-1 agonists (like Byetta) may offer greater effectiveness because of their greater effects on post-meal glucose levels. Nonetheless, this approval for Victoza is certainly exciting, and we expect reimbursement and access to this treatment option to improve in the months ahead.
The second piece of news this month came from GlaxoSmithKline, which announced positive clinical trial results for its new once-weekly GLP-1 agonist (albiglutide) when used in combination with basal insulin therapy. In the trial, 500 people with type 2 diabetes received either a weekly injection of albiglutide in combination with a daily injection of Lantus or a daily injection of Lantus in combination with mealtime injections of the prandial insulin Humalog. Over 26 weeks, those receiving albiglutide achieved significantly greater reductions in A1c than those receiving Humalog (0.82% vs. 0.66%). Weight loss was also greater among those receiving albiglutide (a loss of 1.16 lbs) than those receiving Humalog (a gain of 1.8 lbs). As expected, the most common side effects among those receiving albiglutide were nausea (13.0% with albiglutide vs. 2.1% with Humalog) and vomiting (7.0% vs. 1.4%). The use of albiglutide in combination with a basal insulin could reduce the number of required injections per week by 13 versus Byetta and six versus Victoza. GlaxoSmithKline has not yet revealed when it might apply for approval for albiglutide as a therapy for type 2 diabetes, but we believe it will likely be in 2013, placing a possible approval in early 2014.
Finally, even further down the road, we also heard an update from Sanofi and Zealand Pharma on their novel pen device that will allow users to inject both Lyxumia (the companies’ once-daily GLP-1 agonist) and Lantus at the same time, eliminating one extra shot per day. Notably, the companies announced that their pen device will allow users to adjust their Lantus dose while receiving the same dose of Lyxumia every time. The device is currently under development, and Sanofi has indicated that trials will begin in early 2013. If all goes well, the device could become available as early as late 2014. Meanwhile, Novo Nordisk is taking an alternative approach to its combination GLP-1 agonist/basal insulin pen device. Instead of allowing users to adjust their insulin dose separately from their GLP-1 dose, the drugs (Victoza and the company’s latest basal insulin called degludec) will always be injected together at a fixed ratio to one another. In other words, if a user reduces the amount of degludec they wish to inject, the amount of Victoza they will receive will be reduced as well. Novo Nordisk has indicated that this approach will still allow over 80% of people to receive the right amount of basal insulin and enough Victoza to be effective in the body. Two phase two trials for this device are underway, which are expected to complete in the second half of this year. Assuming the trials complete as expected, approval may be possible as early as the end of 2013. –BK | <urn:uuid:358d65ec-f97e-41e0-be36-fd72698845b9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://diatribe.us/issues/42/new-now-next/1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952964 | 1,271 | 1.828125 | 2 |
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Issue 235, Friday 28 November 2008 - 30 Dhu al-Qa'dah 1429
Obama: living up to the euphoria
It was difficult not to be swayed by the euphoria around the world that greeted the election of Barack Obama as the next US president. The global reaction was compared with Nelson Mandela becoming President of South Africa. Only this time the hope is optimistic and more comprehensive, with the world expecting that as the first black US President of the world’s most powerful country, he would able to bring forward an ambitious agenda not only domestically but internationally to rectify some of the many ills around the globe. But such expectations put a heavy burden on Obama to live up to the euphoria.
The leaders of both close and potential allies fell over themselves to extend their congratulations in the hope of winning favour from the President-elect of the world superpower. Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, battled it out with Conservative Leader, David Cameron, in Parliament on who was the main beneficiary from his victory, while in France, President Nicolas Sarkozy was reportedly first out of the blocks to write an open letter, hailing Obama. “At a time when we must face huge challenges together, your election has raised enormous hope in France, in Europe and beyond,” he said. German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, also heaped praise, saying she was confident the US President-elect could tackle the “significant challenges” he would face immediately after taking office in January. “I am convinced that Europe and the United States will work closely and in a spirit of mutual trust together to confront new dangers and risks and will seize the opportunities presented by our global world,” she said.
To his credit, Obama galvanized apathetic and virgin voters by becoming only the third Democrat in the past 100 years to win by a clear majority. Although he was deemed to be the first black president, he essentially stood as an American, gaining most votes from youths, college-educated, suburb-swelling, socially liberal and non-white groups, including reportedly 95 per cent of Blacks, 67 per cent of Hispantics, 89 per cent of Muslim and 78 per cent of Jews. His primary message was that of inclusiveness and change which resonated with many people.
Ninety per cent of Americans already thought their country was going in the wrong direction. In effect, he can be seen as a legacy of the outgoing US President George W Bush, who succeed in reaching the highest disapproval rating of any American leader in the history of polling that goes back to the 1930s.
Obama will inherit a global financial crisis of unknown scope and a fragile world where peace has been threatened often by policies of his predecessor and where injustices continue to go unresolved. His other drawbacks are that he will not only have to address existing geopolitical realities that the burden of office places upon him but also accommodate his backers and paymasters as well as the numerous American lobbies, not least the pro-Israelis.
In his first 100 days, the President-elect has pledge to start discussions on withdrawing from Iraq and close Guantánamo Bay internment camp that has been such a stain on the US as well as end torture practices. But he will have to do much more if he is to finally end the so called ‘war of terror’ and release the thousands of Muslims lingering in unknown prisons after being kidnapped by the US forces. A crucial test is how he will handle the war in Afghanistan coupled with the turmoil caused in Pakistan.
The biggest challenge, which his predecessors have always shied away from, is the Middle East conflict, which can only be resolved by an American president bringing Israel to heel. To gain entry into the While House, he has appeased the Zionist gallery by going further than Bush in pledging to support Jerusalem to be the “undivided capital” of Israel. What also does not bode well is his appointment of Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff that caused much disdain among Muslims given his ardent pro-Israeli credentials. Emanual’s father, a former member of the Irgun terrorist group, rubbed further salt into the wounds by promoting his son’s pro-Israel influence with the president, while making disparaging remarks about Arabs.
A worrying trend during the election campaign was the way the ‘Muslim card’ was played against Obama and in response, the extent he tried to distance himself from his roots. It was notable that he even avoided any visit to a mosque, whilst he visited a Synagogue and Churches. His team removed women with the hijab from the stage where he was going to speak. The distinctive air of Islamophobia as detailed on our front page even led the resignation of his Muslim-outreach coordinator, Mazen Asbahi, months before polling day. It remains to be seen whether this trend continues to be a tool used again the new president and how he confronts it.
Despite any scepticism, there is no doubt that the election of an intellectual and inspirational president brings the potential of a new dynamism to world politics that can be hugely symbolic and a possible role model for other countries to follow suit. His style has brought a fresh approach to American politics, devoting much time on peace and justice. A great plus was his talk about reconciliation in his victory speech and a willingness to work even with enemies.
Obama carries with him much hope from the goodwill of the world as a harbinger of peace and justice, which is so desperately needed. How he proceeds will depend more upon his actions than his articulate words. One major concern is that he may become bogged down in domestic problems and become isolationist. For the record, he already appears to favour protectionism.
As euphoria dies down, the world will watch and see how his rhetoric to bring about a more just and peaceful world is put into practice.
Back to the front page
The Muslim News | <urn:uuid:bec448d3-3649-47e4-ac1d-097a53437211> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://archive.muslimnews.co.uk/paper/index.php?article=3781 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00066-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976308 | 1,234 | 1.640625 | 2 |
The bustle of everyday life keeps most parents busy. Putting aside time for their kids can pose a problem at times; especially uninterrupted quality time. Being a mother of two little ones between the ages of two and five opens a mother's eyes to the desire these children have to have mommy's undivided attention. Simply being in the room is unacceptable, especially when the mother's attention is on some other project: work, hobby, or simply zoning on the television. Children notice these types of things; if parents are merely present or actually focused.
Especially at young ages, children need the quality time; not only do the interactions help assist in the learning process, but help the child feel needed and loved. Neglecting to put aside time can cause little ones to feel unimportant and cause undue emotional distress.
Being attentive and praising a child's accomplishments, even small ones, assists in building character and a sense of self-worth. No parent wants their child to feel unneeded and the timeframe is short where these growing individuals actually desire the attentiveness of their parents to such a high degree. Once the child has grown into a more independent individual, each one will venture out to new adventures, leaving the parents stunned at how quickly their small lovable babies have 'left the nest'.
It is a horrible feeling for a parent that realized precious time watching their children grow was spent balancing the checkbook, clipping coupons, or watching television. Not that these endeavors are not important, but proper time management would allow for these other items to be done when kids are not vying for attention.
Children also learn by example, and experiencing a lack of attentiveness may in turn cause the children to mimic this behavior. It is not merely important to be attentive to other people, but in all situations. There is also a safety concern to consider if people do not remain attentive to their surroundings. In the workplace, attentiveness to detail is a primary concern that assists in gauging employee's performance.
In practicing attentiveness, a parent can teach young people the importance of this quality to their child. Going one step further to teach them about the attribute can help mold them into successful and courteous people. Horton Hears a Who by Dr. Seuss is an excellent book that parents can read with their children that helps teach about the subject. Another way to encourage attentiveness is to ask questions and encourage discussions about its importance. | <urn:uuid:57bc91f3-9f14-446c-a265-84269debfd4b> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.examiner.com/article/the-importance-of-attentiveness?cid=rss | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960953 | 490 | 3.015625 | 3 |
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - All that virtual boxing, bowling and dancing along with video game systems might not be helping kids meet their daily exercise requirements, a new study suggests.
In the report, kids who were given so-called active video games to play on a Nintendo Wii didn't end up logging any more moderate or vigorous physical activity than those given games they could play sitting on the couch.
Researchers said that it's still possible playing active Wii games instead of other video games or simply watching TV could mean youngsters burn a few extra calories.
But, "is the Wii going to really contribute to getting those sixty minutes of physical activity (a day)? I don't think it will," said Jacob Barkley, an exercise scientist from Kent State University in Ohio who didn't participate in the new research.
Some public health researchers have hoped that active video games might be an alternative to outdoor play and sports for at least some of the physical activity kids need -- especially for those who live in unsafe neighborhoods where playing outside isn't always an option.
To try to see if that's the case, researchers from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, designed every kid's dream study: they passed out Wii consoles to 78 kids who didn't already have one, and gave half the kids their choice of active game -- such as Wii Sports or Dance Dance Revolution-Hottest Party 3 -- and the other half their choice of inactive game, such as Disney Sing-It Pop Hits or Super Mario Galaxy.
Halfway through the study, the kids, all nine to 12 years old and above average weight, got their choice of a second game from the same category as their first.
Tom Baranowski and his colleagues tracked the youngsters for 13 weeks, testing their physical activity levels with a motion-measuring device called an accelerometer.
Participants wore the devices on a belt during four different week-long periods throughout the study, which allowed the research team to determine when they were sedentary or lightly exercising and when they were engaged in moderate-to-vigorous exercise. Kids were generally good at complying with those instructions because if they did, they got to keep the Wii after the study was over.
Accelerometer logs showed that throughout the study period, kids with the active games didn't get any more exercise than those given inactive video games.
At weeks one, six, seven and 12, kids in the active game group got an average of 25 to 28 minutes of moderate or vigorous physical activity each day -- compared to between 26 and 29 minutes in the inactive video game group.
There was also no difference in minutes spent doing light physical activity or being sedentary during any week the researchers monitored, they reported Monday in the journal Pediatrics.
"We expected that playing the video games would in fact lead to a substantial increase in physical activity in the children," Baranowski told Reuters Health.
"Frankly we were shocked by the complete lack of difference."
Baranowski said his team couldn't tell if kids just didn't end up exerting much energy playing the active games, or if they compensated for exercise they got playing Wii with less exercise at other points in the day.
Though the results represent a single experiment and aren't definitive, he said, "Our study indicates that there's no public health benefit from having those active video games."
Nintendo was not available for comment before deadline.
It's still possible that kids playing active Wii games burned a few extra calories during their gaming sessions that the movement device didn't pick up on -- for instance, if they were moving their arms a lot in a boxing game, Barkley said.
Over the course of a year, he said, playing an active instead of totally inactive video game could translate into a couple extra pounds of weight loss -- or fewer pounds of weight gain.
"Maybe the Wii isn't going to increase physical activity a whole heck of a lot," Barkley told Reuters Health. "But it might increase caloric expenditure a little bit more than a traditional sedentary video game, and if you do that on a daily basis that could have a cumulative effect that might be beneficial."
Kevin Short, who has studied exercise and video games at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center in Oklahoma City, agreed.
"The Wii could serve as a potential replacement for sedentary screen time," like TV or other video games, he said.
"If we could replace some of that time when they're just sitting still and not moving... with something active, that may provide some benefit," Short, who wasn't involved in the new study, told Reuters Health.
But, "just because you can play soccer on the Wii, doesn't mean you should stop playing it outside."
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/jsoh2p Pediatrics, online February 27, 2012.
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Are YouMoney Smart? | <urn:uuid:203be2e4-8187-4567-9263-2b65b0b945b6> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.lifescript.com/health/centers/healthy_home/news/2012/02/27/active_video_games_dont_mean_kids_exercise_more.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968817 | 1,079 | 2.546875 | 3 |
Campaign ads want viewers to think they’re just exposing the truth that voters need to hear, but a new study finds campaign attack ads from outside groups are about 85 percent false.
Analysis conducted by the Annenberg Public Policy Center on behalf of the Center for Responsive Politics indicates that four of the biggest third-party spenders in political advertising have not only been shelling out the big bucks on attack ads that contain false claims over the past six months. The vast majority of spending – 85 percent – by these groups, referred to as 501(c)(4)s because of their place in the tax code, was on ad spots that included at least one false assertion.
The ads were fact-checked by the groups like FactCheck.org, PolitiFact.org, the Washington Post’s Fact Checker and the Associated Press.
According to the IRS, a 501(c)(4) is an organization meant to “promote social welfare to benefit the community.”
In this case the community seems to support the GOP. Each of the four top-spending groups named in the report lean Republican. As of June 1, no ads had been sponsored by a 501(c)(4) with Democratic leanings.
Crossroads GPS, the group founded by Karl Rove, has the worst record, according to Annenberg. It has dropped $10.3 million on attack ads with at least one inaccuracy. The organization is the creator of many anti-Obama ads. The most recent being “Stopwatch,” which claims that Obama’s negligence is growing the national debt by $1.4 million every 30 seconds.
In second place is The American Future Fund, which has spent $6.4 million on ads with at least one false claim, according to the fact checkers. It has also spearheaded the attempt to convince the FEC to loosen the definition of “clearly identified candidate” in order to sidestep regulations requiring organizations that run ads attacking candidates to reveal their donors. Read more about that effort here.
Americans for Prosperity and the American Energy Alliance, the third- and fourth-ranked spenders, have shelled out more than $5 million and $3.3 million, respectively, for ads with errors.
None of the groups ranked by Annenberg, thanks to their 501(c)(4)s status, are required to disclose their donors. | <urn:uuid:8319b3fb-5445-4bb5-90cf-e4d2d1d6a368> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/06/vast-majority-of-attack-ads-include-false-claims/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00059-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968123 | 496 | 1.59375 | 2 |
Arthur Seldon was born in 1916 and has lived through the most dynamic and volatile century in the history of mankind. His advocacy of and undeterred belief in classical liberalism have sought to combat the intoxicating and deceptive 'comfort' of collectivism created by the instability of two world wars and unprecedented technological and sociological change.
Published by Liberty Fund The Collected Works of Arthur Seldon spans sixty-five years of Seldons influential thought and elaborates on the genesis of almost all the public/private debates currently before the world. His arguments are as compelling and relevant today as they were over half a century ago.
The Complete Set - All Seven Volumes
Each volume of The Collected Works of Arthur Seldon is available to buy individually. Alternatively, these beautiful hardback books are available as a complete set. Purchasing a complete set represents a saving of £17.00 over buying the volumes individually.
The Seven Volumes
The seven volumes are available to buy individually for £13.95 inc P&P
For more on Arthur Seldon's outstanding contribution to economic life, see: | <urn:uuid:cc9700e4-d7ba-4ae7-a45f-1b055841c811> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.iea.org.uk/publications/recommended-reading/the-collected-works-of-arthur-seldon | 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 | 0.945943 | 224 | 1.679688 | 2 |
For those of you that can't tell, I am a huge mobile apps fan! Not only do I access my family trees through my phone, but basically run my life through it. Kroger digital coupons, ordering through Amazon, GPS tags, banking, bookshelves, and my QR code scanner are all on there and I pretty much use them daily. As a working professional, mom, and wife, it is a way of life that has saved me more than once. So any mobile app that I can find that will help me organize my research is worth a try.
Zotero is a website that has quite a few apps to choose from for storing citations and references, including the option to capture images of text for some apps. The apps that are provided are mainly for Android, but there are a few options for iPhone and iPad. Basically you can create a library of references, add tags, sort, and organize everything you upload. It is easiest to sort everything by surname or location, but others may find some other organization scheme helpful. Next you can create notes, books, and other media citations that can be added to continually within a folder. Think of it as a virtual binder. Then you can access your files through the app whenever you need them. I have found sites and apps like Zotero extremely helpful especially when traveling or when another researcher contacts me for citation information.
Check out the different apps available from Zotero here. | <urn:uuid:06052455-5a0a-41bc-bc85-c7e0e1dd2a07> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.geneabrarian.blogspot.com/2011/11/more-mobile-apps-i-love.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704713110/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516114513-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954538 | 293 | 1.78125 | 2 |
Water Rate Factors
What makes the City of Santa Fe's water rates different than those of others?
The City's approved water rate increase is considered proactive rather than reactive by following goals of the recently adopted Long Range Supply Plan
. The water rate increase provides for water system reliability and sustainability by adding a new water source to the City's water portfolio, installing transmission mains and rehabilitating existing water infrastructure. This is not always common, as has been reported in recent newspaper articles from around the state of New Mexico where many water systems struggle to keep up with the costs associated withe aging infrastructure.
Reliability, Redundancy and Sustainability:
The City's water rate increase provides reliability, redundancy and sustainability to the water source portfolio consisting of: Rio Grande Surface Water Treatment Plant (Buckman Direct Diversion
- BDD), Surface Water Reservoir Treatment Plant (Canyon Road WTP), 6 Shallow City Water Wells, and 14 Deep Buckman Water Wells for the City's water customers. The addition of the BDD project reduces groundwater use in the Buckman well field, thus maintaining groundwater production at sustainable levels and preserving the aquifer as a critical drought reserve. In contrast, other water systems often do not have multiple water sources available and rely on single sources (i.e, groundwater pumping via wells) resulting in a potential unreliable, non-redundant and unsustainable water source portfolio.
Numerous year round water conservation efforts have conserved water and reduced demand to approximately 101 gallons per capita per day. Focus areas have included, but are not limited to: low flow toilet retrofit program, low flow shower heads, rain barrel incentives, high-efficiency washing machine incentives, hot water recirculation systems, commercial air-cooled ice machines, and irrigation installation training programs. The City continues to analyze water conservation alternatives, considering additional or different strategies, new technologies and programs for reducing potable water demands. The City is the leader in water conservation in the Southwest while other water systems do not focus as much on water conservation and are able to keep rates lower due to the quantity of water sold.
Unique Water Infrastructure Requirements:
The City water service area has terrain changes in excess of 1,000 feet in elevation requiring a unique and complex pumping system to provide reliable and redundant water service. The water pumping system consists of shallow (<1,000 feet) City wells, deep (>2,000 feet) Buckman Wells, four (4) Buckman Well field Booster Stations and 13 miles of transmission main to move Buckman Water to the City water service area, four (4) pressure zone transfer booster stations, five (5) BDD Booster Stations and approximately 26 miles of transmission main to move BDD water to the treatment plant and to the City water service area. The City's surface water treatment plants (Canyon Road and BDD) require expensive treatment technologies (energy consumption, chemical addition, etc.) to provide for treatment of extremely variable reservoir and river water quality (turbidity, algal blooms, etc.) in order to treat the City's water in accordance with Federal Safe Drinking Water Act requirements. The City's water distribution system dates back to the 1880s and consists of ten (10) pressure zones (due to terrain) and approximately 610 miles of pipe, with portions of the system requiring upgrades to old pipes that have exceeded their useful life and undersized pipes requiring an increase in piping size to meet current fire flow standards. The cost for water system pumping, treatment upgrades, operation and maintenance are incorporated into the ten (10) year Finance Plan
that is the basis for the water rate increase.
Development/growth pays for its own water:
Changes to water rates are required for sustainability and not for development/growth. Development/growth is required to provide water rights and/or retrofits in the amount of 110% of the development water budget in order to offset the development/growth water usage, install all new water infrastructure (including required water main extensions), pay for Water Division administrative and engineering services and pay utility Expansion Charges (UECs) future required upgrades/expansions to existing water system components due to development/growth.
Water Rates are Rising
- English & Spanish (63KB PDF)
8.2% for a Sustainable Water Future
Financial Plan Executive Summary
Low Income Credit Program
Long Range Supply Plan
Buckman Direct Diversion Project
For more information about the 8.2% water rate increase, contact Utility Billing Customer Service at (505) 955-4333 or Brian Snyder at (505) 955-4267 Email or Maya Martinez at (505) 955-5731 Email
Updated December 15, 2009 | <urn:uuid:7331830c-eddf-466b-8626-09f7d6017ef4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.santafenm.gov/index.aspx?NID=1665 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00073-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.923025 | 959 | 2.859375 | 3 |
Hinemoana Baker: The Page and the Stage
In “Our Children Have Run Away to Fiji” New Zealand poet Hinemoana Baker writes, “When they get there they make entirely/ different noises. This one used to sound human, like a laugh/ now there is more of a yawn to him in the mornings/ a knock, a vernacular; a measurement known mainly to those/ who live in America or Australia. But they were so human to us!/ Now they are so much more, so much has changed.”
In her lyrical poetry, Baker reveals her love of sound and of language. She writes in both official languages of New Zealand, English and Maori, an indigenous language that has been preserved from extinction by recent efforts by Maori leaders and supporters.
In her second collection of poetry, Kōiwi Kōiwi | Bone Bone, Baker combines a dedication to biculturalism with strong elements of humor, wit, and autobiography. She uses personal reflection to unpack the hidden meaning behind everyday moments, where an instant of mistaken identity between two strangers can become a larger comment on different societal expectations on men and women. Baker’s lyricism stems in part from her work as a successful singer and songwriter.
Currently Baker is participating in the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program. She recently performed her music and poetry at the 2010 City of Asylum/Pittsburgh Jazz Poetry Concert alongside Oliver Lake’s Big Band and writers Yusef Komunyakaa (USA), Khet Mar (Burma), Horacio Castellanos Moya (El Salvador), and Maryja Martysevich (Belarus).
In this interview, Baker talks about the tension between Maori-speaking and English-speaking culture, the pressure to reduce your identity to a simple label, and what it means to communicate with her higher self.
In your poetry, you use both English and Maori. What is your relationship to the Maori language?
Like most people in New Zealand who speak Maori, I didn’t learn it at my Nanna’s knee. I learned it at university. That’s slowly changing because there’s been a huge renaissance in Maori language and culture in the last 25 years.
I’m not, by any means, a fluent speaker but I really love it. It couldn’t be more different from English, both culturally and linguistically. I find that tension really satisfying. I’m constantly surprised, in a good way, by the differences.
How would you describe those linguistic differences?
I once heard it said that English is very good at defining the absolute, finite details about how things are different from each other, whereas Maori is very good at finding commonalities. In Maori, it’s not as possible to be clear about the ways in which we differ or disagree. It’s just not the same in English, which probably reflects the difference in the ethics of English culture and the ethics of Maori culture as well.
As a writer do you feel pressure to identify as either Maori or non-Maori?
The vast majority of Maori New Zealanders also have non-Maori heritage. However, I still feel a pressure—perceived or real—to choose, but I don’t choose. I consciously say that I’m both and aim to be as proud or ashamed of both. I’ve always been a person who doesn’t really fall into either camp and so I fall between the cracks a little bit, in terms of everything from how I live my life and what events I attend to what kind of government funding I receive.
In addition to being a poet and a writer you are also a successful singer, musician, and sound producer. What do you see as the relationship between songwriting and poetry in your work?
Lyrics need a lot more help to come alive. Poems have to perform on the page, they don’t get help from music. When Jan Beatty interviewed me on the radio for Prosody, WYEP’s poetry program, she said, “When you read I hear this rhythm and this pace going on. Is that a New Zealand language thing? Or a Maori thing?” I think it’s because I’m a musician. I don’t know if that’s happening on the page for people when they’re just reading it but I hope so. I think there is some conversation happening there.
Your first book, matuhi | needle is accompanied by Maori artwork and a CD featuring you reading poems and singing. What went into the decision to include these elements?
The book was published with the help of the actor Viggo Mortensen, and he was really interested in doing a book combining work by Maori artists and poets. Viggo was living in New Zealand, mostly in Wellington, for about two or three years making Lord of the Rings. By the end of it he really loved Wellington and wanted to give something back to the city. He approached me and said, “I’d like to publish your book.”
When he said, “Would you like a CD in the back?” I said, “Okay, let’s do that.” I know a number of people who are either dyslexic or have some sort of visual impairment. They listen to poetry a lot rather than read it. I thought the CD was a great opportunity and, because I was working on my first album at the time, I thought I would add a track or two from that. It was all fairly hasty and we probably could have done it better but it does mean that I have this amazing object. I was the most hated poet in New Zealand after it was published.
Do you have any recommendations for readers who are interested in contemporary New Zealand literature?
In terms of our literature, our poetry is really strong. A good place to start is a website called Best New Zealand Poems, published by the International Institute of Modern Letters and supported by Victoria University Press. There’s also the New Zealand Book Council which has a massive amount of links to various other places.
How would you describe the reception of poets and authors in New Zealand today?
It would be safe to say that we haven’t been a country that really embraces and celebrates our artists as much as we celebrate and embrace our rugby players. I think that’s slowly changing. We do have a bit of an attitude, that thing of like, “Well, what do you do?” or “What are you actually doing?” When I do residencies, there is a sense of, “Will you just get a real job? A job that we can understand?” That’s probably the case around the world, but particularly in New Zealand.
Does the push towards social acceptance in the job sphere translate to other parts of your life?
It’s similar also in terms of my sexuality; I’ve had relationships with both men and women. Over the years I’ve been a bit of a thorn in the side of people who would rather I was either just with men or just with women. People who think, Could you just stand up and say that you are a lesbian, please? There’s just an urge in me to resist ticking that box. In terms of living my life, I believe that things are just way more complex.
That desire to “resist ticking the box” comes through often in your work. Your poetry plays with and challenges societal expectations of gender roles. Is that a conscious decision?
It’s not so much a conscious thing as it’s just that I live my life. Sometimes I notice odd, little jarring events where it becomes obvious to me that I’m not necessarily fulfilling everyone’s expectations. Sometimes those moments are worth writing about.
I’m not working for a cause or anything like that. I am a political animal, but I don’t feel like I need to tell people about it as much. It’s integrated into my bones. I do feel issues of justice, of right and wrong, very deeply. However I also know that my best writing—and maybe everybody’s best writing—comes from those times when you’re asking questions and not knowing all the answers. One of my professors, the poet Bill Manhire, said to me that you’re always going to be writing from that spot of questioning. You don’t want to be writing from a place of: “I’m really certain of myself and I’m going to tell you all about it.”
Do you see poetry as an attempt to unearth or understand things that are otherwise hidden?
I do. For me, poetry has always been a process of learning something I didn’t know that I knew. It’s not exactly as if somebody else is writing it, but if I’m doing it well, poetry gives me access to some other kind of wisdoms that aren’t mine, but at the same time, they are. It’s like communicating with your higher self.
Read Jen’s bio. | <urn:uuid:ee542180-bc48-46c0-a2b6-529dd6516a7d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sampsoniaway.org/literary-voices/2010/10/11/hinemoana-baker-the-page-and-the-stage/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00069-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972186 | 1,957 | 1.992188 | 2 |
How To Refinish Wood Furniture
|May 19, 2011||Posted by admin under Furniture|
www.schneidermans.com One of most common questions we get asked here at Schneiderman’s Furniture is “What is the difference between solid wood and veneered wood furniture?” One is not necessarily better than the other. In this video Chad & Susan from Schneiderman’s show us what to look for in a piece of wood furniture and how to decide what’s best for you.
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Solid wood furniture often holds a special place in our homes and lives because it is so durable and beautiful and can easily be passed down from one generation to the next. Well built solid wood furniture is harder to come by these days and often costs a small fortune when bought new. More and more people are finding and buying older pieces of furniture and refinishing them to bring them back to their former glory.
The process of taking and old piece of wooden furniture that has been neglected or forgotten and restoring it to a beautiful piece of furniture can be time consuming and frustrating at times, but it can also be incredibly rewarding when you’re done. Here are the general steps required in refinishing a piece of wooden furniture:
1. Pick a piece of furniture – The first step is obviously having a piece of furniture to refinish. If it is the first time you have tried such a project it should probably be something relatively simple in design and without a lot of ornate decorations. You may also want to avoid trying your hand at refinishing priceless antiques and furniture that is in need of extensive repair. A simple chest of drawers or a single chair is a good start. Assess the piece of furniture and make sure it is mostly sturdy and able to be refinished. A flea market or large garage sale is sometimes the perfect place to find old dressers or toyboxes that have been painted over but are just waiting to be refinished.
2. Removing the finish – Now that you have a piece of furniture you’ll want to remove the existing finish. Often this finish is paint and it can be removed several ways. Using a chemical paint stripper that is made exclusively for wood is a good start, but you’ll also need a lot of elbow grease, some steel brushes and a paint scraper to really get that paint off. This is sometimes the most time consuming part of the entire job. Once you begin to remove the finish you should try to identify what type of wood your furniture is made out of because that may affect how you sand and even how you ultimately refinish the piece.
3. Sanding – Once the majority of the previous finish has been removed from every square inch of your piece of furniture you can begin sanding it. Typically you sand with a lower grade grit (lower number, rougher sanding) and move up to higher grades. Yes, you will sand the same piece multiple times. First you may go over a piece of furniture with an 80 grit piece of paper and then you may go over it again with a 120 grit sandpaper and then you may go over it a third time with a 220 grit sand paper. The “grit” refers to how many grits of sand are in a square inch of the paper. The higher the grit the smaller the sand grits and the smoother the sanding job. You sand a piece of wooden furniture for several reasons. You are removing any excess finish and you are also preparing the wood for the next finish. Be careful about over sanding! Some stains and finishes actually have a hard time adhering to a wood surface that it too smooth.
4. Repair – Once you’re done sanding you should check the piece over and make any structural repairs if they are needed. Check dovetail joints to make sure they are tight and consider replacing any metal hardware if it is not functioning properly or could damage the wood of the furniture.
5. Finish – Finally, you can now apply a finish to your new piece of furniture! There are several different options for staining from water based to oil based to Gel stains. They all have advantages and disadvantages and the stain you choose may depend upon the type of wood you’re working with and refinishing. After applying several coats of stain you’ll then want to add a protecting coat which will also depend up the type of wood and the type of stain you are using.
The process of refinishing a piece of wood, no matter how large or how small, is a long one which often requires a lot of patience, a little bit of creativity and a fair bit of persistance. Many people find that once they’ve refinished one piece of furniture that they can’t wait to find the next piece of wooden furniture to fix up and refinish!
Visit HomeImprovementsDepot.com to explore more online home improvement tips and tricks for the average homeowner and amateur handyman.
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Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin. | <urn:uuid:cfe39e56-4ab4-4205-bf1e-c651a92f3fd9> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://bleucheesefencing.com/how-to-refinish-wood-furniture/3173 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960586 | 1,057 | 1.617188 | 2 |
Regular exercise and group therapy can alleviate symptoms of Gulf War veterans? illnesses, according to findings reported at the annual meeting of the American College of Rheumatology in October 2002. A total of 1092 veterans were randomized to receive 3 months of standard care, low-impact exercise 3 to 4 times a week, weekly group sessions of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), or both exercise and CBT.
After 1 year, the exercise-alone and the exercise-plus-CBT groups showed highly significant improvements in fatigue, distress, mental health function, and the ability to think and understand. Participants in the CBT-alone group showed improvements in mental health function and the ability to think and understand. | <urn:uuid:35495854-a3ef-4ad7-81ff-359c28818c6a> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.pharmacytimes.com/publications/issue/2003/2003-01/2003-01-7057 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95225 | 142 | 2.390625 | 2 |
One of the studies I did here at Human-Computer Studies on people’s interaction with adaptive and autonomous systems investigated user interaction with spam filters. While spam filters might not appear the most exciting subject, exploring users’ interaction with them actually offers quite some interesting insights for developers of adaptive and autonomous systems. Spam filters are one of the few types of systems that take semi-autonomous decisions on the user’s behalf AND are actually used in a real-life context by many, many people. They often can also be trained and sometimes operate on somewhat nontransparent criteria.
In this study, I investigated interaction with both adaptive (trainable) and non-adaptive, rule-based filters. Turns out that while many of our participants who used an adaptive filter invested a lot of effort in training, this didn’t increase their trust, nor the level of autonomy they granted their filters; investment doesn’t always translate into acceptance. Additionally, small, sub-optimal interface design features such as filters icons caused many participants to not understand interface items, induced ‘incorrect’ training behaviour and uncertainty about filter activity. It’s interesting that while research on developing adaptive and autonomous systems is on the rise, we haven’t as a community solved some of the seemingly ‘mundane’ interface design issues on less complex systems such as spam filters.
Paper will be available as: Henriette Cramer, Vanessa Evers, Maarten van Someren, Bob Wielinga, Awareness, Training and Trust in Interaction with Adaptive Spam Filters, CHI’09. Will post link to the paper as soon as it’s available.
Not only has the note been accepted, it’s also been nominated for a best note award!
This weekend I’ll give a talk on trends in mobile HCI at the Amsterdam MobileDevCamp on 29 + 30 November. It will be an intro talk trying to get coders to not only focus on novel interaction methods and all things techie, but also into considering social interaction with mobile systems and areas such as mobile persuasion.
Check out www.mobiledevcamp.nl. “A full weekend devoted to developing mobile applications for the iPhone, Android and Symbian platforms. Organised by the Bubble Foundry and hosted at Mediamatic” The sign up procedure is somewhat cumbersome (uses upcoming.org), but it’s free and there’s lots to learn. It’s good to see these type of open events are being organized. Amsterdam needs more of them.
More research-related, I’ll also be participating in the workshop on mobile user interaction at CHI next spring. Still waiting for notifications on the rest of the stuff we sent off to CHI. Already read some quite favourable reviews, so fingers crossed for the final notification [update dec 2008: accepted. I've got a note on interaction with adaptive spam filters and two workshop papers; one on human-robot interaction, one on mobile interaction].
Meanwhile I’m also working on our experiment on human interaction with autonomous mobile systems. The experiment context will be an environmental hazard monitoring system that uses information from both a sensor network and human users via mobile devices/phones. The overarching project aims to prevent catastrophic chemical incidents and reduce pollution through quick detection of harmful gasses and identification of pollution sources. If a potential hazard is detected or reported, the system will use human observation in and around the affected area to gather more information. Participating users will be asked by their mobile agent (e.g. application or service on phone/PDA) to self-report their observations. If necessary, the system provides location-based warnings. I’ll be carrying out a controlled experiment on effects of social behaviour of the system and its positioning as a distant entity that both caters to users but also ‘uses’ them as sensors for its own means.
Posted in work
Tagged CHI'09, mobile | <urn:uuid:b57e44bd-1864-4298-9fc3-167cff82798e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://hcramer.wordpress.com/tag/chi09/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00001-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932881 | 828 | 1.984375 | 2 |
News publishers – this one included – are excited about the potential of smartphone and tablet apps as a new way to make money from subscriptions.
But at the same time, they're gauging the impact and potential of news aggregation apps: Flipboard, Zite, News360, Pulse, Taptu, Flud and numerous others. What if the app-future for news is more about advertising partnerships with these companies than paying punters for the publishers' own apps?
With 1.5m downloads across various smartphone and tablet platforms, News360 is one of the aggregation apps that has some traction. In July 2012, the company relaunched its iPad version. I sat down with chief executive Roman Karachinsky to find out more.
"We rebuilt the app from the ground up," he says. "It's meant to understand your interests, pick the right content for each one and provide a single, very relevant feed that covers all of them. We've spent literally months working on algorithms that make this come together."
News360 is tracking more than 1m different topics, brands, companies and sources, but it's also looking to do more with social networks than simply pull in tweets and status updates from friends.
According to Karachinsky, News360 is more about "sifting" through your Facebook history – posts, comments, Likes and jobs included – and using this to provide a list of news topics that it thinks will be relevant. The app then learns as you use it, based on what you read, how long you read it for, and whether you share it.
The aim is to take News360 beyond the early adopters – power users who are willing to spend lots of time refining their profiles and browsing separate categories or feeds.
"We want to map people's interests without them doing a lot of work," says Karachinsky. "People who are intelligent and want to read the news and be informed citizens, but who don't have the time or energy to put a lot of work into it. The main issue they want to solve is content overload. It's impossible for them to follow everything they want to follow."
In short, News360 is trying to steer away from the idea of social news aggregators – those that show a feed of stories that all your friends have linked to – and back towards the idea of algorithm-based recommendations that use your social profile as data to refine their suggestions.
"If your friend posted something on Facebook, you're probably going to read it there," says Karachinsky. "But if we know you're interested in space exploration, say, we can expose you to media and content that you might have missed. And then you can be the broadcaster and post stuff onto those social networks."
It's too early to tell whether the relaunched News360 app will break out to more mainstream tablet users to compete with Flipboard, Zite and other aggregation apps.
There has been a lot of money heading into these kinds of apps, whether through investment or acquisition – Zite is now owned by CNN for example. Some kind of consolidation seems inevitable, with Karachinsky saying Flipboard and Zite are News360's biggest competitors.
Having announced 8m downloads earlier in 2012, Flipboard seems the biggest company in the space, but Karachinsky is understandably keen to stress its differences to his own product.
"They're not necessarily an aggregator: they're about feeds. Taking existing streams of content and visualising them in a very compelling way, whether that's Facebook and Twitter, or a curated feed from a publisher," he says.
"That's really valuable, they're creating a new medium and doing great work in figuring out advertising strategies. But they're definitely not solving this issue of discovery."
One continuing grey area is over how online publishers – from newspapers and broadcasters to individual blogs – see all these apps, aggregators or otherwise.
Zite was sued for copyright infringement before it got bought, while even within organisations like The Economist there are disagreements over whether something like Flipboard is an important new distribution partner, or a "head-on competitor".
Karachinsky says attitudes are shifting all the time – and in favour of working with rather than against the aggregator apps – but he admits there remain internal divisions in some of the biggest media companies.
"You often have digital and editorial people really looking for discovery methods, trying to find new ways to get content out there by experimenting and trying new things," he says.
"But then the business and legal side might be really conservative, concerned about keeping rights protected and opening this Pandora's box of putting content out there. They'd rather use paywalls to monetise rather than try new advertising methods, and so on. In different organisations, the balance is different."
Karachinsky isn't anti-paywall: he notes that it seems to be working for the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal and New York Times to name but three. The latter has even signed a deal to take its paywall onto Flipboard, making stories available to any Flipboard user who pays for an NYT subscription.
Karachinsky is more concerned about working with the rest of the media industry: sites that are struggling to pay for their running costs with advertising revenues.
"If they are successful in SEO, virality and so on, they can make money but their content suffers. They become the Daily Mail or one of those sites doing top 10 slideshows of kittens!" he says.
"What we're trying to do is find a way to keep the content good and effective, and great writers writing and covering great stories, rather than falling into this trap of creating really cheap and plentiful content that's going to be terrible. The problem: great content doesn't make money right now."
And News360 has the solution? Karachinsky's pitch is that the solution is discovery: apps and algorithms that help people find the great stories that are most relevant to them, and thus drive enough traffic to those stories to help their publishers make money.
That's the theory, anyway. "It's difficult for them, because the model doesn't work yet, and there's no existing service they can look at and think 'these numbers make sense, we can do it'," he says.
"But CNN buying Zite is an interesting indicator of where this is going. CNN understands very well that in two, three, five years time, this will be the way that most people find content: Zite, News360 and other services of a similar nature."
Will they pay for it? That's even less clear. Karachinsky cites the example of Ongo, a website and app in the US that was funded by the New York Times, Washington Post and Gannett to aggregate stories from their sites and others, and charge users from $6.99 a month for ad-free access.
It launched in January 2011, but shut down in June 2012, with CEO Dan Haarmann blaming its complex pricing and Apple's 30% cut of subscriptions as key reasons for its failure.
"They were able to get some people to pay for it, but orders of magnitude less than was needed to make the service viable," says Karachinsky, who goes on to explain that for now, being a free-to-use news aggregation app may be the only way to get such a business up and running.
"If you're just a free aggregator, at this point most sources are fine because you're driving traffic. As soon as you charge, though, people come to you saying 'you're earning money, where's our share?'," he says.
"The model is not there yet. At this point, advertising is the most effective and proven model, and publishers understand how it works: the economics of it. When you have this targeted distribution that we can provide, there's an opportunity to create much more effective advertising strategies."
That's where we're in very early days still, and at a point when news publishers are trying to get their heads around several new, disruptive business models. The task for Karachinsky and his rivals is to break through any wariness with their message that discovery can have a big, positive impact on their businesses.
"There is still tons of work to be done," he says. "It's a problem that won't be solved for years to come, but we've made a significant breakthrough." | <urn:uuid:fd26d096-d770-4177-a640-2e1e7b20fc7d> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/appsblog/2012/jul/16/news360-ipad-relaunch-news-aggregation | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973302 | 1,728 | 1.546875 | 2 |
Aquarium Fish Threaten Oregon's Wild Aquatic Life
SALEM, Ore. – Oregon researchers say they’re finding an increasing number of aquarium fish living in the wild. It’s a problem that could push out natural inhabitants and destroy ecosystems.
They say that the problem is caused by people who flush unwanted goldfish down the toilet or dump them in storm drains, not realizing they can survive.
The fish work their way through sewer systems before finally ending up in small creeks and eventually, larger streams where other wild fish live.
The repercussions of flushing aquarium fish can last long beyond the water spinning down your toilet bowl.
“There’s definitely some mixed messages out there in the popular culture that releasing these things out into the wild is a good thing,” said Paul Heimowitz, Aquatic Invasive Species and Research Coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Pacific Region.
He said with increasing regularity, his team finds fish normally found in aquariums thriving in the fresh waterways.
Heimowitz said that’s because many tank fish are hearty eaters, and can ingest many different foods.
It’s especially true of the Oriental weatherfish. Native to Japan and China, they’re not picky when it comes to eating.
But the Oriental weatherfish, like many aquarium fish, require warm water to thrive. Thom Whittier, a researcher with the U.S. Geological Survey at Oregon State University, said in the future this could become a bigger issue.
Goldfish, the most commonly owned and flushed animal in the world, Oriental weatherfish and amur goby pose a serious threat to aquatic wildlife.
Scientists say they’ve found the amur goby, in “spawning condition.” That’s not a good sign for wild species that also use the spawning pools where the goby was found.
The message Oregon’s fish experts want to send is that flushing a pet fish, no matter what the situation, is never the right choice.
“It’s hard to think of that innocent little goldfish as something that could drive another fish to extinction,” Heimowitz said. “But we need to realize if they’re in the wrong place, they can be a lot scarier than we envisioned when they were in that little fishbowl.”
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You may know Tori Spelling as an award-winning actress, author, and dedicated mother. But did you know she is also a passionate animal lover, and pet… more › | <urn:uuid:f28cbef0-401b-44ab-b738-b3d324cbc0c8> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.zootoo.com/petnews/aquarium-fish-threaten-oregons-wild-aquatic-life-415 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931783 | 593 | 3.140625 | 3 |
By Polya Lesova, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- Russian and Georgian forces clashed in the breakaway region of South Ossetia on Friday, bringing the two countries close to a full-fledged war and leaving hundreds of people dead.
Russian tanks crossed into South Ossetia Friday after Georgia launched a major military offensive to recapture control of the separatist province on Thursday night, the BBC reported. Russia was quoted as saying 12 of its soldiers are dead, and separatists estimate that 1,400 civilians have died.
Russian tanks have reportedly reached the South Ossetian capital, Tskhinvali, and Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili said Russia was waging war on his country, according to the BBC.
NATO, the U.S. and the European Union have all called for an end to the fighting.
Russian market tumbles
In Moscow, Russian equities tumbled, as investors turned nervous following news of the escalating situation. The benchmark RTS stock index fell 6.5%. The index has declined 24.8% this year.
"This can be a major, major conflict," said Jack Dzierwa, global strategist and co-manager of the Global MegaTrends Fund /quotes/zigman/176273 MEGAX -0.33% at U.S. Global Investors. "That's the reason the Russian market is down."
In New York trading, the Market-Vectors Russia ETF /quotes/zigman/464082/quotes/nls/rsx RSX -0.77% , which tracks the performance of the Russian stock market, fell 5.4%.
The Russian currency, the ruble, fell more than 1% against its dual currency basket Friday, said Lars Rasmussen, an analyst at Denmark's Danske Bank.
"The ruble rarely moves this much in one day," Rasmussen said in a note. "Russian financial markets are under selling pressure as political risks are back on the agenda."
South Ossetia has been trying to gain independence since breaking away in a civil war in the 1990s. Georgia's president has pledged to bring South Ossetia and Abkhazia, another separatist region, under full Georgian control.
Russia has troops in South Ossetia on a peacekeeping mission, but the Kremlin also supports the province's separatist ambitions.
"With another trouble spot in Abkhazia, the escalation of separatist conflicts in Georgia could have potentially major security concerns for the whole Caucasus region, as separatists can only defend themselves with the help of Russia, implying an international character to the hostilities," Natalia Leshchenko, a Russia analyst at Global Insight, wrote in a research note.
South Ossetia has a population of 70,000, most of whom are not ethnically Georgian, but close to the Ossetians in Russia's province of North Ossetia. A destitute region, South Ossetia has received two-thirds of its $30 million budget from Russia and the majority of its population holds Russian passports, according to Global Insight. Russian state-controlled gas giant Gazprom /quotes/zigman/248728 UK:OGZD -1.87% is building a pipeline to the region as well as infrastructure.
"For Russia, South Ossetia is a useful means to undermine and cause inconvenience to the unfriendly Georgian government, which sees itself as the U.S. outpost in the post-Soviet space and seeks to join NATO, which is very annoying to Russia," Leshchenko said. | <urn:uuid:273df34b-d0b7-401a-8321-615e74e2d3b7> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.marketwatch.com/story/russia-and-georgia-clash-in-breakaway-region?dist=msr_1 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952927 | 736 | 1.570313 | 2 |
'We were twenty-eight men facing winter on a bleak barren beach of Elephant Island – there was a possibility of a fatal shortage of food – there was no hope of rescue – Plainly the thing to do was to take a boat to the nearest inhabited point.' Ernest Shackleton
Ernest Shackleton from Kildare, the expedition leader, Frank Worsley, captain of the wrecked Endurance, second officer Tom Crean from Kerry, seaman Tim McCarthy from Cork, and two other crewmen sailed 800 miles in the James Caird, a 20-foot open boat, to bring help from the whaling station at Grytviken in South Georgia. They survived the horrendous boat journey and organised the rescue – not a life was lost. All of them were heroes. | <urn:uuid:c6809b83-a5ea-49e7-85c2-d0e46ab0c32e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.patfalvey.com/index.php?page=shop.product_details&category_id=6&flypage=flypage_new.tpl&product_id=28&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=143&vmcchk=1&Itemid=143 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00041-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.975065 | 157 | 2.34375 | 2 |
Stocks for the Long Term: Why Prospects Are Rosy
by Dale Domian and William Reichenstein
You already know the bad news: U.S. stocks as measured by the S&P 500 lost almost 50% from the October 2007 peak though November 18, 2008. Most foreign stock indexes were off by a little more than 50% this year.
The good news is that based on today’s depressed prices, long-term stock prospects appear above average.
In this article
- Historical Evidence
- What Actions Do They Imply?
- What NOT to Do Now
- What You SHOULD Do
Share this article
In this article, we take a look at some of the evidence that supports a rosy multi-year stock outlook, and provide a framework for applying these forecasts.
Without a crystal ball, can investors get a rough “forecast” of long-term stock returns?
To read more, please become an AAII member or CLICK HERE.
William Reichenstein , CFA, holds the Pat and Thomas R. Powers Chair in Investment Management at Baylor University. firstname.lastname@example.org. | <urn:uuid:98b7bf76-33b4-499c-9746-4f045ce4bc90> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.aaii.com/index.cfm/journal/article/stocks-for-the-long-term-why-prospects-are-rosy | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00049-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.923858 | 242 | 1.601563 | 2 |
In spite of being flatly rejected by the state Coastal Commission, PG&E officials have not ruled out applying for permits to conduct high-energy seismic surveys next year offshore of Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant.
Jearl Strickland, PG&E’s manager of nuclear projects, said that before the utility can decide how to proceed, it needs to analyze the commission’s final decision as well as the considerable amount of data it has already gathered via onshore and low-energy offshore seismic surveys.
“It’s a robust and thorough process,” he said. “It will be sometime next year before a final decision is made on how to move forward.”
Meanwhile, biologists involved in two wildlife monitoring programs begun as part of the seismic surveys say information they have gathered will increase scientific knowledge of sea otters and harbor porpoises.
On Nov. 14, the Coastal Commission unanimously rejected PG&E’s request to use extremely loud blasts to map earthquake faults offshore of Diablo Canyon. The commission ruled the utility did not provide enough information about the effects of the surveys or adequately mitigate for them.
Strickland acknowledged that the determination creates a very high threshold should PG&E decide to reapply to do seismic surveys a year from now.
“The commission made it clear that it does not support high-energy seismic surveys,” he said. “At this point, I don’t see a clear path forward.”
In addition to analyzing data already on hand, PG&E will investigate using alternative technologies, look at recent work done by the U.S. Geological Survey on the Hosgri Fault and see how the Coastal Commission reacts to plans to conduct high-energy surveys offshore of San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in Southern California.
The state Public Utilities Commission authorized PG&E to spend up to
$64 million of ratepayer money to perform the onshore and offshore seismic mapping. To date, the utility has spent half that amount, Strickland said.
The CPUC supported the high-energy seismic work and is waiting to see what PG&E decides.
“PG&E will need to review its options and decide if it will reapply to the Coastal Commission in 2013 in order to best figure out what the seismic risks are,” said Terrie Prosper, CPUC spokeswoman.
The concern that crystallized opposition to the sonic blasting was the harm it could do to marine life. Two of the most vulnerable species are sea otters and harbor porpoises, both of which are territorial and most vulnerable to harm if displaced by the loud noises or exposed to them for an extended period.
PG&E funded monitoring programs for both species that were begun before the surveys’ start in order to gain baseline information. One program will continue for the next three years, and the other has been discontinued.
Tim Tinker, a sea otter biologist with the USGS, said 54 sea otters were captured and implanted with radio transmitters and dive recorders to track their movements and behavior. This is the same monitoring done on otters in Big Sur, Monterey Bay and a decade ago in San Simeon.
Originally, the goal was to monitor how the seismic surveys affected the otters’ behavior. Although the surveys have been canceled, biologists will continue daily monitoring of the tagged otters in an effort to better understand trends in the population, particularly why the local population stopped growing in 2006.
“All of the animals are doing quite well right now,” he said.
One of the reasons the population stopped growing was that an inordinate number of them were being bitten and killed by great white sharks.
Biologists theorize that infectious disease is causing the otters to behave in ways that increase the likelihood of being bitten.
Another monitoring program targeted the Morro Bay population of harbor porpoises, estimated to consist of about 2,000 animals. Again, the goal was to record how the porpoises reacted to the sonic blasting.
Biologists with the National Marine Fisheries Service flew aerial surveys of the county’s coastline, counted porpoises and installed underwater acoustic devices to record the porpoises’ echolocation clicks and ambient noise.
The program has been discontinued, but the data collected during the baseline phase will shed light on the Morro Bay population and allow biologists to refine their techniques for estimating porpoise numbers, said Karin Forney, a research biologist with NMFS.
“Harbor porpoises are one of the species that are often negatively impacted by human activity,” she said. “We had a unique opportunity to collect data that will improve our understanding of the species.”
The controversy surrounding the seismic testing also had an unexpected benefit. It increased awareness of a cryptic species. Harbor porpoises feed in small groups and avoid human contact so even fishermen and others who spend time on the water rarely see them, Forney said.
“To me, it’s nice that the Morro Bay community has an increased awareness of this species,” she said. “You can’t appreciate something you don’t see.” | <urn:uuid:a0a7f1ba-4d9e-4f1e-a29c-a9a9fc8bb957> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.sanluisobispo.com/2012/12/01/2313652/pge-may-still-pursue-permits-for.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947902 | 1,079 | 1.890625 | 2 |
This seminar focuses on key questions facing scholars of contemporary Latin American politics: Under what conditions do democratic regimes emerge and endure? Under what conditions are politicians responsive to citizens? Does the choice of political institutions matter? What factors affect institutional instability and weakness? The first part of the seminar considers a variety of approaches to regime transition, including explanations based on class, culture, and individual preferences. The second part of the course begins with an analysis of the quality of democracy and representation in Latin America. To evaluate the impact of specific institutions on democracy, the course considers the advantages and drawbacks of presidential democracy. Particular emphasis is placed on understanding variation in inter-branch relations over time and across countries. The course concludes with a survey of emerging research on timely topics including indigenous movements, corruption, and institutional instability. | <urn:uuid:024e68c0-e3c7-4359-81f8-d89d9037903e> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.rochester.edu/college/psc/courses/search.php?cid=161 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.929096 | 160 | 2.359375 | 2 |
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Hans Wilhelm Frei
An Annotated Bibliography
This bibliography would not have been possible without the kindness of Geraldine Frei, and the help of Martha Smalley and the staff at Yale Divinity School Library. The latter put up with endless requests and a long visit from me when my work on Frei was at an earlier stage, and allowed me to make many, many photocopies. There are plenty of other manuscript sources in the library ready for research, so why not make a visit?
This page is a bibliography of writings by and about Hans Wilhelm Frei (1922-1988). It is exhaustive for his published works, but selective for unpublished materials and secondary literature. In all but a few cases, Frei's unpublished works are to be found in the Hans W. Frei collection at Yale Divinity School, and more details are given in the relevant entries. The annotation is partial, but growing. I have also included, in square brackets, papers or works which I believe once existed, but of which no trace now survives.
The list includes several of the drafts and copies of Frei's letters which can be found in the Yale archive (I have tried to include any letter which has substantial reference to theological matters, or which somehow illuminates Frei's work. There are many, many more letters in the collection.) As it is not always possible to distinguish a copy of a letter actually sent from a draft for a letter that was altered before being sent, the details I give, and the texts I quote, will not always match the letters Frei's correspondents received.
I have included in the list a wide range of the many lecture notes that still exist in the archive, but inevitably I have concentrated on those things which were of particular interest to me at the time when I went to the YDS archive, and there are many other sets of notes there.
I have given several items from the archive titles of my own invention (rather than referring to them as 'Untitled notes on various topics' or similar) and have taken the liberty of using those titles in the body of the book. The bibliography entries for those items below give the game away in all such cases
We know quite precisely when Frei wrote many items. Such items have dates in roman type.
For some items, we know only the date of publication. In the latter case I give the date in italics.
Some items are not easily datable. Where I have been able to give a pretty good guess at the date, I have put them in the relevant location in the bibliography, but listed them with a question mark before the date.
Where I have not been able to get further than a vague hunch as to date, I have listed them at the end of the bibliography, with U (for undated) and an identifying number.
I have listed below many items that can be found in the Hans Wilhelm Frei Papers, Manuscript Group No.76, Special Collections, Yale Divinity School Library. I indicate these items with 'YDS' followed by the item's box and folder numbers. So YDS 13-199 is box 13, folder 199.
Hans W. Frei, Types of Christian Theology, ed. George Hunsinger and William C. Placher (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992).
Hans W. Frei, Theology and Narrative, ed. George Hunsinger and William C. Placher (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993).
From the collection of Geraldine Frei.
- 1956a The Doctrine of Revelation in the Thought of Karl Barth,
1909-1922: The Nature of Barth's Break with Liberalism, unpublished
PhD, Yale University. Sections published in 1957a, pp.40Ę-53, and
in Ten Year Commemoration to the Life of Hans Frei (1922-1988), ed.
Giorgy Olegovich (New York: Semenenko Foundation, 1999), pp.103-187.
The thesis has three chapters. The first is a general tracing of Barth's development from 1909 to the beginning of the Church Dogmatics. The second is a history of nineteenth-century theology from the vantage point of Barth's work, covering Hegel, Schleiermacher, Ritschl, K¹hler, Herrmann, Fritz Barth and others. The third chapter asks what continuity Barth's work has with relationalism, with Overbeck's scepticism, with the Blumhardts' Biblical Realism, and with religious socialism. The conclusion poses questions about whether Barth manages to do justice to human freedom and about Christocentrism, but rather more subtly than has sometimes been the case. The extract published in the Olegovich volume is eccentrically and drastically edited.
- 1957a 'Niebuhr's Theological Background' in Faith and Ethics: The Theology of H. Richard Niebuhr, ed. Paul Ramsey (New York: Harper and Row, 1957), pp.9-64.
- 1957b 'The Theology of H. Richard Niebuhr' in ibid,
These essays began life as a paper delivered in August 1956 in the presence of George F. Thomas. Frei describes them in the introduction to 1978k. 1957a pp.40-53 = 1956a pp.174-202 with minor changes. There are sections on 'Niebuhr's Theological Concerns', 'The Academic Tradition in Nineteenth-Century Protestant Theology', 'Revelation and Theological Method in the Theology of Karl Barth' and 'The Relation of Faith and History in the Thought of Ernst Troeltsch' in 1957a, and 'Niebuhr and the Problem of Theological Method', 'The Doctrine of God', and 'Christology' in 1957b.
- 1958a 'Religion: Natural and Revealed' in A Handbook
of Christian Theology: Definition Essays on Concepts and Movements of Thought
in Contemporary Protestantism, ed. Arthur A. Cohen and Marvin Halverson
(Nashville: Abingdon, 1958), pp.310-21.
T he volume also contains essays by Frei's colleague George Lindbeck. There are sections on 'Definition', 'History', and 'Contemporary Discussion', the latter divided into three sub-topics: theology and philosophy, revelation and history, and Christian faith and human culture. It contains some concise material on Barth.
There then follows a long gap in Frei's work, for which I have found no documentary evidence. If you know of, or possess, any items which were written or presented in this period, please let me know! | <urn:uuid:6c5e8588-d88b-48d2-b117-771988c8d325> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://people.exeter.ac.uk/mahigton/frei/bib1.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926211 | 1,404 | 1.5 | 2 |
Once upon a time there was a small puppy; a beautiful Rottweiler with soft fur, a long tail, and big droopy ears. This puppy lived on the streets, her mother having been caught by Animal Control just weeks after her birth. The puppy always longed to be with others of her kind and searched for a pack of her own but after wandering on her own for so long she began to lose hope. Every animal she encountered she would ask the same question: “Do you know where I can find others like me?” but no one yet had ever been able to help her.
One cold winter day she came across a pair of stray cats rummaging in a trash can for food. “Do you know where I can find others like me?” she asked. The cats responded “I’ve never seen anything like you!” and left the poor puppy alone. The puppy finally gave up hope of finding a pack and began wandering around, joining groups of animals as she found them, trying her best to change herself to fit in, and leaving them when she felt she had worn out her welcome or she was unable to pretend to be someone else. They were normally kind to her but she never felt as if she truly belonged.
One day, she was laying in the park beneath a large tree and a big black dog came up to her, sniffing her from afar at first and then coming closer. The puppy was worried at first that this would just be another short-lived acquaintance but she remained where she was and allowed herself to be sniffed. The big dog got close enough that the puppy could sniff her for a moment before slipping away slowly. After the big dog left the puppy thought she would never see her again but she remained near the tree just in case her new friend returned.
The next day, the big dog did return and stayed longer then the day before; they even spoke a little. The following day the big dog stayed even longer still. Over time, the big dog and the puppy talked about anything and everything, hiding no secrets from one another. Then one day, the big dog said something the puppy thought she would never hear: “Would you like to meet my pack?”
The puppy was overjoyed but cautious and followed the big dog to where the rest of her pack was. The puppy was quite shy but after meeting the pack and seeing how happily they interacted she decided to get to know them better. As she got to know them she began to realize that she had found the pack, the family, that she had longed for. She loved each member of the pack as if they had been born in the same litter and discovered that she could be just who she truly was and still be loved by others. | <urn:uuid:44d9d5f9-a43b-4927-a94c-de2a43afffa5> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://kyotijess.wordpress.com/tag/writing/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.992016 | 572 | 2.296875 | 2 |
Repairing the Salt Bridge
Lorena telephoned to say, “Michael, my water is no longer “soft”. What might be the problem?”
Hi Lorena. While there are several possible causes for water softener or water conditioner failure; a “Salt bridge” is the most common. Occasionally, a hard crust or salt bridge forms in the brine tank. This condition is usually caused by high humidity. When a salt bridge is formed the salt crystals have attached to each other leaving an empty air space between the water in the bottom of the brine tank and the salt. Because the salt is no longer in contact with the water it cannot make brine. Without brine, the resin bed can not regenerate and you will have “hard” water.
Breaking a Salt Bridge: If the brine tank is full or even partially full, the salt is loose on top and the “bridge” is at a deeper level under the loose salt. Use a broom handle or similar tool with wooden or strong plastic handle. Push the handle straight down into the salt. If a hard object is felt prior to reaching the bottom of the brine tank, it is most likely a salt bridge. Carefully push into the bridge in several places to break it up. Often as you push the handle through the salt bridge you will feel a “release” of pressure on the handle as it passes through the “bridge” until it reaches the bottom of the brine tank.
IMPORTANT: DO NOT use a sharp or pointed object to break a salt bridge as you may puncture the tank. Once you’ve cleared the salt bridge you will want to follow the manufacturer’s directions to regenerate your softener.
Lorena, once the salt bridge has been cleared and your softener has been recharged, depending on the amount of water you and your family use it may take from one day up to three days before you will notice your water is again, soft. It is a pleasure to help. Let me know whenever I might be of further assistance, MichaelTags: break, how, salt, softener, to | <urn:uuid:b9521066-30f8-44bb-8147-37111b700e57> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://naturalhealthtechniques.com/water-softener-salt-bridge.htm | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00065-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942425 | 452 | 2 | 2 |
Equality Properties and What They Really Mean
Date: 07/30/2008 at 12:27:13 From: Margaret Subject: Is there a property of equality for powers and roots? In class we are shown how to square both sides of an equation or take the square root of both sides of an equation but is there a rule like the addition property of equality or multiplication property of equality that says it is ok to do so? I have asked the instructor, looked at algebra text books and searched Dr. Math.
Date: 07/30/2008 at 16:06:30 From: Doctor Peterson Subject: Re: Is there a property of equality for powers and roots? Hi, Margaret. Interesting question! I think it shows that these properties really shouldn't be taught in this way, which makes things simple for teaching kids but doesn't accurately reflect what is actually happening. The so-called addition and multiplication (and subtraction and division) properties of equality are not really properties of equality in the first place, but are facts about each operation. I believe you are talking about facts like this, the multiplication property of equality: If a = b and c is any real number, then ac = bc. The idea is that if two numbers are really the same number, then when we multiply them both by the same thing, we get the same answer. How could we not? As long as multiplication is "well-defined"--that is, always gives the same answer--this has to be true. The same is true of any other operation, including powers, square roots, reciprocals, and so on! Any well-defined operation (or function, in fact) will behave this way. The only thing that could go wrong, really, is if you can't perform the operation at all (e.g. if you want to take the square root of both sides but one or both may be negative). This becomes a domain issue, if you are familiar with functions. So you don't really have to look for specific properties of equality associated with each operation you want to use; you just have to determine that it is well-defined (has one value) and that its domain includes the values to which it is being applied. These two facts amount to the property you are looking for. Now, some texts define the "X property of equality" as something a bit deeper than what I have just discussed: If c is any real number other than 0, then the equation ac = bc is EQUIVALENT to the equation a = b. This is what you REALLY need to use when you solve an equation; it says not only that ac is still equal to bc, but that they are ONLY equal if a = b; you don't either lose or gain solutions. This property is not necessarily true for any well-defined operation (or for any function), but for any INVERTIBLE (one-to-one) function (that is, when there is only one way to get any given result). In particular, it is NOT true for even powers, because there are two different numbers with the same square, so that for example 1 = -1 is not true yet (1)^2 = (-1)^2 is true. They are not equivalent. This is why squaring both sides of an equation can yield extraneous solutions. A related issue comes up with square roots. Although it is true that if a = b, then sqrt(a) = sqrt(b), and in fact these equations are equivalent if you ignore domain issues, this can lead to problems when you forget that the radical symbol means only the positive root, and try to apply it to something like this: (-1)^2 = 1^2 Taking the square root of each side by just canceling out the squares, you'd get -1 = 1 which is not true! You might not do this here, but you probably would if there were variables: x^2 = y^2 does not imply that x = y because one might be positive and the other negative! What's happening here is that, on one hand, you are unconsciously using a form of the square root that is not a function (that is, has more than one value) by allowing a negative result; or, on the other hand, you are forgetting that in reality sqrt(x^2) = |x|, not x. So the answer to your question really depends on exactly how your "multiplication property" and so on are defined, and what you want to use your new property to do. Perhaps if you show me how you want to use it, I can clarify what I am saying. Hopefully in taking squares or square roots in equations you have been taught the caveats that arise; some books may present these facts as properties, including all the warnings, but others pass by them all too quietly! - Doctor Peterson, The Math Forum http://mathforum.org/dr.math/
Date: 07/31/2008 at 15:44:32 From: Margaret Subject: Thank you (Is there a property of equality for powers and roots?) Thank you for your help. I need to think about these very interesting ideas and look forward to sharing them with my instructor when we meet for follow up in two weeks. Margaret
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© 1994-2013 The Math Forum | <urn:uuid:7b000c46-cc08-4581-8b0d-3e69093399ab> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/72802.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957671 | 1,102 | 3.453125 | 3 |
Montego Bay is Jamaicaís second largest city that, at the end of the 18th century, was one of the most important harbors for the islandís sugar industry. The lively city centre is a mixture of both old and new with modern concrete houses located next to simple wooden huts and congested streets with numerous small shops and street traders.
Close to Falmouth, thereís the excitement of Martha Brae River Rafting which is an excellent way to explore this tropical paradise, in which dense tropical rain forest shows off all its spectacular colors. It was here, on the north coast, that Christopher Columbus landed in 1502 and where the Spanish were defeated by the British in a bloody battle for sovereign control of the island.
Dunn`s River Falls is the name of a waterfall near to Ochos Rios, one of the islandís most well known natural attractions. In swimming attire, more than a million annual visitors attempt to climb through spraying torrents of water while linking hands in a human chain. In foaming cascades, the water plunges 200 metres down toward the sea over step-shaped limestone blocks and across an overgrown landscape of ferns and plants.
Harmony Hall, a Victorian building that is a reminder of British colonial rule, is the name of an immaculate manor house located on a turn of the century plantation. Today, it contains a handicraft centre and also a gallery that displays the works of indigenous artists.
James Bond Beach is the name of the former winter retreat of the English author, Ian Fleming, who created British secret agent, James Bond. The famous author wrote most of his fourteen 007 novels on the small island of Golden Eye, of which five were set in Jamaica.
Expansive fields of coconut palms dominate the Sun Valley Plantation which continues a tradition that dates back 250 years. In addition to bananas, citrus fruits, papayas, melons and apples, various spices are also cultivated on the plantation.
World famous for their coffee beans, the Blue Mountains represent breathtaking primeval nature with a hint of adventure, a further experience in this sun-scorched island. | <urn:uuid:ddf2e5c5-f93a-4c88-a4af-470181c8f9a1> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.travelvideostore.com/travel-video-series/vista-point/vista-point-jamaica/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961518 | 441 | 2.078125 | 2 |
Dawlish Museum Society
Knowle House was built as a gentleman's residence in 1805, and has been used for various purposes since. It now houses Dawlish Museum. The aim of the Museum is to preserve and display the history of Dawlish through its artefacts, which have been generously donated by local people.
School parties are encouraged to visit by appointment, and a learning room is now complete. There is a huge collection of photographs of old Dawlish and it's people, so if you're researching your family history, or that of your business or home, there may be something for you here.
If you simply want to browse for an hour or two, do visit. If you fancy a rest, or want to eat your sandwiches, there is a pretty little garden. There is something to interest almost everyone at Dawlish Museum, and you can be assured of a warm welcome from the volunteer staff.
Open from 25 April - 30th September.
Last admissions 16.15
Closed: Mon, Tue
Archives, Costume and Textiles, Decorative and Applied Art, Fine Art, Natural Sciences, Medicine, Weapons and War, Science and Technology, Social History, Land Transport | <urn:uuid:363f0b93-ed3e-4fb8-87cf-8ce2a82ca3f4> | CC-MAIN-2013-20 | http://www.culture24.org.uk/sw000035 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938076 | 245 | 1.789063 | 2 |