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New Surveillance Footage of FBI Raid Raid on Roger Stone's Home Reveals Excessive Show of Force
New Surveillance Footage of FBI Raid on Roger Stone's Home Reveals Excessive Show of Force
Newly released surveillance footage from former Trump adviser Roger Stone’s home shows CNN arriving about an hour before a fleet of trucks filled with heavily armed agents arrived to arrest the 66-year-old.
Fox News' Tucker Carlson aired the footage during his show Friday night, saying, "The footage depicts what you’d expect if the FBI raided the home of a Mexican drug lord.”
Stone was charged last month on seven counts, including five for making false statements to Congress, one for witness tampering, and one for obstruction of a government proceeding.
“For context, Roger Stone is a senior citizen accused of false statements to Congress. Take a look at what happened. It’s just before 5 a.m., and an SUV with a CNN cameraman arrives first to this quiet street in Fort Lauderdale, Florida,” Carlson said.
Roger Stone: 'I’m in for the Fight of My Life, But I Will Not Quit'
“Almost exactly one hour later, trucks with heavily-armed men arrive in front of Roger Stone’s house. Immediately CNN’s cameraman jumps out of the car, camera on shoulder, capturing the footage,” he added. “The feds assemble on Stone’s driveway. They’re wearing ballistic armor and carrying assault weapons with 30-round magazines, red-dot sights, and tactical flashlights mounted to their barrel shrouds. One has his gun hanging by a strap while he carries a battering ram in his left hand. All of the men have sidearms holstered on their waists.”
Carlson continued:
A second camera mounted on Stone’s front door shows another angle of the raid. A heavily armed FBI agent approaches the door with his gun drawn while others stake out positions behind. It looks like a high-stakes raid, but CNN's cameraman is still 40 feet away filming it all. One agent swings his firearm around as he scans and surveys Stone’s front porch.
Behind the home a third camera captures agents approaching the back of the house from the side yard. Behind the property, a boat arrives with at least two agents on board.
Within minutes, Stone exits his home to greet the agents who have their rifles pointed at him. Stone raises his hands and spins around, apparently trying to show that he is unarmed. Another FBI agent approaches Stone from behind and cuffs him. It’s just after 6:00 in the morning. It’s still dark out. Twenty minutes later, the same camera shows agents leading Roger Stone back into his house. He is barefoot. Stone is wearing a T-shirt that says, "Roger Stone did nothing wrong."
Carlson concluded the segment by noting that "the FBI and their water-carriers in corporate media" insist that the over-the-top show of force was "by the book, happens all the time."
https://pjmedia.com/video/new-surveillance-footage-of-fbi-raid-on-roger-stones-home-reveals-excessive-show-of-force/
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MEET THE PRESS: Robyn Bresnahan takes over as host of Ottawa Morning on Dec. 5
BY Sarah Brown
POSTED December 1, 2011 9:10 am
Robyn Bresnahan's first day as host of CBC Radio's Ottawa Morning is Dec. 5
When Kathleen Petty left her position in August as host of Ottawa Morning, the city’s top-rated morning radio show, listeners flooded the airwaves with their best wishes and lamented the departure of the tough interviewer with a soft spot for dogs. (In an exit interview with Judy Trinh in Ottawa Magazine, Petty talked fondly of her five years in the capital, but noted that it had taken some time to win over the local crowd.) And then the buzz began. Who would replace Petty at Ottawa Morning? Would the new agenda-setter be from Ottawa or would the CBC cast a wider net? It took two months, but, in October, BBC reporter Robyn Bresnahan was announced as the new host. Bresnahan, who grew up in Calgary, studied journalism at Carleton University and worked at the CBC’s Ottawa offices in 2000-2001 before heading to London, England. Ottawa Magazine caught up with her to find out what the incoming host has planned for the capital. Bresnahan’s first day on-air is Monday, Dec. 5.
Q: How did you hear that the job was up for grabs?
A: I heard from my best friend Rosemary Barton [a reporter with CBC’s Parliamentary Bureau]. She said “You should really apply.” She knew that my husband and I were talking about coming back to Canada at some point. Ottawa was a city we could both agree on — this is where we met! So I threw my name in the hat, never thinking it would go anywhere.
Q: And when did you hear that you had been short-listed?
A: I heard just as we were about to head out for a two-week vacation to Italy. So I’m like, “Great! Let’s do the interview when I get back.” And they were like, “No. The interview will be August 24.” I was freaking out a bit. I ended up doing my interview on the phone while in Tuscany. The interviewers couldn’t see me, but I remember thinking that that was actually kind of perfect because they would only be listening to me — they would know what I was going to sound like on the radio. I had a glass of wine just out of reach on the table for when the interview ended!
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Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Criminology
Oxford Research Encyclopedias Criminology and Criminal Justice
Crime, Media, and Popular Culture
Criminal Behavior
Criminological Theory
Geography of Crime
Prevention/Public Policy
Race, Ethnicity, and Crime
Victimology/Criminal Victimization
Women, Crime, and Justice
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Crime, Media, and Popular Culture (126)
Criminal Behavior (16)
Criminological Theory (28)
Critical Criminology (17)
Geography of Crime (9)
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Juvenile Justice (20)
Prevention/Public Policy (24)
Race, Ethnicity, and Crime (10)
Research Methods (9)
Victimology/Criminal Victimization (6)
White Collar Crime (19)
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Abortion in American Film since 2001
Fran Bigman
In American cinema from 1916 to 2000, two main archetypes emerge in portrayals of women seeking abortion: prima donnas and martyrs/victims. While the prima donna category faded over the ... More
In American cinema from 1916 to 2000, two main archetypes emerge in portrayals of women seeking abortion: prima donnas and martyrs/victims. While the prima donna category faded over the course of the 20th century, study of abortion in American cinema from 2001 to 2016 shows that the victim archetype persists in many films. Women who have abortions are cast as victims in films across a variety of genres: Christian, thriller, horror, and historical. Some recent films, however, namely, Obvious Child (2014) and Grandma (2015), reject this hundred-year-old tendency to portray abortion as regrettable and tragic—especially for the women choosing it—and instead show it as a liberating experience that brings women together, breaking new ground for the depiction of abortion in American film.
A Critical Introduction to Arts Behind Bars
Aylwyn Walsh
This article proposes a focus on some of the arguments in the field—what is “arts behind bars”? What are some of the intentions, and why would people do it? It also signals the range of ... More
This article proposes a focus on some of the arguments in the field—what is “arts behind bars”? What are some of the intentions, and why would people do it? It also signals the range of practices that are to be found—from the development of needlework in male prisons through to participatory arts projects with young people in prisons to collaborative stage shows. Artists working in criminal justice have a wide range of intentions. For a few, there might be a frisson of the danger and caged energy behind bars that is stimulating to creativity and could add something to their own creative process. The model of art for prisoners—professional artists staging a show or doing an unplugged music event in a prison—can raise the profile of prisons and punishment. However, there are a great number of projects that move towards forms of art created with and by prisoners, thereby aligning them with a long history of social and participatory arts. Theoretically, then, the arts behind bars are informed by critical pedagogies as much as the specific disciplinary approaches. This model seeks to build critical consciousness and confidence in mastery as well as induction into the discipline of learning any skill for the purposes of liberating through knowledge. In arts behind bars, the knowledge base might include literacy outcomes, but the learning is often communal, and about creative self-expression.
The practitioners of arts behind bars have two driving intentions. Either they seek to engage more people with their art form and are willing to work in a range of contexts, or they are committed to social justice and hope to use the art form towards additional aims of generating understanding and redressing some of the inequalities experienced by prisoners. It is necessary to consider what new perspectives are offered to the subject of arts in criminal justice by thinking about how wider resources, culture, and artistic paradigms affect perceptions of the value of interventions. This highlights the need for awareness of those artists who choose to work in prisons of the moral and ethical questions raised by bringing art to the system.
A Genre Study of Prosecutors and Criminal Defense Lawyers in American Movies and Television
Michael Asimow
The term genre refers to a set of thematically or stylistically similar popular cultural texts. Courtroom narratives form both movie and television genres, and criminal trials form ... More
The term genre refers to a set of thematically or stylistically similar popular cultural texts. Courtroom narratives form both movie and television genres, and criminal trials form subgenres. Each entry in the criminal subgenres contains a criminal trial and pits a prosecutor against a defense lawyer. This article discusses the genre conventions for these characters.
Where the defense lawyer is a protagonist, the client is a co-protagonist. The client is either innocent or is being unjustly prosecuted. The defense lawyer, often presented in heroic terms, struggles to get the client acquitted (or the punishment reduced). The defense lawyer must overcome obstacles that the antagonist prosecutor places in the lawyer’s path. Defense lawyers are loners who are lacking in personal life or emotions. Perry Mason is the iconic genre defense lawyer.
Where the prosecutor is the protagonist, the crime victim (or survivors of a deceased victim) are the co-protagonists. Prosecutors are relentless, honorable, and often politically ambitious. They must struggle to overcome obstacles erected by defense lawyers. Like defense lawyers, prosecutors lack a personal life or emotions. Jack McCoy on Law & Order is the iconic genre prosecutor.
These generic conventions have become stale. Consequently, creators of pop culture products in the criminal courtroom subgenre employ genre-busting narratives that have refreshed the genre. Defense lawyers often work for clients they suspect are guilty and try to get them off through the use of technical defenses. Guilty clients deceive gullible lawyers into putting on cases with perjured testimony. If the client confesses guilt, the lawyer betrays the client to protect the public. Defense lawyers have personal lives, feelings, and emotions, and some are anti-heroes. Genre-busting prosecutors often have unpleasant personalities, and they don’t hesitate to bend ethical rules. As in the case of defense lawyers, prosecutors have inner lives and personal relationships. These genre-busters have destabilized the generic conventions and may well have established new conventions.
Alternatives to Incarceration
Faye S. Taxman and Alex Breno
Alternatives to incarceration are more than options, they have evolved into sentences of their own accord. Originally, probation and prison were the two major sentences; however, the ... More
Alternatives to incarceration are more than options, they have evolved into sentences of their own accord. Originally, probation and prison were the two major sentences; however, the concept of intermediate or graduated sanctions emerged in the 1980s and evolved throughout the 1990s. While alternatives to incarceration were considered options, they are now recognized as intermediate sanctions, graduated sanctions, and just plain sentencing options. This emergence occurred during the time that probation-plus-conditions sentences spiked, so that the average probationer now has over 17 standard conditions. With Justice Reinvestment Initiatives as a national effort to reduce the impact of mass incarceration policies, the JRI policy effort the has served to legitimize sentences that used to be considered “alternatives” by incorporating risk/need assessments, legislation to reduce sentence lengths and incarceration sentences, and changes in practices to address noncompliant probationers and parolees. Here, a new conceptual model is proposed that integrates sentencing options with results from a risk and need assessment depending on various types of liberty restrictions. Given the need to reduce prison overcrowding, there is an even further need to examine how different sentencing options can be used for different type of individuals.
American Lawyer and Courtroom Comedies
David Ray Papke
A large amount of American law-related popular culture is comedic. Inexpensive literature, Hollywood movies, and prime-time series routinely include images of amusing lawyers and accounts ... More
A large amount of American law-related popular culture is comedic. Inexpensive literature, Hollywood movies, and prime-time series routinely include images of amusing lawyers and accounts of hilarious trials. These pop cultural works entertain readers and viewers and in some instances simultaneously speak to the public’s resentment of powerful legal institutions.
American Trial Films and the Popular Culture of Law
Jessica Silbey
The American trial and American cinema share certain epistemological tendencies. Both stake claims to an authoritative form of knowledge based on the indubitable quality of observable ... More
The American trial and American cinema share certain epistemological tendencies. Both stake claims to an authoritative form of knowledge based on the indubitable quality of observable phenomena. And both are preoccupied with sustaining the authority that underlies the knowledge produced by visual perception. The American trial and cinematic form also increasingly share cultural space. Although the trial film (otherwise known as the courtroom drama) is as old as the medium of film, the continuing popularity of the legal drama centered on a courtroom verdict suggests more than a trend. The inherent affinities between law and film not only produce enduring and memorable stories about law and justice but help constitute a popular legal consciousness that sustains the authority of the rule of law in the United States. This article describes these affinities in more detail, tracing the common themes in trial films, the special case of trial film based on true stories, and the future of the genre in American popular culture. It concludes by reviewing the disciplinary approach to the study of law and visual popular culture.
Anomie Theory
Jón Gunnar Bernburg
Criminal Behavior, Criminological Theory, White Collar Crime
Originating in the tradition of classical sociology (Durkheim, Merton), anomie theory posits how broad social conditions influence deviant behavior and crime. The French sociologist Émile ... More
Originating in the tradition of classical sociology (Durkheim, Merton), anomie theory posits how broad social conditions influence deviant behavior and crime. The French sociologist Émile Durkheim was the first to discuss the concept of anomie as an analytical tool in his 1890s seminal works of sociological theory and method. In these works, anomie, which refers to a widespread lack of commitment to shared values, standards, and rules needed to regulate the behaviors and aspirations of individuals, is an intermediate condition by which social (dis)organization impacts individual distress and deviant behavior. An observant of the massive social changes of 19th-century Europe, Durkheim argued that anomie resulted from rapid social change and the weakening of traditional institutions, in particular the reduced authority of such institutions in the economic sphere, as well as changes in the principles underlying social inequality. A few decades later, the American sociologist Robert Merton re-formulated anomie theory, arguing how a particular malintegration of the culture-structure constitution of modern society produces high rates of crime. Echoing selected themes in Durkheim’s work, and discussing the United States as a prime example, Merton argued how a shared overemphasis on monetary success goals undermines individual commitment to social rules, and generates a particularly acute strain on individuals in disadvantaged social positions. Thus having implications for research on crime rate differences between societies as well as between individuals and groups within the society, anomie theory has inspired a broad range of both macro- and micro-level applications and extensions. On the one hand, the theory has shaped studies of crime rates across large social units, such as countries and metropolitan areas. Such research, while often limited in terms of the types of crime that can reliably be compared across large social units, has linked crime with economic inequality, materialistic values, the institutional dominance of market-driven processes and values, and rapid social change. An important development in this tradition is the advent of multilevel research that links societal factors with individual normlessness, strain, and criminal behavior. On the other hand, micro-level implications of anomie theory, often referred to as classic strain theory, have shaped studies of individual and group differences in criminal behavior within societies. This type of work often studies youths, at times bringing in notions of gangs, subculture, and differential opportunities, focusing on the criminogenic effects of strain stemming from opportunity blockage and relative deprivation. Yet the work rarely examines individual normlessness as an intermediate process linking social structure and delinquency. Finally, anomie theory has been extended and applied to research on business/corporate and white-collar crime. While more research is needed in this area, the extant work suggests how anomie theory provides a particularly powerful explanation of national-level differences in business/corporate crime (e.g., bribery). The article concludes by noting that an increased emphasis on multilevel research may lead to an integration of the macro-level and micro-level extensions and applications of anomie theory in the future.
A Review of the Validity of Juvenile Risk Assessment Across Race/Ethnicity
Christina Campbell and William Miller
Juvenile Justice, Race, Ethnicity, and Crime
Juvenile risk assessment instruments have provided juvenile courts with the opportunity to make standardized decisions concerning sentences and intervention needs. Risk assessments have ... More
Juvenile risk assessment instruments have provided juvenile courts with the opportunity to make standardized decisions concerning sentences and intervention needs. Risk assessments have replaced the reliance on professional decision-making practices in which court officials relied on their hunches or previous experience to determine what to do with youth once they became involved in corrections. A primary goal of juvenile risk assessment is to improve case management and help courts focus resources on juveniles who exhibit the greatest intervention needs. Further, juvenile risk assessments play a critical role in estimating which juveniles will likely reoffend by identifying factors that increase the propensity of future offending. Although some researchers believe that the implementation of standardized juvenile risk assessments is a good strategy for reducing biased decision-making for racial/ethnic minorities, other researchers have called into question the extent to which risk assessments overestimate risk for certain juveniles, especially those in minority groups who have a history of being marginalized due to their race, culture, or ethnicity. This article provides an overview of how well juvenile risk assessment instruments predict future delinquency across race and ethnicity. The review suggests that in general, risk assessments do a good job in predicting recidivism across racial/ethnic groups for diverse populations inside and outside the United States. However, there is still some room for improvement concerning the assessment of risk and needs for ethnic minorities. In addition, while there are some studies that do not report the predictive validity of risk assessment scores across race/ethnicity, risk assessments overall seem to be a promising effort to correctly classify and/or identify juveniles who are at greatest risk for future recidivism.
Fakes and Forgeries in Art, and the More Specific Term “Art Fraud”: A Criminological Perspective
Kenneth Polk
Fakes and forgeries are topics of frequent and agitated discussion in the art world. For criminologists, this interests shifts to art fraud because of its fit with issues of non-authentic ... More
Fakes and forgeries are topics of frequent and agitated discussion in the art world. For criminologists, this interests shifts to art fraud because of its fit with issues of non-authentic art. While fraud shares with the wider interests the need to demonstrate deception (an obvious aspect of a fake), a successful prosecution will require in addition that the defendant be shown to be dishonest (that is, that the deception is intentional), that there is harm as a consequence, and that the victim was actually deceived. Despite its popularity as a topic for discussion in the art world, actual cases of art fraud are exceptionally rare, although cases of “mistaken identity” are reasonably common (but these will often lack the deception and intentionality required of fraud). Among the reasons for art fraud being infrequently observed appear to be: (1) police are less than eager to pursue issues of fraud in art; (2) the deceptive skills required of a successful art faker are actually rarely observed or achieved; and (3) the role of the victim in art fraud is complex and often renders victims either passive or non-compliant with the justice process.
Bank Robbery in Popular Culture
Chad Posick
Bank robbery is an uncommon, but highly fascinating, type of crime. The media often focus on bank robberies, especially if an event was violent or involved weapons. However, data show that ... More
Bank robbery is an uncommon, but highly fascinating, type of crime. The media often focus on bank robberies, especially if an event was violent or involved weapons. However, data show that bank robberies are generally uneventful—rarely involving weapon fights or injured bystanders. Instead, perpetrators tend to use verbal or written commands to obtain their money. Movies and video games depict the unusual bank robberies, which are violent and deadly because they are exciting and action-filled, which appeals to the public. Although generally a misrepresentation of empirical reality, media depictions can highlight criminological theory in action and bring to light issues around impulsivity, thrill-seeking, brain development, group behavior, and the behavioral consequences of social strains.
Big Data and the Study of Communities and Crime
Daniel T. O'Brien
Geography of Crime, Research Methods
In recent years, a variety of novel digital data sources, colloquially referred to as “big data,” have taken the popular imagination by storm. These data sources include, but are not ... More
In recent years, a variety of novel digital data sources, colloquially referred to as “big data,” have taken the popular imagination by storm. These data sources include, but are not limited to, digitized administrative records, activity on and contents of social media and internet platforms, and readings from sensors that track physical and environmental conditions. Some have argued that such data sets have the potential to transform our understanding of human behavior and society, constituting a meta-field known as computational social science. Criminology and criminal justice are no exception to this excitement. Although researchers in these areas have long used administrative records, in recent years they have increasingly looked to the most recent versions of these data, as well as other novel resources, to pursue new questions and tools.
Big Data and Visuality
Janet Chan
Internet and telecommunications, ubiquitous sensing devices, and advances in data storage and analytic capacities have heralded the age of Big Data, where the volume, velocity, and variety ... More
Internet and telecommunications, ubiquitous sensing devices, and advances in data storage and analytic capacities have heralded the age of Big Data, where the volume, velocity, and variety of data not only promise new opportunities for the harvesting of information, but also threaten to overload existing resources for making sense of this information. The use of Big Data technology for criminal justice and crime control is a relatively new development. Big Data technology has overlapped with criminology in two main areas: (a) Big Data is used as a type of data in criminological research, and (b) Big Data analytics is employed as a predictive tool to guide criminal justice decisions and strategies. Much of the debate about Big Data in criminology is concerned with legitimacy, including privacy, accountability, transparency, and fairness.
Big Data is often made accessible through data visualization. Big Data visualization is a performance that simultaneously masks the power of commercial and governmental surveillance and renders information political. The production of visuality operates in an economy of attention. In crime control enterprises, future uncertainties can be masked by affective triggers that create an atmosphere of risk and suspicion. There have also been efforts to mobilize data to expose harms and injustices and garner support for resistance. While Big Data and visuality can perform affective modulation in the race for attention, the impact of data visualization is not always predictable. By removing the visibility of real people or events and by aestheticizing representations of tragedies, data visualization may achieve further distancing and deadening of conscience in situations where graphic photographic images might at least garner initial emotional impact.
Biosocial Theories in Criminology
Jessica Wells and Anthony Walsh
Criminal Behavior, Criminological Theory
While the roots of criminology largely lie in sociological explanations for crime and delinquency, a resurgence has begun wherein human behavior is explained as a product of both ... More
While the roots of criminology largely lie in sociological explanations for crime and delinquency, a resurgence has begun wherein human behavior is explained as a product of both environmental and biological factors: biosocial criminology. Biosocial criminology encompasses many perspectives that seek to explain the relationships between human behavior and genes, evolution, neurobiology, and more. While biosocial criminology does not have a long history in the broader field of criminology, modern advances in technology have made access to data to explore biosocial criminological questions far more readily available. Advanced technology, coupled with studies suggesting that a large proportion of the variance in antisocial behavior is attributable to genetic factors has spurred many criminologists to explore how both nature and nurture influence behavior.
A wide variety of perspectives is apparent within biosocial criminology. These perspectives can be seen as tools to uncover different elements of the equation seeking to understand human behavior. Behavior genetic studies seek to explain what proportion of the variation in a trait or behavior is due to genetic factors. Molecular genetic studies seek to uncover which genes are related to that trait or behavior and how strongly they are associated. Evolutionary psychology seeks to explain why a trait or behavior emerged and remained through the process of natural selection. Neurobiological studies explain how the complex structure and function is related to traits and behavior. While these perspectives vary widely in their approach, one fact remains: neither environmental nor biological explanation for human behavior is sufficient on its own; rather, the complex interplay between environments and biology is critical to advance knowledge about the causes and correlates of criminal and delinquent behavior.
Biplanes, Satellites, and Drones: A High Resolution History of Eyes in the Sky
Arthur Holland Michel
As we find ourselves bearing witness—even in our own backyards—to what is increasingly being referred to as the “drone revolution,” it might be a good time to turn our attention back in ... More
As we find ourselves bearing witness—even in our own backyards—to what is increasingly being referred to as the “drone revolution,” it might be a good time to turn our attention back in time and figure out how, exactly, we got here.
The large-scale use of drones for national defense and law enforcement is a relatively recent development, but unmanned aerial surveillance draws from a doctrine that is as old as flight itself. Though the fundamental logic of aerial surveillance has remained the same—to put an eye in the sky so that one may look down upon one’s enemies—the technology has evolved dramatically over this period, driving shifts in aerial surveillance theory and practice. New technologies enable new techniques that, in turn, inspire new ways of thinking about how to spy from the sky, and produce new experiences for those being watched. Our present drone revolution, which has itself driven what is being called the “intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) revolution,” is the result of this process played out over an entire century.
The unmanned aerial spying efforts of the United States military and intelligence community have a particularly long and influential history, beginning with the Union Army’s manned observation balloon corps of the Civil War. Our story begins, in earnest, with fragile and failure-prone “aerial torpedos” in the First World War and an innovative and overlooked live video transmission system from the 1930s, through the CIA’s little-known—and radically forward-thinking—Samos spy satellite program of the late 1950s and a series of extraordinarily ambitious Cold War drone programs, up to the adoption of drones over Bosnia in the 1990s. Together, these episodes show how we got the drones of today and realized the core principles that define aerial spycraft (that is, how to find and watch “the bad guys”) in the 21st century: cover as much ground as possible; process and disseminate what you collect as quickly as possible, ideally, as close as you can get to real-time; and be as persistent as possible.
The drones and high-resolution aerial cameras that are finding their way into the tool-kits of police departments will bring these principles along with them. Even if the growing number of law enforcement officers now using this technology aren’t fully aware of the long legacy of aerial surveillance that they are joining, the influence of this formative history of surveillance on their aerial crime-fighting operations is evident. Just as aerial surveillance transformed the battlefield, it will have a similarly profound effect on the experience and tactics of those operating the cameras, as well as, crucially, those individuals being watched by them. By grasping this history, we can better understand not only why and how drones are being used to fight crime, but also what to expect when every police department in the country owns an eye in the sky.
Body Cameras and Policing
Bryce Elling Peterson and Daniel S. Lawrence
Courts, Policing, Prevention/Public Policy
Body-worn cameras (BWCs) are small devices that police officers can affix to their person—in a head-, shoulder-, or chest-mounted position—that can audio and video record their ... More
Body-worn cameras (BWCs) are small devices that police officers can affix to their person—in a head-, shoulder-, or chest-mounted position—that can audio and video record their interactions with community members. BWCs have received strong support from the public and, in recent years, widespread buy-in from police leadership and officers because of their ability to improve accountability and transparency and enhance the collection of evidence. Implementation guidelines recommend that officers activate their BWCs during each officer–citizen interaction and inform the people they encounter that they are being recorded. Early research on this technology found that officers equipped with body cameras were significantly less likely to engage in force and receive citizen complaints. However, more recent studies with larger samples have had mixed findings about the impact of body cameras on use of force, citizen complaints, and other police activities and behaviors.
Numerous legal and ethical considerations are associated with BWCs, including their implications for privacy concerns and public disclosure. However, police officials, policymakers, civil rights groups, and the public must continue to weigh these privacy concerns against the potential for BWCs to enhance police accountability and transparency. Future scholarship should focus on the degree to which BWCs can improve police–community relations and yield valuable evidence for both criminal cases and internal investigations.
Campus Policing
Kenneth J. Peak
Since 9/11 and the burgeoning number of mass shootings across the United States (one of the more recent such tragedies, at a Parkland, Florida high school in February 2018, resulted in 17 ... More
Since 9/11 and the burgeoning number of mass shootings across the United States (one of the more recent such tragedies, at a Parkland, Florida high school in February 2018, resulted in 17 people being murdered, 17 wounded, and worldwide student protests for gun control), police at all levels and of all jurisdictions have had to train and prepare for security threats and attacks of all types. Certainly, policing on postsecondary campuses is no exception. Recognizing that campuses are no longer wholly safe, violence-free enclaves, higher education administrators have necessarily sought highly trained and equipped campus police agencies to provide a safer environment for their academic communities.
Policing on college and university (postsecondary) campuses has a unique history, philosophy, role, and functions. Specifically, from their humble beginnings in the early 1900s through the social and campus unrest of the 1960s and 1970s, and until today, their administration, jurisdiction, authority, methods, legal mandates, technologies, and personnel have had to evolve with the times and with new challenges. In addition, like their local and state counterparts, they have come to embrace community policing and problem solving as well as develop plans for all types of critical incidents, both acts of nature and acts of terrorism. In short, history has shown that these organizations must be prepared for the entire gamut of human and natural disorder.
Paul Kaplan
Corrections, Sentencing
The death penalty, also referred to as capital punishment, is the process whereby a state government orders a sentence of death for a person found guilty of a particular set of criminal ... More
The death penalty, also referred to as capital punishment, is the process whereby a state government orders a sentence of death for a person found guilty of a particular set of criminal offenses. In the United States, the primary capital crime is first-degree murder with an additional aggravating factor, usually called a “special circumstance” (e.g., murder of a law enforcement officer). Capital punishment is a complex process that includes a criminal charge, an involved legal process, sentencing, special “death row” prison housing, post-conviction appeals, and the ultimate execution of the defendant. Persons sentenced to death are called condemned. Execution refers specifically to the process in which the defendant is killed.
Capital punishment has been practiced throughout human history, with considerable variation across eras and regions. In the last 50 years, the use of capital punishment has declined across the globe, and there are relatively few countries that use it regularly as a form of punishment, most notably China. Some countries have abolished the death penalty completely, such as all member states of the European Union. Most other countries have seen a decline in its use. For instance, only 31 out of 50 states in the United States currently have death penalty statutes (there are also federal death penalty statutes, which are rarely used). The other 19 U.S. states are referred to as “abolitionist.”
The “modern era” of capital punishment in the United States was spurred by two important Supreme Court cases. The Furman v. Georgia (1972) decision ruled that arbitrariness in the application of the death penalty deemed its use unconstitutional. The reversal of that ruling four years later in Gregg v. Georgia (1976) reestablished the death penalty in America, and experts refer to the modern era as 1976 to the present.
Capital Punishment, Closure, and Media
Jody Madeira
Corrections, Crime, Media, and Popular Culture
In contemporary society, “closure” refers to “end to a traumatic event or an emotional process” (Berns, 2011, pp. 18–19)—and, in the more specific context of capital punishment, ... More
In contemporary society, “closure” refers to “end to a traumatic event or an emotional process” (Berns, 2011, pp. 18–19)—and, in the more specific context of capital punishment, controversy over what, if anything, is needed for murder victims’ families to attain healing and finality or move forward with their lives, including the execution of their loved one’s killer. The term is highly politicized, and is used by both death penalty advocates and its opponents to build arguments in favor of their respective positions. Closure has been indelibly linked to both capital punishment and media institutions since the late 1990s and early 2000s. The media’s penchant for covering emotional events and its role in informing the American public and recording newsworthy events make it perfectly suited to construct, publicize, and reinforce capital punishment’s alleged therapeutic consequences. Legal and political officials also reinforce the supposed link between closure and capital punishment, asking jurors to sentence offenders to death or upholding death sentences to provide victims’ families with a chance to heal. Such assertions are also closely related to beliefs that a particular offender is defiant or lacks remorse. Surprisingly, however, the association between closure and capital punishment has only recently been subjected to empirical scrutiny. Researchers have found that victims’ families deem closure a myth and often find executions themselves unsatisfying, provided that a perpetrator does not enjoy high media visibility so that the execution has a silencing effect, as did Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh’s execution by lethal injection in 2001. Recent empirical examinations of the link between capital punishment and closure prompt a redefinition of closure through which victims’ family members learn to cope with, work through, and tell the story of a murder and its impact. This redefinition is less sensational and thus perhaps less newsworthy, which may have the salubrious effect of discouraging extensive media emphasis on executions’ closure potential. Another way to decouple closure from capital punishment is for media organizations to change their practices of covering perpetrators, such as by not continually showing images of the perpetrator and by incorporating a more extensive focus on the victims and their families. While government officials have called for the media to exercise restraint in the wake of such events as the Oklahoma City bombing and 9/11, victims’ groups are now beginning to advocate for this same goal, with much success.
Car Crimes and the Cultural Imagination
Thalia Anthony and Kieran Tranter
The car and crime become entrenched in the cultural imagination with the widely circulated images of the bullet-hole-ravaged Ford V8 that Bonnie (Parker) and Clyde (Barrow) were in when ... More
The car and crime become entrenched in the cultural imagination with the widely circulated images of the bullet-hole-ravaged Ford V8 that Bonnie (Parker) and Clyde (Barrow) were in when they were killed by Texan and Louisianan police in 1934. This couple of outlaws (and their gang) had kept newspaper readers enthralled and appalled as they robbed, murdered, and kidnapped throughout the Midwest since 1932. The scope of their activities and their success in evading authorities, along with their crimes, which included many vehicle thefts, were facilitated by the mobility of the car. Before Bonnie and Clyde, car crime in the public consciousness comprised images of the foolish and antisocial behavior of the well-to-do car-owning elite. After Bonnie and Clyde, the famous image of their death car and the celebrity-making image of Bonnie as the archetypical gangster moll with cigar and revolver leaning over a stolen car, linked in the cultural imagination crime and cars as everyday through a visceral mix of bodies, sex, and violence.
In particular, the visceral imaginings of car crime after Bonnie and Clyde separated into four locations. All involved, to certain degree, bodies, sex, and violence, but distinct contexts and meanings can be identified. The first location is the imaging of car crime itself; of risky use of the car—speeding, dangerous driving, racing, drink driving—actions evidenced by carnage on the roads. There have emerged two frames for this location. The first is the serious and deadly context of the usually male driver fueled by “combustion masculinity” taking irresponsible risks with bloody consequences. The second is the humorous, over-the-top risky, subversive, and illegal car-based activities, a frame tapped into by television shows like Top Gear (Klein, 2002–2015) and Bush Mechanics (Batty, 2001) and manifest in the car chase trope. The second location is the car as a crime scene. From JFK’s assassination in a Lincoln convertible, to the car as site of sexual assault, to the illicit imaginings of the goings-on in a VW microbus, the car is a place in which crimes happen. The car is seen as constructing an internal geography in which crimes occur. The third location has the car as a facilitator of criminal activity. In the road buddy narrative from On the Road (Kerouac, 1957) to Thelma & Louise (Scott, 1991) the car becomes the outlaw’s mechanical horse facilitating a crime spree and evading arrest. At the fourth location, the car became imaged as property, the car as a crime object. From Gone in 60 Seconds (Sena, 2000) to the advertisements of the vehicle insurance industry, the car became conceived as vulnerable property, the target of theft. While distinguishable, each location is not segmented in the cultural imagination, but, as role-played by gamers in the Grand Theft Auto computer game series, cross and coexist. Now well into its second century, the car, notwithstanding contemporary transformations, nurtures a vivid imagining of its culture gone wrong.
The Characteristics of Illegal Markets
Matías Dewey
Criminal Behavior, Criminological Theory, Critical Criminology
The phenomenon of illegal markets is pervasive. The circulation of illegal goods and services reaches all social segments, crosses national boundaries, and produces enormous revenues. ... More
The phenomenon of illegal markets is pervasive. The circulation of illegal goods and services reaches all social segments, crosses national boundaries, and produces enormous revenues. Scholarship has typically addressed issues of illegal exchanges by focusing on criminal organizations, their members’ activities, internal structures, and businesses while leaving the very notion of illegal markets conceptually underdeveloped. Different from organized crime, the notion of “illegal market” compels us to consider the demand side and to investigate the varied ways it relates to the supply side. Following the path opened up by economic sociology scholarship, this article brings illegal markets to the center of the scene in order to develop them conceptually, observe them in a differentiated way, and investigate their relationships with legal structures. From this perspective, the social organization of markets comes to the fore, highlighting such aspects as the formal and informal institutions sustaining illegal markets; the modes of internal coordination that deal with problems such as value, competition, or trust; moral attitudes toward the production, exchange, or consumption of certain products or services; the cultural elements or cognitive dispositions that promote illegal exchanges; the role of state power in defining what is and is not illegal, and thus how it controls certain exchanges; and the role of the enforcement of the law in the emergence, expansion, or extinction of these markets.
PRINTED FROM the OXFORD RESEARCH ENCYCLOPEDIA, CRIMINOLOGY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE (oxfordre.com/criminology). (c) Oxford University Press USA, 2019. All Rights Reserved. Personal use only; commercial use is strictly prohibited (for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice).
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UBL Inaugurates Pakistan’s First-Ever Digital Lab
Posted 2 years ago by Press Release
UBL inaugurated Pakistan’s first-ever Digital Lab at a ceremony held in Karachi. The lab, which was built in collaboration with IBM, will provide an environment for UBL’s interdisciplinary teams as well as its network of start-ups, Fintech, ecosystem partners and academia to develop personalized and engaging digital ‘customer experiences’.
The Lab was inaugurated by Mohammed Anwar Pervez, OBE, HPk, Chairman UBL & Bestway Group UK. He was accompanied by members of the Board of Directors of UBL, Sima Kamil President & CEO UBL, and senior executives from both UBL and IBM.
With a base of over 4 million customers, the Bank boasts Pakistan’s widest network of over 45,000 customer touch-points and presence in four continents. UBL’s decision to collaborate with IBM to build a Digital Lab stems from its decision to contribute to Pakistan’s digital landscape by transforming its customer experience and reinventing its existing capabilities.
Speaking on the occasion, Sir Mohammed Anwar Pervez, OBE, HPk, Chairman UBL and Bestway Group UK said,
This first of its kind initiative, which is being led by UBL, will add stimulus to the vibrant technology-based financial sector of Pakistan. It is in line with our aspirations for UBL.
“UBL strives to be the best digital bank in Pakistan. It continuously invests in digital and mobile technologies to enhance customer experience and accelerate the national objective of Financial Inclusion”, said Sima Kamil, President & CEO, UBL.
We are confident that IBM Design Thinking is the right approach to help create personalized customer experiences.
Located in Karachi, the Digital Lab will be based on the IBM Thinking Framework, IBM’s approach to applying creative business solutions at the speed and scale modern enterprises require. It will also help customers to place end users at the center of their innovation when addressing issues and developing solutions.
Ahmer says:
marketing gimmick, no substance behind it.
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Tag Archive: hacks
Jeremy Hammond Sentenced To 10 Years In Prison
Prison Books Collective November 15, 2013
From Huffington Post
NEW YORK — Convicted hacker Jeremy Hammond was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison for stealing internal emails from the global intelligence firm Stratfor.
During the hearing, he claimed in a defiant sentencing statement that his acts were meant to expose the truth and that he hacked foreign government websites at the behest of an FBI informant.
“The acts of civil disobedience and direct action that I am being sentenced for today are in line with the principles of community and equality that have guided my life,” Hammond said in a prepared statement provided to HuffPost Live. “I took responsibility for my actions, by pleading guilty, but when will the government be made to answer for its crimes?” (more…)
anonymous, counter surveillance, hacks, Jeremy Hammond, leaks, legal update, news, occupy wallstreet, political prisoners, Politics, Stratfor, surveillance, wikileaks
Lawyers in Stratfor leak case present letters of support ahead of sentencing
Hundreds of letters defending Jeremy Hammond, who is facing 10 years in prison for email leaks, call for lenient sentence
Lawyers acting for Jeremy Hammond, the Chicago-based hacktivist facing up to 10 years in prison for releasing internal emails from the private intelligence agency Stratfor, have lodged 265 letters of support with the federal judge who will determine his sentence on 15 November.
The letters call on judge Loretta Preska of the US district court for the southern district of New York to show leniency towards Hammond, a former member of the hacking network Anonymous who has become a cause célèbre for hacktivists, civil libertarians and those concerned about the rights of whistleblowers. They include 36 submissions from leading data experts and freedom of information campaigners. (more…)
Aaron Swartz, anonymous, Chicago, hacks, Jeremy Hammond, leaks, news, political prisoners, Politics, Stratfor, wikileaks
Twitter engineer, UConn security analyst among 13 indicted for ‘Operation Payback’
Some of the men indicted last week for allegedly taking part in the scores of denial-of-service attacks launched by hacktivist group Anonymous in 2010 don’t fit the stereotype of a pajamas-wearing teen hacker causing havoc from mom’s basement.
For example, The Verge has learned that defendant Phillip Simpson is a 28-year-old IT professional who works for a test-preparation service. Anthony Tadros, 22, is a student at the University of Connecticut, who ironically once worked as a security analyst for the school, according to his LinkedIn profile. Geoffrey Commander is 65 years old. And then there’s Ryan Gubele, a 27-year-old who is a former contract employee for Amazon. In June, Gubele began working as a site reliability engineer for Twitter — and is currently still employed there.
Last week, the US Department of Justice alleged in a 28-page indictment that Gubele and the other 12 defendants helped Anonymous, the hacktivist collective, disrupt or cause the collapse of web sites operated by Bank of America, MasterCard and multiple global antipiracy groups. Some of the companies were attacked for refusing to process donations made to WikiLeaks, the group that published leaked US diplomatic cables. Others came under fire for supporting antipiracy efforts. Anonymous dubbed the DDoS campaign Operation Payback. (more…)
anonymous, hacks, Operation Payback, repression, wikileaks
Hacker who led Anonymous-sponsored hacks against police agrees to plea deal
Prison Books Collective September 4, 2013
From arstechnica
A member of “CabinCr3w,” an Anonymous splinter group, has agreed to a plea bargain with federal prosecutors, according to court documents newly made available on Tuesday.
John Anthony Borell III of Toledo, Ohio (also known as @ItsKahuna) had been charged last year for using SQL injections to attack the websites of various law enforcement and public agencies., including the Utah Chiefs of Police, the Salt Lake City Police Department, and the City of Springfield, Missouri.
According to Borell’s plea deal (PDF), which was signed on April 15, 2013, he agreed that his actions violated a section of federal law addressing computer fraud, that he will serve 36 months in prison, and that he will have to pay nearly $230,000 in restitution to the various institutions that he hacked. The 22-year-old is slated to appear before a federal judge in Utah on August 21, 2013, who is expected to give final approval to the plea bargain.
The law appears to be catching up to Anonymous activists in recent weeks and months. Earlier this month, a 26-year-old Kentucky man named Deric Lostutter outed himself as KYAnonymous and provided a written account of an FBI search on his property in Winchester, Kentucky in April 2013. That search stemmed from online activism pertaining to the Steubenville, Ohio rape case. Lostutter’s search marks the latest in a string of occasions where Anons have been caught and unmasked and have pleaded guilty for their actions.
anonymous, anti-rape, CabinCr3w, hacks, John Anthony Borell III, leaks, political prisoners, Utah
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Tom Brady Drew Brees Sean Payton Bill Belichick Jared Goff Sean McVay Aqib Talib Patrick Mahomes II Todd Gurley C.J. Anderson Sports NFL Super Bowl NFL football Professional football Football NFL Playoffs
New England Patriots Kansas City Chiefs Los Angeles Rams New Orleans Saints
Super Bowl berths on the line in conference title games
By The Associated Press - Feb. 13, 2019 05:12 AM EST
Cheap Trick performs outside Mercedes-Benz Superdome before the NFL football NFC championship game between the New Orleans Saints and the Los Angeles Rams Sunday, Jan. 20, 2019, in New Orleans. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
The Los Angeles Rams are back inside the stadium where they lost for the first time this season, looking for retribution and a Super Bowl berth as they face the New Orleans Saints in the NFC championship game.
The Superdome is coming alive for the last time this football season as predominantly Saints fans arrive for just the second NFC title game to be held at the site of seven Super Bowls.
The previous time the Saints hosted a game this late in a season, they pulled out a hair-raising overtime triumph over Minnesota en route to their first Super Bowl appearance — and championship.
That was the 2009 season. Some nine seasons later, coach Sean Payton and 40-year-old, record-setting quarterback Drew Brees are back with a largely different cast, one victory away from the team's second trip to the NFL's biggest event.
When these teams met in Week 9, running back C.J. Anderson had not yet joined Todd Gurley in the Rams' backfield and Los Angeles cornerback Aqib Talib was not healthy enough to play. Their availability puts the Rams in a stronger position than they were in back on Nov. 4, when they fell to New Orleans 45-35.
This is the first NFC title game for Rams 32-year-old, second-year coach Sean McVay and his 24-year-old quarterback, Jared Goff.
On the AFC side, the New England Patriots are in their eighth consecutive conference championship game and trying to reach the Super Bowl for the fourth time in five seasons and the ninth time overall in the Bill Belichick-Tom Brady era.
The Kansas City Chiefs, led by quarterback Patrick Mahomes, are hosting the AFC title game for the first time at Arrowhead Stadium, and are trying to get to the Super Bowl for the first time since the 1969 season.
One thing that is unusual is that the Patriots are a slight underdog against the top-seeded Chiefs.
"We're going against a team that's the No. 1 seed in the league," Brady said after the team's final practice on Friday. "I'm sure there's a lot of people that are thinking they're going to win. Everyone can have their own opinion. We certainly have an opinion, and we've got to go out there and execute our best in order to accomplish that."
The winners that emerge from the conference championship games will meet in Atlanta on Feb. 3 in the Super Bowl.
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Marlies
Raptors 905
Argonauts
Raptors acquire Marc Gasol from Grizzlies
Posted by Austin Owens on February 7, 2019 February 8, 2019
The Toronto Raptors have acquired centre Marc Gasol from the Memphis Grizzlies in exchange for Jonas Valanciunas, Delon Wright, C.J. Miles, and a 2024 second-round pick, the team announced Thursday.
Gasol was taken by the Los Angeles Lakers in the second round in 2007. Less than a year later, he was traded to Memphis as part of a package that saw his brother, Pau, go the other way.
Since then, the 34-year-old has become one of the steadiest big men in the Association. He’s averaged 15.2 points, 7.7 rebounds, and 3.4 assists in his career.
He has started in all 53 games he’s appeared in this season, putting up 15.7 points, 8.6 boards, and 4.7 helpers in 33.7 minutes a game.
Gasol is under contract until 2020, when he’ll become an unrestricted free agent. He’s owed $25.5 million in 2019-20.
Valanciunas has spent his entire career with the Raptors after they selected him fifth overall in 2011. He has missed 25 games this season after dislocating his thumb against the Golden State Warriors in December.
The 26-year-old has only started in 10 of his 30 appearances this season but has averaged 12.8 points, one assist, and 7.2 rebounds in 18.8 minutes per game.
Wright, 26, was taken by Toronto with the No. 20 pick in 2015. In his first four NBA campaigns, the Utah product provided length and two-way play off the bench in relief of Kyle Lowry. However, with the emergence of Fred VanVleet, Wright has seen his minutes drop slightly this season.
He started two games this season with Lowry missing time with injuries. In 49 games, Wright has put up 6.9 points, 2.2 assists, and 2.6 rebounds on 43.3 percent shooting.
After being acquired ahead of last season to provide the Raptors with a steady 3-point shooter off the bench, Miles has had trouble finding his stroke this year. He’s shot just 31.4 percent from beyond the arc in 40 games this year – down from 36.1 clip he fired at in 2017-18 – and has seen his minutes slashed from 19.1 to 14.1 as a result.
He’s averaged 5.5 points, 1.7 boards, and 0.6 assists on the year.
Wright will become a restricted free agent in the summer of 2020. He will carry a $10.9-million cap hit next season. Valanciunas and Miles can hit the open market following the next campaign. They are owed $17.6 and $8.7 million in 2019-20, respectively.
C.J. MilesDelon WrightJonas ValanciunasMarc GasolMemphis GrizzliesToronto Raptors
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Energy: resources and building performance
Konstantinou, T. (editor) (TU Delft Building Product Innovation)
Ćuković Ignjatović, Nataša (editor) (University of Belgrade)
Zbašnik-Senegačnik, Martina (editor) (University of Ljubljana)
Today, humankind is completely dependent on energy. Energy is indispensable for growth and life on Earth, and it is also of key importance for living comfortably – for heating, lighting, cooling, ventilation, operation of machines and appliances, for transport, etc. The major energy-generating source is the sun, sending the energy to Earth and making life on our planet possible. This energy is free of charge and without negative effects. However, we only know how to use and convert a small part of the solar energy reaching the Earth into other forms of energy necessary to improve the conditions for life and the human comfort. The production of energy that drives our civilisation still depends heavily on the use of non-renewable fossil reserves. The dependence on coal, oil, and natural gas is a major problem faced by the humankind. Buildings need energy throughout their life cycle, which consists of six stages – extraction of raw materials, production of materials and components, transport sale, construction, operation and, finally, demolition. Measures aimed at reducing the dependence of a building on energy throughout its life cycle may be implemented on at least two levels. The first important decision is to locate a building in the environment in a manner such that it will help improve the living conditions in the building by making use of the natural features of the site: by proper orientation of the building to facilitate heating and lighting by means of solar energy; by using the wind to facilitate natural ventilation; by including vegetation in the external and internal environment to improve the quality of air; and by observing the relevant distance from the adjacent buildings to prevent the shading effect. The second important decision in the building design process refers to the selection of materials and building technology. Every stage of the building’s lifecycle calls for a choice that will contribute to the lower energy consumption of the building: extraction of raw materials – choice of raw materials (timber, stone, earth), as they are not energy-intensive; production of materials and components – choice of materials whose production requires little energy; sale of materials and components – choice of materials and components that are produced locally near the construction site and not subject to great transport distances; construction of the building – choice of building technologies that do not require much energy; use or operation of the building – the building should be designed in such a manner as to require little energy for heating, cooling, lighting, and ventilation;demolition – the building should be designed in a manner that permits the structure to be disassembled into the basic elements that can be sorted by specific materials and, if possible, reused or recycled.The use of energy in buildings is thus a complex problem, but it can be reduced and alleviated by making appropriate decisions. Therefore, architects face a major and responsible task of designing the built environment in such a way that its energy dependence will be reduced to a minimum, while at the same time being able to provide comfortable living conditions. Today, architects have many tools at their disposal, facilitating the design process and simultaneously ensuring proper assessment in the early stages of building design.The purpose of this book is to present ongoing research from the universities involved in the project Creating the Network of Knowledge Labs for Sustainable and Resilient Environments (KLABS). This book attempts to highlight the problem of energy use in buildings and propose certain solutions. It consists of nine chapters, organised in three parts. The gathering of chapters into parts serves to identify the different themes that the designer needs to consider, namely energy resources, energy use and comfort, and energy efficiency. Part 1, entitled “Sustainable and Resilient Energy Resources,” sets off by informing the reader about the basic principles of energy sources, production, and use. The chapters give an overview of all forms of energies and energy cycle from resources to end users and evaluate the resilience of renewable energy systems. This information is essential to realise that the building, as an energy consumer, is part of a greater system and the decisions can be made at different levels.Part 2, entitled “Energy and Comfort in the Built Environment”, explain the relationship between energy use and thermal comfort in buildings and how it is predicted. Buildings consume energy to meet the users’ needs and to provide comfort. The appropriate selection of materials has a direct impact on the thermal properties of a building. Moreover, comfort is affected by parameters such as temperature, humidity, air movement, air quality, lighting, and noise. Understanding and calculating those conditions are valuable skills for the designers. After the basics of energy use in buildings have been explained, Part 3, entitled “Energy Saving Strategies” aims to provide information and tools that enable an energy- and environmentally-conscious design. This part is the most extensive as it aims to cover different design aspects. Firstly, passive and active measures that the building design needs to include are explained. Those measures are seen from the perspective of heat flow and generation. The Passive House concept, which is explained in the second chapter of Part 3, is a design approach that successfully incorporates such measures, resulting in low energy use by the building. Other considerations that the following chapters cover are solar control, embodied energy and CO2 emissions, and finally economic evaluation. The energy saving strategies explained in this book, despite not being exhaustive, provide basic knowledge that the designer can use and build upon during the design of new buildings and existing building upgrades. In the context of sustainability and resilience of the built environment, the reduction of energy demand is crucial. This book aims to provide a basic understanding of the energy flows in buildings and the subsequent impact for the building’s operation and its occupants. Most importantly, it covers the principles that need to be taken into account in energy efficient building design and demonstrates their effectiveness. Designers are shaping the built environment and it is their task to make energy-conscious and informed decisions that result in comfortable and resilient buildings.
To reference this document use:
http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:320f4b29-235d-4355-913f-2b07f0d5d44c
Reviews of Sustainability and Resilience of the Built Environment for Education, Research and Design, volume 4
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Connecting with the community
to ensure we go far, together.
We're working with communities to help reach their research needs
Saskatchewan Population Health and Evaluation Research Unit (SPHERU)
In collaboration with University of Regina, at SPHERU, we study the social factors that affect the wellbeing of groups within a population, with a focus on population health intervention research: we look at how to address inequities by taking action on the social determinants of health.
@Station 20 West
U of S has a community engagement and outreach office located at Station 20 West in Saskatoon's core neighbourhood. We're working on projects that are community driven and meaningful for the communities with which we work, collaborating and co-creating knowledge.
Centre for the Study of Co-operatives
We're an interdisciplinary centre of higher learning that provides people with tools to understand co-operatives and to develop them as solutions to economic and social needs.
Saskatchewan Centre for Patient-Oriented Research (SCPOR)
We're a U of S-based partnership of organizations that support patient-oriented research in Saskatchewan.
Rural and Remote Memory Clinic (RRMD)
Our focus is on diagnosis and management of atypical and complex cases of suspected dementia, where an interdisciplinary team assessment is most needed.
Canadian Centre for Health and Safety in Agriculture (CCHSA)
We conduct and stimulate research, education, and health promotion programs aimed at enhancing the health and well-being of agricultural, rural and remote populations.
Community-University Institute for Social Research (CUISR)
We're partnering with the larger community in order to engage in relevant social research that supports a deeper understanding of our communities and that reveals opportunities for improving our quality of life.
We're actively engaged in sharing the benefits of our research with the public.
Current public offerings - Whether it's providing access to galleries and museums, artistic and athletic pursuits, or services U of S researchers are working with members of the public, community based organizations, and civic leadership.
UofS Speakers Bureau - free, engaging public lectures can be requested from a collection of faculty, graduate students, instructors, and researchers. First, consult the list of topics available, then Request a Talk.
Visit our Community Engagement and Outreach portal to find out more.
Innovation Enterprise is responsible for the commercialization of research and knowledge developed by the University's researchers, faculty, staff and graduate students. Our focus is to foster and develop collaborative work environments among researchers, industry partners and funding agencies.
Whether you're a researcher with a great idea, or a business searching for research help, Innovation Enterprise is here to help find a solution.
Partnering for Success
In honor of the fifth anniversary of NSERC’s Strategy for Partnerships and Innovation, U of S Engage-funded researchers and their industrial partners shared their thoughts in a series of videos on what makes a successful partnership.
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The Moonemalle Inheritance – Part 1 – The Old Place: Mr Moonemalle of Moonemalle Walauwa
≈ Comments Off on The Moonemalle Inheritance – Part 1 – The Old Place: Mr Moonemalle of Moonemalle Walauwa
Ada Moonemalle, ‘Galle Walauwe, Dorothea Peternella, Edward Gregory Gunawardena, Galle Court, John Graham Jayatilleke Hulugalle, John Marcellus Lewis Moonemalle, Old Place, The Moonemalle Inheritance, Theodore Barcroft Lewis, Twentieth Century Impressions of Ceylon
John Marcellus Lewis Moonemalle, one of my eight great-grand-fathers, was born I think in 1835. He died in 1887, at the age of 52. That is recorded on his tombstone. He was not at all distinguished, certainly not a patch on his father-in-law, John Graham Jayatilleke Hulugalle, who built up the fortunes of that side of the family, in Kurunagala, and died just five years before his son-in-law.
John Marcellus was also overshadowed by his son-in-law, Edward Gregory Gunawardena. Born in Galle in 1858 and having enrolled as a proctor in the Galle Court at the age of 22, he transferred to Kurunagala five years later, when he married Ada Moonemalle. Their eldest child, a daughter, was born in 1886, so John Marcellus had the pleasure of seeing at least one grand-child before he died.
His picture used to hang in the main drawing-room at Old Place, the mansion Edward Gregory built, where I spent many happy days as a child, and then as a young man, before it was sold. It was pulled down in the nineties, and on the site the Bank of Ceylon built a complex of buildings, including quarters for staff as well as an office. I visited the place some years back, and tried to work out where everything had been, the garage, the deep and frightening well, the outside storehouse for paddy, but everything had been built up and a clear perspective was not possible.
Beside John Marcellus on the wall of the dark drawing room was a picture of his father-in-law, who was stout and commanding, rather like a Dickensian patriarch. Next to him the younger man seemed frail, despite bristly hair that stuck out and a straggly beard. The pictures all vanished when my aunt, the last of the Goonewardenes, moved from Old Place, and it was only recently that I found this one, nestling forlorn in a cupboard. Hulugalle sadly seems to have vanished for ever, and also the other picture that I remember from that section of the drawing room, under the ornate lamps next to the piano. This was of my great-grand-father sitting together with other members of some Association, and my recollection is that he was the only Sri Lankan in the group.
Despite his evidently modest demeanour, and retiring character, John Marcellus must have been of considerable importance to the family fortunes. He had claims I believe to some sort of aristocratic lineage, and that splendidly ostentatious record of a colonial society, ‘Twentieth Century Impressions of Ceylon’, declares that the Moonemalle ‘ancestral seat is the Walauwe at Moonemalle’. Perhaps to rub in the fact that Edward Gregory was not really of an established lineage, Old Place was known in the town as ‘Galle Walauwe’. I suspect that the English name was a subterfuge of sorts to claim a temporal authority the family did not possess.
John Marcellus then seems to have been the only authentic element in the family’s claim to distinction, lending an old name to his self-made father-in-law and providing a respected establishment for the go-getting Gunawardena. I am not sure whether I am not doing an injustice to old Hulugalle, but I can claim the authority of my uncle Lakshman, Bishop of Kurunagala from 1962 to 1983, for this view of him.
Lakshman combined deep pride in his family with a healthy disdain for anything he saw as pretension. He would say that Hulugalle had made his fortune by supporting the British during the 1948 uprising, and that he was then able to marry into a relatively established family, that of the Tennekoons, who were ‘Ratemahattayas of Pannala, in the Kandyan provinces.’ His wife rejoiced in the name of Dorothea Peternella, and her tombstone has the splendidly cryptic inscription, ‘What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter’.
Their daughter, who married John Marcellus, was called Mary Anne, but Lakshman used to claim that her real name was Makamma, and that the name on her tombstone arose from the Anglicization that was essential for social climbing. The name Makamma suggests a Tamil origin, but of course Tamil was the language of the aristocracy in those days, certainly of what were termed the Wanni Kandyans, if not of all the Kandyans (as suggested by the fact that the signatures to the 1815 Kandyan Convention with the British were almost all of them in Tamil).
Be that as it may, by the time Edward Gregory married into the Moonemalle family, they were most definitely Sinhalese Christians who were fervent in their beliefs. There is in the Kurunegala cemetery a tomb also of a Reverend Peter Moonemalle, who died just under a year after John Marcellus did. I suspect this was a brother, but there is no easy way now to check.
There certainly are other Moonemalles around, a family of three boys who were at S. Thomas’ when I was Sub-Warden, the wife of one of my first students at Peradeniya, but we have no record of relationships. John Marcellus and his family, as far as we know, consists only of the offspring of his two children, his daughter Ada and his son Theodore Barcroft Lewis, who was much more distinguished than his father in that he became a member of the Legislative Council in 2006, following on the McCallum Reforms. This however was through appointment by the governor. When he tried to get back into the Council after the franchise was extended to territorial constituencies in the twenties, he lost badly.
He had two sons and three daughters who grew to adulthood. I do not know how many died in childhood. His sister had twelve children altogether, but five of them died young, four in infancy and one when he was just five years old. There was a large picture of this boy, called Brian, at Old Place, and I remember a beautiful child with large liquid eyes, but that too is now lost. He remains now only in small pictures, a tiny figure seated between his siblings, most memorably in a high horse drawn carriage between the two eldest, Eva and Ida. They were in their teens then, winsomely elegant figures themselves, at a time before they turned into the formidable spinsters they were known as in living memory.
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Home Articles Why SA Is Failing To Resolve Its Racial Problem: The Costly Illusion...
Why SA Is Failing To Resolve Its Racial Problem: The Costly Illusion of Racial Superiority (Part 2)
David Matthews
READ PART ONE HERE
The political divide between black and white in South Africa since 1994 is widening at an alarming rate. If it continues to do so, the outcome is likely to be costly for black and white alike – both groups being heavily dependent on each other – whether they like it or not.
The ANC government has from the beginning been determined to follow a Marxist and collectivist economic and social programme that there is little reason to believe will be any more successful in solving South Africa’s poverty problem and preserving civil liberty than it has been for Zimbabwe, Mozambique, or Venezuela. There are three reasons why the ANC has chosen the course they have: Firstly, because the communist Soviet block was their principal supporter during their struggle against apartheid, rather than the liberal and historically racist West. Secondly, because as an African organisation, the ANC is inherently and culturally predisposed to the collectivist nature of communism rather than the individualism of liberalism. Thirdly, because South African whites have since 1994 singly failed to persuade the ANC leadership that a liberal democracy with a market economy would be far better for the country and the people as a whole than authoritarian communism. Given the worldwide, empirical evidence available to support the white’s contention, this is a notable failure on their part, and one which, from their position of political weakness, is likely to cost them dearly in future.
Just why have we failed in this regard? Why, if choosing liberal democracy over communism is, as they say, a ‘no brainer’, and a choice that most of the world has made, could we not persuade the ANC leadership of this, particularly as in 1994 the newly-negotiated South Africa had started out as a liberal democracy with a well-functioning market? Our failure is even more striking because the ‘economic transformation’ that the ANC calls for in order to eliminate black poverty is, in all probability, far more likely to be achieved by a democracy with an open market than by an authoritarian, Marxist economy.
There are two principal causes of this failure, and both are racially related. First is the difficulty, and sometimes unwillingness, of either of the two racial groups to fully understand and appreciate the worldview of the other. This problem is by no means insurmountable. The second cause is seemingly trite, but is, in fact, by far the more important: it is the white’s failure to show the appropriate respect to blacks on an individual, one-to-one basis, just as white’s automatically and generally do to one other, and as blacks generally and automatically also do to one another. Respect is an essential requirement if trust is to exist between people. No one will trust someone who clearly lacks respect for them. There has never been, therefore, any possibility of whites being able to convince the ANC leadership of the advantages of a liberal democracy.
This failure is a by-product of the delusion of ‘racial’ group moral superiority that arises from the emotional self-identification by the individual with their social or cultural group, described in Part 1. When addressing another individual readily identifiable as of one’s own cultural group, that individual is automatically assumed to possess the group’s defining moral virtues (unless there is good reason to believe otherwise). Accordingly, one is relatively at ease with them and naturally accords them the respect due to all those inherently possessing the virtues attributed to one’s own group. One assumes that they know and will adhere to all the standards and beliefs common to the group. Fruitful discussion and debate between different cultural or racial groups, however, is unlikely to succeed if one party is aware that the other does not regard it as a full moral equal or listen to it as such. The widespread lack of respect shown blacks by whites, and not only by white South Africans, but by whites worldwide, is a deeply unfortunate consequence of historical circumstances.
For countless millennia, Homo sapiens developed under radically different circumstances in Europe and Africa respectively. Climate was possibly the most significant of these. What differences exist between the black and white races today are certainly due to such circumstantial differences rather than to any inherent superiority or inferiority. The most obvious difference, skin colour, is clearly attributable to climate. And the popular white belief in their inherent superior intelligence is rebutted by the fact that even on intelligence tests designed by whites, many blacks score higher than many whites.
When Africa was colonised, the inhabitants were still in a relatively undeveloped state technologically and culturally in Western terms, due to their own particular and different historical circumstances. The colonisation of black Africa thus interrupted the natural course of cultural evolution on the continent. And because of the significant technological and cultural differences existing between the indigenous blacks and the white colonists at the time, the whites chose, and were able to enforce, a social, economic, and political order that largely excluded blacks, while at the same time exploiting them economically. The subordinated African society accordingly remained fixed in its relatively undeveloped state, unable to evolve. This relative technological and cultural backwardness is unfortunately often misattributed by whites to supposed inherent black inferiority – moral and cultural.
Faced constantly with the superiority of whites in regard to those factors which conferred power, many Africans duly developed a profound sense of racial inferiority which infects black consciousness throughout the world to this day. As expressed by the black philosopher Frantz Fanon, “The negro enslaved by his [sense of] inferiority, the white man enslaved by his [sense of] superiority, alike.”
While blacks, like everybody else, generally enjoy the sense of superiority provided by their self-identification with their social group, within their own tribal or clan affiliations, they generally do not do so in respect of the wider world.
It is this white delusion of inherent superiority and black fear of inherent inferiority, created by historical accident, that is unnecessarily poisoning black/white political relations in South Africa today. As a thriving and modern nation, South Africa in 1994 presented a unique opportunity for black and white, through cooperation, not only to create an integrated society, but also to disprove to the world once and for all the poisonous and archaic libel of black inferiority.
That this has not happened is to a large extent attributable to conscious and unconscious white arrogance. After 350 years of exploitative rule, having finally landed themselves in a very weak position at the foot of Africa, devoid of political power, the whites in 1994 duly handed the ANC the keys to the state. They then sat back on their untouched assets and subjected the ANC government to a stream of criticism, some of it justified but much of it contemptuous, unreasonable, and racially biased.
What on earth did we whites expect to happen in 1994? Did we somehow not understand that the whole object of gaining political power is to obtain wealth? What did we think that the blacks – impoverished, poorly educated, and largely unskilled after 350 years of neglectful and oppressive white rule – would do once all political power was in their hands? Perpetuate the status quo?
As the blacks’ only ready access to the capital and assets that all humans desire, and to which they now felt entitled, it was to be expected that the ANC leaders would exploit the State. It is highly unlikely that any other politicians in the same circumstances today, white or black, would do any differently.
Thanks to the presence of Nelson Mandela and other moderate ANC leaders, there was an early chance that the ANC could eventually be persuaded that the best interests of their people lay, not in an authoritarian, communistic economic and political system like Venezuela’s, but in a market-based, liberal democracy. For this to happen, however, the blacks had to be ready to listen to what the whites had to say. And for this to happen, the blacks naturally needed the whites to treat them and relate to them as moral equals; not to be condescendingly lectured to, but persuaded that what the whites contended was in fact correct. This has not yet happened, and is unlikely to do so, unless the widespread white attitude towards blacks changes soon.
So seemingly marginal a consideration as the failure of whites to regard and treat blacks with the same degree of respect that whites treat each other has caused the concept of the Rainbow Nation to abort. The constant offence and insult accorded blacks, much of it admittedly unintended and unconscious, has alienated many of them. It has also understandably lost whites the black leadership’s respect and, most importantly, has driven the black political narrative away from conciliation and racial inclusiveness towards reverse apartheid, where whites are regarded as undesirable and illegitimate outsiders. This has pushed the political middle towards the extreme and provided anti-white racial ammunition for radical, nationalistic politicians.
The current moral collapse of the ANC augurs badly for black and white alike in South Africa. To have any chance of avoiding the likelihood of Zimbabwefication, the leaders of society are going to have to get together to work out the best way forward. If whites are to participate usefully in this process, however, we have first to abandon our narcissistic arrogance and delusions of racial superiority, and exhibit a little of the humility and humanity embodied in the concept of ubuntu – now appropriate for our reduced station in the grand scheme of things.
Get your copy of David Matthews’ book on ideology and morality, Our Captured Minds on Amazon.
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David Matthews is a Contributor for the Rational Standard, participating in the main debate on the origins and solutions for racism in society.
Sean Chilcot 5 May 2017 at 06:33 AM
Very good addition to the first part of the series, however, I think there are some points in the piece that are made that seem to be taken for granted. Firstly, the notion that all black people, or the majority, suffer from a sense of racial inferiority, conscious or unconscious, is to a degree believable but not enough to convince me in any meaningful sense to go along with the charade, the same can be said of the idea that the majority of white people have a conscious or unconscious idea of superiority, if you have no data to back up these notions, however believable they may be in an anecdotal sense, this as a point in the article becomes shaky. Secondly, on the point that had colonialism not occurred the cultural evolution would have continued, this as a point in the article is a poorly argued one. The writer lumps black Africa together into one, painting it with a broad brush. This is stupid as there were major differences in technological advances between northern and southern Africa, both regions comprising black Africans, with part of the reason for the advancement of those in the north due to better trade routes, the knowledge of the Egyptian, Greek and Roman Empires, as well as – to a degree – the Arabic/Muslim colonisation of the north, this point can be made for the advancement of the various cultures in Europe, or Asia, or the middle east. It’d also have been useful for the writer to point out an example of a people developing on their own with no outside influence, most notable being conquered, as I am bereft of any legitimate examples I can think of. Thirdly, the idea that the chasm between the races is worse than ever, or at least since ’94 is a false claim, or needs some convincing evidence to back it up. I say this because, according to research done by the SAIRR, the majority of South Africans believe that race relations are going well, although I do believe that more recent polling shows a downturn in sentiment, to what degree I cannot recall. This current downward turn can, most likely, be attributed to the media’s sensationalism of racial issues in the nation, as well as politicians. I think I have touched on the main points that I found to be poorly outlined in the piece. I do agree that white South Africans should do more to convince black South Africans of the merits of a free market and liberal democracy and that they should be more engaged politically, however, I think this article assumes that white South Africans, in large numbers, know what those are and why they’re good. Also a sudden political engagement from white South Africans en masse would be spun by the media as some form of power grab, however patently ridiculous the notion is. Finally, I think the piece is very thought provoking but makes generalisations that are too broad and assumes more than it should, without providing any proof, which detracts from the main message, in my opinion, that white South Africans should get off their asses and make good arguments for these values. I would say the same for black South Africans who believe in those values, maybe they can help educate both black and white South Africans on what a free market is and why a liberal democracy is the way to go.
Ross Connaire Donaghy 5 May 2017 at 10:55 AM
Your assertion that “many blacks score higher than many whites” is rather ambiguous, define “many” and cite your sources. Then, you obviously subscribe to the demontrably false notion that wealth can be generated for a population of fifty million by taking it from four which leads to your next innacurate conclusion which is that whites bear the responsibility for the social and economic decay of this country despite being barred from any serious discource as to how we could rectify the situation, being openly discriminated against by a disfunctional authoritarian government who breeds contempt for us in their low intelligence voters whenever they need a social pariah to distract from their monumental shortcomings and constantly under the threat of some catastrophic upheaval as a result.
Gillian Benade 7 May 2017 at 10:13 AM
Spyti K 8 May 2017 at 09:25 AM
I fear that you ignore, or in the least do not allude to, the political-economic difference between a liberal democracy (with neo-liberal economic policy) and a Command system (with Marxist-Leninist policies); the former offers virtually no economic reward for those who currently have political power, while the latter do, i.e. that the policies that would put us on the path to the economic development (and eventual prosperity) as is practiced in Southeastern Asian states like Singapore, Malaysia and South Korea take at least one generation to reach the point where they hold real large scale economic benefits for society as a whole, while the command economics as practiced in Venezuela hold short term benefits (at the cost of long term damage) for those who are currently of voting age.
Blatherwick Ashburner 10 May 2017 at 10:16 AM
How do we reconcile differences in value systems? JZ claims that corruption, while deemed immoral by western standards, is perfectly accepted by African standards.
With respect to IQ, Dr James Watson, co-discoverer of DNA, holds an opposing view which is well reasoned and statistically supported. More recent advances in genetics tends to support his views on differences between races.
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In PSB Annual Report 2018
Letter of Transmittal
Governor's Foreword
Functions and Objectives of the Payments System Board
Accountability and Communication
Trends in Payments, Clearing and Settlement Systems
Retail Payments Regulation and Policy Issues
Oversight, Supervision and Regulation of Financial Market Infrastructures
The Payments System Board's Announcements and Reserve Bank Reports
Payments System Board Annual Report – 2018 Trends in Payments, Clearing and Settlement Systems
The Payments System Board monitors trends in retail payments, and activity and risk exposures across financial market infrastructure (high-value payment systems, securities settlement systems and central counterparties). This is consistent with the Board's responsibilities to promote efficiency and competition, and control risk, in the Australian payments system.
Retail Payments
The past few decades have seen a gradual shift in Australian consumers' use of electronic payment methods, such as cards and direct debits, to make their payments (Graph 1). This shift appears to have accelerated in recent years. On average, Australians made around 480 electronic transactions per person in 2017/18, compared with 215 transactions per person a decade earlier. By contrast, the use of paper-based payment methods such as cash and cheques has declined. On average, Australians made about 210 cash payments per person in 2016, the latest year for which we have data, down from 320 transactions in 2007. Consistent with these broad trends, the Reserve Bank's Consumer Payments Survey (CPS), which was last undertaken in 2016, showed that cards had overtaken cash as the most frequently used payment method by Australian consumers.
According to the 2016 CPS, the share of consumer payments made in cash fell to 37 per cent of the number of payments in 2016, from around 70 per cent in the 2007 survey (Graph 2).[5] The decline in the relative use of cash over the past decade or so largely reflects consumers preferring to use their debit and credit cards for in-person payments, with an increase in the share of online transactions also playing a role. In recent years, there has been a significant reduction in the share of lower-value payments made using cash, facilitated by the adoption of contactless ‘tap-and-go’ functionality by consumers and merchants at the point of sale. Nonetheless, cash still accounted for over 60 per cent of payments under $10 in 2016, and cash is still used relatively intensively at some types of merchants, such as food retailers. Moreover, cash continues to be used relatively often by some segments of the community, including older Australians and lower-income households. A shift away from cash to electronic payment methods has also been evident in many other countries, though there is still a fairly wide variation in how intensively cash is used across comparable countries (Box A).
The declining use of cash for transactions has been reflected in falls in the use of ATMs for cash withdrawals (Graph 3, left panel). The number and value of ATM withdrawals declined by 4 per cent and 0.3 per cent, respectively, in 2017/18, slower than the average rates of decline of the past few years. In 2017/18, Australians made an average of around 24 ATM withdrawals per person, down from 40 a decade ago (Graph 3, right panel). The significant fall in ATM use over the past decade has increased the incentives for ATM deployers to rationalise their fleets. After rising for much of the past two decades, the number of ATMs in Australia has begun to decline, falling by about 3½ per cent over the year to June. Per-capita ATM coverage is still high in Australia in comparison to many other developed economies.
Despite the decline in the transactional use of cash, demand for cash more generally remains strong.[6] The value of banknotes in circulation increased by 2.6 per cent over the year to June 2018, to about $75 billion (or around 4 per cent of GDP). This increased demand partly reflects the use of cash as a store of value, often for precautionary purposes. Around 70 per cent of participants in the 2016 CPS reported holding some cash outside of their wallet. The use of cash as a store of value is also consistent with the strong growth in high-denomination banknotes in recent years (although it has moderated somewhat in 2018).[7] There is also evidence that overseas demand has contributed to growth in high-denomination banknotes. Over time, the increase in notes in circulation, together with declining use of cash for payments, has translated into a fall in the share of outstanding banknotes that are used for transaction purposes (rather than as a store-of-value).
International Trends in Consumer Payments
Consumers globally are increasingly using electronic methods, such as cards and mobile apps, instead of cash and cheques to make their payments. For example, data across a range of countries indicate that consumers' use of payment cards has increased in recent years (Graph A1).[1] These trends reflect advances in technology, changing consumer preferences, and, to some extent, government policies aimed at facilitating increased use of electronic payment methods.
Graph A1
In Australia, the Reserve Bank's triennial Consumer Payments Survey (CPS) shows that the share of consumer payments made in cash has been falling steadily for a number of years and, in the 2016 survey, debit and credit cards overtook cash as the most commonly used consumer payment method (Graph A2). A number of advanced countries also conduct surveys of consumer payment patterns. Although they are not fully comparable due to survey design differences, these surveys show that Australian consumers are not alone in shifting away from cash for transaction purposes, although there are some notable differences across countries.
Swedish consumers, for example, now use cash relatively infrequently: less than 15 per cent of respondents to a central bank survey in 2018 reported that they had used cash for their most recent purchase, compared to around 40 per cent in 2010.[2] A pronounced shift away from cash for consumer payments has also occurred in Norway.[3] While cards are the most commonly used means of payment in Sweden, use of the mobile payment service Swish – which allows real-time consumer payments – has increased rapidly in recent years. The Swedish central bank has, however, noted concerns that the rapid decline in the use and acceptance of cash could lead to problems for segments of the population that still rely heavily on cash. It has also noted concerns about the resilience and possible monopolisation of private electronic payment systems. Reflecting these concerns, it has been analysing the case for the central bank to issue an electronic form of the krona and considering requirements on banks to continue to provide cash services.[4]
In contrast, cash remains the dominant means of payment in some other European countries (although the share of cash payments has also fallen). According to a recent European Central Bank survey, cash still accounted for around 80 per cent of payments at the point of sale in the euro area in 2016.[5] In particular, cash was used relatively intensively in southern euro area countries – including Greece, Italy and Spain – and in Germany among others. Cash was used particularly intensively for low-value payments, and many consumers in these countries reportedly use cash because of speed and the ability to aid budgeting. On average, euro area consumers used contactless card payments for around 2 per cent of point-of-sale transactions, whereas Australian consumers made around one-third of their in-person payments with contactless cards in the 2016 CPS.[6]
Payment trends in a number of other countries have been broadly similar to those in Australia.
For example, while consumers in Canada, the United States and the Netherlands use cash less frequently than in the past, according to the most recent surveys it remains an important part of the payments mix. As in Australia, cards are now the most common way of making consumer payments in these countries. Research by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston suggests that mobile (phone) payments that connect to card networks are also gaining popularity in the United States, with a third of consumers making such payments in 2016.[7] However, cheques remain a significant payment method in the United States, where the decline in their use has not been as pronounced as it has been in Australia and some other advanced economies. In the Netherlands, for example, the processing of cheques was terminated in 2001.
While consumer survey data are typically unavailable for other regions and for less-developed economies, there is evidence that a shift to electronic payment methods is occurring globally, albeit with significant variation across countries. In some cases, government policies are aiming to promote electronic payments and reduce the economy's reliance on cash. For example, in 2015, the Thai government introduced its National e-Payment initiative, a series of projects aimed at improving the efficiency of financial infrastructure by reducing the need for cash.
In some developing economies, a notable development has been a move away from cash to the use of mobile payment methods. In China, for example, the use of mobile payment apps such as AliPay and WeChat Pay has grown rapidly in recent years, particularly for low-value transactions. These non-bank systems use quick response (QR) code technology to facilitate transactions between users' accounts. This technology has provided a cost-effective way for merchants to accept electronic payments in an environment where many of them were previously unable to do so, largely because of a lack of access to card terminals. Mobile payment technology has also played a significant role in facilitating financial inclusion in some developing countries with large unbanked segments of the population; a notable example is Kenya, where the M-Pesa system is widely used to transfer value and make payments using text messages on mobile phones (without the need to access card networks).
CPMI (2017), ‘Statistics on payment, clearing and settlement systems in the CPMI countries – Figures for 2016’, December. Available at <https://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d172.pdf>. [1]
Sveriges Riksbank (2018), ‘Payment Patterns in Sweden 2018’, May. Available at <https://www.riksbank.se/globalassets/media/statistik/betalningsstatistik/2018/payments-patterns-in-sweden-2018.pdf>. [2]
Norges Bank (2018), ‘Retail payment services 2017’, Norges Bank Papers 2. Available at <https://www.norges-bank.no/en/Published/Publications/Norges-Bank-Papers/2018/norges-bank-memo-22018/>. [3]
See, for example, Ingves S (2018), ‘Money and payments – where are we heading?’, Stockholm School of Economics, Stockholm, 4 June. Available at <https://www.bis.org/review/r180725e.pdf>. [4]
Esselink H and L Hernández (2017), ‘The use of cash by households in the euro area’, European Central Bank Occasional Paper Series 201. [5]
See Doyle M-A, C Fisher, E Tellez and A Yadav (2017), ‘How Australians Pay: New Survey Evidence’, RBA Bulletin, March, pp 59–66. [6]
Greene C and S Schuh (2017), ‘The 2016 Diary of Consumer Payment Choice’, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston Research Data Reports 17-7. [7]
Debit and credit cards combined are the most frequently used payment method in Australia. In 2017/18, domestic personal and business cardholders made around 8.7 billion card payments worth $591 billion, an increase of around 13 per cent and 7 per cent respectively from the previous year (Table 2). Reflecting the increased use of cards for low-value payments, the average value of card payments continued to fall and is now just below $70 (Graph 4, left panel). This is consistent with both changing consumer preferences and merchants being more willing to accept cards for low-value transactions.
Growth in card payments has been underpinned by the rising popularity of debit card payments (Graph 4, right panel). Both the number and value of debit card transactions continues to grow at a faster pace than credit card transactions. The number of debit card transactions has grown at an average annual rate of 14 per cent over the past decade, compared to 7 per cent for credit cards. The share of debit card payments made using the international (Mastercard or Visa) debit system has been increasing steadily over the past five years, while the share of the domestic eftpos system has been declining. This largely reflects the increased use of contactless payments, which were only supported by the international debit schemes until eftpos introduced the capability around a year ago. For credit card payments, the combined market share of American Express and Diners Club (by value of transactions) has declined noticeably in recent months as several banks have ceased issuing American Express companion cards (see the chapter on ‘Retail Payments Regulation and Policy Issues’).
Mobile payments – contactless payments made with a mobile device using an electronic representation of a debit or credit card – are now being offered by an increasing number of card issuers via their own mobile banking applications or third-party electronic wallets (such as Apple Pay and Android Pay). The Bank's 2016 CPS indicated that mobile payments accounted for a small share of in-person payments, with only around 10 per cent of respondents reporting that they had made a mobile payment or were interested in making them. Other sources suggest that this share has increased modestly since then.
Merchant fees
Merchant fees are paid by merchants to their financial institution (or directly to the card scheme in the case of American Express and Diners Club) for the provision of card acquiring services. The level of merchant fees is heavily influenced by the wholesale interchange fees paid from a merchant's financial institution (known as the acquirer) to the cardholder's financial institution for each transaction and the scheme fees that acquirers pay to the schemes. They can also include annual or monthly fees, terminal fees, terminal rentals, joining fees and other fees charged to merchants by their acquirers.
Average merchant fees for international scheme cards have declined since the early 2000s when the Bank started its card payments reforms. In 2017/18, the average merchant fee for transactions on Mastercard and Visa debit cards declined by 4 basis points, to 0.58 per cent in the June quarter, after being unchanged the previous year (Graph 5). This decline followed a reset in the scheme's debit interchange fees following the lowering of the Bank's weighted-average interchange fee benchmark for debit cards in July 2017; overall, however, the fall in merchant fees appears to have been only around half what would have been seen if there had been full pass-through by acquirers of the fall in interchange fees.[8] The average merchant fee for eftpos transactions was 0.26 per cent of transaction values in the June quarter, broadly unchanged over the year and remaining well below the average rates for transactions in the international debit networks.
The average merchant fee for Mastercard and Visa credit cards was 0.85 per cent of transaction values in the June quarter, broadly unchanged relative to the past few years. By contrast, the average fee for American Express transactions has continued to decline, falling by 16 basis points over 2017/18, to 1.42 per cent in the June quarter. This reflects reductions in fees for some merchant types by American Express to bolster its acceptance. Over the same period, the average fee for Diners Club remained broadly unchanged at around 1.8 per cent.
Over the past year, the Bank has focused on some issues regarding the cost of electronic payments to merchants. In late 2017, the Bank asked all the larger acquirers to provide anonymised merchant-level data on the costs to their merchants of accepting different types of cards. The data were collected for about 680,000 merchant accounts and included the total value of card payments and the average cost of payments (in terms of merchant service fees and other costs) in 2016/17 for each of the four-party card schemes (eftpos, Debit Mastercard, Visa Debit, Mastercard credit, Visa credit, and UnionPay). The data corresponded to the information that acquirers are now required to provide their merchants each year as part of the Bank's new surcharging framework.[9] A scatter plot of these data shows that there is a wide range in the cost of payments (averaged across all schemes) for merchants of different sizes, with a tendency for merchants' payment costs to fall as their transaction values rise (Graph 6).
For each of the four-party schemes, average payment costs decline fairly consistently as merchant size increases. Furthermore, merchants of all sizes pay less on average for transactions via eftpos as opposed to the international debit schemes. On average, across different merchant sizes, eftpos is around 44 basis points less expensive than scheme debit, which in turn is around 32 basis points less expensive than scheme credit. UnionPay costs are significantly higher than the other international scheme credit costs, which is not surprising given that most UnionPay transactions in Australia are made with overseas-issued cards that usually have higher interchange fees (UnionPay is not covered by the Bank's interchange standards) (Graph 7).
Direct Entry and BPAY payments
Direct Entry payments account for the bulk of the value of non-cash retail payments (Table 2). Banks and other financial institutions use this system for a wide range of payments, including consumers' internet ‘pay-anyone’ transactions and various types of bulk payments (such as salary and welfare payments) by businesses, corporations and governments. The average value of Direct Entry payments has declined over the past decade, but remains large relative to other electronic payment methods: around $3,500 and $2,950 for direct credits and direct debits, respectively.
In 2017/18, the number and value of BPAY transactions increased by 2.1 per cent and 9.7 per cent, respectively. Consumers and businesses use BPAY to make a range of bill payments, including for utilities, education fees and investments. BPAY payments are much less common than card payments, but the high average value of these payments means they account for a greater share of the value of electronic retail payments than either credit or debit cards. According to the 2016 CPS, consumers are increasingly paying their bills automatically, including via BPAY.
The New Payments Platform (NPP) was launched to the public on 13 February. The NPP was developed through industry collaboration to enable households, businesses and government agencies to make real-time payments on a 24/7 basis. Each NPP payment message is capable of carrying up to 280 characters, permitting richer remittance information than the 18 characters currently available for Direct Entry payments. In addition, the NPP provides a ‘PayID’ service, which allows a payment to be made to a registered mobile phone number, ABN or email address (instead of sending a payment to a BSB and account number).
As expected, the financial institutions connected to the NPP have been rolling out services to customers gradually, with some choosing to bring on particular channels or customer segments earlier than others. In addition, a number of financial institutions are still in the process of connecting to the new infrastructure. However, there has been significant progress in this regard recently. Consistent with the gradual rollout, NPP transactions have been growing steadily since its launch (Graph 8). More than 1.9 million PayIDs had been created as of late August, and around 29 million payments worth $21 billion had been sent through the platform. The average value of an NPP payment has increased and is now around $900, consistent with the NPP being used for some larger-value payments that previously would have gone through the Direct Entry system. Over time, it is expected that the NPP will replace an even greater share of Direct Entry payments, particularly those that are more time critical or which benefit from the additional data capabilities.
The decline in cheque use in Australia has continued, driven by changing preferences and payment innovations. The total number of cheque payments fell by around 20 per cent in 2017/18 (Graph 9). While the decline was driven by commercial cheques, the number of personal and financial institution (bank) cheques also declined. Overall, the number of cheque payments in Australia has fallen by around 80 per cent over the past decade. As a result, cheques now account for less than 1 per cent of the number of non-cash payments or around 9 per cent by value (Table 2). Where cheques are still used, they are most often for relatively large transactions, including some property purchases. This is reflected in the high average value of cheques written of around $12,500.
The shift away from cheques to electronic payments is expected to continue. The recent launch of the NPP, with its capacity to attach richer data to payment messages, as well as e-conveyancing systems like Property Exchange Australia (PEXA), will likely encourage a further reduction in cheque use. As cheque use declines, the per-transaction cost of supporting the cheque system will continue to rise and it is likely that more businesses and other payees will eventually stop accepting cheques. The Australian Payments Council has been developing a strategy to manage the decline in the cheque system in a way that ensures that the payment needs of individuals and businesses continue to be met in a safe, convenient and efficient manner.
Payment fraud
According to data collected by AusPayNet, losses related to fraudulent payment transactions increased by 6 per cent in 2017, to around $650 million, a slightly slower pace of growth than in the past few years (Graph 10, left panel). The estimated fraud rate (the value of fraudulent transactions as a share of overall transactions) increased to 34 cents per $1,000 transacted, from 32 cents in 2016. The vast bulk of fraud losses, around 95 per cent, come from international scheme debit, credit and charge cards; these fraud losses rose by 8 per cent to about $625 million in 2017 (this includes cards issued and/or acquired in Australia). Fraud losses from ATM transactions and on eftpos-only cards declined from $24 million to $17 million in 2017, while cheque fraud remained broadly steady at $6 million.
Graph 10
Consistent with the trend in recent years, the increase in card fraud in 2017 was driven by the fraudulent use of scheme cards in the card-not-present (CNP) environment (i.e. online, telephone or mail order). This type of fraud rose by 15 per cent in 2017 to around $550 million, accounting for nearly 90 per cent of total scheme card fraud losses (Graph 10, right panel). Around half of CNP fraud losses in 2017 occurred at Australian merchants (on both Australian and overseas-issued cards) and the other half was perpetrated overseas using Australian-issued cards.
In contrast to CNP fraud, card-present (CP) scheme fraud losses fell by around $25 million in 2017. For domestic scheme transactions, CP fraud losses have been relatively stable over the past few years, and are lower than they were a decade or so ago, consistent with the enhanced security measures that have been introduced, including chip-and-PIN. CP fraud committed with lost and stolen cards has been increasing in recent years, rising by a further 6 per cent in 2017 and accounting for around 80 per cent of CP scheme fraud losses. The rise in this type of fraud has likely been facilitated by tap-and-go payments that do not require a PIN for transactions below $100. Nonetheless, these fraud losses are still significantly less than CNP fraud losses.
While the industry has had success in reducing CP fraud, there has been more focus recently on measures to tackle the significant rise in CNP fraud, particularly given the expectation that online shopping will continue to grow. An industry framework for mitigating CNP fraud is currently being developed by AusPayNet, and is expected to be implemented over the coming year, subject to industry discussions. The core feature of this framework is a risk-based requirement for merchants and issuers to authenticate customers in CNP transactions using two or more authentication factors, such as one-time passcodes, device information and biometrics (see the chapter on ‘Retail Payments Regulation and Policy Issues’). The industry is also pursuing other strategies to combat CNP fraud, including strengthening data security standards and extending the use of tokenisation to a broader range of payment use cases to protect sensitive card data from theft.
Interest in cryptocurrencies (or crypto-assets or crypto-tokens) has increased significantly in recent years, together with a sharp run-up in prices and the emergence of new products and intermediaries that facilitate trading in them.[10] The prices of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, such as those associated with the Ethereum and Ripple systems, rose particularly sharply in late 2017, as part of what appeared to be a speculative mania that has since significantly subsided (Graph 11). The total market capitalisation of cryptocurrencies reached a peak of over US$800 billion in early 2018, but has since fallen back to around US$200 billion (Graph 12). One factor contributing to the run-up in prices in 2017 was a surge in Initial Coin Offerings, which are a method of fundraising for distributed ledger-based business ventures in which new digital tokens or coins are issued, usually against the payment of cryptocurrencies.
In Australia, it has been estimated that around A$6 billion of cryptocurrencies were traded (bought and sold) at Australian digital currency exchanges (DCEs) in 2017, according to a study by the Australian Digital Commerce Association and Accenture. Around 60 per cent of the total trading value for that year took place in the month of December alone, when cryptocurrency prices and activity spiked higher. The study estimated that Australian DCEs had around 313,000 customer accounts at the end of 2017, however these figures would overstate the number of unique users to the extent that some users had accounts at more than one DCE.
While they are frequently touted as an efficient and anonymous way of making payments, the demand for cryptocurrencies seems to be more focused on their use as a speculative investment than as a payment instrument.[11]
Indeed, in Australia, very few merchants accept cryptocurrencies as a means of payment for goods and services, and cryptocurrencies do not display the other economic attributes normally ascribed to ‘money’. In particular, the volatility in their prices suggests they have not established themselves as a reliable store of value. Moreover, technical features that are required to facilitate trust in a decentralised environment mean that cryptocurrencies are significantly less efficient (e.g. in terms of transaction throughput) than modern payment systems that rely on trusted central parties. It is not obvious, therefore, that cryptocurrencies will ever become a significant part of the payments system in Australia.
High-value Payment and Settlement Systems
In Australia, the final settlement of Australian dollar (AUD) interbank payment obligations occurs across Exchange Settlement (ES) accounts through the Reserve Bank Information and Transfer System (RITS). RITS facilitates settlement of payments on a real-time gross settlement (RTGS) basis. Foreign exchange transactions involving the AUD are generally settled through CLS Bank International (CLS), with AUD funding paid to CLS through RITS. Together these two systems settle the majority of payments in Australia by value. RITS also facilitates the interbank settlement of the payment leg of securities transactions. Securities settlement involves delivery of the security in exchange for payment, typically through a securities settlement facility (SSF).
Reserve Bank Information and Transfer System
RITS is Australia's high-value settlement system, which is used by banks and other approved institutions to settle their payment obligations on a RTGS basis. RITS is used each day to settle time-critical wholesale payments for other financial market infrastructures (FMIs): Australian dollar pay-ins to or pay-outs from CLS; margin payments to central counterparties (CCPs); and debt and equity settlement obligations arising in securities settlement systems. RITS also settles the interbank obligations arising from non-cash retail payments. Over the past financial year average daily volumes and values of RTGS transactions in RITS increased broadly in line with the longer term trends (Table 3 and Graph 13).
Although RITS is primarily an RTGS system, it also facilitates the multilateral net settlement of interbank obligations arising from other systems. These include non-cash retail payments – such as cheques, direct entry payments and card transactions – most of which are netted through the RITS Low Value Settlement Service. Direct entry makes up the majority of the value of retail payments through RITS. RITS also accepts transactions which are netted outside RITS: cash equity transactions through CHESS, ASX Settlement Pty Limited's (ASX Settlement) equities settlement system; Mastercard's AUD domestic obligations; eftpos scheme obligations and property settlement transactions, managed by PEXA. These batch settlement values have grown very strongly in the financial year due largely to property settlement activity by PEXA and the commencement of the eftpos batch in August 2017 (Graph 14).
During the past year, a new service of RITS – the Fast Settlement Service – was established under the RITS Regulations. The Fast Settlement Service was publicly launched with the NPP in February 2018 and settles transactions submitted via the NPP feeder system on an RTGS basis.
CLS Bank International
CLS is an international payment system that links the settlement of the two legs of a foreign exchange transaction. By operating such a payment-versus-payment settlement mechanism, CLS allows participants to mitigate foreign exchange settlement risk, i.e. the risk that one counterparty to a transaction settles its obligation in one currency, but the other counterparty does not settle its obligation in the other currency. CLS currently settles 18 currencies. The current daily average value of AUD settlements at CLS is around $280 billion. It has risen a little this year, consistent with a rise in the average daily turnover in the Australian dollar.
Securities settlement facilities
In Australia, ASX Settlement provides SSF services for ASX-quoted cash equities, debt products and warrants traded on the ASX and Chi-X Australia Pty Ltd (Chi-X) markets. ASX Settlement also provides SSF services for non-ASX listed securities quoted on the National Stock Exchange of Australia and the Sydney Stock Exchange Limited. The average daily value of cash equity settlements through ASX Settlement has increased moderately in recent years to $9.5 billion.
Austraclear Limited (Austraclear) provides SSF services for trades in debt securities, including government bonds and repurchase agreements. Over the last five years, the average daily value of debt securities settled in Austraclear (including under repurchase agreements) has increased by almost 20 per cent, to approximately $48 billion.
Central Counterparties
CCPs play a major role managing the risks associated with trading in financial instruments. CCPs stand between the counterparties to a financial trade, acting as the buyer to every seller and seller to every buyer; this activity is known as clearing. Participants in cleared markets have credit and liquidity exposures only to the CCP, rather than other participants in the market.
In the absence of a participant default, the CCP is not exposed to market risk as it stands between counterparties with opposite (i.e. offsetting) positions. However, in the event that a participant defaults, the CCP must continue to meet its obligations to its surviving participants. In such an event, the CCP faces potential losses from changes in the value of a defaulting participant's portfolio until it closes out the positions in that portfolio.
To mitigate the risk of such losses, CCPs maintain prefunded resources, typically in the form of initial margin and default funds. Initial margin, which is collected from participants, is sized to cover potential future losses on a participant's portfolio in the event they default, to a specified confidence interval. Accordingly, initial margin provides a risk-based measure of the magnitude of exposures faced by CCPs. Default funds (comprising contributions from participants and/or the CCP itself) are available to cover losses if, in the event of default, the defaulting participant's margin is exhausted.[12]
Four CCPs are licensed to provide services in Australia:
ASX Clear Pty Limited (ASX Clear) provides CCP services for ASX-quoted cash equities, debt products and warrants traded on the ASX and Chi-X markets and equity-related derivatives traded on the ASX market or over-the-counter (OTC).
ASX Clear (Futures) Pty Limited (ASX Clear (Futures)) provides CCP services for futures and options on interest rate, equity, energy and commodity products traded on the ASX 24 market, as well as AUD-and NZD-denominated OTC interest rate derivatives (IRD).
LCH Limited's (LCH Ltd) SwapClear service provides CCP services for OTC IRD.
Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. (CME) is licensed to provide CCP services for OTC IRD, and non-AUD IRD traded on the CME market or the Chicago Board of Trade market for which CME permits portfolio margining with OTC IRD.
Exchange-traded products
The ASX CCPs clear exchange-traded futures, options, and cash equities. The four major futures contracts cleared – the SPI 200 equity index, the 3-year and 10-year Treasury bond and 90-day bank bill swap – accounted for around 95 per cent of the total volume of transactions cleared at ASX Clear (Futures) in 2017/18 (Graph 15). Transaction volumes increased for each of the four most actively traded contracts on ASX 24 in 2017/18, with the 10-year Treasury bond futures and 90-day bank bill futures contracts experiencing the strongest growth. Exposures at ASX Clear (Futures), measured by initial margin, grew slightly over the year due in large part to growth in transactions in Treasury bond futures (Graph 16).
ASX Clear generates exposures from cash equities and equity derivatives products (including exchange-traded options). Exposures from cash equity transactions are much lower than for equity derivatives because of the short duration of cash security trades at two days. ASX Clear's total exposures (including both equity derivatives and cash equities), as measured by margin, was lower in 2017/18 than in recent years, reflecting the lower activity in equity derivatives products and a decline in the level of volatility in equity markets (Graphs 17 and 18).
Over-the-counter interest rate derivatives
Consistent with the G20's OTC derivatives reforms, mandatory central clearing of OTC IRD (denominated in AUD and major currencies) between internationally active dealers came into effect in Australia in April 2016. Due in part to these reforms there has been rapid growth in the proportion of OTC IRD that are centrally cleared. Other regulations, such as higher margin and capital requirements for OTC derivatives that are not cleared, and factors such as increased liquidity and netting benefits, have also provided an incentive for firms to clear more of their derivatives by increasing the relative benefits of clearing. Prior to 2012, Australian banks cleared almost none of their IRDs whereas they now clear over three-quarters of their single-currency interest-rate swaps (Graph 19).
CME, ASX Clear (Futures) and LCH Ltd all offer central clearing for AUD-denominated IRD. The products which account for the majority of outstanding AUD positions are interest rate swaps and overnight index swaps. Other products offered include basis swaps, zero-coupon swaps and variable notional swaps. The notional value of all centrally cleared AUD-denominated OTC IRD rose moderately over the 2017/2018 financial year (Graph 20). As at June 2018, 84 per cent of centrally cleared AUD OTC IRD outstanding were cleared at LCH Ltd, with most of the remaining share cleared at ASX Clear (Futures). Slower growth in the notional value of outstanding AUD-denominated OTC IRD at LCH Ltd than ASX Clear (Futures) was partly attributable to strong trade compression activity at LCH Ltd. Compression involves identifying offsetting trades in participants' portfolios and terminating them, while leaving the participants exposures largely unchanged. It reduces the operational costs and risks of managing a large volume of redundant transactions. During 2017/18, nearly $25 trillion in AUD-denominated OTC IRD were compressed by LCH Ltd.
LCH Ltd and CME provide clearing services for OTC IRD in a range of currencies. AUD-denominated contracts make up a small share of outstanding contracts in all currencies – around 5 per cent at LCH Ltd's SwapClear service and around 1 per cent at CME. Australian participation in SwapClear increased over 2017/18, with one new Australian entity joining as a direct participant in April. There are now six Australian-incorporated entities participating as direct clearing participants. CME had no Australian direct clearing participants as at June, though a number of Australian-based banks, superannuation funds and other institutional investors clear products at CME indirectly as clients.
Client clearing
CCPs' exposures are to their direct clearing participants. These participants may offer clearing services to clients, from whom they collect margin to pass onto the CCP. Client margin accounts for a high share of the total initial margin requirements for the CCPs operating in Australia (Graph 21). One reason for these high shares is that clients tend to hold more directional exposures than clearing participants, which are typically dealers that prefer to hold balanced books. Furthermore, client clearing activity has increased over the past few years in response to regulatory changes in the wake of the global financial crisis. In particular, while clearing is not mandatory for many clients – clearing rules in Australia, for example, apply only to large APRA-supervised entities – it has been encouraged by the implementation of margin rules for uncleared OTC derivatives, which increase the costs of these transactions.
Client clearing changes some of the operational and financial risks faced by CCPs. For example, managing the default of a participant that clears for clients would typically involve the CCP ‘porting’ client accounts to a non-defaulting participant. But results of CCP default management ‘fire drills’ have previously indicated that the porting process could be challenging from an operational perspective, in particular for participants that have a large number of clients. And although CCPs usually have no direct credit exposure to clients, the default of a client could adversely affect the participant through which it clears.
For more information, see: Davies C, M-A Doyle, C Fisher and S Nightingale (2016), ‘The Future of Cash’, RBA Bulletin, December, pp 43–52 and Doyle M-A, C Fisher, E Tellez and A Yadav (2017), ‘How Australians Pay: Evidence from the 2016 Consumer Payments Survey’, Research Discussion Paper 2017-04. [5]
Flannigan G and A Staib (2017), ‘The Growing Demand for Cash’, RBA Bulletin, September, pp 63–74. [6]
Flannigan G and S Parsons (2018), ‘High-denomination Banknotes in Circulation: A Cross-country Analysis’, RBA Bulletin, March, viewed 27 August 2018. Available at <https://www.rba.gov.au/publications/bulletin/2018/mar/high-denomination-banknotes-in-circulation-a-cross-country-analysis.html>. [7]
As noted in the section on ‘Interchange fees’ in the chapter on ‘Retail Payments Regulation and Policy Issues’, under the new standards, the weighted-average interchange fee benchmark for debit cards was reduced from 12 cents to 8 cents, and applies jointly to debit and prepaid cards in each designated scheme. The weighted-average benchmark for credit cards was maintained at 0.50 per cent. These weighted-average benchmarks are now also supplemented by ceilings on individual interchange rates: 0.80 per cent for credit; and 15 cents, or 0.20 per cent if the interchange fee is specified in percentage terms, for debit and prepaid. [8]
See the chapter on ‘Retail Payments Regulation and Policy Issues’ for a discussion of the new surcharging framework, including the obligations on acquirers to provide information to merchants on the cost of acceptance for designated card schemes to assist merchants' surcharging decisions. [9]
For more information, see Lowe P (2017), ‘An eAUD?’, Address to the 2017 Australian Payments Summit, Sydney, 13 December. Available at <https://www.rba.gov.au/speeches/2017/sp-gov-2017-12-13.html>. Also, see Richards A (2018), ‘Cryptocurrencies and Distributed Ledger Technology’, Australian Business Economists Briefing, Sydney, 26 June. Available at <https://www.rba.gov.au/speeches/2018/sp-so-2018-06-26.html>. [10]
For a discussion of some policy issues related to cryptocurrencies see the section on ‘Technology and Innovation’ in the chapter on ‘Retail Payments Regulation and Policy Issues’. [11]
CCPs also call variation margin to cover the exposure to actual changes in market prices, to prevent the build-up of current exposures. It is collected from participants with mark-to-market losses, and typically paid out to participants with gains. [12]
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The Sailor and the Sailboat: Leadership and Evidence
My one extravagance is that I live on the Chesapeake Bay and have a small sailboat. I love to sail, even if I’m not especially good at it, but sailing small boats teaches you a lot of important life lessons.
One of these lessons is that leadership is crucial, but leadership can only make a difference if leaders have the tools to translate leadership into outcomes.
Here’s what I mean from a sailing perspective. A sailboat is just a hull, sails, lines, a mast, a rudder, and a centerboard. When these are all in good working order, it still takes a good sailor to manage a small sailboat in heavy weather. However, when any one component is lacking, all hell breaks loose. For example, on my 11-foot sailboat, sometimes the rudder falls off in rough water. Without a rudder, it doesn’t matter how good a sailor you are. You aren’t going anywhere. Similarly, we once lost a mast in a heavy wind. Yikes!
Principals and superintendents in Title I schools are a lot like small-boat sailors in heavy weather, every single day. If all the structures and supports are in place, and if they have a great crew, capable school or district leaders can do wonders for their children.
Proven programs do not manage schools on their own. What they do is help provide the sails, mast, rudder, and lines known to work effectively with a good captain and crew.
Sometimes I hear educational leaders dismiss the importance of proven programs, saying that the only thing that matters is good leadership. But this is only half right. Great leadership is essential to make proven programs work, but proven, replicable programs and other infrastructure are equally essential to enable great leaders to have great results with kids.
So yes, recruit the best captains you can, and mentor them as much as possible. But give them, or enable them to acquire, sailboats known to work. Too many potentially great captains are given sailboats lacking a rudder or mast. When this happens, they’re sunk from the beginning.
Robert Slavin's Blog Challenges, Leadership, Proven programs, Title I Leave a comment September 8, 2016 November 29, 2017 1 Minute
Tailoring Evidence-Based Reform to Different Problems
Not long ago, I gave a speech at the American Psychological Association’s convention in Honolulu (all right, fighting for evidence-based reform does have its pleasures). Readers of this column will not be surprised at anything I said, but I got one question that provoked some thought. My questioner wanted to know why I kept referring to such easy-to-define-and-measure problems as ensuring that children can read or understand algebra, rather than much more complex problems such as how to lead schools.
I didn’t say it at the time, but I think this is both a silly and a profound question. The silly part is its implication that if evidence can’t solve all problems, it is of little value. In fact, is there anyone out there who thinks that it is not important to identify effective and replicable approaches to teaching reading, algebra, and all the other relatively easy-to-define, easy-to-measure problems of education?
Yet solving these does still leave some very important but less-well-defined problems that may take different approaches. These approaches should still be informed by evidence, but perhaps different types of evidence from the design-build-evaluate-disseminate model that usually leads to proven and replicable approaches to reading or algebra, if anything does.
Take leadership, which was my questioner’s example. I don’t think anyone will ever develop and evaluate a “principal protocol” for all schools, but it’s easy to imagine many innovations that could help principals be more effective, if they turned out to work in well-designed evaluations. If you break the principal’s role into its components, this is easy to see. For example, principals play a key role in teacher evaluation, and if anyone designs a teacher evaluation strategy that improves teacher performance overall, this should improve students’ performance, and that is easy to measure. Principals can play a key role in such schoolwide issues as attendance and behavior problems, and solutions for these exist and can readily be implemented and measured.
Principals play a leading role in managing resources, and the impact of each resource can have its own evidence base. Given a certain level of discretionary funding, should principals hire classroom aides, reduce class size, adopt particular programs, implement after-school programs, or purchase playground equipment? There is already evidence on most of these; the principal should be aware of this evidence and take it into account, and more evidence of this kind and better dissemination would be helpful.
Principals should be able to collaborate with staff to set goals, and then motivate and enable the staff to achieve the goals and monitor progress toward doing so. This is less cut-and-dried, but professional development for goal-setting and continuous progress toward targets is available, and the use of specific professional development models can be evaluated and replicated.
The kinds of leadership skills I suspect my questioner was thinking about are perhaps harder to measure and harder to influence. For example, positive relationships with staff, students, parents, and community leaders. Or the ability to make good decisions under pressure. Or the ability to communicate enthusiasm and high expectations for learning, or to serve as a positive role model and moral exemplar. Principals are probably more likely to learn these skills from observing their own principals and through other general life experience, but I would never rule out the possibility that professional development and coaching could build these skills as well. Research might also focus on identifying and selecting extraordinary leaders and keeping them on the job and growing in wisdom and capability over time.
Of course, if principals and school staffs chose and effectively implemented proven classroom programs, proven attendance and behavior programs, proven programs for struggling students, proven parent involvement programs, and so on, then the job of being principal would be a lot easier, and a lot more fulfilling. So rather than worrying about areas in which develop-evaluate-disseminate models don’t directly apply, it might be a good idea to use what we already know how to do, expand the range of proven approaches, and establish incentives and supports to create a school culture that respects and seeks proven solutions.
This may not solve every problem faced by every principal, but it would be a heck of a start, and then we could use different research and development methods to solve the remaining problems.
NOTE: You can obtain my APA address at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=peiZVIJ0Gaw. I’m sorry you couldn’t be in Hawaii to hear it!
Robert Slavin's Blog Evidence-based reform, Leadership, Proven programs, School Principal Leave a comment October 9, 2013 December 7, 2017 3 Minutes
Lessons from Innovators: The National Forum to Accelerate Middle Grades Reform
The process of moving an educational innovation from a good idea to widespread effective implementation is far from straightforward, and no one has a magic formula for doing it. The W. T. Grant and Spencer Foundations, with help from the Forum for Youth Investment, have created a community composed of grantees in the federal Investing in Innovation (i3) program to share ideas and best practices. Our Success for All program participates in this community. In this space, I, in partnership with the Forum for Youth Investment, highlight observations from the experiences of i3 grantees other than our own, in an attempt to share the thinking and experience of colleagues out on the front lines of evidence-based reform.
This blog, based on an interview between the Forum for Youth Investment and Debby Kasak, director of the National Forum to Accelerate Middle Grades Reform, shares how school-to-school mentoring is both bringing about substantial improvements and itself serving as an important sustainability strategy.
Mentoring is Good for Mentors and Mentees
Coaches and mentors, whether at the individual or school level, can improve their own practice by helping others. That is what has begun to happen among schools involved in the National Forum’s i3 project. The National Forum is an alliance of educators, researchers, national associations, and officers of professional organizations and foundations committed to promoting the academic performance and healthy development of young adolescents. Through its Schools to Watch (STW) program, the National Forum has developed criteria for identifying high-performing middle-grades schools and created tools to help schools use them.
The National Forum’s i3 development grant is focused on improving 18 low-performing schools in three states using the STW framework and criteria. The goal is for those schools to learn from other STW schools that have been performing well. “We are inspiring schools to change their practice through whole school intervention,” says Kasak. “Each i3 school is matched up with demographically similar STW schools so they can see that it is possible to make change, even with a tough student population. It helps bring the theory to life for them. Given all the things that teachers get confronted with, they really respond when they see other teachers who are getting results.” But it isn’t just the low-performing schools and their teachers and administrators who are benefitting. “Successful schools can be powerful change agents in the lives of schools that need help, but interestingly, we’ve found that those mentor schools are improving their practice too,” reports Kasak. By helping others – coaching and sharing tools and strategies – schools and individuals within them are reminded to shore up their own promising practices.
Building Relationships is Key
“It sounds like a cliché, but one thing we have learned that can’t be underscored enough is that relationships matter,” Kasak shares. “The first six to seven months that we were involved in this project it was really important that we had coaches in the buildings who could form good relationships with teachers and principals. We needed to take the time to nurture those relationships. And as we did that, we saw the culture and climate of those schools changing.” Supportive relationships help schools weather the inevitable transitions that occur at the senior administration level. If teachers and coaches have a strong network and are committed to the work, it is less disruptive when a principal or superintendent leaves. A cadre of advocates for the initiative remains to educate new leaders. According to Kasak, that is exactly what happened in Chicago. “In Chicago, schools across the city are divided into networks. Originally, all of our schools were part of one network and we had a really supportive network leader. When the district administration changed, the networks were reorganized and our schools were no longer in the same network. One of our new network leaders wasn’t as supportive. But in one school, a teacher invited the Mayor to come visit the school; low and behold he did, and he brought the network leader with him. Seeing the school in action, hearing the teachers talk about their experiences, and building that relationship with the school staff made all the difference. He (the network leader) has been much more supportive since.”
Evaluation Can Be a Powerful Tool
Another way the National Forum has built relationships is through evaluation. Although it may sound counterintuitive, Kasak has found that working with the project evaluation team to look at what they are doing in a developmental way has helped them to share more information with schools than they might have otherwise and to build trust and commitment to the effort. “We are finding that in the second year we have gotten much better participation rates – almost 100% of the faculty in our 18 buildings – than we did the first year,” reports Kasak. In speculating why that might be, the National Forum came up with a couple of explanations. “In part, we know this has to do with being in our second year – teachers understand the process better. But we also credit our evaluation team. They regularly give data back to the schools which helps them better understand how all this work is impacting their school culture. Our evaluation team has really helped us to ask: Are doing what we said we would? Is it working? And how can we improve?”
Participating Schools are Part of the Sustainability Pipeline
The National Forum has an innovative approach to scaling their innovation and sustaining those schools where they are already working. Their two networks – low-performing schools supported through the i3 project and higher-performing Schools to Watch schools – create a natural pipeline toward STW status. The goal is to have all of their i3 schools eventually become STW schools who then mentor and support other low-performing schools that may receive funding through additional i3 funding or other sources down the road. Only three years into the i3 initiative, this pipeline is already in action in North Carolina. “We have one rural school in our i3 project that has just been terrific over the past several years. Recently, it applied to be a Schools to Watch school. They were evaluated and received a very high score, so were designated as a STW school. Now they are in a position to mentor other i3 schools in North Carolina. They benefit from the mentoring process itself, and then every three years will have to go through a re-designation process to maintain STW status, ensuring they are always on their game and thinking about how to get better. This school just went from being one site in a project to being part of a sustainable system of reform. We hope to do this with all of our i3 schools.”
Robert Slavin's Blog Caring, Forum for Youth Investment, Implementation, Investing in Innovation (i3), Leadership, Spencer Foundation, Success for All, W.T. Grant Leave a comment June 19, 2013 December 7, 2017 5 Minutes
Lessons from Innovators: Children’s Learning Initiative
Children’s Literacy Initiative
The process of moving an educational innovation from a good idea to widespread effective implementation is far from straightforward, and no one has a magic formula for doing it. The W. T. Grant and Spencer Foundations, with help from the Forum for Youth Investment, have created a community composed of grantees in the federal Investing in Innovation (i3) program to share ideas and best practices. Our Success for All program participates in this community. In this space, I, in partnership with the two foundations, will highlight observations from the experiences of i3 grantees other than our own, in an attempt to share the thinking and experience of colleagues out on the front lines of evidence-based reform.
Today’s post focuses on the Children’s Literacy Initiative (CLI). It is based on conversations between the Forum and CLI’s Executive Director, Kelly Hunter, on what it takes to maintain fidelity to a complex model in light of constant change in urban school districts. A summary of her comments is as follows.
Plan for change and stick to your core. School systems are in constant flux and developers must be prepared for instability. The Children’s Literacy Initiative (CLI) tries to do that by using training, coaching and other supports to promote quality teaching to ensure that students in low performing, urban districts are proficient readers, writers and thinkers by the end of third grade. They are currently attempting to scale their effort to four new districts, Camden, Chicago, Newark and Philadelphia. This is easier said than done. Such districts experience frequent teacher and administrator turnover, school closures and mergers, and charter formation. Hunter suggests that if you want to implement with fidelity you first have to take a long and hard look at your model, make decisions about what is core, and then message those core ingredients in a way that respects where schools are coming from. Hunter notes, “We realized that we were struggling with messaging our change model. Even though research shows quality teaching is the number one school factor, funders and others were focused on other reforms that are sexy today. We didn’t want to focus on being negative or bad mouthing other reforms. We just knew we had to be strong in our position, share the research, and stay clear about our message and core ingredients.”
Identify the right champions. Kelly and her partners at CLI have learned that regional superintendents are a critical ingredient for sustained change. These area leaders have considerable influence over principals. “At the beginning,” Hunter notes, “we would get central office and schools to sign off, but not the regional superintendents. Then we would be off and running but all of a sudden the regionals were messaging something different than what we were doing.” When regional leaders began to understand the importance of fidelity and appreciate the core ingredients, they were then able to share their enthusiasm with principals or set standards to reinforce values and practices consistent with the model.
Partner to multiply resources and minimize obstacles. As they push towards scale, leaders at CLI have also learned the importance of cultivating new and varied partnerships. In addition to district staff, especially important partners include local funders and other program providers. Local funders are essential from a sustainability standpoint. It is also critical to partner with other entities that provide related services or technical assistance within a building or district – even when they involve a different subject matter or grade. These partnerships can allow for more comprehensive and coherent supports across disciplines and grade levels and minimize confusion among and competing demands on district staff. “It’s about enhancing what we are doing, not changing it,” comments Hunter. For example, in one i3 school in West Philadelphia, Drexel University was providing coaching services in math while CLI was providing literacy coaching. By working together, they were able to make coaching across these topics more consistent and communication more streamlined.
Scale back to scale up. Implementing innovative practices is complicated and labor intensive. Regional knowledge is necessary to help align external needs and resources with your own organizations’ demands and capacities. Networking locally is a great way to learn about a school, community or district, and to identify key stakeholders, funders, and advocates. But building this knowledge and these relationships takes staff, time, and energy. To address this challenge, CLI revisited their initial plan and decided to concentrate energy and resources on implementing the model deeply in four cities rather than spread themselves thinly across ten. According to Hunter, “we knew that in some communities, we didn’t have enough local influence, networking and outreach to raise the dollars and implement the model with fidelity. We were chasing dollars and our model was being compromised. Ultimately that compromises student achievement.” Instead, she says, “over time we hope to build our presence in and around our four hubs and eventually serve as a model for other communities as they scale to surrounding schools and districts.”
Robert Slavin's Blog Early literacy, Investing in Innovation (i3), Leadership, Scale-up, Success for All, Teaching Leave a comment April 23, 2013 December 4, 2017 3 Minutes
Robert Slavin's Blog Children's Literacy Initiative (CLI), Early literacy, Elementary reading, Investing in Innovation (i3), Leadership, Superintendents Leave a comment February 21, 2013 December 7, 2017 3 Minutes
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WATCH: Man Clings to Hood of Moving SUV Because…Road Rage
Why would anyone ever think this was a good idea?
65-year-old Richard Kamrowski’s vehicle was sideswiped by an SUV on the Massachusetts Turnpike last week. He took matters into his own hands when the driver of the SUV tried to leave the scene of an accident. Kamrowski climbed onto the hood of the SUV as it continued to speed away from the scene at speeds of up to 70 miles per hour.
Kamrowski told WFXT-TV Boston, “I thought he was going to run over me and I don’t know I don’t think he stopped he just kept going fast then slow, fast then slow trying to get me to slide off and I wasn’t getting off the car.”
The driver of the SUVis facing charges of assault with a dangerous weapon, negligent driving, and leaving the scene of an accident involving property damage. Kamrowski is also facing a charge of disorderly conduct…because apparently climbing onto the hood of a moving vehicle…is not the way to handle that situation.
The situation just gets weirder after a third party (a licensed gun owner) got out of his car and pointed the gun at the SUV driver and ordered him to get out of his SUV.
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The Minority Female Single Parent Program
In the 1970s and 1980s, the Rockefeller Foundation’s (RF) Equal Opportunity (EO) division sought to address unemployment in minority communities. These efforts aligned with the EO program’s broader goal: to secure and expand social, educational, and economic opportunities for racial minorities in the United States. As the country's urban crisis worsened in the 1970s, EO program officers tried to clarify the causes of, and support public policies designed to address, minority youth unemployment. These officers began by commissioning a background paper on the problem of youth employment by political economist Lester Thurow, of MIT's Sloan School of Management. The paper became the basis of a conference on “Unemployment of Youth and Policy Alternatives” held at the Rockefeller Foundation in May 1977. The RF funded extensive research into the problem in the late 1970s.
Despite these efforts, youth employment never emerged as a full-fledged program in the RF. By 1980, the Foundation had reevaluated its focus, recognizing the structural issues facing minority communities that extended beyond this single issue. This shift may have also resulted from pragmatic concerns. In the late 1970's, the field of youth employment was saturated with programs developed by the federal government, several foundations, and various local public and private agencies. In addition, Ronald Reagan's election as president in 1980 made foundations more skeptical about the federal government's willingness to replicate and enlarge their programs.
A New Focus
This political shift provided the RF with an opportunity to reframe its focus. In 1981, President Reagan signed the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (OBRA), which "encouraged states to devise experimental 'demonstration projects' designed to get welfare recipients to work.[1] The RF decided to implement its own demonstration project aimed at improving the circumstances of minority women on welfare. It invested $17.5 million dollars (nearly $30 million today) in the Minority Female Single Parent demonstration (MFSP), which ran between 1982 and 1988. Although the Foundation worked within a federal framework, it approached the problem with a different ideological perspective than the Reagan administration. In a 1981 New York Times article, RF President Richard Lyman said that through the MFSP program, "We want to underscore the foundation's commitment to poor blacks and Hispanics at a time when their plight ranks relatively low on the national agenda."[2]
A 1987 MFSP Program Report
The MFSP demonstration sought to examine whether community-based organizations could run employment training and counseling programs that would reduce poor single mothers’ reliance on welfare. The RF partially funded four community-based organizations (CBOs) to operate training programs: the Atlanta Urban League, Opportunities Industrialization Center in Providence, Rhode Island, the Center for Employment Training (CET) in San Jose, California, and Wider Opportunities for Women (WOW) in Washington, D.C. The organizations designed their own program models to address the employment challenges facing low-income single mothers. Nearly 4,000 women enrolled in these demonstrations, which offered a variety of services, including job skills assessments, counseling, remedial education, child care assistance, job-skill training, and job placement assistance.
Evaluating Success and Failure
In 1987, the Foundation issued an interim report on the factors they identified as hindering the success -- or causing the outright failure -- of these RF trial programs . "The Foundation is publishing these interim observations," they noted, "in the hope that policymakers and others responsible for such programs in the future can build on the lessons of the past." First, the RF noted that childcare was essential for participants. Second, the Foundation highlighted poor reading and language skills among participants as a significant problem, but did not recommend additional classes as the solution; literacy training had to be made relevant to a job. Third, the structure of the programs must focus not only on job training, but also on job placement. And finally, the women needed access to support services -- personal counseling, transportation, medical care, family planning, legal services, and housing -- to help them succeed in the programs. The CBOs reported that "if a participant's day-to-day concerns were not addressed, sooner or later, she will drop out."[3]
The program's final evaluation supported these early conclusions, and added a few more: above all, "immediate, job-specific training with a strong focus on getting trainees into jobs" proved more successful than providing remedial education first.[4] Only one program, CET, resulted in long-term earnings gains. This program differed from the others in that it provided job-specific skill training up front (based on jobs that existed in the local area), and wove basic literacy and math skills into the training. The other three programs led with remedial education. CET's training focused not only on developing skills required for specific jobs, but also on training in areas with large labor needs. The program worked to place participants in jobs immediately after training.
An MFSP program participant
A "Constructive and Important Failure"
In the end, the MFSP program achieved very minimal success by its own measures. Within the RF, MFSP's failures prompted a major debate about whether the EO program should concentrate its resources on research and policy recommendations or on action-oriented demonstration projects. To a certain extent, RF leaders considered this an institution-wide question in the 1980s. In a July 1984 memo to RF president Richard Lyman about the future direction of the foundation, one staffer noted, “I am struck with the persistent ambivalence at the RF over whether our mission can or should be to help solve problems or merely to diagnose their causes and suggest alternative ways for solving them.”[5] In the end, the MFSP demonstration tried to reconcile the tension between research and action by developing an analytical framework with applicability to other anti-poverty programs. For this reason, studying where the MFSP program fell short held important practical potential. Some outside commentators agreed. Historian of philanthropy Peter Frumkin, for instance, called the MFSP program "one of philanthropy's most constructive and important failures" -- and, he said, "constructive failures create value by helping us understand what went wrong."[6]
[1] Judith Sealander, The Failed Century of the Child: Governing America's Young in the Twentieth Century (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 123.
[2] “Rockefeller Foundation Shifts Policy,” New York Times, December 20, 1981.
[3] “From Welfare to Work: Minority Female Single Parent Program,” 1987, Rockefeller Foundation Collection, RG 1.23, Series 200, Box R3062, Folder “Employment Program for Minority Group Female Single Parents, 1992-1994,” Rockefeller Archive Center (Sleepy Hollow, NY) (hereafter RAC).
[4] Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., Evaluation of the Minority Female Single Parent Demonstration, Volume I, Summary Report, October 1992, xiii.
[5] JS to RWL, July 16, 1984, Rockefeller Foundation Collection, Richard Lyman Papers, Box 1, Folder 5, RAC.
[6] Peter Frumkin, Strategic Giving: The Art and Science of Philanthropy (Chicago: The University of Chicago, 2006), 68.
Navigation Navigation
Lester Thurow Working Papers on Youth Unemployment, September 1977
NUL Director Vernon Jordan to RF President John Knowles, September 9, 1976
RF President John Knowles to NUL Director Vernon Jordan, September 14, 1976
Ralph K Davidson, "Youth Unemployment, With Particular Reference to Youth Unemployment," November 16, 1976
Ralph K. Davidson, "Youth Unemployment," February 2, 1978
NAACP Newsletter on Black Unemployment, February 1978
"Summary of RF Initiatives on Youth Unemployment," July 27, 1978
MFSP Program Press Release, December 18, 1981
RF Support for Youth Unemployment Programs, 1978-1981
Bernard Anderson, "Proposed Plans on Modification of MFSP Evaluation," March 26, 1984
Memo from Bernard Anderson to MFSP Advisory Committee, May 18, 1984
Robinson G. Hollister, "Review of Minority Single Female Parent Program," May 29, 1984
MFSP Advisory Committee, Summary of Special Meeting, July 10, 1984
Overview of the RF's Minority Female Single Parent Program, July 1987
From Welfare to Work: Minority Female Single Parent Program, September 1987
Fact Sheets -- Recent Findings from the Rockefeller Foundation's Minority Female Single Parent (MFSP) Demonstration, December 18, 1989
Press Release, Welfare-to-Work Programs Need to Integrate Remedial and Job Skills, September 20, 1990
New York Times Article on the MFSP, October 25, 1990
Memo, Lamond Godwin to Bernard Anderson, CBO Employment and Training Initiative for Minority Female Single Parents, n.d.
Final Appropriation for the Minority Female Single Parent Program, December 11, 1990
Special Program Update: MFSP Dissemination, June 1991
Picture of MFSP Program Participant, n.d.
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Baby boomers, Beach Boys, Culture, Diary, Entertainment, Journal, Life, Media, Music, Music news, Nostalgia, Pop, Punk, Punk Rock, R&B, Random, Rock music, Seventies TV, Sex Pistols, The Beach Boys, The Sex Pistols, Today In Music, Today in music history, Uncategorized
Today In Music, November 10th
From the Rockmine Almanac for today (Monday 10th November):
1947. Glen Buxton (Alice Cooper) born in Akron, Ohio.
1965. Bill Graham stages his first promotion at the Fillmore Auditorium featuring The Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane.
1978. Johhny Rotten starts legal proceedings in the High Court in London to wind-up The Sex Pistols. His lawyers are granted special leave to serve notice of the action on Sid Vicious who is currently on bail in a New York hospital accused of murdering his girlfriend, Nancy Spungeon. Vicious was admitted to hospital after slashing his wrists in an abortive suicide attempt. Further action is adjourned for a hearing date to be set.
1966. Brian Wilson is hard at work in Gold Star Studios, Los Angeles on the new Beach Boys album, “Smile”. The track “Fire” doesn’t seem to be coming together so he sends an aide out to a toy store to buy plastic red fire helmets for the orchestra, studio crew and friends assembled there. Even that doesn’t quite capture the feeling he’s trying to create so he gets the studio’s janitor, Brother Julius, to start a fire in a bucket in the middle of the studio. On the 24th take he is finally satisfied. Later in the evening, Brian is told that the studio was nearly burned down. A wave of fires had been sweeping the city during the week and Brian decides they’ve been caused by his recording of the track. He tries to set light to the master tape but it won’t ignite. Convinced that he’s imbued the track with magical properties he has the tape locked in a vault where it can do no harm.
1972. The Partridge Family (ABC, U.S.A.) Swiss Family Partridge. Here’s the complete episode. The first clip links to the other two parts.
2006. Gerald Levert (LeVert) dies in Newbury, Ohio, U.S. from an accidental mix of prescription drugs and over the counter medications.
Fillmore Auditorium
Gerald Levert
Glen Buxton
Gold Star Studios
Johhny Rotten
Nancy Spungeon
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14There Was Another Series Of The Anime (That We Never Saw)
The Yu-Gi-Oh! anime that most fans are familiar with is actually called Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters in Japan, and it was the second series to be produced. The first Yu-Gi-Oh! anime (sometimes referred to as "season zero" by fans) was produced by Toei Animation, and ran for a single season in 1998.
What we now know as the Yu-Gi-Oh! card
game did not appear until later episodes, where it was called Magic and Wizards, and was in a much more primitive form. The anime followed the story of the original manga, with the much darker version of the Pharaoh (and his murderous antics). Early versions of characters like Kaiba and Bakura also appeared in this series. This season of the anime had its own film, called Yu-Gi-Oh! The Movie. The character designs in the film more closely resembled the ones seen later in the Duel Monsters version of the anime.
By the time the next season of the anime was released (the one that was released in America), the Duel Monsters card game had been fleshed out. It became the central focus of the story, and was entwined with the story of the Millennium Items.
Next 13 Both Bandit Keith & Pegasus Died In The Manga
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Davis Allen
Graduation Date: 12/14/2013Degree Received: Agroecology & Sustainable Agriculture (BS)Other Degree: History Minor Here's what I've been doing since graduation:I have started working on an MA in environmental history at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio. I was exposed to...
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Sonya Calef
Graduation Date: Dec, 1994Degree Received: Interdisciplinary Studies: Environmental Policy & Planning with Anthro/SD minor After graduating:I was one of the first three students to go through the brand new SD program, because of Dr. Jeff Boyer. I am now in Minneapolis, MN, and work...
Marinell Chandler
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Cameron Farlow
Cameron Farlow earned her undergraduate degrees from UNC-Chapel Hill in Anthropology and Geography in 2006, and completed her Master's Degree in Appalachian Studies and Sustainable Development from Appalachian State University (ASU) in May 2011. She has been putting her studies in localizing food...
Kathleen Lackey
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Author(s): Margery Williams
The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams Bianco The Velveteen Rabbit (or How Toys Become Real) is the charming story of a toy rabbit's quest to become real through the love of his owner. This short novel has been a favourite of children and their parents since 1922. Sayre Street Books offers the world's greatest literature in easy to navigate, beautifully designed digital editions. We are delighted to publish this classic book as part of our extensive Classic Library collection. Many of the books in our collection have been out of print for decades, and therefore have not been accessible to the general public. The aim of our publishing program is to facilitate rapid access to this vast reservoir of literature, and our view is that this is a significant literary work, which deserves to be brought back into print after many decades. The contents of the vast majority of titles in the Classic Library have been scanned from the original works. To ensure a high quality product, each title has been meticulously hand curated by our staff. Our philosophy has been guided by a desire to provide the reader with a book that is as close as possible to ownership of the original work. We hope that you will enjoy this wonderful classic work, and that for you it becomes an enriching experience.
A treasured classic, revisited for a new generation
Margery Williams (Author) Margery Winifred Williams was born in London in 1881. During her lifetime she lived in England, America and Italy and wrote numerous books for adults and children. Her most famous book, The Velveteen Rabbit or How Toys Become Real, was published in1922.Sarah Massini (Illustrator) Sarah's mum always said it was a blessing how paper and a pencil could keep her quiet and out of mischief for hours. Drawing has been a life-long habit that has seen her through careers in corporate design, children's book design and now as an illustrator...and illustrating is what she loves doing best. Sarah lives in Sussex with her husband Peter, her young son Mathew, and her utterly mad terrier Tess, who keeps guard as she draws.
Publisher : Nosy Crow
Imprint : Nosy Crow
Illustrations : Full Colour Illustrations Throughout
Author : Margery Williams
Illustrator : Sarah Massini
Reading Level : Children's - Grade 1-2, Age 6-7
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Sound Bites - Issue #40 - December 2016
Issue #40 December | 2016
On the Cover: Bryan Ricci in Living Color
What's New: Open House Jan. 21 - Get Discounts! Not to Be Missed!
Behind the Scenes: Breathe India, Auroville and a Family's History
Perspective: Learning! A Gift that Lasts Forever
Bryan Ricci in Living Color
Ricci in his West L.A. studio
This 2015 painting reflects Ricci's current interest in color and the application of paint in abstract forms
Ricci's 2012 painting, "Bee's Nest"
Bryan Ricci not only paints in vibrant colors, he thinks about what color means in contemporary Los Angeles.
The painting instructor - who has taught at SMC Community Ed for three years and also teaches at Loyola Marymount University and gives private lessons to elementary school children - continuously explores themes of modern life in his art work.
Lately, he has been focusing on color and the application of paint in abstract forms.
"The work that I make now is about a process of application of paint, and I'm doing things with paint that maybe hasn't been done before," Ricci said in an interview in his West Los Angeles studio.
But he's also excited by a recent show of his in Brisbane, Australia called "Chromophilia," a celebration of color that was informed by the book "Chromophobia."
"Color is really important and it reflects my life," he said. "It's why I came to L.A. from New York."
He explained that the vibrant colors of Los Angeles - reflected in its natural environment, architecture and diversity of people - captured his imagination when he first visited the city in the late 1990s. He moved to L.A. in 2000 to attend graduate school at Otis College of Design & Art, where he earned a Master's of Fine Arts degree.
But to his chagrin, he has noticed that L.A. is becoming increasingly beige -- reflected in recently constructed apartment buildings, McMansions and other elements of the city's built environment. Hence, in reaction to that, he turned to a celebration of color.
Ricci has explored many styles of painting in his career. He started out as a landscape painter and is interested in going back to that.
"My landscapes will be a tribute to the environment because we're in dangerous times," he said. "I'm hoping the paintings will help me or others remember what is important."
A native of upstate New York, Ricci received his BFA from Purchase College School of Art and Design SUNY in 2000. He has been exhibited widely across the United States in group and solo shows, including his 2005 solo show "A Closer Look," held at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles. In 2006 his art appeared as part of an exhibit of American painters at the Insa Art Center in Seoul, South Korea.
In the Winter Session he will teach two classes - Landscape Painting and Paint Anything! (both of which begin Jan. 7).
"I really love to teach," he said. "I like to keep an art conversation going. And it helps my work too."
Bryan Ricci will teach - Landscape Painting and Paint Anything! (both of which begin Jan. 7) in the Winter Session.
Open House Jan. 21 - Get Discounts! Not to Be Missed!
2016 Open House. Salsa and fitness instructor Jackline Daneshrad
Arlene Weinstock demonstrated colored pencil techniques at last year's Open House
Thanks to the runaway success of our Open House 2016, we will be bringing the event back on Saturday, Jan. 21, 2017 - featuring class discounts, mini presentations and more.
The Open House, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. will give attendees a chance to meet instructors and staff and learn about the rich variety of offerings in the Spring Semester. It will be held at the SMC Bundy Campus, Room 123, 3171 S. Bundy Dr., Los Angeles. Ample free parking is available.
As we have done in years past, we will again be offering a one-day discount of 15 percent for all on-ground classes registered during the visit.
Details are still being worked out, but we will be sending out more information via emails, social media posts and the January edition of this newsletter.
We are getting great response from the instructors for the 2017 Open House because they - and all of us at Community Ed - were so encouraged by the enthusiastic turnout earlier this year, and we want to improve on our success.
We know that the Open House and, to a certain extent, our annual Instructor Recruitment Fair, really allows our public to get to know our staff, our way of operating, and our standards. These important events also promote mutual understanding and support as well as opening up channels of communication, which is ultimately our goal.
We know that we are very privileged to enjoy the continual confidence and support of our beloved community, and we strive to do better every year. Even with our limited staff, we have built a team that truly wants to serve our community and students, and make Continuing Education not just a big part of our lives, but a big part of everyone dedicated to learning.
Our very best wishes for a joyous holiday season and a wonderful new year!
Breathe India, Auroville and a Family's History
Heather Lyle singing jazz with her band Blue Cat Express
Heather Lyle with students at an "Indian Idol" Academy in Kolkata, India
Heather Lyle's Vocal Yoga classes at SMC Community Ed
Vocal Yoga and singing instructor Heather Lyle has performed and taught her unique style of vocal pedagogy all over the world. But her upcoming expedition to India has special meaning because she will be teaching for the first time at what could be called a Utopian-like town that her father helped to build in the 1960s.
The SMC Community Ed instructor, along with Catherine Fitzmaurice, will be leading the Breathe India workshop, teaching Fitzmaurice Voicework and the Heather Lyle Vocal Yoga in Auroville, India, Jan. 3-11. The eco-community, dubbed "The City of Dawn," is outside of Puducherry (Pondicherry) on the southeast coast of the South Asian nation.
"This will be an incredible experience as Catherine and I, along with five Fitzmaurice Voicework master teachers, conduct a unique workshop for 24 students coming from throughout the world, including Australia, South Africa, Ireland, the United States, Austria and Spain," Lyle said.
Lyle, a Los Angeles native whose parents she described as "Beat Generation intellectuals," grew up in a nontraditional family whose father was a painter and mother a writer. Lyle said her father, who was given the name Auro Arindam in India, and an artist friend of his found they were painting an unknown woman repeatedly and didn't know why. Then they saw a photo of Mother (Mirra Alfassa) of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram whose face matched the woman they were painting, and they headed to India.
Both artists thought they would spend their time painting at the ashram, but Mother had other plans in mind. She had a dream that all people of all nationalities and all faiths could come and live in unity. In the early sixties, a group of devotees were sent to clear brush, plant trees and build structures in the desert. Lyle's father was sent by the Mother in 1965 to help create the community, which opened in 1968. And thus, Auroville was born.
By then her parents were divorced, but her nontraditional upbringing in the Fairfax district continued as she started yoga in 1969 at the age of 12 - when there was only one yoga studio in Los Angeles - and she pursued her childhood dream of being a singer. She received Bachelor's and Master's of Music degrees from Cal State Northridge and did Ph.D. work at Indiana University.
She's sung all kinds of music, including opera, but for the past 20 years has performed mostly jazz vocals with her band Blue Cat Express. She developed Vocal Yoga and wrote a book "Vocal Yoga, the Joy of Breathing, Singing and Sounding." (She's currently writing her second book, "Vocal Yoga: The Science of the East Meets the Science of the West.")
Fast forward to 2013 when Lyle's book ended up in the hands of Fremantle Media's "India Idol" competition in Kolkata. She was invited to help develop vocal pedagogy for 60 "Indian Idol Academies" that were being created by "Indian Idol" to give young people a chance to train vocally who wouldn't otherwise have the opportunity. After that gig ended, she decided to see Auroville for herself, nearly 50 years after the birth of the community of 2,400 that her father helped to build.
After staying in Auroville, she was inspired to organize Breathe India with her friend Fitzmaurice, who was born in India but now lives and works in Los Angeles.
"I'm so excited about the possibilities and rewards of Breathe India," Lyle said. "The spiritual component and family history make this particularly special to me."
Heather Lyle will teach Vocal Yoga and Contemporary Singing Techniques this spring at SMC Community Education. Registration is open for her classes
Learning! A Gift that Lasts Forever
We at SMC Community Education wish you the happiest of holidays and a wonderful new year
'Tis the season for giving, and rather than crowd into malls trying to decide what to buy for your loved ones and friends, maybe you could consider giving the gift of education.
A gift certificate to one of our classes can give the recipient enlightenment, the thrill of learning to create art or play music, the satisfaction of feeling more fit, or the delight of learning a new language. We're offering hundreds of classes this Winter and Spring, and we believe our instructors give the best gift of all - the gift of lifelong learning.
If you'd like more information on how to get a certificate, just call us at (310) 434-3400 or email us at commed@smc.edu. Our office will close for the holidays Dec. 22 so be sure to contact us soon! We'll be back in business Jan. 3.
Our very best wishes to you and yours for a joyous holiday season and the happiest of new years!
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Charter Schools, ERO, Parata (Hekia), Partnership Schools
Charter Schools NZ: School Trust issued with notice
Posted by Save Our Schools NZ ⋅ February 20, 2015 ⋅ 1 Comment
Filed Under charter school, ERO, failing school, Ngā Parirau Mātauranga Charitable Trust, Partnership School, performance notice, Specialist Audit, Te Pumanawa O Te Wairua
Education Minister Hekia Parata has issued the Trust running Te Pumanawa o te Wairua School with a performance notice requiring it to take immediate action to address areas of serious concern at the school.
Ms Parata met with the Ngā Parirau Mātauranga Charitable Trust today to lay out her concerns about ongoing issues identified by the Education Review Office (ERO) and the Ministry of Education. The Trust is the sponsor for the school at Whangaruru.
“I have become increasingly concerned at the cumulative failures in performance that have seen declining numbers of kids enrolled, sporadic school attendance and the knock-on effect on educational performance.
“The Ministry has worked extensively with the Trust over the past year to address the issues raised, but ERO has found that it would not be able to operate effectively without further substantial support.”
Ms Parata says she is aware of the challenges faced by the school. “A number of these students have been out of the education system for some time. However, these challenges were known by the Trust when they made their proposal and later signed the contract to run the school.
“The Ministry has provided support and advice over many months to the sponsor in a number of areas, including governance, management and operational matters.
“There were some improvements at the school last year, particularly when it was under an interim Chief Executive, but they were not sustained after the interim CE left the school.”
Ms Parata says the Trust has put forward a remedial plan, but she is not confident that it is sufficient to make the difference required.
“Therefore, under the agreement, I have issued a performance notice. This sets out exactly what the performance failures are and what must be done to address them.”
She says a Specialist Audit will be conducted at the school in a month’s time to assess progress.
“I intend to use the findings of the Specialist Audit to assist my overall judgement as to whether the failings identified are capable of being rectified.
“Partnership schools are giving many kids who’ve faced considerable difficulties in their lives the chance to get engaged in education again. But it is our duty to ensure they do actually receive the quality of education they need to open the doors of further promise in their lives.”
Ms Parata says she is not predetermining the outcome of the process.
“The issuing of a performance notice is a step in the process to both protect the rights of these students to get a better education while protecting the use of taxpayers’ funding.”
« Charter Schools: No amount of spin can make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear
Minister needs to take responsibility for Whangaruru disaster – NZEI »
One thought on “Charter Schools NZ: School Trust issued with notice”
Exactly what was to be expected. My friends who own the ajoining farm where the school was originally going to be sited were part of the original proposal but they could see that it was being hijacked by people who should have known better and pulled out of any association. Wise decision. Everything was so foreseeable apart from those in government circlles who can’t see past their crooked flawed ideological noses…. the whole thing was and is a circuis act to benefit a few egos at the expense to the tax payer and to the education of children had this money been spent more wisely.
Posted by milesinnz | February 20, 2015, 1:52 pm
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SMU Law Review
SMU Scholar
Home > Dedman School of Law > Law Journals > SMU Law Review > Vol. 65 (2012) > Iss. 1
Who is Liable for Attorney's Fees under Texas Civil Practice & Remedies Code Section 38.001 in breach of Contract Litigation
Gregory S. Crespi, Southern Methodist University, Dedman School of LawFollow
This article examines the question of who qualifies as an "individual" or "corporation" who may be held liable for attorney's fees in a breach of contract action pursuant to section 38.001 of the Texas Civil Practice & Remedies Code. After a discussion of the relevant legislative commentary regarding section 38.001, the author reviews a series of cases in which courts have applied the “individual or corporation” clause to governmental entities, partnerships, limited liability companies, and private associations and assesses whether the courts have correctly interpreted the statute as to the classes of defendants that it covers. The article concludes with suggestions for how the Texas Supreme Court might clarify the scope of application of section 38.001, as well as some possible amendments to the statute that the Texas legislature could enact to make its intended scope clearer.
Gregory S. Crespi, Who is Liable for Attorney's Fees under Texas Civil Practice & Remedies Code Section 38.001 in breach of Contract Litigation, 65 SMU L. Rev. 71 (2012)
https://scholar.smu.edu/smulr/vol65/iss1/3
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My Small Business
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What is Small Business Saturday?
Small Business Saturday UK is a grassroots, non-commercial campaign, which highlights small business success and encourages consumers to 'shop local' and support small businesses in their communities.
The day itself takes place on the first Saturday in December each year, but the campaign aims to have a lasting impact on small businesses.
On Small Business Saturday, customers across the U.K go out and support all types of small businesses, online, in offices and in stores. Many small businesses take part in the day by hosting events and offering discounts.
How the UK supported Small Business Saturday 2018:
An estimated £812 million was spent in small businesses across the UK on Small Business Saturday, according to research* commissioned by founder and principal supporter American Express. This was up from the £748 million spent on Small Business Saturday last year, with 59% of people aware of the day saying they spent more than usual.
Support for the campaign came from 90% of local councils – a three per cent increase on 2017 – calling for the nation to shop local and support the 5.6 million small businesses across the country.
Positive consumer sentiment and support for small businesses on a local level was echoed through national government, with the Prime Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Mayor of London all supporting the campaign.
Small Business Saturday also drew high engagement on social media. Tweets sent on the day reached more than 100 million people, with #SmallBizSatUK and #SmallBusinessSaturday trending in the UK’s top 5 throughout the day. Facebook and Instagram posts were also up on 2017, with more people sharing their Small Business Saturday stories.
For general enquiries, please contact:
comms@smallbusinesssaturdayuk.com
For all press and media enquiries, please contact:
media@smallbusinesssaturdayuk.com
#SmallBizSatUK
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The SolarFi App offers
Social and economic development is not possible without energy and electricity. Even though Africa is blessed with abundant sunshine, nearly 1 Billion inhabitants of Africa, 600 million people (1.2 billion globally) lack access to electricity. A primary solution to this power deficit is solar energy. SolarFi aims to connect the underserved and unconnected populations in Africa through solar-powered phone charging stations. Access to solar energy and last mile distribution is a mission that SolarFi has tirelessly been working on.
SolarFi connects people to solar power and WiFi, and payments can then be made through-out Africa on the SolarFi platform. SolarFi provides a “business in a box,” and the potential for promoting micro-franchises based on a solar-powergenerating kiosk. The kiosk, can charge mobile phones, offer virtual top-up service to buy mobile airtime, prepaid utilities, pay taxes and other bills. The booths also deliver Internet and local digital content via the intranet. In the SolarFi system, multiple hubs connect wirelessly to create a network managed by each entrepreneurial business owner. Kiosks can charge up to 100 phones simultaneously and provide Wi-Fi Internet for up to 80 users.
The booths are outfitted with sensors and with GPS & video cameras that allow the business owner to remotely monitor their performance and enhance safety. SolarFi addresses 11 out of 17 of the UN’s sustainable development goals (SDG’s) and has a triple bottom line effect. The triple bottom line consists of social equity, economic, and environmental benefits. The phrase, “people, planet, and profit” describes the triple bottom line of SolarFi and the goal of sustainability that we are piloting in Liberia, Ghana and Sierra Leone, two countries that were severely affected by the Ebola virus.
There is a dire need for solar energy and products of SolarFi in countries such as Liberia and Sierra Leone. As of 31st December 2017, for example, only 2% of Liberians had access to electricity in the rural areas, and only 8.6% of Liberians had access to the Internet. In comparison, only 2.4 % of Sierra Leoneans have access to the internet, and 14% have access to electricity. We plan to work with mobile network operators (Phone companies), NGO’s, international aid organizations and the United Nations to distribute solar-powered charging stations.
Donate to SolarFi
© Copyright 2019 SolarFi | All Rights Reserved.
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Deceased = Giannini, Leonard Nick, Sr.
Giannini, Leonard Nick, Sr.
Birth: Friday, February 19, 1932 in Washington, D.C.
Residence: La Plata, Maryland
Death: Monday, September 03, 2018 at the age of 86
Leonard Nick Giannini Sr., 86, of La Plata, Maryland died at his home on Monday, September 3, 2018. Born on February 19, 1932 in Washington, DC, Lenny was the son of the late Angelina Pasquale Giannini and John Baptiste Giannini. He served in the U. S. Air Force until he was Honorably Discharged at the rank of Airman First Class. Lenny was the manager for IGA Grocery Store in Charlotte Hall for many years. He enjoyed playing golf and was a member of the Wicomico Shores Senior Blitz. Lenny loved spending time with his children and grandchildren. He was a member of the St. Columba Masonic Lodge Number 150 and a member of the La Plata United Methodist Church.
In addition to his parents, Lenny was preceded in death by his siblings Violet, Edna, Johnny and Michael. He is survived by his wife of 55 years, Agnes Lee Giannini; children Lori A. Hudson, Leonard Nick Giannini Jr. and his wife Debi; grandchildren Becca and Tre Giannini, Kaileigh Harrison and her husband Travis; brother Rocco.
Family and friends to gather at the La Plata United Methodist Church, 3 Port Tobacco Road, La Plata, Maryland 20646 from 2PM until time for Memorial Service to begin at 3PM. Interment will be private. Memorial contributions may be made to La Plata United Methodist Church or St. Jude's Children's Research 501 St Jude Place, Memphis, TN 38105. Arrangements by Raymond funeral Service.
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Double Helix Law
A blog on DNA evidence
Tag Archives: Senate Bill 775
DNA Database Overhaul Proposed in Pennsylvania
The majority leader of the Pennsylvania Senate, Dominic Pileggi, just introduced a bill to make major changes in the state’s law enforcement DNA database system. The most significant change is the requirement that individuals who are merely arrested for certain crimes must provide a DNA sample for inclusion in the state database. About half the states now have such laws, although (as noted an earlier posting to this blog) their constitutionality is the subject of continuing litigation. This bill is relatively moderate in its approach to arrestee sampling. There must be a judicial finding of probable cause (or a waiver of the preliminary hearing). The DNA profiles must be removed from the database if there is no conviction. The samples may not be used for kinship searching (a topic of previous postings).
The bill requires the state police to develop and implement procedures for kinship searching. Maryland and the District of Columbia prohibit kinship searching, and California, Colorado, New York, Texas, and Virginia conduct such searches in the absence of explicit statutory authority. Currently there is confusion in Pennsylvania over whether disclosure of near matches to local officials is permissible. The state police contend that “Although familial searching has the potential to be a great investigative tool, implementation at this early stage, without direct legislative approval and a standard national policy, is premature.” Flam (2011). Obviously, the notion that in a federation of states, no state should act before “a standard national policy exists” is somewhat strange. Mimicking the policy adopted by executive action in California, the bill restricts kinship searches to cases in which other investigative methods have failed. Unlike the California policy, however, the bill imposes no artificial floor on the number of autosomal alleles that must match. Instead, it requires administrative rule-making to arrive at more “scientifically valid and reliable” procedures.
A unique provision in the bill states that “No DNA sample or DNA record shall be used for human behavioral genetic research.” This prohibition is superfluous. See Kaye (2006). The bill states that “the tests to be performed on each DNA sample shall be used only for law enforcement identification purposes or to assist in the recovery or identification of human remains from disasters or for other humanitarian identification purposes, including identification of missing persons,” and it defines “Law enforcement identification purposes” as “Assisting in the determination of the identity of an individual whose DNA is contained in a biological sample.” Human behavioral genetic research is not an “identification purpose.”
Whether the state can afford an expansion in the databank is unclear. In the absence of adequate data on the effectiveness of DNA sampling on arrest, a cost-benefit analysis of the proposal is all but impossible. Over ten years ago, the National Commission on the Future of DNA Evidence avoided taking a stand on arrestee sampling on that ground that with large backlogs of crime-scene and offender samples awaiting analysis, adding arrestee samples was premature. The Commission suggested that the issue be readdressed in 2005.
Faye Flam, Colorado D.A. Offers Philadelphia Help in Kensington Strangler Case, Philadelphia Inquirer, Jan. 10, 2011.
David H. Kaye, Behavioral Genetics Research and Criminal DNA Databanks, 69 Law and Contemporary Problems, 259 (2006), reprinted in revised form as Behavioral Genetics Research and Criminal DNA Databases: Laws and Policies, in The Impact of Behavioral Science in Criminal Law 355-387 (N. Faranhy ed., New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2009).
Senate Bill 775, Pennsylvania General Assembly, introduced Mar. 15, 2011.
This entry was posted in Uncategorized and tagged arrest, behavioral genetics, DNA database, familial, kinship, Pennsylvania, Senate Bill 775 on March 16, 2011 by dhk3.
Tres Mal Errors with DNA Evidence
Get Serious: The US Department of Justice’s Amicus Brief in Haskell v. Harris
Maryland v. King: The Dissent’s Ten Second Rule
Maryland v. King: When Being Smart and Witty Isn’t Enough
Ninth Circuit Upholds Indefinite Retention of DNA Samples: But Why Retain Them?
Donovan l. martin on “Human Error, Bias, and Malfeasance” in DNA Databases and Law Reviews
pvinegrad on The Oral Argument in Maryland v. King — Part III
pvinegrad on The Oral Argument in Maryland v. King — Part II
David H. Kaye on The Constitutionality of DNA Collection Before Conviction: An Updated Scorecard
Sites at Penn State - WordPress
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DOE investigates Georgetown's judicial policy
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. Department of Education has initiated an investigation into Georgetown University for its handling of sexual assault cases that go through its judicial process.
In a letter sent on April 18 to Georgetown President John DeGioia, the department asked for a legal justification for the university’s confidentiality policy.
The policy requires victims of crimes of violence and nonforcible sex offenses to sign an agreement prohibiting them from discussing the case with others. If they do not, university officials will not tell them what sanctions, if any, were taken against their assailant. Under the policy, if victims disclose those sanctions to others, they also could be disciplined.
The letter was in response to a joint complaint filed last month by the national campus safety organization, Security On Campus, and Georgetown student Kate Dieringer, who was told to sign a confidentiality agreement after she was raped her freshman year.
In the complaint, Dieringer claimed that the university violated her rights under the federal Clery Act.
The DOE has asserted that under the Clery Act, “when an institution determines that an accused student is an alleged perpetrator and has violated the institution rules, then there are no restrictions on disclosure or redisclosure of the final results of a disciplinary proceeding.”
University spokesperson Gloria Lacap said Georgetown takes very seriously both the safety and well being of all of its students and its responsibility to protect the privacy of student records.
“We are committed to maintaining the confidentiality of our student disciplinary system in full compliance with all applicable university policies and federal requirements,” she said.
Once Georgetown provides legal reasoning for its policy, the department will issue a final ruling on the complaints. If the policy is found to be illegal, Georgetown will be expected to bring it into compliance with the Clery Act.
The department said it will not release Georgetown’s response until a decision has been made in the investigation.
Tagged Fall 2003, Georgetown University, reports
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Popular Essay Topics
Police Brutality Essay
Category Popular Essay Topics
Hundreds of innocent lives are taken every year by law enforcement. Whether it is due to bad judgment on the police officers behalf, or intentional targeting due to internalized biases, there are lives being wrongfully taken far too often in our nation today. While people of all racial groups have fallen victim to police brutality, Black men and women are most susceptible to it and suffer from it more than any other group. On average black men are 9 times more likely to be shot by law enforcement than white men (Swaine). The issue with the recurring cases we see regarding police shootings or police harassment is the fact that the officers who abuse their authority don’t always get the punishment they deserve. Misbehaving cops are often spared punishment by colleagues and bosses who cover for them in order to keep them around. There is much controversy regarding how to punish these officers due to the fact that it is difficult to determine whether their actions were justified or not. Even if the victims were proven innocent, courts may still rule the actions of the officers as justified. These circumstances in which officers aren’t held responsible for murdering or severely harming black folks is the reason police brutality is still a serious issue in our society. If a police officer takes an innocent life, they should be immediately removed from the police force and should face further punishment, because if not, law enforcement will continue to abuse their power.
This issue is quite complicated in the way that everyone has a different opinion about whether police officers should be fired for making the mistake of harming an innocent person. Some could argue that not all men and women should be fired from their job because some officers have legitimate reasoning for shooting an unarmed person. They could object my claim by saying not all police officers deserve to lose their job just because they had bad judgment and made a one time mistake. Instead, the option that is proposed on this side of the argument is that these officers should only be suspended and if it happens again, then they should be fired. The issue with this option is that there is the possibility of a second time, the possibility that another innocent life could be taken. While I agree that it isn’t fair to say that every officer who is fired deserves it, or that for the reinstatement of all cops represents the failure of justice, I think killing or severely harming an innocent civilian cause for the removal of the police officer regardless of the circumstances. If we let officers get away with such actions then we cannot expect any progress to be made. For those in law enforcement who want to or do abuse their power, they may begin to believe that they can do so without suffering the consequences because others have gotten away with it in the past.
In an essay written by Assata Shakur, she tells the story of how she was wrongfully accused of murdering Zayd Malik Shakur and state trooper Werner Forester after a traffic stop that went terribly wrong on May 2, 1973. Shakur stated that Trooper Harper claimed he had initially pulled them over due to faulty tail light, yet It became clear that Harper had a racial bias against Black people and that Shakur and her friends were innocent targeted and harassed because of it. Harper claimed he became “suspicious” of their behavior and the resulted in the shooting and killing of Malik. To respond to the events that took place that night, Shakur stated: “The truth is that there was a major cover-up as to what happened on May 2, 1973” (Shakur 65). She continued to explain the ways in which Harper lied in court and to the authorities about who had really shot officer Forester and Malik. This quote is important because it shows the ways in which white police officers whom unlawfully use their power to get away with murder. Since Shakur was a black woman, her side of the story didn’t have much an impact even though she had strong evidence supporting her defense. This story is an example as to how law enforcement holds so much power over minority groups. Harper had lied to cover himself and the court system ruled in his favor because he was a powerful white man. Circumstances like these prove that we cannot excuse officers actions just because they claim they had justified the reasoning for killing an innocent human being. Sure there are instances that are real accidents, but any one of these officers could lie about their true intentions and that is another reason we must hold every officer accountable.
Similarly to Shakur’s experience, there are thousands of African American citizens around the nation today that are still dealing with police brutality and the reality that many guilty officers often get off with little to no punishment. Organizations such as the Black Lives Matter movement continue to fight against police brutality through protest, marches, and sometimes even riots. The group strives to prevent and stop the violence that is inflicted on the black communities by the state and others who unrightfully intervene. In a statement written by the creator of this group, Alicia Garza, she discusses the ways in which the Ferguson case had triggered the momentum within the Black Lives Matter movement. The death of Mike Brown by the hands of police officer Darren Wilson lead to the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement that we know of today. Garza stated that “People were hungry to galvanize their communities to end state-sanctioned violence against Black people, the way Ferguson organizers and allies were doing” (Garza). This statement shows that the BLM group used what happened after the death of Michael Brown and brought the anger and passion that they had within the protests back home. Rather than peaceful, non-violent protesting that black rights activists such as Martin Luther King Jr. practiced in the past, they used the tactics of rioting to gain the attention of the masses. This form of protesting shows how black communities have been pushed to their breaking point due to the oppression they face from the authorities.
Currently, within our society and particularly the media, Black Lives Matter has been given a bad reputation due to the riots that have occurred around the nation. While not all members of BLM agree with the behavior of those involved in the riots, there are a lot of people within the movement that uses violence as a way to point out the injustice black communities face. Members of this group use their anger to damage property and even enforce more violence upon police officers, and this just leads to more bloodshed. In an article written by Joy James in 2015, titled “Moving Targets”, she examines how authority figures within the justice system respond to the riots and violent protesting that have happened more recently by groups such as Black Lives Matter. She stated, “Even as police continued to violate black communities, Attorney General Lynch instructed ‘the Baltimore community’ to adhere to nonviolence” (James). This statement is significant because it shows how someone with so much power within our country responds to cases of police brutality. It touches how police aggression is seen as necessary by many law enforcement officials in our current society and it is often protected by our government. We see this through Lynch’s decision to defend the oppressors rather than the oppressed. Lynch suggests that the solution to this issue is to have activists protest peacefully without violence, instead of holding the police officers who are abusing their power within black communities accountable. This U.S. Attorney General neglects to understand that when groups of Black men and women feel they have to resort to violence in order for change, this shows how big of an issue this really is. If police officers were forced to face the consequences of killing an innocent black person, such as losing their job, and there was justice for those who were killed by law enforcement, groups such as Black Lives Matter wouldn’t feel the need to react with violence.
The loss of a job does not compare to the loss of life. We must prioritize the safety of Black lives and the public over the protection of law enforcement labor rights. If we let these police officers who abuse their authority keep their jobs or merely just temporarily make them pay for their mistakes, we cannot expect police brutality to end. All over the nation, police unions are helping many of these cops to get their jobs back, often through secretive appeals. But we cannot keep reinstating these guilty officers or keeping them employed because we are essentially risking the lives of those belonging to minority groups by doing so. We must stop worrying about the status of these law enforcement officials, and rather we should be focusing on the ways in which we can end police brutality against Blacks within America by any means possible. I believe the first step our country must take to put an end to police brutality starts with Law enforcement officials immediately removing guilty officers from the police force. Because if they don’t, officers will continue to abuse their power and innocent lives within black communities will continuously be at stake.
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City, Singapore
October 30, 2017 Andhika's Blog Leave a comment
Singapore (/ˈsɪŋəpɔːr/ (About this sound listen), /ˈsɪŋɡə-/), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign city-state in Southeast Asia. It is sometimes referred to as the “Lion City”, “Garden City” or the “Little Red Dot”. It lies one degree (137 km) north of the equator, at the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, with Indonesia’s Riau Islands to the south. Singapore’s territory consists of one main island along with 62 other islets. It shares maritime borders with Indonesia at the south while at the north Malaysia. Since independence, extensive land reclamation has increased its total size by 23% (130 km2) and its greening policy has covered the densely populated island with tropical flora, parks and gardens.
Stamford Raffles founded colonial Singapore in 1819 as a trading post of the East India Company, but after its collapse and the eventual establishment of the British Raj, the islands were ceded to Britain and became part of its Straits Settlements in 1826. During the Second World War, Singapore was occupied by Japan. It gained independence from the UK in 1963 by federating with other former British territories to form Malaysia, but separated two years later over ideological differences, becoming a sovereign nation in 1965. After early years of turbulence and despite lacking natural resources and a hinterland, the nation developed rapidly as an Asian Tiger economy, based on external trade and its workforce.
Singapore is a global commerce, finance and transport hub. Its standings include: the most “technology-ready” nation (WEF), top International-meetings city (UIA), city with “best investment potential” (BERI), second-most competitive country, third-largest foreign exchange market, third-largest financial centre, third-largest oil refining and trading centre and the second-busiest container port. The country has also been identified as a tax haven.
Singapore ranks 5th on the UN Human Development Index and the 3rd highest GDP per capita. It is ranked highly in education, healthcare, life expectancy, quality of life, personal safety and housing. Although income inequality is high, 90% of homes are owner-occupied. 38% of Singapore’s 5.6 million residents are permanent residents and other foreign nationals. There are four official languages: English (common and first language), Malay, Mandarin and Tamil, though almost all Singaporeans are bilingual.
Singapore is a unitary multiparty parliamentary republic, with a Westminster system of unicameral parliamentary government. The People’s Action Party has won every election since self-government in 1959. The dominance of the PAP, coupled with a low level of press freedom and restrictions on civil liberties and political rights, has led to Singapore being classified by some as a semi-authoritarian regime. One of the five founding members of ASEAN, Singapore is also the host of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Secretariat and a member of the East Asia Summit, Non-Aligned Movement and the Commonwealth of Nations.
2.1 Ancient Singapore
2.2 British colonisation
2.4 Post-war period
2.5 Campaign for merger
2.6 Singapore with Malaysia
2.7 Republic of Singapore
3 Government and politics
5.1 Employment
5.2 Industry sectors
6.1 Information and communications
6.3 Water supply and sanitation
10.1 Cuisine
10.2 Arts
10.3 Sport and recreation
10.4 Media
The English name of Singapore is an anglicisation of the native Malay name for the country, Singapura, which was in turn derived from Sanskrit (सिंहपुर, IAST: Siṃhapura; siṃha is “lion”, pura is “town” or “city”), hence the customary reference to the nation as the Lion City, and its inclusion in many of the nation’s symbols (e.g., its coat of arms, Merlion emblem). However, it is unlikely that lions ever lived on the island; Sang Nila Utama, the Srivijayan prince said to have founded and named the island Singapura, perhaps saw a Malayan tiger. There are however other suggestions for the origin of the name and scholars do not believe that the origin of the name to be firmly established. The central island has also been called Pulau Ujong as far back as the third century CE, literally “island at the end” (of the Malay Peninsula) in Malay.
Besides the Lion City – a translation of its ancient Sanskrit name, Singapore is also referred to as Garden City for its tree-lined streets and greening efforts since independence, and the Little Red Dot for how the island-nation is depicted on many maps of the world and Asia, as a red dot.
Ancient Singapore
A fragment of the Singapore Stone monolith with the earliest writing found on the island, at “Rocky Point” at the mouth of Singapore River, inscribed with an Indic script, c. 10th to 13th century
The Greco-Roman astronomer Ptolemy (90–168) identified a place called Sabana in the general area in the second century, and the earliest written record of Singapore occurs in a Chinese account from the third century, describing the island of Pu Luo Chung (蒲 罗 中). This was itself a transliteration from the Malay name “Pulau Ujong”, or “island at the end” (of the Malay Peninsula). The Nagarakretagama, a Javanese epic poem written in 1365, referred to a settlement on the island called Tumasik (possibly meaning “Sea Town”). In 1299, according to the Malay Annals, the Kingdom of Singapura was founded on the island by Sang Nila Utama.] Although the historicity of the accounts as given in the Malay Annals is the subject of academic debates, it is nevertheless known from various documents that Singapore in the 14th century, then known as Temasek, was a trading port under the influence of both the Majapahit Empire and the Siamese kingdoms inside Indosphere of Greater India. These Indianized Kingdoms, a term coined by George Cœdès were characterized by surprising resilience, political integrity and administrative stability. Historical sources also indicate that around the end of the 14th century, its ruler Parameswara was attacked by either the Majapahit or the Siamese, forcing him to move on to Melaka where he founded the Sultanate of Malacca. Archaeological evidence suggests that the main settlement on Fort Canning was abandoned around this time, although a small trading settlement continued in Singapore for some time afterwards. In 1613, Portuguese raiders burned down the settlement, and the island faded into obscurity for the next two centuries. By then Singapore was nominally part of the Johor Sultanate. The wider maritime region and much trade was under Dutch control for the following period.
British Colonisation
1825 survey map. Singapore’s free port trade was at Singapore River for 150 years. Fort Canning hill (centre) was home to its ancient and early colonial rulers.
Raffles arrived in Singapore on 28 January 1819 and soon recognised the island as a natural choice for the new port. The island was then nominally ruled by the Sultan of Johor, who was controlled by the Dutch and the Bugis. However, the Sultanate was weakened by factional division and Tengku Abdu’r Rahman and his officials were loyal to Tengku Rahman’s elder brother Tengku Long who was living in exile in Riau. With the Temenggong’s help, Raffles managed to smuggle Tengku Long back into Singapore. He offered to recognize Tengku Long as the rightful Sultan of Johor, given the title of Sultan Hussein and provide him with a yearly payment of $5000 and $3000 to the Temenggong; in return, Sultan Hussein would grant the British the right to establish a trading post on Singapore. A formal treaty was signed on 6 February 1819 and modern Singapore was born.
Sir Stamford Raffles’s statue at the Singapore River spot where he first landed
In 1824, the entire island as well as the Temenggong became a British possession after a further treaty with the Sultan. In 1826, Singapore became part of the Straits Settlements, under the jurisdiction of British India, becoming the regional capital in 1836. Prior to Raffles’ arrival, there were only about a thousand people living on the island, mostly indigenous Malays along with a handful of Chinese. By 1860 the population had swelled to over 80,000, more than half being Chinese. Many of these early immigrants came to work on the pepper and gambier plantations. Later, in the 1890s, when the rubber industry also became established in Malaya and Singapore, the island became a global centre for rubber sorting and export.
Singapore was not much affected by First World War (1914–18), as the conflict did not spread to Southeast Asia. The only significant event during the war was a mutiny by the Muslim sepoys from British India who were garrisoned in Singapore, which occurred in 1915. After hearing rumours that they were to be sent off to fight the Ottoman Empire, which was a Muslim state, the soldiers rebelled. They killed their officers and several British civilians before the mutiny was suppressed by non-Muslim troops arriving from Johore and Burma.
Raffles Hotel was established in 1887.
After the First World War, the British built the large Singapore Naval Base as part of the defensive Singapore strategy. Originally announced in 1923, the construction of the base proceeded slowly until the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931. When completed in 1939, at the very large cost of $500 million, it boasted what was then the largest dry dock in the world, the third-largest floating dock, and having enough fuel tanks to support the entire British navy for six months. It was defended by heavy 15-inch naval guns stationed at Fort Siloso, Fort Canning and Labrador, as well as a Royal Air Force airfield at Tengah Air Base. Winston Churchill touted it as the “Gibraltar of the East” and military discussions often referred to the base as simply “East of Suez”. Unfortunately, it was a base without a fleet. The British Home Fleet was stationed in Europe, and the British could not afford to build a second fleet to protect its interests in Asia. The plan was for the Home Fleet to sail quickly to Singapore in the event of an emergency. However, after World War II broke out in 1939, the fleet was fully occupied with defending Britain.
Singapore Naval Base, built in 1953
During the Second World War, the Imperial Japanese Army invaded British Malaya, culminating in the Battle of Singapore. When the British force of 60,000 troops surrendered on 15 February 1942, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill called the defeat “the worst disaster and largest capitulation in British history. British losses during the fighting for Singapore were heavy, with a total of nearly 85,000 personnel captured, in addition to losses during the earlier fighting in Malaya. About 5,000 were killed or wounded, of which Australians made up the majority. Japanese casualties during the fighting in Singapore amounted to 1,714 killed and 3,378 wounded. [Note 1]. The occupation was to become a major turning point in the histories of several nations, including those of Japan, Britain, and the then-colonial state of Singapore. Japanese newspapers triumphantly declared the victory as deciding the general situation of the war. Singapore was renamed Syonan-to (昭南島 Shōnan-tō), meaning “Light of the South”. Between 5,000 and 25,000 ethnic Chinese people were killed in the subsequent Sook Ching massacre.
British forces had planned to liberate Singapore in 1945; however, the war ended before these operations could be carried out. It was subsequently re-occupied by British, Indian and Australian forces following the Japanese surrender in September. Meanwhile, Tomoyuki Yamashita was tried by a US military commission for war crimes, but not for crimes committed by his troops in Malaya or Singapore. He was convicted and hanged in the Philippines on 23 February 1946.
Post-war Period
British evacuation in 1945 after the Japanese surrender. Kallang Airport’s control tower near the city has been conserved.
After the Japanese surrender to the Allies on 15 August 1945, Singapore fell into a brief state of violence and disorder; looting and revenge-killing were widespread. British troops led by Lord Louis Mountbatten, Supreme Allied Commander for Southeast Asia Command, returned to Singapore to receive formal surrender of the Japanese forces in the region from General Itagaki Seishiro on behalf of General Hisaichi Terauchi on 12 September 1945, and a British Military Administration was formed to govern the island until March 1946. Much of the infrastructure had been destroyed during the war, including harbor facilities at the Port of Singapore. There was also a shortage of food leading to malnutrition, disease, and rampant crime and violence. High food prices, unemployment, and workers’ discontent culminated into a series of strikes in 1947 causing massive stoppages in public transport and other services. By late 1947, the economy began to recover, facilitated by a growing demand for tin and rubber around the world, but it would take several more years before the economy returned to pre-war levels.
The failure of Britain to successfully defend Singapore had destroyed its credibility as infallible ruler in the eyes of Singaporeans. The decades after the war saw a political awakening amongst the local populace and the rise of anti-colonial and nationalist sentiments, epitomized by the slogan Merdeka, or “independence” in the Malay language. The British, on their part, were prepared to gradually increase self-governance for Singapore and Malaya. On 1 April 1946, the Straits Settlements was dissolved and Singapore became a separate Crown Colony with a civil administration headed by a Governor. In July 1947, separate Executive and Legislative Councils were established and the election of six members of the Legislative Council was scheduled in the following year.
David Marshall was Singapore’s 1st Chief Minister, but resigned a year later.
During the 1950s, Chinese communists with strong ties to the trade unions and Chinese schools waged a guerrilla war against the government, leading to the Malayan Emergency. The 1954 National Service Riots, Chinese middle schools riots, and Hock Lee bus riots in Singapore were all linked to these events. David Marshall, pro-independence leader of the Labour Front, won Singapore’s first general election in 1955. He led a delegation to London, but Britain rejected his demand for complete self-rule. He resigned and was replaced by Lim Yew Hock in 1956, whose policies convinced Britain to grant Singapore full internal self-government for all matters except defence and foreign affairs.
During the May 1959 elections, the People’s Action Party won a landslide victory. Singapore became an internally self-governing state within the Commonwealth, with Lee Kuan Yew as its first Prime Minister. As a result, the 1959 general elections were the first after full internal self-government was granted by the British authorities. Singapore was not yet fully independent, as the British still controlled external affairs such as the military and foreign relations. However, Singapore was now a recognised state. Governor Sir William Allmond Codrington Goode served as the first Yang di-Pertuan Negara (Head of State), and was succeeded by Yusof bin Ishak.
Campaign for Merger
The founding father of modern Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew declaring the formation of the Federation of Malaysia on 16 September 1963 in Singapore, with Sabah and Sarawak also celebrating along.
Despite their successes in governing Singapore, the PAP leaders believed that Singapore’s future lay with Malaya due to strong ties between the two nations. It was thought that the merger would benefit the economy by creating a common market which will support new industries, thus solving the ongoing unemployment woes in Singapore. However, a sizable pro-communist wing of the PAP were strongly opposed to the merger, fearing a loss of influence. This is because the ruling party of Malaya, United Malays National Organisation, was staunchly anti-communist and would support the non-communist faction of PAP against them. UMNO, who were initially skeptical of the idea of a merger as they distrust the PAP government and were concerned that the large Chinese population in Singapore would alter the racial balance on which their political power base depended, changed their minds about the merger after being afraid of being taken over by pro-communists. On 27 May, Malaya’s Prime Minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman, mooted the idea of a Federation of Malaysia, comprising existing Federation of Malaya, Singapore, Brunei and the British Borneo territories of North Borneo and Sarawak. The UMNO leaders believed that the additional Malay population in the Borneo territories would offset Singapore’s Chinese population. The British government, for its part, believed that the merger would prevent Singapore from becoming a haven for communism.
Singapore with Malaysia
Right: Lee Kuan Yew, the then Prime Minister of Singapore. Left: Tunku Adul Rahman, the then Prime Minister of Malaysia.
As a result of the 1962 Merger Referendum, on 16 September 1963 Singapore joined with the Federation of Malaya, the Crown Colony of Sarawak and the Crown Colony of North Borneo to form the new federation of Malaysia under the terms of the Malaysia Agreement. Given Singapore’s limited size and lack of natural resources, it was felt integrating with Malaya would provide a route to stronger economic development. The merger would also give the PAP legitimacy, and remove the threat of communist government over Singapore. However, shortly after the merger, the Singapore state government and the Malaysian central government disagreed on many political and economic issues, and communal strife culminated in the 1964 race riots in Singapore.
A symbol of Singapore, the Merlion was created in 1964
On 10 March 1965, a bomb planted by Indonesian saboteurs on a mezzanine floor of the building exploded, killing three people and injuring 33 others. It was the deadliest of at least 42 bomb incidents which occurred during the Konfrontasi. Two members of the Indonesian Marine Corps, Osman bin Haji Mohamed Ali and Harun bin Said, were eventually convicted and executed for the crime. The MacDonald House suffered $250,000 bomb damage.
There were many heated ideological conflicts between the two governments, even on the economic front. Despite an earlier agreement to establish a common market, Singapore continued to face restrictions when trading with the rest of Malaysia. In retaliation, Singapore did not extend to Sabah and Sarawak the full extent of the loans agreed to for economic development of the two eastern states. The situation escalated to such an intensity that talks soon broke down and abusive speeches and writing became rife on both sides. Because of this, on 7 August 1965,the then Malaysian Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman, seeing no alternative to avoid further bloodshed, advised the Parliament of Malaysia that it should vote to expel Singapore from Malaysia. On 9 August 1965, the Malaysian Parliament voted 126 to 0 (with Singaporean delegates not present) to move a bill to amend the constitution providing for Singapore to separate from the Federation of Malaysia.
Financial district (background) 2010
Singapore gained independence as the Republic of Singapore (remaining within the Commonwealth of Nations) on 9 August 1965 with Lee Kuan Yew as the prime minister and Yusof bin Ishak as the president. Race riots broke out once more in 1969. In 1967, the country co-founded the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Lee Kuan Yew became Prime Minister, and the country moved from Third World economy to First World affluence in a single generation. Lee Kuan Yew’s emphasis on rapid economic growth, support for business entrepreneurship, and limitations on internal democracy shaped Singapore’s policies for the next half-century. Further economic success continued through the 1980s, with the unemployment rate falling to 3% and real GDP growth averaging at about 8% up until 1999. During the 1980s, Singapore began to upgrade to higher-technological industries, such as the wafer fabrication sector, in order to compete with its neighbours which now had cheaper labour. Singapore Changi Airport was opened in 1981 and Singapore Airlines was developed to become a major airline. The Port of Singapore became one of the world’s busiest ports and the service and tourism industries also grew immensely during this period. Singapore emerged as an important transportation hub and a major tourist destination.
The PAP rule is termed authoritarian by some activists and opposition politicians who see the strict regulation of political and media activities by the government as an infringement on political rights. In response, the government of Singapore underwent several significant changes. Non-Constituency Members of Parliament were introduced in 1984 to allow up to three losing candidates from opposition parties to be appointed as MPs. Group Representation Constituencies (GRCs) was introduced in 1988 to create multi-seat electoral divisions, intended to ensure minority representation in parliament. Nominated Members of Parliament were introduced in 1990 to allow non-elected non-partisan MPs. The Constitution was amended in 1991 to provide for an Elected President who has veto power in the use of national reserves and appointments to public office. The opposition parties have complained that the GRC system has made it difficult for them to gain a foothold in parliamentary elections in Singapore, and the plurality voting system tends to exclude minority parties.
Lee Hsien Loong – Current and 3rd Prime Minister of Singapore (2004 – )
Goh Chok Tong – 2nd Prime Minister (1990 – 2004)
In 1990, Goh Chok Tong succeeded Lee and became Singapore’s second Prime Minister. During Goh’s tenure, the country went through some post-independence crises, such as the 1997 Asian financial crisis and the 2003 SARS outbreak.
In 2004, Lee Hsien Loong, the eldest son of Lee Kuan Yew, became the country’s third Prime Minister. Lee Hsien Loong’s tenure included the 2008 global financial crisis, the resolution of a dispute over Malayan railways land, and the introduction of integrated resorts. Despite the economy’s exceptional growth, the People’s Action Party (PAP) suffered its worst election results in 2011, winning 60% of votes, amidst hot-button issues of high influx of foreign workers and cost of living. On 23 March 2015 Lee Kuan Yew passed away, during the 50th year of independence, declaring a one-week period of public mourning. Subsequently, the PAP maintained its dominance in Parliament at the September general elections, receiving 69.9% of the popular vote, its second-highest polling result behind the 2001 tally of 75.3%.
Large white building with a red roof, with a palm-lined path leading up to the main entrance
Singapore’s Parliament House, beside the Singapore River.
Singapore is a parliamentary republic with a Westminster system of unicameral parliamentary government representing constituencies. The country’s constitution establishes a representative democracy as the political system. Executive power rests with the Cabinet of Singapore, led by the Prime Minister and, to a much lesser extent, the President. The President is elected through a popular vote, and has veto powers over a specific set of executive decisions, such as the use of the national reserves and the appointment of judges, but otherwise occupies a largely ceremonial post.
The Parliament serves as the legislative branch of the government. Members of Parliament (MPs) consist of elected, non-constituency and nominated members. Elected MPs are voted into the Parliament on a “first-past-the-post” (plurality) basis and represent either single-member or group representation constituencies. The People’s Action Party has won control of Parliament with large majorities in every election since self-governance was secured in 1959.
Although the elections are clean, there is no independent electoral authority and the government has strong influence on the media. Freedom House ranks Singapore as “partly free” in its Freedom in the World report, and The Economist ranks Singapore as a “flawed democracy”, the second best rank of four, in its “Democracy Index”. The latest elections were in September 2015, with the PAP winning 83 of 89 seats contested with 70% of the popular vote.
New and old Supreme Court buildings. The Court of Appeal occupies the ‘disc’ atop, representing the highest level of justice, and a modern interpretation of the dome.
The legal system of Singapore is based on English common law, but with substantial local differences. Trial by jury was abolished in 1970 so that judicial decisions would rest entirely in the hands of appointed judges. Singapore has penalties that include judicial corporal punishment in the form of caning, which may be imposed for such offences as rape, rioting, vandalism, and certain immigration offences. There is Capital punishment in Singapore for murder, as well as for certain aggravated drug-trafficking and firearms offences.
Amnesty International has said that some legal provisions of the Singapore system conflict with the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, and that Singapore has “… possibly the highest execution rate in the world relative to its population”. The government has disputed Amnesty’s claims. Singapore’s judicial system is considered one of the most reliable in Asia.
Speakers’ Corner in Chinatown provides a public demonstration and “free speech” area usually restricted in other parts of the island.
Singapore has been consistently rated among the least corrupt countries in the world by Transparency International. Singapore’s unique combination of a strong almost authoritarian government with an emphasis on meritocracy and good governance is known as the “Singapore model”, and is regarded as a key factor behind Singapore’s political stability, economic growth, and harmonious social order. In 2011, the World Justice Project’s Rule of Law Index ranked Singapore among the top countries surveyed with regard to “order and security”, “absence of corruption”, and “effective criminal justice”. However, the country received a much lower ranking for “freedom of speech” and “freedom of assembly”. All public gatherings of five or more people require police permits, and protests may legally be held only at the Speakers’ Corner.
Singapore’s foreign policy is aimed at maintaining security in Southeast Asia and surrounding territories. An underlying principle is political and economic stability in the region. It has diplomatic relations with more than 180 sovereign states.
Barack Obama attends the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) meeting at ASEAN Summit 2012
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong and US President Barack Obama attended the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) meeting at ASEAN Summit 2012.
As one of the five founding members of ASEAN, it is a strong supporter of the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) and the ASEAN Investment Area, because Singapore’s economy is closely linked to that of the region as a whole. Former Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong proposed the formation of an ASEAN Economic Community, a step beyond the current AFTA, bringing it closer to a common market. This was agreed to in 2007 for implementation by 2015. Other regional organisations are important to Singapore, and it is the host of the APEC Secretariat. Singapore maintains membership in other regional organisations, such as Asia–Europe Meeting, the Forum for East Asia-Latin American Cooperation, the Indian Ocean Rim Association, and the East Asia Summit. It is also a member of the Non-Aligned Movement and the Commonwealth. While Singapore is not a formal member of the G20, it has been invited to participate in G20 processes in most years since 2010.
In general, bilateral relations with other ASEAN members are strong; however, disagreements have arisen, and relations with neighbouring Malaysia and Indonesia have sometimes been strained. Malaysia and Singapore have clashed over the delivery of fresh water to Singapore, and access by the Singapore Armed Forces to Malaysian airspace. Border issues exist with Malaysia and Indonesia, and both have banned the sale of marine sand to Singapore over disputes about Singapore’s land reclamation. Some previous disputes, such as the Pedra Branca dispute, have been resolved by the International Court of Justice. Piracy in the Strait of Malacca has been a cause of concern for all three countries. Close economic ties exist with Brunei, and the two share a pegged currency value, through a Currency Interchangeability Agreement between the two countries which makes both Brunei dollar and Singapore dollar banknotes and coins legal tender in either country.
Ambassador to the USA Chan Heng Chee, Lee Kuan Yew, and US Secretary of Defense William Cohen in a room
Then Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew and Ambassador to the US Chan Heng Chee, met with US Secretary of Defense William Cohen during a visit in 2000.
The first diplomatic contact with China was made in the 1970s, with full diplomatic relations established in the 1990s. Since then the two countries have been major players in strengthening the ASEAN–China relationship. Singapore and the United States share a long-standing close relationship, in particular in defence, the economy, health, and education. The United States was Singapore’s third largest trading partner in 2010, behind China (2nd) and Malaysia (1st). The two countries have a free-trade agreement, and Singapore views its relationship with the United States as an important counterbalance to China’s influence. A Strategic Framework Agreement between the two, signed in 2005, formalises security and defence co-operation. Singapore has pushed regional counter-terrorism initiatives, with a strong resolve to deal with terrorists inside its borders. To this end it has given support to the US-led coalition to fight terrorism, with bilateral co-operation in counter-terrorism and counter-proliferation initiatives, and joint military exercises.
The Singaporean military is arguably the most technologically advanced in Southeast Asia. It comprises the Singapore Army, Republic of Singapore Navy, and Republic of Singapore Air Force. It is seen as the guarantor of the country’s independence. This principle translates into the culture, involving all citizens in the country’s defence. The government spends 4.9% of the country’s GDP on the military—high by regional standards—and one out of every four dollars of government spending is spent on defence.
Singapore Air Force’s F-15SG are Strike Eagle variants (24 units). Pilots also train in Australia, France and the United States due to severe airspace constraints.
After its independence, Singapore had two infantry regiments commanded by British officers. This force was considered too small to provide effective security for the new country, so development of its military forces became a priority. Britain pulled its military out of Singapore in October 1971, leaving behind only a small British, Australian and New Zealand force as a token military presence. The last British soldier left Singapore in March 1976. New Zealand troops were the last to leave, in 1989.
A great deal of initial support came from Israel, a country that is not recognised by the neighbouring Muslim-majority nations of Malaysia, Indonesia, or Brunei. The main fear after independence was an invasion by Malaysia. Israeli Defense Force (IDF) commanders were tasked with creating the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) from scratch, and Israeli instructors were brought in to train Singaporean soldiers. Military courses were conducted according to the IDF’s format, and Singapore adopted a system of conscription and reserve service based on the Israeli model. Singapore still maintains strong security ties with Israel and is one of the biggest buyers of Israeli arms and weapons systems. The MATADOR is one example of recent Singaporean–Israeli collaboration.
Republic of Singapore Navy’s RSS Steadfast and RSS Vigilance sailing line-abreast during CARAT Singapore 2010.
The SAF is being developed to respond to a wide range of issues, in both conventional and unconventional warfare. The Defence Science and Technology Agency is responsible for procuring resources for the military. The geographic restrictions of Singapore mean that the SAF must plan to fully repulse an attack, as they can not fall back and re-group. The small size of the population has also affected the way the SAF has been designed, with a small active force but a large number of reserves.
Singapore has conscription for all able-bodied males at age 18, except those with a criminal record or who can prove that their loss would bring hardship to their families. Males who have yet to complete pre-university education or are awarded the Public Service Commission scholarship can opt to defer their draft. Though not required to perform military service, the number of women in the SAF has been increasing: since 1989 they have been allowed to fill military vocations formerly reserved for men. Before induction into a specific branch of the armed forces, recruits undergo at least 9 weeks of basic military training.
Flag lowering by Singapore troops in Afghanistan.
Because of the scarcity of open land on the main island, training involving activities such as live firing and amphibious warfare is often carried out on smaller islands, typically barred to civilian access. This also avoids risk to the main island and the city. However, large-scale drills are considered too dangerous to be performed in the area, and since 1975 have been performed in Taiwan. Training is also held in about a dozen other countries. In general, military exercises are held with foreign forces once or twice per week.
Due to airspace and land constraints, the Republic of Singapore Air Force (RSAF) maintains a number of overseas bases in Australia, the United States, and France. The RSAF’s 130 Squadron is based in RAAF Base Pearce, Western Australia, and its 126 Squadron is based in the Oakey Army Aviation Centre, Queensland. The RSAF has one squadron—the 150 Squadron—based in Cazaux Air Base in southern France. The RSAF also has a few overseas detachments in the United States, in San Diego, California, Marana, Arizona, Grand Prairie, Texas and Luke Air Force Base, among others.
The SAF has sent forces to assist in operations outside the country, in areas such as Iraq and Afghanistan, in both military and civilian roles. In the region, it has helped stabilise East Timor and has provided aid to Aceh in Indonesia following the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami. In 2014, the RSN deployed two ships, the RSS Resolute and the Tenacious to the Gulf of Aden to aid in counter piracy efforts as part of Task Force 151. The SAF also helped in relief efforts during Hurricane Katrina and Typhoon Haiyan. Singapore is part of the Five Power Defence Arrangements, a military alliance with Australia, Malaysia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom.
Map showing Singapore island and the territories belonging to Singapore and its neighbours
An outline of Singapore and the surrounding islands and waterways.
Singapore consists of 63 islands, including the main island, Pulau Ujong. There are two man-made connections to Johor, Malaysia: the Johor–Singapore Causeway in the north and the Tuas Second Link in the west. Jurong Island, Pulau Tekong, Pulau Ubin and Sentosa are the largest of Singapore’s smaller islands. The highest natural point is Bukit Timah Hill at 163.63 m (537 ft).
Ongoing land reclamation projects have increased Singapore’s land area from 581.5 km2 (224.5 sq mi) in the 1960s to 719.1 km2 (277.6 sq mi) in 2015, an increase of some 23% (130 km2). The country is projected to grow by another 100 km2 (40 sq mi) by 2030. Some projects involve merging smaller islands through land reclamation to form larger, more functional islands, as has been done with Jurong Island.
Singapore’s urbanisation means that it has lost 95% of its historical forests, and now over half of the naturally occurring fauna and flora in Singapore is present in nature reserves, such as the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve and the Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve, which comprise only 0.25% of Singapore’s land area. To combat this decline, in 1967 the government introduced the vision of making Singapore a “garden city” aiming to soften the harshness of urbanisation and improve the quality of life. Since then, nearly 10% of Singapore’s land has been set aside for parks and nature reserves. The government also has plans to preserve the remaining wildlife. Singapore was ranked fourth in the 2014 Environmental Performance Index, which measures the effectiveness of state policies for environmental sustainability.
Singapore has a tropical rainforest climate (Köppen: Af) with no distinctive seasons, uniform temperature and pressure, high humidity, and abundant rainfall. Temperatures usually range from 22 to 35 °C (72 to 95 °F). While temperature does not vary greatly throughout the year, there is a wetter monsoon season from November to January.
From July to October, there is often haze caused by bush fires in neighbouring Indonesia, usually from the island of Sumatra. Although Singapore does not observe daylight saving time (DST), it follows the GMT+8 time zone, one hour ahead of the typical zone for its geographical location.
Britain’s visiting Red Arrows fly over the Gardens by the bay
Singapore has a highly developed market economy, based historically on extended entrepôt trade. Along with Hong Kong, South Korea, and Taiwan, Singapore is one of the original Four Asian Tigers, but has surpassed its peers in terms of GDP per capita. Between 1965 and 1995, growth rates averaged around 6 per cent per annum, transforming the living standards of the population. The Singaporean economy is known as one of the freest, most innovative, most competitive, most dynamic and most business-friendly. The 2015 Index of Economic Freedom ranks Singapore as the second freest economy in the world and the Ease of Doing Business Index has also ranked Singapore as the easiest place to do business for the past decade. According to the Corruption Perceptions Index, Singapore is consistently perceived as one of the least corrupt countries in the world, along with New Zealand and the Scandinavian countries. In 2016, Singapore is rated the world’s most expensive city for the third consecutive year by the Economist Intelligence Unit.
The integrated resort of Marina Bay Sands that opened in 2010 is one of the world’s most photographed buildings.
For several years, Singapore has been one of the few countries with an AAA credit rating from the “big three”, and the only Asian country to achieve this rating. Singapore attracts a large amount of foreign investment as a result of its location, skilled workforce, low tax rates, advanced infrastructure and zero-tolerance against corruption. Singapore has the world’s eleventh largest foreign reserves, and one of the highest net international investment position per capita. There are more than 7,000 multinational corporations from the United States, Japan, and Europe in Singapore. There are also approximately 1,500 companies from China and a similar number from India. Foreign firms are found in almost all sectors of the country’s economy. Roughly 44 percent of the Singaporean workforce is made up of non-Singaporeans. Over ten free-trade agreements have been signed with other countries and regions. Despite market freedom, Singapore’s government operations have a significant stake in the economy, contributing 22% of the GDP.
Singapore is the second-largest foreign investor in India. It is the 14th largest exporter and the 15th largest importer in the world.
Economy Statistics (Recent Years) : Year 2011 To Year 2014
The currency of Singapore is the Singapore dollar (SGD or S$), issued by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). It is interchangeable with the Brunei dollar at par value since 1967, owing to their historically close relations. MAS manages its monetary policy by allowing the Singapore dollar exchange rate to rise or fall within an undisclosed trading band. This is different from most central banks, which use interest rates to manage policy.
Singapore Airlines celebrated Golden Jubilee with its Airbus A380 in ‘SG50’ livery.
In recent years, the country has been identified as an increasingly popular tax haven for the wealthy due to the low tax rate on personal income and tax exemptions on foreign-based income and capital gains. Australian millionaire retailer Brett Blundy and multi-billionaire Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin are two examples of wealthy individuals who have settled in Singapore (Blundy in 2013 and Saverin in 2012). In 2009, Singapore was removed from the OCDE “liste grise” of tax havens, but ranked fourth on the Tax Justice Network’s 2015 Financial Secrecy Index of the world’s off-shore financial service providers, banking one-eighth of the world’s off-shore capital, while “providing numerous tax avoidance and evasion opportunities”. In August 2016, The Straits Times reported that Indonesia had decided to create tax havens on two islands near Singapore to bring Indonesian capital back into the tax base. In October 2016, the Monetary Authority of Singapore admonished and fined UBS and DBS and withdrew Falcon Private Bank’s banking license for their alleged role in the Malaysian Sovereign Fund scandal.
Singapore has the world’s highest percentage of millionaires, with one out of every six households having at least one million US dollars in disposable wealth. This excludes property, businesses, and luxury goods, which if included would increase the number of millionaires, especially as property in Singapore is among the world’s most expensive.
Singapore does not have a minimum wage, believing that it would lower its competitiveness. It also has one of the highest income inequalities among developed countries.
Singapore traditionally has one of the lowest unemployment rates among developed countries. The unemployment rate did not exceed 4% from 2005 to 2014, hitting highs of 3.1% in 2005 and 3% during the 2009 global financial crisis; it fell to 1.8% in the first quarter of 2015.
The government provides numerous assistance programmes to the homeless and needy through the Ministry of Social and Family Development, so acute poverty is rare. Some of the programmes include providing between SGD400 and SGD1000 per month to needy households, providing free medical care at government hospitals, and paying for children’s school fees. The Singapore government also provides numerous benefits to its citizenry, including: free money to encourage residents to exercise in public gyms, up to $166,000 worth of baby bonus benefits for each baby born to a citizen, heavily subsidised healthcare, money to help the disabled, cheap laptops for poor students, rebates for numerous areas such as public transport, utility bills and more.
Although it has been recognised that foreign workers are crucial to the country’s economy, the government is considering capping these workers, as foreign workers make up 80% of the construction industry and up to 50% of the service industry. To keep an effective tap on the issue of immigration and to also attract foreign talents at the same time, the Ministry of Manpower (MoM) issues employment pass under three categories viz: P1 Employment Pass for those individuals with monthly earning of $8,000 and up, P2 Employment Pass for individuals with monthly earning of $4,500–7,999 and Q1 Employment Pass individuals with at least a monthly earning of $3,000.
A view of the cityscape and anchored ships from Singapore’s Eastern Anchorage off the East Coast Park
Singapore Exports by Product (2014)
Globally, Singapore is a leader in several economic sectors, including being 3rd-largest foreign exchange centre, 3rd-leading financial centre, 2nd-largest casino gambling market, 3rd-largest oil-refining and trading centre, world’s largest oil-rig producer and major hub for ship repair services, world’s top logistics hub.
The economy is diversified, with its top contributors – financial services, manufacturing, oil-refining. Its main exports are refined petroleum, integrated circuits and computers ] which constituted 27% of the country’s GDP in 2010, and includes significant electronics, petroleum refining, chemicals, mechanical engineering and biomedical sciences sectors. In 2006, Singapore produced about 10% of the world’s foundry wafer output.
Singapore’s largest companies are in the telecoms, banking, transportation and manufacturing sectors, many of which started as state-run enterprises, and has since been listed on the Singapore Exchange, including Singapore Telecommunications (Singtel), Singapore Technologies Engineering, Keppel Corporation, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation (OCBC), Development Bank of Singapore (DBS), United Overseas Bank (UOB). In 2011, amidst the global financial crisis, OCBC, DBS and UOB were ranked as the world’s 1st, 5th, 6th “strongest banks in the world” respectively by Bloomberg surveys.
The nation’s best known global brands include Singapore Airlines, Changi Airport and Port of Singapore, all three are amongst the most-awarded in their respective industry sectors. Singapore Airlines is ranked as Asia’s most-admired company, and world’s 19th most-admired in 2015, by Fortune’s annual “50 most admired companies in the world” industry surveys. It is also the world’s most-awarded airline, including “Best international airline”, by US-based Travel + Leisure reader surveys, for 20 consecutive years. Changi Airport connects over 100 airlines to more than 300 cities. The strategic international air hub has more than 480 “World’s Best Airport” awards as of 2015, and is known as the most-awarded airport in the world.
Universal Studios’ Hollywood Boulevard, on Sentosa island.
Tourism forms a large part of the economy, with over 15 million tourists visiting the city-state in 2014. To expand the sector, casinos were legalised in 2005, but only two licenses for “Integrated Resorts” were issued, to control money laundering and addiction. Singapore also promotes itself as a medical tourism hub: about 200,000 foreigners seek medical care there each year. Singapore medical services aim to serve at least one million foreign patients annually and generate USD3 billion in revenue. In 2015, Lonely Planet and The New York Times listed Singapore as their top and 6th best world destination to visit respectively.
Singapore is an education hub, with more than 80,000 international students in 2006. 5,000 Malaysian students cross the Johor–Singapore Causeway daily to attend schools in Singapore. In 2009, 20% of all students in Singaporean universities were international students – the maximum cap allowed, a majority from ASEAN, China and India.
The Ministry of Communications and Information oversees the development of Infocomms, Media and the Arts.
Information and communications technologies (ICT) is one of the pillars of Singapore’s economic success. However, Singapore’s mass communications networks, including television and phone networks, have long been operated by the government. When Singapore first came online, Singaporeans could use Teleview to communicate with each other, but no one outside of their sovereign city-state. Publications such as The Wall Street Journal were censored.
The ‘Intelligent Island’ is a term used to describe Singapore in the 1990s, in reference to the island nation’s early adaptive relationship with the internet. The term is referenced in William Gibson’s 1993 essay Disneyland with the Death Penalty.
The World Economic Forum’s 2015 Global Technology Report placed Singapore as the most “Tech-Ready Nation”. It is the most comprehensive survey of the pervasiveness and network-readiness of a country, in terms of market, political and regulatory infrastructure for connectivity. Singapore has also topped Waseda University’s International e-Government rankings from 2009 to 2013, and 2015.
Singapore has the world’s highest smartphone penetration rates, in surveys by Deloitte and Google Consumer Barometer – at 89% and 85% of the population respectively in 2014. Overall mobile phone penetration rate is at 148 mobile phone subscribers per 100 people.
Internet in Singapore is provided by state owned Singtel and partially state owned Starhub and M1 Limited plus some other business internet service providers (ISPs) that offer residential service plans of speeds up to 2 Gbit/s as of Spring 2015.
Equinix (332 participants) and also it’s smaller brother Singapore Internet Exchange (70 participants) are Internet exchange points where Internet service providers and Content delivery networks exchange Internet traffic between their networks (autonomous systems) in various locations in Singapore.
Electronic Road Pricing gantry (road sign) at Beach Road.
As Singapore is a small island with a high population density, the number of private cars on the road is restricted so as to curb pollution and congestion. Car buyers must pay for duties one-and-a-half times the vehicle’s market value, and bid for a Singaporean Certificate of Entitlement (COE), which allows the car to run on the road for a decade. The cost of the Singaporean certificate of entitlement alone would buy a Porsche Boxster in the United States. Car prices are generally significantly higher in Singapore than in other English-speaking countries. As with most Commonwealth countries, vehicles on the road and people walking on the streets keep to the left.
A Singapore MRT train at Eunos station
Singaporean residents also travel by bicycles, bus, taxis and train (MRT or LRT). Two companies run the train transport system—SBS Transit and SMRT Corporation. Four companies, Go-Ahead, Tower-Transit, SBS Transit and SMRT Corporation run the public buses under a ‘Bus Contracting Model’ where operators bid for routes. There are six taxi companies, who together put out over 28,000 taxis on the road. Taxis are a popular form of public transport as the fares are relatively cheap compared to many other developed countries.
Singapore has a road system covering 3,356 kilometres (2,085 mi), which includes 161 kilometres (100 mi) of expressways. The Singapore Area Licensing Scheme, implemented in 1975, became the world’s first congestion pricing scheme, and included other complementary measures such as stringent car ownership quotas and improvements in mass transit. Upgraded in 1998 and renamed Electronic Road Pricing, the system introduced electronic toll collection, electronic detection, and video surveillance technology.
Changi Airport continues to expand with a 4th Terminal and mixed-use complex Jewel by 2018
Singapore is a major international transport hub in Asia, serving some of the busiest sea and air trade routes. Changi Airport is an aviation centre for Southeast Asia and a stopover on the Kangaroo Route between Sydney and London. There are eight airports in the country, and Singapore Changi Airport hosts a network of over 100 airlines connecting Singapore to some 300 cities in about 70 countries and territories worldwide. It has been rated one of the best international airports by international travel magazines, including being rated as the world’s best airport for the first time in 2006 by Skytrax. The national airline is Singapore Airlines.
The Port of Singapore, managed by port operators PSA International and Jurong Port, was the world’s second-busiest port in 2005 in terms of shipping tonnage handled, at 1.15 billion gross tons, and in terms of containerised traffic, at 23.2 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs). It is also the world’s second-busiest, behind Shanghai, in terms of cargo tonnage with 423 million tons handled. In addition, the port is the world’s busiest for transshipment traffic and the world’s biggest ship refuelling centre.
The Port of Singapore, one of the top two busiest container ports in the world since the 1990s. Sentosa island in the background
Access to water is universal, affordable, efficient and of high quality. Innovative integrated water management approaches such as the reuse of reclaimed water, the establishment of protected areas in urban rainwater catchments and the use of estuaries as freshwater reservoirs have been introduced along with seawater desalination to reduce the country’s dependence on water imported from neighbouring Malaysia.
Singapore’s approach does not rely only on physical infrastructure, but it also emphasises proper legislation and enforcement, water pricing, public education as well as research and development.
Chinese and Malay women in Singapore, circa 1890
As of mid-2015, the estimated population of Singapore was 5,535,000 people, 3,375,000 (60.98%) of whom were citizens, while the remaining 2,160,000 (39.02%) were permanent residents (527,700) or foreign students/foreign workers/dependants (1,632,300). According to the country’s most recent census in 2010, nearly 23% of Singaporean residents (i.e. citizens and permanent residents) were foreign born (which means about 10% of Singapore citizens were foreign-born naturalised citizens); if non-residents were counted, nearly 43% of the total population were foreign born.
The same census also reports that about 74.1% of residents were of Chinese descent, 13.4% of Malay descent, 9.2% of Indian descent, and 3.3% of other (including Eurasian) descent. Prior to 2010, each person could register as a member of only one race, by default that of his or her father, therefore mixed-race persons were solely grouped under their father’s race in government censuses. From 2010 onward, people may register using a multi-racial classification, in which they may choose one primary race and one secondary race, but no more than two.
High-rise HDB flats in Bishan overlooking Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park
90.3% of resident households (i.e. households headed by a Singapore citizen or permanent resident) own the homes they live in, and the average household size is 3.43 persons (which include dependants who are neither citizens nor permanent residents). However, due to scarcity of land, 80.4% of resident households live in subsidised, high-rise, public housing apartments known as “HDB flats” because of the government board (Housing and Development Board) responsible for public housing in the country. Also, 75.9% of resident households live in properties that are equal to, or larger than, a four-room (i.e. three bedrooms plus one living room) HDB flat or in private housing. Live-in foreign domestic workers are quite common in Singapore, with about 224,500 foreign domestic workers there, as of December 2013.
The median age of Singaporean residents is 39.3, and the total fertility rate is estimated to be 0.80 children per woman in 2014, the lowest in the world and well below the 2.1 needed to replace the population. To overcome this problem, the Singapore government has been encouraging foreigners to immigrate to Singapore for the past few decades. The large number of immigrants has kept Singapore’s population from declining.
Buddhism is the most widely practised religion in Singapore, with 33% of the resident population declaring themselves adherents at the most recent census. The next-most practised religion is Christianity, followed by Islam, Taoism, and Hinduism. 17% of the population did not have a religious affiliation. The proportion of Christians, Taoists, and non-religious people increased between 2000 and 2010 by about 3% each, whilst the proportion of Buddhists decreased. Other faiths remained largely stable in their share of the population. An analysis by the Pew Research Center found Singapore to be the world’s most religiously diverse nation.
There are monasteries and Dharma centres from all three major traditions of Buddhism in Singapore: Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana. Most Buddhists in Singapore are Chinese and are of the Mahayana tradition, with missionaries having come into the country from Taiwan and China for several decades. However, Thailand’s Theravada Buddhism has seen growing popularity among the populace (not only the Chinese) during the past decade. The religion of Soka Gakkai International, a Japanese Buddhist organisation, is practised by many people in Singapore, but mostly by those of Chinese descent. Tibetan Buddhism has also made slow inroads into the country in recent years.
A multilingual sign in Singapore’s four official languages: English, Chinese, Tamil, Malay.
Singapore has four official languages: English, Malay, Mandarin Chinese, and Tamil. English is the common language, and is the language of business, government, and the medium of instruction in schools. Public bodies in Singapore, such as the Singapore Public Service, (which includes the Singapore Civil Service and other agencies), conduct their business in English, and official documents written in a non-English official language such as Malay, Chinese or Tamil typically have to be translated into English to be accepted for submission.
The Constitution of Singapore and all laws are written in English, and interpreters are required if one wishes to address the Singaporean Courts in a language other than English. English is the native tongue for only one-third of all Singaporeans, with roughly a quarter of all Singaporean Malays, a third of all Singaporean Chinese, and half of all Singaporean Indians speaking it as their native tongue. Twenty percent of Singaporeans cannot read or write in English.
Singaporeans are mostly bilingual, with English as their common language and usually the mother-tongue as a second language taught in schools, in order to preserve each individual’s ethnic identity and values. The official languages amongst Singaporeans are English (80% literacy), Mandarin (65% literacy), Malay (17% literacy), and Tamil (4% literacy).] Singapore English is based on British English, and forms of English spoken in Singapore range from Standard Singapore English to a colloquial form known as “Singlish”. Singlish is discouraged by the government.
English is the language spoken by most Singaporeans at home, 36.9% of the population, just ahead of Mandarin. Nearly half a million speak other varieties of Chinese, mainly Hokkien, Teochew, and Cantonese, as their home language, although the use of these is declining in favour of Mandarin and English. Singapore Chinese characters are written using simplified Chinese characters.
Malay was chosen as a national language by the Singaporean government after independence from Britain in the 1960s to avoid friction with Singapore’s Malay-speaking neighbours—Malaysia and Indonesia. It has a symbolic, rather than functional purpose. It is used in the national anthem “Majulah Singapura”, in citations of Singaporean orders and decorations, and in military commands. In general, Malay is spoken mainly within the Singaporean Malay community, with only 17% of all Singaporeans literate in Malay and only 12% using it as their native language. While Singaporean Malay is officially written in the Latin-based Rumi script, some Singaporean Malays still learn the Arabic-based Jawi script as children alongside Rumi, and Jawi is considered an ethnic script for use on Singaporean Identity Cards.
Around 100,000, or 3%, of Singaporeans speak Tamil as their native language. Tamil has official status in Singapore and there have been no attempts to discourage the use of other Indian languages.
Singapore Management University is one of six public universities in the city-state.
Education for primary, secondary, and tertiary levels is mostly supported by the state. All institutions, private and public, must be registered with the Ministry of Education. English is the language of instruction in all public schools, and all subjects are taught and examined in English except for the “mother tongue” language paper. While the term “mother tongue” in general refers to the first language internationally, in Singapore’s education system, it is used to refer to the second language, as English is the first language. Students who have been abroad for a while, or who struggle with their “Mother Tongue” language, are allowed to take a simpler syllabus or drop the subject.
Education takes place in three stages: primary, secondary, and pre-university education. Only the primary level is compulsory. Students begin with six years of primary school, which is made up of a four-year foundation course and a two-year orientation stage. The curriculum is focused on the development of English, the mother tongue, mathematics, and science. Secondary school lasts from four to five years, and is divided between Special, Express, Normal (Academic), and Normal (Technical) streams in each school, depending on a student’s ability level. The basic coursework breakdown is the same as in the primary level, although classes are much more specialised. Pre-university education takes place over two to three years at senior schools, mostly called Junior Colleges.
Hwa Chong Institution was the first Chinese institution of higher learning in Southeast Asia in 1919.
National examinations are standardised across all schools, with a test taken after each stage. After the first six years of education, students take the Primary School Leaving Examination (PSLE), which determines their placement at secondary school. At the end of the secondary stage, GCE “O”-Level or “N”-level exams are taken; at the end of the following pre-university stage, the GCE “A”-Level exams are taken. Some schools have a degree of freedom in their curriculum and are known as autonomous schools, for secondary education level and above.]
Post-secondary education institutions include 5 polytechnics, institutes of technical education (ITEs), 6 public universities of which the National University of Singapore and Nanyang Technological University are among the top 20 universities in the world.
Singapore students excelled in most of the world education benchmarks in maths, science and reading. In 2015, both its primary and secondary students rank first in OECD’s global school performance rankings across 76 countries – described as the most comprehensive map of education standards. In 2016, Singapore students topped both the Program International Student Assessment (PISA) and the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS).
In the 2015 International Baccalaureate exams taken in 107 countries, Singapore students fared best with more than half of the world’s 81 perfect scorers and 98% passing rate. In the 2016 EF English Proficiency Index taken in 72 countries, Singapore place 6th and has been the only Asian country in the top ten. Singapore literature students has won the Angus Ross Prize by Cambridge Examinations every year since 1987 (except in 2000), awarded to the top A-level English literature student outside Britain, with about 12,000 international candidates.
Singapore General Hospital Museum is housed in the “Bowyer Block”
Singapore has a generally efficient healthcare system, even though their health expenditures are relatively low for developed countries. The World Health Organisation ranks Singapore’s healthcare system as 6th overall in the world in its World Health Report. In general, Singapore has had the lowest infant mortality rate in the world for the past two decades. Life expectancy in Singapore is 80 for males and 85 for females, placing the country 4th in the world for life expectancy. Almost the whole population has access to improved water and sanitation facilities. There are fewer than 10 annual deaths from HIV per 100,000 people. There is a high level of immunisation. Adult obesity is below 10%. The Economist Intelligence Unit, in its 2013 “Where-to-be-born Index”, ranks Singapore as having the best quality of life in Asia and sixth overall in the world.
The government’s healthcare system is based upon the “3M” framework. This has three components: Medifund, which provides a safety net for those not able to otherwise afford healthcare, Medisave, a compulsory national medical savings account system covering about 85% of the population, and Medishield, a government-funded health insurance program. Public hospitals in Singapore have autonomy in their management decisions, and compete for patients. A subsidy scheme exists for those on low income. In 2008, 32% of healthcare was funded by the government. It accounts for approximately 3.5% of Singapore’s GDP.
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Sultan Mosque, a historic mosque in Kampong Glam.
Despite its small size, Singapore has a diversity of languages, religions, and cultures. Former Prime Ministers of Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew and Goh Chok Tong, have stated that Singapore does not fit the traditional description of a nation, calling it a society-in-transition, pointing out the fact that Singaporeans do not all speak the same language, share the same religion, or have the same customs. Even though English is the first language of the nation, according to the 2010 census, 20% of Singaporeans are illiterate in English. This is however an improvement from 1990, when 40% of Singaporeans were illiterate in English.
Ornate details on top of Sri Mariamman Temple in Chinatown district, Singapore’s oldest Hindu temple since 1827
From 1819, it served as a trading port for British ships on their way to India. Being a major trading hub and its close proximity to its neighbor Malaysia, Singapore was prone to many foreign influences, both from Britain and from other Asian countries. Chinese and Indian workers moved to Singapore to work at the harbor. The country remained a British colony until 1942.
When Singapore became independent from the United Kingdom in 1963, most Singaporean citizens were uneducated labourers from Malaysia, China and India. Many were transient labourers, seeking to make some money in Singapore, with no intention of staying permanently. There was also a sizeable minority of middle-class, locally-born people—known as Peranakans or Baba-Nyonya—descendants of 15th and 16th-century Chinese immigrants. With the exception of the Peranakans who pledged their loyalties to Singapore, most of the labourers’ loyalties lay with their respective homelands of Malaysia, China and India. After independence, the government began a deliberate process of crafting a Singaporean identity and culture.
Clan associations played an important role in preserving ethnic dialects and cultural practices in the early years.
Each Singaporean’s behaviours and attitudes are influenced by, among other things, his or her home language and his religion. Singaporeans who speak English as their native language tend to lean toward Western culture, while those who speak Chinese as their native language tend to lean toward Chinese culture and Confucianism. Malay-speaking Singaporeans tend to lean toward Malay culture, which itself is closely linked to Islamic culture.[original research?]
Racial and religious harmony is regarded by Singaporeans as a crucial part of Singapore’s success, and played a part in building a Singaporean identity.
The national flower of Singapore is the hybrid orchid, Vanda ‘Miss Joaquim’, named in memory of a Singapore-born Armenian woman, who crossbred the flower in her garden at Tanjong Pagar in 1893. Many national symbols such as the Coat of arms of Singapore and the Lion head symbol of Singapore make use of the lion, as Singapore is known as the Lion City. Major religious festivals are public holidays.
Singapore has a reputation as a nanny state. However, the government places heavy emphasis on meritocracy, where one is judged based on one’s ability.
A scene in a street market in Chinatown, Singapore, during the Chinese New Year holidays.
Thaipusam procession in Singapore
Saint Andrew’s Cathedral in the Civic District has existed since 1836.
Lau Pa Sat hawker centre in the midst of the financial district. Satay cart-stalls rolls in after dusk, on a side street
The diversity of food is touted as a reason to visit the country, and the variety of food representing different ethnicities is seen by the government as a symbol of its multiculturalism.
In popular culture, food items belong to a particular ethnicity, with Chinese, Malay, and Indian food clearly defined. However, the diversity of cuisine has been increased further by the “hybridisation” of different styles (e.g., the Peranakan cuisine, a mix of Chinese and Malay cuisine).
Esplanade performing arts centre, fronting Marina Bay.
Supertree Grove in Gardens by the bay
Since the 1990s, the government has been promoting Singapore as a centre for arts and culture, in particular the performing arts, and to transform the country into a cosmopolitan “gateway between the East and West”. For example:
The Esplanade, a performing arts centre opened in October 2002.
The national orchestra, Singapore Symphony Orchestra, plays at the Esplanade.
The annual Singapore Arts Festival is organised by the National Arts Council.
The stand-up comedy scene has been growing, with a weekly open mic.
The National Stadium at the Singapore Sports Hub in Kallang.
Popular sports include walking, jogging, swimming, badminton, football and basketball. Most Singaporeans live in public residential areas (known as “HDB flats”) near amenities such as public swimming pools, outdoor basketball courts and indoor sport complexes. Water sports are popular, including sailing, kayaking and water skiing. Scuba diving is another popular recreational sport.
Singapore’s football league, the S.League, launched in 1996, currently comprises nine clubs, including two foreign teams.
The Singapore Slingers, formerly the Hunter Pirates in the Australian National Basketball League, is one of the inaugural teams in the ASEAN Basketball League which was founded in October 2009.
Singapore began hosting a round of the Formula One World Championship, the Singapore Grand Prix, in 2008. The race takes place on the Marina Bay Street Circuit and was the inaugural F1 night race, and the first F1 street race in Asia. Singapore will remain on the F1 calendar until at least 2017, after race organisers signed a contract extension with Formula One Management on the eve of the 2012 event.
Kranji Racecourse is run by the Singapore Turf Club and hosts several meetings per week, including international races—notably the Singapore Airlines International Cup.
Singapore also hosted the inaugural 2010 Summer Youth Olympics.
Singapore is home to the biggest Mixed Martial Arts promotion in Asia, ONE Championship. Notable fighters on the promotions roster include Ben Askren, Roger Gracie, Brandon Vera and Shinya Aoki.
Companies linked to the government control much of the domestic media in Singapore. MediaCorp operates most free-to-air television channels and free-to-air radio stations in Singapore. There are a total of seven free-to-air TV channels offered by Mediacorp. Starhub Cable Vision (SCV) also offers cable television with channels from all around the world, and Singtel’s Mio TV provides an IPTV service. Singapore Press Holdings, a body with close links to the government, controls most of the newspaper industry in Singapore.
Singapore’s media industry has sometimes been criticised for being overly regulated and lacking in freedom by human rights groups such as Freedom House. Self-censorship among journalists is said to be common. In 2014, Singapore dipped to its lowest ranking ever (153rd of 180 nations) on the Press Freedom Index published by the French Reporters Without Borders. The Media Development Authority regulates Singaporean media, claiming to balance the demand for choice and protection against offensive and harmful material.
Private ownership of TV satellite dishes is banned. In 2016, there were an estimated 4.7 million internet users in Singapore, representing 82.5% of the population. The Singapore government does not engage in widespread censoring of the internet, but it maintains a list of one hundred websites—mostly pornographic—that it blocks as a “symbolic statement of the Singaporean community’s stand on harmful and undesirable content on the Internet”. As the block covers only home internet access, users may still visit the blocked websites from their office computers.
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The American Revolution was Not Truly Revolutionary essay
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The American Revolution was Not Truly Revolutionary. Custom The American Revolution was Not Truly Revolutionary Essay Writing Service || The American Revolution was Not Truly Revolutionary Essay samples, help
Revolution can be defined as the act of overthrowing or repudiating and immediate topples of an established reign or political system by the subjects. It involves radical and pervasive change in the general social and political structure of the society. American Revolution saw the end of two centuries of British rule. Heated protests and resentments from the colonists commenced when the British government made attempts to raise government revenue by taxing the colonies. Skirmishes intensified further where many colonists resented over lack of representation in parliament as well as demanding equal rights as other British subjects leading to what seemed to be the struggle and fight for independence. After six years of bloodshed and fighting which utterly involved the use of guerilla tactics and ungainly militias together with the French aid against highly trained and effective British soldiers, America eventually was able to topple the British government by the Peace of Paris, took control of their resources and gained independence thereafter. However, the revolution was accompanied with several changes. Besides America having been granted land and sovereignty, its economy experienced uncertainty and instability and the women, African Americans, and Native Americans also underwent a dynamic change in their positions in the society. This essay will explore the experience of women in the American society during the revolutionary era citing evidence that indeed, the American Revolution was not revolutionary as assumed.
The gain of independence from the British reign through the American Revolution was thought to liberate all Americans and bring them together but instead, more setbacks and challenges were experienced. The irony about this revolution is clearly unveiled through the change in the structure of the society that it was perceived to have brought either socially, politically or economically with reference to women’s life, freedom, property and voting rights. The revolution was majorly political in the quest to gain home reign and to liberate Americans from the British’s unjust laws and rules instead of implicating an overall change in the structure of the society. The revolution did not advocate for the liberty of women and their rights just like for men in the society. Men exercised ultimate and complete power over women just like the British government exercised complete power and dominance over the colonists.
During the revolutionary period, women were utterly considered to be inferior compared to men,- a perception that stripped them off their legal rights. The laws did not consider nor recognize the liberty of women as far as economic, political, or civic matters were concerned. The revolution did not even consider the possibility of including women representatives in the parliament. It only advocated the interest of men with regard to securing position within the federal government, a fact that justifies the non-revolutionary claim of the American Revolution. Their voice was never to be hearkened to and they were never allowed to air their grievances nor participate in the creation and development of the federal govenment.
Property ownership was also another issue, since women were never granted the freedom to own nor have control over any property. Women were only entrusted with housekeeping and were not allowed to have a life outside their home. They were to nurture their husbands and to raise virtuous children so that the United States republic would flourish; a concept termed as “Republican Motherhood”. They belonged to their fathers until they got married where they became the property to their husband; whatever they possessed either acquired or inherited was passed to the ownership of their husband, the children in a marriage belonged to the father alone and the custody of the children if one was to get divorced was usually given to the father and in the case of a husband’s demise, the wife could only access one third of hers husband’s real estate. It was even worse for the single women who were excluded from earning a living and worse still, women could not boycott being battered by their husbands a fact that reveal the irony behind the “revolution” that America claimed to have undergone.
Women were also deprived of their rights and sentiments. The right to contract and the right to own property among other rights denied, women were not allowed to vote. Their desire to vote was like a dream that would never come true. This revelation explains why the American Revolution was not revolutionary, since the freedom fight that involved women was not fully attained and instead, a part of the freedom fighters (men) was enjoying that freedom while the other part (women) was languishing in complete negligence and oppression. In their quest to obtain liberty, they ended up inventing another form of power that saw women under the legislative authority of man.
Despite the exhilarating and disturbing moments during the revolutionary era, this also marked a time of progress for some whereby, in the wake of the revolution, the drafting and ratification of the Constitution of the United States of America was considered vital in a bid to proclaim liberty for all the American citizens. Most people got to comprehend critically the true meaning of revolution-a revolution of revolutionary and hence, drawing their attention to political matters as well as issues of liberty and equality. It was at this time that women begun to realize the need to claim for their rights an influence that saw them hold a number of conference in their endeavors to fight for equality in the United States’ society. More and more radical voices of the revolutionary era supported the issue of gender equality raise by some elite women leading to a significant change in the perception about the relationship between men and women.
In the wake of true revolution, property rights moved a little bit more within reach for women as men began to realize the importance of gender equality. Men left and allowed their women to run the farm, home and businesses. This was all due to the efforts of a few elite women like Abigail Adams, who advocated for equal rights asking men to always remember and consider women too to be having talents and abilities beyond that of a housekeeper and that they can also participate in the building of the nation either economically, politically and socially. As a result, women were granted their wish and could at least enjoy some rights that they had never had a chance to in the past.
Women’s social status no longer remained static as Americans began to realize that the revolution was, indeed, to act as a catalyst to win political freedom from the England and equal rights for all Americans irrespective of the gender. It dawned on them that the base of the democracy was the integrity of every US citizen and mothers who were once considered as social objects presented proper republican models for desired behaviors in the society. They were given a role of the guardians for American’s moral values. As a result, more opportunities of receiving education for women were created and the men’s perception that a woman did not deserve higher profiles in the society was disapproved.
The new drafted and ratified constitution incorporated the law that recognized women’s impendence in economic, political, and civic matters in the society as women continued to challenge the views that men had greater intellectual capacities than women. Women were allowed to air their grievances as well as participate in making of critical decisions that affected the society either socially, economically, or politically. Other than just being simple housekeepers, women got the opportunity to engage in a variety of activities such as sewing clothes, spying, making gunpowder as well as helping to inspire people through writing of books and poems.
The revolution further brought a better meaning to the American women and a new outlook among many American people took toll with more and more of the American women getting updated of their rights as citizens of now considered a free country. Women begun to view politics from a different perspective and grew interest to follow the progress of the politics of the country. They grew concerned and wanted the equality principle to apply even in voting where they demanded to be given a chance to take part in the voting exercise. To a greater degree, the revolution acted as a wakeup call for women to stand up and defend their rights which they deeded. Men realized the potential behind women and accepted their contribution towards the development of the country.
In conclusion, although women had limited rights during the revolutionary era, they contributed a lot towards making a hospitable nation that catered for the needs of all American citizens irrespective of their gender, color, and social status. The American Revolution that led to the evacuation of the British army out of the American soil can be said to have played a very important role in the aspect of awakening women to realize their potential as citizens of a free nation and that the nation needed them for the best of the country. Women deserved the transformation and through their unrelenting efforts, they managed to convince America and the world at large that the society relies on women as much as it does on men.
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Tag: AWARDS 2012
African American Issues, Black Films, Film Projects, Lifestyle, Movies/Film News 18 Nov 2012 18 Nov 2012
A Look At The Black Actors Who Might Contend For The Best Actor Oscar + Some Interesting History
It’s that time of the year, as prognosticators at every level start handicapping the Academy Awards, which are set to take place on February 24 (nominations will be announced on Januray 15, 2013). As much as some of us might dismiss the Oscars as an indication of where black cinema is, or where blacks in cinema are, we can’t ignore their overall industry relevance. I can already hear the chants: who cares about the Oscars; they’re not for *us.* Well, a lot of folks in the industry (and out) do certainly care, and see value in the recognition. I plan to post a follow-up piece that looks at the history of the awards show, and how (or if) it’s impacted the careers of those black entertainers who’ve won trophies.Today, I’m focusing on black actors who just might make the short list of Oscar nominees in the Best Actor (male) category when they’re announced in January; and as you’d expect, there aren’t many of them.In fact, of the 600+ films that would have seen Oscar-qualifying USA theatrical releases by the end of this year, I counted a total of 19 that feature a black male actor in a leading role. How pathetic is that? Doing the math, that’s about 3% of total volume. It shouldn’t be shocking however; it’s a rare occurrence when we cover a film (especially a studio-backed project) that features a black man in the lead role. Very, very rare. 19 times rare. Actually it’s less than 19, because I’m also including indie features in that number.19 out of well over 600 films! It’s a white man’s world, in case you needed that clarification. The overwhelming majority of films with male leads (the bulk of movies made by studios today) star white male actors. And if you take a closer look at the list of 19 films, you’d very quickly dismiss most of them as potential Oscar contenders, given what we know of the criteria for Oscar-caliber movies. In fact, I’d say of the 19, only 3 really stand a chance of making the short list of nominees for Best Actor. First, here’s the list of 19: Red Hook Summer, The Magic of Belle Isle, Wuthering Heights, MIB 3, Safe House, Think Like a Man, Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Witness Protection, Flight, Red Tails, Tyler Perry’s Good Deeds, Alex Cross, A Thousand Words, The Man with the Iron Fists, The Intouchables, Woman Thou Art Loosed!: On the 7th Day, Unconditional, 2 Days in New York, The Last Fall, and Django Unchained.Am I forgetting any films? I used Box Office Mojo as my primary source. I don’t think there are any glaring ommissions though.And of those 19, the only 3 that I think have a shot at nominations are: Denzel Washington in Flight (he’s probably a sure-thing), Jamie Foxx in Django Unchained, and Omar Sy in The Intouchables. The last 2 are Weinstein Company movies, and we all know how well Harvey Weinstein does when it comes to ensuring that movies he wants on the ballot, make it on the ballot.The Omar Sy pick might seem out of left field to you, but, as we’ve noted in past posts, there’s been a definite push to get him an Oscar nomination for his work in that film. He already won the French equivalent of the Oscar (the César) for Best Actor, so why not the Oscar as well.”We definitely think this is an Oscar movie, and we think that Omar, like Jean Dujardin before him, is in this race,” Harvey has said. Of course he’s referring to Jean Dujardin who won the Best Actor Oscar earlier this year, for his work in The Artist (one of the most over-rated movies I saw in 2011).Maybe he’ll make it a a double, with Omar Sy this year. I doubt it, given the competition; but a nomination isn’t entirely out of the question.But if I were to pick one of these 3 actors who I thought was guaranteed to make the short list of 5 nominees, I’d go with Denzel without any hesitation. Django Unchained isn’t out yet, but even when it is released, I don’t know if Jamie’s peformance will match the overwhelming buzz that’s surrounded Denzel’s work in Flight since it was released.And I think Omar Sy would need even more of a push. I’m not really hearing his name mentioned as a real contender.As for the other 16 films on the list, the only other title that I’d say has some potential is Wuthering Heights, which stars James Howson as Heathcliff. There just hasn’t been enough buzz to help elevate awareness of the film. It was released on October 5, and was met with mixed reviews. It hasn’t even reached $100,000 in box office, despite having been in theaters for over a month. And I haven’t Howson’s name mentioned at all as a potential awards contender. It would help if he’d been up for other awards, especially as the film traveled the festival circuit, but he hasn’t picked up any.
I should mention that I considered other films with black actors in starring roles, but none of them featured what would be traditionally referred to as a male lead, so I didn’t include them on the list of 19; these are roles that, if nominated, would likely be in the Best Supporting Actor category. For example: Omari Hardwick and David Oyelowo in Middle Of Nowhere (it’s really Emayatzy Corinealdi’s movie); I’d say the same for the male characters in Sparkle, and also Beasts Of The Southern Wild (specifically, Dwight Henry). CONTINUE READING..
So that’s it!
Filed under: Academy Awards, AWARDS 2012, Black Actors, Black Cinema
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Kostopoulos, Fortunus to captain All-Stars
SPRINGFIELD, Mass. … American Hockey League President and CEO David Andrews announced today that Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins forward Tom Kostopoulos and Texas Stars defenseman Maxime Fortunus have been selected to serve as playing captains for the 2015 AHL All-Star Classic presented by Turning Stone Resort Casino, to be held January 25-26 in Utica, N.Y.
Captains for the American Hockey League All-Star teams are selected by the league president in recognition of their outstanding leadership and service.
Tom Kostopoulos is in his 16th professional season and eighth as a member of the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, where he holds the franchise records for goals, assists, points and games played. The 35-year-old native of Mississauga, Ont., has skated in more than 1,100 pro games, including 495 in the AHL with Wilkes-Barre and Manchester and 630 in the NHL with Pittsburgh, Los Angeles, Montreal, Carolina, Calgary and New Jersey. Now in his second stint as Wilkes-Barre’s team captain (2002-04, 2013- ), Kostopoulos has totaled 152 goals and 231 assists for 383 points in the AHL and helped the Penguins reach the Calder Cup Finals in 2001 and 2004.
Kostopoulos, who made an AHL All-Star Classic appearance in 2002 and missed the 2005 event due to injury, will captain the Eastern Conference AHL All-Stars.
A 12th-year pro now in his sixth season with the Texas Stars and third as team captain, Maxime Fortunus has skated in 658 regular-season AHL games with Texas, Manitoba and Houston, registering 59 goals and 161 assists for 220 points. The 31-year-old native of La Prairie, Que., appeared in the Calder Cup Finals in 2009 and 2010 before captaining the Stars to the championship in 2014, and is tied for sixth all-time with 115 career AHL playoff games played. Undrafted, Fortunus signed as a free agent with Dallas in 2008 and has played nine career NHL contests with the Stars.
Fortunus will be making his AHL All-Star Classic debut as captain of the Western Conference All-Star team.
A very limited number of tickets remain available for the 2015 AHL All-Star Classic presented by Turning Stone Resort Casino. They can be purchased in person at the Utica Memorial Auditorium box office (10-4 ET), by phone at 800-693-8000 or online at www.ticketmaster.com. Tickets for the two-day event are priced as low as $69 and include admission to both the All-Star Skills Competition on Jan. 25 and the All-Star Game on Jan. 26.
The 2015 AHL All-Star Classic presented by Turning Stone Resort Casino will feature the top young talent in the American Hockey League: Of the 644 players to take part in the AHL All-Star Classic since 1995, more than 94 percent have competed in the National Hockey League, including Patrice Bergeron, Daniel Briere, Ryan Callahan, Zdeno Chara, Jimmy Howard, Niklas Kronwall, Chris Kunitz, Ryan Miller, Zach Parise, Tuukka Rask, Pekka Rinne, Bobby Ryan, Martin St. Louis, Cory Schneider, Patrick Sharp, Jason Spezza and Eric Staal.
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I completely agree, Kasey. The whole original cast really had chemistry with each other, and anything could have developed along the way. Grissom could have been with LH or Catherine, or even Terry, if the writers had chosen to pursue those storylines; but in the last 4 years (since Butterflied), it's been Sara. And once they made that choice, I'm glad they saw it through. Since my husband is 14 years older than me, and also started out as my mentor, it was easy for me to make sense of it. Two children, and 25 years later, he's still my one and only.
I wouldn't mind them bringing in love interests for Nick or Greg. I actually thought Greg and Ronnie would make a cute couple; he needs someone upbeat, and smart.
Catherine and Brass? I see them in a close platonic relationship like Catherine and Grissom.
That said, I'm pretty much up for whatever relationship the writers choose to develop. Those personal storylines help to keep the characters and the show interesting, IMO.
I wouldn't mind them bringing in love interests for Nick or Greg.
The thing with bringing in someone to be a love interest for one of their characters is that it's hard, IMO, for a fan to become invested in a relationship when they barely know one of the characters. If Greg was in a relationship with a character who wasn't a CSI and wasn't established at all, I wouldn't like their relationship because I wouldn't know the other character at all. Hence why there aren't exactly shippers crazy about Warrick/Tina. You just can't invest in characters that you don't know. And I agree with Kimbo that the cast is definitely big enough already. I do not think that it would be a good idea to bring in a new cast member just to serve as love interest.
Still if they bring in love interests, I'd rather them try and find women their own age because the whole older man, younger woman storylines has been done. They did it with Grissom and Sara and so there would be comparisons all the time. That's why I think it is better to keep the age gaps a bit smaller if they should chose to bring in love interests ever again.
Or vice versa, have either of the boys dating older women. Let's be fair here. If Sara can date a man 15 years older than her, then why can't Greg or Nick.
I could see Greg doing it. He's very charming and seems to be very appealing to older women.
Nick, I could see him dating a woman much younger than him because he seems to have this dominant personality that Grissom had and that appeals to younger woman particularly those who have had daddy issues.
GregNickRyanFan Holographic Moderator Moderator
Well, they could do what they did with the Kristy character (minus the prostitute part of course). Have the character on a couple of episodes to get the audience used to her and then later have her hook up with Nick or Greg. Nick's gotten to kiss someone on screen (Kristy). It's Greg's turn. I do agree with the whole thing about creating a character solely to be a love interest in general isn't a great idea.
That said, what they could do is do it in flashbacks. Like the team goes to a crime scene and the vic is Greg's old girlfriend from high school or maybe his early 20s (maybe the one he was talking to on the phone when Nick walked in that time lol) and he hasn't seen her in years. Greg has to excuse himself from the case. But, we see flashbacks of the two of them together (kind of how they did Hawkes with his ex gf on that one ep of NY). That way, the character would already be dead, so there would be no need for the auidence to get to know her, but we could get a look into some of Greg's past (since we dont' know that much about it) and get some emotional stuff for Greg at the same time, plus he'd finally get to kiss someone on screen. :lol:
GregNickRyanFan, May 18, 2009
Kimbo,If I were to pair anyone with Sara,it would be Hodges too.I still think she takes the light away from anybody so with Hodges there is no loss.He does the same to Wendy,IMO and that's why I don't like them together.
I also want to see Nick in a relationship.I mean ,I can't believe no woman notices him!!!He is smart and good looking.I am not completely against bringing anyone new becouse if it ends,there would be no tension.We don't need to see the whole relationship,just the two of them on a date once in a while.It will not take time from others.
Speedystokesgirl Judge
I agree that age doesn't matter in relationship, however, it can cause problems in a relationship.
I agree that Sara had daddy issues. What I mean by that, is she did come from an abusive home where dad beat her mom. Which means he probably wasn't much a father. Some women get attracted to older men because, subconsciously, they are looking for the father they never had.
This is what I see with Sara and her attraction to Grissom. She is looking for the 'father' she never had and Grissom fills that void. This is one of the main reason I cannot see this ship. Surviving through foster care, getting an advanced degree and having a successful career in CSI has irrevelant to what's going on her mind or her 'daddy' issues.
IMO, Sara was just not on the same level as Grissom to be with him. Like I've said before, I can see Catherine and Teri Miller with him, but I could see Lady Heather more.
Now I don't want to hear that Grissom went to Sara in Costa Rica. That's irrevelant to the fact that I don't see this pairing and never will.
Speedystokesgirl, May 18, 2009
speedystokesgirl said: ↑
Some women get attracted to older men because, subconsciously, they are looking for the father they never had.
I don't disagree with this; but on the other hand, a lot of men marry women who are like their own mother, but that doesn't mean they have an Oedipus complex.
I'm not trying to change anyone's mind about GSR (that we know will never happen), just stating why I don't agree with the 'daddy issues'. I just don't see that as a factor in their relationship.
Oh I know you're not trying to change my mind or anyone's elses.
I respect that you disagree with me and others. If we all agreed, what would we have to debate about? :lol:
And, yup, some men have that 'mommy' issue too. However, I tend to stay away from them :shifty:. I don't want to be with someone who's looking to be with their mother. :wtf: But that an entirely different thread.
Now for Catherine, I'm thinking that Vartann would be perfect for her. I still don't ship or slash anyone, but they would make a great pair.
I could've seen her with Warrick, but unfortunately, he is no longer in the picture, so I think Vartann would be good for her.
As for Nick, they were planning to bring in a love interest for him, but I highly doubt she was going to be a regular. Probably just a recurring character. She was going to be a social worker, who's beauty comes from within. However, because of the writer's strike, that idea has either been scrapped or on hold. I think the waitress in 'For Gedda' was just someone stating she was going to be his love interest. If that was true, then she would've been still around. Though I'm glad this never took place as she was way too young for him.
I think Nick needs someone closer to his age and a social worker would be perfect. George always said that if Nick had a love interest, that he would want her to be a teacher, social worker, etc.
Personally, I think I'd be perfect for him. :lol: But only in my dreams. :devil:
I just don't think TPTB should go the GSR route because it's been done already and whatever relationship gets starts where there's an older man and a younger woman people will compare it to GSR.
I totally agree, and never thought that ever. She met him in San Francisco, and didn't know his age, nor obviously was not an issue with either of them..she was attracted to him and him to her, because their so much alike. It took him longer to come to terms with their relationship then it did her, but ultimatley when she left Vegas, he was a distraught, lonely, unhappy man, and knew where he wanted to be to start the next chapter of his life "It's time to up the ante" he told Cath and regardless [and I also don't pretend to know why some don't like this union], I do know that there a mega GSR sites out there, and fans galore posting on them.. bottom line, is this is what they, and the writers wanted, and they did end up together~
and I also don't pretend to know why or care why some don't like this union],
If you don't care, then why are you in this thread? You, obviously, cannot accept people not liking GSR, but you have to accept it. We are entitled to our opinion. It sounds like you're saying that we shouldn't voice why we don't like this union.
Just because you see the union and tptb wanted it, doesn't make it right or that everyone can see it or wanted it.
The fact that were put together in the show and ended up together, is still totally IRRELEVANT to the fact that some people don't get this ship and why they don't.
A Ship is subjective. Some people will like it and others won't. I dont like GSR nor do I like Greg/Nick but that's me. Others enjoy it. We don't know why but it's like ice cream. Some people like one flavour and others hate it.
The trouble with GSR was not so much the romance itself but how it was handled by TPTB. They insisted on it being the centre of the show and it felt to me as a nonGSR fan, they were saying, "We really don't care about fans of the other characters, all we care about is GSR." It was sad. I know Billy was the star, but it was AN ENSEMBLE cast.
And on top of that the fans from the website whose name I dare not say were absolutely nasty to those who did not support GSR. It was a George W. Bush mentality of "You're either with us, or you are not a true fan of CSI." It was sad. One poster there said, "Oh the other characters can have their 'very special episodes' but the rest better be GSR." I mean come on, this show was not about GSR it was about a group of forensics crime fighters.
I can't wait for the day when True Hollywood Report tells us 'what really went on behind the scenes' because I know the whole romance caused a lot of friction on set because some of the actors felt their time was being wasted when they would come on set for a whole day only to do two lines.
Anyways, that's my reason for not supporting the almighty GSR-TPTB and SOME of the fans-most GSR fans were reasonable, but others were just nasty and posted things about how the fans of other characters were 'stupid' and such.
It's too bad, really. Maybe someday I'll be able to watch CSI and GSR and not feel inclined to push the FAST Forward button every time a GSR scene comes on.
I really could not have said it any better myself. I agree 99.9%. The only thing I'm not sure about is the "friction on set" situation. As much as I'm sure it happened, we'll never know until, like you said, a behind the scenes expose is done. Like GE's article.
I am a non-GSR fan. Partially because I disliked the characters and partially because it felt like all roads led to GSR. Especially during the middle of season nine when there were ten episodes dedicated to Gil's personal grief. The whole team lost Warrick, and they are focusing on Grissom's girlfriend walking out...AGAIN? I understand when some people say that "That was the final straw for Grissom", but it is an ensemble show.
There is a constant argument over whether SOME or MOST fans wanted GSR (I think it's SOME). But regardless, TPTB can't make everyone happy. But I know for a fact that their number one priority was making sure the big kahuna(WP) was happy. And they did just that. AS myfuturecsi said, I know WP was the star, but it is(was) still and ensemble cast. Or at least, it was supposed to be .
When a romantic pairing dominates more airtime in a procedural drama than the actual investigation, it is no longer a procedural drama; its a soap opera.
As I said, I would have been happy with GSR had it not been the be all and end all of CSI through season seven. I don't think any ship should dominate a show whether it would be GSR or if in the future Wedges. Heck I wouldn't even want my ship Nick/Mandy to dominate the show.
Poor George, he got nailed to the cross for those comments. OH and if someone wants to PM about this, please do so. I'd rather not see links to the website which shall not be mentioned. Then I wouldn't have to notify the admins about it. Really. Talk to me about it. My door is always open. Thanks.
Better yet, let's move on to more interesting topics than GSR which is pretty much dead in the water at this point since they've left the show!
Wedges..did anyone see the cute little scene in the finale with Hodges and Wendy when Hodges talked about porn..those two are so darn cute!
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Tourism in Cali, Colombia
Michael Baker, Leaf Group
Cali (Photo: )
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Cali is Colombia's third-largest city and one of the country's major business centers. The city's culture, history and nightlife also make it one of Colombia's top tourist spots, especially as the country has made strides in becoming a safer destination for international travelers. Tourists can explore the history of the sugar industry that still leaves a tinge of sweet odor in Cali's air, try one of the world's top sailing spots and stop by a club to see why the city is known as the world's salsa capital.
Cali's airport, Alfonso Bonilla Aragon International Airport, is about a 15-minute drive north of the city in Palmira. The airport is Colombia's second busiest, and you can find direct flights to Cali from numerous international gateway cities as well as regular connections from Bogota. By car or bus, Cali is about a 10-hour drive from Bogota, though the U.S. State Department advises against using buses or traveling on roads outside of major cities in Colombia. Because Cali is close to the equator, temperatures generally stay between 66 and 99 degrees F year-round. The rainy seasons run from April to June and September to November.
Notable landmarks in Cali include the Cali River and the "El Gato del Rio," or "river cat" statue, along with several smaller cat statues designed by local artists; the Gothic-style La Ermita Church; the Cristo Rey monument, a 42-meter statue of Christ comparable in size to the famous Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro; and the Calima Gold Museum. The city is a short drive from the Hacienda Piedechinche in Santa Elena, which houses a museum detailing the history of sugar cane plantations in the area, as well as the Hacienda El Paraiso, the former home of author Jorge Isaacs that served as the inspiration for his romantic novels.
Cali's shopping options include the La Alameda Gallery, an open market where you can politely haggle for local crafts and fruits, as well as the massive Chipichape shopping mall, which derives its name from the onomatopoeic sound of a passing train. Golfers can try out several courses, including the 18-hole Farallones country club course and Club Campestre. Nearby Calima Lake boasts the third-strongest winds in the world, making it an ideal spot for sailing. When the sun goes down, you can show off your moves at one of the city's numerous salsa night clubs, and you can sign up for a lesson at one of Cali's salsa schools if you need some practice first.
You'll find a few global hotel brands in Cali, including InterContinental, Radisson and Mercure, but the city also has dozens of local hotels to explore. Several hotels are small boutique properties, such as the Jardin Azul and the Ofi Hotel. The city's first five-star hotel, Hotel Spiwak Chipichape Cali, opened in October 2010, with more than 200 rooms connected directly to the Chipichape Mall. Most major hotels in Cali offer some level of Internet service.
Violence, terrorism and kidnappings associated with rebel armies and drug warlords have diminished significantly in Colombia since peak levels in the 1980s and 1990s. Even so, the U.S. State Department maintains its travel warning for Colombia and specifically notes an uptick in Cali's murder rate. In particular, the State Department advises travelers to take taxis only when called via telephone dispatch or the airport taxi booth, as hailing a cab from the street puts them at a higher risk of robbery. Additionally, ProExport suggests travelers stick to bottled water.
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Chipichape
CIA World Factbook: Colombia
Michael Baker has worked as a full-time journalist since 2002 and currently serves as editor for several travel-industry trade publications in New York. He previously was a business reporter for "The Press of Atlantic City" in New Jersey and "The [Brazoria County] Facts" in Freeport, Texas. Baker holds a Master of Science in journalism from Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Conn.
Baker, Michael. "Tourism in Cali, Colombia." Travel Tips - USA Today, https://traveltips.usatoday.com/tourism-cali-colombia-35912.html. Accessed 18 July 2019.
Baker, Michael. (n.d.). Tourism in Cali, Colombia. Travel Tips - USA Today. Retrieved from https://traveltips.usatoday.com/tourism-cali-colombia-35912.html
Baker, Michael. "Tourism in Cali, Colombia" accessed July 18, 2019. https://traveltips.usatoday.com/tourism-cali-colombia-35912.html
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« Workshops for the Wisconsin Newspaper Association
If you want video of the winning shot, ask the crowd »
Observations about the media from Dan Buttry’s memoir, Peace Warrior
March 4, 2013 by Steve Buttry
As much as I believe in the importance of journalism, I know I don’t have nearly the impact on people’s lives that my brothers do.
As I noted last year after the death of my nephew, Brandon, my younger brother, Don, and his wife, Pam, have adopted 11 children after having three biological children (Brandon was the second-oldest adopted child). I also have mentioned before that my older brother, Dan, is a peace missionary, both here and on the travel blog I share with Mimi.
Dan’s memoir, Peace Warrior, came out last month and I just finished reading it. Dan tells about his work teaching and practicing peacemaking around the world — from Burma, Georgia (Tbilisi, not Atlanta), Liberia, Nagaland, Bosnia, Ethiopia, Nicaragua, Congo and on and on. I sometimes think I’ve seen a lot of the world as a journalist, but Dan has seen much more of it as a peacemaker. And he’s had more profound impact.
If you’re interested in world affairs or Christian missionary work or peacemaking, you might enjoy the book, though I don’t pretend to be a fair judge of it. I enjoyed it, of course, for other reasons. In a way, I was catching up with a brother whose exploits I’ve heard and read before (actually, I scanned his reports from his various travels more often than I read them) but mostly followed from afar. We visit a few times a year and I knew much of the story but the memoir told many details I missed or had forgotten. I’ve understood for decades the depth of Dan’s calling and commitment to peacemaking, but the memoir added greatly to that understanding.
I generally blog about media and journalism issues here, so I won’t focus on Dan’s peacemaking efforts but on a few of his occasional references to media coverage of the conflicts he became involved in. As a journalist, it was interesting to read an activist’s perspective on media coverage (or non-coverage).
Dan Buttry
In the early days of Dan’s peace activism, he was involved in some demonstrations in the United States, including one protesting U.S. support for the Contra rebels in Nicaragua:
We also learned a lesson about media coverage when hundreds of us shut down a major bank building in downtown Boston for a whole day because that was the location for the regional office of the Central Intelligence Agency. Throughout the day thousands of people walked past us or dealt with the inconvenience of the closure of the bank and all the offices in the building. But that night the news was filled with the U.S. bombing of Libya, and our story was not even covered in the local news. It seemed as though deliberate decisions had been made to minimize the news coverage of our actions. We would have to find our own ways to tell the story about peacemaking rather than trusting others to tell it for us.
I know nothing specifically about decisions made by Boston news media on that particular day. But I can confirm for Dan (to my own chagrin and disagreement now and at the time) that I have worked in newsrooms that had specific policies to minimize news coverage of protests. In fact, I thought the policies often overrode good news judgment.
I have written twice before about my preference for denying media coverage to attention-seekers who picket soldiers’ funerals and to mass murderers. But I was always troubled by editors’ decisions to downplay (or refuse to provide) coverage of protests against actions or decisions of the government. This nation was founded in protest and the right to protest is protected in the First Amendment, along with our right to publish. I always found arbitrary decisions — and especially policies — not to cover protests or to minimize coverage of them offensive and even un-American.
Not that I would cover every protest. A small protest might merit no coverage or just a brief. Continuing protests might not deserve daily coverage. My view is that coverage decisions for protests against government policies or actions should be made using good news judgment about the facts surrounding that protest, rather than following arbitrary policies. Most protests are more newsworthy than editors have thought for much of my career (I think that view is less prevalent today) and less newsworthy than the protesters think (yes, they are attention-seeking and I don’t want to give them undue attention).
Sound news judgment should prevail. If a protest shut down a major downtown building, as Dan described in the Boston protest, that was news and those people who were inconvenienced by the protest (or amused, annoyed or inspired) no doubt looked to the news media to see what was going on, and they got no answers. That was bad journalism, even if Dan and his fellow protesters were obviously seeking attention.
But here’s the most important part of that passage to me: Dan’s conclusion that the protesters would have to tell the story themselves. This was in the 1980s, before blogs and social media made it easier for non-journalists to tell their own stories. The editors who showed bad news judgment in failing to cover an event in their community were abusing their gatekeeper power. But, as I noted last year, the fences have blown away, so the gatekeeper role is far less relevant today. That’s not just because of technology but because we abused that role.
In a later passage, Dan writes about moving beyond the gatekeepers:
A trip to Nagaland was organized for Indians to see what was going in within the borders of their own country and to learn directly from the Naga people about their plight instead of hearing everything through the filters of the Indian media.
Some of Dan’s most extensive and meaningful peacekeeping work has been in Nagaland, a region of northeast India that has spent the past 60-plus years fighting for the independence that Gandhi promised. In the 1950s, Dan wrote, the Indian government expelled American Baptist missionaries (Dan’s an American Baptist missionary):
Reporters were also kept out of the region, sealing off an already-remote region from the attention of the world.
This was perhaps the most remarkable thing about Dan’s book to me, how little attention most of the world has paid to many of the wars (mostly civil wars) Dan has been involved in. The war in Bosnia got huge attention. And the war in Congo has received some attention lately (but not commensurate with its status as the most deadly war since World War II). But scant attention has been paid to the war in Nagaland, continuing strife in Burma or the Rose Revolution in Georgia, perhaps the three nations where Dan has spent the most time and effort.
Americans really have a narrow view of the world. Beyond the other major powers and the countries we fight wars with or rattle sabers with, we know little of strife around the world. A later passage about the Nagaland situation underscores the world’s disinterest:
I had argued with Muivah (a leader of a Naga faction) that the sporadic violence of the Naga insurgents was so mundane and forgotten by the world that his actions would garner little attention. On the other hand, a massive boycott and nonviolent witness would be of interest to a major global media outlet like the New York Times, which was running frequent articles on the Indian parliamentary elections. I was wrong. In spite of the fact that I sent press kits with background and contact information to the New York Times, BBC, CNN and many other press organizations, nobody picked up the story of the Naga protest.
There’s some more attention-seeking (but unsuccessful) behavior. Think about this the next time you hear conservatives whining about the supposedly liberal press. For most of his peacemaking career, my bleeding-heart brother has been ignored by the press. But my son Mike, who spent much of his career seeking attention for a conservative U.S. senator (Chuck Hagel, who was and is conservative, despite the furor that Republicans raised over his nomination as defense secretary) regularly found willing reporters.
While much of Dan’s work has been abroad, he also has been involved in domestic peacemaking and wrote about a gang summit held in Kansas City in 1993 (two years after I had left the Kansas City Star):
The summit got off to a rough start with the media almost immediately. No Kansas City gangs were involved with the summit because there were no truce efforts underway there. The major Kansas City paper ran a front page article questioning whether such an event could produce anything good, accompanied by a photo of Kansas City gang members posing with armaments that would delight a liberation army. The summit leaders were furious and took action. First, because they saw the media as unsupportive of their efforts, leaders banned the media from the rest of the summit. Second, they sent a delegation to the local gangs pictured in the paper to tell them that they didn’t know anything about what was going on and inviting them to join the summit meetings. Out of that invitation came one of the strongest on-going metropolitan gang peace initiatives in the whole country.
I found this episode interesting for more than the Kansas City connection. Of course the story and photo angered the summit leaders, but it also pointed out a valid oversight on their part, an oversight they addressed immediately, with positive results. The coverage they viewed as negative was totally legitimate and had a positive impact on the mission of the event. Dan doesn’t say whether or how soon the Kansas City community learned of those positive results. With the media banned in a fit of pique, the summit leaders might have deprived themselves of coverage (or at least delayed coverage) of the local gang peace initiative that grew from the conference.
This is a common viewpoint and reaction by people of a variety of social and political viewpoints: that the media should be “supportive” of whatever they’re doing. We don’t support; we report. If we’re doing our jobs well and you’re running your event well, our coverage will feel supportive. But if you screw up (and not inviting the local gangs was a significant screw-up), we’ll report that, too. But reporting screw-ups is not always bad (and wasn’t in this case).
Qur’an-burning pastor Terry Jones came to Detroit in 2011, in an effort to insult and incite the Muslim community in Dearborn, where Dan had been a pastor and remained involved in interfaith fellowship efforts. The media this time decided to give an attention-seeker what he wanted. Dan was involved in the local response:
A picture of me and one of the Muslim young women beaming at each other with our hands over our hearts was splashed across the Detroit Free Press along with photos of Christian and Muslim clergy standing side by side. Jones came and did his thing, but he ended up as the side story instead of the main feature. We successfully seized the initiative and controlled the prevailing message.
While I think many journalists would squirm a little at Dan’s frank language about attempting to manipulate the media, people try to manipulate us all the time (and Terry Jones has manipulated the media masterfully). We should listen to the people pitching stories to us, even if they don’t have press secretaries who are among our regular sources. But we should also seek out people who should be part of the story but aren’t sophisticated enough to manipulate us. And we should exercise good news judgment, which it appears the Detroit media did in this story.
Another point that Dan made was not about the media, but I think it applies to reporters’ research, originality and attribution:
It reminds me of what my Uncle Frank used to say about his sermon preparation: “I milk a lot of cows but the cheese is mine.”
A good reporter needs to milk a lot of cows, too. But the cheese should be ours (and we should credit the cows). Don’t be surprised if I steal Uncle Frank’s line sometime.
Dan posing with our mother, Harriet Buttry, before receiving his honorary doctoral degree from Central Baptist Theological Seminary.
On a non-media point, here is my only reference in my brother’s memoir (in the context of discussing conflicts among his children):
Of course, sibling conflict was a regular part of life. I was well acquainted with such conflict in my own childhood, having tussled verbally and physically with my two younger brothers as we grew up. My mother used to say, “If the Apostle Paul had known the Buttry boys, he never would have said, ‘Let brotherly love continue.’!”
That made me laugh, and not just because I remembered Mom saying that hundreds of times. But the glancing mention, without even a name, was actually quite an accurate reflection of my place in Dan’s peacemaking work. I’ve never witnessed one of his conflict-resolution workshops or accompanied him in his travels. I think the only event relating to his peace ministry where I’ve been present was in 2009 when Central Baptist Theological Seminary recognized his work by giving him an honorary doctoral degree (that honor didn’t make the memoir, except a brief mention in the timeline that is an appendix).
If I write a memoir of my journalism career someday (nothing in the works), Dan would likely have a cameo appearance at the most (as a religion reporter at the Des Moines Register, I covered a contentious American Baptist convention in Des Moines where Dan was present). We’ve followed vastly different career paths (though both involve teaching and writing), but I admire his work and found his observations about the media interesting.
Two generations of Buttry brothers gathered in 2006: Back from left, Dan, me and Don; front, my sons Mike, Joe and Tom.
Posted in Journalism, Personal | Tagged Dan Buttry, Peace Warrior | 4 Comments
on March 4, 2013 at 10:33 am | Reply Hal Davis
The lesson you drew from the Kansas City summit coverage was excellent:
“The coverage they viewed as negative was totally legitimate and had a positive impact on the mission of the event. Dan doesn’t say whether or how soon the Kansas City community learned of those positive results. With the media banned in a fit of pique, the summit leaders might have deprived themselves of coverage (or at least delayed coverage) of the local gang peace initiative that grew from the conference.”
Have you discussed this aspect of the summit leaders’ pique with your brother?
[…] another post dealing with family, I shared some observations about the media from my brother, Dan’s, memoir, Peace […]
on October 31, 2014 at 9:56 am | Reply Dan Buttry’s keynote address on interfaith relationships | The Buttry Diary
[…] ministry of my brother, Dan. I don’t often vary from journalism and media topics here (when I wrote about Dan’s memoir, Peace Warrior, I examined the media themes he addressed in the […]
on November 11, 2015 at 2:34 pm | Reply My great-niece, Maya Poulter, was one of the best stories of Good Morning America’s 40 years (and my 60+) | The Buttry Diary
[…] the two children of my sister, Carol, Patrick and Kat Devlin. I have written about my brother Dan here, but not about his children. But Mimi and I were delighted to host two of Dan’s adult […]
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The Lynda Steele Show – July 11
stevestebbing
This week on the show I joined guest host Jody Vance to chat about the global setting that Stranger Things may take on for the fourth season as well as more backlash from the casting of Halle Bailey in the lead role of the live action version of The Little Mermaid. For the flick of the week, I give a little rundown of the Kumail Nanjani and Dave Bautista comedy Studer and for the binge, we look at the new Showtime miniseries about Roger Ailes, The Loudest Voice. Check out the clip below.
Guest host Jody Vance
Categories: The Lynda Steele Show•Tags: CKNW, Film Reviews, Movie Reviews, Netflix, Showtime, Stranger Things, Stuber, Television, The Little Mermaid, The Loudest Voice, The Lynda Steele Show•
What The Hell Should I Watch? – July 11
New Releases:
Stuber – I feel like that who have enjoyed the Guardians Of The Galaxy or Infinity War know that Dave Bautista has some great comedy chops so, on the outside, this looks like an immediate win by pairing him with the hilarious Kumail Nanjani known for his role on Silicon Valley and the brilliant comedy The Big Sick, one that he wrote as well. The story has him as Stu an Uber driver who picks up what he assumes to be a normal customer. Unfortunately, the guy he picks up is Vic a reckless detective looking to make a dent in some crime. This looks like a home run to me and it’s also directed by Michael Dowse who Canadians know from his two FUBAR movies. (Not opening in Hamilton)
Crawl – Judging this movie by its basic plot line and poster, this movie would look like your standard survival thriller fare we our main characters battling the elements to predictable results. I’m happy to report that this movie is directed by Hills Have Eyes and Horns director Alejandre Aja so this movie will probably go anywhere but the beaten path. The film has Maze Runner and Pirates Of The Caribbean star Kaya Scodelerio as a woman attempting to rescue her father after a category five hurricane from a sinking house and to make matters worse they are being hunted by a group of alligators. The bonus to having such a cool director in a story like this is that Aja will definitely ramp up the gore as that is something he has consistently brought to all of his movies. This could be really fun.
The Last Black Man in San Francisco – The debut feature film from writer and director Joe Talbot, this movie absolutely stunned me with its message and beautiful cinematography. The story is about a young black man on a quest to find where he belongs in the everchanging city of San Francisco. Fueled by a deep love for his hometown and looking to get out of his best friend’s parents house, he takes an almost squatter’s method of taking over a beautiful house, one that was built by his own grandfather. This film immediately establishes Talbot as a director to look out for but also the performances of Jimmie Fails (who also co-wrote the movie) and Jonathan Majors cannot be ignored because they are heartfelt and emotional. I love this movie and see it sitting at the top of my best of 2019 at the end of the year. (Only opening in Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver)
Unplanned – This movie was released a while back in the states, months ago to be accurate, and given its subject matter the timing of the film is both horrifying and fascinating. The movie is a pandering faith-based film with nothing more than an agenda to be brainlessly consumed by their base. The plot follows a woman who becomes one of the youngest Planned Parenthood directors in the US. After she is asked to assist in an abortion at thirteen weeks she instead resigns, becoming a pro-life activist. I’m usually against banning films or boycotting it as I feel its pretty limiting in the art field but this is a movie that I hope earns no box office numbers whatsoever. No movie should be used as a political weapon or one that confused people with fiction disguised as fact. This honestly makes me mad. (Not opening in Hamilton, Kamloops, Barrie or Oshawa)
Ray & Liz – Welsh writer and director Richard Billingham digs deep into his own past for his debut film and the audience is better off or worse off for it depending on how you look at it. This film is the unflinching story of two brothers upbringing by their horribly neglectful parents in a dingy flat in the outskirts of Birmingham. Through few separate stories, we get a first-hand account of the brutal relationship between the two sons, striving to keep each other safe with a tinge of sibling rivalry, and their greedy and drunken parents, all divided by the subplot of an old recluse who lives upstairs, constantly tanked on homebrew. Birmingham never allows even a second of sentimentality in this film and I’m glad he didn’t because absolutely none of it would ring true. This is a downer story but the upside is that the experience led to the making of this movie. (Only opening in Toronto and Vancouver)
Pet Sematary – One of the staple Stephen King novels gets its turn at the remake treatment and the advance word was that it was actually terrifying. The movie is the story of a family that moves to rural Maine and discover an old burial ground in the woods behind their house that’s soil can reanimate the dead. I was always a fan of the original and, of course, the book so I was salivating for this movie and it managed to grip me in the first moments of the film but then I felt the grip start to loosen, Aside from sequence of very cool gore effects, even with my knowledge of where the story was going to go, the film feels very paint by numbers for anyone who isn’t initiated into what’s going to happen all leading to an ending that really just feels like the equivalent of a shoulder shrug. Maybe I put too much into my expectations but this film doesn’t come through with any of the prementioned hype.
After – What can I say, teen romances and my viewing experiences are sometimes like oil and water, it just doesn’t mix. Every now and then though, something can breakthrough with enough originality behind it to change my mind. So, let’s look at this one, about a young woman who falls for the dark new stranger that crosses her path, which deviates her direction from marrying her high school sweetheart and living her pre-planned life. Yeah, there’s not enough originality to hold me here, an adaptation from a novel that seems to put a lot of these stories out.
Little – Look, when I originally saw the trailer for this movie I totally made the connection that this was the reverse of the Tom Hanks film Big but it really looked like hot garbage. The film stars the massively popular star of Insecure Issa Rae and Regina Hall about a ruthless executive who is transformed into her younger self, played by Blackish’s Marsai Martin, to teach her a lesson about her attitude and how she treats people. A strange thing happened when I watched this movie as I felt myself laughing and enjoying it. Yes, there is some terrible movie tropes that it can’t seem to avoid but the chemistry between Rae and Martin is phenomenal and I absolutely adore the former’s comedic timing. Issa Rae is destined to be a star for a long time I think.
High Life – This is a film I have been massively excited to check out because it pairs acclaimed French filmmaker Claire Denis, responsible for the incredible piece of cinema Beau Trevail, and one of my favorite character actors right now Robert Pattinson. The story is a futuristic one, following a father and his daughter living in the isolation of deep space and from everything I am reading it is mesmerizing in its scope and has a chasm of complexity to it. I love the style of Denis with her slow method and am really intrigued by her stepping into a genre like science fiction. This could be a great one for all the cinephiles out there.
This Island Earth – Getting some real classic sci-fi this week from Shout Factory, a movie that was rushed, underfunded and reshot into cult move history as the film is pretty popular among b-movie 50s fans. The story is as simple as can be, aliens arrive on earth to ask scientists pertinent information to help win their galactic war. Being that it was made in 1955 you could probably guess where this plot is heading as audiences were far easier to dupe than the jaded viewers of today but just seeing the classic troupes in their rawest state is so fascinating to see and it really set the groundwork of all the fantasy and popular science fiction we have today.
Steve’s Blu-Ray Geekout:
Ferrante Fever – I received this documentary from a little studio called Greenwich Entertainment and, although it had a short theatrical run at the beginning of March that I don’t think played in Canada, I had never heard of it. The film focuses on Elena Ferrante, an Italian writer under a fake name who wrote a four-part coming of age story collected as the Neapolitan Novels. First published in 2012, these books caused a literary craze that roped in readers from around the world, including big celebrity endorsements from Hillary Clinton, Gomorrah author Roberto Saviano and one of the great American novelists Jonathan Franzen, all of who appear as interview subjects for this movie. Book lovers should be all over this movie.
The Andromeda Strain – Michael Crichton is a novelist that I followed with rabid fascination as I was just starting my love for reading. Of course, I credit Stephen King for getting me started but I would deviate to the Jurrasic Park writer as a bit of a heady break from the Master of Horror’s carnage and Andromeda Strain was among the first I read. Now Arrow Video gives a brand new blu-ray edition for the adaptation made in 1971, a film about the discovery of an alien virus and the frantic actions to keep it contained. Famed director Robert Wise created a movie with such ramping and slow-burn intensity that some movies of today could really learn from it. Arrow has made a beauty release here with restored sound and picture plus commentary and a really great making of featurette as well as a little doc on Crichton himself.
Trapped Alive – One thing these new releases from Arrow does for me is introduce me to films I may not have gotten to see in my younger years and bring them to the forefront. This is definitely true of this horror film from 1988, the story of a band of survivors including a sheriff’s deputy, some escaped prisoners and two young girls who find themselves trapped in a mine shaft underground, prey for some cannibalistic humanoid underground dwellers. Yes, C.H.U.D. for anyone that gets the reference! The story is simple and, although the movie was made in 1988 and didn’t see release until 1993, this movie is fun in a schlocky Troma fan sort of way. The features are full of interviews and behind the scenes with writer and director Leszek Burzynski as well as cast and crew to give insight to why this classic has been hidden for so long.
Woody Guthrie: All-Star Tribute Concert 1970 – The origins of mainstream folk music has been something a little lost on me but one name I do know is Woody Guthrie and his influence on a lot of the artists I grew up listening to and his lasting effect to this day with bands like Mumford and Sons and even Kings Of Leon. Guthrie set the framework. Narrated by Peter Fonda, this documentary takes a look at the concert organized in 1970 to showcase the talent of the legend who had passed away three years prior. The one night only concert featured his son Arlo, Joan Baez, Pete Seeger, The Band and more and was used to raise money and awareness for Huntington’s disease, which took Woody’s life. The special features include rehearsal footage that has never been seen previously.
The Loudest Voice (Showtime) – Just looking at the trailer and glimpsing Russell Crowe in full makeup and fat suit to play now fallen media mogul and monster Roger Ailes is an incredible accomplishment because we know without a doubt that the actor in the role won’t distract us from the story, just like Adam MacKay and Christian Bale did in Vice. The true story of this is something we all know about a little, this seven part series takes a deep look at Ailes, the founder of Fox News, more to the point, focusing on the past decade in which Ailes arguably became the Republican Party’s not so hidden spokesperson and the sexual harassment accusations that brought his career to a crashing and deserved end. Featuring Sienna Miller as Beth Ailes, Naomi Watts as Gretchen Carlson and character actor Simon McBurney as Rupert Murdoch, you know this is going to be can’t miss television.
Years And Years (HBO) – A brand new co-production between HBO and BBC, this series was created by the mind behind Queer As Folk as well as most of the modern day Doctor Who, Russell T. Davies which means it has me as a viewer hook, line and sinker. It stars Emma Thompson as Vivienne Rook, an outspoken celebrity businesswoman turned political figure whose controversial opinions divide the nation but, beyond that, its also about a Manchester-based family who acts as the microcosm of results and consequences of Rook’s political moves, told over a fifteen year period. The scope of this show is huge but to show it in the little arc of one middle-class family is fascinating.
Point Blank (Netflix) – If you are looking for that action movie fix then Netflix is bringing you some gold nuggets with the dropping of this new film starring Anthony Mackie and Frank Grillo. Directed by Mayhem and Everly director Joe Lynch, this film has a desperate man on a mission to save his pregnant wife from gang members and crooked cops. Looking for the best help possible, he breaks an injured thug out of the hospital to form an alliance to take everyone down. The geek in me, which is a large portion, gets really excited about the collaboration of Mackie and Grillo because, if you think about it, this is a good guy and bad guy team up between the Falcon and Crossbones from the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The Taco Chronicles (Netflix) – I’m not a foodie by any means. Don’t get me wrong, I do love to eat and enjoy the hell out of a great meal but it’s not an obsession. On the other hand, if you put Mexican cuisine in front of me my eyes light up like fireworks because that is my number one and the fact that Netflix has a new docuseries about tacos, well, I’m in love. Yes, we’re going through everything taco related in this show. Talking about its history, significance in Mexico, global appeal and varieties like pastor, carnitas, canasta, asada, barbacoa and guisados, oh man, I’m starving just thinking about it let alone typing it out.
Shangri-La (Showtime) – A fascinating new music docuseries, this will appeal to any music fan because it is focusing on one of the greats, producer Rick Rubin. Told in four parts, it makes a creative conversation delving into the emotional side of music-making using Rubin’s iconic Malibu, CA studio as the backdrop and his history as a legendary music producer and the Def Jam Records co-founder. I’ve always been really interested in the moves Rubin has made, his music philosophy and his drive to keep creating, collaborating with artists that break the mould of the conventional on a regular. Kind of like The Defiant Ones on HBO, this will hold that audience in its palm.
Categories: What The Hell Should I Watch•Tags: After, Blu-Ray, Crawl, Ferrante Fever, Film Reviews, HBO, High Life, Little, Movie Reviews, Netflix, Pet Sematary (2019), Point Blank, Ray & Liz, Shangri-La, Shout Factory, Showtime, Stuber, Television, The Andromeda Strain, The Last Black Man In San Francisco, The Loudest Voice, The Taco Chronicles, This Island Earth, Trapped Alive, Unplanned, Woody Guthrie: All-Star Tribute Concert 1970, Years And Years•
What The Hell Should I Watch? – Jul 4
Spider-Man: Far From Home – The first movie to follow after the massive changes that Avengers: Endgame brought to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, this film is the story that brings closure to this phase, let’s us mourn Tony Stark and prepares us for what’s coming next. I want to keep this one really short as spoiler territory is a hard thing to avoid with this but the film is basically about the world trying to get back to normal after the dusting or what this film calls “the blip” when a new threat to the planet emerges with what may be a new hero in the form of Jake Gyllenhaal’s Mysterio. The movie is the perfect blend of spectacle and laughs filtered into an awkward teenager rom-com, exactly what we needed after the dire consequences of Infinity War and Endgame. This film is a big screen experience in every way and demands to be seen.
Midsommar – If there was a movie that I would put at the top of my list of anticipated films this year this would be number one with a bullet. The sophomore film from Hereditary director Ari Aster, the main details of this movie have been kept very under wraps, the trailer even giving a foreboding sense of mystery in a brilliantly bright wrapper. From what I can glean, the story is about a couple who travels to Sweden to visit a secluded town’s fabled mid-summer festival and what was thought to be an idyllic retreat quickly devolves into an increasingly violent and bizarre competition at the hands of a pagan cult. From everything I’m hearing, this may be on par with the 1970s thriller The Wicker Man and, oh boy, does that excite me!
Wild Rose – This seems to be a really great time for music in movies as we’ve recently received biopics of two of the greatest rock n roll acts of all time, Queen and Elton John, and had the high profile remake o A Star Is Born and the phenomenal indie film Teen Spirit. In this new film that is getting top-notch reviews, Irish singer and actress Jessie Buckley plays a Glasgow singer who is pursuing her dream of moving from Glasgow to Nashville to become the next country star. The movie comes from director Tom Harper, who has directed a slew of great British television and the Woman In Black sequel, so I know this film with have a visual style to go along with its music. This may be one of those hidden gem films.
The Poison Rose – Sometimes a trailer will draw you in to a movie, intriguing you to the point that you make an immediate mental note that this is the movie you want to check out and other times the ad is so awful that you wish it was never made and you feel sorry for anyone who took part in it. Well, this movie speaks to the latter half of the equation but I’m still dying to see it because it looks so terrible. Inspired by some classic film noir, John Travolta plays Carson Phillips, an ex-football star turned PI who has a soft spot for a lady in distress, the one in question being Famke Janssen. Everyone looks like they did this for the money. Travolta has a ridiculous southern accent, Famke looks like she’s floundering and Morgan Freeman is a supporting role? Yeah, train wreck but I can’t look away.
The Beach Bum – Oddball writer and director Harmonie Korine returns to follow up the fantastic Spring Breakers with a Matthew McConaughey character piece and I am definitely here for it. The movie is about Moondog, an ageing stoner who spends his existence rolling around South Florida in a stupor, getting every drop of partying he possibly can. Look, I’m perfectly aware that not everyone is going to dig this movie and you can just look at Korine past films fro the barometer of if you’ll hate this movie as the man wrote Kids, made Gummo and Mister Lonely, two stories that are destined to trigger a disgusted or angry reaction. The gist of this is to just be wary of checking this one out.
The Best Of Enemies – On the outside, this film looks really interesting as it stars Golden Globe winner Taraji P. Henson and Sam Rockwell as civil rights activist Ann Atwater and Exalted Cyclops of the Ku Klux Klan C.P Ellis respectively about the showdown between the two in Durham, North Carolina over school integration in 1972. The film comes from a first-time filmmaker and should excel by the sheer power of the leads alone but it just kind of fizzles I think. This may be due to the fact that, although this is a true story, the take on it and the treatment of that reality seems so far off of anything that is easy to swallow. It just feels whitewashed, wrong and forcing us to feel any sort of redemption for Ellis is, at its core, completely ridiculous.
The Public – Emilio Estevez follows up his indie darling The Way with this socio topical film that is very fitting in the conversation of our times. The film takes place during a cold snap in Cincinnati with Estevez and Jena Malone playing two librarians who find their public library occupied by a group of homeless people looking to escape the cold. Tensions begin to rise leading to a police standoff with the leader of the group played by the incredible Michael Kenneth Williams from The Wire. With the calibre of stars in this, which also includes Alec Baldwin and Orange Is The New Black’s Taylor Schilling, this might be one of the top dramas this week.
Escape Plan: The Extractors – Who would have thought that a forgotten collaboration between mega action stars Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone would spawn a little direct to video franchise? Well, here we are with the third movie in this series now, with Stallone taking the lead and adding former WWE superstar and current action heavyweight Dave Bautista in the last movie and former nineties heartthrob Devon Sawa to this one. These may not be any sort of amazing award-winning films but they do fill the void of mindless action films with a bit of budget to play with. Beggars can’t be choosers.
Okko’s Inn – More anime floated my way this week, this one again playing into the emotional side of the genre. The story follows Okko, a young girl who, after losing her parents in a car accident, starts living in the countryside with her grandmother, the proprietor of a traditional Japanese inn. While she prepares to be the next owner of the inn, Okko finds that she can somehow see friendly ghosts. Different than a lot of the anime films I’ve watched lately, this one felt packed with excitement and solid storytelling which had me engaged throughout. For those who follow my weekly blog here, this is a huge development. I may actually be starting to get it!
Rider On The Rain – It seems like the common ground between last week’s Geekouts and this week’s is Charles Bronson as I bring another one of his classic but ultimately forgotten movies, the difference being that this film is a mystery thriller. All transpiring on a train in France, this movie has Bronson as a U.S. Army colonel who takes it upon himself to track down a crazed rapist who is running rampant. This movie intrigues me massively as it comes from writer Sébastien Japrisot who’s source material of books and stories has brought us films like The Lady in the Car with Glasses and a Gun, One Deadly Summer and my favorite romance film of all time A Very Long Engagement. It’s also interesting to note that Bronson loved this movie so much that he campaigned to get it remade by Cannon Films in 1983, which unfortunately never happened.
When A Stranger Calls Back – Following up one of the greatest babysitter horror films of all time, this movie doubles down on its 1979 predecessor but is a bit limited due to it being a TV movie. Carol Kane and Charles Durning reprise their roles from the original movie which follows the unfortunate path of being a sequel of lesser return, although I still find it pretty entertaining. Beyond that, and some extra fun, this movie was riff tracked by the original guys at Mystery Science Theater 3000 which in my opinion is a huge honor.
Stranger Things: Season 3 (Netflix) – This seems like a week of gifts for me as I’ve been waiting for the latest season of this with such a pent up anticipation because I think it’s my favorite thing that Netflix has ever done. This new season centers around the new mall that opens in Hawkins, a venue that quickly becomes the new sinister setting for our young heroes to take on the next evil trapped in our world from the “Upside Down” after the events of the previous season. Not much info has been given other than the two short trailers but they added 80s stalwart Cary Elwes to the cast, Steve is now a more central role, which I love and it has that beautiful nostalgic look to it. I am excited to binge.
Into the Dark: Culture Shock (Hulu) – A brand new horror anthology series that has been streaming in the US, I bring attention to this, the tenth episode, as it is an important one to our local filmmaker talent as Gigi Saul Guerrero of Luchagore Productions directs this episode, someone I’ve had the extreme pleasure of interviewing for a podcast. Sure to be sick and twisted, this episode follows a young Mexican woman in pursuit of the American Dream, who crosses illegally into the United States, only to find herself in an American nightmare. Featuring Mayans MC’s Richard Cabral and X-Men’s Shawn Ashmore, this hopefully will be something that puts Gigi on producer’s radars in a big way.
Young Justice: Outsiders (DC Universe) – Almost ten years ago DC Animation made a new and pretty gritty series about the Teen Titans, reformed to be a younger version of the Justice League and, as a comic fan, it was awesome. Then, after three seasons, they did the unthinkable and cancelled the show at the height of its popularity. Now, thanks to their new DC Universe streaming service, they made the right decision and resurrected this amazing series and I couldn’t be happier. If you love comics and cartoons then you must be just as elated as I am.
Divorce: Season 3 (HBO) – A show that has managed to keep totally under the radar in my opinion, this series, led by Sarah Jessica Parker, is now picking up some clout heading into the newest season. The show is essentially a dark comedy about the long drawn out divorce between Parker’s character and her soon to be ex-husband played by Thomas Haden Church, a personal favorite. Featuring a supporting cast of Molly Shannon, Tracey Letts, Talia Balsam and Becki Newton, I feel at a loss to why I have never picked up on this show until now but I will be picking up the first season now to get caught up.
Categories: What The Hell Should I Watch•Tags: Blu-Ray, Culture Shock, DC Universe, Divorce, Escape Plan: The Extractors, Film Reviews, HBO, Hulu, Into The Dark, Into The Dark: Culture Shock, Midsommar, Movie Reviews, Netflix, Okko's Inn, Rider On The Rain, Spider-Man: Far From Home, Stranger Things, Television, The Beach Bum, The Best Of Enemies, The Poison Rose, The Public, When A Stranger Calls Back, Wild Rose, Young Justice: Outsiders•
What The Hell Should I Watch? – Jun 27
Annabelle Comes Home – I can’t believe we’re already at the third Annabelle movie but here we are. The series started horribly but Creation proved to be a really entertaining horror film so to up the ante this time Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson’s Lorraine and Ed Warren take center stage for this installment as the doll in question finds it’s way to their artifacts library where it wreaks havoc by waking all the other evil contained there. The movie is directed by the writer of the last movie as well as the new iteration of Stephen King’s It and I have faith that this will be some fun scares for audiences. (Not opening in Hamilton)
Yesterday – Image a world where you were a musician that was the only person who could remember the existence of The Beatles and their music. That is the premise of this new Danny Boyle directed film starring Himesh Patel and the lovely Lily James and as a huge fan of the Fab Four myself I’m really excited for it as it celebrates the music of one of the greatest bands to ever live. The reviews are just above middling but I think there is a special nice who will really latch on to this film and, for the popular music fans, it includes a small role from Ed Sheeran that looks hilarious in the trailer. (Not opening in Hamilton)
Long Day’s Journey Into Night – This beautiful and complex drama caught me totally off guard with its wrought emotion playing so subtly under the surface until the passionate explosion in the final moments. The story follows a troubled man who returns to a small town he frequented in order to find meaning, which he connects to a woman he spent a summer with twenty years prior. Made by an ambitious new Chinese director Gan Bi, this film moves with the grace of a veteran filmmaker with gorgeous and expressive shots throughout. The film may largely come off as an arthouse drama but it’s appeal definitely wasn’t lost on me. (Only opening in Toronto and Vancouver)
Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind – Another music documentary this week following all the stellar ones we’ve received in the previous couple of weeks making it just a perfect time to get immersed in some music stories. This one focuses on the legendary Gordon Lightfoot, an artist said to be Canada’s greatest songwriter and I really have no argument against it. His songs are iconic and if you think you’ve never heard one I assure you that you are wrong. This film portrait shows the man for better or worse and with all his scars on display and the truth of this movie is something I absolutely loved about it. This is a special film and one important to all Canadiana. (Only opening in Toronto and Vancouver)
Dumbo – Disney continues their big 2019 with the first of their three live-action updates of classic films from their animation library. This movie, being based on the original film from 1941, may only hold in the hearts of kids who are deeply immersed in the whole catalogue contained the iconic vault but for us adults in the know, we are aware of the importance of this adaptation. My reservations lied in the director choice of Tim Burton who hasn’t made a truly great film since maybe Sweeney Todd but this movie actually worked for me quite a bit and maybe it was from the restraint he exhibited. The reunion between him and stars Michael Keaton and Danny Devito was really great to see and Burton knows how to shoot his main lady for the last few films Eva Green so beautifully. This is a definitely winning pick to grab for the whole family this week.
The Hummingbird Project – A couple of years back I checked out a frozen but decidedly damaged love story out of Alaska called Two Lovers and a Bear from Canadian director Kim Nguyen and really enjoyed it. Now he’s back with a very American tale, about a high-frequency trader and his genius but autistic computer programmer cousin who decide to go into business for themselves and get a fibre optic line run from Kansas to Wall Street to get stock information a millisecond before anyone else, all behind the back of their ruthless former employer. This movie is all about performances, with lead star Jesse Eisenberg giving his usual neurotically nuanced delivery and Salma Hayek as their formidable foe. This one has to be handed to Alexander Skarsgard as the MVP, playing the autism spectrum so well and sporting a cul de sac of baldness against his usual beauty, and the supporting work from Michael Mando is fantastic. Really liked this one.
The Kid – Gathering some of the friends he made while making the remake of The Magnificent Seven, Vincent D’onofrio directs his first western, the second film of his overall, led by Ethan Hawke, Dane DeHaan and Chris Pratt as characters old west fans will know well. Told through the eyes of an orphaned young boy, we see the final encounters between legendary lawman Pat Garrett, played by Hawke, and Billy The Kid who is played brilliantly by DeHaan. This movie is all about great acting as every person seriously brings it and, interestingly enough, Pratt actually plays the villain of the movie, such a departure for the wildly popular hero star. Take this from me, western fans will not want to miss this one.
Furie – One thing that isn’t super popular among martial arts movies is an ass-kicking lady lead character to cheer on. There is, of course, the Sonny Chiba spin-off series Sister Street Fighter and the kill Thai actioner Chocolate and another handful but its slim pickings. This movie dispells that a bit by having a single mother who is the local debt collector in her village, a job she takes ruthlessly serious. When her daughter is kidnapped by some angry former clients, she must head to the big city to retrieve her and to deliver a beatdown to the perpetrators that will not be forgotten. The plot and script are pretty lax but the action is fast, hard-hitting and massively entertaining.
Cinderella – Another movie from the legendary Disney vault gets released today, one of the absolute favorites that everyone grew up on. This new edition, a part of their Signature Collection, gives a brand new restored version of the 1950 film, the ninth in this new Disney push, and while the audio and video portions of the film are unchanged from the Diamond Edition it does have some audio commentary which is comprised of recreated comments from directors and producers behind the movie as well as Walt Disney himself, a trivia track which plays with the feature itself and so many featurettes. This is a must own for all Disney fans.
Night Of The Creeps – I was so excited to receive the collector’s edition of this mid-80s horror classic as it is one of my favorite undead films of all time from one of the greatest writer-directors to ever get screwed out of Hollywood, Fred Dekker. Starring one of the best B-movie actors, Tom Atkins, this film takes place on prom night in small town middle America when an army of alien brain parasites take over, turning their hosts into unstoppable killing machines. This movie has moments of pure horror brilliance, plot twists that’ll shock you and lines that I quote to this day like “Thrill me” and “I got good news and bad news, girls. The good news is your dates are here. That bad news is they’re dead.” Such a prized possession in my collection now.
Cold Sweat – Heading back to 1970, before Death Wish was a mega-hit, Charles Bronson starred in this thriller for Wait Until Dark and multiple Bond film director Terence Young. The story follows an ex-military man who is forced to lead a smuggling job in order to free his wife and daughter from kidnappers. The movie wasn’t released in the USA until 1974, over three years after it was made, and immediately made it’s television debut three days later, destroying any chance it had for real box office returns. I have such a keen interest in this forgotten film as it is based on a story by Richard Matheson, the mind behind I Am Legend and A Stir Of Echoes.
The Emmanuelle Trilogy – A little while back Kino Lorber sent me these movies from their Kino Classic series and, I can’t lie, these are you basic French softcore porns. Consisting of Emmanuelle, Emanuelle 2 and Goodbye Emmanuelle, these films follow the title character, played by Sylvia Kristel, who, in the first film is the wife of a French diplomat in Bangkok ad embarks on a voyage of sexual discovery. The second movie ups the ante by having her return to her husband in Hong Kong and proceeds to have several extramarital affairs, this time with his knowledge to make things saucier. The final film, at least for Kristel because the character would carry on, Emmanuelle and her husband continue their amoral lifestyle in the Seychelles. These movies are nothing more than beautiful looking fluff but they captivated European audiences throughout the seventies.
The Brain – The cover of this weirdo little sci-fi horror movie had me transfixed immediately because it plays directly into my love of the 70s and 80s campy monster films like Ghoulies, The Stuff and It’s Alive. This one is about an alien organism that uses its host to brainwash the world through television, leading a teenager to take on the battle of destroying this extraterrestrial and saving the earth in the process. This movie has no recognizable names, the director hasn’t done anything you’ve heard of and the writer is an unknown as well but what this film has is cult status written all over it and deservedly so.
Curfew: Season 1 (Spectrum) – This is more of a “put this on your list mention” as it is playing on this channel Spectrum and the British network Sky but the cast has me so interested when I saw it mentioned in this week’s new premieres. Starring Sean Bean, Adam Brody, Billy Zane and many other recognizable faces, this movie is an action thriller about a group of amateur drivers from all over the world brought to compete in an illegal night-time street race so you know the character work is going to be fun, which is totally outing me as a Death Race fan, both original and Statham. That being said, the SYFY show Blood Drive was really fun too.
Legion: Season 3 (FX) – The final season of this mind trip of an X-Men related series is kicking off and it’s a great time to reflect on the awesomeness we’ve gotten so far. From the creative mind of Fargo showrunner Noah Hawley and led by the brilliant actor Dan Stevens, this is the story of David Haller, a troubled young man diagnosed as schizophrenic who discovers that there may be more to his condition including special powers that will change his life forever. I don’t want to give too much away about the central plot of this series because Hawley’s narrative drive is to take your head for a spin and I don’t want to take that away from new viewers. Just watch it!
Exhibit A: Season 1 (Netflix) – One thing is very certain when it comes to Netflix original series and that is that true crimes shows are the top go-to picks on the streaming service. This new show looks to take a bite out of that market as it follows controversial crimes through the lens of forensic science and, most importantly, the innocent people convicted of crimes because the science, which should have protected them backfired. This show may be opening a whole new can of worms, just like the Making A Murderer seasons did, but I’m more than intrigued to see their findings.
The Chosen One: Season 1 (Netflix) – This new Netflix six-episode series has made it’s way to our televisions from Brazil and seems pretty fascinating in its subject matter. The show is about three doctors who travel to the remote Pantanal, a natural region encompassing the world’s largest tropical wetland area in Brazil, to bring a Zika vaccine. There they clash with the village’s faith healer, inadvertently making an enemy of him in the process, pulling them deeper into the mysteries of his cult. The show looks so interesting and I have a real soft spot for foreign television, especially if it’s well made. This may be a hit.
Euphoria: Season 1 (HBO) – Now that Game OF Thrones has ended and Chernobyl made it’s run you didn’t think that HBO was going to rest on its laurels, did you? This new show is making big waves and is a teen drama looking with an unflinching eye at a group of high school students as they grapple with issues of drugs, sex, and violence. Starring Maude Apatow, which makes a lifelong Judd fan feel really old, Zendaya and The Last Ship’s Eric Dane, this series has been getting some really great reviews and it comes from Sam Levinson who directed the fantastic Assassination Nation last year.
Categories: What The Hell Should I Watch•Tags: Annabelle Comes Home, Blu-Ray, Cinderella, Cold Sweat, Curfew, Dumbo, Emmanuelle, Emmanuelle 2, Euphoria, Exhibit A, Film Reviews, Furie, FX, Goodbye Emmanuelle, Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind, HBO, Legion, Long Day's Journey Into Night, Movie Reviews, Netflix, New Releases, Night Of The Creeps, Spectrum, Television, The Brain, The Chosen One, The Hummingbird Project, The Kid, Yesterday•
Toy Story 4 – When it was announced that a new Toy Story was being written, slated for release nine years after the third movie came out, I was a bit skeptical. I personally felt like Toy Story 3 wrapped everything up quite nicely in a beautifully made film but the early reviews for this new adventure are hugely favorable. With the toys now with a new owner named Bonnie, gifted to her by Andy at the end of the last movie, they head on a road trip with a new created pal named Forky who ends up getting lost. This leads Buzz and Woody to go and bring him back to the family and I feel like everyone needs to have tissues handy for this movie.
Child’s Play – I really don’t know how to feel about this remake or reboot as I really enjoyed the direction that this Don Mancini created series was going with the comedy horror angle. Chucky, for me, is one of those iconic horror staples, especially with the voice of Brad Dourif but I’m willing to give this movie a shot, and not just because it was all shot in Vancouver. The “Buddi” doll in this new film is computer programmable, a gift that a mother (Aubrey Plaza) gives her son that gets possessed by an evil entity with the voice of Mark Hamill. That latter part is another reason I’m giving this movie a chance. (Not opening in Hamilton)
Anna – French action director Luc Besson is back with another woman led ass kicker movie. The film stars Sasha Luss, a relatively unknown actress who featured in Besson’s last movie Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets in a predominantly CGI role, but she looks totally badass in the trailer. She plays the title character, a beautiful and deadly assassin and really that’s all I know about it and with this great action director, well, that’s all you need to know. The rest of the cast is solid too with Helen Mirren, Luke Evans and Cillian Murphy. If you’re looking for more brainless stuff and can’t do horror, this is your ticket. (Not opening in Kamloops or Oshawa)
Us – This is definitely one of my favorite films of the year, right now sitting at number one, writer and director Jordan Peele’s follow up to the amazing, massively popular and Oscar-winning thriller Get Out. The movie is about a black family terrorized by an opposite evil version of them, a family of doppelgangers, and I was hooked from the first trailer I saw and definitely deeper once I saw the opening scene. Peele is starting to build himself the moniker of the modern day mast of suspense and thrills like Alfred Hitchcock, which came in handy with the Vancouver shot reboot of The Twilight Zone. This is the high bar of this year to hurdle over to win my affections and now with the movie on demand and on Blu-ray, I can’t wait to hear people’s takes on its themes.
Wonder Park – Paramount really hoped that this film took off, about an amusement park that comes from the imagination of a wildly creative girl named June but, as she discovers, something she created as a child has become real in the forest near her house when she becomes a preteen. The voice cast features Jennifer Garner, Keenan Thompson, Mila Kunis, Ken Jeong, Matthew Broderick and John Oliver but looks like the lower than the standard fare we are used to from Dreamworks and Pixar. Unfortunately the movie never really had any box office steam and I think parents kind of ignored this film as the trailer is pretty bland.
Hotel Mumbai – Dev Patel stars in this true story film about the terrorist attack on the Taj Hotel in Mumbai focusing on the hotel staff that put their lives on the line to save others. Armie Hammer co-stars in this movie from first time writer and director Anthony Maras, relying heavily on the real transcripts from that horrifying day and the reviews are trending in a good direction. I think it’s fascinating that Patel stars in this AND the Best and Second Marigold Hotel movies. A very different experience, I assure you.
Under The Silver Lake – I have been waiting for this movie to debut ever since it screened at the Vancouver International Film Festival this past year because it is the second film from It Follows director David Robert Mitchell. Doing more of a noir mystery film this time, Andrew Garfield stars as an intelligent loner who becomes infatuated with a woman he sees swimming in the pool at his apartment complex. When she disappears he sets off on an investigation to her whereabouts across the weirdest and more dangerous parts of Los Angeles. The movie seems to be hitting the middle of the road as far as reviews go but its oddness is something that keeps coming up which makes me all that more intrigued. I love the weird stuff.
Run The Race – I now I’m the master of my own destiny but in the want to be fully inclusive of reviewing everything I threw in this blu-ray that Universal sent me and oh boy did I regret it. A faith-based film from producer Tim Tebow, this movie is about football, God and daddy issues, following two athlete brothers, one who has been sidelined due to seizures and the other who is the star quarterback. Right away, the pandering, wooden acting and melodramatic glossiness of the film turned me off and it got considerably worse as the film progressed. Is there a way that producers and filmmakers can make a movie that doesn’t feel like a religious commercial? I am literally begging for a writer and filmmaker to prove me wrong with something that doesn’t feel like it came off the recruitment assembly line because watching these movies is increasingly frustrating. Hail Satan in closing.
Crypto – I hadn’t heard of this financial crime thriller until I saw the new release list but the cast is really interesting, featuring supporting roles from Alexis Bledel, her husband Vincent Kartheiser, Jill Hennessy, Westworld’s Luke Hemsworth and Kurt Russell. The movie follows a young Wall Street banker who is drawn into investigating a tangled web of corruption and fraud in Upstate New York and investigating this movie is a bit perplexing as Richard Roeper seemed to really like it but it doesn’t look like anyone else does. Might be a warning sign.
Modest Heroes – More anime from Shout Factory found it’s way into my mailbox with this new film but this one is a little different as it is an anthology of three original shorts written and directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi (When Marnie Was There), Yoshiyuki Momose (visual effects on Princess Mononoke) and Akihiko Yamashita (assistant director on Tales from Earthsea). The movie takes full advantage of the short form animation and really delves into some emotional filmmaking, fleshing out a promising future for the latter two new feature anime directors. It exhibits the range of Studio Ponoc but also has a bit of a Twilight Zone flare to it as well, almost like an homage. I’m still a little out of the loop on the anime genre but films like this get me closer and closer to being a fan.
Universal Horror Collection: Volume 1 – This boxset got a little delayed as there may have been some sort of rights battle as it was supposed to be called the Bela Lugosi/Boris Karloff Collection but we finally have it, the four movie collector’s edition that has The Black Cat, The Raven, The Invisible Ray and Black Friday. Lately, with all these cool classic horror films being sent to me, I’ve been able to take a deeper look at the genre’s origins and it’s through the great special features that Shout Factory supplies such as the ones for this boxset like 2K scans of the original film elements, commentaries with film historians and so many featurettes. This is a treasure trove of Edgar Allan Poe and two of the greatest legends to bring horror to the masses.
Bertolt Brecht’s Galileo – This is one of two new releases I received from Kino Lorber Classics that are very different films for me to cover, a blu-ray issuing of some of what they call the “American Theater Films”. This one is a biopic about Galileo Galilei, the seventeenth century Italian who laid the foundations of modern science made himself one of the world’s first telescopes and discovered the moons of Jupiter. This version features a cameo by Sir John Gielgud, all filmed in a day, and the director of the movie Joseph Losey had also directed the original Broadway production of “Galileo”, twenty-eight years previously. Also, a nerd moment, Michael Gough appears in this movie in a major role and he would go on to be Alfred in the first four Batman movies.
Lost In The Stars – Continuing on the “American Theater Films” release path, this film is a musical based on the novel Cry, the Beloved Country starring Brock Peters from To Kill A Mockingbird. He plays Stephen Kumalo, a black South African minister desperately searching through back alleys and the dilapidated bungalows of Johannesburg for his son, Absalom. This is the only film in the American Film Theater series to get a G rating from the MPAA although the subject matter feels a bit tough for a general audience in my opinion.
Steve’s Blu-Ray Geek Out:
An Innocent Man – Remember when Tom Selleck was a leading star that could topline a theatrically released movie? Kino Lorber remembers and has put out this blu-ray edition of the crime thriller from 1989 co-starring the brilliant Academy Award winner F. Murray Abraham. Selleck plays a man framed for drug possession by a pair of dirty cops and exacts his revenge after being released from prison in this movie from Bullitt and Breaking Away director Peter Yates. Fun fact about the behind the scenes on this film, actor M.C. Gainey, who audiences may know from Con Air and Django Unchained, was high on cocaine during his audition for the role of Malcolm and still got the role maybe because of his highness.
Unstrung Heroes – Another Kino Lorber Classic, I remember this movie when it was released back in 1995 because it was noted that Seinfeld star Michael Richards was doing a more dramatic role right during the heyday of his hit series. This movie is the feature directorial debut of Oscar winner Diane Keaton and follows a young boy named Steven Lidz who is unhappy with his home life since his mother (Andie MacDowell) got sick and goes and lives with his two crazy Uncles (Richards and John Turturro). There he changes, gets closer to his Uncles and starts to grow into the man he will become but his parents want him home even though he is finally happy and popular. This is a beautiful but ultimately forgotten coming of age film that deserves more eyes on it.
Superstition – Shout Factory has issued this brand new special edition of this creepy witchcraft horror film that features absolutely no one anyone would know. The story is about a witch who is put to death in 1692 but swears vengeance on her persecutors and returns to the present day to punish their descendants. The movie is directed by James W. Roberson, someone more known as a cinematographer for television, and achieved cult status in the United Kingdom though it went by a different name, The Witch. The film was also listed on Greater Manchester Police’s list of films subject to seizure during the UK video nasty scare of the 1980’s, which was just an insanely weird time for horror films.
Dark: Season 2 (Netflix) – Coming from Germany, the first season of this supernatural based show was released just after the second season of Stranger Things, giving those fans something to tide them over for the long wait for the third season. The story is a family saga set in a German town where the disappearance of two young children exposes the relationships among four families. This is the first German series produced by Netflix and although it is a bit of a slow burn, the payoffs are fantastic and the character development is solid. This is some seriously creepy television that will get some love from the genre fans.
Riviera: Season 2 (Sundance Now) – Available through the Roku, this drama stars Julia Stiles and Lena Olin and comes from master filmmaker Neil Jordan who just astounded me with his new movie Greta. The story is about a woman who discovers her family’s lifestyle has been funded by murder her husband is killed in a yacht explosion, tearing her life apart, and seeks to protect herself and her grieving family. The show is a bit soaked in melodrama but Jordan’s knack for intrigue and thrills keeps you engaged for the whole series.
Yellowstone: Season 2 (Paramount) – If you are a big western fan then you need no more information about this series other than it stars Kevin Costner. For those who need a deeper reason to get immersed in this just know that the show was created by Taylor Sheridan, the mind behind Sicario, Hell Or High Water and Wind River, all incredible films. The show is about a ranching family in Montana who faces off against others looking to encroach on their land, including land developers, an Indian reservation, and representatives of America’s first National Park. The show has a lot of middling reviews but, let’s be fair, so does a lot of Costner’s work.
The Lavander Scare (PBS) – It’s really rare that we get something so interesting on the public broadcast network but this is an interesting one as it combines documentary with some high calibre reenactments through voiceover that includes the cast of Zachary Quinto, Cynthia Nixon, T.R. Knight and narrated by Glenn Close. The film is about some tragic history from when the U.S. was deeply embroiled in the Cold War and President Eisenhower deemed homosexuals to be “security risks” and ordered the immediate firing of any government employee discovered to be gay or lesbian. It triggered a vicious witch hunt that lasted for forty years and ruined thousands of lives but ultimately triggered what would become the modern LGBT rights movement.
Drunk History: Season 6 (Comedy Network) – If you have yet to catch a single episode of this madness from creator Derek Waters, the gist of the premise is that he gets a comedian pal sloppy drunk and then asks them to tell a story from somewhere in history then, to sweeten the pot for us viewers, he gets a cast of famous actors and comedians to reenact the story to hilarious results. I have loved every episode I’ve seen, all available on Crave, and have already been enjoying this new season which includes appearances by Seth Rogen as Victor Frankenstein, Chris Parnell as Carl Sagan and Thomas Lennon as William Randolph Hearst, just to name a few.
Categories: What The Hell Should I Watch•Tags: American Film Theatre, An Innocent Man, Anna, Bertolt Brecht's Galileo, Blu-Ray, Child's Play (2019), Comedy Network, Crypto, Dark, Drunk History, Film Reviews, Hotel Mumbai, Kino Classics, Kino Lorber, Lost In The Stars, Modest Heroes, Movie Reviews, Netflix, Paramount, PBS, Riviera, Run The Race, Shout Factory, Sundance Now, Superstition, Television, The Lavander Scare, Toy Story 4, Under The Silver Lake, Universal Horror Collection: Volume 1, Unstrung Heroes, Us, Wonder Park, Yellowstone•
What The Hell Should I Watch? – June 13
Men In Black: International – Seven years after the attempt to bring this franchise back with the lacklustre Men In Black 3 we are going for the reboot treatment with really no returning cast members except for Emma Thompson who only appeared in the last film. Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson reunite to take on intergalactic threats which may tie back to a mole in their own organization. I enjoy both actors a lot so I really want this film to work and rejuvenate this story but the trailers leave me with absolutely nothing aside from a hopefully funny animated side character voiced by Kumail Nanjani. I don’t really have enough faith in director F. Gary Gray to pull this off either.
Shaft – Speaking of rebooting a franchise, Shaft gets the whole grandfather, dad and son treatment with Richard Roundtree and Samuel L. Jackson reprising their roles as John Shaft I and John Shaft II respectively as they mentor John Shaft Jr., played by Independence Day: Resurgence star Jesse T. Usher. The twist is that Shaft Jr. isn’t a tough guy like his dad and grandpa but a cybersecurity genius and MIT graduate who must use his skills to solve the murder of a close family friend. The film is directed by Barbershop and Fantastic Four director Tim Story and while this movie is more playing to his style I just don’t have a belief that this will be anything beyond a vaguely entertaining film. (Not opening in Kamloops)
The Dead Don’t Die – Jim Jarmusch takes his hilariously deadpan style and applies it to a genre that always needs a bit of a fresh breath, zombie horror. Bringing some of his staple stars including Bill Murray from his film Coffee And Cigarettes, Adam Driver from his last effort Patterson and, of course, Tilda Swinton, Jarmusch crafts a small-town story of a zombie outbreak where the weirdo citizens have to band together to survive. This movie is definitely not going to rope in everyone as horror fans will be possibly put off by the dialogue style and, well, all of this great filmmaker’s movies have a less than mainstream appeal. I’m excited for it. (Not opening in Kamloops or Oshawa)
Late Night – Lots of great praise and reviews are coming in for this Mindy Kaling written comedy that she stars in as well alongside the great Emma Thompson. Thompson plays Katherine Newbury, a late night talk show host who is on the cusp of losing her show due to low ratings. Kaling’s character is a writer brought in a gender equality push by Newbury in an attempt to give a fresh rejuvenation to the show and the two slowly form a bond that might be the ticket to getting ratings back. The film is being lauded for its fresh comedy approach and Mindy Kaling’s storytelling shedding light on diversity in the high entertainment levels. I really hope this movie succeeds as I think it would do great things for how we look at race, gender and popular films. (Not opening in Hamilton or Oshawa)
Echo In The Canyon – Headed by Wallflowers frontman and the son of a legendary musician Jacob Dylan, this movie explore the Los Angeles area of Laurel Canyon in the 1960s, a thriving time of exploration, collaboration and a burgeoning rock and roll style. Through interviews with David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Tom Petty, Michelle Phillips, Roger McGuinn and more, Dylan helps give as an idea of what this time looked like, what we received from it musically and some really great insight into the personal friendships of some of the greatest musicians ever. Adding to that, Dylan and friends like Beck, Cat Power, Fiona Apple and Eric Clapton get together to cover a lot of this great music both live and in the recording studio. The soundtrack is available now and is just fantastic. Go see this movie then go get the album, you won’t regret it. (Only playing in Toronto, Hamilton and Vancouver.)
Halston – This seems to be a consistent thing as every time that I screen a new fashion documentary I say that I don’t really have any sort of invested interest in it yet each time I find myself engrossed in the subject matter. It just happened pretty recently that I watched the fil McQueen, about the late Alexander McQueen, and this one draws a comparison in completely different directions. While McQueen created his art and largely kept his persona subdued, Halston lived his art, flaunted it on his friends like Liza Minnelli and made sure he was the face of his company. Unfortunately, large corporate mergers, ignorant money men and even misappropriation of his name led to constant stress that might have led to his death. An interesting biopic and human interest story. (Only playing in Toronto, Hamilton, Edmonton and Vancouver.)
Captain Marvel – One of the middle pieces along with Ant-Man And The Wasp to tide you over since a large part of the Marvel universe got dusted at the end of Avengers: Infinity War at the hands of Thanos, now we get to see the origin story of a galactic warrior in the comfort of our own home. Battling trolls even before she battles Skrulls in the movie, people were already throwing shade at star Brie Larson but I think she was perfectly suited to play the strongest character in the MCU. I also love that this story takes place in the mid-nineties and has a de-aged Samuel L. Jackson and Clark Gregg plus the villain is played by a great villain actor, Ben Mendelsohn. While this movie is not necessarily the strongest film that we’ve gotten in the ten plus years of Marvel Studios it is certainly an entertaining one.
Five Feet Apart – It feels like I heard about this one a long while back and it’s just making its debut now. Riverdale star Dylan Sprouse and Support The Girls’ Haley Lu Richardson, a favorite of mine, lead this film about two terminally ill teens who fall in love after meeting at the hospital. Give Richarson’s involvement in the film I am immediately drawn to this but it could go down the same path we saw in Josh Green’s adaptation of the popular young adult novel The Fault In Our Stars, a film I was a bit late to find but enjoyed a lot.
Captive State – This movie looked absolutely fascinating and I have to say it was due to smart marketing with its trailers not giving a lot of exposition and doing almost what Cloverfield did with an alien invasion angle. The film takes place in Chicago ten years after it has been infiltrated and taken over by an extraterrestrial force. Now subservient to their new overlords, the film explores the human dynamics of everyday life, politics and the formation of a resistance. This definitely looks my type of movie through in through and I’m was excited about what Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes filmmaker Rupert Wyatt was bringing in this sci-fi mystery and the cast including Vera Farmiga, John Goodman Moonlight’s Ashton Sanders and If Beale Street Could Talk’s Kiki Layne was just icing on the cake. I never received this movie in theaters and finally got to check it out now and was so very disappointed. The film is a narrative mess that seems to meander constantly in its storytelling, almost to a point that I couldn’t tell who the main character was. The effects come across as either unfinished in the landscape shots and alien craft sequences and way too dark in the only instances where we get an actual look at the alien. What a waste.
The Mustang – I’ve enjoyed actor Matthias Schoenaerts work since I first saw him in Left Bank and since he did The Drop I think he’s made a stride into the North American cinema landscape and this film looks like it could further his leading man push. He plays Roman, a violent inmate who tries to find a path out of his rage through participating in an outdoor maintenance program training wild horses. Both Schoenaerts and co-star Bruce Dern are being praised for the film but it really was an unfortunate afterthought during awards season.
T-34 – A World War II tank film from Russia, this was an unexpected movie in my mailbox and good luck reading up on it if you surf onto Rotten Tomatoes because the page doesn’t exist. It’s supposed to but it’s a 404 Gateway error instead. The film follows a group of Russian POWs who are desperately escaping a German prison camp in a salvaged T-34 tank. The movie relies on the brotherhood between these characters and, although there’s no documentary confirmation of a Soviet tank’s escape from the German concentration camp, there was confirmed successful escape of Soviet imprisoned pilots leading by Michael Devyataev on German bomber in February 1945. If you dig World War II movies you will definitely feel this one.
Sinatra In Palm Springs: The Place He Called Home – More music documentaries but this one is focused on possibly the most popular crooners of all time, O’l Blue Eyes. In particular, this movie looks at his connection to Palm Springs, his home for fifty years of his life, a place that he also spent the time of his brief but rocky marriage to actress Ava Gardner. The Rancho Mirage, the name of his home, was what he called “My Heaven” and may even contain the ghost of the Rat Packer if you believe in that sort of thing.
Can’t Stop The Music – The Pride Month releases from Shout Factory continues this week with this big ensemble musical that acts as a biopic on The Village People in a way. With the disco group at the center of attention, the movie also features Bruce Jenner and Steve Guttenberg, the latter playing a disc jockey who gets a career break playing at the local club, Saddle Tramps. After writing a song about his roommate, a retired supermodel, he gathers enough clout to earn a record deal which stars his ladder to disco stardom. Unfortunately, this movie absolutely tanked at the box office and was always paired with the Olivia Newton-John film Xanadu, another critical and financial failure.
Frankenstein Created Woman – Peter Cushing playing Victor Frankenstein in a Hammer horror film. This is all a brilliant recipe to make classic theatrical monster movies but this one comes with a gender twist. This film features a freshly resurrected Dr. Victor Frankenstein who’s first dastardly plan is to transfer the essence of a murdered young man into the body of a woman which prompts an insatiable urge to kill all those around her. Legendary director Martin Scorcese actually lists this movie as one of his favorite in the horror genre and many laud it as one of the best of the Hammer catalogue with its freshness in plot and storytelling. You also win me over with Cushing in the lead. He was amazing.
Jeffrey – The second of the Pride Month movies this week, this dramedy has a pretty great cast with Steven Weber, Michael T. Weiss, Patrick Stewart and Nathan Lane. The movie, released in 1995, is about a gay man living in New York who decides to swear off sex at the height of the AIDS epidemic but immediately meets the man of his dreams afterward. Does he stay true to his commitment or pursue a relationship that could be worthy of giving everything up? Patrick Stewart, who plays the partner of someone in the terminal stage of HIV, read this script on the set of Star Trek: Generations and used the emotion from it to portray a pivotal emotional scene for it. Definitely happy to receive this important movie in the gay community.
Devil’s Kiss – A movie sent to me by Kino Lorber’s Redemption releases, this is the classic Italian “Satan’s minion’s” movie with a professor and a disgraced former countess who band together to use an occult spell to reanimate dead bodies to do their murderous bidding. The movie was made by writer and director Georges Gigo who had a very short career of only four films all revolving around the occult, demons and, well, women and brothels, kind of like a typical Italian man in the 1970s. This movie is full of camp, paint like red blood and lots of nudity, the perfect movie to riff on with a group of friends like you’re doing your own Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Green Card – Remember when American cinema was pushing French legend and plane urinating champion Gerard Depardieu as an A-list star? Well, this is one of the movies that came from that time and it holds up as a sweetheart of a film with Andie MacDowell, directed by one of the great Australian directors Peter Weir. The film has Depardieu as a French man who agrees to a marriage of convenience in order to stay in the United States and, obviously because this is a rom-com, the feelings grow into a real relationship as the story progresses. Fun fact, and totally against the norm of Hollywood, Weir asked MacDowell to gain weight for the movie instead of losing it.
Grave Of The Vampire – Another seventies vampire film from the vaults of Shout Factory, this movie doesn’t really have any stars of note and the lead billed actor only has thirty minutes of screen time but it is a disturbing little b-movie entry. The movie follows the legendary vampire Kroft who descends on a graveyard after a long slumber, attacking a couple, assaulting the woman and impregnating her. The child that comes from this is an imp of a vampire, feeding only on the blood from his now living dead mother. Yes, this movie is all kinds of messed up, I wonder why we ever really heard about it before.
The Manitou – Speaking of weird little horror films, we go back to 1978 for this story of psychics, grotesque body lumps and four hundred-year-old Native American demons. I’m definitely getting weird with the Geek Outs this week but as soon as this one crossed my doorway I knew it’d be fun. For some real-life weirdness, the director of this movie William Girdler was actually killed before the release when his helicopter crashed as he was scouting for his next movie. Unfortunately, the film wasn’t a huge success or memorable but they did hand out barf bags at the premiere. Classy.
Bachman – Definitely one of Canada’s greatest living musicians, Randy Bachman gets the full documentary treatment in this short new film from John Barnard who directed the Sheepdogs doc Have At It in 2012. The focus of this movie is to follow Bachman as he writes his newest song and also take a trip down memory lane featuring rarely seen footage, pictures and archived documents that had been stored in our nation’s capital for decades. This movie has interviews with some of the other greats we have here like Neil Young, Sam Roberts and Buffy Sainte Marie, people from the press like Terry David Mulligan and, a personal favorite also from Winnipeg like Bachman, Chris Jericho. This is a really great week for music documentaries on What The Hell Should I Watch.
The Big Clock – A late arrival I received from Arrow Video, this film noir crime thriller comes from 1948 and features one of Paramount’s most bankable and durable stars Ray Milland, Tarzan’s Jane, Maureen O’Sullivan and Spartacus actor Charles Laughton. The film follows a greedy tycoon who frames an unknown and innocent man for a murder he committed. Unfortunately for the man bent on ruining his life, the falsely accused has enough wherewithal to start investigating the charge himself. Funny enough, Kevin Costner’s “No Way Out” is actually a remake of this film.
Marvel’s Jessica Jones: Season 3 (Netflix) – The final Marvel series available on Netflix takes its bow with one of my favorites, the tough-willed, super strong and heavy drinking private investigator. Kristen Ritter has really owned this role, an absolute comic fan favorite, giving her a texture onscreen of an embattled woman that has fought her way through memory loss, abuse and post-traumatic stress.I’m really looking forward to how this season with deal with the final resolution of this character and what other Marvel characters it will introduce along the way. Heck, as a comic fan this is what I look forward to with all the shows. It was really a golden Netflix time and now it’s over.
Trinkets: Season 1 (Netflix) – This is kind of my wild card this week because it’s a teen drama so it could really go either way. Brianna Hildebrand who played the angsty Negasonic Teenage Warhead in the Deadpool movies, stars in this series about three girls who meet in Shoplifters Anonymous and become friends. The reason I’m interested in this one is it kind of gives me a Nick And Norah’s Infinite Playlist vibe, which is fitting as the creators directed Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List, based on a book by the same author.
Absentia: Season 2 (Amazon Prime & Showcase) – Canadian actress and former Castle star Stana Kati stars in this crime drama about an FBI agent who is declared dead in absentia, otherwise known as a legal presumption of death, and must fight to reclaim her family, identity and innocence when she finds herself the prime suspect in a string of murders. The show, produced in a co-production with Israel and the US, was a difficult shoot because all ten episodes of the first season were filmed simultaneously based on location. It was filmed like a movie over three and a half months in the middle of winter.
Too Old To Die Young: Season 1 (Amazon Prime) – This collaboration between one of my favorite filmmakers ever Nicholas Winding Refn and one of the greatest comic writers to be printed Ed Brubaker has been brewing for a while and I’ve been not so patiently anticipating it. Miles Teller, William Balwin, John Hawkes and Jena Malone star in this new series about a young Los Angeles detective who lives a double life as a vicious hitman. The two parallel existences start to crumble his reality and blur his perception of reality as he falls deeper into violence. This show is not going to be for those with a weak stomach and will most likely find a niche audience.
Los Espookys: Season 1 (HBO) – After Portlandia thoroughly made me laugh my ass off, I’m totally willing to always watch anything Fred Armisen does without a doubt and this weird new comedy is a great example. With Armisen in the lead, the show is about a group of horror fans who turn their love of the genre into a business that’s sole purpose is to provide “scares fro the needy” by travelling to a weird Latin American country where the strange and eerie are just part of the normal everyday life. The show may be a bit too quirky to nail down a regular audience but it could also become a comedy cult classic.
Categories: What The Hell Should I Watch•Tags: Absentia, Amazon Prime, Bachman, Blu-Ray, Can't Stop The Music, Captain Marvel, Captive State, Devil's Kiss, Echo In The Canyon, Film Reviews, Five Feet Apart, Frankenstein Created Woman, Grave Of The Vampire, Green Card, Halston, HBO, Jeffrey, Late Night, Los Espookys, Marvel's Jessica Jones, Men In Black: International, Movie Reviews, Netflix, New Releases, Shaft (2019), Showcase, Sinatra In Palm Springs: The Place He Called Home, T-34, Television, The Big Clock, The Dead Don't Die, The Manitou, The Mustang, Too Old To Die Young, Trinkets•
What The Hell Should I Watch? – Jun 6
The Secret Life Of Pets 2 – Illumination Entertainment brings out this new sequel, one that isn’t connected to their Despicable Me franchise and all without the problematic Louis CK providing the lead voice, this time around being replaced by one of the good guys, Patton Oswalt. All the other favorites have returned including Eric Stonestreet, Jenny Slate and Kevin Hart along with newcomers Tiffany Haddish and Harrison Ford, so all the kids should be happy and I actually thought the first movie was pretty fun so I have good expectations for this follow-up. Illumination could be looking at their next monster franchise if all goes well.
Dark Phoenix – I haven’t had any faith in an X-Men movie since Bryan Singer ripped the reigns of the franchise back from director Matthew Vaughn after First Class, which was phenomenal, to make Days Of Future Past which was a film that crumbled under the weight of simply deconstructing it after my viewing. Then came Apocalypse, which was a dismal piece of convenient plot piece garbage and now we have this new film, the end story to this long-running Marvel created story and directed by producer Simon Kinberg, who I think is the reason, along with Singer, that this series took such a nosedive. So, where are my hopes with this movie? About ankle height. Yes, this may be total crap again.
Pavarotti – I’m really hit or miss with the narrative films of Ron Howard but as a documentarian, more importantly, a music documentarian he is making some seriously great movies. After his last one, Eight Days A Week, he focuses on the life and work of opera legend Luciano Pavarotti and I have to admit that my knowledge of and even appreciation for opera is quite low but the passion and joy that flows through the man in archival and rehearsal footage and home movies is almost infectious. Howard also uses Pavarotti’s concert footage in a way that helps tell the story of his work, his creative mind and his personal relationships. This is a great watch for any music lover with a broader mind in their tastes. (Only opening in Toronto and Vancouver)
The Tomorrow Man – Two stellar actors in John Lithgow and Blythe Danner lead this lighthearted romantic drama about two ageing people who have seemed to have given up on love and friendship. Lithgow plays Ed, a recluse who is constantly preparing for the end of the world, constantly buying provisions to stock in his bomb shelter at the local grocers, the place he spots Blythe Danner’s character Ronnie, who works at the local knick knack shop, buying things she will never use. Ed eventually steels up enough nerve to ask Ronnie out and the odd relationship of feeling out each other’s quirks begins. The story feels a bit standard but these two veterans are really what the draw is here because they make every moment of the film feel so deeply meaningful. (Only opening in Toronto and Vancouver)
The Souvenir – This is a really interesting film as it has Tilda Swinton playing mother to her real-life daughter Honor Swinton Byrne in a story about a young film student in the early 80s who becomes romantically involved with a man who sends her life into chaos. Coming of age dramas can be hit or miss but the narrative moves a bit differently in this movie as it is a semi-autobiographical film for director Joanna Hogg. Swinton Byrne feels like an established veteran already, handling the emotional heavy lifting that shows the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree or other metaphors of that nature. (Only opening in Vancouver)
Wild Nights With Emily – This is without a doubt one of the weirdest approaches to a biopic I’ve ever seen but Molly Shannon plays famed recluse poet Emily Dickenson in this film that hugs the line of being an odd duck hysterical comedy and a life story. First off, that “recluse” stuff seems to be a complete and utter fabrication according to this movie, lies to smear the gifted writer and prevent her works from being published, another false rumor that this movie seeks to dispell. Featuring a brilliant performance on the opposite of Shannon, Amy Seimetz plays Mabel, her nemesis whose only goal is to destroy her reputation through misinformation. This movie is odd, quirky and totally fascinating, something that would pair perfectly with Cynthia Nixon’s portrayal of Dickenson in Terence Davies A Quiet Passion. (Only opening in Toronto and Vancouver)
Framing John DeLorean – We all known the DeLorean as Back To The Future made it such a huge part of our pop culture that you really need to live under a rock to not know about it but is the rise and fall of the DeLorean Motor Company as common of knowledge? This film is the only film to be made on the man who had a dream and screwed everyone in the process to keep it alive as four different films were optioned but never came to fruition, one produced by DeLorean himself. This documentary takes a fascinating approach of being a linear story told about the rise of an idea, the execution and then the scandalous fall through bad deals and a cocaine bust with re-enactments starring Alec Baldwin. The final result is ambitious and engrossing, such an interesting way of telling a real story. (Only opening in Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver and Barrie)
A Madea Family Funeral – Tyler Perry is moving onto the next phase of his life and in order for him to do that he needs to put a merciful end to him dressing up as an old woman like he was basketball star Larry Johnson playing Grandmama in the nineties, so, naturally you’d have a funeral. You know it’s a really slow week when this film is your big release but here we are. I don’t really expect any sort of deviation from your regular Madea film, I’m just glad we aren’t lampooning horror anymore and that Perry can put his oldest character, as well as the other three he plays in this series, to bed.
Gloria Bell – This is sure to be a great film just based on the track record of Chilean director Sebastian Lelio alone. Winner of last year’s best foreign Oscar for his amazing film A Fantastic Woman and also the man behind the acclaimed drama The Club, it’s really cool to see him continue his rise in the mainstream with his latest, a remake of one of his own. The film follows Julianne Moore as a woman seeking love in the clubs of Los Angeles in her 50s and co-stars the great John Turturro, so that’s two tried and true actor’s actors.
JT LeRoy – Before even really paying attention to what the premise was for this film, I was captivated by the two lead stars Kristen Stewart and Laura Dern, although the name JT Leroy seemed so familiar. It turns out that this soul-wrenching and inspirational writer who turned out to be a total fraud was behind a movie that astounded me years ago, The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, the debut of Asia Argento as a filmmaker. Well, this movie is about exactly that, the creation of a false persona to be used in public by the writer behind Leroy, Laura Albert, and the woman that was used to be “his” body, Savannah Knoop, who wrote the book this movie was based on. And yes, they cover the Argento movie with Diane Kruger playing that character in a possibly detrimental way to the real-life person. I found this film absolutely fascinating and it is a damn fine chemistry of performances from Dern and Stewart.
The Man Who Killed Don Quixote – After a long twenty-five years of trying to get his white whale, a Don Quixote movie made, one version of it documented in the tragically hilarious documentary Lost In La Mancha, his vision has finally arrived for us. The movie has Adam Driver as an entitled commercial director who returns to the Spanish village he shot a low budget Don Quixote film in only to find his lead star still living the role. As he joins him for an insane adventure, he begins to feel the connection to the land, the story and the life of Quixote that he had long forgotten. I think the biggest problem with the movie is that it comes after a decade and a half of anticipation and its never going to be exactly what you wanted. It feels disjointed and haphazard at times with erratic cuts and seemingly odd plot holes but it exudes Gilliam’s charm and originality as a filmmaker and for that reason alone I celebrate this achievement. He finally did it and I’m proud of him.
The Haunting Of Sharon Tate – This year is going to be a big one when it comes to anything dealing with Charles Manson and Sharon Tate as we’ve already had former Doctor Who Matt Smith play him in Charlie Says and next month we had Margot Robbie taking on the Tate role in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood. The thing to know about this movie in particular right away is that it isn’t good. Hilary Duff plays Tate in this film and, well, she’s just not very good and neither is her co-star Jonathan Bennett. Usual television documentarian Daniel Farrands writes and directs this film, one of his three true crime adaptations and I really wish, for everyone’s sake, that he didn’t.
Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan: Season 1 – It’s been a movie lifetime of ups and downs for the government agent character of Jack Ryan as he rose to fame as Alec Baldwin, sustained it for a couple of films with Harrison Ford then plummeted with Ben Affleck then Chris Pine. Now, with this Amazon Prime produced series, he’s back on the upswing with John Krasinski in the role. The show is very solid and I’ve always wanted this character to succeed in some fashion and had no idea this would be it. Season two is probably going to be just as great too.
I’ll Take Your Dead – Another horror original from Shout Factory, this movie is also a Canadian one from Ontario writer and director Chad Archibald. The story is about a father and daughter who live in a farmhouse in the county where he disposes of dead bodies from gang-related murders in the nearby city and the daughter Gloria is convinced that some of the victims that have been dropped off are haunting their house. The movie suffers a bit in the script department but the blood, the atmosphere and the general plot keep you on board.
A Star Is Born: Special Encore Edition – A musician helps a young singer and actress find fame, even as age and alcoholism send his own career into a downward spiral in this third remake. This is an excellent movie, punctuated by brilliant performances from Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga with great music that will get caught in your head plus pacing and direction that keeps you engrossed, also by Cooper with the eye of master cinematographer Matthew Libatique. There’s such a pent up soul running throughout this film and feel it does real justice to the story, even if it’s one we’ve seen three times before. I know I’ve said all of this before, the only difference with this version of the movie is that all of the performances have been extended, adding another eleven minutes on to the movie.
Mighty Morphin Power Ranger The Movie – I can’t lie, when I opened the package from Shout Factory and saw this staring up at me my childhood screamed in excitement and, yes, I spent money to see this in theaters. The original incarnation of the iconic space ninjas hit the big screen in this mid-nineties hit to take on the dastardly Ivan Ooze and we were all here for it. Whether we were still rabid fans of the show, had a crush on Pink Ranger Amy Jo Johnson or just thought Tommy the Green Ranger was the coolest, this movie had you hooked and Shout Factory knows how to play into that nostalgia so brilliantly. This is one of those “gotta have it” nerd buys for sure.
The Iceman Cometh – A classic film released by Kino Lorber, this is a pretty interesting find just based on all the pieces involved. For one, it’s my first Lee Marvin movie in my collection, which is crazy that I don’t own Dirty Dozen or something yet. It was both the final film of The Wild Bunch’s Robert Ryan and The Best Years Of Our Lives actor Frederic March as well as a last minute lead for Marvin who was stepping in for Jason Robards. The movie is an adaptation of a popular Eugene O’Neill play and also has Jeff Bridges in an early role, one he had turned down initially before being berated by his former boss, The Last American Hero director Lamont Johnson.
The Vault – The weirdness in this thriller is off the chain and I absolutely love it. The main overarching story is about a bank robbery but that is merely just the tipping point of the story. The real intrigue comes from WHO’s bank they are robbing and WHAT is contained in the vault. Taryn Manning, Clifton Collins Jr. and James Franco star in The Signal director Dan Bush’s brand new horror mystery that has a trailer that will blow your hair back and the details of the plot are best kept under wraps as this is a story that evolves in some crazy directions. This is a genre mash-up that won’t rope in everyone but for those who want something a little different it will definitely quell that urge.
Brighton Beach Memoirs – Another one of those great entries into the Shout Select series from Shout Factory, this is a special film to fans of stage plays, screenplays and teleplays as this is a loosely autobiographical story from one of the greatest writers in history, Neil Simon. Jonathan Silverman made his onscreen debut as Eugene, a teenager recollecting his upbringing in a tight-knit Jewish family, going through puberty, sexual fantasies and having absolutely no space in a crowded house to call his own. The supporting cast features Blythe Danner and was part of the most productive part of Simon’s career where he made eleven straight films with producer Ray Stark including Biloxi Blues, Murder By Death and The Goodbye Girl.
Warning Sign – With Chernobyl dazzling audiences on HBO and The Hot one just debuting on Nat Geo, I thought it was a perfect time for me to bring this Shout Factory release starring Sam Waterston, Kathleen Quinlan and Yaphet Kotto. The plot follows an outbreak of a virulent bacteria in a secret government laboratory, which seals everyone inside after the security agents act on “protocol one”. Waterston’s character is the nearby town’s sheriff whose wife is locked in the facility and he is on a desperate rampage to get her out. Without giving too much away about this movie, I think it is pretty massively underrated and holds up the paranoia horror genre quite well.
The Grand Duel – A new special edition that I received from Arrow, I was really excited to get my hands on this one for a big reason. The film stars Lee Van Cleef, the legend who was in The Good, The Bad And The Ugly and Escape From New York. Better than just having him in the movie, he’s the hero, a gruff ex-sheriff who throws his hat in with a wrongly convicted man to take on the band of outlaws who framed him. Quick, simple and right to the point in an iconic feeling western storyline. Funny enough, for trivia sake, the music from this film was used by Quentin Tarantino in his Kill Bill movies.
Pure: Season 2 (Superchannel) – Making it’s shift to a brand new platform on Superchannel, this show is a homegrown series that should be on serious television enthusiasts lists. It’s the story of Noah Funk, a newly-elected Mennonite pastor, who is determined to rid his community of drug traffickers by betraying a fellow Mennonite to the police and Victoria actor Ryan Robbins excels in the lead role, the drawing point for every Breaking Bad fan to jump on it, he’s just that great. Christopher Heyerdahl from Hell On Wheels also features in this as well.
Fear The Walking Dead: Season 5 (AMC) – Let’s face it, at this point Fear is the best zombie show on television as the original incarnation of this series needs a little shot in the ass to get going again. The cast is flying on all cylinders with Lennie James’ Morgan being my absolute favorite at the moment but don’t let that take away from how stellar Alycia Debnam-Carey is on a consistent level. In a ramble of names, this show is always getting the best of the best as Garret Dillahunt, Jenna Elfman and Matt Frewer are still feature roles and the breakout star, Colman Domingo, is still killing it as Victor Strand.
NOS4A2: Season 1 (AMC) – From the mind of writer Joe Hill, the son of horror master Stephen King, comes this brand new series to bring vampire lore to a whole new level. Zachary Quinto plays Charlie Manx, an immortal vampire who feeds off the souls of children who finds his ultimate nemesis in a woman with a special ability that could threaten his entire existence. I’m already on board with the mere mention of Hill’s name, being that I’ve been waiting years for an adaptation of his popular comic Locke & Key, but even cooler is that this all takes place in the Stephen King universe, complete with small references to Maine towns and King-verse happenings. I’m psyched to see where this series will go.
The Handmaid’s Tale: Season 3 (Bravo) – The hit Margaret Atwood series returns again and will certainly keep it’s perch on top of the pack when it comes to award season because, let’s face it, Elisabeth Moss is just that damn good. My favorite trivia about this show (because you are going to watch it whatever I say) is the actresses have said that the head coverings they wear when they go outside are like blinders, completely cutting off their peripheral vision. The actresses can’t see each other unless they’re looking directly at each other. They have to act largely based on what they can hear. Fascinating.
Luther: Season 5 (BBC America) – I just love that DCI John Luther is a role that Idris Elba will always come back to because, besides The Wire, this role is one of my absolute favorites. The sad thing is that it looks like the four-episode season will be all we see of him in this tortured performance as that’s all they have in the cannon at this point, aside from a possible movie. I’ll take what I can get as this is a show that always delivers.
Categories: What The Hell Should I Watch•Tags: A Madea Family Funeral, A Star Is Born (2018), Arrow Video, Blu-Ray, Brighton Beach Memoirs, Dark Phoenix, Fear The Walking Dead, Film Reviews, Framing John DeLorean, Gloria Bell, I'll Take Your Dead, JT LeRoy, Kino Lorber, Luther, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers The Movie, Movie Reviews, MVD Visual, NOS4A2, Pavarotti, Pure, Shout Factory, Television, The Grand Duel, The Handmaid's Tale, The Haunting Of Sharon Tate, The Iceman Cometh, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, The Secret Life Of Pets 2, The Souvenir, The Tomorrow Man, The Vault, Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan, Warning Sign, Wild Nights With Emily•
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US energy policy
The storm clouds have been gathering over energy policy for a decade or more. Joe Castro/AAP Image
A high price for policy failure: the ten-year story of spiralling electricity bills
January 1, 2018 5.37pm EST
David Blowers, Grattan Institute
David Blowers
Energy Fellow, Grattan Institute
David Blowers does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Politicians are told never to waste a good crisis. Australia’s electricity sector is in crisis, or something close to it. The nation’s first-ever statewide blackout, in South Australia in September 2016, was followed by electricity shortages in several states last summer. More shortages are anticipated over coming summers.
But for most Australians, the most visible impact of this crisis has been their ever-increasing electricity bills. Electricity prices have become a political hot potato, and the blame game has been running unchecked for more than a year.
Read more: A year since the SA blackout, who's winning the high-wattage power play?
Electricity retailers find fault with governments, and renewable energy advocates point the finger at the nasty old fossil-fuel generators. The right-wing commentariat blames renewables, while the federal government blames everyone but itself.
The truth is there is no silver bullet. No single factor or decision is responsible for the electricity prices we endure today. Rather, it is the confluence of many different policies and pressures at every step of the electricity supply chain.
According to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), retail customers in the National Electricity Market (which excludes Western Australia and the Northern Territory) now pay 44% more in real terms for electricity than we did ten years ago.
Four components make up your electricity bill. Each has contributed to this increase.
How your rising power bills stack up. ACCC, Author provided
The biggest culprit has been the network component – the cost of transporting the electricity. Next comes the retail component – the cost of billing and servicing the customer. Then there is the wholesale component – the cost of generating the electricity. And finally, the government policy component – the cost of environmental schemes that we pay for through our electricity bills.
Each component has a different tale, told differently in every state. But ultimately, this is a story about a decade of policy failure.
Network costs form the biggest part of your electricity bill. Australia is a big country, and moving electricity around it is expensive. As the graph above shows, network costs have contributed 40% of the total price increase over the past decade.
The reason we now pay so much for the network is simply that we have built an awful lot more stuff over the past decade. It’s also because it was agreed – through the industry regulator – that network businesses could build more network infrastructure and that we all have to pay for it, regardless of whether it is really needed.
Network businesses are heavily regulated. Their costs, charges and profits all have to be ticked off. This is supposed to keep costs down and prevent consumers being charged too much.
That’s the theory. But the fact is costs have spiralled. Between 2005 and 2016 the total value of the National Electricity Market (NEM) distribution network increased from A$42 billion to A$72 billion – a whopping 70%. During that time there has been little change in the number of customers using the network or the amount of electricity they used. The result: every unit of electricity we consume costs much more than it used to.
There are several reasons for this expensive overbuild. First, forecasts of electricity demand were wrong – badly wrong. Instead of ever-increasing consumption, the amount of electricity we used started to decline in 2009. A whole lot of network infrastructure was built to meet demand that never eventuated.
Second, governments in New South Wales and Queensland imposed strict reliability settings – designed to avoid blackouts – on the networks in the mid-2000s. To meet these reliability settings, the network businesses had to spend a lot more money reinforcing their networks than they otherwise would have.
Third, the way in which network businesses are regulated encourages extra spending on infrastructure. In an industry where you are guaranteed a 10% return on investment, virtually risk-free – as network businesses were between 2009 and 2014 – you are inclined to build, build, build.
The blame for this “gold-plating” of network assets is spread widely. Governments have been accused of panicking and setting reliability standards too high. The regulator has copped its share for allowing businesses too much capital spend and too high a return. Privatisation has also been criticised, which is slightly bizarre given that the worst offenders have been state-owned businesses.
Retail rollercoaster
The second biggest increase in your bill has been the amount we pay for the services provided to us by retailers. Across the NEM, 26% of the price increase over the past decade has been due to retail margins.
This increase in the retail component was never supposed to happen. To understand why, you must go back to the rationale for opening the retail sector to competition. Back in the 1990s, it was felt that retail energy was ripe for competition, which would deliver lower prices and more innovative products for consumers.
In theory, where competition exists, firms seek to reduce their costs to maximise their profits, in turn allowing them to reduce prices so as to grab as many customers as possible. The more they cut their costs, the more they can cut prices. Theoretically, costs are minimised and profits are squeezed. If competition works as it’s supposed to, the retail component should go down, not up.
But the exact opposite has happened in the electricity sector. In Victoria, the state that in 2009 became the first to completely deregulate its retail electricity market, the retail component of the bill has contributed to 36% of the price increase over the past decade.
On average, Victorians pay almost A$400 a year to retailers, more than any other mainland state in the NEM. This is consistent with the Grattan Institute’s Price Shock report, which showed that rising profits are causing pain for Victorian electricity consumers. Many customers remain on expensive deals, and do not switch to cheaper offers because the market is so complicated. These “sticky” customers have been cited as the cause of “excessive” profits to retailers.
But the new figures provided by the ACCC, which come directly from retailers, paint a different picture. The ACCC finds that the increase in margins in Victoria is wholly down to the increasing costs of retailers doing business.
There are reasons why competition might drive prices up, not down. Retailers now spend money on marketing to recruit and retain customers. And the existence of multiple retailers leads to duplications in costs that would not exist if a single retailer ran the market.
But these increases should be offset by retailers finding savings elsewhere, and this doesn’t seem to have happened. History may judge the introduction of competition to the retail electricity market as an expensive mistake.
Generational problems
So far, we have accounted for 65% of the bill increase of the past decade, and neither renewables nor coal have been mentioned once. Nor were they ever likely to be. The actual generation of electricity has only ever formed a minor portion of your electricity bill – the ACCC report shows that in 2015-16 the wholesale component constituted only 22% of the typical bill.
In the past year, however, wholesale prices have really increased. In 2015-16, households paid on average A$341 a year for the generation of electricity – far less than they were paying in 2006-07. But in the past year, that is estimated to have increased to A$530 a year.
Generators, particularly in Queensland, have been engaging in questionable behaviour, but it is the fundamental change in the supply and demand balance that means higher prices are here to stay for at least the next few years.
The truth is the cost of generating electricity has been exceptionally low in most parts of Australia for most of the past two decades. When the NEM was created in 1998, there was arguably more generation capacity in the system than was needed to meet demand. And in economics, more supply than demand equals low prices.
Over the years our politicians have been particularly good at ensuring overcapacity in the system. Most of the investment in generation in the NEM since its creation has been driven by either taxpayers’ money, or government schemes and incentives – not by market forces. The result has been oversupply.
Up until the late 2000s the market kept chugging along. Then two things happened. First, consumers started using less electricity. And second, the Renewable Energy Target (RET) was ramped up, pushing more supply into the market.
Demand down and supply up meant even more oversupply, and continued low prices. But the combination of low prices and low demand put pressure on the finances of existing fossil fuel generators. Old generators were being asked to produce less electricity than before, for lower prices. Smaller power stations began to be mothballed or retired.
Something had to give, and it did when both Alinta and Engie decided it was no longer financially viable to keep their power stations running. Far from being oversupplied, the market is now struggling to meet demand on hot days when people use the most electricity. The result is very high prices.
A tight demand and supply balance with less coal-fired generation has meant that Australia increasingly relies on gas-fired generation, at a time when gas prices are astronomical, leading to accusations of price-gouging.
Put simply, Australia has failed to build enough new generation over recent years to reliably replace ageing coal plants when they leave the market.
Is it renewable energy’s fault that coal-fired power stations have closed? Yes, but this is what needs to happen if we are to reduce greenhouse emissions. Is it renewables’ fault that replacement generation has not been built? No. It’s the government’s fault for failing to provide the right environment for new investment.
The right investment climate is crucial. Marcella Cheng/The Conversation, CC BY
The current predicament could have been avoided if we had a credible and comprehensive emissions reduction policy to drive investment in the sector. Such a policy would give investors the confidence to build generation with the knowledge about what carbon liabilities they may face in the future. But the carbon price was repealed in 2014 and replaced with nothing.
We’re still waiting for an alternative policy. We’re still waiting for enough generation capacity to be built. And we’re still paying sky-high wholesale prices for electricity.
Finally, we have the direct cost of government green schemes over the past decade: the RET; the household solar panel subsidies; and the energy-efficiency incentives for homes and businesses.
They represent 16% of the price increase over the past 10 years – but they are still only 6% of the average bill.
If the aim of these schemes has been to reduce emissions, they have not done a very good job. Rooftop solar panel subsidies have been expensive and inequitable. The RET is more effective as an industry subsidy than an emissions reduction or energy transition policy. And energy efficiency schemes have produced questionable results.
It hasn’t been a total waste of money, but far deeper emissions cuts could have been delivered if those funds had been channelled into a coherent policy.
Read more: One day we won't need a Renewable Energy Target, because we'll have good climate policy
The story of Australia’s high electricity prices is not really one of private companies ripping off consumers. Nor is it a tale about the privatisation of an essential service. Rather, this is the story of a decade of policy drift and political failure.
Governments have been repeatedly warned about the need to tackle these problems, but have done very little.
Instead they have focused their energy on squabbling over climate policy. State governments have introduced inefficient schemes, scrapped them, and then introduced them again, while the federal government has discarded policies without even trying them.
There is a huge void where our sensible energy policy should be. Network overbuild and ballooning retailer margins both dwarf the impact of the carbon price, yet if you listen only to our politicians you’d be forgiven for thinking the opposite.
And still it goes on. The underlying causes of Australia’s electricity price headaches – the regulation of networks, ineffective retail market competition, and our barely coping generators – need immediate attention. But still the petty politicking prevails.
The Coalition has rejected the Clean Energy Target recommended by Chief Scientist Alan Finkel. Labor will give no guarantee of support for the government’s alternative policy, the National Energy Guarantee. Some politicians doubt the very idea that we need to act on climate change. Some states have given up on Canberra and are going it alone.
We’ve been here before and we know how this story ends. Crisis wasted.
National Electricity Market
Electricity grid
Electricity prices
In the Global Biodiversity Information Facility there are 682,447 records of human encounters with dandelions. from www.shutterstock.com
AI is learning from our encounters with nature – and that’s a concern
Marcella Cheng/The Conversation
Turnbull has politicked himself into irrelevance on energy and climate in 2018
LGBTIQ minorities in many Asian countries must overcome violence and discrimination in their day-to-day lives. Reuters
Michael Kirby: the rainbow in Asia and the fight for gay rights in our region
REUTERS/Rebekah Kebede/File Photo
A gas shortage next year is unlikely, but that’s the only good news
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Scott Warren, left, accompanied by one of his defense lawyers, Amy Knight, speaks with press outside federal court in Tucson, Ariz., on June 11, 2019. Photo: Laura Saunders for The InterceptScott Warren, left, accompanied by one of his defense lawyers, Amy Knight, speaks with press outside federal court in Tucson, Ariz., on June 11, 2019. Photo: Laura Saunders for The Intercept
Felony Trial of No More Deaths Volunteer Scott Warren Ends in Mistrial
Ryan Devereaux
June 12 2019, 12:13 p.m.
Twelve jurors walked into the federal courthouse in Tucson, Arizona, Tuesday afternoon with a problem. Two weeks after the U.S. government began to argue its case in the prosecution of Scott Warren, a border-based humanitarian aid volunteer accused of two counts of felony harboring and one count of conspiracy, the jurors could not come to a unanimous decision as to whether he was innocent or guilty.
The previous afternoon, the jurors had sent a letter to District Judge Raner Collins, informing him that they were deadlocked. Collins ordered them to go back and try again. By Tuesday, they were still stuck. Eight jurors believed Warren was innocent on all counts. Four believed he was guilty. They sent Collins another note, and, at 1:33 p.m., they reentered his courtroom. The judge asked the jurors if they all believed that further deliberation would fail to yield a unanimous decision. On that point, they were all in agreement: The jury was hung.
“I want to thank you for your time and your attention,” Collins said, and with that, he dismissed the jurors, and one of the most important trials involving humanitarian aid on the U.S.-Mexico border in recent memory came to an end.
Nineteen months after his arrest, Warren’s case had drawn international attention and outrage, with United Nations human rights experts and advocacy organizations from around the world decrying the prosecution as a blatant attack on humanitarian aid in a region where thousands of migrants have died — and continue to die — in the desert.
Despite the mistrial, the government has not dropped the charges against Warren, a 36-year-old geographer from Ajo, Arizona. The possibility of a retrial is still alive, with Warren facing up to 20 years in prison if convicted on all counts and sentenced to consecutive terms. A status meeting in the case is scheduled for early July.
“The government put on its best case with the full force of countless resources, and 12 jurors could not agree with that case,” defense attorney Greg Kuykendall told reporters Tuesday. “Scott Warren remains innocent as a legal and as a factual matter, because the jury could not conclude otherwise,” he added. “We remain devoted today in our commitment to defend Scott’s lifelong devotion to providing humanitarian aid.”
Water and other assorted goods outside the Barn, a humanitarian aid shelter in Ajo, Arizona.
Photo: Laura Saunders for The Intercept
Warren was arrested on January 17, 2018, at a humanitarian aid facility in Ajo known as the Barn, some 40 miles above the border, in one of the deadliest stretches of the Sonoran Desert for migrants making their way north. Owing to a Clinton-era border strategy known as Prevention Through Deterrence, which intentionally funnels migrants into the most dangerous areas of the desert and remains the foundation of modern American border enforcement to this day, a minimum of 3,000 people have died in the Arizona borderlands — though the true total is guaranteed to be higher.
In 2014, Warren began building bridges between humanitarian groups in southern Arizona, an effort to focus aid work — including the delivery of food and water, and search and recovery operations — in an area where the effects of Prevention Through Deterrence have been particularly brutal: the so-called West Desert, also known as the Ajo corridor. In the years that followed, these volunteers directly contributed to a historic increase in the number of human remains and bodies recovered in the region.
On the morning of Warren’s arrest, one of the groups Warren volunteers with, the faith-based organization No More Deaths, published a detailed report implicating the Border Patrol in the destruction of jugs containing thousands of gallons of water left for migrants crossing the desert over multiple years. The report included video evidence. Hours after it was published, a pair of plainclothes Border Patrol agents set up a surveillance post across from the Barn. There they spotted Warren with two individuals they suspected were undocumented.
“Toncs at the barn,” agent Brendan Burns wrote in a group text, using Border Patrol slang for migrants; some believe it refers to the sound a flashlight makes when it connects with a human skull.
The “toncs” Burns referred to were 23-year-old Kristian Perez-Villanueva, of El Salvador, and 20-year-old José Arnaldo Sacaria-Goday, of Honduras. The pair had left their countries separately. Perez-Villanueva hoped to seek asylum. Sacaria-Goday was homeless. They were strangers when they met in a Mexican border town. They became close and crossed the border together. They spent two nights in the desert, where they were chased by immigration agents and tossed their backpacks and supplies, including their food.
Backed up by a caravan of law enforcement vehicles, the agents in the wash descended on the Barn and placed Warren and the two young men under arrest. The following month, Warren was indicted by a grand jury. While Warren was released on his own recognizance after a night in Border Patrol custody, Perez-Villanueva and Sacaria-Goday were not. The government detained the pair as material witnesses in its case for several weeks, then deported them once their depositions were taken.
As The Intercept reported in a yearlong investigation published in May, Warren’s felony case was the culmination of an escalating law enforcement crackdown against humanitarian volunteers in southern Arizona that began shortly after President Donald Trump’s inauguration.
Warren was also one of nine No More Deaths volunteers hit with federal misdemeanor littering charges in 2017 for leaving food, water, and other humanitarian aid supplies on a federal wildlife reserve outside Ajo, where migrants routinely die. The first trial in those cases, held in January, resulted in four No More Deaths volunteers convicted and sentenced to 15 months of probation and ordered to pay $250 in fines. A second group of volunteers facing misdemeanor charges accepted similar consequences days later, and the charges against them were formally dismissed.
Warren’s misdemeanor trial was held last month. Judge Collins has yet to issue a decision in that case.
Following the jury’s dismissal Tuesday, Warren’s friends and family filtered out into the hallway on the fifth floor of the courthouse, many unclear on what would happen next.
“Scott wanted to resume his life,” Mark Warren, Scott’s father, told The Intercept. “This has been the focus of Scott’s life for such a long time now, and it’s all encompassing. It’s not like it’s just something that’s happening to me over here — it’s everything.”
Original reporting. Fearless journalism. Delivered to you.
As Warren’s family and supporters awaited new information, Kuykendall and his co-counsel, Amy Knight, were given the rare opportunity to speak with the jurors about the case at length. The defense attorneys told The Intercept they left the conversation with the impression that the deliberations in the case were serious and the jurors’ recaps of the process were specific.
When Warren stepped out of the courthouse Tuesday afternoon, he was greeted by a throng of press, friends, and supporters. Standing before the cameras and microphones, he immediately addressed the issues that matter to him most. “Since my arrest in January 2018, at least 88 bodies were recovered from the Ajo corridor of the Arizona desert. We know that’s a minimum number and that many more are out there and have not been found,” Warren told the crowd. “The government’s plan, in the midst of this humanitarian crisis? Policies to target undocumented people, refugees, and their families; prosecutions to criminalize humanitarian aid, kindness, and solidarity.”
As he wrapped up his brief remarks, Warren turned his focus to the people who have supported him and to the people who have been lost from his story. “I’ve received enormous support from family, friends, lawyers, and my community. Thank you to everyone, and I want to say that I love you all very, very much,” he said. “The other men that were arrested with me that day, José Sacaria-Goday and Kristian Perez-Villanueva, have not received the attention and outpouring of support that I have. I do not know how they are doing now, but I desperately hope that they are safe.”
Ryan Devereaux[email protected]theintercept.com@rdevro
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Iran raps UK for lack of commitment to yellowcake deal
IFP- Iranian parliamentarian Mohammad-Javad Jamali Nobandegani lashed out at the UK’s lack of commitment to its contract with Iran to sell 900 tonnes of concentrated uranium, also known as yellowcake, to the country, saying the issue will soon be addressed in a meeting of the Iranian Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission.
According to a Farsi report by ICANA, Jamali Nobandegani noted that Germany, France, the US and the UK each played the role of a bad cop over the course of the nuclear negotiations with Iran, adding the same role was performed by the UK with regard to its contract with Iran when London broke its promises to Tehran.
With the coming into power of Theresa May and Donald Trump as the UK and US prime minister and president, respectively, there has been a change in the division of responsibilities between the world powers, with the British radical conservative being assigned to go back on the UK’s promises to Iran, he said.
The Iranian lawmaker stressed that, “We expect the Iranian officials in charge of supervising the other sides’ commitment to the implementation of the nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), to give stronger responses to such breaches of commitments by the six world powers.”
“In the past, we were witness to several instances of Washington’s failing to honour its financial and banking commitments to Tehran. This time, the UK is creating problems for the implementation of the deal.”
Commenting on the performance of the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in following up the breaches of promises by the sextet with regard to the JCPOA, he said, “The Foreign Ministry has done its utmost to address such issues. Nevertheless, since this one has recently been raised by the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI), Ali Akbar Salehi, we are not adequately informed about the moves made by the ministry in this regard.”
The lawmaker noted that after Rouhani took office [in 2013], the responsibility of following up issues pertaining to the nuclear talks were taken away from Iran’s Supreme National Security Council and handed over to the Foreign Ministry.
Therefore, he added, the ministry is expected to react immediately and precisely to such moves by the P5+1 and act transparently in protecting the rights of the Iranian nation.
Jamali Nobandegani said although the Foreign Ministry has done its best to tackle such issues and safeguard the rights and interests of the Iranian people, it has, so far, failed to achieve any outstanding achievements.
“The Iranian Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission has failed to hold any serious sessions recently, as it has been engaged in the process of reviewing the bills for the budget of the year to mid-March 2018 and the Sixth Five-Year Economic Development Plan (2017-22). However, it will soon hold a meeting to address this issue.”
Iran-Uk relations, Iran’s yellow cake, Mohammad-Javad Jamali Nobandegani March 13, 2017
Iran’s coverage: Foreign Minister Zarif says Netanyahu is faking history and Jewish faith
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The Montessori School
18 Montessori Place, Kingsley
Dr Maria Montessori
Montessori Characteristics
The Montessori Classroom
Recommend Reading
Term 1, 2019
Our school aims to provide a safe and harmonious learning environment for the spontaneous development of children between the ages of 3 and 18 years in all human spheres.
Montessori has social as well as educational aims so Montessori educators seek to promote peace, international harmony and the well being of all children throughout the world.
The Montessori School was founded by Mrs W. M. Duyker-de-Vries in 1962 and is the oldest Montessori School in Australia.
It is the first Montessori school in Western Australia to include a Secondary school for students from 12 to 18 years and the first Montessori School in the world to offer the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma course, an internationally recognised university entrance qualification.
Our school is located in Kingsley, in Perth's northern suburbs. It enjoys a scenic bushland setting, on top of a hill, overlooking Lake Goollelal.
Initially the school catered for pre-primary children only, with a primary section being added in 1965 and secondary in 1972. The Montessori School became an International Baccalaureate (IB) school in 1993.
Enrolments: 160 - 180 students
Ages: 3 to 18 years.
Pre-Primary:
(three groups)
up to 25 children aged 3 - 6 years, with one teacher and full-time aide
Lower Primary:
(two groups)
up to 25 children aged 7 - 9 years, with one teacher and part-time aide
Upper Primary:
up to 25 students aged 10 - 12 years, with one teacher and part-time aide
Lower Secondary:
up to 25 students aged 13 - 15 years with one teacher and part-time aide
Upper Secondary (IB):
up to 20 students aged 16 - 18 years
Our school has a strong commitment to ensure that Montessori education is available to as many families as possible and therefore fees are kept as low as is practical.
School fees cover all materials and equipment, as well as excursions for students in the primary classes. Some additional charges will apply for secondary students.
Home | Our School | Classrooms | Prospective Parents | Recent News | Upcoming Events | School Community | Contact Us | Sitemap
© 2019 The Montessori School. All rights reserved. Website by AB Web Developers Perth
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COSMOS GLOBAL: Australia (Walangee)
Cosmos Global: Walangee
Proll, Eric - Producer
Hill, E.
Catalogue Number: CDG-DVD-109
Our adventure begins in dense rainforests outside Cairns, in the north of Queensland, one of Australia's most popular tourist destinations. We are part of an expedition that will travel far from the tourist trail and into vast unspoiled regions in order to search for an extraordinary aborigine, Walangee!
A newly-ignited forest fire forces us to change direction and take an alternative route. On this occasion it is no problem, otherwise our entire expedition could be in jeopardy. Our new route travels along a gravel-covered forest road: a four wheel drive vehicle in this part of Queensland is an absolute necessity.
Three rivers, the Lockhart, Pascoe and Jardine, as well as numerous small tributaries, flow across the pathless jungle area of the north coast of Australia. The rivers are habitats for a large variety of very unusual creatures.
We feel a little like how the first European discoverers of Australia must have felt. Cape York Peninsula was one of the first regions to be discovered by the first seafarers, long before Captain James Cook discovered the fifth continent.
Within his hut, Chief Walangee is busy with the creation of a new harpoon. For the inhabitants of Cape York Peninsula, for thousands of years the harpoon has been the most important hunting device. Today, the point of the harpoon is made of iron. Chief Walangee is one of the last authentic hunters of this region.
We also visit one of the most famous diving sites in the world, the Great Barrier Reef, which consists of around a thousand islands and almost three thousand individual reefs.
This journey into Australia's natural past has confirmed that it is one of the world's most untouched land masses, in which ancient traditions continue to be used for practical purposes, not just a tourist's carefully-posed photo opportunity!
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Sampson McCormick
Photo: Don Harris
Sampson McCormick was born on March 13, 1986. He is a popular award-winning stand-up comedian, writer, activist, and filmmaker.
Sampson McCormick was born the youngest son of Florence McCormick in Evergreen, North Carolina, and moved as a child to Washington, DC in 1989. McCormick says he very much loves his older brother, Corey, and helped the pastor shift his theology and views on religion, sexuality, and masculinity. But not all of McCormick’s family has been as receptive or supportive.
“Growing up, I had a very abusive stepfather who verbally and physically beat me for being gay,” McCormick told the Ubuntu Biography Project. “I was also spiritually humiliated, and kicked out of church for being gay. I really didn’t understand what my sexuality meant or was able to come to terms with the challenges until I was outed by a girl that I had kind of been dating. Then, I stopped running from it, and was able to own it and tackle the challenges that came from being a Black, gay man. Humor and writing helped soooooo much!”
At the age of 15, McCormick found solace in his comedy. Too young to get into venues, bouncers would make him pay them to sneak in the back door (“when I started having good sets, they started letting me in the front and sneaking me drinks—don’t tell nobody”).
As a student, McCormick was honored with the prestigious Charlene Drew Jarvis Science award, and graduated with a 3.89 grade point average. After attending the New School for Enterprise and Development in Washington, DC, he graduated from Bowie State University in Maryland, where he studied broadcast communications, theater, drama/cultural media, journalism, and public relations.
Even before attending college, McCormick was already performing comedy, connecting with audiences through his amusing take on our maddening world, but also engaging people through his insightful narratives. McCormick’s comedy has tackled many serious issues, including his difficult childhood and abusive stepfather, homelessness, homophobia in churches, fighting off bullies, politics, race issues, and domestic violence. McCormick has used his humor to overcome these challenges, and to speak out about the perils of growing up Black and gay in America.
“Our community is so important to me, I love us, all that we have contributed to society and our strength,” said McCormick. “I really wish we realized that, and could come together the way that previous generations did—that’s missing. We should be proud of who we are because of that, and how far we’ve come, and because we have better sex than everybody else, and because being Black and gay are both two of the most beautiful identities on the planet.”
Despite that allegiance, McCormick refuses to be defined by his identity as a Black and gay man, and performs in mainstream venues that have included the White House, Broadway in New York, Arena Stage, Daughters of the American Revolution’s Constitution Hall, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the 2012 International AIDS Conference at the Washington Convention Center, and at many college campuses, including Harvard University, Emerson College, Swarthmore College, Penn State University, and Central Michigan University. McCormick has also entertained audiences at the famed Comedy Store, as well as many LGBTQ pride festivals and events. In 2013, McCormick headlined at the historic Howard Theatre in Washington, DC.
Sampson McCormick has worked alongside notable acts such as Patti LaBelle, Angela Bassett, Bruce Vilanch, Paul Mooney, Thea Vidale, Luenell, Whoopi Goldberg, Robin Williams, and Adele Givens. He makes a point of mentoring new young artists, and gives them a chance to appear with him as opening acts while he’s on tour.
McCormick’s hit comedy shows, “Don’t Make Me Take Off My Earrings,” “No Tea, No Shade,” and “That Bitch Better Be Funny!” have riveted audiences, and brought him great acclaim for his refreshing, bold, intelligent, and honest humor. He also hosts a channel on YouTube that’s ventured into more serious territory—like getting an HIV test—but community issues are still delivered with his trademark humor shining through.
Sampson McCormick also is constantly reaching out to LGBTQ youth, in mentorship and support, and engages the community with humor, and lectures on the intersections of race and sexuality. He strongly supports programs that cater to LGBTQ homeless youth, the transgender community, and those affected by HIV/AIDS and poverty. McCormick works tirelessly to help lobby more effective anti-hate crime laws, and testifies at hearings in support of anti-bullying laws, and better education opportunities and initiatives to confront poverty in underserved communities.
In 2016, Sampson co-starred in “I Live Here,” a Shane Watson-directed film that received a Student Academy Award nomination in the category of Narrative (Domestic Film Schools). He also produced “A Tough Act to Follow,” a documentary on the issues around diversity in comedy and entertainment. As one of the first Black out LGBTQ stand-up comics in the country, McCormick is considered a pioneering comedian who challenged the status quo of a lack of diversity in comedy.
McCormick has been featured in several print publications, including “The Washington Examiner,” “MetroWeekly,” the “Washington Blade,” “SWERV,” “Frontiers,” “Truth Magazine,” the “Washington Post,” “Out” “Bay Area Reporter,” and “East Bay Express.” He’s appeared on MTV, BET, VH1 and the OWN network. McCormick is also the author of three books, “Taboo Village: A Perspective On Being Gay In Black America,” “Ebonic Faggotry,” and “Carefree Black Boy.”
McCormick makes his home in Los Angeles, California, and enjoys reading, documentaries, theater, road trips, dinner with friends, French Bulldogs, laughter, sage, meditation, prayer, incense and rhythmic music, especially African drum and Afro-Cuban music. “It also goes without saying, I love men,” joked McCormick. “When I have time, I get a drink and just watch them—they’re sexy…except when they ain’t about shit, which, for me, is rarely the case because I know how to choose. And let’s face it—I’m a catch!”
You can learn more about McCormick and check out his performance schedule at www.sampsoncomedy.com/. You can also follow him on Twitter (@OfficialSampson) and Instagram (@MisterSampson).
“In the stage that I’m in now, I love the healing work that humor does,” Sampson told the Ubuntu Biography Project. “Once, I used it to affirm, I still do, but for now, just lots of healing—and encouragement. Growing up, we laughed through poverty, homelessness, violence, homophobia, racism, so many obstacles and it helped us to cope. I believe that if you laugh at something, you can survive it.”
We thank Sampson McCormick for changing the world through laughter, and for his unwavering support of our community.
by Ubuntu Biography Project on March 13, 2017
Categories: All, March, March 13, McCormick, Sampson • Tags: 1986, March 13, Sampson McCormick, Ubuntu Biography Project
← Devin Barrington-Ward
Trinice McNally →
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Author Archives: gee4213
Trivia for Pro Bowl Weekend
Posted by gee4213 in Gee's Thoughts
Baltimore Ravens, JJ Watt, Justin Tucker, NFL, NFL Trivia
With a week to go until the Super Bowl we have had a bit of fun in the Pro Bowl skill competitions and I have watched my first game of coaching tape that I will write up, but we also have two trivia questions to contend with so here goes:
‘And then we move onto Week 21, the Pro Bowl and there are 2 questions this week with 3 points up for grabs.
Firstly, in the 2018 Regular Season who (player) kicked the most field goals? As a bonus How Many was that?
Secondly, for 1 point, whose foundation (player not team) raised a record $41m following Hurricane Harvey?’
So the second question is the easiest for me to answer as the damage that Hurricane Harvey caused in Houston was very memorable, as was the fund raising effort that was led by JJ Watt.
As for field goals, I’m going to plump for probably the best field goal kicker in the league, who just happens to play for a team who relied heavily on him and their defence for the first half of the season so I’m plumping for Justin Tucker and say he got thirty-two field goals.
‘Ok, quick answers this week. Question one I should really know as the kicking connoisseur of the group, but I’m afraid it’s going to be a guess. I’ll go with Baltimore’s Justin Tucker with about 38 kicks made.
Question 2 is easy, and unfair as the answer is Gee’s Spirit Animal and all round good guy, Mr Julian* Jonathan* Watt!
* – may not be his real names… it’s JJ Watt.’
Farewell to the Teams who Fell at the Final Hurdle
Posted by gee4213 in Gee's Thoughts, Playoffs
Alvin Kamara, Andy Reid, Bill Belichick, Bob Sutton, Dallas Cowboys, Drew Brees, Kansas City Chiefs, Kareem Hunt, LA Rams, Marcus Davenport, Michael Thomas, Minnesota Vikings, New Orleans Saints, NFL, Patrick Mahomes, Sean Payton, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
We now know the Super Bowl participants and before I really focus in on that matchup and the stories of those teams, it’s time to say goodbye to the pair of teams that fell at the final hurdle.
This is the second straight year where the New Orleans Saints suffered a gut wrenching loss to send them out of the playoffs. Last year, a last minute miraculous play from the Vikings combined with an awful play by a safety saw the Saints crashing out. This season their hopes were dashed by a third down play that could have seen a flag thrown for pass interference or a helmet to helmet but received neither. The player admitted the foul as he was worried about giving up a touchdown and Sean Payton received a phone call telling him that the refs had blown the call. I don’t know if by the time the competition committee meet in March that things will have died down again, but there is a reason that Bill Belichick has been calling for all plays to be reviewable and no one, be it player, coach or referee wants to see a game turn on such a moment.
But what about the Saints’ season?
Well they went to the playoffs for a second straight year and were my tip for the Super Bowl for a number of weeks, but unfortunately this was not to be. Drew Brees turned forty this week, and whilst he threw for fewer yards this season, he set a record for completion percentage as he led the Saints to 13-3 record that was only matched by the Rams team that beat them at the weekend. The Saints may have started the year with a loss to the Buccaneers, but they were not the only team to concede a lot of yards to that Bucs’ offence and they promptly won ten straight games until they lost to the Dallas Cowboys in week thirteen, but I will come to that in a minute.
The Saints’ defence took a few weeks to come together, but the offence scored forty-points three times in their opening five games and for a large part of the season they looked to be on a level with the Chiefs and Rams as the best in the league. However, they really struggled against the Cowboys in week thirteen and never quite looked the same again.
How much of this was because coordinators saw something in that game that they could apply I don’t know, but there were other problems. The Saints struggled for a reliable second receiver for much of the season and relied on Alvin Kamara coming out of the backfield to supplement Michael Thomas. More worrying was through this end section of the regular season and into the playoffs Brees struggled with the long ball, under-throwing passes and getting bailed out by receivers but also getting intercepted. It would not surprise me if he has been carrying an injury as almost everyone playing in the NFL at the end of the season is managing something, but I wouldn’t push the panic button. However, if the big focus of last year’s draft was the addition of a pass rusher, and they gave up a lot to trade up and pick Marcus Davenport, then the Saints should make sure they have the receivers to utilise Brees’ time left. He has stated that he intends to return and the Saints for the past two season have been very competitive and were definitely worthy of the Super Bowl this season, but that doesn’t mean you win them. Brees has at least won one though, which is more than some Hall of Fame quarterbacks have managed. It makes sense to come back for another year with this team as in tact as possible, which is good as the Saints have one of the smaller amounts of salary cap space available in 2019 but even if they manage this there’s no guarantee that they will be as good next year and that is what makes this loss so painful. There’s hope for next season, but there’s no sugar coating the fact that the Saints are up against the clock with the age of Drew Brees. I would really like him to win another Super Bowl, but only time will tell if this was his best chance.
If the Saints are fighting against Father Time as well as the rest of the league, then the Chiefs in the opposite position thanks to how impressive Patrick Mahomes has been in his first full season. The only other quarterback to throw for five thousand yards and fifty touchdowns was Peyton Manning in 2013 when he threw for five thousand four hundred and seventy-seven yards and fifty-five touchdowns. If you consider where Manning was at that point in his career and compare to how young Mahomes is then it is truly frightening for the rest of the league and particularly for the rest of the AFC West who will likely see him twice a season for the next decade and hopefully more with injury luck.
For most of the season the Chiefs offence has enthralled and entertained with motion, quick breaking plays and quick scores. They were not even that heavily affected by the loss of Kareem Hunt after he was dropped by the team once video emerged of an incident in a hotel in the off-season where he shoved a woman to the ground and kicked her. Their Achilles heel has been the defence, and ultimately defensive coordinator Bob Sutton has paid for this with his job. Given the range of talent the Chiefs possess, the offence should be just as potent next season, possibly even more so as Mahomes gains experience and he proved in the second half of the Conference Championship game that even after difficult starts he can rise to the big occasions. The Chiefs are just above league average in salary cap space for next season, and given the team they have put together already, if they can improve their defence to merely average as opposed to twenty-sixth in the league by DVOA then this team could be terrifying. There are still questions about some of the ways that Andy Reid runs the clock, but for all the jokes he has a really impressive coaching record and we could be about to see the years where he gets the Super Bowls to go with the wins.
It has now been forty-eight years since the Chiefs made it to the Super Bowl, I would not be at all surprised if they are playing in next year’s.
Aaron Donald, Alvin Kamara, Andrus Peat, Andy Reid, Bill Belichick, CJ Anderson, Dallas Cowboys, Drew Brees, Eric Berry, Indianapolis Colts, James Develin, James White, Josh Reynolds, Julian Edelman, Kansas City Chiefs, LA Rams, Mark Ingram, Max Unger, New England Patriots, New Orleans Saints, NFL, NFL Trivia, Patrick Mahomes, Rob Gronkowski, Sean McVay, Sheldon Rankins, Sony Michel, Ted Ginn, Todd Gurley, Tom Brady
Tonight we get the top two teams from both conferences competing to see who goes to the Super Bowl, which is much more important than our trivia competition but we’re doing it anyway!
‘For this week I’ll keep it simple and its ONE point for each of the 3 questions.
In the 2018 Regular season who had the most sacks?
We have already asked which team has made the most Championship appearances (The Steelers with 16) but who has made the second most?
Finally, which team has won the most Championship games?
Dan still has a 1 point advantage – will that be the case come Sunday?’
Okay, so this is a varied set of questions, but let’s see how we go. I’m pretty certain that the answer to the first question is Aaron Donald, which just goes to show how impressive he is as he got them playing defensive tackle.
I’m slightly worried that there is a trick to the other questions because this brings back to my mind the overall record post I did in the summer before this season and so I am sure that the team with the most championship wins is the Green Bay Packers, but were they super-efficient and got it on fewer tries or are they second to the Steelers in terms of appearances? The Packers got thirteen championships (I have the spreadsheet to prove it) and if the Steelers were first with sixteen then the Packers were in at least thirteen championship games so I’m sticking with them for both questions. I look forward to being proved wrong…
‘I’m really feeling the pressure here – after a terrible pick-em season, I’m desperate to win the trivia competition, and with 3 weeks left (I think) I’m getting nervous!
Question one I’m going to go with Aaron Donald – it’s a bit of a guess but he’s been a sack machine for years so I’ll go with him for the most this season.
Sorry to jump around, but I’m going for the Patriots as the team who have won the most Conference Championships in Q3 and I’m between them and the Packers for second most appearances in question two… I think I’ll stick with the Patriots for both answers.’
LA Rams @ New Orleans Saints
The first game on Sunday sees the LA Rams take their second ranked offence and nineteenth ranked defence by DVOA to play the slightly more evenly spread New Orleans Saints. The Saints actually rank fourth in offence and eleventh in defence but fourth in overall DVOA.
What does this all mean given that all four teams playing this weekend are ranked in the top seven by DVOA?
At this stage of the season I’m not entirely sure. Neither team’s offence has been at the peak of their form in recent weeks, but the Rams performance on the ground against the Dallas Cowboys’ run defence was particularly impressive so you have to think that running the ball will feature heavily in Sean McVay’s game plan. The combination of CJ Anderson, picked up as a free agent late in the season, and a now healthy Todd Gurley created a fearsome tandem that the Rams used to amass two hundred and thirty-eight yards between them with both rushing for one hundred yard. I have again run out of time to finish the coaching tape I was watching this week, but I did see how the Rams managed to run the ball so effectively with 11 personnel. The mix of repeated jet motion, moving the tight end, and even end around runs by Josh Reynolds and fakes of the same created consistent motion going both ways that served to make a good run defence a step slow. The Saints rushing defence actually ranked two places higher by DVOA at the end of the season that the Cowboys, but a big question in this game is how will the injury to defensive tackle Sheldon Rankins last week affect the Saints ability to pressure and hold up in the middle of their defensive line.
The Saints might not be too dissimilar in the way they attack the LA Rams defence given that the Rams finished the season ranked twenty-eighth in rush defence by DVOA and the Saints have both Alvin Kamara and Mark Ingram able to run and catch passes out of the backfield. Kamara is devastating in space, whereas Ingram is a more powerful runner and the Rams will have their hands full dealing with this duo. Getting Ted Ginn back from injury has allowed the Saints to stretch the field more, but the awkward truth is that these days Drew Brees struggles a little to get the ball deep as the opening play interception in the game last week demonstrates because Brees underthrew Ginn. The worry for the Saints is that whilst the Rams rush defence is not great, they do have Aaron Donald who is probably the most disruptive defensive player in the league and left guard Andrus Peat is playing with a broken hand. I know offensive linemen are a different breed when it comes to injury, but this is not a great time to be nursing an injury and the Saints also had centre Max Unger dealing with a knee injury during the week.
In recent years it has been the home teams who have been getting through to the Super Bowl, but this game feels really tight. The Saints have a great home advantage, and the experience at head coach and quarterback, but there are some injury concerns and the Rams have several players who can take over a game as well as a really well schemed offence. I would lean to the Saints still, mainly because of Drew Brees’ experience as compared to Jared Goff and Sean Payton’s knack of being aggressive at the right time but it wouldn’t exactly be a surprise if the Rams won.
New England Patriots @ Kansas City Chiefs
I have been one of many who have wondered about the form of the Patriots this year, but that does not mean that I think they suck as Tom Brady claimed after their win over the Chargers this week. We are all pretty familiar with the legend of the sixth round quarterback and how he is still using that slight and others to motivate himself. Given the success that him and Bill Belichick have had over the years I was definitely not overlooking them last week, and lo and behold, they demonstrated what they are truly capable of. We had Julian Edleman throw back the clock and catch nine balls for one hundred and fifty-one yards whilst James White caught fifteen balls out of the backfield on screen plays and gained ninety-seven yards. Meanwhile Sony Michel ran for one hundred and twenty-nine yards, helped by the blocking of fullback James Develin and in particular Rob Gronkowski. Gronk may have had only one reception in this game, but he blocked effectively and looked good doing it as the Patriots put up forty-one points to give themselves control for the entire game. Now they take this offence to Arrowhead stadium and have to try to keep up with a great Chiefs’ offence. This the Patriots can definitely do, but it is frequently foolish to try to predict how the Patriots will approach the game. I suspect they will try to use their multiple running backs and short passing game to slow the Chiefs’ pass rush and given that their defence ranked twenty-sixth by DVOA at the end of the regular season they may stand a chance, but I’ll come back to that after we’ve talked the Chiefs properly.
The Chiefs have been one of the dominant teams of this season as well as one of the defining narratives thanks to the performance of Patrick Mahomes in his first full season of starting. The young quarterback has continually wowed with his ability to throw the ball as he racked up fifty touchdowns and over five thousand yards during the regular season. He showed few signs of nerves last week as the Chiefs made short work of a Colts team who had been as good as anyone in recent weeks. The defence has been the weakness of this team through the season, but they looked really good against the Colts even if Eric Berry continues to sit out. The Chiefs lost 40-43 in New England earlier this season and this was one of the few games where Mahomes showed some nerves and he threw two of his twelve interceptions that week. However, this week they welcome the Patriots to their own turf in what should be a second great game this.
This game is really hard to call, there is always an unpredictability to the approach that Bill Bilichick will take, whilst Andy Reid’s team has looked great all season. If anybody can silence the raucous Arrowhead crowd it is Tom Brady, but with a defence that is mid-table by DVOA the Patriots will need to keep up with the Chiefs offence. Given the time of year and the weather we may not get the explosion of points there were in their previous meeting, but Patriots have not been good on the road this season and so despite never wanting to bet against the Patriots I am leaning towards the Chiefs in this one.
We should be in for two great games today and then all of a sudden we’ll have two weeks full of news and no football (no, the Pro Bowl doesn’t count) and then it will be the big day. I’m looking forward to all three games as there are simply no bad matchup in any combination of the four teams left, let’s hope the games live up to expectations.
The Divisional Dismayed
Andrew Luck, Anthony Lynn, Carson Wentz, Chris Ballard, Conference Championships, Dak Prescott, Dallas Cowboys, Frank Reich, Howie Roseman, Indianapolis Colts, Jason Garrett, Jerry Jones, Joey Bosa, Josh McDaniels, Kansas City Chiefs, LA Chargers, New England Patriots, NFL, Nick Foles, Philadelphia Eagles, Philip Rivers, Playoffs, Super Bowl
There are two games and two weekends left between now and the Super Bowl, and I will give full attention to the teams in the Conference Championship games on Sunday before the teams take the field, but it is time to say goodbye to the divisional dismayed who fell last week.
There is a reason that teams fight for the top two seed and last weekend the advantages told as all four home teams won, and so to the losers.
The Colts might be the least dismayed team to lose this round. Their performance against the Chiefs was worrying as both sides of the ball struggled in the cold of Arrowhead but in head coach Frank Reich’s first year the Colts were really competitive and this bodes well for the future. Reich’s tenure started late after Josh McDaniels pulled out of the job late after the Patriots’ Super Bowl loss, but Reich and the coaching staff have already established an identity with a roster that has been turned around in only a couple of off-seasons by GM Chris Ballard. I expect them to be a real force next season given that Ballard has another draft and the most cap room for the 2019 season to further augment this team. Whilst there is no guarantee of success given the volatility of the NFL and injury luck, I do tip the Colts to be right up there with the best next season now they have surrounded Andrew Luck with the talent to make the most of his skills. Luck has looked really good in this latter half of the season, although he seemed to be off last weekend, but after it looked for a while like we might not seem him play again the success this season is hopefully laying the ground work for future seasons. I just hope I’m not jinxing the 2019 Colts by being this optimistic about them.
I’m conflicted about how the Cowboys will fare next season as whilst there were definite positives to take from this season, there are also a bunch of question. This starts with head coach Jason Garrett who survives another year as Jerry’s man, but the nine year head coach added just his second playoff win to a record of three playoff visits and Garrett has never got beyond the divisional round. The defence looked really good for long stretches of this season, but we know that defence is more volatile than offence, and the Rams ran all over the Cowboys on Saturday and that was the strength of this Cowboys defence. Meanwhile, the offence desperately needs more options around Dak Prescott who is about to go into the final season of his rookie deal. For once the Cowboys cap number does not look bad as they have the tenth amount of space in the league when looking at 2019, but the big question will be how much of this space will Prescott’s deal take and the Cowboys have frequently not been afraid of handing out big deals to starts and regretting it towards the end of the deal. They have enough young talent to be competitive again next season, but I do wonder if there is a ceiling to what they can achieve without some serious tweaking. Everyone will be watching the Cowboys anyway, but I don’t know if the 2019 team will be able to break into the elite strata of teams truly competing for the Super Bowl.
LA Chargers
There is a lot of good to take from the Chargers season but they are another team that head into the off-season with a lot of questions surrounding them. They got thoroughly outplayed by the Patriots on Sunday, and kept seven defensive backs on the field for longer than they should have so that tells you the linebackers need upgrading. The offensive line also gave up too much pressure and so re-enforcements would be a welcome addition, but the not so secret question is how much longer can Philip Rivers go? The thirty-five year old quarterback has won one of his nine games against the Patriots and is 0-5 in Gillete Stadium. I’m not saying that he can’t win, but the Chargers don’t have a lot of time to turn things round and whilst Anthony Lynn has done well in his first two seasons as head coach of the Chargers, there is still work to be done and very little cap room for next year. The Chargers are not exactly bringing in the fans from LA either, despite being a competitive team. If Joey Bosa can be healthy all next season then the Chargers could be right up there with the best in the league again, but in the longer term we might be looking at quarterback controversies and a franchise that hasn’t been able to truly establish itself in a demanding market. There was no football in LA for a long time, and teams have struggled and moved away from the city before, and with the Rams’ previous history in LA serving them well I can’t help but wonder where the Chargers will be playing once Rivers calls it a day. For now though, let’s enjoy what we have.
The defending Eagles did well to get back to the playoffs given the way the season started for them and how many injuries the roster sustained. They will be hoping to return a lot of players next season, but will need to add some speed to an offence that couldn’t stretch the field and find a consistent running game as well as shoring up the back of the defence. For all his playoff magic, Nick Foles, Super Bowl winning quarterback, will be playing for someone else next season, but Carson Wentz’s stress fracture will be healed in plenty of time for him to have a full off-season and I suspect he will be even better for the Eagles another twelve months away from his knee surgery. After all the turnover in the coaching staff last season, where the offence suffered a real brain drain, I think that the Eagles will be raring to go next season. They may be solidly in the middle in terms of cap space, but Howie Roseman has demonstrated his aggressive strategy of draft trades and free agent moves can build incredibly deep rosters and after this season, I would expect the Eagles to be back at it again next season. I can hear the fans singing, ‘Fly Eagles fly!’ already.
Sunday Divisional Games
Alvin Kamara, Dallas Cowboys, Drew Brees, Fletcher Cox, Gus Bradley, Joey Bosa, Josh Gordon, LA Chargers, Mark Ingram, Melvin Ingram, Michael Thomas, New England Patriots, New Orleans Saints, NFL, Nick Foles, Philadelphia Eagles, Philip Rivers, Rob Gronkowski, Sean Payton, Tom Brady
Following on from Saturday’s contests, we have the Sunday Divisional games, although I have to fail at the trivia competition first:
‘First then, for the 2018 Regular Season only who scored the most touchdowns? Name, Team and Number for a max 3 points.
My second Divisional related question was triggered by the chaos which followed the Vikings TD as time expired last year.
What penalty is to be applied if a team lines up for scrimmage with fewer than 11 on the field? 2 points available here.’
There was a clarification on the first question that a quarterback running the ball would count, but not passes as we were looking for the play crossing the goal line with the ball. This immediately made me think of quarterbacks and suspected Cam Newton, but I just don’t think that quarterbacks get enough of an opportunity to lead the league in touchdowns so I’m going to jump positions on the Panthers and plump for Christian McCaffery, who had a fantastic year and I’m going for eight touchdowns.
As for the penalty, I’m not sure there is one but my guess is illegal formation as what else could it be? Well, I’ll find out later in the week!
‘Tricky questions again this week, and I feel a bit more pressure now I’m leading!
Question one I had to clarify as I was originally thinking of a Quarterback who will have thrown the most touchdowns, but apparently that doesn’t count. So I think it’ll be a running back, and I’m a bit torn between Todd Gurley and Alvin Kamara…. I think I’ll go with Saints Number 41, Alvin Kamara.
Second question I think is a bit of a trick. Obviously there’s a penalty for having too many players on the field, but I don’t think there is one for having too few. I’m just struggling to justify why that answer warrants 2 points and whether there’s another answer to go with it, but I’ll stick with that!’
LA Chargers (5th) @ New England Patriots(2nd)
Another year, another division win for the New England Patriots but this is the first time in nine seasons that they didn’t get at least twelve wins. There have been several, is he slipping moments for Tom Brady in recent seasons, which is perhaps not that surprising given that he is now forty-one, but the Patriots have not been as convincing this season as in recent years. Part of this is the relative weakness of their receiver group, which was worrying enough that the Patriots took the risk of trading for Josh Gordon. The troubled receiver did supply help on the field for a while, but even the Patriots couldn’t help Gordon off the field and it may be that the football environment may not be conducive for Gordon staying healthy. Back on the field, Rob Gronkowski has laboured all season and doesn’t look himself, but Brady has thrown for over four thousand yards and the Patriots do rank fifth in the league by DVOA so all is not terrible. They have lost some surprising games but their defence ranks better by DVOA than last year they still earned a bye week for the start of the playoffs.
This week the entertain one of the more dangerous fifth seeds of recent years in the twelve win LA Chargers. I didn’t get to watch all of the coaching tape from last week, but the Chargers played with seven defensive backs to counter the Ravens running game, reminding everyone just how good a defensive coordinator Gus Bradley is. It also helps that in Joey Bosa and Melvin Ingram, Bradley has the players to get pressure on the quarterback whilst rushing four, which is the nearest anyone has found to a formula to stop Tom Brady. For all his regular season success, Philip Rivers has not had the playoff victories he wold have hoped for and has a pair of playoff losses to the Patriots from the 07/08 seasons to avenge. The Chargers have really played well this season and stand as good a chance of dethroning the Patriots as anyone has in recent years. However, winning in Foxborough is never easy and particularly not in the playoffs and so I must give the edge to the Patriots as I don’t think you can count them out until they have lost, but this is a dangerous game for them.
Philadelphia Eagles (6th) @ New Orleans Saints (1st)
The New Orleans Saints took a step forward last season with a draft that yielded the offensive and defensive rookies of the year and finally pairing a defence good enough to help the always proficient Drew Brees get back into the playoffs. They carried this momentum forward into this season and continue to make moves in an attempt to maximise the chances of getting Brees another Super Bowl in the time the veteran quarterback has left. Their offence was truly terrifying for a lot of the season, and even when it cooled off they still found ways to win and finished with only three losses all season. In securing the first seed they ensured that they got to play with their impressive home field advantage. They currently rank fourth of the elite offences through the season, and if there is a weakness in the offence it is the talent behind Alvin Kamara and Michael Thomas, although Mark Ingram did also run the ball effectively in the games he played, but the creativity of Sean Payton and Drew Brees has been more than enough to carry them through.
This week they welcome the Philadelphia Eagles and the supposed playoff mojo of Nick Foles. There is not a large enough sample size to declare that Foles is especially effective in the playoffs, but he has certainly done brilliantly for a backup over last season and this. Still, we shouldn’t forget how effective the Eagles defensive line was against the Chicago Bears last week. Still, the Saints at home are a different prospect and Fletcher Cox and the rest of the defence will need to get pressure up the middle to disrupt Brees. It is possible as the Cowboys demonstrated earlier this season, but right now the Saints are my tip for the Super Bowl. Brees may have thrown for under four thousand yards for the first time in fourteen years, but he also has the highest completion percentage of his career and the lowest number of interceptions. The route to the Super Bowl runs through New Orleans and I don’t see the Eagles disrupting that this week, although of course all things are possible.
Saturday Divisional Games
Aaron Donald, Allen Hurns, Amari Cooper, Andy Reid, CJ Anderson, Cole Beasley, Cooper Kupp, Dallas Cowboys, Ezekiel Elliott, Indianapolis Colts, Jared Goff, Kansas City Chiefs, Kareem Hunt, LA Rams, Ndamukong Suh, NFL, Patrick Mahomes, Sean McVay, Tavon Austin, Todd Gurley
Now we have all the teams that are left in the competition playing it is time to look at the Saturday games.
Indianapolis Colts (6th) @ Kansas City Chiefs (1st)
The Kansas City Chiefs have been the talk of the NFL all season thanks to their high powered offence and the play of Patrick Mahomes in his first full season. Mahomes threw fifty touchdown and only twelve interceptions as he account for five thousand spectacular yards. We’ve had no look passes, differing arm angles and regular how did he do that plays, which have made Reid’s offensive scheme hum. This has been helped by the glut of talent the Chiefs have at the skills positions, and although there was a wobble after they cut running back Kareem Hunt after video of his assault of a woman in a hotel surfaced (because TMZ are better at investigating these incidents than the NFL are), the Chiefs finished the season with two thirty points games. The worry for the Chiefs is that their offence may match their overall ranking of first by DVOA, and their special teams are ranked second, but their defence is ranked twenty-sixth and so whilst they went 12-4, they have had to win a lot of shoot outs.
There are other problems though. One is that the Chiefs home playoff record has not been good, and whilst they will hope to overturn that this weekend, it would not exactly be a surprise if Mahomes shows some nerves early in the game. They welcome a Colts team who went on the road to beat their divisional rivals last week and come into this game with good form and great offensive and defensive lines. The other problem I want to mention for the Chiefs is that their defence was bottom of the league in rush defence by DVOA, and so whilst the Colts are not especially great at running the ball, they don’t have to be. I don’t have strong feeling on who is going to win this game, but I am really looking forward to seeing it as I think it could be spectacular given the Chiefs offence skill and defensive problems. I could see the Arrowhead crowd getting nervous if the Chiefs don’t get off to a good start and I do think an upset is possible. I’m not going to call it as a home teams in the divisional rounds have been won of the safer bets of the playoffs recently, but it definitely could happen.
Dallas Cowboys (4th) @ LA Rams (2nd)
The LA Rams may have suffered a disappointing Wildcard loss last season in Sean McVay’s first year, but they built on that momentum and hit the ground running this season. The offence was as scary as anyone’s up to their week twelve bye. Injury has hampered them a little since then, and one of the big questions going into this game is just how healthy is Todd Gurley. However, the signing of CJ Anderson helped them right the ship at the end of the season, and if Jared Goff’s form has dipped since the Rams lost Cooper Kupp they have done enough to be seeded second in the NFC. On the other side of the ball, Aaron Donald has had a formidable year as arguably the leagues best defensive player, but things have never quite gelled for all of the free-agents they have brought in and so whilst the offence is second in the league by DVOA, the defence is nineteenth. This is still better than the Chiefs, even if it is a similar formula and they may run into similar problems against the Cowboys as I see the Chiefs having with the Colts.
The Cowboys were the only home team to win in the Wildcard round and take their own formula to face the Rams. This starts with an offence built around Ezekiel Elliott running the ball and increasingly catching the ball out the back field. The addition of Amari Cooper has opened up defences for the Cowboys, but losing Allen Hurns last week to a nasty dislocation/broken fibula will hurt the passing game as will the niggles Cole Beasley and Tavon Austin are dealing with. However, the Rams defence has struggled against the run, only ranking twenty-eighth by DVOA despite the presence of Donald and Ndamukong Suh in the middle of the defensive line. The Cowboys formula of running the ball could definitely work in this game. Meanwhile the Cowboys defence has looked pretty good as well and finished the season ranked fifth in rushing defence by DVOA. If they can limit the Rams effectiveness in running the ball and not over commit to the play fakes of the Rams then they could well sneak this game and you know the Cowboys fans will likely be well represented in the Coliseum this Saturday. I lean to the Rams in this one, but I can make a formula for the Cowboys to win this game.
Close games have been a feature of this season. We could well have two of them today!
Fell at the First Hurdle
Aaron Rodgers, Adam Gase, Andy Reid, Arizona Cardinals, Baker Mayfield, Baltimore Ravens, Bill O'Brien, Bruce Arians, Chicago Bears, Cleveland Browns, DeAndre Hopkins, Deshaun Watson, Freddie Kitchens, Green Bay Packers, Houston Texans, Jason Licht, JJ Watt, John Harbaugh, Josh Rosen, Kliff Kingsbury, Lamar Jackson, Marcus Mariota, Matt LeFleur, Matt Nagy, Mike McCarthy, Mitchell Trubisky, New York Jets, NFL, Ozzie Newsome, Pete Carroll, Russell Wilson, Sam Darnold, Sean McVay, Seattle Seahawks, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Vic Fangio
Here we are in the second week of January with four playoff games complete, eight teams left, and six games to the Super Bowl. Today I’ll be taking a look at the playoff teams who fell at the first hurdle and will run through the coaching news as I have it, although it will be worth you checking the usual places as events are picking up pace as teams start to hire.
The Texans made it to the playoffs but fell to their surging division rivals in the Indianapolis Colts. The Texans had a slow start to the season, and there was talk of Bill O’Brien’s job being in danger if they lost again and fell to 0-4. Instead they got an overtime win against the Colts, and then ripped off a further eight wins. The problem they have though, is whilst the front seven of their defence is strong, and they have one of the best receivers in the game as well as a dynamic young quarterback, there are holes in the rest of the team. This might not be surprising given they had to trade away picks to get their quarterback in Deshaun Watson, but they need to balance up the skill players surrounding DeAndre Hopkins or get them healthier and they need to improve the secondary of their defence. They have the sixth most cap space looking forward to 2019 so they have some room to manoeuvre, particularly with a young quarterback on a rookie deal, but they also have several picks in this year’s draft that have been traded away. More worrying is that whilst O’Brien keeps making the Texans competitive in the division, they have not quite convinced and the Colts look like they are shaping up to be a fearsome team in 2019. Experience teaches us that the Texans will likely compete for the division title again next season, and it was definitely great to see JJ Watt playing a high level again and who know what he might be able to achieve with a full off-season without a major injury to rehab. The Texans have gone to the playoffs four times in the last eight years, and twice under O’Brien, but in his five years as head coach they have only won one playoff game and that just makes me wonder if the owner will start to think about a change if the Texans can’t get a step further next season.
This is going to be curious one to write up as in a lot of ways the Seahawks defied the expectations coming into the season by finishing 10-6 and making the playoffs despite their young roster. The defence was overhauled and they committed to running the ball as their identity and that was good enough to make the playoffs, but my worry is that they will be too stubborn surrounding the offensive game plan. The repeated run on first and second down in their Wildcard loss to the Cowboys was not effective thanks to the Cowboys fifth rated rush defence. We have moved well pst establishing the run as a offensive philosophy and I very much believe that what you need is a credible threat to do either so that play action is effective. In Russell Wilson the Seahawks have one of the most effective quarterbacks in the game, and if they say ran play action on fifty percent of their first downs and threw in some mid-range passing they could be really effective without abandoning the run. I just don’t know if it is going to happen or not and it makes no sense to extend Russell Wilson as they will need to do shortly, and pay him the premium he is going to deservedly ask for if they don’t make the most of him. That doesn’t mean they should start running an Andy Reid style offence, but to my mind the offence needs tweaking. They have plenty of cap space and frequently draft well, but I just don’t if they are going to change spots now and I wonder if that will hobble them from getting back to the Super Bowl.
The Ravens got back to the playoffs after three years of missing out, and discovered the future of their offence in rookie quarterback Lamar Jackson. They can’t keep giving him carries at a record setting pace despite him only playing half a season, but he can throw the ball and the fact that he was able to get a couple of touchdowns in the fourth quarter of their Wildcard loss to the Chargers should reassure that he won’t be solved by a clever defence. The front office won’t be the same with Ozzie Newsome stepping down, but it feels like with the infrastructure in Baltimore they will be back and competitive next season. It certainly seems like John Harbaugh will stay as long as he gets the contract extension with the terms he wants. Unlike many defences, the Ravens always seem to be around the top five in the league and so you would imagine that the Ravens can focus on getting Jackson tools for the passing game, although you can never have too many pass rushers or corners. The Ravens are a little below league average for cap space in 2019 as currently constructed, but you would expect them to be there or there about next season and with a good draft they could be really scary.
The Bears loss in the Double Doink game was heart breaking, although the field goal miss has been amended to a block as a defender did get a touch. Either way, the worry for the Bears is that they had the number one defence in the league and couldn’t get the game won against the Eagles. They are twenty-third in the league in salary cap and there are players whose contract has expired. As defence is generally considered to be less consistent year to year (unless you’re the Ravens it seems), any step back from the defence would have to be countered by an improvement in the offence. Although Matt Nagy has improved the team, and there has been lots of focus on the way he called the offence, it only finished twentieth in the league by DVOA. I definitely thought that Mitchell Trubisky looked better this season, but he really needs to improve next year and there’s no way of knowing if it will happen. They also look like they will be without defensive coordinator Vic Fangio who is being looked at as a head coach candidate for the Broncos, who was the mastermind behind the Bears defence, and whilst they have a lot of talent, a new coordinator is not guaranteed to get the same result with the new roster next season. I do think the Bears can remain competitive, but there are enough factors to make Bears’ fans wary that it was a one season wonder. Hopefully a good pre-season and start to the 2019 season will put those fears to rest.
And so we move to the coaching carousel, where we have started to get some hires.
First up were the Green Bay Packers, who had a head start thank to their firing of Mike McCarthy mid-season. They are hoping to capitalise on the rise of Sean McVay by hiring his former assistant Matt LeFleur after one year of running the offence in Tennessee. It’s hard to assess how good a job LeFleur did with the Titans given the nerve injury Marcus Mariota battled through for large parts of the season, but at age thirty-nine with limited experience it is a risk. He’ll have been hired with a mandate to innovate and to get the best out of Aaron Rodgers, but as ever with young coaches it will all depend on how he builds his staff. I don’t think it is a coincidence that both McVay and Matt Nagy had first year success as a head coach and had very experienced defensive coordinators to lean on.
There will be no such concerns about the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ new head coach, as they have hired Bruce Arians, who is one of my favourite coaches. I hope the year rest has helped his health as that is honestly my biggest worry, but he was attracted to the Bucs by his relationship with GM Jason Light and if anyone can turn around that franchise given some time it is Arians. I’m not totally abandoning my previous comments on the Bucs from last week as there is a lot to do, but I have about as much faith in Arians turning it around as anyone.
The Cleveland Browns have hired their temporary offensive coordinator Freddie Kitchens as their new head coach, following the recent trend of teaming up an offensive mind with a young quarterback and we shall have to see how this works. Certainly the rapor with Baker Mayfield seems positive, but these hires haven’t always worke so we shall have to see.
The Arizona Cardinals have hired Kliff Kingsbury from college, and the honest answer is I don’t know enough about college football to judge this hire. It is deliberately an offensive coach to develop Josh Rosen and I’ve sean a video clipe of Sean McVaty praising him but only time will tell on that one.
Finally, at least of the ones I’ve seen confirmed, the New York Jets have hired Adam Gase to be another offensive minded head coach paired to a young quarterback, and Sam Darnold will have to hope to replicate the success of Peyton Manning than Ryan Tannehill.
There are other hires in the works as well as coordinators hired or staying so keep your eyes out and we’ll do a deeper dive when things calm down and we don’t have more important things like games to watch.
Sunday Wildcards
Bal, Carson Wentz, Chicago Bears, Fletcher Cox, Jay Ajayi, Joe Flacco, Joey Bosa, Khalil Mack, LA Chargers, Lamar Jackson, Matt Nagy, Mitchell Trubisky, NFL, Nick Foles, Philadelphia Eagles, Philip Rivers, Vic Fangio
And now it is time to at the Sunday Wildcard games but before that there’s this week’s trivia question to deal with.
‘Firstly and with 2 points on offer I want to know
The 2017/18’s Offensive and Defensive Rookies of the Year played for which teams?
Secondly and again for 2 points:
What was significant about the 2015/16 Wildcard Weekend?’
Now, the first question I think is slightly sneaky as I believe both players were on the New Orleans Saints, namely Alvin Kamara and Marshon Lattimore.
The second is trickier and I’m torn between two things, either this was the last time that a team with a losing record made the playoffs, or and this is the one I’m going for, this was the last time that a road team won wildcard game. I’m sure both of these are wrong but I can’t think anything else so I have a nasty feeling I’m going to kick myself when the answer is revealed.
‘This week’s trivia is keeping me occupied and my mind off the state of the names linked with the Dolphins HC position!
First question was about last year’s Rookies of the Year, and I believe they were both from the New Orleans Saints – I know offensively it was Alvin Kamara and while I can’t think who the defensive rookie was, I’m fairly sure they were also a Saint.
The second question is a bit tougher. I’ve looked at the results and I’m still struggling. I don’t think it’s the first time any of the teams made it to the playoffs, and I don’t think there’s anything significant about the dates or anything like that. The only think I notice is that all of the road teams won which I would have thought is pretty rare… was it the first time that had happened? I’ll go with that.’
LA Charger (5th) @ Baltimore Ravens (4th)
The Ravens are yet another example of your season being defined by how you finish a season rather than how you start it, although they were at least competitive all year. However, after a 3-1 start the Ravens fell to 4-5 before the bye and had lost against all three of their division opponents. However, with an injury to Joe Flacco’s hip they put Lamar Jackson into the starting line-up and went 6-1 in the second half of the season. It has to be said that the reason they were competitive all year was that their defence was right up there for best in the league all season, and it was their offensive woes that were causing them problems after some initial promise. However, when they placed rookie quarterback Jackson into the line-up, they started running the ball so much that the combination of time of procession and their defence enabled them beat everyone but the Chiefs after their bye, including the Chargers. The commitment to the running game did not mean that they were lining up with 21 personnel and running up the middle, but rather the Ravens made use of the pistol and multiple tight-ends to take advantage of Jackson’s skill running the ball, which also opened up the game for their running backs. How sustainable this is in the long term I don’t know, but it makes them a scary proposition in this game.
The Chargers may be the fifth seed, but they actually have a better record at 12-4 than the Ravens and have been a force all year. Their slightly slow start can be attributed to facing both the Chiefs and Rams in their opening four games but the only team with a losing record they lost to all year was their division rivals the Broncos. Otherwise, despite missing Joey Bosa for half the season on defence they won and kept winning thanks to strong performances on both sides of the ball, in fact they finished third in the league on offence by DVOA and eighth in defence. If there is a worry, it is that they have been banged up at running back through the latter half of the season and they lost to the Ravens two weeks ago. In fact, the Chargers had real problems picking up a linebacker defensive-tackle stunt in that game, which overcame Philip Rivers’ usual ability to counter poor offensive line play by being quick to get rid of the ball.
So how does this game look to shape up? Well, this time the Chargers have to travel across the country to face the Ravens but given their lack of home field advantage in their temporary home in LA this might not be the disadvantage you might think. You also have to believe that the Chargers will figure something out to stop the particular protection issue they had in their last game. The Chargers have the players on offence to function against a good Ravens defence and if the Ravens blitz as much as they did late against the Browns last week in a close game, then I can see Philip Rivers making much smarter plays to get rid of the ball. This is a game where if the Chargers can get up early they can cause the Ravens real problems by getting them out of their time of procession and defence game plan. I think it will be a tough game and I can definitely see the Chargers winning it, but with their ability to play in more than one way and the experience of Rivers at quarterback I give the Chargers a slight edge.
Philadelphia Eagles (6th) @ Chicago Bears (3rd)
The Bears are the turnaround story of the season having gone 12-4 after going 5-11 the previous year. Matt Nagy has been able to come in and improve the offence, although I was surprised that their offensive DVOA was only twentieth in the league, although that is still better than the twenty-eight they were last season. Yet when combined with the league’s best defence by DVOA the formula has been more than enough for the Bears to win. It helped that Nagy was secure enough when he came in to keep Vic Fangio on as defensive coordinator, who has continued his development of the defence and the addition of Khalil Mack via trade at the start of the season augmented an already strong defence and was in of itself transformative.
The Eagles on the other hand, have very much had a season of Super Bowl hangover and injury, which meant that they required a late surge and results to go their way even get into the playoffs. In fact they almost have to thank the very team they face this evening as if the Bears had not beaten the Vikings in their last game of the regular season then the Eagles win against Washington would have been meaningless. Both the Eagles’ offensive and defensive DVOAs are very average, and whilst the defence has struggled with injuries, particularly in the secondary, the offence has struggled with an absence of players who can stretch the field and a running game that has lacked consistency since Jay Ajayi was lost for the season to a torn ACL. It should be mentioned that Fletcher Cox has had a remarkable year as part of reduced but still strong defensive line, while on offence tight-end Zac Ertz has been the stand out player on offence. However, as is often the way, the big story of the Eagles’ season is at quarterback. Carson Wentz led the team for most of last season only to go down with a knee injury late in the season, which saw Nick Foles come in and lead the Eagles all the way to a Super Bowl title. However, Foles started the season 1-1 before Wentz came back in and went 5-6 and things started to look bleak for the Super Bowl Champions when it was revealed that Wentz had a stress fracture in his back. Now, last year’s run was remarkable enough for Nick Foles, who not so long ago was at home contemplating retirement, yet now he is an Super Bowl MVP and he went 3-0 at the end of the season to get the Eagles into the playoffs and here they are travelling to face the Bears.
The Bears are surprisingly strong favourites, with the line often being quoted as the Bears giving six and a half points to the Eagles, which looks strong to me. I think this will be an fascinating matchup and given the injuries I would give the edge to the Bears but if I was picking against the line I’d lean Eagles given their recent form and the fact the Bears have been limiting what they ask Mitchell Trubisky to do, and anytime you have to specifically game plan to limit your quarterback’s mistakes then you are at a slight disadvantage and I would not put it pas the Eagles to be able to take advantage.
AAF: Saquon Barkley
Posted by gee4213 in Amateur Adventures in Film
Dallas Cowboys, Eli Manning, Jamon Brown, Jeff Heath, New York Giants, NFL, Saquon Barkley, Sean Lee, Wayne Gallman
As this was the last week I could look at players from twenty teams I decided to treat myself to a player I wouldn’t get a chance to look at going forward and so I had a look at Saquon Barkley who would be the outright favourite for offensive rookie of the year if it were not for the value advantage that quarterbacks enjoy in such awards.
The interesting thing for me about this particular game was that the New York Giants were taking on the Dallas Cowboys in week seventeen, and so I got to see Barkley go up against the fifth best rush defence in the league by DVOA and to be fair that is pretty much how they looked in this game.
A cursory look at the stats would have you believe that Barkley was effective all game as he ran for one hundred and nine yards at over six yards per carry, but if you remove his one sixty-eight yard run that we shall discuss in a moment then his rest of his runs went for forty-one yards at an anaemic two-and-half yards a carry. No one has every questioned Barkley’s talent or athleticism, but there has been talk of him being boom or bust and looking to break the big run rather than taking what’s there. It’s hard to say if he has got over this from the evidence of this game because the reason his numbers looked so average for most of the game is that all to often when he had the ball in his hands, the Cowboys front seven or eight (they were often playing in single high safety looks) would be in their run fits and there was often nowhere for the running back to go. Still, Barkley worked hard to get what he can, and not all runs were stuffed for short gains, he made some decent runs using his agility and ability to cut and get what he can, but often he and his blockers would be met in the hole. The Giants had more success attacking the edges of the defence than running between the tackles but the difference was marginal.
The Giants rotated Barkley in and out with Wayne Gallman but there was no pass run split and Barkley was able to work on third down and ran plenty of routes, including down the field when he was flexed out as a receiver, which was not uncommon. On one play he also ran a route and willingly blocked to help make a big pickup. Still if he was no that effective in the passing game and gained most of his rushing yards on one play, what is the buzz about him? Well partly the answer is that anytime he has the ball in space he is dangerous and he can catch the ball and has done in other games, but in this game you would point to the play that went for nearly seventy yards.
On second and twenty, starting on their own seventeen-yard line the Giants lined up with 11 personnel in a shotgun formation facing the Cowboys in a nickel formation with two high safeties. On a draw play Barkley took the handoff and followed right guard Jamon Brown who blocked Sean Lee allowing Barkley to find a small crease and get behind the secondary to pick up sixty-eight yards. Eventually Jeff Heath was able to catch him and battle Barkley down, but the damage was done as flew past the defence and then was hard to bring down. That in essence is his game.
It is this threat of breaking a play that makes Saqoun Barkely so dangerous. He has been hindered this season by a Giants offensive line that couldn’t consistently open holes for him, or they certainly could in this game, and the fact that Eli Manning can’t throw the ball downfield consistently anymore. Manning did make some deep throws but he can’t do it often enough for this team to move the ball effectively and maintain drives. The Giants have some great skill position players but to unlock Barkley’s full potential they need to improve the offensive line and their quarterback play. The scary thing is that Barkley was still able to account for two thousand yards of offence this season even with these limitations so whilst I’m still not sure I would have made the same draft decision at number two, I can see why the Giants did.
Wildcard Saturday
Amari Cooper, Andrew Luck, Bill O'Brien, Chris Carson, Dallas Cowboys, Darius Leonard, DeAndre Hopkins, Deshaun Watson, Doug Baldwin, Eric Ebron, Ezekiel Elliott, Frank Reich, Houston Texans, Indianapolis Colts, Jason Garrett, Jaylon Smith, JJ Watt, Josh McDaniels, Legion of Boom, Leighton Vander Esch, Marlon Mack, NFL, Pete Carroll, Russell Wilson, Seattle Seahawks, Ty Hilton, Tyler Lockett
So here we are at the start of the playoffs with a Wildcard Saturday that features two games.
Indianapolis Colts (6th) @ Houston Texans (3rd)
The first game of the playoffs is an AFC South divisional rivalry game that sees the Texans host the Colts.
The Texans took a slightly strange route to the playoffs as they lost their opening three games and there was talk that Bill O’Brien’s job was in danger, but then they went on a nine game winning streak before alternating wins and losses. The strength of this team is their top ten defence, even if their special teams unit does rank higher by DVOA, but this defence features a strong front seven including a healthy JJ Watt and a slightly suspect pass secondary. Meanwhile on offence they have relied on running the ball and Deshaun Watson’s legs to compliment DeAndre Hopkins amazing ability as receiver. Hopkins should be considered amongst the best receivers in the game but does not have a lot of help around him and the Texans’ offensive line is definitely a problem. We’ll take a look at how this might play out shortly, but firstly let’s talk about how the Colts got to this game.
The Colts also had a tricky start to the season that included an overtime loss to the Texans that sparked the Texans’ nine game winning streak. However, slowly all three phases of the team came together in Frank Reich’s first season in charge and that in of itself is something worth talking about. The Colts were ready to officially announce Patriots’ offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels as their new head coach once the Super Bowl was over, only for McDaniels to pull out at the last minute and leave the Colts scrambling to find a new coach and what a coach they found. Frank Reich left the Super Bowl winning Eagles and was able to use the staff that had already been assembled for McDaniels to turn the Colts from a team who went 4-12 last season to a 10-6 team that returned Andrew Luck to health and form. The defence was the first thing to come together, ably led in tackles by rookie linebacker Darius Leonard, they dragged themselves into the tenth best unit in the game by DVOA. Meanwhile, for pretty much the first time in his career Andrew Luck has an offensive line that gives him more than a couple of seconds to get rid of the ball and Marlon Mack has given them enough balance as a runner to make this offence effective. We all knew that TY Hilton was a great receiver but free-agent acquisition tight-end Eric Ebron has also benefitted from his new surroundings, contributing thirteen touchdowns to go with his seven hundred and fifty yards.
This should be an interesting matchup between two teams who obviously know each other well. Earlier in the season Deshaun Watson was over exposing himself running the ball and had to deal with bruised lung and ribs that were serious enough that he was bussed to one road game rather than flown. The defence of the Colts should be able to match up to the Texans’ offence, particularly as they will be able to double Hopkins without too much worry as long as they can contain Watson. Meanwhile if the Colts offensive line can protect Luck as they have recently then the Colts should be able to move the ball effectively on the Texans. The Texans lost their last home gain against the Colts, and whilst I can see it being another close game I actually kind of fancy the road underdog to spring the upset.
Seattle Seahawks (5th) @ Dallas Cowboys (4th)
The Dallas Cowboys are another team who started relatively slowly, going 3-5 before turning things around and only losing one more game this season. The catalyst for this transformation appears to be the trade for Amari Cooper, and whilst his success does not negate the argument that the Cowboys traded away too much to get him, the move certainly helped this team. As did the defence’s transformation from one that was overly reliant on linebacker Sean Lee to one that thrived on the play of rookie linebacker Leighton Vander Esch and Jaylon Smith finally beginning to show some of the college form that excited so many before his horrible knee injury in his final bowl game. The Cowboys are actually only ranked twenty-first in the league by DVOA, although their defence is top ten but their winning formula has been utilising the NFL leading rusher Ezekiel Elliott more effectively whilst Amari Cooper has opened up the passing game enough to make the Cowboys a functional offence if an uninspiring twenty-fourth by DVOA.
This Saturday they host a Seattle Seahawks team that many had written off in pre-season as they overhauled their roster, moving away the last vestiges of the Legion of Boom defence and collecting young talent. However, Pete Carroll has returned to the formula that saw him have so much success and so whilst the defence only ranks fourteenth in the league by DVOA, the offence ranks in the top ten thanks to their run first approach and Russell Wilson efficient play in the passing game. The now thirty-year old quarterback threw thirty-five touchdown and only seven interceptions, relying on his chemistry with Tyler Lockett and Doug Baldwin when available. However, Chris Carson has run for eleven hundred yards in fourteen games and it is the run first approach that has allowed the Seahawks to remain competitive and overcome an 0-2 start to make the playoffs.
This should be a bruising old school game that is going to feature two tough defences and a lot of running the ball. The Seahawks actually rank nine places better than the Cowboys by overall DVOA and given Pete Carroll’s playoff experience, not to mention a Super Bowl win, it is hard not to give them the edge over Jason Garrett’s Cowboys. It might be one for the football purist but I’m certainly looking forward to it.
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Read Next: Woodstock 50 Applies for Vernon Downs Permit Yet Again
Parents Accusing R. Kelly of Holding Daughters in Abusive ‘Cult’ to Hold Press Conference, Writer Says
By Jem Aswad
Jem Aswad
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Veteran reporter Jim DeRogatis is no stranger to strong allegations against R. Kelly: He’s the reporter who in 2000 received the sex tape that prosecutors alleged showed the singer having sex with a 14-year-old girl, and which led to Kelly’s highly publicized 2008 trial on child-pornography charges. And while that case was ultimately dismissed, multiple allegations of sexual misconduct have surrounded the singer since the mid-1990s — including his brief and illegal marriage to singer Aaliyah, when she was just 15 — and DeRogatis has reported on all of them.
Thus it was not entirely surprising to see his byline on Monday morning’s bombshell, a BuzzFeed News article wherein three sets of parents claim that Kelly is holding their daughters in an abusive “cult.” The new report claims that the young women fell under Kelly’s sway after being brought to him by their parents in an effort to further their musical careers, but that he then “brainwashed” them.
According to parents and the former associates, Kelly keeps several young women at his homes in Atlanta and Chicago; replaces their cell phones with ones specifically used to communicate with him and forbids them to contact their families; requires they call him “daddy” and ask permission to leave the studio or their residences; films their sexual encounters with him; and abuses them physically and verbally. The three former Kelly associates who support the parents’ claims — Cheryl Mack, Kitti Jones, and Asante McGee — have gone on the record to support the parents’ claims. While some of the parents, who have not seen their daughters for many months, have contacted police, the young women claim that they are not being held against their wills. (Reps and an attorney for R. Kelly had not responded to Variety‘s requests for comment at press time.)
The report withholds the identities of the young women but claims BuzzFeed News has verified their identities — and in the interview with DeRogatis below, the writer says he expects the parents to hold a press conference imminently.
Why are the young women named in the story anonymous?
The parents intend to come forward — they’ve always wanted to, but we at BuzzFeed would not name the victims of domestic abuse so we are respecting their privacy by not using the parents’ names in the story. But [Jones, Mack and McGee] were fearless in speaking on the record with their names — two women who were part of the “cult,” as one woman and the parents call it, who had sexual relationships with Kelly and left, and the third woman on the record is a woman who worked for a year and a half for him as a personal assistant. But probably not for long — the parents have said they’re going to hold a press conference in Atlanta, possibly very soon.
How did this latest development in the story reach you?
As you know, I’ve been on this story since 2000 — the videotape that got him indicted and tried and acquitted came to me when I was a reporter at the Chicago Sun Times, and because of all that work, the two parents from Georgia came to me in November. The Georgia parents’ daughter stopped going to college and began living with Kelly midway through her fall semester, in October or November of 2016, and they’ve only heard from her with two texts and seen her once in that time, and that’s the entirety of their communication with their daughter.
If any of the accusations against R. Kelly are true, how does he continue to get away with it?
I think there are two factors here. One is that parents know he was acquitted [in 2008] but they don’t necessarily know the long, detailed history of the many accusations from civil lawsuits dating back 25 years. They want to believe the best of a man whose music they love. All of these young women were promised musical careers, like Kelly gave Aaliyah — and let’s not forget the history there, he married Aaliyah illegally at age 15 under a falsified Cook County [Illinois] wedding license at a hotel near O’Hare airport, and that marriage was annulled and they were separated. None of that evidence was ever brought up at his child-pornography trial. So the parents believe that they will have a career for their daughters and the daughters want that very much, and they trusted a man that parents say they perhaps should not have trusted.
Number two, the music industry continues to enable him. He appeared on Jimmy Fallon on December 23 singing Christmas songs. He’s got an endorsement deal with Alexander Wang. He headlined a show Saturday night in Merillville, Indiana; he’s on tour today. Lady Gaga made a song and video with him [“What Do U Want”] three years ago — it doesn’t stop, and people are not questioning whether they should be in bed with him. A representative from his record company did not respond to requests for comment; we have three cellphone numbers for Kelly, he did not answer; and his civil attorney gave us a one-paragraph answer that is in the story. So I don’t think the record industry was unaware — they were certainly aware and I don’t think they cared.
How is that possible?
Look, I’m a fat, white 52-year-old guy. It’s been said by African-American scholars who’ve written about this, most notably Mark Anthony Neal, that if it had been one white girl, this would have been a different story. But it continues to be young African-American women that he’s preying on, and I can’t think of anybody who the media cares less about. It’s horrifying to me. These parents are devastated, they’ve been living in hell for a year and a half.
There were photos of Kelly in prison togs in 2002, public sentiment seemed to be dramatically against him, and yet the case dragged on and he was acquitted. How did that happen?
It’s rape culture. The fact that the girl in videotape and her mother and father never testified in the trial — despite three dozen other people testifying: relatives, basketball coaches, ministers, teachers, friends, best friend’s families — they never heard from the young woman in the videotape. She continued to be part of this R. Kelly “cult,” as it’s been described, along with her best friend from high school. So I think the fact that we’ve never met the young woman in that video tape — who was allegedly 14 years old when she was having a sexual relationship with R. Kelly — it remains in the realm of gossip and Dave Chappelle skits and jokes in the “Barbershop” movies. We’re not thinking about the very real damage to these young women.
And why other reporters — except for Jennifer Vineyard at MTV News [in the 2000s and] Jessica Hopper for The Village Voice — have never followed up like they did with the Bill Cosby story is an indictment on entertainment reporting, in my opinion. The culture of celebrity journalism, the culture of the music industry, and the fact that African-American victims in general are often not believed in domestic and sexual-abuse [incidents] created a perfect storm of things that have not yet produced a Bill Cosby moment for R. Kelly.
Also, there’s a judge in Chicago who heard that case, Vincent Gaughan. It took six-and-a-half years to go to trial, it broke all records, and every 6-8 weeks the judge would convene the prosecution and defense in the courtroom for a status update. He would immediately retire to closed chambers, and everything that happened every six to eight weeks for six-and-a-half years remains sealed. The Chicago Sun Times, the Chicago Tribune and Chicago public radio sued to get those transcripts opened, it lost in the Illinois appellate court and the Illinois Supreme Court. So nine-tenths of what happened in the R. Kelly trial remains sealed from the public record, and to this day we do not know what other evidence has been prohibited from open court. In my opinion — based on research and lots of evidence — Kelly has gotten considerations from the legal system that no other citizen would have gotten.
Have you tried to speak with the girl in the videotape?
Oh my god yes, we were on her doorstep when we got the video. She’s never spoken to the media. She has a story to tell, whether she ever decides to tell it.
But the parents of the young women who are in the “cult” have no legal recourse?
No, and they’re incredibly frustrated and they’ve done everything you would think a parent could do. They went to police in Florida, Georgia and Chicago, they have had well-being checks conducted and the women come out and say we want to be here and they’re of legal age, so the police and lawyers can’t do anything. But the Georgia parents have spoken for several hours with the FBI, which will neither confirm nor deny an investigation to us, but [the parents are] optimistic that perhaps the FBI can help.
Jim DeRogatis
Kanye West, Kim Kardashian Lobbied Trump for A$AP Rocky's Release, Source Confirms
Kanye West and Kim Kardashian lobbied President Trump to help release A$AP Rocky from jail in Sweden, a source close to the situation confirms to Variety. The news was first reported by TMZ. A$AP Rocky (real name: Rakim Myers) has been behind bars in the country since July 2 after being involved in an altercation [...]
Billy Eichner, Seth Rogen Recall Meeting Beyoncé for the First Time at 'The Lion King' Premiere
Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen may co-star in the new “The Lion King” with Beyoncé, but they didn’t meet Queen Bey until the world premiere of the movie earlier this month in Hollywood. “She was really lovely,” Eichner told me when he and Rogen sat down for this week’s episode of “The Big Ticket,” Variety [...]
For better or worse, Woodstock 50 isn’t giving up on Vernon Downs, despite being rejected twice already: The producers have applied for another permit to hold the festival at Vernon Downs, according to the Utica Observer Dispatch. Town Attorney Vincent Rossi confirmed the application was submitted Wednesday. This is the festival’s third application; previous applications [...]
Randy Travis Says 'Amen' to Condo in Nashville
Multiplatinum-selling country music mandarin Randy Travis, who rarely performs publicly after a 2013 illness and stroke, has sold a house-sized condominium in the upscale Belle Meade area of Nashville for $545,000, just shy of its $550,000 asking price. The seven-time Grammy winner and 2016 inductee to the Country Music Hall of Fame acquired the top-floor [...]
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Wassily Kandinsky Art Reproductions, Choose from 3 Product Types - Giclee Print, Oil on Canvas, and Wood Prints from Wanford.
Several Circles 1926 By Wassily Kandinsky
View our Wassily Kandinsky Gallery
Painting With Green Center 1913 By Wassily Kandinsky
Blue Rider 1903 By Wassily Kandinsky
Couple Riding 1906 By Wassily Kandinsky
Intime Message 1942 By Wassily Kandinsky
Accent On Rose 1926 By Wassily Kandinsky
Sky Blue 1940 By Wassily Kandinsky
Colourful Life 1907 By Wassily Kandinsky
Transverse Line 1923 By Wassily Kandinsky
Composition Vi 1913 By Wassily Kandinsky
Yellow Red Blue 1925 By Wassily Kandinsky
Small Worlds Vi 1922 By Wassily Kandinsky
Unknown By 189369 By Wassily Kandinsky
All Saints Day Ii 1911 By Wassily Kandinsky
Black Frame 1922 By Wassily Kandinsky
Boat Trip 1910 By Wassily Kandinsky
Horses 1909 By Wassily Kandinsky
Improvisation 12 Rider 1910 By Wassily Kandinsky
Improvisation 209 1917 By Wassily Kandinsky
Improvisation 26 ( Oars) 1912 By Wassily Kandinsky
Improvisation 26 Rowing 1912 By Wassily Kandinsky
The Cow 1910 By Wassily Kandinsky
A Mountain 1909 By Wassily Kandinsky
Black Relationship 1924 By Wassily Kandinsky
Black Strokes I 1913 By Wassily Kandinsky
Crossing 1928 By Wassily Kandinsky
Downwards 1929 By Wassily Kandinsky
Dreamy Improvisation 1913 By Wassily Kandinsky
Farewell 1903 By Wassily Kandinsky
Fugue 1914 By Wassily Kandinsky
Gabriele Munter 1905 By Wassily Kandinsky
Gabriele Munter Painting 1903 By Wassily Kandinsky
Gabriele Munter Painting In Kallmunz 1903 By Wassily Kandinsky
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Brazil: Lula renounces candidacy ahead of presidential poll
Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva, the hugely popular but jailed former Brazilian president, has withdrawn his candidacy for the country’s top seat ahead of a general election next month.
Lula, who is barred from running in the October 7 vote due to a corruption conviction, stepped down on Tuesday as the leftist Workers Party (PT) nominee, the party said in a statement.
Fernando Haddad, Lula’s former running mate, was named as the PT’s replacement presidential candidate.
The PT’s announcement was made outside the police headquarters where Lula is imprisoned in the city of Curitiba, in southern Parana state, just hours ahead of a 7pm local time (22:00 GMT) cut-off point for the PT to name a substitute candidate.
Following the announcement, Lula called in a post on twitter for his supporters to back Haddad’s bid for president.
Por isso, quero pedir, de coração, a todos que votariam em mim, que votem no companheiro @Haddad_Fernando para Presidente da República.
— Lula (@LulaOficial) September 11, 2018
Translation: So I want to ask you, from my heart, to everyone who would vote for me, to vote for the Comrade @Haddad_Fernando [Fernando Haddad] for President of the Republic.
Tuesday’s deadline was set by Brazil’s top electoral court when it ruled at the beginning of September to ban Lula’s candidacy under the country’s “Clean Slate” law, which forbids people with serious criminal convictions from standing for office within eight years of them being found guilty.
The 72-year-old has appealed to the Supreme Court to have the judgement overturned.
Lula could plausibly still run as a candidate if the Supreme Court reverses the electoral court’s decision, with the latter scheduled to conduct a final review of all nominees and outstanding cases related to the election on September 17 – though analysts suggested to Al Jazeera that this was improbable.
Haddad (C) served as mayor of Sao Paulo for one term, from 2013 to 2017 [File: Andre Penner/AP]
Professor Francisco Panizza, a professor in Latin American and comparative politics at the UK’s London School of Economics, said it was “very unlikely” Lula’s ban would be rescinded.
“The rulings have been extremely consistent … there is a clear line within the judiciary that Lula should not be able to stand,” Panizza told Al Jazeera.
“The court will have such a radical break [if it overturns the ban] with what lower courts have consistently ruled over the last year,” he added.
‘Decisive week’
Born in rural northeastern Brazil in 1945, the charismatic Lula rose through trade union politics and PT circles to serve for two terms as the country’s president from 2003 to 2010. He left office with personal approval ratings approaching 90 percent.
But his image as a working-class hero was rocked in July 2017 when he was sentenced to nearly 10 years in prison for accepting bribes totalling 3.7m reais (approximately $900,000) from Brazilian construction company OAS while in office. He has consistently protested his innocence, alleging the charges were politically motivated.
In January, an appeals court upheld his conviction and extended the jail term to 12 years.
Despite the controversies, Lula has topped recent opinion surveys gauging presidential candidates’ popularity levels. Polling published last week by research institute Data Poder 360 showed between 33-37 percent of voters intended to vote for Lula, if he were allowed to run.
His enduring appeal is owed, in part, to an economic boom which occurred during his time in office and his “key role” in every election since Brazil’s transition to democracy in 1985 after two decades of military rule, Oliver Stuenkel, a professor of international relations at the Getulio Vargas Foundation (FGV), told Al Jazeera.
Lula’s presidency coincided with poverty rates falling by more than 50 percent in Latin America’s most populous country, according to FGV, a Brazilian higher education institution specialising in economics and business.
“The question [now] is to what extent he can transfer votes to Haddad,” Stuenkel said.
“This week is really decisive, and it will emerge whether Lula waited just a bit too long [to renounce the candidacy] and whether he should have taken that step earlier in order to allow Haddad to create his own recognition,” he added.
Support for Haddad among voters is currently hovering at about nine percent, according to data published on Monday by polling agency DataFolha.
Prosecutors charged Haddad last week with corruption over donations made to the PT by representatives of a construction conglomerate to allegedly cover debts accrued while he was campaigning for mayor in Sao Paulo in 2012, an election he won.
His candidacy is unlikely to be blocked, as there appears to be insufficient time for a trial to take place before the elections, but the accusation could prompt a backlash from voters weary of multiple corruption scandals in recent years.
Since 2014, more than 150 business leaders, multinational corporations and politicians – including Lula – have been arrested or prosecuted as part a major corruption investigation known as Lava Jato, or Car Wash.
Bolsonaro surges
Haddad, 55, is expected to face a struggle to close the gap in support between himself and Jair Bolsonaro, a far-right frontrunner candidate who is projected to win between 24 and 30 percent of the vote, according to recent polls.
Bolsonaro’s popularity appeared to grow in recent days after he was stabbed while campaigning in the city of Juiz de Fora, in southeastern Minais Gerais state, on Thursday.
“The PT’s narrative is that Lula is the victim, but the problem is that since last Thursday, there’s another victim,” Stuenkel said.
“The hottest story in town is no longer Lula not being allowed to participate but it’s an assassination attempt against the leading candidate [Bolsonaro],” he added.
Brazil’s electoral system requires a candidate to win a majority vote – 50 percent plus one – to secure an outright victory. If no such result is returned in the first round, a second ballot featuring only the top two first round performers will be held two weeks later, on October 28.
Bolsonaro suffered life-threatening wounds to his intestines due to the stabbing [Raysa Campos Leite/Reuters]
It remains unclear whether Bolsonaro, 63, will be able to resume campaigning ahead of the first round having undergone surgery following the attack. The Rio de Janeiro Congressman’s sons, Flavio and Eduardo, are campaigning on his behalf while he recuperates.
Bolsonaro, a member of the Social Liberal Party and a former army captain, has pledged to crack down on corruption and spiralling violent crime rates in Brazil, which is home to more than 210 million people.
He has also attracted widespread criticism for making numerous controversial statements over the years regarding race, gender and sexual orientation, with analysts predicting he will prove too divisive among voters to win the majority-support required to take office.
According to Panizza, there is a “very good” chance Bolsonaro will attract enough support to top the first round, however, and force a second vote.
“The big question is, who will be competing against him [Bolsonaro] in the second round,” Panizza said.
“In short whoever wins the race for second place in the first round is very likely to be the next president of Brazil,” he added.
The country’s last four presidential elections, from 2002 onwards, have all gone to a runoff vote.
More than 20 percent of the electorate are either undecided about who to support or plan not to take part in the vote, according to DataFolha’s poll, despite participation being compulsory by national law.
A 2017 study by Latinobarometro, a Chile-based polling group, found that only 13 percent of Brazilians are satisfied with democracy.
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J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter spinoff 'Fantastic Beasts' premieres in London
J.K. Rowling's new saga is 'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them' - seventeen.com
The film starring Academy Award winner Eddie Redmayne debuts in the United States on Friday, 11/18
by John Heinz
November 16, 2016 at 1:06 PM Wed 16 Nov 2016 01:06:30 PM EST
Set in 1920's New York City, "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" explores J.K. Rowling's magical universe in a dramatic and thrilling way, sure to excite fans around the world. In transporting the story across the Atlantic to a Prohibition-era world of city wizards and otherworldly threats, the movie seeks to open up a whole new chapter of spell casting wizardry for fans of the "Harry Potter" series.
"Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" centers around disputes between factions who support the use of magic and those who do not. Ensuring plenty of laughs, thrills and excitement, the PG-13 film is expected to perform very well.
J.K Rowling again poised to enchant the world
At the London premiere of the film, J.K. Rowling announced that this would be the first of a projected 5 films centered around the quirky and eccentric Magizoologist Newt Scamander, played by Eddie Redmayne.
Redmayne appeared alongside Rowling at the premiere and each beaming with enthusiasm about introducing fans of Harry Potter into a whole new world that will feel familiar, while at the same time stand on its own as a unique expression of the sociohistorical magical universe started with Harry, Ron and Hermione.
Concepts like the Magical Congress of United States and Jonny Depp showing up dramatically alongside some familiar faces and ideas make "Fantastic Beasts" the perfect film for those who absolutely adore the world of wizarding that Rowling was so masterfully able to create. Fans around the world can rejoice because the film will soon see worldwide theatrical release.
'Fantastic Beasts' goes worldwide Friday, November 18th
"Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" will be released in the United States and many other places on Friday, November 18th. For those who fell in love with the Harry Potter books and movies, new Rowling is the perfect holiday treat. "Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone," which was originally published in 1997, went on to be one of 10 bestselling books of all time, grossing $8 billion; subsequent films have earned $7.8bn in global distribution.
While it is unclear if "Fantastic Beasts" will be as beloved as Harry Potter, at the London premiere, J.K. Rowling looked more than enthusiastic and joyful about the prospect of writing and creating more and for the fans. That's about the best news any fan could hope for.
John Heinz
International Journalist. Global Humanitarian. Cosmic Traveler..
Follow John on Facebook
Read more on the same topic from John Heinz:
Wikileaks releases CIA Vault 7 document cache entitled 'Year Zero' Global food insecurity impacted heavily by consumer choice Electronic health record databases being sold for as much as $500,000
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Category Archives: Arizona
Killed – Mario Edward Garnett (Phoenix, AZ)
MEMPHIS, TN (localmemphis.com)–A nationwide manhunt ended Saturday when a bank robber, accused of shooting and killing a police officer in Tupelo, Mississippi, was killed during a shootout with police in Arizona.
Investigators say the suspect killed in Phoenix is the same man who shot and killed Sgt. Gale Stauffer Monday. Officer Joseph Maher was also injured in that shooting. The suspect was also caught on camera earlier Monday morning trying to rob a bank in Atlanta, GA.
“All of us hope that the conclusion of this investigation will bring some measure of comfort and peace,” said FBI Special Agent in Charge, Daniel McMullen.
In Tupelo, Mississippi, the FBI along with state and local law enforcement held a media conference, and Beth Stauffer, the widow of Officer Gale Stauffer, also made a statement thanking law enforcement for their work and the nation for their prayers and support.
The man suspected in a spree of bank robberies and the killing of a police officer in Tupelo, Miss., was sentenced in 2010 for threatening to kill President Obama and his predecessors, a federal law enforcement official told ABC News.
Authorities today identified the suspect, who was killed Saturday in a shootout with police outside a Phoenix, Ariz., bank, as Mario Edward Garnett, 40.
An indictment said that in August 2010 Garnett allegedly posted a message to the White House website, saying among other things: “if you order a strike on Iran, I’m going to come up there and blow your brains out on national TV. You scheming hypocrite … Netanyahu is a dead man. Damn Israel.”
Six days later, he allegedly posted another message, saying: “I’m going to settle some scores on behalf of Israel and America’s victims on behalf of those they continue to oppress. I’ll kill president and farmer alike. You are either worth something or you are chaff.”
Garnett was sentenced in June 2011 to eight months behind bars and three years supervised release for the threats against the president.
According to court documents, he was held for a month after his sentencing, but on July 26, 2011, he was let out on supervised released.
He was supposed to participate in a “program of mental health aftercare,” but he violated the conditions of supervised released, saying during a mental health session on Sept. 21, 2011, that his probation officer should be “put to death,” according to the document.
He repeatedly “rants and makes threats,” court documents said at the time.
A federal judge placed Garnett on home confinement with GPS monitoring for 120 days.
But in October 2011, a federal judge sentenced Garnett to 24 months in prison for violating his supervised release, and the judge said he “recommends a facility to evaluate and address the defendant’s mental health.”
http://www2.localmemphis.com/mostpopular/story/Police-Kill-Suspect-Wanted-In-Tupelo-Officers/Rqd0hg6xEkCl0kG5s8b9KQ.cspx
http://www.cnn.com/2013/12/29/justice/bank-robber-manhunt/
http://heavy.com/news/2013/12/arizona-bank-robber-shot-dead/
http://abcnews.go.com/US/suspected-cop-killer-bank-robber-threatened-president/story?id=21360320
http://www.abc15.com/news/region-phoenix-metro/central-phoenix/mario-edward-garnett-suspect-in-nationwide-manhunt-had-no-arizona-connections
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/suspected-killer-fatally-shot-phoenix-bank-heist-ends-nationwide-manhunt-article-1.1561445
http://archive.azcentral.com/community/phoenix/articles/20131229phoenix-robbery-shooting-suspect-linked-officers-death-abrk.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/12/30/mario-edward-garnett-robbery-suspect_n_4517715.html
http://articles.latimes.com/2013/dec/29/nation/la-na-nn-bank-robberies-20131229
https://usgunviolence.wordpress.com/2013/12/23/double-shooting-killed-police-officer-kevin-gale-stauffer-jr-tupelo-ms/
https://usgunviolence.wordpress.com/2013/12/23/double-shooting-wounded-police-officer-tupelo-ms/
This entry was posted in Arizona, Dead, Man, Robbery at Gunpoint, Shot by Police on December 28, 2013 by usgunviolence.
Double Shooting – Killed – Michael Clower (Red Rock, AZ)
On Monday, Dec. 23, 2013 at 6:25 a.m. an armed robbery occurred at the “M Passion Adult Boutique” in Picacho Peak. According to a Pinal County Sherriff’s office press release, two armed suspects entered the business and tied up the female employee in a back room. The female was able to escape and called 9-1-1 as the suspects were running out the back door. The safe from the business was taken by the suspects.
An “attempt to locate” was broadcasted to law enforcement agencies.
At 6:29 a.m. a PCSO deputy located an Audi passenger car in the area of the reported robbery leaving at a high rate of speed westbound on Interstate-10. The deputy attempted to stop the vehicle by using his emergency lights and siren. The vehicle failed to yield and a pursuit was initiated in which the Audi reached speeds in excess of 120 mph.
At 6:37 a.m. the suspect vehicle exited onto northbound Highway 87. The suspect vehicle pulled into a dirt field and then the suspect vehicle and deputy’s vehicle collided.
Initial information is the two armed suspects exited the vehicle and shot at the deputy. The deputy returned fire and shot both suspects. One suspect died at the scene and the other suspect who was shot in the arm and leg attempted to run. The deputy was able to catch him and attempted to arrest him yet the suspect fought with him.
Eventually the suspect was taken into custody and transported to a hospital to be treated for his gunshot wounds.
The suspects, who authorities later identified as 32-year-old Michael Clower and 23-year-old Adam Chavez, exited the damaged vehicle and began firing at the officer. The deputy returned fire, killing Clower and striking Chavez in the arm and leg, according to a Sheriff’s Office spokesman.
Babeu said Chavez fought and struggled with the deputy during the arrest.
The deputy, who is a seven year veteran and member of the SWAT and Search and Rescue teams, appeared to have escaped the head-on collision without injuries, Babeu said.
Chavez was hospitalized but his condition was not available Monday evening.
http://www.trivalleycentral.com/eloy_enterprise/news/pcso-deputy-involved-in-shooting-near-red-rock/article_ba9200ec-6e63-11e3-9f13-001a4bcf887a.html
http://kjzz.org/content/13953/red-rock-robbery-ends-car-chase-fatal-shooting
http://www.1041kqth.com/news/Armed-robbery-ends-in-fatal-officer-involved-shooting–237021891.html
http://archive.azcentral.com/community/pinal/articles/20131223pinall-county-deputy-shooting-robbery-suspects-abrk.html
http://www.scrippsmedia.com/kgun9/news/Armed-robbery-ends-in-fatal-officer-involved-shooting–237021891.html
This entry was posted in Arizona, Dead, Man, Multiple Shooting, Robbery at Gunpoint, Shot by Police on December 23, 2013 by usgunviolence.
Double Shooting – Wounded – Man (Red Rock, AZ)
This entry was posted in Arizona, Man, Multiple Shooting, Robbery at Gunpoint, Shot by Police, Wounded on December 23, 2013 by usgunviolence.
Killed – Jerome Armstead (Phoenix, AZ)
Police on Saturday were looking for a suspect they believe shot and killed a man in an apartment complex in south Phoenix.
Sgt. Tommy Thompson said police responding to a 911 call at 10:45 p.m. found Jerome Armstead, 34, in the breezeway of the complex near 28th Street and Broadway Road.
“He had been shot multiple times,” Thompson said.
Armstead died later at a nearby hospital.
Officers responded to an apartment complex near 28th Street and Broadway around 10 p.m. Friday where they found a man in a breezeway suffering from multiple gunshot wounds, said Sgt. Tommy Thompson, spokesman for Phoenix Police Department.
http://archive.azcentral.com/community/phoenix/articles/20131221phoenix-shooting-death-apartments-arizona-brk.html
http://www.kpho.com/story/24279695/phoenix-police-investigate-deadly-shooting
http://ktar.com/story/80545/man-killed-in-south-phoenix-apartment-complex-shooting/
http://www.abc15.com/news/region-phoenix-metro/central-phoenix/pd-man-shot-killed-outside-phoenix-apartment-complex
This entry was posted in Arizona, Dead, Man on December 20, 2013 by usgunviolence.
Killed – Toddler (Sahuarita, AZ)
SAHUARITA, Ariz. — Police say an Arizona toddler is dead after accidentally shooting himself with his parent’s gun.
Officer Philip Steele tells KVOA television station that the shooting happened Friday night at the family’s home in Sahuarita, south of Tucson.
Steele says officers found the 3-year-old boy with a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the face after responding to an emergency call along Calle Minerva around 7:45 p.m. The boy was pronounced dead at the scene.
Steele says the parents told investigators the firearm was inadvertently misplaced for a short time. That’s when the child found it.
SAHUARITA, AZ, 12/20/13: A 3-year-old boy has died after accidentally shooting himself with his parent’s gun. Officer Philip Steele with Sahuarita Police tells KGUN9 that officers responded to a call in the 300 block of Calle Minerva, around 7:45 p.m on Friday. When officers arrived on scene, the boy was found with a self-inflicted gunshot would to the face. The boy was pronounced dead at the scene, said Steele. The parents told officers the firearm was misplaced for a short time, during which the child found and fatally discharged the weapon.
http://www.toledoblade.com/Nation/2013/12/21/Arizona-3-year-old-dies-after-accidentally-shooting-himself-with-parent-s-gun.html
http://www.azcentral.com/news/arizona/free/20131221arizona-toddler-dead-accidental-shooting-sahuarita.html
http://www.scrippsmedia.com/kgun9/news/Toddler-dies-from-self-inflicted-gunshot-wound-236868601.html
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/12/25/1262912/-Accidentally-shot-by-an-otherwise-responsible-gun-owner-GunFAIL-XLIX
This entry was posted in Accidental Shooting, Arizona, Baby, Dead on December 20, 2013 by usgunviolence.
Killed – Jordan Nava (Youngtown, AZ)
Maricopa County sheriff’s deputies have made two arrests in connection with the shooting death of a man Saturday outside a Youngtown hotel.
Jamal Akil Nathani Perryman, 24, of Glendale, was arrested Monday after questioning by detectives, according to a court document acquired Thursday morning.
Deputies took Joseph Gonzales, 22, into custody Wednesday morning after a search warrant on a home near 163rd Avenue and Jomax.
Perryman and Gonzales are accused of trying to rob Jordan Nava of a half-pound of cocaine valued at $7,600 in the parking lot of a Best Western Hotel.
The suspects’ cell phones were both traced to the shooting location, leading to their questioning and arrests.
Gonzales got away the day of the shooting in a ’90s model gray/silver sedan driven by Perryman eastbound on Grand Avenue, according to MCSO spokesman Christopher Hegstrom.
MCSO said Nava, 24, was shot near the Best Western Hotel at 11201 W. Grand Ave. shortly before 4 p.m. Saturday.
The court document said Gonzales pulled a gun while in Nava’s vehicle and ordered him to give up the cocaine. A witness who was acting as the “middle man” for the buy said Nava pulled a gun, but Gonzales fired first.
Gonzales left the vehicle as Nava fired back and got into the car with Perryman, the witness said.
Nava was rushed to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
http://www.kpho.com/story/24225465/1-dead-in-shooting-outside-youngtown-hotel-suspect-sought
http://raycomgroup.worldnow.com/story/24225465/police-arrest-suspect-in-deadly-shooting-outside-youngtown-hotel
http://archive.azcentral.com/community/surprise/articles/20131218man-arrested-surprise-after-fatal-best-western-shooting-abrk.html
http://archive.azcentral.com/community/surprise/articles/20131215youngtown-fatal-shooting-suspect-sought-by-police-abrk.html
http://ktar.com/story/80329/mcso-searching-for-murder-suspect/
http://www.kpho.com/story/24225465/police-arrest-suspect-in-deadly-shooting-outside-youngtown-hotel
This entry was posted in Arizona, Dead, Man, Robbery at Gunpoint on December 14, 2013 by usgunviolence.
Double Murder/Suicide – Dead – Hector Karaca (Tucson, AZ)
The suspect in an October double murder in Phoenix has died after a chase and a shooting in Tucson.
KOLD-TV, the CBS affiliate in Tucson, reports that U.S. Marshals and Toledo police served a warrant on the suspect at a motel near the Tucson airport.
Police said that led to a carjacking and a pursuit to 22nd Street and Fifth Avenue in south Tucson where the suspect, Hector “Flaco” Taner Karaca, 24, shot himself.
Police were looking for Karaca in connection with the Oct. 21 murders of 25-year-old Jose Alonso Villa and his 17-year-old girlfriend, Kristen Bianca Furgeri. Their bodies were found in a bed in a back house near 27th Avenue and Indian School Road shortly after 11:30 p.m., said Phoenix Police Sgt. Trent Crump.
Villa’s brother heard gunshots coming from the back house and told his mother. She looked out the front window and saw Karaca running to her car and leaving, according to the police report.
It also said Villa’s mother waited about 10 minutes until her husband arrived home before calling police. When her husband got home, he checked on his son and Furgeri and found them shot to death.
The charred remains of a white 2005 Hyundai Elantra stolen from the scene were found in an alley near 20th Avenue just north of Buckeye Road the following morning. Police identified the suspect as Karaca, who spent time in the Arizona prison system for vehicle theft.
In an interview with police, Villa’s mother said she went to the back house about 9:30 p.m. and there was a man there she knew as “Flaco” carrying a green, camouflage gun in the home with her son and his girlfriend.
Villa’s father told police Karaca and Villa became friends about a month prior to the deadly shooting and that Karaca would come to the house once a week. On the day of the shooting, Villa’s father said Karaca was trying to sell him the camouflage gun.
He said witnesses saw the suspect get into the family’s Hyundai and drive away with the car’s lights off.
On Dec. 12, authorities located Karaca in Tucson and when they attempted to arrest him, he led police on a chase and then shot himself to death.
http://www.kpho.com/story/23754939/stolen-car-found-suspect-idd-in-phoenix-double-homicide
http://raycomgroup.worldnow.com/story/23754939/stolen-car-found-suspect-idd-in-phoenix-double-homicide
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/25/hector-taner-karaca-phoenix-murders_n_4162798.html
http://www.fox10phoenix.com/story/23754301/2013/10/22/phoenix-police-investigate-double-murder
http://www.abc15.com/news/region-central-southern-az/tucson/phoenix-murder-suspect-dead-after-chase-in-tucson
http://www.azfamily.com/story/28375445/police-double-murder-suspect-shoots-self-after-chase
http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/24212056/2013/12/13/murder-suspect-commits-suicide-after-pursuit
http://www.wmcactionnews5.com/story/23772410/bank-account-set-up-by-family-for-slain-teen
http://www.azfamily.com/story/28373510/suspect-in-double-murder-on-the-loose
http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/phoenix-pd-looking-for-double-murder-suspect-6650582
http://dcourier.com/main.asp?SectionID=14&SubSectionID=468&ArticleID=125064
This entry was posted in Arizona, Dead, Man, Multiple Shooting, Murder-Suicide, Suicide on December 12, 2013 by usgunviolence.
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Recordings for Someone
All the stories in this week's show center on personal recordings that one person made for just one other person.
We hear a tape that a man named David Cossin made for a woman in Italy, who he'd met during a week he spent there. In the tape, he tries to convince her to visit him in New York. Host Ira Glass explains that hearing this tape—made by one person, for one other—is different than other things you hear on the radio. There's something unusually emotional and direct about it. Most radio stories are for an audience of many. This week, an audience of many listens in on tapes intended for an audience of one. (2 minutes)
Buddy Picture
Jonathan Goldstein
Producer Jonathan Goldstein with a story about friendship, mothers and sons, and what some have called the greatest phone message in the world—it circulated at Columbia University in New York City, and had something to do with the Little Mermaid. (19 minutes)
Special Effects Story
Kevin Murphy is a college student in Idaho who stutters. Using the power of radio editing, he and the production staff of This American Life removed his pauses, stutters and repeats so that he could record a message in which he doesn't stutter at all. This allowed him to tape a message about something that's been bothering him, to send to one man...a pizza guy, in Idaho. Visit the National Stuttering Association website. (6 minutes)
John Brasfield
During the Persian Gulf War, John Brasfield was an army scout. He went on dangerous missions, in which he was exposed to enemy fire with little protection. On most missions, he took along a cassette recorder and taped the action for his wife. He did it so that if something did happen to him, she'd at least know what happened, and he might get a chance to say goodbye. And then, on February 27, 1991, he accidentally recorded an incident that haunted him for years...an incident in which Iraqi soldiers may have been unnecessarily killed. (18 minutes)
“The Battle Is Over (But the War Goes On)” by Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry
Act Four
David Cossin
We hear more of David Cossin's tapes. He made over a dozen for the woman in Italy. And we hear from the woman — Allesandra Pomarico—about whether they worked, and what she thought of them. (10 minutes)
“Send Me Some Lovin” by Otis Redding
134: We Didn’t
Act Two: Dance
What do we do when we're not doing something? Not writing a book, not doing our jobs, not falling in love? Sometimes we just feel self-conscious.
172: 24 Hours at the Golden Apple
Act Two: Night
In this act, we hear from the rowdier, drunker late-night patrons of the Golden Apple.
603: Once More, With Feeling
Act Two: The Real Decoy
Producer Stephanie Foo talks to veteran Michael Pitre, who had to change the way he talked about his experiences in the military after he realized the effect it was having on people.
In Dog We Trust (2000)
Exactly how much are the animals that live in our home caught up in everyday family dynamics?
Conspiracy theories about the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin continue to shape Israel's politics and future.
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Yahoo Unveils Entertainment App for iPad
by Redesign Unit in Information Technology News, IT News, Technology News, Web 2.0 News, Web Industry News Tags: Redesign Your Web, Web Redesign Services, Yahoo Inc
Yahoo! Inc., recently announced Yahoo! Entertainment for the Apple iPad, which provides consumers with entertainment content, television listings, videos, news.
Yahoo! is leveraging the features of the iPad to create one of the most interactive and personal experiences possible. The Multi-Touch user interface makes it easy to help people discover new content on Yahoo! Entertainment, said a press release.
The app takes advantage of iPad’s geo-location functionality to pinpoint consumers’ locations to deliver relevant, local television listings and content. It offers real-time content from local providers, it surfaces and recommends TV shows, entertainment articles, and a wide variety of videos from across the Web.
The app can be used in both portrait and landscape displays.
“Devices like the iPad allow Yahoo! to create new experiences and expand the art of what’s possible in the eyes of consumers. Just like we did with Connected TV and mobile, we successfully re-imagined the consumer experiences for an entirely new platform,” said Tapan Bhat, senior vice president of Yahoo!’s Integrated Consumer Experiences.
Yahoo! Entertainment for iPad is available for free from the App Store on iPad.
http://www.ciol.com/Developer/Developer/News-Reports/Yahoo-unveils-entertainment-app-for-iPad/134535/0/
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More Terrible Stories From El Salvador About Abortion as a Crime
Thanks to my son, Greg Weeks, for pointing me to a story in Thomson Reuters Foundation News today that follows up on my blog post a few days ago about the incredibly restrictive abortion law in El Salvador. The article starts with the story of one young woman who was sent to jail with a 30 year sentence for allegedly having had an abortion.
It is a decade since her ordeal began, when 17-year-old Vasquez was raped and left pregnant. She suffered a miscarriage and her baby died. At hospital, doctors accused Vasquez of having an abortion, which is banned in El Salvador without exception.
Vasquez was convicted of aggravated murder in 2008 and sent to jail. She spent seven years in prison before winning release in 2015 following a rare pardon by lawmakers after El Salvador's top court ruled due process had been violated in her trial.
She was a lucky one. At least 17 other young woman are serving long prison sentences for allegedly having had an abortion, and the likelihood of the country easing its policy seems fairly low.
Congresswoman Lorena Pena, who introduced a bill in October to ease the ban, says it would allow abortion under certain circumstances, including in cases of rape and a risky pregnancy. "It's about saving women's lives," said Pena, who belongs to El Salvador's ruling leftist FMLN party. "The changes to the law are so that women can decide about their own lives, their own futures," Pena told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a telephone interview. So far, debates over the country's fiscal crisis and rampant gang violence have overshadowed all other concerns, and lawmakers have yet to vote on the abortion bill.
Unfortunately for young, defenseless women, a combination of the Roman Catholic Church and Protestant evangelical groups oppose overturning the abortion ban, and so it is unlikely to be changed, despite pleas from the United Nations and other international groups. It is impossible for me to understand how ruining a young woman's life is more important than all of the other really big issues that face El Salvador.
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The Use of Poison Gas
From World War I Document Archive
Revision as of 15:52, 30 June 2009 by Bkimberl (talk | contribs)
WWI Document Archive > 1915 Documents > The Use of Poison Gas
Will Irwin, correspondent
From the New York Tribune, April 25, 26, 27, 1915.
The German Army dispersed chlorine gas over Allied lines at Ypres on 22 April 1915.
North of France, April 24. -- There is no doubt that the action which has been proceeding about Ypres for a week, and which will probably be known in history as the second battle of Ypres, is the hardest and hottest which has yet developed on the extreme Western front. Indeed, no battle of the war has developed so much action on so concentrated a front. It is the third desperate attempt of the Germans since this war began to break through the combined British and Belgian lines and take the all-important City of Calais.
This series of attacks and counterattacks running along the whole line, developed into that general attack on the British lines with Calais for objective which the Germans probably had been planning ever since matters began to come to a deadlock in the Carpathians. The Germans, making full use of their artillery, launched infantry attacks in their old manner -- close-locked. As formerly, the British and French slaughtered them heavily with machine-gun and rifle fire. Then on Thursday the Germans suddenly threw in that attack its asphyxiating bombs, which will doubtless become famous in this war. It succeeded in breaking the line of French near Bixschoote, although not to such an extent as the Germans claim in today's communique.
The nearest British support was a part of the Canadian contingent. Fighting with desperate bravery, the Canadians succeeded in recovering part of the lost ground. They are still at it today. On a favorable wind the sound of cannonading can be heard as far away as the coast towns.
The nature of the gasses carried by the German asphyxiating shells remain a mystery. Whatever gas it is, it spreads rapidly and remains close to the ground. It is believed not to be specially deadly -- one that rather over powers its victims and puts them hors de combat without killing many. Its effect at Bixschoote may have been due to panic caused by the novelty of the device. Its composition and manner of discharge are probably no mystery to the scientific artillerymen of the Allies. That such devices might be used in war has been known for a long time, but the positive prohibitions of The Hague Conference have prevented the more civilized nations of Europe from going far with experiments in this line.
New York Tribune, April 27, 1915
Boulogne, April 25.-- The gaseous vapor which the Germans used against the French divisions near Ypres last Thursday, contrary to the rules of The Hague Convention, introduces a new element into warfare. The attack of last Thursday evening was preceded by the rising of a cloud of vapor, greenish gray and iridescent. That vapor settled to the ground like a swamp mist and drifted toward the French trenches on a brisk wind. Its effect on the French was a violent nausea and faintness, followed by an utter collapse. It is believed that the Germans, who charged in behind the vapor, met no resistance at all, the French at their front being virtually paralyzed.
Everything indicates long and thorough preparation for this attack. The work of sending out the vapor was done from the advanced German trenches. Men garbed in a dress resembling the harness of a diver and armed with retorts or generators about three feet high and connected with ordinary hose pipe turned the vapor loose towards the French lines. Some witnesses maintain that the Germans sprayed the earth before the trenches with a fluid which, being ignited, sent up the fumes. The German troops, who followed up this advantage with a direct attack, held inspirators in their mouths, thus preventing them from being overcome by the fumes.
In addition to this, the Germans appear to have fired ordinary explosive shells loaded with some chemical which had a paralyzing effect on all the men in the region of the explosion. Some chemical in the composition of those shells produced violent watering of the eyes, so that the men overcome by them were practically blinded for some hours.
The effect of the noxious trench gas seems to be slow in wearing away. The men come out of their nausea in a state of utter collapse. Some of the rescued have already died from the aftereffects. How many of the men left unconscious in the trenches when the French broke died from the fumes it is impossible to say, since those trenches were at once occupied by the Germans.
This new form of attack needs for success a favorable wind. Twice in the day that followed the Germans tried trench vapor on the Canadians, who made on the right of the French position a stand which will probably be remembered as one of the heroic episodes of this war. In both cases the wind was not favorable, and the Canadians managed to stick through it. The noxious, explosive bombs were, however, used continually against the Canadian forces and caused some losses.
Retrieved from "https://wwi.lib.byu.edu/index.php?title=The_Use_of_Poison_Gas&oldid=8341"
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UNESCO » Culture » World Heritage Centre » About World Heritage » Reporting & Monitoring » State of Conservation
State of Conservation
Marine & coastal
Earthen Architecture
Religious & Sacred
only with
Property on the List in Danger
States Parties
With DSOCR
Properties and threats
List of Threats
Other Threats
With Threats
2019 state of conservation reports (upload in process)
Temple of Preah Vihear
(Cambodia)
Factors affecting the property in 2010*
Management systems/ management plan
Factors* affecting the property identified in previous reports
a) Tensions regarding border claims in the vicinity of the property;
b) Absence of a finalized and operative site management plan;
UNESCO Extra-Budgetary Funds until 2010
Total amount provided to the property: EUR 30,500 under the UNESCO-France Convention (including EUR 18,500 for the preparation of the nomination dossier and EUR 12,000 as Technical Cooperation).
International Assistance: requests for the property until 2010
Requests approved: 1 (from 2009-2009)
Total amount approved : 30,000 USD
2009 Conservation and Management of the Preah Vihear Temple (Approved) 30,000 USD
Missions to the property until 2010**
March/April 2009, joint UNESCO-ICOMOS reinforced monitoring mission
Conservation issues presented to the World Heritage Committee in 2010
On 1 February 2010, a report on the state of conservation of the Temple of Preah Vihear was submitted by the State Party, together with a copy of the Management Plan for the World Heritage property. This report includes information regarding the perimeters of the inscribed property and of its buffer zone; the progress made on the preparation of the Management Plan; activities carried out in 2009; landscaping and enlargement of the buffer zone; and a project for the development of an eco-global Museum.
a) Perimeters of the inscribed property and of its buffer zone
The report of the State Party recalls that the inscribed property includes a smaller area compared to the original proposal reviewed by the World Heritage Committee in 2007. It contains, moreover, a `zoning plan delineating the buffer zone` addressing the request by the Committee in 2008 (paragraph 15 of Decision 32 COM 8B.102) to provide “additional details of the inscribed property and (...) delineating the buffer zone identified in the RGPP”. The World heritage Committee had also requested “a full Management Plan for the inscribed property, including a finalized map” (paragraph 16 of Decision 32 COM 8B.102).
Indeed, the RGPP (revised graphic plan of the property), i.e. the cartographic document on the basis of which the Committee had inscribed the property in 2008, did not clearly indicate the perimeter of the buffer zone. The zoning plan submitted by the State Party is reproduced here below for examination by the Committee.
The State Party of Cambodia, in its report, clarifies that a finalized map will be only possible when the demarcation of the border is materialized on the ground upon the agreement by the States Parties of Cambodia and Thailand of the final results of the work of the Joint Boundary commission (JBC).
b) Progress made on the preparation of the Management Plan
The State Party notes that the Management Plan was completed during 2009 and benefited from several technical missions on the site by a team of international experts. The Management Plan is structured around seven chapters over 115 pages, ranging from a discussion of the significance of the site (Chapter two) to the identification of conservation issues and recommendations (Chapter three), to an explanation of how the Plan would be implemented (Chapter six) and to a proposed programme for action (Chapter seven).
c) Activities carried out in 2009
In terms of actions undertaken on the ground, the State Party reported the establishment of specialised teams on archaeology, architectural conservation and planning, by the National Authority for the Protection of Preah Vihear (ANPV). The State Party refers as well to the technical missions undertaken by a team of international experts (in part funded through International Assistance under the World Heritage Fund). On 2 April 2009, these experts had formulated some recommendations meant to provide guidance to the ANPV, covering aspects such as the planning and management of the setting of the property (1 to 3); access to the site (4 and 5); the strengthening of the capacity of the ANPV, including in terms of documentation (6 and 7); the conservation of the architectural elements of the temple (8 and 9); and environmental issues. A list of specific actions to safeguard the architectural components of the Temple is also provided in the State Party’s report. The State Party informs that the implementation of these activities has started.
d) Landscaping and enlargement of the buffer zone
The State Party report noted that a new village, located some twenty kilometres to the south of the Temple (in the direction of Saem, a village located in Cambodia) has been created. This is meant to accommodate all those who had recently settled, in a disordered fashion, in the plane to the south of the World Heritage property, including in areas of considerable archaeological significance. Moreover, the State Party informs that the Military Command stationed in the vicinity of the site, has been moved near the new village, over twenty kilometres from the World heritage property. These decisions should allow, in the future, the enlargement of the buffer zone of the World Heritage property towards the south, as suggested by the international experts. Indeed, according to the State Party, the relative legal and administrative procedures are already under way. Finally, the State Party notes that the reconstruction of the market destroyed during the events of 2 April 2009, located near the foot of the north-south stairs leading to the Temple, is being finalised.
e) Development of an eco-global Museum
Thanks to a contribution from a Japanese donor, and to an amount of USD 500,000 provided by the Royal Government of Cambodia, the State Party has been developing and will continue to develop an Eco-Global Museum, to be located some thirteen kilometres to the south from the Temple, in the direction of the new village. This will present the Temple and its region in their natural, social and cultural contexts.
Following the submission of the State Party report and Management Plan, the Cambodian authorities have addressed a letter, dated 10 February 2010, to the UNESCO Assistant Director-General for Culture, requesting UNESCO’s cooperation in convening an international coordinating committee for Preah Vihear, as requested by the World Heritage Committee in paragraph 14 of its Decision 32 COM 8B.102. At the time of drafting of the present report (June 2010), discussions were underway between UNESCO, the Cambodian authorities and other concerned parties regarding the appropriate process for establishing this mechanism.
The World Heritage Centre and the Advisory Bodies note with satisfaction the steps undertaken by the State Party to enlarge the buffer zone of the World Heritage property to the south, since this would contribute to preserving the visual integrity of its wider natural setting. The World Heritage Centre and ICOMOS also welcome the measures taken by the State Party to preserve the environment surrounding the World Heritage property towards the south, provide a solution for the relocation of some of the recent settlers that occupied areas of archaeological significance, as well as the ongoing establishment of an eco-global Museum.
With regard to the Management Plan, the World Heritage Centre and ICOMOS consider that it provides a good vision for the conservation of the World Heritage property as well as a solid basis on which the ANPV can develop its policies and operational procedures. They note, at the same time, that many of the very important recommendations made in the Management Plan are yet to be implemented, and encourage the State Party to make every effort to this end, in cooperation with the international community.
The World Heritage Centre and the Advisory Bodies, moreover, welcome the steps taken by the State Party of Cambodia to convene a preliminary meeting for the setting up of an international coordinating committee, acknowledge the efforts deployed by it in that regard, and hope that the ongoing discussions will lead to positive results.
Decisions adopted by the Committee in 2010
Draft Decision
34 COM 7B.66
Temple of Preah Vihear (Cambodia) (C 1224rev)
The World Heritage Committee,
1. Having received Document WHC-10/34.COM/7B.Add.3,
2. Recalling Decisions 31 COM 8B.24, 32 COM 8B.102, and 33 COM 7B.65, adopted at its 31st session (Christchurch, 2007), 32nd session (Quebec City, 2008), and 33rd session (Seville, 2009) respectively,
3. Takes note that the World Heritage Centre has the documents submitted by the State Party;
4. Further welcomes the steps taken by the State Party towards the establishment of an international coordinating committee for the sustainable conservation of the Temple of Preah Vihear;
5. Decides to consider the documents submitted by the State Party at its 35th session in 2011.
Next 2011 Previous 2009
Date of Inscription: 2008
Nomination records (Year): 2005, 2006, 2008
Criteria: (i)
Other information on site
Read the SOUV
Documents examined by the Committee in 2010
* : The threats indicated are listed in alphabetical order; their order does not constitute a classification according to the importance of their impact on the property.
Furthermore, they are presented irrespective of the type of threat faced by the property, i.e. with specific and proven imminent danger (“ascertained danger”) or with threats which could have deleterious effects on the property’s Outstanding Universal Value (“potential danger”).
** : All mission reports are not always available electronically.
Convention Text
Policy Compendium
World Heritage Fund
International Assistance
Reporting & Monitoring
Periodic Reporting
List of factors affecting the properties
Reactive Monitoring
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Category Archives: Interview
‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ actor J.B. Smoove explains his improvised journey to comedy success ahead of Peekskill gig
Actor J.B. Smoove grew up funny. He’s the first to tell you that his whole family — particularly mom Elizabeth Whitehead — is “hilarious.” So he had a head start on the road to a career as a comedian.
But it took more than luck to hit a peak in his career at age 42, when the Mount Vernon, New York, -raised Smoove was tapped to play Leon, the permanent houseguest, on Larry David’s cringeworthy HBO comedy series “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”
He talks about his relentless climb up the ladder and reveals the key to his success in my conversation with him for The Journal News/lohud.com in advance of his appearance at the Paramount Hudson Valley Theater in Peekskill, New York, this Friday evening, April 6.
His standup act it unpredictable and changes on a dime to suit his mood and the vibe of the evening’s audiences.
“I would say this: If you love Leon, you’re gonna love J.B. Smoove,” he says.
Read the interview and get all the details for seeing him live in Peekskill on lohud.com by GOING HERE.
Posted in Comedy, Concerts, Interview, lohud.com, News, tv
Tagged curb your enthusiasm, j.b. smoove, jerry brooks, leon, lohud.com, mount vernon, Paramount, Peekskill, standup
Stephan Jenkins reflects on free-range chicken and 20 years of Third Eye Blind
The enduring San Francisco band hits the Capitol Theatre in Port Chester on Saturday, Oct. 7.
When you’re in a rock band that tours as much as Third Eye Blind, little things sometimes loom large.
On a mid-September afternoon, front man Stephan Jenkins is having a bite to eat while he chats with The Journal News by phone from the Elmwood Park Amphitheater in downtown Roanoke, Virginia.
“I’m enjoying a chicken Caesar here,” the California native says. “They’ve got free range organic chicken in Roanoke, Virginia. How about that?”
After kicking off Oct. 5 in Providence, Rhode Island, the tour takes the band to Hampton Beach, New Hampshire, and to Port Chester’s Capitol Theatre on Oct. 7.
Looking back on the songs from Third Eye Blind’s self-titled debut album, released 20 years ago, Jenkins remains proud of the work that first brought him fame. The work has endured, he says, even if it means something different now.
“I’m not the same person I was,” he explains. “It’s funny, I can revisit that person, and know that person and have more affection and appreciation for that person than I did when I was that person.”
He describes the person who wrote and recorded that album as “somebody who was very flawed.”
“There was a real drive,” he recalls. “That person had a real rage to live and a drive that was impressive. And, so yeah, I like that person.”
He resists describing how he sees himself today.
“I don’t know, I’ll tell you in 20 years. I’m not gifted with self- knowledge.
CLICK HERE to read more of Jenkins’ insights in the full interview on lohud.com.
Posted in Concerts, Interview, lohud.com, Music, News, Pop and Rock
Tagged Capitol Theatre, Port Chester, Stephan Jenkins, Third Eye Blind
How Ron Wasserman’s visit with Fred Hellerman, the last living member of The Weavers folk quartet, resulted in a world premiere
Ron Wasserman, front left, with the New York Jazzharmonic. (Mihyun Kang)
Fred Hellerman, the sole surviving member of the famous 1950s folk quartet the Weavers until his death on Sept. 1 at the age of 89, wanted to be more than just a folkie, his son, Caleb Hellerman told The Washington Post.
The quartet – which Hellerman founded with Pete Seeger, Ronnie Gilbert, and Lee Hays — was immensely popular for its vocal harmonies and faux naïve guitar-and-banjo versions of songs like Lead Belly’s “Goodnight, Irene,” other now-standard folk songs including “On Top of Old Smoky” and “The Hammer Song.”
Hellerman, the son of a poor immigrant couple, taught himself to play the guitar while serving in the Coast Guard during World War II and never studied music.
As a result, he longed to be taken seriously as a musician, and was always self-conscious about his lack of musical education, his son said. “He wanted to be seen as a serious musician and composer,” he said.
On June 28, just two months before Hellerman died, the New York Jazzharmonic gave him just the boost he wanted by giving one of Hellerman composition’s, “Fourths of July,” its world premiere at the Washington Square Music Festival.
It was almost by chance that Ron Wasserman of New City, the Jazzharmonic’s artistic director, found out about the piece a year ago and began the process of bringing it to the world.
“When I started talking about this with him, it was really kind of thrilling, because I felt like I’d made a discovery,” Wasserman explains.
Hellerman was old friends with Wasserman’s mother, retired singer Joan Wile.
“She sang with him in another group he had after the Weavers, called the Neighbors. The Weavers were blacklisted for a while, so he formed the Neighbors, and my mother was in that group.”
Hellerman and Wile had fallen out of touch, but reconnected in the last several years, says Wasserman, who soon learned that Hellerman possessed some demo recordings he had produced for Wile.
Hellerman wasn’t able to email digital copies of the recordings, so Wasserman paid the elderly musician a visit.
“I went over to his house and got the recordings, which are actually really good, some of the best recordings I’ve heard of my mother singing back in the day.”
Hellerman was intent on getting Wasserman’s attention for something else.
“He was like, ‘I’ve got to play you this piece I wrote,'” Wasserman says. “He had a MIDI computer realization of the piece. He says, ‘I wrote this 30 years ago and nobody’s played it…
“It was a good piece, it was a patriotic kind of piece that the Boston Pops would play, sort of like a theme and variations on ‘Yankee Doodle Dandy.’ So I was like, yeah, I’m gonna do the piece,” Wasserman says.
Wasserman learned that the germ of Hellerman’s idea came from his son, Caleb, who was then an infant.
“When his son was a baby in the crib, he used to scream. In the morning he would wake up like an alarm clock screaming out ‘Yankee Doodle Dandy,'” explains Wasserman. Hellerman learned to turn the noisy distraction into something productive by composing countermelodies in his head. “Eventually, a number of years later, the piece had stuck with him, and that’s how he wrote it. So he dedicated it to his son.”
Because it was written for conventional string orchestra, Wasserman had to recorchestrate it for his 17-piece jazz band.
Over the months between Wasserman’s initial discussions with Hellerman and the June concert date, Hellerman’s health deteriorated. He was too frail to attend the premiere at New York University’s Frederick Loewe Theatre.
“That’s the great irony, the irony of ironies. But his family was there, and they had a great time,” Wasserman says.
Though Hellerman couldn’t attend the premiere, Wasserman found the Washington Square Music Festival audience was very aware of its composer.
“I said to the crowd, ‘You guys remember Fred Hellerman?’ And of course, down there in the Village everybody remembered Fred Hellerman.”
Posted in Folk, Interview, Music, News, RIP
Tagged Fourths of July, Fred Hellerman, New York Jazzharmonic, Ron Wasserman, The Weavers, Washington Square Music Festival, World Premiere
Sufi rocker Salman Ahmad fights polio and oppression with music
Salman Ahmad (Photo by Chris Ramirez)
Salman Ahmad was born in Pakistan, but he developed his love of rock and roll during the formative teen years he spent in Tappan, New York, a town in southern Rockland County.
Today, a quarter century after founding the multi-million selling band Junoon in Pakistan, where he returned in his late teens, he’s still making music. Now, more than ever, it’s in service to his humanitarian spirit as much as to his Rockland-born rock and roll heart.
I had the chance to speak with Ahmad by Skype the other day about his life and work.
Though music is his life, he’s also a trained physician. Right now, he’s back in Pakistan, using his celebrity, and a bit of his medial savvy, in the battle to eradicate polio there.
But all the while, he’s looking over his shoulder, because, while he’s a Muslim like most in his homeland, he’s a known target for extremists who don’t like the Western influence he brings with him.
Go here.to read the whole interview, done for The Journal News/lohud.com.
Posted in Interview, lohud.com, Music, Rockland County, World Music
Tagged Junoon, Pakistan, Peter Gabriel, polio, Salman Ahmad, sufi
UPDATE: ‘The Little Prince’ gets special screening with the director in Yonkers Sunday, along with theatrical run and Netflix premiere (Video)
It had to be at least a little demoralizing for Mark Osborne, the veteran “Kung Fu Panda” director from Hastings-on-Hudson, to see his lyrical take on classic children’s book “The Little Prince” get pulled from the Paramount Pictures release schedule just a week before its U.S. premiere this spring.
After all, it was a film he felt “destined” to make, he told me in an interview for The Journal News/lohud, because he was introduced to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s beloved 1943 illustrated novella by the woman who is now his wife.
“She gave me her copy of the book when we were going to have to separate” when he decided to transfer to the West Coast for college. She wanted “to keep us connected,” he said “She would quote from the book in letters to me.”
Story continues below trailer.
He did get a chance to see it on the big screen in special one-off sneak preview at the Jacob Burns Film Center in Pleasantville just days before Paramount pulled the plug.
Although, Netflix stepped in and picked up the film almost immediately, it appeared that the lovely film would be for streaming only, and not generally available in a theater.
While streaming is probably the method many families would prefer to use to watch the family flick, there’s something sad about the idea that Osborne’s gorgeous creation would not be available on a bigger screen as a communal moviegoing experience.
Luckily for film buffs of all ages, the “Netflix Exclusive” is scheduled for a theatrical run that begins Friday, the same day it’s available for streaming. The IFC Center in Manhattan’s West Village has the exclusive, which was announced in a splashy full-page ad in Sunday’s New York Times.
For a real treat, see this one in the theater.
The IFC Center is at 323 Sixth Ave. (at Third Street) in Manhattan. Go here for showtimes and tickets.
NEW: You’ll also have one chance to see the movie on a big screen without making the trip into Manhattan. There’s a special screening with the director at 6:30 p.m. Sunday Aug. 7 at Alamo Drafthouse, 2548 Central Park Avenue in Yonkers. GO HERE to buy tickets at $13.25.
Posted in Interview, lohud.com, Movies, News
Tagged Alamo Drafthouse, Antoine de Saint-Exupery, Hastings-on-Hudson, IFC Center, Kung Fu Panda, Mark Osborne, Netflix, Paramount Pictures, screening, The Little Prince, Yonkers
Rockland County’s Martha Mooke performs music from ‘No Ordinary Window’ on Sunday
Nyack composer and electro-acoustic violist Martha Mooke brings her spectacular sounds to ArtsRock‘s Music at Union Arts Center series this Sunday afternoon.
She’s a spectacular violist, and her compositions on her latest album, “No Ordinary Window,” are beautiful, boundary-busting windows into her own sonic imagination.
“I slip through the cracks of defined boundaries,” she told me in a recent interview. “I keep re-creating my way…. I try to take on challenges.”
Read my recent interview with Mooke for The Journal News/lohud.com by going here, and then grab some tickets for Sunday afternoon’s show.
When: 2 p.m., Sunday, April 3.
Where: Union Arts Center, 2 Union St, Sparkill, New York
Tickets: $20 in advance/$25 at door/$10 students, available online by going here.
Posted in Concerts, Contemporary, Contemporary Classical, Interview, lohud.com, Music, News, Recordings, Rockland County
Tagged Martha Mooke, No Ordinary Window, Nyack, Sparkill, Union Arts Center, viola
First-time novelist Jessica Tom finds the way to Hollywood’s heart is through its stomach, too
Novelist Jessica Tom on the cover of the Life & Style section of the March 10, 2016, issue of The Journal News
Jessica Tom, a Brooklyn-based writer and foodie who grew up in the Hudson Valley town of Pleasantville, is a skilled writer, but her provocatively titled debut novel, “Food Whore,” has benefited from a large dose of good luck, too.
It took the Yale-trained writer five years of hard works to get her first novel published. But the luck kicked in even before the book came out. She was lucky to get a bonus that most novelists — first-timers and veterans alike — can only dream of: Hollywood’s DreamWorks studio bought an option on her New York City-centric tale of food and intrigue.
I had a chance to chat with Tom about growing up in Westchester County and the process of writing “Food Whore,” in an interview published Thursday in The Journal News.
GO HERE to read the full interview on lohud.com.
Posted in Books, Interview, lohud.com, News
Tagged Brooklyn, dining, dreamworkd, food, food whore, hollywood, jessica tom, novel, Pleasantville, restaurants
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ACG PERT Steering Committee
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DHG joins ACG as an Official Sponsor of Growth
Accounting and advisory firm commits to annual substantial investment into ACG Global network
CHICAGO, January 8, 2019 – The Association for Corporate Growth (ACG) announced today that Dixon Hughes Goodman LLP (DHG), a top 20 public accounting firm, is now an Official Sponsor of Growth (OSG) of the middle-market association.
ACG collaborates with organizations like DHG to further the association’s mission to drive middle-market growth. The multi-year sponsorship supports ACG’s large-scale networking events, including the InterGrowth and EuroGrowth conferences, thought leadership content in Middle Market Growth® magazine Middle Market Insights webinars, and other initiatives.
“ACG and DHG are jointly committed to driving growth in the middle market, and this investment underscores that shared mission,” said Angela MacPhee, chair, ACG Global Board of Directors, and partner, Baker Tilly. “We’re grateful for DHG’s ongoing support and look forward to our continued alliance in the years ahead.”
The OSG sponsorship is the highest level of commitment at ACG Global. Through branding and thought leadership opportunities with ACG, sponsoring organizations advance their business goals while contributing to a healthy middle-market dealmaking ecosystem. DHG joins Insperity, a professional employer organization, as ACG Global’s second OSG sponsor.
“We are committed to helping middle-market private equity,” said Scott Linch, partner, DHG Private Equity. “DHG has become a premier middle-market private equity services practice in the U.S. and we have greatly benefited from strategically aligning with ACG.”
Linch was a board member of ACG Charlotte in 2011 when he first attended InterGrowth. Since then, he has served on ACG’s Global Board of Directors and, most recently, as chair of the InterGrowth planning committee. “Scott’s story is one that illustrates the opportunities that become available when companies weave ACG into the fabric of their growth strategy,” MacPhee said.
Karen Craven
kcraven@acg.org
About the Association for Corporate Growth
Founded in 1954, ACG has 59 chapters across the globe. ACG’s worldwide network comprises 90,000 professionals within the middle market, including 14,500 members who serve as the investors, lenders, owners, executives and advisers to growing middle-market companies. ACG’s mission is to drive middle-market growth. For more information about ACG, please visit www.acg.org.
About InterGrowth
For more than half a century, InterGrowth has been the nexus of the middle-market dealmaking community. Pitchbook estimates that 2018 InterGrowth attendees were involved in more than one-third of U.S. private equity deals and sat on more than $189 billion in dry powder. In 2019, InterGrowth will be held May 6-8, 2019 at the Waldorf Astoria Orlando and the Hilton Orlando Bonnet Creek. For more information, please visit www.InterGrowth.org.
About DHG
Headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, DHG ranks among the nation’s top 20 public accounting firms. With more than 2,000 professionals in 13 states, DHG offers comprehensive assurance, tax and advisory services to clients in all 50 states as well as internationally. DHG offers a dedicated group of professionals across multiple service lines to provide private equity firms and their portfolio companies a full array of services to meet their needs in a challenging market. DHG provides a resourceful, one-stop solution at any stage of the deal lifecycle. Learn more at www.dhg.com.
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Coca-Cola Is Embracing AI and Chatbots in Preparation for a Digital-First Future
Chief digital officer David Godsman on new customer experiences
By Marty Swant
"We experiment in a lot of different areas," Godsman says, "and we have a global platform to do that."
When David Godsman joined Coca-Cola as chief digital officer nearly a year ago, his remit was to transform the traditionally brick-and-mortar business into a “consumer-centric beverage brand” for the digital era. Godsman—who spent the past several years in digital banking at Bank of America before heading up the company’s payments and commerce unit—is the first person in the role for the beverage brand. (The company also eliminated its CMO position and moved the role into another team focused on growth and customer experience.)
Coca-Cola is just one of many brands across a variety of industries grappling with how to serve consumers through new digital platforms. Using data, artificial intelligence and connected devices, it’s trying to rapidly test and enact new customer experiences and services.
“This is a large digital transformation exclusive to the Coca-Cola Company,” he said. “It isn’t about changing digital experiences but also about helping customers make decisions in a more effective manner. It’s about an operational transition.”
Adweek: How do you approach R&D and investment in innovation?
David Godsman: We experiment in a lot of different areas, and we have a global platform to do that. A simple example is when we wanted to look at the opportunity of vending and loyalty, Japan was an ideal market for that, and now we’re taking those learnings and applying them elsewhere around the world. What we do is generally experiment with things, and when we think things have grown to the point where they could become what is considered a “best practice,” we then start to syndicate those business units across all of our marketers to make sure that the learning is moving as fast as possible. And then ultimately, as they mature they become more commercialized, where generally we know everybody is adopting the same discipline.
Big in Japan Coca-Cola’s experiment with AI-powered vending machines is a hit.
I hear you’ve been testing AI-powered vending machines.
We’ve got a number of different examples going in the system focused on the vending side of the business. In Japan, one of our largest markets, we’ve got a platform called Coke On. Coke On is essentially a mobile-driven loyalty platform that allows you to walk up to any of the 1 million vending machines in Japan—200,000 in Tokyo alone—and actually be able to redeem loyalty rewards with just the flip of your thumb. It’s leveraging that across the vending network. We’ve also looked at some forms of AI in terms of optimizing how our vending machines are placed and where they’re placed to ensure we’re meeting consumer demand based off of patterns and things of that nature. I would say it’s been a lot of trial. The Coke On app has been incredibly successful; it’s approaching 6 million downloads. People are using it with great frequency.
What do you plan to implement elsewhere in other markets based on that?
People enjoy engaging with vending machines. That may be an assumed fact, but what we see as a reality is people do enjoy engaging with a digital experience as part of a vending transaction, so that’s been interesting. People do vary their beverages and their beverage selections as they do that, but they also appreciate the instant gratification of not only receiving the reward recognition for a purchase but also being able to use digital as a mechanism to redeem that reward. It’s a very fun thing. You literally walk up to a vending machine—the app can determine which vending machine you’re standing in front of anywhere. It pulls up the beverages that are already in it with real-time inventory and presents that back to you on the mobile app as you’re standing in front of the vending machine so you can select from any of those beverages.
You’ve also been experimenting with chatbots. How are they doing?
It’s very much still in its infancy. What we were trying to explore was [how to] effectively use chatbots in serving scenarios. We know that consumers find there is great convenience in being able to find quick answers or to address thoughts that they have. So we’ve tested a little bit in that space (such as using chatbots in the vending machines), but haven’t gone as far as creating highly brand-centric chatbots. We think there’s a lot still to play out there. Frankly, we’re already focused on the voice element.
How do you use data holistically across Coca-Cola and with its brands?
I would say we’re moving from a model where we knew you consumed a brand of ours, but we only knew you in the context of that brand, to a model where we can recognize [a consumer] across every brand that they consume or has affinity for within the Coca-Cola portfolio. And when we start to be able to do that, the relationship and the dialogue we can have with you as a consumer is significantly greater than if we just knew you as a Sprite consumer or just only as a Coca-Cola consumer. So it allows us to help shift the conversation into a broader portfolio conversation and to ensure that consumers have awareness of all the brand and portfolios that are a part of the Coca-Cola Company.
Click for more from this issue
This story first appeared in the Dec. 4, 2017, issue of Adweek magazine. Click here to subscribe.
http://adweek.it/2AEeC31
Marty Swant
@martyswant
Marty Swant is a technology staff writer for Adweek, where he specializes in digital marketing trends, social platforms, ad tech and emerging tech such as virtual reality and artificial intelligence.
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Home | Press Centre | Press Releases | Multimillion-dollar agreement on the expansion of Health Services in Tanzania
Princess Zahra Aga Khan, Head of AKDN's Social Welfare Department looks on as AFD’s deputy Chief Executive Officer, Jacques Moineville, and Amin Habib, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Aga Khan Health Services in Tanzania exchange agreements following the signing ceremony which took place Friday 9th May in France.
AKDN / Gary Otte
The French Development Agency and AKDN sign a multimillion-dollar agreement on the expansion of Health Services in Tanzania
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Gouvieux, France, 9 May 2014 - The Agence Française de Développement (AFD) and the Aga Khan Development Network today signed a US$ 79.8 million agreement, in an effort to substantially enhance the quality and reach of the Network’s health programmes in Tanzania.
Princess Zahra Aga Khan, who heads AKDN’s Social Welfare Department, attended the signing ceremony at the AKDN headquarters in Gouvieux France. The agreement was signed by AFD’s deputy Chief Executive Officer, Jacques Moineville, and Amin Habib, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Aga Khan Health Services in Tanzania.
The US $ 79.8 million agreement, which includes a US$ 53.5 million concessional loan from AFD and a US$ 26.3 million contribution from AKDN, covers the construction of a new 14,000 square metre facility that will accommodate cardiology, oncology, neurosciences, critical care, mother and child health, nuclear medicine and imaging services. It also encompasses the establishment of 30 outreach centres across Tanzania that will provide free monitoring, immunization and family planning services.
The full expansion also envisages the establishment of an enhanced patient welfare programme and the creation of postgraduate medical education residency programmes in surgery and medicine in partnership with the Aga Khan University.
The agreement, which marks the beginning of the second phase of the hospital’s expansion plans, reinforces the leading role the Aga Khan Hospital Dar es Salaam plays in the country’s primary, secondary and tertiary healthcare system. The expansion is part of the broader development of an integrated AKDN health system in East Africa. The first development phase of the hospital, which was completed in June 2000, included upgrades to inpatient accommodation, consulting clinics, the laboratory, pharmacy and an accidents and emergency unit.
Established in 1964, Aga Khan Hospital, Dar es Salaam is a private, not-for-profit institution that provides primary, secondary and tertiary level health care services in Tanzania. In 2003, the Hospital was awarded the ISO 9001: 2000 (International Standardisation Organisation) certificate. This certification is awarded only when a hospital’s clinical, diagnostic, administrative, and support services conform to the ISO standards.
The Hospital is part of the Aga Khan Development Network’s (AKDN) Health System in eight countries, which provides community health programmes covering over 200 health facilities, including 12 hospitals. It is one of the most comprehensive private not-for-profit health care systems in the developing world. In Tanzania, the Network operates one hospital and six medical centres. The Hospital provides general medical services, specialist clinics and state of the art diagnostic services. It is also part of the Aga Khan Health Services international referral system, with links to the Aga Khan University Hospital, Nairobi and the Aga Khan University Hospital, Karachi.
The Agence Française de Développement (AFD) is a public development finance institution that has been working to fight poverty and foster economic growth in developing countries and the French Overseas Provinces for seventy years. It executes the policy defined by the French Government.
AFD is present on four continents where it has an international network of seventy agencies and representation offices, including nine in the French Overseas Provinces and one in Brussels. It finances and supports projects that improve people’s living conditions, promote economic growth and protect the planet, such as schooling for children, maternal health, support for farmers and small businesses, water supply, tropical forest preservation, and the fight against climate change.
In 2012, AFD approved €7 billion to finance activities in developing countries and the France’s overseas provinces. The funds will help get 10 million children into primary school and 3 million into secondary school; they will also improve drinking water supply for 1.79 million people. Energy efficiency projects financed by AFD in 2012 will save nearly 3.6 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually.
Latest On AKDN
10 Finalists chosen for 2019 Global Pluralism Award
Prince Amyn receives Medal of Honour of the City of Porto
Aga Khan Museum opens “Seeing Through Babel” exhibition in London
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Scientists make molar breakthrough
Advances in stem cell research have allowed British scientists to grow teeth using DNA, meaning dentures could soon be a thing of the past.
Britons like PM Tony Blair could stay smiling longer
British people over the age of 50 lose an average of 12 teeth out of 32.
And for many, the thought of wearing dentures is difficult to swallow.
Researchers at Kings College London say scientific advances mean that one day people could grow their own replacement teeth.
Paul Sharpe, head of division of Craniofacial Biology and Biomaterials at the Dental Institute at King's College, says scientists used their knowledge of how teeth develop in the embryo to produce cells that could be transplanted into the mouth.
The transplant develops into a tooth, just as it would in the embryo.
The research has been tested successfully on mice, and scientists hope to begin trials on humans in the next two years.
Sharpe's team has recently been awarded $885,000 to continue their research.
So far, they've successfully grown molars - the large grinding teeth at the back of the mouth - but incisors and canines are proving more difficult.
It reportedly takes two months for a tooth to fully develop.
The technology could be available to the public within the next five years.
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"Age considers; youth ventures." - R. Tagore
Oxford, England: My Study Abroad, Summer 2015!
This time next week, I will be on a flight to the United Kingdom where I will get to spend 3 weeks earning nearly a full semester of credits studying at Oxford University.
In high school I was obsessed with Oxford University because that's where J.R.R. Tolkien, my literary hero, studied and taught AND wrote my favorite works, along with C.S. Lewis and a group of prominent English professors and authors. Now I will have the opportunity to walk where he did and see the same things he saw every day, over 70 years ago, but more than that, I'll be studying his own subject of English, as well as History.
I'll be taking 3 courses while at Oxford:
1) World Affairs, a multi-lecture course with speakers from around the world, which will cover political issues including the Arab Spring, during which I was present in the Middle East.
2) Exploring Britain, a history course that takes us across the country to different sites including London.
3) This is the one I am most excited for, Shakespeare on Stage and Screen. We will be studying 8 plays and seeing them all performed live, including my favorite, the Merchant of Venice, which we will actually see AT THE GLOBE THEATER. I am beyond excited; I cannot allow my thoughts on it too much else I should ne'er sleep again.
I will also have Friday-Sunday free every week to go explore on my own, so I am going to take major advantage of that. There's so much to see and so little time, but I'll be posting my adventures here hopefully weekly, if not in a weekly-recap form upon return.
This is the pub where Tolkien and Lewis met with other writers in a group called The Inklings to review and discuss literature. This is number one on my sites to see!
London's Globe Theater. We'll also travel to Stratford-upon-Avon where Shakespeare was born and lived, and see a few plays there.
BUT THAT'S NOT ALL.
On my way back across the pond I'll be spending 4 days in Dublin with my mom, and then we'll be traveling over to Northern Ireland for another 5 days to see a friend and explore Belfast! Ghost tours and Game of Thrones filming locations are definitely on the must-see list.
Dunluce Castle in Northern Ireland represents House of Greyjoy, ruler of the Iron Islands. This is a serious consolation for having no chance at the Iron Throne.
I have so many adventures ahead of me this month, I can't wait to share them with you! If you have any questions about planning your own trips, I have a Pinterest board (link attached here) for Dublin and Northern Ireland, and many free sites are included on the list. I may set one up for Oxford too, I'll post more on that.
Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoy following my journey!
Istanbul, Dec. 24th 2014
And so we come to the end of my travel posts... for now! The final day of our trip came with exhaustion: we were all ready to relax and get on with the Christmas spirit! But I’m glad we got to spend some time in Turkey. 22 hours in a country, or at least a city, is enough time to know if you want to return, and I know I have zero interest in ever going back to the over-populated Istanbul. 24 million people in dusty city streets and severely overcrowded public transportation — which is especially unnerving as a woman in a conservative Muslim society — is not my cup of tea.
People constantly heckled you to buy whatever they were selling, and things were more expensive than in Prague, the capital of designer shopping. And hardly anything was in English; I know that’s not mandatory but it just makes travel difficult. Nothing was in Greek either, and considering most tourists we saw were Greek, and Turkey is… well we all know that old chestnut with Constantinople and the Ottoman conquest… but come on, stuff needs to be understandable, Turkish is far from a widely-spoken language. I was shocked to learn that Turkey has been voted the number one country for tourism: the airport wasn’t even easily accessible.
Regardless of the experience’s quality, we saw the main attractions in the city and that is what’s important. First we visited the Grand Bazaar, a popular shopping attraction very similar to what I’ve seen in the Middle East or Greece. Mostly knock-off designer bags, jeans, Nike shoes, even toys, so we didn’t really buy anything; but there were some beautiful pieces of pottery that we really liked, and mom bought a few little plates and bowls. They do a style of painting with three-dimensional designs of paisley and flowers, almost like henna, and it’s always very vibrant and beautiful. There were little Dervish men (Sufi Muslims from Persia) made out of pottery, in their traditional dancing clothes and form. Another Turkish specialty is these beautiful glass electric lanterns, but they were too difficult to transport in our suitcases and the electricity type didn’t match Bahrain or America’s unfortunately.
Turkish delight, with nuts, a fruit flavor, rose, or mint, and always powdered sugar. It's made in logs.
Teas, homemade and often local/native concoctions.
Our next destination was the Blue Mosque, completed in 1616 following the invasion of the Muslim Ottoman Empire. It was large, and a strange contrast to the ancient castles of the European monarchs of the same age we had seen not even a week prior. It’s amazing to think of the differences in cultures across the continents, so different and yet both were engaged in political warfare, as is the case all throughout history I suppose.
Finally we visited Agia Sofia (St. Sophia’s, or Holy Wisdom), the oldest Greek Orthodox church in the world. It functioned as a church from 537 to 1453, when the Ottomans invaded and destroyed much of its gold mosaics and iconography of Jesus and Mother Mary. It is said that they left the images of the other saints because they carried over into Islam, and added an inscription of Allah on the dome. There was even a painting of an Ottoman emperor kissing the feet of Allah because he had divorced and remarried 3 times and wished to remarry again, against Islamic beliefs. We had a very knowledgeable tour guide who, although Muslim, made very clear she was interested in the history and the connection of religions rather than the superiority of one or the other. At Agia Sofia, they are still restoring their damages today, and many of the covered mosaics are being rediscovered.
Sultan's tomb.
For water.
It’s not a perfect country by any means, and not somewhere I’m likely to return, but I’m glad I had this opportunity to see such historic landmarks of an ancient land.
So comes the end of my tour of Europe! The rest of my vacation was spent in Bahrain, socializing with old friends and enjoying a true melting pot of cultures (which mostly consists of delicious foods!) Stay tuned for some great book recommendations, I’ve been reading a lot while I’m overseas, and whatever else comes my way on this adventure! I hope everyone had wonderful holidays, and I’d love to hear about your trips or at-home adventures this season, so please feel free to comment!
St. Charles Bridge, Fantastical Castles and Ancient Cemeteries: Prague, Dec. 20th-23rd 2014
I decided to write about Prague all at once, because we spent most of our three days here with the castle. But first some background.
Prague has four districts that are considered separate cities, although they are all in the same city. There is Old Town, which dates to the 800s and is where our Marriott was. Then there is the newest, Jewish Town, which has the oldest Jewish cemetery in the world, and dates from the 1300s; strangely, due to events in World War II as well as many, many persecutions over the past nearly-1,000 years, the entire Jewish population in the Czech Republic is less than 10,000. The other two districts are indistinguishable but designated by their origins, from the 900s, and the second from the 1100s.
The Castle has had inhabitants on that hill, where a rich supply of natural spring water runs through, since 3600 BC. The castle was built by Pre. a people that were not Slavs but Bohemians. The throne was then transferred to the Luxembourgs (yes, the founders of that little country), and then to the Jagiellons, until the Habsburgs of Austria took the throne in the Baroque era (late 1500s to the 1600s). It was Franz Joseph and Sisi (see my second day in Vienna blog post) that saw the end of the Habsburgs in Czechoslovakia, and Sisi became the Queen of Hungary later in her reign for her freeing of the Hungarian people from Austrian rule.
The Castle has, of course, gone through changes over the thousands of years it has been inhabited, but it largely hasn’t changed since the 1300s. The museums at this location are sprawling. There are over 14 of them in the area. We first walked up the mountain/hill across the city, so we saw the castle and its cathedrals from there; then we ventured to the other side, to the Castle itself, and that was even more impressive. The city is expansive, colorful, and ancient, and we saw it from every angle.
The most notable museums in the Castle were the main museum of history (where no pictures were allowed but where I learned the information relayed above.) There was an armory, with replicas of real shields and weapons, armor and especially helmets.
They also had rooms of replica homes, the coolest of which was the Herbalist’s, and the Psychic’s (a normal house, I was happy to see); psychics are people too!
The Castle reminded me of the Red Wedding in Game of Thrones, or Casterly Rock, or at least how we imagine it could look. It was medieval and yet something I would love to see more of nowadays, funny how that works. It pains me to know that so little exists from that time, and worst of all that the artifacts show that wear and tear. It’s also frustrating that we know so little concrete evidence about life in the castles we so love to tour. But we learn more every day, so that’s the positive side.
We also saw the cathedral there where a lot of relics and people were buried who were former Habsburgs or other royals, it’s as close as you can get to meeting royalty as a peasant like me so that was fascinating.
Our first day we took an antique car ride around the city, which turned out to be a very informative tour. We saw the house where Amadeus was filmed, and learned that the director, Milos Foreman, was Czechoslovakian (see my second day in Vienna post for more on this as well.) We learned where Mission Impossible: III and IV, (Ghost Protocol) were filmed, and that’s something I was super fascinated by as a Tom Cruise lover (I know, I know, very unpopular but I can’t help but be impressed, he ages like a fine wine it’s amazing.)
The second day we went to the Charles Bridge, a very famous, ancient bridge that is now just for walking. It had great views of the city and is lined with beautiful statues. Also, Tom Cruise ran across this bridge in MI3 so that was pretty exciting! We also saw the famous Astronomical Clock of Prague, which was built in 1410, the 3rd oldest in the world. It has an ornate show of little figurines on every hour, and it's a beautiful building, a true marvel of historical architecture.
The third day, we went to the Jewish Quarter, saw parts of the Kafka Square named for the writer Franz Kafka who wrote in Prague for a few years, and most notably saw the oldest Jewish cemetery in the world! It was so eerily beautiful. There was an adjoining museum about burial customs as well as a background on holy days and their differing calendar, which was something I never knew much about so I was excited for this opportunity. There was a building built like a synagogue with names of every person who was confirmed dead or missing during the Second World War, and most names were connected to Terezin Concentration Camp. It was too far from the city for us to go, but it was moving enough to see their names along the walls of this memorial.
We spent the rest of the time walking the markets and eating the local cuisine. Overall, our time in Prague was brief but well-spent. I’m writing this from the flight to Istanbul, where we’ll spend Christmas Eve, and then it’s onto Bahrain for Christmas Day and the rest of my Christmas break!
Karlsplatz and St. Charles Church: Our Final Day in Vienna, Dec. 20th 2014
Today wasn’t a full day in the city, but we made the most of it before our flight left for Prague, the feature of my next post. We decided to visit another Christmas market in Karlsplatz, which was about 25 minutes from our hotel, and St. Charles Church, the namesake of the plaza holding the festivities.
This church proved to be one of the more immaculate churches because of its mind-boggling height, somewhere around 10-12 stories of domed artwork. The church had an elevator indoors which allowed you to go all the way to the start of the dome, and then there were steps to go up, through the dome and beyond into the outside through the top of the building. My mom and brother, Christopher, ventured to this, but Nicholas and I stayed down for our fear of heights. It was terrifying to think how the artists had worked to paint it all, nearly 300 years earlier.
Some paths and stairways were visible behind the dome and as we went up the elevator, a terrifying testament to how it was accessed before elevators.
Vienna has been my favorite city in a long time, and I’m learning German with renewed vigor, hopeful that upon my return to Austria I can travel to the smaller towns more easily. When I return to the city again, I am hoping to visit the Belvedere museum plaza, something I was vague on and didn’t particularly understand existed so largely, until our taxi to the airport drove through it. It’s a huge plaza heading away from the city center that holds another Habsburg palace, as well as smaller museums, including the Army Museum.
I would also like to visit the Military History Museum, the Natural History Museum (in the Museumsquartier, across from the Art History Museum we visited in the last post about my trip) and to take a day trip out to the ‘Sound of Music’ house. There is also another palace (I know I know, but I’m a sucker for crumbled monarchies!) about an hour outside the city which has beautiful gardens, similar to Shönbrunn, where I would also return on my next trip. I’ll be aiming for a spring/summer venture, to see the city in a new light.
Thank you for reading about my adventures in Vienna, and I hope you’ll come along with me for my next post of this trip, to Prague!
Maria Theresiaplatz and Weinmarkt: Vienna Dec. 19th 2014
Today we saw the Museumsquartier, a large, LARGE group of squares and plazas with museums on every side. There are sculptures everywhere as well, and mini parks I”m sure would be gorgeous during the spring and summer months. Of course I was most excited to see Mozart’s statue, as he is one of my main celebrity crushes.
In this plaza is the Freud Museum, Leopold Museum, and about a dozen others. We saw the Art History Museum, in Maria Theresiaplatz, where there was a large Christmas Market of course! Armed with some glühwein, glorious German mulled wine, we ventured in. Valasquez was on special exhibition, but we saw many classical artists. I didn’t have as much time as I would have liked to read about all the different people, but I took all the names and I’ll hopefully be able to learn more at home. The majority of the museum was priceless Habsburg collectibles.
We went to the town hall and the current parliament building for all of Austria, and took some pictures of the architecture there (pictured in above slideshow) when we saw the largest, oldest Christmas market, the Christkindlmarkt! It was beautiful and the glühwein was magnificent.
Vienna is a city I know I want to return to, hopefully in the spring or summer for a slightly different take, so I can see the museums that I missed out on. But I loved this city, and these traditions of glühwein and such will be adapted for my home forever now.
The Hofburg and the Catacombs:Vienna, Dec. 18th 2014
This day in Vienna will be especially memorable because our family friends, the Sonntags, who are from Slovakia but live in Dubai as expatriats, much like how my family live in Bahrain but are from Pennsylvania. They were en route from Innsbruck, Austria, where they were skiing, so they took the train to meet us in Vienna. It was great to see Richard, we haven’t seen each other in two years and with both of our international lifestyles who knows when I’ll see them all again, but that’s life when you travel as much as we do! We went to St. Stephan’s again, it’s the center of the city, and then we set out to the Hofburg, the parliament complex of the former Habsburg empire. Be sure to read my day 2 in Vienna post, where I gave some background on the Habsburg dynasty, my new obsession.
This was a palace where they spent more time than Schönbrunn, and they had an entire museum on Sisi called the Sisi Museum. It even went into detail of her childhood and her hobbies, her exercise equipment was on display, and her dresses as well as her writings. She was a great poet, a typical melanchly sort, and her period of mourning after the suicide of their only son and heir was her most creative and her psychological state the most fragile, naturally. She was what I call dismally fascinating, and I absolutely adore her for it.
After leaving there we went into St. Peter’s Church, and then our family ventured into the catacombs. The Cathedral, est. ca. 1300 by Kaiser Karl IV, and housed his and his family's bodies, the royal Habsburg's organs, a mass plague burial of the upper class, and many many stacks of coffined burials for nobility, two floors, all the way through WWII. Also, priests and bishops of the church have been buried there since 1630, and will continue to be buried there indefinitely.
Later in the evening my mom and I went to a free concert in the catacombs of St. Peter’s, and that was a fascinating experience. They played Baroque music on actual Baroque instruments: a hurdy-gurdy, bagpipes, a wooden flute, a cello, and a harpsichord, the latter of which I had never heard played live. The choice of music was unfamiliar compositions by the court composers of the Habsburgs at the Hofburg, which was an unexpected tie-in with all else I had learned that day. Everything was in German so I only caught about 1/3 or so of the information spoken, but I really enjoyed the concert nonetheless.
Tomorrow we head into our fourth and final day, when we venture to the Museumsquartier, and the Art History Museum at Maria Theresiaplatz!
Schönbrunn and Mozart: Vienna, Dec. 17th 2014
Today we set out to see Schönbrunn Palace, the beautiful yellow palace Vienna is often known for. This is the number one attraction in Vienna, and as far as I am concerned it is the greatest site where I’ve learned the most, and if I only had one day in the city it is where I would return.
Of course there was a beautiful Christmas Market out front, I have learned they are everywhere in the city, and it was here I first tried Glühwein, or mulled red wine with Christmasy spices like cinnamon and nutmeg; this is surely a new tradition for me, it was so delicious! Every market has its own mugs, and I’ve collected one at each location and will continue to throughout my whole trip! It’s a great souvenir for an affordable price, and a great excuse to get more Glühwein!
We took the public transport to the market, the metro. Our stop was in Stadtpark, the city park of Vienna. It’s a beautiful park with a golden statue of the favored composer of the Viennese monarchs in the 19th century, Johann Strauss. On this trip to Schönbrunn I learned everything there is to know about the Habsburgs, the royal family of Austria, and I hope I’ll retain it all and continue to read about it when I go home.
The castle was amazing. The Habsburgs loved gold and lavish lives of decadent shows of their riches. The most prominent features in the castle were the walls, of which were 3-dimensional artistic vines of gold-plated woods and ceramics. They heated the castle with large, gold and ceramic ovens that were stoked from a hidden passage in the walls so as to keep the rooms clean. The receiving rooms, where the Kaiser/Emperor would meet guests, were so structured and regulated that even the inclination of the emperor’s head was uniform for each guest. They even had a recording of Emperor Franz Joseph, my favorite monarch, saying “thank you, it’s been a pleasure”.
I could go on all day about the glory of the Habsburgs, but I’ll give a very brief overview. Maria Theresia, of whom a major plaza and Christmas Market is dedicated to in the Museumsquartier (where we are going tomorrow), was the favored monarch, ruling over 60 years, around the late-1600s to the mid-1700s. There was some unrest and assassination until the 1800s when eventually the people’s favorite, the humble, modest, loving Franz Joseph came to power. In his own time he was much beloved. He came to power at only 18, and married a Bavarian princess, Elisabeth, nicknamed Sisi. Not liked during her time for her dislike for her husband, she was tragically depressed and spent most of her life apart from Franz Joseph, notably two years on the Greek island Corfu, and on her yacht. She was a tragic wonder, a fascination and a legend, stabbed to death by Italian terrorists. Her husband’s response when learning of her death was “you have no idea how much I loved this woman.” He was a great man and my favorite monarch I’ve ever learned about. He even lived modestly, considering all the money he had, and he put his people first in every way he could. Upon Sisi’s death, however, it was her legend that lived on into modern history, mainly through cinema and Hollywood publicity.
When we left we browsed the gardens, which i”m sure would be more impressive in the summer, but they were so large and the statues in the front, in Greek form, were very regal and gave the yard a speechless appeal. The aviary was particularly interesting, built in the late 1700s and still functional. We also looked at the Christmas Markets on the premises; these things are EVERYWHERE here, it’s great!
After leaving, we went to the Mozarthaus… the actual apartment W.A. Mozart lived in after 1785 until his death! 5 Domgasse, Wien… the address Mozart’s freelance writings were written at, including The Marriage of Figarro, Don Giovanni, countless sonatas and concertos, and the famous Requiem. This is where his pupils came to be tutored, and where his famous parlor games were played. This was where Haydn told Mozart's father Leopold, “your son is the greatest composer I’ve met or heard of”; HAYDN said that!
Needless to say I fangirled endlessly.
I learned so much here. They had an entire section on disputing the legends of Salieri’s hatred of Mozart, the subject of Milos Foreman’s Amadeus film in the 1980s. I learned that Salieri was actually a fantastic composer, and an accomplished musician, working for the monarchy in every possible musical avenue, as court composer to organizer of music entertainment events. He was just more modest than Mozart, and that is why his fame was not so eternal. They actually had a good relationship, and it was Salieri who had Don Giovanni performed at the Orangery in Schönbrunn for its first performance, to the royal family.
Mozart had a good friend, Antonio Saliman, who was of Nigerian descent.
His co-writer (who wrote the words) for his operas was just as talented as he, and famous for his librettos.
I also learned that Mozart was a member of the Free Masons, and his last finished composition was a cantata for their organization in Vienna.
The mystery of his death was never solved, and the reports of his poisoning came from his sudden falling ill. It is likely he took mercury in an effort to end his illness, which as we know now, is practically suicide. But with his involvement with the Free Masons I wonder if it could not have been… Illuminati… but that’s just me. It broke my heart to hear all about his struggles on his last day. He still sang the parts in Requiem with his assistant and his wife, and it was during Lacrimosa, my favorite part of the Requiem, that he faltered and could not continue. He died 11 hours later.
The lives of Mozart, Salieri, and the Habsburg monarchs were the focus of today, and I couldn’t have been more pleased! This was my favorite day in Vienna, altogether.
Arrival in Vienna, Austria! Cathedrals, Christmas Markets & Schysters in Coats, Dec. 16th 2014
17 hours of travel time to Bahrain paired with 11 hours to Vienna all in three days... but finally, I'm here!
We are staying at the Marriot right in der Mitte, or the city center, which I would highly recommend for its scenic views and walking location for all the major destinations in the city, especially at this time of year.
We set out, fighting jet-lag, intent on discovering the beauty of Vienna from the start. My first impression was the taxi ride from the airport, and coming into the city it was as reminiscent of home as it was of other parts of Europe. With the exceptions of a few differing plants along the road, and traffic signs in a different format plus kilometers, there was factories and homes with only slight variations from what I'd pass in Reading or Philly. But as we neared the city, and passed over the beautiful, elegant, famous Danube River, we were in a darling paradise, a historic beauty that was aged enough I believed it was real, but just incredible enough to take my breath away.
To put it in the most relatable way, it feels like a town in Disney World. The sidewalks are directly up against the buildings, which are all vibrant colors or pastel yellow, with greening metal roofs or delicately white moldings around each window and doorframe. The German language itself is so charming that it felt surreal to be in such a place of timeless elegance. Vienna has a childish innocence mixed seamlessly with mature dignity, with just a smattering of sex clubs to remind you that this is, in fact, modern Europe. It's a complete immersion into the familiar European culture, with an occasional McDonalds and Starbucks to call to globalization, but the cultural identity is not lost in this great city.
The shops and streets are decorated for Christmas, and the prominent decoration is fir trees lining the streets, in the center of the walks, at the corners of each building... hundreds of them, and not even decorated, just in their natural state of beauty. The Christmas Markets, a tradition since 1298, are spread throughout the walkable square, where delicate Christmas tree ornaments, snow globes (invented in Vienna), hand-carved wooden items, Steiff teddy bears, Tuhn toys, and other classic German goods can be bought.
The food was my favorite part. Bratwurst, of course, being sausage and of piggie origin was not something I endeavored upon (micropigs are my soulmates, I don't eat pork) but my family certainly enjoyed it. I had pumpkin soup in a bread bowl, and if we are out tonight I'll be getting the goulash in a bread bowl; the bread was delicious German sourdough and the pumpkin soup so fresh, as was everything in the market. The pretzels were larger than entire loaves of bread I've seen! Had they not been out in the cold I'd have gotten one, as I'm sure they were heavenly when soft and warm.
The best of the food was the mulled wines, hand-crafted and invented in competitions, then the winners are sold throughout the city in the same little ceramic boot mugs, which can be bought for the 3 Euro deposit or returned for a refill. We tried the Trifoler Apfel, with real chopped apples blended with white wine and cinnamon and about a dozen other subtle ingredients, and I've never been warmer!
Update: I collected the mugs at each location and have about 6 altogether.
Our next venture was the St. Stephan's Cathedral, a Catholic church with a spire reaching up to 67 meters (about 220 feet) that my mother decided we should climb. This was a terrible endeavor for my brother Nicholas and I, who are terrified of heights, but I kept Indiana Jones in mind and figured this was pretty safe by comparison to' Last Crusade's' "leap of faith".
I got some great photos and saw a breathtaking view of the city I'm already in love with! I found it especially lovely how colorful the shingles on the roof were; I wonder how long they have been there, judging by the coat of arms I'd say hundreds of years, and that's not even old for a city like Vienna. So incomprehensibly fascinating.
Now comes to the real Wahba adventure... but first let me give some background, and a bit of warning that may seem obvious upon its retelling. In Vienna, there are these men dressed in festive red coats or sometimes a navy or black, with gold fastenings and embroidery. They speak tons of languages fluently and appear to be tour guides here to help you. They have information on lots of attractions and will give you guidance to your desired destinations.
But these men are not your friend. They are shysters at their best.
They work for rinky-dink theater companies that are amateur at best, overselling the tickets for upwards of 50 Euros to these little venues with tiny shows that are presented to be concert halls and masterful performances with full orchestras. We were victims of one such shyster (interestingly, this word originates from the German Shiesser, or "worthless person".)
Luckily we did not spend as much as some people are pushed into, my dad is a master negotiator, but we were not impressed with Palais Palffy's concert of Mozart and Strauss. Most concerts in Vienna are tributes to these golden composers, and I am personally about 99% sure that in a past life I was romantically involved with W.A. Mozart and am still very much in love... so I was not happy to see his name soiled in the name of riches, the one thing he detested and died in poverty to protest, for the sake of music's purity.
Moral of the story: fast-talking salesman can be selling ANYTHING, and Google your options before purchasing, folks.
Our concert was not terrible, but not what we were sold on. The "authentic costumes" were nothing like our Renaissance Faire could have procured; the "full orchestra" was 6 people; the "large stage" was about 20 feet across; the "opera house" was an art building ACROSS THE STREET from the ACTUAL opera house; and the ballet "dancers" get quotation marks because if I can replicate your moves, lady, then it's not very good ballet.
The highlight of the show was the leader of the sextet, who was a well-accomplished violinist, and the cellist, who was hilariously jamming out to every song. The musicians were alright, and the sole opera singer was even tolerable, which is hard to manage even in professional opera. Had the show been advertised as an intimate setting and not sold as an elaborate life-changing event, we would have been satisfied. But the lies paired with charing a mandatory 1 Euro 50 for EACH COAT to be checked upon arrival is why I warn all of tourism against these men in ornate coats.
Overall it made for an eventful first day in the city; stay tuned for our second day at Schönbrunn Palace, the famous Yellow Palace of Austria, the summer residence of Austria's former monarchs.
Vienna Waits for You: Europe, Christmas 2014!
You can get what you want or you can just get old." - Billy Joel
This semester I've been very keen to be impulsive. When opportunity strikes, I take it, and I've been trying new things and learning so much about myself. Never say never, and anything is possible; these are two of the most cliché sayings and yet so true right now, and I couldn't be happier about that.
I love being young and selfish with my time and I think that's a-ok. I'm not very good at the selfish part, but I'm trying to put myself first because now more than ever is the time to do that!
Billy Joel's 'Vienna' has been my power anthem all semester for such inspiring lyrics and I'm really, REALLY trying to enjoy the ride, Billy, thanks for the reminder.
When the opportunity arose to travel this Christmas instead of staying home and finding a part-time job or otherwise slacking off indoors this winter, I jumped at it. My parents and I discussed it and decided on... a tour de Europe East!
This month I'll be spending Christmastime in one of the most magical places for winter ever, Vienna, Austria! After that we'll be traveling to Prague in the Czech Republic, then a pitstop in Istanbul before going to Bahrain where I'll relax by the beach for most of January before coming back in time for the spring semester.
I'll be writing every day in Europe, and keeping up-to-date on cultural events of note while in Bahrain. My family live there, and I had lived there for three-and-a-half years in high school; but I might tourist-it-up a bit for the sake of interesting journalism!
I'm so fortunate to be able to cross such things off my bucket list, and I can't wait to experience these new places this Christmas, while spending rare time with my family! Therapuetic reading by the pool on the beach, dinner and drinks at the British Club or Crown Plaza, parties with friends and catching up with an island of wonderfully diverse expatriats... I really can't wait to "hang up the phone and get away for a while".
Central Market, Lancaster: Over 200 Years of Local Goods
Earlier this month, Toni, Martina and I took a girls day and visited one of the most exciting places in Lancaster City: historic Central Market! The website announces the Market to be "the Country's Oldest Farmer's Market, in the Heart of Amish Country." It is held every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday afternoon in a 120-year old building built with classic red Lancaster brick, located in one of the most beautiful parts of town. Lancaster, like all cities unfortunately, is going somewhat downhill, but the historic districts are thankfully in tact, and as beautiful as ever.
We decided to get some organic foods and teas that particular weekend, and as lame as it sounds it really was exciting. It feels good to be in company with so many other people who share your interests in a place, and everything was so well priced. It was refreshing to see a place that was genuinely 'small-town' in such a big city.
We took the bus in and spent about an hour at the market, and I got two homemade teas from the herb-and-tea shop there: Russian Spice and Apricot Orange, and I also got a loose-leaf diffuser. It is delicious, especially the Russian Spice, and I am actually thinking about trying to make my own tea this summer. I also got some organic snap peas to snack on. All together I spent about $6, it is really well priced. I've got some pictures I'd love to show you too, see the slideshow below!
Meet Liz, Your Resident Hobbit
Full-time student and Netflix extraordinaire, I'm a hippie and a Tudor wench: a nerd for pop culture, literature, sci-fi, the paranormal, history and music of most genres.
I investigate nature but mostly because I love being childish outdoors.
Learning for the sake of gaining knowledge is my game.
I also travel. A lot.
10/10 Would Recommend
A Good Cause
The PA Renaissance Faire
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Full Statute Name: Mckinney's Consolidated Laws of New York Annotated. Environmental Conservation Law. Chapter 43-B. Of the Consolidated Laws. Article 11. Fish and Wildlife. Title 5. Fish and Wildlife Management Practices Cooperative Program; Prohibitions; Taking of Fish, Wildlife, Shellfish and Crustacea for Scientific or Propagation Purposes; Destructive Wildlife; Rabies Control; Guides; Endangered Species. § 11-0512. Possession, sale, barter, transfer, exchange and import of wild animals as pets prohibited
Primary Citation: McKinney's E. C. L. § 11-0512 Country of Origin: United States Last Checked: January, 2019 Alternate Citation: NY ENVIR CONSER § 11-0512 Date Adopted: 2004
This section provides that no person shall knowingly possess, harbor, sell, barter, transfer, exchange or import any wild animal for use as a pet in New York state, except that any person who possessed a wild animal for use as a pet at the time that this section went effect may retain possession of such animal for the remainder of its life. Certain other entities are also excepted from this ban.
1. It shall be prohibited for any person to:
a. knowingly possess, harbor, sell, barter, transfer, exchange or import any wild animal for use as a pet in New York state, except as provided in subdivision three of this section; or
b. intentionally release or set at-large any wild animal, authorized by this section for use as a pet, from the location where the animal is permitted to be possessed or harbored.
2. This section shall not apply to the following persons and entities with respect to wild animals owned or harbored by them solely for a purpose other than for use as a pet:
a. Zoological facilities licensed pursuant to 7 USC. Sec. 2131 et seq.;
b. Exhibitors licensed pursuant to the Animal Welfare Act, 7 USC. Sections 2132-2134 and reptile exhibitors who have demonstrated to the department, in accordance with regulations promulgated by the commissioner, that the sole purpose for which the wild animal or animals are used is for exhibition to the public for profit or compensation;
c. Research facilities as defined in the Animal Welfare Act, 7 USC. Section 2132 (e), which are licensed by the United States Secretary of Agriculture;
d. Licensed veterinarians and incorporated humane societies, animal shelters, societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals or animal welfare organizations in temporary possession of wild animals;
e. State universities, private colleges or universities, or state agencies working with wild animals;
f. Wildlife rehabilitators licensed pursuant to the provisions of subdivision three of section 11-0515 of this title and regulations promulgated thereunder, who are tending to sick or injured wild animals;
g. A person having custody of a wild animal solely for the purpose of transporting it to a licensed veterinarian, wildlife rehabilitator, humane society or other entity authorized by this section to handle or treat wild animals;
h. A wildlife sanctuary as defined in subdivision thirty-two of section 11-0103 of this article;
i. A person who is not a resident of this state who is in the state only for the purpose of travelling between locations outside the state. In no event shall this time period exceed ten days;
j. A person who is paralyzed from the neck down who possesses a new world monkey trained to perform tasks for its owner by an organization described in section 501(c) of the Internal Revenue Code of 19861 and dedicated to improving the quality of life of persons paralyzed from the neck down.
3. Any person who possesses or harbors a wild animal for use as a pet at the time that this section takes effect may retain possession of such animal for the remainder of its life, provided that such person:
a. Has not been convicted of any offense relating to cruelty to animals or under a judicial order prohibiting possession of animals;
b. Applies to the department within six months of the effective date of this section, and obtains from the department, a license pursuant to subdivision four of this section;
c. Complies with all applicable federal, state, or local laws, including any ordinance, rule or regulation adopted by a local board of health, or any rules and regulations established by the department as requisites for ownership of such wild animal; and
d. Reports a release to the local police department and animal control immediately upon discovery of the release. Each escape during a twelve month period of time will subject the possessor to penalties by the department pursuant to subdivisions eight and nine of this section.
4. The department shall be required to issue licenses authorizing possession of wild animals only to those persons who comply with the provisions of subdivision three of this section and with any regulations promulgated by the department thereunder. Such licenses shall be valid in any jurisdiction within the state where possession of a wild animal is not prohibited by local law or ordinance, rule or regulation adopted by a local board of health, and shall be renewable biennially during the life of the animal subject to continued compliance with the provisions of this section and with any regulations promulgated thereunder. The department shall forward copies of such licenses to the clerk of the city, town or village in which each wild animal is harbored.
a. License applications shall include, but shall not be limited to, the following:
(1) The name, address and telephone number of the person who owns, possesses or harbors the wild animal or animals, including an acknowledgment that the person who owns, possesses or harbors the wild animal or animals is twenty-one years of age or older.
(2) The address of the location where the wild animal or animals will be kept, if different from the above.
(3) A detailed description of each wild animal owned, possessed or harbored, including species, gender, age, any identifying characteristics, and an identification tag or tattoo if required by the department, with proof, acceptable to the department, that each such wild animal was acquired prior to the effective date of this section.
(4) The name, address and telephone number of the veterinarian, who has agreed to treat the wild animal.
(5) An acknowledgment indicating that the wild animal or animals will not be bred.
(6) A detailed certification establishing that the location in which the wild animal will be kept complies with all appropriate standards of care and at minimum complies with the standards for animal care set forth in the Federal Animal Welfare Act and other applicable federal, state and local standards, including, but not limited to housing, temperature, ventilation, drainage, sanitation, food, water, exercise and veterinary care appropriate to the species and sufficient to maintain the wild animal in good health.
(7) An acknowledgment that the wild animal will not be tied, tethered, or chained outdoors, allowed to run at large and that the wild animal will not be brought to any public park or commercial or retail establishment unless it is being brought to a veterinarian or veterinary clinic.
(8) An acknowledgment that possession, harboring or owning such wild animal does not violate any applicable federal, state or local law, including any ordinance, rule or regulation adopted by a local board of health.
b. The department shall set biennial license fees for the possession of wild animals pursuant to subdivision three of this section in an amount determined to be reasonable but not more than one hundred seventy-five dollars for two years for each wild animal. License fees shall be used solely for the implementation and enforcement of this section.
5. The provisions of the state administrative procedure act shall apply to the denial or revocation of a license.
6. Any person in possession of a wild animal as a pet that has been granted a license pursuant to subdivision four of this section shall not breed, or sell, trade, barter or exchange such wild animal.
7. A person possessing, owning or harboring a wild animal who is denied a license pursuant to subdivision four of this section, or whose license is revoked, shall surrender such wild animal to the department or an authorized agent thereof at a location designated by the department for such surrender or a police or peace officer of this state, a local animal control officer, or a duly incorporated society for the prevention of cruelty to animals, or provide proof that the animal has been humanely euthanized according to American Veterinary Medical Association standards by a licensed veterinarian.
8. The department, any police or peace officer of this state, a local animal control officer, or a duly incorporated society for the prevention of cruelty to animals is hereby authorized to enforce the provisions of this section and issue notices of violation to persons in violation of this section, and shall have the authority to seize any wild animal held in violation of this section. A county society for the prevention of cruelty to animals must obtain a warrant before seizing a wild animal or arresting a person who owns or possesses a wild animal under this section. Wild animals seized or surrendered pursuant to the provisions of this section shall be transferred to a duly incorporated wildlife sanctuary as defined in this section, or a zoological facility, or shall be humanely euthanized. Any costs associated with seizing, transferring, recapturing or euthanizing a wild animal shall be borne by the person who owned, harbored or possessed the animal. The department shall also have the authority to seek injunctive relief in any court of appropriate jurisdiction to prevent continued violations of this section.
9. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, any person who knowingly breeds a wild animal or knowingly possesses, owns, harbors, sells, barters, transfers, exchanges, or imports a wild animal for use as a pet or intentionally releases or sets at-large any wild animal, authorized by this section for use as a pet, from the location where the animal is permitted to be possessed or harbored in violation of the provisions of this section shall be subject to a penalty of not more than five hundred dollars for the first offense and not more than one thousand dollars for a second and subsequent offenses. Each instance of breeding, owning, harboring, sale, barter, release, transfer, exchange, or import of a wild animal in violation of this section shall constitute a separate offense.
10. Nothing contained in this section shall prevent any city, town or county from enacting more restrictive provisions governing the possession of wild animals for use as pets.
(Added L.2004, c. 692, § 5, eff. Jan. 1, 2005. Amended L.2004, c. 693, § 2, eff. Jan. 1, 2005; L.2005, c. 10, § 3, eff. March 15, 2005; L.2012, c. 326, §§ 1, 2, eff. Sept. 30, 2012.)
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ANSNA
ASNAC 2019
About ANSNA
The Australian Network for Social Network Analysis (ANSNA) aims to build greater coordination and collaboration among social network researchers and practitioners in Australia and overseas, and raise the profile of Australian social network research nationally and internationally. It is the national focal point for SNA in Australia, providing information about resources, connections, training in SNA, conferences, and more. ANSNA is endorsed by the International Network for Social Network Analysis (INSNA).
Two co-chairs of ANSNA serve as contact points to the SNA community in Australia. In 2019, these co-chairs are:
Robert Ackland is an Associate Professor in the School of Sociology at the Australian National University. His PhD was in economics, but since 2002 Robert has been conducting quantitative research into online social and organisational networks. He leads the Virtual Observatory for the Study of Online Networks Lab http://vosonlab.net and he created the VOSON software for hyperlink network construction and analysis (now commercially hosted by a company he founded) and co-created the SocialMediaLab R package for collecting networks and text from social media. Robert has been teaching ANU courses on the social science of the Internet and online research methods since 2008 and his book Web Social Science: Concepts, Data and Tools for Social Scientists in the Digital Age (SAGE) was published in 2013.
Associate Professor David Bright is a criminologist and forensic psychologist with the Centre for Crime Policy and Research at Flinders University. His research interests include criminal networks, organised crime, and terrorism. He has expertise in the application of social network analysis to the study of illicit networks such organised criminal groups and terrorist groups. Recent publications include a paper describing the use of computer simulations to measure the differential effectiveness of law enforcement interventions against criminal networks, the use of longitudinal social network analysis to analyse the formation and evolution of a drug trafficking network, and mapping of terrorist cells including lone actor terrorists operating within Australia.
What is SNA and why use it?
Borgatti and Halgin (2011) give us a good definition of a network:
A network consists of a set of actors or nodes along with a set of ties of a specified type (such as friendship) that link them. The ties interconnect through shared end points to form paths that indirectly link nodes that are not directly tied. The pattern of ties in a network yields a particular structure, and nodes occupy positions within this structure. Much of the theoretical wealth of network analysis consists of characterizing network structures (e.g., small-worldness) and node positions (e.g., centrality) and relating these to group and node outcomes. (Borgatti & Halgin, 2011, p. 2)
We can consider trains lines and stations as constituting a network. However, a social network is one which involves people in some way.
Network ties can be, for example, friendship, advice, trust, knowledge transfer, trade, and even bullying. Any type of relationship can be studied using SNA. Importantly, the more precise the network tie, the great the possibility for understanding the network. For example, looking at a network of ‘trusted advisors’ is likely to be more informative than a network of ‘people you know or consider to be an acquaintance’.
Network actors can be people, organisations, groups, countries, ideas, or some combination of these. Notably, actors can have attributes – for example (in the case of people) age, gender, nationalities, political views, motivations, and personality type. For organisations, attributes could be number of employees, turnover, geographic location, function, and so on.
Why use SNA?
Social Network Analysis (SNA) allows you to understand the ‘patterns and implications’ of social ties (Wasserman & Faust, 1994, p. 3). Why do actors form network ties to others? For instance, why do people in organisation go to others for advice? Are particular people more likely to be the ‘go-to’ people? If so, which ones, and what does this say about the organisation. Alternatively, how do network ties affect network actors? For example, does my position in an advice-seeking network have implications on my individual performance? Do people in brokerage positions perform better than others? Questions that have been asked using SNA include:
Is my organisation siloed or connected?
How do you transfer knowledge across global boundaries?
What sort of social support network protects against mental health issues?
How do informal networks influence the culture of teams?
Is obesity contagious?
How do school friends influence academic performance?
What is the role of network in the recruitment of directors on boards?
What does a highly functioning innovation start-up ecosystem look like?
Areas of application
SNA has been used within the disciplines of business and management, sociology, social psychology, health, innovation, education, criminology, political science and many more. SNA has been used to study formal and informal groups, organisations, communities, international trade and relations, amongst others.
‘A picture is worth a thousand words’ is an appropriate description for the value of network visualisations (see network below). Such visualisations give powerful information, such as whether the network is connected or not (this network is siloed)), whether ‘birds of a feather flock together’ (that is definitely the case here, different colours represent different groups of people), or whether there are key connectors or brokers who hold the network together (there are few of these in this network).
However, sometimes networks are so ‘busy’ and have so many connections that is difficult simply to ‘see’ what is going on (left). In such cases, SNA offers a range of possibilities to use quantitative network metrics and statistical analyses to better understand what is happening in the network beyond what the naked eye can see.
The Australian Social Network Analysis Conference (ASNAC) is held annually in November and is the key Australian conference for academics and practitioners interested in SNA. More information in regards to this years conference can be found above in the navigation field.
INSNA
Sunbelt is the premier conference for the International Network for Social Network Analysis (INSNA). INSNA are the peak professional body for social network scholars and practitioners. In 2018, Sunbelt will be held in Utrecht, The Netherlands.
MelNet Social Network Research Group holds Social Network Analysis 5-Day Course: Theory, Method and Application each year at Swinburne University of Technology in Melbourne. The next course is in Feb 2018 at Swinburne. This course shows you how to conduct social network research, moving from the fundamentals of networks to the use of cutting-edge statistical models for social networks. Register here.
ACSPRI holds an Introduction to Social Network Research and Analysis to be held in Feb 2018.
ACSPRI also hols a Big Data Analysis for Social Scientists course. This course introduces you to the collection and analysis of socially-generated 'big data' using the R statistical software and Gephi network visualisation software. The focus is on programmatic approaches for collecting and analysing big data from social media and the WWW. The course will also provide an opportunity for you to learn how these data and techniques are already being used in social science research.
There is a range of social network software packages out there, many of them free. Some focus more on network visualisation, and other focus more on network analytics and statistical analysis of networks. This is not a comprehensive list, but represents some commonly used packages.
MPNet
Statnet
RSiena
VOSON
SocialMediaLab
Introductory reading list
The following represent some introductory reading into the area of social network analysis (SNA), though there are many others.
Interesting academic publications include:
Borgatti, S. P., & Halgin, D. S. (2011). On Network Theory. Organization Science, 22(5), 1168-1181. doi:10.1287/orsc.1100.0641
Borgatti, S. P., Mehra, A., Brass, D. J., & Labianca, G. (2009). Network Analysis in the Social Sciences. Science, 323(5916), 892-895.
Burt, R. S. (1992). Structural holes. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Granovetter, M. S. (1973). The Strength of Weak Ties. American Journal of Sociology, 78(6), 1360-1380.
Ibarra, H., & Andrews, S. B. (1993). Power, Social-Influence, and Sense Making - Effects of Network Centrality and Proximity on Employee Perceptions. Administrative Science Quarterly, 38(2), 277-303.
McPherson, M., Smith-Lovin, L., & Cook, J. M. (2001). Birds of a feather: Homophily in social networks. Annual Review of Sociology, 27, 415-444.
Wasserman, S., & Faust, K. (1994). Social network analysis: Methods and applications. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
There is no formal membership of ANSNA. However, below is a listing of groups in Australia who specialise in SNA.
MelNet
Australian National University, VOSON Lab
Contact us to add your group here.
Join the ANSNA mailing list and be informed of events, conferences, presentations, courses, job vacancies, etc...
50 Wakefield Street, Hawthorn, Victoria, 3122, Australia03 9214 8230pengwang@swin.edu.au
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Follow President Donald Trump as he shapes America’s future
Members of Trump's legal team reportedly wanted Jared Kushner to step down over his Russia ties
Natasha Bertrand
Sep 12th 2017 5:52AM
Members of President Donald Trump's legal team wanted his son-in-law Jared Kushner to resign from his position as a senior adviser because of his controversial meetings with Russian nationals during the election and his initial failure to disclose them on his security clearance form, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Trump's main lawyer in the Russia probe, John Dowd, told the Journal that he "didn't agree" with some of his colleagues' view that Kushner should resign.
"I thought it was absurd,” Dowd said. “I made my views known.”
Marc Kasowitz, Trump's former attorney who took on a reduced role following a minor email scandal, largely echoed Dowd's sentiments. White House special counsel Ty Cobb called the report "completely false" in a statement on Monday night.
According to the Journal, however, some of Trump's laywers went as far as to draft a statement for Kushner to explain why he was stepping down. Trump resisted, telling aides that Kushner had done nothing wrong.
Kushner met twice with former Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak in 2016 — once during the election at the Mayflower Hotel in April and again during the transition period at Trump Tower in December — and once with the CEO of a sanctioned Russian bank, Sergey Gorkov, who was personally appointed by Vladimir Putin.
RELATED: Where Kushner has traveled since becoming senior adviser
Where Jared Kushner has traveled since becoming Senior Advisor
North Charleston & South Carolina
Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner arrive on Air Force One to accompany U.S. President Donald Trump for his tour of the Boeing South Carolina facility in North Charleston, South Carolina, U.S. February 17, 2017. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
U.S. President Donald Trump's daughter Ivanka Trump (C) and her family, husband Jared Kushner (L) and children Joseph and Arabella Kushner, arrive aboard the Marine One helicopter with the president to board Air Force One for travel to Florida from Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, U.S. March 3, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
White House Senior Advisor Jared Kushner (C) attends a roundtable discussion held by U.S. President Donald Trump with auto industry leaders at the American Center for Mobility in Ypsilanti Township, Michigan, U.S. March 15, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
U.S. President Donald Trump's son-in-law and senior advisor Jared Kushner (L) speaks with Marine Corps Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, before departing for Iraq from Ramstein Air Base, Germany April 3, 2017. DoD/Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Dominique A. Pineiro/Handout via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. EDITORIAL USE ONLY.
Jared Kushner, senior advisor and son-in-law to U.S. President Donald Trump, meets with service members at a forward operating base near Qayyarah West in Iraq, April 4, 2017. DoD/Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Dominique A. Pineiro/Handout via REUTERS
China's first lady Peng Liyuan talks with Trump Senior Advisor Jared Kushner as they attend a dinner at the start of a summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate in West Palm Beach, Florida, U.S. April 6, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Barria
White House senior advisor Jared Kushner (C) arrives to join U.S. President Donald Trump and the rest of the U.S. delegation to meet with Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud at the Royal Court in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia May 20, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
White House senior advisor Jared Kushner leaves a note at the Western Wall in Jerusalem May 22, 2017. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
White House senior advisor Jared Kushner and his wife Ivanka Trump arrive to meet Pope Francis at the Vatican, May 24, 2017. REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi
White House senior advisor Jared Kushner holds his son Theo as U.S. President Donald Trump with the first family arrives at Joint Base Andrews outside Washington, U.S., after a weekend at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey, June 11, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas meets with White House senior advisor Jared Kushner in the West Bank City of Ramallah June 21, 2017. Thaer Ghanaim/PPO/Handout via REUTERS
Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner, senior advisor of President Donald Trump, arrive aboard Air Force One at Warsaw military airport in Warsaw, Poland July 5, 2017. REUTERS/Laszlo Balogh
Kushner also attended a meeting organized by his brother-in-law Donald Trump Jr. at Trump Tower last June with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya and Russian-American lobbyist Rinat Akhmetshin. Trump's attorneys were aware of that meeting when they began pushing for his ouster, according to the Journal, since he was the only one at the meeting who currently holds a White House job.
In an 11-page statement provided to the Senate Intelligence Committee in late July detailing his Russian contacts during the campaign and transition period, Kushner said he "did not recall" the meeting with Veselnitskaya and Akhmetshin until he began "reviewing documents and emails in response to congressional requests for information."
Trump's legal team reportedly prepared talking points to address the meeting, but never used them — instead, Donald Trump Jr. issued a misleading statement that arguably made matters far worse for the White House.
Kushner also drew scrutiny at the beginning of the summer when the Washington Post reported that he had tried to establish a secret line of communication between the Trump administration and Russian government officials during the transition period.
In talks with Kislyak in December — which Kushner did not originally disclose on his security clearance form — Kushner floated the possibility of using Russian diplomatic facilities in the US to essentially conceal the transition's interactions with Russian officials from US government scrutiny, The Post wrote, citing US intelligence officials briefed on the matter.
Kislyak was reportedly "taken aback" by Kushner's request because it posed significant risks for the Trump team and the Kremlin. But he passed along the request to Moscow, which is how it got picked up by US intelligence officials.
Kushner said in his statement for the Senate Intelligence Committee that the communications channel was meant to discuss the US' and Russia's Syria policy.
"I believed developing a thoughtful approach on Syria was a very high priority given the ongoing humanitarian crisis, and I asked if they had an existing communications channel at his embassy we could use where they would be comfortable transmitting the information they wanted to relay to General Flynn," Kushner wrote.
"The Ambassador said that would not be possible and so we all agreed that we would receive this information after the Inauguration. Nothing else occurred."
Kislyak reportedly orchestrated the meeting between Kushner and Gorkov, who was appointed by Putin in January 2016 as part of a restructuring of the bank's management team, Bloomberg reported last year.
The Kremlin and the White House have provided conflicting explanations for why Kushner met with Gorkov. Kushner said he met with him in his capacity as a transition official, whereas Gorkov's representatives said he met with Kushner on official business.
Reuters reported earlier this year that the FBI is examining whether Gorkov suggested to Kushner that Russian banks could finance Trump associates' business ventures if US sanctions were lifted or relaxed.
NOW WATCH: We went inside the Charlottesville winery Trump bragged about during the press conference
2 more Trump associates lawyer up as Mueller's investigation escalates
Manafort is reportedly blocking the FBI from reviewing his interview with Congress about the Trump Tower meeting
Trump lawyer Ty Cobb in private emails with prankster: 'Manafort and Flynn' will cause the Russia investigation 'to linger'
Chat live about Trump's presidency
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Click to copyhttps://apnews.com/3002446a513144e4b4261dfc9af42a69
US Navy to dub newest rescue ship ‘Cherokee Nation’
WASHINGTON, D.C. (AP) — One of the U.S. Navy’s newest rescue ships is being named the “Cherokee Nation” to honor the service and contributions the Cherokee people have made to the Navy and Marine Corps.
Secretary of the Navy Richard Spencer announced Friday that Gulf Island Shipyards has been awarded a $64.8 million contract to build the ship, scheduled for completion by 2021.
The Navy says the contract includes an option for six additional vessels, each to be named in honor of a prominent Native American or tribe.
Navy officials say it’s the fifth U.S. ship to be named in honor of the Cherokee people and the first since a World War II-era tugboat dubbed the USS Cherokee.
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Stephen Garrett Breaks Down Premiere; Tom Hiddleston, Hugh Laurie on Night
Posted by Carolyn Koo
This week, the show’s EP breaks down the premiere, while Tom Hiddleston and Hugh Laurie discuss The Night Manager. Plus, John le Carré’s sons talk about bringing the book to the screen. Read on for more:
• Yahoo TV interviews Executive Producer Stephen Garrett, who says Pine ends up in Zermatt because he’s “run away. He’s ashamed of what’s happened to Sophie. He’s locked himself away from the world. That moment of fate, when Roper returns to his life, he knows he has no choice but to act.”
• Discussing Pine, Tom Hiddleston tells Los Angeles Times, “He does a very brave thing, which is to be willing to live outside the system, to eradicate his own identity, to take on another identity, and live without the privilege of intimate relationships.”
• Hugh Laurie tells Variety that Roper “at least has the guts to know he’s terrible. He knows that he’s going to hell. In fact, I even wonder whether he’s hoping to go to hell. He knows he’s a damned soul and he wants to be caught.”
• Yahoo TV speaks with Hugh Laurie, who says, “Dickie Roper’s character just rang true to me immediately. I felt like I knew how he walked and talked and dressed and moved. He was beautifully formed — but also a character who seemed to be the focus of such anger on [John] le Carré’s part.”
• John le Carré’s sons talk to Variety about bringing The Night Manager to the screen, with Simon Cornwell saying, “It was effectively put together as a six-hour film with an Oscar-winning director (Susanne Bier), extraordinary cast and very strong performances.”
• Olivia Colman, interviewed by The Hollywood Reporter about Angela Burr, says, “She’d never put her unborn child in danger, but I don’t think she can really afford to think about it too much. She’s got to get this job done.”
• The Los Angeles Times declares that the show’s real thrill is “watching [Olivia] Colman’s Burr heave herself, belly first, out of yet another chair to do whatever it takes to bring just a little bit of justice to an often unjust world.”
• Speaking with Vanity Fair about Jed, Elizabeth Debicki says, “We think we’ve got her worked out in three minutes. Then very quickly at the beginning of Episode 2 you realize what’s under the surface. It’s a house of cards, and it’s very fragile in its construction.”
• Interviewed by the Associated Press, Tom Hiddleston says The Night Manager “deals with the more fascinating aspects of the psyche and identity and to what extent we tell lies to ourselves to justify who we are.”
• Talking to NPR about Roper, Hugh Laurie says that “when the chance came to play him, I just leapt at it, and with sort of indecent haste.”
• “Watch Night Manager week by week or in one DVR’d binge, but don’t miss the excellence that is this adaptation of John le Carré’s 1993 novel – you will be the lesser for it if you do,” Deadline says.
• Vogue enthuses, “Jetting from the Cairo streets to posh Alpine hotels to cliffside villas in Mallorca, The Night Manager is the best and most exciting le Carré adaptation in more than 30 years.”
• Reviewing The Night Manager, Entertainment Weekly proclaims, “A clever fable of heroic renewal, The Night Manager gives us a redemptive journey into a heart of darkness and a portrait of a genre mired in shadow pining for daylight.”
• “If you’re looking to cast a charming international villain, a cultured man whose devotion to his son and whose philanthropic front mask the fact that he’s a cold-blooded merchant of death, you can start and stop with Hugh Laurie,” The Boston Globe writes in its review of The Night Manager.
• During a conversation with Interview, Elizabeth Debicki notes that Jed is “an enigma the whole way through. You get little snippets, but you never get a whole sense of everything. She never sits down and tells you how it is.”
• For recaps and reviews of Episode 1, check out The Daily Beast, Digital Spy, Entertainment Weekly, E! Online, The Guardian, The New York Times, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The Telegraph, Vulture and Yahoo TV.
To stay up-to-date on all the latest news about The Night Manager, sign up for The Night Manager Newsletter.
follow The Night Manager:
AMC Announces Limited Series Based on John le Carré’s The Spy Who Came in From the Cold
The Night Manager Nominated for Four Golden Globes
The Night Manager Earns a Television Critics Award Nomination
The Night Manager Q&A — Simon Cornwell (Executive Producer)
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The Bernhardt Doctrine: Dismissing Rules and Dodging Oversight
By Marc Rehmann Posted on July 2, 2019, 9:04 am
U.S. Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt is hard to put a finger on. Attempts to understand what he’s doing or who he’s meeting with through Freedom of Information Act requests have yielded surprisingly few documents and sparse calendars. Bernhardt has granted relatively few—or brief, if at all—on-the-record interviews with reporters. He has also largely avoided testifying in front of Congress before May of this year.
Despite this opaqueness, a picture of Bernhardt’s approach to governance is starting to emerge—one of a former oil and gas lobbyist pushing a destructive anti-conservation agenda with a flagrant disregard for the coequal branches of U.S. government. The U.S. Department of the Interior’s (DOI) Bernhardt era—his time as deputy secretary and now secretary—is marked by actions that consistently ignore Congress and the rule of law. While the courts have begun to provide a check on Bernhardt’s approach, he continues to both circumvent public input and accountability and undermine Congress’ oversight role.
In many ways, Bernhardt’s approach to leadership resembles that of his boss, President Donald Trump, who regularly dismisses opposition from the legislative and judicial branches and, ultimately, diminishes the oversight role that the public expects the government to serve. This column examines how Bernhardt has used his executive authority at the expense of the American public as well as to undermine Congress and the law of the land.
Disdain for Congress
The U.S. Constitution’s Article I vested in Congress the power of not only writing the laws that govern the executive branch, but also providing it with the important tool of investigating the federal government. Under Bernhardt’s leadership, the DOI has taken myriad actions that are at odds with congressional-mandated law and has resisted the legislative branch’s attempts to rein it in.
Bypassing Congress and putting parks in jeopardy: Earlier this year, Bernhardt made a controversial decision to keep national parks open during the government shutdown. To do so, he diverted entrance fees that were intended for repair and maintenance projects, putting even more strain on the already underfunded National Park Service (NPS). In response, Betty McCollum (DFL-MN) and other congressional members accused Bernhardt of violating the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act that clearly prohibits these funds from being taken away from their intended purpose. Bernhardt has since said that it was squarely within his purview to make that move.
Ignoring Congress to promote drilling near protected sites: Since 2002, every Interior appropriations act has included a provision that prohibits federal funds from being used for oil, gas, and coal development activities within the historic boundaries of Utah’s Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Bernhardt’s department’s decision to actively prepare for leasing in this monument—which President Trump illegally revoked in 2017—violates this 17-year-old restriction. The Government Accountability Office is now investigating whether or not the action puts Bernhardt in violation of the Antideficiency Act, which prohibits agencies from spending funds in advance or in excess of a congressional appropriation. Under Bernhardt’s watch, the DOI also has repeatedly limited the public’s opportunity to comment on the management of public lands and mineral extraction, including by adopting a sweeping policy that slashed the time that the public has to comment on proposed oil and gas leases.
Dismissing the U.S. Senate’s advise-and-consent role: More than two years into the Trump administration, many of the Senate-confirmed political positions at the DOI remain unfilled. Instead, a series of acting officials tapped by the Trump administration have held key positions such as the directors of the NPS and Bureau of Land Management. These extended acting role circumvent the Senate, whose role is to approve or disapprove key administration personnel. For his part, Bernhardt has issued an unprecedented number of secretarial orders that effectively skirt the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, a 20-year-old law that limits how many days individuals can serve in an acting capacity and carry out decisions reserved for Senate-confirmed posts. For example, no fewer than three complaints that have been filed this year alleged that the DOI has violated the law.
Shrugging off federal ethics law requirements: In April, Bernhardt was confirmed by the smallest margin ever for an interior secretary. Within days, news outlets reported that he was also the first interior secretary to be under investigation by the department’s inspector general on his first day on the job. The ongoing investigation concerns whether or not Bernhardt violated his ethics recusals pledge in relation to his extensive work as a lobbyist prior to joining the DOI. As previous CAP research has found, Bernhardt’s clientelistic system for dispensing political favors puts him at risk of violating the congressional ethics guideposts. Bernhardt has publicly denied any wrongdoing.
Avoiding transparency: Shortly after Bernhardt was confirmed as secretary, the National Archives and Records Administration confirmed that they were investigating whether or not Bernhardt had violated requirements under the Federal Records Act. At issue in the ongoing investigation are Bernhardt’s creation and deletion of multiple calendars as well as his practice of purposely leaving meetings off his schedule. Bernhardt has since admitted that his personal itinerary was regularly overwritten. Additionally, Bernhardt has attempted to use executive authority to dilute long-standing transparency laws that are essential to the public’s ability to make informed decisions. For example, in late 2018 and in the middle of a government shutdown, he released a proposal that would suppress public records requests and undermine the Freedom of Information Act. And in another ethically dubious move, he defended an internal policy that allows politically appointed officials to review and comment on public records requests that relate to them.
Using fallacious legal interpretations to ignore climate change: In May, Bernhardt flippantly told members of the House Committee on Natural Resources that he hadn’t “lost any sleep” over the record-high amount of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere, adding that he wasn’t obligated to address the pressing issue because Congress had not passed a law dictating so. Bernhardt’s statement reveals a selective interpretation of the law, given that Congress has passed numerous laws that provide his department the authority and flexibility to combat climate change, including the Federal Land Policy and Management Act and National Park Service Organic Act.
Sidestepping the judiciary
In a rush to undo protections for land, water, and wildlife, Bernhardt’s DOI has attempted to short circuit the regulatory process and ignore science in ways that have not held up to judicial scrutiny. Time and time again, the courts have reprimanded the DOI for ignoring the rule of law. With many decisions pending on the department’s final actions, the courts will continue to be an important check on Bernhardt’s executive overreach.
Failing to justify actions under the law: Bernhardt has led efforts to weaken or repeal Obama-era rules that protect U.S. air, water, and public lands. In many cases, however, the DOI has attempted to do so without providing even the most basic legal reasoning or without following the Administrative Procedures Act, which governs internal procedures of administrative agencies, including how and why they must interact with the public. Federal courts have repeatedly struck down the department’s legally questionable rollbacks, including the reversal of a ban on offshore drilling in parts of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans; the approval of a road through a national wildlife refuge; and the repeal of a coal valuation rule that was meant to increase revenue for taxpayers.
Declining to follow environmental review requirements: On at least eight separate occasions during the past two years, federal courts have reprimanded the DOI for failing to consider the effects of climate change in agency decisions. Despite repeated warnings, Bernhardt is leading an agency that willfully ignores the intent of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in its analyses of major projects, including a proposal for oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Scorning federal courts’ final decisions: President Trump has repeatedly attacked judges and the courts for rulings that he disagrees with—and Bernhardt appears to be following suit. For example, after a federal judge struck down the Trump administration’s rescission of the Obama-era coal moratorium rule on new leases, Bernhardt’s department issued a press release that backhandedly criticized the judge for requiring a NEPA analysis.
Bernhardt has spent his time at the DOI pushing forward policies that strip away public land protections, reverse progress on climate change, and undermine transparency laws. These policies have been implemented with a disregard for the federal government’s equal branches of government as well as the public’s right to know what is happening inside its government. The courts have begun to provide an important check on Bernhardt’s department, but Congress should continue its oversight role to expose Bernhardt’s executive overreach, disregard for the public, and disrespect for the law.
Marc Rehmann is the senior campaign manager for the Law of the Land Project at the Center for American Progress
The author would like to thank Nicole Gentile, Kate Kelly, Sung Chung, Ben Podnar, Anne Dechter, and Tricia Woodcome for their contributions to this column.
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Free Download: Esser "Headlock"
Check out a totally-free download of Esser's brand-new single "Headlock." Following the release of "I Love You," this new track is another good example of his Esser's left-field pop experimentations. The song is a quirky and totally fun tune that combines the singer's indie sensibilities with a distinct pop flavor. It's sweet and crunchy as I like to put it. The 23 year-old singer was initially signed to hipster label Merok, but is now part of Transgressive Records, wihch has a distribution and promotion pact with Warner Brother to give obscure new talent a chance to get some mainstream exposure. Let's see how fast the Esser buzz catches on overseas.
Download Esser "Headlock"
July 31, 2008 in Esser, MP3 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Vote for Charlotte Gainsbourg to Win an 2008 MTV Video Music Award
MTV is doing things a little different for this year's Video Music Awards. Viewers will not only be able to vote for a select group of nominated videos, they can now also vote to select the nominees. One of the potential nominees for Best Pop Video is the wonderful Charlotte Gainsbourg.
Head over to the MTV web site to check out and vote for two of her videos that are up for nomination. The first is for "The Songs That We Sing" that was directed by Nathalie Canguilhem. The second video that is up for nominee consideration is "The Operator," which was directed by famed director and photographer Jean Baptise Mondino. An MTV nod would most certainly help throw Gainsbourg back in the spotlight.
Both of these songs are taken from her 2007 album, titled "5:55," which is one of my favorite records of last year. The French chanteuse, who is the daughter of Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birki, recorded the CD in collaboration with Air's Nicolas Godin and Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich.
Watch Charlotte Gainsbourg "The Songs That We Sing"
Watch Charlotte Gainsbourg "The Operator"
Download Charlotte Gainsbourh "The Songs That We Sing"
July 30, 2008 in MP3 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Kylie Dazzles in London
ArjanWrites.com reader Will W. flew to London last week to watch Kylie Minogue perform at the 02 Arena, and he has lots of great things to say about the show. "Seeing Kylie perform live was an experience on a completely different level," he writes on his Facebook page. "Say what you will about Kylie Minogue's musical ability, but after watching her on stage, you will quickly understand why she was voted Great Britain's Favourite Entertainer yet again recently."
Read Will's entire review here. Also, make sure to check some of his front-row pictures, including photos of the Kylie Skull, the Kylie set and the Kylie Men.
July 30, 2008 in Kylie Minogue | Permalink | Comments (3)
Arjan interviews Roisin Murphy (Part 2)
"We are going to do a bigger tour in the autumn, so we are going to play some pretty big venues and then we are going to release a DVD in October as well, so you are going to be able to see it and hear the entire show," Roisin Murphy tells me in an exclusive interview.
Find the second part of my interview with Roisin Murphy after the jump. If you missed Part 1, read it here.
Read about Roisin 's take on Sophie Ellis-Bextor's "On & Off," her growth as a performer, her love for Grace Jones, the dire situation at EMI, her love for intellectual men and much more.
Arjan: Looking back at the last 10 months, how has touring and the release of "Overpowered" affected you as an artist?
Róisín: Well, you know a little bit about my story. I was not really a singer at all when I began to make music. I was just messing around with my boyfriend, having a good time in his studio which he owned. We used to go down and just make stupid little tracks. So I was saying stuff like “do you like my tight sweater, see how it fits my body” and all that. And then I became a singer and from there I became a performer. This album in particular has really helped to grow and become a better performer and be comfortable on stage. From a little girl who was just messing around to what I am doing now has been a massive leap of understanding and knowing about what I do.
This album also taught me that I can make records in lots of different ways with different people and I think it added a lot to my confidence.
Arjan: You have played a lot of big European festivals this year. I'd imagine pleasing a festival audience is not easy, especially because you have people out there that are not there to see you specifically, but maybe the band after you.
Róisín: Totally. I have been the preacher man, you know, you go out there and try to convert people. It is a challenge on a lot of levels I mean you are used to having soundchecks, you are used to – you know, having it all your way, it is your show. You have to do things differently at festivals, but I have been doing them for years now. I did lots of festivals with Moloko, so I am kind of used to it. I love the fact that one day I am playing in a defused coal mine in East Germany and then the next day I am playing in a field in England and then the next day I am on a beach in Spain.
But I love it, I like a little bit of challenge, you know me.
Arjan: I have been really enjoying the Brussels show you recorded and put out on CD by the way.
Róisín: Yeah, that was a great show. We are going to do a bigger tour in the autumn, so we are going to play some pretty big venues and then we are going to release a DVD in October as well, so you are going to be able to see it and hear the entire show.
Arjan: Any dates yet for that bigger tour? Venues?
Róisín: It's all in the works right now so I'm not exactly sure about the details.
Arjan: A lot of people have also asked about how you feel about the lack of commercial success of your recent singles. How do you respond to that?
Róisín: Well, I get a lot of people saying to me, 'you should be as big as Madonna, 'you are the next big star,' whatever, it is very, very hard to be disappointed in the situation that I am in right now considering where I have come from. And for me, I have made a great record. I am gathering more and more fans and more and more momentum.
You have to contextualize what has happened with the singles and with what is happening in the music business, and particularly what is happening with my record label, EMI, everybody is fired. I am just going out there and playing the shows and gather more and more fans. It is very difficult for me to be disappointed in that.
Also, don't forget the fact that when I left Moloko I didn’t even know that I’d have a career. For me to be here talking to you now about what I am doing is just an absolute pleasure. It's really nice to talk to you again.
Arjan: Thanks, Róisín. It's my pleasure as well. Readers are also curious about you take on Sophie Ellis-Bextor's version of "On & Off" that Calvin Harris originally wrote for you. Thoughts?
Róisín: I think it is great. I think it is lot better than my version actually. I think it suits her voice better, I think it is more narrative somehow with her singing it, that kind of dry delivery that she does, it doesn’t sound like anybody else, she has really made it her own. I think it is great - it is a really good pop song.
Arjan: Dale wondered how big of an inspiration Grace Jones is to you.
Róisín: She has been a huge influence of on me. I love her records, but as a live performer, she has been an absolutely massive influence on me. I saw her like 6, 7 years ago in Florence, Italy and it was so dramatic, yet so simple. No special effects. Just performance.
Arjan: Have you seen her new video?
Róisín: I haven’t – I heard of it though. it is quite a slow song somebody was telling me...
Arjan: Yeah, you should see the video - it is amazing, it is just out of this world. She's such a freak of nature.
Róisín: Yeah, that's right. She is very, what is the word - she is very unusual.
Arjan: So after all the touring in Europe, are you planning a nice vacation?
Róisín: A vacation, me? Hello no.
Arjan: No?
Róisín: I don't like vacations. I am supposed to have September off, but September is fashion month all over the world, so I am going to go and do some fashion things, stop thinking about music for a while, start thinking about dresses and hats again.
Arjan: What shows would you like to see?
Róisín: Vivienne Westwood, Viktor & Rolf and I’d love to see the Louis Vuitton show. I would also love to come over to New York and see the Marc Jacobs show. I love him. He is a genius.
Arjan: When you don’t really take a vacation, how do you relax on the road? Do you listen to music, read or sleep a lot or what do you do?
Róisín: I have an iPod full of lectures actually which I download from a great company called The Teaching Company. You can go to their site and download philosophy lectures, lectures about history and science and social sciences and things like that.
I like to listen to clever men talking. It gets me all wet and soggy listening to those intellectuals. [Laughs]
No, honestly, I love an intelligent man. If I don’t have any around me, I only have a lot of roadies around me who are rocking around the Christmas tree, so I thought let me get me some intellectual stimulus while I'm on the road.
Arjan: So have you already thought about your next album or is it way too early for that?
Róisín: Yeah, a bit to early, but I am going to go into the studio in a couple of weeks actually. I am going to go and write a song with two of the girls who have toured with me and I am going to do like a little sort of girl group thing and see how that goes.
July 29, 2008 in Róisín Murphy | Permalink | Comments (11)
Free Download" Keri Hilson "Energy"
Before the talented Keri Hilson became a global chart sensation together with Timbaland and "The Way I Are," the Atlanta-based artist was mostly known as an R&B songwriter. Hilson has written hits for people like Mary J Blige, Chris Brown, Toni Braxton and Britney Spears.
After the massive success of "The Way I Are," the singer is now looking to continue her momentum in the charts with her brand-new single, titled "Energy."
It can't be all that easy for Hilson to carve out a nice of her own in the overpopulated R&B landscape with superstar singers like Rihanna and Beyonce and emerging singers like Jordin Sparks and Michelle Williams competing for the same coveted space.
"Energy" is an accomplished slice of producer-based r&b pop that is slick, sleek and will surely get her some chart attention - here and overseas. But its radio-friendly quality does not deliver a distinct little spark to help her create a groove of her own if that was ever her intent. Download a guilt-free copy at MTV web site while you can.
Download Keri Hilson "Energy"
July 29, 2008 in MP3 | Permalink | Comments (15)
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16 February 2019 25 February 2019 mehmedalikuplay
Thus Spoke Zarathustra – An Examination On An Ancient Religion
Most of you may know Nietzsche’s famous book. Nietzsche uses Zarathustra as the narrator and submits his some aphorisms about his philosophical acquirement in this work. I have read the book several times and I was curious about this name and the connection between the aphorisms and Zarathustra. He was the prophet of one of the oldest religions. Which kind of a link can be between an atheist of modern times and a prophet of ancient times? To be honest, I couldn’t find the connection between them rather than imperious narration which handles the reader and the little similarity between Nietzsche’s übermensch and Zarathustra (I think an übermensch can be only a prophet) yet but while I am seeking a solution, I acquired a lot of interesting information about this religion and made some observations. Let’s get a deeper understanding of Zarathustra and Zoroastrianism.
Zoroastrianism and Zarathustra
Zarathustra is the founder of Zoroastrianism and the writer of the holy book, Avesta. There is no much information about him other than the narrative in Avesta. In fact, Avesta is a compound book which includes many other texts. These texts are differentiated according to their subject. For example, Yasna is about worship and rituals whereas Vendidad is an ecclesiastical text. It is thought that Zarathustra has been flourished in approximately 3000 years ago in the east of contemporary Iran. It is the oldest monotheistic extant religion and like Islam, it sprang as defiance of a polytheistic religion.
Avesta.org
The birth of Zarathustra resembles the birth of Jesus. Both of their mothers were virgins when they gave birth to them. Mother of Zarathustra conceives him by a shaft of light.
Based on the Zoroastrian sources and legends, he was 30 years old when he declares himself as the prophet of the only God, Ahura Mazda.
Zarathustra goes down from the mountain with Avesta and the holy light and what’s more, he doesn’t have the sword of Jon Snow, the Lightbringer. 🙂
After a while, he infused his belief into Vishtasp (The father of Cyrus the Great) and Zoroastrianism became the official religion of Achaemenids in a short time. With the rise of the Achaemenid Empire, this new religion has spread from the Caucasus to the Nile.
Most of the people who have no sufficient knowledge assume that they are a worshipper of fire and they believe in fire. However, this is a weird thought as much as thinking that Muslims believe in a simple square building, Kaabe. On the contrary, they believe in Ahura Mazda, the creator soul and the god of wisdom, goodness, and light. It is a spiritual entity apart from sun and fire.
They use a veil when they are near the fire because they believe that the dirty breath of human can mess the purity of fire.
Zoroastrian morning prayer
On the other hand, Zoroastrianism is a dualist religion which consists of also an adversary god-like destructive entity, Ahriman. According to the narrative in Avesta, in the beginning, Ahura Mazda and Ahriman are in a struggle and the reflection of this struggle reflects upon the human beings. In this struggle, human should work for Asha(the right and order) and against druj(deceit and falsehood).
A description of the struggle between the wisdom of Ahura Mazda and the destructive power of Ahriman
Actually, they have a figure which summarizes the ethical concerns of Zoroastrianism, named as Farahavar. Farahavar can be thought like guarding angel in Christianity.
1- The head represents wisdom.
2- The three-layered feathers of Farahavar’s wings represent the three main point of the ethics of Zoroastrianism: Good thought, good word, and good deed.
3- The lower feathers also layered as three parts and they represent bad thought, bad word, and bad deed.
4-Farahavar has two loops stretching towards the opposite direction. These represent the streams of human in life. It means that we should look away from the evil and look forward to the good.
5- The ring held by Farahavar represents loyalty and faithfulness. Does that sound familiar? 🙂
6- The other hand of Farahavar is upward and it represents the struggle to thrive and against the evil.
7-The circle in the middle of Farahavar represents eternal life.
In 330 BC, Alexander the Great broke the last resistance of Achaemenids and captured Persepolis. He allowed his soldiers to loot the city and burned most of the copies of Zend Avesta with the gorgeous city of Persepolis. The Parsi fraction of Zoroastrians migrated towards India with a few copies of Zend Avesta and establish Mumbai there. Today, most of the Zoroastrian population live in India.
A painting on the burning of Persepolis
A Parsee fire temple in Mumbai
http://www.persepolis.nu
The ruins of Persepolis
The other catastrophe which Zoroastrians experienced is the expansion of Islam. Whereas, in Qur’an, there is a mention about Zoroastrians as “Mecusi” and their religion classified as a heavenly religion, afterward successor paid no attention to these verses and Umayyad dynasty classified these people as an infidel and made life difficult for them. Most of the Parsee population immigrated to India. Today, around 30000 Zoroastrians live under an Islamic state and they are carrying out their spiritual rituals relatively free except their burial ceremony. However, the reason behind that is, surprisingly, not depending on religious but ecological affairs.
https://www.101india.com
A dakhma, also known as the tower of silence, in Mumbai
Soil, fire, and water are pure and holy elements in Zoroastrianism and the human body is thought as dirty. Therefore, they don’t bury or burn their corpses. They put them in dakhmas and wait for vultures to extinguish their corpses. However, with the decrease of the population of vultures, corpses couldn’t be extinguished, became composed and posed a danger for people around the tower. In Iran and India, these towers are not used anymore. Zoroastrians put their corpses into a concrete tomb now.
There is a kind of places around the dakhmas. In these adobe buildings, Pre-funeral rituals are carried out. (Yazd/ Cham)
The dakhma in Cham
Cypresses represent the eternal life and there are planted old cypresses around atashgahs.
An atashgah in Yazd
Walking on the water was also one of the miracles of Jesus.
The Zoroastrian population can drain away soon but they have a lot of impacts on other cultures and their belief systems. For instance, praying five times a day, call to prayer, ablution, head cover, facing a direction in prayer, and reading scripture in original languages are some of their commonalities in terms of rituals. In addition, there is also a narrative on Arta Viraf’s night journey to heaven like the Prophet Mohammed’s ascension. If we want to speak in contemporary Iran, the effect of Zoroastrianism on the Shi’a is more powerful and concrete. On the other hand, it also has commonalities with Christianity. Especially on miracles, Jesus and Zarathustra have a lot of common points. It can be said that the satan, the judgment day, heaven and hell are also fundamentally Zoroastrian figures.
https://www.florenceinferno.com
Dante’s inferno description overlaps with Arta Viraf’s description.
Today, Iran is described as the opposite polar of the Western World. It is politically true but culturally wrong. People who stand behind the fog of mainstream media can think how can we similar to a Zoroastrian. For example, their impacts can be seen in our popular literature and cinema. Maybe you should read again Game of Thrones- Ice and Fire.
https://winteriscoming.net
I think music is one of the remarkable indicators of culture and society. Zoroastrianism’s effect is reaching up to our popular culture. If I say that one of your favorite rock stars is a Zoroastrian, does it surprise you?
In an interview, Mercury’s sister says that “I think what [Freddie’s] Zoroastrian faith gave him was to work hard, to persevere, and to follow your dreams.” He is a Zoroastrian and his first name was Farrokh Bulsara which he legally changed.
Look up to the skies and see
Thus spoke Zarathustra!
Cover Picture // http://looklex.com/e.o/slides/zarathustra01.jpg
#ahuramazda
#freddiemercury
#zoroastrianism
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Entry from October 23, 2013
City of the Hour (Dallas nickname)
Wikipedia: Dallas
Dallas /ˈdæləs/ is the ninth-largest city in the United States and the third-largest city in the state of Texas. The bulk of the city is in Dallas County, of which it is the county seat. However, slices of the city are located in Collin, Denton, Kaufman, and Rockwall counties. The city had a population of 1,197,816 in 2010, according to the United States Census Bureau.
8 May 1910, Dallas (TX) Morning News, pg. 5, col. 1:
DALLAS, “THE CITY OF THE HOUR.”
Such Is Prize Slogan Adopted by the Chamber of Commerce, “The Pulse of the State.”
Dallas now has a new slogan, or to be more precise, three slogans. Some weeks ago the real estate firm of Murphy & Bolanz offered $50 to be divided into three prizes for the best three slogans submitted, competition open to the whole world. More than 600 persons tried for the money, about 200 of them being nonresidents. Two weeks ago, the directors of the Chamber of Commerce appointed a special committee to go over the mottoes submitted and award the prizes. The committee put in more than a week on the task.
The first prize of $35 was awarded to Samuel Rizzotto of Dallas, and his motto is “The City of the Hour.”
The second prize of $15 was won by Fred J. Lagler, also of Dallas, and his suggestion was “The Pulse of the State.”
The third prize of $10 has been divided between Madeline Frees of St. Louis, formerly a resident of Dallas, and Mrs. L. V. Craig of Dallas, they both having selected the same, “Dallas on Top.”
1916 Almanac and Encyclopedia
New York, NY: The Press Publishing Company
SOBRIQUETS OR BY-NAMES OF CITIES IN THE UNITED STATES.
Dallas—The City of the Hour.
Texas (Lone Star State Dictionary) • Wednesday, October 23, 2013 • Permalink
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Barzanò e Zanardo
Domain names, between freedom of expression and distinctive character of trademarks in domain name disputes
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of Andrea Mascetti
Seeking a balance between fundamental rights, such as freedom of expression and distinctive character of trademarks involves not only national and European case law, but also the field of domain name disputes.
Disputes on generic domain names (gTLD, new gTLD) are handled, all together and without overlapping with judicial proceedings, by international arbitration authorities (WIPO, among others) which are called upon to apply a whole set of rules known as Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP).
The Policy is a compromise among the various stakeholders on the line: on one hand, registrars and registrants, interested in limiting the application scope of the rules only to clear cases of cybersquatting; on the other hand, brand owners more interested in a broad interpretation of the Policy, including more doubtful and controversial case#_ftn1s. The result, as often happens when different interests are at stake, is a text which leaves wide room for interpretation.
Highly discussed, since the entry into force of the Policy (1999), is the issue of domain names composed by third parties’ trademarks and used in connection with freedom of expression.
A first topic that needs to be cleared is whether disputes involving fundamental rights fall under the Policy application scope. In other words, given the current regulatory framework, Panelists could rule on domain name disputes if the registrant uses the domain name exclusively for criticism purposes (so called criticism sites)? This matter has already been discussed in the Policy’s drafting process, then debated in its initial application phase.
Some Panelists believe that the Policy has no “jurisdiction” if principles like freedom of expression are at stake, given that its application should be limited only to those cases where cybersquatting is clear and only when economic and commercial purposes are involved.[1] Policy’s preparatory works are consistent with this approach, as it is stated that the scope of application should be limited to a restricted range of cases in which domain names are registered to exploit commercially and in bad faith third party’s trademarks, while all other cases should be left to courts.[2] Following this approach, domain name disputes that raise non strictly commercial or economic interests (for example, fundamental rights like the freedom of expression), should lead to dismissal pronouncements, with no ruling on the merits, since the matter falls within the ordinary judiciary’s sphere of competence.
However, the overriding trend[3] is to include in the Policy’s scope of application, also disputes involving fundamental rights. In fact, the regulation has no provision which justifies such exclusion. On the contrary, some of its rules seem to admit, even implicitly, that panelists are entitled to decide disputes not involving merely commercial interests. Some of these are the following:
4(c)(iii) sets forth a list of non-exhaustive cases in which registrants could claim to have an interest or a right to register the domain name, thus preventing the transfer of the disputed domain name. Domain names used for legitimate non-commercial purposes is one of these cases. Therefore, in order to defend a disputed domain name, it is not sufficient to prove that it is used with no commercial purposes, but also that such use is legitimate. Hence, the Policy seems to consider cases of non-commercial but illegitimate use of domain names, which should not be an obstacle to the transfer of the domain name;
4(b) lists several examples of registration and use in bad faith. Well, these cases do not distinguish between a commercial or non-commercial use of the domain name;
finally, the Policy does not state that the commercial use of a domain name is a requirement to obtain its transfer or cancellation. Instead, paragraph 2 just refers to cases of domain names violating the trademark owner’s rights.
This is the approach followed by the great majority of panelists. Therefore, even though a dispute involves fundamental rights like freedom of expression, this doesn’t mean it shouldn’t undergo the Policy rules. In fact, it is not disputed that internet users could register domain names and use them to criticize brand owners, what is at stake, is to exert such freedom by registering domain names which are identical or similar to trademarks legitimately owned and used by third subjects.
Given that Panelists can theoretically rule on cases involving freedom of expression, the next step is to discuss when such freedom actually overrules brand owners’ interests and when, on the other hand, the latter prevails on the former.
According to the case law, Panelists give particular relevance to the nature of the disputed domain name.[4] In case of identity between domain name and trademark (such as <trademark.com>), Panelists’ approach is that brand owners should prevail upon the freedom of expression. In these cases, the owner of the disputed domain name benefits of increased data traffic exclusively due to the reputation of a third party’s trademark and has nothing to do with the website contents and so to the merits of who is behind it. In other words, Internet users that visit a domain name identical to a trademark (<trademark.com>), expect to find a website directly managed by the trademark owner. However, in case the website is a blog criticizing the brand owner, such legitimate expectation is deceived and this circumstance for many Panelist is sufficient to exclude the applicability of the principle of freedom of expression. This approach draws its inspiration from the initial interest confusion theory (or pre sale confusion), which is the confusion of the protected trademark with a website recalling it with its domain name, when the user first approaches it. Additionally, the domain name’s owner is taking unfair advantage from the number of users visiting his website, trusting to find the brand owner’s official website.
On the contrary, domain names composed by the trademark combined with a descriptive word (such as <odiotrademark>, <trademarkfaschifo.com>, <trademarksucks>), give immediately to the internet user the idea of a website used to criticize or express negative opinions. As a consequence, in these cases, Internet users are aware, since the very beginning, that the domain names do not belong to the trademark owner’s official network and that they are used for criticism purposes. Therefore, pre-sale confusion’s theory falls short, and freedom of expression prevails on trademark owner’s interests.
The nature of the use of the domain name is an additional factor often considered by the Panelists.[5] As mentioned, commercial use is not a necessary condition according to the Policy, but it still is, in practice, an important element to establish whether or not there is fair use. It is clear that, if freedom of criticism is just a pretext to actually make business using a third party’s trademark, then fair use cannot be claimed. Let’s imagine that the domain name links to a criticism website, which has sections where it is possible to purchase goods bearing the trademark or competing with it. Or again, think about a blog reporting several advertising links or pay per click, next to the comments about the brand. Finally, let’s imagine the case of the owner of the domain name (used for criticism purposes) that contacts the brand owner and offers the domain name for sale at a very expensive price. These circumstances have been considered useful to support bad faith use of domain names, thus favoring the brand owner’s position in previous domain name disputes.
Beside these factors, Panelists considered, other elements such as:
(i) multiple domain name registrations. Panelists exclude a fair use finding when the same subject registers many domains, containing a trademark, albeit used to express criticism and negative opinions about the brand owner. Basically, the idea is that registering one or two domain names is enough to create a criticism website; on the contrary, in case multiple domain names are involved, the result is to prevent the brand owner from using his/her own trademark in the corresponding domain, thus damaging his/her commercial activity;
(ii) layout of the website which the domain name redirects to. If it’s extremely similar to the brand owner official website and there’s no disclaimer informing users that the domain name owner has no right upon the protected trademark, then the brand owner has more chances to tip the balance in his/her favour in some controversial cases.[6]
At this point, let’s see how this case law applies to the case of the domain name <trumphotels.org>, registered by an American lawyer and used to post articles and negative comments about internal and external policies carried out by the current US President.
As many people know, Donald Trump beside his political role is also a very successful businessman. His activities also cover the hospitality industry and are obviously protected by IP rights all over the world. In particular, TRUMP has been registered worldwide as a trademark for hotel services. Therefore, <trumphotels.org> is very likely to be an attractive and interesting domain name for the President and his legal team.
The domain name is composed by the protected trademark TRUMP combined with the generic term “HOTELS”, clearly linked to the potential claimant business area. To me, this is an element favouring the trademark owner, since the domain name, as such, does not make it clear to the visitor that it is actually a blog about the President’s activities. On the contrary, an Internet user landing on <trumphotels.org> will reasonably think to visit the brand owner’s official website. Furthermore, other companies linked to the US President own trademarks for “TRUMPHOTELS”, so perfectly identical to the domain at issue.
On the other hand, other elements seem to favour the website owner. Firstly, the website hosts exclusively post and articles about the President’s internal and external policies. There is no evidence of any economical activity or advertising links revealing the aim to commercially exploit the trademark TRUMPHOTELS. In addition, a further research has shown that there are no other domain names composed of the protected trademark registered by the owner of the domain. Another issue to be considered, is that the website shows a clear and visible disclaimer informing all users that the website does not have any right connected to the trademarks TRUMPHOTELS or TRUMP and it only hosts informative and satirical contents.
This case is interesting because it brings in all factors that the case law has considered so far, with reference to the relationship between trademarks and freedom of expression. The nature of the domain name is an element favouring the potential claimant, while the absence of commercial purposes and the presence of a clear and visible disclaimer are evidence supporting the potential defendant. As a consequence, the outcome of this possible dispute is quite uncertain, but I believe chances of success are slightly higher for the New York lawyer. The nationality of the Panelist selected to settle the dispute could be a crucial factor in this case. In fact, the parties involved are both American, so in case of domain name dispute, the Panelist would very likely be American. Under this regard, US legal experts take into strong account the First Amendment to the American Constitution establishing, among others, the principles of freedom of expression and publication. Looking at the previous case law, it appears that many American Panelists have cited the First Amendment in deciding in favour of the domain name’s owner, even if it was identical to the trademark.[7] In light of this, I consider unlikely that Mr. Donald Trump could succeed in a domain name dispute on <trumphotels.org> and, probably, that’s the reason why the website is still online.
Conclusively, Panelists reached a consolidated approach extending the scope of the Policy also to those cases not falling into the typical definition of “cybersquatting“, including cases involving fundamental rights. On the merits, its up to the counselors verify, on a case by case basis and accordingly to the case law outlined above, whether the disputed domain name could be transferred or not.
[1] Opinioni dissenzienti in WIPO case n. D2008-0387, Aspis Liv Forsakrings AB vs Neon Network, LLC, e WIPO case n. D2013-0097, Yellowstone Mountain Club LLC vs. Offshore Limited D.
[2] Second Staff Report on Implementation Documents for the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy.
[3] WIPO Overview of WIPO Panel Views on Selected UDRP Questions, Third Edition (“WIPO Jurisprudential Overview 3.0”).
[4] WIPO case n. D2006-1627, Joseph Dello Russo M.D. vs. Michelle Guillaumin; WIPO case n. D2008-0647, Sermo Inc VS CatalystMD LLC; v. anche WIPO Overview of WIPO Panel Views on Selected UDRP Questions, Third Edition (“WIPO Jurisprudential Overview 3.0”), 2.6.2., 2.6.3.
[5] WIPO case n. D2000-0662, Wal-Mart Stores INC vs Richard MacLeod; WIPO case n. D2016-1465, De Beers Intangibles Limited vs. Domain Admin; v. anche WIPO Overview of WIPO Panel Views on Selected UDRP Questions, Third Edition (“WIPO Jurisprudential Overview 3.0”), 2.6.1..
[6] WIPO case n. D2017-0091, Bernardelli Cesarina vs. Paola Ferrario, Ferrario Photography.
[7] WIPO case n. D2004-0014, Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association vs. Paul McCauley.
of Andrea Mascetti Posted December 21, 2018
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The entry into force of the General Data Protection Regulation (hereinafter GDPR) had a remarkable impact in several fields of law as well as in the everyday life of companies, public authorities and professionals dealing with personal data. Online protection of IP assets is certainly among the sectors involved to the greatest extent in the new EU regulation. As a matter of fact, the implementation of GDPR led to a “substantial” shadowing of the WHOIS records (i.e. the public database where all information about domain names is available). Currently, Whois only provide data on domain name registration and expiration dates, registrar and the “status” of the domain name (thin whois data), while information on the registrant and the administrative contact (thick whois data) is no longer available (often, even in case the registrant is a legal person, therefore out of the GDPR scope).
Can A Domain Name Be Recovered?
Business and the Internet: a fundamental union in the modern digital era. Professionals and businesses who are willing to step into today’s market should do it also – and mainly – through one or more websites promoting their products and services. The Internet is not only a resource offering an unlimited range of opportunities but also, as everybody knows, a source of more or less serious risks for both people exploiting the web for their own business and users surfing the net to buy products or services. Among these, the so-called phenomenon of cybersquatting, that is to say the illicit appropriation of domain names corresponding to other people’s trademarks or names, particularly involves whoever deals with IP matters.
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Sixth annual 'Vagina Monologues' benefits women's advocacy efforts
By Bates News. Published on February 8, 2006
Elizabeth Brady, a junior from Pembroke, Mass., directs the sixth annual Bates College production of Eve Ensler’s The Vagina Monologues in performances at 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday, Feb. 10 and 11, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St.
The production is sponsored by the Robinson Players, a student theater group at Bates. Admission is $3, with proceeds supporting both the Auburn-based Abused Women’s Advocacy Project and V-Day, an international effort to end violence against women and girls. For more information, please call 207-786-6135.
Ensler based The Vagina Monologues on interviews that she conducted with more than 200 women about their sexuality, their bodies and their stories of violence and sexual abuse. The result is a collection of women’s stories that are personal yet universal, comic and poignant, brazen and mysterious.
Premiered 10 years ago, the play has enlightened, shocked and entertained audiences all over the world. In 1998, Ensler founded the organization V-Day as a means to parlay the play’s success into an effective force for social and political change. (For more information, see the V-Day Web site.)
Bates is one of some 550 colleges and universities in 45 countries to take part in V-Day performances of The Vagina Monologues during February and March 2006. “We’re all really excited about its message,” says Brady, a chemistry major who is making her directorial debut with this production.
“While there are funny skits, there are also serious skits, and even the funny skits have a point to them about women having a choice and not being silent. We all really stand behind that.”
Since its Obie-winning premiere, Ensler’s play has been performed to broad acclaim worldwide. Productions have featured such top actors as Glenn Close, Cate Blanchett, Susan Sarandon, Marisa Tomei, Rosie Perez, Lily Tomlin, Kate Winslett, Melanie Griffith and Calista Flockhart.
At Bates, Brady performed in the Robinson Players production in 2004 and 2005. “I’ve always been a women’s rights advocate, so I’m really excited about it and happy to be involved with it,” she says.
“We have a great cast this year. They are probably one of the most enthusiastic casts I have ever worked with.”
As director, “I want to put a different kind of energy into it,” Brady says. “We are bound by contract that we can’t actually change any of the monologues, so I want to put a new spin on presenting them — a little bit more in-your-face, a little bit more eye-pleasing, a little bit more action.”
For instance, she’s considering more props, flashier costumes and the concept of having some of the players act out what the narrator is saying. “Just to keep the audience engaged and emphasize the points a little bit, and maybe get a little laugh out of the audience — because it does get very serious at times,” she says.
Brady wishes that Ensler’s play dealt more directly with issues specific to women in college — peer pressure about sex, for instance. But she’s not about to sit down and write a letter taking the playwright — who’s touring this winter with a new play, The Good Body — to task. “The show is so popular and it obviously has lasted such a long time and gets so much attention that I don’t think I could critique her,” Brady says.
Last year, Brady adds, “we sold out both nights. I’m still hearing congratulatory things from everybody. Everyone remembers you when you are in The Vagina Monologues.”
Categories Arts Faculty and staff
Tags arts arts music Elizabeth Brady Eve Ensler music performing arts V-Day Vagina Monologues visual art
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Middletown too strong for F.S. Key
Glenn P. GrahamTHE BALTIMORE SUN
There was 2:25 left in the third quarter when Francis Scott Key guard Mike Crawmer went diving on the floor for a loose ball.
The Eagles trailed Monocacy Valley Athletic League leader Middletown by 46 points at the time, but the Eagles wouldn't quit.
About 20 seconds later, Key's Topher Casserly grabbed a rare defensive rebound and headed up court only to dribble the ball off the heel of one of his own players. That's how things went last night for the Eagles, who fell, 96-48, to a very talented Middletown team that came in with only one loss this season.
The visiting Knights (15-1, 11-1 in the MVAL) dominated from start to finish, scoring the game's first 15 points and opening up a 25-5 lead after one quarter. The lead was 53-18 at the half. Twelve of the Knights' 14 players scored in the win, led by Matt DeOrsey's 19 and Jon DeGrange's 16.
"They're very tough, but we didn't play anywhere near our potential," said Key coach Jeff Cook.
"They just took it to us on both offense and defense and we didn't do much about it. You have to give them credit."
The one consolation for the Eagles was their second-half play. Despite the game being well out of reach, Cook was pleased with the play of some of his reserves, particularly Bill Kennedy (team-high 10 points and seven rebounds), Chris Hild (nine points) and Dave Johnson (three points).
"At halftime I told them to just go out there and get a little respect," Cook said.
"I told the starters they wouldn't see as much time to give the other guys a chance to see some time. They came in and worked really hard."
Middletown senior center John Bennett, at 6 feet 9, set the tone at both ends. He was either blocking or altering every shot the Eagles (6-8, 5-7 in the MVAL) would put up on the defensive end and dominating the boards at the other end to convert easy baskets. He was the third Knight in double figures with 14.
The Eagles didn't get on the board until Casserly hit one of two free throws with 2:20 left in the first quarter.
Their first field goal didn't come until Kyle Stephenson scored inside with 32 seconds left in the quarter. The Knights were leading 22-3 before the basket.
The Knights then scored the first 14 points of the second quarter to put any thoughts of a Key comeback to rest. Cook said the big difference was his team's poor defensive play.
"We just gave them to many easy layups," he said.
"In the past we've had some very good defensive teams. This year, we have more offense, but the defense isn't always there."
Cook will get a good idea what his team is all about when it gets back into action by playing host to MVAL foe Smithsburg tonight.
"I told them to get a good night's rest and be ready for tomorrow," he said. "We'll definitely see what we're made of."
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Shots come early as Caps lose to Flyers, 6-4
The thrills and spills started early, with a goal and two penalties in the first 3 1/2 minutes.
The Philadelphia Flyers and Washington Capitals put on a performance featuring plenty of hard hits and 10 goals, including one from the NHL's first $100 million man. Philadelphia remained the hotter of the streaking teams with a 6-4 road victory yesterday.
"It was a good hockey game," said Flyers center Mike Richards, who put in a rebound that slowed the Capitals' comeback bid in the third period. "Everyone played hard. There were some hits, scoring. Everything that you'd want in a hockey game, there was today."
Mike Knuble had his first two-goal game of the season, and Jim Dowd, R.J. Umberger and Kimmo Timonen also scored for Philadelphia.
Alex Ovechkin notched his 33rd goal of the season in his first game since signing a 13-year, $124 million contract, and Alexander Semin and Mike Green also scored for Washington, which had won four of five.
"There was a lot of try there, but we made too many mistakes," Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau said.
Off the ice
Senators -- Ottawa left wing Dany Heatley will be sidelined up to six weeks because of a separated right shoulder. He missed last night's game against the Islanders, ending a streak of 205 straight games played. Heatley was injured during a collision in Saturday's 3-2 victory over Detroit. The 26-year-old has 56 points (25 goals, 31 assists) this season.
Dany Heatley
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appalachian center
Talk with Dr. Pam Marcum, NASA SOFIA Project Scientist
Please, join us as we welcome a very special guest to the University, Dr. Pam M. Marcum, SOFIA Project Scientist with the NASA Ames Research Center! The Department of Physics & Astronomy invited Dr. Marcum to visit Campus and talk about her work with NASA and the SOFIA (Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy) Project. Dr. Marcum will participate in several lectures and activities while on our Campus, and as she is a native of Lawrence County, Kentucky in the Appalachian Region of our State, The UK Appalachian Center is very excited to invite you to a talk and meet-and-greet here at the Center on Friday, April 15, 2016. Dr. Marcum will talk about her Kentucky roots and her journey to the incredible work she does now. This is a free event, and UK Students, Staff, and Faculty are encouraged to attend and very welcome. A light lunch will be served. Please, read more about Dr. Marcum and her work here.
Friday, April 15, 2016 - 12:00pm to 1:30pm
UK Appalachian Center
appalach
European Folk Dancing workshops
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(TAD 140: Intro to Dance)—10-10:50 am, Blazer Hall, Dance Hall
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Blazer Hall
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Thursday, March 3, 2016 - 2:00pm to 4:30pm
Special Collections Library, M. I. King, 2nd floor/
The Immigrant Experience and Contribution in Appalachian Coalfields Special Collections Exhibit, Preceded by Poetry Reading
Please, join the UK Appalachian Center, Special Collections Library, and the Department of Modern and Classical Languages, Literatures, and Cultures for a very exciting Event as a part of the Arts & Sciences Year of Europe. This event is free for all UK Students, Faculty, and Staff and will be located in the M. I. King Special Collections Library on the 2nd floor on Thursday, March 3, 2016. Italian language students will read selected poems from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. This will be followed by an exhibit entilted The Immigrant Experience and Contribution in Appalachian Coalfields from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. Light refreshements will be served.
Special Collections Library, 2nd floor
#MCLLC
uk special collections library
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Talk by Crystal Wilkinson
Please, join the UK Appalachian Center and the African American and Africana Studies Program in welcoming beloved author Crystal Wilkinson to Campus for a talk on Tuesday, April 5th. Ms. Wilkinson is the current Writer in Residence at Berea College and will present in the UKAA Auditorium in the W. T. Young Library from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. Her talk is titled Black Women and Mental Health in Appalachia. She will also read from her latest novel, The Birds of Opulence and hold a discussion with audience members. This event is free, and all UK Students, Faculty, and Staff are most welcome to attend! Please, find more information about Crystal Wilkinson here.
Tuesday, April 5, 2016 - 3:00pm to 4:30pm
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This will be the 7th annual Graduate Appalachian Research Symposium and Arts Showcase! This event brings students from across UK's Campus and from throughout the Appalachian Region together to present their work and research, and the theme is Difference and Affinity: Representing Appalachia. This year's keynote speaker is Tom Hansell, Co-Director of University Documentary Film Services and Assistant Professor at the Center for Appalachian Studies at Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina and Director of After Coal. The Symposium will span two days this year: Saturday, March 5, 2016 and Sunday, March 6, 2016 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on both days. Poster submissions are due online by midnight on Sunday, January 31, 2016. Registration for presenters and non-presenting attendees is due online by Monday, February 15, 2016. Please, see the GARC page on our website for more information and for submission and registration instructions! This year's Symposium and Art Showcase is generously co-sponsored by the UK Student Government Association.
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graduate appalachian research community
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SWAP Event with 2015 Eller Billings Summer Mini Research Grant Recipients
Please, join us in welcoming two of our 2015 Eller Billings Summer Mini Research Grant Recipients as they present their work at our SWAP (Sharing Work on Appalachia in Progress) Event! Tammy Clemmons, a Graduate Student in Anthropology will give at talk entitled Youth Media Education and Activism in Central Appalachia and Chelsea Adams, a Graduate Students in Educational Psychology will give a talk entitled Stigma Conciousness in Appalachian Students at the UK Appalachian Center from 12 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday, April 13, 2016. This is a free event for UK faculty, students, and staff, and lunch will be provided.
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 - 12:00pm to 1:30pm
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Alpesh Patel: What happens when you make your first million at 24?
Alpesh Patel is a mobile phone entrepreneur, motivational speaker, author and one of GQ South Africa’s ‘Best Dressed Men’. We caught him in-between suit fittings in London to find out about the rise and fall of his entrepreneurial journey as detailed in his new book, Tested.
Imagine having a loaded gun pointed at you in a dispute over payment of three laptop computers, or armed soldiers swarming your house party to forcibly shut it down. These are just some of the harrowing incidents Alpesh Patel has endured in his eventful entrepreneurial journey.
All successful entrepreneurs experience highs and lows but Alpesh has gone through the wringer to get to where he is today. The journey of the founder of Mi Fone, the first African mobile device brand, is so compelling it deserves Hollywood treatment. It’s told in graphic detail in his thoroughly entertaining memoir, aptly titled Tested.
This entrepreneur has come a long way since selling clunky Motorola phones in London in the late Eighties. After graduating in Economics from the University of Hull, Alpesh identified a niche market in Hong Kong and made his first million dollars by 24.
From 1990 for a few years his Motorola phones were flying off the shelves in Hong Kong. With his bank accounts bulging, life couldn’t get any sweeter but competition soon kicked in. “I was initially the only show in town,” he says. “But I was very lax and did not build on the foundation I had created in Hong Kong. I was young and had little wisdom. I always thought I knew what’s best. And because the good days just kept on coming I thought they would never stop.”
Alpesh diversified into other consumer goods with little success. He even launched ‘SafeBag’, a luggage wrapping machine in 1993 but didn’t have the patience to pursue it. “Now this idea is everywhere and some folks are making billions out of it …. except me!” he chuckles.
He moved to South Africa to try to revive his fortunes, but things were not working in his favour. The day he met his wife-to-be, Alpesh had less than $1 in his pocket. He decided then that things had to change. He got his first job at 33, and in his last role as director of sales, Motorola Middle East and Africa, Alpesh generated over $500m in revenues for Motorola taking them to No.1 market share in many African countries. “I was the ultimate intrapreneur, creating new trading channels for the company.”
But despite all the success and numerous offers from other companies, Alpesh decided to put his life savings on the line and in 2008 he rolled the dice to start Mi Fone.
He admits to bootstrapping it out of a mix of naivety and foolishness. “We were a David in the field of many Goliaths,” he says. Yet the day they launched they had generated their first revenues and within the first few years they were in 14 markets with cumulative sales of more than $30m.
Being an underdog, competing against the bigger, more established brands, Mi Fone had to contend with numerous challenges. That included giving substantial credit to clients and borrowing money at high interest rates to keep afloat.
“I started playing Russian roulette with the cash-flow machine. I was a ‘yes man’. I would do anything to please my distributors and because they had the power and muscle to get my phones out there, I had to deal with them on their terms.”
Besides being the first African device brand, Mi Fone’s innovations also included the continent’s first smartphone debit card, and Oju, the world’s first black emoticons which sparked a global media frenzy. “It was nice to get all these awards but awards did not help me pay the bills.”
Even though Mi Fone had not been able to raise any external funding for eight years, it had done well enough to garner the attention of a $5 billion South African public listed conglomerate that eventually purchased a controlling stake in the brand. But Alpesh admits that sealing the deal was one of the most stressful times of his life.
“In hindsight I should have walked away, but the business needed the much-required cash injection.”
On top of all that, Xiaomi, a Chinese company, entered the African market with their own phones, also called Mi which led to immense confusion and problems. “I had to fight for what we stood for and the fact that we were in Africa first.”
With his investors being lethargic and with the 2015 Africa currency crisis as well as drawn-out legal issues, by April 2016 Alpesh had “burnt out”.
“I was sizzled. My mind, body and soul were exhausted. I had to put Mi Fone aside to focus on my family and myself. I had to get my sanity back.”
He then took time out to write Tested, his 350-page rollercoaster journey spanning 30 years and four continents. “It was a form of self-healing and it poured out of me because when you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything.”
While Alpesh admits to several mistakes, he has some massive achievements, including the success of Mi Fone and eventually exiting to a public listed company. “It shows that you can build a business with nothing.” He is also proud of creating the first black smileys – even before Apple – and his success in building the Motorola brand in Africa.
“Even in all this turmoil I was responsible enough to keep my family together and maintain my integrity, ethics and principles. I can write my story as I have nothing to hide and no-one to protect.” Alpesh is currently in the process of moving base from South Africa to London and is concentrating on a variety of Peshmode projects.
“Our challenge today is to constantly keep improving and challenging ourselves so we become the only ones to do what we do. Only then do we create real value and only then are we the masters of our own lanes. Until then…the hustle continues.”
Photographs by Rahul Khona
On location at The Bespoke Club London
There’s no manual for being a parent, and negotiating a balance between family life and achieving your dreams can be a challenge. We asked Saleem Sheikh, Senior Partner of GSC. MORE
When it comes to property, meet the Patel brothers disrupting the market
Jesal and Nilesh from The Prideview Group share their fresh approach to property and finding opportunities in challenging times. “You have to look at an investment with a long term horizon.. MORE
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Yawn... It's The Mids
The tide is turning for the wisteria sisters
It comes as a surprise to many as to why Pippa Middleon and her sister Kate, aka the Duchess of Cambridge, are so renowned in social circles as these beautiful fashionistas.
Hailed as the next best thing, the sisters have been picked up by the press as these scions of the modern era.
What’s more, their ghastly dresses, ropey faces and questionable derrieres have been hailed as something to aim for throughout the world.
However, It would seem the fashion world is finally turning on the wisteria sisters – a nickname the press gave them for their notorious social climbing – after an array of fashion faux pas and annoying social graces!
My source says, “It was Dame Vivienne Westwood who got the ball rolling and now everyone is jumping on the band wagon.” At last…
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Home / Explore / The châteaux / The Regional Estate of Chaumont-sur-Loire
The Regional Estate of Chaumont-sur-Loire
A beautiful view over the wild river
Between Blois and Amboise, the Château de Chaumont-sur-Loire has the most breathtaking interior and gardens
A little history...
In the 10th century the Count of Blois, Eudes I, built a fortress to protect the city from the attacks of the Count of Anjou. In thanks for his support, Eudes gave Chaumont to the Norman knight Gelduin the Younger. His son and successor Geoffroy, who did not have children, chose his his niece, Denise de Fougères to be his heiress. In 1054 she married Sulpice I of Amboise. Thus, Chaumont became the property of the family of Amboise for about five centuries.
In 1465, Louis XI had the buildings and extensions destroyed to punish Pierre d'Amboise for having rebelled against the king's power. A few years later, in 1469, the king pardoned Pierre restored his lands and gave him funds for the reconstruction of Chaumont.
From 1468 to 1510, the north wing (now replaced), the west wing and the beginning of the south wing were built by Pierre's son, Charles I, in the Gothic style. The south wing, the gate house, the east wing, the chapel and the grand courtyard staircase were completed by his grandson, Charles II, in a style more marked by the Renaissance.
In 1560, Catherine de Medici, widow of King Henry II and regent of the kingdom of France, bought the Château de Chaumont and forced Diane de Poitiers, former favourite of the king, to give him Chenonceau in exchange. Catherine carried out some restoration and affixed her own emblems above the decorative stonework of the walkway. Between the end of the sixteenth and the middle of the eighteenth century, the Château de Chaumont passed through several different hands.
The Château de Chaumont-sur-Loire © Blois-Chambord Tourist Office
In 1750 it was acquired by Jacques Donatien Le Ray, future intendant of Louis XVI. He knocked down the north wing to open the main courtyard to the Loire and founded a pottery and glass factory in the site of the present-day stables, which attracted many artists, led by the sculptor and engraver Jean-Baptiste Nini. Jacques Donatien Ray hosted Benjamin Franklin in 1776, and saved the château from the French Revolution. His son, known as "Le Ray the American" sold the property to the Baron of Etchegoyen in 1823.
In the nineteenth century, the château belonged, successively to the Count of Aramon and Viscount Joseph Walsh who both carried out major restoration work. In 1875, Marie-Charlotte Constance Say, daughter and heiress of the rich Constant Say, the sugar cane magnate, bought the estate, and a few months later married Prince Henri-Amédée de Broglie.
This wealthy couple continued to enlarge and improve the estate with the help of the architect Paul-Ernest Sanson. They restored the exteriors, modernised the interiors (electricity, central heating, running water) and built the stables. In 1884, the landscape architect Henri Duchêne redesigned the park surrounding the château. Eventually, having spent all their fortune and owing enormous taxes, the princess yielded the estate to the French state for 1,800,000 gold francs in 1938.
Since 2007, the Regional Estate of Chaumont-sur-Loire has belonged to the Centre-Val de Loire Region and in October 2008 became a Cultural Meeting Place, an establishment recognised by the Ministry of Culture and Communication for its missions to safeguard the national artistic and cultural heritage.
International garden festival
WHY NOT GET HOLD OF A PASS'CHÂTEAUX !
Save money by buying tickets for multiple visits online. Check out or our special offers - they allow you to visit the various châteaux in the Loire valley at a reduced price..
The north face of the Château de Chaumont-sur-Loire. © ©...
The Regional Estate of Chaumont-sur-Loire © L. de Serres
The Château de Chaumont-sur-Loire seen from the Loire© L....
The Château de Chaumont at night © Blois-Chambord Tourist...
The living-rooms of the Château de Chaumont-sur-Loire ©...
The amazing gardens of Chaumont-sur-Loire.© Blois...
The grounds of the Château de Chaumont
The Château de Chaumont had no garden in the sixteenth century - it was not until the 19th century that the Count of Aramon planted several species of trees, including the cedars. However, the main architect of the grounds is undoubtedly Prince Henri-Amédée de Broglie, who who developed the park in the English style with the help of landscape gardener Henri Duchêne.
Prince de Broglie moved the cemetery, demolished two hamlets and the church, rebuilding the banks of the Loire. By 1917, year of his death, the Chaumont estate had nearly 2,500 hectares of woods, farms and land. The landscaped park itself represents 21 hectares of the total.
Curiosities:
the cemetery of dogs and monkeys, favourite pets of the Princess de Broglie, is located in the pleasure garden between the château and the farm
the stables built in 1877, on the site of the former Le Ray factory
The Arts and Nature Centre
Since 2008, The Regional Estate of Chaumont-sur-Loire has been a centre of artistic and landscape creation. Each year, exhibitions of the visual arts and photography, concerts and film screenings make the place a living art venue "dedicated to the relationship between nature and culture."
Regional Estate of Chaumont
From 14 € Full-fare
Domaine Régional de Chaumont-sur-Loire
Chaumont-sur-Loire
20 € Adult
Discovering the Loire
Town, village, neighbourhood
Children's visits in the Loire Valley
The châteaux of the Loire are always a source of wonder for our youngest visitors
Clos Lucé Manor
Near the Château d'Amboise, discover Clos Lucé, the last home of Italian Renaissance genius Leonardo da Vinci
A short trip of 4 to 5 days to see the best Renaissance sites of the destination
The Maison des Vins, Chambord
The Maison des Vins de Chambord proposes an of innovative and exciting concept in wine tasting for the AOC Cheverny and Cour-Cheverny wines
Taking in the Loire... slowly
A few examples of slower-paced activities, to discover all the wealth of the Loire Valley without the rush
Among the châteaux of the Loire, Villandry undoubtedly owes its fame to its exceptional terraced gardens
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The rise of nurse practitioners in Canada
Doctor shortages are putting a strain on our healthcare system. Nurse practitioners could be one way to relieve it
Source: Best Health Magazine, November/December 2008; photo by Tony A. Galic/Candid Photography Studios
One day this past July, a 41-year-old woman walked into a clinic for her annual checkup. After a Pap smear and blood pressure reading, she got a renewal prescription for her thyroid medication and advice on how a family history of diabetes affected her risk.
The examination, prescription and medical advice were not from a doctor, but from a nurse practitioner (NP): Marilyn Butcher, director of Canada’s first NP-led clinic. “This is the first time a group of nurse practitioners has formed a non-profit organization, created a board and received funding,” says NP Roberta Heale, the clinic’s co-founder.
This take-charge move has put NPs in the national spotlight. The Sudbury, Ont., clinic got accolades from Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty, who announced funding for 25 similar clinics after it opened in August 2007. Since then, NPs from coast to coast keep calling Heale and Butcher, asking how they did it. And while this is the country’s first NP clinic, it’s not likely to be the last.
The history of nurse practitioners in Canada
Canada started training NPs in 1967, and we now have more than 2,000. NPs do everything from diagnosing and managing chronic diseases to treating ear infections, ordering tests and writing prescriptions. They also focus on disease prevention. But Butcher insists their role is not that of a physician. “NPs are registered nurses with additional training, experience and education that enables us to practise nursing in an expanded role,” she says. When patients have complex diagnoses or need help to manage a serious condition such as out-of-control diabetes, Butcher collaborates with the physicians associated with her clinic.
The idea for the Sudbury clinic came in 2005 when Heale and Butcher, who had worked together at the Victorian Order of Nurses, were frustrated with their careers. Butcher, married with two children in their 20s, was piecing together an income doing several casual NP jobs. Meanwhile, Heale, also married and with two teenage daughters, had turned to teaching in the NP program at Sudbury’s Laurentian University since there were few jobs in the field. The two knew of eight NPs in the area working as regular nurses, and of many more who were underemployed.
To further their profession—and help the 30,000 people in Sudbury without a family physician—Heale and Butcher lobbied for funding from the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care. By summer 2007, they had received government funding and opened their clinic.
The clinic’s successes and goals
During its first year, the clinic was bombarded with calls. It gradually took on about 1,400 patients, and continues to accept new ones. It is currently staffed by three full-time NPs; Butcher herself sees patients part-time (Heale, still at Laurentian and president of the clinic’s board, doesn’t work hands-on). Appointments range from 15 to 30 minutes. Two doctors join the group two to three days a week in total. “We don’t have the doctors doing annual health exams or prenatal checkups. We want to use everyone’s skills to the fullest,” says Butcher. Eventually, the pair plan to open a second location to accommodate 4,500 patients, and to include two more NPs, a dietitian, a social worker, a registered nurse and a pharmacist.
Dr. Tara Leary, one of the clinic’s doctors, likes its collaborative approach. “I think that patients are getting excellent care. It’s like having two primary caregivers at one number. You can’t beat that.”
Are nurse practitioner clinics effective?
Heale and Butcher have surveyed their patients and found they are happy with the clinic’s approach. And international research confirms that NPs can work: A review of 34 studies, published in the BMJ (British Medical Journal), found that NPs kept people just as healthy as doctors, and patients were more satisfied with their care.
Still, “there’s a huge lack of public awareness about the role,” Butcher admits. As well, NP education and scope of practice are not standardized across the country. To address these and other issues, the Nurse Practitioner Council of Canada was formed.
While The College of Family Physicians of Canada does not have an official position on NPs, some doctors have voiced concerns. “A nurse practitioner cannot provide a doctor’s care,” says Dr. Ken Arnold, president of the Ontario Medical Association. He thinks the Sudbury clinic should be assessed to be sure people are getting the best care possible.
Choosing to see a nurse practitioner instead of a doctor may not be for everyone. But for many, this new type of clinic is a great way to stay well.
Pictured: Marilyn Butcher (left) and Roberta Heale are the founders of Canada’s first nurse practitioner-led clinic.
This article was originally titled "Beyond Nursing," in the November/December 2008 issue of Best Health Magazine. Subscribe today and never miss an issue!
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No one left then. But halfway through the sermon, a group of French girls made their way toward the velvet ropes that blocked the exit. An usher shook his head firmly, but they ignored him and walked out.
The clash between tourists and congregants plays out every Sunday at Mother African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, the oldest black church in New York state. It's one of many Harlem churches that have become tourist attractions for visitors from all over the world who want to listen to soulful gospel music at ablack church service. With a record number of tourists descending upon New York City last year, the crowds of foreigners are becoming a source of irritation among faithful churchgoers.
To preserve the sanctity of the service, pastors struggle to enforce strict rules of conduct. But the reality is that these visitors are often filling church pews that would otherwise remain empty — and filling the collection basket with precious dollar bills.
"Our building is in need of repair," church member Paul Henderson said after the service. "We need assistance. They're helping to sustain us."
The rules are simple enough: No photography, no flip-flops, no exiting during the sermon. They are printed on pamphlets and multilingual signs and announced at the start of every service. But they are often ignored. Ushers roamed the pews like security guards, stopping more than one person from filming on digital cameras.
"I understand that you're visiting and you want to have a memory of it," said Carlos Smith-Ramsay, who joined the church several years ago. "But when we ask you to stop and you continue to do so after the fact, that's disrespectful."
Some pastors quietly manage the crowds by requiring a written confirmation of guests from tour operators, refusing walk-in visitors. Some churches provide assigned seating for tourists, while others demand a list specifying which countries the tourists are from and whether they speak English.
And still more forbid the tour companies from advertising which churches are on the tour in hopes of curbing the number of unwanted visitors.
The Rev. Gregory Robeson Smith, Mother AME Zion's pastor, refuses to work with tour operators. He doesn't even like to use the word "tourist," preferring instead to call them part of his "international congregation." And he won't turn anyone away.
"I refuse to commercialize the church worship experience," he said. "You don't pay people to experience the Lord, to come and pray. I think that's unconscionable."
Yet the tourists' presence is undeniable. At Mother AME Zion, there were nearly 200 of them, overwhelming the congregation by at least 5 to 1.
"They want to see what they've seen on television," said Larcelia Kebe, president of Harlem Your Way! Tours Unlimited. "They want to see what they've seen in the movies."
The gospel tour industry has exploded since it was born in the early 1980s. On a busy summer Sunday, Harlem Spirituals, one of the oldest and largest tour operators, might run 15 full buses, said Erika Elisabeth, a company vice president.
Ticket prices but can cost up to $55. Most churches get a cut of the profit. Others, like Mother AME Zion, make money by encouraging visitors to drop a suggested donation into the collection basket.
"Some of the tour operators really have made this whole thing about money," Kebe said. "It's created a problem. Because many of them are getting a lot of money from the tourists in order to get into a church. And there may be people in the church who are making a little money on the side."
During his sermon, Smith appealed to the congregation to help pay for repairs to the church's aging organ.
"We've got about $1,200 worth of work that needs to be done," he said. "I need 12 people to give me $100."
Without the tourists' wallets, the organ might never get fixed. Mother AME Zion's congregation is dying off, and there are very few young people left to fill the generation gap.
That's not the case everywhere. Just around the corner is the thriving Abyssinian Baptist Church, arguably the neighborhood's most popular tourist magnet, where visitors are often turned away because the pews are too full.
Celeste Lejeune, 16, from Paris, didn't know anything about Mother AME Zion's history as a stop on the Underground Railroad, or that its congregants once included Frederick Douglass and Harriet Tubman.
"I would like to just hear voices of people who live in Harlem, and see the atmosphere," she said. "We don't have music like this in France."
That is precisely the sort of outlook that disheartens the congregation, who would like to believe the tourists have come to listen to the word of God, to be transformed by the power of Scripture.
"Within this site that's meant to be sacred, you have, maybe to some of the members, this invasion of the secular and profane," said Margarita Simon Guillory, an assistant professor of religion at the University of Rochester in Rochester, N.Y. "You're going to have a certain amount of tension in that space."
Longtime congregation member Dabney Montgomery, 88, a Tuskegee Airman during World War II and a civil rights activist, believes the tourists walk away richer for the experience.
"In listening to the Gospel, they get something out that they didn't expect," he said. "The word of God."
But most of them are there to see a show — and a show they got. The pastor gave a dramatic sermon filled with historical and political overtones, his voice slowing to a low growl and then rising back up, cracking with the effort. The choir sang hymn after joyful hymn as the congregation clapped in time with the music. One woman gave a beautiful soprano solo.
If nothing else, the tourists got to step back in time for an hour or two. A time when ladies wore dresses and stockings to church and ushers with immaculate white gloves guided people to their seats. A time when thechurch was the center of social life, the place to see and be seen.
At least with the tourists around, the place feels a little less empty on Sunday mornings.
"They're not tourists," Smith said. "They're people of faith. In Christ, there is no East, no West."
(Photo: AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
Written by Meghan Barr, Associated Press
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Dr Edward Liao
Straight & Up Intelligent Innovations Group Co.
Edward Da-Yin Liao is currently the co-founder and CEO of Straight & Up Intelligent Innovations (SUII) Group Co., an intelligent solution innovator headquartered in San Francisco Bay Area, USA.
He received his BS degree in mechanical engineering and his MS and PhD degrees in electrical engineering from National Taiwan University in 1989, 1991, and 1994 respectively. He is creative and business-savvy, with more than two decades of progressive experience across a broad range of computer integration, automation, system engineering and management functions in semiconductor and high-tech industries.
Since 2005, he has held CEO and CTO positions in a multimedia software startup in Taiwan, an RFID company in Silicon Valley, and a UK-based international missioncritical software company. Between 2001 and 2005, he was affiliated to the Department of Information Management at National Chi-Nan University, Taiwan, and was also an adjunct assistant professor at National Chiao-Tung University, Taiwan.
Before his professorship, he worked as a department manager and a senior director in the IT divisions of semiconductor foundry and TFT/LCD manufacturing companies for six years. He participated in and led the development of computer-integrated manufacturing (CIM) and automation projects in four wafer fabs and one TFT/LCD fab. He has solid, full-stack knowledge of industrial backgrounds in executive positions with strong domain expertise in system architecture, process optimization, and business intelligence. He evangelizes deep learning, robotics, automation, Internet of Things (IoT), 5G wireless communications, and smart and healthy living.
Edward is a member of IEEE and is a reviewer for several international journals and transactions. He has been invited to be session chair/co-chair and/or keynote speaker at many international conferences, and has published more than fifty academic journal and conference papers.
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Once upon a time machine
This year's A Listers jumped at the chance to fast-forward and rewind in their time machines to a future of world domination or some fondly remembered private pleasures. But, in 2014, seemingly only a dog could soften the blow of coming back down to Earth with a bump, Jeremy Lee writes.
This year's A List questionnaire is, we have been reliably told, the most challenging ever.We already know where you elite lot go on holiday, who your friends in the business are, how you unwind and even how many lavatories you have in your house, as well as the obvious stuff such as your career highlights and your favourite ads. So, in a bid to keep things fresh, we sought inspiration elsewhere… and in the clichéd style so beloved of The X Factor contestants, this year we invited advertising’s A Listers to embark on a journey. Twice, in fact.
First, we gifted you an imaginary time-travel machine to take you anywhere you wanted. This was a particularly welcome and prescient present to a number of contributors such as Christian Hinchcliffe, Leon Jaume, Andy Jones, Paul Kitcatt and Camilla Harrisson, who had already identified it as something that would make an improvement to their lives – which shows, if nothing else, how well we have got to know some of you over the years through your toilets, your friends and your favourite media. The prospect of where the time machine would take you, however, was a sticky one for many others – none more so than Nils Leonard, who (and pass the smelling salts – no, make that the sick bag) would use it to return to the orgasm he had in northern Spain. A lovely thought, we’re sure, but maybe not one for sharing in this book (assuming, of course, that it was a shared and not a solitary experience). And while we’re on the subject of the bawdy, quite what David and Sarah Golding got up to at midnight on 4 June 2006 is also something that you’ll have to ask them – but we feel confident in saying that you would have to be a voyeur (and a specialist one, at that) if you wanted to accompany them on the that particular trip back in time.
But advertising isn’t just about the pleasures of the flesh, of course. Many A Listers promised that they would undertake societal good, such as saving the world or, in David Prideaux’s case, recasting the Sykes-Picot Agreement that shaped the post-imperial Middle East (although the 1966 World Cup final also proved a popular destination for many, which says as much about the state of England’s national football team as it does the dewy-eyed nostalgia of the ad industry’s elite team). Others, such as Mark Boyd and Johnny Hardstaff, would get in their time machine and try to change the face of political history by influencing the outcomes and moral compasses of Alex Salmond and Margaret Thatcher (depending on your point of view, these could also be filed as an undertaking of societal good).
But – and here we feel the need to send our apologies to Messrs Hinchcliffe, Jaume, Jones, Kitcatt and Ms Harrisson – a time machine is, for the time being, a mere fantasy and one that we are unable to deliver on just yet.
A rather more likely destination (just five short years away) is 2020. But, perhaps given the sobering – if admittedly unlikely – prospect of the world ending tomorrow (another bleak question that sent you, quite rightly, scuttling back to your families), it may be a fanciful place. And given Moray MacLennan’s answer to what he’ll be doing that year, Maurice Saatchi, Bill Muirhead, Jeremy Sinclair and David Kershaw must he hoping so.
By then, MacLennan claims that he will have wiped out the M&C Saatchi founding partners in a Godfather-style spree, that WPP and Publicis will have collapsed after the demises of Sir Martin Sorrell and Maurice Lévy, and that he will now have supreme power in the advertising world. It’s certainly a fantasy, although one in which the rest of the ad community is likely to have similar misgivings to the M&C boys. Jim Bolton finds the prospect of 2020 taking him to a very, erm, dark place as well. "It’s a little hazy... it’s very dark... worms are crawling from my anus... am I dead? Or do I just have worms crawling from my anus? Both are a worry," he answers.
But, to counterbalance this darkness, there is also, thankfully, the inevitable light, revealing that advertising has not completely taken leave of its senses. After all, it’s still a great business, isn’t it? Few will disagree with Richard Huntington’s assessment that you can spend your life working with clever, creative, funny and attractive people. More than one of our respondents also use that hoary old line that it’s "the most fun you can have with your clothes on" – something that Leonard might like to reflect upon (incidentally, Lindsey Clay has a cleaner, more family-friendly version: to her, it’s the most fun you can have outside of netball). And, to Paul Lawson, things are more prosaic still: it’s still a great business because you can be drunk at your desk at 10am – something that might explain why the recently promoted Katie Lee finds her meditation lessons so satisfying, if not necessary.
To those of you with long memories, Campaign concluded in The A List last year that 2013 was the year of the goldfish – no two days were the same. But, this year, the goldfish has been supplanted and replaced by the dog. Everyone wants one to improve their lives – who knew that something so easily obtainable would make such a profound difference to the industry’s collective well-being? It’s almost worth the IPA investing in a therapy dog scheme, similar to those offered in old-people’s homes or palliative care units, at meetings of the IPA Council.
It’s sadly unlikely, however. We learn that Paul Bainsfair is more concerned with obtaining a golf swing like Rory McIlroy’s. But, given the prospect of Bainsfair spending 2020 asleep in a driverless car on the M3 (a chilling thought for anyone with a holiday home down in the South-West), some leisure time is allowed before this accident waiting to happen occurs.
Well, it could have been the year of the dog but, alternatively, maybe it was the year of the bear. Delightfully – and showing that touch of creativity and cleverness that Huntington wrote of earlier – given a hypothetical invitation to give a TED talk, some of you couldn’t resist making a joke about turning the debate to one on Big Ted, Little Ted and Jemima of 70s children’s TV series Play School fame (yes, we’re looking at you again, Lawson). Jonathan Burley, however, let us down rather on this one and chose to deliver his on his specialist subject of Silk Cut 100s – and anyone who has ever walked up Rathbone Place will confirm that he truly is a world expert on that matter. But, generally, you wear your wisdom lightly; it is what marks you out and is why we like you.
But that’s not to say that the A List questionnaire isn’t also an excuse on our part to sneakily find out new things about you. So, what gems did we uncover through this year’s opportunistic peek into your worlds (it’s easier – and more ethical – than phone-hacking)?
Despite being creative and clever and funny, there is also a contradictory but inherent conservatism when it comes to spending money – property, particularly in London, was the favoured area of investment if you got your hands on an ephemeral £1 million. Maybe our expectations of things more outrageous were blunted by our time machine – if so, then it’s our fault.
But there are still some things that even the most casual cultural observer might find interesting. For instance, Tess Alps has learned how to stop melons dropping off (although her knees are proving rather more problematic to cure); Russell Ramsey is aware that he is clever and genuine but has no social skills; given the choice, Robert Senior would be Johnny Hornby for the day so that he could steal his clients – which is something that Ben Fennell would also do to poor old Charles Vallance. Robert Ffitch, meanwhile, would like to be James Murphy for a day – although his reasons are rather more touching and self-effacing. "James Murphy is, annoyingly, very bright, very successful, very rich and very nice. It would be good to enjoy that combo for 24 hours," he writes sweetly.
You all have at least one of these qualities and, in many instances, even several – Murphy isn’t the only one who can claim a full house. It’s why you are all members of this year’s A List. And, assuming that MacLennan doesn’t finally break in the next 12 months and conduct his unnecessary slaughter, we hope to see all of you here again next year. We look forward to finding out what animal the next 12 months shapes up to be – and hope that it doesn’t turn out to be a pig of a year for you. Enjoy the "journey".
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Camp Goodtimes
Community fundraisers
Top research stories of 2011
You are here: About us / News / National / 2012 / Top research stories of 2011
January 2012 — Canadian Cancer Society-funded researchers continue to discover ways to reduce cancer incidence and mortality and enhance the quality of life for Canadians living with and beyond cancer. Here are the top 10 research stories of 2011.
1. Landmark trial finds exemestane significantly reduces risk of breast cancer
A large international clinical trial investigating a new way to prevent breast cancer in women at increased risk of developing the disease found that the drug exemestane reduces this risk by 65 per cent compared with placebo. The trial was led by the NCIC Clinical Trials Group, which is funded by the Canadian Cancer Society. This discovery was recognized by the American Society of Clinical Oncology as one of the world’s most important cancer treatment breakthroughs in 2011.
Reference: The New England Journal of Medicine, June 2011
2. New surveillance protocol improves survival for individuals at high risk for cancer
A Toronto research team led by Dr David Malkin found that a new cancer surveillance protocol dramatically improves survival for adults and children with Li-Fraumeni syndrome, a hereditary disease that significantly increases a person’s susceptibility to cancer. The study found that those under surveillance had a 100 per cent survival rate after cancer was detected. For those not under surveillance the survival rate was 21 per cent.
Reference: The Lancet Oncology, June 2011
3. Discovery of human blood stem cell could end search for bone marrow
With his research team in Toronto, Dr Dick identified a human blood stem cell that is capable of regenerating the entire blood system. This breakthrough finding could lead to new ways of treating cancer and other debilitating diseases more effectively.
Reference: Science, July 2011
4. Practice-changing trial shows additional radiation decreases cancer recurrence
A Canadian-led clinical trial has found that additional radiation treatment improves disease-free survival in women with early breast cancer and reduces the risk of cancer recurrence – a finding that could change the standard treatment for these women. Interim analysis of the results showed a greater than 30 per cent improvement in disease-free survival for those receiving additional radiation therapy. The trial was led by the NCIC Clinical Trials Group, which is funded by the Canadian Cancer Society. This discovery was recognized by the American Society of Clinical Oncology as one of the world’s most important cancer treatment breakthroughs in 2011.
Reference: American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting, June 2011
5. New insight into genetics of ovarian cancer development
Dr Sherif Abou Elela in Sherbrooke screened ovarian cancer cells and identified several variants in their genetic material that control growth and survival. This work provides important insight into the genetic factors that contribute to the development of ovarian cancers and cancer biology in general.
Reference: Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, May 2011
6. Drug “holiday” will change standard of care for men with recurring prostate cancer
A trial led by the NCIC Clinical Trials Group, which is funded by the Canadian Cancer Society, found that men with prostate cancer who are treated with intermittent courses of androgen-suppressing (hormone) therapy live as long as those receiving continuous therapy. The results are expected to change current treatment protocols and reduce some of the side effects of hormone therapy, including impotence. The findings were presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) where the research was selected as the “Best of ASCO”.
7. New imaging method could more accurately detect lung cancer
Dr Haishan Zeng in Vancouver led a pilot study testing a new technology – laser Raman Spectroscopy (LRS) – to determine if it could improve the detection of lung cancers. Dr Zeng and his research team found that LRS was able to detect pre-cancerous lesions with a 96 per cent sensitivity and a 91 per cent specificity, when used in combination with existing methods. The application of LRS, which was developed in British Columbia, could improve early detection of lung cancer and reduce the number of false positives associated with other methods.
Reference: Journal of Thoracic Oncology, July 2011
8. Researcher develops tumour-killing nanoparticles
Dr Gang Zheng in Toronto recently developed a new class of nanoparticles, called porphysomes, which target and destroy tumours. When they collect in tumours, porphysomes convert light from a laser into energy that kills the cancer cells. This work earned Dr Zheng the University Health Network Inventor of the Year award.
Reference: Nature Materials, March 2011
9. Survey finds more young men using smokeless tobacco
The Youth Smoking Survey examined the use of smokeless tobacco (chewing tobacco and snuff) by youth between 2004 and 2008. They found that in Canada, young men are the prime users of smokeless tobacco, with the highest use being in western provinces and the lowest in Quebec. The findings from this biennial survey help in the development, implementation and evaluation of tobacco control strategies, policies and programs for young people. The survey, funded by Health Canada, was conducted by the Propel Centre for Population Health Impact, which is a Canadian Cancer Society-funded program at the University of Waterloo.
Reference: Canadian Journal of Public Health, September/October 2011
10. Findings may provide new treatment option for childhood leukemia
Leading the one of the first studies of its kind to investigate the role of the KIR genes in the development of childhood leukemia, Dr Ali Ahmad and his research team in Montreal showed that children that inherited activating KIR genes had a decreased risk of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). The findings provide important insight into the underlying cause of ALL and may also reveal a new therapeutic option by targeting KIR proteins.
Reference: Blood, August 2011
Late-breaking honourable mentions from 2010
Research finds anti-cancer agent no wonder drug
Dr Brenda Coomber and her research team in Guelph found that DCA (dichloroacetate), a drug thought to have anti-cancer properties, is not effective at killing colon cancer cells in mice and, in some instances, causes tumours to grow. DCA has been touted in the popular press as a potential powerful anti-cancer therapy with anecdotal evidence of self medication. The findings underscore the importance of appropriately testing new therapies for cancer patients.
Reference: Cancer Letters, November 2010
Discovery may lead to new diagnostics and treatment for eye cancer
Researchers in Vancouver, led by Dr Catherine Van Raamsdonk, found that 79 per cent of uveal melanomas - the most common type of eye cancer - have mutations in one of two oncogenes (GNA11 or GNAQ). The findings greatly increase our knowledge about uveal melanomas and are already being used to develop new diagnostics and therapies.
Reference: The New England Journal of Medicine, December 2010
Researchers discover new cellular mechanism in cancer development
Dr Marc Therrien in Montreal discovered a new way for a protein called EJC to direct signalling pathways that control cell division. Dysfunctional signalling pathways play a role in the development of many cancers and this work provides new insight into how molecular communication breaks down. The findings were selected by the Faculty of 1000 as a "Must Read" paper and as one of the top ten scientific discoveries of the year in Quebec by the Quebec Science magazine.
Reference: Cell, October 2010
Society-funded researchers honoured
In 2011, scientists funded by the Society received major national awards recognizing their research achievements:
Dr Geoffrey Fong received the Canadian Institutes for Health Translation Award for his research that has helped set the global agenda on tobacco regulation. Dr Fong is a professor in Psychology and Health Studies at the University of Waterloo and a researcher with the Propel Centre for Population Health Impact.
Drs Allan and Connie Eaves, BC Cancer Agency, received the 2011 Canadian Blood Services Lifetime Achievement Award for their contributions to the field of transplantation and transfusion medicine in Canada and around the world.
Dr Anne-Claude Gingras, Principal Investigator, Scientist, Mount Sinai Hospital, was named to the 2011 list of Canada’s Most Powerful Women: Top 100 Awards by the Women’s Executive Network Foundation in the “Trailblazers and Trendsetters” category. Dr Gingras is renowned internationally for her studies of protein interactions that play a role in the development of cancer, drug resistance and immunity
The following researchers have been elected by their peers to the Royal Society of Canada in recognition of their outstanding scientific achievements. Election to the Royal Society of Canada is one of the highest honours a scholar can receive in the arts, humanities and sciences.
Dr Steven Jones , BC Cancer Agency, for his leading contributions to the field of genome informatics.
Dr James Rutka, The Hospital for Sick Children, who is a surgeon and scientist with keen interests in the molecular biology of human brain tumours.
Dr Frank Sicheri, Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute, Mount Sinai Hospital, who uses x-ray crystallography to understand how signalling proteins compose communication pathways in the cell and how the dysregulation of signalling proteins contributes to human disease.
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4 impressive traits that turn regular people into CEOs — and how to master them yourself
Leah Thomas,
Fairygodboss
Jul. 4, 2019, 8:00 AM
Steve Jobs.
Justin Sullivan / Staff / Getty Images
Many people think of CEOs as a cut above the rest, "powerful and patrician."
Naturally, most ordinary people assume they could never rise to this CEO-level.
But researchers have found that there are four attainable traits that CEOs embody, and they're well within reach for the average worker.
Think you can never become a CEO? Think again, say Elena Botelho and Kim Powell, researchers and authors of the book "The CEO Next Door."
Botelho and Powell studied data from 17,000 leadership assessments, from which they chose 2,600 to study even further. The two partnered with professors from both the University of Chicago and Columbia University to analyze the traits these leaders embody most frequently.
The writers state that most people believe the "iconic CEO is powerful and patrician, a bold, charismatic extrovert with a flawless resume." Which means we don't think we can become CEOs ourselves, as we could never measure up. But they've found that's just not true. There are four necessary traits that can help regular working people become the CEO they've always dreamt of becoming. And they're easier to achieve than you may think.
"Even the most impressive CEOs often didn't start out knowing they were destined for greatness," the writers said.
1. They make their decisions fast
Blair Gable / Reuters
The researchers discovered that leaders who are able to make decisions quickly without procrastination or excessive questioning are 12 times more likely to be successful as CEOs. One example of this is the former CEO of Greyhound, Steve Gorman.
Gorman came into his position as CEO in 2003 when the company was losing money and its parent company was preparing to shut the company down. Gorman spent his first four months listening to various pitches on how to save the business. He decided to take a chance and alter the routes for the bus line around the US and Canada's most populated areas. His plan worked, and was later on sold for double what it was worth when Gorman took over in 2003. The authors outline how Gorman's action — regardless of whether or not he thought it was the best decision, or whether or not he could have guaranteed it was going to work — was better than not making a decision at all.
2. They're able to sell their own idea
Sean Gallup/Getty Images
Successful CEOs also have a little saleswoman in them. Leaders must be able to not only inspire others with their idea and goal, but get them on board with it as well. And this doesn't just mean being a likeable person — it means being someone that can also be seen as the person to get this job done and can be trusted with what could be seen as risk taking. The authors say that these CEOs have all been able to describe their idea in a way that others can see and understand, and build relationships with those who can help them make their ideas happen.
The researchers describe Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, as one of these people. Even though Jobs wasn't always viewed as being the nicest of leaders, he was able to inspire others with his ideas that could have been (and were!) viewed as unconventional. Not anymore.
3. They're consistent with their actions and their results
REUTERS/Jason Reed
Being viewed as reliable increases one's chances of being hired, according to the researchers. Reliability means leaders can be counted on to deliver on their word and their plans, and can be trusted with being in charge of company responsibilities.
The CEO who the authors noted when discussing reliability was Brett Godfrey. Godfrey was chosen by Richard Branson to head Virgin Australia in 2000. Branson chose Godfrey, who was an employee of his at Virgin Group, because of his work ethic and detail-oriented personality. As an employee, Godfrey showed Branson he was reliable and could handle the leadership position he was then given.
4. They're able to adapt to any circumstance
REUTERS/Clodagh Kilcoyne
As the researchers wrote: "Aspiring leaders have to learn to navigate the uncharted." And they point to Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon, when discussing adaptability. Bezos founded Amazon in 1994, when it was solely a bookstore. It then branched out into music and video and now offers virtually any product you can imagine, from clothes to home goods to electronics.
The writers also noted companies Kodak, Blockbuster, and Borders are those that failed to adapt, leading to their less-than-successful current standing.
It's important for leaders to change with the times in order to remain relevant. The most successful leaders are those who aren't afraid to take a chance on adapting, even when it means branching out into unfamiliar company territory.
Read the original article on Fairygodboss.
FGB is the largest career community for women.
Copyright 2019. Follow Fairygodboss on Twitter.
SEE ALSO: 19 highly accomplished execs share the one daily habit that's the key to their success
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8 famous people who served on D-Day
Áine Cain
2019 marks the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings, when Allied forces stormed the beaches of Normandy, France.
June 2019 will mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day.
On June 6, 1944, the Allies embarked on the crucial invasion of Normandy on the coast of France. Allied forces suffered major casualties, but the ensuing campaign ultimately dislodged German forces from France.
Did you know these eight famous people participated in the D-Day invasion?
James Doohan.
Golden Pacific Media/YouTube
Actor James Doohan is beloved among Trekkies for his portrayal of chief engineer Montgomery "Scotty" Scott in "Star Trek."
Years before he donned the Starfleet uniform, Doohan joined the Royal Canadian Artillery during WWII. During the Normandy invasion, he stormed Juno Beach and took out two snipers before he was struck by six bullets from a machine gun, according to website Today I Found Out.
He lost part of a finger, but the silver cigarette case in his pocket stopped a bullet from piercing his heart.
David Niven.
Oscars / Youtube
Academy Award-winning British thespian David Niven became a lieutenant colonel of the British Commandos during the Second World War.
In the D-Day invasion, he commanded the Phantom Signals Unit, according to the New York Post. This unit was responsible for keeping rear commanders informed on enemy positions.
After the war, he declined to speak much about his military experience.
Yogi Berra.
Getty Photos / Al Bello
Famed baseball catcher Yogi Berra helped to storm Normandy by manning a naval support craft. The vessel fired rockets at enemy positions on Omaha Beach.
The New York Post reports that Seaman Second Class Berra manned a machine gun during the battle.
Medgar Evers
Medgar Evers.
AP / File Photo
In 1963, activist Medgar Evers was assassinated due to his efforts to promote civil rights for African Americans.
Decades earlier, Evers served in the 325th Port Company during World War II, eventually rising to the rank of sergeant. This segregated unit of black soldiers delivered supplies during the Normandy invasion, according to the NAACP.
J.D. Salinger.
"The Catcher in the Rye" author J.D. Salinger belonged to a unit that invaded Utah Beach on D-Day.
According to Vanity Fair, Salinger carried several chapters of his magnum opus with him when he stormed the shores of France.
John Ford.
Allan Warren/Wikimedia Commons
Director John Ford, famous for Westerns like "Stagecoach" and "The Searchers," also went ashore with the D-Day invasion.
As a commander in the US Naval Reserve, Ford led a team of US Coast Guard cameramen in filming a documentary on D-Day for the Navy.
His film on the Normandy invasion ultimately saw a very limited release to the public, due to the amount of Allied casualties. Much of the D-Day footage has since disappeared, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Henry Fonda.
National Museum of the United States Navy / Flickr
According to " WWII: The Book of Lists" by Chris Martin, American actor Henry Fonda served as a quartermaster on the destroyer USS Satterlee, which provided support to the Allies during the Normandy invasion.
Years later, he played a part in the war epic "The Longest Day," which focused on the D-Day landings.
Alec Guinness.
"Star Wars" and "Bridge Over the River Kwai" star Alec Guinness served in Great Britain's Royal Navy during WWII, according to the History Answers blog.
StarWars.com reports that the Obi Wan actor served as an officer on a landing craft and transported British soldiers to the shores of Normandy on D-Day.
SEE ALSO: 11 celebrities who served in the military before they got famous
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The owner of English Premier League soccer team Leicester City was 'on board crashed helicopter'
Alex Fraser,
Oct. 28, 2018, 4:30 AM
Firemen at the scene of where the helicopter belonging to Leicester City owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha crashed outside the King Power Stadium
Reuters/Andrew Yates
The helicopter of Premier League soccer team Leicester City's owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha crashed on Saturday night.
Accident happened as the helicopter was leaving the club's stadium following a match against West Ham United.
BBC reports suggest Srivaddhanaprabha was on board the helicopter as it crashed.
There is no word yet on any possible fatalities from the crash.
LEICESTER, England (Reuters) - Leicester City soccer club owner Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha was on board a helicopter that crashed outside the club's stadium, the BBC reported on Sunday, quoting a source close to his family.
The helicopter crashed in a ball of flames in the club's car park on Saturday after a Premier League match.
Officials from the club and Vichai's company, duty-free giant King Power International, declined to comment on whether he was in the helicopter when it spiraled out of control and crashed around an hour after the game.
According to eyewitnesses, the helicopter just cleared the top of the stadium before it started to spin. It then plummeted to the ground and burst into flames.
A spokesman for the Midlands club said on Saturday: "We are assisting Leicestershire Police and the emergency services in dealing with a major incident at King Power Stadium."
John Butcher, who was near the stadium at the time of the crash, told the BBC his nephew saw the helicopter spiral out of control apparently due to a faulty rear propeller.
"Within a second it dropped like a stone to the floor...Luckily it did spiral for a little while and everybody sort of ran, sort of scattered. As far as we are aware nobody around the car park was caught up in this problem."
In Thailand, officials at King Power said they could not yet comment on the crash or say whether Vichai had been aboard.
Vichai is a huge favorite with the fans after he bought the unfancied side from central England in 2010 and they went on to stun the soccer world by winning the league title in 2016.
According to Forbes magazine he is the fifth richest person in Thailand with an estimated net worth of $4.9 billion.
Leicestershire Police said a team from the Department for Transport's Air Accidents Investigations Branch had taken charge of the investigation into the cause of the crash.
English champions
After pumping millions of pounds into the club, he helped steer them back into the top flight in 2014 before they stunned the sport by beating the likes of Manchester United, Liverpool and Chelsea to become champions of England.
Leading players in the side, including Jamie Vardy and Harry Maguire, sent messages of support on Twitter while rival clubs including Manchester City also voiced their concern.
Freelance photographer Ryan Brown was covering the game and saw the helicopter clear the stadium before it crashed, the BBC reported.
"Literally the engine stopped and I turned around, and it made a bit of a whirring noise," Brown told BBC Radio 5 Live. "It turned silent, blades started spinning and then there was a big bang."
Leicester had played a league match at home against West Ham United earlier on Saturday, drawing 1-1.
The self-made businessman Vichai founded Thai duty-free giant King Power in 1989.
The duty-free business got a big boost in 2006 when it was granted an airport monopoly under the government of then prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and it continued to prosper even after Thaksin's ouster in a coup that year.
The family's empire also includes Belgian soccer club, Oud-Heverlee Leuven.
More: Leicester City Helicopter Crash
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Wisconsin Republican: Women Are Paid Less Because 'Money Is More Important For Men'
Grace Wyler
Apr. 9, 2012, 7:15 PM
Daniel Goodman / Business Insider
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker opened up a new front in the GOP's war against women last week when he overturned his state's equal pay law, which made it easier for workers to sue their employers for wage discrimination.
Walker, a rising star in the Republican party, has come under fire for his decision to repeal the law, which was passed largely to address Wisconsin's huge gap in male and female wages. Since the equal pay law was passed in 2009, the state has risen from 36th to 24th in national gender pay parity rankings.
Walker has stayed remarkably silent about the move, and has yet to comment publicly on his decision. But the Daily Beast reports that his fellow Badger State Republicans have not been as quiet, arguing that wage discrimination was never really a major problem to begin with and that the equal pay law put an undue burden on businesses.
"It's an underreported problem, but a huge number of discrimination claims are baseless," Republican state Senator Glenn Grothman, a major force behind the repeal, told the Daily Beast. "Most of them are filed by fired employees, and really today almost anybody is a protected class."
As a result, Grothman argued, many companies are forced to pay fired employees to go away, raising the cost of business intolerable levels. "It just puts Wisconsin way out of whack with other states," he says. "I'm not sure there are any other states this bad off."
But Grothman didn't stop there. According to him, wage gaps are not the result of discrimination, but actually just a reflection of the fact that men and women prioritize earning money differently.
"You could argue that money is more important for men," he said. "I think a guy in their first job, maybe because they expect to be a breadwinner someday, may be a little more money-conscious. To attribute everything to a so-called bias in the workplace is just not true."*
*Women are actually primary or co-breadwinner in two-thirds of American households.
More: Governance Women Wisconsin Republicans
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HomeBusiness West BlogScale-ups a priority in the Industrial Strategy
Scale-ups a priority in the Industrial Strategy
The government has published the UK’s first industrial strategy and there is plenty for SMEs to get excited about.
Tara Gillam, Head of Enterprise at Business West has responded to the whitepaper:
It is encouraging to see a strong focus on scale up businesses and we particularly welcome the renewed commitment to work with and strengthen Local Enterprise Partnerships and Growth Hubs, which we see as being instrumental in creating growth opportunities in the South West of England, especially in the West of England and Swindon and Wiltshire LEP regions.
“We want Growth Hubs to carry on building their reach, developing peer-to-peer networks, connecting businesses to the best support available from the private and public sectors. We will also work with Local Enterprise Partnerships, Growth Hubs, universities and the private sector to support high potential businesses to scale up.” – P182
Driving the increased focus on scale up initiatives is recognition of the value of small businesses to the local economy, and the potential for boosting national productivity by supporting high-potential businesses to reach the next stage of growth.
“We could do better in the longer-term process of building up successful businesses to reach large-scale and as the Scale-Up Taskforce has highlighted, more can be done to increase the number of businesses that achieve their full potential.” – P172
This is good news for many businesses, but the government should be wary of forgetting fledgling start-ups amongst the flurry of support for high-potential and high-growth businesses.
Going forward, it is important that the government builds on the foundations set out in the whitepaper by producing strong local industrial strategies that reflect the potential of businesses beyond London.
The West of England is already great place to start a business and with sustained support we can continue building a business environment that empowers new businesses to grow and expand.
The Industrial Strategy whitepaper can be read in full here.
Do you want to join the conversation?
West of England LEP
The purpose of the West of England Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) is to secure the region’s continuing and ambitious economic success and attractiveness as a place for its residents to live and thrive and for businesses and communities to grow in a sustainable way.
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Georgia–Abkhazia
An Abkhaz perspective
Foreword: A comparative perspective on peace agreements
Introduction: Trapped between war and peace
The roots of the conflict
Georgian perspectives
The South Ossetia case
Economic dimensions: Incentive or obstacle?
The Inguri power complex
The role of the UN
Russia’s role
Civic initiatives
Displacement and return
Key texts: Accord Georgia
Chronology: Accord Georgia
Profiles: Accord Georgia
Bibliography: Accord Georgia
Abbreviations: Accord Georgia
7_GeorgiaAbkhaz_Dancersandpolice.jpg
Peter Nasmyth
A question of sovereignty: The Georgia–Abkhazia peace process
Liana Kvarchelia
Liana Kvarchelia presents on Abkhaz perspective on the Georgia–Abkhazia conflict, setting out Abhkazia’s main positions and looking at how these have fluctuated under pressure from the West and Russia. She looks into the reasons for negotiating deadlock and discusses the refugee dilemma. She asserts that Georgia will need to decide if it values traditional territorial integrity over stability and a revived economy; if it desires the latter, an Abkhazian state under international guarantee may be the only solution.
The negotiations between Georgia and Abkhazia that have been under way since 1993 have failed to resolve the differences between them and left relations frozen in a condition of ‘neither war nor peace’. Indeed, Abkhazia and Georgia now seem further away from political agreement than in April 1994 when the Declaration on Measures for a Political Settlement of the Georgian–Abkhaz Conflict and its appendix the Quadripartite Agreement were signed.
Negotiations have been primarily about the settlement of state and legal relations between Abkhazia and Georgia and the return of Georgian refugees to Abkhazia. On the first issue, the principles underlying the positions are diametrically opposed. Georgians consider Abkhazia to be an inalienable part of Georgia with at most the status of an autonomous republic. From the Georgian perspective any other arrangement might lead to further disintegration of the Georgian state, which is already troubled by its lack of control over Adjaria and Javakheti, not to mention South Ossetia. The Abkhaz argue that, as Abkhazia was forcibly incorporated into Georgia by Stalin’s regime in 1931, the collapse of the USSR and the subsequent unilateral annulment by Georgia of legal measures joining the two countries in one republic merely confirmed Abkhazia’s legal and moral right to independence. Furthermore, Abkhaz claim that the war unleashed by Georgia in 1992 has resulted in de facto independence. From the outset of the conflict the Georgian side pronounced the inviolability of the territorial integrity of the former Soviet Republic of Georgia and the inadmissibility of any internal reorganisation of Georgia on federal principles. The Abkhaz representatives did not set out their position so unequivocally. The lack of clarity over whether Abkhazia has been seeking independence or confederal relations with Georgia is a consequence of constant pressure, including the threat of force, exerted throughout the negotiation process by the West and Russia. The majority of UN Security Council Resolutions have been openly pro-Georgian. This reflects the bias inherent in the negotiation process conducted under the auspices of the UN to which Georgia belongs and Abkhazia does not. In December 1994 Russia introduced restrictions at the Russian–Abkhaz border under the pretext of its military action in Chechnya and in January 1996 implemented the CIS decision to introduce economic sanctions against Abkhazia at Georgian insistence. Pressure on Abkhazia increased further with the creation of the Group of Friends of Georgia, comprising the USA, the UK, Germany, France and Russia. The ambassadors of the ‘Friends’ have actively joined the negotiation process, especially since 1997. As a result they are now better informed about Abkhazia and its demands, but this has not in itself contributed to any significant change in the substance of the negotiations.
Seeking compromise
Forced to consider compromise formulations accommodating both Abkhazia’s sovereignty and the international community’s demand for the observance of territorial integrity, Abkhazia has looked for a model within the framework of one entity. However, Abkhazia has insisted that negotiations be about the reconstruction of state and legal relations between the two republics rather than the political status of Abkhazia within Georgia. The Abkhaz argue that this compromise was accepted by Georgia, initially in a draft proposal prepared by UN Special Envoy Eduard Brunner in Geneva in April 1994 (although Georgia did not sign this) and then in the joint Declaration on Measures for a Political Settlement which Georgia did sign. The compromise was confirmed by UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali who stated in his report of 3 May 1994 that ‘efforts are being made to find a solution within which Abkhazia would be a subject with sovereign rights within the framework of a union State to be established as a result of negotiations’. The joint Declaration stated that the parties had reached a ‘mutual understanding regarding powers for joint action’ in the fields of foreign policy and foreign economic ties, border guard and customs arrangements, transport and communications, ecology, energy and insuring human and civic rights. From the Abkhaz perspective this model of relations, based on mutually delegated competencies and the equal rights of subjects within the union state, could have served as the basis for a treaty. That it did not was underlined in July 1997 when a draft protocol detailing the procedures regulating legal relations between the parties was prepared through Russian mediation. The Georgians refused to sign at the last minute. They considered themselves to be the central authority of the union state with authority to delegate responsibilities to Abkhazia, while in the Declaration and in the Abkhaz view, authority within the union state should be derived from two equal subjects leading to the mutual delegation of competencies to the union state. Georgia has since advocated a federal model that differs little from the pre-war period.
This climate is not conducive to constructive negotiations and inevitably the parties have adopted different strategies. Georgia constantly attempts to use its fluctuating relationship with Russia to exert pressure on Abkhazia to become more accommodating. For example, a precondition for the continued presence of Russian military bases in Georgia is the reintegration of Abkhazia into Georgia. Furthermore, Georgia plays Russia against the West by advocating the replacement of the CISPKF with an international force, while also advocating that the CISPKF mandate be widened to include police functions to secure the mass return of refugees. The prospective oil pipeline from Baku, the undesirable precedent which secession in Abkhazia would set for the Russian Federation, and the insistence on the return of the refugees before the issue of political status can be addressed are other levers used by Georgia.
Abkhazia has much less room for manoeuvre. The Abkhaz are accused by Georgia and the West of a pro-Russian orientation, but their increasing reliance on Russia is a direct consequence of the Georgian-instigated, Russian-imposed blockade. However, despite the isolation it causes, the incomplete nature of the blockade means that Russia is the only realistic route for external travel and the best option for trade, regardless of whether or not this is a preference. The Abkhaz do not want this isolation, but neither do they want to be integrated into the international community through Tbilisi.
The Abkhaz have few illusions about Russia whose strategic interests in the region militate against recognising Abkhaz independence, which would mean the loss of Georgia and the creation of a precedent for its own federal subjects, above all with regard to Chechnya. However, recognition of Abkhaz sovereignty within the framework of Georgia provides Russia with a lever to influence both republics. Transferring the initiative exclusively to Georgia – in other words, to the West – is not in Russia’s interests either. The status quo is therefore convenient. Furthermore, any decisive Russian moves against Abkhazia could destabilise the situation in the North Caucasus thereby renewing the threat to the territorial integrity of Russia itself.
Negotiations going nowhere
For the last five years Georgian–Abkhaz negotiations have reflected the struggle between Russia and the West for spheres of influence over the perimeter of the Eurasian corridor. Declarations by both mediators that the conflicting parties should engage in direct dialogue and that only the parties themselves can decide the shape of their relations can hardly be taken at face value given the geopolitical context.
Nevertheless, there have been negotiations and increased direct contact between the parties, particularly at a high level, as well as between representatives of civil society. But while direct contact, including between the presidents and their envoys, has improved dialogue within limited confines it has not led to meaningful progress. Meetings also arise out of the practicalities of living in a conflict zone and the need to address issues concerning cross-border trade or security and the exchange of hostages. These contacts occur mostly in the Gal region between the Gal population and people from neighbouring villages, and between heads of village and town administrations, on either side of the Ingur River.
More structured meetings, often characterised by the involvement of NGOs seeking dialogue as an alternative to war, have been held under the banner of long-term confidence building. The UN has also tried to engage the two communities in confidence building, especially in meetings held in Athens in October 1998 and Istanbul in June 1999 but no NGO representatives with experience in civic peace initiatives were invited. The meetings did not result in any reconciliatory moves and were in fact a pretext to bring the chief negotiators together in an informal environment. Abkhaz society believes that this absence of progress reflects the lack of confidence in the UN caused by the perceived bias it shows to Georgia, a member state. UN-supported confidence building is more likely to succeed through the implementation of agreements that have already been signed, particularly under the UN’s aegis, rather than through such meetings.
Deadlock between the parties over issues of status and return in the first years of negotiations challenged the mediators to look for agreement in other spheres. The creation in November 1997 of a Co-ordination Council within the framework of the Geneva Process, and a UN Needs Assessment Mission to Abkhazia in February 1998 to evaluate the economic situation, created the temporary illusion of a breakthrough. However, Georgian reluctance to have the mission report acted upon revealed yet another impasse. It became clear that the international community regards economic and even humanitarian aid to Abkhazia as directly dependent on progress towards a political settlement within the framework of a Georgian state. But the use of economic development by Georgia and the Western negotiators as an inducement to Abkhazia to integrate into the Georgian economy would be a compromise too far for Abkhazia. Russia’s continuing policy of sanctions against Abkhazia serves only to highlight the lack of alternatives.
Not expecting Abkhazia to compromise in exchange for economic assistance, from early 1998 President Shevardnadze began to refer to the ‘Bosnian model’ of settlement and demanded a change in the nature of the peacekeeping operation, arguing that peace through coercion could achieve the conditions for the safe return of Georgian refugees to Abkhazia. However, peace based on such coercion would not be sustainable.
The refugee dilemma
Analysis of the roles of the UN and OSCE and the nature of UN Security Council Resolutions reveals a markedly tougher stance with regard to Abkhazia than to other conflict and refugee situations in the Caucasus. For example, the Security Council expressed at most serious concern about the demographic changes in Nagorno-Karabakh, while demanding of Abkhazia the return of refugees with no prior conditions and before the differences which had provoked the conflict were resolved. The Security Council stressed the unacceptability of linking the process of the return of refugees to a political settlement, whereas they have not exerted similar pressure on the Armenians over Karabakh.
For the Georgian leadership the return of the refugees is above all a political question. A long-term policy of Georgianisation resulted in Georgians constituting the largest ethnic group of Abkhazia’s pre-war multinational population. With the departure from the Georgian – occupied territories of the Greek and Jewish populations during the war and the economic migration of some Russians, Armenians and Abkhaz, mainly to Russia and Armenia, the mass return of Georgian refugees alone would create a demographic situation clearly favouring Georgia. After its recent defeat in the war Tbilisi has no confidence in its ability to resolve the ‘Abkhaz problem’ on its own and is trying to use the Georgian population from Abkhazia, under the cover of international organisations, as an instrument for forcing a resolution of the conflict in its favour. This strategy lies behind the revived proposal to expand the Security Zone beyond the Gal region and give the peacekeeping forces police functions. Many in Abkhazia believe this would simply create a larger area of instability and further embroil the peacekeepers in conflict since it is in the Security Zone that the Georgian guerrillas are most active.In Abkhazia the Georgian refugees are generally distrusted. Those who fought with or supported the Georgian forces are often regarded as traitors. In these circumstances Abkhaz society could only countenance the return of Georgians who did not fight on the Georgian side once Abkhazia receives recognition as an independent state. Given the history of Georgian–Abkhaz relations only international recognition would convince Abkhaz society that the return of the refugees would not represent a threat to its security. What is more, the Abkhaz believe that descendants of Abkhaz refugees from the nineteenth century Caucasian War now living mostly in Turkey, should be allowed an equal right to return, whereas Russian sanctions ban the entry into Abkhazia of foreign citizens.
While the humanitarian plight of the refugees is a factor that looms over the negotiation process, those who claim to represent them play a negative role. The Georgian government does not formally support the ‘government-in-exile’ (the ethnic Georgian former members of the government and parliament of Abkhazia, now mainly based in Tbilisi and Zugdidi and linked to guerrilla groups sent into Abkhazia). Nevertheless, there is constant reference to them as an alternative if Abkhazia does not agree to the compromises Georgia wants. The Abkhaz refuse to negotiate with representatives of the ‘government-in-exile’, because this would narrow the subject of negotiations to relations between two communities from Abkhazia, instead of between Georgia and Abkhazia.
In October 1998 leaders of the ‘government-in-exile’ founded the Party for the Liberation of Abkhazia which adopted a resolution stating that the return of Georgian refugees would be possible only after Georgian jurisdiction has been established over the whole territory of Abkhazia. Inflammatory language and the threat of mobilising refugees for future campaigns in Abkhazia has done nothing to promote reconciliation, rather it has inclined Abkhaz to be increasingly negative about return. However, the refugee leaders’ only option is to return to Abkhazia victorious. The Abkhaz will not allow them back with other refugees because they consider them to be responsible for the war of 1992–93 and the following terrorist activities. In this context the Abkhaz are unlikely to let them be a party to the negotiations. Nevertheless, when a political solution is achieved it is with refugees that Abkhaz society will have to rebuild relations, however antagonistic they currently are.
The return of refugees to the Gal region of Abkhazia, which before the war was populated predominantly by Mingrelians who did not on the whole participate in military action on the Georgian side in 1992–93, has been regarded in Abkhazia as a less painful option. By the beginning of 1998, international organisations estimated that more than sixty thousand people had returned to the region. However, in 1998 alone thirteen civilians, thirty-six Abkhaz militiamen and eight peacekeepers died at the hands of terrorists. In May 1998 the situation changed drastically with the sharp rise in terrorist activity by Georgian paramilitary units. This led to clashes with the Abkhaz militia and an unsuccessful attempt by Georgia to seize the Gal region, as a result of which some thirty thousands residents were again displaced. Having experienced another defeat the government in Tbilisi, which had until then distanced itself from the ‘partisans’, practically admitted its responsibility for the events by signing an agreement on a ceasefire and separation of forces. The Gagra Protocol of 26 May 1998 obliges Georgia ‘to take effective measures to halt the penetration into Abkhazia of terrorist and sabotage groups, armed bands and individuals’, but no criminal case has yet been instituted in Georgia in connection with terrorist activity. On the contrary, Zurab Samushia, the commander of the White Legion terrorist unit gives press conferences in Tbilisi and terrorists continue to penetrate the Gal region and occasionally beyond.
Georgia’s bad faith frequently goes unchallenged by the international community, repeating a familiar pattern in which the Abkhaz are censured for their activities but abuses committed by the Georgians go largely unmarked. The August 1992 invasion of Abkhazia is ignored and no condemnation is levelled at Georgia for the mass human rights violations and killings during the war, while Abkhazia is accused of ethnic cleansing. In January 1999 on the eve of the UN Security Council session the Abkhaz president called on Tbilisi and international organisations to support Abkhazia’s unilateral decision to allow the return of refugees to districts which previously had compact Georgian populations – namely the Gal region. However, the Georgian government, despite its own previous demands for the return of the Georgian population to Abkhazia prior to a political solution, now linked the safe return of the refugees to a political settlement, understanding by this the establishment of Georgian jurisdiction over Abkhazia. The Security Council responded to the Abkhaz initiative on 29 January 1999 by referring to the Lisbon resolution of the OSCE, which interpreted the mass exodus of the Georgian population during the liberation of Abkhazia from Georgian armed forces in September 1993 as ethnic cleansing.
Abkhaz society will not be ignored
The Security Council is not the only source of pressure on the Abkhaz leadership. If agreements are signed limiting the de facto independence of Abkhazia, its leaders will have to answer to their own people. President Ardzinba has already been publicly attacked for his visit to Tbilisi in August 1997 and there has been fierce criticism of the draft agreements on the creation of a common state with Georgia. Nevertheless, in general there is a passive attitude to the negotiation process in Abkhazia, partly explained by the grind of daily survival and partly by the fact that most people do not believe the president was sincere in his intention to unite with Georgia. Experience, however, shows that society is instantly mobilised by the slightest deterioration in the situation as in 1994 when a Russian general in charge of peacekeeping operations attempted to open the Abkhaz–Georgian border to the mass return of refugees.
Abkhaz society is consolidated around the idea that the Abkhaz nation, like any other, including the Georgian, has the right to freedom and independence. The Abkhaz cannot understand why the desire of other nations for independence is so problematic for Georgian society. The answer may be found in the evolution of Georgian mass consciousness which has for decades been influenced by descriptions of Georgians as hospitable ‘landlords’ who have given shelter to ‘members of other nationalities’.
The past decade has stirred the historical memory of the Abkhaz who for over a century have regarded Georgia as a source of aggression. The attempt to resolve the ‘Abkhaz question’ once and for all by force removed all trust in Georgia. While revanchist policy is frequently aired in the Georgian media, calls by Georgian intellectuals to reject the policy of sanctions receive no positive response from the government, still less the public. In the absence of a conciliatory tone or any sense of culpability for instigating the war, many Abkhaz believe that Georgia, whose democratic credentials have yet to be proven, is an unattractive partner with which to build a common state.
It is difficult to gauge the viability of a settlement that forces the Abkhaz to adopt the Georgian idea of coexistence. The history of relations with Georgia suggests that only statehood, underpinned by international guarantees, will achieve conditions of security and the preservation not only of the identity of the Abkhaz nation but of its physical survival. Being within Georgia, as the recent war has shown, does not provide such guarantees. Georgia also needs to decide whether territorial integrity in the traditional sense is more important than stability and a flourishing economy.
Whatever form relations between Georgia and Abkhazia take, it will be possible to speak of genuine peace and security in the region only if the principle of equal rights lies at the foundation of these relations. Whether this principle is achieved through the signing of a treaty on peace and good-neighbourliness by two independent states, or within the framework of a Georgian–Abkhaz confederation, or through the creation of supranational, Caucasus-wide structures depends on how far the interests of realpolitik are aimed at achieving an enduring resolution.
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Between war and peace: Cambodia 1991-1998
Introduction: Cambodia's constitutional challenge
Cambodia’s historical legacy
Diplomatic pragmatism: ASEAN's response to the July 1997 coup
Cambodia's agonising quest: Political progress amidst institutional backwardness
The monarchy's future public role: To reign but not to rule?
Drawn into the political maelstrom: Cambodia's nascent press
Paris agreements and commentary
Steering the middle path: Buddhism, non-violence and political change in Cambodia
Cambodian women in politics: Breaking through the traditional image
Institutions versus personalities: International peacebuilding dilemmas
Selective principles, confusing signals: French and US policy on Cambodia
Chronology: Accord Cambodia
Profiles: Accord Cambodia
Further reading: Accord Cambodia
5_Cambodia_photo soldier in crowd.jpg
UN Photo/John Isaac
Safeguarding peace: Cambodia's constitutional challenge
David Ashley
As foreign involvement waned and the nationalistic and ideological aspects of the Cambodian war receded, the principal dynamic behind the conflict became the factional scramble for power. David Ashley recounts the developments of 1991-98, including the implementation of the Paris accords, the 1993 elections, the power-sharing arrangement that followed (accompanied by the undermining of state effectiveness), and the 1997 coup and the international response.
The struggle for power, 1991-1993
In the late 1980s, as foreign involvement waned and the nationalistic and ideological aspects of the Cambodian war receded, the principal dynamic behind the conflict became the factional scramble for power. Cambodia was a nation with no traditions of sharing power and no institutions with which to limit it: one either had absolute power to use and abuse, or one was subject to those who did. Nor does Cambodian history provide any examples of governments peacefully giving up power: the violence with which opponents were traditionally treated, taken to gross extremes under Pol Pot, perhaps suggests why. Power – and only power – brought security, as it also did wealth and patronage.
But economic and military realities meant that prospective governments could not survive without international recognition and aid. So while the forms of the struggle between the factions varied during the 1980s and 1990s – military, diplomatic and political – the aims remained unchanged: power and legitimacy.
An absence of common ground
Each of the factions justified its pursuit of power, less on the needs of its followers or its plans for the future than on its past claims to legitimacy and the past crimes of others. This made it all the more difficult to find common ground between them. In particular, the aims of the two militarily strongest factions, the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) and the Khmer Rouge (officially known as the Party of Democratic Kampuchea, PDK), were diametrically opposed. The CPP hoped the peace process would legitimise the state structure arranged by the Vietnamese in 1979, known as the 'State of Cambodia' (SoC). The Khmer Rouge hoped the peace process would dismantle the SoC regime and replace it with an administration made up of all four factions, thus returning to the Khmer Rouge a share of state power and legitimacy. Both still hoped to monopolise power in the long-term.
The idea, floated from the early 1980s, of holding elections to decide who should have power and legitimacy failed to break the deadlock; after all, Cambodian elections had always been won by whoever organised them. The CPP insisted that elections be held under the SoC and the Khmer Rouge insisted that elections be held under a quadripartite coalition. The CPP argued the SoC was the only bulwark against the 'return of the genocidal Pol Pot regime'. The Khmer Rouge argued that the SoC was the creation and creature of an illegal Vietnamese occupation and that, with it in power, free elections were impossible.
The position of the two smaller factions, Prince Ranariddh's FUNCINPEC and Son Sann's KPLNF, was more flexible. Although allied to the Khmer Rouge before the peace agreement on nationalist grounds, they professed to desire peace and democracy. With the weakest armies, they had a vested interest in promoting peaceful competition. Since they, unlike the 'former' communist factions, had no hope of capturing the whole state, they aimed for a share of government posts. In the eyes of the Khmer Rouge and CPP, they were corrupt opportunists and potential allies rather than serious opponents.
The aims of the Paris agreements
The Paris agreements had two primary objectives. The first was to end international involvement in the Cambodian conflict. This was achieved by all foreign players pledging to end partisan assistance to the factions. The second aim, acknowledging that the factions were unwilling to end the struggle between them, was to transform the military conflict into a political one. All factions would give up their weapons and compete in elections, with international recognition and aid going to the winner. To get around the intractable question of who should organise the elections and run the country in the pre-election period, the agreements entrusted this responsibility to the United Nations.
It was the failure of this second objective which determined Cambodia's troubled course after 1991. In part, no accord could have brought peace in 1991 because the motor behind the peace process was international pressure rather than national reconciliation. In part, the Paris agreements, by looking to elections to decide the winner in a decade-long war, raised the electoral stakes so high that no side could agree to lose. And in part, the unsuccessful implementation of the agreements – including the failure to disarm factional armies and to create a neutral state structure – ensured elections would not end the conflict.
Dilemmas of implementation
In retrospect, it was inevitable that the UN's attempt to implement the Paris agreements would run into difficulties. The objectives of the CPP and the Khmer Rouge remained incompatible: both only signed the accord under strong international pressure and in the hope that they could twist its ambiguities to their advantage. The CPP hoped that the UN Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC) and the Supreme National Council (SNC) – the quadripartite body set up to represent Cambodia's sovereignty and promote reconciliation – would be toothless bodies whose presence would simply legitimise the SoC structure. The Khmer Rouge hoped that a strong UNTAC and SNC would significantly weaken the SoC's control over the country. They could not both be right.
In the event, the problems arrived far sooner than UNTAC itself, which was charged with overseeing implementation of the Paris agreements and was only fully deployed in mid-1992. The agreements, signed on 23 October 1991, unleashed a rapid series of events which included a short-lived alliance between the CPP and FUNCINPEC (see box): the near-lynching of Khmer Rouge president, Khieu Samphan, by a CPP-organised mob on his arrival in Phnom Penh and the crushing of student demonstrations against SoC corruption. Meanwhile, UNTAC's arrival was delayed due to financial and bureaucratic hold-ups and the US Congress' continued to object to Khmer Rouge involvement.
Accord between the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) and the National United Front for an Independent, Neutral, Peaceful and Cooperative Cambodia (FUNCINPEC)
In view of effectively implementing the Agreement on a political settlement and promoting mutual trust;
In view of maintaining political stability in Cambodia and creating conditions favouring the accomplishment of His Royal Highness Samdech Norodom Sihanouk's noble mission in the service of the nation;
The Cambodian People's Party represented by H.E. Mr Hun Sen, and the National United Front for an Independent, Neutral, Peaceful and Cooperative Cambodia, represented by H.R.H. Prince Norodom Ranariddh, have agreed as follows:
Article 1: The two parties agree to cooperate fully in creating conditions favouring the accomplishment of H.R.H. Samdech Norodom Sihanouk's mission in service of the nation. The two parties pledge to support H.R.H. Samdech Norodom Sihanouk's candidature in the forthcoming presidential elections in Cambodia.
Article 2: The two parties agree to refrain from attacking each other from this day on and during the electoral campaign. The two parties pledge to make the necessary efforts to honour this commitment.
Article 3: The two parties agree to cooperate in the future National Assembly, and to do so regardless of the number of seats obtained by each party in the National Assembly, and to form a coalition government based on the supreme interests of the nation.
Article 4: The two parties agree to build on this cooperation to lay a solid basis for realising national reconciliation and contributing to social stability.
Article 5: This accord, which is the fruit of sincere goodwill, represents the basis for cooperation between the two political forces at the present time and in the future.
Article 6: Upon signature of this accord, the two parties will name their respective representatives to consult and resolve together any problems which might arise during its implementation.
Signed in Phnom Penh, 20 November 1991
In the name of FUNCINPEC, Norodom Ranariddh
In the name of the CPP, Hun Sen
From Pol Pot's perspective, an American plot was being hatched to divert the quadripartite Paris agreements into a bipartite (CPP-FUNCINPEC) accord, through which western aid would sustain the SoC structures and fund them to destroy the Khmer Rouge. Subsequent events over 1992 and 1993 – particularly UNTAC's failure to control the SoC structure and the creation of a CPP-FUNCINPEC coalition government after the elections – only confirmed Pol Pot in his analysis. Beginning in January 1992, the Khmer Rouge thus grew increasingly sceptical of the peace process: it renounced the ceasefire, refused to disarm, ended cooperation with UNTAC, boycotted the elections and eventually launched an unsuccessful military campaign to derail the elections. But the Khmer Rouge's actions – which it justified by UNTAC's alleged refusal to implement the agreements' provisions on verifying withdrawal of Vietnamese forces and controlling the SoC structure – ironically served to make implementation harder and the CPP stronger.
First, the Khmer Rouge's renunciation of the ceasefire meant that the demobilisation of the other factions was suspended. All sides ended up retaining most of their men and weapons in the post-UNTAC era. This particularly favoured the CPP whose army was easily the largest. The continued Khmer Rouge attacks also made it easier – politically and practically – for the CPP to use violence against the 'opposition' parties as they sought to organise within SoC-controlled areas. Some 100 members of FUNCINPEC and the Buddhist Liberal Democratic Party (BLDP, the principal successor to the KPLNF) were killed in CPP-organised violence in 1992-93.
Second, given the continuing fighting, the Supreme National Council (SNC) failed to become a substantive institution or build reconciliation between the factions which – despite the gradual proliferation of alternative political parties, newspapers and non-governmental organisations – remained the key political players. This failure of reconciliation was not surprising. The factional leaders were never truly committed to burying their differences which instead were accentuated and even deepened by the process of electoral competition.
Third, the de facto withdrawal of the Khmer Rouge from the peace process weakened UNTAC's ability to take action against the CPP. UNTAC did not have the military capacity or international backing to compel the Khmer Rouge to abide by the agreements; the Security Council contented itself with imposing token trade sanctions. But this also meant that UNTAC could do even less against the CPP's similarly systematic, but significantly less gross violations. Moreover, once the UN had invested its resources and credibility in Cambodia, it needed the CPP more than the other way around. With the Khmer Rouge out, UNTAC needed the remaining factions in order for there to be a peace process at all, in particular the CPP which controlled almost all of the territory on which UNTAC was deployed.
Against this background, it was impossible for the UN to implement its mandate to ensure a 'neutral political environment' for the elections. The CPP maintained its tight control of the bureaucracy, army, police, media and judiciary and used them systematically to support its electoral campaign. FUNCINPEC and the KPLNF were little different in the much smaller zones along the Thai-Cambodian border which they administered. Although aware of this, the UN lacked the margin for manoeuvre and the political backing of member countries to do much about it. The end-result was that almost nothing was done to remove key state structures from factional domination. For the same reasons, despite gathering evidence of widespread human rights abuses, UNTAC could not penetrate the wall of official impunity.
UNTAC did have major successes, particularly where it could do things itself – such as repatriating 350,000 refugees, promoting human rights awareness and organising the elections. In the longer perspective, the mere presence of 22,000 well-paid UN personnel throughout Cambodia greatly accelerated the fledgling process of economic and political liberalisation. But UNTAC's mandate, organisation and resources were designed for a peacekeeping rather than a peace implementation operation: where the factions refused to implement their commitments, UNTAC ultimately decided it could not force them into compliance.
The May 1993 elections
The Paris agreements foresaw the elections taking place in a neutral, peaceful, free environment. By May 1993, despite admitting such an environment did not exist, the UN insisted on holding the elections on schedule. FUNCINPEC and the BLDP, believing the CPP enjoyed a huge advantage, considered a boycott but were dissuaded by strong international pressure and the relatively peaceful and successful character of their final month of campaigning.
The gamble paid off. In a festive atmosphere, the hitherto silent Cambodian masses withstood the intimidation of both the Khmer Rouge and the CPP. Despite Khmer Rouge efforts to coerce people into joining its boycott of the elections, 89% of those registered turned out to vote. And despite the CPP's liberal use of violence and the SoC structures, it lost. Prince Ranariddh's FUNCINPEC won 58 out of 120 seats in the new assembly with pledges to return Sihanouk to power, forging peace with the Khmer Rouge and ending corruption and Vietnamese immigration. FUNCINPEC's long-time ally, the BLDP, gained 10 seats. The CPP, whose campaign focused on the need to fight the Khmer Rouge militarily and on accusations that FUNCINPEC and the BLDP were Pol Pot stooges, won 51 seats. Only one seat went to any of the 17 other parties.
Unfortunately, UNTAC's success in promoting and harnessing this overwhelming enthusiasm for democracy proved less important than its inability to bring about the institutions and environment necessary for a democratic transition. The CPP refused to accept the results and, by means of the gun, forced its way into the dominant position in a coalition government with FUNCINPEC (see box).
Gun-barrel democracy
When the CPP failed to gain its expected electoral victory, it immediately rejected the results, alleging that UNTAC had fixed them. Fearing an imminent coup, Prince Sihanouk suggested that the results be put aside in favour of a 50:50 coalition between CPP and FUNCINPEC (in line with his long-held preference for a grand coalition under his own leadership). When his son and FUNCINPEC President, Prince Ranariddh, initially refused, the CPP activated its contingency plan, threatening a secession of its heartland east of the Mekong and renewed civil war. Since neither FUNCINPEC nor UNTAC were in a position to confront the CPP militarily, and since FUNCINPEC and its allies lacked the two-thirds majority necessary to push through a new constitution, Ranariddh reluctantly accepted Sihanouk's compromise.
In return, the CPP accepted the fact (although never the validity) of the election results and the new assembly voted in a 'provisional national Government' with Ranariddh and the long-time SoC Prime Minister, Hun Sen, as co-premiers. The assembly proceeded to prepare a liberal Constitution which re-created the Kingdom of Cambodia. On 23 September 1993, Sihanouk returned to the throne after a gap of 23 years. The provisional government was renamed the Royal Government of Cambodia and the co-premier system was retained, with Ranariddh as the 'first' Prime Minister and Hun Sen as the 'second'.
The other two parties in parliament joined a government of national unity, which thus faced no formal opposition. Talks on bringing the Khmer Rouge into the government, however, floundered because the political positions of the CPP and Khmer Rouge remained irreconcilable. The war in the countryside continued.
Notwithstanding the dubious circumstances of the coalition's creation and the continuing Khmer Rouge insurgency, the international community declared the elections and UNTAC a great success. After all, a principal aim of the peace process had been an internationally recognisable government, and now there was one which not only controlled most of the country but could also claim popular legitimacy. With much relief, the international community declared the Cambodian conflict over.
The power-sharing experiment, 1993-1996
Power-sharing as peacekeeping
Given its origins, the coalition was never simply a political deal to gain a parliamentary majority. Rather it was the key element in an unwritten power-sharing arrangement which kept the peace between the CPP and FUNCINPEC for three years. This was evident from two of the most unusual features of the coalition:
First, the power-sharing arrangement embraced not only the cabinet but the entire state. This reflected the fact that CPP and FUNCINPEC remained factions – with their own armies, police, media and bureaucrats – rather than ordinary political parties. While the CPP-controlled institutions and personnel instantaneously became those of the Royal Government, FUNCINPEC (and to a lesser extent the BLDP) integrated large numbers of existing and newly-recruited personnel into the already bloated SoC civilian and military apparatus.
Second, the two parties were formally equal, as symbolised by having co-premiers with equal power and status. Not only the government but virtually every state body – from police commissariats to ministerial departments – had the same dual-command structure. Whether they had a head from the CPP and a deputy head from FUNCINPEC, or vice-versa, or two equal heads in the case of sensitive departments like the ministries of interior and defence, each was supposed to function on the principle of 'consensus' (i.e. all decisions were to be mutually agreed by both parties). But equality had its limits: the CPP retained a crucial advantage for it successfully defended its monopoly over the courts and sub-provincial authorities whilst the police, gendarmerie and army were all headed by CPP nominees.
This consensus-based power-sharing structure naturally gave the CPP a veto over all decisions of the new government. For the system to work at all Ranariddh had to make significant concessions. He thus acquiesced in fighting and outlawing the Khmer Rouge, sidelining his father – who spent most of the post-election years in Beijing in poor health and spirits – and generally making no attempt to exert FUNCINPEC's parliamentary strength or implement his electoral pledges. Instead, Ranariddh concentrated on such common ground as existed with his co-premier: promoting foreign relations, economic development and their own power and wealth. For nearly three years, the two men cooperated surprisingly well on a programme of economic liberalism and political conservatism.
The decline of the state
State power is both a means and an end in the Cambodian conflict. Without access to either state power or foreign assistance, the Khmer Rouge weakened significantly after 1993. By contrast, the CPP and FUNCINPEC, by sharing power as Cambodia opened up to international trade and investment, developed new sources of revenue independent of their former foreign patrons. Whilst the state remained reliant on foreign aid to fight the Khmer Rouge and to barely maintain Cambodia's appalling social services, the two parties grew rich on the spoils of office.
The simultaneous weakening of the state and strengthening of the parties was not restricted to finance. Instead of neutralising a 'One Party-State', power-sharing Cambodian-style created two separate 'Party-States', in effect two parallel structures of authority – one belonging to the CPP, the other to FUNCINPEC. Rather than working with their immediate counterpart from the other party, officials from the highest level down preferred to use their party clients and colleagues to conduct their business. Orders, loyalty and money flowed through these channels rather than the formal state apparatus. Hierarchical patron-client networks, a constant in Cambodian history, expanded and subsumed the state.
One result was that, instead of much-needed reform, the state continued to grow in size and weaken in effectiveness despite massive foreign aid. Within the context of uncontrolled liberalisation and easy access to weapons, the state's weakness fostered a lawless society in which not only non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and investors, but also armed criminals and drug traffickers operated freely.
The growth of the parallel structures of authority, moreover, affected power relations within the two parties. The dual structures were ultimately answerable to the co-premiers and thus significantly bolstered their personal authority and wealth. Until early 1996 – besides suppressing their mutual opponents in the Khmer Rouge, the press and parliament – each Prime Minister used the other's support to attack opponents within his own political party.
In the case of FUNCINPEC, Ranariddh used Hun Sen's backing to act against internal critics, notably the Finance Minister Sam Rainsy and the Foreign Minister Prince Sirivudh. Sam Rainsy was sacked and later expelled from parliament for his trenchant criticisms of the co-premiers. Sirivudh resigned in sympathy with Rainsy but was arrested in December 1995 on the trumped-up charge of plotting to murder Hun Sen. Although Hun Sen accepted the King's request to exile Sirivudh, he was sentenced to 20 years and Hun Sen vehemently opposed any plan to allow him to return.
The arrest of Sirivudh, the FUNCINPEC Secretary General and the King's half-brother, was the clearest evidence yet of how Hun Sen was using Ranariddh's weakness as co-premier to undermine FUNCINPEC and humiliate the royal family. It also signalled another step in Hun Sen's inexorable rise. During his time as SoC premier from 1985 to 1993, Hun Sen had always had to compete for influence within the CPP's collective leadership. After 1993, he used Ranariddh's support to successfully expand his own scope for action. Using the phenomenal financial resources he accumulated as co-premier, Hun Sen built a formidable personal power-base. This included a 1,500-man bodyguard and a media empire embracing several radio and television stations and over 20 newspapers.
Hun Sen's rise did not go unchallenged. Anti-Hun Sen resentment within the CPP lay behind a failed coup by elements within the Interior Ministry in July 1994 and remained a thorn in his side thereafter. Chea Sim, the CPP President, and his brother-in-law, Sar Kheng, co-Minister of Interior, disapproved of Hun Sen's aggressive tendencies and his inclination to act without consultation. But while they and many others within the CPP believed that Hun Sen was unnecessarily provoking FUNCINPEC, by 1996 they no longer had the power to restrain him.
Collapse of the coalition, 1996-1997
Cambodia's much-vaunted political stability foundered on two threats to the power-sharing arrangements in early 1996, one actual and one potential. The actual threat lay in the imbalance within the coalition as Hun Sen increasingly flexed his muscles vis-à-vis Ranariddh. The potential threat lay in the commune elections scheduled for 1997 (but eventually cancelled) and forthcoming parliamentary elections in 1998, which evoked the same hopes and fears as in 1993. Once again, these elections would bear the burden of deciding the winner and loser among armed adversaries in a country where there was no neutral state, a weak rule of law and where violence remained part of the political process.
Cambodia's stability was so fragile because it had not been built on a democratic process which could incorporate change and debate: indeed there had been little progress after 1993 in developing the institutions, fora and discourse essential for substantive political debate in Cambodia. Instead, stability rested on the denial of any political differences and the relationship between two all-powerful but impetuous men. When Hun Sen's provocations shattered that illusion, close cooperation turned into mortal enmity and the Cambodian conflict returned to centre stage.
Alliance building through 'national reconciliation'
The period from April 1996 to July 1997 was one of ever-increasing tension. Although the coalition continued on paper, in practice the state was split in two: it was a simple process for the dual structures to follow their leaders and move from coexistence to confrontation. In preparing for the inevitable showdown, whether it came in elections or on the battlefield, both parties competed for the allegiance of each and every political actor, from the most minor newspaper to the Khmer Rouge. On offer were money, positions and legal protection: any wrongdoing, from corruption to genocide, was considered subordinate to the need to build up one's party and personal networks.
Both parties used the label of 'national reconciliation' to cover their alliance building. For Ranariddh, 'national reconciliation' meant returning to the populist, anti-Vietnamese rhetoric of pre-1993 and re-embracing his former allies, including Rainsy, Son Sann and Khieu Samphan. For Hun Sen, 'national reconciliation' meant using his greater wealth and power to exploit internal differences within Ranariddh's 'National United Front' with the aim of bringing as many people over to his side as possible.
With the reduced relevance of post-1979 ideological stereotypes and the greater importance of money politics, alliance building became less predictable and more dynamic. Beginning in mid-1996, both Ranariddh and Hun Sen initiated tentative contacts with segments of the Khmer Rouge. Each offered attractive terms – continued control of armies, resources and territory; amnesties; senior military or provincial positions – beyond anything previously on the negotiating table.
This competition for its allegiance was the final straw which broke the Khmer Rouge's back (see box below). In August 1996 a faction associated with Ieng Sary, Pol Pot's Deputy Prime Minister for Foreign Affairs between 1975 and 1978, broke away. In the name of 'national reconciliation' Ieng Sary was amnestied by the government, and his movement, which controlled two major strongholds, cleverly maintained its autonomy. The revolt meanwhile spread rapidly to all of the Khmer Rouge in western Cambodia and other Khmer Rouge elements ended up joining both parties.
The collapse of the Khmer Rouge
The decline of the Khmer Rouge has been the greatest change in post-1991 Cambodia. As one of the last Maoist insurgencies it was ultimately doomed. Pol Pot's strategy rested on finding a way to dismantle the SoC apparatus, which never happened. Even if political opportunity had existed, the PDK was ill-equipped to exploit it. Its popular appeal was limited by memories of its period in power. The movement's structure, thinking and leadership had become outdated and inflexible. Its organisational coherence depended on a paranoid isolation of its followers from the outside world and by exposing them, even temporarily, to peace and contemporary normality, the Khmer Rouge leadership sapped the will of its fighters.
Without Chinese aid or Thai logistical support, its insurgency posed no serious threat to the Phnom Penh government. In mid-1994, lacking allies and ammunition and with morale sinking as peace and/or victory moved further away, Pol Pot sought to reinvigorate the movement with the 'class hatred' of the 'poor peasants'. He reintroduced the brutal Maoist rhetoric, discipline and tactics which the Khmer Rouge had, supposedly, renounced after the 'killing fields'. The effect was to deepen the disillusionment felt by many Khmer Rouge cadres and combatants. Defections gathered pace until the movement finally collapsed in western Cambodia.
Unsure who to blame for this disastrous decline, and who should succeed an ailing Pol Pot, the remaining leadership fought amongst itself. In June 1997, Pol Pot had his ex-defence minister, Son Sen, killed and tried to purge his veteran deputies, Nuon Chea and Ta Mok. He failed and was himself arrested, underwent a show-trial and was sentenced to life-long detention. By the time of Pol Pot's fatal heart attack on 14 May 1998, the movement itself was on the point of total collapse, with virtually no troops or territory. The vast majority had – for reasons of pragmatism, money or war-weariness – sided with their long-time enemy, Hun Sen.
In October 98, Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan and Ta Mok, the key remaining members of the Khmer Rouge leadership, remained in the jungle – their fate uncertain.
The July 1997 coup
It was always likely that the stand-off between the co-premiers would end in violence. Hun Sen had already shown a willingness to revert to the threat and actuality of force. The worst single act of political violence was a March 1997 grenade attack against a Sam Rainsy-led demonstration outside the parliament, which left at least 16 people dead. According to a UN investigation, the attack was organised with the complicity of Hun Sen's bodyguard.
Any political solution – including new elections – depended on cooperation between Hun Sen and Prince Ranariddh, the absence of which was the cause of the stand-off. But the passive, disinterested attitude of the international community further contributed to the stalemate. The nations which had worked so hard to bring peace failed to capitalise on the leverage that the Paris agreements and their foreign aid gave them. All they offered were uncoordinated and toothless appeals to the goodwill of Cambodia's leaders who, all evidence suggested, had none.
Confident that the outside world would take no action provided the façade of parliamentary democracy and coalition government was maintained, Hun Sen took action to undermine Ranariddh's position, first by fostering a revolt among FUNCINPEC members of parliament and, when that failed, by taking military action. Beginning on 2 July 1997, his forces disarmed FUNCINPEC-aligned troops first around, and then within Phnom Penh itself. The fighting in the capital, over the weekend of 5-6 July, left an estimated 100 civilians dead. The public aim of this unilateral military action was to arrest and replace Ranariddh.
The pretext centred on allegations that Ranariddh had brought thousands of Khmer Rouge soldiers into Phnom Penh in a plot to bring back Pol Pot's 'genocidal regime'. Although Ranariddh had indeed been negotiating with the Khmer Rouge remnants immediately before the coup, Hun Sen's allegations were baseless: no hardline Khmer Rouge were found among FUNCINPEC's forces in Phnom Penh and former Khmer Rouge from western Cambodia were by then at least as prominent among Hun Sen's forces as they were in Ranariddh's.
Post-coup, pre-election
Having gained power, Hun Sen still needed to secure legitimacy. Instead of suppressing all opposition, Hun Sen chose his targets carefully: his real aim, besides dismissing Ranariddh, was to demolish FUNCINPEC's parallel military and bureaucratic structures while retaining the façade of the coalition. In the immediate aftermath of the coup, senior figures in the FUNCINPEC military and police were captured and executed. The remaining FUNCINPEC forces proved no match for the larger and better-equipped CPP forces.
Hun Sen moved equally quickly to consolidate his political authority. Using the two-thirds majority in parliament which he now obtained through the co-option and intimidation of several FUNCINPEC MPs, Hun Sen had Ranariddh replaced as first Prime Minister by the politically malleable Foreign Minister, Ung Huot. This effectively meant that the FUNCINPEC structure came under Hun Sen's control. Hun Sen also used his new parliamentary majority to cement his control over the judiciary: the two highest constitutional bodies, the Supreme Council of the Magistracy and the Constitutional Council, were both formed with clear CPP majorities (as was the National Election Committee the body responsible for organising the 1998 parliamentary election).
Although the international response to Hun Sen's actions was muted, he did suffer two major diplomatic setbacks: ASEAN suspended Cambodia's entry and the country's UN seat was left vacant, at Washington's insistence. Equally important, Cambodia's economy was simultaneously hit by the flight of investors after the fighting, the suspension of aid by the US, Germany, IMF and World Bank, and the regional financial meltdown. For both political and economic reasons, therefore, Hun Sen intensified his close ties with China. He also sought to ensure that preparations for parliamentary elections were sufficiently credible for the international community to bankroll the process and recognise the results. Once again, the focus of the Cambodian conflict shifted temporarily from the bullet to the ballot.
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The investigation, which was prompted by a tip from an employee, led to product recalls. The company temporarily stopped making and distributing its generic over-the-counter medications — about 25 percent of its total business. In June, the manufacturer pleaded guilty to mail fraud, a charge prosecutors linked to sending falsified data about its product stability and shelf-life to the FDA.
Leiner filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in March. Last month, nutritional supplement maker and retailer NBTY Inc. bought Leiner for about $371 million at an auction. NBTY has said it expects the deal to close by September.
An attorney for Leiner did not immediately return a message seeking comment.
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Syrian Refugees and Canada’s “Defining Moment”: One Year On
In Report
Part of a massive influx of Syrian Kurdish refugees to Turkey, 22 September 2014.Photo credit: European Commission/European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO)
By Elke Winter, Benjamin Zyla, Charlotte Murret-Labarthe
Origins of the crisis
In March 2011, three months after the Arab Spring began in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, fifteen Syrian schoolchildren were arrested and tortured for writing on a wall the anti-regime slogan: “The people want the overthrow of the regime.” This event sparked massive outrage across the country, notably in Homs and Damascus, and led to protests and uprisings against President Bashar al-Assad.
In response, the president assembled a strong, militarized front comprised mainly of the Syrian Armed Forces, the National Defence Force, a pro-government militia led by members of his extended family, as well as Lebanese Hezbollah and Iranian Revolutionary Guards. High levels of brutality from the government were common in quelling these protests.
At the same time, rebel forces rallied together to form the Free Syrian Army (FSA) in July 2011 to support the civilian protest. The FSA gradually seized control of various towns and villages and surprised the government with their military capacity and resilience. These continuing battles between the government and its allies and the FSA have led to a civil war, called by some “the worst humanitarian crisis of our time.”
Syrians escape
In June 2011, with the escalation of violence and worsening living conditions, the civil war reached a military impasse and Syrians started to flee their country. By 2016, an estimated 13.5 million Syrians needed humanitarian assistance, 4.8 million sought refuge in other countries, mainly their neighbours, while another 6.5 million were internally displaced. In addition, more than two million Syrians had attempted to travel across the Mediterranean Sea to seek refuge in Europe.
Ultimately, the unprecedented migration resulted in border closures across Europe. Not only refugees from Syria, but also migrants from Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Morocco, Pakistan, and Tunisia were seeking refuge. Finally, in March 2016, the European Union managed to negotiate a complex agreement with Turkey to host refugees rather than letting them enter the EU.
The volume of displaced people was also a significant burden on refugee camps in the countries around Syria. In December 2014, the World Food Program (WFP) announced a suspension of food vouchers in refugee camps due to a lack of funding, affecting 1.7 million Syrian refugees in Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, Iraq, and Egypt. This aggravated the humanitarian crisis. In June 2015, with only 23% of funding requirements met, the UN was forced to announce a funding shortage for its agencies as well as NGOs providing immediate assistance on the ground.
Against this backdrop, and in light of suffering refugees being televised on TV, the German government announced in August 2015 that it would temporarily accept roughly 800,000 refugees. Sweden had already announced in 2013 that it would grant permanent residency to all Syrian refugees who applied. Since then, both countries, along with many others in the EU, have backtracked on their commitments.
Syrian refugees in Canada
In Canada, by the end of 2014, only 1,285 Syrians had been approved for Canadian refugee status, and just under 1,100 had travelled to Canada. At the beginning of 2015, Stephen Harper’s Conservative government made a pledge to accept 10,000 Syrian refugees over the next three years, most of them privately sponsored. Priority would also be given to individuals who belong to an ethnic, religious, or sexual minority. The modest interest in the crisis between 2011 and 2015 shifted dramatically on 3 September 2015 when the body of Alan Kurdi, 3 years old, washed up on the Turkish shore. Because of Alan Kurdi’s tragic death, Canadians finally realized that the “refugee crisis” was not merely a European problem, especially since Kurdi’s aunt had been trying to get the family to Canada. Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government, elected in October 2015, promised to admit an additional 25,000 refugees, with over half sponsored by the government — a goal officially attained on 27 February 2016. To date, 35,147 Syrian refugees have been resettled in Canada under the Liberal government.
In order to bring Syrian refugees to Canada, with the help of the United Nations Refugee Agency, the government first identifies those who desire to migrate to Canada then carefully screens and processes potential candidates. Currently, there are three different refugee resettlement programs bringing Syrian refugees to Canada: Government-Assisted, Privately Sponsored, and Blended Visa Office-Referred.
Resettlement into Canada can take six months or more. A medical examination, a background check, and a security check are necessary, while travel and medical costs are covered by a loan to the refugees. Currently, one year after their arrival, many Government-Assisted Refugees are transitioning from refugee assistance to social assistance. The challenges ahead are abundant: refugees have fled war, lived in refugee camps, had their education interrupted, and have lost family members. Despite the warm welcome of their sponsors, refugees in Canada tend to be chronically under-employed and many refugee youth experience racial discrimination and bullying.
Canada’s time to shine?
The influx of Syrian refugees may indeed be a “defining moment” for Canada, as underlined by Governor General David Johnston. On the one hand, their integration tests the country’s commitment to diversity, inclusiveness, and tolerance. On the other, we can learn much from the refugees’ courage, resilience, and adaptive capabilities. The arrival by now of 35,000 Syrian refugees is also a good opportunity to remember that Canada was built on welcoming others, from First Nations helping the first European settlers to survive to accommodating ethnically diverse migrants from all corners of the world. The tradition continues!
This text was adapted from an article published in “Refugee Pathways/Les parcours des réfugiés,” special issue of Canadian Diversity/Diversité Canadienne, fall 2016, https://acs-aec.ca/en/publications/canadian-diversity/ (free download of bilingual magazine).
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Car Hire Penzance
Penzance Guide
Thanks to Gilbert and Sullivan, pirates are the first thing most people associate with the Cornwall community of Penzance. However, by the time the duo had penned their famous opera in 1879, Penzance had already made its own claim to fame as a peaceful seaside resort. No major Cornwall town lies farther west than Penzance, 275 miles southwest of London and situated far enough south for palm trees to grow around its tranquil church. As many of the town's bus lines close down after the summer tourism season, private vehicles are the easiest way to explore Penzance and its surrounding seaside communities.
Who to Book With
Two Europcar branches stand next to each other in Penzance town centre, while an Enterprise franchise is located on the town's outskirts. Penzance also contains a few independent dealerships, such as Tucker Car Hire. Many of these companies accept online bookings, which are the cheapest option, especially when made in advance. Some visitors also choose to obtain vehicles at Newquay Airport, the nearest to Penzance, then drive the 41 miles into town.
As Great Britain's southwesternmost region, Cornwall enjoys one of the country's mildest and sunniest climates. However, summer remains the busiest tourism season in Penzance and the rest of Cornwall, even though temperatures aren't always as warm as in the rest of southern England. Although public transport may not be as widely available in Penzance after the summer ends, spring and autumn visitors will enjoy good bargains on hotel rooms and private vehicle rentals. Snow and frost are rarely seen in winter.
Need to Know Essentials
Presentation of the following documents is mandatory for claiming private rental vehicles:
- An International Driving Permit or valid driving license for the United Kingdom
- A secondary form of photo identification, such as a passport
- The same credit card the vehicle was reserved with
- Confirmation of the initial reservation
For more info read our FAQ's.
A new duel carriageway near Newquay should reduce the five to six hours it currently takes to drive the 275 miles between London to Penzance along the M5, M4 and the A30. Summer traffic jams are the biggest obstacle motorists will encounter while driving around this picturesque part of Cornwall. The nearest large city, Plymouth, lies 75 miles east of Penzance.
Further general driving details can be found in our guide to the United Kingdom.
Although much of Penzance is walkable, buses and cars offer the best ways to access the entire town and surrounding region, unless you have a car. None of the United Kingdom's mainland rail station lies farther south than Penzance's, while the closest airport is 41 miles away near Newquay. Ferry journeys from Penzance to the Isles of Scilly take about two hours and 40 minutes. Local bus services are reduced on Sundays and after the summer tourism season.
Penzance's rail station, the southernmost in mainland Britain, stands near the harbour on Market Jew Street. The Cornish Rail Line's western terminus is found here, and First Great Western is the region's main rail provider. Arriving to Penzance by train takes roughly two hours from Plymouth, four hours from Bristol and less than five and a half hours from London.
One of the town's leading taxi providers, Penzance Taxi Company, not only offers reasonable fares for journeys around the town, but also gives two-hour guided tours of the surrounding West Penwith area. Daytime journeys between Penzance and Newquay Airport cost around £89.50.
Many of the routes on Penzance's First Bus Cornwall service are not available after summer or on Sundays. FirstDay passes allowing passengers unlimited travel across the region for a day cost around £3.55 each, while FirstWeek passes cost about £13. Megabus and National Express tickets for the eight to nine-hour bus journey to London Victoria can be had for as little as £1 during special promotions. CrossCountry buses are also available for journeys across Great Britain.
Penzance is just one of several scenic Cornwall communities worth exploring, and many of the region's other worthwhile attractions are just short drives away. The neighbouring Mount's Bay villages of Mousehole and Newlyn are no more than four miles outside of Penzance. Although Sennen Beach, nine miles away, can be crowded in summer, it is still a recommended daytrip getaway.
Recommended Drives
Penzance - This may be Great Britain's southernmost major town, but the smaller town of Newlyn lies even further south, four miles from Penzance. Newlyn may be most famous for its tidal observatory, its late 19th century artists’ colony and the stream of intimate inns along its fishing harbour.
Mousehole - None other than Dylan Thomas once referred to Mousehole, 2.5 miles south of Penzance, as England's loveliest village. As part of the Cornwall Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, Mousehole enjoys the same status as a national park. Yellow lichen grows on the many historic houses, while the sheltered Mount's Bay beach is a safe family swimming spot. Due to Mousehole's extremely narrow roads, motorists should park their vehicles before walking into the village.
Sennen Beach - Located 9 miles from Penzance, is often known as Whitesands Bay. This mile-long beach boasts a shallow valley and a stream at its centre, while sheltered sand dunes provide a peaceful sunbathing atmosphere. Land's End, mainland Great Britain's westernmost point, lies just around the corner from this beloved beach.
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Ember days (corruption from Lat. Quatuor Tempora , four times) are the days at the beginning of the seasons ordered by the Church as days of fast and abstinence. They were definitely arranged and prescribed for the entire Church by Pope Gregory VII (1073-1085) for the Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday after 13 December (S. Lucia), after Ash Wednesday, after Whitsunday, and after 14 September (Exaltation of the Cross). The purpose of their introduction, besides the general one intended by all prayer and fasting, was to thank God for the gifts of nature, to teach men to make use of them in moderation, and to assist the needy. The immediate occasion was the practice of the heathens of Rome. The Romans were originally given to agriculture, and their native gods belonged to the same class. At the beginning of the time for seeding and harvesting religious ceremonies were performed to implore the help of their deities : in June for a bountiful harvest, in September for a rich vintage, and in December for the seeding; hence their feriae sementivae, feriae messis , and feri vindimiales . The Church, when converting heathen nations, has always tried to sanctify any practices which could be utilized for a good purpose. At first the Church in Rome had fasts in June, September, and December; the exact days were not fixed but were announced by the priests. The "Liber Pontificalis" ascribes to Pope Callistus (217-222) a law ordering: the fast, but probably it is older. Leo the Great (440-461) considers it an Apostolic institution. When the fourth season was added cannot be ascertained, but Gelasius (492-496) speaks of all four. This pope also permitted the conferring of priesthood and deaconship on the Saturdays of ember week--these were formerly given only at Easter. Before Gelasius the ember days were known only in Rome, but after his time their observance spread. They were brought into England by St. Augustine; into Gaul and Germany by the Carlovingians. Spain adopted them with the Roman Liturgy in the eleventh century. They were introduced by St. Charles Borromeo into Milan. The Eastern Church does not know them. The present Roman Missal, in the formulary for the Ember days, retains in part the old practice of lessons from Scripture in addition to the ordinary two: for the Wednesdays three, for the Saturdays six, and seven for the Saturday in December. Some of these lessons contain promises of a bountiful harvest for those that serve God.
Crystal Swarovski Sterling Silver Rosary
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girl saints
St. Padre Pio Pillow Case - Spanish Prayer
St. Michael Pillow Case - Spanish Prayer
St. Martin de Porres FlashCard
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Samuel L. Jackson confirms Elizabeth Olsen joining "Avengers: Age of Ultron"
By Jessica Derschowitz
October 3, 2013 / 4:16 PM / CBS News
Samuel L. Jackson is spilling a bit of "Avengers" scoop.
The actor revealed that Elizabeth Olsen will be joining the cast of "Avengers: Age of Ultron."
"I don't think we begin shooting before March of next year," Jackson told The Wall Street Journal of the Joss Whedon-written and directed Marvel sequel. "I know we're shooting in London, that James Spader is Ultron and going to be the bad guy, and that we added Ms. [Elizabeth] Olsen, but I don't know what she's doing, if she's on the inside or the outside. I haven't seen a script."
He doesn't specifically say what role she's playing, but Hitfix notes it had been rumored that she was circling the role of Scarlet Witch.
Jackson made the comment while talking about his cameo as Nick Fury on this week's episode of ABC's "Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D."
Scarlet Witch is the daughter of Magneto and the twin sister of Quicksilver, meaning she also has ties to the X-Men. Quicksilver will be played by Evan Peters ("American Horror Story") in the next film in that superhero franchise, "X-Men: Days of Future Past." It's been rumored that Aaron Taylor-Johnson ("Kick-Ass") will play the same character in "Age of Ultron."
Olsen, 24, is the younger sister of Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen. Her other acting credits include "Martha Marcy May Marlene," "Silent House" and the upcoming "Kill Your Darlings," "Oldboy" and remake of "Godzilla."
"Avengers: Age of Ultron" is set to be released on May 1, 2015.
First published on October 3, 2013 / 4:16 PM
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On the Set With George Clooney
Actor George Clooney, left, talks to city officials Katherine Oliver, center, and John Battista, second from left, on the set of the film "Michael Clayton" Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2006, in the Tribeca neighborhood of New York. The city has enacted a tax credit to lure producers into shooting movies there. Officials say it has generated $600 million in new business and thousands of jobs.
Actor George Clooney works on the set of the film "Michael Clayton" in an alley in the Tribeca neighborhood, Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2006, in New York. The drama, directed by Tony Gilroy, is being shot in New York City and Middletown, N.Y. It is due in theaters later this year.
Actor George Clooney, left, shares a playful moment with actor Austin Williams, who plays his son, while working on the set of the film "Michael Clayton" in the Tribeca neighborhood, Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2006, in New York. The film is about the last and worst day in the career of a high-profile attorney.
A close-up of Oscar-winning actor George Clooney at work on the set of "Michael Clayton" in New York's Tribeca neighborhood, Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2006. Clooney won an Academy Award for his supporting role in "Syriana" and was nominated for directing and writing Oscars for his Edward R. Murrow biopic, "Good Night and Good Luck."
George Clooney, center, is surrounded by cast and crew on the set of the film "Michael Clayton" in an alley in the Tribeca neighborhood, Wednesday, Feb. 15, 2006, in New York. It is directed by Tony Gilroy, who also directed "The Cutting Edge," "The Bourne Identity" and its sequel, "The Bourne Supremacy."
George Clooney chows down a hot dog on the set of his new movie "Michael Clayton" on Feb. 18, 2006, in New York. The thriller, due out later this year, also stars Tilda Swinton, Sydney Pollack and Tom Wilkinson. It is being produced by Clooney and director Steven Soderbergh.
Credit: GETTY IMAGES/Arnaldo Magnani
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All General Acute Care Hospitals
Changes to the Minimum Licensed Nurse to Patient Ratios Effective January 1, 2008
The purpose of this letter is to notify and remind general acute care hospitals of changes to the minimum nurse-to-patient ratios for “step down”, ‘telemetry” and “specialty care” units, effective January 1, 2008.
As provided under Title 22 of the California Code of Regulations, Section 70217(a):
“(9) The licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in a step-down unit shall be 1:4 or fewer at all times. Commencing January 1, 2008, the licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in a step-down unit shall be 1:3 or fewer at all times. A step down unit is defined as a unit which is organized, operated, and maintained to provide for the monitoring and care of patients with moderate or potentially severe physiologic instability requiring technical support but not necessarily artificial life support. Step-down patients are those patients who require less care than intensive care, but more than that which is available from medical/surgical care. Artificial life support is defined as a system that uses medical technology to aid, support, or replace a vital function of the body that has been seriously damaged. Technical support is defined as specialized equipment and/or personnel providing for invasive monitoring, telemetry, or mechanical ventilation, for the immediate amelioration or remediation of severe pathology.”
“(10) The licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in a telemetry unit shall be 1:5 or fewer at all times. Commencing January 1, 2008, the licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in a telemetry unit shall be 1:4 or fewer at all times. Telemetry unit is defined as a unit organized, operated, and maintained to provide care for and continuous cardiac monitoring of patients in a stable condition, having or suspected of having a cardiac condition or a disease requiring the electronic monitoring, recording, retrieval, and display of cardiac electrical signals. Telemetry unit as defined in these regulations does not include fetal monitoring nor fetal surveillance.”
“(12) The licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in a specialty care unit shall be 1:5 or fewer at all times. Commencing January 1, 2008, the licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in a specialty care unit shall be 1:4 or fewer at all times. A specialty care unit is defined as a unit which is organized, operated, and maintained to provide care for a specific medical condition or a specific patient population. Services provided in these units are more specialized to meet the needs of patients with the specific condition or disease process than that which is required on medical/surgical units, and is not otherwise covered by subdivision (a).”
In addition, Title 22 of the California Code of Regulations, Section 70217 addresses the licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in medical/surgical care units which may include mixed patient populations.
“(a)(11) The licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in medical/surgical care units shall be 1:6 or fewer at all times. Commencing January 1, 2005, the licensed nurse-to-patient ratio in medical/surgical care units shall be 1:5 or fewer at all times. A medical/surgical unit is a unit with beds classified as medical/surgical in which patients, who require less care than that which is available in intensive care units, step-down units, or specialty care units receive 24 hour inpatient general medical services, post-surgical services, or both general medical and post-surgical services. These units may include mixed patient populations of diverse diagnoses and diverse age groups who require care appropriate to a medical/surgical unit.”
It is imperative that hospitals staff according to patient acuity. Hospitals must ensure that they are staffed to assure that the needs of the patients are met. It is far more important that hospitals pay attention to the patient classification system and the needs of the patient rather than the minimum staffing requirements. Hospitals are reminded that the regulations only reflect the minimum standards for staffing and that to be in compliance with the regulations refer to Section 70217(b).
The CDPH wants to emphasize that these regulations have been in effect and this should serve as an immediate reminder. As a result of these regulations, hospital policy and procedure changes should be made accordingly.
Original Signed by Pamela Dickfoss for
Kathleen Billingsley, R.N.
Center for Healthcare Quality
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Rory Stewart MP: National Citizen Service is working – and should be expanded more swiftly
By Rory Stewart MP
Follow @RoryStewartUK
From Reggie to Dessie: The colleagues are desperate to impress Johnson, B. But he doesn’t know who most of them are.
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Rory Stewart is MP for Penrith and the Border and a member of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee
I have spent much of this summer walking through Northern England and Southern Scotland. On those hills I met hundreds of people who loved the British landscape, and I found that almost every person in each village was driving voluntary projects, from the hospice movement to first responder medical care. People’s energies were, however, going into charities which were either very local, or grandly global. They seemed to be avoiding the middle ground of national projects and felt that politics was a dirty word. Voluntary activity was dominated by older people – the young were much less involved.
But I also saw the beginnings of an answer to some of these challenges. National Citizen Service is still a pilot. But it is now reaching tens of thousands of 16 year-olds. I met some of the students gathering in the Lake District as part of a two week course in an outdoors centre. They were building – somewhat rickety – rafts on Ullswater with the Prime-Minister. (I saw incidentally how much this project meant personally to the Prime-Minister – who felt his own life had been changed by going through a similar experience when he was 16.) I met the students later when they were working on voluntary projects in their communities.
It was a powerful combination. The participants had often been immersed all their lives in their families or schools. They were learning to live independently in an outdoor centre, and then in a rain-soaked tent. They were pushing themselves to climb mountains, or ford streams. They were learning how to work as a group. They were taking responsibility for real projects in communities. And they were succeeding, often to their surprise, in all these things. Some of the benefits were obvious. The mentors talked of building self-reliance or ‘life skills’. Some stories were moving: a girl from London, for example, described how surviving on her own on the hillside had given her confidence for the first time.
Many of them had never lived outdoors. Students from cities were learning that the countryside was also theirs. Their activities gave them a stake in that landscape. They were experiencing directly the countryside, which is the core of our national heritage. They were working in teams with people from different backgrounds, from cities, from villages, from different ends of the country. They were learning how they were part of a larger, more varied society – that included Brighton as much as Penrith or Newcastle. And they were learning it in a very British way. They were outdoors, in a country which first discovered the romance of landscape; and they were working in charities in a nation which has a particular genius for community action.
The National Citizen Service has been piloting for three years, and growing steadily and successfully. 50,000 people should pass through the program this year in England and Northern Ireland. I believe we can grow it more quickly. We should aim to get the majority of the seven hundred thousand sixteen year olds in Britain entering this scheme over the next three years. We should expand to Scotland and Wales. We should make the experience deeper, and longer. There are already many good youth programs.
But this would be different because it would be truly national: reflecting our imagination and values as a nation. We should also aim to make it close to universal. It will cost money – perhaps as much as half a mile of Crossrail – but it is difficult to think of a single program that would make as much difference to as many people.
The students spoke of how these weeks changed their life. But its deepest benefit may be for our identity as citizens. If we are bold enough, we could help a new generation to see a potential beyond their families, or their offices. We can help them find what we share in our landscape, and in the energy of our different communities. We can stretch ourselves to be more than simply citizens of a neighbourhood – or simply, blandly, citizens of the world. We can become again, in a fuller sense, citizens of Britain.
Rory Stewart MP
26 comments for: Rory Stewart MP: National Citizen Service is working – and should be expanded more swiftly
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Northern England property for sale
Two magnificent houses which show why more and more buyers are looking north
Penny Churchill January 4, 2018
House prices in northern England are far more affordable than they are down south, explains Penny Churchill. The listings of Henbury Hall and Oterrington Hall show just how much more buyers can get – whether they're searching at the bottom or at the top of the market.
According to a recent report from Savills Residential Research, house-price growth in the UK will slow next year, as political and economic uncertainty weighs down the market. Analyst Lawrence Bowles believes that price growth – generally accepted as the measure of a healthy housing market – will be most sluggish in areas where affordability is most stretched. This currently means London and the commuter belt; areas beyond the Home Counties, where incomes have risen more in line with house prices, have greater potential for growth.
‘That’s why we expect the North to outperform London and the rest of the country – especially the North-West, where house prices sit at a modest multiple of average incomes: 5.6 times in the North-West, compared with 12.9 times in London,’ Mr Bowles reveals.
It’s a situation that may well lend wings to the launch by Savills, in November 2017, of one of Cheshire’s most iconic houses, the de Ferranti family’s glorious, neo-Classical Henbury Hall, with its immaculate, 530-acre estate near Macclesfield.
Offered at a guide price of £20 million for the whole, the estate has already attracted solid interest both from home and overseas buyers, Crispin Holborow reports.
Prices in some spots down south are continuing to rise, particularly in the area of the Cotswolds from north Oxfordshire to Stow-on-the-Wold. And because of that more people are looking to the north as an alternative, according to Luke Morgan of Strutt & Parker, who finds that edge-of-village houses around Harrogate, where a number of houses were sold last year without ever appearing on the open market, are now more popular than ever.
Dspite a perennial shortage of houses, there are more sales of country homes in Yorkshire than in any other northern area, say Strutt & Parker. Georgian houses, especially those with grand entrances and long, tree-lined drives to guarantee privacy, are much in demand.
A prime example is Otterington Hall, set in 91 acres of famous gardens, parkland, pasture and woodland, between the villages of North and South Otterington, on the western edge of the North York Moors.
Built in the early 1800s, with later additions, the impressive, 11,000sq ft house is for sale, for only the second time since the early 1900s, at a guide price of £3.95m.
Credit: Jackson-Stops
Best country houses for sale this week
Catch up on the best country houses for sale this week that have come to the market via Country Life.
Otterington Hall, a magnificent home with superb topiary and beautiful stables
Yorkshire properties of this calibre are few and far between: this is a spectacular home with three further cottages, amazing
An exquisite neo-Classical country house executed in perfect symmetry
The enduring English love affair with the Palladian tradition is encapsulated at glorious Henbury Hall in Cheshire, inspired by Villa
Polo against the backdrop of a ruined castle? It can only be Cowdray... Credit: Getty
The joy of earning to play polo, the intoxicating sport where you’ll ride ‘on one of the Ferraris of the horse world’
The Utterly Inessential Shopping List: A chocolate subscription, Highgrove’s sugar bowl and an in-home bowling alley
Oxford Cottage in Marlow, where previous residents include the novelist novelist and historian George Payne Rainsford James. Credit: Savills
An immaculate 18th-century ‘country’ cottage that’s in the middle of one of the loveliest towns in the Home Counties
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European Committee for the Prevention of Torture
and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT)
CPT Members
CPT Secretariat
Standards and tools
HUDOC CPT database
CPT/
CPT publishes report on its UK visit: criticism levelled at spiralling violence and lack of safety in prisons; and inadequate safeguards to protect patients in mental health settings highlighted
In a report published today, the Council of Europe’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman and Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) raises serious concerns over the lack of safety for inmates and staff in prisons in England. Causes include prison violence spiralling out of control, poor regimes and chronic overcrowding. The report also examines the treatment afforded to patients in a number of psychiatric hospitals. It notes the caring approach by staff in these institutions but is critical of the safeguards concerning forced treatment, the use of force on patients and the use of long-term segregation and night-time confinement in high secure hospitals. Treatment of detained persons by the police and the situation in immigration centres are also covered in the report.
Imprimer en PDF
In the report, the CPT welcomes the recent recognition by the authorities to reform the prison system of England and Wales. Yet, it underlines that unless concrete, determined and swift action is taken to significantly reduce the current prison population, the regime improvements envisaged by the authorities’ reform agenda would remain unattainable.
The CPT is deeply concerned by the amount of severe generalised violence evident in each of the prisons visited, notably inter-prisoner violence and attacks by prisoners on staff. Injuries to both prisoners and staff, documented over a three-month period in the prisons visited, included multiple cases of scalding water being thrown over victims (resulting in severe burns over 10% of the victims’ bodies), ‘shank’ (make-shift knife) wounds, head wounds, broken noses and broken teeth. Injuries frequently required hospitalisation and, in one case, resulted in the death of an inmate. While the number of recorded violent incidents at all prisons visited was alarmingly high, the CPT believes that these figures under-record the actual number of incidents and consequently fail to afford a true picture of the severity of the situation.
The cumulative effect of certain systemic failings found is that none of the prisons visited could be considered safe for prisoners or staff. The CPT recommends that concrete measures be taken to bring prisons back under the effective control of staff, reversing the recent trends of escalating violence and that a far greater investment in preventing violence be undertaken. In particular, this requires a swift reinforcement of staffing levels to provide for a safe environment for prisoners and staff.
The CPT underlines that many aspects of prison life were being negatively affected by overcrowding in the prison system. The regimes in all prisons visited were inadequate, with a considerable number of prisoners spending up to 22 hours per day locked up in their cells. The situation was particularly bleak for juveniles placed on ‘separation’ lists, who could spend up to 23.5 hours a day locked up alone in their cells. In the CPT’s view, holding juveniles in such conditions amounts to inhuman and degrading treatment. Findings and data show that juvenile offenders in YOIs have been held alone in conditions akin to solitary confinement for periods of 30 days, 60 days and even, occasionally, up to 80 days. The CPT recommends that juveniles should not be segregated in such conditions, even for the purposes of good order, and instead be placed in small staff-intensive units.
As regards the psychiatric institutions visited, the CPT’s report recognises the clear dedication of the many mental health professionals working hard to care for the patients under their responsibility. However, the CPT considers that there are a few areas which require serious reflection and change; notably, consent to treatment safeguards need to be reinforced during the first three months of involuntary placement in a hospital; the powers of the Mental Health Tribunal need to be reinforced and expanded to deal with appeals concerning such issues as consent to treatment, transfers to more secure hospitals, the use of means of restraint and the application of specific treatment measures. In the high secure hospitals, the CPT is highly critical about the measure of long-term segregation as currently applied and voices misgivings over the use of force deployed to control patients. It also calls for a review of the night time confinement policy in these hospitals. More generally, the report recommends greater efforts are required to recruit and retain registered mental health nurses, whose numbers have decreased by more than 8.5% since 2009, at a time when the number of patients being detained in England is increasing year on year.
The report is published at the request of the United Kingdom authorities. The response of the United Kingdom will be published shortly.
Read the executive summary
Preventing torture in Europe
www.cpt.coe.int
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Storms just a bump in the road at CCC
Daniel Jones @daniel_m_jones
Mar 26, 2018 at 10:33 PM Mar 26, 2018 at 10:33 PM
When the second wave of storms rolled through Columbia on Monday afternoon, Columbia Country Club superintendent Joe Herzog made the call: he had to do what was necessary to protect his baby.
The 55-year old Herzog has been CCC’s superintendent for 30 years. His duty is to maintain one of Mid-Missouri’s finest courses, to guard it against the worst that nature can throw at it — and, to a lesser extent, to make sure that the act of using the course doesn’t destroy it.
All in all, it wasn’t a difficult decision. By noon, there was standing water on the first fairway and in most of the course’s bunkers. The greens were saturated. A wet course is a vulnerable course, one easier wrecked by divots and tire tracks and pock-marks. But even the hardiest golfers would have agreed that the course was unplayable.
The Columbia College Spring Invitational just happened to fall on a hellish day for golf.
“We did the best we could, but God didn’t want us to play golf today,” Herzog said.
Most of the players in Monday’s event, which included men’s and women’s players from Columbia College and William Woods, got in four holes before lightning and rain cancelled the event. The original plan was for them to play 36.
Herzog probably had an idea of what kind of day awaited him. When working with grass is your world, weather is your obsession.
“My alarm goes off, I grab my phone, I look at the weather. It’s that constant,” Herzog said. “If there was a way to have the alarm tell me what the weather is doing, I would do that. You base your day off of what the weather is going to do.”
Technology has made the task easier through the years, even if it remains an inexact science. He’s even determined what mobile weather service works best: Accuweather, which he finds provides the most aggressive (i.e., worst-case) forecast.
“If you’re a superintendent or a golf pro, you have a minor in meteorology,” said Zach Herzog, the head golf professional at CCC and Joe’s son.
Golf, a game so in tune with grass and dirt and sand and trees, has a close and unavoidable relationship with nature. By extension, golfers do, too. Monday was a reminder the results aren’t always pretty.
Columbia College senior Daymond Dollens, a Centralia native, recalled playing CCC in high school with snowflakes pelting his face as he walked up to the 18th green. St. Louis native Trevor Cronin, Columbia’s No. 1 player, also grew up playing in snow. Next year he’s headed to Arizona in an attempt to make it to the professional level.
“I played some of my best rounds in high school in the snow and cold,” Cronin said. “You’re not thinking about anything. You’re just playing golf. I enjoy playing in these conditions because a lot of guys are mentally weak. They’ll give up.”
Cronin, who shot 1-under par on his four holes Monday, said that his best shot of the day was a 120-yard approach with a full 6-iron swing. On a pleasant day, that club is good for 165 yards.
"When we’re playing in great conditions, I think that gets in the way a lot," Cronin said. "Everyone’s overthinking mechanics. When you’re out here, you’re just trying to get the ball in the hole."
Even golf’s rules break down in soggy weather. Players can be granted relief out of “casual water,” which is when water is visible above the ground while the player is in their stance. CCC’s entire course could have been classified as casual water on Monday — but there was no place to be granted relief.
“We’re used to it,” Dollens said. “You just gotta focus on your routine. … There’s going to be a lot of things you can’t control out here, but that’s just golf.”
Herzog sent his staff home early Monday. There’s little they can do in the rain. But after the crowd left he made his rounds, checking to see what kind of condition the course will be in Tuesday. He’s also got to keep a close watch on Hinkson Creek, Columbia’s largest waterway, which comes into play on four holes.
Still, these days are a breeze compared to July and August, when the course is busiest and the weather is most dangerous. The late summer’s heat and humidity are ripe for grass-killing diseases. Sleepless nights are ahead.
“It’s downhill after Labor Day,” Herzog said. “You know how teachers are like, ‘How many days until Memorial Day?’ Us superintendents, we’re looking forward to Labor Day.”
djones@columbiatribune.com
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