text
stringlengths 213
24.6k
| id
stringlengths 47
47
| dump
stringclasses 1
value | url
stringlengths 14
499
| file_path
stringlengths 138
138
| language
stringclasses 1
value | language_score
float64 0.9
1
| token_count
int64 51
4.1k
| score
float64 1.5
5.06
| int_score
int64 2
5
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
commentary part 34
If a person is given both rationale and emotion, there must be a justification for why both are necessary in life. We often grow up, trusting what we feel. If it hurts, it must be bad. If it feels good, we want more. Despite these instinctual cravings, we have logic and, moreover, memory.
I have discovered with time that what I rely on is rationale and the sense that comes with experience. I like to extricate and excavate the meanings, the intentions, the electrical impulses and neurological paths that are taken by various humans to come to the decision or end result that so many decisions do. It’s interesting. And, if examined closely enough, it really does make sense.
Of course, this is only true if the observer is not also the participant. Then, emotions rush in just as fast as reason and somehow they intertwine to wreak havoc upon a once assured mind.
Only time will determine the well chosen path, since emotions whisper happy but fleeting futures and reason creates monotony and routine. I thought I was able to healthily balance the uncommon middle ground. I am only beginning to learn.
I’m actually falling asleep as I type and think right now. And I can only think of the great truths that reach me by logic and reason and beyond, and how it is the only thing that lasts, the only thing that matters.
Everything else is excess. What are you to me?
|
<urn:uuid:83ff55f5-2b95-428d-ad4c-7053d48464c8>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://eunisaur.blogspot.com/2009_08_09_archive.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.965546
| 305
| 1.882813
| 2
|
Nikola Tesla (1856-1943) was a world-renowned inventor, physicist, mechanical engineer and electrical engineer. Of Serb descent, he was born in Smiljan, Croatia (then part of Austrian Empire). Tesla is regarded as one of the most important inventors in history. He is also well known for his contributions to the discipline of electricity and magnetism in the late 19th and early 20th century. His patents and theoretical work form the basis of modern alternating current electric power (AC) systems, including the polyphase power distribution systems and the AC motor, with which he helped usher in the Second Industrial Revolution.
From the Wikipedia entry on Nikola Tesla. See more.
Order design in:
|
<urn:uuid:739937da-29d2-480a-9caa-21a17640b02f>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.magnanimousportraits.com/innovators/97-Tesla.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00040-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.949862
| 147
| 2.9375
| 3
|
Anticipation is building for the announcement that will unleash a
frenzy of excitement for more than 37,000 high school students
around the world and NASA will broadcast it live.
Teams race the clock to earn additional points in 2007's 'Rack and Roll.'Click image for enlargement. Credit: FIRST Robotics. It's not the announcement of the latest video game, cell phone or MP3 player, but the release of the 2008 competition scenario from the For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology or FIRST Robotics Annual Kick-off event in Manchester, New Hampshire.
On Saturday, Jan. 5, 2008, beginning at 10 a.m. EST, NASA TV will
broadcast the Manchester event on NASA's public and education
channels. Details for receiving NASA TV can be found on the NASA
TV Web site at http://www.nasa.gov/ntv.
The event will also be Web cast at the NASA Robotics Alliance
Project (RAP) Web site at http://robotics.nasa.gov.
Teams also have the opportunity to participate in approximately 40 local kick-off events from New York to Hawaii. International teams in Brazil, Canada and Israel also have local kick-off events.
Each year, FIRST develops a new competition scenario with new twists and nuances to challenge rookie and veteran teams alike. With minimal instructions and identical parts kits, the approximately 1,500 teams only have six weeks to analyze the game scenario and engineer a robot that best addresses the scenario's challenges. At the end of the build-period, teams must meet strict deadlines for packing and shipping their robots to their chosen regional competition.
Sponsored by NASA, teams compete in the inaugural Bayou Region in New Orleans, Louisiana.Click image for enlargement. Credit: NASA. Participation in FIRST robotics has grown significantly in its 16 seasons of competition and NASA has been an integral partner with FIRST in making robotics fun, exciting and accessible. In 2008, NASA through the Robotics Alliance Project is sponsoring six regional competitions, including a new competition in Hawaii. NASA helps establish new regional competition sites with grants and technical and logistics expertise. NASA's goal is to help make the competition sites sustainable within three years. Along with the new regional competitions, NASA headquarters and 10 NASA field centers provide grants to more than 200 teams including 164 rookie and second-year teams building their robotics programs.
Join the excitement and stay tuned for the excitement of the regional competitions starting on Feb. 28, 2008 and running through the month of March. Teams will be competing for coveted spots at the FIRST Championship event on April 17-19, 2008 in Atlanta's Georgia Dome.
For more information about FIRST Robotics, visit their Web site at http://www.usfirst.org.
Do you find robotics fascinating? Want to learn more? Visit the NASA Robotics Alliance Project Web site. NASA's RAP can serve as your warehouse for robotics lessons, resources and information.
|
<urn:uuid:12b3093e-d3a2-4fb0-bf6c-f1abea9b5edb>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/first2008.html
|
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
| 0.919682
| 603
| 2.484375
| 2
|
Most Active Stories
2 Languages, Many Voices: Latinos In The U.S.
Sun October 9, 2011
West Liberty Is Nation's First Majority Hispanic Town
Originally published on Tue August 7, 2012 2:42 pm
(This report is part of the Morning Edition series "2 Languages, Many Voices: Latinos In The U.S.," looking at the ways Latinos are changing — and being changed — by the U.S.)
One place the Hispanic population is growing is in the overwhelmingly white state of Iowa. The latest census figures show the Hispanic population, while only 5 percent of the state, has almost doubled since 2000.
And one small town — West Liberty — is the first in Iowa to have a majority Hispanic population.
Downtown West Liberty, Iowa, is quintessentially Midwestern American, both quaint and historic, with brick buildings lining brick streets. A typical stroll involves walking past the bank, a renovated theater, a hair salon, restaurants and stores.
West Liberty Mayor Chad Thomas says that unlike a lot of other small Midwestern towns that are dying, West Liberty is alive.
"I see a lot of businesses that are open, and not vacant storefronts," Thomas says. "Probably half of the businesses are Hispanic-owned."
Next to Paul Revere's Pizza on 3rd Street is Tienda La Luna, and next to the American Legion Hall is the popular Acapulco Mexican Bakery.
Now at 3,700 people and counting, the eastern Iowa town is growing and thriving, Thomas says.
"If you didn't have the Hispanic population here in town, yeah, we would be much more like a lot of smaller towns, and there would be a lot more storefronts that are empty," he says.
And unlike other parts of the Midwest that are attracting Latino immigrants, the Hispanic population in West Liberty is not new.
"I mean, we're very unique in that there's folks in this community, in the Hispanic community, that are here in their fifth and sixth generation," Thomas says.
In the 2000 census, West Liberty was already well over 40 percent Latino, and has been steadily growing for decades.
The first big surge in Latino immigrants arrived in the 1930s for jobs in what was then a Louis Rich turkey processing plant.
That plant, now called West Liberty Foods, is still a draw for some newcomers. But most of the recent increase in the Hispanic population comes from growing, established families who came for the Louis Rich jobs, stayed and planted roots in this quiet, safe and friendly small town.
Jose Zacarias is among them. The 56-year-old moved to West Liberty from Mexico in 1984, working first in the turkey processing plant, a job he said was dirty, grueling and dangerous. By learning English, he was able to get better factory jobs. They were farther away, but Zacarias continued living in West Liberty.
He bought a big old farmhouse on the outskirts of West Liberty 20 years ago and raised three boys there. He called it and the two acres around him "a quiet piece of heaven" — until the new high school was built nearby a few years ago.
He considers many Anglos among his closest friends, and says the white and Hispanic communities in West Liberty get along well. But he says it wasn't always this way.
"When I arrived here in '84, they told me that such and such businessman wouldn't allow it, like for instance, the bar owners, wouldn't allow Mexican customers there, or they despise them openly, or things like that," Zacarias says.
But Zacarias and others in West Liberty say such conflicts gradually faded away, especially as Hispanics became more economically integrated into the community, and as the schools better integrated the community's children.
The West Liberty school system has what was the first dual-language program in the state.
Students take all of their classes in both Spanish and English, switching from an English-language teacher in the morning to a Spanish-language teacher in the afternoon.
West Liberty Elementary School principal Nancy Gardner says the program is voluntary, with half of the spots reserved for kids who speak English primarily at home, and half for those who speak Spanish.
"And in the end, all the students then become bilingual, biliterate and bicultural," Gardner says.
The dual language program is now in its 14th year, and last spring graduated its first high school senior class of students who started as kindergartners.
The program is so successful, several Anglo families have moved to West Liberty from nearby Iowa City, Muscatine and other towns specifically to enroll their kids. The program, which now has a waiting list, is being duplicated in a handful of other Iowa school districts with growing Hispanic populations.
At a time when many communities around the country struggle with an anti-immigrant and anti-Latino backlash, West Liberty is embracing and celebrating its cultural diversity. But according to many here, including Zacarias, West Liberty is still not a bicultural utopia.
"What I'm saying is we don't have an integrated community," he says.
Zacarias, who was sworn in as a U.S. citizen only a few weeks ago, says this is especially true when it comes to civic involvement. For example, with local elections coming up next month, he says he recently attended a forum for school board candidates. About 30 or 40 people showed up, but he says he was the only Hispanic there. He says he is taking matters into his own hands by running for a seat on the West Liberty City Council.
"We need to get together with the Hispanics and say, we are no longer a minority, we have some responsibilities, and we need to get organized," he says. "We've run out of excuses. It's time to do some work."
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
It's MORNING EDITION from NPR News. Good morning. I'm Steve Inskeep.
RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:
And I'm Renee Montagne.
We're going to spend some time now with America's largest minority - Latinos. Their numbers jumped in the last census and are growing fast. Sociologist Ruben Rumbaut has been studying thousands of children of immigrants since the 1990s.
PROFESSOR RUBEN RUMBAUT: The population growth of Hispanics has been stunning. That population was estimated to be about four million in 1950. It is over 50 million today. And it is about 16 percent or so of the total U.S. population, but it is expected to reach 25 percent of the total U.S. population in less than two decades.
INSKEEP: So the growth remains huge. Now, these days most of that growth comes not from immigration but from Hispanics born in the United States. And these young Latinos are growing up immersed in two worlds.
RUMBAUT: To be bicultural, to be bilingual, means to feel comfortable in two cultural worlds; to feel comfortable and proficient in two languages, to be able to dance salsa, to be able to enjoy TV programs, movies, songs on the radio and song that touch on many different genres. The U.S. American culture is a multi-layer construction made up of the contributions of many people over many, many decades. So the Hispanic or Latino contribution will be one more that will be layered upon that.
MONTAGNE: This morning, we begin a series called Two Languages, Many Voices about bicultural Latinos and their impact on education, entertainment, religion, technology and the workplace. We begin in a small town in Iowa called West Liberty.
INSKEEP: Iowa's Hispanic population has almost doubled in the last decade. Latinos still make up only 5 percent of the state, but West Liberty is the first Iowa city with a Hispanic majority. NPR's David Schaper reports.
DAVID SCHAPER, BYLINE: Downtown West Liberty, Iowa is quintessentially Midwestern American. It's both quaint and historic with reddish brick buildings lining brick-paved streets.
MAYOR CHAD THOMAS: What we're coming up to is Third Street.
SCHAPER: Walking past the bank, the renovated theater, a hair salon, restaurants and shops, Mayor Chad Thomas says West Liberty is thriving. And he says about half of the businesses downtown are Hispanic owned.
THOMAS: If you didn't have the Hispanic population here in town, yeah, we would be much more like a lot of the smaller towns and there would be a lot more store fronts that were empty, and...
SCHAPER: Next to Paul Revere's Pizza on Third Street in West Liberty is Tienda La Luna. Next to the American Legion Hall is the popular Acapulco Mexican Bakery, among others. And many of these Hispanic businesses are not new. Mayor Thomas says this growing eastern Iowa town of 3,700 has had a significant Hispanic population for decades.
THOMAS: I mean, we're very unique in that, you know, there's folks in this community in the Hispanic community that are here on their fifth, sixth generation.
SCHAPER: Fifty-two percent of West Liberty residents identified themselves as Hispanic or Latino in the 2010 census, up from just over 40 percent in 2000. The first surge in Latino immigrants arrived in the 1930s to fill jobs in what was then a Louis Rich turkey processing plant.
That plant, now West Liberty Foods, is still a draw for immigrants, but the bulk of the recent increase in the Hispanic population in West Liberty is in the growing, established families. Many of the recent newcomers to West Liberty are those like Mayor Thomas, who moved here with his wife 11 years ago seeking a quiet, friendly small town, and diversity.
THOMAS: A big factor for us, since we were thinking about kids, was the dual-language school program. So, you know, the thought of our children being able to go through the school system and come out speaking Spanish relatively fluently...
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: (Foreign language spoken)
GROUP: (Foreign language spoken)
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: (Foreign language spoken)
SCHAPER: The dual language program in West Liberty's schools was the first of its kind in the state. These fourth graders learn all their subjects in both Spanish and English. West Liberty elementary principal Nancy Gardner says the program is voluntary, with half of the spots reserved for kids who speak English primarily at home, half for those who speak Spanish.
NANCY GARDNER: And in the end, all the students then- become bilingual, bi-literate and bicultural.
SCHAPER: The dual language program is now in its 14th year, and is so successful it has a waiting list and is now a model for other Iowa school districts.
Parent Martha Rodriguez says the program helps the younger generation hold onto their culture, while giving them a competitive advantage. In addition, Rodriguez says her kids are able to build cross-cultural friendships.
MARTHA RODRIGUEZ: My kids have always been doing good with either both Anglo and Hispanic kids. They hang around with both.
SCHAPER: Was it that way when you were young?
RODRIGUEZ: No. It was completely different when I was young.
(SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)
SCHAPER: The 42-year old Rodriguez immigrated to West Liberty from Mexico when she was 10. And says back then, she and other Hispanics felt more isolated and segregated in West Liberty, especially those who didn't speak English well. But Rodriguez and others say those tensions, for the most part, are history.
JOSE ZACARIAS: We don't have the conflicts we used to have in the past.
SCHAPER: Jose Zacarias moved to West Liberty from Mexico in 1984 and took a job in the turkey processing plant.
(SOUNDBITE OF FOOTSTEPS)
SCHAPER: As soon as he learned enough English, he found work elsewhere. But he sunk his roots in this close-knit small town, saved his money and 20 years ago, bought this old farmhouse on a couple of acres on the outskirts of town.
ZACARIAS: As you can see, this is a very quiet place and nice. Before they built it, the school; that was about eight years ago, this was heaven.
SCHAPER: Zacarias raised three boys here. Two are off at college, the third working full time, and if that's how you measure success, he says he's done OK.
Like others here, Zacarias says at a time when Hispanics elsewhere around the country face an anti-immigrant backlash, it's refreshing that the small town of West Liberty is clearly trying to embrace and celebrate it's diversity.
David Schaper, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.
|
<urn:uuid:b85f3ade-5cac-4f95-9611-903b06e43cfd>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://ketr.org/post/west-liberty-nations-first-majority-hispanic-town
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.971494
| 2,698
| 2.140625
| 2
|
The infantry-style terrorist attacks that killed 164 people in Mumbai, India, in November had a profound effect on counter-terrorism planning in the United States. Federal, state and local authorities took a hard look at their existing defenses and, in many cases, found them wanting. Another infantry-style attack in Kabul, Afghanistan, last week only heightened U.S. authorities’ concerns.
In the cities most likely to be targeted — large, symbolic municipalities such as New York — authorities have added military-style combat training to the curriculum of their police academies, in a bid to ensure that street cops are prepared to defend against terrorists armed with assault rifles, grenades and rockets. By the same token, big-city cops are getting heavier weapons and body armor.
Large cities, especially New York and Chicago, are also investing in surveillance systems using networked cameras, intended to help spot attackers early on. Such systems can cost hundreds of millions of dollars, putting them out of reach of smaller municipalities that are also concerned about their vulnerability to infantry assault.
“You don’t have to have these capabilities everywhere in the country,” says James Carafano, an analyst at the Washington, D.C.-based Heritage Foundation. Big cities are more likely targets and, owing to their terrain, pose unique challenges. Smaller communities can get by with smaller, cheaper technologies, and in some cases can replace hardware with human systems. But the goal is the same: to “harden” a community against infantry assault.
In Richland County, South Carolina, population 360,000, the 550-strong sheriff’s department has just one full-time officer in its Homeland Security division. But all officers receive some counter-terrorism training, and as far as weapons and tools go, the department has “whatever New York or L.A. would have … on a smaller scale,” according to Sheriff Leon Lott. That includes a special weapons team, bomb-disposal equipment, chemical- and biological-weapons detection gear, boats, aircraft and even an Army-surplus Armored Personnel Carrier sporting a .50-caliber machine gun, pictured. “There’s not anything we can’t respond to.”
To catch Mumbai-style attackers before they open fire, Lott says he relies on alert citizens phoning in tips, rather than on sophisticated surveillance systems. “Intelligence is key,” he says. To keep the local network healthy, Richland County Sheriff’s Department representatives attend the meetings of 370 neighborhood groups.
The reliable police presence at these meetings also serves to “build confidence in us, so they know we can deal with” an attack, Lott says. Public communication is vital to preventing widespread panic that might hamper authorities’ response to an attack. “Accurate information serves to protect the public, reassuring them that the government is responding appropriately to the threat or attack,” said Department of Homeland Security Under Secretary Charles Allen.
If prevention fails and an attack occurs, cooperation between the sheriff’s department, other local law enforcement and state and federal forces is paramount, Lott says. To that end, South Carolina, like most states, maintains a “fusion center” where representatives of all levels of government coordinate their actions. This center features prominently in Lott’s frequent “mock-disaster” exercises, which the department launched in the aftermath of the 1999 Columbine school shooting. The next such exercise will be based on the Mumbai attacks, Lott says.
Regional cultural differences shape the way Richland County would respond to an armed assault, versus New York City’s likely response. Sebastian D’Souza, a photographer for The Mumbai Mirror newspaper, recalled watching the Mumbai shooters and thinking, “I only wish I had a gun rather than a camera.” The U.S. National Rifle Association and libertarian think-tanks latched onto D’Souza’s comment as a powerful endorsement of their pro-gun lobbying efforts. India, after all, has strict gun-control laws — and so do many large cities in the U.S.
Carafano warns against the NRA’s logic. “Just because they [the Indians] had gun control doesn’t mean we shouldn’t,” he says. “The question of guns or no guns, out of context, is not very fruitful.”
To Lott, it is a fruitful question. “In the South, you have guns. In the North, nobody does. If they [terrorists] did something here, everyone would be running around with hunting rifles.”
|
<urn:uuid:4d7ad4cc-308d-4059-aa37-4636d987cfb9>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.trust-us.ch/?p=1127
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.954155
| 980
| 2.140625
| 2
|
Traditionally, FreeBSD has had what is called a ``monolithic'' kernel. This means that
the kernel was one large program, supported a fixed list of devices, and if you wanted to
change the kernel's behavior then you had to compile a new kernel, and then reboot your
computer with the new kernel.
Today, FreeBSD is rapidly moving to a model where much of the kernel's functionality
is contained in modules which can be dynamically loaded and unloaded from the kernel as
necessary. This allows the kernel to adapt to new hardware suddenly becoming available
(such as PCMCIA cards in a laptop), or for new functionality to be brought into the
kernel that was not necessary when the kernel was originally compiled. This is known as a
modular kernel. Colloquially these are called KLDs.
Despite this, it is still necessary to carry out some static kernel configuration. In
some cases this is because the functionality is so tied to the kernel that it can not be
made dynamically loadable. In others it may simply be because no one has yet taken the
time to write a dynamic loadable kernel module for that functionality yet.
Building a custom kernel is one of the most important rites of passage nearly every
UNIX® user must endure. This process, while time
consuming, will provide many benefits to your FreeBSD system. Unlike the GENERIC kernel, which must support a wide range of hardware, a
custom kernel only contains support for your PC's hardware. This has a number of benefits, such
Faster boot time. Since the kernel will only probe the hardware you have on your
system, the time it takes your system to boot will decrease dramatically.
Less memory usage. A custom kernel often uses less memory than the GENERIC kernel, which is important because the kernel must always
be present in real memory. For this reason, a custom kernel is especially useful on a
system with a small amount of RAM.
Additional hardware support. A custom kernel allows you to add in support for devices
such as sound cards, which are not present in the GENERIC
|
<urn:uuid:e87b8d00-446e-4854-b5da-8385978f67c5>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://freebsd.active-venture.com/handbook/kernelconfig-custom-kernel.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00059-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.939884
| 435
| 2.9375
| 3
|
Is sex overvalued, or too cheap?
This has consequences. One is that sexual violations become more frequent. (Similarly, violence increased over Cabbage Patch dolls and gas when they were in short supply.) Sexual crimes and other sexual transgressions (e.g. lying, cheating) become almost commonplace.
Another consequence of sex being overvalued, is that sexual violations also become overvalued. Sexual jokes in the office become harassment. (We are not allowed to cheapen sex by making jokes about it.) Sexually explicit pictures become pornography. We have rape crisis clinics but no mugging or murder clinics. Sexual mutilation becomes a media event: a seriously injured victim of violence is page 23 news, while headlines scream about even the most minor of sexual offenses. Sexual offenses receive special treatment.
The ultimate sexual crime receives the ultimate in special treatment. Rape becomes as bad as murder, and victims of rape and other sexual crimes are called "survivors." Of course rape is a serious crime, but let's get real here -- it isn't anywhere near as serious as murder.
This overvaluing of sexual crimes also aggravates the emotional pain of victims. How is a woman supposed to feel after being raped when society tells her that it is as bad as being murdered?
Sexual offenders must assume the ultimate responsibility for their actions. But does that mean we should ignore contributing factors? Like the sexual power differential between men and women? Men are raised to believe that they have all the power over women, a belief feminists reinforce. Imagine what a shock it must be for most men when they discover how little power, but how much responsibility, they have in the sexual arena. How much sexual abuse is a reaction of men against this domination?
Feminists tell us that sexual crimes are not about sex, but power. This begs the question. Why is it that men choose to express this power in a sexual way? I do not think it is coincidence. Men are reacting against women's sexual power. A study found that 85% of victims of rape or attempted rape were between the ages of 13 and 30 (only about 25% of women are in this age group). This is when women are at the peak of their sexual power.
Am I blaming the victim? No. The victim has nothing to do with it. The dynamics of sexual assault were set into motion long before most victims go through their wardrobes or apply their makeup. The problem is systemic, involving women's behavior in general. Feminists have no trouble criticizing the behavior of non-abusing men as contributing to abusers' actions (e.g. Playboy). Why is it that we can't criticize people's behavior just because they happen to be the same gender as the victim?
Another common response when women are criticized for their sexual looks, is "rape is not sex, but violence." Nonsense. Of course, it's sex. And violence. It's ironic that only when women's behavior is questioned, is rape considered non-sexual. In all other cases, it is considered sex. After all, most all of feminism's solutions to sexual abuse problems involve sexuality (i.e., male-oriented sexuality) -- from censoring Playboy, to castrating "offenders." However when women's sexuality is questioned, suddenly rape is not sex, but violence. Why? Because women need to maintain female sexuality as it is, because it is their base of power.
I believe most feminists, as well as a sizable portion of Americans, believe that the problem of sexual abuse is getting worse. Feminism, I would argue, is largely responsible for this. The basic contributing factors of violence are frustration, anger, feeling of failure, and low self-esteem. Certainly feminists have aggravated all of these in men, with their duplicity and continual blaming of men for anything negative. Feminists seem to have a modus operandi of revenge rather than amelioration. After 20 years of feminism's "solutions," therefore, it's time to try a different approach.
Email to the Editor -- If you don't want your email to be considered for publication in the "Email to the Editor" column, say so.
|
<urn:uuid:32e1a1df-4387-4f57-b0e9-e1b348b2dd0b>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.backlash.com/content/gender/1996/7-jul96/me07.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00050-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.973504
| 853
| 1.71875
| 2
|
I had to educate myself on this. For instance, until I read Katiebabs’ WTF post on Laurell K. Hamilton (among other things) I would have cleanly classified Anita Blake as contemporary paranormal romance. If Anita Blake is urban fantasy then so to by deduction must be Keri Arthur’s Riley Jenson Series and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Which begs the question, when did vampires and werewolves leave their home in Paranormal Land and cross into the Fantasy World? Isn't fantasy populated with witches, magic, dragons, and princes? As Orson Scott Card said (and I’m paraphrasing) if you think trees the story is a fantasy; if you think metal it’s a science fiction… or in this case not-fantasy. I think of vampires and werewolves as claws and teeth, which is probably why I’m so confused. Are you? Let’s figure it out together.
Urban Fantasy Romance Is:
- Fantasy elements (also including paranormal here don’t ask me why) in a people populated setting be it city or town.
- Sure to deal with mystery, suspense, and/or crime.
- Reliant heavily on world-building to make it work. How did these creature rise from obscurity and into the everyday? How do normal humans deal with them?
- A romance, but it doesn't overwhelm the driving plot.
- Usually a series so world-building and romance arcs are sprinkled throughout many books.
- Usually contemporary or modern, but can be set in historical or futuristic settings too.
- Populated with tough kick-ass heroines.
- Never fluffy. It’s gritty, dark, and thrilling.
Urban Fantasy vs Paranormal Romance:
What’s the difference between an urban fantasy and a paranormal written in an urban setting? Please explain! Here’s what I got so far…
- Paranormal romance is usually hero-centric whereas urban fantasy tends to be heroine-centric.
- Paranormal romance is about the hero and heroine’s relationship first and foremost with a HEA (happily ever after). Urban Fantasy romance is about saving the world and finding love while you do it.
Avon executive editor Erika Tsang explains: “In paranormal romance the relationship between the couple is the focus of the main plot. In urban fantasy, the world that the couple exists in is the focus.” Publisher's Weekly
This is why everyone says the two get confused and are used interchangeably. It really is a difference of degrees I feel.
Do you prefer Urban Fantasy or Paranormal Romance? I am clearly a fan of both even though before I wrote this post I thought I never read an urban fantasy. Give me Edward Cullen and Buffy Summers!
What are some of the other Urban Fantasy Romance series that you enjoy?
|
<urn:uuid:2eb7e072-b5c2-4f6b-9225-8d6264282996>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.loveromancepassion.com/what-is-urban-fantasy-romance/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.922651
| 596
| 1.726563
| 2
|
Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center
The little-wing pearly mussel faces water quality degradation resulting from industrial and sewage effluents and the runoff of silt and other water pollutants from poorly designed construction, development, mining, agricultural, and forestry activities. Further, the spread of the exotic zebra mussel (Dreissena polymorpha) represents a potential threat to the survival of this species. Zebra mussels outcompete native mussel fauna, and infestations in the water column can physically disrupt normal breeding and feeding behavior.
Although little measurable progress has been made in establishing new mussel populations or in stabilizing existing populations, substantial recovery efforts for all the State's federally listed mussels are under way. Research is continuing on maintaining captive mussel populations, mussel cryopreservation, and potential impacts of the exotic zebra mussel on native mussels. A section 7 consultation with the Tennessee Valley Authority and the Army Corps of Engineers on a proposed wood chip mill on the Tennessee River is under way.
Recovery of the little-wing pearly mussel will require additional research to develop new propagation techniques, reintroduction into unoccupied historical habitat, and determination of the factors that are causing declines in the wild. Also, technology is needed for cryopreservation of freshwater mussel genetic material.
In both FY 1991 and FY 1992, the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency was provided $59,500 to study freshwater mussels, including research on artificial propagation, surveying Tennessee River tributaries, and research on mussel reintroduction.
Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA): This Federal agency is responsible for ensuring that its projects do not jeopardize federally listed mussels. TVA has also been an advocate for mussel recovery. The agency conducts mussel surveys as part of its environmental review of proposed projects and maintains a geographic data base on mussel distribution. It is also developing mussel propagation technology, and has conducted a bioassay of various chemicals using juvenile mussels. TVA is also involved in efforts to restore the little-wing pearly mussel in Kentucky and North Carolina.
Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency: This State agency is responsible for managing the State's mussel populations and an extensive mussel fishery, conducting mussel surveys, and maintaining a geographic data base on mussel distribution. The Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency recently implemented new size regulations to reduce the take of immature mussels and also monitors the catch of commercial mussel fishermen to reduce take of federally listed mussels. The agency also has designated nine mussel sanctuaries to protect State and federally protected mussels.
Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation: Through a natural history data base, this State agency provides valuable information on the distribution of federally listed mussels. It also helps protect these species through its environmental review process.
Aquatic Resource Center: This private organization is developing techniques for artificially propagating freshwater mussels and feeding the resulting juvenile mussels.
Plan approved 9/22/89.
|
<urn:uuid:3f57492d-4c76-45e3-8f45-6b7554f5df2e>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/wildlife/recoprog/states/species/pegifabt.htm
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00026-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.908894
| 612
| 3.390625
| 3
|
The Art of a Bad Learning Environment
By Andre M. Perry
So what are we to learn from the Boyet Junior High School art installation, which in one case displayed an image of President Barack Obama with a bullet hole in his head? This digitally manipulated image was the low light of several political cartoons drawn by middle school students of this Slidell, Louisiana school as part of an art project that at least one concerned child and parent brought to the attention of authorities.
Since the news broke more parents have rightly demanded a full investigation as to how those images made it to the exhibit. I don’t understand how a lesson of political cartooning can roam so aimlessly in the academic woods. There’s a reason why Civics is generally taught in high school. Middle school students should be building the historical and rhetorical acumen to engage in what should be a structured conversation or project on politics. Students’ abilities to discern political discourse and/or systems are limited by the curriculums up to that point. The assignment clearly demonstrated a lack of preparedness.
If the students were prepared, then what goal was the teacher aiming for?
When I first saw some of the completed assignments, I noticed the intellectual laziness that contributed to what a teacher could not possibly consider art. Certainly, it can’t be considered worthy enough to go on a school wall. To go on the Internet and transpose a bullet hole on a random image of President Obama is clearly a nasty, regurgitated political argument of some derisive talk radio show or dinner table.
However, it’s even more disturbing for a teacher or faculty to allow this obviously loose political commentary to hang on the walls. I hope the aftermath of this incident does not devolve into a base conversation of free speech. The Boyet exhibit made clear, free speech in schools is filtered by a responsibility to maintain an environment conducive to learning. In addition, there are actual laws that prohibit speech that can incite violence particularly against elected officials and especially the President of the United States.
I hope St. Tammany School District officials conduct a learning walk at Boyet to see what other images violate common decency let alone the purpose of public schools. All institutions that consider themselves to be places of education, but in particular public institutions, have obligations to practice an idealized connection between truth, justice and community. To practice an idealized connection between truth, justice and community is to assume there is currently no perfect person, community or social system. Schools are the agents of positive change that help society work towards a more perfect union that is inclusive, civil and free from bullets.
Applaud the students, families and teachers of Boyet who understand that schools introduce free speech to intellectual rigor and civility.
However, there something we can all do to learn from this incident. Look around your child’s school. Take in the physical space of your college or university. See what’s on the walls. Who does the bronze bust immortalize? For whom are the buildings and rooms named? The physical structures that contain schools and colleges are also windows and mirrors to the values and people that communities hold dear.
If your schools’ walls say more about who you are than what we should become, then the only art that we’ve mastered is that of repeating history.
|
<urn:uuid:6fb172c0-9e7a-4b76-9f2a-9558e354e9d9>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://blogs.loyno.edu/education-blog/2012/02/10/the-art-of-a-bad-learning-environment/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00064-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.965214
| 682
| 1.976563
| 2
|
Modern art and modern life
Edward VII died on the 6th of May 1910 and his son George became King, but the hedonistic atmosphere of the Edwardian era continued for a few more years. During this period artists increasingly used bold colour and decorative design to express their response to the modern world.
We had the Post-Impressionists’ exhibition ... another thrilling experience ...
Modern art in Britain is said to have begun in 1910, the year that Roger Fry’s Manet and the Post-Impressionists exhibition was shown at the Grafton Galleries, London. The English Post-Impressionists simplified their scenes into flat patterns, using vibrant colours.
I feel sorry for anyone who did not see Diaghilev’s first seasons … it gave me the feeling of being born again into a new and glamorous world, with complete satisfaction for every aesthetic sense.
In 1911 Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes performed at Covent Garden. The British art world and high society were caught up in a wave of enthusiasm, viewing the ballet as a ‘Post-Impressionist picture put in motion’.
End of an era
The plunge of civilisation into this abyss of blood and darkness…
For many Edwardians the years immediately before the First World War were ones of suspended action, dislocation and psychological tension, however, the outbreak war in August 1914 utterly destroyed their secrets and desires. Edwardian men, women and children became caught up in a war they couldn’t control, and the Edwardian era came to an end.
|NGA Home | Introduction | Gallery | Search | Essay | Learning | Symposium | Visiting | Previous|
|
<urn:uuid:a55bbfea-0dea-4cdd-abce-18712d51c05e>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.nga.gov.au/Exhibition/Edwardians/Default.cfm?mystartrow=25&realstartrow=25&MnuID=2&GalID=6
|
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
| 0.957676
| 352
| 2.921875
| 3
|
February 18, 2011 | By Bill Gates
Annual Letter: Agriculture’s Promise
As most of the world’s poorest people are farmers, helping them grow and earn more from their crops is the best way to fight poverty and associated ills. In his 2011 letter as co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill reports progress and some new strategies for agricultural development.
Outside of health the area where we invest the most to help poor people is agriculture. There is so much potential in agricultural development because most poor people in the world feed their families and earn their income from farming. When farmers increase their productivity, nutrition is improved and hunger and poverty are reduced. In countries like Rwanda, Ethiopia, and Tanzania, investments in seeds, training, access to markets, and innovative agricultural policy are making a real difference. Ghana made agriculture a priority and cut hunger by 75 percent between 1990 and 2004. The increase in food production has led to economic development in other areas.
But the growth in other countries has been slower. These are complex issues, and it’s going to take strong leadership to make sure farmers have the opportunity to seize their potential. Kofi Annan, who chairs the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, is leading the way by helping to drive a new agriculture agenda for the continent.
One program I’m especially enthusiastic about is a partnership launched in 2008 with the World Food Programme (WFP), the world’s largest humanitarian agency for fighting hunger. What I like about it is that it takes a new approach to something the world has been doing for a long time, food aid.
In the past most small farmers were not able to sell their produce to WFP to be used as food aid. They had trouble meeting WFP’s complicated requirements and delivering food in bulk quantities that met WFP’s quality standards. Our partnership works with farmers and others to resolve these issues, making it possible for them to sell to lots of additional buyers including WFP. When the West African country of Niger experienced a famine last summer, WFP bought 1,000 metric tons of rice from a farmers’ organization in Mali. When small farmers in Mali are earning extra income by feeding hungry families in Niger, it’s a clear win-win.
The near-term rise in food prices and the long-term increased demand for food will create opportunities for small farmers even in the poorest countries. In fact, increasing production in Africa will be critical for the world to have enough food. It’s encouraging that foreign aid for agriculture has now increased from its historic low of just $2.8 billion in 2003 to $5.9 billion in 2009, and it’s critical that nations don’t cut back again.
One of the most important new developments came in April when I joined the finance ministers of the United States, Spain, Canada, and South Korea to launch the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program with initial commitments of nearly $1 billion over three years. This program provides support to developing countries with strong domestic agricultural development plans that they are already investing in themselves but cannot fully fund. It has generated amazing demand, demonstrating how committed poor nations are to their own agricultural development.
|
<urn:uuid:e7a6ad6b-44e1-4793-a713-b7f361272984>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Topics/Development/Bills-Annual-Letter-Agricultures-Promise
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708766848/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125246-00055-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.960112
| 663
| 2.5
| 2
|
Books. Bikes. Boomsticks.
"The right to buy weapons is the right to be free." -A.E. van Vogt
Huh.Not possible.You can't multiple PI by a round number and get a round number.Even in Excel which has PI to a paltry 15 decimal places it's 42.003Sheesh. Of course, it may be close enough the real answer for engineering purposes.Hahahahahahah.Sorry that may be cry with laughter, as an engineer.Day of the nerd.
MAde me cry... sigh.
My son is a nerd. Because I told him about it (aloud: pi times leet equals the answer to life the universe and everything), and he instantly responded, "How many decimal places?"
3 thousandths was a close enough tolerance on many parts to send a man to the moon...I'll take it. :)
Close enough for intelligence work...
Years ago a college econ professor said "be nice to nerds, because one day they will rule the world."
1337%?That sounds like Zaphods annual salary increase.
3 thousandths was a close enough tolerance on many parts to send a man to the moon...I'll take it. :) Darn skippy. Although I think I'll have to put that on the shirt so I can silence the naysayers.
How many nerd points do I get for this?
Only 3 decimal places?As if we needed any _further_ proof that the Good Lord built this universe to budget and not to specification. =)boror: Me, when I'm suffering from insufficient entertainment value to due a low BAC.
i know what pi is, but what is the significance of 1337%? Unless that is some big deal, this analysis is meaningless.
Tickmeister - Some kids discovered that using assorted other characters can produce glyphs which look like normal letters. L337, in the right font and frame of mind, spells out LEET. That in turn is a corruption of elite. So, kids who think they're cool call themselves L337.Anyway, I don't take this little gem to be a coincidence.Jim
Finally, the appropriate way to cut pizza!Ulises from CACaptain, Starfleet (ret.)
6 times 9 = 42, base 13.
It's close enough for government work... :-)
13.37 x pi = 42.0030938Which isn't close enough to build the computer I am typing this on.I guess it really is true that the US ranks 26th among industrial nations in mathematics education.
That is only to a few digits of precision. (You can find pi calculated to a million digits with a simple web search.From a set-theoretic point of view. (Set theory is something you were probably introduced to in first grade, though you can also do Ph.D.-level research in the more esoteric areas)...Pi is an irrational number. (If you don't remember middle school/junior high math, I can't help you.)The product (when you multiply) of an irrational number and a rational number is irrational. 13.37 is rational, pi is irrational, so the product is irrational. (It may also be transcendental, I haven't thought about this a very long time....)
Me thinks some people are a little too nitpicky with the math, it is close enough for jazz :DSomeone said t-shirts?
Somebody drank too many Pan-Galactic Gargle Blasters.
So..... God's a geek.... but he codes in VB?
The question is: is 13.37 an exact or estimated number?
EEEEEK!! WHITE MICE!!!
Dr_Mike said...6 times 9 = 42, base 13.------------------------"I may be a sorry case, but I don't write jokes in base 13." - Douglas Adams-Tim D
What can you do with 5,271,009?
6 * 9 = 42 is a true statement -- in base 13
Isn't the Universe in the Neighborhood of 13.37 Billion years old? This is based on our perspective of looking back to the Point of Origin from Earth, of course. But since that would be a radius, and 2 times Pi times R gives us the Circumference, that means one Orbit would take 84 Billion light years. why that means to reach every point in Known Space we would need an FTL Drive that could go from 0 to 84 Billion LIght Years per Second MAX. By Crom, I think I've defined just how much we need to get around our Bubble of Space Time! Okay, all you Ringworld Engineers out there, you know what we need, so get to work!
"You can't multiple PI by a round number and get a round number."Perhaps Deep Thought simply believed we weren't ready for the remainder.
Oh, gawd! I laughed so hard it hurt.
Post a Comment
|
<urn:uuid:07e5c482-7be7-45bf-bbc1-8e26cdd7c2f3>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://booksbikesboomsticks.blogspot.com/2010/09/i-lose-25-cool-points.html?showComment=1285446496093
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.942928
| 1,034
| 1.648438
| 2
|
By Ana Maria Fores Tamayo (Contact)
To be delivered to: Arne Duncan, US Secretary of Education and President Barack Obama
Teacher working conditions become student learning conditions. Adjuncts teaching college students have more than doubled since 1970. Today, they teach well over 70% of classes nationwide, yet they are paid shamefully little in comparison to their tenure or tenure track counterparts. They have no chance for advancement, they have no continuity with their semester-to-semester schedule, and they have no say on anything pertaining to their university or college. Moreover, because they are compensated so unequally, they need to hold several teaching positions in order to support themselves, making their workload unfeasible. If you want a better education for students, then you must demand better pay and status for the majority of the faculty teaching in today's institutions of higher education across the country. Demand better salaries for the underpaid and undervalued adjuncts, the contingency labor force that teaches most of the imperative core classes students need in order to succeed in today's competitive academic climate.
Note: MoveOn Civic Action does not necessarily endorse the contents of petitions posted on this site. MoveOn Petitions is an open tool that anyone can use to post a petition advocating any point of view, so long as the petition does not violate our terms of service.
|
<urn:uuid:1eb67bf1-77c1-4d7f-8e6e-4637b4d416c8>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/better-pay-for-adjuncts
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.963329
| 276
| 1.671875
| 2
|
Thursday, January 5, 2012
The following is a quote from the book, Sleeping With the Devil:
It wasn't long before the Saudis were spreading money everywhere, like manure on a winter's field. The White House put out its hand to fund pet projects that Congress wouldn't fund or couldn't afford, from a war in Afghanistan to one in Nicaragua. Every Washington think tank, from the supposedly nonpartisan Middle East Institute to the Meridian International Center, took Saudi money. Washington's boiler room — the K Street lobbyists, PR firms, and lawyers — lived off the stuff. So did its bluestocking charities, like the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Children's National Medical Center, and every presidential library of the last thirty years. The Saudis even kicked in a quarter of a million dollars on a winter sports clinic for disabled American veterans.
Saudi money also seeped into the bureaucracy. Any Washington bureaucrat with a room-temperature IQ knows that if he stays on the right side of the kingdom, some way or another, he'll be able to finagle his way to feed at the Saudi trough. A consulting contract with Aramco, a chair at the American University, a job with Lockheed — it doesn't matter. There's hardly a living former assistant secretary of state for the Near East; CIA director; White House staffer, or member of Congress who hasn't ended up on the Saudi payroll in one way or another, or so it sometimes seems. With this kind of money waiting out there, of course Washington's bureaucrats don't have the backbone to take on Saudi Arabia.
What's going on here? The way I look at things, it amounts to an indirect, extralegal tax on Americans. Saudi Arabia raises the price of gasoline, then remits a huge percentage to Washington, but not just to anyone. A big chunk goes to pet White House projects; part goes into the pockets of ex-bureaucrats and politicos who keep their mouths shut about the kingdom. And a lot goes to keeping our defense industry humming in bad times. Add it all up, and Saudi Arabia is one of Washington's biggest hitters.
Washington likes to describe all this with an inoffensive, neutral economic term: recycling petrodollars. But it's plain old influence peddling.
Sleeping With the Devil: was authored by Robert Baer, a former case officer in the Directorate of Operations for the CIA from 1976 to 1997. His overseas assignments included stints in Iraq, Dushanbe, Rabat, Paris, Beirut, Khartoum, and New Delhi. He speaks Arabic, Farsi, French, German, and English. He has handled agents who infiltrated Hizballah, Fatah-Hawari, and Al-Qaeda.
|
<urn:uuid:83af1028-fdf6-43ac-b147-178355b08640>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.openfuelstandard.org/2012/01/ofs-bill-whats-in-way.html
|
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
| 0.9547
| 571
| 1.671875
| 2
|
The article starts with the following quote that is very applicable to Fort Thomas:
"research shows that a healthy and vibrant downtown boosts the economic health and quality of life in a community. Specifically, it creates jobs, incubates small businesses, reduces sprawl, protects property values, and increases the community’s options for goods and services. A healthy downtown is a symbol of community pride and history."
For purposes of analysis as it relates to Fort Thomas I will focus my thoughts on the Midway district but a similar analysis could be interesting in regards to the central business district and Inverness. The report mentions a few strategies that appear to be successful across a wide array of communities and studies including:
- Aim for a multi-functional downtown - The Midway borders some great assets including Tower Park and the closed to the public reservoir. I think a vision for Midway should include these assets if we are going to make the area successful. In the history of the Midway district it was the Army base that is now our public park that provided a market for retail to begin with. Rather than focusing just on facades or parking we need to pay attention to how the community uses the assets around the retail district and how all assets work together.
- Create partnerships - the report says "Downtown revitalization encompasses a wide range of activities. Therefore, it requires the cooperation of local government, chambers of commerce, the private sectors, civic organizations, and other key institutions." While I have not researched the issue I wonder if the city would be able to work with the water district to still allow walkers, runners, & roller-bladers to enjoy the walkway around the reservoirs. That is just one example where cooperation with other area agencies could allow the Midway to be more than what we currently have on the drawing board.
- Focus on developing the unique qualities of downtown - the work of the Renaissance Board has definitely been a big help in preserving the architecture and character of the district and the current plan by council to improve the streetscape including burying the utilities and improving the sidewalks will go a long way towards success in this area.
- Maintain and develop genuine public spaces - this is one area that I think we have fallen far short on in the Midway. The article lists wide sidewalks as an option and I think this is key for outdoor seating and subsequently for attracting additional restaurants. For anyone that has visited Europe a great feature in many public parks are park tables with chess boards built into them -this is the type of concept that I think would go over great being so close to the VA Hospital and Tower Park.
- Get local governments involved - this point focuses on the council's role in making a favorable environment for a renewed community. This includes zoning and support with historical designation.
|
<urn:uuid:02014cb2-5274-4bdb-bd2b-eb5eec294755>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.fortthomasmatters.com/2008_02_01_archive.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.958354
| 565
| 1.757813
| 2
|
Changing weather conditions can create respiratory challenges for calves. Cooling temperatures in fall and big temperature swings between day and night can lead to stress and wear on calves’ immune systems.
“Cooler weather may require closing windows and doors to calf housing,” says Greg Edwards, DVM, dairy technical services, Pfizer Animal Health. “That can create an environment with poor ventilation, minimized air exchange and, potentially, a buildup of bovine respiratory disease-causing pathogens, which calves can pick up easily.”
BRSV spreads as easily as the common cold
One of the causes of bovine respiratory disease (BRD) is bovine respiratory syncytial virus (BRSV). An omnipresent pathogen, BRSV is as common to calves as cold germs are to humans — it affects up to 70 percent of dairies.1
“It’s just as easy for calves to acquire BRSV from infected pen mates or surfaces on the farm as it is for humans to pick up cold germs on shopping carts,” Edwards says.
Calves have a greater chance of developing a respiratory infection during high-stress times, such as weaning or moving to group housing. While respiratory diseases appear most often during such events, calves may be exposed to the virus earlier in life. Research shows that not only are calves affected with BRD in the first few months of life more likely to die, but those that survive grow more slowly, calve later and produce less milk in at least their first lactation.2
Vaccinate to help prevent BRSV
“Vaccinating newborn calves using an intranasal vaccine (such as INFORCE 3) helps prime their immune systems to help protect their lungs and lives,” Edwards says.
A trial tested young calves’ response to INFORCE 3 intranasal respiratory vaccine, and results showed that INFORCE 3 helps override BRSV maternal antibodies present in colostrum. Calves vaccinated with INFORCE 3 had a 57 percent reduction in lung lesions and 70% less mortality than the control group of calves, following a challenge with BRSV.3
Jump-start their immunity
Help boost calves’ immunity by following these tips on nutrition, calf care and intranasal vaccination:
- Feed calves high-quality colostrum within the first few hours of life.
- Give an initial intranasal vaccination within the first 24 hours to help build strong immunity against bovine rhinotracheitis (IBR), parainfluenza 3 (PI3) and BRSV.
- Provide pre-weaned calves enough calories and protein to more than double birth weight by 60 days of age through milk replacer or pasteurized whole milk and a balanced starter.
- Feed calves based on individual size and weight, and adjust feeding based on outside climate.
- Be consistent with rations and feed at the same time each day. If changes are necessary in diet or feeding time, do so gradually.
- Revaccinate calves before moving to group housing.
- Provide ample space for resting and for feed bunks in group environments.
- Maintain proper air exchange to keep fresh air coming in while minimizing growth of airborne pathogens and eliminate harmful odors.
Work with your veterinarian to evaluate calf health and management on your dairy operation.
1 Steven T, Grubbs ST, Kania SA, Potgieter LND. Prevalence of ovine and bovine respiratory syncytial virus infections in cattle determined with a synthetic peptide-based immunoassay. J Vet Diagn Invest 2001;13(2):128-132.
2 Van Der Fels-Klerx HJ, Martin SW, Nielen M, Huirne RBM. Effects on productivity and risk factors of bovine respiratory disease in dairy heifers: a review for the Netherlands. Netherlands Journal of Agricultural Science 2002;50(1):27-45.
3 Data on file, Study Report No. 3131R-60-11-857, Pfizer Inc.
|
<urn:uuid:ee96fe09-1e1d-40e2-80cc-9b1cfe64a5d3>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.dairyherd.com/dairy-resources/calf-heifer/Protect-calves-respiratory-systems-this-fall-170220556.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.920241
| 865
| 3.578125
| 4
|
Curcumin comes from the Turmeric plant and has been in India as a spice for centuries. Traditionally, people used curcumin to add flavour to their dishes, with many cultures recognizing the spice for its many medicinal properties. As the use of curcumin continues to grow in popularity, so does the acknowledgement of its many benefits. It is for this reason that many around the world have decided to begin integrating curcumin (mostly through the intake of turmeric) into their daily lives. The methods of doing so include simply consuming turmeric as a food source, taking turmeric extract in pill form, or ingesting highly concentrated liquid turmeric extract.
One primary reason for the explosion of publicity and scientific research over curcumin has to do with its unique relationship with diseases like cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, and much more. The powers of curcumin on cancer in particular, however, have sparked a great deal of interest.
Curcumin and Cancer
The world of modern medicine has discovered that curcumin is highly effective when it comes to combating cancer in a number of trials. In one study, it was found that curcumin reduced the size of a particular type of brain tumor by a shocking 81 percent. Published in the Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry back in 2011, the groundbreaking research discovered that the compound drastically reduced brain tumors in 9 out of the 11 studies examined by 81 percent. What’s more, the scientists discovered no evidence of toxicity. In other words, the healing properties come at no expense — side effect free.
The findings add a large degree of credible confirmation to its heavy use within the ancient Chinese and Indian systems of medicine.
Further studies have also reached similar conclusions. Another study showing how even small amounts of the substance can be highly beneficial found that just 1,000 milligrams of curcumin can help stop the growth of cancer. For this study, researchers from the UCLA examined the cancer-blocking nature of curcumin during a study that consisted of 21 participants suffering from both head and neck cancers. Given two chewable curcumin tablets which both contained 1,000 milligrams each, the effects were examined by an independent lab in Maryland.
The result? The lab discovered that the enzymes in the patients’ mouths which are actually responsible for spreading and promoting cancer were actually substantially inhibited by the curcumin tablets. The curcumin compound actually stopped the spread of malignant cells. And the health-promoting properties do not stop at cancer. Curcumin, and turmeric as a whole, have also been researched to aid in the fight against a wide variety of health conditions — many of which are life-threatening.
Amazingly, curcumin has been found to benefit over 560 negative conditions including: Alzheimer’s disease, oxidative stress, DNA damage, inflammation, HIV infections, and cancer. Studies performed on lab mice have even shown that curcumin also effectively treated kidney problems and restored kidney functions.
Curcumin and Alzheimer’s
The rise in Alzheimer’s disease cases has opened the eyes of the modern world to the gravity of this disease, with curcumin showing extreme promise in the treatment and prevention of Alzheimer’s. In fact, over 29 pieces of peer-reviewed research now available to the public have shown that curcumin can be instrumental in the treatment of this disease. It is thought for this reason that India, a region in which the consumption of turmeric (and subsequently curcumin) is especially high, has some of the lowest Alzheimer’s rates in the world.
It is reportedly due to the life-promoting properties of the spice that a reduction in Alzheimer’s risk is observed. In recent research, it was even unveiled that fruit flies live 75 percent longer when given curcumin. While of course the research was conducted on insects and not humans, the study pinpoints just how significantly curcumin can play a role in enhancing life in all forms. More specifically, it can play a role in slowing the development of Alzheimer’s and dementia.
And what’s more, it is so simple to add into your daily routine.
Curcumin is even effective in lowering bad cholesterol levels naturally. Curcumin is effective in lowering LDL (bad cholesterol) and increasing HDL, or good cholesterol. When taken on a daily basis, curcumin may significantly decrease LDL levels.
Preliminary findings on studies in the use of curcumin in the treatment of Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) have shown that the virus does react to curcumin treatment. As more health professionals become aware of this information, we could possibly see curcumin being formally used in the treatment of HIV in the future.
Curcumin is also used in the treatment of arthritis and cataracts. As studies on the health benefits of curcumin are being performed routinely, more and more health benefits are expected to be seen in the future.
|
<urn:uuid:23fdccc1-7c7a-4053-a3c7-b686ade04b7b>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://naturalsociety.com/curcumin/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.959181
| 1,024
| 2.828125
| 3
|
Today Jews around the world celebrate Purim—God’s deliverance of His people through Queen Esther. That tragedy in history began because of the royal advisor Haman’s thirst for power. What Queen Esther did to counter his evil was to be gracious to her husband the King; bringing him relaxation and comfort where he could savor food and drink and find restful moments in her company and beauty.
When that banquet was done; she gave him another. She did not rush through her request. As she encouraged her husband the King to savor his time with her, she showed him that what she would be asking was not something trivial.
The savoring ensured that the King understood its importance. It was important enough to make him think and wait for her request.
I am in the midst of writing a bible study about how God sees his women of faith with lessons learned from Queen Esther. I struggle with my desire to be obedient in writing the book and getting it out into the world. Yet, the book appears to want to be written at a slower pace. Why?
Is it fear that once I finish the writing, I will have to face the tremendous work and anxiety of pursuing publication—agents and publishers and rejections?
Is it a lack of passion for the subject? Although I thought this was a good idea at one time, does my interest no longer compel me forward?
Is it a sense that there’s not enough meat in the subject as I have presented it? That there are not enough lessons to share with others? Or that I’m not the right person to share them?
Or is it that the Holy Spirit leading me in the writing, is taking me at a slower pace—perhaps so I can learn the lessons more fully myself; accept them at a deeper level and thus share them more passionately and without fear—thus overcoming all those other concerns?
No doubt there are more lessons for me to learn. I am meant, not just to read and understand and share. I am meant to savor the reading. I am meant to savor the understanding. And I am meant to savor the sharing.
There is a time element to the word “savor”; not just a depth of effort. We are not meant to rush through life. Nor are we meant to rush through understanding and sharing.
In all things, God has given us this one and only earthly life and He means us to fully live in it. He means us to savor, not just the beauty and wonder; not just the pleasure and joy; but also the work—and even the burdens he places before us. So that by savoring, we can get the most from each moment He has gifted us with.
Today, the Jewish people celebrate the holy day of Purim, God’s deliverance from Haman’s planned destruction. It is a day to praise God for his hand in our lives today.
And for me, it is a day to remember to savor the lessons I can learn from a beautiful queen who lived several thousand of years ago.
PRAYER: Lord, please help us slow down when you want us to savor something important. Help us learn every lesson you want us to learn. Help us to live fully in each moment you give us today. Amen.
WHAT ABOUT YOU? What do you need to savor today?
|
<urn:uuid:7aca2075-6a80-49e2-b619-28732cdb3359>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://fromcarolsquill.blogspot.com/2012/03/savor-legacy-of-queen.html?showComment=1331130251614
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00024-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.976254
| 701
| 1.6875
| 2
|
Pete Rose and Dikembe Mutombo, the retired sports stars, are famous for very different reasons -- Rose for his gambling, Mutombo for his philanthropy. The Baseball Hall of Fame permanently barred Rose from induction for betting on the Cincinnati Reds, his own team. The National Basketball Association twice awarded Mr. Mutombo the J. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award for his humanitarian work combating infectious diseases like polio.
The two strike a fitting contrast to illustrate a point about the new tax law enacted as part of the "fiscal cliff" deal and the coming battle over the presidential budget.
One might think that U.S. tax policy would favor philanthropic behavior over gambling, but the exact opposite is true. As a result of the fiscal cliff deal, the deduction for charitable contributions is limited, but the deduction for gambling losses -- up to the amount of gambling winnings -- is not. In 2013, it is better to gamble than to give.
This is all a result of the "Pease" limitation, which reduces certain itemized deductions. It lowers the charitable deduction by 3 percent of adjusted gross income above $250,000 for singles and $300,000 for married couples, for a maximum reduction of 80 percent of itemized deductions. But some deductions are excluded from the Pease limitation, and the deduction for gambling losses is one.
Charitable contributions should be treated more favorably than gambling losses because they are not a form of personal consumption -- after all, the charity consumes the gift, not the donor. Gambling losses, on the other hand, are an entertainment expense. At the very least, gifts to charity should be treated no worse than gambling losses. If the deduction for gambling losses is exempt from Pease, the same should go for charitable gifts.
Pease is a clever trick to raise revenue, but it is a headache to calculate, and it creates perverse tax policy. For some generous taxpayers, it creates a significant disincentive to give. At the moment you make a gift, it is difficult to know if or by how much Pease will limit its deductability, because that is determined by yearly income and other deductions. The more your income exceeds $250,000, the more Pease will limit your charitable deduction, which complicates matters. And again, Pease bites the hardest on those who are wealthy and generous. Those who prefer gambling to charity get off scot-free.
There are good reasons to carve out charitable deductions from the Pease limitation that transcend the debate about federal revenue. The purpose of the charitable deduction is to maintain the independence of civil society from the government. As Justice John Marshall once put it, "The power to tax involves the power to destroy." By carving charitable gifts out of the tax base, the charitable deduction helps to maintain the separation of church and state. It also preserves Americans' freedom to form, fund and operate charitable organizations, giving substance to our constitutionally protected freedom of association. The deduction enables American civic engagement with minimum government interference.
Moreover, charitable gifts should not be taxed because many charities rely on them for funding. According to the National Center for Charitable Statistics, the United States has approximately 900,000 public charities, 100,000 private foundations and 320,000 religious congregations. Charitable giving is essential to preserve this part of our society. If the government were to tax charitable gifts, it would blur the lines between the government and an independent charitable sector. Yet Pease, in its awkward way, does just that. By limiting the charitable deduction, Pease pulls a portion of charitable gifts back into the tax base.
Both Right and Left should agree on the importance of maintaining an independent civil society. Exempting the charitable deduction from Pease therefore should be a political win for both sides.
Charities should support efforts to exempt the charitable deduction from Pease, and they should work hard to persuade the president to exempt the charitable deduction from the 28 percent cap on itemized deductions that he has proposed in the past four presidential budgets. But at the very least, our tax law should not treat philanthropists worse than it does gamblers.
Alexander Reid is of counsel in Morgan Lewis's Tax Practice and former legislative counsel for the congressional Joint Committee on Taxation. He is chairman of the Tax-Exempt Organizations Committee of the District of Columbia Bar and is vice chairman of the D.C. Bar Tax Section Steering Committee.
|
<urn:uuid:44c2cea0-8644-482c-a482-fed97e6acf24>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://washingtonexaminer.com/sunday-reflection-is-it-better-to-gamble-than-to-give/article/2521004
|
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
| 0.953444
| 897
| 1.539063
| 2
|
Edgar Allen Poe (1809-1849)
Edgar Allen Poe was born into a creative Boston family.
His mother and father were both actors, as well as his uncle, who also took to the stage.
Poe was named Edgar Poe and had a younger sister Rosalie Poe. Poe may have been named after a character from the Shakespearian play, “King Lear”, as his family was members of an acting troupe. In the play, Edgar is the son of the Earl of Gloucester. I find this a bit prophetic as Shakespeare’s Edgar hides his true identity from the King, by pretending to be Tom O’ Bedlam, a lunatic -- bedlam being a play on the word bedlam, meaning madness. The character of Edgar has the last speech in the play that implies that he seeks to be the King, as Poe is now considered the King of the Macabre.
Poe’s early life was a sad story in itself. In 1810, his father abandoned his family and in 1811, his mother died of pulmonary tuberculosis. He is taken in by the family of John Allen and moved to Richmond, Va. The family name of Allen was used as Poe’s middle name from then on, but John Allen never adopted Poe, even though John Allen had Poe baptized “Edgar Allen Poe” in 1812.
This seem to set the course of Poe’s life: a minor notable in his own time, but not quite acceptable to the upper crust circles of society.
The Allen family lived in England 1815-1820, where Poe attended school. In the later part of 1820, the Allen family moved back to Richmond. For a time he attended the University of Virginia, but left with money troubles under rumors of a possible problem with gambling depts. Poe departed the University of Virginia, and entered into different jobs, one as a reporter and used the pseudonym “Henri Le Rennet”. He was unable to support himself, even doing odd jobs on the side.
On May 27 of 1827, Poe lied about his identity and age, claiming to be 20, when he was actually 18 and enlisted in the army as the fictitious “Edgar A. Perry.” In less than five years he had attained the rank of sergeant major, and was recommended to attend West Point. He was forced to confess the ruse about who he really was and his age, and write a letter explaining the situation to John Allen. It is not known if there was ever response to this “Letter of Admission” or not, but Poe moved back to Baltimore to stay with Poe’s relatives before attending West Point, and never lived with the Allen family again.
During his time as “Perry,” Poe managed to have a collection of poems published (“Tamerlane and Other Pomes”) only signing the work as “By a Bostonian.” Only Calvin Thomas, the publisher, knew that Poe was the poet, until 1829 when the collection was republished under his real name. The work that is signed “By a Bostonian” are rare and only a very few copies are known to exist.
Poe disliked West Point, and he conceived a plan to get court-martialed. It worked and he was drummed out of the Army in 1831. A second collection of poems was published by Poe in New York in 1831. This included “Tamerlane” and was dedicated to the cadets at West Point. He had been popular with the cadets for writing humorous antidotes about their commandant. But the collection of poems met with little success. Poe was one of the first to attempt to write as a career. In 1838, he became the editor of the Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine. Several more positions followed; this may be the reason for him showing up in so many cities and towns. It almost rivals the “George Washington slept here” craze. Many of his many residences have been turned into Poe Museums. A few of these sites are still supported by the Raven Society.
It was not until the publication of “The Raven” in 1845 that Poe received notoriety as a poet, and is attributed with conceiving the “gothic-horror” style of writing. He is also attributed with starting the “fiction detective novel” genera influencing other writer like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s “Sherlock Homes” first published in 1887, although Doyle only referred to Poe only once in his diaries. Regardless of any disclaimers, Poe wrote some of the first known short stories in this “Detective Genre”, such as “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” and “The Gold-Bug.”
“The Gold-Bug” showcased Poe’s talent for cryptography and that influenced William Friedman who was instrumental in breaking the Japanese diplomatic Purple Code during World War II. The surrounding aura of mystery, macabre, horror and unfulfilled romance that leads to the slow downfalls into madness that happens to many of Poe’s characters reflects his own life in many ways, His death was no exception.
Poe died Oct. 7, 1849, at the age of 40 under mysterious circumstances. October the 7th was an election day in the district where Poe was discovered in a delirious state near a polling place, which leads to the theory that Poe was a victim of “cooping.” The victims of “cooping” were forced to vote numerous times, and were beaten, drugged and to forcibly change clothes to repeatedly cast prearranged ballots (stuffing the ballot box) while being kept prisoner in what was referred to as a “coop”.
The clothes that Poe was found wearing were not his own and did not fit him and he was beaten up and drugged or intoxicated. This was the classic state of victims of this “cooping” practice. The other explanations for Poe’s demise are equally troubling. Nothing of what actually happened or any records exist to put a definitive answer to the question as to what caused Poe’s death, with the exception of a short letter sent to his doctor.
The practice of “cooping” persisted up to the turn of the century and was practiced widely by Tammany Hall under William “Boss” Tweed and the rival gangs of New York City in the 1860s, and was outlawed during Teddy Roosevelt’s Presidency (1901-1909).
Much of what we know of Poe’s life comes from the writings of Rufus W. Griswold. Griswold wrote that Poe was addicted to alcohol, and drugs like laudanum. It was however true that Poe suffered from fits of depression, and had few real friends. But, Griswold has been accused of the character assassination of Poe when he wrote a biography of Poe making such claims. So Edgar Allen Poe remains as much a mystery as ever.
Poe was interred on Oct. 8, 1849 in an unmarked grave at Westminster Hall and Burying Ground only marked with a sandstone marker with the number 80 craved into it; a pauper’s grave. Later a Poe relative replaced the marker with an engraved headstone that has since disappeared. There was some trouble finding Poe’s remains in November 1875. It seems that the bodies in this part of the cemetery were buried facing west rather than the customary eastward manor. After unearthing some five sets of remains Poe was identified by his skull’s prominent forehead. Poe was moved to his present burial site on the grounds of the University Of Maryland, now the Maryland School of Law.
On Oct 10, 2009, Poe got a grand funeral befitting his status as America’s Gothic Master. The whole affair was a macabre play complete with actors playing long dead authors delivering speeches parsing the works of Baltimore’s now “favorite son” at the large marble monument that marks his grave, originally dedicated on Nov. 17, 1875. A life-size waxwork figure of Poe laid out in a reproduction of his casket was also in attendance -- a melancholic eulogizing chapter in an eccentric story that Poe could have written himself.
|
<urn:uuid:490f32b2-4e86-40ba-a5c6-776d592ef182>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://mesquitelocalnews.com/sections/columns/art-writing/tortured-quill-mad-poet.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.987684
| 1,761
| 3.40625
| 3
|
I have a 2-year-old child who's hateful to other kids. I watch two other kids during the day and she takes toys away and even hits them. This is my third child and my older kids never acted this way. I have tried time-outs, nothing seems to work. Do you have any ideas?
It may help to take a step back and try to understand the motivtions behind the behavior, although you'll still need to deal with it. Is your child feeling jealous of your attention to other children? Maybe some one-on-one time with her during another part of the day would help. Is the behavior centered around certain toys? If so, getting duplicates would diffuse the situation. Is it at a certain time of day? Maybe she needs her nap time re-arranged.
Regardless, when you see her bullying the other children, try an approach that´s based on reinforcement theory, the idea that toddler behavior that gets adult attention (even negative attention like a scolding), can happen more frequently as a result of the attention. Next time it happens, pay no attention to your daughter, but instead give lots of comfort to her 'victim'. The lesson for her is that not only doesn't she get what she wants, but the other guy gets your time as well.
There aren't any perfect approaches to your situation. What works depends on a child's needs and temperament and level of development. It would also be good if you had some adult assistance for the other children in your care while you are dealing with this, if possible. Good luck.
|
<urn:uuid:6cbea21b-4f23-4dc6-bd6d-73269a756073>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.babyzone.com/parenting/discipline/whining-and-tantrums/aggression-in-child_77011
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00056-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.978579
| 325
| 1.851563
| 2
|
I have just purchased a raspberry pi, and i believe i should put linux on it. However, i am a total noob to doing this stuff myself. Iv downloaded and ISO file containing the Zorin version. however iv no idea how to get it onto the SD card properly, do i need to do something to it for it to be read?
Any help appreciated!
|
<urn:uuid:05113e01-f1a3-46e1-a3e5-42b40930926b>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.linux.com/community/forums/getting-started-with-linux/im-a-total-noob/15071
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.954487
| 77
| 1.5
| 2
|
- According to the conventional wisdom, road transportation would be highly inefficient without the government's power of eminent domain, because property owners could refuse to sell their property at the government's asking price. In reality, there are strong grounds for thinking that private, for-profit road companies would have fewer problems with holdouts and few problems as severe as that of government failure in road transportation.
Eminent Domainˇwho needs it?
Not Bruce Benson. He argues that those who want to build roads, pipelines, and so on don't need it either. In an interesting Independent Review article he tackles the "holdout problem" and other justifications for grabbing land. Here's the abstract:
|
<urn:uuid:ef11db8d-8413-4f2e-8c6d-38848c8573e4>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://reason.org/news/printer/eminent-domainwho-needs-it
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.970054
| 139
| 2.21875
| 2
|
On Thu, Jul 7, 2011 at 4:08 PM, David
I am trying to use OpenLDAP from an embedded Linux system to
authenticate (PAM LDAP) against a Windows AD server. I must
use TLS to secure this, but I would rather not use SASL or
Kerberos if possible.
I have been able to mock this up on a Centos system without
TLS, and the PAM worked fine. When I turn on TLS, the Windows
server handshakes the TLS but then has a problem with the
first message. I am also working that side.
I have walked through the handshake with s_client, and the
connection is happy.
I am now working with ldapsearch and trying things....
The first thing I notice is that it seems to try an SASL bind.
Can I stop this?
I'm not sure I have SASL actually installed on this system,
and I'm not sure I want it in my target.
ldapsearch -x <--- does simple auth instead of sasl.
Is this possible? from both the OpenLDAP client and/or Windows
Ideas on the correct alphabet soup to try this with ldapsearch
would be appreciated.
Well, I have seen this done through samba, but you *should* be
able to use AD's LDAP to authenticate your Linux workstation,
|
<urn:uuid:0ae60c85-d9a5-41eb-8bdb-d39835c2cf32>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.openldap.org/lists/openldap-technical/201107/msg00095.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00072-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.927795
| 301
| 1.601563
| 2
|
Could saline in the pool reduce the potential hazards?
- C N Barry
- General practitioner Wroughton Health Centre, Wroughton, Swindon SN4 9LW
EDITOR,—I have recently attended four water births; three went smoothly, but in one the baby had some difficulty breathing and was admitted to the special care baby unit, where he had a convulsion and was found to have a low sodium concentration. Inhalation of water was thought to be …
|
<urn:uuid:6ed7c8f8-7601-4c06-9ef8-10b40b55cb9c>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.bmj.com/content/310/6994/1602.3
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368707435344/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516123035-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.983739
| 98
| 1.554688
| 2
|
August 14, 2012; Source: Examiner
In Uganda, the official website of the prime minister, along with other government websites, were hacked and defaced last week by the hacktivist collective Anonymous. The cyber-militants did so in support of the Ugandan LGBT community and in retaliation for the government’s anti-gay policies, particularly legislation that lingers in Parliament that has been referred to as the “kill the gays” bill. The bill would imprison anyone who fails to report alleged homosexuals, as well as execute lesbians and gays.
“You have been warned, repeatedly to expect us,” the collective’s message read (this was not the first time Anonymous hackers took control of Ugandan government websites). “Your violations of the rights of LGBT people have disgusted us. ALL people have the right to live in dignity free from the repression of someone else’s political and religious beliefs. You should be PROUD of your LGBT citizens, because they clearly have more balls than you will ever have.”
Anonymous also posted a photograph taken at Uganda’s first LGBT Pride celebration, which was originally featured on The Advocate’s website. This has alarmed Melanie Nathan, a blogger who wrote about photos from the historic event and who fears that the activist pictured has unnecessarily been put in danger.
“While I support all protests against the anti-gay Ugandan Government, I fear this may cause a backlash to the LGBTI [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex] community of activists who so bravely showed their faces at Pride,” she explains on her blog. “The photo used by Anonymous which is now all over the internet is harmful and should not have been used in that fashion … their attempt to help the Ugandan gay community, may in fact be causing more harm to the actual brave activists who put themselves on the line.”
“My concern is the manner in which Anonymous claim to speak on behalf of Uganda LGBT activists with no consultation whatsoever,” says Val Kalende, an activist quoted by Nathan. “Do they understand how their actions could be perceived by Ugandans? I question the motive of Anonymous. They need to be advised. Those well-meaning interventions can cause severe backlash for activists on the ground. Hacking government websites to ‘help’ victims of state-sponsored homophobia? Who does that? I think this extremist violent intervention MUST STOP. I would advise you speak to activists on the ground for their views on this.”
Whether or not the Ugandan LGBT community agrees or disagrees with Kalende, this is a serious lesson for those of us in the West who might act “on behalf” of those in the developing world without first asking what they need and how we can best help: sometimes, this can mean not intervening at all. – Erwin de Leon
|
<urn:uuid:91b6f6b2-f6c2-4de5-9b84-3073a89d03b6>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://nonprofitquarterly.org/policysocial-context/20873-anonymous-hacking-in-uganda-may-bring-lgbt-safety-concerns.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.974216
| 596
| 1.53125
| 2
|
As I write this, I am planning my route home from Alexandria, La., where I’m in the middle of the Louisiana Agricultural Technology and Management Conference, sponsored by Louisiana Agricultural Consultants Association. It’s a great conference, as usual, but I’m having to leave early because of another round of winter weather.
Alexandria, or “Alex” as it’s known around here, is a typical southern city in many ways, except for one -- its traffic circle.
A traffic circle – in some places, they’re called roundabouts – is essentially a circular intersection with an island in the middle. All the cars are going in one direction and are constantly entering and peeling off the circle onto streets that connect to the circle like wheel spokes. It’s both creative and confusing, somewhere between a great idea for keeping traffic moving in a busy city and a wormhole into another dimension.
If you know what you’re doing, you can get on and off without much trouble, but if you’re not familiar with the design or the local geography, it can be dizzying. The Alexandria traffic circle is imposing. It encloses an island of trees and spans the length of several of football fields.
If you driving in the city, you can’t avoid the doggone thing. Even if you make a mistake, peel off on the wrong road and have to stop and ask directions, you always get the same answer, “Well, you go back to the circle …”
If not for the excellent advice from a friendly citizen, I might still be contributing to the wear and tear of the asphalt in the circle.
The Alexandria traffic circle even has its own Facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=175891795776, with 31 members who both love and loathe the feature. One member expresses horror at an apparent plan to build a second traffic circle in the city. Another, a beauty is in the eyes of the beholder type, says there’s no problem with the circle, rather the “dumb” drivers who try to use it. One suggests using spike strips to discourage discourteousness.
In defense of traffic circles, studies show that they do decrease accidents versus traditional intersections.
Alexandria’s traffic circle will be a breeze compared to what is looking more and more like another white knuckle adventure to Memphis on Thursday morning.
If you’re wondering if all the snow and ice of this winter disproves global warming, not so fast. I heard a meteorologist on The Weather Channel explain that yes, the world is getting warmer, it’s just not getting warmer here in the United States. That carbon dioxide stuff sure acts in mysterious ways.
No doubt, something is screwy with the climate. In one part of the world, the ice caps are melting. And right here in the warm, friendly Mid-South, Ice Road Truckers could film an episode on Interstate 40.
|
<urn:uuid:850801f9-6abe-4c90-8e29-6a52d61c9419>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://deltafarmpress.com/print/cotton/alexandria-s-traffic-circle-dizzying-ride?group_id=37656
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698207393/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095647-00040-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.93025
| 634
| 1.59375
| 2
|
Fall Bloom Of Rhododendrons
Dr. Sandra McDonald, Hampton, VA
Fall bloom of rhododendrons has been a problem for nurserymen and rhododendron gardeners for many years. It occurs in species and hybrids of rhododendrons, including evergreen and deciduous azaleas. This phenomenon has occupied my thoughts at various times and I am putting my observations and conclusions forward where I hope they will be tested as a research project for some professor or graduate student.
R. L Ticknor briefly discussed the problem in "Rhododendron News'", February, 1980, published by the Portland Chapter of the American Rhododendron Society, and suggested dry conditions followed by a thorough soaking of the soil, then warm weather to stimulate the plants. Norman Pellett and Bertie Boyce in "'Flower Bud Cold Hardiness" which appeared in American Horticulturist, Oct/Nov 1979, mention that sometimes environmental conditions, perhaps a period of dry weather in late summer overcomes inhibition (dormancy). Henry Skinner, Fred Galle and Daniel Milbocker have mentioned this phenomenon in lectures or in conversation with me.
In field observations at Le-Mac Nurseries, Inc., Hampton, Va., budded 2 year old plants of Rhododendron 'Cunningham's White' were compared to budded 3 year old plants of R. 'Cunningham's White' in beds in the same field. The 2 year old plants did not fall bloom while the 3 year old plants did. A major difference in culture of the 2 beds was the watering. The 2 year old plants received frequent irrigation (usually twice a week) while the 3 year old plants received less frequent irrigation. Temperatures should have been the same in both beds since all plants were in an open field in full sun. Older plants of R. 'Cunningham's White' in a stock ground which has afternoon shade, but was not irrigated at all, bloomed out almost 100% in the fall.
In another area of the nursery, evergreen azalea 'Prize' was grown in 2 situations. These plants were all the same age, potted in the same medium, and fertilized similarly, but one group was under 51% saran shade and the other was in sun. The plants under shade did not fall bloom, but the plants in sun did have occasional buds break dormancy and bloom in the fall. In this case I think it was still dryness causing the fall flowering. Several times in the summer I had noticed the plants in sun were not being kept adequately watered and eventually discovered the automatic watering had broken and the plants in sun were being inadequately hand watered. Since these plants did not have shade they actually needed more water than the shaded plants, but were receiving less with resultant early bud set and fall bloom.
Dry conditions (though not dry enough to kill the plant or completely stop bud set) seem to promote early bud set. These early-set buds can then bloom out after they have had more dry weather to overcome dormancy followed by rainfall or irrigation in conjunction with warm autumn weather to force the flowers.
Larson (4) has done much work with forcing azaleas and has an interesting discussion on breaking azaleas flower bud dormancy with cold treatment. He also reports work of several others who used gibberellic acid to overcome flower bud dormancy.
Schoeneweiss (9) did a study on breaking dormancy of red oak (Quercus rubra) seedlings in the greenhouse. In his study GA (gibberellic acid)-lanolin paste on leaf scars broke terminal bud dormancy. In another of his tests, GA-glycerol and pure glycerol also broke dormancy in oak, while untreated plants did not. In all these cases if GA-glycerol or glycerol alone was used, lateral rather than terminal buds grew. Schoenweiss mentions studies by Kemp, Fuller and Davidson (2) and Kramer (3) in which breaking of dormancy in plants is associated with an increase in soluble carbohydrate content. Scheoneweiss devised tests using pure ethylene glycol, pure glycerol, 1 N glucose, 1 N sucrose, 1% GA in pure glycerol, 1% GA in water and also untreated checks, treatments applied December 7. Dormancy breaking from treatments with ethylene glycol, glycerol and GA was consistent; glucose and sucrose seemed to have some effect, but results were erratic. In another test with ethylene glycol, glycerol and GA in glycerol on two species of oak (Q. palustris and Q. macrocarpa) and on sweet gum (Liquidambar styraciflua), the oaks broke dormancy with all treatments, but the sweetgum only with GA-glycerol.
Schoeneweiss reported that after the first flush of growth following dormancy breaking, test plants became quiescent and did not put on further growth as they would during the summer. This corresponds with my experience with a test lot of deciduous azalea rooted cuttings. The rooted cuttings treated with GA put on one flush of growth then went dormant in early summer until the next year.
Several at least partially interchangeable treatments have been found to overcome bud dormancy and certain type of seed dormancy. Chemical treatment with 2-chloroethanol (called ethylene chlorohydrin in older works) applied in the vapor form breaks dormancy of some fruit trees (8); very short exposure to warm water bath sometimes breaks dormancy; exposure to low temperatures for a minimum number of days to months breaks bud dormancy for many plants, including fruit trees and rhododendrons and azaleas; gibberellins have been found to break dormancy of many deciduous plants and some cold requiring seeds (peach). Gibberellin can partially or completely replace cold storage in acceleration of flowering of well developed azalea buds (1;5). I have personal knowledge of a Virginia Beach, Va. camellia gardener who 'gibbs' some of her rhododendrons as well as her camellias to get fall bloom.
I believe drought also has some effect in breaking some kinds of dormancy as has been casually observed by several others mentioned earlier. Salisbury and Ross (8, on page 693) state "Hydrolytic activities, including breakdown of metabolites in general but particularly the hydrolysis of starch and protein, increase during desiccation. This general increase in rate of metabolic breakdown is probably the most universal characteristic of high water stress." They also state there is a decrease in rate of translocation of solutes. I believe this transformation of starch into sugar and decrease in translocation should lead to a build up in sugar content during drought conditions.
I suspect an important factor that several, if not all the above mentioned dormancy breaking treatments have in common is the conversion of starch to sugar, especially the breakdown of starch by the enzyme a amylase to dextrins and perhaps further to glucose and maltose. a amylase, beta amylase and starch phosphorylase (all enzymes which convert starch to sugar) are very active in germinating seeds high in starch (8). beta amylase is already present in the seeds, but most of the a amylase is produced as germination progresses.
An interesting aside remark mentioned by Salisbury and Ross (8) is that potato tubers stored at temperatures only slightly above freezing, showed an accumulation of reducing sugars such as glucose and fructose, and of sucrose with an accompanying loss of 1 to 5 percent of the starch. Pressey and Shaw (7) who did this work found that the accumulation of reducing sugars results from an accompanying increase in the enzyme invertase. The sugars are reconverted back to starch on re-warming to above 10°C.
Salisbury and Ross discuss the paradox with which we are faced. Low temperature is known to reduce the rate of chemical reactions, but we seem to have an increased production of something at low temperatures. They discuss the scheme proposed by Melchers and Lang in Europe and Gregory and Purvis in England, to solve this problem. The researchers in Europe and England proposed two interacting reactions, one with a fairly low temperature coefficient and the other with a higher temperature coefficient. The product of the first reaction is acted upon by the second reaction. If reaction I progresses at low temperatures more rapidly than reaction II, we can have an accumulation of product at low temperatures. This would seem to be an explanation of how the potato tuber example works, as well as how gibberellin can increase during cold treatment.
Paleg (6) and Harugoru Yomo suggested that a gibberellin (GA3) was the hormone provided by the embryo and that it induced an increase in the content of a amylase (an enzyme which converts starch to sugar) and of proteases in aleurone layers of seeds with embryos removed. Joseph Varner (in Salisbury and Ross, pp. 477-478) proved with radioactive carbon that the increase of alpha amylase is actually due to a greater production of this enzyme in the presence of gibberellic acid, rather than to an activation by this hormone (gibberellic acid) of preexisting enzyme molecules.
The starch to sugar conversion seems to be a common factor in dormancy breaking in several of the methods discussed above. Sugars serve as food for the developing meristematic tissue in seeds and buds. Verifying the drought, sugar and fall bloom relationships in rhododendrons would be an interesting project and perhaps would be a start towards solving the problem.
There is much individual variation in fall blooming of rhododendrons. In my seedling lots of the species R. carolinianum, some individual plants seem to fall bloom regularly and others never do at all, although they are growing side by side within a bed. Fall bloom is probably a quantitative character varying with individual plants within a species, varying with individual hybrids, and even varying from species to species with some species more prone to fall bloom than others.
Most of us are interested in preventing fall bloom in our rhododendrons. Certain inhibitory chemicals such as cycocel and phosphon can delay bloom, but probably would not be practical solutions for the gardener. Adequate water throughout the growing season may help prevent fall bloom in all but the most regular fall blooming rhododendrons. Clear definition of the problem should lead to more precise and more practical solutions.
Some rhododendrons which fall bloom in the area of Hampton, Virginia are:
Album Elegans Princess Juliana R. hippophaeoides (some) Antoon van Welie Purple Splendour Balta
Rainbow PJM Confection Red Cloud EVERGREEN AZALEAS Cunningham's White Spring Dawn Hexe Elie Whitney Orange Opal Everestianum Wissahickon Indian Summer Graf Zepplin Van Nes Sensation Dorset Kate Waterer Yak-Corona
Kevin Evening Glow Golden Oriole Kentucky Cardinal R. carolinianum (some) R. luteum (some) Mist Maiden R. dauricum (some) Peachy Keen
1. Boodley, J. W. and J. W. Mastalerz, 1959, The use of gibberellic acid to force azaleas without a cold
temperature treatment, Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 74:68-85.
2. Kemp, H. T., R. G. Fuller, and R. S. Davidson, 1957, Gibberellic acid, Agri. Chem., 12(4):30-31.
3. Kramer, P. J., 1934, Methods of breaking dormancy in certain forest trees, J. For., 3 2:734-741.
4. Larson, Roy A., 1975, Continuous production of flowering azaleas, pp. 72-77 in: Anton Kofranek and Roy
Larson eds. Growing azaleas commercially. Univ. of Cal., Div. of Ag. Sci. 108 p.
5. Martin, L. W., S. C. Wiggans and R. N. Payne, 1960, The use of gibberellic acid to break flower bud
dormancy, Proc. Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 76:590-593.
6. Paleg, L. G., 1965, Physiological effects of gibberellins, Ann. Rev. of Plant Physiol., 16:291-322.
7. Pressy, R. and R. Shaw, 1966, Effect of temperature on invertase, invertase inhibitors, and sugars in potato
tubers, Plant Physiol., 41:1657-1661.
8. Salisbury, Frank B. and Cleon Ross, 1969, Plant Physiology, Wadsworth Pub. Co., Ca. 747p. (pp. 244-
246; 459-460; 475-478; 570-571; 576-577; 693-694).
9. Schoeneweiss, Donald F., 1963, Methods for breaking dormancy of oak seedlings in the greenhouse, Proc.
Amer. Soc. Hort. Sci., 83:819-824.
|
<urn:uuid:72fbe88b-f964-4873-a9df-0cb2bb144b58>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/ejournals/JARS/v35n3/v35n3-mcdonald.htm
|
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
| 0.935988
| 2,813
| 3.015625
| 3
|
Time is eroding nest eggs
Today’s average 40-year-old is likely to have 30% less funds in retirement than the previous generation because of lower market returns, longevity and a lower savings rate relative to income, a recent study by Alexander Forbes suggests.
The Alexander Forbes Pensions Index, launched in April, indicates how the income a typical person is projected to receive in retirement has changed since January 2002. The index tracks three indices based on three savers and reflects the impact of market conditions, longevity and savings rates across generations. The three savers were born on January 1 1972, 1962 and 1952, respectively. On January 1 2002, they were 30, 40 and 50 years old and all expected to be on track to have a pension that replaced 75% of their pre-tax salaries when they retired at age 65. This means that their index value was 75 on January 1 2002.
However, because of declining market conditions, by 2012 these values had fallen significantly and the 60-year-old born in 1952 is now expected to receive an income of only 57% of final salary in retirement, whereas the 40-year-old saver is expected to receive a replacement value of only 40%.
Michael Prinsloo, head of best practice at Alexander Forbes’s research and product development department, said all three savers were invested in the same way. However, the saver born in 1952 had a considerably better index value than the saver born in 1972 because the retirement-savings landscape had changed.
Prinsloo said the investment outlook today was considerably gloomier than it was 10 years ago and younger members were expected to be invested in these less favourable markets for longer. In addition, salary inflation has been high relative to investment returns in recent years. It decreases the index because past savings are proportionately lower relative to the current salary and this effect is amplified over time to retirement when final salaries are expected to be considerably higher for younger members.
For the members who are only five years away from retirement, an effective drop in expected retirement income of 24% over the past 10 years has serious consequences.
They have only five years in which to boost their reduced savings. Alternatively, they will either have to work longer, where possible, or seriously scale down their lifestyle in retirement.
Alexander Forbes said, although younger members did have time to rectify problems, the index showed they were sensitive to weaker market conditions and also faced two additional challenges: longevity and higher consumption rates.
In terms of longevity, the costs of purchasing an annuity on retirement are expected to increase as insurers price for the average member to live longer. At the same time, younger people have much higher rates of consumption than the previous generation, which not only leaves less money to save, but also increases the cost of their lifestyle on retirement.
Ultimately, younger people will need to increase the amount they put away for retirement. It is unlikely that a 40-year-old today will be able to afford to retire at age 65, especially if they are expected to live into their 90s. Prinsloo said this would also require a rethink by employers about employees’ contribution rates and retirement ages.
The cheapest way to save for retirement
In a low-return environment, costs will have a greater impact on the amount of funds available in retirement. In its recent discussion document on retirement reform, “Strengthening Retirement Savings”, the treasury indicated that it would like to have retirement products with costs of less than 1% a year. There are no actively managed retirement annuities in the market that can meet this target. In fact, most cost about 2% to 3% a year. However, there are index-tracker retirement annuities that meet these requirements, as long as there are no additional adviser fees.
10X Investments has a balanced tracker portfolio that can be used for a retirement annuity or preservation fund. The portfolios are based on age and years to retirement. A 10X retirement annuity will cost you less than 1% a year and there are no adviser fees.
Old Mutual Unit Trusts offers two low-cost, long-term investment portfolios that fall in the 1% cost structure targeted by the treasury. The Old Mutual Rafi 40 Fund is an enhanced index-tracking fund that takes into account a number of fundamental investment principles (cash flow, sales, dividends and book value) in constructing a portfolio of 40 stocks. The fund’s annual service fee is 0.86% and the total expense ratio is 0.88%.
Investors can also consider a more traditional approach and invest in the Old Mutual Top 40 Fund, giving them exposure to the largest 40 companies on the JSE. The fund’s annual fee is 0.68% and the total expense ratio 0.73%.
To adhere to regulation 28 requirements for retirement investments, investors can include 25% money market in the portfolio, further reducing the total cost. By combining 75% Old Mutual Top 40 and 25% Old Mutual Money Market, the investor can reduce the total cost to 0.65%.
These funds can be used in Old Mutual Unit Trusts retirement-product wrappers, including the retirement annuity, preservation fund and living annuity. There is no product cost associated with investing in retirement products. – Maya Fischer-French
|
<urn:uuid:8f957281-a182-48bd-9c03-fc9fa4fc5a41>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://mg.co.za/article/2012-06-21-oding-nest-eggs
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00064-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.97623
| 1,087
| 2.40625
| 2
|
Ensemble Vermillian: Gems from the Golden AgeSunday, May 19 | 3 pm
Museum Auditorium, East Building
$10 Museum members, students
Frances Blaker, recorders; David Wilson, baroque violin; Barbara Krumdieck, baroque cello; William Simms, theorbo and baroque guitar; Jennifer Streeter, harpsichord
Ensemble Vermillian is prized for its vivid interpretations of baroque-era music, performed with period instruments. A recent review notes that the group’s music is “so graceful and well recorded that listening to it is nearly a visual experience.”
The ensemble has crafted a thoughtful program that offers deep insights into four masterpieces from the Museum’s collection: Bernardo Strozzi’s Portrait of a Gentleman (circa 1625), Guido Reni’s Madonna and Child (circa 1628), and Rubens and workshop’s The Bear Hunt (1639) and The Holy Family with Saint Anne (circa 1630). Strozzi in fact painted the portrait of featured composer Claudio Monteverdi.
Docent-led tours of featured works of art are offered at 1:45 pm. Tour reservations are required by Friday before the concert. For reservations call Christine Molesky, assistant coordinator of adult programs, at (919) 664-6785.
Sights and Sounds on Sundays is funded, in part, by the City of Raleigh, based on recommendations of the Raleigh Arts Commission; and by the United Arts Council of Raleigh and Wake County, with funds from the United Arts Campaign; as well as by the North Carolina Arts Council, a division of the Department of Cultural Resources.
See more in this series:
Chamber Music Concerts
Find other events like this:
All events on this day:
May 19, 2013
|
<urn:uuid:dfd0984f-2b98-4317-bb89-7d224afc3e6c>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://ncartmuseum.org/calendar/event/2013/05/19/ensemble_vermillian/1500
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.914288
| 393
| 1.601563
| 2
|
Core Functions and Capabilities of State Public Health Laboratories
A Report of the Association of Public Health Laboratories
The material in this report originated in the Public Health Practice Program Office, Edward L. Baker, M.D., Director, and the Division of Laboratory Systems, Robert Martin, Dr.P.H., Director.
Emerging natural and man-made threats to the health of the nation's population require development of a seamless laboratory network to address preventable health risks; this can be achieved only by defining the role of public health laboratories in public and private laboratory service delivery. Establishing defined core functions and capabilities for state public health laboratories will provide a basis for assessing and improving quality laboratory activities. Defining public health laboratory functions in support of public health programs is the beginning of the process of developing performance standards for laboratories, against which state public health laboratories, and eventually local public health and clinical laboratories, will establish and implement best laboratory practices. Public health is changing, and as a part of that change, public health laboratories must advocate for and implement improvements for public health testing and surveillance. These changes are outlined also in the Association of Public Health Laboratories consensus report (Association of Public Health Laboratories. Core functions and capabilities of state public health laboratories: a white paper for use in understanding the role and value of public health laboratories in protecting our nation's health. Washington, DC: Association of Public Health Laboratories, 2000).
Delivery of high-quality laboratory services is essential in our health-care system both for providing the foundation for clinical decisions and as an objective means to measure and monitor biological and environmental markers. In response to an increasing concern regarding the U.S. population's vulnerability to health risks, efforts have been made to reduce preventable risks (e.g., those related to terrorist events, antimicrobial resistance, foodborne illness, and environmental threats). Accurate and timely laboratory analyses are critical to identifying, tracking, and limiting public health threats and ultimately reducing rates of preventable morbidity and mortality (1--3). Optimal functioning of the public health system to meet these threats is dependent on uniform and high-quality laboratory testing (4). Furthermore, facing public health challenges from emerging and reemerging pathogens (e.g., West Nile virus , drug-resistant communicable disease agents , and Escherichia coli O157:H7 [7,8]), requires evaluation of the functions, responsibilities, and capacities of state public health laboratories (SPHLs) (9). This evaluation of the role of public health laboratories includes environmental threat concerns (10) and appropriate application of technological advances (i.e., tandem mass spectrometry or pulsed field gel electrophoresis [11--13]). Certain disease prevention and control programs within CDC support and promote technical capacity in SPHLs (e.g., PulseNet for molecular typing; Laboratory Response Network for bioterrorism preparedness; Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity program; and resources for tuberculosis, human immunodeficiency virus [HIV], sexually transmitted diseases, blood lead, and others).
A key precept for public health is recognizing that the majority of testing for public health is either performed in private laboratories or is dependent on private laboratories for referral and reporting. Therefore, a function of public health, and specifically of SPHLs, is to ensure the availability, quality, and reporting of laboratory testing performed in the private sector. A minimal association exists between SPHLs and private (i.e., hospital and independent) laboratories, and this limited association can lead to a lack of communication and coordination of the laboratory testing that is necessary to support public health interventions.
An impediment to improving public-private coordination is the disparity of functions among SPHLs, because those functions evolved differently in each state. As of January 2002, approximately 174,000 laboratories were operating in the United States; this number included an estimated 2,000 public health laboratories, and the remainder included hospital, independent, and physician office laboratories (14). Laboratories are difficult to quantify or describe according to the volume and scope of work they perform. SPHLs operate autonomously, and delivery of public health testing historically has been, and will continue to be, state-based. State health systems vary in aspects that affect the delivery of quality public health testing. For example, state health systems individually determine which diseases are reportable by laboratories or clinicians (15). Technical standards exist for disease-specific testing, but no standard definitions exist for the broader role and functions of public health laboratories. Developing an effective laboratory system for public health testing requires definitions for standard functions of SPHLs, including a broader role in ensuring the quality of testing throughout the state.
Since the 1980s, the HIV epidemic has emphasized SHPLs' critical roles of assessing, leading, and developing health policy. Public health laboratories still consist of diverse groups and institutions (9). Public health laboratories are a loose network of federal, state, and local laboratories that work in undefined collaboration with private clinical laboratories (16). Disease outbreaks during 1992--2002 have increased the recognition of the specific testing capacities in SPHLs and reinforced the need for improving and developing communication and coordination of testing services between SPHLs and clinical laboratories (17--20). After the anthrax attacks during September--October 2001, agencies within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, including CDC, established laboratory priorities for bioterrorism preparedness. These priorities encourage leadership functions for policy development, laboratory improvement, and training and education for clinical laboratory personnel. Guidelines accompanying the FY 2002 supplemental emergency funding for bioterrorism preparedness and response and public health infrastructure improvement address the need for public-private integration of laboratory functions critical to public health. The need to develop these links is well-recognized and is the single critical benchmark for laboratories in the Guidance for Fiscal Year 2002 Supplemental Funds for Bioterrorism (21). That benchmark requires developing a plan to improve working relationships and communication between clinical laboratories and higher lever laboratories to ensure that core capabilities are maintained. Core capabilities concerning bioterrorism include 1) performing rule-out testing on critical bioterrorism agents; 2) safely packing and handling specimens; and 3) referring specimens and isolates to higher level laboratories for further testing.
The trend to better define the role of public health is apparent in public health policy documents (e.g., the Essential Services ). The first of the 10 essential services of public health (i.e., monitoring health status to identify and solve community health problems) is directly dependent on laboratory provision of analysis, pathogen identification, and disease monitoring. The second essential service (i.e., diagnosing and investigating health problems and health hazards in the community) is directly supported by laboratory functions (22). The significance of the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) core functions and capabilities of SPHLs lies in the fact that laboratory testing is a common denominator for fulfillment of these and the majority of public health objectives, which are designed to be met by measurable indicators of goals. Attainment of these goals can only be accomplished through performance of consistent, high-quality laboratory testing, for which assessment requires a definition of laboratory capabilities.
Healthy People 2010, which also shapes the role of public health, addresses goals for building the public health infrastructure (23). Included among the goals are increasing accessibility of laboratory services and the proportion of tribal, state, and local health agencies that provide or ensure comprehensive laboratory services to support essential public health services (Objective 23-13) (23). The definition of critical laboratory services and its functions are described by APHL (24), and consensus regarding these functions of public health laboratory services is the base for assessing all laboratories. APHL's recommendations go beyond the traditional functions that are acknowledged as the responsibilities of laboratory services (i.e., specimen analysis and isolate identification, disease control and surveillance, reference and specialized testing, and food safety) to areas of leadership and strengthening laboratory infrastructure for the public health testing system (i.e., laboratory improvement and regulation, policy development, training and education, and partnership and coordination). These recommendations for core functions enable state leaders and stakeholders (e.g., state epidemiologists, state and local health officers, and state legislators) to assess the adequacy of the public health laboratory systems, allocate resources, and encourage needed relationships between the public health system and the health-care delivery system. Further, these recommendations provide a guide for assessing and monitoring the service and value of the public health laboratories by serving as a basis for creation of policy development (25). From this foundation, development of laboratory performance standards and laboratory quality assurance can evolve in the United States.
Development of the core functions document and this report represent the culmination of activities that reflect a 1988 Institute of Medicine (IOM) report (25). The IOM report stated, "public health, as a profession, as a governmental activity, and as a commitment of society is neither clearly defined, adequately supported, nor fully understood" (25). Since the early 1990s, a common theme of all public health reports has been that public health activities and practices were not well-defined and that the mission and infrastructure necessary to support public health was also not well-defined (26). In this report, we focus on one component (the state public health laboratories) of one critical piece of the public health infrastructure (laboratories) and relate the consensus view of the membership of APHL regarding the core functions and capabilities of SPHLs.
Although state public health laboratories have been in existence for longer than 100 years, no organization had yet defined necessary activities of SPHLs. However, the lack of defined activities is understandable, considering that this group of >50 laboratories was created independently by states and from the outset had different charters that gave them a heterogeneous character. Despite their diversity, in the aggregate, they represent a critical component of our nation's public health infrastructure, and public health is well-served to have a defined list of core functions and capabilities that all state public health laboratories have endorsed.
This attempt to define the core functions of SPHLs began in approximately 1993 when APHL (then the Association of State and Territorial Public Health Laboratory Directors) developed an internal unpublished report that addressed the need to distinguish public health laboratories from other laboratories (e.g., those in clinical and hospital settings) (G. Anderson, A. DiSalvo, and W. Hausler in "Task Force Report on the Public Health Laboratory: A Critical National Resource; Report to the Association of State and Territorial Public Health Laboratory Directors," unpublished, 1993). In 1993, a perspective regarding the evolution of public health laboratories since their creation was published (27).
APHL continued to review the need for a more formal definition of core functions for public health laboratories, and in 1995, an internal report (R. L. Cada, S. L. Inhorn, P. Bouchard, J. M. Counts, and M. W. Kimberly in "Core Functions of Public Health Laboratories: A Report to the Association of State and Territorial Public Health Laboratory Directors by a Task Force, unpublished, 1995) was distributed to the membership. The report started the process of more clearly identifying the core functions of SPHLs and related the core functions of laboratories to assessment, quality assurance, and policy development --- the core functions of public health established in the 1988 IOM report (25). In 1996, professionals within the laboratory section of the American Public Health Association issued an internal report on the role of public health laboratories. In 1999, health officials stated that the United States needed a national laboratory system (17,19,20), and the General Accounting Office stated, "public health officials have not developed a consensus definition of the minimum capabilities that state and local health departments need to conduct infectious disease surveillance" (28). By that time, APHL had already charged its Leadership Development Task Force with developing a definitive statement concerning the core functions of state public health laboratories. APHL's resulting strategic plan reflected the priority needs and activities of APHL and guided their mission in defining the role of SPHLs in two of their strategic goals for 1999--2001: 1) to ensure that essential laboratory services are available to support public health activities in the changing health-care environment, and 2) to advocate effectively for public health laboratories through legislation, policy development, and public information (29).
The work of the APHL Task Force in defining core functions and capabilities of SPHLs was performed in collaboration with and support from CDC's Public Health Practice Program Office, Division of Laboratory Systems (PHPPO/DLS). Since 1987, APHL has had a cooperative agreement with CDC through PHPPO/DLS. A component of this agreement has focused on the National Laboratory Partnership (NLP), which is a multifaceted program that allows collaboration among APHL members, professional and scientific staff, and CDC for work related to public health laboratory practice. NLP activities with CDC have supported APHL's development of this report. Representatives from PHPPO/DLS actively participated in APHL meetings and discussions that led to the consensus vote regarding the APHL position. The value of defining core functions for SPHLs lies in the support given to CDC initiatives for developing laboratory infrastructure for testing (e.g., foodborne disease investigations and vaccine-preventable diseases). PHPPO also views the core function report as a prerequisite to developing performance standards for public health laboratories. The report (24) was adopted in its entirety by unanimous vote as the consensus position of APHL at the 2000 APHL annual meeting. Those adopted core functions are stated in this report.
These recommendations describe the broader functions and elements that are necessary to ensure the laboratory capability to execute the core functions. The term core function is a role assumed by the laboratory that underlies the laboratory's ability to support public health. The term capability denotes a specific activity that ensures the successful implementation of an associated function. For each capability, each state public health laboratory has a capacity for performing a specified number of tests within a certain time. Laboratory capacity is a key concern in light of strengthening bioterrorism preparedness and the federal mandate to address infectious disease outbreaks, other public health threats, and emergencies (24).
This report is the beginning of a process to improve public health testing, which will also require the definition of core functions of public health laboratories at the local level. This will help meet the need identified in the 1988 IOM report to better define and understand one of the critical infrastructure components of public health.
SPHL Core Functions
SPHLs should accomplish the following 11 core functions as part of their organizational capacity:
Disease Prevention, Control, and Surveillance
Integrated Data Management
Reference and Specialized Testing
Environmental Health and Protection
Laboratory Improvement and Regulation
Public Health-Related Research
Training and Education
Partnerships and Communication
Before development of the APHL Core Functions and Capabilities of State Public Health Laboratories (24), a concise and thorough definition of public health laboratory functions in support of public health programs did not exist. Typically, public health laboratories had been recognized only for the service they provided in analyzing specimens, both human and environmental, and for identification and confirmation of microorganisms. Funding was available for these visible functions of the laboratory, but recognition and noncategorical funding was not available for functions related to infrastructure, including training and workforce development; communication among laboratories, medical colleagues, and the public; and leadership for laboratory personnel. Certain external activities directly related to the analysis function have not been recognized (e.g., transport of isolates and specimens to referral laboratories --- the cost and logistics have been left to the individual laboratories, both public and private, to work out on their own [state-supported laboratory transport systems exist in only a limited number of states]).
The APHL core functions and this report are advancements in understanding the unique roles and activities provided by public health laboratories in the United States. Other national public health activities --- including bioterrorism preparedness --- will benefit from recognition of these roles and functions. The timing of efforts that are the logical outgrowth of the core functions is critical during this period of strengthening public health infrastructure and preparedness for bioterrorist events and other public health emergencies. The definition of laboratory core functions will provide a basis for assessment and improvement of laboratory activities, followed by policy development and quality assurance.
The National Laboratory System, a cooperative initiative of CDC and APHL, is dependent on and supportive of the laboratory core functions, including those external functions that integrate with clinical laboratories. The National Laboratory System is a strategic priority for APHL and includes the objectives of assessing and monitoring private and public laboratory capacities, increasing coordination and communication among laboratories, and building partnerships between public and private laboratories, workforce development through training and education, and promotion of laboratory standards. As federal guidelines have emphasized the need for effective working relationships and communication between clinical laboratories and higher-level laboratories, pilot projects in four states have demonstrated the benefits of systematic integration of laboratories, with attention toward upgrading laboratory function.
Another key continuation of the definition of laboratory core functions is the need to develop performance standards. Performance standards are critical for public health in providing potential benefits of improved accountability; better resource deployment; enhanced capacity building for community, state, and national public health systems; widespread use of best practices; and increased focus on mission and goals (30). The same premise is true for benefits of performance standards for laboratories. Work is in progress to create performance standards for the nation's laboratories through collaborative efforts of APHL and CDC.
The outcome from the definitions within the APHL 2000 Consensus White Paper on the Core Functions and Capabilities of State Public Health Laboratories will extend through the following needed initiatives:
Collectively, these efforts will enable all laboratories in the United States to actively support and participate in major public health activities that keep the population healthy and free of disease and unhealthy environmental exposures.
The preparers of this report are grateful for the contributions of Jon Counts, Dr.P.H., University of Washington, Seattle, Washington; Roger Carlson, Ph.D., Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; Jack DeBoy, Dr.P.H., State Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, Baltimore, Maryland; Leonard Green, M.P.S., Gregory Hayes, Dr.P.H., and Ray Lundgren, Jr., Ph.D., retired, Providence, Rhode Island; and Steve Hinrichs, M.D., University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, Nebraska.
* This report was supported in part by an appointment to the Research Participation Program at CDC, administered by the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education through an interagency agreement between the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, CDC.
Not listed in order of priority or significance.
Disclaimer All MMWR HTML versions of articles are electronic conversions from ASCII text into HTML. This conversion may have resulted in character translation or format errors in the HTML version. Users should not rely on this HTML document, but are referred to the electronic PDF version and/or the original MMWR paper copy for the official text, figures, and tables. An original paper copy of this issue can be obtained from the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO), Washington, DC 20402-9371; telephone: (202) 512-1800. Contact GPO for current prices.**Questions or messages regarding errors in formatting should be addressed to email@example.com.
Page converted: 9/11/2002
This page last reviewed 9/11/2002
|
<urn:uuid:a1a4002b-40d5-4c0b-9caf-e0eb1f5d3bb7>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/rr5114a1.htm
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00053-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.927763
| 4,007
| 2.484375
| 2
|
LOS ANGELES — While Mars was likely a more hospitable place in its wetter, warmer past, the Red Planet may still be capable of supporting microbial life today, some scientists say.
Ongoing research in Mars-like places such as Antarctica and Chile's Atacama Desert shows that microbes can eke out a living in extremely cold and dry environments, several researchers stressed at "The Present-Day Habitability of Mars" conference held here at the University of California Los Angeles this month.
And not all parts of the Red Planet's surface may be arid currently — at least not all the time. Evidence is building that liquid water might flow seasonally at some Martian sites, potentially providing a haven for life as we know it.
"We certainly can't rule out the possibility that it's habitable today," said Alfred McEwen of the University of Arizona, principal investigator for the HiRise camera aboard NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft. [The Search for Life on Mars: A Photo Timeline]
Surface water on Mars?
McEwen discussed some intriguing observations by HiRise, which suggest that briny water may flow down steep Martian slopes during the local spring and summer.
Sixteen such sites have been identified to date, mostly on the slopes of the huge Valles Marineris canyon complex, McEwen said. The tracks seem to repeat seasonally as the syrupy fluids descend along weather-worn pathways.
While the brines may originate underground, Caltech's Edwin Kite noted, there is an increasing suspicion that a process known as deliquescence — in which moisture present in the atmosphere is gathered by compounds on the ground, allowing it to become a liquid — may be responsible.
Astrobiologists are keen to learn more about these brines, for not much is known about them at the moment.
"Briny water on Mars may or may not be habitable to microbes, either from Earth or from Mars," McEwen said.
Martian life may be able to survive even in places where water doesn't seep and flow, some scientists stressed.
For example, microbes here on Earth make a living in the Atacama and the dry valleys of Antarctica, both of which are extremely cold and arid, said Chris McKay of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif.
Antarctic sites also receive seasonally high ultraviolet radiation doses thanks to a hole in the ozone layer that tends to develop every August through November. This provides yet another parallel to Mars, whose thin atmosphere and lack of a protective magnetic field make the planet more radiation-bombarded than Earth.
[Slideshow: Astronaut's amazing photos of Earth from space]
In the Antarctic dry valleys, McKay said, organisms dwell within rocks, just deep enough to be shielded from the worst of the UV but close enough to the surface to receive the benefits of photosynthesis. Something similar might be happening on Mars today, if life ever evolved there.
McKay also discussed deliquescence, which in the Atacama allows salts to gather enough water to support the existence of life.
McKay offered some advice to NASA's Mars rover Curiosity, which landed in August to determine whether Mars could ever have supported microbial life: "Watch for salt along the road!"
A possible energy source
A number of presenters spent some time talking about perchlorate, a chlorine-containing chemical that NASA's Phoenix lander spotted near the Martian north pole in 2008.
McKay and other researchers think perchlorate may be the reason that NASA's twin Viking landers didn't detect any organic compounds — the carbon-containing building blocks of life as we know it — on the Red Planet back in the 1970s.
The Vikings vaporized Martian soil and looked for any organics boiling off. They found nothing but a few chlorine compounds that were attributed to contamination. But after Phoenix's perchlorate find, McKay and some other researchers performed an experiment.
They added perchlorate to some desert dirt from Chile known to contain organics. They heated the soil up and found the same chlorine compounds the Vikings did, suggesting that organics may have been present in the Vikings' samples but were broken down by the combination of heat and perchlorate.
While this backstory is interesting in its own right, perchlorate is also relevant to the possible habitability of present-day Mars.
"Perchlorate, it turns out, is a potent chemoautotrophic energy source," said Carol Stoker, also of NASA Ames, noting that the chemical could potentially sustain microbes in the dark Martian subsurface, where photosynthesis is not an option.
And some Earth microbes use perchlorate for food, so that could be happening on Mars as well, scientists have pointed out.
"The Present-Day Habitability of Mars" took place Feb. 4-5 and was co-hosted by the NASA Astrobiology institute and the UK Centre for Astrobiology. Archived videos of conference presentations are available here.Copyright 2013 SPACE.com, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
|
<urn:uuid:f97309e4-0e86-4866-8681-518e98e9749a>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://news.yahoo.com/mars-may-habitable-today-scientists-212454782.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.944596
| 1,065
| 4
| 4
|
24. Papal Journeys have become an
important element in the work of implementing the Second Vatican Council.
Begun by John XXIII on the eve of the Council with a memorable pilgrimage to
Loreto and Assisi (1962), they notably increased under Paul VI who, after
first visiting the Holy Land (1964), undertook nine other great apostolic
journeys which brought him into direct contact with the peoples of the
The current Pontificate has widened this
programme of travels even further, starting with Mexico, on the occasion of
the Third General Conference of the Latin American Episcopate held in Puebla
in 1979. In that same year, there was also the trip to Poland for the
Jubilee of the nine hundredth anniversary of the death of Saint Stanislaus,
Bishop and Martyr.
The successive stages of these travels are well known. Papal journeys have become a
regular occurrence, taking in the particular Churches in every continent and showing
concern for the development of ecumenical relationships with Christians of various
denominations. Particularly important in this regard were the visits to Turkey (1979),
Germany (1980), England, Scotland and Wales (1982), Switzerland (1984), the Scandinavian
countries (1989), and most recently the Baltic countries (1993).
At present, it is my fervent wish to visit
Sarajevo in Bosnia-Hercegovina and the Middle East: Lebanon, Jerusalem and
the Holy Land. It would be very significant if in the Year 2000 it were
possible to visit the places on the road taken by the People of God
of the Old Covenant, starting from the places associated with Abraham
and Moses, through Egypt and Mount Sinai, as far as Damascus, the city which
witnessed the conversion of Saint Paul.
25. In preparing for the Year 2000, the individual Churches have
their own role to play, as they celebrate with their own Jubilees
significant stages in the salvation history of the various peoples. Among
these regional or local Jubilees, events of great importance have
included the millennium of the Baptism of Rus' in 1988 (11) as also the five
hundredth anniversary of the beginning of evangelization in America (1492).
Besides events of such wide-ranging impact, we may recall others which,
although not of universal importance, are no less significant: for example,
the millennium of the Baptism of Poland in 1966 and of the Baptism of
Hungary in 1968, together with the six hundredth anniversary of the Baptism
of Lithuania in 1987. There will soon also be celebrated the 1500th
anniversary of the Baptism of Clovis (496), king of the Franks, and the
1400th anniversary of the arrival of Saint Augustine in Canterbury (597),
marking the beginning of the evangelization of the Anglo-Saxon world.
As far as Asia is concerned, the Jubilee will remind us of the Apostle Thomas, who,
according to tradition, brought the proclamation of the Gospel at the very beginning of
the Christian era to India, where missionaries from Portugal would not arrive until about
the year 1500. The current year also marks the seventh centenary of the evangelization of
China (1294), and we are preparing to commemorate the spread of missionary work in the
Philippines with the erection of the Metropolitan See of Manila (1595). We likewise look
forward to the fourth centenary of the first martyrs in Japan (1597).
In Africa, where the first proclamation of
the Gospel also dates back to Apostolic times, together with the 1650th
anniversary of the episcopal consecration of the first Bishop of the
Ethiopians, Saint Frumentius (c. 340), and the five hundredth anniversary of
the beginning of the evangelization of Angola in the ancient Kingdom of the
Congo (1491), nations such as Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, the Central African
Republic, Burundi and Burkina Faso are celebrating the centenaries of the
arrival of the first missionaries in their respective territories. Other
African nations have recently celebrated such centenaries.
And how can we fail to mention the Eastern
Churches, whose ancient Patriarchates are so closely linked to the apostolic
heritage and whose venerable theological, liturgical and spiritual
traditions constitute a tremendous wealth which is the common patrimony of
the whole of Christianity? The many jubilee celebrations in these Churches,
and in the Communities which acknowledge them as the origin of their own
apostolicity, recall the journey of Christ down the centuries, leading to
the Great Jubilee at the end of the second millennium.
Seen in this light, the whole of Christian history appears to us as a single river,
into which many tributaries pour their waters. The Year 2000 invites us to gather with
renewed fidelity and ever deeper communion along the banks of this great river: the
river of Revelation, of Christianity and of the Church, a river which flows through human
history starting from the event which took place at Nazareth and then at Bethlehem two
thousand years ago. This is truly the "river" which with its
"streams", in the expression of the Psalm, "make glad the city of God"
26. The Holy Years celebrated in the
latter part of this century have also prepared for the Year 2000. The Holy Year proclaimed
by Paul VI in 1975 is still fresh in our memory. The celebration of 1983 as the Year of Redemption followed
along the same lines. The Marian Year 1986/87 perhaps struck a more
resounding chord; it was eagerly awaited and profoundly experienced in the
individual local Churches, especially at the Marian Shrines around the
world. The Encyclical Redemptoris Mater, issued on that occasion,
drew attention to the Council's teaching on the presence of the Mother of
God in the mystery of Christ and the Church: two thousand years ago the Son
of God was made man by the power of the Holy Spirit and was born of the
Immaculate Virgin Mary. The
Marian Year was as it were an anticipation of the Jubilee, and contained
much of what will find fuller expression in the Year 2000.
|
<urn:uuid:77aa29a9-6d6e-490c-b855-3172f12d2281>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.ewtn.com/Jubilee/gj2000/tertio9.htm
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.935113
| 1,327
| 2.453125
| 2
|
Using your credit cards wisely is largely a matter of being informed - e.g., how much your card company is charging you for credit - and by following some simple tips for using the card.
Table of Contents
Known as the Credit CARD Act of 2009, the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009 went into effect on February 22, 2010. The legislation strengthens consumer protection in the credit card market and is a comprehensive reform measure to protect credit card holders in the US against unfair interest rate hikes and hidden fees. Specifically, the legislation addresses:
Even with the new law in place, consumers should still be wary and shop around for the credit card that's best for them.
To choose a credit card wisely, you must first review and understand the terms and features of the various cards. This can add up to very respectable savings over a period of time. In addition, you should also know how use your cards wisely to keep your costs to a minimum. The Financial Guide explains how to achieve these goals.
Chances are you have received offers in the mail asking if you would like to open credit card accounts. Frequently, these offers say that you have been "pre-approved" for the card, often with a very attractive interest rate (usually, a short-term "low-ball" rate) and with a line of credit purportedly set aside for your use (although few people ultimately qualify for the credit line in the promotional literature). Typically, these offers urge you to accept quickly, "before the offer expires." However, before accepting a credit card offer, understand the card's credit terms and compare costs of similar cards to get the terms and features you want.
Making an informed decision about a credit card is largely a matter of finding out what the actual cost of credit is under that card. Credit cards involve not only a "finance charge" - a charge for the convenience of borrowing - but usually other, less obvious charges as well.
Learn which credit terms and conditions apply. Each affects the overall cost of the credit you will be using. Due to the provisions of the Fair Credit and Charge Card Disclosure Act (1998), you can compare terms and fees before you agree to open a credit card or charge card (no interest) account. Be sure to consider and compare the terms listed below, which both direct-mail applications and pre-approved solicitations must reveal.
Which card is best for you may depend on how you plan to use it. If you plan to pay bills in full each month, the size of the annual fee or other fees, and not the periodic and annual percentage rate, may be more important. If you expect to use credit cards to pay for purchases over time, the APR and the balance computation method are important terms to consider. In either case, keep in mind that your costs will also be affected by the grace period.
Annual Percentage Rate
The "annual percentage rate," or APR, is disclosed to you when you apply for a card, again when you open the account, and on each bill you receive. It is a measure of the cost of credit, expressed as a yearly rate.
The card issuer also must disclose the "periodic rate," the rate the card issuer applies to your outstanding account balance to figure the finance charge for each billing period.
Some credit card plans allow the card issuer to change the annual percentage rate on your account when interest rates or other economic indicators (called indexes) change. Because the rate change is linked to the performance of the index, which may rise or fall, these plans are commonly called "variable rate" plans. Rate changes raise or lower the amount of the finance charge you pay on your account. If the credit card you are considering has a variable rate feature, the card issuer must tell you that the rate may vary and how the rate is determined, including which index is used and what additional amount (the "margin") is added to the index to determine your new rate. You also must be told how much and how often your rate may change.
A grace period allows you to avoid the finance charge by paying your current balance in full before the due date shown on your statement. Knowing whether a credit card plan gives you a grace period and the length of this period is especially important if you plan to pay your account in full each month.
If there is no grace period, the card issuer will impose a finance charge from the date you use your credit card or from the date each credit card transaction is posted to your account. If your credit card allows a grace period, the card issuer must mail your bill at least 14 days before your payment is due. This policy ensures that you have enough time to make your payment by the due date.
More than nine out of 10 cards (95 percent) had no annual fee in 2011 up from 90 percent in 2010 according to BankRate.com, making it easier than ever to find a credit card with no annual fee. On credit cards that did carry annual fees, the fees ranged from $15 to $39.
Transaction Fees and Other Charges
A credit card also may involve other types of fees. For example, some card issuers charge a fee when you use the card to obtain a cash advance, when you fail to make a payment on time (late fees), or when you go over your credit limit (over-limit fees). The Credit CARD Act of 2009 also addresses
The Credit CARD Act of 2009 specifically addresses late fees and over-limit fees in that card holders must be given at least 21 days from the time of mailing to pay their bill and all late fee “traps” such as weekend deadlines and due dates that change each month are eliminated. In addition, the law helps consumers avoid over-limit fees because issuing institutions must now obtain a consumer’s permission to process transactions that would place the account over the limit.
Balance transfer fees are incurred when balances are transferred from high interest credit cards to lower interest cards. Fees for balance transfers are typically based on a percentage of the amount being transferred (typically 3% or 5%), with limits on minimum or maximum fee amounts. Many credit card issuers offer zero percent interest on balance transfers for the first six to 12 months that revert to regular interests rates at the end of the promotion period.
Other types of fees can include foreign transaction fees, fees for receiving a copy of monthly statements, replacing lost cards, or for using the credit card as a source of funds for overdraft protection.
Balance Computation Method for the Finance Charge
If your plan has no grace period or if you expect to pay for purchases over time, it is important to know how the card issuer will calculate your finance charge. This charge will vary depending upon the method the card issuer uses to figure your balance. The method used can make a difference, sometimes a big difference, in how much finance charge you will pay-even when the APR is identical to that charged by another card issuer and the pattern of purchases and payments is the same.
Thanks to the Credit CARD Act of 2009, credit card issuers are now required to show consumers on their periodic statements how long it would take to pay off the existing balance – and the total interest cost – if the consumer paid only the minimum due, as well as the payment amount and total interest cost to pay off the existing balance in 36 months.
Average Daily Balance
The average daily balance method (including or excluding new purchases) gives you credit for your payment from the day the card issuer receives it. To compute the balance due, the card issuer totals the beginning balance for each day in the billing period and deducts any payments credited to your account that day. New purchases may or may not be added to the balance, depending on the plan, but cash advances typically are added. The resulting daily balances are added up for the billing cycle and the total is then divided by the number of days in the billing period to arrive at the "average daily balance." This is the most common method used by credit card issuers.
This balance is computed by subtracting the payments you made and any credits you received during the present billing period from the balance you owed at the end of the previous billing period. New purchases that you made during the billing period are not included. Under the adjusted balance method, you have until the end of the billing cycle to pay part of your balance and you avoid the interest charges on that portion. Some creditors exclude prior, unpaid finance charges from the previous balance. The adjusted balance method usually is the most advantageous to card users.
As the name suggests, this balance is simply the amount that you owed at the end of the previous billing period. Payments, credits, or new purchases made during the current billing period are not taken into account. Some creditors also exclude unpaid finance charges in computing this balance. If you do not understand how the balance on your account is computed, ask the card issuer. (An explanation of how the balance was determined must appear on the billing statements the card issuer provides you and on applications and pre-approved solicitations the card issuer may send you.)
When shopping for a credit card, you probably will want to look at other factors besides cost, such as whether the credit limit is high enough to meet your needs, how widely the card is accepted, and what services and features are available under the plan. You may be interested, for example, in "affinity cards," all-purpose credit cards that are sponsored by professional organizations, college alumni associations, and some members of the travel industry. Frequently, an affinity card issuer donates a portion of the annual fees or transaction charges to the sponsoring organization or allows you to qualify for free travel or other bonuses.
"While the interest rate is a major factor in determining your interest cost, the method of computing the balance to which the interest rate is applied can also be significant. The following table shows how your interest cost can vary when the Average Daily Balance, Adjusted Balance and Previous Balance methods are used."
* To figure average daily balance (including new purchases):
($400 x 15 days) + ($100 x 3 days) + ($150 x 12 days) divided by 30 days = $270
** To figure average daily balance (excluding new purchases):
($400 x 15 days) + ($100 x 15 days) divided by 30 days = $250
As you can see, the finance charge varies based upon which balance is used and whether new purchases are included or excluded.
The use of rebate and rewards cards has grown rapidly. Costco for example sponsors a credit card (Costco Cash Rebate card) that give rebates on the cost of merchandise you buy with the card once you spend a certain amount. You usually get larger rebates on the sponsoring company's products and lower rebates on other card charges. Credit card solicitations promise cash, frequent-flier miles or points that will buy everything from hotel rooms to gas.
Here are some suggestions for the use of credit cards:
1. Pay bills promptly to keep finance charges as low as possible.
2. Keep a list of your credit card account numbers, telephone numbers of each card issuer, and login information (if you pay your credit cards online) in a safe place in case your cards are lost or stolen.
3. Protect your credit cards and account numbers to prevent unauthorized use.
4. Deal only with reliable firms. Check with your local consumer protection agency or the Better Business Bureau (BBB) closest to where the business is located. Study the advertising offer carefully. Ask the company about its warranty, refund and exchange policies. If you cannot get the answers to your questions, or there are any doubtful claims, don't buy.
5. Never Send Cash. Never give out your credit, debit charge card, or bank account number unless you have checked out the company or have done business with them before.
If there is a problem with your order, for instance if you were billed for the wrong amount, you never got the product, the goods arrived in damaged condition, or the merchandise or services were misrepresented, then try to resolve it by following these steps:
When you have charged your purchase, you are entitled to a response to your complaint within 30 days, and the problem must be resolved within two billing cycles (but not more than 90 days). If you used a debit card, you are entitled to a response within 10 days. However, if the financial institution that issued the card needs more time, it may take up to 45 days, provided it credits your account with the disputed amount until the dispute is resolved.
The following agencies are responsible for enforcing federal laws that govern credit card transactions. Questions concerning a particular card issuer should be directed to the enforcement agency responsible for that issuer.
Credit Cards: Frequently Asked Questions
Credit Reports: What You Should Know - And Do - About Yours
Credit Reports: Frequently Asked Questions
Merchant Credit Card Abuses: What They Cannot Ask You To Do
Your Credit Card Rights: What To Do If You Have a Problem
Getting Out of Financial Trouble: Steps You Can Take
Financial Trouble: Frequently Asked Questions
Credit Rating: Frequently Asked Questions
Loans: Frequently Asked Questions
Debt Consolidation Financial Calculator
Accelerate Debt Payoff Calculator
Roll-Down Your Credit Card Debt Calculator
Credit Card Pay Off Calculator
|
<urn:uuid:53f9e4a5-460f-44f1-b958-9dd19fe63e67>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.taxladyllc.com/le-creditcards.php
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00010-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.956463
| 2,724
| 2.03125
| 2
|
Commitments DocumentView commitments to advance the Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health.
2010Sweden’s strong commitment to Women’s and Children’s health is clearly reflected in Sweden's policy for global development , in Sweden's international policy on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) and in the Policy for Gender Equality and the Rights and Role of Women . In the bilateral development cooperation support is primarily given to the strengthening of national health and education systems with a focus on a broad SRHR approach. A range of funding and other mechanisms is used. Policy dialogue and strategic partnerships are essential to raise awareness and build capacity with regard to phenomena related to maternal and child health including controversial issues such as access to safe abortions. Globally Sweden supports the UN system (UNFPA including the UNFPA/ICM program to strengthen midwifery, UNICEF, UNESCO), global initiatives (GAVI, Education for all Fast Track Initiative, GFATM) and civil society (IPAS, IPPF, Men Engage network). To further strengthen the commitment a special effort on MDG5 has been developed . The ambition is to raise awareness and build capacity to improve maternal health at all levels of development cooperation. Sweden also endorses the G8 Muskoka Initiative for Maternal, Newborn and Child Health, and has made a substantial allocation in the budget bill proposed to parliament for 2011 to further strengthen work to improve child health.
2011Sweden has enhanced its commitment to the Global Strategy for Women's and Children's Health during 2011. Contributing to the achievement of the MDGs, especially MDGs 4 and 5, is one of the core focuses of Swedish development aid, which amounts to approximately 1% of its annual Gross Domestic Income. In 2011, Sweden has committed to allocate 500 million Swedish kroner to combat child mortality and maternal mortality and promote health, education and youth entrepreneurship. In addition the Swedish Minister for International Development Cooperation has announced that Swedish development aid has the ambition of helping save the lives of 250,000 children, as well as 50,000 women who otherwise would lose their lives due to complications arising from pregnancy or childbirth. Sweden will support, through bilateral development cooperation, efforts to strengthen national health and education systems, in order to generate better access to sexual and reproductive health. A range of different funding mechanisms are utilized and policy dialogues and external partnerships are essential to Sweden's assistance. Sweden will continue its support to UNFPA, UNICEF and UNESCO; global initiatives such as the GAVI Alliance (with $201 million for the period 2011-2015), the GFATM; and civil society (Ipas, IPPF, MenEngage Alliance). Sweden endorses the G8 Muskoka Initiative on Maternal, Newborn and Child Health.
2012—Born Too SoonThis report puts important attention to an area within the continuum of maternal and newborn health care. Knowledge and interventions to prevent prematurity is a neglected area in many countries of the world; especially in low income countries. For Sweden and Sida the reduction of newborn morbidity and mortality remains a high priority. We are committed to reducing the incidence of prematurity and to do so mainly through support to capacity building of a competent midwifery workforce. An educated and professional midwife provides a number of important prerequisites for preventing pre-term births as well as identifying and caring for the pre-term baby. As part of the global movement to reduce MNC mortality Sida will work to increase awareness of the role midwives can play and improve education and working conditions to allow midwives to play a significant role in the prevention of premature birth and competent care for the pre-term baby.
2012—London Family Planning SummitSweden’s priority is to work in the most effective way for the rights and improved health of women and girls in the most vulnerable countries in Africa. The Swedish government will continue to be a major player, both financially and politically, in the issue of family planning. Sweden will increase spending on contraceptives from its 2010 level of US $32 million per year to US $40 million per year, totaling an additional US $40 million between 2011 and 2015. Sweden also commits to ensuring that support of family planning utilizes existing structures for financing and support, and is contributing to the broader agenda of Millennium Development Goal’s (MDG) 4 and 5. The government plans to increase its contribution to MDG 4 and 5 from its current amount of US $450 million per year.
|
<urn:uuid:3c9edf93-1559-4e74-817d-0b0ab771247e>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://everywomaneverychild.org/commitments/all-commitments/entry/1/89
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00022-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.941778
| 923
| 2.625
| 3
|
Dr. Jason M. Hartman is an Invisalign® Preferred Provider. What does this mean for you? With his focus on patient care and needs, you can be comfortable and confident that Dr. Hartman is focused on helping you achieve the beautiful smile you've always wanted using the Invisalign® system. Invisalign® straightens your teeth without wires and brackets, using a series of clear, customized, removable appliances called aligners. It's virtually undetectable, which means hardly anyone will know that you're straightening your teeth.
The Invisalign System combines advanced 3-D computer graphics technology with 100-year-old science of orthodontics. Invisalign aligners are designed to move your teeth in small steps to the desired final position prescribed by your orthodontist. Each aligner is precisely calibrated and manufactured to fit your mouth at each stage of the treatment plan. Your first step is to visit our office to determine if Invisalign is right for you. After sending precise treatment instructions, Invisalign uses advanced computer technology to translate these instructions in a sequence of finely calibrated aligners — as few as 12 or as many as 48. Each aligner is worn for about two weeks and only taken out to eat, brush and floss. As you replace each aligner with the next, your teeth will begin to move gradually — week-by-week until the final alignment prescribed is attained. Then you'll be smiling like you never have before!
If you want to learn more about Invisalign and how it works, please visit the Invisalign Homepage.
To ensure the best possible results, only an orthodontist who has been trained and certified by Align Technology can diagnose and treat using Invisalign. Invisalign is not intended for children and is not appropriate for every adult. Only an orthodontist can determine if this treatment is an effective option for you. To see if Invisalign can help you achieve the smile you've always wanted, contact us to make an appointment.
A. You must wear your aligners for up to 22 hours daily. You may remove them for eating, drinking and regular oral hygiene.
A. No. Unlike braces, you may eat whatever you like as long as you remove the aligners before eating. Prior to placing the aligners back on, it is important to brush your teeth and the aligners after you eat.
A. Like any orthodontic treatment, there is a short adjustment period. The more you speak with the aligners on, the quicker you will adjust.
A. There will be some pressure and minor discomfort for a day or two after each initial insertion. This is a sign that your teeth are moving sequentially into their final position.
A. It is recommended that you remove your aligners prior to chewing gum as the gum will stick to the aligners.
A. We discourage smoking with aligners as the cigarette smoke will tend to discolor them.
A. Brushing them with toothpaste will keep them fresh and clean.
A. Regular office visits are every five to six weeks. This will ensure that your Invisalign treatment is progressing as planned.
A. All orthodontic patients are instructed to wear their retainers at night indefinitely. Sleeping with your retainers in at night will ensure a healthy bite and maintain the new position of your teeth.
A. Treatment time varies depending on the severity of the misaligned teeth. Treatment time can be shorter than traditional braces, between six and 18 months.
A. Yes, if their teeth, including second molars, have grown in completely.
|
<urn:uuid:3c7b7950-19f1-48fa-bfc5-85d08f16a942>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.bethlehemortho.com/Treatment/Invisalign.aspx
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.943447
| 750
| 1.523438
| 2
|
Western History & Genealogy Blog
Reply to comment
As a young man he was a page in the Cleveland, Ohio main library. Glenn and his wife Juanita discovered Colorado during his stint in the military in World War II. He stayed and began his career as a geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey. They raised their two daughters and son in Lakewood. His mother relocated to Colorado to be closer to her family. She was the genealogist in the family. Glenn would come with her to the Denver Public Library as she did research and as they pulled books he dutifully reshelved them [remembering his days as a young page]. After a few weeks Joanne Classen asked him to sign the volunteer register and keep track of his hours. That was 50 years ago.Glenn Robert Scott created a wonderful beginners guide and checklist and went on to create close to 70 items which are cataloged at the DPL. His compiled family histories and genealogies note challenging research topics. His opus magnus is the Historical Trail Map series published by the U. S. Geological Survey. His papers were donated to the DPL. Glenn Robert Scott was the first recipient of the Eleanor Gehres Award for outstanding service to the Western History community from the Denver Public Library in 1991 and the 1990 Volunteer of the Year from the DPL and the Friends Foundation. Glenn died on 4 June 2012. He was preceded in death by his wife Juanita. He is survived by daughters Jeanne [Roger Pestorious] of Conger, MN, Kathy [Donald Fagerstone] of Windsor, CO and son James Scott, Lakewood, CO.
|
<urn:uuid:05793e0f-0921-4b77-8add-d63387be8a66>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://history.denverlibrary.org/blog/comment/reply/482
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00023-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.987386
| 336
| 1.9375
| 2
|
HiPEAC 2008: Travel Information
Getting there by air
Göteborg's two airports are served by around 40 airlines and are conveniently located close to the city centre. There are daily direct flights from many of Europe's major cities. Intercontinental travel generally goes through a major hub such as Copenhagen, Frankfurt, London, or Amsterdam.
- Göteborg-Landvetter Airport (airport code: GOT) is Göteborg's main airport, located 25 km east of the city centre. There is a bus service from the airport to the city centre, with a one-way fare of SEK 70 (Euro currency is accepted). During peak hours, buses depart every 15 minutes.
- Göteborg City Airport (airport code: GSE) is served by Ryanair, Wizz Air, and Air Berlin. Schedules of the airport coaches fit in with the timetables of all regular flights.
Most taxi companies offer fixed rates from the airport to the city centre. Always ask the driver for the price before the journey (maximum SEK 350).
Getting there by train
Swedish Railways (SJ) provides frequent train connections between Göteborg and the rest of Sweden. Total travel time to/from Stockholm by high-speed trains is approximately three hours from city centre to city centre. Göteborg also has daily high-speed connections to both Oslo and Copenhagen, which each take approximately three hours.
The main railway station in Göteborg, 'Centralstationen', is located right in the city centre.
More information: SJ
Getting there by car
The E6 and E20 freeways pass through Göteborg, as do national highways (riksväg) 40 and 45. The most convenient route from Stockholm is to follow the E4 freeway South to Jönköping and then follow highway 40 West. Approximate distances and traveling time:
- Malmö: 300 km, 3h
- Oslo: 320 km, 4h
- Stockholm: 500 km, 5h
More information: Road map
Getting there by ship
Stena Line operates ferries from continental Europe along two routes. Fredrikshavn (Denmark) can be reached in 2h on a high-speed craft and in 3.15h on a car ferry. Kiel (Germany) can be reached in 14h. The terminals are situated near the city centre in Göteborg.
More information: Stena Line
|
<urn:uuid:571b1b07-8eba-4142-abb1-d7a562a6a4a3>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.hipeac.net/hipeac2008/index.php?page=travel
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00048-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.93514
| 509
| 1.703125
| 2
|
Two SEIU locals, including Maryland’s largest healthcare union, join growing movement to save historic civil rights site
Dr. Helena Hicks, protestor at 1955 sit-in to desegregate Read’s lunch counter, will speak at rally, announce next steps in campaign
BALTIMORE — Union and community activists will rally Thursday to save the historic Read’s Drug Store building in downtown Baltimore. The rally will feature remarks from Dr. Helena Hicks, one of the eight protestors at the 1955 sit-in to desegregate the whites-only lunch counter at Read’s.
Hicks will be joined by leaders from the preservation group Baltimore Heritage and by activists from two SEIU locals, including 1199SEIU, Maryland’s largest healthcare union. 1199SEIU delegates voted last month to back the effort to save the historic civil rights site, which is targeted for demolition by an out-of-town developer. The Baltimore chapter of 1199SEIU has deep ties to the civil rights movement, having been founded in 1969 during a campaign led by Coretta Scott King.
“Our history and Baltimore’s history is bound up in the civil rights struggle,” says 1199SEIU Executive Vice President John Reid. “We can’t build a healthy future for Baltimore by erasing this vital part of its past.”
1199SEIU has been leading an ambitious effort to revitalize the city called the Heart of Baltimore campaign. The campaign is uniting local healthcare workers to improve patient care and working conditions in the city’s many hospitals and nursing homes, which employ 1 in 5 Baltimore workers. By lifting the living standards of workers in healthcare, which is now Baltimore’s biggest industry, the Heart of Baltimore campaign aims to drive smart and sustainable growth all across the city.
Thursday’s rally is being held in conjunction with SEIU Local 32BJ, the SEIU affiliate that represents local janitors and security officers. 1199SEIU and 32BJ are both partners in the “Fight for a Fair Economy,” a national campaign backed by SEIU to promote job-creation efforts that benefit average Americans, not just wealthy CEOs and well-connected developers.
“Tearing down an invaluable landmark from the civil rights movement is not the kind of responsible economic development Baltimore needs,” said Jaime Contreras, Local 32BJ Capital Area District Chair.
The Fight for a Fair Economy, which is being launched this spring, will focus intensely on 17 American cities, including Baltimore. The Baltimore campaign, which is being coordinated in partnership with local community groups, is known as “Good Jobs, A Better Baltimore.”
|
<urn:uuid:f6157954-185d-4371-bcb2-c7f5ec5f826c>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.theheartofbaltimore.org/news-press/2011/3/28/reads-drug-store-preservation-effort-gaining-momentum-with-t.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00058-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.950952
| 559
| 1.78125
| 2
|
Crews worked to rescue a doe and her fawn on Tuesday after they fell into a deep reservoir in the North Carolina mountains.
The deer were first spotted over the weekend, surrounded by a 12-foot concrete wall.
Eyewitness News could see the frightened doe as she darted through the overgrown brush at the bottom of the reservoir. Her baby wasn't moving after collapsing overnight. The fawn died sometime Tuesday morning after being trapped for days.
“I don't know if they fell in there or what happened, but there is no way they could get out, I know that,” witness Linzi Martin said.
Word spread quickly about the deer near the town of Mortimer in the northern part of Caldwell County. The reservoir was built nearly 100 years ago for an old mill that no longer exists.
At the top of a steep path, there is no fence -- just a huge drop-off into the reservoir.
Wildlife biologists worked to get the deer out safely.
“She looks like she is in reasonably good shape. Maybe a little bit thin, but she is moving around well and not panicking,” said wildlife biologist Mike Carraway.
They climbed down into the reservoir with a dart gun, hoping to get close enough for a shot to knock out the doe.
The deer ran around the reservoir before collapsing near a tree. The wildlife biologist then pulled her out of the hole. The whole rescue took less than 30 minutes.
“She's out. She's out cold. She's out of the pit and is healthy and ought to do just fine,” said wildlife biologist Danny Ray.
The state biologist stayed with the deer until she came to on Tuesday afternoon Both men involved in the rescue said they hope to have the wall at the old reservoir knocked down or fenced off to keep other deer or anyone else from getting hurt.
|
<urn:uuid:02976943-3e95-442a-96c5-464429a790c0>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.wsoctv.com/news/news/local/wildlife-biologists-work-rescue-deer-trapped-reser/nQCtY/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697974692/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516095254-00037-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.980595
| 391
| 1.609375
| 2
|
EPA faces third straight year of cuts
President Obama’s environmental agenda, under political attack and on the back burner in a sluggish economy, will face budget cuts for the third straight year.
The proposed Environmental Protection Agency budget for fiscal year 2013 is $8.3 billion, down from $9.0 billion last year. This year’s request represents a 1.2 percent decrease, or $105 million, from the 2012 enacted level.
Tellingly, EPA’s budget barely acknowledges the agency’s plans to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants -- a stark reversal from last year’s budget, which said EPA’s “measured, common-sense steps to address greenhouse gas pollution” was one of its “funding points of focus.”
Instead, this year’s budget says the administration “continues to support greenhouse gas emissions reduction in the U.S. in the range of 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 83 percent by 2050.” Those have been the goals for addressing climate change since the beginning of the Obama administration, but no legislation has been enacted requiring the reductions to be achieved.
The only mention EPA's greenhouse gas rules for power plants receives in this year's budget is one sentence that doesn't say anything about when the rules are coming. "EPA will continue to develop regulatory strategies to control GHG emissions from major stationary sources."
The EPA budget does acknowledge one program already on the books that can help reduce greenhouse gases: the increased fuel-economy standards for vehicles that the administration worked out with the auto industry last year. The budget “supports the 2012 implementation of a historic national program to improve fuel economy and reduce greenhouse gases (GHGs) from cars and trucks by about 21 percent by 2030, saving an estimated 1.8 billion barrels of oil,” the proposal from EPA states.
Rules to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants have been pending at the White House’s Office of Management and Budget for regulatory review since early November, longer than the normal review time. EPA had said the rules would come out by the end of January. But election-year politics are quickly taking over, and experts predict the White House will keep the rules in the draft stages for awhile.
Proposed cuts in EPA’s budget include $359 million in State Revolving Funds for water projects, “in part because of the continuing constrained fiscal environment; $33 million to the agency’s hazardous substance Superfund account; and $50 million by eliminating “outdated, underperforming and overlapping programs,” which includes certain grant programs and the Clean Automotive Technologies program.
The areas the budget proposes to increase funding are scarce. EPA asks for $15 million more to help restore the Chesapeake Bay, up from the $67.4 million it requested in its FY2012 budget. EPA requests $1.2 billion in grants to support state and tribal efforts to implement environmental programs, the same as last year’s proposal.
In a sign of shifting priorities, Obama’s $8.3 billion budget request for FY2013 is closer to the last budget proposed under the George W. Bush administration than it is to what Obama proposed his first year in office. In 2009 he proposed a 26 percent increase in EPA’s budget: Up to $10.3 billion from $7.6 billion under Bush.
While it is very unlikely to emerge from Congress unscathed, the administration’s EPA budget proposal is an important blueprint for Obama’s priorities, and the continued cuts EPA is facing shows the president’s priorities have shifted away from the agency.
House Energy and Power Subcommittee Chairman Ed Whitfield, R-Ky., said his panel will likely scrutinize EPA grants. “Seldom do we really look at these grant programs,” Whitfield said late last week at a briefing. “When I go to my district people still primarily talk about the debt we have.… We don’t have any idea how much money is going out to these grants, no idea where these grants are going.”
Last year House Republicans passed numerous bills to delay or nullify many EPA regulations only to see them die in the Democratic-controlled Senate. But EPA’s budget proposal provides an opening for a new round of attacks.
“EPA will come in on its budget, so that’ll give us a chance to address whatever issues we want and look at their budget and see how that is helpful or harmful,” House Environment and Economy Subcommittee Chairman John Shimkus, R-Ill., said recently.
|
<urn:uuid:03f1bd27-35fa-4092-b797-3ecd74956968>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.govexec.com/oversight/2012/02/epa-faces-third-straight-year-cuts/41185/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700958435/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516104238-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.944544
| 957
| 2.390625
| 2
|
Rotarians from around the world gather at RI conventions. Photo by Monika Lozinska-Lee / Rotary Images.
Rotary’s biggest event is the annual RI Convention, a celebration of the year’s accomplishments with a focus on Rotary’s future. Once you attend an RI Convention you will better understand the diversity and scope of the organization. Register for the next RI Convention!
Many other events happen throughout the Rotary world, such as presidents-elect training seminars, which prepare incoming club presidents, and district leadership seminars, which help Rotarians further develop their leadership skills and learn about opportunities in Rotary. At the International Assembly, the annual training meeting for incoming district governors, the theme for the new Rotary year is announced.
Another Rotary event is the Council on Legislation, Rotary’s parliament, which meets every three years.
|
<urn:uuid:494d6d87-9ab1-494e-ab0c-2f244c61a795>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://rotary.org/EN/MEMBERS/EVENTS/Pages/ridefault.aspx
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00002-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.954922
| 181
| 1.820313
| 2
|
Choked by Cars, Europe Looks for Alternatives
Rise in traffic is most drastic in East Europe. Officials gather to find ways to slow growth.
In Paris last summer, you couldn't see the city of lights for the smog. The air quality became so dangerous that at one point, the number of cars entering the city was restricted.Skip to next paragraph
Subscribe Today to the Monitor
"It was a matter of an extreme disaster situation," says Kaj Barlund, an official with the Economic Commission for Europe (ECE). "From one day to another we had to restrict half of the private cars and traffic in Paris.
Traffic congestion in Europe, he says, "is a trend that is becoming worse."
Despite a reputation for bike paths and public transport, many countries in Europe are scrambling for ways to keep more cars off the roads.
Take the Baltic state of Latvia, for instance. In 1990, when it was in the Soviet Union, its capital, Riga, had 120 cars per 1,000 people. Today, there are 200 cars per 1,000 people, and the growth shows no sign of slowing.
"We have been behind the Iron Curtain so long," says Andis Zilans, Riga's director of planning. "We watched [on TV] all the beautiful things in the West, fashionable ladies stepping in and out of cars. It became a goal for us to own a car."
Mr. Zilans adds, "In Riga, we expect the number of car owners to increase close to the rest of Europe. There will be 300 to 400 per 1,000. I think that we can learn from experiences in Western Europe and minimize the damage. It is not just limiting cars, it is providing alternatives."
At a workshop earlier this month sponsored by Austria and the ECE, officials from all over Europe discussed a wide range of transportation- and energy-related proposals that would benefit the environment.
Delegates from across Europe expressed concern about the impact of the growing number of autos in the former East bloc. In Krakow, Poland, for example, 53,000 new cars were registered in 1996.
"What is needed is dialogue and making new options available," Mr. Barlund of the ECE says. "Unhappily, change comes slowly. What is needed is to disseminate new proposals, ideas, and initiatives for use on a local level."
"We have to look at what makes life pleasant, worth living, and enjoyable and what also gives the environment a fair chance," says Gabriella Langschwert of the Austrian Ministry of Environment, Youth, and Family Affairs. "We should not restrict people in their desire to move. But can their desire to move be only fulfilled by using cars?
"Can we do better with car sharing?" she suggests. "Is it wise to have one person in a car jamming the road...? Right now in Austria there is a combination of rail and taxi service for people who want to go skiing."
Delegates noted that countries in transition had good public transport systems in place, with a high level of service. But experts warned that some of that system is breaking down under the financial pressures of a transition to a free-market economy.
In Riga, no money is budgeted for public transportation. "We have gone from one extreme to another. The whole city is fighting over the budget, and now we have a transport system that is not a moneymaker, so there is a great tendency for service to decrease," says planning director Zilans.
"Yes, we will make some mistakes. But we hope that it will not be as bad as ... in the West," he adds.
"You cannot tell citizens that they cannot use a car. The whole world uses a car."
|
<urn:uuid:c0b6b131-83ee-4792-81b4-29b33789caae>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.csmonitor.com/1998/0224/022498.intl.intl.3.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00044-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.968872
| 785
| 2.21875
| 2
|
This next piece in my series on arguments for libertarianism looks at virtue ethics. Which presents something of a problem. Most of the ways to justify a libertarian state begin with a moral philosophy and then extend it to politics. This was the case with the last three installments on Robert Nozick. Nozick takes the idea of basic rights already familiar to most of us and asks what sort of state they allow. Similarly, consequentialist libertarianism–where I’ll likely turn next–draws on another familiar moral philosophy: what’s right is whatever produces the best results.
But unless you’ve studied moral philosophy, it’s unlikely you’ve even heard of virtue ethics. And, unless you’ve studied virtue ethics, it’s unlikely you have much of a sense of what it’s all about. This is in large part because virtue ethics looks almost nothing like other schools in its basic approach to addressing moral issues.
Which all means I probably can’t assume the kind of background knowledge I did with Nozick or I will with consequentialism. And that means first writing a post introducing virtue ethics, before moving on to what it’s all got to do with libertarianism. Before undertaking that task, however, it’s important to be clear about something. Just as “consequentialism” isn’t a single, agreed upon moral theory but rather a name for a category of theories often in disagreement, virtue ethics is a school of thought, with multiple, often conflicting forms. In what follows, I do my best to stick to the areas of agreement and paint with broad strokes, avoiding the niggling–and for now, unnecessary–details.
Let’s start with the biggest difference between virtue ethics and other schools of moral philosophy. Typically, the key question of morality is “What’s the right action?” For consequentialists, the answer is whichever choice produces the best results. They’ll differ on what “results” means, though typically they’ll say it has to do with “the most happiness” or “the least pain.”
Deontologists hold that the right action is whichever conforms to proper rules or duties. While the content of those duties varies among deontologists, most libertarians align them with natural rights. Thus the morally right action is the one that doesn’t violate another person’s rights. Any action violating rights constitutes a moral wrong.
Libertarians will recognize this divide. On the consequentialist side, you have people like Ludwig von Mises and David Friedman, who argue that free markets just work better than the alternatives. On the deontological side, we find Murray Rothbard and Robert Nozick, grounding their libertarianism in fundamental human rights. Writes Nozick, “Individuals have rights, and there are things no person or group may do to them (without violating their rights).”
Virtue ethicists think they’re all starting with the wrong question. Rather than “What is the right action?,” we should ask “What is a good (i.e., virtuous) person?”
A good person is a person living a good life by the standards we share because of our common humanity. In other words, what’s a good life for humans is not the same as a good life for cats or a good life for tulips. We have a nature, and that nature defines the contours of the good life, just as our nature defines the contours of good nutrition.
But does this mean there’s really only one sort of good life? That we can’t reasonably disagree about what makes a life good? Yes and no. Yes, in the sense that two lives, both equally good, may look rather different in their details. A good life lived by an urban business woman isn’t much like a good life lived by a member of the Amish. And clearly we don’t want to say that only the Amish live good lives or only cosmopolitan city dwellers do.
But at the same time, enormous commonalities exist between good lives of any sort. To have a good life is to be loving and be loved. It is to pursue–and one hopes, achieve–meaningful accomplishments. It is to be fair and honest and kind. No one really believes otherwise. Would any of us defend as “good” a life without love, without accomplishments? One filled with dishonesty and animosity? A life of violence and insecurity? Certainly not.
It is that sort of good life, defined in broad universals, that virtue ethics is all about. It’s the sort of life we’re talking about when we say, “He’s a good man.” We all know what that means.
The ancient greek philosopher Aristotle, whose writings inspire and inform most modern virtue ethical thinking, called this good life one of “eudaimonia.” While often translated as happiness, the term more precisely means something like “human flourishing.” Eudaimonia isn’t found in a moment but rather in a lifetime. Only at the end of our lives can we be sure we’ve achieved it, as it takes into account the life as a whole. Eudaimonia is the well-lived life. Thus we can be on the path to it even at those times when we are immediately unhappy, as those temporary bouts of displeasure can have effects that enrich and improve our lives as a whole.
Our purpose as humans is to find eudaimonia. (And this isn’t just a purpose, but a strong desire. Who, after all, wants to lead a bad life?) The way we assure our lives will be good is to possess virtues and to make choices in accord with them. In order to achieve eudaimonia–to live well–we need access to goods and we need to possess virtue.
Goods are things like food, shelter, clothing, books, health, education, and so on. Without them, we won’t have the resources necessary to let us cultivate virtue. Clearly this is one of the points by which virtue ethics can lead to libertarianism. For free markets represent the best way humanity’s found for delivering goods. Thus if goods are necessary for virtuousness, which is necessary for eudaimonia, then a system of markets will be preferable to one without.
Next, we need virtues of character. These we’re all familiar with: compassion, courage, hope, integrity, honesty, benevolence, and so on. They can be thought of as both skills and dispositions. We have to fully understand the content of the virtue, which is why virtue ethics places such emphasis on moral education. We must also be disposed to act in accord with the virtue. I may understand benevolence, but unless I’m inclined to act in accord with it, I’m not myself benevolent.
Finally, we need the virtue of practical wisdom. This is the skill of understanding what virtues apply to a situation and how to act in such a way as to manifest them. Practical wisdom is the trait of being morally wise. Without it, I may act out of a sense of benevolence, but my actions could do harm to those I intend to help, and so I won’t truly be benevolent. Thus practical wisdom is a necessary component of–or prerequisite to–all the virtues.
Thus a virtuous person is one who has learned about and fully internalized all of the virtues. They have become a key part of who he is, such that his actions are always motivated by them. And he has the practical wisdom necessary to ensure that his motivations and his actions are in line.
Really being virtuous means we don’t try to behave morality, because if we have to try–if our urges tell us to do something else–then we haven’t properly internalized the virtues. Instead, we aim to be virtuous people and, when we are, one of the results will be morally right action. Here again we see an important connection between virtue ethics and libertarianism. Virtue is a character trait, not a command. It is something we must achieve ourselves (though certainly with help from others), not something that can be forced upon us by the state. The state may provide part of the framework that enables us to achieve virtuousness, but it cannot (and so should not try to) make us virtuous.
Taking morally right actions isn’t why one cultivates virtue, of course. Rather one cultivates virtue because being virtuous is just what it means to achieve eudaimonia. The virtuous life is the good life.
With all this in mind, we can finally answer the question of moral action. To act well when faced with a moral dilemma is to do whatever a virtuous person would characteristically do in a similar situation. A fully virtuous person possesses all the virtues, as well as the practical wisdom to act well. We say “act well” instead of “right action” because virtue ethics acknowledges that not all dilemmas have a right answer. Two virtuous people, in the same circumstances, could take different actions, while both acting in accord with the virtues.
Notice that this formulation is not a recipe for acting morally but, rather, a means to evaluate the morality of an action. If presented with a moral dilemma, we shouldn’t ask, “What would a virtuous person do in this situation.” Rather, we should act in accord with what our own virtue tell us to do. Thus a person lacking virtue will not be able to behave virtuously–though he can still stumble upon the right moral action by accident.
In one sense, this means virtue ethics isn’t as clear a path to right moral action as the alternatives. You can’t just apply a rule and get a result. Rather, virtue ethics says, “Let us start by enabling people to develop kindness, honesty, prudence, caring, and so on. Then we we can trust those virtuous people to act well.” In fact, the acting well will simply be whatever choices those virtuous people make.
It’s possible to argue that much of the wisdom of consequentialism and deontology can find a place within a virtue ethical framework. A virtuous person will care about the consequences of his actions and he will act in ways that respect the autonomy of others. We cannot achieve eudaimonia by actively and consistently doing harm, nor can we achieve it by treating our fellow humans as means instead of ends.
And all of this has profound implications for the state, a topic I’ll turn to next time.
For more on what distinguishes virtue ethics from consequentialism and deontology, as well as what advantages it may have over both, take a look at Why Virtue Ethics is Better Than Consequentialism and Deontology at Philosophus Autodidactus. ↩
|
<urn:uuid:6abfb44b-18be-426f-b863-a8474bb6ce04>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.libertarianism.org/blog?page=1
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00071-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.949989
| 2,309
| 2.234375
| 2
|
Need to find new recycling options | Letters
February 20, 2013 · Updated 10:46 AM
Megan Hansen, in her editorial of Feb. 16, stated that “Residents want cubside recycling.” What she should have said is that residents want voluntary curbside recycling, not mandatory curbside recycling, which is nothing more than a tax.
Why should island residents have to haul their own garbage to the transfer station just to avoid a tax?
When curbside recycling for the entire island came up five years ago, the county spent a few weeks conducting an unofficial poll. Of the respondents, 29 percent were OK with mandatory recycling, but 71 percent were opposed.
When the Island County Solid Waste and Moderate Risk Waste Management Plan was adopted on Jan. 28, 2008, in Section 7.4.2 Customer Preferences it states:
“Customers typically favor voluntary rather than mandatory collection service because they prefer choice. Mandatory collection in Whatcom County was discontinued soon after it was established due to customer complaints.”
Commissioner Kelly Emerson commented in a commissioners’ meeting in January that her constituents were running about 70 percent against mandatory curbside recycling. After all of these years the percentages haven’t changed. Approximately 70 percent of island residents that are served by Island Disposal do not want mandatory curbside recycling.
It’s just that the commissioners have not been listening. Finally, we have two commissioners, Kelly Emerson and Jill Johnson who are listening to their constituents and they should be commended for stopping mandatory curbside recycling dead in its tracks.
If Island Disposal cannot make voluntary curbside recycling work, then find another company.
|
<urn:uuid:cbb021a6-5955-4fcf-92c7-24f1ce78f6d6>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.whidbeynewstimes.com/opinion/letters/192082421.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wntall+%28All+Stories+-+Whidbey+News+Times%29
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.957781
| 345
| 1.882813
| 2
|
Online social networks like Facebook and Twitter let you revive old relationships, share musings on current events and tell acquaintances about everything from your new job promotion to the cute thing your dog did.
Unfortunately, the ease of sharing information can lead some people to reveal too much. (Do you really need a daily update on the gastrointestinal upset of someone you barely know?)
But the danger of over-revelation leads beyond mere social faux pas. More than half of adults who use online social networks post information that puts them at risk of cybercrime, including fraudulent credit card use, says a recent survey by Consumer Reports.
According to the 2012 Javelin Strategy and Research's independent analysis of identity fraud report, in 2011, more than 11.6 million adults were victims of fraud, up 11% from the previous year. The report also found that users of social media sites such as LinkedIn, Google +, Facebook and Twitter have the highest instances of identity theft. And though the study notes that there is no proof of direct causation, it also states that more people are sharing too much sensitive information via these sites that can be used to confirm identity.
Avoid credit card fraud: Keep some information private
Risky information includes names or photos of your children, your home street address, and when you're going to be away from home on vacation.
A less obvious, but potent, risk is revealing your full birth date. Revealing the month, day, and year you were born gives ammunition to identity thieves, who can use the date to get more personal information and access to your bank and credit card accounts, says Consumer Reports. If you really want to share your birthday, just reveal the month and day -- not the year.
Besides keeping risky information to yourself, experts advise using social network privacy controls, computer security software, and strong passwords. The U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team says a good password includes upper and lowercase letters, numbers and symbols, and it does not spell out any word in any language.
Alert credit card companies if you suspect fraud
If you think you've been a victim of credit card fraud, call your credit card companies immediately to cancel the account numbers, and contact credit bureaus to place a fraud alert on your credit reports.
Meanwhile, go ahead and share cute stories about your dog on Facebook, but take advantage of privacy controls, keep your security software up to date, and if you wonder whether or not you should share something, you probably shouldn't.
The original article can be found at IndexCreditCards.com:
Don't reveal your full birth date on Facebook
|
<urn:uuid:11d48ada-d0a2-481c-994f-544aae3ef6d7>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/2012/11/27/dont-reveal-your-full-birth-date-on-facebook/?intcmp=related
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699273641/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516101433-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.940537
| 533
| 2.53125
| 3
|
10 Dog Causes That Deserve Your Donations This Holiday Season
Animal-welfare organizations need help year-round, but the holiday season brings with it a multitude of gift-giving opportunities. Making a donation to one or more of these causes can better the lives of dogs in your community or around the country. You can give directly, in the name of a loved one, or in memory of a beloved pet no longer living.
1. Local rescue group, humane society, or shelter
Whether you got a furever friend through the organization or simply support its efforts, a donation of money or supplies will help the volunteers continue their good works. Inquire with a known group, humane society, or shelter as to its needs, or use Petfinder to discover organizations in your area.
2. Local pet food bank or national distributor
Imagine not being able to afford food for your dogs. Help those in exactly that situation by donating to a local pet food bank. You also can give to a national organization that obtains perfectly good surplus pet food from manufacturers and distributes it to animal-welfare organizations. The organizations not only give the food to their rescues but also to families in need, helping to keep more dogs at home and out of the shelter system. Find a local pet food bank through your area humane society or donate to a national distributor such as Rescue Bank.
3. American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
The ASPCA has its fingers in a number of animal-welfare pies, including rescuing animals from abuse, passing humane laws, and sharing resources with shelters across the country. The organization offers a variety of ways you can donate funds, including:
- Monthly donation to become an ASPCA Guardian
- One-time donation to receive membership in the organization
- Honor Gift donation in the name of a loved one
- Memorial Gift donation in the name of a late loved one or beloved pet
- Symbolic Gift donation that represents a specific effort, from grooming of adoptive pets to the medical treatment of abused pets
When you donate in the name of a person or pet, the ASPCA sends a greeting card to the recipient acknowledging your gift. Symbolic Gifts also come with a greeting card, certificate of appreciation, and an educational brochure, as well as a premium gift of your choosing (collar, bowl, or pin) for the higher donation levels. All donations of $25 or more result in a one-year subscription to ASPCA Action newsletter for you.
4. The Humane Society of the United States
The HSUS also works to improve the lives of animals on a national and state level, including advocating through public policy, corporate reform, and national campaigns against cruelty. Among the many donation opportunities are:
- Monthly donation to become a Humane Hero
- One-time donation
- Hip, Hip, Humane! gift donation in the name of a loved one
- Kindred Spirits memorial gift in the name of a late loved one or beloved pet
When you donate in the name of a person or pet, the HSUS sends a greeting card to the recipient acknowledging your gift, as well a one-year subscription to All Animals magazine for donations of $25 or higher.
5. North Shore Animal League America
In addition to the more than one million dogs and cats North Shore Animal League America has saved since 1944, its current efforts include helping the many pets displaced by Hurricane Sandy. It continues to care for hundreds of animals at its emergency pet shelter in Nassau County, New York, and it distributes pet supplies to the areas hardest hit by the storm. The organization offers a variety of ways you can donate funds, including:
- Monthly donation
- One-time donation
- Gift donation
- Holiday gift donation
- Gift sponsorship
- Memorial gift donation
When you make a gift donation or sponsorship, the organization sends a greeting card to the recipient. Personalized tributes include a memorial brick or photo tile at the organization’s Port Washington, New York, campus. The tile donation also comes with a version for your home.
6. PetSmart Charities
You likely already give to this organization at the register each visit, but consider a holiday donation as well. The largest funder of animal-welfare efforts in North America, PetSmart Charities creates and supports programs that save the lives of homeless pets, raise awareness of companion-animal welfare issues, and promote healthy relationships between people and pets. You can make a monthly, one-time, or tribute or memorial donation. When you donate in the name of a person or pet, the organization sends a greeting card via regular mail or email to the recipient acknowledging your gift.
7. Search Dog Foundation
When Wilma Melville retired from teaching school, she and her dog Murphy trained to become a canine search team. Her work after the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing inspired her to create Search Dog Foundation, which partners rescued dogs with firefighters to find people buried alive in disaster wreckage. Since then, SDF dogs have helped in more than 80 emergencies and disasters, including 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina. Help the organization train additional teams with a monthly or one-time gift in your name or that of a loved one or pet. You can even sponsor a search dog for $10,000.
8. The Pets for the Elderly Foundation
This organization covers adoption fees so those 60 or older can bring a companion dog or cat into their life. It works with nearly 60 shelters across the country. You can make a one-time donation via mail or PayPal.
9. Kickstarter Campaign: A Dog Named Gucci
When Doug James heard a puppy’s cries while standing on his front porch, he went to investigate. The dog had been brutally abused, including being set on fire. James saved Gucci’s life, and the two spent 16 years together. During that time, the pair worked with legislators to change the laws in Alabama to make animal abuse a felony.
Noted rock documentarian/director Gorman Bechard and producer Patricia Clark want to make a movie about the abused pup and his rescuer, not only to tell their tale but also to help change animal abuse laws in other states. Money donated given the A Dog Named Gucci Kickstarter campaign will fund transportation, food, and lodging expenses so volunteers can travel to Alabama for interviews, as well as other expenses associated with the film.
The campaign runs through Dec. 17. Backers will receive a gift in return, ranging from a "Special Thanks to" listing in the credits for a pledge of $1 or more, to the largest backer package available (first executive producer listing on the poster, separate title card in the film credits, invite to the premiere, DVD screener of the flim, and Bechard’s six DVDs and six novels) for a $10,000 pledge or more. Not to worry if you don’t have that kind of cash, as multiple backer levels exist in between the two.
10. Donate your time
If the current economy has left you without much to spend this holiday season, you can choose to give by volunteering at a local animal organization. Use a site such as VolunteerMatch to find opportunities near you.
These are just a few of the many worthy dog causes you can donate to this holiday season. When donating to a charitable organization, use a website such as Charity Navigator to help you make the most informed contributions possible. Also, remember to save your receipts. Donations not only feed your soul, but they also can result in a deduction come tax time.
What dog causes do you donate to? Please share your favorites in the comments!
|
<urn:uuid:3314be8f-1189-4255-8234-256710d0d048>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.dogster.com/lifestyle/10-dog-causes-charities-donations-holiday-season
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.942519
| 1,571
| 1.773438
| 2
|
Judge William Wayne Justice has died at age 89 after a long illness. Texas can now exhale, and those who are crafting a New Texas should take the life of Judge Justice as an example of the type of justice Texas doesn’t want and won’t tolerate.
Appointed to the Federal District bench by President Lyndon Johnson in 1968, he became known as a liberal judge whose decisions radically changed law and society in Texas.
Justice did not believe that the US Constitution and the bill of Rights were static and unchangeable. he advocated the living constitution viewpoint that the Constitution should evolve as the society evolved.
Consequently, he legislated from the Federal bench.
His legal decisions covered issues in prison reform, immigration, public education, public housing and voting law.
In one of his more infamous rulings in 1977, Doe v. Plyler, he ordered that undocumented immigrant children had the same rights as US citizens and must receive public education. he also ordered bilingual public education.
Once his liberalism was chronicled and well-known, reformers and social do-gooders flocked to his courtroom to file class action cases. some of the class action cases, many of which were the largest lawsuits in America, dragged on for decades. And his court decisions changed Texas forever and influenced legal precedent nationwide.
Frank Kemerer, Justice’s biographer and university professor, said that Justice was perhaps the single most influential agent for change in 20th-century Texas history.
Likely, Kemerer is right. but Justice’s brand of change did violence to the US Constitution. he should have been impeached and removed from office. but in a tyrannical Federal government that snickers at state’s rights and outright ignores the US Constitution, Justice was a hero.
In the new nation of Texas, Federal judges must be chosen that are committed to strict interpretation of the new Texas Constitution. The judges should be required to sign an affidavit stating their commitment to strict interpretation, and judges should stand for re-election or re-appointment every few years.no lifetime appointments to the Bench. in instances of judicial activism, judges should be subject to removal from the bench at any time.
The New Texas deserves no less than judges who will protect liberty.
|
<urn:uuid:fc744918-332f-4d1c-915b-41091eec3358>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://freestuffsnews.com/category/texas-judge/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00000-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.977081
| 464
| 2.796875
| 3
|
Established in 2003, DukeDivest described itself as “a group of concerned students, faculty, staff, and alumni calling upon Duke University to … divest from companies that do military business with Israel.” Condemning the “diplomatic, military, and financial support” which the United States gave “to Israel’s brutal occupation of Palestinian lands,” the organization stood “in solidarity with the Palestinian people in their struggle for self-determination” and sought to “pressure the Israeli government to comply with international law.”
The DukeDivest petition included the following statements:
“We, the undersigned members of the Duke University community, are appalled by the human rights abuses against Palestinians at the hands of the Israeli government, the continual military occupation and colonization of Palestinian territory by Israeli armed forces and settlers, and the forcible eviction from and demolition of Palestinian homes, towns, and cities.... We believe that our university ought to use its influence—political and financial—to encourage the United States government and the government of Israel to respect the human rights of the Palestinian people. We call on Duke University to divest from all companies with military ties to Israel, until these conditions are met: Israel is in compliance with United Nations Resolution 242, which notes the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war, and which calls for the withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from occupied territories; Israel is in compliance with the United Nations Committee Against Torture 2001 Report, which recommends that Israel’s use of legal tortures be ended; Israel is in compliance with the Fourth Geneva Convention … [and] ceases building new settlements, and vacates existing settlements, in occupied Palestinian territories; Israel acknowledges in principle the applicability of United Nations Resolution 194 with respect to the rights of refugees; [and] Israel accepts and implements the principle of a viable, internationally recognized state acceptable to the Palestinian people.”
Among the 265 signatories to the foregoing petition were professors Miriam Cooke, Michael Hardt, Frederic Jameson, and Becky Thompson.
In an effort to rationalize its positions and proposals, DukeDivest claimed, falsely, that “torture is endemic and systemic—part and parcel of the Israeli Occupation and Israel’s security culture”; that the Israeli government regularly employed torture against “left wing” political activists; and that it was “valid” to liken the Israeli government to South Africa’s former apartheid regime.
DukeDivest became inactive in 2006.
|
<urn:uuid:5dc88bca-52ca-4117-8594-4b99b81ade16>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/printgroupProfile.asp?grpid=6449
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.945023
| 522
| 1.570313
| 2
|
, in 2001, a dance-diva makeover seemed like an impossibility, but the singer/songwriter revived and sustained her career with the sexually charged
in 2006, in the process consolidating her position as one of the most unpredictable artists of her decade.
always proudly displayed her Portuguese heritage, a distinction that separated her from legions of emerging female singer/songwriters in the early days of the new millennium, but her uniqueness didn’t cease there: she had an ear for elliptical yet memorable melodies, a taste for Brit-pop balanced by an immersion in modern R&B and hip-hop. All this surfaced on
and its hits “Turn Off the Light” and “I’m Like a Bird,” but she really pushed her rhythmic influences to the forefront on
, resulting in “Promiscuous” and “Man Eater,” her biggest hits to date, and suggesting that
A native of the Canadian city of Victoria, Furtado
was a musically precocious child, learning to play a variety of instruments and singing in choirs, spending as much time listening to modern R&B like Mariah Carey
as she did Brit-pop, eventually winding her way toward hip-hop and Brazilian music. Upon her high school graduation she headed to Toronto, soon joining the hip-hop duo Nelstar. Not long afterward, the duo of Brian West
and Gerald Eaton
, core members of the Philosopher Kings
, produced the Furtado
demo that led to her contract with DreamWorks. Whoa, Nelly!
, her first album, appeared in late 2000 and DreamWorks built the album gradually, capitalizing on strong reviews and a supporting slot for Moby
, with the record truly taking off when “I’m Like a Bird” turned into a hit on a road that led to a Grammy for Song of the Year. This was one of four Grammy nominations and several hits including “Turn Off the Light,” which displayed her rhythmic roots in a way “I’m Like a Bird” did not. Furtado
had a daughter as she was working on her second album, and her new role as a mother was evident on Folklore
. Released in November 2003, Folklore
was an ambitious album that garnered some good reviews along with some negative notices, and it failed to generate a hit.
Perhaps the under-performance of Folklore
toward the musical makeover of Loose
, the 2006 album produced largely by hip-hop superstar Timbaland
. Heavy on grooves and overtly sexual, Loose
had a pair of smash singles: “Promiscuous,” which was a chart-topper in the U.S., and “Maneater,” which performed the same feat in the U.K. Both singles set the soundtrack for 2006 around the world, helping the album shift seven million copies internationally. Her star status fortified, Furtado
took her time delivering a follow-up, releasing her first Spanish-language album, Mi Plan
, in September 2009. A collection of remixes from Mi Plan
appeared a year later and was followed just a few weeks later by The Best of Nelly Furtado. Her fifth studio album, the largely positive and upbeat The Spirit Indestructible, was scheduled for release during fall 2012.
|
<urn:uuid:bec850ec-b73e-4c06-a038-d0d0f216c572>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://montreal.virginradio.ca/Music/Artist.aspx?id=451535
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00031-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.962753
| 710
| 1.53125
| 2
|
The Collection on Albert W. Miller contains materials that document the professional work of Albert W. Miller. The collection
primarily consists of photographs, press clippings, and other material regarding the Albert W. Miller Manufacturing Company
and the Magnolia Automobile Company that were owned and operated by Albert W. Miller in Riverside, California during the early
twentieth century. Additionally, this collection also contains postcards, press clippings, and other material on cities in
Southern California and vintage automobiles.
Albert W. Miller, a resident of Riverside, California, was a wood worker, car manufacturer, and owner of the Albert W. Miller
Manufacturing Company. He was the inventor of the
Miller Lock Mortiser, a machine used to cut openings in doors for mortise locks. Miller also established and owned the Magnolia Automobile Company
in Riverside, California along with friend Watt L. Morland. This venture was short lived as the first automobile produced,
Magnolia, failed to work and the company went defunct.
0.5 linear feet
(1 document box)
Copyright has not been assigned to the University of California, Riverside Libraries, Special Collections & Archives. All
requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Head of Special Collections
& Archives. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the Regents of the University of California as the owner of the
physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by
|
<urn:uuid:e7a3c073-7318-462f-8060-39071713e94e>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://oac4.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt6m3nf49v/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00057-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.935358
| 315
| 2.3125
| 2
|
An ethical tradition is a group of things that one group of people think are right and wrong. People believe that these things are right and wrong because other people think that way and they have thought that way for a long time.
An ethical tradition can be like a set of laws because most people agree with it and only do what it says is right. However an ethical tradition is not normally written down and is not enforced by a police force.
The branch of philosophy called ethics is not the same as an ethical tradition. This is because ethics is about asking questions and not just thinking what other people think. However some ethical philosophers want to know why people follow ethical traditions. They also want to know what ethical traditions are the same for different groups of people. This type of ethics is sometimes called the science of morals.
|
<urn:uuid:130e25e2-68b1-46bc-996d-666288a57e31>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethical_tradition
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00025-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.98053
| 164
| 3.421875
| 3
|
Many well-intentioned people think that it's possible to remove the influence of money from politics. A coin has two faces: on one face you have the influence of money on politics, and on the other face you have the influence of politics on money. What would a coin with only one side look like? How can politics possibly control companies without companies wanting to control politics?
As long as the people give politicians the power to control companies, companies are going to try to control politicians. If the people don't give politicians that power, politicians have no influence to peddle. Without influence to peddle, companies have two choices: waste money buying politicians who can't help them, or spend the money competing harder with other companies.
There is one and only one way to successfully take money out of politics: to take politics out of money. As long as corrupt politicians have influence to sell, there will be corrupt businessmen to buy it. The problem here is not corrupt politicians or corrupt businessmen. The problem is that the people have chosen to give up their market power over corporations. They have turned that power into political power and concentrated it in politicians. This is wrong. Until this is fixed, no other change will help matters. If you have a screen door on your submarine, running your pump faster or slower, or diving higher or lower will not help you.
In order to take the politics out of money, you need a general agreement in society that market regulation of companies is sufficient. We don't have that now. Many people think that corporations are evil and need to be controlled. They do, but the profit motive is sufficient. Let's take an example from the initial URL. He lays the blame for obese americans on cheap high-calorie food, and says that corporations sell this food because it's profitable. This is all true. It's only profitable because people want to buy it. He doesn't say so, but I think that he is convinced that people are willing to put up with obesity to get cheap food. This seems like a ridiculous notion given the number of people seeking to lose weight. Instead of railing against corporations, he needs to start his own corporation to sell food that tastes good, and uses the more expensive ingredients that won't make you fat.
Only in America could you find a market for low-fat cheese.
|
<urn:uuid:33f56d2c-54e4-4b7d-b7d0-3ae18de6c8da>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://angry-economist.russnelson.com/money-out-of-politics.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00070-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.979893
| 476
| 2.125
| 2
|
Hexagons. Bees build them out of wax. A snowflake’s beauty is based on their floor plan. Every time you pick up a pencil you hold one. This morning, they were at it again, when hexagonal ice crystals created a halo and sun pillar display around the sun.
Three different phenomena were happening, but all were created by sunlight refracted through or reflected off of 6-sided, columnar ice crystals shaped like very tiny pencils. Halos are fairly common and occur when a light ray is bent or refracted as it passes through one side of a crystal and emerges at an angle out the other side. Millions of crystals all doing the same thing concentrate the sun’s light into a circle with a radius of 22 degrees (44 degree diameter).
The same crystals form the upper tangent arc, but only the ones that are horizontal or parallel to the ground. Sunlight glinting off the undersides of hexagonal, plate-shaped crystals falling parallel to the ground create the vertical streak of light or sun pillar.
By the time I got back to the house from walking the dog, the clouds had changed and all of it went away. You never know when nature, always unmindful of human scheduling, will unveil something out of the ordinary.
Watch the sundog (at right) disappear in a flurry of shock waves as the rocket rises. At left, keep an eye for a streak of light to form and fade.
Halo phenomena and in particular sundogs were in the news again late this week when atmospheric optics expert Les Cowley cracked the mystery on why the rocket that launched the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) “destroyed” a sundog on its way to orbit.
Sundogs are brilliant, round patches of light on either side of a solar or lunar halo, and they form by light refracted by those plate-shaped hexagonal ice crystals. When the rocket was launched on February 11, 2010 and rose through a layer of cirrus clouds, shock waves disturbed the ice crystals causing a multi-colored sundog to completely disappear. At the same time, a streak of cloudy light appeared alongside the rocket.
Cowley and colleague Robert Greenler at first thought that randomly-distributed crystals might be responsible for the streak, but that didn’t jive with their computer models. Then they realized that the crystals were organized by the shock waves into a “dancing army of spinning tops” that in unison produced a small halo around the rocket itself.
The streak you see in the video is only part of a hypothetical halo around the rocket. “This could be the start of a new research field—halo dynamics,” said Cowley. To learn more about this interesting new phenomenon, please check out this NASA release.
One last tidbit: Algol, the “Demon Star” in Perseus we visited in a blog earlier this week, will be up to its old tricks again this evening. It’s at minimum light at 6:07 p.m. Central time, which means if you go out when it first gets dark, it will shine at its faintest. Take a look again around 8 or 9 o’clock and the star will have returned to normal brightness. Very easy to see!
|
<urn:uuid:d386c566-ba26-440f-b97b-a71b4bf6968a>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://astrobob.areavoices.com/2011/02/12/87142/
|
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
| 0.945431
| 689
| 3.21875
| 3
|
Image by Mark “Jock” Simpson
Does anyone recall the film Peter Berg was due to direct before he made the choice–in hindsight, perhaps not a bad decision–to direct Universal’s “Battleship?
It was Frank Herbert’s seminal sci-fi novel “Dune?”
A novel, by the way, that since his death seemed to have spawned more sequels than when he was alive.
Despite the few attempts to translate the property to the big screen–David Lynch’s some what steampunkish version of the novel was the first–and only version–to make it to theaters (though this was after Chilean director Alejandro Jodorowsky‘s version was abandoned due to projected cost overuns), though according to Box Office Mojo it earned $30 million domestically, on a $40 million dollar budget.
The SciFi Channel, now known as SyFy (for reasons only their marketing department will ever know), created their own versions of Herbert’s “Dune,” as well as “Children of Dune.” I actually perferred “Children of Dune” to “Dune,” though both suffered from a lack of both budget and scale to create the worlds that Frank Herbert’s books required.
And would Berg have done “Dune” justice? It’s hard to tell, if only because he had never done anything on that scale before. That being said, from what I hear about “Battleship,” perhaps this is a question best left unanswered.
|
<urn:uuid:d2099b06-d24b-42bf-be92-0d81fd3d52ee>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://screenphiles.com/tag/peter-berg/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00063-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.986576
| 339
| 1.601563
| 2
|
NUUK (Reuters) - Kuupik Kleist's earliest memories are hunting whales with hand-thrown harpoons. Now, as Greenland's prime minister, he is feted by Chinese and European leaders as he opens up its untapped mineral resources.
A verdict on this country's transformation comes on Tuesday, when this island - a quarter the size of the United States and with only 57,000 mostly Inuit inhabitants - holds a general election.
There is only one polling station in the capital Nuuk, which has just two traffic lights and where hunting is still the most popular pastime. But the vote may pack a global punch.
After four years of Kleist - a quiet-spoken musician known as Greenland's Leonard Cohen for his gravelly voice - the vote is effectively a referendum on how far it embraces international mining companies, energy giants, and foreign workers.
At stake may be Greenland's growing geopolitical role as global warming and the thawing of sea ice open up new sea lanes, minerals and oil fields - drawing the interest of world powers from China to the United States.
"There is a growing nationalist backlash. It's not a nice thing to see," Kleist said, sitting in his ninth floor office overlooking the snow-capped hills surrounding Nuuk Bay.
"The fear of being overrun by foreigners is exaggerated," the 54-year-old said. "We are becoming a global player. We need to avoid ethnicity, nationalistic feelings."
With Greenland having self-rule from Denmark aside from defense and security, the vote has seen a split between Kleist and an opposition linked to traditional Greenlanders like fishermen and hunters who feel he has gone too far in welcoming foreign companies.
There are calls for more taxes on foreign firms, growing suspicions about Chinese mining investments, demands for more environmental safeguards and even anti-colonial rhetoric to limit the use the Danish language being spoken.
"The main issue is that people feel that they are not part of the decision-making process of big scale projects and mining," opposition leader Aleqa Hammond said at her small campaign offices in Nuuk. "Where is the voice of the people?"
Hammond also grew up in a remote village. Her father died when she was young after he fell through ice while hunting. She says her family tried to make her marry a hunter. She refused. Instead, she has a good chance of being next prime minister.
Since Greenland won self-government in 2009, most politicians have aimed for growing autonomy and eventual independence. The more revenues from mining or oil, the more Greenland weans itself of Denmark's annual grant that accounts for more than half the island's budget.
In Kleist's gleaming new offices in Nuuk, many Danish civil servants sip cappuccinos, huddle over computer screens and plot policies from finance to mining regulations. Greenlanders mention the symbolism of an executive and its staff whose offices sit over Nuuk's one shopping mall.
The civil servants stand out in Nuuk, where sushi bars and cozy, heated cafes with sofas and internet contrast with barren, concrete housing estates of fishing industry workers.
HOPE OR HYPE?
Not one mining or oil project has got off the ground yet.
But more than 100 exploration licenses have been awarded. There are large deposits of rare earths, used in products from wind turbines to hybrid-powered cars. China accounts for the majority of world supply. There are hopes for gold and zinc.
Government officials says reserves may be equivalent to as much half of the entire North Sea.
Central to the debate in Greenland is a $2.3 billion project for an iron ore mine by the British-based London Mining Plc near a fiord in Nuuk. It may involve diesel power plants, a road and port and would supply China with iron to fuel its economy.
Some 2,000 Chinese workers - the equivalent of around four percent of Greenland's population - could fly in for its construction, touching nerves where unemployment is rising.
"People feel that I am unemployed but the Chinese are coming in by mass," said Hammond.
At Nuuk's windswept port, fishermen drag in fish and seals from a catch. The floor on a small warehouse is awash with blood. There is a gagging stench of dead flesh.
Johannes Heilmann, 64, grew up hunting for whales. He still fishes with a 19-feet long boat encrusted in ice in the harbor, shooting occasional seal with a rifle to sell for meat in Nuuk.
Fishing accounts for 90 percent of Greenland's exports.
Heilmann is the Greenlander that is suspicious of mining. He campaigns against Kleist. He complains about fishing quotas, and how cheaper foreign produce is pushing out local food.
"No matter how much mining comes here, fisheries will be our main industry," Heilmann said. "Politicians should pay more attention to us."
Heilmann worries about London Mining. He fears any spill from the iron ore ships could destroy fishing.
"I don't mind if Chinese come here," he said. "But if there is an accident?"
Others are more nationalistic. One new party, Partii Inuit, has caused controversy by calling for more prominence for Greenlandic language over Danish, still widely used here.
Four hours north of Nuuk by boat lies Maniitsoq, one of many villages dotted on the western coast, relying on state subsidies for heating and communications. Unemployment is high.
U.S. giant Alcoa Inc has considered building an aluminium smelter there, strategically sited between European and North American markets. It could entail the import of thousands of workers, possibly from China.
Many here are desperate for Alcoa after much of fisheries has vanished. The town is huddled on an outcrop of windswept rocks with rusty housing blocks.
"The younger people, they all want Alcoa," said Jens Moller, head of a community training project in Maniitsoq, told Reuters by phone. "The older generation want better fishing. They are the ones likely to vote for the opposition."
In Nuuk, Karsten Peter Jensen is a 27-year-old post graduate student. He enjoys hunting in fiords for grouse or reindeer. But he also enjoys sushi bars and chic shops.
"The last four years have been very positive, we have looked to the outside world," Jensen said. "But for other people, they think change has come too fast. There is a perception Greenlanders have been put aside a bit."
Worries that China wants an Arctic foothold have risen in a territory that for years was a Cold War ally of the West.
It was little surprise when President Hu Jintao, China's outgoing leader, paid a three-day visit last year to Denmark, home to just six million people. Many assumed Greenland's riches were on his mind despite official denials.
Hammond says she would introduce royalties for mining companies and revise a law passed last year that effectively allowed big mining companies to employ thousands of foreign workers for construction of projects.
"For the greedy ones that want 100 percent of everything, Greenland is not for them," Hammond said.
That has some investors worried. Several mining executives, who asked to remain anonymous as they did not want to talk about politics, said investment decisions were on hold.
Few believe Greenland would turn against mining. The concern is more that politicians could hurt a fragile and emerging industry through demanding too many royalties and taxes.
"We are a small country that is in competition with the rest of the world," said Maliina Abelsen, finance minister. "When you build up expectations, you get people saying that we have so much in the ground, so we are fine."
"But we cannot eat that for breakfast. It is still in the ground."
An annual grant from Denmark has been effectively frozen at around 3.5 billion Danish crowns (about $610 million) and will shrink in real value over time.
Kleist pointed to his view over Nuuk. Icebergs floated by. He worried that if he lost power he would lose the view.
"There's always been a tendency to isolate Greenland from the rest of the world," Kleist said. "It's been my personal ambition to open us up. There is no alternative."
(Additional reporting by Katja Vahl; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
|
<urn:uuid:23c5eabb-f7d3-4580-a4f8-4b366d5498c5>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/advisor/vote-rich-greenland-debates-global-role-133926141.html
|
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
| 0.971409
| 1,747
| 1.828125
| 2
|
Facts. Advice has
been requested on whether the manufacturers excise tax on firearms and
ammunition is imposed in the following situations. A manufacturer makes firearms and
loans them to its employees or writers for trade publications. The employees
receive the firearms for display or demonstration to prospective customers
or to familiarize themselves with the firearms. The writers receive the
firearms for the purpose of familiarization and technical evaluation.
During the period the firearms are loaned, usually no more than 180 days,
the employees display or demonstrate the firearms to prospective customers
which may include firing them. During a similar period of time the writers
examine the firearms which may involve firing them.
At the end of the
loan period, the manufacturer offers the firearms for sale to the employees
or the writers. Firearms that the employees or writers do not purchase
are returned to the manufacturer for sale to other persons. Because of
the condition of the firearms or the expense in restocking and examining
for possible defects or damage, the manufacturer normally sells the firearms
at reduced sale prices.
General. The provisions
of 26 U.S.C. 4181 and 27 CFR 53.61 impose an excise tax on the sale of
firearms or ammunition by the manufacturer or importer. The provisions of 26 U.S.C.
4218 and 27 CFR 53.111 impose this excise tax on the use of firearms or
ammunition by the manufacturer or importer in the same manner as if they
had been sold.
Prior Rulings. Two
rulings issued by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), Rev. Rul. 60-290,
1960-2 C.B. 331, and Rev. Rul. 63-256, 1963-2 C.B. 534, addressed the
use of taxable articles by the manufacturer for purposes of display or
Rev. Rul. 60-290
concerned the use of typewriters in the manufacturer's showroom as demonstrators.
The ruling held as follows:
It is held, therefore,
that the use of a taxable business machine as a demonstrator by the manufacturer,
producer, or importer thereof, in the operation of a business in which
he is engaged, makes such person liable, under the provisions of section
4218(a) of the Code, for the manufacturers excise tax imposed by Section
4191 of the Code in the same manner as if the business machines were sold
by him. It is further held that the liability for such tax is incurred
at the time the demonstrator is placed in use and is computed on the price
for which such or similar business machines are sold by manufacturers
in the ordinary course of trade as determined by the Secretary of the
Treasury or his delegate.
Rev. Rul. 63-256
further elaborated on the principles set forth in Rev. Rul. 60-290. Rev.
Rul. 63-256 involved a situation in which a corporation maintained exhibition
halls where its products were put on display. Only a small portion of
the articles (radio and television receiving sets, phonographs, and combinations
thereof) were actually turned on and operated. In addition, some of the
articles were placed in the homes and offices of the corporation's executives
for display purposes or to familiarize themselves with the company's products.
The ruling held as follows:
The articles in the
instant case are used in the operation of the corporation's business in
a manner similar to the typewriters involved in Revenue Ruling 60-290, irrespective of whether
they are actually operated while on display. Therefore, it is concluded
that the principles set forth in that Revenue Ruling are equally applicable
to the use of the radio receiving sets, etc., which are displayed in the
manner described in this case.
Applying these principles
to the display and demonstration of firearms in the present case, it is
apparent that the firearms manufacturer's loan of firearms to its employees or writers is
an integral part of its business. In the present situations the display,
demonstration, or evaluation is intended to benefit the manufacturer through
increased sales or by advertising when a technical evaluation of the firearm
is published. In the case of display or demonstration by employees of
the manufacturer , there is an express agency relationship so that use
by the employee amounts to use by the manufacturer. Similarly, evaluation
of the firearms by writers for trade publications results in an implied
agency relationship between the parties so that use by the writers amounts
to use by the manufacturer.
Therefore, the firearms
manufacturer is liable for the tax on the use of the firearms when they
are loaned to its employees or the writers. Tax is imposed at the time the articles are
placed in use by the manufacturer. Computation of the tax is based upon the provisions of 26 U.S.C. 4218(c).
The fact that the firearms are later sold at reduced sale prices does
not reduce the liability for the excise tax on the manufacturer's use.
Held: The tax imposed
under 26 U.S.C. 4181 and 4218 applies to the loan of a firearm by the
manufacturer to employees for the purposes of display or demonstration. Tax also applies
to the manufacturer's loan of a firearm to writers for trade publications
for purposes of familiarization and technical evaluation. Tax liability
is incurred at the time the firearms are placed in use by the manufacturer
and is calculated pursuant to 26 U.S.C. 4218(c).
26 U.S.C. 4181 and
4218 and 27 CFR 53.61 and 53.111: Tax on Use by Manufacturer, Producer
or Importer of Firearms or Ammunition.
|
<urn:uuid:a73cb566-2d53-4011-8c88-603a4fcf4a62>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.atf.gov/regulations-rulings/rulings/atf-rulings/atf-ruling-94-6.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
| 0.951394
| 1,204
| 1.710938
| 2
|
From the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada, a helpful banker's guide to spotting "single-issue terrorists," which includes (apparently) abortionists and ecological extremists. It also groups attacks on property with attacks on people, and sales of books and literature with sales of false identification documents.
Counter-terrorism specialists define single-issue or special interest terrorist groups as being motivated by political and social issues and as using violence and criminal activities to further their agendas. Single-issue terrorists may include militant minority rights activists, abortionists, animal rights activists and ecological/environmental extremists. They believe that their legitimate cause morally justifies their extremist violent behavior in opposition to government action or inaction. Terrorist attacks include the use of bombs, such as mail and car bombs. Their targets are often research laboratories, clinics and individuals' property. Single-issue terrorist groups function domestically but have an international scope.
Terrorist Financing [fintrac.gc.ca]
I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.
|
<urn:uuid:1f77454d-2d40-4655-9551-b34d5fc8e62d>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://boingboing.net/2011/10/14/canadian-government-advice-defines-abortionists-as-terrorists.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705953421/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120553-00055-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.947598
| 274
| 1.875
| 2
|
Home Insurance FAQ
For most people, their home is their largest investment and as such should always be protected with home insurance. Whether you own, mortgage, or rent, homeowners insurance is available with various coverage options to offer you financial defense in the event of unforeseen incidents and damages. Home insurance is a relatively small investment that offers a potentially large return on your investment if you ever need it. Just as you can add options to your policy in order to cover additional incidentals, you can also reduce your home insurance rate by changing your coverage and adding discounts to the policy.
Types of Homeowners Insurance
If you are financing the purchase of your home, you will be obligated by your lender to purchase homeowners insurance. This is because the lender does not want to risk depreciation or loss of its investment. If you own your home outright then home insurance is certainly optional but it is highly recommended. There are various coverage options that can be suited to address your needs.
Certain factors need to be taken into consideration when deciding on how much home insurance coverage to purchase for your home. The age and value of your home will be one of the primary points in determining not just the amount of coverage but the type of coverage. Coverage is relatively standard and is set forth by ISO (Insurance Services Office). There are currently seven types of homeowners insurance.
The most basic coverage is HO-1, which would cover you in the event of fire or lightning. HO-2 offers broader coverage and includes theft and vandalism as well as hail damage or a collapsed building. HO-3 is a specialized insurance coverage that provides you with protection against most hazards. Any exceptions will be listed as exclusions on your policy. This is the most common policy purchased by homeowners with endorsements or riders being added to include the otherwise excluded coverage that may be needed.
HO-5 is deluxe coverage, which automatically includes protection for most items excluded by HO-3. For the older home, HO-8 insurance ensures that the homeowner will receive suitable replacement materials as available with current supplies. (For example, plaster may be replaced by drywall.)
If you own a condo, you still need homeowners insurance. However, since you most likely don’t own the land or any external structures, you need a different type of home insurance. The condo owner can purchase HO-6 home insurance which is intended for the condo owner and covers not only personal property but provides liability protection as well. Owners of mobile homes can obtain the HO-7 policy.
Many renters make the mistake of not obtaining renters insurance since they don’t own the apartment, condo, or house that they are renting. However, renters are still at risk for disaster, such as fire, and criminal activity. Therefore, renters are able to purchase HO-4 home insurance to protect their personal property against any events such as those covered in HO-2. Additionally, renters get personal liability insurance as part of their standard coverage.
Homeowners Insurance Coverage
According to the ISO, there are six types of coverage that pertain to home insurance. The coverage classification specifies what is actually covered by the insurance policy and should be thoroughly reviewed and understood so that you know exactly what is covered. For example, if you have HO-1 for fire insurance but it only applies to Coverage A (your dwelling) and not Coverage B (other structures), then your garage will not be covered in the event of a fire.
Coverage A refers to the dwelling, which is the actual building but not the land. This coverage is typical in all home insurance policies except for HO-4, renters insurance, since the renter does not own the dwelling. Coverage B includes other structures that are on the property, such as a garage, but are only covered if they are for personal use and not business.
Personal property is protected under Coverage C and addresses your belongings. Depending on the type of insurance you have, your personal property can be covered from smoke damage or if they are stolen during a burglary. Some items are only covered up to a certain amount so you may need a special endorsement for items of greater value that exceeds the threshold limit. This is typical for furs, fine jewelry, coin collections, and sometimes electronic equipment.
Sometimes damage occurs to your home that displaces you during renovation. If you have Additional Living Expenses with Coverage D, you can receive reimbursement for costs associated with your new temporary living arrangements. This typically includes the cost of a hotel or apartment but does not usually include meals or entertainment. Coverage D also offers Loss of Use protection, which helps cover loss of rental expenses if you are unable to earn rental income while repairs are being done.
The fifth Coverage is classified as Additional and addresses many expenses that are not otherwise covered. These could include charges assessed by the fire department, debris removal, identity theft, and landscaping damage. The sixth classification is not related to coverage but rather Exclusions. Here is where you will find all of the perils that are not included with your home insurance. Earthquakes and water damage are common homeowners insurance exclusions as well as several others. It is very important to know what risks are being excluded so that you can consider purchasing optional endorsements for select coverage as needed. For example, if floods are not covered but you live in a flood zone, you may want to purchase flood insurance.
Premiums and Discounts for Home Insurance
Your premiums for your home insurance are based on several factors. The age and size of your home as well as the geographical location of your home will generally determine the base rate. Unlike auto insurance which charges higher rates for newer cars, in home insurance the newer houses usually get charged lower rates. This is because older houses tend to have outdated materials and technology (such as lead and old wiring) that can cause greater risks. If your home is located near a flood zone or in a high crime area, your rates will also be affected. While living in a flood zone can increase your home insurance premium, living in close proximity to a fire department can lower your rate.
Your credit history and FICO score can also impact the rate you get. It is common to authorize insurance companies to pull your credit report and a poor credit performance can impact the rate you are offered. If you have damaging credit try to repair it as soon as possible and then request a reassessment of your premium.
Once you determine the type of coverage you need, you can reduce your premium by increasing your deductible. The difference between replacement cost and actual cash value can also impact your cost. 100% replacement cost will be reflected by a higher premium but it will also provide a bigger benefit if there is a claim. Likewise, if you have older furniture and such, you may decide to save money on your insurance premium and select coverage that pays you the depreciated value of your loss in the event there is a payout.
Take advantage of discounts that you can earn on your home insurance through safety and security measures. Having a secured area for your guard dog could help with your personal liability insurance and installing burglar alarms and smoke detectors will almost always reduce your premium. If you have an auto, you can generally get a multi-policy discount by placing both your car and your home with the same insurance provider.
Free Home Insurance Quotes Online
Compared to auto insurance and health insurance, home insurance is one of the least expensive insurance policies you can buy. Ironically, it can also have the largest return on your investment. As with all insurance, you hope you never need it, but whether you have a leaky roof or a fire, knowing you are covered can ease a lot of the stress that naturally accompanies disaster. Use the insurance quote tool on this page now to shop for free home insurance quotes!
|
<urn:uuid:24c029a8-a588-4fdb-84ac-d89aea32bcb0>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.insuranceproviders.com/home-insurance/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.968598
| 1,571
| 1.523438
| 2
|
12 Things Everyone Needs To Know About The Catholic Church
- The Church isn't rich and selling off her "riches" isn't going to help much.
- Catholic Mass is not boring. If the mass is what the Catholic Church says it is, then it is the most exciting thing to happen in thousands of years.
- The Church is not anti-woman. In fact, the Church is the #1 defender of a women's most basic rights.
- Celibacy didn't cause the abuse scandal. If that were so, then we would see higher rates of abuse in Catholic clergy, but we don't.
- The Church loves the Bible. Heck, the Catholic Church gave the world the Bible. So, why would she not revere the written Word of God?
- Catholics are not only called to think for themselves, if they don't they are not truly taking on the faith. You can't believe merely because someone else decided it already, you have to choose belief personally.
- Catholics don't worship Mary or the Saints. But, we do ask them to pray for us, because the Bible says they are interceding for us before God.
- Purgatory and indulgences are real and yes they are still a part of Catholic teaching.
- The Church teaches that everyone is called to love and respect those who have a same-sex attraction. There is no homophobia taught by the Catholic Church. (see CCC 2358)
- The Church believes that everyone who goes to Heaven is saved by Jesus Christ. No grace comes from any other source.
- The Catholic Church is not anti-sex. Why would Catholic have big families if this were the case? Sex is a wonderful and beautiful thing. Just like any good thing it can be abused.
- The Church is growing. In fact, in many parts of the world the population is absolutely exploding.
There are many others. What else do you think the world needs to know?
|
<urn:uuid:18a489d9-4265-43be-9a68-80387e74d3e5>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://marysaggies.blogspot.com/2012/12/12-things-everyone-need-to-know-about.html?showComment=1355325080992
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00014-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.979538
| 406
| 1.515625
| 2
|
An Illinois man died from West Nile complications over the weekend as the United States battles its biggest spike in the virus since 2004.
William J. Mueller was hospitalized for two weeks and died Saturday, according to the website for the village of Lombard, a Chicago suburb.
Mueller, 76, was Lombard's president, a post he held for almost two decades.
This year's U.S. outbreak of West Nile, which is spread through infected mosquitoes, is one of the worst since the virus was first detected in the United States in 1999, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
At least 26 deaths and 693 cases in 32 states have been reported nationwide as of Tuesday evening, the CDC said.
A West Nile virus epidemic in Texas prompted a judge to declare a state of emergency in Dallas County, where the disease has killed at least nine people. Insecticide spraying from planes will be offered to certain communities hit hard by the virus.
"Dallas had a very mild winter, we had a lot of rain -- we were very thankful for all the rain, because we had been part of the drought last year -- (but) that combination is going to create a higher mosquito population," Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings told CNN.
Ebonie Conner is the mother of one of the Texas victims, 14-year-old Jordan, who is now being treated for West Nile symptoms. There are no medications to treat the virus or vaccines to prevent infection.
"The symptoms play peek-a-boo with you," she told CNN, noting that her daughter's symptoms began with a headache.
"Jordan has never really said she had a headache, so when the mention of a headache became complaint of a headache, I was very concerned. And when the complaint included vomiting -- well, the next day we had a doctor's appointment."
|
<urn:uuid:c60be09e-cca7-4384-9aa0-438e7cb4189e>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.wlky.com/news/health/West-Nile-blamed-in-State-Official-s-death/-/9365864/16186758/-/kegu76z/-/index.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702448584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516110728-00042-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.983914
| 382
| 2.03125
| 2
|
About the Golden Olive Bumble Trout Fly
The Golden Olive Bumble comes into its own as an attractor when on bob.
However, don't underestimate when fished singularly, it can be a real killer.
Superb during a Mayfly hatch on Lochs / lakes specially in gentle waves.
It is suggested that the Bumbles origins date back to Derbyshire in the 1500's when the fly was attached to a horsehair line. The fly when first alighting on the water was fished as a dapping fly, which slowly sank and fished as a wet hackle fly.
It has survived in flyboxes for more than 500 years because it works.
Creator of this trout fly: Anon
Tier of this trout fly: Paul Strasman
Country of origin for this trout fly: Ireland
- Hook : 8 - 12
- Tying Silk : Brown or yellow
- Body : Golden olive seal's fur or well waxed yellow tying silk
- Rib : Oval gold
- Palmered Hackle : Golden olive and medium red game cocks, together
- Front Hackle : Tradional blue jay or Grey partridge or Guinea fowl dyed blue
Comments from other fly fishermen
This fly is of Irish Origin. The tying presented originated from Kingsmill Moore. In english books and tying references pre-dating Kingsmill there was a different style of pattern given for the Bumble (herl bodies with single mono-tone palmered hackle). - Posted by Gary on 05/08/2009
Thanks for the comment, I've corrected the origin. - Posted by David Radley - Fish4Flies Team on 06/08/2009
As you will have gathered, I am a fan of Mr Kingsmill. I also spend a lot of time researching the origins of patterns. The original English Bumble is a lovely looking fly, but sadly not fished much anymore. - Posted by Gary on 06/08/2009
Sign-in to make a comment
To make a comment, please sign-in or register an account with us.
Please register your billing address here. Delivery addresses can be entered and selected later.
|
<urn:uuid:7ccd0400-91b8-47c7-a44a-be6e048d2fbd>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.fish4flies.com/Dry/Bumble/Golden_Olive_Bumble
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00036-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.914945
| 445
| 1.9375
| 2
|
Vietnam veteran and anti-war activist Ron Kovic is author of the autobiography "Born on the Fourth of July"
The following is a personal appeal from Ron Kovic, Vietnam War veteran and author of Born on the Fourth of July, to Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans and active-duty service members. Kovic issued the appeal to bring more veterans and GIs into the anti-war struggle and to support the work of March Forward!.
As a former United States Marine Corps infantry sergeant, who was shot and paralyzed from the mid-chest down on Jan. 20, 1968, during my second tour of duty in Vietnam, and someone who has lived with the wounds of that war for over 40 years, I am writing this letter to ask you to join me as we begin a critical new phase in the growing anti-war movement.
Many of you have already served multiple deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan. You have been coming home now for almost 10 years. Many have begun to question, to doubt these wars and our leaders. Over two million of you have served honorably in both theatres of conflict. Though many years separate us, we are brothers and sisters.
Though we have fought in conflicts generations apart, we have all been to the same place. We know what war is. We understand it, and for many of us, our lives will never be the same again. In many ways, we represent a very powerful force in our country—a moral, spiritual, and political high ground that is unassailable, a potential to transform our nation that is undeniable. No one knows peace or the preciousness of life better than the soldiers who have fought in war, or been affected by it directly: the mother of a son who has died, a wife who will never see her husband again, a child who will never have a father, a father who will never see his son again.
For, it is we who live with the physical and emotional scars of war, and we who live with these wounds everyday, and feel their weight and pain every morning. It is we who have walked and wheeled through the streets of our country and watched children stare at us and wonder why. And it is we who cry out now for the future, for a world without war.
We are the reminders of what war can do, of how it can wound and hurt, and diminish all that is good and human. We struggle everyday to believe in a life that was almost taken away from us. We know that even though we have lost, though parts of our bodies may be missing, though we may not be able to see or feel, we are important men and women, with important lessons to teach, with important things to share.
Those of us lucky enough to have survived combat yearn for life now, for beauty, for all that is decent and good, for in war we saw the worst in the human being. We saw poverty and death, killing and savagery, the darkest sides of the human soul, the most hated parts of our humanity.
I, like many Americans who served in Vietnam and those now serving in Iraq and Afghanistan (and countless human beings throughout history), had been willing to give my life for my country with little knowledge or awareness of what that really meant.
Like many of you who joined up after 9/11, I trusted and believed and had no reason to doubt the sincerity and motives of my government. It would not be until many months after being wounded, and while recovering at a veterans’ hospital in New York that I would begin to question whether I and the others who had gone to that war had gone for nothing.
Change does not come easily, and opposing one’s government during a time of war is often very difficult. You've been taught to follow orders, to obey and not question, to go along with the program and do exactly what you’re told. You learned that in boot camp. You learned that the day the drill instructors started screaming at you. It is "Yes Sir” and “No Sir” and nothing in between. There is the physical and verbal abuse, the vicious threats and constant harassment to keep you off balance. It is a powerful conditioning process, a process that began long ago, long before we signed those papers at the recruit stations of our hometowns, a process deeply ingrained in the American culture and psyche, and it has shaped and influenced us from our earliest childhood.
The late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said that, "A time comes when silence is betrayal." King went on to say that, "The truth of these words is beyond doubt, but the mission to which they call us is a most difficult one. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty. Even when pressed with the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government’s policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within ones own bosom and the surrounding world. Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexing as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict we are often on the verge of being mesmerized but we must move on."
Over 40 years have passed since Dr. King spoke those words to an overflow crowd at the Riverside church in New York City in 1967, and the tragic lessons of Vietnam continue to go unheeded. The same patterns of wars, lies, aggression and brutality continue to repeat themselves. Another country, another occupation, another reason to hate and fear, but in the end it is the same crime being committed over and over again, the same innocent civilians being killed, the same young men and women returning home in caskets and body bags and wheelchairs.
We have petitioned our government time and time again. We have peacefully marched and demonstrated for over a decade yet the killing and mayhem continues. Precious lives continue to be wasted as another generation of young men and women are squandered in this, our latest foreign policy debacle.
Our leaders refuse to listen. They refuse to learn. How many more senseless wars, flag draped caskets, grieving mothers, paraplegics, amputees, stressed-out sons and daughters, innocent civilians slaughtered before we finally decide to break the silence of this shameful night? Many of us trusted and believed that change would come, these wars would end, and that we would finally we be listened to but that is not at all what has happened. We have been tragically misled.
We have been deceived and betrayed. We have been promised peace and we have been given war. We have been told there would be change and nothing is changing. Rather than learning the lessons from the disastrous fiasco in Iraq, our government continues down the path of destruction, brutality, aggression and war, dragging us deeper into another senseless and unnecessary conflict in Afghanistan. The physical and psychological battles from the war in Iraq and Afghanistan will rage on for decades, deeply impacting the lives of citizens in all countries involved.
As the 43rd anniversary of my wounding in Vietnam approaches, in many ways I feel my injury in that war has been a blessing in disguise. I have been given the opportunity to move through that dark night of the soul to a new shore, to gain an understanding, a knowledge, a completely different vision. I now believe that I have suffered for a reason, and in many ways I have found that reason in my commitment to peace and non-violence. We who have witnessed the obscenity of war and experienced its horror and terrible consequences have an obligation to rise above our pain and sorrow and turn the tragedy of our lives into a triumph.
I have come to believe that there is nothing in the lives of human beings more terrifying than war, and nothing more important then for those of us who have experienced it to share its awful truth.
A time comes when a people can no longer wait. A time comes when the agonies, the suffering, have become too great. A time comes when a people must act and do what is necessary. Lives are at stake. No longer can we trust the President or politicians to end these wars. No longer can we believe them when they say the troops will come home soon. They have long since lost their credibility.
Each day that passes another life is lost. Each hour that this war drags on the need for a daring new approach by the anti war movement becomes more apparent. Bold, creative, and imaginative leadership is needed, and I do not believe there is a group more suited for that task at this time than the veterans of our nation’s most recent conflict.
At exactly 10:00 a.m., Thursday morning, Dec. 16, 2010, veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, including troops now serving in the armed forces of the United States, will be leading a dramatic act of non-violent civil disobedience in front of the White House in Washington, D.C. with other brave veterans and citizens, protesting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, calling for all troops to be brought home immediately and without delay. (Click here to learn more about this action)
May this action and other actions like it in the days ahead represent a growing awareness by the American people that only they can end these wars and begin to redirect the priorities of our nation toward more positive and life affirming goals.
I am writing this letter to you today asking you to join them on that day—and the difficult days ahead, to bravely, and with great dignity step over that line you've not stepped over before and begin to exert that powerful moral force you as veterans and active-duty troops represent; to raise your voices, to protest, to demonstrate, to end these wars and make our country a better place.
This is my hope. This is my prayer.
With great admiration and respect,
Author, Born on the Fourth of July
March 23rd, 2013
This evening is going be a big moment in turning our country around on the issue of gun violence. That's why I desperately want you ...
March 21st, 2013
I am hosting a nationwide series of house parties this Saturday night where tens of thousands of people will gather together in living rooms to ...
March 15th, 2013
The response to my Newtown letter this week has been overwhelming. It is so very clear to everyone that the majority of Americans have had ...
March 13th, 2013
The year was 1955. Emmett Till was a young African American boy from Chicago visiting relatives in Mississippi. One day Emmett was seen "flirting" with ...
February 26th, 2013
Thanks to everyone for bearing with me as I spend so much time on what happened to Emad Burnat. It's important to me because he's ...
February 26th, 2013
On Tuesday, February 19th, Emad Burnat, the Palestianian co-director of the Oscar-nominated documentary '5 Broken Cameras,' was detained with his wife and son at Los ...
February 20th, 2013
Last night was the Motion Picture Academy-sponsored dinner in Beverly Hills honoring the directors and producers of this year's five nominated films for Best Documentary. ...
September 11th, 2010
OpenMike 9/11/10 Michael Moore's daily blog I am opposed to the building of the "mosque" two blocks from Ground Zero. I want it built on ...
December 14th, 2010
Yesterday, in the Westminster Magistrates Court in London, the lawyers for WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange presented to the judge a document from me stating that ...
May 12th, 2011
"The Nazis killed tens of MILLIONS. They got a trial. Why? Because we're not like them. We're Americans. We roll different." – Michael Moore in ...
November 22nd, 2011
This past weekend I participated in a four-hour meeting of Occupy Wall Street activists whose job it is to come up with the vision and ...
September 22nd, 2011
I encourage everyone I know to never travel to Georgia, never buy anything made in Georgia, to never do business in Georgia. I will ask ...
December 16th, 2010
Dear Swedish Government: Hi there -- or as you all say, Hallå! You know, all of us here in the U.S. love your country. Your ...
November 2nd, 2010
This letter contains (almost) no criticisms of how the Democrats have brought this day of reckoning upon themselves. That -- and where to go from ...
|
<urn:uuid:a76bc1b6-dd6a-4070-adc5-0dc0decaee0a>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://michaelmoore.com/words/mike-friends-blog/raise-your-voices
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368700264179/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516103104-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.968763
| 2,570
| 1.59375
| 2
|
Part 1: To the Teacher
To the Teacher Introduction
Teachers and students all over Virginia are becoming involved in caring for Virginia's environment. This Project Action Guide includes a variety of projects, with step-by-step instructions from planning through closure, resources readily available to teachers, ways to make student efforts a recognized part of a statewide project, and much more.
Upper elementary and middle school students often feel strongly about environmental issues but lack the skills and information necessary to take responsible and appropriate action. This publication can help teachers in upper elementary grades to channel this student interest and enthusiasm into productive learning experiences that result in positive environmental outcomes. The projects provide a structured approach to open-ended problem solving. With teachers serving as facilitators and advisors, students can benefit from defining and addressing problems within a real-world context.
Some projects presented in this publication may take several months to complete; others are shorter term. Time frames will vary with individual project plans.
Through these projects, teachers and students become part of Virginia's growing network of people who are making a difference.
|
<urn:uuid:885c25ce-84a1-4abf-97cf-15677be229bb>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.doe.virginia.gov/instruction/science/elementary/lessons_bay/proj_action_guide/to_teacher/index.shtml
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696383156/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092623-00017-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.952281
| 217
| 3.59375
| 4
|
FIRE / RESCUE BATTALION CHIEF
DEFINITION OF CLASS:
This is command level administrative and management work in fire/rescue
services. Work involves the delivery of direct firefighting, rescue, and
emergency medical services (EMS) as the highest ranking officer of a district;
or as manager of a County wide fire/rescue program or service. Personal
contacts are with higher level fire/rescue personnel to plan and coordinate
work and to exchange information; with other fire/rescue personnel to
provide work direction, supervision and guidance; with personnel of other
emergency service agencies to coordinate firefighting and rescue efforts;
with local fire and rescue departments to coordinate their services with
that of the career service within assigned districts; and with the public
to provide information and emergency assistance as required.
An employee in this class supervises assigned staff; plans, conducts and coordinates work in such areas as budget, procurement, personnel administration, labor relations, training, and maintenance and security of buildings, grounds and equipment. Work affects the efficiency and effectiveness of fire/rescue programs and services; the rescue, health and safety of individuals; and the preservation of structures and other physical property. Work is performed in accordance with established policies and procedures which are normally applicable but which may require modification by the employee in unusual situations. Assignments require initiative and resourcefulness, analysis and assessment of unusual problems and/or emergency situations, and judgment in deciding upon an appropriate course of action. Work in emergency services, which is performed on an assigned shift, requires periods of medium physical effort and involves some exposure to heat, dirt, disease, confined spaces, heights and other unpleasant conditions. An employee in this class is exposed to the risk of serious injury, requiring the use of protective clothing and the strict observance of safety precautions and procedures. Work is performed under general direction and is reviewed in terms of compatibility with department policies and procedures and effectiveness in meeting requirements.
EXAMPLES OF DUTIES: (Illustrative Only)
Responds to fire alarms and other emergency or service calls with fire/rescue
companies; assumes overall command at scene of emergency until relieved
by a senior officer.
Supervises, coordinates and evaluates the tactics and strategies used to resolve emergency and other situations.
At the scene of an incident, may oversee and participate in the sampling of flammable atmospheres and chemicals to determine hazards involved and provide courses of action to eliminate same.
Reviews and forwards written operational, fire prevention, emergency medical, training, and personnel reports to senior officers.
Provides work direction and supervision to staff; resolves personnel matters and refers more complex cases or issues to senior officers for appropriate action.
Provides oversight and coordination for the assignment of fire/rescue personnel to duty assignments.
Provides oversight and coordination for preparation of annual budget and monitors budget expenditures.
Oversees the drafting of recommendations for the selection of equipment, supplies, and apparatus.
Oversees the operation of the Emergency Communications Center and manages the Department's communication program.
Oversees the personnel function for department employees and serves as Labor Relations Officer for the Department.
Evaluates and makes recommendations on the effectiveness of home and commercial building inspections and reports findings to proper officers as necessary.
Develops and implements policies and procedures governing operations of all equipment, apparatus and medical units operated in the fire/rescue service as required in cooperation with the local fire and rescue departments and the Fire/Rescue Commission.
Serves as liaison between local fire and rescue departments, other fire/rescue departments and squads, government, and public and private agencies as required.
Oversees and occasionally participates in investigations and inspections at the scene of a firefighting operation to determine cause, origin, and circumstances of the fire as required.
Oversees and directs surveillance in relation to arson and suspicious fire investigations as required.
Plans, directs and coordinates fire prevention and educational programs for the public as required.
Develops and recommends proposed laws and regulations as required.
Develops, recommends and implements effective standard operating procedures as required.
Oversees the coordination of the Emergency Medical Services Program with the Montgomery County Fire/Rescue Service.
Oversees and is responsible for the utilization and maintenance of assigned facilities, equipment, and apparatus.
Provides recommendations for the improvement of apparatus, equipment and facilities.
May be assigned as a member/supervisor on a specialty team.
Inspects and evaluates facilities, equipment and apparatus.
Assumes the duties of higher level officers in their absence.
Performs related duties as required.
Experience: Satisfactory completion of two (2) years of career experience
as a Montgomery County Division of Fire and Rescue Services Fire/Rescue
Education: Successful completion of sixty (60) semester hours in a degree program at an accredited college or university.
Training: Successful completion of all training courses and certifications required for promotion to this class by the Montgomery County Department of Fire and Rescue Services.
Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:
Thorough knowledge of the organization, functions, rules, regulations,
policies and procedures of the Montgomery County Department of Fire/Rescue
Thorough knowledge of fire suppression, rescue and emergency medical services principles, practices, apparatus, equipment, techniques and methods.
Thorough knowledge of fire prevention methods and techniques.
Thorough knowledge of fire administration, personnel management and budget administration.
Thorough knowledge of the functions and activities of other departments, organizations, and associations related to fire/rescue operations.
Thorough knowledge of geographic, climatic, and structural characteristics of the Department's response area as related to fire/rescue service planning and operations.
Thorough knowledge of the local and state laws governing the functions and activities of the fire/rescue service under normal and emergency conditions.
Ability to plan and direct the preparation of technical and administrative recommendations and reports.
Ability to work in elevated and/or confined places, toxic atmospheres, and extreme heat.
Ability to swim and stay afloat.
Ability to supervise, motivate and evaluate staff.
Ability to speak effectively before officials and citizen groups.
Ability to communicate effectively, both orally and in writing.
Ability to successfully complete a test designed to assess the ability to maintain a level of physical fitness to perform critical physical tasks required of the position and to appropriately lead unit members or other subordinates in fitness activities.
NOTE: All minimum qualifications for this class must be attained prior
deadline for application for promotion to this class.
LICENSE AND CERTIFICATION REQUIREMENTS:
Possession and maintenance at all times of a valid driver's license
as required by the Department of Fire and Rescue Services.
Maintenance of State of Maryland certification as EMT-B.
Maintenance of all other certifications as required by the Department of Fire/Rescue Services.
Employees promoted to this class will be required to serve a probationary period of six (6) months, during which time performance will be carefully evaluated. Continuation in this class will be contingent upon successful completion of the probationary period.
MEDICAL PROTOCOL: Core I Exam * (Successful completion of most recent physical examination and drug screen as required.)
Class Established: July, 1971 Revised: July, 1976
Formerly titled: Fire/Rescue Captain
Fire/Rescue District Chief
|
<urn:uuid:33b2c416-acd6-4880-9c95-b206e44c9e08>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www6.montgomerycountymd.gov/content/ohr/download/3165.htm
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.926591
| 1,543
| 2.515625
| 3
|
What does digestive distress mean in your cat?
If your cat is passing loose or frequent stools, this is a good indicator that something might be wrong with its overall health. According to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, diarrhea in cats can occur if a cat is simply adapting to a change in diet, but can also be caused by illness or infection. Diarrhea is a symptom, not a diagnosis.
In addition to a food intolerance, diarrhea could indicate your cat might be suffering from an allergy, internal parasites like roundworms, or even bacterial or viral infections. Other chronic medical conditions such as feline inflammatory bowel disease, kidney or liver disease and feline hyperthyroidism may also result in diarrhea in cats, the news outlet reports.
While most people know what diarrhea is, you should also know when to seek veterinary help for your feline. If your cat is passing bloody or black stool along with the diarrhea, call a vet immediately, as this could signal internal bleeding. If your cat has had abnormal stools for more than a few days, or if you notice vomiting or a lack of appetite you should also see your vet.
There are a number of questions your veterinarian will ask about your cat's recent behavior and health, according to VCA Animal Hospitals. Consider when you first noticed the unusual stools, what the nature of your cat's bowel movements is, what it has been eating, and whether it has any pre-existing medical problems. Your veterinarian will likely run tests on your cat’s stool and possibly even bloodwork to determine what is affecting your cat.
|
<urn:uuid:ef6d8ade-bbe6-48dd-9ff9-1e6291760de9>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.vcaspecialtyvets.com/alameda-east/news/pet-news/what-does-digestive-distress-mean-in-your-cat/312
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705559639/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115919-00019-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.947529
| 330
| 2.84375
| 3
|
The Department of Energy’s Build America Program hopes to transform the U.S. residential building market by creating and promoting innovative ways to achieve 50% energy savings in new and existing homes for all U.S. climate regions. It’s an ambitious goal, but they have the bare-knuckled commitment and technological resources achieve it.
This summer, I spent three days at the DOE’s Build America Technical Update conference in Denver. Although the program included eight hours of daily lectures and more than 24 technical presentations, a few dominant themes of interest to Vision 2020 emerged, including:
--What innovations are important to future homes?
--How do we avoid doing harm with high-performance enclosures?
--Why are so many high-performance homes under performing?
--How do advancing codes and standards actually get in the way of performance?
Emerging technology: While some promising new technology was discussed, one theme repeated with almost militant frustration was that U.S. heating and air-conditioning manufacturers are not supplying equipment sizes commensurate with high-performance housing requirements. James Cummings of the Florida Energy Center pointed out that not only were most air-conditioning systems sized for peak demand, resulting in significant over-sizing for 90% of operation time, but that this was exacerbated by high-performance enclosures that typically require smaller equipment than manufacturers offer. “Try get a 1-ton or smaller air conditioning unit and you can’t,” said Cummings.
Cooling systems are also set to respond to sensible, or air temperature controls, when the main burden for most and especially high-performance home air conditioning comes with latent loads, or humidity.
In addition to urging manufacturers to make available the smaller equipment required by high-performance envelopes, Cummings also suggests developing a new generation of variable-capacity heat pump systems that satisfy both latent and sensible loads. Some systems exist currently, but they remain comparatively expensive and complicated to install.
John Straube, a principle at the Building Science Corporation and professor of building science at the Civil Engineering Department of the University of Waterloo, Canada, says the age of dual systems has passed, with one system providing household heat and the other hot water. With the low heating requirements resulting from improved enclosures, energy demands have shifted from space to water heating. His preferred solution would come with combining a high-efficiency, gas, tankless hot water system with a small air handler and a micro-duct system, perhaps made from PVC pipe.
Dave Strecher, who leads IBACOS’s research effort in innovative space conditioning strategies for low-load homes presented a strategy to effectively heat and cool a high-performance shell using equipment available today. In essence, the method involves using the oversize equipment and duct systems available, but eliminating most of the distribution network by removing as many interior walls as possible, and then conditioning this large, loft-like area with a single register. Of course, some rooms will still have walls, such as bedrooms and bathrooms, for which Strecher recommends the use of passive, high- and low-wall vent systems through the interior partitions to enable air transfer.
DEVap systems: One of the more exciting developments at DOE involves research on a “super advanced” desiccant enhanced evaporative air conditioning (DEVap) system
: a compact, cost-effective cooling unit that uses 90% less electricity and up to 80% less total energy than its traditional counterparts, while also efficiently managing humidity so that it can maintain a comfortable atmosphere for building occupants without the need for overcooling. Another development comes with emerging technology in radiant floor air conditioning that promises a complete heating and cooling system that requires no blowers or ducting when coupled with an energy recovery ventilation system devoted exclusively to indoor air quality.
Speakers seemed to agree with Joseph Lstiburek, principle of Building Science Corporation and adjunct professor of Building Science at the University of Toronto, Canada, that the trend toward ever-tighter building envelopes is misguided. Lstiburek, who coined the now-famous adage of high-performance building, “Build tight, ventilate right,” says “build tight” means three air changes per hour at 50 Pascals, not one and half, or even lower, as the Passive House standard requires (0.6 ACH). “There’s no logic behind the tighter standards, and it’s expensive and unbelievably difficult to achieve, especially since you have to over-ventilate to compensate for all the problems created when you construct nearly airtight houses,” said Lstiburek.
All the speakers also agreed that the main problem facing the industry today comes from HVAC installation defects. Nearly 80% of high-performance homes tested recently in a California study were not operating up to standard. Nameplate output standards for heating and air conditioning are based on ideal conditions; actual field operation depends on proper duct sizing and fan tuning, among other adjustments. By and large, the HVAC industry neglects key commissioning procedures that result in missed opportunities for operational efficiency and performance.
At the meeting, the debate came with how to overcome this problem, with some advocating improved training, others law enforcement, and still others improved equipment with a diagnostic dashboard that would make commissioning easier.
Codes and standards: The strongest arguments began with debate on the second half of the Lstiburek famous equation, “ventilate right.” Lstiburek opposes changes in ventilation requirements now in effect under the new ASHRAE 62.2, which he says promotes excessive, inefficient ventilation that results in poor indoor air quality. Inefficient, because the 80% increase in ventilation requirement under ASHRAE 62.2, “cancels all the benefit gained in the last two codes updates of IECC,” said Lstiburek. Especially in humid areas, where the standard forces you to add highly energy-inefficient dehumidification. “Why go through all the effort to tighten a structure and then add the equivalent of a gaping hole?” asked Lstiburek. While ERV systems can temper incoming air, they do not dehumidify it.
On the big picture, Sam Rashkin, chief architect for the DOE’s Building Technologies program, emphasized that technology is only half the solution. “Better technologies don’t always win,” said Rashkin, introducing a discussion on market delivery solutions that would effectively communicate and validate the value of high-performance homes innovation. All speakers agreed that the industry needs a uniform label, such as vehicle miles per gallon to achieve a broad market grasp of high performance vs. code-compliant housing.
|
<urn:uuid:b921eca2-cb22-4e21-99ba-5d167df341a1>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.ecobuildingpulse.com/green-building/building-america-meeting-touches-on-ventilationin.aspx
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00067-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.938423
| 1,395
| 2.453125
| 2
|
Environmental regulation and assessment processes
The oil and gas industry supports effective, efficient and transparent regulation based on sound science.
The industry works to highest standards, uses hundreds of environmental scientists, and in Australia it has a long history of responsible environmental management.
Environmental approvals are usually subject to a range of conditions. These often require the development and approval of more specific management plans, the monitoring of performance and impacts, remedial action and investment in further environmental research or environment protection programs.
For major projects these programs add tens of millions of dollars to already high project costs and significantly increase regulatory uncertainty.
For example, it took more than three years and a 13,500 page Environmental Impact Statement for the Gladstone LNG Project to achieve commonwealth and state approval. These approvals imposed 1200 strict conditions over the project’s operations and requirements for further extensive scientific work to be undertaken as the project proceeds.
The industry faces overlapping state and federal laws with duplicative, inconsistent, ambiguous and often arbitrary requirements. Paperwork and costs are significantly increased and projects are delayed without improving environmental outcomes.
Streamlining oil and gas environmental regulations could save taxpayers and industry millions of dollars without weakening safety and environmental outcomes.
Conditions should be clearly defined and focused on specific outcomes that deliver significant environmental benefits. There is no point in compelling project proponents to spend large sums on programs with little environmental value.
|
<urn:uuid:058c7842-42cb-4e28-bf93-184c2984fdab>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.appea.com.au/oil-gas-explained/operation/environmental-regulation-and-assessment-processes/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704132298/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113532-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.926014
| 278
| 2.5625
| 3
|
Tue November 27, 2012
Iraqi Businesses Feel Pinch Of Iran's Economic Woes
Originally published on Tue November 27, 2012 7:31 am
RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:
This is MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Renee Montagne.
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
And I'm Steve Inskeep.
We've heard about how U.S. and European sanctions on Iran have caused that country's currency to plummet and how Iran is now buying up gold and trying to dump its own currency outside its borders. Well, Iran is part of a regional economy and the falling currency is starting to hurt at least one of Iran's neighbors. NPR's Kelly McEvers sent this report from southern Iraq.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN: (Foreign language spoken)
KELLY MCEVERS, BYLINE: We're standing in the holy city of Najaf. These are big days for Shiite Muslims. It's the holiday that marks the Battle of Karbala, which is just up the road here. Right now the sounds you hear are prayers, the stories of the Battle of Karbala being told over loudspeakers.
Every year millions of Iraqis come down here for these holidays. But also millions of Iranians usually come to visit these holy sites. Lately though, those Iranians aren't coming in nearly as many numbers as they were before. And the Iraqi economy is really taking a hit.
Everywhere in Najaf you see the signs of the dwindling numbers. Where once there were long lines of massive tour buses crowded with Iranian pilgrims are now nearly empty streets. On one street that approaches a holy shrine, about a third of the shops are closed.
The street used to be thronged with pilgrims buying any kind of trinket that carries the extra blessing of being bought near the shrine, even if that trinket is made in China. Now, though, shop-owner Ahmed Na'amen says merchants are barely hanging on.
AHMED NA'AMEN: (Through translator) See these two shops, they closed. And even see my next neighbor, since the morning until now he has not sold anything.
MCEVERS: Na'amen says even if they do see a few Iranian pilgrims, they usually aren't buying. Or when they do buy, it's very little.
NA'AMEN: (Through translator) Before, they would buy, for instance, 10 pieces. But right now they buy only one piece. So this is the difference. We've got nine pieces difference.
MCEVERS: Iraq's economy is dominated by the oil sector, which is back up to what it was just before the U.S. invaded nearly ten years ago. Increased security is bringing some needed foreign investment, analysts say. And it's encouraging Iraqis to pull the money out from under their mattresses and start projects again.
So up until very recently over the last several years, owning a hotel was an extremely good investment here in Najaf. You could sort of guarantee that, you know, religious pilgrims were going to come to this place. But now, all these hotels are either closed, advertising big discounts, or just going out of business completely. Here in front of this hotel is a totally defunct generator. And the hotel itself is just - inside the glass and brass doors, it's just dark.
Not far from this row of failing hotels is one we visited more than two years ago. Back then it was a shabby place that still did brisk enough business. Lately it was remodeled by a Turkish company.
You have modern furniture here in the lobby. There's a tiger-print table with kind of a shag rug and you've got elaborate light fixtures everywhere. How many people are staying in the hotel right now? How many pilgrims from Iran are staying in the hotel right now?
SA'EB ABU GHONEM: How many? No one.
MCEVERS: No one.
GHONEM: No one.
MCEVERS: That's hotel owner Sa'eb Abu Ghonem, who also heads the hotel association in Najaf.
GHONEM: (Foreign language spoken)
MCEVERS: He says the lobby used to be a hive of buzzing workers and guests coming and going. But now he's started calling himself a failure for investing in religious tourism when he could've invested in a mall.
One of the only other people in the lobby is a man named Adnan Nimr Al Sultan. We find him sitting on a couch, looking out at the empty street. He used to manage the staff here at the hotel. He was laid off two months ago. Now he comes to the hotel a few times a week, hoping someone might have a lead on a job.
ADNAN NIMR AL SULTAN: (Foreign language spoken)
MCEVERS: Sultan says he used to make about $500 a month. Now he's had to borrow money to pay rent and expenses. He's already $6,000 in debt. He drives a taxi at night to make a few bucks to feed his three kids. We ask him who's to blame for the drop in currency and the drop in tourism here in Najaf.
Do people blame the Americans or do they blame the Iraqi government for this situation?
SULTAN: (Foreign language spoken)
MCEVERS: I blame the Iraqi government, he says.
SULTAN: And you ask why? Because, because.
MCEVERS: We had a socialist system and now we're moving to a capitalist system. But it's too fast. We can have a boom in the religious tourism business and then a bust. There's no safety net, he says. No one cares about us workers.
Kelly McEvers, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
|
<urn:uuid:31c78da6-6e51-4b57-8792-d641bd4607cd>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://nipr.fm/post/iraqi-businesses-feel-pinch-irans-economic-woes
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00011-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.970019
| 1,214
| 1.828125
| 2
|
Gibbs presented his “Love is Greater than Hate” program at the school campuses in George West, Three Rivers and Tilden last week trying to spread his message about preventing bullying.
Gibbs took time Tuesday night to provide a program for the parents at the George West cafeteria. It gave the highlights of what he was trying to stress to their children and also gave a list of ways that parents can try and help their children cope with bullying.
“Bullying is not just a school problem but a problem in every domain in life,” Gibbs told a group of parents. “My program focuses on making the victim become resilient.”
He said that teaching kids and people in general to become more resilient empowers them.
Bullies do what they do looking for a certain reaction, but if they fail to get that reaction they oftentimes will stop the bullying, he said.
“If you can be calm and not let the words hurt you, it will help,” Gibbs said.
His solution is about flexing the Golden Rule; “treat every person like your friend, even your enemies,” he said.
He explained that is harder for a person to be mean if the person he or she is being mean to is nice back.
“Be calm and kind” was his advice.
He demonstrated his point by having two role-playing scenarios with one of the parents from the audience.
In the first scenario, the mother was supposed to bully him by saying mean things to him and he saying mean things back, with the situation escalating as the insults got worse.
In the second scenario, the mother continued to bully Gibbs, but this time he only said positive or nice things back.
When the scenario finished, the volunteer said it was much harder to continue the verbal abuse when he was only responding back with kindness.
Gibbs encouraged the parents to practice the same kind of role-playing scenarios with their children.
Another tip Gibbs gave parents was to practice the three E’s. First, he said, to empathize with the child and hear his or her problem out and talk about his/her specific situation. Second was to encourage the child, and third was to empower the child. Empowering the child included the role playing so that the child can practice the proper ways to respond to a bully.
“Bullies do it for the payoff,” he reminded parents.
Teaching children the Golden Rule will build resilience and confidence in them and deter the bullying.
For children with anger issues who still need an outlet, he encouraged www.thehopeline.com, an online and phone-based helped center where “trained volunteers serve as HopeCoaches, engaging teenagers and young adults by listening, empathizing, encouraging, offering biblical perspectives and prayer,” said the group’s website.
Gibbs said he too was bullied as a child, and, when his mother and counselor taught him the Golden Rule, it changed his life.
Gibbs has been touring the country for more than a decade and teaching students the art and importance of being resilient.
“If you learn this skill, it will put you in charge of all your relationships,” he said.
|
<urn:uuid:70b94bad-cbe8-43f4-b804-9f56511f816b>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.mysoutex.com/view/full_story_landing/20908769/article-Resilience-offered-as-solution-to-bullying-
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.980994
| 680
| 2.578125
| 3
|
June 22, 2011 marked a major shift in the regulatory environment. The SEC adopted rules for implementing the Dodd-Frank Act, yet they did not take these actions unilaterally. These necessary actions substantiate core provisions of the Dodd-Frank Act. According to SEC Chairperson Mary L. Schapiro, “These rules will fill a key gap in the regulatory landscape.”
Changes to the Investment Advisers Act
As was mentioned on several occasions in this book, rules are created to interpret legislation passed by Congress. The SEC’s new rules enforced Congress’ legislative intent in passing the Dodd-Frank Act. Many changes to the Investment Advisers Act were authorized by Title IV of the Dodd-Frank Act.
Among other changes, the new rules:
- reallocated oversight of certain mid-sized advisors to state securities regulators;
- made changes to Form ADV and its instructions;
- repealed the private advisor exemption found in section 203(b)(3) of the Investment Advisers Act; and
- provided a new definition of assets under management.
The new rules help the SEC to identify which RIAs must make the transition to state registration.
Impact of Dodd-Frank on Mid-Sized Advisors
The Dodd-Frank Act created a new RIA category referred to as “mid-sized advisors”, and it shifted primary responsibility for regulatory oversight of mid-sized advisors to the states. Mid-sized advisors are defined as those firms with assets under management that range from $25 million to $100 million.
The SEC adopted Rule 203A-5 to ease the transition from SEC to state registration. Mid-sized advisors registered with the SEC as of July 21, 2011, must remain registered with the Commission until January 1, 2012. All advisors registered with the SEC as of January 1, 2012, regardless of size, must file a one-time amendment to their Form ADV no later than March 30, 2012. This filing generally coincides with the advisor’s annual updating amendment filing if their fiscal year ends in December and will require them to update all of the items in Form ADV. Mid-sized advisors no longer eligible for SEC registration must switch to state oversight and withdraw their federal registrations by June 28, 2012. Since Wyoming does not regulate RIAs, an investment advisor with its principal place of business in that state, must be SEC-registered unless the firm is exempt from registration with the Commission.
Before switching from SEC to state registration, however, a mid-sized advisor should refer to the investment advisory laws for that state to determine if the firm is exempt from registration. If the mid-sized advisor is not required to register with the securities regulator of the state in which the firm maintains its place of business, it should remain SEC-registered. Mid-sized advisors should also remain SEC registered if the state in which the firm maintains its principal place of business does not subject advisors to an examination. For example, New York does not currently conduct examinations of advisors, so mid-sized RIAs domiciled in that state must be SEC-registered. It remains to be seen if other states will not be conducting examinations of RIAs.
Rule 203A-2 contains exemptions from the prohibition on SEC registration. The start-up exemption applies to advisory firms who expect to be eligible for SEC registration within 120 days of their registration approval date. There is a multi-state exemption for RIAs required to register in at least 15 states. RIAs in that category may choose to register or remain registered with the SEC.
Rule 203A-1 was adopted to prevent an RIA from being forced to frequently switch between SEC and state registration as the value of its assets under management change. The SEC has set up a buffer zone for mid-sized RIAs with assets under management which rise above or fall below the $100 million threshold. The new rule raised the threshold to $110 million, at which time the advisor must register with the SEC. If an advisor is already SEC-registered, the firm does not need to withdraw its registration until its assets under management fall beneath the $90 million threshold.
Mid-sized advisors eligible for a Rule 203A-2 exemption, along with advisors to a registered investment company or business development company under the Investment Company Act, may not rely on the buffer. Those entities are required to register with the SEC, regardless of the amount of their assets under management. In addition, those advisors that register with the SEC because they expect to have $100 million in assets under management within 120 days may not rely upon the buffer.
Under the new rules, the SEC amended the multi-state advisor exemption to align the rule with the Dodd-Frank requirements. This exemption now permits all investment advisors required to register as an investment advisor with fifteen or more states to register with the SEC. The previous requirement was that the advisor needed to be registered in at least thirty states.
An RIA relying on the multi-state advisor exemption must withdraw from SEC registration when it is no longer required to be registered in at least fifteen states. Advisors are only required to assess their eligibility for SEC registration annually.
As we saw in Differences Between State and SEC Regulation of Investment Advisors, NASAA launched a coordinated review program on November 29, 2011, easing the transition process for RIAs switching from SEC to state registration. The program is available to SEC-registered investment advisory firms who must switch to state registration in four to fourteen states.
Regulatory Assets under Management
The new Form ADV instructions refer to “regulatory assets under management,” instead of the traditional term, “assets under management.” Regulatory assets under management include securities portfolios for which RIAs provide continuous and regular supervisory or management services.
Assets must be included in the calculation, even if they are:
- family or proprietary assets;
- assets managed without compensation of any kind; or
- assets of foreign clients.
Revised instructions to Form ADV require an RIA to calculate its regulatory assets under management on a gross basis. An RIA may not deduct any unpaid outstanding loans or other accrued liabilities. An RIA should not deduct securities purchased on margin when calculating regulatory assets under management. The SEC’s rationale is that it does not matter if a client has borrowed money for purchasing a portion of the regulatory assets under management.
The SEC’s intent was to provide a uniform method for calculating assets under management to maintain consistency for registration purposes and risk assessment. Using a uniform method for calculating assets under management prevents RIAs from excluding assets in order to avoid registration or to remain state registered. In addition, the uniform method is intended to prevent inconsistent application of the Investment Advisers Act to RIAs managing the same amount of assets.
When the SEC implemented its new rules, they also revised the Form ADV instructions. RIAs must now provide the specific number of employees who are IARs or licensed insurance agents, whereas in the past, Form ADV required RIAs to select from a range of numbers. RIAs must also report the number and types of clients receiving advisory services. An approximate number of clients is acceptable if the firm has over 100 clients, and the approximate number of clients who are not United States persons must be reported.
There are new categories for business development companies, other investment advisers, and insurance companies. The RIA must answer questions regarding the types of clients it advises, specify the percentage each client type comprises in relation to the total number of clients, and report the approximate percentage of regulatory assets under management attributed to each client type.
As a result of the SEC’s new rules, pension consultants may be forced to transition from SEC to state registration. Only pension consultants providing investment advice to plans with assets exceeding $200 million may remain SEC-registered. Until now, a pension consultant was permitted to be SEC-registered if it provided investment advice to plans with $50 million or more in assets.
Family offices are entities established by affluent families for wealth-management and other services to members of the family. Historically, family offices were not required to register with the SEC, because there was an exemption provided to investment advisors with fewer than fifteen clients. This fifteen client exemption was repealed, so that the SEC could regulate hedge fund and other private advisors. Under the new rules, however, certain family offices still do not need to be registered as investment advisors.
A family office will be excluded from registration under the Investment Advisers Act if it:
- is wholly owned by family clients and is exclusively controlled by family members and/or family entities;
- does not hold itself out as an investment advisor to the public; and
- only provides investment advice to “family clients” as defined by the rule.
Generally, the term “family members” includes all lineal descendants of a common ancestor who are no more than ten generations removed from the youngest generation of family members. Lineal descendants include adopted children, stepchildren, foster children of a common ancestor, and descendants’ spouses or spousal equivalents. The family office is also permitted to advise key employees, charities, and certain family trusts, without losing its exemption from registration.
Those family offices not qualifying for the exclusion must register with either the SEC or the appropriate state securities regulator by March 30, 2012.
Hedge Funds and Private Equity Funds
As previously noted, advisors to hedge funds and private equity funds were entitled to a registration exemption if they had fewer than fifteen clients or funds and did not hold themselves out as investment advisers. These formerly-exempt advisors have until March 30, 2012, to register with the SEC, and the application must be filed by February 14, 2012, allowing forty-five days to review it.
The SEC also revised Form ADV instructions guiding advisors of private funds in determining their regulatory assets under management. The following steps must be taken by the advisor.
- The firm must include the value of any private fund over which it exercises continuous and regular supervisory or management services.
- The firm must include the amount of any uncalled capital commitments made to a private fund managed by the adviser.
- The firm must utilize the market value of private fund assets or the fair value of private fund assets where market value is unavailable.
This third instruction prevents an investment advisor from electing to value its assets based on their cost, which is likely to be lower than valuing assets based on their market value. As previously mentioned, the advisor must use the fair value of fund assets where market value is not available.
Amendments to Form ADV are intended to gather detailed information from advisors of private funds. This information includes conflicts of interest and identification of key service providers.
There were three new exemptions from registration created for advisors of private funds. These exemptions apply to:
- advisors solely to venture capital funds;
- advisors that only give advice to private funds with less than $150 million in assets under management; and
- certain foreign advisors that have no place of business in the U.S.
The first two groups in this list are referred to as exempt reporting advisors. Even though they are not required to register with the SEC, exempt reporting advisors are subject to strict reporting, recordkeeping, and other compliance obligations. Although exempt reporting advisors file the same Form ADV as RIAs, they only need to respond to certain items and questions. Exempt reporting advisors must file their first Form ADV between January 1, 2012 and March 30, 2012.
The Big Picture
Cost of compliance plays a major role in decisions made by advisory firms. In situations where an RIA has the ability to choose between state or SEC registration, the firm may try to anticipate which regulatory oversight will be less burdensome. For example, some state securities regulators are conducting examinations of RIAs registered in that state, but do not have an office there. Historically, the state where an RIA has its principal place of business conducts any examinations that occur. If an RIA may be subject to examinations by some or all of the states in which it is registered, the firm may choose SEC registration if it qualifies for the multi-state advisor exemption.
Conversely, if regulatory oversight of SEC-registered investment advisors becomes oppressive, a firm might choose to remain state registered for as long as possible. It might even turn down clients if their assets will make the difference between state and SEC registration.
|
<urn:uuid:3647337e-2602-407f-a081-a9dffbc7f84e>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.advisorone.com/2012/01/01/recent-changes-in-the-regulatory-landscape?t=careers3ft3deconomy-markets
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.961276
| 2,520
| 1.546875
| 2
|
Most Active Stories
- Mystery man revealed : The daredevil behind the lens
- Skagit Valley eatery goes for the laughs to attract business
- Watch: Seattle Public Library tries to break record for longest book-domino chain
- North Cascades Nat'l Park named one of 10 'hidden gems' in U.S.
- Epiphany! Make an iceberg-blue cheese layer cake
News & Music Contributors
UW professor integral part of new Libyan opposition government
A longtime University of Washington economics professor has quickly found himself in a lead role with fellow Libyans fighting to defeat ruler Col. Moammar Gadhafi's forces.
Shortly after Ali Al Tarhouni returned to Libya weeks ago, he was named finance minister for Libya's opposition movement, according to a statement Wednesday from the University of Washington press office.
This morning, NPR's Eric Westervelt reported on Tarhouni's role as part of a movement struggling to hold onto control of areas it's taken during the uprising. Westervelt's interview with him in the eastern Libya city of Benghazi (and heard on KPLU's Morning Edition) captures the professor's account the current situation with rebel forces:
(Tarhouni) admits that the provisional government's work "was and remains very chaotic...We have to get our house in order," he says. Tarhouni thinks the semi-trained soldiers who defected are already deployed out there and number only about 1,000."They don't have any airplanes. I don't think they have any heavy armaments. So whatever it is that you saw is still heavily dependent on these young people," he says.
The New York Times' Kareem Fahim reports Tarhouni expressed hopes that if another critical stronghold, the city of Ajdabiya, is taken by the opposition, it will be a significant accomplishment for his side:
“If Ajdabiya is liberated, I think the dynamics will change,” he said.
Fahim writes Tarhouni's enthusiasm for reforms in his native country started as a young man:
In the early 1970s, as a student activist, Mr. Tarhouni was kicked out of college in Libya several times as he and his fellow students called for democracy and greater freedoms. He left the country in 1973, was stripped of his citizenship and sentenced to death in absentia a few years later, he said. He was put on a government hit list in 1981, he said.
Tarhounia began his teaching career at the UW's Foster School of Business in 1985, where he's remained since, according to a UW press statement:
“We hope Ali and his relatives are safe and not in harm’s way. We're also proud to have one of our longtime faculty members playing a significant role in Libya’s transitional government,” said James Jiambalvo, dean of the Foster School.
Tarhouni is married to Mary Li, a lawyer in the Washington Attorney General's office, according to the UW.
|
<urn:uuid:cad76f63-20e7-4c2b-a6b7-d8ac9742ced7>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://kplu.org/post/uw-professor-integral-part-new-libyan-opposition-government
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368709037764/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516125717-00034-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.973725
| 627
| 1.734375
| 2
|
Current as of: 2010
A. The state agency on aging:
(1) may receive on behalf of the state any gifts, donations or bequests from any source to be used in carrying out its duties; and
(2) is designated as the state agency for handling all programs of the federal government related to the aged, except those designated by law as the responsibility of another state agency, and may enter into agreements and contracts with agencies of the federal government for this purpose.
B. The state agency on aging may adopt and promulgate such reasonable rules and regulations as are deemed necessary to carry out its duties. Unless otherwise provided by law, no rule or regulation affecting any person or agency outside the state agency on aging shall be adopted, amended or repealed without a public hearing on the proposed action before the director of the state agency on aging or a hearing officer designated by him. The public hearing shall be held in Santa Fe unless otherwise permitted by statute. Notice of the subject matter of the rule or regulation, the action proposed to be taken, the time and place of the hearing, the manner in which interested persons may present their views and the method by which copies of the proposed rule or regulation or proposed amendment or repeal of an existing rule or regulation may be obtained shall be published once at least thirty days prior to the hearing in a newspaper of general circulation and mailed at least thirty days prior to the hearing date to all persons who have made a written request for advance notice of hearing. The director of the state agency on aging shall also provide such notice to the director of each senior citizen center no later than forty days prior to the public hearing. All rules and regulations shall be filed in accordance with the State Rules Act [Chapter 14, Article 4 NMSA 1978].
C. To ensure that the health and safety needs of the state's aged population are being met, the state agency on aging may conduct unannounced quality care evaluations of health and long-term care facilities that provide services to the aged, including the use of undercover patients or employees. Any employee or contractor of the state agency on aging who participates in such an evaluation shall be immune from liability in any civil action related to the evaluation, provided it is conducted in good faith. The purpose of this subsection is to confirm and clarify the authority of the state agency on aging to conduct quality care evaluations to protect the interests of the state's aged population.
Questions & Answers: Aging
New Mexico Laws: Aging
U.S. Code Provisions: Aging
|
<urn:uuid:2052abc6-a83a-4997-a91c-b75e10b5ae69>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.lawserver.com/law/state/new-mexico/nm-statutes/new_mexico_statutes_28-4-6
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368702810651/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516111330-00012-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.949582
| 508
| 1.5625
| 2
|
To the Editor: The abrupt hypothyroidism from the pretreatment protocol prior to the administration of radioactive iodine for thyroid carcinoma may cause susceptible individuals to become psychotic. The protocol involves the intentional creation of a severe, although brief, hypothyroid state. The following is a case of new-onset psychosis in a woman who underwent radioactive iodine treatment of thyroid follicular and papillary microcarcinoma.
"Ms. T" is a 39-year-old married woman who underwent a right hemithyroidectomy in October 2007 for follicular thyroid cancer. She then underwent a left thyroid lobectomy in March 2008 for thyroid papillary microcarcinoma. Levothyroxine was started after she was found to have an elevated thyroid-stimulating hormone postoperatively at 6.78 microunits/ml. Because of enlarged lymph nodes and suspected residual cancer cells, she received radioactive iodine treatment in May 2008. The next day she developed paranoid delusions that her home was bugged by various electrical devices. She thought her conversations were being recorded, and she insisted that her husband leave his cell phone and other electronic devices in his car. She developed ideas of reference that the headlines in magazines and newspapers were sending her personal messages. The patient had no prior psychiatric history and did not receive a psychiatric evaluation until November 2008, at which time she also had laboratory and imaging studies. Her thyroid-stimulating hormone level, free T4 level, electrolytes, complete blood count, toxicology screen, and brain magnetic resonance imaging were all normal. and brain magnetic resonance imaging were all normal.
At this point, Ms. T was given a diagnosis of radioactive iodine-induced psychotic disorder and was treated with risperidone, 0.5 mg at bedtime. At a follow-up appointment 1 week later, she reported being almost free of any paranoid thoughts or ideas of reference. She was tolerating the medication well, and her affect was much brighter and less guarded. The patient was without psychotic symptoms at a follow-up evaluation 4 months later while continuing to take risperidone.
Because of the immediate development of psychotic symptoms the day after radioactive iodine treatment, there is clearly a strong suggestion that psychosis in this patient was caused by radioactive iodine, especially since the patient had no history of mental illness. A MEDLINE search from 1966 to the present was performed using the search terms "radioactive iodine and thyroid and psychosis," "radioactive iodine and psychosis," "radioactive iodine and delusions," and "radioactive iodine and paranoia." Our search revealed only one case report of psychosis following treatment with radioactive iodine, which was from 1970 in the British Journal of Psychiatry. This case also described the abrupt onset of a toxic psychosis immediately following treatment with radioactive iodine (1).
The protocol for receiving radioactive iodine is that the patient is rendered hypothyroid for 3 weeks prior to iodine treatment (personal communication with D. Ross, M.D., March 2009). There are several cases describing the acute onset of psychosis as a result of hypothyroidism, but the rapidity of onset and the need for antipsychotic treatment in addition to normalization of thyroid status make the present case unique (2, 3).
1.Bethell MF: Toxic psychosis caused by radioactive iodine: Br J Psychiatry 1970; 117:473–4742.Davis AT: Psychotic states associated with disorders of thyroid function: Int J Psychiatry Med 1989; 19:47–563.Brewer C: Psychosis due to acute hypothyroidism during the administration of carbimazole: Br J Psychiatry 1969; 115:1181–1183
The author reports no competing interests.
This letter (doi: 10.1176/appi.ajp.2009.08121883) was accepted for publication in March 2009
Reprints are not available; however, Letters to the Editor can be downloaded at http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org.
|
<urn:uuid:2c8db7c7-b0c7-4fde-b29d-38170eaa39ff>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/article.aspx?articleID=101157
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701459211/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105059-00028-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.96361
| 806
| 1.640625
| 2
|
The concept of shared value – where business helps solve societal problems and increases profits at the same time – has been well received, but not by everyone. John Elkington, for example, is concerned that it elbows aside the sustainability agenda. I disagree with his concern, and believe we will embrace shared value as the vital and missing link between our current model of capitalism and a sustainable future.
Shared value is disruptive
Shared value is a disruptive concept because the pursuit of financial returns doesn’t always sit well with social value and community outcomes; it’s a bit like mixing oil with water.
Michael Porter and Mark Kramer gained traction with their Harvard paper entitled Creating Shared Value in 2011. They asserted that corporations can gain financial benefits from treating their stakeholders, such as suppliers, governments and communities, as partners instead of adversaries. In other words, manage your stakeholders well and the profits will follow.
In doing so, a business potentially mobilises all of its assets for social impact, compared to more prevalent corporate responsibility practices that are hamstrung by budget allocations.
John Elkington, who in 1994 coined the term “triple bottom line” as a way of more formally recognising the environmental and social impacts of business, has raised concerns about the apparent miracle cure that shared value represents. He is also worried that sustainability is being scooped up and dumped in “the bucket of history”.
Who is right and who is wrong? In the heat of the moment – and the disruption that comes with new ideas – it seems we have fallen into the trap of comparing apples with oranges.
|
<urn:uuid:1884d7d3-e35a-4105-b8e5-135d5097c798>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://philpreston.co/tag/shareholders/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00062-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.967081
| 329
| 2.09375
| 2
|
What is Home Rule and why should I care?
In a nutshell, the state Constitution was amended in 1902, 1912, and 1970 to allow cities and towns to become self-governing entities rather than requiring oversight by the state – that is the essence of being Home Rule. In the absence of home rule a city or town is known as a “statutory” city or town. State statutes dictate the operation and governance of statutory cities or towns. Home rule cities and towns are governed by a Charter created by and for the people of their city or town.
Is Home Rule good for Salida?
I’ll give you an economist’s answer…it depends. On the one hand there are some potentially positive aspects of home rule:
There are some aspects of home rule that would allow for decisions to be made more efficiently, with potentially less waste at no additional cost to city citizens. For example, when local sales taxes are collected by the Department of Revenue as is required for statutory cities like Salida, there is a one- to two-month delay between collection of those taxes from local vendors and reporting of the results and submitting funds back to the city. In the interim the state earns the interest on those funds (which is not too significant now with the low interest rates we’ve seen in recent years, but can be thousand of dollars per year when interest rates are in more normal historical ranges).
Perhaps less obvious is the difficulty in planning (like setting budget) when there is a significant lag in knowing how the local economy is doing. For example we typically don’t know the economic benefit of a large event in the city like FIBArk, a cycling event, or Art Walk until one to two months after the event has occurred. Home Rule municipalities are allowed (but not required) to self-collect taxes so economic performance is understood sooner and the city, rather than the state earns the interest on those funds.
Local control of local issues
Home rule places power to make decisions for items that are uniquely local in nature to local citizens and decision-makers. And that power, through the Charter, can be amended as changing needs warrant by a vote of the people, whereas citizens of statutory cities have little ability (I’ll go out on a limb and say no ability) to modify the state statutes that they are governed by.
One example of local control is the ability of the citizens to adopt differential tax rates. Home rule could allow what many cities across the country allow – a lower tax on groceries for example. Statutory cities do not have that option. But here, TABOR comes into play as well. Even if the city were to adopt Home Rule and propose to lower sales taxes on groceries, it would have to go to a public vote.
Arbitrary requirements in state statutes
You might recall the controversy surrounding the “2B” ballot measure a few years ago. In 2008 city voters approved a $4.83 tax (adjusted down to $2.50 by council) on a hotel room. Or was it? A room tax or lodging tax is a very common thing in cities/towns that have economies reliant on tourism. It turns out that what voters approved isn’t a tax on a hotel room but a tax on the owner of a hotel for every room that they rent out, i.e., it is a tax on the occupation of hotel/motel/hostel/vacation rental operator.
This kind of awkward language was required because of Salida’s status as a statutory city. Even though the outcome is exactly the same as if it were a tax on the room – that is $2.50 per room per night – the fact that it is called a lodgers tax (an Occupational Lodgers Tax really) implies that it is imposed on a profession rather than the nightly rental of a room. And that is what caused much of the controversy. As a home rule municipality, a simple tax on a room could have been implemented if approved by the voters.
Cities and towns that have adopted home rule seem to be satisfied with it.
There are close to 100 Home Rule municipalities in Colorado. More than 90% of the residents of Colorado live in home rule cities. Given that any Home Rule municipality can go back to being statutory at any time with a simple vote of the people, it is reassuring that no Home Rule municipality in Colorado has ever chosen to do so.
Taxes. What about taxes – everyone tells me that taxes will go up?
Both home rule and statutory cities must follow TABOR. Voters must approve all tax changes. Home rule municipalities have no additional power to tax.
And on the other hand there are some potentially negative aspects of home rule:
Statutory rules have served Salida reasonably well for more than 130 years. While home rule may offer some significant advantages, it is not likely to change the daily life of a typical resident. Our future will likely be bright whether we adopt home rule or not. The city will continue to function and the sky will remain above our heads.
Home rule is not free
While there is no reason to believe that home rule itself will make running government more costly, the process of moving to home rule – elections, voting machines, materials, legal fees, etc. is estimated to cost $30-$32k. If the city were to move to self-collection of taxes (not a requirement of home rule, but an option) we can expect to spend $10k to $25k upfront (legal fees associated with the ordinance to establish self-collection, training, software, vendor education and forms, etc.) and approximately $65k to $75k per year for additional salary and software costs. However, most municipalities that self-collect report that sales tax receipts increase due to the local oversight. For example, Salida’s 2011 sales tax revenue was nearly $3.7 million. A 1% increase amounts to $37,000 while a 5% increase would be more than $180,000 in revenue.
The Charter Commission could draft a charter that would not serve the needs of the citizens. This possibility exists, but citizens get to vote to adopt or reject it
As others have noted, it is possible to create a Home Rule Charter that exactly duplicates how the city operates today but codifies it into the Charter rather than state statutes. This is probably a good starting point. From there, figure out what works and what doesn’t and what might work a bit better with minor adjustment and write it into the Charter.
Home rule election process: Two elections, three questions
On Sept 18, 2012, City Council set in motion the process to investigate home rule. Council set the first of two elections to be held Jan.15, 2013. In that first election two questions will be asked of voters: First, shall the City of Salida form a Charter Commission to create a Home Rule Charter and second, which eleven citizens of the city serve as Commission members?
If the answer to the first question, Shall the city form a Charter Commission is “No,” then the issue is over and Home Rule is rejected. If the answer to the question is “Yes,” then the eleven citizens receiving the most votes will become the Charter Commission.
The Charter Commission will then have 30-180 days to create a Charter. All meetings of the Charter Commission must be open to the public. The City of Salida will provide resources requested by the Charter Commission including meeting space, materials and access to legal advice. When the Charter Commission is ready, they will present their proposed charter to the city. The city will have a reading of the Charter and publish the Charter in the Mountain Mail. The City Council will then call for an election to approve or reject the Charter within 30-185 days. At this point that election is projected to take place late summer 2013.
If voters approve the Charter, then Salida becomes a Home Rule city and the Charter is adopted. The charter would then replace state statutes in the areas the Charter specifically addresses. If voters reject the Charter, the Charter Commission will reconvene to rewrite the Charter following the rules and timelines above. If the Charter is rejected a second time, the home rule issue dies and the Charter Committee is dissolved.
So you’ve elected to investigate Home Rule and have elected a Charter Commission
What goes into the Charter?
The Charter is primarily a limiting document. Its goal is to state the basic structure and operational procedures of city government affairs. In areas where the charter is silent, state statutes apply. You can find many examples of home rule charters on the City of Salida website.
There are a few required elements of a charter: Prefatory synopsis, provisions regarding ordinances, and provisions regarding citizen-driven efforts.
The prefatory synopsis is essentially an executive summary of the Charter. Some charters have highlighted the differences between their city’s Charter and operation as a statutory city. Some have included the philosophy and guiding principles of the charter commission.
Continuing, Amending, or Repealing existing ordinances. The Charter lays out whether existing city ordinances will be continued (adopted as previously used as a statutory city), amended (with amendments stated in Charter), or repealed (either stated in Charter or directed to be done on adoption of home rule).
Initiative, Referendum and Recall Procedures. The Charter must spell out how citizen-initiated procedures are carried out.
In addition to Charter provisions that are specifically required, there are many other additions that the Charter Commission may wish to include:
Form of government.
Salida’s existing form of government is called a “weak mayor” system (no offense to Don or are many previous mayors!), but it could be changed if citizens desired to a strong mayor, council-manager, or other form.
Elected officials. How officials are elected, including length of terms, by ward or at large, etc.
Election procedures – adopting existing state election code, make minor changes, alter election dates, etc.
Ordinances and Resolutions – procedures to adopting each and notification requirements
Legal and Judicial (how city legal representation selected, etc.)
Budget (adopting, priorities, local preference, restrictions, etc.)
Operation of enterprise funds
And many more…
My take on home rule
I have attempted to provide a relatively brief and balanced synopsis of the home rule process. I am a member of City Council and I have participated in investigations into home rule in the past. Because of that, I know some citizens will think that I am biased.
My question is this: If there is a way for the governance of the city to be carried out in a more efficient manner that meets the needs of city residents and can adapt as those needs change, isn’t it worth investigating?
So, yes, I am biased. My bias is that I believe that democracy works. I firmly believe that a Commission of 11 thoughtful residents elected at large by Salida voters can create a Charter that serves us better today and in the future than a set of stagnant state statutes largely written in the early in the 1900s when Colorado was a significantly different place than it is today.
Some citizens have voiced the concern that they don’t trust city government and reject home rule based on that. I would point out that everything that the city does now is done under the statutory authority granted by the state. Ironically, home rule would potentially give those concerned about the actions of city government a means of addressing those actions.
I believe we should give the Charter Commission a chance to show us that there might be something better for Salida. If we like the Charter that they draft, fantastic! If not we move on a put an issue that has been discussed across the city for decades to rest.
If you find any evidence that Home Rule has not served any Colorado municipality well, please either post that information here for all to see or send it to me and I will ensure that it appears among other home rule documents on the city website.
|
<urn:uuid:90931c37-7587-459c-9929-f2d3bec12d20>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://salidacitizen.com/2012/11/councilman-stewart-explains-home-rule/comment-page-1/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706499548/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516121459-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.962625
| 2,489
| 3
| 3
|
Any long, narrow, sloping depression on land that had been shaped by flowing water. Streambeds can range in width from a few feet for a brook to several thousand feet for the largest rivers. The channel may or may not contain flowing water at any given time; some carry water only occasionally. Streambeds may be cut in bedrock or through sand, clay, silt, or other unconsolidated materials.
Learn more about streambed with a free trial on Britannica.com.
|
<urn:uuid:290047ac-4a8a-481a-9d70-5d1bdb7c30fa>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.reference.com/browse/streambed
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368701852492/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516105732-00013-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.948819
| 102
| 2.953125
| 3
|
26 November 2010
The government of Canada will not participate in events next year at the United Nations commemorating the controversial 2001 Durban declaration on racism. Canadian Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said the “government has lost faith in the Durban process. We will not be part of this event, which commemorates an agenda that promotes racism rather than combats it. Canada will not participate in this charade any longer. The government of Canada will not lend Canada's good name to the organized exercise in scapegoating the State of Israel] that is the Durban process."
Last week, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution to hold a one-day plenary in September 2011 to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the first Durban conference in 2001. Last year, nine governments including Canada, the United States, Australia, Israel, Germany and Britain boycotted the UN Durban Review Conference (nicknamed ‘Durban II’) because of fears Israel would again be singled out for criticism. Kenney claimed that those concerns were confirmed when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad used the conference as a platform to launch a vicious attack on Israel. The Iranian president’s speech sparked a temporary walkout by delegates of 23 Western states and overshadowed the core issue of rising racism, discrimination and xenophobia.
The Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC) welcomed the decision. CJC President Mark J. Freiman (pictured on the right) declared: "Both Durban I and II, ostensibly aimed at fighting racism, turned out be little more than concerted anti-Semitic charades that set back the real fight against racism and discrimination by decades. This UN process is fundamentally flawed and by now beyond repair. All that can be expected are attempts to build on the poisonous record and accordingly the process must be condemned without reservation.”
CJC Chief Executive Bernie M. Farber recalled that, "the Canadian Jewish delegation walked out of the initial Durban Conference in 2001. In 2009, Canada led the way by becoming the first country in the world to boycott this poisonous UN-sponsored sham. Today, we remain proud of our Governments' previous positions, and we are proud of this current position. Once again, Canada is taking the lead in refusing to dignify the travesty known as the UN World Conference Against Racism. We congratulate Minister Kenney on his unrelenting stand in the fight against anti-Semitism and all forms of hatred."
Opposition leader Michael Ignatieff of the Liberal Party gave his support to the government on this issue, calling the first Durban conference “a festival of racism against Israel and the Jewish people that Canada was right to condemn." He declared: "Sadly, while a decade has passed, the Durban conferences remain a staging ground for anti-Semitic and anti-Israel statements. Canada should absolutely not participate in the Durban III conference or countenance in any way these hateful views.”
We welcome any comments you may have on this article.
Comments are moderated and we reserve the right to edit or remove any which are derogatory or offensive.
The WJC is not responsible for the content of any comments.
There are no comments
Fill up the form above and be the first one
Subscribe to our newsletter.
|
<urn:uuid:ec91a04a-e1f3-49c8-ba9f-aacdf228f2d2>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.worldjewishcongress.org/en/news/9725/canada_announces_boycott_of_united_nations_durban_iii_charade_
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.941601
| 662
| 2.15625
| 2
|
On August 21, Australia voted the first Aboriginal representative in the lower House of Representatives in an election regarded widely as free and fair. Today, however, the ugly face of race in the lucky country has reacted by sending hate emails to Ken Wyatt whom the white electorate say they did not know was ‘black’ when they voted for him.
This comes barely half a year since an American expert Sol Trujilo raised a media storm when he called Australia “backward and “racist” in a BBC interview from his home base in San Diego. The Analyst this week attempts to see the Australian race issue in relation to the country’s ever increasing expert Australian population in Zambia. Could race soon become a factor in Zambia the way it almost became when white Zimbabwean farmers moved to Mkushi after Robert Mugabe redistributed land? This edition of the analyst will attempt to explore this issue in the footsteps of Sol.
Was Sol so right about ‘racist’ Australia?
When American citizen Sol Trujillo left Australia in May 2009, he described the country as “back-ward”“racist” in his first interview with the BBC as former CEO of the multi-billion dollar state-owned Telco, Telstra. and
The immediate reaction from supporters of the lucky state was that Sol was just a “bitter” Yankee who should have actually been grateful he stashed away millions of dollars working down-under as an expert.
His supporters, however, said Sol was so right because at one time or another or rather whenever things went wrong in the state Telco, he was either called a Yankee or Amigo, a direct derogatory assault on his Mexican-American descent which he had no problem with until he went down under seeking greener pastures.
Infact in an interview with the media, popular but short lived Star Prime Minister Kevin Rudd had two words for Sol as he packed his bags after a trying career as Telstra boss, “Adios Amigos,” which many thought was in bad taste especially coming from a national leader.
Today, however, Australia’s racialist history which it tries to hide so much to the outside world has come to haunt it yet again, exposing the half desert mineral rich country as the haven of all things racist and back-wardness perhaps only after apartheid South Africa.
After more than a centenary, Ken Wyatt, a 58 year old indigenous or put plainly, Aboriginal Australian won the seat of Hasluck in Western Australia (WA) for the conservative or white Liberal Party in an August 21 poll.
Some newspapers described Wyatt’s move to power as, “rising above childhood poverty to become the first indigenous person ever elected to the lower House of Representatives,” probably a good thing for Australia.
However, the ghost of Sol Trujilo who branded Australia as probably the worst racist country ever has risen again following threats from white supremacist voters who just can’t believe that they voted a ‘black’ into the “lower house” of representatives.
By August 21, Wyatt had already received a total of 50 hate racist emails telling him he would not have had a snow balls chance in hell at the polls had they known he was just an Aboriginal?
Having grown up in this same hostile racist environment and leaving under the shackles of race, Wyatt has responded by saying he will not be “perturbed” by the supremacists but continue working with those that support a society where one race is not more superior than the other, a commendable and gentlemanly response.
But just where will the racist buck stop on Australia’s inherently discriminatory tendencies?
Has Zambia which is currently “enjoying” substantial investment from the lucky country that is bringing in lots of “expert” workers to do electrician jobs etc got anything to worry about?
What signs should Zambians (the government and people) look out for and guard against to ensure that Australians whose racist history is a matter of public knowledge, debate and outrage are not exported to Zambia, especially in the booming resource sector, the main stay of Zambia’s economy?
In order to understand this, it is perhaps important to take a few steps backwards and look at Australia from their own prism—how they view themselves and “others” such as Zambians, Africans or indigenous people.
An article in the London-based The New African magazine in 2009 perhaps summed Australia’s “egalitarian” and “multi-cultural” society more succinctly than any other when it stated that the lucky country endowed with abundant wealth was still “struggling to find its feet” regarding the race issue.
This was shortly after Barak Obama, a son of a black father from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas had just been sworn in as America’s first black President, something that could have attracted hate emails in Huslack WA as in the August election of Wyatt.
Perhaps of special note was the articles reference to how the Australian government treated two near fatal accidents, one on the high seas involving black Australians (Torres Islanders) and an under-ground mine accident involving three white Australians, one of them died.
Anyhow, according to scanty newspaper reports the three blacks Dinghy ran out of gasoline on the high seas after heavy storms blew them several miles away from the shores but finally one of the several SOS text messages they had sent was picked by police.
They were safely air lifted to their home after a 22 day ordeal of hopelessness, fear and grave anguish having lost up to between 20 to 30 kgs each, barely alive.
During the same period in 2006, a rock fall resulted into three white Australians being trapped about a 1000 meters under-ground a faulty mine, one of them died.
What’s of interest though was that their rescue was covered blow by blow by all the national television channels and was of course concluded by a dinner at the Australian State House hosted by you guessed who, former Prime Minister John Howard.
He described the two whites as they wined and dined as epitomizing all the great stuff, character and courage that Australia represents and stand for but ofcourse no mention was made of the three black Australians that survived a 22 day ordeal on the sea without food or water.
A remote small newspaper according to a study done by an Australian university don once cited a police constable describing the survival of the three islanders as almost miraculous, “‘they’ are experienced sea people “these” people.”
Somehow they seem to have simply disappeared and melted back into “their” normal lives compared to the whites who got book and film deals and various accolades and perhaps got schools and roads named after them.
If this is not a typical case of Australia’s racial background—by the way studies show that most of the whites that cannot stand living side by side with blacks in South Africa and Zimbabwe migrate to Australia—perhaps a study done by three other Australian professors can help shade light on this.
In a paper entitled Imagining Australia: Australian National Identity Macgregor Duncan, Andrew Leigh, David Madden and Peter Tynan state that Australia has always had “a preference for an Anglo-Australia with its attendant discrimination against indigenous peoples and non-Anglo immigrants”.
If this is not enough to alarm any responsible government as Australia and other foreign countries head for Zambia, then what would it take before measures to ensure racial tensions especially at places of work do not start simmering, especially as reports abound that Zambians with higher graduate and post graduate educations are forced to work under lower conditions than for instance the Australian counter-parts?
Of course “token” Zambians are often put into place in one or three menial managerial positions or even director but out of say 10 managerial positions seven would be Australian or Canadian while the remaining three lesser managerial positions would go to Zambians, often more qualified than their fellow foreign managers and paid less of course.
One surprising thing is that the same Zambians would never be given jobs as mere clerks in some of these foreign countries that send “clerks” sometimes with piano playing qualifications to become managers here.
Jobs like business, finance and other technical jobs are almost exclusively for foreigners, how the government through the department of immigration over looks this just beats lots of critics of the porous Zambian system of allowing foreign “experts.”
Take Australian millionaire Dick Smith’s racially charged media out bursts in August 2010 for instance. He charged that immigrants—he didn’t specify the race—are going to deplete natural resources of Australia such as water so therefore they must be barred from entering the country.
Smith is probably the proverbial fool whom in the abundance of water dies of thirst but just the sheer race attitude a million like him is allowed to air on national television like ABC is intolerable especially when he has the facts wrong.
One analyst asked when this issue was raised, “Why can’t we emulate countries like Botswana which dictate that the majority positions of managers be held by Mutswana’s and the rest be advertised locally and internationally? Why should we let foreigners dictate terms to us in our land when they should be equal partners, they invest the money, we own the wealth, everybody is happy.”
The unpopular argument, the one the government glosses over and the one the so called investors hate to acknowledge is that as the discontentment increases in these companies, productivity will fall, which hunts shall increase and eventually a total collapse of systems.
The Zambian government on its part has a responsibility to read the signs early and nip the problem in the bud rather than wait for the goodwill it has created to be taken for granted by so called foreign investors who are creating jobs more for their people and the leaner ones for Zambians.
A typical example of a time bomb waiting to explode is where a Zambian professional with a university degree can earn as little as the equivalent of $US1, 500 compared to a foreign colleague with piano credentials earning treble the amount.
In fact, trade union movement leaders and their members feel this is likely to be a campaign issue as the country draws nearer to the polls in just under a year.
Unfortunately, those companies that do not take corrective measures now are likely to get burnt and have their investment scuttled while those that chose to practice equality now can survive.
It is like Steve Bantu Biko said regarding the disparity between whites in apartheid South Africa and their exclusive system deliberately designed to deny blacks privileges on colour grounds, “You cannot have one percent of the population get the best land live in the best houses while the majority suffer…when we are in the west, we confirm to western values, conversely whites should confirm to African terms after apartheid ends.”
This warning must find a home in the board rooms of all foreign companies in Zambia who want to import their racial histories in a modern democratic Zambia that has welcomed them with open arms and offered them the best terms ever.
|
<urn:uuid:2124c8ae-fe43-4e0d-b1ce-8736f74060ba>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.zambianwatchdog.com/?p=8621
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368698924319/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516100844-00060-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.974107
| 2,304
| 1.695313
| 2
|
Mont Ida Elementary School is located in Welda, KS and is one of 6 schools in Garnett School District. It is a public school that serves 23 students in grades 1-8.
Mont Ida Elementary School made AYP in 2009. Under No Child Left Behind, a school makes Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) if it achieves the minimum levels of improvement determined by the state of Kansas in terms of student performance and other accountability measures. See Mont Ida Elementary School's test results to learn more about school performance.
Student Economic Level (2011)
In 2011, Mont Ida Elementary School had 26% of students eligible for free or reduced price lunch programs. Kansas had 47% of eligible students for free or reduced price lunch programs. Eligibility for the National School Lunch Program is based on family income levels.
The Garnett spends $10,038 per pupil in current expenditures. The district spends 63% on instruction, 32% on support services, 5% on other elementary and secondary expenditures. More about Garnett District
In 2011, Mont Ida Elementary School had 11 students for every full-time equivalent teacher. The Kansas average is 14 students per full-time equivalent teacher.
|
<urn:uuid:ceff8522-80a7-40a5-a00b-71875d260cb8>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.education.com/schoolfinder/us/kansas/welda/mont-ida-elementary/?page=test-scores
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706890813/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516122130-00072-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.949839
| 248
| 2.5
| 2
|
It’s high season in the nation’s national parks as millions of visitors come to see nature. If last year’s visitor figures hold up — and early indications suggest they will — nine million visitors will see the Great Smoky Mountains, the most visited national park. Three other parks — Grand Canyon (more than four million visitors in 2011) Yellowstone (about three million) and Acadia (more than two million) — combined will attract roughly the same number.
Yet many visitors are likely to find their view of the natural landscapes softened, if not significantly obscured, by haze or smog from civilization.
An amendment to the Clean Air Act passed 35 years ago was designed to ensure that when visitors get to their destinations, they will be able to see the parks’ vistas.
For the better part of those years, there has been a tug of war between the owners of manufacturing concerns — particularly coal-fired power-plants — and the Environmental Protection Agency over how far the agency can go in requiring plants to cut down on three pollutants linked to haze: fine particles, which blur the air on their own, and sulfur dioxide and oxides of nitrogen, which break down into other smog-producing chemicals with the sun’s help.
The 1977 law, and a rule that followed it in 1999, are intended to protect visibility in 156 national parks and wilderness areas. The most recent survey of air quality in the parks showed that visibility was stable or improving in the vast majority of them. But it noted that if a place with bad visibility remains stable, that is not particularly good news.
Now, working to avoid legal sanctions for excessive delays, the E.P.A. says it has approved 11 state cleanup plans and provisionally approved another 11 with small modifications that do not impose new requirements. It has also proposed to approve eight more state plans.
In Colorado, the local power company, Xcel Energy and environmental groups like the Environmental Defense Fund worked together to produce a plan that met with the E.P.A.’s approval. When that was announced, the state’s congressional delegation gave an unusual bipartisan backslap to all.
But the agency’s proposals to toughen some of the requirements on power plants in the remaining 20 states have created a buzzsaw of opposition in places like Oklahoma, North Dakota and, most recently, Arizona.
Those states are fighting back, arguing that the Obama administration should not be imposing major cleanup costs on electric generating companies when the overall economy is struggling and that the requirements could cause plant closings and eliminate jobs.
Arizona’s plan was partly rejected on July 3. The E.P.A. called for the installation of new high-end equipment to control the release of oxides of nitrogen from three large power plants: Cholla, Coronado and Apache.
The agency said its proposal was intended to reduce nitrogen oxide emissions by 7,800 tons a year at Cholla, 4,700 tons a year at the Apache Generating Station and 4,500 tons a year at the Coronado Generating Station. “This proposal will make scenic vistas clearer while cleaning the air that Arizonans breathe,” the E.P.A.’s regional administrator for the Pacific Southwest, Jared Blumenfeld, said in a statement.
In an e-mail, an agency spokeswoman, Enesta Jones, said the three plants “affect visibility at 18 national parks and wilderness areas, including the Grand Canyon, Mesa Verde and the Petrified Forest.”
Some of the plants are more than 100 miles from the parks involved, but with the right meteorological conditions in in the flat, dry landscape, a stream of smoke from the Cholla plant can be seen for many miles along Interstate 40.
But Henry Darwin, director of that state’s department of environmental quality, said the E.P.A.’s requirements for the installation of six new pollution-control devices using selective catalytic reduction at the three plants were unnecessary.
He said the resulting difference in haze at the Grand Canyon would not be discernible and that the agency’s methods for drafting the requirements failed to include state officials in the process, allowing them only to comment after the fact.
In an interview, he argued that the addition of the devices, which cost tens of millions of dollars apiece, would cause the cost of electricity will go up as well as the cost of water, which is moved throughout the state’s elaborate plumbing system with electrical power. “I think they had a predetermined policy” of requiring the advanced technology, no matter the cost, Mr. Darwin asserted.
The Navajo Generating Station on the Navajo Nation’s reservation was not addressed in the recent E.P.A. ruling. Yet many expect that the agency will impose similar requirements on that plant, jeopardizing its continued operation and risking the jobs of Native Americans working there.
The columnist George F. Will entered the fray last week, echoing arguments made by some Congressional Republicans in hearings that jobs are being sacrificed for imperceptible improvements in visibility.
Opening a hearing last month, Representative James Lankford of Oklahoma, the chairman of a subcommittee of the House Government Oversight and Accountability Committee, said: “E.P.A. is attempting to federalize the program and imposing costs well beyond what the state had determined was necessary or justified. Ultimately, E.P.A.’s proposal will costs billions of dollars for visibility improvements that are undetectable to the human eye.”
E. Scott Pruitt, Oklahoma’s attorney general, charged in subsequent testimony that “with the backing of the Obama administration, the E.P.A. is engaging in super-legislative activity that Congress has not authorized, resulting in unchecked rule-making.”
Shortly thereafter, Mr. Pruitt was challenged by Robert V. Percival, who directs the environmental law program at the University of Maryland’s law school. “There has not been any change in E.P.A. that has in any way cut out the public from the process,” he said.
|
<urn:uuid:0da9ef11-d92b-4749-ae11-ed8148754873>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/12/de-hazing-the-lazy-days-of-summer/?ref=republicanparty
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703682988/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112802-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.949823
| 1,275
| 2.875
| 3
|
Jewish World Review April 15, 2002 /4 Iyar, 5762
http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | If the definition of madness is doing the same thing over and over while expecting a different result, Secretary of State Powell's mission to the Middle East is crazy. "However long the Israeli incursions continue," he said on Thursday, "the problem will still be there. We will still need to go to a negotiating process that will lead to peace."
Even for Powell, with his long history of strategic misjudgments, this is insane.
How can Powell still imagine that a "negotiating process" with Yasser Arafat can ever lead to peace? For Arafat and his Palestinian Authority, negotiations are a tool of war -- a mechanism for harvesting their gains from terror and violence. They don't seek negotiations in order to stop the killing, they kill in order to make their negotiations more fruitful. After eight years of a "peace process" that has slaughtered more Israelis than the 1967 war did, it should be clear even to Powell that negotiating with Arafat leads only to bloodshed.
And forcing Israel to back away from its current war will lead only to bloodshed, too. Last Tuesday, yielding to Bush administration pressure, Israel pulled its troops out of the West Bank cities of Tulkarm and Qalqilya. Forty-eight hours later, eight Israelis were murdered and 22 were wounded when a suicide bomber exploded a bus near Haifa. The terrorist had entered Israel by way of -- Tulkarm.
Powell is not alone, of course, in demanding an Israeli pullback. "The whole world is demanding that Israel withdraw," lectures Kofi Annan, the UN secretary general. "I don't think the whole world, including the friends of the Israeli people and government, can be wrong."
But the whole world can be wrong. It was wrong in 1981, when Israel bombed Saddam Hussein's nuclear-weapons reactor in Osirak. The death toll Israel prevented with that daring mission is incalculable, yet the unanimous reaction was one of outrage and scorn.
Well, this is another Osirak moment. Far from being an impediment to the war against international terrorism, the battle in the West Bank is a frontline in that war. Unless Israel demolishes Arafat's mass-murder machine, unless his hellish "martyrdom" cult is shut down, it will only be a matter of time before suicide bombers are detonating themselves in the markets and cafes of the West.
The United States did not spend eight years negotiating with Mullah Omar and the Taliban. President Bush gave them one chance to cooperate and hand over Osama bin Laden; when they refused, they were destroyed. Arafat and his lieutenants, by contrast, have been given chance after chance to prove their peaceful bona fides. What they have proven instead is that they are liars and conscienceless killers. If America after Sept. 11 had the right to obliterate the Taliban, Israel has the right to obliterate the Palestinian Authority.
The history of this conflict is long and complicated, but its moral dimensions now are clear-cut.
One side sends its soldiers to wipe out suicide bombers. The other side sends suicide bombers to wipe out diners at a Passover seder. One side publishes maps showing how Israel and a Palestinian state can coexist. The other side publishes maps on which Israel doesn't exist.
One side apologizes when its explosives kill the wives and children of the terrorists it targeted. The other side targets wives and children.
One side was grief-stricken on Sept. 11 and declared a national day of mourning. The other side danced in the streets and distributed candies in celebration.
One side has never deployed a suicide bomber in its 54 years of existence. The other side has deployed more than 40 in the past 12 months alone.
One side developed a mandatory "peace curriculum" to prepare its children to live in peace next to a Palestinian state. The other side steeps its children in hate, extolling suicide bombers as "martyrs" they should emulate and operating summer camps to train them for jihad.
One side is an unshakable ally of the United States and fully backs our war against global terrorism. The other side is armed and financed by Iraq, Iran, and Syria, three of the world's most notorious terrorist states.
One side repeatedly gave up land for peace. The other side took the land and made war.
This is not the time for peace missions and negotiations. The way
to end the war in the West Bank is not to make Israel retreat but to let
it fight its way to a decisive victory. The "peace process" was the
cause of this war; now it will take a war to bring peace. Israel should
be encouraged to crush the Palestinians' terrorist network, destroy the
Palestinian Authority, demilitarize the territories, and banish Arafat
forever. Only then will the Palestinians be free. And only then will
it be possible for them to detoxify their poisoned society, choose
decent and responsible leaders, and join with Israel in crafting, at
long last, a genuine and lasting peace.
04/12/02: The slavery reparations hustle
|
<urn:uuid:34c98119-6e6c-4d3f-978c-2ce74ebcc988>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://jewishworldreview.com/jeff/jacoby041502.asp
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.953226
| 1,086
| 1.710938
| 2
|
Cruising with Lazarus
Why Do We Tolerate People Who Are HIV Positive and Spreading the Disease?
"We have all these programs and HIV prevention people are scratching their heads saying, 'How can we help people with HIV?' When it is all said and done it's up to the community to say, 'we just don't want HIV to spread.'" So says Thomas J. Coates, Ph.D., Professor of Medicine, Epidemiology, and Biostatistics and Director of the Center for AIDS Prevention Studies (CAPS). For the past 17 years, Dr. Coates has worked to keep the AIDS research agenda relevant as the epidemic unfolds. The National Institutes of Health, Family Health International's USAID-sponsored AIDS prevention project, the World Health Organization, and the U.S. Congress seek his advice on AIDS research.
Coates is a respectable, quotable dude who's been trying to draw attention to the fact that HIV infections have been steadily rising among gay and bisexual men across the country for the past several years. Last spring, at a University of California HIV forum in San Francisco, a frustrated Coates admonished the gay community to change its attitudes toward the disease and toward people who are HIV positive. "We are so used to thinking of HIV-positive people as victims, we are afraid to think of an HIV-positive person as responsible," said Coates, who is HIV-positive. "Why do we tolerate people who are HIV positive and spreading the disease?"
The gay community has never really wanted to address that last question. In order to have a discussion about why we tolerate HIV-positive gay and bisexual men who knowingly spread the virus, we'd have to talk about accountability and responsibility -- two words that imply our behaviors actually have ramifications.
God forbid that sexually active gay and bisexual men should take a hard, objective look at our behaviors. That wouldn't be nearly as much fun as a circuit party, a night at the bathhouse, or having your best gay buds over to watch the latest episode of "Queer as Folk." Nope, I'm afraid that when it comes to HIV prevention many gay and bisexual men have given up, stopped caring or quit listening.
It's now been twenty-one years since HIV reared its complex, virulent head. In the early days of the epidemic, the gay community rallied. We took this virus seriously at a time when the doddering occupant of the White House conspicuously failed to mention AIDS in public. We protested when the nation's news media attempted to fan the flames of hysteria with superficial reporting. We acted up when our so-called religious leaders claimed AIDS was God's wrath upon wicked homosexuals. We demanded that the medical community treat us, funeral homes respectfully bury our dead and that America stop blaming us for this damn virus.
But perhaps the most important thing we did was talk about prevention and sexual choices, and this led to safer sex messages. Still, as someone who lived through the crisis and chaos of the 1980s, I sincerely believe that sheer, unmitigated fear is the only thing that made HIV prevention work in the first place. Fear, after all, is a reliable motivator. Faced with unrelenting disease and death, gay men developed and adopted safer sexual practices resulting in a steady decline in infections. Today, however, most prevention specialists agree that yesterday's fear has dissipated and the urgency surrounding HIV decreased substantially after 1996 when AIDS drugs began to make a difference in both treatment and ultimately the way many view HIV disease.
Now, our past prevention success is increasingly undermined by three things -- a government determined to eradicate explicit prevention programs and impose unrealistic, sex-negative, pro-abstinence nonsense upon the American public; pharmaceutical companies promoting AIDS drugs through glossy and calculatedly deceitful advertising erroneously depicting HIV disease as more of a nuisance than the incurable, chronic, fatal condition it really is; and an insidious, growing apathy about HIV among gay men.
It's easy to blame the usual suspects -- sexphobic government bureaucrats and profit-motivated pharmaceutical executives -- but it's the gay community's own ambivalence and indifference that's most shocking.
HIV prevention educators are telling us they've hit a wall and safer sex messages from the 1980s, tweaked for the '90s, no longer have much effect on gay and bisexual men. Worse, young, homosexually active black men who don't identify as gay or bisexual ("on the down low") are not listening to prevention messages they perceive to be designed for white gay men -- a tragic situation resulting in the grim prediction that, without intervention, one in three black men will be infected by age 29.
So what needs to happen? First, let's just admit that the original HIV prevention and education model is outdated. That model generates a specific type of prevention intervention, "information messages," which have been the core of prevention work since the mid 1980s. What's now clear is that information is necessary, but not sufficient to change sexual risk behavior. HIV transmission isn't caused by people not knowing how to use a condom; believe me, I can show a gay or bisexual guy how to do it once and he'll get it. Nope, HIV transmission among gay or bisexual men is caused by all kinds of emotional motivations that influence sexual decision-making -- things like depression ("Why should I bother with condoms; I just don't care anymore."), and grief or guilt ("My friends are already infected and my lover is dead; I might as well join them.")
Let's acknowledge a few facts: sometimes a lack of self-assertiveness or low self-esteem creates sexual risk ("I really wanted to be with him, but he refused to wear a condom, so I just gave in and let him have his way."); for lonely gay men who may lack intimacy in their lives, sex may be a quick fix they'll take any way they can, safe or not; and we can't ignore the dizziness and denial that allows some gay men to proclaim, "I've been having unsafe sex for years and I'm still negative -- I must be immune!" No, honey, you're just lucky, and if you say that one more time out loud I'm going to personally shake the snot out of you.
In other words, gay and bisexual men lead complicated lives and their sexual choices are extremely personal and complex; that's why well-meaning, fear-based, but ultimately simpleminded information messages like "Wear a Condom Every Time" have now entered the Dead Catch Phrase Hall of Fame along with "Whoomp! There it is," "Well, isn't that special" and "Have a nice day."
It's time for gay and AIDS service organizations to shift away from basic latex condom education to a more comprehensive sexual education approach for gay and bisexual men as well as men of color who have sex with men but reject those labels. Furthermore, we need to look at the totality of gay and bisexual men's health, from fitness to substance abuse and mental health. If we take a look at the broader health and wellness issues for gay and bisexual men it should help reduce the number of new HIV infections.
Since it's evident that prevention methods are failing, maybe we should be asking twentysomething gay and bisexual men, "Why aren't you afraid of HIV?" If we don't start that dialogue, young gay men will likely conclude, if they haven't already, that the epidemic is over and all HIV infection means is that you start taking pills. If we don't tell them about drug resistance, side effects and the inevitable health problems created by the drugs themselves, who will? It won't be those homophobic politicians we love to hate. We may be tired and burned out, but those of us who have been dealing with safer sex and no cure for 15 or 20 years still have some work to do. To leave any of this up to the government is going to spell genocide for gay men, who remain the population most likely to get infected by HIV in the United States.
Now let's return to the question posed by Tom Coates of the Center for AIDS Prevention Studies: "Why do we tolerate people who are HIV-positive and spreading the disease?" Well, now that's a brainteaser. The gay community doesn't seem to have a problem speaking out about most things we find wrong or morally reprehensible, like that whole "gays in the military" thing, or the ban on gay marriages, or the vicious beating and death of Matthew Shepard. It's only fair to let gays serve in the military if they can pass rigorous training and wish to defend our country the institution of marriage has certainly survived all these thousands of years despite the fact that 50% of their marriages end in divorce, so it's hard to imagine gays making Holy Matrimony any worse and wouldn't any decent individual, gay or straight, be able to see that there is no justification whatsoever for two straight men beating another man to death just because he's gay?
So then, why do we tolerate HIV-positive gay and bisexual men who willingly and knowingly spread HIV? Well, I think maybe it's because the gay community is way better at evaluating and judging the behaviors and character flaws of straight politicians, religious leaders, and obnoxious talk show hosts like Dr. Laura. When it comes to critiquing ourselves it's usually a bunch of whining about how Rosie O'Donnell should have come out of the closet sooner or the nasty stigmatization of those gay boys who belong to the Log Cabin Republicans. I really don't understand how Rosie and a bunch of gay Republicans can generate more animosity than irresponsible gay creeps who lie to their sexual partners about being HIV-positive or just let them assume they're HIV-negative so that sex will happen.
It's also pretty callous of us to shrug off the new infections by suggesting that the newly infected should have "been more careful" or "ought to know better by now." This is the equivalent of telling rape victims they deserve their fate for wearing a tube top or walking on a bad street. I'm of the opinion that if you aren't willing to disclose that you're positive to potential sexual partners, or you lie about it, or you bareback someone because they trusted you and conveniently failed to ask your status, then you're nothing more than a sexual terrorist and I hope you get caught, confronted, fined ridiculous sums of money, jailed, chemically or surgically castrated, released back into society but forced to register as a sex offender wherever you live.
So much for my politically incorrect opinion; Tom Coates has a more scholarly approach. "Gay liberation is about sexual freedom and HIV prevention is about restraint," says Coates. "Until HIV is eradicated in our community, gay liberation cannot reach its potential. HIV will sap the longevity of the community. We need to ask, 'Does the community as a whole want this to happen?' Prevention has got to go back to the community. The community has got to say it is not okay to spread HIV," he says. "Until that is done, nothing is going to change."
Got a comment? Write to David at email@example.com.
This article was provided by AIDS Survival Project. It is a part of the publication Survival News.
|
<urn:uuid:31a57f1b-0b05-4441-9781-9fd23645f772>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.thebody.com/content/art32387.html?nxtprv
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00027-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.966918
| 2,312
| 2.328125
| 2
|
Fretfulness of temper will generally characterize those who are negligent of order.
Compassion is an emotion of which we ought never to be ashamed. Graceful, particularly in youth, is the tear of sympathy, and the heart that melts at the tale of woe. We should not permit ease and indulgence to contract our affections, and wrap us up in a selfish enjoyment; but we should accustom ourselves to think of the distresses of human, life, of the solitary cottage; the dying parent, and the weeping orphan. Nor ought we ever to sport with pain and distress in any of our amusements, or treat even the meanest insect with wanton cruelty.
Worry not about the possible troubles of the future; for if they come, you are but anticipating and adding to their weight; and if they do not come, your worry is useless; and in either case it is weak and in vain, and a distrust of God's providence.
Worry not about the possible troubles of the future; for if they come, you are but anticipating and adding to their weight; and if they do not come, your worry is useless; and in either case it is weak and in vain, and a distrust of God's providence
People first abandon reason, and then become obstinate; and the deeper they are in error the more angry they are.
Gentleness corrects whatever is offensive in our manner.
Nothing, except what flows from the heart, can render even external manners truly pleasing.
Pride makes us esteem ourselves; vanity makes us desire the esteem of others.
Only mediocrity of enjoyment is allowed to man.
Exercise is the chief source of improvement in our faculties.
The spirit of true religion breathes gentleness and affability; it gives a native, unaffected ease to the behavior; it is social, kind, cheerful; far removed from the cloudy and illiberal disposition which clouds the brow, sharpens the temper, and dejects the spirit.
Embellish truth only with a view to gain it the more full and free admission into your hearer's minds; and your ornaments will, in that case, be simple, masculine, natural.
In the eye of that Supreme Being to whom our whole internal frame is uncovered, dispositions hold the place of actions.
The great standard of literature as to purity and exactness of style is the Bible.
Idleness is the great corrupter of youth, and the bane and dishonor of middle age. He who, in the prime of life, finds time to hang heavy on his hands, may with much reason suspect that he has not consulted the duties which the consideration of his age imposed upon him; assuredly he has not consulted his happiness.
|
<urn:uuid:0a91a72a-172f-4cca-9dec-6f89d1938061>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.finestquotes.com/author_quotes-author-Hugh+Blair-page-0.htm
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368703298047/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516112138-00033-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.950764
| 570
| 2.265625
| 2
|
William to appease Argentina with Nazi uniform
PRINCE William is to ease the growing tension with Argentina by borrowing his brother’s SS uniform.
As he embarks on a tour of duty in the Falklands, the Prince will offer the hand of friendship to Buenos Aries by piloting his large helicopter while wearing one of his family’s swastika armbands.
The Ministry of Defence said the Prince was ‘very keen’ to play a diplomatic role by emphasising Argentina and the Royal Family’s shared love of all things German.
A spokesman said: “If the Prince encounters any Argentine vessels while on patrol he will hover close to them, shout ‘ich liebe Frau Kirchner’ and then sing the Horst Wessel Song.”
The Prince has borrowed the 12th Waffen SS Panzer Division uniform from his brother Harry who borrowed it from his grandfather who borrowed it from Adolf Eichmann.
Military historian, Denys Finch-Hatton, said: “It was one of Eichmann’s prized possessions and he would not have fled Germany without it. In a way it’s like it’s coming home.”
The move was welcomed in Argentina where many families still have fond memories of the SS.
Diego Boorman, from San Fernando, said: “It would be a shame to go to war with the British as I feel a tremendous kinship with Prince William. Our great-great uncles were very close ‘chums’.
“Indeed, I have a letter from King Edward to my Uncle Martin inviting him to Balmoral for a murder mystery weekend.”
The government hopes to build on the Prince’s mission by sending the Duchess of Cambridge to Buenos Aires wearing a lovely hat in the shape of Osvaldo Ardiles.
|
<urn:uuid:c23e9b4e-47e8-4996-a1b8-8af31c4f4025>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/international/william-to-appease-argentina-with-nazi-uniform-201202034853
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00006-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.955748
| 389
| 1.632813
| 2
|
Kennesaw has a general population of 21,675 and an overall student population of 23,051. Approximately 22,389 of Kennesaw's students are enrolled in schools that offer business programs.
Kennesaw's largest business school is Kennesaw State University. In 2010, Kennesaw State University graduated approximately 561 students from its business program.
A reported 1,198 students graduated with credentials in business in Kennesaw in 2010. If you decide to join their ranks, you can expect to pay an average of $18,553 per year in tuition if you are eligible for instate tuition. Out of state tuition for all Kennesaw business schools was an average of $27,245 per year in 2009.
In addition to tuition costs, you should plan on spending an average of $1,250 for books and supplies each year, while enrolled in a business program in Kennesaw. And if you live on campus, you will face an additional expense of $8,017 per year, on average, for room and board at Kennesaw-based business schools. Students who live at home can cut this cost down to approximately $0.
If you decide to work as a business professional in Kennesaw, your job prospects are not very good. In 2010, of the 82,870 business professionals in Georgia, 49,130 were working in the greater Kennesaw area. The number of business professionals in Kennesaw is expected to increase by 4% by the year 2018. This projected change is faster than the projected nationwide trend for business professionals.
|
<urn:uuid:5dcecdd2-707a-4aa4-9217-8bfb6291f72f>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.hackcollege.com/school-finder/schools/georgia/kennesaw/business/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696381249/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092621-00009-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.967269
| 323
| 1.679688
| 2
|
A medical team at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec recently administered anesthesia to a patient, which normally wouldn't be a remarkable accomplishment - except that this patient was receiving surgery in Pisa, Italy, thousands of miles away.
The team used video conferencing to complete a medical first: remote anesthesia administration. Anesthesia is one of the most difficult and risky aspects of surgery because a complex group of drugs and machines must interact perfectly to keep a person unconscious and immobilized, yet still alive. A single misstep can spell death for a patient.
Dr. Thomas Hemmerling and his team from McGill's anesthesia department treated patients undergoing thyroid gland surgery in Italy by rendering them unconscious remotely from a control room in Montreal.
"The practice has obvious applications in countries with a significant number of people living in remote areas, like Canada, where specialists may not be available on site," Hemmerling told Postmedia News. The technology could also aid military operations and developing countries, such as Rwanda, which has only 10 anesthesiologists serving the entire nation.
The process, which has been dubbed "teleanesthesia," is still in its infancy.
"This is just a proof of concept," Hemmerling said. "The second step is to standardize all the different parts of what we are doing, lighting, camera placement, to compare the performance of remote anesthesia to local anesthesia."
|
<urn:uuid:bd779f59-ad67-41b3-a48a-40643970b19e>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.megameeting.com/news/canadian-medical-team-pioneers-anesthesia-administration-vi-19939516.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368710006682/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516131326-00020-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.966315
| 281
| 3.0625
| 3
|
Diocese unmoved by letter on gays
By Steven G. Vegh
©Copyright 1997 Guy Gannett Communications
If the law endorses sexual activity, ''the church is very much opposed,'' Mutty said.
The Diocese of Portland will not endorse Maine's gay-rights law, despite the declaration by U.S. Roman Catholic bishops that the Church accepts gays and lesbians regardless of their homosexuality.
Marc Mutty, a spokesman for the diocese, said Wednesday that the bishops' open letter had no bearing on the top question the diocese has posed concerning the Maine law: Does the gay-rights law address only homosexuals' sexual orientation, or does it also affirm same-gender sexual activity?
Maine's gay-rights law was approved by the Legislature and signed by the governor last spring. But conservative Christian groups want to overturn the law and are seeking a statewide referendum. The secretary of state's office is checking petition signatures gathered by those groups; if there are enough signatures, a referendum will be held this winter.
The diocese is officially neutral on whether the referendum should be supported or opposed. But some Catholics, such as Anne Underwood of Topsham, say the bishops' letter justifies a diocesan shift in favor of gay rights.
''It's important to consider this an issue of social justice, not sexuality,'' said Underwood, who is not gay. She serves on the Diocesan Public Policy Committee, which advises the diocese on public policy. Underwood stressed she was not commenting on behalf of the committee.
Mutty said the bishops' letter also will not alter diocesan attitudes toward gays and lesbians because the Church in Maine has for years told parishioners that being homosexual is not incompatible with being a good Catholic. ''This is not an earth-shattering, historic document,'' he said of the bishops' letter.
The letter by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Marriage and Family tells Catholics, and particularly those with gay children, that homosexuals ''must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity.''
The committee said ''multiple factors'' seem to account for a homosexual orientation.
''Generally, homosexual orientation is experienced as a given, not as something freely chosen. By itself, therefore, a homosexual orientation cannot be considered sinful, for morality presumes the freedom to choose,'' the committee stated.
The letter urged parents to accept, support and maintain a relationship with sons and daughters who are gays and lesbians.
Portland's Karen Geraghty predicted that the bishops' theme would be a comfort to many Catholic parents, including her own.
Now a Portland city councilor, Geraghty was raised in a Catholic family and attended parochial school through high school. She left the church 10 years ago because she saw it as unwelcoming to women and homosexuals; she is a lesbian.
Nonetheless, ''my folks still go to church, and struggle with how to be a good parent and good church member'' as parents of a lesbian daughter, Geraghty said. ''I was pleased by the letter, and it will help my folks.''
Bath's Vincent and Elizabeth Messler said they've always accepted their daughter's homosexuality. But the bishops' letter was a relief anyway.
''Finally, we have some kind of recognition,'' Elizabeth said.
Told that Maine's diocese already formally affirms gay church members, Vincent Messler said dubiously, ''The diocese having felt this way is the best-kept secret I've ever heard.'' He said homosexuals have not typically been made to feel welcome in Catholic churches.
Rosemary Ananis said her family long ago accepted her homosexuality, and has approved of her marriage-like relationship with another woman.
Ananis is both a member of St. Mary's Church in Wells, and president of Dignity Maine. The group is the local affiliate of Dignity USA, which advocates for Catholic lesbians and gays.
Ananis said the bishops should have gone further and endorsed monogamous gay relationships as a proper setting for gays' sexual activity.
''My sense is, the church thinks gays and lesbians just want to run around having sex everywhere,'' Ananis said. ''Dignity says sexual activity is a normal part of who we are, and is OK when it takes place in a loving, committed monogamous union, and is certainly within Christ's teaching.''
Mutty said the church's opposition to gay and lesbian sexual activity is centered not on homosexuality, but on its definition of where such activity is appropriate.
The appropriate setting, he said, is marriage between a man and woman, with that union open to the possibility of child. Sexual activity outside of marriage, whether homosexual or heterosexual, is not acceptable.
Mutty acknowledged that the church's distinction between accepting a homosexual orientation and disapproving of homosexual sex is hard for the public to grasp.
''The distinction is critically important to the church, but nobody else,'' he said. ''To expect a person who is homosexual not to act on that sexuality is absurd to some people.''
Mutty said Maine's gay-rights law, and its legislative sponsors, are ambiguous about whether the law affirms sexual orientation, or gay sexual activity that is unacceptable to the church.
But Underwood said the statement by the bishops that homosexuals' fundamental human rights must be respected should point Maine's diocese toward opposing the anti-gay-rights referendum. ''Given that one line, how can we maintain neutrality?'' she said.
Mutty said the letter gives no such prompting. ''I don't see this as justification for changing our stand in any way,'' he said.
The Portland Press Herald Home Page
The Maine GayNet Archive
|
<urn:uuid:e3e99331-2d6b-4556-bd1f-379d109895d5>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://people.maine.com/paula/pph/pph-10.3.97.html
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00045-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.960145
| 1,170
| 1.734375
| 2
|
Pope Benedict XVI will officially proclaim Mother Marianne Cope and Kateri Tekakwitha Saints on Sunday.
Mother Marianne played a large role in the establishment of the first two hospitals in the Central New York area.
One was known as St. Elizabeth Hospital in Utica at the time, and St. Joseph's hospital in Syracuse.
Tekakwitha was born in Auriesville, NY and was known as the Lily of the Mohawks.
"Somebody who is responsible for the founding of both of our hospitals, St. Elizabeth's and St. Joe's, to be recognized as a Saint, is a wonderful honor. Not only did we have our own Saint, but she grew up in this area and she was responsible of the founding of our medical center," said Bob Scholefield, the Chief Operation Officer at St. Elizabeth Medical Center.
The celebration of the canonization of the two will be taking place in Rome, Italy.
|
<urn:uuid:61e9f95b-c4e6-4de5-9398-b33cdf382206>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://cnyhomepage.com/fulltext?nxd_id=164692
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00003-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.983882
| 198
| 1.976563
| 2
|
Tim Maurer, Contributor
Personal finance is more PERSONAL than it is finance.
Some time back, I tweeted, “Money serves us best when it is a facilitator of relationships, not an end in and of itself.” A follower replied, “What are your thoughts/suggestions on how to live this out?” Quite sure that, “I’m not sure, but I thought it sounded good,” was not the response he was looking for, and knowing 140 characters wouldn’t do it justice, I promised to get back to him with the benefit of more page space.
While money has no power in-and-of itself, we do a remarkable job of giving it power and allowing it to come between us in relationships. If we elevate money to a position worthy of relationship, our relationships with people don’t stand a chance. This is because the people in our lives are just like we are—flawed and imperfect. No matter how much they love us, people inevitably let us down, argue with us and hurt us. Money can’t. It promises to give us everything we want if we dedicate ourselves to it, and there’s an entire industry out there working very hard to convince us of that (albeit shrouded in snapshots of gorgeous golf courses, picturesque beach homes, keeling sailboats, leaping whales and charging bulls).
How, then, can we practically differentiate between the life-giving, relationship-infusing, beneficial uses of money and the relationship-destroying, life-draining worship of money? Well, it’s into the gray we roam, but here are three ways we can test our heart on this matter:
1) Name your loves – What are the first three, five or seven things that come to mind that really set you on fire. If a noticeable percentage of your loves are NOT persons, causes, movements, vocations or God, but material objects (animate or inanimate), consider red flag #1 raised.
2) Ask those you love – Hopefully some of the aforementioned loves are people; if so, consider asking them what THEY think critically of your interaction with the almighty dollar. This takes guts—to ask the question and to give the answer! Be prepared for a humbling, and don’t bite back. If, of course, you don’t have any people on the list of your loves or you’re unwilling to ask them this question, consider red flag #2 raised.
3) Budget for experiences – Even those who claim not to budget must engage in a modicum of budgeting, at least for the mandatory expenses of life, right?—your mortgage, utilities, auto insurance, 401k…(greens fees and salon appointments). Well, if the loves of your life are genuine priorities—presumably over your mandatory fixed expenses—shouldn’t budgeting for experiences with them be a non-negotiable? And I’m not just talking about requisite vacations, but also date nights for spouses or sweethearts (not both), “date nights” with your kids individually, taking your parents on vacation, and going on physical trips to support your causes.
One of my foremost mentors in money and life shared a story with me, a confession of sorts that illustrated he valued money above the foremost relationship in his world. As one of the most knowledgeable financial planners in the country, he dutifully managed the household budget with a keen eye for discrepancies. And at repeated intervals, his wife spent more than the mutually determined limit for their credit card that was paid off every month. Every month, she broke the spending limit and he broke her will for doing so.
Until one day, he felt a deep sense of conviction that he should take 100% of the energy he was dedicating to correcting this egregious wrong and instead pour it into his wife in the form of tangible affirmations and expressions of love. Several months later, his wife came to him in tears, acknowledging that she realized she had been subconsciously sabotaging their budget. The reason? She felt his actions and words proved that money was more important than she, but had seen in recent months that it must not be true.
I do believe with all of my heart that money serves us best when it is a facilitator of relationships, not an end in and of itself, but merely acknowledging, understanding and knowing that does us little good. It’s in the practical application of this truth that our lives—and the lives of those we love—are changed for the better.
|
<urn:uuid:05f53d6e-104e-4092-9ef0-7fd180a1c035>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.forbes.com/sites/timmaurer/2012/09/21/money-vs-people/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368706153698/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516120913-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.961578
| 952
| 1.710938
| 2
|
American singer/actress Dale Evans took a stenographer's job while seeking out singing work. A widow at 17, she became a radio and nightclub songstress, married again and set out to try her luck in Hollywood. Few good parts came her way at the major studios (she is barely visible in 20th Century-Fox's Orchestra Wives , which featured an equally unbilled Jackie Gleason), so she had to settle for leading roles at Republic Studios, a "B" factory. She wasn't keen on westerns, but westerns were what she got, co-starring in 20 oaters with Republic's Number One singing cowboy, Roy Rogers. It wasn't until Rogers' first wife died in the late '40s that he and Evans realized that theirs was more than just a happy professional association. Rogers and Evans were married in 1947, assuming the honorary mantle of "King of the Cowboys and Queen of the West;" it was Evans who wrote the couple's enduring theme song, "Happy Trails to You."
The Rogers starred together in two TV series, a standard weekly western in the 1950s and an ABC variety show in 1962; in the early '80s, Evans soloed as host of a long-running syndicated religious talk show. Rogers and Evans' marriage was sorely tested by multiple tragedies; of Evans' six children, one was mentally retarded and only three survived past the age of 21. Evans was strengthened by the solidarity of her marriage and by her unwavering religious convictions. To help others to cope with anguish, she has written several uplifting books about the travails and triumphs of her life. She has also been quite active in her pet cause, the prevention of child abuse. In the mid-'90s Dale Evans was in the process of recovering from a serious illness, and resuming her religious and charitable activities. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi
|
<urn:uuid:47a0cb8d-86bc-464e-8d65-b26dcb9ac1d0>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://spill.hollywood.com/Actor/ActorDetails.aspx?Name=Dale%20Evans&PersonId=22240&view=bio
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368705195219/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516115315-00015-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.988679
| 384
| 1.570313
| 2
|
High-tech is linked to war and brutality not only through the arms industry. Computers, cellphones, and other electronic equipment can be part of a shocking connection of highly advanced technology with human suffering, forced labor and unending war. Does it sound too preposterous?
Well just take a look at the 2009 report “Faced with a gun, what can you do? War and the militarisation of mining in eastern Congo” by Global Witness. It tells us about the “conflict minerals” or “blood minerals” that are widely used by high-tech electronic industries. Raw-material in their supply-chain could have been sourced from many parts of the provinces of North and South Kivu, where armed groups and the Congolese national army control the trade in cassiterite (tin ore), gold, columbite-tantalite (coltan), wolframite (a source of tungsten) and other minerals. The report documents a billionaire tale of brutality, tyranny, and corruption. Not too dissimilar from the story most of us came to know from the movie “Blood Diamond”, directed by Edward Zwick, with Leonardo Di Caprio, Djimon Hounsou, and Jennifer Connely or from National Geographic’s documentary Blood Diamond (Diamond of War).
In their broader struggle to seize economic, political and military power, all the main warring parties have carried out the most horrific human rights abuses, including widespread killings of unarmed civilians, rape, torture and looting, recruitment of child soldiers to fight in their ranks, and forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of people. The lure of eastern Congo’s mineral riches is one of the factors spurring them on. By the time these minerals reach their ultimate destinations – the international markets in Europe, Asia, North America and elsewhere – their origin, and the suffering caused by this trade, has long been forgotten.
These minerals of war end up into advanced products of major global companies, reports Global Witness:
Several of the main comptoirs – trading houses based in Goma and Bukavu – buy, sell and export minerals produced by or benefiting the warring parties. They include Groupe Olive, Muyeye, MDM, Panju and others. The fact that these comptoirs are officially licensed and registered with the Congolese government acts as a cover for laundering minerals which are fuelling the conflict. These comptoirs’ customers include European and Asian companies, such as the Thailand Smelting and Refining Corporation (THA ISARCO), the world’s fifth-largest tin-producing company, owned by British metals giant Amalgamated Metal Corporation (AMC); British company Afrimex; and several Belgian companies such as Trademet and Traxys. These companies sell the minerals on to a range of processing and manufacturing companies, including firms in the electronics industry. Economic actors are turning a blind eye to the impact of their trade. They continue to plead ignorance as to the origin of their supplies and hide behind a multitude of other excuses for failing to implement practices which would exclude from their supply chain minerals which are fueling the armed conflict.
The report says that cassiterite (tin ore) is the most important blood mineral in terms of quantity and price. It has many uses as a component in the production of solders, tin plating and alloys. Downstream users are the electronics and tin can industries. Electronic solders alone accounted for over 44% of all refined tin in 2007. In 2007 and 2008 the so-called Democratic Republic of Congo accounted for about 5% of global tin ore production.
The trading houses – comptoirs – are, according to Global Witness, a critical part of this chain of supply and export of minerals, in a setting of violence, exploitation, environmental and human degradation.
“We all end up buying minerals which, in some way, have been produced illegally. You can’t just ask us to stop. We have no alternatives other than closing,” a representative of one to the comptoirs told Global Witness.
Global Witness has written to about 200 companies all over the world inquiring about their trade practices in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Some of the companies which replied to Global Witness stated that they were committed to upholding and improving due diligence policies. However, the policies or internal codes of conduct they refer to are fairly general and do not include specific safeguards against the mineral trade fueling armed conflict.
Global Witness’s view at the time of the report is that the industry lacked a coherent plan to address the conflict dimension of the mineral trade.
The industry has adopted some actions to address the problem, coordinated by its trade association, the International Tin Research Institute – ITRI. The Institute claims that “Phase 1”, implemented in July 2009, was “a comprehensive due diligence plan for tin minerals exported from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).” It is now announcing “Phase 2” of its policy called ITRI Tin Supply Chain Initiative, iTSCi.
ITRI says that iTSCi represents “the first practical field trial designed to address concerns over ‘conflict minerals’ from that region and has required significant commitment and funding, around US$600k, to be put in place in order to go ahead.”
Phase 2 consists of “a pilot trial which will begin to track minerals and provide verifiable provenance information from individual mine sites in eastern DRC; something that has not been possible up to now.”
This initiative has the support of an impressive number of well-know downstream users of tin and tantalum in the electronics sector, such as Apple, Dell, HP, IBM, Intel, Lenovo, Microsoft, Motorola, Nokia, Nokia Siemens Networks, Philips, RIM, Sony, Telefonica, Western Digital and Xerox.
Kay Nimmo, ITRI’s Manager of Sustainability and Regulatory Affairs says that the industry can now “move ahead with this next step in the iTSCi project” which “really demonstrates the commitment of the tin, and now also the tantalum sector, to find a solution to this difficult issue.”
It is a welcome move, but it still seems to be too weak a response to such a brutal problem. Global Witness acknowledges that many mining and electronic companies have clear policies regarding the sustainability of their supply-chain, but due diligence procedures fall short of adequately addressing the problem of the warring parties’ control of a major share of mineral supplies.
A Group of Experts nominated by the UN in 2004 to recommend actions regarding conflict minerals, issued a report in 2008, urging UN member states to “take appropriate measures to ensure that exporters and consumers of Congolese mineral products under their jurisdiction conduct due diligence on their suppliers and not accept verbal assurances from buyers regarding the origin of their product”.
ITRI’s plan to track minerals and provide verifiable provenance information could be an important instrument for origin certification in the supply-chain. Similar cases of illegal goods entering the production process of large, competitive companies show that only the giant corporate downstream users have the power to enforce rules aiming at cleaning the supply-chain.
The situation doesn’t seem to have improved much since Global Witness issued its report and ITRI implemented Phase 1 of its project. Annie Dunnebacke, just back from a month in eastern DRC, reports that:
For more than a decade now, the country’s mineral wealth has provided an incentive and a cash base for the conflict to continue. Unless the government and international donors implement a comprehensive strategy which tackles once and for all the economic drivers of this conflict, the local population will continue to suffer and the country’s future will continue to be blighted.
Emilie Serralta, also part of Global Witness’ team just back from the Congo, adds that the
capacity of the former rebels to siphon off revenue from the mines means they could afford to re-arm if they decide peace no longer suits them. This is particularly dangerous considering the ex-commanders’ history of reverting to rebellion when they don’t get what they want.
Global Witness said on a recent press release to have evidence that companies in eastern DRC and Rwanda are still buying goods directly from militarized mines.
Some in the industry have committed on paper to greater supply chain traceability and more responsible sourcing practices, but so far companies buying minerals from eastern Congo have failed to move beyond the rhetoric and put in place credible due diligence measures.
Annie Dunnebacke contends, on a Global Witness press release, that
It’s not enough for companies to rely on promises made or paperwork filled out by their suppliers. If companies want to avoid being complicit in the conflict and human rights abuses, they have to carry out investigations to find out exactly which mines the goods come from, and who has benefited from the trade. Information about who controls which mine site is common knowledge in the trading towns of eastern Congo. Companies buying minerals from militarised areas cannot claim ignorance.
Tags: Africa, cellphones, IT, minerals, sustainability, war
|
<urn:uuid:6c785bf4-306d-4d6a-bdbd-61c2c1ba8877>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.ecopolity.com/2010/03/23/minerals-of-blood-in-our-computers-and-cell-phones/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368708142388/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516124222-00040-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.947416
| 1,920
| 2.265625
| 2
|
Are you a night owl or an early bird? Personally, I don’t think I am either. However, research shows that a preference for being an early riser or a late sleeper is influenced by genetics.
A study conducted at the University of California at San Francisco by Dr. Ying-Hui Fu and her team revealed a rare mutation in the gene DEC2 of a mother and daughter who needed only an average of 6.5 hours of sleep per night due to more intense REM sleep states. People with this mutation (also called “short-sleepers”) appear to sleep more efficiently.
Think you are one of the lucky few? The odds are stacked against you. Less than 3% of the population is said to carry this mutation. For the other 97% of us, how do we find out how much sleep we need? In seventh grade math class, I remember learning a formula for calculating how many hours of sleep we need at night based on our age throughout childhood. Once we hit the age of 18, our sleep needs pretty much stay the same (between 7.5 to 9 hours) assuming the absence of certain medical conditions.
After feeling sleep deprived for close to two years, I took a long-needed sleep vacation! I didn’t have to go anywhere other than my bed; I just had to prioritize this little but necessary experiment, and I was on my way to feeling better than I have in years. Here’s what you need to do.
- Carve out two weeks where you have some flexibility to go to bed at the same time every night & wake up without an alarm clock
- Don’t worry… for the first couple of days you will sleep longer if you have been sleep deprived – your body’s way of paying off your “sleep debt”
- Continue going to be at a consistent time and waking up naturally. Within two weeks, you will establish a sleep pattern and obtaining the same amount of sleep each night
Nine hours ended up being my magic number. No wonder I had felt sleep deprived! I was getting between 6 and 7 hours of sleep every night for the past several years.
Need other tips for getting a good night’s sleep? Make sure you are sleeping on a comfortable mattress and pillow, and limit television watching and computer use in the few hours before bedtime. Try to exercise in the earlier part of the day and steer clear of late-night caffeine and alcohol intake.
Schedule your sleep vacation and follow this simple formula. You’ll be sleeping like a rockstar before you know it.
|
<urn:uuid:9546216a-2f97-45a7-8a1e-0ce860884091>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://thewellnessscientist.com/blog/tag/sleep-vacation/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368697380733/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516094300-00039-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.96256
| 537
| 2.234375
| 2
|
Shift workers 'risking' Type 2 diabetes and obesity
Shift workers getting too little sleep at the wrong time of day may be increasing their risk of diabetes and obesity, according to researchers.
The team is calling for more measures to reduce the impact of shift working following the results of its study.
Researchers controlled the lives of 21 people, including meal and bedtimes.
The results, published in Science Translational Medicine, showed changes to normal sleep meant the body struggled to control sugar levels.
Some participants even developed early symptoms of diabetes within weeks.
Shift work has been associated with a host of health problems.
Doctors at Brigham and Women's Hospital, in the US, were trying to study its effects in a controlled environment.Lower insulin levels
The 21 health-trial participants started with 10 hours' sleep at night. This was followed by three weeks of disruption to their sleep and body clocks.
End Quote Dr Orfeu Buxton Brigham and Women's Hospital
The evidence is clear that getting enough sleep is important for health, and that sleep should be at night for best effect”
The length of the day was extended to 28 hours, creating an effect similar to a full-time flyer constantly getting jet lag.
Participants were allowed only 6.5 hours' sleep in the new 28-hour day, equivalent to 5.6 hours in a normal day. They also lived in dim light to prevent normal light resetting the body clock.
During this part of the study, sugar levels in the blood were "significantly increased" immediately after a meal and during "fasting" parts of the day.
The researchers showed that lower levels of insulin - the hormone that normally controls blood sugar - were produced.
Three of the participants had sugar levels which stayed so high after their meals they were classified as "pre-diabetic".
They also highlighted a risk of putting on weight as the body slowed down.
"The 8% drop in resting metabolic rate that we measured in our participants... translates into a 12.5-pound increase in weight over a single year," they wrote.
End Quote Dr Matthew Hobbs Diabetes UK
Clearly, this does not equate to the normal experience of shift workers... it is not possible to conclude that the findings would translate to real conditions in the wider public”
Lead researcher Dr Orfeu Buxton said: "We think these results support the findings from studies showing that, in people with a pre-diabetic condition, shift workers who stay awake at night are much more likely to progress to full-on diabetes than day workers.
"Since night workers often have a hard time sleeping during the day, they can face both circadian [body clock] disruption working at night and insufficient sleep during the day.
"The evidence is clear that getting enough sleep is important for health, and that sleep should be at night for best effect."
The research group called for more efforts to reduce the health impact of shift working.Artificial world
Dr Matthew Hobbs, head of research at Diabetes UK, said: "This is an interesting study which shows that under extreme conditions involving sleep deprivation and 'tricking' the body clock, participants produced less insulin and therefore had higher blood glucose levels then when they were able to sleep normally and live according to normal daily rhythms."
He cautioned that the laboratory conditions were not the same as working nights.
"Clearly, this does not equate to the normal experience of shift workers who are able, for example, to use bright lights when not sleeping.
"The study also involved only 21 people. For these reasons, it is not possible to conclude that the findings would translate to real conditions in the wider public."
|
<urn:uuid:7dd6297e-61ce-4c79-9218-57e4e9c4a239>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17680882
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368696382584/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516092622-00061-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.969922
| 755
| 2.75
| 3
|
Did you know that in section 1513 of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA, or what is better known as the stimulus), there is a clause that requires the executive branch, of which "Dear Leader" Barack Hussein Obama is head, to submit a new report describing how the stimulus is doing every three months until September 30, 2013. The law states:
In consultation with the Director of the Office of Management and Budget and the Secretary of the Treasury, the Chairperson of the Council of Economic Advisers [CEA] shall submit quarterly reports to the Committees on Appropriations of the Senate and House of Representatives that detail the impact of programs funded through covered funds on employment, estimated economic growth, and other key economic indicators."
Guess when the most recent quarterly report was issued? June 2011. I don't think that's even close to being current. What happened to the four 2012 reports that CEA was supposed to issue? Could these facts, and the effect they could have had on the 2012 election, have had anything to do with the reports not being released?
- Fewer than fifty nine percent (58.6%) of Americans are currently employed; down 2.4 percent from the time of Obama's first inauguration. By the way, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) chart illustrates just how effective the "stimulus" was in terms of increasing employment. Sure, the chart shows job losses before Obama was inaugurated. But he and the CEA said that the jobs situation would rebound if only the "stimulus" was passed. As Henry Morganthau, Treasury Secretary under Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), said, "We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work... I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started... And an enormous debt to boot!" Morganthau said that in May 1939, but it is quite appropriate for Obama's administration.
- Obama's own CEA said for every $317,000 in "stimulus" spending, only one job had been created or saved.
- Christina Romer, the first CEA head, said the "stimulus" legislation was needed to keep unemployment below 8 percent, and that, by 2012, the stimulus would have caused unemployment to fall below 6 percent. But, the unemployment rate surpassed 10 percent after the "stimulus" was passed. The unemployment rate stayed above 8 percent for more than three years. The BLS managed to get it under 8 percent just before the 2012 election, and the MSM ate it up.
- The most recent CEA report was the fifth consecutive "stimulus" report that showed this number getting progressively worse.
Could releasing the required reports have given the "low information" voters the information they needed in order to make an informed vote?
|
<urn:uuid:19f7cb90-164f-4734-9bea-e581900f5e3f>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://blogcritics.org/politics/article/obama-doesnt-follow-his-own-law/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368704392896/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516113952-00030-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.97431
| 585
| 2.515625
| 3
|
Albania existed as a protectorate of the Kingdom of Italy officially known as the Albanian Kingdom (Gheg Albanian: Mbretnija Shqiptare, Standard Albanian: Mbretëria Shqiptare, Italian: Regno albanese), officially led by Italy's King Victor Emmanuel III and its government led by Italian governors between 1939 after being occupied by Italy until 1943. During this time, Albania ceased to exist as an independent country, and existed as an autonomous part of the Italian Empire led by Italian government officials who intended to make Albania part of a Greater Italy.
The Kingdom of Italy invaded Albania on 7 April 1939, five months before the start of the Second World War. The Albanian armed resistance proved ineffective against Italians and, after a short defense, the country was occupied. On 9 April 1939 Albanian King Zog fled to Greece, in spite of earlier alliance and support of Italy that Albania held with Italy since 1925. However Italy's political leader, Benito Mussolini required direct control over Albania to officially expand his empire as he had grown jealous of Germany's annexation of Austria and occupation of Czechoslovakia. Albania ceased to exist as an independent country and became a component of the Italian Empire. Albania was turned into an Italian protectorate, similar to the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, in that the land was an autonomous territory of Italy which was designed for eventual colonization and Italianization. The throne was claimed by king Victor Emmanuel III of Italy, who was the official ruler of Albania until his abdication on 25 July 1943. The government was led by Italian governors and an Albanian civil government.
Albania was important culturally and historically to the Italian nationalist aims of the Fascists, as the territory of Albania had long been part of the Roman Empire, even prior to the annexation of northern Italy by the Romans. Later some coastal areas (like Durazzo) had been influenced and owned by the Italian Republic of Venice for many years (Albania Veneta).
Strategically, control of Albania gave Italy a position in the Balkans to invade Greece which it did in 1940, as well as challenge Italy's other rival, Yugoslavia, to which a war via Albania would garner support of Albanian nationalists who wanted to gain Albanian populated territories in Kosovo and Vardar Macedonia.
While Victor Emmanuel ruled as king, Shefqet Bej Verlaci served as the Prime Minister. Shefqet Verlaci controlled the day to day activities of the Italian protectorate. On 3 December 1941, Shefqet Bej Verlaci was replaced as Prime Minister and Head of State by Mustafa Merlika Kruja. Nazi Germany occupied Albania when Italy quit the war in 1943.
From the start, Albanian foreign affairs, customs, as well as natural resources came under direct control of Italy. The puppet Albanian Fascist Party became the ruling party of the country and the Fascists allowed Italian citizens to settle in Albania and to own land so that they could gradually transform it into Italian soil.
In October 1940, during the Greco-Italian War, Albania served as a staging-area for Italian dictator Benito Mussolini's unsuccessful invasion of Greece. Mussolini planned to invade Greece and other countries like Yugoslavia in the area to give Italy territorial control of most of the Mediterranean Sea coastline, as part of the Fascists objective of creating the objective of Mare Nostrum ("Our Sea") in which Italy would dominate the Mediterranean.
But, soon after the Italian invasion, the Greeks counter-attacked and a sizeable portion of Albania was in Greek hands (including the cities of Gjirokastër and Korçë). In April 1941, after Greece capitulated to the German forces, the Greek territorial gains in southern Albania returned to Italian command. Under Italian command came also large areas of Greece after the succesfull German invasion of Greece.
After the fall of Yugoslavia and Greece in April 1941, the Italian Fascists added to the territory of the Kingdom of Albania most of the Albanian-inhabited areas that had been previously given to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. The Albanian fascists claimed in May 1941 that nearly all the Albanian populated territories were united to Albania (see map). Even areas of northern Greece (Chameria) were administered by Albanians. But this was even a consequence of borders that Italy and Germany agreed on when dividing their spheres of influence. Some small portions of territories with Albanian majority remained outside the new borders and contact between the two parts was practically impossible: the Albanian population under the Bulgarian rule was heavily oppressed.
After the surrender of the Italian Army in September 1943, Albania was occupied by the Germans and soon exploded into a ferocious guerilla war.
|
<urn:uuid:1c5f246b-35fb-4e39-a718-ae2a718f3e8d>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.reference.com/browse/Regno+albanese
|
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
| 0.978489
| 971
| 4.09375
| 4
|
A QUIET REBELLION: THE PORTRAIT OF THE FEMALE IN VICTORIAN CHILDREN'S FANTASY (LEWIS CARROLL, GEORGE MACDONALD, MRS. MOLESWORTH, JAMES BARRIE, EDITH NESBIT)
The picture of the Victorian female that has been handed down to us is that of the Angel in the House--submissive, domesticated, and content with her limited lot. It is a picture that the adult fiction of the Victorian era does little to dispel. Independence and assertiveness, when they rear their ugly heads, are roundly condemned and soon put down. Yet in the twentieth century a totally different fictional portrait emerges--that of the liberated, modern female. Where did she come from? Certainly there were social advances, but what literary link exists between the Victorian and the modern fictional woman? The bright and independent Alice of Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland suggests that children's literature, more specifically children's fantasy, might provide the strong, liberated females who would bridge the gap between the nineteenth century Angel and the twentieth century feminist.^ Children's fantasy was clearly influential because of its extreme popularity during the Victorian era, a time that was indeed proclaimed the Golden Age of Children's Literature by virtue of the many fantasies published during the period from about 1840 to 1910. Moreover, fantasy, like myth, reaches out to the unconscious of the reader where a subliminal feminist message could readily be implanted without inciting overt rebellion. After all, fantasies need not reflect reality. They can create worlds with their own rules.^ A thorough study of historical and critical overviews of Victorian children's literature and the reading of hundreds of original Victorian children's fantasies made it clear that a statistical approach to the problem of the presentation of the female in Victorian children's fantasy would be both unscholarly and unprofitable. It was therefore determined to limit the study to critical readings of major children's fantasies with female characters--primarily the works of Lewis Carroll, George MacDonald, Mary Louisa Molesworth, Edith Nesbit, and James Barrie, with references to other relevant works. The study was divided into portraits of mothers, spinsters, girls, and magical women.^ These portraits proved to be startling for the Victorian era. Mothers, whose nurturing presence one would expect to find, were often absent from the scene. Spinsters were admirable, useful women rather than embittered old maids. Girls were intelligent and assertive, not squeamish and subdued. And magical women were not witches, but positive figures of great power.^ Victorian children's fantasy was fostering a quiet rebellion, one that held out great hope for the equality of the sexes because it worked in a magical way on the minds and hearts of future generations. ^
EDITH LAZAROS HONIG,
"A QUIET REBELLION: THE PORTRAIT OF THE FEMALE IN VICTORIAN CHILDREN'S FANTASY (LEWIS CARROLL, GEORGE MACDONALD, MRS. MOLESWORTH, JAMES BARRIE, EDITH NESBIT)"
(January 1, 1985).
ETD Collection for Fordham University.
|
<urn:uuid:4b475cf4-b49e-4058-8118-ad2edbf6f364>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://fordham.bepress.com/dissertations/AAI8521393/
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368711005985/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516133005-00054-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.940558
| 669
| 3.1875
| 3
|
Date: 12-Nov-2010 From: Chris Humphrey <chumphreyc-s-p.org> Subject: Age Effects in the Acquisition of English Onset Clusters by Turkish Learners: Yildiz E-mail this message to a friend
Title: Age Effects in the Acquisition of English Onset Clusters by Turkish Learners
Subtitle: An Optimality-Theoretic Approach
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Age Effects in the Acquisition of English Onset Clusters by Turkish Learners: An Optimality-Theoretic Approach offers a state-of-the-art examination of the acquisition of English onset clusters by Turkish learners, and considers the age effects in second language (L2) phonology. Unlike previous research trends, this research examines the developmental paths of L2 phonology, rather than the 'end-state' of acquisition. This in return will yield insightful data which appeals to both L2 theory and phonological theory. The L2 data presented here will be accounted for within a constraint-based framework known as Optimality Theory (OT).
The first two chapters provide an overview of first and second language phonology, and are also discussed under OT framework in chapter 3. Chapter 4 serves to highlight the syllable structure of Turkish and English and addresses a number of partially overlapping themes: synchronic and diachronic analysis of English and Turkish consonant inventory, loan phonology, and prosodic development. The remaining chapters provide a detailed presentation of the novel empirical results, along with a discussion of its wider implications in phonological theory and phonological acquisition.
Indispensable for students and researchers working in the areas of phonological theory and phonological acquisition, this volume will also appeal to applied linguists and speech language pathologists.
|
<urn:uuid:2d253311-738f-45aa-b2f2-12b6a502a05c>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://linguistlist.org/issues/21/21-4663.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
| 0.910837
| 361
| 1.679688
| 2
|
The number of Syrians seeking refuge in
neighbouring countries is "growing rapidly" every day and a total of
229,000 Syrians have so far registered as refugees in Turkey, Iraq,
Lebanon and Jordan, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees said
Antonio Guterres, the head of the UN refugee agency, told the UN Security Council that the armed conflict in Syria has led to a "dramatic and deepening humanitarian crisis" for the region.
The UN said an estimated 2.5 million Syrians have become affected by the intensified fighting inside their country. It said an appeal for 180 million dollars to assist the Syrians had received only half of that amount while the humanitarian situation is worsening.
The UN asked the Syrian government to urgently allowed relief organizations to enter the country so they could deliver aid to those in need.
Most Popular Stories
- GM Joins Nissan to Supply Small Cargo Vehicle
- Bieber Booed at Billboard Awards
- Marketo Makes a Mint in IPO: Stock Shoots Up More than 50 Percent
- GM to Rejoin S&P 500, Akerson Says
- Kerry Concerned Over Blasphemy Laws, Anti-Semitism
- Ford's Supplier Diversity Program Turns 35
- Ford Trucks See Boost as Roadshow Reaches Saudi Arabia
- Ladies in White Group Needs Help From Abroad
- Darden Competition for Small Businesses Opens
- NTSB Wants to Lower Blood Alcohol Limit to 0.05
|
<urn:uuid:8316e5b7-01da-447c-a4b9-11b39191d0a6>
|
CC-MAIN-2013-20
|
http://www.hispanicbusiness.com/2012/8/30/229000_syrians_fled_to_neighboring_countries.htm
|
s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2013-20/segments/1368699881956/warc/CC-MAIN-20130516102441-00046-ip-10-60-113-184.ec2.internal.warc.gz
|
en
| 0.919373
| 302
| 2.25
| 2
|