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Chinese University Asks Students to Sign ‘Suicide Waivers’
A university in southern China asked students entering its freshman class to sign a document absolving the school of responsibility should the student commit suicide — a macabre sign, say some, of the growing pressures of Chinese society
By Chengcheng Jiang / Beijing Sept. 17, 2013
REUTERS / REUTERS
A high school student takes a nap on a desk during his lunch break in a classroom in the Chinese city of Hefei, Anhui province, on June 2, 2012
For college freshmen anywhere, paperwork is an inevitable drag on the exciting first few days of college life. Spare a thought, though, for the 5,000 freshmen at the City College of Dongguan University of Technology in China’s coastal Guangdong province who were required to sign an agreement absolving the school of responsibility if the students were to commit suicide.
School officials told Chinese media that the agreement serves merely as a “warm reminder” of long-standing school policy for the new intake of students. But outraged parents and online commentators argue that the process heaps yet more pressure on already overstressed students. “I think this kind of agreement is irresponsible and unfair, and I doubt it’s going to have any effect on student behavior,” says Ms. Li, whose son just started his first year at college and who declines to be identified with her full name. “The school should provide counseling services and other help for students, instead of trying to absolve themselves of responsibility even before anything has happened.”
Suicide rates among college students have actually remained fairly stable among college students, hovering close to one or two per 100,000 people in recent years — a rate well below the national average. While there is no official figure for suicides on a national level, a research project conducted by the Ministry of Health in 2010 found the suicide rate in larger urban areas was 6.41 per 100,000 people and in rural areas, it was 10.01 per 100,000. However, with the threat of litigation rising as more Chinese pursue legal action to redress grievances and stress levels soaring among students, the college in Dongguan appears to have decided it needed some insurance.
Education has long been seen in China as the only path to success, a legacy of the country’s Confucian heritage. But a massive increase in the numbers of students taking university courses coupled with a sharp economic slowdown has meant that, for many, a degree is not the golden ticket it once seemed to be. Of the class of 2013, with some 7 million graduates across the country, just 35% had found a job at the time of graduation — a dramatic fall of 12% year on year.
With stress levels for students on the rise and postgraduation opportunities harder to find, some are starting to doubt the value of education as an investment.
This month on the popular microblogging platform Sina Weibo, one of the most discussed topics concerned a father who refused to pay his daughter’s college fees. The father said he would rather use the money to invest in a small business for his daughter. Investing in a college education, he said, would be “like throwing the money away.”
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You are here: Home » Crime »
Florida cop arrested for refusing to remove Guy Fawkes mask in Obamacare protest
December 4, 2013 8:37 am Comments Off on Florida cop arrested for refusing to remove Guy Fawkes mask in Obamacare protest Views: 1894
A Florida police officer who was protesting US President Obama’s newly implemented healthcare law has been arrested because he refused to take off a Guy Fawkes mask he was wearing at a demonstration.
Ericson Harrell, 39, was wearing a mask, a black cape, and holding an inverted American flag when police approached him in Plantation, Florida. Harrell told officers he was “protesting Obamacare” but the police report notes “he refused each time” when he “was asked several times to remove his mask and produce some form of identification or tell us his name” and taken into custody.
The mask is the same one popularized in the film “V for Vendetta” and then by the activist hacking collective known as Anonymous.
The police report does not mention whether other protesters were at the scene or if Harrell was holding his own individual rally. It does say Harrell was not willing to tell police who he was, “stating his anonymity was his cause, thus the mask…He stated the mask was used by movement groups around the world for protests.”
He only told responding officers “I’m a cop, I’m a cop” and was apprehended when one policeman found a .40 caliber pistol in his waistband.
Harrell, who was charged with obstruction of justice and with wearing a hood or mask on the street, was given a notice to appear in court and not jailed.
The statute Harrell was charged under was originally signed into law in an attempt to criminalize the Ku Klux Klan without violating the white supremacist group’s right to free assembly or free speech.
Chapter 876 Section 12 of Title XLVI under Florida law classifies “wearing mask hood, or other device on public way” as a crime. Stating in full: “no person or persons over 16 years of age shall, while wearing any mask hood, or device whereby any portion of the face is so hidden, concealed, or covered as to conceal the identity of the wearer, enter upon, or be or appear upon any lane, walk, alley, street, road, highway, or other public way in this state.”
Harrell’s supervisor at the North Miami Beach police told the Miami Sun-Sentinel that the officer is a 15-year veteran of the force and has been placed on paid administrative leave pending the outcome of the investigation.
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You are here: Home » Analysis »
What 16 Successful People Read In The Morning
May 11, 2014 7:08 pm 0 comments Views: 2128
Staying informed is a constant struggle for most of us, let alone people with high-profile, high-pressure jobs. There’s usually not time to leisurely read a favorite paper over coffee.Yet catching up on news is an important part of what’s often a very early morning for many of the world’s most successful people.
Now we would like everyone to read Business Insider in the morning (or the afternoon), but it turns out some very important people have their own favorite sources of news.
Warren Buffett starts his days with an assortment of national and local news.
REUTERS/Carlo Allegri
The billionaire investor tells CNBC he reads the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, the New York Times, USA Today, the Omaha World-Herald, and the American Banker in the mornings. That’s a hefty list to get through.
David Cush reads five newspapers and listens to sports radio on a bike at the gym.
The Virgin America CEO told the AP that he wakes up at 4:15 a.m. on the West Coast to send emails and call people on the East Coast. Then he heads to the gym, hops on an exercise bike, listens to Dallas sports radio, and reads his daily papers, which include the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, San Francisco Chronicle, and Financial Times.
Bill Gates reads the national papers and gets a daily news digest.
The Microsoft co-founder gets a daily news digest with a wide array of topics, and he gets alerts for stories on Berkshire Hathaway, where he sits on the board of directors. Gates also reads the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and the Economist cover-to-cover, according to an interview with Fox Business.
Dave Girouard reads the New York Times and Wall Street Journal on his Nexus 7, and mixes in some Winston Churchill.
Courtesy of Upstart
Girouard, CEO of Upstart and former president of Google Enterprise, told Business Insider that he’s a big fan of Winston Churchill’s speeches. He’s currently reading “Never Give In! The Best of Winston Churchill’s Speeches.” For news, he scrolls through the New York Times and Wall Street Journal.
David Heinemeier Hansson flicks through tech blogs.
Courtesy of David Heinemeier Hansson
The Danish programmer and creator of the programming language Ruby on Rails consumes a tech-filled fare each morning. He tells Business Insider that his daily round consists of Reddit, Hacker News, Engadget, the Economist, Boing Boing, and Twitter.
Jeffrey Immelt reads his papers in a very particular fashion.
“I typically read the Wall Street Journal, from the center section out,” the General Electric CEO told Fast Company. “Then I’ll go to the Financial Times and scan the FTIndex and the second section. I’ll read the New York Times business page and throw the rest away. I look at USA Today, the sports section first, business page second, and life third. I’ll turn to Page Six of the New York Post and then a little bit on business.”
Charlie Munger is devoted to the Economist.
When Fox Business asked the Berkshire Hathaway vice-chairman and right-hand man to Warren Buffett what he likes to read in the morning, Munger kept it simple. “The Economist,” he said.
Gavin Newsom starts with Politico’s Playbook email, and then reads each of California’s major papers.
The California Lieutenant Governor told The Wire that he starts by rotating through the morning shows at 7 a.m., then moves to his iPad to read Playbook, the Sacramento Bee, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the Los Angeles Times. Finally, he moves on to the news app Flipboard, through which he checks sites like Mashable and AllThingsD.
Barack Obama reads the national papers, a blog or two, and some magazines.
The President of the United States told Rolling Stone he begins his day with the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post. He’s a devoted reader of the Times’ columnists, and also likes Andrew Sullivan, the New Yorker, and The Atlantic.
Jonah Peretti pulls out the business or sports section from the New York Times for the subway ride; his wife keeps the rest.
Daniel Goodman / Business Insider
The Buzzfeed founder and CEO wakes up around 8:30 a.m. and heads into the office with the sports or business section of the New York Times, he tells The Wire. He also takes New York magazine; subscriptions to the New Yorker and Economist fell by the wayside after he had twins.
Still, like many younger leaders, the principle way he discovers information is through Twitter and Facebook.
Steve Reinemund reads the Dallas Morning News and several national dailies.
Stuart Ramson/AP
The former PepsiCo CEO gets up promptly at 5:30 a.m. and heads downstairs with a stack of newspapers, Starwinar.com reports. He goes through the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Financial Times, as well as the Dallas Morning News.
Howard Schultz has kept his morning reading routine intact for 25 years.
In 2006, the Starbucks CEO told CNNMoney that he gets up between 5 and 5:30 a.m., makes coffee, and then picks up three newspapers: the Seattle Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the New York Times. The habit must work, because he’s stuck with it for more than two decades.
Nate Silver checks Twitter, Memeorandum, and Real Clear Politics pre-coffee in election years.
Flickr/Randy Stewart
The FiveThirtyEight editor-in-chief shared his election-year reading habits with The Wire.
He starts with Twitter, Memeorandum, and Real Clear Politics before his coffee. He might hit the snooze button if nothing is breaking. Later come blogs like The Atlantic, Marginal Revolution, and Andrew Sullivan.
Shepard Smith works on TV, but relies on the websites of the New York Post and New York Times.
The Fox News host tells AdWeek that he starts his day with the websites of The New York Post or New York Times. After that comes The Daily Beast, SportsGrid, and sometimes Buzzfeed. Then comes sites relevant to whatever is being covered that day, including lots of local newspapers.
It’s a constant struggle to keep from being overwhelmed, he says. “If media were food, I would be obese,” Smith says.
Chuck Todd catches up with at least one major newspaper from each state on Twitter.
Reuters/Jason Reed
Todd, NBC’s Chief White House Correspondent, is up between 4:30 and 5 every morning, he tells AdWeek, and after catching up with dispatches and email updates, goes on Twitter to catch major news stories from local newspapers.
“Twitter is the 21st century wire,” Todd says. “I remember the first time I got access to the [Associated Press] 50-state wire in 1992, and at that time, there was nothing like it. Now Twitter is the same way. I’ve made my own powerful, worldwide newswire on politics and international affairs.”
He also reads the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Financial Times on his iPad.
Gary Whitehill supplements the Wall Street Journal with dozens of RSS feeds.
Screenshot from YouTube
Sixty-three, to be precise. The Huffington Post reports that Whitehill, the founder of Entrepreneur Week, spends the first part of his day reading 40 pages in whatever his current book is, scanning through 63 RSS feeds, and perusing the Wall Street Journal.
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FCC commissioner targets midband spectrum for 5G within 2 years
FierceWireless News
CHARLOTTE, North Carolina—One of the FCC’s five commissioners said that he’s working to release enough midband spectrum over the next two years that providers could create a new, fully operational 5G network using the licenses.
Those comments, made here at the WIA’s Connect (X) show by Commissioner Michael O'Rielly, are noteworthy considering he is taking the lead at the agency in the industry’s ongoing CBRS proceeding. Wireless industry players are keen to see the FCC act on that proceeding because it will release up to 150 MHz of spectrum in the 3.5 GHz band for both licensed and unlicensed operations.
However, O'Rielly gave no indication about how and when the FCC might act on the CBRS issue. He said that geographic licensing sizes are the last sticking point in the proceeding—large wireless operators are pushing the FCC to issue 3.5 GHz licenses in larger geographic sizes, while others are urging the agency to issue smaller licenses—but he didn’t say how the agency might fall on the issue. O'Rielly also did not say when the FCC might issue final rules on the 3.5 GHz band, though many in the industry expect the agency to do so this summer.
Nonetheless, O'Rielly said that the CBRS band is just one of several that he hopes to release to the wireless industry in the next two years. He also pointed to the 3.45-3.55 GHz the NTIA may release, and the 3.7-4.2 GHz band, also known as the C band.
And O’Rielly hinted that another band that the FCC may investigate, the 4.9 GHz band, may free up additional spectrum because he said that public-safety users on that band currently only use 3% of the available 4.9 GHz licenses today.
“This commission is completely committed to this purpose” of freeing up spectrum, O’Rielly said, adding that the FCC is working to release both licensed and unlicensed spectrum; he specifically pointed to the agency’s work in 6 GHz and the 5.9 GHz bands in unlicensed. “It’s something we’re really working on.”
The purpose, O’Rielly made clear, is to ensure that the United States can take a leading role in the global rollout of 5G wireless network technology. He said the issue is critical because some countries have taken an “industrial policy” toward the deployment of 5G. Though O’Rielly didn’t name China, that country’s government has moved to issue spectrum and deployment targets to China’s government-controlled telecom carriers and infrastructure vendors.
“There definitely, in my opinion, is a race” to 5G, O’Rielly said, adding that the United States is “well positioned” in the race.
Interestingly, O’Rielly said that, beyond releasing spectrum, the FCC will also look to smooth the deployment of 5G infrastructure, including small cells. Indeed, the FCC has already voted on rules geared toward removing or loosening rules around small cell rollouts.
Now, O’Rielly said, the FCC next plans to look at city and state rules that are hindering the rollout of small cells. Specifically, he said the agency would move against “bad actors”: cities and states that are seeking to charge wireless operators unreasonable fees to deploy small cells, or are moving too slowly on the topic. “We’ve tried the nice approach,” O’Rielly said. Now, “we’ll have to take the aggressive route, and I’m completely comfortable in doing so.”
And what will U.S. providers do with 5G equipment and spectrum? O’Rielly pointed to virtual reality and telehealth, but noted that “there are so many other possibilities that we don’t and can’t imagine now.”
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Ultimate CALL Of DUTY Experience Hits the Online Auction Block to Benefit Veterans
Are you looking for a new "favorite" charity? Want to bid on something cool? Look no further my peeps because we have it right here on Alien Bee for you! How about one an online charity auction with Call of Duty, Treyarch Studios and Jeep? Sounds great doesn't it and we have all the details for you below!
Ultimate Call of Duty Experience Hits the Online Auction Block to Benefit Call of Duty Endowment
Limited-Edition 2011 Jeep Wrangler Call of Duty: Black Ops Edition, a Tour of Treyarch Studios, and a Chance to Meet the Creators of Call of Duty: Black Ops Open for Bidding at charitybuzz.com
Santa Monica, CA - Activision, Treyarch Studios and Jeep have partnered to auction an incredible Call of Duty experience at leading charity auction site charitybuzz.com. The package is truly a gamers dream, including:
A Limited-Edition 2011 Jeep Wrangler Call of Duty: Black Ops Edition
A tour of Treyarch Studios, the designers of Call of Duty Black Ops
The chance to meet the creators of Call of Duty Black Ops
Proceeds will benefit the Call of Duty Endowment (www.callofdutyendowment.org), a nonprofit public benefit corporation which helps soldiers transition to civilian careers after their military service. The Call of Duty Endowment focuses its resources on assisting organizations that provide job placement and training to veterans, as well as engaging the media and public forums to raise awareness about the issue.
Bidding on the one-of-kind package, which is valued at $35,000, is open through Wednesday, October 26th, at:http://www.charitybuzz.com/catalog_items/287100 . Currently, bidding has already topped $26,000 with two weeks left to bid.
Founded in 1996, and acquired by Activision in 2001, Treyarch has grown to become one of the most successful game developers in the world. Home to some of the industry's best and brightest creative talents, Treyarch's most recent creation is Call of Duty: Black Ops. Call of Duty: Black Ops, encapsulates the studio's years of experience in developing Call of Duty games, first person shooters, and online multiplayer games.
The auction winner will experience Treyarch's first-class creative environment. The studio is known to mix it up with unforgettable studio wrap parties, regular visits from the In N Out truck, keg infused studio happy hours, Treyarch flag football games, lunchtime basketball and evening game play.
The 2011 Jeep Wrangler and Wrangler Unlimited Call of Duty: Black Ops Edition is based on the Jeep Wrangler Rubicon model and features dark Rubicon wheels in a high-gloss Mineral Gray. The vehicles exterior color is black and features Call of Duty: Black Ops graphics on the roof and front quarter panels. The vehicle also features taillamp guards and a fuel-filler door from Mopar®. Inspired by Call of Duty: Black Ops, the new limited-edition Wrangler delivers legendary Jeep capability, aggressive 32-inch off-road tires, live axles with locking differentials in the front and rear, and a two-speed transfer case. The partnership delivers a natural fit including an in-game integration into both the epic single player storyline of Call of Duty: Black Ops and the titles much anticipated multiplayer experience.
It was important for us to make sure that the Jeep partnership would be authentic and enhance the setting we immerse our fans in with Black Ops, said Mark Lamia, Studio Head of game developer Treyarch. Our work with the Jeep team focused around using the Jeep Wrangler in our levels, and gameplay experiences, and translating the style and look of the vehicle in Black Ops to the Jeep on the showroom floor that our fans can own.
About charitybuzzA leader in cause marketing, charitybuzz (www.charitybuzz.com) aligns nonprofits with international brands and celebrity icons to raise funds through innovative online auctions. Featuring pop culture experiences, VIP events, luxury travel, fine art, couture fashion, coveted internships, upscale merchandise and more, charitybuzz brings its online community of socially conscious bidders exclusive opportunities to doGOOD and liveWELL. Since launching, charitybuzz has raised more than $50 million for charities around the globe. To learn more, please visit www.charitybuzz.com, email info@charitybuzz.com, fan us on facebook at www.facebook.com/charitybuzz or follow us on twitter at www.twitter.com/charitybuzz.
Labels: call of duty, charity, charitybuzz, jeepers creepers, Treyarch Studios
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Author’s Guideline
Large-N Analysis in the Study of Conflict*
Time-Series Cross-Sectional Data and the Study of Conflict
Examining Internal Conflict through the Lens of Interstate Relations
The Collection of Data on Relations between States and Nonstate Armed Groups
Conclusion and Future Research
Belgin San-Akca
DOI:10.20991/allazimuth.476414
All Azimuth V8, N2, 135-56
In this paper, I examine the generation and use of large-N datasets and issues related to operationalization and measurement in the quantitative study of inter-state and intra-state conflict. Specifically, I critically evaluate the work on transnational dimensions of internal conflict and talk about my own journey related to my research on interactions between states and nonstate armed groups. I address the gaps in existing research, the use of proxy measures in large-N data analysis, and talk in detail about observational data collection and coding. I argue that future research should bridge the gap between studies of conflict across the fields of Comparative Politics and International Relations. I make suggestions laying the standards of academic scholarship in collecting data and increasing transparency in research.
Keywords : civil war, foreign state support, inter-state war, NAGs Dataset, Positivism
August Comte, founder of the discipline of sociology, wrote about positivism back in the mid-19th century, claiming that there are laws governing human behavior and the social world similar to laws that govern natural phenomena. According to Comte, human behavior could have been explained and predicted through reason and observation. Nevertheless, it was not till after the end of WWII that discontent about the inability to predict the collapse of democracy in Germany during the inter-war period and the subsequent emergence of fascism resulted in research emphasizing the scientific pursuit of empirical facts and objective truth. It took positivism almost a century to influence the study of political phenomena. Its effect was mostly driven by the development of probability sampling techniques and the ability to conduct mass surveys, which facilitated the study of electoral choices. Positivism stresses collecting and recording data, which allows replication of social scientific research.
Positivism aspires to discover empirical regularities across human and societal behavior and builds on the assumption that social phenomena are like natural phenomena. Social scientists should focus on observable phenomena, which constitute the basis for quantifiable data. In the view of positivists, “facts exist independently of the observer and his or her values”.[1] The purpose of social scientists, then, is to accumulate an objective pool of knowledge, which can be used to explain and predict causality across a complex set of concepts and events. Both social and natural sciences are united in terms of deducing testable hypotheses from new ideas and pre-existing theories and comparing them to observed individual experiences for verification.[2] This approach to scientific discovery denies non-testable theories. Empirical scientists do not have any interest in such metaphysical explanations, which do not require observation of individual behavior for generalization and prediction.
This positivist approach has been driving the development of Political Science as a discipline across Europe and North America from the 1930s on. Due to its emphasis on the observation of individual human behavior to verify hypotheses and predict future behavior, it is referred to as behavioralism in Political Science. Initially being puzzled by the inability to predict the rise of fascism in Germany during the inter-war period, early research using the behavioral approach focused on explaining and predicting people’s electoral choices.[3] Behavioralists criticized the early work related to political phenomena, which relied on qualitative and normative research to describe how individuals comply with formal rules and institutions. They, on the other hand, emphasized explaining how individuals behave and make decisions in various social settings.[4] Their reliance on quantifiable and empirical data made behavioralist scholars study human behavior as it is rather than as it ought to be. In this respect, the purpose of political scientific research was not about introducing values and ethical standards. The goal of political scientists was to produce value-free empirical and objective knowledge about social regularities. Therefore, sampling, interviewing, scoring and scaling, and statistical analysis were the main instruments of research in the 1960s and 1970s.
The impact of behavioralism was not limited to the study of electoral choices. Its arrival into the field of war and conflict happened in the same period.[5] The behavioral study of war acknowledged it as undesirable from early on.[6] Yet, to be entirely abolished from the human agenda, war must be understood fully. Much of this early research agenda, which encompassed both a normative view of war as undesirable and a desire to achieve an extensive definition of war, was referred to as peace research. War was being quantified and studied to achieve peace in the world.[7] Two major quantitative studies of war were developed in this context: the Correlates of War (COW)[8] and the Uppsala Conflict Data Program (UCDP).[9]
Since the end of WWII, over 20 million people (around 3.5 million as battle-related deaths and the remaining 16.5 million as civilians) have died in internal conflicts or civil wars within the borders of states, while around 2 million people have lost their lives during wars between or among states.[10] Among many factors that have contributed to the unprecedented amount of fatalities during internal conflicts, the most striking ones are the change in the nature of insurgencies—they tend to have increasingly deadly technology,[11] and the endurance of armed groups that instigate violent campaigns against their governments..[12] According to the Dangerous Companions Project, among 454 nonstate armed groups that fought against governments in the post-1945 period, almost 60% received some form of military, material, and logistics support from outside states.[13] This means that foreign state support is a significant factor contributing to the endurance of nonstate armed groups as well as increasing duration of conflicts.
It has been almost seventy years since President Truman gave his seminal speech later characterized as the “Truman Doctrine.” The distinction between civil war and international war was meaningless, according to Truman, even if there was a slim chance that civil war would lead to communist insurgent victory and the establishment of communist regimes. In Truman’s view, the U.S. had to fight against “changes in the status quo… by such methods as coercion, or by such subterfuges as political infiltration”.[14] The subsequent years witnessed active U.S. involvement all over the world, to avoid regime change through communist insurgencies by providing military and financial aid to governments fighting against insurgents.
Clearly, external state intervention in internal conflicts was neither under the monopoly of the U.S., nor was it directed against insurgents in every instance. In contrast, frequently, states found themselves providing some form of support to dissidents, rather than governments fighting against domestic dissidents. Nevertheless, most theories and empirical studies of civil war, rebellion, and insurgency focused on domestic political, social and economic conditions in explaining conflict onset. Scholars of international conflict, on the other hand, have ignored nonstate armed actors, privileging states as the major actors shaping world politics.
In the past couple of decades, two major developments have signaled that scholarly thinking about domestic and international conflict should be reinvigorated: 1. there is a reduction of direct inter-state war over time, probably more so in the post-WWII period, and 2. civil wars or ethnic conflicts turn out to be the prevalent form of violence in the post-Cold War period. Furthermore, civil wars tend to last longer and spread across the borders of neighboring states, thus easily transforming into transnational conflicts. These developments require us to think about conflict in a broader sense regardless of its domain to unwrap the causal mechanisms through which interstate relations influence internal conflict dynamics. Only a unified theoretical framework looking at internal conflict through the lenses of interstate conflict and cooperation patterns can provide novel insights for broad questions about why nonstate groups prefer violence over nonviolence and why certain states prefer nonstate armed groups as partners rather than states.
With these in mind, I continue with a sketch of major scholarly works on civil war and explain how I positioned my own research along the lines of foreign state support of nonstate armed groups to bridge the gap in the study of conflict across both domestic and international domains. The following section talks about the Dangerous Companions Project and data collection and coding processes related to this project. The final section makes some recommendations about the development of some theoretical frameworks linking the apparently distinct realms of domestic and international conflict.
2. Time-Series Cross-Sectional Data and the Study of Conflict
The dominant approach to the study of conflict and cooperation in inter-state relations in the post-Cold War period has, till recently, focused on democratic states’ potential to engage in peaceful international relations. Most research about democratic peace produced findings using two major datasets: the Polity Dataset[15] and the Correlates of War Project War Dataset (COW).[16] From the analysis of these datasets, there emerged a scholarly consensus on the negative impact of democracy on inter-state war, although such consensus is missing when it comes to the factors that drive the onset of internal or domestic conflict, such as ethnic rebellion and civil war. The intuitive anticipation related to the role of democracy or democratic institutions in internal conflict is that democratic institutions help mediating conflict among distinct segments of a society. Therefore, democracies should be less likely to experience civil war or internal conflict. Yet, existing research produced mixed results with respect to the effect of regime type on the likelihood of civil war onset.[17] This body of research relied mostly on the UCDP/PRIO Armed Conflict Dataset[18] and the COW civil war data.[19]
Even though a large-N analytical approach was adopted by a significant number of scholars studying conflict across both domains of domestic and international politics, for a long while there has been an intellectual division within conflict studies. This intellectual divide can partly be attributed to the high risk contained in studying conflict under a unified theoretical framework. It is more convenient to study signs of conflict, such as war, terrorism, revolution, and ethnic strife to avoid criticism associated with a holistic approach. The ongoing conflict in Syria, and the intervention by multiple outside states and nonstate actors demonstrate, once again, that internal conflicts are rarely confined to the domestic setting in which they occur. Therefore, we are in need of urgent scholarship that can yield a clear understanding of the intricate dynamics of interactions not only among states, but also between states and non-state armed groups.
Figure 1 displays all actors that were involved in the Syrian conflict in 2015. The green lines indicate the alliance or support ties between outside states and nonstate armed groups as well as among groups and among states. The red lines show the enmity ties similarly. The black circles show the nonstate armed groups’ centrality, i.e. the number of alliance and enmity ties they have with external states and other nonstate armed groups. The green triangles refer to the countries, and their size indicates the number of alliance and enmity ties they share with groups.
Figure 1: Syria, 2015
The Syrian conflict is neither the first nor the only one with so many actors involved. During the Cold War period, external intervention in internal conflicts or support of one of the disputants was shaped primarily by the strategic interests of nation-states—mostly regional or major powers. This has not changed. Indeed, supporting domestic dissidents has evolved into a normal foreign policy practice given that states have increasingly become more reluctant to confront each other by waging direct wars. Whether to achieve domestic regime change, liberate the minorities living under repressive regimes, put an end to atrocities seen in civil wars, or gain leverage over an enemy, states have been motivated to intervene in each other’s internal conflicts either through supporting the government or the opposition side. The type of intervention varies from overt to covert as well as from military to economic and diplomatic support to either side in a conflict, i.e. the government and/or nonstate armed groups.
Foreign state intervention in internal conflict has been serving as a major means through which internal conflicts are internationalized. A considerable amount of work has emphasized the role of outside state support on the onset, evolution and termination of internal conflicts although the role of outside state support on conflict onset is still understudied. We know that outside intervention prolongs civil wars; states are more likely to interfere in internal conflict of others if there is transnational ethnic kin; and states support armed groups due to both strategic and ideational motives.[20]
While the end of the Cold War signaled an end to super power rivalry, as mentioned earlier, the international realm has been plagued with violence emanating from the actions of various types of non-state armed groups; i.e. ethnic and/or religious insurgents, terrorists, and militants. The more intriguing phenomenon has been the ability of these groups to adapt quickly to this new environment, which no longer had the super power patrons conveniently providing resources to them. How do armed groups attract support within the borders of other states? Why do states support rebel groups despite the fact that it might attract retaliation? Why and how did supporting armed groups transform into a foreign policy strategy frequently adopted by states? What are the implications of this transformation for interstate conflict and cooperation?
To answer these questions, I developed the Dangerous Companions Project (nonstatearmedgroups.ku.edu.tr). The project’s output is twofold. On the one hand, it presents a unique cross-sectional time-variant dataset on ideational characteristics, objectives and foreign state supporters of armed groups that have been active in the post-WWII period. It also has information on several types of outside state support, i.e. safe havens, training camps, open offices, funds, and weapons. On the other hand, it includes bibliographic information about the sources used for coding each group included in the dataset. The project’s website, therefore, serves as a reference for the main sources to be utilized for quick information on each rebel group.
I conceptualized the interactions between states and armed groups into two types: 1. governments intentionally provide support to certain groups, and 2. armed groups select certain states to obtain resources from. This second type of interaction is essential for capturing long-term shifts in armed groups’ ability to learn how to acquire resources abroad. This was necessary to cover the cases in which armed groups were not intentionally supported by a given government, but were still able to operate within the borders of a country under that government’s jurisprudence. This approach makes it possible to test some hypotheses that were put forward related to the effect of the end of the Cold War on intervention in civil war. Though the super power rivalry’s termination meant that armed groups would not find the resources they needed readily available, they managed to adapt to the changing interstate environment over time. Therefore, it is essential to trace the causes of foreign state support for rebel groups to the inter-state relations.
2.1. Why collect large-N data?
An analysis of long-term patterns in the interactions of states and armed groups requires going beyond simple case study analysis limited to exploring the mechanisms with a small number of cases. Although case study analysis is significant for uncovering the causal mechanisms at play, it does not allow us to capture broader linkages between inter-state relations and increasing state-rebel group alliances. Initially, I examined three cases: (1) Iran during the Shah period when it enjoyed the support of a very strong ally, the USA, against a very strong Soviet threat; (2) Lebanon during the 1960s wherein there was not much threat facing Lebanon in the first half of the decade, but then the 1967-68 war changed the Lebanese external security environment; and (3) Syria during the 1990s, when it was abandoned by the Arab world in international politics and domestic leadership had a lot of pressures from bureaucrats and public in general to move forward with liberal economic reforms.
The objective of the case study analysis was to develop a grounded theory about the possible mechanisms through which some states choose to support armed groups against some other states. I chose the countries on the basis of three criteria: countries that are engaged in protracted conflicts make it easy to identify perceived adversaries, which are asymmetrically powerful and to control for the degree of threat across cases. Second, I examined countries that vary in their ability of internal mobilization – ability to extract for arms buildup. The third criterion for case selection was to identify countries with various sets of response strategies. My purpose was to determine the variation in ability to achieve internal mobilization and specify a list of potential responses against external threats. These cases were studied for a paper, which was written as part of the requirements of a graduate seminar on qualitative methods.
The table below describes the characteristics of the cases. Every case was part of an enduring rivalry during the relevant period. Therefore, we can argue that there was a high external threat environment during the period. All of the four cases faced an asymmetrically powerful adversary with the exception of Iran between 1970 and 1974. Iran’s catching parity with Iraq was not impossible during that period, yet Iraq had signed an alliance agreement with the Soviet Union in 1972, which led to extensive Soviet export of weapons to the Ba’th regime in Iraq[21]. Therefore, in the first half of the 1970s, it is possible to argue that Iran was facing an asymmetrically powerful rival that was backed by the Soviets. In addition, the Soviet threat was always present for the Shah regime. Furthermore, the Shah regime in Iran faced domestic opposition throughout the 1970s, which resulted in increasing expenditures on arms importation from the United States. There was not an alliance agreement signed between the Shah regime and the United States, but Iran was aligned with the US during the 1970s and the Shah himself was placed in power as a result of a US-backed coup d'état.
The first phase of data included around 125 armed groups, which were active between 1946 and 2001. It was funded by a Dissertation Improvement Grant by the Institute of Governmental Affairs, University of California in 2008. Later, after the completion of my doctoral studies,the broader project including around 450 armed groups was funded by a Marie Curie Reintegration Grant for a four-year period between 2011 and 2015. Throughout the period, during which data collection was completed, several undergraduate and graduate students were trained and employed as coders.[22] The output of the overall project was published in a book by Oxford University Press in 2016.[23]I distinguished between an alliance and alignment. Alignment does not mean a formal agreement among partners that entails helping each other in case of an external attack. Alignment points to sharing similar ideological, strategic, and foreign policy objectives to some extent. In this sense, although Iraq and Syria had close relations during the 1960s and 1970s, it does not mean that the two regimes were allies. After a detailed review of these cases, I developed a coding protocol for defining cooperation between states and armed groups as well as starting to build up a grounded theory to guide the data collection effort.
3. Examining Internal Conflict through the Lens of Interstate Relations
In the post-WWII period, a total of 104 states had to fight against armed groups challenging them for some territorial and/or governmental concessions. Seventy-eight of these states had to fight armed groups, which were supported by foreign states. This corresponds to 75% of all conflict-ridden states. Out of 454 armed groups, that were active in the same period, 234 were supported by foreign states. This means that almost 52% of armed rebel groups were supported by outside states seeking to somehow influence the course of a given internal conflict. A total of 62% of all internal conflicts involved outside interveners in the same period.[24]
The study of internal conflict or domestic contestation has been spread across multiple fields. Since Gurr wrote the famous “Why Men Rebel”, scholarly research has identified individual grievances as the major source of domestic conflict, such as rebellions, ethnic strife and civil war.[25] Indeed, most empirical research assumes individual grievances are automatically aggregated at the group level to give birth to internal conflict. Once violence is experienced, ethnic strife or civil war is the outcome of the frustration leading to the collective expression of the individual grievances. However, the theory of relative deprivation and explanations at the frustration-aggression nexus inadequately clarified how violence was born out of anger. Neither did they explain the conditions under which violence was perceived as a logical instrument to pursue grievances.
To fill this gap, utility-based or rational-actor approaches were adopted. In their prominent work on whether greed, as an indication of utility-driven violence, or grievances leads to civil war, Collier and Hoeffler challenged the conventional wisdom.[26] In line with these approaches, two strands of research have been dominating the study of internal conflict. Frequently applied to the study of ethnic strife, the major source of mobilization for ethnic groups is attributed to the discrimination policies pursued by the majority ethnic group in the domestic realm. On the other hand, those who favor the rational actor approach, argue that individuals occasionally behave to maximize their benefits rather than address their grievances, though it is not difficult to see how the two, utility maximization and addressing grievances, could complement each other or overlap.
What is missing in this overall picture is the role international norms, regulations, and external actors play in convincing a dissatisfied group of individuals that it is conceivable and logical to organize and press for specific claims from political authorities to address the collectively felt grievances. Furthermore, external actors might signal to dissidents whether the use of a specific type of instrument for the expression of grievances is acceptable or not. In other words, the international community can play an effective role at this mobilization stage, when individual grievances are translated into collective action by:
tipping the balance against the dissidents or governments, thus aggravating or alleviating grievances, and
shaping the perception of domestic dissidents and governments about the utility of a certain course of action, i.e. violence vs. nonviolence, or accommodation vs. repression.
Figure 2 provides a visual description of the theoretical framework disaggregated by the actors. My future goal is to develop interdisciplinary and systematic explanations of domestic conflict dynamics as a function of the macro-historical changes in the international system to test hypotheses about the following propositions:
system-level changes in the international environment, including the spreading of liberal norms and institutions, shifting balance of power, and change in power distribution, influence domestic conflict and contestation by providing signals to dissidents about the course of action they should take to pursue their demands from the corresponding governments. For armed groups, these actions might involve violent or nonviolent means and for governments the response could vary between accommodative and repressive measures, and
the dynamics of resistance campaign in one state and the strategies of the opposition groups and the government influence decisions of external (state and non-state) actors about whether to support one of the disputants, which side to support, and the type of support to provide to one’s protégé.
Figure 2: Visualizing the Linkages between Domestic Conflict Dynamics and External Actors
Why do we need such an overarching framework? As mentioned previously, though we have invaluable research on transnational dimensions of civil war, we still lack a consistent and systematic joint scholarly effort to explain the role outside states play in conflict onset and the responses of target governments to rebel groups when there are outside states involved. Nor do we have such scholarship on how foreign state support influences the strategy and objectives of armed rebel groups. In other words, we need to more effectively bring interstate relations into the study of civil war. To do that, we need nuanced data disaggregating the nature of interactions between states and rebel groups.
The causes of civil war or internal conflict seem to be investigated in the limited domain of domestic politics. Key works identify political grievances, economic inequality, and greed-related motives as the major source of internal conflict though there is no consensus on what drives deprived groups to rebel and resort to violence. When they try to bring in foreign state support as an explanation, usually it is treated as a control variable rather than a key explanatory variable. Therefore, most empirical research, till recently, used proxy measurements or variables to capture the effect of this significant control variable.[27] Table 2 presents the empirical framework of four key published works on internal conflict onset and identifies the gaps in knowledge and empirical designs.
The most significant puzzle that inspires the civil war literature is the lack of relationship between ethnic-religious diversity of a country and its predisposition to civil conflict. Scholars intrigued by this puzzle developed systematic explanations for the conditions under which such countries experience conflict. Fearon and Laitin[28] argue that the key determinants of civil war are poverty, political instability, rough terrain and population size. Building on the opportunity explanation of Collier and Hoeffler,[29] they argue that access to resources motivates rebellion only if political institutions fail to translate grievances into policy. While Collier and Hoeffler argue that rebellion is a function of the perceived opportunity to loot resources by rebels, Fearon and Laitin argue that resources motivate rebellion if there is economic inequality to begin with and the state has a weak capacity to govern. Further, they argue that resource-rich states are more likely to end up with weak state institutions since they use such resources to buy the support of domestic public rather than spend them to strengthen their military capacity.
The financially, bureaucratically, and militarily weak states, due to poverty, present rebels with more opportunities to recruit militants and loot resources. According to Fearon and Laitin[30], the evidence shows that poverty increases the likelihood of civil war outbreak. When poverty-related measures (GDP per capita) are controlled for, ethnic and religious diversity or fractionalization are not significant factors to determine whether civil war will be experienced or not. Furthermore, political instability increases rebels’ chances to organize and seek rebellion, thus increasing the likelihood of civil war onset.
When it comes to foreign state support, Fearon and Laitin talk a great deal about foreign support and how it can encourage rebellion and insurgency. Yet they do not test this proposition empirically. The additional empirical tests, not published in the article, include the number of ongoing civil wars in one’s neighborhood, yet they do not yield any significant results. [31] This is surprising given that among the 110 civil war onset cases identified by Fearon and Laitin in the period between 1945 and 1999, 70 were identified to have a foreign state supporter.[32] The challenge remains, though. We do not know if there was any role played by foreign states in instigating violent rebellion before conflict initiates.
Kalyvas and Balcells pointed to the changing technology of rebellion across the Cold War and post-Cold War periods. They demonstrate that, with the end of the Cold War, a significant change occurred in the international system which affected both states’ and rebels’ capacity: the decrease of support from the two superpowers. The change in their capacity affected the way rebels fight. They list three technologies or styles of rebellion. First is conventional civil war, which emerges when the military technologies of states and rebels match. Irregular civil war emerges when the military technologies of the rebels lag behind those of states. And, symmetric nonconventional (SNC) warfare emerges when the military capacity of the state and rebels match at a low level. This latter form is mostly the case when a state lacks capacity.
Their theory about the changing nature of insurgent technology relies on the assumption that material support was in decline in the post-Cold War period in comparison to the Cold War period due to the decline in super powe support. Yet the NAGs Dataset shows that while around 62% of the total years in which there was some type of support to rebel groups, belongs to the Cold War years, the remaining occurred in the post-Cold War era. A comparison of the number of groups that received foreign state support across the two periods reveals that while 49% of all armed groups active during the Cold War period received such support, 53% of groups received such support in the post-Cold War era.[33] If there was a change in the technology of rebellion, it was not due to the decline of foreign state support. One needs to examine the change in the ideology, objectives and nature of such groups to explain the change in the technology of rebellion.
4. The Collection of Data on Relations between States and Nonstate Armed Groups
Scholarly explanation about how the causal mechanism works from foreign support to civil war, has included investigations on the effect of transnational ethnic kin, safe havens across borders, and interstate rivalry.[34] When it comes to the effect of outside intervention on conflict duration and termination, the main explanations focus on whether there are multiple third parties intervening, the interaction among them, on whose side they intervene, and their motivation for intervention. Regan takes the lead in pointing out that it matters if the intervention is biased toward either side of an internal conflict or remains neutral, while Aydin and Regan refine this argument by examining the nature of relations between states intervening in the same conflict.[35] Their finding is similar to that of Balch-Lindsay and Enterline, who conclude that balanced interventions prolong civil wars.[36] Aydin and Regan find that in the case of multiple interveners, intervention on the same side by these interveners can shorten civil wars if they also share similar interests. Thus, this finding goes beyond simply stating that intervention on one side shortens civil wars.
By the same token, Cunningham argues that it is not about whether an intervention is on one side of an internal conflict, but about the intentions of the interveners.[37] Those who have their own agenda prolong civil wars rather than shorten them. Some recent work renews the debate about whether outside interveners influence civil war duration through provision of funds, weapons, and safe havens. Wood examines the effect of foreign support on civilian targeting during civil war while Sawyer, et al. find that states fight rebels longer if rebels receive fungible external resources.[38]
Other bodies of research one can draw on are placed in the study of proxy warfare and promotion of regime change by outside actors.[39] Most of this research focuses on a specific type of intervention, namely overt military intervention, and does not disaggregate the actors involved. This last issue is also present in the extensive literature on external intervention, though less so in the research specifically focusing on external state support of nonstate armed groups.
Especially when there is more than one armed group fighting against a state, it is essential to examine each group and its ties with outside actors to build nuanced explanations about why states prefer supporting one group over the other. While the US and Turkey are both allies of NATO, the US provides arms and funds to the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and People’s Defense Units (YPG) in Syria, which are both considered to be terrorist organizations by Turkey. By the same token, while Russia and the US agree on the fight against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), they disagree on whether to take sides with the Syrian government and Assad regime. Indeed, the US wants regime change, while Russia wants to maintain the rule of the current Syrian regime. These complex interactions can only be captured if we disaggregate internal conflicts to multiple stages and actors involved.
4.1. Conceptualization of foreign state support
Foreign state support takes several forms, such as arms, funds, safe havens, and military equipment. Since such support to armed groups goes usually secret, it is not always easy to find this information. Furthermore, governments might or might not allow rebel groups to operate freely in their borders. The overwhelming belief in the post-Cold War period was that armed groups exploit the weak states, which are unable to control their borders. Yet we know that it is the modus operandi for states to support such groups to achieve foreign policy objectives. Among the 454 groups for which foreign state support was coded in the NAGs Dataset, 203 groups were able to move freely within the borders of many states and raise resources. One hundred fourteen states turned out to be either safe havens for group militants seeking refuge in foreign territories, financial hubs for raising money, or weapons smuggling and transportation points.
I treat states and armed groups as equivalent actors in world politics. When armed groups are offered some support from states, they decide whether or not to accept such support. When armed groups make such decisions, they are mostly concerned with the autonomy of their operations. Since a foreign government aiding or abetting an armed group does not want to lose control over its protégé, groups would carefully choose their state allies to maximize their autonomy of conduct.
To fully capture the complex web of interactions between states and armed groups, I developed a selection model of states and groups. I argue that armed groups, as well as states, choose their allies carefully. State selection occurs when the government of a given state creates channels to support an armed group intentionally. Rebel selection occurs when a rebel group seeks support within the borders of a state without the government or politicians of that state intentionally creating such channels. Rebel selection cases are usually specific to democratic states, which have institutions embedded with liberal norms. The democratic freedoms and liberties built into democratic systems are exploited by armed groups, which are in constant search for resources.[40]
The following example is related to the M-19 Group of Colombia and helps further explain the coding process and the kind of information we looked for when coding foreign state support for armed groups.
State Selection Case of Support: Below is an example of an excerpt that is used from published news resources and media to collect and code information about the M-19 group of Colombia:
In related developments, a former M-19 member claimed the group receives ''suitcases of dollars'' from Cuba and training from Nicaragua.
In an interview with the Cali newspaper Occidente Flor Marina said, ''The M-19 has Cuban, Libyan, Nicaraguan and Peruvian trainers in the mountains.''
''Suitcases of dollars arrive from the outside, especially from Cuba, and are changed in Bogota,'' she said. ''Arms arrive continually from Cuba, Nicaragua, Libya and El Salvador.''
The woman said she escaped from the rebel group after five months. She said she was tricked into joining the group when a friend invited her on a trip to visit his parents.[41]
One of the four Libyan cargo planes detained in Brazil
enroute to Nicaragua was carrying weapons for Colombia's largest guerrilla
group, Colombian Defence Minister Fernando Landazabal said yesterday.
He told reporters the country's security services learned that a U.S.-
built Hercules C-130 was carrying arms for the M-19 group, but the plan
was foiled when a technical fault forced it to land in Manaos, Brazil.
'We were ready to repel the operation,' General Landazabal said. He
added the army had knowledge that the M-19 guerrillas were due to receive
weapons either from Libya or Europe.
…The reports said that the arms shipment was planned to coincide with
the 13th anniversary of the creation of the M-19, best known for the two-
month seizure of the Dominican Embassy in Bogota three years ago.
The M-19 broke an undeclared truce, military sources said, by launching
a dawn attack on Puerto Asis two days ago in which five guerrillas were
killed. There were no casualties among security forces, the sources said.
The newspaper El Tiempo reported on Thursday that M-19's leader, Jaime
Bateman, was recently in Libya, where he met Libyan leader Muammar
Gadaffi. Mr. Bateman told reporters three days ago that he will resume a
kidnap campaign to finance the M-19's activities and has ordered his
guerrillas back into hiding.
…Gen. Landazabal told Radio Caracol that each of the four planes was
carrying 42 guerrillas.
"We are carrying out private investigations to establish if any M-19
guerrillas were included among them," he said.[42]
These news reports provide credible information about possible channels through which M-19 raises resources. When confirming a specific piece of information, the coding protocol required coders to verify the information from at least three different sources.
De Facto Rebel Selection Case of Support: The following is an example of a news report used for coding de facto support, which occurs without the consent of the government of a state within which a group is able to recruit, establish safe havens, and raise funds. The news include information about Free Aceh Movement (GAM)’s use of Thai and Malaysian territories for weapons smuggling and safe haven. Since Thai and Malaysian governments cooperate to catch the smuggled weapons and GAM militants, Thailand and Malaysia are coded as de facto supporters of GAM.
…Thai police are on the lookout for a Free
Aceh Movement (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka or GAM) arms-smuggling syndicate
mastermind who operates on both sides of the Thai-Malaysia border.
They also seek the co-operation of Malaysian police to find and detain
the suspect, an Indonesian citizen.
This follows the discovery that recent seizures of high-powered arms in
this coastal district situated north of the border from Perlis, was headed
for Aceh, north Sumatra.
This year alone, Thai police here have seized four M-79 grenade
launchers, 17 grenades and 36 automatic assault rifles consisting of M-16s
and AK-47s, all headed for the war-torn Indonesian province.
Satun police chief Major-General Prajak Musikasukont said the mastermind
sourced the weapons from Cambodia and was using Satun as a transit point.
"The syndicate has been operating for four years and the mastermind is
always commuting to and fro between southern Thailand and several areas in
Malaysia, including Langkawi, in an effort to evade capture," he said at
the Satun district police headquarters today…[43]
Since a state might turn out to be both an intentional and de facto supporter, it is possible to code the same state for both and specific types of support. Below is a distribution of types of support coded. The first column gives figures in terms of the number of NAGs receiving each form of support. The second column introduces the figures related to each category with respect to the proportion of number of NAGs receiving a specific form of support to the total number of NAGs coded (454). The last column provides the percentage of each type of support to the entire years of support. Since the unit of analysis is triadic, it makes sense to think about it in terms of total number of binary support years.
4.2. Unit of analysis: a triadic analysis of support onset
The theoretical framework I developed proposes an analysis of support onset through the lens of interstate relations. Therefore, I constructed a triadic time-series cross-sectional dataset to capture the effect over time as well as across different cases. A case emerges as soon as a NAG starts to challenge a state for the following objectives: 1- toppling an existing leadership, 2- change of regime type (transition from autocracy to democracy or the reverse regime change), 3- demands for autonomy, 4- secession/territorial demand, and 5- demands for policy change. The state, which is the subject of the NAG’s attack is called the “target”. Ideally, all other states in the world are potential supporters. When coding state support, I treated each state as such. Yet when conducting the empirical analysis in some of my publications, I narrowed down the list of potential supporters for every NAG. This was necessary to handle an unnecessary inflation of zero observations. Figure 3 presents a visualization of the anticipated interactions among a NAG, its target and a state, which I call a “potential supporter”. Support onset is explained through the developments in the interstate environment of targets and potential supporters as well as the interactions between target and potential supporter.
Figure 3: Potential Supporter-NAG-Target State Triad
Potential Supporter: A state is called a potential supporter of a NAG, if it is in the Politically Relevant Group (PRG) of a target state. Most dyadic states of interstate war also adopt a similar strategy. It would not be theoretically intuitive to anticipate a militarized dispute between Somalia and Sweden since they are located so distant from each other. The PRG of a state includes geographically contiguous states, regional powers and major powers. Regional and major powers are included among potential supporters of each NAG since they have some aspirations that stretch over a broader geographical area.[44]
A NAG-target state dyad is then paired with each state in the PRG of a target state for empirical analysis. Using the NAGs dataset, it is possible to identify which of the states in a PRG transformed from potential supporter to actual supporter. Each triad is listed for the entire period during which a NAG survived.
4.3. Data sources, credibility and transparency
The Dangerous Companions Project has a website, on which sources used to code information about foreign state support are publicly shared under the profile of each NAG. This is especially significant to increase transparency in academic research and make information available to public.
Furthermore, to give users a sense of credibility and precision of the information found, a precision variable is coded for each foreign state supporter and each type of support. In order to specify how confident the coder is about the evidence of active support, the variable receives the following scores. Lower scores correspond to higher level of precision, thus higher level of credibility:
1 – The supporter outright stated its intention and/or type of support, and/or the support was officially documented by that state or another.
2 – A reliable journalist, scholar, or media outlet recorded the support and provides convincing evidence and there are other sources that confirm this information.
3 – Support is highly suspected by a reliable source (such as journalist, scholar, or media outlet), but cannot be confirmed by other sources.
4 -- One state accuses another state of supporting a group, but it cannot provide official documentation beyond allegations.
The information is mostly found using the following sources: Lexis-Nexis academic web program, Keesing’s Archives, and published secondary sources, including political science journals, journals focusing on particular regions of the world, books and book chapters. Each coder received training and was given a sample NAG to code to. Afterwards, inter-coder reliability was confirmed. Each coder was given a questionnaire with directions and guidance about how to conduct research on online databases and sources to find and collect the required data. The following keywords were searched in the Lexis-Nexis categories “Major U.S. and World Publications,” “News Wire Services,” and “TV and Radio Broadcast Transcripts” with each group’s name: support, assistance, sponsor, safe haven, sanctuary, training camps, camps arms, weapons, funds, and troops. [45]
The NAGs dataset is unique in terms of the temporal and spatial domain covered as well as the de facto support coding. Several other existing datasets coded third-party interventions in internal conflicts. Cunningham, Gleditsch and Salehyan’s Non-State Actor (NSA)[46], is a dyadic dataset that includes information for each NSA’s military strength and capacity, leadership characteristic, popular support and political linkages as well as external sponsorship. Nevertheless, external state support is not disaggregated. For any kind of support, it is coded as “1”. It also lacks the temporal dimension.
By the same token, UCDP External Support Data codes external supporters that give support to an armed group in a given year for the period between 1975 and 2010. It also codes for different types of support and the type of the external supporter.[47] These data, however, do not go beyond 1975 and are not time-variant. The total number of observations in the external support dataset is around 7,900, whereas the total number of observations in the NAGs Dataset is around 16,000. Furthermore, the NAGs dataset has time-variant information on both objectives and ideational characteristics of groups. If a group shifts its ideology from socialism to liberalism, this is a significant piece of information. Such nuanced data can provide an opportunity to observe how armed groups adopt new globally dominant ideologies from time to time to improve their ability to find foreign supporters. Finally, the literature on outside intervention in internal conflict yielded some data on foreign support of armed groups.[48] Yet they did not disaggregate the actors involved in the same intrastate conflict. It is important to know if country A supports group X, but does not do so for group Y, which are involved in the same conflict fighting against the same state.
5. Data Analysis
The empirical method that I used in the analysis related to the factors determining support onset for rebel groups relied on binary logit analysis with control over temporal dependence. The conventional method of controlling for temporal dependence is the method developed by Beck, Katz, and Tucker.[49] This method generates a variable that counts consecutive years or duration of non-cases. In this particular context, it would mean the consecutive years of no support observations. The idea is to account for time dependence. Given that a state provides support to a NAG in year X, it is more likely to continue its support in year X+1. There is a new method to control for temporal dependence developed by Carter and Signorino.[50] The main difference is that the previous method had cubic splines to capture the main spikes in temporal domain, whose their interpretation was difficult. Regardless, temporal domain has to be controlled for in the analysis of a dataset that contains time-variant information. Empirical analysis in some of my work was also conducted using this new method, yet there was not a significant difference between them and the method, which relies on cubic splines.
6. Conclusion and Future Research
The NAGs dataset is prepared to facilitate further research on the effect of outside states on instigating rebellion and violent conflict within the borders of states. Given that we did not yet collect data to see if outside states somehow foster violent internal conflict, future scholarship might think about theoretical and empirical ways of addressing this question. We have extensive research about the transnational dynamics of internal conflict. Why do states intervene in the conflicts of others? How do they choose their side: government vs. armed group? Figure 4 demonstrates potential gaps in the existing research. We are yet to conduct research about the role of external state support on the choice of strategy by conflicting sides as well as the governance capacity of armed groups.
Figure 4: Future Research Venues
The challenge stems from the difficulty of identifying groups with potential grievances across every state. Most datasets on armed conflict, and the NAGs dataset is not an exception, are biased towards violence. This means that scholarship cannot empirically offer much when it comes to explaining how external states might fuel grievances within a state. Furthermore, the NAGs dataset relies on observational data rather than witness accounts. It uses interviews conducted by reliable news agencies to get primary information about state supporters of armed groups and case study analysis by scholars, yet it still falls short in incorporating a multiplicity of resources. It relies on Western media sources to a great extent, which is problematic at times.
This paper presented a personal history about a scholarly journey spreading across almost a decade. The dataset, which was the outcome of the mentioned project is now extensively used by scholars in Europe and North America. The empirical findings have yielded three articles and a book,[51] and are evidence of the power of using empirical data in a systematic manner. IR scholars in Turkey should adopt the highest standards when it comes to conducting academic research. Mere story-telling or future-guessing do not qualify as scholarly prediction, which must build on expertise in a specific area and empirical data.
*The author discloses the use of BAGEP (Science Academy Young Scientists Award Programme) support for the project, which is subject of this article. She also thanks Merve Keskin and İlayda Bilge Önder for their excellent research assistantship.
[1] Peter Burnham, K. G. Lutz, and W. Grant, Research Methods in Political Science (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 31.
[2] Karl Popper, The Logic of Scientific Discovery (London& New York: Routledge 2002[1959]).
[3] Charles E. Merriam and H. F. Gosnell, Non–Voting, Causes and Methods of Control (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1924).
[4] David Easton, The Political System. An Inquiry into the State of Political Science (New York: Knopf, 1953).
[5] See Jeffrey S. Dixon and M. R. Sarkees, A Guide to Intra–state Wars: An Examination of Civil, Regional, and Intercommunal Wars, 1816–2014 (Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2016), 1–24 for a detailed review of the emergence of behavioral study of war and COW program.
[6] Quincy Wright, Study of War (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964).
[7] Lewis Fry Richardson, Statistics of Deadly Quarrels (Boxwood Press,1960); Gaston Bouthoul, War (New York: Walker,1963); Quincy Wright, Study of War (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1964); Gaston Bouthoul, R. Carrère and G. Köhler, “A List of the 366 Major Armed Conflicts of the Period 1740–1974,” Peace Research 10, no. 3 (1978): 83–108.
[8] Correlates of War (COW), accessed March 2, 2018, http://www.correlatesofwar.org/.
[9] Uppsala Conflict Data Program (UCDP), accessed March 2, 2018, http://ucdp.uu.se/.
[10] Meredith Reid Sarkees and F. Wayman, Resort to War: 1816–2007 (Washington DC, CQ Press, 2010); Dixon and Sarkees, A Guide to Intra–state Wars, 1816–2014.
[11] James A. Piazza, “Is Islamist Terrorism More Dangerous?: An Empirical Study of Group Ideology, Organization, and Goal Structure,” Terrorism and Political Violence 21, no. 1 (2009): 62–88; Stathis N. Kalyvas and L. Balcells, “International System and Technologies of Rebellion: How the End of Cold War Shaped Internal Conflict,” American Political Science Review 104, no. 3 (2010): 415–29.
[12] James D. Fearon, “Civil War and the Current International System,” Daedalus 146, no. 4 (2017): 18–32.
[13] Belgin San-Akca, States in Disguise: Causes of State Support for Rebel Groups (New York, Oxford University Press, 2016). Manuscript submitted for publication.
[14] The Avalon Project, “President Harry S. Truman's Address before a Joint Session of Congress, March 12, 1947,” Yale Law School Lillian Goldman Law Library, http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/trudoc.asp.
[15] Monty G. Marshall and K. Jaggers, “Polity IV Project: Political Regime Characteristics and Transitions, 1800–2007” (Center for Systemic Peace, Vienna, VA, 2009).
[16] Meredith Reid Sarkees and F. Wayman, Resort to War: 1816–2007 (Washington DC, CQ Press, 2010).
[17] Paul Collier and A. Hoeffler, Greed and Grievance in Civil War (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2000); J. D. Fearon and D. D. Laitin, “Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War,” American Political Science Review 97, no. 1 (2003): 75–90; Paul Collier and A. Hoeffler, “Greed and Grievance in Civil War,” Oxford Economic Papers 56 (2004): 563–95. While Fearon and Laitin did not find a significant effect of democracy on conflict onset, Collier and Hoeffler found a significant negative effect of democracy on civil war onset.
[18] Nils Petter Gleditsch, P. Wallensteen, M. Eriksson, M. Sollenberg, and H. Strand, “Armed Conflict 1946–2001: A New Dataset,” Journal of Peace Research 39, no. 5 (2002).: 625–37.
[19] James D. Singer and M. H. Small, “Correlates of War Project: International and Civil War Data, 1816–1992.” ICPSR Study # 9905 (Ann Arbor, MI: ICPSR, 1994). Note that COW civil war data is updated now: Meredith Reid Sarkees and F. Wayman, Resort to War: 1816–2007 (Washington DC: CQ Press, 2010).
[20] David R. Davis and W. H. Moore, “Ethnicity Matters: Transnational Ethnic Alliances and Foreign Policy Behavior,” International Studies Quarterly 41, no. 1 (1997): 171–84; Kristian S. Gleditsch, “Transnational Dimensions of Civil War,” Journal of Peace Research 44, no. 3 (2007): 293–309; David Carment, P. James, and Z. Taydas, “The Internationalization of Ethnic Conflict: State, Society, and Synthesis,” International Studies Review 11, no. 1 (2009): 63–86; Lars-Erik Cederman, L. Girardin, and K. S. Gleditsch, “Ethnonationalist Triads: Assessing the Influence of Kin Groups on Civil Wars,” World Politics 61, no. 3 (2009): 403–37; David E. Cunningham, K. S. Gleditsch, and I. Salehyan, “It Takes Two: A Dyadic Analysis of Civil War Duration and Outcome,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 53, no. 4 (2009): 570–97; Kristin M. Bakke, “Copying and learning from outsiders? Assessing diffusion from transnational insurgents in the Chechen wars, ” in Transnational Dynamics of Civil War, ed. J. Y. Checkel (New York: Cambridge University Press 2013): 31–62, Lars-Erik Cederman, K. S. Gleditsch, I. Salehyan, and J. Wucherpfennig, “Transborder Ethnic Kin and Civil War,” International Organization 67, no. 2 (2013): 389–410; Katherine Sawyer, K. G. Cunningham, and R. Reed, “The Role of External Support in Civil War Termination,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 61, no. 6 (2015): 1174–1202; San-Akca, States in Disguise.
[21] Mark J. Gasiorowski, “Regime Legitimacy and National Security: The Case of Pahlavi Iran,” in National Security in the Third World: The Management of Internal and External Threats, ed. E. E. Azar and C.-in Moon (Cambridge, University of Maryland, 1988), 227–50.
[22] See, Non–State Armed Groups, https://nonstatearmedgroups.ku.edu.tr.
[23] San-Akca, States in Disguise.
[24]Belgin San-Akca, “Dangerous Companions: Cooperation between States and Nonstate Armed Groups,” NAGs Dataset – v.04/2015, https://nonstatearmedgroups.ku.edu.tr/; San-Akca, States in Disguise. These figures were calculated by using the NAGs Dataset.
[25] Ted R. Gurr, Why Men Rebel (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1968).
[26] Collier and Hoeffler, “Greed and Grievance”.
[27] Fearon and Laitin, “Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War”; Collier and Hoeffler, “Greed and Grievance”; Kalyvas and Balcells, “International System and Technologies of Rebellion”.
[28] Fearon and Laitin, “Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War”.
[29] Collier and Hoeffler, Greed and Grievance; Collier and Hoeffler, “Greed and Grievance”.
[31] Additional tables, available at https://web.stanford.edu/group/fearon–research/cgi–bin/wordpress/wp–content/uploads/2013/10/addtabs.pdf, indicate that number of ongoing civil wars in one’s neighborhood in the present or previous year does not have a significant effect on the likelihood of civil war onset (Table 13, p.24).
[32] San-Akca, Dangerous Companions; San-Akca, States in Disguise.
[33] These figures are calculated from San-Akca, NAGs Dataset.
[34] Stephen M. Saideman, “Explaining the International Relations of Secessionist Conflicts: Vulnerability vs. Ethnic Ties,” International Organization 51, no. 4 (1997): 721–53; Stephen M. Saideman, The Ties That Divide: Ethnic Politics, Foreign Policy, and International Conflict (New York, Colombia University Press, 2001); Stephen M. Saideman, “Discrimination in International Relations: Analyzing External Support for Ethnic Groups,” Journal of Peace Research 39, no. 1 (2002): 27–50, Cederman, Girardin and Gleditsch, “Ethnonationalist Triads”; Cederman, Gleditsch, Salehyan and Wucherpfennig, “Transborder Ethnic Kin and Civil War”.
[35] Patrick M. Regan, “Third–Party Interventions and the Duration of Intrastate Conflicts,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 46, no. 1 (2002): 55–73; Aysegul Aydin and P. M. Regan, “Networks of Third–party Interveners and Civil War Duration,” European Journal of International Relations 18, no. 3 (2011): 573–97.
[36] Dylan Balch–Lindsay and A. J. Enterline, “Killing Time: The World Politics of Civil War Duration, 1820–1992,” International Studies Quarterly 44, no. 4 (2000): 615–42.
[37] David E. Cunningham, “Veto Players and Civil War Duration,” American Journal of Political Science 50, no. 4 (2006): 875–92; David Cunningham, “Blocking Resolution: How External States can Prolong Civil War,” Journal of Peace Research 47, no. 2 (2010): 115–27.
[38] Reed M. Wood, “From Loss to Looting? Battlefield Costs and Rebel Incentives for Violence,” International Organization 68, no. 4 (2014): 979–99; Sawyer, Cunningham and Reed, “The Role of External Support”.
[39] Karl W. Deutsch, External Involvement in Internal War. Internal War: Problems and Approaches, ed. H. Eckstein (New York, Free Press, 1964): 100–10; Richard J. Barnett, Intervention and Revolution: America’s Confrontation with Insurgent Movements Around the World (Ontario: New American Library, 1968); Jason Lyall and L. C. I. Wilson, “Rage Against the Machines: Explaining Outcomes in Counterinsurgency Wars,” International Organization 63, no. 1 (2009): 67–106; John Malloy I. Owen, The Clash of Ideas in World Politics: Transnational Networks, States, and Regime Change, 1510–2010 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010).
[40] Belgin San-Akca, “Democracy and Vulnerability: An Exploitation Theory of Democracies by Terrorists,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 58, no. 7 (2014): 1285–310.
[41] R. Barnett, “Guerillas Convene 'Peace Conference',” United Press International, Bogota, Colombia, 1985.
[42] Gerald M. Boyd, “Reagan Accuses Soviet of Aiding Latin Terrorists,” The New York Times, January 3, 1986, 1, column 5, foreign desk.
[43] Sheridan Mahavera, “Border Alert for Arms Mastermind,” New Straits Times, August, 30, 2003. For further details of data coding process and protocol, see San-Akca, States in Disguise, appendix 2, 159–80.
[44] Zeev Maoz and B. D. Mor, “Enduring Rivalries: The Early Years,” International Political Science Review 17, no. 2 (1996): 141–60; Douglas Lemke and W. Reed, “The Relevance of Politically Relevant Dyads,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 45, no. 1 (2001): 126–44; Z. Maoz and B. Russett, “Normative and Structural Causes of Democratic Peace, 1946–1986,” American Political Science Review 87, no. 3 (1993): 624–38. Maoz (1996) and Maoz & Russett (1993) talk extensively about the criteria to identify politically relevant dyads. In addition, Maoz (1996) identifies the pairs of indirectly contiguous states that share a colonial or imperial past. See pp. 122–23 in Maoz (1996) for a detailed explanation of political relevancy. See Lemke and Reed (2001) for a comparison of the statistical results for conflict analysis by using all the dyads in the world and politically relevant dyads. They conclude that there are not significant differences across findings, and using politically relevant dyads makes statistical research with a large population of cases manageable.
[45] Detailed coding rules are published in San-Akca, States in Disguise, 174–75. There might be some overlaps between the corresponding sections of the book and the coding procedures outlined here.
[46] David E. Cunningham, K. S. Gleditsch, and I. Salehyan, Non–State Actor Data – Version 3.3., 2009.
[47] Stina Högbladh, T. Pettersson, and L. Themnér, “External Support in Armed Conflict 1975–2009” (paper presented at the 52nd Annual International Studies Association Convention. Montreal, Canada, 2011).
[48] Patrick M. Regan, “Conditions of Successful Third–Party Intervention in Intrastate Conflicts,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 40, no. 2 (1996): 336–59; Aydin and Regan, “Networks of Third–party Interveners”.
[49] Nathaniel Beck, J. N. Katz, and R. Tucker, “Taking Time Seriously,” American Journal of Political Science 42, no. 4 (1998): 1260–88.
[50] David B. Carter and C. S. Signorino, “Back to the Future: Modeling Time Dependence in Binary Data,” Political Analysis 18, no. 3 (2010): 271–92.
[51] Belgin San Akca, “Supporting Non–State Armed Groups: A Resort to Illegality,” Journal of Strategic Studies 32, no. 4 (2009): 589–613; Zeev Maoz and B. San-Akca, “Rivalry and State Support for Non–state Armed Groups (NAGs),” International Studies Quarterly 56, no. 4 (2012): 720–34; San-Akca, “Democracy and Vulnerability; San-Akca, States in Disguise.
Aydin, Aysegul, and P. M. Regan. “Networks of Third–party Interveners and Civil War Duration.” European Journal of International Relations 18, no. 3 (2011): 573–97.
Bakke, Kristin M. “Copying and Learning From Outsiders? Assessing Diffusion from Transnational Insurgents in the Chechen Wars.” In Transnational Dynamics of Civil War, edited by J. Y. Checkel, 31–62. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2013.
Balch–Lindsay, Dylan, and A. J. Enterline. “Killing Time: The World Politics of Civil War Duration, 1820–1992.” International Studies Quarterly 44, no. 4 (2000): 615–42.
Barnett, R. “Guerillas Convene 'Peace Conference'.” United Press International, Bogota, Colombia, 1985.
Barnett, Richard J. Intervention and Revolution: America’s Confrontation with Insurgent Movements around the World. Ontario: New American Library, 1968.
Beck, Nathaniel, J. N. Katz, and R. Tucker. “Taking Time Seriously.” American Journal of Political Science 42, no. 4 (1998): 1260–88.
Bouthoul, Gaston. War. New York: Walker, 1963.
Bouthoul, Gaston, R. Carrère, and G. Köhler. “A List of the 366 Major Armed Conflicts of the Period 1740–1974.” Peace Research 10, no. 3 (1978): 83–108.
Boyd, Gerald M. “Reagan Accuses Soviet of Aiding Latin Terrorists.” The New York Times, January 3, 1986.
Burnham, Peter, K. G. Lutz, and W. Grant. Research Methods in Political Science. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.
Carment, David, P. James, and Z. Taydas. “The Internationalization of Ethnic Conflict: State, Society, and Synthesis.” International Studies Review 11, no. 1 (2009): 63–86.
Carter, David B., and C. S. Signorino. “Back to the Future: Modeling Time Dependence in Binary Data.” Political Analysis 18, no. 3 (2010): 271–92.
Cederman, Lars-Erik, L. Girardin, and K. S. Gleditsch. “Ethnonationalist Triads: Assessing the Influence of Kin Groups on Civil Wars.” World Politics 61, no. 3 (2009): 403–37.
Cederman, Lars-Erik, K. S. Gleditsch, I. Salehyan, and J. Wucherpfennig. “Transborder Ethnic Kin and Civil War.” International Organization 67, no. 2 (2013): 389–410.
Collier, Paul, and A. Hoeffler. Greed and Grievance in Civil War. Washington, DC: World Bank, 2000.
———. “Greed and Grievance in Civil War.” Oxford Economic Papers 56, no. 4 (2004): 563–95.
Cunningham, David. “Blocking Resolution: How External States can Prolong Civil War.” Journal of Peace Research 47, no. 2 (2010): 115–27.
———. “Veto Players and Civil War Duration.” American Journal of Political Science 50, no. 4 (2006): 875–92.
Cunningham, David E., K. S. Gleditsch, and I. Salehyan. “It Takes Two: A Dyadic Analysis of Civil War Duration and Outcome.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 53, no. 4 (2009): 570–97.
———. Non–State Actor Data – Version 3.3., 2009.
Davis, David R., and W. H. Moore. “Ethnicity Matters: Transnational Ethnic Alliances and Foreign Policy Behavior.” International Studies Quarterly 41, no. 1 (1997): 171–84.
Deutsch, Karl W. “External Involvement in Internal War.” In Internal War: Problems and Approaches edited by H. Eckstein, 100–10. New York: Free Press, 1964.
Dixon, Jeffrey S., and M. R. Sarkees. A Guide to Intra–state Wars: An Examination of Civil, Regional, and Intercommunal Wars, 1816–2014. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press, 2016.
Easton, David. The Political System. An Inquiry into the State of Political Science. New York: Knopf, 1953.
Fearon, James D. “Civil War and the Current International System.” Daedalus 146, no. 4 (2017): 18–32.
Fearon, James D., and D. D. Laitin. “Ethnicity, Insurgency, and Civil War.” American Political Science Review 97, no. 1: 75–90.
Gasiorowski, Mark J. “Regime Legitimacy and National Security: The Case of Pahlavi Iran.” In National Security in the Third World: The Management of Internal and External Threats, edited by E. E. Azar and C.-in Moon, 227–50. Cambridge, University of Maryland, 1988.
Gleditsch, Kristian S. “Transnational Dimensions of Civil War.” Journal of Peace Research 44, no. 3 (2007): 293–309.
Gleditsch, Nils Petter, P. Wallensteen, M. Eriksson, M. Sollenberg, and H. Strand. “Armed Conflict 1946–2001: A New Dataset.” Journal of Peace Research 39, no. 5 (2002): 625–37.
Gurr, Ted R. Why Men Rebel. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1968.
Högbladh, Stina, T. Pettersson, and L. Themné. “External Support in Armed Conflict 1975–2009.” Paper presented at the 52nd Annual International Studies Association Convention, Montreal, Canada, 2011.
Kalyvas, Stathis N., and L. Balcells. “International System and Technologies of Rebellion: How the End of Cold War Shaped Internal Conflict.” American Political Science Review 104, no. 3 (2010): 415–29.
Lemke, Douglas, and W. Reed. “The Relevance of Politically Relevant Dyads.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 45, no. 1 (2001): 126–44.
Lyall, Jason, and L. C. I. Wilson. “Rage against the Machines: Explaining Outcomes in Counterinsurgency Wars.” International Organization 63, no. 1 (2009): 67–106.
Mahavera, Sheridan. “Border Alert for Arms Mastermind.” New Straits Times, August, 30, 2003.
Maoz, Zeev, and B. D. Mor. “Enduring Rivalries: The Early Years.” International Political Science Review 17, no. 2 (1996): 141–60.
Maoz, Zeev, and B. Russett. “Normative and Structural Causes of Democratic Peace, 1946–1986.” American Political Science Review 87, no. 3 (1993): 624–38.
Maoz, Zeev, and B. San–Akca. “Rivalry and State Support for Non–state Armed Groups (NAGs).” International Studies Quarterly 56, no. 4 (2012): 720–34.
Marshall, Monty G., and K. Jaggers. “Polity IV Project:Political Regime Characteristics and Transitions, 1800–2007.” Center for Systemic Peace, Vienna, VA, 2009.
Merriam, Charles E., and H. F. Gosnell. Non–Voting, Causes and Methods of Control. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1924.
Owen, John Malloy I. The Clash of Ideas in World Politics: Transnational Networks, States, and Regime Change, 1510–2010. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010.
Piazza, James A. “Is Islamist Terrorism More Dangerous?: An Empirical Study of Group Ideology, Organization, and Goal Structure.” Terrorism and Political Violence 21, no. 1 (2009): 62–88.
Popper, Karl. The Logic of Scientific Discovery. Routledge Classics, 2002[1959].
Regan, Patrick M. “Conditions of Successful Third–Party Intervention in Intrastate Conflicts.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 40, no. 2 (1996): 336–59.
———. “Third-Party Interventions and the Duration of Intrastate Conflicts.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 46, no. 1 (2002): 55–73.
Richardson, Lewis Fry. Statistics of Deadly Quarrels. Boxwood Press, 1960.
Saideman, Stephen M. “Discrimination in International Relations: Analyzing External Support for Ethnic Groups.” Journal of Peace Research 39, no. 1 (2002): 27–50.
———. “Explaining the International Relations of Secessionist Conflicts: Vulnerability vs. Ethnic Ties.” International Organization 51, no. 4 (1997): 721–53.
———. The Ties That Divide: Ethnic Politics, Foreign Policy, and International Conflict. New York: Colombia University Press, 2001.
San-Akca, Belgin. “Dangerous Companions: Cooperation between States and Nonstate Armed Groups.” NAGs Dataset v.04/2015. Koç University, Istanbul, April 2015. nonstatearmedgroups.ku.edu.tr.
———. “Democracy and Vulnerability: An Exploitation Theory of Democracies by Terrorists.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 58, no. 7 (2014): 1285–310.
———. States in Disguise: Causes of State Support for Rebel Groups. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016.
———. “Supporting Non–State Armed Groups: A Resort to Illegality?” Journal of Strategic Studies 32, no. 4 (2009): 589–613.
Sarkees, Meredith Reid, and F. Wayman. Resort to War: 1816–2007. Washington DC: CQ Press, 2010.
Sawyer, Katherine, K. G. Cunningham, and R. Reed. “The Role of External Support in Civil War Termination.” Journal of Conflict Resolution 59 (2015): 1–29.
Singer, J. David, and M. H. Small. “Correlates of War Project: International and Civil War Data, 1816–1992.” ICPSR Study # 9905. Ann Arbor, MI: ICPSR, 1994.
Wood, Reed M. “From Loss to Looting? Battlefield Costs and Rebel Incentives for Violence.” International Organization 68, no. 4 (2014): 979–99.
Wright, Quincy. Study of War. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964.
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Schneider Electric President Systems > Schneider Electric President Systems Ltd > About Us
In the Middle East region, APW President Systems has established a large sales and marketing distribution network, starting in 2002. The network now covers Dubai, Oman, Lebanon, Egypt and Kuwait. Currently, the company serves over 200 customers across the region.
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The Company is backed by an Engineering Resources Center (ERC) which provides design and engineering facilities supported by Pro-E, and other design tools, for designing its products.
With a total of 1,65,500 sq ft of fully-equipped modern manufacturing space, the Company has the capacity to make up to 60,000 Enclosures, 70,000 Card Frames and 30,000 Instrument Cases each year.
The manufacturing facilities include state-of-the-art CNC Turret Presses, Press Brakes, Robotic welding, and the latest Powder Coating Plant, which includes a conveyorised environment-friendly spray pre-treatment process, and a fully automated Powder Coating system. All operations are controlled in-house through a full-fledged Computer Aided Manufacturing system.
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The President brand has been established in many countries, including the Middle East, Australia, USA, Singapore, UK, France, Italy, Poland, Netherlands, Germany and China.
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Brandon Garbot
BRANDON GARBOT has appeared in solo and chamber performances in venues including Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall, Severance Hall, the Kennedy Center, and in Tainan, Taiwan. He has appeared as soloist with the Oregon Symphony, Jefferson Symphony, Meridian Symphony, Portland Columbia Symphony, Olympia Symphony, Newport Symphony, Salem Chamber Orchestra, Brevard Music Center Orchestra, and the Cleveland Orchestra Youth Orchestra.
Mr. Garbot is a substitute violinist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, guest musician with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, and has served as concertmaster of the New York String Orchestra and as a concertmaster of the Academy Festival Orchestra at the Music Academy of the West. As a chamber musician, he has collaborated with members of Eighth Blackbird, Theodore Arm, Hsin-Yun Huang, Paul Katz, Richard O’Neill, Steven Tenenbom, Jason Vieaux, and composer/electric guitarist Steven Mackey. He has been invited to perform at festivals including Chamber Music Northwest, Festival Mozaic, the Taos School of Music, Music Academy of the West, Music from Angel Fire, the Perlman Music Program and was chosen to participate in the inaugural Chamber Music Encounters of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center .
Mr. Garbot’s performances have been featured on APM’s Performance Today and WHYY’s On Stage at Curtis. Brandon Garbot is a student of violinist Ida Kavafian and Arnold Steinhardt at the Curtis Institute of Music and he received a Young Artist Diploma from the Cleveland Institute of Music, where he was a student of William Preucil. He has also studied with Itzhak Perlman and Catherine Cho at the Perlman Music Program.
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Q. I know you're disappointed you didn't get a higher finish. But what was it like getting a close‑up look at history today?
TONY FINAU: It was great. Not the ending that I wanted. But a handful of years ago I don't know a lot of people believed that Tiger would win another major. From what I saw today obviously he's not going anywhere anytime soon and congrats to him on his 15th major.
Q. You hung in there early and as you're playing you're throwing stuff at him, everybody is throwing stuff at him, what did you see from him and how did that affect your game?
TONY FINAU: Yeah, I mean I don't know if it affected my game or anything. For me 12 was the turning point. He hit the green and I hit it in the water when Francesco had hit it in the water. I knew from then on I pretty much had a chance to make something happen. I missed an eagle on 15. Had a birdie look on 17. Had a birdie look on 14. So I still could have made something happen coming down the stretch. But 12 was kind of the big swing. And unfortunately I hit it in the water and Tiger hit it on the green and that was kind of‑‑ he rolled that all the way in.
For me it was fun being a part of the action. And it's a lot of fun to be in that type of atmosphere. It's what I practice for, what I play for, what I train for. My time is coming. I know it is. And I've just got to keep riding the storm.
Q. Your little guy was here, but he probably doesn't understand what happened. What will you tell him when he's old enough to understands?
TONY FINAU: I'll tell him I was there when Tiger won his 15th major in the final group. You can't say enough about Tiger and what he's done for the game. It's great for him to be involved in the game and now he's got his 15th major. He's going to be a force to be reckoned with these next few years, I'm sure.
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Volume 25, Issue 4, Winter 2007
Protecting Mexico’s Corn
Bats help keep the pests at bay
By Leonardo J. López-Damián
Corn is the heart and soul of Mexico’s agriculture. It accounts for more than 60 percent of the nation’s total agricultural output and 62 percent of its cultivated land. Up to 18 million people – some 17 percent of Mexico’s population – depend on corn production for their livelihood. And bats help them do it.
Mexican free-tailed bats (Tadarida brasiliensis) make a major contribution to protecting these all-important corn crops from insect damage. That fact, however, is almost completely unknown to most farmers in Mexico, where bats face a wide array of perils. Although bats are invaluable to ecosystems and human economies, they are often persecuted because of needless fears born of myths and misinformation. Accurate information confirmed by scientific investigation can be a powerful tool in promoting bat conservation.
Under the direction of National Autonomous University of Mexico Professor Rodrigo Medellín, who heads the Program for Conservation of Mexican Bats (PCMM), I am conducting the first systematic study of the diet of Mexican free-tailed bats in Mexico. PCMM and its parent, BIOCONCIENCIA, which promotes conservation throughout Mexico, are sponsoring the study, which is designed to document the freetails’ role in reducing corn pests. This project is supported in part by a BCI Student Research Scholarship funded by the U.S. Forest Service International Programs.
Among the most damaging pests of Mexico’s corn crops are two insects: corn earworm (also known as cotton bollworm) moths (Helicoverpa zea) during summertime in northern Mexico, and fall armyworm moths (Spodoptera frugiperda) during winter months in the south. The larvae of these moths cause enormous destruction to corn plants and ears. Both moths are active primarily at night, and bats are primary predators of night-flying insects.
Both moths are also major crop pests in the south-central United States, where bats’ economic values are well documented and many farmers, especially Texas cotton growers, have learned the lesson. Close to 100 million Mexican free-tailed bats spend their summers in caves, bridges and tunnels of Central Texas. Each bat can eat roughly two-thirds of its body weight in insects every night for a remarkable total of roughly 1,000 tons of insects nightly.
In 2006, an interdisciplinary research project concluded that the pest-reduction services of Mexican free-tailed bats in south-central Texas are worth an average of about $740,000 a year to cotton farmers whose annual harvest is valued at about $6 million.
But what is the bats’ impact in Mexico? To find out, we decided to document the freetails’ diet and how it changes across the nation. Millions of these bats spend winters in central and southern Mexico, then migrate to northern Mexico and the southwestern United States each spring. The bats’ geographical and seasonal distribution coincides with the activity of the two major insect pests over cornfields, so bats obviously prey heavily on the moths. Our task was to document that and convince people of the direct economic value of protecting these bats.
We worked in three caves, each home to about 1 million Mexican free-tailed bats: La Boca Cave in northern Mexico; El Salitre Cave in central Mexico; and in the south, San Francisco Cave in the state of Chiapas.
We visited each cave once a month for more than a year, capturing bats as they returned from their nightly foraging. Even now, whenever we approach one of the sites, we are awestruck by the thick stream of bats emerging from the depths, their darting bodies and flapping wings silhouetted against the twilight sky. It takes up to an hour for these thousands upon thousands of bats – each one a voracious hunter of insects – to fly out of their roost.
We captured more than 1,500 Mexican free-tailed bats returning from their foraging bouts, and obtained nearly 900 samples for dietary analysis. Insect identification requires careful comparison of various pieces with pictures and descriptions of insects in the scientific literature, as in a complex jigsaw puzzle.
Our results showed a very diverse diet. Among bats from all three caves, we identified insect parts from 40 insect families that represented 15 orders. Major food items were moths, small beetles and true bugs, such as stinkbugs and seed bugs.
At La Boca and El Salitre, where Mexican freetails are largely absent during winter months, the diet is dominated by moths from July to September. This is right after adult flying moths begin to emerge from cornfields in June. In San Francisco Cave in the south, where freetails are found year-round, moth consumption peaks from January to March and again from August to December. This coincides with moth emergences from cornfields in the region.
Bats are clearly taking advantage of this abundant food supply and feeding heavily on moths that wreak so much destruction on Mexico’s most important crop. The order Lepidoptera (moths and butterflies) accounted for approximately 63 percent of total volume of the Mexican free-tailed bat diet in our samples from all three caves. Our next step is DNA analysis of a subset of fecal samples to document the bats’ consumption of specific crop pests.
BCI and PCMM have worked to protect these and other bat caves in Mexico for more than 12 years. The bat colonies in this study present complex challenges that require long-term commitment. For example, San Francisco Cave is being used as a drainage for local wastewater. We have been working for three years to convince the local government of the health risk, and La Trinitaria Municipality has begun work on a recovery plan that is to include a water-treatment plant.
We hope research such as ours may stimulate these and other conservation projects in Mexico. Efforts to protect bats must be solidly based on strong science, knowledge of local conditions and cooperation with the local people. Our goal is to provide clear and convincing evidence of bats’ exceptional values and help people appreciate the economic payoff of protecting these bats and their habitats. Such knowledge can go a very long way toward building a consensus on bat conservation in Mexico and around the world.
LEONARDO J. LÓPEZ-DAMIÁN is a graduate student in biology at the Institute of Ecology of the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
You can help Bat Conservation International encourage promising students like Leonardo López-Damián to conduct important research around the world. Contact development@batcon.org to support the BCI Student Research Scholarship Program.
Bats, Kangaroos and Glow Worms
Helping Nature provide hollow trees for forest bats
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Tag Archives: autism
Grandmothers speak, autism not so much
Posted on May 27, 2017 by itlandm
Even when autism speaks, people don’t understand it…
There is reason to think that the human race did not really come into its own until the evolution of the grandmother. I do not know which came first, speech or grandparents, but the two go particularly well together, and the combination made our ancestors superior to every other creature under the sky, including other human races.
But before we travel into the deep past where fossils lie, let me take a quick stop by my old grandmother. She once told me that she believed her son, my uncle, was brain damaged due to the long and hard birth. He was not her firstborn, in fact there were two girls before him and two after him. But unlike them, he never learned to talk, and whenever I saw him he was simply sitting there rocking back and forth. I grew up thinking he was an idiot. Much later I realized he was almost certainly autistic. And even much later I realized that most likely so was I. A surprising trait often seen in autistic children is that their brain grows faster during their first three years, and in some cases this starts before birth. That would explain the hard birth of my uncle. There is no significant difference is adult brain size though. This implies that if autistic people were a separate race, they would mature faster than mainstream humans, at least in some aspects. But what if autistic people once was a separate race? A race of humans without grandmothers? Let me tell you why that makes sense.
We do not know how long humans have been talking. Some think it was related to the sudden spread of humankind all over the world, and the appearance of advanced weapons and art. In old books this is often described as happening as late as 40 000 years ago. This date has been pushed backward with ever new discoveries, which imply that African humans were universally making elaborate weapons and tools at least 65 000 years ago, and there are signs of elaborate tools in some places much earlier. In other places in Africa there are signs of trade (tools made from stone that only exists far away) and symbolic art. Then again, it seems that Neanderthals also had simple art, cared for sick family members, and even sometimes buried them with flowers. This implies symbolic thinking, which is usually associated with speech.
Recent reconstructions of Neanderthal throat and head show that they were physically capable of speech, although not with the same sounds that we use, and they would sound strange to us. The common ancestor of Neanderthals and modern humans lived half a million years ago, probably a couple hundred thousand years longer than that again. This is attested not only by the fossil record but also the genome, which has been sequenced. If the common ancestor of Neanderthals and African humans was capable of some degree of speech, maybe that was not the magic ingredient after all. Perhaps our ancestors knew how to speak, but only spoke about boring things for hundreds of thousands of years. “Groo kill deer.” “Groo eat now.” “Groo want mate.” Half a million years of Facebook posts, until Heaven had mercy and let creativity descend on humankind.
Be that as it may, advanced speech made grandparents very valuable. Even when you were too brittle to hunt down animals, you still knew where they lived and what they did, because you had decades of hunting experience. You could tell the grandkids all about it so the first time they set out to hunt, they knew exactly what to expect. You could also tell them where to find edible plants, and not least how to avoid the poisonous ones. Suddenly a long childhood wasn’t such a terrible waste of time, because the elders of the tribe basically functioned as a school and a library, teaching you everything you needed to know and a lot you didn’t.
Humans are not entirely unique in having grandparents live to an old age, but it is pretty rare. Elephants have them too, but they tend to stay strong and healthy longer and lead the family. (Elephant blood was recently found to contain some kind of chemical that can overcome infections that antibiotics can’t. Hopefully we will find out what it is before the last of them is killed by poachers.) But the rule of thumb is that parents die pretty soon after they are no longer needed for their own children. Fish and squids basically give up on life once their eggs are hatched, if not before. Mammals need to be around a while to provide milk and protect their young, but that’s it: Menopause is quickly followed by death. Humans, on the other side, live a lot longer, often enough to see their grandchildren grow up unless some unfortunate event occurs. This makes perfect sense given their role as teachers. Only when dementia sets in do they wander off in the night and die in the snow or get lost in the jungle.
I don’t know the family structure of Neanderthals, but recent research does not really support the theory that autism comes from Neanderthal genes. It is a bit early to say, but autism seems to be common enough among African-Americans. Admittedly slave owners tended to take sexual liberties with their women slaves, so Neanderthal genes could have come in that way, but there should still be noticeably less of them. It is hard to say how common autism is in African countries, because very few black African countries have enough health care resources to deal with more than the most acute threats to life and limb. This is improving rapidly in the most peaceful countries, though, so we might soon find out how the status is with autism in Africa.
But a more likely hypothesis is that autism has been with us much longer, and may have been inherited from the common ancestor of humans and Neanderthals, Homo Heidelbergensis. While the early Heidelberger man had smaller brains than most of us today, a later variant of the species was visibly larger than modern man both in body and brain. We don’t know the timing of the life cycle of this race, but it seems that Neanderthal children had an early growth spurt which implies that they matured faster than their African cousins. Sounds familiar? It should.
In a world where speech was less important, if it existed at all, you needed to grow your brain quickly, you needed to observe details so you could do the same things you saw your parents do, without them explaining it to you. Being autistic would not be a big deal in that kind of human life. It might even be the default. And with your large brain came acute senses: Being able to hear sounds that modern humans don’t notice, register small changes in the light or details in touch or taste. All of them abilities that are common on the autism spectrum.
But at this point we are well within the realm of speculation. There is no proof or even widespread belief that autism is something we have carried with us from interbreeding with an older race of humans. The common view, I think, is that it appeared as some kind of mutation very long ago. Whatever the case, autism has been preserved in the human race for tens of thousands of years at the very least, since it is found across the world. The reason why it was preserved is surely that it has some positive survival value. Probably not in high dose, as in my low-functioning autistic uncle. I doubt he would have lived long on his own. But take a small dash of autism mixed with the normal non-autistic human, and you get someone with unusual abilities. Perhaps unusual disabilities too, so we don’t usually qualify as supermen. But having that one person who notices an unusual sound before the rest of the tribe? That can be a big help that one time when there is an attack by an enemy tribe or a dangerous beast. And the high-functioning autistic tend to have higher intelligence than the average, possibly because of combining two slightly different sets of brain genes.
Eurasian people do after all still carry around about 2% Neanderthal genes, not a lot but still noticeable. These genes do cause some trouble (like autoimmune diseases) but also add a larger arsenal to our immune system to face new pathogens. It is not unthinkable that we may carry genes from even further back, genes that are not present in everyone but that are needed for humanity as a whole to function at its best. It would be a shame if organizations like “Autiism Speaks” (surely that must be meant ironically) succeed in eliminating autism completely from the world. Because that would not just make people like my uncle disappear, but also my grandmother and me.
Posted in human mind, science | Tagged autism, Neanderthals | 3 Replies
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More Than You Wanted to Know about What I’m Up to Now and What’s Next
by Bella DePaulo | Mar 1, 2015 | Uncategorized | 0 comments
I haven’t posted an update in a while, so making up for all that elapsed time, here is more than you ever wanted to know about what I’m up to now and what I’m planning to do next.
There are 7 sections:
The latest on How We Live Now
New Collection – Marriage vs. Single Life: How Science and the Media Got It So Wrong – and a Stand-Alone Chapter from It
Kindle Countdown Deals on Amazon
More Translations of More of My Books
Coming Soon: Courses on Udemy
My Next Collection: Family in the Lives of Single People
The Next Book of Original Research and Writing
1. The latest on How We Live Now
As many of you already know, I have been working for years on a book that will not be published until August 25, 2015. For How We Live Now: Redefining Home and Family in the 21st Century. For that book, I traveled around the country interviewing people in their homes about their innovative lifespaces and how they found their place, their space, and their people. It was a huge undertaking, and my editors and I are still going through the process of copy-editing, proofreading, and soon, getting early copies out to people in the media and other interested parties. A few days ago, we got our first international offer. Random House will be publishing it as part of their Korean list. (The English language version of How We Live Now is published by Beyond Words/Atria, a partner imprint of Simon & Schuster.)
One of the downsides of traditional publishing is that I had to sign a contract promising not to publishing any new (previously unpublished) work until 6 months after How We Live Now is published, so not until the end of February 2016. That’s an entire year from now!
What I can do, though, is to put together collections of articles and chapters I wrote previously. Because I have been writing chapters for scholarly books as well as articles for other popular publications in addition to my blogging (mostly at my Living Single blog at Psychology Today and my Single at Heart blog at Psych Central), there is actually quite a lot of material I can work with.
2. New Collection – Marriage vs. Single Life: How Science and the Media Got It So Wrong – and a Stand-Alone Chapter from It
When I write chapters for scholarly books, I can’t include them in my own collections for a year or so (depending on the contract) and in the meantime, it is difficult for anyone to access those chapters because academic volumes tend to be very expensive. Happily, two of those chapters have just become available to me to include in my own collections, and one of them is in a book I just published. On the publishing platform I used, Amazon sets a minimal price for both the e-book and paperback editions, but within those constraints, I’ve made the book very affordable.
The new collection is called Marriage vs. Single Life: How Science and the Media Got It So Wrong. It begins with one of those two chapters I just mentioned. “Living single: Lightening up those dark, dopey myths” originally appeared in the volume The Dark Side of Personal Relationships II, edited by Cupach and Spitzberg. My chapter begins like this:
When I was invited to write this chapter on living single for this new Dark Side volume, I was both honored and offended. Honored, because the Dark Side series is terrific. What self-respecting relationships scholar does not have a few volumes adorning a bookshelf? Offended, because how dare anyone suggest that the topic of living single belongs with other writings on ominous relationship topics such as rejection, narcissism, in-laws, aggression, and interpersonal violence?
I went back and forth with the editors, and they assured me that they did not mean to disparage singles. When they also quickly agreed to allow me to craft my own snarky subtitle, “Lightening up those dark, dopey myths,” I agreed, too.
I consider the second chapter in Marriage vs. Single Life to be a very substantial contribution to our knowledge and thinking about whether getting married really does transform people, making them happier, healthier, more connected with other people, and more likely to live longer (among other claims) than when they were single. Every time a new claim like that is catapulted all over the media, I look at the original research report, and invariably find that the claims are grossly exaggerated or just plain wrong.
I have been doing this for more than a decade. But over the past few years, some very important articles have been published that are consistent with what I’ve been saying all along. For example, there is a longitudinal study that assessed many kinds of outcomes (such as happiness, health, social ties, and self-esteem) and included the appropriate statistical analyses – a true rarity. Another is a statistical review of 18 studies of the implications of getting married for happiness and life satisfaction.
With these new contributions to the science of marriage and single life, I was able to write what I believe to be the strongest, most powerful challenge to the claims that getting married causes people to become happier and healthier and have more ties to other people and live longer and all the rest. I wrote a thorough, thoughtful, no-holds-barred article on the topic. That is the second chapter in Marriage vs. Single Life. The collection also includes 39 other shorter chapters, mostly blog posts from “Living Single” and “Single at Heart.” They are articles in which I debunked individual studies in more detail and discussed what the relevant research really does show and what it all means.
Because I think the second chapter of Marriage vs. Single Life is so important, I also published it separately in a very brief book, The Science of Marriage: What We Know That Just Isn’t So. That book includes just that article, “No study has ever shown that getting married makes people happier or healthier – and no study ever will,” and a brief introduction describing its history. (Short version: I originally submitted it to an academic journal. That did not go well. The editor and reviewers wanted me to delete some of my strongest arguments, water down most of the rest, and add some stuff about how wonderful marriage can be. They also wanted me to tone down my writing, to be careful not to hurt the feelings of researchers who have made many of the bogus claims about how marriage makes people happier and healthier. There was no expression of concern for the millions of single people inappropriately denigrated by false claims. So I declined, and decided to publish this paper on my own, so I could say exactly what I wanted to say, in the way I wanted to say it.)
I want the word to get out, so I made The Science of Marriage: What We Know That Just Isn’t So very affordable, within the constraints of what Amazon would allow. But if there is anyone who would like to read it and who does not want to pay anything at all to do so, just let me know and I’ll send you a pdf for free.
I think that debunking the myth that getting married makes people happier and healthier and better off in all sorts of ways is a tremendously important task. Those myths are taken as facts in our culture. They are perpetrated by celebrity scholars and authors, such as Dan Gilbert and Dan Buettner. The claims are referenced as facts in influential court decisions. Programs and organizations and books and campaigns have been built around the assumption that getting married truly is psychologically and interpersonally transformative. Perhaps even more significantly, these presumptions have contributed to the stigmatizing and shaming of millions of single people. Singles are told that their lives are second rate, and those claims come wrapped in the sheen of science. Some take those claims to heart. I know because I have been hearing from them, personally, for more than a decade. The social scientists making these claims and the reporters transcribing them need to be challenged. I am going to do so as forcefully as I know how.
3. Kindle Countdown Deals on Amazon
For books I’ve published using the Amazon platforms, Amazon offers the option of putting the e-book editions on sale for 7 days once every three months. All of my relevant books will be on sale for 7 days starting on March 1, 2015. (The sale does not include the two newest books I just described because they have to be available for a month before Amazon makes them eligible. So those two will be discounted later.)
The e-books of mine that are currently eligible for the discount starting on March 1, 2015 are:
The Best of Single Life
Singlism: What It Is, Why It Matters, and How to Stop It
Single with Attitude: Not Your Typical Take on Health and Happiness, Love and Money, Marriage and Friendship
Behind the Door of Deceit: Understanding the Biggest Liars in Our Lives
The Hows and Whys of Lies
When the Truth Hurts: Lying to Be Kind
The Lies We Tell and the Clues We Miss: Professional Papers
Is Anyone Really Good at Detecting Lies? Professional Papers
Friendsight: What Friends Know that Others Don’t
In another three months (the soonest Amazon allows), I’ll put them on sale again.
4. More Translations of More of My Books
Previously, I told you about Babelcube and other publishers and platforms currently making my books available in other languages. Now, there are even more books getting translated into even more languages. For example, The Best of Single Life is now available in Portuguese and in Spanish. Singled Out is getting translated into Spanish. Behind the Door of Deceit, already translated into Portuguese and Spanish, is now being translated into Italian. Separately from the Babelcube platform, another translator is working on a Japanese translation of Singled Out and the Douban publisher is in the process of producing a Chinese version of The Hows and Whys of Lies (already available in Portuguese and soon to be available in Spanish.)
I’ll keep updating all of the available translations of all of my books here. I’ve also included that link on the homepage of this website (in the box under the one about The Best of Single Life).
5. Coming Soon: Courses on Udemy
I have been working on courses about single life and about my other area of expertise (the psychology of lying and detecting lies) for Udemy. I need to master the technology of doing this (always a challenge for me) but with a little luck, I should have the first course posted sometime this month (March 2015). I’ll start a blog post about my Udemy courses and update it the same way I update the post about the translations of my books. Also, I will have a link on my homepage to the post about my Udemy courses (in the same box where I mention the translations).
The course that is closest to being ready is tentatively called “Why We Lie.” I may also put together a companion book that is a collection of some of my previous writings on deceiving and detecting deceit.
6. My Next Collection: Family in the Lives of Single People
I mentioned earlier that there is a second chapter that just became available to me for inclusion in my own collections. That one is, “Single, No Children: Who is Your Family?” It was published in the very expensive volume edited by Vangelisti, Routledge Handbook of Family Communication, 2nd ed. The original version had a long summary section which was eventually edited out. I published that summary in a series of blog posts that were very popular over at “Living Single.” My plan is to republish that chapter in a much more affordable collection. Half of the book will be on that topic – family (and friends) in the lives of single people who have no children. The other half will be about single parents and their children.
7. The Next Book of Original Research and Writing
I’m eager to start working on a new book of original research and writing, even though I can’t publish any completely new writing (previously unpublished) for a year. I have long wanted to write a book called Single at Heart, so maybe I’ll do that next. When I was quoted in the New York Times most recently, an editor who has her own imprint asked if I was interested in writing a book about singles, so who knows, maybe this really will happen.
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See Related Education Journals
Learning Democracy
Education Reform in West Germany, 1945-1965
Brian M. Puaca
ISBN 978-1-84545-568-2 25% OFF! $120.00/£85.00 $90.00/£63.75 Hb Published (July 2009)
Hb View cartYour country: United States - Click here to remove geolocation Buy the eBook from these vendors Request a Review or Examination Copy (in Digital Format)
Winner of the American Educational Research Association's 2011 New Scholar's Book Award
"The use of sources is outstanding. One of the achievements of this book is its significance for Americanists and Europeanists. For the former, he situates his study in a conversation about American education for democracy in the post-WWII world. For Europeanists he concludes by looking back from 1968, claiming persuasively that the reforms of the 50s and 60s create the necessary conditions for student protests later on. The book is also significant in that it is the only ground-level examination in any language of the US reconstruction of West Germany written for over twenty years... Finally, the book tells us something about democratic education as such. By looking at student government, newspapers, and other extra or co-curricular activities, as well as course offerings and textbooks, Puaca reminds us that education is much more than the explicit curriculum." · From the Committee's Report
“Puaca has produced an innovative, coherently organized, and elegantly written book that challenges us to rethink some of our preconceived notions on education reform in the early Federal Republic.” · American Historical Review
“…challenges a standard narrative that envisions the late 1960s as the moment when an assault on the conservativism of the 1950s took place. The book’s strengths lie in its meticulous examination of the gradual development of educational innovations and in its ability to capture the voices of students and teachers from that period…[It] is an important new addition to the scholarship [and] a rich and welcome contribution to the fields of German history and the history of education.” · Central European History
“By tracing the progression of internal reforms first chronologically and then thematically, Puaca’s most important contribution is to reveal the education reform process as a subtle, gradual, ground-level transformation that was instigated and achieved largely by Germans. While the American impact during the occupation years and beyond was real, German public schools were by no means Americanized.” · German Politics & Society
"Without a doubt, [this study] provides an important reinterpretation of West German society in the first two decades after the war. It is a work that will change the historiography of educational reforms generally and West Germany specifically, and one that belongs on the shelves of all historians interested in modern European and US history." · German History
“This book offers important differentiations and corrections [of the existing research]. It contributes to the dismantling of the myth of the ‘sixty-eighters’: long before this spectacular year there were fundamental, gradually implemented reforms and successful institutional attempts at democratization on which the activists of 1968 were often able to build, without necessarily being aware of it.” · Historische Zeitschrift
“Brian M. Puaca tells a German success story that historians have missed…[He] makes a compelling case that German resistance to American prescriptions did not preclude democratic change…[and] offers a new framework for the post-World War II period.” · H-Education
“…[a] splendid account of education reform in West Germany from 1945 to 1965…Shifting attention from dramatic, centralized events to subtle, gradual evolution, Learning Democracy deepens our understanding of how school change happens in any place and era.” · History of Education Quarterly
“…well written, well organized, extremely well supported by documentation … and well reasoned.” · James Tent, author of Mission on the Rhine: Reeducation and Denazification in American-Occupied Germany
Scholarship on the history of West Germany’s educational system has traditionally portrayed the postwar period of Allied occupation as a failure and the following decades as a time of pedagogical stagnation. Two decades after World War II, however, the Federal Republic had become a stable democracy, a member of NATO, and a close ally of the West. Had the schools really failed to contribute to this remarkable transformation of German society and political culture?
This study persuasively argues that long before the protest movements of the late 1960s, the West German educational system was undergoing meaningful reform from within. Although politicians and intellectual elites paid little attention to education after 1945, administrators, teachers, and pupils initiated significant changes in schools at the local level. The work of these actors resulted in an array of democratic reforms that signaled a departure from the authoritarian and nationalistic legacies of the past. The establishment of exchange programs between the United States and West Germany, the formation of student government organizations and student newspapers, the publication of revised history and civics textbooks, the expansion of teacher training programs, and the creation of a Social Studies curriculum all contributed to the advent of a new German educational system following World War II. The subtle, incremental reforms inaugurated during the first two postwar decades prepared a new generation of young Germans for their responsibilities as citizens of a democratic state.
Brian Puaca is Assistant Professor of History at Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Virginia. He received the 2006 Claude Eggertsen Prize for the most outstanding dissertation in the history of education from the History of Education Society.
Related Link: Hear Brian Puaca on Virginia public radio.
Subject: Educational Studies Postwar History
LC: LA721.82 .P83 2009
BL: YC.2010.a.132
EDU016000 EDUCATION/History;
SOC000000 SOCIAL SCIENCE/General
JN Education
Chapter 1. Rebuilding Education in a “New Spirit,” 1945-1947
Chapter 2. New Experiences Inside and Outside the Classroom, 1948-1954
Chapter 3. Changes Continue Beneath the Surface, 1955-1959
Chapter 4. Ambitious Efforts in the New Decade, 1960-1965
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Bill Gladstone Genealogy
Toronto Jewish Records
Search Births
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Family Trees >>
Glickstein-Gladstone
Glicenstein (Extended)
Rubinoff-Naftolin
Agudas Hamishpocha
Montreal novel wins Jewish Book Award (2009)
by Bill Gladstone
The White Space Between, the novel by Montrealer Ami Sands Brodoff that won the 2009 Canadian Jewish Book Award for fiction, focuses on Willow Ives and her mother, Jane Ives, a Czech-born Holocaust survivor formerly known as Jana Ivanova, and Willow’s need to understand the persistent gaps in her mother’s past.
Much of the story unfolds in Montreal, where Willow, following in her late grandfather’s footsteps, becomes a talented professional puppeteer; she creates a diverse family of marionettes that she gives life and voice to, seeming to need this imaginary world as a child needs dolls. Because her mother has kept much of her wartime experiences a blank, Willow knows hardly anything about her father, who becomes a mythic figure in her imagination.
When her mother (who had been living in New Jersey) decides to return to Montreal to testify for the Witness Foundation, Willow feels mixed emotions. “She is unnerved that her mother would now decide to tell her story to strangers, a story Willow has been told only in bits and pieces, fragments that don’t quite fit into a whole. And yet in truth, she has been afraid to hear this story, as much as she longs and needs to, settling up here in Montreal to sleuth it out on her own.”
Willow’s quest takes her to the top of Montreal’s mountain and also to Prague; she eventually solves the riddle of her paternity and fills in many of the white spaces in her psychic identity card. The book offers a good example of what Toronto poet-essayist Kenneth Sherman meant when he described as “void and voice,” the two opposing impulses of Holocaust literature, the simultaneous imperatives to hide and yet to tell.
For the first three decades or so after the Holocaust, relatively few writers seemed willing to venture into that dark, problematic and largely uncharted literary terrain. Then, shortly after the ground-breaking TV series “Holocaust” in the mid-1970s, Elie Wiesel commented that once no one wanted to talk about the Holocaust and suddenly everyone seemed eager to do so.
That eagerness continues: today Holocaust lit still dominates Jewish letters. A century from now, how many of these books will still be read? We like to believe that the best — by authors like Wiesel, Anne Frank, Primo Levi and Aharon Appelfeld — will survive, while less notable works will submerge into literature’s invisible bedrock.
In my reading of The White Space Between, the book seemed to start slowly but the characters became more sympathetic and intriguing with each turning page. Brodoff’s prose bears an affinity to the work of Margaret Laurence in her exploration of the mother-daughter relationship, her periodic insertion of old photos and memory capsules into the narrative, and her search for the basic humanity in people. Brodoff, who has published a previous novel and collection of short stories, is a writer worth watching.
The Diary of Laura’s Twin by Kathy Kacer, took the youth literature prize at the 2009 Canadian Jewish Book Awards. Like The White Space Between, it is published by the Second Story Press.
Part of the publishing house’s successful series of Holocaust Remembrance Books for Young Readers, The Diary of Laura’s Twin tells the story of a modern-day Jewish girl who is “twinned” with Sara Gittler, a child from the Warsaw Ghetto. The narrative alternates between Laura’s and Sara’s diametrically different worlds, which are at least 60 years apart, and is illustrated by many photographs of the latter.
Again we see the familiar pattern of a young protagonist, Laura, who fills in the void of her unknowing by reading Sara’s Holocaust diary, then speaks about her “twin” at her bat-mitzvah ceremony. Inspired by Sara’s bravery, Laura finds the courage to act after learning of a friend’s silence after possibly witnessing the desecration of a Jewish cemetery.
Holocaust remembrance that sparks social justice: a winning formula for mass-market juvenile fiction. No doubt the book will be popular with young Jewish and Gentile readers alike.
Isa Milman’s Prairie Kaddish, winner of the 2009 Canadian Jewish Book Award for poetry, seems to redefine the meaning of poetry. Here we have a book of remembrance, a sort of historic scrapbook about the former Jewish agricultural settlement of Lipton, Saskatchewan, and the picturesque graveyard that remains.
Milman includes maps, photographs, letters, lists of names and Yiddish subtitles between her freeform poetic creations. In poems such as “Immigrant Song,” she documents her discovery of the Lipton experiment, right from the moment of her first visit to the cemetery.
As if I heard a drum
struck by an invisible hand,
as if after thirty years in Canada
the grass sang me a welcome song.
As if those Jewish bones called me
meydele, said they’d waited for me so long,
as if they laid their hands on my eyes
to unblind me, and pulled me close to listen
as they whispered fragments of their stories,
slices of their dreams…
The poetry is vibrant and accessible, and has caught on like a prairie wildfire after a recent review in Forward. A rarity for a book of poetry, Prairie Kaddish has already gone into a second printing. The publisher is Coteau Books of Regina (www. coteaubooks.com). ♦
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Yom Kippur on University Avenue (1912)
by n-a
From the Toronto Evening Telegram, September 12, 1912 Special Service conducted by Cantor Wladowsky With impressive ceremonial, with colour and light, and music of clear yet deep toned voices, special services for the Jewish New Year were celebrated in the University avenue synagogue this morning. Through windows within the vestibule you saw an audience of…
Obit: Dr. Daniel Hill (1923-2003)
From the Globe and Mail, 2003 As a great-grandson of American slaves, Dr. Daniel Hill carried the lessons of universal equality and civil rights in his blood. Founding director of the Ontario Human Rights Commission and a former Ontario ombudsman, Dr. Hill is being remembered as a pioneer of the human rights movement in Canada…
Young Toronto Jews enter the professions (1929)
Professions claim young Jews; many rise to prominence Dr. Bessie Pullan Singer First Woman in Canada to Receive Degree of Doctor of Medicine From the Toronto Evening Telegram, January 2, 1929 ◊ Note: This is an interesting, albeit uneven story that focuses more on two prominent rabbis of the city than on the younger generation of…
My day in court; or, Every dog has his day
I am one of this city’s great silent army of working poor, and so my name is Legion. I am just one of the masses, evidently, poor and huddled, yearning to breath free; one of the anonymous faces that wash up in the courtrooms of Old City Hall each morning, charged with bylaw infractions and…
Hot Art: Knelman probes secret world of stolen art
Some years ago, while researching an article for Walrus Magazine on art theft, Joshua Knelman interviewed a convicted art thief in a local restaurant. While providing some quotable patter, the thief threatened to break Knelman’s legs if he used his real name, and handed him some rolled-up items, which proved to be stolen artworks, now…
Orchestrating the American dream
Family Matters: Sam, Jennie and the Kids, by Burton Bernstein, was first published in 1982, and remains, 30 years later, one of the most interesting family histories this reviewer has read. The reason is not so much that Burton Bernstein was the brother of a celebrity, the great composer-conductor Leonard Bernstein, but because he treated…
Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World
In his book Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World, Montreal author Marc Raboy points out that Guglielmo Marconi was the Bill Gates or Steven Jobs of his day, and was the world’s first champion of and visionary for not just global wireless communications, but two-way global wireless communications. Although associated primarily with the development…
OJA exhibit pays homage to Benjamin Brown
From the Canadian Jewish News, February 2016 “Location, location, location,” they say, are the three most important things in real estate. If so, the Ontario Jewish Archives (OJA) has scored a wonderful coup by securing the Urbanspace Gallery in the majestic loft building at 401 Richmond Street West as the venue for an exhibition in…
Toronto Panorama 1910
Kitty Wintrob, author of I’m Not Going Back
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On Invoking the Deaths of Children, Where Does the Real ‘‘Moral Obscenity’’ Lie
by Mazy on Mon 23 Sep 2013, 09:48
Eric Reeves
Professor at Smith College
GET UPDATES FROM ERIC REEVES
Posted: 09/21/2013 12:55 pm
One of the most dismaying features of current discussions about how the U.S. should respond to Syria's use of chemical weapons against civilians, including hundreds of children, is the moral framework that has been created, ultimately in service of political goals. The implicit claim has been made repeatedly, including by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, that some children's deaths are more "obscene" or "heinous" than others. I believe this to be a dismayingly invidious comparison. The claim that a child who dies from a chemical attack dies a more horrible death than the child in Darfur who dies in agony, over many hours, having been eviscerated by the shrapnel exploding out a bomb dropped from a high-flying, grossly inaccurate cargo plane known simply as the "Antonov."
Antonovs have been a critical part of the military arsenal of Khartoum's National Islamic Front/National Congress Party regime, and its Sudan Armed Forces (SAF), for many years. They have deliberately -- with regularity and unconstrained brutality -- attacked civilian targets, and even humanitarian operations, including those of the International Committee of the Red Cross and the UN's World Food Program. Such an utterly indiscriminate bombing campaign has no direct military purpose; it is, however, a highly effective weapon if the goal is to destroy populations and the agricultural capacity perceived as supporting various rebel groups, a number of which have emerged throughout Sudan's cruelly marginalized peripheral areas.
This is currently the case in Darfur, in Blue Nile and in South Kordofan states -- all on the western or southern periphery of what is now (northern) Sudan. South Sudan endured the brunt of Khartoum's aerial assaults during the long civil war, going back to the 1990s; substantial data began to be collected in 1999 following the many deliberate bombings of hospitals by Khartoum in what was then Equatoria. The South -- in the increasingly likely event of resumed all-out war between Khartoum and Juba over the contested area of Abyei -- will again become the target of indiscriminate aerial bombardment. The specific purposes for Khartoum's recent acquisition of a dozen Sukhoi Su-24 precision attack aircraft may soon be clear. But the lumbering, deadly Antonovs -- crudely retrofitted Russian cargo planes which have no bomb-sighting mechanism -- will do most of the work in a war that will again focus on civilian destruction, not military victory.
Moreover, since no avionic equipment in the world can make of the Antonov anything more than an indiscriminate instrument of civilian destruction -- given their 5,000-meter cruising and attack altitude -- we confront again the question of invidious comparisons implicit in statements by Kerry and others. Why is the death of a Syrian ten-year-old boy from Sarin gas any more significant, morally or otherwise, than the agonizing death of the eviscerated seven-year-old girl in Darfur, whose robust constitution allows her to fight off death for hours, all of which are passed in a state of tremendous pain from which there is no medical or even analgesic relief.
And if there is no medical relief, it is in all probability because Khartoum so widely obstructs humanitarian efforts in Darfur, as well as movements of the feckless UN/African Union peacekeeping mission (UNAMID). For more than three years, the eastern Jebel Marra area in the center of the Darfur region has been under humanitarian embargo -- of precisely the sort Khartoum has previously imposed on relief organizations in South Sudan, in eastern Sudan, in the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan during the 1990s, and now most conspicuously in Blue Nile State and, again, the Nuba Mountains.
More than a million people, perhaps many more, are at acute risk in South Kordofan and Blue Nile -- largely because Khartoum's Antonovs have destroyed fields and wells and markets on which the broader agricultural economy was based. People are starving, and may soon starve in great numbers, given the failure of this year's planting season. The Antonov may be crude, but it is a highly effective weapon of mass destruction -- true mass destruction, measured not in the thousands but the many hundreds of thousands.
Antonov attacks take place on a virtually daily basis according to multiple Darfuri reports from the ground in Darfur; similar reports come from the Nuba Mountains and Blue Nile. Destruction of wells and villages, the loss of livestock and an unrelenting death and despair -- these are the "bombs" the Antonovs drop. And sometimes the children, invisible to us because we choose not to look, or even compel UN observation, are terribly wounded by these bombs. To suggest that their terrors, their pain and agony, their deaths are any less "morally obscene" than gas attacks on children in Syria is a painfully invidious comparison -- the more so since in the end, it is politically expedient.
A substantial update to my lengthy report and data archiving ("'They Bombed Everything that Moved': Aerial Military Attacks on Civilians and Humanitarians in Sudan, 1999 - 2013"),
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] will be posted on that site September 22, 2013; it focuses on events in Darfur, June 2012 - September 2013.
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Despite Truce, Satellites Confirm Malakal Under Attack Again
by Mazy on Fri 21 Feb 2014, 03:06
New Satellite Sentinel Project (SSP) imagery shows more than 535 huts in and around Malakal have been destroyed in recent clashes, in direct violation the January cessation of hostilities agreement between South Sudan's combatant forces (see Figure 1) DigitalGlobe’s analysis confirms that at least 57 huts in a residential area of town were destroyed, likely as a result of renewed fighting between the South Sudanese army and the armed opposition. (see Figure 2) The destruction of another 77 huts in Malakal's market area is evident in imagery collected on February 17, and 40 percent of market stalls are visibly destroyed or severely damaged. (see Figure 3) More than 400 huts were destroyed in the east of the city.
Overview of Malakal, Upper Nile State, South Sudan, Imagery taken February 17, 2014
Malakal has changed hands at least twice in recent weeks, and SSP previously reported on war crimes committed in the town during the last bout of violence. DigitalGlobe Analytics review of recent imagery over Malakal, including coverage from February 12, 2014, confirms that the damage shown to civilian structures in this report occurred since that time.
The safety of hundreds of thousands of civilians — those fleeing the area, those trapped within the town, and those at a U.N. compound in Malakal — is immediately at stake. The United Nations Mission in South Sudan compound, which currently houses 21,600 displaced persons, is now caught in the crossfire between rebel and government forces. UNMISS condemned the attacks and called on fighters to respect the inviolability of the U.N. premises, warning that the clashes would exacerbate an urgent humanitarian situation. Julia Albert-Recht, the International Medical Corps (IMC) Programme
Manager in Malakal warned that “the renewed fighting is having a devastating knock-on effect for civilians in Malakal." She cautioned that continued fighting will limit IMC's doctors' ability to operate, leaving civilians in "real danger" since its doctors won't be able to " get out to help them." Albert-Recht added, "There are thousands of innocent families in Malakal who need health and nutrition assistance which they won’t get because of this latest round of fighting.” IMC reports that it treated over 100 people hurt in the fighting on February 18 alone. Over 56,000 displaced people are in Malakal town, but outside the protection of the U.N. base.
Destroyed homes in Malakal, Upper Nile State, South Sudan. Imagery taken on February 17, 2014.
While combatant forces battled on Malakal's streets, inter-communal clashes broke out within the U.N. camp among Nuer and Dinka displaced people. The U.N confirms that 10 people were killed as a result of the recent fighting and that many others were treated at the base hospital for injuries. A multi-ethnic city housing Shilluk, Nuer, Dinka, Bari and many other ethnic groups, Malakal has historically been a bastion of diversity. Nonetheless, as a result of the recent fighting, reports from credible sources of violence and door-to-door searches along ethnic lines are widespread.
Malakal holds the key to control of South Sudan's lucrative oil fields at Paloch, which is just 90 miles away and houses an oil complex where a key crude oil processing facility is situated. As of the time of publication, there were conflicting accounts of who currently controls Malakal. (see Reuters and Voice of America, Radio Tamazuj).
An aid source told France 24 and Agence France-Presse that rebels had launched a “very big, coordinated attack” and government-aligned warplanes had flown over Malakal. Enough Project’s ground sources reported heavy gunfire between government forces and rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army/Movement In Opposition forces (including White Army elements) around Malakal’s airport. One local ground source reports that the attack on Malakal came from the north, along the Melut – Malakal road, and that by mid-day forces had seized the airport and taken command of northern entrances to the city.
Upper Nile state authorities asserted that clashes broke out at 7 a.m. in the town’s northern, southern and central areas. By the SPLA's account, rebel forces aligned with Riek Machar reportedly attacked Malakal in an effort to recapture the town from the government. South Sudanese Presidential spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny claimed to the BBC that rebels were “well-equipped,” using AK-47 assault rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, and machine guns. But the armed opposition asserts that South Sudanese government forces, with Ugandan support, attacked rebel positions in Malakal. Philip Aguer, who denies that Ugandan forces are in Malakal, alleged thar clashes were ongoing in the town. Upper Nile state officials also asserted that the government remained in control of the town and airport.
Destruction of Malakal market place, imagery from February 17, 2014.
The Satellite Sentinel Project has been tracking violations of the cessation of hostilities agreement since it was signed in late January. SSP previously reported on a government offensive on Leer town in Unity state. Recently, South Sudanese army Lt. General Malual Ayom Dor, who heads military operations in Jonglei, publicly confirmed another violation of the cessation of hostilities agreement, that his "forces fought [against Machar's troops] in self-defence until we managed to push them away and take control of [Gadiang]”
U.N. Assistant Secretary-General and humanitarian coordinator Toby Lanzer confirmed that hostilities broke out in Malakal, and highlighted the need to protect non-combatants. Humanitarian aid organization Oxfam has said those trapped in Malakal are “very afraid" due to the fighting. An assessment by humanitarian agencies found that attacks in Malakal and the surrounding area have sent at least 10,000 people fleeing north toward Rom, a transit point for displaced people heading to Melut.
In addition to local and displaced South Sudanese people caught amid violent clashes, there are also more than 125,000 Sudanese refugees from Blue Nile state, who fled fighting and attacks from the Sudanese government only to be at risk now in South Sudan’s Upper Nile state.
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Home Lord Martin Rees
Lord Martin Rees
Astronomer Royal at Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge
Astronomer Royal, Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge
Former President of the Royal Society (2005 to 2010)
Martin Rees is a Fellow of Trinity College and Emeritus Professor of Cosmology and Astrophysics at the University of Cambridge. He holds the honorary title of Astronomer Royal and also Visiting Professor at Imperial College London and at Leicester University. He served for ten years as director of Cambridge's Institute of Astronomy and he was a Royal Society Professor from 1992 to 2003.
His current research relates to high energy astrophysics and cosmic structure formation. He is a foreign associate of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and is an honorary member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Pontifical Academy, and several other foreign academies.
His awards include the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society, the Balzan International Prize, the Bruce Medal of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, the Heineman Prize for Astrophysics (AAS/AIP), the Bower Award for Science of the Franklin Institute, the Cosmology Prize of the Peter Gruber Foundation, the Einstein Award of the World Cultural Council and the Crafoord Prize (Royal Swedish Academy).
Lord Rees has been president of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (1994-95) and the Royal Astronomical Society (1992-94) and a trustee of the British Museum, NESTA and the Kennedy Memorial Trust. He is currently on the Board of Trustees of the National Museum of Science and Industry, the Institute for Public Policy Research, and the Princeton Institute for Advanced Study, and has served on many bodies connected with education, space research, arms control and international collaboration in science.
In 2005 he was appointed to the House of Lords and he was President of the Royal Society between 2005 and 2010.
Trinity College, Cambridge
http://www.trin.cam.ac.uk/index.php?pageid=172
Cambridge Astronomy
http://www.ast.cam.ac.uk/~mjr/
http://royalsociety.org/people/martin-rees/
Rt Hon Sir Oliver Letwin MP
Dr Wayne Williams
UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)
Ed Humpherson
UK Statistics Authority
Dr Geoff Mulgan
Richard Sandford
University College London (UCL)
Scottish Fiscal Commission
Victoria Robb
Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG)
Simon Sharpe
Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS)
Dr Alex Marsh
Craig Bennett
Friends of the Earth (England, Wales and Northern Ireland)
Dr Stuart Wainwright
Dr Steven Hill
Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE)
Daniel Korski
Number 10 Policy Unit
Dr Zeynep Engin
Data for Policy
Liz McKeown
Office of National Statistics (ONS)
Matt Sanders
Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge
Astronomer Royal
11 June 2018, 5:30pm
Two cultures: can policy makers and academic institutions ever work together effectively?
The UK has scientific advisers at the top of government, but with science, engineering and technology playing greater and greater roles in our lives there is a correspondingly greater need for a broader understanding of these issues by policy makers.
8 February 2018, 5:30pm
Climate seminar 4: Climate science and policy - tales of the unexpected
In news articles
What can Cambridge do about climate change?
In our final seminar of the 2016 Climate Change series, we heard from a panel of experts on what Cambridge could do to drive progress in sustainable living and combatting climate change.
Sustainable Humanity, Sustainable Environment, Our Responsibility
The penultimate session of the Climate and Sustainability in Multiple Dimensions seminar series saw talks from Professor Sir Partha Dasgupta, Professor Charles Kennel and Lord Martin Rees on the relationship between humanity and nature, and its implications for sustainability.
Guardian RSS Feed
Can we all move to Mars? Prof Martin Rees on space exploration – video
My hero: Lisa Jardine by Martin Rees
Stephen Hawking launches $100m search for alien life beyond solar system
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TRAVEL CALENDAR
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Travel Tip: Art and Archaeology in United States
Marsden Hartley: Madawaska - Acadian Light-Heavy, 1940
WASHINGTON, D.C. • The Phillips Collection • Ongoing
Marsden Hartley (1877 - 1943) was a painter, poet, writer and pioneer of American modernism. Born in Lewiston, Maine, he lived a peripatetic life, working in Paris, Berlin, New York, Mexico, New Mexico, Bermuda and elsewhere before returning to Maine in 1934.
This retrospective-the first in more than 20 years-features approximately 75 paintings that demonstrate the stylistic and thematic range of Hartley's innovative work. Included are early impressionist Maine landscapes, symbolic "Berlin" paintings, the cubistic "Provincetown" series, powerful landscapes of the American southwest, Mexico, France, and the Alps, and examples of the raw figurative style that characterizes Hartley's return to the Northeast.
In the last nine years of his life, Hartley reinvented himself as "the painter from Maine." Coinciding with the Great Depression, this period marked his first sustained venture into figurative painting. Hartley consciously adopted a primitive style to celebrate the "sturdy simple people" with whom he identified. A variety of his late portraits, seascapes, and still lifes are recollections of the Masons, the Nova Scotia fishing family Hartley befriended in 1935. After he lived with them for about a year, their two sons were drowned in a capsized boat that sank in a storm. Indeed, love, loss, and memory impelled Hartley to create his most compelling images. Decidedly sensuous, Hartley's semi-nude portraits of swimmers and wrestlers made in the late 1930s are powerful sexual images of men. Not uncommon among some Englishmen and Anglo-americans of that time, these paintings also reflect Hartley's awareness of Nazi propaganda and other bizarre notions about the Aryan male to which he might have subscribed (He left the United States for Europe in 1921). In 1942, the year before his death, Hartley began a series of still lifes with landscape or seascape backgrounds as well as his last landscape series depicting views of Mount Katahdin, Maine. After Washington D.C., this exhibition travels to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri, from 11 October 2003 through 11 January 2004.
A catalogue has been published by Yale University Press in association with the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art.
The Phillips Collection Web Site
Contact: Tel: (1) 202 387 21 51
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More Art and Archaeology Travel Listings:
Art of Native America: The Charles and Valerie Diker Collection
Glenn Ligon: What We Said The Last Time
Carlito Dalceggio: I Do Not Scream For An Audience, I Shout At The Holy
Prototypology: An Index of Process and Mutation
Gods, Myths and Mortals: Greek Treasures Across the Millennia from the Benaki Museum
More United States Travel Listings:
The New Greek Galleries: Greek and Roman Art Galleries
Event selection, descriptions, ratings, page designs, and all other information in these listings
Images are copyright Culturekiosque.com or their original copyright holders.
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By Cycling News December 18, 2018 4:21pm
Updated: December 18, 2018 4:22pm Race: Vuelta a Espana
Vuelta a Espana introduces young rider jersey in 2019
Top under-26 rider to wear white, organisers scraps combined points classification
Simon Yates (Mitchelton-Scott)
(Bettini Photo)
Organisers of the Vuelta a España announced Tuesday that they would be introducing an official young rider competition in the 2019 edition of the Spanish Grand Tour. The highest placed under-26 rider in the general classification will wear a white jersey.
2019 Vuelta a Espana to feature eight summit finishes
2020 Vuelta a Espana to begin in the Netherlands with team time trial
Vuelta a Espana rumoured to return to more traditional route in 2019
2019 Vuelta a Espana offers eight mountaintop finishes, goes off road
Andorra stage offers crucial climbing test in 2019 Vuelta a Espana
The Vuelta a España has used a white jersey in previous editions, however, it was worn by the rider leading the combined points ranking. This year, Simon Yates won the red jersey as the overall champion, and the white jersey as the rider with the highest combined points. There was no specific jersey associated with this best young rider in previous editions, although it was recognised with a trophy sponsored by the sports daily AS, the event's official newspaper.
The sponsor of this new white jersey, representing the best young rider, will be Feníe Energía, an electricity and gas utility company that over the past two years has sponsored the most aggressive rider prize. The combined ranking will disappear, although its sponsor – Fertiberia – will continue to be linked to La Vuelta.
"It is a privilege to clothe the rough diamonds of international cycling," said Isabel Reija, Feníe Energía's CEO, in a press statement. "Our jersey will be worn by today's finest young riders, who will go on to become tomorrow's stars. The generational handover in this sport is a reality, and we are delighted to be part of it, just as we are part of the regeneration of the energy sector."
This new white jersey for the best young rider will thus put an end to the combined ranking or combinada that has been a category since 1970. That ranking was based on the criterion of a sustained performance, taking the best cyclists in the overall standing, the mountain, and the table by points.
Los Machucos to return next season
Utrecht and Noord-Brabant to host start of Spanish Grand Tour
Fewer tough uphill finishes, more set-piece mountain stages on the cards at Wednesday presentation
Difficult mid-race stage in Andorra could be decisive
Punchy stage features relentless climbing, off-road segment and summit finish
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Join the City for the National Women's History Month Event, Thurs., March 10, 5:00-7:30 p.m., at City Hall
This year's theme, gleaned from the National Women's History Month Project's National Theme; Working To Form A More Perfect Union: Honoring Women in Public Service and Government recognizes the role that women have played in shaping our government institutions through public service and leadership. They have dramatically influenced public policy and built viable institutions and organizations. As voters and public servants, women have played a pivotal role in moving American History forward, from championing basic human rights and the right to vote, to ensuring access and equal opportunity for all Americans, leading to a stronger and more democratic society.
Join City Manager Patricia Martel for an evening of music, networking, a special presentation, and edible delights. Women of all ages and life path journeys are invited to attend this free event.
The event will feature Vibo Simfani with guest vocal artist and poet. Vibo Simfani bridges cultures from around the globe by fusing elements of classical, Latin jazz, and Brazilian styles such as Bossa Nova and Choro.
Click here for more information, or contact Leslie Peay at (650) 991-8190 or lpeay@dalycity.org.
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Special Collections in the Library
Finley Collection
Sir Moses Finley, who was Master from 1976 to 1982, left his personal Library to the College, and this is housed in a special room on the upper floor of the Study Centre. This collection covers many aspects of the philosophical, political and social organisation of the ancient Greek and Roman worlds. It differs from the rest of the Library in that it is a major resource for research. Access to these books may be arranged through the Student Librarian.
Vesalius's "Fabrica" and Spigelius's "Opera"
In 1995 the College was given two remarkable medical books by Mr Geoffrey R Fisk.
Mr Fisk became a member of the College and studied for an M. Phil in Physical Anthropology when he and Mrs Fisk moved to Cambridge on his retirement from St. Bartholomew's Hospital London, where he had been a teacher on the orthopaedic graduate rotation and Senior Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeon at Princess Alexandra Hosptial, Harlow. Mr Fisk's major interest was the Hand and he has been president of the Society for Surgery of the Hand. Mr and Mrs Fisk have continued to play an active part in Darwin College life, attending the lectures of the annual Darwin series, College dinners and other College functions.
The first of the medical books is the "Fabrica" by Andreas Vesalius (1543) which has been described as the "most famous book on human anatomy ever printed and one of the most important". The woodcut illustrations, (the artist was probably Titian) are particularly famous for their technical excellence, the striking poses of the human models and the attractive Tuscan settings in which the models stand.
The second of the books is the "Opera" by Adrian Spigelius (1645). The plates mark a new epoch in anatomical illustration, being engraved on copper, in contrast to the woodcuts of the "Fabrica". This book also contains an early and important reprint of Harvey's description (1628) of the Circulation of the Blood.
The College is extremely fortunate in possessing first editions of two books that have played such a role in the development of science.
The library also includes a collection of children' books, a section devoted to Darwin and Evolution, and a special section devoted to books written by members of the College. There are small collections of DVDs and choral music for use by college members.
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How ‘Ashes To Ashes’ Put The First Act Of David Bowie’s Career To Rest
Posted by admin | Oct 6, 2017 | David Bowie News Of The World | 0 |
David Bowie performing live in 1978. A new box set collects all of Bowie’s albums released between 1977 and 1982
In 1980, David Bowie was in the middle of a new kind of transformation. After launching himself to stardom in 1969 with his first hit single, “Space Oddity,” he spent a decade morphing from Major Tom to Ziggy Stardust to Aladdin Sane to Halloween Jack to The Thin White Duke — a series of characters that also emblemized radically different approaches to rock music, from sci-fi glam to stark experimentalism. By the end of the ’70s, however, he dispensed with such alter egos. Instead, he absorbed them all into a single if mercurial persona, one known simply as David Bowie. And that persona hinged on “Ashes To Ashes.”
His 1979 album, Lodger, wrapped up a groundbreaking, three-album collaboration with Brian Eno that had yielded his most acclaimed work to date, including the full-lengths Low and “Heroes.” But the final installment of this Berlin Trilogy also exhausted Bowie and Eno’s partnership. Lodger, as excellent as it was, felt anticlimactic. At the end of the year, he recorded a new version of “Space Oddity” for British television, and it was an eerie resurrection of the character that had put him on the map: Major Tom, the lost astronaut cast adrift in space, an existentialist casualty of humankind’s quest to conquer the heavens. For the restlessly forward-looking Bowie, this reprise of “Space Oddity” seemed tainted with an odd nostalgia, and it felt like a loop being closed. On top of it all, Bowie separated from his wife of ten years, Angela, with their divorce set to be finalized in February of 1980.
He began the new decade with his blankest slate since his pre-fame days in the ’60s. But after owning and defining the ’70s, what was Bowie to do in the uncharted waters of a new decade, especially when it had become predictable for him to reinvent himself? Enlisting his longtime friend and producer Tony Visconti, he responded with Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps). Recorded in New York and London throughout early 1980, the album took the sprawling innovation of The Berlin Trilogy and whittled it down into more digestible, if no less challenging, pop songs. “Ashes To Ashes” was the lead single. It also marked the return of Major Tom. The new song, released in August of 1980, was the sequel to “Space Oddity,” something Bowie blatantly made clear in the opening verse: “Do you remember a guy that’s been / In such an early song? / I’ve heard a rumor from Ground Control / Oh no, don’t say it’s true.” Eleven years had passed since “Space Oddity.” In that time, much had changed for Major Tom, as it had for Bowie. Left to decay in space, he’d grown paranoid and addicted to drugs: “Strung out in heaven’s high / Hitting an all-time low.”
For Bowie, “Ashes To Ashes” was anything but a low. It became his second number-one single in the U.K. His first had been, funnily enough, a reissue of “Space Oddity” in 1975. To capitalize on this, Bowie’s label, RCA Records, released a promotional single in 1980 titled “The Continuing Story of Major Tom.” On it, “Space Oddity” was mixed smoothly into “Ashes to Ashes,” creating a nine-minute epic. The end of the first song meshed uncannily with the start of the second: The lonely beeping at the conclusion of “Space Oddity” bled into the high-pitched, pizzicato-like melody at the beginning of “Ashes to Ashes.” It was as if that had been Bowie’s intention all along.
At the same time, the mix dramatically demonstrated just how far he’d progressed in the ’70s. His voice was now deeper and more profound. The music was jagged, jarring, and richly textured in a completely different way than “Space Oddity” had been. Rather than psychedelically spacious, it carried a sterile air of computers, androids and off-kilter motorization. Guitarist Chuck Hammer conveyed this feeling with layers of synthesized guitar. Flangers gave a grand piano an alien quality. Dennis Davis’ drums were disorienting yet mathematical, a funk beat from another dimension.
In the booklet that accompanies the new Bowie box set A New Career In A New Town (1977-1982), Visconti calls the song’s rhythm “a mind-bender. Your brain tells you this isn’t supposed to work.” In The Complete David Bowie by Nicholas Pegg, Bowie said that Davis “had in incredibly hard time with it, trying to play it and turn the beat backwards.” No one, though, had a harder time in “Ashes To Ashes” than Major Tom. Voiced by Bowie, he runs through a litany of memories, regrets, and hallucinations, along with a desperate desire to get better: “I’m hoping to kick / But the planet is glowing.” He wishes to free his caged psyche as well as his exiled body: “Want an axe to break the ice / Wanna come down right now.
Most poignant of all is the song’s indelible bridge, in which Bowie laments, “I never done good things / I never done bad things / I never did anything out of the blue.” The spacesuit drops away, and Bowie himself stands there, naked and afraid. “Those three particular lines represent a continuing, returning feeling of inadequacy over what I’ve done,” he said in Peter Doggett’s book The Man Who Sold The World. “I have a lot of reservations about what I’ve done, inasmuch as I don’t feel much of it has any import at all.” It was a rare and mature show of vulnerability in someone who, for so long, had cloaked himself in concept and costume.
David Mallet, who had directed the video clip of Bowie’s 1979 version of “Space Oddity,” was asked to helm the video for “Ashes To Ashes.” At the time it was the most expensive pop video ever, shot a year before MTV launched in 1981 and proving that music videos were viable promotional investments. It aided immensely in the song’s popularity, despite being as edgy and jarring as the song itself. Mallet used the new computer graphics workstation Paintbox to radically alter the color palette of the short film, rendering the sky black and the ocean pink. Bowie alternates between portraying a clown, an astronaut, and the inmate of an insane asylum — paralleling the many roles he’d played in his career.
In his book David Bowie: A Life, Dylan Jones recounts an anecdote that sheds light on the artist’s self-reflective frame of mind in 1980: “An old man searching for driftwood on the beach was asked to move away from the set. When Mallet pointed at Bowie and asked the old man if he knew who he was, the old man replied, ‘Of course I do. It’s some c*** in a clown suit.’ Bowie later said, ‘That was a huge moment for me. It put me back in my place and made me realize, “Yes, I’m just a c*** in a clown suit.”‘” Three years later, Bowie’s next album, the crowd-pleasing Let’s Dance, became the bestselling record he’d ever enjoy. And in his footsteps, hordes of successful new-wave artists, from The Human League to Duran Duran, followed.
But before he got there, the self-reflection in a handful of Bowie’s late-1970s songs began to bleed over into self-reference. Singing in the first person, he imbued “DJ” — one of Lodger‘s best singles — with a hint that performing his hits over and over had dehumanized him. “I am a DJ / I am what I play.” At the same time, the song could be read as both a tribute and taunt aimed at the radio industry who programmed so much of Bowie’s fate. And on “Fashion,” another single from Scary Monsters, Bowie mercilessly dissected a core component of his persona to an extent he hadn’t done since 1975’s “Fame.” In both “DJ” and “Fashion,” Bowie’s turn toward contained, catchy experimentalism — rather than the sprawling avant-garde scope of Low and ‘Heroes’ — is both obvious and bracing. “Ashes to Ashes” was part of a continuum, a deliberate use of cutting-edge technology, studio techniques, harsh textures, and minimalism in the pursuit of elevating pop music while preserving Bowie’s image as a sonic iconoclast.
“Ashes To Ashes” fades out on an unsettlingly note, with a nursery-rhyme chant of “My mama said, to get things done / You’d better not mess with Major Tom.” In singing these lines, Bowie disobeyed them. He was messing with Major Tom after having resigned him to cosmic limbo over a decade earlier. “When I originally wrote about Major Tom, I was a very pragmatic and self-opinionated lad,” he says in The Complete David Bowie. “Here we had the great blast of American technological know-how shoving this guy up into space, but once he gets there he’s not quite sure why he’s there. And that’s where I left him. Now we’ve found out that he’s under some kind of realization that the whole process that got him up there had decayed, was born out of decay; it has decayed him, and he’s in the process of decaying.” He also called the song “the end of something,” adding, “I was wrapping up the ’70s really for myself, and that seemed a good enough epitaph for it — that we’ve lost [Major Tom], he’s out there somewhere, we’ll leave him be.”
Other artists did not leave Bowie’s famous spaceman be, most famously the German synth-pop star Peter Schilling in his 1983 hit “Major Tom (Coming Home),” which basically amounted to fan fiction in song form. Bowie also broke his own rule. He unearthed Major Tom once more in his 1995 song “Hallo Spaceboy,” co-written with Eno. In the lyrics, Bowie bids farewell to his doomed astronaut: “Spaceboy, you’re sleepy now / Your silhouette is so stationary.” And in “Blackstar,” Bowie’s final video before his death in 2016, the visor of a spacesuit is raised, revealing a bejeweled skull that may or may not have belonged to Major Tom. By building on the character throughout the decades, Bowie finally found a resting place for Major Tom: in the pantheon of pop mythology. But it was “Ashes To Ashes” that consummated Major Tom’s role as a postmodern folk hero — and gave Bowie closure to his most momentous decade.
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Welcome to my David Bowie World Bootleg Site The reason I've become a huge Bowie fan is that I've come into contact with in the year 1976 the music of David Bowie.Bowie was so innovative and a special person that I've started collecting Bootlegs and the collection is pretty extensive but there is still plenty to collect ,see my Wanted list. On 8 August 2014 I have launched this site to expand my collection and information about David Bowie to share with others. Over the years I have contacts with other Bowie collectors whereby we can exchange with each other many Bootlegs. I'd like to thank everyone for the positive comments and using source information. Should any account on or about my site than you can mail me: Greeting Diedrich Streuper ,Groningen ,The Netherlands
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March 23, 2007, - 12:19 pm
Lies, Damn Lies & The Movies: “Shooter” Thug Mark Wahlberg Hates America, Defames Troops
To update Mark Twain, there are lies, damn lies, and Hollywood movies.
The latest Hollywood offering starring “former” thug Mark Wahlberg–“Shooter“–is the epitome of that. It’s in theaters today and looks like a great movie, with all of its cool shooting and explosion scenes. On the contrary, it is anything but.
Aside from being a sad combo rip-off of “Enemy of the State” and “Rambo II,” this movie is a withering attack not just on the Bush Administration and our soldiers in Iraq, it is a flat-out attack on America with no basis in fact.
Mark Wahlberg: Criminal Thug Has “Message” for America On-Screen, Off
The movie begins with a scene of genius Marine sharpshooter Bob Lee Swagger (Wahlberg) taking out Ethiopian soldiers a mile away with a single shot. He’s that good. But the American soldiers in what he believes is a legitimate military operation decide to cut and run and abandon him and deny his existence. Disgruntled, he retires from the military to a rustic mountain log cabin.
Then, the plot gets preposterous. A group of men–one of whom identifies himself as a Colonel (Danny Glover, not a word of whose dialogue you can decipher)–come to visit him and appeal to his patriotism. But for a smart guy, he sure is stupid.
The men tell Swagger that an “inside man” wants to assassinate the President in the next two weeks. They want him to plan his own assassination as a sharpshooter and report back to them on how it would be possible to kill the President, so they can prevent it (riiiiight). And they want him to go with them to the scene of the likely assassination scenario to help them “spot” the shooter. (Yeah, even more believable. NOT.) Without verifying who they are in the least, Swagger immediately agrees to participate.
And–surprise! surprise!–they frame him for an attempted assassination of the Commander in Chief. It’s not like I’m spoiling the movie for you. All of this is in the trailer. And any ninny with a base IQ would know this dude is being set up. Come on.
But what will actually spoil the movie for you are the stark, absurd political statements in the movie. In the end, these mysterious plotters–who are apparently a rogue CIA operation working with an overdramatic, corrupt U.S. Senator (but it’s never really clear who they are)–were really out to kill an Ethiopian Bishop who was going to speak out against American corruption.
You see, America has been raping, torturing, and mass-murdering whole Ethiopian villages for years. And we’ve been doing it all to get cheap oil. Aside from the fact that gas is yet again nearing post-$3 levels per gallon, the fact is that America hasn’t and doesn’t rape, torture, or mass-murder, ANYONE in Ethiopia . . . or even Africa. No, that would be the Muslim Arab government of Sudan, which was doing that to its own people, until they wiped out its Black Christian population, and is now doing the same to its Black Muslims.
But, hey, why tell the truth, when an absurd movie plot can frame and blame America instead? That’s so much more exciting, right?
Then there are the obnoxious statements riddled throughout this movie and even its . . . wardrobe?! Actor Mark Pena, playing an incompetent FBI agent, wears a Che Guevara T-shirt. Nothing like a side of Che chic to go with the main course of America-hatred.
Mark Wahlberg delivers several monologues against the country that made this accused attempted-murderer and drug dealer into a multi-millionaire and Academy Award Nominee, including dialogue like this:
This is a country where the Secretary of Defense can tell the entire country on TV that it’s about freedom, not oil. Because it’s all a big lie.
Abu Ghraib–We knew their [the few U.S. soldiers who participated)bosses knew.
We killed raped, tortured, and killed people for oil in Ethiopia.
Since he has a lot of lines against America’s presence in Iraq and the lack of WMDs, it’s clear Ethiopia is a proxy for Iraq in this movie.
And Wahlberg goes on and on and on and on about how America is a criminal country (and that’s beside the utterances of other characters about the conspiracy on the Grassy Knoll in the JFK assassination).
Well, here’s a little news (for anyone planning to see “Shooter”) on the identity of the real criminal:
Mark Wahlberg.
In 1988, Wahlberg, after a series of arrests (he’s an admitted car thief and drug dealer), attacked a Vietnamese immigrant. Respected news sources say he took the man’s eye out with a meathook, in order to steal his beer. But I can’t see the full details of his assault because Wahlberg–who was 17 and tried as an adult–had the records sealed, according to officials at Boston’s Suffolk County courthouse. The one court document that was mysteriously obtained by The Smoking Gun states that in the process, Wahlberg called the man a “Vietnam f-cking shit.” When police brought him to the victim to have him identified, Wahlberg responded:
You don’t have to let him identify me. I’ll tell you now that’s the mother-f-cker whose head I split open.
Wahlberg was charged with attempted murder and was sentenced to two years in the Massachusetts’ Deer Island House of Corrections. He served only 45 days.
Before that, in 1986, Wahlberg was convicted of assaulting a 12-year-old Black boy and his brother and sister near Wahlberg’s Dorchester neighborhood. Wahlberg and two friends chased them on bikes, threw rocks at them, and told them:
We don’t like Black ni–ers in the area so get the f-ck away from the area.
While throwing the rocks, Wahlberg and friends yelled:
Kill the ni–er. Kill the ni–er.
A Black girl was hit by one of the rocks.
Wahlberg bragged to USA Weekend:
I was arrested so many times.
In another interview, he bragged that the number of arrests was in the teens or twenties.
And he bragged to ABC’s “Nightline” that he has never contacted the Vietnamese victim he mutilated or his other victims (to apologize or make things right) because he doesn’t feel he has to. He’s “made amends” by making a lot of money in successful pop music, modeling, and acting careers. He says he sleeps very well at night.
This is the kind of man who stars in a movie calling America a criminal nation and our generals and lesser-ranked soldiers criminals, rapists, and murderers for oil.
Wahlberg claims this movie
speaks to the sort of stuff we as a country are going through right now. I really wanted to make it.
Uh, no, it doesn’t speak to anything America has ever done or gone through, Mark. It’s fiction, unlike your criminal past.
Mark Wahlberg needs to stop delivering lectures to moviegoers about this great country that unfortunately gave so much to someone so undeserving–and unrepentant criminal thug.
Pot. Kettle. Black. Mark Wahlberg. “Shooter.” This is one Calvin Klein model you don’t want to emulate.
Skip this awful movie.
Tags: ABC, Academy Award, actor, admitted car thief, Africa, America, Bishop, Bob Lee Swagger (Wahlberg), Boston, Bush administration, Central Intelligence Agency, Colonel, commander in chief, Danny Glover, Debbie Schlussel, Defames, Enemy of the State, Ethiopia, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Iraq, Mark Pena, Mark Twain, Mark Wahlberg, Mark Wahlberg Hates, Massachusetts, Massachusetts' Deer Island House of Corrections, Message, Muslim Arab government, Nightline, oil, President, Rambo II, Secretary of Defense, Senator, Shooter, Sudan, Suffolk County, Suffolk County courthouse, Thug Mark Wahlberg Hates America, Troops By Debbie Schlussel To, United States, USA Weekend, USD, Vietnam
Posted in Columns, Movie Reviews
The scum Hollywood Left feeds this kind of disgusting propaganda to all the brain-dead Lieberals and their ilk. They eat this garbage up to feed the demented monsters within their minds. Danny Glover is an enemy of freedom. He never met an anti-American dictator he didn’t like. The Left is a refuge for the ignorant and mentally diseased.
FreethinkerNY on March 23, 2007 at 1:40 pm
Having been to the Boston area for lenghty periods over the last 20 yrs I can vouch for what Debbie states here.
This reprobate is an unrepentant scumbag (pardon my language) & I pi$$ on his personna.I have NEVER nor will I EVER pay a dime to see his garbage.
billybob on March 23, 2007 at 2:20 pm
This is America. We don’t care how worthless a person is as long as we’re comfortable and entertained. Are there boobs and pretty explosions? Good enough for us. That’s how we roll here.
Stealthkix on March 23, 2007 at 2:34 pm
Shepard Smith on Fox’s Studio B and his guest just praised the movie. I think Fox has no right claiming they are “fair and balanced”. “Left and unaware” is more acurate.
the time is now on March 23, 2007 at 3:00 pm
Good. We got the real poop on this “movie star,” the former Marky Mark. For even more background try this link-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Wahlberg
Now who knows where we email to let them know we can put our “meat hook” into their pocketbook, until Marky atones with his very own moolah and good deeds.
Happiness Pursuer on March 23, 2007 at 3:46 pm
RE: Marky Mark’s background—sound like the All-Amerikkklan kid to me!!!
Kind of flies in the face of the so called UBERliberalist state of Massachucettes though…and reminds me of Malcolm’s UP NORTH saying. YOU PEOPLE are under the delusion that racism subscribes to a particular political party, ignorant of the fact that the backbone of the neo-con movement is the good ol’ Dixiecrat party.
As a kid they were STILL busing and busting heads in Boston, and as Howard Beach showed, NYC got more than a bit of Klan to it…hell, i remember a Klan rally on Rockaway Beach circa 1980.
Guess i’ll go see the Sandler movie this weekend.
EminemsRevenge on March 23, 2007 at 4:20 pm
Shooter is a typical mindless, but exciting actioner.
While I hold no truck with Wahlberg, the sad fact is that MANY Hollywood leading men had criminal pasts. Ironically, this is not well known, although one who was innocent–Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle–is never remembered as such.
True, also that Glover is a Leftist fool, but we should keep in mind that this is only entertainment. Whatever “protest” that you think you are mounting by not seeing this or that particular movie is pointless, since the majority of the American public do not know or care about the real lives of these stars. Thus, your action will have little impact, except maybe making you feel better.
If you are begrudging the stars their money and fame, save your negative vibes for the awful political class–and that includes both parties–most of whom really are scum, and who affect your lives far more than Hollywood talent.
Red Ryder on March 23, 2007 at 4:45 pm
The days of real men like James Cagney who took veterans into his home and helped them get jobs or Lew Ayres who saw extensive combat as a conscientious objector in WWII are over. My Army service fell in between conflicts but not a single Liberal ever said thanks for your sacrafice or was concerned whether my life was in danger. Some guy who bragged about his anti-war protests in Berkely almost got his as kicked when he attacked me verbally and a southern AO SEAL from the Vietnam War overheard the conversation and almost gave him some payback. Regardless of you political viewpoint if you haven’t served you only have part of the picture, so give the vets your respect. Tread lightly my liberal adversaries there is a limit to the patience of our guys coming back.
code7 on March 23, 2007 at 5:50 pm
Vintage Schlussel.
Aside (but related): I just learned that actor James Arness (Gunsmoke) was wounded during the liberation of Sicily in 1943. He’s so tall (6’7″) that he was the very first out of his landing craft and to hit the beach — i.e., if he couldn’t stand up in the surf, then no one could. (From his Wiki entry.)
Jeremiah on March 23, 2007 at 9:28 pm
I don’t go to movies much. I don’t buy music much. And I don’t watch television much.
Follow the money is good advice.
Blithering leftist tools and treasonous hypocrites the ilk of glover-maines-moore-odonnell are funded when sheeple want to be ‘entertained’. America suffers and the culture declines, but, hey…we have our eye candy.
~Deck chairs on the titanic…..
locomotivebreath1901 on March 24, 2007 at 10:11 am
It just amazes me the scum that get hired and promoted in Hollywood. The fault of course is that of the studios that seem to not have any standards with whom they associate and hire as actors and actresses. In fact, they seem to go out of their way to hire thugs and criminals when there are thousands of highly talented people with great backgrounds that never get a break.
Just look at the rap industry that was created by the Hollywood music moguls. The “talent” came directly from the gangs in LA and the California Prison system.
Americans should be concerned because this Talent is being promoted to our children. They are the new role models.
I guy like Wahlberg should be sitting in a prison cell not making millions making movies.
ScottyDog on March 24, 2007 at 3:20 pm
I had to laugh at this “review”, I really did. Debbie, you call yourself a “Conservative Commentator” If you were a true conservative you’d be ashamed at what your president has done in your name. Since when does the label “Conservative” mean to simply accept whatever your administration does is just and whatever it says is gospel? I’m sorry, you’re not conservative, you’re a sheep. When the final page is written on this sorry chapter in U.S. history, The truth will be known and you will be “outed” as yet another pseudo conservative shill. By going so far overboard in your condemnation of this film you’re showing just what you think of your fan base. Are you going to take away their right to go see the movie and make up their own minds? It’s a MOVIE! Were you this bent out of shape when Frosty the Snowman melted away? That was a movie too, you fool. Your readers deserve you if they follow your judgement. As a true conservative, I’m ashamed you exist.
theseanman66 on March 25, 2007 at 12:07 am
Good work Deb, I was all set to see this movie but would have felt bad were it not for your heads up. I hate supporting the left when they make propoganda films. I enjoy your columns.
livsafe on March 27, 2007 at 7:12 am
As a not-so-happy resident of the UBERLiberal state of Massachusetts, let me tell you we read and hear of liberal judges ignoring the rule of law over and over again. uhoh…let’s slap this one’s hand, uhoh…did you really mean to do that? slap your hand. naughty naughty naughty
And then you wonder why scum like Wahlberg aren’t bothered by their misdeeds!
Thanks for such an informative article, Debbie. If we ever went to the movies, we’d for sure skip this one. However, our sentiments rest with some of the other postings…why should we give one single dollar to the Hollywood liberals? In no way will we support them!
CapeConservative on March 27, 2007 at 8:58 am
The list of Hollwood “stars” whom we refuse to go see in movies or in concert keep growing. It isn’t a Liberal or Conservative thing to us, it is an American thing. I do not spend movie on “stars” who insult their “fans”. They do not care about us or they wouldn’t insult us so frequently. Just look at how trashy they are now, flashing their booty, DUI, overdoses, etc. Just a bunch of trashy people. What happened to the Jimmy Stewarts????????????????????
Buff on March 27, 2007 at 9:45 am
This was a good review, just wish I had read this BEFORE I went to see the movie yesterday! I was surprised and disgusted by the anti-American comments laced throughout this film. And to theseanman66 above, we do not follow Debbie like sheep, we listen to her (and others like Rush and Ann Coulter) because they agree with US. Have you ever thought about what would have happened if we had not gone to Iraq and Saddam had given WMD’s to Osama. Pres. Bush is so hated by the left that nothing he did would please them. The Pres. did his duty to protect the American people. History will vindicate him one day (at least the history written by true historians) but the Left will never give a Republican who is not a Liberal a fair shake.
snowmane on March 27, 2007 at 11:14 am
I know Mark Wahlberg’s background, and I have never gone to a single movie he has been in. Thanks for putting his fact sheet out there for all to see, Debbie. Nothing can surpass the idiocy of these anti-American traitors in Hollywood. If they managed to get what they’ve been striving for, the destruction of America, they’d be the first ones shot under a new regime.
Bernard on March 27, 2007 at 11:53 am
99.9% of Hollyweird continues to prove what pussy-liberals they are. Take the comments of Sean Penn, Alec Baldwin, Susan Surhandon, Danny Glover, and Jane “Traitor Bitch” Fonda…and you know how most of Hollywood thinks.
Every person in the conservative “half” of America needs to boycott Hollywood and all of their movies. Only in the pocketbook can we make them understand that their views are NOT our views. Only by hitting them square in the wallet can we make OUR voices heard. I have been to one movie in the last three years…Casino Royale (sorry…I just love Bond movies…). I know I might sound hypocritical because I listen to Boston and Tom Sholtz is a liberal as they come…but I don’t hear him on the telly saying what trash the troops are and how much America sucks. And I’m STILL waiting for all those pussy-liberals who said they’d leave the country if Bush was elected…TO FREAKIN’ LEAVE!!! If you don’t like the team…get out of the stadium!!!
“Now I’m calling on citizens from all over the world, this is Captain America calling. I held you up when you were down on your knees, so would you catch me now I’m falling”. The Kinks
Ziggy Spaz on March 27, 2007 at 8:53 pm
Ziggy…John would be so proud of you! Twice in this posting 🙂
CapeConservative on March 27, 2007 at 10:17 pm
Yeah…can’t believe I didn’t on the other post. I usually never miss a chance to call a pussy-liberal…well…a pussy-liberal. A pox on the lot of them!!
Ziggy Spaz on March 27, 2007 at 11:59 pm
Shame, Damn Shame
I read the book (“Point of Impact”) just as the movie was coming out. None of the stuff Debbie criticizes is in the book. I would have enjoyed very much a movie that followed the novel.
What is most pathetic is that the main character is NOT anti-american at all in the novel. He’s actually quite patriotic. And the bad guys are renegade spooks, not the U.S. gov’t.
As with many novels, once they get to Hollywood and get converted into screenplays, the leftist anti-American movie producers put their political spin on it.
This is a classic perversion. I was a Tom Clancy fan until he cooperated with the movie producers in sanitizing “Sum Of All Fears” for the movie to make the bad guy neonazis instead of Arab terrorists.
The author writes what he cares about for the book and then sell it for a movie for as much as he can get from the movie producer with no regard for the book’s messages. In so doing, the author goes from artist to whore.
Tammuz29 on March 29, 2007 at 2:03 pm
Only a Righty wingnut would consider this movie a threat to American values. It is pathetic to regard a fellow countryman a traitor because he disagrees with you. Shooter is a mindless action flick, they are a dime a dozen. Am I to belive that a movie that doesn’t have the alleged negative comment on “American Values” is better because it has no “liberal” slant? Is Under Siege any less stupid? I suppose that I shouldn’t complain though. As long as you morons are wringing your hands and gnashing your teeth over what a communist Whalberg is, your not out doing whatever stupid things wingnuts do when not crying about the unfairness of the world. Pussy righties.
tkel on October 18, 2008 at 4:30 pm
I just saw this movie on TNT. I thought I could grin and bear it, but MAN it’s communist message was about as redundant as a Head-on ad! I rolled with laughter when the Che Guavara tee shirt appeared. And honestly, just how blatant are the last few lines? “you can’t kill me, I’m a senator!”
Good grief!!! Is there no shame?
jag on August 8, 2009 at 11:15 pm
wow…finally just got a chance to see this movie – heard it was ‘cool’… how scary that the masses just consume this crap and get the lib garbage stuck to them!
With Jon Stewart as their chief of news and a steady stream of garbage coming out of hollywood…I fear for the future.
tv929 on October 4, 2010 at 3:15 pm
Ok, first off I am a registered Republican and I think Debbie needs to chill out. This movie is NOT Anti-American, neither is it Anti-Military. The primary Antagonist is one corrupt US Senator…not the US Government as a whole. The villains who go after Walbherg’s charactor (Danny Glover, Rade Serbedzija, Elias Koteas) are not US government personal but contractors who were hired by the Senator to help with the cover up. The people who burn the village down at the beginning are also contractors, they are not US military (although Marine Snipers were tricked into covering thier escape).
Matt on July 29, 2011 at 8:26 pm
Does anybody take this seriously? This is just a “Bash Wahlberg” article. Wow, dude really needs to lighten up. That much hate isn’t good for anybody. It’s a movie, calm down.
Ed Tabore on March 21, 2016 at 11:32 am
Leave a Reply for billybob
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Why is the Temple Lot Suit important?
It's interesting to note that throughout the Internet, whether comments are made by Utah LDS, ex-Utah LDS, Christians against Utah LDS, or Community of Christ (formerly RLDS), the discussions about Joseph and polygamy rarely mention the Temple Lot Suit. It's as though the trial never happened. Yet, it is one of the most important documents existing that proves Joseph is innocent of teaching and practicing polygamy.
About the Temple Lot
According to The Temple of the Lord, by Richard and Pamela Price (you may purchase a copy online), the spot for the temple in Independence, Missouri (See RLDS Doctrine and Covenants 57:1) was dedicated in 1831 by Joseph Smith, Jr. and ten elders of the LDS Church (See The Temple of the Lord, p. 21). The dedicated spot for the temple was on a 63.27 acre tract which was purchased by the original LDS Church on December 19, 1831 (See ibid., p. 35) but deeded in the name of Edward Partridge, Bishop of the Church (See ibid., p. 38). After the LDS were driven out of Independence, the property was deeded over to Martin Harris. However, because of Missouri Governor Boggs' Extermination Order, it was unsafe for Harris to come to Jackson County Missouri to record the deed. Thus, the Harris Deed, which was a warranty deed (the seller warrants that it is legally theirs to sell) was never recorded (See ibid., pp.41–50).
About two years after Joseph's death in 1844, Brigham Young led several thousand LDS to Utah. On the way they stopped near what is now the Omaha, Nebraska area and camped for the winter, calling it Winter Quarters. While at Winter Quarters, Mr. Pool from Independence, Missouri contacted Brigham Young, who had a plural marriage with Emily Partridge, the daughter of the deceased Edward Partridge. Pool asked Young if Edward's wife and children would sell to him a quit claim deed (the seller doesn't guarantee they have the right to sell the property but will quit claiming ownership of it) for the Temple Lot. The Temple Lot is the city block between the RLDS Stone Church on the north and the RLDS Auditorium on the south that was designated by Joseph as the spot for the temple and which is a part of the 63.27 acre tract that the original LDS Church purchased (See ibid., pp. 73–86). The Partridges agreed to the deal and sold a quit claim deed to Pool for the land. The Pool Deed eventually changed hands until it was purchased by the Church of Christ (Temple Lot), who owns it today (See ibid., pp. 52–61).
In addition to the Pool Deed, in the 1870s a warranty deed was recorded that transferred all the properties of the original LDS Church in Independence, Missouri from Edward Partridge to Oliver Cowdery on behalf of Cowdery's children. Based on this deed, a quit claim deed for the Temple Lot was sold to the RLDS Church (See ibid., pp. 63–72). Thus, both the RLDS Church and the Church of Christ (Temple Lot) owned quit claim deeds to the Temple Lot.
About the Suit
In the early 1890s, the RLDS Church sued in court (Circuit Court of the United States, for the Western District of Missouri, Western Division, at Kansas City, Missouri, Judge John F. Philips) the Church of Christ (Temple Lot) who had possession of the land. The RLDS Church wanted the court to decide which church was the rightful owner of the Temple Lot. The Utah LDS Church assisted the Church of Christ (Temple Lot) in their defense. The presence of the Utah LDS Church in the trial was so notable "that Judge Philips in his decision spoke of it as 'the power behind the throne.' They furnished many leading witnesses, including Wilford Woodruff, president of the Utah church, Lorenzo Snow, president of the Utah twelve, and at least two of the women who had become notorious by reason of their claim that they were plural wives of Joseph Smith the Martyr" (The Church in Court, compiled and arranged by Elbert A. Smith).
Since neither party owned a warranty deed to the land, Judge Philips had to determine who was the proper successor to the original LDS Church which had purchased the 63.27 acre tract containing the Temple Lot. Thus, he had to determine the original beliefs of the church as well as the beliefs of the churches represented at the suit to decide which church was the legitimate continuation of the original church and entitled to the property.
The Utah LDS Church, Church of Christ, and the RLDS Church brought forth their best witnesses to testify how their church continued the beliefs of the original church. The Utah LDS Church tried to prove that the authority for the doctrines unique to their organization, including polygamy, came from the teachings and practice of Joseph Smith, Jr. The RLDS Church brought evidence and testimony that these doctrines were an invention of Brigham Young and other Utah LDS leaders and were not taught or practiced by Joseph. After many testimonies and cross examinations, Judge Philips rendered, in part, the following decision:
"There can be no question of the fact that Brigham Young's assumed presidency was a bold and bald usurpation. The Book of Doctrine and Covenants (printed in 1846) page 411, containing a revelation to Joseph Smith, January 19, 1841, gave unto them "my servant Joseph, to be a presiding elder over all my church, to be a translator, a revelator, a seer, and a prophet." The book clearly taught that the succession should descend lineally and go to the firstborn. Joseph Smith so taught, and, before his taking off, publicly proclaimed his son Joseph, the present head of Complainant Church, his successor, and he was so anointed.
"The Book of Mormon itself inveighed against the sin of polygamy.... Conformably to the Book of Mormon, the Book of Doctrine and Covenants expressly declared "that we believe that one man should have but one wife, and one woman but one husband." And this declaration of the church on this subject reappeared in the Book of Doctrine and Covenants, editions of 1846 and 1856. Its first appearance as a dogma of the church [the dogma of polygamy] was in the Utah Church in 1852.
"Claim is made by the Utah Church that this doctrine is predicated of a revelation made to Joseph Smith in July, 1843. No such revelation was ever made public during the life of Joseph Smith, and under the law of the church it could not become an article of faith and belief until submitted to and adopted by the church. This was never done.
"It is charged by the Respondents, as an echo of the Utah Church, that Joseph Smith, 'the Martyr,' secretly taught and practiced polygamy; and the Utah contingent furnishes the evidence, and two of the women, to prove this fact. It perhaps would be uncharitable to say of these women that they have borne false testimony as to their connection with Joseph Smith; but, in view of all the evidence and circumstances surrounding the alleged intercourse, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that at most they were but sports in 'nest hiding.' In view of the contention of the Salt Lake party, that polygamy obtained at Nauvoo as early as 1841, it must be a little embarrassing to President Woodruff of that organization when he is confronted, as he was in the evidence in this case, with a published card in the church organ at Nauvoo in October, 1843, certifying that he knew of no other rule or system of marriage than the one published in the Book of Doctrine and Covenants, and that the 'secret wife system,' charged against the church, was a creature of invention by one Doctor Bennett, and that they knew of no such society. That certificate was signed by the leading members of the church, including John Taylor the former President of the Utah Church. And a similar certificate was published by the Ladies' Relief Society of the same place, signed by Emma Smith, wife of Joseph Smith, and Phoebe Woodruff, wife of the present President Woodruff. No such marriage ever occurred under the rules of the church, and no offspring came from the imputed illicit intercourse, although Joseph Smith was in the full vigor of young manhood, and his wife, Emma, was giving birth to healthy children in regular order, and was enciente at the time of Joseph's death" (The Temple Lot Case, Price Publishing Company, pp. 543–551).
The Importance of the Suit
The importance of the Temple Lot Suit in relation to Joseph's character was that in a court of law, Joseph was found innocent of teaching and practicing polygamy. The Utah LDS Church brought forth their best witnesses that Joseph taught and practiced polygamy to prove they were the continuation of the original church. Yet, in an unbiased court of law, the Utah LDS Church could not prove that Joseph taught or practiced polygamy, even with two witnesses who claimed to be Joseph's plural wives. In fact, the witnesses they produced—their best ones—were not credible witnesses according to Judge Philips.
So debates can continue and books can be written alleging all sorts of hideous acts by Joseph involving polygamy. But the fact still remains that in an unbiased court of law, where best evidence is presented and allegations have to be proved and witnesses have to be credible and every man is innocent until proven guilty, Joseph Smith, Jr. was found innocent of teaching and practicing polygamy.
Posted by JSDefender at 9:47 PM 6 comments: Links to this post
Labels: Book of Mormon, Brigham Young, LDS DC 132, Polygamy Issue, Temple Lot Suit
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Mental Health Column
HomeSportsSpeaker warns Denison about steroid usage
Speaker warns Denison about steroid usage
Donald Hooton cites a recent Minnesota University study when he says that, “5-6 percent of middle school and high school boys and 4-5 percent of high school girls are using anabolic steroids…That’s over a million and a half kids.”
He is not the least bit surprised. “So many of our kids today are pressured by body image to look better. Whether that’s through marketing, society, but also the pressure to win, to play at the next level… these kids feel as if to properly fit into society, they have to have that perfect body, to be famous, the kids think they have to be a sports athlete. So everybody that’s on TV, everybody that is successful, they projected to get these kids to have this great body image. And today our kids want it instantly, they want it the fastest way possible,” Hooton says.
Hooton personally came to Denison University last week in order to “educate kids on the dangers of appearance and performance enhancing drugs, dietary supplements, energy drinks, energy shots, anabolic steroids…We’re here to educate them on what it is they are putting in their body, why they don’t need it, and even if it were not against the rules, why they shouldn’t be taking it.”
He also highlighted the universal ignorance about the benefit of real foods in a proper diet, as he believes that “you can get everything necessary for your diet through natural foods, and results also come from working hard.”
“There’s nothing you can’t get in a proper diet, that you can get in a dietary supplement.” He adds, “I am going to challenge the student athletes to bring whatever bottle up, or supplement it is, I want them to read and what you are doing to supplement and what the ingredients are actually doing better than what you could be getting eating vegetables and fruits.”
Hooton says not only do the dietary supplements not work, they may be detrimental to your body.
“20-25 percent of over-the-counter dietary supplements you and I can buy will be spiked with some form of anabolic steroid… so you’re at risk of putting a potentially harmful drug into your body,” he said.
He also talked about the recent scare of pre-workout supplements such as Jack3d, which is presently undergoing a lawsuit due to an ingredient called DMAA (dimethylamylamine) which the New York Times describes as something that “frequently raises blood pressure and heart rate, and could lead to heart attacks.” The New York Times also reports that “In December 2011, after the deaths of two soldiers who had used Jack3d, the Defense Department removed all products containing DMAA from stores on military bases, including more than 100 GNC shops.”
Hooton explains the danger and unnecessity of pre-workouts. “[The pre workouts] increase core temperature and heart rate. What is the first thing you do when you go to the gym? You warm up, which increases your heart rate and your core temperature.”
His motivation is a personal family tragedy stemming from anabolic steroids.
“I lost my younger brother ten years ago after he and a bunch of his friends made the uneducated decision to begin using anabolic steroids,” Hooton says.
In response to his brother’s death, Hooton and his family started the Hooton Foundation to prevent situations like the one his brother, and his family, went through as much as possible for the near future.
The Hooton Foundation’s mission is to “educate North America’s youth and their adult influencers about the dangers of anabolic steroids and Appearance & Performance Enhancing Drugs (APEDS).” Their goal is to ultimately end “the use of APEDS in high schools, middle school, and universities.”
The Hooton Foundation spreads the awareness through a multitude of speakers who talk throughout the country to all forms of student bodies, such as Denison University.
Donald Hooton, the vice president of education of the Hooton Foundation and a former college athlete, implies that the statistics that the NCAA puts out about anabolic steroid use in collegiate sports might be misleading, for he himself “saw 75 percent of the guys at two different [college baseball] schools actively using it, they never had any education about it and had no idea what they were putting in their bodies.”
Also, Hooton explained that a lot of steroids go under the radar on tests and even physical appearance tests because not all steroids do the same thing, even if the public perception of them is that it makes people freakishly hulkish.
Hooton mentions the recent backlash over seven-time Tour de France winning bicyclist Lance Armstrong for his point, “Nobody believed [Lance Armstrong] took steroids. Everybody believed him when he came out and said that he did not use, because he is not a big guy. However, not all steroids make you this big massive person, not everybody is using it for those reasons. The most tested athlete in the world and he never got caught until years after.”
At the end of the day, safety is the number one concern for the Hooton Foundation, an institution that eventually wants to eliminate all sources of APEDs. The only way Hooton feels that is possible is through education.
Tags:Hooton, Sports, Steroids
An update on Denison Athletics
Three Denisonians named NCAC Player of the Week
Taekwondo Club: Kicking and punching all the way to success
Biology major with a math minor. Originate from New Albany, Ohio. I love my Big Red.
Millard Baker
It is unrealistic to think that any effort will eliminate the use of APEDs. With safety being the number one concern, something needs to be done to address the safety of those individuals who ignore calls for prohibition and choose to use anabolic steroids, etc. anyway.
How do we minimize harm for people using steroids? And for people who come off steroids?
Education and harm reduction is the best solution.
Mr. Baker,
Safety is of course a priority. However, this foundation deals with the education of anabolic steroids throughout the country. They do not deal with “harm reduction”. My best guess would be to ask a doctor for that.
Steroid education and harm reduction are inseparable especially when safety is the objective.
To pitch stories to The Denisonian editors, email denisonian@denison.edu or come to content meetings every Monday in Knapp 106 at 5:30!
Food Recovery at Denison
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGfY4NcVSgQ
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The Enduring Appeal of Mario Kart
September 24, 2015 / Roger Edwards
One of the best games I have ever played is Super Mario Kart. It simply embodies all those elements that make Nintendo titles so great. It is a polished product with a cheerful aesthetic that is eminently playable. It has exactly the right balance between skill and random chance resulting in a fun and compelling game. No two races are ever the same. It is one of the few titles that I have literally played all night with friends. I still smart over the “incident” where someone stole my feather just as I was about to jump across the shortcut on the Ghost Valley 1 track (this will make perfect sense to those who have played the game).
Due to the game’s inherent appeal, there has been a further seven incarnations of Mario Kart. All have proven to be bestsellers. Despite Nintendo’s ongoing financial difficulties, last year’s release of Mario Kart 8 was a welcome shot in the arm for the ailing games company. Sales have reached 2 million copies in the US alone since its May release. The title has also been beneficial for sales of the ailing Wii U, a console that until recently had been effectively written off by many in the gaming industry. Furthermore Mario Kart 8 attracted “strongest review scores in franchise history,” according to the company.
So what exactly are the reasons behind the enduring appeal of Mario Kart? Obviously the accessible and well-conceived game mechanics are a big factor. Each new version of the game maintains the balance between refining old ideas while introducing fresh new ones. The pleasant graphics with their stylised cartoon aesthetic along with the playful soundtrack broadens its appeal to all age groups. The game also lacks the male-centric philosophy that is associated with so many driving and racing franchises. Perhaps the most important quality present in all versions of Mario Kart is the “fun factor”. It’s something Nintendo has always inherently. It’s the reason why I still play Super Mario Kart today, via an emulator on my PC and tablet.
categories / Gaming, Mario Kart
Newer / September 25, 2015
White Tiger (2012)
El Dorado (1966)
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William Werden Wilson
Captain William Werden Wilson (7 January, 1877 – 24 October, 1950) was an officer in the Royal Navy.
1 Life & Career
2 Post-War
4 Footnotes
Wilson was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant on 30 June, 1899.[1]
Wilson was promoted to the rank of Commander on 30 June, 1912.[2]
Wilson was appointed in command of the destroyer Garry on 28 July, 1914.[3]
Wilson was placed on the Retired List at his own request with the rank of Captain on 7 January, 1923.[4]
Naval Appointments
New Command Captain of H.M.S. Derwent
14 Jul, 1904[5] – 7 Feb, 1905[6] Succeeded by
Osmond J. Prentis
? Captain of H.M. T.B. 113
14 Jul, 1904 Succeeded by
Richard K. Philpott
Walter C. Chaytor Captain of H.M.S. Ringdove
18 May, 1907[7] – 21 May, 1909[8] Succeeded by
Arthur T. Blackwood
Charles B. Miller Captain of H.M.S. Æolus
22 Nov, 1910[9][10] – 1 May, 1911[11] Succeeded by
Alan G. Hotham
Graham R. L. Edwards Captain of H.M.S. Garry
28 Jul, 1914[12][13] – 9 Oct, 1915[14] Succeeded by
Ambrose T. N. Abbay
New Command Captain of H.M.S. Mounsey
9 Oct, 1915[15] Succeeded by
Ralph V. Eyre
Ralph V. Eyre Captain of H.M.S. Brisk
Oct, 1915[16] – 7 Jun, 1916[17] Succeeded by
Algernon E. P. Lyons
New Command Captain of H.M.S. Patriot
7 Jun, 1916[18] – late Jun, 1916[19] Succeeded by
Robert G. Hamond
Robert G. Hamond Captain of H.M.S. Owl
Jun, 1916[20][21] – 30 Oct, 1917[22] Succeeded by
John O. Barron
Alfred W. Paget Senior Naval Officer, Larne
22 Feb, 1918 – 27 May, 1919 Succeeded by
Francis E. M. Garforth Captain of H.M.S. Amphitrite
27 May, 1919[23] – 23 Jul, 1919[24] Succeeded by
↑ Wilson Service Record. The National Archives. ADM 196/44/286. f. 321.
↑ The Navy List. (January, 1915). p. 322.
↑ The Navy List. (April, 1911). p. 273.
↑ The Navy List. (October, 1915). p. 394h.
↑ Wilson Service Record. The National Archives. ADM 196/44/286. f. 321. Eyre's next command states October
↑ The Navy List. (November, 1917). p. 396d.
Retrieved from "http://www.dreadnoughtproject.org/tfs/index.php?title=William_Werden_Wilson&oldid=273491"
People (UK)
Captains (UK)
H.M.S. Britannia (Training Ship) Entrants of January, 1891
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#1,941. Devil's Island (1939)
Directed By: William Clemens
Starring: Boris Karloff, Nedda Harrigan, James Stephenson
Tag line: "A Drama of Inhuman Cruelty!"
Trivia: This movie brought massive protests from the French government for its depiction of that country's penal system
Dr. Charles Gaudet (Boris Karloff), a noted brain surgeon, is arrested for trying to help a political prisoner who was shot while escaping. Convicted of treason for his actions, Dr. Gaudet is sentenced to 10 years hard labor on Devil’s Island, a penal colony that’s home to some of the worst criminals in France. But as Gaudet soon discovers, the inmates themselves are being mistreated by the guards, who are acting on the orders of the sadistic commandant, Col. Armand Lucien (James Stephenson). When he tries to speak out against these injustices, Gaudet is labeled a troublemaker, and not even saving the commandant’s daughter (Rolla Gourvitch), who was badly injured in a fall, can keep the good doctor out of solitary confinement. Fed up with the horrible conditions, Gaudet, aided by the commandant’s sympathetic wife (Nedda Harrigan), plans an elaborate escape, realizing full well that, if he’s caught, it means a trip to the guillotine.
Released by Warner Brothers in 1939, Devil’s Island, which shines a light on the mistreatment of prisoners at France’s famed Devil’s Island, fell right in line with the other “socially conscious” films the studio was putting out around that time (the best being 1932’s I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang, which actually led to prison reform in the south). And even though Warners delayed the release of the movie so as not to anger the French (it hit theaters a year after the government stopped sending new prisoners to the penal colony), Devil’s Island still manages to get its point across by way of some well-realized scenes (the trouble begins when an inmate named Andre, played by John Harmon, is assigned to the timber cutting unit, despite the fact he’s suffering from tuberculosis. When the poor guy drops dead, a riot ensues, and as a result, Dr. Gaudet and a few others are put in solitary while the ringleader is sent to the guillotine).
In addition to its hard-hitting sequences, Devil’s Island features yet another fine performance by Boris Karloff, who, along with playing a sympathetic character (which was the actor’s specialty), displays an inner strength that causes his Dr. Gaudet to speak his mind in any situation (realizing Andre’s condition was life-threatening, Gaudet tries to warn the prison’s doctor, played by Edward Keane, that the hard labor could kill him. And, of course, he was right).
The movie does pull its punches towards the end, which ultimately weakens its message (the filmmakers imply that the horrors of Devil’s Island were the fault of a few rogue individuals, essentially letting the French government off the hook), but while it may fall a bit short as social commentary, Karloff himself makes Devil’s Island worth your time.
#1,933. Scrooged (1988)
#1,934. Arcade (1993)
#1,935. 'Twas the Night Before Christmas (1974)
#1,936. The Hebrew Hammer (2003)
#1,937. Barbarella (1968)
#1,938. Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (2010)
#1,939. The Year of Living Dangerously (1982)
#1,940. Gesualdo: Death For Five Voices (1995)
#1,942. Oklahoma Crude (1973)
#1,943. Joyeux Noel (2005)
#1,944. The Ultimate Wave Tahiti (2010)
#1,945. Dollman (1991)
#1,946. A Christmas Horror Story (2015)
#1,947. Prep & Landing: Operation: Secret Santa (...
#1,948. West of Shanghai (1937)
#1,949. The Invisible Menace (1938)
#1,950. Lenny Bruce Without Tears (1972)
#1,951. The Gate (1987)
#1,952. Which Way is Up? (1977)
#1,953. Day of the Animals (1977)
#1,954. Quantrill's Raiders (1958)
#1,955. A Shot in the Dark (1964)
#1,956. Stalking Santa (2006)
#1,957. Varsity Show (1937)
#1,958. Jerusalem (2013)
#1,959. The Dead Lands (2014)
#1,960. WarGames (1983)
#1,961. Count Dracula (1970)
#1,962. Dead Snow 2: Red vs. Dead (2014)
#1,963. Anonymous (2011)
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1. "Look what your brother did to the door! Ain't he got no pride in his home?"
- The Cook, from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
2. "If I'm curt with you it's because time is a factor. I think fast, I talk fast and I need you guys to act fast if you wanna get out of this. So pretty please, with sugar on top. Clean the fucking car"
- Winston, aka "The Wolf", Pulp Fiction
3. "All right, Mr. DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up"
- Norma Desmond, Sunset Boulevard
4. "You gotta be fuckin' kidding"
- Palmer, 1982's The Thing
5. "The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist"
- Verbal, The Usual Suspects
6. "Hey, don't knock masturbation! It's sex with someone I love"
- Alvy Singer, Annie Hall
7. "Wendy? darling? Light of my life. I'm not gonna hurt ya. You didn't let me finish my sentence. I said, I'm not gonna hurt ya. I'm just going to bash your brains in"
- Jack Torrence, The Shining
8. "$10,000 for me by myself. For that you get the head, the tail, the whole damn thing"
- Captain Quint, Jaws
9. "Made it, Ma! Top of the world!"
- Cody Jarrett, White Heat
10. "I've... seen things... you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannehauser Gate. All those... moments... will be lost in time, like... tears in rain"
- Roy Batty, Blade Runner
11. "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!"
- Howard Beale, Network
12. "Ricky, I'm going to miss you. Apparently you're the only one in Casablanca with less scruples than I"
- Captain Renault, Casablanca
13. "Fiendish Dr. Wu, you done FUCKED UP NOW!"
- Black Dynamite, Black Dynamite
14. "You're gonna be dumb enough to pull a gun on a man, you better be smart enough to pull the trigger"
- Tyrone Washington, The Boys in Company C
15. "I kick ass for the Lord!"
- Father McGruder, Dead Alive
16. "Oh, in the name of God! Now I know what it feels like to BE God!"
- Henry Frankenstein, Frankenstein
17. "You gonna eat your fat?"
- Spalding, Caddyshack
18. "I can't lie to you about your chances, but... you have my sympathies"
- Ash, Alien
19. "Oh my God Almighty! Someone has sent me a bowel movement!"
- Babs Johnson, Pink Flamingos
20. "What we got here is... failure to communicate"
- Captain, Cool Hand Luke
21. "We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off"
- Tyler Durden, Fight Club
22. "We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold"
- Raoul Duke, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
23. "We grow copious amounts of ganja, yah? And you're carrying a wasted girl and a bag of fertilizer. You don't look like your average horti-fucking-culturalist!"
- Winston, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
24. "You best start believing in ghost stories, Miss Turner... you're in one!"
- Capt. Barbpossa, Pirates of the Carribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl
25. "I don't wanna kill anybody. But if I gotta get out that door, and you're standing in my way, one way or the other, you're gettin' outta my way"
- Mr. Pink, Reservoir Dogs
26. "Have you ever heard of Kurgaal? It is a prison below Omsk. Many men have gone there. Few have returned. I have returned. After fifteen years... I... have returned"
- Dr. Vitus Verdegast, 1934's The Black Cat
27. "No, Mr. Bond, I expect you to DIE!"
- Auric Goldfinger, Goldfinger
28. "You probably heard we ain't in the prisoner-takin' business; we in the killin' Nazi business. And cousin, business is a-boomin'"
- Lt. Aldo Raine, Inglourious Basterds
29. "There was me... that is Alex... and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar trying to make up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening"
- Alex, A Clockwork Orange
30. "You know, Jill, you remind me of my mother. She was the biggest whore in Alameda and the finest woman that ever lived. Whoever my father was - for an hour or for a month - he must have been a happy man"
- Cheyenne, Once Upon a Time in the West
31. "Do not concentrate on the finger or you will miss all of the heavenly glory!"
- Lee, Enter the Dragon
32. "My mom and dad are gonna be so mad at me!"
- Stu, Scream
33. "I read somewhere their periods attract bears. Bears can smell the menstruation"
- Brick Tamland, Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy
34. "We blew it"
- Wyatt, Easy Rider
35. "Fuck you. That's my name. You know why, mister? You drove a Hyundai to get here. I drove an eighty-thousand dollar BMW. THAT'S my name. And your name is you're wanting"
- Blake, Glengarry Glen Ross
36. "And to think... I hesitated"
- Channing Cenobite, Hellbound: Hellraiser II
37. "I do wish we could chat longer, but... I'm having an old friend for dinner"
- Hannibal Lecter, The Silence of the Lambs
38. "You see, Jason was my son, and today is his birthday..."
- Pamela Voorhees, 1980's Friday the 13th
39. "The future has taken root in the present"
- Merlin, Excalibur
40. "That which is eternal cannot die. But if it's any consolation, sweet Alex, THAT HURT LIKE HELL!"
- The Djinn, Wishmaster
41. "Of course he has a knife. He ALWAYS has a knife! We ALL have knives! It's 1183 and we're barbarians!"
- Eleanor of Aquitaine, The Lion in Winter
42. "I can tell you with no ego, this is my finest sword. If on your journey, you should encounter God, God will be cut"
- Hattori Hanzo, Kill Bill, Vol. 1
43. "They're coming to get you, Barbara!"
- Johnny Night of the Living Dead
44. "I really have nothing to say, but I want to say it all the same"
- Guido, Fellini's 8 1/2
45. "Dead? No excuse for laying off work"
- Supreme Being, Time Bandits
46. "Genetic power is the most awesome force the planet's ever seen, but you wield it like a kid that's found his dad's gun"
- Dr. Ian Malcolm, Jurassic Park
47. "All right, no one is to stone ANYONE until I blow this whistle"
- Jewish Official, Life of Brian
48. "Our battle, our struggle, is to create art. Our weapon is the moving picture. Because we have the moving picture, our paintings will grow and recede; our poetry will be shadows that lengthen and conceal; our light will play across living faces that laugh and agonize; and our music will linger and finally overwhelm, because it will have a context as certain as the grave. We are scientists engaged in the creation of memory... but our memory will neither blur nor fade"
- F.W. Murnau, Shadow of the Vampire
49. "Where there's a will - and there is a fucking will - there's a way - and there is a fucking way"
- Teddy Bass, Sexy Beast
50. "Thank you, honey, this is a beautiful party. You invited all my friends. Good thinking!"
- Johnny, The Room
51. "Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room!"
- President Merkin Muffley, Dr. Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
52. "God, how I hate the twentieth century"
- Gen. George S. Patton, Patton
53. "This car is 100% death proof. Only to get the benefit of it, honey, you really gotta be sitting in my seat"
- Stuntman Mike, Death Proof
54. "Aren't you a healer and a vessel for the holy spirit? When are you coming over and make my son hear again? Can't you do that?"
- Daniel Plainview, There Will Be Blood
55. "For as long as I can remember I always wanted to be a gangster"
- Henry Hill, Goodfellas
56. "Men, you are about to embark on a great crusade to stamp out runaway decency in the west. Now you men will only be risking your lives, whilst I will be risking an almost certain Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor"
- Hedley Lamaar, Blazing Saddles
57. "An old man dies. A young woman lives. A fair trade. I love you, Nancy."
- John Hartigan, Sin City
58. "This is the West, sir. When the legend becomes fact, print the legend."
- Maxwell Scott, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance
59. "Immediately after making this statement, Royal realized that it was true"
- Narrator, The Royal Tenenbaums
60. "I hired these guys for three days a week and they just started showing up every day. That was four years ago"
- Rob Gordon, High Fidelity
61. "You see, in this world there’s two kinds of people, my friend; those with loaded guns and those who dig. You dig"
- Blondie, The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
62. "Oh no, it wasn't the airplanes. It was beauty killed the beast"
- Carl Denham, King Kong
63. "There's more to life than a little money, you know. Don'tcha know that? And here ya are, and it's a beautiful day. Well. I just don't understand it"
- Marge Gunderson, Fargo
64. "But, Mrs. Mulwray, I goddamn near lost my nose. And I like it. I like breathing through it. And I still think you're hiding something"
- Jake Gittes, Chinatown
65. "Two households, different as dried plums and pears In fair Manhattan, where we lay our scene"
- Lemmy, Tromeo and Juliet
66. "You *are* home"
- Penny Lane, Almost Famous
67. "One thing about living in Santa Carla I never could stomach; all the damn vampires"
- Grandpa, The Lost Boys
68. "Saigon... shit; I'm still only in Saigon... "
- Capt. Willard, Apocalypse Now
69. "Because some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn"
- Alfred, The Dark Knight
70. "I like simple pleasures, like butter in my ass, lollipops in my mouth. That's just me. That's just something that I enjoy"
- Floyd Gondolli, Boogie Nights
71. "Mrs. Robinson, if you don't mind my saying so, this conversation is getting a little strange"
- Banjamin Braddock, The Graduate
72. "Certainly. You take the blonde, I'll take the one in the turban"
- Igor, Young Frankenstein
73. "They're going to search me when I first meet them, right? So I can't have a weapon on me then. But if Clemenza can figure a way to have a weapon planted there for me, then I'll kill them both"
- Michael Corleone, The Godfather
74. "You are a vicious bastard Rotelli. I'm glad you're dead!"
- The Joker, Batman
75. "Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die"
- Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride
76. "The only hand on your pecker is going to be your own"
- Fenwick, Diner
77. "Therefore let us be happy while we are happy. Let us be kind, generous, affectionate and good. It is necessary and not at all shameful to take pleasure in the little world"
- Gustav Adolf Ekdahl, Fanny and Alexander
78. "Australia. What fresh hell is this?"
- Captain Stanley, The Proposition
79. "Son of a bitch, I'm sick of these dolphins"
- Steve Zissou, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou
80. "I was 12 going on 13 the first time I saw a dead human being. It happened in the summer of 1959... a long time ago, but only if you measure in terms of years"
- The Writer, Stand By Me
81. "Mother! Oh God, mother! Blood! Blood!"
- Norman Bates, Psycho
82. "Frankly, you're beginning to smell, and for a stud in New York, that's a handicap"
- Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo, Midnight Cowboy
83. "Chapter One. He adored New York City. He idolized it all out of proportion. Eh uh, no, make that he, he romanticized it all out of proportion"
- Isaac Davis, Manhattan
84. "You just never know when you're living in a golden age"
- Alexander Payne, Z Channel: A Magnificent Obsession
85. "Will the dancing Hitlers please wait in the wings? We are only seeing singing Hitlers"
- Roger De Bris, The Producers
86. "If you ladies leave my island, if you survive recruit training, you will be a weapon. You will be a minister of death praying for war. But until that day you are pukes. You are the lowest form of life on Earth. You are not even human fucking beings. You are nothing but unorganized grabastic pieces of amphibian shit!"
- Gunnery Sergeant Hartman, Full Metal Jacket
87. "I'm a foolish old man who's been drawn into a wild goose chase by a harpie in trousers and a nincompoop"
- Rooster Cogburn, 2010's True Grit
88. "You're one... *ugly* motherfucker!"
- Dutch, Predator
89. "For one who has not lived even a single lifetime, you're a wise man, Van Helsing"
- Count Dracula, Dracula
90. "Maybe it will and maybe it won't, but if it do, you gonna fly through them pearly gates with the biggest fucking smile St. Peter ever seen!"
- Coffy, Coffy
91. "Food for five years, a thousand gallons of gas, air filtration, water filtration, Geiger counter. Bomb shelter! Underground... God damn monsters"
- Burt Gummer, Tremors
92. "Think ya used enough dynamite there, Butch?"
- Sundance Kid, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
93. "Now let me correct you on a couple of things, OK? Aristotle was not Belgian. The central message of Buddhism is not 'Every man for himself.' And the London Underground is not a political movement. Those are all mistakes, Otto. I looked them up."
- Wanda, A Fish Called Wanda
94. "The ghosts are moving tonight, restless... hungry. May I introduce myself? I'm Watson Pritchard. In just a moment I'll show you the only really haunted house in the world"
- Watson Pritchard, House on Haunted Hill
95. "The Irish are the blacks of Europe. And Dubliners are the blacks of Ireland. And the Northside Dubliners are the blacks of Dublin. So say it once, say it loud: I'm black and I'm proud"
- Jimmy Rabbitte, The Commitments
96. "I am serious... and don't call me Shirley"
- Dr. Rumack, Airplane!
97. "A decapitated head can continue to see for approximately twenty seconds. So when I have one that's gawking, I always hold it up so that it can see its body. It's a little extra I throw in for no added charge"
- The Gemini Killer, The Exorcist III
98. "Waste not, want not!"
- Helga Ten Dorp, Deathtrap
99. "I knew it. I'm surrounded by assholes!"
- Dark Helmet, Spaceballs
100. "There are no two words in the English language more harmful than 'good job'"
- Terence Fletcher, Whiplash
Fun list! A few I might add (not that anyone's asking):
- "I admire your notion of fair odds, Mister." (The Magnificent Seven)
- "You just keep thinking, Butch -- that's what you're good at!" (Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid)
- "You're gonna need a bigger boat." (Jaws)
- "You seem a decent fellow. I hate to kill you." "YOU seem a decent fellow. I hate to die." (The Princess Bride)
- "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn." (Gone With the Wind)
- "Take your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!" (Planet of the Apes)
- "When you have to shoot, shoot -- don't talk." (The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly)
- "Why, you speak treason!" "Fluently." (Adventures of Robin Hood)
- "Welcome to Sherwood, m'lady!" (Adventures of Robin Hood)
- "Leave the gun. Take the cannoli." (The Godfather)
- "Listen to them -- children of the night! What music they make!" (Dracula)
- "It WAS the boogeyman!" "As a matter of fact, it was." (Halloween)
- "By the power vested in me by Kaiser Wilhelm II, I pronounce you man and wife -- proceed with the execution." (The African Queen)
I could go on and on (oh yeah, I already have).
Dean: Thank you! And all of the ones you listed are excellent as well! Thanks for taking the time to do so.
Nobody's perfect-some like it hot.
All the bitches in the house say yo oh! - Ali G in da house
Andrew Sayre said...
Here's one you might want to squeeze in there some place:
How do you know you're God?
Simple. When I pray to Him, I find I am talking to myself.
-The Ruling Class
#1. Armageddon (1998)
#2. eXistenZ (1999)
#3. Pinocchio (1940)
#4. American Graffiti (1973)
#5. Short Cuts (1993)
#6. Welcome to Nollywood (2007)
#7. Horrors of War (2006)
#8. Coffy (1973)
#9. Bloody Mama (1970)
#10. Suburbia (1983)
#11. The Wind That Shakes the Barley (2006)
#12. Raging Bull (1980)
#13. The Thing (1982)
#14. 1776 (1972)
#15. The Man With Bogart's Face (1980)
#16. The French Connection (1971)
#17. Day For Night (1973)
#18. The Lion in Winter (1968)
#19. Local Hero (1983)
#20. Chloe in the Afternoon (1972)
#21. One Crazy Summer (1986)
#22. American Swing (2008)
#23. Charley Varrick (1973)
#24. She-Wolves of the Wasteland (1988)
#25. Excalibur (1981)
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"I found out I had HIV when I was pregnant for the first time, in 2009. In Kyrgyzstan, all women are tested during pregnancy twice, once early on and once later in the pregnancy. They say it is your choice whether to get tested, but if you don't then you cannot get maternity services. The result was a shock but I wanted to have my child.
My medical card has a code on it which shows that I have HIV to anyone who knows the codes... as soon as people in the hospital saw that code, they didn't want to help me
I sat down with my own maternity doctor and with the AIDS Centre and made a plan with them about the delivery and how it would be managed, because there is a lot of stigma associated with HIV in Kyrgyzstan. So, my doctor understood the issues. But when I started to give birth, my doctor was not available. So that meant I had to go to the maternity hospital and be seen by whoever was there. My medical card has a code on it which shows that I have HIV to anyone who knows the codes. There was no question about whether I disclosed my status – it was already there, on my medical card. And as soon as people in the hospital saw that code, they didn't want to help me. They started to find all kinds of reasons for rejecting me, for not being able to help with the delivery, but it was only because they were afraid of my HIV. Even the management of the hospital didn't want to accept me.
When people came to help with the birth, they were dressed up with gloves and suits and masks like spacemen
Eventually, I managed to contact the Head of the AIDS Centre and they intervened with the Head of the hospital to let me stay there, because I was about to give birth. But even then and despite their intervention, I was put in an isolation room. When people came to help with the birth, they were dressed up with gloves and suits and masks like spacemen. They were obviously very reluctant to touch me or even the baby. They left us in isolation the whole time I was there recovering, even when the baby was crying. It was awful. Afterwards I went back to that hospital with people from the AIDS Centre. We did some training with them and I talked about my experience and why it was wrong. It was very successful and it has led to further training sessions in other maternity hospitals, so I hope that some good has come of it. But I know, from later experiences and from other women, that there is still a long way to go to get rid of stigma in our maternity system.
They left us in isolation the whole time I was there recovering, even when the baby was crying. It was awful
The articles in the HIV news section represent a diversity of opinions on topics of interest to the HIV treatment activist community. The EATG is not responsible for their content. The articles posted in that section do not necessarily reflect EATG views or opinions. For further questions please contact the source referred to in each article.
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EATG » New WHO scorecard shows poor progress of the viral hepatitis response in the African region
New WHO scorecard shows poor progress of the viral hepatitis response in the African region
Brazzaville, Republic of Congo, June 14, 2019 – A new scorecard – the first to examine hepatitis prevalence and response in the World Health Organization (WHO) African region, shows that only three of the 47 countries are on track to eliminate the disease that affects one in 15 people in the region. Dying of viral hepatitis in Africa is becoming a bigger threat than dying of AIDS, malaria or tuberculosis.
“This analysis is the first to track each country in the region and to assess progress towards the goal of saving the lives of more than two million Africans who may develop progressive hepatitis B or C liver disease in the next decade if countries fail to ramp up their efforts,” said Dr Matshidiso Moeti, WHO Regional Director for Africa.
The scorecard will be presented at the first African Hepatitis Summit to be held in Kampala, Uganda from June 18 – 20.
It provides vital information about the status of the regional hepatitis response, measuring progress against the Framework for Action for the Prevention, Care and Treatment of Viral Hepatitis in the African Region (2016–2020). It was created as a guide for Member States on the implementation of the Global Health Sector Strategy on Viral Hepatitis, which calls for the elimination of hepatitis by 2030 (defined as a 90% reduction in new cases and 65% reduction in deaths).
Every year more than 200 000 people in Africa are dying from complications of viral hepatitis B and C-related liver disease, including cirrhosis and liver cancer. Sixty million people in the WHO Africa Region were living with chronic hepatitis B infection in 2015. More than 4.8 million of them are children under five years old. A further 10 million are infected with hepatitis C, most likely due to unsafe injection practices within health facilities or by communities.
The analysis shows that 28 countries have developed a national hepatitis strategic plan for viral hepatitis; however, most are still in draft form with only 13 officially published and disseminated. WHO has been a major partner in the regional response with policy development and provision of technical and financial support as well as capacity building for a co-ordinated regional response.
Only 15% (7/47) countries are leading prevention efforts with national coverage of both Hepatitis B birth dose and childhood pentavalent vaccination exceeding 90%. There are major gaps in hepatitis testing and treatment with less than eight countries providing subsidized testing and treatment for viral hepatitis. Uganda has started free nationwide hepatitis B treatment, and Rwanda is providing free treatment for both hepatitis B and C. These two countries are championing the regional response and are on track to reach the 2020 Framework targets for testing and community awareness.
Administration of the hepatitis B vaccination at birth and in early infancy is the most effective way to halt the transmission of the virus because 95% of the burden of chronic disease is due to infections among children, acquired before their fifth birthday, including mother-to-child transmission.
In spite of the low cost of birth dose vaccination – less than US$ 0.20 per child – only 11 countries in the region are following this protocol. One such country is Cabo Verde where the government has mobilized financial resources and has achieved 99% vaccination coverage at birth.
In Uganda, where more than 6% of the population is infected, the commitment to end hepatitis infection was driven by civil society and strong political will with the result that it became one of the first African nations to fund domestic action against hepatitis B.
With investments of around US$ 3 million a year, Uganda embarked on a massive, free hepatitis B screening programme in 2015, along with widespread community mobilization and awareness-raising actions. More than four million people have been screened. More than 30% of the population who are infected with hepatitis B are now aware of their status and can access comprehensive treatment services, including free medication. This performance exceeds the 2020 target for screening and awareness. There however remains much to be done to reach treatment targets.
“It is fitting that the first African Hepatitis Summit should be held in Uganda,” says Dr Moeti. “The country has superb lessons to share, and we support these important exchanges as they are helping to build evidence-based policies and promoting partnerships for more concerted action against viral hepatitis across the region. They are showing us that beating this disease is achievable.”
WHO | Africa Region
The World Health Organization contributes to a better future for people everywhere. Good health lays the foundation for vibrant and productive communities, stronger economies, safer nations and a better world. As the lead health authority within the United Nations system, our work touches people’s lives around the world every day. In Africa, WHO serves 47 Member States and works with development partners to improve the health and well-being of all people living here. The WHO Regional Office for Africa is located in Brazzaville, Republic of Congo. Learn more at www.afro.who.int and follow us on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
WHO Regional Office for Africa
News categories: Hepatitis
Newsletter / News bulletin
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EFOEUPATI – Ensuring the future of EUPATI beyond 2020
Project aims: To ensure the sustainability of the results of the EUPATI project, to develop sustainable models of collaboration to ensure this, and put into place the infrastructure required for…
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Scooby-Doo Club
Scooby-Doo Images on Fanpop
the dracula girl
added by viper_jojo
girl from ghoul school
ghoul school
Bisexualnerd22, jenny53 and 1 other like this
added by breebree446
group and scooby-doo
added by alpha-hydranoid
scooby-doo and shaggy
Scooby and the Gang
added by JulieL44
Scooby and Shaggy's Ice cream pizza
posted by princessfelicia
Mash Strawberry ice cream into a round cake or pie pan,
..................................................................................................
To make the pepperoni, decorate the top with mini cookies or round candy,
Put the pan into the freezer for two hours,
Use a can of Whipped Cream to spray a tasty crust around the edge of the ice cream pizza
Cut the pizza in slices and dig in .
Solve Velma's Brainteaser
The gang was standing in line at the ice cream shop in town.
Shaggy was first in line, deciding whether he should buy the double chocolate sundae or the vanilla ice sundae,
Fred was in between Daphne and Scooby. He was enjoying being so close to Daphne that he had no clue what flavor he was gonna choose when it was his turn,
Velma was right behind Shaggy but not next to Daphne. She, on the other hand was thinking of all the health treats in eating one cone.
Who was last in line?
added by nugget14
don ' t realy scooby....xxxx
added by scooby_hop
added by australia-101
Scooby Doo AbracadabraDoo
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With the establishment of new refineries and the adoption of improved technologies, the sugar industry in China has expanded rapidly over the past two decades into a highly integrated industry. Consumption has also increased, and domestic requirements have been met from both domestic production and imports. Although some amounts of sugar are also exported, China is a substantial net importer of sugar. An alternative sweetener industry has also been developed, making China one of the worlds major producers and consumers of saccharin, however, in recent years health concerns have led to reductions in use.
Sugarcane accounts for about 80 percent of sugar production in China, and sugarbeet makes up the balance. About 80 percent of Chinas sugarcane crop is grown in the South and Southwest regions, including Guangxi, Guangdong, and Yunnan provinces. Production in Guangxi accounts for about 40 percent of the national total, and for the first time in 1993, overtook Guangdong as the leading supplying province. The general trend is for a move from Guangdong to Guangxi, and from eastern Guangxi to its west and Yunnan, as sugarcane gives way to diversification into more profitable crops.
Over 95 percent of sugarbeet production is concentrated in the Northeast and Northwest regions, with Heilongjiang, Xinjiang, and Inner Mongolia contributing about 75 percent of the total. Within this, Heilongjiang and eastern Inner Mongolia account for around 55 percent of total area. However, beet production is facing increased pressure from competing crops in the traditional Northeast area of Heilongjiang, Jilin, and Inner Mongolia. For example, in Heilongjiang the area under beet has shrunk to an average of 319 000 hectares in recent years, compared with a record 426 000 hectares almost a decade ago. Maize is the principal substitute crop, which gives returns twice those of sugarbeet. In Xinjiang, however, production continues to expand with price support and input subsidies to growers from the provincial government.
Producers are free to plant the crops of their choice. The State Planning Commission establishes "guidance" prices for sugar crops and refined sugar, but often neither the industry nor buyers trade at these prices, and the actual price is influenced by local market conditions. Returns from sugarcane are, on average, not as competitive as those from fruits, vegetables, grains, and oilseeds. For this reason, diversification into other crops is pushing sugarcane production from the east to the west of southern China where there is less competition from alternative crops.
Over the last ten years, sugarcane yields have increased somewhat from about 53 tonnes/ha to a peak at 59 tonnes/ha in 1993. During 1990-95, yields averaged 58 tonnes/ha. Yields in the traditional growing areas (Guangdong and Fujian) are generally higher, than those in Guangxi (the main cane-producing province). The higher yields of the former are attributed mainly to irrigation. In 1996, adverse weather and changes in the procurement procedure for sugarcane, from being based on sugar content to total weight of the cane, resulted in a reduction in yields to 51.8 tonnes/ha.
During the past decade, sugarbeet yields have fluctuated along an upward trend, averaging about 19 tonnes/ha over the 1990-95 period. This yield is exceptionally low by world standards. For example, yields in the United States and Europe have averaged 50 tonnes/ha in recent years. Some of the reasons given for the lower yields include drought, plant disease, shorter sunshine hours and smaller differences in temperature between day and night in key growing areas.
Over the last 3 years, sugar production in China averaged 6.6 million tonnes, raw value, which was significantly lower than the record 8.5 million tonnes production in the early 1990s. Sugarcane production during 1994-96 amounted to 65 million tonnes, while beet production was about 14 million tonnes. The decline in sugar production reflected both smaller sugarcane and sugarbeet crops compared to the early eighties.
The number of sugar mills in China is estimated at approximately 500 (400 for sugarcane and 100 for sugarbeet), with an annual processing capacity of 8.5 million tonnes. The average processing capacity per mill is estimated at 1 500 tonnes/day. The largest mill (in Guangxi) has a processing capacity of 10 000 tonnes/day and the smallest mill only 200 tonnes/day. There are approximately 150 sugar mills with a processing capacity of less than 1 000 tonnes/day. Average recovery rates over the last 3 years has been estimated at between 8.3 percent and 10 percent for sugarcane processing, and 9.1 percent and 12 percent for sugarbeet processing.
While sugar is the major sweetener used in China, saccharin also plays an important role. Chinas sugar consumption is normally about 7.0 million tonnes, and over the last decade has grown at average annual rates close to 2.0 percent. HFCS and glucose are also produced in China, but do not play a major role.
Per caput sugar consumption averaged 5.9 kg (raw equivalent) in 1995 and 1996. This level is significantly below the world average of around 20 kg. It is also much lower than the consumption in neighbouring Asian countries (51 kg in Malaysia, 20 kg in Republic of Korea, 26 kg in Thailand, 13 kg in Indonesia). The low per caput consumption can be attributed to traditional eating habits, relatively low per caput GDP and the use of substitutes.
Traditionally, the Chinese diet utilizes less sugar in meal preparations. Direct sugar consumption by households accounts for about 50 percent of the total consumption, with the remainder being used industrially for manufactured foods. In comparison with the eighties, the share of direct sugar consumption by households has increased in the nineties, while the share of industrial use has fallen (from its previous level of 65 to 70 percent to the currently estimated 50 percent).
Even within China itself, regional dietary differences affect sugar consumption. For example, sugar consumption in the north is generally lower than in the south, as northerners tend to eat salty rather than sweet foods. In the southern regions, per caput sugar consumption is about 20 percent higher than the nation-wide average. Also, in rural areas, per caput consumption levels, at only around 1.34 kg, are lower than in urban areas. However, in recent years, sugar consumption in urban areas has shown a declining trend, while consumption in rural areas has been trending upward.
Sugar consumption is also affected by the widespread replacement of sugar with saccharin, a high-intensity sweetener. However, in 1991 the safety of saccharin was queried, and stricter regulations were introduced on maximum levels that could be used in various products. In 1993, the Government took further steps to control the manufacture and use of non-nutritive sweeteners. It announced the reduction of cyclamate output by 20 to 30 percent, the halt in construction of new factories, limits on the import of all non-nutritive sweeteners and strict control on their use in food and drink. In recent years, saccharin consumption is estimated at 4 000 to 6 000 tonnes per year, mainly by industry. At this level of consumption, about 1.5 million tonnes to 2 million tonnes of sugar were replaced, which was about 25 percent of normal sugar consumption.
The goal of Chinas sugar policy is self-sufficiency, but this is becoming ever more difficult to achieve as returns from sugar are often lower than the returns from competing crops, and comparative advantage incentives are increasingly influencing planting decisions as the Chinese economy opens up to the world.
China imports sugar primarily from Thailand, Cuba, Australia, Brazil, and Guatemala. Thailand and Cuba accounted for about two-thirds of total imports in 1995. In September 1994, the Government appointed CEROILS, a state-owned company, to be the sole importer. The bulk of the sugar is imported in raw form and processed for domestic consumption. A small proportion is processed and re-exported. Major export destinations include the Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan, and the Yemen Republic. In 1993, these countries accounted for about 70 percent of total exports.
Demand for imports and exports fluctuates widely, and makes China a volatile player in the world market. For instance, in 1995 imports rose dramatically to nearly 3.0 million tonnes, and then in 1996, they dropped to 1.4 million tonnes. There are many factors that contribute to this volatility, including incompatibilities resulting from a liberalized sugar market existing alongside the persistent regulatory measures of state institutions. After liberalizing sugar production and marketing in 1992, import and export decisions continued to be made without taking full account of the responses of consumption and production in the liberalized market. In addition, since the prices of major grain crops are still under government regulation, price policies for these crops have an important impact on sugar production because many of them compete with sugar crops.
In 1986, the Government relaxed price controls on most crops, except grains and sugar. The immediate effect was a sudden decline in sugar production as many farmers switched to other crops, with a 1 million tonne drop in production in the following year alone. The competitive situation, which developed, has set the tone for potential sugar shortages in the coming decade.
The State Planning Commission sets guidance levels for producer procurement and mill (ex-factory) prices for sugar. These prices can be adjusted up or down depending on changes in the market during the previous year. However, the actual producer procurement and mill prices may deviate from the guidance prices, depending on current local market conditions. This can contribute to imbalances in domestic supply and demand, as producers react to uncertainty in sugar prices when making planting decisions, also taking into account the often more stable returns from other commodities. For grains, procurement prices for grains are guaranteed by the Central Government, which may be more assuring than the procurement prices offered by sugar mills. In cases where sugar mills are unable to pay producers in cash, payment with promissory notes may also dampen producers intentions to grow sugar crops.
Chinas mill (ex-factory) prices of sugar are linked to the world price at the port of entry for imports, after adding a 30 percent tariff and a 17 percent value-added tax (VAT) is applied post-tariff. During periods of imports, mill prices at the ports should be about 50 percent higher than the world price.
Towards the year 2000, China is expected to remain a net importer to fill the shortfall of domestic production. Although net imports could stabilize around 1.0 to 2.0 million tonnes over the next few years, the longer-term outlook is for further increases in imports.
Continued competition from alternative crops is expected to reduce sugar area in traditional growing regions. For sugarcane, production areas are likely to continue shifting from the east towards the west, as land may be diverted to vegetables, fruits, grains, and oilseeds. Despite the guidance prices set for sugar crops, producers may continue to find procurement prices for grains to be more attractive, in addition to the higher returns often obtained from the cultivation of crops not subject to price controls.
The growth in area planted to sugar in regions that are undertaking agricultural expansion may also be limited due to the relatively low returns. For example, the Governments 5 Year Plan in Guangxi calls for an expansion of sugarcane area from 453 300 hectares in 1995 to 466 700 hectares by the year 2000. Even if the plan is fulfilled, the annual growth rate of sugarcane area would only be 0.5 percent, while the average annual increase in sugarcane yields is about 1 to 2 percent.
Thus, domestically produced sugar supplies are not expected to keep pace with the growth in domestic consumption. The population expansion rate has averaged 1.4 percent over the last decade, and this is likely to continue. T here has also been significant income growth during the last decade, which is expected to accelerate in the future. The ongoing growth will most likely increase consumer demand for sugar-based processed foods, beverages, snacks, and desserts. Some analysts believe the growth rate of sugar consumption could be as high as 8 percent annually over the next few years. With increasingly focused government efforts to enhance productivity and improve returns from domestic production, the growth rate of imports may be slowed, but over the longer run China will still need to import large amounts of raw sugar.
Table 1 : China sugarcane and sugarbeet area, yield and production
Harvested area
'000 Ha
Mt / Ha
'000 Mt
Table 2 : China sugar production, trade and consumption
Consumption (*)
Per caput
...'000 Mt, raw equivalent ...
kg/year
(*) White sugar
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Why educate Cambodia
Feeding Dreams
Supporters' Stories
Feeding Dreams (UK)
Debbie Alcorn
Olivia Ponte
Wendy Lofty
A question of responsibility
Laura Fowler
Cherry Ng
Bunhor
Jack Gillett
Mersey Walk
I spent a year volunteering in Cambodia between 2007/8 and many months working at AFESIP, an NGO working with trafficked women and girls. I was impressed by the tireless work AFESIP carried out for young marginalised girls and women in Cambodia. I saw first-hand the difference their interventions made, not only to women and girls but also to the wider family networks and the broader community. An important strength of AFESIP was its grassroots nature, local knowledge and ability to work with women and girls across Cambodia.
I returned to the UK to embark upon an MSc International Development Studies and undertook field research into the reintegration opportunities for AFESIP's residents in Cambodia. In my thesis in 2009, I observed that 'The strength and determination of AFESIP's founder, Somaly Mam, has been a determining factor for AFESIP’s survival and in raising the issue of trafficking nationally and internationally'. The global financial crisis in 2008 and a lack of government commitment to tackling the cause, led to a shortfall of funding for AFESIP’s core services. In an attempt to secure AFESIP's future funding and to enable these services to continue and expand, Mam aligned herself with some US supporters to set up the Somaly Mam Foundation (SMF). Whilst the establishment of SMF initially appeared to have beneficial effects such as increased funding and profile-raising of trafficking in Cambodia, this relationship could not be regarded as benign or apolitical. In my research of 2009 I suggested that 'The relationship of SMF to AFESIP must be considered within the context of the hegemonic relationship which can exist between the developed world to the developing and more specifically from the US to Cambodia. It can be argued that the increased funding opportunities the relationship with SMF enables also brings its own burdens in relation to power and decision-making which could have far reaching implications for AFESIP in the future. (Herd 2010)'
It is with a heavy heart that I have witnessed what has now unfolded between SMF and AFESIP. The relationship between these two organisations has evolved in a way that may not be surprising considering the unequal power dynamic that often dictates the direction of much development work. Following an investigation commissioned by SMF and the publication of an article by Newsweek in May 2014, Somaly Mam left SMF. The damning piece, questioning the validity of her stories, featured across the international stage with extensive media coverage of her very public humiliation. I have met Somaly Mam on a number of occasions and have seen first-hand the inspiration she has been to thousands of vulnerable young Khmer girls and women. I would suggest her very presence and motivational words have provided comfort and hope to those whose lives often felt hopeless.
SMF have openly admitted that they used a law firm to conduct a 3rd party investigation into allegations concerning the personal history of Somaly Mam. The question that springs to my mind is 'Why?' In a world where sexual exploitation, gender inequality and abject poverty remain prevalent, why would a charity allocate scarce resources to paying lawyers to investigate a woman who has devoted her life to improving the lives of thousands of children and young women? One might ask why they chose this option over allocating those same resources to investigating the traffickers in Cambodia. There appears a certain irony that the very people who strode into Cambodia approximately seven years ago vowing to do something to help 'save them' are now the very people who could potentially have brought Somaly Mam and possibly AFESIP to their knees.
When SMF first made their public statement on their website about Somaly Mam, they also clearly stated that they would continue to support AFESIP Cambodia. Gina Reiss-Wilchins, SMF Executive Director, stated 'We look forward to moving past these events and focusing all of our energies on this vital work, ensuring that the hundreds of women and girls that are currently being served in our grant partner AFESIP’s three centers for recovery and rehabilitation, receive the care that they so desperately need..' (May 2014). However, shortly after this pledge, they withdrew their funding to AFESIP without any notice. This action leaves over 150 women and girls within AFESIP shelters without any security for their future.; over 10,000 women and girls’ access to medical, legal and outreach services in jeopardy; over 100 staff potentially without employment and an organisation which has been at the forefront of counter-trafficking work in Cambodia for many years, without any sense of what the future might hold. Whilst I am not party to all the facts related to the demise of the relationship between SMF, Somaly Mam and AFESIP, what is most concerning is that contractual agreements can seemingly be broken with such ease. In an environment where the media and general public seem to crave the 'victim' story, which can include the details of sexual and physical abuse, there is increasing pressure on NGOs and activists to provide these stories. It is vital that international donors and media consider the impact of such sensationalised approaches. There is a very real risk that such approaches lead to further exploitation.
Anyone who has spent any amount of time in Cambodia will know that gender inequality and poverty are rife. Rigidly held definitions, such as 'trafficking' or 'orphans' are not always as clear cut as people would like .If we visited the care system of any developed country throughout the world we would find that a large number of children in state care are not orphans. They are placed in orphanages/care homes because their parents are unable to provide for them. The issues and arguments therefore of their 'true' orphan status is nebulous; their plight of destitution, vulnerability and need however, is not. It is this perspective and principal that should be applied to the plight, welfare and future of AFESIP's residents.
Whilst SMF have become embroiled in their very public argument about the validity of Somaly Mam's story, the women and girls in AFESIP's care seem to have been forgotten. The consequences of SMF's abrupt withdrawal of funds from AFESIP could have catastrophic consequences. This raises the question as to what level of responsibility and accountability international donor agencies, such as SMF, should have, and what happens when it all goes wrong? Shouldn't donors shoulder some of the responsibility, rather than try to extricate themselves if things become difficult or blurred. Another very concerning aspect of this story is that when a key donor decides to withdraw their funding from a grassroots organisation, they have the funds, resources and expertise to present their position and yet this position is often denied to the local organisation who may have no such resources, thus leaving a very one sided view. It is vital that grassroots organisations are given a voice and that a balanced picture can then be seen. A number of points and objections have been raised by AFESIP to SMF, questioning the decision and manner by which their funding was withdrawn. To date these points and objections have remained unanswered. .
An organisation such as SMF, based in the US, can seemingly drop an organisation such as AFESIP and move on to ply their trade elsewhere. Yet where is the accountability for SMF? Should they be allowed to rebrand and move onto 'supporting' another charity in the developing world without redress? Should their actions go unchecked?' What happens to the funds raised for the work of AFESIP or in the name of Somaly Mam?
Gill Herd (Chair, Schools for Children of Cambodia)
AFESIP
VDCA
© 2019 - Feeding Dreams (UK). Registered in England and Wales, charity reg no. 1099609
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Soluble Receptors of the Interleukin-10 Family of Cytokines: Interleukin-22 Receptor Alpha 2
Author(s): R. Sabat, E. Wallace, K. Asadullah, W. Sterry, H.-D. Volk, K. Wolk. Interdisciplinary group of Molecular Immunopathology, Dermatology / Medical Immunology, University Medicine Charité, Campus Charité Mitte, Schumannstr. 20/21, D-10117 Berlin, Germany.
Journal Name: Anti-Inflammatory & Anti-Allergy Agents in Medicinal Chemistry
The interleukin (IL)-10 family of cytokines comprising IL-10, IL-19, IL-20, IL-22, IL-24, IL-26, IL-28α, IL- 28β, and IL-29 uses receptors of the cytokine receptor family class 2. Here we review the current knowledge about IL-22 receptor-α2 (IL-22Rα2) which is the first known soluble receptor of that cytokine family. The human IL-22Rα2-encoding gene includes seven exons and is located on chromosome 6 between the genes for interferon-γ receptor-1 and IL-20 receptor- 1. The products of this gene are three different mRNA splice variants. The genes for the mouse and rat IL-22Rα2 have a very similar genomic location and structure to those in humans, although they lack the human exon 4 counterpart and produce only one variant which corresponds to the human variant 2. Irrespective of the species and splice variant, IL- 22Rα2 lacks any sequence for a transmembrane or an intracellular part, and is a secreted protein. It is particularly expressed in the placenta, the mammary glands, and the lymph nodes but also in the gastrointestinal system, the lungs, the skin, and other lymphatic organs. It seems, however, that the variants 3 and 1 are more restricted in their expression. Variant 2 binds to and inhibits the activity of IL-22 in vitro, whereas the specificity of variants 3 and 1 has not been identified. The discovery of IL-22Rα2 represents a first step towards understanding the regulatory network regarding the action of IL-22 and perhaps of other members of the IL-10 family. It also may open up new ways for targeting the action of these cytokines for therapeutic interests.
Keywords: IL-22 binding protein, CRF2-s1, soluble receptor, CRF2-10, IL-10 family
Anti-Inflammatory & Anti-Allergy Agents in Medicinal Chemistry
Title: Soluble Receptors of the Interleukin-10 Family of Cytokines: Interleukin-22 Receptor Alpha 2
Author(s):R. Sabat, E. Wallace, K. Asadullah, W. Sterry, H.-D. Volk and K. Wolk
Affiliation:Interdisciplinary group of Molecular Immunopathology, Dermatology / Medical Immunology, University Medicine Charité, Campus Charité Mitte, Schumannstr. 20/21, D-10117 Berlin, Germany.
Keywords:IL-22 binding protein, CRF2-s1, soluble receptor, CRF2-10, IL-10 family
Abstract: The interleukin (IL)-10 family of cytokines comprising IL-10, IL-19, IL-20, IL-22, IL-24, IL-26, IL-28α, IL- 28β, and IL-29 uses receptors of the cytokine receptor family class 2. Here we review the current knowledge about IL-22 receptor-α2 (IL-22Rα2) which is the first known soluble receptor of that cytokine family. The human IL-22Rα2-encoding gene includes seven exons and is located on chromosome 6 between the genes for interferon-γ receptor-1 and IL-20 receptor- 1. The products of this gene are three different mRNA splice variants. The genes for the mouse and rat IL-22Rα2 have a very similar genomic location and structure to those in humans, although they lack the human exon 4 counterpart and produce only one variant which corresponds to the human variant 2. Irrespective of the species and splice variant, IL- 22Rα2 lacks any sequence for a transmembrane or an intracellular part, and is a secreted protein. It is particularly expressed in the placenta, the mammary glands, and the lymph nodes but also in the gastrointestinal system, the lungs, the skin, and other lymphatic organs. It seems, however, that the variants 3 and 1 are more restricted in their expression. Variant 2 binds to and inhibits the activity of IL-22 in vitro, whereas the specificity of variants 3 and 1 has not been identified. The discovery of IL-22Rα2 represents a first step towards understanding the regulatory network regarding the action of IL-22 and perhaps of other members of the IL-10 family. It also may open up new ways for targeting the action of these cytokines for therapeutic interests.
R. Sabat, E. Wallace, K. Asadullah, W. Sterry, H.-D. Volk and K. Wolk, “ Soluble Receptors of the Interleukin-10 Family of Cytokines: Interleukin-22 Receptor Alpha 2”, Anti-Inflammatory & Anti-Allergy Agents in Medicinal Chemistry (2006) 5: 215. https://doi.org/10.2174/187152306778017692
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Document selected : RC-B8-0109/2014
RC-B8-0109/2014
PV 18/09/2014 - 10.6
JOINT MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION
PE537.011v01-00}
PE537.040v01-00} RC1
B8-0109/2014}
B8-0138/2014} RC1/rev.2
pursuant to Rule 123(2) and (4) of the Rules of Procedure
replacing the motions by the following groups:
ECR (B8‑0109/2014)
Verts/ALE (B8‑0110/2014)
PPE (B8‑0121/2014)
ALDE (B8‑0134/2014)
S&D (B8‑0138/2014)
on the situation in Iraq and Syria, and the IS offensive, including the persecution of minorities (2014/2843(RSP))
Cristian Dan Preda, Arnaud Danjean, Jacek Saryusz-Wolski, Elmar Brok, Mariya Gabriel, Andrej Plenković, Francisco José Millán Mon, David McAllister, Michèle Alliot-Marie, Tunne Kelam, László Tőkés, Esther de Lange, Lars Adaktusson, Monica Luisa Macovei, Dubravka Šuica, Jarosław Leszek Wałęsa, György Hölvényi, Davor Ivo Stier, Emil Radev, Philippe Juvin, Gabrielius Landsbergis, Francesc Gambús, Marijana Petir, Monika Hohlmeier, Ivana Maletić, Anna Záborská on behalf of the PPE Group
Victor Boştinaru, Richard Howitt, Ana Gomes, Kati Piri, Liisa Jaakonsaari, Gilles Pargneaux, Boris Zala, Goffredo Maria Bettini, Elena Valenciano Martínez-Orozco, Nicola Caputo, Andi Cristea, Demetris Papadakis, Tonino Picula, Vincent Peillon, Afzal Khan on behalf of the S&D Group
Charles Tannock, Jana Žitňanská, Ruža Tomašić, Anna Elżbieta Fotyga, Tomasz Piotr Poręba, Ryszard Antoni Legutko, Ryszard Czarnecki on behalf of the ECR Group
Javier Nart, Robert Rochefort, Andrus Ansip, Marielle de Sarnez, Juan Carlos Girauta Vidal, Frédérique Ries, Ramon Tremosa i Balcells, Petr Ježek, Gérard Deprez, Petras Auštrevičius, Johannes Cornelis van Baalen, Ivan Jakovčić, Fredrick Federley, Marietje Schaake, Louis Michel on behalf of the ALDE Group
Barbara Lochbihler on behalf of the Verts/ALE Group
Fabio Massimo Castaldo, Ignazio Corrao
European Parliament resolution on the situation in Iraq and Syria, and the IS offensive, including the persecution of minorities (2014/2843(RSP))
The European Parliament,
– having regard to its previous resolutions on Iraq and Syria,
– having regard to the Foreign Affairs Council conclusions on Iraq and Syria,
– having regard to the European Council conclusions on Iraq and Syria of 30 August 2014,
– having regard to the statements by the Vice-President of the Commission / High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy on Iraq and Syria,
– having regard to UN Security Council resolution 2170 (2014) and UN Human Rights Council resolution S-22/L.1 (2014),
– having regard to the statements by the UN Secretary-General on Iraq and Syria,
– having regard to the NATO Summit Declaration of 5 September 2014,
– having regard to the EU guidelines on the promotion and protection of freedom of religion or belief adopted on 24 June 2013,
– having regard to the conclusions of the Paris conference on security in Iraq and the fight against Islamic State of 15 September 2014,
– having regard to the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) between the European Union and its Member States, of the one part, and the Republic of Iraq, of the other, and to its resolution of 17 January 2013 on the EU-Iraq Partnership and Cooperation Agreement(1),
– having regard to Rule 123(2) and (4) of its Rules of Procedure,
A. whereas the security and humanitarian situation in Iraq and Syria, which was already critical, has further deteriorated as a result of the occupation of parts of their territory by the terrorist jihadist al-Qaeda splinter group Islamic State (IS); whereas the transnational character of IS and associated terrorist groups poses a threat to the wider region; whereas there are growing concerns for the welfare of those still trapped in areas controlled by IS forces;
B. whereas the disintegration of the Iraqi-Syrian border has provided IS with opportunities to enhance its presence in both countries; whereas IS has, over the past months, extended its territorial conquest from eastern Syria into north-western Iraq, including Iraq’s second‑largest city, Mosul; whereas on 29 June 2014 it was reported that IS had proclaimed a ‘caliphate’, or ‘Islamic state’, in the territories it controlled in Iraq and Syria, and whereas its leader, Abdu Bakr al-Baghdadi, has declared himself as the caliph; whereas IS does not recognise the internationally accepted borders and has declared its intention to spread the ‘Islamic caliphate’ to other Muslim-majority countries;
C. whereas the conquest of the territories in Iraq and Syria was followed by the imposition of the harsh interpretation of Sharia law; whereas serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law have been committed in the areas under the control of IS and associated groups, including targeted killings, forced conversions, abductions, selling of women, slavery of women and children, recruitment of children for suicide bombings, sexual and physical abuse and torture; whereas IS has murdered the journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff and the aid worker David Haines; whereas Christian, Yazidi, Turkmen, Shabak, Kaka’e, Sabian and Shia communities have been targeted by IS, as well as many Arabs and Sunni Muslims; whereas mosques, monuments, shrines, churches and other places of worship, tombs and cemeteries, as well as archaeological and cultural heritage sites, have been deliberately destroyed;
D. whereas Iraqi Christians have recently been persecuted, deprived of their fundamental rights and forced to leave their homes and become refugees because of their religion and convictions; whereas according to Open Doors International the number of Christians in Iraq has significantly fallen, from 1.2 million at the beginning of the 1990s to between 330 000 and 350 000 now; whereas before the conflict in Syria started, around 1.8 million Christians lived in the country; whereas since the conflict started at least 500 000 Christians have been displaced;
E. whereas according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) an estimated 1.4 million persons were internally displaced this year in Iraq and an estimated 1.5 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance; whereas the upsurge of IS has produced a humanitarian crisis, notably a massive displacement of civilians; whereas on 12 August 2014 the EU decided to increase its humanitarian assistance to Iraq by EUR 5 million to provide basic assistance to displaced people, thus bringing humanitarian funding for Iraq to EUR 17 million so far in 2014; whereas the EU has been further extending its humanitarian aid and has established an air bridge between Brussels and Erbil;
F. whereas according to the UN over 191 000 people have died in Syria in the conflict; whereas according to OCHA an estimated 6.4 million persons are internally displaced in Syria and there are more than 3 million Syrian refugees, mainly in Lebanon (1.17 million refugees), Turkey (832 000), Jordan (613 000), Iraq (215 000) and Egypt and North Africa (162 000); whereas, according to the Office for Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection (ECHO) an estimated 10.8 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance; whereas so far in 2014 the EU has contributed EUR 150 million in humanitarian aid for the victims of the Syrian crisis;
G. whereas hundreds of foreign fighters, including many from EU Member States, have joined the IS insurgency; whereas these EU citizens are identified as a security risk by the governments of the Member States;
H. whereas the EU has acknowledged the burden placed on the Kurdistan region and the Kurdistan Regional Government, which are hosting a large number of internally displaced persons;
I. whereas the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has stated that it remains very difficult to operate within the area to give civilians and refugees the proper aid they need; whereas it is important to shelter the hundreds of thousands of Syrian and Iraqi refugees before winter arrives;
J. whereas the EU has reiterated its firm commitment to Iraq’s unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity;
K. whereas the Heads of State and Government participating in the NATO Summit on 4 and 5 September 2014 stated that the presence of IS in both Syria and Iraq is a threat to regional stability, and that the people of Syria and Iraq and elsewhere in the region need the support of the international community to counter that threat;
L. whereas the possibility has been raised of carrying out air strikes in eastern Syria; whereas at the NATO meeting of 5 September 2014 an anti-IS coalition was formed; whereas the European External Action Service (EEAS) is currently working on a comprehensive regional strategy to address the threat posed by IS; whereas on 10 September 2014 US President Barack Obama unveiled his strategy to combat IS, which includes, among other actions, a systematic campaign of air strikes against IS targets ‘wherever they are’, including in Syria, increased support for allied ground forces fighting IS, and greater counter-terrorism efforts aimed at cutting off the group’s funding; whereas the Arab League has pledged to strengthen cooperation to bring down IS in Syria and Iraq;
M. whereas IS has secured significant income sources by looting banks and businesses on territories it controls and taking over up to six oilfields in Syria, including Syria’s largest oil facility, the al-Omar field close to the border with Iraq, and is receiving funds from wealthy donors, most of whom are from the region;
N. whereas the promotion of democracy and respect for human rights, including the right to freedom of religion and belief, are fundamental principles and aims of the EU and constitute common ground for its relations with third countries;
1. Is extremely concerned at the deterioration of the security and humanitarian situation in Iraq and in Syria as a result of the occupation of parts of their territory by IS; firmly condemns the indiscriminate killings and human rights violations perpetrated by this and other terrorist organisations against religious and ethnic minorities and the most vulnerable groups; strongly condemns attacks directed at civilian targets, including hospitals, schools and places of worship, and the use of executions and sexual violence by IS in Iraq and Syria; underlines the fact that there should be no impunity for the perpetrators of these acts;
2. Strongly condemns the murders of the journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff and the aid worker David Haines by IS, and expresses grave concern for the safety of others still being held captive by the extremists; expresses its deep sympathy and condolences to the families of these victims and to the families of all victims of the conflict;
3. Emphasises that widespread or systematic attacks directed against civilians because of their ethnic or political background, religion, belief or gender may constitute a crime against humanity; strongly condemns all forms of persecution, discrimination and intolerance based on religion and belief, and acts of violence against all religious communities; stresses once again that the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion is a fundamental human right;
4. Expresses its support for all victims of religious intolerance and hatred; expresses its solidarity with the members of the Christian communities being persecuted and facing the danger of extinction in their motherlands, Iraq and Syria, as well as with other persecuted religious minorities; confirms and supports the inalienable right of all religious and ethnic minorities living in Iraq and Syria, including Christians, to continue to live in their historical and traditional homelands in dignity, equality and safety, and to practise their religion freely; stresses that the crimes committed against Christian minorities such as Assyrians, Syriacs and Chaldeans, as well as Yazidis and Shia Muslims, represent a final push by IS for a complete religious cleansing in the region; notes that for centuries members of different religious groups coexisted peacefully in the region;
5. Rejects without reservation and considers illegitimate the announcement by the IS leadership that it has established a caliphate in the areas it now controls; emphasises that the creation and expansion of the ‘Islamic caliphate’, as well as activities of other extremist groups in Iraq and Syria, is a direct threat to the security of European countries; rejects the notion of any unilateral changes of internationally recognised borders by force; stresses again that IS is subject to the arms embargo and assets freeze imposed by UN Security Council resolutions 1267 (1999) and 1989 (2011), and underlines the importance of prompt and effective implementation of those measures; calls on the Council to consider more effective use of the existing restrictive measures, and in particular to deny IS the benefits of illicit oil sales or sales of other resources on international markets; is deeply concerned about the assertions that actors in some Member States are engaged in illicit oil trade with IS; asks the Commission whether it can confirm these assertions and, if so, calls on the Commission and the Member States to ensure that the illicit oil trade is immediately brought to an end;
6. Condemns the use and exploitation of oilfields and related infrastructure by IS and associated groups, which enables IS to generate substantial income, and urges all states to uphold UN Security Council resolutions 2161 (2014) and 2170 (2014), which condemn any trade, direct or indirect, with IS and associated groups; is concerned that IS is generating income through sales of oil; takes note of the EU’s intention to tighten sanctions in order to prevent IS from selling oil; therefore calls for the EU to impose sanctions on all those (governments and public or private companies) involved in the transport, transformation, refinement and commercialisation of oil extracted in IS-controlled areas, together with strict controls on financial flows in order to prevent economic activity and exploitation of tax havens on the part of IS;
7. Welcomes the appeal of 8 September 2014 by all the French Islamic federations, as well as appeals by other Islamic communities, which unequivocally and unconditionally condemns the instrumentalisation of Islam by extremist terrorist groups to justify their violence, intolerance and crimes against humanity;
8. Calls on all parties to the conflict in Iraq to ensure the protection of the civilian population and adhere to their obligations under international humanitarian and human rights law; calls for immediate support and humanitarian assistance for the displaced people of Iraq;
9. Welcomes the efforts of the United States and of all the other contributing states to support the Iraqi national and local authorities in their fight against IS, to stop the advance of IS and to facilitate access for humanitarian support; welcomes the call by the USA for an international coalition against IS, which is building up; welcomes the decision reached by the Arab League on 7 September 2014 to take the necessary measures to confront IS and cooperate with international, regional and national efforts to combat militants in Syria and Iraq, and to endorse UN Security Council resolution 2170 (2014); calls on the Arab League to discuss amending the Arab Convention for Fighting Terrorism of 1998 so that it can challenge global terrorism by all means;
10. Calls on the international community to assist the Iraqi authorities – including by providing military protection to particularly vulnerable groups – in ensuring protection of, and assistance to, those fleeing the areas affected by terrorism, in particular members of vulnerable groups and of ethnic and religious communities; calls on all regional actors to contribute to efforts to promote security and stability in Iraq; recalls that it should be the ultimate commitment and responsibility of all regional actors, as well as of the EU, to do their utmost to guarantee the return of traditional minorities and all citizens to their original places of residence from which they were forced to flee; calls on the EU Member States to assist the Iraqi and local authorities by all possible means, including appropriate military assistance, in containing and repelling the terrorist and aggressive IS expansion; underlines the necessity for coordinated action by countries in the region to counter the IS threat; calls on all regional actors to do everything in their power to stop all activities by official or private bodies intended to propagate and spread extreme Islamist ideologies; calls on Turkey to clearly and unambiguously commit itself to countering the common security threat posed by IS; calls for the EU to facilitate a regional dialogue on the problems facing the Middle East and to include all significant parties, in particular Iran and Saudi Arabia;
11. Welcomes the mobilisation of the European Emergency Response Coordination Centre and the activation of the EU Civil Protection Mechanism at the request of the Iraqi Government; welcomes the EU’s humanitarian assistance to Iraq and Syria; calls for additional humanitarian support for the populations affected by the conflict, including the Syrian Kurds;
12. Calls on all parties to the conflict in Syria, in particular the Syrian regime, to ensure the protection of the civilian population, to adhere to their obligations under international humanitarian and human rights law, to facilitate the provision of humanitarian aid and assistance through all possible channels, including across borders and conflict lines, and to ensure the safety of all medical personnel and humanitarian workers; commends the role of Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey in accepting refugees; calls on the international community to be more active and forthcoming in burden-sharing and to provide direct financial support to the host countries; calls for the EU to put pressure on all donors to fulfil their promises and deliver their pledges in a swift manner; welcomes the commitments by the Member States, since the EU is the biggest donor of financial aid and source of future pledges;
13. Emphasises the need to seize all possibilities with a view to effectively countering the IS threat in Syria, with full respect for international law; stresses that in the long term only a lasting and inclusive political solution entailing a peaceful transition to a genuinely representative government in Syria would help to neutralise the threat of IS and other extremist organisations;
14. Calls on all parties to the conflict in Syria to respect the mandate of the UN’s Disengagement Observer Force and ensure the safety and freedom of movement of UN troops, including those from EU Member States; condemns the fact that 45 Fijian peacekeepers were detained by an armed group; welcomes the release of the peacekeepers on 11 September 2014;
15. Recalls the statement by the Special Coordinator for the Joint Mission of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and the United Nations (OPCW-UN), who declared that 96 % of Syrian chemical weapons have been destroyed; calls for the remaining weapons to be deactivated in accordance with the Framework for Elimination of Syrian Chemical Weapons;
16. Welcomes the decision by individual Member States to respond positively to the call by the Kurdish regional authorities to urgently provide military material; stresses that such responses reflect the capabilities and national laws of the Member States and have the consent of the Iraqi national authorities; calls on those Member States which are providing military material to the Kurdish regional authorities to coordinate their efforts and to implement effective monitoring measures in order to prevent uncontrolled dissemination and the use of military material against civilians;
17. Reiterates its concern that thousands of transnational foreign fighters, including citizens of the Member States, have joined the IS insurgency; calls on the Member States to take appropriate measures to prevent fighters from travelling from their soil, in line with UN Security Council resolution 2170 (2014), and to develop a common strategy for security services and EU agencies in monitoring and controlling jihadists; calls for cooperation in the EU and at international level with a view to appropriate legal action against any individual suspected of being involved in acts of terrorism; calls on the Member States to intensify cooperation and exchange of information among themselves and with EU bodies, and to ensure efficient cooperation with Turkey; stresses the importance of prevention, prosecution, outreach, rehabilitation and reintegration;
18. Welcomes the formation of a new and inclusive government in Iraq, as well as the adoption of the ministerial programme; supports the Prime Minister’s efforts to finalise the formation of the government; calls on the government to be truly representative, with an inclusive agenda; stresses that the government should properly represent the political, religious and ethnic diversity of Iraqi society, including its Sunni minority, in order to stop the bloodshed and the fragmentation of the country; calls on all participants to work together in the interests of political stability and peace, and in combating the IS insurgency; underlines the fact that Iraq’s unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity are essential for stability and economic development in the country and the region;
19. Calls on the Iraqi Government and Parliament to urgently review legislation and legal practice, reform the country’s judicial system and security apparatus and implement inclusive policies towards all Iraqis with a view to ending the policy of discrimination;
20. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to take specific actions to address the situation of women in Iraq and Syria and guarantee their freedom and respect for their most fundamental rights, and to adopt measures to prevent exploitation of, and abuse and violence against, women and children, in particular the early marriage of girls; is particularly concerned at the increase in all forms of violence against Yazidi women, who are imprisoned, raped, sexually abused and sold by the members of IS;
21. Expresses concern at the increasing number of cases of recruitment of children and young people in Iraq and Syria; encourages the Commission to engage with partners – including international organisations – to prepare a comprehensive programme to address the need to protect children and women affected by armed conflict;
22. Supports the request by the UN Human Rights Council to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights for the urgent dispatching of a mission to Iraq, to investigate the violations and abuses of international human rights law committed by IS and associated terrorist groups and establish the facts and circumstances of such abuses and violations, with a view to avoiding impunity and ensuring full accountability;
23. Remains convinced that there can be no sustainable peace in Syria and Iraq without accountability for the crimes committed by all sides during the conflict, in particular those based on religious or ethnic grounds; reiterates its call for the referral of those suspected of committing crimes against humanity in Syria and Iraq to the International Criminal Court and supports all initiatives in this direction;
24. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Vice-President of the Commission / High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, the Council, the Commission, the EU Special Representative for Human Rights, the governments and parliaments of the Member States, the Government and Council of Representatives of Iraq, the Regional Government of Kurdistan, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, and the United Nations Human Rights Council and all the parties involved in the conflict in Syria.
Texts adopted, P7_TA(2013)0023.
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Frances S. Patai Lecture Series
March 19: Transnational High-Risk Activism and the Work of Frances S. Patai on the Spanish Civil War
6:30 to 7:30 pm, CCNY Center for Worker Education (CWE) Auditorium, 25 Broadway, New York, NY 10004. (Take 4 or 5 train to Bowling Green, or the R train to Whitehall Street)
Speaker: Danielle A. Zach, Frances S. Patai Postdoctoral Fellow in Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights Studies, CCNY CWE
Over the past few months, major US and other Western newspapers have drawn attention to the “unprecedented scale” of participation of foreign fighters in the bloody turmoil unfolding in Iraq and Syria, and more specifically to the success of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in recruiting American and European men and women to join its ranks. The US government estimates the total foreign presence at 20,000 from 90 or so countries. Since 9/11, the transnational connections of armed actors—particularly with diaspora communities in Western countries—have also received significant attention from academics and policy analysts, with many pointing to processes associated with globalization as facilitating factors. Using the Spanish Civil War as a case study, the lecture presents the work of Frances S. Patai on female volunteers of the American Medical Bureau and North American Committee to Aid Spanish Democracy to show how high-risk transnational activism of this kind is neither a new development arising from contemporary globalization nor “unprecedented” in magnitude. Indeed the Second Spanish Republic’s ability to draw estimated 40,000 volunteers as combatants into the ranks of its International Brigades along with another 10,000 in support roles to defend it against Nationalist forces far surpasses what we are witnessing in the Middle East (or any other conflict zone) today.
Volunteers of the American Medical Bureau (AMB), from the Frances S. Patai Collection at New York University
March 30: Sexual Violence in Armed Conflict
6:30-8:30 pm, CCNY Center for Worker Education Auditorium, 25 Broadway, New York, NY 10004 (Take 4 or 5 train to Bowling Green, or the R train to Whitehall Street)
Guest Speaker: Rana Jaleel, Postdoctoral Fellow, Columbia Law School
This event focuses sexual violence in armed conflict, particularly mass rape as a weapon of war. The event will begin with a screening of the PBS film I Came to Testify, which concerns the Bosnian rape camps, women’s testimony before the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), and developments in international law to prosecute perpetrators. Dr. Jaleel will present her research on sexual violence in armed conflict. In addition to the Bosnian case, she will also discuss Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as well as present-day Syria.
UC Berkeley students protesting rape as a weapon of war in Syria, The Daily Californian, February 28, 2013
May 4: “Never Again”: Mass Atrocity Prevention in the Twenty-first Century and the Responsibility to Protect
Guest speaker: Dr. Simon Adams, Executive Director of the Global Center for the Responsibility to Protect (GCR2P)
Moderator: Professor Rajan Menon, CCNY Political Science Department
This year marks the one-hundredth anniversary of the Armenian genocide and the twentieth anniversary of the Srebrenica massacre. It is thus a critical time for the human rights community to assess progress on the development of international norms, law, and efforts to prevent and halt genocide and other mass atrocities. At the heart of contemporary debates is the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) doctrine. While R2P has been considered an “emerging norm,” the application of R2P remains contested in international peace and security circles. Dr. Adams will discuss the R2P doctrine, its evolution over the past decade and a half, and challenges that impede consensus on when the international community of states should invoke R2P to protect civilians from mass atrocity crimes.
European Press Photo Agency
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Real Issue
Osian's Art Fund: The Broken Paddle
Flamboyance and grandeur marked out Neville Tuli as India's best-known art messiah. Today the collapse of his fund has revealed he got it all wrong
By Dinesh Narayanan, Elizabeth Flock, Shloka Nath
No, it was not the money that I valued —what I wanted was to make all this mob of Heintzes, hotel proprietors, and fine ladies of Baden talk about me, recount my story, wonder at me, extol my doings, and worship my winnings.”
–Fyodor Dostoevsky in The Gambler
India Asia Arab Art Fund: Cracks in the Framework
If the 19th Century Russian author were to live and search for a novel idea today, he could try telling the story of Neville Tuli, who spent 18 years gambling on horses at Ladbrokes in London, returned to his roots in India where he became the best-known spokesman of the country’s art and launched the world’s largest art fund. The story would, of course, turn melancholic, detailing how he fell from glory with the plunge in the art market, struggled to pay his investors and stared at the risk of losing all that
he created.
Image: Gautam Singh for Forbes India
NOWHERE TO LOOK: Investors thought Tuli had the vision for the future of Indian art; until he fell short of expectations
One good place to start the plot would be the Mumbai office of ABN Amro Bank. A bank executive pays a visit to the office of Tuli’s Osian’s Connoisseurs of Art (Osian’s) almost every other day to recover money that the firm owes several wealthy clients of the bank who invested in an art fund sponsored by it. The dues are more than Rs. 40 crore. The bank has so far managed to extract some of that money. A lot remains. (ABN Amro declined to discuss the case with Forbes India but said it will review any client complaint and investigate).
Neville Tuli, the flamboyant chairman and managing director of Osian’s, needed about Rs. 115 crore to repay investors in Osian’s Art Fund – Scheme Contemporary 1, when the three-year scheme matured in July 2009. Unfortunately, a global recession froze the art market, landing Osian’s in a liquidity crisis and left the close-ended art fund marooned with unsold inventory and a cash shortage just around that time.
Soon, word spread that Tuli’s art fund wasn’t able to pay off investors at its close. This set off a reaction among the art fraternity, beating down the prices of the works of marquee names such as M.F. Husain and F.N.Souza in the fund’s portfolio. Surely, Tuli has told banks such as ABN Amro and BNP Paribas that referred their clients to the fund that it was only a “delay not default” caused by the art market reversal. But he isn’t getting too many backers to cut the delay.
Bankers, for instance, have rebuffed Tuli’s attempts for a bail-out on the grounds that Osian’s is already over-leveraged and its cash flows have shrunk. “Neville Tuli has come to us several times over the past few months for money. We will not lend him one rupee more,” says a top banker who had lent handsomely to Osian’s in the past.
Tuli had told Forbes India on January 16 that the art holdings of the fund have now been sold and the firm is awaiting payment from buyers. In an email to Forbes India just before this edition went to press Tuli said that out of 656 unit holders in the fund, two batches of 59 unit holders would have been paid by 25 January 2010 (a total of Rs. 15.3 crore), and all others have been paid. Forbes India could not independently confirm this.
Meanwhile, he has also raised money from other sources. He raised over Rs. 9 crore last May by selling shares in his company (the fund’s sponsor) to Reita Gadkari, a London-based investor, at a premium of Rs. 1,240 per Rs. 10 share. He even borrowed money from private financiers at interest rates of up to 30 per cent to meet payments.
As things stand, the financial picture looks bleak. While Osian’s has not yet filed its accounts for the year ended March 2009 with the Registrar of Companies (RoC), Tuli’s email says that as of 31 March 2009, revenues were Rs. 68 crore and the company made a loss of Rs. 19 crore. Its total debt was Rs. 109 crore. Estimates based on due diligence done by KPMG for Dubai-based Abraaj Capital, an investor of Osian’s, reported Osian’s debt as Rs. 133 crore for the same period.
The impact of a bearish art market is only a facet of Osian’s problems. There are several others.
Osian’s most high-profile investor, Abraaj Capital, has filed a suit in London’s commercial court to recover $23.7 million it gave Bregawn Jersey, one of Tuli’s offshore companies, to seed an international venture called the India Asia Arab Art Fund. Meanwhile, Osian’s most ambitious project, Osianama, an art conservatory and pop culture museum, is yet to rise from the flat piece of land in Central Mumbai where the famed Minerva theatre once stood.
Osian’s is going through its worst phase in its nine-year existence. The situation is a far cry from what Tuli had envisaged when he told The Hindu newspaper six years ago, “I have love, passion, motivation, and I want to change things. I want to make materialism serve creativity.”
In due course, many would buy that dream and Neville Tuli would gain a reputation as a magnet for investors.
The list of investors in Osian’s Connoisseurs of Art reads like a roll-call of the art appreciation elite in India: Sanjeev Khandelwal of Khandelwal Laboratories, industrialist Gautam Thapar, Citibanker Pramit Jhaveri, Sheshasayee Properties of Kumar Mangalam Birla, Priya Paul of Apeejay Surendra Group, HCL Corporation Ltd., Roshni Nadar, Gates Foundation’s Ashok Alexander, celebrity cook Tarala Dalal, MphasiS founder Jaithirth Rao, Kamal Morarka of Gannon Dunkerly and Sangita Kathiwada are just some names.
Ready for the Gamble
Yet, when he broke into the art scene, Tuli was virtually unheard of. “There was a striking, slim, young man with a magnificent head of hair, and he kept putting up his paddle at the drop of a hat. He was surrounded by a bevy of young ladies egging him on. We wondered who this young man was. He was simply not known in Bombay,’’ says artist Jehangir Sabavala of Tuli’s early days.
Tuli was in his early thirties when he came to India about 15 years ago. The Indian art market in the mid-Nineties was notoriously inefficient. Dubious practices and grey dealings dominated the scene. And the playing field was small. Even in 2004, the Indian art market was barely worth Rs. 50 crore.
Tuli burst into this milieu with an endearing mystique of an obsessively gambling Non-Resident Indian, a Punjabi with a French-sounding name and holding a degree from the London School of Economics (Tuli describes himself as a development theorist). He had then vowed to build a merit-conscious art infrastructure “independent of traditional patronage systems.”
For a man who calls himself a crazy gambler, the booming Indian economy gave the perfect ticket to big stakes. “Every system that we have created in the world has started as a gamble and materialism has slowly been institutionalised,” Tuli told Forbes India in an August 2009 interview. “A gamble is played within an uncertain context where the less the flow of information, the greater the gamble seems. The more the randomness, the better the gamble.”
Tuli started with a charity for Indian art called HEART (The Tuli Foundation for Holistic Education and Art), which helped him connect with artists, collectors, dealers, and galleries. Pheroza Godrej, owner of Cymroza Gallery and a well-known figure in high society, says that her gallery effectively launched him. Many people say that Tuli has a knack of making friends, and foes, in elite circles.
Sangita Kathiwada, socialite and chairperson of Cabochon Arts, a crucial cog in Tuli’s business, remembers that when he came to India after studying Indian art and architecture, he set out in search of people committed to the arts and Indian culture to support HEART. “He always says heart first and mind later,” she recollects. “We opened a cute little gallery called The Window, as a non-commercial gallery in a space I had outside Melange. The idea was to allow people the enjoyment of looking at art while learning from it,’’ Kathiwada claims.
Tuli then produced a book called The Flamed Mosaic which brought him instant celebrity status and gave him a foothold in the art world as a serious player. Even today, many regard it as the most definitive book on Indian contemporary art.
The local glitterati noticed him immediately as he bid aggressively at auctions and held forth passionately about art and culture at social dos. One socialite industrialist says Tuli always moves in the charmed circle of the rich and famous, giving lectures on art and culture at every opportunity.
Tuli understood that as the country’s economy flourished, a wave would wash the art market too. He wanted to ride its crest. The strategy was simple — own as many artworks as possible before the market exploded and also create hype for unknown artists and obscure memorabilia such as movie tickets sold 50 years ago. He started with the intention of bringing fame and value to obscure artists whom he owned and believed should be on the world stage.
An industrialist, also an art aficionado, says that at auctions he would be waving his paddle about furiously which, he felt, was rather uncool. He adds that Tuli used to get high society women to host him at pre-dinner parties where he would “instruct” them on art. “That’s how he started getting all his contacts together,” he says.
As Tuli slowly worked his way into the exclusive club of India’s elite, the roll of dice started turning against him. He gave up charity pretty soon.
When the Heart Stopped Beating
At a HEART auction in 1999, Tuli put up some old works of art with the assurance that two experts had certified their provenance or the history of their origin and ownership. It was later found that he had never even showed them the works. Given that certified provenance confirms the authenticity and legality of a work and can fetch higher prices, this controversy was a serious one. But Tuli terms the allegations “absolute nonsense and lies” insisting that it was HEART that introduced the concept of provenance in India.
However, that was to be HEART’s last auction. “I realised charity was ineffective, and I had to bring economics to the centre of it. I wanted to create the greatest arts and culture institution in the world and it needed to have financial independence,” he says.
Image: Dinesh Krishnan
As an auction house, you don't sell art from your own stocks... It gives rigging a chance, says Harsh Goenka, art collector
After HEART failed, Tuli founded Osian’s Connoisseurs of Art in 2000, which runs a self-supported auction house that expanded to include art advisory services, a film house, publishing and design house, a centre for archiving Indian, Asian and Arab art, and even own a Durand cup football team, the New Delhi Heroes, besides sponsoring the cup tournament itself. Though these projects got him admiration, the business model did not make sense from the start. The auction house was funding everything.
His expansive ventures got him the headlines, but money was still a trickle.
Osian’s was simply not in the big league. It needed to expand fast to be prestigious and influential in the art world. But Tuli thought it was growing too slowly and started weaving much bigger plans.
By 2005-2006, Tuli’s company had reported revenues of Rs. 65 crore and a healthy profit of over Rs. 11 crore. An ambitious Tuli began eyeing a global play with a subsidiary and its first office in Dubai. “It is expected that by 2009-2010, Osian’s (consolidated) profit after tax will reach approximately Rs. 110 crore on an expected revenue of Rs. 460 crore,” he forecast.
Osian’s sold shares to two strategic investors at Rs. 1,400 per share that year. Two years later, Abraaj Capital invested $20 million at Rs. 1,600 per share for a 9.4 percent stake. The company set the quarter ended March 2009 as the target date for a public share issue.
In June 2006, just when the stock market was down but the art market peaked, Neville Tuli announced the launch of an art fund amid an economic boom. All markets were awash with liquidity. The art market was estimated to be growing at nearly 100 per cent.
A clutch of banks led by BNP Paribas and ABN Amro referred their wealthy clients to buy units in Osian’s Art Fund and in return got hefty fees of up to 20 per cent in some transactions, according to a person who was involved with the issue. The banks together earned nearly Rs. 5.5 crore. The fund raised an unprecedented Rs. 102 crore.
Tuli’s networking ability brought to the board of Osian Art Fund’s asset management company names such as Gautam Thapar, Ashok Alexander, Lord Meghnad Desai, corporate lawyer Cyril Shroff and Pramit Jhaveri. One of the directors of the trustee company was former Securities and Exchange Board of India chairman D.R. Mehta (Mehta quit in January 2008), the first annual report of the fund says.
The company did not spare any expense in selling the fund as it overshot the 5 per cent limit for issue expenses by a mile. It ended up spending a total of Rs 6.3 crore as initial expenses, the surplus borne by Osian’s. More than 650 investors spread across 39 cities bought units in the fund.
That year, Osian’s rewarded its Chairman and Managing Director Tuli with a gross remuneration of Rs. 3.2 crore. He had earned a little under Rs. 70 lakh the previous year. He bought a house on Mumbai’s tony Carmichael Road from actress Sharmila Tagore with a Rs. 5 crore bank loan underwritten by Osian’s. Neville Tuli had suddenly become a high roller.
Tuli went on an art and artefacts buying spree. Gone were the days when he scoured the country for hidden treasures that could be bought cheap. He spent millions on Japanese Samurai masks and James Bond memorabilia. Tuli says that Osian’s has the largest collection of Hollywood memorabilia anywhere in the world. According to him, the firm owned more than 2.65 lakh pieces of art, objets d’art and pop memorabilia.
The Cowboy Culture
Art funds look very much like mutual funds but differ in a key detail. Regulation. Stock market regulator SEBI had indeed brought out some recommendations to regulate art funds, but they were never finalised. Art fund managers were free to operate like cowboys.
Initially, Osian’s art fund appeared to be a thumping success with its net asset value (NAV) racing to Rs. 121 in February 2007, barely six months after closure. Its total corpus was invested in 146 artists, the top 20 of whom included masters such as V.S. Gaitonde, F.N. Souza, S.H. Raza and M.F. Husain. The first disclosure report said the 20 comprised three-fourths of the value of the Fund.
The NAV of the Fund’s units rose to Rs. 138 within two years of launch before falling to Rs. 128 in January 2009. By the time the scheme matured in July, it had fallen to Rs. 112.
Image: Santosh Nagwekar/ Fotocorp
We wondered who this young man was. He was simply not known in Bombay, says Artist, Jehangir Sabawala
In the euphoria of the previous years, investors were, however, blind to one small detail tucked away in the notes to the accounts. It said: “In the absence of a regulated active market, the net realisable value has been estimated on the basis of management’s expectation thereof, taking into account, where applicable, prices of similar paintings sold during the period.’’ That meant Neville Tuli practically decided the value of the stock as he had hand-picked every piece of work. Although the value of a piece of art is always debatable, there is a reasonable price range that experts forecast.
Tuli made another fatal mistake. He bid aggressively and paid top dollar for the art he wanted. In hindsight, it is clear he almost always overpaid. “Neville Tuli got carried away and paid many times more than the then current market values for artists like Akbar Padamsee, Gaitonde, Husain, Jogen, etc.,” says art consultant Bijay Anand. “You can, as a human being, make some errors in judgement sometimes [but] what are you trying to prove if you consistently pay multiples of market valuations for particular artists. Don’t you have a responsibility to the investors who have invested their hard earned monies with you?”
Lovers of art may pay any price, but not investors looking for returns. “He pays exorbitant rates for things he doesn’t need to. He buys artwork and doesn’t pick it up. With Neville, nothing makes sense,’’ says a person from whose firm Tuli has purchased art.
The valuations were based on an art index. It is another matter that the index was also created and managed by Osian’s in association with The Economic Times, a financial daily owned by the Bennett, Coleman and Company that is an investor in Osian’s. In a mutual fund set-up, these would have been clear conflicts of interest. But then, unlike mutual funds, it helps that art is unregulated in India.
“It appears to me there is an issue of transparency here. As an auction house, you don’t sell art from your own stocks. The integrity of the process can get breached and [it] gives rigging a chance. Naturally these things get noticed and you lose respect,” says Harsh Goenka, one of India’s leading industrialists and a prominent art collector.
While Osian’s set up the fund, it also shared its director with the asset manager. Its auction house bought and sold art on behalf of the fund. Cabochon Arts, a dealership set up by Tuli and transferred to his close friend Sangita Kathiwada (who is also a shareholder in Osian’s) and her son Digvijay Kathiwada in 2007, has had extensive dealings with the fund through the auction house. Tuli’s mother Swaraj Tuli was a director on the company’s board even in December 2007. The company’s email address continues to be hq@Osians.com even though it has moved its registered office from Osian’s Nariman Point premises to Napean Sea Road in Mumbai.
Two KPMG officials, who conducted a due diligence on the company on behalf of Abraaj Capital, describe Cabochon as a company over which Tuli has indirect control. The officials, who titled their report of July 1, 2009, Project Picasso II, say the company did not give them details of purchases and sales from the fund and hence they could not comment on the arm’s length pricing.
Tuli turns the logic of such conflict of interest on its head. “Osian’s is everything in one cup, because, unless you have synergies you can’t do half these things. If the art fund does not have the expertise of an auction house… if we did not have the suppliers, access to the clients… if we did not have all that knowledge, we can’t run the art fund. It’s impossible.’’ But what is haunting him now is another statement he made to investors. “Time will now show whether we can carry this responsibility and fulfil the promises to our investors,” he had written in the fund’s first disclosure report in early 2007.
Net Anxiety Value
That time came in the middle of 2009 when the fund closed, but Tuli failed to keep his promise. Used as they were to fancy NAVs, investors were just about digesting the fall in the market but at least expected to be paid what was due. But for five months, even that didn’t happen. Finally, Osian’s told investors that it would send out cheques in December second week. However, it managed to pay only a few investors, that too only 85 per cent of their principal. Tuli then told the two foreign banks that had referred the fund to their clients that he would not be able to meet the deadline. But he assured them that he would pay.
The unravelling of the world’s second biggest art fund had begun.
“If I were an investor in such an entity, I would take whatever money I can recover and run with it. At the moment, things don’t seem to be all right,” says Goenka.
Investors hadn’t got early warning. Even as the market fell, optimistic valuations by the Osian’s management of the art it owned and its ability to sell it in a falling market kept the NAV of the fund much higher than what could have been its actual market value.
Tuli now admits that the NAV might have been out of sync with the market.
“To some extent this can be seen to be so, but then no one foresaw the rapid collapse in prices, liquidity and volumes in the art markets, around the world not just India,’’ he says and blames the lack
of financial support systems for the liquidity crisis. “If a client does not pay the promised amount at the price agreed at the time agreed, what legal recourse can help the immediate repayment that the fund requires?”
While the NAV trap tightened, Osian’s, the company, was gasping for cash liquidity as revenues from the auction house dried up. It used up its entire working capital and overdraft lines of about Rs. 55 crore with a slew of banks during the year. Its bank loans increased from Rs 65. crore in March 2008 to Rs. 106 crore a year later, according to Project Picasso II. The report says that the cash crunch was so severe that the company could not pay loan instalments, statutory dues, overdue creditors, keyman insurance premium and even salaries in Delhi.
To meet urgent payments, it borrowed money from private companies such as Globe Commodities, Solaris Holdings and Mahalakshmi Glass Works in the form of inter-corporate deposits paying interest rates ranging from 18 per cent to 30 per cent per annum. Inventory levels shot up from 186 crore to about Rs 230 crore while sale of own stock plunged to a third and margins collapsed by nearly 80 per cent, Osian’s management informed the KPMG officials, according to the report. (Tuli has maintained that at no point did the company have short-term debt of more than Rs. 5 crore.)
In his latest email to Forbes India Tuli also said that the ICDs were very short term borrowing against incoming funds, and that they had the option to be converted into sale of art after a fixed date. The situation became even worse because Osian’s operates on a level of receivables that is unusual for companies. One banker says that Tuli asked for a loan repayment to be postponed because Osian’s’ clients were not able to pay.
The KPMG report said various entities and individuals owed Osian’s more than Rs. 100 crore, more than a third of which was owed as advisory fees for setting up the India Asia Arab Art Fund (IAAF). Of the $16 million that IAAF owed, Osian’s had already accounted for about $4 million as revenues in fiscal year 2007-08. It had accounted for the rest as receivables in the next year.
However, the fund never got off because it did not find enough takers. Tuli told Forbes India that Osian’s statutory auditors, Deloitte Haskins and Sells were in no position to comment on the timing of the arrival of the advisory fees but insisted that it was consistent with accounting practices because IAAF was only “postponed not cancelled.”
The ambitious international venture not only sullied Osian’s books, it also landed Tuli in trouble with both Abraaj Capital and international auction house Christie’s. Tuli’s offshore company based in Jersey Isles was acting as the purchasing agent for IAAF and had accordingly signed an agreement with Abraaj in June 2008. The June agreement listed a total loan of about $23.7 million to Bregawn in the previous month. Abraaj has moved a London court to recover that money for which Neville Tuli has also given a personal guarantee.
Tuli says that Bregawn was acting only as a purchasing agent for Abraaj, which bought the art with the intention of selling it to IAAF. The Osian’s Art Fund had an option of selling its Modern and Contemporary art collection to IAAF if it was launched.
Bregawn landed Tuli in another soup too. Auction house Christie’s has reportedly held on to art worth almost a million dollars that Tuli purchased for Osian’s because Bregawn owed it millions of dollars. Osian’s recently moved court to prevent Christie’s from re-auctioning the art works. Osian’s, according to reports, claims Bregawn is a separate company and, therefore, not responsible for that company’s liabilities. Neville Tuli cannot ring-fence Osian’s or Bregawn, a source says, because he is the face for both, a view Christie’s has also taken. Another source close to international auctioneers says that auction house Sotheby’s too came close to suing Osian’s last year for an $8 million payment. The source said Tuli bought art but never paid for it.
“Sotheby’s has now received a partial payment from one of the Neville Tuli companies in respect of the amounts due to Sotheby’s. A substantial debt to Sotheby’s remains and Sotheby’s is holding art property as collateral against this debt. Sotheby’s will not be commenting on the precise details but even collectively, Neville Tuli’s companies have not paid US$8.8million for any property,’’ Mathew Weigman, worldwide director of sales publicity at Sotheby’s, said. However, at the time of going to press, Sotheby’s had not moved court.
In his August interview with Forbes India, Tuli answered questions about his debts. “Osian’s does not owe one rupee to Christie’s. Osian’s does not owe one rupee to SaffronArt. Osian’s does not owe anything to any auction house; the only thing we owed was something to Sotheby’s, OK? And Rs. 1 crore. We don’t owe anything to galleries, we don’t deal with galleries; we don’t buy from them.”
He had also said Osian’s had not bought anything at Christie’s. The day after the interview, he sent a list of creditors, including 13 galleries. The list puts Osian’s’ total outstanding debt at Rs. 10.5 crore, of which Rs. 6 crore is owed to auction houses, specifically Rs. 3.3 crore to Sotheby’s. It did not list any debt to Christie’s.
When Osian’s Art Fund was launched, an advisor with a foreign institutional investor concluded that it was too risky to bet on. He argued that the total value of transactions in the art market had been Rs. 50 crore in 2004, Rs. 225 crore in 2005 and Rs. 311 crore in 2006 until June.
There were only 12 paintings in Indian contemporary art until then to have fetched a value in excess of Rs. 3 crore and 102 paintings in the previous two years to have crossed Rs. 1 crore. “The market seems to be quite small for the size of the fund,” he wrote to his bosses.
The advisor’s observations turned out to be uncannily accurate. Osian’s Art Fund was a big fish in a small pond. Now the pond has little water and Osian’s is struggling for breath. A perfect existential conundrum for a Dostoevsky novel.
(This story appears in the 05 February, 2010 issue of Forbes India. You can buy our tablet version from Magzter.com. To visit our Archives, click here.)
Neville Tuli
Osian's Connoisseurs of Art
India Asia Arab Art Fund
Osian�s Art Fund
Jehangir Sabawala
Harsh Goenka
A-t
Very biased article. Saddened by the journalism quality here, business is business, tuli was trying to bring India\'s potential as a art powerhouse and his dream went down. its business, dont be so hurtful
Kunal Shah
Sanjeev Khandelwal, one of the directors of osian, should be sued by investors and the public. He took out all his money from osian before it crashed and publically told everyone to buy into osian. He cheated his own friends and relatives. He also runs a small pharmaceutical company and pretends to be a venture investor. Anybody doing business with this guy should be aware, he will cheat you and is a big fraud. OSIAN was his scam idea with Neville.
Tiara Jones
I happen to meet one of the employee of Osians and he told me that the company has not paid him salary since last 8 months!! just think a company who is treating it's employees as it's slave and not paying even salaries or can't even afford to pay salaries to its staff, how come will it pay to it's investors??
on Dec 4, 2010
Neel S
I havent yet got a dime back from Osians. Can't understand how they could pay 85% to some of the investors while depriving the others 100% . Is there any legal recourse available ? How bout the glitterati in the board of directors , can they be of any help at all?
on Aug 22, 2010
Samir Singhal
Haven't even received part redemption. I would say investors who have received 85% of the corpus are very lucky indeed. I feel cheated. Can anybody help ?
Sanjay Mukim
We can try to help all the investors from a unite we have made in Delhi , I am also one of the investors and I am also in the same pain as you the only thing I need contact details of all the directors of Osians Art Fund to send them legal notice indidiually and if they do not repond for sure a crimical action will be taken against all the directors ( no one will be spared ) whatever storys they make up
R K Chandrashekar
I am also an investor in Osian Art Fund. Please include me in the fight to recover our hard earned money. I did receive 85% of the corpus more than a year ago. Since then, only promises but noting else. I have retired and need these funds urgently. Thanks.
As of today, Neville has paid only 85% of the corpus. Remaining 15% and the (meagre) profit is yet to be received, which he and his staff have been promising since December 2009 end. In spite of the Auction held in Mar 2010, he has not yet paid up the investors. He is heard to be sitting on a highly valued art collection but it seems wishes to raise his hands to pay up the investors.
Elias Korah
For every con man a sucker is born every minute.
Naren Panjwani
Your quote from Dostoevsky's gambler story is spot on - as a clue to the phenomenon of Neville T... But I feel sad that Osian's dream has gone sour, though yes, knowing Neville personally, I'm not surprised. The picture of Osianama as a project stuck in mud and debris was depressing...
These adverse developments would further alienate investors from alternative investment instruments
on Mar 1, 2010
Since when did Forbes start taking up issues of personal vendetta? Elizabeth i believe was not glorified as a journalist and treated on par with others when she walked into Osians the first time round! is that the reason for the article? i also heard that Osians was aware of the article and Mr. Tuli allowed the article to be printed because he believes in democracy!!! This is business not glorified philosophy we are dealing with!! ups and downs are natural here just as the vultures who swoop down on those who fall! Lets see Forbes' democracy now!
Requiem For An Age: Far Eastern Economic Review
Netbooks: Small, Simple, Effective
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Sunday Spotify 16: 9/25/16
September 25, 2016 Written by The Ghost
So, you may have heard about this 2nd Annual Ghosty Awards thing going on. Expect to hear announcements very soon regarding the actual awards ceremony. In the meantime, I encourage you to vote, and spread the word to all your friends. Remember, it’s your civic duty to vote in The Ghosty Awards!
Speaking of duties, it’s my weekly duty to provide you with a Sunday Spotify 16. It should be no surprise that this week’s playlist leans heavily on acts with nominations. There are still a few non-nominated acts among the sixteen, as well as some new releases. So have a seat, press play, and listen away!
Cut Throat Finches, “Boundaries”
Congratulations to Cut Throat Finches, who earned seven nominations this year, more than any other act. And that’s after their “birthday gift” of a Wham! cover.
Pinata Protest, “Volver, Volver”
If you feel like going to a show tonight, Three Links would be an excellent choice. San Antonio based Pinata Protest will bring their Tex-Mex flavored punk rock to the venue. If the songs I’ve listened to are any indication, I’d imagine this would be a very entertaining show. Vandoliers and Responsible Johnny, also entertaining acts, open the show.
True Widow, “F.W.T.S.: L.T.M.”
A True Widow song title consisting of only letters? Who’d have guessed it? On a completely separate note, Nicole Estill earned herself a nomination for Best Bassist.
Mur, “Climb and Fall”
Mur released Fire Escapes a matter of weeks before the nominations were announced. While Max Hartman got a nod for Best Keyboardist, the album hadn’t been out long enough for it to appropriately sink in with me. Had it been released even in August, I strongly suspect it’d be getting a nod. Let this be a lesson: don’t release killer albums a week or two before the nomination process ends.
Boss Battle, “Jolt”
It’s been awhile since I’ve highlighted this band, but I figure now’s a good time to remind the GOBL readers of the band. So here’s your reminder: Boss Battle was nominated for Best Texas Act and Best Texas EP for Attack Time. And they’re awesome. Reminder given.
Northern National, “Addiction”
I’ll be totally honest: many of Northern National’s tracks are a little too poppy and polished for my taste. I’ve always recognized their talent, but it didn’t click with me personally. “Addiction”, however, finds the band in a grittier, almost Black Keys vibe, and it fits them very nicely. Would love to see the band pursue this musical vein further.
Party Static, “Wasted Waster”
Just a fun party track from Party Static.
Jonas Martin, “Because Love”
Due to his move to NYC, next year he’ll only qualify for Best Questionably Local Act. Since The Color Scheme was released while residing here, he still earns a Best Album nomination, along with Best Solo Artist. Not bad for a born again Yankee.
(monkeysphere), “Dance Into the Void”
Sure, “Come Back to the Show” is the more popular track from the band. I felt this track better showed off the musical skills of Mikey Frenchtoast and Colton Crews, who earned Ghosty nominations for Best Bassist and Best Drummer respectively. Plus, the band earned several other nominations, including the highly coveted Best Live Act nomination.
88 Killa, “Boomerang”
I hope to have an announcement soon regarding this Best Rap/Hip-Hop nominee.
Kinsley August, “Smokey Lovers”
A few weeks ago, I shared this song on a Sunday playlist. The following Sunday, Mark plays it on the Local Ticket. Coincidence? Probably, but I’m going to try to give myself credit for Mark’s fine decision.
Somogyi, “T.M.I.”
Just in case you didn’t get enough initial based music from the earlier True Widow track, here’s another courtesy of Ghosty nominee Somogyi. She’s up for Best Pop Artist. That probably has something to do with her ability to construct a catchy yet beautifully smart tune. Oh, and her vocals are pretty darn amazing too.
Signals and Alibis, “Whistleblower”
While Signals and Alibis themselves weren’t nominated per se, lead singer Rebecca Jozwiak earned a total of three nominations. She earned one for Best Folk/Acoustic artists, as well as nods for Best Songwriter and Musical MVP. The latter two nominations were earned on the strength of both her solo career and her work with S&A.
Hoaxes, “Baby Blue”
When thinking of Texas bands, I tend to focus on Austin, San Antonio, and Houston. El Paso often gets overlooked, and that shouldn’t happen. Hoaxes is a case in point of a really strong band from that fine city.
Toadies, “Tyler”
The band earned a nomination for Best Beyond the Metroplex Act based on the strength of their Heretics album. I thought about sharing that album’s version of “Tyler”, but opted for the original from Rubberneck instead. You don’t mind, do you? I figured you wouldn’t.
Cameron Matthew Ray, “Her Song”
Time constraints have prevented The Ghost from writing many an interesting local music story. It remains to be seen if I’ll get to cover Mr. Ray’s upcoming show at the University of Texas at Arlington’s Planetarium show in the detail it so deserves. If not, know that this Thursday he’ll perform his music set to a show at the planetarium. Stars and songs? An absolutely awe-inspiring combination. Oh, and for those keeping score at home, Cameron also received nominations for Best Male Vocalist and Best Folk/Acoustic Act.
Dallas Music, Playlists, Texas Music
(monkeysphere), 88 killa, boss battle, cameron matthew ray, cut throat finches, hoaxes, jonas martin, kinsley august, mur, northern national, party static, pinata protest, signals and alibis, somogyi, toadies, true widow
Monday Mixteen: 6/3/19 — The Ghost may not have said much in the past month, but that does not mean that there have been no new developments in GOBL land. In fact, I have a long overdue show announcement. I will be returning to Opening Bell Coffee on Saturday, June 22nd for another edition of Acoustiganza. There’s even a [...]
The Ghostified Gathering — For a week or so, Festify was all the rage on social media. It was an app that created fictitious festival lineups based on one’s Spotify listening habits. One could create a lineup based on the most listened to artists over the course of a month, six months, or one’s entire time on Spotify. The [...]
Monday Mixteen: 3/25/19 — For those not aware of Crowd Control, it’s a unique and cool Open Mic concept from Brittany Griffiths (Wavelength) and Billy Law. The last Thursday of each month, Crowd Control hosts an open mic, and each month there is a theme. The performers must present original material, and the performers are encouraged to tie their [...]
Monday Mixteen: 3/11/19 — A funny thing happened on the way to making last week’s Monday Mixteen. WordPress would not allow me to log in to update. Even once that issue was resolved, several previously published articles disappeared. Bah humbug. The plan was to make last week’s Monday Mixteen a tribute to Three Links’ anniversary weekend, and to promote [...]
The Ghost’s Top 101 of 2018: #7... — Another day, another reveal of countdown songs. Yesterday, you saw #101-71. #70 is something of a rebel. It’s one of one two songs in the countdown that is currently unavailable on Spotify. You can take that up with Starside R&D on January 5, when they perform at Double-Wide along with Kid Fight and Sandovall. So [...]
New Music: Matt Tedder, “Good as Gone”
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Posted on 03/06/2011 by dave.miller.uk@gmail.com
Surrey Schools title for Katy-Ann with an emphatic win at Reigate
Katy-Ann McDonald’s outstanding winter continued on Saturday as she was crowned Surrey schools cross country champion. Despite being among the youngest in the junior girl’s (Years 8 and 9) age category, McDonald dominated the race, finishing 34 seconds clear of her nearest rival at Priory Park, Reigate. McDonald’s latest accolade follows a first place finish in the U13 girl’s race at the McCain UK Cross Challenge Series in Antrim last month, which came a week after she became Surrey cross country champion in her age group.
Another HHH athlete attracting plaudits is Cambridge University student Lewis Lloyd, who finished 15th in a high-class field at the British Universities and Colleges Sport cross-country championships. Like McDonald, Lloyd became Surrey cross-country champion in his respective age category in January.
There was further success for Harriers at the East Surrey League cross-country relays on Wimbledon Common, with the club clinching victory in all competitions. The senior men’s team comprising Ross Macdonald, John Tayleur, Vic Maughn and Deron Fagan finished one minute and 31 seconds ahead of second-place Croydon Harriers. Macdonald’s time of 10:11 for the 1.95-mile course was the club’s fastest leg, with Fagan just a second slower.
The club also claimed first, second and third places in the combined U17/U15 relay. 14 year old Ed Olsen’s impressive first leg of 10:13 – only two seconds short of Macdonald’s benchmark – propelled Harriers into an unassailable lead, before strong runs from U15 Paul Burgess and U17 Merhawi Yemane confirmed overall victory.
An all-girls team made up of sisters Alice and Daisy Setyabule and Olivia Lamont were runners-up to the boys. The U13 competition, ran as solo legs rather than the relay format, was won by Sam Cohen in 12:06, with Tatiana Cooke first girl and fifth overall in 12:44.
Away from cross-country, Chris Busaileh was Harriers’ highest-placed finisher at the Chichester Priory 10k, clocking 31:26 to finish 10th in windy conditions. Mike Cummings finished in 23rd, running 32:03. Fast-improving Sue Swaine ran a best time of 39:42 to finish 30th woman, while Penel Fixter also logged a personal best, finishing in 46:24.
The weekend’s leading parkrun performer from HHH was veteran Ben Paviour, whose time of 16:22 won the Southend event, while Mohammed Ismail was second at Dulwich Park clocking 16:40. Jonny Muir was fifth at Dulwich in 17:24 and Richard Wonnacott sixth in 17.40. Meanwhile, Gary Ironmonger was eighth at the Brockwell parkrun, posting a time of 18:36.
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Josh Sheehan to compete for the IFMXF World Championship 2011
Posted February 23rd, 2011 by Holtzy
Australian Freestyle MX rising star, Josh Sheehan has signed on to compete for the World Championship in the 2011 season of the IFMXF FIM Freestyle MX World Championship and Night of the Jumps throughout Europe and Brazil.
Sheehan has spared no time in wanting to make the most of his opportunity by with intensive training after signing with IFMXF. Josh has mastered the 360 which only a few riders in the world possess, while also being known as the Ruler Flip king in his native Australia. Sheehan has been working on a variety of new back flip combinations and also working on some new tricks for the 2011 season which he is waiting to unleash at his first World Championship event.
Sheehan made his IFMXF debut in November 2010 competing in four rounds of the 2010 season as a wild card in Czech Republic and Austria. As a wild card, Josh also achieved a 3rd place in Vienna in Freestyle, while also winning the combined whip competitions two nights in a row with Brody Wilson.
“I am really looking forward to competing in a full season of Night of the Jumps and FIM events. The competition is extremely high and I could match it with the best in 2010 when I was a wild card rider. I have learnt some new tricks and I feel more comfortable in that arena, so I cannot wait to ride in front of the screaming European fans again” Sheehan said.
For 2011, Sheehan has set his sights high on the podium and has learnt from his earlier competitions in the international scene including Red Bull X-Fighters in Rome 2010. “I know what I need to do now to get on the podium, and I also have learnt a lot about the judging in different competitions.” Sheehan continued.
Unfortunately Josh will miss the opening rounds of the FIM World Championship while he is performing as part of the Travis Pastrana led team for the Nitro Circus Live tour in New Zealand and Australia in February and March. Josh will then make his first appearance in 2011 at the FIM Freestyle MX World Championship on May 7th in Adana, Turkey. Josh will then compete in the remainder of 14 events with the IFMXF team.
The crew at HGM wish Sheeny all the best in taking on the world. Go ya bloody legend!!!!
Josh Sheehan is supported by Carlton Dry Honda racing team, Valyside and Dragon.
For more information on FIM World Championships, visit www.nightofthejumps.com
For more information regarding Josh Sheehan, email
2007 Narrogin Rev Heads DVD Out Now
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NC 3 - Samsung 1, Changwon [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
NC scored first on an RBI double by third baseman Mo Chang-Min in the bottom of the 3rd. Samsung managed to tie the score at 1-1 in the top of the 5th on a sacrifice fly by shortstop Kim Sang-Su, but it would be the only run for the Lions tonight as Samsung managed just 2 hits in the final 4 innings. The Dinos took the lead in the bottom of the 6th on first baseman Cho Yeong-Hun's RBI single. NC added one more in the botton of the 8th to give us the final score of 3-1. Rookie pitcher No Sung-Ho got his first win of his KBO career. No went 8 innings allowing just 5 hits and 1 walk. The loss went to Samsung's Rick VandenHurk who gave up 7 hits and 2 walks in 7 innings.
Hanwha 2 - LG 1, Seoul (Jamsil) [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
Hanwha put the first run on the board in the top of the 3rd when centerfielder Ko Dong-Jin drove in Song Kwang-Min from third base with a single. The Eagles extended the lead to 2-0 in the top of the 6th with an RBI single from left fielder Lee Yang-Ki. LG scored their only run of the night in the bottom half of the 6th when Jeong Ui-Yoon grounded out to second allowing Kwon Yong-Gwan to score from third. The Twins loaded the bases in the bottom of the 7th, but failed to bring the tying run across the plate. Hanwha's Yu Chang-Sik was the winning pitcher, allowing 5 hits and 1 walk in 5 innings. The loss went to LG's Radhames Liz who gave up 8 hits and 2 walks in 6 2/3 innings.
Doosan 9 - KIA 7, Gwangju [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
Doosan took the lead in the top of the 1st, and while KIA had plenty of scoring they were never able to catch up with the Bears. Catcher Yang Yui-Ji was the top performer for Doosan, going 2 for 4 with 2 RBIs and 3 runs scored. A total of 12 pitchers saw action between the two teams, but the win went to Doosan starter Yu Heui-Kwan. With LG and Samsung both losing tonight, Doosan moved within 3 games of first place. KIA, on the other hand, has lost 8 of their last 10 games and appears to be in real danger of falling into 8th place behind NC if they can't turn things around.
Lotte 9 - Nexen 3, Busan [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
KIA Tigers sign American pitcher Duane Below
First of all, allow me to apologize for the lateness of this news. The story actually broke last week, but I was a bit too busy do a write-up on it. Anyway...
The KIA Tigers have signed Duane Below to replace Anthony Lerew who was released last month. Below is a 27 year old left-hander who came from the Miami Marlins organization. Below was drafted by the Detroit Tigers in 2006. After spending several years in the minors, Below made his MLB debut on July 20, 2011 for Detroit. He made the opening day roster for the 2012 season, but eventually found himself back in the minors. He was released in April 2013 and was claimed off waivers by Miami where he was assigned to the AAA New Orleans Zephyrs. Below appeared in 13 games for New Orleans this year, ending up with 5 wins, 5 losses, and an ERA of 2.55.
Below arrived in Korea on August 2 and his since undergone a medical checkup. According to KIA manager Sun Dong-Yeol, Below is expected to get his first start on Thursday (August 8) against the NC Dinos.
Below has never been to Korea, but according to news articles he has received plenty of information about the country. His sister was a US Army nurse who spent time stationed in Korea. Additionally, Below was a teammate of current NC Dinos pitcher Adam Wilk in the Detroit minor league system. Wilk has reportedly given Below plenty of advice about playing baseball in Korea prior to his arrival.
LG 9 - Samsung 6, Seoul (Jamsil) [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
Samsung put the first 2 runs on the board in the top of the 2nd following an error by LG third baseman Jeong Seong-Hoon and an RBI single by Samsung catcher Jin Kab-Yong. LG answered with 1 run in the bottom of the 2nd and 2 more in the bottom of the 4th on a solo homerun by left fielder Jeong Ui-Yoon and a RBI single by Jeon Seong-Hoon to take the lead with a score of 3-2. Samsung tied it up in the top of the 5th on an RBI single by Choi Hyeong-Woo, but LG took the lead for good when they scored 4 runs in the bottom of the 6th, an inning that included 2 Samsung errors and a wild pitch. Samsung would strike back and bring the score as close as 6-7 in the top of the 8th, but they couldn't get over the hump. LG sealed the win in the bottom of the 8th on a 2-run homrun by catcher Yoon Yo-Sup. LG wins the series 2 games to 1.
Doosan 5 - SK 2, Incheon [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
This ended up being a very close game, with the score tied at 2-2 heading into the 9th inning. In the top of the 9th, Doosan's Kim Hyun-Soo hit a 2-run homerun to put the bears ahead. Later in the inning, shortstop Son Si-Hyun hit an RBI single to make the score 5-2. SK batters went down 1-2-3 in the bottom half of the inning, and the game was over. The win went to Doosan reliever Hong Sang-Sam, who only faced 1 batter in the bottom of the 8th. The losing pitcher was SK's Lim Kyung-Wan who put the go-ahead run on base in the top of the 9th. Doosan wins the series 2-1.
KIA 6 - Nexen 0, Gwangju [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
KIA scored 1 in the top of the 1st on a sacrifice fly by left fielder Na Ji-Wan, which would prove to be the only run that the Tigers needed. KIA went on to score 5 more over the course of the game. Na Ji-Wan finished 1-2 with 2 sac flies and a 2-RBI double, making himself responsible for 4 of KIA's 6 runs. Nexen had very little offense going tonight, finishing with just 3 hits for the entire game. The winning pitcher was KIA's Kim Jin-Woo who pitched 8 innings, allowing 2 hits while striking out 9 batters. The loss went to Nexen starter Brandon Knight who gave up 3 runs off of 5 hits in just 2 innings. KIA ended their losing streak, but Nexen wins the series 2 games to 1.
Hanwha - NC, Changwon - Rained Out
Samsung 3 - LG 0, Seoul (Jamsil) [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
A sellout crowd showed up in Jamsil tonight, but the home team didn't give the fans much to cheer for. LG finished with a total of 6 hits, but never more than one in an inning. Samsung got on the board in the top of the 4th on a string of 3 straight singles. The Lions added one more when center fielder Jeong Hyeong-Sik hit a solo homerun in the top of the 9th to give the final score of 3-0. Samsung starter Yoon Sung-Hwan got the win after pitching 5 1/3 scoreless innings while Oh Seung-Hwan closed it out for the save. LG's Radhames Liz pitched 7 innings, allowing 6 hits and 2 runs while striking out 9 batters for the loss. The weekend series between the league's top two teams is now tied at one game a piece with the final match-up tomorrow in Jamsil.
SK 7 - Doosan 5, Incheon [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
In the top of the 2nd Doosan's Choi Jun-Seok, Hong Seong-Heun, and Oh Jae-Won hit 3 consecutive solo homeruns, but this burst would be the only scoring the Bears would see during the first 8 innings. With the score tied at 3-3 heading into the bottom of the 6th, SK took the lead when third baseman Choi Jeong bounced one off the left field foul pole for a solo homerun. Later in the same inning, catcher Cho In-Sung hit a 3-run homerun to put SK ahead 7-3. Doosan DH Hong Seong-Heun hit a 2-run homerun with 2 outs in the top of the 9th to bring the Bears within 2. It was Hong's second homerun of the game, but it was too little, too late for a Doosan comeback.
Hanwha 4 - NC 2, Changwon [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
This matchup between the 1st and 2nd place teams in the league remained scoreless through 5 1/2 innings. LG finally got on the board in the bottom of the 6th when right fielder Lee Jin-Young hit an RBI single to put the Twins ahead 1-0. Later in the same inning, with 2 outs on the board, captain Lee Byeong-Kyu hit a 2-run homerun to put LG up 3-0. Esmailin Caridad made his KBO debut coming out of the bullpen for Samsung in the 7th inning. Caridad pitched 1 inning, faced 4 batters, and gave up 1 single. Samsung finally had their chance in the top of the 8th. Third baseman Park Seok-Min came to the plate with the bases loaded and 2 outs. Park hit a double to leftfield, scoring 2 runs, but it wasn't enough to catch up. The next batter, pinch hitter Bae Yeong-Seop, grounded out and the inning was over. In the bottom of the 8th LG added an insurance run on an RBI single by Jeong Ui-Yoon. Samsung went down 1-2-3 in the 9th and the game was over.
NC 4 - Hanwha 0, Changwon [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
NC center fielder Na Sung-Bum hit an RBI single in the bottom of the 1st to put the Dinos ahead 1-0. It would eventually prove to be the only run the team needed, but the Dinos added 3 more in the bottom of the 3rd to make the score 4-0. NC starting pitcher Charlie Shirek pitched 8 scoreless innings, allowing 7 hits, 1 walk, and striking out 9 batters. Shirek earned his 7th win of the season. Yu Chang-Sik pitched 4 innings and took the loss for Hanwha. Yu's record now stands at 1-7 for the season. The NC Dinos have now won 4 games in a row, and 6 of their last 7.
Interview with NC pitcher Charlie Shirek (English)
Newcomer Derek Hankins got his second KBO start tonight for Doosan. Hankins pitched 5 innings and gave up 8 hits, 5 walks, and 3 runs. Chris Seddon started for SK, pitched 6 2/3 innings and gave up 7 hits, 3 walks, and 4 runs. The score was 4-3 heading into the bottom of the 9th. SK first baseman Park Jung-Kwon lead off the inning with a solo homerun to tie the score at 4-4. The score remained tied until the top of the 11th when Doosan's Kim Hyun-Soo drove in Min Byeong-Heon with a double to put the Bears ahead. Son Si-Hyun was up next and added another run with an RBI single to make the score 6-4. SK came up empty in the bottom of the 11th. SK has now lost 4 home games in a row.
KT Wiz hire Cho Beom-Hyeon as first manager
OSEN, along with several other news sources, is reporting that the expansion team KT Wiz has selected Cho Beom-Hyeon to be the team's first manager. The Wiz will join the futures league (minor league) in 2014 and will move up to the KBO's top division for the 2015 season.
Cho signed a 3 year deal with the team worth 1.5 billion won. Cho is 53 years old and a former KBO player. Cho was a catcher who played 11 seasons with the OB Bears and the Samsung Lions between 1982 and 1992. After retiring, Cho went on to coach for several years before accepting his first managing position with the SK Wyverns in 2003. Cho managed SK for 4 seasons, before becoming the manager of the KIA Tigers in 2008. Cho stayed with KIA for 4 seasons, including their championship year in 2009. He also managed the Korean National Baseball Team to a gold medal at the 2010 Asian Games.
In the past few months there has been media reports that KT was looking for an "outside the box" candidate, possibly a foreigner or someone with experience abroad, but Cho, a former KBO player and manager, is very much a safe and traditional choice.
Which KBO rule change would you most like to see?
Allow games to play past 12 innings (no ties)
Allow more foreign players
Play games on Mondays
Change free agency rules
Change playoff structure
Get rid of regional draft
Eliminate the DH
other (mention in comments)
Nexen 5 - Hanwha 2, Seoul (Mokdong) [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
Nexen shortstop Kang Jung-Ho put the Heroes ahead 1-0 with an RBI single in the bottom of the 2nd. The rest of Nexen's runs came with one swing of the bat when third baseman Kim Min-Seong hit a grand slam in the bottom of the 4th to put his team ahead 5-0. Kim has now hit a homerun in each of his last 4 games. Hanwha scored a couple of late runs, but couldn't dig themselves out of the hole. Andy Van Hekken got the win for Nexen after allowing 6 hits and striking out 11 batters in 7 innings. Hanwha rookie Jo Jee-Hoon picked up his second loss in just his second KBO start. Nexen wins the series 2 games to 1.
Highlights and Interview with Nexen pitcher Andy Van Hekken (English)
NC 5 - SK 4, Incheon [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
NC's Na Sung-Bum hit a solo homerun in the top of the 1st to put the Dinos ahead 1-0, but SK answered right back. Jeong Keun-Woo lead off the bottom of the 1st with a homerun, and teammate Park Jung-Kwon hit a solo homerun of his own to put the Wyverns ahead 2-1 after 1 inning. The lead would not last long, as NC scored 4 in the top of the 2nd to take the 5-2 lead. SK third baseman Choi Jeong hit a 2-run homerun in the bottom of the 3rd to put the Wyverns within 1 run with a score of 5-4, but the score would hold as neither team was able to put any runs on the board during the final 6 innings. Relief pitcher Lee Seong-Min got the win for the Dinos as the team successfully completed the sweep of SK.
Samsung 12 - KIA 2, Gwangju [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
Another day, another blowout in Gwangju. Samsung left fielder Choi Hyeong-Woo went 3 for 6 with 3 doubles, and there were plenty of other hits to go around as the team finished the game with a total of 17. Rick VandenHurk pitched 8 innings for Samsung, allowing 4 hits and 2 runs for the win. The loss went to KIA's Lim Joon-Seop who gave up 9 runs off of 11 hits in 4 1/3 innings. Red hot Samsung sweeps the series against ice cold KIA. Since the All-Star break Samsung is 8-1 while KIA is 2-7.
Doosan 8 - Lotte 3, Busan [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
NC starting pitcher Lee Jae-Hak pitched the full 9 innings. It was the first complete game shutout of his career, and also the first by an NC Dinos pitcher since the team joined the league this year. Lee allowed just 2 hits, 3 walks, and struck out 12 batters. On the offensive side, NC leadoff batter Kim Jong-Ho went 2 for 4, including a triple to lead off the top of the 1st. Shortstop No Jin-Hyuk also added a solo homerun in the top of the 6th. The losing pitcher was SK's Baek In-Sik who gave up 5 hits in 5 innings. NC leads the series 2-0 against SK and will be looking for the sweep tomorrow.
Believe it or not, KIA actually lead for about half of the game. The Tigers were up 4-2 heading into the 6th inning, when Samsung exploded for 10 runs. 10 is the most runs scored in a single inning this season, and just 3 runs shy of the all-time single inning record set at 13 by the LG Twins on April 23, 1992 against the OB Bears. The Lions went on to rub salt in the wound by scoring 4 more in the top of the 9th. Samsung's Bae Young-Soo gets the win after allowing 8 hits and 4 runs in 7 innings. The loss goes to KIA's Yoon Suk-Min who gave up 5 runs in 5 innings. Yoon was pulled in a 6th inning that required a total of 4 KIA pitchers to end Samsung's rally. The Lions now lead the series 2-0.
The scoreboard in Gwangju had a bit of difficulty with Samsung's huge 6th inning
Nexen scored first in the bottom of the 1st on an RBI single from first baseman Park Byung-Ho to take the 1-0 lead, but Hanwha would even things up with a solo homerun from shortstop Song Kwang-Min to make the score 1-1 in the top of the 2nd. Park Byung-Ho got 2 more RBIs in the form of a 2-run homerun in the bottom of the 3rd which would give Nexen the lead for good. Nexen third baseman Kim Min-Seong added a solo homerun in the bottom of the 6th. Kim has hit a homerun in each of his past 3 games. Nexen starter Moon Sung-Hyun got the win after giving up 7 hits and 2 runs in 5 innings. The loss went to Hanwha's Kim Hyuk-Min. The series is tied at 1-1 with the final game tomorrow in Mokdong.
Hanwha 10 - Nexen 3, Seoul (Mokdong) [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
The Hanwha Eagles took the weekend off, and the rest seems to have done the team well. Hanwha wasted no time, scoring 6 runs in the top of the 1st inning. The Eagles finished the game with 10 runs, which is their second highest run total this season. DH Kim Tae-Wan went 3 for 4 with 3 doubles and first baseman Kim Tae-Kyun went 2 for 4 with a double, a homerun, 2 RBIs and 3 runs scored, leading the way for Hanwha. Dana Eveland got the win after allowing 6 hits and 3 runs in 7 1/3 innings. The loss went to Nexen's Kang Yoon-Koo who pitched 6 innings allowing 9 runs off of 11 hits. The only bright spot for Nexen was rookie DH Ahn Tae-Yeong who went 2 for 3 with 2 singles and a hit by pitch. After 3 KBO games Ahn's batting average stands at .800.
Each team scored a run in the first inning to put the score at an even 1-1 early on. NC took the lead in the top of the 5th on a solo homerun by third baseman Mo Chang-Min. The Dinos added 2 more runs in the top of the 6th on back to back solo homeruns from Lee Ho-Jun and Kwon Hee-Dong to bring the score to 4-1. An RBI single by SK left fielder Cho Dong-Hwa in the bottom of the 7th would make the score 4-2, but it would be the last run of the game. NC's Eric Hacker was the winning pitcher, allowing 2 runs off of 4 hits in 6 1/3 innings. The Loss went to SK's Jo-Jo Reyes, his 10th loss of the season and 4th loss out of his last 5 starts. Reyes becomes the first pitcher this year to reach 10 losses.
Lotte 6 - Doosan 2, Busan [Box Score] [Video Highlights]
Doosan put the first run on the board in the top of the 1st in the form of an RBI single from right fielder Min Byeong-Heon, but the lead would not last long as Lotte tied the score at 1-1 in the bottom of the 2nd on a solo homerun by Yong Deok-Han. The Giants would go on to score 5 more runs in the bottom of the 5th, an inning that included 2 doubles, 3 singles, an error, and a sacrifice fly to put Lotte ahead 6-1. Doosan would manage to score one more in the top of the 7th on an RBI single by catcher Yang Yui-Ji, but it wasn't enough to get a comeback started. Chris Oxsrping got the win for Lotte, allowing just 3 hits in 6 innings of work. The Loss went to Doosan's No Kyeong-Eun who allowed 3 earned runs off of 10 hits in 6 innings.
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Steven DeMille began his career at Fox Lorber/New Video Group where he was involved with the launch of A&E Home Video in addition to marketing Fox Lorber branded features. From Fox Lorber, he went on to co-found A-Pix Entertainment (a division of Unapix Entertainment) where he oversaw all home entertainment and television marketing.
In 2001, DeMille moved to Los Angeles to become VP of marketing for First Look Home Entertainment and later, SVP Marketing for First Look Media where he oversaw international and theatrical marketing. At First Look he merged the marketing departments of Capital Entertainment and DEJ Productions and became SVP of Marketing Services after the merger with Ventura Distribution. Revenues for the company grew from approximately $3 million to over $80 million during his tenure. Notable titles at First Look were; Chopper, Mayor of the Sunset Strip, The Proposition, A Guide To Recognizing Your Saints, “American Idol,” “Baywatch” and “Unsolved Mysteries.”
In 2007 DeMille joined Image Entertainment as SVP, Marketing to oversee all company marketing efforts including home entertainment, theatrical and expansion into the digital and VOD marketplaces. Notable titles and brands include; Peter Weir’s The Way Back, The Resident (Hillary Swank), Management (Jennifer Aniston), Sidney Lumet’s Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead, Jeff Dunham stand-up, Discovery Channel, Criterion Collection and the NBA. From 2012 to 2016, Steven was CMO for Inception Media Group where he oversaw US and International marketing and feature film acquisitions. Notable brands and titles include; CJ Entertainment, The Smithsonian Channel, Spinning Plates and Trevor Noah: African American.
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Exit, Voice, and Loyalty
Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States
Albert O. Hirschman
$29.00 • £23.95 • €26.00
BUSINESS & ECONOMICS: Economics: General
BUSINESS & ECONOMICS: General
Educators: Request an online exam copy »What’s this?
“Hirschman’s work changes how you see the world. It illuminates yesterday, today, and tomorrow… His most important [book].” —Cass R. Sunstein, The New York Review of Books
“A 126-page burst of lucidity… [Hirschman’s] masterwork.” —Roger Lowenstein, The Wall Street Journal
“One of the masterpieces of contemporary political thought.” —Malcolm Gladwell, The New Yorker
“This unusual and subtle book is…an exercise in interdisciplinary analysis focused on the interaction between market and non-market forces affecting the process of development and decline… Professor Hirschman develops a theory of loyalty as a key factor in the interaction between voice and exit: loyalty is shown to postpone exit and to make voice more effective through the possibility of exit.” —The Economic Journal
“This is an imaginative little book. Its message should be of use to economists, political scientists, and all those interested in policy questions related to these areas. Hirschman starts his argument by assuming that in time all organizations (firms, bureaus, political parties, governments, and so on) develop slack and experience a deterioration in the quality of their output. The clients of a declining organization have two options for reversing this trend: exit and voice. And much of the book is devoted to an explication of the ways in which these options operate, their relative advantages and weaknesses, the interdependence between them… It is in these discussions of current problems and institutions, however, that I find the book most rewarding. His basic point, that there exists a symbiosis between exit and voice, is certainly valid and significant. Its importance gets driven home by the way Hirschman applies the idea to various current issues. One emerges from the book feeling he has obtained a new analytic insight into policy questions which can be applied again and again.” —Dennis C. Mueller, Public Policy
“Professor Hirschman’s small book is bursting with new ideas. The economist has typically assumed that dissatisfaction with an organization’s product is met by withdrawal of demand, while the political scientist thinks rather of the protests possible within the organization. Hirschman argues that both processes are at work and demonstrates beautifully by analysis and example that their interaction has surprising implications, a theory that illuminates strikingly many important economic and political phenomena of the day. The whole argument is developed with an extraordinary richness of reference to many societies and cultures.” —Kenneth J. Arrow
“This is a marvelously perceptive essay which illuminates some of the most interesting economic and social questions of our time. I have read it with enormous interest and admiration, and the further pleasure that one has in being with an author who can think things through.” —John Kenneth Galbraith
“There is, of course, no substitute for a mind as original, playful, subtle, and fresh as Hirschman’s.” —Stanley Hoffmann
“I read Exit, Voice, and Loyalty with absolute fascination and found that it pulled together, in organized form, many random glimmerings that I had previously understood only dimly.” —Joseph Kraft
At the New York Review of Books and The American Prospect, read appreciations of Albert Hirschman, who passed away in 2012 at the age of 97
Read the New York Times obituary for Hirschman
Buy Elsewhere
IndieBound »
Barnes & Noble »
Find at a Library »Cite This Book » Permalink
An Ezra Klein Show Recommended Book, 2018
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Register now for CEDIA’s Awards and Leadership conference
CEDIA’s new Awards and Leadership Conference will take place at the Drake Hotel in Chicago from July 24-25 and early bird tickets are now available.
Targeted at executive leadership, the conference will offer a full day of education seminars followed by the CEDIA awards celebration.
The day will kick off with a keynote address by David Rendall who will provide an unconventional seven-part framework for achieving competitive separation by embracing flaws rather than fixing them. Following that, attendees will have the opportunity to attend two courses that interest them most.
The lunch session will focus on the latest economic and housing forecast, with Metrostudy senior vice president and chief economist Mark Boud.
The afternoon will offer two additional courses to choose from, covering topics such as: attracting and retaining talent; successfully navigating the lighting business; and building a great brand.
CEDIA senior vice president of education and certification Tom Darling says the company wanted to think outside the box in terms of speakers and sessions that would appeal to a wide range of industry leaders.
“The goal was to offer a mix of both tactical and strategic sessions so that there was high-level thinking as well as tangible, quick-to-implement takeaways. From sessions on what’s next in privacy and security, to incorporating wellness products, to succession planning, we’ve developed a program that will provide value to attendees no matter their company’s size or role within the industry.”
Following the Leadership Conference, attendees will have a break before the awards celebration which begins at 8 p.m.
CEDIA senior vice president of industry engagement Giles Sutton says: “The Drake is going to provide such an iconic backdrop to recognise this year’s CEDIA award winners. We look forward to celebrating with our members at this event and all the way through CEDIA Expo.”
The post Register now for CEDIA’s Awards and Leadership conference appeared first on Connected Magazine.
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Cory Stephens
Program Manager and Learning Enhancement Officer
NW-ACE
Corey Stephens, NW-ACE Program Manager and Learning Enhancement Officer, draws upon his passion for community development and growth to provide students with indispensable mentorship with which to guide the next generation of entrepreneurs.
Cory began his business education at the University of Victoria’s School of Business, graduating in 1996 with a Bachelor of Commerce degree with an entrepreneurship specialization. During his studies Cory developed many skills, including knowledge of new venture decision-making models, opportunity recognition, economic development of communities, strategy formulation, methods of business research, marketing research methods, and the creation of marketing strategies. The expertise gained in these areas would lead to a lifelong integration of such ideas with his professional experience.
After graduation from the University of Victoria, Cory furthered his expertise by working for numerous organizations, including the Metlakatla Development Corporation, the Metlakatla First Nation, Export Development Canada, the New Zealand Trade Development Board, HSBC Bank Canada, and founding and directing Foot Print Consulting in Prince Rupert. While working at Foot Print Consulting Cory successfully prepared several funding proposals for Health Canada and Fisheries and Oceans Canada, and also worked in project development for both institutions. One of these projects was the creation and implementation of a training and capacity program for Health Canada, which was introduced as a best practices model for Pacific Coast First Nations organizations.
Cory’s work also demonstrates his passion for supporting the growth of local communities, while at the same time ensuring that traditions and customs are honored. In his role as Economic Development Strategy and Research Consultant, he researched and helped with the development of a First Nations economic development strategy. Additionally, Cory researched, identified, and reported on barriers to First Nations’ economic development and barriers to access to capital.
Cory’s involvement in the community does not end with his work, but continues in his volunteering involvement. In 2010, Cory was the Promotions Director of the Prince Rupert Northern BC Winter Games. Additionally, Cory volunteered his marketing expertise for National Aboriginal Day Celebrations between 2006 and 2010. Cory was also involved with the Success by Six Promotional Campaign in 2009.
After many years of business experience in numerous organizations, Cory brings his experience and approach to building community and culture through business to the ACE Program. Cory was approached by the University of Victoria to join the ACE Program shortly after its inception, and has been the Learning Enhancement Officer and Program Manager of the NW-ACE Program since the beginning of the second student cohort.
Cory’s impact on the entrepreneurs he works with demonstrates the difference his work has made to the ACE Program. As Dr. Brent Mainprize, ACE Program Director and entrepreneurship professor at the University of Victoria, notes, “program manager Cory Stephens…must be recognized for the operational success of the NW-ACE and NW-EAGLE programs” (Dann 2015). This success achieved by the NW-ACE Program is significant, as shown through its recognition through multiple awards, including the ICAB Partnership and Collaboration Visionary Award (2014), the Alan Blizzard Award (2016), and the Global Best Award received in Oslo, Norway in 2016.
When asked about the success of the NW-ACE Program, Cory credits all of the members of the program, both internal to the ACE team and community leaders. In an interview with CBC Radio, Cory states that “[p]art of that success is also attributed to the caliber of the mentors we’re able to recruit to the program.” Cory explains that “[a]nother reason that the program is incredibly successful is that we strongly believe that once the program is underway, during that six months of the program, the students are all learning at different rates and once you’ve completed the NW-ACE Program, you’re not done” (CBC News, October 29, 2016) as they continue to receive guidance over the growth of their new venture.
Cory’s continued support for his students is evident through his work: as even “[a]fter the program is over, we continue to support [students].” The ACE Program maintains close connections with graduates, and Cory notes that it is common for ACE graduates to comment that “they [now] see opportunity in a different way.” ACE students embrace their opportunity to be role models and agents for change in their community. Community leaders have told Cory that students who have participated in the NW-ACE Program are standing up in public meetings and “providing feedback and comments and guidance to the direction of their communities” (CBC News, October 29, 2016).
Cory states that he is “incredibly proud of [the] students,” and that he “never envisioned that [he] would be a teacher, a mentor, a coach” (CBC News, October 29, 2016). His leadership qualities are revealed through his consistent advice to students on the many opportunities to apply skills that they develop during the program. Giuliana Hauknes and Christine Moody, winners of the Northwest Innovation Challenge, described that “[i]t was NW-ACE program manager Cory Stephens who brought to our attention the Northwest Innovation Challenge,” a community business challenge in Terrace, BC, which the pair went on to win for their venture: Project Hlaana (Gustavson Blog, 2014).
Cory’s students also have great things to say about his teaching style. Cory noted in an interview on CFNR FM that “I’m honored and I’m very humbled by the very positive feedback that students give me about my very candid, frank approach to providing instruction and mentorship to them” (CFNR FM, September 2016).
Aboriginal Canadian Entrepreneurs is very grateful for the leadership Cory provides to the students, faculty, and administrators of the ACE Program. Please follow these links if you are interested in learning more about Cory’s work with the ACE Program:
NW-ACE Learning Enhancement Officer Cory Stephens
Northern View “NW-ACE program earns prestigious honours”
CBC North by Northwest “big awards for ACE program”
Northwest Innovation Challenge Winner: Project Hlaana
Gustavson School of Business “Honoured by the Invitation” by Moira Dann
Alan Blizzard Award Presentation – NW-ACE
Journeys with Kiefer Collison – Interview with Cory Stephens
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Give CSME More Credit, Says CARICOM Secretary General
Caribbean360 July 4, 2017
CARICOM Secretary General Irwin LaRocque
ST GEORGE’S, Grenada, Tuesday July 4, 2017 – The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Single Market and Economy (CSME) is not getting the credit it deserves for all it achieves, according to the 15-member grouping’s top public servant.
CARICOM Secretary General Irwin LaRocque yesterday admitted that the CSME was seen by many as a waste of time, but said this was simply because the people of the region did not know enough about the achievements.
“There are always a few things I can say that we can do better, but I think we are doing not too badly . . . . So we have to do a better job at communication, basically, both from the standpoint of the Secretariat as well as the member states. I regret that people see it as a waste of time. I don’t think it is. Absolutely not,” LaRoque told a news conference in Grenada to announce the agenda for the CARICOM Heads of Government summit which officially starts this evening.
“It is constant communication to the people of the region in terms of what we are doing, what we are achieving and how we are going forward. Sometimes we take for granted what it is that we are doing,” he added.
CARICOM is yet to achieve the second phase of the integration process, which includes harmonized economic policy.
However, LaRocque said at the last summit, the leaders had taken stock of the CSME, and a roadmap was being prepared to help countries that were “lagging behind in certain areas”.
“We are in discussion with them on time frames that need to be adhered to. That does not mean that the rights and obligations that member states have by virtue of the Treaty of Chaguaramas, or by decisions taken, [are] negated,” he said.
The Secretary General said the Georgetown, Guyana-headquartered Secretariat and the member countries have an obligation to inform the general public “what is going on and how they are benefiting from it in terms of functional corporation in a vast number of areas – education, health, our advocacy in the international community”.
LaRocque announced that the leaders’ three-day summit will have a heavy emphasis on tourism, human resource development and entrepreneurship.
Other matters on the packed agenda include crime and security, border issues, health, climate adaptation, renewable energy, and Brexit. (Barbados Today)
Click here to receive news via email from Caribbean360. (View sample)
Jamaica's National Security Minister Says Fewer Guns and Ammo Getting into the Island
Court Orders Soca Star Destra to Pay for Rupturing Man's Bladder During Performance
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Councillor Darrell Flynn mourned by Mayor and Council
SYDNEY, NS - Cape Breton Regional Municipality's Mayor and Councillors are mourning the passing of their colleague and friend, Darrell Flynn. Flynn was hospitalized on June 22 with complications related to pneumonia.
Flynn, 58, was the owner of Sydney’s Swiss Chalet restaurant. A successful businessman, Flynn decided to enter municipal politics to serve his community and won a by-election in District 10 on December 6, 2014. Prior to serving as a CBRM Councillor, he served with distinction as an elected member of the Cape Breton-Victoria Regional School Board.
"Our deepest sympathies go out to Darrell’s wife Eileen, children Emily Grace and Pat, and family," said Mayor Cecil Clarke. “We are deeply saddened by this sudden and tragic loss of such a good person, in the prime of his life, giving back to his community.”
Flags at City Hall and other municipal facilities have been lowered to half-mast.
"On behalf of Council and staff at the Cape Breton Regional Municipality, I extend our heartfelt condolences to Darrell’s family and friends," said Clarke. “His experience and leadership will be missed at the council table. I am proud to have served with him.”
In May, Flynn announced he would reoffer for his District 10 council seat and was actively attending meetings and events until his hospitalization.
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Building bridges of peace and friendship at the 2018 Novi Sad General Assembly of the Conference of European Churches. Photo: Phil Tanis/CEC.
The Conference of European Churches was founded in 1959 as a peacebuilding organisation following the death and destruction of World War II. We continue to honour these earliest roots through an ongoing commitment to peacebuilding and reconciliation. Through various activities we seek to build bridges, provide an opportunity for encounter, and work for social justice.
In this context, following document was issued:
The Role of Religion in Conflict, Peacebuilding and Reconciliation – A study document of CEC Thematic Reference Group on Peacebuilding and Reconciliation, presented at the 2018 Novi Sad General Assembly.
Porvoo Communion of Churches Keys to Inter Faith Engagement
The churches in the Porvoo Communion produced Guidelines for Inter Faith Encounter at a conference in Oslo in November-December 2003. These guidelines were further developed at a major Interfaith Engagement Consultation in Gothenburg in March 2011.
CEC urges support for resolution on arms export, arms embargo
In its commitment to Europe as a whole and seeking to promote an authentic, credible and socially responsible Christian witness, CEC urges strong support for European Parliament resolutions on arms export of 17 December 2015 and on the humanitarian situation in Yemen of 25 February 2016 including arms embargo against Saudi Arabia.
CEC Commemorates 100th Anniversary of Armenian Genocide
Today, 24 April 2015, marks the 100th anniversary of the start of the Armenian genocide. Between 1915 and 1922 as many as 1.5 million Armenians were massacred and thousands more displaced from their homeland. One hundred years later, work for recognition and reparation remains.
World Council of Churches delegation visits Ukraine, CEC President included
From 17 to 20 March a World Council of Churches delegation visited Ukraine. The delegation included high-level representation from churches in the WCC fellowship, including Conference of European Churches President Rt. Rev. Christopher Hill, DD, KCVO.
Ceasefire brokered for Ukraine, CEC prays for lasting peace
The Conference of European Churches, along with many political and religious institutions across Europe, expresses its relief at the announcement of a ceasefire in Ukraine. After 16 hours of negotiations in Belarus, the political leadership of Russia and Ukraine along with France and Germany brokered a ceasefire deal that will come into effect on 15 February.
Dialogue, peace building at heart of World Interfaith Harmony Week
Just four years ago the United Nations unanimously adopted a proposal declaring the first week of February as World Interfaith Harmony Week. Since this first observation in 2011, the week has grown into a worldwide celebration of dialogue and peace building. Hundreds of local events bring together people from different religious traditions in a shared love of the good and love of neighbour.
Press Release: CEC Congratulates Nobel Peace Prize winners
The Conference of European Churches congratulates Kailash Satyarthi and Malala Yousafzai who were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize 2014 for their work on "the struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the rights of all children to education"
CEC urges member churches to encourage leaders on Syria
The Conference of European Churches is urging its church leaders to pray, and to encourage their political representatives to do all they can to try to secure peace in Syria at the upcoming United Nations-lead Geneva 2 talks.
CEC urges its churches to pray for Ukraine
As Christians from both Western and Eastern traditions prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus, this period has traditionally been one in which special efforts are made to attain peace and reconciliation in areas where there are conflicts.
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2008 Artists to Watch
Photo by Cover design by Melissa Webster
By JFP Staff Wednesday, June 11, 2008 5:48 p.m. CDT
Music is constantly evolving, and so is the southern landscape that produces so many young new artists. Every year, the summer brings with it not only sweltering heat, but also the opportunity to get out and enjoy some good music.
With this year's Music Issue, which coincides with Jackson's own music festival, Jubilee!JAM, we sought to capture that sense of discovery by highlighting eight local artists who are busy making their mark on Jackson's music scene. They produce music that ranges from southern punk, to old-school country, to experimental rap, and they represent the future of the city's artistic movement.
In addition to these "Artists To Watch" is an interview with Juicy J of Oscar-winning Memphis rap group Three 6 Mafia, a look at hometown hero Claire Holley's new album, a guide to starting your vinyl collection and lots more. Use the issue as an intro to Jubilee!JAM, and as a starting place for getting out into the city and discovering some new musical heat.
Dark Knights of Camelot
by Lauren Beattie
Dark Knights of Camelot started as a side project for Ben Shea, the lead guitarist of Hattiesburg band Stale Fashion.
In the past two years, Stale Fashion has gone on hiatus, and Dark Knights has grown into a six-member band with its own devoted local following. Their sound is a laid-back rock, sort of a folksy alternative largely led by Shea's low, clear voice. You can best hear this in "Brazil," a slow song that still packs a punch with the hard guitar riffs.
Shea started Dark Knights because he "wanted to be adamant about something." He started his love affair with music at an early age with piano and started playing guitar when he was 13. Shea cobbled the band's members together from the Hattiesburg pool of musicians he had "dreamed of playing with." The line-up is finished off with Brad Newton, Harry Crump, Ttoccs Rekarp, Sam Adcock and David Stark.
One element of his former band Shea brought to the Dark Knights is his flier design, which he draws by hand. One of them includes a human head on a snake's body wrapping itself through a guitar, and another shows a praying mantis against a red sun. Check out their sound at myspace.com/darknightsofcamelot.
5th Child
by David Dennis, Jr.
Mainstream music has been pretty bad lately. Sure, songs are just as catchy, and the beats have as much bump as ever, but something is missing. Hip-hop needs a heavy dose of captivating and thought-provoking lyrics. 5th Child provides amazing lyricism over down-south, soul-influenced production, making listeners simultaneously look to the sky in deep meditation while doing the "this is hot" head bob.
His first two albums were innovative gems that will one day be considered underground classics.
On one of his newer songs, "Humble," 5th proclaims: "I'm tired of being modest, I gotta start being honest / I'm a problem baby." The most endearing quality about this MC's artistry is his cerebral approach to each line he spits. 5th Child embraces a concept and makes sure that each word furthers the story he is trying to tell. Listening to his music is listening to poetry on wax.
5th Child is hard at work on his third album, "Behind The Music," which is sure to hit your ears pretty soon. He is also touring all summer, so visit his MySpace page (myspace.com/5thchildmusic) to find out where to see his high-energy show.
by Jeri Lynn Ostrander
Learning piano from her grandfather as a young child, Caroline Crawford has been around music her whole life. Surprisingly, though, Crawford was tone deaf until she was older, so her parents tried to discourage her from pursuing a musical career.
"I eventually developed the physical strength to carry my voice, and I learned by just playing the piano and listening," she says.
Crawford's musically eclectic taste is evident in her influences, which include everything from Middle Eastern belly dance music, to David Bowie and Tchaikovsky. Her music goes through stages, waxing and waning with her creative bursts, but her sound would definitely be classified as rock.
"At the piano is the only time I feel completely honest and real," says Crawford, the former fashion stylist for the Jackson Free Press. "Worthwhile music comes from inside, and if you don't like what you're playing it's not going to work."
In addition to the piano, Crawford plays guitar, sings, and writes all her music and poetic lyrics. She also enjoys a strong female fanbase. "Women understand the gray areas of life and not just the black and white," she says. "Men can relate, but women really get it. I write more about the gray areas."
Visit myspace.com/carolinespiano to hear Caroline Crawford's sound and check out her tour schedule.
7even:Thirty
Usually when people do these "Artists to Watch" type things, they introduce an artist and try to tell the reader who the artist sounds like, to give a feel of familiarity to the newcomer. Well, that just isn't going happen here because it's simply impossible to compare 7even:Thirty to another musical entity.
Just take a listen to his debut album "Star: The 7even:Thirty Experience." The album lives up to its name as it is definitely an experience to relish. Each track moves seamlessly, creating the feeling that the album is more a journey from beginning to end than a collection of standalone tracks. One minute, 7even is destroying a track with stellar lyrical dexterity, mixing metaphors about interstellar travel and everyday life. Then, suddenly, he breaks into crooning about a bevy of intergalactic concepts. A standout track from the album is "1 Point 21 Jiggawatts," on which the MC describes his space-traveling vehicle as a futuristic machine through which the passenger can get a glimpse how far ahead of the competition 7even:Thirty really is.
You can buy the album on iTunes or visit 7even:Thirty's MySpace page at myspace.com/7eventhirtysounds.
Cool Papa Bell
by Andi Agnew
James "Cool Papa" Bell, a Starkville native, was known as the "fastest man in the league" in the early days of pro baseball. He has a street in St. Louis named after him, and of course, Cool Papa Bell Drive, the street here in Jackson leading to Smith-Wills Stadium and the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame. But I wonder if Cool Papa ever thought that a funky, blues-rock band would be named after him, too?
William Gates, Paul Bresnahan, Robby Peoples and Chris Wheeler make up Cool Papa Bell. The group may be new on the scene, but the music tells you that these guys have been at this for a while. A mix of funky grooves, blues lyrics and sloppy New Orleans beats, Cool Papa Bell's sound stands out from the crowd of indie-rock bands that have cropped up in Jackson over the last few years. Peoples' growling vocals and soulful harmonica are authentic and a perfect fit for gritty tunes like "I Been Down" and "Gypsy Blues." Fans of Galactic and North Mississippi All-Stars will find that Cool Papa Bell's sound tucks in nicely between the two.
The group has just put the finishing touches on their debut album. They have not determined a release date, but you can catch Cool Papa Bell at Martin's Restaurant and Lounge on June 28.
DJ Brayks
by Vince Falconi
DJ Brayks, or Ken Bray when he's not working, does not care if you want to hear Soulja Boy or the new Britney Spears. It isn't that he thinks those songs are boring, but it's his job to "take stuff you know and try to make it new."
A native of San Diego, Brayks, 32, got his start as a deejay at his sister's birthday party 15 years ago, mixing and mashing songs on a dual deck stereo and using cassette tapes to layer songs over each other. Since then, he has upgraded to laptops and digital turntables, and his audiences have increased to international proportions.
When he relocated to Jackson in late November 2007 with his then-girlfriend, Brayks was confused by friends' sympathetic response to news of his moving here. Once in town, Brayks says, he found a city with a vibrant arts community.
"I'd like to be considered an artist. We're all artists; we paint our days," he says. While his art is more aural than visual (though he mixes and mashes videos, too), his craft is just as nuanced, taking seemingly dissonant tracks and sounds and making it nearly impossible to keep from at least bouncing your shoulders in time.
In addition to spinning Thursday through Saturday at Club Fire, with other gigs sprinkled in his schedule, Brayks works as a producer and has started a few projects, including Plan B (a band/production group) and a new downtown club opening soon.
While he makes sure to keep a lot of details under wraps, he's open about the fact that he wants to see people's perspective on nightlife change. When people pay to get into a club, Brayks says, "(they're) paying for entertainment." He sees the goal of going out as being able "to have fun with your friends, and maybe make some new ones."
When you hear music by Nine Inch Nails mashed up with 50 Cent, or his own original music, as long as you let go of your assumptions about dance music and trust that Brayks knows how to make you move, you're sure to leave satisfied. Groove to DJ Brayks at Club Fire or online at myspace.com/djbrayks.
Deltagun
The members of Deltagun identify themselves as southern-punk rockers and, fittingly, their sound is raw and approachable. Formerly called Slang, the band has been constantly changing its line-up almost since it formed in 2007; even now, they're looking for a new lead singer so that their current one can focus on guitar-playing. However, that hasn't stopped them from gathering a following. Their accessibility stems from the fact that most of their songs broach no subjects that have not affected themselves or their average listener.
Casey, the drummer, describes their music as "down, straight to the bone rock 'n' roll. No glamoursouthern!" Their punk edge is most clear in the song, "Oh Yeah," which incorporates the requisite fast punk beat and high energy. Their newer songs, however, such as "Ms Behave," seem to be moving more and more toward the southern aspect of their sound, yielding a slow-and-steady sound.
This summer, the band is embarking on a 15-state tour, including Louisiana, South Carolina and Pennsylvania. Currently, they have a four-song demo available on their Web site, but they are working on their new album, "The Legend of Billy Rhodes." Listen to their music at myspace.com/slangtheband.
SweetWater Jade
As little girls singing in the school play eight years ago, Kelsey Carroll, Jeanna Upchurch and Whitney Hennigan had no idea they would one day be honored as Mississippi's future Grammy contenders. SweetWater Jade performed at local competitions and fairs until a couple of years ago when they realized big changes were happening. People began calling them for gigs instead of the other way around.
Upchurch, of Madison, first realized the "wow factor" when the group opened for country music star Taylor Swift in May. "I look up to Taylor and Lady Antebellum
and there they were watching me sing on stage!" she says.
This upbeat country-rock trio has opened for the Beach Boys, Sammy Kershaw and Dierks Bentley and performed with Mississippi natives Jerry Lee Lewis and Marty Stuart. Most recently, SWJ performed at the CMA Music Festival in Nashville.
"We aren't in this for the fame. We are in it for the music," Carroll says. "I just want one day to have someone sing one of our songs, and if someone came up to me and told me that I helped them through a hard time with one of our songs that would be my dream."
SWJ is not willing to accept success at just any cost. Hennigan, of Brandon, explains: "We've established who we are, and we are staying true to ourselves. We are doing what we love and we want people to like us just the way we are."
These "down home Mississippi green-eyed girls" won't need to change a thingfans do love them just the way they are. Listen to SWJ's debut album at myspace.com/sweetwaterjade or go to sweetwaterjade.com to see their tour schedule.
Coffee Toss
The 2008 Jackson Young Influentials
Best Of 2009: Urban Living
Summer Fun Fashion
Honor our Veterans: Make fun of Hippies
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Smallest State is Big Battleground on Gay Marriage
By The Associated Press Tuesday, January 15, 2013 10:40 a.m. CST
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — Supporters of same-sex marriage rights plan to assemble at the Rhode Island Statehouse to urge lawmakers to make the smallest state the 10th to allow gay and lesbian couples to wed—and the last to do so in New England.
House Speaker Gordon Fox has called a vote on gay marriage legislation in his chamber by month's end, making Rhode Island the latest state to address an issue whose supporters see things swinging their way after last November's election.
The House Judiciary Committee is set to hear testimony from supporters and opponents on Tuesday. If earlier hearings are any indication, it's likely to be a long, contentious day filled with protest signs, tears and sometimes bitter arguments over one of our culture's most basic institutions.
Sylvia DeLuca, of North Kingstown, tears up when she talks about how her daughter Louisa had to travel to Massachusetts to get married when her two brothers were allowed to do so wherever they wanted.
"They're being regarded as inferior human beings," said DeLuca, 71, who plans to travel to the Statehouse for Tuesday's public hearing with her husband of 52 years, Anthony DeLuca. "She is as perfect a human being as her brothers are."
Christopher Plante, director of the state chapter of the National Organization for Marriage, said he believes most Rhode Islanders remain opposed to gay marriage. But he acknowledged that the debate has taken on "a higher pitch" this year.
He said he expects as many as 500 opponents will show up at the hearing.
"I don't think we're fighting a losing battle," he said after Gov. Lincoln Chafee and top labor unions announced a new coalition in favor of gay marriage. "What you see is the elites and people who are using their positions for their personal opinions, but they don't represent the voices of Rhode Islanders."
Supporters hope the measure will pass the House, led by Fox, an openly gay Democrat, but concede the state Senate is more challenging. Senate President Teresa Paiva Weed is a gay marriage opponent but has said she will allow a committee vote on the legislation should it pass the House.
Supporters are hoping to build on national momentum after voters in Maine, Maryland and Washington passed gay marriage ballot questions last fall. Meanwhile, in Minnesota, voters rejected a proposed state constitutional amendment that would have prohibited gay marriage, the first time such a ballot question has failed in the United States.
Lawmakers in Illinois are also expected to consider gay marriage this year.
Rhode Island is the only state in New England without gay marriage. Depending on whom you ask, that's either an embarrassing distinction or a welcome defense against the spread of gay marriage.
Chafee, an independent, likes to conjure the memory of Rhode Island founder Roger Williams when discussing gay marriage. Williams founded Rhode Island as a beacon of religious tolerance and was known for his friendship with native Americans.
Chafee said all couples — straight or otherwise — should be afforded the same rights to wed and urged lawmakers to "call the roll" and vote this year to join the rest of New England.
"It is time to honor and affirm that legacy," Chafee said Monday. "Call the roll for Roger Williams. Call the roll for history and I'll be happy to sign it."
State lawmakers have passed civil unions for gay couples, and Chafee signed an executive order recognizing gay marriages performed in other states. But supporters say they're confident 2013 is the year the state takes the next step.
Religious leaders have lined up on both sides. Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin of the Providence diocese remains a vocal opponent, last week calling gay marriage "immoral and unnecessary." He's urged lawmakers to instead put gay marriage on the ballot as a referendum.
Leaders of other religious groups, however, have taken up the gay marriage banner.
"Christ welcomed all to his table," said the Rev. Gene Dyszlewski, chairman of the Rhode Island Religious Coalition for Marriage Equality. "We hope to follow his example."
RI on Way to be 10th State to Allow Gay Marriage
Gay Couples Get Hitched in Minnesota, Rhode Island
Minn. Governor to Sign Bill Allowing Gay Marriage
Obama Urges Court to Overturn Gay Marriage Ban
Obama Weighs Stepping in on Gay Marriage Case
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In 1970, the Foundation was set up to be the nonprofit owner of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival – Jazz Fest – with a mission to sow the seeds of our unique culture for generations to come.
In the early days, the festival wasn’t the world-famous event that it is today – one that attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors to New Orleans and pumps $300 million a year into the local economy. No, it is often s aid that at the first Jazz Fest there were more performers onstage than people in the audience.
But the founders believed that Jazz Fest would one day grow into a major success. Everyone involved wanted to make sure that the festival’s proceeds would be redistributed into the local community.
So the Foundation, a 501©(3) nonprofit organization, was established with the following mission:
“To promote, preserve, perpetuate and encourage the music, arts, culture and heritage of communities in Louisiana through festivals, programs and other cultural, educational, civic and economic activities.”
To that end, the Foundation has developed numerous programs and assets. Click here to learn more about them, and here to contribute to the Foundation’s efforts.
The Jazz & Heritage Foundation has a dedicated, full-time staff to carry out the work of the organization. The staff is overseen by a large and diverse Board of Directors and Advisory Council, whose members represent the many communities and cultures to be found in our city.
Photo by J.R. Thomason
Kathleen Turner, President
Kathleen Turner has more than 20 years of experience as a General Manager of performing arts centers and touring Broadway productions, along with convention centers and arenas throughout the United States. A graduate of Emerson College in Boston, MA, she is an expert in operations management, with a long track record of reducing deficits, increasing revenues and implementing marketing plans. She has programmed numerous series of Broadway plays, concerts, trade shows, sports and community events. As General Manager of the Pontchartrain Convention and Civic Center, she oversaw the completion of a $7 million restoration. She is currently the Executive Director of the French Market Corporation, a self-sustaining public benefits entity overseeing some of the City of New Orleans most historical properties and assets in the French Quarter. In addition to the board membership of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival and Foundation, Ms. Turner has served on several boards, is a member of the Association of Theatrical Press Agents and Managers (ATPAM), a sculptor and studies at New Orleans academy of Fine Arts, and an avid Motorcyclist.
Jeffrey Goldring, First Vice President
Jeffrey Goldring is a Director of the Sazerac Company, America's largest distiller of alcoholic beverages, which owns and manufactures nearly 200 brands of spirits sold throughout the United States and abroad. He is also a Director of Crescent Crown Distributing, the nation's second-largest beer wholesaler. Jeffrey is the fourth generation to lead the family business, which was started by his great-grandfather, Newman Goldring, in Pensacola, FL, in 1898. A New Orleans native, Jeffrey holds a B.S. in business administration from Tulane University and is a graduate of Isidore Newman High School. In keeping with his family's longstanding leading role in the civic and philanthropic life of New Orleans, Jeffrey serves the boards of many local nonprofits. In addition to those of the Goldring Family Foundation, the Woldenburg Family Foundation and the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation, Jeffrey also is on the boards of the Tipitina's Foundation, the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra, the New Orleans Jewish Federation, Temple Sinai, the Anti-Defamation League and KIPP Charter Schools. Jeffrey is married and has one child.
David Francis, Second Vice President
New Orleans native David Francis is the executive vice president and associate publisher of NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune. He has worked for NOLA Media Group and its predecessor, The Times-Picayune, for more than 18 years. During his tenure, the paper has won four Pulitzer Prizes, the first in its 176-year history, and most recently NMG has received national recognition for “Louisiana Purchased” the joint investigation by NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune and New Orleans Fox network affiliate WVUE into the state's campaign finance practices. The investigation won a national Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio Television Digital News Association, the national Peabody and Headliner Awards, as well as three regional Murrow Awards. Prior to joining The Times-Picayune, Francis served as a business planner with the Pepsi Cola Company, based in Denver, CO, where he developed strategic and annual operating plans. Before that he was the region's manager of financial operations and services, responsible for the Rocky Mountain area's accounting and auditing departments. Francis came to Pepsi from Deloitte & Touche, where he worked as an audit manager. He earned his undergraduate and master's degrees in business administration at Tulane University and is a Certified Public Accountant (Inactive status). In addition to the board membership of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival and Foundation, he is secretary of The Times-Picayune Doll and Toy Fund Board and is a member of the New Orleans Museum of Arts Director’s Council. He is a former president of the Louisiana Press Association, Louisiana Daily Newspaper Publishers Association and Children's Bureau of New Orleans. He has served on the boards of the Louis Armstrong Jazz Camp, New Orleans Chamber of Commerce, the Greater New Orleans Foundation and Board of Advisory for Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of New Orleans.
Tara Carter Hernandez, Secretary
Tara is President of JCH Development, an urban real estate development company that converts underutilized real estate into “cool”, creative spaces. She has developed residential, multi-family, and commercial projects throughout Louisiana, and in Mississippi and Missouri. She is also actively involved in the local entrepreneurial start up community. Ms. Hernandez is a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge MA with a Master of Science Degree in Real Estate Development and a graduate of Loyola University New Orleans with a degree in Finance. She has served on international and local boards and is currently very active in the local community and serves as Chair-Elect of Greater New Orleans, Inc. (GNO,Inc.), a Board member of the Idea Village, as well as a Commissioner of the PORT of New Orleans.
Rachel F. Cousin, Treasurer
Rachel Ferrouillet Cousin retired from the U.S. Postal Service in 2013 after 35 years of employment. Of her 35 years, she spent 32 years in various management positions, with 27 years in the Sales and Marketing arenas. Since retiring, she fills her time traveling, spending time with her family and community volunteering. She presently serves on the boards of the Boy Scouts Diversity Gala, Eldercare Services and the Divorce Resource Center. She has worked with the Jazz & Heritage Foundation since 2011. A New Orleans native, Rachel attended St. Joseph Academy and Dominican College. She is married to Alan Cousin, with whom she shares four children and two grandchildren.
Jay H. Banks
Gerald Billes
Cecil “C.J.” Blache
Skipper Bond
Mickey Caplinger
Sidney H. Cates IV
Richard F. Cortizas
Douglas Hammel
Deborah D. Harkins
Barbara Herman
Tara Carter Hernandez, Treasurer
Clifford V. Johnson
David A. Kerstein
Ellen M. Lee
Ronald P. McClain
Julie Wise Oreck
J.R. Pegues
Howard L. Rodgers III
Katy Roubion
Leonard Smith III
Karen B. Solomon
Parker Sternbergh
David Torkanowsky
Advisory Council:
Candice Bates Anderson
Mark Boucree
Abhi Bhansali
Maple Gaines
N. Sundiata Haley
Courtney Slatten Katzenstein
Barbara Lacen Keller
Brittany Major
Tulio Murillo
Greg Rattler
Charles Rice Jr.
Caryn Rodgers-Battiste
Past Presidents Senate:
Michael G. Bagneris
Johann Bultman
Don T. Erwin
Sarah Allen Freeman
Marion Greenup
Nancy Marinovic
Demetric M. Mercadel
David W. Oestreicher II
Arthur Pulitzer
D. Joan Rhodes
William “Bill” Rouselle
Anthony “Tony” Ruda
Donna Santiago
Joel Sellers
Ronald J. Sholes
Dan Williams
Roxy Wright
Honor Council:
Dorian Bennett
Sid Bhansali
James B. Borders IV
Michael J. Gourrier
Beverly Guillory-Andry
Nadir Hasan
Henry Lacey
Gabou Mendy
Allison H. Peña
Rafael Perales
Penny Randolph-Biagas
Suzette Toledano
Steve Tujague
Don Marshall, Executive Director
Sarita Carriere, Director of Finance and Human Resources
Kia Robinson, Programs, Marketing & Communications Coordinator
Rachel Lyons, Archivist
Dolores Hooper, Associate Archivist
Jarrod Remetich, Senior Accounting Clerk
Jason Doyle, Production Manager
Khalid Hafiz, Assistant Production/Facility Manager
Shanna E. Hudson-Stowe, Development Associate
1205 N. Rampart Street, New Orleans, Louisiana 70116
Phone: (504) 558-6100 • Fax:
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EWMC Celebrates 40th Anniversary in Kansas City
Retired International Representative Mary Whipps O’Brien is one of two surviving EWMC founders.
As Kansas City and Local 124 host the 24th annual leadership conference of the Electrical Workers Minority Caucus on Jan. 16, members will reflect upon the legacy of one of the longest-standing minority caucuses in the labor movement formed 40 years ago in the same city during the 30th IBEW Convention.
Retired International Representative Mary Whipps O’Brien—one of two EWMC founders still living—recalled the hardships of African-American workers in the IBEW in a video that will be shown at the conference.
O’Brien, who was featured in an April 2012 Electrical Worker story on the fight to defend voting rights, recounted her history as a labor and civil rights activist in her native Mississippi where she took part in organizing the Presto manufacturing plant in Canton.
“Don’t get discouraged and don’t give up,” O’Brien advises young IBEW members who want to play a more active role in the union. “If you have the audacity to speak up and you show that you can do a job as well as anyone else, you can succeed. It may not be easy, but you can do it.”
As part of the EWMC conference, members will donate their labor in a day of service to the surrounding community.
Since last year’s conference in Houston, the EWMC has been busy on several different fronts.
The organization’s newsletter, The Communicator, reports that officers participated in presentations at progress meetings.
National Secretary Grace Smith and Executive Board Member Eppie Martinez encouraged members to build a more inclusive IBEW and labor movement, at the Eighth District Progress Meeting in Teton Village, Wyo. Smith provided an overview of EWMC workshops on building organizing skills, public speaking, coalition building and political action.
EWMC President and Local 595 Business Manager Victor Uno, Vice President Cheryl Thomas and executive board member Fred Narnjo carried the EWMC’s message to the Tenth District Progress Meeting in Little Rock, Ark.
In July, EWMC national officers met with International President Hill, International Secretary-Treasurer Sam Chilia, Executive Assistant to the International President Sherilyn Wright and Director of the Department of Civic and Community Engagement Carolyn Williams to discuss the caucus’s work in the union and in communities, describing challenges minority members are experiencing.
EWMC members also participated in events commemorating the 50th anniversary of the 1963 march on Washington in August.
Members of EWMC Youth, a caucus within the wider organization, have played a leading role in IBEW’s young worker effort, RENEW (Reach out and Energize Next-gen Electrical Workers), which held a conference in September in Washington.
International President Edwin D. Hill says, “On the occasion of the EWMC’s historic conference, I convey the deep gratitude of our officers, staff and members for everything the caucus has done and continues to do to build a more diverse, inclusive and stronger IBEW.”
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Home Business & Economy Economy
Egypt sees ‘steep rebound’ in tourists as industry recovers
in Economy, Hospitality
The number of tourists to Egypt soared 40 percent in the first nine months of 2018 from a year earlier, recovering from a slump that began with the Arab Spring and continued as unrest persisted, the tourism minister said.
“We expect that by the end of 2018 we will not be at the levels that we’ve seen in 2010, but we are approaching that,” Rania al-Mashat told Bloomberg TV. “The rebound is quite steep and we’re trying to put the industry on a competitive base compared to our peers.”
The government plans to announce a new private equity fund to upgrade its hotels and new investment opportunities on islands in the Red Sea, she said. Tourism is critical to Egypt’s economy, accounting for 20 percent of output, according to Mashat. The annual number of visitors began plummeting from a 2010 peak of more than 14 million following the popular uprising that deposed Hosni Mubarak the following year.
Some 8 million tourists visited Egypt last year. “The government is trying to diversify tourist base, targeting travelers from Asia and Latin America The $1 billion Grand Egyptian Museum, with more than 10,000 artifacts, will open in 2020,” Mashat said.
Increased cooperation between Iraq and Qatar
Bank Audi, EBRD bring $200mn for green projects
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Interview: Erik Loyer
David August 2, 2010 August 15, 2014 Interview, Past
Back in 1998, when I first saw The Lair of the Marrow Monkey I was totally taken in. In an era of CD-ROMs which sequenced the user through mostly static screens, or of experimental works with seemingly random or chaotic interactions, Lair‘s merger of storytelling with focused interactivity was really special.
And then, three years later, along came Chroma (2001), which took those ideas and advanced them to new heights. The work connected the interactive experience to the unfolding narrative with a simultaneous tightness and fluidity that was remarkable.
Sadly, because they require Shockwave, the pieces are on the verge of extinction. But they’re still online if your browser supports it. If not, then there is a full set of videos showing them being used. Definitely worth checking-out!
These two beautiful pieces were created by Erik Loyer. And as I’ve been posting lately about how to incorporate interactivity into linear experiences, this seemed like an ideal time to ask him about his work. Here then is our Q&A…
Q: What was your inspiration in creating Lair? Was it an independent work?
The Lair of the Marrow Monkey had two main inspirations: a piece called Ding an Sich by Piotr Szyhalski, and experimental work done by the designer Michael Worthington at CalArts. I was working at the alternative CD-ROM games company Inscape at the time, and our art director had both Szyhalski and Worthington visit our offices to show their work. As we had been spending our days at Inscape creating these sprawling, multi-year CD-ROM projects, I was struck by, and very much attracted to, the small scale of the pieces these two designers were creating, attuned as they were to the very limited world wide web of the mid-90s. These were works one could imagine developing over the space of a few weeks or even days, and yet through strategic use of dynamic animation, sound, and simple interactivity their experiential impact was much greater than most of us had been conditioned to expect by the rhetoric of the CD-ROM age, in which bigger was always better. When Inscape collapsed in 1997, I started working on my own website in my suddenly abundant spare time, and in about two weeks put together the piece that later became the “Mnemonic Membrane” chapter of Lair.
Q: Can you talk a little about the story – and the process of authoring Lair. Did you develop the story first, or simultaneously with the programming and interactivity?
The story for Lair was assembled from various fragments—poems and other short pieces I had been writing over several years, exploring what “being digital” meant at a time when the cultural impact of computers on everyday life was expanding rapidly. For my first website, the immediate precursor to Lair, I had developed this conceit of a fictional research institute where intrepid explorers were mapping the contours of a recently discovered “natural cyberspace” called “mnemonos,” and then sharing their discoveries through interactive journal entries posted online. The story was a pretext that not only allowed me to bring together these disparate fragments and give them a reason for being in one place, but also enabled me to construct a larger story arc that put those fragments in a narrative context. I wanted to tell the story of someone who fell in love with the unique joys and capabilities digital technology, faced its obsessive underbelly, and came out of the experience still in love, but no longer blindly so. That arc was implicit in the sequencing of the pre-existing poems and monologues I selected for the site, and then I wrote some new material to help bridge certain gaps as the piece was being created.
The Lair of the Marrow Monkey
Q: The piece unfolds with what feel like a series of interactive puzzles — or are they more like interactive toys that accompany the story? What were you hoping to achieve with them?
Each “chapter” of Lair is meant to function as a window into its authoring character’s subjectivity. Some chapters take the form of letters which the user reads in a special interface; others are more elaborate interactive pieces. I was very much smitten with the operas of John Adams, and really wanted to structure the work as a series of arias, moments in which time stops and a character unburdens themselves about what they’re thinking and feeling. That impulse also informed the titling of each chapter using the initial words of the character’s monologue, as you often see with operas. I was also very keen to avoid representational imagery in the work; I wanted to prove something about the potential of interactive media by portraying the thoughts of a character purely through dynamic abstract graphics and typography.
Q: What do you think is the piece’s most interesting aspect?
For me, Chapter 6 (the “Mnemonic Membrane”) is the most successful. In that chapter I think I figured out the correct balance between giving the user a satisfying degree of autonomy within a predefined text, while still letting that text shape the overall experience. The source text for that chapter was a 33 stanza poem I had been attempting to adapt to interactive media in various ways for five years (by that time). In a way, that poem was my school for learning how to design for the medium. By the time I produced “Mnemonic Membrane,” I had more or less exhausted what I knew how to do with the poem in an interactive format, but decided to give it one more go, this time with a radically different approach. All my past attempts had centered around revealing the poem as I had originally written it. Having gotten that impulse out of my system, I was now free to let users “remix” the poem as they saw fit using the interface that turned the poem’s themes into sources of vibration in a digital surface, which would respond by emitting related text from the poem in semi-random sequence. Each theme had a signature style of vibration, and by combining them the user could “feel” their way through the themes of the poem in completely non-linear, and yet satisfying ways. The nature of the interaction enabled users to actively engage the work by hypothesizing about what might happen if certain themes were combined, while still constraining the overall interaction within the content of the poem.
Q: What was the design and production process like?
Lair was actually a refinement of concepts from my very first site, which was called Institute for Investigation into the Mind of Marrow, and for which “Mnemonic Membrane” was originally developed during the summer of 1997. The form and text of Lair really started to take shape in December of that year, energized by an early 1998 submission deadline for the L.A. Freewaves festival (The Freewaves festival in 1996 had been my very first public exhibition). I did all the design, music and programming for the site myself on evenings and weekends. The biggest technical challenges involved the synchronization of animation and music in Chapter 5 and Chapter 9, techniques which ended up being much more fully developed in my next project, Chroma.
Q: Great segue! So… after Lair, you launched Chroma. How did that project come about?
Chroma is a serialized sequel to Lair that follows the characters as they continue to explore this “natural cyberspace” they’ve discovered, delving into issues of race and ethnicity in digital space. The ideas for both Lair and Chroma evolved during roughly the same period of time in the mid 90s, but I didn’t initially think of them as related projects. In fact, Chroma was originally a pitch for a CD-ROM adventure game with a completely different premise and story (though still dealing with issues of race), and was a project I unsuccessfully tried to get produced while I was working at Inscape. After the success of Lair, I had the opportunity to apply for a Rockefeller Film/Video/Multimedia Fellowship, and adapted the themes of Chroma to fit the world and characters of Lair. I was fortunate enough to receive the fellowship, and then the project began in earnest.
Q: The integration between the story and the interaction was so much tighter, fluidly evolving in-sync to the narrative. How did you develop that idea?
By the end of the production of Lair I had become very interested in an approach I called “interactive music video” — a very tightly synchronized combination of interactive motion graphics, music, and narration. Music has always been integral to my artistic practice. I’m constantly making analogies between other forms of creativity and musical composition, and always striving for musical qualities in my work. I think the fact that music is fundamentally abstract and can be enjoyed on both visceral and cerebral levels simultaneously is a big part of its appeal for me. With Chroma I felt I really wanted musical dynamics to drive the experience. Even though in some ways this resulted in less interactivity than was present in chapters of Lair, it was important to me to take this approach as far as I could.
Q: And the project’s design and production process?
The Rockefeller funding enabled me to take a more expansive approach to the design and production of Chroma than I could with Lair. I wrote the script and hired a casting director named Patrick Baca to help me secure professional voice talent, and I enlisted two colleagues of mine from Razorfish as well: Anita Lozinska as art director, and Eric Campdoras on the programming side. Overall, it was a fantastic experience and process. I did a lot of pre-production, developing interaction concepts and musical ideas for each chapter, creating an animation engine to drive the work, and refining the script. Once the voice-over recording was completed the production really took off, with Anita, Eric and I having regular meetings to develop the overall look and feel as well as specific technical implementations for the various chapters. The main development work unfolded over about two years, after which time I realized I had bitten off much more than I could chew and had to stop the project after completing about a third of the story.
Q: After these pieces, what came next? And what are you up to now? Are there threads of continuity you try to have with your work?
After Chroma, I completed a number of commissioned art projects before being hired as Co-Creative Director of the experimental online-only academic journal Vectors. Vectors has been and continues to be a wonderful interactive design playground in which I’ve been fortunate enough to collaborate with a range of brilliant scholars, artists and activists on some great projects. My work with the Vectors team today centers around helping to develop publishing tools for media studies scholars that will enable them to write born-digital scholarship which relies heavily on dynamic media, using rhetorical structures that are impossible to achieve in print. Continuing the musical theme that’s always been a part of my work, I see this practice as a kind of digital instrument-making.
In my personal work, I’ve become increasingly interested in adapting the visual language of comics to interactive media, combining illustration with explorations in interactive music and touch- and gesture-based interfaces to create hybrid storytelling experiences. Even though the forms of these new projects are much different than those of Lair or Chroma, for me they are the direct descendants of those experiments with narrative, music, and interactivity, with touch control having removed some of the limitations that were inherent to those pieces. My most recent work in this vein is an iPhone app called Ruben & Lullaby, and I’m currently developing a new project for the iPad.
Q: Thanks so much for your time.
Chroma, Erik Loyer, extinct, interview, Lair of the Marrow Monkey
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Website: www.seanwebsterband.com
It all started when….
… a 14 year old boy was introduced to guitar based music by a school friend. Sean became instantly hooked on the instrument and began researching as many influences as he could. All the blues greats; the Kings (Albert, BB and Freddie), Collins, Cray, alongside Moore, Knopfler, Lang and of course the reason Sean says he plays guitar…. Eric Clapton. Music from that point became Sean’s main focus in life. He would cycle 20 kms to watch friends rehearse in a band, which after some time he became the singer of: Journeymen. Years later and through various incarnations, The Sean Webster band was formed. This itself has had a few line-up changes over the years, but Sean believes change can only be a good thing in the end: “I’m not the greatest fan of change at the beginning because I like things to run smooth, but it also forces you to learn, evaluate and ultimately re-shape what you already have. Keeping it fresh!”
Sean has toured many countries such as The Netherlands, France, Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, The United Kingdom, Finland, Poland and The U.S.A. playing festivals and venues throughout.
He has also appeared on national FOX TV in Austin Texas, recorded live sessions for BBC radio 2 and appeared for interviews on many regional radio and TV shows.
Sean has released 5 albums and 1 EP. His 6th and latest album entitled Leave your heart at the door has Sean going back to being the only guitarist on the album, something which hasn’t happened since his first. At the risk of sounding like a cliche, the album REALLY does have something for everyone. It has blues, ballads and mainstream offerings which Sean hopes will keep his fans interested.
Recorded at the legendary Superfly Studios in Nottinghamshire, Sean felt it was like going home. “I recorded my second album If Only at Superfly back in 2005 and the Engineer and now owner Andy is simply fantastic. It is such a comfortable place to be in that I felt confident in taking the helm of Producer, part mixer, arranger, and 100% writer for this album, apart from the last track which was written by the great Keith Urban.”
Having recorded the majority of the album in just 4 days, the results are outstanding. After completing the mixing, the album was sent to Jon Astley at “Close to the edge” for mastering. Jon has mastered albums for just about everyone including The Who, Charlie Watts, Abba, George Harrison, Tori Amos, Eric Clapton, The Rolling Stones, Jools Holland, Tom Jones, Emmylou Harris, Damien Dempsey, Tears for Fears, Led Zeppelin, Level 42, The Boomtown Rats, John Mayall, Toto, Norah Jones, Stereophonics, KT Tunstall, Van Morrison, Paul McCartney, Peter Gabriel, Slade, Sting, Porcupine Tree, Bono and The Lancashire Hotpots!
Jon said of the album “I had such a lovely day with this album, thank you for a great record, a breath of fresh air!!!”
Having secured distribution with Cadiz Music in the UK and promotional duties from Hans Broere Promotions this album is set to take Sean on a new adventure.
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Waikato Pistons - Pistons Since 2000
Pistons Since 2000
In 2000 the Pistons were called the Warriors. This changed the next year to the Titans then again in 2007 to the Pistons to account for the fact that Hamilton was hosting the V8 Supercars. In 2000 the Warriors lost in the semi-final to the Nelson Giants 105-100 with import Darryl Johnson top scoring for the Warriors with 27 points along with 19 rebounds, Phil Jones of the Giants top scored for them with 25 points. In 2001 the newly named Titans enjoyed much success winning the NBL championship for the first time under new head coach Jeff Green. Clifton Bush top scored in this game with 26 points and 11 rebounds. They beat the Wellington Saints. The same thing happened the next year, Jeff Green coached the Titans to the championship for the second year running beating the Nelson Giants 85-83. Brendon Pongia top scored in this game with 17. The next was much of the same except the Titans lost the final to Wellington 97-88 with the top scorer Pero Cameron. The next year saw a change in coaching with the Titans bringing in Tim McTamney to coach them. They finished sixth with a record of 10 wins and 8 losses. The next season was the best under McTamney with the Titans losing in the semi-final to the Nelson Giants 77-65. The top scorer was Greg Lewis with 22 points. The next year was the worst the Titans experienced finishing 9th overall with a record of 4 wins and 14 losses. The next year saw another change in coaching staff with Murray McMahon stepping into the shoes of head coach, this also saw the name change to the Pistons. This season ended with the Pistons losing the semi-final in overtime to the Nelson Giants 109-103 and the top scorer for the Pistons was Jason Crowe with 28. The next season was a fairytale season for the Pistons, once again bringing the winning feeling back to the Waikato, winning the championship over the Wellington Saints in a best of 3 series the Pistons won 2-0. The top scorers in these games were Jason Crowe with 26 in the first game and Pero Cameron with 20 in the second game. The next season saw another coaching changed after the sad death of Murray McMahon. Breakers assistant coach Dean Vickerman filled the head coach vacancy and led the Pistons to their second straight title, beating out the Nelson Giants 2-0 in a best of 3 series. Top scorers were Adam Ballinger with 22 in the first game and Justin Bailey with 32 in the second game. In 2010 the Pistons made the finals again under Dean Vickerman, they came up against a strong Wellington Saints team, unfortunately losing the series 2-1. The top scorers in the games for the Pistons were Tom Abercrombie with 32 in the first game, Rashad Tucker with 18 in the second and Tom Abercrombie in game 3 with 29.
Read more about this topic: Waikato Pistons
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Famous quotes containing the word pistons:
“Wheels shake the roadbed stone,
The pistons jerk and shove,
I stay up half the night
To see the land I love.”
—Theodore Roethke (19081963)
Terms related to waikato pistons:
Canterbury Rams
Giants Top
Jason Crowe
National Basketball League (new Zealand)
Nelson Giants
Top Scored
Wellington Saints
Seay
Wikipedia 2000 (Creative Commons)
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Lookout Alabama
Celebrating the unique culture, history and natural beauty of Alabama's Lookout Mountain region
Where to Find the Print Magazine
Lookout Mountain Area Events
Lookout Alabama Club
Order Photo Prints
Feature: Vision Vortex
[s2If is_user_logged_in()]
Click here to view this article as a PDF[/s2If]
The prolific works of one of America’s most famous folk artists consist of buildings, sculptures, paintings and more, all constructed of cast-off materials and on display in a garden that feels like another world.
by KATHRYNE MCDORMAN
One of my friend Gregg;s wry observations about life in our times – and believe me, he is full of them – is that any shed, built at a bit of distance from an otherwise tidy home, represents “some poor sucker’s dream gone bad.” When pressed about his exact meaning, he gives me a baleful glance and sighs deeply, refusing to elaborate.
After years of pondering this, I think I know what he means when I consider the sheds I have seen…filled with old exercise equipment, rusting tools, art supplies and, in Gregg’s case, scraps of wood and leather he dreams of shaping into furniture or flooring or picture frames. Gregg is a a man who turned old muffler pipes into an attractive dining room suite, so I can question neither his authority nor the sincerity of his claims.[s2If !is_user_logged_in()]
To read the rest of this article, pick up a copy of the Summer 2014 issue OR Subscribe Now for instant access to our online edition, which offers more photos (including those not published in the print edition).
[/s2If][s2If is_user_logged_in()]Seriously, this is one sucker who knows what he is talking about. On that level, Gregg would have understood Howard Finster intuitively. Finster’s religious visions would have confounded Gregg, but the urge to create something from scraps of cast-off items would speak to him.
Described in simple terms, Howard Finster’s life might appear to have been rather ordinary. Born at the foot of Lookout Mountain in Valley Head, Ala., in 1916, he died in 2001 on the other side of that same mountain at age 84. He spent his life doing a bit of millwork, a bit of bicycle repair work and so forth – he declared he mastered 22 different trades – and, after feeling “the call” at age 13, preaching at two small Baptist churches.
His life and story, however, become quite extraordinary when we hear about his visions and resulting actions. He said God spoke to him first at the age of 3, and, 57 years later, God commanded him to turn what had been a hobby, collecting stray items and painting secular and religious figures on them, into a full-time service. According to Finster, God even gave him a specific number of creations He required: 5,000.
Thereafter, Finster kept a strict count of all he painted and shaped.
By that count, he created 48,000 pieces consisting of paintings, buildings, sculptures and mosaics. Images of Elvis and Lincoln, aliens and war heroes reside comfortably among John the Baptist, angels demons and various other less-identifiable faces. When his works outgrew a site originally called the Plant Farm Museum and located just outside Summerville, Ga., Finster purchased four additional acres. This place that he loved and nurtured came to be known as Finster’s Paradise Garden.
As he found his eye for creating images, Finster enthusiastically encouraged others to do the same. As he described it:
My work is scrubby,
It’s bad, nasty art
But it’s telling you something
You don’t have to be a perfect artist
To work in art.
Today, Paradise Garden’s staff delights in displaying not only Finster’s work, but hundreds of pieces by hose whom Finster emboldened to follow their own visions.
Upon entering the garden, there is a distinct feeling of going down the rabbit hole with Alice. Everywhere one looks there are eccentrically shaped buildings, large murals of faces with knowing eyes and jumbles of every kind of bicycle and machine part shaped into iconic towers. The Visitors’ Center where Finster used to greet the curious is an old house, formerly without electricity and water. It is now refitted as an attractive information center and gift shop.
Our guide, Kathy Berry, shares her enthusiasm and pride that the gardens and the gallery that was added to the center were chosen among nine sites to display a traveling exhibit of outstanding Georgia artists. Films of interviews with Finster telling his story, curators speaking to the significance of the work and narratives of the restoration of the garden play continuously. Although Berry did not know Finster, her face lights up recounting anecdotes passed on to her by visitors who did. “That way,” she says, “I come to know him.”
Finster’s work has been called “folk art” or “outsider art.” This refers to work produced by self-taught artists who tend to create from some private inspiration or obsession and who use all sorts of non-traditional materials. For many, the art seems unsophisticated, simple even, but that is also its strength. Lacking any claim to, or knowledge of, conventional artistic techniques, the art is a pure pouring forth from the artist to the object. Folk art has become an attractive commodity for art
collectors and even the most discerning museums in the country.
Finster is one of the most well known folk artists of the 20th century. The High Museum in Atlanta has
bought several of Finster’s works, as has the Smithsonian.
One critic called him “the Andy Warhol of the South.” Few other folk artists have been written about in the The Wall Street Journal or have designed album covers for the likes of R.E. M. and the Talking Heads. Finster even made an appearance on NBC’s “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson, and R.E.M. filmed the video for “Radio Free Europe” in Paradise Garden in 1983.
Wandering toward the gardens, we find a 1970s Cadillac covered with Finster’s portraits and Bible verses. One of the first “art cars” found in any collection, says Berry, it was Finster’s transportation to a 1980 symposium in North Carolina, where he was a guest of Wake Forest University. Finster explained it was “cheaper and faster than a Greyhound bus.”
We enter a structure that looks like two long hallways joined in an L shape. Finster called it “the wheelchair ramp,” and in his time, it was used to bring visitors to the part of the garden at the lowest elevation of the land. Today it is filled with artwork, framed posters recounting Finster’s travels and recognition from the art world, hand-lettered Bible verses and many pieces that Finster inspired others to create. The area is available for group meetings and could also be a wedding venue that would provide a vivid backdrop and life-long memories. Passing down both corridors, we arrive at another part of Finster’s backyard filled with mosaic work and plants.
Sadly, some of the mosaics are cracked and chipped, but those that remain reveal an exuberant artist who loved color and cherished all things that reflected light and motion. It is extraordinary to see mundane pieces of our lives like toilet-tank covers become part of a concrete collage that frames a duck – by the creek bed, of course. Old refrigerators are Finster’s canvases, too, with an image of George Washington appearing beside paintings of rockets heading to space, a jet plane dirigible and parachutes. It is almost as if the first president dreamed the future.
The gardens can leave one with sensory overload, surely, but filled with the delight of discovery. As Michael Sanders, one of the gardeners, says, “I get to come to Paradise every day, and I always see something that I have never seen before.”
There is a quality to Finster that shines through all of his work, no matter how diverse: his sense of joy. It is as if an inspired but rascally little boy filled with genius and artistic vision crawled into a garden and exploded. His extravagant output is filled with humor. To see him on film is to see a brilliant, backwoods preacher “having us on” with a joke, but we are in on the joke. Despite some of the fire-and-brimstone rhetoric in the Bible verses he posts, there is a gentle quality to the man with an irrepressible wink at the viewer. I can imagine him finding it hard to keep a straight face when serious scholars analyzed his work. Oh, he’d bedazzle them with his rapid-fire flood of words, but inside, I suspect, he’d be chuckling. Then he’d pick up his banjo and strike up a tune.
On the day of our visit, the man behind the preservation of the gardens, Jordan Poole, is busy directing volunteers, some from as far away as Atlanta, as they clear undergrowth that is a constant threat to the pathways and gardens. Poole has two degrees in historic preservation and professional experience working at Mount Vernon. Beyond academic qualifications, however, he brings his passion to preserving Finster’s vision of the garden. Most preservationists work at sites respected for generations; few have Poole’s opportunity to develop a site from whole cloth.
Poole grew up in Summerville and had heard of Finster and his garden. Years after Finster died, Poole spearheaded the restoration and preservation of the artist’s garden. He describes his “ah-ha” moment as occurring in Washington when he met an ambassador to the Vatican. When an assistant to the diplomat asked Poole where he was from, Poole responded, “Summerville, Georgia.”
“Oh,” he commented, “That’s where Howard Finster is from!”
As Poole explains it, “you can’t buy roots,” and he knew it was time to return to his home and preserve Finster’s legacy.
His first act was to encourage Chattooga County to buy the land and create the Paradise Garden Foundation to raise money and take responsibility for maintenance of the property. As more people became aware of his efforts, Poole says excitement built in the community, along with hope for economic development in the county, formerly reliant almost exclusively upon textile mills. Chattooga County purchased the property in December 2011, and the foundation was established in January 2012.
Poole foresees the opportunity for the gardens and art in general to revive civic pride. “Thirty-five years ago, Summerville used to be called the mural city of Georgia because so much public art covered town buildings,” he says. “People need to take ownership of Finster’s legacy and promote it.”
Ideas pour forth from Poole in an excited rush. He anticipates building an artist-in-residence program. He envisions Summerville and the garden as a hub for “traditional mountain crafts” because “Lookout Mountain is filled with the most amazing artists.” He has heard of the iconic clothesline art show, Plum Nelly, that closed in 1974 and wants to create something similar near the garden. The buildings and the art of the garden site are a bit too fragile to support large crowds milling about eating and drinking, but nearby Dowdy Park in Summerville features Finster Day, which is held in late May or early June and brings artists, musicians and visitors to town.
Of necessity, Poole is a practical dreamer who spends a good deal of his time overseeing the foundation’s budget, fundraising through grants and gifts and publicizing Paradise Garden. The site is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the state of Georgia has recognized its importance, the folk art community cherishes it as a “national folk art site” and local citizens are happy to direct tourists. During our visit, we witness sightseers from Iceland excitedly exploring the buildings.
Howard Finster never became wealthy despite his “shaman-like personality that helped to shape his public persona and increasing celebrity,” we read in the information center. When an interviewer who visited him in the garden asked where all his money from the sale of his art was, Finster responded, “You are looking at my money; you are walking on my money.”
He would prefer to know that his art was continuing to influence lives. Judging by the dedication of the staff at the garden and the interest that this “man of visions” and his art continue to inspire, he should rest easy from his labors; his work is in good hands. I cannot wait to introduce philosopher Gregg to his evangelical brother.[/s2If]
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OAuthException: Error validating access token: Session has expired on Tuesday, 15-Aug-17 17:23:39 PDT. The current time is Thursday, 18-Jul-19 19:22:44 PDT.
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Soul, Time and World
One of the principles of Jewish mystical thought is the parallel between the physical structure of the human being and the spiritual structure of creation.
One such mystical concept is the three layer structure: there is an inner spiritual - and physical - layer, a middle layer and an external layer. Spiritually speaking, these are the soul, time and world. A human being possesses all three aspects. (We'll come back to this.)
The human embryo also develops in three layers - endoderm (inner), mesoderm (middle), ectoderm (outer).
The endoderm forms the lungs, thyroid, and pancreas; it also produces the stomach, intestines, etc. From the endoderm comes the respiratory and the digestive systems. Ironically, our innermost layer is the one with the most direct contact with what's outside us: air, food and water enter through endoderm organs.
"And the L-rd G-d formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul" (Gen. 2:7). We are soul-connected to our Divine origin.
The mesoderm, the middle layer, forms the skeleton and its muscles, connective tissues, the heart, blood, kidney and spleen. The middle spiritual layer is time - movement. The heart beats; there is rhythm. The skeleton and the muscles enable us to move. Time is a measurement of movement. And it is through time that the soul connects with the world.
The ectoderm, the outer layer, forms the epidermis (skin), the central nervous system and the sensory organs. It is our sense of self, which psychologists tell us is the most external part of our being - the unconscious or subconscious (the endodermic or inner layer - the soul layer) being where most of "who we are" resides. (Athletes and performers know this: they become truly one - "in the zone" - with the performance or the act, and "lose" the sense of self.) The world outside us we perceive - and thus interact with - through barriers. There are borders to our perceptions (we cannot see ultraviolet light, for example, and need it "translated" into the visible spectrum).
And now, so what? What is at least one lesson from this observation?
Agency: we require agency - the senses, including our skin, and their "interpreter," the central nervous system - in order to affect the world. We affect the world by how we move through it - movement, which is time, that results in change. And we ourselves, at our innermost core, are agents of G-d - we are sustained by the Divine "breath of life" breathed within us.
Thus, our formation, physical and spiritual, indicates that we are an expression of G-dliness and the Divine life force within us. Let us reveal that as we move through life, for our movement automatically changes the world.
To read more visit davidybkaufmann.blogspot.com
Living with the Rebbe
This week's Torah portion Noach, has special significance because it is the first Torah reading which comes after the frenetic month of Tishrei which was filled with Jewish holidays from its beginning until almost the end of the month. Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah kept us busy doing all kinds of mitzvot (commandments) connected to their respective celebrations.
The month of Cheshvan, however, and the first Torah portion we read to inaugurate it, start a new chapter and facet of our lives. It is this week that we begin our service of G-d within the context of our everyday, mundane activities. This is reflected in the name of the portion itself - "Noach," which comes from the Hebrew root meaning "rest" and "satisfaction," for our worship of G-d, if performed properly, should arouse such feelings in us.
The Zohar teaches that all the days of the week receive their blessing from the Shabbat which precedes it. Last week, when we began to read the Torah anew with the portion of Beraishit (Genesis), we read about how the world was created and how it exists as a complete and perfect entity. Noach, however, contains G-d's promise that the world, even after man's descent into sin, will continue to exist forever. Indeed, Noach teaches us the state of perfection that man can reach if he only turns to G-d with a true desire to return to Him. In other words, Noach teaches us how the vast potential of G-d's creation can be brought into actual expression.
When a Jew fulfills his mission in life by living a lifestyle in consonance with Torah law, his service generates satisfaction and pleasure for G-d, as it were, fulfilling His desire to have a dwelling place in the world below.
"And the earth was corrupt before G-d; and the earth was filled with violence," the Torah states. Never had the world sunken to such a low and degenerate state. Yet even after such a tremendous descent, man was able to recover, with the ultimate result that the world was brought to a higher level of refinement and purity than before.
This concept is even reflected in the Torah's terminology for G-d. When discussing the creation of the world, the Torah uses the word "Elokim," which is numerically equal to the word "hateva," meaning the natural world and the laws of nature which G-d put into place. In contrast, with regard to Noach, the Torah states, "And Noach found favor in the eyes of G-d (yud, hay, vav, hay)," a terminology which points to a level of G-dliness above the natural order of things. Our job as Jews, by adhering to the Torah, is to fuse the two types of holiness, so that even that level of G-dliness which is higher than mere nature is revealed in our daily lives and illuminates the physical world.
This fusion finds voice in the promise G-d made to Noach that the world will continue without interruption, for it is in the maintenance of the world's natural order that G-d's infinite power in reflected. The lack of change in the natural world conveys to us the immutability of an infinite and unchanging G-d of the universe.
Adapted from a talk of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, 5752-1991
Getting Older not Old by Rabbi Eli Hecht
This month I visited my dear father at a nursing home. He is frail and nearing his ninetieth birthday. Presently he is weak but very determined to become stronger than ever. He was widowed and had been living at home for the past few years with 24 hour care. At this time he is not able to live at his home as more care is needed. So, by choice, he is a resident at the Sephardic Nursing and Rehabilitation Center located in Brooklyn, New York. His message seems to be that "I am getting older, not old. And to prove the point he runs his life as always. He stays in control. He made the choice and it was a wise choice indeed.
My father is the President of the Rabbinical Alliance of America. For over sixty five years he has lead the Jewish community and rabbinical organizations. He still sees hundreds of people that come for advice or socialization. His room at the nursing center is his new office and temporary home.
This month he participated in a special program for the Rabbinical Alliance of America. The organization has over 800 Rabbis and many came together meeting for inspiration, Torah and rabbinical direction. If you can't make it to the program then bring the program to you! The way he pictures his predicament of living away from home is that it will prolong his life and not, G-d forbid, as some think, otherwise. If you want to live then take the courage and enter a home where they can help you.
Let me explain with a four-hundred year old story attributed to Rabbi Zechariah Alshari.
A man dreamed that he saw an angel standing over him with a sword. "Who are you, my lord?" he asked in alarm.
"I am the Angel of Death, and I have come for your soul."
"Have pity on me, I have my little sons and daughters. Wait until they grow up and then come back."
The Angel of Death pitied the poor man, returned his sword to its sheath, and said, "I'll let you off. But the next time I come for you, no excuses will help."
The man thanked him and requested that he send a messenger before coming again, so that he could prepare himself and not have to live in constant fear. The Angel of Death agreed.
When the man awoke, he realized it was only a dream. Little by little, his dream about death was forgotten. In the course of time, he married off his sons and daughters, grandchildren, and even some great grandchildren. At last he grew old and fell fatally ill. Now the Angel of Death arrived and was ready to take him.
"How could you have come like this without a warning? Didn't you promise to send me a messenger first?"
"Oh man," said the Angel of Death, "I sent you not one messenger, but many."
"Where were they?" asked the man. "I didn't see or hear a single one of them."
The Angel of Death said, "Why, they're right here, all of them. The first was your eyes, which used to be sharp and grew dim. Then were your teeth, which once could grind stones and then fell out of your mouth. Then there was your stature, for now you are bent like a bow while once you were straight as a palm tree. The next was your legs on which you hobble and last was your appetite - how flat everything tastes to you now! Those are the messengers I sent you. So come along and no excuses."
My father had a problem with his teeth - so he got new ones. He has a problem with his eyes - so he got a cataract operation and a new pair of glasses. Now he has a problem with is appetite so he changed to a better tasting diet. He can't walk well - that's why they make wheel chairs! He needs to talk so he has two phones - one by his bed and a cell phone. He wants to stay active with his beloved Rabbinical Alliance so he brings them to meet at the nursing home. These people now realize that these things can be done for every person.
There is a lesson to be taught.
We must educate the communities about the good things about nursing homes. How they can help nurture and preserve life in a quality fashion. Most of all it is up to the families to show a strong interest, support, by preserving the love and bond between those entering nursing homes. Unfortunately when this is not done feelings of abandonment are experienced and become a detriment to their health.
Remember a nursing home is a home away from home providing better care, love and nourishment which cannot be given in a home setting.
You can provide a great mitzvah in sharing this message with families facing the decisions of placing loved ones into dignified nursing or retirement homes. Meanwhile we pray for the health of my father, Rav Avraham Dov ben Sara.
Torah Scrolls Welcomed
A double celebration was held at the Sadovsky Street Synagogue in Chernovtsy, Ukraine. The synagogue, which had been closed by the Soviet Regime over 70 years ago, was renovated and reopened, and a new Torah scroll was completed and welcomed into the synagogue. Chabad of North Brooklyn, New York, welcomed a new Torah scroll, dedicated in the merit of Sholom Rubashkin. Chabad of Palm Springs, California, welcomed a new Torah scroll on the eve of Rosh Hashana. Chabad of Kenosha, Wisconsin, recently welcomed a new Torah scroll that was started when their two Torah scrolls were stolen in April, 2008. Though the Torah scrolls were recovered in 2010, the writing of the new Torah continued, as Rabbi Tzali Wilschanski of Chabad Kenosha explained, "Once you start something positive, you shouldn't stop." Cozumel, Mexico, celebrated the completion of a Torah scroll for the first time in history. The Torah was welcomed into the Chabad House of Cozumel.
The Rebbe Writes
26 Teves 5725 [1965]
This is to acknowledge receipt of your letter with the enclosure, in which you write about your problem of acute anxiety, and ask my advice.
The best and most effective thing to do, in a situation such as yours, is to study thoroughly those sections and chapters in our sacred books where the matter of Divine Providence and bitachon [trust] are discussed, such as Chovos Halvovos, Shaar Habitachon, and similar. It is well to keep in mind those chapters and verses in the Tehillim [Psalms] which speak of these subjects, as well as the Midrashim and interpretations of our Sages on them.
These things should be studied with such depth that they should become a part of one's thinking. In this way there will be no room left for any kind of anxiety or worry, and as King David said in the Tehillim, "G-d is with me, I shall not fear. What can man do unto me!"
As you well know, the matter of hashgocho protis [Divine providence] is the basis of true monotheism, a concept which to us means not only that G-d is One, but that there is oneness in the whole of nature. In other words, the whole universe has one Supreme Being, Who not only is the Creator of everything, but also is the Master, continually supervising every detail of his handiwork. The corollary of this is that there cannot be a single point in the whole order of the world which is separated from the Supreme Being, or in any way not subject to His control. At the same time it is obvious that the Supreme Being is also the Essence of Perfection and Goodness.
And although many things in the world seem imperfect, and require completion or perfection, there can be no doubt that there is a perfect order in the world, and even the lowest in the scale of Creation, namely the inanimate things, display wonderful perfection and symmetry, as can be seen from the atoms and molecules of inorganic matter. Hence, the conclusion must be that even those things which require completion are also part of the perfect order and necessary for the fulfillment of the good, as all this is explained at length in the teachings of Chassidus.
It is explained there that in order for a man to attain perfection, it is necessary that he should also have the feeling that he is not only on the receiving end, but also a contributor, and according to the expression of our Sages of blessed memory, "A partner in the Creation." This is why things have been left in the world for him to improve and perfect.
I also want to make the further observation, and this is also essential, that there is really no basis for anxiety at any time, and as you yourself mentioned in your letter, that you find no reason for it. Even in such cases where you think you know the reason for your anxiety, the reason is undoubtedly imaginary, or at any rate, not the real cause. For the real cause is that one's daily life is not in complete harmony with the true essence of a Jew. In such a case it is impossible not to have an awkward feeling that things do not seem to fit somehow, and it is this disharmony which is at the bottom of the anxiety, and it is in proportion to the discrepancy between his way of life and his true natural self.
Everybody recognizes that anxiety has to do with the psyche. But in the case of a Jew, the so-called psyche is really the neshama [soul]. Some Jews have a particularly sensitive soul, in which case the abovementioned disharmony would create a greater anxiety. In such a case even subtle and "minor" infractions of didukei mitzvoth [details of the commandments] would create anxiety. But even in the case of an ordinary soul of the average Jew, there must inevitably be created some anxiety if there is a failure to observe the fundamental mitzvoth. It is very possible that the above may have a bearing on your situation. If this is so, then all that is necessary is to rectify matters, and bring the daily life and conduct into complete harmony with the essence of the soul, through strict adherence to the Torah and mitzvoth. Then the symptoms will disappear of themselves.
It is necessary to mention also that in your case, where your position gives you a great deal of influence on your environment, your influence is an integral part of your harmonious life, and it is therefore essential that your influence, too, should be in harmony with the Torah and mitzvoth in the fullest measure.
I suggest that you should also have the mezuzoth of your home checked, as also your tefillin, and before putting on your tefillin every weekday morning, to put aside a small coin for tzedakah [charity].
Hoping to hear good news from you in regard to all the matters discussed above.
P.S. As for the question of seeing me personally in connection with this year's occurrence, the calendar of appointments is filled to capacity and for a long time in advance. But the important thing is that it is not at all necessary for you to take the trouble and time to see me personally, inasmuch as all I could tell you is what I wrote to you above.
FEIVEL is a Yiddish form of the ancient Jewish name FEIVUSH whose origin was the Latin vivus, meaning "life." Feivush was erroneously considered to be a derivation from Phoebus, god of the sun and consequently it became associated with the Hebrew URI (light) and the Aramaic SHRAGA (candle).
FEIGEL or FEIGE is the Yiddish form of TZIPORA, "bird" in Hebrew. Tzipora was the wife of Moses.
A Word from the Director
Rabbi Shmuel M. Butman
There was once a train that had to travel over a steep mountain. The locomotive that pulled the cars strained and groaned with the effort. "How wonderful it would be," the engineer thought, "if the engine didn't have to drag all those cars. Then I could reach my destination in record time." At that moment the cable connecting the locomotive to the rest of the convoy snapped, and the engineer's wish came true. He arrived at the station house well ahead of schedule.
Excitedly, the engineer told the stationmaster how the locomotive had traveled much faster by itself. But much to his surprise, his boss was not pleased. "You fool! Who cares if the engine reaches the station house? The whole purpose of the locomotive is to bring the train to its destination. Without the cars behind it, there's no point to the whole trip."
The "locomotive" in the story is the month of Tishrei; the "cars" of the train are the 11 other months of the year.
We are now in the month of Marcheshvan, the only month of the Jewish calendar without holidays. The feelings of spiritual nourishment, uniting with family, closeness to G-d, that come from celebrating Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Simchat Torah and Shemini Atzeret are behind us, and the year to come - like train tracks stretching out to the horizon - looms ahead.
As we return to "reality," our challenge now is to incorporate the warmth and spiritual elevation of the holidays into our regular day-to-day existence. Will the "locomotive" stay attached to the "cars" and lead them in the right direction, or will all the positive emotions we experienced - the deep faith in G-d that was aroused, the feelings of Jewish unity and love for our fellow Jews - remain disassociated from our daily lives?
By channeling our resolve into practical action (perhaps taking on an additional mitzva: putting on tefilin, eating kosher, being more careful in Shabbat observance, etc.), the month of Tishrei will propel us forward and upward. For in truth, being Jewish is a 365-day-a-year excursion...
Thoughts that Count
And take to you of all food that is eaten...and it shall be for food for you, and for them (Gen. 6:21)
When a righteous person consumes food, the food fulfills its purpose in creation, becomes spiritually elevated, and "justifies" its existence. G-d therefore told Noah, "It shall be food for you, and for them [i.e., spiritual sustenance for the various foods themselves]."
(Tiferet Shlomo)
G-d said to Noah, "Come you and all your house into the ark" (Gen. 7:1)
The Zohar explains that the name Noah ("Noach" in Hebrew), from the root meaning to rest, is an allusion to Shabbat, which is also derived from the Hebrew word meaning cessation of work. Moreover, in the same way that the ark was the means by which Noah and his family were saved from the Flood, so too is the holy Shabbat the "lifesaver" that rescues the Jew from drowning in the world's deluge...
(Avnei Eizel)
Noah went in, and his sons...because of the waters of the Flood (Gen. 7:7)
As Rashi comments, "Even Noah was of little faith; he believed and did not believe that the Flood would come, and did not enter the ark until the waters forced him." When a person trusts in G-d that something will happen, his faith actually helps it occur that much sooner; in fact, the speed with which it happens is in direct proportion to the magnitude of his faith. Thus Noah didn't want to believe "too much" in the Flood, for fear that his faith would bring it on sooner rather than later.
(Oheiv Yisrael)
It Once Happened
There was once in Poland, a Jewish timber merchant named Reb Dov Ber who traded for many years with the gentry. One day he was walking through the dense forests as was his custom before entering a bid on any timber. Suddenly he was accosted by a huge brown bear, two heads taller than himself.
Dov Ber was himself a burly, muscular man, but he had no desire to fight the huge monster, and so, he quietly and calmly moved away from its line of vision. The hungry bear pursued him and he hid behind a thick tree, hoping the bear would continue moving on.
The bear, however, caught up to him and they began a frantic chase, running in circles around the trees, both becoming increasingly exhausted.
Finally, the weary bear, reached out trying to grab the man, but instead encircled the tree trunk with its massive paws.
Dov Ber grabbed both paws with his hands and desperately stuck them into the wood of the trunk. As the bear tried to disengage his paws, Dov Ber removed his belt and with his last strength, he tied the helpless bear to the tree. He hurried to the closest village and related his harrowing experience to the villagers.
They listened skeptically to his tale, and although it seemed far-fetched to them, they armed themselves and followed him to the spot. Sure enough, the bear was still belted to the tree, tired from its struggle to extricate itself.
One of the men ran to get the local poretz (Polish landowner), who finished the bear off with one well-placed shot.
Reb Dov, suffering from the terrible trauma, appeared home the next day a changed man. His hair and beard were now snow-white, and from that day on he was called "White Bear."
Reb Dov prospered in his business, earning a reputation being an honest, G-d fearing man. From his contract with the great Count Potocki he made a large annual profit, for although the timber was available to the highest bidder, White Bear had established his claim.
Once, a new timber merchant named Meir Pinsker came to the area and decided that he would take Count Potocki's business away from Reb Dov. When Reb Dov was informed that this newcomer had decided to try to take away his accustomed account he was deeply disturbed. How could a fellow Jew disregard the Torah law of not encroaching on the livelihood of another? He decided to visit his Rebbe, the Shpoler Zeide, who was a disciple of the Baal Shem Tov.
The Shpoler Zeide listened to Reb Dov's problem and told him, "G-d hates injustice. Don't worry. Go home and continue your business as usual. The L-rd who provided for you up to now will not abandon you."
When the time arrived for the bids to be considered, his new competitor won the contract to the timber. Pinsker hurried to the forest and was marking his trees when two horsemen appeared and angrily asked his name, demanding to see his contract. They studied the document and said, "If your name is Pinsker, then you are a thief, for there is another name written here." And they beat Reb Meir unmercifully.
Meanwhile, Reb Dov followed the advice of his Rebbe and went about marking his trees as if this year was no different than all the preceding ones.
The same two horsemen stopped him in the forest and in a friendly tone one remarked, "Can you imagine that! Just a couple of days ago another man claimed these trees as his own. And with your name clearly on the contract!" They handed him the contract, and there was his own name clearly written and stamped.
When Meir Pinsker recovered from his beating, he went to make a complaint to the count. But when all the forest-keepers were summoned, Reb Meir was unable to identify the two who had beaten him. The count scoffed. "Perhaps they were devils, paying you in kind for your bit of devilry with the 'White Bear,' " he chided. But he promised to look into the matter.
Reb Dov was summoned to appear before the count. They concluded that due to the custom of many years, Reb Dov's name was filled in as a matter of habit. "What would you like to do, White Bear?" asked the count.
"Let Meir Pinsker and I go before my rabbi and he will decide." The count was agreeable and the two men stood before the Shpoler Zeide.
"Your lust for money caused you to transgress the commandment not to diminish your brother's livelihood!" the Rebbe said to the repentant Pinsker, and he gave him an appropriate penitence to atone for his sin.
Reb Dov was told to make a monetary settlement with Reb Meir, so that the latter would not suffer unduly. In the end both men left the Rebbe feeling happy with his verdicts with peace established between them.
Moshiach Matters
The G-dly revelation that was manifested in the ark had a profound effect on all the animals, causing them to live together amicably and harmoniously for an entire year. Thus the conditions in the ark were the prototype and forerunner of the Messianic era, when according to many commentators, the Biblical prophecy of "and the wolf shall live with the lamb" will be fulfilled in the literal sense.
(Hitva'aduyot 5743)
L'Chaim: 5774 - 2013
The Weekly Aliyot
Audio: Rabbi Manis Friedman
Daily Lessons
Weekly Texts & Audio
Candle-Lighting times
248 Positive
365 Negative
Java Phones
Palm Pilot
P800/P900
Moshiach
For children - part 1
About Holidays
The Hebrew Alphabet
Hebrew/English Calendar
by SIE
The Alter Rebbe
The Rebbe Maharash
The Previous Rebbe
Mitzvah Campaign
Rabbi Riddle
Rebbetzin Riddle
Tzivos Hashem
L'Chaim Weekly
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Spinal Cord Injury Victims to Receive Help From Computer
Man Riding Bicycle Killed After Hit by DUI Driver
Published by adminlvj at September 5, 2014
Nevada’s beautiful landscape and warm climate is very inviting for those who enjoy riding motorcycles. However, even taking a simple summer afternoon spin on a motorcycle can be very dangerous. Those who are involved in accidents while on motorcycles have a much greater risk of injury and death than those who are in a passenger vehicle.
According to reports from the Nevada Highway Patrol, a motorcycle rider has died from injuries sustained in a crash on the Fourth of July in Sparks. Kenneth Roger Stewart, 51, was taken off life support and died after being admitted to an area hospital following the crash. His passenger, Cameron Stewart, 19, was released from the hospital after being treated for minor injuries.
The victim was riding a 2003 Harley-Davidson motorcycle on Pyramid Way when Mark Kesner, 49, turned left in front of him. Kesner fled the scene but was later arrested.
Deadly Motorcycle Crashes More Common Than Ever
According to the Centers for Disease Control, motorcycle accidents are more common than they have ever been, even though the overall number of traffic-related fatalities has declined in the past decade. CDC reports show that more than 34,000 people died and another 1.22 million were injured between 2001 and 2008 as a direct result of motorcycle accidents. Approximately half of these accidents were single-vehicle accidents. The rest involved at least one other vehicle, often a passenger car. When another vehicle is involved, the majority of these accidents are the fault of someone other than the motorcycle rider.
What If I Am Injured or Lose Someone in a Motorcycle Accident?
In the aftermath of an accident involving a motorcycle, the injured party may be able to seek compensation for damages and losses. These types of compensation include recovery of any medical costs related to the accident, loss of income from the inability to work due to an injury, and pain and suffering. Depending on the situation, victims may even be able to recover damages for losses that have not yet been incurred, such as future medical costs and income loss.
It is very important, when pursuing a personal injury or wrongful death case, to gather and organize evidence as well as have an understanding of personal injury law. This is difficult for the average person to do, but Sam Harding Law Firm in Las Vegas is ready to help. Contact him today for a free case evaluation.
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Cifam
Trusting
Fri.tech.
My Metelli
METELLI GROUP REINFORCES ITS LEADERSHIP IN THEENGINE COOLING AND DISTRIBUTION SEGMENT
Metelli Group continues to confirm its leadership and know-how in the engine cooling and distribution sector through the acquisition of two major Italian production companies, assuming majority stake in BREDA LORETT S.R.L. and full ownership of BUGATTI AUTORICAMBI S.P.A. These two strategic acquisitions will help make the company more structured and therefore better equipped to face future challenges. For the past 40 years, BREDA LORETT S.R.L. with headquarters in Pianezza (Turin, Italy), has specialised in the design, production and distribution of both traditional and automatic belt tensioners, idler pulleys, wheel kits, dampers pulley, clutch thrust bearings and timing belt kit. Founded in 1972, BUGATTI AUTORICAMBI S.P.A. is a long-established company with headquarters in Castegnato (Brescia, Italy) that specialises in the design and production of water pumps for the automotive aftermarket sector (cars and light commercial vehicles). The acquisition of this company, which operates in the same market segment, will reinforce Metelli group's leadership position in the industry. Both companies are now under the corporate control of Metelli group, which plans to enhance synergies in terms of R&D, know-how and production. However, the companies will retain operational, managerial and commercial independence, in continuity with the activities of the current management, which will carry on with the development process that has been taking place over the past years.
Tel: +39 030 705 711 | Fax: +39 030 70 57 376
Metelli S.p.A. | Via Bonotto, 3/5 - 25033 Cologne (BS) - Italy
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"If you know you are going to fail, then fail gloriously."
Movies.com > Murray Lerner
Murray Lerner doesn't have any movies playing in theaters.
High Fidelity: The Adventures of the...
The Other Side of the Mirror: Bob Dylan...
Miles Davis: Miles Electric - A Different...
From Mao to Mozart: Isaac Stern in China
Rocketship X-M
Murray Lerner
Profession: Director, Producer, Cinematographer
The Other Side of the Mirror: Bob Dylan Live at the Newport Folk Festival, 1963-1965 as Cinematographer
From Mao to Mozart: Isaac Stern in China as Director
Miles Davis: Miles Electric - A Different Kind of Blue as Director
Message to Love: The Isle of Wight Festival as Cinematographer
High Fidelity: The Adventures of the Guarneri String Quartet as Producer
All Murray Lerner films
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50 Cent Releases “Animal Ambition” Without Going Through the “Audition Process”
June 4th, 2014 by K104
G-Unit/Caroline/CapitolToday sees the release of 50 Cent‘s fifth studio album, Animal Ambition, which marks his first disc as an independent artist. The rapper feels he’s become a more effective artist after departing with his longtime record label, Universal Music Group’s Interscope Records, and Eminem‘s imprint, Shady/Aftermath.
“Timing means everything in the music business, music marks time,” 50 tells ABC News Radio. “The actual period that it comes out, that’s like if someone is in a relationship with someone, they’ll say ‘This is our song.’ And when that song comes on years later they will reflect on how they felt when it first came”
He continues, “So now I have the ability to release a record instead of having to go through the audition process. Even being an established artist and having a successful sales history, there’s a point where you have to play your music in a staff meeting and then you want everyone to be impressed so it creates a morale. I don’t actually have to do that audition,” he say, laughing.
The rapper’s new-found independence lead to an unconventional promotional campaign that featured new music being released every week leading up the album’s launch date. The first offering, “Smoke,” featuring Trey Songz, was produced two years ago by Dr. Dre. The rapper tells ABC News Radio how the record came together.
“I ran into Trey and I told him that I needed him to hear it, because he didn’t even remember the record, he recorded it like two years ago,” Fiddy recalls. “So when he got a chance to listen to it, he was like, ‘Oh yo! I want to re-vocal it because the way I’m doing it now it’s a little different.'”
50 agreed that reworking the track would “make it more current,” adding, “it only took about three sessions before [Trey] was really happy with it.”
The rapper adds, “When he brought it back, I changed my vocals in the chorus, because I want it to match what he had did at that point and then we were done with the actual record.”
50 says Animal Ambition‘s concept is about prosperity, which is an idea he feels many fans will relate to. “You hear it in one piece and you listen to it, you understand why its conceptually the way it is,” he says. “It’s pretty tough for you to turn your nose up at prosperity. The people that I have value for in my life all have an interest in living on a decent life and on a good level, so there’s things on the record relate to that.”
After being in the industry for more than a decade, 50 also says he isn’t worrying about first-week album sales. “It doesn’t event matter to me, because everything is a failure moving forward, considering what I’ve already experienced, like everything would be so low that I have to make it not matter to me,” 50 says. “I’ve had such a huge successful sales history that if you came in saying, ‘I gotta do this much.’ And then you look around, you’d say, ‘Well, nobody is doing that.'”
Animal Ambition‘s 11 tracks features contributions from Yo Gotti, Jadakiss and Styles P, and a bonus track, which includes a collaboration with ScHoolboy Q. The set marks 50 Cent’s first offering since 2009’s Before I Self-Destruct.
ambition animal audition Cent going process releases through without
Miguel Releases New Track in Response to a Week of Violent Attacks Read More
Chris Brown Releases Two New Songs in Wake of Recent Shooting Deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile Read More
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Listen to Sturgill Simpson’s New Zombie Ballad, “The Dead Don’t Die”
Sturgill Simpson dropped his first new song in more than three years with the release of “The Dead Don’t Die,” the title track to a new zombie flick directed by Jim Jarmusch.
The new track, which Sturgill penned at Jarmusch’s request, serves as a running gag throughout the film as multiple actors make reference to the song or Sturgill. The new movie opens on June 14, starring Bill Murray, Adam Driver, Steve Buscemi, Danny Glover, Selena Gomez and more.
“The motivation for doing it was Jim Jarmusch called me and asked me if I wanted to write a song for his movie,” says Sturgill. “And I think I said yes before he even got the question out. I’ve always loved his work, probably since I was too young to really even understand or be watching, so like Ghost Dog, movies like Dead Man, they had a huge impact on me. I’ve probably seen Ghost Dog like two or three hundred times, so it really is like a sort of a bucket list thing getting to work with him. [It was] the title of the film, so I knew it had to be the title of the song. And then, I’m just reading the script—some little anecdotes and takeaways from what I thought the real underlying message that Jim was getting across. It was different because . . . I’ll usually write my own stuff from a perspective of my own life experience, and this was more . . . this was fun. It was a lot of fun.”
Listen to “The Dead Don’t Die” below.
photo by Carissa Riccardi/NCD
written by Jim Casey | @TheJimCasey | published June 13, 2019 6:35 AM
category: NCD News | related posts: Sturgill Simpson, The Dead Don't Die
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"Zak McKracken: between time and space" is an unofficial sequel to the adventure game "Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders" released in 1988. We, the "Artificial Hair Bros." have devoted our time to create a worthy follow up to this all-time-classic. Capturing the mood and of the original game and creating something new nonetheless.
It's been a while since Zak's last adventure. People have forgotten all about our hero who saved humanity from enslavement. His five minutes of fame went by way too quick and the money he earned with his award winning book went down the drains when Zak decided to get his own newspaper off the ground.
But now Zak has to prove his worth once again. Stumbling into his next adventure, Zak gets yet another chance to show the world what real heroes are made of...
Why a sequel to ZakMcKracken?
Zak McKracken is one of the few adventure games that never got a proper sequel. There are no high-res backgrounds and no sweeping soundtrack, this left us with a lot of freedom when we started working on this game.
Handmade backgrounds, elaborate cut-scenes
We think that hand-drawn backgrounds made some of the old adventure games something very special. This is why we decided to keep the gameplay stricly 2D. But Zak:btas isn't just a pixel-adventure, we have created the scenery and characters in our own graphical style and added 3D cut-scenes to add some diversity.
How long did it take to develop this game?
Work on the project began in 2002. In the beginning starting out as an amateur-game, we soon found ourselves reaching higher levels of quality step by step. By the time we are done 5 years of hard work will lay behind us.
What problems had to be solved when making this game?
One of the biggest challenges has been recruiting a team one could rely on and keeping the members of the team motivated to work on their respective parts. Unfortunately not everyone is motivated and passionate enough to work on a project for free over such a long period of time. But we were lucky enough to find reliable members for each part of development. You really do need a good working team to master a project like this.
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Statue of Liberty Live Streaming New York Cam, NYC, USA
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Home Breaking The best Restaurants in the world accolade for Tim Raue
The best Restaurants in the world accolade for Tim Raue
On Tuesday evening, it was so far, the list of the 50 best Restaurants in the world, was published in Singapore solemnly. The whole of the front of a Restaurant, which was endowed this year, with three Michelin stars: the Mirazur with chef Mauro Colagreco.
He can call his Restaurant the best in the world. In the last year, the Restaurant is located in Menton, on the Côte d’azur, still on Position three was. The cuisine is not French, but reflects the personal journey of colagreco. Once in Argentina, was born, he has taken 19 years ago on foot in France. All of the shows on his plates. He worked for such luminaries as Alain Passard and Alain Ducasse. Since 2006 he runs his own Restaurant.
Osteria Francescana in Modena
Massimo Bottura – The Italians despised him, yet he was the best cook in the world
By Denise Snieguole Wachter
Last year, Massimo Bottura won with his Osteria Francescana, there is the first place of the list. The is now ascended to the Olympus of the “Best of the Best”. A new category, which is determined for 2019 for those who have once occupied space 1. The managers justify this by saying that the movement of the peak positions would otherwise be too low. Who was once the world’s best Restaurant, is not taken into account in the next list.
Tim Raue: the Best Restaurant in Germany
for Tim Raue there was good news: He landed with his Berlin Restaurant again in the Top 50. The Restaurant “Tim Raue” is ranked this year at # 40 (2018 square 37), and is the only Restaurant in Germany in the Top 50: “madness! We are incredibly pleased that our Restaurant has received this year, this international recognition. Warmth, discipline, courage, ambition and passion are the attributes, the Rough, our terrific Team and we every day life and try to delight our guests,” announced Marie-Anne, the Manager, and the chef are.
New cook book “My Way”
star chef Tim Raue from the pack: “I never wanted to end up back in the gutter”
“Berlin has become in recent years, the culinary epicenter of Germany, and also with two other Restaurants in the expanded list represented what pleased for our colleagues immensely. We represent this style, to create highly personalized culinary experiences for guests from all over the world, with unique employees of all genders, races, and religions, local colour and, above all, fun.”
Already in the past week, the courts 51 to 120 were announced. The “Nobel hard and Dirty,” Billy Wagner Micha Schäfer and the “Seriously” by Dylan Watson-Brawn have made it to the courts, 57 and 118. So two more Restaurants in Berlin are on the list.
Noma: From Zero to number two
Best Restaurant in the world
Noma: As a farm re-opened and now with two Michelin-stars
awarded The highest new entry ever, scored by René Redzepi with his new “Noma”. It is considered to be one of the most influential Restaurants in the world and be a chef as a godfather of the new Nordic cuisine. A year ago, the Restaurant had moved. Redzepi and his Team restored an old warehouse in Copenhagen, to an urban Farm. Bigger than before with its own gardens and greenhouses. This year, the “Noma” was awarded only two stars, now with the 2. Place on the Pellegrino list.
The list of “The World’s 50 Best Restaurants” is because of their main sponsor, San Pellegrino, as well as “Pellegrino list of” known and exists since 2002. The Ranking is created on the basis of the votes of an influential group of more than 1000 leading experts from the international gastronomy. 40 members and a Chairman from a total of 26 regions around the world, “The World’s 50 Best Restaurants Academy form”.
Each member may cast ten votes. Of these ten votes must be at least four Restaurants outside of the Region of the member concerned. The Jury of each Region consists of Restaurant journalists and critics as well as renowned restaurateurs.
The System is quite opaque and is often viewed critically. German Restaurants are traditionally under-represented. What we notice is that especially star-endowed Restaurants, with male chefs are in the Top 50. At least, the proportion of women was increased in the Jury.
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Top Ten Things Black America Will Have To Show For 8 Years Of President Obama
Posted by Ed Griffith 27sc on June 01, 2013 · Flag
Submitted by ed2291 on April 30, 2013 - 4:34pm
When Barack Obama leaves the White House in January 2017, what will black America, his earliest and most consistent supporters, have to show for making his political career possible. We'll have the T-shirts and buttons and posters, the souvenirs. That will be the good news. The bad news is what else we'll have.... and not.
The Obama Legacy, Pt 1: Top Ten Things Black America Will Have To Show For 8 Years of President Obama
by BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon (Bruce has kindly consented to let us reprint this article in full. It is also found online here.)
To hear our black political class tell it, the election of the first black US president was its ultimate achievement to date, a giant step toward fulfillment of a previous generation's insurgent agenda for social transformation. Is that real? Has the career of Barack Hussein Obama really advanced any of the historic goals of the Freedom Movement? Is the question even fair?
With corporate media already speculating about next year's midterm elections, and the presidential contest of 2016, it's entirely appropriate to discuss the president's legacy. And fair is fair --- the black political class doesn't want its meager achievements compared to the agenda of those who fought for our freedom a half century ago, it probably ought to abandon its ceaseless self-promotion as the inheritors of that tradition.
It was the overwhelming black and brown vote, along with the utter, unwavering and uncritical support of African America which made President Obama's career possible. When he leaves office in January 2017, what will be the top ten things we can say black America gained or lost from his two terms in the White House?
10. We'll still have Obamacare, the cynically misnamed “Affordable Care Act”. The problem is that Obamacare was written by a health insurance company lobbyist to prolong his employer's parasitic business model, not to make health care available or affordable. A third of the health care dollar goes to advertising, profits, fat executive salaries, lobbying and the paperwork occasioned by thousands of insurers who make more money denying care than providing it, instead of a single payer, like Canada, Medicare, or social security. As Physicians for a National Health Plan point out, Obamacare will not curb medical costs or stem the tide of bankruptcies caused by health care bills. It won't force most employers who now don't offer affordable coverage to offer it in the future, because the administration is allowing employers to write its enforcement regulations, and it will leave millions more, all poor and disproportionately people of color, uncovered altogether.
Worst of all, Obamacare's 2016 effective date reveals it as a promise the administration never intended to keep. Back in 1965, when computers with less power than today's laptops were the size of boxcars, the Johnson administration passed Medicare and put it into effect the same year. That's the real comparison between the achievement of Obamacare and the effective results of a previous generation's struggle.
9. We'll probably have reductions in social security proposed and enacted by a Democrat, something no Republican could have initiated, that sets the stage for further reductions in benefit by either party.
In the tradition of Democrat Bill Clinton, who did what Republicans tried and failed to do, “ending welfare as we know it” in the 1990s, Barack Obama has promised Wall Street that he would curb “entitlements” the code word for cutting Medicare, Medicaid and social security.
With poverty at record levels, the ending of many defined benefit pension plans and the broken promise of retirement security from 401K plans looming black seniors will still be more dependent on social security than anybody, and the value of real benefits will be declining, if Barack's first negotiating offer to Republicans is any indication of his stance on this issue.
8. We'll have solidly in place a new tradition of bailing out banksters and speculators, and lots more immunity from prosecution for corporate scofflaws.
The so-called “Bush bailout” was only accomplished when George W. Bush in the last weeks of his presidency, and opposed by Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress called candidate Barack Obama to Washington to persuade reluctant Democrats to vote for it. After failing to pass the first time, Obama swung half the black caucus and enough Democrats overall to secure the passage of the $3 trillion Bush bailout. Once Obama assumed office, the $3 trillion became $16 trillion, with a free pass for the Federal Reserve to shovel more public money at Wall Street at will.
And for corporate lawbreakers, whether you were Goldman Sachs, knowingly peddling worthless securities to pension funds, or Bank of America, which foreclosing and evicting tens of thousands in cases where it couldn't prove actual ownership, a phone, cable or internet provider handing over access to billions of calls and emails, or British Petroleum, murdering its Gulf Coast ecosystems, livelihoods and its own workers, the Obama administration's Justice Department has come up with infinitesimal fines and immunity from prosecution for past and future crimes as the answer.
7. When Obama leaves office, we'll still have gentrification as the only model of urban economic development. To be fair, this isn't the exclusive failure of President Obama, it's the failure of vision of the entire black misleadership class, stretching over decades. But as the most powerful actor in the land, the man whose career is the crowning achievement so far of the black political class, Obama absolutely deserves to wear the jacket for leaving things as bad as or worse than the day he assumed office.
6. The day Barack Obama leaves the White House we'll still have the world's biggest prison state, with three quarters of its inmates black and brown, the insane 40 years War On Drugs, and a black person murdered by police, private security or vigilantes every day or so.
The best the Obama administration and its allies in Congress could do to address the 100 to 1 cocaine to crack penalty disparity was cutting it to 18 to 1 without changing the sentence of a single person already serving unjust time. Hundreds of thousands of black and brown youth are still doing years for mere grams of crack or minute scraps of marijuana. The police and prison state will, as before, remain the nation's preferred means to address poverty, homelessness, mental illness, immigration and many other social, economic and medical conditions.
5. We'll have US troops in more than thirty African countries enforcing Western land grabs and the corporate neoliberal order, and keeping Africa barefoot, sick, hungry and afraid, but well-armed. And we'll have an even larger overall military budget with more troops and more overseas bases than under George Bush.
During the Clinton and second Bush administrations, the US bankrolled, trained and supplied the armies of 52 out of 54 African nations to ensure that the continent remained the poorest and most war-torn on earth. Under its first black president, the US has stepped up the game with actual deployments of drones, mercenaries, special forces and other US military units in more than thirty African countries to enforce the neoliberal order in which Africa's wealth is diverted from its people into the economies and overseas bank accounts of the West and a handful of native kleptocrats.
Martin Luther King told us decades ago that the number one purveyor of violence on this planet was the US government. Barack Obama, who many fancifully associate with King, hasn't changed that one iota.
4. When Obama leaves office, it will be legal and acceptable for US presidents to unilaterally murder with or without announcement of cause anybody, anyplace on the planet within the reach of US drones, special operators and mercenaries.
When Obama assumed office the US was secretly imprisoning and torturing thousands in at least a dozen countries around the world. We are told now that torture and secret jails are used less often now, that the preferred expedient being simple murder via special ops team or drone.
3. The Obama administration will have closed and privatized more public schools than at any time in US history.
This is already an accomplished fact. Under President Obama, the US Department of Education has extended the authority to certify school systems to private agencies controlled by champions of privatization like the Gates, Walton Family, and Eli Broad Foundations, and allowed the same actors to write its Race To The Top program, which allocates federal education dollars to the school systems that disband, privatize, and hand over their assets to private actors the quickest.
2. We can cherish the memory of 8 years of watching that pretty brown family in that big White House, along with unprecedented black unemployment, declining real wages, and the most drastic shrinkage of black family wealth since we began tracking and comparing black and white wealth.
Who needs economic progress when millions can take down those old pictures of Martin, and the Kennedy boys, and replace them with the likeness of Barack and Michelle.
1. After 8 years of Barack Obama, black leadership and black America will have decisively lost and forgotten the habit, the inclination, even the example of standing against unjust and abusive power, and our former reputation around the world as a people of struggle. The height of the black Freedom Movement was only about 8 or 10 years, but it left an example of what it was to stand for justice and righteousness against bad laws and bad governance that inspired us and the rest of the world. Black youth who will reach maturity in the middle of this decade have no examples of struggle to look up to, only accommodations to power and excuses for inaction and ineffectiveness on every front.
All in all, it's not an inspiring legacy. For Latinos, the Obama era will mark historic broken promises on a path to citizenship for the undocumented, and the largest number of deportations by far of any administration in history. For labor, the biggest single broken promises are the failure to push through laws that would make the organization of unions easier, or the renegotiation of NAFTA. For media activists, there are the broken promises on network neutrality and freedom of the internet.
White America gets its card stamped as officially anti-racist ---- there are black CEOs, black admirals and generals, 40-some blacks in Congress and there's been a black president, after all. When the accounting is done, and Obama leaves the White House, everybody gets something.
Bruce A. Dixon is managing editor at Black Agenda Report, and a state committee member of the Georgia Green Party. He lives and works near Marietta GA and can be contacted at bruce.dixon(at)blackagendareport.com or via the site's contact page.
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NB-IoT is Dead. Long Live NB-IoT.
December 12th, 2016 | Published in Wireless Connectivity | 17 Comments
As the old adage goes, “while the cat’s away, the mice will play”. In the case of NB-IOT, “when the spec’s delayed, LPWAN will play”, which is exactly what’s happening in the Internet of Things market today. The problem is that 3GPP (the 3rd Generation Partnership Project), the standards body which has been responsible for the 3G, 4G and 5G mobile standards, dropped the ball as far as the Internet of Things is concerned. Seduced by the slabs of black glass which suck up both our attention and the mobile networks’ spectrum, the 3GPP engineers totally forgot to design something to replace the old 2G workhorse of GPRS, which is responsible for most of today’s machine to machine communications. Instead, they spent all of their time designing high power, high speed, expensive variants of 4G to support an ongoing dynasty of iPhones, Galaxys and Pixels, none of which were any use for the Internet of Things.
Noticing this hole, a number of companies who had been developing proprietary, low cost, low speed, low power communication options saw an opportunity and created the Low Power WAN market. Whilst many perceived them as a group of Emperors with no clothes, the network operators were so desperate to have something to offer for upcoming IoT applications that they started engaging with them, rolling out LPWAN infrastructure. Whether they believed the LPWAN story, or just hoped it would fill a hole is difficult to ascertain, but no-one can deny that LPWAN is now firmly on the map, in the form of Sigfox, LoRa, Ingenu and a raft of others. To address that challenge to their hegemony, the GSM Association (GSMA) directed the 3GPP to assemble their own suit of imperial clothing which would be called the Narrow Band Internet of Things, or NB-IoT.
This is the story of why NB-IOT was too late, why it will fail in the short term, why it will win in the long term, and why the industry will struggle to make any money from it.
Download “NB-IoT is Dead. Long Live NB-IoT.” NB-IoT-is-Dead.pdf – Downloaded 4179 times – 597 KB
One of the most surprising aspects of this story is how long it took 3GPP and the network operators to realise that they had a problem. It’s not as if they didn’t see the problem coming. Back in 2010, Ericsson set the bar for much of the subsequent hype around the Internet of Things by making a very public prediction that by 2020 there would be 50 billion internet connected devices. They’ve subsequently downgraded that, but very few in the industry noticed – for them, it’s very difficult to discard the prospect of “tens of billions” once it’s made its way into their business plans. Numbers that big get attention in boardrooms, whether or not they mean anything – they just sound so good that they are assumed to be true.
What happened is that the industry became fixated with the concept of revenue today, rather than revenue tomorrow. As users embraced smartphones, their demand for data soared. When competing smartphone vendors made smartphone screens larger, mobile video took off, putting further pressure on the network’s capacity. Everyone’s attention became focused on how to build enough capacity into their network to retain their users. Instead of calling for new standards for M2M and IoT, operators started concentrating on how they could use their existing spectrum more efficiently. There was an easy answer to this – turn off their old 2G networks and use them for 4G, which supported around 40 times as many users. It was only as they started to do this that they belatedly realised that they were euthanising the only technology they had which would support the Internet of Things. At which point the LPWAN industry stepped into the frame and started cutting deals. The GSMA panicked, and directed 3GPP to embark on the path to NB-IoT.
At this stage it’s worth pointing two things out. The first is the normal timeline for developing a new radio standard, and the second is the requirements for the majority of the projected 50 billion IoT devices.
Developing a wireless standard is a slow business. Back in 2010 I tried to estimate the time and cost involved and came to the conclusion that it costs around a billion dollars and takes 8 – 10 years before the standard is robust and getting traction in the market. That was for personal area networks like Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and ZigBee. Cellular networks are more complex, so cost more and take longer. Despite the evidence, the GSMA announced that their new NB-IoT standard would be complete and released in six months. Six months later, they announced that it was going well and that they would release it in six months’ time. And six months after that they put out a press release saying that the specification was complete. We’ll come back to that in a minute.
The second thing we need to look at is what a standard for wireless IoT connectivity needs to do? Most IoT devices will be quite taciturn. They will measure data and events and send that data a few times each day. They’re not going to be streaming video or having lengthy conversations because they’re battery powered. If they’re going to run for several years on a small battery or some energy harvesting power supply, all they can manage is a few messages each day. Sigfox understand this and make it evident in their data plans. They’re not talking about hundreds of Megabytes like the cellular industry, but as little as 14 messages of 12 bytes each day. That’s about the same as a single SMS message. To put it another way, most IoT applications make text messaging look bloated.
It’s not at all clear that the GSMA understand this. In a recent Mobile Broadband Forum meeting, the GSMA and other operators kept on implying that IoT devices need data rates of tens or hundreds of kilobits per second. That is definitely what network operators want to sell, but it’s not what IoT devices need. If we’re going to get to billions of device, connectivity and silicon needs to be cheap. Cheaper and simpler than GPRS was. The cellular industry has never taken on board that fact that the reason we don’t already have billions of IoT devices is that even GPRS is too expensive. Trying to make NB-IoT more complex than GPRS is not going to kickstart the IoT era. What we need is a standard which will let companies make a chip that costs around a dollar in high volume.
That’s not where the cellular chip industry has been going. In the early days of 2G, networks operated at two different frequencies, with relatively simple radio modulation. That meant that chips were moderately simple. Over time, the GPRS modules which are used in most current IoT devices have fallen in price to around $7. However, as the desire for more bandwidth has grown, 3G and 4G chips have become much more complex. Moore’s law has helped to prevent them becoming exorbitant, but each new release of the standards has to support a growing number of frequency bands (we’re up from 2 to over 70), as well as all of the different protocols in the previous standards which have gone before it. Developing these is prohibitively expensive. As a result, 3G modules cost around $20 and 4G modules $35. The growing complexity, which requires immensely complex protocol stacks to complement the chips, has benefitted a very few silicon suppliers, who have largely destroyed the competition. Qualcomm dominates, with Mediatek taking most of the rest of the market. The business model for both is to sell billions of chips to a small number of high volume manufacturers who have deep technical competence to integrate these into their products. That is very different to the model needed to support tens of thousands of IoT manufacturers who need $1 comms chips which they can just drop into their products.
You can see this contradiction in the NB-IoT standard which has recently been released. There were two industry groupings with radically different approaches. The traditional one, led by Nokia and Ericsson, proposed what is essentially a cut down, lower power variant of 4G. The key feature of this is that it is capable of working with other 4G devices in the same spectrum, so it can easily be slotted into existing networks. However, to do that it needed to retain a fair degree of radio complexity to be aware of other 4G traffic. That has two consequences. It meant the chip was much more complex because it had to be able to identify what was going on around it, hence it’s still expensive. It also made it more difficult to make it very low power.
The alternative approach, led by Huawei and Vodafone was for a “clean sheet“ approach. This was a solution which did not have the intelligence to coexist with 4G networks, but required operators to set aside a small amount of spectrum for it, (which could be a guard band), specifically reserved for IoT traffic. As the chips didn’t need to be aware of any other 4G traffic, they could be much simpler and hence much cheaper. It’s a cleaner approach, but one which goes against the traditional network approach of making complex hardware which can work on any band around the world. Network operators typically prefer the complex hardware approach, as it passes the problem of global interoperability onto the chip and protocol stack companies. Whatever the operators do with their networks, regardless of the frequency bands they own, things just work. But it raises the cost of hardware.
This “clean sheet” approach grew out of the Weightless standard. Neul – a Cambridge start-up helped developed Weightless as a new radio and protocol for use in TV Whitespace. That failed to get traction, but the company was acquired by Huawei and the technology repurposed to work in the licensed spectrum that’s used for LTE. Because it does not have the baggage of backward compatibility, there’s a fair chance that the silicon could get down to the $1 mark.
These two approaches are essentially incompatible, and it was interesting to speculate how 3GPP would resolve the difference between them. Hence I was intrigued to see the resulting specification when it was published. When you start to read it, you can see how they managed to get it out so quickly. Instead of trying to find a compromise, it includes both the Huawei / Vodafone and Ericsson / Nokia / Intel options, so it is entirely up the chip vendor and network operator to decide which they support. That means that a user or manufacturer has absolutely no idea of whether an NB-IoT product they make will work on any particular NB-IoT network. It’s as if the acronym should really be Nobody Believes the Internet of Things.
It’s a fudge, where the specification group has produced some pieces of paper to meet a deadline and then passed everything over to a PR department which is taking the post-truth approach to promoting the technology. It would be nice to think that the specification group had realised that this first release was just a PR exercise and were working on harmonising the two conflicting proposals, but it seems they’re ignoring that and looking at adding location features instead, presumably because LoRa is offering that, and they don’t want to be left behind again. In other words, bells and whistles are more important to them than making NB-IoT work.
Making it work appears to be left to market forces. Vodafone is trumpeting the first commercial NB-IoT network. At the same time, Sonera, in Finland is announcing the first commerical NB-IoT trial. Although that may seem confusing, there is no contradiction here. Both are telling the truth, as Vodafone is using Huawei’s NB-IoT, which is totally different for the Nokia NB-IoT which Sonera is using. Nobody knows which variant will win. The key player in this could end up being Huawei. They have a captive silicon supplier in Hisilicon, which should help them get to the $1 chip price point. If they could persuade the Chinese Government to deploy hundreds of millions of devices in the country, this could make it the de facto standard. Nokia, Ericsson and Intel are unlikely to concede without a struggle, but with a higher cost and the lack of scale that a Government backed deployment in China could provide, they may struggle to gain momentum.
Unfortunately, this type of commercial battle generally doesn’t help the market. Without global compatibility, manufacturers will be loath to adopt the technology, as they have no idea whether it will work in any target market. That reduces volumes, which keeps chip costs high. It also delays all of the important things like developing test equipment and compliance programs which are vital to develop a robust network, which further undermines confidence. To survive, NB-IoT needs to be a single low cost, globally interoperable standard. In its current form, NB-IoT is dead.
While it goes through its death throes, the LPWAN suppliers will make mischief.
Sigfox is being aggressive in pricing, both for modules and data contracts. They recently announced that modules will be available for just $3 in 2017 and already have data plans with charges as low as $1.50 per year. They also desperately need to get the number of connections up, so will probably offer even lower costs in the near future. The company has raised over $300 million in funding and is aiming for an IPO in 2018. However, they feel that they need to get above 100 million active devices to persuade the market to support a decent valuation. So their investors will be putting pressure on them to get more connections made as soon as possible, potentially commoditising the IoT connectivity market in an attempt to buy market share from their rivals.
LoRa is a more distributed community, with multiple vendors providing parts of the ecosystem. However, LoRa has a significant difference from other LPWAN offerings, which could be important. It is the fact that anyone can buy a gateway and set up their own network. A crowdfunded initiative – the Things Network, has designed modules and gateways and persuaded the electronics distributor Farnell / Element14 to sell them in the same way they sell Raspberry Pis. For those who don’t know it, the Raspberry Pi is a highly effective embedded computing board. Originally designed to help teach coding in schools, it has been adopted by the maker community as the basis for thousands of projects and products. Farnell have recently announced that they have shipped their ten millionth Raspberry Pi.
The Things Network / Farnell initiative is relevant, as they will be selling LoRa gateways for €250. In other words, for €250, anyone can become an Internet of Things network operator covering a radius of around 5km. The Things Network – a development community attempting to build a global LoRa network, is providing compatibility layers behind that which will stitch many of these gateways together. Costs will probably be slightly higher than Sigfox, but this will appeal to an open source community, with the innovation benefits that brings to an emerging technology.
There are issues about scaling. Tech hotspots like Cambridge, Amsterdam and Berlin could each have over a thousand LoRa gateways by Christmas 2017, which could make or break the technology. It will be an interesting experiment. It may also give Ingenu an opportunity, as they’ve been in the game longer and appear to have a more robust technology in terms of scalability. But they’ve not achieved the same traction in the minds of IoT developers yet.
This brings us to the important part, which is what this means for network operators? Other than Vodafone, who have firmly nailed their colours onto the NB-IoT mast, most operators are hedging their bets by flirting with at least one proprietary LPWAN option. However, in order to get critical mass, contract prices are racing to the bottom. SK telecom is down to $0.30 per month and Sigfox’s pricing will probably push that down to below $2 a year in the near future. That’s a long way away from the $50- $200 that operators get from their current M2M contracts.
At $2 a year, 20 billion devices will contribute around 4% of current global mobile subscription revenues. That is probably less than network operators currently make from their GPRS subscriptions, yet it will replace much of that revenue. In other words, by supporting 20 billion IoT devices, the network operators will probably be making less money. Let me emphasise that point. The IoT opportunity of tens of billions of connected devices could reduce mobile operator revenue, not increase it.
Many mobile operators seem to think that they will make money from other parts of the IoT value chain, like cloud services or data analytics, but there is little indication that they’re well positioned for that. Amazon, Google and a host of others are already there. In the next few years, the volume in deployments will probably be using the LPWAN standards of Sigfox and LoRa. The developers who choose them will naturally turn to Amazon and Google, giving them the opportunity to further refine their IoT offerings. I’ll cover this in more detail in a future article.
Despite the present debacle over NB-IoT, the developers at 3GPP are bright – they will eventually get a specification out which meets the industry’s requirements, whether that’s driven by market forces winning out or technical decisions. However, my guess is that it may not be before 2023, as that’s how long wireless standards take. Which gives the different LPWAN standards plenty of time to play, and time for the cloud and analytics providers to shake out, settle down and start some serious customer acquisition.
The great thing about 3GPP standards is that they’re dead easy to roll out. In most cases they’re simply a software upgrade for the base stations. So it won’t take long to go from a final standard to global availability. At which point most IoT manufacturers will probably migrate to it, signalling the end of the short-lived LPWAN era. Of course, most of the LPWAN players and their investors are looking for shorter term returns, so they may already have disappeared. Even five years is a long time in a venture funded world.
What will be missing in the future NB-IoT world will be the hoped-for revenue. The years of LPWAN competition will have driven any profits out of NB-IoT, leaving the operators as pipes. It will also have established other players higher up in the value chain who can cream off what profit there is to be made. A future variant of NB-IoT will come to life and dominate as the connectivity standard for IoT, not least because as volumes grow, the licensed spectrum that operators own will offer a Quality of Service that is missing from the LPWAN offerings. It will also provide the certainty that manufacturers are desperate for, which is that the network will be a stable solution which is available for fifteen to twenty years. NB-IoT will wipe out any remaining alternatives, but it will not be the IoT pot of gold that many in the industry believe.
There is a final sting in the tail of this story, which is that for years we have been striving to develop low power, wide area connectivity which will enable a sensor battery life of ten years or more. The irony is that we now have a set of different LPWAN options which look as if they do support a ten year battery life, but it’s unlikely that any of them will still be operating in ten years’ time. In other words, battery life now exceeds network life.
One wonders how we got to this point? There is little good news for an equipment manufacturer, who is faced with the prospect that whatever connectivity solution they choose today, it will probably disappear within the next ten years. In other words, their product obsolescence is in the hands of their choice of network operator. But that’s the problem when you forget your King is dying and everyone spends their time running around backing pretenders to the throne. Be careful what you wish for. NB-IoT is dead. Long live NB-IoT.
17 comments ↓
#1 Joe joe on 12.13.16 at 4:35 pm
Overall a well written article though one may not agree to all the arguments.
The article has couple of mistakes like Sigfox support 140 msg (not 14) of 12 bytes. Sigfox module is available under 2$.
The author seems confused over NBIoT and eMTC which are both part of 3GPP yet quite different. Above all whosoever believe that NBIoT is a simple software upgrade lives in ‘HEAVEN’. In the first place you need add new network entities like SCEF and C-SGN, then need hardware upgrade eNB, then you need to upgrade a lot of softwares of eNB as well as network elements such as OSS, HSS…The overall cost is HUGE, multiple times rolling out unlicensed band LPWA networks.
The author argue that NBIoT will only prevail in the end owing to QoS. Do you ever listen that telco have given qos commitment for M2M or any cellular services? They always take no risk and charge huge amounts with BE service standards. Finally the cost of NBIoT services per annum will never be comparable to unlicensed LPWA due to huge CAPEX and above all huge OPEX of teleco organizations. The best ending would have been that as the market is BIllions of devices, unlicensed and licensed will coexist with each having certain advantages and sweet spot of offerings.
#2 Nick on 12.13.16 at 5:21 pm
Thanks for the comments. The message numbers I quoted for Sigfox were for their most frugal plan. I’m not sure whether that’s available in all countries. I believe that 140 messages per day is the maximum plan. I’ve not seen a $2 module yet – the one they recently announced (http://www.thinxtra.com/2016/11/sigfox-ultra-low-cost-modules/) is USD 3, but I’m sure that will price will go down with volume.
I don’t believe I am confusing NB-IOT with eMTC, although given the proliferation of acronyms coming out of 3GPP it’s possible I’m behind the curve. When I went through the documents cited in the NB-IoT press release I found they contained conflicting proposals from the two camps, with no indication that they were being harmonised. That’s also been confirmed in a couple of recent presentations from the GSMA. So if I’m confused, I’m not alone.
I do agree about the huge cost of rolling any of this out. However, it’s a small part of the ongoing costs of future LTE releases. If the networks push back against 5G, which I suspect they will do, then the infrastructure suppliers will probably bite the bullet and include these in future upgrades as they realise that they need to find more ways of differentiating their 4G offerings.
One thing I didn’t talk about is how well the LPWAN options will scale? Ingenu, in their former existence as On-Ramp, learnt that scaling LPWAN is far from trivial and spent a lot of time and money in upgrading their network and protocols. I don’t think Sigfox and LoRa have reached that pain point yet, but you have to wonder whether we can support 50 million IoT devices in half a MHz of unlicensed spectrum?
I didn’t intend that QoS would be a major reason for a return to cellular suppliers, but I do suspect that we will find unlicensed spectrum deficient. Whether operators can charge more for QoS is the big question. Once IoT companies have got used to the $1 per year contracts from LPWAN they’re unlikely to want to pay the network operators more. So the other question is what happens if we hit unlicensed spectrum crunch? If that means a price rise, then the IoT will stop in its tracks. If it doesn’t, the operators will have a very lean time. What’s worrying is that neither are good outcomes, particularly for anyone investing in the IoT.
The info about Sigfox messages offerings is public in many blogs but there is no option of 14 msg per day but highest one is 140msg/day and minimum with 2 msg/day which is valid to all of their networks. Sigfox Wisol module for EU and ME is available in 1.89$ at low volumes, I have confirmed from some guys who are now actually developing devices on it. In fact Wisol confirms commercial availability of modules for EU and ME. For US and ANZ module price is below 3$, samples are available now.
For telco, if you go simply on Press Releases mostly they are misleading and inaccurate. I have seen such press releases, in fact drafted them myself as this is what telco do. You need to verify info from sources to see what’s behind the scenes. There are no variants of NBIoT in 3GPP, unless you mix up eMTC, ECGSM and NBIoT which are all very different.
For Massive IoT rollout, cost is one of the main factor. I bet on unlicensed because operators have to pay for spectrum license (may it be 200khz), IPR cost as part of chipsets, CAPEX and OPEX as mentioned earlier . I believe that IoT market is too huge for one single technology to digest alone, so many will sustain and will find their sweet spots like NBIoT or other cellular technologies for slightly high data rate with better command and control mechanism where customers are willing to pay more while LoRa for private networks and Sigfox for very bottom part of the pivot with limited downlink and uplink and cheapest cost.
And only the time will tell what happens, till then I keep my fingers crossed!
PS: I put LoRa for private only because already many interference and capacity issues are reported globally and they are killing bandwidth. Sigfox capacity with 200khz is quite good, at least never heard or capacity or interference issue.
Thanks for the update on pricing.
With regards to the NB-IoT press release, I also don’t believe PR. So I dug down into the change request it referenced, which is available at http://www.3gpp.org/images/PDF/R13_IOT_rev3.pdf. If you then start reading through the documents that are being submitted to release 13, you find the inconsistencies.
The problem with multiple different standards is which one does a manufacturer choose if they’re shipping a global product? One support call wipes out the profits from adding wireless from tens of devices. Which is why many manufacturers may just wait.
#5 Patrick Burns on 12.16.16 at 5:50 pm
Nick – illuminating piece and surprised more hasn’t been written on this given what is at stake for the cellular industry.
“The great thing about 3GPP standards is that they’re dead easy to roll out. In most cases they’re simply a software upgrade for the base stations. So it won’t take long to go from a final standard to global availability. At which point most IoT manufacturers will probably migrate to it, signalling the end of the short-lived LPWAN era.”
I work mostly with industrial IoT customers and hear something quite different from them: there is little appetite for relying on a carrier for IoT infrastructure. There are exceptions, but so far I don’t see NB-IoT dominating in closed-loop networks, but maybe you have a different perspective.
You’re right in pointing out that there is effectively a “dark WAN” out there already, in the form of proprietary wireless networks, which already carry a lot of the current IoT traffic. They may well offer better QoS than cellular networks. It’s interesting that some of the bigger ones, such as Telensa, have not taken the route of jumping onto the “come and connect with me” bandwagon, but are quietly getting on with expanding their existing business model of enabling vertical sectors. I.e. they’re following a more traditional business model, rather than rushing for an IPO or exit.
#7 Patrick Burns on 12.17.16 at 5:12 am
“At which point most IoT manufacturers will probably migrate to it, signalling the end of the short-lived LPWAN era.”
If most IoT networks are and will be closed loop and most IoT endpoints will exist in closed loop networks and NB-IoT won’t be used in closed loop networks, what exactly is the market opportunity for NB-IoT that would cause IoT manufacturers to migrate to it? The feedback from industrial users is that the cellular opportunity there will be mostly limited to backhaul. TCO, rumors about not-so-great NB-IoT battery life, network security/management concerns — not exactly conditions for industrial sector endpoint domination by cellular. Any cellular carriers or analysts with bullish forecasts for industrial NB-IoT endpoint deployments should be heavily scrutinized.
NB-IoT’s better prospects may lie in consumer markets, where ease of use, more tolerance for shorter battery life, and an existing installed base give it some short-term advantages, but as anyone with home automation scars will testify, this is a mosh pit. Unlicensed band LPWAN network operators who can solve for ease of use will compete here, too. And combined with your statement “The IoT opportunity of tens of billions of connected devices could reduce mobile operator revenue, not increase it.” makes the cellular foray into the IoT way more problematic than I think most analysts are prepared to admit today.
It’s not yet clear which unlicensed LPWAN radio will win the LPWAN war, but I strongly disagree with the argument that LPWAN’s are a short lived, mischief-making fad. To the contrary, I don’t see any reason why LPWAN technologies like LoRa or TI’s CC13XX series cannot encroach on traditional low power LAN incumbents, offering better signal propagation and more modern networking stacks. A well-managed execution effort by a LPWAN company/standards body in the unlicensed band has more long-term potential for manufacturers to migrate to it than does a comparable effort from the cellular side.
#8 Gong Jian (Ken) on 12.20.16 at 7:45 am
Hi, Nick,
Could you please explain what makes you believe there are differences between NB-IoT of Huawei/Vodafone and NB-IoT of Ericsson/Nokia? What my colleagues told me is that they are exactly same thing and Ericsson/Nokia’s NB-IoT also support guard-band deployment. I’ll be very grateful if you can share some evidences showing the conflicts of the two NB-IoT alternatives.
Thanks & BR.
#9 Nick on 12.20.16 at 12:31 pm
The mains difference I understand between them is the philosophy about how they coexist with existing networks. From what I can see, the Huawei / Vodafone approach comes from a clean sheet approach, where a cellular operator would reserve spectrum for the IoT. The Ericsson / Nokia approach allows it to coexist within an LTE band, where it could share spectrum with other LTE traffic.
That sounds a simple difference, but it has big ramifications. If NB-IoT is going to exist with other LTE traffic, the radios need to be able to monitor and interpret what else is happening and schedule accordingly. That means more complex radios and processing. The effect of that is to increase cost and reduce battery life. For an operator this may seem good, as they can be more dynamic in terms of allocating their spectrum usage, which is a good selling point for cellular operators. However, the increased complexity encourages chip vendors to add other features, typically combining NB-IoT with Cat M, further pushing up the cost.
If they decide not to coexist with LTE, the implementation can be much simpler, but operators will need to allocate spectrum solely for IoT, which is something they don’t like doing, particularly before the market has taken off. From an industry point of view, the NB-IOT spectrum should be common to every operator around the world. If it’s not, then you need to go back to more complex radios, which can cope with every network they encounter, which drives the cost up again.
In the short term, we will see both. That means that a manufacturer choosing NB-IOT can’t be sure it will work on any network, which is not good for growing volume. In time, the cellular industry will make a choice which should provide global access, but we will probably need a second or third release of NB-IOT to reach that point. Right now, most NB-IOT development is being done for the benefit of cellular infrastructure and silicon suppliers, not for the industries which will end up using it.
#10 Nick on 12.20.16 at 12:52 pm
I didn’t mean to imply they’re a fad. I do think they’re making mischief, but they have every right to, as 3GPP has failed to deliver. The interesting question is how short- or long-lived they will be?
There’s are a number of parts to that question. The first is whether any burn and die? There is a lot of investment in some of them, and if they don’t deliver, then investors may walk away, leaving the network at risk of collapse. Another option could be to find a niche and concentrate on that, rather than trying to be a global IoT network. Telensa is a perfect example of how to play that game. Another is to merge into a future NB-IOT specification.
My comment that when NB-IOT becomes stable, manufacturers will migrate to it is pragmatic. The thing that manufacturers want for IoT is a standard that is global, robust and which will be there through a product line’s life, which means ten to fifteen years. That is what cellular networks do and have a history of doing. And it’s what LPWAN networks don’t have a history of. Yet. Remember this is about billions of devices, not what we hear promoted today, which is mostly makers trying to build at scale.
I don’t believe that manufacturers will migrate because of cost, dissatisfaction with LPWAN, throughput or any other technical reason. They will migrate because in their eyes, mobile operators are global utilities and global companies trust global utilities for infrastructure. It’s the old question of “would you base your business on a fifteen person startup that’s only been in existence for eighteen months”? That is the biggest threat to LPWAN. They have five years to prove they can become utilities, which is going to be a very hard task. If they don’t manage that, or find a profitable niche, then they may find they’re no longer relevant.
It may not. That’s why there are still so many successful private wireless networks. However, I expect to see some get pushed out at the next round of spectrum auctions, as more and more is gobbled up by the cellular operators.
The thing with the industrial space is it’s all based on sensible investment and return decisions, which I consider M2M rather than IoT. The latter needs scale to get out shareable data, which is a different game.
#12 Michael Elling on 02.06.17 at 11:45 pm
The allegory of the cave comes to mind. What if in all this 2-D debate we’re incapable of seeing a third dimension; namely that the business model of the MNOs and not the tech per se, or the process of dualing standards, is flawed?
In a period of rapid obsolescence there has to be a better model for supply/demand clearing for more rapid returns. Sharing of customers, revenues, devices and infrastructure comes to mind; yet this only happens with settlements. With a greater or lesser orientation towards net neutrality and bill and keep we have been moving away from settlements over the last 2 decades.
Settlements between actors (north-south and east-west in the informational stack) are price signals that provide incentives and disincentives. As this is anathema to the 4 layer IP folks, maybe we should begin a discussion about this and let the carriers have the networks and eat them too. Just as long as they get out of their doghouse siloes.
Michael, NYC
#13 Jay Lee on 02.14.17 at 4:32 am
I truly enjoyed reading your article and found it very interesting. My question is along the same line as Ken’s (Gong Jian) in that there is no difference in the actual frozen Release 13 from Huawei’s CIoT and Nokia’s LTE-NB (code named LTE-extDRX in Release 13).
Huawei had pushed its CIoT (which is what you referred to as the “clean slate approach” based on its acquisition of Neul) until the freeze date in June 2016 of Release 13. However, after June 2016, Huawei no longer mentions CIoT, does this mean the actual Release 13 does not contain Huawei’s approach? Can you kindly list the actual content of Release 13 where you had identified the existence of Huawei’s non-bachward-compatible “clean slate” approach in it? More specifically, the approved RAN specs RP-160456, RP-160443 and RP-1604760in Release 13 are all LTE-extDRX, and aren’t all these Nokia’s propsals and none from Huawei?
Thanks a lot and I very much look forward to your insights.
#14 Nick on 02.16.17 at 4:44 pm
Jay,
Thanks a lot for your comments and questions. Unfortunately I didn’t keep a note of the individual documents in the released set. When I looked at them I had hoped to see a clear decision to use the clean slate approach, as that provides the most obvious route down to a $1 chip. Instead, the bulk of the documents suggested that the committee had gone for the more backwards compatible approach, which gives the “advantage” of coexisting with other LTE activity. That is obviously a preference from cellular operators, as they can dynamically adjust spectrum to cope with the level of usage. However, it means a considerably more complex chip, raising the cost. It also inevitably plays to a desire to support more bands, so any global solution ends up with a more expensive antenna and front end. Which is not going to help NB-IoT in its battle with the LPWANs.
However, I found bits of the Huawei proposals still included, which suggested to me that this release remains something of a “pick the bits you like” standard, where different players can select whatever they feel is the most attractive combination of features for their ongoing trials. That may a good way to get early trials running, not least because whatever option a company may have picked can be continued, but I don’t think it’s a good way to write a specification, as ultimately it comes down to letting the market decide, largely based on who gets to critical mass first. We may then find that the resulting solution doesn’t provide the correct cost point to support a credible business model.
If that’s the case, the LPWAN players will continue to gain ground, until the point where the GSMA has another moment of realising that they’ve dropped the ball, and we see a repeat of the knee-jerk panic to get a competing specification out. Currently the process does not feel that it’s being led by people who are really serious about getting the best possible specification out, rather than getting something out as quickly as possible. For implementers, that just feeds uncertainty and pushes them further into the arms of the LPWAN fold.
The other part that worries me is that the radio is probably the easier bit. What will stall the IoT far more comprehensively is the lack of a credible provisioning method. Putting SIM cards into billions of devices is not practical. Yet every time I talk to operators about their IoT plans, they always revolve around SIM cards. If the NB-IOT group were looking at solving provisioning in Releases 14 and 15 I’d have some confidence that they knew what they’re doing. Instead, their desire to add location seems to suggest that they’re locked into an orgy of technical masturbation, rather than understanding what the market needs. Just because LoRa is trying to do it, doesn’t mean it’s a good idea. So my hope of seeing a $1 NB-IoT solution still seems a long way away. But I expect to see an LPWAN one within the next 18 months. Which should be just in time to get a whole new raft of “enhanced NB-IOT” PR announcements for MWC 2019 as everyone starts again.
#15 Pete on 04.12.17 at 1:19 pm
I tend to agree with joe joe’s comment, that eMTC and NB-IoT got mixed up.
When you talk about the cut down approach by Nokia and Ericsson, that seems to me is LTE R13 Cat M1 (aka eMTC).
https://www.u-blox.com/en/product/sara-r404m-module
And when you talk about the “clean sheet“ approach by Huawei and Vodafone, that sounds to me like LTE R13 Cat NB1 (aka NB-IoT)
https://www.u-blox.com/en/product/sara-n2-series
#16 David on 06.28.17 at 11:28 am
A very informative and interesting article – thanks for writing it. Just one side point really, that there are different IoT markets. Yes the 10 year battery, very small data volume is one and maybe the main market, but there is also the market where NB-IOT is being deployed in volume today, that of cars of which there are are already over 50M devices deployed, where low power is not a consideration and probably quite large data volumes are required, so NB-IoT fits quite well there.
#17 Nick on 07.24.17 at 7:48 am
Absolutely, but in a way you’ve answered the point – it’s 50 million today and will grow organically from there. It’s not the tens of billions. To get to that number we really do need low power.
Of course, it may be that we don’t, in which case automotive will be the major drive, just as it has been for Bluetooth via handsfree.
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HomeAbout UsNewsGartner Includes Prognoz in Magic Quadrant for Advanced Analytics Platforms
Gartner Includes Prognoz in Magic Quadrant for Advanced Analytics Platforms
Gartner, Inc., the world’s leading information technology research and advisory company, has included Prognoz in the Magic Quadrant for Advanced Analytics Platforms report* for our flagship product—the Prognoz Platform. The Magic Quadrant for Advanced Analytics Platforms recognizes market leaders among Business Intelligence vendors whose software offers sophisticated methods for data analysis beyond traditional approaches such as querying and reporting.
“For nearly twenty-five years, we at Prognoz have focused on a specific goal: the development of modeling and forecasting tools,” said Dmitriy Andrianov, the founder of Prognoz. “We believe this recognition by Gartner for the second consecutive year proves the long-term viability of our business approach. We are particularly happy that the experts at Gartner identified the development of advanced analytics and prescriptive analytics among the most important trends for the future.”
According to Gartner, “The advanced analytics platforms that are the focus of the Magic Quadrant this year use a visual workflow environment (as opposed to a coding-based approach) targeting core data scientists and, increasingly, "citizen data scientists" and advanced business analysts. These platforms also help experienced data scientists become more productive by offering reusability of workflows, more automation, analytic guidance and accelerators for common use cases.”
The Prognoz Platform is a BI platform designed to develop high-tech business applications on a turnkey basis. The platform has a broad range of tools for creating desktop, Web-based, and mobile applications for data visualization, OLAP, reporting, and modeling and forecasting of business processes. The platform fully supports modern market demands for Business Intelligence, such as advanced analytics capabilities, high performance, an intuitive interface, and end-user-oriented tools, to name a few. In particular, the platform supports operation through a system of cloud services, seamless integration with Microsoft Office, social media, and geographic information systems.
* Gartner “Magic Quadrant for Advanced Analytics Platforms” by Lisa Kart, Gareth Herschel, Alexander Linden, and Jim Hare, February 9, 2016.
Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product, or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner's research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.
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Entertainment City to wrap up with final weekend of excitement
Entertainment City organisers invited residents and visitors to enjoy its final weekend before the Summer in Qatar highlight closes its doors on Saturday 13th July at 11 pm. Entertainment-seekers of all ages can enjoy the wide range of games and activities, including the largest bouncy castle, a mini-golf course that takes you around the world, mobile trampoline park, inflatable zone, retro arcade games, virtual reality games, as well as a vast food area.
Cricket fans can also gather to watch a live broadcast of the semi-final of the International Cricket Council (ICC) World Cup, on Thursday 11th at 12:30pm. The screens will also show sporting rivals Australia and England as they meet for a second time in the second semi-final.
Entertainment Cityis part of the Summer in Qatar program curated by Qatar National Tourism Council (QNTC) and its 30+ partners from the public and private sectors for residents and visitors to enjoy the season’s fun and festivities. The programcontains a wide range of activities for people of all ages and interests. These include family-friendly entertainment shows, music concerts and comedy performances by top international artists, summer camps for children and youth, thrilling experiences and sporting tournaments in addition to exciting travel, hospitality and retail promotions running until 16 August.
entertainment city
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Author`s name Dmitry Sudakov
Does Russia need luxury tax?
The updated list of the Ministry for Industry and Trade counts 909 positions. The list includes 201 new positions. Spokespeople for the department said that increased taxation would affect vehicles with a price tag of more than 3 million rubles. Thus, the list of vehicles that fall under the "luxury tax" has been expanded.
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Source: Pravda.Ru photo archive
For vehicles priced from three to five million rubles (year-old), the coefficient is 1.5; for vehicles aged one or two years - 1.3, and for two or three year-old vehicles, the coefficient is 1.1. A car with a price tag of 5-10 million rubles (up to five years old) would entail a double tax. A vehicle costing more than 10-15 million rubles (aged 10-20 years) would entail a triple tax.
Does Russia need the "luxury tax?" Pravda.Ru asked this question to experts.
Director of the analytical department at Alpari company, Alexander Razuvaev:
"The Ministry for Industry and Trade has expanded the list of vehicles subject to the "luxury tax." Many in Russia paid attention to the social aspect of the tax: for some reason the luxury tax does not embrace either elite real estate, or yachts, or football clubs. Does Russia need a separate law on the luxury tax, which they tried to adopt, but have not adopted yet? I believe that we need this law.
"I do not think that the budget will receive a lot from this law, because Russia's primary source of income is the oil and gas sector. Yet, one needs such a tax to reduce social tensions and other things. Luxury real estate, elite vehicles and other luxury items should be taxed accordingly. As for football clubs, they do not bring money so far. For example, the main shareholder of Spartak, Mr. Fedun, has invested about a billion dollars in the club, and he is unlikely to receive the money back.
"I understand why the State Duma does not promote the idea of the luxury tax in Russia. There are very wealthy people in Russia, like in other countries. The privatization that Russia had to experience 25 years ago was a very complicated process."
Chairman of the Committee for Monetary and Financial Policy, member of the expert council in "Business Russia" public organization, Igor Lavrovsky:
"If a person has two apartments in France, he or she is supposed to either live there or rent it to someone. An apartment is not supposed to be an empty investment. In Russia, there are many "frozen apartments" that have been removed from the market. They do not bring any profit to anyone. One needs to introduce financial leverage to force people to put money into circulation. "The share of luxury vehicles in Russia is minuscule, and luxury tax payments would be a drop in the bucket for the Russian budget. In Russia, we have not clearly defined the notion of "luxury." I think that Russia has to come a long way before we can do it."
Read article on the Russian version of Pravda.Ru
Topics cars luxury russian people
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Township Council » Meetings » Minutes: January 4, 2007
All meeting minutes posted on the township website are unofficial minutes. Official copies of minutes may be obtained from the township clerk.
Minutes: January 4, 2007
A regular meeting of the Randolph Township Council was called to order at 8:00 p.m. by Mayor Obremski. This meeting is held pursuant to the New Jersey Open Public Meetings Act. Adequate notice of the meeting has been provided by posting written notice of the time, date, location and, to the extent known, the agenda of the meeting in Randolph Township. This notice was posted on the Bulletin Board within Town Hall, it was filed with the Township Clerk, and it was provided to those persons or entities requesting notification. Notice was also provided to the Morris County Daily Record and the Randolph Reporter on January 6, 2006 by faxing them the annual resolution adopted by the Council on January 5, 2006. The annual resolution, which included this meeting date, was advertised in the Morris County Daily Record, the official newspaper of the Township of Randolph, on January 9, 2006 and in the Randolph Reporter on February 2, 2006.
Councilman Algeier
Councilman Alpert
Councilman Metz
Councilman Napoliello
Councilwoman Price
Deputy Mayor Mitsch
Mayor Obremski
Also present: Township Manager John Lovell and Attorney Tiena Cafoni
Mayor Obremski led the Pledge of Allegiance.
COUNCIL AND MANAGER REPORTS
Manager Lovell reminded the Council of a Highlands Council Commission presentation on January 9, 2007, at 2:00 p.m. at the Frelinghuysen Arboretum.
OPEN TO PUBLIC
Nancie Ludwig, 14 Lookout Road, expressed disappointment that the Council did not allow residents to speak after the Pool Committee presented their report to the Council. She requested the Town Council and the chairman of the Pool Committee be available to the public for questions and comments throughout the process of discussions about the proposed pool. Mrs. Ludwig requested the Council contact the Board of Education to discuss the lack of recycling at the schools.
Deputy Mayor Mitsch responded that as the former liaison to the Board of Education, the issue of recycling at the schools has been raised with the Board.
Adam Zyto, 18 Alpine Drive, asked the Council why the proposed pool was a part of budgetary discussion since no formal decision has been made to construct a pool.
Manager Lovell responded that in order for a pool to move forward in 2007 it must be referenced in the capital outlay program from a planning perspective.
SOIL MOVEMENT HEARING—CAMPUS PLAZA
An attorney from Greenbaum Rowe Smith & Davis representing the applicant noted the proposed project is approved to be completed in three distinct phases, which is why they had requested a six-month time period for the soil movement process. The Township Engineer has objected to the six-month time period and suggested a 90-day time period instead. Due to the phasing aspect of this project, a shorter time period may not be adequate.
Manager Lovell summarized the stipulations of the permit as follows:
The time period for soil movement begins when the bond is posted
Soil movement activities only during the hours of 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. or dark, whichever comes first
Top soil should be retained on site
Removal of soil is limited to Route 10 and Dover-Chester Road to Route 10
Soil is to be disposed of beyond the limits of the township
Loading and unloading equipment must be done on site
If topsoil is in excess of six inches on site, excess can be removed at the discretion of the Township Engineer
Applicant must concur and comply with all traffic recommendations of the Randolph Township Police Chief
A cash bond in the amount of $20,000.00 shall be posted
The applicant must comply with all Planning Board conditions
The attorney noted that she will speak to her client regarding the limitation to Route 10 and not being able to use county roads for moving the soil.
The application for a soil movement permit for Campus Plaza will be carried to the meeting on January 18, 2007, so that the attorney can discuss the issues of a time allotment for soil movement and the restriction of county roads with her client.
Ms. Cafoni noted for the record that notice was provided to the public on this application and the application is being carried to January 18, 2007, at 8:00 p.m. at the Municipal Building. No further notice will be provided. Anyone interested in this issue can be heard at the public hearing on January 18, 2007.
ZONE CHANGE REQUEST
A) Baker Residential
The applicant is interested in developing Block 44, Lot 4. Aspects of the presentation included:
background on Baker Residential
the development of 69 single family cluster homes
the development of 4 single family COAH units
the development of 60 stacked townhomes
the development of 12 COAH townhome units
site plan details
architectural and landscape features
anticipated price range of units
Councilman Algeier would prefer the development scale back the size of the proposed community center, eliminate plans for a pool at the site, reconfigure some units to include rear-loading garages, and possibly adding front porches. He also expressed concern with the units having a possible third bedroom, making it more amenable to a family and increasing enrollment in the schools.
Mayor Obresmki expressed concern with the high price anticipated for the units and would prefer something more affordable.
The recommendation was made by the Council that Baker Residential revise their plan and return to the Council for another presentation.
B) Avalon Bay
The applicant is interested in developing Block 44, Lot 11. Aspects of the presentation included:
past projects built and managed by Avalon Bay
the development of 102 luxury rental units and 13 COAH units
anticipated price range for 2 and 3 bedroom units
concerns with density of the proposed development
Councilwoman Price noted that perhaps not all members of the Council disagree with the idea of locating certain amenities in a development such as this proposed plan.
Councilwoman Price made a motion to refer this plan to the Planning Board. Councilman Metz seconded the motion, and the following roll call vote was taken:
AYES:
NAYS: None
C) Stark Property, Mt. Freedom LLC
The applicant is interested in developing Block 224, Lot 5. Aspects of the presentation included:
the development of a 16,000 square foot commercial building
design and architectural specifics
conditions at the site
zoning at the site
traffic concerns and implications
sewer and septic considerations
COAH obligations
Councilman Napoliello made a motion to forward this plan to the Planning Board. Deputy Mayor Mitsch seconded the motion, and the following roll call vote was taken:
Mayor Obremski asked the Manager to remind the applicant that the rezoning issue is only for his parcel, not the entire tract of that area that was referenced during the presentation.
(1) Amend Land Development Ordinances—Cell Towers/Antennas
Manager Lovell reported that a great deal of effort was went into the drafting of this ordinance. He noted that currently applications for cell towers are made before the Board of Adjustment and Randolph does not have control over where the cell towers are placed. The new ordinance will give Randolph some control and recommends introducing the ordinance.
BE IT RESOLVED that an Ordinance entitled “AN ORDINANCE AMENDING THE LAND DEVELOPMENT ORDINANCE OF THE TOWNSHIP OF RANDOLPH, MORRIS COUNTY, NEW JERSEY, TO REGULATE WIRELESS TELECOMMUNICATION FACILITIES AND INSTALLATIONS IN THE TOWNSHIP OF RANDOLPH” be introduced, read by title by the Township Clerk and passed on first reading.
BE IT RESOLVED that said Ordinance shall be further considered for final passage at the meeting of the Township Council of the Township of Randolph on the 1st of February, 2007, at 8:00 in the evening, prevailing time, at the Municipal Building in said Township, at which time and place all persons interested shall be given an opportunity to be heard concerning said ordinance.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Township Clerk be authorized and directed to advertise said ordinance in full with the Notice of Introduction thereof, in the official designated newspaper according to law.
Deputy Mayor Mitsch made a motion to introduce the ordinance. Councilwoman Price seconded the motion, and the following roll call vote was taken:
(2) Amend Land Development Ordinance—OL Zone and PO/R Standards and Zoning Map Changes
Manager Lovell summarized the proposed changes to the zoning ordinance.
BE IT RESOLVED that an Ordinance entitled “AN ORDINANCE AMENDING THE LAND DEVELOPMENT ORDINANCE OF THE TOWNSHIP OF RANDOLPH, MORRIS COUNTY, NEW JERSEY, TO MODIFY THE PO/R DISTRICT, TO REZONE CERTAIN PROPERTIES AND TO MAKE VARIOUS OTHER AMENDMENTS” be introduced, read by title by the Township Clerk and passed on first reading.
Deputy Mayor Mitsch made a motion to introduce the ordinance. Councilman Metz seconded the motion, and the following roll call vote was taken:
(3) Amend Chapter 10 to Create a Community Services Advisory Committee
Manager Lovell stated that this ordinance will combine the responsibilities of the Community Services Committee, the Senior Citizens’ Advisory Committee, and the defunct Randolph CARES Committee. The new committee will be known as the Community Services Advisory Committee. The recommendation for this ordinance was made by several committee members.
BE IT RESOLVED that an Ordinance entitled “AN ORDINANCE COMBINING THE SENIOR CITIZENS’ ADVISORY COMMITTEE, THE COMMUNITY SERVICES COMMITTEE, AND THE RANDOLPH CARES COMMITTEE INTO A SINGLE COMMITTEE TO BE KNOWN AS THE COMMUNITY SERVICES ADVISORY COMMITTEE” be introduced, read by title by the Township Clerk and passed on first reading.
A. Committee to Advise on Facility Upgrades
Councilmen Napoliello, Alpert, and Algeier agreed to sit on a committee which will work with the Township Manager to determine upgrades necessary at municipally owned properties.
B. 2007 Meeting Calendar
Manager Lovell presented a revised 2007 Meeting Calendar for the Council’s approval.
Councilman Metz made a motion to accept the calendar as presented. Councilman Alpert seconded the motion, and the following roll call vote was taken:
R _____
WHEREAS, N.J.S.A. 10:4-6 et seq., known as the “Open Public Meetings Act” requires that all public bodies of the State of New Jersey provide adequate notice to the public of its intended meetings.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE MAYOR AND COUNCIL OF THE TOWNSHIP OF RANDOLPH, MORRIS COUNTY, NEW JERSEY, AS FOLLOWS:
1. The regular meetings of the Township Council for the Township of Randolph to discuss or act upon public business during the calendar year 2007 will be held on Thursdays on the dates listed below. Regular meetings and work session meetings are scheduled to begin at 8:00 p.m. prevailing time. The public is invited to attend work sessions, but there is no public participation except at the beginning of the meeting during the “Open To The Public” portion of the agenda. Final action may or may not be taken at all scheduled meetings which are held at the Randolph Township Municipal Building, 502 Millbrook Avenue, Randolph, New Jersey, on the following dates:
(8:00 P.M.)
COMBINED MEETING
January 4 January 18 January 25
February 1 February 15 February 22
March 1 March 15 March 29
April 5 April 19 April 26
May 3 May 17 May 31
June 7 June 21* June 28
July 10 (Tuesday) Summer Schedule Summer Schedule
August 7 (Tuesday) Summer Schedule Summer Schedule
September 6 September 20 September 27
October 2 (Tuesday) October 18* October 25
November 1 No Meeting Scheduled November 29
December 6 December 20* No Meeting Scheduled
Reorganization Meeting, Tuesday, January 1, 2008 at 2:00 p.m.
January 3, 2008 January 17, 2008 January 31, 2008
*May be cancelled depending upon legislative workload.
2. Certified copies of this said Resolution shall, within seven days of its adoption, be mailed to the Morris County Daily Record, the official newspaper designated by the Randolph Township Council, and to the Randolph Reporter.
3. A certified copy of this said Resolution shall also be maintained throughout the year 2007 on the bulletin board located immediately adjacent to the Municipal Clerk’s Office in the main hallway of the Municipal Building.
4. A certified copy of this said Resolution shall be mailed to any person requesting notices of meetings of the Township Council pursuant to N.J.S.A. 10:4-19 and whoever has paid the required fee for such notice.
C. Special Saturday Session to Discuss Mt. Freedom Village Center
Saturday, February 10, 2007, was selected as the date for a special meeting to discuss the Mt. Freedom Village Center. The meeting at the Municipal Building will begin at 8:30 a.m. and a three hour time allotment has been provided.
D. Committee to Address Highlands Act and Cross Acceptance Issues With Mine Hill
Manager Lovell noted that there is a 60-day comment period and he anticipates an extension being made to that comment period. It is his sense that Randolph begin a review of the process so that the town has an official position on the issue. He also reminded the Council there were some cross-acceptance issues with Morris County when comparing Randolph’s map to Mine Hill’s map. The Manager would like to re-establish the committee that dealt previously with the cross-acceptance process.
Councilman Napoliello and Mayor Obremski agreed to serve on the committee.
The Manager stated he will notify the Planning Board and Darren Carney, the Planning and Zoning Administrator, will begin setting up the first meeting.
E. Leasing Route 10 Property for Billboards
The Manager summarized the history of the billboards on this property. CBS Viacom has bid on the project. Randolph has the option to either enter into a five year lease for $12,500.00 per year or a ten year lease for $15,000.00 per year. Both options include receiving 25 percent of gross revenue earned from the billboards.
One advantage to entering into a ten year lease is the possibility of Viacom investing in upgrading the billboard, thus potentially increasing their sales revenue and increasing Randolph’s earnings from the billboard.
Councilman Napoliello expressed some concern about being locked into an agreement for a ten year period and favored a five year contract.
Councilman Algeier suggested the Manager inform Viacom that Randolph will enter into a five year contract with them, however, if Viacom was definitely willing to upgrade their billboard product, perhaps then Randolph would be interested in seeking a ten year contract.
Manager Lovell stated that he will present Viacom with the five year contract resolution.
COMBINED ACTION RESOLUTIONS
Manager Lovell noted that Item B should be pulled from the agenda.
Deputy Mayor Mitsch made a motion to approve the Combined Action items. Councilman Alpert seconded the motion, and the following roll call vote was taken:
A. Refunds/Adjustments Resolutions
(1) Refund Outside Tax Sale Certificate #1806 for Block 18.01, Lot 1.01—2 Middlebury Blvd to R. Rothman—$101,718.23
WHEREAS, Outside Tax Sale Certificate #1806 held by R. Rothman, assessed to Randolph Commerce Center, Block 18.01, Lot 1.01, 2 Middlebury Boulevard; and
WHEREAS, the above mentioned Tax Sale Certificate has been redeemed through the Tax Collector, including principal and interest in the amount of $84,118.23, and premium in the amount of $17,600.00.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, that the Treasurer be instructed to refund $101,718.23 to R. Rothman, holder of Tax Sale Certificate #1806.
(2) Refund Outside Tax Sale Certificate #1858 for Block 57, Lot 21, to Park Finance, LLC—$31,466.56
WHEREAS, Outside Tax Sale Certificate #1858 held by Park Finance, LLC, assessed to A. Morogeorges, Block 57, Lot 21, 32 Harmony Road; and
WHEREAS, the above mentioned Tax Sale Certificate has been redeemed through the Tax Collector, including principal and interest, in the amount of $12,866.56 and premium in the amount of $18,600.00.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, that the Treasurer be instructed to refund $31,466.56 to Park Finance, LLC, holder of Tax Sale Certificate #1858.
(3) Refund Overpayment for Reduction of 2006 Taxes, Block 42, Lot 122.03—Arrowgate Village—$7,018.40
WHEREAS, Arrowgate Village has been granted a reduction in assessed valuation for the tax year 2006 by the Tax Court of New Jersey on Block 42, Lot 122.03, known as 950 Route 10; and
WHEREAS, an overpayment exists as a result of the reduction for the year 2006 in the amount of $7,018.40; and
WHEREAS, it is recommended by the Tax Collector that this overpayment be refunded at this time.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, that the Treasurer be instructed to refund the overpayment of $7,018.40 to Arrowgate Village.
(4) Refund Overpayment for Block 77, Lot 33—312 Quaker Church Road to Quaker Village—$60,720.00
WHEREAS, Quaker Village has been granted a reduction in assessed valuation for the tax years 2005 and 2006 by the Tax Court of New Jersey on Block 77, Lot 33, known as 312 Quaker Church Road; and
WHEREAS, an overpayment exists as a result of the reduction for the year 2005 in the amount of $29,590.00 and 2006 in the amount of $31,130.00; and
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, that the Treasurer be instructed to refund the overpayment of $60,720.00 to Quaker Village.
(5) Refund Outside Tax Sale Certificate #1539 for Block 18, Lot 1.01, to Jeremy Doppelt—$248,029.67
WHEREAS, Outside Tax Sale Certificate #1539 held by Jeremy Doppelt, assessed to Randolph Commerce Center, Block 18, Lot 1.01, 11 Aspen Drive; and
WHEREAS, the above mentioned Tax Sale Certificate has been redeemed through the Tax Collector, including principal and interest in the amount of $248,029.67.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, that the Treasurer be instructed to refund $248,029.67 to Jeremy Doppelt, holder of Tax Sale Certificate #1539.
(6) Refund Outside Tax Sale Certificate #1860 for Block 119, Lot 110.101, to American Tax Funding, LLC—$18,866.97
WHEREAS, Outside Tax Sale Certificate #1860 held by American Tax Funding, LLC, assessed to Pablo Quinteros, Block 119, Lot 110.101, 1 Ridgewood Drive; and
WHEREAS, the above mentioned Tax Sale Certificate has been redeemed through the Tax Collector, including principal and interest in the amount of $2,166.97 and premium in the amount of $16,700.00.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, that the Treasurer be instructed to refund $18,866.97 to American Tax Funding, LLC, holder of Tax Sale Certificate #1860.
(7) Refund Cash Bond for Block 81, Lot 6, for 57 Carrell Road to Patricia Kiely of 2 Everdale Road—$300.00
WHEREAS, on October 31, 2006, Engineering received and deposited with the Finance Department a check in the amount of $300.00 covering a road opening cash bond for the purpose of connecting to the water line for 57 Carrell Road, Block 81, Lot 6; and
WHEREAS, the road opening has been repaired, inspected, and found to be acceptable.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that it is recommended by Carl J. Bressan, Township Engineer, that the cash bond in the amount of $300.00 be refunded to Patricia Kiely of 2 Everdale Road, Randolph, NJ 07869.
(8) Release Road Opening Bond—Block 24, Lot 116, to Thomas Marcinkowski—$300.00
WHEREAS, on November 25, 2006, Engineering received and deposited with the Finance Department a check in the amount of $300.00 covering a road opening cash bond for the purpose of connecting to the water system for 463 Millbrook Avenue, Block 24, Lot 116; and
WHEREAS, the road opening has been repaired, inspected and found to be acceptable.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that it is recommended by Carl J. Bressan, Township Engineer, that the cash bond in the amount of $300.00 be refunded to Mr. Thomas Marcinkowski, 463 Millbrook Avenue, Randolph, NJ 07869.
(9) Refund Escrow Fees for Police Detail to Various Companies
WHEREAS, the Finance Department received escrow funds for Police Detail; and
WHEREAS, the Detail work has been completed.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, Morris County, New Jersey, that it is recommended by the Finance Department that the escrow funds for the following amounts be refunded:
Lembo Realty Association—$ 142.00
Schifano Construction Corporation—$ 390.00
Douglas Collinson—$ 213.00
(10) Refund Escrow Fee for Block 53, Lot 56, to Heritage Village XVII—$255.30
WHEREAS, the Planning and Zoning Department received escrow funds from Heritage Village XVII for Block 53, Lot 56; and
WHEREAS, the project has been completed and closed out.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that it is recommended by Darren Carney, Planning and Zoning Administrator, that the escrow funds in the amount of $255.30 be refunded to Heritage Village XVII, SJC Builders, 1360 Sussex Turnpike, Randolph, NJ 07869.
(11) Refund Escrow Fee for Block 93, Lot 57, to Granite Doby, SJC Builders—$230.00
WHEREAS, the Planning and Zoning Department received escrow funds from Granite Doby for Block 93, Lot 57; and
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that it is recommended by Darren Carney, Planning and Zoning Administrator, that the escrow funds in the amount of $230.00 be refunded to Granite Doby, SJC Builders, 1360 Sussex Turnpike, Randolph, NJ 07869.
(12) Refund Escrow Fee for Block 49, Lot 2, to Heritage Village South—$1,873.50
WHEREAS, the Planning and Zoning Department received escrow funds from Heritage Village South for Block 49, Lot 2; and
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that it is recommended by Darren Carney, Planning and Zoning Administrator, that the escrow funds in the amount of $1,873.50 be refunded to Heritage Village South, SJC Builders, 1360 Sussex Turnpike, Randolph, NJ 07869.
(13) Refund of Tree Bond for Block 114, Lot 10, to Daniel Pepitone—$800.00
WHEREAS, a tree bond in the amount of $800.00 was previously posted by Daniel Pepitone, Block 114, Lot 10; and
WHEREAS, all of the requirements have been met.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that it is recommended by Darren Carney, Planning and Zoning Administrator, that the tree bond in the amount of $800.00 be refunded to Daniel Pepitone, 9 Forrest Road, Randolph, NJ 07869.
B. Approve Soil Movement Application—Campus Plaza
This item was pulled from the agenda.
C. Authorizing the Lease of Public Property at Block 195, Lot 18, for Erecting Billboards for Commercial Advertising
WHEREAS, the Township of Randolph desires to lease public property described as a portion of Tax Block 195, Lot 18, at 80 Route 10 West; and
WHEREAS, bids were received on December 5, 2006, in accordance with the Local Public Contracts Law; and
WHEREAS, CBS Outdoor, Inc., Fairfield, New Jersey, owner of the existing billboards, was the sole bidder at an annual lease price of $12,500.00 for a five-year lease plus 25 percent of revenue generated.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Township Council, Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that a contract be awarded to CBS Outdoor, Inc., at a total contract price of $12,500.00 plus 25 percent of revenue generated as described in specifications for a five-year contract beginning January 1, 2007.
D. Authorize Professional Services Agreement for Garden State Labs for Testing of Food and Water Samples
WHEREAS, there exists a need to enter into a professional services agreement with Garden State Laboratories to provide professional services with regard to testing of food and water samples; and
WHEREAS, the cost for such professional services of $3,714.00 per year are to be paid quarterly; and
WHEREAS, funds are available for this purpose; and
WHEREAS, the Local Public Contracts Law (NJSA 40A:11-5 et seq.) requires that the resolution authorizing the award for professional services without competitive bid and the contract itself must be available for public inspection.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Township Council, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that:
1. The Township of Randolph hereby authorizes the execution of a professional services agreement with Garden State Laboratories, Inc.
2. A notice of this resolution shall be printed once in the official newspaper of the Township of Randolph.
CERTIFICATION OF AVAILABILITY OF FUNDS
Dated: January 4, 2007
As required by N.J.S.A. 40A:4-57, N.J.A.C. 5:30-14.5, and any other applicable requirement, I, Michael J. Soccio, Director of Finance of the Township of Randolph, have ascertained that funds are available in the 2007 Budget—Health, Other Expense, to award a contract to Garden State Laboratories to provide professional services with regard to testing of food and water samples in the amount not to exceed $3,714.00.
Michael J. Soccio
E. Authorize Rescission (From Universal Uniforms) and Re-Awarding (to Atlantic Tactical) of Categories A, D & E Under MCCPC Contract #23 Police Uniforms and Equipment
WHEREAS, the Morris County Cooperative Pricing Council has entered into a contract dated December 7, 2006, with Universal Uniforms of Morristown, New Jersey, for Categories A, D, and E of Contract #23 (Police Uniforms and Equipment) for contract period January 1, 2007 - December 31, 2007; and
WHEREAS, Universal Uniforms was awarded Categories A, D, and E in error and should have been awarded to Atlantic Tactical of New Jersey based on their low total bid for the categories and their compliance with the bid specifications; and
WHEREAS, it is in the public’s interest to rescind Universal Uniform’s contract for Categories A, D, and E and re-award Atlantic Tactical of New Jersey the categories noted at the bid prices submitted on October 24, 2006.
Category A: Police Uniform Purchase
Category D: Police Equipment
Category E: Police Academy Uniforms and Equipment
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that the contract with Universal Uniforms be rescinded for Categories A, D, and E and re-awarded to Atlantic Tactical of New Jersey beginning January 1, 2007 - December 31, 2007.
F. Authorize the Rescission of a Portion of MCCPC Contract #16 Office Supplies for the 2007 Contract Period from Clinton Business Products and Ergospace Design; Award of Category E (Equivalent Manufacturers Furniture) to Ergospace Design
WHEREAS, the Township of Randolph on behalf of the Morris County Cooperative Pricing Council awarded a portion of Contract #16 (Office Supplies) on December 7, 2006, to Clinton Business Products and Ergospace Design; and
WHEREAS, Clinton Business Products notified the MCCPC that they could not hold their discounts for Categories B, C, D and E due to increased prices in their 2007 catalog as indicated:
Category B (Computer Equipment—40%)
Category C (Miscellaneous Equipment—39%)
Category D (Food Service Supplies—40%)
Category E (HON Furniture—50%)
and;
WHEREAS, Ergospace Design notified the MCCPC that they could not hold their discount for Category E due to increased prices in their 2007 catalog as indicated:
Category E (GLOBAL Furniture—40%)
WHEREAS, it is in the public interest to rescind Clinton Business Products’ contract for Categories B, C, D and E (Hon) and Ergospace Design’s contract for Category E (GLOBAL) noted above and re-bid the contract for the categories indicated on behalf of the MCCPC for the year 2007; and
WHEREAS, the Township of Randolph on behalf of the Morris County Cooperative Pricing Council wishes to award a portion of Category E (Furniture—EQUIVALENT MFG.) to Ergospace Design at 50% discount off their catalog prices; and
WHEREAS, bids have been advertised and received on October 24, 2006, in accordance with the “Local Public Contracts Law”; and
WHEREAS, the Township of Randolph on behalf of the MCCPC has determined that Ergospace Design submitted the highest discount for the category specified meeting the specifications and requirements of the MCCPC.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Township Council, Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that the categories awarded to Clinton Business Products and Ergospace Design on December 7, 2006, under Contract #16 (Office Supplies) be rescinded and re-bid as noted:
Clinton Business Products: Categories B, C, D and E (HON Furniture)
Ergospace Design: Category E (GLOBAL Furniture)
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED by the Township Council, Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that Category E be awarded to Ergospace Design as noted:
Category E (EQUIVALENT MANUFACTURERS Furniture)
G. Authorizing Signatures on Treatment Works Approval Permit Application for 143 Hurd Street in Mine Hill Township
WHEREAS, Vincent Borelli, the owner of the property located at 143 Hurd Street in Mine Hill Township, has the need to connect to the sanitary sewer; and
WHEREAS, the project involves the construction of the extension of a sanitary sewer, which is to be owned and operated by the Township of Mine Hill; and
WHEREAS, the sewer will connect into the Jackson Brook Interceptor, which is owned and operated by Randolph Township; and
WHEREAS, Randolph Township is requested to certify the Treatment Works Approval (TWA) application that the wastewater conveyance system has sufficient capacity to accept these additional flows; and
WHEREAS, he has retained a professional engineer who has prepared a design to replace the existing system.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Mayor and Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, that the Mayor is authorized to sign the TWA.
H. Authorizing the Abatement of 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Quarter Municipal Property Taxes for Block 27, Lot 6, and Block 199, Lot 1
WHEREAS, pursuant to Ordinance No. 2-06, the Township of Randolph (“Township”) purchased property formally known as Block 27, Lot 6, and Block 199, Lot 1, on the Official Tax Map of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey (“Property”); and
WHEREAS, the Closing of Title took place on December 14, 2006; and
WHEREAS, pursuant to the contract for the acquisition of the Property, King Land Co., former owner of the Property, paid the municipal taxes through March 31, 2006; and
WHEREAS, upon the Closing of Title to the Property, the Township must remove the Property from the Township’s tax roll so that it does not have to pay taxes to itself for land owned by the Township and the Township is responsible for the taxes until the Property is removed from the Township’s tax roll.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Township Council of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, they being the Governing Body thereof, as follows:
1. The 2nd, 3rd and 4th quarter of 2006 municipal property taxes for Block 27, Lot 6, and Block 199, Lot 1, on the Official Tax Map of the Township of Randolph, County of Morris, State of New Jersey, shall be and are hereby abated, permanently removing the Property from the Township of Randolph’s Tax Roll.
2. The Township Tax Collector, together with all other appropriate officers, employees, and professionals of the Township are hereby authorized and directed to take any and all steps necessary to effectuate the purposes of this resolution.
3. This Resolution shall take effect immediately.
I. Raffles
(1) Off-Premise Merchandise Raffle, Oak Knoll School of the Holy Child, April 28, 2007, 6:30 p.m. - 12:00 a.m. at Nash Dance Center, 10-12 Emery Avenue, Randolph, NJ
(2) Raffle License, Nixon School PTA, Tricky Tray, April 27, 2007, 8:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. at the Skylands at Randolph, Route 10, Randolph
(3) Raffle License, Nixon School PTA, On-Premise 50/50, April 27, 2007, 8:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. at the Skylands of Randolph, Route 10, Randolph
(4) Raffle License, Ironia School PTA, Basket Raffle, January 27, 2007, 10:00 a.m. to 3:45 p.m. at the Ironia School, Dover-Chester Road, Randolph
(5) Raffle License, Ironia School PTA, On-Premise 50/50, January 27, 2007, 10:00 a.m. to 3:45 p.m. at the Ironia School, Dover-Chester Road, Randolph
(6) Raffle License, Basket Raffle, Kennedy Elementary School PTA, March 23, 2007, 6:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. at the Skylands at Randolph, Route 10, Randolph, NJ
(7) Raffle License, On-Premise 50/50, Kennedy Elementary School PTA, March 23, 2007, 6:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m. at the Skylands at Randolph, Route 10, Randolph, NJ
Councilman Napoliello and Councilman Alpert stated they thought the first meeting of the new Council went very well.
Councilman Metz asked about the North Jersey Municipal Employee Benefit Fund.
Manager Lovell explained the process by which the township seeks insurance on the open market and offers various plans to township employees.
Councilman Metz asked about the taxes paid by the Morris County ARC, who is tax exempt.
Manager Lovell responded that the ARC contributes the amount of municipal taxes as opposed to paying for the schools portion.
Councilman Napoliello reported that there has been some graffiti painted onto a building in town that could possibly be gang related. He has discussed it with the Manager, and the Councilman will bring it to the attention of the MAC Committee. He asked that Councilman Metz also bring it to the attention of the Board of Education.
Councilman Alpert noted that the police can photograph the graffiti and forward it to the State Police’s Gang Unit, where they will be able to tell definitively if it is gang related.
Manager Lovell stated that he has already alerted the detective bureau and they have begun an investigation.
Mayor Obremski reported that he received a pamphlet from a 13 year old resident of Mendham who has been working with the Morris County Health Officer on an education program concerning Avian Flu and asked if Randolph would be interested in participating in the program. The Mayor would like to review the product and reply to the young man.
Councilwoman Price noted that the Board of Health has discussed Avian Flu issues. Information is available from the CDC as well.
Lee Whilden, 82 Radtke Road, asked about the billboard location that was discussed this evening and noted that a non-resident had written to her a couple of years ago indicating that the nicest part of Route 10 was along Randolph where there was not excessive commercial development. She asked that the Council keep these thoughts in mind when discussing issues along Route 10. She wished the Council good luck in 2007.
The Mayor adjourned the meeting at 10:45 p.m.
Donna Marie Luciani
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North Carolina: Romney 49%, Obama 44%
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Mitt Romney has a five-point edge over President Obama in the battleground state of North Carolina.
The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Voters in the Tar Heel State finds Romney with 49% support, while the president earns 44% of the vote. Three percent (3%) prefer some other candidate, and another four percent (4%) are undecided. (To see survey question wording, click here.)
This moves the state from Toss-Up Status to Leans Romney in the Rasmussen Reports Electoral College Projections.
The economy is the top issue of Election 2012 and, like Americans everywhere, there are deep concerns in North Carolina. Only 11% rate the U.S. economy as good or excellent, while 53% say it’s poor. Twenty-four percent (24%) say economic conditions in the nation are getting better these days, but a plurality (47%) feel they’re getting worse.
Just 35% believe the economy will get better if Obama is reelected and Democrats regain control of Congress. Forty-eight percent (48%) believe it will get worse. If Romney is elected and Republicans win control of Congress, 40% believe it will get better and 41% say worse. For both men, the North Carolina numbers are a bit more optimistic than the national average.
Fifty-two percent (52%) of voters in the state say, generally speaking, entrepreneurs who start small businesses do the most to create jobs and economic growth. Twenty-two percent (22%) give big business the credit while 7% point to state and local governments. Only 5% give primary credit to the federal government.
Furthermore, 62% say small businesses provides a more valuable service to the community than big businesses, state and local governments and federal governments.
Seventy-three percent (73%) believe people who start small businesses are primarily responsible for the success or failure of their own businesses. An overwhelming majority (81%) say small business owners work harder than the typical worker does. North Carolina voters’ perceptions of small businesses are comparable to the views of voters nationwide.
(Want a free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports updates are also available on Twitter or Facebook.
The survey of 500 Likely Voters in North Carolina was conducted on August 1, 2012 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 4.5 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.
Romney has consistently held a modest lead in North Carolina. In June, he was up three and in May he was up eight. The Obama campaign appears to be seriously contesting the state and will hold the Democratic convention in Charlotte. The Romney team appears to discount concerns that Obama could win the state again. In 2008, Obama became the first Democrat to win North Carolina’s Electoral College votes since Jimmy Carter in 1976.
Fifty percent (50%) of North Carolina voters have at least a somewhat favorable opinion of Romney, while 47% view him unfavorably. These numbers include Very Favorable reviews from 23% and Very Unfavorable marks from 30%.
As for the president, 47% of voters in the state at least somewhat approve of the job he is doing. Fifty-one percent (51%), however, disapprove of Obama’s job performance. That includes Strong Approval from 31% and Strong Disapproval from 46%, giving the president an Approval Index of -15, better than the level measured among Likely Voters nationwide. Romney leads Obama among males, 52% to 37%, but trails the president among females 51% to 46%. Younger voters tend to support the president while their elders favor Romney.
Among voters not affiliated with either of the two major political parties, Romney holds a 59% to 29% advantage over the incumbent.
Looking at other states around the country, Romney leads in Indiana, Missouri and North Dakota. Obama is ahead in New Hampshire, Nevada, Michigan and Pennsylvania. The race is a toss-up in Florida, Iowa, Colorado, Wisconsin, Ohio and Virginia.
Additional information from this survey and a full demographic breakdown are available to Platinum Members only.
Please sign up for the Rasmussen Reports daily e-mail update (it’s free) or follow us on Twitter or Facebook. Let us keep you up to date with the latest public opinion news.
Rasmussen Reports is a media company specializing in the collection, publication and distribution of public opinion information.
We conduct public opinion polls on a variety of topics to inform our audience on events in the news and other topics of interest. To ensure editorial control and independence, we pay for the polls ourselves and generate revenue through the sale of subscriptions, sponsorships, and advertising. Nightly polling on politics, business and lifestyle topics provides the content to update the Rasmussen Reports web site many times each day. If it's in the news, it's in our polls. Additionally, the data drives a daily update newsletter and various media outlets across the country.
Some information, including the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll and commentaries are available for free to the general public. Subscriptions are available for $4.95 a month or 34.95 a year that provide subscribers with exclusive access to more than 20 stories per week on upcoming elections, consumer confidence, and issues that affect us all. For those who are really into the numbers, Platinum Members can review demographic crosstabs and a full history of our data.
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What They Told Us: Reviewing Last Week’s Key Polls
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OJO Labs Raises $20.5 Million in VC Funding and Plans to Double in Size
May 17, 2018 by lalorek Leave a Comment
OJO Labs Cofounders John Berkowitz and David Rubin. photo by John Davidson.
OJO Labs, an Austin artificial intelligence startup, has raised $20.5 million in venture capital.
The company, founded in 2015, raised the Series B round from new investors Realogy, the Royal Bank of Canada, Northwest Mutual Fund Ventures and ServiceMaster. It also included existing investors LiveOak Venture Partners and Silverton Partners, both based in Austin.
“This Series B round is super unique because we are bringing in all of these huge industry giants,” said John Berkowitz, co-founder and CEO of OJO Labs. “They propel OJO to millions and millions of consumers.”
Previously, OJO Labs raised $6 million in Series A funding from LiveOak Venture Partners and Silverton. At that time, the company only had 11 employees, based at WeWork on Congress.
Since then, OJO Labs, with 33 employees in Austin and 75 employees on the island of Saint Lucia, has moved into new headquarters at 720 Brazos. The company plans to double its workforce in both places, Berkowitz said during an interview at the company’s downtown headquarters on Thursday. For now, OJO has enough office space to accommodate the expanded workforce, he said.
“We’ve been working on this conversational AI platform for three years,” Berkowitz said. “We have applied it to the residential real estate space. So we built an AI assistant to help consumers navigate their home journey – that search for homes, get help with their mortgages, ask questions about specific properties. It’s just kind of a better experience to help consumers make their decisions.”
OJO Labs has several patents pending that are the cusp of being granted, Berkowitz said.
OJO Labs runs a 24/7 operation in the island of Saint Lucia in the Caribbean where it trains the Artificial Intelligence agent using human coaches. Berkowitz’s last company, Yodle, had a huge operation in Saint Lucia. When he launched his latest company, the prime minister of Saint Lucia traveled to Austin to meet with him about setting up a new operation there.
“It’s a really stable government,” Berkowitz said. “And really smart, hardworking people. And it’s below the hurricane belt.”
It’s an incredible advantage in AI to have employees to train the technology, Berkowitz said. It’s what he calls the “blue collar” work of AI.
“No PhDs on the West Coast want to find out that the real way to make the AI work is to do real-time training with huge human operations,” Berkowitz said.
Austin has a real competitive advantage when it comes to the AI race because it does business to business software companies and human operations or call centers, Berkowitz said.
“We’re not scared of thousands of employees integrated into the technology, a lot of companies are,” Berkowitz said.
The machines need help from humans, Berkowitz said.
“Our mission on the wall is to fundamentally improve the way people make their most important decisions through the fusion of machine and human intelligence,” Berkowitz said. “Combining machines and humans
is the real key in our venture and we’re proud of it and we don’t shy away from it.”
OJO Labs is laser-focused on creating an experience humans love, Berkowitz said. Its OJO assistant is free to consumers. It lets homebuyers ask all kinds of questions of the OJO assistant about home features ranging from things like swimming pools, views of downtown, large kitchens, large lots, school districts, etc. The OJO assistant sends the homebuyer texts of potential homes with photos and listings. It learns what the person likes and what the person doesn’t like through the interaction. When the person is ready to buy, it refers them to a human agent to handle the homebuying experience and provides the agent with the background information on the customer’s preferences.
“OJO serves the customer like they have a best friend who is the world’s smartest real estate agent,” Berkowitz said.
Real estate is just the first industry OJO plans to use its AI technology, Berkowitz said. It’s also eyeing financial services, healthcare, and other industries for future applications, he said.
With the latest funding round, OJO Labs plans to expand its product, data science, and engineering teams. In February, Peter Kappler, a former Google engineer who was instrumental in developing the AdWords platform and opening Google’s Austin office in 2007, joined OJO Labs as its Chief Technology Officer.
“I’ve looked at numerous technology startup opportunities since I retired from Google, but none as exciting as OJO Labs,” Kappler said in a news release. “I chose to join and help build this company because this technology and team are tackling serious problems by providing a level of personalization at a scale previously unachievable.”
Photo courtesy of OJO Labs
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22-02-2019 01-03-2019 Barbara C. AbramsHorse Racing
Springtime in Australia means one thing, it’s time for the Melbourne Spring Racing Carnival and more importantly, Melbourne Cup Day. They call it the “the race that stops a nation”. Local governments list the race day as a legal state holiday. People from all over the world gather for a series of races held over one incredible week, featuring numerous Group 1 events with the Melbourne Cup serving as the Carnival’s centerpiece.
With all that said, Melbourne Cup Day is more than a day of first-class horse racing, it’s a racing festival spectacle like no other in the world. The Carnival’s history is rich, dating back over a century and a half. The real charm of Melbourne Cup Day and the big race is it has something to offer for everyone, no matter what gender, ethnicity or age. The real charm lies in the detains.
The Race and Venue
In 1861, the Victorian Racing Club set out to innovate one of the greatest horse racing events in the world. The Melbourne Cup was born. The four-day Melbourne Cup Carnival has been held during late October/early November each year since 1864 with the feature event always scheduled to start at 3:00 pm on the first Tuesday of November. The historic Flemington Race Course (Melbourne, Victoria, Australia) serves as host for the carnival.
The Melbourne Cup is the richest turf race in the world with an overall purse that now sits at A$7,300,000 (60% to the winning owner). Race conditions: 3200 meters (two miles) on Turf for 3-year-olds and upward, racing under handicap conditions. Weights are assigned by Victoria Club officials after the first round of nominations are recorded. The race usually receives 300-400 nominations with the actual Melbourne Cup race restricted to 24 starters. Starting selections follow a predetermined set of guidelines if the race ends up over-subscribed.
As a world horse racing event, Melbourne Cup Day receives remarkable media coverage from the trusted sources. Horseplayers and the game lovers also bet on the race from horse racing venues and online racebooks for this magnificent Melbourne Cup events all over the nation.
Melbourne Cup Race History
The list of of Melbourne Cup horses that have won this race reads like a who’s who of thoroughbred horse racing history. It’s noteworthy that the race’s only three-time winner was the super mare Makybe Diva (2003, 2004, 2005). Other important winners include Kingston Rule (1990), Think Big (1974, 1975), the incomparable Phar Lap (1930) and last year’s winner Cross Counter from the powerful connections of Godolphin/Appleby/McEvoy.
The Day’s Festivities
As mentioned earlier, the real charm of Melbourne Cup Day lies in the special events that create one of the top racing spectacles in the world. This year’s Melbourne Cup Day will be held on Tuesday, November 5, 2019. The race usually draws live attendance of around 100,000 patrons with as many as 600,000,000 million people watching the race worldwide.
Around the carnival grounds, patron will have access to a number of fun and exciting activities. For the starstruck fans, there will be plenty of international celebrities moving about the ground. To keep the kids busy, the Victoria Racing Club offers special activities for kids of all ages.
Adult patrons will be treated to drink and fine dining in the facility’s clubhouse and dining facilities as well as in the food/beverage tents located throughout the grounds. No worries about what’s on the menu as cuisines from all over the world are in the offering.
In between races, patrons are invited to enjoy a variety of live entertainment. From magicians to live concerts, patrons are assured a full day of activities. When it’s race time, big screen TVs located all over the facility will make it easy for race fans to make sure they don’t miss any of the racing action.
Of course, it wouldn’t be Melbourne Cup Day without a focus on fashion. For the ladies, it’s all about the beautiful print dresses and spectacular hats. For the men, well, it’s about looking at the beautiful ladies.
The Melbourne Cup Racing Carnival has survived for over 150 years now. With first-class racing, pageantry and all the charms of spring, it’s a tradition that will surely survive another 150 years.
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Retired Island County Sheriff’s deputies offer free firearms training for women
by Maria Matson
Tuesday, May 28, 2019 7:28pm
Firearms are no laughing matter, and nobody is going to laugh at these women during this training class. Two retired deputies of the Island County Sheriff’s Office will make sure of it.
Robert Clark was a detective for the sheriff’s office for 13 years, a firearms instructor and served in the Navy.
He noticed a trend that troubled him in his years of experience — too many women were afraid of firearms or had unrealistic expectations of them, Clark said.
One problem was that some women would do gun training classes, but the classes wouldn’t be a supportive environment and the women would end up becoming “the entertainment of the day” he said. “Everyone got a chuckle out of the fact that they failed.”
And then they wouldn’t want to return again.
“So, we said ‘we’re going to fix that,’” he said of himself and his fellow instructor Errol Ortego, also a retired deputy.
That’s why the classes they offer are women only—no one else allowed in even to observe, Clark said.
After a request from the Central Whidbey Sportsmen’s Association in Coupeville and Clark’s and Ortego’s discussions about the need for such classes, the first training session was launched 20 years ago and has been offered through the years, sometimes several times per year.
Clark and Ortego have also offered youth gun safety class, aimed at resolving the mystery and unanswered curiosity surrounding firearms that youth often have.
The next upcoming, free class for women will be 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday, June 2 at the Central Whidbey Sportsman’s Club at 397 W. Safari St. in Coupeville. There will be another session offered Saturday, July 6.
“Too many people’s idea of firearms is learned from television,” Clark said. “We show them that’s TV — that’s not real life. We try to give them an idea of what guns are really about.”
Attendees have described the class as “like drinking from a fire hydrant,” Clark said, since they provide so much information during the day-long session.
“They can shoot everything or they don’t have to shoot anything,” he said. People can do as much or as little that they are comfortable with, and they can ask the instructors any question, Clark said.
Ortego, who served in the Marines, said his favorite part is getting to meet the people who attend the classes.
Clark said they purposely keep the class sizes small, in order to offer better training and a comfortable, safe environment. Pre-registration is required to reserve a spot. Attendees must be over the age of 18 and the class size is limited to 20 .
Attendees can bring their own safety equipment and their own guns, but no ammo, and they will be checked at the door. All firearms brought in will be inspected and approved before use. Attendees are encouraged to bring a lunch.
Some of the topics covered include safety, types of firearms, operation of firearms and basic marksmanship. The morning is classroom instruction and the afternoon will be shooting time at the range.
• To sign up for the class, contact Clark at 360-929-2167 or Ortego at 360-929-8918.
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Like many Web sites, this Site actively collects information from its visitors both by asking them specific questions and by permitting them to communicate directly with us via e-mail, feedback forms, chat rooms and so forth. Some of the information that you submit may be personally identifiable information (that is, information that can be uniquely identified with you, such as your full name, address, e-mail address, phone number and so on).
For sure you can never go wrong purchasing any of the models we did tennis racquet reviews on in this article. They feature such things as excellent racquet grip size, large sweet spots and they also have many advanced technologies used in their construction. If you don’t like any of those models, then you should refer to the handy buying guide to help you in your new tennis racquet selection process.
The origins of the 15, 30, and 40 scores are believed to be medieval French. The earliest reference is in a ballad by Charles D'Orleans in 1435 which refers to quarante cinque ("forty-five"), which gave rise to modern 40. In 1522 there is a sentence in Latin "we are winning 30, we are winning 45". The first recorded theories about the origin of 15 were published in 1555 and 1579. However, the origins of this convention remain obscure.[3]
It wasn't until the 16th century that rackets came into use, and the game began to be called "tennis", from the French term tenez, which can be translated as "hold!", "receive!" or "take!", an interjection used as a call from the server to his opponent.[6] It was popular in England and France, although the game was only played indoors where the ball could be hit off the wall. Henry VIII of England was a big fan of this game, which is now known as real tennis.[7] During the 18th and early 19th centuries, as real tennis declined, new racket sports emerged in England.[8]
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Although Kolkmann admits that concrete courts cost substantially more initially than asphalt, an asphalt surface often requires more frequent and costly upkeep over its lifespan to repair cracking and settling. "Through our own recordkeeping, we estimate that an asphalt court will be unavailable for play, due to repairs being made, for about 100 days over a 20-year period," he says. "During this same time, a post-tensioned slab would be down for about 20 days. In our climate in the upper Midwest, repairs can only be done in the summer, when everyone wants to play. For a private court, the downtime may not be as crucial. But for a club, it can be a substantial unknown cost in lost revenue."
The comprehensive rules promulgated in 1924 by the ILTF, have remained largely stable in the ensuing eighty years, the one major change being the addition of the tiebreak system designed by Jimmy Van Alen.[32] That same year, tennis withdrew from the Olympics after the 1924 Games but returned 60 years later as a 21-and-under demonstration event in 1984. This reinstatement was credited by the efforts by the then ITF President Philippe Chatrier, ITF General Secretary David Gray and ITF Vice President Pablo Llorens, and support from IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch. The success of the event was overwhelming and the IOC decided to reintroduce tennis as a full medal sport at Seoul in 1988.[33][34]
More recently, Roger Federer is considered by many observers to have the most "complete" game in modern tennis. He has won 20 grand slam titles and 6 World Tour Finals, the most for any male player. Many experts of tennis, former tennis players and his own tennis peers believe Federer is the greatest player in the history of the game.[110][111][112][113][114][115] Federer's biggest rival Rafael Nadal is regarded as the greatest competitor in tennis history by some former players and is regarded to have the potential to be the greatest of all time.[116][117] Nadal is regarded as the greatest clay court player of all time.[118]
The tiebreak is sometimes not employed for the final set of a match and an advantage set is used instead. Therefore, the deciding set must be played until one player or team has won two more games than the opponent. Of the major tennis championships, this now only applies in the French Open. In the US Open, a tiebreak is played in the deciding set (fifth set for the men, third set for the women) at 6–6. Starting in 2019, in Wimbledon, a tiebreak will be played if the score reaches 12–12 in the final set. In the Australian Open, a "first to 10" tiebreak is played in the deciding set if it reaches 6–6.[20][21] (When the tiebreak was first introduced at Wimbledon in 1971, it was invoked at 8–8 rather than 6–6.) The US Open formerly held "Super Saturday" where the two men's semi-finals were played along with the women's final on the second Saturday of the event; therefore a tie-break was more prudent where player rest and scheduling is more important.
You acknowledge and agree that USTA, in management of certain sweepstakes, promotions, or programs, may share your information with sweepstakes partners or US Open Sponsors (collectively, “Permitted Third Parties”). Your registration constitutes permission for the USTA and Permitted Third Parties to contact you for promotional and/or marketing purposes. Your relationship with each Permitted Third Party is independent of the USTA and subject to that Permitted Third Party’s terms of use and/or privacy policy. By registering, you acknowledge and agree that USTA does not and cannot control the actions of any Permitted Third Party, and you further agree to release and hold harmless USTA from any and all liability, injury, loss or damage of any kind that may arise from or out of your interaction with such Permitted Third Party.
Moving, always moving, and all the time thinking and checking off: Maintain the continental grip, the base knuckle of the index finger of my left hand resting on the bevel one notch counterclockwise from the racket handle’s high noon. (Check.) Keep the racket in front and the racket head up. (Check.) Knees slightly bent. (Check.) Turn sideways quickly, and punch with your shoulder, don’t swing; and tighten your grip at the moment the ball is about to hit the strings.
The rackets from the Wilson Ultra series are processed in the graphite frame construction with carbon fiber, so that a power-loaded playing feeling is created. The oversize head provides good spin characteristics and the power of the club can be controlled very well via the spin. A comfortable racquet handling and a special parallel drilling technology (the strings dampen more vibrations) provide comfort.
Size. The overall size of a regulation tennis court for doubles play is 60 x 120 feet (per the International Tennis Federation). However, you must allow additional space around the court perimeter to give the contractor room to work and to permit the installation of drainage, landscaping, and fencing. Munson recommends leaving at least 12 feet between the court sidelines and the closest fixed obstructions, and 21 feet between the baselines and fixed obstructions. Where space is limited, you can downsize to a slightly smaller court. ITF recommends a minimum court size of 56 x 114 feet. An NBA/NCAA regulation full-size basketball court is 94 feet long and 50 feet wide. For backyards without enough acreage for a pro court, half courts can suffice for one-on-one games. (See this diagram of court dimensions from Half Court Sports.)
Tie-break sets are now nearly universal in all levels of play, for all sets in a match; however, the tie-break is not a compulsory element in any set, and the actual formatting of sets and tie-breaks depends on the tournament director in tournaments, and, in private matches, on the players' agreement before play begins. Tie-breaks are not used in the final set in the Australian Open for singles before 2019, the French Open for singles, Wimbledon before 2019, or the Fed Cup, nor were they used for final sets in Davis Cup play or the Olympics before 2016. The US Open now uses a tiebreak in the final set, both in singles and in doubles, and was the only major tournament to use a tiebreak in the final set for singles before 2019, but the Australian Open and French Open do use a final set tiebreak in both men's and women's doubles.
"Tennis Court" received generally positive reviews from contemporary critics. Siân Rowe from NME complimented Lorde's "strong pop vocals".[31] Emily Yoshida from Grantland labelled it a "murkily winsome, ever-so-slightly chopped ballad",[48] while Kyle Jaeger writing for The Hollywood Reporter commended the track's lyrical content and its "catchy" melody.[49] Billboard's Jason Lipshutz was favourable towards the song's "detached attitude" and minimalist production that evoked "something intoxicating" in the music scene.[29] Sharing the same sentiment, Adam Offitzer from independent music blog Pretty Much Amazing regarded "Tennis Court" as a "[burst] of originality" in the mainstream music scene of "mindless hooks and dubstep anthems" for its minimalism and "clever" lyrics.[23]
A volley is a shot returned to the opponent in mid-air before the ball bounces, generally performed near the net, and is usually made with a stiff-wristed punching motion to hit the ball into an open area of the opponent's court. The half volley is made by hitting the ball on the rise just after it has bounced, also generally in the vicinity of the net, and played with the racket close to the ground.[78] The swinging volley is hit out of the air as the player approaches the net. It is an offensive shot used to take preparation time away from the opponent, as it returns the ball into the opponent's court much faster than a standard volley.
In the US, "Tennis Court" was released as a 7-inch vinyl single on 27 August 2013.[14] Lava and Republic Records initially planned to service "Tennis Court" to US modern rock radio on 11 March 2014 and contemporary hit radio (CHR) on 8 April 2014 as the album's third US airplay single, following "Royals" and "Team".[15] Republic cancelled the scheduled release in favour of "Glory and Gore", which impacted modern rock radio on 11 March.[16][17] The label also planned to service "Glory and Gore" to CHR, but subsequently called of its release and serviced "Tennis Court" to CHR as originally planned.[18] "Tennis Court" ultimately impacted hot adult contemporary radio and CHR on 21 and 22 April 2014, respectively.[19][20] It was released to UK radio on 12 May 2014.[21]
Grass courts are the fastest type of courts in common use.[7] They consist of grass grown on very hard-packed soil, which adds additional variables: bounces depend on how healthy the grass is, how recently it has been mowed, and the wear and tear of recent play. Points are usually very quick where fast, low bounces keep rallies short, and the serve plays a more important role than on other surfaces. Grass courts tend to favour serve-and-volley tennis players.
During informal play of tennis, especially at tennis clubs in the U.S. (also in other English speaking countries), score announcements are frequently shortened with the use of abbreviations. For example, a score 15 is replaced with "five", or in some cases "fif". "Love" is often substituted to indicate "zero". Similarly, the scores of 30 and 40 may sometimes be spoken as "three" or "four" respectively. A score of 15-all may sometimes be announced as "fives." To further confuse score announcements, a score of 30-all (30–30) may often be called "deuce", and the following point referred to as "ad in" or "ad out" (or "my ad" or "your ad"), depending on which player (or team) won the point. The logic for this is that a 30-all score is effectively the same as deuce (40–40).[34]
Advantage sets sometimes continue much longer than tie-break sets. The 2010 Wimbledon first-round match between John Isner and Nicolas Mahut, which is the longest professional tennis match in history, notably ended with Isner winning the fifth set by 70–68. The match lasted in total 11 hours and five minutes, with the fifth set alone lasting eight hours, 11 minutes. Whoever wins by a margin of two wins the set, but this could take a very long time to finish.
Focus on ball trajectory and how cleanly you hit the ball – this will then allow your brain to merge the technical instruction you’ve been working on with the natural way of movement that creates effortless power – and eventually sound tennis techniques will emerge that simultaneously produce a lot of effortless power and allow easy adjustments to different situations in the game.
You and your group of friends just started to play tennis just to have a little fun with it. You do not plan to compete or anything. Your main focus is to have fun and have a good time with your friends. You do not care about whether you have the proper technique or the form, you just want the ball to keep in play and have some long and exciting rallies with your group of friends.
For a right-handed player, the forehand is a stroke that begins on the right side of the body, continues across the body as contact is made with the ball, and ends on the left side of the body. There are various grips for executing the forehand, and their popularity has fluctuated over the years. The most important ones are the continental, the eastern, the semi-western, and the western. For a number of years, the small, frail 1920s player Bill Johnston was considered by many to have had the best forehand of all time, a stroke that he hit shoulder-high using a western grip. Few top players used the western grip after the 1920s, but in the latter part of the 20th century, as shot-making techniques and equipment changed radically, the western forehand made a strong comeback and is now used by many modern players. No matter which grip is used, most forehands are generally executed with one hand holding the racket, but there have been fine players with two-handed forehands. In the 1940s and 50s, the Ecuadorian/American player Pancho Segura used a two-handed forehand to achieve a devastating effect against larger, more powerful players. Players such as Monica Seles or France's Fabrice Santoro and Marion Bartoli are also notable players known for their two-handed forehands.[76]
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New upcoming coach of Olimp Tennis Academy. I will build my own academy very soon. I have quite a lot of awards and trophies. If you are ready to play tennis with me, my email is below. I'm a professional tennis player. I have a lot of experience. I can teach kids, students, amateurs and pro. If you would like to know more about tennis or just have fun and leisure, just write me [email protected]
Ego/fear=childISH and constrictive. Playful is ChildLIKE allows freedom from ego which results in ease and natural power. The adult self can choose when to let go. When and where it is safe. A tennis court is a safe universe with lines and rules. Those rules allow play without anxiety. Embrace the parameters and have fun. You’ve already won the hardest part and it works! (OK..I still swear my arse off, in a garbled language somewhere between a Glasgow dockyard and Babylon when I miss, but that’s fun too).
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Premier events for women form the most prestigious level of events on the Women's Tennis Association Tour after the Grand Slam tournaments. These events offer the largest rewards in terms of points and prize money. Within the Premier category are Premier Mandatory, Premier 5, and Premier tournaments. The Premier events were introduced in 2009 replacing the previous Tier I and II tournament categories. Currently four tournaments are Premier Mandatory, five tournaments are Premier 5, and twelve tournaments are Premier. The first tiering system in women's tennis was introduced in 1988. At the time of its creation, only two tournaments, the Lipton International Players Championships in Florida and the German Open in Berlin, comprised the Tier I category.
Simply put, kids combine the technical analytical instruction with their desire to be comfortable (which is nothing else than the body’s signal of telling you what is a natural way of generating force), while adults do everything in their power to perform the movement “correctly,” even when it doesn’t feel comfortable and it doesn’t produce any natural force.
If time and finances permit, adult beginners should take a beginner tennis clinic and hit lots of balls, period. The clinic should be augmented by private lessons. After the basics are in place, find someone to hit with who can control the ball and see if he or she can practice with you. Take more clinics and hit balls … get exposure to hitting while you work on grip technique and footwork. Set a goal to get into the next level within 6-8 weeks.
The lines that delineate the width of the court are called the baseline (farthest back) and the service line (middle of the court). The short mark in the center of each baseline is referred to as either the hash mark or the center mark. The outermost lines that make up the length are called the doubles sidelines. These are the boundaries used when doubles is being played. The lines to the inside of the doubles sidelines are the singles sidelines and are used as boundaries in singles play. The area between a doubles sideline and the nearest singles sideline is called the doubles alley, which is considered playable in doubles play. The line that runs across the center of a player's side of the court is called the service line because the serve must be delivered into the area between the service line and the net on the receiving side. Despite its name, this is not where a player legally stands when making a serve.[52]
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I was born in Colombia but lived all my life in Venezuela. I got a tennis scholarship at Oklahoma, where I got my bachelor degree in Psychology. I worked as head pro at Club Nautico De Maracaibo in Venezuela for 23 years where I made lots of friends and made a lots of great players! 8 players I have taught played tennis for colleges here in the USA. I am a real friendly person and very serious about tennis. Sincerely yours, Jose
I focus on the student ability to improve skills in the court by having constant repetitions of drills. I also make the lesson more attractive for the students by playing with them and make them experience real game practice. I structure my lessons with short warm up continued by certain amount of drills and finally different games applied to different situations of the game.
A game consists of a sequence of points played with the same player serving. A game is won by the first player to have won at least four points in total and at least two points more than the opponent. The running score of each game is described in a manner peculiar to tennis: scores from zero to three points are described as "love", "15", "30", and "40", respectively. If at least three points have been scored by each player, making the player's scores equal at 40 apiece, the score is not called out as "40–40", but rather as "deuce". If at least three points have been scored by each side and a player has one more point than his opponent, the score of the game is "advantage" for the player in the lead. During informal games, "advantage" can also be called "ad in" or "van in" when the serving player is ahead, and "ad out" or "van out" when the receiving player is ahead.
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What gives concrete the competitive edge? According to Fred Kolkmann, tennis and track division manager for Munson Inc., Glendale, Wis., concrete play courts are more durable, low maintenance, and crack resistant. Munson specializes in post-tensioned concrete and other types of play courts, and has won national and state awards for its concrete tennis court installations.
The dimensions of a tennis court are defined and regulated by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) governing body and are written down in the annual 'Rules of Tennis' document.[1] The court is 78 feet (23.77 metres) long. Its width is 27 feet (8.23 metres) for singles matches and 36 feet (10.97 metres) for doubles matches.[2] The service line is 21 feet (6.40 metres) from the net.[2] Additional clear space around the court is needed in order for players to reach overrun balls for a total of 60 feet (18 metres) wide and 120 feet (37 metres) long. A net is stretched across the full width of the court, parallel with the baselines, dividing it into two equal ends. The net is 3 feet 6 inches (1.07 metres) high at the posts, and 3 feet (0.91 metres) high in the center.[3] The net posts are 3 feet (0.91 metres) outside the doubles court on each side or, for a singles net, 3 feet (0.91 metres) outside the singles court on each side.
But it’s not all downside, emotionally, a reckoning with limits and failure, that I’m feeling when I’m playing with Kirill. I have improved, and am proud of that. Being able to spend a couple of hours each week playing with a gifted athlete — and a natural teacher — is gratifying in and of itself. There is also, for instance, the patience I feel at times — patience, finally, as I near 60 — when Kirill and I are rallying for 8 or 9 or 12 or 15 shots. He has a way of sensing when I have found a rhythm (he has told me as much) and he will start hitting with more pace, and I will feed off it, and then he will alter his shots — topspin, flat, slice — to make me take the ball in different strike zones, high to low. And as I at once concentrate but do not overthink; move quickly but without restless tension; and am neither consumed with winning the rally nor anxious about losing it, I am as serene in a moment as I have ever been or am likely to be.
The International Tennis Federation (ITF) conducts a junior tour that allows juniors to establish a world ranking and an Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) or Women's Tennis Association (WTA) ranking. Most juniors who enter the international circuit do so by progressing through ITF, Satellite, Future, and Challenger tournaments before entering the main circuit. The latter three circuits also have adults competing in them. Some juniors, however, such as Australian Lleyton Hewitt and Frenchman Gaël Monfils, have catapulted directly from the junior tour to the ATP tour by dominating the junior scene or by taking advantage of opportunities given to them to participate in professional tournaments.
I’ve spent years in attempts to understand tennis techniques and secrets that few people ever learn in tennis lessons. Most competitive junior tennis players have the privilege of time and money to develop and learn tennis techniques, but maybe you don’t. Tennis techniques are an important part for every tennis player and even small changes in tennis technique can result in big improvements.
Tennis racquets come in a very wide variety of price ranges, to say the least. You may want to set yourself a budget to help narrow down your choices because you will have so many of them. Do we find a correlation between the price of a tennis racquet and the quality of it? The answer here is absolutely but you have to be careful here too.In general, the higher the price a tennis racquet is the better quality that tennis racquet is because it most likely much innovative design features built into it. Be careful here too, though. Because things such as the tennis racquet brand or a tennis racquet that is designed by a famous player may up the price of a tennis racquet without it making the tennis racquet better than some lower priced models.
He said there was no way he could ever have been a pro player, and that he knew that in his early teens — for one thing, there wasn’t the money to get him to tournaments beyond those near his home. He plays competitively now one night a week, which is all his schedule allows, hitting with guys his age who had played serious college tennis and, in some cases, joined the low rungs of the pro tour for a year or two.
A frequent topic of discussion among tennis fans and commentators is who was the greatest male singles player of all time. By a large margin, an Associated Press poll in 1950 named Bill Tilden as the greatest player of the first half of the 20th century.[95] From 1920 to 1930, Tilden won singles titles at Wimbledon three times and the U.S. Championships seven times. In 1938, however, Donald Budge became the first person to win all four major singles titles during the same calendar year, the Grand Slam, and won six consecutive major titles in 1937 and 1938. Tilden called Budge "the finest player 365 days a year that ever lived."[96] In his 1979 autobiography, Jack Kramer said that, based on consistent play, Budge was the greatest player ever.[97] Some observers, however, also felt that Kramer deserved consideration for the title. Kramer was among the few who dominated amateur and professional tennis during the late 1940s and early 1950s. Tony Trabert has said that of the players he saw before the start of the open era, Kramer was the best male champion.[98]
As it happens, I was reading a ruefully captivating new memoir called “Swimming Studies,” by a onetime contender for the Canadian Olympic team, Leanne Shapton, which explores how growing up a competitive swimmer formed her habits of heart and mind. Years later, her daily rhythms and life choices, her nightly dreams, her understanding of duration, pleasure, pain and reward, remain informed by her hours in the training pool. Swimming strokes carved the contours of her inner life, and it’s not at all clear she is thankful for that. Of course, Andre Agassi, in his memoir, writes of how the aloneness of singles tennis — the very thing that imparted to Kirill a kind of Emersonian self-reliance, as he understands it — just enlarged his loneliness. You never know.
If you find reading boring then you can try watching free instructional videos on the internet. The best part about these videos is that it is made by tennis pros who are passionate about teaching tennis, so you won’t find the videos hard to understand. Between reading and watching the instructional videos, you will pick up important details about tennis on your own.
Choosing the right tennis racquet can help you play your best on the court. No matter what type of player you are, there are racquets of all shapes and sizes, and one is sure to match your needs and help you to take your gameplay to the next level. You can find a range of new, used, and pre-owned tennis racquets on eBay that you'll be excited to carry onto the court, including ones from brand names such as Babolat, Wilson, Prince, and Head.
Hunter/Killer: This 11.7oz beefcake is what the attack-happy Novak Djokovic uses to great effect. It is made for speed with the weight distributed toward the ends so that it aids movement in any direction. The 18×20 string arrangement is unusual, but geared toward flat hitters who want to be able to aim their slams or throw a little english onto a powerful stroke. This is probably the best one you can find if you like to attack the net rather than hanging back at the baseline. The 100 square-inch head is a little on the large side for catching sneaky balls that would otherwise get by you. The racket is extremely stable and balanced when moving, but you’ll definitely catch a few bad vibrations as you use it. [Purchase: $186]
For length, 21 to 26 inches (53 to 66 cm) is normally the junior racket range, while 27 inches (69 cm) is for stronger more physically-mature players. Some are also available at lengths of 27.5 to 29 inches (70 to 74 cm). The Gamma Big Bubba was produced with a 32 inches (81 cm) length but it is no longer legal in that length. Gamma responded by changing the length of the grip portion of the racket, to continue sales. The length restriction was based on the concern that such long rackets would make the serve too dominant, but that concern has never been objectively supported with testing. Moreover, some players, such as John Isner, are much taller and have longer arms than average professionals (and especially low stature ones), giving them a much larger advantage in terms of height for the service than is possible with several inches of racket length. This makes the length restriction more questionable. Finally, the professionals who nearly always choose to use the longest rackets typically choose them because they use two-handed groundstrokes for both forehand and backhand, using the extra length to improve their reach. An example is Marion Bartoli. As this type of player is not dominant in the sport, or even close to being average in terms of per capita representation, the length restriction seems even more unnecessary. Despite Prince's attempt to market longer length "longbody" rackets in the 1990s, standard length remains the overwhelming choice of players, further negating the argument in favor of the length restriction. When most players who choose to use a longer racket than 27 inches (69 cm) choose one, they typically only use a 27.5 inches (70 cm) model, rather than one approaching 30 inches (76 cm). Longer rackets were introduced by Dunlop[10]
Very simply, find yourself a certified and reputable teaching professional (“pro”) and take a handful or dozen lessons over the course of a few weeks to jump-start the learning process and help you retain and apply the instructors teachings. Don’t be surprised or alarmed if the pro has you doing some things that feel awkward, or asks you to change the way you’ve been doing things before. He or she may have you doing certain exercises or “drills” that are designed to develop specific skills that, to you, may seem impractical or odd, but which actually work. Be patient, be alert, be attentive, Listen and apply as much as you can. Finally, come prepared to each lesson by having practiced at least once or twice since the previous lesson, and bring water and a towel, sunglasses, sunscreen and a cap to prevent sunburn and heat exhaustion.
A tennis court is the venue where the sport of tennis is played. It is a firm rectangular surface with a low net stretched across the center. The same surface can be used to play both doubles and singles matches. A variety of surfaces can be used to create a tennis court, each with its own characteristics which affect the playing style of the game.
In the U.S. in 1874 Mary Ewing Outerbridge, a young socialite, returned from Bermuda with a sphairistikè set. She became fascinated by the game of tennis after watching British army officers play.[18] She laid out a tennis court at the Staten Island Cricket Club at Camp Washington, Tompkinsville, Staten Island, New York. The first American National championship was played there in September 1880. An Englishman named O.E. Woodhouse won the singles title, and a silver cup worth $100, by defeating Canadian I. F. Hellmuth.[19] There was also a doubles match which was won by a local pair. There were different rules at each club. The ball in Boston was larger than the one normally used in New York.
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Sen. Richard Black to ST: U.S. has established 17 bases in Syria without the slightest lawful justification for doing so
Created on Thursday, 22 November 2018 06:32 | Published Date | | Hits: 4483
Virginia State senator Richard H. Black has made it clear that the United States makes trade between Iran and Syria more difficult by occupying the north of the Euphrates River in accordance with ‘Plan B’ announced several years ago by Secretary of State John Kerry .
He told the Syriatimes e-newspaper that The U.S. has attempted to block routes between the countries wherever possible and it has established 17 bases in Syria without the slightest lawful justification for doing so.
“The United States has established a semi-autonomous region dominated by Syrian Kurds to control the region. Since Kurds make up only 20% of the area’s population, allowing them to dominate the region creates a political unstable situation; the much larger Arabic population is almost certain to take up arms to avoid falling under the domination of the Kurdish minority. This creates a situation where ethnic violence provides justification for the U.S. to remain in the area indefinitely, since the United States has announced it’s intention to prevent the resurgence of ISIS. The reemergence of violence in the area would likely be attributed to ISIS and used as a pretext for continued occupation,” the senator said.
U.S. refuses to publicize barbaric nature of its premier “moderate rebel” group
Asked about the US use of internationally banned weapons in attacking areas in the north of Syria, Sen. Black replied: “There are reports that the U.S. has used cluster bombs and white phosphorus in Syria. The U.S. has denied those allegations. Meanwhile, the U.S. led coalition repeatedly complains about the use of so-called “barrel bombs” by Syria. It is not clear what the distinction is between a barrel containing explosives and shrapnel and a 15,000 pound “bunker-busting” bomb that hurls razor-sharp shrapnel great distances.”
He pointed out that during his recent visit to Syria [in September 2018] he entered a building that contained “barrel rockets” that were manufactured by the terrorists who were driven from Aleppo.
“Some people claim that “barrel bombs” should be illegal because they are not precision-guided. The “barrel rockets” were fired by terrorists into random civilian areas for the sole purpose of killing innocent people. I have not heard any of Syria’s military opponents complaining about the use of “barrel rockets” by the terrorists. In fact, the west has never complained about any legal violations by terrorists that they support,” the Senator stated.
He made it clear that the United States refuses to publicize the barbaric nature of it’s premier “moderate rebel” group [the Free Syrian Army], and its constant cooperation with terror forces like al Nusra and ISIS.
“We know, for example, that the Free Syrian Army frequently beheads and mutilates captives. We know they have cannibalized soldiers in battle. We know that they have thrown postal workers from municipal buildings to their death. Within the last several weeks, the Free Syrian Army distributed a video depicting one of its soldiers carrying out an “honor killing” of his own sister by machine gunning her to death,” the Senator said.
He indicated that he traveled five hours from Damascus to Aleppo on his trip to Syria this September. Everywhere he went, there was a feeling of joy among the people that the terrorists were driven out and that freedom had returned to Syria. There was tremendous gratitude for the Syrian president and the Syrian armed forces.
“Had Western powers, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey overthrown Syria, an al-Qaeda-style government would have seized power. It would have combined with ISIS-held territories to form a massive and violent caliphate with all of the arms presently held by the Syrian Arab Army. Surrounding nations would have collapsed as a result, and been integrated into the savage caliphate. This terroristic government would have annihilated millions of moderate Muslims and religious minorities,” Sen. Black asserted.
He went on to say: “Had the West and its Arab allies succeeded in toppling Syria, I am convinced that Europe would now be threatened by jihad waged not by isolated terrorists, but by massive armed forces. In 2016, I went to Palmyra right after it was liberated by the Syrian armed forces. When I spoke to the pilots and aircrew standing by an attack aircraft, I told them that they were not only fighting to defend Syria but that they were defending the entire civilized world.”
Continued presence of ISIS is advantageous to the West
The senator, in addition, referred to the fact that the Law of Land Warfare has been completely disregarded by Western and Arab nations seeking to overthrow the legitimate, duly elected government of Syria.
“For example, the Law of Land Warfare prohibits the occupation of another non-belligerent sovereign nation. Nonetheless, the United States has established 17 bases in Syria without the slightest lawful justification for doing so. This has been done under the guise of fighting ISIS. However, the United States has prohibited Iraqi forces from entering Syria to finish off the final ISIS pocket where the Euphrates River crosses into Iraq. By the same token, the U.S. bombed and killed 200-300 Russian fighters who crossed the Euphrates to attack ISIS positions in the same region,” Sen. Black affirmed.
He added that it seems clear that the continued presence of ISIS is advantageous to the West even if a massive ISIS caliphate is not.
The Senator concluded by saying: “In my lifetime, there has never been a greater force of evil than the terror rained down on Syria by foreign nations. Its cruelty and savagery have had no bounds. Nonetheless, Syria has defended itself against the economic might of 2/3 of the world’s great powers and has beaten them all. As a career military officer and student of military affairs, I cannot explain how Syria could accomplish this if it were not the will of God.”
Sen. Richard Black to ST: Syria has won the war
Sen. Richard Black to ST: US occupation of Al-Tanf complicates Syria’s efforts to liberate all of its territory from terrorists
Sen. Richard Black to ST: Poison Gas Claims Have always Been False, but Used to Justify War
doomed to failure
Origins of the Syrian War
The Atrocities of US Backed "moderate rebel" Terrorists
Public Opinion Started to Realize Reality About Syria Events
This is what it is!
War on Syria was an unlawful war of aggression
Senator Richard Black: attacks on Syria are war crimes
Another Page of Glory
https://youtu.be/YFojnwq1ltI
Syria: Defender of the World
Journey into the Heart of Reality
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The Forged Coupon, And Other Stories : Book 01, Chapter 13
Revolt Library >> Anarchism >> The Forged Coupon, And Other Stories >> Book 00001, Chapter 00013
Author : Leo Tolstoy
(1828 - 1910) ~ Father of Christian Anarchism : In 1861, during the second of his European tours, Tolstoy met with Proudhon, with whom he exchanged ideas. Inspired by the encounter, Tolstoy returned to Yasnaya Polyana to found thirteen schools that were the first attempt to implement a practical model of libertarian education. (From : Anarchy Archives.)
• "Only by recognizing the land as just such an article of common possession as the sun and air will you be able, without bias and justly, to establish the ownership of land among all men, according to any of the existing projects or according to some new project composed or chosen by you in common." (From : "To the Working People," by Leo Tolstoy, Yasnaya P....)
• "If, in former times, Governments were necessary to defend their people from other people's attacks, now, on the contrary, Governments artificially disturb the peace that exists between the nations, and provoke enmity among them." (From : "Patriotism and Government," by Leo Tolstoy, May 1....)
• "It is necessary that men should understand things as they are, should call them by their right names, and should know that an army is an instrument for killing, and that the enrollment and management of an army -- the very things which Kings, Emperors, and Presidents occupy themselves with so self-confidently -- is a preparation for murder." (From : "'Thou Shalt Not Kill'," by Leo Tolstoy, August 8,....)
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Book 01, Chapter 13
MEANWHILE the yard-porter Vassily was marching on the open road down to the south.
He walked in daytime, and when night came some policeman would get him shelter in a peasant’s cottage. He was given bread everywhere, and sometimes he was asked to sit down to the evening meal. In a village in the Orel district, where he had stayed for the night, he heard that a merchant who had hired the landowner’s orchard for the season, was looking out for strong and able men to serve as watchmen for the fruit-crops. Vassily was tired of tramping, and as he had also no desire whatever to go back to his native village, he went to the man who owned the orchard, and got engaged as watchman for five rubles a month.
Vassily found it very agreeable to live in his orchard shed, and all the more so when the apples and pears began to grow ripe, and when the men from the barn supplied him every day with large bundles of fresh straw from the threshing machine. He used to lie the whole day long on the fragrant straw, with fresh, delicately smelling apples in heaps at his side, looking out in every direction to prevent the village boys from stealing fruit; and he used to whistle and sing meanwhile, to amuse himself. He knew no end of songs, and had a fine voice. When peasant women and young girls came to ask for apples, and to have a chat with him, Vassily gave them larger or smaller apples according as he liked their looks, and received eggs or money in return. The rest of the time he had nothing to do, but to lie on his back and get up for his meals in the kitchen. He had only one shirt left, one of pink cotton, and that was in holes. But he was strongly built and enjoyed excellent health. When the kettle with black gruel was taken from the stove and served to the working men, Vassily used to eat enough for three, and filled the old watchman on the estate with unceasing wonder. At nights Vassily never slept. He whistled or shouted from time to time to keep off thieves, and his piercing, cat-like eyes saw clearly in the darkness.
One night a company of young lads from the village made their way stealthily to the orchard to shake down apples from the trees. Vassily, coming noiselessly from behind, attacked them; they tried to escape, but he took one of them prisoner to his master.
Vassily’s first shed stood at the farthest end of the orchard, but after the pears had been picked he had to remove to another shed only forty paces away from the house of his master. He liked this new place very much. The whole day long he could see the young ladies and gentlemen enjoying themselves; going out for drives in the evenings and quite late at nights, playing the piano or the violin, and singing and dancing. He saw the ladies sitting with the young students on the window sills, engaged in animated conversation, and then going in pairs to walk the dark avenue of lime trees, lit up only by streaks of moonlight. He saw the servants running about with food and drink, he saw the cooks, the stewards, the laundresses, the gardeners, the coachmen, hard at work to supply their masters with food and drink and constant amusement. Sometimes the young people from the master’s house came to the shed, and Vassily offered them the choicest apples, juicy and red. The young ladies used to take large bites out of the apples on the spot, praising their taste, and spoke French to one another—Vassily quite understood it was all about him—and asked Vassily to sing for them.
Vassily felt the greatest admiration for his master’s mode of living, which reminded him of what he had seen in Moscow; and he became more and more convinced that the only thing that mattered in life was money. He thought and thought how to get hold of a large sum of money. He remembered his former ways of making small profits whenever he could, and came to the conclusion that that was altogether wrong. Occasional stealing is of no use, he thought. He must arrange a well-prepared plan, and after getting all the information he wanted, carry out his purpose so as to avoid detection.
After the feast of Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the last crop of autumn apples was gathered; the master was content with the results, paid off Vassily, and gave him an extra sum as reward for his faithful service.
Vassily put on his new jacket, and a new hat—both were presents from his master’s son—but did not make his way homeward. He hated the very thought of the vulgar peasants’ life. He went back to Moscow in company of some drunken soldiers, who had been watchmen in the orchard together with him. On his arrival there he at once resolved, under cover of night, to break into the shop where he had been employed, and beaten, and then turned out by the proprietor without being paid. He knew the place well, and knew where the money was locked up. So he bade the soldiers, who helped him, keep watch outside, and forcing the courtyard door entered the shop and took all the money he could lay his hands on. All this was done very cleverly, and no trace was left of the burglary. The money Vassily had found in the shop amounted to 370 rubles. He gave a hundred rubles to his assistants, and with the rest left for another town where he gave way to dissipation in company of friends of both sexes. The police traced his movements, and when at last he was arrested and put into prison he had hardly anything left out of the money which he had stolen.
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Request for Comments: 7254 A. Allen
Category: Informational Blackberry
ISSN: 2070-1721 D. McDonald
Eircom
P. Gosden
GSM Association
A Uniform Resource Name Namespace
for the Global System for Mobile Communications Association (GSMA)
and the International Mobile station Equipment Identity (IMEI)
This specification defines a Uniform Resource Name (URN) namespace
and a Namespace Specific String (NSS) for the International Mobile
station Equipment Identity (IMEI), as well as an associated parameter
for the International Mobile station Equipment Identity and Software
Version number (IMEISV). The IMEI and IMEISV were introduced as part
of the specification for the GSM and are also now incorporated by the
3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) as part of the 3GPP
specification for GSM, Universal Mobile Telecommunications System
(UMTS), and 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) networks. The IMEI and
IMEISV are used to uniquely identify Mobile Equipment within these
systems and are managed by the GSMA. URNs from this namespace almost
always contain personally identifiable information and need to be
treated accordingly.
This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is
published for informational purposes.
This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF). It represents the consensus of the IETF community. It has
received public review and has been approved for publication by the
Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG). Not all documents
approved by the IESG are a candidate for any level of Internet
Standard; see Section 2 of RFC 5741.
Information about the current status of this document, any errata,
and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at
http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7254.
Montemurro, et al. Informational [Page 1]
RFC 7254 The GSMA and IMEI URN May 2014
Copyright (c) 2014 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
(http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
publication of this document. Please review these documents
carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must
include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
described in the Simplified BSD License.
This document may contain material from IETF Documents or IETF
Contributions published or made publicly available before November
10, 2008. The person(s) controlling the copyright in some of this
material may not have granted the IETF Trust the right to allow
modifications of such material outside the IETF Standards Process.
Without obtaining an adequate license from the person(s) controlling
the copyright in such materials, this document may not be modified
outside the IETF Standards Process, and derivative works of it may
not be created outside the IETF Standards Process, except to format
it for publication as an RFC or to translate it into languages other
than English.
1. Introduction ....................................................3
2. Terminology .....................................................4
3. Namespace Registration Template .................................4
4. Specification ...................................................8
4.1. IMEI Parameters ............................................8
4.2. IMEI Format ................................................9
4.2.1. Type Allocation Code (TAC) ..........................9
4.2.2. Serial Number (SNR) .................................9
4.2.3. Spare ..............................................10
4.2.4. Binary Encoding ....................................10
4.3. IMEISV Format .............................................10
4.3.1. Type Allocation Code (TAC) .........................10
4.3.2. Serial Number (SNR) ................................11
4.3.3. Software Version Number (SVN) ......................11
5. Community Considerations .......................................11
6. Namespace Considerations .......................................12
7. IANA Considerations ............................................12
8. Security and Privacy Considerations ............................12
9. Acknowledgements ...............................................14
10. References ....................................................14
10.1. Normative References .....................................14
10.2. Informative References ...................................15
Version number (IMEISV) as per the namespace registration requirement
found in RFC 3406 [1]. The Namespace Identifier (NID) 'gsma' is for
identities used in GSM, Universal Mobile Telecommunications System
(UMTS), and Long Term Evolution (LTE) networks. The IMEI and the
IMEISV are managed by the GSMA, so this NID is managed by the GSMA.
While this specification currently defines only the 'imei' NSS under
the 'gsma' NID, additional NSS under the 'gsma' NID may be specified
in the future by the GSMA, using the procedure for URN NSS changes
and additions (currently through the publication of future
Informational RFCs approved by IETF consensus).
The IMEI is 15 decimal digits long and includes a Type Allocation
Code (TAC) of 8 decimal digits and a Serial Number (SNR) of 6 decimal
digits plus a Spare decimal digit. The TAC identifies the type of
the Mobile Equipment and is chosen from a range of values allocated
to the Mobile Equipment manufacturer in order to uniquely identify
the model of the Mobile Equipment. The SNR is an individual serial
number that uniquely identifies each Mobile Equipment device within
the TAC. The Spare digit is used as a Check digit to validate the
IMEI and is always set to the value 0 when transmitted by the Mobile
The IMEISV is 16 decimal digits long and includes the TAC and SNR,
same as for the IMEI, but also includes a 2 decimal digit Software
Version Number (SVN), which is allocated by the Mobile Equipment
manufacturer to identify the software version of the Mobile
The information here is meant to be a concise guide for those wishing
to use the IMEI and IMEISV as URNs. Nothing in this document should
be construed to override 3GPP Technical Specification (TS) 23.003
[2], which specifies the IMEI and IMEISV.
The GSMA is a global trade association representing nearly 800 mobile
phone operators across 220 territories and countries of the world.
The primary goals of the GSMA are to ensure that mobile phones and
wireless services work globally and are easily accessible. Further
details about the GSMA's role in allocating the IMEI and the IMEISV,
as well as the IMEI and IMEISV allocation guidelines, can be found in
GSMA Permanent Reference Document (PRD) TS.06 [3].
2. Terminology
document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [4].
3. Namespace Registration Template
Namespace ID: 'gsma'
Registration version number: 1
Registration date: 2014-01-12
Declared registrant of the namespace:
Registering organization:
Name: GSM Association
Address: 1st Floor, Mid City Place,
71 High Holborn, London, England
Designated contact person:
Name: Paul Gosden
Coordinates: pgosden@gsma.com
Declaration of syntactic structure:
The identifier is expressed in American Standard Code for
Information Interchange (ASCII) characters and has a hierarchical
structure expressed using the Augmented Backus-Naur Form (ABNF)
defined in RFC 5234 [5], as follows:
gsma-urn = "urn:" gsma-NID ":" gsma-NSS
gsma-NID = "gsma"
gsma-NSS = imei-specifier / future-gsma-specifier
imei-specifier = "imei:" ( imeival / ext-imei )
[ ";" sw-version-param ]
[ ";" imei-version-param ]
ext-imei = gsma-defined-nonempty ;GSMA defined and
;IETF consensus
;required
sw-version-param = "svn=" software-version
imei-version-param = "vers=" imei-version-val
software-version = 2DIGIT
imei-version-val = DIGIT
future-gsma-specifier = future-specifier
*( ";" future-param )
future-specifier = gsma-defined-nonempty ;GSMA defined
future-param = par-name [ EQUAL par-value ]
par-name = gsma-defined-nonempty
par-value = gsma-defined-nonempty
EQUAL = "="
gsma-defined-nonempty = 1*gsma-urn-char
gsma-urn-char = ALPHA / DIGIT
/ "-" / "." / "_" / "%" / ":"
An NSS for the IMEI is defined under the 'gsma' NID.
An IMEI is an identifier under the 'gsma' NID that uniquely
identifies the mobile devices used in the GSM, UMTS, and LTE
networks.
The representation of the IMEI is defined in 3GPP TS 23.003 [2].
To accurately represent an IMEI received in a cellular signaling
message (see 3GPP TS 24.008 [6]) as a URN, it is necessary to
convert the received binary (Binary Coded Decimal (BCD)) encoded
bit sequence to a decimal digit string representation. Each field
has its representation for humans as a decimal digit string with
the most significant digit first.
The following ABNF includes the set of core rules in RFC 5234 [5];
the core rules are not repeated here.
A URN with the 'imei' NSS contains one 'imeival', and its formal
definition is provided by the following ABNF (RFC 5234) [5]:
imeival = tac "-" snr "-" spare
tac = 8DIGIT
snr = 6DIGIT
spare = DIGIT
<future-gsma-specifier> and <gsma-defined-nonempty> can comprise
any ASCII characters compliant with the above ABNF.
The GSMA will take responsibility for the 'gsma' namespace,
including the 'imei' NSS.
Additional NSS may be added for future identifiers needed by the
GSMA, at their discretion. Only URNs with the 'imei' NSS are
considered to be "GSMA IMEI URNs", and use in IETF protocols of
other NSS that might be defined in the future will require IETF
consensus.
Relevant ancillary documentation:
See IMEI Allocation and Approval Guidelines (GSMA PRD TS.06) [3]
and 3GPP TS 23.003 [2].
Identifier uniqueness considerations:
Identifiers under the 'gsma' NID are defined and assigned by the
GSMA after ensuring that the URNs to be assigned are unique.
Uniqueness is achieved by checking against the IANA registry of
previously assigned names.
Procedures are in place to ensure that each IMEI is uniquely
assigned by the Mobile Equipment manufacturer so that it is
guaranteed to uniquely identify that particular Mobile Equipment
Procedures are in place to ensure that each IMEISV is uniquely
device and the specific software version installed.
Identifier persistence considerations:
The GSMA is committed to maintaining uniqueness and persistence of
all resources identified by assigned URNs.
As the NID sought is 'gsma' and "GSMA" is the long-standing
acronym for the trade association that represents the mobile phone
operators, the URN should also persist indefinitely (at least as
long as there is a need for its use). The assignment process
guarantees that names are not reassigned. The binding between the
name and its resource is permanent.
The TAC and SNR portions of the IMEI and IMEISV are permanently
stored in the Mobile Equipment, so they remain persistent as long
as the Mobile Equipment exists. The process for TAC and SNR
assignment is documented in GSMA PRD TS.06 [3], and once assigned,
the TAC and SNR values are not reassigned to other Mobile
Equipment devices. The SVN portion of the IMEISV may be modified
by software when new versions are installed but should be
persistent for the duration of the installation of that specific
version of software.
Process of identifier assignment:
The GSMA will manage the <NSS> (including 'imei') and
<future-gsma-specifier> identifier resources to maintain
uniqueness.
The process for IMEI and IMEISV assignment is documented in GSMA
PRD TS.06 [3].
Process for identifier resolution:
Since the 'gsma' NSS is not currently globally resolvable, this is
Rules for Lexical Equivalence:
Two GSMA IMEI URNs are equivalent if they have the same 'imeival'
value, and the same parameter values in the same sequential order,
with the exception that the 'vers=0' parameter is to be ignored
for the purposes of comparison. All of these comparisons are to
be case insensitive.
Any identifier in the 'gsma' NSS can be compared using the normal
mechanisms for percent-encoded UTF-8 strings (see RFC 3629 [7]).
Conformance with URN Syntax:
The string representation of the 'gsma' NID and of the 'imei' NSS
is fully compatible with the URN syntax (see RFC 2141 [8]).
Validation mechanism:
The IMEI can be validated using the mechanism defined in Annex B
of 3GPP TS 23.003 [2]. There is no mechanism defined to validate
the SVN field of the IMEISV.
Scope: The GSMA URN is global in scope.
4. Specification
4.1. IMEI Parameters
The optional 'vers' parameter and the 'ext-imei' field in the ABNF
are included for extensibility of the 'imei' NSS -- for example, if
the IMEI format is extended in the future (such as with additional
digits or using hex digits). In this case, the 'vers' parameter
would contain a non-zero value and the 'ext-imei' would be further
defined to represent the syntax of the extended IMEI format. A value
of the 'vers' parameter equal to 0 or the absence of the 'vers'
parameter means the URN format is compliant with the format specified
Any change to the format of the 'imei' NSS requires the use of the
procedure for URN NSS changes and additions (currently through the
publication of future Informational RFCs approved by IETF consensus).
The use of the 'vers' parameter was chosen for extensibility instead
of defining a new NSS (e.g., 'imei2') because it is likely that many
applications will only need to perform string compares of the
'imeival'. So, even if the format or length of the 'imeival' changes
in the future, such applications should continue to work without
having to be updated to understand a new NSS.
RFC 7255 [10] specifies how the GSMA IMEI URN can be used as an
instance ID as specified in RFC 5626 [11]. Any future value of the
'vers' parameter other than 0, or the definition of additional
parameters that are intended to be used as part of an instance ID,
will require an update to RFC 7255 [10].
urn:gsma:imei:90420156-025763-0;vers=0
The IMEISV is an identifier that uniquely identifies mobile devices
and their associated software versions used in the GSM, UMTS, and LTE
networks. The representation of the IMEISV is defined in 3GPP TS
23.003 [2].
To represent the IMEISV, the URN parameter 'svn' is appended to the
GSMA IMEI URN and set equal to the decimal string representation of
the two software version number (svn) digits in the IMEISV, and the
Spare digit in the IMEI 'imeival' is set to zero.
urn:gsma:imei:90420156-025763-0;svn=42
4.2. IMEI Format
4.2.1. Type Allocation Code (TAC)
The TAC is an 8 decimal digit value. The TAC identifies the type of
the model of the Mobile Equipment.
4.2.2. Serial Number (SNR)
The SNR is a 6 decimal digit value. The SNR is an individual serial
the TAC.
4.2.3. Spare
The Spare is a single decimal digit. When the IMEI is stored on the
Mobile Equipment and network equipment, it contains a value that is
used as a Check digit and is intended to avoid manual reporting
errors (e.g., when customers register stolen mobiles at the
operator's customer care desk) and also to help guard against the
possibility of incorrect entries being provisioned in the network
equipment. The Spare is always set to zero when transmitted by the
Mobile Equipment (including when in the IMEI URN format). Annex B of
3GPP TS 23.003 [2] specifies a mechanism for computing the actual
Check digit in order to validate the TAC and SNR.
4.2.4. Binary Encoding
When included in a cellular signaling message, the IMEI format is 15
decimal digits encoded in 8 octets, using BCD as defined in 3GPP TS
24.008 [6]. Figure 1 is an abstract representation of a BCD-encoded
IMEI stored in memory (the actual storage format in memory is
implementation specific). In Figure 1, the most significant digit of
the TAC is coded in the least significant bits of octet 1. The most
significant digit of the SNR is coded in the least significant bits
of octet 5. The Spare digit is coded in the least significant bits
of octet 8. When included in an identity element in a cellular
signaling message, the most significant digit of the TAC is
included in digit 1 of the identity element in Figure 10.5.4 of
3GPP TS 24.008 [6].
14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 Decimal Digits
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| | | S|
| T | S | p|
| A | N | a|
| C | R | r|
| | | e|
+--+-----+-----+-----+--+--+-----+-----+--+--+
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Octets
Figure 1: IMEI Format
4.3. IMEISV Format
The TAC is the same as the TAC in the IMEI (see Section 4.2.1).
Montemurro, et al. Informational [Page 10]
The SNR is the same as the SNR in the IMEI (see Section 4.2.2).
4.3.3. Software Version Number (SVN)
The Software Version Number is allocated by the mobile device
manufacturer to identify the software version of the mobile device.
When included in a cellular signaling message, the IMEISV format is
16 decimal digits encoded in 8 octets using BCD as defined in 3GPP TS
IMEISV stored in memory (the actual storage format in memory is
the TAC is coded in the most significant bits of octet 1. The most
significant digit of the SNR is coded in the most significant bits of
octet 5. The most significant digit of the SVN is coded in the most
significant bits of octet 8. When included in an identity element in
a cellular signaling message, the most significant digit of the TAC
is included in digit 1 of the identity element in Figure 10.5.4 of
15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 Decimal Digits
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
| | | |
| T | S | S |
| A | N | V |
| C | R | N |
+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+
Figure 2: IMEISV Format
5. Community Considerations
GSM, UMTS, and LTE mobile devices will be interoperating with
Internet devices for a variety of voice and data services. To do
this, they need to make use of Internet protocols that will operate
end to end between devices in GSM/UMTS/LTE networks and those in the
general Internet. Some of these protocols require the use of URNs as
identifiers. Within the GSM/UMTS/LTE networks, mobile devices are
identified by their IMEI or IMEISV. Internet users will need to be
able to receive and include the GSMA URN in various Internet protocol
elements to facilitate communication between pure Internet-based
devices and GSM/UMTS/LTE mobile devices. Thus, the existence and
syntax of these namespaces need to be available to the general
Internet community, and the namespace needs to be reserved with IANA
in order to guarantee uniqueness and prevent potential namespace
conflicts both within the Internet and within GSM/UMTS/LTE networks.
Conversely, Internet implementations will not generally possess IMEI
identifiers. The identifiers generated by such implementations will
typically be URNs within namespaces other than 'gsma' and may,
depending on context, even be non-URN URIs. Implementations are
advised to be ready to process URIs other than 'gsma' namespaced
URNs, so as to aid in interoperability.
6. Namespace Considerations
A URN was considered the most appropriate URI to represent the IMEI
and IMEISV, as these identifiers may be used and transported
similarly to the Universally Unique Identifier (UUID), which is
defined as a URN in RFC 4122 [12]. Since specifications for
protocols that are used to transport device identifiers often require
the device identifier to be globally unique and in the URN format, it
is necessary that the URN formats are defined to represent the IMEI
and IMEISV.
7. IANA Considerations
In accordance with BCP 66 (RFC 3406) [1], IANA has registered the
Formal URN Namespace 'gsma' in the "Uniform Resource Names (URN)
Namespaces" registry, using the registration template presented in
Section 3 of this document.
8. Security and Privacy Considerations
IMEIs (but with the Spare value set to the value of the Check digit)
are displayable on most mobile devices and in many cases are printed
on the case within the battery compartment. Anyone with brief
physical access to the mobile device can therefore easily obtain the
IMEI. Therefore, IMEIs MUST NOT be used as security capabilities
(identifiers whose mere possession grants access). Unfortunately,
there are currently examples of some applications that are using the
IMEI for authorization. Also, some service provider's customer
service departments have been known to use knowledge of the IMEI as
"proof" that the caller is the legitimate owner of the mobile device.
Both of these are inappropriate uses of the IMEI.
While the specific software version of the mobile device only
identifies the lower-layer software that has undergone and passed
certification testing, and not the operating system or application
software, the software version could identify software that is
vulnerable to attacks or is known to contain security holes.
Therefore, the IMEISV MUST only be delivered to trusted entities
within carrier networks and not provided to the Internet at large, as
it could help a malicious device identify that the mobile device is
running software that is known to be vulnerable to certain attacks.
This concern is similar to concerns regarding the use of the
User-Agent header in the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) as
specified in RFC 3261 [13]. Therefore, the IMEISV (that is, the IMEI
URN with a 'svn' parameter) MUST NOT be delivered to devices that are
not trusted. IMEIs are almost always personally identifiable
information, and so these URNs MUST be treated as personally
identifiable information in all cases. In order to prevent violating
a user's privacy, the IMEI URN MUST NOT be included in messages
intended to convey any level of anonymity.
Since the IMEI is permanently assigned to the mobile device and is
not modified when the ownership of the mobile device changes (even
upon a complete software reload of the device), the IMEI URN MUST NOT
be used as a user identifier or user address by an application.
Using the IMEI to identify a user or as a user address could result
in communications destined for a previous owner of a device being
received by the new device owner or could allow the new device owner
to access information or services owned by the previous device owner.
Additionally, since the IMEI identifies the mobile device, it
potentially could be used to identify and track users for the
purposes of surveillance and call data mining if sent in the clear.
Since the IMEI is personally identifiable information, uses of the
IMEI URN with IETF protocols require a specification and IETF Expert
Review [14] in order to ensure that privacy concerns are
appropriately addressed. Protocols carrying the IMEI URN SHOULD at a
minimum use channels that are strongly hop-by-hop encrypted, and it
is RECOMMENDED that end-to-end encryption be used.
Additional security considerations are specified in 3GPP TS 22.016
[9]. Specifically, the IMEI is to be incorporated in a module that
is contained within the terminal. The IMEI SHALL NOT be changed
after the terminal's production process. It SHALL resist tampering,
i.e., manipulation and change, by any means (e.g., physical,
electrical, and software).
9. Acknowledgements
This document draws heavily on the 3GPP work on Numbering,
Addressing, and Identification in 3GPP TS 23.003 [2] and also on the
style and structure used in RFC 4122 [12]. The authors would like to
thank Cullen Jennings, Lisa Dusseault, Dale Worley, Ivo Sedlacek,
Atle Monrad, James Yu, Mary Barnes, Tim Bray, S. Moonesamy, Alexey
Melnikov, Martin Duerst, John Klensin, Paul Kyzivat, Christer
Holmberg, Barry Leiba, and Stephen Farrell for their help and
10.1. Normative References
[1] Daigle, L., van Gulik, D., Iannella, R., and P. Faltstrom,
"Uniform Resource Names (URN) Namespace Definition Mechanisms",
BCP 66, RFC 3406, October 2002.
[2] 3GPP, "Numbering, addressing and identification", 3GPP TS 23.003
(Release 8), March 2014, <ftp://ftp.3gpp.org/Specs/
archive/23_series/23.003/>.
[3] GSM Association, "IMEI Allocation and Approval Guidelines", PRD
TS.06 (DG06) Version 6.0, July 2011,
<http://www.gsma.com/newsroom/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/
ts0660tacallocationprocessapproved.pdf>.
[4] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement
Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[5] Crocker, D. and P. Overell, "Augmented BNF for Syntax
Specifications: ABNF", STD 68, RFC 5234, January 2008.
[6] 3GPP, "Mobile radio interface Layer 3 specification; Core
network protocols; Stage 3", 3GPP TS 24.008 (Release 8), June
2013, <ftp://ftp.3gpp.org/Specs/archive/24_series/ 24.008/>.
[7] Yergeau, F., "UTF-8, a transformation format of ISO 10646", STD
63, RFC 3629, November 2003.
[8] Moats, R., "URN Syntax", RFC 2141, May 1997.
[9] 3GPP, "International Mobile station Equipment Identities
(IMEI)", 3GPP TS 22.016 (Release 8), December 2009,
<ftp://ftp.3gpp.org/Specs/archive/22_series/22.016/>.
10.2. Informative References
[10] Allen, A., Ed., "Using the International Mobile station
Equipment Identity (IMEI) Uniform Resource Name (URN) as an
Instance ID", RFC 7255, May 2014.
[11] Jennings, C., Mahy, R., and F. Audet, "Managing Client-
Initiated Connections in the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)",
RFC 5626, October 2009.
[12] Leach, P., Mealling, M., and R. Salz, "A Universally Unique
IDentifier (UUID) URN Namespace", RFC 4122, July 2005.
[13] Rosenberg, J., Schulzrinne, H., Camarillo, G., Johnston, A.,
Peterson, J., Sparks, R., Handley, M., and E. Schooler, "SIP:
[14] Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, "Guidelines for Writing an IANA
Considerations Section in RFCs", BCP 26, RFC 5226, May 2008.
Authors' Addresses
Michael Montemurro (editor)
4701 Tahoe Dr.
Mississauga, Ontario L4W 0B4
EMail: mmontemurro@blackberry.com
Andrew Allen
Sunrise, Florida 33323
EMail: aallen@blackberry.com
EMail: David.McDonald@meteor.ie
Paul Gosden
1st Floor, Mid City Place, 71 High Holborn
EMail: pgosden@gsma.com
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Network Working Group H. Hannu
Request for Comments: 3322 Ericsson
Category: Informational January 2003
Signaling Compression (SigComp) Requirements & Assumptions
The purpose of this document is to outline requirements and
motivations for the development of a scheme for compression and
decompression of messages from signaling protocols. In wireless
environments and especially in cellular systems, e.g., GSM (Global
System for Mobile communications) and UMTS (Universal Mobile
Telecommunications System), there is a need to maximize the transport
efficiency for data over the radio interface. With the introduction
of SIP/SDP (Session Initiation Protocol/Session Description Protocol)
to cellular devices, compression of the signaling messages should be
considered in order to improve both service availability and quality,
mainly by reducing the user idle time, e.g., at call setup.
1. Introduction....................................................2
1.1. Protocol Characteristics......................................2
1.2. Cellular System Radio Characteristics.........................3
2. Motivation for Signaling Reduction..............................4
2.1. Estimation of Call Setup Delay Using SIP/SDP..................4
3. Alternatives for Signaling Reduction............................6
4. Assumptions.....................................................7
5. Requirements....................................................8
5.1. General Requirements..........................................8
5.2. Performance Requirements......................................9
6. Security Considerations.........................................11
7. IANA Considerations.............................................11
8. References......................................................11
9. Author's Address................................................12
10. Full Copyright Statement.......................................13
Hannu Informational [Page 1]
RFC 3322 SigComp Requirements & Assumptions January 2003
In wireless environments, and especially in cellular systems, such as
GSM/GPRS, there is a need to maximize the transport efficiency of
data over the radio interface. The radio spectrum is rather
expensive and must be carefully used. Therefore, the cellular
systems must support a sufficient number of users to make them
economically feasible. Thus, there is a limitation in the per user
bandwidth.
Compressing the headers of the network and transport protocols used
for carrying user data is one way to make more efficient use of the
scarce radio resources [ROHC]. However, compression of the messages
from signaling protocols, such as SIP/SDP, should also be considered
to increase the radio resource usage even further. Compression will
also improve the service quality by reducing the user idle time at
e.g., call setup. When IP is used end-to-end, new applications, such
as streaming, will be brought to tiny end-hosts, such as cellular
devices. This will introduce additional traffic in cellular systems.
Compression of signaling messages, such as RTSP [RTSP], should also
be considered to improve both the service availability and quality.
New services with their corresponding signaling protocols make it
reasonable to consider a scheme that is generic. The scheme should
be generic in the meaning that the scheme can efficiently be applied
to arbitrary protocols with certain characteristics, such as the
ASCII based protocols SIP and RTSP.
1.1. Protocol Characteristics
The following application signaling protocols are examples of
protocols that are expected to be commonly used in the future. Some
of their characteristics are described below.
1.1.1 SIP
The Session Initiation Protocol [SIP] is an application layer
protocol for establishing, modifying and terminating multimedia
sessions or calls. These sessions include Internet multimedia
conferences, Internet telephony and similar applications. SIP can be
used over either TCP [TCP] or UDP [UDP]. SIP is a text based
protocol, using ISO 10646 in UTF-8 encoding.
1.1.2 SDP
The Session Description Protocol [SDP] is used to advertise
multimedia conferences and communicate conference addresses and
conference tool specific information. It is also used for general
real-time multimedia session description purposes. SDP is carried in
the message body of SIP and RTSP messages. SDP is text based using
the ISO 10646 character set in UTF-8 encoding.
1.1.3 RTSP
The Real Time Streaming Protocol [RTSP] is an application level
protocol for controlling the delivery of data with real-time
properties, such as audio and video. RTSP may use UDP or TCP (or
other) as a transport protocol. RTSP is text based using the ISO
10646 character set in UTF-8 encoding.
1.1.4 Protocol Similarities
The above protocols have many similarities. These similarities will
have implications on solutions to the problems they create in
conjunction with e.g., cellular radio access. The similarities
- Requests and reply characteristics. When a sender sends a
request, it stays idle until it has received a response. Hence,
it typically takes a number of round trip times to conclude e.g.,
a SIP session.
- They are ASCII based.
- They are generous in size in order to provide the necessary
information to the session participants.
- SIP and RTSP share many common header field names, methods and
status codes. The traffic patterns are also similar. The
signaling is carried out primarily under the set up phase. For
SIP, this means that the majority of the signaling is carried out
to set up a phone call or multimedia session. For RTSP, the
majority of the signaling is done before the transmission of
application data.
1.2. Cellular System Radio Characteristics
Partly to enable high utilization of cellular systems, and partly due
to the unreliable nature of the radio media, cellular links have
characteristics that differ somewhat from a typical fixed link, e.g.,
copper or fiber. The most important characteristics are the lossy
behavior of cellular links and the large round trip times.
The quality in a radio system typically changes from one radio frame
to another due to fading in the radio channel. Due to the nature of
the radio media and interference from other radio users, the average
bit error rate (BER) can be 10e-3 with a variation roughly between
10e-2 to 10e-4. To be able to use the radio media with its error
characteristics, methods such as forward error correction (FEC) and
interleaving are used. If these methods were not used, the BER of a
cellular radio channel would be around 10 %. Thus, radio links are,
by nature, error prone. The final packet loss rate may be further
reduced by applying low level retransmissions (ARQ) over the radio
channel; however, this trades decreased packet loss rate for a larger
delay. By applying methods to decrease BER, the system delay is
increased. In some cellular systems, the algorithmic channel round
trip delay is in the order of 80 ms. Other sources of delays are
DSP-processing, node-internal delay and transmission. A general
value for the RTT is difficult to state, but it might be as high as
200 ms.
For cellular systems it is of vital importance to have a sufficient
number of users per cell; otherwise the system cost would prohibit
deployment. It is crucial to use the existing bandwidth carefully;
hence the average user bit rate is typically relatively low compared
to the average user bit rate in wired line systems. This is
especially important for mass market services like voice.
2. Motivation for Signaling Reduction
The need for solving the problems caused by the signaling protocol
messages is exemplified in this chapter by looking at a typical
SIP/SDP Call Setup sequence over a narrow band channel.
2.1 Estimation of Call Setup Delay Using SIP/SDP
Figure 2.1 shows an example of SIP signaling between two termination
points with a wireless link between, and the resulting delay under
certain system assumptions.
It should be noted that the used figures represent a very narrow band
link. E.g., a WCDMA system can provide maximum bit rates up to 2
Mbits/s in ideal conditions, but that means one single user would
consume all radio resources in the cell. For a mass market service
such as voice, it is always crucial to reduce the bandwidth
requirements for each user.
Client Network-Proxy Size [bytes] Time [ms]
|---------- INVITE --------->| 620 517+70=587
|<-- 183 Session progress ---| 500 417+70=487
|---------- PRACK ---------->| 250 208+70=278
|<----- 200 OK (PRACK) ------| 300 250+70=320
: :
|<...... RSVP and SM .......>|
|---------- COMET ---------->| 620 517+70=587
|<----- 200 OK (COMET) ------| 450
| | +
|<------ 180 Ringing --------| 230 567+70=637
|<----- 200 OK (PRACK) ------| 300
|<--------- 200 OK ----------| 450 625+70=695
|----------- ACK ----------->| 230 192+70=262
Figure 2.1. SIP signaling delays assuming a link speed of 9600
bits/sec and a RTT of 140 ms.
The one way delay is calculated according to the following equation:
OneWayDelay =
MessageSize[bits]/LinkSpeed[bits/sec] + RTT[sec]/2 (eq. 1)
The following values have been used:
RTT/2: 70 ms
LinkSpeed 9.6 kbps
The delay formula is based on an approximation of a WCDMA radio
access method for speech services. The approximation is rather
crude. For instance, delays caused by possible retransmissions due
to errors are ignored. Further, these calculations also assume that
there is only one cellular link in the path and take delays in an
eventual intermediate IP-network into account. Even if this
approximation is crude, it is still sufficient to provide
representative numbers and enable comparisons. The message size
given in Figure 2.1, is typical for a SIP/SDP call setup sequence.
2.1.1 Delay Results
Applying equation 1 to each SIP/SDP message shown in the example of
Figure 2.1 gives a total delay of 4131 ms from the first SIP/SDP
message to the last. The RSVP and Session Management (Radio Bearer
setup), displayed in Figure 2.1, will add approximately 1.5 seconds
to the total delay, using equation 1. However, there will also be
RSVP and SM signaling prior to the SIP INVITE message to establish
the radio bearer, which would add approximately another 1.5 seconds.
In [TSG] there is a comparison between GERAN call setup using SIP and
ordinary GSM call setup. For a typical GSM call setup, the time is
about 3.6 seconds, and for the case when using SIP, the call setup is
approximately 7.9 seconds.
Another situation that would benefit from reduced signaling is
carrying signaling messages over narrow bandwidth links in mid-call.
For GERAN, this will result in frame stealing with degraded speech
quality as a result.
Thus, solutions are needed to reduce the signaling delay and the
required bandwidth when considering both system bandwidth
requirements and service setup delays.
3. Alternatives for Signaling Reduction
More or less attractive solutions to the previously mentioned
problems can be outlined:
- Increase the user bit rate
An increase of the bit rate per user will decrease the number of
users per cell. There exist systems (for example WCDMA) which can
provide high bit rates and even variable rates, e.g., at the setup
of new sessions. However, there are also systems, e.g., GSM/EDGE,
where it is not possible to reach these high bit rates in all
situations. At the cell borders, for example, the signal strength
to noise ratio will be lower and result in a lower bit rate. In
general, an unnecessary increase of the bit rate should be avoided
due to the higher system cost introduced and the possibility of
denial of service. The latter could, for example, be caused by
lack of enough bandwidth to support the sending of the large setup
message within a required time period, which is set for QoS
- Decrease the RTT of the cellular link
Decreasing the RTT would require substantial system changes and is
thus not feasible in the short term. Further, the RTT-delay
caused by interleaving and FEC will always have to be present
regardless of which system is used. Otherwise the BER will be too
high for the received data to be useful, or alternatively trigger
retransmissions giving an average total delay of the same or
higher magnitude.
- Optimize message sequence for the protocols
If the request/response pattern could be eased up, then "keeping
the pipe full" could be a way forward. Thus, instead of following
the message sequence described in Figure 4.2, more than one
message would be sent in a row, even though no response has been
received. However, this would entail protocol changes and may be
difficult at the current date.
- Protocol stripping
Removing fields from a message would decrease the size of the
messages to some extent. However, this would cause the loss of
transparency and thus violate the End-to-End principle and is thus
not desirable.
- Compression
By compressing messages, the impact of the mentioned problems
could be decreased. Compared to the other possible solutions
compression can be made, and must be, transparent to the end-user
application. Thus, compression seems to be the most attractive
way forward.
4. Assumptions
- Negotiation
How the usage of compression is negotiated is out of the scope for
this compression solution and must be handled by e.g., the
protocol the messages of which are to be compressed.
- Reliable transport
With reliable transport, it is assumed that a transport recovered
from data that is damaged, lost, duplicated, or delivered out of
order, e.g., [TCP].
- Unreliable transport
With unreliable transport, it is assumed that a transport does not
have the capabilities of a reliable transport, e.g., [UDP].
5. Requirements
This chapter states requirements for a signaling compression scheme
to be developed in the IETF ROHC WG.
The requirements are divided into two parts. Section 5.1 sets
general requirements concerning the Internet infrastructure, while
Section 5.2 sets requirements on the scheme itself.
5.1. General Requirements
1. Transparency: When a message is compressed and then decompressed,
the result must be bitwise identical to the original message.
Justification: This is to ensure that the compression scheme will
not cause problems for any current or future part of the Internet
infrastructure.
Note: See also requirement 9.
2. Header compression coexistence: The compression scheme must be
able to coexist with header compression, especially the ROHC
Justification: Signaling compression is used because there is a
need to conserve bandwidth usage. In that case, header
compression will likely be needed too.
3a. Compatibility: The compression scheme must be constructed in such
a way that it allows the above protocols' mechanisms to negotiate
whether the compression scheme is to be applied or not.
Justification: Two entities must be able to communicate
regardless if the signaling compression scheme is implemented at
both entities or not.
3b. Ubiquity: Modifications to the protocols generating the messages
that are to be compressed, must not be required for the
compression scheme to work.
Justification: This will simplify deployment of the compression
scheme.
Note: This does not preclude making extensions, which are related
to the signaling compression scheme, to existing protocols, as
long as the extensions are backward compatible.
4. Generality: Compression of arbitrary message streams must be
supported. The signaling compression scheme must not be limited
to certain protocols, traffic patterns or sessions. It must not
assume any message pattern to be able to perform compression.
Justification: There might be a future need for compression of
different ASCII based signaling protocols. This requirement will
minimize future work.
Note: This does not preclude optimization for certain streams.
5. Unidirectional routes: The compression scheme must be able to
operate on unidirectional routes, i.e., without explicit feedback
messages from the decompressor.
Note: Implementations on unidirectional routes might possibly
show a degraded performance compared to implementations on bi-
directional routes.
6. Transport: The solution must work for both unreliable and
reliable underlying transport protocols, e.g., UDP and TCP.
Justification: The protocols, which generate the messages that
are to be compressed, may use either an unreliable or a reliable
underlying transport.
Note: This should not be taken to mean that the same set of
solution mechanisms must be used over both unreliable and
reliable transport.
5.2. Performance Requirements
The performance requirements in this section and the following
subsections are valid for both unreliable and reliable underlying
7. Scalability: The scheme must be flexible to accommodate a range
of compressors/decompressors with varying memory and processor
capabilities.
Justification: A primary target for the signaling compression
scheme is cellular systems, where the mobile terminals have
varying capabilities.
8. Delay: The signaling compression must not noticeably add to the
delay experienced by the end user.
Justification: Reduction of the user experienced delay is the
main purpose of signaling compression.
Note: This requirement is intended to prevent schemes that
achieve compression efficiency at the expense of delay, i.e.,
queuing of messages to improve the compression efficiency should
be avoided.
The following requirements are grouped into two subsections, a
robustness section and a compression efficiency section.
5.2.1. Robustness
The requirements in this section concern the issue of when compressed
messages should be correctly decompressed. The transparency
requirement (first requirement) covers the issue with faulty
decompressed messages.
9. Residual errors: The compression scheme must be resilient against
errors undetected by lower layers, i.e., the probability of
incorrect decompression caused by such undetected errors must be
scheme is cellular systems, where undetected errors might be
introduced on the cellular link.
10. Error propagation: Propagation of errors due to signaling
compression should be kept at an absolute minimum. Loss or
damage to a single or several messages, between compressor and
decompressor should not prevent compression and decompression of
later messages.
Justification: Error propagation reduces resource utilization and
11. Delay: The compression scheme must be able to perform compression
and decompression of messages under all expected delay
Hannu Informational [Page 10]
5.2.2. Compression Efficiency
This section states requirements related to compression efficiency.
12. Message loss: Loss or damage to a single or several messages, on
the link between compressor and decompressor, should not prevent
the usage of later messages in the compression and decompression
13. Moderate message misordering: The scheme should allow for the
correct decompression of messages, that have been moderately
misordered (1-2 messages) between compressor and decompressor.
The scheme should not prevent the usage of later messages in the
compression and decompression process.
Justification: Misordering is frequent on the Internet, and this
kind of misordering is common.
6. Security Considerations
A protocol specified to meet these requirements must be able to cope
with packets that have undergone security measures, such as
encryption, without adding any security risks. This document, by
itself however, does not add any security risks.
7. IANA Considerations
A protocol which meets these requirements may require the IANA to
assign various numbers. This document by itself however, does not
require any IANA involvement.
[ROHC] Bormann, C., Burmeister, C., Degermark, M., Fukushima, H.,
Hannu, H., Jonsson, L-E., Hakenberg, R., Koren, T., Le, K.,
Liu, Z., Martensson, A., Miyazaki, A., Svanbro, K., Wiebke,
T., Yoshimura, T. and H. Zheng, "RObust Header Compression
(ROHC): Framework and four profiles: RTP, UDP, ESP, and
uncompressed", RFC 3095, July 2001.
[RTSP] Schulzrinne, H., Rao, A. and R. Lanphier, "Real Time Streaming
Protocol (RTSP)", RFC 2326, April 1998.
[SDP] Handley, H. and V. Jacobson, "SDP: Session Description
Protocol", RFC 2327, April 1998.
[SIP] Rosenberg, J., Schulzrinne, H., Camarillo, G., Johnston, A.,
Peterson, J., Sparks, R., Handley, M. and E. Schooler, "SIP:
[UDP] Postel, J., "User Datagram Protocol", STD 6, RFC 768, August
[TCP] Postel, J., "Transmission Control Protocol", STD 7, RFC 793,
September 1981.
[TSG] Nortel Networks, "A Comparison Between GERAN Packet-Switched
Call Setup Using SIP and GSM Circuit-Switched Call Setup Using
RIL3-CC, RIL3-MM, RIL3-RR, and DTAP", 3GPP TSG GERAN #2, GP-
000508, 6-10 November 2000.
9. Author's Address
Hans Hannu
Ericsson AB
SE-971 28 Lulea, Sweden
Phone: +46 920 20 21 84
EMail: hans.hannu@epl.ericsson.se
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t. 90, Elizabeth Stanley, The Road to Hell, State Violence against Children in Postwar New Zealand
July 22, 2017 Michelle Elvy
The Road to Hell, State Violence against Children in Postwar New Zealand by Elizabeth Stanley,
Auckland: AUP (2016).
RRP: $45.
Pb, pp296.
Reviewed by Marie Connolly.
Child welfare in New Zealand, as in other Western countries, has a long history of providing care for children and young people. Over time large numbers of children have been taken from their families and placed with strangers often in family-like care settings, but also in institutional care. Sometimes they were treated well. Sometimes they were treated brutally in dehumanising and humiliating ways. This book by Elizabeth Stanley tells the stories of children who were abused and terrorised in state institutional care. Their stories expose a system that failed utterly and miserably in its duty to protect and nurture children that it had a responsibility to care for. It is a story of negligence and the concealment of atrocities that have had tragic results for many children who clearly deserved better. It is a difficult book to read – a sad reminder of the powerlessness of children when controlled by abusive adults that they should have been able to trust, in the very places that should have provided them safety.
Stanley, a criminologist at Victoria University of Wellington, is experienced in writing about human rights violations, particularly in the context of state crime. In this book she interviews people who were incarcerated in children’s homes and institutions across the length and breadth of New Zealand. She does not claim academic neutrality. Rather, she seeks justice for people whose lives have been blighted by physical and sexual abuse perpetrated by institutional staff who were employed by the state. Institutional systems internationally have been plagued with these stories of failure. Tom McCarthy’s excellent film Spotlight dramatised the widespread abuse of children in the US by members of the Catholic Church. Similarly, Mary Keenan’s book Child Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church examined the abuse of children in Ireland. Closer to home, Australia is currently in the midst of a Royal Commission into Institutional Child Abuse. All these investigations expose betrayals of trust and crimes against children that share things in common. They are systems that support cultures of violence that permit adults to prey on powerless and vulnerable children with impunity, and then do whatever they can to cover it up to protect the ‘good name’ of the institution.
The Road to Hell begins with the stories of sad, abused children whose home lives were characterised by violence and neglect, and for whom protection by the state was necessary and justified. You would think that it would not be difficult to provide them with better care environments. Yet in the chapters that follow the stories of systematic abuse including, perhaps most shockingly, the use of electro-convulsive therapy (ECT) as a common behavioural management tool. It is a shameful indictment on a child welfare system that had responsibility for institutions that Stanley describes as ‘closed places with weak external oversight’ (p 9). These were places that allowed violence to flourish and become normalised. Stanley recognises that not all children experienced abuse, and that there were humane staff who did their best to look after children well. But sadly, positive stories are few and for the children terrorised by abusive people in these institutions, the consequences have often been tragic and long lasting.
Stanley ends the book suggesting ways in which the state might make amends through official recognition and assurances that those who come forward to tell their stories will not be further victimised through the processes that are available to them. As I reflect on the experiences and effects of what Stanley calls ‘the generational tolerance of state-led violence’ (p 200), I can’t help but wonder if whether repairing harm and sharpening efforts to monitor institutional care will ever be enough. We have ample evidence from this and other enquiries into institutional care to know that institutions create power dynamics that present very real risk for children and young people.[1] Yet we continue to build them even though we know that they are likely to be criminogenic – they become learning environments for children and young people that have the potential to reinforce and embed criminality. I think Ministers and people who have a say in how the state responds to children in care should read this book. Perhaps then we will find better solutions that respond to the contemporary needs of children and young people.
[1] M. Keenan (2012). Child Sexual Abuse and the Catholic Church: Gender, Power and Organisational Culture. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Marie Connolly is the Chair and Head of Social Work School of Health Sciences at The University of Melbourne. She has written extensively in the area of child and family welfare, including Beyond the risk paradigm in child protection (2017), Understanding Violence (2013), Understanding child and family welfare (2012), and Morals, rights and practice in the human services (2008).
Published takahē 90, August, 2017.
Guest fiction interview: Frankie McMillan
Hunt Ducker poetry competition
The short story competition short list has been announced
Avalanche appreciation
Announcing the Short Story Competition Long List
Donate to takahē
Amount: NZD
Subscribe to the takahē blog!
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Anti Narcoleptics Drugs > Anti Narcoleptic Articles > Best friend Modafinil in fight with sleepiness
Best friend Modafinil in fight with sleepiness
Modafinil is…your ally against sleep.
Modafinil is a popular psycho stimulant which is widely sold in the US, Australia and countries of Europe under several commercial trade names such as Modavigil, Modalert and Provigil. It is a drug that is approved by the special institution for evaluation of quality of the products of the USA for treating various sleep disorders. The drug originates much stronger feelings of vigilance and focus, while also keeping a person in a state of wakefulness and full of energy for more than a few days.
The substance has recently become famous and gained fame as a «nootropic drug» or a «smart drug» due to its capability to increase mental performance of a person and increase the concentration of thoughts throughout the day. Students started using the given medication for long study periods and in order to successfully prepare for exams when time is almost over. Such off-label usage has been recognized ideal for a number of other situations, particularly the ones that require working for a long time or extra hours.
Those situations that demand prolonged periods of vigilance and increased attention benefit from the usage of Generic Modafinil. Originally the drug was designed and developed as the main help in treatment of narcoleptic patients, and later it was applied to other kinds of sleep disorders such as shift work sleep disorder and sudden attacks of inordinate unreasonable sleepiness during the day from other states such as insomnia. The drug has been also used off-label for a variety of different purposes. For instance, it is often received by the students when preparing for exams, because everybody knows that there is never enough time.
People who work shifts (doctors, taxi drivers, guardians) need it for keeping a state of wakefulness and vigilance during the night and having a good sleep in a daytime. Passengers flying to distant time zones use it to adjust to the local time and avoid sleep problems. It is also required by managers, businessmen, programmers for improving the efficiency of performance and for prolonged effective work. So you can buy Modafinil (according to your own goals) at the nearest drugstore or order Modafinil online at one of reliable pharmacies, which is even more convenient.
How does the drug work and why is it so effective?
There are a big number of different theories that are able to explain the precise mechanism of working of the given drug, but the fact is that its exact influence on the human body is still uncertain. However, scientists do know what the medication does not actually affect, namely it does not stimulate the central nervous system directly like the similar drug amphetamine does, because it is based on medicines. Such stimulation is the source of the jitters that typically are common for these drugs. Modafinil also is responsible for the spike in blood pressure and enhanced heart rate, that are usual side effects that appear due to the usage of psycho stimulants.
The drug’s way of action does not cause such harmful side effects at the same level as other similar medications. Maybe instead of focusing on these aspects of its action, which are still unknown, researchers should look at the occurred effects told by those people who used the drug. Medication liquidates or greatly reduces feelings of fatigue, mentioning that even after long periods with the lack of sleep people can still continue working at the highest level. The drug also sharpens the focus and increases concentration, letting a person work on a project without being quite easily distracted. People who have been using Modafinil also inform that it seems to make information flow a lot better. Every of these effects makes it clear that the medication is ideal for everybody who has a lot of work to be done.
Does the drug have any significant side effects?
The medication has undergone countless clinical trials and researches on its way to be approved by the USA institution that evaluates the quality of medicines. As a result, scientists are well aware about its side effects. The most commonly known ones are mild headache (20% of patients) and a little nausea (11%). Such figures are based on different clinical researches that have been conducted. Most people who received the drug classify its side effects as mild and insignificant and they usually go away after the first couple of hours after using the drug.
There are other non-significant side effects that occurred in 2% or less of the researches, which could be present in other conditions or in quite rare cases. This medication shows absolutely no signs of withdrawal symptoms, and if the effect occurs, it goes away after the drug wears off. This fact makes Modafinil irreplaceable for temporary usage.
Modafinil is a psycho stimulant that helps people stay in a state of wakefulness for quite a long time. It also helps in a fight with narcolepsy.
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The Ram and the He-goat.* 1After this first vision, I, Daniel, had another, in the third year of the reign of King Belshazzar. 2In my vision I saw myself in the fortress of Susa* in the province of Elam; I was beside the river Ulai. 3I looked up and saw standing by the river a ram with two great horns, the one larger and newer than the other. 4I saw the ram butting toward the west, north, and south. No beast could withstand it or be rescued from its power; it did what it pleased and grew powerful.
5As I was reflecting, a he-goat with a prominent horn on its forehead suddenly came from the west across the whole earth without touching the ground. 6It came to the two-horned ram I had seen standing by the river, and rushed toward it with savage force. 7I saw it reach the ram; enraged, the he-goat attacked and shattered both its horns. The ram did not have the strength to withstand it; the he-goat threw the ram to the ground and trampled upon it. No one could rescue the ram from its power.
8The he-goat grew very powerful, but at the height of its strength the great horn was shattered, and in its place came up four others, facing the four winds of heaven. 9Out of one of them came a little horn* which grew and grew toward the south, the east, and the glorious land. 10It grew even to the host of heaven,* so that it cast down to earth some of the host and some of the stars and trampled on them. 11It grew even to the Prince of the host, from whom the daily sacrifice was removed, and whose sanctuary was cast down. 12The host was given over together with the daily sacrifice in the course of transgression. It cast truth to the ground, and was succeeding in its undertaking.
13I heard a holy one speaking, and another said to whichever one it was that spoke, “How long shall the events of this vision last concerning the daily sacrifice, the desolating sin,* the giving over of the sanctuary and the host for trampling?” 14He answered him, “For two thousand three hundred evenings and mornings; then the sanctuary shall be set right.”
15While I, Daniel, sought the meaning of the vision I had seen, one who looked like a man stood before me, 16and on the Ulai I heard a human voice that cried out, “Gabriel,* explain the vision to this man.” 17When he came near where I was standing, I fell prostrate in terror. But he said to me, “Understand, O son of man, that the vision refers to the end time.”* 18As he spoke to me, I fell forward unconscious; he touched me and made me stand up. 19“I will show you,” he said, “what is to happen in the last days of wrath; for it is for the appointed time of the end.
20“The two-horned ram you saw represents the kings of the Medes and Persians.* 21The he-goat is the king of the Greeks, and the great horn on its forehead is the first king. 22The four that rose in its place when it was shattered are four kingdoms that will issue from his nation, but without his strength.
23“At the end of their reign,
when sinners have reached their measure,
There shall arise a king,
impudent, and skilled in intrigue.
24He shall be strong and powerful,
bring about fearful ruin,
and succeed in his undertaking.
He shall destroy powerful peoples;
25his cunning shall be against the holy ones,
his treacherous conduct shall succeed.
He shall be proud of heart
and destroy many by stealth.
But when he rises against the Prince of princes,
he shall be broken without a hand being raised.
26As for the vision of the evenings and the mornings,
what was spoken is true.
But you, keep this vision secret:
it is for the distant future.”
27I, Daniel, was weak and ill for some days; then I arose and took care of the king’s affairs. But the vision left me desolate, without understanding.
* [8:1–27] This vision continues images of the preceding one, and develops it in more detail. As explained in vv. 20–22 the two-horned ram represents the combined kingdom of the Medes and Persians, destroyed by Alexander’s Hellenistic empire originating in the west. Once again the author is interested only in the Seleucid dynasty, which emerged from the dissolution of Alexander’s empire after his death in 323 B.C.
* [8:2] The fortress of Susa: the royal palace of the Persian kings in the ancient territory of Elam, east of Babylonia. The river Ulai: a canal along the northern side of Susa. Some scholars argue that the Hebrew word understood as “river” here should instead be translated “gate.”
* [8:9] A little horn: as in chap. 7, Antiochus IV. The glorious land: Israel.
* [8:10–12] The host of heaven: the angelic host, symbolized by the stars. The Prince of the host: the Most High God, whose worship Antiochus suppressed (1 Mc 1:45).
* [8:13] The desolating sin: the Hebrew contains a wordplay (shomem) on the name Baal Shamem (“lord of the heavens,” identified by some as the Greek Zeus Olympios). The reference is to some object with which Antiochus profaned the Temple of Jerusalem (2 Mc 6:2), most probably a pagan altar.
* [8:16] The angel Gabriel is mentioned here for the first time in the Bible. There is wordplay in the preceding verse on geber, “manlike figure.”
* [8:17] The end time: the time when God sits in judgment on the wicked (v. 19).
* [8:20] The Medes and Persians: the Medes had been allies of the Babylonians in destroying the Assyrian empire (late seventh century B.C.), and Cyrus the Persian defeated the Medes en route to conquering the Babylonians. The Book of Daniel, however, treats the Medes and Persians as a dual kingdom; cf. also 5:28; 6:9; and note on 6:1.
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I remember Jeppy
ed at such a sale, telling Jeppy he needn’t pay such a sum at this time as it would take several weeks to deliver the tractor. But Jeppy paid cash and that’s how it would be; he didn’t believe in that fancy credit business, sick or well.
....He trapped beaver several winters and fairly well at it. He had a wireless telegraph line of about thirty miles along the rough beaches from Coal Harbour to Holberg that he had to patrol. Trees were forever falling over the line but Jep would hop into his little gas boat and, following the shoreline, would find the break and mend it. He was used to being alone in the forest and was not a man who needed company.
....There is a story told of this man that is true. One winter he was taking his small gas boat around the north end of Vancouver Island—a very rocky and dangerous tidal waterway. Before he got to Cape Scott a storm came up and Jep hit a rock and his boat remained stuck, several hundred feet out from the rocky shore. Without panic he simply took off his clothes, dove into the icy waters and swam to the beach. The area was without habitation and Jep realized he would have to survive on his own till he was found by searchers. He therefore concluded that it would be wiser to swim back out to the boat and get his clothing. Out into the storm he swam, boarded the boat, retrieved his clothes, and, before heading for shore again took with him in a sack a dozen of beer. He was picked up several days later—not much the worse for wear. How could a storm or a rocky isolated area hurt a man like Jeppy?
One summer he left the crew in camp to continue logging while he took on
....He was a boy and a man of the forest around us in coastal British Columbia. His life spanned a too quick forty years and in those years he had been a fisherman, a wireless lineman, a whaler, a trapper, a sort of tide flat rancher and of course a logger. He called his outfit the “Adventure Logging Company Ltd.” and his name was Jepetha Hole of coal Harbour situated on Quatsino sound at the northern end of Vancouver Island. He was quite a man and I’d like to tell you a bit about him now that the cold of winter has set in on us.
....It was in a cold, late November of 1961 that he died while helping to load his logs on a big log barge for shipment to the markets of Van-couver. The shock of the news up and down the sound was met with disbelief. Jeppy was the kind of man that was really part of the sound—and it seemed he could no more leave it than could its tides and shores. I don’t remember ever hearing Jeppy speak bad of anyone and I don’t believe anyone ever spoke bad of him.
....He was a stocky man, strong, soft spoken, not given to a lot of words in conversation, and a man who never went back on his word. Denim pants—a bit too large—a neckline show of Stanfields red or black label underwear and a wool or cotton shirt was his finery. Sound or big city, no flashy garments for Jep!
....Jeppy was in some ways much like the famed fictional character David Harum. He was an Inlet philosopher and a trader of goods. I remember the time 20 years ago that we traded a cookhouse for an A-frame float. Jeppy was in need of a new A-frame float for logging along the shores of Quatsino Sound and we were building a new logging campsite and so needed a building for a cookhouse. He and his crew went to work and moved a big two story building that was owned by his brother from an impossible site at Coal Harbour. They used jacks and
skids and know-how and somehow moved the big building down onto a large log float—perfectly intact. A day or so later he towed the structure out to the west coast and we made the trade for our A-frame. It was a good swap for both of us. And then I rem-ember as a young lad, Jeppy and his brother Doug once gathered up a whole shipload of empty beer bottles at Coal Harbour and had a freighter stop in at their dock and loaded the ship with their gatherings. The event was marveled at for years after.
....He loved animals and it was a not uncommon sight to see a tame black bear roaming about the grounds of the Holes’ Hotel in Coal Harbour. Jeppy’s mother would make him tie it up every so often when it scared the daylights out of some hazy logger passing through on his way to camp. A very kindly man by the name of Mr. Harper had been hired by the Hole parents to be teacher to Jeppy and his two sisters and their brothers as there was no school in Coal Harbour in those days. The soft spoken Mr. Harper had his trials with Jeppy, the worst of which was to keep his attention while he taught him his lessons. Jeppy’s mind was always out in the forest or on the beaches or waterways of Quatsino Sound.
....Jeppy believed in paying cash for what he bought and Jerry Holmes of the Great Yellow Tractor Co. will always remember the time he got a call from the Vancouver General Hospital to come and see Jeppy, who was in the institution bedridden with illness. He hustled down to the hospital and on entering Jeppy’s room was prepared to console the ailing logger. Instead Jeppy immediately asked Holmes how much he wanted for a brand new big Yellow Tractor. Holmes mumbled something about $35,000 and Jep pulled out a checkbook, wrote out a check for $34,500 and handed it to Jerry saying this was all he had now but would send the remaining $500 along later. The Yellow Tractor salesman was astonish-
British Columbia Lumberman, December, 1972
job of towing whales from the whaling fleet that was working the waters off the north end of Vancouver Island. He had a good sized tug and it was his job to go out each day and gather from the fleet the dead floating whales and tow them to the Whaling Station at Coal Harbour. It so happened that a threatened loggers strike was imminent and I was worried about getting our logs towed to the pulp mill, a distance of 50 miles, before the deadline. We had to tow the logs, about a half million board feet of them, in two large bag booms through the first 10 miles of open Pacific waters, making the job impossible unless we had a tug. Jeppy heard of our plight and knowing that no log tugs were available arrived at our camp one morning at six o’clock and said he was there to help us out.
....We started out with the tow into the open waters of the Pacific—Jeppy’s whale tug, our camp boats and speed boats, and an assortment of local fish boats. Jeppy was hooked on as the lead boat and he and I spent the morning in his wheelhouse watching the slow steady shoreline go by. However the whaling fleet were several miles offshore with a load of whales for him and were screaming over the radio phone for him to come and pick them up so they could get back to their job. Jeppy calmly told them that a logger was in danger of losing his logs if he left the tow—and anyway logs were more important than whales. That’s the way he was when a friend needed help.
....Jeppy married a local girl and they set up a sort of tideflat ranch with cows and chickens. However Jep was often away from home and it would be left to his wife to catch any mink or coon after the fowl, or for that matter to shoot any cougar that prowled about their lonely place. It was said of Mrs. Hole that she was as good a shot as Jeppy and her cougar kills were many.
....Those who came to his funeral will never forget that stormy southwestern day of hail and snow. We arrived from all over the Sound at the little wooden church at the village of Quatsino. There were Indian families, loggers, fishermen and an array of local people wrapped up in Mackinaws and rain gear. The little building only held a few and most people waited outside under the hemlocks while the storm blew around
them. We loaded Jep in the back of an old pickup truck to take him to his resting place about a mile and a half from the church. There were only about five vehicles of any type in Quatsino then as its narrow road was not connected to outside roads. With the five strange old pickups and trucks in procession we wound our way along the road—hardly seeing because the snow gale was so fierce. Looking back now I think Jep must have been amused at the scene, for with his wonderful sense of humor he could never find sadness as he found that day. It’s as if he would say: “What the heck are all you folks doing out here on a day like this, don’tcha know it’s snowing and blowing?”
....There are people in the forest around us—and with a pardon to the Yellow Tractor Company et al—I find
them more interesting than the great machines of the forest. They are interesting because they gave of themselves to an industry that has grown up the hard way. It’s been an industry that needed strong leaders, tough character, daring-do, and people who could do without the comforts of city life and cope with and enjoy their forests. Jepetha Hole of the Adventure Logging Company was such a man. He grew up, lived and worked and died on the waterways of Quatsino Sound, and the people of the forest around that sound shall never forget the boy and the man of the forest.
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- A REFUGE FROM REALITY! - THE BLOG OF MAJOR GENERAL "WHOPPER" CREEDON -
Aw crap! "That guy!" died! RIP Charles Napier
You probably won't recognise the name Charles Napier too quickly as he wasn't particularly famous for it, but because of his voice, his face and the square-jawed tough guys and military types he played in many movies and TV shows, he will be remembered forever - even if only as "that guy!"
Gen. Gilmore [Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery]
Napier was born in Scottsville, Kentucky, served in 11th Airborne Division and studied teaching before becoming an actor. He made his film debut in Cherry, Harry & Raquel! in 1970. Among his more memorable movie roles were Murdock, the intelligence officer in Rambo: First Blood Part II and Lt. Boyle in Silence of the Lambs. Less serious roles included Loaded Weapon 1 and as generals in the first two Austin Powers movies. His role as Judge Garnett in Philadelphia was described [by those who saw his whole performance] as "career defining" but sadly much if it was cut for running time.
Col. Briggs [The A-Team]
Napier was just as recognised for his numerous television appearances. He guest starred dozens of TV shows like Mission: Impossible, The Incredible Hulk, The Rockford Files and Knight Rider. He also did two episodes of The A-Team. His most memorable TV work is of course the role of Adam the "space hippie" in the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "The Way to Eden". 25 years later he returned to Star Trek to portray Lt. General Rex Denning in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Little Green Men".
On Star Trek - Adam [L] and Gen. Rex Denning [R]
The voice of Duke Phillips [The Critic]
Napier's voice is instantly recognisable. He voiced many of The Incredible Hulk's growls in the '70's has also provided several guest voices for episodes of The Simpsons. Fans of the animated Superman series in the late 90's and later The Justice League will know his voice as General Hardcastle. His greatest voice work in my opinion however is as the Ted Turner-esque media mogul Duke Phillips in the 1990's animated series The Critic.
Napier was married twice and had three children. He collapsed in his home on Monday and was found the following morning and taken to Memorial Hospital in Bakersfield, California. He was taken off life support just before 1pm EST on Wednesday and died shortly thereafter. He was 75.
Posted by Major General Creedon at 01:00
Labels: Movies, Obituary, Star Trek, TV
Former Grunt said...
I remember him on a lor of those roles. He was awesome in The Blues Brothers too. RIP Mr. Napier
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STAR WARS: Force For Change Founding Member
Major General Creedon
SPEARHEAD Regional Command - Europe
Years of being dropped on the head as a child has led me to believe that I'm a U.S. Marine General, a senior officer of a UN unit dedicated to defending the planet from things that the world doesn't believe exist. My spiritual beliefs are those formed from the work of George Lucas whom I consider to be a deity. Politically, I'm a right-wing authoritarian and believe diplomacy is achieved by those with the bigger gun. I enjoy listening to scores from movies and TV, watching action, military and sci-fi movies and television, playing 3D shooters and RPGs on the PC, reading comic-books and I adore the impressive sound of my own voice. I recorded 2IGTV; an award-nominated Podcast with my friend Mark centred on news from the world of popular culture which ran for 64 Episodes between '05 and '09. As an actor I've appeared in two major Irish short films and the pilot of a web-series. I've something to say about almost everything and you've made the wise choice of coming here to benefit from my vast wisdom, knowledge and ego - enjoy!
THE GENERAL'S RATINGS
No Star: The greatest load of shit ever, no redeeming qualities. It's creators are blacklisted and will be shot on sight if they don't redeem themselves before I meet them. Seriously - Dear God why?
1 Star (*): Awful crap. A complete waste of time. Should not have been made.
1.5 Stars (*1/2): Bad movie. I'm not happy about having paid to see this.
2 Stars (**): Dissapointing. Not that good at all except for perhaps a few select scenes or elements. I'll choose not to see this again.
2.5 Stars (**1/2): Glad I saw it, but ultimately not good enough. I won't turn it off if it appears on TV, but I'll have it on while doing something else, just to wait for the cool bit I remember.
3 Stars (***): Meh! Middle of the road movie. Balance between love and hated. May watch this on TV years later / may not.
3.5 Stars (***1/2): Enjoyable, but I would need to see it again, possibly on TV before I would purchase it.
4 Stars (****): Extreamly good. I would prefer to watch this again on Blu Ray a year or two on rather than see it on TV, but...
4.5 Stars (****1/2): Several minor flaws but not enough to distract you from excellence. Most likely will be added to my BD collection.
5 Stars (*****): An outstanding work of art. Practically Flawless. To be added to my BD collection.
5 Star Plus (*****+): One of the finest examples of it's genre. Flawless. Automatically becomes part of my BD collection upon release.
EXEMPTION GRANTED: To be granted an exemption, a movie has literally to be amongst the greatest movies of all time. Examples include Robocop (1987), The Matrix (1999), Mission Impossible 2 (2000), Transformers (2007) and Iron Man 2 (2010). For religious purposes it is accepted that all Star Wars movies are exempt by default and cannot be reviewed.
Brigadier General Creedon is a Class-1 Nutter, he is not affiliated with a recognised news service, an officer of the US Marine Corps, a member of the organised Jedi Order or has ever slept with Scarlett Johannson. The General's Medal Of Honor is made of painted lead and bits of copper.
"If you don't like the news, go out and make some of your own!" -Scoop Nisker
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Movie Review: Solo - A Star Wars Story (2018) *Spoiler Free*
Solo - A Star Wars Story is one of those prequel movies you could watch prior to seeing Episode IV, A New Hope (if you're one of the few who've never seen the original trilogy) and it would fit right in. In fact, you'd probably enjoy Solo a lot more if this was your first introduction to the character, and even the Star Wars universe.
Unfortunately, if you're very familiar with the character of Han Solo from all the other films, Solo - A Star Wars story is a bit like watching a retelling of a story you pretty much already knew.
That's not to say there aren't a few surprises in the detail but the broad strokes that you've heard about in most of the other films are nearly all played out here.
Intertwined with that is this film's plot which revolves around a specific heist, that is all new, and provides plenty of opportunity to show you things that you haven't heard stories about before.
Overall Solo is a solid film. The cast all do a great job with what they had to work with. Both Alden Ehrenreich and Donald Glover play good versions of Han and Lando respectively without coming off as trying to do straight impersonations of Harrison Ford and Billy Dee Williams. I'd certainly turn up to watch them in another Solo adventure.
Personally I came to see this movie for Chewbacca, who is my favorite Star Wars character, especially when he's partnered with Han Solo. For the first time he is played entirely by Joonas Suotamo (if you exclude Chewie's barely more than a cameo role in The Last Jedi) who does a great job keeping the character consistent from what Peter Mayhew achieved in the role.
It did grate on me a little that, when Han and Chewie first meet, their conversation is subtitled (for the first time ever, I think). I'm very glad this didn't continue beyond the first few lines because part of what makes Chewie an enjoyable character is, even when no one is translating, you still get the gist of what he's trying to express.
The film is let down mostly by being a prequel that is showing you the stories you'd only heard about until now... and some of those stories may not quite live up to your expectations. Case in point, the Kessel run (surely it's not a spoiler to say you get to see the Kessel run in this movie).
The Kessel run in its self is an exciting sequence. I'm just not sure on how it's depicted in this film translates to a legend that made it as far as Rey's ears, decades later, in The Force Awakens.
Beyond that, Solo has plenty of action sequences that are as good as any you've seen in the Star Wars franchise, a few new and interesting characters, one or two surprises you may not have guessed, and it's clearly setting up for possibly another Solo adventure - or at least, elements that may impact other Star Wars Anthology stories. (My preference would be for another Solo movie now we've got all the 'stories you've only heard about' out of the way).
As I said, it's a movie that is really only let down by being a prequel. If this was your introduction to the Star Wars universe you'd probably be far more impressed. It's not a bad film, by any stretch. Lucas Film just need to work out how to make these prequel stories seem a little less like visual flash backs and a little more like new and exciting additions to Star Wars cannon.
If you're a fan of Han Solo or Chewbacca you'll be glad this movie exists. On it's own it doesn't add much to the Star Wars canon that wasn't already there, though future films could certainly build upon this one to bring us all new adventures in the years prior to the original trilogy.
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Biggest EU Banks Embark On The Mother Of All Debt Binges
Posted by Tyler Durden on February 15, 2017 7:30 am
Tags: bailout, Banque de France, Bond, Business, CAC 40, Capital Markets, Credit rating agency, debt, Economy, European Banking Authority, European Central Bank, European Commission, Finance, france, Institutional Investors, italy, MONEY, Rating Agencies, Real estate, Société Générale, Subordinated debt, Systemic risk, Systemically important financial institution, Yen
Categories: bailout Banque de France Bond Business CAC 40 Capital Markets Credit rating agency debt Economy European Banking Authority European Central Bank European Commission Finance france Institutional Investors italy money Rating Agencies Real estate Société Générale Subordinated debt Systemic risk Systemically important financial institution Yen
Submitted by Don Quijones via WolfStreet.com,
Spain’s three biggest banks, Banco Santander, BBVA and Caixa Bank, have got off to a flying start this year having issued €8.6 billion in new debt, seven times the amount they sold during the same period of last year. The last time they rolled out so much debt so quickly was in 2007, the year that Spain’s spectacular real estate bubble reached its climactic peak.
Santander accounts for well over half of the new debt issued, with €5.12 billion of senior bonds, subordinate bonds, and a newfangled class of bail-in-able debt with the name of “senior non-preferred bonds” (A.K.A. senior junior, senior subordinated or Tier 3) that we covered in some detail just before Christmas.
Investors beware…
This newfangled class of bail-in-able debt was cooked up last year by French-based financial engineers in order to help France’s four global systemically important banks (BNP Paribas, Crédit Agricole, Groupe BPCE and Société Générale) out of a serious quandary: how to satisfy pending European and global regulations demanding much larger capital and debt buffers without having to pay investors costly returns on the billions of euros of funds they lend them to do so.
That’s what makes senior non-preferred debt so ingenious: it pretends to be simultaneously one thing (senior), in order to keep the yield (and the cost for the bank) down, and another (junior) in order to qualify as bail-in-able. What it amounts to is a perfect scam for big banks to bamboozle bondholders – usually institutional investors like our beaten-down pension funds – into buying something with other people’s money that doesn’t yield nearly enough to compensate them for the risks they’re taking.
Put simply, if a bank is resolved, holders of these instruments could lose much or all of their money, similar to stock holders. According to Olivier Irisson, executive chief financial officer at Groupe BPCE, France’s second largest bank, it’s a “very good compromise for investors and banks.”
Judging by how they’re selling, yield-starved investors seem to agree. After the new bonds were rubber stamped by the Banque de France in mid-December, investors gobbled up €1.5 billion of Credit Agricole’s senior non-preferred 10-year bonds despite only receiving about 45 basis points more than they would get on traditional senior debt and about 65 basis points less than on subordinated.
Voracious Appetite
Société Générale quickly followed CA’s lead, issuing €3.5 billion of 5-year dollar-denominated notes. Investors lapped it up. During the same week BNP Paribas sold €1 billion of bail-in-able debt, a mere drop in the ocean compared to the €30 billion of senior non-preferred debt it hopes to raise by 2019. BPCE issued its first non-preferred deal in the second week of the year, a €1 billion six-year trade that attracted $2.4 billion of orders. It then launched an even riskier samurai (yen denominated) non-preferred trade, and most investors were not put off by the A- rating.
“2017 will be the year of senior non-preferred,” said Vincent Hoarau, head of financial institutions syndicate at Crédit Agricole. Europe’s biggest banks certainly have a voracious appetite for new funds. The European Banking Authority recently estimated a €310 billion gap in all the region’s banks meeting their total loss absorbing capital requirements before the 2019 deadline. And much of that gap is expected to be filled by senior non-preferred bonds.
The European Commission has already endorsed the financial instrument, rating agencies have also lent their approval and the ECB can’t wait to come up with “a common framework at Union level“. However, the legislation permitting its issuance is currently only in place in France and is not expected to be passed elsewhere in Europe before the second half of 2017, at the earliest.
But certain banks have already jumped the gun, including Holland’s ING and Spain’s Santander, both of which have begun issuing senior non-preferred bonds despite the fact their issuance has not been officially sanctioned by each bank’s respective national regulator. Even more ominous, Italy’s fragile superbank, Unicredit, has also expressed an interest, though it will probably have to wait for Italy’s banking crisis, of which it has a major part, to blow over (assuming it can) before joining the party.
A Staggering Volume of Debt
Even by today’s inflated standards, the volume of debt the G-SIBs hope to issue in the next two years is staggering. Santander alone intends to issue between €43 billion and €57 billion, in order to meet the capital requirements that are scheduled to come into effect for the world’s 30 biggest banks on Jan 1, 2019. That’s between 60% and 75% of Santander’s entire market cap. And if everything goes according to plan, most of that debt — between €28 billion and €35.5 billion worth — will be issued in the form of senior non-preferred bonds.
For the moment there’s little concern over investor appetite, says Demetrio Salorio, global head of debt capital markets at Société Générale Corporate & Investment Banking. “The investor base is keen,” he says. “They are far more at ease with the instrument than they were 18 months ago.” Spreads could even tighten, he reckons.
All of which is testament to just how desperately starved of yield institutional investors have become in the NIRP environment as they’re trying to get their hands on financial instruments that offer virtually no security in exchange for the slimmest of additional returns.
But the investor pain, when it’s time for it, should relieve taxpayers and the public. When the bank collapses and is being resolved or recapitalized, these bondholders are supposed to get bailed in and lose some or all of their investment. This would protect taxpayers at least to some extent from getting shanghaied into doing that job. And if institutional investors who take that risk don’t get paid enough for taking that risk, so be it. It’s just pension funds and retirement nest eggs under their management that will take the hit.
Unless, of course, the government, under political pressure, decides to bail out those bondholders anyway with taxpayer money, as they’re doing in Italy’s banking crisis at the moment, on the pretext that these bondholders were naive retail investors who were missold a similar version of bail-in-able junior bonds. And so it would be back to square one.
In Italy, the insider blame game has begun. Read… Italy’s Banking Crisis Is Even Worse Than We Thought
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Columns / News / Previews / TV Movie Goodness
Luke Macfarlane Talks Maggie’s Christmas Miracle and Killjoys [Exclusive]
Posted by Heather M on December 9, 2017 at 4:19 pm
Photo Credit: Bettina Strauss/Crown Media United States LLC
[Warning: General spoilers ahead.]
Christmas is a season of favorites. Here at TV Goodness, we’re fond of our Hallmark holiday movies, and we’re doubly fond of Luke Macfarlane, who headlines his third Christmas movie in a row this Sunday, co-starring alongside Jill Wagner in Karen Kingsbury’s Maggie’s Christmas Miracle on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries. Macfarlane was kind enough to get on the phone with me again this week to chat about the film, his recent play in LA, and Killjoys‘ two-season renewal, which begins production next month.
The new film was a bit of kismet from Macfarlane’s relationship with David Rosemont, who was a producer on PBS’s Mercy Street, and director Michael Robison, who has worked on Killjoys. It’s a more wistful film than his last two season movies, 2015’s Christmas Land and 2016’s The Mistletoe Promise, and the first one based on a book.
“I always enjoy making [these films]. I really do. David Rosemont had worked on Mercy Street and when my name came up [for this], he said I’d be great. Michael had directed Killjoys, so [it all came together],” he explains.
“The ones on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries are a little less quirky, and a little more serious and heartwarming. This one is going to make you cry. It’s based on a book by Karen Kingsbury, [who] came to visit the set. She’s a really amazing, lovely woman.”
“It’s about a guy who comes to the city with his wife, who’s sick, and she passes away. He’s got this small store, and he eventually tutors Jill [Wagner]’s son and they fall for each other. He brings them together. I got along with Jill just like a house on fire. I knew I was going to like her immediately. She reminds me of my twin sister. She’s funny. She’s just like a broad. I really, really adore her.”
Photo Credit: Craig Schwartz
Audiences in L.A. had the opportunity to see Macfarlane on stage this fall in Big Night, which turned out to be unintentionally timely. “It was a wonderful opportunity. Wendie Malick was incredible. [Our director was] Walter Bobbie, who directed Chicago. Paul Rudnick is one of the great comic playwrights,” he shares.
“It was a great cast and really wonderful script. It was challenging as a comedy because we were dealing with gun violence and the aftermath of a Pulse nightclub-type shooting with this group of people in a hotel room right before the Oscars, and how they deal with that and process it.
The Las Vegas shooting occurred during the run of the play, and that led to an additional layer of challenges and insights. “You’re always grateful as an actor to work through things that are in the social conscience,” he says.
Killjoys wrapped its third season in September, and we’re thrilled it will be back for seasons four and five. So is Macfarlane, who says it was a lovely surprise, as was the arc that found D’av and Dutch reunited. “[The renewal] was totally unexpected. I really was hoping they’d just pick us up for four episodes to give us the chance to wrap up our story. I was totally shocked,” he recalls.
“We’re super thrilled and excited, and Michelle [Lovretta] gets to properly wrap up her story. At the end of last year, I was sensing anxiety about that [in terms of], ‘Do we end it forever?’ In the middle of [last season’s arc, I was wondering, ‘Where am I going? What are you doing with me, writers?'”
Photo Credit: Ian Watson/Killjoys III Productions Limited/Syfy
“But I was really, really happy with where it went. I remember a brief encounter with Michelle. I was in the hallway chatting with Hannah, and Michelle came up. Hannah is really articulate and smart about talking about character stuff and Michelle asked, ‘What are you thinking happens with D’avin and Dutch at the end of the season?’”
“In her mind, I think she’s always felt like they have a future together romantically but had never really wanted to push that or has really always wanted to take her time, but when you’re writing what might be your final episode, what do you do about that? What do you give them? What don’t you give them? I think Michelle has liked the idea of bringing two people together that are really unexpected. Part of the unexpected is taking the time to let people slowly warm to it. Anyway, I really enjoyed where D’avin came to last year. I [don’t know] what the next two seasons hold for us. Zero idea.”
Photo Credit: Space Channel
With Killjoys completing production next summer, Macfarlane isn’t yet sure what will follow, but he has time to figure it out. “Killjoys is my fifth series, and my first to come to an end on its own terms. I’m very happy about that,” he says. “I do love TV and [after Killjoys ends], I want to be on another series. I do not know what comes next for me. I have no idea what that looks like.”
Karen Kingsbury’s Maggie’s Christmas Miracle premieres Sunday night at 9/8c on Hallmark Movies & Mysteries. Here’s a sneak peek.
Tags: Big Night, Exclusive Interview, Hallmark Movies and Mysteries, Heather M, Jill Wagner, Karen Kingsbury, Killjoys, Luke Macfarlane, Maggie's Christmas Miracle, Paul Rudnick, Syfy, Walter Bobbie, Wendie Malick
Author: Heather M Senior Writer/Columnist: Heather began writing about TV way back when Jensen Ackles was Alec on Dark Angel (so, "dibs.") EDITOR NOTE: No dibs!. She never got on the reality bandwagon. Instead, her TV viewing must be scripted. She's intensely loyal to actors, writers, and directors and loves comedy, drama, suspense, and sci-fi equally. If it was filmed in Vancouver (or Canada, really), she's going to be all over it. Don't look for snark. If she's made the time to watch it, she likes it (or loves it), because life's too short to watch sh-tty TV. But she will call BS when it's right there for the taking. By day, she writes marketing communications for the IT sector. She's a lifelong Texan (minus the pre-K years), so you'll have to accept the liberal use of "y'all." You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram at @approximofnice.
Luke Macfarlane Talks A Shoe Addict’s Christmas [Exclusive]November 23, 2018
Aaron Ashmore Talks Johnny’s Journey and Future on Killjoys [Exclusive]September 18, 2018
Aaron Ashmore and Luke Macfarlane Break Down Family Dynamics in Killjoys “Johnny Dangerously” [Exclusive]July 27, 2018
Luke Macfarlane Talks Killjoys, The Night Shift, Hallmark, and Mercy Street [Exclusive]July 18, 2017
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Displaying archived playlist for Roots & Wings on 2011-03-04 06:00:00
1 The Pearls Dave Van Rogers Sunday Street (Philo)
2 Jigs & Polkas Royal Scottish Academy, Year III The Furture of Our Past (Greentrax)
3 Puirt a Beul Ainsley Hamill (Year I) _______________________________
4 1952 Vincent Black Lightning Claire Hastings (Year III) _________________________________
5 March & Reels Year III ___________________________________
6 Everybody Knows Stevie Palmer Heartprint Shadow (Gtx)
7 Off to Sea Once More Enoch Kent Take a Trip With Me (Borealis)
8 Salsas Finlay MacDonald Band ReEcho (GTX)
9 Old Reels Bonnie Rideout Scottish Fiddle Collection (Maggie's Music)
10 Sir Steve Huska of Bryce Canyon Old Blind Dogs Wherever Yet May Be (Compass)
11 Work Life Out to Keep Life In Martin Carthy Rigs o the Time (Topic/Music Club)
12 Lads & Lassiess Daimh Diversions (Gtx)
13 Honey Hair/He Was a Friend of Mine David Massengill Dave on Dave (Gadfly)
14 45 Years (N'West Passage Stan Rogers Very Best of Stan (www.stanrogers.net)
15 Red Dress Susan Werner Kickin' the Beehive (SW)
16 You Play Me Like a Radio Twangtown Paramours Twangtown Paramours (TP)
17 Custodian Si Kahn Courage (SCR)
18 Hope for Better Days David Berkeley Some Kind of Cure (SMP)
19 Shadow Debi Smith Cupid (DS)
20 Blue Was the Colour Cris Cuddy Diamond Shine (VC)
21 Blue Moon on New Year's Eve Geoff Bartley Put the Big Stone Down (MRC/GB)
22 One Hour Radio Special Buddy Guy Joyride Music/Sony)
23 The High Road Home Jack Williams The High Road Home (WR/FE)
24 He Can Be Found/ Simnging As We Rise Gibson Brothers Help My Brother (Compass)
25 He Started Building..... Rachel Harrington Celilo Falls (Skinny DEnnis)
26 Worn Our Shoes Caleb Klauder Western Country (West Sound/Quicksilver)
27 Driftin' Apart Frank Solivan & Dirty Kitchen FS&DK (DK)
28 Westy Texas Wind Brad Boyer Oasis Country XI #1 (Oasis)
29 There'll Awlays Be... David Parmley/ Continental Divide ...A Rocking Chair (Pinecastle)
30 ADD Hogwalleer Ramblers Mea Culpa (HWR)
31 Cannonball Blues Jerry Douglas/ Peter Rowan Yonder (SH)
32 When We Meet to Part No More Doyle Lawson/Quicsilver Way Down Deep in My Soul (SH)
33 Rollin' Thro This Unfirendly World Nashville BG Band ____________________________
34 Still Waters Osborne Bros _________________________
35 God's Coloring Book Country Gentlemen _______________________________
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Home >> World Map >> Eastern Asia >> Japan >> Port of Abashiri
Port of Abashiri
The Port of Abashiri, on the Okhotsk Sea, is located in the estuary of the Abashiri River. The port was first used in 1919; however, it did not become a practical commercial harbor until 1978.
The Abashiri Port Authority is responsible for managing and operating the Port of Abashiri. Cargoes through the Port of Abashiri are those that relate to local consumption and production, particularly coastal fishing. Most recently, sight-seeing of the drift ice in winter has become a popular activity.
The Port of Abashiri is currently re-developing its urban areas, including the waterfront. The port can accommodate small vessels with an inner depth of 3.5 meters.
In 2007, foreign trade accounted for a small portion of total cargo throughput in the Port of Abashiri. Imports of 95 tons included raw wood (35 tons) and coal (46 tons), while exports included one ton of automobiles.
Local trade of 503 tons of cargo dominated activity at the Port of Abashiri. Exports of 178 tons included wheat (90 tons), heavy oil (9 tons), gravel sand (17 tons), and industrial goods (38 tons). Local imports of 325 tons included petrochemical products (122 tons), cement (57 tons), limestone (38 tons), and marine products (54 tons).
Review and History Port Commerce Cruising and Travel Satellite Map Contact Information
2011 Tsunami Area
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Hotel - Gyeongbokgung Palace - Korea Folklore Museum - Jogyesa Temple - Presidential Office - City hall
http://www.wowcoreatour.com/booking/join...rning Tour
Gyeongbokgung Palace – Korea Folklore Museum
Jogyesa Temple – Presidential Office (Blue House)
Gyeongbokgung Palace is replaced with Changdeokgung Palace on Tuesday.
If you stay at Gangnam (South of Seoul) or do not accommodate at the above downtown, additional charge is USD 15 Per Person (2~3 Pax) and USD10 (Over 4 Pax).
Built in 1395, Gyeongbokgung Palace is also commonly referred to as the “Northern Palace” because its location is furthest north when compared to the neighboring palaces of Changdeokgung (Eastern Palace) and Gyeongheegung (Western Palace). Gyeongbokgung Palace is arguably the most beautiful and remains the largest of all five palaces. The premises were once destroyed by fire during the Imjinwaeran War (Japanese Invasion, 1592-1598). However, all of the palace's 7,700 rooms were later restored under the leadership of Heungseondaewongun during the reign of King Gojong (1852-1919).
Deoksugung Palace
Located at the corner of Seoul's busiest downtown intersection, Deoksugung Palace is famous for its elegant stone-wall road. It is also the only palace that sits alongside a series of western style buildings that add to the uniqueness of the surrounding scenery. Deoksugung Palace originally belonged to Wolsandaegun (1454~1488), the older brother of King Seongjong (1469~1494) of the Joseon Dynasty. It became a proper palace when Gwanghaegun (1575~1641) ascended the throne and gave the palace the name Gyeongungung in 1611. Afterwards, the name was then changed back to its orginal title of Deoksugung.
Korean Folklore Museum
Located inside Gyeongbokgung Palace, the National Folk Museum of Korea presents over 4,000 historical artifacts that were used in the daily lives of ordinary Korean people. Here you can fully immerse yourselves in previous domestic and agricultural lifestyles, and learn about Korea’s cultural beliefs.The National Folk Museum of Korea has three permanent and two special exhibitions as well as a library, souvenir shop, and other subsidiary facilities.
Seoul Museum of History captures the traditional culture of Seoul. Vestiges from the prehistoric era to modern Seoul are on display. The museum was renovated with modern updates in May 2002, 17 years after opening. The main exhibit halls are on the 3rd floor. Many of the Joseon Dynasty relics were donated during the Relic Donation Campaign. Also, the landscape of Seoul is recreated when it was the capital of the Joseon Dynasty. Another exhibit showcases the daily life of the Seoulites, while another presents items through an online cyber museum. The 1st floor has many convenient facilities such as a coat check and the Kids Corner playroom.
Jogyesa Temple
Jogyesa Temple is the center of Zen Buddhism in Korea, and is famous for being located in the city. From the busy streets of Jongno, follow the road towards Anguk Subway Station, and you will see Jogyesa Temple. The first thing you will notice at the temple are the lovely trees. These locust trees and baeksong trees in front of the Daeungjeon, the main temple building, are about 500 years old. One locust tree is about 26-meter high, and in the summer, provides a large amount of shade to enhance the mood of the temple. The baeksong tree is designated as a Natural Monument. The Daeungjeon building is a stately building built in 1938. The Dancheong is particularly beautiful with all the different colors painted on it, and inside the building is the statue of Seokgamoni.
Presidential Office
The signature markings of the Presidential Residence of Cheong Wa Dae are its blue tiles. It is the first thing that catches one's attention upon entering the premises. The blue tiles and the smooth roof blend beautifully with Mt. Bugaksan in the backdrop.The unique buildings of Cheong Wa Dae are comprised of the Main Office, Yeongbingwan (Guest House), Chunchugwan (Spring and Autumn Pavilion), Nokjiwon (Green grass), the Mugunghwa (Rose of Sharon) Valley, and the Seven Palaces. It is interesting to see that these buildings all have distinctive shapes. They are unique and beautifully designed, built in the Korean traditional style.
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Moses Lake 4-Year-Old Busted for Riding Motorcycle on Sidewalk
Patrick Smith, Getty Images
I love small towns. You usually have more freedom to be yourself and "the pursuit of happiness." But that freedom wasn't extended to a four year old earlier this month.
Moses Lake police reported in a public record stopping a four year old from "riding a motorcycle on a sidewalk" was one of their requests. I'm guessing it was one of those minibikes that are electric -- or maybe the ones with little weed-wacker motors.
I know people who sell those who have no problem with three- or four-year-old grandkids riding them. They don't go that fast.
Still, I wouldn't let MY kid ride one around. But they were on the sidewalk. I don't know, it's summer, I vote live and let live!
Categories: Tri-Cities News
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Mom earns $3,000 Disney voucher, uses it to buy hundreds of toys for kids in need
This story originally appeared on Babble and is reprinted with permission.
Plenty of us harbor secret wishes or dreams for the future. Maybe it's to finally build that dream house we've been drawing on a napkin for years; or launch a business we've never been brave enough to try; or retire early and travel the world.
But Erica Donovan has always had a different kind of dream: To grant someone else's wish, in a big way. And this holiday season, she finally did.
The Plainville, Connecticut mom, who works as an independent consultant at the direct sales company Thirty-One Gifts, was awarded a $3,000 Disney gift voucher in September as part of a months-long work incentive program. She was told that the $3,000 could be used towards literally anything in the Disney stratosphere, from a Disney cruise to a stay at Walt Disney World Resorts. But Donovan knew right away where she wanted to spend the money - and it certainly wasn't on herself.
"We are a very community-minded family, [so] donating my voucher was the only way to go!" says Donovan, who has also worked as a volunteer firefighter along with her husband, and currently acts as the executive director of a small non-profit that provides services to people with developmental disabilities.
It wasn't long before her thoughts turned to the holidays, and the millions of American families in need this year.
"We are fortunate enough to have a Naval and Marine reserve base in our town," Donovan tells Babble, "and I've seen the amazing work they do with Toys for Tots. There is need everywhere, and we have so much ... "
And so, on November 9, she headed over to her local Disney store in Westfarms Mall, flanked by two Marines from Toys for Tots, and began plucking toys from the shelves.
Into her cart went stuffed animals of classic Disney characters, Toy Story figurines, and even dress-up clothes - anything she thought would make eyes light up on Christmas morning or Hanukkah night.
Image source: The Walt Disney Company
"The Disney magic I felt from the first call to the store was AMAZING!" shares Donovan, who called the store ahead of time to advise them of her large purchase. As a result, a dedicated cast member was with her the whole time, helping her pick out toys and making sure she took advantage of the annual Friends & Family discount, which saved her an extra 25 percent.
Donovan says the day was filled with an overwhelming amount of joy; so much so, that she had to hold back tears as she updated friends and family via Facebook Live. But what she didn't expect was the chain reaction her random act of kindness would immediately set off around her.
"After about an hour," Donovan shares, "[The cast member] quietly let me know that a mother who had been shopping with her children had asked what was going on, and when she found out, had purchased an entire bag of toys to leave with the Marines as her own donation. I'm welling up just [thinking about it], as charity and love are so contagious - this was more than I could have imagined."
But that wasn't the only person Donovan inspired to give back that day.
"Throughout the day, several other shoppers (and even [a] mall passersby!) found out what was happening and added their own donations of toys to the collection," she shares. "My heart was so full, and I was thrilled that I was able to be the catalyst for so much good."
After four hours of "shopping, schlepping, bagging, and more schlepping," Donovan says she'd amassed a total of 272 toys and spent a total of $3,748 - though thanks to the Friends & Family discount, she was able to get that number down to meet her budget, with $2 to spare. (She handed it to the customer patiently waiting in line behind her.)
"I've often had the fantasy of passing out hundred-dollar bills to strangers," says Donovan, "and this was my real-life version of that. Knowing that so many children will be receiving magical Christmas toys - and that I was able to provide that - truly IS my wish come true."
Though little did she know, this was just be the beginning.
A few weeks later, Donovan got an unexpected voice mail from the Director of Stores, North America at The Disney Store, Jeff Zimmerman, who told her that Disney had heard about her generous donation and wanted to match the amount by giving her another $3,000 for Toys for Tots.
"When I received the call ... I was literally stunned," says Donovan. "I began sobbing - the ugly, hysterical type of sobbing that renders you unable to breathe or form a sentence - and didn't stop for close to an hour. I was so shocked and surprised, and absolutely touched by the generosity ... Being given the opportunity to actually go back to the store and do the shopping was such an amazing gift to me - and having the opportunity to share it with my daughter and my friends made that reward even sweeter. [It] was the best Christmas gift ever."
And that's (still) not all. Once Donovan's own generosity made headlines, other donations started rolling in, too. On December 8 - the same day she headed back to The Disney Store to complete her second purchase - Westfarms Mall added another $3,000 to the pot. And then LEGO joined in with $3,000 more.
Even strangers were moved to donate after hearing Donovan's story, which all in all helped her initial act of kindness bring in a whopping total of $13,000 in donations for Toys for Tots - an incredible sum even she can't believe.
"It's still sinking in," Donovan tells Babble. "Knowing that my original $3,000 donation has turned into over $13,000 is overwhelming."
Donovan says she's also humbled to know that even in some small way, she's helped make Christmas a little bit brighter this year for hundreds of kids whose families are struggling.
"There were times when our girls were younger that my husband and I struggled, and I'm so appreciative that we're not in a position now where we need to worry about gifts for our kids," she shares. "Having a personal understanding of the stress, worry, and sleeplessness that come with Christmas for people in need makes me feel even better that so many parents will be able to cross that part off their list."
Most of all, though, Donovan hopes that anyone out there reading this story is inspired to pay it forward in any way they can, too.
"It's important to me that anyone hearing this incredible story understands that it's not about me," she shares. "It's not about any one person spending money or making grand gestures. It's about spreading love and the spirit of giving. If I can be the catalyst for spreading positivity and joy, even for just a little while during this season, then I've been given the greatest gift possible."
More on Babble:
Nonprofit Gives Kids with Life-Threatening Illnesses Hope by Hosting Christmas Every Week
How a 4th-Grader's Handmade Fidget Toys Are Helping to Pay Off School Lunch Debts
Mom Creates "Blessing Fence" in Her Front Yard to Offer Warmth to Those in Need This Winter
family & parentingchildrenholidaydisneybabbledonationsfeel good
Is SF less patriotic because it doesn't have a 4th of July parade?
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See the best, worst places to celebrate 4th of July
How to keep your pets happy and safe this 4th of July
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US soccer players speak out on equal pay suit, inspiring women and whether they'll boycott the World Cup
andkate hodgson
Mar 11, 2019, 9:38 AM ET
Play David Rosenblum/Icon Sportswire via AP
WATCH Soccer stars speak out on gender discrimination
Members of the U.S. Women's National Team say they know they are on the "right side" of fighting for equal pay with their new lawsuit that blasts soccer's national governing body for allegedly paying mere "lip service" to gender equality and dishing out markedly more pay to the men's team.
"We know in our hearts, and we know with the facts that we have, that we’re on the right side of this," Megan Rapinoe, a star forward for the team, said Monday on "Good Morning America." "I don't think anyone can argue that there's gender inequities in this world, that there’s a pay gap, that there's pay discrepancies."
(MORE: US Women's National Team sues soccer's governing body for gender discrimination on International Women's Day)
Rapinoe and her teammates on the world champion U.S. Women's National Team (USWNT) sued the United States Soccer Federation (USSF) Friday for gender discrimination. The lawsuit comes just three months before Team USA -- the winningest team in women's World Cup history -- prepares to defend its title at the FIFA World Cup in France.
Rapinoe and her teammate Alex Morgan, also a forward, said they have no plans to boycott the World Cup while the lawsuit plays out in court.
"I don't think it's ever been in our minds to step off the field," Morgan said. "We've been looking forward to the World Cup for three years now ... We want to continue to play for our country at the highest stage this summer in France."
Alex Morgan and Megan Rapinoe appear on "Good Morning America," March 11, 2019.
Lawsuit about 'much more' than pay equity
The lawsuit, filed in California federal court on International Women's Day, cites not just pay, but also the denial of "at least equal playing, training, and travel conditions; equal promotion of their games; equal support and development for their games; and other terms and conditions of employment."
"In reality, the USSF has utterly failed to promote gender equality," the lawsuit reads. "It has stubbornly refused to treat its female employees who are members of the [women's national team] equally to its male employees who are members of the [men's national team]."
(MORE: Ruth Bader Ginsburg to Cardi B to J.K. Rowling: Women's national soccer team honors inspirational women with their jerseys)
The USSF, the lawsuit claims, "has paid only lip service to gender equality and continues to practice gender-based discrimination against its champion female employees on the WNT in comparison to its less successful male employees on the MNT."
The suit says that female players earned $15,000 for "being asked to try out for the World Cup team and making the team roster" in 2013 through 2016. On the other hand, men earned $55,000 each for making the World Cup team in 2014.
To critics who argue the U.S. men's team brings in more revenue and so should be compensated more, Rapinoe and Morgan said those claims are "arbitrary."
"Obviously [pay equity] is the hot button issue but in order to have I think a fair and a balanced conversation around compensation, we need to look at everything," Rapinoe said. "We need to look at the way the youth teams are funded. We need to look at the way our staff -- our coaching staff, our medical staff -- is funded. We need to look at promotion and branding and marketing and sponsorship, all of that."
Paul rolland/Sipa USA via AP
U.S.team soccer at the women's friendly football match between France and USA at Oceane stadium in Le Havre, France, on Jan.19, 2019.
"Until we do, until we have equity and equality of the men's and women's team on both those sides, we can't really say, 'Oh, the men make this and the women make this,'" she added.
Morgan pointed out that the 2015 Women's World Cup final was the "most-watched U.S. soccer game in history."
"So I think those claims are really arbitrary," she said of the revenue comparison.
The U.S. men's soccer team did not qualify for the 2018 FIFA World Cup. Their best finish was third place -- in 1930. The U.S. women's team, on the other hand, has won the World Cup three times -- in 1991, 1999 and 2015 -- and the gold medal at the Olympics four times, most recently in 2012.
(MORE: Abby Wambach tells women to be the wolves in the world in fiery commencement speech)
The 28 members of the 2015 winning team are all named as plaintiffs and the suit requests class action status to represent players who have been on the team since February of that year. The suit seeks back pay including interest and benefits, damages, attorneys' fees and other relief.
Mike Carlson/AP
United States' Tobin Heath, second from right, is congratulated on her goal by Mallory Pugh (11), Megan Rapinoe and Alex Morgan (13) during the first half of a SheBelieves Cup soccer match against Brazil, March 5, 2019, in Tampa, Fla.
In 2017, the women's team reached an agreement with the USSF after filing a complaint with the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission over pay.
The agreement included direct and bonus pay increases and per diems equal to the men's team, according to ESPNW, as well as improved travel and financial support for pregnant or adopting players. It also included required improvements in National Women's Soccer League standards.
In February, the EEOC issued the soccer players a "right to sue," the new lawsuit indicates, which is required to sue for discrimination under federal law.
U.S. Soccer released a statement Monday pointing out that the U.S. Women's National Team reached a collective bargaining agreement with the organization two years ago.
"U.S. Soccer and the U.S. Women’s National Team reached a collective bargaining agreement two years ago. U.S. Soccer has faithfully and consistently worked with the U.S. Women’s National Team players and staff to provide the team everything it needs to perform at the highest levels possible and compete to win world championships," the statement read. "The substantial and unwavering commitment by U.S. Soccer to those very ideals is evident in our proactive approach to drive the women’s game forward, which includes the creation of two elite women’s international tournaments to increase competition opportunities, adding additional technical and high-performance staff focused only on the USWNT, and enhancing our marketing campaigns. Our continued support and efforts toward enriching the women’s game is every bit as certain today as it will be in the future.”
'Inspiring women around the world'
The USWNT is not the only women's team fighting for equal pay and conditions. The women's national hockey team has been on its own mission, following the soccer team and spurred by its victory at the 2018 Winter Olympics.
Similarly, professional female athletes in tennis and basketball have also been making calls for equal pay, prize money, conditions and infrastructure.
Rapinoe said she hopes the USWNT's lawsuit sends a message to women to "fight for what you believe in."
"The big picture ultimately is just giving that message that you should fight for what you believe in. You should fight for what you feel you earn and never give up," she said, acknowledging that the fight is "difficult at times."
David Rosenblum/Icon Sportswire via AP
Alex Morgan and Megan Rapinoe celebrate a goal during the International Friendly match between the U.S. and Mexico in Jacksonville, Fla., April 5, 2018.
"For us, it's not only about leaving our sport in a better place, leaving it better for the young girls that will come after, but just in general, inspiring women around the world to stand up for what they believe in," Rapinoe said. "They have an ally in us. We are with them. we support them and we will continue this fight as long as we need to."
Morgan spoke about the support the USWNT has felt in their fight, including from the U.S. men's team.
"The men have also come out and said that they are in support of us as well, and so we respect them so much for that," she said. "It's great to see that support from them, from a lot of our sponsors as well, from women all around the world, both inside and outside of the sport."
"You know that you're doing something right when you gain that support from people around you to help lift you up," Morgan added.
ABC News' Alexandra Svokos contributed to this report.
US soccer players speak out on equal pay suit: 'We're on the right side of this'
+US women's soccer team sues over gender discrimination
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Review: True Stories (1986)
Comedy, Musical, Romance Leave a comment
Taken at face value as satire, True Stories is condescending and simplistic – a tired condemnation of consumerism as a spiritual force. David Byrne could conflate a certain midwestern happiness with a naive embrace of capitalism – a musical number late in the game involving a series of advertisement-based Talking Heads members could be seen as the thesis.
I say all of that with a definite potentiality to all of the verbs. Could be seen as so and so. Because, despite what’s all there on the surface, True Stories never feels patronising, never feels like it’s making fun of Virgil, Texas, and the way its denizens – liars, fools, cheaters though they may be – live. Instead, Byrne finds legitimate awe and curiosity in the proceedings, bringing out the beauty of this specific time of America, where consumerism and idealism walked hand in hand. When a microchip company bringing up a small town could be seen as a sign of a happy future, where jobs were plentiful and technology was impossibly endless. Where never getting out of bed because one doesn’t have to is both a sign of laziness and a sign of prosperity. The film’s spirit is most embodied in the character of Louis (played by a young and impossibly adorable John Goodman), who eventually places an ad for a girlfriend on the TV, and whom Byrne embraces without an ounce of pity. He has the ability to advertise his love, so why shouldn’t he? Just because the festival celebrating the town’s “Specialness” is paid for and primarily exists as an ad for the electronics company doesn’t mean it can’t also be used as a venue to proclaim truth and beauty in the face of an infinite future.
An exceedingly optimistic film, even if such attitude is what immediately dates it as one from a long ago time.
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Ancestry of Lysander Franklin Gurney
LYSANDER FRANKLIN GURNEY, late of Brockton, Plymouth Co., Mass., was a descendant of some of the earliest settlers of this section. Going back to the mother country, we find the following general information in “The Gurneys of Earlham” 1two volumes, Hart, Mich., March 16, 1906. Volume 1, Volume 2.
The Norfolk Gurneys claim descent from the ancient Barons of Gournay in Normandy, where the curious Ports Ibert with many old towers of the walls and the twelfth century church of Saint Hildevert attest the wealth and power of its ancient lords. Several members of the House accompanied William the Conqueror to England, and fought at the battle of Hastings, after which the valor of the aged Hugh de Gurney III. was rewarded by the establishment of the English Barony of Gourney, held by tenure of military service and by large grants of land, so that he has left his name of Baron Gourney in Somerset and several other places in England. The story of the “House of Gourney” is told in a magnificent history by Daniel Gurney of Juncton Hall, near Norwich, County of Norfolk, England, which possesses historic interest and shows much antiquarian research.
The Gurney arms cherished by the American branch show this connection with the English Gurneys.
According to manuscript in the possession of the late Lysander F. Gurney’s family, there were two emigrants of the name to these shores in the early days, Edward Gurney coming to Cambridge in 1636, and John Gurney coming to Braintree. The latter was an apprentice to John Newgate. He was born Sept. 29, 1615, and died in 1663. His wife died in 1664. According to the direct line given in the family records Richard Gurney, of Weymouth, of whom we have definite knowledge, appears to have been his son.
One John Gurney, of Weymouth, son of Richard, was a soldier in Johnson’s company in 1675.
Taking up the direct ancestry of the late Lysander Franklin Gurney,
Richard Gurney, an inhabitant of Weymouth, and a freeman of 1681, had there by his wife Rebecca (probably a daughter of John Taylor):
Joseph, born Feb. 23, 1664-65
Mary, born Sept. 9, 1667
Joseph Gurney, son of Richard and Rebecca, born Feb. 23, 1664-65, married Mary Perkins. He settled in Abington, Mass., about the close of the seventeenth century. Their children were:
Joseph, if no more
Of these Perkins, born in 1723, married, the Christian name of his wife being Jane, settled in East Bridgewater, and left descendants. Benoni also married and left descendants.
Joseph Gurney (2), son of Joseph and Mary, born Feb. 4, 1735, married Sarah Shaw and their children were:
Joseph, born March 28, 1759
Joseph Gurney (3), son of Joseph (2) and his wife Sarah (Shaw), born March 28, 1759, married Mary Smith. She died before his removal, about 1783, to Ashfield, Mass., and their son Melvin, then an infant, was left with his aunt, Jane Smith, who married Thomas Whiting, of East Abington. Joseph Gurney (3) married a second time, and had a son Joseph.
Melvin Gurney, grandfather of Lysander F., was born April 22, 1782, and died April 15, 1854, aged seventy-two years. He married Jan. 30, 1807, Olive Holbrook. Their children were:
Thomas W., born Jan. 30, 1809, married Nov. 13, 1836, Mary C. Stoddard
Melvin, Jr., born Sept. 27, 1810, married June 9, 1833, Lydia Burrell
William H., born July 3, 1812, married Nov. 30, 1837, Eveline L. Briggs
Joseph W. is mentioned below
Olive B., born March 12, 1817, died March 28, 1851, in her thirty-fifth year
James S., born May 17, 1819, married Nov. 30, 1843, Elizabeth W. Loud
Joseph Warren Gurney, father of Lysander F. Gurney, was born Sept. 3, 1814, in East Abington, Mass., and died there Aug. 28, 1869, aged nearly fifty-five years. He was a shoemaker by trade, while clockmaking was his avocation. He married May 25, 1837, Iantha E. Studley, daughter of David Studley, of Hanover, Mass. His children were:
Warren Studley Gurney, born in Hanover June 5, 1839, served through the Civil war as a musician in various regiment bands, and was always known as an excellent musician. He was a first-class watchmaker and in 1870 entered the jewelry business in the firm of Gurney Brothers, in which he continued until his death, which occurred in 1896. He was twice married, his first wife being Winifred Knowles, of Provincetown, and his second Mary Sturtevant, of Brockton, who is still living in Mexico. He was the father of the following children:
Fred Warren, a jeweler, who died in Brockton, unmarried
Harvey Studley, a jeweler, who died in Colorado, where his wife, Eveline (Cross), is still living
Melvin Knowles, a graduate of Harvard, a chemist by profession, who is residing in Mexico, unmarried.
Matilda J., born March 8, 1841, now deceased, married Peter Curtis, of East Abington, and they had two children
Lysander Franklin is mentioned below.
Ann E., born Dec. 20, 1847, married Benjamin A. Burrell, of East Abington, a shoe manufacturer in Rockland, Mass. They have had three children
Ralph.
Lilla A., born May 18, 1855, died Aug. 21, 1855.
Lysander Franklin Gurney was born June 8, 1843, at the Studley homestead in Hanover, and there received his early schooling
Lysander Franklin Gurney was born June 8, 1843, at the Studley homestead in Hanover, and there received his early schooling. Later he attended school at East Abington, whither the family moved when he was twelve years old, and at North Bridgewater, as Brockton was then known. He was sixteen when he came to the latter place, to learn watchmaking, and when he was twenty years old, in 1863, his uncle, David Fearing Studley, set him up in the jewelry business in North Bridgewater, in the front room of a house which Mr. Studley owned, on the north corner of Church and Main streets. He was of the third generation of clockmakers in the Gurney family,, his father and grandfather having been masters of the trade. In 1870 his elder brother, Warren S. Gurney, became a partner in the business, the name changing from L. F. Gurney to Gurney Brothers, which style has ever since been retained, though the firm is now known as the Gurney Brothers Company. In 1871 several changes were made in the quarters occupied by the business, a store front being put in the building, and there it was carried on until moved to its present location in the Washburn block, No. 122 Main street, at the south corner of School street. Various changes have been made in the store since its establishment in the Washburn block, the most important extension being made in 1901, when the removal of another firm gave Gurney Brothers a long desired opportunity to enlarge and remodel their quarters. Warren S. Gurney continued in the business until his death, after which it was carried on by Lysander F. Gurney until it was established as a stock company in 1901, at which time his sons Merton S. and Sanford K. were admitted into the firm.
The Gurney Brothers Company have the leading establishment of the kind in Brockton, being in fact one of the largest jewelry and watchmaking concerns in New England outside of Boston. Lysander F. Gurney was an experienced tradesman himself, and appreciated the efforts of those in his employ. The Gurney Brothers always aimed to engage the most expert labor obtainable, and several of the responsible employees of the house to-day have been with them for twenty-five years or more and have a high reputation for reliability and skill. A number of relatives of the Gurneys have been connected with the establishment. The liberal policy and high principles observed by this house have become proverbial. No business man in Brockton held a higher place in the esteem of his associates than Lysander F. Gurney. His sincere, conscientious efforts to do the right thing under all circumstances not only made him well liked, but gained him a standing which, backed by his progressive disposition, assured the steady growth of his business. He was equally well thought of in social and church circles. A devoted member of the First Congregational Church, he served many years as treasurer of the parish, and by his conservative management of its finances made himself a very valuable factor in the material upbuilding of that church. He was chosen treasurer several years before the fire that destroyed the old Brown structure, and for years not only devoted his time and best efforts to promoting the best interests of the church but also gave generously out of his own pocket, to an extent that was probably realized by very few people. The pastor, Mr. Hudson, had come to Brockton before the church recovered from the blow of the fire, and Mr. Gurney stood by him faithfully in the uphill fight which had to be made to place the church upon the solid basis it now enjoys. For seven years before his death Mr. Gurney was one of the three trustees of the Marcus Packard fund, which increased materially under their fostering administration.
Aside from the charitable work and benevolences into which his prominent connection with his church drew him, Mr. Gurney aided many who were in need, giving liberally of his means and taking a personal interest in the beneficiaries which cheered many a heart in distress. His charities were wide, but so quietly done that none but the recipients were aware of his generosity, and it is truthfully said that all who came to him for aid were kindly met and sympathetically dealt with. The same might be said of his relations with other business men. His advice was valued, his judgment respected, and, as one of the oldest and most reliable merchants of Brockton, he was very frequently consulted on business questions, gladly giving his counsel and assistance when sought in his characteristically unostentatious way. His intelligence was looked up to by younger men especially, and his modest manner and approachable nature made him well liked by employees and employers alike. With a high conception of duty, and an earnest desire to do what was right from a Christian’s point of view, Mr. Gurney endeavored to follow the simple, honest, helpful life which he considered man’s highest aim, and how well. he succeeded is best judged by the expressions of loving remembrance coming from all who had relations with him. His pastor, Mr. Hudson, spoke of him as
“one of the simplest yet most effective men of his acquaintance; always quiet, but always firm on matters touching what he conceived to be his principles; a man to be depended upon absolutely in every relation of life.”
In his political views Mr. Gurney was a stanch Republican, and he was a strong friend of the temperance cause, favoring no license in local movements. He never cared for public office and never aspired to such position. He was a member of the Commercial Club, and though a Mason, a well known member of Paul Revere Lodge, A. F. & A. M., of Brockton, was not very active in the fraternity. He made many warm friendships wherever he went, but he was a quiet, home-loving man, and it was his genial nature, not a desire for the excitement of social pleasures, that made him so popular.
No better evidence of the esteem in which Mr. Gurney was held is needed than the marks of respect which were shown at the time of his death. Though he had been in declining health for some time, and had been ill for a week or so, the end, which was caused by heart failure, came quite suddenly on the afternoon of Nov. 20, 1905, at his home in Brockton, and was a shock to the community as well as to his family. Social, church, fraternal and business friends united in sympathetic demonstrations. The funeral services, as Mr. Gurney would have wished, were conducted by his pastor and marked for their simplicity. He was laid to rest in the family lot in Union cemetery.
Mr. Gurney married, June 3, 1866, Chloe Richmond Lyon, daughter of the late Vinal and Damaris Williams (Keith) Lyon, of North Bridgewater, a record of which family appears elsewhere in these volumes. The family home was at No. 113 Green street, at the corner of Warren avenue. To Mr. and Mrs. Gurney were born three children, all sons:
Frank Ellis Gurney, born July 22, 1867, was graduated from the Brockton high school in 1885, as valedictorian of his class, was fitted for and’entered Amherst College, after which he took a special course of four years at the State normal school at Bridgewater. Following that he taught school at Garden City, R. I., and is now instructor of Latin, astronomy and algebra at the State normal school at Bridgewater, Mass. He married Cornelia Augusta Churchill, daughter of George Churchill, of Brockton, and they had one son, Studley Churchill Gurney, who died in infancy.
Merton Studley Gurney, born April 14, 1869, was graduated from the Brockton high school, class of 1887, learned the watchmaker’s trade with his father, and is now a member of the firm of Gurney Brothers Company. He married Ella Gertrude Packard, daughter of Rodney B. Packard, of Brockton, and they have three children
Fred Packard
Sanford Keith Gurney, born Oct. 30, 1875, is a graduate of the Brockton high school and of Brown University, class of 1897. He is a member of the Gurney Brothers Company. He married Mabelle Florence Crocker, daughter of Bradford Crocker, of Newton, and they have two children
Joseph Gale
Richard Crocker
Mrs. Chloe E. (Lyon) Gurney, whose death occurred Dec. 14, 1910, was a prominent member of Deborah Sampson Chapter, D. A. E., of Brockton, being a past regent, having served two years as regent of that body. She was a descendant of sixteen of the original proprietors of Bridgewater, Mass., and of seven of the original proprietors of Taunton; of nine Revolutionary soldiers, namely:
Col. Simeon Cary
Benjamin Keith
Josiah Perkins, Jr.
Corporal Jedediah Lyon
Jonas Reynolds
Ensign Luke Perkins
Levi Keith
Josiah Perkins, Sr.
Job Richmond
of four of the “Fortune” “passengers
of thirteen of the passengers of the “Ann” and “Little James”
of sixteen of the “Mayflower” passengers, viz.
Isaac Allerton and wife Mary Norris, through their daughter Mary, who married Elder Thomas Cushman
John Alden and Priscilla Mullins, through their son Joseph
William Mullins and his wife Priscilla
Elder William Brewster and wife
Francis Cooke
John Howland
John Tilley and his wife Bridget and daughter Elizabeth, who married John Howland
Richard Warren
Mrs. Gurney was well known in social circles and charitable work. She was always in hearty sympathy with her husband’s benevolent projects, and assisted him in such work whenever possible.
Footnotes: [ + ]
1. ↩ two volumes, Hart, Mich., March 16, 1906. Volume 1, Volume 2
Briggs, Burrell, Churchill, Crocker, Cross, Curtis, Cushman, Gourney, Gurney, Holbrook, Howland, Hudson, Keith, Loud, Lyon, Mullins, Newgate, Norris, Packard, Perkins, Shaw, Smith, Stoddard, Studley, Surtevant, Taylor, Whiting,
Civil War,
Abington Massachusetts, Ashfield Massachusetts, Braintree Massachusetts, Bridgewater Massachusetts, Brockton Massachusetts, Cambridge Massachusetts, East Abington Massachusetts, East Bridgewater Massachusetts, Garden City Rhode Island, Hanover Massachusetts, North Bridgewater Massachusetts, Norwich England, Plymouth County MA, Rockland Massachusetts, Weymouth Massachusetts,
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Surname: Colburn
Ancestry of Loyed Ellis Chamberlain of Brockton, Massachusetts
Conspicuous on the roll of the representative lawyers of southeastern Massachusetts appears the name of Loyed Ellis Chamberlain. In no profession is there a career more open to men of talent than in that of the law, and in no field of endeavor is there demanded a more careful preparation, a more perfect appreciation of the absolute ethics of life, or of the underlying principles which form the basis of all human rights and privileges. Unflagging application, intuitive judgment, and a determination to utilize fully the means at hand are the elements which insure personal success and prestige in this
Descendants of Abraham Tappan of Newbury, MA
The Tappan family of Attleboro, while not an old one in this section of the State, has, nevertheless, been resident for half a century in Attleboro, where Ephraim H. Tappan makes his home, and where his sons, Charles H. and William C, the latter now deceased, have been identified with the manufacturing interests of that section, by their great energy, enterprise and progressive spirit making for themselves a name ranking them among the foremost jewelry manufacturers of the State. The Tappan family was planted in America by:
Abraham Toppan (or Tappan), son of William Topham, of Calbridge, in the parish of Coverham, and fourth in descent from Robert Topham, of Linton, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England; he was baptized April 10, 1606. He lived for some time in Yarmouth, County of Norfolk. His wife, whose maiden name was Taylor, was born in 1607, daughter of Elizabeth, who married (second) John Goodale, whom she outlived and from whom she inherited considerable property. Mr. Toppan with his wife, two children and maidservant, in 1637, took passage in the “Mary and Ann” to New England, and there came in the same vessel with them Mrs. Goodale, his mother-in-law. He settled in Newbury, being admitted Oct. 16, 1637, and at different times in the year following several lots were granted to him. He made a number of voyages to Barbadoes, one or more of which were profitable. He died Nov. 5, 1672, aged sixty-six, in the house on “Toppan’s Lane” which he had built about 1670 for his son Jacob. His widow died March 20, 1689, aged eighty-two years. The children of Abraham and Susanna (Taylor) Toppan were:
Lowell Massachusetts Genealogy
Tracing ancestors in Lowell, Massachusetts online and for free has been greatly enhanced by the University of Massachusetts in Lowell which provided digitized version of a large quantity of the Lowell public records. Combined with the cemetery and census records available freely online, you should be able to easily trace your ancestors from the founding of Lowell in 1826 through 1940, the last year of available census records. To add color to the otherwise basic facts of your ancestors existence we provide free access to a wide range of manuscripts on the history of Lowell, it’s manufactures and residents.
Richard Dexter Genealogy, 1642-1904
Being a history of the descendants of Richard Dexter of Malden, Massachusetts, from the notes of John Haven Dexter and original researches. Richard Dexter, who was admitted an inhabitant of Boston (New England), Feb. 28, 1642, came from within ten miles of the town of Slane, Co. Meath, Ireland, and belonged to a branch of that family of Dexter who were descendants of Richard de Excester, the Lord Justice of Ireland. He, with his wife Bridget, and three or more children, fled to England from the great Irish Massacre of the Protestants which commenced Oct. 27, 1641. When Richard Dexter and family left England and by what vessel, we are unable to state, but he could not have remained there long, as we know he was living at Boston prior to Feb. 28, 1642.
Hinckley Genealogy of Blue Hill, Maine
Bushrod W. Hinckley was a lawyer, and for a number of years the only one in town. He was born in Thetford, Vt. He married Sarah F. Wilcox, by whom he had children as follows: Ellen, Francis, Caroline and Hattie. Mr. Hinckley died Dec. 17, 1869; Mrs. Hinckley July 5, 1889.
Contributions of the Old Residents’ Historical Association, Lowell MA
The Lowell Historical Society of Lowell Massachusetts published 6 volumes of “contributions” to the recording of the history of Lowell Massachusetts at the turn of the century. These contributions were continued by the contributions by the Lowell Historical Society. Volume I A Fragment, written in 1843, by Theodore Edson Boott, Kirk, by Theodore Edson Carpet-Weaving and the Lowell Manufacturing Company, by Samuel Fay Dana, Samuel L., Memoir of, by John O. Green Early Recollections of an Old Resident, by Josiah B. French East Chelmsford (now Lowell), Families Living in, in 1802, by Z. E. Stone Green, Benjamin, Biography of, by
Dedham Massachusetts Historical Society Register 1890-1903
From 1890-1903, the Dedham Historical Society in Dedham Massachusetts printed a quarterly pamphlet for it’s historical society called the “Dedham Historical Register.” In this pamphlet a variety of genealogical data was published on families of Dedham and the villages emanating from the early residents of Dedham, such as Dorchester, Franklin, Medfield, Medway, Needham, and Sharon, etc.
Clough Genealogy of Blue Hill, Maine
The Clough Genealogy of Blue Hill, Maine is a study into the genealogy of two supposed brothers, Asa and Benjamin Clough. Asa Clough was born at Haverhill, Mass., Aug. 25, 1764; died Jan. 2, 1851, in his eighty-seventh year. He married Abigail Pecker, Nov. 27, 1789. She was born at Bradford, Mass., Nov. 27, 1766, and died March 16, 1854, in her eighty-eighth year. They had a family of ten children, as follows: Daniel, Cheever, Sally, John, Asa, Leonard, James, Lydia, Zelotes, and Louisa. Benjamin was born Aug. 15, 1755, married Relief Wyman, March 12, 1788. She was born Sept. 16, 1761, and died March 25, 1819. The date of his death is not recorded. The children of Benjamin, Sr., and Relief (Wyman) Clough were: Moody, Abigail, Hannah, Phebe, Benjamin, Dorias, and Ezra. There was a third brother, John, who travelled from Haverhill Mass. to Blue Hill Maine, however, he is not treated in this genealogy.
Dodge Genealogy of Blue Hill, Maine
Phineas Dodge, head of this family, died at about 80 years of age. He was the son of Elisha and Lydia (Day) Dodge, born Sept. 6, 1813. In his youth he was a sailor, afterwards became a ship carpenter and ended his days as a farmer. The children of Phineas and Harriet Newell (Candage) Dodge were: Justin, Rosina, Adelbert, Clara, mina, Frank, Annah and George.
Colburn Genealogy of Blue Hill, Maine
Charles Colburn was a sailor in his younger days; he was born in the town of Billerica, Mass., and came to Blue Hill previous to 1829. He married Serena Parker, daughter of Marble and Hannah (Lovejoy) Parker, Oct. 15, 1829. The children of Charles and Serena Colburn were as follows: Hannah, Eliza, Charles and Mary.
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