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CNCA Integrated Paving Solutions Overview
A one-page overview of cement based solutions for pavements.
Best Practices – Utility Cuts in Concrete Pavement
Concrete pavements have long been recognized as clean, smooth riding, strong, and durable, and properly designed and constructed concrete pavements should provide several decades of zero- to low-maintenance service. At times, it is necessary to cut trenches in some concrete pavements, particularly in urban areas, in order to repair or install utilities such as sewers, drainage structures, water mains, gas mains and service
lines, telecommunication lines, and power conduits. Unless the cost of trenchless methods that do not disturb the pavement is justified, the pavement must be opened up, the utility installed or repaired, and the pavement restored using a utility cut restoration. If these operations are carried out properly (see Appendix 1 for the step-by-step process of making a utility cut in a concrete pavement), there will be minimal impact on the pavement’s functional serviceability, ride quality, and lifespan.
Utility Cuts in Concrete Pavements – ACPA
Concrete pavements have long been recognized as clean, smooth riding, strong, and durable, and properly designed and constructed concrete pavements should provide several decades of zero- to low-maintenance service. At times, it is necessary to cut trenches in some concrete pavements, particularly in urban areas, in order to repair or install utilities such as sewers, drainage structures, water mains, gas mains and service lines, telecommunication lines, and power conduits.
Guide Specification for Materials and Construction of Jointed Unreinforced Concrete Pavement Parking Lots
Jointed unreinforced concrete parking lots may be designed using various methods; however, NRMCA recommends using the American Concrete Institute (ACI) procedure 330R-08 Guide for the Design and Construction of Concrete Parking Lots which specifically addresses the unique loading conditions, durability considerations, and joint layout patterns inherent to parking lots. ACI 330R-08 can be obtained from ACI at www.concrete.org.
Shedding Light on Concrete’s Reflectivity – NRMCA
Due to its lighter color and uniform surface texture, the high reflectivity of a concrete pavement provides greater luminance than other typical pavements. In fact, studies show that a concrete pavement’s average luminance is 1.77 times higher than asphalt.
Case Study – Monache High School Parking Lot
Porterville Unified School District needed to replace failed asphalt parking lot. The old pavement was ground and reused as base for the new concrete surface. The need to reduce maintenance costs coupled with limited access after solar panels were installed made concrete the clear choice.
Article – Full Depth Reclamation Solves Construction Problems in Wet and Weak Soils
On average, 57,000 tons of cargo is pushed through the Port of Seattle’s Terminal 115 each month. Located just south of downtown Seattle, the terminal is occupied by Northland Services Inc., the port’s fourth-largest tenant.
The busy yard takes a lot of pounding, so when rehabilitation became necessary, special consideration was given to the available alternatives before deciding on a paving and pavement foundation method. A method of pavement rehabilitation known as full-depth reclamation proved to be the foundation method of choice, as it provided greater strength and durability than most of the other pavement alternatives.
Project Profile – Monache High School Parking Lot with Solar
Using Pervious Concrete to Earn LEED Points
Pervious concrete is a unique and innovative means to manage stormwater. When pervious concrete is used in building site design, it can aid in the process of qualifying for LEED Green Building Rating System credits. Pervious concrete has been used successfully in many types of construction on applications such as parking lots, streets, plazas, nature trails and walkways. While pervious concrete can be used for a surprising number of applications, its primary use is in pavement.
Storm Water Solutions – Bay Area Pervious Concrete
Imperviousness refers to the inability of a surface to allow water to percolate through. A sponge is pervious, a countertop is impervious, cardboard is somewhere in between. Sandy soils are pervious; asphalt is not. On an impervious surface, water is forced to travel downhill until it finds a place it can sink into soil or enter a wetland.
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Home People Coast Guard awards Purple Heart to World War II veteran in New Smyrna Beach, Fla.
Coast Guard awards Purple Heart to World War II veteran in New Smyrna Beach, Fla.
Jun 4th, 2010 · Comments Off on Coast Guard awards Purple Heart to World War II veteran in New Smyrna Beach, Fla.
NEW SMYRNA BEACH, Fla. – The Coast Guard presented Harry Milton Daube, 88, the sole survivor of the USS Leopold, a 306-foot Coast Guard manned torpedo attack ship, the Purple Heart Friday at his home in New Smyrna Beach.
More than 66 years ago Seaman First Class Daube served in the Coast Guard aboard the USS Leopold, an Edsall class destroyer, before the ship was struck and devastated by an enemy torpedo March 9, 1944, in freezing cold water south of Iceland.
Harry Milton Daube, 88, holds a Purple Heart after being awarded the medal during a ceremony at his home in New Smyrna Beach, Friday, June 4, 2010.
Three hundred and fifty seven Coast Guardsmen lost their lives in the attack. Daube and the 27 other survivors waited on a life raft to be rescued after the Leopold split into two pieces and eventually sank.
After his return to the United States, Daube said he continued to serve in the Coast Guard, in New York, until the end of World War II.
Daube accepted the Purple Heart in company of close friends and a few local Coast Guardsmen.
The Purple Heart is the oldest military decoration in the world in present use and the first American award made available to the common soldier. The Purple Heart was established by Gen. George Washington in Newburgh, N.Y., Aug. 7, 1782. The Purple Heart is awarded in the name of the president of the United States to any member of an armed force or any civilian national of the United States who has been wounded or killed in action.
Additional photos of the presentation can be found at the Coast Guard News Facebook page.
Tags:Harry Milton Daube · Purple Heart · USS Leopold
Honoring Purple Heart recipients
02/8/2015 · 1 Comment
Coast Guard World War II veteran receives Purple Heart
03/13/2012 · Comments Off on Coast Guard World War II veteran receives Purple Heart
Coast Guard World War II veteran to receive Purple Heart
03/8/2012 · Comments Off on Coast Guard World War II veteran to receive Purple Heart
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'Riverdale': Marisol Nichols Teases Her Role in the Winter Finale
By Russ Burlingame - December 20, 2018 01:49 pm EST
Tonight, Hermione Lodge (Marisol Nichols) will play a significant role in shaping the future of the town of Riverdale when she, acting as mayor, decides to close down Riverdale High due to parental fears about the seizures students have been having recently.
What do the seizures have to do with Gryphons and Gargoyles? Or with her husband Hiram's ever-growing criminal empire? And what good will closing down the school do at all, if it turns out the seizures are not viral but rather something more sinister?
We spoke with Nichols, in New York City to promote a new line of Vicks DayQuil and NyQuil SEVERE with VapoCOOL products, about tonight's episode and what fans can expect moving forward.
"I think that Hermione, for her, she wanted to keep that mayoral thing separate" from Hiram's life of crime," Nichols told ComicBook.com. "She's always trying to go legit, and doing her best to gain some power for herself so that they can be legitimate so that she doesn't always have to live in fear."
That is going to come to a kind of head in tonight's episode, as Hiram asks her to use her official authority to do something that will almost certainly not end well for anyone but Hiram.
Without saying whether or not Hiram's plan is a success, Nichols explained why this is a hard choice for Hermione, where other things he has asked for have been less of a struggle for her.
"She's the one in charge of that town. So, if anything goes wrong, she knows that's on her," Nichols explained. "And so already having to compromise her needs and wants and her moral compass as mayor with already one hit, and the second hit is that, and guess who's going to be responsible?"
Nichols herself is celebrating the winter finale in New York as part of the publicity tour and ribbon-cutting for a line of products from home health giant Vicks. She came from Los Angeles, which explains the trip to New York. If she was not on break from Riverdale, there would be no need to go find a city with snow and cold, since it shoots in Vancouver.
"It is cold and flu season, so the timing couldn't have been better," Nichols said. "Just like most people, like most everyone, you get sick, you don't have time to take a sick day. You don't have time to lay in bed. You've got to do what you can to keep moving and keep being productive, so hence Vicks."
The new line includes Vicks NyQuil VapoCOOL and DayQuil VapoCOOL as well as a line of severe medicated losenges.
Riverdale airs on Wednesday nights at 8 p.m. ET/PT, before episodes of Legacies on The CW.
Fans Aren't Too Thrilled the Game of Thrones Finale Earned an Emmy Nomination
Into the Badlands and Batman Begins Actor Karl Shiels Dies at 47
Netflix Releasing New Anime Documentary
Stranger Things Cast Sings Praises of Avatar: The Last Airbender
Emmy Awards Rule Kept Stranger Things From Being Nominated
Legends of Tomorrow Reassures Fans About Missing Actors in First Season 5 Photo
Game of Thrones Prequel: Naomi Watts' Costume Potentially Leaks
Rick and Morty Season 4 First Look Revealed
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Category Archives: Joe Staton
Review: FAMILY MAN by Jerome Charyn & Joe Staton
The Empire State Building looms large over Alonzo.
“To finally have this collaboration between two giants available in a single volume is a gift for which we can only hope to be worthy.” — Howard Chaykin
Sometimes, a book is placed under my nose and I just can’t stop reading. So it is with Family Man, the crime noir graphic novel written by Jerome Charyn and drawn by Joe Staton. This is a deluxe edition to the 1995 series by Paradox Press, an imprint of DC Comics. This new 2019 edition is by It’s Alive and IDW Publishing. For a brief moment, both publishers were working together. What matters most is that this book packs a wallop, full of the grim and gritty underbelly of New York City that novelist Jerome Charyn knows so well. As is the case here at Comics Grinder, while we enjoy sharing images from books with you, we also don’t rely on it so much to the exclusion of thoughtful reviews. That said, let’s take a closer look at a book that well deserves it.
Alonzo pays his respects and kisses Don Furioso’s hand.
As a reviewer who also happens to be a cartoonist, I can tell you on an intimate level that this is a very special book. It’s a perfect pairing of writer and artist. Both Staton and Charyn are not holding back anything while also working as a team. Charyn is busy condensing his prose to the perfect concise distillation. Staton is busy letting loose with his highly expressive line ever mindful of disciplined efficiency and consistency. Both are being the artists they were born to be, both working on the same page. Take a look at the panel above. A whole story, a whole way of life, is held together in that one rectangle. Staton is depicting a connection between two brute men. Alonzo is the Mafia hitman showing respect. Don Furioso is the kingpin in decline who has been reduced to fretting over his colon.
Family Man page excerpt
We can see that Alonzo and the don are both past their prime and yet remain quite deadly creatures with no immediate plans to depart this earth. To that end, Alonzo the mob’s hitman, fixer, and “family man,” has been assigned the job of killing a band of rogue assassins who are bent on killing off all the Mafia dons in the city. It won’t be an easy task for Alonzo by any means. Add to the mix Charles, his own brother, the local Monsignor who works for the NYPD. If the killers don’t get him, Alonzo’s own brother just might.
Let’s take a moment to skip back to Joe Staton’s artwork. If you examine the above examples, you’ll start to focus in on the distinctive shades running throughout. Before everything went digital, artists had to be rather crafty about finding ways to create tones to spice up black & white line art. One way was with the use of a special bristol board that was embedded with shading inside the board. Applying a brush that had been dipped into a special solution would reveal the shading hidden within the board. What tones ended up making it to the surface were dependent upon the artist’s choice of brushstrokes. It’s my guess that Staton had a hefty stockpile of Duotone board at his disposal. By the early ’90s, around the time of the creation of this graphic novel, this old-fashioned board was pretty much already extinct. Staton probably had hoarded more than enough of this board going back decades. The results are stunning, of course, and it would take some doing to even try to come close to emulating it in Photoshop. Staton has a clean sharp style to begin with so this special shading technique was really just an option, an option that he makes the most of in this book.
Greetings from the Bronx Boys
With Family Man, Jerome Charyn and Joe Staton create their very own crime noir mythos. Alonzo, the mob hitman, and Charles, his monsignor brother, have numerous tales to tell and to act out. The setting, the mood, and the attitude all add up to an edgy good time. Joe Staton (Batman, Green Lantern) seems to channel the best of the work he’s done during his impressive career. He also seems to offer a tip of the hat to Will Eisner’s The Spirit. Jerome Charyn plays with various crime fiction tropes and brings in his unique sensibility as evidenced by his critically-acclaimed Isaac Seidel crime novel series. Alonzo is a “family man” in more ways than one. He used to be a true family man with a wife and kids. Later on, he became a family man to the mob alone. And, to further frustrate and complicate matters, he finds himself in mortal conflict with his only remaining member of flesh and blood family, his brother, Charles, the man of god who is not what he seems. As Charyn and Staton drop each layer of the narrative into place, the reader becomes all the more invested in the outcome.
A satisfying narrative, whatever the medium, is made up of a finely spun web of action, deliberation, long and short pauses, and a resolution that resonates, perhaps even transcends. It’s a matter of a myriad of creative choices and observations, big and small. Bit by bit, it all comes into focus: Alonzo, our big hefty protagonist, seems up to any challenge given enough time to digest a hoagie. Something about a certain metropolis is forever swirling in the background, and creeping into the foreground. New York City welcomes everyone but it coddles no one. Better to be tough, tough it out. A flamboyant so-called “man of god ‘ should wear a cloak or cape. And Alonzo better have a secret weapon. All the hoods eat hoagies too. Lastly, in the end, all the corruption, filth, mayhem, and blood lust tallies up. Maybe nobody gets the girl, like they used to in the movies. It’s all set “one hour into the future” with a crime-ridden New York City on her knees! But Alonzo will prevail, one way or another, and live or die as a “family man.”
Family Man, published by It’s Alive and IDW
I welcome everyone, especially my longtime readers, to check out the video review below. I invite you all to like, subscribe, do whatever you like to engage with, the Comics Grinder YouTube channel. Comics Grinder welcomes your support, as always, to help expand our reach and scope with your feedback and general goodwill! Take a look:
Family Man, by Jerome Charyn & Joe Staton, is a 300-page hardcover. For more details, and how to purchase, visit IDW Publishing right here.
Filed under Comics, DC Comics, Graphic Novel Reviews, graphic novels, IDW Publishing, IT’S ALIVE! Press, Jerome Charyn, Joe Staton, New York City, Paradox Press, The Spirit, Will Eisner
Tagged as Catholic, comics, Crime Fiction, DC Comics, Empire State Building, Entertainment, Graphic Novel Reviews, graphic novels, Italian, Jerome Charyn, Joe Staton, Little Italy, Mafia, Media, New York, New York City, Noir, NYC, Paradox Press, Pop Culture, Publishing, The Spirit, Will Eisner
Kickstarter: FAMILY MAN by Jerome Charyn & Joe Staton
FAMILY MAN by Jerome Charyn & Joe Staton
The story begins in New York City…one hour into the future. Crime runs rampant, rogue cops patrol the rubble-strewn streets, predatory gangs steal anything that isn’t nailed down, and the once powerful mafia dons cower in fear in their tenement prisons. Someone is killing the mob chieftains one by one, and the last survivors call on Alonzo, The Family Man, to hunt down the murderer. But it won’t be easy – not when Alonzo’s own brother Charles, the gun-toting Monsignor of the corruption-ridden New York City police department, is a prime suspect.
Full page of original art by Joe Staton
Jerome Charyn (The Magician’s Wife) is one of my favorite writers. He is a one-of-a-kind visionary. Charyn has worked with some of the best cartoonists in the world and his work with Joe Staton (Dick Tracy) is no exception. Take a look at the examples in this post and it will give you a taste of the hard-boiled, multi-layered tale that is FAMILY MAN. A Kickstarter campaign is on now thru May 21st in support of releasing, for the first time, a collected graphic novel of this classic work. Visit it right here.
Jerome Charyn & Joe Staton
This is a project that Mr. Charyn and Mr. Staton worked on in 1994, during the heyday of Paradox Press, an imprint of DC Comics. Take a closer look at the artwork and marvel over the distinctive shading made possible with the Craft Tint duotone process. These special bristol boards were coated with shading underneath the surface. The artist exposed the shading as needed. Back in 1994, FAMILY MAN ended up as a three-part comic book series of 96-pages each. Thanks to IT’S ALIVE! Press, this stunning work of comics can now be given the best possible presentation as a graphic novel. That includes displaying each page as it originally appeared on the art board
Close-up view of Joe Staton artwork
I really can’t say enough about the remarkable talent of novelist Jerome Charyn. We will pursue that further in subsequent posts. What I’ll say now is that he was way ahead of his time, at least in American circles, by taking his literary skills to the comics medium. In Europe, for example, that has been well understood for decades. In America, we’ve had time to catch up. If you read a Charyn work in comics, you are treated to a vast world of intrigue with characters that will get under your skin. For FAMILY MAN, Charyn and Staton serve up a nice pulpy noir tale set in New York City “one hour into the future.” It is a story about two brothers on separate sides of the law caught in a dystopia they understand all too well and which will pit them in a bloody conflict.
It’s not too late to join in and reserve your copy of FAMILY MAN. This is a wonderful opportunity to own a shining example of comics at its best. Check out the Kickstarter and learn more about rewards, including original art by Joe Staton, right here.
Filed under Comics, Crime Fiction, Dick Tracy, Drew Ford, graphic novels, IT’S ALIVE! Press, Jerome Charyn, Joe Staton, Kickstarter, New York City, Noir
Tagged as Art, arts, comic books, comics, Crime Fiction, Dick Tracy, Entertainment, graphic novels, IT’S ALIVE! Press, Jerome Charyn, Kickstarter, Media, New York, New York City, Noir, Pop Culture, Publishing
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Bizarre 'Family' secrets
Police describe strange behavior - five arraigned in tot's death
San Francisco Chronicle/February 12, 2002
By Jaxon Van Derbeken, Stacy Finz, and Kevin Fagan
Calling themselves "The Family," a group of four women and a man led a secretive life with their 13 abused children in Marin County until one youngster died of malnutrition, exposing a history of bizarre behavior, authorities said yesterday.
Winnfred Everett Wright, 45, and the women who gave birth to his many children had violent encounters with police and neighbors while the unkempt children cried for food, according to police records and witness accounts.
Yesterday, Wright and the four women -- some of whom had privileged backgrounds -- were marched into Marin County Superior Court for arraignment on accusations that they had abused and killed a 19-month-old boy who died in November.
The five were arrested last week in the exclusive suburb of Marinwood. They had been under investigation since November, when the other 12 children, ranging in age from 8 months to 16 years, were removed from the home.
Wright, sporting long dreadlocks and smiling occasionally, and the four women declined to enter pleas because they had not yet consulted with their attorneys. They sat calmly, shackled at the wrists and ankles, saying nothing.
Wright and the women -- Carol Louise Bremner, 44; Mary Campbell, 37; Deirdre Hart Wilson, 37; and Kali Polk-Matthews, 20 -- were indicted last week on charges of involuntary manslaughter and child endangerment. Except for Polk- Matthews, who was not the mother of any of the children, all were also indicted on one count each of second-degree murder.
At the brief court appearance, Wilson and Campbell were visibly pregnant, and Bremner wore a surgical mask over her face, her gray hair tightly cropped. Bremner's attorney, public defender Martha Osterloh, said she has leukemia.
Marin Sheriff's Det. Fred Marziano said none of the children attended school and all were badly abused and malnourished. Some had rickets, a debilitating bone disease caused by vitamin deficiency that is rarely seen in America.
During the three-month investigations, authorities conducted DNA tests to determine that Wright, Bremner, Campbell and Wilson were the parents of the 13 children. Campbell was the mother of the dead boy, police said.
Investigators searched the house and found no religious material, but when asked if they had discounted any possibility of a cult operating in the house, Marziano was noncommittal.
"We did not find any material that linked them to one particular religion," he said. "I have several theories, but this isn't the proper time to talk about them."
However, an increasingly disturbing scenario was painted through court and police records and the recollections of those who knew the group.
The Family, as they called themselves, was first investigated by San Francisco Child Protective Services a decade ago, and subsequent investigations revealed allegations of abuse, hostile behavior and starvation.
Given the shocking condition of the children, the background of some of the women is confounding, too: Deirdre Wilson is a granddaughter of Xerox Corp.'s founder, Joseph C. Wilson; Polk-Matthews was a promising student and athlete at an exclusive San Francisco high school; and Bremner attended the University of California at Berkeley.
'Sweet, Intelligent' Women
Polk-Matthews and Bremner were both described separately by friends as "sweet and intelligent," and those who knew them were puzzled that they wound up being accused of manslaughter.
In the early 1990s in San Francisco, an anonymous tip about the mistreatment of several young children at a home in the Sunset District evidently prompted some of the first actions by authorities. But it is unclear exactly what happened to the children.
"It was bizarre," said one woman with knowledge of the group. "The whole lifestyle -- in the beginning it was more about love and peace. That was the recruitment pitch. But the group dynamics changed and deteriorated."
In late 1993, Wright -- the putative leader of The Family -- was arrested after he allegedly shouted threats to neighbors and paraded around the neighborhood with several young children, who mimicked his obscenities and mannerisms, according to neighbors and police reports.
The threats, neighbors say, came just after authorities received reports that several children were being kept ill-fed and ill-clothed in the filth in front of a rented home on 22nd Avenue.
"There were eight children in the house, one was 6 or 7 months old -- these children used to look after themselves, basically," one witness recalled. "All of the children were in the yard, the oldest, who was 8, looking after them, including the little baby."
Wright Stayed Home with Kids
The three women who lived in the home would work, and Wright would stay home. "He would be here with all of the children," a onetime neighbor said. "They had no underwear on, making mud pools in the yard," she said. "You could hear them crying, asking for food."
San Francisco Child Protective Services officials responded but were not allowed into the home.
Protective service authorities in San Francisco had no record of that report, said spokeswoman Maureen Davidson.
Child Protective Services officials in Marin also responded, years later, to similar disturbances -- but yesterday they refused to comment.
According to an October 1993 San Francisco police report, one neighbor said the children followed Wright as he walked up and down the street, shouting obscenities.
"The children were mimicking Wright and throwing gravel in different directions," according to the report.
According to another police report, two officers arrived in response to complaints and heard Wright yelling at neighbors.
"I will punish you!" he shouted. When the two officers came to the door, Deirdre Wilson and Mary Campisi answered. "Both women protested verbally," the report notes, Wilson shouting, "Get out of my house! He is not here! You can't come in here!"
According to the report, officers had to fight off the two women before they could arrest Wright. Charges against Wright and Wilson were later dropped.
Group's Formation a Puzzle
How the women came to live with Wright remains a puzzle to many who knew them.
Polk-Matthews seemed to have slipped out of sight after leaving for college, recalled her friends and former teachers at the private Lick-Wilmerding High School in San Francisco.
"Kali was just a really sweet student," said one of Polk-Matthews' former high school teachers, who asked not to be named. "Hearing about her involvement is just bizarre. She was not particularly outgoing, but was sweet."
Another Lick-Wilmerding teacher saw a different side.
"She was a mixed personality," said the teacher, who also spoke on condition of anonymity. "One time I went to the opera and she was there dressed to kill with a handsome man, looking like this upper-class kid who had it all together. Other times, in school, you would sense that she wasn't telling the truth and maybe was living a double life."
Heather Pon-Barry, 20, met Polk-Matthews in kindergarten. The two became best friends and stayed that way through high school, playing varsity soccer all four years and going on family camping trips.
But according to Pon-Barry -- now a junior at Stanford University -- the girls grew apart in the summer of 2000.
"I don't know how she went from the Kali I used to know to this," Pon-Barry said from her dorm room yesterday.
Dropped out of Sight
"Last summer, I had heard she was living in Marin. I tried to get in touch with Kali, but her mother never had a number for where she was," Pon-Barry said. "I was worried about Kali."
After graduating from Lick-Wilmerding, Polk-Matthews headed to Spelman College, a historically black college for women in Atlanta. She stayed just a year.
Bremner was described by one friend, who said she knew her at UC Berkeley, as "extremely intelligent, soft-spoken, kind-hearted" and known as "Carol the saint."
In the Marin neighborhood where The Family lived, neighbors were struggling yesterday to make sense of it all.
Michael Spalding, 48, said he often saw two older girls writing "Watch your karma" in chalk on the sidewalk. Some of people in the house also wore T- shirts emblazoned with "weird sayings and stuff," he said. "I just thought they were really bizarre."
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A private Tesla backed by Saudi Arabia might not be as far-fetched as you think - TechCrunch
This week the business and tech world was stunned when Elon Musk hinted on August 7, via Twitter of course, that he wanted to take Tesla private. The estimated price tag for such a move is commonly put at up to $72 billion. Shortly after that no ‘white knights’ appeared and Tesla’s shares plummeted.
But today, Bloomberg came out with a new report which might well fan the flames of speculation on Monday.
Its story has sources which say that Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund (called the Public Investment Fund or PIF) was already in talks with Tesla to become a significant investor before Musk’s tweets.
The timing of this revelation is important, because the PIF has already built up a stake — valued at about $2 billion — just short of 5 percent in Tesla in recent months.
One could easily surmise that the world’s biggest crude oil producer might well be considering a stake in the world’s most iconic electric car company to hedge against oil. Indeed, that is exactly what Bloomberg’s sources are telling them.
Now, part of the reasons the PIF might be talking to Tesla is that the car maker is alleged to have already had limited talks with SoftBank, of which PIF is a major baker.
What makes these rumours so interesting is that Saudi Arabia’s government is planning to supercharge the PIF into a $2 trillion fund.
And a major (let me repeat that) major focus of the PIF is technology. Why? The Saudis are extremely keen to diversify the kingdom’s oil-dependent economy and it needs a war-chest and technology assets to do that.
This policy is being driven by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the next in line to the thrown and dubbed ‘MBS’ by everyone in Saudi.
Since he was named heir-apparent last year he’s been on a tear, restricting the powers of the religious police, removing the ban on female drivers and various other cultural reforms. He’s also driving the country’s tech policy, which last week appointed Steve Wosniak as a “tech ambassador”.
He’s also behind Saudi Vision 2030, a huge national plan to diversify the economy, and develop public service sectors such as health, education and infrastructure. Technology will be a key enabler and driver of these numerous changes. Saudi Arabia is the largest spender on ICT in the Middle East, with spending estimated at $35 billion in 2015 and expected to surpass $39 billion by 2019.
Then there’s Neom, the planned mega city close to the border region of Saudi Arabia and Egypt which will be 33 times the size of New York and make Dubai look like a village. This is being backed by $500 billion from the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia and international investors.
Put all this in the context of a ‘mere’ $72 billion for Tesla, an icon of the industry, a millennial Crown Prince who is hot for tech, and a sovereign wealth fund which will eventually hit $2 trillion, and Elon Musk’s hints that he may find enough funding to take Tesla private might not look so fanciful after all.
Image Credit: Ahmed Kutty/Gulf News
Powerball ticket sold in New York City wins $245 million jackpot – CBS News
Berry growers using lasers to stave off thieving birds – Minnesota Public Radio News
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An Integrated Approach to Prevention: The Links between Prevention, the 2030 Agenda, and Sustaining Peace
An integrated approach to crisis and conflict prevention requires clarity on what is meant by prevention, and how the concept of prevention fits with the 2030 Agenda, sustaining peace, and other relevant frameworks. This new briefing paper by Sarah Cliffe and David Steven proposes a new paradigm for prevention that has three levels: (i) universal prevention strategies that aim to build healthy societies that manage conflict productively, provide safety and security, increase resilience, and enhance social, political, and economic inclusion; (ii) “at risk” prevention strategies that target groups, communities, and countries that face elevated risk of conflict, or where violence is highest and resilience lowest; and (iii) prevention strategies that are tailored to situations of ongoing conflict or crisis.
Author(s) / Contributor(s): Sarah Cliffe, David Steven
Topic(s): 2030 Agenda, Crises, International Security, Peace Operations, Post 2015 Development, Transnational Threats
Program(s): Multilateral Reform, Peace and Security, Peaceful, Just and Inclusive Societies
Who are the Killers of Beni?
Since October 2014, the region around the town of Beni in north eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) has been the site of some of the worst massacres in the country’s recent history. Over five hundred people have been killed and tens of thousands have fled their homes. The UN mission and the Congolese government have publicly stated that the massacres are the work of Ugandan rebels from the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).
Topic(s): Crises, Humanitarian Crises
For almost a decade, the Annual Review of Global Peace Operations (ARGPO) was the flagship publication of the Center on International Cooperation (CIC). During that time, CIC also released three editions of the Review of Political Missions.
Author(s) / Contributor(s): Jim Della-Giacoma, Alexandra Novosseloff, Ryan Rappa, Richard Gowan, Alischa Kugel , WPS Sidhu, Sarah Cliffe, Barnett Rubin, James Traub
Region/Country: China, Europe, Middle East, Libya, Syria, South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa
Topic(s): Afghanistan, Crises, Fragile States, Global Governance, United Nations
U.S., Russia Duel Over Humanitarian Interventions in Iraq and Ukraine
Is the UN peacekeeper selection process flawed?
The United States Lowers Israel's Diplomatic Shield at the United Nations
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You are here: Home / News / News / 2nd Annual Paulist Productions Scholarship
2nd Annual Paulist Productions Scholarship
February 1, 2016 /0 Comments/in News /by Colette Sartor
We are proud to announce that the 2nd Annual Paulist Productions Scholarship!
Paulist Productions, a company dedicated to developing stories at the intersection of faith and culture, will give a needs-based scholarship to one of our very talented semi-finalists to attend the Feature Retreat held from October 15th to October 18th in Idyllwild, CA.
To be in the running for this scholarship, you must submit your script before April 5th, 2016 through the CineStory website here. By entering, you will automatically be considered for the scholarship.
*Please note that the writer named as the CineStory Fellowship Winner is not eligible for the Paulist Productions Scholarship.
About Paulist Productions
Paulist Productions was founded over 50 years ago to provide thought-provoking entertainment that explores the human condition, and has produced award-winning documentaries, feature films, television, and TV movies addressing pressing social issues and important moral questions. Paulist has created programming for Paramount, Warner Brothers, CBS, ABC, A&E, the History Channel, Hallmark Hall of Fame and UPtv, collaborating with industry greats such as Martin Sheen, William Shatner and Tom Fontana. In a time of rapid change and declining options for family viewing, Paulist is dedicated to developing positive programming with meaningful content. For updates, please visit our page on Facebook.
https://secureservercdn.net/166.62.115.136/2v0.56f.myftpupload.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/paulist-productions.png?time=1563222299 198 120 Colette Sartor https://secureservercdn.net/166.62.115.136/2v0.56f.myftpupload.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/CineStory-logo-orig.png Colette Sartor2016-02-01 01:49:052019-05-03 14:43:032nd Annual Paulist Productions Scholarship
CineStory Alum Selected for Prestigious Writing Program 2016 TV Semifinalists in Original Categories
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West Haven Beaches & Shoreline
West Haven prides itself on being home to the longest stretch of publicly accessible shoreline in Connecticut. The city’s nearly 4-mile tract of beach on Long Island Sound comprises 25% of the state’s public beaches, a valuable asset that is ripe for discovery.
West Haven is also home to one of the best beaches to visit in New England, according to Globe Magazine, published by The Boston Globe and Boston Globe Media. In the magazine’s 2018 Summer Travel edition, West Haven, specifically the Sandy Point Beach & Bird Sanctuary, was ranked 11th out of “The 20 best beaches to visit in New England.”
According to the magazine, Sandy Point was best for “birding, fishing, trails.” When highlighting the area, the magazine said: “A 1.7-mile recreation path ties together West Haven’s sandy beaches on Long Island Sound. On the eastern end, the sand spit known as Sandy Point is one of the prize locations on the Connecticut Coastal Birding Trail. Save the swimming for nearby Bradley Point and Morse parks and take the binoculars to Sandy Point to watch the shorebirds. A colony of sharp-tailed sparrows nests in the adjacent tidal marsh. The entire sanctuary is also a major stopover for spring and fall migrants. Surfcasters like the point at night during striper season.” Read the full article at Globe Magazine.
The West Haven shore is one of the state’s foremost locations to observe rare shorebirds, serving as a migratory route for some of the most endangered bird species. The Sandy Point Beach & Bird Sanctuary, a site listed on the Connecticut Coastal Birding Trail, has been designated an “Important Bird Area” by Audubon Connecticut, a state office of the National Audubon Society. The estuary is also where Sammy the harp seal has been spotted.
Learn more about Sandy Point at Audubon Connecticut's website and CT Waterbirds Blogspot.
Historic Bradley Point Park, boasting scenic panoramas of Long Island Sound, marks the area where invading British troops landed on July 5, 1779, and now serves as a haven for picnickers and passive recreation. The shoreline is just minutes from the downtown business and entertainment district.
2019 Lifeguard Hours
Lifeguards are on duty weekends only from May 25 to June 23, daily from June 24 to Aug. 9, and weekends only from Aug. 10 to Sept. 2. Supervision is from 10:15 a.m. to 3 p.m. weekdays and 10:15 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekends.
2019 Daily Parking Rates (Nonresidents)
The daily parking fee for nonresidents is $12, or $1.50 per hour, payable at the parking meters in the Sea Bluff, Bradley Point, Morse Park and Sandy Point beach lots and at the April Street boat ramp. The kiosks accept bills, coins and credit cards.
Directions to Beaches
Sandy Point Beach & Bird Sanctuary
Savin Rock Museum
Ward-Heitmann House Museum
West Haven Veterans Museum & Learning Center
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‘We take full responsibility and we regret any inconvenience our decision might have caused’ – INEC apologises to Nigerians
Professor Mahmood Yakubu, Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), has taken full responsibility for the postponement of the elections. In a new statement released this evening, he cited bad weather and other logistics issues, as well as cases of lawsuits filed against the commission. He, however, restated the commitment of the commission to ensuring free, fair and credible elections. He said the commission was confronted with myriad of challenges and had to resort to postponing the elections. See the full statement below…l. About thirteen hours ago, I conveyed to Nigerians the decision of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to reschedule the 2019 general elections by one week. Presidential and National Assembly elections earlier scheduled for 16th February 2019 will now hold on Saturday 23rd February 2019, while Governorship, State Assembly and FCT Area Council elections scheduled for 2nd March 20l9 will now hold on Saturday 9th March 2019. The one-week adjustment was a painful one for INEC, but necessary in the overall interest of our democracy.2. Nigerians will recall that when this Commission was appointed in November 2015, we promised Nigerians two cardinal things. First, we shall work hard to consolidate the improvements made in the management of elections. Secondly, we shall always be open, transparent and responsive. We have strived diligently to keep these promises in very trying circumstances.3. In keeping with our promise to consolidate the gains of the last two electoral cycles, the Commission has conducted 195 rerun and off-season elections across the country since the last general elections. Most of these elections have been generally adjudged to show progressive improvements in planning, execution and outcomes.4. This commitment to continue to improve on election administration has informed our preparations for the 20l9 general elections. Our goal is to plan carefully, execute meticulously and bring stability into election management in Nigeria. Consequently, we announced fixed dates for elections in Nigeria to the effect that Presidential and National Assembly elections will always hold on the third Saturday in February of an election year. While the Governorship and State Assembly elections follow two weeks later. Having settled this, we began the planning quite early, with a Strategic Plan (SP), 3 Strategic Programme of Action (SPA) and an Election Project Plan (EPP). In fact, the plan for the 2019 general elections was ready in November 2017 and we subsequently issued the timetable and schedule of activities for the elections over one year ago on 9th January 2018. We carefully followed the timetable and implemented 13 of the 14 activities as scheduled. We kept to the timeframe and have not missed the date fixed for any single activity.5. In preparing for the 2019 general elections, we have come face-to-face with the realities of conducting such an extensive national deployment of men and materials in a developing country like ours. It is said that elections constitute the most extensive mobilization of men and materials that any country could undertake in peacetime. The challenges of doing so, even under the best of circumstances, are enormous. Within a period of 16 months, we registered over 14 million Nigerians as new voters, collecting their names, addresses, photographs and their entire ten fingerprints. Beyond that, we prepared, printed and delivered their Permanent Voter Cards for collection. I should note that of the 14.28 million Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) made available for collection, about 10.87 million or 76.12% have been collected.6. It is often not appreciated the magnitude of activities that the Commission undertakes during general elections. Not only have we recruited and trained about 1 million young people to serve as ad hoc staff, the magnitude of materials mobilized for our elections isenormous. For instance, the Commission has printed 421.7 million ballot papers for six scheduled elections, as well as 13.6 million leaves of result forms for the Presidential election alone. Indeed, managing 91 political parties and 23,316 candidates for whom votes will be cast in 119,973 polling units by over 84 million voters is certainly astounding. No doubt, preparations for the 2019 general elections have been extremely tasking for the Commission.7. It is therefore not unexpected that such a tremendous national mobilization of men and materials will encounter operational challenges and we have had our own fair share of such challenges. There has been delay in delivering ballot papers and result sheets for the elections which is not unusual. However, I must emphasize that all the ballot papers and result sheets were ready before the elections despite the very tight legal timeframe for finalizing nomination of candidates and dealing with the spate of legal challenges that accompany it. In this regard, the Commission has been sued or joined in over 640 court cases arising from the nomination of candidates. As at today, there are 40 different court orders against the Commission on whether to add or drop candidates. The net effect of these is that there is usually roughly a one-month window for the Commission to print ballot papers and result sheets and either fly or transport them to several destinations until they finally get to each polling unit. Unfortunately, in the last one week, flights within the country have been adversely affected by bad weather. For instance, three days ago, we were unable to deliver materials to some locations due to bad weather. We therefore had to rely on slow-moving long haulage vehicles to locations that can be serviced by air in spite of the fact that we created five zonal airport hubs: Abuja (North Central), Port Harcourt (South South and South East), Kano (North West), Maiduguri and Yola (North East) and Lagos (South West) to facilitate the delivery of electoral logistics.8. Apart from these logistical challenges, we also faced what may well be attempts to sabotage our preparations. In a space of two weeks, we had to deal with serious fire incidents in three of our offices in Isiala Ngwa South Local Government Area of Abia State, Qu’an Pan Local Government Area of Plateau State and our Anambra State Office at Awka. In all three cases, serious disruptions were occasioned by the fire, further diverting our attention from regular preparations to recovery from the impact of the incidents. In Isiala Ngwa South, hundreds of PVCs were burnt, necessitating the re-compiling of the affected cards and reprinting in time to ensure that the affected voters are not disenfranchised. I am glad that all the cards were quickly reprinted and made available for collection by their owners.9. In Qu’an Pan Local Government Area, our entire office was razed, destroying all the materials prepared for the elections printed register of voters, ballot boxes, voting cubicles and several electricitygenerating sets. 11 Registration Areas and over 100 polling units were affected by the fire. We recovered quickly and have since replaced everything destroyed. In addition, we secured a suitable building from which to conduct the elections.10. Perhaps the most serious was the fire incident in our Anambra State Office at Awka, which destroyed over 4,600 Smart Card Readers being prepared for the elections. These Card Readers take at least six months to procure. Despite this setback, we have practically recovered from this by mopping up every available spare SCR across the country and within 24 hours delivered them for elections to hold in Anambra State.11. All these challenges mean that there have been differences in preparations from one state to another. Our overall assessment is that if the elections went on as planned, polls will not open at 8am in all polling units nationwide. Yet, we are determined that polls must hold at the same time everywhere in the country. In this way, elections will not be staggered. This is very important to public perception of elections as free, fair and credible. We promised Nigerians that we shall be open, transparent and responsive.12. Faced with these challenges, we initially thought that we only require a maximum of 24 hours to resolve the logistics issues involved and complete our deployment for the election. This would mean shifting the elections to commence on Sunday 17th February 2019. However, given the restriction of movement during elections, that could affect many voters who worship on Sundays. While the Commission was considering the following Monday 18th February 2019 as an option, our ICT Department advised us that it would require 5-6 days to reconfigure about 180,000 Smart Card Readers earlier programmed to work only on election day Saturday 16th February 20l9. It is for this reason that the Commission decided to adjust the election dates to Saturday 23rd February 2019 for Presidential and National Assembly elections and a consequential adjustment of Governorship, State Assembly and FCT Area Council elections to Saturday 9th March 2019. 13. Some sensitive materials have been distributed. However, all such materials have been retrieved and will be taken back to custody of the Central Bank of Nigeria. I want to assure you that there will be properaudit to account for all materials.14. In the next few days, the Commission will work on the basis of the following plan:S/No. Activity Timeframe- Completion/confirmation of deployment of materials (Monday l8th February 2019)- Configuration of the Smart Card Readers (Sunday 17th Thursday 21st February 2019)- Receipt and Deployment of sensitive materials to LGAs (Wednesday 20 and Thursday 21st February 2019)- Refresher training for ad hoc staff (Thursday 21st February 2019)- Deployment of personnel to RACs (Friday 22nd of February 2019)- Election Day (Saturday 23rd February 2019)15. I want to appeal to Nigerians and all other stakeholders for their understanding in what has been a very difficult decision for the Commission. But we believe that ultimately this is for the good of our democracy and country. I wish to assure you of our commitment to free, fair and credible elections.16. As Chairman of INEC, and on behalf of the Commission, we take full responsibility for what happened and we regret any inconvenience our decision might have caused.17. Thank you and God bless.The post ‘We take full responsibility and we regret any inconvenience our decision might have caused’ – INEC apologises to Nigerians appeared first Citypeople.com.ng.
Related Topics:apologisescausedDecisionfullinconvenienceINECNigeriansregretresponsibility
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Two Nigerians Score As Arsenal Defeat Colorado Rapids 3-0
We didnât transmit results electronically â INEC Chair
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Walmart Pays $282 Million to End Long-Running FCPA Investigation
Expensive Reminder About the Importance of Monitoring Foreign Agents
On June 20, 2019, Walmart Inc. (“Walmart” or the “Company”), the Arkansas-based global retail corporation, settled a long-running corruption investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice (the “DOJ”) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) (collectively the “Government”), with the Company paying a total of $282 million in penalties and disgorgement and its Brazilian subsidiary pleading guilty to criminal charges.1 Under the DOJ settlement, Walmart and its wholly owned Brazilian subsidiary, WMT Brasilia S.a.r.l. (“WMT Brasilia”), agreed to pay a combined criminal penalty of $137 million to resolve the DOJ’s criminal investigation into violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (the “FCPA”) and agreed to the appointment of an independent monitor for a two-year period. WMT Brasilia pleaded guilty to criminal charges of knowing and willful violations of the FCPA’s books and records provisions.2 The parallel SEC settlement involved an administrative order in which Walmart agreed to disgorge approximately $145 million for violations of the books and records and internal controls provisions of the FCPA.3 Although Walmart did not voluntarily self-disclose the conduct, it received credit for cooperation and undertook extensive remediation.
According to the agreed-upon statement of facts in the DOJ settlement documents, as well as allegations in the SEC administrative order, from 2000 until 2011, despite the fact that certain Walmart personnel responsible for implementing and maintaining the Company’s internal accounting controls related to anti-corruption were aware of certain controls failures, including failures related to potentially improper payments to government officials by certain Walmart foreign subsidiaries, Walmart failed to implement appropriate internal controls to prevent such improper payments. Specifically, the DOJ alleged that Walmart failed to do the following: (1) conduct sufficient anti-corruption due diligence on third-party intermediaries (“TPIs”) who interacted with foreign officials; (2) implement appropriate controls related to payments to TPIs; (3) require proof of services before paying TPIs; (4) require that TPIs had written contracts with anti-corruption compliance provisions; (5) ensure that donations ostensibly made to foreign government agencies were not converted to personal use by foreign officials; and (6) implement appropriate policies covering gifts, travel and entertainment for foreign officials.
As a result of these failures, Walmart’s subsidiaries in Mexico, India, Brazil and China hired TPIs without sufficient controls in place to prevent them from making improper payments to government officials in connection with obtaining store permits and licenses. The insufficient internal controls enabled Walmart’s foreign subsidiaries in Mexico, India, Brazil and China to accelerate store openings.
In Mexico, a former attorney for Walmart Mexico reported to Walmart in 2005 that, for several years prior, he had personally overseen a scheme in which certain TPIs, called “gestores,” made improper payments to government officials to obtain permits and licenses for the subsidiary and that several executives at the subsidiary knew of and approved of the scheme. Invoices submitted by the gestores included a code that identified the reasons the subsidiary had made the improper payment, including (1) to avoid a requirement; (2) to influence, control or gain knowledge of privileged information known by the government officials; and (3) to eliminate fines. Despite identifying corroborating evidence in a preliminary review of the allegations, and recommendations from Walmart in-house investigators and Internal Audit regarding further investigative steps, Walmart tasked an internal lawyer, whom the former Walmart Mexico attorney had alleged knew about the improper payment scheme, to lead the remainder of the internal investigation. The investigation concluded that the former Walmart Mexico attorney’s allegations were unfounded, though it noted that certain of Walmart Mexico’s anti-corruption controls were deficient. Walmart failed to implement recommendations related to those weaknesses in controls until 2011.
The DOJ and the SEC also alleged that in India, Walmart was aware of corruption risks but knowingly failed to take steps to implement appropriate internal controls to address those risks. Between 2008 and early 2011, six internal audit reports identified weaknesses in anti-corruption related internal controls of Walmart’s majority-owned joint venture in India. As a result, from 2009 until 2011, Walmart’s joint venture in India retained TPIs that made improper payments to government officials in order to obtain store-operating permits and licenses. These improper payments were recorded in the joint venture’s books and records with vague descriptions like “misc fees,” “miscellaneous,” “professional fees,” “incidental” and “government fee.”
Likewise, in Brazil, beginning as early as 2008 and continuing until 2011, Walmart executives received internal audit reports identifying weaknesses in anti-corruption related internal controls at Walmart Brazil.4 Despite these repeated findings, Walmart Brazil continued to engage TPIs without conducting the required due diligence. Certain of these TPIs made improper payments to Brazilian government officials, including a construction company that made improper payments to government officials in connection with the construction of two Brazil stores in 2009, without the knowledge of Walmart Brazil. Walmart Brazil also used this construction company to indirectly hire a TPI that Walmart Brazil could not engage directly due to corruption red flags associated with the TPI. The TPI made improper payments to Brazilian government officials in connection with the construction of a Walmart store in Brazil, albeit without the knowledge of Walmart Brazil.
Finally, in China, Walmart’s local subsidiary’s Internal Audit team flagged anti-corruption controls weaknesses between 2003 and 2011, including those related to small payments or gifts to government officials. From 2007 until early 2010, Walmart and the subsidiary failed to address virtually any anti-corruption related audit concerns.
Walmart entered into a three-year non-prosecution agreement with the DOJ and agreed to retain an independent corporate compliance monitor for two years. The $137 million penalty reflects a 20 percent reduction off the bottom of the applicable U.S. Sentencing Guidelines fine range for the portion of the penalty applicable to conduct in Mexico and a 25 percent reduction for the portion applicable to the conduct in Brazil, China and India. Walmart fully cooperated with the investigations in Brazil, China and India, but the DOJ concluded that, with regard to Mexico, the company did not timely provide documents and information to the government and did not “de-conflict” with the government’s request to interview a witness before Walmart itself interviewed that witness. In addition, the resolution reflected the fact that Walmart did not voluntarily disclose the conduct in Mexico and only disclosed the conduct in Brazil, China and India only after the DOJ had already begun investigating the conduct in Mexico. The $137 million penalty includes a forfeiture of $3.6 million and a fine of $724,898 from WMT Brasilia.
The SEC’s administrative order mirrors the conduct alleged in the DOJ resolution. Walmart consented to the SEC’s order finding that it violated the books and records and internal accounting controls provisions of the FCPA and agreed to pay approximately $144 million in disgorgement and prejudgment interest.5
What is perhaps most notable about Walmart’s FCPA settlement is the duration of the investigation and the resulting costs. Walmart first disclosed the FCPA investigation in December 2011, approximately seven and a half years ago. The Company announced a reserve for the settlement in November 2017, more than 18 months ago. In addition to the fines and disgorgement, Walmart has disclosed in securities filings that it spent more than $900 million in professional fees and compliance enhancement expenses. Notwithstanding the considerable time that has elapsed and the substantial expenses incurred by Walmart, the DOJ stated that “an independent compliance monitor is necessary to ensure that the Company’s compliance program is operating effectively and adequately tested . . . .” In addition, Walmart also paid $160 million to settle a shareholder class action related to the FCPA investigation. Although Walmart was able to obtain cooperation and remediation credit in the absence of a voluntary disclosure, consistent with the DOJ’s corporate enforcement policy, the case demonstrates the importance of being proactive in response to allegations of wrongdoing and findings of potential weaknesses in anti-corruption internal controls. Companies should be aware that their responses to corruption red flags or internal controls weaknesses may be viewed and judged in hindsight, and should be careful to take reasoned, appropriate measures to address such allegations or findings.
Click here to download this article.
1 Walmart first disclosed the Government’s investigation in an SEC filing in 2011, and subsequently disclosed approximately $910 million in professional fees and compliance enhancement expenses related to the investigation through last year.
2 Non-Prosecution Agreement with Walmart Inc. (June 20, 2019), available here; Plea Agreement with WMT Brasilia S.a.r.l. (June 20, 2019), available here; Judgement at 4, United State v. WMT Brasilia S.a.r.l., No. 19cr192 (E.D. Va. June 20, 2019), ECF No. 14.
3 Securities and Exchange Commission, In re Walmart Inc., Administrative Proceeding File No. 3-19207 (June 20, 2019).
4 WMT Brasilia is a wholly owned subsidiary of Walmart and is a majority-owner of Walmart Brazil, Walmart’s wholly owned subsidiary in Brazil, and the majority-owner of retail stores operating as Walmart Brazil.
5 Notably, although neither the SEC nor the DOJ alleged violations of the FCPA’s anti-bribery provisions, the SEC nevertheless obtained disgorgement.
Anti-Bribery and Anti-Corruption - US
Jeffrey D. Clark
Robert J. Meyer
Michael S. Schachter
William J. Stellmach
Martin J. Weinstein
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Home Conceal & Carry
4 Cases That Highlight the Thorny Subject of Concealed Carry at Work
in Conceal & Carry
You work in a place of business that may be prone to armed robberies, but the employer insists that all employees remain unarmed. Obviously, there are times when the rights of employers and employees collide regarding concealed carry at work.
Can an employer fire an employee for carrying a gun against the employer’s orders? Yes. Can the employee sue the employer for defending himself? Well, he can try, but I’ve not yet seen a case where the fired employee prevailed in such a lawsuit. Here’s why.
Instructive Example — Case One
In 2014, mlive.com reported, “A federal appeals court has affirmed Walgreens’ rights in firing a pharmacist who shot at armed robbers using his legally concealed handgun. Jeremy Hoven was fired from a Walgreens in Benton Harbor [Michigan] in 2011, eight days after shooting at armed robbers who entered the store during his overnight shift. Walgreens said he violated the company’s ‘non-escalation’ policy.
“Hoven was working in the back of the store when he noticed a manager being pushed toward him by one of the armed robbers. He tried to dial 911, but one of the robbers jumped over the counter and pointed a gun at him. Hoven’s attorney said the alleged robber tried to shoot at Hoven, but the suspect’s gun jammed. Hoven pulled his handgun and fired shots at the suspect. No injuries occurred in the incident captured by surveillance video. Benton Township Police said there have been no arrests in the case.
“In a 3-0 decision Monday, June 2, the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals said there are no public policies protecting Hoven. He filed a lawsuit claiming he was terminated in violation of public policy for exercising his rights of self-defense, defense of others and to carry a concealed weapon. A federal judge in 2012 granted Walgreens’ motion for dismissal before the case could go to trial. Hoven didn’t dispute that he was an at-will employee who could be fired at any time for any, or no, reason. He became a full-time pharmacist for Walgreens in 2006. Hoven experienced an armed robbery at the pharmacy in 2007. He then asked the company to improve its security systems, but Walgreens didn’t comply. Hoven received a concealed pistol license and carried a handgun in his pants pocket during his shifts.”
The story continued, “Michigan’s Concealed Pistol Licensing Act says that an employer shall not prohibit an employee from receiving and carrying a concealed weapon with a license, but also says the law ‘does not prohibit an employer from prohibiting an employee from carrying a concealed pistol in the course of his or her employment with that employer.’ Hoven argued the statute is unconstitutional and ‘improperly delegates authority to private employers to regulate, restrict and eliminate an individual’s fundamental right to bear arms for self-defense and defense of others’ by denying permit holders their right to carry in the workplace for self-defense.”
However, “The Court of Appeals said the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and Article I of the Michigan Constitution prevent some state interference with an individual’s right to bear arms and engage in self-defense, but ‘they do not prevent interference with these rights by private actors.’ Appeals Judge Karen Nelson Moore wrote that the Michigan Self-Defense Act doesn’t confer an unlimited right to engage in self-defense — it only provides a potential defense to criminal prosecution by the state.”
More Concealed Carry at Work Cases
Losing your job for defending your life with a gun carried in defiance of company policy may not necessarily render you unemployable. Consider the following concealed carry at work examples.
Case Two
In 2017 in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Jennifer Wertz, a young mother of three, was working her shift behind the counter at a major gas station when an armed robber entered and pointed his weapon at her. She promptly drew her own handgun and shot the man in the chest, decisively ending the encounter. He survived his chest wound, and she emerged unscathed. However, the company suspended her for two weeks without pay and said she would probably lose her job, since the chain had a “no guns for employees” policy.
Ms. Wertz told the press, “I’d rather be alive and have to find another job. So I was thinking about it, and I realized it was either shoot or be shot, so I decided to protect myself. I will continue to protect myself and my family.”
Her mother took the matter to GoFundMe, and an outraged public promptly donated almost $75,000 to the courageous young woman who had fought back. Sounds like a happy ending to me.
Case Three
Some three decades ago, right after Florida passed its landmark “shall issue” carry license law, Mark Yuhr became the first identified “save” from that reform legislation. Driving a taxi in Miami, a thug robbed him at gunpoint. When it became apparent that the robber was going to murder him because he hadn’t gotten enough money, Mark drew his own newly licensed Colt Government Model 1911 and emptied it into the gunman before the latter could fire his stolen S&W 9mm pistol.
Authorities ruled it a justifiable homicide and no lawsuits followed. However, the taxi company frowned on armed drivers and Mark ended up separated from his employment. When word got out on what happened, an outraged public swamped Mark with job offers, and he entered what would become a distinguished career in professional security. And he would later use the same Colt .45 to win another deadly battle against an armed criminal.
Case Four
Public opinion can dissuade the employing authority from enforcing its “no-gun” policy against employees. In Pennsylvania, a crazed gunman entered a psychiatric clinic and shot his case worker to death. He then turned his gun on Dr. Lee Silverman, wounding him. Silverman, however, shot back with his own little Seecamp .32 ACP; wounding the gunman badly enough to stop the budding murder spree.
The National Review reported, “District attorney Jack Whelan said, ‘If Dr. Silverman did not have the firearm and did not utilize the firearm, he’d be dead today. And other people would be dead.’ In fact, the doctor had breached the facility’s ‘no firearms’ policy by carrying a weapon with him to work. The facility released a statement saying that it looked forward to his ‘return to serving patients at our hospital.’”
For obvious reasons, neither Combat Handguns nor I will advise you to violate employment policy. Prosecutors can charge those who carry concealed in gun-free zones. In fact, folks have been warned not to do so beforehand. At the same time, these cases of people who carried against policy and would have died otherwise cannot be ignored. This collision of rights is what makes the matter so worthy of discussion.
This article is from the July/August 2018 issue of Combat Handguns Magazine. Digital and physical copies available at OutdoorGroupStore.com.
Tags: Concealed CarryLifestyleMassad AyoobSelf Defense
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Spotlighting this month's hottest up-and-coming artist
CoSign: All Dogs Deliver Pop Punk Straight Outta Ohio
The Columbus quartet is one of the best acts we saw at SXSW
on March 22, 2016, 2:30pm
Photo by Ben Kaye
“Honestly, I was just born to do this,” Maryn Jones tells me in a hotel lobby before her band, All Dogs, plays one of their final South by Southwest shows. “This” is, of course, making music. She’s known for years, but started seriously focusing in 2007 when she was 19. Living in Boston, she desperately wanted to be in a band, but couldn’t find one that fit.
“Everyone was a lot older,” she recalls, “and there was just a lot of dudes playing in bands, and I was like, ‘I want to be in a band, but I only know one or two women that play [punk] music in Boston.'” She befriended Columbus outfit Delay when they came through and ended up visiting them in Ohio, where she discovered a completely different scene. “I think one of the first shows I went to, it was a band of all women,” she says of that fateful visit. “Everyone was just really nice and really supportive and encouraging … I feel like this was before there was a big push to make music more inclusive, and so it was really striking to me.”
She soon left Massachusetts for Ohio, eventually forming All Dogs with bassist Amanda Bartley and Delay drummer Jesse Withers. They recorded a split tape and 7-inch as a three-piece before adding Philadelphia-based guitarist Nick Harris. Where prior songs were written by Jones and handed off to the bandmates to add their parts, their debut record, Kicking Every Day, was far more collaborative. “It was more like, ‘Here’s a guitar riff. I don’t know what to do with it. You guys help me.’ Or Amanda would write a guitar riff and be like, ‘Do you guys like this?’ ‘Yeah, I’ll write a melody. Let’s bring it to Jesse.'”
As a second guitarist in a second city, Harris’ parts came together much like the earlier recordings did. However, that might not be the case for long. “I’m moving to Philly any day now,” Jones reveals. Though she found new life in Columbus years ago, the local basement scene began dying as people got older and started families — “Just doing the thing,” as Jones puts it.
Ironically, her old hometown of Boston has since shifted to become the type of place Jones would’ve thrived. “I know so many women that play in bands there, and they’re like fucking badass and hardcore bands. And you know, that’s not the most important part of it, but it’s really inspiring.” Always willing to move with the scene, she sees what’s happening in Philly now as the same vibe that drew her to Columbus years ago, and it’s something she wants to be around.
In fact, she needs to be around music in general; that’s why she also plays in Saintseneca and has her solo project, Yowler. Yowler’s debut release, The Offer, was written within a year of Kicking Every Day, but as a different type of lyrical outlet. “All Dogs’ songs are really personal and about some personal things and like mental health,” she explains. “And so are the Yowler ones, but the Yowler ones are very intense.” Where All Dogs follows a theme of love’s toils, Yowler is more free. “I was just allowing myself to write whatever came out,” she explains.
Jones needs those options, because as wonderful as All Dogs’ “poppy songs that are played really loud” are, she knows her creativity craves multiple channels. “Honestly, I don’t think that I could ever be in one project, because that’s just how my brain works.” That said, the band knows All Dogs is something special. “I feel incredibly serious about it,” she declares, “and I feel very tied to it. I think everybody likes being in the band – I hope – and I feel like this is the first time for most of us that we’ve kind of taken on a project [with the goal of making it a career].”
Although she says the other band members may be on the cusp of deciding to continue on or “get real jobs,” there’s a joy in their live show that makes you hope they never do. It’s an open sweetness that makes you feel welcomed in the rowdy, poppy world they inhabit, full of honest melodies.
Photo by Philip Cosores
As Kicking Every Day gains more and more acclaim, signs point to All Dogs being a lasting pop punk outfit. Either way, Jones has all the makings of a powerful female voice in modern music. She’s drawn comparisons to Waxahatchee, Girlpool, and Mitski, something she speculates originates from them all being “women feeling just very real.” “I feel like a lot of times women in music become this symbol or something, just like a thing. It’s more about the fact that it’s a woman playing music, when it’s like, ‘I’m actually just a human.'”
Jones may be just a human, but she and the Dogs are making some utterly endearing music.
CoSign
SBTRKT and The-Dream join forces on new song “Good Morning” — listen
In wake of Brussels terror attacks, WB cancels Batman v Superman red carpet in London
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salomon_amar@nymc.edu
Salomon Amar, DDS, PhD
Provost for Biomedical Research, Vice Dean for Research, Professor of Dental Medicine
Share Amar, Salomon on Facebook Share Amar, Salomon on LinkedIn Share Amar, Salomon on Twitter
Dr. Salomon Amar is Professor of Dental Medicine and Provost for Biomedical Research at Touro College and University System, and Professor of Pharmacology, Professor of Microbiology and Immunology, as well as Vice Dean for Research at New York Medical College. He is a prolific researcher and author of more than 160 scholarly articles on topics including the role of inflammation and oral health, molecular immunology, biotechnology, periodontal disease, pharmacology and clinical trials. His research has been covered in The Wall Street Journal and The Los Angeles Times among several others.
Dr. Amar studied Mathematics and Physics at Aquiba School in Strasbourg France. At Louis Pasteur University in Strasbourg, France Dr. Amar received his B.S. in Mathematics and Physics, a D.D.S, a M.S. in Skeletal Tissues and Apatites, a Ph.D. in Developmental Biology, as well as a certificate in Histology Cytology and Periodontology.
Dr. Amar was a USA Postdoctoral Fellow in Biochemistry-Molecular Biology at Northwestern University, earned a USA Certificate in Periodontology at the Eastman Dental Center, and his USA D.M.D. at Boston University.
1980 Aquiba School, Strasbourg, France B.S., Mathematics and Physics
1985 Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg, France D.D.S.
1985 Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg, France Certificate, Histology Cytology
1986 Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg, France M.S., Skeletal Tissues and Apatites
1987 Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg, France Certificate, Periodontology
1989 Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg, France Ph.D., Developmental Biology
1990 Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois, USA Postdoctoral Fellow, Biochemistry-Molecular Biology
1994 Eastman Dental Center, Rochester, NY USA Certificate, Periodontology
1997 Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts, USA D.M.D
You can see his recent abstracts at NIH PubMed site.
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US begins the military encirclement of Russia
June 30, 2015 · by truthman_2012 · in News · Leave a comment
The US is to deploy heavy weapons – including tanks, armoured vehicles and artillery – in a number of European nations, amid Nato concerns over Russia’s role in Ukraine. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-33238004
US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter said the equipment would be placed in Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania.
Nato has vowed to boost military might in the east as ties with Russia have soured.
Russia has condemned the new Nato and US moves.
Responding earlier to reports of the planned deployment, Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Nato of “coming to our borders”.
On a visit to the Estonian capital, Tallinn, Mr Carter said each set of equipment would be enough either for a military company, or about 150 soldiers, or a battalion – roughly 750 soldiers.
Much of the equipment was already in Europe, officials said.
In addition to the six nations, Germany will also take part in the expanded military effort, but already has the US materiel.
Mr Carter said several European countries had agreed to host the new deployment
Mr Carter said the equipment would be moved around the region to help forces in Europe train better and be more mobile.
“We intend to move those equipment sets around as exercises move around,” he said. “They’re not static.”
According to a fact-sheet provided by the US military, the deployment would include 250 tanks, Bradley fighting vehicles and self-propelled howitzer artillery guns.
Analysis: BBC defence correspondent Jonathan Marcus
Mr Carter’s announcement is the latest in a battery of measures intended to reassure Nato allies in the face of a resurgent Russia.
In 2013, the last US tanks left Europe – part of the draw-down at the end of the Cold War. About a year later, small numbers were sent back to a training range in Germany, but now much more significant numbers of armoured vehicles are being deployed.
In an effort to spread the reassurance as widely as possible, the tanks and other combat vehicles will go to seven countries: Bulgaria, Estonia, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania. This may be intended to send a signal to Moscow as well; penny packets of vehicles dispersed to a number of countries may look less threatening than a full armoured brigade in a single location.
The US has also pledged intelligence, logistical and a range of other support to Nato’s new very-high-readiness reaction force. But the message from Washington is clear. It still expects its Nato allies to take on their share of bolstering the alliance’s defences.
A Russian defence ministry official, quoted by Reuters news agency, said the placement of weapons in Nato states along the border would be the most aggressive US act since the Cold War.
Earlier this week, Mr Carter said the US would contribute weapons, aircraft and personnel to a new Nato rapid-reaction force.
Nato announced the formation of the force last year, amid concern over the potential threat from Russia and from Islamic State rebels in the Middle East.
Ties between Nato and Russia have been strained since conflict erupted in Ukraine last year.
The Ukrainian government, Western leaders and Nato say there is clear evidence that Russia is aiding the rebels in eastern Ukraine with heavy weapons and soldiers. Independent experts echo that accusation.
Moscow denies it, insisting that any Russians serving with the rebels are “volunteers”.
Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter confirmed plans to position heavy American tanks and other weaponry in the Baltics and Eastern Europe for the first time. The plan has prompted unease in some quarters ahead of the NATO defense ministers’ meetings, and strong protests from Moscow that coincided with an announcement by President Vladimir V. Putin that he was bolstering Russia’s arsenal of strategic nuclear weapons. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/24/world/europe/nato-returns-its-attention-to-an-old-foe-russia.html?ref=world
Revising Strategies
Russia’s annexation of Crimea, and its role in the war in eastern Ukraine, has already resulted in what NATO’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, recently called “the biggest reinforcement of NATO forces since the end of the Cold War.”
It has involved a marked increase in training rotations on territory of the newer NATO allies in the east, and increased patrols of the air and seas from the Baltic to the Black Sea intended to counter an increase of patrols by Russian forces around NATO’s periphery.
Most of those are temporary deployments. But in February, NATO announced that it would set up six new command units within the Eastern allies and create a 5,000-strong rapid reaction “spearhead” force.
With the leaders of NATO’s 28 members scheduled to gather in Warsaw for an important summit meeting next year, the alliance is now considering what other measures are needed to adjust its forces, to increase spending that had plummeted as part of a “peace dividend,” and to revisit NATO’s military strategy and planning.
“During the Cold War, we had everything there in the neighborhood we needed to respond,” said Julianne Smith, a former defense and White House official who is now a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security in Washington. “It’s all atrophied. We haven’t gone through the muscle movements of a conventional attack in Europe for decades.”
NATO’s steps, and its deliberations over future ones, have exposed internal tensions within the alliance over the extent of the threat Mr. Putin’s Russia poses. That, in turn, has colored the debate over how vigorously the allies should prepare.
Some view the threat as imminent, while others view Russia as less a threat than the instability, the flood of migrants and the rise of extremism emanating from North Africa. A recent poll suggested that residents in some member nations were far from committed to the notion of going to war to protect the other NATO allies — let alone Ukraine.
NATO’s response to the events in Ukraine has required a shift in strategic thinking as profound as the one that accompanied the collapse of the Soviet Union, when the alliance’s main adversary suddenly no longer existed. For years, the Russia that emerged from the Soviet ruins seemed destined to be a partner if not an ally, something Mr. Putin himself did not rule out when he first came to office in 2000.
“I don’t think we’re in the Cold War again — yet,” said James G. Stavridis, the retired admiral and NATO military commander, now dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, who served on a destroyer as a “thorough seagoing cold warrior” when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991.
He added, however, “I can kind of see it from here.”
While some do not rule out a conventional confrontation — something Mr. Putin himself rejected as “insane” — others point to the potential threats shrouded in subterfuge and subversion, much like Russia’s annexation of Crimea in March 2014 and its continuing support for ethnic Russians in the war in eastern Ukraine, which has claimed more than 6,000 lives.
A confidential assessment of the risk of Russia destabilizing the Baltic States is expected to be presented at the NATO meetings this week. But the potential for such an attack has implicitly been the focus of much of the training and planning going on in places like this.
In private and in public, some officials and commanders argue that much more is needed to reverse two decades of policy, particularly to shore up an eastern flank that to many, especially here in the Baltics, feels gravely exposed to a Russian attack.
Poland’s defense minister, Tomasz Siemoniak, said that NATO had to undertake a “strategic adaptation” that accounted for the fact that Russia’s hostility toward the alliance was “a change in climate and not a summer storm.” It is time, he said, to consider significant deployments of heavy weapons in Eastern Europe, brushing
aside the worry that such a move would provoke Russia. “I think the caution expressed by some of our European allies is excessive,” Mr.
Siemoniak said in a speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington in May.
Some believe that stoking divisions among the allies is simply another of the tactics that Mr. Putin has employed.
Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, the commander of United States Army forces in Europe, said in an interview, “I am sure they want to create doubts in the minds of some members of the alliance that the other 27 members won’t be there for them.”
The rising tensions between NATO and Russia coincide with a sharp decline in the United States military presence in Europe: to 64,000 troops now, including just 27,000 soldiers, from more than 400,000 at the height of the Cold War. Other nations’ militaries have shrunk, too. Britain now has a smaller army than during the Crimean War in the mid-19th century.
The notion of a more robust NATO has encountered inertia that has built over the last two decades. The “peace dividend” that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union could prove hard to reverse, said David Ochmanek, a former senior Pentagon official who is a senior analyst at the RAND Corporation.
NATO’s militaries drew down so precipitously that it has become a regular challenge for members to maintain military spending at 2 percent of gross domestic product, a level considered minimal for effective defense.
At the same time, few of the NATO allies are looking to increase military spending significantly. “Nobody in any military establishment is looking for more bills to pay right now,” Mr. Ochmanek said.
A Message of Solidarity
Even before the annexation of Crimea, NATO had watched Russia warily.
“NATO has reduced defense spending over a long period of time, especially European NATO allies,” Mr. Stoltenberg said in an interview in Washington in May. “Russia has increased substantially. So they have modernized their forces. They have increased their capacity. And they are exercising more. And they are also now starting to use nuclear rhetoric, nuclear exercises and nuclear operations as part of their nuclear posture. This is destabilizing.”
While American officials say that exercises like the one at this former Soviet tank base are mainly to allow NATO and Baltic States to hone their training together, they are also intended to send a strong message of solidarity. More than 6,000 troops from 14 allied nations — three times the number of
soldiers that joined the same exercise two years ago, before Russia’s invasion of Crimea and eastern Ukraine — conducted the annual Saber Strike training exercise in the Baltics and Poland that ended Friday.
On a brilliant, sunny day this month, 150 Latvian infantry members fought across a sandy pine barren to seize locations defended by Atropians, a fictional foe played by Gurkha soldiers of the British Army. Both sides traded simulated artillery and rocket fire, before the Latvians dashed from the woods and used smoke screens as cover to seize their targets. The A-10 attack planes roared overhead. But what really snapped back the necks of Baltic and other European observers was the B-52 bomber, on call for any additional strikes.
Latvia’s defense chief, Lt. Gen. Raimonds Graube, looked up admiringly at the warplanes and dismissed any suggestion that a NATO exercise with B-52s might provoke the Russians, as some European officials have complained. “Our soldiers must be ready to train on an international level,” he said.
For a United States military that has spent nearly two decades fighting insurgencies in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, the tensions with Russia have young soldiers, many born after the Soviet Union collapsed, learning new skills and brushing up on an old adversary.
“It’s not lost on me or my soldiers where we’re operating,” said Lt. Col. Chad Chalfont, an Army battalion commander training at a former Soviet base in Rukla, Lithuania.
Colonel Chalfont, whose father served as an Air Force officer in an underground nuclear missile silo during the Cold War, said American and Lithuanian troops drilled together on mundane but critical tasks like talking on the same radio frequency. Lithuanian infantry troops also learn more complex skills, like operating together with American battle tanks for the first time in dense pine forests.
The threat to the Baltic nations, at least in theory, is acute. For the Pentagon, Mr. Ochmanek of RAND has run war games trying to anticipate how to defend the Baltics in particular, the most immediate concern for the alliance. “It’s not realistic to think they could defend themselves against a determined Russian attack,” he said.
There is a hope that deterrence will suffice to prevent Russia from moving, but many fear that Mr. Putin’s government could seek to undermine the allies by subterfuge, as Russia did in Crimea and is doing in Ukraine. More likely than any ground attack from Russian troops, NATO officials say,
would be some kind of cyberstrike or information warfare assault, two of the critical components of a hybrid warfare style that is central to a new Russian military strategy unveiled in 2013 by Russia’s chief of the general staff, Gen. Valery V. Gerasimov.
The doctrine explicitly acknowledged the use of “military means of a concealed character, including carrying out actions of informational conflict and the actions of special operations forces.”
For those on NATO’s front lines, the doctrine appears all too real. This month, unknown hackers targeted the website of the Lithuanian Army leadership, posting false information about NATO exercises in the Baltics and Poland, a Lithuanian Defense Ministry spokesman said.
Lithuanian officials said the false messages included a report that the NATO exercise was a pretext for a possible annexation of the Russian region of Kaliningrad, which lies between Lithuania and Poland.
All of this is on NATO’s mind as it takes interim measures to deal with the threat.
Asked what steps his military would take if Russian “little green men” tried to sneak across his border, General Terras, Estonia’s chief of defense, said bluntly, “We will shoot them.”
← NSA spied on French heads of state for years
Presidential candidate supports legal marijuana →
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Scott Walker: The Outsider Sensibility and Creative Visions of Identity
April 2, 2008 — Patrick Zimmerman
Scott Walker has been described as one of the greatest living avant-garde artists, with hardly any other American musician having had greater influence upon rock music, while at the same time remaining almost completely unknown to his countrymen. Walker grew up in Texas, New York City and Southern California, but he became a celebrity in England during the mid 1960s as part of the Walker Brothers band. This was at the time when young American audiences were going wild over British pop-music groups. The Walker Brothers were a vocal trio who wed soaring vocal harmonies, lush soundtrack arrangements and a patently somber worldview into a uniquely theatrical package.
Scott Walker’s voice was perhaps the most beautiful male non-soul voice of that era, and an increasingly free-thinking “Beat” attitude was at the core of the group’s appeal. Although the Walker Brothers became huge in Europe and claimed a fan club bigger than even The Beatles, Scott Walker’s eccentricity cast a dark cloud over the band’s public image. Scott began to write increasingly complicated interlaced music, and its sense of bleakness was intensified by his mix of translated Jacques Brel tunes with his distinctly arty and pained original numbers. By 1969, his works were failing to appear on music charts at all.
An increasingly elusive Scott Walker slowly withdrew from public view. His voice began to lose some of its former pop-music sense of majesty, a reflection of his new interest in the experimental synth-driven avant-garde, which he helped revolutionize to major critical success, but only minor public attention. Walker seemed to vanish, while artists as diverse as David Bowie, Brian Eno, Julian Cope, Bryan Ferry, Ultravox and Marc Almond became fiercely ardent supporters of his unique body of work, citing him as a primary influence on their careers. Gale Harold (the actor in Queer as Folk) served as an Associate Producer, along with David Bowie as Executive Producer, of the new acclaimed documentary about the influential artistic vision of Walker’s experimental musical work, 30 Century Man.
The ongoing show of support by the more widely-known artists helped to keep the shy Walker’s reputation alive until he appeared again in 1995 with a new album, a work that was both formidable and deeply disconcerting, completely stripping away the dark romanticism that had once filtered some semblance of light through in his work. However, in person Walker doesn’t appear to fit the common stereotype of a tortured artist. After many years, he has completed a new album, The Drift, and in recent interviews about the recording Walker comes across as plainspoken, unpretentious and honest.
The videos presented below include an extended trailer for the new documentary about Walker (30 Century Man) and a music video of the song Jesse from his new album.
Scott Walker: 30 Century Man (Extended Trailer)
Scott Walker: Jesse (From Walker’s 2006 Album, The Drift)
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Posted in Art, Britain, celebrities, composer, composition, Cultural, cultural issues, Culture, England, Entertainment, freedom, Gay, gay issues, Gay Life, gay pride, GLBT, image, Media, motion pictures, Movies, multimedia, Music, music video, national news, News, object relations, Personalties, photograph, Photography, Psychoanalysis, Psychology, relationships, rights, Social, Social Ideas, Social Life, Society, songs, Technology, U. S. news, United Kingdom, Video, WordPress Video, World, world news. Tags: 30 Century Man, Art, avant-garde music, Brian Eno, Britain, celebrities, composer, composition, creativity, Cultural, cultural issues, Culture, David Bowie, documentary, England, Entertainment, experimental music, film, films, Gale Harold, Gay, gay issues, Gay Life, gay pride, GLBT, Great Britain, identity, Jesse, movie, Movies, multimedia, Music, music video, music videos, musician, News, photographs, Photography, Psychoanalysis, Psychology, Queer as Folk, Scott Walker, Social, social issues, Social Life, Society, songs, Sophie, Technology, The Drift, The Walker Brothers, United Kingdom, Video, videos, World, world news. Comments Off on Scott Walker: The Outsider Sensibility and Creative Visions of Identity
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Women’s Rights in Saudi Arabia
Posted on July 28, 2013 by Ian | disorderedworld
The movie Wadjda, by Saudi Arabia’s first female director Haifaa al Mansour, is an entertaining and endearing story of headstrong ten year old Wadjda who can’t make sense of the crippling restrictions that Saudi society imposes on women and girls. By the end of the film we too are left wondering at the childish tyranny of the adults in charge.
Wadjda is the first film to have been entirely filmed within Saudi Arabia, by the country’s first female director. The film’s central character, Wadjda, is a ten-year-old schoolgirl who wants to buy a bicycle, so she can race against Abdullah, the little boy next door. But in Saudi Arabia little girls do not ride bicycles. Headstrong, and gifted with a nascent sense of justice, Wadjda refuses to abandon her dream.
The central plot in Wadjda makes for an entertaining and endearing story, but the real power of the film is the insight it provides into the everyday indignities suffered by women under a system of total subjugation. Wadjda’s mother struggles to keep her job when her male driver suddenly quits. Forbidden to drive, women in such situations are effectively confined to house arrest. Wadjda’s mother also suffers heartbreak as her husband, under pressure from his relatives, searches for a second wife to give him a male heir. Complications during Wadjda’s birth mean that Wadjda’s mother is unable to have another child. The enforced servility of women is shown in other ways too, such as when Wadjda and her mother cook for her father and his friends, then leave the food on the floor outside the room where the men are meeting, knock and walk away.
Women’s absolute subjugation is enforced from the earliest age. In school the girls are told they must use tissue to turn the pages of the Koran in class if they are menstruating – forced publicly to recognise their own ‘uncleanliness’. In another scene, the girls move indoors when workmen appear on a roof overlooking the school playground. Only bad girls would remain in sight and flaunt themselves they are told– with a clear message that anyone disobeying deserves whatever may come. This transfer of guilt and responsibility from bully to innocent victim underpins the entire system of sexist oppression. Women must cover their bodies and stay out of sight of any man outside their family for fear they will unleash the uncontrollable lust of men. And women are forced to shoulder the burden of responsibility under law should their ‘provocative nature’ lead any man into temptation.
photo credit: Coolhuntparis via photopin cc
Saudi’s System of Apartheid
Saudi Arabia’s social and legal system creates a set of rules and practices as abhorrent as South Africa’s apartheid system. Uniquely among Muslim-majority countries, Saudi Arabia imposes almost complete segregation of the sexes. While things are slowly changing, this policy currently excludes women from most activities, including paid employment. The obligation for employers to put in place separate facilities for women, so as to guarantee that they do not mix with men in their working lives, makes the employment of women virtually impossible[1].
Saudi Arabia also enforces a male guardianship system, whereby women require permission from their male relatives for almost every conceivable activity, including driving alone. Senior government clerics have issued religious rulings prohibiting women from driving, for fear that they would become morally corrupt if they were to encounter and mingle with unrelated men[2].
Saudi law also enables fathers and brothers to force their female relatives to marry against their will. Women who refuse can be tried for unlawful ‘rebellion’ against their guardian. For women who find themselves in violently abusive relationships, the Saudi interpretation of Sari’ah law makes it is virtually impossible to escape through divorce. The male guardianship system and the limits placed on women to work, to move freely, and to interact with unrelated men, represent a system of laws and practices as abhorrent as the apartheid system in South Africa. And as the film Wadjda shows, enforced marriage between young girls and men decades their senior are commonplace.
Women and the Arab Spring
Although Saudi Arabia represents an extreme example of women’s oppression, cultures of patriarchy, in which men hold authority over women, children and property, are widespread across the Middle East. The leading role played by women in the Arab Spring, in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Yemen and Bahrain, and the Green Revolution in Iran, signal a rebellion not just against political dictators but a rebellion of women against dominant cultural values that dehumanise them. The aftermath of the revolutions, however, show clearly that the overthrow of the dictators still leaves the tyranny of deeply rooted sexist cultures to be addressed.
Director Haifaa al Mansour, who directed parts of the film from inside a van in order to adhere to the restrictions on men and women working together, insists she is not a radical. She is right of course. There is nothing radical about women being treated with dignity and respect. There is nothing radical about insisting that women must have the same freedoms as men. And there is nothing radical in seeing that the restrictions that Saudi society imposes on women and girls make no sense at all. After all, even a ten year old child can see that.
[1] Christoph Wilcke, Saudi Women’s Struggle, in The Unfinished Revolution, The Policy Press, 2012:99
This entry was posted in Building a Better Future and tagged Arab Spring, good and evil, Haifaa al Mansour, religious tyranny, Saudi Arabia, Wadjda by Ian | disorderedworld. Bookmark the permalink.
2 thoughts on “Women’s Rights in Saudi Arabia”
Orla Kerrigan on October 28, 2013 at 10:06 pm said:
I worked for many years in the middle east and when entering SA airspace the Captain told us to turn our watches back 300 years!!
Andrew (Andy) Alcock on April 5, 2018 at 2:01 am said:
What? Only 300? The place sounds Neanderthal and its treatment of women abominable. Donald Tr ump seems to like the place, however.
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Fourteen (14) indicted for hazing death
In a Resolution dated 5 November 2014 and released today, a Panel of National Prosecution Service (NPS) prosecutors found probable cause to indict fourteen (14) individuals for violation of Republic Act No. 8049, in connection with the death of Guillo U. Servando and injuries inflicted on his fellow neophytes, John Paul C. Raval, Lorenze Anthony R. Agustin and Levin Roland Flores.
The Panel found that “there exists probable cause to indict” the following “members of the Tau Gamma Phi Fraternity, College of St. Benilde Chapter,” who “were present during the final initiation rites of victims Servando, Raval, Agustin and Flores on June 28, 2014,” and who conducted “[t]he initiation rites of the four (4) neophytes ... without notice and authority from school authorities concerned”:
1. CODY ERROL MORALES y SORIANO, alias “CODY MORALES”;
2. DANIEL PAUL MARTIN BAUTISTA, alias “POPE BAUTISTA”;
3. KURT MICHAEL ALMAZANy DICEN, alias "KURT";
4. ESMERSON NATHANIEL CALUPAS y LOPEZ, alias “EMENG”;
5. HANS KILLIAN TATLONGHARI y TUMANENG, alias
“HANS TAMARING”;
6. ELEAZAR III PABLICO YGARCIA alias “TREX GARCIA”;
7. JOHN KEVIN NAVOA y ALCALA;
8.. VIC ANGELO DY y GO;
9. MARK ANDREW RAMOS y SORIANO;
10. MICHAEL DAVID CASTAÑEDA y TRESIANA;
11. JUSTIN FRANCIS D. REYES, alias “JAY RAY” and alias “RAY JAY”;
12. alias “KIKO”;
13. alias “BEA”; and
14. JANE DOE.
According to the Panel, “[t]he positive identification of the fraternity members of Tau Gamma Phi by the three neophytes, Raval, Agustin and Flores, who survived the hazing,” and were not even blindfolded at the time, “as well as their vivid recollection of what really transpired on June 28, 2014, which at least were not rebutted by the respondents, who either resorted to flight or disappear[ance] to parts unknown, more than swayed our minds to morally conclude that they were telling the truth, and that their testimonies were in fact credible, true and straightforward.” Such testimonies were found to be “likewise buttressed by the sworn statements of the maintenance and security personnel of One Archer's Place Condominium ... where victim Servando expired,” and by other pieces of evidence (i.e., the closed circuit tv footages from the condominium on the day of the initiation rites, as well as photographs submitted by complainants).
The Panel resolved to charge Almazan, even though said respondent claimed that he only participated in the initiation rites because he was threatened by respondent MORALES, finding that such defense is “uncorroborated and self-serving”, and “at most ... evidentiary in nature at the moment, and which should be threshed out in the full-blown trial of the case."
On the other hand, the Panel resolved to dismiss the charge against the following respondents:
1. JEMAR P. PAJARITO;
2. LUIS SOLOMON R. AREVALO;
3. CARL FRANCIS L. LORESCA;
4. STEVEN JORGE V. PEÑANO, alias “PENNY”;
5. MA.TERESA G. DAYANGHIRANG; and
6. ALYSSAFEDERIQUE E. VALBUENA.
As to Pajarito, who is the caretaker of the house wherein the initiation rites was conducted, the Panel favorably considered “his defense of his lack of knowledge on the planned initiation rites,” which “was not at all contradicted by any of the respondents nor the victims themselves,” and the finding that “he did not participate in the infliction of physical harm on the person of the neophytes,” but, “[i]n fact, ... provided the victims assistance in order to prevent them from fainting or passing out.” Thus, the Panel concluded that they “are thus of the obstinate view that he should not be indicted for violation of R.A. 8049.”
The Panel likewise declined to find probable cause against Arevalo, Loresca and Peñano who, though were identified as members of the fraternity and were, at least, present (in the case of Arevalo) at or momentarily seen passing by during the initiation rite (in the case of Loresca and Peñano), “did not, in fact, inflict any physical harm to the victims.” The same conclusion and holding was applied to the other two respondents, Dayanghari and Valbuena, who were likewise present during the initiation rites.
This is in spite of the presumption in the law, stating that “mere presence of any person during the hazing is prima facie evidence of participation therein as principal unless he prevented the commission of the acts punishable [t]herein.”
According to the Panel, "[t]o [their] minds, the context of such a presumption must however be inevitably correlated with Section 4 of the special law which clearly enunciates that – “If the person subjected to hazing or other forms of initiation rites suffers any physical injury or dies as a result thereof, the officers and members of the fraternity, sorority or organization who ACTUALLY PARTICIPATED IN THE INFLICTION OF PHYSICAL HARM shall be liable as principals.”
The Panel, thus noted that, “[t]herein lies the flaw in the law, so to speak, in that spectators or attendees to a hazing rite cannot ipso facto be criminally indicted as principal to the crime on account of mere attendance therein, and if said spectators or attendees did not actually participate in the infliction of physical injury to the neophytes.”
The Panel pointed out, too, that among the other principals who are indictable under the law are the officers, former officers, or alumni of the organization, group or fraternity or sorority who actually planned the hazing although not present when the acts constituting the hazing were committed. Among the accomplices, on the other hand, are the owner of the place where the hazing was conducted, the parents or officers of the organization, fraternity, group or organization, if it could be proven that they had actual knowledge of the hazing. However, in the complaint, only those who were present during the hazing were charged, and complainants “did not include the owner of the house, nor the alumni or officers of the Tau Gamma Phi Fraternity and school authorities, for the expedient and plain reason that there was no evidence of their consent or knowledge on their part of such hazing.”
According to Certifications issued by the Bureau of Immigration, respondents Navoa, Pablico, Tatlonghari, Calupas and Valbuena have already left the country on various dates.
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How the West Learned to Share its Scarce Water.
Water is for Fighting Over
In my new home state of New Mexico, the biggest and most important industry by far is what you might call National Security Science, as practiced at the 2 big National Labs, Los Alamos and Sandia. For many years, one local journalist “owned the beat.” If you wanted to understand what was happening at the labs, in the greater contexts of national security, nuclear science and weapons technology, you read John Fleck in the Albuquerque Journal.
Then, John switched beats, to New Mexico’s most treasured, most threatened natural resource, water, and once again, worked his way to universally recognized status as “the man,” the state’s greatest journalistic authority on water, its uses and its management, and its role in the future of the State and the whole Southwestern quadrant of the United States.
Now John has made another switch. He’s staying on the water beat, but he’s taken it from the Journal and from daily journalism, to the University of New Mexico and teaching some very lucky students, and book-writing. His Water Is for Fighting Over has gotten the kind of high praise from reviewers and scholars that his journalism always got from his professional peers and loyal readers.
It is with deep pleasure that I welcome John Fleck back to our HERE & THERE conversation.
John let’s start by explaining that your book title is meant to be ironic. It’s message is that when people and jurisdictions stop fighting over water and start working together on conservation and management that good things start to happen.
John Fleck is Professor of Practice in Water Policy and Governance and Director of the University of New Mexico Water Resources Program. Much of his career was spent in journalism, focused since the 1980s on the interface between science and political and policy processes, with special emphasis on climate and water in the southwestern United States. He was the Water Resource program’s writer-in-residence for three years before transitioning to academia full time in 2016. In the field of water resources, his primary interest is in nurturing the collaborative water governance needed to adapt to scarcity in the southwestern United States as populations grow while climate change reduces water supplies.
Water is for Fighting Over: and Other Myths about Water in the West, Island Press, 2016
CATEGORIES: Books we like, Environment, New Mexico
TAGS: Dave Marash, drought in the American Southwest, John Fleck, Water is for Fighting Over, Water Policy
The US and Mexico Agree to Share Colorado Basin Water. A “Win
John Fleck, UNM
A great journalist
author on the Southwest's most treasured resource: water.
Dan Joseph, author
The Last Ride of the Iron Horse
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Day for Night Kaytranada
Friday 12:30–2:00 Blue Stage
Born in Haiti and raised in the city of Montreal, Canadian artist Kaytranada has experienced an explosive rise in the past couple of years with his irresistible production and live sets, but the hard work and success did not happen over night. Before touring the globe and amassing millions of hits online with his series of beloved tracks and mixes, the young man came up as a true disciple, absorbing hip hop and RnB culture since his childhood and finding ways to make the music his own.
Since the age of fourteen, when he first began to DJ and the following year when his brother introduced him to music production software, his output has been relentless. As he explains, “after he showed me the basics, from that day on I couldn’t stop making beats,” pumping out a beat a day for the next couple of years and soon after self-releasing a series of EPs and beat tapes that quickly began to expand his reach. Official releases on HW&W and Jakarta Records soon spread his name like wildfire and some instant-classic remixes by the likes of Missy Elliot, Janet Jackson,TLC, Danny Brown and others have cemented his reputation and his sound; an undeniable swing of the drums comparable to Dilla’s, a signature soulful touch in the melodies, and a healthy dose of funky bass lines.
In 2014, Announcing via his Facebook page, KAYTRANADA signed an exclusive recording agreement with XL Recordings, the historic London based record label. His long-awaited debut album, 99.9%, was released on May 6, 2016 with an overwhelming positive response. The album includes features from GoldLink, AlunaGeorge, Syd, Anderson .Paakm and Vic Mensa among others. “Glowed Up ft. Anderson .Paak” was named Best New Music by Pitchfork when it was released as the album’s 3rd single, along with a stunning music video. The album’s second music video for “Lite Spots” was nominated for a 2016 Much Music Video award.
Apart from his solo work, Kaytranada has produced for Mick Jenkins, Mobb Deep, Kali Uchis, Mobb Deep, Chance The Rapper, Talib Kweli, The Internet, and more. All of this production caught the eye of someone in particular in late 2015. Def Jam legend, Rick Rubin reached out to Kaytranada for a partnership with his publishing company Pulse Recordings. They soon later inked an exclusive deal.
Critics often say his career as an artist has 3 parts and that’s what makes him so versatile and talented. Solo artist, producer, and DJ. The latter of which he has proved time and time again. Kaytranada has toured over 100 different cities world wide, and has played many major festivals such as Coachella, Osheaga, Panorama, LoveBox, and many more. He is nonstop in demand as one of the worlds most popular DJs, and sells out the world’s most prestige venues on a regular basis with his exceptional show.
With his career only beginning, and having accomplished so much already, keep your eye on this extraordinary producer as chances are you will be hearing a lot from him in the decades to come.
kaytranada.com
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Environmental Health & Safety > About Us
The Office of Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) is a staff function within the portfolio of the Vice President, Research and Innovation. EHS has a broad portfolio with a broad mandate across the three campuses with the objective of ensuring and facilitating a safe environment for all employees, students, visitors and contractors who participate in our community and frequent our spaces.
The mission of the EHS Department is to ensure that an environmentally responsible, safe and healthy work, research and study environment exists at the University of Toronto.
We do this by being proactive in identifying risks and emerging issues and by developing and implementing innovative, practical and sustainable processes to manage them, including training and awareness, teaching, provision of expert advice, emergency response and assurance.
Through close collaboration with all members of the University community we establish and maintain health and safety systems that are widely acknowledged to be of excellent quality and that, while not limiting or impeding academic freedom and freedom of research, maintain a high level of safety.
Contact Us – Environmental Protection Staff
Contact Us – Radiation Protection Services Staff
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Elisabeth Murray
Writer, reader, feminist killjoy
Tag Archives: romance
Strange Fruit – Lillian Smith
Banned to the hilt and consequently a bestseller, a book set in 1920s smalltown Georgia. It is often billed as a tale of interracial love, between Tracy Deen, a young white man from a wealthy family, and Nonnie Anderson, a young black woman who is a college graduate and is now working as a maid. But it is certainly no “forbidden romance” in the genre of “Romeo and Juliet” – this is a story of white supremacy, the misogyny at the heart of heterosexual coupledom, the objectification and trafficking of black women by white men, and the damage done by “well-meaning” progressives. Thankfully, there is no construction of a pre-existing force of romantic love that clashes with cruel social forces and ends in tragedy. Smith therefore gets at something far more insightful than many “feel-good” narratives that simply aim to tell us that, after all, love is love, and offer very little understanding of the violence done by inscriptions of normativity. The novel skips between characters almost dizzily, taking us into the heads of many townspeople who reflect on the Tracy and Nonnie, a murder that takes place, and a lynching. We see how white supremacy is reproduced and how it shores up the identity of white citizens, including those liberals who espouse social justice. Towards the end of the novel, the psychic fragmentation experienced by some characters is depicted in exhilarating modernist prose. There are many reflections of the 1940s white supremacist culture Smith herself wrote out of, representations of black characters that are jarring to a twenty-first century reader. But her striving for representation of this white supremacy, her vivid and daring representation of queerness, sexuality, and desire, as well as the racist and sexist violence that pervades the novel, is a reminder of what we still need from radical writers today.
This entry was posted in PhD Reading and tagged Lillian Smith, race, reading, romance, slavery, southern literature, violence, white supremacy on September 23, 2017 by Elisabeth Murray.
Feminism is for Everybody: A Choice to Love (Part 2)
You are mistaken if you think feminism is about women. It is about rethinking gender in a way that unravels patriarchy, which instils ideologies of masculinity that are about domination and violence.
Necessarily, this means we must rethink relationships and family. This is what scares conservatives most, why they cry “political correctness” at any critique of gender stereotypes. Undermining gender necessarily undermines the family.
As hooks shows, “A utopian vision of the patriarchal family remains intact despite all the evidence which proves that the well-being of children is no more secure in the dysfunctional male-headed household than in the dysfunctional female-headed household. Children need to be raised in loving environments. Whenever domination is present love is lacking.”
Feminism has always been concerned with such relationships. As hooks traces the concerns of second wave feminism in relation to marriage and partnership, she mentions that many feminists “saw sexual monogamy with men as reinforcing the idea that the female body was property belonging to the individual male she was bonded with. We chose non-monogamous relationships and often refused to marry. We believed living with a male partner without state-sanctioned marriage within patriarchal society helped men maintain a healthy respect for female autonomy. Feminists advocated demanding an end to sexual slavery and called attention to the prevalence of marital rape while at the same time championing the rights of women to express sexual desire, initiate sexual interaction, and be sexually fulfilled.”
In a society in which marriage, romance, partnership and intimacy have been structured and defined by patriarchal assumptions, how can we reenvision them as feminist? Is it impossible? Certainly we must always be critical of marriage, monogamy and family units. Then again we must also be critical of polyamory, the fight for marriage equality, and the so-called “non-traditional family.” The problems faced by second wave feminists in their own lives forces us to never let our guard down. For example, is it possible for marriage to be a viable feminist option given the huge, undeniable patriarchal legacy of the institution? It remains as such today.
The discussion sparked by second wave feminism about sexuality remains with us today, though it is still fraught. As hooks advises, “While men must let go of the sexist assumption that female sexuality exists to serve and satisfy their needs, many women must also let go a fixation on penetration.” This is why feminism is intertwined with ideas of sexuality as much as with race, class, religion, and age. Feminism cannot be heteronormative, it must be queer. Because patriarchy has rested on heteronormativty. But today we still assume that heterosexuality is natural, and that sexual “orientations” are genetic, inborn, fixed, and markers of our identity. Until we let go of this, we can’t reach a feminist sexual politic.
While hooks doesn’t yet articulate this, she does recognise the centrality of heteronormativity to patriarchy: “Masses of heterosexual women remain unable to let go the sexist assumption that their sexuality must always be sought after by men to have meaning and value. To do so they must believe that same-sex sexual encounters, self-pleasuring, and celibacy are as vital and life-enhancing as sexual intercourse with men within patriarchal culture.” We see the truth of the second wave’s realisation that “women would only be truly sexually liberated when we arrived at a place where we could see ourselves as having sexual value and agency irrespective of whether or not we were the objects of male desire.” We still live in the world hooks describes here: “We will never know how many millions of women stay in relationships with dominating sexist males simply because they cannot imagine a life where they can be happy without men, whether they are satisfied sexually and emotionally with the men in their life or not. If any female feels she needs anything beyond herself to legitimate and validate her existence, she is already giving away her power to be self-defining, her agency. Lesbian women inspired me from childhood on to claim the space of my own self-definition.”
This is why queer women are vital in “representing” feminism to the mainstream. After all, “this is the special wisdom radical lesbian thinkers brought to the feminist movement. Even if there were exceptional straight women who theoretically understood that one could be utterly fulfilled without the approval of men, without male erotic affirmation, they did not bring to the movement the lived experience of this belief.”
Unfortunately, with the white-washed, straight-washed feminism in the mainstream eye, such truths are swept under the carpet. Today, given the length of time since the radicalism of the second wave that bro ught feminism to the mainstream, we have forgotten how these women dealt with sexuality and relationality in a patriarchal world. Hooks recalls that, “In the early stages of feminist movement we used the phrase ‘woman-identified woman’ or ‘man-identified woman’ to distinguish between those activists who did not choose lesbianism but who did choose to be woman-identified, meaning their ontological existence did not depend on male affirmation. Male-identified females were those who dropped feminist principles in a flash if they interfered with romantic heterosexual concerns. They were the females who also supported men more than woman, who could always see things from the male perspective.”
Internalised misogyny and girl hate abound today, to the extent that many think that jealousy is an inborn trait of women and friendships between women. How are we supposed to enact feminism in such a context? Unfortunately, hooks’ observation remains true: “The vast majority of straight women, whether they were actively feminist or not, were more concerned about their relationships with men.”
Hooks show s us what a queer feminism looks like, and why it is for all: “In a world where positive expressions of sexual longing connect us we will all be free to choose those sexual practices which affirm and nurture our growth. Those practices may range from choosing promiscuity or celibacy, from embracing one specific sexual identity and preference or choosing a roaming unchartered desire that is kindled only by interaction and engagement with specific individuals with whom we feel the spark of erotic recognition no matter their sex, race, class, or even their sexual preference.”
Most people’s aversion to this shows how ingrained a patriarchal heteronormativty is within us. Because of this overwhelming power, we struggle to envision intersectionality. Feminism becomes one thing: equality with men. But such a notion is incomprehensible unless we first examine the terms of that “equality.” So, “Women who claim to be feminist while perpetuating homophobia are as misguided and hypocritical as those who want sisterhood while holding on to white supremacist thought.”
Embracing a watered down, palatable version of feminism is easy. Heteronormativity is embedded in everything we hold dear, especially romance, that foundation of so many films, songs, books, and life dreams. But, as the second wave articulated, “female freedom could only happen if women let go their attachment to romantic love.”
Hard to swallow? Maybe, but ultimately liberating. After all:
“Romantic love as most people understand it in patriarchal culture makes one unaware, renders one powerless and out of control. Feminist thinkers called attention to the way this notion of love served the interests of patriarchal men and women. It supported the notion that one could do anything in the name of love: beat people, restrict their movements, even kill them and call it a ‘crime of passion,’ plead, ‘I loved her so much I had to kill her.’ Love in patriarchal culture was linked to notions of possession, to paradigms of domination and submission wherein it was assumed one person would give love and another person receive it. Within the patriarchy heterosexist bonds were formed on the basis that women being the gender in touch with caring emotions would give men love, and in return men, being in touch with power and aggression, would provide and protect.” This is so uncomfortable because patriarchal romantic love is what we think of as love, how we define love, it is something natural. It is difficult to think of it as socially constructed. And yet the work of feminism has shown us that it is constructed, and for a specific purpose, and that it is damaging.
Hooks offers as alternative vision: “When we accept that true love is rooted in recognition and acceptance, that love combines acknowledgement, care, responsibility, commitment, and knowledge, we understand there can be no love without justice. With that awareness comes the understanding that love has the power to transform us, giving us the strength to oppose domination. To choose feminist politics, then, is a choice to love.”
Why then would most people prefer the anti-feminist heterosexist dominating versions of romantic love we are fed every day?
It stems from a misunderstanding of the visionary nature of feminism, how it has beamed a light on our most taken-for-granted ideas. As hooks argues, this is partly because “one of the difficulties we faced spreading the word about feminism is that anything having to do with the female gender is seen as covering feminist ground even if it does not contain a feminist perspective. We do have radio shows and a few television shows that highlight gender issues, but that is not the same as highlighting feminism.”
On a sidenote, I would recommend the bitch media podcast, which certainly does contain a feminist perspective.
Feminism isn’t just about women, just as everything about women isn’t feminist. Hooks recommends “a collective door-to-door effort to spread the message of feminism,…to start again with the basic premise that feminist politics is necessarily radical.” That includes all these self-declared feminists in the public eye. “Confusion about this inherent radicalism emerged as feminist activists moved away from challenging sexism in all its manifestations and focused solely on reforms.”
Until we end the neverending defences of “feminism doesn’t mean hating men!” we won’t understand the true meaning of the movement. For everybody who has ever been caught in a debate going nowhere with someone who has never educated themselves about feminism but has expected to gain all they need to know from a mainstream mass media which is necessarily patriarchal, here is the book you can hand over.
This entry was posted in Feminsm, Uncategorized and tagged abuse, bell hooks, feminism, gender, girl hate, heteronormativity, internalised misogyny, marriage, masculinity, monogamy, mononormativity, patriarchy, queer, romance, sisterhood, violence on January 3, 2015 by Elisabeth Murray.
A Fanatic Heart: Edna O’Brien’s screaming women
This is my first experience with Edna O’Brien, whom I have been longing to read for years, and she did not disappoint. Her work itself and the reaction to it pose a giant problem for the patriarchal literary world and male-dominated society in general. Bolder than Alice Munro, and in the more restrictive context of Ireland, she is just as insistent on recording women’s voices in all their honesty, beauty, woundedness, sexuality, and strength. But why is her unapologetic insistence seldom celebrated by feminists?
O’Brien is well-known for writing about women’s experiences and is certainly a feminist writer. She has been called the “doyenne of Irish literature” and Philip Roth’s admiration has stuck equally fast: he referred to her as “the most gifted woman now writing in English.”
Putting aside the accusations of misogyny levelled at Roth’s own writing, why these qualifications? Why is she “the most gifted woman?” Why the “doyenne,” which means “senior lady” or “grande dame” or something? Ah, the eternal problem of male writers as the default, or the “great writer” signifying a man unless otherwise specified. Why is it that the topics of great literature are simply “human experiences” when written about by a man but if a woman writes about what she knows she is writing about “women’s experiences”?
Who are the great Irish writers?
Joyce, Beckett, Heaney, Yeats, Wilde.
Could it be more obvious that our society is patriarchal when men’s experiences are universal but women’s are specific to us, somehow niche? It is the way textbooks show the human body as male, and the female body may be shown to illustrate reproduction, or for the way it differs from the “standard” of the male body. It is a body marked by difference. O’Brien’s work is marked by its difference from the universal norm of male experience.
This at once shows us our patriarchal heritage (and current condition) and makes her work feminist. She knows she is writing in a patriarchal world. The world she depicts is patriarchal. And she is making a space for the voices regarded as different, marginal, and so often unheard – women’s voices.
Given her generous concern with women’s experiences, it is perhaps surprising that she has been largely ignored or dismissed by feminist critics. Apparently her characters are too defeated, wounded, victimised, dependent on men. This catches her work in an odd in-between place. On the one hand, her first book The Country Girls was banned and o ften burned in Ireland for its depiction of women’s sexuality and she chose self-imposed exile, echoing Joyce and Beckett, to write more freely in London. On the other hand, she hasn’t had much interest from those most critical of patriarchy’s forced silences: feminists.
This may have something to do with the fact that O’Brien doesn’t seem to write from a consciously “feminist” perspective – that is, applying academic feminist theory to real life – and as far as I can tell has never really embraced a feminist label. As a fiction writer also entranced by feminist theory I wonder: how can we creatively represent feminist ideas, undermine patriarchal “real life” society and at the same time patriarchal language and systems of representation that are our legacy as writers in English?
For one thing, we need to honestly give voice to women’s experiences as we know them. Making a decision to write about “strong female characters” may be politically appropriate, but it’s not always ethical. Much of the trouble comes from the fact that women characters are expected to stand in for women as a whole – every single woman everywhere right now. Fiction writers simply aren’t concerned with that. The short story, the novel, are intensely personal and subjective forms. They are not political tracts. They examine the individual: her life, her thoughts, her heart. Of course, this opens out onto the world. But in the same way that men in fiction aren’t expected to represent an entire gender, we need to write weak women, wounded women, women who find comfort in patriarchal certainty, women who try and fail, women who are unsure, women who have no other choice but to live in exile. Fiction writers have a very special relationship to the old feminist adage: “The personal is political.”
For many Western liberal feminists, religion isn’t a popular subject. Writing about Ireland, despite her exile, O’Brien cannot help but be tied up with Catholicism, and she is never apologetic about it. Many feminists have forgotten about the reality of women’s experiences to such an extent that they wish to deny the power and truth of religion in many women’s lives. This cultural imperialism seems to me, if anything, anti-feminist. Feminism is an opening out, a construction of space, in which women’s voices are loud and truthful and multiplicitous.
Failure to recognise the subtlety with which O’Brien writes about the Catholic Church is unfortunate, because it is a failure to deconstruct the kind of patriarchal power the Church circulated, and still circulates today, which can teach us a lot about the patriarchal power that circulates in society as a whole. When asked why she has been forgiving of her father’s “small oppressions” but not so the Church’s, O’Brien remarked:
“The mantle of the Church, the power of the Church, the jurisdiction, the authority, was so overwhelming and not about Christianity. It was very secular. It was about power… What was done to people in the name of God was wrong in every way. It was a murder: psychic, social, and heart murder. And that was because the Church, the bishops and priests, they were omnipotent.”
This is murder done to individual women, and relationships between women. In “A Scandalous Woman” young Eily Hogan is sacrificed following her passionate relationship with a bank clerk and her pregnancy. She is punished – beaten and forced into solitary confinement and finally into marriage. Her future, her sanity and her very Self are sacrificed to a morality that denies women choice and a full sexuality. So the narrator concludes, having visited Eily after some time when they are both married and mothers, “what with that and the holy water and the red rowan tree bright and instinct with life, I thought that ours indeed was a land of shame, a land of murder, and a land of strange, throttled, sacrificial women.”
Edna O’Brien
It is not about religion, it is about power. A centuries-long power that has othered women, objectified them, made them into nothing but reproductive objects. O’Brien does not diminish the crime of this. It’s not simply “the way things are,” that women marry men and raise children, it is murder.
To recognise the wounds this causes is not to represent women as merely victims, but to give them a voice and the words with which to represent this recognition. Her narrators are intelligent. They experience desire and sexuality fully, in a way they are told is only natural for men. O’Brien also knows that to recognise the full force of patriarchal denial is to muddle your way through a mess of alternatives to compulsory heterosexuality, marriage and the nuclear family.
She writes the complexity of women’s relationships with women without resorting to the reductive patriarchal categories of “lesbian” and “heterosexual.” But she retains that sense of transgression that must be present in all relationships between women in a patriarchal hierarchy of intimacy, in which women’s first priority is supposed to be husband and children. Unfortunately this aspect of her work has been largely ignored, which merely echoes the tendency of a patriarchal society to ignore women’s friendships, desires and sexualities.
In the story “Sister Imelda,” the narrator, a young girl in a Catholic convent, develops an intimacy with a nun that is often blocked given the strictures of their context. She says, “I could cry, or I could tremble to try to convey the emotion, but I could not tell her” and “I dared to touch her wrist to communicate my sadness.” O’Brien narrates the small resistances women find to express intimacy, which in a patriarchal context is not supposed to be bodily. We all know the Madonna/Whore dichotomy that has been a staple of patriarchy for centuries. A woman may only be “pure” (and respectable to patriarchal society) when she denies her sexuality, or in fact when she has none. O’Brien blurs these lines, just a year after Adrienne Rich’s seminal 1980 essay “Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence.” Intimacy and desire between women, which for O’Brien cannot be easily categorised as and reduced to sexual or non-sexual, is a way of resisting the overwhelming force of institutional heterosexuality that proscribes women’s futures. And it happens within a so-called patriarchal institution – a convent – which, let’s not forget, is made up of women.
Writers who are not interested in perpetuating patriarchal systems of thought and relationality must recognise such relationships between women. Just recognising them is difficult enough, because as Rich tells us “We begin to observe behaviour, both in history and in individual biography, that has hitherto been invisible or misnamed, behaviour which often constitutes, given the limits of the counterforce exerted in a given time and place, radical rebellion. And we can connect these rebellions and the necessity for them with the physical passion of woman for woman which is central to lesbian existence: the erotic sensuality which has been, precisely, the most violently erased fact of female experience.”
So in “The Mouth of the Cave” we read the deceptively simple narrative of a woman coming across a woman standing in the grass, dressing. She asks herself “Why am I running, why am I trembling, why am I afraid? Because she is a woman and so am I. Because, because? I did not know.”
That these intimacies and desires are written as transgressive, never fully enacted, confusing for the reader and narrators at once, is explained by Rich too. As she forces us to acknowledge: “What deserves further exploration is the doublethink many women engage in and from which no woman is permanently and utterly free: However woman-to-woman relationships, female support networks, a female and feminist value system are relied on and cherished, indoctrination in male credibility and status can still create synapses in thought, denials in feeling, wishful thinking, a profound sexual and intellectual confusion.”
Her stories focus very little on marriage and children. They confront the expectations of domesticity without depicting its day-to-day details. The beautiful and shocking story “Paradise” tells of a young woman on holiday with a wealthy older man who has been married three times and his friends. The impossibility of being herself in such an environment is painful: she cannot delude herself into the idea of a perfect love affair that only comes from the absence of outsiders. “She knew she ought to speak. She wanted to. Both for his sake and for her own. Her mind would give a little leap and be still and would leap again; words were struggling to be set free, to say something, a little amusing something to establish her among them. But her tongue was tied. They would know her predecessors. They would compare her minutely, her appearance, her accent, the way he behaved with her. They would know better than she how important she was to him, if it were serious or just a passing notion.”
The small unkindnesses in unequal relationships that usually remain buried become the unforgiveable murder that O’Brien documents elsewhere. In taking swimming lessons the narrator finds both an incapacity for something supposed to be easy and a fascination with something she doesn’t quite understand. Finally, alone, she submits to the water: “As she went down to the cold and thrilling region she thought, They will never know, they will never, ever know, for sure.” The moment is most meaningful for her because she is alone, finally allowed to confront what Simone de Beauvoir would call her “transcendence” or her subjectivity: not how others see her but how she sees herself. “At some point she began to fight and thresh about, and she cried, though she could not know the extent of those cries.”
Of course, the impropriety of her suicide attempt leads to the guests leaving early and the man she is with expresses no empathy and she understands the relationship is over. The strength wrapped up in a moment of apparent defeat is clear in the reaction to her near-drowning: “the guests were polite and offhand and still specious, but along with that they were cautious now and deeply disapproving. Their manner told her that it had been a stupid and ghastly thing to do, and had she succeeded she would have involved all of them in her stupid and ghastly mess.”
The desperate measures to which women must go to speak, to imprint themselves on a world that consigns them to being looked at, to immanence as Beauvoir would say – or to being objects – is nothing short of sacrificial. O’Brien’s women aren’t women at ease. How could they be? But they are “strong women.” Along with being wounded, defeated, victimised. I think this has something to do with how O’Brien correlates writing with mental distress.
“Name me a writer who isn’t in psychological distress. They wouldn’t be writers unless they were in distress and complex and turbid and disturbed. Harmonious, happy, or for that matter businesspeople, are not creative people, they’re not.”
This is because writers must be outsiders. We have no other choice. So too for the women of O’Brien’s fiction, and that is why their voices are painful. They force us, if we are willing to read, to hear them. We feel their disturbance because O’Brien has made a space in the restrictive patriarchal symbolic. As Julia Kristeva says, “Women have the luck and responsibility of being boundary-subjects.” Sometimes it’s only in murmurs or cries or fights that O’Brien’s women can speak. But in the inscription of their voices we are also forced to recognise the shame, murder and sacrifice enacted by the patriarchal silencing that is never without gaps.
This entry was posted in Feminsm, Writing and tagged abuse, Adrienne Rich, creativity, Edna O'Brien, ethical writing, feminism, gender, heteronormativity, marriage, patriarchy, political writing, queer, reading, romance, Simone de Beauvoir, sisterhood, violence, writers, writing on September 20, 2014 by Elisabeth Murray.
A Prison Cell Built for Two: Romance, Monogamy and Violence
I know I could write pretty much what I want about patriarchy and heteronormativity. I’d have to get pretty radical before progressive people got upset. And yet to criticise monogamy? People who love attacking heteronormativity with me stop when I start on mononormativity. “Well, that’s okay isn’t it?” Aren’t romance and monogamy synonymous? Isn’t it how our society works best? Then – hold on, are you criticising my relationship? This tells me I’m getting something right.
Laura Kipnis points out that monogamy is “secured through routine interrogations (“Who was that on the phone, dear?”), surveillance, (“Do you think I didn’t notice how much time you spent talking to X at the reception?”), or impromptu search and seizure. We are taught that this is necessary, romantic, even natural. That each partner should be naturally jealous and overbearing of the other’s movements, words and thoughts. Why can’t we see this for what it is, controlling and often downright abusive?
By falling for the trap that jealousy and efforts at control are “natural” (does that mean biologically determined?) we fail to see what’s really at stake. No, it’s not your relationship. It’s the social order. Again, thank you, Kipnis: “adultery puts things at risk: from the organisation of daily life to the very moral fabric of the nation.” This is why “cheaters” get called “immature,” “selfish,” “irresponsible.” It’s the language of what Kipnis calls “bad citizenship.”
When you start to see how institutionalised heterosexuality is built into the social order, you see the point of monogamy. These little units, neat little heterosexual couples, neat little nuclear families in their neat little houses, are the building blocks of capitalist society.
But wait! How can something so beautiful as romance and love and commitment be subject to social forces? It’s destiny, it’s a force of nature.
Just look at the workplace vocabulary we use to describe monogamous relationships. There’s the oldest line in the book: “Marriage takes work.” We are asked to “show commitment,” or we may get criticised for “being scared of commitment.” We are advised to “compromise,” “negotiate,” “put in more time,” “be more accommodating.” If necessary, we should question whether the relationship is “worth saving” and if we shouldn’t just “cut our losses.”
Isn’t this just a little scary? The language of business moves into intimacy. And yet, it’s not at all surprising if we see how heterosexual monogamy is always institutionalised, not the result of a “natural drive” but fundamental to the social order.
And yet apparently resistance is futile. Everywhere you turn there are heterosexual monogamous couples! Turn on the TV, there they are. Attend a family gathering, there they are. Walk into a café – still there! There would be no problem if there weren’t so many. It’s the overwhelming discursive power of heterosexual monogamy that is so damaging. You see a forty year old unmarried woman – first question: “Why isn’t she married?” You overhear the word “polyamory” and blush, or shake your head at the immaturity or downright immorality. A handsome young man always shows up to parties without a woman in his shadow – what’s going on? Must be gay.
The discourse of romance as meaning heterosexual monogamy is suffocating. Even more so, it includes the notion that all people should aim for it. My one life’s goal is apparently to meet a man, date, marry, buy house, reproduce, raise offspring, die.
Not a bad life script, but why the only acceptable one? Why the only one that is “built into my DNA”?
Okay, this is all well and good, but what’s truly wrong with this discourse? Why can’t we find a “partner” of the “opposite sex,” “settle down” and never “stray”? Apologies for the scare quotes, but seriously. Maybe you don’t mind supporting the status quo, maybe you don’t even mind the capitalist system, enjoy your relationship being legitimated by the state? Well, there are a whole lot more problems with our ideas of romance than we ever hear at the cinema.
The ultimate problem with heterosexual monogamy is the way it enshrines a hierarchy of relationships. One’s most important bond is with one’s romantic partner. Yeah, you might have friends, but it’s cool to ignore them if you find yourself in a relationship. Obviously you’ll take your partner to that social function, I mean who else is there? Couples refer to themselves as “we.” Other people refer to couples as “John and Jane” or whatever. They merge.
Becky Rosa’s work on anti-monogamy is some of the best I’ve ever read. She criticises monogamy for promoting an “ideology that as adults we should primarily bond with one person, meeting most of our needs from them.” We not only see this in the proliferation of songs, movies, books obsessed with finding a “life partner” but in the social and economic status and incentives given to married or de facto couples. This is why conservative politicians (and unfortunately most of the population) want to promote the couple, the nuclear family. It’s the most orderly way of sorting people.
Mononormativity is the pervasive normalisation of monogamous romantic relationships as the most desirable, “natural” form of relating. Once you realise its presence you feel suffocated. Double beds. Armrests at the cinema that lift up between two seats and are locked down on either side. Two’s company, three’s a crowd. The third wheel. The odd person out. A lover being our “other half.” Which is based on Plato’s myth of humans originally being connected balls, then split in two, so we search always for our “wholeness.” Why is two such a magic number?
This hierarchy is ultimately patriarchal. Women in a heterosexual monogamous relationship have greater status and opportunities than women who aren’t. They are seen as normal. They are successful. In this stasis – the status quo of heterosexual monogamy – compulsory heterosexuality is affirmed and women’s highest priority is their husband and children. Dangerous, potentially radical ways of relating, such as women’s friendships, are diminished.
Isn’t it time to deprioritise this privileging of sexual relations as comprising our most meaningful relationships? Why do we equate our most important emotional relationships with monogamy? Why have we closed off all our other options? Why are friends less important than lovers? Why is the sexual cordoned off, welcomed only in monogamous relationships? Rosa puts it best: “For monogamy to exist, there needs to be a division between sexual/romantic love and nonsexual love…We believe that there is a distinction between the romantic/sexual love people feel for their partners, the love people feel for their friends and the love we feel for our biological families, yet this is not quantified nor qualified.” How come it’s unacceptable to love two people romantically, yet we would never dream that a mother or a father couldn’t love all of their children. The fact is, monogamy suits patriarchy.
This belief sets up a hierarchy of relationships with monogamous partner at the top. The relative neglect of other relationships results in a poverty of intimacy. As Rosa puts it, this “is maintained by ensuring that certain needs can only be met within a certain kind of relationship, the couple” and “it is also very difficult for people not in couple relationships to get the love and caring they want if other people are absorbed in their pair-bond.” Friendship is always less important than romantic relationships. We are obsessed with the “story” of how a couple met each other, but do you ever ask where your friend met her friend? In meeting with a friend we ask, “How is John?” (her partner), but not “How is Marie?” (her friend). We gossip if someone is going out on a date, but not if he is going out with a friend. We gossip that a relationship is on the rocks. Couldn’t care less about the intimacy between siblings. Someone bails on a night out with friends to go on a date? All good. And of course, as Jackson and Scott point out, there’s the eternal problem of “the assumption that we have a pre-ordained right to impose a lover on our friends and that they are automatically included in any social invitation.” Our lives are impoverished by investment in a single “love” relationship.
This poverty is central to patriarchy. With women and men dependent on each other, heteronormativity is maintained and women are separated from each other. Monogamy is also deeply conservative: it keeps couples focused inside – on domesticity, on the house, the car, the kids – rather than seeking radical social change. This is the idea of “settling down,” which apparently everyone learns to yearn for as they “mature.”
Let’s turn to Kipnis again for a dispassionate summing-up: “the authorised forms of desire are those pollinated in the hothouse of the nuclear family, forever in lockstep with its oedipal technologies.”
Just as problematic is the treatment of people as objects. The language of capitalism is inherent to romance. We talk of people as an “item,” call partners “mine” or “my man,” we say “I’m all yours,” “I want you,” “I gotta have you,” “I’ll kill any man who takes you from me,” “You belong to me,” “The girl gets the boy,” “I’m not available.” Why do we speak like this about the person we apparently care for most in the world? We do we feel the need to have exclusive ownership of somebody? While many are leaving behind the abusive capitalistic features of marriage or de facto relationships, such as joint bank accounts, joint ownership of property and women taking men’s surnames (though seriously in 2014 the number of women still doing this is startling), mononormativity thrives on ownership.
Since reading some theorists on intimacy, I am constantly shocked by what I hear in songs and see on TV. Things that are so clearly violent and abusive are represented as “romantic.”
Women and men alike want to know where their partners are at all times. Men can’t talk to women their girlfriends don’t like. Women can’t go out with a man they find attractive. Why didn’t she answer the call? Why doesn’t he say the right thing in this circumstance? Kipnis lists a huge range of interdictions that most people would consider perfectly reasonable when taken one by one: “You can’t spend more than X amount of time talking to such persons, with X measured in nanoseconds. You can’t provoke the mate’s jealousy. You can’t talk to people who make the mate feel insecure or threatened. You can’t socialise with your exes, even if you swear it’s really over. You can’t transgress the standards or degree of honesty or bluntness that the other person feels is appropriate in social situations.” After a few pages of this, the panopticon of coupledom seems hideous, nothing appealing about it.
It’s apparently romantic to lust after someone, even badger or chase them, though they don’t offer any encouragement. A marriage or relationship is a failure if it ends in divorce. Inevitable human change is not permitted. To be locked inside the same rules and the same priorities with the same person – to the exclusion of all others – is apparently our hearts’ desire. Why don’t we recognise that this benefits social order, and not necessarily us? We have been sucked in to the vortex of the romance myth.
How about the lovely song “I Will Possess Your Heart” by Death Cab for Cutie?
Or the Beatles, “Run for Your Life”?
“You’d better run for your life, little girl
Hide your head in the sand, little girl
Catch you with another man
That’s the end, little girl.”
Misogynistic, obviously, but the panopticon of monogamy is practiced on both sides, being a keystone of heterosexuality.
Aretha Franklin sings in “Until You Come Back to Me (That’s What I’m Gonna Do)”:
“I guess I’ll rap on your door
Tap on your window pane
I wanna tell you, baby
Changes I’ve been going through
Missing you, listening you
Til you come back to me that’s what I’m gonna do.”
And how can we leave out the woman who proclaimed she finds feminism “boring,” Lana Del Rey? “He hit me and it felt like a kiss.” Of course, she is referencing The Crystals’ 1960s hit, and forty years on our ideas of romance are just as entwined with abuse and control, so maybe a few more of us should try to figure out what this feminism thing is all about.
Then we have the supposed latest feminist icon, Beyoncé, singing that the only way some man can have a say in her activities is if he claims exclusive ownership: “If you liked it then you should have put a ring on it.”
And lastly (though the examples go on forever), Selena Gomez declaring in a song I can only gather is directed towards pre-teens: “When you’re ready come and get it…I’ll be sittin’ right here, real patient” and to top it off “Even if you knock it, ain’t no way to stop it.”
In these last two songs, we have the well-worn delusion that women are after “secure” monogamy, the gatekeepers of romance, always passive, and men have to give up their “natural” desire to be wayward. These women objectify themselves. Call it the oldest trick in the book of the patriarchy.
These lovely pop songs normalise abuse for the sake of monogamy. In our definition of romance, violence is never far away. It’s pop culture like this that is the reason we still have horrendous rates of violence against women. In Australia, a woman a week is killed by an intimate partner. This in a society in which women apparently participate at a level equal to men. But it’s the more insidious ideas we still have about women, men and heterosexual relationships that cause this violence. Which is why we need to look at what makes us uncomfortable: the fact that control and interdictions which are thought of as “just part of monogamy” would be better classified as abuse.
The idea that monogamy provides security is hugely troubling. Apparently women need to be in a monogamous relationship, and desire marriage, because they need to feel “secure.” Why? Are men constantly thinking about relationships with other women? Is the only thing making you feel safe the fact that you are in a relationship with rules? The fact that your partner is forbidden to leave you? The fact that the state has recognised your relationship as legitimate? Jealousy is considered a natural emotion, because we don’t want to consider the possibility that it’s actually the control at the heart of monogamy that is the problem.
In fact, romantic monogamous relationships capitalise on insecurity. They can only thrive on jealousy, anxiety and self-absorption. Simone de Beauvoir tells us that women utterly abdicate their sense of identity in romantic relationships, because “A woman is non-existent without a master.” A man is the essential, and her only chance at true life is through him. Patriarchal heteronormativity has told women that this is their only means of achievement. And who makes up the biggest market for romance novels, romantic comedies, magazines to improve marriage? Yeah.
And yet society tells us that the only way to be a mature, fully-realised person is to be engaged in a romantic monogamous relationship! Preferably heterosexual and state-sanctioned through marriage, but as a last resort same-sex monogamy will do.
This tells us romance is not the prime expression of human compassion. It is ultimately about the self. While men are less defined by their relationships and their children, they are also sucked in to this grand, totalising myth. We are told that the best way to discover ourselves is in falling in love. Oh, so it’s about us, not them? Or we are supposed to “lose ourselves in them.” In which case it is still about us. And to maintain romance, we must set up rules, interdictions, lines you cannot cross. This is because in the end it is about social order. Beauvoir tells it like it is: “Love has a smaller place in woman’s life than has often been supposed. Husband, children, home, amusements, social duties, vanity, sexuality, career, are much more important. Most women dream of a grand amour, a soul-searing love.” This is the fiction. The fact is institutionalised monogamy. Isn’t the search for our “other half” or true “wholeness” essentially selfish? It stops us from seeing the other person as they are, as we are able to see friends and relatives, without reference to ourselves, but as a whole person in themselves. As Beauvoir says, the “dream…to attain supreme existence through losing oneself in the other” is not selfless, but self-obsessed. In refusing to allow the other person freedom, in establishing so many rules about their movements, speech, glances and smiles, we are not showing care. We are creating our own insecurity. Monogamy doesn’t solve the problem of jealousy, it creates it. If you didn’t need to control your partner, you wouldn’t mind how intimate they were with another person.
So the hook is romance, but the end goal is domesticity. The end goal is institutionalised couples who lock themselves out of all the other complex network of relationships that are a whole lot more radical. Because we are told that this is the only way to stop the everlasting insecurity inside of us.
This entry was posted in Feminsm and tagged abuse, Becky Rosa, feminism, gender, heteronormativity, internalised misogyny, Laura Kipnis, marriage, misogyny, monogamy, mononormativity, patriarchy, queer, romance, Simone de Beauvoir, violence on July 20, 2014 by Elisabeth Murray.
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1. Train each muscle group twice per week. To maximize muscle growth, plan to train every major muscle group at least twice per week. According to a 2016 Sports Medicine review, even if you don't work that muscle any harder or longer, by simply dividing your chest, leg or back workout into two days, you'll spur more muscle growth. While the jury is still out on whether training each muscle group three days per week is better than two at spurring hypertrophy, it is likely better suited toward experienced lifters than beginners, Matheny says.
Whey, the liquid remaining after milk has been curdled and strained, is rapidly digested and absorbed and has a remarkable ability to stimulate muscle protein synthesis (Hayes & Cribb, 2008). Whey is available in three varieties — whey protein powder, whey protein concentrate, whey protein isolate — and all provide high levels of the essential and branched chain amino acids, vitamins and minerals.
If you want to take creatine as a supplement for bigger and stronger muscles, then the standard protocol is to have a “loading period” where you significantly increase your creatine intake for a few days or weeks. “This can prime your muscles to increase the amount of creatine that they ‘hold,’” explains Bates. “During the loading period, you generally take 5 g of creatine four times per day. After the loading period, you decrease the amount of creatine you take to a ‘maintenance’ level of 3 to 5 g per day.” (That’s also the recommendation from the International Society of Sports Nutrition.) (5)
The majority of creatine in the human body is in two forms, either the phosphorylated form making up 60% of the stores or in the free form which makes up 40% of the stores. The average 70 kg young male has a creatine pool of around 120-140 g which varies between individuals [10,11] depending on the skeletal muscle fiber type [1] and quantity of muscle mass [11]. The endogenous production and dietary intake matches the rate of creatinine production from the degradation of phosphocreatine and creatine at 2.6% and 1.1%/d respectively. In general, oral creatine supplementation leads to an increase of creatine levels within the body. Creatine can be cleared from the blood by saturation into various organs and cells or by renal filtration [1].
Creatine is not an essential nutrient[19] as it is naturally produced in the human body from the amino acids glycine and arginine, with an additional requirement for methionine to catalyze the transformation of guanidinoacetate to creatine. In the first step of the biosynthesis these two amino acids are combined by the enzyme arginine:glycine amidinotransferase (AGAT, EC:2.1.4.1) to form guanidinoacetate, which is then methylated by guanidinoacetate N-methyltransferase (GAMT, EC:2.1.1.2), using S-adenosyl methionine as the methyl donor. Creatine itself can be phosphorylated by creatine kinase to form phosphocreatine, which is used as an energy buffer in skeletal muscles and the brain.
Hartman, J. W., Tang, J. E., Wilkinson, S. B., Tarnopolsky, M. A., Lawrence, R. L., Fullerton, A. V., & Phillips, S. M. (2007). Consumption of fat-free fluid milk after resistance exercise promotes greater lean mass accretion than does consumption of soy or carbohydrate in young, novice, male weightlifters. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 86(2), 373-381.
Maughan RJ, King DS, Lea T. Dietary supplements. J Sports Sci. 2004 Jan;22(1):95-113.Kreider RB. Dietary supplements and the promotion of muscle growth with resistance exercise. Sports Med. 1999 Feb;27(2):97-110.Kerksick CM, Rasmussen CJ, Lancaster SL, et al. The effects of protein and amino acid supplementation on performance and training adaptations during ten weeks of resistance training. J Strength Cond Res. 2006 Aug;20(3):643-53.Update of Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2001;(1):CD002946. Glucosamine therapy for treating osteoarthritis. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2005 Apr 18;(2):CD002946.AIS Sports Nutrition - AIS Sports Supplement Program 2007.
Warm up sets are also important. For example, the same lifter working on his chest would also be advised to complete at least two warm up sets prior to hitting his "core tonnage." Core tonnage refers to the heavier lifts that actually strain your muscles. For example, if the lifter's main sets were at 205 lbs, 225 lbs and 235 lbs on the bench, then a warmup of 5 reps of 135 and 5 reps of 185 would be advisable. Some lifters will warm up with a 50/50 set for example 50% of the target weight for 50% of the target repetitions. When properly warmed up the lifter will then have more strength and stamina since the blood has begun to flow to the muscle groups.[7]
In another case, supplements touted as "myostatin blockers" were formulated from a type of sea algae. In a test tube, they effectively blocked the activity of the protein myostatin, which inhibits muscular growth in the body. The supplement ads implied that they'd enable you to develop unprecedented levels of muscular growth, but as it turned out, they didn't actually work in the human body.
In vitro studies on endothelial cells have noted that the benefits of creatine against atherosclerosis (via immune cell adhesion to the endothelial cell) are blocked with the pharmaceutical ZM241385, a high affintiy adenosine A2A receptor antagonist.[316] This particular receptor subset (A2A rather than other adenosine receptors) and its inhibition are similar to caffeine,[589] suggesting that caffeine may have an inhibitory effect on this mechanism of creatine.
Don’t make the mistake of trying to bulk up when you should be on a diet. While you might have muscle on your mind, most people need to get leaner first. If you’re fat and you start eating for size, you’re only going to get fatter. Get rid of the excess blubber first, to the point where you can see some abs, and then worry about getting big. You should be as low as 12% body fat before you change your diet up to focus on mass gain. That will ensure that your insulin sensitivity is high. When it is, you can eat more carbs and your body won’t store them as fat.
Sure, using a more effective workout routine or diet plan will work better/faster than a less effective one. However, even when you’re doing everything just right and you’ve optimized every single major and minor factor to work as quickly and effectively as possible (which I’m going to show you how to do), the simple fact is that you’re still not going to build muscle “fast.”
Using too much weight, too soon; always start lower than your expected ability and work your way up that first workout. If your form suffers, you are swinging the weight, or using momentum, this indicates you may be using too much weight. Greater momentum increases the potential for injury and reduces the effectiveness to the muscle group being targeted.
When you’re planning your high-protein meals, 20 grams of protein is the optimal amount generally accepted for muscle growth. Research has found that the body doesn’t use much more than 20 grams for muscle-building at any one sitting. Around 80 grams of protein per day (or, four meals containing 20-grams of protein each) is about right for most people.
Cancel, pause, or adjust your order at any time, hassle free. Your credit card will only be charged when your order ships. The discount applied every time is 15% off. Since it would be weird to subscribe to a kettlebell, the subscriptions and subscription discounts are only for things you'll need often, like supplements, foods, and personal care items.
Some other cytokines and hormones may increase the receptor activity. These include growth hormone (GH) which acts upon the growth hormone receptor (GHR)[166][167] to stimulate c-Src[168][169] which directly increases the activity of the CrT via phosphorylation. This is known to occur with the 55kDa version of c-Src but not the 70kDa version and requires CD59 alongside c-Src.[170]
Do a single set of repetitions. Theories on the best way to approach weight training abound, including countless repetitions and hours at the gym. But research shows that a single set of exercise with a weight that fatigues your muscle after about 12 to 15 repetitions can build muscle efficiently in most people and can be as effective as three sets of the same exercise.
Many non-competitive bodybuilders choose not to adopt this conventional strategy, as it often results in significant unwanted fat gain during the "bulking" phase. The attempt to increase muscle mass in one's body without any gain in fat is called clean bulking. Competitive bodybuilders focus their efforts to achieve a peak appearance during a brief "competition season".[citation needed] Clean bulking takes longer and is a more refined approach to achieving the body fat and muscle mass percentage a person is looking for. A common tactic for keeping fat low and muscle mass high would be to have higher calorie and lower calorie days to maintain a balance between gain and loss. Many clean bulk diets start off with a moderate amount of carbs, moderate amount of protein, and a decently low amount of fats. "Gaining lean muscle means going for leaner cuts of meat, like flank steaks and fillets, chicken, and, of course, fish," says White[who?]. "Enjoy your meat with some starch: rice, beans, quinoa, whole-grain couscous, or sweet potato, for example".[20] To maintain a clean bulk it is important to reach calorie goals every day. Macronutrient goals will be different for each person, but, it is ideal to get as close as possible.
Great Paleo beef protein, why? Because it doesn't have any preservatives, fillers, Dairy, soy, yeast, corn, or any other additives. No artificial colorings/flavorings. That makes this product not just paleo, but also autoimmune paleo friendly, hard to find. That basically means anti alergic, you dont get the same digestive issues many people get with whey. I think beef protein is underrated, I just finished a batch and went back to my whey. The whey gives me bloating/gas that this product doesnt. Also if you don't like how the amino acid profile stacks up agains Whey protein powder you can add some BCAA to powder, at least thats what I do. In a 30 gram saving you get 28 grams of protein (zero fat and zero carb), not bad!
Creatine supplementation (11.4g) with glycerol (1g/kg; per se effective[394][395]) and glucose (75g) in endurance runners in the heat appears to attenuate the increase in internal temperature associated with an increase in total body water of 0.71+/-0.42L, while performance (VO2 max and running economy) were unaffected over 30 minutes.[3] Creatine is effective without glycerol (20g daily with 140g of glucose polymer over a week),[346] again without an improvement in physical performance.
Creatine pyruvate (also known as creatine 2-oxopropanoate) in an isomolar dose relative to creatine monohydrate has been shown to produce higher plasma levels of creatine (peak and AUC) with no discernible differences in absorption or excretion values.[83] The same study noted increased performance from creatine pyruvate at low (4.4g creatine equivalence) doses relative to citrate and monohydrate, possibly due to the pyruvate group.
Gordon, P. H., Cheung, Y. K., Levin, B., Andrews, H., Doorish, C., Macarthur, R. B., Montes, J., Bednarz, K., Florence, J., Rowin, J., Boylan, K., Mozaffar, T., Tandan, R., Mitsumoto, H., Kelvin, E. A., Chapin, J., Bedlack, R., Rivner, M., McCluskey, L. F., Pestronk, A., Graves, M., Sorenson, E. J., Barohn, R. J., Belsh, J. M., Lou, J. S., Levine, T., Saperstein, D., Miller, R. G., and Scelsa, S. N. A novel, efficient, randomized selection trial comparing combinations of drug therapy for ALS. Amyotroph.Lateral.Scler. 2008;9:212-222. View abstract.
There appears to be some potential for creatine supplementation. However, many questions remain. Are there any long-term harmful effects from supplementation? Is there a point where enhanced performance levels off from long-term supplement usage? What effect does "stacking" or taking two ergogenic aids simultaneously have on the body? What happens if you immediately stop taking the creatine supplement? Is the enhanced performance great enough to warrant the expense of the supplement? Until further research answers these questions, creatine is not recommended for the average athlete.
Our bodies store creatine in our muscles so that we have quick access to it for fast, high-intensity movements, like sprinting or powerlifting, explains Autumn Bates, a certified clinical nutritionist and sports nutritionist in private practice in Manhattan Beach, California. “It's a nonessential amino acid, meaning your body creates it and you don't need to primarily get it from food.”
This increased permeability is noted in glioma cells, where it exerts anti-cancer effects related to cell swelling,[99][100] and in other membranes, such as breast cancer cells[101] and skeletal (contractile) muscle cells.[102] The kinetics of cyclocreatine appear to be first-order,[101] with a relative Vmax of 90, Km of 25mM and a KD of 1.2mM.[103]
That said, many people experience stomach cramps when they consume creatine monohydrate and it’s possible that taking a creatine with a different pH — usually creatine hydrochloride — can have a different effect on stomach acid and make for a creatine that digests more easily. As far as we know, the easier digestion doesn’t necessarily mean it’s more effective or that you need less of it to achieve the desired result.
Homocysteine is produced after S-adenosyl methionine is used up (as donating a methyl group creates S-adenosylhomocysteine, which then produces homocysteine) mostly from phosphatidylcholine synthesis[307] and its reduction (via either methylation from trimethylglycine via betaine:homocysteine methyltransferase, urinary excretion, or convertion into L-cysteine via cystathionine beta-synthase[308]) is thought to be therapeutic for cardiovascular diseases.
After all, if you’re doing more reps in a set, the weight would obviously be lighter and the intensity level lower. If you’re doing fewer reps in a set, the weight is obviously heavier and the intensity is higher. In addition, how close you come to reaching failure – aka the point in a set when you are unable to complete a rep – also plays a role here.
A previous meta-analysis [28] reported an overall creatine supplementation effect size (ES) of 0.24 ± 0.02 for activities lasting ≤30 s. (primarily using the ATP- phosphocreatine energy system). For this short high-intensity exercise, creatine supplementation resulted in a 7.5 ± 0.7% increase from base line which was greater than the 4.3 ± 0.6% improvement observed for placebo groups. When looking at the individual selected measures for anaerobic performance the greatest effect of creatine supplementation was observed on the number of repetitions which showed an ES of 0.64 ± 0.18. Furthermore, an increase from base line of 45.4 ± 7.2% compared to 22.9 ± 7.3% for the placebo group was observed. The second greatest ES was on the weight lifted at 0.51 ± 0.16 with an increase from base line of 13.4 ± 2.7% for the placebo group and 24.7 ± 3.9% for the creatine group. Other measures improved by creatine with a mean ES greater than 0 were for the amount of work accomplished, weight lifted, time, force production, cycle ergometer revolutions/min and power. The possible effect of creatine supplementation on multiple high intensity short duration bouts (<30 s) have shown an ES not statistically significant from 0. This would indicate that creatine supplementation might be useful to attenuate fatigue symptoms over multiple bouts of high-intensity, short duration exercise. The ES of creatine on anaerobic endurance exercise (>30 – 150s), primarily using the anaerobic glycolysis energy system, was 0.19 ± 0.05 with an improvement from baseline of 4.9 ± 1.5 % for creatine and -2.0 ± 0.6% for the placebo. The specific aspects of anaerobic endurance performance improved by creatine supplementation were work and power, both of which had a mean ES greater than 0. From the findings of this previous meta-analysis [28] it would appear that creatine supplementation has the most pronounced effect on short duration (<30s) high intensity intermittent exercises.
Gualano, B., de, Salles Painelli, V, Roschel, H., Lugaresi, R., Dorea, E., Artioli, G. G., Lima, F. R., da Silva, M. E., Cunha, M. R., Seguro, A. C., Shimizu, M. H., Otaduy, M. C., Sapienza, M. T., da Costa, Leite C., Bonfa, E., and Lancha Junior, A. H. Creatine supplementation does not impair kidney function in type 2 diabetic patients: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, clinical trial. Eur.J.Appl.Physiol 2011;111(5):749-756. View abstract.
Stash away your scale for several weeks — and set a strength training goal instead. That’s the advice of Lisette Cifaldi, director of behavioral health at Hilton Head Health weight loss resort who counsels patients. “I think strength training shifts your perspective,” she says. “The happiness doesn’t come from achieving a certain number [on the scale]. It comes from the process of getting stronger and feeling empowered that you’re navigating your own success.”
Incubation of a β-cell with additional creatine (5-10mM), even at saturated concentrations of glucose, is able to further increase insulin secretion in response to glucose, specifically as the leucine metabolite 2-ketoisocaproic acid, potassium, and a potassium channel blocker were all ineffective.[494] This has been found to occur in rats given 2% of the diet as creatine[345] but has since failed in humans given 5g of creatine.[351]
Creatine has been found to increase skeletal muscle glycogen when given to sedentary adults for a loading and maintenance phase for 37 days at 2g (13.5% after five days of loading, but returning to baseline at the end of the trial). Exercise was not enforced in this study.[207] This study also noted that, despite a normalization of glycogen after the trial, total creatine and ATP was still higher than placebo,[207] and a loading protocol appears to have failed elsewhere in increasing glycogen stores in sedentary people subject to an aerobic exercise test before and after the loading phase.[349]
For the bench press, start with a weight that you can lift comfortably. If you are a beginner, try lifting the bar along with 5lbs or 10lbs on each side. With arms at shoulder-width apart, grab onto the bar and slowly lower the bar until it's at nipple level; push up until your arms are fully extended upwards. Do 8–10 repetitions (reps) like this for three sets (3 x 8), adding additional weight each set. Once you have a few months of practice, slowly increase weight and go down to 6–8 reps per set, aiming to reach muscle failure at the end of the third set.
To do dips, place your hands at shoulder-width apart on a bench, with your body and feet stretched out in front of the bench. Slowly bend your elbows and lower your body down so that your butt nearly touches the floor. Lift back up with your arms to starting position; repeat, doing 3 x 8. If this isn't a high-intensity set for you, increase the resistance by lifting one foot off the floor.
The first thing you need is a weight training program that signals the muscle building process to begin. Research has shown that a well designed program will generate this “signal” via a combination of progressive tension overload (as in, getting stronger over time), metabolic stress (as in, fatiguing the muscle and getting “the pump”), and muscular damage (as in, actual damage to the muscle tissue itself).
Beast Creature could be another good option for female athletes. It’s tasty, it contains five types of creatine, and it contains ingredients that could improve fat loss by increasing insulin sensitivity. One potential bonus is that it also has 70 percent of your daily biotin, a nutrient often included in women’s multivitamins due its purported benefits for hair and nails.
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Of Course the Alt-Right Is Against Capitalism
If any tribe seeks to control the market, they will have to abolish it first.
Economics Nazism Alt Right Collectivism Anti-Capitalism
Some people on the left are starting to worry about getting trolled by the alt-right. This is because the alt-right has become aggressively anti-capitalist, pro-welfare state, and in favor of a government that specifically promotes white interests, not a free market that offers no privilege to anyone.
“The alt-right is looking to expand its ranks,” declares Salon, “and prominent leaders of the notorious white supremacist movement apparently believe that leftists are an ideal target for their recruiting efforts.” This follows a huge investigative piece that appeared in The Nation, in which a reporter from the publication attended a number of alt-right events, where leftist ideas are newly fashionable.
Salon then warns leftists not to fall for it:
The alt-right’s “anti-capitalism,” then, is really just anti-Semitism wrapped up in an economic veil, devoid of any real critique of capitalism. Their economic turn is simply a means to further their movement and spread their racist ideology.
There is truth in that statement. Anti-semitism and racism have been a core part of the attacks on the market for centuries, which raises some interesting questions about the anti-market left itself.
The Salon claim also understates the full-on anti-liberalism of alt-right ideology, a topic that forms the thesis of my book on the topic. Indeed, in its origins, this outlook was formed in opposition to the world-transforming power of markets. It is rooted in resentment of the expansion of liberty and prosperity of the early 19th century, and the fear that capitalism would break down old hierarchies, traditional attachments, and national borders. The revolt they favored was always a revolt against the market.
Trolling the Left
It’s true that in modern times, in the United States, this gang gained public attention by first attempting to pass themselves off as libertarians, hanging out at meet ups, conferences, and taking over subreddits. It worked for a while, given the libertarian commitment to free association and free speech. But then people got wise to the game. Over the last year, many leaders within the libertarian community have doubled down on an effort to preserve the integrity of libertarian ideas and make sure they were not compromised by this gang.
Libertarianism then became a low performer for recruitment. That’s when the shift became apparent. The new language of the alt-right is all about denouncing corporate capitalism for failing to do its bidding. They say that capitalism is too politically correct, is excluding them from social media, is declining to let them use financial tools to raise money, and is generally promoting their enemies in cooperation with the media.
The left often accuses capitalism of doing things for which it is not actually guilty, such as excluding the poor, exploiting workers, ravaging the earth, and so on. The alt-right, however, is mostly attacking capitalism for things that corporations are, in fact, doing and doing well. These people are not popular people, and their views have proven poisonous for venues like Twitter and Facebook, and are banned not for PC reasons, but simply because they reduce the value of the platforms.
In other ways, however, the market – which is no respecter of persons or ideologies – has been a great friend to the alt-right. Amazon sells their books. Their podcasts are hosted by capitalist firms. Their publishing venues are based on the profit-and-loss model. The market has done the same for red and green ideologies too. The market is a tool for everyone without exception.
Tribal Barriers
It’s also true that the market has always provided a main impetus for breaking down tribal barriers. It thinks in terms of individual rights because it is designed to appeal to individual minds. If your goal is the promotion of group solidarity and exclusion, it is not a good tool. Its watchwords are inclusion and empowerment of everyone. It was the gradual liberalization of markets and the technology and universalist values that came with it that ended slavery, promoted minority and women’s rights, and created this thing we call the middle class.
It makes perfect sense, then, that the alt-right would reveal itself to be anti-liberal not just in politics, but also in economics. In fact, it should make the left uncomfortable that the alt-right feels at home with the economic ideas of socialists, and not for the first time. What has always united the Hegelians of the right and left has been their shared opposition to the free society. The details of the critique and proposed alternatives are different depending on the tribe, but that economic freedom itself is the target of both is nothing new.
Recall that in its early days, the Nazi party called merely for boycotts of Jewish businesses, and even instructed party members to use no physical violence. This was April 1, 1933. The hope was that this would inspire a nation to cause bankruptcy to the Jews and drive them out of the country. It didn’t work. People continued to deal with Jewish doctors, grocers, and intellectuals. The next step was absolutely necessary: the Nazis abolished the market itself with the Nuremberg Laws of 1935. History has shown us that if any tribe seeks to control the market, they will have to abolish it first.
The Blending of Left and Right
The alt-right’s turn toward overt anti-capitalism is neither surprising nor new nor counterintuitive. The revolving door between the left and the right has been going around for two centuries. People like John Ruskin or Thomas Carlyle might have been non-Marxists and conservatives in every respect, but they targeted the market as the most feared enemy of their agenda for social and economic control. The Progressives too, split between their right and left branches, each anxious to use the state to stop the market drive that spreads the benefits of prosperity to all people.
The strange way in which the far left and right are bound up with each other has been noted by consistent liberals for a long time. Their membership is fluid, wrote Max Eastman in 1956, observing that “every judgment and choice, every trait and mode of behavior, that once had given meaning to the word ‘Right’ is now supported and approved by those whom all agree in calling ‘Left’ or ‘Leftist.’”
Equally, there have been periods in history when what used to be called left was suddenly called right, as illustrated in the magically adaptive mind of Werner Sombart, who easily made the journey from Communist to Nazi.
In the much-truncated and cartoonish remake in the presidential election of 2016, many observers noted the odd way in which it was difficult to distinguish the platforms of Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump: anti-trade, pro-"worker", promising universal health coverage, and generally railing against globalism and capitalist financial power. That they hated each other was not a surprise. This fits the narrative of history in which political tribes save their most vituperative attacks for those closest to them in outlook.
(Fortunately for the American people, the winner of that election has come to discover that deregulation and tax cuts are more popular among the public than protectionism and executive centralization.)
The alt-right’s turn toward overt anti-capitalism is neither surprising nor new nor counterintuitive. It doesn’t just stem from anti-Semitism, even if that is a seemingly inevitable part of it. Collectivism of all sorts and every form stands opposed to economic liberty. Just give it time: all types of collectivism end up sounding more or less like each other.
Jeffrey Tucker is a former Director of Content for the Foundation for Economic Education. He is the Editorial Director at the American Institute for Economic Research, a managing partner of Vellum Capital, the founder of Liberty.me, Distinguished Honorary Member of Mises Brazil, economics adviser to FreeSociety.com, research fellow at the Acton Institute, policy adviser of the Heartland Institute, founder of the CryptoCurrency Conference, member of the editorial board of the Molinari Review, an advisor to the blockchain application builder Factom, and author of five books.
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Team USA Sweeps Medal Podium In Skeet At World Cup
by Justin Nazaroff September 11, 2018
Congratulations to these three fantastic women who represent the United States shooting community with pride! We swept the podium at the World Cup and cemented our dominance in Women's Skeet.
Caitlin Connor took home the gold, winning her first international gold medal. She finally gets to the top of the podium after winning seven previous World Cup silver medals.
Kimberly Rhode won the silver medal. Kim's bronze medal at the 2016 Rio Olympics made her the first Olympian EVER to win a medal on five different continents, the first Summer Olympian to win an individual medal at SIX CONSECUTIVE summer games, and the first woman to medal in six consecutive Olympics.
Amber English took home the bronze medal, and is a member of the US Army Marksmanship Unit.
Great job, ladies. Thank you for representing our country!
For more information, check out the USA Shooting website at http://www.usashooting.org/
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Vol. 3 No. 2 (2012) , Article ID: 17379 , 8 pages DOI:10.4236/am.2012.32018
Invariant Relative Orbits Taking into Account Third-Body Perturbation
Walid Ali Rahoma1,2, Gilles Metris2
●How to Cite this Article
1Department of Astronomy, Faculty of Science, Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt
2Observatoire de la Côte d’Azur, Grasse, France
Email: walid_rahoma@yahoo.com
Received October 12, 2011; revised December 19, 2011; accepted December 27, 2011
Keywords: Invariant Relative Orbits; Third-Body Perturbation; Hamiltonian
For a satellite in an orbit of more than 1600 km in altitude, the effects of Sun and Moon on the orbit can’t be negligible. Working with mean orbital elements, the secular drift of the longitude of the ascending node and the sum of the argument of perigee and mean anomaly are set equal between two neighboring orbits to negate the separation over time due to the potential of the Earth and the third body effect. The expressions for the second order conditions that guarantee that the drift rates of two neighboring orbits are equal on the average are derived. To this end, the Hamiltonian was developed. The expressions for the non-vanishing time rate of change of canonical elements are obtained.
Formation flying is a key technology enabling a number of missions which a single satellite cannot accomplish: from remote sensing to astronomy. The relative motion, which shows no drift even in presence of a large disturbance, could be a very attractive solution. To maintain the formation and constellation, the relative drifts due to the perturbation between the spacecraft should be carefully considered. Invariant Relative Orbits shows no drift between the spacecraft due to the perturbation even if in presence of a large disturbance.
The literature is wealth with works dealing with designing certain invariant relative orbits for spacecraft flying formations, and it seems worth to sketch some of the most relevant works. Schaub and Alfriend [1] presented a method to establish J2 invariant relative orbits for spacecraft formation flying applications. They designed relative orbit geometry using differences in mean orbit elements. Two constraints on the three momenta element differences are derived. Zhang and Dai [2] removed the drifts by adjusting the semi-axis of the follower satellite and obtained a similar conclusion. By means of Routh transformation and dynamical system theory, Koon and Marsden [3] developed a method to find the invariant orbit. Then Li and Li [4] and Meng et al. [5] concluded, from the point of view of relative orbital elements, that the drifts of relative orbit result from the orbital inclination and right ascension of ascending node of the two satellites. Biggs and Becerra [6] proposed a method to determinate the J2 invariant orbit with the leader’s orbit of zero inclination based on the targeting method in chaos dynamics. Abd El-Salam et al. [7] used the Hamiltonian framework to construct an analytical method to design invariant relative constellation orbits due to the zonal harmonics ; ; up to the second order, assuming being of order 1.
Our propose was to extend Schaub and Alfriend [1] and Abd El-Salam et al. [7] model by adding the effect of the third body which have important at high altitude. Using the Hamiltonian framework, the perturbations can be easily added. The Hamiltonian of the problem was constructed by considering the effect of the third body of . The expressions for the time rate of change of the secular elements are obtained, second order conditions are established between the differences in momenta elements (semi-major axis, eccentricity and inclination angle) that guarantee that the drift rates of two neighboring orbits are equal on the average.
2. Hamiltonian Approach
There are several ways to derive the equations of motion for any such system. We emphasized on the Hamiltonian structure for this system. The Hamiltonian formulation allows for additional conservative forces to be added to the Hamiltonian, thus the addition of complexity to the model can be incorporated with ease. Non-conservative forces can be added in the momenta equations of motion. The Hamiltonian equations of motion allows us to directly use control and simulation techniques.
Notations in the whole text, we use the well-known keplerian elements: the semi-major axis a, the eccentricity e, the inclination , the right ascension of ascending node , the argument of perigee , and the mean anomaly M. We also use the true anomaly f and an intermediary variable .
The Hamiltonian in the present framework can be written in the form
where is the force function due to the Earth’s gravitational potential, and p is the canonical momentum vector and the disturbing function due to the effect of perturbing body.
2.1. Influence of Oblateness Perturbations
The actual shape of the Earth is that of an eggplant. The center of mass does not lie on the spin axis and neither the meridian nor the latitudinal contours are circles. The net result of this irregular shape is to produce a variation in the gravitational acceleration to that predicted using a point mass distribution. The Earth’s gravitational potential is usually expressed by the following expression (Vinti’s potential)
where is the equatorial radius of the Earth,
is the Earth’s gravitational parameter where is the gravitational constant;
are the geocentric coordinates of the satellite with measured east of Greenwich;
and are harmonic coefficients;
are associated Legendre Polynomials.
In the potential function, the terms with , and correspond respectively to zonal, tesseral and sectorial harmonics. The Earth gravitational potential can be rewritten, up to second order in , truncating the series at , as, Abd El-Salam et al. [7]
where and is the zonal harmonic coefficients.
2.2. Third Body Perturbation
The effect of the third body in the motion of an artificial satellite have became particularly interesting now, when space debris imposes a serious threat to space activities. These perturbations are the most important mechanism of delivering major Earth orbiting objects into the regions where the atmosphere can start their decay.
If it is assumed that the main body; Earth; with mass is fixed in the center of the reference system x-y. The perturbing body, with mass is in an elliptic orbit with semi-major axis, , eccentricity , and mean motion , given by the expression , and are the radius vectors of the satellite and (assuming ), and is the angle between these radius vectors. The disturbing function (using the tradition expansion in Legendre polynomials) due to the third body is given by, Domingos et al. [8],
where and
Using the Delaunay canonical-variables defined by
Mean anomaly
Argument of the Perigee
Longitude of ascending node
Considering as a small parameter of the problem, the orders of magnitude, up to the second order, of the involved parameters are defined as follows: , and let us define the dimensionless parameters as
The Hamiltonian, Equation (1) up to the second order, can now be expressed as a power series in as follows
where represents the unperturbed part of the problem, is the perturbation:
Now we need to eliminate the short as well as the long periodic terms of the satellite motion in addition to the short periodic terms of the distance perturbing body. Using the perturbation technique based on Lie series and Lie transform, Kamel [9], the transformed Hamiltonianfor different orders 0, 1, 2 can be written as, Abd ElSalam et al. [7] and Domingos et al. [8].
Using the Hamiltonian canonical equations of the motion, to write , argument of mean latitude ( ) is the sum of the mean anomaly and the argument of perigee (i.e. ), as
and the secular drift rates of the longitude of the ascending node, :
3. Constraints for Invariant Orbits
In order to prevent two neighboring orbits from drifting apart, the average secular growth needs to be equal. Short period oscillations can be ignored here since these are only “temporary” deviations. The long period rates appear secular over a few weeks and they are .
Since the mean angle quantities and do not directly contribute to the secular growth, their values can be chosen at will. However, the mean momenta values and H (and therefore implicitly and ) must be carefully chosen to match the secular drift rates. To keep the satellites from drifting apart over time, it would be desirable to match all three rates . We impose the condition that the relative average drift rate of the angle between the radius vectors be zero. This results in
Now and can be rewritten as
where the non-vanishing coefficients and are computed in Appendix I.
Let the reference mean orbit elements be denoted with the subscript “0”. The drift rate of a neighboring orbit can be written as a series expansion about the reference orbit element, here it is enough to keep the second order only, as
where we make use of the fact that and only, also supposing that is the difference in mean latitude rates,
Note that this theory will lead to an analytical second order conditions on the mean orbit elements. To establish a more precise set of orbit elements satisfying Equations
(9) and (10), either or could be chosen and the remaining two momenta orbit element differences found through a numerical root solving technique. However, the analytical second order conditions provide reasonably accurate solutions to these two constraints equations and provide a wealth of insight into the behavior of Earth potential and third body effect invariant relative orbits.
The required derivatives can be evaluated as
where and with .
To enforce equal drift rates and between neighboring orbits, we must set and equal to zero in expanded Equations (13) and (14), yields
Equations (15) and (16) are two simultaneous nonlinear algebraic equations in three unknowns, namely . When one of these three unknowns is assumed known (say ), these two equations can be solved as:
Multiplying Equation (15) by and Equation (16) by and then subtracting yields
Substituting Equation (17) into Equation (15) yields an algebraic equation of fourth degree in only in the form
4. Solution of the Quartic Equation (18)
The roots of the quartic Equation (18) can be written as
Substituting the four roots ’s into Equation (17) yields the four constraints ’s that guarantee the invariance of the relative motion of certain satellite constellation
Accurate modeling of relative motion dynamics for initial conditions close to the leader satellite is essential for flying formation. Therefore, the solutions of interest are restricted to a specific set of initial conditions that lead to periodic motion, such that the satellites do not drift apart. This paper showed an analytical expression to secular drift rates due to oblate Earth model, truncating its potential series at , and third body effect and set it equal between two neighboring orbits. It followed the same steps used before in Abd El-Salam et al. [7] for the Earth model so the calculation of Abd El-Salam et al. [7] and Schaub and Alfriend [1] is a special case from this calculations. The variation in the inclination ( ) can be chosen at will for the nominal inclination, and the variations in both the eccentricity ( ) and semi-major axis ( ) from their nominal values are set to zero. Noted that these constraint conditions are not justified near the critical inclination angle. Using instead of to avoid the singularity when but for the nonsingular elements must be used. Future developments of this approach to the formation flying problem include another perturbation forces like solar radiation and lunisolar effects.
The first author wish to express his appreciation for the support provided by the French government under the No de dossier: 688028B, No affiliation: 194264/733177.
The authors gratefully thank referees for their helpful, suggestions and comments.
H. Schaub and K. Alfriend, “J2 Invariant Relative Orbits for Spacecraft Formations,” Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy, Vol. 79, No. 2, 2001, pp. 77-95. doi:10.1023/A:1011161811472
Y. Zhang and J. Dai, “Satellite Formation Flying with J2 Perturbation,” Journal of National University of Defense Technology, Vol. 24, No. 2, 2002, pp. 6-10.
W. S. Koon and J. E. Marsden, “J2 Dynamics and Formation Flight,” Proceedings of AIAA Guidance, Navigation, and Control Conference, Montreal, August 2001, p. 4090.
X. Li and J. Li, “Study on Relative Orbital Configuration in Satellite Formation Flying,” Acta Mechanica Sinica, Vol. 21, No. 1, 2005, pp. 87-94. doi:10.1007/s10409-004-0009-3
X. Meng, J. Li and Y. Gao, “J2 Perturbation Analysis of Relative Orbits in Satellite Formation Flying,” Acta Mechanica Sinica, Vol. 38, No. 1, 2006, pp. 89-96.
J. D. Biggs and V. M. Becerra, “A Search for Invariant Relative Satellite Motion,” 4th Workshop on Satellite Constellations and Formation Flying, Sao Jose dos Campos, 2005, pp. 203-213.
F. A. Abd El-Salam, I. A. El-Tohamy, M. K. Ahmed, W. A. Rahoma and M. A. Rassem, “Invariant Relative Orbits for Satellite Constellations: A Second Order Theory,” Applied Mathematics and Computation, Vol. 181, No. 1, 2006, pp. 6-20. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2006.01.004
R. C. Domingos, R. V. deMoraes and A. F. Prado, “Third-Body Perturbation in the Case of Elliptic Orbits for the Disturbing Body,” Mathematical Problems in Engineering, Vol. 2008, 2008, p. 14. doi:10.1155/2008/763654
A. A. Kamel, “Expansion Formulae in Canonical Transformations Depending on a Small Parameter,” Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy, Vol. 1, No. 2, 1969, pp. 190-199. doi:10.1007/BF01228838
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RBC Confirms US Subpoena Over Auction Rate Securities
The Globe and Mail, Tara Perkins, 7 August 2008
Royal Bank of Canada was one of a number of financial institutions subpoenaed in the United States in connection with auction-rate securities, the bank confirmed yesterday.
The $330-billion (U.S.) market for auction-rate securities collapsed this year as a result of the liquidity crunch, leaving many American investors stuck with frozen securities.
The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that Citigroup Inc. is negotiating with federal regulators to settle allegations it wrongly told customers the securities were safe and liquid. Citigroup could wind up buying back more than $5-billion of the securities from investors and paying a fine of up to $100-million, the newspaper reported.
Late last month, New York Attorney-General Andrew Cuomo launched a multibillion-dollar securities fraud lawsuit against UBS AG, alleging it was falsely selling and marketing auction-rate securities as safe. He further alleged that as the market for the securities began to collapse, the bank's top executives quickly sold $21-million of their personal holdings of auction-rate securities while continuing to market them.
"UBS is not alone in this scheme," Mr. Cuomo had told reporters. "There are other institutions which participated, but UBS is a major player."
His office has reportedly subpoenaed dozens of companies since beginning its investigation.
"I can confirm that RBC Capital Markets Corp., along with others, were subpoenaed back in April," Royal Bank spokeswoman Beja Rodeck said in an e-mail yesterday.
Veritas Investment Research analyst Ohad Lederer wrote in a note to clients this week: "We don't know how badly [RBC] will get stung by its involvement in the auction-rate securities market. The facts are few, we admit, but combined with a pinch of imagination and a dash of conjecture, it is not a stretch to see how the issue could adversely weigh on Royal's U.S. strategy and/or results."
The bank's inventory of auction-rate securities built up from a negligible balance to $3.7-billion in the weeks leading up to a decision in early February by a number of U.S. banks to withdraw their support for the market (which precipitated the collapse), Mr. Lederer noted. And RBC has already taken a $212-million writedown on its securities, and has disclosed that it is a "remarketing agent" for a program of $21.3-billion, of which $20.2-billion is student loans.
Mr. Lederer said he assumes elevated funding costs are to blame for most of Royal's writedown.
Labels: RBC
Scotiabank Sets-up Fund Manager with Chinese Bank
Preview of Banks' Q3 2008 Earnings
Banks' Credit Losses Top $500 Billion on Writedown...
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Where Do Bank Stocks Go From Here?
Financial Post, John Greenwood, 26 Octber 2009
Like their peers around the world, Canadian banks got clobbered on stock markets as the financial crisis raged. But as the gloom cleared, their shares -- unlike those of many foreign banks that had the misfortune of owning toxic credit investments -- rocketed skyward, leading the way in one of the most spectacular stock market rallies in decades.
By early August, they had regained nearly all the ground lost since the storm broke in September 2008, collectively rising about 65% from the lows of March.
But for nearly three months since then, bank shares have mostly treaded water -- the sole exception Royal Bank of Canada, which peaked at the end of August instead of the beginning. As the broader Toronto market ploughed ahead, investors have been left wondering if that's all there is for the bank rally.
Brad Smith, an analyst at Blackmont Capital Inc., said he's not surprised.
"More than anything else, what you are seeing is a natural period of consolidation that you would expect to occur after a significant advance driven by improved earnings multiples going forward," said Mr. Smith. "So it's not surprising we are seeing this temporary lull."
Shares in Royal Bank last week closed at $53.39, down 59¢. Bank of Montreal ended at $52.03, down $1.01. Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce was $1.09 lower at $64.36. Toronto-Dominion Bank was down 67¢ at $64.97, while Bank of Nova Scotia finished at $46.34, down 53¢.
Mr. Smith said the market is still trying to decide if the early optimism around the Canadian banks and their lack of exposure to subprime mortgages justifies the spectacular rise in shares, arguing that the upcoming forth-quarter earnings --due in early November -- will provide a lot of the answers.
One concern is that much of the good news that analysts are expecting has already been factored into the shares, so unless the results include some positive surprises, it could be bad news for investors.
"The banks are trading at roughly 13 times expected 2010 earnings but the reality is that, historically, the range is between eight and 15 times earnings, so we are much closer to peak multiple levels than troughs," said Mr. Smith.
Another issue that will likely affect the banks is proposed new regulations that have come out of Group of 20 nations discussions. In recent weeks, the focus has been on executive bonuses but the rules are expected to cover everything from how much capital banks are required to hold to the amount of leverage they can take on.
"These are the kinds of things that really do affect profitability," said an analyst who asked not to be identified. "No one knows [what the regulations will ultimately look like], so until you get some clarification you just have to hold your breath."
For its part, the federal government has argued that since banks in this country didn't get mixed up in the kind of toxic investments and reckless risk-taking that brought down so many of their global peers, Canadian regulations aren't in need of the kind of overhaul they're getting in the United States and Europe.
But critics say that unless Ottawa follows suit with its fellow G20 countries, it risks upsetting the global balance and becoming a magnet for foreign firms that want to sidestep the rules in their home jurisdictions.
"Capital markets is a global business," said Mr. Smith. "You can't have pockets of regulation that are different from the rest because all the capital will tilt into those jurisdictions."
Another explanation for why bank shares haven't moved is that investment dollars are being drawn toward more attractive sectors such as energy.
At a time when there is so much uncertainty over financial services, the logic around oil and gas is simple. Against the backdrop of an improving global economy, oil prices have been moving steadily higher over the past few months.
"At the end of the day, a guy pulling oil out of the ground [in today's economy] has less risk than a guy sitting on a bunch of loans."
Labels: BMO, CIBC, National Bank, RBC, Scotiabank, TD Bank
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Atayal people
"Tayan" redirects here. For the town in Kyrgyzstan, see Tayan, Kyrgyzstan.
The Atayal (Chinese: 泰雅; pinyin: Tàiyǎ), also known as the Tayal and the Tayan,[1] are a Taiwanese indigenous people. In 2014, the Atayal people numbered 85,888. This was approximately 15.9% of Taiwan's total indigenous population, making them the third-largest indigenous group.[2][3] The preferred endonym is "Tayal", although the Taiwanese government officially recognizes them as "Atayal".[4]
Tayal, Tayan
A Tayal woman with tattoo on her face as a symbol of maturity, which was a tradition for both males and females. The custom was prohibited during Japanese rule.
89,741 (Jan 2018)
Regions with significant populations
Atayal, Mandarin, Taiwanese Hokkien, Yilan Creole Japanese
Animism, Christianity
Related ethnic groups
Seediq, Truku, Kavalan, Taiwanese Aborigines
EtymologyEdit
The Atayal word for Atayal is tayal, meaning "human" or "man".[5]
1901 map of Taiwan, with "Atayal Group of Savages" marked.
Atayal sculpture in Wulai.
The first record of Atayal inhabitance is found near the upper reaches of the Zhuoshui River. However, during the late 17th century they crossed the Central Mountain Ranges into the wilderness of the east. They then settled in the Liwu River valley. Seventy-nine Atayal villages can be found here.[citation needed]
Taiwan is home of a number of Austronesian indigenous groups since before 4,000 BC.[6] However, genetic analysis suggests that the different peoples may have different ancestral source populations originating in mainland Asia, and developed in isolation from each other. The Atayal people are believed to have migrated to Taiwan from Southern China or Southeast Asia.[7] Genetic studies have also found similarities between the Atayal and other people in the Philippines and Thailand, and to a lesser extent with south China and Vietnam.[8] The Atayal are genetically distinct from the Amis people who are the largest indigenous group in Taiwan, as well as from the Han people, suggesting little mingling between these people.[9] Studies on Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) polymorphisms suggest ancient migrations of two lineages of the various peoples into Taiwan approximately 11,000-26,000 years ago.[10]
Recent DNA studies show that the Lapita people and modern Polynesians have a common ancestry with the Atayal and the Kankanaey people of the northern Philippines.[11]
The Atayal are visibly different from the Han Chinese of Taiwan.[12] Intermarriage with Chinese also produced a significant number of Atayal-Chinese mixed offspring and celebrities such as Vivian Hsu, Vic Zhou, Yuming Lai, Kao Chin Su-mei.
FolkloreEdit
According to stories told by their elders, the first Atayal ancestors appeared when a stone, Pinspkan, cracked apart. There were three people, but one decided to go back into the stone. One man and one woman who lived together for a very long time and loved each other very much. But the boy was shy and wouldn't dare approach her. Whereupon, the girl came up with an idea. She left her home and found some coal with which to blacken her face so she could pose as a different girl.
After several days, she crept back into their home and the boy mistook her for another girl and they lived happily ever after. Not long after, the couple bore children, fulfilling their mission of procreating the next generation. The Atayal custom of face tattooing may have come from the girl blackening her face in the story.
LifestyleEdit
Traditional aboriginal designs are often found on modern buildings in Taiwan in places where aborigines traditionally live. Here is an Atayal-inspired community center in rural Ilan County.
The Atayal people have a well-developed culture. They originally lived by fishing, hunting, gathering, and growing crops on burned-off mountain fields. Atayal also practice crafts such as weaving, net knotting, and woodworking. They also have traditional musical instruments and dances.
The Atayal are known as skilled warriors. In a practice illegal since the Japanese Colonial Era (1895 –1945), to earn his facial tattoo a man had to bring back at least one human head; these heads, or skulls, were highly honored, given food and drink, and expected to bring good harvests to the fields. (See Headhunting.) The Atayal were known to be fierce fighters as observed in the case of the Wushe Incident, in which the Atayal participated in an uprising against colonial Japanese forces.
Lalaw Behuw was the weapon of the Atayals.[13] Traditional Aboriginal weapons have featured in movies.[14]
Traditional dressEdit
The Atayal are proficient weavers, incorporating symbolic patterns and designs on their traditional dress. The features are mainly of geometric style, and the colors are bright and dazzling. Most of the designs are argyles and horizontal lines. In Atayal culture, the horizontal lines represent the rainbow bridge which leads the dead to where the ancestors' spirits live. Argyles, on the other hand, represent ancestors' eyes protecting the Atayal. The favorite color of this culture is red because it represents blood and power.
Facial tattoosEdit
A Tayal couple in Japanese occupation period.
The Atayal people are also known for using facial tattooing and teeth filing in coming-of-age initiation rituals. The facial tattoo, in Squliq Tayal, is called ptasan. In the past both men and women had to show that they had performed a major task associated with an adult before their faces could be tattooed. For a man, he had to take the head of an enemy, showing his valor as a hunter to protect and provide for his people, while women had to be able to weave cloth. A girl would learn to weave when she was about ten or twelve, and she had to master the skill in order to earn her tattoo. Only those with tattoos could marry, and, after death, only those with tattoos could cross the hongu utux, or spirit bridge (the rainbow) to the hereafter.
Male tattooing is relatively simple, with only two bands down the forehead and chin. Once a male came of age he would have his forehead tattooed; after fathering a child, his bottom chin was tattooed. For the female, tattooing was done on the cheek, typically from the ears across both cheeks to the lips forming a V shape. While tattooing on a man is relatively quick, on a female it may take up to ten hours.[7]
Tattooing was performed only by female tattooists. The tattooing was performed using a group of needles lashed to a stick called atok tapped into the skin using a hammer called totsin. Black ash would then be rubbed into the skin to create the tattoo. Healing could take up to a month.[7]
The Japanese banned the practice of tattooing in 1930 because of its association with headhunting. With the introduction of Christianity, the practice declined, and tattoos are now only seen on the elderly even though it is no longer banned. However, some young people in recent years have attempted to revive the practice.[7] By 2018 only one traditionally tattooed Atayal person survived, Lawa Piheg, who was tattooed when she was 8; she did not want the practice to continue.[15]
Atayal in modern timesEdit
The Atayal people reside in central and northern Taiwan, along the Hsuehshan mountains. The image depicts the two major dialect groups of the Atayal language.
Main article: Taiwanese aborigines – Contemporary Aborigines
The Atayal people in Taiwan live in central and northern Taiwan. The northernmost village is Ulay (Wulai in Chinese), about 25 kilometers south of central Taipei. The name Ulay is derived from /qilux/, hot, because of the hot springs on the riverbank. [1] The Wulai Atayal Museum in the town is a place to learn about the history and culture of the Atayal.
By 2003 the mainly Christian community of Smangus had become well known as a tourist destination, and an experiment in communalism.[16]
Many Atayal are bilingual, but the Atayal language still remains in active use.
Notable Atayal peopleEdit
Esther Huang, actress and singer
Jane Huang, singer of rock duo Y2J
Joanne Tseng, actress and member of pop duo Sweety
Kao Chin Su-mei, actress, singer and politician
Landy Wen, singer
Lo Chih-an, football player
Lo Chih-en, football player
Payen Talu, member of Legislative Yuan (1996–2002)
Vic Chou, actor and member of pop group F4
Vivian Hsu, actress
Yuming Lai, singer of rock duo Y2J
Atayal Resort
Wulai Atayal Museum
^ Atayal Archived 2012-08-13 at the Wayback Machine, Digital Museum of Taiwan Indigenous Peoples.
^ Hsieh Chia-chen & Jeffrey Wu (February 15, 2014). "Amis remains Taiwan's biggest aboriginal tribe at 37.1% of total". Focus Taiwan.
^ Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics, Executive Yuan, R.O.C. (DGBAS). National Statistics, Republic of China (Taiwan). Preliminary statistical analysis report of 2000 Population and Housing Census Archived 2007-03-12 at the Wayback Machine. Excerpted from Table 28:Indigenous population distribution in Taiwan-Fukien Area. Accessed PM 8/30/06
^ Thao, Yer J. (2019). "Voices of Atayal People: Indigenous Cultural Memory in Modern Taiwan Society". Advances in Social Sciences Research Journal. 6 (3): 141–158. doi:10.14738/assrj.63.6314.
^ Council of Indigenous Peoples. "原住民族語言線上詞典 - 原住民族委員會" (in Chinese). Retrieved 28 April 2019.
^ Merritt Ruhlen (1994). The origin of language: tracing the origin of the mother tongue. Wiley, New York. pp. 177–180.
^ a b c d Margo DeMello (30 May 2014). Inked: Tattoos and Body Art around the World. ABC-CLIO. pp. 34–36. ISBN 978-1610690751.
^ Chen KH, Cann H, Chen TC, Van West B, Cavalli-Sforza L (1985). "Genetic markers of an aboriginal Taiwanese population". Am J Phys Anthropol. 66 (3): 327–337. doi:10.1002/ajpa.1330660310. PMID 3857010.
^ Rachel A. Chow; Jose L. Caeiro; Shu-Juo Chen; Ralph L. Garcia-Bertrand; Rene J. Herrera (2005). "Genetic characterization of four Austronesian-speaking populations" (PDF). Journal of Human Genetics. 50 (11): 550–559. doi:10.1007/s10038-005-0294-0. PMID 16208426.
^ Tajima A, Sun CS, Pan IH, Ishida T, Saitou N, Horai S (2003). "Mitochondrial DNA polymorphisms in nine aboriginal groups of Taiwan: implications for the population history of aboriginal Taiwanese". Human Genetics. 113 (1): 24–33. doi:10.1007/s00439-003-0945-1. PMID 12687351.
^ Gibbons, Ann (3 October 2016). "'Game-changing' study suggests first Polynesians voyaged all the way from East Asia". Science. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
^ Dudding, Adam (15 March 2015). "New Zealand's long-lost Taiwanese cuzzies". Stuff Destinations. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
^ http://nccur.lib.nccu.edu.tw/bitstream/140.119/34564/9/25900309.pdf http://conference.masalu.org.tw/webadmin/upload/1-6-1-%E9%84%AD%E5%85%89%E5%8D%9A--%E4%BF%AE%E6%AD%A3%E5%BE%8C.pdf http://e-dictionary.apc.gov.tw/tay/4/DLText.htm https://www.flickr.com/photos/94448433@N00/5865993483 http://flickrhivemind.net/Tags/knife,laraw http://www.flickriver.com/photos/tags/%E7%95%AA%E5%88%80/interesting/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/talovich/5865996049 https://www.flickr.com/photos/talovich/5866548974 http://etnics.es/foro/index.php?topic=1700.5;wap2 http://www.appledaily.com.tw/appledaily/article/forum/20070510/3462555/
^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2016-09-13. Retrieved 2016-08-25. CS1 maint: Archived copy as title (link) http://travel.cnn.com/hong-kong/visit/seediq-bale-401232/ http://savageminds.org/2011/12/31/the-translation-of-seediq-bale/ http://screenanarchy.com/2012/08/-fantasia-2012-wrap-all.html
^ "My face was tattooed when I was eight". BBC News. 25 September 2018. Interview with last tattooed person, with historical photographs of instruments, tattooed people, etc.
^ "Returning to the land of the ancestors." Taipei Times, Aug 10 2003. Accessed 10/21/06.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Atayal people.
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This article is about the modern folkloristic genre and its history. For the music and instruments of the ancient Celts until late Antiquity, see Ancient Celtic music. For the record label, see Celtic Music (record label).
Rapalje performing in 2010
Celtic music is a broad grouping of music genres that evolved out of the folk music traditions of the Celtic people of Western Europe.[1][2] It refers to both orally-transmitted traditional music and recorded music and the styles vary considerably to include everything from "trad" (traditional) music to a wide range of hybrids.
Description and definitionEdit
An 18th century depiction of an ancient Druid playing the harp
Celtic music means two things mainly. First, it is the music of the people that identify themselves as Celts. Secondly, it refers to whatever qualities may be unique to the music of the Celtic nations. Many notable Celtic musicians such as Alan Stivell and Paddy Moloney[3] claim that the different Celtic music genres have a lot in common.[1][2][4]
These following melodic practices may be used[4] widely across the different variants of Celtic Music:
Celtic harp performed at a Celtic festival in 2010
It is common for the melodic line to move up and down the primary chords in many Celtic songs. There are a number of possible reasons for this:
Melodic variation can be easily introduced. Melodic variation is widely used in Celtic music, especially by the pipes and harp.
It is easier to anticipate the direction that the melody will take, so that harmony either composed or improvised can be introduced: cliched cadences that are essential for impromptu harmony are also more easily formed.
The relatively wider tonal intervals in some songs make it possible for stress accents within the poetic line to be more in keeping with the local Celtic accent.
Across just one Celtic group.
By more than one Celtic language population belonging to different Celtic groups.
These two latter usage patterns may simply be remnants of formerly widespread melodic practices.
Often, the term Celtic music is applied to the music of Ireland and Scotland because both lands have produced well-known distinctive styles which actually have genuine commonality and clear mutual influences. The definition is further complicated by the fact that Irish independence has allowed Ireland to promote 'Celtic' music as a specifically Irish product. However, these are modern geographical references to a people who share a common Celtic ancestry and consequently, a common musical heritage.
These styles are known because of the importance of Irish and Scottish people in the English speaking world, especially in the United States, where they had a profound impact on American music, particularly bluegrass and country music.[5] The music of Wales, Cornwall, the Isle of Man, Brittany, Galicia, Cantabria and Asturias (Spain) and Portugal are also considered Celtic music, the tradition being particularly strong in Brittany,[6] where Celtic festivals large and small take place throughout the year,[7] and in Wales, where the ancient eisteddfod tradition has been revived and flourishes. Additionally, the musics of ethnically Celtic peoples abroad are vibrant, especially in Canada and the United States. In Canada the provinces of Atlantic Canada are known for being a home of Celtic music, most notably on the islands of Newfoundland, Cape Breton and Prince Edward Island. The traditional music of Atlantic Canada is heavily influenced by the Irish, Scottish and Acadian ethnic makeup of much of the region's communities.[8] In some parts of Atlantic Canada, such as Newfoundland, Celtic music is as or more popular than in the old country. Further, some older forms of Celtic music that are rare in Scotland and Ireland today, such as the practice of accompanying a fiddle with a piano, or the Gaelic spinning songs of Cape Breton remain common in the Maritimes. Much of the music of this region is Celtic in nature, but originates in the local area and celebrates the sea, seafaring, fishing and other primary industries.
DivisionsEdit
Alan Stivell at Nuremberg, Germany, 2007
In Celtic Music: A Complete Guide, June Skinner Sawyers acknowledges six Celtic nationalities divided into two groups according to their linguistic heritage.[9] The Q-Celtic nationalities are the Irish, Scottish and Manx peoples, while the P-Celtic groups are the Cornish, Bretons and Welsh peoples. Musician Alan Stivell uses a similar dichotomy, between the Gaelic (Irish/Scottish/Manx) and the Brythonic (Breton/Welsh/Cornish) branches, which differentiate "mostly by the extended range (sometimes more than two octaves) of Irish and Scottish melodies and the closed range of Breton and Welsh melodies (often reduced to a half-octave), and by the frequent use of the pure pentatonic scale in Gaelic music."[10]
There is also tremendous variation between Celtic regions. Ireland, Scotland, Brittany and Wales have living traditions of language and music, and there has been a recent major revival of interest in Celtic heritage in Cornwall and the Isle of Man. Galicia has a Celtic language revival movement to revive the Q-Celtic Gallaic language used into Roman times.[11][12][13][14] Most of the Iberian Peninsula had a similar Celtic language in pre-Roman times. A Brythonic language was used in parts of Galicia and Asturias into early Medieval times brought by Britons fleeing the Anglo-Saxon invasions via Brittany.[15][16] The Romance language currently spoken in Galicia, Galician (Galego) is closely related to the Portuguese language used mainly in Brazil and Portugal. Galician music is claimed to be Celtic.[2] The same is true of the music of Asturias,[2] Cantabria, and that of Northern Portugal (some say even traditional music from Central Portugal can be labeled Celtic).
Breton artist Alan Stivell was one of the earliest musicians to use the word Celtic and Keltia in his marketing materials, starting in the early 1960s as part of the worldwide folk music revival of that era[17][18] with the term quickly catching on with other artists worldwide. Today, the genre is well established and incredibly diverse.
There are musical genres and styles specific to each Celtic country, due in part to the influence of individual song traditions and the characteristics of specific languages:[19]
Celtic traditional music
Music of Scotland
Strathspeys are specific to Highland Scotland, for example, and it has been hypothesized that they mimic the rhythms of the Scottish Gaelic language.[20]
Pibroch
Cerdd Dant (string music) or Canu Penillion (verse singing) is the art of vocal improvisation over a given melody in Welsh musical tradition. It is an important competition in eisteddfodau. The singer or (small) choir sings a counter melody over a harp melody.[21]
Waulking song
Puirt à beul
Kan ha diskan
Sean-nós song
Celtic hip hop
Celtic rock
Celtic metal
Celtic punk
Celtic fusion
Progressive music
FestivalsEdit
See list of Celtic festivals for a more complete list of Celtic festivals by country, including music festivals. Festivals focused largely or partly on Celtic music can be found at Category:Celtic music festivals.
The modern Celtic music scene involves a large number of music festivals, as it has traditionally. Some of the most prominent festivals focused solely on music include:
Festival Internacional do Mundo Celta de Ortigueira (Ortigueira, Galicia, Spain)
Festival Intercéltico de Avilés (Avilés, Asturies, Spain)
Folixa na Primavera (Mieres, Asturies, Spain)
Festival Celta Internacional Reino de León, (León, Spain)
Festival Internacional de Música Celta de Collado Villalba (Collado Villalba, Spain)
Yn Chruinnaght (Isle of Man)
Celtic Connections (Glasgow, Scotland)[22]
Hebridean Celtic Festival (Stornoway, Scotland)[23]
Massed pipers at the Lorient festival
Fleadh ceol na hÉireann (Tullamore, Ireland)
Festival Intercéltico de Sendim (Sendim, Portugal)[24][25]
Galaicofolia (Esposende, Portugal)[26]
Festival Folk Celta Ponte da Barca (Ponte da Barca, Portugal)
Douro Celtic Fest (Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal)
Festival Interceltique de Lorient (Lorient, France)[27]
Festival del Kan ar Bobl (Lorient, France)
Festival de Cornouaille (Quimper, France)
Les Nuits Celtiques du Stade de France (Paris, France)
Montelago Celtic Night (Colfiorito, Macerata, Italy)
Triskell International Celtic Festival (Trieste, Italy)
Festival celtique de Québec or Québec city celtic festival, (Quebec city, Quebec, Canada)[28]
Festival Mémoire et Racines (Joliette, Quebec, Canada)
Celtic Colours (Cape Breton, Nova Scotia)
Paganfest (Tour through Europe)
Celtic fusionEdit
Main article: Celtic fusion
The oldest musical tradition which fits under the label of Celtic fusion originated in the rural American south in the early colonial period and incorporated Scottish, Scots-Irish, Irish, Welsh, English, and African influences. Variously referred to as roots music, American folk music, or old-time music, this tradition has exerted a strong influence on all forms of American music, including country, blues, and rock and roll.[29] In addition to its lasting effects on other genres, it marked the first modern large-scale mixing of musical traditions from multiple ethnic and religious communities within the Celtic diaspora.
In the 1960s several bands put forward modern adaptations of Celtic music pulling influences from several of the Celtic nations at once to create a modern pan-celtic sound. A few of those include bagadoù (Breton pipe bands), Fairport Convention, Pentangle, Steeleye Span and Horslips.
In the 1970s Clannad[30] made their mark initially in the folk and traditional scene, and then subsequently went on to bridge the gap between traditional Celtic and pop music in the 1980s and 1990s, incorporating elements from new-age, smooth jazz, and folk rock. Traces of Clannad's legacy can be heard in the music of many artists, including Enya, Donna Taggart, Altan, Capercaillie, The Corrs, Loreena McKennitt, Anúna, Riverdance and U2. The solo music of Clannad's lead singer, Moya Brennan (often referred to as the First Lady of Celtic Music) has further enhanced this influence.
Later, beginning in 1982 with The Pogues' invention of Celtic folk-punk and Stockton's Wing blend of Irish traditional and Pop, Rock and Reggae, there has been a movement to incorporate Celtic influences into other genres of music. Bands like Flogging Molly, Black 47, Dropkick Murphys, The Young Dubliners, The Tossers introduced a hybrid of Celtic rock, punk, reggae, hardcore and other elements in the 1990s that has become popular with Irish-American youth.
Today there are Celtic-influenced subgenres of virtually every type of popular music including electronica, rock, metal, punk, hip hop, reggae, new-age, Latin, Andean and pop. Collectively these modern interpretations of Celtic music are sometimes referred to as Celtic fusion.
Other modern adaptationsEdit
Outside of America, the first deliberate attempts to create a "Pan-Celtic music" were made by the Breton Taldir Jaffrennou, having translated songs from Ireland, Scotland, and Wales into Breton between the two world wars. One of his major works was to bring "Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau" (the Welsh national anthem) back in Brittany and create lyrics in Breton. Eventually this song became "Bro goz va zadoù" ("Old land of my fathers") and is the most widely accepted Breton anthem. In the 70s, the Breton Alan Cochevelou (future Alan Stivell) began playing a mixed repertoire from the main Celtic countries on the Celtic harp his father created.[18]
Probably the most successful all inclusive Celtic music composition in recent years is Shaun Daveys composition 'The Pilgrim'. This suite depicts the journey of St. Colum Cille through the Celtic nations of Ireland, Scotland, the Isle of Man, Wales, Cornwall, Brittany and Galicia. The suite which includes a Scottish pipe band, Irish and Welsh harpists, Galician gaitas, Irish uilleann pipes, the bombardes of Brittany, two vocal soloists and a narrator is set against a background of a classical orchestra and a large choir.
Modern music may also be termed "Celtic" because it is written and recorded in a Celtic language, regardless of musical style. Many of the Celtic languages have experienced resurgences in modern years, spurred on partly by the action of artists and musicians who have embraced them as hallmarks of identity and distinctness. In 1971, the Irish band Skara Brae recorded its only LP (simply called Skara Brae), all songs in Irish. In 1978 Runrig recorded an album in Scottish Gaelic. In 1992 Capercaillie recorded "A Prince Among Islands", the first Scottish Gaelic language record to reach the UK top 40. In 1996, a song in Breton represented France in the 41st Eurovision Song Contest, the first time in history that France had a song without a word in French. Since about 2005, Oi Polloi (from Scotland) have recorded in Scottish Gaelic. Mill a h-Uile Rud (a Scottish Gaelic punk band from Seattle) recorded in the language in 2004.
Several contemporary bands have Welsh language songs, such as Ceredwen, which fuses traditional instruments with trip hop beats, the Super Furry Animals, Fernhill, and so on (see the Music of Wales article for more Welsh and Welsh-language bands). The same phenomenon occurs in Brittany, where many singers record songs in Breton, traditional or modern (hip hop, rap, and so on.).
Folk music of Ireland
Music of Brittany
Music of Cornwall
Music of Galicia, Cantabria and Asturias
Music of the Isle of Man
Music of Wales
Music of Portugal
Traditional Gaelic music
^ a b Melhuish, Martin (1998). Celtic Tides: Traditional Music in a New Age. Ontario, Canada: Quarry Press Inc. pp. 8, 28. ISBN 1-55082-205-5.
^ a b c d Alberro, Manuel (2005). "Celtic Legacy in Galicia". E-Keltoi: Journal of Interdisciplinary Celtic Studies. 6: 1005–1035.
^ Melhuish, Martin (1998). Celtic Tides: Traditional Music in a New Age. Ontario, Canada: Quarry Press Inc. pp. 73–79 especially 77 and 79. ISBN 1-55082-205-5.
^ a b Aubrey, Graham (2011). The Ingenious Cornish - Inventions, Enterprises and Exploits: The Ethnicity Factor in Cornish Music Both at Home and Abroad. Wallaroo Town Hall during Kernewek Lowender 2011 Biennial Seminar: Cornish Association of South Australia Est. 1890. p. 16.
^ Troxler, Bill (14 October 2007). "From Heather to High Lonesome". Bluegrass and Celtic Music. Chincoteague Cultural Alliance. Archived from the original on 28 August 2008.
^ "What is celtic music?". www.ceolas.org. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
^ Defrance Yves, “New Celtic Music in Brittany”, in Continuum Encyclopedia of popular music of the world, London-New York, International Association of Popular Music, Continuum Books, Part.3 Genres, vol.10, 2013, 3 p.
^ Melhuish, Martin (1998). Celtic Tides: Traditional Music in a New Age. Ontario, Canada: Quarry Press Inc. pp. 121–152. ISBN 1-55082-205-5.
^ Sawyers, June Skinner (2000). Celtic Music: A Complete Guide (1st Da Capo Press ed.). New York: Da Capo Press. p. 4. ISBN 0-306-81007-7. Retrieved 25 March 2016.
^ translation by Steve Winick
^ "Celtic Music - Celtic Music Instruments". Retrieved 10 August 2016.
^ "Gallaic Revival". Archived from the original on 7 January 2018. Retrieved 11 May 2013.
^ "Gallaic Revival Movement". Retrieved 11 May 2013.
^ "Gallaic Revival Movement". "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2 October 2012. Retrieved 2013-05-11. CS1 maint: Archived copy as title (link) CS1 maint: BOT: original-url status unknown (link)
^ Koch, John (2005). Celtic Culture : A Historical Encyclopedia. ABL-CIO. p. 275. ISBN 978-1-85109-440-0. Retrieved 29 September 2012.
^ Zimmer with Koch and Minard (eds.), Stefan with John T. and Antone (2012). The Celts: History, Life, and Culture - see map of Celtic language distribution. California: ABC-CLIO, LLC. p. 162. ISBN 978-1-59884-964-6. CS1 maint: Extra text: authors list (link)
^ Bruce Elder. All Music Guide, Answers.com . Retrieved 15 July 2009.
^ a b JT Koch (ed). Celtic Culture. A Historical Encyclopaedia ABC-CLIO 2006 pp 1627–1628
^ "Celtic Music Genre Overview | AllMusic". AllMusic. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
^ Cockburn, Craig. "Traditional Gaelic song and singing sean-nós". Silicon Glen. Retrieved 25 March 2016.
^ "About Cerdd Dant". Cymdeithas Cerdd Dant Cymru. Archived from the original on 16 December 2010. Retrieved 5 May 2012.
^ "Celtic connections:Scotland's premier winter music festival". Celtic connections website. Celtic Connections. 2010. Retrieved 23 January 2010.
^ "Hebridean Celtic Festival 2010 - the biggest homecoming party of the year". Hebridean Celtic Festival website. Hebridean Celtic Festival. 2009. Retrieved 23 January 2010.
^ "IntercelticoSendim.com". Archived from the original on 27 December 2008.
^ "Festival Intercéltico de Sendim 2015". Douro Valley. August 2015. Retrieved 25 March 2016.
^ "Galaicofolia". Galaicofolia. Retrieved 25 March 2016.
^ "Site Officiel du Festival Interceltique de Lorient". Festival Interceltique de Lorient website. Festival Interceltique de Lorient. 2009. Archived from the original on 5 March 2010. Retrieved 23 January 2010.
^ "Festival Celtique de Québec". 2012. Retrieved 2 July 2012.
^ Irish Folk, Trad and Blues: A Secret History" by Colin Harper (2005) covers Horslips, The Pogues, Planxty and others.
^ http://www.allmusic.com/artist/clannad-mn0000781732
European Music at Curlie
Celtic melody library
Free sheet music on CelticScores.com
Free sheet music, chords, midis at Vashon Celtic Tunes
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Celtic_music&oldid=905965428"
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National monument (United States)
(Redirected from U.S. National Monument)
Devils Tower National Monument, Wyoming
Navajo National Monument, Arizona
Statue of Liberty National Monument, New Jersey and New York
Fort Matanzas National Monument, Florida
In the United States, a national monument is a protected area that is similar to a national park, but can be created from any land owned or controlled by the federal government[a] by proclamation of the President of the United States.
National monuments can be managed by one of several federal agencies: the National Park Service, United States Forest Service, United States Fish and Wildlife Service, the Bureau of Land Management, or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (in the case of marine national monuments). Historically, some national monuments were managed by the War Department.[1]
National monuments can be so designated through the power of the Antiquities Act of 1906. President Theodore Roosevelt used the act to declare Devils Tower in Wyoming as the first U.S. national monument.
2 List of national monuments
Supt. Frank "Boss" Pinkley – the southwestern national monuments, 1934
The Antiquities Act of 1906 resulted from concerns about protecting mostly prehistoric Native American ruins and artifacts (collectively termed "antiquities") on federal lands in the American West.[citation needed] The Act authorized permits for legitimate archaeological investigations and penalties for taking or destroying antiquities without permission. Additionally, it authorized the president to proclaim "historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest" on federal lands as national monuments, "the limits of which in all cases shall be confined to the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the objects to be protected."[2]
The reference in the act to "objects of...scientific interest" enabled President Theodore Roosevelt to make a natural geological feature, Devils Tower in Wyoming, the first national monument three months later.[3] Among the next three monuments he proclaimed in 1906 was Petrified Forest in Arizona, another natural feature.
In 1908, Roosevelt used the act to proclaim more than 800,000 acres (3,200 km2) of the Grand Canyon as a national monument.
In 1918, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed Katmai National Monument in Alaska, comprising more than 1,000,000 acres (4,000 km2). Katmai was later enlarged to nearly 2,800,000 acres (11,000 km2) by subsequent Antiquities Act proclamations and for many years was the largest national park system unit. Petrified Forest, Grand Canyon, and Great Sand Dunes were also originally proclaimed as national monuments and later designated as national parks by Congress.[4][5][6]
In response to Roosevelt's declaration of the Grand Canyon monument, a putative mining claimant sued in federal court, claiming that Roosevelt had overstepped the Antiquities Act authority by protecting an entire canyon. In 1920, the United States Supreme Court ruled unanimously that the Grand Canyon was indeed "an object of historic or scientific interest" and could be protected by proclamation, setting a precedent for the use of the Antiquities Act to preserve large areas.[7] Federal courts have since rejected every challenge to the president's use of Antiquities Act preservation authority, ruling that the law gives the president exclusive discretion over the determination of the size and nature of the objects protected.
Substantial opposition did not materialize until 1943, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt proclaimed Jackson Hole National Monument in Wyoming. He did this to accept a donation of lands acquired by John D. Rockefeller, Jr., for addition to Grand Teton National Park after Congress had declined to authorize this park expansion. Roosevelt's proclamation unleashed a storm of criticism about use of the Antiquities Act to circumvent Congress. A bill abolishing Jackson Hole National Monument passed Congress but was vetoed by Roosevelt, and Congressional and court challenges to the proclamation authority were mounted. In 1950, Congress finally incorporated most of the monument into Grand Teton National Park, but the act doing so barred further use of the proclamation authority in Wyoming except for areas of 5,000 acres or less.
The most substantial use of the proclamation authority came in 1978, when President Jimmy Carter proclaimed 15 new national monuments in Alaska after Congress had adjourned without passing a major Alaska lands bill strongly opposed in that state. Congress passed a revised version of the bill in 1980 incorporating most of these national monuments into national parks and preserves, but the act also curtailed further use of the proclamation authority in Alaska.
The proclamation authority was not used again anywhere until 1996, when President Bill Clinton proclaimed the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah. This action was widely unpopular in Utah,[8] and bills were introduced to further restrict the president's authority.[9], none of which have been enacted. Most of the 16 national monuments created by President Clinton are managed not by the National Park Service, but by the Bureau of Land Management as part of the National Landscape Conservation System.[citation needed]
Presidents have used the Antiquities Act's proclamation authority not only to create new national monuments but to enlarge existing ones. For example, Franklin D. Roosevelt significantly enlarged Dinosaur National Monument in 1938. Lyndon B. Johnson added Ellis Island to Statue of Liberty National Monument in 1965, and Jimmy Carter made major additions to Glacier Bay and Katmai National Monuments in 1978.[10]
On June 24, 2016, President Barack Obama designated the Stonewall Inn and surrounding areas in Greenwich Village, New York as the Stonewall National Monument, the first national monument commemorating the struggle for LGBT rights in the United States.[11]
^ See the Antiquities Act article for exceptions.
List of national monuments[edit]
Main article: List of national monuments of the United States
List of U.S. National Forests
List of areas in the United States National Park System (includes list of NPS-managed national monuments)
List of U.S. wilderness areas
Protected areas of the United States
List of proposed national monuments of the United States
^ Glimpses of Our National Monuments. U.S. Government Printing Office. 1930. Archived from the original on November 22, 2012.
^ "American Antiquities Act". National Park Service. Archived from the original on October 11, 2014. Retrieved October 11, 2014.
^ "Devils Tower First 50 Years" (PDF). National Park Service. Archived (PDF) from the original on May 31, 2009. Retrieved October 11, 2014.
^ "PUBLIC LAW 85-358-MAR. 28, 1958" (PDF). Government Printing Office. Archived (PDF) from the original on July 13, 2014. Retrieved October 11, 2014.
^ "Records of the NPS". archives.gov. Archived from the original on October 16, 2014. Retrieved October 11, 2014.
^ "Antiquities Act 1906–2006: Maps, facts and figures" (archive). nps.gov. National Park Service. Retrieved February 6, 2018.
^ Cameron v. United States Archived March 30, 2014, at the Wayback Machine, 252 U.S. 450 (1920)
^ Wieber, Audrey (October 12, 2014). "Locals Bitter Over Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument Creation". MagicValley.com. Twin Falls Times-News. Archived from the original on August 26, 2015. Retrieved July 11, 2015.
^ Lewis, Neil A. (October 8, 1997). "House Tweaks Clinton Over Creation of National Monuments". New York Times. Archived from the original on July 20, 2015. Retrieved July 11, 2015.
^ Canyons of the Ancients National Monument (N.M.), Resource Management Plan: Environmental Impact Statement. January 1, 2009. Archived from the original on December 6, 2017.
^ "President Obama Designates Stonewall National Monument" Archived June 24, 2016, at the Wayback Machine (Official announcement from White House Press Office; June 24, 2016)
Wikivoyage has a travel guide for United States National Monuments.
National monument proclamations under the Antiquities Act (public domain text)
Congressional Research Service (CRS) reports regarding national monuments
Wikimedia Commons has media related to National Monuments of the United States.
Federal protected areas in the United States
Cooperative Management and Protection Area
Estuarine Research Reserves
Forest Reserve
Lakeshores
Marine Sanctuaries
Natural Landmarks
Outstanding Natural Area
Research Natural Areas
Scenic Areas
Scenic Trails
Seashores
Wild and Scenic Rivers
Wildlife Refuges
Wilderness Study Areas
Federal Historic sites of the United States
Battlefield Parks
Battlefield Site
International Historic Site
Historic Trails
Historical Reserves
Military Parks
See also: National Register of Historic Places
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=National_monument_(United_States)&oldid=882368722"
National Monuments of the United States
Bureau of Land Management National Monuments
National Park Service National Monuments
United States Forest Service National Monuments
Parks in the United States
Monuments and memorials in the United States
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Charles Keeping Illustrating paintbox picture books
tags: 1960's illustration, 1970's illustration, artist, Charles Keeping, Children's Book Illustration, Colourful art, fishink, illustration, illustrator, lithographer, Painter, The Keeping Gallery
Charles Keeping (1924-1988) an illustrator and lithographer, produced dynamic and emotive images. Born in Lambeth, East London, his secure and happy upbringing had an unusually important effect in shaping both the man and the artist. Entering a working class family, there was no obvious route for Charles to get into art school. He spent his childhood in a house that overlooked an active stable yard, and became a frequent and accurate observer of horses and carts. He attended the Frank Bryant School for Boys, in Kennington, leaving at the age of 14 to become apprentice to a printer.
He joined the Royal Navy Army at the age of 18, and fought in the Second World War, serving as a wireless operator. He received a head wound which he became convinced would make him become a Jekyll and Hyde figure, but after being institutionalised, he recovered. Determined to pursue his love of drawing, he applied several times to study art at the Regent Street Polytechnic, but was unable to get a grant. He kept on applying, supporting himself by reading gas meters, and continuing drawing in the evenings. It was at the Regent Street Polytechnic (1946-52), where he met the designer and illustrator Renate Meyer, whom he later married. His books explore amazing roads into colour and texture, whilst dealing with solitary, often lonely figures in their tiny worlds.
He took various jobs, including cartoonist on the Daily Herald, before starting work as a book illustrator. In 1956, he was commissioned by the Oxford University Press to illustrate stories for children written by Rosemary Sutcliffe, and with the encouragement of the doyenne of children’s book editors, Mabel George of OUP, was launched on a career which for three decades made him one of the best known and more prolific illustrators (1960-1980s). He made brilliant use of colour and the new printing techniques, using a mixture of gouache, tempera, watercolour and inks. He was an early enthusiast for Plasticowell, the grained plastic sheets designed by the printers, Cowells of Ipswich, for lithographic illustrations.
Charles Keeping was always concerned with the lot of the working horse: having been born in Lambeth, he was surrounded by them. He wrote two picture books, Black Dolly and Sean and the Carthorse about ill-treated working horses, and one Richard, about a working police horse whose treatment is always fair. Illustrating Black Beauty must have been something of a dream commission: he dedicated his version “to all those concerned with the care and welfare of horses and ponies.”
Keeping won the Kate Greenaway award for Charley, Charlotte and the Golden Canary (1967), and again for The Highwayman (1981); he was a prize-winner in the Francis Williams Award for Tinker, Tailor (1968), and for Kevin Crossley-Holland’s The Wildman (1976); and he won the Emil Award in 1987 for Jack the Treacle Eater. He became particularly well known for his work on historical novels for children, especially tales by Rosemary Sutcliff, which often depicted Vikings, men in battle or war situations. Or similarly for Leon Garfield books about ghosts, creatures from the dark and other sinister characters.
His commitment to the immense project to illustrate the complete Dickens for the Folio Society was total, and he completed it just before his death on 16 May 1988. He became the first illustrator to complete a full edition of Dickens illustrated by a single artist. His wife Renate, also an artist, set up a website called The Keeping Gallery so that both of their work can be treasured.
Have you ever seen such colour in books before ?
Thanks to Matt for sending in these scans after seeing this post.
Amazing use of rich shading and textures. Wonderful work Mr Keeping.
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Fishink in Manchester. From Fashion to Fire station. →
James Hutcheson permalink
Excellent post – well done. Charles Keeping was unique and an inspiration to many . . .
Fishink permalink
Thanks James, it’s very true, but I don’t hear his name mentioned as often as it should be. Wonderful, colourful work.
Laura (PA Pict) permalink
September 5, 2016 11:35 pm
I’m always so grateful to you and your blog for introducing me to wonderful illustrators. I absolutely love the dynamic line work and the scratchy texture to these illustrations.
Cheers Laura, he had quite a range of styles.
alibrookes permalink
Wonderful post! I love the way Keeping uses colour and texture, and the attention to detail is outstanding!
Very true Ali
jesusknowsmyname permalink
I find his colored illustrations mesmerizing. And who would have thought to illustrate what one was drawing in the moisture on a window? And he captured the idea and emotion so well! I felt the suspense and emotion in his illustrations for ‘Through The Window’ as if I were Jacob! Well done Craig, thanks for sharing. Hope things are going well for you.
I think his coloured work captures my attention the most too, especially where the colours are almost overpowering. I haven’t seen many artists working in this way from that period before. Glad you enjoyed it Joy, all well here thanks and with you too I hope.
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(-) Remove 2007 (2) filter 2007 (2)
(-) Remove <label class='research-domain' title='The Social World, Diversity, Population'>SH3 (4)</label> filter SH3 (4)
(-) Remove Germany (4) filter Germany (4)
Project acronym COEVOLVE
Project From Forest to Farmland and Meadow to Metropolis: What Role for Humans in Explaining the Enigma of Holocene CO2 and Methane Concentrations?
Researcher (PI) Jed Oliver Kaplan
Host Institution (HI) MAX-PLANCK-GESELLSCHAFT ZUR FORDERUNG DER WISSENSCHAFTEN EV
Summary The Holocene record of atmospheric CO2 and methane concentrations is an enigma. Concentrations of both gases increased from the beginning of the epoch 11,700 years ago to about 10,000 BP, then declined for several thousand years, but by 6000 BP, concentrations of both gases were steadily increasing again. This mid-late Holocene rise in greenhouse gases is unusual; similar patterns are not observed during previous interglacials. While various mechanisms have been proposed to explain these changes in Holocene CO2 and methane, there is one undisputed feature of this epoch that we know is different from the rest of Earth history: the existence of behaviorally modern humans. How humanity could have influenced the Holocene increase in CO2 and methane concentrations is the subject of the COEVOLVE project. In an interdisciplinary study that combines the social and natural sciences, we will reconstruct anthropogenic CO2 and methane emissions over the Holocene using a state-of-the-art model of terrestrial biogeochemistry and earth surface processes. The novelty of our approach is to develop a geodatabase of anthropogenic activities derived from historical and archaeological observations to drive our model, and to evaluate our simulations against a new, comprehensive global reconstruction of past land cover. COEVOLVE is organized around three activities: 1) synthesis of observations of past land cover change from paleoecological archives, 2) development of a spatial database of the spread of technology, industry, culture, and trade that influenced global land use and resource consumption patterns and 3) informed by parts 1 and 2, modeling of terrestrial biogeochemical cycles and land surface processes including deforestation, soil erosion, and fire. With a new perspective on preindustrial environmental impact, the COEVOLVE project will make a breakthrough in our understanding of the influence of humans on greenhouse gas concentrations and global climate during the Holocene.
The Holocene record of atmospheric CO2 and methane concentrations is an enigma. Concentrations of both gases increased from the beginning of the epoch 11,700 years ago to about 10,000 BP, then declined for several thousand years, but by 6000 BP, concentrations of both gases were steadily increasing again. This mid-late Holocene rise in greenhouse gases is unusual; similar patterns are not observed during previous interglacials. While various mechanisms have been proposed to explain these changes in Holocene CO2 and methane, there is one undisputed feature of this epoch that we know is different from the rest of Earth history: the existence of behaviorally modern humans. How humanity could have influenced the Holocene increase in CO2 and methane concentrations is the subject of the COEVOLVE project. In an interdisciplinary study that combines the social and natural sciences, we will reconstruct anthropogenic CO2 and methane emissions over the Holocene using a state-of-the-art model of terrestrial biogeochemistry and earth surface processes. The novelty of our approach is to develop a geodatabase of anthropogenic activities derived from historical and archaeological observations to drive our model, and to evaluate our simulations against a new, comprehensive global reconstruction of past land cover. COEVOLVE is organized around three activities: 1) synthesis of observations of past land cover change from paleoecological archives, 2) development of a spatial database of the spread of technology, industry, culture, and trade that influenced global land use and resource consumption patterns and 3) informed by parts 1 and 2, modeling of terrestrial biogeochemical cycles and land surface processes including deforestation, soil erosion, and fire. With a new perspective on preindustrial environmental impact, the COEVOLVE project will make a breakthrough in our understanding of the influence of humans on greenhouse gas concentrations and global climate during the Holocene.
Project acronym GRASP-CN
Project Human reaching and grasping - cognitive networks of visual action control
Researcher (PI) Marc Himmelbach
Host Institution (HI) EBERHARD KARLS UNIVERSITAET TUEBINGEN
Summary Cognitive Neuroscience throughout the last decade was dominated by a two stream model of visual processing. A ventral pathway was presumed to be dedicated to perception-related processing. A dorsal pathway was presumed to be dedicated to action-related processing. The proposed project challenges this view combining neuroimaging and neuropsychological methods. Neuroimaging in healthy humans allows for a view on correlated activity of the intact perception-action system, patients with visuomotor deficits reveal causalities between perception- and action-related information processing and the demonstration of neural reorganisation. However, neuroimaging studies including patients with brain lesions have rarely been conducted. Patients with optic ataxia after brain damage demonstrate specific visuomotor disorders: (i) deficient grip scaling to object size and (ii) spatial mismatch between perceived positions and goal-directed hand movements. These deficits vary with temporal parameters and knowledge about the object to be grasped and/or manipulated. Furthermore, the patients seem to adopt cognitive strategies to improve their performance. Therefore, they allow for the investigation of interactions between visual perception, spatial memory, and cognitive processing for the purpose of goal-directed action control. The proposed project comprises behavioural experiments to reveal the impact of object/action knowledge on movement control and of movement timing in optic ataxia patients. Investigations of reaching and grasping using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and transcranial magnetic stimulation in healthy subjects and patients complement the neuropsychological research approach. The analysis of specific activation patterns and behavioural changes upon TMS application in patients - under consideration of their individual brain damage - in comparison with large groups of healthy controls will allow for a causal description of human visual action control.
Cognitive Neuroscience throughout the last decade was dominated by a two stream model of visual processing. A ventral pathway was presumed to be dedicated to perception-related processing. A dorsal pathway was presumed to be dedicated to action-related processing. The proposed project challenges this view combining neuroimaging and neuropsychological methods. Neuroimaging in healthy humans allows for a view on correlated activity of the intact perception-action system, patients with visuomotor deficits reveal causalities between perception- and action-related information processing and the demonstration of neural reorganisation. However, neuroimaging studies including patients with brain lesions have rarely been conducted. Patients with optic ataxia after brain damage demonstrate specific visuomotor disorders: (i) deficient grip scaling to object size and (ii) spatial mismatch between perceived positions and goal-directed hand movements. These deficits vary with temporal parameters and knowledge about the object to be grasped and/or manipulated. Furthermore, the patients seem to adopt cognitive strategies to improve their performance. Therefore, they allow for the investigation of interactions between visual perception, spatial memory, and cognitive processing for the purpose of goal-directed action control. The proposed project comprises behavioural experiments to reveal the impact of object/action knowledge on movement control and of movement timing in optic ataxia patients. Investigations of reaching and grasping using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and transcranial magnetic stimulation in healthy subjects and patients complement the neuropsychological research approach. The analysis of specific activation patterns and behavioural changes upon TMS application in patients - under consideration of their individual brain damage - in comparison with large groups of healthy controls will allow for a causal description of human visual action control.
Project acronym NEURODEVELOPMENT
Project A neurodevelopmental approach to human language processing
Researcher (PI) Claudia Katrin Friedrich
Host Institution (HI) UNIVERSITAET HAMBURG
Summary Despite a large number of studies on human language comprehension and its development, the neurocognitive system underlying normal and impaired language processing has yet not been characterized. In particular, it is currently debated whether different subsystems in language comprehension work together in a serial or a parallel fashion. The grant project will use online measures of neuronal activity as revealed by the recording of event-related brain potentials (ERPs), to test a new account to human language processing that emerges from a neurodevelopmental perspective. Specifically, the proposal is guided by the hypothesis that adult language processing is characterized by simultaneously activated neurorepresentational systems at different stages of language comprehension, but that these parallel neuronal networks are acquired sequentially during infancy and childhood. Using ERPs recorded in a series of fragment priming experiments, evidence for the proposed neurodevelopmental model of language comprehension will be obtained in infants, children and adults. Additional analysis techniques, such as the characterization of temporal dynamics of ERPs, will be applied to investigate the assumed functional parallelism in neuronal language processing. The results will serve as a basis for a neurolinguistic model of both language acquisition and the functional organization of the adult language processing system. The work will be of importance for questions of education and for the understanding and treatment of developmental language disorders.
Despite a large number of studies on human language comprehension and its development, the neurocognitive system underlying normal and impaired language processing has yet not been characterized. In particular, it is currently debated whether different subsystems in language comprehension work together in a serial or a parallel fashion. The grant project will use online measures of neuronal activity as revealed by the recording of event-related brain potentials (ERPs), to test a new account to human language processing that emerges from a neurodevelopmental perspective. Specifically, the proposal is guided by the hypothesis that adult language processing is characterized by simultaneously activated neurorepresentational systems at different stages of language comprehension, but that these parallel neuronal networks are acquired sequentially during infancy and childhood. Using ERPs recorded in a series of fragment priming experiments, evidence for the proposed neurodevelopmental model of language comprehension will be obtained in infants, children and adults. Additional analysis techniques, such as the characterization of temporal dynamics of ERPs, will be applied to investigate the assumed functional parallelism in neuronal language processing. The results will serve as a basis for a neurolinguistic model of both language acquisition and the functional organization of the adult language processing system. The work will be of importance for questions of education and for the understanding and treatment of developmental language disorders.
Project acronym TRANSFORMIG
Project Transforming Migration: Transnational Transfer of Multicultural Habitus
Researcher (PI) Magdalena Nowicka
Host Institution (HI) HUMBOLDT-UNIVERSITAET ZU BERLIN
Summary How do migrants develop the competence to successfully operate within a new society, and will these newly acquired intercultural skills and attitudes transfer between individuals and geographical locations? Can migration, and to what extent, trigger a shift towards more tolerance and respect for ethnic and cultural diversity in the countries sending migrants? And how are these effects mediated by particular conditions? These are the questions the TRANSFORmIG project seeks to answer by investigating recent massive migration between Poland and Great Britain and Germany. The ‘Polish case’ is highly instructive because of diametrically opposed contexts between which the transnational migrants regularly ‘switch’: Britain and Germany are characterized by a level and kind of multi-cultural complexity that is unknown to immigrants from Poland which is recognized as one of the most ethnically homogeneous country in the world. The TRANSFORmIG project puts the hypothesis that contact with diversity – socializing with people of diverse backgrounds – leads to (a positive) change of attitudes both among migrants and their peer groups in the communities of origin, and that these effects are mediated by the particular configurations and representations of diversity. The TRANSFORmIG project entails interdisciplinary, multi-method research in selected localities in Great Britain, Germany and Poland. Spanning sociology, anthropology, history and media studies, the project investigates with the help of a longitudinal qualitative study, individual and group interviews, ethnography and discourse analysis how people’s attitudes and skills to act in diverse societies change over time and in dependence with historical and contemporary conditions. Findings will significantly advance social scientific understanding of the processes of transnational transfer of values and attitudes and the spread of intercultural competences under the condition of growing diversification of societies.
How do migrants develop the competence to successfully operate within a new society, and will these newly acquired intercultural skills and attitudes transfer between individuals and geographical locations? Can migration, and to what extent, trigger a shift towards more tolerance and respect for ethnic and cultural diversity in the countries sending migrants? And how are these effects mediated by particular conditions? These are the questions the TRANSFORmIG project seeks to answer by investigating recent massive migration between Poland and Great Britain and Germany. The ‘Polish case’ is highly instructive because of diametrically opposed contexts between which the transnational migrants regularly ‘switch’: Britain and Germany are characterized by a level and kind of multi-cultural complexity that is unknown to immigrants from Poland which is recognized as one of the most ethnically homogeneous country in the world. The TRANSFORmIG project puts the hypothesis that contact with diversity – socializing with people of diverse backgrounds – leads to (a positive) change of attitudes both among migrants and their peer groups in the communities of origin, and that these effects are mediated by the particular configurations and representations of diversity. The TRANSFORmIG project entails interdisciplinary, multi-method research in selected localities in Great Britain, Germany and Poland. Spanning sociology, anthropology, history and media studies, the project investigates with the help of a longitudinal qualitative study, individual and group interviews, ethnography and discourse analysis how people’s attitudes and skills to act in diverse societies change over time and in dependence with historical and contemporary conditions. Findings will significantly advance social scientific understanding of the processes of transnational transfer of values and attitudes and the spread of intercultural competences under the condition of growing diversification of societies.
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It’s unfair to designate someone a hero. Heroes are brave, wise, honorable, honest, and noble exemplars. And if you poke deeply enough into a real person’s life, you’ll likely be disappointed at what you find, what with humans being inclined toward selfishness, spite, and bad decision making. How can we expect someone to live up to the impossible standard of “hero” for one day, much less forever?
Ok, so what is Bowie to me? Beyond all doubt, a musical genius. Most artists stick to the one thing they do well and typically embarrass themselves when they venture outside those cozy confines. Bowie jumped musical genres like a nimble 9-year-old playing hopscotch, effortlessly trying on rock, pop, electronica, techno, folk, glam, R&B, and just about any other kind of popular music style you can name.
Yet, I can’t call him a musical inspiration. His songwriting and lyrical prowess is so far beyond my own that I am unable to channel even a feeble likeness of it. Hunky Dory is the very first album I ever bought, and it’s still my favorite. Every song on it would be the best song most other musicians ever wrote.
Bowie was also avant garde in every aspect of his artistry, be it his clothes, his music, his stage show, or his ever-changing persona. He was a charismatic actor, a playwright, and maybe even an alien. But not my hero. He smoked heavily and became addicted to cocaine and no doubt acted like an arrogant prick at times in the early days of fame. He surely disappointed people throughout his life and may have been rude to a fan or two.
Well, I guess there are two heroic aspects to Bowie, because they inspire admiration in me, and admiration is the main ingredient when you set out to make a hero for yourself. One: After the Let’s Dance album sold a bajillion copies, Bowie could have spent the next 30 years reaping countless riches doing greatest-hits stadium tours. Space Oddity. Changes. Life on Mars. Ziggy Stardust. Starman. Young Americans. Rebel Rebel. Suffragette City. Ashes to Ashes. Let’s Dance. Modern Love. China Girl. Cat People. Under Pressure. LatherRinseRepeat.
Instead, Bowie continued his experimentation with such commercially inaccessible releases as Earthling, an unmelodic album laden with hard techno grooves that were sure to alienate the “greatest hits” crowd.
Two: Whether releasing albums he knew wouldn’t sell many copies (because he wanted to do something new), or dressing as a woman in public, or performing on Soul Train, or doing whatever otherwise struck his artistic fancy, he didn’t care what you, I, or anyone thought about it. He believed in his vision and followed his muse, and he didn’t need beta listeners or approval from anyone calling himself an expert.
Ok. On that count, I’ll let Bowie be my hero. Just for one day.
28 Comments | tags: David Bowie, heroes, inspiration, Music | posted in Essay, Music
I’m finally one of the cool kids
If you want to be popular, you usually have to be good-looking, wealthy, charismatic, famous, athletic, or have some sort of talent in the arts. I arguably possess a bit of the last one, but widespread dissemination of said talent is often needed before you can go clubbing in New York with an entourage that may or may not include current NBA stars, Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and at least two former Nickelodeon starlets who are now 25-going-on-50 and totally wacked-out on cocaine.
However, there is a secret side-door for us normies into the world of the cool kids: Resembling a newly famous celebrity. Remember all the girls getting their hair straightened to look like Jennifer Aniston back in the ’90s? Teenage girls are probably dressing and styling themselves after Rihanna and Taylor Swift these days, though I wouldn’t know because I haven’t worked in a shopping mall since VCRs.
I’ve never had the good fortune to resemble a trendy famous person. I look more like Anton LaVey, the founder of the Church of Satan, than I do Justin Bieber, and I can’t believe this sentence now exists.
Then, two weeks ago, things changed. British actor Peter Capaldi took over the lead role in BBC’s global phenomenon Doctor Who. Whenever a new performer steps into that iconic role, he instantly becomes the most talked about actor in Great Britain.
And what are people discussing about Mr. Capaldi? His acting? No. His eyebrows. Dude’s brows are already legendary.
I was chatting about the latest episode with a friend the other day when she stopped in mid-sentence. “Holy crap, Eric,” she said. “You got Capaldi brows!”
I immediately took to Twitter with this boast and, as if to prove my point about side-door popularity before I even thought of it, BBC picked it up and retweeted it to thousands and thousands of people. Somehow I doubt uncool kids get retweeted like that.
Here’s the photographic evidence:
Capaldi vs Baker
Note: If you’d like to be in my entourage, please submit an essay explaining why you are cool enough and how many drinks you are willing to buy me. Thank you.
A bit of sad news this week: Lost amid the chatter about the Jennifer Lawrence photo-hacking scandal was the death of singer Jimi Jamison of the ’70s and ’80s pop-rock band Survivor, whose hits included Eye of the Tiger (with a different singer), The Search is Over, I Can’t Hold Back, and High on You. Survivor never received critical recognition and, to be real, their music didn’t have much substance. However, they did know how to craft a good pop song. Regardless of their place in music history, Jimi Jamison had a killer voice. You don’t have to like their music (which I do) to admit the guy owned serious pipes. He could have sung for Journey.
Jamison died this past Sunday at age 63. Rock on, Jimi!
49 Comments | tags: arts and entertainment, Doctor Who, humor, Jimi Jamison, Music, Peter Capaldi | posted in Humor, Movies and TV, Music
Goodbye, Bobby Womack (1944-2014)
Bobby Womack is one of the greatest soul singers in music history.
Known for his raspy voice and storyteller’s approach to songwriting and performing, Womack began recording music in the early 1960s and never stopped. Some of his best-known songs include Across 110th Street, Harry Hippie, Lookin’ for a Love, and That’s the Way I Feel About Cha. He released over 30 studio and live albums and as many singles during his career, and he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2009.
Womack died Friday at age 70.
A relatively recent live clip if Bobby singing “Harry Hippie”
An old clip of Womack performing “Lookin’ for a Love” on Soul Train (with a bonus bad-ass intro from the late Don Cornelius). Fortunately, Bobby was much better at songwriting than lip-syncing!
Sorry, the best looking and sounding clip I could find of “Across a 110th Street” is the title sequence from the film Jackie Brown.
16 Comments | tags: Bobby Womack, obituary, Soul music | posted in Music
Music vs. Writing
If my grandfather were alive, he would look at this and ask me, “So who took your picture?”
This post is going to degenerate into another “I hate writing rules” rant. I can feel it in me bones!
[Who knew old bones were sensitive to not just to changing weather but also to one’s own bad attitude? Old bones make excellent bludgeons by the way (especially femurs), though I believe I’m drifting off topic.]
I’ve been playing in bands or at least engaged in some kind of music project on and off for almost three decades. I’ve recorded in professional studios and performed on many stages before all kinds of audiences. The only “rules” I remember hearing are: 1.) Practice a lot, and 2.) Listen to different kinds of music, not just the style you play. Granted, I don’t read musician blogs (are there any?), but that seems like a stark contrast to the massive volume of writing advice and rules heaped upon us daily. It’s alarming how many ways I am failing as a writer.
I’m particularly negligent when it comes to “reading in my genre.” Partly because I don’t know what genre I’m in (is Twilight Zonish a genre?), and partly because, beyond my desire to be entertained and moved by good storytelling, I don’t care what other writers are writing. I’m a bad student, I know.
“Listen to all different kinds of music” is fantastic advice… much better than, “Listen to all the bands that play the same style of music you do.” Absorbing the tones, rhythms, and textures of jazz, metal, soul, reggae, classical, disco, punk, and blues music has made me so much better of a rock musician than if I’d been admonished to listen to the other rock bands to see what they‘re doing! Writing songs comes from the heart and soul, not from carefully tracking trends, as should writing prose.
Sure, no one said only read in your genre. But I’d go as far as to say, “Deliberately read outside your genre. Bring something unique when you come back.”
[Before you hurl some “apples and oranges” comment toward the stage (I’m specifically addressing Mr. Frutman in the aisle seat on the left, row 7), I don’t like apples or oranges and am therefore impervious to your cliché. Arguments about illogical thinking, on the other hand, might carry some weight.]
Look at that! I made my point in under 400 words. Who loves you?
I’ve been podcast again! To relive the excitement of my post on cringe-inducing books, this time with a professional voiceover specialist, click here.
31 Comments | tags: fiction, Music, songwriting, Writing, Writing advice | posted in Music, On writing
Album Review: Chase Bell & White Licorish – Skywords
I shall begin, in most appalling fashion, with a tangent: Please excuse and do not misinterpret my use of the word “jazzy” in this review. Many people fear words related to “jazz.” They know jazz is supposed to be cool and hip and that fandom is a sign of musical erudition, but they just don’t like it. It’s weird, what with all that lack of commercial appeal and the odd time signatures.
To clarify, Chase Bell & White Licorish’s U.S. debut album, Skywords, is not jazz. It is a pop/rock record. I simply believe that every musician in this band secretly plays jazz when not recording pop songs as Chase Bell & White Licorish. This music has that spontaneous, textured, lively feel of jazz, and, like great jazz recordings, it brilliantly captures the natural ambient quality of the instruments.
Damn, too many uses of the j-word so far. Pop pop pop. Rock rock rock. How’s that, Google search algorithms?
Lyrically introspective and musically adventurous, Skywords is pop music that defies easy classification in the same way that old Police albums did: They were pop, but even casual listeners could sense that a lot more than three-chord Monte was going on. Like Sting did after he left the Police, Chase Bell & White Licorish expand on the “sophisticated pop” concept by adding a horn section. That New Jersey-born singer/songwriter and bandleader Chase Bell recruited his musicians from Italy adds further dimension to the sonic landscape.
Bell’s voice resides in the higher-pitched Bruno Mars range, while the melodies and phrasing evoke John Mayer. As a listener drawn to belters with lots of power, I did not find the singing on the album immediately attractive, as Bell tends to use a lot of soft falsetto as he jabs and rolls his way through and around the arrangements. That said, the style suits the jazz-infused (yeah, I went there) musical arrangements perfectly, and the songs draw the listener without resorting to excessive production or digital effects. The best word I can use to describe Chase Bell & White Licorish’s music is “organic.” From an old-school guy like me, that’s a big compliment.
To learn more about this artist and hear sound samples, check out chasebell.com.
11 Comments | tags: Chase Bell & White Licorice, Music, Skywords | posted in Music
New Artist Spotlight: Hip-Hop Poet PoetryMisses
I spend way too much time bitching about technology problems without praising the tech gods when things work. Such as the confluence of do-it-yourself music recording and social media that allows artists to create their work and get it out there without being beholden to some executive in suit. That is awesome and powerful.
How else would the world be able to discover original artists like PoetryMisses, who performs her spoken-word poetry to a beat and then posts to YouTube? Don’t let the smile fool you. She’s unapologetic, and she ain’t playing around.
PoetryMisses answers my questions below this clip, “Best for me,” a real slow burn of tension and angst. Listen as you read!
EJB: What made you decide to put your poetry to music?
PoetryMisses: I’ve been writing poetry since before the age of 10, and I’ve always had a strong passion for all genres of music; I just never saw myself actually doing it! Recently I started getting more serious about what I want to do with my life and decided my poetry needs to have more energy to it, because it just couldn’t be wasted. So, after I started playing around with the words and instrumentals, I knew I had found my niche.
EJB: How confident were you that you could make your poetry work with beats and rhythms?
PoetryMisses: You would be surprised how much I struggled in the beginning. To me, poetry is freedom with no limits, no exact number of words because I’m all about free verse. So, when you have only a certain number of bars and a certain beat to keep up with, it gets confusing. Practice truly does make you better at anything in life, because before you knew it, I was writing complete songs with confidence that came from nowhere.
EJB: Please tell us about your recording process.
PoetryMisses: My first step is to find a beat. I usually have a “beat finding” day when I get online to browse for the perfect sound I need. Depending on my mood of the day, the beat will be slower or fast paced. I usually don’t write on the same day, just so I can let the tunes sit in my head for a while. Then there is my writing process. First verse, chorus, second verse, and whatever else comes behind that. I usually have had the same mundane writing process since I’ve started rapping, but I love EVERY step. I record myself most days. It’s very stress relieving when I can do it alone, but my daughter always wants to “spit” right along with me. Recording for me is pretty straightforward. I don’t like to waste time.
EJB: What inspires and influences your poetry?
PoetryMisses: It’s simple: My life. I can only write about and share what I know and have been through. There used to be a ton of unhappiness, being lost as a teenager, and love. Now I try to focus more on the happiness, freedom, and pure love for life. My dreams are what inspire me to write. I used to hate the way my mind would expand when I was younger. Now, as an adult, it’s what fuels me. To be able to share the countless wonders that float by in my head means everything to me.
EJB: What do you hope to do with your music?
PoetryMisses: Inspire! That is truly my main mission. To let everyone know that you can have the life you want and be who you want to be without caring what the next person thinks. I want to spread happiness. That’s the only way to live.
EJB: What do people need to know about you?
PoetryMisses: That’s a pretty tough question. I’m still learning and creating myself each day. I’m nowhere near perfect, but I love myself and I love the mission that God has planned for me. Listening to my music will tell you everything you need to know! I’m what you call a “privately open” person. My past is what has made me and besides being a mother, inspiring people and letting you know it’s okay to love yourself and be happy even when life is taking more than giving, is what I’m here for.
Ok, here’s PoetryMisses’ self-introduction in the form of a poetic monologue that appears to be totally off the cuff, since she’s sitting in a car. The language gets pretty rough, so proceed only if you are ok with naked honesty . And F bombs.
14 Comments | tags: digital recording, hip hop, Mesha Leigh, Music, poetry, PoetryMisses, recording, spoken word | posted in Music
Interview with author and Motown historian Peter Benjaminson
Greetings readers and fellow writers. I have an awesome treat for you today!
Peter Benjaminson, author of several books about the famed Motown record label and its artists, was gracious enough to sit down with me for a few minutes this weekend to discuss his newest biography, Mary Wells: The Tumultuous Life of Motown’s First Superstar (Chicago Review Press).
For the uninitiated, Mary Wells was not the first Motown act to score a number one hit (that honor belongs to The Marvelettes and Please Mr. Postman), but she was the first solo artist to become a recognizable star for the label, thanks to a smash hit song that, nearly five decades later, is still beloved the world over: My Guy. She also toured with The Beatles (!) in 1964 and influenced a generation of singers. But instead of joining the ranks of Motown legends such as Diana Ross and Stevie Wonder, Mary’s life took a different turn. Several, in fact. And Peter Benjaminson’s book is by far the most in-depth chronicle of those events ever written.
EJB: Thank you, Mr. Benjaminson, for taking the time to talk about your latest book with us. What inspired you to tell the story of Mary Wells, Motown’s first solo star?
Peter Benjaminson: I was working as a reporter for the Detroit Free Press when Woodward and Bernstein used what they called “investigative reporting” to topple President Nixon. A fellow reporter named David Anderson and I went to the library to look up a book on investigative reporting so that we could learn about that kind of reporting. When we found out that no book had ever been written on the subject a light bulb ignited over our heads because we were actually doing that kind of reporting and figured we could write the book ourselves. So we wrote it – it was titled, believe it or not, Investigative Reporting — and was the first and best how-to in the field. It went through two publishers and two editions and stayed in print for 20 years. This convinced me that book writing was for me.
Since I was in Detroit, I thought of writing about the auto industry, but that had been done already by numerous other writers. Then one day when I was sitting in the City Room waiting for an assignment, an editor told me he had heard that Flo Ballard, formerly of the Supremes, was on welfare. I roared over to her house, interviewed her, and wrote a story about her being on welfare, which was the equivalent of writing in the Washington Post today that Joe Biden is on food stamps. Flo was pleased by the sympathetic reaction to her story and invited me back to visit her on evenings and weekends after work to record her life story as told by her. But when I tried to sell the book idea to Grove Press in New York, they pointed out (this was in 1977) that no book had ever been written in this country about Motown itself. So a bright light went on over my head and I filled that gap by writing The Story of Motown, which Grove Press published in 1979.
I kept trying to sell the Flo Ballard book idea, but I was unable to do it until – gulp – 2006 – the year that the “Dreamgirls” movie came out and convinced movie makers and book publishers that there was money to be made in the Supremes story. I then sold the Ballard book idea to Chicago Review Press, which published it in 2008 as The Lost Supreme: The Life of Dreamgirl Florence Ballard.
Then a guy named Randy Russi called me from Florida and told me he was a friend of Mary Wells (Mary had lived near him in Florida for a time). He suggested I write a book about Mary. I got peeved at him because I thought Mary’s story would be a replay of Flo’s story with the names changed, but he convinced me there were 100 or so reasons why Mary’s story was more interesting than Flo’s. Because The Lost Supreme had done so well, it was easy to convince Chicago Review Press to publish Mary’s story and they recently published the book we’re talking about, Mary Wells: The Tumultuous Life of Motown’s First Superstar.
EJB: What do you think would surprise people the most about Mary Wells?
Peter Benjaminson: Some, but not all of her fans will be surprised to learn that, a), she married two brothers, one after the other (Cecil and then Curtis Womack, although her marriage to Curtis was common-law) and had children with both of them, and, b), that she had a fairly good musical career, including a No. 1 hit, Gigolo, after leaving Motown.
EJB: This is the second biography you have written about a Motown star who died young, the first being The Lost Supreme, about Diana Ross’s fellow Supreme Florence Ballard. Tragic figures make for fascinating subjects, of course, but what is it about the Motown era that intrigues you so?
Peter Benjaminson: It’s not just me. I don’t believe there’s another record company anywhere about which more than two or three books have been written. More than 180 books have been written about Motown, with mine being the most recent. That’s because Motown succeeded in closing the gap between white and black music in America, something that no other company was able to do and that will never happen again.
EJB: What’s next for Peter Benjaminson? Do you have any more Motown artist biographies in the works? How about one on Gladys Horton? Marvin Gaye? Tammi Terrell? I can guarantee you at least one reader!
Peter Benjaminson
Peter Benjaminson: Thanks for guaranteeing me at least one reader. I would hesitate to write a book on Marvin Gaye or Tammi Terrell because other authors have already done so. I admit I was the third author to write a book on Flo Ballard, but I had one thing that the previous authors did not: an eight-hour revelatory interview of Flo audio-taped the year before she died that had never been previously publicized or released. There’s no book on Gladys Horton I know of but she has fewer fans than Marvin Gaye, Tammi Terrell, Flo Ballard, or Mary Wells, which would make a proposed book a very difficult sell to publishers and readers.
What I am working on is books on two people who had millions and millions of fans: Rick James and Farrah Fawcett. James was Motown’s final superstar, sold literally millions of records and was a popular character on TV, sometimes playing himself, as late as 2004, which was also the year of his death. Farrah, a major TV, stage and movie star who died the same day that Michael Jackson died in 2009, changed the hairstyles of many American women, struggled to improve as an actress throughout her life, and was nominated for a posthumous Emmy for producing a movie about her own death. She also appeared on the cover of People Magazine some 14 times. Neither has been the subject of a serious biography. In book publishing terms, writing about either person wouldn’t be too much of a stretch for me: James would be the third Motown star I’ve written about, as well as the fourth book I’ve written on Motown, and Fawcett would be the third female entertainer whose biography I’ve written.
EJB: Any quick tips for non-fiction writers looking to break into music journalism?
Peter Benjaminson: They should take heed of the greatest advice ever offered to a music journalist: “Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.” The saying originates with Nietzsche but has been stated more recently by others.
More seriously, since I don’t actually believe the above, in my career “music journalism” implies writing articles for music magazines, websites, and blogs and “music book writing” implies just what it says. If you’re a staff writer or contract freelancer for a music journalism outlet, that’s great, but otherwise, at least in the world of journalism in which I grew up, you have to propose every single article to every single outlet you want to write it for, and writing the proposal and dickering with the editors about what it’s going to say usually takes much more time than actually writing the piece. In book world, you only have to write the proposal and dicker about it once or twice, and then spend years writing the book. I prefer the latter. (Please note that this advice may be outdated in the world of on-line and self-publishing in which I did NOT grow up.)
EJB: Thanks so much, Peter, and good luck with your latest projects.
Mary Wells: The Tumultuous Life of Motown’s First Superstar is available on amazon.com, barnesandnoble.com, and at any bookstore with good taste. I also urge you to check out The Lost Supreme, Peter’s biography of Florence Ballard. It’s a vivid portrait of a talented singer who met a tragic end.
Here’s Mary Wells’s biggest hit:
32 Comments | tags: arts and entertainment, Florence Ballard, Mary Wells, Mary Wells: The Tumultuous Life of Motown's First Superstar, Motown, Music, non-fiction, Peter Benjaminson, Writing | posted in Interviews, Music, On writing
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Psychoanalysis (Masters Theses)
The Talking Cure and Aphasia
Restricted Access (2.144Mb)
O'Sullivan, Margaret
MA in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy
One of the mantras of psychoanalysis seems to be the statement 'Of course, psychoanalysis isn't for everybody'. Psychoanalysis was originally called 'the talking cure' so I wondered about psychoanalysis with analysands who couldn't talk. I am referring not to people with aphonia - that is people who suffer from a lack of voice due to disease or defects in the vocal organs - though that needs consideration too. Rather I will deal with analysands whose lack of 'talk' is associated with brain damage, that is people with aphasia. It was disconcerting to read Laplanche and Pontalis (1973, p 450) referring to 1891 and 'the then topical question of aphasia' but I decided that maybe the time had come to make the question of aphasia topical again in the interest of those who suffer from it. In this paper I will show that the relationship between psychoanalysis and aphasia is a reciprocal one, that it is not just a case of what can psychoanalysis do for people with aphasia but also how much the study of people with aphasia has contributed, not just to the development of psychoanalysis, but to its very existence. This should not really be surprising because it is common that many developments of knowledge have happened through investigation of the abnormal, and it was through investigation of people with aphasia that theories of the production of speech were produced. In the first half of the paper I will concentrate on two landmark publications. The first is Freud's 'On Aphasia' (1891) which is a neurological work, which laid the groundwork for his later psychoanalytic theories. The second is Roman Jakobson's 'Two Aspects of Language and Two Types of Aphasic Disturbance' (1956) which Lacan used in the development of his theories. Both of these were theoretical works in the sense that they were written by scientists - a neurologist and a linguist - who were not in contact with people with aphasia, certainly not in a therapeutic situation. References to aphasia and psychoanalysis that I found seemed to belong to the history of psychoanalysis, though, without a major review of the literature (outside the scope of this paper), I cannot say that no references to aphasia and psychoanalysis from a clinical point of view exist Grotjahn (1940) calls his paper an 'Investigation' of a seventy-oneyear-old man with senile dementia because he admits that he undertook the psychoanalysis mainly as a research problem rather than with therapeutic intent Though Grotjahn followed a form of psychoanalysis which was definitely not acceptable to Lacan ('Under the guidance of his physician he was able to accept reality .. .' p 97) the value of the paper is that throughout he kept to psychoanalytic categories to show that the development of senile dementia is governed by psychological laws. For the second part of the paper I will present two case studies of people with different kinds of aphasia. One is that of an 80 year old woman, Mary, whose aphasia is the result of Senile Dementia Alzheimer's Type. The other is of a 50 year old man, John, who suffered from a stroke. They differ in that one has a cognitive deficit while the other doesn't. My conclusion will be that from my experience, and on the basis of psychoanalytic theory, psychoanalysis is suitable for at least some people with aphasia, even when the aphasia is associated with cognitive deficit. In between these two sections will be a chapter which will show the difficulty of defining exactly what aphasia is. Then it will try to elucidate the difference between speech and language as theorised by Lacan. Finally it will question whether aphasia would make someone unsuitable for psychoanalysis, given this theory.
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Category Archives: Jon Durant
Innovative Guitarist Jon Durant Releases New Solo Guitar Album “Alternate Landscapes”
Portland, OR – Following his acclaimed CD “Parting Is,” Jon Durant returns with a new solo album “Alternate Landscapes.” While both records are solo guitar, that’s also where the similarity ends.
Alternate Landscapes expands the idea of solo guitar to include MIDI guitar triggering old school synthesizer sequences and breathy wind instruments alongside Jon’s signature cloud guitar textures. The result is a strikingly original blend of highly unusual sounds and textures with the additional context of vintage synthesis all translated through the guitar. In addition, each of the four expansive tracks take the listener on an extended sonic journey through a multitude of aural landscapes.
Durant commented: “For my entire musical career, I’ve steadfastly refused to wear my influences on my sleeve. If I ever do something that sounds too much like someone else, I have always discarded it. This time I allowed myself to let, for example, my Tangerine Dream influence come to the fore, and decided to make a statement that offered homage without being too derivative.”
Continuing, Durant spoke of the very different nature of how he approached his guitar playing on “Alternate Landscapes” relative to his previous work: “I’ve always had a great love of melody, and on all my earlier work whether solo or with Burnt Belief my lead guitar was a centerpiece of what I did. The cloud guitar textures, for which I have gained a certain reputation, were usually placed in a context underneath a more obvious lead guitar melody. On Alternative Landscapes, however, I have almost eliminated the lead guitar voice in favor of letting the cloud guitar textures become the dominant theme.”
“Two of the songs, “Aragon” and “Ciel du Cheval” are solo guitar pieces, performed live in the studio with no overdubs. All the percussive elements on “Aragon are a loop played on guitar, over which I played my fretless guitar. “Ciel du Cheval” is solo cloud guitar piece all played on guitar with an E-Bow. Listeners might be reminded of the landmark work of Fripp & Eno in it’s scope and approach, though not necessarily in the sounds that emerge.”
The other two tracks involve the use of guitar synthesizer, and also include sounds of voices and trains recorded on an iPhone and played back through the pickups of a guitar and processed through Durant’s complex effects rig to render those sounds completely indistinguishable from where they began.
Guitarist Jon Durant brings a unique sense of texture and melody to his instrument. His distinctive “cloud guitar” soundscapes and engaging lead work have graced numerous CD recordings and film soundtracks. His 2018 release “Parting Is” was nominated for “Best Ambient Album” in the Zone Music Reporter awards. In 2019, several highly regarded recordings feature Jon’s work as a session player, including Stephan Thelen’s landmark “Fractal Guitar” on which Durant can be heard alongside David Torn and Marcus Reuter and many other innovative guitarists.
As executive producer of Alchemy Records, he produces recordings for internationally acclaimed artists in his small home studio. Alongside Durant’s six solo albums and three Burnt Belief records (with Colin Edwin of Porcupine Tree), Alchemy has also released albums by artists Michael Manring, Gary Willis, Leni Stern/Wayne Krantz and others.
To Purchase Jon Durant’s “Alternate Landscapes”:
https://jondurant.bandcamp.com/album/alternate-landscapes
https://www.amazon.com/Alternate-Landscapes-Jon-Durant/dp/B07NRF9ST6
https://burningshed.com/jon-durant_alternate-landscapes_cd?filter_tag=jon%20
Video for Burnt Belief, “Ghosts Aquatic”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxr375VDpPA
Video for Burnt Belief, “Dissemble”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eJ4vg-ZyTI
Video for Burnt Belief, “Semazen”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKDdZ8um-G0
Jon Durant’s official website: http://www.jondurant.com
Leave a comment | posted in Jon Durant, Press Release
Innovative Guitarist Jon Durant Releases Solo Guitar Album “Parting Is”
Boston, MA – Following three acclaimed CDs with his group Burnt Belief, Jon Durant has returned with his first solo album since 2011’s “Dance of the Shadow Planets.” Unlike his previous solo albums, however, “Parting Is” is a completely solo guitar album.
A deeply emotional and personal record, “Parting Is” takes the idea of a solo guitar album and transforms it into a stunning sonic landscape of texture and color. Many of the sounds on the album bear no relationship with traditional guitar, but there are no synthesizers employed at all. Everything is played by Jon Durant on guitars (with Durant also playing fretless bass on four pieces).
Durant commented: “In recent years, I have been spending a lot of time away from people and places I love very much. My two boys are out of the house, one graduated college and the other is a senior in college this year. We have a wonderful time when I get to see them, but then they go away and there is a bit of a pang as we part. Also, we have a second home on the other side of the country (Portland, OR) where I spend a fair bit of time, and is also where much of this album began. Frequently my wife will join me for a long weekend, and I will stay on for another week or so, and of course there’s the sadness when we part. What is reflected in this music is the sweet sorrow that comes from this parting – recognizing that it’s temporary but still longing for more time together.”
About the music, Durant stated: “On most days, one of the first things I do is grab a cup of tea or coffee, and begin to experiment with my guitar. The music that comes out is not done with any intention of becoming a composition, or a recording, but is rather more of a meditation. However, a friend heard a brief recording of one such piece and asked why I didn’t record more of them. When I began to do so, I felt a pattern was emerging that might be worth exploring.
“Many pieces begin as loops that I would play a melodic lead over. I recorded several of these, then began to deconstruct the loops and record the various parts as separate components which could become less loop like and more dynamic and flowing. The track, ‘Open Window’ is a perfect example of how that played out.”
That track, “Open Window” also provides an opportunity to explore the unusual sound and textures that Durant creates. The primary guitar which began as a loop is an electric 12 string. From there, multiple electric 12 string parts were layered in a minimalistic way. The melodic guitar is a fretless electric guitar, and the low tones (which sound a bit like the old Moog Bass Pedals) are generated from the fretless guitar. Also, swirling around in the background are Jon’s unique cloud guitar sounds, notes which hang in the air like clouds with no discernable beginnings or endings.
There are three solo cloud guitar pieces (“Clouds in Advance”, “Before the Rain Falls” and “Willamette Fog”) and two pieces which remained as a loop with lead guitar over the top. “The Room Where She Waits” is a loop of electric 12 String and the lead is fretless guitar. On “Evolve in Place”, the loop is an electric guitar with fretless guitar over the top.
Guitarist Jon Durant brings a unique sense of texture and melody to his instrument. His distinctive “cloud guitar” soundscapes and engaging lead work have graced numerous CD recordings and film soundtracks. As executive producer of Alchemy Records, he produces recordings for internationally acclaimed artists in his small home studio. Alongside Durant’s six solo albums and three Burnt Belief records (with Colin Edwin of Porcupine Tree), Alchemy has also released albums by artists Michael Manring, Gary Willis, Leni Stern/Wayne Krantz and others.
To Purchase Jon Durant’s “Parting Is”:
https://www.amazon.com/Parting-Jon-Durant/dp/B077319LXV
https://burningshed.com
Leave a comment | posted in Burnt Belief, Jon Durant, Press Release
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Frugalchariot's Blog
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Posted on September 16, 2016 by frugalchariot
Whilst digging through a pile of old files buried on an old hard drive, I ran across an old essay of mine, one from just short of a dozen years ago. It was my “response”– not published or posted anywhere — to the world created by the Bush administration in the aftermath of 9-11; a world of war, based on irrational fear.
Look around today, particularly in the shadows of the fear-mongering that’s driving this election season. Think of Trump’s hate-filled and fear-mongering proposals concerning “illegals,” “Muslims,””ISIS” and all else that’s covered under the phobia umbrella including, for a great many, their not-yet-spent irrational fear and hate of soon-to-be-outgoing President Obama. He’s black, after all, and this here’s a white country! Scary scary.
I’d propose ways to stop the phobia train — if I could think of some. Clearly that’s not going to happen, though, so — stated another way — here we go again, back into the pit. How many times must we do this? Every time a Republican gets up onto the national stage, looks like to me. Anyway, I’ll leave comments to others, and simply add here the essay I wrote in November 2004; it’s title was a simple one: FEAR.
“I believe we are on an irreversible trend toward more freedom and democracy — but that could change.” –Vice President Dan Quayle, 5/22/89
It occurs to me that since events on 9-11 re-awakened the lion and apparently offered him an excuse to eat, at his pleasure, everything in the jungle without the need to think about it first, this nation — E pluribus unum in that jungle — has been in fear of everything in the jungle save for the lion. That is, I think, a potentially dangerous mistake.
Closer to home, the events of 9-11 served to awaken a sleeping president from his executive lethargy AND to awaken the American people to the fact that America is no longer insular and apart from the real world but is, rather, an intimate part of it. Those two realities soon joined hands, mated, and a few months later gave birth to a beast; soon after the birth of the beast, the beast flexed his muscles and nothing has since been the same. There are no official counts, but reasonable estimates suggest that between 100- and 150-thousand people have died, each and all in atonement for the 3000 which perished on 9-11. The ratio falls somewhere between 30 an 50 to one, and it’s only just begun. Some will call that justice; others might prefer ‘insanity’ as a more accurate descriptor.
Many in this nation claim to be in constant fear of the Anext@ terrorist attack while others feel more fear, by orders of magnitude, the disease within than they fear the prospect of a bad guy with a gun, out there somewhere, who may or may not have the idea of taking a random shot in the dark at someone – anyone – at some future date. The gunshot, if fired, may or may not impact any given individual (or individuals) directly, but the disease within will impact eventually come to impact each and every one, without a doubt.
This is why I have little or no fear of what’s become a buzzword these days, i.e. “International Fundamentalist Islamic Terrorists.” True, they’ve managed to destroy two buildings and damage a third, destroy four commercial airliners and kill 3000 innocent people in the process, and that’s a worthy issue for concern and one which demands action. And, in fairness to the Bush administration, action against the perpetrators WAS taken, and it was at least in part effective in the sense that it took away their principal training ground and forced them to scatter toward the four winds. But that was where intelligent action stopped, and from all indications it was stopped early to enable action in league with a long pre-existing passion, the overthrow of a sovereign government which, while run by a generally evil ego-maniac, presented no threat to the US which could not be dealt with through far less damaging and drastic means, and orders of magnitude less costly in terms of treasure, property, and people.
But there came into play an even darker aspect: the manipulation of fear, the imposition of fear. How different from the day that Franklin Roosevelt said to his nation immediately following a deadly attack: “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.” Not so today. The events of 9-11 were every bit as worthy of an equivalent to Roosevelt’s appraisal following the events of the 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, but 9-11’s meaning was soon twisted and convoluted by ill-intentioned people of agenda, twisted to reflect not national self-confidence or even national self-interest, but instead to promote a hatred and fear of not only the perpetrators — a small group of Islamic fundamentalists — but also of nations, a religion and culture which embraces more than a billion people worldwide, and …. and a fear and hatred of everyone in THIS country who found reason to disagree with the paths its executive, George W. Bush, was choosing. “If you’re not with us, you’re against us” he said. And almost instantly there appeared a line in the sand which separated his political agenda from thoughtful course, “patriot” from “traitor” — and, one more time, Christian from Heathen.
Next came the invasion of Iraq, a sovereign nation which was of no threat to the US. It was a preemption based on lies — lies which were spoken to cause fear amongst the gullible masses, fears that the Muslim hordes were preparing to attack America with heinous “Weapons of Mass Destruction” — their only goal to destroy America’s freedom and liberty. The invasion of Iraq was touted as part and parcel to the War on Terrorism, the “war” which Bush declared on or about 9-12-01; the reality was that the events of 9-11 simply served as an excuse to resurrect the old agenda which dated back to 1992, the idea of deposing Saddam Hussein in order that America might indulge herself in nation-building, to reconstruct from the ashes a Phoenix loyal enough to America to allow US military bases on its soil in order to protect and safeguard forever the availability of Middle Eastern oil to fuel America’s industrial and economic engine. “Democracy” in Iraq for Iraqis? A buzzword, meaningless in the classic sense; an inverted buzzword to describe the new American Empire, uttered in the same vein as other more familiar administration inversions such as “Healthy Forests” and “Clear Skies” and “No Child Left Behind.” In each case simply imagine the exact opposite and you’re home free.
America had been leaning toward empire since the end of the Second World War. She’s made bitter forays into Korea and Vietnam in the process, and has installed and supported fascist terrorist dictatorships wherever possible in the Western Hemisphere — “Anti-Communist” puppet states which never cared for anything other than perpetuation of the personal power of the dictator, a dictator who granted, in return, the right of American corporate business to proceed without regulation in the pursuit of their own goals. These puppet states were, in that sense and in effect, little more than a reduced-in-size mirror-image of whichever regime was current in Washington DC.
During the 1930’s and coincident with National Socialism’s ascent to full power of the state in Germany, Hermann Goering noted that “Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them that they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism & exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.”
On November 3, 2004, the day after Bush’s election to a second term as president of the US, American author Dean Bakopoulus wrote: “What happened yesterday was this: The Republicans finally achieved their long-held goal to use fear (of Muslims, of homosexuals, of minorities, of terrorism) and fundamentalism to get poor people to vote for the causes of the wealthy. It worked. Mission accomplished. The arrogant invented a crisis and the ignorant rallied to be saved from it; it’s the oldest form of power play in the world.”
History repeats yet one more time, the always-hungry lion still roams; its latest incarnation, the November 2, 2004 electoral spread (popular vote), approximately 51-49 % in favor of the lion, in favor of fear, and in favor of numerous peripheral issues which, to an open mind, would have absolutely no bearing on the vote spread in an election and to the unfortunate exclusion of myriad issues which should, indeed, be considered, but were not. Fear. Fear which yields first suspicion, then eventually hatred. In 1941, post Pearl Harbor fears were exploited by racists and bigots to the point where American citizens of Japanese ancestry were plucked from their homes and livelihoods to be “resettled” in “relocation camps” such as in Manzanar California and Sacaton Arizona, to name but two. Their crime? Their ancestry. In 2001, post 9-11, fears were exacerbated and hatred fomented by certain well-known Christian Evangelicals who shifted blame for the attacks away from the few to the many, to the worldwide Muslim community as a whole. There were hate crimes in America then, crimes based on hatred, of course, and on fear. A man was murdered in Phoenix, Arizona simply because he wore a turban and was, therefore and in ignorant association, “a goddamned A-rab.” He was a Sikh, a gentle person who was seeking to live the promise of America, a land where each and all (or no) religious beliefs are equally acceptable, thanks to Article I of the US Constitution’s Bill of Rights which simply states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof …”
That’s where the essay ended. I suppose I could have written more, but decided not to bother since all that’s left to say is that which many have said over and over again. And only a few ever seem to listen, and nothing ever changes. I guess FEAR must be magical or something. A gift from the gods maybe. Or genetic? Some don’t have it, millions do? Is there a solution?
Beats me, but irrational fear does indeed seem to have always been a major driver of the entire of the human community.
About frugalchariot
How Frugal is the Chariot That bears the Human soul. (Emily Dickinson)
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Governance Models of Cultural Districts
Home>Publications>Governance Models of Cultural Districts
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2017 Cultural Infrastructure Index
The Cultural Infrastructure Index, undertaken for the Global Cultural Districts Network by AEA Consulting, seeks to measure investment in capital projects in the cultural sector, identifying projects with a budget of US$10 million or more. This year’s findings reveal an increase in both the number and value of completed projects over 2017, with a significant bump in the Middle East, reflecting the completion of the Louvre Abu Dhabi. North America continues to lead in the number of projects, followed by Europe and Asia. While many believe the era of the “starchitect” may be ending, cultural infrastructure strategies are now firmly part of the public policy discourse in many countries. The private sector now appears to be driving a further wave of investment, expanding the definition of “culture” further into entertainment and experience.
Beyond Concrete Barriers: Innovation in Urban Furniture and Security in Public Space
Safety is a fundamental, if often unspoken, premise of successful placemaking, informing both the design and programming of public spaces. More and more placemaking efforts are focused on the creation or revitalization of public spaces, often in downtown areas involving heavy foot and vehicle traffic. For these projects to be successful, it is critical that the design, technology and security oversight be effective but also recessive, requiring imagination and intelligence to be applied to the design process from the start. Managers of cultural districts, Business Improvement Districts, and other public spaces are seeking innovative solutions for securing their public spaces in ways that retain the beauty and attraction of these areas.
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Home Analysis The Jerusalem Talks
The Jerusalem Talks
Security officials from Russia, the U.S. and Israel are meeting next week to discuss regional developments.
On Monday, U.S. national security adviser John Bolton will meet with his Israeli and Russian counterparts in Jerusalem. A trilateral meeting such as this is odd to begin with, and one taking place amid the situation currently unfolding in the Middle East even more so. Also interesting is that this meeting is taking place in Jerusalem. While Russia maintains decent relations with Israel, a meeting of this sort in Jerusalem would seem to indicate a Russian indifference to Muslim sensibilities – something Israel and the U.S. display regularly. Still, they’ve agreed to meet in Jerusalem this time, optics aside. Topping the meeting agenda, purportedly, is Syria. But there’s plenty else going on in the Middle East for the three to discuss.
The officials will meet in the midst of intensifying tensions between the U.S. and Iran. Last week, the U.S. blamed Iran for attacks on two tankers near the Strait of Hormuz, and this week Iran shot down an American drone. On Friday, news broke that the U.S. had been ready to launch airstrikes in response to the downed drone, but that U.S. President Donald Trump had called off the attacks at the last minute, feeling they would have caused disproportional casualties. That may be true, or the White House may have been bluffing an attack to unnerve the Iranians; Trump has been intimating a desire for talks with Iran and may have been trying to force Tehran to the table. Whatever the intent, tensions in the Persian Gulf remain high.
Meanwhile, Israel is engaged in massive war games that appear to be focused on the Syrian border. Israel sees the presence of Iran and its proxies, including Hezbollah, in Syria as a direct threat to its security – a threat they’ve countered with periodic airstrikes on Iranian positions in Syria. Israel has kept Russia apprised of impending attacks, and Russia, which controls Syrian air space and has generally been allied with Iran in Syria, has nonetheless allowed the airstrikes to go on for months.
There’s no doubt that all three countries will want to speak about Iran. The U.S. and Israeli positions are fairly clear. Israel wants Iran out of Syria and Hezbollah disarmed, while the U.S. wants to break the Iranian sphere of influence that currently stretches from Iran though Iraq, Syria and Lebanon to the Mediterranean Sea. The question, then, is what brings Russia to the table. Moscow has said it will make the case for Iran (though whether Iran trusts Russia as its mouthpiece is another question altogether). But Russia’s main interests lay outside of the Middle East; it wants to regain its strategic buffer that collapsed in 1992, and it wants to see an increase in energy prices to stabilize its economy.
If we take the Russian interest seriously, then its approach to the meeting will be less about speaking for Iran and more about using Iran as a bargaining chip. Russia could actually benefit from a conflict in the Persian Gulf; it is not militarily exposed there, and a fight would surely drive up the price of oil, on which the Russian economy so heavily depends.
But the U.S. and Israel don’t want to fight Iran. The 2006 war with Hezbollah didn’t go well for Israel. Its forays into Lebanon didn’t put an end to the threat, and it doesn’t want another failed war. The U.S. has been mired in war in the Middle East for 15 years without a satisfactory outcome, and Washington’s strategy is to draw down its forces. But tensions with Iran have put pressure on the U.S. to increase its presence in the region. If the U.S. tries to deal with Iran in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq – let alone Iran itself – it will be tripling down on its failures since 2003. Even with the help of Israeli and Saudi forces, using U.S. military force to roll back Iran’s sphere of influence in the region would be enormously costly and likely impossible.
Simply put, the U.S. and Israel want to break Iranian power without assuming the risks of doing so. Russia holds the key. It is allied with Iran, but that alliance has made Iran dependent, not equal. Russia is the only major power not hostile to Iran, but that’s already changing in Syria. If Russia turns on Tehran, it would intensify Iran’s isolation and array forces against Iran that it could not resist.
In exchange for joining a powerful anti-Iran coalition, Russia will look to the U.S. – which can deliver its interests. Moscow will want an end to economic sanctions, a guarantee of U.S. neutrality on Ukraine, and likely a withdrawal of U.S. forces from Poland and Romania. While Russia may have interests in the Middle East, it’s these burning issues that it really cares about, and it is here that Russia will try to gain leverage. For the U.S., sanctions are not critical – neither Crimea nor eastern Ukraine are major issues – and while it doesn’t trust Russia enough to withdraw from Poland and Romania, Russia can probably live with that. Israel, for its part, would be happy with anything that massively weakens Iran.
The talks may well stick to far more trivial issues than this, and there will be no grand bargain on the table. Yet, senior security officials from these three countries are not meeting in Jerusalem to make some pious declaration. It seems they’ll be there to do business.
George Friedman is an internationally recognized geopolitical forecaster and strategist on international affairs and the founder and chairman of Geopolitical Futures. Dr. Friedman is a New York Times bestselling author and his most popular book, The Next 100 Years, is kept alive by the prescience of its predictions. Other best-selling books include Flashpoints: The Emerging Crisis in Europe, The Next Decade, America’s Secret War, The Future of War and The Intelligence Edge. His books have been translated into more than 20 languages. Dr. Friedman has briefed numerous military and government organizations in the United States and overseas and appears regularly as an expert on international affairs, foreign policy and intelligence in major media. For almost 20 years before resigning in May 2015, Dr. Friedman was CEO and then chairman of Stratfor, a company he founded in 1996. Friedman received his bachelor’s degree from the City College of the City University of New York and holds a doctorate in government from Cornell University.
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THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. On Sunday and Monday, I will attend ceremonies in The Netherlands and Russia, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of V-E Day.
These events will celebrate a great triumph of good over evil. We will never forget the acts of courage that made possible the liberation of a continent, or the heroes who fought in the cause of freedom. And we honor the brave Americans and allied troops who humbled tyrants, defended the innocent, and liberated the oppressed. By their courage and sacrifice, they showed the world that there is no power like the power of freedom -- and no soldier as strong as a soldier who fights for that freedom.
Radio Address:
The defeat of Nazi Germany brought an end to the armed conflict in Europe. Unfortunately, for millions of people on that continent, tyranny remained -- in a different uniform. In Latvia, where I'm also visiting on this trip, free people were taken captive by another totalitarian empire. Germany was split into free and un-free halves. And countries like Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary were cut off from liberty by an Iron Curtain. The people of these countries survived the Cold War through great courage, and then they took history into their own hands and reclaimed their freedom.
The result is the continent of Europe, wounded by decades of conflict and oppression, is today whole, free and at peace for the first time in its history. The wave of democracy that swept Central and Eastern Europe in 1989 has now swept to nations like Georgia and Ukraine. And the victory for freedom represented by V-E Day has become a reality for millions of people.
On my trip, I will visit Freedom Square in Tbilisi, Georgia, to applaud the people there for the Rose Revolution that advanced democracy in their land. Georgia has survived oppression, fought for liberty and taken its place among free nations. America is proud to call Georgia our partner in freedom, and we will help the people of that country enhance prosperity, improve security and spread liberty at home and abroad.
The new democracies of Europe still have much work to do. Free elections are a significant achievement, yet they are only part of a fully functioning democracy. Democratic governments must be committed to providing full and equal rights for minorities, resolving conflicts peacefully, encouraging a vibrant political opposition, and ensuring the rule of law. As the nations of Central and Eastern Europe work to build up the institutions necessary for a free society, America will stand by their side.
Today, these nations are standing with us as we defend liberty abroad. Freedom has no better friends than those with a fresh memory of tyranny. That is why countries like Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Georgia have been partners in our coalition in Iraq and Afghanistan. We're grateful for their contributions, and especially for the example they are setting for other aspiring democracies.
America and these new democracies are bound together by history, by the universal rights we have defended together, and by our deepest convictions. All of us understand that the advance of freedom is the concentrated work of generations -- from the brave Americans who fought against Nazi Germany sixty years ago to those who struggle for liberty today. And by working together, we will ensure that the promise of liberty and democracy won on V-E Day will one day reach every person and every nation in the 21st century.
Thank you for listening.
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--Neonatal/Perinatal Medicine (2)
--Spinal Cord Injury Research (1)
--Mental Health Research (15)
--Clinical (4)
--Radiation Physics (1)
--Colorectal Surgery (1)
--General Surgery (19)
--Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Surgery (1)
--Minimally Invasive Surgery (2)
--Pediatric Surgery (1)
--Plastic Surgery (7)
--Health Services Research (13)
Opioid Policy (17)
Precision Health (20)
Nauzley Abedini, M.D.
Transitions of care and healthcare worker access
Mahshid Abir, M.D., M.Sc.
Acute care delivery and disaster preparedness and response
Megan Adams, M.D., J.D.
Value of care in gastrointestinal endoscopy
Outcomes and decision-making for pediatric gastrointestinal diseases
Lindsay Admon, M.D., M.Sc.
Maternal and reproductive health and health disparities
Nnenaya Agochukwu, M.D.
Urologic health services, global health
John Allen, M.D., M.B.A.
Value of care in colon cancer prevention
Frank Anderson, M.D., M.P.H.
Reproductive health and global health
Peter Arvan, M.D., Ph.D.
Sawsan As-Sanie, M.D., M.P.H.
Gynecologic conditions and surgery, and opioids
Shervin Assari, M.D., M.P.H.
Health disparities and mental health
Vinita Bahl, D.M.D., M.P.P.
Healthcare quality, costs, and safety
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Tag: Patrick Macnee
The Howling werewolf gets a statue via Scream Factory
PCS Collectibles have been commissioned by Scream Factory to create a statue of the werewolf from Joe Dante’s The Howling. The PVC statue stands six and a half inches on …
Waxwork II: Lost in Time – USA, 1992
‘A killer is waiting… In the past, present and future.’ Waxwork II: Lost in Time is a 1992 American horror comedy feature film written and directed by Anthony Hickox (Knife Edge; Jill the Ripper; …
Sweet Sixteen – USA, 1983
‘What terrors are unleashed when a girl turns…’ Sweet Sixteen – also promoted as Sweet 16 – is a 1983 American mystery horror feature film directed by Jim Sotos (The Last Victim) …
The Veil – TV series, USA, 1958
The Veil is an American horror suspense anthology television series produced in 1958 by Hal Roach Studios and filmed in England at Elstree Studios. The series was hosted by Boris Karloff, who also acted in every episode …
Dead of Night – USA, 1977
Dead of Night is a 1977 American made-for-television anthology fantasy horror film directed by Dan Curtis (Burnt Offerings; Dark Shadows; The Norliss Tapes; Trilogy of Terror). It originally premiered on NBC on …
Masque of the Red Death – USA, 1989
Masque of the Red Death is a 1989 American horror feature film produced by Roger Corman, and directed by Larry Brand (Paranoia; writer of Halloween: Resurrection; Psychic Murders), starring Adrian Paul (Deadly Descent: …
Transformations – USA, 1988
Transformations – aka Alien Transformations – is a 1988 American science fiction horror film directed by Jay Kamen from a screenplay by Mitch Brian (Night Screams; Presence of Mind). On …
The Creature Wasn’t Nice aka Naked Space – USA, 1981
The Creature Wasn’t Nice – also known as Spaceship and Naked Space – is a 1981 (released 1983) American science fiction comedy horror feature film written and directed by Bruce Kimmel. It attempts to …
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North Korea's Kim meets China's Xi, says awaiting US actions
By KEN MORITSUGU
BC-AS--North Korea-China,11th Ld-Writethru
Uncredited, ASSOCIATED PRESS
BEIJING (AP) — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, meeting in Pyongyang with Chinese President Xi Jinping, said Thursday that his country is waiting for a desired response in stalled nuclear talks with the United States.
"North Korea would like to remain patient, but it hopes the relevant party will meet halfway with North Korea to explore resolution plans that accommodate each other's reasonable concerns," he said, according to Chinese state broadcaster CCTV.
Xi's trip to North Korea, the first by a Chinese president in 14 years, raises the possibility that China could help break a monthslong impasse in talks between the U.S. and North Korea over the North's nuclear weapons.
Describing the issue as "highly complex and sensitive," Xi said his government is willing to play a constructive role in the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
"The international community expects the U.S. and North Korea to continue to talk and achieve results," he said, according to CCTV.
The summit comes as both countries are locked in separate disputes with the United States — China over trade and North Korea over its nuclear weapons.
With Xi due to meet President Donald Trump next week in Japan, analysts say Kim may ask the Chinese leader to pass on a message that could revive the talks with the U.S.
Xi's two-day state visit to North Korea, announced just three days ago, began with the synchronized pomp of all major events in the country.
About 10,000 cheering people and a 21-gun salute greeted Xi and senior Chinese officials at an arrival ceremony at Pyongyang's airport.
The CCTV evening news showed Xi and his wife Peng Liyuan waving to the crowd after emerging from their Air China plane, then being greeted by Kim and his wife, Ri Sol Ju before receiving flowers and watching goose-stepping troops march by.
The crowd stood in tight formations, waving flowers and chanting slogans to welcome Xi. Other people lined the roads and cheered from overpasses as Xi's motorcade traveled to central Pyongyang, where he joined Kim in an open-top vehicle.
Standing in the car, they waved to crowds as they rode to the square where the embalmed bodies of Kim's grandfather and father, the first two leaders of North Korea, lie in state.
The Korean Central News Agency, which is an arm of the North Korean government, said newspapers in the country are praising Xi's visit.
"Newspapers of the DPRK in their editorials on Thursday say that the Korean people warmly welcome with delight Xi Jinping, president of the People's Republic of China, who is coming to the DPRK with the warm friendship feeling of the fraternal Chinese people," the KCNA reported.
Nuclear talks between the U.S. and North Korea broke down after a second summit between Kim and Trump in February in Vietnam ended in failure.
A series of North Korean ballistic missile and nuclear tests in 2016 and 2017 alarmed the U.S., its Asian allies, Japan and South Korea, and even China. Last year, Kim turned to diplomacy, including his first meeting with Trump in Singapore.
The talks with the U.S. have reached an impasse over a fundamental difference in approach.
The U.S. is demanding that North Korea abandon its nuclear weapons entirely before international sanctions are lifted. North Korea is seeking a step-by-step approach in which moves toward denuclearization are matched by concessions from the U.S., notably a relaxation of the sanctions.
"Over more than a year, the North Korean side has taken many positive measures to avoid escalation of the situation and manage and control the peninsular situation, but it hasn't received an active response from the relevant party," Kim told Xi on Thursday, according to CCTV.
Xi is expected to endorse North Korea's calls for an incremental disarmament process.
A commentary in China's official Xinhua news agency said China could play a unique role in breaking the cycle of mistrust between North Korea and the U.S, but that both sides "need to have reasonable expectations and refrain from imposing unilateral and unrealistic demands."
A former North Korean diplomat who defected in 2016 said he thinks Kim wants to give Xi a message to deliver to Trump when the two meet at the upcoming G-20 summit in Japan.
Thae Yong Ho said Kim may offer to abandon some of his nuclear facilities in a bid to set up a third summit with the U.S. president. But he cautioned that such a move would be only to buy time and not to denuclearize fully, as the U.S. is demanding.
"The main purpose for the Kim Jong Un regime in negotiating is to keep North Korea as a new nuclear state in this region, there is no doubt about that," he said at a news conference in Tokyo, where he is promoting the Japanese translation of his book, "Password From the Third Floor," an inside look at North Korean diplomacy and the Kim regime.
China is North Korea's most important foreign partner, though their relations grew somewhat rocky as Kim's efforts to build his country's nuclear weapons capabilities threatened regional stability.
Kim met Xi four times in China as the talks with both the U.S. and South Korea got underway. A banner at the airport welcome ceremony read, "Long Live with Unbreakable Friendship and Unity Formed by Blood."
The nations fought together in the 1950-53 Korean War against the United States, South Korea and their allies. China welcomed Kim's announcement last year that he was shifting the country's focus from nuclear weapons to economic development.
Associated Press writers Hyung-jin Kim in Seoul, South Korea, Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo and researcher Yu Bing in Beijing contributed to this story.
State funerals
Nuclear proliferation
Places in this Story
China government
North Korea government
People in the Story
Thae Yong Ho
Wilkes-Barre News
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Tag: peru
Incredible Incas, Chpt 1, Pt 2
We continue following the account of the journey through Peru of author Loren McIntyre in the first chapter “The Silent Strings”. We follow him thru Lima, old temples, Nazca, Cuzco & Bolivia while we learn history along his travels of the Pan American Highway.
Let’s read about the Incan civilization together!
Image Credit: Cruising From Stockholm
Posted on March 26, 2017 March 9, 2017 Categories Andes, archaeology, Education, History, Homeschool, Indigenous People, Machu Picchu, school, Science, UncategorizedTags andes, archaeology, cuzco, gringa, history, inca, nazca, peruLeave a comment on Incredible Incas, Chpt 1, Pt 2
We follow author Loren McIntyre on his fascinating journey through the history, culture and archeology of Peru’s Incan Empire. In the first part of chapter 1 he talks about all that gold!
Let’s discover Peru’s Incan Empire together!
Image Credit: PBS
Posted on March 17, 2017 March 9, 2017 Categories Andes, archaeology, Art, Books, culture, Education, History, Homeschool, Inca, Indigenous People, Machu Picchu, Peru, Reading, school, South America, UncategorizedTags andes, archaeology, conquistador, cuzco, gringa, history, inca, nazca, peruLeave a comment on Incredible Incas, Chpt 1, Pt 1
Energy Being Architects
So who was building stuff before the Incan people were dominating the culture and geography of the Andes in Peru? When people think of the megalithic temple structure of Machu Piccu they assume it was built by the Incan civilization. However, the reality is that the Incas actually built on top of megalithic architecture that existed by the time that they arrived. The Incan Empire was officially declared in 1438. The megalithic structures they built on and integrated into their cities, trading centers and places of worship were already thousands of years old. Who the heck were those people?
In the first video below you will see a Peruvian tour guide describe them as energy beings who lived on Earth before our Sun existed. These energy beings existed in a perpetual twilight. When a devastating cataclysm happened, they retreated into complex cave systems in order to survive. When this cosmic catastrophe resulted in a Sun that blazed during daylight hours, the energy beings were only able to come out at twilight and return to their cave dwellings at sunrise. Thus their reign of constructing megalithic civilizations was over. And, as legend goes, they still exist and survive in those cave systems today.
If a curious explorer ventures into a cave, hoping to encounter these beings, they may get an unpleasant surprise. Although they are not evil creatures who mean us harm, our species simply don’t mix well. The result can be paralysis or frightening hallucinations.
Another video depicts Chullpa where burial towers and grain silos line the legendary Incan Road system that stretches 25,000 from the high Andean elevations to the rainforest jungle below. Examples of the differences in the quality of craftsmanship can be seen here. The older, more ancient, mystery stonemasonry results in smooth, straight line enormous stones fitted together with such precision no mortar is required. The stones themselves are volcanic stone that have been crafted smooth. The newer work by Incans seems amateurish with the natural shapes of the stones retained, giving walls and structures a cobblestone appearance. Incan stonework also required masonry because they lacked the skill for precision crafting of the stones as they fit together.
More examples that depict the contrast between the ancient mysterious megalithic architecture paired with Incan architecture is featured in a video on location at Ollantaytambo. The gringa is fascinated and ready for a bit of spelunking. Even if she ends up paralyzed with bizarre hallucinations temporarily!
#1. Mysterious Peruvian cavedwellings of ancient energy beings…
#2. Burial towers & grain silos along the Incan Road in Chullpa, near Cusco…
#3. Ollantaytambo in Peru was built before the Incas…
Sources cited
Image credit: s8int.com
Posted on November 23, 2016 November 22, 2016 Categories archaeology, architecture, Education, History, Homeschool, Inca, Peru, UncategorizedTags andes, architecture, barrio, gringa, inca, Machu Piccu, megalithic, peru1 Comment on Energy Being Architects
Ancient Ychma Guide Dogs
You know that old saying, “dog is man’s best friend”? The gringa completely understands this. She has lived her life according to this rule. I grew up on a cattle ranch exposed to working dogs that were smart and worthy of respect. They opened gates, herded cattle into corrals and other pastures, and kept them moving down chutes when they balked. It was the gringa’s habit to roam the woods around our house and down into the Brazos River Valley. But I was rarely alone. Morris was a Keeshond that my older sister got as a puppy. He stayed at my parent’s home after she moved away. I would give him horrible haircuts with garden shears every summer, snipping off his long, thick coat to give him some relief. That was a foreshadow of what was to come.
When I entered college with aspirations of becoming an English teacher, I had to get a job. I began working for a veterinarian. Eventually, the veterinarian trained the gringa as a dog groomer. The gringa’s health held up for about two semesters then epilepsy came charging in demanding attention. This began a cycle of sporadic attempts to go back to college, working, health crisis, hiatus, and on and on and on. Eventually I realized that it was unlikely I would ever sustain a lengthy enough stretch of good health to graduate or even make a reliable employee. I gave up on a teaching degree, said a tearful thank you and good-bye to a very kind veterinarian, and began a career as a self-employed dog groomer, a career that lasted more than 25 years.
During that time the gringa had Sparky the hero dog who took a bullet to save his family, as well as many other dogs that have been rescued and re-homed. The gringa currently has a service dog who is also my constant companion. Abby is a seizure-alert dog who is small enough for me to carry in a front-pack wherever I go. Abby is as adorable as she is good at her job. She has a perpetual puppy look. A Maltese-Yorkie mix, the gringa calls her a Malarkie.
Now, the dear reader is probably wondering where the gringa is going with this dog-biography. Well, the gringa is going to Peru and other ancient civilizations. She has recently found out that the caveman’s ancient ancestors sacrificed dogs. Eyeing him suspiciously as I curl a protective arm around my Abby, I try to imagine him thousands of years ago sacrificing a dog. The gringa can’t see it in her mind’s eye.
The caveman is such a kind, gentle soul. Just about every Peruvian I have met when we have traveled to his jungle origins are similar in nature. Quick to smile and laugh with a gentleness and generosity that would bring tears to your eyes. And dogs roam freely. Even in the capital city of Lima they are left unmolested to go about their business. So what was up with sacrificing them so many years ago?
In Lima, there are ruins underneath the city’s zoo where archaeologists are excavating remains of what they believe to be warriors who died violent deaths and dogs who were ritually sacrificed and buried with them. This is the work of the Ychma culture. This is not the first discovery of human Ychma remains within the city, but the finding of sacrificed dogs, by rope strangulation and slit throats (egad!), is what makes this site a bit more interesting.
The Ychma lived about 2,000 years ago in the area of Peru that is modern day Lima. Typical burials of the average Ychma would include pottery, textiles and often items related to the textile industry like thread and needles. The skill of crafting textiles was a gift from their god’s father, Virachocha, who beget many gods, particularly the Ychma god, Pachacamac.
The Ychma people were also buried facing the sea, in honor of their god’s wife, Urpi Wachay, who is an ocean deity. Her name’s translation means “one who gives birth to doves”. The gringa finds that beautiful. Anyway, I digress.
The Ychma god, Pachacamac, was one of the Sun God’s children. Pachacamac was a god of fire, interacting directly with humankind. His father, Sun god Viracocha, the god who created the world and taught the making of crafts such as textiles and pottery, was invisible, remote and uninvolved with his creation. After creating the world and showing humanity how to tend to itself, he left their governance up to his children. Eventually the world he created became corrupt and needed rejuvenation. That was the work of Pachacamac.
He had a tri-une, or three level, nature. There is the level that is unseen, unmanifested. There is also the aspect of his name’s translation that literally means the “one who moves the world”. Seeing how Lima is often rocked by earthquakes it is easy to understand why this characteristic was adopted. Then there is the name translation aspect that means “the language of man”, as in being an oracle, a god who communicated directly with mankind.
The nature of Pachacamac is thought to be like that of a spoiled and precocious child, embodied in the earthquakes as temper tantrums. Sacrifices were meant to appease him, just like giving candy to a baby. The Ychma built a shrine and temple complex that still inspires religious pilgrimage today. Pachacamac held such powerful sway over the Ychma that even when the Incas subjugated them in the 1400s, the empire absorbed Pachacamac into their own religious pantheon.
The Ychma also built the ancient cities Puruchuco and Cajamarquilla along with 16 stepped pyramids. The pyramids were religious sites to make offerings. There were agricultural items and foods often given in ceramic containers. There were also pyramids dedicated to human sacrifice. Not only were humans sacrificed, but animals like frogs were sacrificed as an offering that would please the gods so that they would send rain. But the gringa still wants to know why they sacrificed the dogs.
The Ychma were not alone in this practice. The ancient Greeks did it. The ancient Romans did, too. Romano-British dog sacrifice remains have also been found. But why? Depending on the culture and religion, the reasons varied: fertility, guardians, divination, guide passage from life to death, provide companionship in the afterlife. Although archaeology experts have yet to publish the significance of the sacrificed Ychma dogs, the gringa has drawn her own conclusions.
I believe that since they were buried with warriors who show evidence of violent, deadly wounds, she believes the dogs were intended to provide protection, as well as companionship, in the afterlife. A noble death? Yes, so my soft heart takes some comfort that the dogs died as revered symbols rather than exterminated as pests. But still it irks me. But the gringa will no longer eye the caveman suspiciously when he walks by Abby with knife or rope in his hands.
www.ancient-origins.net
www.apmagazine.info
www.academia.edu
Posted on October 24, 2016 October 22, 2016 Categories archaeology, culture, dog, Education, History, Homeschool, Peru, Religion, UncategorizedTags barrio, culture, dog, gringa, history, homeschool, peru, religion, sacrifice, ychma1 Comment on Ancient Ychma Guide Dogs
The UK’s Windowless Plane – What’s The Point?
Have the gringa’s dear readers seen the United Kingdom’s announcement of the future of flying? The gringa has and she would just like to know why no one bothered to ask her advice on what should be the new and improved planes of tomorrow. Windows are the least of my worries on board an airplane. Technicon Design engineers, however, seem to think differently. They believe their revolutionary design is just what the world of travel needs for the following reasons:
Reduced fuel costs
Reduced overall aircraft weight
Reduced maintenance costs
Enhanced aesthetics of airplane interior
What passengers will have instead of windows will be LED screens that will display the outside view, movies, or, heaven forbid, presentations (EGAD! Surely not!). Individual LED displays can be used for passenger convenience to place a service order with flight attendants or display personal images of choice.
While the uber-wealthy will get to enjoy this style of travel a decade before the rest of the world’s peons, the gringa is not all that impressed. Please let me complain, er, I mean, explain…
#1. Reduce fuel costs? Big deal. Every single time an airline finds a way to reduce cost, it is only for the benefit of the airline to maximize profit. I have yet to pay a single dime less for any airline ticket I have ever purchased. A roundtrip flight to Peru cost the gringa $600 a decade ago. Today, it’s about $800 on a good day. So, when airlines start saying things like, “This technology will reduce the cost of a ticket,” and it actually happens (because we’ve all heard that one before) the gringa will be sufficiently impressed.
#2. Reduce overall weight? Again, big deal. The gringa could care less about how much an airplane weighs. They all fall like a rock to oblivion below if anything goes wrong. When airlines report that they have developed an airplane design that is light as a feather and will float safely and gently to the earth in the event of mechanical difficulties, the gringa will be on board with that development.
#3. Reduce maintenance costs? Why should I care? It still has nothing to do with the price of oranges today. What the gringa really wants to hear is that a smart-plane has been developed that can detect an explosive device within a one mile radius. Aerospace engineers, are you hearing the gringa?
#4. Enhanced aesthetics of the plane’s interior? Now that’s just a bunch of baloney. I want the dadburn window, okay? I mean a REAL window. Why the heck would a gravity bound Earthling give up the chance to see a REAL LIVE CLOUD close up? Are you out of your mind? If you really want to improve the aesthetics of the interior give us passengers more leg room for crying out loud! Give us a bathroom where we can really sit for awhile and enjoy ourselves. Give me an aisle wide enough that some stranger doesn’t get a face full of patootie as I pass by during a bit of turbulence. Good grief, engineers, where DO you get your inspiration?
So, even if they announce that all of the things they see as benefits will reduce the cost of flying, the gringa wants to know exactly “who” is supposed to enjoy the benefit of those cost reductions. Will it really be the passengers or will it be the stockholders? When the caveman and I can fly south and see his family for as much as we pay for a week’s worth of groceries, THEN and ONLY then, will the gringa be happy about giving up the up close and personal experience of clouds. The dear reader can view a video of the U.K.’s windowless Spike S-512 and decide for themselves.
Source & Image Credit: www.telegraph.co.uk
Posted on May 27, 2016 May 27, 2016 Categories Aeronautic, Aerospace, consumer advocacy, Education, Engineering, Exploration, Family, future, Homeschool, Kids, Physics, Science, technology, Travel, Uncategorized, VacationTags aeronautic, aeroplane, aerospace, aircraft, airplane, barrio, bomb, britain, british, caveman, cloud, earth, engineer, england, english, explosive, fuel, gravity, gringa, gringo, hispanic, latin, led, peru, plane, S-512, spike, spike S-512, stockholder, technicon, technology, travel, turbulence, uk, window2 Comments on The UK’s Windowless Plane – What’s The Point?
No, Virginia, There Is No Secret Base At Antarctica
The gringa promised to peruse Admiral Byrd’s diaries and report on any log he may have made to support the claims of conspiracy theorists (CTs) that there is a secret German military base at Antarctica. However, his authentic diary is a record of his flight across the North Pole in 1926. Although there is an Admiral Byrd diary website, it is a fraud and does not record any truthful occurrence of Operation Highjump.
The gringa did not want to disappoint the dear reader so she dug a bit further. She dipped her toe into the netherworld of Wikileaks. Here is a brief summary of the most interesting points of research on Pre-and Post- World War II era Antarctica. I have summarized the most important facts and added my own two cent’s worth at the end in a “NOTE”:
UK Polar Record of Scott Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge
Polar Record 43 (224): 1-21 (2007)
December 1938-April 1939 Pre-WWII German expedition to Antarctica on naval vessel Schabenland authorized by Herman Goering & led by Captain Alfred Ritscher (not a naval military captain but a merchant marine captain who served the German navy in a civilian capacity because he was the most experienced polar explorer in Germany). Mission objective was to evaluate viability of Germany’s whaling industry that supplied oil, lubricants, glycerin (for explosive nitroglycerin), margarine, etc. Their war effort would depend upon these supplies. Mission reports widely published in German scientific literature and eventually translated into numerous languages were later referred to by the British, Americans, Swedes, and Norwegians. The reports contained maps and photographic surveys. (3) landings made
January 14, 1939 Norway responds to Germany’s expedition to Antarctica and lays claim to the territory it had earlier discovered, Dronning Maud Land that Germany announced it was setting out to explore
Jan-Feb 1939 German expedition visits Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. Mission objective: explore area discovered by Norwegian whaling fleets and lay claim to the territory before Norway did for the whaling rights. Any proposed base was not a military base but a whaling industry base for Germany’s fleet of whaling vessels. The outbreak of the war prevented a return expedition to begin construction of a whaling station. No official German expeditions returned until after 1959. Because of Norway’s official territory claim, Germany never disputed the issue (NOTE: this visit did not result in the construction of a secret German base in Antarctica, time, lack of adequate maps and ice conditions would have prevented the completion of any kind of base being constructed. In a later British expedition it took 18 days to complete a crude hut even with the support of specialized heavy equipment).
1943-1945 Great Britain launches secret wartime mission “Tabarin” w/Special Air Services Regiment (SAS). Objective was to occupy Falkland Islands in order to deny use of harbours to German ships because Chile and Argentina were friendly with Germany during WWII. (NOTE: this was not a staged attack upon a secret German base)
July & August 1945 (after German surrender of WWII) 2 U-boats arrive in Argentina’s naval base Mar del Plata. Subs were Captained by Lieutenant Otto Wermuth and Oberleutnant Heinz Schaeffer. Rather than be the escape subs for Hitler, Hitler really did commit suicide and these were Germans stationed off the coast of New York when their country surrendered and they were just trying to escape to a friendly country. However, Wermuth, Schaeffer and their crews were taken prisoner by Argentina and officially became prisoners of war, interrogated by Argentine Navy, US Navy and British Royal Navy. (NOTE: these boats were not capable of operation in ice bound waters with pack ice up to 2m thick off the Antarctic coastline so they did not come from a secret German base there)
Summer 1946-1947 US Navy “Operation Highjump” (classified Confidential) performs mock invasion of Antarctica. The Operation was not a dark op. The exercise was widely publicized in the New York Times and 11 journalists were imbedded with the mission’s crews. This was Truman’s first Cold War exercise to flex US military muscle in the face of the Soviet Union (NOTE: not a staged attack upon a secret German base but a training operation for the possibility of war with the Soviet Union during a Russian winter)
1958 (3) nuclear weapons exploded in Antarctic region in US classified Operation Argus (NOTE: this was not to destroy a secret German base at Dronning Maud Land. The nukes were detonated 2000km north of that location and again, the flex of US muscle in the face of the Soviets during the Cold War)
All classified documents for these operations have since been declassified.
The gringa hates to burst the bubble of CTs who thoroughly enjoy entertaining the notion that there is a secret base of extra-terrestrials and Germans located beneath the ice of Antarctica. But there is nothing there. And since the whole premise of believing in a dark ops space program called “Dark Fleet” is dependent upon the secret Antarctica base existing, that, too, is just a fantasy.
Nothing would delight me more than to find an ET hide-out. The gringa would march right in and have a chat. Maybe even go for a ride, buzzing the horizon in one of their spaceships. I would even be thrilled if they “beamed” me about the globe on a world tour. But, alas, they are not to be found at Antarctica (or Egypt or Peru). But I’ll keep looking.
Source: https://wikileaks.org/gifiles/attach/49/49783_.pdf
Image credit: http://www.artofadam.wordpress.com (modified by the gringa)
Posted on April 15, 2016 April 14, 2016 Categories Aerospace, antarctica, arctic, defense, Earth, Education, Egypt, Exploration, extra terrestrial, Family, Fantasy, Fiction, folklore, future, German American, Germany, History, Homeschool, Kids, legend, Library, Nazi, Peru, planet, Prisoner of War, Prisoners of War, Science, soldiers, South America, Space, Space Exploration, spacecraft, Uncategorized, World War IITags admiral, admiral byrd, antarctica, argentina, barrio, british, chile, dronning, Egypt, falkland, German, gringa, gringo, hispanic, latin, maud, military, navy, Nazi, norway, operation argus, operation highjump, peru, polar, Russia, sas, soviet, spaceship, sweden, tabarin, tabirin, whaling, wikileak, World War II, WWII1 Comment on No, Virginia, There Is No Secret Base At Antarctica
CTs, Just As Interesting As ETs
The past couple of weeks the gringa has enjoyed exploring the veracity of claims that attempt to link extra-terrestrial origins to ancient Egyptians and ancient Peruvians. Writing about such topics can result in interesting messages imploring me to also explore conspiracy theories connected with the “space race”. I have been encouraged to delve into the “black ops” and “secret space programs” that have been ongoing for decades.
Now, although the gringa finds such ideas intriguing and fascinating, I have foregone writing on such subjects because of the principle of journalistic integrity. The very nature of a black operation or secret government program makes it impossible to verify any accusation. But I must admit my natural curiosity and love of science fiction has made it impossible for me to resist.
The compromise I will make is to write a post that makes no claim as to whether these programs really do exist or not but, rather, present the claims that have been made. Although I may offer opinions, sarcastic or otherwise, I will attempt to remain true to a policy of journalistic integrity. I encourage the dear reader to simply enjoy the read and please do not run out and invest in a prepper bunker. Here goes…
What Is The Dark Fleet?
According to certain conspiracy theorists the Dark Fleet is a secret, government black ops space program. These CTs (not ETs, dear reader, but CTs… conspiracy theorists) claim that there is grave danger to the public posed by this program. The aim of this program is to save mankind from extinction upon this slowly dying planet. However, the danger is that not all of us will be saved. Only the elite (wealthy) and highly skilled will be rescued. As a matter of fact, many of the these elite and highly skilled have already been removed from this planet and transferred to cosmic colonies throughout the twenty years this secret space program has been in operation.
Apparently the origins of Dark Fleet are found within Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany. Desperately developing advanced technologies that would help the Nazis win the war and rule the world, Hitler funneled huge amounts of cash into different research and development programs. The ranks of the Nazi party were conditioned to be naturally suspicious of everyone. Because of this many secret societies evolved, like-minded Nazis working together for specific group goals. Many of these secret societies were devoted to developing world changing technologies.
It is easy to peruse historical records of World War II and discover that Nazis ventured all over the world, expeditions dedicated to research as well as collection of unusual objects, sacred objects and esoteric objects. CTs claim that they were also looking for extra-terrestrial objects and technologies connected to ancient civilizations. But they assert that the expeditions actually commenced immediately after World War I. Now, World War I officially ended November 11, 1918. The Nazi party officially formed February 24, 1920. So, it’s possible this assertion is true that Nazis were searching for esoteric items long before World War II began.
Thanks to the gringa’s previous posts of the past couple of weeks, we can all rest assured that the Nazis didn’t find ET technology in Egypt or Peru. But, according to the CTs, that’s not where the Nazis searched. The Nazi expeditions were dispatched to China, India and Tibet. CTs claim that while there they discovered ancient texts which they confiscated as well as forcibly removing monks and scribes to serve as interpreters, transporting all back to Germany.
As Hitler and the Nazi party came into official power in the 1930s, the search for objects and texts that could contain the potential of amazing power grew with great fervor. The most active Nazi secret societies involved in this activity have been named by CTs as: Thule, Vril and Black Sun. Hmmm. Can anything be discovered about a secret society? Wouldn’t that be oxymoronish? Public access to information about a club that is secret so officially doesn’t exist?
Thule Society – Apparently these guys were not too good at keeping secrets. They actually have a Wikipedia page so they are no big secret. They sponsored the German Workers’ party which was later reorganized by Hitler into the National Socialist German Workers’ Party and was his political vehicle to power.
This not-so-secret secret society evidently has, at some time or other, published their old membership list which contains the names of some very illustrious Nazis. Of course, true to Nazi ideology, the tenets of belief were commitment to the purity of the Aryan race and denouncing relations to any non-Aryan. The name of the society is rooted in a belief that an ancient landmass named Thule once existed in the northernmost regions of Scandinavia and this is where the Aryan race originated.
Not only did Thule members believe in an Atlantis type motherland, but they also believed that the Earth was hollow. The hollow earth theory purports that the outer earth is a protective bubble housing an entire civilization secretly within. The Thulies believed that the inhabitants of inner earth had psychokinetic powers and if they could harness this power for the Nazi party they could rule the world.
The Thule Society is a favorite among CTs because this secret society had a belief in ETs, supernatural abilities and esoteric practices such as alchemy.
Vril – And yet another not-so-secret society with a Wikipedia page and all sorts of public information widely available. Interestingly enough, there is no hard evidence to prove or disprove this secret society actually existed so they were better at keeping secrets than the Thule.
The closest thing to “evidence” that such a society existed is a quote from a magazine article written by Willy Ley, a rocket engineer from Germany who was “relocated” to the U.S. in 1937. Ley claims that this “secret society” was founded based on an 1871 novel “The Coming Race” authored by Edward Bulwer-Lyton. Its premise was a fictional account of Earth’s sub-terranean “master race” who used their supernatural power that was called “vril”. Famous occultists like Helena Blavatsky claimed that this work of fiction was, in fact, based upon secret, esoteric truths. The gringa only says, “Mm hmm.”
The membership roll of Vril reads like a “Who’s Who” of old school psychics. Probably all on board because of their devotion to the queen of all psychics, Helena Blavatsky.
Needless to say, the gringa believes it to be one heck of a stretch by CTs to attribute any credibility to Vril ideology much less the actual existence of a secret society by the same name that has secret space technology. No, rather than a secret ET society, it sounds more like a secret book club.
Black Sun – Not only does this not-so-secret secret society have a Wikipedia page, among many other information resources, they even have their own dot-org website. Yes, not a secret at all. They boldly proclaim their online presence. However, the gringa highly doubts that this is the original Black Sun secret society of Nazi era Germany. Rather, it is probably produced by CTs who desperately want to legitimize their cause. So, the gringa returns to Wikipedia.
This secret society has its own occult symbol that was openly used by Nazis, so, again, not so secret. The philosophy of Black Sun ideology is that when consciousness reaches ultimate enlightenment light and darkness reverse, thus what was hidden becomes revealed.
Experts on secret societies say that the Black Sun secret society was a secret society within a secret society. I know, I know, the dear reader is scratching their head saying, “What was that?” The Black Sun membership was comprised of the elite ranks within the Thule secret society. Aha, secrets within secrets because, like the gringa said, Nazis were hyper-suspicious and trusted no one, not even a secret society blood brother.
The secrets of this society have remained mostly hidden. Evidently, they had such a bad reputation (and a Heinrich Himmler connection) that even today it is illegal in Germany to reproduce their symbols and wear its insignia. This secret organization was strongly connected to the expeditions into Tibet.
The Tibet missions centered around the SS searching for sacred relics (the Holy Grail and Ark of the Covenant) and extra-terrestrial technology, presumably from crash-landed UFOs.
Their Activity Today
CTs claim that members of these secret societies are alive and well and working from secret bases in Antarctica and South America. Supposedly they have created advanced spacecraft and weapons. They claim this is the real reason behind Admiral Byrd’s Antarctica expedition, to lead an invasion force of 4,000 American, Australian and British troops into this secret Nazi base. In a mission dubbed “Operation High Jump”, CTs claim that Byrd’s forces met with strong resistance by Nazis using their advanced spacecraft and weapons.
Interestingly enough, much of “Operation High Jump” can actually be confirmed. For Byrd’s expedition to be only exploratory in nature, it is highly provocative to discover that among the naval vessels in the fleet were destroyers, submarines, and an aircraft carrier. It gets curioser and curioser to the gringa when U.S. National Defense archives record that one of the vessels, USS Pine Island (a seaplane tender) was not just sold and scrapped but was actually struck from all Naval records.
Upon the conclusion of Admiral Byrd’s “exploration mission”, he returned and recommended that allied forces establish a military defense base at the North Pole. Now, at the time of these recommendations the war was over. So, what was it that he perceived to be a threat? The gringa smells a mystery and upcoming research on all things related to Admiral Byrd.
CTs also claim that scientific and engineering experts within these organizations succeeded in building an anti-gravity spaceship and that it was confiscated by the American military and returned to the U.S. under the utmost secrecy. In fact, the conspiracy of CTs goes even deeper.
They assert that these secret societies populated by Nazi party members were actually not devoted to Nazi ideology. Rather, they exploited the resources and power of the party to further their own agenda. When Nazi Germany ultimately lost the war they then aligned themselves willingly with the United States who was willing to secretly fund the research and development of their highly advanced toys of war. The offshoot of this is the development of a U.S. dark ops space program called “Dark Fleet”.
And to discover the CT claims for the details of the “Dark Fleet” program, the dear reader will just have to come back for the next interesting installment.
A quick recap of what the gringa thinks are the only credible point of interest: the records of Admiral Byrd. I believe the secret society of Vril to be wishful thinking on the part of CTs. It was actually a book club which desperately wished for the story to be true. However, desperately wishing something so does not make it so. If the Thule secret society was based on the existence of a non-existence figment of an author’s imagination, Vril, then, although it was a real secret society, its basis for existence, the discovery of Vril’s location in order to exploit the supernatural power of its inhabitants, has no connection with reality. That would also mean that the secret society Black Sun within the secret society Thule was also based on something which did not exist. All of this would then mean that it is highly unlikely that “Dark Fleet” is a reality. But the gringa digs on.
Wikipedia (of course)
www.bibliotecapleyades.net
http://www.sitsshow.blogspot.com
http://www.gaia.com
Posted on April 11, 2016 April 10, 2016 Categories UncategorizedTags alchemy, antarctica, ark, aryan, atlantis, barrio, black op, black sun, blavatsky, book, bulwer, byrd, China, civilization, colonies, colonist, colonize, colony, conspiracy, cosmic, Cosmos, covenant, dark fleet, destroyer, earth, Egypt, elite, engineer, esoteric, extinct, extra terrestrial, fiction, Germany, grail, gravity, gringa, gringo, himmler, hispanic, hitler, hollow earth, India, interpreter, latin, ley, lyton, monk, naval, Nazi, occult, peru, prepper, psychic, psychokinetic, rocket, sacred, scandinavia, science, science fiction, scientific, scientist, scribe, seaplane, secret, socialist, space, spacecraft, submarine, supernatural, technologies, technology, thule, tibet, vril, war, weaponLeave a comment on CTs, Just As Interesting As ETs
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Tag: temple
Guests & Gods
The gringa was recently requested by a fellow blogger for permission to re-post some of my material. I was flattered at the interest and apparent seal of approval. In appreciative reciprocation I also wanted to re-post an item of this blogger’s choosing. The gringa’s “guest” blogger, Octavian D. Curpas, YouTube video blogger from Arizona, forwarded a transcript of a German Christian singer he recently interviewed, Florence Joy Enns. Lacking a URL link to a video of this interview, the best the gringa can do is provide a link to his YouTube channel, Octavian D. Curpas and a link to the video that inspired the interview, Florence performing “Mein Ziel”. From a Christian perspective, Octavian advocates for reunification of Norwegian children separated from their families through Norway’s version of the U.S.’s Child Protective Services. The gringa will not even attempt to delve into those delicate waters and stick to what she knows. But, dear reader, expect this post to be a bit more personal.
So, returning to his interview of Florence, the gringa then wonders how she can get the subject of a German Christian singer to relate to anything science or fantastical. The intrigue begins with the first quote Octavian cites from Florence, “God answered my prayer when I was 5 years old.” Florence prayed for a baby brother and, despite her parents’ intentions to have no more children, Florence’s prayers were answered and she got a baby brother.
This takes the gringa back to when her eldest son was only three-years-old. We were driving over a bridge and a little dog was running through traffic, perilously close to becoming flattened road kill. Zachary began praying very loudly for God to send a rescuer to the dog. Within moments traffic stopped behind us, a car opened its door and the dog jumped in. My son became a believer.
Now, my son’s independent action of unprompted prayer came as a surprise. The gringa is Jewish. The caveman is Catholic. We are both non-practicers of our respective religions where ritual and temple attendance is concerned. We believe our faiths are based on love and compassion and that is the lifestyle we live, following the easy rule of thumb delivered by Jesus to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It seems simple enough. As a homeschooling mom, the gringa did include religious studies as part of my son’s curriculum, but it included instruction and history on every major religion in the world: Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Shintoism, Taoism, and much more. So, although we have never forced any formal religious training upon our children, they have all grown up and adopted their own religious beliefs and lifestyles. They learned the best way, by our example and explanations for their questions.
A few years after our eldest son’s first prayer was answered, he asked me how he would know that God is real. The gringa adopted, of course, a Jewish perspective for such a question. I explained to him that in the religious texts I rely on for wisdom an example is given in which the person asks God for a demonstration. There is nothing wrong with such a thing. I told him that Jews call it “asking God for a sign”. I told him the story of Gideon who asked God to give him a sign by “putting out the fleece”. God responded. That night, before Zachary went to bed, he looked upward and said, “God, if you’re real there will be a cat at the front door tomorrow.” Now, the gringa chuckled to herself then tucked her precocious six-year-old boy into bed and thought nothing more of it. The next morning, while preparing breakfast, I saw my little boy tear through the apartment and open the door, immediately screaming, “YES!” Low and behold there was a darn cat sitting on our welcome mat. I thought I might faint. How strong the faith of the child. How pure the heart that asks for a sign. How kind and benevolent for a god to respond.
The reality is that such stories are not uncommon. They cannot be explained. Regardless of whether a person believes in God as creative cosmic energy or a divine old man with a beard, there are simply things that happen in which science can only shrug, hold up its hands and say, “Hey, we don’t have a clue.” The gringa adores science and all its fascinations. I also believe that there is a kernel of truth to all of the world’s diverse religions. They all share commonalities where kindness, compassion and forgiveness are concerned. I try to not sweat the details that are controversial points of doctrine and stick to those key elements that maintain a single thread throughout them. I don’t believe religious faith and belief in science are mutually exclusive. I believe they are inextricably linked together. I believe that science will eventually reveal what exactly the greatest architect, scientist and artist the world has ever known is. So, in a way, science is also my religion.
Image Source: 3.bp.blogspot.com
Posted on July 20, 2016 July 20, 2016 Categories Art, Big Bang Theory, Children, christ, christian, Earth, Education, Family, Germany, History, Homeschool, Islam, jesus, Judaism, Kids, muslim, mystery, philosophy, Religion, Science, theology, UncategorizedTags architect, arizona, artist, barrio, believer, buddha, buddhism, buddhist, Catholic, child, christ, christian, church, cosmic, Cosmos, curpas, curriculum, divine, doctrine, enns, German, gideon, God, gringa, gringo, hindu, hispanic, history, homeschool, islam, jesus, Jew, judaism, latin, mein ziel, miracle, muslim, norway, norwegian, octavian, pray, religion, religious, ritual, saviour, science, scientist, shinto, tao, temple, youtube1 Comment on Guests & Gods
Japan’s Underwater City of the Sea Gods
The gringa’s dear readers may find musings of the lost city of Atlantis as fascinating as the gringa. What if it has actually been discovered off the coast of Japan? Hey, stranger things have happened! Although it is more likely that it is a lost city from Japan’s ancient Jomon civilization, sunk into the ocean thousands of years ago after a cataclysmic earthquake, tsunami or climate upheaval after the last ice age, it is still fun to entertain fantastical theories as well as explore the real science behind this archaeological mystery.
Originally discovered by dive instructor Kihachiro Aratake in 1986, these amazing formations have come to be known as the Yonaguni Monument. This massive underwater complex, dated to have hailed around 8000BC, can be found off the coastline of the island Yonaguni which is part of Japan’s Ryukyu island chain. Extending over an area of almost 1000 feet x 500 feet, the complex consists of ten structures, some appearing to be in the shape of animals as well as to contain glyphs of human characters and animals. Roads and retaining walls can be seen connecting the structure in the pattern of a well designed city.
For decades scuba diving tourists, as well as scuba diving archaeologists, have explored ancient ruins of a castle, majestic archway, five temples, a step pyramid and a massive arena. As the gringa only gets to explore pictures of the ruins, it is still pretty obvious even to my untrained eye that these are man-made. Yet there are still scientists who prefer to believe these are natural formations that were enhanced by ancient people into functional structures. This really aggravates the gringa when scientists wave aside the obvious because they just don’t want to admit that ancient civilizations may have been far more advanced than modern “experts” have traditionally been taught to believe.
Just as the west has Aesop’s fables, Japanese culture has their own popular fables, myths and legends. The Mu civilization is a fabled Pacific people. The ancient tale explains that they disappeared under the waves of the sea. In 1996 Masaaki Kimura, professor of marine geology from Japan’s University of the Ryukyus, began his own research to see if this is the long lost home of the Mu. He, too, was of the belief that Yonaguni was most likely a man-manipulated complex of natural formations. However, he was completely converted after his first dive.
Kimura identified quarry marks on many of the megalithic stones. And, since nature does not normally lay out large stones in symmetrical patterns and create many stones with right angles, the gringa tends to agree with Kimura’s conclusion. He studied carvings that were distinctly human faces and animals. The style was clearly indicative of Asian art. He refers to Egypt’s famous sphinx as he described one underwater sculpture of what seems to be a king. A glyph resembling a horse and a painted relief resembling a cow are still discernible making it apparent that this was not a city of mermaids and mermen living under the sea but was actually a thriving, above-ground metropolis at one time.
This area of the Pacific is famous for earthquakes and tsunamis. In the spring of 1771 the largest tsunami ever recorded struck Yonaguni. With a height of well over 130 feet, a catastrophic oceanic wave such as this would have been powerful enough to blast this ancient city well below the surface of the Pacific. Also, 10,000 years ago the sea level would have been more than 100 feet lower than it is today. The geographical area that the Yonaguni complex sits on would, at the time of its existence, have been well above the sea and on dry ground, a coastal city. A land bridge would have also existed connecting the chain of islands with the mainland making it entirely possible for humans to settle there with their domesticated animals.
Although some experts date the ruins to be about 10,000 years old, Kimura’s estimate gives the complex a much younger age. He suspects it may be a 5,000 year old civilization. Either way, this still places the city’s existence during the time of the Jomon civilization. Evidence to be more specific about the age of the structures is hard to come by. Existing beneath the ocean means that things like pottery or wooden objects have long since decayed and disappeared forever. There is, however, the chance of analysis of the paint used on the cow to get a bit more specific at pinning down a particular century.
Jomon culture during the timeframe considered for these structures can be divided into two separate eras:
Incipient Jomon (10,500-8000BC)
Initial Jomon (8000-5000BC)
Incipient Jomon civilization has left behind archaeological remains that indicate that the Jomon people were primarily hunter gatherers who produced pottery identified by their pointed bottoms and corded markings. The following period, Initial Jomon, was noted by rising sea levels and global temperatures. The land bridge between the islands and the mainland would have disappeared. Diet would have transitioned to primarily sea based fare and the development of agriculture and farm production animals since natural resources were limited on the island. Large refuse mounds consisting of large amounts of shells discovered on archeological digs on the islands attests to this. Remains of stone religious figurines and tools such as knives and axes have also been discovered in island digs and dated to the same period as the underwater city.
Historians describe the culture of the Jomon era to be very complex and in the early stages of organized agricultural develpment. Similarities with Asia’s ancient northeastern cultures as well as the ancient indigenous peoples of the Americas can be detected in many of the artifacts discovered. The Jomon preferred to live in coastal or river communities in homes that were sunken into the earth. Ironic, then, that one of their greatest cities eventually sunk into the ocean.
Although the gringa is unable to scuba dive because of epilepsy, I am certain that at least a few dear readers could join the many tourist divers and send me pictures and a recount of your adventure. During winter months, shark enthusiasts sink beneath the waves to observe the hammerheads that frequent the area. However, if sharks aren’t your thing, and you prefer the mystery of history, you can always take a detour to the ruins and share your thrills here on the gringa’s blog.
Since the late 90s the underwater city has become increasingly popular among tourists. Famous writers and photographers have braved the waves to record their own bit of history. The Discovery Channel and National Geographic have performed their own expeditions. So, if any dear reader does get the opportunity for a dive of their own, you must drop the gringa a line here and share your own exciting story.
www.mic.com
www.news.com.au
Hidden Archaeology
www.yonaguni.ws
www.britannica.com
www.metmuseum.org
Image source: Source: Hidden Archeology
Posted on June 3, 2016 May 31, 2016 Categories archaeology, Art, climate change, Earth, Education, Exploration, History, Homeschool, Indigenous People, legend, Library, Literacy, mystery, pyramid, Travel, UncategorizedTags aesop, agriculture, ancient, aratake, archaeological, archaeology, asia, atlantis, barrio, castle, civilization, climate, culture, discovery, earthquake, Egypt, fable, geographic, geologist, geology, glyph, gringa, gringo, hammerhead, hispanic, historian, history, island, Japan, jomon, kihachiro, kimura, latin, legend, marine, masaaki, megalith, mermaid, merman, mermen, mu, ocean, pacific, pottery, pyramid, ruin, ryukyu, science, scientist, scuba, sea, shark, sphinx, temple, tsunami, yonaguni4 Comments on Japan’s Underwater City of the Sea Gods
Trump – Connect The Dots
The gringa likes to steer clear of controversial politics. However, after researching Donald Trump’s candidacy for almost 12 months now, I feel compelled to share. Although all the candidates for the US presidency have their fair share of baggage and issues, I sincerely believe Donald is the only one who threatens to cause irreparable damage to my nation as well as to other countries around the world. So, while some candidates may be troublesome, Donald is downright dangerous.
This election season is historical and a struggle for the heart of our nation. Donald’s bigotry is dangerous. Those who deny this are: A. Right wing extremists who are trained in the art of subversion and misinformation; or B. Average folk who really don’t want to destroy their country but are caught up in the celebrity of Donald and doing nothing more than believing everything he says. This post is for those people in the hopes that it will open their eyes. To see the outline of Donald the white supremacist in chief, one only has to connect the dots.
Over the past year I have been going toe-to-toe with Donald supporters, dispelling and exposing their concerted efforts to recruit through misinformation campaigns. I have been threatened with rape, beheading, bombing, dismemberment and any other imaginable form of torture and murder, along with my loved ones. Although the gringa finds this disturbing, it only confirms my belief in the truth I will share, truth Donald supporters either don’t want to admit or don’t want to see the light of day. So, get comfortable. You are in for a long read, almost 4,000 words.
If you are a Donald supporter and become incensed by what I publish and feel the need to insult or threaten me, it’s no big deal to this gal. I’ve heard it all before. Besides, I am a direct descendant of a Mississippi Klansmen, my maternal great-grandfather, and have dealt with just about any insult you could throw my way. I will ignore your insults just as I have ignored that side of my family for years. Truth matters more.
Begin At The Beginning – Donald’s Early Years
Donald’s father, Frederick Christ Trump, was arrested in May, 1927. He was a KKK Klansmen participating in a “Fascisti” riot targeting Catholic New York City Police officers. Trump was arrested for assaulting New York City police officers. Arrested with him were fellow KKK Klansmen: John E. Kapp, John Marcy, Fred Lyons, Thomas Caroll, Thomas Erwin, and Harry J. Free. The arrest was reported in the June 1, 1927 edition of the New York Times as well as many other newspapers. Trump got off with a not guilty plea which is not surprising. One strategy of the hoods Klansmen hide behind is so that legally they can offer up a defense of no proper identification available as to their involvement in the crime.
Donald’s father enjoyed the power and benefits of KKK membership in an America that had not yet passed the Civil Rights Act (passage in 1964). This is the era where a young Donald, born in 1946, was raised and conditioned, being prepped to one day take over his father’s empire. A teenage Donald would have witnessed his KKK father’s reactions to Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Park’s famous bus ride, marches, protests and the riots and unrest associated with desegregation. The gringa does not believe that a KKK father would have left a multi-million dollar legacy to a son who was not with the ideological “program”. (Sources: boingboing.net/2015/09/09/1927, www.ibtimes.co.uk/frederick-christ-trump, www.scmp.com/news/world/article/1918462/1927, www.vice.com/read/all-the-evidence, www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3229542/).
Donald’s father needed effective legal counsel to help manage his real estate empire. Donald spoke of the family attorney as his personal mentor, perhaps even more influential than his own father to shaping Trump’s business style and persona as we see him today. This man was none other than Roy Cohn, aide to Joe McCarthy, and known for his anti-Semitism, hatred of Communists and brutal hatred of homosexuals. After service to McCarthy, Cohn became counsel to some of the most notorious mafia figures in US history: Tony Salerno, Carmine Galante, and John Gotti, just to name a few. In essence, Donald “mobbed up” with a vicious attorney who believed what our country calls “McCarthyism”. (Source: www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/04/, www.thenation.com, www.salon.com/2015/09/26/ ).
As Donald continued managing the helm of his father’s empire, his true racist colors can be seen in the transcripts of the Department of Justice case against a young Donald and his father’s empire for racial discrimination. Their racism is DOCUMENTED in court records. They were once again defended in court aggressively by their “McCarthy-ist” attorney. This occurred in the 1970s, less than a decade after the passage of the Civil Rights Act but it seems Donald and his father believed they did not have to change with the times. (Source: www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/12/15/, www.washingtonpost.com).
In 1991 a biography on Donald was published, “Trumped!”. Within the covers are quotes of Donald’s words to biographer O’Donnel about a black man working at Trump Plaza as an accountant. Donald’s words are very telling that, as of 1991, “grown man” Donald, no longer dependent on the approval of a KKK father, was still a well-conditioned racist: “… laziness is a trait in blacks… Black guys counting my money! I hate it. The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes every day.” Donald said that. You can buy the book yourself or Google it.
Donald & His Special Interest Groups – Now
What about now? Has Donald changed? Is he still a racist, xenophobe Klansman in Republican disguise? The gringa believes he is based on the fact that his strongest support comes from special interest groups that are identified by the FBI, Southern Poverty Law Center and Anti-Defamation League as domestic terror groups, right wing extremists, white supremacists, white nationalists, radicalized Christians, radicalized Constitutionalists and conspiracy theorists and Donald has never denounced them publicly or vehemently. In fact he has allowed them to flourish and recruit at his rallies. His campaign’s success is greatly in part because of the effective recruitment campaigns of these domestic terror organizations. Let’s examine a few of these groups connected to Donald and see who they are, what they represent and what they believe Donald’s political ideology represents.
Donald’s first public endorsement by a white supremacist domestic terror group was Tweeted September, 2015:
@realDonaldTrump You Sir are the only hope we have of getting WHITE AMERICA BACK! WE all will be voting for you! CHURCH OF INVISIBLE EMPIRE – Wm. Quigg (@GrandDragonCa) September 17, 2015
After this endorsement Donald came under media scrutiny. The KKK moved into damage control and attempted a public endorsement of Hillary Clinton. This move is very typical of the political strategies exercised by groups like this in order to propagate misinformation campaigns. The media and Clinton’s other political opponents ignored this ruse for what it was, but white supremacists still use this as a deflect argument when the truth of Donald’s white supremacy connections begins to hit too close to home in debate and argument. More on misinformation strategies of organizations like this will follow later in the post. For now the gringa is trying to stay on point about some of the domestic terror organizations linked to Donald.
Opening line quote from open letter to Donald from the national KKK chapter, published March, 2016 on their website, www.kkk.com, which he has never denounced: “They hate you for the same reason they hate us.”
Most recent public endorsement of Donald by the KKK national chapter published May, 2, 2016 that Donald has not denounced: “The reason a lot of Klan members like Donald Trump is because a lot of what he believes in, we believe in,” KKK Imperial Wizard. The KKK video can be viewed at www.thewrap.com (Source: www.sfgate.com, www.washingtonpost.com/news ).
Recent interview with former KKK Grand Wizard David Duke expressing his belief that Donald will enact a white supremacist agenda that Donald has not refuted: freakoutnation.com/2016/05/.
Stormfront is a white nationalist domestic terror group that proudly supports Donald and has actively recruited at his rallies. Although this organization officially lists its membership at 30,000, it has the largest white supremacist web forum in the entire WORLD according to the FBI and Southern Poverty Law Center. Its founder and leader, Don Black, was investigated, along with other white supremacist domestic terror groups, by the FBI in connection with the radicalization of Dylan Roof who murdered a church full of people in North Carolina last year. In Black’s appeals to fellow white supremacists he railed against the investigation as a violation of his Second Amendment right to freedom of speech. He believes speech is protected even if that right is exploited in the propagation of radicalizing propaganda designed to incite mass murder. (Sources: www.postandcourier.com and www.splcenter.org/hatewatch).
Stormfront makes no effort to hide their faith in Donald to enact their white supremacist ideology as his political agenda should he become president. Title of article written by one of their members supporting Donald with this message as a byline: “Donald Trump is just the opening act. Yes, we will live to see a Fourth Reich”. (Source: www.dailykos.com/story/2015/8/28/1416143/).
Southern Poverty Law Center has classified Stormfront as a white nationalist/white supremacist domestic terror group of radicalized right-wing extremists. This domestic terror group is connected with Donald Trump. A quote from their website states that they have actively recruited at Donald’s rallies: “Trump’s presidential campaign has received support from numerous white nationalist groups and leaders who have used his campaign to recruit followers, fundraise, and spread their message. Trump has retweeted white nationalists, repeatedly declined to denounce former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard David Duke in an interview, and gave press credentials to a white nationalist figure who also interviewed Donald Trump Jr.” Stormfront also announced recently that they had to upgrade their servers due to a 40% increase in website traffic since Donald’s sail to the top and Donald has NEVER denounced their support. (Sources: www.stormfront.org/forum/t1149220/, www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/04/17/).
A third white supremacist domestic terror group supporting Donald due to their belief that his political ideology aligns with their own is the Council of Conservative Citizens that boasts over 1 million members and growing. Dylan Roof, who murdered nine Americans having a prayer meeting in their North Carolina church last year, credited this domestic terror group’s website as one source of radicalizing propaganda. Introduction to an article on the CofCC website expresses their belief in Donald’s white supremacist agenda and that he will “make America great again” by returning the nation to pre-Reconstruction Era policies. Donald has never denounced the support of this domestic terror group. (Source: www.amren.com/news/2016/03/).
The Anti-Defamation League, Southern Poverty Law Center and the FBI have all identified Council of Conservative Citizens as a domestic terror organization of radicalized extremists and this is yet one of many such organizations tied to Donald’s rise to the top as the Republican candidate. CofCC has also stated that it actively recruited at Trump’s rallies. (Sources: www.adl.org/combating-hate/).
Now, the dear reader may be asking themselves, “Are these fringe groups really that dangerous? I mean, isn’t it the radicalized ISIS style terrorists we should be worried about?” The gringa assures you that the domestic terror threat from Trump’s most fervent supporters is the REAL and PRESENT danger the US is dealing with. Consider the following data and information…
Since 9/11 only 45 Americans have lost their lives on American soil at the hands of radicalized extremists using the Muslim label. Those extremists were radicalized HERE, in America. Our vetting process of immigrants is working the way it is designed to work to protect Americans from imported terrorists.
However, since 9/11 right wing extremists, such as white supremacists, white nationalists, radicalized Christians, radicalized Constitutionalists, and conspiracy theorists, have murdered, injured and terrorized thousands of Americans. According to collated data from the FBI, on average, 337 events of domestic terror occur every year. These terrorist activities are performed by some of the very groups supporting Donald, not Muslims. To break it down easier, the average American is 7 times more likely to be injured or killed by a right wing extremist than by a radicalized Muslim. A few examples of the terrorist activities perpetrated by the types of domestic terror groups and individual domestic terrorists supporting Donald:
SC church massacre, 2015, by Dylan Roof, radicalized by white nationalist groups Stormfront & Council of Conservative Citizens, 9 AMERICANS KILLED
1/8/2011 Gabrielle Gifford shot, 6 killed by Jared Loughner who was radicalized by the propaganda of anti-Semitic, anti-immigrant, white supremacist hate group American Renaissance according to DHS report.
Wisconsin Sikh Temple massacre, Aug. 5, 2012 Wade Michael Page, neo-Nazi, fatally shot six worshippers and wounded four others.
George Tiller murdered May 31, 2009 by radicalized Christian Scott Roeder. This occurred after he had already had his clinic firebombed by right wing extremists and had survived a previous assassination attempt, shot 5 times by radicalized Christian Shelly Shannon in 1993.
Knoxville Unitarian Universalist Church massacre July 27, 2008 by radicalized Christian Jim David Adkisson murdering 2 and injuring others while a children’s play was being performed. His manifesto stated that he hated “liberals, Democrats and gays”.
January 17, 2011 white supremacist/white separatist Kevin William Harpham was arrested after attempting to bomb a Martin Luther King Jr. Day Unity March in Spokane, Washington.
January 2012, Jason Barnwell, Jake Murphy, Dustin Hammond, and Gary Dodson, white supremacists, committed a racial hate crime of fire bombing the home of an inter-racial couple in Evening Shade, Arkansas.
Over a period of 86 years the KKK alone was responsible for lynching over 3,446 AMERICANS. That does not include unreported crimes, rapes, and assaults by the KKK or crimes committed by any number of white supremacist groups spawned since the KKKs inception.
Donald lies about Muslims being the REAL domestic terror threat. The FBI and Southern Poverty Law Center’s data and public reports both agree that the very organizations that support Donald, the domestic terror groups he is connected to and has never denounced, are the very REAL and present domestic terror threat. FBI quote published on their website regarding domestic terror: “Today’s extremists are more challenging than ever. They’re affiliated with a variety of white supremacy groups, and they can be motivated by any number of religious or political ideologies… White supremacy extremists specifically target racial, ethnic, and religious minorities; the federal government;… Their tactics include assault, murder, threats and intimidation, and bombings. They also commit other kinds of crimes—like drug trafficking, bank and armored car robberies, and counterfeiting—to fund their hate-filled activities…”
White nationalists, radicalized Christians and white supremacist domestic terror groups and their terrorist in chief, Donald, are a greater threat to freedom in America today than radicalized Muslims have ever been. Anyone who says otherwise is either a white supremacist sympathizer attempting to misinform or a person who is simply ignorant of the truth.
Sources: www.rawstory.com/2015/06/, securitydata.newamerica.net/extremists, www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2012/may/extremism, thinkprogress.org/justice/, usuncut.com/news/, www.FBI.gov, Southern Poverty Law Center
Despite the official data from the FBI, Donald still insists on promoting anti-Muslim hate propaganda. Donald has re-stated recently that he will indeed require Muslim ID badges. This is an absolute unconstitutional position, requiring dismantling the fundamental principle of the Constitution, separation of church and state. NO federal, state, county or municipal ID requires religious identity. A person can change their religious identity whenever they please. It is not a permanent identifier such as physical identifiers.
But Donald goes even further than badges, dangerously further. He proposes to create a database on all activities of Muslim AMERICANS. He also wants to legalize warrantless searches of Muslim AMERICANS. Do you understand that? Because he is proposing an absolute ban of Muslim immigrants, his ID, database and warrantless searches agenda is aimed at AMERICANS. (Source: www.washingtonpost.com/news/, thehill.com)
Political Strategies of Domestic Terror Groups
The dear reader may be wondering why the media doesn’t expose Donald. The dear reader may also be wondering why political opponents have not used this information as well to expose Donald. The gringa will tell you why. Every media outlet has their own political bias and agenda. They do not want to tank the careers of the politicians they support. And the racist domestic terror groups have perpetrated a very clever strategy to protect themselves from ever being exposed by either political party. This strategy is just as effective as the cloaks and hoods the KKK Klansmen use to hide their identities.
Radicalized racist domestic terror groups are neither Republican nor Democrat, although members have their own political affiliation. Throughout history they have aligned with either party depending on which was most expedient at any given time to further the white supremacist/nationalist cause. And at THIS PRESENT TIME they do not necessarily identify as Republican, but as Donald’s supporters. White supremacists/nationalists only exploit the advantages of power within each party. A white supremacist/nationalist is neither a Republican nor Democrat, even if it is actively supporting one of the parties. The political party identity is really only a means to an end, furthering a white supremacist/nationalist agenda. The loyalty of a white supremacist/nationalist is only to their racist agenda and white nationalist identity.
What this strategy effectively does, then, is muddy the political waters. The effective political strategy of moving between both parties has created a dirty political history with skeletons in both party’s closet. This strategy results in NEITHER party ever going after an opponent hard about any white supremacist/nationalist support they may be receiving. It is another way white supremacists/nationalists are able to hide under the shrouds of political party shame, knowing full well one party cannot call out the other party on the connection because they both have history. By infiltrating BOTH parties at different times in history white supremacist/nationalist organizations have ensured they can wear this cloak of shame and remain hidden as they push through their political agendas.
The leaders of these domestic terror groups supporting Donald are not uneducated hillbillies living in bunkers in the deep woods (although many of their minions are). The leaders of these organizations are highly educated, many of them have law degrees, specializing in Constitutional law, medical degrees in psychology that enable them to develop effective recruitment propaganda. And ever since the first day that they have been forced to submit to a black man’s presidency, they have been fervently strategizing and infiltrating powerful political parties for this very moment in time.
These infiltrators are in America’s state legislatures, governors’ mansions, city councils, sheriff’s departments, school boards, city police departments and, most importantly, the Republican party. They have already staged a successful coup of one of the nation’s most powerful political parties and they are staged to next take the White House. And the discriminatory “bathroom” legislation going on the deep South now comes as no surprise once people understand what is going on.
Transgender Americans have been using public bathrooms associated with their gender identity for decades without any outcry. There is absolutely no criminal data to suggest it has ever been a problem. Yet now the transgender community and the LGBT community at large are the targets of discriminatory laws in southern states in the control of right wing extremists. It is a test. These domestic terror groups are determining what kind of resistance they should expect from the public once Donald takes office and rewards the special interest groups that helped him get there by giving them exactly what they want, free reign to oppress and discriminate against non-whites and non-Christians. And the LGBT community is the “safe” group to target right now without fully exposing themselves and their full race/religious based agenda.
White supremacists/nationalist domestic terror groups have become highly active with recruitment and their ranks have been growing with Donald’s supporters. Recruitment propaganda uses key emotional trigger words such as “patriot” and “conservative”. Not all political groups that use these labels are white supremacist, but many are and you have to be careful. White supremacist recruiters are highly trained to be subversive. These are not rednecks from the backwoods. A white supremacist/nationalist recruiter is not going to approach you and say, “Hey, I’m with a racist organization. Wanna join?” No, they tap into a person’s Christian or politically conservative outrage at having to live politically correct and gradually condition them to a white supremacist ideology.
And don’t be surprised to see a few acceptable minorities mixed in to a “public” face for these organizations. Much like how Donald exploits Ben Carson and other minorities, placing them in the limelight. This strategy is so when white supremacist connections are pointed out Donald and his supporters can point to their “cover” and say, “Look! Donald’s even working close with minorities. He loves them and they love him.”
And if a person gets too close to exposing the truth about Donald’s white supremacist/nationalist domestic terror group connections, the favorite strategy these groups use is to deflect with the accusation of the Democrat party’s connection with the KKK. In particular they like to point the finger at Hillary’s relationship with Robert Byrd. The gringa has already explained the inter-party relationships white supremacists historically have with both political parties as a strategy to protect them from exposure. However, to move beyond that neutralizing argument, let’s examine Democrat Senator Byrd’s history and put that argument to bed once and for all as well:
The REAL story on Byrd and why it’s a non-issue with the media & other candidates who see it as NON-relevant: A young adult 20-something Robert Byrd was a KKK recruiter in the 1930s-1940s. He remained a Klansman during the early years of his 51 year career serving as Senator of West Virginia. Byrd later renounced his KKK past and called it “the worst mistake” of his life in his last autobiography in 1997. When interviewed, he warned all young people to steer clear of the Klan. He also publicly expressed deep regret at voting against Civil Rights legislation in the 1960s. Born in 1917, Byrd’s early life was conditioned in a heavily racist South (much like Donald’s dad) but he grew and socially evolved and recognized the error of such beliefs and became a changed man (unlike Donald’s dad).
I find it amusing when subversive white supremacists defending Donald’s white supremacist connections with misinformation use the Byrd argument. Their own argument defeats them. Their logic is that they reject and demonize the Democrat party/Hillary/Byrd because of historical connections with white supremacists. By their own logic, then, they must reject Donald whose white supremacist connections are very real, out in the open, active right now and obvious to everyone which is why white supremacists are working so hard on spreading misinformation on social media and any venue of open debate. And if misinformation doesn’t work to shut up a person they then resort to personal insults, attacks and, ultimately, intimidation. And that is exactly why every single non-racist, non-xenophobic, non-religious bigot must work even harder to defeat them despite the fact that they are well armed, well organized and have a history of intimidation, murder, arson and bombing as their methods of dealing with those who oppose them.
Sources: cited within the body of the article
Image Credit: www.pbskids.org
Posted on May 9, 2016 May 9, 2016 Categories American Immigration Law, bigot, christian, citizenship, Civil Rights, class warfare, deportation, Discriminate, discrimination, displaced persons, Diversity, Education, emigrate, Ethnic, Ethnicity, Homeschool, immigrant, immigrant labor, immigrant worker, immigrate, immigration, immigration reform, Islam, Judaism, labor, laborer, law enforcement, Library, Literacy, muslim, naturalization, Nazi, police, police brutality, politics, prejudice, race, racism, racist, terrorism, Uncategorized, working classTags adkisson, adl, alabama, anti-semitism, arkansas, behead, bigot, bomb, bunker, campaign, candidate, carolina, caroll, Catholic, civil rights, clinton, cohn, communism, conservative, conspiracy, constitution, council, coup, david duke, defamation, democrat, desegregation, dismember, don black, donald, dragon, dylan roof, elect, election, endorsement, ethnic, extremist, fascist, fbi, fred trump, frederick christ trump, galante, gotti, governor, harpham, hate, hillary, homosexual, ideology, immigrant, infiltrate, infiltration, infiltrator, isis, islam, kapp, kkk, klan, klansman, knoxville, legislature, lgbt, lynch, lynching, mafia, manifesto, martin luther king, massacre, mccarthy, media, minorities, minority, mississippi, murder, muslim, nationalist, Nazi, new york, police, politics, presidency, president, propaganda, quiqq, race, racism, racist, radical, radicalization, radicalized, rape, Reconstruction, recruit, reich, religious, renaissance, republican, robert byrd, roeder, rosa parks, salerno, separatist, sheriff, sikh, slaughter, speech, splc, stormfront, subversion, supremacist, temple, terror, terrorist, torture, trans, transgender, trump, vetting, virginia, washington, white supremacist, white supremacy, wisconsin, wizard, xenophobe, xenophobia, yarmulke15 Comments on Trump – Connect The Dots
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← Lies Across Grand Rapids: Confronting Visible Local History
Archival photo of Anti-Apartheid Protest in Grand Rapids →
More White Lies: Grand Rapids and Settler Colonialism
Posted on August 19, 2015 by Jeff Smith (GRIID)
Last week, we began a new section for the Grand Rapids People’s History Project, entitled Lies Across Grand Rapids. The purpose behind this part of the larger project is to provide a critical look at historical landmarks and how they can perpetuate hegemonic narratives about this community.
Hegemonic narratives serve multiple purposes. First, such narratives are an attempt to tell history from the point of view of those with power and privilege. Most of us are familiar with such narratives, since US history is generally taught as the chronological high points of people in power, such as presidents, capitalists and philanthropists.
Hegemonic narratives, by their very definition, also omit or marginalize the voices of those who have resisted the exploitation and oppression of those in power – Indigenous people, slaves, abolitionists, workers, women, immigrants, queer identifying, etc.
However, there is a third consequence of hegemonic narratives. If we are told history through a narrow lens and don’t hear the voices of those most marginalized, then our ability to creatively imagine new narratives about present day systems of power will be significantly limited. For radical historians like Howard Zinn, the point of doing a People’s History, is to not only come to terms with history from below, but to help us frame how we view what is happening in the here and now.
For those who have visited the Grand Rapids People’s History Project site, it is clear that the work we have done does not follow some chronological script. Projects areas are undertaken based upon information and research we have come across, input from supporters and inspiration from other people engaged in People’s History work.
One important example of this work is Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz’s book, An Indigenous People’s History of the United States. Dunbar-Ortiz does not write an exhaustive account of the ways in which native lands and native people were plundered, rather she gives us the framework for a new narrative how the history of the US. The primary analytical point that the author makes is that the US was founded on an ideology and practice of settler colonialism.
“Settler colonialism has best been defined as more of an imposed structure than an historical event. This structure is characterized by relationships of domination and subjugation that become woven throughout the fabric of society, and even becomes disguised as paternalistic benevolence. The objective of settler colonialism is always the acquisition of indigenous territories and resources, which means the native must be eliminated. This can be accomplished in overt ways including biological warfare and military domination but also in more subtle ways; for example, through national policies of assimilation.”
For Dunbar-Ortiz, we cannot talk about the US, past or present, unless we come to terms with the ongoing legacy of settler colonialism. Such a reframing of the narrative is indeed radical, but it is ultimately necessary of we are serious about how we read and make history now.
Settler Colonialism in Grand Rapids
Using the important analysis of Dunbar-Ortiz, one can see how Grand Rapids is the result of settler colonialism. Indigenous communities existed here for centuries before European colonizers came to West Michigan. This fact is usually noted in Grand Rapids history books, but only enough to merit a few pages.
In Z.Z. Lydens’ book, A Look at Early Grand Rapids, he attempts to portray what happened to the native population as tame compared to other parts of the country. “The history of Grand Rapids does not have a backdrop of conflict with the Indians. There were no tales of raids and scalpings and scourging of the settlement with flame.”
While it is true that the level of violence against Native people, in what is now called West Michigan, was not as overt as was done to Lakota or Sioux nations, the violence was real and systemic. Lydens’ commentary is instructive, since it not only limits any understanding of violence, it ignores how settler colonialism functions.
The reality is that thousands of indigenous people lived along the Grand River prior to the European invasion. Most in these native communities experienced displacement by force, religious colonization, the flooding of their communities with alcohol and displacement through legal maneuvers known as treaties. There were numerous treaties that resulted in the takeover of Native land by settler colonialists throughout what is now called Michigan (see map above), but settler colonialists have a long history of violation of those treaties.
In terms of what this meant for Native people who lived along the Grand River in what is now Grand Rapids, many of them fled to areas in the Great Lakes that in the first half of the 19th century gave them a better chance of surviving settler colonialism.
There is little of this history that is documented by settler colonial historians, but there are glimpses of what some of the consequences were to Native communities and Native culture. For instance, according to local historian Gordon Olsen, we know that many of the burial mounds were destroyed by settlers who excavated the burial mounds to use as filler for other areas of the developing city that had been removed to construct roads. In fact, according to Olsen (A Grand Rapids Sampler) Charles Belknap wrote about this process since as a young boy he brought water to the men involved in the excavation project. Much of the contents of the burial mounds were destroyed, while others were sold to museums or kept as souvenirs by settler colonialists involved in the early development of Grand Rapids. (see map for believed locations of Native burial mounds)
Beyond these few references to Native people in the area, little is written about them again in most history books about Grand Rapids or West Michigan. The near omission of Native life in this area is not surprising, since the limited references serve the hegemonic narrative about the “origins” of Grand Rapids. If we acknowledge that a whole community of people were here and then forcibly removed through a variety of means then we are more likely to have to come to terms with the real foundations of what constitute Grand Rapids. Such a reckoning might even influence how we organize ourselves today, with the possible delegitimization of the current systems of power that need the hegemonic narrative to justify the ongoing development and progress in Grand Rapids.
To counter the hegemonic narrative, it is our intent to conduct interviews with local Native historians to allow them to share their rich tradition of not only how they remember the European invasion, but what their oral tradition tells them about what life was like before the waves of settler colonialists occupied their land.
This entry was posted in Indigenous Resistance, Lies Across Grand Rapids and tagged hegemonic narratives, Michigan Native Treaties, native history in Grand Rapids, settler colonialism. Bookmark the permalink.
8 Responses to More White Lies: Grand Rapids and Settler Colonialism
Christopher Ray Reader says:
Where did the map of burial grounds come from, and where did the information for the map come from.
Belknap mentions the destruction of the mounds in his book, Yesterdays of Grand Rapids.
Jeff Smith (GRIID) says:
The map and the information about Belknap was cited in the piece coming from Gordon Olsen’s book “A Grand Rapids Sampler,” which does include an excerpt from Belnap’s book.
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Franklin's Charge
Preserving the Franklin Battlefield
This is our opportunity to make history. This will be our legacy.
The Battle of Franklin Trust and Franklin’s Charge have completed the purchase of the Lovell property, a 1.6 acre tract of land immediately south of The Carter House. The houses have been removed and the land returned to its original condition. Currently, work is underway through an archaeological dig to locate and mark the exact location of the Federal trench line across this property and future plans include placing interpretive markers and replant at least a portion of the Carter family garden as it existed on November 30, 1864. The property will soon be deeded to the City of Franklin and will become part of the larger Carter Hill Battlefield Park. Our work is certainly not finished. We will seek to purchase and preserve additional core battlefield property. A committee of Franklin’s Charge is currently involved in a project to acquire six full scale, non firing replica Civil War cannons and carriages and place them in the exact location they occupied on the cotton gin site on November 30, 1864.
Every dollar is important so please give what you can. All donations are tax deductible. Help us make history as we save what many believe is the most important unprotected piece of Civil War battlefield in America.
The battle began at 4 p.m. with roughly 20,000 Confederate soldiers moving forward toward a similar number of Federal troops. The attack itself was far bigger than Pickett’s Charge at Gettysburg. The two armies came into close contact shortly before 4:30 p.m. and the fighting soon became brutal and fiendishly savage. With the sun down shortly after the two sides fully engaged it was dark by just minutes after 5 p.m. When recollecting the battle years later one man said simply, “It was as if the devil had full possession of the earth.”
During the awful hours as the battle raged and swirled around them, the Carter family took refuge in their basement. Some two dozen men, women, and children, including Albert Lotz and his family from across the pike, waited as the horrors of war seemed to almost engulf them. Fountain Branch Carter had years earlier watched as all three of his surviving sons went off to fight for the Confederacy. The middle son, Tod, had not been home for three and a half years and was serving as an aide for General Thomas Benton Smith during the Battle of Franklin. He was mortally wounded during the fighting and his body was found the next morning and brought by his family back to the house. Surrounded by his father, one brother, sisters, and nieces and nephews, Tod died at home two days later.
At around midnight the Federal army began a careful withdrawal from the battlefield and in short order the Northern troops were en route to Nashville. Left behind was a small town and a battered Confederate army. Altogether, some 10,000 American soldiers became casualties at Franklin and about three-fourths of that number were Confederates. About 2,300 men died, some 7,000 were wounded, and roughly 1,000 were taken prisoner.
Find out more about our organization, our projects, and our success so far in Franklin.
Ready to take the next step? You can become a contributor to our cause or sign up for email updates.
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The Risks and Benefits of Using AI to Detect Crime
Lisa Quest
Anthony Charrie
Lucas du Croo de Jongh
Subas Roy
Companies are using AI to prevent and detect everything from routine employee theft to insider trading — and even to predict and prevent crimes. But determining whether AI crime-fighting solutions are a good strategic fit for a company depends on whether the benefits outweigh the risks that accompany them. The increased use of AI tools for crime prevention could cause external risks to cascade in unexpected ways. A company could lose its credibility with the public, regulators, and other stakeholders in myriad ways — for example, if there are false alerts that mistakenly identify people as “suspicious” or “criminal” due to a racial bias unintentionally built into the system. Or, at the other end of the spectrum, if they miss criminal activities. But given the wealth of data available today, and the rising expectations of customers and public authorities when it comes to protecting and managing that data, many companies have decided that using AI is one of the only ways to keep up with increasingly sophisticated criminals.
Patrick George/Getty Images
Companies are using AI to prevent and detect everything from routine employee theft to insider trading. Many banks and large corporations employ artificial intelligence to detect and prevent fraud and money laundering. Social media companies use machine learning to block illicit content such as child pornography. Businesses are constantly experimenting with new ways to use artificial intelligence for better risk management and faster, more responsive fraud detection — and even to predict and prevent crimes.
While today’s basic technology is not necessarily revolutionary, the algorithms it uses and the results they can produce are. For instance, banks have been using transaction monitoring systems for decades based on pre-defined binary rules that require the output to be manually checked. The success rate is generally low: On average, only 2% of the transactions flagged by the systems ultimately reflect a true crime or malicious intent. By contrast, today’s machine-learning solutions use predictive rules that automatically recognize anomalies in data sets. These advanced algorithms can significantly reduce the number of false alerts by filtering out cases that were flagged incorrectly, while uncovering others missed using conventional rules.
Given the wealth of data available today, and the rising expectations of customers and public authorities when it comes to protecting and managing that data, many companies have decided that this is one of the only ways to keep up with increasingly sophisticated criminals. Today, for example, social media companies are expected to uncover and remove terrorist recruitment videos and messages almost instantly. In time, AI-powered crime-fighting tools could become a requirement for large businesses, in part because there will be no other way to rapidly detect and interpret patterns across billions of pieces of data.
Adopting AI
Sponsored by SAS
How companies are using artificial intelligence in their business operations.
But determining whether AI crime-fighting solutions are a good strategic fit for a company depends on whether the benefits outweigh the risks that accompany them. One such risk is that biased conclusions can be drawn from AI based on factors like ethnicity, gender, and age. Companies can also experience backlash from customers who worry that their data will be misused or exploited by even more data-intensive surveillance of their records, transactions, and communications — especially if those insights are shared with the government. Recently, for example, a European bank was forced to backtrack on its plan to ask customers for permission to monitor their social media accounts as part of its mortgage application process, after a public outcry over its “Big Brother” tactics.
So how are leading-edge companies evaluating the benefits and risks of rapidly evolving AI crime-fighting and risk management? Below, we explain some of the steps they’re taking:
Evaluating the strategic fit
Before embarking on an AI risk management initiative, managers must first understand where machine learning is already making a big difference. Banks, for example, are halting financial crimes much more quickly and cheaply than they used to by using AI for automating processes and conducting multilayered “deep learning” analyses. Even though banks now file 20 times more suspicious activity reports linked to money laundering than they did in 2012, AI tools have permitted them to shrink the armies of people they employ to evaluate alerts for suspicious activities. That’s because their false alerts have fallen by as much as half thanks to AI, and because many banks are now able to automate routine human legwork in document evaluation. For example, using artificial intelligence, Paypal has also cut its false alerts in half. And Royal Bank of Scotland prevented losses of over $9 million to customers after conducting a year-long pilot with Vocalink Analytics, a payments business, to use AI to scan small business transactions for fake invoices.
AI tools also allow companies to surface suspicious patterns or relationships invisible even to experts. For instance, artificial neural networks can enable employees to predict the next moves of even unidentified criminals who have figured out ways around alert triggers in binary rule-based security systems. These artificial neural networks link millions of data points from seemingly unrelated databases containing everything from social media posts to internet protocol addresses used on airport Wi-Fi networks to real estate holdings or tax returns, and identify patterns.
The next step in assessing the wisdom of launching an AI risk management program is for companies to evaluate to what extent customers and government authorities will expect them to be ahead of the curve. Even if it does not become a regulatory or legal obligation, companies might find it advantageous to play a leading role in the use of advanced analytics so they can take part in setting industrywide standards. They can help ensure that industry participants, regulators, technology innovators, and customers are being kept safe, without trampling on people’s privacy and human rights.
Assessing and mitigating internal risks
As managers examine how AI can assist them in identifying criminal activities, they should also consider how it fits in with their broader AI strategy. AI risk management and crime detection should not be conducted in isolation. Back-testing against simpler models can help banks limit the impact of potentially inexplicable conclusions drawn by artificial intelligence, especially if there is an unknown event for which the model has not been trained. For example, banks use artificial intelligence to monitor transactions and reduce the number of false alerts they receive on potential rogue transactions, such as money that’s being laundered for criminal purposes. These are back-tested against simpler rules-based models to identify potential outliers. An AI model may, for example, mistakenly overlook a large money laundering transaction that would normally trigger an alert in a rule-based system if it determines, based on biased data, that large transactions made by customers who reside in wealthy neighborhoods do not merit as much attention. Using this approach enables companies to design more transparent machine learning models, even if that means they operate within more explicit bounds.
Most of all, managers should assess whether their company’s data analytics are sufficient to handle complex AI tools. If not, they need to develop data analytics capabilities in-house to reach a critical mass of automated processes and structured analytics.
Understanding and preparing for external risks
Increased use of AI tools for crime prevention could also cause external risks to cascade in unexpected ways. A company could lose its credibility with the public, regulators, and other stakeholders in myriad ways — for example, if there are false alerts that mistakenly identify people as “suspicious” or “criminal” due to a racial bias unintentionally built into the system. Or, at the other end of the spectrum, if they miss criminal activities, like drug trafficking conducted by their clients or funds channeled from sanctioned countries such as Iran. Criminals could resort to more extreme, and potentially violent, measures to outmaneuver AI. Customers could flee to less closely monitored entities outside of regulated industries. A moral hazard could even develop if employees become too reliant on AI crime-fighting tools to catch criminals for them.
To prevent this from happening, companies need to create and test a variety of scenarios of cascading events resulting from AI-driven tools used to track criminal activities. To outsmart money launderers, for example, banks should conduct “war games” with ex-prosecutors and investigators to discover how they would beat their system.
With results produced through scenario analysis, managers can then help top executives and board members decide how comfortable they are with using AI crime-fighting. They can also develop crisis management playbooks containing internal and external communication strategies so they can react swiftly when things (inevitably) go wrong.
By using AI, companies can identify areas of potential crimes such as fraud, money laundering, and terrorist financing — in addition to more mundane crimes such as employee theft, cyber fraud, and fake invoices — to help public agencies with prosecuting these offenses much more effectively and efficiently. But with these benefits come risks that should be openly, honestly, and transparently assessed to determine whether using AI in this way is a strategic fit. It will not be easy. But clear communication with regulators and customers will allow companies to rise to the challenge when things go wrong. AI will eventually have a hugely positive impact on reducing crime in the world — as long as it is managed well.
Lisa Quest is a London-based partner in Oliver Wyman’s Public Policy and Organizational Effectiveness Practices.
Anthony Charrie is a principal in Oliver Wyman’s Public Policy Practice in Europe.
Lucas du Croo de Jongh is an Amsterdam-based partner in Oliver Wyman’s Digital, Technology, Operations & Analytics Practice.
Subas Roy is a London-based partner in Oliver Wyman’s Digital, Technology, Operations & Analytics Practice.
This article is about TECHNOLOGY
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Disability Compensation Schedule
Work accidents in North Carolina do not always end with all injuries healed and a full recovery. Hundreds of workers and employees every year sustain injuries that leave them impaired for a long time, or even for the remainder of their lives.
A finger cut off, permanent hearing loss, crippling back pain or disfigurement are all examples of what can happen after a serious workplace accident.
How does North Carolina deal with disability resulting from such injuries?
In order to understand the different cases, we need to differentiate between:
Temporary Partial or Total Disability: The worker gets compensation for loss of wages and receives medical treatment until found able to return to work;
Permanent Total Disability: After receiving medical treatment, the worker gets compensation for loss of wages during a period that has recently been capped at 500 weeks;
Permanent Partial Disability: After receiving medical treatment, if the impaired worker can find a suitable and lower paying job, he or she gets compensation for reduced wages during a maximum of 300 weeks.
Alternatively, a worker with Permanent Partial Disability may elect to receive compensation, not for lower wages, but for impairment, that will be granted according to a fixed schedule (for scheduled injuries) or on a case by case basis by the Industrial Commission (for unscheduled injuries).
Scheduled Injuries:
The N.C. Workers’ Compensation Act determines that an amount, generally calculated at two-thirds of the average weekly wage of the injured employee, will be paid for scheduled injuries during a period of time that depends on the nature and severity of the resulting impairment. For instance:
75 weeks for the loss of a thumb, 45 weeks for the loss of a first finger (index);
200 weeks for the loss of a hand, 144 weeks for the loss of a foot;
Further detailed provisions describe the compensation for impaired vision or hearing, while all injuries that cannot be categorized under the “schedule” are awarded by the Industrial Commission.
If you, or a loved one, has been seriously injured in a workplace accident, it is crucial for your future well-being that you do not allow the employer’s insurance carrier to make all the calculations and all the decisions. You should seek support from someone who will defend your interests.
Contact Joe Miller Law in Elizabeth City, where attorney Joseph Miller, Esq has been representing injured North Carolina workers for over 20 years. Call us locally 757-455-8889 or toll-free 888-694-7994 or send us an e-mail for a FREE, no commitment discussion of your case.
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Fracking Boom Brings Environmental, Health Problems to Dozens of Cities
By: Igor Derysh
According to a report in The Daily Telegraph, the United States is soon expected to leapfrog Saudi Arabia as the leading global producer of crude oil. Unlike Saudi Arabia, which has expansive oil fields, much of the oil in the United States is buried deep under rock formations and requires a special process called hydraulic fracking (breaking up of the rock formation using highly pressurized pumps). This controversial drilling practice has only recently come into the mainstream but many cities and towns are already suffering from serious negative impacts to environment and health.
For one, the liquid used in fracking contains numerous chemicals that are injected into the earth and can contaminate water. Many drinking wells and livestock wells in rural areas are now to dangerous to get water from. Josh Fox’s documentary Gasland infamously showed a man able to light the water from his kitchen faucet on fire because of the high amount of flammable chemicals contaminating the town’s drinking water.
In Fort Worth, Texas, residents are reporting illnesses caused by vapors from the drilling. Don Young, a local resident, notes that “Some days the air is so bad you can’t see downtown.” Meanwhile, neighboring Dallas has voted to ban fracking in most of the city.
Because fracking destroys rock formations deep within the earth, scientists have found that areas where fracking has begun has seen spikes in earthquake activity. The Fort Worth Basin had never recorded a single earthquake prior to 2008. Between 2009 and 2010, the town was hit by more than 50 small earthquakes.
In Oklahoma, the situation is even more dire as the state has experienced thousands of earthquakes each year since fracking intensified. In 2013 alone, the state has recorded 2,600 earthquakes. Not all of these are small. Some regularly occurring earthquakes have registered at 4.5 to 5.6 (for comparison, the Haiti earthquake registered a 7.0) in magnitude.
All of these reports come as the fracking industry grows extremely rapidly around the country. In north Texas alone, the number of new gas and oil wells has exploded by 800 percent since 2000.
(Image courtesy of Adam Welz/CREDO Action)
Igor Derysh is the Managing Editor of Latest. com and a syndicated columnist whose work has appeared in The Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Boston Herald, Baltimore Sun, and Orlando Sun Sentinel, and AOL News. His work has been criticized in even more publications. Follow him on Twitter @IgorDerysh
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Famous Quotes,
Proverbs, and Sayings
Winston Churchill Quotes (666 quotes)
“A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject.”
―Winston Churchill
Source/Notes:
The Churchill wit (1965 edition)
“A joke is a very serious thing.”
“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”
“A politician needs the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn't happen.”
“A prisoner of war is a man who tries to kill you and fails, and then asks you not to kill him.”
Churchill by Himself: The Definitive Collection of Quotations (2008 edition), PublicAffairs - ISBN: 9781586486389
“All the great things are simple, and many can be expressed in a single word: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope.”
United Europe Meeting, Albert Hall, London (May 14, 1947)
“Although personally I am quite content with existing explosives, I feel we must not stand in the path of improvement.”
30 August 1941. As quoted in: "Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists" (November 1950), p. 328. Also in: "A Dictionary of Scientific Quotations" (CRC Press, 1991) by Alan L. Mackay, p. 54 - ISBN: 9780750301060.
“An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.”
As quoted in: Reader's Digest (December 1954)
“Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.”
“Baldwin thought Europe was a bore, and Chamberlain thought it was only a greater Birmingham.”
“Battles are won by slaughter and maneuver. The greater the general, the more he contributes in maneuver, the less he demands in slaughter.”
“Courage is rightly esteemed the first of human qualities... because it is the quality which guarantees all others.”
Maxims and reflections of the Rt. Hon. Winston S. Churchill (Houghton Mifflin, 1949), p. 168
If you know some quotes that would be a good fit here, send us a note!
Picture Source: Wikimedia Commons
Born: November 30, 1874
Died: January 24, 1965 (aged 90)
Occupation: Statesman
Bio: Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill was a British Conservative politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. Widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century, he served as Prime Minister twice.
British Prime Ministers
Born on November 30
“Don't be afraid. The dead cannot hurt you. They give you no pain, except that of seeing your own death in their faces. And one can face that, I find.”
— Lois McMaster Bujold
More popular authors
Popular Occupations
© 2019 iz Quotes
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Home / ISI Students / Coming to the U.S. / Additional exams
The GRE exam
Graduate and business school applicants from all around the world take the GRE revised General Test.to measure the kind of thinking necessary for the programs you will engage in at this level of education. The results provide schools with a common measure for comparing candidates' qualifications beyond undergraduate records, recommendation letters and other qualifications.
The GRE is offered at about 700 test centers in more than 160 countries around the world. In most regions, the computer-based test is available on a continuous basis throughout the year. In Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Korea, the computer- based test is available one to three times per month. In areas of the world where computer-based testing is not available, the test is administered in a paper-based format up to three times a year in October, November and February.
The GRE revised General Test features question types that closely reflect the kind of thinking you'll do in graduate or business school:
• Verbal Reasoning — Measures your ability to analyze and evaluate written material and synthesize information obtained from it, analyze relationships among component parts of sentences and recognize relationships among words and concepts.
• Quantitative Reasoning — Measures problem-solving ability, focusing on basic concepts of arithmetic, algebra, geometry and data analysis.
• Analytical Writing — Measures critical thinking and analytical writing skills, specifically your ability to articulate and support complex ideas clearly and effectively.
You can prepare yourself for the GRE by becoming familiar with the test format, reviewing fundamentals, increasing and practicing your vocabulary, and taking practice tests. GRE tests three main areas: verbal ability, mathematical proficiency and analytical ability. There will be two sections for each of these areas.
You will have 30 minutes to complete each section of the exam. Each verbal section will have 38 questions, each math section will have 30 questions, and each analytical section will have 25 questions. There is also an un-scored section with 25-30 questions of varying content.
When you take the test, guess at answers you do not know - there’s no penalty for incorrect answers. First eliminate answers you know are wrong and then choose the most likely answer.
The IELTS exam
Depending on your study or career plan for studying in the U.S., you might also be required to take the IELTS exam, in addition to the TOEFL®. Although the TOEFL® represents the standard by which most universities and colleges measure, you should familiarize yourself with the International English Language Testing System (IELTS) as well.
This exam assesses the English language proficiency of people who want to study or work where English is used as the language of communication. According to their website,tests are offered in over 900 locations around the world up to four times per month. For more information on locations and registering for this exam, please visit their website.
The IELTS measures the four language skills, listening, reading, writing and speaking, and relies on face-to-face interviews with a certified examiner in an interactive situation to measure fluency.
Test takers can choose between two versions of the test, either the Academic or the General Training version, depending on visa requirements and/or academic or professionals goals. Both versions include the same listening and speaking sections, but have different requirements for the reading and writing sections.
The Academic measures the English language proficiency necessary for a higher education environment, whereas the General Training measures English language proficiency in a more practical, everyday context.
What to expect arriving at the airport in the United States
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Dean 11-13-2018
M11 Wild Duck Cluster
M11 is an open star cluster also known as the “Wild Duck Cluster,” due to its purported prominant V-shape, reminiscent of a flock of wild ducks in flight. This open cluster is 20 light-years in diameter and 6,200 light-years away.
NGC 7009 The Saturn Nebula
NGC 7009 is planetary nebula in Aquarius with a greenish-yellowish hue. It was formed by a low-mass star ejecting its outer layers into space. The central star is now a tiny white dwarf star with a surface temperature of 55,000 K, ionizing the expelled outer layers with its UV radiation. The green color is caused by double-ionized oxygen. It was named “The Saturn Nebula” by Lord Rosse in the 1840s, when telescopes had improved to the point that its Saturn-like shape could be discerned.
The same side of the Moon always faces Earth because the lunar periods of rotation and revolution are the same. The surface of the moon is covered with impact craters and lava-filled basins. The Moon is about a fourth of Earth’s diameter and is about 30 Earth-diameters away.
November 12, 2018….Phil’s NOP Group
November 13, 2018 – Lucas
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Bird-like dinosaur is oldest unearthed in North America
Credit: University of Manchester
A team of palaeontologists from the UK and US have identified a one of a kind 150 million year old dinosaur skeleton. The specimen has been classified as a new species to science with the discovery also raising questions about the evolution of avian flight.
During the summer of 2001, the skeleton was discovered while removing overlying rock during the excavation of Wyoming's longest dinosaur, Supersaurus. The quarry was located the steep slopes of the famous Morrison Formation. Most dinosaur fans will be familiar with other Morrison Formation celebrities such as Stegosaurus, Diplodocus and Allosaurus. This new chicken-sized, carnivorous dinosaur lived in a world populated by giants. It is the smallest dinosaur ever found in Wyoming.
Co-author of the study, Bill Wahl, who is the preparation laboratory manager at the Wyoming Dinosaur Centre and the palaeontologist who found and collected the specimen, recalled just how exciting the find was: "We were removing a ledge of overburden rock and found—unfortunately with a shovel—some tiny, delicate bones poking out. We immediately stopped, collected as much of the bones as possible and spent the next few days frantically searching for more. Only after some of the bones were cleaned did we realise that we had found something spectacular."
In 2005, the specimen was donated to the Big Horn Basin Foundation, a research and educational non-profit that in 2016 merged with the Wyoming Dinosaur Centre to form a new non-profit foundation, where the specimen is now curated.
The specimen has been known in scientific circles for several years, but only by its nickname 'Lori', or as 'the Lori specimen'. Yet, it had remained the subject of unpublished research until now. The study was published in PeerJ, co-author Dean Lomax is a palaeontologist and visiting scientist at The University of Manchester who first saw the specimen in 2008 (then aged 18).
"I remember the first time I laid my eyes on this little dinosaur. Even back then, I knew it was a significant discovery. But, it wasn't until 2015 when our dino team formed and we began to study 'Lori' in much more detail than ever before. In fact, the project took a major step forward with a successful crowdfunding campaign launched through experiment.com in 2016, for which we are grateful to everybody who kindly donated and helped make this project happen".
Lori has also now received its formal, scientific name, Hesperornithoides miessleri. Hesperornithoides is a combination of 'Hesper', referring to the discovery in the American West, and 'ornis' for the bird-like form of the dinosaur, whereas the species name honours the Miessler family, whose land the specimen was found on and who have been avid supporters of the project.
One of the other key findings of the study relates to the origin of avian (bird) flight. In particular, Hesperornithoides is a highly terrestrial proto-bird, suggesting that many features we associate with being bird-like evolved in dinosaurs that lived out their lives on the ground.
Lead author and Ph.D. candidate at The University of Wisconsin-Madison, Scott Hartman said: "We wanted to expand the dataset used to test dinosaur-bird relationships, so we added hundreds of new species and tens of thousands of new characters. We found that Lori is a primitive member of a group of dinosaurs that includes Troodon, but perhaps more importantly we discovered that the smaller details of the family tree of bird-like dinosaurs isn't quite as resolved as some researchers would claim."
Hartman continued: "For example, it only takes a few changes in the dataset for Hesperornithoides to be found as a closer relative of Velociraptor than of Troodon. One robust finding we did come up with is that even as the interrelationships changed, the primitive members of all these groups were non-flying ground dwelling dinosaurs. That means that some small relatives of Velociraptor such as Microraptor that looks like it could have glided evolved this separately from the modern bird family."
More information: Scott Hartman et al. A new paravian dinosaur from the Late Jurassic of North America supports a late acquisition of avian flight, PeerJ (2019). DOI: 10.7717/peerj.7247
Provided by University of Manchester
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May 7, 2019 May 5, 2019 / Marc Lancaster / Leave a comment
On Nov. 12, 1903, the S.S. Pennsylvania sailed into New York harbor, completing a two-week journey from Hamburg.
Pfc. Charley Havlat (ABMC photo)
Among the passengers arriving in the United States that day were the Havlat family, from Ronov nad Doubravou in Bohemia. Ten Havlats in all are shown on the manifest, including 23-year-old Anton Havlat Jr., whose father and namesake was the patriarch of the group.
They told immigration officials they were headed to Nebraska, where they had family near Omaha, and so began an American saga that would see one of their own killed in his ancestral homeland in the final minutes of a cataclysm that touched all of Europe.
This is the story of Pfc. Charley Havlat, the Nebraska-born son of immigrants who became the last American combat casualty in Europe during World War II on the soil his parents had left decades earlier. Continue reading →
April 21, 2019 April 21, 2019 / Marc Lancaster / Leave a comment
As the U.S. space program blossomed in the 1960s, NASA officials settled on a certain profile as they screened astronaut candidates.
First and foremost, they needed elite pilots — those who had proven in combat or in testing new aircraft that they could handle any scenario that might arise miles above the earth. But they also preferred men whose aviation skills came with strong scientific underpinnings, ideally including advanced academic degrees.
Had he been born a quarter-century later, Robert M. Losey might have had a resume that stacked up well against any of the men who became household names to future generations.
A West Point graduate who later earned two master’s degrees from Caltech, Losey was clearly on the fast track in the Army Air Corps as the political situation in Europe deteriorated in the late 1930s. Already under the wing of Gen. Henry “Hap” Arnold as a staffer in Washington, Losey seemed destined to play a critical role in the inevitable conflict over the horizon.
If given a chance, we might know his name decades later for his impact on the war, rather than the historical footnote he became: the first American service member killed in World War II.
Editor’s note: I originally wrote this story as a Memorial Day piece for The Washington Times in 2014.
As flames filled his B-26 Marauder over northern France, 1st Lt. James Taaffe scrambled through the bailout checklist.The bomber had taken a direct hit from German flak under the pilot’s compartment, and flames enveloped the aircraft from that point back, rendering the bomb bay doors useless as an escape route.
Capt. Elmer Gedeon fought to keep the plane aloft. It had just dropped its payload on a German V-1 rocket site from about 12,000 feet but had not cleared the target area — and its accompanying anti-aircraft defenses — by the moment of impact. It was around 7:30 p.m. on April 20, 1944.
Taaffe reached to open the escape hatches above the pilot’s and co-pilot’s seats. Below, he could see his bombardier, Pvt. Charles Atkinson, clawing toward the pilot’s compartment from his station in the nose of the plane. The navigator-bombardier, 2nd Lt. Jack Marsh, was close behind. Taaffe couldn’t see the other three members of the crew, whose stations were to the rear of the plane: Staff Sgt. Joseph Kobret, the tail gunner; Sgt. John Felker, the engineer and top turret gunner; and Sgt. Ira Thomas, the radio operator and waist gunner.
Watching from a neighboring plane, 2nd Lt. Herschel Lockett estimated that Gedeon’s Marauder managed to hold course for only five seconds or so after taking the hit before peeling toward the ground. It was time for the crew to escape.
Glancing to his left, Taaffe saw Gedeon still conscious and at the controls. The hatch above his head open, Taaffe jumped clear of the plane and blacked out. He came to several seconds later, suspended by parachute, floating through the air.
“I recovered consciousness about 7,000 feet later and before I landed, saw the plane spin by me and go in,” Taaffe said in an Army Air Forces report completed after the war. “Was engaged with small arms fire and wounds until captured and saw no other chutes.”
May 28, 2018 May 28, 2018 / Marc Lancaster / Leave a comment
On May 29, 1944, the War Department’s Bureau of Public Relations issued a two-page press release touting the leadership of Lt. Col. Lyle J. Deffenbaugh of Council Bluffs, Iowa, and the critical role he played in the fight for Mount Porchia, Italy, some months earlier.
In the narrative, which was sent to about a dozen newspapers, Maj. Robert W. Kane describes how Deffenbaugh went four days and nights without sleep as he personally led the drive to take the cold, windswept peak in early January 1944.
Lt. Col. Lyle J. Deffenbaugh
“On the night of January 4 our battalion was to make a night attack in conjunction with another Armored Infantry battalion against Mount Porchia,” Kane recounted. “Lt. Col. Deffenbaugh left me to take charge of the battalion command post so that he himself could go along with the assault companies because he said it was going to be one of the toughest battles we had ever had — and he wanted to be in it.”
Kane went on, describing how he had received reports of Deffenbaugh fighting his way to the departure line for the assault, then continuously moving from company to company providing encouragement over the coming days, all while under heavy German fire.
“I was at the battalion command post, and as the wounded were brought to the aid station, I asked many of them how it was and if they figured we would be able to get to the objective,” Kane continued. “Their answers were always about the same, ‘It is a tough battle, but we will get there because the Old Man is right up there with us.”
The press release describing Deffenbaugh’s heroics in Italy was exactly the kind of story the War Department loved to tell to everyone back home. A classic in the “local boy makes good” genre that undoubtedly led to a swelling of pride among Deffenbaugh’s family and friends in Iowa.
This particular bit of PR, though, came with a sad twist. Two weeks later, those same family and friends would learn that Lt. Col. Lyle J. Deffenbaugh had been killed in action in Italy on May 28, a day before the release was sent out.
February 1, 2017 January 30, 2017 / Marc Lancaster / Leave a comment
On January 7, 1942, one month after Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, Vice Admiral William F. Halsey was presented with a proposal for the U.S. Navy’s first significant offensive operation in the Pacific.
Halsey’s flagship, the carrier USS Enterprise, would team with Yorktown to strike the Japanese-held Marshall Islands and Gilbert Islands, while Lexington would hit Wake Island. Enterprise‘s aircraft would launch their raid about three weeks later, on February 1, and ultimately would succeed in demonstrating the damage the Navy’s carrier-based forces could do.
Hoyle Smith
Enterprise‘s aircraft would be credited with destroying a dozen Japanese planes while sinking three ships and damaging eight others in raids around the northern Marshall Islands that morning. With her own planes recovered, Enterprise set a course back toward Hawaii at high speed after spending hours within the reach of enemy airfields.
Before she could get out of range, though, the Japanese managed a strike of their own with five twin-engine bombers. None of them managed to score a direct hit on the mighty carrier, but one bomb detonated close enough to kill Boatswain’s Mate 2nd Class Hoyle Smith.
Wayne Hockett Jr., an aspiring Iowa businessman cut down near Anzio
January 25, 2017 January 24, 2017 / Marc Lancaster / 2 Comments
The May 20, 1938 edition of the Coe College newspaper, the Cosmos, included the latest installment of ‘We’re Asking,’ a feature in which a series of students at the Iowa school were asked a question and their responses duly catalogued by the correspondent.
The question for that edition was, “If you could be someone else, whom would you choose to be?”
Wayne Hockett Jr.
Several of the 18 responses featured the expected celebrity answers, and a couple of young ladies said they were happy just being themselves. Among the whimsical musings, the answer provided by sophomore Wayne Hockett stands out: “Mussolini. He has a lotta power and can do as he pleases.”
Even if it was intended to be tongue-in-cheek, the answer is chilling to look back on through the eyes of history. For less than six years later, Hockett would meet his fate in the Italian dictator’s country, likely within a few miles of a canal that bore Mussolini’s name.
Vernon L. Bensley, a South Dakota kid who just missed his 21st birthday
January 9, 2017 January 9, 2017 / Marc Lancaster / Leave a comment
From an early age, Vernon Lyle Bensley could be counted on to excel.
Perhaps it was his status as the second-youngest of Joseph and Anna Bensley’s eight children that helped him find whatever drive it took to stand out among the crowd. Whatever the case, evidence is dotted along the path of his all-too-short life that he was someone who could be counted upon to get things done.
The first evidence we see of young Vernon’s drive begins at age 10. He is living in tiny Iroquois, South Dakota, with his parents and his siblings who have not yet moved on to homes of their own.
S/Sgt. Vernon L. Bensley
One of the area papers, the Evening Huronite, sponsors a regular contest in which children who color in the paper’s comic strips can win a ticket to the Huron Theatre. Vernon is one of the winners announced in the August 9, 1934, edition, and that’s only the beginning. For the next few years, his name appears regularly among those whose “neat” and “attractive” coloring efforts earn them a free movie.
By 1938, at age 14, Vernon is inducted into the Busy Cub 4-H Club of Iroquois, and that same year he is elected freshman class secretary and treasurer at Iroquois High School. He remains involved in a variety of activities throughout high school and as a senior in November 1941 he takes first place in the school oratory competition, giving him the opportunity to advance to the district-level competition.
A kid like that in November 1941 would have been well aware of what was going on in the rest of the world. But sitting in a classroom in Iroquois every day — a little over 100 miles from Sioux Falls, a little under 300 miles from Minneapolis — it’s hard to believe the youngest of the four Bensley boys could have imagined what awaited him once the dominoes started falling the following month.
December 17, 2016 December 17, 2016 / Marc Lancaster / Leave a comment
Henry T. Waskow and the tribute that made him famous
By the end of 1943, Ernie Pyle’s dispatches had become the indispensable lens through which Americans on the home front viewed their war. Though he was twice as old as many of the men whose toils he chronicled, Pyle’s humble, in-the-trenches approach endeared him to four-stars and grunts alike. All it took was a glance at a couple of his columns, though, to see that the latter mattered far more to him.
Capt. Henry T. Waskow
If World War II was everyman’s conflict, no one did a better job of telling that amorphous character’s story than Pyle. And no single piece drove home the theme of Pyle’s work than his masterfully crafted tribute to a 25-year-old who died on a nameless ridge in Italy on December 14, 1943.
“In this war I have known a lot of officers who were loved and respected by the soldiers under them,” Pyle’s story began. “But never have I crossed the trail of any man as beloved as Capt. Henry T. Waskow of Belton, Texas.”
‘Father Al’ stood aside to save shipmates as the USS Oklahoma met its fate
December 7, 2016 December 7, 2016 / Marc Lancaster / Leave a comment
Unlike the hundreds of other men aboard the U.S.S. Oklahoma as the clock neared 8 a.m. on Sunday, December 7, 1941, Lt. (j.g.) Aloysius Schmitt might reasonably have thought the bulk of his work for the day was already done.
Lt. (j.g.) Aloysius H. Schmitt (U.S. Navy photo)
The Catholic chaplain had said Mass at 7 a.m. and was hearing confessions aboard the battleship he had called home since early 1940. The Oklahoma was moored at berth F-5 at Pearl Harbor, outboard of the U.S.S. Maryland on the south side of Ford Island — Battleship Row, they called it.
At about 7:55 a.m., Japanese dive bombers zoomed low over the harbor, first targeting American planes on the ground at Ford Island and elsewhere in the vicinity. Minutes later, the first torpedoes were in the water, and Battleship Row was under attack.
The incident was over within two hours, the Japanese planes on their way back to rendezvous with their carriers at sea. They left behind a horrorscape of destruction centered on two battleships, the Arizona and Oklahoma. Of the 2,403 people killed that morning — the first official American combat deaths of World War II — just over two-thirds were aboard those two ships.
Among them was the man known to his shipmates as “Father Al,” who spent his final minutes ensuring others had a chance to escape the Oklahoma as he put his own fate in the hands of God.
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Dr Mark Selby – Science. Tech and Learning
Tag: scifi
Posted on 24 Jan 2019 8 Feb 2019
Andy Weir — My Geek Hero
Do I just sit back and allow a portrayal of events that, claim to be scientifically factual, to be made to be made into a feature movie, when I know, and can show by basic chemistry and toxicology, that the events portrayed are wrong?
Andy Weir at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in 2015.
If you’ve followed The Dossier you may have read the article: “Artemis” by Andy Weir — Blame it on the Moon. At the time I wrote this I was concerned that “Artemis” the movie might be in the pipeline. Andy has impeccable connections in this regard after having his earlier book The Martian made into a movie, directed by one of the most celebrated directors around in Ridley Scott.
For these reasons, I shouldn’t have been surprised that a feature film adaption has been in the works since even before the book itself was published according to Wikipedia. Since I wrote my article, I had been struggling with the thought: what is my responsibility? Do I just sit back and allow a portrayal of events that, claim to be scientifically factual, to be made into a feature movie, when I know, and can show by basic chemistry and toxicology, that the events portrayed are wrong? Furthermore, the depicted events could mislead the public if made into a feature-length movie. Being a former science academic (who still considers himself to be in the STEM education business) these things matter to me.
Continue reading “Andy Weir — My Geek Hero”
Posted on 28 Aug 2018 27 Oct 2018
Reading and Reflecting
Reading the sci-fi novel Coyote by Allen Steele (2002), reflecting on the political turmoil in Australia, last week, and wishfully thinking about escaping it all to the Ursa Majoris star system.
Coyote by Allen Steele from Goodreads
I’ve recently started reading the interstellar colonization novel Coyote by Allen Steele (2002). I found it a bit difficult to get into initially, given that my previous reading (also TV series watching) had been The Expanse series which is more action-packed from the very first pages of Leviathan Wakes (book 1). But I’m now appreciating that the Coyote series is written as fictional history, starting from a beginning point and moving forward in a linear fashion from that. Actually, now that I’ve spent the effort to get into the Coyote universe it’s becoming a most enjoyable experience.
Coyote is the destination for interstellar settlement of the Ursae Majoris system, some 46 light years from Earth. Coyote is a moon of the gas-giant planet Bear. The planets and moons of the Ursae Majoris system are named after native-American mythological icons. Coyote is smaller than Earth, but larger than Mars and has a slightly lower gravity and surface air pressure. Being a moon of a gas giant, the seasons on Coyote is more complex than on Earth, so much so as to require that the colonists invent an entirely new calendar system. Coyote and The Expanse novels both have a similar approach to the way that scientific realism is built into their respective fictional universes.
Many of the colonists to Coyote are escaping a highly-conservative and repressive regime on Earth, called the United States Republic (USR) after a second American revolution. I’m not suggesting that political revolution is likely in Australia (or America) anytime soon, But given the political events in Australia of the week starting 19th August, originating from conservative disquiet in the Australian Liberal party and leading to the downfall of a Prime Minister, I couldn’t help but reflect on the fictional events in Coyote and the actual events being played out in Canberra.
How could a modern liberal society, like Australia or the United States turn into a right-wing authoritarian regime, like that depicted in the Coyote novels, or like that seen in numerous other places on Earth, both currently and in the past?
Continue reading “Reading and Reflecting”
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The Unfairness of Measuring Teaching Performance – Revisited
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Burke and Wills Expedition -- Forensic Analysis of the Death of Charlie Gray
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FeaturesEssays & Reviews
Relationship, Definition, Accountability
In Support of the Anglican Covenant
An Apologetic Series
By Nathaniel W. Pierce
I have a special place in my heart for the 1928 Book of Common Prayer. I was given a copy at birth, and baptized and confirmed in liturgies from its pages. It guided me to ordained ministry, planted the seed of liturgical renewal, and prepared me for the 1979 BCP. There we were introduced (liturgically speaking) for the first time to the “C” word, prominently displayed in the two sections of the BCP most used by Episcopalians who do not attend church services regularly. I am, of course, referring to “The Baptismal Covenant” and “the bond and covenant of marriage.” At its simplest level the concept of “covenant” includes three characteristics: relationship, definition, and accountability.
In baptism and marriage all three basic elements of a covenantal relationship are clear. The one being baptized enters into an explicit relationship with God; marriage is a public, explicit, lifelong, and mutual commitment by two persons to each other. The understanding of that relationship, its definition, is clearly stated (see the Baptismal Covenant, pp. 304-5, and the marriage vows, p. 427). Our sense of accountability is expressed every time we renew our own baptismal covenant and (for some) our own marriage vows.
What does this thinking mean for the proposed Anglican Covenant? Surely Episcopalians’ difficulties do not arise out of any disagreement about our desire to be in relationship. The preamble of the Constitution of the Episcopal Church clearly states our self-understanding as a church: we are in relationship with the Anglican Communion, something most Episcopalians value and cherish. (The constitution’s preamble eassentially quotes a portion of Resolution 49 of the 1930 Lambeth Conference.)
The other two characteristics of a covenantal relationship, definition and accountability, are problematic. Since the publication in 2004 of the Windsor Report I have identified at least ten distinct and different understandings of the essential nature of the Anglican Communion. Indeed, one is clearly articulated in the preamble of our constitution. For 144 years Anglican provinces around the world (including the Episcopal Church) were free to define for themselves what it meant to be part of the Anglican Communion. Now those many years of holy ambiguity are coming to an end. Cherished assumptions by individuals and provinces are being challenged by a definition — the proposed Covenant — written by the whole Anglican Communion, not just one part of it.
The idea of “accountability” runs against the grain of our culture. We believe that local people know what is best for their own community. When it comes to living out the Gospel, we Episcopalians know how to interpret Scripture in our modern world. When John Wesley, as a priest of the Church of England, laid hands to ordain in 1784, that sacramental action, done out of a conviction that mission priests were needed to serve American Methodists (and, may it be noted, he was right), led to a schism which has still not been healed. Like Wesley, we want to be autonomous and in communion. However, as the Windsor Report noted, “communion is, in fact, the fundamental limit to autonomy” (¶82). We can have one or the other, but not both.
Will we cling to our own definition of communion, thereby dismissing what the rest of the Anglican Communion says yet again? Will we insist on preserving a self-delusional understanding of autonomy? What does it mean to “believe in … the holy catholic Church” (see the Baptismal Covenant)? These are the questions we face as we consider the Anglican Covenant.
Covenant FAQs
What happens if the Episcopal Church does not accept the proposed Anglican Covenant?
Pretty much the same thing that happens to a couple not ready for the covenant of marriage or a person unable to embrace the Baptismal Covenant: the relationship may continue; perhaps the couple will choose to live together and the unbaptized person will attend worship services. In each case the status of the relationship will be ambiguous — not in but not out.
It feels like the definition of the Anglican Communion is being changed.
This, in my view, is correct. In response to a request from the American House of Bishops in 1859, the Archbishop of Canterbury invited the bishops of the Anglican ethos and tradition to gather at Canterbury in 1867. Building on the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral (1886, 1888), the 1930 Lambeth Conference adopted this self-definition: “The Anglican Communion is a fellowship … of those duly constituted dioceses, Provinces, or regional Churches in communion with the see of Canterbury, which have the following characteristics in common: … c) They are bound together not by a central legislative and executive authority, but by mutual loyalty sustained through the common counsel of the Bishops in Conference” (excerpts from Resolution 49).
Note: the preamble to our constitution essentially quotes this 1930 Lambeth resolution but omits the “c” clause. Thus, our definition of being a “constituent member of the Anglican Communion” did not include a sense of accountability to the Lambeth Conference.
The problem is that the 2003 General Convention of the Episcopal Church violated the “c” clause in that 1930 definition. We acted in a manner which clearly indicated that we were no longer bound by “the mutual loyalty sustained through the common counsel of the Bishops in Conference.” When the 1930 self-definition failed, trust was compromised. The 2008 Lambeth Conference turned inward, its historic role of sustaining mutual loyalty no longer viable.
The wider Communion could have left things there, accepting this de facto new self-definition (1930 minus the “c” clause). Alternatively, it could craft something to augment it as recommended by the 2004 Windsor report. It chose the latter course of action. Furthermore, many argue that the proposed Anglican Covenant is yet another step toward a genuine, Christ-centered, biblical concept of communion which naturally flows from Lambeth 1867 and the self-definition put forward by Lambeth 1930. In other words, our self-definition continues to evolve on a cycle of 60 to 70 years.
I thought statements and resolutions from the Lambeth Conference were advisory.
They were and are. Yet over the years all provinces and bishops voluntarily gave such statements and resolutions great respect. This was the “glue” which held the Anglican Communion together. It worked for 136 years, enabling the Communion to navigate its way through the tricky waters of prayer book revision and ordination of women to the priesthood and episcopate. Recall that it was the Episcopal Church which asked the 1988 Lambeth Conference to extend the policy of “local option” to ordaining women bishops and it did so.
I believe that the 2003 General Convention’s decision to give consent to the election of Gene Robinson as Bishop of New Hampshire was gospel-based and the right thing to do.
The Rev. Dr. Katherine Grieb, professor of New Testament at Virginia Theological Seminary and a member of the Covenant Design Group, has suggested that the Episcopal Church accept the Covenant and continue its efforts to be fully inclusive of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons. This both/and approach is quintessentially Anglican. We need not be trapped by a manufactured and artificial either/or.
The Rev. Nathaniel W. Pierce is a retired Episcopal priest and currently serves as worship leader of St. Philip’s Church, Quantico, Maryland, in the Diocese of Easton.
The Living Church launched Our Unity in Christ, a series of essays supporting the proposed Anglican Covenant, in February 2011. An introduction and complete index to the series are available here.
Our Unity in Christ Series
A Covenant of Consideration
The Anglican Communion: A Brief History Lesson
Cranmer’s Elegance and the Wondrous Exchange
Covenants and Fragments
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Short movie 26 Min. - Thriller / Horror / Road Movie
Julie has a fight with her boyfriend inside the car, while he drives her home. The fight escalates and she decides to get out of the car, in the middle of nowhere. Her boyfriend, Chris, spins the tires and disappears.
It's a hot summer day. Julie has no idea where she is. She keeps walking in hope of finding somebody to get her a cab or a lift. It doesn't take long for her to reach a small cabin. A huge guy is sitting outside and looks like he is sleeping. Julie tries to wake him up. What Julie couldn't see from a distance is that the guy is deformed and possible a person with special needs, but he looks dangerous to her eyes.. She tries to escape from him, but he manages to grab her.
Julie wakes up inside the small cabin long afterwards. The place is dark and disgusting, looks like a pigsty. She starts screaming after realizing she has a bad wound on her leg. Soon, two other guys enter the cabin and a nightmare begins, while Julie isn't exactly sure what their intentions are...
The movie was shot during the summer of 2007 and the original intention was to create a Texas Chan Saw Massacre style low budget little movie that would showcase a very realistic redneck danger situation for a beautiful girl who gets lost in the fields. The set was perfect and it was truly scary and adventurous for all the actors and crew members, especially after dark. No electricity and no soul for miles. The set was filled with real pig heads and other parts, that due to the heat (about 40 ºC or 104 ºF) quickly attracted all types of insects and made the cabin genuinely disgusting as hell. There was a 72-min. Work-print available for a while, due to a sales agent who wanted a longer version, but this movie was originally shot as a SHORT MOVIE and with 26 min. running time, it doesn't miss any of the horrors or the action.
Language: Greek (with English Subtitles)
Filip Halo
Haritomeni Gourasa
George Alatakis
Jimmy Citro
Lazaros Mavridis
Sick Stills
Director's Statement and a few extra words
Sick is a realistic European Texas Chainsaw Massacre teaming up with a Virus Outbreak situation, but that is only the first layer. The movie is actually about Domestic Violence and how couples feel when they start hating each other, but still having to live together. Every single thing that happens in this movie is symbolic and the sickness is not just a real virus, it is mostly emotional, it is was drives couples crazy, the so-called "Zygophrenia".
Julie has a fight with her boyfriend inside the car while they are getting back home and she decides to get out in the middle of nowhere. Those are the dangers that occur when couples are fighting. They are vulnerable to external dangers, because they are living the moment in their own microcosmos. Chris drives away and abandons Julie. A hot summer day... She walks and walks until she finds a small cabin and a huge guy sleeping outside. The guy is deformed and covered in blood, it is unclear how dangerous he is. He captures Julie. This is how a man or a woman feels after a fight, they make bad decisions and they end up in other people's arms or homes, sometimes with weird consequences.
Julie wakes up trapped inside the cabin, which is full of pig head holding lamps on the walls, guts, intestines and probably human parts. Two other sick bastards enter the cabin and abuse Julie, both mentally and physically. Her only escape is her boyfriend. She manages to call him, but then she goes back to a different torturing, the real one.
Julie has mixed feelings about Chris, it's love and hate! The line is thin. She wants to sacrifice him and to get rid of him, but at the same time she cannot live without him. She cleans herself up, she tries to re-cover and to think of all the good moments and the love they once shared. She prepares dinner for him, like she always did, he visits her... He gets back home, but he is not the same person anymore. They share moments of silence, until a worse fight takes place, a mayhem, a certain massacre. At the same time, we explore the thoughts of Chris, his pain for her... He blames her for not trying hard, for not making it possible for him to be with her. He wants to love her and to kill her, but he is also a victim...
Anyone who has been in a passionate relationship, will fully understand the allegoric meanings, the symbolism and the anger, this is not just a typical horror movie or a dramatic thriller, this is a film that goes beyond standard film-making. This was exactly the reason why the movie could never been released back in 2007-'08, a distributor demanded a workprint of 72 minutes for selling it as a full length feature film, and basically destroyed the vision. This was shot as a short movie in the first place, and finally after all those years, the movie is restored and has a proper Director's Cut, and it is available for free, for every horror and cinema fan to enjoy! Try to find all the hidden layers and symbolism, what the pig parts are, how the sickness works, what the emotions of the main two characters are... If you don't want to go that deep, you can still watch it as a horror movie, you will enjoy it either way...
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© Espen Eichhöfer
Icarus from Saxony
TEXT BERND HAUSER
PHOTOS ESPEN EICHHÖFER
Icarus from Saxony Michael Schlosser dreamed of fleeing – or rather, flying out of – East Germany in a propeller plane he built secretly in his backyard. A co-worker betrayed him and he was sent to prison. Now, 28 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, he wants to show the world that his plan would have succeeded.
Michael Schlosser yanks the pull cord. Once, twice – but still the engine refuses to start. The twin-cylinder engine, which once powered one of the German Democratic Republic’s iconic Trabant cars, is now intended to power a plane Schlosser built himself. The aluminum fuselage and wings gleam in the evening light. Men in cheap T-shirts and expensive aviator watches, members of the Langhennersdorf flying club, stand around Schlosser’s baby, bottles of beer in their hands, enjoying a relaxed Sunday evening after a day spent flying their microlight craft over the forests and hamlets of the Eastern Ore Mountains. Schlosser, 73, a beefy man with a mop of gray hair, has yet to set off on his maiden flight with his plane. “Has it got brakes?” asks one of the pilots. “Nope,” replies Schlosser, “I don’t need any.” The vice president of the club remarks that the curvature of the wings looks serviceable: “It should certainly take off.” And what about landing? “If he’s capable and really lucky, sure, why not?”
Schlosser tugs the cord again, and the engine finally sputters into life and revs up. The hand-carved ash wood propeller creates a gust of wind, blowing Schlosser’s hair off his face and giving him a slightly rakish look – a magnificent man in his flying machine. He’s here to test whether his flying contraption can reach takeoff speed. The flying club has allowed him to use its runway. And perhaps, if things go well, he might just pull up the throttle a tiny bit more, getting the wheels to leave the ground and finally obtaining the proof he needs. “It bugs me when people doubt it,” admits Schlosser, “but this plane can fly!”
DIY: Michael Schlosser works on his plane outside his barn in Liebstadt near Dresden
Powered by a Trabant: attached to the yellow disc, the propeller is driven by twin cylinders
This is not the only airworthy plane he’s built, he says. The first was back in 1983, a top-secret undertaking in his hen house in Dresden. Master motor mechanic Schlosser had done his national service in the East German air force, where he picked up a few tips and tricks. Aerodynamic problems were solved by dipping into Die Wunder des Segelflugs, an antiquarian book about sailplanes. Over the years, his hard work paid off and the plane, which had a takeoff weight of 265 kilograms, gradually took shape. His dream was to flee East Germany at 120 kilometers per hour. He aimed to take off from a forest clearing, cross the Iron Curtain over the illuminated A9 freeway and then land on the highway at Rudolphstein in Bavaria, early in the morning, at 5 a.m., when there was hardly any traffic. That was his bold plan.
Divorced and with his career in tatters – his application for a trade license had been rejected because he refused to join the SED or one of the bloc parties – there was nothing to keep him in East Germany. Even as a child, Schlosser switched to stubborn if he felt he was being forced to do something. When the Soviet Army crushed the East German uprising on June 17, 1953, Schlosser’s father ordered his 9-year-old son to present flowers to the soldiers on the streets. “I didn’t want to,” says Schlosser. He also dodged the Young Pioneers’ meetings, earning him beatings from his father; at age ten, he went to live with his grandparents.
The dress rehearsal for his escape started early in the morning on August 14, 1983, on a Russian army drill ground. Just as he was unloading his plane from the truck, a group of Soviet soldiers emerged from the forest. “I work for television,” he said – truthfully: He was the fleet manager at the Dresden studios of the state-owned channel. “I have to test this plane for a new series”, a blatant lie smoothed over with two bottles of vodka. The Russians helped him assemble the plane, and sat down. Schlosser accelerated, took off and was two meters above the ground when he had to land again because the trees were getting dangerously close. The soldiers applauded.
He has no proof of this successful rehearsal, and never got to attempt his escape flight. Shortly before, the Stasi – the East German secret police – clipped the wings of the Saxon “Icarus”, as the police called him. In Greek mythology, Icarus donned wings made of feathers and wax; despite his father’s warning, he flew too close to the sun, the wax melted and he crashed. East Germany abhorred daring citizens. A colleague at the studio was an informant. He noticed that Schlosser was reading an article on kites in a Hungarian magazine and reported it. Stasi officers searched his hen house and found the plane: Schlosser got four and a half years in prison for attempted defection.
After five months of incarceration, the Federal Republic paid 96 000 deutschmarks for his release and he was free to move to the West and open his own garage in Ludwigshafen. But the interrogations and his time in prison had left their mark on Schlosser, who suffers from migraines and nightmares in which wardens rattle keys. “Again and again, I see Erich Honecker standing by my bed.” At 60, he returned to Dresden. He now shows visitors around the Stasi museum, visits schools and tells his story. “I’ve felt much better since.” But what Schlosser really needs to leave the past behind is for a replica of his plane to actually take off and fly. Today is the day.
“I know that you have to avoid fear at all costs. Fear is your enemy,” says Schlosser. He starts rolling, pushes the throttle, judders across the grass runway, picks up speed: 20 kilometers an hour, then 30, 40. The wings wobble disconcertingly. Suddenly, the tiny aircraft swerves abruptly to the left, the engine dies. What happened? “There was a deep groove in the runway,” says Schlosser calmly, as he climbs out of the cockpit, “it caused a bolt to break.” Now he can’t steer the rear wheel. He pushes the plane back to the hangar. “Nothing I can do about it today.”
Better luck next time: Michael Schlosser pushes his damaged aircraft back to the hangar
Lutz, one of the microlight pilots, approaches Schlosser. “Boy, that’s an impressive piece of engineering. But it’s just as well the Stasi locked you up or you wouldn’t have lived to see the Wall come down,” noting that the propellers need to be narrower and their curve altered, that the side rudders need to be further out, and most importantly, that the wings need to be reinforced. “If your wing breaks, you lose control over the whole thing.” Schlosser defends his design: “In 1983 I had different wings; they were lighter.” They were made of plywood and canvas and coated with latex and polyester resin to form a hard shell. “I literally built my plane from nothing!” he adds, a hint of defiance in his voice. In East Germany’s economy of scarcity, it took wits and cunning to obtain any kind of materials.
Michael Schlosser is not about to give up. “Today has shown me that I need to build an exact replica of my 1983 plane,” including the lighter wings. And he wants to tune the Trabant twin-cylinder engine, taking it from 28 HP to a meaty 36 HP. Schlosser looks up to the sky and says: “From now on, you’ll be seeing a lot more of me here on this airfield!”
Daring attempts to get from East to West
Engineer Joachim Neumann spent years digging a tunnel to East Berlin, helping nearly 100 people to flee.
WIND-POWERED
Karsten Klünder and Dirk Deckert built boards and wind-surfed to freedom from Hiddensee to Denmark.
TRAIN TO FREEDOM
Engine driver Harry Deterling crashed through the border in a steam train packed with friends and family.
Nautical engineer Walter Gerber built a submarine, was caught and spent four years in prison.
Alpine air on the Bosporus
For the Swiss hotel group Swissôtel, a special scent has been developed: a fragrance that creates a distinctive Alpine atmosphere in all homes and resorts.
We went along to Frankfurt Airport and asked: What’s your dream travel destination for 2016?
What’s in your bags, Mighty Oaks?
“Howl” was the song that, in 2014, spelled overnight success for Craig Saunders, Ian Hooper and Claudio Donizelli. Lufthansa Magazin took a peek into their hand luggage
“I’m in the business of illusion”
Sky talk
Musical star, actor, model and Oscar host: Hugh Jackman is an all-rounder. In an interview, he talks about his fear of singing, about big egos, small problems and the end of Wolverine
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Fall 2011 / Features
Tornado! Photographer’s images touch hearts around the world
Like millions of Americans on May 22, Mike Gullett was dreaming of summer. In what had become a family tradition, Gullett’s family gathered at his home in Carl Junction, Mo., on the northwest edge of Joplin, to prepare the pool for the upcoming Memorial Day weekend. Ahead lay scores of lazy summer days and backyard barbecues.
But while the Gulletts and most residents of the area were enjoying that warm Sunday afternoon, a monster storm churned in the west over Kansas. It was gathering strength for an explosive strike that would, in a matter of only minutes, transform not just a city, but an entire region and everyone who calls this place home.
Initially, Gullett said, he wasn’t too concerned by the storm.
“We knew there was some bad weather coming possibly,” Gullett said. “But we’ve seen that before. The lightning started, so we decided to go inside and eat something, hoping that after it passed we could get going again.”
But the storm intensified. They lost power. Soon some of the 14 people who had gathered at the Gulletts’ home began receiving ominous text messages.
“Some of my friends there were getting texts from their wives who were in Baxter (Baxter Springs, Kan.) and other places, saying, ‘They’ve just reported that Home Depot’s been blown away and Walgreens is gone.’”
Gullett, who spent 25 years as a newspaper photographer before joining the faculty in PSU’s Department of Communication in 2000, still works for the Associated Press on a contract basis and he knew it was time to go to work.
“I told my wife, ‘I have to go,’” Gullett said.
With just fragments of information gleaned from frantic text messages, Gullett headed into Joplin, unsure of what to expect. He began to see damage as he drove in from the northwest and then suddenly he entered a surreal world – a world that nothing in his many years of covering disasters prepared him for.
“No first-responders yet,” Gullett said. “By this time, the first responders were the neighbors. Neighbors were helping neighbors. As I walked down past St. John’s (Regional Medical Center), I couldn’t tell what street I was on. And then I saw people. I’ve never seen people just walking in shock — masses of people, just walking. They didn’t know really where to go.”
Gullett spent the next several days taking photographs and transmitting them to the Associated Press. The dramatic photographic story he told was repeated in major newspapers, on television and in online media across the U.S. and around the world. It was a compelling story that was at the same time heartbreaking and heartwarming, dramatic and uplifting. For his work, Gullett shared the Associated Press “Beat of the Week” honors with two other photographers covering the disaster.
As a newspaper photographer, Gullett has seen lots of “terrible things,” but nothing has affected him so profoundly as did the May 22 tornado. The sight before him that afternoon was so overwhelming that, for just the second time in his career, Gullett wondered whether he would be able to make a picture.
“This is my hometown,” Gullett said, pausing as the emotions came rushing back. “When this happened, it was kind of like I was personally involved, because it’s my neighbors.”
But Gullett did go to work. The story, he said, was too important not to tell.
“(Photojournalists) take pictures to inform,” Gullett said. “That’s the only reason. We’re informing the public. All the donations, all the volunteers are only there because the media informed the world.”
As rescue and recovery transitioned to clean-up and rebuilding, Gullett transitioned to shooting only occasionally, in order to document the long road to healing and rebuilding. It is a process not only for the city, but for the survivors and Gullett, as well.
“I still remember the first bad picture I had to take when I came out of school,” Gullett said. “There’s certain images you just don’t forget. In Joplin, it wasn’t that there was any one image that I saw, it was the whole thing. Just day after day of it.”
“(Photojournalists) take pictures to inform. That’s the only reason. We’re informing the public. All the donations, all the volunteers are only there because the media informed the world.” – Mike Gullett, Associate Professor, PSU Department of Communication, MA 2001
Tags: Joplin, Tornado
Previous articleRobinson named student health services director Next articleThe story behind the photo
N Prater says:
Such powerful photos. Each one tells a story. My favorite though has to the “For Sale, Pool in Basement” one. I’m from Joplin and this photo speaks so well to the spirit of that city — being able to find some humor/sunshine amid the destruction.
Robinson named student health services director
Dr. Brenda Robinson, of Pittsburg, was selected as the director of student health services for the university in June. “We...
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Jan Jakub Wygnanski
Kuba Wygnanski "is sociologist by training. He started his public activity as Solidarity activist. After 1989, he became deeply involved in numerous initiatives aiming to support civil society both in Poland and other countries. He has started several NGOs including KLON (main support, research and information centre for Polish non-profit centre) and Forum of Nongovernmental Initiatives (FIP) which plays key role as representative of Polish Third Sector. FIP has initiated series of sector wide debates and meetings including 3 national forums of several hundreds organisations.
"For 6 years, Kuba was a Board Member of Stefan Batory Foundation (OSI network), one of the main grant giving organisations in Poland. He was also involved in the design and estbalishment of Civil Society Development Programme successful attempt to organize TOT programme for Poland and Hungary.
"Kuba is also involved in numerous activities outside of Poland including humanitarian work in Romania, Sarajevo, Kosovo and Kazahstan. He has also worked for number of international organisations and institutions including OECD, USAID, World Bank, International Rescue Committee, Academy of Educational Development and many others. For few years Kuba was a member of International Committee of Council on Foundations. Recently, Kuba spent one year as Yale World Fellow in New Haven, USA.
"Kuba is deeply committed to CIVICUS mission and activities. He was one of few representatives from Poland present at CIVICUS meetings in Mexico and Budapest. Recently, he became involved in the preparation of the CIVICUS Civil Society Index for Poland. He was very instrumental in the creation of Polish National Federation of NGOs, and for that reason might be useful in CIVICUS efforts regarding issues of National Associations of NGOs. Kuba is well informed about activities of NGOs in other countries, particularly in Central and Eastern Europe, which might be helpful in promotion of CIVICUS in this region." [1]
Currently a director of CIVICUS.
"Biography", CIVICUS, Accessed November 2006.
Retrieved from "https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Jan_Jakub_Wygnanski&oldid=312796"
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Saigon a big lure for international travelers in 2019
Vietnam’s commercial hub, Ho Chi Minh City, figures prominently this year among travel plans of vacation enthusiasts around the world. The city, which received more than seven million foreign arrivals last year, comes third on the list of top 10 trending global destinations this year, based on data collected by Kayak. Kayak is a popular travel booking site that allows people to look for cheap flights and hotels for holidays. A Kayak survey found a year-on-year surge of 49 percent…
Heroic folk tale inspires Vietnamese designer’s latest collection
Ha has used traditional embroidery techniques to depict images from Thanh Giong, a popular folk story about a war hero in Vietnamese history. These images were originally painted by artist Nguyen Tu Nghiem. In the folk story, the boy Giong grows in size to be a giant hero, who rides on an iron horse leading the Van Lang kingdom (ancient name for Vietnam) to victory against northern invaders (Han Chinese). Brocade fabric with natural colors created by the Ta Oi ethnic minority…
Artisan sustains legacy of clay statue making in northern Vietnam
Clay statues have been a traditional type of toys in Vietnam, and are popular during the Mid-Autumn Festival and Lunar New Year. They are usually figurines of animals like turtles, birds and people in traditional clothes. Today they have lost their popularity, and Phung Dinh Giap, 67, and his wife Nguyen Thi Dieu are among the last artisans to still make them. “The technique of making these figurines is simple, but the entire process, from preparing the materials to completing the…
Young Hanoi craftsman helps preserve traditional music
Dao Xa in Dong Lo Commune, Hanoi’s Ung Hoa District, was designated as a craft village for the production of traditional musical instruments such as erhu, zither and two-chord guitar three years ago, but visitors here can hardly see any musical instruments or hear music. Nguyen Ngoc Tua, chairman of Dong Lo Commune, says despite being named a traditional craft village, Dao Xa has less than 10 craftsman and they make few instruments. Duong Minh Cuong’s is the only family…
Located in a small alley off Hang Tre Street in Hanoi’s Old Quarter, 95 percent of the items at the Hidden Gem Coffee are recycled. The coffee shop has four floors and each has a distinctive design. Nguyen Van Tho, the owner, explained that the name of the café represents its core value. “It comes from the teaching of my grandmother that we should not hastily throw anything away, but consider it carefully, and maybe we can discover its unexpected values.” Tho’s motivation in…
The recent survey, which polled 1,400 people aged 18 and above in all provinces and cities, found that overall only 21 percent thought divorce was “not wrong” while 40 percent said it was. The higher their education level, the more likely they were to say divorce is “normal”. The least approval for divorces was among seniors (50 years and older) and people with low education and income (less than VND5 million or $215 a month). Almost no one with postgraduate…
Missosology.org, a leading pageant-related community forum, has put H’Hen Nie on top of the 10 beautiful women it has shortlisted to choose the Timeless Beauty title winner. H’Hen Nie, a Top 5 Miss Universe contestant, heads the list with 4,373 points, followed by Miss International Philippines, Maria Ahtisa Manalo (4,355 points) and Miss Earth Portugal, Telma Madeira (4,173 points). H’Hen Nie, 27, who belongs to the Ede community, is the first ethnic minority woman to win the Miss Vietnam contest. Photo acquired by VnExpress…
In pictures: the best of Vietnam this week
Vietnamese pizza Grilled rice paper with toppings such as egg, dried beef, mayonnaise and shallots is considered one of the most popular street snacks in Vietnam. The snack is said to have been invented in Da Lat in the Central Highlands and is often dubbed “Vietnamese pizza” due to the way it looks and is prepared. Photo taken at a food stall on Nguyen Hue pedestrian street in District 1 by Instagrammer foodiswhyimbroke. Read more Source link
One dish, five eateries – an exploration in Saigon
Nguyen Hue, District 1 On the ground floor of an apartment building on the Nguyen Hue walking street, this eatery has been serving grilled pork with rice vermicelli (bun thit nuong) for more than half a century. The staff of this eatery are middle-aged women, each performing her duty smoothly – one mans the main kitchen, one grills the meat, one serves the dishes and another cleans up. A small bowl of spiced fish sauce dip is an indispensable part of the…
Thousands of piggybanks invite abundance in the Year of the Pig
Pottery mills in Tan Vinh Hiep Commune, Tan Uyen Town, Binh Duong Province, do not have much time to rest these days. They have to supply thousands of colorful terracotta piggybanks to the market. It is almost noon, but Nguyen Thi Hanh, 49, does not take a lunch break but is pouring clay into the pig’s shape molds in an area of 1,000 square meters. “For years, this commune has had the tradition of making piggy banks. This year is…
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Larry Johnson
Corporate Culture Expert, Author and Speaker
Powerful Presentations
Clients Organized By Industry
Implementing Change: Banana Carts & Smart Phones
Larry Johnson’s Insights On Improving The Culture
Implementing change usually means overcoming the resistance of others to changing. Ken Olsen, who was CEO of Digital Equipment Corporation back in 1977 once famously said “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.How short sighted was that?
I would laugh at him now except that back in 2008, I bought my last flip phone. The salesman tried to sell me one with a camera, and I said, “Why would anybody want a camera in their phone?” How short sighted was that? This is all to say that people have a hard time seeing the possibilities in the future when they haven’t even thought about future. So, if you want them to change, it’s probably a good idea to help them see the possible outcome of the change before it happens.
Seeing the future helps implementing change
And I’m reminded of a story told by Arie de Geus in his book The Living Company. Back in the early 1900’s, a group of British scientists was exploring a remote mountain region on the Malaysian Peninsula. They came across a tribe of people who were completely untouched by civilization. The tribe had no modern conveniences and had not even invented the wheel for themselves.
The group got to know the tribe and its chief, whom they found to be an intelligent fellow. They brought him down to Singapore for a day so he could see what the modern world was like. At the time, Singapore was a bustling port city with all the modern conveniences of the time: steam cars, rail road trains, cargo ships, multi-story buildings, and electricity. After 24 hours of immersion in this environment, they brought him back into the hills to his tribe.
Imagine the scientists’ surprise
During the debrief, they asked him, “What are your impressions of Singapore?”
To their surprise, it wasn’t the buildings or the trains or the ships or the electric lights. It was that he saw a man who could carry more bananas by himself than any of his tribe’s people could carry. Why? Because the man had a cart and the chief had never seen one. All the other stuff was so far out of the chief’s realm of experience that they made no impression on him. The best that he could do was see something to which he could relate.
So what does that have to do with you implementing change on your team?
If, when implementing change, you want people to behave differently. Or you want them to try a new system. Or you want them to utilize new software, and they are resisting, it may behoove you to help them see what the change will look like once it’s in place.
What works in Malaysia will work here too
A few years ago Rusty, a client of mine, did just that to change the entire culture of his company. He had recently taken charge of a large car dealership that his father had started in the 1950s. The existing culture was a focus that said, “Promise the customer anything to get the sale and then charge as much as possible for repairs later. In other words, profit and turn-over came first and customer loyalty came last.
Rusty wanted to change the emphasis to make the sales process as pleasant as possible. Then delight the customer with awesome service so you could gain her loyalty. To make this happen, Rusty made arrangements with the local Ritz Carlton Hotel, whose motto is, “We are Ladies and Gentlemen serving Ladies and Gentlemen,.” He paid to have employees of the dealership go through new employee orientation at the Ritz.
Rusty said the results were amazing. People came back with a whole new perspective on how to provide great customer service. He went on to say, “Implementing change became so much easier when people could see the future.”
When implementing change, consider this
So you might keep that in mind when you try to bring about change with your team. Is there a way you can help the team members see where you are heading? At least see a model of it, get a picture of it, or experience it in some way or another. Can they visit a location where a similar change has occurred?
I think of the chief and the banana cart. Perhaps bringing his tribe to a small village where the carts are already in use would have helped him in implementing change to a banana cart culture.
I you’d like to read more about implementing change, check out my blog article Change Requires Some “Tough” With the “Tender”
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Kathie Pillard, Account Executive
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According to the New Testament, Jesus was buried in a new tomb hewn out of rock (Matthew 27:60, Mark 15:46, Luke 23:53) in a garden near the crucifixion site (John 19:41), just outside the city (John 19:20, Hebrews 13:12). In addition, the entrance was low and sealed with a stone (Matthew 27:60, Mark 15:46, John 20:11), and on the right side it was possible to sit where the body of Jesus had lain (Mark 16:5, John 20:12). Based upon the Biblical description and upon other known first-century tombs, the tomb of Jesus can be reconstructed as having had a small forecourt, a low entry passage and a burial chamber with benches, or “couches”, on three sides for the placement of the deceased.
There are two main contenders for the location of Jesus’ tomb in the Old City of Jerusalem: the Garden Tomb, 251 m north of the Damascus Gate, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the Christian Quarter. The Garden Tomb, however, has no authentic ancient tradition associated with it. It was suggested as the site of Jesus’ burial after the renowned Britisk military hero Charles Gordon, while visiting Jerusalem in 1883, suggested that Calvary would have been located on a nearby hill. His identification was based on a fanciful interpretation of ancient Jerusalem as being in the shape of a skeleton, with the skull (i.e. Golgatha) positioned at a hill north of the Damascus Gate. This led to the identification of a tomb on the western side of the hill as Jesus’ burial place, once referred to as Gordon’s Tomb. Modern investigations of the Garden Tomb and others in the vicinity, however, indicate that they were part of a cemetery dating to the divided monarchy period rather than the first century A.D.
The chuch of the Holy Sepulchre location, on the other hand, has a tradition going back to the early Christian times. When the Roman emperor Hadrian rebuilt Jerusalem in A.D. 130/131, he constructed a temple to Jupiter and Venus over the site of the present Church of the Holy Sepulchre. In A.D. 325 Constantine ordered the removal of Hadrian’s temple. Local Christian tradition had claimed this to be site of Jesus’ tomb, and, remarkably, a tomb area was indeed discovered beneath it. Constantine had a church constructed on the site and built a small structure, or edicule, within the building to enclose the tomb itself. The present Church of the Holy Sepulchre is the continuation of Constantine’s church.
In favour of the authenticity of this location is the fact that there was a continuous Christian presence in Jerusalem from Jesus’ death until Constantine uncovered the tomb. This Christian community doubtless would have venerated the site of Jesus’ burial, preserving the memory of the location of His tomb. Also, the site of the church was an old quarry during the time of Jesus, although at least part of it had been made into a garden (John 19:41). The fact that the site of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre had been a quarry implies that it was outside the walls of the city (it is today inside the Old City). This agrees wit the fact that Jesus was crucified outside the walls. Within this area at least four tombs cut into the western rock face have been discovered, only one of which corresponds to the type in which Jesus was buried.
The church was destroyed in 614 and rebuilt in 626. The deicule was destroyed in 1009 by the Egyptian caliph al-Hakim Bi-Amr Allah. Contemporary accounts suggest that the southern wall, the burial couch and part of the northern wall survived this destruction. The rebuilt edicule has suffered damage and neglect over the centuries since that time, so that today it is a hodgepodge of reconstructions and repairs. Although absolute certainty is impossible, the evidence points to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre as being the actual site of Jesus’ tomb.
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PUD No. 1 of Jefferson County v. Washington Department of Ecology
PETITIONER: PUD No. 1 Of Jefferson County et al.
RESPONDENT: Washington Department Of Ecology et al.
LOCATION: U.S. Penitentiary Terre Haute
LOWER COURT: Washington Supreme Court
ARGUED: Feb 23, 1994
DECIDED: May 31, 1994
Christine O. Gregoire - on behalf of the Respondents
Howard E. Shapiro - on behalf of the Petitioners
Lawrence G. Wallace - on behalf of the United States, as amicus curiae, supporting the Respondents
Media for PUD No. 1 of Jefferson County v. Washington Department of Ecology
Opinion Announcement - May 31, 1994
Oral Argument - February 23, 1994
Audio Transcription for Oral Argument - February 23, 1994 in PUD No. 1 of Jefferson County v. Washington Department of Ecology
Audio Transcription for Opinion Announcement - May 31, 1994 in PUD No. 1 of Jefferson County v. Washington Department of Ecology
The second case is No. 92-1911, coming to us on writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court of Washington, its Public Utility District No. 1 of Jefferson County against the Department of Ecology.
Section 401 of the Clean Water Act requires states to provide a water quality certification before a federal license can be issued for any activity that may result in a discharge in the intrastate navigable waters.
The petitioners are city and local utility district, want to build a hydroelectric project on the Dosewallips River.
The project would reduce the water flow in the relevant part of the river to a residual flow of between 65 and 155 cubic feet per second.
To protect the river's fisheries, the respondent state issued a Section 401 certification imposing, among other things, a minimum stream flow requirement of between 100 and 200 cubic feet per second.
The Washington Supreme Court affirmed.
In the opinion filed today, we also affirm.
We hold that Washington State's minimum stream flow requirement is a permissible condition in our Section 401 certification.
The State may impose requirements to ensure that activities which may result in a discharge into the navigable waters will comply with state water quality standards.
Moreover, a state may impose conditions on certification in so far as necessary to enforce a designated use contained in the state's water quality standard.
The minimum stream flow is such a requirement because it is necessary to protect the designated use of the river as a fish habitat.
Petitioners' assertion that the Clean Water Act is only concerned with water quality, not quantity, rests on an artificial distinction since a sufficient lowering of quantity could destroy all of the river's designated uses and since the Act recognizes that reduced stream flow can constitute water pollution.
Finally, we are unwilling to read implied limitations into Section 401 based on a petitioners' claim that a conflict exists between the stream flow condition and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's authority to license hydroelectric projects under the Federal Power Act.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has not yet acted on petitioner's license application and we do not decide here that issue.
Justice Stevens has filed a concurring opinion; Justice Thomas has filed a dissenting opinion which Justice Scalia has joined.
← In re Anderson
Tennessee v. Middlebrooks →
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Keenan: Duelling measures: who’s better off - men or women?
Tom Keenan
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau sits beside Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook, at a session on gender parity, in Davos, Switzerland, in 2016.
A recent study from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives lamented the “double-paned glass ceiling” in Canada’s private sector. According to the CCPA, female executives not only have trouble reaching the executive suite, they only earn 68 cents on the dollar when they get there.
Drilling down into the report reveals that much of the difference is due to variable compensation — things like bonuses and stock options. Base salary only accounted for 27 per cent of Canadian executive compensation, and it seems that men have been more successful than women in getting those income-boosting, tax-advantaged perks.
Then again, money isn’t everything. A fascinating new study claims that, all things considered, women are better off than men is 91 of 134 nations studied, including Canada, Australia, the U.K. and the U.S.
How’d they get that idea? It has a lot to do with men’s health.
Gijsbert Stoet of the University of Essex and David C. Geary of the University of Missouri created a new index they call Basic Index of Gender Equality (BIGI). It aims to measure “sex differences in the opportunity to lead a long healthy and satisfied life that is grounded in educational opportunities.” BIGI combines three scores with equal weighting: basic educational opportunities; healthy life expectancy; and overall life satisfaction.
Of course, it’s the oldest trick in the book to cook up a new index that supports some desired outcome or conclusion. And measuring things like overall life satisfaction is fraught with problems. Also, why combine the three factors equally? Isn’t that rather arbitrary?
Still, it’s worth hearing the surprising reason why these researchers felt a new measure was necessary, and how it can give us a fuller picture of male and female well-being.
Since 2006, we’ve had the widely accepted Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI) which comes from the World Economic Forum. It measures women’s participation in the economy; educational attainment; health and survival; and political empowerment.
It should come as no surprise that, on the 2017 GGGI, Iceland, Norway and Finland led the pack, with Syria, Pakistan and Yemen showing the greatest disadvantage for women. Canada ranked 16th and the U.S. came 50th — behind countries like Moldova and Mozambique.
But wait a minute, say the BIGI creators. Since it’s intended to measure female progress, or lack of it, the GGGI simply discards any data where women are better off than men. As noted in the 350-page GGGI report, “Truncating the data at the equality benchmarks for each assigns the same score to a country that has reached parity between women and men and one where women have surpassed men.”
In a University of Missouri press release, Stoet and Geary also argue against this approach. They also note that some components of the GGGI, like percentage of top-level politicians who are female, aren’t very relevant to the average person’s life.
They believe it’s more honest, and revelatory, to incorporate data points where women have the upper hand. They also wanted to prevent an advantage in one area from cancelling out a disadvantage in another, so they dropped the plus and minus signs to produce another index — the Average Absolute Deviation from Gender Parity (AADP).
When they did that, as shown at bigi.genderequality.info, Bahrain, Great Britain and the Netherlands led the AADP pack, with Liberia, Benin and Chad bringing up the rear with the biggest gender parity gaps. Canada came in 17th and the U.S. was 34th.
Developed countries where it’s better to be a guy include Singapore and Israel, but just by a little bit. Maleness is also an apparent asset in Italy, China and Bolivia, plus a lot of places you probably aren’t going to consider living like Benin and Burkina Faso.
Why are men’s lives shorter in almost every country? Aside from any natural male proclivity for risk-taking, there are external factors like harsher punishments for the same crime, compulsory military service, and more occupational deaths.
Alcohol overuse and obesity are also relevant, and “men consume more alcohol than women in all nations.” Interestingly, the study found that “a higher proportion of overweight men is almost uniquely observed in countries where BIGI favours women. Countries in which women are more disadvantaged than men all show a higher proportion of overweight women.” That’s certainly food for thought.
The authors conclude that “the most developed countries in the world come closest to achieving gender equality, albeit with a slight advantage for women. In the least developed countries, women nearly always fall behind men.”
No index is without its problems, and the authors note that their approach is just another tool to help understand global gender issues. The main takeaway for us is the significant room for improvement in men’s health and life expectancy.
The authors point out that many countries have strategies for women’s health but far fewer have one for men. They single out Ireland and Australia as countries that have made good progress on this.
Ultimately, health and lifestyle choices are individual, so that makes this a great time to think about ways to boost your own healthy lifespan and overall life satisfaction. You might also pause to thank a teacher, since your fine education has allowed you to read all about this.
Dr. Tom Keenan is an award-winning journalist, public speaker, professor in the Faculty of Environmental Design at the University of Calgary, and author of the best-selling book, Technocreep: The Surrender of Privacy and the Capitalization of Intimacy
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Responses to groundless claims concerning Mr. Adnan Oktar on the balkanist.net web site
A couple of days ago, the www.balkanist.net, which is available in English and Croatian, published a misleading article concerning world-renown Muslim author Mr. Adnan Oktar (aka Harun Yahya), whose ideas and work impact the world. The piece in question makes a number of false, baseless and unjustified allegations that are not based on any evidence.
Primarily, the article’s author has never met nor interviewed Mr. Oktar, who has authored more than 300 works translated into 70 languages, and who was named amongst the world’s most influential Muslims by Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding in the Georgetown University in USA in cooperation with the Royal Islamic Strategic Studies Center in 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012. The piece in question makes insults and allegations, distortions and misinterpretations, to the extent that the allegations in the article constitute incriminating evidence against the very author who wrote them. To the contrary of Balkanist.net’s claims and accusations, Mr. Oktar has no criminal records. For this reason, it is impossible to consider the piece as the product of objective journalism.
TO THE CONTRARY OF FALSE ACCUSATIONS, MR. OKTAR HAS NO CRIMINAL RECORDS
http://psychologicalwarfaremethods.com/to-the-contrary-of-false-accusations-mr-oktar-has-no-criminal-records/
The piece written is biased, intending to misdirect readers as part of a smear campaign. Use of unprofessional and biased opinions can be seen clearly in many parts of this article, which was obviously written with an ulterior motive.
The author of the piece makes such assertions without having met Mr. Oktar or any of his friends who appear on the TV show together with him. Consequently, the author of the Balkanist.net attempts to accuse the individuals in question to force her point of view on the readers.
In a similar and unprofessional manner, the Balkanist.net article uses references that have been deemed false by court rulings. Fabricated reports with no evidence are cited as support in a way to violate the personal rights with no regard to objective and truthful reporting.
Investigative or objective journalism is supposed to be based on evidence, using correct, logical and reasonable arguments and documents based on the evidence and usually supplementing it with interviews with the subject in question or with people who are familiar with the particular situations cited. A presentation can only then be made based on sound analysis to substantiate to the reader the claims it makes. Balkanist.net makes no attempt to write a professional article, rather publishes a lazy allegation-filled production at best. As is known, violation of the personal rights of an individual or a group by using wrong information constitutes a crime all over the world. Therefore, legal action was taken to ensure that this article is removed from the website and replaced with a statement of refutation explaining the truths. For this reason, the administrators of Balkanist.net should correct the said false information immediately and swiftly make up for their actions as they misled people.
Due to these baseless allegations, it is now necessary to issue accurate responses concerning the claims on the site. A thorough response to the false nature of the claims made against Mr. Adnan Oktar and his friends on the www.balkanist.net can be found below, which will provide the true state of affairs for readers’ consideration in a comprehensive manner.
1) The Baseless Nature of the Sexual Allegations Made against Adnan Oktar and His Friends:
The Balkanist.net, in its futile attempts, uses one of the most classical methods to try to slander, discredit and defame a well-known public figure, namely sexual allegations. In order for the claims in question to be accepted, there would first have to be a plaintiff, aggrieved party or a witness that is willing to testify and confirm these allegations. On the contrary there exists not a single witness, plaintiff or aggrieved party to confirm this. Turkish courts have outright rejected all such prior allegations.
There is not a single witness who will verify the said allegations made in the article on the Balkanist.net. Furthermore, claims regarding hidden cameras for use of coercion or blackmail on the Balkanist.net web site have also been legally proven to be false. The verdicts of acquittal and dismissal of proceedings many times given by the courts and public prosecutors definitely disprove this claim. Indeed there exists not a single piece of evidence or recording that would verify this unfounded claim.
The Balkanist.net cites a raid in 1999, where volunteers were taken under custody and under duress, made to sign statements prepared by the police officials. In fact Balkanist.net describes in no less than 2 paragraphs, graphically what those allegations were, yet fails to mention in equal detail that all those allegations were either denied, or not accepted by the Turkish courts. However the truth is very clear:
The individuals that were tried to be presented as witnesses to the claim in question were forced to sign the testimonies put in front of them under duress at the police station. These individuals later said in court to the judges that they were pressured to sign the testimonies while under custody, refused their own statements taken during that time. They further added that they had not been oppressed or harmed either by Mr. Oktar or anyone from this community, and that there was no question of any sexual advantage being taken, as had been alleged. The corrected statements given to the prosecutor are available in the court minutes.
The claims made in the article are based on testimonies signed under duress and torture by some members of SRF, of which Mr. Oktar is the honorary president, who were tried and taken under custody in 1999, as a result of the plots hatched by the alleged Ergenekon Terror Organization and of the 28th February process, also called the Post-Modern Coup. According to the law, police testimonies signed under torture and in the absence of advocates are utterly invalid. However, based on the invalid testimonies taken by police, the indictment was prepared and a case was opened based on the invalid evidence. These totally fantastical testimonies of no legal validity and considered as illegal by the Court as a basis for a verdict are repeated on Balkanist.net article and presented to readers in a contrary viewpoint, confusing readers as to the true facts.
Balkanist.net web site like most atheist or Darwinist publications, also appears to be severely irritated by Mr. Oktar’s strong anti-Darwinist activities. Consequently it is not surprising that such claims appeared on the Balkanist.net web site. Amongst its other motives, by publishing a slanderous article about a famous individual, the Balkanist.net site in all likelihood seeks to attract Internet traffic for its own purposes.
2) Mr. Oktar Has Never Claimed to Be a Messiah or Mahdi:
Mr. Oktar has never claimed to be Messiah or Mahdi. There is not any evidence revealing that Mr. Oktar has such a claim. On Mr. Oktar’s websites, books, essays, videos and conversation programs aired daily, it is impossible to encounter a single statement showing that he claims to be Mahdi. Indeed, he has sworn at various times in his life that he makes no such claim and that he will never do. Some people have made such a supposition because the features of Hazrat Mahdi (pbuh) reported in the hadiths of the Prophet Muhammad (may God bless him and grant him peace) resemble him very closely and since he describes the portents of the Mahdi that appear in Islamic texts on his shows and in his books. The Prophet Muhammad (may God bless him and grant him peace), tells people to hear the glad tidings of Hazrat Mahdi (pbuh), and on the basis of that advice Mr. Oktar describes the features of the Mahdi as related in the hadiths.
Mr. Oktar has countless times stated in interviews and on his live broadcasts on A9 TV Channel that there is a very close resemblance between himself and Hazrat Mahdi (pbuh) as described in the hadiths, but that this will never mean that he is the Mahdi. It is evident that many people can resemble the description given in the hadiths. According to Islam, Hazrat Mahdi (pbuh) is a person appointed in destiny. In order for us to be convinced that someone is the Mahdi, he needs to be instrumental in the building of Islamic Union and for the Prophet Jesus (pbuh) to pray behind him when he comes, as revealed in the hadiths. Only upon seeing these portents can we say, “God knows best, this is probably Hazrat Mahdi (pbuh).”
3) The False Nature of the Claim that Mr. Oktar “Practices Islam in a Different Way”
The Islam advocated by Mr. Oktar is the true Islam described in the Qur’an and by which people lived in the time of our Prophet (may God bless him and grant him peace). This is not a different conception of Islam as alleged on the Balkanist.net web site. Mr. Oktar espouses the true moral values of Islam based on the Qur’an, which he regards as the source of democracy, human rights and freedom of thought.
This unreal claim on Balkanist.net, which is totally based on speculations, is nothing more than slander by certain people hostile to the SRF community. Indeed this claim is refuted by countless number of evidence.
Mr. Oktar’s works and interviews expounding the Ahl Al-Sunnah creed, and the obligatory nature and merits of the salat 5 times a day are closely followed worldwide. Furthermore these are included in Adnan Oktar’s books that he has written since the 1990s. There is therefore no evidence and no witnesses to make it possible to make such a claim against Mr. Oktar.
When Mr. Oktar’s works are examined, his views regarding to adherence to Ahl Al-Sunnah in performance of salat are explicitly set out. In the book, Quick Grasp of Faith- 1, p.63 and 64, the author states that salat must be performed five times a day and is made up of a total of 40 rakats including its obligatory, essential and sunnah rakats. In the book, Basic Tenets of Islam, p. 81-83, it is again explicitly stated that salat must be performed five times a day and is made up of 40 rakats. In another book by the author, Perfected Faith, p. 24-25, he explains that salat is to be performed five times a day.
Respected professors of theology have also submitted their scientific opinions stating that Mr. Oktar’s understanding is in line with the Hanafi school and in compliance with Ahl Al-Sunnah. Prof. MEHMET BAYRAKDAR, one of these respected professors from the Ankara University Theology Faculty, states the following in his scientific opinion:
“IN NONE OF THE WORKS OF THE AUTHOR DO THERE EXIST ANY VIEWS CONTRARY TO THE QUR’AN AND SUNNAH, THE FUNDAMENTAL SOURCES OF ISLAM. On the contrary, our traditional Turkish-Islamic understanding is preserved. There is no information contrary to our national and religious customs...”
Below are the scientific opinions of the valuable theology professors proving the baselessness of the claims on Balkanist.net suggesting that the author “allegedly engaged in different religious practices”:
I. Prof. Dr. Salih Akdemir’s (Ankara University Qur’anic Commentary Department Academic Member) 20.03.2000 dated opinion
II. Prof. Dr. Mevlüt Güngör’s (Ankara University Qur’anic Commentary Department Chairman) 25.03.2000 dated opinion
III. Prof. Dr. Hayrettin Karaman’s (European International Islam University Academic Member) opinion
IV. Prof. Dr. M. Saim Yeprem’s (Marmara University Theology Faculty Dean) 20.10.2000 dated opinion
V. Prof. Dr. M. Hayri Kırbaşoğlu’s (Ankara University Hadith Department Acadamic Member) 28.03.2000 dated opinion
VI. Prof. Dr. Mehmet Bayrakdar’s (Ankara University Theology Faculty Academic Member) 30.05.2000 dated opinion
VII. Assistant Professor Dr. İlhami Güler’s (Ankara University Islamic Philosophy Department Academic Member) 25.03.2000 dated opinion
VIII. Assistant Professor Ömer Özsoy’s (Ankara University Commentary Department Academic Member) 29.02.2000 dated opinion
IX. Associate Professor Mehmet Paçacı’s (Ankara University Theology Faculty Islamic Sciences Academic Member) 01.06.2000 dated opinion
4) The invalidity of the allegations about Mr. Oktar’s female friends
The claim on the site in question that Mr. Oktar had built a harem for himself is one of the fantastical and mendacious sex-based slanders that intend to cause public indignation and is based on no evidence at all.
A community that has great influence as a result of its world-wide accomplishments would surely attract the attention of many people with different ideas. In this sense, such people can say many things just for the sake of opposition, in an attempt to diminish the effect of people they are against. However this by no means changes the facts. Throughout history sincere people, prophets, messengers, people who strived in the way of God have been similarly defamed.
The Prophet Joseph (pbuh) is a most important example cited in this respect in the Qur'an. The technique is particularly popular for use against people known for their religious identities. Since Mr. Oktar is also a religious individual, and since he and the SRF community were well known for their sensitivity on national and moral issues, the circles in question must have thought that the best way of allegedly damaging their reputations in the public eye was to make sex-based allegations. The scenarios of a “harem” and “Adnan Oktar’s women” are completely erroneous.
These groundless claims were brought up in court following the aforementioned police operation against the SRF community on 12 November, 1999. However, all the women portrayed as victims in these scenarios stated that the claims were completely fictitious and that all the people they knew from the SRF were highly moral, upright and virtuous people. The various witnesses appearing in court also confirmed this.
RESPONSES FROM FAMILIES OF THE MEMBERS OF SRF COMMUNITY TO CERTAIN FAMILIES MAKING GROUNDLESS ALLEGATIONS.
http://psychologicalwarfaremethods.com/responses-from-families-of-the-members-of-bav-community-to-families-making-groundless-allegations/#.U0E7URyhDhJ
5) The Spurious Nature of Depicting the Make-up Worn by Mr. Oktar’s Female Friends As an Offense:
Women from all nations and of all beliefs right across the world use make-up. Women on all shows on TV stations in Turkey, Europe and the USA all wear make-up and wear slightly revealing or revealing clothes. In European countries and the USA, since great care is taken in daily life with regard to the implementation of individual rights and freedoms, people are judged neither because of their clothes nor make-up. In societies where a weak sense of democracy reigns, however, deep-seated prejudices on these subjects still persist. It is just as wrong to label someone because of his bright clothes and make-up as it is to condemn someone for wearing dull clothes and no make-up.
Every woman is free to wear the make-up she thinks suits her best. Criticism on that subject suggests a flawed understanding on the part of the person making it. Thousands of world-wide popular, embraced and admired artists are known for their excessive make-up and they are loved and admired especially by this attribute.
Women have worn make-up since ancient times. Women wore henna, rouge and kohl and dyed their hair in the time of our Prophet (may God bless him and grant him peace). It is therefore wrong to say that make-up is inadmissible in Islam and take a stance against these women with a very biased viewpoint.
6) The Idea that Mr. Oktar Regards Himself As a Sultan and Espouses the Turkish-Islamic Union in Order to Assume Leadership of this Unity Is Groundless and Baseless
Mr. Oktar has never made the slightest suggestion that he has any desire to become allegedly a leader or “sultan” of the Turkish-Islamic world or any expectation thereof. Let alone making a statement regarding this, he has never given even the slightest hint to that effect.
Mr. Oktar desires Turkish-Islamic Union, not in order to lead this Union, but in order for the oppression in the world to come to an end and to see the building of world peace and a climate of brotherhood in which different nations and beliefs can live together under democracy. This, like all the other allegations on Balkanist.net, is a groundless claim, the product of fantasy and devoid of any evidence.
7) The Fallacy of the Claim that Mr. Oktar Is Addressed As Sultan:
This is nothing but an extremely ridiculous, imaginary fiction put forward in an unskillful fashion to support the role attempted to be fictionalized on Balkanist.net. There is not a single person around Mr. Oktar who addresses him as “Sultan”. Also the participants on A9 TV also have never addressed him so. Mr. Oktar has also never asked for being addressed in such a way.
However, Mr. Oktar does from time to time address people older than him who he specially respects as “my Sultan.” The term “my sultan” in Turkish is a word that can be used to express affection and respect and to honor the recipient.
8) The Delusiveness of Linking Mr. Oktar with some Political Figures and the Claim that Contacts Were Made with the Welfare Party to Secure Economic Advantages
It is striking that a special effort is made in the piece in question to link Mr. Oktar with some political figures. Mr. Oktar does make political remarks on his programs about the daily, political developments in the world, but he has many times stated that he has no ties to any political party. For example, Mr. Oktar frequently states that he admires the CHP’s support for a modern Turkey and secularism, the MHP’s opposition to the fragmentation of Turkey, and the steps taken toward freedom and democracy and accomplishments in economy by the AK Party. More than that, Mr. Oktar frequently reiterates, at every available opportunity, that he has made friendships with communists, atheists and members of different faiths, even though they hold different worldviews than his own.
Although the piece alleges that Mr. Oktar unreservedly backs the Prime Minister of Turkey, that is untrue. Mr. Oktar criticizes many of the government’s policies; for instance he calls for the removal of some actions restricting freedoms, draws attention to the peril of federalism and sovereign regions, often reminds that all sections of society must be embraced.
The piece published on the web site also contains a false allegation that Mr. Oktar and a group of his colleagues established ties with some politicians in order to seek material gain. A politician being a guest in the home of one of the members of the Foundation quite clearly cannot be regarded as evidence of corruption in any part of the world. The way that the site carried this in the report, backed up by no evidence, documentation or other information, is illogical.
Similar claims to those carried on the Balkanist.net web site have frequently been made in order to blacken the names of companies, parties and groups of a devout nature in 1998-2002, known as the 28th February process in Turkey, and for purposes of provocation.
Due to these false allegations the Financial Crimes Investigation Board (MASAK), affiliated to the Finance Ministry, carried out a detailed investigation into the assets of Mr. Oktar and his colleagues. Three separate official MASAK reports based on these investigations and subsequently sent to the courts stated that neither Mr. Oktar nor any members of the SRF had assets or cash acquired by illicit means.
ALLEGATIONS OF ILLEGAL EARNINGS WERE DEMOLISHED BY THE STATE’S OWN REPORTS
http://psychologicalwarfaremethods.com/official-state-reports-refuted-the-allegations-of-unfair-earnings/#.U0EsAb8mzmI
The Balkanist.net web site’s claim that links have been established with politicians is nothing other than a repetition of a baseless allegation that has been thrown out by the Turkish courts.
9) Mr. Adnan Oktar was held in a mental hospital as a part of a conspiracy
Mr. Oktar has been subjected to many plots since he has been waging a very comprehensive and powerful ideological struggle worldwide against atheist, Darwinist, materialist and communist groupings. One is the alleged “schizophrenia diagnosis”, which was annulled when it was proved to be a groundless plot by the related institutions. This allegation was refuted by Forensic Medicine Institute, and Military Hospital issued a sanity report.
Mr. Oktar was held in mental hospital among the most severely damaged mental patients for 10 months without any justification simply because of the unease his book Judaism and Freemasonry caused in certain circles. He was also held in a cell in prison for 9 months. This method of dissuasion employed to put an end to Mr. Oktar’s activities continued for around 19 months through various forms of torture and maltreatment. That diagnosis, the result of a plot to discredit Mr. Oktar, was subsequently annulled by a military hospital and Mr. Oktar was reported to be “psychologically and physically healthy.” The report in question was also approved by the Supreme Specialty Council.
During the period Mr. Oktar was held in the mental hospital some Darwinist press organs raised this subject on a frequent basis and often published writings against him. However, when the military hospital annulled this unfounded report against Mr. Oktar, these press organs never said a word about the military hospital’s report verifying his physical and psychological well-being.
Similarly, Balkanist.net still employs this devious tactic and only mentions the fake report and never mentions the fact that it is annulled.
ADNAN OKTAR’S “SANITY” REPORT ISSUED BY THE GULHANE MILITARY MEDICAL ACADEMY.
http://psychologicalwarfaremethods.com/adnan-oktars-sanity-report-issued-by-the-gulhane-military-medical-academy/#.U0E5WxyhDhI
10) Response to allegations based on monetary considerations against members of the SRF
The claims made by Balkanist.net regarding SRF members’ attitude toward their families are based on atrocious slanders. Only 4-5 families, whose names are included in the evidence files of the case concerned and known to be supported by Alleged Ergenekon Terror Organization members, voiced the slanders produced by this alleged terror organization through various speculations. They tried to affect the judgment and waged negative propaganda against the SRF community.
In order to see the respect and love of SRF members for their families, one should consider the deep convictions of HUNDREDS of families who explicitly express their views and love for Mr. Oktar and the SRF community rather than a mere 4-5 families supported by the Alleged Ergenekon Terror Organization. Hundreds of families express their happiness at how Mr. Oktar educated their children while growing up as devout individuals possessed of moral perfection and state that their children are always their greatest supporters and helpers, including in times of hardship and sickness.
The claim that “families provide money for the community“ is another consequence of the provocation carried out by people from the alleged organization. This claim, which is intended to influence the court and cause indignation among the public, has not a single solid piece of evidence behind it. This claim has been utterly disproved by the testimonies before the court given by 4 people whose names are mentioned in the SRF case indictment. There are no witnesses, or complainants or aggrieved parties on this subject.
Furthermore, members of the SRF community are generally married people, 40-45 years old, with regular family and business lives. All are graduates of prominent Turkish and foreign universities who have successful professional lives. This claim made against them is unbecoming to their personalities and life styles. This aside, considering their financial situations, it is clear that they would never need something like that.
In addition, as can also be seen from the statements by the families, these families receive financial assistance from their children. As a requisite of our religion, all members of the SRF circle regard their families as sacred and show them great respect and love. Consequently, such claims are completely false and are based on improper speculations.
11) Baseless Allegations against Adnan Oktar and His Group of Friends:
Another of the groundless claims made against Mr. Oktar and his colleagues in the 28th February process in Turkey is regarding their so-called “hierarchical structure.” The fact is that Mr. Oktar and his colleagues are a group of friends based around love and friendship. This claim, made as part of psychological operations against Mr. Oktar, has also been disproved in court.
Mr. Oktar is not the leader, sheikh or hodja of a religious congregation. He has stated this many times on television programs in which he takes part. He is a writer and a man of ideas. The people around him are not his ”disciples” or his ”men”, but educated, grown-up people with their own professions and social lives. The fact that these people like Mr. Oktar or support his ideas does not mean that they are one community. At most, they may be regarded as a group sharing some ideas.
12) Balkanist.net Attempted to Show the Cocaine Conspiracy against Mr. Adnan Oktar, Which Was Disproved by Judicial Authorities, As If It Was the Truth:
Balkanist.net has raised the subject of a plot against Adnan Oktar that occurred several years ago, of which Mr. Oktar was acquitted in court, trying to make it look like a fact. This was the cocaine plot.
Although the cocaine conspiracy against Mr. Oktar set up by the Alleged Ergenekon Terror Organization was exposed by judicial bodies and shown to bear no truth, the plot has once again been raised by this web site as if it were genuine fact. The fact is that the cocaine conspiracy against Mr. Oktar is an indication of what the Alleged Ergenekon Organization, with its materialist and Darwinist ideology, is capable of solely because of its unease at the spread of Adnan Oktar’s national and spiritual values.
In the middle of 1991, Adnan Oktar and a few colleagues were detained in Izmir with no grounds being provided. He was later transferred to the Istanbul Security Department, where he was held for 72 hours. At the end of 72 hours he was sent to the Forensic Medicine Institution for a cocaine test. It was then announced that a large quantity of a cocaine side-product had been found in his blood. If the enormous amount of cocaine allegedly extracted from Adnan Oktar’s blood had been ingested more than 72 hours before, it would have killed him. This shows that this amount of cocaine had entered his body shortly before, within the previous 72 hours, in other words while he was in detention. In other words, the cocaine had been mixed in with his food while he was detained at the Security Department.
It emerged through reports from 20 foreign forensic medicine institutions and from an official report from the Turkish Forensic Medicine Institution that this was a plot against him, and the court acquitted him, saying the whole thing was a conspiracy. This incident shows the kind of plan set in motion by some sinister forces wishing to hinder Adnan Oktar’s activities and just what they are capable of.
PSYCHOLOGICAL WAR TECHNIQUES EMPLOYED IN THE COCAINE PLOT AGAINST ADNAN OKTAR.
http://psychologicalwarfaremethods.com/psychological-war-techniques-employed-in-the-cocaine-plot-against-adnan-oktar/#.U0E9HhyhDhI
13) The Allegation That Cocaine Is Widely Used in the Group Is Totally Unfounded
This, like all the other claims carried on the site, is another fantastical allegation that is completely untrue, is based on no evidence or information, and was made for the first time by Balkanist.net. Mr. Oktar frequently emphasizes on TV programs on which he appears and in conversations with friends that cigarettes and alcohol are harmful, and explains that he is opposed to everything that is bad for health. Therefore, such a claim can only be the result of deliberate distortion on the part of Balkanist.net.
14) The only evidence behind the allegation of blackmail based on the use of hidden cameras that appears in the indictment is false statements. No other evidence exists.
The Balkanist.net web site also contains accounts based solely on false statements written by the police and signed under duress while under detention, which therefore have no legal bearing. These imaginary accounts refer to “well-known people being blackmailed by the use of hidden cameras” and to “threats being made against these people.”
First of all, in 1999, 45 homes were raided simultaneously at 03:00 am in a move against the SRF. The homes were searched for several hours, but NOT A SINGLE SECRET RECORD or any other violation of the law WAS FOUND. The imputations that appeared, illegally, in the press were part of a smear campaign against the SRF community.
The court possessed not a single piece of evidence to support the claims in question. The reasoned opinion in favor of acquittal issued twice by the prosecutor was based on the fact that THERE WAS NOT A SINGLE PIECE OF EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT THESE or any other accusation, and the prosecutor made this clear in these opinions. The verdicts of acquittal and dismissal of proceedings given by the Courts and public prosecutors totally disprove this claim.
These claims, which are in the court file BUT ARE NOT SUPPORTED EVEN BY A SINGLE PIECE OF SOLID EVIDENCE, are based only on the testimonies signed under duress and torture by the SRF members tried and taken under custody as a result of the plots hatched by the Alleged Ergenekon Terror Organization in 1999. (There are 18 Forensic Medicine reports to the effect that members of the SRF were tortured in detention. It has been confirmed by court decision that SRF member Emre Calikoglu was tortured. Besides, security officials of the time are still on trial for torture, with prosecutors demanding sentences of 216 years for each.)
According to the law, statements signed under torture and in the absence of advocates are utterly invalid. However, the penalty imposed on the SRF case was based on these invalid statements taken by the police.
At the end of the judicial process based on these false testimonies the guilty verdict handed down by the court was OVERTURNED by the Supreme Court of Appeals on 28.12.2009 because of the legal errors it contained.
The guilty verdict and 3-year sentence handed down in 2008 to Adnan Oktar and various members of the SRF community was actually appealed by the prosecutor, on the grounds of totally improper practice and statements taken and signed at the Security Directorate under duress and in the absence of a lawyer, and which were therefore legally inadmissible.
The prosecutor also stated there had been various errors of law and practice committed. He TWICE REQUESTED ACQUITTAL during the court proceedings on the grounds that THERE WAS NO EVIDENCE AGAINST THE DEFENDANTS AND OF THE PROCEDURAL ERRORS COMMITTED BY THE COURT. He also APPEALED AGAINST THE SENTENCE following the ruling. We have complete respect for the court, but this state of affairs is significant in that it showed that the ruling should again be considered by the judicial authorities. Indeed, the Supreme Court of Appeals took this up straight away and OVERTURNED the ruling, citing 5 separate legal violations.
The Balkanist.net web site carries a detailed description of accusations based solely on false statements. The way that the site presents such utter fabrications, devoid of any supporting legal evidence or witnesses, to its readers as if they were true facts is a clear sign of prejudiced behavior.
15) The Baseless Nature of the Allegations Concerning Ebru Simsek:
The fact that allegations made by the individual called Ebru Simsek against Mr. Oktar and the SRF community are utterly false has been established by a number of court rulings. Nonetheless, these total fabrications are constantly reiterated by circles opposed to the intellectual activities of the SRF.
Judicial rulings showing that all of Ebru Simsek’s claims are slanders:
1. The Chief Prosecutor’s Office’s considered acquittal opinion showing that Ebru Simsek’s allegations in Case No. 2006/26, an extension of the SRF case, were slanders and the VERDICT OF ACQUITTAL No. 2007/7 dated 22.01.2007 by the Istanbul 2nd High Criminal Court.
2. The Istanbul Chief Prosecutor’s Office’s VERDICT OF NON-PROSECUTION of Ebru Simsek's fantastical claims (in 1999) under ruling No. 96/9848 Hz – 99/8409 K. dated 12.08.1999.
3. The Istanbul Chief Prosecutor’s Office’s VERDICT OF NON-PROSECUTION No. 05/27549 Hz. - 05/12003 K. dated 18.10.2005.
4. The Istanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office’s verdict of non-prosecution No. 02/60013 Hz. - 02/18838 K. dated 31.12.2002 and the Beyoglu 3rd High Criminal Court’s VERDICT OF REFUSAL OF OBJECTION No. 03/458 Mut. dated 28.04.2003 regarding the refusal of objection against the former.
5. The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office’s verdict of non-prosecution No. 02/39606 Hz. - 03/8860 K. dated 30.06.2003 and the Beyoglu 2nd High Criminal Court’s VERDICT OF REFUSAL OF OBJECTION No. 03/333 Mut. dated 03.10.2003 regarding the refusal of objection against the former.
6. The Bagcilar Public Prosecutor’s Office’s verdict of non-prosecution No. 02/21669 Hz. - 03/6120 K. dated 15.10.2003 and the Eyup 2nd High Criminal Court’s VERDICT OF REFUSAL OF OBJECTION No. 03/894 D.Is. dated 02.01.2004 regarding the refusal of objection against the former.
7. The Uskudar Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office’s verdict of non-prosecution No. 04/7693 Hz. - 04/4749 K. dated 01.07.2004 and the Kadikoy 2nd High Criminal Court’s VERDICT OF REFUSAL OF OBJECTION No. 04/437 Mut. dated 09.09.2004 regarding the refusal of objection against the former.
8. The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office’s VERDICT OF REFUSAL OF OBJECTION No. 05/51724 Hz. – 06/2432 K. dated 27.03.2006.
9. The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office’s VERDICT OF REFUSAL OF OBJECTION No. 05/51725 Hz.
10. Following the known images of Ebru Simsek in the press, an Istanbul University Medical School Department of Forensic Medicine expert carried out an inquiry in which IT WAS ESTABLISHED UNDER REPORT No. 2005/127765 dated 21.10.2005 that Ebru Simsek’s claims were merely slanders.
11. Istanbul 2nd High Criminal Court had the home in the allegations of Ebru Simsek and the home in the images examined by an official expert, accompanied by the court judges. This expert report revealed that THE HOME IN THE IMAGES DEFINITELY DID NOT BELONG TO THE SRF MEMBER.
12. Filiz Karatas, who shared a house with Ebru Simsek at the time she began issuing slanders against the SRF members, gave a witness statement to the court in Istanbul 2nd High Criminal Court file No. 04/337 E. on 09.12.2004 and said that the SRF members were uninvolved in the matter and THAT THEY HAD MADE THIS IMAGINARY ALLEGATION TOGETHER TO SLANDER THE SRF.
13. Ten separate criminal complaints brought by those slandered by Ebru Simsek were examined by 10 different public prosecutors from different offices; these prosecutors concluded, as a result of their investigations, that Ebru Simsek’s claims were slanderous.
16) The Allegation that the “Court System Has Been Misused” is Baseless; the Rights Given to All Citizens under Turkish Law Have Been Brought to Bear:
Another claim on the web site in question is the unfounded allegation that plaintiffs were wronged by defamation lawsuits. Yet everything that happened took place in full public view. Despite the existence of dozens of court rulings that all the allegations were mendacious, Ebru Simsek persisted in making these false allegations against members of the SRF and Mr. Oktar. As a result, Mr. Oktar and the other victims of this slander then took action to protect their own personal rights. That is why the defamation lawsuits filed against Ebru Simsek are not misuse of the law but the use of right bestowed on all citizens under Turkish law. The fact that the courts agreed to hear the claims is proof they are not a misuse of the law.
17) The Claim regarding the Caddisfly in the Atlas of Creation:
The widely known evolutionist Richard Dawkins highlighted the photograph of a caddisfly in Mr. Adnan Oktar’s opus the Atlas of Creation, which caused great impact all around the world, as a great discovery. However, this is a photograph of a model deliberately included in the book by Mr. Oktar. Whether the photograph is of a model or not does not alter the fact that this living creature is still alive in our day.
Desperate, at a loss for words and anguished in the face of the extraordinary evidence for Creation in the magnificent Atlas of Creation that invalidates evolution, Dawkins takes every opportunity to bring up this photograph of a model deliberately included by the author in the book as if it were a great discovery. By this attitude Dawkins embodies the pathetic situation in which Darwinism finds itself. The caddisfly is living in our time with the same appearance as possessed by fossils dating back millions of years. In other words, it has not undergone any changes. That is why Dawkins feels so upset.
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UCSB responds to the deaths of six students
by Camillia Lanham
PHOTO BY CHLOE RUCKER
IN MOURNING: Members of the UC Santa Barbara and Isla Vista communities held numerous events to mourn the deaths of six UCSB students killed on May 23. Classes were canceled on May 27.
Flags at all University of California campuses are sitting at half-staff until Sunday, June 1, to mourn the loss of six UC Santa Barbara students murdered in Isla Vista on May 23.
“Our UCSB family is in mourning,” Chancellor Henry Yang wrote in a letter to the campus community on May 24. “We grieve for the precious lives lost, and we share in the heartbreak of their families, friends, and classmates.”
College officials canceled classes on May 27, declaring it a day of mourning and reflection, and a memorial service was held at Harder Stadium that afternoon. Students held a candlelight vigil the evening of May 24; it started on the UCSB campus and moved to Aniwq ‘Oyo Park, according to the Santa Barbara Independent. To help students and community members deal with the tragedy, the college has extended walk-in advising hours and made counselors available by phone 24 hours a day.
The murders made headlines on the Central Coast and across the nation. News outlets descended on Isla Vista and continue to put out reports about the murders and the now-dead man police say was behind it all: 22-year-old Elliot Rodger.
The media frenzy drew ire from at least one UCSB student.
“It is bad enough that on top of dealing with the sudden and unnecessary loss of our fellow Gauchos, the people of Isla Vista not only feel unsafe in a place we call home, but are treated as animals in a zoo by reporters and news channels,” junior Monica Rodriguez wrote on her Facebook page. “So the amount of frustration I feel when I actually see what is being published and circulated is off the damn charts.”
She writes that too much emphasis is placed on Rodger rather than the victims of the tragedy and the community’s response.
The Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department is continuing its investigation into the suspect’s life and the 12 different crime scenes in and around Isla Vista.
The victims have been identified as 20-year-old Cheng Yuan Hong of San Jose, 19 year-old George Chen of San Jose, 20-year-old Weihan Wang of Fremont, 22-year-old Katherine Breann Cooper of Chino Hills, 19-year-old Veronika Elizabeth Weiss of Westlake Village, and 20-year-old Christopher Michaels-Martinez of San Luis Obispo.
On May 24, the attorney for the Rodger family, Alan Shifman, also held a press conference in front of the family’s home in Woodland Hills. Shifman said Elliot Rodger was diagnosed at an early age with highly functioning Asperger syndrome and had been receiving help from multiple professionals. Asperger syndrome is an autism-spectrum disorder that affects language and behavioral development in children.
“The world has got to spend more on this mental health system because it does appear to be broken,” Shifman said during the conference.
He also said Rodger didn’t have a history with gun violence and that his parents noticed their son’s recent posts on YouTube regarding suicide and multiple murders and reported them to police weeks ago.
“They’re devastated. … It’s a tragedy of immense consequences,” Shifman said during the press conference. “It’s a tragedy we really have to get our hands around and try to prevent from happening again.”
The day after the tragedy, the father of one of the victims also spoke at a press conference. The visibly distraught Richard Martinez, father of Chris Martinez, called out the National Rifle Association and U.S. Congress and asked for things to change.
“You don’t think it’ll happen to your child until it does. His death has left our family lost and broken. Why did Chris die? Chris died because of craven, irresponsible politicians and the NRA. They talk about gun rights—what about Chris’ right to live?” Martinez said during the press conference. “Too many have died. We should say to ourselves, ‘Not one more.’”
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78 – Geordie Lavers-McBain – Living & Breathing The Martial Arts Lifestyle
http://media.blubrry.com/martialartsmedia/p/martialartsmedia.s3.amazonaws.com/podcast/Episode_78_Geordie_Lavers_McBain.mp3
Get Notified Of Future Episodes: Apple Podcasts | Android | Stitcher | Spotify | RSS | More
Geordie's life is 24/7 martial arts! We discuss creating your own style, tournaments, optimising KPI's and more.
IN THIS EPISODE, YOU WILL LEARN:
How Geordie was able to develop his own martial arts style and why he refers to it as the best style
How he started teaching combat sports in the Australian army
The three battles one must win in self-defence
How to host successful martial arts tournaments
How to optimise key performance indicators in your school
*Need help growing your martial arts school? Learn More Here.
If you can put those sorts of things together and you can work out what makes an elite athlete, what things should you focus on and you apply it to your business, OK, what makes a really good class? What makes a really good ad?
And even if the ad is to a completely different thing, or your classes are a completely different style, you can just put those key factor and key components together and work out what it is that's really important.
GEORGE: Hey, George here – welcome to another episode of the Martial Arts Media business podcast. This episode is going to be a little bit different. We’re busy driving in a car, we just finished an event in Sydney and I've got with me Geordie and Giorgio.
GIORGIO: How's it going guys?
GEORGE: Good, and I'm speaking today to someone I've been trying to interview for quite a long time and he's been hard to track down, but I'm finally in a car with him and he can't escape. So, welcome to the show Geordie Lavers McBain.
GEORDIE: Thanks for having me on George.
GEORGE: Cool, so just for the sound, I'm going to be passing the phone up and down. So we might sound like we’re going in and out, but here we go.
So first up Geordie – thanks for being on the call. Just for everyone that doesn't know who you're, you own multiple schools, you've got a long history in martial arts – give us the two-minute take – who's Geordie Lavers McBain?
GEORDIE: Ok, that's a complicated question. I'm a martial artist, I like just about all styles of martial arts. I teach my own style of martial arts in my school and I have a lot of combat sports that I also teach. I teach wrestling, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, Muay Thai, MMA, I have guys who fight in Kyokushin, boxing – lots of different styles of combat sports, but I also have my own style of martial arts, which I've sort of combined with all the different styles that I've done over the years.
I've done a variety of different things, and have black belts in different things, so… yeah, so that's what I do there. Also, around jiu-jitsu tournaments in Queensland and wrestling tournaments in Queensland and I also am a defence force contractor with the army. I go on base two times a week and teachgrappling, close quarters grappling and different things like that, so it's pretty much me I guess.
GEORGE: Pretty much, but that's quite a full plate. So there's a lot of places we could start. I guess just starting – how did you get around to developing your own style?
GEORDIE: Yeah, so my own style was a combination, so basically what happened was, many years ago I've trained in a lot of different styles of martial arts, so I started teaching Zen Do Kai way back in the day and my instructor ended up leaving Zen Do Kai and then he sort of went on a different path, so I started doing my own system. And Zen Do Kai was the best of everything in progression, but I really sort of took that to heart.
So I started sort of thinking about, what other things I can incorporate into what we do. I looked at different ways to test that, so I bounced for about 15 years, so I sort of worked at a few things that worked in that environment. Also, I sort of was just looking at different ways that we could test things, such as like, how do we work out if body punctures were effective for multiple areas.
So, if I'm doing boxing and I’ve got a big glove on, I punch someone in the stomach and that works, then I put on say, a smaller glove in the Thai boxing sort of arena and I punch him in the stomach and it still works. Then I get a smaller glove, like in MMA glove and punch him in the stomach and it still works and then I put on like a little padded piece of felt, like in Kudo, and you still punch someone in the stomach and it works. Then you go in Kyokushin, you punch them in the stomach it works, it's kind of like, well that punch is probably universally going to work because it's worked against fully resisting opponents, so we’ll incorporate that into our martial arts system.
But anything which only really sports specific, or only sort of works in one environment, we tend not to focus on that in our core curriculum and that's something that if people want to do, then they're going to learn that as an extra. So if someone becomes like an elite level jiu-jitsu player, and they want to learn some inverted guard or something, that's fine, that's something we’ll teach to them.
But in the context about martial arts curriculum, we’re not going to do that, because it’s not going to work in other environments, it's not going to work against someone in the streets, it's not going to work against multiple people, it’s not going to work when someone's armed, we’re probably not going to worry about incorporating an inverted guard in that sort of scenario, so we take that out of our curriculum. So we just try to have something which is really practical.
GEORGE: Got to say, how do you prioritize all that? Because I mean, that's a lot going on, is your own style sort of the top priority or what you focus on in the school? How do you juggle in between them all?
GEORDIE: Yeah, so my own style is kind of like my legacy I guess because it’s my style. People say what's the best style in the world and the normal answer is there isn't one. But when you have your own style and you have complete control over what the curriculum is, then it should be your style. So I believe that my style is the best style in the world because it's the best style for me. And if it wasn't, there was something that wasn't practical or something I didn't agree with, I could change it immediately and then it becomes the best style again.
So, that is my kind of hope for my legacy, our future generations and so on. It's my pressure testing and constantly re-evaluating through all the different combat sports we do, plus the stuff I do with the army. Plus different other groups of people that I teach in different contexts and environments, we sort of look at that. But as far as… basically we have grappling without a Gi, grappling with a Gi, striking without a Gi, striking with one and combine them together, with a Gi, without. In combat sports, sort of scenarios. And it comes together that way.
GEORGE: What a perfect… so just to give it some context as well, the question I haven't asked: so you're running multiple schools, right?
GEORDIE: Yeah, that's correct. So I have two full-time schools, which I run myself and I also have a part-time school, which I also teach at, because I train during the day near that school, so I work there. And I also have 10 other schools that my students run in different locations.
GEORGE: Cool. So, jumping over to the military – how does that fit into all this in the schedule?
GEORDIE: So, yeah, I'm there 2 days a week, so that's sort of how it fits into my personal schedule – is that what you meant?
GEORGE: Let's rephrase: first up, tell me a bit more about working with the military and how that got started.
GEORDIE: Ok, yeah. So, I've always been interested in that style of things, so I've done a lot of training with different people over the years and combative training and stuff like that and tried to find the truest sources of that sort of information, first-hand knowledge and so on. And anyway, what really happened was, when Kudo first sort of started growing up in Australia, Paul Cale who is in special forces and a commando introduced me to a heap of other soldiers that were all in the special forces still, they were soldiers that were involved in that combative style thing on base and on different bases all around. And through that, I got to meet these different people and then I eventually got invited onto a base to teach a seminar.
From that seminar, I got invited back again. They seemed to feel that the direction that I was teaching and the skillset which I was trying to impart, was much more along the lines of what they were after in developing with soldiers. And so from that, basically I ended up getting a defence force contract. I’ve got a pass which lets me on base any time of the day or night and I can go there all the time and train and teach and we run tournaments and competitions, with a variety of different rule sets, that sort of try to reflect the same features of what's going to happen out in the battlefield.
So what's important, how should you know that, what should people be able to do, what shouldn't they be able to do. If you've got all your gear on and you're rolling around on the ground, there are certain positions that just aren't going to work for you. If someone is… essentially, you've got your primary weapon, you've got your secondary weapon, which is both firearms. Then you've got a knife, which is usually on your hip, and you got to the last resort knife on your chest and how do we incorporate those sorts of things in close quarters and what stuff is happening from there.
Paul Cale worked the Australian combative program, so the army can use his program, which everybody in the Australian army has to know. And this sort of stuff is a continuation training, so away soldiers, once they’ve got their basic force down, they can continue on with those same goals and mindsets in place, of, be aggressive, push forward, never give up and other features of that.
For example, we don't do leg locks whatsoever in the army when we’re grappling, because… a few things. One, you've got boots on, too, if I'm playing with your legs, you can stab me or shoot me and usually when you go for a leg submission, you have to give up top domination to go to the bottom. In those sorts of circumstances, it's really not advantageous. So we’ve just got to make sure that were always staying with that mindset of, how do we get back on the Gi that we’re meant to be using and rather than make it into a mixed martial arts match or something like that, everything has to be always focused towards moving towards your objective in that situation.
We try to do our finals in a cage, because when you're doing room clearance drills and in urban warfare, if you kick a door and you have to go in and get someone, what's going to happen if you're going to be up against a wall. You're going to be up against something in that, they might put you against it, or you might put them against it. So we have to do a lot of drills that sort of relate to that and a lot of different martial arts styles have drills, they fight people against a wall, but you really can't go beyond things like, the information that the MMA has pulled out and the tactics and knowledge of that.
And then if you weaponise that and then you also have other people in your team doing the techniques, then you can really start to develop some really good tactics and then you can practice them against live people and develop competitions for them. That's what basically my role is to help do. We wear things like plate carriers, armed plate carries, which we put rubber inside of for PPE. And what happens is, you can throw people and choke them and use that against them and it becomes a little bit more realistic. And we just try to work out what tactics and what ways that can work, so… yeah. So that's pretty much how I got there and the stuff we do, I think.
GEORGE: OK. So, I mean, working at that high level of self-defence, you know, if you look at everyday martial arts schools, everybody likes to promote the aspect of self-defence: what do you feel is missing in that? I mean, if you're working on that type of level, where it has to be so realistic because it’s a life and death situation, how do you feel martial arts… What do you think martial arts schools can do better to make things a bit more realistic, or you know, up to the game with self-defence?
GEORDIE: Yeah, so pressure testing is really important. Creating dynamic simulations, where you're recreating the environment in which you're hoping to defend yourself is important. Putting people under duress and stress and seeing how they perform. Also, like for me, there are three battles you've got to win in self-defence. So the first battle you have to win is an immediate physical battle, which is right now. There are enough techniques out there in the martial arts world to understand that.
Certain situations are going to be more extreme, a lot of people don't practice defending another person, or defending against somebody else with somebody else, but that sort of stuff probably isn't as important as making sure you've got some more fundamental, physical skills. And if you want to win the physical battle, that's anywhere from an hour to three seconds to two minutes, or you know, it really depends on how long it goes. Some self-defence situations can take a long time, others are over in a split second.
But you've got to move on to the next one, which is your legal battle. Even in the military, there are rules of engagement. Everyone is sort of obliged to follow some rules. And you have to follow those rules, if you don't, you're in breach of that. And in the real world, as a civilian, if we don't follow those rules, we might go to jail for the next 25 years.
And then, of course, you've got to win the moral battle, which is the last battle. Which is the battle of, are you happy with what you did? So, uncle Bob is there at Christmas time, he's had too much to drink and he grabs the butter knife and he threatens you with it. You know, it's a lethal weapon and you poke him in the eye with your finger and he's blind and every Christmas, you have to go back and see uncle Bob and your grandma won't talk to you anymore, because he's wearing a patch over his eye. Your mom won't speak so much to you, because you blinded Uncle Bob.
You're having a bit of trouble sleeping because you never really thought you're going to poke someone in the eye. It was a bit squishy and you sort of feel that every time you pick up something which is a bit squishy and it gives you nightmares. You're sort of losing that moral battle and if it's really full on, maybe that's going to be… Your life is now upset by that, you can't sleep every night, you're getting nightmares, it’s coming back to you, all because of something you did, which you might not have really meant to do.
So the reality is, you have to already be sure of what you're going to be able to do morally before you worry about what you're going to do. And then you also have to understand legally what you're going to have to do. So realistically, the last thing is actually the physical. You have to be morally prepared for what you're going to do. You have to be legally understood, what would a reasonable person do in that situation. Did you actually fear the… In correspondence to what you actually did to the person, was there? And then, physically, were you capable of actually doing it? So, I think that probably would be a good thing to start within focusing on self-defence.
GEORGE: Awesome. So just looking at the time we have, tell me a bit more about your tournaments and that side of your martial arts?
GEORDIE: Sure. I ran my first grappling tournament in 2003 and that was like shoot wrestling, combined with Brazilian jiu-jitsu and just some guys were doing different styles, sort of submission style wrestling back then in Queensland and we just wanted to get everyone together to do a tournament, there weren't really many tournaments around then. Mat Cooper was running tournaments, but there was no Internet really, telling anyone anything, so it was all word of mouth.
So I started then and then, that sort of moved forward to Daniel Lemoore, who was my jiu-jitsu coach and I decided to form a partnership and start running jiu-jitsu comps, try and lift the level of the Queensland competitors. We weren't doing so well in jiu-jitsu tournaments up here. I was actually taking students in a state 3-4 times every year, to go and compete in other states, so that we could lift our competition game. And we just figured, if we could run more comps here, we’d lift our end level locally, we wouldn't have to travel.
So that started out slow, the Queensland Brazilian jiu-jitsu, that's the name of our association, our circuit. We’re now affiliated with the Australian Federation of Brazilian jiu-jitsu, we did that about 4 years ago. So we run the state champions for that up in Queensland. This year, we've got 16 tournaments, next year we've already got 22 tournaments planned. We've got a regional Queensland, so… a lot of the other states, the state bodies who run the tournaments will only stay in their major cities.
So if they're in Victoria, the Victorian federation only really runs competitions in Melbourne, whereas we’re running competitions in Cairns, Townsville, Rockhampton, Gladstone, Mackay, up on the sunshine coast, Ipswich, Brisbane, Gold Coast – we’re trying to run competitions all over, we really want to be a circuit for the whole state. You know some of the competitions are quite small, some of the competitions took us 2-3 years before we actually made the money back on the flights and we try to have to best quality referees on our tournaments as well, so it took a bit of time.
The other thing we do is none of our staff are volunteers, everybody's paid. You give someone a t-shirt, we pay you for that, we pay everybody, we make sure we’re paying them above minimum wage and we try and look after our staff because our staff are important. We give our referees really good money because if you have bad referees, you have a bad tournament. So that's kind of the jiu-jitsu.
Also, we run wrestling tournaments, I've run a lot of Kudo tournaments as well and I run, even within my own club, because we do multiple styles, we run our own internal tournaments twice a year. I enjoy running tournaments, I find that once you've got a good system in place, it’s really, really easy to just continue on. I've got some really good staff members now, some of them are getting paid really well, some of them are almost on a wage, because what we're doing is, we're just making sure that they’re constantly able to organise the things that we need them to organise, so we can really offer a really good product to people who want to compete. We want to make sure it’s the smoothest and the easiest tournament.
We don't charge spectators at our tournaments either, especially jiu-jitsu, because to me, if you go watch jiu-jitsu, it's generally because your mom, your dad, your son, your daughter, your niece, your nephew – someone related to you, or some close personal friend is competing. You're not going there for the spectacle of it. No one is saying, “Hey, what are you doing Saturday or Sunday? Oh nothing. Oh, let's go watch a jiu-jitsu tournament,” – no one is doing that unless they're doing jiu-jitsu.
There are people who might go watch boxing or kickboxing or something, but no one is doing that for jiu-jitsu. It's probably pretty boring to watch, to be honest. The rules are really complicated, it's hard to sort of understand what's happening and the best guys in the world are the most exciting if you understand that when he changed his grip from the left lapel to the right lapel, that was really complex and something’s about to happen. But mom and dad don't get that, so why should we charge these people a spectator fee? So we also just make sure that everyone has the… We try to make everyone have the best experience that they can possibly have in our competitions.
We were doing really big customised medals, probably about 7 years before anybody else was doing that around. Really spent the money on things that we felt were important and we’re re-investing all the time, we’re actually sponsoring a movie, a Netflix level quality movie, to come out, a history of jiu-jitsu in Queensland. We’ve decided that we’re going to sponsor that. We don't have any credit control over it, so we’re just sort of hoping that it makes everyone look really good, hope it makes us look really good.
But the thing is, it might not. We've hired an independent director who's won multiple awards, and we’re like, OK, let's show everybody this. So we’re trying to put back in and the way we can do that is by running really good tournaments and people support it and we try to support the community back ourselves, so this is one of the things we're doing.
GEORGE: Awesome. So, on the business side, you've got lots going on. You're a man of few words, but your actions speak super loud of the things that you're doing. If we're talking on the business side, what do you feel is your big thing, your sort of zone of what you're doing in business that makes you really successful?
GEORDIE: I just really like teaching martial arts and teaching classes, so I think if you're passionate about what you do, people pick up on that. I can't even walk past a class that I'm not meant to be teaching and not want to get in there and teach. I think if you're genuine, people feel that genuineness and they want to follow on. I really love structure and systems. I really like analysing curriculums and developing systems for things and really trying to work out what the truth of something is and get the most result from that.
I'm lucky, I've trained a lot of champion athletes and my wife has 67 titles in 8 different combats. She's a world Muay Thai champion, Australian boxing champ, Australian Kyokushin champ, a high-level jiu-jitsu champion, multiple different things like that, national titles and so on. World combat wrestling champion, Kudo champion, MMA fighter… Heaps of different things like that. And basically, it’s just working out what works. And the business is exactly the same. So you sit there and go: how do I make something work?
So, once you work it out, if you get someone who’s a world Muay Thai champion, you can make them the world combat wrestling champion. She's hoping to get in the Olympic games for freestyle wrestling, coming up in Tokyo. If you can put those sorts of things together and you can work out what makes an elite athlete, what things should you focus on and you apply it to your business, OK, what makes a really good class? What makes a really good ad?
And even if the ad is to a completely different thing, or your classes are a completely different style, you can just put those key factor and key components together and work out what it is that's really important. What are the things that actually matter? Because there's a lot of fluff and there's a lot of other stuff out there that will get you a 1% return, or a 2% return here. But the reality is if you can get something that gives you a 25% return on effort, why spend time and effort on something that's going to give a lower yield result?
And then at the top end, you've got to be prepared to change so much of what you do. So I've done a lot of traditional martial arts styles and if you're saying to pure traditionalists that you can improve an aspect of what they do by, say, 80% if they change 2% of what they do, they won't do it. Like, my personal experience is that they just won't do it, because it's not traditional, it's not what they do. But if you say to an athlete, if you change 80% of what you do, I can give you a 2% return and you're at the top level – he'll change 80% of what they do.
And if you take that sort of association across to business, if someone could say to you, I can improve your bottom line by 2% if you change 80% of what you do – that's an improvement. Why not do that? Because it's never going to be the other way around, it's never going to be if you change 2%, you're going to get 80% in return. Sometimes you've got to make big changes and look at those sorts of things, how do I get that slight, different improvement? And you've got to take risks and you've got to try and see what's the most up-to-date thing out there.
The first set of kettlebells I ever got, I imported from… I think it was the Czech Republic, somewhere over in Eastern Europe and no one had them in Australia. And I got this really old wrestling book that was actually written in Russian and they had kettlebells there. And they had a lot of pictures and I thought, that looks like a really good thing, how do I get those things? Took me ages to find out what they were called – and now you can buy them from K-mart.
So if you want to stay cutting edge too, you can't just rest on your laurels and say, yep, we've worked that out. You've got to be always like, well, what's changing, what's the next most proven, effective thing that you can do. And a lot of fads end up being not very good. Even people who do ice cold baths, research has now shown that just stretching lightly after training gives you the same result in recovery, but because all the football teams are doing it, everyone just assumed it was the way you should do it. So don't always just jump on fads either, try and do a bit of research and try and really work it out. Just because the good guys do it, doesn't mean it's actually giving any effect.
GEORGE: Cool. So on that, on optimising, you're talking about optimising little, making little changes that really optimise your business etc: is there something that you… You know, with optimising, sometimes it's easier to remove stuff than to just add stuff. Because I think we always want to… there's a danger in always wanting the best thing, because you end up kind of going halfway in a lot of things. You major in minor tasks type of thing. So is there sort of a couple of things that you really focus on to optimise your results, and are there things that you've kind of just eliminated from your school that you don't do, that maybe the everyday martial arts school would do?
GEORDIE: That's a good question. Things, I guess the key performance indicators are really important to see what's happening, but culture is pretty important. So I sort of look at, like I'm a little bit of a, what do I want my martial arts school to look like, as far as, is this somewhere I’d want to train, is this somewhere I’d want to do it. Sometimes that can be a mistake, because really, then you just start marketing to yourself. You know, someone who's doing martial arts for 8 years old, that's pretty tricky, because there are not too many of those other guys out there. But on the same take, you've got to sort of look and go, what do I want it to look like? What do I want it to feel like? And how do I cut those things out that I don't like?
Like, I don't do birthday parties at my club, because I don't want to do that. It’s something where I'm like, for me, it doesn't feel like it's something that I want to do, so I don't do it. But I know people who are way more successful, who do them. But it's just not the culture that I want to do. So I get success not because I don't get those people who do the birthday party to join up, but because maybe the culture that I'm trying to instil in my students is one where they feel that that's not what we do here, so they like that and they stay a bit longer. I'm not sure, I'm not sure a 100% on that, but there's little things where I know I'm doing different to a lot of other schools, but I kind of feel like that is kind of helping.
GEORGE: Hey Geordie, thanks for being on. And if… Any last words if people want to find out more about you? Where do they go?
GEORDIE: Probably Facebook would be the easiest. I'm Geordie Lavers McBain, G-E-O-R-D-I-E, Lavers McBain. I'm sure if you write the first one, the second one will turn up. Yeah, if you want to reach out, my club is called Black Dragon Kai and yeah, I really appreciate you wanting to interview me – thank you very much, you’ve had some amazing martial artists before, so to be grouped with those people, it's a bit of an honour, so thanks heaps George.
GEORGE: You're welcome. Awesome – thanks a lot Geordie and thanks Giorgio for driving us and keeping the podcast running.
GIORGIO: You're welcome!
GEORGE: All right, awesome – cheers.
Awesome. Thanks for listening. If you want to connect with another top, smart martial arts school owners, and have a chat about marketing, lead generation, what's working now, or just have a gentle rant about things that are happening in the industry, then I want to invite you to join our Facebook group.
It's a private Facebook group and in there, I share a lot of extra videos and downloads and worksheets – the things that are working for us when we help school owners grow and share a couple of video interviews and a bunch of cool extra resources.
So it's called the Martial Arts Media Business Community and an easy way to access it is, if you just go to the domain named martialartsmedia.group, so martialaartsmedia.group, g-r-o-u-p, there's no .Com or anything, martialartsmedia.group. That will take you straight there. Request to join and I will accept your invitation.
Thanks – I'll speak to you on the next episode – cheers!
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June 17, 2019 in Marketing , Podcast
80 – Discovering Your Martial Arts Student’s Inner Greatness
79 – A Different Approach To Running Self-Defence Courses For Corporates
77 – What Happens When You Have The Wrong Martial Arts Business Coach
76 – Practical Tips On How To Grow Your Martial Arts School
75 – Growing Your School With Video & Teaching Martial Arts For Special Needs (From A Wheelchair)
74 – How To Sell Your Martial Arts School Into Profit Despite A Flood Disaster
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George Fourie
Hi I'm George Fourie, the founder of MartialArtsMedia.com. When I'm not doing dad duties or training on the mats (which I manage to combine when my son is willing! :), I'm helping Martial Arts Gym owners grow their business through the power of online media.
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Trump right to rein in EPA water grab
Posted by Thomas Mitchell | Mar 9, 2017 | Editorials, Top Stories | 0
President Trump this past week signed an executive order telling the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers to review the so-called waters of the United States (WOTUS) rule created under the Obama administration, which attempted to usurp dominion over every stream, ditch, wetland or muddy hoof print that might eventually spill a few drops of water into any rivulet that might occasionally be navigable with an inner tube. “We’re going to free up our country and it’s going to be done in a very environmental and positive environmental way, I will tell you that,” Trump said. “[We will] create millions of jobs, so many jobs are delayed for so many years that it’s unfair to everybody.” Trump ordered the federal agencies to review a 2006 opinion by the late Justice Antonin Scalia, that reduced the scope of the act by defining “waters of the United States” as only permanent bodies of water and not the occasional result of rainfall. Nevada was one of 23 states to file suit over the WOTUS rule. The Supreme Court ruled this past summer that property owners had a right to sue in court over permitting decisions. The federal agencies had contended property owners could only go to court once decisions were final, but essentially argued that all permitting decisions are reviewable and potentially reversible and therefore never final.
But litigation is expensive and time consuming. Heading off the designation to begin with is a better solution.
Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt, whose office pressed the federal lawsuit on behalf of the state, said of Trump’s executive order: “The waters of the United States rule proposed by the former administration would drastically expand federal authority over state and local waters, and I am encouraged that this administration is taking action to ensure that the executive branch’s decisions are in line with congressional intent. We are pleased to see that this administration recognizes what the majority of states have already recognized — that federal rules like the waters of the United States rule must be interpreted consistently with the intent of Congress, and that specific needs of individual states must be taken into account by federal agencies like the EPA.”
In December 2010, the Hawkes Co. applied for a permit to mine peat on property in Minnesota. More than a year later the Army Corps denied the application, saying the land contained “water of the United States” because its wetlands had a “significant nexus” to the Red River of the North, located some 120 miles away. In the opinion of the court, Chief Justice John Roberts pointed out the definition of WOTUS used by the EPA and the Corps includes “land areas occasionally or regularly saturated with water — such as ‘mudflats, sandflats, wetlands, sloughs, prairie potholes, wet meadows, [and] playa lakes’ — the ‘use, degradation or destruction of which could affect interstate or foreign commerce.’ The Corps has applied that definition to assert jurisdiction over ‘270-to-300 million acres of swampy lands in the United States — including half of Alaska and an area the size of California in the lower 48 States.’” Roberts also noted that a specialized individual permit on average costs $271,596 and 788 days to complete. He said the permitting process can be “arduous, expensive, and long.” He left out futile, since the process never ends.
The Western Congressional Caucus said the EPA spurned public comment and input from the states in the rule making process, “This is nothing short of a federal seizure of state waters, to the point where very few, if any, water bodies will be left for the states to manage. Water rights, economic growth, and local conservation efforts will suffer. Instead of working with the local officials and state agencies who know their needs the best, citizens will have to depend on a disconnected federal bureaucracy for management of our most precious natural resource: our water.” Trump is to be applauded for reining in the overreach of the EPA and Corps in grabbing powers never envisioned by Congress. — TM
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France Abuses State of Emergency: Puts Citizens Under Preventive House Arrest Because They Might Protest During Climate Conference
30 Monday Nov 2015
Posted by miningawareness in Uncategorized
Abuse of State of Emergency, Africa, Climate Conference, COP21, fascism, France, Free Speech, Human Rights, Niger, Paris, state of emergency, UN, uranium mining, Vichy
Using the state of emergency declared after Paris terrorist attacks to arrest citizens who they believe might protest during the climate conference clearly violates UN Human Rights criteria which state that measures taken during a state of emergency should be “limited to the extent strictly required by the exigencies of the situation.” Already the announced duration of the state of emergency, into next year, appears excessive. Terrorist attacks are nothing new in France. Given France’s ongoing legacy of abuse in Africa (including uranium mining), along with its participation in the kidnapping of Haiti’s democratically elected president, no one should be surprised that it abuses its own people. Countries who abuse other peoples appear to abuse their own, as well.
French uranium mine in Niger
French State owned Areva’s uranium mine in Niger
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlit
One of the most bizarre things about the recently declared French State of Emergency is that the government was willing and able to search the home of an anti-nuclear activist for warning that the new French nuclear reactor could not withstand a suicide airplane attack (kami-kaze), but the French government alleged that a state of emergency was required to search the homes of terrorists. See: https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stéphane_Lhomme
Jackboots of fascism on the march again in France?
Personal flag of Philippe Pétain, (Fascist) Chief of State of (Fascist) Vichy France https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vichy_France
From: “Human Rights Committee, General Comment 29, States of Emergency (article 4), U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.11 (2001)“: “4. A fundamental requirement for any measures derogating from the Covenant, as set forth in article 4, paragraph 1, is that such measures are limited to the extent strictly required by the exigencies of the situation. This requirement relates to the duration, geographical coverage and material scope of the state of emergency and any measures of derogation resorted to because of the emergency…” [1]
From Common Dreams:
“France Puts 24 Climate Activists Under House Arrest Ahead of COP21
‘A gross abuse of power that risks turning the summit into a farce’ Published on Saturday, November 28, 2015, by Common Dreams staff
French police have placed 24 activists under ‘house arrest’ ahead of the major UN climate warming COP21 talks starting near Paris next week.
The French interior ministry said Friday the government was trying to prevent the activists from demonstrating ahead of the COP21 conference, but their lawyers and Amnesty International accused the government of abusing the ‘state of emergency’ put into effect after the Paris attacks.
Three of those arrested are accused of belonging to the “radical opposition movement”, according to Agence France Presse.
“They are banned from leaving their home town in western France without special police permission, they must report to a local police station three times a day and remain at their homes between 8:00 pm and 6:00 am until December 12, the day after the talks are due to end.”
The interior ministry says the three individuals have caused “serious disturbances to public order” in the past.
Author and climate change activist, Naomi Klein, accused the French authorities of “a gross abuse of power that risks turning the summit into a farce”.
“Climate summits are not photo opportunities to boost the popularity of politicians. Given the stakes of the climate crisis, they are by their nature highly contested. That is democracy, messy as it may be. The French government, under cover of anti-terrorism laws, seems to be trying to avoid this, shamefully banning peaceful demonstrations and using emergency powers to pre-emptively detain key activists,” Klein told the Guardian.
The activists’ lawyer, Marie Dose, said the state of emergency was being “misused” in their cases. “This is an attack on the right to demonstrate,” she said.
In the wake of the attacks in Paris that killed 130 people on November 13, the government banned all public demonstrations linked to COP21.
Stephan Oberreit, head of Amnesty International France, said the measures taken by the government were “disproportionate”.
“The systematic banning of all meetings linked to COP21 deprives critical voices of an essential outlet to express themselves,” he said in a statement. “Amnesty International believes that banning any gatherings related to the COP21 of Nov. 28 to 30, appears to be a disproportionate interference with the right to demonstrate on this subject, since the date of the rallies is closely related to the holding of the COP21.”
France’s Human Rights League (LDH) on Thursday condemned the decision to place Joel Domenjoud, a member of the legal team for the coalition of protest groups, under house arrest.
Domenjoud, a legal activist, told the Guardian that he had been served with a restraining order wrongly describing him as a “principal leader of the ultra-left movement” just hours after a judge refused to hear an appeal against the ban on the climate demo that he had petitioned for.
“I wasn’t there when they came to my house but my neighbor called me to say ‘What’s wrong? The stairs are full of cops from the first to the third floor!’” he said.
Domenjoud says he was then followed by several undercover officers, before returning home, where he was served with the restraining notice.
“I feel angry about it because I think they made a big mistake,” Domenjoud added. “They weren’t looking for people like us activists – or if they were, it shows that they can target people for no reason at all and our civil liberties are in danger.” CC-BY-SA-3.0 http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/11/28/france-puts-24-climate-activists-under-house-arrest-ahead-cop21 (Emphasis added)
Note 1: From: “Human Rights Committee, General Comment 29, States of Emergency (article 4), U.N. Doc. CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.11 (2001): “4. A fundamental requirement for any measures derogating from the Covenant, as set forth in article 4, paragraph 1, is that such measures are limited to the extent strictly required by the exigencies of the situation. This requirement relates to the duration, geographical coverage and material scope of the state of emergency and any measures of derogation resorted to because of the emergency. Derogation from some Covenant obligations in emergency situations is clearly distinct from restrictions or limitations allowed even in normal times under several provisions of the Covenant.[2] Nevertheless, the obligation to limit any derogations to those strictly required by the exigencies of the situation reflects the principle of proportionality which is common to derogation and limitation powers. Moreover, the mere fact that a permissible derogation from a specific provision may, of itself, be justified by the exigencies of the situation does not obviate the requirement that specific measures taken pursuant to the derogation must also be shown to be required by the exigencies of the situation. In practice, this will ensure that no provision of the Covenant, however validly derogated from will be entirely inapplicable to the behaviour of a State party. When considering States parties’ reports the Committee has expressed its concern over insufficient attention being paid to the principle of proportionality.[3]” http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/gencomm/hrc29.html (Emphasis our own).
“Using emergency powers, France puts climate activists under house arrest French authorities place 24 climate activists under house arrest for the duration of the Paris climate summit under precautionary pretenses, but some are calling the government’s detention of potential protesters a violation of free speech.” By Story Hinckley, Staff NOVEMBER 29, 2015 http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2015/1129/Using-emergency-powers-France-puts-climate-activists-under-house-arrest
Many thanks to Flying Cuttlefish of the Louisiana Sinkhole Bugle for the heads up: https://lasinkhole.wordpress.com
See also: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/11/29/1455079/-Thousands-Defy-Paris-Global-Climate-March-Ban-Face-Gas-Arrest-COP21
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Tag: movie
Why I won’t be seeing the movie If I Stay
I want to talk about If I Stay, the young adult book by Gayle Forman. All 231 pages rest on one question: What would you do if you had to choose?
As in, if you found yourself looking down on your comatose body after surviving a terrible car crash that kills your parents and only brother, would you want to stick around for all the ensuing pain or hightail it out of there?
When I saw a commercial for If I Stay (out Aug. 22) and Chloë Grace Moretz’s (one of my favorite young actresses) character got all weepy saying, “He wrote me a song,” my heart didn’t flutter. I thought it looked dumb and badly acted:
Like, this scene looks boring:
But maybe the book is good, I thought. OK. Nope. Not any better.
If I Stay has the potential to be good, but it’s a hugely overrated book. While wandering the hospital all corporeal and watching her loved ones talk to her broken body, the character Mia debates whether she wants to stay (and live without her family) or let herself die. You figure the author isn’t going to write a book where the message is “life isn’t that worth living,” so you know she’ll probably choose to live — but the point is more to explore the decision and all its implications. After all, who really gets to choose? Probably doesn’t happen all that often.
So she does a lot of thinking, mostly about music and her boyfriend. Her parents were rockers in their day, and her boyfriend has his own band that’s gaining popularity, but she plays the cello. Lame — or at least she thinks so. Most of her recollections deal with her doubts, not about whether her boyfriend Adam loves her but why he loves her. She can’t believe someone so cool would care about someone as plain as her. She doesn’t feel like she even belongs in her own family.
Then Adam shows up at the hospital (back to real time now), and she’s a mess. Seeing him makes her want to live, and that complicates her decision to call it quits. Because romance.
If I Stay is a pretty easy read — and it ends so abruptly you’ll be disappointed (I didn’t realize the 100 pages at the end of my version was all authory, previewy stuff). I wanted Forman to dig deeper into the question of why someone would stay (and what it means not to), but she never did. She never ventured beyond the obvious or connected all the stuff Mia thought about — music, love, family belonging, friendship — back to her final decision in a way that felt like it actually meant something.
And what about the movie line where Moretz’s character cries and smiles and says, “He wrote me a song”? Yeah, that never even happens.
So I don’t know about you, but I’m chalking this one up as another overrated YA book and skipping the theaters.
Nightmares in the jungle: a review of Catching Fire
I can only form one clear thought.
This is no place for a girl on fire.
I’m already well into reading Mockingjay, but I wanted to stop and discuss Catching Fire (spoilers!), the middle novel of The Hunger Games, which came to movie theaters this winter.
I always expect second books in trilogies to be the weakest. In Catching Fire, author Suzanne Collins turns the story in a predictable direction: a budding rebellion against the Capitol. The plot lacks as much substance as the first book, but Collins manages to surprise me by throwing main character Katniss Everdeen back in the Hunger Games with a bunch of old people and young, lethal victors from the past annual “celebrations.”
Katniss will always have a place in the Games now, but I didn’t expect to see her back in costume so soon. It’s a good twist, but not everyone will approve: The Games segment of the book is short and too similar to events we’ve already seen, and the first half to two-thirds are plodding. The romance, fake or otherwise, between Katniss and Peeta — the boy with the bread and her star-crossed “lover” — and Katniss and Gale — her childhood friend and fellow hunter — is more prominent in this novel (that’s good or bad, depending on what you were hoping for) although Collins thankfully grounds it in the grim reality of their situation. In the Games or in District 12, every move Katniss makes still puts her life and the lives of others in jeopardy.
So Catching Fire is lighter on content than the first book. There are some beautiful or dramatic moments involving a wedding gown, Katniss’s lead stylist (Cinna), and her competitors — and supposed allies — in the Games. I found the story absorbing though maybe that was because the romance was so juicy, but I also liked Katniss’s opponents more this time around. They’re a lot more striking: Johanna, who strips and trains naked (the actress for her in the movie, Jena Malone, is perfect); Finnick, charming and arrogant and deadly in the water and on land, who becomes one of my favorite new characters; and the intelligent and weird “Nuts” and “Volts,” to name a few. I also liked all the environmental traps in the arena even if they felt contrived (monkeys, blood rain, etc.), like Collins was just dropping obstacles in there to pad out the Games (not that the wall of fire from book one was ever particularly clever or original). The characters’ interactions are what make the battle royale interesting, not anything the Gamemakers throw at them — although I did think the jungle and clock theme were fun.
I spent a good amount of time during my read-through thinking about Peeta and Gale and whom, if either, Katniss is better off with. I don’t think it’s fair that she should be forced into a romance when marriage and kids and love are the last things on her mind. But for her, these relationships are still happening — unwillingly and as much out of necessity as natural desire. Her survival in the Games depends on how well she and Peeta can put on a “show” for the audience, but they’re also thrust together privately through their mutual situation. They comfort each other when they’re tormented by nightmares; their trust in each other is strong because of the Games — and that bond, formed through the preservation of their own mortality, is much more intense than that between her and Gale. Those two only tasted a small measure of danger in the woods outside District 12. Their reading of each other’s body language is much more intimate as hunters, and perhaps their world view is more similar, but Katniss never expressed a love for Gale whereas with Peeta, she feels gratitude and admiration — for the eloquence of his words, for his optimism. For saving her life time and again. For understanding what it’s like to survive the Games because he was there with her.
I don’t know how the trilogy will end, but I’m hoping Katniss gets to be with Peeta. What started as distrust and confusion and a sickly sweet performance has morphed into genuine affection, friendship, and more. They sleep soundly next to one another. She notices his hands as they work on a painting or drawing, like a lover would. And that’s all because of the nightmare they went through in their first Hunger Games. Sometimes, life is funny that way.
Reading the game: who else loves Mortal Kombat?
People seemed to respond well to my previous article about the selection of Uncharted books and comics available, so I thought I’d do the same with another video game I reviewed recently, Mortal Kombat Komplete Edition. Since the early nineties, Mortal Kombat has developed a negative reputation for its violence and gore, and … let’s just say the Komplete Edition, which packs in the DLC from last year’s Mortal Kombat 9 for the same retail price, doesn’t help matters—especially not with its up-close and gruesome X-ray moves, which show back-breaking and skull-slamming from the inside out.
I like fighting games (Guilty Gear in particular), but I never really got into Mortal Kombat. I rented Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe from Midway Games and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment (WBIE) back in 2008 because of my interest in comic books, but that wasn’t exactly the best representation of Mortal Kombat, and it didn’t make me a fan of the series to say the least. On the other hand, the new Mortal Kombat is arguably the best representation one could hope for, so I’ve seen both the ugly and beautiful sides of the game.
Anyway, since I was reviewing the game for a website, I had to do a lot of playing when MK isn’t normally my game of choice. Because the game’s story retells the events of the first three games, Mortal Kombat is a perfect introduction to the series. And it helps that the game is just GOOD.
Now on to some reading! I dug up these books for all the MK fans out there.
Mortal Kombat by Jeff Rovin
Publisher: Berkley
This one’s an oldie and definitely out of print, but it shouldn’t be difficult to track down online. Considering the live-action movie came out in 1995, this is no doubt closely tied with the New Lines film. Rovin himself was an assistant editor at DC Comics in the ’70s. One of his other novels, Tom Clancy’s Op-Center: War of Eagles, became a New York Times bestseller.
Mortal Kombat: A Novel by Martin Delrio
Publisher: Tor Books
Delrio’s book was a direct novelization of the movie. Apparently “Martin Delrio” is a pseudonym for not one, but two people: James D. MacDonald and his wife, Debra Doyle. The adaptation contains images from the movie. MacDonald assumed many different names and wrote the Circle of Magic (not to be confused with the books by Tamora Pierce) and Mageworld series.
Mortal Kombat: Annihilation by Jerome Preisler
Publication Date: November 1997
Preisler’s book served as a novelization of the second Mortal Kombat film, which released in 1997 along with the book. The author has written CSI and Tom Clancy books, most notably.
Also, somebody was crazy enough to put some of these books online, so you can read those for free. Amazingly, the author of the webpage provides different formats for each book, including .MOBI files and PDF.
Mortal Kombat: The Movie: Behind the Scenes by Michael Goldman and Richard Aaron
Publisher: Prima Lifestyles
This companion to the original film might actually be worth a look for nostalgia’s sake. The book documents the special effects, plot, and cast of the movie along with 100 stills. Richard Aaron handled photography for Mortal Kombat and other media productions, and Michael R. Goldman worked as a feature editor and staff writer for Daily Variety at the time and contributed to several science fiction publications.
Beyond Barbie and Mortal Kombat: New Perspectives on Gender and Gaming by Yasmin B. Kafai, et al.
Publisher: The MIT Press
You can tell by the title that this is a collection of essays, written by a number of contributors, so Mortal Kombat is only one topic of discussion—and unfortunately, I’m not sure how much of that discourse it represents. I’m getting the sense that the book is more about the medium’s response to women, in games and out of them, and less about Mortal Kombat itself, an implication that’s already been made based on the key word “beyond” in the title. So I can’t say that this is the perfect read for MK fans, but I thought it was interesting nonetheless and wanted to throw it out there. After all, Mortal Kombat has a lot of scantily clad women. I’m not even sure how some of their outfits stay on. Especially Mileena’s …
What Mortal Kombat books do you recommend?
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On Tuesday, a bill regulating the licensing, education and requirements to be a private investigator passed out of the House Governmental Affairs Committee. “HB80 will for the first time provide licensure for private investigators in Alabama,” said the bill’s sponsor Rep. Dr. Jim McClendon (R-Springville).
The House worked off of a ten minute calendar on Thursday, passing a number of non-controversial bills which have now gone to the Senate.
-Approved a bill that would provide tax credits to businesses that invest in or locate in low income or impoverished areas.
-Passed a bill that requires a victim or the victim’s family to be notified before the defendant is given youthful offender status in a case involving death or serious injury to the victim.
-Approved a bill that would allow Alabama National Guard members to pay in-state tuition when attending state colleges.
-Passed a bill that allows active or retired military service members to visit Alabama state parks free of charge on state or federal holidays.
-Debated, but did not vote on a bill to make it a crime to fail to report the death of a child or that a child is missing.
-HB238 passed the House on a unanimous vote. The Bill doubles the distance from which protesters can demonstrate at funerals. The bill would move protesters 1,000 feet away from funeral sites, up from 500 feet. The sponsor, Rep. Duwayne Bridges said the bill was inspired by the activities of Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., which sends protesters to funerals of military personnel and others.
- Democrats blocked a vote on Tuesday on a bill that would provide public school teachers with $300 per year to purchase school supplies, saying the amount was not enough. A vote was taken on Thursday and passed. Goes to the House
-Began debating bills on whether to continue certain state agencies and boards. Voted to continue the Public Service Commission. Goes to House.
-Senate Constitution, Campaign Finance, Ethics and Elections Committee approved a proposed constitutional amendment to authorize the Ten Commandments to be displayed on state property and at public schools. Goes to Senate.
—Senate Confirmation Committee approved the nomination of Jimmy Sanford to serve on Auburn University Board of Trustees. Goes to Senate for confirmation.
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Culture John McDermott November 27, 2017
A Conversation With Chuck Palahniuk, the Author of ‘Fight Club’ and the Man Behind Tyler Durden
It’s been more than 20 years since Chuck Palahniuk first unleashed Fight Club on the world and simultaneously inspired legions of impressionable young men and appalled their parents. But the themes Palahniuk explored in that book — the emasculation of late-capitalism and the creeping sense of worthlessness and dread that accompanies it — seems more relevant now than it did even back then. Modern men find themselves in a precarious position, where masculinity itself is being (justifiably) re-evaluated, and in some cases, derided as the source of all society’s ills. And many of them are facing the troubling realization that they will never be as successful as their parents.
In response, a substantial number of them have dug in to oppose that evolution — men who seem to worship at the altar of Tyler Durden, the Fight Club character who was a paragon of unfettered, unapologetic machismo. If Durden were alive today, he wouldn’t inspire Project Mayhem — he’d be wearing a MAGA hat, leading a group of disaffected young men through the streets with pitchforks and staging #GamerGate-esque online harassment campaigns.
And so, Fight Club seems to be a rallying cry for their anger.
MEL recently spoke with Palahniuk about the book’s influence on the toxic ideologies that have taken hold in our culture today; why he thinks another kind of toxic ideology — toxic masculinity — doesn’t exist; the meaning of Harvey Weinstein, Joseph Campbell and John Lennon’s assassination; and how he coined the derogatory term “snowflake.”
A lot of the things you wrote about in Fight Club and revisit in Fight Club 2 seem even more pertinent today than when you originally wrote them more than 20 years ago. Specifically, the disillusionment of men who haven’t radicalized but have adopted radical ideologies and the infantilization of the modern workplace. You were able to see the seeds of what has now grown into these very toxic elements in our culture.
In Slaughterhouse-Five, there’s a comment about how many people are being born every day. Someone else responds by saying, “And I suppose they’re all going to want dignity and respect.” This dovetails into a grueling dread that I felt as a younger person — that status and recognition would always be beyond my reach. I think subsequent generations, larger generations, are coming up against that same realization: That despite their expectations, they might never receive any kind of status. And they’re willing to do whatever it takes at this point to make their mark in the world.
It seems like a lot of these movements, though, have seized on the ideas expressed in Fight Club. They’ve co-opted these things that you wrote about and made it a part of their own ideologies. Do you feel any regrets or resentment about this? Or better put, how does it make you feel when you see men’s rights activists on Reddit quoting your work to rationalize the terrible shit they say online?
I feel a little frustrated that our culture hasn’t given these men a wider selection of narratives to choose from. Really, the only narratives they go to are The Matrix and Fight Club.
Yes, they get red pilled and then they look at Tyler Durden as the platonic ideal.
Exactly. Almost all the narratives being sold in our culture take place in this established, very static sense of reality. We have very few narratives that question reality and give people a way to step outside of it and establish something new. So far, the only two things are The Matrix and Fight Club. I feel bad that people have such slim pickings to choose from.
But it almost sounds like you have a certain level of sympathy for these guys as well.
I have sympathy in that I was young a long time ago. And I know the terror of worrying that my life wasn’t going to amount to anything — that I wouldn’t be able to establish a home or create a career for myself. I can totally empathize with that panicked place young people are in.
What are your politics?
My politics are about empowering the individual and allowing the individual to make what they see as the best choice. That’s all Fight Club was about. It was a lot of psychodrama and gestalt exercises that would empower each person. Then, ideally, each person would leave Fight Club and go on to live whatever their dream was — that they would have a sense of potential and ability they could carry into whatever it was they wanted to achieve in the world. It wasn’t about perpetuating Fight Club itself.
Have people come to you and said, “Fight Club helped me realize my potential”?
In a lot of different ways. Many people decided to, as a permission through nihilism, to go ahead and do the thing that they’ve dreamt of doing. And a lot of fathers and sons were able to connect to this story and express their frustration about what little parenting they themselves got from their fathers.
A lot of people think of you as a nihilist. Do you bristle at that label?
You know, I am kind of a nihilist, but I’m not a depressive nihilist. I’m a nihilist who says that if nothing inherently means anything, we have the choice to do whatever it is we dream of doing.
You’ve been known to go after some of your critics throughout your career. Is that something you wish you hadn’t done in retrospect?
I willingly did it twice. And they were both instances very early in my career. I’ve never done it otherwise, so I can forgive myself for maybe taking actions I shouldn’t have taken. But what the hell? I had to learn.
This was before social media had taken off, too, and everyone was a critic. What is it like now when everyone can either directly give you praise or tell you what a terrible writer you are and how you should go die in a fire?
You have to completely ignore it. Because if it’s all praise, it just gets you high and that’s not healthy. And if it’s all criticism, it just gets you depressed and that’s not healthy. So I ignore it as much as I possibly can. And the people who bring me the news, I know those people aren’t my friends. It’s like Nora Ephron, one of my favorite writers, once wrote: It takes two people to hurt you — one person to actually say or do the thing, and a second person to tell you that this thing has been done against you.
Both Fight Club and Choke have been made into movies. Did you take any issue with the film versions?
No. You know, there is no point. The book will always be there. The film needs to be its own thing; it’s a different medium. It needs to express itself through different aspects of this story. So you can’t expect the film to be completely the book.
But with Fight Club specifically, there were so many people who got rich and famous and whose entire careers were changed by that movie. I mean, David Fincher became one of the biggest directors in Hollywood afterwards. Is there any type of resentment that people are dining out on this thing that you created and that maybe your role in it has been lost somewhat?
Not in the slightest. Because when that movie came out, it was an enormous failure. It was a failure in a way that Blade Runner was initially a failure. It was out of release within maybe two weeks and considered a massive massive tank. Pretty much everyone associated with the movie lost their jobs. It took a year or two of putting together the meticulous DVD to dig that movie back into profitability.
Earlier, you mentioned the terror you experienced as a young man about maybe never being successful. But now that you are successful — and I imagine successful beyond your wildest dreams — are you fulfilled? Or do you have the same sense of dread?
I’m very fulfilled. Because I get to work with many gifted creative and passionate people. That’s great because we all want to live our lives in the company of other people who love what they’re doing. There’s no better life than that. On the other hand, I’ve started to teach because I do want to be back in touch with what it was like to be that kid who couldn’t write a great story. I want to be able to be with those people until they break through and can write something fantastic.
I ask because in Fight Club 2, we find that the narrator has successfully put his Tyler Durden alter ego to the side. He got married and had a kid and is living the American dream in his house in suburbia. But he’s deeply unfulfilled. He worries his wife doesn’t love him, and he’s worried his kid doesn’t respect him. So Tyler Durden starts popping back up. To me, that seemed to express that there’s a certain hollowness or lack of fulfillment in achieving what you want.
It’s funny, it isn’t the process of getting stuff, it’s the stuff itself that becomes the anchor. It’s buy the house, buy the car and then what? It’s that isolated stasis that’s the unfulfilling part you ultimately have to destroy.
That’s the American pattern — you achieve a success that allows you isolation. Then you do something subconsciously to destroy the circumstance because you can come down into community after that. Maybe you’ve got this great career where you can do whatever you want, but on the side, you’re sexually harassing and assaulting women. You’re doing something that’s going to force you out of the isolation of success. It’s going to push you back into the community with other people. We like to move between isolation and community and back to isolation again.
Are you referencing Harvey Weinstein specifically?
Well, whether it’s Weinstein or successful people who abuse drugs or have affairs like Tiger Woods, people always create the circumstances along the way that will destroy the pedestal that they’ve found themselves on. Then they can come back to earth and just be a person among people. Lance Armstrong is another good example.
So more of a self-destructive impulse. But is there any way to keep those two things in balance? Can those two things co-exist as a part of a man’s personality? Or are they irreconcilable?
Can you build a house on a plot of land without tearing down the house that’s already there? I think it’s inaccurate to call it self-destructive. In a way, it’s a different form of self-improvement or a different form of creativity. That act of demolition in order to replace the thing with a more profound and better thing.
In the book, you also seem to portray suburbia as an affront to masculinity and manhood itself. Do you personally feel that way? I know you’re an outdoorsman and live in a rural area. Is that something that you seek out to maintain your edge?
That’s a tough one. Because I’m not so much talking about suburbia as I am talking about this self-isolation that goes back to the whole snowflake metaphor where we’re taught that we’re special and hyper-individualized by being told that we’re unique and innately a treasure. It’s that idea of ourselves as different that drives us apart from one another. It was only once I realized, No, actually, all of us have far more in common than we have differences, and I’m not a snowflake, that I recognized myself in other people. That’s when I started to write about myself as part of a larger pattern of a larger experience.
“Snowflake” is an interesting word. It’s what Tyler Durden uses to tell men that they’re not unique or special. But now it’s been coopted by the alt-right as their favorite epithet of liberals and people who have no toughness. Which gets back to what we were talking about before…
You know, you want people to adopt the thing. You want to put the book in the movie producer’s hand and have them adopt it like a baby, raise it and put a huge amount of energy into it. In doing so, the movie producer is going to change it so that it reflects the movie producer’s experience. And once that material passes on to an audience, the audience adopts it. It will become the child of the audience and will serve whatever purpose the audience has for it. It would be insane to think that the author could control every iteration or every interpretation of their work.
So you just feel like an innocent bystander to how it’s being used? You don’t feel any type of feeling either way — good or bad?
No, I do not. You know, it’s like J.D. Salinger, Catcher in the Rye and the death of John Lennon. I don’t think Salinger felt huge remorse that he’d written a fantastic book, and this book was interpreted by a damaged person. Nor do I think it was Salinger’s fault.
There’s one passage in Fight Club 2 that I found particularly interesting. You write, “Throughout childhood, people tell you to be less sensitive. Adulthood begins the moment someone tells you that you need to be more sensitive.” Is that something that you’ve specifically had to work on as you’ve grown older?
Oh, hell yeah. It’s one of those little truisms. You have so many people telling you, “Don’t be so sensitive.” Then, suddenly one day, it turns around.
You seem very soft and gentle over the phone, I’m surprised that the man who wrote Fight Club seems so tender in his voice.
I’m a much older man now too. Fight Club was 20 years ago for me.
It seems like you’re saying that you’ve released a lot of the rage you had as a young man.
I was going through a huge disillusionment. I’d been a really good student. I kept my nose clean. I followed this blueprint society had presented to me that said that if I did all these things — get my degree, pay back my student loans and work very hard — eventually I’d achieve some sort of satisfying success.
But it just wasn’t working. Around the age of 30, all of that good boy stuff starts to fall apart. You have to make a choice as to whether you’re going to continue along that road, or whether you’re going to veer off that road and find ways to succeed you weren’t taught. That’s where I was. I was really disillusioned that I’d been given the same roadmap everyone else was given, but that none of us were finding it effective.
We hear the term “toxic masculinity” a lot these days. As someone who writes a lot about manhood, what does it mean to you?
Oh boy, I’m not sure if I really believe in it.
It seems like a label put on a certain type of behavior from the outside. It’s just such a vague term that it’s hard to address.
Let me take the opposite approach then: Who would be the male role model in today’s culture? Is there somebody who young men have to look up to as the ideal man and is someone who I should aspire to be like?
Joseph Campbell said that beyond a person’s biological father, people needed a secondary father — especially men. Typically that was a teacher, coach, military officer or priest. But it would be someone who isn’t the biological father but would take the adolescent and coach him into manhood from that point. The problem is that so many of these secondary fathers are being brought down in recent history. Sports coaches have become stigmatized. Priests have become pariahs. For whatever reason, men are leaving teaching. And so, many of these secondary fathers are disappearing altogether. When that happens, what are we left with? Are these children or young men ever going to grow up?
Is that what you fear — that we’re going to have a generation of young men who have never been fully socialized? Who have never been fully taught, not just how to be men, but how to be fully realized people?
I’m not afraid that it won’t happen, because it’s gonna happen. One of the things that I loved about Campbell is that he explained gangs by saying this is what happens when there’s no secondary father. These gangs are taking young men and giving them impossible tasks, giving them praise and rewards and coaching them to an adulthood. But it’s a negative adulthood. And so, as these secondary fathers disappear for everyone, there will be similar forms that will appear and fulfill that function. But they will coach these young men to maybe more negative manhoods.
Yet it also seems like there’s a lack of universally accepted male role models at the national level. There’s no Frank Sinatra or Hugh Hefner anymore — no one who, for better or worse, everyone looks up to. Do you think I’m wrong in that assessment?
I think you’re wrong in that these were maybe not the healthiest male role models to model yourself after. I prefer to think of someone like John Glenn.
Okay, I’ll buy that. Is there a modern-day John Glenn?
Maybe not on the big, big level that everyone can emulate. But I think that on a more local level, there are teachers who mentor students. The man who taught me minimalist writing, Tom Spanbauer, was very much the master of this workshop of students. And among his apprentices — the people who could produce work that was marketable — bought their way out of his workshop. They achieved a mastery of their own. I’d like to see more of that happening. Instead of people just being given grades and being given loans to repay. I’d like to see them actually demonstrate a mastery in something useful in this kind of apprentice/mentor student role.
You’ve experienced a lot of death in your life and even volunteered at a hospice for a time. Why were you drawn to something so morbid?
It panicked me as a young person to first get a sense of my mortality — that at some point, I was going to be called upon to die. Because I had no idea what it was like to die. By working at a hospice, I was able to see what the process was like — that some people die beautifully and some people die horribly, but that if they could do it, I could do it, too. It gave me a greater sense of ease around the inevitability of dying.
Later in life, your father was murdered by the ex-husband of his new girlfriend. When something that terrible and seemingly random happens, how do you try to make sense of it?
By using my journalism degree. By going to the trials and talking about all the details. By understanding moment by moment everything that took place. And by establishing a sense of, not quite control, but a sense of having mastered the narrative of what led to what.
On another strange and inevitable level, my father had almost been killed as a child. His father had become very upset and killed his mother and himself. But he also tried to kill my father. He just gave up searching for him before he committed suicide. When my father was finally killed by this woman’s ex-husband all these years later, a mattress fell on top of his body as the building he was in burned. The mattress is what preserved his body well enough that they could identify him as my father. Crazy enough, the reason my father survived as a child when his father went insane was that he had hidden underneath a mattress.
There were so many coincidences like that. So in a way, my father’s death seemed like this perfect circle back to this past event actually coming to fruition. There were just too many odd coincidences to completely ignore them all.
And yet, despite all these coincidences, you still identify as a nihilist? Something like that is uncanny. It almost seems otherworldly that there would be that many parallels.
There’s a choice — you can either identify as a nihilist, or you can try to impose your own belief system on something you don’t understand. The latter option says more about controlling other people, and I prefer not to do that. I’d rather work from a position of nihilism, because I think that’s the best base for creativity and play.
Still, you needed to process your father’s murder as a story and have some control of it in order to get past it.
I treat storytelling as a digestive function. You ruminate like a chewing animal. And you chew a story over and over again until it has absolutely no emotional reaction, and you’ve resolved your emotional reaction to it. First by distancing it as a craft exercise — by turning it into a story — that’s one step. But the big step is to tell that story over and over again until you’ve completely assimilated the event into your identity, and you’ve exhausted your emotional reaction. You are no longer used by the story; you’re using the story at that point.
You also supported your father’s killer being sentenced to death, a sentence that ended up getting commuted. I can’t imagine you arrived at that conclusion lightly.
Some of the officials showed me documents from this man’s lifetime of incarceration. It was unethical, maybe even illegal, but there were a long string of things that he’d been convicted of doing since childhood. This man had created so much pain and had destroyed so many people’s lives that it just seemed like the cleanest way of resolving his life.
What was the most important thing that your dad taught you?
When I was little, we lived out in the country and had this chopping block where we killed chickens. My father had told me not to put metal washers over my fingers and get them stuck. But I did it anyway. The washer got stuck, and my finger turned black. I went to my father, and he said, “We’re going to have to cut this off.” It was completely clear to me that it was my fault, that there was a price to pay and that my father was doing me a favor by washing my finger and putting rubbing alcohol on the axe so it would be sterile.
When we got to the chopping block, my father had me kneel down and put my finger on it. Then, he swung the axe and missed by an inch. Afterward, he took me inside and took the washer off with soap and water. But in that moment, I was very clear — and I’ve been very clear since — that if things are going to happen in my life, I’m gonna have to make them happen — and if they don’t happen, I’m going to have to take responsibility.
That’s one parenting technique…
He was like a 22-year-old guy. So I don’t want to be too hard on him.
That’s very gracious of you. Nowadays, someone would call DCFS if something like that happened.
Again, he was a 22-year-old guy whose father had killed himself and his mother in a murder suicide. He’d been beaten as a child and had grown up to the best of his abilities. He had no parenting skills. I think he did a marvelous job when you consider his circumstances.
Aside from your father’s murder, the other big element of your personal life that’s become public is your sexuality. You didn’t, however, come out until 2003. And, in fact, even gave the impression that you were married to a woman. Why?
Because of my partner. He doesn’t want to be a public person. And the next question they ask you after coming out is, “Who are you with?” So I chose not to go down that road. For the same reasons so many celebrities will refuse to talk about their children — they don’t want to make their children into public figures.
If you were to start your career today, would you be more willing to come out? I imagine it would be much easier now socially speaking.
I’d probably do it exactly the opposite way. I’d say no picture on the book. I’d use a pseudonym like the author of The Hunger Games. I’d refuse to do any kind of public relations. I’d keep myself entirely out of the process.
Because I’d like the work to stand on its own and to be judged on its own. I’ve become exhausted with the constant explanation of the work, which I don’t think is necessary. Too much of the presence of the author can get between the reader and the story. Afterwards, the reader will no longer see themselves in the story; they will see too much of the author.
That’s interesting because there’s a certain kind of bro-y, straight white guy who really loves the Fight Club movie — and the book if they happen to read it. I imagine that they’re a little surprised when they find out the author is gay. Would you consider that accurate?
They are, and they aren’t. I don’t think it’s a big deal. I also wrote Invisible Monsters, which gay guys love as well as straight women because it’s all about that panicky feeling that this beautiful thing isn’t going to be beautiful forever and that you’ve got to transition that beauty into a different, more lasting form of power. That’s something so many beautiful women face and why people really attach to Invisible Monsters. And so, I think that by the time that book came out, I had such a variety of books in the world that the particulars about me were less important.
You’re really downplaying your own role in this. You don’t take pride in the fact that people really resonate with your work and want to discuss it with you?
That’s because my degree is in journalism. My job is to listen to people at parties and to identify their stories and to find a commonality in the pattern between them. Because when someone tells an anecdote that goes over well, it evokes other people to tell almost identical anecdotes from their own life. Then you choose the very best of these to demonstrate a very human dynamic. In a way, what I do isn’t so much invent things as it is identifying them. Later, I just put them together in a report that looks like a novel.
You think of your fiction as reporting?
It is. I have so little imagination. But I have so much admiration when I hear a great story from someone — the journalist in me wants to preserve it, archive it and honor it in some way.
Not long ago, we were talking about male role models, but it just dawned on me that I never asked you who yours was when you were growing up.
Dr. Christiaan Barnard. He was a heart transplant surgeon in South Africa. There was an article about him in a magazine when I was a small child, and something about him just completely captivated my attention.
Do you know what it was exactly?
The idea that he had dedicated his life to heart transplant research but that he had developed arthritis so severe that he could no longer do the work himself. That seemed like such a tragedy and made him infinitely more appealing.
How Men Treat Women They Find Unfuckable
Male Indifference in ‘Midsommar’ Is the Movie’s Real Horror
Tighty-Whities and the Women Who Hate Them
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Can Turkish Relations Be Repaired And Help?
Posted by Tim Upham on January 11, 2013 at 7:33am in Israel and Palestine
Israel had the closest relations in Dar al-Islam (The Abode of Islam) with Turkey, in fact the two countries did joint naval maneuvers with each other in the Mediterranean Sea off the Syrian coast. Until on May 31, 2010, when the "Mavi Marmara" a Turkish flagged ship was trying to run a blockade on Gaza, and ended up being stormed by Israeli commandos. During this operation 10 civilians were killed, and Turkey protested over the brutality of this military operation. Ankara withdrew its ambassador from Israel, and in September Israel's ambassador to Turkey was expelled. The number of Turkish tourists to Israel, and Israeli tourists to Turkey dropped off. It seemed as though the Israeli-Turkish love affair was dead. But completely? Several opposition Turkish lawmakers protested to Turkish Prime Recep Tayyip Erdogan over this action, and thought it was too extreme. But strangely enough Israeli-Turkish trade increased. In 2011, Israel exported U.S. $4 billion dollars worth of commodities to Turkey, which exceeded what Israel exported to Canada. In 2013, it is forecasted to be U.S. $5 billion dollars. Turkey has exported U.S. $2.3 billion dollars worth of commodities to Israel, making Israel the sixth largest customer of Turkey. But earlier in May 2010, Turkish President Abdullah Gul called upon Hamas to recognize the State of Israel, and has never retracted it. Hamas did announce that they would recognize the pre-1967 borders though. With the recently discovered Tamar natural gas fields in the Mediterranean Sea, Turkey has requested being a customer for this Israeli natural gas. But one thing that could pull Israel and Turkey closer together is that the Turkish Government announced that it will get into dialogue with the Kurdistan Workers' Party. Sectarian violence between Turks and Kurds has taken 40,000 lives, and several key Kurdish opposition leaders are in Turkish prisons. Abdullah Ocalan is one of the founding members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, and is currently serving a prison sentence on an island prison in the Marmara Sea (that name again, Marmara). The Kurdistan Workers' Party originally was fighting for independence from Turkey, but they changed their campaign to be based on either autonomy or to make Turkey into a federation. But most important of all, human rights for Kurds in Turkey, such as use of their language -- the Kurds speak two dialects in Turkey, Kurmanji and Zaza -- to be spoken openly in public, used in media and education. Currently, Kurdish is allowed to be used in courtrooms, and in private schools. Legalization of Kurdish political parties such as the Kurdistan Workers's Party and the Democratic Society Party, and granting amnesty to Kurdish lawmakers banned from politics. It will be interesting to see how this dialogue between the Turkish Government and Kurdish renegades progresses, and if this progression can help resurrect the Oslo Accords between Israelis and Palestinians, which caused the Turkish-Israeli rift in the first place. But if Turkey can progress on this, and Israelis and Palestinians can move forward with the Oslo Accords, then the relationship between Israel and Turkey will no longer be one of two nation-states meddling into each others affairs, but two nation-states that can say to each other "this is what we able to resolve and accomplish."
Permalink Reply by David Friedfeld on February 4, 2013 at 8:19am
I know this one started with a discussion on Turkish-Israeli relations, and it has gone all over the ME.
In your post above , you mentioned Jordan and King Abdullah. Below is a recent article from the Jordan Times. We all know that Jordan has a peace treaty with Israel, and in fact, Jordan and Israel had reasonablly good relations even before the peace treaty ( albeit secretly between leadership) .
Take read of the article, and ask yourself----how can we influence "the street" in various Arab countries to respect and engage with the peace initiatives of their leaders. I am sorely disappointed by what I have just read.
AMMAN — Jordanian cartoonist Naser Al Jafari, who won third place in an international award on political cartoons on Sunday said he rejected the prize because it is “funded by a pro-Israel cartoonist”.
Jafari, who works as a cartoonist at Al Ghad daily, won the $3,000 third prize in the 2012 United Nations/Ranan Lurie International Political Cartoon Award.
Jafari, who applied for the award in October last year, said he received some papers and a cheque by mail in early January informing him that he won third place.
“The cheque I received was signed by Lurie himself. Then I did some research about him and asked colleagues in the profession about him and discovered that he has connections with the Zionist entity [Israel],” Jafari told The Jordan Times.
“I refused to accept the award because it is funded by Lurie who is known for supporting the Zionist entity and has a history of dealing with the Zionist movement. I cannot accept an award from such a person,” the cartoonist said, adding that “Lurie has never condemned any of Israel’s practices against the Palestinians”.
“Although this is a UN award that is judged by international experts, when I realised it is funded by someone who is pro-Israel, I decided to refuse it,” Jafari added.
The UN established this award “to promote the highest standard of excellence in political cartoons depicting the spirit of the United Nations”, according to a statement on the prize’s official website
“We have named this award after Mr Lurie, as we find that his political cartoons epitomise the high standards that we at the United Nations would like to see,” the statement added.
Lurie has been nominated by Cyprus for the Nobel Peace Prize, and has appeared in the Guinness Book of World Records for 20 consecutive years as “the most widely syndicated political cartoonist in the world”, according to the website.
“As of July 1998, his work was published in 103 countries in 1,105 newspapers with a total circulation of 104 million copies.”
Jafari, a recipient of several local and Arab awards, said he sent back the documents he received along with the cheque and two statements in Arabic and English explaining why he rejected the award to the organisers a few days ago.
The cartoonist said the Jordan Engineers Association honoured him recently for rejecting the prize and launched an annual award named after him to support excelling media professionals who fight for and support Jerusalem and the Palestinian issue through their words or cartoons.
In Jordan, which is the second country in the region after Egypt that has signed a peace treaty with Israel, professional associations oppose normalisation of relations with Israel.
Permalink Reply by Tim Upham on February 4, 2013 at 8:37am
It goes both ways. Business between Israel and Jordan has been a growing phenomenon. But it obviously has not reached these professional associations in Jordan yet. Also, the Jordanian Ministry of Tourism issued a statement asking Israeli tourists coming to Jordan not to wear "Jewish dress." What has Jordan's Minister of Tourism been watching "Fiddler on the Roof?" These all are pretty prejudices that need to be broken down. Prejudices that both Jews and Arab have for each other, are as deep rooted as it was in the United States between black and white. The Civil Rights Act become law in 1964, but how long did it actually take for black-white prejudice to be broken down?
Permalink Reply by Tim Upham on February 27, 2013 at 5:06am
The Turkish Government and the Kurdistan Workers' Party hope to reach a peace deal by Nowruz on March 21st. I will drink a cup of chai to that. If the Turks and Kurds can do it, then so can the Israelis and Palestinians. But Mousa Abu Marzook said that Hamas will recognize the pre-1967 borders, but not what is beyond it. To bad Obama cannot have a meeting with him, to think differently.
Permalink Reply by Tim Upham on March 3, 2013 at 6:32pm
Israel and Turkey were having joint naval maneuvers together during the 1990's, long after the Soviet Union ceased to exist. This was alarming Syria when this was done. But now Prime Minister Erdogan wants peace with the Kurds -- another Muslim people. In fact, he was quoted as saying he "would drink poison to have peace with the Kurds." Peace between the Turkish Government and the Kurdistan Workers' Party, is going to be as difficult to nail down as Israeli-Palestinian peace. The Kurds are hoping to reach a peace deal with the Turkish Government by Nowruz -- March 21st. The only thing I can say is if that happens, then it will definitely be a Happy Nowruz.
Permalink Reply by Ece Koc on March 22, 2013 at 6:53pm
http://www.jpost.com/International/Obama-Netanyahu-Erdogan-speak-by...
Very important progress. I hope that things will get better between Turkey and Israel. It is a very good start.
Permalink Reply by Tim Upham on March 22, 2013 at 7:12pm
Israeli exports to Turkey will reach U.S. $5 billion dollars this year. Turkey will be surpassing Canada, in the amount that Israel exports to. A great deal of this will be due to Turkey requesting to be a customer of Israeli natural gas out of Israel's share of the Tamar natural gas fields. So the increased trade between the two nations, will help to foster better relations. When I was at Ben-Gurion Airport in 2006, I saw a great deal of Turkish tourists coming in there. So hopefully, tourism between the two countries will return to previous levels. There is no reason why relations between Israel and Turkey cannot return back to pre-2010 levels. Both nations have some tough nuts to crack. Turkey has cracked on of them, by establishing peace with the Kurds. But the toughest nut for both of them, is Israel to be able to establish peace with the Palestinians, and for Turkey to go back into its past and admit to the Armenian Genocide. At a luncheon one time to the Turkish ambassador to the United States, I brought that up, and the man about grabbed me by the throat. But with all of the archives I have gone though in Washington, D.C., London, and Jerusalem, I could not just sit there and not say anything. It is like Israel establishing peace with the Palestinians, with what I have seen in Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza, I just cannot say nothing.
Permalink Reply by Tim Upham on April 13, 2013 at 10:56pm
The Turkish newspaper "Radika" just published a poll that was conducted in the city of Adana. In this poll, 70% of all teachers and students strongly believe that if given the opportunity, that Jews, Armenians, and Greeks could hurt the country.
Permalink Reply by Eyal Raviv on April 19, 2013 at 12:03pm
This discussion is recommended in today's recommendations: http://mepeace.org/profiles/blogs/mepeace-recommendations-april-19
In light recent developments - what has changed?
Permalink Reply by Tim Upham on April 19, 2013 at 8:26pm
Personally, I am seeing changes in the Turkish press. I am seeing it become more open. "Zaman" a daily newspaper in Turkey, had an article about a women's bureau of the ruling Justice and Development Party, putting up a large in sign in Hebrew, claiming they have always been welcoming to Jews, Greeks, and Armenians. I responded back to the newspaper, saying Turkey has something to gain by having good relations with Israel and Greece. I also mentioned that Turkey can clears its conscience by admitting to the Armenian Genocide of World War I. For "Zaman" published it on-line. The first time I had mentioned the Armenian Genocide to a Turkish publication, and they printed it. As for relations with Israel, Israeli exports to Turkey this year will be a record U.S. $5 billion dollars worth, and tourism is starting to return back to the pre-2011 levels. The next move with be if the Turkish and Israeli navies can do joint maneuvers again. Turkish President Abdullah Gul has called upon Hamas to recognize the State of Israel, but it is hoped that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan can do the same, especially on his upcoming trip to Gaza. "The Times of Israel" had a story on the revitalization of a Ladino publication in Istanbul. This is symbolic to me, because my mother spoke Ladino when she was growing up. So it has not been in vain, it seems that Israeli-Turkish relations are indeed getting past the strain. I am not sure yet, how smooth the peace talks are going on between the Turkish Government and the Kurdistan Workers' Party. A cease-fire is in effect, but has civil liberties been enacted yet, in regards to using Kurdish in education and media, and has the ban has been lifted on outlawed Kurdish political parties. The Kurds are no longer aspiring for an independent country, but want to see some type of federation. But the big question is can the Turkish Government and Kurdistan Workers' Party peace negotiations lend themselves to the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations? I hope they can, and I hope Turkey will prove itself strong by admitting to the Armenian Genocide. Hopefully, you can be more and precise information from our representatives from the Turkish media here.
Permalink Reply by Tim Upham on August 6, 2013 at 11:17pm
Ynet Publication just revealed that Israeli tourism to Turkey is up by 86% this year, with a record number of 56,000 Israeli tourists visiting Turkey. So relations are starting to heal.
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FedEx and UPS go back and forth over the NRA
by Julia Horowitz @juliakhorowitz February 28, 2018: 11:23 PM ET
UPS chief addresses gun policy
The latest fight between FedEx and UPS isn't about shipping. It's about ties to the National Rifle Association.
UPS (UPS) said in a statement Wednesday that it is not a sponsor of the NRA and that it does not offer a special discount for NRA members.
That comes after its competitor, FedEx (FDX) — itself fielding criticism from activists for standing by its NRA shipping discount — accused UPS of having a relationship with America's top gun lobby.
"For shipping from its online store, the NRA uses UPS and not FedEx," FedEx said on Tuesday.
UPS maintains that it's a "common carrier," and that if a shipper like the NRA "is engaged in lawful conduct, has an item that is legal to ship, and agrees to the company's terms and conditions regarding the shipment, UPS will transport their shipment from origin to destination."
Both UPS and the U.S. Postal Service are listed as shippers for the NRA online store, which "includes accessories such as ball caps, T-shirts, holsters and hunting and sporting goods merchandise," UPS added.
On Wednesday, FedEx said that UPS provides "discounted shipping rates to the NRA, which uses UPS for shipping."
UPS said in response that it does not disclose the terms of its customer contracts. "UPS provides highly competitive commercial terms," the company said in a statement.
The NRA has become a controversial partner for many companies in the wake of the high school shooting in Parkland, Florida earlier this month, which left 17 people dead.
A number of companies that offered discounts to NRA members, such as Hertz (HTZ), Delta (DAL) and MetLife (MET), said in the past week that they would end their programs.
Related: Companies learn the hard way: There's no easy way to take sides in polarized America
Still, many have found it difficult to wade into the public battle over gun rights without taking political heat or alienating part of their customer base.
Delta, for example, is now in a showdown with Georgia Republicans, who are threatening to block a state tax break that would benefit the airline.
FedEx made news on Monday when it said it would keep its discount for NRA members.
The company said in a statement that it "has never set or changed rates for any of our millions of customers around the world in response to their politics, beliefs or positions on issues," and that the NRA is one of "hundreds of organizations" that pay discounted rates for shipping.
In the same statement, FedEx tried to distance itself from the NRA on gun policy, saying that the company believes that assault rifles should only be available for military use.
Despite the attempted balancing act, FedEx continued to receive negative social media attention, and had to release a follow-up statement on Tuesday. That's when FedEx sought to divert attention to UPS.
"FedEx is aware there are some continuing concerns related to the NRA, and we want to provide important, clarifying facts," the company said. " ... FedEx has never provided any donation or sponsorship to the NRA."
CNNMoney (New York) First published February 28, 2018: 12:56 PM ET
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Feel the Earth Move! National Tour of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical Opens in Boston
November 2nd, 2015 | By Broadway.com Staff
We've got some kind of wonderful news for you! The national tour of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical opens in Boston on November 3. The hit Broadway musical will play the Boston Opera House through November 15. Beautiful stars Abby Mueller as Carole King and Liam Tobin as Gerry Goffin.
Directed by Marc Bruni and with a book by Tony and Academy Award nominee Douglas McGrath, Beautiful tells the inspiring true story of King’s remarkable rise to stardom, from being part of a hit songwriting team with her husband Gerry Goffin, to her relationship with fellow writers and best friends Cynthia Weil and Barry Mann, to becoming one of the most successful solo acts in popular music history. Along the way, she made more than beautiful music, she wrote the soundtrack to a generation.
The score of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical features a host of unforgettable hit songs, including "So Far Away," "Some Kind of Wonderful," "Will You Love Me Tomorrow," "The Locomotion," "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling," "One Fine Day," "You've Got a Friend," "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman" and "I Feel the Earth Move."
In addition to Mueller and Tobin, the show stars Becky Gulsvig as Cynthia Weil, Ben Fankhauser as Barry Mann, Curt Bouril as Donnie Kirshner and Suzanne Grodner as Genie Klein.
Don’t miss your chance to see this beloved and award-winning musical; buy your tickets today!
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Afterfab – Harder (feat Ismael)
Historically, dance music hasn’t really been a type of music that has told stories. With vocalists and more intricate production in the past decade, the trend has certainly become more common, but too often a track will just use a vocal sample and then a bass drop. For Afterfab on “Harder,” it’s almost as if the production followed the story.
With the help of Ismael, Afterfab tells a clear story of love and longing, and the emotions that come along with it. The production is imperfect but seemingly intentionally so, in keeping with the theme of the song. On the other hand, the vocals, conveying the bulk of the story, are crisp and beautiful.
Check out “Harder” by Afterfab below.
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The Mysterious Fifth Marx Brother
More elusive than the famed "fifth Beatle," Milton "Gummo" Marx somehow managed to avoid the spotlight that shone so brightly on his four brothers yet was perfectly content that it was so, an attitude so decidedly un-American it's a wonder Joe McCarthy didn't go after him instead of the Communists. Always uncomfortable on stage, Gummo left the act when he was drafted shortly before the Armistice in 1918. After the war, he worked as a theatrical agent, representing among others his brother Groucho.
That's Gummo on the bottom of the pile there.
He earned his nickname either because he frequently wore rubber overshoes (a.k.a. galoshes or gumshoes) or because he crept up on people as quietly as a "gumshoe" (detective). I've read both theories.
In honor of his birthday today (he was born in 1892), here's the famous "elephant in my pajamas" scene from 1930's Animal Crackers. Admittedly, this has nothing to do with Gummo, but any excuse in a storm, right?
Posted by Mythical Monkey at 9:27 AM
Labels: Comedy, Early Sound, Marx Brothers
Joseph "Jon" Lanthier said...
Ah, a lovely tribute to an oft-forgotten Marx. According to the book "Groucho, Harpo, Chico and sometimes Zeppo" -- if I remember correctly -- Gummo was often Groucho's understudy in early stage productions, and at least a few critics seem to have professed a preference for the Gummers at the time, which is borderline unbelievable. But who knows, since I don't think any footage of him acting exists.
KC said...
Gummo looks a bit like Mel Brooks--weird.
Mythical Monkey said...
at least a few critics seem to have professed a preference for the Gummers at the time
I did not know that.
You know, assuming that the critics who saw him weren't delusional, there could have been a couple of things going on: either Gummo was a very talented but very shy man (ala what's her name, Susan Boyle?, that British singer who was a YouTube sensation a while back) or he was like the youngest kid in a talented sports family who initially looked better than he really was because he'd grown up playing against high levels of competition (his own brothers) -- say, Jesus Alou, the younger and less successful brother of Matty and Felipe. Possibly, also, by the time he was old enough to get seriously involved in the stage act, he was already so jaded, it held no appeal for him.
Or, of course, the memories of critics dimmed over time and it made a better story to say, "Well, you know, the real talent was Gummo."
I guess we'll never know, but it's an interesting question to think about.
Maybe he is Mel Brooks. I mean, I've never seen them in a room together. You know?
Ford Fairlane said...
Mule, how is it possible that we walked out of Home Alone and yet stayed for every single second of Ford Fairlane?
To quote my favorite philosopher, "It does not compute."
Who Am Us Anyway? said...
That's easy: the whole thing was done with the white of an egg :-)
Vote For Alternate Oscars!
What are the Katie-Bar-The-Door Awards?
Named for Katie-Bar-The-Door, the Katies are "alternate Oscars"—who should have been nominated, who should have won—but really they're just an excuse to write a history of the movies from the Silent Era to the present day.
To see a list of nominees and winners by decade, as well as links to my essays about them, click the highlighted links:
Remember: There are no wrong answers, only movies you haven't seen yet.
The Silent Oscars
And don't forget to check out the Silent Oscars—my year-by-year choices for best picture, director and all four acting categories for the pre-Oscar years, 1902-1927.
Mythical Monkey
Look at me—Joe College, with a touch of arthritis. Are my eyes really brown? Uh, no, they're green. Would we have the nerve to dive into the icy water and save a person from drowning? That's a key question. I, of course, can't swim, so I never have to face it. Say, haven't you anything better to do than to keep popping in here early every morning and asking a lot of fool questions?
What is a Mythical Monkey?
An infinite number of monkeys typing at an infinite number of typewriters for an infinite amount of time will eventually produce Shakespeare's Hamlet.
This is the blog of one such monkey.
"Prosperity" Is Just Around The Corner
Not All Vampires Suck Your Blood
Wait A Minute, Wait A Minute—You Ain't Heard Nothi...
Best Supporting Actress of 1930-31: Joan Blondell ...
Best Fun-Stupid Movie of 1930-31: Dracula
The Short, Sweet Life Of Olive Thomas
A Musical Interlude #2
Promised Pictures Of Supporting Actor Nominees
Flappers And Flickers
Achievements In The Use Of Sound: 1927-1931
Lillian Gish Day On TCM
Another Name You Should Know: Mae Clarke
Blogging Muleboy Style
What This Cold Is Doing To Me, Starring James Cagn...
Buster Keaton's Birthday
While You're Waiting ...
1888 1895 1902 1903 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1910 1911 1912 1913 1914 1915 1916 1917 1918 1919 1920 1921 1922 1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944 1945 1946 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 1959 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2005 2007 2008 2009 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 Alternate Oscars Awards and Honors Best Actor Best Actress Best Director Best Picture Best Screenplay Best Song Best Supporting Actor Best Supporting Actress Fake Posters Katie Nominees Katie Winners Must-See Quizzes and Polls Review Silent Oscars Special Katie Awards That's Typing Tuesday
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Great White is a hard rock band that formed in 1978 in Los Angeles, California, United States. The band was popular during the late 80s, when their cover of Ian Hunter's "Once Bitten, Twice Shy" became a Top 5 hit in the United States. The band's only constant members have been Jack Russell (vocals) and Mark Kendall (guitar), with the exception of a period between 2000 and 2001 in which Kendall did not perform with the band.
The band continued to release new material into the 1990s, although none of their material charted in the United States. In 2003, the band made headlines when The Station nightclub fire led to the deaths of 100 people in West Warwick, Rhode Island, including the band's guitarist Ty Longley, who had been a member of the band for three years. Great White made a comeback in 2007 with the release of a new album and an accompanying tour
Great White started their career as Dante Fox, playing their first gig in 1981 at The Troubadour in Hollywood, California. After recording several demos, the band chose as manager Alan Niven, who had worked for the independent distributor Greenworld in Torrance, California and had dealt with Mötley Crüe's debut self-release. Niven suggested the name change from Dante Fox after seeing singer Jack Russell introduce Mark Kendall (guitarist) during his solo as "Mark Kendall, the Great White", due to his natually white-blonde hair, white Fender Telecaster guitar, white jumpsuit, and white Capezio shoes. In 1982, founding members Mark Kendall, Jack Russell, drummer Gary Holland, and bassist Lorne Black recorded and released a 5-song EP, Out of the Night, on the independent label Aegean formed by Niven. Niven then convinced the Los Angeles radio station KMET to begin adding songs from the EP to its playlist in heavy rotation. KLOS-FM soon did the same. The band suddenly went from drawing 100 people to a local club to drawing thousands in L.A. concert halls such as Perkins Palace in Pasadena, The Palace in Hollywood and the Country Club in Reseda. As an unsigned act, Great White headlined at Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia playing to 6,250 people. Near the end of 1983, EMI America signed the band and subsequently released Great White's eponymous debut album in early 1984. The band immediately toured the UK supporting Whitesnake's Slide It In tour and the entire US and Canada opening for Judas Priest's Defenders of the Faith tour. Shot in the Dark, their follow-up independent release, marked the arrival of drummer Audie Desbrow. By the time Capitol Records signed the band and reissued Shot in the Dark, keyboardist-guitarist Michael Lardie had come aboard. After the release of Shot in the Dark, Great White hit the road with Dokken and was on the verge of even bigger success.
The band hit the mainstream in 1987 when they released Once Bitten…, which featured the hits "Rock Me" and "Save Your Love".
Once Bitten… was certified platinum in April 1988.
The band followed up with …Twice Shy in 1989. The album included their biggest hit, "Once Bitten, Twice Shy", a cover of a UK hit single by Ian Hunter. They received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Hard Rock Performance. The album was certified platinum in July 1989 and then double platinum in September of that same year. The model Bobbie Brown (also known for being in Warrant's "Cherry Pie" video) appeared in the video for "Once Bitten, Twice Shy". They finished off the 80s touring in support of …Twice Shy as headliners and with some best known bands, such as Bon Jovi.
In 1990, the band featured in the heavy metal video series Hard 'N' Heavy containing music, concert footage and interviews. The video included Slash and Duff from Guns N' Roses appearing with the band at a Children of the Night Benefit concert in L.A., the performance helping to raise money for housing abused homeless children. Both bands shared the same manager, Alan Niven at the time.
The band continued into the next decade performing the song "House of Broken Love" at the American Music Awards in January 1990. In March, Great White embarked on their first tour of Japan. They returned to the United States for the Memorial Day weekend festival dubbed The World Series of Rock, which featured Whitesnake, Skid Row, Bad English, and Hericane Alice. Great White recorded two more albums for Capitol Records, Hooked, which was certified gold, and Psycho City. In support of Hooked, Great White did a tour as headliner tour, had a guest slot with German metal band Scorpions and travelled to Europe and Japan. Psycho City was followed by a US tour with Kiss.
Capitol issued the compilation The Best of Great White: 1986–1992 in 1993, when Great White had already departed the label to begin work on their next studio release, Sail Away. Before the release of the album, Great White spent seven months on the road headlining clubs. According to Lardie, it was "the longest stint we ever did without a break." Great White kept up the pace once Sail Away was released on Zoo Records in 1994, touring the US several times over the following year and a half. Their next release, Let It Rock, was released in 1996 through yet another label, Imago Records.
In 1999, the band released Can't Get There from Here and embarked on a tour with Ratt, Poison, and L.A. Guns. The album featured the single "Rollin' Stoned", which managed to chart at No. 8 on the Billboard Mainstream Rock Tracks chart.
n a memo dated 20 January 2000 Mark Kendall announced he was leaving Great White, shortly thereafter both Audie Desbrow and Sean McNabb left Great White. Kendall was replaced by guitarist Matthew Johnson. Desbrow, clearly very unhappy with the financial state of the band posted a tirade on his website lambasting Jack Russell and Michael Lardie, while claiming to have been "fired" from Great White. Meanwhile, it was rumored that Sean McNabb was fired for going to management and asking to see the accounting books. Despite only having one original member left, the band announced plans to begin work on a new album in late 2000. Early in the process, some of the new songs were played for John Kalodner at Columbia Records. It was mutually agreed that the "magic was gone" and the band decided their heart was not in the recording process. They subsequently left Columbia Records and discontinued work on the new album. On 5 November 2001 Jack Russell announced the end of Great White, stating that he was moving on, and that Great White would play one final farewell show on 31 December 2001 at the Galaxy Theatre in Santa Ana, CA. Both Kendall and McNabb rejoined the band for the farewell show, recorded for a live CD entitled Thank You…Goodnight! released by Knight Records. The live album includes two new tracks, "Back to the Rhythm" and "Play On" from their discontinued studio sessions, both of which would ultimately wind up on their reunion album Back to the Rhythm in 2007.
In late 2002, in part due to his failure to attract good audiences while on the road with his solo band, Jack Russell contacted Kendall, who himself was struggling to gain an audience on his own. Kendall agreed to play some dates with Russell's band, allowing Russell to use the name Great White once again. Billed as "Jack Russell's Great White," the tour was to consist primarily of classic songs from the Great White catalog with some of Russell's solo work mixed in. Eventually, more dates were added and the tour extended through the early months of 2003.
The band returned to the national spotlight on 20 February 2003. At the beginning of a Great White performance at The Station night club in Rhode Island, pyrotechnics used by the band's crew created a spray of sparks that ignited the foam soundproofing material in the ceiling around the stage. One hundred people including the band's guitarist Ty Longley, died in the fire that followed. In 2008 the band agreed to pay $1 million to survivors and victims' relatives of the fire while admitting to no wrongdoing. This amount also covers former tour manager Daniel Biechele along with the band members, record label, and management as it existed at the time of the fire. The settlement was the maximum allowed under the band's insurance plan. Victims had previously received $3.8 million raised by United Way of America.
Though the media referred to the band as "Great White" following the tragedy in Rhode Island, the band was officially performing under the moniker of "Jack Russell's Great White" at the time of the incident. In fact, prior to the fire, the band's official website posted a message stating that Great White had not re-formed. It's unclear when the band began officially going by "Great White" again.
Great White played their first full show following the Rhode Island tragedy on 22 July, starting a benefit tour for the survivors and victims of the fire. The band toured until 2005 to raise funds for the Station Family Fund, which had been set up to help the victims of the tragedy. In late 2005, citing "medical reasons", the band canceled the second half of their summer tour. The "medical reasons" turned out to be Jack Russell's addictions to alcohol and cocaine. He would later detail a particular low point of being caught by his ex-wife smoking crack in a laundry room. This was the end of this version of Great White, as Jack Russell entered rehabilitation and did not perform again until 2007. Russell used the year of 2006 to get sober and get a facelift that was detailed on ExtraTV. Russell later referred to this incarnation of Great White as "Fake White", saying "It still sounded like Great White, but not – almost like we were doing a cover of ourselves."
Talk of a reunion of Great White began in a 2004 interview, where Jack Russell told to Metal Express Radio: "I spoke with Michael , we threw that around a bit, and thought that sounds like a cool idea, it'd be fun. I'm pretty positive it's gonna happen… probably next year (…) We talked to some other people, and Audie would not be a person I would want to play with ever again in my life. There were some bridges burned there that I just can’t forgive, and I’m a very forgiving person. I just can’t let that one go. I have to stand up for myself…". Russell's stance towards Desbrow seemed to have changed course by 2006 when he told Mitch Lafon: "I talked to Michael Lardie the other day and he is into doing it. I just want to get hold of Tony Montana and Audie Desbrow. I think that would be very special for our 25th anniversary tour to have the same guys… we haven't played together in a very long time". Later in 2006, guitarist Mark Kendall officially announced that Great White had re-formed its classic lineup. The re-formed lineup of Russell, Kendall, Lardie, McNabb and Desbrow played their first date together in more than 5 years on 27 January 2007 at the Keyclub in Hollywood performing in the Harpseals.org Benefit Concert for the Seals 2007. The band continued to tour throughout the rest of the year
During the band's recent tour in the UK, vocalist Jack Russell commented that "I think I'm enjoying it more now than the last time we were over, I think the older you get, at least for me anyway, you appreciate more and more. This is the twilight of our career at best, and any time we get after this is icing on the cake, it's a gift. It's been 25 or 26 years now since the band became Great White, and I've been playing with my guitarist since '78 when I was 17 years old, I'm 47 now, so that's 30 years".
Once Bitten Twice Shy
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The Bruin Sisterhood June 28, 2011 By Stuart Hall, USGA
Brianna Do keeps tabs on her ball on the seventh tee at the Old Macdonald course at Bandon Dunes Resort Wednesday. (John Mummert/USGA)
Bandon, Ore. – While they might not have the divine secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, the women on the UCLA golf team have nurtured their own unique bond.
Tiffany Lua and Brianna Do are a yin-and-yang duo who want to compete on The Amazing Race. Lee Lopez once found her car completely enveloped in Saran Wrap thanks to her teammates, and Latin dancing and a Harry Potter movie marathon are items on a team bucket list that was compiled late in the collegiate season.
We’re really close, said Stephanie Kono, 21, the oldest of five Bruins who qualified for the 35th U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links Championship at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort. I trust them more than anyone. We share a lot of things with each other and I’m sure they know a lot of things about me that they don’t want to know. But I feel like I can be myself around them and that makes me feel comfortable on and off the course.
Not only did the quintet of Kono, Do, Lopez, Lua and Ani Gulugian qualify for the championship — all finished inside the top 36 in stroke play — all five also advanced to the first round of match play on Tuesday. They went a combined 3-2.
Do started the Bruins’ day with a 4-and-3 win over Kristen Park, the 2007 U.S. Girls Junior champion. Lopez lost in 20 holes to Kelsey Chugg; Kono defeated Gianna Misenhelter 1 up; Lua won 2-up over Ciera Min; and Gulugian lost 3 and 1 to Lauren Cate.
In late May, UCLA won its third NCAA Women’s National Championship with four of the Bandon Five in the lineup. Senior Glory Yang started in place of Do. That title and this week’s presence is an indication of the Bruins’ strength that is expected to continue in the fall with the arrival of touted freshmen Erynne Lee and Kyle Roig.
During a 2010-11 season in which the Bruins won six of 11 tournaments, four of this week’s five finished as the low Bruin in tournament play. Also, Lua won twice, and Kono and Lopez won once each. Do was the sixth player in the lineup, but Kono is quick to point out that she lost to Do in the second round of last year’s WAPL.
When I look at every one of my teammates, you know they have worked just as hard as you, Lopez said. So to win [the national championship], knowing how hard each and every one of those girls worked. I can’t describe it. It was surreal.
After some down time following the title, the women quickly continued their success by qualifying for the year’s first USGA women’s tournament.
Winning was a huge confidence boost for all of us, said Do, adding that it was the group’s hope after making match play not to play each other early in the bracket. With victories, Do and Lopez would have met in Wednesday’s second round, while Lua and Gulugian could have met in the third round.
We’re all newsContenting for each, said Lua, who was a 2010 U.S. Curtis Cup Team member along with Kono. Each has appeared in 21 USGA championships, and Kono will add to her total by playing in next week’s U.S. Women’s Open.
Lua’s and Kono’s extensive USGA experience does not put them on a pedestal.
Lua suggests that may be due to the team’s parity.
We’re all really competitive, we all make fun of each other and we’re not afraid to admit things to each other, Lua said. When we’re all working hard and we’re all able to push each other in a competitive and light-hearted atmosphere, I think that’s huge.
I think that’s due a lot to our coaches, Alicia [Um-Holmes], our assistant, and [12th-year head coach] Carrie Forsyth. They know how to be tough on us and still be practical. I tell people that Carrie is like our mom and Alicia is like our big sister.
While the fivesome will be scattered about this summer, playing in a wide range of tournaments, Lopez says they are never far apart in their friendship.
We’re all like sisters, it’s like a sorority at school, so it’s pretty cool, she said.
And it is back at UCLA where the women will reunite and maybe check a few more things off the bucket list, even though Kono admits coach Forsyth might frown on a few of the items.
Sisters, though, have a way of keeping secrets.
Stuart Hall is a North Carolina-based freelance writer whose work has previously appeared on USGA websites.
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Andrew Burton/Getty
Don’t Look to Democrats to Regulate Big Tech
Why the party of regulation is taking a hands-off approach to Silicon Valley
By Alex Shephard
After years of breathlessly positive press coverage and warm relations with the political class, Silicon Valley is facing a reckoning. Tech giants have come under scrutiny for a wide range of reasons, including the way social media networks destroy “the social fabric,” their unprecedented economic power, and, not least, facilitating the Russian government’s campaign to tilt the election to Donald Trump. Publications from across the ideological spectrum—National Review, The Nation, Esquire, Harvard Business Review—have called for reining in Big Tech, and, in some cases, breaking up tech conglomerates. The public, too, wants action taken. An Axios poll released in late February found that 55 percent of respondents wanted Silicon Valley to be better regulated—up from 40 percent in November 2016.
Given this environment, you would expect the Democrats, the only pro-regulation party left in Washington, to seize the moment. But that’s not quite what’s happened.
A recent interview that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer gave to Recode’s Kara Swisher helps explain why. “For a decade, tech was a great, great thing,” Schumer said. “It allowed people to agglomerate. It allowed people who had no power, who didn’t own a newspaper, who didn’t own a TV station, who didn’t have a megaphone, to get together and have power.”
All true, but Schumer waded into some murky waters when discussing Amazon:
Amazon does great things for huge amounts of people, and they only have 3 to 4 percent of the retail market. Could it get greater? Yes! But again, I’d be careful. They are creating cheaper, better competition. Yes, they’re big. Big can do good things as well as bad things, and you’ve got to separate the wheat from the chaff. Would the world be a better place or a worse place if there were no Amazon right now? My guess is a worse place. And yet, there’s a lot of problems, for sure.
This is pretty much how Amazon would hope to be described by a Democrat. Despite the ethical and economic implications of Amazon’s metastatic growth into so many areas of the economy, Schumer still clings to the old line that Amazon and its defenders have used—that the company has ultimately been good for the market by making its competitors more efficient and by providing venues for small businesses to make money on its e-retail site.
Schumer’s 3-to-4 percent number is a favorite of Amazon’s. Yes, the company has captured more than half of e-commerce, but e-commerce still makes up a relatively small percentage of total retail sales. Thus, in Schumer’s telling, it can hardly be considered a monopoly.
Yet Amazon is on the verge of becoming the first $1 trillion company (all while paying zero federal taxes in 2017). It has staggering control over the only growing retail sector, which ultimately gives it enormous market power. Through its rapacious little-to-no profit strategy, it has not only challenged the supremacy of traditional retailers like Walmart, but has also put downward price pressure on companies across the economy, most notably in book publishing, where Amazon got its start. Amazon’s low prices may be good for consumers, but it is not so great for the companies that hire those consumers.
Schumer’s sleight of hand acts as a defense of the company’s strategy, making him out of step with his own party. In the Axios poll, 64 percent of Democrats expressed concern that the government will not do enough to regulate tech. But Schumer seems satisfied that the market will take care of the issue. Later in the interview, he had this to say about regulation: “The amount the Trump administration is doing against Russia is, appallingly, zero, almost. So it’s up to tech to do more. And I do think they’re making an effort—not only because it’s the right thing to do but because they know that down the road, their survival depends on it.”
In fact, the opposite is true. Tech companies have so much power these days that they don’t have to self-regulate. Giants like Google and Facebook and Amazon don’t have meaningful competitors, and meanwhile the minority party is signaling that the government is not poised to act.
To the extent that tech companies are self-regulating in response to criticism, we’ve mostly seen face-saving measures, like Facebook’s cosmetic changes to its NewsFeed. Schumer also expressed support for the Honest Ads Act, which would regulate ads on Google, Facebook, and Twitter and was proposed by Democrats Mark Warner and Amy Klobuchar. That bill is an overdue correction—it’s crazy that social media ads are not regulated like other ads—but does nothing about the underlying concerns about economic monopsony and media dominance.
The more generous interpretation of Schumer’s comments to Swisher is that he’s concerned about holding his party together and doesn’t want to risk a battle over regulating the tech industry while the Democrats are in the minority. The less generous interpretation is that Schumer doesn’t want to anger a valuable group of reliable campaign contributors heading into two crucial elections. Regardless, this dynamic essentially guarantees that no major tech regulation will be pushed any time soon.
Alex Shephard is a staff writer at The New Republic.
@alex_shephard
Politics, Tech, Amazon, Google, Facebook, Apple, Chuck Schumer, Amy Klobuchar, Mark Warner, John McCain, Honest Ads Act
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Jackson EMC Foundation: 10 Years, $10 Million
This month, Jackson EMC celebrates the 10th anniversary of the Jackson EMC Foundation, formed in October 2005 as the administrative arm of our Operation Round Up® program.
Through Operation Round Up, Jackson EMC members round up their power bill to the next dollar with the extra change supporting charitable causes in our communities.
As the Foundation’s 10-year anniversary approached, we decided to do the math.
On average, each Jackson EMC member who rounds up his or her monthly power bill contributes approximately $6 annually through this program. That’s basically the cost of one fast-food meal per member, per year. But when you consider we serve more than 217,000 members – and that a full 90 percent of our members participate in this incredible philanthropic endeavor – the numbers add up quickly.
When the math was done, we were – in a word – astounded.
In 10 years, the Jackson EMC Foundation has contributed more than $10 million to charitable organizations and needy individuals within northeast Georgia.
That’s a lot of help given to those who need it the most, and it’s all thanks to our members who give up the cost of a burger and fries each year to help their neighbors in need. Due to your generosity, thousands upon thousands have been helped over the course of the past decade: The homeless have been sheltered, the hungry have been fed, and those sick have received medicine.
Operation Round Up started collecting funds on October 1, 2005, and the Jackson EMC Foundation awarded its first round of grants less than a month later. Since then, the Foundation’s volunteer board of directors has met monthly to study grant applications and fund as many as possible. Grants of up to $15,000 per year are available to charitable 501(c)3 organizations, while grants up to $3,500 are made to individuals with no other source of help.
In 10 years’ time, the Foundation has provided more than $10 million in grants to individuals and organizations that serve humanitarian needs within Jackson EMC’s 10-county service area, which includes Banks, Barrow, Clarke, Franklin, Gwinnett, Hall, Jackson, Lumpkin, Madison and Oglethorpe counties. This massive amount has positively impacted millions of people through food banks, domestic violence shelters, free clinics, after-school programs and so many more programs.
Also over the past decade, the Foundation has given about $850,000 to more than 300 individuals in dire need or emergency situations. Your contributions have paid for wheelchair ramps for the elderly and dentures for those whose health was at risk because they couldn’t chew food.
Beauty Baldwin, a director on the Jackson EMC Foundation Board since it was founded and the board’s current chairman, takes the Foundation’s mission to heart.
“We have discovered the need is great in our communities, so we never make decisions lightly,” she says. “We are honored to serve in this capacity, and we are overwhelmed at how the numbers have added up in just one decade – 10 years, $10 million, and it’s all because members of Jackson EMC give pennies when they pay their power bill, pennies that truly become powerful when multiplied.”
Grant recipients are ever-grateful for the power of those pennies.
Since awarded its first grant in January 2006, Mercy Health Center, a free clinic in Athens, has received $92,324 in Jackson EMC Foundation funding for everything from facility renovations to a dental hygiene program. The grants have helped the Center serve its 2,200 low-income patients, according to Executive Director Tracy Thompson.
“By investing in Mercy Health Center, the Jackson EMC Foundation is investing in their community,” she says.
NOA’s Ark (No One Alone), Inc. is another longtime recipient of Foundation funding. The domestic violence shelter and counseling program in Dahlonega has received $72,000 in grant monies, most for trauma counseling programs for domestic violence victims and their family members.
“We feel that counseling is the essential component here – one of the key factors in not repeating the cycle and getting out of the shelter and on with life,” says NOA’s Ark Executive Director Cara Ledford. “And that’s why we’re so grateful for the Jackson EMC Foundation.” For Derek Hutchens, director of the Boys & Girls Club of Winder-Barrow County, receiving Jackson EMC Foundation funding for the club’s after-school homework assistance programs is about much more than the money.
“Getting their support means they believe in our programs and consider us a trusted agency,” says Hutchens. “For the Foundation to grant us year after year, it means their board of directors has done their research and they believe in what we do. And it means they are willing to invest in this organization and help youth move from grade to grade to ultimately graduate from high school.”
This investment in its communities through Operation Round Up and the Jackson EMC Foundation is how Jackson EMC fulfills one of its cooperative principles: Commitment to Community. With the extra pennies members give, the dollars add up, one at a time, to benefit children who need homework help, families who need shelter from the storms of violence, individuals who need assistance paying for their medications, and so much more.
Carol, a Lawrenceville mother of four, recently received assistance at the Lawrenceville Cooperative Ministry, a recipient of Jackson EMC Foundation grants for the past decade. In between jobs, she needed food and help paying the bills. Thanks to the Ministry, and Foundation funding, this mother was able to continue caring for her children.
“I’m very grateful for the help,” she said, with emphasis on grateful. “Thankful means you’re satisfied and appreciative, but grateful means very absolutely, you are appreciative. I am grateful.”
Share this release
April Sorrow
Director of PR and Communication
asorrow@jacksonemc.com
Perspective: What's a Co-op?
Together, We're a Cooperative
Ways to Pay Your Jackson EMC Bill
Jackson EMC Communicators Receive National Recognition
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Newsroom / News Releases DOT Rankings May 14, 2013
Hawaiian #1 for Punctuality in March
HONOLULU – Hawaiian Airlines led the U.S. airline industry for on-time performance and the avoidance of flight cancellations during the month of March, as reported today by the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT).
Hawaiian scored the DOT’s highest ranking for punctuality, with 91.0 percent of its flights arriving as scheduled throughout the month of March.
Hawaiian also led the industry in the avoidance of flight cancellations with a total of six cancellations out of 6,000 flights operated during March for a cancellation rate of 0.1 percent.
Hawaiian provides daily nonstop service to Hawai‘i from 11 gateway cities in North America – more cities than any other carrier – using Airbus A330-200 and Boeing 767-300 aircraft, making it the only carrier to offer wide-body, twin-aisle aircraft for all transpacific flights.
Hawai‘i’s largest and longest-serving carrier is also the leading provider of air service between the islands of Hawai‘i.
The DOT’s monthly Air Travel Consumer Report ranking the nation’s 16 largest air carriers is available online at http://www.dot.gov/individuals/air-consumer/air-travel-consumer-reports.
Hawaiian has led all U.S. carriers in on-time performance for each of the past nine years (2004-2012) as reported by the U.S. Department of Transportation. Consumer surveys by Condé Nast Traveler, Travel + Leisure and Zagat have all ranked Hawaiian the highest of all domestic airlines serving Hawai‘i.
Now in its 84th year of continuous service, Hawaiian is Hawai‘i’s biggest and longest-serving airline, as well as the largest provider of passenger air service from its primary visitor markets on the U.S. mainland. Hawaiian offers nonstop service to Hawai‘i from more U.S. gateway cities (11) than any other airline, along with service from Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, American Samoa, and Tahiti. New nonstop service will begin between Honolulu and Taipei, Taiwan on July 9, 2013 and, subject to government approvals, between Honolulu and Beijing, China in April 2014. Hawaiian also provides approximately 160 jet flights daily between the Hawaiian Islands.
Hawaiian Airlines, Inc. is a subsidiary of Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: HA). Additional information is available at HawaiianAirlines.com. Follow updates on Twitter about Hawaiian (@HawaiianAir) and its special fare offers (@HawaiianFares), and become a fan on its Facebook page (Hawaiian Airlines).
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Member Profile: Elizabeth Lund
Poetic Lines is one of our newest Community Channel shows, featuring interviews and discussions with poets and critics. Producer Elizabeth Lund joined NewTV last fall and began recording her show in 2018. She is a poet and reviews poetry every month for The Washington Post. She also reviews for The Christian Science Monitor, where she was the poetry editor for 10 years.
Elizabeth first learned about NewTV through an ad for Books & Beyond in the Newton Free Library’s newsletter. She credits the staff with helping facilitate her production and improve her skills as an interviewer. Katie Duval, former director of member services, helped Elizabeth upgrade the set, taught her how to edit, and assisted her in assembling a crew for an episode featuring a major poet traveling to Newton as part of his national book tour. Kathleen Golden, production coordinator, has been extremely supportive and helped Elizabeth adjust camera angles, while Jenn Adams, news director, showed her how to improve her on-air presence and makeup.
“her show makes poetry 'more accessible, and allows the audience to listen in.'”
Each episode introduces a different poet — some emerging, some well known. The video format allows Elizabeth to explore a writer’s work in greater depth versus the print format, in which reviewers are limited by word-count limits. She believes that her show makes poetry “more accessible, and allows the audience to listen in.”
“they have been viewed by people across the United States, including the Executive Director of the American Academy
of Poets, one of the largest literary organizations in the nation.”
NewTV prides itself on its diverse membership of producers who have unique stories to tell. Elizabeth is heartened by the response she’s received and says, “Although I have only taped a few shows so far, they have been viewed by people across the United States, including the Executive Director of the American Academy of Poets, one of the largest literary organizations in the nation.”
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« Young Adult: Cynicism with Low Dividends | Main | Fred Wiseman Drawings »
“What were you doing to her, boy?” a cop asks young Michael in the offices of a porno theater. Jerzy Skolimowski’s 1970 movie Deep End revolves around the question of exactly what teenage Michael wants to do with his slightly older co-worker Susan. Standing in Michael’s way of exploring Susan and his own nascent sexuality are Susan’s fiancé, her older lover, the cops, and Michael’s generalized anxiety about all things sex.
Michael meets Susan when he gets a job at a public bathhouse. Susan shows him the ropes and teaches him how to clean a private room. After she’s done, nothing looks any cleaner, and the whole establishment is layered with such a permanent layer of filth that the routine of cleaning it seems like a sick joke.
The bathhouse’s clientele is made up of horny weirdos and derelicts moaning and groaning through the movie’s atonal dubbing, as well as gaggles of prepubescent girls being teased and fanny-slapped by their swimming instructor. As we watch virgin Mike’s tentative discovery of his sexual desire in the confines of this den of iniquity, the grime of the bathhouse comes to look seedy and perverted. In the background of one scene, a worker slaps bright red paint over a slime green wall without any primer: like Michael’s desire, the wall’s color is getting more intense but it remains muddy. When a fire extinguisher starts spraying unnecessarily (prematurely?), there’s no mistaking the double meaning of the white goop sprayed all over the floor, or Susan’s lament that she’s the one who will have to clean it up.
Michael feels himself maturing but unable to function in an adult world, and Deep End brilliantly captures this tension between youth and adulthood, grappling with aggressive feelings of carnality and being unsure if they’re dirty or not. If the feelings are dirty, but you can’t get rid of them, then maybe all bets are off. Maybe Michael has to turn off his conscience entirely. By the end of the movie, he will seem to have done just that.
Throughout Deep End, the light is dreary. Outside it’s a gray winter and in the bathhouse everything is sickly fluorescent. The camera is relentlessly intimate, often so close to the actors that it can’t keep up with simple movements, occasionally a beat behind the action. Things look a little more vibrant in the little red light district where Michael lurks looking for Susan, but the place he really wants to be is inaccessible. When he tries to find Susan in a club that she goes to with her boyfriend, he stands in the entryway talking to the girl at the door. He can’t get in unless he pays membership fees, and he doesn’t have enough. The whole movie is littered with talk about money: how much he and Susan are making in tips, how much Susan’s engagement ring cost, the price of the hot dogs Michael orders from a street vendor while he stalks Susan from the sidewalk. Susan makes plush stuffed pigs to earn “a few extra bob,” and will eventually take some kind of financial security in marriage, but what will Michael do?
Susan tells him that if he plays things right, he can earn a lot of tips, not only from female clients but some of the men, too. She holds back from being explicit, not because Deep End is being coy about its sex-charged subject matter, but because to spell out what she means she’d be admitting to herself that she does it (whatever it is), too. You don’t have to do anything, she tells Michael, just let the customers use their imaginations. It’s a murky border to navigate, the one between selling yourself as a sexual object and prostituting yourself outright. Later in the film, Susan will become a literal sexual object when Michael finds a topless wooden cutout of her outside a strip club and confronts her with it. He steals the image from the club and hides in a brothel where sex is readily available, but only so that he's only there so that he can hang onto the image of Susan. But even as Michael fights to possess the sexual image of Susan, he later demands that she be ashamed of it. He can want it, but she should hate it.
Michael’s sexual awakening is focused exclusively on Susan. Even when an ex-girlfriend turns up and offers herself to Michael, he turns her down, thinking that he’s graduated to someone older like Susan, even though she’s shown only a teasing interest in him. Because she’s the one who’s really turned him on for the first time, he demands that she let him have her, not only by confronting her with her own objectified, possessed image but by other, more severe means.
“What were you doing to her, boy?” Michael is asked. “I love her,” he stammers back. But the dirtiness he perceives in his own sexual drive won’t let him love her and desire her at once, so the object wins out. Michael swims with the nude cutout of Susan in the pool in a sexual fantasy, and when he’s able to bring that fantasy to life, it’s at Susan’s expense.
Deep End is playing at BAMcinematek starting today.
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Noble Iron
Noble Iron Announces Q1 2013 Results and $15.0 Million Debt Financing
Noble Iron Announces Q1 2013…
NOBLE IRON INC.
NIR: TSX Venture Exchange
Houston, Texas – Noble Iron Inc. (“Noble Iron” or the “Company”, NIR: TSX Venture Exchange) announced its unaudited interim financial results for the quarter ending March 31, 2013 and additional debt financing.
Total revenue in Q1 2013 was $4.5 million, compared to $4.0 million in Q1 2012
Total adjusted EBITDA in Q1 2013 was $0.3 million, compared to $0.5 million in Q1 2012
The Company closed a $15.0 million revolving credit facility for its Texas operations
Rental revenue from the equipment rental and distribution segment increased by 44% compared to Q1 2012. Adjusted EBITDA in the equipment rental and distribution segment increased 78% compared to Q1 2012. Total net loss for the period of Q1 2013 was $1.3 million, compared to a net loss of $0.4 million in Q1 2012.
The terms of the $15.0 million financing facility for Noble Iron’s Texas operations include a revolving line of credit and a variable interest rate equivalent to one-month LIBOR plus 275 basis points; approximately 3.00% at closing. Previous financing arrangements for the Company’s Texas operations included a number of debt facilities charging interest rates ranging from 5.8% to 7.0%. The new facility includes a cash sweep against outstanding debt, and no scheduled principal payments are due during the four year term of the loan. The facility allows the Company to draw up to $15.0 million, based upon a borrowing base determined by the value of equipment fleet, accounts receivable and inventory. A total of $5.4 million was funded at closing, and $9.6 million remains available to draw by the Company subject to borrowing base availability.
“We are excited with the progress of the Noble Iron model and its development. Our year-over-year revenue growth of 44% within the Company’s equipment rental and distribution segment demonstrates our team’s commitment to providing our customers quality equipment and hassle-free service at the lowest price.” said Willie Swisher, CEO of the Company.
Nabil Kassam, Executive Chairman of Noble Iron commented, “the new debt financing will provide Noble Iron with significant growth capacity at our Texas CELL. We are pleased to continue working with our lending partner, Regions Bank, and look forward to pursuing additional expansion opportunities.”
Financial information indicated, as set out in this news release, is presented on a basis consistent with the accounting principles used to prepare Noble Iron’s most recently filed financial statements. The consolidated financial statements are prepared by management in accordance with International Financial Reporting Standards, as issued by the International Accounting Standards Board. Readers are advised that the Company faces various risk factors with respect to its business and operations: for further information please see the Management Discussion and Analysis of Noble Iron Inc. at www.SEDAR.com.
About Noble Iron Inc. (NIR: TSX Venture Exchange)
Noble Iron Inc. operates in three complementary sectors: equipment rental, equipment dealership, and enterprise asset management software for the construction and industrial equipment industry.
The Company operates its equipment rental business and dealerships under the name “Noble Iron”. Noble Iron rental depots, or CELLs, currently serve customers in California and Texas. A noble Iron offer select manufacturer equipment and accessories for sale, and is the exclusive distributor of LiuGong Construction Machinery equipment in Southeast Texas.
The Company’s software division, Texada Software, develops software applications to manage the complete equipment ownership lifecycle, from acquisition, rental, sales and other activities, through to disposal. Texada offers in-the-cloud or client-based software, and is scalable to meet the needs of any customer.
The Company can be reached at 1-832-767-4424, or at www.nobleiron.com.
Corporate communications contact:
Thomas Caldaroni
Email: thomas.caldaroni@nobleiron.com
Non-IFRS Measures
References in this press release to Adjusted EBITDA are to earnings before interest expense, deferred income taxes, depreciation, amortization, share based compensation, gain on fair value increment on acquisition (net of deferred income taxes), acquisition expenses, accretion on convertible debt, interest on convertible debentures and foreign exchange. Adjusted EBITDA is a measure used by investors to compare issuers on the basis of ability to generate cash flow from operations. Adjusted EBITDA is not an earnings measure recognized by International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), does not have standardized meanings prescribed by IFRS and is therefore unlikely to be comparable to similar measures presented by other issuers. Noble Iron’s management believes that Adjusted EBITDA is an important supplemental measure in evaluating Noble Iron’s performance and in determining whether to invest in its common shares. Readers of this information are cautioned that Adjusted EBITDA should not be construed as an alternative to net income or loss determined in accordance with IFRS as an indicator of Noble Iron’s performance, or cash flows from operating, investing and financing activities as measures of Noble Iron’s liquidity and cash flows. Noble Iron’s method of calculating Adjusted EBITDA may differ from the methods used by other issuers and, accordingly, Noble Iron’s Adjusted EBITDA may not be comparable to similar measures presented by other issuers.
This news release may contain forward-looking statements which reflect the Company’s current expectations regarding future events. The forward-looking statements are often, but not always, identified by the use of words such as “seek”, “anticipate”, “plan”, “estimate”, “expect”, “intend” and statements that an event or result “may”, “will”, “should”, “could” or “might” occur or be achieved and other similar expressions. These forward-looking statements involve risk and uncertainties, including the difficulty in predicting acceptance of and demands for new products, the impact of the products and pricing strategies of competitors, delays in developing and launching new products, fluctuations in operating results and other risks, any of which could cause results, performance, or achievements to differ materially from the results discussed or implied in the forward-looking statements. Many risks are inherent in the industries in which the Company participates; others are more specific to the Company. The Company’s ongoing quarterly filings should be consulted for additional information on risks and uncertainties relating to these forward-looking statements. Investors should not place undue reliance on any forward-looking statements. Management assumes no obligation to update or alter any forward-looking statements whether as a result of new information, further events or otherwise.
By Kevin Bertrand June 3, 2013
Author: Kevin Bertrand
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Noble Iron Announces Appointment of Chief Financial Officer
MD&A For The Three Month Period Ended March 31, 2019
Interim Consolidated Financial Statements For The Three Month Period Ended March 31, 2019, and 2018
MD&A for the Three and Twelve Month Period Ended December 31, 2018
Audited Consolidated Financial Statements For The Years Ended December 31, 2018 and 2017
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Home Competitions Awards Crick African Network’s African Career Accelerator (CAN ACA) Awards 2018 for African...
Crick African Network’s African Career Accelerator (CAN ACA) Awards 2018 for African Post-Doctoral Researchers
DEADLINE: 23:59 GMT on 01 August, 2018.
The Crick African Network is pleased to announce a call for applications for the African Career Accelerator Awards.
The Crick African Network’s African Career Accelerator (CAN ACA) awardswill provide Fellowship support for African Post-Doctoral researchers aiming to make the transition to becoming an independent researcher and launching their own research group. The CAN ACA awards will invest in early-career researchers who have demonstrated strong scientific and leadership potential, as well as a commitment to continuing their research on the African continent. This call is made possible by funding from the UK’s Global Challenges Research Fund.
Nature of Award
Fellowships are for a duration of up to two years, and may include personal salary, visa costs and research expenses to implement the research. The Fellowships will be undertaken in two locations:
The Francis Crick Institute (‘the Crick’, UK) and at one of the five African partner institutions: The University of Ghana (Ghana), Stellenbosch University (South Africa), University of Cape Town (South Africa), MRC Unit The Gambia at LSHTM (The Gambia) and MRC/UVRI and LSHTM Uganda Research Unit.
Fellows will spend at least six months in each location, although this can be accumulated in more than one visit. It is expected that up to six fellowships will be awarded in this round, each with a value of up to approximately £130,000.
Provision has been made to cover costs of travel for both relocation and conferences, as well as research related costs for consumables.
Each fellowship also includes the option of the purchase of up to two pieces of equipment, each up to a value of £10,000.
Fellowships will commence no later than 31st March 2019.
The scope of the research themes which can be undertaken as part of this Award can be defined as the infectious diseases of poverty, with an emphasis on Tuberculosis, Malaria and HIV/AIDS, but also extending to neglected tropical diseases or non-communicable diseases with an infection component.
Clinical research is possible, but will have to be discussed specifically with potential supervisors/ advisors and institutions to confirm whether resources are available to support the research.
Applicants must be a citizen of one of the 55 African nations, as defined by the African Union.
Applicants will also have a PhD and have no more than 6 years’ post-doctoral research experience (with allowances for legitimate career breaks) but more than 2 years’ post-doctoral experience unless the applicant has an outstanding track record, supported by publication and employment history.
Background of Applicants
Competitive applicants will have a strong track record of research.
They will have a PhD, and have progressed to a postdoctoral role through which they are on a demonstrable path to independence. Prior experience of applying for grant funding is desirable but not required.
Neither is it essential to currently be employed on the African continent, but applications should demonstrate the applicant’s desire to establish themselves as an independent researcher on the African continent.
Fellows will be supported by two supervisors/advisors: one each from the Crick and the chosen African partner institution, as well as having the option of support from one of the 14 Crick Science Technology Platforms (STP) which specialize in specific techniques and technologies.
To apply, applicants must first submit a mandatory Expression of Interest form (see Guidance Notes for Expression of Interest form) by emailing it to [email protected]. The Expression of Interest form will be available between Monday 23rd April 2018 and 23:59 GMT on the 1st July 2018.
The purpose of the Expression of Interest form (EoI) is to establish eligibility as well as assisting applicants to find a combination of supervisors/advisors within the Crick and in African Partner Institutions who would be appropriate to support the proposed research. Having established eligibility, applicants are invited to discuss their proposed research with suggested supervisors to refine research plans.
Eligible applicants will be provided with the link to the online application portal which opens on 23rd May 2018 and closes at 23:59 GMT on 1st August 2018.
Applicants successful at the full application stage will be invited to interview. Interviews will take place during September 2018.
The outcome of applications will be announced on 1st October 2018.
For more information, email [email protected]
Visit the Official Webpage of the Crick African Network African Career Accelerator Awards 2018
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Peacedirect Tomorrow’s Peacebuilders Photo Prize 2018 (Photo Equipment Worth $1000)
TDR Clinical and Research Development Fellowship 2019 (Fully-Funded)
Kiplinger Program in Public Affairs Journalism Fellowship 2018 at Ohio State...
Africa Oxford Initiative (AfOx) Visiting Fellows Program 2018 for African-based Researchers...
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Center for Oral History
Search Interviews
Browse Oral Histories Alphabetically
Yue Xiong
Yue Xiong was born in Nanchang. His father was a scholar sent to a labor camp during the Cultural Revolution, and his mother struggled to support the family. After high school Xiong worked on the farm where his family lived. When the Cultural Revolution ended, Xiong attended Fudan University. James Watson's book on the molecular biology of the gene inspired him. Interested in the China-United States Biochemistry Examination and Application program, Xiong learned English and went to the University of Rochester, where he entered Thomas Eickbush's laboratory researching DNA sequencing and transposable elements of the chorea gene. Xiong helped develop the mild-extracting method for isolating linealized and supercoiled DNA. He is now at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, looking at cell-cycle control and tumor suppression.
Tian Xu
Tian Xu was born in Jiaxing City. During the Cultural Revolution, his parents endured reeducation," the family moved to a shack, and Xu's schooling was negatively impacted. He took up Go to keep himself challenged mentally. After the Cultural Revolution, Xu studied genetics at Fudan University. When a famous mathematician, Shiing-Shen Chern, returned to Xu's hometown from Berkeley, Xu resolved to go to the United States. He went to Yale University, where he entered Spyros Artavanis-Tsakonas's lab. Xu stubbornly resisted learning English until he entered Gerald Rubin's laboratory at University of California, Berkeley. He later became a principal investigator at Yale. He discusses his current research on cancer and the LATS and DRPLA genes, motivation for pursuing science, and the advantages and disadvantages of being a principal investigator. "
Zhaohui Xu
Zhaohui Xu was born in Suzhou, China. Because the Cultural Revolution dictated a child's future occupation, education options were limited, and there were few books, no movies, no television. Soon things began to change, and in junior high school Xu began science classes. He attended University of Science and Technology of China for its broader science base. Xu loved the excitement of discovery to be found in basic science, but because Chinese research facilities were so limited, he knew he wanted to go to graduate school elsewhere, eventually attending University of Minnesota. After his PhD and six years in Paul Sigler's lab at Yale, he accepted an assistant professorship at the University of Michigan. There, he works on crystal structure of the trigger factor, crystal structure of the cytosolic chaperones GroEL and GroES, and SecA and SecB.
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NSGA Presents Inaugural Male and Female Athlete of the Year Awards
News and Events Press Releases
DALLAS, Texas- A affable, lifelong multi-sport athlete and a passionate player and advocate of senior women’s basketball were named as recipients of the first-ever male and female Athlete of the Year awards at the National Senior Games Awards Gala. The program was part of the 2017 National Senior Games Association (NSGA) Annual Conference held January 25-28 in Dallas. Richard “Dick” Naslund, 91, o...
Dr. Kenneth Cooper Addresses NSGA Annual Conference
DALLAS, Texas- Dr. Kenneth H. Cooper, preventive medicine pioneer and “father of aerobics,” presented a talk at the 2017 National Senior Games Association (NSGA) Annual Conference on Friday, January 27. Attendees were representatives from 53 Member Games that serve as qualifying events for the biennial National Senior Games, as well as partners and vendors of the organization. Dr. Cooper is founde...
“I Guess I’m a Creature of Habit”
Jordan Wolle, 89, Las Cruces, New Mexico No one loves water more than Jordan Wolle. That could be the setup for a joke, given that he has lived most of his life in arid New Mexico. However, he is quick to state his opinion that there are more good swimmers per capita there than most other states. He is also proud to have represented The Land of Enchantment in every National Senior Games since the ...
Both Feet on the Floor
George Freeman, 86, Foley, Alabama There are just some people in the world that catch you by surprise. When you first meet George Freeman, he doesn’t strike you as an outgoing, gregarious person. He possesses an unassuming and good-natured personality that puts people at ease, and he is a good listener. However, once he starts talking, joking, and telling stories, he has the ability to light up a ...
The Long Run - January 2017
Association News 2017 Message From NSGA As we enter a historic year for NSGA, CEO Marc T. Riker pauses to appreciate how far the organization has come. Make sure to follow the link below to read his entire message. Happy New Year! To kick off 2017, it is time to reflect on what our organization has accomplished over the past four years, and to look forward to the 2017 National Senior Games ...
"Banner Year, Bright Future" January 2017 Athlete of the Month
Sue McCarthy, 53, South Portland, Maine Spectators and the media frequently spend more time lauding the accomplishments of our oldest athletes, and they are truly worthy of the attention. On the other hand, there are also equally impressive performances in the youngest sport age divisions. Case in point: Maine sprinter Sue McCarthy, whose first appearance at the 2015 National Senior Games presente...
2017 Message from NSGA
Happy New Year! To kick off 2017, It is time to reflect on what our organization has accomplished over the past four years, and to look forward to the 2017 National Senior Games presented by Humana coming to Birmingham, and the milestone it represents. In 2012, while serving as Director of National Games for the National Senior Games the Board of Directors approached me about taking on the role of...
Ed True, 85,O'Fallon, Illinois As you read through Ed True’s life history in the conversation below, it becomes clear that the multi-faceted man has never found himself wondering what to do next with his life. It’s also evident that he has made the most from every turn he has taken. His mantra for happiness and success in life is simple: Don’t do anything you don’t enjoy doing. There are a lot of ...
Go, Dottie, Go!
Dottie Gray, 91, Saint Louis, Missouri When Dottie Gray signed up for the first national sports competition for seniors in 1987, she had no idea how far the road ahead would stretch. In fact, before she was 54, the petite powerhouse had no idea she would even become a runner, or that her example would inspire many others to pursue fitness. Dottie had no competitive sports history growing up, burni...
The Long Run - December 2016
Association News NSGA and ACE Introduce New Fitness Portal Full of Resources In the September newsletter, NSGA announced the formation of a new partnership with the American Council on Exercise (ACE) , a non-profit organization that certifies exercise professionals and health coaches. We also promised exciting things to come. Link to September story. We are thrilled to release the devel...
"Christmas Hit Maker Runs Like a Reindeer" December 2016 Athlete of the Month
Elmo Shropshire, 80, Novato, California While visiting the 2016 Florida Senior Games, we found an athlete whose name may not be familiar, but whose voice is instantly recognizable. That’s because Elmo Shropshire is the man who gave the world the smash hit holiday novelty song “Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer.” The 80-year-old runner hails from Lexington, Kentucky but has lived in Novato, Califo...
The Long Run - November 2016
Association News NSGA Names Health and Wellness Manager Andrew M. Walker has joined NSGA as the first-ever Health and Wellness Manager, underscoring our commitment to advocate healthy, active lifestyles for people 50 and over. He will serve as staff liaison to the NSGA Foundation and Member organizations, manage partnerships with like-minded organizations, and will assist with selecting content fo...
Tucson Proclaims “National Senior Games Day”
TUCSON, Arizona (November 14, 2016)- The mayor of Tucson proclaimed this day “National Senior Games Day” to help welcome visitors from the National Senior Games Association to the “Old Pueblo City.” Mayor Jonathan Rothschild issued the proclamation to commemorate the visit by an NSGA team to capture interviews with key local organizers of the 1997 National Senior Games (then called the National Se...
"At Your Service" November 2016 Athlete of the Month
Carroll Marty, 82, Ames, Iowa Carroll Marty has found the key to happiness and longevity, and it’s the same for all senior athletes: just keep moving. However, the 82-year-old has taken it to a level where it’s hard to keep up with the Iowa native and longtime resident of Ames. It’s not that he’s been a lifelong competitive athlete; that really began 30 years ago when he entered his first all-ag...
NSGA Names Andrew M. Walker as Health and Wellness Manager
BATON ROUGE, Louisiana - The National Senior Games Association (NSGA) has named Andrew M. Walker as the organization’s first-ever Health and Wellness Manager, underscoring the commitment by NSGA to advance its core mission to advocate healthy, active lifestyles for people 50 and over. Walker earned a B.S. in health education from the University of Florida, and a master’s degree in public health fr...
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Home New Orleans Visit the locations of “Green Book” in Louisiana
On Location Photos
Visit the locations of “Green Book” in Louisiana
“Green Book” has just won 3 Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Mahershala Ali) and Best Original Screenplay. Set in the 1960s, it follows the story of Tony Vallelonga (Viggo Mortensen) who is hired as a driver by Dr. Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali), a renowned pianist who is going on tour to southern states.
The movie has been surrounded with controversies and criticism, specially because Dr. Shirley’s family has stated that the friendship depicted in the film did not happen.
Controversies aside, let’s focus on the locations used for this road-trip movie. Surprisingly enough, it was entirely shot in Louisiana, with only one day of filming in New York City. See below some of the cities and places where the characters where supposed to be.
1. Copacabana Club
Before being hired by Dr. Shirley, Tony was working for a club as a bouncer. In the movie, that club is in Manhattan. In real life, however, the exterior is the International House Hotel on Camp Street in New Orleans disguised as a club. The interior is the Carver Theater in New Orleans.
2. Hot-dog contest
Early in the film, Tony gets into a hot-dog contest to get some money. That scene was shot at The Clover Grill (900 Bourbon St, New Orleans, LA 70130).
3. Tony’s apartment
Before leaving for the road-trip, Tony says goodbye to his wife and children in front for their building, which supposedly is in the Bronx. In fact, it was shot downtown Hammond, in front of Northshore Broadcasting building — dressed up with a fire escape and laundry line — in the 100 block of S. Cypress Street, at its intersection with East Thomas Street.
4. Party in Pittsburgh
Tony and Dr. Shirley stop at a private party in Pittsburgh. In reality, this house is also in New Orleans and it is the W.P. Brown House (4717 St. Charles Ave.), which was also featured in the TV show “The Purge.”
5. Performance in Indiana
One of the tour stops is in Hoover, Indiana, where there is a problem with Dr. Shirley’s piano. That location is actually the McAlister Auditorium on the campus of Tulane University.
6. Performance in Macon, Georgia
Another stop is Macon, Georgia, which was filmed at the Orpheum Theater in New Orleans. Coincidentally, this is where the movie premiere during the 2018 New Orleans Film Festival.
7. The Saenger Theatre
Doubling as a fancy hotel lobby, The Saenger Theatre was used in the film where the two characters have an argument about Tony’s grammar and diction.
8. Memphis, Tennessee
At one point in their tour, Tony accidentally meets some friends from New York as they are arriving at a hotel in Memphis. That scene was shot at the Roosevelt Hotel, just off Canal Street. This hotel has also been used for “Twilight: Breaking Dawn” and “Trumbo.”
9. Swimming Pool
Without spoiling it, we can say that one of the major revelations about Dr. Shirley’s life happens after he was swimming. It was filmed inside the New Orleans Athletic Club.
10. Concert at a private club
Later in the movie, one of the concerts take place at a very fancy private club, where there is a problem in the restaurant involving Dr. Shirley. Those scenes were shot at the Clubhouse at English Turn Country Club.
11. Performance at a bar
After leaving that private club, Dr. Shirley and Tony go to a local bar, where the pianist has an impromptu performance. That was shot at Ruby’s Roadhouse on Lamarque Street in Mandeville.
12. Raleigh, North Carolina
One of Dr. Shirley’s shows was at a private house, supposedly in Raleigh, North Carolina. That is actually Houmas House Plantation in Ascension Parish.
13. Parking-lot picnic table
The most amusing situations of the movie would happen when Dr. Shirley helped Tony to write letters to his wife. Since Tony had no idea how to write a nice letter, Dr. Shirley would dictate them. One of those scenes happened at a picnic table outside a restaurant. That scene was shot at Miss Anne’s Fried Chicken in the Tangipahoa town of Amite.
We’ll leave you with the trailer, so you can see some of the locations we mentioned!
Sources: Nola.com, IndieWire
Contributor Carolina Malhado also has a blog reviewing movies, TV shows and theater in New York. You can follow it on Twitter and Instagram as well.
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Page added on August 29, 2012
Hillary Clinton Supports UN Population Control
The title alone should make the hair on your back stand up, Hillary Clinton Supports UNPopulation Control. The idea of elitists determining who should live isn’t new; but many folks have chosen to forget some of the darker periods in history. Daniel Tailor wrote an article back on August 27, 2007, Eugenics Moves to theTwenty-First Century which gave a history along with updates on the manipulation of the human race.
“In 1902, Andrew Carnegie founded the Carnegie Institute which among other things, funded the Eugenics Record Office in America. The ERO (1910-1944) operated from Cold Spring Harbor in New York. Eugenics policies, which led to the sterilization of thousands of Americans, were developed in this office.
The Rockefellers, perhaps more so, were also heavily involved with eugenics. Rockefeller influence in American eugenics can be traced to the beginnings of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories. John D. Rockefeller, along with Averell Harriman gave $11 million to create the facility in the early 1900’s. Rockefeller influence also spread overseas to Germany, where the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Psychiatry, and the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Eugenics, Anthropology and Human Heredity resided. Much of the money used to run these facilities came from Rockefeller. These weren’t just average scientific institutes; the Kaiser Wilhelm Institutes would become the center for Nazi eugenics programs.”
“The world has a cancer, and that cancer is man.” – Merton Lambert, former spokesman for the Rockefeller foundation
It’s too painful to think about what happened in the not too distant past, NAZI extermination of inferior humans; and anyway, that could never happen again. Take off your blinders and look what’s has been going on, just not talked about much in the media.
“The history of eugenics in America is filled with controversy and harrowing stories of forced sterilization throughout many U.S. states. In 2002 Mark R. Warner, the governor of Virginia issued an apology for the thousands of individuals that the state had sterilized from 1924 to 1979.”
That has to be a misprint, 1979? You mean to tell me people have been sterilized by force here in the United States as late as 1979? The sad truth, it’s true; and it would be as safe bet the practice continues to this day. In an article titled, Hell on Earth: TheAmerican Eugenics Movement and the Fernald Boys Home, we are shown some of the horrors which have been swept under the rug.
“During the famous 1927 Supreme Court case “Buck v. Bell”, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes declared “Three generations of imbeciles is enough,” and ruled that involuntary sterilization of the “feebleminded” — the long-sought goal of eugenicists — was to become the law of the land. In an 8 to 1 decision the Court legitimized Virginia’s law on sterilization which was not repealed until 1974.
But it turns out that the three generations in this case, Carrie Buck, her mother Emma, and her daughter Vivian weren’t imbeciles. Carrie was an average student and Vivian, taken from her mother and placed in the home of the family whose nephew had fathered her, made the honor role once in her short life.”
“The State Boys Rebellion retells the true story of Frederick Boyce and his friends who spent their childhoods in the Walter E. Fernald School for the Feeble-minded in Massachusetts, a government program that locked poor or uneducated children into mental institutions from the early 1900s through the 1970s. There, the children were neglected, abused and used for scientific experiments as part of the eugenics movement that tried to separate people considered to be genetically inferior from the rest of society in order to prevent them from reproducing.”
We know that marketing a product is just as important as the product itself; the same is true with ideas. Those in favor of eugenics and population control are reluctant to come right out and say what their intentions are; folks might get wise to the game plan. Today eugenics has incorporated an environmental twist; we need to limit the damage humans are doing to Mother Earth; now who wouldn’t be in favor of saving the planet?
“Since the early days of eugenics, a new “brand” of this science has emerged in modern times. The environmental branch of eugenics believes that, due to overpopulation, measures must be taken to either impede population growth through various eugenic policies, or take drastic measures to eliminate living human beings from the earth. Unlike those who advocate eugenics to strictly rid humanity of “undesirables,” some advocate the culling of humanity in general in order to save planet earth. Many globalist initiatives surround environmental issues, one of which has been population control and reduction.”
That about brings us back to Hillary Clinton jumping into the spotlight with our new found commitment to assist the United Nations goal of limiting world population through the use of modern scientific means. The UN won’t haul undesirables off to concentration camps as was done, by mistake, so many years ago; that kind of stuff makes for bad press. Today governments can modify the food undesirables consume; they can sterilize one meal at a time with genetically modified food.
“In a new (12 November 2008) Austrian study that will send shock waves through the corridors of power in the EU, and through the offices of the GM corporations, it has been discovered that GM corn has a damaging effect upon the reproductive system.”
Let that information soak in, and while you’re at it consider how easy it was to have a government paid shrink declare a US Marine mentally unstable and hauled away to a sanatorium in handcuffs for simply expressing his views on a Facebook account the other day.
“Police – acting under a state law that allows emergency, temporary psychiatric commitments upon the recommendation of a mental health professional – took Raub to the John Randolph Medical Center in Hopewell. He was not charged with any crime.”
How easy would it be to use government paid health care providers to declare individuals unfit for society? Obamacare and a government run health care system holds Americans hostage to a wide range of unthinkable horrors. If we consider how that legislation set up Death Panels to determine ineligibility for treatment based on age or expected cost overruns to returning soldiers being labeled as future right wing terrorists by Homeland Security because they may have seen too much violence during their tour of duty then it could be said that nobody is safe and that inalienable rights no longer exist in America.
When I read that Hillary Clinton has made population control the centerpiece of U.S. foreign policy; yes, the hair on my back stood up as if I’d been struck by lightning. This is the same woman who at this very moment is attempting to work out details of how to disarm every individual in America via a U.N. arms agreement, an agreement which would not need to be ratified by our Senate; only a signature from our president and it would become the law of the land. Sleep tight and sweet dreams, our nation is in good hands.
— T.F. Stern
themoralliberal.com
10 Comments on "Hillary Clinton Supports UN Population Control"
dissident on Wed, 29th Aug 2012 12:41 am
As if the UN has any real power. It would be US policy that Clinton promotes. This phobia about the “United Nothings” taking over America is absurd.
SilentRunning on Wed, 29th Aug 2012 2:16 am
What a stupid right wing screed.
Population Control is not equal eugenics does not equal death camps.
Sane Population Policy beats the alternative: Population explosion followed by resource exhaustion followed by massive die-off. That is the inevitable result of a lack of population policy.
I for one, support the UN and educating people to reduce the population growth rate to zero, and then to gradual negative population growth over the long term until our numbers are about 1 billion – which would allow a comfortable existence for everyone on the planet with the resources we have. All this would be accomplished by education, free access to birth control and tax policies – no coercion and no death camps.
Kenz300 on Wed, 29th Aug 2012 4:37 am
The worlds resources are finite while population growth continues adding over a billion more people in the last 12 years.
Every country needs to develop a plan to balance its population with its resources, food, water, energy and jobs. THose that do not will be exporting their people and their problems.
If you can not provide for yourself you can not provide for a child.
Access to family planning services needs to be available to all that want it.
Endless population growth only leads to more poverty, suffering and despair.
mike on Wed, 29th Aug 2012 7:46 am
I’m all for self imposed population control. With regards to centrally planned population control, can’t we all just have a big global land and sea war, then those of us clever enough and peaceful enough to not join in get to live and perpetuate our clever peaceful genes. job done.
BillT on Wed, 29th Aug 2012 2:06 pm
Hilary could start the ball rolling by doing away with herself…
Welch on Wed, 29th Aug 2012 2:08 pm
“The title alone should make the hair on your back stand up”
Why? It would be the single best thing we ever did.
Frank Kling on Thu, 30th Aug 2012 3:39 am
Too bad the pols. do not have the guts to implement such a plan before it’s too late. Fantastic idea!
Lisa on Thu, 30th Aug 2012 7:10 am
I’m sensing that everyone here in favour of population control assume they – or anyone they care about – are not going to be shaved off (“It would be the single best thing we ever did”). Big mistake. Why do you think no one cares that GMO and vaccines seem to have limiting effects on the reprodcution system?
And exactly what problem is it that you propose to solve with culling of the human population? That there are too many humans? Why don’t you start with ants – there are literally trillions of them!!
Paul Fishman on Tue, 2nd Feb 2016 6:42 am
Hillary Rotten Clinton if she gets the presidency by criminal sabatoge will impose population control on America EXACTLY like China with a two child policy allowing on ONE girl in the American family. Along with her husband’s help they will also impose forced abortion as well if a family dares to have three or more children.
Dr. Gafan on Tue, 13th Nov 2018 2:08 pm
The source link in the article got expired, here is the working one – https://www.lvcriminaldefense.com/brandon-j-raub-marine-detained/
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Financial Flexibility and the Choice between Dividends and Stock Repurchases
See all articles by Clifford P. Stephens
Clifford P. Stephens
Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge - E.J. Ourso College of Business Administration
Murali Jagannathan
SUNY at Binghamton - School of Management
Michael S. Weisbach
Ohio State University (OSU) - Department of Finance; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER); European Corporate Governance Institute (ECGI)
Date Written: February 3, 1999
The paper measures the growth in open-market stock repurchases and the manner in which stock repurchases and dividends are used in U.S. corporations. We find that aggregate repurchases have increased dramatically over this period: the number and value of repurchase program announcements has grown from 115 and $15.4 billion in 1985 to 755 and $115 billion in 1996. Actual share repurchases have grown from approximately $8.8 billion in 1985 to over $63 billion in 1996. These repurchases represent an economically important source of payouts, and are responsible for much of the variation in aggregate payouts. Nonetheless they are still small relative to the $142 billion in dividends paid by industrial firms listed on Compustat in 1996. Stock repurchases and dividends are used at different times from one another, by different kinds of firms. Stock repurchases are very pro-cyclical, while dividends increase steadily over time. Dividends are paid by firms with higher "permanent" operating cash flows, while repurchases are used by firms with higher "temporary", non-operating cash flows. Repurchasing firms also have much more volatile cash flows and distributions. These results are consistent with the view that the flexibility inherent in repurchase programs is one reason why they are sometimes used instead of dividends.
Stephens, Clifford P. and Jagannathan, Murali and Weisbach, Michael S., Financial Flexibility and the Choice between Dividends and Stock Repurchases (February 3, 1999). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=148548 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.148548
Clifford P. Stephens (Contact Author)
Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge - E.J. Ourso College of Business Administration ( email )
2159 CEBA
Baton Rouge, LA 70803-6308
SUNY at Binghamton - School of Management ( email )
Binghamton, NY 13902-6015
Ohio State University (OSU) - Department of Finance ( email )
2100 Neil Avenue
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Tag Archives: kings
Book Review of The Waning of the Middle Ages by J. Huizinga, The Civilization of the Renaissance In Italy by Jacob Burckhardt & The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy by Ernst Cassirer
In The Waning of the Middle Ages, Huizinga several times contrasts the democratic ideal of work– which he views as the ideal of modernity– to the aristocratic “true culture” of the Middle Ages. The reason for this contrast lies in the modern era’s conforming “of life to an ideal standard,” and not vice versa, which condition Huizinga views as a privation of culture. Man in the Middle Ages, by contrast, constructed his culture in accord with his conduct, customs, manners, costume, &c., and did not force himself to conform to an ideal, like the Modern ideal of the worker, but adapted and tailored the ideal to his singular and many-sided nature, or fancy. The comparison Huizinga makes between modern and Medieval times, usually to the disparagement of the former, underscores his thesis that it is the “overripeness” of Medieval culture that reveals it as an “epoch of fading and decay” — the adjective “overripe” indicating, in Huizinga’s analysis, the Medieval world’s highly mannered and overwrought use of symbol which, as he establishes through a wealth of examples, is effectively deployed throughout all religious and poetical forms of expression of the time. Thus, the features Huizinga assigns to the Middle Ages of self-containment and a perfection of attitude and expression in regard to all things, marks Medieval culture at the beginning of the 15th century as a culture at its limits, and one to be inevitably overtaken by Burckhardt’s “universal men” of the Renaissance, who are to melancholy Medieval man “as is the aspray to the fish, who takes it by sovereignty of nature.”1
The contrast made between the modern era and the Middle Ages is important to how Huizinga interprets aristocratic and feudal culture in Medieval France:
From the Thirteenth Century onward inveterate party quarrels arise in nearly all countries: first in Italy, then in France… Though economic interest may sometimes have been at the bottom of these quarrels, the attempts which have been made to disengage them often smack somewhat of arbitrary construction. The desire to discover economic causes is to some degree a craze with us, and sometimes leads us to forget a much simpler psychological explanation of the facts.2
With this claim, Huizinga disengages himself from the Marxist reorientation of history along economic and materialist lines. Ever since Marx reduced the driving force of social and political alterations to material and economic causes, and resolved the contemplative aim of traditional philosophy into the service of history, the tendency to interpret history on Marx’s terms is ever-present, since the materialist project is not comprised of mere fact-finding, but the criticism of history itself, which, as Marx, echoing Feuerbach, writes, “disillusions man so that he will think, act, and fashion his reality as a man who has lost his illusions… so that he will revolve about himself as his own true sun.”3
Huizinga situates the complex symbolism, aesthetic, and formalized chivalric conventions saturating the age at the center of the Medieval experience and does not seek out economic explanations regarding how Medieval culture came to be consumed by its own heavy opulence. If the development of such complex forms is not reducible to active economic causes, interpretive psychological explanations have more to offer in the face of the overwhelmingly foreign landscape of the Middle Ages, and this is the territory where Huizinga makes his case.
In spite of any economic conditions that may have prevailed at the time, the Medieval conception of chivalry is understood by Huizinga to be the manner by which Medieval nobles related to the servant class. This relationship was comprised of “the innate and immediate sentiments of fidelity and fellowship,” which is “a feudal sentiment at bottom.”4 Such a form of attachment is unthinkable six centuries later. Beyond any outward bond of sentiment between men from otherwise discrete social orders, the unequal relationship of men was put on momentarily equal footing, as Huizinga notes, by the omnipresent memento mori, which served as a potent reminder of human mutability, everywhere visible in a culture that freely amalgamated pessimism, subliminity, and despair. Many years later, in 1538, Hans Holbein the Younger, in woodcuts done for a German edition of the Dance of Death, was still making use of thoroughly Medieval motifs to demonstrate the same point about the transient nature of human life, regardless of social standing. In the Middle Ages, not only posthumous odds and ends, but poets as well, admonished the constituents of the nobility to attain to that curiously Medieval conception of equality, whose formulation is expressed in the Medieval conception of chivalry:
[T]he reason of these poetical admonitions on the subject of true nobility and human equality generally lies in the stimulus they impart to the nobles to adapt themselves to the true ideal of knighthood, and thereby to support and purify the world.5
Clearly the impetus for action is not found in the counting house, but, as Huizinga phrases it, in the “value of chivalrous ideas.” He notes that the nobility, the men who made the history of the Middle Ages, “were no romantic dreamers, but dealt in solid facts.” Chivalrous ideas represented far more than a mere “ornament of society,” having little practical efficacy or permanent value; chivalry in fact represented the highest and most complete formulation of social values to be found in the age.
Men in the Middle Ages also looked to Antiquity for models of virtuous conduct and political theory. Huizinga rejects Burckhardt’s claim (in The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy) that the Renaissance alone was the period when the rediscovery of Antiquity occurred. Huizinga situates his conception of history against Burckhardt’s by pointing out that Burckhardt insists on too sharp of a distinction between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, and furthermore, that
The Middle Ages had always lived in the shadow of Antiquity, always handled its treasures, or what they had of them, interpreting it according to truly Medieval principles: Scholastic Theology, chivalry, asceticism, and courtesy. Now, by an inward ripening, the mind, after having been so long conversant with the forms of Antiquity, began to grasp its spirit… Europe, after having lived in the shadow of Antiquity, lived in its sunshine once more.6
The psychological interpretation of how the shift from what we call the Middle Ages to what we call the Renaissance occurred is worth noting, since this is the sort of explanation Huizinga favors. Rather than a sudden revival of cultural and literary forms long forgotten, which is part and parcel of the account one finds in Burckhardt, Huizinga points out that the differences between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance are not driven by the “classic expression and imagery” of Antiquity, as though it existed in one age and not the other, but that “the soul of Western Christendom itself was outgrowing Medieval forms and modes of thought that had become shackles.”
Burckhardt distills his understanding of the many figures and events that shaped the Renaissance from a distinction between theoretical activity and practical activity, i.e., a material understanding of the Renaissance as opposed to a psychological or philosophical one. Huizinga interprets the Middle Ages with an eye towards the soul, or spirit of the times, but he does not give a place to a discussion of speculative philosophy or theoretical activity in his account; yet one has the impression that the philosophical activity of the age underlies the psychological current of Huizinga’s account. Burckhardt is more explicit in the omission of philosophy from his account of the Renaissance, and places the narrative accent squarely on the practical, ethical, and religious life of men in the Renaissance as the mitigating factors of social construction and principles of individuation. This focus allows him to regard the speculative philosophy of the Renaissance as counting for very little — a move that Cassirer, in The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy, takes him directly to task on. The many developments in the twin spheres of political and religious life in the Renaissance Burckhardt calls “the chief reason for the early development of the Italian,” which species of human for Burckhardt is synonymous with “the individual.” Through the transitions and evolution of the Italian State, the modern individual, as we now have him, was being shaped. Prior to the Renaissance, and especially in the feudal Middle Ages, man’s orientation towards himself was, as Burckhardt informs us, almost non-existent: “Man was conscious of himself only as a member of a race, people, party, family, or corporation — only through some general category.”7 How the individual was born and nurtured in Italy is Burckhardt’s main concern throughout The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy. He traces this process, first, through the early forms of the Italian State in the latter 15th century, which in its despotic form, foisted upon both the tyrant and his protectors “the highest degree of individuality” — some men became true individuals out of necessity. Only later, under the ideal conditions of the Italian Republic, was this new sense of the self channeled into the “rediscovery” of Antiquity, and ultimately, it was the monuments and intellectual luminosity of the Ancients that led to the redefinition in the period of the Renaissance of what it means to be human.
The advent of the Italian Republic is what Burckhardt credits with the rediscovery of Antiquity in the form of the arts, the Classics, the Greek and Latin languages, Classical philology, &c. The Church, ostensibly sovereign over all of men’s activities in the Middle Ages, is suddenly subordinated to the new influence of the Ancients on men’s activities and minds, thereby allowing the Italian Humanists to become influential “because they knew what the Ancients knew, because they tried to write as the Ancients wrote, because they began to think, and soon to feel, as the Ancients thought and felt.”8 Such an image gives the impression that the Italians of the 16th century were only distinguished from the Ancients by their mode of dress, and perhaps a few other contingencies of culture. Such an account is doubtful, as it was a palpable habit of historians and critics of the 19th century to associate and align their sentiments perhaps too vehemently with the objects and figures of the past, and effectively reinvent what chance and fortune had handed down as the remains of eclipsed civilizations. It is paradoxical that the men of the Middle Ages, who are closer in time to the Ancients then the men of the Renaissance, are often supposed to have possessed less of their forbearer’s spirit and learning than those men who took up the task of understanding and assimilating the wisdom of the Ancients at an even later point in time. It may be that the spin put on the interpretation of Antiquity, first by the Humanists in the Renaissance, and then by historical revisionists of the 19th century, is simply more compelling for us because of temporal proximity, and nothing more — men of the Renaissance are more like us than the men of the Middle Ages; and surely the Ancients must be to us the most shadowy and foreign of all. In any event, Huizinga’s suggestion that psychological explanations might provide us with a simpler account of the facts than materialist doctrines or historical sentiment might prove to be true. The Italians Burckhardt assigns the most elevated passions to, i.e., a more genuine experience of Antiquity than was accessible or necessary for the men of the Middle Ages, is due to the Italian’s “measureless devotion to Antiquity” — which statement can be re-read as the continued reinterpretation and assimilation of the treasures of Antiquity into the 16th century Italian’s own collective life and culture.
Refreshingly opposed to the one-sided worship of Classical Antiquity is the figure of Pico Della Mirandola, to whom Burckhardt only devotes no more than a few paragraphs. He deftly sketches a portrait of “the only man who loudly and vigorously defended the truth and science of all ages’9against the measureless devotion to Antiquity common at the time. This is one of the few instances where Burckhardt appears to give an assessment of Renaissance philosophy. He maintains that the grand possibilities of Pico’s reconciliatory attitude to philosophic, scientific, and religious differences was thwarted by the advent of the Counter-Reformation: “Looking at Pico, we can only guess at the lofty flight Italian philosophy would have taken had not the Counter-Reformation annihilated the higher spiritual life of the people.”10 Cassirer could not disagree more with the claim that philosophy foundered in the 16th century, and focuses his investigation squarely on the theoretic and philosophical works of the Renaissance to prove the opposite point. Cassirer’s move is a radical departure from the thesis of Burckhardt, which punctuates the practical activity of man in the Renaissance, or the material forces that shaped events and encompassed “the spirit of the age,” as opposed to theoretical activity, which Burckhardt does not view as having played a significant role, and thus considers an outdated continuation of Scholasticism.11
Cassirer understands the general shift in worldview that took place in the Renaissance in a fashion similar to Burckhardt. For both writers, the Renaissance was a time in which the gradual process of individuation became the project of all the forces of production, and this problematization of the individual is traceable within the applied practices of the artists, humanist thinkers, and the early despotic regimes, culminating in the Italian republics of Florence and Venice. Yet Cassirer goes much further than Burckhardt in the scope of his analysis of Renaissance thought — intellectual activity being the first distinctive feature of individuation amongst men — and appropriately reconfigures the break established by Burckhardt between theory and practice by reviving Hegel’s teleological demand that the diverse philosophic activity of an age must of necessity be gathered within a single “simple focal point.”12 The leading representitive of this philosophical convergence, for Cassirer, is the Italian Nicholas Cusanus, whose philosophy contains “the full consciousness and spiritual essence”13 of his age, according to Cassirer. Cusanus fulfills, as well, another theoretical premise of Cassirer’s, viz., the
history of philosophy… can only make responsible generalizations by immersing itself in the most concrete particulars and in the most subtle nuances of historical detail. What is needed is the universality of a systematic point of view and… orientation.14
Cassirer expends a great deal of energy in setting out in detail the neglected philosophic system of Cusanus, whose thought, at more than one point, seems to anticipate the Copernican Revolution of Kant. A probable parallel between the two thinkers is not lost on Cassirer, although he himself only alludes to no more than a contiguous, possibly accidental connection between the thought of the two men. Cassirer’s precondition that the scholar’s universal, systematic point of view “in no way coincides with the universality of merely empirical concepts”15 has something of a Kantian transcendental ring to it, and it is probably no accident that Cassirer discusses at length the subject/object problem in the Renaissance and how both ultimate and scientific/artistic objectivity is explored in the Neo-Platonic mysticism of Ficino, and Leonardo Da Vinci’s “necessity of nature,” where, “[r]eflection on human freedom, on man’s original, creative force, requires as it compliment and its confirmation the concept of the immanent ‘necessity’ of the natural object.”16
The explication Cassirer undertakes of the thought of Leonardo is one of the most rewarding portions of the book; whereas much obscure drivel has been published and pandered on the life and work of Leonardo, Cassirer succeeds in setting at a diaphanous distance the most significant aspects of Leonardo’s contribution to Renaissance philosophy:
Leonardo’s vision of nature proved to be a methodologically necessary transition point, for it was artistic ‘vision’ which first championed the right of scientific abstraction and paved the way for it. The ‘exact fantasy’ of Leonardo the artist has nothing to do with that chaotic surging and billowing of subjective feeling which threatens to coalesce all forms into an undifferentiated whole.17
In examining “the complete parallel” between the theory of art and the theory of science in the Renaissance, Cassirer manages to put into words the thought that must have crossed the mind of anyone who has explored the comprehensive attitude of the men of that time, to the effect that the parallel between the theory of art and the theory of science
reveals to us one of the most profound motifs in the entire intellectual movement of the Renaissance. One might say that nearly all the great achievements of the Renaissance are gathered here as in a focal point. One might say, furthermore, that these achievements are nearly all rooted in a new attitude towards the problem ofform, and in a new sensitivity to form.18
Interestingly, Cassirer links this “problem of form” to another way in which it is possible to distinguish (but not divide) the Middle Ages from the Renaissance. Like Huizinga, Cassirer acknowledges that the men of the Middle Ages both handled and were conversant with the intellectual and material treasures of Antiquity. But there exists a dichotomy of spontaneity in the way in which objects and ideas of Antiquity were understood between the two ages. Quoting Karl Borinski, Cassirer writes,
Certainly the Middle Ages… had enough ties to Antiquity. A complete rupture with Antiquity had never come about, thanks to the Church, the cultural power that replaced it…. On the whole, the influence of Antiquity on the Middle Ages was, as has been… pointed out, an influence of content… A change in the attitude of the personality towards Antiquity expressed itself in form —starting with the form of the individual with his feeling, thinking, and living, and going on to the renewal of Ancient and Classical forms in poetry and art, state and society.19
The matter of “artistic sensibility” is understood by Cassirer to have given “concrete determination to the concept of nature formulated by Renaissance science.” This notion is nowhere more apparent than in the antediluvian geology found in several paintings, and scores of drawings, by Leonardo’s hand. He does not set his Madonna’s and tacitly pagan figures of Saints in cloisters, nor does he depict them in settings dominated by forgettable landscape architecture. Rather, his Saints and Virgins inhabit a primordial wasteland where one is more likely to stumble over the corpses of giant saurians than encounter a flourishing grove. This conception of nature could only have come about through an intensification of Leonardo’s own theoretical perspective — “for [Leonardo]… the creative power of the artist is as certain as that of theoretical or scientific thought. Science is a second creation made with the understanding; painting is a second creation made with the imagination.”20 One could not ask for a better formulation of Leonardo’s scientific and artistic programme than that.
1 Shakespeare, Coriolanus, IV. Vii. 34-5.
2 J. Huizinga, The Waning of the Middle Ages (Edward Arnold Publishers, Ltd., London, 1963), p 13.
3 Karl Marx, in The Marx-Engles Reader, ed. Robert C. Tucker (W.W. Norton & Company Inc., 1978), p 54.
4 Huizinga, p 23.
5 Ibid., p 102.
6 Ibid., pp 307-8.
7 Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy (Barnes and Noble Books, 1999), p 81.
11 In the synthesizing philosophic activities of Pico Della Mirandolla (namely, the marrying together Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy), there is the distinct aroma of Scholastic philosophy — particularly in the effort he devotes to defending and elaborating the Scholastic trinity — God, freedom, and the immortality of the soul.
12 Ernst Cassirer, The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy, translated by Mario Domandi (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1972) p 7.
13 Ibid., p 1.
16 Ibid., p 153.
18 Ibid., p 159. Italics in original.
19 Ibid., pp 159-60.
20 Ibid., 161.
This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged 17th century, alchemy, aristotle, atheism, atheist, book, books, chivalry, christian, church, criticism, critique, dance of death, danse macabre, das capital, democracy, dignity of man, economic, economics, economy, Ernst Cassirer, feudalism, Feuerbach, ficino, god, greek, Hans Holbein, history, history of ideas, Huizinga, intellectual, Jacob Burckhardt, karl marx, king, kings, leonardo da vinci, Machiavelli, medieval, memento mori, middle ages, mysticism, occult, oration, philosophers, philosophy, Pico Della Mirandola, plato, prince, renaissance, review, roman, romance of the rose, Shakespeare, socrates, The Civilization of the Renaissance In Italy, The Individual and the Cosmos in Renaissance Philosophy, The Waning of the Middle Ages, theology, thomas aquinas on December 12, 2012 by philosophymajor.
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Some RMA plans contain assessment criteria in their rules to guide or direct users towards considering specified environmental effects or issues.
Assessment criteria should not be included in the plan as rules. The statutory framework of the RMA enables provision for such criteria (or matters of assessment) to be included in such a way that the consent authority should have regard to them through their presence in objectives and policies. Assessment criteria can also be expressed as matters over which control or discretion is retained when writing rules for controlled or restricted discretionary activities.
There may also be a role for assessment criteria in full discretionary activities when there is a need to draw attention to particular effects. The wording can make the assessment criteria mandatory (e.g. "…the council must be satisfied…") or discretionary (e.g. "…the council may take into account whether…") in an application.
Good practice in using assessment criteria
Incorporate assessment criteria into policies instead of rules where possible.
Where assessment criteria are contained in objectives and policies, ensure there is a clear cross-referencing back to them from the rules that implement those objectives and policies.
Where assessment criteria in controlled or restricted discretionary activities rules are intended to be (or have the effect of) matters over which the council intends to retain control or restrict its discretion, they should be expressed as such.
Matters of assessment should relate back to effects the activity may have on the environment, or the aspect of non-compliance that has triggered the need for the resource consent.
Write assessment criteria as 'inclusive ' statements (i.e. "…includes the following…").
The following phrases can be used at the start of each assessment matter:
"The extent to which …"
"The ability to…"
"The degree to which…"
"Whether the…"
In some cases such criteria would be better incorporated into the objectives and policies of plans, but there may be circumstances (such as when considering full discretionary activities) where the criteria may be of such detail that their incorporation into policy could result in overly long, complex, policies. If assessment criteria are used, care should be taken to ensure that they are directly related to the relevant objectives and policies, and do not provide any additional matters for consideration or leave gaps.
Cross-referencing
Plans that deal with a multitude of issues and topics (such as district plans, combined planning documents, or regional plans that deal with more than one topic) are of such complexity that cross-referencing is usually necessary to avoid excessive repetition. Cross-referencing can take a number of forms, though summary tables and italicised references next to plan provisions (side notes) are increasingly becoming common methods.
When cross-referencing consider:
making the cross-reference visible either by way of its position on the page or font.
when making a cross-reference from a rule to another rule, placing the cross reference in the rule itself (e.g. "…and must also comply with standards for noise emissions in rule 2.3.5.5")
using summary tables to show the linkages between multiple provisions
making cross-references hyperlinks in on-line (electronic web-based) plans.
cross-references that are too general ("…refer to chapters 10-12 of this plan for objectives and policies that apply…").
For more information refer to cross-references in RMA Plans.
Definitions are used to give a standard meaning to words or phrases that occur frequently throughout a plan. The use of definitions avoids repetition and promotes consistency in interpretation. As the defined terms are usually part of, and crucial to, policies and rules, the same level of care should be taken in their drafting.
In writing definitions it is good practice to:
use definitions sparingly and only where needed - ask whether defining the term under consideration is likely to clarify provisions, or just adds complexity
reflect common understandings or meanings of the defined term as far as practical (refer to the Oxford English Dictionary as a starting point)
define words that differ in meaning from common understandings or meanings when used in the RMA plan
use diagrams to illustrate terms that are difficult to describe in words (such as matters with a spatial or geographic component)
place all definitions in one place (for example a 'definitions' chapter in the plan) unless the definition is only used in one particular rule or clause ("for the purpose of this rule, height means…")
consider placing terms that are defined outside the plan (such as in legislation) in a glossary located either before or after the definitions chapter of the plan
arrange definitions in alphabetical order
check definitions against each other to ensure that there are no gaps or overlaps
re-check definitions before notification of a plan or plan change or after amendments. Delete definitions of terms that are no longer used, and ensure those that remain are consistent with the latest changes or amendments
use hyperlinks in electronic plans to take the reader from rules back to definitions where a defined term is used in an objective, policy or rule
work towards definitions that are consistent with those of other district and regional plans. This may mean looking at what other plans use (most plans are now on-line) or discussing definitions and experiences with staff from other local authorities.
defining terms that have a commonly accepted meaning (e.g. sky) unless such terms are to have their meaning 'restricted' or 'extended' in the plan
writing definitions in such a way so that they become a de facto rule or contain matters that would be better expressed as a rule (by containing thresholds, standards or terms for example)
using the words 'means' and 'includes' in the same definition ('means' relates to the complete and total meaning whereas 'includes' is used where the meaning is incomplete or indicative)
scattering definitions throughout the plan
repeating or paraphrasing definitions or sections in statutes or regulations (if there is desire to make these available to readers, consider putting them in a glossary that is identified as not forming part of the plan)
writing definitions in such a way that change the status of activities or that deal with matters that should be dealt with in a rule (readers expect definitions to only relate to matters of interpretation or meaning)
definitions referring to other defined terms that in turn refer to the former definition (so creating circular arguments).
See examples of definitions styles.
Book traversal links for Assessment Criteria
‹ Writing Effective and Enforceable Rules
Methods - Other Than Rules ›
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Home » News » Impaired Mental Status May Hike Death Risk In Elderly After Heart Attack
Impaired Mental Status May Hike Death Risk In Elderly After Heart Attack
By Janice Wood
Associate News Editor
Last updated: 27 Aug 2018
Impaired mental status is associated with a doubled risk of death one year after a heart attack in elderly patients, according to new research.
“Cardiologists should consider conducting simple tests to assess mental status in elderly people after a heart attack,” said study author Professor Farzin Beygui of Caen University Hospital in France.
“Patients with reduced mental status can then receive more intensive management, such as regular follow-up appointments with their general practitioners or nurses, more specific assessment for an early diagnosis of dementia and tailored therapy.”
The risks of dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, confusion and delirium increase with age. Elderly people are also at higher risk of having a heart attack and dying afterwards. People aged 75 and over account for approximately one-third of heart attack admissions and more than half of those dying in the hospital after admission for a heart attack.
The new study assessed the impact of mental status on the risk of death in 600 patients aged 75 and above admitted for a heart attack and followed up for at least one year. Mental status was assessed using the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and the Confusion Assessment Method (CAM), both simple bedside tests routinely used in clinical practice, the researchers explained.
Cognitive impairment was detected in 174 (29 percent of) patients. Patients with impaired mental function were more than twice as likely to be dead one year after their heart attack than those with healthy mental function, the study discovered.
The association was independent of other potential predictors of death such as age, sex, invasive treatment, type of myocardial infarction, heart failure, and severity of the heart attack, according to the study’s findings.
Impaired mental status was also associated with a nearly four-fold higher rate of bleeding complications while in the hospital and a more than two-fold higher risk of being readmitted to the hospital for cardiovascular causes within three months after discharge, researchers noted.
“Almost one-third of elderly heart attack patients in our study had reduced mental capacity,” Beygui said. “These patients had higher risks of bleeding, rehospitalization, and death. This may be because they forget to take their medicines or take them more than prescribed, rather than because of poor cognitive function itself.”
“Assessing mental status is a simple way to identify elderly patients at particularly high risk of poor outcomes following a heart attack,” he continued. “Identifying these patients may help us target treatment to those who need it most.”
The study was presented at the European Society of Cardiology Congress 2018.
Source: European Society of Cardiology
Photo: Graph Credit: European Society of Cardiology.
Janice Wood
Janice Wood is a long-time writer and editor who began working at a daily newspaper before graduating from college. She has worked at a variety of newspapers, magazines and websites, covering everything from aviation to finance to healthcare.
Wood, J. (2018). Impaired Mental Status May Hike Death Risk In Elderly After Heart Attack. Psych Central. Retrieved on July 17, 2019, from https://psychcentral.com/news/2018/08/27/impaired-mental-status-may-hike-death-risk-in-elderly-after-heart-attack/138141.html
Last reviewed: By a member of our scientific advisory board on 27 Aug 2018
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Tycho - Weather
Mom + Pop / Ninja Tune
Tycho is the Grammy-nominated electronic music project led by Scott Hansen as the primary composer, songwriter and producer. The highly anticipated release of their fifth studio album “Weather” is an exciting progression from their previous output, with most of the new tracks being vocal lead, while still retaining the signature Tycho sound. The sonic shift has been enhanced by the collaboration with exciting new vocalist Saint Sinner, who will be joining the live band following their time in the studio. “Weather” will be available on Mom + Pop Music X Ninja Tune.
Tycho has been remixed by the likes of Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith and Bibio and in turn, have done remixes for Little Dragon, Maggie Rogers and ODESZA. Recommended if you like… Boards of Canada, Bibio, Bonobo, Jon Hopkins, Mark Pritchard, Com Truise, Ulrich Schnauss
For How Long
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JLo Cast in ‘Hustlers’ Movie as Former Stripper Who Swindles Rich Wall Street Men
Courtesy of Annapurna Pictures
By Kristen Lopez | 11 months ago
Jennifer Lopez is a woman of numerous talents, going all the way back to her audition for In Living Color. The Nuyorican actress is a beauty maven, world-class performer, television and movie star, and now we can add stripper to the list.
It’s been announced Lopez will lead the Annapurna Pictures film Hustlers, a story based on Jessica Pressler’s New York Magazine article, “The Hustlers at Scores.” Lopez is set to play the “ringleader” of a group of former exotic dancers determined to fleece the wealthy men they used to perform for. The movie is set to be directed and written by Lorene Scafaria and look at the women’s lives during the early 2000s at the height of the financial crisis. When describing the film Scafaria hopes to present an “empathetic look” at the gender roles between men and women, and how “the rules of the club are the rules of the world.”
This is another new turn in the career of Lopez, who is coming off the last season of her NBC drama Shades of Blue. Working alongside Scafaria, who’s previous features Seeking a Friend for the End of the World and The Meddler were unique takes on stereotypical genres, is exciting. The plot sounds reminiscent of another movie about a heisting girl gang, this year’s Ocean’s 8, and if we can get some flashy stripper clothes and money, we should have a good time. Considering Lopez modeled her “I’m Glad” music video back in 2002 on Flashdance – another movie about a stripper having to hustle – dare we hope for some more references this time?
Hustlers does not currently have a release date.
hustlers, Jennifer Lopez. Wednesday, August 8, 2018 at 2:15 PM EDT August 8, 2018 by Kristen Lopez
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UP NEXT: ‘Hustlers’ Movie Starring JLo, Constance Wu & Cardi B Finally H...
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