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Medigate
The solution to many of the problems of the computer-based recording of the medical record has been elusive, largely due to difficulties in efficient capture of those data elements that comprise the records of the Present Illness and of the Physical Findings. Reliable input of data has proven to be more complex than originally envisioned by early work in the field; this has led to more effort into the development of good interfaces.
In early systems, the focus was primarily on the storage and processing of the data rather than on the problems associated with the collection and display of the data and the associated issues of interface design. The characteristics of the user are very important to the development of a good interface system. The capacity of the physician to interact directly with elegant computer-based clinical aids can only be fully realized when the physician also interacts directly with the system for capture of the primary clinical data that s/he generates, which is then electronically available on-line for analysis and decision support.
The MEDIGATE System was developed to study some of the problems in interface design. The design employs an object-oriented approach through the direct manipulation of graphical objects, along with hypertext approaches and semantic networking to build a system that is more natural to the user. The primary design objectives of the MEDIGATE System are to develop and evaluate different interface designs for recording observations from the physical examination in an attempt to overcome some of the deficiencies in this major component of the individual record of health and illness.
The design of this system employees an object-oriented approach through the direct manipulation of graphical objects integrated with hypertext and semantic networking technologies to build a system that is more natural to the user.
I was involved with the architecture, design, and implementation of this project and I was also the project manager for this research sponsored by Lifespan Research Institute and University Park Pathology Associates.
I have written a various papers describing the MEDIGATE system in more details and they can be found here.
Adaptive Object Model
Joe's Publications
Can be downloaded from my website. I add new material as it's been published.
Training Mentoring
Are you looking for design patterns training or mentoring? Joseph provides training courses for a variety of languages.
Contact Joe
Joe Yoder
© 1996 - 2018 Joseph Yoder Enterprises, Inc.
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Dubai—the most modern and hippest place to be in the Middle East today. The place practically reeks of wealth, with its dime-a-dozen Ferraris, yachts, humongous yet atractive shopping malls, ultra high-end merchandise, five to seven-star hotels, to name a few. Purchasing power in this tiny Emirati state is so great that I read of diamond encrusted license plates and see diamond studded designer cellphones. Here, if one is on top of the moolah heap, how else can one distinguish himself way above the average dough-laden masses?
Vertu Signature Cobra by Boucheron priced at U$ 310,000, with 2 diamonds, 2 emeralds, & 439 rubies
For most people in the Third World, Dubai is the new Land of Plenty. With its tax-free salaries and its ever-growing need for jobs, Dubai attracts people from lowly workers to well-skilled professionals. I think I can say that those who form the immigrant worker base are mostly Indians, Pakistanis, and Filipinos—Indians perhaps dominating the immigrant worker population. I felt so at home at the malls in Dubai. Almost every shop had a Filipino salesperson and most of those in the major groceries–Spinney’s, Carrefour and Panda Hypermart– were Filipinos. It felt like shopping back home, only dealing with much higher prices.
Poverty seems non-existent here. There seems to be absolutely no beggars or homeless people. At least I’ve never run into any. I hear it’s against the law to beg. And who needs to, when Dubai’s citizens are well taken cared of by a government giving comfortable pensions. Utilities and housing are all paid for by the government as well.
Health care, though, leaves much to be desired. The Filipinos I’ve talked to all agree that hospitals and doctors in the U.A.E. need so much more improvement. Most dread getting sick as they do not trust doctors’ medical skills nor the hygiene of Dubai’s hospitals and would rather go home to the Philippines where medical treatment is superb. With all that money, don’t you think health care should be state-of-the-art? Strange.
The Rose Tower, Dubai. World's Tallest Hotel @ 333 meters, 74 floors
Construction has been in a fever pitch these past few years since 2003; so that Dubai has burgeoned rapidly into one with a beautiful cityscape of glittering glass architectural behemoths. Dubai wants to be the -est; hence the Burj Dubai, tallest building in the world (as of today); the Dubai Mall, one of the largest shopping malls in the world boasting perhaps one of the world’s largest indoor aquariums which has clinched the Guiness World Record for having the World’s Largest Acrylic Panel; the Rose Tower at 333 meters has replaced the Burj Al Arab (currently the tallest hotel) as the tallest hotel in the world.
The ruler of this tiny kingdom, Shiekh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, is indeed a visionary. He had invested loads of his kingdom’s petrol money and invited a lot more into creating a tax-free business haven and a playground of a city for anyone with the cash to burn. To be globally attractive and competitive, he’s welcomed the freedom of the Western culture (up to a certain point); hence, the chic bars and nightspots, midriff-bared or mini-skirted women; and hip-hop Arabs (can you picture “cool dude” Arabs in “Yo, Mama” duds?—quite incongruous, really).
The Dubai Mall Aquarium
For an Islamic state, this is a HUGE leap forward. What was conspicuously absent for Dubai to be a complete mogul haven is a casino. Maybe a bit too much to swallow for U.A.E.’s Moslems now; but I see gambling as the next big thing for Dubai. It’s all in the justification – religion or money? Hmmm….quite a moral wrestling match here.
But why all these changes? To decide to invite opposing ideas and diverse cultures and religions to co-exist with a usually closed Moslem culture must have had, I surmise, earned Shiekh Maktoum some serious flack. But he must be a cut above other Middle Eastern rulers to recognize that to survive rich in the long term, one has to move forward as the rest of the world — or rather the rest of the market. Dubai’s major bread and butter used to be oil. He however must have recognized the urgent need to diversify in the face of petering oil reserves and frenetic global development of energy source alternatives. So, if Dubai runs out of oil or if hardly anyone really needs it anymore, the little state wouldn’t be caught dead in the water. It will have its robust financial industry, trade, real estate and tourism industries to carry it very well into the next several decades.
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When the tough gets going
Ethan Filippo, Kohl Viega, and Cooper Bennigson|July 19, 2018
In the last game of the season, soccer star Grant Gini ’19 helped Jesuit High School’s varsity soccer team fight against McClatchy High School by playing strong defense. But even with their best efforts, they still lost 2-1.
“We should have used more communication and passing,” said Grant.
Losing the game was not matter though. Last season, they had a winning streak of 12 games. No matter what the score, Grant still appreciated being on the team because he enjoys the company of his teammates.
“I love the team, and we have a good team chemistry.” said Grant.
Even when the team loses, they all had positive attitudes, but Grant did not all the time.
“I have gotten a five game suspension for fighting once,” said Grant.
As the story goes, his teammate was in a fight and Grant went to help him, but instead he was sucker punched in the jaw. Yet, even being injured, he returned the punch, and the referee gave him a five game suspension.
The punch was not the only injury. He had gotten a torn meniscus, a sprained mcl, and he rolled his ankle multiple times. But Grant only kept going in the game. When they tied 2-2 against ToKay, for example, they went in to penalty kicks (PK’s). They won six to five in Pk’s. If Grant wasn’t playing in the game, their team could have lost. He keeps going, even into the next year.
“We will totally have a successful season this year,” said Grant. “We will have a bunch of returning players and probably win the Season Cup. “
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Chris Hansen, Luke Dougherty, and Liam Shaw|July 5, 2019
Video games have an interesting history. They were designed from people messing around and for rapid code breaking. People became bored and eventually started creating the games. The games have evolved over decades. One of the first games was called Tennis for Two. Pong also became very popular. They then turned into arcade games. One of the most popular games ever was PacMan. Another game called Space Invaders was one of the first shooter games ever. This inspired future first person shooting games. These arcade games later turned into what we know now as video game consoles. One of the first consoles was Atari. These kept being made. Some of the newer consoles include the PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo consoles. The video game consoles have evolved over periods of time. We mention the PlayStation, XBox, and the Nintendo game consoles. Now in modern day we now have Virtual Reality (VR) games. This is very popular and has earned a lot of money of this console. Another big form of the VR console is called the VR Oculus. You put the headset on and put controllers in your hand and move around. This is one of the newest and most modern forms of the video game world.
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Peter Dinklage Reads Poetry, Talks Game of Thrones on Ron Burgundy Podcast
posted by Taylor Fields - Apr 10, 2019
Peter Dinklage is known for his appearances in many movies and TV shows, but especially hit HBO series Game of Thrones as his character Tyrion Lannister. And with the premiere of the final season of the show less than a week away, Dinklage was the latest guest to appear on "The Ron Burgundy Podcast," this week's episode focusing on ... poetry.
The podcast's co-host and producer Carolina suggested an episode about poetry to "add more culture." However, Ron Burgundy didn't exactly agree, as his idea of culture is "exotic dancing with drums and scarves."
But, the show proceeded with the poetry topic, as Carolina (who minored in 19th century poetry at Sarah Lawrence College) talked about her favorite poet: Emily Dickinson. But, Burgundy was more interested in his new sound machine, which makes a wide variety of sound effects, to pay attention to facts about Dickinson.
Then, Dinklage called in to the podcast to recite some poetry himself; he's actually a big fan of poetry. He called it "a lost art form."
But, before Peter read his first poem, he chatted a bit about Game of Thrones (or "Throne of Games" as Burgundy kept calling the show), and explained that he could not reveal any spoilers for fans.
Following confirmation that the dragons on the show are not real and that they have an incredibly talented special affects team, Dinklage recited his first poem which was written by his 7-year-old daughter. "A gentle flower blows in the moonlight," the actor read, before being interrupted by Ron's sound machine. And after some back and forth, Dinklage was finally able to recite the full poem, which contained one more line: "It sings, it dances."
After Ron unplugged his disruptive sound machine (or so he claimed), the second poem that Dinklage read was by Oscar Wilde called Her Voice. The actor got through four lines before he was, again, interrupted by Burgundy and his sound machine. Apparently his "elbow slipped."
Peter's time on the episode almost ended there as he said that even though he was "alright," he explained that "Game of Thrones fans [are] pretty upset by this, that's all I gotta say. And you don't want to mess with them, you know?" He also added that he "did a lot of research on these poems."
Dinklage tried to get through a few more poems, but was continuously interrupted by Ron's sound machine, and before saying goodbye, said, "You know why I'm still on the line? I'll tell you the hard truth of it all. Game of Thrones is over. Things like this is all I have left. Then, he thanked Burgundy and said, "You've made me realize the next path of my life is gonna be this."
Listen to the Peter Dinklage and Ron Burgundy (and Ron's sound machine) on the latest episode of "The Ron Burgundy Podcast" on iHeartRadio.
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PheuThaiVictory
03 JULY 2011 - BANGKOK, THAILAND: People in Bangkok celebrate news that the Pheu Thai party and Yingluck Shinawatra won the Thai election Sunday. Yingluck Shinawatra and the Pheu Thai Party scored a massive landslide win in the Thai election Sunday. Pheu That is estimated to have won more than 300 seats in Thailand 500 seat parliament, so they won an absolute majority and could govern without having to form a coalition with minor parties. Pheu Thai is the latest incarnation of deposed former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's political party. Yingluck is his youngest sister. Many observers expect legal challenges to the Pheu Thai victory and the election does not completely resolve Thailand's difficult political history of the last five years. PHOTO BY JACK KURTZ
070311 Celebration Democracy Elections Party Pheu Thai Party Red Shirts Thailand Thaksin Shinawatra Victory Yingluck Shinawatra ZUMA
Red Shirts (all), Yingluck Shinawatra Wins Thai Premiership, Thailand (All)
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Home / Articles / The Week in Review / Your Money
Behind the Blue Chips of the Dow Jones Industrial Average
The papers and news stations recently reported that stocks were off to a weak start on Wall Street as a rally began losing steam. The Dow Jones industrial Average (DJIA) fell eight points, less than 0.1%, to 15,322 after the first few minutes of trading Thursday. The Dow had gained 3.5% so far that month.
The DJIA is the revered veteran of financial reports; the old reliable of the major U.S. stock indices. Chances are you’ve heard and read reports of its rise and fall many times on the Internet, the radio, the evening news and in the newspaper. A stock index of 30 “blue-chip” publicly traded U.S. companies that are thought to be leaders in their industries, the DJIA is a favorite index among financial reporters and market watchers alike because it is meant to measure the strength and weakness of the entire stock market.
This week the DJIA – also referred to as “The Dow” – got more ink than usual. Dow Jones & Company announced that Goldman Sachs, Visa and Nike are joining the index, while Hewlett-Packard, Bank of America and Alcoa are out. It is considered the biggest shakeup of The Dow in about a decade. The changes will take effect at the opening of trading September 23.
American Express, Coca-Cola, Wal-Mart
What’s the significance of the comings and goings of Dow members? While these decisions are somewhat subjective on the part of the index editors because there are no pre-determined criteria for a stock to be added or deleted, the arrival of new companies does provide some insight into the U.S. economy.
First, though, it helps to understand a few Dow basics. The index, which began in 1896 with 12 industrial stocks – stocks of companies that manufactured products – now includes 30 stocks from high-profile American companies in a variety of industries, from manufacturing to entertainment and information technology. Companies in The Dow include American Express, AT&T, Boeing, Caterpillar, Coca-Cola, IBM, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble and Wal-Mart. “You are a bona fide blue-chip stock when you are in the Dow Jones 30,” notes Robert Stambaugh, a Wharton professor of finance. “It lends cache and star quality to a company to be in The Dow. The companies they have put in over the years have had recent upward movement and have increased their prominence in the economy and in their sectors.”
The Dow average has seen lots of movement in recent years. The index closed above 15,000 for the first time earlier this year on May 7, 2013. This was encouraging news given The Dow’s downward trend during the economic recession that began in 2008. On July 19, 2007, The Dow closed just above 14,000 for the first time. But then on September 29, 2008, the same day the U.S. House rejected the $700 billion financial bailout package to help Wall Street, the Dow had the worst single-day point drop in history, plunging 777.68 points. The week of October 6 that year, the index continued a steep decline, closing at 8451.19. These days it is on the rebound as the economy improves.
Stambaugh, who teaches finance to undergrads at Wharton, is often surprised by how few of his students understand the math behind the DJIA. A stock index is a method of measuring the value of a section of the stock market. Other indices include the S&P 500 and the Russell 3000. The Dow index is the sum of its 30 stock prices divided by a number, which is known as the divisor.
However, the addition of three new stocks with varying stock prices, which will happen on the 23rd, does not change the value of the index. “Every time there is a change in terms of an addition or subtraction of stocks, or a stock in the index splits so that its price is dropped in half, they have to adjust the divisor,” notes Stambaugh. “By adjusting the divisor, the overall index is not affected.”
Skewed Financial
And speaking of numbers, some have questioned why the DJIA continually takes a pass on adding some of the country’s largest businesses, namely Apple and Google. Apple, which is based in California and makes the Mac line of computers, iPhones, iPads and other popular products, is the largest publicly traded corporation in the world by market capitalization (a determinant of a company’s size, other than total sales, that is arrived at by calculating a company’s shares outstanding by the market price of one share). Apple’s stock is trading at about $465 a share, which, as it turns, out makes it just too big for The Dow. “Companies like Apple and Google are excluded because of their share price,” says Stambaugh. “A stock that has a very high price will end up dominating movements in the index. If you put a very high-priced stock in the index, then the day-to-day up and down movements would reflect largely the movements of this very high stock.”
The arrival of Goldman Sachs, Nike and Visa to the DJIA does say something about the U.S. economy, suggests Stambaugh. “They have tilted the index more toward financials. It’s called the Dow Jones Industrial index, but if you look at what they’ve done, two of the companies they’ve tossed out, HP and Alcoa, actually make things and sell them. They replaced those with Goldman, Visa and Nike. Goldman and Visa are financial services firms and Nike makes stuff and sells it. This reflects that financial services firms have a bigger presence in our U.S. economy.”
Nike’s new home among the Dow 30 is also noteworthy because it marks the inclusion of the first apparel maker since International Shoe was replaced in 1933. And while real money managers prefer to use other indices as their benchmarks of investment performance, The DJIA will continue to be a stalwart symbol of Wall Street. “Its popularity stems from the fact that it is the oldest, best-known index, and the popular press tends to quote it first,” says Stambaugh. It will forever be considered the barometer of America’s stock market.
What is the Dow Jones Industrial Average?
Why did The Dow get more ink than usual this week?
What is the significance of the announced changes to The Dow?
Reuters: Dow Jones Index Announces Biggest Shakeup in Decades
The Washington Post: The Dow Jones Is Ridiculous
Companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average
CNNMoney: The Dow Jones Industrial Average
What Is an Investment?
Speculation – Stocks
A ‘Sneakerhead’ Shares His Simple Strategy: Buy Low and Sell High
The Top 10 Terms Every New Investor Should Know
Investing 101: The Prospect of Growing Your Money
Understanding Risk and Return: The Roller Coaster Ride of Investing
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Why Were the Three Witnesses Shown the Liahona?
Liahona by Mike Wallace
“And now, my son, I have somewhat to say concerning the thing which our fathers call a ball, or director—or our fathers called it Liahona, which is, being interpreted, a compass; and the Lord prepared it.”
Some may not realize that, aside from viewing the plates, the Three Witnesses of the Book of Mormon beheld several other Nephite artifacts, including the “miraculous directors which were given to Lehi while in the wilderness, on the borders of the Red Sea” (Doctrine and Covenants 17:1).1 These “directors” apparently refer to the “spindles” which “pointed the way” that Lehi’s family should travel through the wilderness (1 Nephi 16:10).2 According to the prophet Alma, this was “the thing which our fathers call a ball, or director—or our fathers called it Liahona,3 which is, being interpreted, a compass; and the Lord prepared it” (Alma 37:38).4
Why was it important for the Three Witnesses to visually witness this object? One likely possibility is that it gave credence to the Lehite exodus story and the founding of the Nephite nation. Don Bradley has proposed that just as the Ark of the Covenant held sacred religious artifacts related to the founding of the Israelite nation, the Nephites had their own national treasures—including the Liahona—which they held in their own sacred repository.5
The Ark of the Covenant. Image via Wikimedia Commons
The Ark of the Covenant was known to contain a golden pot of manna, the rod of Aaron which budded, and the stone tablets from Mt. Sinai (Hebrews 9:4).6 Remarkably, the Liahona has parallels to each of these items. The strongest resemblance is between the Liahona and the manna. Both were discovered in the morning, both were discovered upon the ground, both were round in appearance,7 and both evoked wonder or astonishment.
Exodus 16:13–15 (Manna)
1 Nephi 16:16 (Liahona)
… in the morning the dew lay round about the host. And when the dew that lay was gone up, behold, upon the face [ground] of the wilderness there lay a small round thing ... And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna: for they wist not what it was.
16 And it came to pass that as my father arose in the morning, and went forth to the tent door, to his great astonishment he beheld upon the ground a round ball of curious workmanship;
It is also significant that both items helped wandering travelers to avoid starvation in the wilderness. The manna itself was food, while the Liahona helped Lehi’s family get food by directing them to fertile areas and wild game (1 Nephi 16:16, 30–31).8 It’s even likely that Nephi intentionally crafted his story in a way that would help readers make a connection between the manna and the Liahona. In each situation, the miraculous obtaining of food came immediately after members of the group murmured against the Lord.9 And in each case, the murmuring was related to hunger and the desire to return back to their respective lands.10
Nefi ora con liahona by Jorge Cocco
In the Bible, we learn that Aaron’s rod, among other staffs, was used as an appropriate means of determining God’s will (Numbers 17:1–11). The Liahona’s “spindles” or “directors” seemed to similarly function as a means by which the Lord could communicate with His people.11 In both circumstances, the objects were rod-like in shape and had writing upon them.12 Using sticks or arrows for divination practices was well known in many ancient societies, and God manifested his will in this manner in a number of Bible stories.13
Finally, just as the Lord permanently inscribed the Ten Commandments onto the stone tablets with His own finger (Deuteronomy 9:10), He also caused writing to miraculously appear upon the Liahona’s “pointers” (1 Nephi 16:26–29). Even though the words found on the Liahona changed from “time to time” (v. 29), it’s clear that both objects conveyed the specific words of the Lord. Alma, when giving counsel to his son Helaman, declared that “it is as easy to give heed to the word of Christ, which will point to you a straight course to eternal bliss, as it was for our fathers to give heed to this compass, which would point unto them a straight course to the promised land” (Alma 37:44).14
Nephi's Temple by Jody Livingston
Don Bradley has noted that the “Jerusalem temple was, in one sense, a house for the Ark of the Covenant.” With this in mind, he asked, “How could the Nephites keep the Law of Moses without access to the Ark of the Covenant? … Something, presumably something remarkable, would have to sit in the Ark’s place” in their own temple.5 It is not certain exactly where the Nephite relics were housed or how they were understood by their people. But the correlations between their treasured artifacts and those housed in the Israelite Ark of the Covenant are intriguing.16
Recognizing that the Liahona has parallels to each of the sacred items in the Israelite Ark helps explain why it was included among the sacred objects shown to the Three Witnesses.17 This divine artifact was revered among Nephite prophets and was kept and preserved as one of their most sacred national treasures.18 Its very existence helps establish the reality of the Lehite exodus from Jerusalem. And it meaningfully represents the Lord’s hand in leading a branch of Israel to a land of promise in the New World.
In explaining the reason for presenting the Nephite artifacts to the witnesses, the Lord declared, “And this you shall do that … I may bring about my righteous purposes unto the children of men in this work” (Doctrine and Covenants 17:4). The Liahona, in particular, has become a treasured symbol in our own gospel dispensation. It has been adopted as the name of one of the official LDS church magazines. And numerous conference talks have drawn from its symbolic lessons about giving heed to divine revelation.19 More than ever before, the historical reality and spiritual power of this divinely crafted object is helping strengthen testimonies and further the Lord’s work and purposes.
Don Bradley, “Piercing the Veil: Temple Worship in the Lost 116 Pages,” FairMormon presentation, 2012, online at fairmormon.org.
Robert E. Wells, “The Liahona Triad” in A Book of Mormon Treasury: Gospel Insights from General Authorities and Religious Educators (Salt Lake City and Provo, UT: Deseret Book and Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 2003), 80–96.
Hugh Nibley, “The Liahona’s Cousins,” Improvement Era, February 1961, 87–89, 104–110.
1. David Whitmer reported on several occasions that the Three Witnesses beheld this object with the other Nephite artifacts, just as was promised in Doctrine and Covenants 17:1–2. See History, circa June 1839–circa 1841 [Draft 2], p. 25, footnote 79, accessed December 1, 2017, online at josephsmithpapers.org.
2. For discussions of how the Liahona may have functioned, see Robert L. Bunker, “The Design of the Liahona and the Purpose of the Second Spindle,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 3, no. 2 (1994): 1–11; Robert F. Smith, “Lodestone and the Liahona,” in Reexploring the Book of Mormon: A Decade of New Research, ed. John W. Welch (Provo, UT: FARMS, 1992), 44–46; Alan Miner, The Liahona: Miracles by Small Means (Springville, UT: Cedar Fort, Inc., 2013).
3. For encyclopedic treatments of the Liahona, see Douglas Kent Ludlow, “Liahona,” Encyclopedia of Mormonism, 4 vols., ed. Daniel H. Ludlow (New York, NY: Macmillan, 1992), 2:829–830; Neal Elwood Lambert, “Liahona,” in Book of Mormon Reference Companion, ed. Dennis L. Largey (Provo, UT: Deseret Book, 2003), 519–520.
4. For a discussion of the etymology of Liahona, see “Liahona,” in Book of Mormon Onomasticon, ed. Paul Y. Hoskisson, online at onoma.lib.byu.edu; Jonathan Curci, “Liahona: ‘The Direction of the Lord’: An Etymological Explanation,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 16, no. 2 (2007): 60–67, 97–98.
5. a. b. See Don Bradley, “Piercing the Veil: Temple Worship in the Lost 116 Pages,” FairMormon presentation, 2012, online at fairmormon.org. See also, Gordon C. Thomasson, “Mosiah: The Complex Symbolism and Symbolic Complex of Kingship in the Book of Mormon,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 2, no. 1 (1993): 28–32.
6. It’s unclear exactly how this verse should be reconciled with 1 Kings 8:9, which declares that nothing was in the Ark except for the stone tablets. It’s possible that by Solomon’s time, Aaron’s rod and the jar of manna had been removed. It’s also possible that the rod and the manna were never strictly in the Ark, but were placed somewhere close by. There may even have been opposing traditions about what was contained in the Ark. In any case, other scriptures make it clear that the rod and the manna were definitely associated with the stone tablets and their resting place inside the holy of holies (Exodus 16:33–34; Numbers 17:10).
7. Although “small round thing” in the KJV is an inaccurate translation from the Hebrew, it happens to be an accurate description, for we are also told that the manna looked like coriander seeds (Exodus 16:31), which are known for their distinctive round shape. For instance, the ancient Jewish text Yoma 75a, explained, “The manna … is not compared to coriander seed except for its roundness.”
8. See Bradley, “Piercing the Veil,” online at fairmormon.org.
9. For a discussion of murmuring and the Liahona, see Hugh W. Nibley, “The Liahona and Murmurings in the Wilderness,” in Teachings of the Book of Mormon, 4 vols. (Provo, Utah: FARMS, 1993), 1:208–224.
10. See Exodus 16:3, 11–15; 1 Nephi 16:18–20, 35, 39. See also, Alan Goff, “Mourning, Consolation, and Repentance at Nahom,” in Rediscovering the Book of Mormon: Insights You May Have Missed Before, ed. John L. Sorenson and Melvin J. Thorne (Salt Lake City and Provo, UT: Deseret Book and FARMS, 1991), 92–99.
11. See Bradley, “Piercing the Veil,” online at fairmormon.org.
12. See Numbers 17:2–3; 1 Nephi 16:29.
13. See Hugh Nibley, “The Liahona’s Cousins,” Improvement Era, February 1961, 87–89, 104–110; Hugh Nibley, “The Arrow, the Hunter, and the State,” in The Ancient State, The Collected Works of Hugh Nibley, Volume 10 (Salt Lake City and Provo, UT: Deseret Book and FARMS, 1991), 1–32. For a different treatment of divination practices in the Bible and the Book of Mormon, see Amanda Colleen Brown, “Out of the Dust: An Examination of Necromancy as a Literary Construct in the Book of Mormon,” Studia Antiqua 14, no. 2 (2016): 27–37.
14. Emphasis added. See also, W. Rolfe Kerr, “The Words of Christ—Our Spiritual Liahona,” Ensign, May 2004, online at lds.org.
16. For correlations between the sword of Laban, Urim and Thummim, breastplate, and the plates themselves, see Bradley, “Piercing the Veil,” online at fairmormon.org.
17. In both ancient and modern times, witnesses have been used to help establish the truth of important facts in legal proceedings. Israelite law, for example, establishes the need for two or three witnesses in trial situations (Deuteronomy 19:15). For more on the need for witnesses, see John W. Welch, “Doubled, Sealed, Witnessed Documents: From the Ancient World to the Book of Mormon,” in Mormons, Scripture, and the Ancient World: Studies in Honor of John L. Sorenson, ed. Davis Bitton (Provo, UT: FARMS, 1998), 391–444.
18. For instance, see Mosiah 1:16; Alma 37:38–46.
19. One helpful resource for identifying how the Liahona has been discussed in general conference talks is the LDS Scripture Citation Index found at scriptures.byu.edu. See also, Robert E. Wells, “The Liahona Triad” in A Book of Mormon Treasury: Gospel Insights from General Authorities and Religious Educators (Salt Lake City and Provo, UT: Deseret Book and Religious Studies Center, Brigham Young University, 2003), 80–96.
Solomon's Temple
Nephite Temple
Three Witnesses
Did the Book of Mormon Witnesses Really See What They Claimed?
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Jon Bon Jovi Slams Kardashians and Reality TV
Ethan Miller / Nicholas Hunt, Getty Images
Count Jon Bon Jovi among those who have no use for reality television shows like the Real Housewives and Kardashians franchises.
In a new interview, the Bon Jovi frontman slammed celebrities who've become rich and famous just for being rich and famous. “I think it’s horrific that we live in that world, and I can tell you I’ve never given 60 seconds of my life, ever, to one of those Housewives of Blah Blah and Kardashians,” he said on The Sunday Project (via Yahoo!).
He took particular exception to Kim Kardashian, who first entered public consciousness in 2007 when a sex tape she made with rapper Ray J was leaked. She has since managed to leverage her brand into a lucrative career across several industries. “What’s gonna be in your autobiography? 'I made a porno, and guess what? I got famous,'" he said. ”Fuck, sorry, I’ll pass!”
Bon Jovi instead reserved his respect for those who earn their fame as a result of creative endeavors. “Go and write a book, paint a painting, act, study, sing" or write a play, he said. "Fame is a byproduct of writing a good song.”
The article points out that Bon Jovi attempted to enter the world of reality TV in 2015 as the executive producer of a show called If I Wasn't a Rock Star. The concept involved musicians returning to their hometowns to spend time working at local jobs. The project, which was co-produced by the Weinstein Company, never aired.
Bon Jovi Albums Ranked
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Source: Jon Bon Jovi Slams Kardashians and Reality TV
Filed Under: Jon Bon Jovi
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Sociology of Work in Japan
This page intentionally left blank A Sociology of Work in Japan What shapes the decisions of employees to work in Japan? The authors of this comprehensive and up-to-date survey of the relationship between work and society in Japan argue that individual decisions about work can only be understood by considering the larger social context. Many factors combine to affect such choices, including the structuring of labor markets, social policy at the national and meso level and, of course, global in? uences, which have come increasingly to impinge on the organization of work and life generally.
The analysis asks why the Japanese work such long hours, and why they are so committed to their ? rms, if this is indeed the case. By considering labor markets, social policy, and relationships between labor and management, the book offers penetrating insights into contemporary Japanese society and glimpses of what might happen in the future. Underlying the discussion is a challenge to the celebration of Japanese management practices which has dominated the literature for the last three decades.
This is an important and groundbreaking book for students of sociology and economics. ?? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? is Professor of Japanese Studies in the School of Languages, Cultures and Linguistics at Monash University. His publications include Images of Japanese Society: A Study in the Construction of Social Reality (1986). ? ??? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?? ? ? ? ? is Professor of Sociology at Waseda University, Tokyo. He is the author and editor of many books including Enterprise Unionism in Japan (1991) and The Human Face of Industrial Con? ict in Post-war Japan (1999).
Contemporary Japanese Society Editor: Yoshio Sugimoto, La Trobe University Advisory Editors: Harumi Befu, Stanford University Roger Goodman, Oxford University Michio Muramatsu, Kyoto University Wolfgang Seifert, Universit? t Heidelberg a Chizuko Ueno, University of Tokyo Contemporary Japanese Society provides a comprehensive portrayal of modern Japan through the analysis of key aspects of Japanese society and culture, ranging from work and gender politics to science and technology. The series offers a balanced yet interpretive approach.
Books are designed for a wide range of readers, from undergraduate beginners in Japanese studies to scholars and professionals. D. P. Martinez (ed. ) The Worlds of Japanese Popular Culture 0 521 63128 9 hardback 0 521 63729 5 paperback Kaori Okano and Motonori Tsuchiya Education in Contemporary Japan: Inequality and Diversity 0 521 62252 2 hardback 0 521 62686 2 paperback Morris Low, Shigeru Nakayama and Hitoshi Yoshioka Science, Technology and Society in Contemporary Japan 0 521 65282 0 hardback 0 521 65425 4 paperback Roger Goodman (ed. Family and Social Policy in Japan: Anthropological Approaches 0 521 81571 1 hardback 0 521 01635 5 paperback Yoshio Sugimoto An Introduction to Japanese Society (2nd edn) 0 521 82193 2 hardback 0 521 52925 5 paperback Vera Mackie Feminism in Modern Japan: Citizenship, Embodiment and Sexuality 0 521 82018 9 hardback 0 521 52719 8 paperback Nanette Gottlieb Language and Society in Japan 0 521 82577 6 hardback 0 521 53284 1 paperback A Sociology of Work in Japan
Ross Mouer Monash University and Kawanishi Hirosuke Waseda University cambridge university press Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, Sao Paulo Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge cb2 2ru, UK Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www. cambridge. org Information on this title: www. cambridge. org/9780521651202 © Ross Mouer and Kawanishi Hirosuke 2005 This book is in copyright.
Subject to statutory exception and to the provision of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published in print format 2005 isbn-13 isbn-10 isbn-13 isbn-10 isbn-13 isbn-10 978-0-511-11097-9 eBook (EBL) 0-511-11097-9 eBook (EBL) 978-0-521-65120-2 hardback 0-521-65120-4 hardback 978-0-521-65845-4 paperback 0-521-65845-4 paperback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of urls for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Contents List of ? gures List of tables Preface Note on transliteration, romanization, and translation List of abbreviations Part I: A context for studying work page vii viii xi xvii xx The Japanese at work 2 Toward a sociology of work in Postwar Japan 3 Competing models for understanding work in Japan Part II: The commitment to being at work 4 Hours of work, labor-force participation and the work ethic Part III: Processing labor through Japan’s labor markets 5 Change and challenge in the labor market 6 Segmentation of the labor market Part IV: The broader social policy context for understanding choice at work in Japan 7 From labor policy to social policy: a framework for understanding labor process in Japan at the national level 8 Social security and safety nets 24 51 69 97 117 145 178 v vi Contents Part V: The power relations shaping the organization of work in Japan 9 The state of the union movement in Japan 10 Management organizations and the interests of employers Part VI: The future 253 264 296 300 199 229 11 The future of work in Japan References Author index General index Figures 5. 1 The structuring of the labor market in Japan, entry into its segments and paths for downward mobility (circa 1990) page 98 5. 2 Strategies used by ? ms to reduce labor costs by the severity of the recession and the number of employees needing to be retrenched 108 6. 1 The segmented labor force in Japan’s large ? rms 137 6. 2 The emerging labor market in Japan (circa 2000) 138 9. 1 The three tiers of organized labor in Japan 205 9. 2 A genealogy of the postwar labor movement in Japan 206 9. 3 The structuring of the union movement with competing enterprise unions 212 vii Tables 2. 1 4. 1 4. 2 4. 3 4. 4 4. 5 4. 6 4. 4. 8 4. 9 4. 10 4. 11 4. 12 4. 13 4. 14 5. 1 5. 2 Approaches to understanding labor processes and the organization of work in Japan page 26 International comparison of weekly hours of work for production workers in manufacturing 71 Annual hours of work in twelve countries: 1988–99 72 International groupings by annual hours of work 73 Hours of work based on the NHK surveys on the uses of time in Japan, 1990 and 2000 74 The implementation of the two-day weekend by ? m size, 1994 77 Monthly standard hours of work, overtime, and total hours of work in Japan, 1960–2001 78 Total annual hours of work and the percentage worked as overtime by ? rm size, 1960–2000 80 Bonus payments as a multiple of monthly salaries in non-agricultural industries excluding services, 1955–2000 81 The average number of hours spent commuting, 1990 83 Percentage distribution of the labor force by commuting time in twelve countries, 1988 84 International comparison of working days lost to industrial disputes in the early 1990s 86 The accrual and use of annual leave, 2001 87 Comparative ? ures on labor-force participation for six countries in the early 1990s 90 Real difference in hours of work per person in the population, circa 1992–3 92 Labor-force participation for males and females in Japan, 1955–2000 101 Male and female labor-force participation rates by age group, 1990 and 2001 102 viii List of tables ix 5. 3 Percentage of ? rms using different means of reducing their labor costs in four countries in the late 1990s 5. 4 The effects of introducing a variable workweek scheme on wage costs: some hypothetical cases 5. 5 Change in the percentage of ? ms using a variable workweek scheme, 1989–2000 6. 1 The percentage distribution of private sector employees by employment status, 1992 and 1997 6. 2 Growth in the number of non-regular employees in the non-agricultural private sector by ? rm size, 1996 and 2000 6. 3 The distribution of establishments and the number of employees by ? rm size, 1978, 1986, and 1999 6. 4 Variation in working conditions by ? rm size in 2001 6. 5 Variation in working environment by ? rm size in 2000 6. 6 The number of furiitaa in August 2000 6. 7 Percentage of students who become employed upon graduation, 1996–2000 6. 8 Percentage of ? ms reaching informal agreements to hire March 2001 graduates before they graduated 7. 1 Japan’s postwar labor legislation 7. 2 Legislation and conventions affecting the formulation of labor law in Japan 7. 3 Percentage of national income spent on social welfare in six nations (circa the mid-1990s) 7. 4 Percentage breakdown for labor costs and the amounts spent on non-wage welfare bene? ts by private ? rms in Japan, 1975–98 7. 5 A comparison of the effect of eight variables on the distribution of income in Japan and the United States circa the mid-1980s 7. 6 The percentage of students receiving private education 7. Percentage of employees by industrial sector, 1960–2000 7. 8 Minimum days of annual leave set by Article 39 of the Labor Standards Law 8. 1 Minimum wage rates set for Tokyo (at 1 January 2001) 8. 2 Number of days for which bene? ts are available for the unemployed (at 1 January 2001) 8. 3 The number and percentage of employees covered by unemployment insurance and the percentage of insured employees who receive bene? ts, 1970–2000 109 112 115 118 119 119 120 122 124 128 129 149 151 156 158 163 168 171 175 182 183 184 x List of tables 8. 4 Changes in the number of households and individuals receiving basic livelihood assistance, 1970–2000 8. The ratio of subscribers to bene? ciaries for the National Pensions Basic Fund, 1993–9 8. 6 The bene? ts paid from the National Pensions Basic Fund to those in Insured Groups I, II, and III, 1999 8. 7 An overview of the major medical insurance schemes in Japan, March 2000 8. 8 Percentage of national income paid out by medical insurance funds as bene? ts and the percentage of the population aged over 65, 1955–99 9. 1 Long-term trends in the unionization rates in Japan, 1946–2001 9. 2 A comparison of unionization rates in four countries, 1985–2000 9. 3 The national centers and their major industrial af? liates, 1970 9. Union members af? liated to each national center, 1998–2000 9. 5 Percentage of unions attaching importance to different matters raised by management in the course of their ? rm’s restructuring, 2000 9. 6 Unionization rate by ? rm size 9. 7 Percentage of unions having an in? uence on restructuring in their ? rm, 2000 9. 8 Distribution of unions by membership size, 2000 10. 1 References to unions and management associations in the index to Takanashi Akira’s Shunto Wage Offensive 10. 2 Major enterprise groupings in Japan in 1995 10. 3 An overview of ? ve major employers’ federations, 1950–2003 10. 4 Distribution of ? rms in Japan by ? m size, July 1999 185 188 190 192 193 201 203 207 210 213 213 218 219 230 234 238 241 Preface This project began nearly ten years ago. At that time a huge literature existed in English on Japanese-style management. Most of it was favorably disposed to what was seen as being an approach to human relations and personnel management that had gone beyond the division of labor and regimentation associated with the Fordist paradigm. In particular there was an interest in how Japanese-style management had produced a highly motivated work force with an exceptionally strong work ethic and commitment to the ? rm and its goals.
To get a better idea of the extent to which work was carried out autonomously in Japan, we felt it would be useful to shift attention from the cultural or ideational domain to the structuring of work choices at both levels, paying special attention to the consequences of not working “hard” for long hours. To provide a better understanding of the work ethic and the reasons for the long hours of work registered in Japan, we felt it was necessary ? rst to set ? rm-level arrangements and choices about work in the context of the larger social parameters: the way external labor markets were structured, the overall mosaic of strati? ation and the provision of various kinds of social services, and the power relations between the labor movement and management at the national level. In our view these were the major structures which limited choice with regard to work at the ? rm level. In our minds was the anecdote of the Japanese researcher who had traveled to Australia to investigate the country’s unemployment insurance scheme in the early 1990s just as the unemployment rate in Japan was climbing to over 3 percent for the ? rst time in nearly forty years. It soon became obvious that the researcher was looking for ways to tighten the system in Japan.
His assumption was that tougher treatment of the unemployed would motivate them to resume work at a quicker pace. The assumption was perhaps reasonable, as Australia itself had had very low rates of employment until the early 1970s, and had then engaged in a discourse which referred to the unemployed as “dole bludgers” as the unemployment rate rose. xi xii Preface When he asked about the length of time for which unemployment bene? ts could be received, which at the time was only six months in Japan, he was greatly surprised to ? nd that there was no time limit on receiving the bene? ts in Australia.
Having ascertained that he was indeed being informed about the dole and not pensions or ongoing compensation for an incapacity owing to a work-related accident, he scratched his head and concluded that the work ethic in Australia was actually quite strong if roughly 90 percent of the labor force was still willing to work “voluntarily” without the compulsion of starving, whereas 3 percent of Japanese (or even more, considering disguised unemployment) chose not to work even with a very strong ? nancial inducement to do so (i. e. to work or to starve after six months). This incident con? med in our minds the need to tie ideas about why employees work as they do to broader structures limiting the conditions of possibility which confront each worker as he or she wrestles with several discourses about work in order to make decisions about where, when, and how hard to work. Over the intervening years a number of correctives to the Japanese model began to emerge. As a result, many observers of Japanese-style management came to appreciate that, for whatever post-Fordist elements there might be, there were also ultra-Fordist features as well. More attention also came to be paid to the nature of the tiered subcontracting which was entral to the functioning of just-in-time schemes and rested on a disaggregation or Balkanization of the labor market. Those inter-? rm relationships injected into the organization of work another set of power relationships external to the ? rm. There was a growing appreciation that a large proportion of the labor force worked outside the large-? rm sector in which the features commonly associated with the Japanese model were normally found. Rather than absorbing the casuals, part-timers, and subcontracted workers over time, it became clear that the large ? ms actually existed in a symbiotic relationship with them, dependent upon their very existence. A literature also emerged on attempts to implement Japanese-style management abroad, and other structural features began to be highlighted in terms of the considerable extent to which members of the core work force were regimented within the model companies themselves. While some writers attributed any friction which emerged to differences in cultural orientations, commenting that a managerial style suited for a conformist- or consensualist-oriented society would have dif? ulty in many of the more individualistically inclined societies of the West, the structural features designed to discipline the labor force still loomed large. From a slightly different perspective, the situation of working women had also become a popular topic for foreign researchers, and much of the English-language literature which resulted from this pointed to the Preface xiii structural weaknesses of Japan’s 1986 Equal Employment Opportunity Law, which lacked the teeth to force change.
In Japan itself attention was being given to the problem of karoshi and to the reasons employees felt compelled to overwork. With that there was a much broader concern with work patterns associated with the model which severely limited the opportunities for some of Japan’s best-educated and dynamic male employees to be with their families and to take a greater interest in community affairs. While valid, these critiques did not seem to present an integrated overview of the larger structural context in which workers made choices about work. Many of the ritiques were set within a normative framework, albeit in critical terms which have no doubt served to nurture the belief that Japan needed to change. Few dealt with the changing power relations that shaped the structural context. Much of the change occurring in Japan was put down to the inevitability of universal forces or global patterns emerging elsewhere and explained in terms of how Japanese culture was “catching up. ” It seemed to be taken for granted that the collapse of Japan’s union movement, especially in terms of its commitment to leftist political goals, was a logical outcome of having new levels of af? ence. If there was a structured element, it was in the collapse of socialist regimes that heralded the end of the cold war (even while the Japan Communist Party continued to receive a healthy 10 percent of the popular vote at national elections). Many descriptions of work in Japan came to be characterized by a set of assumptions bound up in the view that the end of history as we knew it was now in sight in terms of the tensions produced by ideological and cultural differences.
The original idea for this volume was to present an alternative account which explained Japanese-style management not in terms of any uniqueness in cultural or ideological terms, but as a means of expropriating surplus within a speci? c superstructural framework that severely limited the choices available to workers and potential workers at the macro level. During the 1990s Japan drifted into a prolonged recession with rising unemployment and a growing awareness that the world outside was changing, as other nations were rapidly moving to ? d niches in the newly emerging global economy. In considering those changes, it seemed to us that a new superstructure was emerging which would increasingly shape the way work is organized in Japan. There was an awareness that the recession of the union movement was not unique to Japan. The aging of the population, the impact of Japan’s af? uence on the attitudes of its young people to work, the widening gap in the distribution of income, and many other changes in Japanese society could also be seen as universal phenomena.
Successive ? nancial scandals invited comparisons with xiv Preface the situation in other similarly developed societies. At the same time, out of those comparisons emerged a sense that international standards were coming increasingly to in? uence the way societies organized their economic, political, and social affairs (and, ultimately, their very cultures). Moreover, the north–south issues and Japanese investment overseas underlined ways in which the world is strati? ed and structured in terms of the global economy.
Given the above perspective, it became apparent to us that a full understanding of work in Japan would need to consider the labor process at three levels: the way work was organized in individual ? rms, the way societies were structured to allocate work through more broadly based labor markets, and the way the international division of labor was decided. The growing prominence of the extra-territorial factors has caused us to think of the global as a new world order that is now the macro level.
To better articulate that way of sorting through our thoughts about work in Japan, we have come to use the term “meso level” when referring to structures, ideas, and events at the societal (particularly the national) level. In considering the dynamics which result in decisions being made about the organization of work at each of these three levels, it seemed to us that the key variables relate to inequality of one type or another. The forces for change and those for the status quo can be found in the collectivities that have come to be organized in reference to those inequalities.
The inequalities are most commonly de? ned by gender, occupation, organizational size, age, educational background, and spatial location. The role of these factors in accounting for inequalities will be obvious to most readers. Widened beyond a certain point, inequalities reveal objective contradictions. It is the awareness of those contradictions that produces tensions and creates pressure for change. In other words, it is the subjective assessment of those involved in working and in organizing work that is critical. In the past, unions have played a central role in in? encing how workers felt about the objective inequalities which bounded their lives, and much of the employment relationship revolved around the attempts of labor and management to in? uence the way workers perceived the importance of those inequalities in their lives, the choices they had in managing inequality, and the tradeoffs that arose when inequality was multidimensional. Over time, other forces also came into play as the standard of living rose, and these seem to have become noticeably more conspicuous as Japan moved through the 1980s and 1990s.
The assessment of inequality is also tempered by an assessment of its relative importance in terms of the overall level of rewards received in the relevant society. Hence, a commonly heard argument from those seeking to justify having some measure of inequality is that it is better to be poor Preface xv in a rich society than to be in the middle of a poor society. This view is often presented by those at the top of wealthy societies, and goes against the notions of mateship, comradeship, and to each according to his or her needs.
Once a view has crystallized about the dimensions of inequality and its overall importance in the larger scheme of things, the decision to act will be based on an assessment of the likely chances that change will occur and the likely sanctions that will be imposed should the push for change fail. Here the role of the state is central. Our search for the meaning of work in Japan is set in this context of objective inequalities, visions of inequality and the realities of power. This volume seeks to examine how these three elements interact at the meso level.
One of our working hypotheses is that individuals have already made an assessment of their chances and opportunities in the larger society before entering the world of work in a particular ? rm, and that a good deal of their behavior in the ? rm will result from decisions signi? cantly shaped by that world view. This is a hypothesis we cannot test here, but the volume is written in part as a preparation for making such a test. While the media, increased travel, better education, the internet, and aspects of global consumption (e. g. nternational advertising) have served increasingly to draw individuals to the global level and have opened up opportunities to know more about the international division of labor and associated inequalities, and about local phenomena which are universal, it is our feeling that the minds of workers have been imprinted from that vantage point, but not yet to the extent that those impressions outweigh their impressions of the world from the meso level in shaping their assessment of the meso- or micro-level realities. This is another hypothesis to be tested, but not in this volume.
The major aim in writing this book was to draw a picture of the terrain on which work is organized at the meso level in Japan. There seems to be a general recognition that the old paradigms for organizing work in Japanese ? rms no longer hold. As the Japanese struggle to ? nd ways to reinvigorate their economy, there is an active search for a model to replace that currently used for organizing work. There is a common recognition that the Japanese model – with all its structural features, as an important component of the Japanese economy (indeed, of Japanese society) – contributed immensely to the economic achievements of the 1960s and 1970s.
The energy focused in accomplishing those achievements carried Japan forward to an economic apex during the “bubble years” of the late 1980s and early 1990s, when huge balance-of-payments surpluses were recorded and unrealistically high levels of lending occurred to ? nance further growth and non-growth projects alike. There is now a serious xvi Preface realization, however, that a replacement model is needed as one of the cornerstones, if not the keystone, in the building of a new Japanese economy. A study of the dynamics shaping labor process at the meso level will go some way toward highlighting the parameters likely to de? e the paradigm which emerges for work in Japan. In trying to assess the way work is organized at the meso level we have sought to tell a story about how various objective facts relate to the way employees might see the world in subjective terms. We have tried to utilize a wide range of material, including academic opinion and some reference to scholarly research ? ndings, government statistics, popular views in the media, and expositions in some of the popular encyclopedias. In the end we wanted a volume that would communicate not only to readers across several societies (i. e. n English-reading audience and a Japanese-reading audience), but also to those working at different levels in either society. Only time will tell whether we have been successful in doing this. Note on transliteration, romanization, and translation A large number of Japanese terms are introduced in this volume. Several considerations have led us to their introduction. One is to overcome the tendency to think in terms of universals. The introduction of the terms, usually in parentheses following an English explanation, serves to remind us that many of the concepts used in writing about work in Japan have cultural emic dimensions (i. . a set of connotations peculiar to the Japanese setting). The word rodo kumiai, for example, refers to an organization for and by workers in a generic or etic sense. However, when the term is used in Japan, its connotations for most Japanese suggest a particular approach to union organization, trends in unionization rates, a history of ideological struggle between left-wing and right-wing groups, an association with a broad range of citizens’ movements, and a speci? c approach to organization at both the national level and the grassroots level.
The term is also used to refer to a range of other self-help or mutual-help organizations, including credit unions and agricultural, consumer, or insurance cooperatives. Japanese terms are liberally inserted as a subtle reminder that there are real differences in meaning between the Japanese and English terms and the context in which people in different societies talk about similar matters. A second reason for using Japanese terms is to facilitate communication by supplying readers with a basic list of key words that will immediately be recognized by the Japanese with whom they may wish to discuss issues raised in this volume.
Consequently, references to “labor union” (rodo kumiai) serve to indicate that we use the term “labor union” as a rough equivalent for what we are really writing about (i. e. , Japanese rodo kumiai). Conversely, reference to “rodo kumiai” (labor union) is made to indicate that the rodo kumiai we are writing about are fairly similar to “labor unions” in English. As is common practice, all foreign words, including the large number of Japanese words introduced in this text, are italicized. The exceptions include proper nouns and of? cial titles. The personal names of Japanese are given in the Japanese order, with the surname ? st. Exceptions are xvii xviii Transliteration, romanization, and translation made for Japanese who live and work abroad and are generally known abroad by their given name followed by the surname. There are obviously cases in the gray area; an increasing number of Japanese move back and forth or have signi? cant careers abroad before returning home to Japan. The decision in such cases can only be arbitrary. Japanese words have been romanized in the Standard or Hepburn style. However, the macron or elongation mark has been omitted in transcribing long vowels for ordinary Japanese words.
This is in line with common practice as noted by Neustupny (1991: 8), who suggests it is always inserted “in texts addressed to specialized Japanese studies audiences” but generally omitted from “more popular writings” for a broader audience. While purists in the use of the Japanese language might object, several considerations led to this decision. First, in percentage terms, a brief count of Japanese words mentioned in the text suggested that fewer than 10 percent had elongated vowels, and of those few were words where confusion would occur.
An example of such confusion might be the name “Ohashi,” which could consist of either the two characters meaning “big bridge” or the two characters meaning “little bridge. ” However, our feeling was that the majority of readers would be reading in English only and not reading the references. Second, dictionaries such as Kenkyusha’s list words in romanized script so that all words which differ only in terms of the short and elongated vowel are listed together, and the choice of the right term is easy given the context, and the fact that an English translation is supplied in most cases.
In recent years the Japanese have absorbed a large number of foreign words which are sometimes more dif? cult to decode or to look up than native Japanese words. The origin of such words is denoted in Japanese by writing them in a designated script, katakana. For those words, we have indicated the elongated sound by repeating the double vowel in the roman script. Thus, the publication Shukan Rodo Nyuusu is the “Weekly News on Work. ” In trialing this approach with a small sample of postgraduate students, who were asked to transcribe back into English from romanized
Japanese, it was found that the error rate in transcription was negligible. The experiment suggested that personal names were more dif? cult than ordinary words to transcribe back into Japanese, and that more errors occurred in transcribing items in the list of references than in the text. However, the purpose of the list is to allow readers to locate cited sources, and there are a number of ways to do that even with partial information (e. g. by looking up the title of the publication rather than the author’s name), and again the demerits of omitting the elongation mark seemed small.
In this regard, an effort was made to provide a list of references that was as detailed as possible. Transliteration, romanization, and translation xix This work has included small amounts of translation, mostly from the Japanese-language titles in the list of references for which both the romanized Japanese and an English translation are provided. Titles are short and tend to invite a direct translation. Because the direct translation is somewhat awkward or misleading in English when taken out of context, some liberty has been taken to provide a translation which best matches the overall thrust of each speci? item. In translating longer passages, a number of arbitrary interpretive and stylistic decisions were made. These kinds of decisions rest on assumptions about the function the translation is to perform in the telling of the story. Which version is most appropriate can only be left to the reader’s broader judgments about the story itself – judgments that are likely to vary from reader to reader. We can only ask for the reader’s patience, tolerance, and understanding in this matter, and welcome all critical comments so that a better job of storytelling can be done next time.
Abbreviations ASC CPI GHQ ILO JCP LDP LSL MITI MNE MSC MWL NGO NKSC NPO QC SRN WHO WTO YSC Asahi Shimbun (morning edition of a national daily newspaper) Consumer Price Index General Headquarters (of the Allied occupation of Japan) International Labor Organization Japan Communist Party Liberal Democratic Party Labor Standards Law Ministry of International Trade and Industry multinational enterprise Mainichi Shimbun (morning edition of a national daily newspaper) Minimum Wage Law non-government organization Nihon Keizai Shimbun (morning edition of the nation’s leading ? ancial daily) non-pro? t organization quality control Shukan Rodo Nyuusu (a weekly newspaper) World Health Organization World Trade Organization Yomiuri Shimbun (morning edition of a national daily newspaper) xx Part I A context for studying work 1 The Japanese at work 1. 1 Japanese-style management and the interest in Japanese at work Over the last twenty years, a huge literature has emerged about work in Japan. The interest in Japan has followed that country’s success as a national economy.
Although economists had been aware of Japan’s steady rise to economic prominence over the hundred years following the Meiji Restoration in 1868, from around 1970 Japan’s large balanceof-payments surpluses drew wider attention to “the Japanese miracle. ” A number of books appeared to suggest that Japan had overnight become a new economic superstate that would challenge or even threaten Western economic supremacy. Their titles were often couched in ethnocentric terms that connoted not only warnings, but also condescending surprise, that a non-Western nation so severely beaten in 1945 could achieve so much within twenty-? ve years.
To explain Japan’s sudden emergence as an economic superstate, many writers, including the futurologist Herman Kahn (1970), attached great importance to the Japanese mindset. They alleged that cultural remnants or feudalistic values – such as group loyalty, a motivation to achieve based on duty and the fear of shame or losing face, and Confucian frugality – and a special sense of community or national consensus were the wellsprings of Japan’s economic success. Two underlying concerns marked much of that literature. One was a resentment of Japan’s success in selling manufactured goods in the markets of the advanced industrialized economies.
Many writers sought to assess the likelihood that Japan’s success would be shortlived and not result in a long-term “threat. ” This focus underscored a fear and often encouraged a belief that there was a need for protective measures to counter the Japanese invasion. The second concern arose from the ideological position taken in many Western countries during the cold war. In the West a high value had been placed on free trade and there was a very real rationalist interest in how Japanese goods had become so competitive in terms of price and quality. 4 A context for studying work This emphasis served to counter the ? rst concern and opened the door for the “Japan guru” and others associated with the “learn-from-Japan campaign” which emerged in the late 1970s. As Japanese exports continued to make inroads abroad, and Japan’s balance-of-payment surpluses ballooned in the 1980s, American and European managers began to visit Japan in large numbers to learn about quality control and bottom-up management techniques.
An early stimulus to the interest in Japanese-style management was Dore’s British Factory – Japanese Factory (1973). Taking the theory of late development as a starting point, Dore argued that Japan had leapfrogged ahead in the design of industrial relations systems because it had been able to circumnavigate many of the problems associated with earlier efforts to industrialize. He suggested that Japan had avoided the strong antagonistic class relations between workers and managers which had characterized the industrialization process in many Western societies.
Dore argued further that corporate welfarism had resolved many of the social justice issues in Japan. In 1979 Vogel published Japan as Number One, in which he too argued that Japan had actually moved ahead of the US and many European countries in a number of critical areas. He praised the Japanese approach to organizing work, the maintenance of high levels of cultural cohesion and social stability, the functioning of a highly effective bureaucracy, and the achievement of generally high levels of literacy.
By the early 1980s the “learn-from-Japan campaign” was in high gear. One book after another appeared which extolled Japanese approaches to maintaining law and order, to supplying high-quality education, to fostering meaningful social interaction, and to developing satisfying and productive industrial relations or management styles. It became fashionable for academic writers to conclude research reports on Japan with a chapter on lessons for others. The interest in learning from Japan was quite pronounced in the area of management.
Something about Japanese-style management was seen as accounting for high levels of productivity. The quality of Japanese products and the low level of industrial disputes were seen as evidence of the success of Japanese management, low levels of worker alienation, and a distinct work ethic. Ouchi’s Theory Z (1981) and Pascale and Athos’s The Art of Japanese Management (1981) were two of the earlier volumes seeking to explain Japanese-style management to English-speaking managers around the world. The 1980s saw an outpouring of volumes on all aspects of Japanese-style management.
Throughout this period Japan’s experience became a major point of reference for many who were writing about management and global capitalism. Writers such as Thurow (1983, 1992 and 1996) and Drucker (1993) typify this interest in Japan. The Japanese at work 5 By the late 1980s many observers, such as Kenny and Florida (1993), were proclaiming that Japan had developed a truly post-Fordist or postmodern approach to organizing work. Much of the literature on Japanese management assumed that the Japanese worker’s commitment to work and to his place of work had been integral to the superior performance of the Japanese economy.
That commitment was seen as overriding the adverse conditions which many workers had to put up with, including long hours and excessive regimentation. It was commonly argued that Japanese management had worked with and fostered a cultural paradigm that was quite different from the one found in most Western countries. The assumption was that Japanese culture resulted in workers and managers sharing similar values, which underpinned Japanese work practices and an unusually strong commitment to doing work. The conclusion was often that Western managers needed to alter their managerial style.
The corollary was that a kind of cultural revolution was required in many Western societies so that antagonistic class relations formed during earlier stages of industrialization would give way to more cooperative relations at work and in society at large. 1. 2 Reassessing Japanese-style management Given the general enthusiasm for Japanese-style management, linked to the functional requisites for high productivity, other aspects of work organization have tended to be pushed aside. This was especially true outside Japan.
North American scholarship had traditionally veered away from Marxist themes. As the cold war progressed, traditional perspectives on industrial relations which emphasized con? ict and its resolution through power relations tended to give way to optimistic assessments concerning the manageability of human resources and the ability of progressive management to preempt con? ict. Countering that predilection, Kassalow (1983) argued that Japan’s approach to industrial relations would not be a serious model for organizing work elsewhere unless three conditions were met. The ? st was that the system produced high levels of national economic competitiveness. Second was that all the stakeholders in Japan agreed the model was a satisfactory way of organizing work. Third was that members of the society generating the model desired to export it. The second and third conditions have been least satis? ed and require close examination. As for consensus, conservative governments and employers’ associations have since the early 1950s attacked left-wing unionism and the Marxist-inspired scholarship associated with it. Two successive 6 A context for studying work oil shocks” in the 1970s fostered a renewed seriousness about national economic competitiveness and discipline at work. As socialist regimes abroad increasingly came to confront various contradictions in the 1980s, conservatives made headway and seemingly emerged victorious by the end of the 1980s, by which time militant left-wing unionism had also lost out in the uni? cation of the labor movement. As the bubble years of the 1980s gave way to a new consumerism, dissident scholarship relevant to the understanding of work in Japan ebbed, and the interest in critiques of work organization in Japan waned.
This gave the impression that consensus had been achieved and that the second condition seemed to have been met. However, after Japan’s economic bubble burst in the early 1990s, thirty-? ve years of conservative rule came to an end. In the 1990s successive ? nancial crises, the frequent turnover of national governments, rising unemployment, multicultural pressures, and the incursion of foreign-made goods underlined the need for a fundamental questioning of the work-related institutions previously seen as the wellspring of Japan’s postwar economic success.
Many Japanese began to face a certain dilemma: three decades of hard work and Japan’s very high per capita incomes had not produced a commensurately high standard of living. This led to questions about how hard to work and the even more basic question: how wealthy is wealthy enough? By the 1990s many Japanese were feeling a great national tiredness and frustration in not knowing how to convert the nation’s economic prowess into a better quality of life. There was a growing awareness that mammoth changes were required to alter a system that had been geared to putting production ? rst.
As Shimada (1995) put it, there were problems in having a system which produces more than can be consumed: Japan’s huge balance-of-payments surpluses were symptomatic of serious economic anorexia. Japan’s economy had come to be structured in ways that made it dif? cult for ordinary Japanese to enjoy the wealth it generated. It was an economy built on lean production. Such an economy, Shimada argued, had serious health problems. Re? ecting on this systemic problem, Sato (1993) wrote about Japan’s new spiritual refugees who were migrating to Australia to escape the Japanese system.
These Japanese differed from the economic emigrants who left Japan at the beginning of the twentieth century. At issue was the dysfunctioning of the Japanese system as a whole. For such Japanese the high material standard of living was offset by high levels of stress. This perspective is presented in the recent writings of Kumazawa (1996 and 1997) and by those who write about karoshi (death from overwork). Those writing about these aspects would argue that Kassalow’s consensus was The Japanese at work 7 to be found more in the form of an awkward silence than in a resounding cheer for the bene? s of Japanese-style management. Overseas, Japanese ? rms came to be known for their hostility to unionism, for their failure to incorporate local managers, women or the aged into the upper realms of management, for a lack of seriousness in dealing with certain social issues such as sexual harassment, for implementing just-in-time systems that overly disciplined workers in a vast array of hierarchically aligned subcontractors, and for the tightness with which it withheld from the public information on in-house dealings and other socially relevant matters.
These considerations mark the extent to which of? cial and unof? cial interpretations diverge and the “labeling” by which certain ways of organizing work are presented to the public as “respectable” and others are not. Because the engineering of work organization inevitably involves social change, management in leading ? rms must constantly engage in public relations exercises to implement change. For this reason, a full analysis of work in Japan requires that attention be paid both to the manifest and to the latent ways in which work is organized.
As for the third of Kassalow’s conditions, Japanese management and the government have been equivocal about the transferability of Japanesestyle management. Prior to 1980 most of Japan’s investment overseas had been by small ? rms seeking to save on labor-intensive processes. From the late 1970s Japan’s large ? rms began in a concerted manner to manufacture abroad within tariff-protected or regulated areas and to counter mounting criticism of the negative effects their large-scale exports from Japan were having on other societies. For this reason there was sensitivity to local work practices.
However, as Japanese multinational enterprises (MNEs) became more con? dent in their own labor processes and more familiar with the foreign settings, many encouraged their leaner subcontractors to follow them abroad, and Japanese managers began to introduce some Japanese practices while leaving others at home. On the home front, partly as a result of direct pressure through the Structural Impediments Initiatives that came to be built into US–Japan bilateral relations in the late 1980s, many Japanese became more aware of the bene? ts of aligning practices in Japan with those found in other major economies.
Steps to deregulate the Japanese economy have also coincided with social changes in Japan over the past ten to ? fteen years. New developments in global capitalism have made the export of Japanesestyle management and Japanese-style industrial relations practices in toto less pertinent. Japanese who want to say no to Western demands are now much less likely to do so on cultural grounds or to invoke parochial notions of cultural relativism in order to justify the introduction of allegedly Japanese ways of managing. 8 A context for studying work
As the evidence on Japanese-style management overseas accumulated during the 1980s, Japanese management increasingly came under the scrutiny of local communities. In North America and Europe many have a greater appreciation of the social consequences of Japanese-style management. Japanese managers now seem less enthusiastic about implementing the Japanese approach to industrial relations abroad. Another factor undermining the con? dence of Japanese managers and depressing interest abroad in learning from the way work is organized in Japan has been the inability of the national economy to perform at levels achieved prior to 1990.
During the 1990s the Japanese model lost its edge in meeting Kassalow’s ? rst criterion. 1. 3 A general perspective on postmodernism and the organization of work: post-Fordist or ultra-Fordist? The Japanese experience poses some hard questions about the nature of work. Four decades of rapid economic growth from the 1950s took Japan far beyond industrialization. In the late 1980s it was commonly argued that in becoming post-industrial Japanese society had also gone beyond modernization and the processes of rationalization which led to standardization, not just in work processes but also in life processes more generally.
With the emergence of a national labor market and mass society, many came to the view that 90 percent of the Japanese identi? ed with some amorphous “middle class. ” Nevertheless, although one can point to standardization in the education system, in the mass media, in the language, and in the rhythm of commuting, serious questions remain concerning the homogeneity of the Japanese in terms of a shared consciousness or ethos at work. These doubts were systematically detailed by Mouer and Sugimoto (1986).
During the late 1980s and early 1990s debate focused on whether Japanese-style management actually represented a new post-Fordist system of production or was only a logical extension of the Fordist production system. Various contributions to that debate were later brought together in a volume edited by Kato and Steven (1993). 1. 3. 1 The dilemma of modernity Modernization challenged social theorists with its emphasis on choice and liberation. Some time ago, Apter (1966) wrote that the essence of being modern lies in the willingness and the ability to make strategic choices.
The dilemma of choice was especially apparent in societies that The Japanese at work 9 came late to industrialization and required disciplined efforts to “catch up. ” For them modernization became an exercise in the mobilization of entire populations to ward off outside control. This produced a tension between (i) the ability of individuals to make rational choices in their pursuit of individual freedom and autonomy, and (ii) the capacity of societies to make collective choices which were rational in terms of achieving self-sustaining development and national independence.
Developmentalist ideologies sometimes blurred the distinction between internalized cultural values and politically supported policy objectives. Today some write about an Asian mode of democracy, whereby the national development needed to win new freedoms for Asian societies results in strategic restrictions being placed on the choices available to the individuals who constitute those societies. The debate on Asian values highlights ambiguities and tensions created by modernity and by notions of universal economic rationality.
Greater physical comfort and new standards based on universalistic principles are products of modernization and the drive for economic rationality. Beyond a certain point, however, further development requires more open ? ows of information that in turn allow individuals to disengage themselves from the state and its narrowly de? ned goals. This gives rise to postmodernity and to multiculturalist values that challenge many of the assumptions built into work when it is organized solely in the service of modernity and national development.
As Japan continues to develop and the Japanese begin to enjoy the fruits of modernity, many of the tensions between modernity and postmodernity emerge at work. For some time now, the nature of Japan’s postmodernity has been debated. While the general consensus seems to be that Japan’s culture has been able to incorporate contrasting elements, doubts remain about the extent to which Japan’s social structures demonstrate a similar tolerance or ? exibility.
This was certainly the view of American policymakers intent on Japan removing various structural impediments in the late 1980s, and structured change did result in changed behavior and new patterns of consumption. Although structural in? exibility in the economy was highlighted by Japan’s hesitancy to improve transparency in its ? nancial sector, the Structural Impediments Initiatives also directed attention toward Japan’s rigid system of centrally controlled education, segmented labor markets, and other facets of social organization.
Change in these domains over the past decade reinforces the view that many structures in Japan have operated independently of a coherent national culture and can be further altered in response to political realignments of power relations. 10 A context for studying work 1. 3. 2 The question of ? exibility at work From the early 1990s the ? exibility of the Japanese system with regard to work has been questioned in three areas. One concerns questions of choice and multiculturalism at work.
Here “multiculturalism” refers not only to the level of tolerance shown toward newcomers and Japan’s different ethnic minorities, but also to ? exibility in recognizing or accepting different work patterns to accommodate the handicapped, those with special family responsibilities, those at different points in their life, those with different sexual preferences, and those with different work–leisure ethics. Much of the discussion of these matters by business interests in Japan has correctly pointed out that this kind of ? exibility is often very expensive in terms of a ? m’s economic competitiveness. Chapters 5 and 6 discuss the labor market and suggest that Japan’s system for organizing work still appears to be rigidly modernist and assimilationist (i. e. monocultural), although internationalization and various internal forces for postmodernism seem to be producing greater ? exibility at work than has been the case in the past. A second area of concern involves the shift from the clearly de? ned and easily measured goal of income maximization and more national GDP per capita to the nebulous goal of improving the standard of living and lifestyles.
Workers have come increasingly to reassess their goals at work, both materially and psychologically. Those in the modernist mode tend to conclude that the younger generation, spoilt by af? uence, has lost the work ethic. Modernists may also push to widen the scope for individual choice, but relate workways and lifestyle to fairly predictable stages in life. However, the Japanese now access vast information about the outside world via the media and the internet. A growing number tour, study, and do business abroad, often accompanied by their families. During the bubble ears many came to see irony in Japan having the highest GNP per capita and the most advanced electronic gadgetry in the world while many citizens experienced circumstances associated with the early stages of economic development: substandard housing, long hours of work, and poor infrastructure for leisure-time activities and for medical care. The third set of choices relate to the nature of the work ethic, the commitment of the Japanese to their work organizations, and the balance between voluntarism and regimentation or between self-discipline and institutionalized discipline.
The distinction between institutional structures and culture is important in assessing the extent to which the Japanese approach to work still relies on structures rather than on culture or shared values. This is odd, given that much of the literature on work in The Japanese at work 11 Japan has traditionally placed heavy emphasis on uniquely Japanese cultural traits or values as major factors facilitating Japan’s past economic achievements at the enterprise level. Structures exist at several levels, and behavior in the ? rm is often shaped by institutions at the national level, and increasingly by global arrangements. . 3. 3 Corporatism and the free market economy Questions concerning the locus of power or decision-making in Japan have been at the center of debate on contemporary Japan for some time (e. g. Stockwin 1980). Numerous observers such as van Wolferen (1990) and McCormack (1996) have argued that decision-making in Japan is diffused in a complex network of interconnected interests. These descriptions, while sometimes intended as a means of delineating the peculiarity of Japan’s approach to social organization, are often consistent with those found in writings about power elites and strategic elites in other societies.
Pluralists (such as Sone 1989) point to a wide range of participants in Japan’s political process. Contributors to Inagami (1995) describe work organization in corporatistic terms as a form of centralized democracy. This view had appeared earlier in Okochi, Karsh, and Levine (1973), who argued that the organization of work in Japan and in other industrialized societies can usefully be understood in terms of the institutional framework earlier advanced by Dunlop (1958). They posited that work organizations are shaped by arrangements that incorporate and balance the interests of big business, big government, and big labor.
This understanding was also the starting point for Kenny and Florida (1993), who saw Japan’s strong union movement immediately after the war as a de? ning in? uence on work organization. Developments of the past decade, however, lead one to question the corporatist framework. The in? uence of the national peak organizations for labor, including Rengo, has greatly declined. As noted below in chapter 9, the unionization rate has dropped considerably over the past two decades. Rengo’s in? uence on social policy relevant to the wellbeing of many in Japan’s labor force has also declined.
Once the major political vehicle for organized labor in Japan, the Japan Socialist Party (now the Social Democratic Party) survives in a very shaky manner after a brief taste of coalition power with the Murayama cabinet (1993–6). As Shimizu (1997) and others have suggested, the inability of Japanese unions to affect policy has led many to question the need for Japanese unions to exist at all – a view at odds with the notion that there is a corporatist balance of power. 12 A context for studying work Such doubts are not new.
Galenson and Odaka (1976) questioned whether Japanese unions were really free and meaningfully committed to the interests of their members. Kawanishi (1992a) described how many unions perform as an adjunct to management in the implementation of personnel policies designed by and for management. This is not to ignore the signi? cant role some unions play in enhancing the wellbeing of their members at the ? rm level (cf. Kawanishi 1992a; Benson 1994 and 1996). Another dif? culty with the corporatist formulation is that the business– government relationship is less cosy and less predictable than in the past.
The in? uence of the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) has waned considerably over the past ? fteen to twenty years, and, despite amalgamation, the peak employer organizations such as Nikkeiren and Keidanren have come to have less sway over their members. In the 1980s Sugimoto (1988) noted a divergence between the forces for “emperor-? rst capitalism” and those for business-? rst capitalism. He posited that ? rms putting pro? ts ahead of the national interest had become conspicuous in the 1980s.
The tight linkage of corporate and bureaucratic interests through shingikai (government advisory councils) also weakened as radical unionism faded and old ministries were restructured by administrative reforms in the late 1990s. In 2001 the Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of Health and Welfare were merged. As the in? uence of the three main parties determining industrial relations waned, the corporatistic structuring of life also seemed to give way to less institutionalized market forces: a sign perhaps that a civil society was emerging in Japan.
This ? ts in with the views of a number of writers (e. g. Mouer and Sugimoto 1995 and 2003; Rifkin 1996; Garten 1997; Nikkei Bijinesu 1997) who suggest that the end of the cold war was accompanied by increased international competition and a new level of economic rationalism at the ? rm level. They point to fundamental ways in which a number of elements at the global level are coming to affect the organization of work as it evolves in Japan and elsewhere at the beginning of the twenty-? rst century.
As the organization of work is restructured to incorporate advances in information technology and communications, it is perhaps useful to think of how labor process is being shaped simultaneously on three different, though overlapping, levels. In considering the future of work in contemporary Japan, the concerns mentioned in this section have shifted attention either up to the suprastructural factors at the international or global level or down to the ? rm and other factors at the local level. However, as the in? ence of big government, big business and big labor declines, there is a danger that other phenomena at the national level will be overlooked. The Japanese at work 13 Without introducing the debate on the continuing signi? cance of the nation state in the global era, this is, then, an argument that a thorough discussion of labor process must consider work relations at the macro level (used here to refer to factors shaping global standards and the international division of labor in terms of the world system), at the meso level (referring here to the many institutional arrangements in? encing how work is organized at the national level), and at the micro level (referring primarily to how work is organized at the local level in speci? c ? rms and in regionally based industries). There is also a danger that the importance of institutional or structural differences will be downplayed as attention focuses on universal trends: the decline in permanent ? xed-shift employment, falling unionization rates, the end to the long-term decline in the working hours of permanent employees, the multiculturalization of the labor force, the aging of the population, growing social inequality, and change in the family.
Looking at fourteen nations around the world, the contributions to Corn? eld and Hodson (2002) emphasize the continued importance of national differences in work organization while also acknowledging these common trends. 1. 3. 4 The generation of surplus The ? ftieth anniversary of the Marshall Plan in May 1997 drew attention to the importance of capital in the postwar economic recovery of Europe. The success of the Plan demonstrated a simple truth in the work of Rostow (1959) and others writing about economic development: ongoing capital accumulation is a sine qua non for economic growth.
They argued that societies progressed through a series of stages with the rate of savings increasing to a critical level where economies “took off,” and then to even higher levels in periods of very high growth, before dropping back to levels necessary to sustain high productivity. Continuing to present this simple truth, writers on the advanced economies over the past few decades have come to recognize that surplus for capital formation is a necessary but not always suf? cient condition for growth to occur.
The lower rates of productivity found in many Western nations during the 1970s and 1980s were attributed to excessive spending, some of which was by the state for social welfare and social justice. In some countries, military spending has also eroded savings. Subsequent efforts to constrain public spending in such areas has shifted attention to the microeconomic level and to what private ? rms can achieve when unfettered by taxes and regulations. Here, certain aspects of Japanesestyle management (e. g. just-in-time arrangements and enterprise bargaining) have been featured as ways in which ? ms can achieve higher 14 A context for studying work levels of productivity. Massive restructuring in large economic organizations has not stopped simply with the removal of waste. The overall belt-tightening in ? rms has resulted in more careful regulation of labor inputs and the intensi? cation of work among those who remain in permanent employment. This has obviously affected the way work is organized in Japan. Many writers suggest that the new advances in information technology now drive a new kind of industrial revolution.
Less prominently noted is the fact that these changes in the economy’s technological base are requiring new levels of capital accumulation for another takeoff and for the sustained growth that is meant to follow. Accordingly, for the foreseeable future, work organization is likely to be characterized by the ongoing change needed to sustain a process of capital formation and accumulation. The changes required for the necessary savings to be achieved may be seen in various social developments. One is the growing inequality in the distribution of income.
This trend needs to be understood not only in each of the advanced economies of the world, but also in terms of the growing gap between the rich and the poor nations as world production systems come to institutionalize divisions of labor on a global scale (Korzeniewicz and Moran 1997). Japan is again a key case. Huge investments are required if the Japanese economy is to transform itself in the high-tech era in order to improve its competitiveness in world trade. Already Japan feels pressured by China’s emergence as an economic powerhouse.
Central to Japan making the transition will be the mechanisms for generating surplus. Doubt since the 1990s about whether Japan’s ? nancial institutions will perform well in this regard has caused many of Japan’s most dynamic enterprises to push for labor market deregulation. The demand for freedom to maneuver their labor force more ? exibly focuses attention on how the Japanese state will balance efforts to generate economic surplus with the need to provide economic security to citizens at work.
While some writers have indicated that work organization will have to change fundamentally in more globalized economies (Rifkin 1996; Lipietz 1997), some such as Kumazawa (1996 and 1997) have noted that this transition is already producing in Japan various mechanisms to squeeze labor further. This is consistent with the view that Japanese-style management in the 1970s and 1980s had become an accentuated form of “ultra-Fordism” rather than the harbinger of “post-Fordism. The earlier debate on Fordism reminds us that an understanding of how work is organized in Japan must include a careful consideration of how labor process at the micro level functions within the broader context of labor process at the meso (national) and macro (global) levels. The Japanese at work 15 1. 4 Work ideology in the changing world system To develop further a sociology of labor in Japan, attention needs to be given to how the new technologies are shaping interaction between labor processes on the global, national, and local levels, as individuals, organizations, and states seek to generate economic surplus.
Work intensi? cation, casualization, and changes in the wage system have been markedly shaped by power relations between the “big three. ” As new forces emerge at the local and international levels and the fundamentals of ownership change, especially as they relate to industrial property (i. e. the production, movement, and control of information) and to citizenship, further tensions will emerge from the clash between ideologies pushing for the modern and those advocating the postmodern.
Following the cold war, attention shifted away from the East–West divide and from comparisons of how capitalist or market economies stacked up against socialist or command economies. However, even though socialism is now widely seen as a failed blueprint for economic development, if not for social development more generally, it is dif? cult to conclude that we will see the end of ideology as predicted by Bell (1960) over forty years ago, or Fukuyama (1993) more recently. Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars (1994) argue that there are at least seven cultures of capitalism. As the competition between capitalist nations intensi? s, debate will likely come to revolve around the superiority of speci? c approaches to capitalism. The “Look East policies” of Malaysia and Singapore in the 1980s and early 1990s combined ideas about work organization in Asia with assumptions about Asian modes of democracy. Mahathir and Ishihara (1994) and others argue that Asian values require a different approach to social organization. Although the ? nal outcome may be a move toward global standards, it will likely be some time before we see the ultimate capitalist system combining best capitalist world practice in all spheres of economic and social activity.
The experience with national systems of industrial relations has been that complex institutions have a life of their own and that such institutions are revamped only every ? fty to a hundred years. It is thus important to consider the extent to which Japan’s institutions at the national level accommodate or compromise “global standards. ” To understand the forces shaping the future of work in advanced capitalist economies, it is useful to assess how the debate on different capitalisms is shaping the world system.
Much of the recent discussion of trade strategies in international forums is about the balance to be struck between working and living. Two general categories of concern are central 16 A context for studying work to any assessment of competing brands of capitalism. One is the way work is organized and relates to the right, the privilege, the opportunity, and/or the duty to work. The other involves the goals to be achieved through work. 1. 5 Toward a superior work ethic? Several yardsticks are used to evaluate competing economic models. Some time ago Wilcox (1966) identi? d eight criteria for the task. Here two are considered: ef? ciency and the freedom to choose. 1. 5. 1 Ef? ciency The ? rst criterion is whether one system of production is more ef? cient than another. The focus on ef? ciency is largely about the ability of systems to export and to generate balance-of-payments surpluses. That ability was mentioned above as a major reason why national systems of industrial relations become widely accepted as models for other societies. The importance of this criterion will be enhanced by moves to more open trade through the World Trade Organization (WTO).
With freer trade in capital, technology, ideologies and culture accompanying the more market-oriented approach of the WTO, the competitive advantage of many local areas may not go much beyond the productivity of locally based labor. Microeconomic reform is about making those workers more ef? cient and testing their ef? ciency through competition (e. g. deregulated labor markets). Most assessments of Japan, beginning with two OECD reports on the Japanese system of industrial relations in the 1970s, have rated highly the contributions of Japanese labor to Japan’s overall economic competitiveness.
Japan is now confronted by the need to squeeze from its labor force further productivity while maintaining higher levels of commitment. By choosing to further deregulate Japan’s labor markets, policymakers are challenging established understandings about the rewards and incentives previously seen as keys to motivating the Japanese labor force. The issues raised by this dilemma are addressed at various points throughout this volume as central to any assessment about the peculiarities that might distinguish Japanese capitalism from other versions. 1. 5. Choice and free trade A key issue arising out of the commitment to free trade is how to conceive of the right to compete in the free trade of goods and services. These concerns link back through time to questions of colonialism, economic The Japanese at work 17 imperialism, and economic dependence. Do workers in industrialized countries really wish to compete on a level playing ? eld with workers in the non-industrialized world? If so, what are the rules that de? ne notions of fair competition, and who makes those rules? How legitimate are sweat shops?
How legitimate as a means of competing is social dumping in the form of lower wages, longer hours of work, poorer housing, and environmental degradation? The consequences of winning or losing the game of national economic competition are such that citizens in many countries can easily be persuaded that various deprivations are a reasonable price to pay for national economic independence. 1. 5. 3 Human rights and the right to compete Unbridled competition between work organizations ultimately raises questions about human rights and cultural style.
Time lags in development often invite accusations of hypocrisy from the less-developed nations. Why were sweat shops or child labor acceptable in eighteenthcentury England but are not in twenty-? rst-century Bangladesh? Why does the coverage given to the Olympics and to many other international sporting events by the Western-dominated media legitimate one kind of child labor that later leads to stardom in the entertainment industry while the same media condemn child labor when it occurs in a factory?
While these kinds of issues seldom surfaced in Japan–US trade disputes, assumptions about which structural arrangements for work are “fair” or “unfair” did. Many Japanese continue to be resentful of what they see as American attempts to impose its inconsistent norms as “global standards. ” Such attempts are seen ultimately as abrogating the right to compete and limiting the right of nations to set and to control working conditions in line with the wishes of their citizens. As a means to an end, the right to compete is the right to work, and that is in turn the right of workers to accept regimentation to achieve national goals.
In contemporary Japan karoshi (death from overwork) has been seen as a serious problem (Karoshi Bengodan Zenkoku Renraku Kaigi 1991), but if the Japanese wish to pay that price, do most Europeans, Australians, or North Americans still wish to compete? Free trade arrangements for ? nancial services and the ? ow of investment have come increasingly to mean that the price of failure could well be selling off “the farm” or a nation’s cultural assets to more competitive foreign interests. Another consideration is the fact that the amount of effort required to gain independence often appears to be greater han that necessary to maintain a competitive advantage once this has been achieved. A third is that workers in more competitive economies often become “embourgeoised” once an af? uent lifestyle is achieved. 18 A context for studying work The challenge is more starkly stated when translated into hours of work. Japan’s annual average of 2,100–2,200 hours circa 1990 contrasted sharply with the 1,500–1,600 hours recorded in many European countries. While the extra leisure enjoyed by many Europeans might be regarded as a kind of reward for superior ef? iency, a free trade regime will, ceteris paribus, result in Japan’s longer hours of work putting pressure on workers in those societies to follow suit. Similarly, still longer hours and lower labor costs in China are seen as pressuring Japanese workers. Given the general acknowledgment that many Japanese workers are doing “service overtime” (unrecorded, and therefore free, overtime for their employers), some between 500 and 800 hours a year, it is not idle to speculate about mechanisms in Japan that might ensure that Japanese workers cannot be prodded into working 2,500 hours a year in order to improve their international competitiveness.
Although the Japanese model now draws less interest, Japanese views on these matters are relevant to policymakers elsewhere. Leaving aside the very public contribution of Japanese commentators to Australian thinking about its levels of industrial disputation at the end of the 1970s, and less obvious Japanese in? uence contributing to the introduction of enterprise bargaining, one might speculate about how the publicity given to Japanese perceptions at the end of the 1980s that Australians were all “large, lazy and lucky” (Ormonde 1992) facilitated work intensi? ation and the rise in the hours of work in Australia over the 1990s. Because hours of work fell remarkably in Japan during the 1990s, and Japan is no longer so different in this regard, the Japanese experience is relevant to the management of international competition and to assessments of Asian values and propositions that the appropriateness of certain social arrangements (including regimentation at work) is determined by overall levels of productivity and what a society (and its individuals) can reasonably afford. Japanese policymakers continue to grapple with the tradeoffs between ef? iency and social justice and with how best to motivate younger workers with a diverse range of interests. In order to assess that tradeoff, a fuller appreciation of the factors shaping the Japanese “commitment” or “willingness” to work long hours is needed. Central to any evaluation of the long hours of work recorded in Japan at the beginning of the 1990s is an assessment of how voluntarily Japanese workers work. If the long hours of work recorded in Japan are just a re? ection of a culturally ordained work ethic (i. e. he joy of working as much as possible), the appropriate response in societies wishing to compete may simply be to exhort their own workers to work longer or harder or with more commitment. If, however, Japanese work habits are seen to be the product of structures which reward and penalize workers The Japanese at work 19 for differences in hours worked, then there are questions about human rights at work, about the desirability of having international standards, and about the tradeoff between hours of work, productivity, and voluntariness. 1. 6 Toward an understanding of work in Japan
The preceding discussion suggests there are competing visions of how work is organized in Japan. This should not be surprising; Japan is a complex society. Its economy consists of large and small ? rms, male and female employees, those with more education at elite institutions and those with less education at mediocre schools, various industries and geographic regions, unionized and non-unionized workers. For persons positioned differently in the Japanese economy, work will obviously mean different things and result in different understandings.
These variations will be most apparent at the micro level. This volume tries to capture some of the context or milieu in which the Japanese make choices about work. As indicated above, the context for work can be conceived on three levels: the macro or international, the meso or national, and the micro, ? rm-speci? c, or local. Workers and management interact most at the micro levels. Many studies, including a number of good ethnographies, have thrown light on how work is organized at the ? rm level. At the other end of the spectrum, few workers or managers have much input on the international stage.
Decisions there are often made beyond the boundaries of most states. The extent to which Japan as a nation state or the Japanese as private citizens are able to affect decisions at the global level increasingly deserves careful attention as global civil society emerges. At the national level, individual workers also have little direct input, although some may have a collective input through their unions. Managers at large ? rms, however, are probably more likely to affect arrangements for work at the national level in Japan.
They most often do so through industrial federations and have an input into the formation of industrial policy. Management at medium-sized and smaller ? rms and representatives of regional economic interests may have varying amounts of in? uence. In democracies like Japan individuals can and do compete to support political parties with quite different social agendas at the national level. Out of that competition (or lack of it) emerges the overall framework structuring inequality, social welfare and redistributive mechanisms, education, and the political balance of power.
The mosaic of institutions, legislation, practices, and political alliances which emerges at this level very much colors the milieu in which each worker makes choices 20 A context for studying work in their own world of work. The outcomes at the national or “meso” level set parameters limiting the choices available to individuals when they think about their work. The literature on industrial relations and labor law in Japan at the meso level is abundant. It tends to be framed largely in terms of how institutions function from the point of view of policymakers.
Less emphasis has been placed on how that framework delineates the choices confronting workers on an everyday basis. This volume considers how the meso level impinges on those choices and affects labor process in Japan’s external labor markets. This book does not seek to provide a de? nitive introduction to all aspects of work in Japan. In focusing on the meso or national level, it has left discussion of in-house concerns at the ? rm level for another volume. Such a volume would also consider more carefully the everyday life concerns and the ways work and individual life courses are conceptualized within the context of the family.
Although work organization is increasingly coming to be in? uenced by international bodies (such as the WTO or the ILO) and by the diffusion of international standards across a wide range of domains (including social welfare, education, skill classi? cations, working conditions, and labor market reform), these in? uences are also beyond the scope of this book. Written as an introduction to the world of work in Japan, this volume is conceived as an eclectic exercise. Several disciplines deal with work. The sociology of work has been greatly enriched by reference to a wide range of competing paradigms.
An effort was made in writing this volume to introduce a range of paradigms providing insight into how work is organized in Japan, and the views of those in industrial relations, management studies, the organizational and administrative sciences, philosophy, anthropology, and psychology are incorporated. The study of work also embraces a concern with comparative issues. Here it is important to balance an emphasis on Japan’s uniqueness with an awareness of the universal. Japan is a society with a long social history.
Over many centuries various traditions and practices developed which continue to shape the organization of work in Japan and the vocabulary for talking about work. While Wigmore’s volumes on commercial practices in Tokugawa Japan (1969–75) suggest that it would be wise to eschew gross generalizations about work, even when referring to traditional Japan, a discernible rhythm to work in contemporary Japan nevertheless distinguishes it from work elsewhere. Knowledge of that ethos provides a general mindset or common ground for the Japanese to exchange views about work.
At the same time, the way work is experienced in contemporary Japan varies greatly as a result of one’s positioning in a complex The Japanese at work 21 and very segmented labor market. Moreover, the organization of work is increasingly being shaped by the logic of production technologies found elsewhere and by developments in the global economy. Over the years, the debate on convergence and divergence has centered on Japan because it was the ? rst Asian nation to industrialize (e. g. see Cole 1971; Rohlen 1974).
Social scientists and other observers were interested in whether Japan’s Asianness or its industrialization would be the more in? uential factor shaping social life in Japan. Those believing in convergence (such as Cole 1971) argued that Japanese society would gradually become more like Western societies as it adopted similar industrial technologies. They saw convergence as a logical outcome of the push to modernize. Other scholars (such as Rohlen 1974) argued that Japanese society would remain culturally and socially distinct, re? ecting Japan’s different history and its unique culture.
Rather than being dominated by the logic of industrialism, they argue, Japan has achieved new levels of economic choice which will allow it increasingly to articulate its difference in economic terms and in the way work is organized. A third position was taken by Dore (1973), who argued that reverse convergence might occur, a position which seems reasonable given the overseas interest in Japanese-style management in the 1980s. A fourth, less optimistic, scenario would be that associated with Huntington’s (1992) notion of civilizations tenaciously ? hting to survive and constantly jostling for position in the new world order. Whatever the process of cultural diffusion and social change might be, the preceding discussion in this chapter has underlined the importance of considering the Japanese experience with work in a comparative perspective and in terms of its linkages to the experiences of other countries. The continuing debate on convergence and divergence raises interesting and challenging questions about the nature of social change. The debate has also injected into discussions of work in Japan the important distinction between function and form.
Cole’s (1971) discussion of functional equivalents allows us to see similarities in terms of the overall functioning of society, while cultural differences remain in terms of forms. 1. 7 The structure of this volume This chapter has provided a broad context in which the political economy of work links hours of work to the nation’s economic competitiveness. The next chapter introduces the Japanese literature on work, focusing on the sociology of work and its attention to the paradoxical coexistence of high levels of commitment to work and high levels of alienation born out of 2 A context for studying work the harsh conditions under which many Japanese have labored. It discusses eight streams of scholarship dealing with work and tells the story of the uncovering of a dual consciousness among Japan’s employees. On the distributive side, the poor working conditions and the constraints imposed by management at the place of work are mentioned. The other concern has been with ef? ciency – the dictates of the market and the realities of the ? rm as a socioeconomic entity.
Although it is the acceptance of “managerial wisdom” that is usually associated with paternalism and Japanese-style management, traditional concerns with social justice and the associated emic vocabulary in the union movement still surface in the everyday lives of employees and their families. Chapter 3 develops further the framework beginning to take shape in chapter 2. It identi? es four paradigmatic approaches for considering work in contemporary Japan, and then introduces four in? uential ? gures writing about work in contemporary Japan.
It concludes by presenting a multilevel framework for considering work organization in Japan. Chapter 4 presents data on hours of work in Japan, the aspect of workways in Japan most commonly cited in the literature on Japan’s international competitiveness as setting Japan apart from advanced industrialized economies. As mentioned above, some cite long hours of work as evidence of a strong commitment to the ? rm and to an especially strong work ethic in Japan. For others, the same long hours symbolize the extremes of unbridled competition and the excesses of an ultra-Fordist approach to regimenting work.
While the chapter concludes that hours of work in Japan are probably long compared to those in many other similarly industrialized societies, it also recognizes the long-term trend toward shorter hours of work, and eschews a tendency to exaggerate the extent to which work in Japan is characterized by excessively long hours. The remaining chapters focus on the meso-level milieu in which choices about work are made by most Japanese individuals in the context of their families. They describe a milieu in which many Japanese choose to work or feel impelled to work long hours.
They identify as the main reason for the continuing trend toward a shorter work year in Japan the gradual loosening of structural constraints rather than changing cultural values per se. Chapters 5 and 6 consider how the labor market is structured. Chapters 7 and 8 consider how labor law and redistributive social policies provide parameters shaping industrial relations and civil minimums for Japan’s workers. Chapters 9 and 10 provide brief overviews of management organizations and labor unions which, along with the government and bureaucracy of Japan, share power in determining those parameters and minimums.
The Japanese at work 23 The volume concludes with a look to the future, commenting on how the elements go together and on the issues that have begun to surface at the beginning of the twenty-? rst century as the economy and society of Japan continue to internationalize in the face of globalization. Returning to some of the issues raised in this chapter, the conclusion comments on tensions currently shaping discussions about the future of work in Japan. As an introduction to understanding work in Japan, this volume is written with two principal audiences in mind.
The ? rst consists of students who are informed about industrial relations and the sociology of work but who do not have a knowledge of work in Japan. The second consists of students who possess a basic knowledge of Japanese society but do not have a full grasp of issues concerning work. In providing an introduction to the world of work in Japan, the authors seek to provide a perspective useful in considering the following questions: (1) Why have the Japanese worked longer hours in the postwar period? 2) How do meso-economic, political, and social environments limit the choices Japanese employees have regarding their work? (3) Who are the major actors shaping the choices which Japanese workers have at the meso level? (4) How much variation is there in the environments in which Japanese workers ? nd themselves? (5) In what meso-level context are workways practiced in Japan, and how does the Japanese context differ from those found elsewhere in other similarly advanced economies? (6) How are certain interests served by the competing perspectives on the above questions? 7) What forces exist to change the way work is presently conducted in Japan? While no chapter will deal with all of these questions, it is the authors’ earnest desire that the volume as a whole will assist readers in formulating their own answers to the questions listed above. As in any introductory treatment, the brushstrokes are necessarily broad; signi? cant details and some issues have been glossed over. Nevertheless, the authors have endeavored to provide a snapshot that will capture the complexities characterizing work organization in Japan.
They welcome any feedback and hope there will be an opportunity to revise their thinking in future writings on work in Japan. 2 Toward a sociology of work in postwar Japan 2. 1 Perspectives on work in Japan Scholars researching the organization of work in Japan can be characterized in terms of their interaction with eight scholarly traditions. Each grouping has had its own traditions, professional associations, and publishing outlets. Many scholars have worked across several of these traditions in their efforts to understand how work is organized in Japan and what the resultant processes have meant for Japan, for the Japanese ? m, and for the individual Japanese worker. Although one can delineate a number of coherent intellectual approaches as distinct streams of scholarship, one must also recognize that they overlap. This chapter has three aims. One is to introduce eight streams of research on work in Japan and to indicate how the insights of each bear on our understanding of how work is organized in Japan. The second is to trace some of the main arguments that have emerged in the attempt to grasp how individual workers have come to develop a work ethic.
These overviews are presented as a means of encouraging readers to develop multiple perspectives when formulating their views on the work ethic in Japan. The third aim is to have readers think about the methodology of studying work. Compared with the approach taken to studying work by many scholars in North America and Europe, Japanese intellectuals have been reluctant to engage in participant observation or extended participation. Rather, they have conducted in-depth interviews with broad crosssections of workers.
Exceptions include Kamata (1973 and 1982), a journalist who worked at a subsidiary of the large automobile manufacturer, Toyota. Another would be Shimizu (1996), a novelist who has drawn on earlier work experiences to portray the workplace and its inhabitants. Although a small number of labor sociologists in Japan have shown an interest in methodologies which result in interaction with working people, the paucity of close encounters with the workplace and its inhabitants in Japanese studies of work contrasts with the heavy reliance on 24
Toward a sociology of work in postwar Japan 25 such approaches by foreign scholars studying work in Japan. The studies by Cole (1971), Rohlen (1974), Clark (1979), the contributors to Plath (1983), Kondo (1990), Dalby (1985), and others rely on participant observation or other methods of close interactive observation and stand out in this regard. The next section of this chapter provides a brief overview of various competing paradigms or streams of research that provide insight into how work is organized in Japan.
The development of the sociology of labor is then discussed, with a focus on worker motivation. The following section considers four paradigmatic approaches used by contemporary writers on work in Japan. 2. 2 Eight intellectual traditions focused on understanding work in Japan Although there is much overlap, meaningful distinctions can be drawn between the approaches to studying work organization in terms of (a) the phenomena on which each focuses, (b) the sense of relevance and the outcome most commonly sought, (c) research methodology, and (d) the unit of analysis most frequently used.
An overview of the major approaches is presented in table 2. 1. A full list of the main persons associated with each of the streams would show that many individuals have been active in more than one stream. The world of work has generated debate among Japanese academics and other intellectuals over the past hundred years. One concern has been with understanding how new technologies alter organizational requirements and power relations in ways that fundamentally in? uence work culture and practices, the social strati? ation matrix, and the lines of cleavage that fragment or segment the labor force and the larger society. Another focus has been the mobilization and melding of the labor force to achieve the aims of the state. A third has been the effect of new products and services on Japan’s consumer culture and on the work ethos of ordinary citizens as they attempt to mesh their work life (on the production side) with family life and a certain standard of living (on the consumption side).
Over the years attention has focused on what appears to be the paradox of the Japanese work ethic: the general tendency of Japanese to accept long hours of work and other forms of discipline without the full returns or the rewards generally associated with having done concomitant work in many other advanced economies. The discussion tends to progress from a consideration of approaches most concerned with the social context in which work occurs to those more focused on individual outcomes. A loosely chronological order is Table 2. Approaches to understanding labor processes and the organization of work in Japan E. Human resource management (Japanese-style management) Nihonteki keiei ron Japan America England France America Japan Labor process The workers’ consciousness Union behavior Rodo keizaigaku Rodo shakaigaku Rodo kagaku Germany F. Labor economics G. H. Sociology of work Science of work (Labor sociology) A. Social policy B. Studies on the labor movement C. Industrial sociology/ anthropology D. Industrial relations Japanese term America Shakai seisaku ron Rodo undo ron Sangyo shakaigaku (roshi kankei ron) Sangyo jinruigaku
Roshi kankei ron Intellectual origins Germany England Japan England America Phenomena most concerned with Workability of state policies concerning work arrangement Labor unions and labor movement Institutions which structure and facilitate the organization of work at the ? rm level Personnel System for the management regulation of the collective (organized) strategies interests of the state, employers, and workers Workings of the labor market as it determines the composition of the work force, labor mobility, wages, and other working conditions More effective abor market and allocation of labor in terms of having an ef? cient economy Physiology of work and fatigue Poverty (household expenditures and the uses of time) Signi? cant outcome sought from research Social unity (fairness and integration of worker into society) maximizing social ef? ciency Government policy documents Government statistics Case studies based on interviews with management Company documents A more effective labor movement which better serves the interests of a workers vis-` -vis the interests of monopoly capital
Understanding of work organization The management of alienation generated by work arrangements Economic development Effective personnel management Healthy work A more egalitarian society force for workers and managers A more effective union movement Main methodology Government policy Documents and statistics Interviews with labor leaders Union documents Attitudinal and behavioral surveys Government and industry-based survey data and statistics Enterprise surveys Interviews with workers (Participant) observation of the workplace Physiological experiments Observation of the workplace
Case studies based on interviews with key players System disputes Management organization Culture TSUDA Masumi IWATA Ryushi NAKAYAMA Ichiro HAZAMA Hiroshi KOIKE Kazuo SANO Yoko ONO Akira SHIMADA Haruo ODAKA Kunio MATSUSHIMA Shizuo HAZAMA Hiroshi KAWANISHI Hirosuke KAMATA Satoshi KUMAZAWA Makoto SHIMIZU Ikko and similar novelists The individual and mechanisms Division of work The worker The union Body Surveys of individuals Historical documents Analysis of household records and time sheets Major unit of analysis NAKAYAMA Ichiro KOSHIRO Kazutoshi HANAMI Tadashi The state and national policy The union Employee and interpersonal relations
Main Japanese writers associated with the approach OKOCHI Kazuo KOSHIRO Kazutoshi HANAMI Tadashi TOTSUKA Hideo YAMAMOTO Kiyoshi HYODO Tsutomu SHIRAI Taishiro FUJITA Wakao MATSUSHIMA Shizuo MANNARI Hiroshi OKAMOTO Hideaki FUJIMOTO Takeshi SHIMOYAMA Fusao KAGOYAMA Kyo KAROSHI Bengodan Major academic associations Nihon Rodo Kenkyu Zasshi Soshiki Gakkai Nenpo Kei-eishi Gakkai Nenpo Shakai Seisaku Rodo Undo Gakkai Kenkyusha Shudan Nihon Roshi Kankei Kenkyu Kyokai Nihon Roshi Kankei Kenkyu Kyokai Soshiki Gakkai Kei-eishi Gakkai Rodo Kagaku Major journals Shakai Seisaku Gakkai Nenpo Gekkan Rodo Mondai Nihon Rodo Kenkyu Zasshi
Major research organizations Solomon Levine Ronald Dore Nihon Rodo Kenkyu Kiko Nihon Rodo Kenkyu Kiko Richard Pascale William Ouchi Robert Ballon Ronald Dore Robert Evans Koji Taira KOIKE Kazuo Jon Woronoff Robert Cole Rodo Kagaku Kenkyujo Main writers in English to consult Sheldon Garron Ehud Harari Joe Moore Robert Cole Andrew Gordon Ronald Dore Matthew Allen Rodney Clarke Thomas Rohlen 28 A context for studying work followed to provide the reader with some sense of how each intellectual milieu and ethos has evolved. A cursory examination of the competing intellectual traditions reveals that their development re? cts not only stages in Japan’s industrial development, but also distinct periods in the political and social economy of Japan and the Japanese state. 2. 2. 1 The Social Policy School ( Shakai Seisaku Gakkai) As an urban working class began to emerge at the end of the nineteenth century, the “labor problem” (rodo mondai) (the tensions arising out of poor or exploitative working conditions and the need for intervention to protect many in the labor force) began to draw the attention of policymakers and those with a serious interest in the directions in which the nation was heading.
Leaders in late developers like Japan and Germany knew from the experience of early developers like the United Kingdom that serious social unrest could easily result from the dislocations associated with industrialization. In Germany the Society for the Study of Social Problems was formed in 1872 to promote studies facilitating the state taking an active role in regulating work and industrial relations, so that the nation could develop and modernize as quickly as possible.
Soon afterwards the Japanese government began sending students to study social policy in Germany, with the expectation that it too would develop policies to expedite Japan’s modernization and industrialization by carefully dealing with a range of problems emerging from the dislocation and poor working conditions experienced by its labor force. If not managed properly, it was held, the tensions produced by rapid social and economic change could seriously delay or even derail Japan’s efforts to develop.
The Japanese state at that time was being structured around an imperial ideology that promoted and legitimated paternalistic approaches to work organization. To implement that ideology, policies were developed to repress independent labor unionism. In that climate, the study of labor unions and the working class was beyond the imagination of those who formed Japan’s Society for the Study of Social Policy (Shakai Seisaku Gakkai) in 1896. The Society’s ? rst national conference in 1907 focused on “The Factory Law and the Labor Problem” and supported the ameliorative approach being taken by “responsible” leaders at
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9/11 Remembered in Ceremony at City Park
A memorial ceremony in remembrance of Sept. 11, 2011 was held on Monday morning at City Park. (Photo by Andrew Weeks)
TWIN FALLS, Idaho (KLIX) – Dave Lessly remembers what he was doing on that infamous September morning 16 years ago.
He was keeping busy at work when his supervisor came in to tell the crew that the business was shutting down for the morning. They went into a room and watched the news unfold: planes had flown into the World Trade Center.
“I was shocked more than anything,” he said. “I was shocked that something like this could happen here in the U.S.”
Before long, Lessly started experiencing a flood of other emotions: anger, sadness, fear – and then he started wondering what it was he could do for his country.
Some of those same feelings returned to Lessly on Monday at City Park, where a memorial ceremony was held on the 16th anniversary of the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. A flag presentation, short talks, and a song of remembrance were part of the ceremony.
“I still think about it,” he said after the 40-minute ceremony. “I think about all the people who lost loved ones, and what it is we can do as American citizens to protect our freedoms and uphold our beliefs.”
Twin Falls was one of many communities in Idaho and across the country that held memorial ceremonies today. Those at City Park included city and county government officials, local law enforcement officers, firefighters and representatives of other organizations, among others.
Lessly and his wife, Peggy, were at the park with small American flags that they put to good use earlier in the morning at the I.B. Perrine Bridge. As members of the Magic Valley chapter of the POW/MIA Awareness Association, they were at the bridge with some 20 other members, waving their flags and getting the attention of passersby. The group meets regularly to plan community activities and raise money for the organization, which works to help find missing war veterans.
“Did you know that Idaho still has eight missing veterans?” he asked.
Lessly, who served in the U.S. Navy from 1988-1994, said the country’s flag is important enough to him that he flies it from his home every day. It’s a symbol of freedom, but also of other good things in the country.
City and county government officials, local law enforcement officers, firefighters and representatives of other organizations, among others, attended the ceremony on Monday, Sept. 11, at Twin Falls City Park. (Photo by Andrew Weeks)
Twin Falls County Commissioner Jack Johnson said ceremonies like the one Monday serve as a reminder of the importance of being unified as a community and country instead of divided.
Johnson, whose career involved working with the Jerome and Twin Falls sheriff's offices, was a sergeant at the time of the terrorist attacks and said he remembers what he was doing on that infamous morning 16 years ago.
“I had the day off and was home watching the morning news,” he said. “When that first plane hit I knew our country was under attack.”
Back then the country seemed to unite after the attacks, he said, but anymore there is a lot of division politically, socially and otherwise. Whenever he sees an image or video clip from Black Tuesday, some of the old feelings return.
“As an American citizen you can’t help but still be angry about it,” Johnson said. “But these days we need to do things to help unite our country. Our country is so divided right now that we need to find things to do that bring us together.”
Helping someone in need or saying hello to a stranger are simple things that help the larger cause, he said, adding that he thinks for the most part Twin Falls is doing a pretty good job of that.
Filed Under: 911, community, september 11, twin falls
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The Lego Batman Movie Review
So I watched The Lego Batman Movie…
I was apprehensive about going to watch this film. If you’ve been reading this blog long enough or have ever casually bumped into me, you’ll know how much I LOVE Batman. So when anything comes out with his name on it, I want it to be excellent. Furthermore, spin-offs can be tricky because just because we liked a character in small, infrequent doses doesn’t mean we’ll love a whole movie dedicated to them. Luckily for me, my fears were all in vain.
Okay, basic plot: While foiling The Joker’s most recent plan to destroy Gotham, Batman (Will Arnett) casually laughs off the tag of The Joker (Zach Galifianakis) being his ‘Greatest Villain’. This drives The Joker insane (well, more insane than usual) and causes him to come up with his most devious plan yet. Meanwhile Batman has to deal with the fact that new police commissioner, Barbara Gordon (Rosario Dawson) has come up with a new strategy of defending Gotham that is completely unreliant on Batman. Eager to prove that Gotham still needs him (and that he needs no one), Batman comes up with a plan to stop Joker’s villainy forever. This, however, plays right into Joker’s plan and forces Batman to come to terms with the fact that, even though he’s a muscular billionaire-ninja, he has fears and can’t win this fight alone.
This movie is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! From the opening credits of the film it’s made clear just what kind of movie this is. The Lego Batman Movie functions both as a spoof (that mocks the genre) but also a worthy addition to the history of Batman. It reminded me a lot of Kingsman: The Secret Service in that way and of course Deadpool. This is due to a team of immensely talented writers (Seth Grahame-Smith, Chris McKenna, Erik Sommers, Jared Stern and John Whittington) who craft a script that manages to never take itself too seriously while also never being too much of joke. It’s a wonderful continuation of what was started in The Lego Movie both in terms of the individual character of Batman and the overall style of storytelling the lego animation provides. Now that I think about it, it’s amazing how similar this film is to Deadpool. The Lego Batman Movie is in no way a rip-off but rather a parallel that unlike Deadpool young children will be allowed to see (well, at least legally).
As much praise as I throw to this film’s screenwriting team, I have to throw equal amounts, if not more praise to director, Chris McKay. McKay worked on The Lego Movie as a co-director of animation; but it’s his work on another one of my favourite pieces of animated comedy that I think was the key to this film’s success – Robot Chicken. If you’ve never seen Robot Chicken you haven’t really lived. Robot Chicken is an animated series and the brainchild of Seth Green and Matthew Seinreich. The show centres around pop-culture parodies brought to life through stop-animation. The style of comedy in that series is evident in this film. The lack of rules that exist in this animated medium allow for the comedy to be more outrageous and for an ensemble cast to appear without the usual fight for screentime that having so many notable actors in a live action film would cause.
Speaking of the cast, this film has a stellar one. Firstly, I have to bow down to Will Arnett who honestly is in my list of Top 3 Batman Actors of all time! He’s sensational. He perfectly delivers the gritt and guile of Batman while also adding comedy and a silliness to the character that we’ve never quite seen. His performance highlights everything that is good about this film in terms of its writing and setting. Michael Cera who stars as Dick Grayson/Robin also deserves a round of applause for his fun and light-hearted interpretation of the character. Honestly, I could go on and on praising every single member of this film’s cast individually because they honestly deserve it. I’ll just mention Rosario Dawson who gives an entertaining performance as the strong, independent Baraba Gordon; Ralph Fiennes – who puts in a regal as well as rumpus turn as Alfred (Bruce’s butler and surrogate father) and Zach Galifianakis who is inspired as The Joker. I bow down to all of the actors’ tai chi in this film.
You don’t need to have watched The Lego Movie to enjoy this film nor does this film use The Lego Movie as a crutch to stand on. This is a standalone movie that works beautifully and relies on its own comedy and heart to entertain. That being said, there are plenty of references to other pieces of work from Adam West’s Batman to the Animated Batman Series all the way even up to Batman vs Superman and Suicide Squad. There are probably a million others that I missed. This film’s awareness that it’s a movie but ability to function as a movie is astounding.
Overall, The Lego Batman Movie is a giant homerun! It’s funny, has great characters, wonderful, creative minds working behind the scenes and actors who do tremendous work to bring it all to life. It’s definitely worth seeing. 8/10
Posted in Movie reviewTagged batman, dc, DC comics, lego, michael cera, Movie review, ralph fiennes, rosario dawson, the lego batman movie, will arnett, Zach GalifianakisBy Kgothatjo Magolego1 Comment
One thought on “The Lego Batman Movie Review”
tsepotheview says:
Yeah mr kagiso the movie is good, who ever thought that one day I’ll watch this kind of movie…
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Logan Allen Collects One Dollar Bet from John Cena
When we interviewed Logan Allen at Southwest University Park a few weeks ago, the El Paso Chihuahuas starting pitcher described his now infamous "one dollar bet" he made with actor and professional wrestler John Cena. The chance encounter between the two in December of 2017 was described by Cena in this video.
Earlier this week we found out that the San Diego Padres would call up Allen to make his Major League debut against the Milwaukee Brewers. Nobody was happier to hear this news than Cena, who was in attendance at Petco Park for Allen's debut. The 22-year old shutout the Brewers over seven innings, and he even registered his first hit and scored a run in San Diego's 4-0 win over Milwaukee. After the game, Allen talked about the moment and he mentioned his bet with Cena at the 3:35 mark.
Prior to this afternoon's game, both Allen and Cena met in front of the pitcher's mound, and the bet was paid.
Allen is one of the best stories I have covered in the five-plus years since the Chihuahuas debuted in Triple-A. He dedicates every game he pitches to his older brother Philip, who has severe cerebral palsy and cannot walk or talk. Cena, who broke the record for most Make-A-Wish appearances, was emotional when Logan talked to him about his older brother.
From a baseball standpoint, it not surprising that Allen's first start in the big leagues was a success. He has coasted through the Minor Leagues and he was named the Texas League Pitcher of the Year in 2018. Like most Triple-A pitchers, the 2019 has not been as easy for him as his past stops, but he has put together a strong May and positioned himself well for his first call-up to San Diego. Even if he comes back to the Chihuahuas, expect the Padres to give Allen plenty of opportunities to become a fixture in their starting rotation.
Filed Under: El Paso Chihuahuas, john cena, san diego padres
Categories: Audio / Videos / Photos, Featured (Carousel), Include in Newsletter, Sports
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Lakota Local School District » About Us » What's New » Petermann Bus Drivers Announce Strike
Petermann Bus Drivers Announce Strike, No Transportation Until Further Notice
This evening, Lakota Local Schools was notified that its contracted bus provider, Petermann Transportation, could not reach an agreement in contract negotiations with its drivers. The bus drivers have chosen to strike, effective immediately. This means that beginning the morning of Tuesday, April 16, busing will not be available to any students who utilize Lakota school transportation until the drivers return to work. This includes special education preschoolers and high-schoolers, as well as parochial school students.
We understand that this puts an enormous burden on our parents who normally rely on busing for their children. Through the duration of the strike:
Students will not be marked tardy or absent if they are unable to find transportation to school on the day(s) the strike is in force;
Please consider carpools to get students to and from school; and
Please be patient during drop-off and pick-up due the the increased number of vehicles.
"We are extremely disappointed with this outcome and the impact it will have on our students," said Lakota Chief Operations Officer Chris Passarge. "We have been reassured throughout this process that negotiations were ongoing and that we shouldn’t expect any sort of disruption to our transportation services. After receiving word that an agreement had been reached between Petermann and the bus drivers’ union leadership over the weekend, this is an unexpected and unfortunate turn of events."
Representatives from Petermann and the bus drivers’ union will continue to meet in an effort to reach an agreement and we will communicate to families as soon as we have more information about their progress.
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SciFi Weekend: Agent Carter;Daredevil; Sleepy Hollow; The Flash; Arrow; Broadchurch; Gotham; 12 Monkeys; Penny Dreadful; The 100; Edward Herrmann; Stuart Scott
January 4, 2015 — Ron Chusid
Agent Carter is one of the more eagerly awaited new shows to begin this winter. ABC has released another promotional video, in which Haley Atwell discusses her character’s double life.
Entertainment Weekly has more information on the upcoming Daredevil series on Netflix. Here are just some of the points:
1. Daredevil will be a uniquely localized Marvel story. Unlike the globe-trotting Avengers or SHIELD gang, Matt will stick to his hometown. “Within the Marvel universe there are thousands of heroes of all shapes and sizes, but The Avengers are here to save the universe and Daredevil is here to save the neighborhood,” Loeb said. “It’s a very unique look at Hell’s Kitchen in New York, where Matt Murdoch grew up and continues to defend it from people who would harm the people that live there.”
2. Daredevil will feel like a crime story, not a superhero show. “We really wanted to take our cue from [films like] The French Connection, Dog Day Afternoon, Taxi Driver, and make it very, very grounded, very gritty, very real,” DeKnight said. “We always say we would rather lean toward The Wire than what’s considered a classic superhero television show.” Added Loeb: “There aren’t going to be people flying through the sky. There are no magic hammers.”
There are five more points in the full article.
Unreality Primetime has some spoilers as to what happens when Sleepy Hollow returns, including information on Frank Irving and an encounter between Abbie and an avenging angel. Spoilers also available for the return of The Flash. They also have some information on season two of Broadchurch.
The released synopsis by CW of the next episode of Arrow might also be seen as something of a spoiler:
THE TEAM DEALS WITH OLIVER’S DISAPPEARANCE — In the aftermath of Oliver’s (Stephen Amell) fight with Ra’s al Ghul (Matt Nable), Diggle (David Ramsey) and Arsenal (Colton Haynes) continue to protect the city in the Arrow’s absence. However, after three days without hearing from Oliver, they begin to fear the worst may have happened to their friend. Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) refuses to believe that Oliver could be dead until Merlyn (John Barrowman) pays the team a surprise visit. Thea (Willa Holland) suspects there is something more behind Oliver’s disappearance and asks Merlyn for a favor. Meanwhile, Ray (Brandon Routh) tests a part of his new suit and Laurel (Katie Cassidy) takes up the mantle of the Black Canary. Glen Winter directed the episode written by Marc Guggenheim & Erik Oleson.
Speakeasy looks at the second half of the season of Gotham and interviewed series developer Bruno Heller:
Heller said we can look forward to a bigger, more complex show as stories start to pay off and others take hold. “A lot of the episodes set up for later story. So, certainly, in that way, the story will become much more engaging and much more operatic and suspenseful. It will drag you in because these are characters you have come to know and perhaps love,” he said.
Because it’s such a big show, Heller said it takes a while to get it right, particularly how to pack all that story, character and sense of place into a network show. Now that the series is grooving along, though, Heller and company plan to deliver something even bigger. “On that level, you will see more production value, more action, more drama — you know, more,” he said with a laugh.
Entertainment Weekly described some of the differences between the movie and upcoming television version of 12 Monkeys. Among the differences listed, more will be seen of the future and there will be different factions interested in the time machine which pose a threat. Unlike the movie, in which the 12 Monkeys group turned out not to have a rather trivial goal, the group is more important in the television show.
The synopsis for the pilot, which airs January 16, suggests yet another major difference:
27 years after a virus wipes out most of humanity, scientists send a man (James Cole) back to 2015 to stop the plague from ever happening. Cole’s only lead is a virologist (Dr. Cassandra Railly), who knows the dangerous source of the outbreak
In the movie, Cole was seeking information to help the people in the future find a cure for the virus but the past had happened and could not be changed. The pilot synopsis provides a different mission. I suspect that these differences will make for a stronger television show as the more limited premise of the movie would not provide as much material for an ongoing weekly show. There are more potential stories in trying to change things as opposed to getting information, events in the future present a new avenue for stories, and the title of an ongoing television series should refer to something more significant than in the movie.
Showtime has released a trailer for Penny Dreadful’s second season. The season will be ten episodes, two more than in the first season.
When I gave my list of top new shows last week, I mentioned two shows which I did not rank as I had not seen them, but have heard excellent things about–The 100 and Manhattan. Over the holiday I decided to catch up on The 100 based upon many excellent reviews from both genre bloggers and mainstream television critics. I picked this first since the show is now on hiatus but resumes on January 21, while we have more time until Manhattan returns. I very quickly got hooked on The 100, quickly knocking off the first season this weekend and starting the second season last night. I’ll discuss it more in the future, but wanted to give it a plug while there is still plenty of time for everyone to get caught up.
In order to plan out television binging and viewing for January, Vulture has a list of when television shows are returning.
Io9 has a good list of the top science fiction and fantasy books of 2014.
Edward Herrmann, who played Richard Gilmore on Gilmore Girls, died last week. Alexis Bledel had this to say:
Bledel, who played the granddaughter of Herrmann’s character in the Gilmore Girls, described him as “a wonderful actor and a kind man”.
“He was endlessly knowledgeable about theatre, TV and film, and would generously share his wisdom or tell stories from a long and rewarding career,” Bledel continued.
“I am grateful to him for that, and will miss him tremendously.
“He loved acting and was the head of our Gilmore family with his strong presence and great sense of humor. May he rest in peace.”
I anticipate hearing his voice for a long time to come as he is also the recorded voice giving announcements on Shepler’s Ferry coming into and leaving the docks going to and from Mackinac Island.
Other deaths this week include Donna Douglas, who played Elly May Clampett on The Beverly Hillbillies, and ESPN anchor Stuart Scott. Think Progress wrote about how Scott changed ESPN:
In a media world largely devoid of both African-American faces and, especially, African-American vernacular, Scott’s iconic catchphrases — “Boo-Yeah!”, “Cool as the other side of the pillow,” and “Can I get a witness?” chief among them — brought a style that had been absent from sports and media programming straight to ESPN’s most-watched program and, by virtue, to the living rooms of white and black families alike.
Scott’s popularity, and the appeal of his brand of style, made him an icon for other aspiring African-American broadcasters who hadn’t seen anything like him on TV before.
“He was a trailblazer not only because he was black — obviously black — but because of his style, his demeanor, his presentation,” ESPN anchor Stan Verrett, also black, told ABC News for Scott’s obituary. “He did not shy away from the fact that he was a black man, and that allowed the rest of us who came along to just be ourselves.”
“Yes, he brought hip-hop into the conversation,” Jay Harris, another SportsCenter anchor who followed in Scott’s footsteps, said. “But I would go further than that. He brought in the barber shop, the church, R&B, soul music. Soul period.”
He changed ESPN too. Scott’s style wasn’t immediately popular with ESPN’s audience or even its top brass. According to the ABC obituary, Scott and ESPN received regular hate mail over his “hip-hop style,” and at times, ESPN officials asked him to consider dialing it back. Scott refused, and over time that unwillingness to relent proved right.
Posted in Science Fiction, Sports and Games, Television. Tags: Agent Carter, Agents of SHIELD, Alexis Bledel, Arrow, Black Canary, Broadchurch, Daredevil, Emily Bett Richards, Gilmore Girls, Gotham, Hayley Atwell, John Barrowman, Manhattan, Marc Guggenheim, Penny Dreadful, Science Fiction, Sleepy Hollow, Stephen Amell, The 100, The Avengers, The Flash. 14 Comments »
Red State Republicans Are A Minority Of Population Despite Senate Gains
The Senate is probably the strongest example of how our political system is (small-d) non-democratic. Each state receives two Senators, regardless of size, and the District of Columbia, with a population greater than several states, receives zero. The difference in size between the smallest and largest states has also increased significantly since this compromise was reached in the writing of the Constitution. A combination of factors including Senate races primarily in red states, the usual problems faced by either party in the sixth year of a presidency (with Republicans even losing control of the Senate under Ronald Reagan), and several tactical errors by Democratic candidates, led to the Republicans taking control. However, Vox has an interesting calculation:
But here’s a crazy fact: those 46 Democrats got more votes than the 54 Republicans across the 2010, 2012, and 2014 elections. According to Nathan Nicholson, a researcher at the voting reform advocacy group FairVote, “the 46 Democratic caucus members in the 114th Congress received a total of 67.8 million votes in winning their seats, while the 54 Republican caucus members received 47.1 million votes.”
Republicans also receive an advantage in the House due to a combination of gerrymandering and the fact that Democratic votes are more concentrated in cities, leading to Democrats winning a smaller number of districts by higher margins, and in some years allowing Republicans to control the House with a minority of the vote.
Republicans will be forced to defend more seats in blue states in 2016 but the magnitude of the Republican pick up in 2014 will make it much harder for Democrats to actually regain control. The Atlantic looked at key election races, pointing out:
Democrats will be benefiting from a favorable landscape, with Republicans defending 24 seats (many of them in blue territory) while Democrats will be defending only 10. To leverage that advantage into control of the Senate, however, Democrats need to net at least four seats (five, if Republicans win the presidency). That requires sweeping out blue-state freshman Republicans in states such as Illinois, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin while also defeating a couple of brand-name senators, such as Rob Portman or Marco Rubio, in perennial swing states.
Other factors could help Democrats in 2016 beyond the geography. The economy will hopefully be even stronger, unless the Republican-controlled Congress, or even factors beyond political control, create further problems. The Affordable Care Act will be even more established, assuming Republicans aren’t successful in dismantling it in Congress or the courts, and might be less of a divisive political issue. Perhaps most importantly, the Democrats will be running a more national campaign behind a presidential candidate as opposed to running as Republican-lite and hiding from Obama.
The Los Angeles Times reports, Obama to hit the road, selling economic progress:
Eager to stay on the offensive as new Republican majorities are seated in Congress, the president plans to take a more bullish economic message on the road next week in something of an early test drive of his State of the Union message.
During stops in Michigan, Arizona and Tennessee, Obama plans to draw a connection between actions his administration took early in his presidency and increasingly positive economic trends in sectors such as manufacturing and housing.
Officials say he’ll also offer specific new proposals — some that he’ll pursue with Congress and others he’ll advance with his own authority — that are intended to build on that progress, particularly for the middle class.
It’s an approach that upends the traditional White House script to start the year, when new policy rollouts are usually reserved for the president’s annual address to Congress.
But the White House is eager to sustain momentum it says started to build after November with major actions on immigration and Cuba as Obama began what he calls the “fourth quarter” of his presidency.
Obama, and other Democrats, should have been made the successes of Democratic policies the major point of the campaign, as opposed to running away from their successes. They might have still lost in deep red states, but Democratic turnout would have been better and they would have done better in less red areas. Besides the benefits of running on Obama’s previous record, as a result of Obama’s post-election actions his approval has shot up in the Gallup and other polls.
Posted in Barack Obama, Congress, Democrats, Economy, Health Care, Politics, Polls, Republicans. Tags: Barack Obama, Democrats, Health Care Reform, Marco Rubio, Politics, Polls, Republicans. No Comments »
« Republican State Governments Expected To Renew The Culture Wars And Promote Conservative Pseudo-Science On Abortion
SciFi Weekend: Agent Carter;Daredevil; Sleepy Hollow; The Flash; Arrow; Broadchurch; Gotham; 12 Monkeys; Penny Dreadful; The 100; Edward Herrmann; Stuart Scott »
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Groundbreaking Study On Alzheimer’s Disease Taking Place At UC Irvine
Filed Under:Alzheimer's disease, UC Irvine, UCI Mind
IRVINE (CBSLA.com) —A groundbreaking study focusing on Alzheimer’s disease is taking place at UC Irvine.
According to doctors, someone in the U.S. develops Alzheimer’s disease every 67 seconds.
KCAL9’s Michele Gile spoke with Alzheimer’s patient, Lucy Lisabeth, who plans to donate her brain to science one day.
Lisabeth was diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment at 62. According to doctors, this diagnosis is usually a precursor to developing Alzheimer’s disease.
Four years later, she was diagnosed with mild Alzheimer’s disease.
“I didn’t have any clue that anything was really going on,” Lisabeth added
During her diagnosis, Lisabeth lived in Mission Viejo with her husband Roger and taught third grade.
Her husband shared that he noticed back in 2009 that his wife was not remembering things that he said to her.
“It was my telling her what we were going to be doing on the weekend and then having to tell her more than once,” Roger Lisabeth said.
“The kids in the class would tell me ‘You told us that yesterday’ or ‘You told us that already,’ ” Lisabeth added. “I’d say ‘Well, I just wanted to make sure you knew.’ ”
The couple visited UCI Mind, a federally funded Alzheimer’s disease research center in Orange County, shortly after discovering her lapse of memory.
Gile also spoke with a researcher who is part of a clinical study at UCI Mind to attempt to one day slow memory loss.
“This is the first step toward developing a prevention for Alzheimer’s disease,” said Aimee Pierce.
The study, named A4, focuses on people ages 65 to 85. According to researchers, the study also focuses on a protein present in the brain of those with Alzheimer’s disease.
“We know the biggest risk factor is age and our population is aging,” Pierce said. “We really need to prevent Alzheimer’s disease, treat it as well, but prevention is going to be the key.”
Roger and Lucy Lisabeth hope that others will assist in funding UCI Mind in their important research.
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Georgiaand across the nation. And you can search for free.
Mcduffie County ,
Search for free or advertise your land for sale in Georgia
Mcduffie County is in Georgia. Whether you are a potential homeowner looking for a lot for sale or a builder or developer seeking land for sale for your next project, the perfect property for you may be found in Georgia. It’s known as the Peach State, but Georgia ranks first in U.S. production of watermelons, peanuts, pecans, and broilers (chickens). Vast pine stands support the state’s timber and paper production, and Georgia is a large contributor to the textile and chemical industries as well. Several Fortune 500 companies are headquartered here, including Home Depot, UPS, Coca-cola, Delta Air Lines, and Aflac. Major cities include Augusta, Columbus, Savannah, Athens, and the most well-known, the capital city of Atlanta. The Atlanta-Metro region is one of the fastest-growing areas in the country, with more than 5 million people and a huge impact on communication and transportation services. Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport hosts more passengers than any other airport in the world, transporting 90 million people each year. Tourism is a big part of Georgia’s economy, and there is plenty to see and do. Within Atlanta, visitors can tour the CNN studios, go to the World of Coca-Cola, and see the impressive Georgia Aquarium - the world’s largest with 60 exhibits in 10 million gallons of water. Sports fans can take in a Braves game at Turner Field, watch the Atlanta Falcons play football in the Georgia Dome, or catch the Hawks playing baseball at Philips Arena – all in Atlanta – or visit the storied greens at Augusta National Golf Club, home to the Masters. The largest of the southeastern states, Georgia’s geography includes mountains, beaches, canyons, forests, and 64 popular state parks. In spite of notoriously humid summers, Georgians enjoy a relatively moderate climate, so outdoor adventures abound. Popular destinations such as Stone Mountain, Brasstown Bald, Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area, and Lake Lanier offer a huge variety of activities including hiking, fishing, canoeing, tubing, horseback riding, zip lines, water skiing, and more. The Golden Isles area of the Georgia coast includes the resort-rich islands of St. Simons, Sea Island, historic Brunswick (one of five original ports for the Colonies in 1789), and family-friendly Jekyll Island. The state is steeped in history and hosts sites dedicated to former presidents Jimmy Carter (a Georgian) and Franklin D. Roosevelt (who sought treatment for polio in Warm Springs, GA), as well as civil rights leader and Atlanta-native Martin Luther King, Jr. If you are seeking property in Georgia, you will find a wide variety of choices, from waterfront property for sale, lake property for sale, beachfront property for sale, riverfront land for sale, wooded property for sale, golf course lots for sale, mountain lots for sale, vacant land for sale and even cheap land for sale.
Pike National Forest | Colorado | 109± Acres & 3 Ponds For Sale
Woodland Park, CO
109 Acres $599,000
56 Lots Selling in 27 Groups
Conifer, CO
71 Acres AUCTION
Golf course owners selling 2nd parcel and 3rd parcel of adjacent land
53 Acres $1,400,000
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Employment Law Daily Substantively unconscionable clause in au pair agreements should have been severed, arbitration ordered
Substantively unconscionable clause in au pair agreements should have been severed, arbitration ordered
Because the arbitration provisions contained in au pair agreements had only one substantively unconscionable clause, the Tenth Circuit ruled that a federal district court abused its discretion by refusing to sever the offending clause and otherwise enforce the agreement to arbitrate. Although the appeals court agreed the au pair agreements were adhesive contracts, it found they were procedurally unconscionable to only a moderate degree. Further, the au pairs’ youth, status as foreigners, and inexperience with contracts did not increase the procedural unconscionability to any significant degree, and because the provision was not concealed, no element of surprise could be inferred. Because the au pair agreements had moderate procedural unconscionability and significant substantive unconscionability due to an arbitration provider selection clause, they were unenforceable as written. However, contrary to the district court, the appeals court concluded that the one offending clause in the arbitration provision should be severed and the parties’ agreement to arbitrate their dispute enforced (Beltran v. AuPairCare, Inc., October 30, 2018, McHugh, C.).
Au pair program. Au pairs filed a class action lawsuit against au pair sponsoring companies alleging violations of antitrust laws, RICO, the FLSA, and state minimum wage laws, and other state laws. Au pairs are limited to one-year or less in the United States for each trip, and are required to be “proficient in spoken English.” Sponsors designated by the State Department conduct the au pair exchange program. The sponsors are responsible for selecting au pairs, selecting suitable host families, and placing au pairs with particular host families.
The au pair program affords foreign nationals “the opportunity to live with an American host family and participate directly in the home life of the host family.” Au pairs provide child care services for the host family subject to weekly and daily hour limitations, pursue six hours of academic credit during their year in the U.S., and receive in exchange monetary compensation, and two weeks paid vacation over the course of the year.
The au pair agreements contained a choice of law provision stating that they were governed by the laws of California. Additionally, the agreement signed by the au pairs contained identical arbitration provisions. After the named plaintiff filed her second amended complaint to add two former au pairs, the employer filed a motion to compel arbitration and dismiss the lawsuit.
Unconscionable provisions. The district court denied the employer’s motion, finding the arbitration provision unconscionable. The district court concluded that the au pair agreements were contracts of adhesion and procedurally unconscionable because the au pairs were relatively young at the time they signed the contracts, were foreigners, spoke English as a second language, and had no experience with contracts or contract law. Although each au pair had read the contract before signing it, the district court found that neither understood what “arbitration” meant. It also found an element of surprise because the arbitration provision was “buried” at the end of 80 paragraphs under a nondescript header and did not explain in plain English that the au pairs were waiving their right to access the United States court system.
The district court also determined that the arbitration provision was substantively unconscionable. It agreed with the au pairs that the clause vesting the employer with the right to unilaterally select an arbitration provider was substantively unconscionable. Finding the arbitration provision both procedurally and substantively unconscionable, the district court refused to sever any offending clauses, and denied the employer’s motion to compel arbitration.
Unconscionability. The Tenth Circuit agreed with the district court that the arbitration agreement was unconscionable, however it reached that conclusion for reasons more limited than those found by the lower court. As a consequence, the appeals court concluded that the provision was not permeated by unconscionability, and therefore the offending clauses should have been stricken, so that the parties’ agreement to arbitrate could be enforced.
Under California law, “unconscionability consists of both procedural and substantive elements.” “The procedural element addresses the circumstances of the contract negotiation and formation, focusing on oppression or surprise due to unequal bargaining power.” “Substantive unconscionability pertains to the fairness of an agreement’s actual terms and to assessments of whether they are overly harsh or one-sided.” The appeals court began its analysis by addressing procedural unconscionability.
Contract formation. Applying California law to the au pair agreement and arbitration agreement, the employer did not contest that the au pair agreements were adhesive contracts, which established a modest degree of procedural unconscionability. In this instance, the appeals court rejected the au pairs’ argument that they did not have a “meaningful alternative” to entering the au pair agreement. The au pair program is not employment in the traditional sense, and cannot be described as “necessary employment.” It is a means of educational and cultural exchange. Thus, participation in the program is not a matter of “necessity.”
The appeals court was also not convinced the fact that the au pairs spoke English as a second language increased the procedural unconscionability of the agreement. It was uncontested that the au pairs received translations of the agreement in their native languages. Moreover, to be eligible for participation in the program, au pairs had to be “proficient in spoken English.” Further, the court concluded that the au pairs’ contention that their age, status as foreigners, inexperience in contract law, and lack of knowledge of the meaning of “arbitration” were not factors increasing the procedural unconscionability of the contract formation. Those factors increased procedural unconscionability only a “moderate” degree. Finally, the appeals court found any surprise from the contract to be negligible.
Fairness of actual terms. The au pairs argued that three distinct clauses in the arbitration provision were unconscionable: the clause allowing the employer to unilaterally select the arbitration provider; the forum selection clause; and the fee shifting clause. First, the appeals court concluded the clause allowing the employer to unilaterally select the arbitration provider had the same inherent unconscionability as allowing it to select the arbitrator. Thus, this clause had a high degree of substantive unconscionability.
However, the au pairs’ contention that the forum selection clause was unconscionable was rejected. Here, the appeals court agreed with the employer that evidence in the record suggested that the au pairs should have reasonably expected they would be required to arbitrate in California, since it was a California company and the agreement was negotiated in California. Thus, the clause was not unconscionable. Finally, the appeals court rejected the au pairs’ contention that the fee shifting clause was unconscionable. The court observed that by its own terms, the fee shifting clause applied only to breach of contract claims.
Severance. Having found that only the arbitration provider selection clause was the only substantively unconscionable clause, the appeals court concluded that the contract was not permeated by unconscionability. It determined that it could easily sever the one offending clause from the remainder of the agreement. Accordingly, the appeals court concluded that the district court abused its discretion by not severing the offending clause. Thus, it determined that the arbitration provision should be severed and the parties’ agreement to arbitrate their dispute enforced.
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Archive for category: School of Public Affairs
J.R. Deshazo, professor of public policy and urban planning, is director of the Luskin Center for Innovation at the UCLA School of Public Affairs.
School of Public Affairs Welcomes Luskin Center for Innovation The Luskin Center is moved to the UCLA School of Public Affairs to increase the quality, visibility and coordination of research related to civic engagement
January 19, 2010 /0 Comments/in Climate Change, For Faculty, Luskin Center, Public Policy, Resources, School of Public Affairs J.R. DeShazo /by Joe Luk
In a move that enhances UCLA’s civic engagement while consolidating university resources, the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation—devoted to applied research and policy development relevant to the needs of Los Angeles—has recently become a new addition to the UCLA School of Public Affairs under the leadership of Dean Franklin Gilliam.
“Moving the Luskin Center to the School of Public Affairs advances UCLA’s efforts to increase the quality, visibility and coordination of research related to civic engagement,” states executive vice chancellor and provost Scott Waugh in an announcement to the University community, “We also are strengthening opportunities for students to participate in such research.”
J. R. DeShazo, associate professor of public policy, is appointed as the director of the Luskin Center, which focuses on the theme of addressing “pollution in L.A.”
Nonprofits React to UCLA Report on Their Struggle in Recession A UCLA Center for Civil Society study finds that costs and demands of non profits are rising while funding is diminishing
November 2, 2009 /0 Comments/in School of Public Affairs, Social Welfare, Social Welfare News /by Joe Luk
By Robin Heffler
On Friday, October 23, the UCLA Center for Civil Society in the UCLA School of Public Affairs released a report detailing the mixed impact of the current economic downturn on the local non-profit sector, delivering its findings in person to 185 representatives of non-profit organizations in the greater Los Angeles area, and receiving their immediate feedback.
Among the major findings were that most Los Angeles-area nonprofit organizations have experience reductions in funding from government and private foundations, while costs and demands for their services have risen. Yet the nonprofits largely have been able to retain their volunteers, staff, and programs.
The report, Resilience and Vulnerability: The State of the Nonprofit Sector in Los Angeles , was presented at the Center’s annual conference for local nonprofits, held at the Skirball Cultural Center. Researched and written by David B. Howard and Hyeon Jong Kil (both doctoral researchers in Social Welfare), it was based on a survey of more than 250 non-profit organizations from June to August 2009. There are about 41,500 registered nonprofit organizations in Los Angeles County.
One conference attendee, Abbe Lande of the Saban Free Clinic, echoed the report’s findings when she told other participants, “At every staff meeting we talk about tightening our belts. We keep doing more with less—trying to squeeze in more patients without hiring more staff –and the pressure to produce is intense. We’re seeing more people come in for the first time with incomes of about 200 percent of the poverty level. A lot of it is for mental health services.”
To better weather the recession, the report recommended that nonprofits focus more on program evaluation to better attract funders and make decisions about scarce resources; engage in widespread advocacy efforts, including discussions about policy decisions with elected officials and lawmakers; and collaborate with other nonprofits to decrease costs, increase efficiency, and share knowledge, merging when necessary.
Ted Knoll, who runs the Whittier Area First Day Coalition, which provides services for those who are homeless or at-risk of being homeless, said he appreciated both the “content and process” of the conference. “We did a merger in 2001, so I know this is doable,” he said. “The conference has made me think about possibly doing it again. At the same time, I’m networking with people I haven’t seen in years.”
Conference participants shared their experiences during small-group discussions on the findings. David Howard said that feedback will be included in an addendum to the report. “It helps us to tell a clearer story of what’s happening to nonprofits, which helps deliver messages that often get lost in the numbers,” he said.
In closing remarks, Helmut Anheier, founding director of the Center, said, “We will have a slow recovery for nonprofits. We didn’t learn the lessons from the previous recessions – that you need to prepare for them when times are good. This crisis will push business and nonprofits closer because there is little that the government can offer. Nonprofits will need to make sure that their concerns are part of the political agenda.”
Intervening in Violence: “People Join Gangs Because of a Lethal Absence of Hope” Associate professor Jorja Leap discusses factors that lead to young people joining gangs on radio show
October 21, 2009 /0 Comments/in School of Public Affairs, Social Welfare, Social Welfare News Jorja Leap /by Joe Luk
Jorja Leap, adjunct associate professor of social welfare, appeared as a guest on the Howard Gluss radio show to discuss the factors that lead to young people joining gangs.
Jorja Leap is an expert in crisis intervention and trauma response. Her research examines gangs, prison culture and high-risk and system-involved youth
“So many of the young men and young women I have worked with over the years come from families where there has been abuse,” says Leap. “They come from families where other family members have been gang members themselves. They come from families where there has been substance abuse and multiple problems and they also come from communities that are impoverished, but also more importantly communities that are affected by violence.”
The following is an excerpt from the interview:
GLUSS: We need the facts and then we need an emotional connection to the facts. So give us some of the facts.
LEAP: Well, the facts are, and I’m going to quote Father Greg Boyle here, gangs do not arise and people do not join gangs because of violence, people join gangs because of a lethal absence of hope.
GLUSS: Which is depression.
LEAP: It’s depression, you’re absolutely right. It’s a sense of powerlessness. It’s feeling there are no opportunities, no options, no one who cares. And that’s what it comes from. It comes from depression, and it also comes from, this will come as no surprise to you and I’m sure to other listeners, it also comes from families and communities.
So many of the young men and young women I have worked with over the years come from families where there has been abuse. They come from families where other family members have been gang members themselves. They come from families where there has been substance abuse and multiple problems and they also come from communities that are impoverished, but also more importantly communities that are affected by violence.
And you’ve mentioned that I’ve worked all over the world and one of the commonalities is that when young people and children are raised in violent communities they often have post traumatic stress disorder even as they are growing up and they will join gangs and engage in violent behavior strangely enough in order to feel empowered.
GLUSS: There’s a sense of respect and self esteem with that.
LEAP: Exactly…now you know, for example, I witnessed one very powerful transformation. There are young men and young women who are now being trained, former gang members that are being trained in solar panel installation, a job that with which they can earn a tremendous amount of money. The transformation in them and the sense of control they begin to feel is just astonishing in terms of themselves and their identity.
Listen to the entire interview here.
Dr. Jorja Leap is a professor at UCLA, a recognized expert in crisis intervention and trauma response and has been involved with training and research for the United Nations and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe as part of post-war development and conflict resolution in Bosnia and Kosovo and has conducted work with the families of victims of the 9/11 WTC disaster. She is the author of the book, “No One Knows Their Names.”
Questions for Sidewalk Scholar Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris Urban Planning professor details the importance of the urban sidewalk in new book.
October 21, 2009 /0 Comments/in Development and Housing, School of Public Affairs, Urban Planning Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris /by Joe Luk
Anastasia Louaitou-Sideris
Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, a professor of urban planning and a scholar of urban design and urban history at the Luskin School of Public Affairs, has researched the uses of all kinds of public spaces, from parks to plazas. Now she and her former Ph.D. student, Renia Ehrenfeucht, have tackled a most pedestrian subject, the lowly urban sidewalk. In their new book, “Sidewalks: Conflict and Negotation over Public Space” (MIT Press, 2009), Loukaitou-Sideris and Ehrenfeucht, now an assistant professor at the University of New Orleans, track the furious battles that have been fought on sidewalks over free speech, public access and conflicting uses. They have looked into policies governing sidewalks in five cities — Los Angeles, New York, Boston, Miami and Seattle — and found reasons why some cities have a vibrant sidewalk culture and in other cities, sidewalks are devoid of life.
The following is excerpted from an interview with UCLA Newsroom.
What first intrigued you about sidewalks?
Coming from Athens, Greece, where there is a very intensive use of sidewalks, I experienced a cultural shock when I first came to this country in 1983 as a graduate student and saw that sidewalks were empty in most places. This was so much in contrast to my own life experiences. I always had this question: Why are American sidewalks empty? What happened to the pedestrians? The book really responds to these questions.
In your book, you talk about sidewalk culture. What do you mean by that?
It’s the ability of people to territorialize this public space for positive uses because they feel that it is their own. As a citizen of a city, you feel you can jog, walk your dog or use this public space for public discourse, to display wares or communicate with your neighbors. But there are many instances where our laws have discouraged this sidewalk culture from developing. Cities now require permits for many uses of this public space. And these have intensified over the last decade.
Take street vending. It’s banned in Los Angeles, even though you can still find some street vendors in many communities, especially in East L.A. But we have banned not only street vending from sidewalks, but public demonstrations and celebrations. In the book, we document how over the years this emptying of sidewalks took place through regulations and ordinances.
Fifty-eight students are participating in the Senior Fellows program this year. Over the thirteen years since the program was created in 1997, more than 600 students have been matched with individual mentors for professional development.
Luskin School of Public Affairs Launches 2009-2010 Senior Fellows Cohort KCET’s Val Zavala opened the welcome event for the new cohort of Fellows, who have been matched with 58 students.
October 20, 2009 /0 Comments/in School of Public Affairs /by Joe Luk
Together with several returning Senior Fellows, including the keynote speaker, KCET’s vice president of news and public affairs, Val Zavala, the 2009 Senior Fellows Breakfast sparked conversations about career interests, networking, and policy issues, to be further followed up with activities throughout the academic year.
“You’re really going to enjoy this,” said Zavala, addressing the new Senior Fellows, “the time you spend is true quality time, both for the young people and in relationship with the School.”
This year’s cohort includes new participants who are professionals from the media, public service, business, environmental, and government sectors: Hasan Ikhrata, executive director, Southern California Association of Governments; BongHwan “BH” Kim, general manager, Department of Neighborhood Empowerment, City of Los Angeles; Frank I. Luntz, president of The Word Doctors; Jim Newton, opinion editor-at-large, The Los Angeles Times; Mary D. Nichols, chairman, California Air Resources Board; Katherine Aguilar Perez, executive director, Urban Land Institute, Los Angeles; and William E. Simon, Jr., co-chairman, William E. Simon & Sons, LLC.
“Get them to your workplace, show them around and introduce them to your colleagues,” Zavala urged students, “make it a real high priority.”
The School of Public Affairs opened the 2009-2010 Senior Fellows program at a welcome breakfast this morning at the UCLA Faculty Center. The Fellows, selected for their distinguished leadership across sectors, are invited to contribute their time and expertise through a career-site visit program, professional mentorship of two to three current School of Public Affairs students, and a policy briefing on leadership, management, or a topic relevant to their field of expertise. Students who participate in the program are selected in a competitive process and matched to a Fellow at the recommendation of graduate advisors and faculty in their respective departments.
Click here to view the event photos.
UCLA participated in the first Rosenfield Forum in Washington D.C., bringing together top researchers from around the country.
Escaping the prison trap: UCLA professors, criminal justice experts tackle prison crisis at DC forum UCLA participates in first Rosenfield Forum in Washington D.C., bringing together top researchers from across the country.
October 20, 2009 /0 Comments/in Public Policy, School of Public Affairs, Social Welfare, Urban Planning Franklin D. Gilliam Jr., Mark Kleiman /by Joe Luk
UCLA brought together top researchers in the criminal justice field, congressional staff, a high-ranking official in the Obama administration and a California congressman for its first Rosenfield Forum in Washington, D.C., on Oct. 8.
More than 70 people participated in the half-day event, titled “Escaping the Prison Trap: How to Have Less Crime and Less Incarceration,” which included three panels and presentations by premiere scholars from UCLA and other institutions.
“We’re fortunate that within the walls of our school we had a diversity of approaches to the issues” that helped UCLA in hosting this forum, Franklin D. Gilliam Jr., dean of the UCLA School of Public Affairs, said in his opening remarks. “At the risk of sounding immodest, this diversity of approaches and viewpoints is a hallmark of our school and one of its great strengths.”
U.S. Associate Attorney General Thomas J. Perrelli, the third-highest ranking official in the Justice Department, led off the forum with a discussion of the Obama administration’s approach to crime prevention and reduction. His comments underscored Gilliam’s point about the wealth of expertise at UCLA.
“Everyone always talks about being ‘tough’ on crime, but our focus is being ‘smart’ on crime,” said Perrelli, who also worked under former Attorney General Janet Reno during the Clinton administration. “Research in this area is not research for its own sake; it is the kind of thing we really do hope to examine, implement and, frankly, learn more from. There really are people, particularly in this Justice Department, who are listening to the outcomes of your conversations and the research that you develop. We’re excited to hear more.”
“Escaping the Prison Trap” sought to address some of the major issues confronting the U.S. justice system today, including the country’s unprecedented incarceration rate; the role of communities in reducing crime, especially among juveniles; and the development of innovative programs for deterring crime and reducing prison crowding.
Two additional Rosenfield Forums will bring together UCLA scholars with national and local leaders this academic year; the next addresses transportation issues, and the final forum will explore issues related to youth in the foster care system.
“We’re excited, we’re thrilled to be here in Washington,” Gilliam said at the outset of the forum, which helped broaden UCLA’s influence as an institution committed to helping solve some of the nation’s most pressing problems. “We want to promote UCLA faculty and inform — and hopefully influence — the national debate.”
Throughout the four-hour discussion, scholars laid out the problems with our current prison system and ways to fix it.
“You have to figure out what works,” Perrelli said. “Nothing, really, should be off the table, and if you’re going to figure out what works, you need evidence and research to do that.”
He asked for the academics’ help on that front.
“Help us think outside the box about the next generation of promising approaches,” he said. “I think we’re asking the right questions about how to really make communities safer, how to reduce crime.”
Using evidence-based approaches and research and determining how to use governments’ limited resources more effectively is the path U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s Justice Department will follow, he added.
U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff (D–Calif.) repeated Perrelli’s request for assistance as he wrapped up the forum.
“We desperately need the expertise and insight of the people in this room,” he told the eight panelists and the experts assembled in the audience. “It’s always a fight in Congress” to try to change policy when crime is the issue.
Anyone who attempts to implement programs similar to the ones discussed during the three panels gets tagged as being “soft on crime,” Schiff said, making such programs a tough sell to legislators.
“But look at the crisis in California, where one-fourth of the prison population may have to be released by court order,” he said. “I don’t want to wait until we’re in a situation like that. We need to be more proactive, more thoughtful.”
Perrelli also addressed the issue’s political sensitivity and the implications of reform efforts.
“The easier course politically might simply be to take the ‘tough on crime’ approach, to announce the tough on crime mantra and put more people in jail,” Perrelli said.
But that won’t solve the problem, reduce crime or save money, he added.
“It shouldn’t surprise us that the system that we have now isn’t working particularly well,” Perrelli said. “You think about the amount of money that you’re spending on prisons, particularly in this era of budget cuts, and you ask yourself, ‘If I could make the community as safe or safer than it is today but reduce the level of incarceration and have those funds to do a host of other things, what could we do with that?'”
Panelists discussed a wide range of topics, from the effect of maximum-minimum sentencing guidelines to the perils of treating juvenile offenders as adults and the correlation between prison sentences and unemployment.
“The phrase ‘crime doesn’t pay’ is oft-repeated by those who are ‘tough on crime,’ yet statistics bear out that crime already doesn’t pay, literally,” said panelist Mark Kleiman, a UCLA professor of public policy. “A burglar makes about $8 for every day he’s in prison.”
All the panelists criticized fixes that represent mere “tinkering” and recommended wholesale changes to the system.
“I don’t believe we can fix this with business as usual, but we can fix this — it is real,” said David Kennedy, director of the Center on Crime Prevention and Control at the City University of New York’s John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
David F. Weiman, an economics professor at Columbia University and Barnard College, offered just one reason why fundamentally changing the system would be so challenging.
“The status quo is deeply entrenched,” he said. “It’s an uphill battle because there’s a system already in place.” Weiman likened the potential need to close prisons to the extremely politically sensitive process of military base closures.
“Imagine closing prisons,” Weiman said. “Each prison has constituency,” just like the bases.
As the forum wrapped up, Gilliam said that Associate Attorney General Perrelli had laid out the theme in his opening remarks.
“Maybe the theme of the whole forum is being ‘smart’ on crime,” Gilliam said. “It’s not a matter of whether we are ‘tough’ on crime, but are we ‘smart’ on crime?”
Gilliam also encouraged academics, when returning to their research, to focus even more on solutions.
“One of the things that plagues this field is a ‘crisis’ focus,” he said. “There aren’t enough solutions.”
The Rosenfield Forum in Washington, D.C. brings together researchers to discuss methods of crime reduction
Crime Forum Opens in Washington DC: Judge Alm Delivers on HOPE Rosenfield Forum brings together researchers to discuss methods of crime reduction
October 7, 2009 /0 Comments/in Public Policy, Public Policy News, School of Public Affairs, Social Welfare, Social Welfare News, Urban Planning Franklin D. Gilliam Jr., Laura Abrams, Mark Kleiman, Michael Stoll /by Joe Luk
WASHINGTON, DC—Addressing the record incarceration rates across the U.S. and the boom in the prison population, the UCLA School of Public Affairs launched the first in a series of public discussions on critical national issues with the opening dinner of the Rosenfield Forums at the National Press Club in Washington DC.
“The Rosenfield Forums are an opportunity to bring together some of the country’s best thinkers, practitioners, advocates, policy makers, and other stakeholders,” says Dean Franklin D. Gilliam, Jr., “This week’s particular event focuses on encouraging all of us to think a little differently about how we reduce crime in the United States. This is an important and deeply corrosive phenomenon: it corrodes the public space, it corrodes our young people, and it crowds our prisons. Much of the worlds of crime and punishment are artificially constructed around these two poles—too much crime and too much incarceration. What you’ll see in this event is scholars grappling with the complexities of these issues, and presenting some elegant solutions—elegant in both simplicity and power.”
The inaugural forum, “Escaping the Prison Trap: How to Have Less Crime and Less Incarceration,” featured a keynote address on October 7 by the Honorable Steve S. Alm of the Hawaii State Judiciary. Alm is the creator of Project HOPE (Hawaii’s Opportunity and Probation and Enforcement), an innovative crime reduction program for drug offenses that has had dramatic success rates. Judge Alm described a frustrating sentencing and incarceration system that amounted to little more than a revolving door for minor drug offenders to move in and out of the judicial system.
“I can send them to the beach, or send them to prison—it’s crazy that these were the only options.” After gaining cooperation from several agencies, including the probation department, the sheriffs and U.S. marshals, Judge Alm created a systematic approach in which offenders were given instructions for calling a telephone hotline to see if they were selected that day for random drug testing. If they tested positive for drugs, they are arrested on the spot and brought up for a hearing within two days. “Swift and certain consequence is the key.” Says Alm, “If probationers know there will be caught and punished, they will not violate. Probation officers are pleased with the results, because clients were showing up to their appointments, and showing up sober.”
The program has had remarkable success in Hawaii (up to a 50% drop in repeat offenses among drug probationers); has been replicated by other judges; and has become the focus of research by UCLA Public Policy Professor Mark Kleiman and Pepperdine University Public Policy Professor Angela Hawken. The Department of Justice has funded a program to introduce the program to other jurisdictions across the country.
The Rosenfield Forums continue on October 8 at the Rayburn Building on Capital Hill with panel discussions on: reducing juvenile crime and incarceration, led by Associate Professor Laura Abrams of the Department of Social Welfare; the consequences of mass incarceration, led by Professor Michael Stoll of the Department of Public Policy; and getting more crime control with less punishment, led by Professor Mark Kleiman of the Department of Public Policy.
Challenges for Youth Reentering Society After Incarceration Social Welfare Associate Professor Laura Abrams joined the Howard Gluss Radio Show to discuss juvenile justice and reentry.
August 24, 2009 /0 Comments/in Diversity, School of Public Affairs, Social Welfare, Social Welfare News Laura Abrams /by Joe Luk
Laura Abrams, associate professor of social welfare at UCLA, appeared as a guest on the Howard Gluss radio show (August 14, 2009) to discuss the barriers to successful reentry to society for juveniles in the incarceration system. Abrams is the director of the juvenile justice and reentry project, a program of the Department of Social Welfare at the UCLA School of Public Affairs that fosters the reintegration of juvenile offenders into the community upon their release. The following are excerpts from the interview.
What are the major challenges that we face as a society for stopping young people entering the prison system?
“One of the things that it’s hard for people to wrap their minds around when we talk about juvenile offenders is that they are young people…and the majority haven’t committed violent crimes. They’re young people who deserve the opportunity to have a different pathway in their lives.”
“As a community, we think more about the punitive aspect of corrections and juvenile justice and not so much what happens when they return to society and when they transition to adulthood…When youth are get out of settings of incarceration, they’re often in a place where they don’t have school credits, or haven’t graduated from high school, they don’t have job skills, some don’t have families to return to. So they enter that already difficult transitional period of emerging adulthood without many skills or resources necessary to be successful.”
“Research has identified practices in the juvenile justice system that give youth a chance at better outcomes:
Diversion, or keeping low-risk offenders out of incarceration (through home arrest or probation);
Smaller settings, rather than large institutional settings;
Longer treatment duration than (6 months rather than 2 months);
Staff trained in therapeutic practices like cognitive behavioral work and family work; and
Addressing underlying problems such as substance abuse, mental health issues and learning disabilities.”
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Category Archives: NOVA
Magnat Magnasphere Nova Speaker System Review
Magnat Magnasphere Nova BRON
Magnat, a prominent West German loudspeaker manufacturer, is introducing a novel four-way, three-piece speaker system that is claimed to be the first speaker to achieve true omnidirectional sound dispersion. The system supplied to us for test was a preproduction model, as the speaker is not scheduled for release until later this year.
The Magnasphere Nova consists of two satellite speakers and a powered subwoofer module. The subwoofer, like similar products in its external appearance, is approximately cubical and has a glossy black piano finish. Its output emerges from slots about 2 inches high and 20 inches long near floor level on the front and rear of the enclosure.
The satellites, however, are unique in appearance and design. Each consists of three black, perfo-rated-metal spheres stacked vertically on a slender black-steel column. Each sphere contains a pair of magnetic drivers mounted back-to-back and radiating in opposite directions. Since each driver pair operates in phase, the radiation pattern is approximately the same in all directions except in the plane of the sphere’s vertical “equator,” where the drivers are joined.
The bottom sphere of each satellite, the “woofer,” contains two 4-inch polypropylene-dome radiators that operate between 100 and 1,400 Hz. Each dome, constructed of two different thicknesses of polypropylene and mounted in a cutout in a plastic sphere slightly less than 8 inches in diameter, is driven at its 2-1/4-inch diameter by an inner “cone” that has a smaller voice coil at its apex.
The middle sphere, which radiates from 1,400 to 3,400 Hz, is essentially a smaller version of the woofer sphere. It contains two 2-inch soft-metal-dome radiators mounted back-to-back within a 4-inch spherical case, which in turn is surrounded by the perforated-metal cage. Immediately above it is the tweeter, with a pair of 1-inch drivers in a 2-1/2-inch cage (all these dimensions are approximate).
Passive crossover networks for the satellite drivers are located within their spherical enclosures, which are joined by eight-pin DIN connectors. A separate control box contains an active electronic crossover circuit, with a slope of 24 dB per octave, that excludes the low-bass frequencies from the satellites, supplying them to the subwoofer module through a cable and DIN plugs. The controller has front-panel adjustments for setting the subwoofer’s output level and the low-bass crossover frequency (either 80, 100, or 120 Hz).
An unusual feature of the Magnat system is its time-delay correction. Any three-piece system such as the Magnasphere Nova is very likely to have large time differences between the outputs of its subwoofer and satellites. In part, this results from the placement of these components in the listening room, where they are often many feet apart, and in part from the inherently greater delay in the output of a subwoofer compared with that of a midrange or high-frequency driver. The audible significance, if any, of these time differences has not been established, but the Magnasphere Nova provides a way for the user to compensate for them, if only approximately.
The signals supplied to the satellites are routed through a high-pass Bessel filter whose delay can be adjusted for 0, 32, or 64 milliseconds (ms) by a switch on the control unit. Since typical delay differences in a three-piece system like the Nova will fall in that range, presumably a user could reduce the differences substantially by delaying the satellite speakers’ output by 32 or 64 ms.
The Magnasphere Nova subwoofer contains four long-throw drivers, each with a cone diameter of 7-2/5 inches. They are mounted in opposing pairs on a board that divides the inside of the cabinet horizontally. Each pair is driven by the signal from one stereo channel, although the acoustic outputs of all four drivers are effectively combined at the cabinet’s ports. Magnat describes the subwoofer as having a “compound principle” of operation. Apparently each opposing pair of drivers operates in “push-pull” mode, with their cones moving in the same direction, instead of in opposition as in the satellites. The subwoofer’s amplifier, built into the enclosure, is rated to deliver 180 watts per channel continuously, or 500 watts peak output, with less than 0.05 percent distortion.
The top of the tweeter sphere is about 47 inches from the floor, the bottom of the woofer sphere about 30 inches. The stands, about 1-5/8 inches in diameter, have black cast-iron bases. Each complete satellite weighs about 28 pounds. The subwoofer module is about 21 inches wide and high, and 18 inches deep. Although its weight was not specified, we can testify that it is very heavy!
The control unit is a black-finished metal cabinet that measures 16-3/4 inches wide, 11 inches deep, and 3-3/8 inches high. Its front panel contains a power switch and a small button that causes a motor to open and close the lower half of the panel, which covers the other controls. The panel also has a pair of overload lights to warn of excessive signal levels. Price: $5,500 (estimated) for the system.
Some details of the Magnasphere Nova system, especially the control unit and its specific adjustment ranges, might be changed in the final production models. Since the radiators used in the satellites have been in the Magnat product line for some time, however, they can be expected to remain as described.
We placed the satellites about 8 feet apart and 4 feet from the wall behind them. The subwoofer was located approximately on the same line as the satellites and midway between them. We set the subwoofer output level by ear for the best possible bass response without excessive boominess on vocal sounds, and the 80-hz crossover setting was used for most listening and measurements. We tried the other settings as well, but the lowest of the three frequencies generally produced the best results.
Our frequency-response measurements were made in the usual way, plotting room-response curves for both satellites on the same chart and averaging them to smooth out room standing-wave effects. We measured the subwoofer’s response with each of the crossover settings, placing the microphone at one of the output slots. Bass distortion was measured at the same point, using the 80-Hz crossover setting.
We measured the impedance of a satellite unit, which is the only part of the Magnasphere Nova that is actually driven by the user’s regular system power amplifier, over the full audio frequency range. The system’s sensitivity was measured at a 1-meter distance, with only one satellite operating, using 2.83 volts of pink-noise input. Since there is no fixed relationship between the signal input level and the subwoofer’s acoustic output (their relative levels are set by ear), we measured the drive signal needed to produce a 90-dB sound-pressure level (SPL) at a 1-meter distance from the subwoofer slot at 50 Hz (on the flat portion of the subwoofer’s frequency response) and then maintained that same input level from 100 Hz downward when measuring bass distortion.
Our quasi-anechoic FFT response measurements with the IQS signal-analysis system were made 1 meter from a satellite. With the microphone close to each of the spheres, we also measured their individual frequency response on the forward axis and at 45 and 90 degrees off-axis (the latter angle is close to the solid band that unites each pair of hemispheres). Plotting the axial and off-axis response curves on the same printout enabled us to assess the actual directivity of each section of the satellite speaker. In addition to our usual group-delay measurements, applied to a complete satellite array, we made a group-delay measurement on the output of the subwoofer alone.
The satellites’ combined room response was very uniform, ±3 dB from 200 to 20,000 Hz, indicating a relatively flat acoustic power-output characteristic. Below 200 or 300 Hz the response became irregular because of room reflections. The close-miked subwoofer response was flat within ± 2 dB from 25 to 80 Hz using the 80-Hz crossover setting; the upper limit extended to 110 and 140 Hz with the 100- and 120-Hz settings, respectively. From 30 to 72 Hz, the subwoofer’s output varied only ± 1 dB.
Splicing the Nova system’s bass and room-response curves was not as easy as it is for most conventional single-cabinet speaker systems. The reference level of the bass curve could be placed almost anywhere relative to the room-response level, and the room’s standing-wave effects eliminated the usual clues to the relationship between the two. We finally joined the curves with the flat region of the subwoofer response at the same level as the smoothed satellite room response, which left the region from 100 to 200 Hz undefined. Since this frequency range is strongly affected by speaker placement and room dimensions, our choice was not unreasonable. The other parts of the curve give a fair indication of what the Magnasphere Nova system itself is capable of.
The composite response, which had only a few minor irregularities, varied ± 3 dB from 23 to 20,000 Hz. The bass distortion was between 2 and 3 percent from 25 to 100 Hz, climbing to 8.5 percent at 20 Hz. The distortion consisted entirely of second and third harmonics.
The impedance of a satellite, using the 100-Hz crossover, varied between 3.7 and 7 ohms over the range from 200 to 20,000 Hz (the nominal system rating is 4 ohms). The impedance rose smoothly below 200 Hz, to about 60 ohms at 20 Hz, reflecting the isolation provided by the system’s crossover network.
The system’s sensitivity appeared to be rather low, with each satellite producing only 80 dB spl at 1 meter with a drive signal of 2.83 volts of pink noise. This figure does not include, however, the considerable contribution of the subwoofer at frequencies below 100 Hz. In actual use, the system did not require an unusual amount of drive power even at very high levels.
The fft measurements were consistent with our other results. Since they extended beyond our usual 20,000-hz measurement limit, they confirmed that the satellites’ high-frequency response was virtually flat up to about 27,000 Hz. One of the more interesting fft measurements was the group-delay response to the subwoofer, which averaged about 30 milliseconds from 35 to 95 Hz and increased to 70 ms at 20 Hz. This suggests that the optional delay compensation in the Nova’s system controller could, in theory, correct for much of the difference between the subwoofer’s delay and the typical delay of less than 0.5 ms across the rest of the audio range that we measured from the satellite output.
The fft measurements also proved that the spherical radiators are not really omnidirectional, although their effective dispersion is wide enough to give them many of the subjective qualities of an omnidirectional radiator. A close-miked measurement of the tweeter sphere at angles of 0 and 45 degrees off its forward axis showed that the two response curves differed by 3 to 6 dB over most of the tweeter’s operating range. Although this is good dispersion, the response at 90 degrees off the forward axis was down more than 20 dB over most of the range. As would be expected, the midrange radiator was better, with less than 3 dB separating the axial and 45-degree curves over its full operating range. Still, the midrange output at 90 degrees off-axis was typically 18 to 20 dB below the axial level. The woofer sphere showed virtually no response change over the first 45 degrees, but at 90 degrees it was a uniform 12 dB down over most of that driver’s operating range.
The Magnasphere Nova system was a very “listenable” speaker. The sound from the satellites seemed to float in the air, with no clues to its origin as long as we were a few feet away from the speakers. It not only filled the space between them but extended behind and above them as well.
We were unable to hear any difference in the sound as a result of switching the delay compensation between 0 and 64 milliseconds, but there is little evidence to show that bass delays in that range are audible. While this feature looks promising in principle, it may be of little practical value.
The subwoofer, of course, cannot be located by ear, although it is certainly obvious to the eye. Too much subwoofer output can make some programs bottom-heavy, and we chose what seemed to be a reasonable level for our listening tests, setting the bass control at less than half of its maximum rotation. Even this middling level produced a solid, almost tactile deep-bass output with suitable program material.
We soon found that listening to the Magnasphere Nova tends to distract one from trying to dissect and analyze its sound output. That is a characteristic of most very good speakers, and the Nova is unequivocally one of the better-sounding ones we have heard.
Our only clear disagreement with the claims made for the Magnasphere Nova concerns its supposed “omnidirectionality.” The satellites are really sets of three dipole radiators, with virtually no radiation to the sides and equal outputs front and rear. They have the audible qualities of a good dipole and are much more compact than most. Whether you find them attractive as home furnishings is a matter of personal taste. And they are certainly expensive. But in the final analysis, it is the sound of a speaker that justifies its cost, and Magnat’s Magnasphere Nova system passes that test beautifully.
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Farewell Home Season
Ruf’s bases-clearing double in the first inning staked the Phillies to a 3-1 lead but that’s all the sound the offense made the rest of the night as the Nationals inched closer to taking the NL East title away from the Phillies who have owned it since 2007.
Riding three home runs, Washington ended the Phillies 11-year string of playing .500 or better at home as they finished 40-41. Last losing season at home was 2000.
The Phillies lost back-to-back series for the first time since the last two series right before the All-Star Game. They battled back into wildcard contention but one more loss or one more St. Louis win ends that faint hope.
J-Roll was the last batter, ending the home season with a pop up at 10:20 p.m. He jogged to first, made a right turn into the Phillies dugout and headed for the clubhouse with the rest of his teammates.
Washington was high-fiving on the field, which is certainly an improvement from the previous year’s last games at Citizens Bank Park, postseason losses to the Cardinals in 2011 and Giants in 2010. Worse than last year’s loss was the sight of Howard on the field in pain from a torn Achilles. While the Phillies had a ton of injuries this season, the good news is no one got hurt on the final home game.
While the fans were heading home, the Phillies headed for a Delta charter flight for Miami. Three games there and then three in DC ends the season. The Nationals headed for St. Louis for the weekend.
The season’s 62nd sellout pushed the season total to 3,565,718, fourth highest in team history. It was Fan Appreciation Night and prizes were given out all night long. Probably the most valuable prize was a gift card for gas from Sunoco.
The big crowd had dwindled, leaving a small number to see the end. The faithful filed out slowly out after the last out. A few lingered and took photos with their iPhones. Ushers and usherettes hugged. The ballgirls hung out in front of the Phillies dugout. Their season was over, too, but they didn’t want to leave.
The ground crew worked on the field and covered the mound and home plate with tarps, a post-game ritual. There’s no game until next April but there’s a wedding on the field Saturday.
Here Comes The Bride is replacing Take Me Out To the Ball Game.
A fitting tribute for this bunch of losers…so much for home field advantage, huh? What’s the Vegas line on them going 4-1 in these last away games to get above .500 for the season? A zillion to 1 most likely!
By davy on September 29, 2012 12:59 pm - Reply
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HOTEL MUMBAI (2019) – Brutal Re-Telling of Mumbai Terrorist Attack
In 2008, terrorists stormed the famed Taj Hotel in Mumbai, India, killing and wounding hundreds of people. With only a miniscule police force outside the hotel, and special forces units hours away, it fell upon the hotel staff to protect the hotel’s guests. HOTEL MUMBAI (2019) tells their story.
Unfortunately, it also tells the story of the actual terrorists, as the film attempts to point out that the terrorists were young men who were obviously duped by their unseen leader to carry out these vicious attacks. This part of the movie, although minor, doesn’t work as well as the rest.
The best part of HOTEL MUMBAI is the stories it tells of the victims hiding inside the hotel.
Arjun (Dev Patel) is married, has a young son, and his wife is pregnant with their next child. He works at the hotel, and money is tight, and so he desperately needs this job. When he forgets his shoes, he’s scolded by the head chef Oberoi (Anupam Kher) and told to go home, but he begs to stay, and Oberoi relents and offers him a spare pair of shoes in his office.
David (Armie Hammer) and Zahra (Nazanin Boniadi) are a multicultural couple. He’s American and she’s Indian. They’re at the hotel with their baby and baby’s nanny Sally (Tilda Cobham-Hervey).
Once the terrorists storm the hotel, head chef Oberoi is the one who pretty much organizes the resistance, helping to move as many guests as possible into the most secure area of the hotel.
As the terrorists move freely about the building, with special forces hours away, the story becomes more harrowing as the guests gradually begin to run out of options. There are only so many places they can hide, and the gunmen, armed with assault rifles and grenades, continue their onslaught with frightening persistence.
The scenes of death and carnage in HOTEL MUMBAI are brutal and difficult to watch. Some have suggested that these scenes border on the exploitative. I wouldn’t go that far, but I will say that watching the gunmen march boldly through the hotel killing innocent people indiscriminately, taking their time about it because law enforcement was nowhere in sight, was wince inducing. But it also bolsters the story. The film makes clear the awful fate that awaits the guests if they’re spotted by the terrorists.
HOTEL MUMBAI works best when following the plight of the survivors, the frightened guests, and the brave hotel staff who did their best to protect them. Writer/director Anthony Maras and screenwriter John Collee flesh out the characters in a relatively brief time. I really cared for all of these folks, which made the movie that more effective.
And the cast also helps. Oscar nominee Dev Patel comes closest to playing a lead character, as the main story is framed around Arjun. Patel, who was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for LION (2016), and who also starred in SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE (2008) and CHAPPIE (2015), is as expected excellent here. Arjun is both a sympathetic and very brave character, putting his life on the line for the hotel guests.
Armie Hammer, who we just saw in ON THE BASIS OF SEX (2018) where he played Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s husband Martin, is very good here as David. The scenes where he makes his way back up to his room to rescue his baby and Sally are extremely compelling.
Nazanin Boniadi is equally as good as David’s wife Zahra. She too has to brave the bloody corridors of the hotel to find her family. And Tilda Cobham-Hervey, who spends most of the movie protecting Zahra’s and David’s baby is excellent as the terrified Sally.
I also enjoyed Jason Isaacs, who recently played Captain Gabriel Lorca on STAR TREK: DISCOVERY (2017-18), and who also starred in the impressive horror movie A CURE FOR WELLNESS (2016). Here he plays a Russian operative named Vasili who’s a guest at the hotel and befriends Zahra once the terrorists attack. Not only does he get some of the best lines in the film, but he’s the only character in the movie inside the hotel with any kind of military experience.
My favorite performance in the film however probably belongs to Anupam Kher as head chef Oberoi. He makes Oberoi the ultimate professional, and when he’s tasked with protecting the guests, he accepts the challenge and does what he can. What I particularly liked about this character and Kher’s performance is that he doesn’t suddenly become an action hero. He’s a chef, and what he can do to help these people is limited. The help he can offer is based on his knowledge of the hotel, knowing where the safest place is to keep the guests, and also his cool demeanor as head chef serves him well in keeping the people calm.
Kher was also memorable in SILVER LININGS PLAYBOOK (2012) and THE BIG SICK (2016). He’s a character actor who makes his mark every time I see him in a movie, even if he’s playing a relatively small role.
As I said, HOTEL MUMBAI also portrays the terrorists as young men pretty much brainwashed by their unseen leader who speaks to them on the phone and coldly encourages them to kill as many people as possible, all in the name of Allah. While the film should be commended for taking this approach— it’s always a good idea to present as many sides to a story as possible— it didn’t really win me over. Watching them brutally murder people, I didn’t really want to know anything about them, nor did I feel sympathy for them. In fact, I probably would have enjoyed the movie more had it not featured any background on these killers at all. Intellectually, I understood the approach, but emotionally I rebelled against it.
The film does a better job pointing out that the Muslim terrorists do not represent all Muslims. Zahra is also Muslim, and her confrontation with one of the terrorists, one of the most riveting scenes in the movie, is symbolic of this difference.
The other subplot that also really works is the small security force which realizes that even though they are outmanned and outgunned, they have to do something to fight back, and so they venture back into the hotel in an attempt to commandeer the security cameras so they can at least get a fix on the terrorists’ positions inside the hotel. Theirs is also a harrowing story.
HOTEL MUMBAI is a riveting and oftentimes disturbing re-telling of the deadly terrorist attack on the Taj Hotel. I hesitate to say I enjoyed this film because it’s not a comfortable movie to sit through, but it succeeds in telling its edge-of-your seat story of a small group of hotel guests and staff who banded together to fight for their survival against a merciless group of vicious gunmen.
While I may not have “enjoyed” it, I highly recommend it.
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Michael’s Musings: United We Stand, Divided We’re— Streaming?
It’s commonly believed, and rightly so, that we live in an extremely divided society here in 2019, especially politically. Yup, you’d be hard-pressed to argue that the political divides which exist today aren’t among the most divisive we’ve experienced in a long time.
Similarly, we’re also divided by our home entertainment. Oh, I don’t mean by what we like and don’t like, but rather, by what we have access to. Specifically, I’m talking about streaming services.
There are a lot of them out there, comparable in price and quality.
For me, I have Netflix. I was on board when they only offered DVDs, and when they made the switch to streaming, I followed along and loved it even more. The price is right, and they provide tons of movies and TV shows. Sure, there are things they don’t have, but they offer so much. I’m never going to run out of things to watch, and so I don’t mind that some of my favorite movies aren’t available there. Most of these favorite movies I own on DVD/Blu-ray anyway.
However, what I don’t have is what’s available on the other services. To get that, obviously, you have to buy the other services. Each. One. Separately. And so there’s CBS All Access, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and Sling TV, to name just a few. And there’ll be more. For instance very soon Disney will be launching its own streaming service.
Take your pick. Or buy them all. If you can afford them. And that’s a big if. So right now we don’t have access to the same programming, unless we pay for it, which means we’re watching different things. No big deal. Right?
In the old days of broadcast and network TV this wouldn’t have been a problem. Everyone in the nation could tune into their favorite programs if they wanted to because they were available to all, and they were free.
Access to television wasn’t part of my grandparents’ budget. It’s part of mine. And yours.
So, in a way, we’ve gone backwards, and whenever society moves backwards, that’s not a good thing.
And what happens if the same thing occurs with our news access? As more people move away from cable TV, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, and since broadcast TV doesn’t exist anymore, access to news is shrinking.
Sure, you can get news online, but let’s say it becomes harder to do so. Let’s say people stop making the time to read online news, or their news feeds grow increasingly partisan and brief. Do we run the risk of becoming an uninformed society? Years ago, Walter Cronkite was famously associated with news coverage of major historic events like the JFK assassination and the moon landing. Can you imagine such events happening today but without news coverage? That’s a scary concept.
It’s also not realistic. Yet.
I mean, right now there’s no shortage of news outlets, but what if this changes? What if we become a society so enamored with streaming services that’s all we watch?
Now, I’m not arguing that technology is bad, or that we need to return to the “good old days of broadcast television” when there were only three major networks. I’m not saying that at all. Because given the choice between what streaming has to offer compared to television in the old days, I’ll choose streaming every time.
And that’s because our current streaming services are great. They provide tons of content which we can watch whenever we want. You can’t get a better deal than what they provide.
Except when everyone and their grandmother offers a streaming service, forcing viewers to choose what they want to watch and charging them to pay for more services than they ultimately need.
It’s a potentially bad precedent to put all the costs for the various streaming services on the consumer who I bet most likely cannot afford more than one or two of them, which then forces the consumer to pick and choose between them. You and I won’t have access to the same programs.
In the end, if they continue to pop up and charge customers for exclusive programming, streaming services could become more alienating than we bargained for.
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US (2019) – Ambitious Horror Movie Never Seems Real
I was really looking forward to seeing US (2019).
Written and directed by Jordan Peele, the man who gave us GET OUT (2017), one of my favorite movies from that year, US boasted creepy trailers and advanced critical acclaim.
Imagine my disappointment when the end credits rolled and I found myself realizing I had just sat through— a dud.
Yep, I didn’t like US all that much. Didn’t like it at all.
The film opens creepily enough. It’s 1986, and a young girl is with her family at a beach boardwalk amusement park. The girl walks away and enters a house of mirrors on her own, where she has a bizarre and frightening experience. The film switches to present day where the girl Adelaide (Lupita Nyong’o) is now an adult with her own family: husband Gabe (Winston Duke), teenage daughter Zora (Shahadi Wright Joseph) and younger son Jason (Evan Alex).
They’re a normal enough family and early on they’re fun to watch. On vacation, they decide to go to the same beach boardwalk where Adelaide had her traumatic experience as a kid. How weird is that? I don’t think I’d take my kids to a place that held such haunting memories for me, but anyway, throughout the vacation Adelaide can’t help but feel that something bad is going to happen to her family. Of course she feels this! She’s at the same place where she had her childhood trauma! Duh!
Her fears become reality when at night four mysterious figures show up outside their door, figures that look like another family. Young Jason nails it when he says “They’re us.” Because that’s who they are, strange zombielike doppelgängers of the four family members.
And it’s at this point in the film, where it introduces its horrific elements, where it should take off and soar, where for me, it simply all unravels, and I lost interest.
Not for reasons usually associated with a bad horror movie.
For starters, US is a very ambitious movie, in terms of theme and symbolic images. It plays like a college thesis. There’s a lot going on, but for me, its undoing is a lack of believability and ultimately a lack of emotion. It’s a rare thing for me to like a movie that doesn’t move me emotionally, and US didn’t move me one iota, mostly because the threat never seemed real to me, and so I never was full on board with the plight of these characters.
Sure, I appreciated what the film was saying, I understood why it was saying it, but I didn’t believe the way it was saying it. Basically, there are two versions of this family, and as the film later shows, two versions of a lot of families, and when the alternate Adelaide responds to the question of who is she with the answer, “We’re Americans,” you get the point of the two Americas. The alternate Americans are dressed in red, not a friendly color these days. I get the symbolism.
But the story as told in US made little sense to me. The story of these people’s origins never resonated with me as anything other than a symbolic treatise on our modern-day culture. As such, it distracted me from the proceedings and took away from the horror elements. The entire time the family was fighting for their lives I felt disconnected from them because their story played out less like the events in a movie and more like the pages of a college thesis paper.
So, there’s a lot to digest here, and for people who like to analyze movies, US is the film for them. For people who enjoy horror movies, I’d wager to guess those folks might be a little disappointed. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not arguing that the only good horror movie is a dumb horror movie. I love smart movies. But US tries too hard to be intellectual at the expense of being emotional.
The acting is excellent. Lupita Nyong’o excels as both Adelaide and the very chilling alternate version of her. Elizabeth Moss is equally as good as family friend Kitty and her evil doppelgänger.
Winston Duke is fun to watch as the relaxed amiable dad Gabe, although his “twin” is less effective as he lumbers around like a zombie and isn’t as frightening as some of the others. Duke and Nyong’o, who both co-starred in BLACK PANTHER (2018), make for a realistic couple, one of the few parts of this movie I found believable.
Shahadi Wright Joseph is very good as daughter Zora, as is Evan Alex as son Jason.
One of the reasons I liked GET OUT so much was it was both a scary horror movie and an incisive commentary on race. Here, Jordan Peele is working with a much broader canvas. He’s covering much more ground, but while US is a more ambitious film than GET OUT, it doesn’t work nearly as well. For starters, its story just seemed way too convoluted to be credible.
And since it wasn’t believable, I didn’t feel for the characters, and as a result ultimately didn’t care all that much for the movie.
And while there are plenty of creepy parts, I didn’t find US all that scary either.
I predict that I may like US more with subsequent viewings, because there is a lot to absorb. But my initial reaction to it was akin to reading a poem ripe with figurative language that told a story so unreal it distracted from its metaphors. In short, the ambitious US never convinced me that what it was saying was real.
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IN THE SPOOKLIGHT: STEPHANIE (2017)
Shree Crooks as STEPHANIE (2017)
STEPHANIE (2017), a horror film about a little girl facing an unknown horrific threat all by her lonesome almost works.
What stops this flick from ultimately succeeding is a lack of courage on the part of the filmmakers to take this story to the deepest dark places it should have gone. Instead, we have a plot tweak midway through that changes everything, and the film is worse off for it.
When STEPHANIE opens, young Stephanie (Shree Crooks) is home alone, occupying herself with her imaginary stuffed animal friends, getting into mischief as any child would do left to their own devices. She attempts among other things to cook and clean on her own, running afoul of every day threats like broken glass on the floor while walking barefoot. You’ll wince even before the supernatural elements are introduced. Just why she’s by herself we’re not exactly sure, although there seems to have been some sort of apocalyptic incident that has wiped out at the very least the population around her.
One night, as she brushes her teeth and plays in front of the bathroom mirror, she hears a strange noise coming from the darkness. She knows what it is. Evidently, there is some sort of “monster” which enters her house at times, and to escape, she has to hide and remain silent. She hears the monster foraging throughout the house, growling and sniffing for prey, and then it leaves.
Adding to the mystery there’s also a dead body in her house, Stephanie’s brother, who seems to have succumbed to whatever malady wiped out everyone else. Stephanie it appears is immune. But then one day, Stephanie’s parents return, and while she is overjoyed to see them, she suddenly wonders why they left her alone in the first place.
And it’s at this point in the movie where the plot changes, and from here on in, things just don’t work as well because the story enters territory we’ve all seen before and any innovative freshness the film possessed earlier disappears.
Which is too bad because the first half of STEPHANIE is really, really good, and the biggest reason why is the performance by young actress Shree Crooks as Stephanie. I hesitate to give such high praise to such a young actress, but she’s so good here she’s nearly mesmerizing. Early on, when she has the run of the house, she’s fun to watch, and later when the monster invades, you share in Stephanie’s terror. Crooks does fear really well.
So, early on the story had me hooked. I wanted to know why Stephanie was alone and just what kind of monster kept breaking into her house. And I cared enough about young Stephanie that I was ready to watch a film about just one little girl on her own having to square off against a monstrous threat.
But ultimately this isn’t the story STEPHANIE has to tell. Her parents arrive home, and the inevitable plot twist isn’t up to snuff and only serves to steer the story into familiar territory, which is far less satisfying than what had come before it. Unfortunately, when all is said and done, STEPHANIE ends up being just a standard horror movie.
Frank Grillo and Anna Torv [recently of Netflix’ MINDHUNTER (2017-19)] play Stephanie’s parents, and while there’s nothing wrong with their performances, they unfortunately appear in the film’s inferior second half.
The screenplay by Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski tells two different stories, and I enjoyed the first story much better than the second. The first half of the story with Stephanie home alone works so well I was really looking forward to seeing how she was going to deal with the monster in her house, but that confrontation never happens.
Director Akiva Goldsman sets up some suspenseful scenes early on, especially when the monster invades the house. Goldsman also deserves plenty of credit for capturing such a powerful performance from such a young performer. Shree Crooks completely carries the first half of the movie all by her lonesome.
Later, when the story pivots, the scares are much more standard, the results more predictable.
STEPHANIE did not have a theatrical release and was instead marketed straight to video on demand. I saw it on Netflix.
As it stands, it’s not a bad horror movie, but based on the way it started, it had the potential to be something very special, if only the initial story had been allowed to develop.
In spite of this, Shree Crooks delivers the performance of the movie. She’s terrific throughout, and she’s the main reason to see STEPHANIE.
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CAPTIVE STATE (2019) – Science Fiction Thriller Struggles Mightily To Tell Its Story
CAPTIVE STATE (2019) is a new science fiction thriller with some really neat ideas and a remarkable story to tell, but sadly— very sadly—- it also has a script that struggles mightily to tell it.
The movie gets off to a busy yet intriguing start with a bunch of information hurled at its audience immediately. There’s been an alien invasion which has completely overwhelmed humankind, and the governments of the world have capitulated power to these superior beings who now control the Earth. As a result, the “haves” — people with power and money— have gotten stronger as they’ve been given positions of leadership, while the “have-nots” have gotten weaker, as they’ve been thrust into ghettos and hard-working mining jobs, which happens to be a perfect metaphor for what some say has been happening in the real world for the past few decades.
But all hope is not lost, as there are resistance fighters constantly operating in the shadows with the express purpose of taking down these all-powerful aliens. These resistance fighters believe the only thing the aliens are interested in is draining the Earth of its resources. They believe the aliens’ end game is the destruction of the planet, even if the “haves” who enjoy plenty of power now refuse to see it.
So, the plot of the movie focuses on a small band of resistant fighters in Chicago as they work on a plan to strike back at their alien oppressors, while one of the “haves,” police detective William Mulligan (John Goodman) does everything in his power to uncover this resistant cell and destroy them.
I really liked the idea behind CAPTIVE STATE. I enjoyed its story of resistance fighters trying to strike back against an all-powerful alien race which had been ruling the world for nearly a decade. I enjoyed the obvious symbolic references to what’s going on in today’s world, where people feel increasingly oppressed and powerless.
But there are far more things with CAPTIVE STATE that I didn’t like. Let’s start with the way it tells its story. The screenplay by Erica Beeney and director Rupert Wyatt seems to be purposefully confusing. Characters speak, and their meanings aren’t clear. They make phone calls and send messages in code, but the audience doesn’t know why nor do they understand the meanings.
Most of the movie is a collection of really cool looking scenes showing people slyly plotting resistance while cop William Mulligan hunts them down. It all looks good and sounds good with some effective music by Rob Simonsen, but very little of it makes sense. The writers forgot to include the audience on what’s going on. It’s one of those films where I’m sure the audience is going to spend most of the time scratching their heads rather than enjoying a suspenseful story.
It reminded me of a 1960s British spy thriller where the screenplay was purposefully obscure, or a movie which back in the old days would have been aired after midnight because prime time audiences wouldn’t have had the patience for its lack of narrative. Some folks will no doubt absolutely love CAPTIVE STATE and won’t see its narrative woes as a weakness, but for me, I prefer a story that is told in a more organized fashion than the one told here.
There are other problems as well. The biggest one for me is there wasn’t a clear protagonist. The central characters in the movie are two brothers, Gabriel Drummond (Ashton Sanders) and Rafe Drummond (Jonathan Majors) whose parents were killed by the aliens in the film’s opening moments. Rafe has become the face of the Chicago resistance, but since his character is officially dead, he lives in the shadows and is barely in the movie.
The main character is supposed to be Gabriel, the younger brother, as he’s also a person the police are interested in, as they believe he can lead them to the resistance. But even though Gabriel is on-screen more than Rafe, he’s not developed as a character either.
Then there’s cop William Mulligan as played by John Goodman, who gruffly goes through the motions hunting down resistance fighters without showing any emotion.
Speaking of those resistance fighters, there’s a whole bunch of them, none of whom we ever really get to know or care about.
Then there’s the aliens themselves, which we hardly see. When we do see them, they reminded me of the types of creatures seen in the CLOVERFIELD universe, but we really don’t see much of them at all here.
There is little that is visually stimulating or memorable in CAPTIVE STATE, nothing memorable like those huge hovering ships in DISTRICT 9 (2009), a film that did a better job telling its alien occupation story. There were also shades of Arthur C. Clarke’s novel Childhood’s End here, with its story and theme of humans dealing with the occupation of a superior alien race, but the novel dealt with it in ways that are far superior to how it is handled in this movie.
The cast here also doesn’t do a whole lot, and a lot of the problem is the screenplay which really doesn’t develop the characters. John Goodman is okay as William Mulligan, but it is largely a one note performance. Unlike his role in 10 CLOVERFIELD LANE (2016) where he knocked it out of the park playing quite the frightening character, Goodman is stuck playing a man who is purposely unemotional for reasons that become clear later in the story.
Ashton Sanders, who starred in the Oscar-winning MOONLIGHT (2016), is decent enough as Gabriel, the character who should have been the main focus here had this film had a better script. There just really aren’t any defining moments for Gabriel or ones that allow Sanders to truly shine in the role.
Jonathan Majors is allowed to do even less as older brother Rafe. There are a lot of solid actors in supporting roles here, but none of them get to do much of anything. Even Vera Farmiga can’t save the day, as her role as a mysterious prostitute has little impact while she’s on screen. Now, her character is important, as revealed later on, but that’s how a lot of this movie is. Important details are relayed after characters are gone or situations have already happened. It just doesn’t make for satisfying storytelling.
Even the end, when it’s obvious what’s happening, and what direction the plot is taking, the movie doesn’t give the audience the benefit of a satisfying conclusion. It leaves things just a bit obscure. The trouble is, what’s happening is not obscure, so why not just show the audience this instead of playing games and keeping important plot points hidden just for the sake of trying to be creative? It’s a case of trying too hard to make a thought-provoking offbeat thriller. Sometimes straightforward storytelling is just plain better.
Director Rupert Wyatt does a nice job creating quick intense scenes of resistance fighters organizing and plotting but struggles with the big-ticket items like grand cinematic sequences and building suspense. Probably the best sequence in the movie is the major caper by the resistance to attack the aliens at Soldier Field. This sequence works well, even if its payoff isn’t all that satisfying, but other than this, there’s not a whole lot that’s memorable about this movie.
For a science fiction thriller, it’s not visually satisfying at all. As I said, there are no memorable images as found in DISTRICT 9, and the script is far inferior to the stories, dialogue, and character development found in recent science fiction films like ANNIHILATION (2018) and ARRIVAL (2016).
ANNIHILATION and ARRIVAL also had strong female leads and supporting characters. The women in CAPTIVE STATE are few and far between, and none of the major characters are women.
Rupert Wyatt also directed RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES (2011), the first of the APES reboots, and a movie I enjoyed more than CAPTIVE STATE.
I really wanted to like CAPTIVE STATE. In fact, after its first five minutes, I was even more interested in the story it was about to tell, but what followed was a narrative that clearly struggled to move this intriguing story forward. Its characters were not developed, and as such there really wasn’t anyone for the audience to identify with or root for. And the alien threat was barely shown and hardly explored.
So, at the end of the day, while I certainly did not hate CAPTIVE STATE, I left the theater disappointed.
A better script could have made CAPTIVE STATE a captivating science fiction thriller, but it’s clear that this film did not have that script. The end result is a movie with impressive ideas and symbolism but with such a muddled narrative that its audience will be hard-pressed to enjoy them.
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CAPTAIN MARVEL (2019) – Exciting Character, Mediocre Movie
The best part of CAPTAIN MARVEL (2019) is Brie Larson’s performance as the title character, a female superhero who kicks butt and takes guff from no man. The worst part is her origin story as told in this movie simply isn’t all that interesting. In fact, it’s all rather—dare I say it?— dull.
On the faraway planet of Hala, Vers (Brie Larson) is being trained by a member of the Kree race, Yon-Rogg (Jude Law) to combat terrorists, known as the Skrulls, but she is too emotional, and she continually fails in her training. As a result, she’s sent to see the Supreme Intelligence (Annette Bening), a being who appears differently to everyone who sees her, taking the shape of someone important in the lives of the visiting individual, but Vers doesn’t recognize the face of the Supreme Intelligence at all, and that’s because she has a problem with her memory and cannot remember her past.
When she is captured by the Skrulls terrorists, they probe her mind, which allows Vers to see images of her past, and she realizes she was once on Earth. Both she and the Skrulls make their way to Earth during the 1990s, and it’s here where she meets a young Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), and together they take on the alien threat.
Captain Marvel, as played by Brie Larson, is clearly the best part of CAPTAIN MARVEL She personifies confidence and resilience, standing up to the insults and catcalls of men, pretty much stamping them out. Of course, since this is a Marvel superhero movie, she’s also about defeating the bad guys, and she does that well too. A little too well actually. No one in this film really stands up to her all that well, and that’s because once she figures out who she is, she’s pretty much unstoppable.
Larson is relaxed and confident in the lead role, and I enjoyed watching her throughout this movie. Sadly, she’s the one bright spot in an otherwise dull vehicle. Even the girl power aspect isn’t completely successful. Empowering women is a prominent theme here, and it works, but compared to a film like BLACK PANTHER (2018), which, thanks largely to Michael B. Jordan’s performance, I thought had the most powerful message on race relations of all the films I saw in 2018, the theme here is only window dressing. It’s clear what the film is trying to say, but it just doesn’t say it with much conviction.
Likewise, the plight of the Skrulls, which ties in to today’s current immigration crisis, fails to resonate. It’s too superficial to make a serious impact.
Samuel L. Jackson returns yet again as Nick Fury, this time with a CGI face to make him look much younger, and to be honest, there was just something off-putting about his appearance. In short, it didn’t work for me.
Jude Law makes for a very boring villain, while Ben Mendelson fares better as the shapeshifting Skrull Talos. Mendelson does a nice job imbuing the character with sympathy, and I have to say Talos was my favorite character in this movie other than Captain Marvel herself
And strangely, the liveliest character in the film is a cat named Goose. That’s not saying a whole lot.
The screenplay by directors Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, and by Geneva Robertson-Dworet contains the signature Marvel humor, which works well throughout, and there are plenty of tie-ins to other Marvel movies, specifically the upcoming AVENGERS: ENDGAME (2019). Again, no problems here.
And it was fun to have the film set in the 1990s, which set up a lot of jokes, like Blockbuster Video stores, slow running computers, and very slow downloads.
But the story as a whole really did nothing for me. It also wasn’t told all that clearly. The film suffers from a sloppy opening, and it takes a good twenty minutes or so for this one to truly get started.
I enjoyed DC’s WONDER WOMAN (2017) more than I did CAPTAIN MARVEL. It told a better story, and did a better job presenting its lead character.
Directors Boden and Fleck struggle a bit at the helm of CAPTAIN MARVEL. In terms of visual satisfaction there aren’t any complaints here. The film looks great. But I was not impressed at how this one told its story, and that’s a combination of both the writing and the direction. I found the jumping around during the film’s early moments, between dreams, memories, reality, flashbacks, planets, times, was all over the place and made for a very distracting beginning.
I also wasn’t impressed by the pacing. There were far too many slow parts in this one.
CAPTAIN MARVEL is nowhere near as good or as fun as the Marvel films from 2018, BLACK PANTHER, AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR, and ANT-MAN AND THE WASP. It’s also not as good as the CAPTAIN AMERICA films. I did like it better than the first two THOR movies, and while Captain Marvel is certainly a far more likeable character than Doctor Strange, I preferred the Doctor’s film to this one as well.
Which is too bad because Captain Marvel is an important character, a female superhero who uses the negative experiences from her youth to empower her to be the strongest hero she can be. I liked her a lot, and I’m looking forward to seeing her again soon in the upcoming AVENGERS: ENDGAME which opens in April.
I also enjoyed the Stan Lee homage at the beginning of the movie.
And like all the Marvel superhero movies, there’s an after-credit scene, and once more there are two of these. The first one is the more important one, with a tie-in to the next AVENGERS film, while the last one is the silly one, good for a laugh only. Stay only if you want that one last chuckle.
CAPTAIN MARVEL introduces an exciting new superhero to the Marvel cinematic universe, but does it in a movie that is not on par with their better films.
While I loved the character, I can’t place the movie in Marvel’s upper echelon of superhero films. It’s one of their lesser entries for sure.
Action movie Adventure movies Marvel movies Michael Arruda movie reviews Uncategorized AVENGERS: ENDGAME Ben Mendelsohn Brie Larson Captain Marvel CAPTAIN MARVEL (2019) CAPTAIN MARVEL (2019) movie review CAPTAIN MARVEL (2019) review female superheroes Jude Law Marvel comics Marvel superhero movies Michael Arruda movie reviews movies with a strong female lead Samuel L. Jackson Stan Lee THE AVENGERS Wonder Woman
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The Chinese billionaire who wants to out-Tesla Tesla
Bloomberg News for Bloomberg 2016-07-05 14:25:39 UTC
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Jia Yueting has all the trappings of a successful Chinese tech entrepreneur with global ambitions.
A self-made billionaire who got his start as the IT guy at his local tax bureau, Jia’s flagship internet-video company now sports a $15 billion market capitalization and a buy rating from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Donning hoodies and t-shirts, he boasts of plans to take on Apple Inc. in smartphones and surpass Tesla Motors Inc. in electric cars. Jia’s Faraday Future has lured staff from Ferrari and BMW, and won the backing of Nevada’s governor to construct a $1 billion auto plant in North Las Vegas — about 400 miles from where Tesla broke ground on a giant battery factory in 2014.
Yet for all of Jia’s accomplishments, the 43-year-old tycoon has failed to win the confidence of one key man. Dan Schwartz, Nevada’s treasurer, says he’s skeptical Jia can secure financing for the car plant, a project that needs government support for power lines, water mains and roads. Schwartz, the former CEO of a private-equity research firm in Hong Kong, wants more transparency on the funding before signing off on state bonds for $120 million of infrastructure improvements.
SEE ALSO: Tesla Challenger in China Plans to Debut $106,000 E-Roadster
The crux of Schwartz’s concern is Jia’s reliance on equity-backed loans, a financing strategy that could leave Nevada taxpayers vulnerable to the whims of China’s volatile stock market. Jia has pledged 87 percent of his holdings in Leshi Internet Information & Technology Corp. — his flagship firm — for cash that he then plowed back into his companies, regulatory filings show. The stock, which was halted in Shenzhen for the first five months of 2016, has dropped 11 percent since it resumed trading on June 3, a move that heightens Schwartz’s fear that a margin call could prevent Jia from funding the plant.
Yueting Jia during a discussion titled 'Ecosystem Of The Future' as part of the 20th St. Petersburg International Economic Forum at the ExpoForum Convention and Exhibition Center.
Image: Getty images/Stoyan Vassev/TASS
“You can see where this leads,” Schwartz said in a phone interview. “His Internet company is successful, but that doesn’t generate the billions of dollars he’d need. Where’s he going to get the money?’’
The financing questions surrounding Jia’s foray into the U.S. electric-car market are becoming more common around the world as China Inc. embarks on an unprecedented overseas shopping spree. The nation’s firms, which boosted outbound direct investment by 62 percent in January-May from a year earlier, are branching out even as rising debt levels and weak profits at home cast doubt over their ability to secure stable funding.
Financing Plans
Faraday, whose 1,000-horsepower concept car has drawn comparisons to the Batmobile, says it has the full support of Nevada’s governor and is pushing forward with the city of North Las Vegas on infrastructure planning. The 800-employee carmaker — a separate company from Leshi that’s majority-owned by Jia — has sought to address Schwartz’s concerns, but could “technically” build the plant without the state bonds, Faraday spokeswoman Stacy Morris said in an e-mailed reply to questions.
Jia has invested more than $300 million of his own money into Faraday and the firm will announce a round of outside funding within weeks, said Winston Cheng, a former Bank of America Corp. investment banker who now runs corporate finance for Jia’s companies. He said the size of the funding would be “meaningful” and come from Asian investors, while declining to provide more details.
“I don’t understand why he’s trying to kill these high end jobs in the state of California and Nevada,” Cheng said in an interview, referring to Schwartz. “It baffles me.”
Goldman Bullish
City, county and regional government agencies are already working with Faraday on infrastructure for the plant, and the Nevada Governor’s Office of Economic Development has approved funding for worker training, the GOED said in an e-mailed response to questions from Bloomberg. Tesla — which is named, like Faraday, after a 19th century pioneer in the field of electricity — declined to comment.
SEE ALSO: Tesla’s Deliveries Miss Due to ‘Extreme’ Production Ramp-up
Leshi, the publicly-traded centerpiece of Jia’s empire, shows few signs of financial distress. Profits increased 20 percent in the first quarter, while its quick ratio, a gauge of the firm’s ability to meet obligations over the coming year, is in line with the median for Chinese companies as a whole, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Leshi’s Altman Z score, a measure of bankruptcy risk, suggests trouble is unlikely.
Visitors look at FFZERO1, a Faraday Future's concept car, during Beijing International Automotive Exhibition on April 27, 2016 in Beijing, China.
Image: VCG/VCG via Getty Images
Analysts are bullish on the stock, with 9 of 11 forecasters tracked by Bloomberg giving it the equivalent of a buy rating. Goldman Sachs issued a price target of 70.22 yuan on June 22, or 35 percent above its Monday close. The bank declined a request to interview its Leshi analyst.
Investors are less sanguine, with Leshi shares sinking for six straight days after they resumed trading last month. At 105 times projected earnings for this year, the stock is more than twice as expensive as the median China-listed company. The firm has recorded negative cash flow for the past two quarters, data compiled by Bloomberg show. Shares slipped as much as 0.9 percent on Tuesday, before closing 0.4 percent higher.
Stock Loans
“It’s a matter of time before problems emerge,” said Wang Zheng, the Shanghai-based chief investment officer at Jingxi Investment Management Co., which oversees about $300 million and is avoiding Leshi shares in part because of concerns over its financing strategy. The company’s high valuation reflects the appeal of “concept” stocks among Chinese individual investors, Wang said.
Jia and his family have pledged about $5 billion of Leshi shares as collateral for loans, amounting to a 35 percent stake, according to data compiled by Bloomberg from the company’s first-quarter report. Jia also sold 2.5 billion yuan ($375 million) of Leshi shares in June 2015 and lent the proceeds back to Leshi to "relieve the company’s financing pressure.” He later entered into a contract with an asset management firm to exchange 100 million shares, or about 5.3 percent of the company, for cash that he then lent to Leshi interest-free. Jia pledged to repurchase the stake after Leshi repays the money.
“The company is capital strapped,” said Dai Ming, a money manager at Hengsheng Asset Management Co. in Shanghai.
For Schwartz, Jia and Faraday Future need to explain more clearly how they plan to provide stable financing for the Nevada project. Only then would he consider supporting a state debt sale to fund the plant’s infrastructure. He said it’s his role as treasurer to bring the bond before the state’s board of finance, whose chairman is the governor, for approval.
SEE ALSO: Fatal Tesla Crash Spurs Criticism of On-The-Road Beta Testing
Schwartz, an elected member of the Republican party who took office in January 2015, dismissed the notion that his opposition to the Faraday project has anything to do with his political ambitions. He has clashed with the Republican governor before on budgetary issues, according to local media, amid speculation he could mount his own bid for governor.
“I may/may not run for governor, but this project has nothing to do with my political future,” Schwartz said in an e-mail. “It’s strictly about whether Faraday has the money/expertise to build a $1 billion electric car manufacturing facility in North Las Vegas. And, if they don’t, whether or not I want the Nevada taxpayer to pick up the tab.”
— With assistance by Jill Mao, Tian Ying, Shai Oster, and Lulu Chen
This article originally published at Bloomberg here
Topics: Business, electric cars, Elon Musk, Tesla
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Category: Nepal videos
Expoza Travel
With its three ancient Nepalese royal cities, Kathmandu Valley at the foot of the mighty Himalayas contains some of the most precious treasures in Asia along with a truly unique and mediaeval atmosphere. However, the beauty of this country and its historic buildings have for many years been out of the reach of most foreigners. And even today Nepal is full of mystique. Kathmandu became increasingly important during the reign of the Malla sovereigns who created one of the city’s main landmarks, Durbar Square. The Taleju Temple is located in the heart of the Durbar district. It is believed that in the tenth century King Gunakamadeva The Second founded the town. He moved his residence from PATAN to today´s Kathmandu. However, little of the architecture of that time has survived to the present day. The heart of Durbar Square, the richly decorated and spacious Hanuman Dhoka Palace, dates back much earlier. Not only because of its famous carved peacock windows but also due to its museum, Bhaktapur is the centre of traditional Nepalese wood carving. Compared to other royal cities in Patan and Kathmandu, Bhaktapur is the most original and is without a doubt the most historically authentic. The city owes its remarkable buildings and renovations to comprehensive donations from several countries. Only essential work and modernisation were undertaken and they eventually contributed to an improvement in the daily life of the local population. According to legend the founding of Patan, with a population of over a hundred thousand the second largest royal city in Nepal, dates back to Pre-Christian times. As opposed to the Malla cities of Khatmandu and Bhaktapur that were mainly influenced by the Hindu religion, Patan was for many years a major Buddhist city. It is believed that it was founded in the third century B.C. by the famous Buddhist emperor, Ashoka, who visited the town while on a pilgrimage from Northern India. Kathmandu, Bhaktapur and Patana are the three legendary royal cities of Nepal that still possess a mysterious and ancient power and continue to be the sacred sanctuary of Himalayan art.
The video is published here with permission of the publisher Expoza Travel.
Image gallery Nepal:
https://mazalien.nl/travel-videos/asia-videos/nepal-videos/the-three-royal-cities-of-nepal#sigProIdf025d7d6a6
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Tag Archives: LiveScience
By Laura Geggel Associate Editor | LiveScience
A portrait of Charles Etienne Gudin, who fought in Napoleon’s Grande Armée. (Photo12/UIG/Getty Images)
An excavation in a peculiar place — under the foundation of a dance floor in Russia — has uncovered the remains of one of Napoleon Bonaparte’s favorite generals: a one-legged man who was killed by a cannonball more than 200 years ago, news sources report.
Gen. Charles Etienne Gudin fought with Napoleon during the failed French invasion of Russia in 1812. On July 6 of this year, an international team of French and Russian archaeologists discovered what are believed to be his remains, in Smolensk, a city about 250 miles (400 kilometers) west of Moscow, according to Reuters.
After his death at age 44 on Aug. 22, 1812, Gudin got star treatment. His name was inscribed on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, his bust was placed at the Palace of Versailles, a Paris street was named after him and, as a sentimental gesture, his heart was removed from his body and placed in a chapel at the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. [Photos: Archaeologists Excavate Battlefield from Napoleonic Wars]
The researchers said that several clues suggested that the skeleton they found under the dance floor belongs to Gudin, who had known Napoleon since childhood. Both men attended the Military School in Brienne, in France’s Champagne region. Upon hearing of Gudin’s death, Napoleon reportedly cried and ordered that his friend’s name be engraved on the Arc de Triomphe, according to Euronews.
Records from the 1812 Russian invasion note that Gudin’s battlefield injuries required him to have his left leg amputated below the knee, Euronews reported. Indeed, the skeleton in the coffin was missing its left leg and showed evidence of injury to the right leg — details that were also mentioned in those records, the archaeologists said, according to Reuters.
Moreover, it was “with a high degree of probability” that the remains the team uncovered belonged to an aristocrat and a military veteran of both the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars, they said, according to Reuters.
“It’s a historic moment not only for me, but for I think for our two countries,” French historian and archaeologist Pierre Malinovsky, who helped find the remains, told the Smolensk newspaper Rabochiy Put(Worker’s Journey), according to Reuters. “Napoleon was one of the last people to see him alive, which is very important, and he’s the first general from the Napoleonic period that we have found.”
The general has known living descendants, so researchers plan to test the skeleton for DNA. That way, they’ll be able to say for sure whether the remains are those of Gudin.
Gudin, however, is hardly the only French fatality recently found in Russia. Earlier this year, scientists did a virtual facial reconstruction of a man in his 20s who was slashed in the face with a saber and died during the invasion of Russia.
Tagged as Charles Etienne Gudin, history, Laura Geggel, LiveScience, Napoleon, Remains of Napoleon's one-legged general found under Russian dance floor
Neolithic people made fake islands more than 5,600 years ago
A bird’s-eye view of Loch Bhorgastail, an islet that was clearly human-made with boulders. (Copyright Antiquity Publications Ltd; Photograph by F. Sturt; Duncan Garrow and Fraser Sturt, Antiquity 2019.)
Hundreds of tiny islands around Scotland didn’t arise naturally. They’re fakes that were constructed out of boulders, clay and timbers by Neolithic people about 5,600 years ago, a new study finds.
Researchers have known about these artificial islands, known as crannogs, for decades. But many archaeologists thought that the crannogs were made more recently, in the Iron Age about 2,800 years ago.
The new finding not only shows that these crannogs are much older than previously thought but also that they were likely “special locations” for Neolithic people, according to nearby pottery fragments found by modern divers, the researchers wrote in the study.
Initially, many researchers thought that Scotland’s crannogs were built around 800 B.C. and reused until post-medieval times in A.D. 1700. But in the 1980s, hints began to emerge that some of these islands were made much earlier. In addition, in 2012, Chris Murray, a former Royal Navy diver, found well-preserved Neolithic pots on the lake floor near some of these islands, and he alerted a local museum about the discovery.
To investigate, two U.K archaeologists, Duncan Garrow from the University of Reading and Fraser Sturt from the University of Southampton, teamed up in 2016 and 2017 to take a comprehensive look at several crannogs in the Outer Hebrides, an artificial island hotspot off the coast of northern Scotland. In particular, they looked at islets in three lakes: Loch Arnish, Loch Bhorgastail and Loch Langabhat.
According to radiocarbon dating, four of the crannogs were created between 3640 B.C. and 3360 B.C., the researchers found. Other evidence, including ground and underwater surveys, palaeoenvironmental coring and excavation, supported the idea that these particular islets dated to the Neolithic.
Archaeologists have yet to find any Neolithic structures on the islands, and they said more excavations were needed. But divers found dozens of Neolithic pottery fragments, some of them burnt, around the islets at Bhorgastail and Langabhat, the researchers said.
These pots were likely dropped into the water intentionally, possibly for a ritual, the researchers said.
Each of the islets is fairly small, measuring approximately 33 feet (10 meters) across. One islet in Loch Bhorgastail even had a stone causeway connecting it to the mainland. And though it undoubtedly took a lot of work to make these crannogs, these structures were clearly important to ancient people, as there are 570 known in Scotland alone. (There are more in Ireland, the researchers noted.)
So far, just 10% of the crannogs in Scotland have been radiocarbon dated, meaning that there may be more ancient crannogs than these newfound Neolithic ones, the researchers said.
The study was published online June 12 in the journal Antiquity.
Originally published on Live Science.
Tagged as 600 years ago, archaeology, crannog, islands, Laura Geggel, LiveScience, neolithic, Neolithic people made fake islands more than 5
Did Van Gogh shoot himself? Auction of pistol reignites debate.
By Tom Metcalfe Live Science Contributor | LiveScience
The pistol thought to be the one used by Van Gogh to shoot himself is on public display at Paris’ Drouot auction house. (FRANCOIS GUILLOT/AFP/Getty Images)
The auction of a pistol said to have been used by the painter Vincent van Gogh to shoot himself has reignited a debate about who actually pulled the trigger: Did Van Gogh commit suicide, or was he shot by someone else?
The gun will be auctioned in France on Wednesday (June 19), where it’s expected to sell for more than $50,000.
For years, most Van Gogh experts have accepted the explanation that he shot himself in the chest with a pistol in a suicide in July 1890. [30 of the World’s Most Valuable Treasures That Are Still Missing]
Such a gun was found more than 70 years later, in a field near the French farming village of Auvers-sur-Oise where Van Gogh died, and it has widely been accepted as the weapon he used to shoot himself.
Van Gogh lived on for 30 hours before dying from the wound. His last words, according to his brother Theo, were “the sadness will last forever.”
In the years since his death, the Dutch expressionist painter, who cut off his left ear in a dispute with the painter Paul Gauguin has become the archetype of a despairing, suicidal artist overcome by depression.
But in 2011, biographers Gregory White Smith and Steven Naifeh argued that Van Gogh didn’t shoot himself, but was shot accidentally by 16-year-old René Secrétan, who was spending the summer in the village.
According to their biography “Van Gogh: The Life” (Random House, 2011), Secrétan and his brother both befriended and bullied Van Gogh when he stayed at Auvers — and that Secrétan possessed the gun involved.
Based on a number of lingering mysteries about the last hours of Van Gogh’s life, the authors proposed that the artist was shot during a scuffle with Secrétan; then, he implied that he had shot himself, in order to cover for the boys, they wrote in an essay in Vanity Fair.
The theory that Van Gogh was shot by another is disputed by some experts on the life of the artist. But Naifeh told Live Science that he was more convinced than ever that Secrétan shot Van Gogh.
Mystery weapon
The gun being auctioned in Paris next week is a Belgian-made 7mm Lefaucheux revolver — a popular small caliber handgun at that time.
The gun matches the description of the 7mm bullet taken from Van Gogh’s body by his doctor, and it is theorized that its low power may be why Van Gogh didn’t die immediately but staggered back to his hotel with the bullet still lodged in his chest.
The pistol was found by a farmer in 1965 — 75 years after Van Gogh’s death — in a field at Auvers, badly corroded and beyond use. It was then given to the family who owned the hotel where Van Gogh died.
Grégoire Veyrès, the auctioneer for Auction Art who is conducting the sale, told Live Science that an investigation by the writer Alain Rohan determined that the corroded weapon had been buried in the ground for at least 50 years. [In Photos: Van Gogh Masterpiece Reveals True Colors]
Rohan’s investigative work was accepted as valid by the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam, which displayed the gun in a 2016 exhibition about the artist’s mental illness, Veyrès said.
According to Van Gogh expert Martin Bailey, who writes regularly on the artist for the Art Newspaper in London, the gun is accepted among many Van Gogh scholars as the weapon that he used to take his own life.
Death debated
“I believe it highly likely, although not certain, that it is the actual gun,” Bailey told Live Science, adding that the Van Gogh Museum had also stated there was a “strong possibility” that this was the gun he used.
While the 2011 biography by Smith and Naifeh was “excellent,” he said, many Van Gogh experts didn’t accept their theory.
“I am convinced that it was suicide, not murder or manslaughter,” he said. “Van Gogh’s family and close friends believed it was suicide.”
Naifeh, who won a Pulitzer Prize with Smith in 1991 for their biography of the American painter Jackson Pollock, said his discussions with forensic experts had strengthened his belief that Secrétan shot the artist.
“I have only become more convinced that it is more likely that he was shot in a scuffle than that he wasn’t,” he told Live Science.
Naifeh noted that there was no evidence linking the gun either to Van Gogh or to the manner of his death.
“What forensic evidence is there to tie Vincent van Gogh to this gun? And, even if there were forensic evidence tying Vincent to this gun, what does this say about who pulled the trigger?” he asked: “Those are the two big questions, and I do not see any answers.”
Although Van Gogh is one of the most famous artists in the world — one of his paintings of a farmed field, completed a year before his death, sold for $81 million in 2017 — he sold only one painting during his lifetime, for 400 francs.
The most expensive Van Gogh painting to date was sold for $82 million in 1990, the “Portrait of Dr. Gachet” from 1890. Gachet was the doctor who would ultimately attend his death later that year.
Tagged as Did Van Gogh shoot himself? Auction of pistol reignites debate, history, LiveScience, tom metcalfe, van gogh
Scientists develop new laser that can find and destroy cancer cells in the blood
By Yasemin Saplakoglu Staff Writer | LiveScience
Computer generated graphic design of red blood cells flowing inside vessel (iStock)
Cancer cells can spread to other parts of the body through the blood. And now, researchers have developed a new kind of laser that can find and zap those tumor cells from the outside of the skin.
Though it may still be a ways away from becoming a commercial diagnostic tool, the laser is up to 1,000 times more sensitive than current methods used to detect tumor cells in blood, the researchers reported June 12 in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
To test for cancer spread, doctors typically take blood samples, but often the tests fail to find tumor cells even if they are present in a single sample, especially if the patient has an early form of cancer, said senior author Vladimir Zharov, director of the nanomedicine center at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.
If the tests do come back positive, that typically means there’s a high concentration of circulating tumor cells in the blood; at that point, the cancer has likely spread widely to other organs and it’s often “too late to effectively treat patients,” Zharov added. [Top 10 Cancer-Fighting Foods]
Years ago, Zharov and his team came up with the idea of an alternate, noninvasive method to test larger quantities of blood with a greater sensitivity. Taking the familiar route, they tested it in the lab, then on animals and recently brought it to clinical trials in humans.
The new technology, dubbed the Cytophone, uses pulses of laser light on the outside of the skin to heat up cells in the blood. But the laser only heats up melanoma cells — not healthy cells — because these cells carry a dark pigment called melanin, which absorbs the light. The Cytophone then uses an ultrasound technique to detect the teensy, tiny waves emitted by this heating effect.
They tested the technology on 28 light-skinned patients who had melanoma and on 19 healthy volunteers who didn’t have melanoma. They shone the laser onto the patients’ hands and found that within 10 seconds to 60 minutes, the technology could identify circulating tumor cells in 27 out of 28 of those volunteers.
Finding and killing tumor cells
The device didn’t return any false positives on the healthy volunteers, and it didn’t cause safety concerns or side effects, they said. Melanin is a pigment that is normally present in the skin, but skin cells aren’t harmed, Zharov said. Even though the skin produces melanin naturally, this laser technique doesn’t harm those cells. That’s because the laser light exposes a relatively a large area on the skin (so it’s not focused enough on individual skin cells to damage them), while the laser energy is more concentrated on the blood vessels and circulating tumor cells, he added.
Unexpectedly, the team also found that after the treatment, the cancer patients had fewer circulating tumor cells. “We used a relatively low energy” with the primary purpose of diagnosing rather than treating the cancer, Zharov said. Yet, even at that low energy, the laser beam seemed able to destroy the cancer cells.
Here’s how it works: As the melanin absorbs the heat, the water around the melanin inside the cells begins to evaporate, producing a bubble that expands and collapses, mechanically destroying the cell, Zharov said.
“Our goal is by killing these cells, we can help prevent the spreading of metastatic cancer,” he said. But he hopes to conduct more research to optimize the device further to kill more tumor cells, while still being harmless to other cells.
They also haven’t yet tested the device on people with darker skin, who have higher levels of melanin. Even so, only a very small percentage of African Americans get melanoma.
The team hopes to expand the technology to find circulating tumor cells released by cancers other than melanoma. These cancer cells don’t carry melanin, so to detect them, the researchers would first need to inject the patients with specific markers or molecules that would bind to these cells so that they can be targeted by the laser. They have so far demonstrated that this technique could work on human breast cancer cells in the lab.
Tagged as cancer treatment, lasers, LiveScience, Scientists develop new laser that can find and destroy cancer cells in the blood, yasemin saplakoglu
November 8, 2016 · 12:09 pm
New discovery fills gap in ancient Jerusalem history
DIGGING HISTORY
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Archaeologists think construction on this ancient building started in the early second century B.C. and continued into the Hasmonean period. (Israeli Antiquities Authority)
Archaeologists have discovered the first ruins of a building from the Hasmonean period in Jerusalem, filling a gap in the ancient city’s history, the Israeli Antiquities Authority (IAA) announced.
The building’s remains were uncovered during an extensive dig at the Givati Parking Lot, located in Jerusalem’s oldest neighborhood, the City of David. Excavations over several years at the site have turned up some remarkable finds, including a building from the Second Temple period that may have belonged to Queen Helene, a trove of coins from the Byzantine period, and recently, a 1,700-year-old curse tablet in the ruins of a Roman mansion.
Despite extensive excavations in Jerusalem, IAA archaeologists Doron Ben Ami and Yana Tchekhanovets said there has been an absence of buildings from the Hasmonean period in the city’s archaeological record. Simon Maccabeus founded the Hasmonean dynasty in 140 B.C. This group ruled Judea until 37 B.C., when Herod the Great came into power. [In Photos: The Controversial ‘Tomb of Herod the Great’]
“Apart from several remains of the city’s fortifications that were discovered in different parts of Jerusalem, as well as pottery and other small finds, none of the Hasmonean city’s buildings have been uncovered so far, and this discovery bridges a certain gap in Jerusalem’s settlement sequence,” excavators Doron Ben Ami and Yana Tchekhanovets said in a statement. “The Hasmonean city, which is well-known to us from the historical descriptions that appear in the works of Josephus, has suddenly acquired tangible expression.”
Flavius Josephus recounted Jewish history and the Jewish revolt against the Romans in his first century A.D. books “The Jewish War” and “Antiquities of the Jews.” Some archaeologists have used his texts to guide their work and interpretations. For example, excavators who recently found cooking pots and a lamp in an underground chamber in Jerusalem think these objects could be material evidence of Josephus’ account of famine during the Roman siege of the city.
IAA officials said the Hasmonean building has only come to light in recent months, adding that the structure boasts quite impressive dimensions. It rises 13 feet (4 meters) and covers 688 square feet (64 square meters) with limestone walls more than 3 feet (1 m) thick.
Inside, the excavators found pottery and coins, the latter of which helped them determine the age of the building. IAA researchers think construction on the building began in the early second century B.C. and continued into the Hasmonean period, when the most significant changes were made inside the structure.
Tagged as ancient history, jerusalem, LiveScience
Deep, hidden trench discovered beneath Antarctic glacier
By Laura Geggel, Staff Writer
Radar that can penetrate ice helped researchers make this 3D map of the bedrock beneath the Jakobshavn Glacier in Greenland. (Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets)
Ice-penetrating radar has uncovered a previously unknown ice-covered trench, and other detailed terrain, in the bedrock hidden beneath two massive, bluish glaciers in Greenland and Antarctica.
The gaping features were revealed in the first, highly detailed 3D maps of the frozen bedrock the land under Greenland’s Jakobshavn Glacier and Antarctica’s Byrd Glacier which may help researchers predict how glaciers, ice sheets and sea levels may change in the future.
“Without bed topography, you cannot build a decent ice-sheet model,” lead researcher Prasad Gogineni, director of the Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets (CReSIS) at the University of Kansas, said in a statement.
For the study, the CReSIS team analyzed survey data, collected from 2006 to 2011, with a NASA device called a multichannel coherent radar depth sounder/imager (MCoRDS/I) that can send radar through ice to map the ground beneath. [See Stunning Photos of Antarctica’s Ice]
Researchers operate MCoRDS/I by sending radar waves down to the glaciers. The radar signals not only reflect off the ice’s surface, but they also bounce off layers within the ice sheet and the bedrock below. Taken together, these signals give researches access to a 3D view of the terrain.
However, even MCoRDS/I faces challenges when mapping bedrock. Warm ice and rough surfaces can weaken and scatter radar waves, the researchers said. To help overcome this challenge, the researchers used a sensitive radar tool that has a large antenna array, and relied on cutting edge signal- and image-processing techniques to remove interference and create a bedrock map.
“We showed that we have the technology to map beds,” Gogineni said.
After analyzing the data in a computer program, the researchers were able to create comprehensive, 3D maps of the terrain under the Jakobshavn and Byrd glaciers.
Interestingly, glaciologists have wanted a detailed map of Jakobshavn Glacier for years. It’s the world’s fastest moving glacier, and it drains about 7.5 percent of the Greenland Ice Sheet, the researchers said.
Byrd Glacier, which also moves faster than average, was previously mapped in the 1970s. Yet, beneath the glacier, the researchers recorded a trench about 1.9 miles below sea level that the old mappers had missed. With the new maps and knowledge of the trench, the researchers revised depth measurements of the bedrock, finding the old depth measurements were off by about a half-mile in some areas.
Future technologies, such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), may help create even more detailed maps of bedrock beneath glaciers, the researchers said.
“Improving ice-sheet models means we need even finer resolution,” Gogineni said. “To do this, we need lines flown much closer together, which small UAVs would be well-suited for.”
The study was published in the September issue of the Journal of Glaciology.
Tagged as Deep, director of the Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets (CReSIS) at the University of Kansas, Greenland Ice Sheet, hidden trench discovered beneath Antarctic glacier, Journal of Glaciology, Laura Geggel, LiveScience, Prasad Gogineni
June 2, 2015 · 11:01 pm
By Megan Gannon
Tagged as ancient history, archaeology, hasmonian period, israeli antiquities authority, jerusalem, LiveScience, megan gannon
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Growth Timeline
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M Group Announces the Acquisition of The Edge at Oakland
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M Group Announces its Partnership with BPM & Co, Inc.
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M Group Announces the Acquisition of Regents Court Apartments
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M Group Announces the Acquisition of Waldon Lakes Apartment Homes
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M Group Announces the Acquisition of Aston Place and The Abigail
COLUMBUS, OH. (Nov. 20, 2015)–M Group is pleased to announce the acquisition of Aston Place and The Abigail in Columbus, Ohio. M Group acquired these properties in partnership with Coastal...
Miami Worldcenter Wins Site Plan Approval
MIAMI, FL – May 18, 2015 – Plans for the first phase of Miami Worldcenter, one of the largest urban real estate developments underway in the U.S., have received the...
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Inside Sweden’s Social Democratic Party
7 June, 2015 18 September, 2017
by Jessica Nilsson Williams
In Monthly Policy Review.
At the end of May, Sweden’s Social Democratic Party held its annual party congress amidst record-low polling numbers, a troubled government coalition, and a limited ability to push through Social Democratic reforms. Still, the party is the most powerful party Sweden has seen and its party congress underscored the enormous party apparatus that is still very much in place.
The SAP congress: a lukewarm event
The Social Democratic Party’s 38th congress in Västerås took place against a backdrop of falling support in the opinion polls and a limited ability to push through reforms until later in the autumn. According to the latest polls, support for the party has fallen to 25 per cent. For some observers it was a stark reminder of the decades where the Social Democratic Party (SAP) was the party that had the greatest influence over Swedish society and the party congresses were events of national importance.
The Social Democratic Party is the oldest, largest and historically most powerful party in Sweden. In the 1930s, the Social Democrats came to power and ruled the country for the greater part of the 20th Century. Social Democratic hegemony reached its zenith in the 1960s and thereafter began a gentle decline. The party has, often in concert with big companies, dominated and had a great influence on the development of Swedish society, supported by a large voter base. One reason for the party being able to retain its voter support over the years was that, despite being formed in 1889 to fight for workers’ interests, it launched itself as a party as much for the middle class. Between 1932 and 1988, the Social Democrats never received less than 40 per cent of the vote in a single election. And in two elections, 1940 and 1968, the party received over 50 per cent of the vote. As late as 1994 the Social Democrats won 45.3 per cent of the vote. However, in reality, by the 1970s the SAP no longer dominated Swedish politics unchallenged, and since the 2006, SAP has continued to lose voter support. In the last seven general elections, the SAP has only received over 40 per cent of the vote on one occasion: at the 1994 election. The demographic composition of the SAP voters has changed over the years. The Social Democratic constituency has slowly aged: about a third of the S-voters are now older than 65, a far higher share than in the early 1990s, when the figure was around 20 per cent. Another clear demographic change regards education. Today, the S-voter is clearly more highly educated (graduate from university / college). Only 9 per cent of those who voted for SAP in the 1988 election were highly educated, the corresponding percentage in the last election was 30 per cent. Class identification is still strong: about half of the SAP voters say that the description “working class” fits best their own home (although the proportion of Swedish voters that can be classified as working class is below 25 per cent).
To an outsider, the Social Democratic Party can seem like a labyrinth of different bodies at different levels. Below is Mundus International’s explanation to how it all comes together
The Party Executive Board
The members of VU are included in the Party Executive Board (Partistyrelsen), which also has 26 additional members. The Party Executive Board meets ten times a year and is formally the highest decision-making body between congresses.
Party Districts
There are 26 party districts. The chairmen of the districts (Distriktsordförande) count as party heavyweights and are highly active when a new party leader is being elected (or, in the case of Håkan Juholt, dismissed).
S-associations are the home of the grassroots
The party grass roots operate in so-called S-associations (S-föreningar). There are about 2,800 S-associations, all with a strong connection to a local neighbourhood, municipality or cause. They can also be trade unions in the workplace, or connect around a certain theme, such as foreign policy.
S-municipalities (S-kommuner)
This is the forum where members of the various S-associations within a municipality meet. There are about 290 S-municipalities. At this level, the local policies are formulated and municipal-level appointments are made. This is also where proposals that could be applied at regional or national level are screened before they are pushed up the hierarchy.
VU is the inner circle
The Executive Committee (Verkställande Utskottet, VU) is the party’s most powerful body between congresses (see below) and manages the on-going work within the party. It consists of seven members (including the Party Leader and the Party Secretary) plus eight alternates who meet about once a week.
The Nomination Committee finds the leaders
According to Social Democratic tradition, party leader candidates never compete openly for the chairmanship. Instead, the Nomination Committee (Valberedningen) probes the terrain and receives nominations from the districts. In practice, the choice has already been done when the Nomination Committee presents its proposal to the congress. Under special circumstances the Party Executive Board can select the party leader, as happened when Olof Palme was murdered.
Ultimately, the congress decides
Previously, congresses were held every four years, but the 2013 SAP congress decided that, going forward, congresses should be held every second year. It is only the congress that can appoint a party leader, following a proposal from the Nomination Committee. The party congress also appoints the Party Executive Board and the Party Secretary.
Motions of policy can be submitted by individual members, S-associations or district boards. 350 representatives, appointed by the party districts, have voting rights at the party congress. The number of members from each party district decides how many representatives the districts can send to the party congress.
On the congress agenda: jobs
Leading up to the 2014 election, Stefan Löfven said in an interview with the Guardian that he, if elected Prime Minister, wanted to pursue the old internationalist dream of a “global deal” on employment rights. And in this respect, he wanted to learn from Palme: “He showed us that a man from a very small country could make a difference in the world. That’s something I want to renew right now: that we can make a difference”, Mr Löfven said. Soon after that, he stated one way in which he wanted to make a difference: Sweden should have the lowest unemployment rate in the EU by 2020.
Following suit, over the last weekend of May, 350 representatives from across Sweden gathered in Västerås for the bi-annual Social Democratic Party congress. Only two issues were on the agenda: The first one, how to turn SAP into a spirited and vibrant popular movement, may not be that interesting to outsiders, but the second agenda item, how the Social Democrats should increase employment and reduce unemployment, created expectations both inside and outside the party.
The Social Democrats and the government have been criticised for its 2020 target for unemployment being unrealistic. At his opening speech of the congress, Stefan Löfven countered the criticism by calling the aim for Sweden to have the lowest unemployment rate in the EU by 2020 is a “big” goal. “But we Social Democrats usually don’t have small ones,” he said and added that both Germany and the U.S. have managed to nearly cut their unemployment in half within relatively few years. He reminded the audience that one of his predecessors, Göran Persson, in 1996 set a goal to halve unemployment despite many critics: “We halved unemployment then and now we’re rolling up our sleeves again,” said Mr Löfven.
A new measure that was launched is the so-called job contract (upphandlingsjobb). The idea is to enable the public sector to demand that those long-term unemployed will get a job or internship as part of procurement. The method has been used in England, in the contract with Crossrail, which is to provide better train services in and around London. The requirement was an apprentice for every three million pounds invested. During a press conference at the party congress, Mr Löfven said that the public sector procured SEK 600 billion each year and he that he now wanted to “put our community resources to work”. Requirements for apprenticeships or jobs for those unemployed have become possible in other EU countries, but not in Sweden, with the exception of a few municipalities. Now the government wants to make employment considerations a requirement in public procurement. This new type of contract is expected to lift 10,000 people out of long-term unemployment. The government also plans to establish a special procurement authority to be in place by 1 September this year. The authority will assist the public sector in making employment demands of, for example, those long-term unemployed. A commission is currently underway to prepare for the new authority. The idea was put forward in a SAP memorandum ahead of the 2014 elections.
Also included in the party’s agenda for jobs are housing, infrastructure and economy. Mikael Damberg, the Minister for Enterprise and Innovation, said that the job agenda had become “even clearer” after the party’s board supported the proposals that came from a working group, which wanted to see more concrete formulations when it came to future public investments; including increasing the share of the GDP that is invested during the mandate period and to build 45,000 new homes per year until 2030. The Finance Minister, Magdalena Andersson, said the government would target spending on roads and railways, including high-speed networks to connect the biggest cities. Furthermore, the government is looking to encourage investments in projects by the state-run pension funds and at setting up debt-financed projects. “For example, you can look at if you can do the same thing with high-speed railways, these are pretty big sums. It will be more defined in the infrastructure proposal next autumn,” Ms Andersson told media.
School before Netflix
Another strong message from the congress was the SAP push for education. In his opening speech, Mr Löfven called for Sweden’s citizens to make more of an effort and raise their expectations of themselves and their environments. This is required for investments in schools and education to have an impact, and in order to be able to close-in on employment goals. Mr Löfven said. “Swedish students will need to make a little more of an effort. Some need to know that school comes first, not almost first. Before Netflix, before exercise and friends, from primary school to upper secondary school”, said Mr Löfven.
The party also decided to strive towards an equal division of parental leave time. The issue has been up for discussion before. In fact, the former party leader, Göran Persson, was opposed to the idea during his time as party leader, because he saw it as unpopular among Social Democratic voters. Stefan Löfven himself does not seem to plan to push hard to reach the party’s goal of one day instituting a policy of equally-shared parental leave. Speaking to media, Mr Löfven downplayed the decision and stressed that the goal was a long-term one, and did not want to predict when it might be achieved.
The three days in Västerås presented the party representatives an opportunity to do their utmost to show themselves and the world that they have the political answer to the question of how to bring down unemployment to the lowest level in Europe. Punters and analysts were not convinced they managed to the full. There are times where various parties have taken major steps forward during party congresses. However, the 2015 S-congress will most probably be regarded as one where this did not happen. In the words of Aftonbladet’s Lena Mellin, the Social Democratic Party’s 38th congress was “a lukewarm event”.
Note: The full version of this article, including footnotes, is only available in the subscriber version.
12 August, 2015 The SSU: still shaping tomorrow’s leaders
9 September, 2016 The political autumn 2016
29 May, 2014 The Almedalen Week: casual style – serious intent
Tagged Politics.
Previous: Information warfare: Interview with Patrik Oksanen
Next:Swedish foreign policy: Wallström delivers keynote speech
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Halsey moved to 'tears' by music for second album
Halsey is "proud to the point of tears" about the music she has created for her second album.
The 'Closer' hitmaker has admitted she often worries if she has used up all of her magic on her debut album, but she hopes her follow-up to 2015's 'Badlands' will have an impact on her female fans and make them feel "empowered".
Speaking to Billboard magazine about her next record, she said: "Sometimes I worry: What if I used up all my pixie dust on the first one?
"But I'm proud to the point of tears of what I've been able to create. Being a woman in this industry means using your platform to make every kind of woman feel empowered."
Meanwhile, the pop beauty has revealed her ultimate collaborator would be Alanis Morissette, as she has been a big inspiration on the 22-year-old singer's career.
Asked for her ideal collaboration, she said: "Even if it was just writing together, I'd love to work with Alanis Morissette. She has been a huge part of me having the confidence to be the kind of artist I am."
And it seems the 'Ironic' hitmaker is not the only artist Halsey - whose real name is Ashley Nicolette Frangipane - wants to team up with.
She is a huge fan of Rihanna and would love to record music with her.
She recently said: "If I could collaborate with anyone, it would be Rihanna. I love her. I wish she was my big sister."
Jamaican artist Sean Paul's mother had to educate her son about musician Sia.
Lady Gaga has penned a hopeful open letter on how she copes with her post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) on a daily basis.
Former Motorhead guitarist Phil Campbell feels haunted by the late Lemmy Kilmister.
A new online study has revealed Katy Perry is the world's biggest serial celebrity dater.
John Legend is happy to take his wife Chrissy Teigen's lyric suggestions on board.
Beyoncé and Adele will go head-to-head for three gongs at the 2017 Grammy Awards.
Beyonce looks set for a big night at the 2017 Grammy Awards after scoring nine nominations.
Paloma Faith has given birth to her first child.
Aspiring musician Cruz Beckham is being tipped as the next Justin Bieber.
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Revisiting the Cincinnati Enquirer vs. Chiquita
Given the ongoing debate surrounding Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning—and whether or not they committed a crime or acted in the public good—it is fitting to revisit a case which on a much smaller scale. The story of the Cincinnati Enquirer vs. Chiquita Banana showed how the “illegitimate” gathering of evidence was considered a more serious crime than that of engaging in widespread murder, bribery, arms trafficking, and knowingly poisoning the environment of communities throughout Latin America.
Given the ongoing debate surrounding Edward Snowden and Bradley Manning—and whether or not they committed a crime or acted in the public good—it is fitting to revisit a case that showed how the “illegitimate” gathering of evidence was considered a more serious crime than that of engaging in widespread murder, bribery, arms trafficking, and knowingly poisoning the environment of communities throughout Latin America. It is the story of the Cincinnati Enquirer vs. Chiquita Banana.
In 1998, Mike Gallagher and Cameron McWhirter, two investigative reporters from the Cincinnati Enquirer, published an 18-page expose which revealed that Chiquita banana (headquartered in Cincinnati) was engaged in wide ranging human rights abuses and environmental crimes. The journalists had worked with Chiquita lawyer George Ventura, who provided access to Chiquita’s internal voicemail system. They were able to obtain confidential information about Chiquita’s role in widespread criminal activity by monitoring internal communications.
"Photo Credit: Policymic.com
Shortly after the publication of the story, the Cincinnati Enquirer had to issue both a retraction and apologize not for the acts being untrue—but for the way in which Gallagher and McWhirter gained their information. In addition to the apology and retraction, the Cincinnati Enquirer was forced to pay Chiquita a settlement of over $10 million for damages. Both Gallagher and Ventura were convicted of stealing Chiquita’s internal voicemails—with Gallagher being immediately fired from the paper. The ruling was a clear statement that investigations of corporate wrongdoing was subject to severe punishment and should be discouraged by the example set by the Cincinnati Enquirer. While the articles were retracted, they are still available here on the WikiLeaks website.
Clearly with the case of Chiquita, it did not learn its lesson—as the damaging reports from 1998 did nothing to stop it from admitting to paying Colombian right wing death squads in 2003. Represented by current Attorney General Eric Holder, Chiquita claimed that they were being extorted by the groups and had to pay the money in order to protect their workers. Mario Iguaran, the Attorney General of Colombia claimed otherwise, bluntly stating that "this was not payment of extortion money. It was support for an illegal armed group whose methods included murder."
Simply, the attempt by the court system to erase any wrongdoing from Chiquita’s record allowed it to continue with the status quo and terrorize communities throughout Latin America. According to Iguaran, Chiquita's payments to the AUC paramilitaries (an organization listed as a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department) led to the murder of 4,000 civilians in the banana growing regions of Colombia and funded the growth of paramilitary organizations throughout the country. Additionally, court documents have shown that a shipment of 3,000 AK-47 assault rifles and 5 million rounds of ammunition from Nicaragua to Colombia in 2001 was invoiced to Chiquita.
This shows the double standard that exists between the people on one side and corporations and the government on the other. In the Snowden controversy, the Obama administration has defended the actions of the National Security Agency by stating that their monitoring of the civilian population allowed them to prevent terrorist attacks—thus Snowden is a criminal and the government was seeking to protect the public. In the case of Chiquita, Gallagher, McWhirter, and Ventura exposed the criminal activities of a multinational corporation with close ties to the United States and Colombian governments in addition to terrorist organizations—yet they were the ones who were punished. It was only five years later in 2003 that Chiquita was forced to pay a $25 million fine for their criminal activities throughout Latin America—with none of the money going to the affected communities.
Despite the U.S. Justice Department stating that Chiquita's payments to the paramilitaries ''were reviewed and approved by senior executives of the corporation, to include high-ranking officers, directors and employees,'' they did not list specific names to avoid wider measures of accountability. What the Cincinnati Enquirer revealed about Chiquita Banana was the stranglehold that corporations have over the legal system and the double standard regarding the application of justice. The courts deemed that the crime committed by Gallagher, McWhirter, and Ventura was more serious than the multitude of crimes committed by Chiquita.
In the end, the issue of whistleblowing and the government's response is dictated by unequal relationships of power. Actions which challenge the status quo and shed light of matters regarded as inconvenient by governments and multinational corporations will be portrayed as illegal or unethical, while those which seek to further cement the legitimacy of everyday criminal activity by the powerful is applauded. Eventually, in July of 2012, Gallagher had his record expunged by the courts, but not after having his career threatened and his courageous work silenced.
One glimmer of hope regarding Chiquita being held accountable for its criminal activities is the ongoing lawsuit in a Florida court brought about by thousands of Colombians, who are the relatives of victims, in seeking to hold the company accountable for murder, torture, and environmental destruction. Villagers allege that the death squads used “random and targeted violence in exchange for financial assistance and access to Chiquita’s private port for arms and drug smuggling.” Furthermore, over 5,500 pages of documents contradicting Chiquita’s claim that it was extorted by Colombian paramilitaries have been released and are available online here. Chiquita’s continued involvement in criminal activity highlights how large and influential corporations feel as if they are above the law. Openly lying to the court and paying a relatively small fee in proportion to the damage they have caused across Latin America is not evidence of justice—it is blatant evidence of corruption which go up to the highest levels of government.
Kevin Edmonds is a NACLA blogger focusing on the Caribbean. For more from his blog, "The Other Side of Paradise," visit nacla.org/blog/other-side-paradise. Edmonds is a former NACLA research associate and a current PhD student at the University of Toronto, where he is studying the impact of neoliberalism on the St. Lucian banana trade. Follow him on twitter @kevin_edmonds.
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Morneau's credibility on the line as Liberals hit reset button on tax reforms
Finance Minister Bill Morneau looks on at a press conference on tax reforms in Stouffville, Ont., on Monday, October 16, 2017. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette
Joan Bryden
PMN Canada
OTTAWA — Justin Trudeau hit the reset button on his government’s controversial small-business tax reforms Monday but the awkward spectacle of the prime minister sidelining his finance minister, along with mushrooming questions about Bill Morneau’s personal financial arrangements, suggests the political crisis roiling Liberal ranks isn’t over just yet.
Indeed, the controversy has morphed into a test of credibility for Morneau, Trudeau’s most important minister, the architect of the Liberals’ economic agenda and the chief salesman for the tax reforms.
At a news conference to announce that the government will belatedly honour its promise to cut the small business tax rate to nine per cent, reporters asked as many questions about why Morneau hasn’t put his substantial assets in a blind trust as they did about the tax measures.
Trudeau didn’t help matters by initially insisting on fielding questions directed specifically to Morneau, who stood by watching while the prime minister defended his beleaguered minister’s ethics.
“You have to ask a question of me first because you get a chance to talk to the prime minister,” Trudeau told one reporter before finally allowing Morneau to explain that he has followed “to the letter” the recommendations of ethics commissioner Mary Dawson for dealing with his assets and avoiding any conflict of interest.
The uncomfortable news conference prompted New Democrat MP Nathan Cullen to wonder aloud if Trudeau “is starting to lose confidence in his finance minister.”
“Certainly many Canadians are,” Cullen said.
“The rollout of this small business tax plan has been so badly botched, I think we’d agree that both the message saying to many small business owners you’re tax cheats and also the messenger in this case — somebody who is so inherently conflicted, and I’d suggest maybe legally conflicted — is causing a lot of problems for both the prime minister, his Liberal caucus and for this finance (minister).”
In the House of Commons, opposition parties zeroed in on the lack of a blind trust, plus last week’s revelation that Morneau failed to disclose a private company that owns a family villa in France, to cast further doubt on his credibility.
Conservative MP Peter Kent said “this extremely wealthy minister” seems to believe “he is above conflict of interest and ethics reporting rules.” His party’s House leader, Candice Bergen, went even further, accusing the finance minister of becoming “so arrogant and so entitled that he actually thinks he is above the law.”
Cullen sarcastically attributed the multiple controversies surrounding Morneau to forgetfulness.
“He forgot that cutting small business taxes was a promise that he ran on, he forgot he owned a luxury villa in France, but, hey, what middle-class Canadian hasn’t? He also forgot to tell us that his vast wealth was not, in fact, in a blind trust and he only comes clean when he is in a world of trouble.”
As for the reviving the promise to cut the small business tax rate, which Morneau shelved in his first budget, Cullen dismissed that as damage control in the face of the angry backlash that greeted the small business tax reform proposals from doctors, lawyers, accountants, shop keepers, premiers and even some Liberal backbenchers.
“When Liberals have totally screwed up a small business tax plan, when they have attacked small businesses while ignoring their wealthy friends, when they are backed so deep into a corner they have nowhere else to go, then and only then will Liberals honour their commitments to Canadians.”
Opposition MPs also kept up a barrage of questions about a now-withdrawn Canada Revenue Agency notice that employee discounts will henceforth be considered taxable benefits. While Morneau was not involved in that fiasco and the government has insisted it has no plans to tax the discounts given to retail sector workers, ongoing confusion over what other discounts might be taxable gave opposition parties more ammunition to question the credibility of the government as a whole and its claim to be a champion of the middle class.
Business groups, who’ve bitterly denounced the tax reform plans, were more charitable about Monday’s partial climb-down, welcoming the reduction in the small business tax rate and the promise of changes to the proposed reforms to be unveiled later in the week.
“It’s certainly an awful lot better than it was only a few short hours ago,” said Dan Kelly, president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business.
Nevertheless, Kelly added that the business community will want to see the details of the changes and have tax experts analyse them before giving a thumbs up. There’s been “a bit of a trust erosion with the government” which makes the business community “a bit shy to react,” he said.
“We really need to make sure that what the government’s intentions are is actually the case when we study the proposals in detail,” he said.
“There’s no question it took a knock, it did affect the trust the business community has with government and with the ministry of finance, and it’s going to take a little bit of time for that to come back. But I think it can come back if the government is sincere and taking some new approaches.”
Perrin Beatty, president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said the government appears to be doing “a dance of the seven veils” with its changes to the tax reform proposals and it’s not until all the details are known that its impact can be judged.
“At this point, everybody’s from Missouri. They want to see something that’s concrete,” he said.
Beatty said part of the problem with the original proposals was that the government understated the impact, essentially telling business people, “‘Don’t worry, be happy’ and what we heard from all the tax practitioners across the country was, ‘Worry.”‘
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Newest Worldwide Headlines, Photos And Videos
Jill T Frey November 22, 2015 0 COMMENTS
9 BBC World Information is most commonly watched as a free-to-air (FTA) channel. The next chapter guarantees even more intrigue, with an appeal that may evaluation feedback US President Donald Trump has made in regards to the case and a much-anticipated finale to season two of the hit podcast Serial within the works. On 13 January 2009 at 09:fifty seven GMT, BBC World News switched its broadcast to 16:9 format, initially in Europe on Astra 1L satellite , 7 and Eutelsat Sizzling Chook 6 satellite to other broadcast feeds within the Asian area from 20 January 2009.
The channel’s present title -BBC World Information- was launched on 21 April 2008 as part of a £550,000 rebranding of the BBC’s general news output and visual id. BBC World Information is, for the most part, the same channel all over the world; the commercials are intended to be the one variations. Former US Vice President Joe Biden strongly criticised President Donald Trump and predicted an emboldened and determined Russia would as soon as again meddle in an American election.
The first half-hour of this programme may be seen in the UK on BBC Four or BBC Information Channel on weekends. The US President was back on Twitter in power after his account was taken down for eleven minutes yesterday. BBC World’s on-air design was changed significantly on 3 April 2000, bringing it nearer to the look of its sister channel within the UK which was then generally known as BBC News 24, the on-air look of which had been redesigned in 1999.
This simulcast is along with in a single day simulcasts at the high of the hour from 00.00 to 05.00 UK time on each BBC World News and BBC Information Channel and are merely branded as BBC News (except for Newsday which simulcasts at 00.00 UK time weekdays), even when they are produced by BBC World News. President Donald Trump has referred to as for the person charged over the New York truck assault to be executed.
On PBS stations, BBC World News is just not broadcast with conventional commercials (the breaks are filled with news tales) but omits the Met Workplace worldwide climate forecast on the finish of the programme, replacing it with underwriting announcements. A Twitter employee on their final day with the agency was responsible for taking down Donald Trump’s account, the agency has said, because the president resumed tweeting after the 11-minute outage.
Funbeach.com Visit Lengthy Beach Peninsula
Brexit And The Veterinary Occupation
Latest World Information, Videos & Images
National, Regional And World Information
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Home » Film Reviews » Mother Küsters goes to Heaven – Fassbinder and the the question of what comes after exploitation.
Armin Meier
Mother Küsters goes to Heaven – Fassbinder and the the question of what comes after exploitation.
Posted by lisathatcher on October 10, 2012 in Film Reviews
Mother Küsters goes to Heaven (1975) is another of those chilling Fassbinders. Chilling, not just because of the subject matter, but also because it stars Armin Meier who will kill himself over his love for Fassbinder in three years after this film is made and about whom Fassbinder will make In a Year of Thirteen Moons. Typical of Fassbinder it also stars Irm Herman, the woman he battered and assaulted for years through their marriage and Ingrid Caven, a woman he would be married to for two years in the future. Oh – his mothers in there too, just when you thought it couldn’t get any weirder. It seems only Fassbinder can get all these people to work coherently on a set together. Although, perhaps this explains why he worked so fast and why this film only took twenty days to make.
There are a few directors that can send a certain kind of thrill through me as soon as the opening credits start to roll. Godard can do it, Bergman can do it and the only other is Fassbinder. The thing in me that “knows” – that thing Kandinsky called the corresponding vibration in the human soul – begins to hum as if plucked as soon as I sit in front of a Fassbinder film. I can’t explain why. Maybe its just because he’s a favourite? Maybe it’s because both Godard and Fassbinder loved Brecht and followed him avidly – Fassbinder including many homages to Godard in his films. I can see too much of Fassbinder in a row, he’s a tough watch after all, but I am always rewarded, even when I am not so keen on the film itself. There was no danger of that this time. Easily one of Fassbinders best films this amazing portrayal of the deceit and exploitation human creatures will wield over each other left me astounded. And not just because it has two endings (both of which are portrayed on the DVD) but because of its unashamed fearlessness. He is so remarkably good at using art to portray his own fears.
The moment Mother Kusters receives the news about her husband. Note the light.
Also, like all of Fasssbinders films, this is deceptively simple. The basic plot unfolds thus: a woman Emma Küsters (Brigitte Mira) is at home preparing for the return of her husband from his day at work. He is late and she is speculating about where he is. She is bickering with her daughter-in-law while they make the dinner. They hear on the radio a factory worker has gone mad, murdered his supervisor and then used the machinery at the plant to kill himself. The man who did this terrible thing turns out to be her gentle husband, a man she has been married to for forty years. The rest of the film is many threads of the story at once, as Emma goes about the complicated task of trying to clear her husband’s name, for he has been labelled “The Factory Murderer” and is looked on as a villain.
Slowly, she will wake to discover she and her story will be horribly exploited as she is also abandoned by absolutely everyone in her world, including her children. First it will be journalists, then the bourgeois communist party (a fantastic idea of Fassbinders – I have only known communists like this) the factory her husband worked for and eventually anarchists. One child will use the notoriety of her father to further her singing career, and the other will use his unborn child as an excuse to avoid his mother and forget his father. Through it all Emma Küsters (Küsters literally means “church custodian) continues to be both the saintly mother figure and the christian-ized saint type a-la Bresson – thinking here of Mouchette or Balthazar. Indeed the end Fassbinder made for the European audiences has a very Bresson saintly-ending (we know what happens to Bresson saints and it aint pretty). One small piece of motherly loveliness – the final shot on the European version (the details of the end are done in captions against this shot) shows a side portrait of Mother Küsters with Fassbinders actual mother in the background. Clever no?
As for the two endings, I won’t go into them here. You will have to watch the film to see what Fassbinder does here. It’s remarkably clever of course, each a play on the idea of going to heaven. One tragic, and in keeping with the theme, and one typically Americanised, clumsy and light.
One thing I did want to highlight that I think is terribly clever, is the way Fassbinder brings objects to the fore and places people behind. I have a few examples below. He is a director that is always intrigued by the object that makes us real, and looking at some stills in the face of this is exciting. (well to me it is anyway)
Make sure you get to and see this as soon as you can .
The objects behind come to the fore and the human is seen as just another object.
A wall divides the room, the couple, the screen.
Many images focus on Mother Kusters hands and the work she does making up the power points.
The microphone looks like the gun off a tank pointed at her face.
Distance and washed out colours. Alienation and lifelessness.
← Creel Pone #7 – Vocals and Electronic noise. Mo Yan Wins the Nobel Prize for Literature →
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Should answers from authors be treated differently from other answers?
Mithrandir asked a question about the TombQuest series, and the author of the series offered to come write an answer.
Should answers written by authors be treated differently from normal answers on this site?
Not sure why the question is getting downvoted here. If you disagree with Hamlet's take on the issue, downvote his answer - but surely this is a reasonable discussion to be having in the first place? – Rand al'Thor Mar 20 '17 at 17:59
This is a complex and multi-faceted issue, and I'm probably not going to be able to (maybe I'm not even qualified to) cover all aspects of it, but here goes.
I think an answer from an author should be judged on its own merits to some degree, but we should also bear in mind that it's from the author when evaluating it, because that may make a difference.
There's a happy medium to be found here. Obviously we shouldn't take every answer from an author to be "Word of God", the definitive final answer to the question ... but on the other hand, the author can, at least in some contexts, tell us things that nobody else could. A lot of this is going to depend on the nature of the question as well as just the text of the answer.
In a pure analysis question which relies heavily on interpretation, an answer from the author isn't going to be worth much more than an answer from anyone else. Saying "X means Y, because I'm the author and I intended X to mean Y" would be a bad answer, but saying "X can be interpreted as meaning Y, because [blah blah blah, sensible analysis]" would be a good one.
I don't think I really need to give examples here. The issue of how much an author's statement is worth has already been gone over ad nauseam on this site.
In a question which asks about authorial intent, or about some other aspect of a literary work which the author would be likely to know better than anyone else (let's remember that this site isn't just for analysis questions), an answer from the author should be treated differently from an answer from just some random SE user.
For instance, if we had a question like this about a work by an author who was still alive, and they signed up to the site to tell us about the parallels between their own childhood and that of their character, that could be a really good answer which nobody else would be qualified to write.
In both cases, I think there's a simple rule of thumb to determine how, if at all, an answer by the author should be treated differently from any other.
Imagine the author had been interviewed, said exactly what's in this answer, and the interview had been published. Would just quoting from that interview make a reasonable answer?
Take the first case, of an interpretation-based analysis question. An author might have given an interview in which they state that they intended X to mean Y; just quoting this wouldn't make a good answer. Or they might have justified in the interview why X meaning Y makes sense, in which case (if their argument is good enough) quoting this could make a decent answer.
Take the second case, of a question which the author is more qualified to answer than anyone else. If they've already answered it in an interview, then the contents of that interview could be turned into a reasonable answer on this site.
It's true that the Stack Exchange platform isn't designed for hosting interviews with experts, but it is designed for getting answers from experts to good questions, and interviews can sometimes be quoted in order to form decent Stack Exchange answers.
In this answer or this answer, for instance, I've included quotes from authorial interviews as part of a broader analysis of a topic. If Art Spiegelman or Richard Adams had posted those answers, with the textual-analysis parts exactly the same and the authorial-interview parts replaced by simple statements rather than linked quotes, the answers would be exactly as valid as mine are.
There's still the issue of verifying that an author really is who they claim to be. I mean, anyone could sign up under the username "J.K. Rowling" and post troll answers to questions about the Harry Potter books. I've already addressed this issue elsewhere:
No personally identifying information about SE users is publicly visible. And beyond making off-site contact with the celebrity themselves (which is a possibility and has been done in the past), such information is the only way of proving a user is who they say they are. So, if you find someone who claims to be a specific actor, author, etc. and you're doubtful about their claim, feel free to flag the post for moderator attention. The mods are the only people who have a chance of verifying a user's identity.
In some cases (such as with the question from @Mithrandir linked in the OP), the author could confirm elsewhere, e.g. using their official Twitter account, that the answer really is from them. And if you're unsure, you can always raise a flag and ask the mods to check.
Of course, this only matters in cases where it makes a difference whether or not the answer is really from the author. If someone claims to be the author and posts a decent analysis which would stand on its own, no need to check. If someone makes claims about the author while claiming to be them, and those claims are crucial to the answer, then a check might be wise.
Rand al'ThorRand al'Thor
I'm sorry, but I don't think this debate is about whether interviews from authors are acceptable sources (everyone seems to think that's what I'm arguing about, but that's not at all what I'm saying). The debate is about whether the Stack Exchange platform is an appropriate platform for question and answer sessions with authors. – user111 Mar 20 '17 at 18:41
@Hamlet I know you're not arguing against interviews as acceptable sources. But what I'm saying (and what Mith is saying in his answer) is that answers from authors can be just as valid as quotes from interviews with authors. – Rand al'Thor Mar 20 '17 at 18:48
It's also worth noting that good answers require sources, context, and thorough answers. An author answering with "this is true" is just a bad answer: they need to cite their own work. – Aza♦ Mar 20 '17 at 23:14
I was going to just keep this as a comment, but then I ran out of room in the comment box.
I think one of the flaws here is this idea of us not being here to interview authors. Sure, I can totally agree that that's not what we're here for. There are many other sites that rock that sort of author interaction, and we're not here for that.
That said, I think there is a large difference between "hey I wrote this thing! I have a unique perspective because it came out of my head!" and effectively doing an AMA thing using SE's platform. If the author can come in, and write a super excellent answer held to the same standards as any other answer on this site, why not? And if we can demonstratively prove they are who they say they are, that's kinda neat, no? (Bonus points if we can make them stick around and be more active, because more people is always awesome).
I don't think we should turn away authors of works, if they choose to grace us with their presence. After all, if they came in and wrote an awesome answer and didn't state they were the author, we'd be like HOLY MOLY THIS IS GREAT HAVE AN UPVOTE. I don't see why this should change if we manage to prove they are who they say they are - after all, the beauty of the SE system is that we can have multiple answers, so even if the author comes in and says the thing is x because y, it is completely possible someone else could come in and go "what about x being because of z" and if they manage to make a good strong case for it backed up by the text or whatever else, that's awesome too.
Sometimes the author is going to be the right expert for the job at hand, sometimes they won't be. I think as well we need to keep in mind that not all our questions are going to be or should be high level analysis, so there's room for all sorts of expertise from all sorts of angles.
I say we should give it a shot, hold anything to our usual standards, and then see how it falls out. No use throwing the baby out with the bathwater.
AshAsh
If they provide a reason to believe that they actually are who they claim to be, then we treat it as if it were an interview or other statement by the author.
If the person who is answering can provide a reason to believe that they are who they claim to be, then we can believe them. In this case, I tweeted the question I asked, on a Twitter account for a wiki about that series, that the author of that series is following and has retweeted/responded to before. This is the author's official Twitter account, so unless you believe that his account was hacked, we can assume that if someone posts an answer with the name 'Michael Northrop' on that question, it's them.
We use quotes from the author as (mostly) reliable sources - for instance, in (self-promotion alert!) my recent question, the answer has some quotes from an interview. If that's a good source, then why not having the author post here?
In this case, again, this can't be answered from solely the books or solely the game - it requires knowledge of both. I assume that he will provide screenshots (and if he doesn't, there's always the comments); he might not want to post quotes from his book online, though. In this case I'm inclined to assume that he knows what he's talking about :)
Mithrandir♦Mithrandir
The Stack Exchange platform isn't designed for interviews with authors and other experts. See meta.stackexchange.com/questions/58486/… and meta.stackexchange.com/questions/258474/… – user111 Mar 20 '17 at 18:16
@Hamlet No-one's advocating using SE for interviews, but rather to treat what they say in an answer with the same weight as you would do an interview on another site—it would be silly to require authors to cite themselves on what they intended to do, and the whole point of SE is expert-level Q&A. – Aurora0001 Mar 20 '17 at 18:27
Quoting an interview without adding anything to it makes for a poor answer, and this answer equates an author's Stack answer with an unadorned quote. That concerns me because it lowers the quality expected from author answers in comparison to Stack answers given by other users. – BESW Mar 20 '17 at 22:20
Let's untangle this a bit. There are a lot of red herrings in this discussion, and it's become a bit of a mess. It's starting to hinder our ability to talk about this cleanly. Ignore quality, author validation, and all the rest for now; that's putting the cart before the horse. Let's talk about that later.
For now, let's focus instead just on the relationship of an author to their work. Albeit this is more complicated and thorny than I'd like it to be, let's delineate Questions a User Can Ask into two subtly different categories:
Questions about what the author meant to say
Questions about what meaning the text conveys (and other textual questions)
The author has the power to write the work however they'd like; often, authors will have a goal in mind when doing so. Authors therefore have primacy over questions of intent. An author's answer stating, "I am the author, and I intended to [have Sam lob an expensive mango at Susan]" is sufficient to establish what the author intended to write. This should be an acceptable answer.
Authors, however, do not have the power to absolutely determine what meaning the text conveys. The meaning of the text is the meaning as interpreted by the reader, not by the author. Understanding the meaning of a text requries evidence, thought, analysis, and cultural critique. Authors therefore do not have primacy over questions of meaning and interpretation. If an author wants to answer one of these questions, that's great! They're probably one of the most qualified people to do so. But they still need to provide the same level of evidence and analysis.
The critical point is this: if an author answers a question of meaning with a statement of intent, they have given a non-answer to the question.
Quality is a separate issue. An author providing a statement of intent without textual evidence to show where it comes through is missing something important. It is an answer to the question, but it may or may not be a very good one; questions of intent are better when they're supported by textual and meta-textual evidence. We should encourage authors to provide as much information and evidence as possible, because it will make their answer better - but it isn't a strict requirement.
Things that are red herrings:
Validating an author's identity. We can't discuss the importance of validating an author's identity without first knowing whether and how much the author is important at all. While relevant to any practical consideration, it's tangential to how we should handle their answers in principle.
Interviews with authors & the form and method of interviewing. We're getting sidetracked talking about interviews, and using Stack Exchange as an interview platform. A great deal of things are implied by the word "interview," very few of which concern the purpose of this question.
Things that might be confusing:
Primacy isn't authority. An author's answer doesn't mean their response is guaranteed to be correct. It has happened in the past, albeit relatively infrequently, that the consensus about an author's intent differs sharply from their stated intent. Primacy here simply means first consideration.
What if a user, who you knew wasn't the author, wrote an answer to a question about intentions saying "I was the author, and here were my intentions." How would you react to that answer? I'm guessing that most of the people on this site would downvote it. In my mind, that invalidates your claim that validating an author's identity isn't important. – user111 Mar 21 '17 at 6:47
@Hamlet I'm trying to separate practical considerations from philosophical ones. We can't discuss both of them at the same time, and we need to have our ducks in line before we can look at the practical way of handling authorial answers. I'm not dismissing the question, but I think this is the wrong time to try and address it. – Aza♦ Mar 21 '17 at 6:47
I don't think you can separate the two. Stack Exchange philosophy is fundamentally against verifying the identity of community members. In practice, these answers only work if the identity of the author is verified. There's a conflict here that no one seems to be addressing. – user111 Mar 21 '17 at 6:51
@Hamlet Discussion hasn't settled on whether answers from authors are meaningful at all. That's a wider-reaching discussion than one on whether we could validate an authorial account. They're not in conflict, either: "we'd like to do X, but we can't validate, so we should do Y" is a totally reasonable answer. But you can't come to that answer without first knowing X. – Aza♦ Mar 21 '17 at 6:54
No, authors should be treated as expert users like everybody else. Experience-based answers are often very useful, and an author's experience can be part of a great answer about their own work or the industry in which they operate!
We still expect the same level of quality from an author as from any other user, including providing explanations, sources, and quotes as needed to give an answer the "how" and "why" which makes Stack answers awesome. The author isn't exempt from the need to support a claim; they just have access to a different set of resources to do so.
BESWBESW
I like this answer, but. If the question is essentially about the author in some way (whether it's about their intent in a particular book, or their life outside of their books, or anything else), why do they need to provide sources or quotes? They'd end up quoting themselves, when they could just have made their statement outright. – Rand al'Thor Mar 20 '17 at 22:43
@Randal'Thor "Explanations," then, would be the expected how-and-why-ness. This is basic experience-based answer guideline stuff. If you're answering based on personal experience you don't have to quote things, you have to explain what you did, what effect it had, why it matters, and so on. – BESW Mar 21 '17 at 2:36
No. Answers by authors should be treated exactly the same as answers by normal community members. The fact that the community member claims to be the author (whether that claim can be verified or not) should have no bearing on how we evaluate the answer.
Clearly, the community has decided that for certain types of questions, answers that only discuss intentionality are correct and encouraged. That's not what's at issue here.
What's at issue here is that in practice, an answer by someone claiming to be an author will only be correct if we can verify that person's identity. Think about it. What if a user, who you knew wasn't the author, wrote an answer to a question about intentions saying "I was the author, and here were my intentions." How would you react to that answer? I'm guessing that most of the people on this site would downvote it.
The problem is that the Stack Exchange platform isn't designed for answers where the correctness of the answer is dependent on who wrote the answer. We don't have features like verified profiles for a reason. Answers aren't evaluated on the basis of who wrote them, but the arguments and evidence contained in the answer.
If an author comes along and writes an answer but offers no evidence other than "I am the author", I would downvote that answer the same way I would downvote an answer that offered no evidence other than "I have a PHD in [x]".
What evidence is available to authors? The same evidence available to normal users. Quotes from the book are acceptable. Unverified claims that "this is how I wrote the book" or "these were my intentions" are not.
Here's the standard we should use for evaluating author answers. Imagine that the answer was written by a someone who you know is not the author. Would the answer still be a good answer? If yes, then the answer is acceptable. If no, then the answer is not.
In this case, the proof is that I specifically asked him to come and write the answer, so it's not just some random guy claiming to be the author. We have a reason to assume it's the actual author. – Mithrandir♦ Mar 20 '17 at 16:44
If an author says "I intended to say ____", then why should that be any different from them having an interview, quoting that in an answer then posting it? Quoting an interview would certainly count as a valid source here, so why would that be any different to them just saying it directly in an answer? – Aurora0001 Mar 20 '17 at 16:46
@Aurora0001 because the Stack Exchange platform isn't designed for interviews with experts. – user111 Mar 20 '17 at 18:21
@Hamlet But quoting such interviews can (in some contexts) make for decent Stack Exchange answers. – Rand al'Thor Mar 20 '17 at 18:22
@Randal'Thor that is not what I am arguing against here. I am not arguing against interviews with experts being appropriate sources. I am saying that the Stack Exchange platform is not an appropriate platform for interviews with experts. – user111 Mar 20 '17 at 18:37
@Hamlet I don't see why not, it's a Q&A platform. Turning it around, say someone asks a question that would be best answered by quoting a statement by the author ("Why did the author choose to...?"). The author sees it and could clearly answer it right then and there. What should the author do if you think that posting their answer is not a good idea? – Martin Ender Mar 20 '17 at 19:15
@Hamlet The Stack Exchange platform is all about getting answers from experts. What's the difference, in your view, between that and the idea of "interviews with experts" which you're so against? I mean, both are about asking question(s) and getting answer(s) from experts. – Rand al'Thor Mar 20 '17 at 22:09
Is this site focused on Literature Analysis or literature in general?
How should we deal with authors who use pseudonyms?
Should we be using comments as substitutes for answers?
Best Questions & Answers from 3rd Quarter of 2017
Best Questions & Answers from 1st Quarter of 2018
Best Questions & Answers from 4th Quarter of 2018
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How rich is Maurice Starr? Net Worth, Money
Maurice Starr Net Worth
Maurice Starr how much money? For this question we spent 12 hours on research (Wikipedia, Youtube, we read books in libraries, etc) to review the post.
The main source of income: Musicians
Total Net Worth at the moment 2019 year – is about $10 Million.
Maurice Starr information Birth date: 1953-01-01 Birth place: Florida, USA Profession:Soundtrack, Producer, Actor
:How tall is Maurice Starr – 1,81m.
How much weight is Maurice Starr – 59kg
Maurice Starr is an American musician, songwriter, and record producer. Though trying his hand at a solo career, hes best known for his work creating songs and albums with pop and soul bands such as Con Funk Shun, New Edition, and the New Kids on the Block.
Biography,Originally from Deland, Florida, Johnson moved to Boston, Massachusetts, in the early 1970s. As an artist, Johnson was a member of The Johnson Brothers (not to be confused with The Brothers Johnson from Los Angeles, California) and the seminal electro group known as the Jonzun Crew with brothers Michael Jonzun and Soni Jonzun. In 1980, Johnson changed his name to Maurice Starr and recorded two R&B albums, Flaming Starr and Spacey Lady. Unsuccessful as a solo artist, and described as a cross between Berry Gordy and P.T. Barnum, Starr decided to create a band to perform the songs that he wrote.In 1982, Starr discovered the band New Edition on his talent show. He co-wrote and co-produced their debut album with the hits, Candy Girl, Is This The End, and Popcorn Love. After the album that produced these singles, creative differences caused Starr and New Edition to go their separate ways. The group continued to produce a number of U.S. Top 10 R&B hit singles throughout the 80s and 90s including the top 5 hit (Cool it Now) in the Billboard Hot 100. Three of the members, Bobby Brown, Johnny Gill, and Ralph Tresvant, went on to have successful solo careers, while the three others formed the award-winning group Bell Biv DeVoe.In 1984, Starr created New Kids on the Block, a band consisting of five male teenagers, brothers Jordan Knight and Jonathan Knight, with Danny Wood, Donnie Wahlberg and Joey McIntyre. Starr intended New Kids on the Block to be a white version of New Edition, he stated I honestly believe that if theyd been white, (the group) would have been 20 times as big. By 1989, New Kids On The Block was the fastest-rising act in the United States. Starr also handled the group’s lucrative marketing of posters, T-shirts, and other spin-offs.Starr later attempted to repeat his success with artists such as Perfect Gentlemen, Rick Wes, Homework, the Superiors, Tommy Page and Ana.
Wikipedia Source: Maurice Starr
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E-Sangha and “sect bashing” (continuation of the ‘cult’ smear history)
For previous installments:
The history of the New Kadampa Tradition’s ‘cult’ smear, Part 1
The Rise of Sectarianism in Buddhist Discussion Forums
In the late 1990s, the cult smear against the NKT was spread mainly by the Tibetan government in exile and official Dalai Lama websites, on alt.religion newsgroup discussions, and by word of mouth in Tibetan Buddhist Centers loyal to the Dalai Lama. However, in the years that followed, during the 2000’s, a fully-fledged Internet attack on Geshe Kelsang Gyatso and the NKT began to take place on certain Buddhist discussion boards such as E-Sangha, Buddhanet, Beliefnet, and Phayul by Tibetan and Western supporters of the Dalai Lama.
The normal pattern in such discussion forums was that a “newbie” would post a question along the lines of: “There’s this Buddhist group near me called the NKT, I’m thinking of going to some of their classes, what do people think? Do you have any information about them?” This innocent question would result in a flood of negative posts, denouncing the NKT as a cult, claiming they weren’t Buddhist but spirit-worshipping murderers, etc, and recommending the questioner try “a genuine Buddhist group”.
These posters who were so vehemently opposed to the NKT were Tibetan Buddhists from various sects although, more recently, they were joined by a few disaffected ex-NKT members who jumped on the bandwagon with prolific posts.
The most egregious of these discussion forums is E-Sangha, which has also recently been receiving a slew of complaints from other Buddhist groups and individuals for its intolerance and censorship. As it says on the E-Sangha Watch website:
E-SANGHA WATCH has been created with the support, guidance and encouragement of concerned Buddhist clergy and lay-persons of several schools wishing to firmly yet constructively oppose, publicize, correct and explain to the unwary the current state of intra-Buddhist sectarian bias, misinformation, religious intolerance and ‘sect bashing’ which unfortunately exists under the present policies and administration of the ‘E-Sangha’ Buddhism Portal website.
(More examples of E-Sangha’s bias, misinformation, intolerance and sect-bashing are also collected here and here. Laura Busch also wrote a doctoral thesis on E-Sangha available here.)
Many NKT practitioners and others have been shocked over the years to find that the New Kadampa Tradition is actually banned on this supposedly open Buddhist forum, the largest Buddhist chat group on the Internet! The board regulations state in black and white:
“These few “Buddhist” schools of thoughts are not recognized by E-sangha. No links to their websites, their books, or their followers’ websites are allowed: New Kadampa Tradition (NKT) and all other proponents of Dolgyal/Shugden”
However, a reading of the background to this ban and who instigated and maintains it will hopefully reassure people that the reasons behind it were completely capricious and unjustified.
E-Sangha is a Buddhist forum that started in 2003. In September 2003, E-Sangha administrators conducted a poll of its members to decide if the NKT section that had been started on the board should be removed. This poll was requested by Global Moderator Henry Chia, also known as Ngawang Gelek, a Sakya practitioner from Singapore who had posted actively against the NKT on the alt.religion newsgroup discussions during the Dorje Shugden controversy in 1996/97.
Labeling the NKT as non-Buddhist for its reliance on Dorje Shugden, Henry cut and pasted every single negative article regarding the NKT and Dorje Shugden taken from the TGIE and Dalai Lama official websites and then advised the members “to make up their own minds”. As one member pointed out: “Thanks to Henry, plenty of information is now available for folks to make an informed vote.” There was no information, however, posted from the side of the NKT or any other Shugden practitioner.
There never was a vote. By the middle of September 2003, “Teyes”, the E-Sangha founder, had decided:
“I have read through almost every word that Henry had written, clicking on almost every link. The messages are exhaustive and I tried hard to digest the vast amount of information. I am not an expert in Buddhism, although raised in a Buddhist family, thus all members help are required, especially in issues like this. I appreciate Henry’s frankness in raising this point and I agreed with Henry that:
1) There will be no links to NKT website as from today.
2) There will be no seperate listings of them as a unique group within our database.
3) All NKT’s folks can participate in all our discussion.
Thanks everyone for their help, especially Henry. (So members, you can disregard the votes about NKT). Have a nice day!”
And he followed this with another posting later:
I have considered all the pros and cons when NKT section was removed. After examining, I am rather worried that newbies in Buddhism might be misled. That’s my main fear, especially E-Sangha has been growing steadily over the last 2 months, and is right now, the most active board on Buddhism. I hope that we will put this issue behind us. Thanks.”
With no knowledge of the NKT other than what he had heard from Henry, and despite the fact that the NKT had hundreds of Centers and thousands of students all over the world who were happily and sincerely practicing Mahayana Buddhism, the owner of E-Sangha condemned the NKT as dangerous for “newbies”, a theme that was continued in all subsequent discussions.
Another E-Sangha global moderator called Namdrol (Malcolm Smith) joined in the discussion and over a period of many months provided E-Sangha members with a huge amount of astounding, sometimes laughable, and (according to one psychiatrist who responded) clinically delusional misinformation. For example, those who rely upon Wisdom Buddha Dorje Shugden (called here “Dolgyal”) are responsible for the invasion of Tibet, Mad Cow disease, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan:
“Gyalpos also cause strife and cattle diseases. The outbreak of Mad Cow disease in Northern England a couple of years ago has been attributed to the strong presence of Shugden practitioners in Northern England.”
“I don’t hate Pabhongkha; I don’t hate Dolgyal. But I think that Dolgyal is harmful and that because of him, the Tibetan Goverment fell, the Chinese were able to easily invade, and these sorts of things are predicted in many texts.
It may be hard for you to beleive, but the strong presence of Dolgyal practitioners in Northern England led to the Mad Cow disease outbreak; the burning of the millions of bovine corpses incited the anger of the Mamos, and they in turn caused these wars in which we are now ensconced– so this is no joke–really!”
Most recently, Namdrol incited forum members to more intolerance (on the occasion of the Dalai Lama’s being admitted to hospital for kidney stones):
“We can all thank the Shugden people for HHDL’s present state of ill health.”
However, because he is an “old-timer” and a global moderator, his words astonishingly enough have carried weight and adversely influenced many people. For example:
“Namdrol’s point’s should be well taken, he really knows his stuff when it comes to Tibetan Buddhism. He has practiced for a long time and personally knows many very high lama’s, and Rinpoche’s”.
Namdrol has devoted many postings to slandering the Gelugpa tradition in general that was passed down through Je Phabongkhapa, Trijang Rinpoche and their disciples, even casting aspersions on Lama Zopa and the FPMT (who have the Dalai Lama as their patron). Umpteen people have been banned from E-Sangha for questioning the moderators or not toeing the party line, but not once has another moderator asked Namdrol to stop his divisive, intolerant and sectarian speech.
Here is an example of the intolerance toward the NKT on E-Sangha that was enshrined as policy in 2003 and continues to this day, from a recent thread concerning the opening of an NKT World Peace Cafe:
“The NKT is not a legitimate Buddhist organization in my opinion. For this reason, I would certainly avoid the cafe. I would also spend an hour or two emailing leads to local media about the controversy surrounding the cult.”
“the NKT is dangerous and the spirit they worship is too. how can they propose to open a world peace cafe when the biggest part of their organization is the worship of a malicious spirit?”
“As we all know, this cult have done and still doing so much damaging to the public”
“To them Dharma is a business opportunity to fund the growth of their sect and kelsang gyatso’s empire.”
“You could always be an infiltrator, share some other views. Would be interesting to go in there and say you know, a lot of people consider the NKT to be a cult.”
(For the smear that Geshe Kelsang has profited from the growth of the NKT, see Smear: Geshe Kelsang has millions of pounds that have come from his disciples.)
It is clear that some E-Sangha members are sufficiently militant to take action against the NKT by contacting venues where classes are being held to get them cancelled, defacing publicity, and vandalizing Geshe Kelsang’s books in bookstores so that they won’t sell. Some members have openly boasted about engaging in such activities, and the existence and effects of these behaviors are one reason the New Kadampa Truth website was compiled.
E-Sangha’s mission statement reads: “E-Sangha’s intent is to keep the tradition alive and flourishing, and to help bring peace, harmony and happiness into everyones lives.” Yet they have been the source of destroying peace, harmony and happiness between Buddhist groups and practitioners since they began in 2003. The clique of moderators have frequently broken their own detailed board guidelines on adhering to right intention, right speech, and right action.
Any reference to the ‘NKT’ on a web forum or discussion board these days will almost inevitably draw a barrage of ‘cult’ allegations as surely as a magnet attracts iron.
Sadly, we can see that the Dalai Lama’s unjustified condemnations have been effective in associating ‘NKT’ and ‘cult’ in the minds of his followers and many other Tibetan Buddhists.
27 Comments | Dalai Lama, Dorje Shugden, E-Sangha, Smear: NKT is a cult | Tagged: buddhism, Dalai Lama, Dolgyal, Dorje Shugden, E-Sangha, E-Sangha Watch, Henry Chia, Je Phabongkhapa, Malcolm Smith, Namdrol, New Kadampa Tradition, Ngawang Gelek, NKT cult, nkt-ikbu, Pabongkha, trijang rinpoche | Permalink
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Home Special Events Tony Campolo to Speak at Belmont on ‘Citizenship and Faith’
Tony Campolo to Speak at Belmont on ‘Citizenship and Faith’
Nationally celebrated speaker and author Dr. Tony Campolo will visit Belmont University on Wed., Sept. 3 to address “Citizenship and Faith,” the first topic in a Speaker Series covering subjects pertinent to Belmont’s hosting of the 2008 Town Hall Presidential Debate. The event will occur at 10 a.m. in Belmont’s Massey Performing Arts Center.
Campolo, a professor emeritus of sociology at Pennsylvania’s Eastern University, is the founder of the Evangelical Association for the Promotion of Education (EAPE) and the author of 35 books, including his latest Red Letter Christians: A Citizen’s Guide to Faith and Politics. A media commentator on religious, social and political matters, Campolo has appeared on CNN and MSNBC as well as television programs like “Politically Incorrect,” “The Colbert Report,” “Nightline,” “Crossfire” and “Larry King Live.”
This program will be open to the public. For more information, visit www.belmontdebate08.com.
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Irving Berlin’s Holiday Inn at Paper Mill Playhouse, November 21 – December 30
In this musical based on the beloved Bing Crosby/Fred Astaire film, Jim Hardy leaves behind the hustle and bustle of showbiz for a quiet life on a Connecticut farm. Jim’s agrarian efforts are a flop, but things start looking up when he falls for a talented schoolteacher, and together they infuse their sleepy rural setting with some Broadway razzle-dazzle. Fresh from a Broadway run, this heartwarming, toe-tapping production features more than 20 classic songs from the Berlin catalog, including “Easter Parade,” “Cheek to Cheek,” “Steppin’ Out with My Baby,” and “White Christmas.” More info
Paper Mill Playhouse
In this musical based on the beloved Bing Crosby/Fred Astaire film, Jim Hardy leaves behind the hustle and bustle of showbiz for a quiet life on a Connecticut farm. Jim’s agrarian efforts are a flop, but things start looking up when he falls for a talented schoolteacher, and together they infuse their sleepy rural setting with some Broadway razzle-dazzle.
Fresh from a Broadway run, this heartwarming, toe-tapping production features more than 20 classic songs from the Berlin catalog, including “Easter Parade,” “Cheek to Cheek,” “Steppin’ Out with My Baby,” and “White Christmas.”
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Man mistaken to be former Côte d’Ivoire President beaten by angry men in France (Video)
A man was mistaken to be Côte d’Ivoire’s former president Laurent Gbagbo, was attacked and beaten by some angry men while walking on the streets of Paris.
He was chased across the street before they realised he was innocent and his only crime was looking like the former president.
The former president is facing charges of fraud, murder and persecution at the International Criminal Court in Hague following the end of his administration in 2011.
TagsCôte d'IvoireInternational Criminal CourtLaurent GbagboMan
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Home » Blog » Movies » Perfectly Good Cars Get Thrown Out Of A Plane In Furious 7
Perfectly Good Cars Get Thrown Out Of A Plane In Furious 7
Tim Brennan April 12th, 2015 Movies, Blog Share:
According to the dictionary, one of the definitions of the word “superfluous” is, “unnecessary or needless.” I mention that just to give you guys a heads up. This entire review is superfluous. I will put irresponsible amounts of money down betting that you’ve already made up your mind if you’re going to see Furious 7. Odds are nothing I write will sway you one way or the other. Is it causing me to undergo an existential crisis? Yes. But I knew the risks when I took the job, dammit.
But wait! Before you think I’m going to start mercilessly ragging on Furious 7, which I’m not, let’s remember that summer movies are specifically designed and marketed to engage the lizard brain. Big, loud and thrilling is the name of the game. When you see a preview where Chris Pratt leads a squad of velociraptors, or The Hulk and Iron Man lay waste to a city, you make a snap decision. Within a few seconds, you decide if you’ll buy in or not. The tragedy is that, sometimes, if you don’t give a movie a fair chance, you’ll miss out on something good. I almost made that mistake.
Way back in 2001, Vin Diesel and Paul Walker starred in The Fast And The Furious, a semi-charming Point Break knock-off. I saw it on video and didn’t think much of it, because I don’t care about cars. As Hollywood so often does, sequels began to appear. I arrogantly ignored them. My bad, especially because in 2011, Fast Five was released. A game changer, this altered the entire nature of the franchise. Where there were initially lots of street racing and macho posturing, Fast Five proudly raised a middle finger towards physics and reality. Like an Americanized version of the Bond franchise, action sequences and stunts were constantly pushed to be crazier. Not only that, but plot threads and characters from previous films were intertwined, creating a vast mythology. It’s like the Marvel movies, only nobody is overtly a superhero. It’s become a multiracial, globetrotting franchise that constantly goes bigger.
Which brings us to Furious 7. The plot is incidental, but let’s get it out of the way. The film opens with Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham), visiting his hospitalized brother (who was the bad guy in Fast And Furious 6). His brother is in a coma. Shaw is extremely angry and wants revenge on the people that left his sibling in such lousy shape. We know that Shaw is formidable, not because the script tells us, but because we see the aftermath of Shaw beating the hell out of an entire hospital and getting away unseen. To all you writers out there, that’s how you introduce a threat.
Seriously, the plot is that simple. Dom (Vin Diesel), Brian (Paul Walker) and the rest of the gang are being hunted by Shaw. Screenwriter Chris Morgan throws in a bunch of nonsensical plot mechanics, such as the team being tasked to steal a high-tech surveillance program by shadowy operative Mr. Nobody (Kurt Russell). Wisely, the story keeps the revenge plot in mind and never strays from it for too long. But when it does stray, it usually pays dividends.
Arguably, the best action sequence in the film is fairly early on. The team must skydive in their cars, land on a treacherous mountain road and rescue a beautiful kidnapped hacker*. It’s an extended sequence that’s shot clearly, precisely, and with a strong sense of geography. You always know where everybody is in relation to everybody else. When the action escalates, it does so in a way that feels natural. It reminds me a little of the truck chase in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Director James Wan has come a long way from directing Saw in 2004. Every scene has a feeling of momentum and urgency, and the finale has a good (if slightly cheesy) sense of closure.
Series co-star Paul Walker died in a car wreck in 2013. Walker was roughly halfway finished shooting his scenes at the time of his death. This necessitated script rewrites and the use of body doubles and CGI in some scenes. It mostly feels natural, and Walker’s sendoff at the end is legitimately touching. While these films are basically dumb as hell, there’s a real sincerity to how the characters and cast interact with each other. Walker’s loss feels real to everyone attached.
Having said all that, it’s not a perfect film. Statham’s villain just shows up whenever the plot needs him to attack the heroes. Plus, there’s an early, and awesome fight between Statham and charisma magnet Dwayne Johnson. Afterwards, Johnson essentially vanishes for most of the film, reducing his role to an extended cameo. Plus, remember how I mentioned the plot is dumb? If you’re someone who nitpicks or demands intelligence from your films, this movie will make you beg for death. There were a few plot points that would have made sense had I seen the last few installments. But, really, it ain’t that complicated.
But it doesn’t matter. Furious 7 starts the summer movie season off with a bang. In terms of pure, meat-headed fun, it’s a success. I walked out wearing a big, stupid grin. Sometimes, that’s enough.
*Seriously, everybody is beautiful in these movies. I’m sure janitors and telemarketers in Fast and Furious world are gorgeous.
Tim has been alarmingly enthusiastic about movies ever since childhood. He grew up in Boulder and, foolishly, left Colorado to study Communications in Washington State. Making matters worse, he moved to Connecticut after meeting his too-good-for-him wife. Drawn by the Rockies and a mild climate, he triumphantly returned and settled down back in Boulder County. He's written numerous screenplays, loves hiking, and embarrassed himself in front of Samuel L. Jackson. True story.
Tagged: dwayne johnsonfurious 7jason stathampaul walkervin diesel
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ELECTION CHATTER (DAY 31): On the campaign trail with the living dead
BY Mark Bourrie
POSTED April 25, 2011 1:15 pm
Day 31: In which Ottawa Magazine contributing editor Mark Bourrie paints a disturbing picture of the federal party leaders as various incarnations of the living dead
I know I am the first member of the Parliamentary Press Gallery to raise the issue of the living dead being a potent force in the campaign. Now, it seems, the political parties have latched on to the problem, but in ways I have never expected.
Take Stephen Harper. The Prime Minister is a known Cyborg, composed of spare parts from various autopsies gone terribly wrong, some 1990s-era nanotechnology, and programming by the Republican National Committee. The hairpiece should have been a give-away, yet Canadians refuse to believe.
Then there’s John Baird. Mr. Baird is a known werewolf. The press downplays this fact, calling him an “attack dog,” when, in fact, it is quite obvious that Mike Harris went back to North Bay with Baird’s soul.
Now, I do not suggest anyone go after Baird with a silver bullet. Simply waving a cross in Baird’s face should cause an immediate and very obvious flinch. You should be able to back him into a corner and keep him cowering harmlessly until the small children make their escape. (Leaving raw meat nearby will not provoke a serious reaction. Baird caught on to that trick in his Queen’s Park days. Back then, he lived in the tunnel that connects the legislature building to the University Avenue subway line, and people used to amuse themselves tossing him pieces of hot dog.)
As far as I know, there are no other undead minions of Satan campaigning for the Tories, although Krista Erickson of the new Sun News Network looks rather unearthly. Strange moonlight rites could not revive Brian Mulroney, and poor Joe Clark had a stake driven through his heart some 31 years ago, and is thus unavailable.
So is Ed Broadbent. His protégé, Jack Layton, who limps because of “hip surgery” — in reality, difficulties with the embalming equipment — has managed to come across as a man who is actually one of the living. If the campaign lasted three more weeks, he’d risk having his ears turn green and fall off.
Then there’s Count Ignatieff who, as I have so often explained, travels with what staffers call “the sleeping coffin” and reacts poorly to mirrors and sunlight. The Liberals have foisted on us a count with a dubious family background who, supposedly, arrived on these shores from “Harvard.” But, as I have often noted, his accent has a distinct Carpathian Mountains twang to it.
Count Ignatieff no longer travels alone. Two other zombies, Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin, have joined the Ignatieff campaign in a stratagem that can only be the work of the Prince of Darkness. Neither time nor the prayers of nuns have cleansed the soul of Chrétien, who is laden with the sins of Quebec ad men and sleazy small-town grifters of the Mauricie.
Poor Paul Martin was exhumed from the Eastern Townships to remind us of our former prosperity, but all those years in the same crypt as Chrétien have left him with a taint that no amount of Holy Water can wash away.
In a sad parody of Easter, the most despised of the Undead has risen and walks among us now. Black Jacques Parizeau is loose in the Quebec countryside, and all the roadside crosses and shrines of the Distinct Society will not bring him to heel. Parizeau is allegedly 80 years old. In fact, he has been around much, much longer. The Huron have an oral tradition of him stalking their cornfields and raiding their villages long before the arrival of the Europeans.
Back then, he sought small children. Today, he settles for support for his apprentice, Gilles Duceppe.
I think this may be the last election where the living dead are a potent political force. It’s fairly safe to assume that Count Ignatieff will depart for “Harvard” if things go poorly. Chrétien will retire to his mausoleum, Martin to his lonely New England-style graveyard near Knowlton, and Parizeau will end up howling in a bell tower in the wine country of France.
If the people of Ottawa West-Nepean have an ounce of Christian virtue, they will shoo John Baird out of their village, although, for the life of me, I can’t imagine where he will get his meat. He should turn up regularly on the Sun News Network, but that’s hardly a living.
We will be left with the Cyborg. Perhaps that’s what we need. Maybe we are not good people, and we’ll become better under the Tory knout. Unless the Rapture interrupts the process, we may learn that we get the leaders who most resemble us.
Canadians yearn for leadership from the land of the living, but, in our dysfunctional political and media systems, a person with an organically-generated pulse and a functioning brain doesn’t stand a chance.
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Home / argentina / The Ministry of Health confirmed a new case of measles and believes that it infected a Russian tourist – 04/15/2015
The Ministry of Health confirmed a new case of measles and believes that it infected a Russian tourist – 04/15/2015
argentina April 16, 2019 argentina
The new measles case was confirmed in the country. The affected person is 36-year-old man from Rosario who would have contact with a Russian tourist who visited Argentina. Obviously, they shared a flight on March 16, which united Puerto Iguazu, Misiones, and Buenos Aires. In total, There are already four infected so far this year, according to the National Health Secretariat.
Rosario "started fever on April 1, adding a rash (eruption) the next day". "In the period of portability Moved from the city of Buenos Aires, he traveled to Venezuela on a charter flight and participated in social events in Rosario"Details of the health report portfolio, which provides it "The patient is a good evolution".
In addition, he adds that "the samples were processed from the CEMAR laboratory of Rosario and confirmed in the Malbran laboratory".
Look, too
In dialogue with ClarinPatricia Angeryari, national director of epidemiology, explained that it is examined whether this last case is secondary. That is, if the Argentinean contacted the Russian tourist. "There are high probabilities, although Rosario has also traveled, and yet it has not been confirmed, the results of some exams have disappeared," Angelehi said, adding that the others were imported cases: in addition to the Russian, there were two Argentines who infected the virus abroad. "One traveled to Southeast Asia for work, and the other was in contact with a person with measles in a cruise in San Pablo," added the referral to the Secretariat.
Clarin Bulletin
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Last year there were 14 cases. It is usually imported, according to Angeli. "We managed to close the epidemics in 2018. It also includes control to avoid new cases." Now we do the same. "The one who probably infected Rosario was in several places We are in communication with several provinces to see if there are new cases"He pointed out. And he asked the general population Go to a doctor for symptoms such as an allergy or a fever rash.
To be protected from measles, children should be given a one-year lifetime triple viral vaccine and be completed by boosting income in schools. Adults who are not sure if both doses are applied should visit a clinical doctor to check if they have the necessary antibodies or decide on a vaccine "in dirty" or without serology.
Argentina, like much of Latin America, is without autochthonous measles. The same is not happening in the north of Brazil, Venezuela, the United States, and Southeast Asia.
"The risk of infection in non-vaccinated people who come in contact with the virus is between 90% and 95%. It is arranged with air when speaking or nodding, "he said. Clarin pediatric infectiousologist Eduardo Lopez, who is the head of the Department of Medicine at the Children's Hospital.
Lopez stressed that, before the four are confirmed, it is important to deal with the drops that may arise. "Surely, they will make a blockade environmental vaccine for people who have the virus. You need to know that people who have the infection begin to get infected 24 hours before presenting their symptoms"Says a specialist for infectious diseases, who adds that the contagion of the imported case is unfortunate because "This means that the Argentine population is not fully protected".
In this sense, he explains that "average adults" may not have a second dose: "It is that the reinforcement was carried out in 1999/2000, for this reason, it is likely that they were not given." It is advisable to consult a doctor and use the dose. Especially if you are planning to travel to one of the risk areas. In public hospitals, its application is free.
Where was the Russian tourist who infected Rosario
On April 4, the national health authority issued an epidemiological warning "high risk of spread of measles" when he confirmed the disease case of a Russian tourist who was in Capital, Puerto Iguacu and Montevideo, in Uruguay, in March.
The Ministry of Health has released the flights made by the man to alert the rest of the passengers.
Russian tourist traveled company And on flight 570 on March 14: made the trip Buenos Aires-Puerto Iguacu. About the same company returned to 571 on March 16. At this last time I would have infected Rosario.
The patient also started a service from Buquebús which sailed from Buenos Aires to Montevideo on March 17 at 6.38 and returned for the same day that day at 21.34.
How is the evolution of the disease
In general, it usually appears fever in two days. The third, a box of conjunctivitis, nasal catarrh and cough. Then the person starts to sprout. On eruption in the face erupts, extends through the trunk and ends on the extremities. Stop infecting 24 hours after the rash to complete.
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Via Skeptico, I've learned of some more antivaccination stupidity issuing forth from self-proclaimed "skeptic" Bill Maher during his recent appearance on Larry King Live. Get a load of this:
MAHER: I'm not into western medicine. That to me is a complete scare tactic. It just shows you, you can...
KING: You mean you don't get a -- you don't get a flu shot?
MAHER: A flu shot is the worst thing you can do.
KING: Why?
MAHER: Because it's got -- it's got mercury.
KING: It prevents flu.
MAHER: It doesn't prevent. First of all, that's...
KING: I haven't had the flu in 25 years since I've been taking a flu shot.
MAHER: Well, I hate to tell you, Larry, but if you have a flu shot for more than five years in a row, there's ten times the likelihood that you'll get Alzheimer's disease. I would stop getting your...
KING: What did you say?
MAHER: That went better in rehearsal but it was still good. Absolutely, no the defense against disease is to have a strong immune system. A flu shot just compromises your immune system.
Ooh, boy. As Skeptico points out, that's a very specific claim, that getting flu shots more than five years in a row will increase your likelihood of getting Alzheimer's disease by ten-fold. Personally, I'm unaware of any good (or even not so good) evidence that flu vaccines can increase your risk of Alzheimer's, but I'm always willing to try fill in the gaps in my knowledge. That's why I wonder what research, if any, supports Maher's assertion. Based on past experience, my guess is probably none, but, as Skeptico does, I will try to keep an open mind with regards to this topic and join Skeptico in e-mailing Bill to provide a specific source for his claim. My guess is that Maher probably read it on the altie kook site Whale.to or somewhere similar.
I thought about it a little more, and, because I was curious about where Maher might have found such a claim, I did a little investigating. First, I did a simple Google search using the terms "flu vaccine Alzheimer's." Guess what website came up first when I did my search? If you said the extremly flaky Whale.to website. . .you won! Here it is, right from the source:
According to Hugh Fudenberg, MD (http://members.aol.com/nitrf), the world's leading immunogeneticist and 13th most quoted biologist of our times (nearly 850 papers in peer review journals), if an individual has had five consecutive flu shots between 1970 and 1980 (the years studied) his/her chances of getting Alzheimer's Disease is ten times higher than if they had one, two or no shots. I asked Dr. Fudenberg why this was so and he said it was due to the mercury and aluminum that is in every flu shot (and most childhood shots). The gradual mercury and aluminum buildup in the brain causes cognitive dysfunction. Is that why Alzheimer's is expected to quadruple? Notes: Recorded from Dr. Fudenberg's speech at the NVIC International Vaccine Conference, Arlington, VA September, 1997. Quoted with permission. Alzheimer's to quadruple statement is from John's Hopkins Newsletter Nov 1998.
Fudenberg?
Hmmm. That name sounded very familiar, so I did a little more digging. It turns out that Hugh Fudenberg was a collaborator and co-inventor with Andrew Wakefield, the scientist who published an absolutely horribly designed study in the Lancet in 1998 linking the MMR vaccine to autism, nearly all of whose authors later publicly retracted their authorship. This study, now thoroughly repudiated, caused a major scare in Britain and elsewhere regarding MMR, echoes of which persist even today, with anti-vaxers still citing Wakefield's Lancet study as "evidence" that MMR causes autism. (Particularly hilarious is when they attribute MMR "causing" autism to the mercury in thimerosal, mainly because MMR has never contained thimerosal.) Dr. Fudenberg also happens to have been involved in some very dubious "treatments" for autism that led to some problems with his medical license. In November 1995, the South Carolina Medical Board concluded that Fudenberg was "guilty of engaging in dishonorable, unethical, or unprofessional conduct," and he was fined $10,000 and ordered to surrender his license to prescribe controlled substances (narcotic drugs). His medical license was also placed on suspension. In March 1996, he was permitted to resume practice under terms of probation that did not permit him to prescribe any drugs. His medical license expired in January 2004; and in March 2004, he applied to have it reinstated. However, after a hearing in which the Board considered a neuropsychatric report issued in 2003, Fudenberg agreed to remain in a "retired" status and withdrew his application for reactivation of his license. Nowadays, Dr. Fudenberg runs a nonprofit "research" organization called Neuro Immunotherapeutics Research Foundation and still appears to be pushing dubious remedies for autism. He also charges $750 per hour for "review of past medical records," $750 per hour for "determining what new tests need to be ordered; ordering of new tests; evaluation of new tests," and $750 per hour for "determining which therapy will work and which will not; discussing this with patient along with an in-depth study of past medical history to determine what makes a patient better or worse."
All of this sounds a lot like practicing medicine to me, which makes me wonder how someone with a lapsed medical license can get away with providing such "services" at such inflated prices. (Once again I have to wonder if I'm in the wrong business.) Of course, none of this means Dr. Fudenberg doesn't make a valid point, but he certainly hasn't supported it, as far as I can tell, and I looked. And just because he's published over 660 scientific papers in his career (not 800, as claimed, at least not according to PubMed, unless he published a lot before 1965) doesn't mean he isn't off the wall. After all, later in life Nobel Laureate Linus Pauling marred his legacy by lending his name to a lot of dubious vitamin C quackery. Besides, as far as I can tell, with one exception in 1999, Dr. Fudenberg hasn't published any original research since the late 1980's. If you look at his PubMed publication list, you'll find that there is nothing after around 1989 other than review articles, speculative articles in Medical Hypotheses, plus a publication or two in dubious journals such as Biotherapy (which is no longer published). Looking at the list, a knowledgeable person can tell right about when Dr. Fudenberg started to descend into fringe medicine, sometime between 1985-1989. And, try as I might, I couldn't find an article by Fudenberg to support his claim about the flu vaccine that Maher parrotted on Larry King Live.
In any case, the specific dubious autism treatment with which Dr. Fudenberg was involved is the use of something called "transfer factor" to make a combined measles vaccine and autism "cure." The method of making these so-called "transfer factors" is bizarre in the extreme and involves injecting mice with measles, extracting and processing white blood cells, injecting the result into pregnant goats, milking the goats after kid-birth and turning the product into capsules for autistic children. In a patent application (based in part on the infamous Lancet paper) obtained by Brian Deer, Wakefield represented a vaccine/therapy for "MMR-based" autism using transfer factor as potentially a "complete cure" for autism or for "alleviation of symptoms."
So what did Dr. Fudenberg base his claim about flu vaccines and autism on? Try as I might, I couldn't find any research that supports this assertion, at least not in PubMed. Any Google searches done inevitably brought up the same quote as above or variants of it, but no source pointed me to any actual research supporting Dr. Fudenberg's claim, even though he did seem to imply that he had done a study. Certainly there is nothing I could find in the peer-reviewed literature when I searched Dr. Fudenberg's name with the term "influenza." Indeed, the only paper I could find on PubMed on the subject of the flu vaccine and Alzheimer's disease concluded:
After adjustment for age, sex and education, past exposure to vaccines against diphtheria or tetanus, poliomyelitis and influenza was associated with lower risk for Alzheimer's disease (odds ratio [OR] 0.41, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.27-0.62; OR 0.60, 95% CI 0.37-0.99; and OR 0.75, 95% CI 0.54-1.04 respectively) than no exposure to these vaccines...Past exposure to vaccines against diphtheria or tetanus, poliomyelitis and influenza may protect against subsequent development of Alzheimer's disease.
My goodness! It looks as though the flu vaccine might actually protect against Alzheimers! True, this is a retrospective study using a self-questionnaire, which is a big problem. It definitely needs to be replicated with a more reliable study methodology than what was used and doing individual studies for each vaccine, rather than lumping four vaccines together in one study. However, I'd be willing to bet that, for all its shortcomings, this study is probably better evidence than Dr. Fudenberg can produce, and there is zero doubt in my mind that it's way better evidence than Bill Maher can produce, given that he undoubtedly got his bogus claim from either Whale.to, the infamous conspiracy-mongering Rense.com site, Vaccination Liberation, or (of course) from altie supreme Dr. Mercola. Clearly, Bill Maher has difficulty evaluating the reliability and plausibility of evidence with regard to his beliefs in unnamed "toxins" rather than microorganisms causing disease, something he's shown before when he swallowed whole the myth of Pasteur's supposed deathbed "recantation" that he was wrong, and he sure seems pretty credulous about "evidence" coming from anti-vax websites.
But that's not all. Maher also parrotted the claim that it was better sanitation, not the polio vaccine, that eliminated polio. This is simply not true. Better sanitation certainly helps eliminate such diseases, but sanitation was pretty good in the 1950's, just before the polio vaccine was developed, and polio outbreaks were still fairly common and still quite feared. (People of a certain age will remember polio scares that occurred throughout this country before the polio vaccine was developed that would shut down public swimming pools and baths.) In actuality, better sanitation may have made people more susceptible to severe complications from polio, because sanitation made sure that most people were no longer routinely exposed to the virus as children. Also going against Maher's assertion is the observation that when polio vaccination rates fall, polio returns. It's the same with other infectious diseases, like pertussis.
I've written about Bill Maher's medical wingnuttery before. Given his antivaccination statements based on no evidence or on demonstrably incorrect evidence and his support of PETA, it's hard for me to conclude now that Bill Maher, who likes to represent himself as hard-nosed "skeptic" speaking truth to power, is anything other than a total wingnut, at least when it comes to medicine. As The Uncredible Hallq points out, Maher seems far more certain about his "ability to think" than is justified based on the evidence of his own words. Worse, he's not just peddling "concerns" about vaccination or "skepticism" over whether specific vaccinations have an insufficiently favorable risk-benefit ratio to justify their use, an argument scientists and doctors sometimes make for certain vaccines. No, he's pushing a misguided belief that vaccines do more harm than good and a hostility towards vaccination in general that are both wrong-headed and just plain wrong. Vaccination represents arguably the single most effective public health intervention ever developed by "conventional" medicine. It has all but eliminated diseases that once ravaged huge swaths of this planet and will to protect billions of people from horrific diseases--that is, unless muddle-headed alties like Bill Maher have their way and persuade people that they don't need to vaccinate their children or themselves.
Skeptico 12/19/2005 1:50 AM
Good takedown.
I was too lazy to do a search myself to find the source of the quote, but a commenter called woly
posted the same source you did. And I discovered that quote is repeated verbatim all over the web. No research or studies mind you, just a quote from “the world's leading immunogeneticist”. Cough cough, oh yes. Can you say “argument from authority”?
Nice find of that study showing vaccines reduce alzheimer’s too.
I'm pretty sure that Maher had a face lift a couple of years ago. If so, it would seem that he's willing to accept Western Medicine some of the time.
VKW
Orac 12/19/2005 8:20 AM
Skeptico,
I wrote most of this up on Saturday and didn't check on your post again before posting my article.
Can one say that Fudenberg was *de-licensed*?
Not an "Altie" here, but in the last 25 years I have never had the flu shot AND I have never had the flu. Coincidence?
Orac 12/19/2005 1:41 PM
Yeah, I noticed that too. I had also wanted to make a snarky comment that maybe Fudenberg was right about vaccines and Alzheimer's, given the general level of intelligence of discourse on the Larry King show.
I restrained myself--until now.
Ali 12/19/2005 2:04 PM
Maher seems to be suffering from paranoid personality disorder. His pattern of speech also indicates erratic thoughts. It makes me wonder what he's abusing, in addition to the admitted marijuana.
I find it hilarious and sad that whale.to has an article entitled "Paranoid/Paranoia: Media Buzzwords To Silence The Politically Incorrect."
HCN 12/19/2005 2:55 PM
A few months ago I did a check on Fudenberg's publications, and I noticed the same thing. Lots of papers a few decades ago, and then a trickle to very little.
After reading about his mental health status which prevented him from getting his medical license back, I am wondering if he has not succumbed to some kind of neurodegenative disease. Possibly not Alzheimer's, but something else (perhaps similar to what happened to Nicola Tesla, who himself went from brilliant to bizarre).
Kev 12/19/2005 2:59 PM
This the same person?
Kyle 12/19/2005 3:47 PM
Thanks for taking the time to take what he said apart.
Kev,
Yep, that's him.
Dr. Bud 12/19/2005 4:51 PM
I checked to see if Maher is one of the 98% of entertainment-biz folks who never graduated from college, and was surprised to find he actually graduated from Cornell. But his major was [drumroll . . .] ENGLISH (syn. Terminal Unemployability), so he need not be taken seriously about anything scientific, medical, or otherwise quantitative.
grad student hack 12/19/2005 9:12 PM
Oi, doctor bud, having an arts degree does not make one an altie, nor does it make one ignorant of medical, scientific or quantitative subjects. Critical thinking skills apply and are taught across the academic spectrum, though some, such as Maher, miss that part of their education. What's Dr. Fudenberg's excuse? He seems to have emerged from your discipline.
It may be fun to chortle into your beard about the so-called Terminally Unemployable, but let's face it, that's a cheap shot. Let's stick to legitimate targets for scorn, like those who insist that HIV doesn't cause AIDS (at the expense of their children) and those that fuel anti-vax paranoia.
Argy Stokes 12/19/2005 9:43 PM
"Nice find of that study showing vaccines reduce alzheimer’s too."
So they did a case control study and asked Alzheimer's patients to recall whether or not they'd had flu vaccines? That's pretty bad study design. I can't imagine how a flu shot would have any impact on Alzheimer's, except that it may make old folk live longer, and hence more likely to develope the disease.
HCN 12/20/2005 12:02 AM
grad student hack said: "What's Dr. Fudenberg's excuse? He seems to have emerged from your discipline."
Best guess is some kind of mental illness or some kind degenerative brain disease. At one time he was qualified, but there are thoughts that he has an illness:
http://briandeer.com/wakefield/hugh-fudenberg.htm which states "Professor Fudenberg plainly suffers from disability, and Brian Deer publishes this information only because he believes the public interest justifies the intrusion."
Hence, the comparison I made to Nicola Tesla:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicola_Tesla
Though the biography I read about him over a decade ago did not call it obsessive-compulsive disorder, OCD. But there may be similarities to Howard Hughes, who seemed to get worse as he aged. Fudenberg may have one of many mental illnesses that progress with age.
I have no explanation for Mahar. Other than he is starting to get sucked into the cult of his own celebrity, and actually believes his own publicity. I would not attack his education, since my artist mother was probably the smartest all around person I knew (she explained number bases, like binary and octal, to me when got them in math).
Jack Lifton 12/20/2005 9:27 AM
Bill Maher is not particularly funny, and he certainly is way past his, apparently temporary, reign as an A-List television personality-he was never quite a star.
Now, having said that we quickly can get to the bottom of his wing-nuttiness. He is either seeking publicity by being contrary, or he is just one of those individuals for whom logical analysis and logical thinking is not possible due either to a poor education, a low attention span, or a low IQ.
It seems to be difficult for some intelligent people to accept that intelligence is not required to be either active in or successful at show business or, for that matter, television news reading.
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Social Security, Bequests, and the Life Cycle Theory of Saving: Cross-Sectional Tests
46 Pages Posted: 4 Jul 2004 Last revised: 12 Sep 2010
See all articles by Alan S. Blinder
Alan S. Blinder
Princeton University - Department of Economics; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
Roger H. Gordon
University of California, San Diego (UCSD) - Department of Economics; Harvard University - Department of Economics; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR); National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
Donald E. Wise
Rider University; National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER)
This paper studies the asset holdings of white American men near retirement age. Assets as conventional defined show no tendency to decline with age, in apparent contradiction of the life-cycle theory of saving. However, a broadened concept of assets which includes expected future pension benefits (both public and private) and expected future earnings ("human wealth") does decline more or less as predicted by the theory. No matter how they are defined, assets are a decreasing function of the number of children--which casts doubt on the strength of the bequest motive. Finally, financial assets and social security wealth fail to exhibit the inverse relationship suggested by Feldstein's displacement hypothesis. To investigate these issues econometrically, an equation for assets is developed from the strict life-cycle theory. The specification is generalized to allow for (a) a bequest motive, proxied by the number of children; (b) displacement of private wealth by social security wealth that is not exactly dollar-for-dollar; (c) a level of consumption late in life that differs systematically from what the strict life-cycle theory implies. The equation is estimated by nonlinear least squares on a rich cross- sectional data set containing over 4300 observations. The results show that the life-cycle model has little ability to explain cross-sectional variability in asset holdings. The model's key parameters are poorly identified, despite the large sample size and considerable cross-sectional variation in most variables. According to the estimates, consumption late in Life is on average only about half of what the strict life-cycle theory predicts; each dollar of social security wealth displaces about 3% (with a large standard error) of private wealth; and the bequest motive, while present, is quite weak.
Blinder, Alan S. and Gordon, Roger H. and Wise, Donald E., Social Security, Bequests, and the Life Cycle Theory of Saving: Cross-Sectional Tests (1981). NBER Working Paper No. w0619. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=275375
Alan S. Blinder (Contact Author)
Princeton University - Department of Economics ( email )
University of California, San Diego (UCSD) - Department of Economics ( email )
Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)
Rider University ( email )
2083 Lawrenceville Road
Management Sciences Department
HOME PAGE: http://www.soa.org/academic/rider_university.html
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The bat's form has become more refined over time. In the mid-19th century, baseball batters were known to shape or whittle their own bats by hand. This allowed there to be a wide variety in shape, size, and weight. For example, there were flat bats, round bats, short bats, and fat bats. Earlier bats were known to be much heavier and larger than today's regulated ones. During the 19th century, many shapes were experimented with, as well as handle designs. Today, bats are much more uniform in design.
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Whether you’re looking for youth league or adult league solutions, our selection of baseball gear offers everything you need to kick off the baseball season with your best foot forward. We carry nothing but the finest baseball mitts and gloves available made by Wilson®, Mizuno®, Louisville®, and other brands trusted by professional baseball players and coaches. Carry your gear to the diamond with ease with the help of our sleek and stylish backpacks, equipment bags, and duffels.
Four historically significant baseball bats showcased in the National Baseball Hall of Fame's traveling exhibit "Baseball As America". From left to right: bat used by Babe Ruth to hit his 60th home run during the 1927 season, bat used by Roger Maris to hit his 61st home run during the 1961 season, bat used by Mark McGwire to hit his 70th home run during the 1998 season, and the bat used by Sammy Sosa for his 66th home run during the same season.
There are limitations to how much and where a baseball player may apply pine tar to a baseball bat. According to Rule 1.10(c) of the Major League Baseball Rulebook, it is not allowed more than 18 inches up from the bottom handle. An infamous example of the rule in execution is the Pine Tar Incident on July 24, 1983. Rules 1.10 and 6.06 were later changed to reflect the intent of Major League Baseball, as exemplified by the league president's ruling. Rule 1.10 now only requires that the bat be removed from the game if discovered after being used in a game; it no longer necessitates any change to the results of any play which may have taken place. Rule 6.06 refers only to bats that are "altered or tampered with in such a way to improve the distance factor or cause an unusual reaction on the baseball. This includes, bats that are filled, flat-surfaced, nailed, hollowed, grooved or covered with a substance such as paraffin, wax, etc." It no longer makes any mention of an "illegally batted ball". In 2001, MLB approved the use of Gorilla Gold Grip Enhancer in major and minor league games as an alternative to pine tar.[23][24]
Fungo bats are, simply put, a long, skinny, and lightweight baseball bat used for fielding practice. Typically, they are around 34 to 37 inches in length and between 17 and 24 ounces in weight, give or take a couple of ounces. They will also almost always feature a 2 1/4 inch barrel diameter to allow for more control during a swing. As you can tell, fungo bats are longer than a normal baseball bat and much more lightweight in comparison. Most fungo bats are going to be made up of ash wood while there are some maple and bamboo wood fungo bats, some composite wood fungo bats, and very few aluminum alloy fungo bats. Almost all of these designs will be under $100 with very few eclipsing that mark.
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« The Scandals Of Bernie Sanders
Bernie finally pulls the plug on his nuisance suit v. the DNC »
Posted by Phoenix Woman on March 5, 2016
Ah, the “Trump is bringing millions and millions of new voters into the Republicsn Party” meme. Consider this yet another myth, along with the one stating that Democratic primary turnout is predictive of general election turnout, that is being promoted by people with vested interests in its being believed:
A better way of looking at that claim is to consider how many new voters are turning out. This is hard to measure without full access to state voter files, but we can estimate.
For example, exit and entrance poll data reported by CNN tells us about how many of the people who’ve come out to vote in that party’s elections this year are first-time voters. Forty-four percent of voters in Iowa were doing so for the first time, compared with 16 percent in New Hampshire and 20 percent in Texas. The high was 62 percent in Nevada — one of the few states where Democrats turned out more heavily than Republicans. Adding it up, we get about 1.1 million people on the Democratic side who’ve come out to vote for the first time in a primary in 2016.
That’s not necessarily new voters. Democrats have a habit of voting only in the general election and skipping the primaries. But it’s an estimate.
We can also estimate how many of those people came out because of Bernie Sanders, the unexpected candidate who’s doing well with new voters on the Democratic side. In states where there were enough new voters for their vote preferences to be statistically significant, about 563,000 of those new voters backed Sanders. It’s safe to assume that he got about another 100,000 from the states where there were too few new voters to break out this measure separately. So, figure that Sanders spurred about 650,000 people go to the polls. That’s out of 6.2 million total voters. Impressive.
On the Republican side, the math is trickier. First and foremost, exit and entrance polls in most states didn’t ask Republicans whether it was their first time voting, only doing so in New Hampshire and Iowa. In those two states, about 127,000 people were voting for the first time, and about 42,000 of those were voting for Trump. That’s actually lower than the number of new voters in Iowa and New Hampshire that backed Sanders; he got about 68,000 votes from new voters in those two states.
That’s the second reason the math is tricky. Sanders has accrued 37.5 percent of all of the Democratic votes, to Trump’s 34.5 percent of the Republican one. (All vote result data is from the irreplaceable U.S. Election Atlas.) Sanders is trailing in the delegate count by a lot, and Trump is winning by a lot — but there are two Democrats and four Republicans. And there are four Republicans now; just over a month ago, there were still a dozen to split up the vote. In Iowa and New Hampshire, Trump got 30 and 38 percent of the new vote, respectively. Sanders got 59 percent and 78 percent.
So it seems safe to assume that, even with increased Republican turn-out, the number of new voters voting for Trump isn’t much higher than the number backing Sanders. It’s hard to believe that it has reached 1 million, much less “millions and millions.”
This entry was posted on March 5, 2016 at 8:36 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
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Header widget area right
I-LYA
Member List by Boat Name
Base Handicaps
WELCOME TO THE PHRF-LE WEBSITE!
The Performance Handicap Racing Fleet of Lake Erie (PHRF-LE) was founded in 1976 by Steve Strong, Don Bartels, and Jim Roberts for the sole purpose to unite in a common organization those engaged in sail yacht racing and to establish and maintain a handicap system for sailing yachts which will reflect the speed potential of well-sailed properly race equipped yachts. Its Articles of Incorporation were filed in 1982. There is no credit for lack of sailing skill or boat preparation. The handicap is based on an Olympic style race course and approximately 11 knots of wind with the yacht being sailed by a top notch crew with the best available equipment.
PHRF-LE is a handicap certificate issuing organization; it does not sponsor, organize or manage competitive sailing events. Our members are from clubs as far West as Monroe, Michigan to Buffalo, New York on the Eastern end of Lake Erie and includes a few clubs along the southern shore of Canada.
The PHRF Committee is a volunteer group and consists of Area Handicappers and measurers. Area Handicappers must serve on the Board as a measurer before becoming an Area Handicapper. Area Handicappers are the only voting members of the Board. Area Handicappers are required to attend a minimum number of meetings in order to maintain voting status. The meetings follow parliamentary procedures and Robert’s Rules of Order, including a required meeting quorum and majority vote of those present on rating changes, etc. There are four officers: the Chairman, the Vice-Chairman, the Treasurer and the Executive Secretary, elected annually by the committee. With the exception of the Executive Secretary, all officers shall be Area Handicappers. The Chairman does not vote unless a quorum is needed and/or to break a tie vote.
Performance Handicap Racing Fleet (PHRF) handicaps are based on the speed potential of the boat, determined as much as possible on observations of previous racing experiences. Handicaps are determined by looking at boats of the same type, based on sail area to displacement ratios and then make adjustments based on the differences. In addition handicappers generally look to see if the boat has raced in another PHRF area around the country. Handicaps are reviewed every few years when the committee chooses a rating band to look at for any anomalies.
Beginnings of PHRF
As the boating industry expanded during the late 70’s, low maintenance fiberglass boats were built by the thousands, hundreds out of the same molds. The number of new sailors racing increased just as rapidly. Many of them came from one-design day sailor fleets. They did not understand the measurement rules and they didn’t want to spend a lot of money on ratings. They simply wanted to get out on the water and race. Many of the “old salts” as well were tired of the expense and complication of the measurement rules.
In Southern California a group of yachtsmen developed a new approach to handicapping, and organized the Pacific Handicap Racing Fleet. The British were already using the Portsmouth Yardstick system of handicapping different classes of day sailors to facilitate their racing together. Portsmouth numbers were assigned on the basis of observed performance. Similarly, the Pacific Handicap Racing Fleet assigned handicaps to classes of cruising boats based on observations of actual performance, instead of operating on measurement or design information. They made supplemental use of the same measurements when performance data was not available, but not in a rating formula. The system was inexpensive, easy to administer, and produced ratings quickly. The method of rating yachts became popular and spread to other parts of the country, where “Pacific” in Pacific Handicap Racing Fleet was changed to “Performance” to become Performance Handicap Racing Fleet, which we now know to be PHRF.
The Performance Handicap Racing Fleet of Lake Erie
E-Mail: phrfle@gmail.com
© Performance Handicap Racing Fleet of Lake Erie.
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HomeFinanceFinancial Briefs
Financial Briefs
India and overseas
PFC raises $1 billion in the international market (India)
Power Finance Corporation (PFC) has raised $1 billion through Reg-S bonds in the international market. The transaction was carried out in two tranches – a five-year tranche for $400 million at 3.87 per cent at a re-offer spread of 195 basis points over five-year US Treasury (UST) rates and a 10-year tranche for $600 million at 4.57 per cent at a re-offer spread of 242.5 basis points over 10-year UST rates. The bond sale received a demand for about $5 billion, against which the company retained only the targeted sum.
CGPL raises Rs 11.1 billion through NCDs on a private placement basis
Tata Power’s wholly owned subsidiary, Coastal Gujarat Power Limited (CGPL), has raised Rs 11.1 billion through the issuance of non-convertible debentures (NCDs) on a private placement basis. The NCDs will be issued in three series of Rs 3.7 billion each and will carry a coupon rate of 9.15 per cent, payable annually. The proceeds will be used for CGPL’s corporate purposes, including refinancing existing debt, capital expenditure and augmentation of working capital.
NCLT rejects EPJL’s insolvency bid
The National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) has rejected a Rs 12 billion offer by the former promoters of Essar Power Jharkhand Limited (EPJL) for a one-time settlement against a total debt of about Rs 56 billion. The bid was declined by ICICI Bank, which is the lead lender and has 99.34 per cent voting rights. The promoters had earlier offered Rs 9 billion. EPJL, a step-down subsidiary of Essar Power, is setting up a 1,200 MW coal-based power plant in Latehar district of Jharkhand, which is 45 per cent complete.
Greenko raises $495 million for two storage projects
Greenko Energy Holdings has signed definitive agreements for primary equity totalling $495 million from an affiliate of GIC and a wholly owned entity of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority. The company will utilise the proceeds for its two upcoming storage projects, each of 1.2 GW capacity, at Pinnapuram and Saundatti in Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka respectively. These projects entail an overall capital outlay of $2 billion and are expected to be commissioned in 2022.
Brookfield likely to acquire majority stake in Suzlon Energy
Suzlon Energy has offered a one-time settlement proposal to its lenders that entails potential majority stake sale to Canadian investor, Brookfield. The move will infuse additional equity in the company and also help waive a considerable amount of debt from lenders including foreign currency convertible bondholders. Reportedly, Suzlon plans to reportedly close the deal in three to six months.
Sekura Energy completes the acquisition of EIL’s transmission assets
Sekura Energy Limited, owned by the Edelweiss Infrastructure Yield Plus Fund, has completed the acquisition of Essel Infraprojects Limited’s (EIL) two transmission assets. The projects acquired are Darbhanga-Motihari Transmission Limited and Northern Region Strengthening Scheme (NRSS) XXXI (B) Transmission Limited. EIL had entered into an agreement to sell the two transmission assets to Sekura Energy in October 2018. The agreement also gave Sekura the right to purchase two other transmission assets owned by EIL – Warora-Kurnool Transmission Limited and NRSS XXXVI Transmission Limited, which are expected to be commissioned in the year 2019-20. These projects are likely to be acquired post-commissioning.
SEFA approves a $995,000 grant for investment in renewables in Ethiopia (Ethiopia)
The Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (SEFA), managed by the African Development Bank, has approved a $995,000 grant to support the roll-out of a sustainable procurement framework for independent power producers (IPPs) in Ethiopia. The SEFA grant is intended to encourage private investments in hydropower projects through Ethiopia’s Renewable Energy Programme.
Mexico’s El Paso to be acquired by IIF for $2.78 billion (Mexico)
New Mexico’s utility El Paso Electric will be acquired by the Infrastructure Investments Fund (IIF) for $2.78 billion in an all-cash deal, advised by J.P. Morgan Investment Management. IIF will pay $68.25 for each share of El Paso Electric. The deal for El Paso provides electricity to about 428,000 customers in the Rio Grande valley in west Texas and southern New Mexico. The deal is worth $4.3 billion, including debt.
J-POWER buys stake in Genex Power’s 250 MW pumped storage plant (Australia)
Genex Power Limited has signed a share subscription agreement (SSA) with Electric Power Development Company Limited, trading as J-POWER, for a conditional investment of up to $17.5 million. The investment will be made by way of a subscription for ordinary shares in Genex, with the proceeds to be principally applied towards Genex’s equity funding component for construction of the 250 MW Kidston Pumped Storage Hydro Project (K2-Hydro). As a further condition precedent under the SSA, Genex has agreed to enter into a technical service agreement with J-POWER, wherein the latter will provide professional technical advisory services to Genex in relation to the development as well as operational stages of the K2-Hydro project.
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Sports Head injuries Injuries Health Athlete health Football NFL football Professional football Athlete injuries
NFL teams up with NCAA for next round of safety improvements
By MICHAEL MAROT - Jun. 19, 2019 08:45 PM EDT
FILE - In this Jan. 29, 2019, file photo, NFL Chief Medical Officer Dr. Allen Sills gestures while speaking during a health and safety tour at Mercedes-Benz Stadium for the NFL Super Bowl 53 football game in Atlanta. The NFL's top medical experts are asking college football physicians and trainers to help make the game safer. Dr. Allen Sills and Jeff Miller, the NFL's executive vice president for health and safety initiatives, spent Monday June 17 2019 and Tuesday, June 18, 2019 in Indianapolis sharing data about their findings on the prevention and treatment of injuries. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip, File)
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — The NFL's top medical experts believe they can take the knowledge of college football physicians and trainers and the research from the NCAA to make football safer — together.
Dr. Allen Sills and Jeff Miller, the NFL's executive vice president for health and safety initiatives, spent Monday and Tuesday in Indianapolis sharing data about their findings on the prevention and treatment of injuries. It's the most formal presentation league executives have had with college officials, and Sills and Miller hope this presentation leads to a broader conversation that includes discussions about lower-body injuries.
"We're able to show them what we're working on and what we're finding and how we're applying that knowledge into the day-to-day care of professional athletes," Sills told The Associated Press during a break. "I think we hope this is the start of even more regular interaction between the two organizations because we share the exact same goals, which is improving the health and safety of players."
The two-day meeting included participants from the NFL's health and safety team, the NCAA's Sport Science Institute and medical staffs from schools in each of the power five conferences. It comes amid a rapidly evolving landscape of injuries in football. Sills is the league's chief medical officer.
Over the past decade, Miller estimates the NFL made between 50 and 60 rules changes to enhance player safety. Members of the league's competition committee now routinely contact the medical team before considering making additional changes.
Plus, as Sills and Miller have collected more data they found NFL coaches and players increasingly receptive to their recommendations and conclusions.
Players, they say, are asking more questions about equipment, such as helmets. Coaches and assistant coaches, they add, have shown greater interest in how they can reduce the number of injuries at practices.
"They (coaches) care about these people," Miller said. "They care about the performance of them and they care about their long-term viability in the league, and those are all real good reasons to be open minded about how we practice, train and treat athletes as they go through an NFL training season or regular season."
The NCAA also has put a premium on player safety.
It has introduced rules such as "targeting" in football, established a formal concussion protocol that includes guidelines for players returning to action after suffering a head injury and adding a section on the well-being of athletes to the governing body's web site.
But the key to success may be developing how to get the message out about additional safety measures.
Until now, much of the focus publicly was on concussions: Last year's statistics showed a 24 % decrease in the number of concussions, dropping from 281 in 2017 to 214.
While Sills and Miller agree such work must continue, they also believe it's time to specifically tackle another key issue: lower-body injuries such as sprained ankles, strained hamstrings and knee injuries, which wind up costing athletes more playing time than concussions.
"We're taking a very, I think, comprehensive approach to understanding foot, ankle or knee injuries and the contributing aspects of that," Miller said. "I think, we are looking at the performance of certain cleats; their traction; how easily they release from different turf surfaces; how much different turf surfaces contribute to potential injuries; how we train our athletes, the load they go through on a daily basis or through a training camp and whether that correlates with particular sprains or strains."
The league has invested more than $60 million over the past 3½ years to get those answers, which they want others to use.
It's not just injuries, either.
Sills and Miller spoke Tuesday about handling emergency situations when players suffer cardiac arrests or heat illnesses, in addition to brain and spine injuries, and they back the NFL's new mental health initiative that was announced last month.
What they want most, though, is to share this information with schools that can help the sport remain strong and safe.
"We know that our knowledge is expanding rapidly and there are many things we can learn from each other," said Sills, a neurosurgeon who worked at Vanderbilt before taking the NFL's post in March 2017. "There's a lot of potential for collaboration around the research questions we're both working on. For example, we have a major research effort around playing surfaces and how cleats interact with playing surfaces. We can look at 1,800 athletes in the NFL, but imagine the power of being able to expand those observations to a number of NCAA athletes. That's going to allow you to reach conclusions a lot quicker and with more power because we'll have more athletes."
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Three Questions with C.D. Wright
By: Danniel Schoonebeek March 1, 2013
Like gasoline, C.D. Wright’s poems are charged by their own volatility. The voices in her poems may break down or evaporate, but they leave behind their trace as the poems press onward. The result, to use one of C.D.’s own words, is a “welter” of voices and images that weave a crosshatch throughout her entire body of work. Calla lilies and copperheads rub up against the voices of Ozark commoners, advice columnists, and youth in revolt. An organ cactus will lead us into an argument between a man and a woman or a segretionist’s rant. The work undertaken in Wright’s poems is the work of making a public record. She wants the voice of injustice and she wants the voice of those who protest it. She wants the fall and the rise. And as much as this work in an effort to “get the present inside the present,” as she writes in One with Others, it’s also a way to ensure that we never “hear the engines of dissent run down.” —Danniel Schoonebeek
Danniel Schoonebeek: If there’s one thing poets love, it’s telling other people what poetry is and how it works. “Poetry makes nothing happen,” Auden wrote. Or here’s Charles Simic: “Poetry is an orphan of silence.” How do you know when you’re reading a poem you love? And just what in the world is this thing we call poetry anyway?
C.D. Wright: Poems matter when they enter something that matters to me in a way for which I have yet to find my own language. It’s the point of entry that engages my interest, and then it is the unfolding of thought in a very particular form that attaches to the way I aim to experience the world. It may or may not affirm what I suspected to be the case, but it trues me nonetheless. Words are precious and vulnerable. They are readily manipulated, disfigured. Poets use a lot of angles to bring their integrity to the fore. I remain interested in those angles.
In a lunchtime conversation with Robert Creeley (here in Providence), he told me he didn’t think you could get three people to agree on what poetry is. Maybe he said, on what a poem is and what a poem is not. It does seem futile. To some extent it’s what all of the other genres (as they are marketed, not as they are practiced) are averse to embrace. I believe poetry should bear in mind what W.S. Merwin called an essential, in the sense of an irreducible language. Any definition I threw out could be shredded from all quarters, but I certainly don’t think poetry aspires to the ineffable. Genres are confining and date themselves. Poetry takes in; it’s a good space to explore what’s been ignored or neglected inside the boundaries, and a good position from which to make a run for it over those boundaries.
DS: “The world is not ineluctably finished,” you write in One with Others, “though the watchfires have been doused,” These lines look back at one of Frost’s most penetrative questions: “what to make of a diminished thing.” But Frost was dealing with a different America, a modern America, and One with Others tackles both present-day America and the racial upheaval of Arkansas in 1969, six years after Frost’s death. So what do we make of a diminished thing in contemporary America? And are we wrong to think ourselves diminished at all?
CDW: I think poets are constantly charged with recharging the world, such as it is, in whatever state it is inherited. If you are referring to our reduced status in the new world order, well, the more outside we become, the more interesting our distanced perspective could become. We get an increasingly unobstructed view of things. Driving home to the East Bay, I often see hawks on top of the highway lamp posts. It is worrisome that these are the tallest objects from which to eye their next meal. But I admire their adaptation to the best available perch. Yes, of course I hate it that poets are not part of a larger conversation, but I would qualify by saying I am not very convinced there is a real conversation going on in any expansive, thoughtful sense of the term.
DS: Your work often looks backward in order, as you say, to “get the present in the present.” In art, this work is often undertaken to prevent a moment, a story, a person from falling into the arena of the forgotten. Can the same hold true for the voices of silenced writers, who don’t have the privilege of freedom of expression? Do we have a responsibility to get the voice inside the voice, so to speak, by listening for the places where voices have been silenced?
CDW: Voices silenced by the forces I assume you mean. Those voices have to be heard. Absolutely. They are saying what they see, what they experience. They are not mouthing off so they can go to prison and forfeit what little freedom they have. Clearly authoritarian states are afraid of even small, solo voices. Less mucked-up states with grandiose images of themselves are afraid of truth-speakers as well. But they can just paper over the dissenters with very clever advertising and most unsubtle propaganda. They just carjack the language. The weirdening never lets up. Ergo poets shouldn’t either.
Tags: C.D. Wright, freedom of speech, Interview, Obscurity and Shelter, one with others, PEN Poetry Series, poetry, robert frostGenre: InterviewTopic: Poetry SeriesCategory: Online Series, Original Literature
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PhD Funding: Artistic Re-enactments of Performance Art as Vehicles of Cultural Transfer in Eastern Europe since 1960
Posted on January 12, 2017 by Amy Bryzgel
Department of Film and Visual Culture, University of Aberdeen
Supervisor: Dr. Amy Bryzgel, Senior Lecturer in Film and Visual Culture, University of Aberdeen (a.bryzgel@abdn.ac.uk)
Application Deadline: March 21, 2017
Applications are invited for PhD research topics that focus on artistic re-enactments of performances from across the former communist and socialist countries of Central, Eastern and South-Eastern Europe in recent artistic practice. There are numerous examples of artistic re-enactments across the region, providing scope for a range of dissertation topics. Projects can include comparative studies, for example, of the relevance of re-enactments in one local tradition versus that of another; or single-country studies of a number of re-enactments being staged in one context. Dissertations will address the following research questions: what are the various functions of artistic re-enactments of performances in Eastern Europe? How do these functions compare with current understandings of re-enactment in the West? How can re-enactments be used to access a lost or inaccessible history (such as performance art in Eastern Europe)? Also welcome are proposals that consider revisiting culturally relevant or historically significant places by artists or within the context of artistic re-enactments.
Selection will be made on the basis of academic merit. Individuals with a strong research background in the field of Eastern European contemporary art and/or performance art, from either an art history or visual culture background, are encouraged to apply. Applicants should have the necessary language skills needed to undertake the proposed research, and should consider funding sources for travel to conduct field research abroad if it is necessary to the proposed project.
The project is funded by a University of Aberdeen Elphinstone Scholarship, which covers the cost of tuition fees only, whether Home, EU or Overseas, and will be awarded through an open competition.
Interested applicants should contact Dr. Amy Bryzgel with a project proposal of no more than 2,000 words, including discussion of Aims and Objectives, Research Questions, Research Context, Methodology and Critical Approach.
Deadline for all applications: 21 March 2017
More information can be found here: https://www.findaphd.com/search/ProjectDetails.aspx?PJID=73927&LID=3612
How to apply: http://www.abdn.ac.uk/study/postgraduate-research/how-to-apply-1639.php
Conference: Performance Art East, Northeast, West
Posted on September 10, 2015 by Amy Bryzgel
I am very pleased to announce that registration is now open for a conference on performance that I am organizing in Aberdeen in October.
Performance Art East, Northeast, West will explore the development of performance art in Eastern Europe, North America, and the Northeast of Scotland, highlighting connections between artists that occurred along the way. The conference will feature a roster of researchers who specialize in the performance art, as well as performances by artists from Eastern Europe.
It is free and open to the public, but registration is essential. Book your place here.
More information on the conference is available here.
Speakers and performers include Jana Pisarikova (Czech Republic), Luchezar Boyadjiev (Bulgaria), Catherine Spencer (St. Andrews), Bozidar Jurjevic (Croatia) and Branko Miliskovic (Serbia).
Friday 30 October, 9.00am – 3.00pm, Linklater Rooms
Saturday 31 October, 9.00am – 2.30pm, 7th floor of Sir Duncan Rice Library.
Venue: Linklater Rooms (30th Oct) and Sir Duncan Rice Library (31st Oct), King’s College, University of Aberdeen
Laibach in North Korea
Posted on August 20, 2015 by Amy Bryzgel
Laibach in 1989
Readers of this site will no doubt be aware of the momentous concert that took place in Pyongyang last night, August 19, 2015. Laibach became the first foreign rock group ever to play a gig in North Korea. I’ve written a piece about the significance of Laibach playing in North Korea, of all places, for The Conversation UK. Please check it out:
First foreign band to play North Korea is famed for its ‘fascism’
Natalia LL: Secretum et Tremor
Posted on June 12, 2015 by Amy Bryzgel
On April 16, 2015, I was invited to give a talk at the Centre for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle in Warsaw, on the work of Natalia LL. The lecture took place I in conjunction with the closing events for her show: “Natalia LL: Secretum et Tremor.” Although I am not an expert in Natalia LL’s work, I was pleased to receive this invitation to come speak at CSW, because it was about ten years ago that I first arrived there, to access the artist files and library for my PhD dissertation research, which featured a chapter on the work of Katarzyna Kozyra. Since my specialism is in performance art in Central, Eastern and Southern Europe since the 1960s, my interest in Natalia LL’s work is of course in the manner in which she uses performance and the performative in her work, which spans many genres and media: performance, installation, photography, video. Her work can be viewed through various lenses, as well – conceptual art, performance art, and feminism. It also spans both the personal and the rational or logical. Consequently, my talk, Intimate Transfigurations, focused on the manner in which her artwork experiences numerous “transfigurations” depending upon the perspective from which it is viewed. Despite the fact that some of her work falls into the category of conceptual art, which in the North American context leans toward depersonalization, what Natalia LL represents in her work is often very personal and “intimate.” My talk presented her work from a number of these varied viewpoints, by contextualizing the work of Natalia LL both locally and regionally, within the context of late-communist and post-communist Poland and East-Central Europe, as well as internationally, demonstrating the great range and breadth of her work and its continued relevance in contemporary art.
I have to admit I was a bit nervous, as when I arrived in the lecture hall, I was told that Natalia LL would be there in person! It is always disconcerting to speak about a living artist in front of that artist, but the artist was more than gracious. It was in fact a great experience having her there—although I never managed to interview her in person (only via email), the audience that night was able to ask her questions, and the artist certainly had a lot of interesting stories to tell.
“Secretum et Tremor,” curated by Ewa Toniak, is a wonderful retrospective of the artist’s work, for many reasons. What I liked most about the show was its simplicity—it included most of the key works, and a range of media (photography, video, performance, installation), without being overwhelming. Natalia LL’s more recent work is rather quirky, and challenging, but in the context of this exhibition it becomes clear that this kitschy, camp, over the top, strange work makes perfect sense in the context of her oeuvre. What the installation, organization, selection and design of the exhibition really brought out was the theatricality of her work, consistent from the 1960s until today, as well as a sense of play. The overall sense that you get when you leave the exhibition is that her work captures both eroticism and playfulness, humanity and theatricality…all with the red thread of that ever-present banana, both food and phallus—that which sustains life.
Ewa Toniak and Natalia LL
On Saturday, April 18, Ewa Toniak gave a curator’s tour of the exhibition. It was great to hear about the exhibition from her point of view, her vision, and what her intention was behind the selection and installation of works. The exhibition began in a makeshift “corridor” created by photo images and video images of Natalia LL’s iconic Consumer Art from the 1970s. The wall was painted in a manner reminiscent of the PRL time (socialist Poland), with the lower half of the walls dark grey to prevent them getting dirty, something which was often seen in Eastern European and Soviet apartment buildings with communal corridors. This corridor sets up the context in which the artist was working. Consumer Art, which features products such as bananas and sausages which were often hard to obtain—and thus consume—in socialist Poland, ironizes the idea of consumption in a planned economy. It also turns the tables on the notion of woman as that which is consumed by the male—because in these images it is the woman who is firmly in control of both her sexuality, and the phallus, as the models that the artist used in the series have their way with the sausages, bananas and puddings that they put in their mouths, lick, and let drip from their lips. At times, one could easily question whether one was watching pornography or an artistic video. The line between the two was deliberately made thin by the artist.
After the Consumer Art corridor, one enters Natalia LL’s grand salon – a room with green walls and a plush green velvet settee, emphasizing the theatrical element that runs throughout her work. Wagnerian music, an accompaniment to some of her video works, streams through the exhibition halls. The next room, in which the title of the exhibition is written, in a script composed of photographs by the artists, is bathed in red, and a later room is bright yellow. One room contains a more recent installation—one of the round tower rooms was completely papered over in none other than bananas.
In the video work Brunhilde’s Dream, the artist cuts open that sacred banana, turning the phallic form into a vagina. She penetrates the banana with her knife, splits it open, and lets the juices flow out. She also penetrates her cleavage with a banana, then zooms in and out on the spadix (the phallic part) of a Cala Lily, effectively penetrating it with her gaze. These are the themes that run through her work—the vaginal and phallic forms, which depend on one another, both for their existence, and for procreation, and the life juices that flow from them.
The final room of the exhibition includes two video performances from the 1970s, thus, as Toniak told us, we go through the entire exhibition only to come full circle, back to the beginning, to the themes that the artist in fact never left. In Impressions (1973), a model can be seen jumping up and down, her breasts bouncing, dripping cream on her breasts. In Artifical Reality (1975, 1976), the artist is seen sitting in a chair, posing for the camera, playing with different poses, gazes, views. These two works were what brought the entire exhibition home for me, and created an overriding understanding of her work which, I think, is all about play. Theatricality—yes; sex—yes; but above all, and incorporating those two elements, a delight in playing—with one’s body, with another’s body, with food, with sex, with theatre, with objects, with costumes, with one’s partner—with life in general.
I was honored to be interviewed for a documentary that Polish cultural television is producing on Natalia LL. I was asked by the producers if I could contextualize Natalia LL.’s work both regionally and globally, and my thoughts on her attitude toward sex. As for what my answers were, you can wait for the video…
Natalia LL with Malgorzata ludwisiak, director of csw
After Ewa’s tour, we all gathered for a public interview with Natalia LL, and…an official birthday celebration. We had cake, champagne,… and I presented her with a few bananas.
New Project: SCOT//EAST
SCOT//EAST
An exhibition and events programme exploring gender identity and migration
Researchers affiliated with the University of Aberdeen, Scottish Art Blog and Performing the East are collaborating on an exhibition and concurrent events programme that aim to examine the impact of migration on individuals, specifically with regard to gender identity. This project will take place in March 2016 in Aberdeen to coincide with International Women’s Day.
The project will be centred around an exhibition held at NeWave Gallery, Aberdeen. It will provide a platform on which to showcase artistic production from both local and migrant communities in Scotland, through the lens of gender and gender identity.
The project is called Scot//East as it reflects our intention to welcome artists from European communities ‘East of Scotland’ to contribute.
Scotland and Central and Eastern Europe have strong historic ties. Migration dates back centuries. In 2015, Scotland boasts large migrant communities of Poles, Russians and citizens of the Baltic States (Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia), yet the unique and individual cultures of these countries are less understood.
We want to change this… We want to learn more…
We invite artists of both regional backgrounds, whose work deals specifically with gender and sexual identity, to connect with us to learn more about our project. The treatment of these topics is not only highly relevant to current discussions of civil rights, but can also provide insight into the way that different communities negotiate such categories, based on individual local experiences and traditions.
If you feel that your work lends itself to our exhibition, please email us to say hello:
scot.east.art@gmail.com
We will add you to our mailing list which will keep you updated on progress and provide you with our official ‘artist’s call’.
Amy Bryzgel, Fern Insh and Jasmina Zaloznik
Posted on June 8, 2015 by Amy Bryzgel
I am pleased to announce the publication of my monograph on the Latvian painter, performance artist and theorist, Miervaldis Polis (b. 1948) by the Latvian publisher, Neputns. This is the first monograph to appear on the artist, and it attempts to contextualise the various strands of his work, from his early paintings, to his performances in the 1980s, and his return to painting and formal portraiture in the post-Soviet period. It received support of the Latvian Culture Capital Fund and the Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies. I finished writing the monograph in 2012, after which it was translated into Latvian by Stella Pelse. Over the course of the last several years, Neputns has worked tirelessly to amass the most complete collection of the artists paintings, performances, and photographs of his everyday life.
Click here to read more about the book and purchase it through Neputns.
Miervaldis Polis, by Amy Bryzgel (Eimija Brizgela, in Latvian)
Follow me on Facebook and Twitter!
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You’ll find more frequent updates there!
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N is for Nexus
April 16, 2018 by rolandclarke
The aim of my Blogging From A to Z Challenge is to find the origins of online games, some relatively modern and some with ancient roots. Gaming might well be a modern take on an art that is almost timeless – storytelling. A perfect excuse for a writer to delve a little deeper.
[Visit here for links to other A to Z participants.]
Game: NEXUS: The Kingdom of the Winds, alternately known as Nexus TK or simply Nexus, a pay to play MMORPG, is loosely based on Korean mythology and on a series of graphic novels by an artist named Kim Jin. Nexus is a classic 2D MMORPG famous for being the North American version of Baram, the world’s first MMORPG.
This is the first of the oriental games that I am looking at– here originating with Korean mythology.
Release Date: KOR: 5 April 1996; NA: 1998
Developer: NEXON Inc.
Genre/gameplay mechanics: distinguished from other MMORPGs by its 2D tile graphics, intense player involvement, a central storyline, and its manhwa-like style. Flexible character development system – four “basic” paths, four sub-paths each, plus a choice from three alignments symbolizing death, balance or life. Learn about moral virtues or obtain unique abilities. Player-run game through clans. Most players are known by others and are treated with a general amount of respect by the average player, so the fanbase community is solid.
Setting: Nexus is set in a land similar, geographically, to the Three Kingdoms of Korea. Other lands such as Han and Ilbon, though not present in the game itself, are often referenced. In addition to the three kingdoms, there are nine villages in which a player may live. Three exist for each kingdom, containing houses which players may rent for a fee. Homes may be customized as a player sees fit using “floor plans” offered for homes of different sizes.
Storytelling: Rich and well-developed – “At the heart of the stories lies the struggles of three kingdoms which fight to protect their lands from enemies across the seas or beyond the mountains. The heroes and adventures of Koguryo, Buya and Nagnang face threats from mythological and historical invaders who constantly attack the lands lead by King M’hul, Queen Lasahn and King ChaeRi respectively. Together, these three nations form a region of Asia called “The Kingdom of The Winds”. This is a place shrouded in myths and legends, a land where many heroes are born, rise to great heights and occasionally, fail.”
Releases + Expansions:
Development of Baram began in Korea in 1994 and the game was released on April 5, 1996. One year later, it also entered beta in the United States, going commercial in 1998.
In 2005, the US subsidiary of NEXON changed its name to Kru Interactive and took over running Nexus, Dark Ages, and Shattered Galaxy as an independent company’
Formats: Microsoft Windows
Origins (Chronological):
Baramue Nara is the series of graphic novels by the artist named Kim Jin that is one of the origins. However, my internet surf failed to find more on what sounds like an interesting guy. Can anyone enlighten me?
1st century – The Three Kingdoms of Korea refers to the kingdoms of Baekje, Silla and Goguryeo. The latter was later known as Goryeo, from which the modern name Korea is derived. The Three Kingdoms period in Korea extends from the first century B.C.E. (specifically 57 B.C.E.) until Silla’s triumph over Goguryeo in 668, marking the beginning of the North and South States period.
Korean mythology refers to stories passed down by word of mouth over thousands of years on the Korean Peninsula. These stories serve as creation myths about the world and origin myths about nature or the social world. The earliest Korean myths are rooted in Korean shamanism. Rituals that glorify shamanistic gods are central to the retelling of Korean shamanistic myths. Only a fraction of Korean myths believed to have existed in ancient times were ultimately documented by Confucian and Buddhist scholars, many of whom modified the stories to fit within their own belief systems. The gods and goddesses of Korea are the topic of this article on an underappreciated pantheon of deities.
Recommendation: Well received on its initial release and with a staunch community, today the game looks outdated compared to modern games. Current reviews are sparse and moderate.
Alternative ‘N’ thoughts:
N is also for Narnia as in C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia, mentioned under my C post. Or N is for New Hope as in Star Wars and that will be under S. Plus N is for Neverending Story, a wonderful book by Michael Ende and a good film.
+ ‘N’ Games played: Neverwinter.
Enter this portal to reach other Worlds in my A2ZMMORPG
Hela da
This entry was posted in A to Z Challenge, Gaming, Ideas, Writing and tagged A to Z Challenge, Baram, Baramue Nara, Blogging from A to Z Challenge, Gaming, Kim Jin, Korea, Korean mythology, manwha, mythology, Neverending Story, Neverwinter, Nexon, Nexus, NEXUS: The Kingdom of the Winds, Three Kingdoms of Korea. Bookmark the permalink.
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O is for Onigiri →
2 thoughts on “N is for Nexus”
Ellen @ The Cynical Sailor says: April 18, 2018 at 12:52 pm
It might look outdated, but I think it still looks really cute. Although, maybe cute isn’t what serious gamers are looking for?
rolandclarke says: April 18, 2018 at 7:57 pm
Some games, like this one, are ‘cute’ and fun. Perhaps, they are aimed at younger players that relate to the more cartoon/anime look, and they don’t demand the realism that others look for – as you say, Ellen. Each to their own.
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"dogs leave paw prints on our hearts"
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Home > Labradoodles
Three month old Labradoodle
The Labradoodle is a “designer dog,” a hybrid dog breed resulting from breeding a Poodle with a Labrador Retriever. Like all other designer “breeds,” the Labradoodle is not truly a breed of its own, but is a crossbreed. Like other ‘designer breeds’, the Labradoodle has seen a recent surge in popularity. As a crossbreed, the Labradoodle is not eligible for registration with purebred registries such as the American Kennel Club, but it can be registered with the Continental Kennel Club. The Labradoodle is not considered a purebred because it doesn’t ‘breed true’, meaning that it doesn’t display a consistent set of characteristics. Bred to be a hypoallergenic service dog, the Labradoodle went on to prove that she could also be a versatile family and therapy dog as well. A Labradoodle is happiest when she’s with the people she loves, and she’ll shower her family with affection and devotion. With the energy of the Labrador Retriever and the work ethic of both the Lab and the Poodle, she’s a joy. Thanks to the efforts of a handful of people, the Labradoodle may soon end up as one of the most popular breeds around.
Generation Types:
F1 Labradoodle:
First generation Labradoodles are referred to as “F1.” These are the product of a pure Labrador Retriever bred with a pure Poodle, making the resulting Doodle 50% Poodle and 50% Labrador Retriever. F1 Doodles have the great labradoodle intelligence with higher “lab like” energy and drive. They also have all of the traits that make Labradoodles such desirable dogs, including intelligence, a loving demeanor, and hypoallergenic qualities. However, it is important to note that most F1 Labradoodles shed lightly to moderately. F1 doodles tend to have wispy coats long 5″ or short 2″ in length, wiry or harsher fleece in texture, while basically straight in wave. As first generation hybrids, these dogs have the added health benefits associated to Hybrid Vigour. This is a phenomenon in animal breeding referring to the fact that the first cross between two unrelated purebred lines is healthier and grows better than either parent line.
F1B Labradoodle:
When a F1 Doodle is cross-bred with a Poodle, the term “F1B” is used to describe their resulting offspring. A F1B Labradoodle is 25% Labrador Retriever and 75% Poodle. This generation has become the most popular generational breed largely because F1B Labradoodles are non-shedders 90% of the time. This makes them the most hypoallergenic of all the Doodle generational breeds. Even though F1B doodles are technically 75% poodle, they still exhibit the same favorable personality traits and behaviors as F1 Doodles (with the exception of shedding). F1B Doodles tend to have more variety and the coat texture ranges from fleece to wool and the wave ranges from straight to wavy..
Second generation Labradoodles are referred to as “F2”. These are the product of two F1 Doodle parents. They are about 75%-85% poodle 15%-25% lab, may be true to the labradoodle standard in physical appearance and are consistently non-shedding. The coat texture ranges from fleece to wool and the wave ranges from wavy to curly.
Multi-generation Labradoodles:
Technically a multigeneration Labradoodle should be the result of generations of Labradoodle to Labradoodle breeding, but in practice backcrosses and poodles are also used in the early generations.When multigeneration Labradoodles were first introduced to North American breeders, they were given a Lab-Poodle breeding program as the breeding model for Labradoodles, which suggesteded that Poodles could be reintroduced into the early generations.This breeding program allowed breeding to poodles for the first four generations – which is why in some older lines of multigen dogs, ‘there is a lot of poodle in the doodle’. Poodles are less expensive, they make shedding lines more nonshed, and they allow the introduction of some popular new colours such as red and parti. Good breeders are selective about adding only a modest amount of poodle in the early generations.
Australian Labradoodles:
In 2004, the name Australian Labradoodle was used to describe the lines of multigeneration Labradoodles with long pedigrees, some dating back to the two kennels in Australia who started breeding them in the early 1990’s. It was later announced was that there were in fact six breeds used in the breeding program; Poodle, Labrador Retriever, Irish Water Spaniel, Curly Coat Retriever, American Cocker Spaniel, English Cocker Spaniel.The Curly Coated Retriever experiment was a failure and those lines were abandoned. Only two Irish Water Spaniels were used, and only one time each. This left the main contributors as : Labrador, Poodle and American & English Cocker Spaniels. Multigeneration Labradoodles from Australia started to take off in North America in the late 1990’s. Now there are a large number of breeders in North America and in Australia who own breeding dogs from these lines. Their coat texture is either silky fleece (preferred) or soft spiraling wool and sometimes you can get variations on the wave from straight to curly. The goal is to achieve the true Australian Labradoodle look, temperament, coat and conformation. True to the Australian Labradoodle standard in physical appearance, and pedigree, consistently non-shedding fleece sheepdog like coat, dander free. Great Australian Labradoodle temperament, intelligence, and laid back nature.
The Labradoodle has an average shoulder height of 13-26 in (33-66 cm) and weighs 22-88 lbs (10-40 kg). Labradoodles resulting from crosses with Toy Poodles are smaller than those resulting from crosses with Miniature or Standard Poodles. As a crossbreed, the Labradoodle may have a wide variety of features, but typical features are those listed in the Australian Labradoodle standard: a broad head with medium stop (depression where the muzzle meets the forehead), wide set eyes, flat ears level with the eyes, scissors bit, large nose, low set tail, and body slightly longer than tall.
Coat:
Due to the Poodle influence, the Labradoodle may have a wide variety of coats. The Labradoodle coat may be wiry or soft, straight or curly, or anywhere in between. There are a wide variety of possible Labradoodle colors, including white, cream, red, brown, black, and gold. First generation crosses shed lightly with a wispy hair coat, Second generation Labradoodles of primarily Poodle mixture are nonshedding with a fleece textured coat or hair coat, and higher generation Labradoodles are nonshedding with a fleece textured coat. The Australian variety is non-shedding with a fleece or wool textured coat.
The Labradoodle is friendly, family oriented, and lively. It is very clever, perky, and funny. Labradoodles love their family and are highly loyal. The Labradoodle will try to get away with mischief if its owner doesn’t keep it in line.
Labradoodles are friendly with dogs, other pets and children. They are affectionate with strangers and do not make good watchdogs.
The Labradoodle requires monthly brushing to keep the coat free of tangles, more often for curly coats. The Labradoodle has a lifespan of 13-15 years. It is susceptible to hip and elbow dysplasia (malformed joints which can cause lameness or arthritis) and PRA, a retinal disorder, but as a mixed breed it is somewhat less likely to suffer health problems than purebreds (known as ‘hybrid vigor’).
The Labradoodle is intelligent and eager to please, making it straightforward to train. Labradoodles are able to learn a wide variety of unusual tricks. Labradoodles may attempt to outsmart their owners when they see an opportunity.
Labradoodles require a moderate amount of exercise such as a daily walk or playtime in a fenced-in yard. Most are fond of swimming, like their parent breeds. The Labradoodle is well suited to apartment life.
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Singing our own song - September 28, 2012
“Give ear, O heavens, let me speak;
let the earth hear the words I utter!
May my discourse come down as the rain,
my speech distill as dew.”
So begins the Song or Poem of Moses,
which appears to foreshadow the coming history
of the Israelites in their land.
The song tells of a people close to God
that strayed far from a path of belief and faithfulness.
Moses could have delivered his message
in a different way, but he chose a form
that has its own rhythm and feel.
It was almost as if words of warning
delivered in the form of a song
had a greater potential to penetrate
the minds and hearts of the people.
The opening words of the song
describe how a message can begin to "sink in,"
Just as rain or dew soaks into the ground
to enhance the growth of plants,
words spoken or sung well can offer us nourishment
that can enable us to grow in knowledge.
We likely have our own personal ways
in which we are inspired to shape our words
into prose, poetry, or song lyrics with melody.
Perhaps the ideas come to us
in the way that rain may suddenly start to fall ‑ in an instant.
It may be a gradual process, whereby thoughts and feelings
come together over a longer period of time,
emerging into something new and complete
when they are ready.
What is most important is that we be open
to the possibility of expressing ourselves
by singing our own song, even if it has no melody.
Our words voice our feelings, our opinions and our beliefs,
but, mostly, they tell our story.
So may we, like Moses, find new ways to convey
our own personal narrative.
May our creativity flow like a stream.
May new thoughts penetrate our souls
like a soothing, cleansing rain.
And may our words, however we express them,
nourish one another with insight, wisdom,
comfort and hope.
“Our Hope: Judaism and Eternity” - Yom Kippur Morning September 26, 2012
ASHER NATAN LANU TORAH EMET, V’CHA-YEI OLAM NATA B’TOCHEINU. BARUCH ATAH ADONAI, NOTEIN HATORAH. We have heard these words countless times. Most of us probably know them by heart. They are mentioned in the Talmud, and they may be 2000 years old. We recite those phrases in the blessing after the Torah reading as we take part in an aliyah. This Yom Kippur morning offers us an opportunity to look at that blessing more closely, to further understand its meaning.
This short liturgical paragraph begins with what we could call the “standard blessing formula” - BLESSED ARE YOU, ETERNAL ONE, OUR GOD, RULER OF THE UNIVERSE – BARUCH ATAH ADONAI ELOHEINU MELECH HAOLAM. Next comes the “operative language,” the heart of the prayer - ASHER NATAN LANU TORAT EMET – WHO HAS GIVEN US A TRUE TORAH – OR A TORAH OF TRUTH…..V’CHAYEI OLAM NATA B’TOCHEINU – AND HAS PLANTED IN OUR MIDST (OR INSIDE OF US) ETERNAL LIFE. BARUCH ATAH ADONAI, NOTEIN HATORAH – BLESSED ARE YOU, ETERNAL ONE, GIVER OF THE TORAH. This blessing focuses on learning and tradition, like the prayer before the reading, but it seems to add a phrase almost at random. We probably wouldn’t have expected a reference to eternal life to be part of a ritual that signifies our dedication to the study of this sacred text.
The beginning of this morning’s Torah reading from Deuteronomy Chapter 29 may begin to explain how eternity and Torah fit together. The Torah portion portrays Moses standing before the Israelites as they reaffirmed the covenant, their special relationship with God. Moses told the people that God was making a covenant “with those who were standing with them on that day,” and with “those who were not there on that day.” The statement about those who were not present referred to members of generations yet to come. By the time the Jewish Bible, the TANAKH, was complete in the year 90 CE, the teachings of the Torah had already transcended time. At that point in history, our tradition had been passed down many times over from parents to children. It is not surprising that the great Sage Hillel characterized the words and teachings of the Torah as eternal as early as the first century CE. We can find his declaration in the Sayings of the Rabbis, Pirkei Avot: “KANA SHEIM TOV, KANA L’ATZMO – When you acquire a good name, you acquire it for yourself, on your own. KANA LO DIVREI TORAH, KANA LO CHAYEI HAOLAM HABA – when you make the words of Torah and its heritage your own, you acquire life in the world to come –that is, eternal life, or a piece of eternity. We may think of study and listening to Torah and Haftarah readings during a service as tied only to that very moment of recitation and reflection. Those very rituals place us in an ever-growing chain of tradition. We as members of Temple Beth-El derive benefit from eternal Jewish sources for wisdom when we participate in our ongoing Talmud Study and Torah study groups, the Jewish women’s spirituality group and our Religious School. We can acquire words of Torah by attending Temple Beth-El’s introduction to Judaism class, our upcoming course on the Sayings of the Rabbis, Pirkei Avot, and other classes, series, discussions and one-time lectures that we offer. It isn’t only wisdom and knowledge that we seek when we study. We explore the sacred texts of our heritage so that we will act in the best way possible. We have discussed our values and our words during these High Holy Days. It is what we do that demonstrates our response to the call in this morning’s Torah reading to “Choose life!”
Study and action based on Jewish wisdom and values allow us to touch upon something eternal. We don’t talk much about eternity in our society, so the words of the blessing after the Torah reading that speak of eternal life might regularly pass us by without acknowledgement. So what is the Jewish view of eternity? The Torah was virtually silent on the topic. The remaining books in the Bible spoke of eternity in terms of afterlife: an ultimate resting place for the souls of the dead called SHEOL, a dark, non-descript place within the earth where the souls of those who had died knew neither reward nor punishment. They were just “there.” To be in SHEOL, which translates as “the pit,” was to be in the lowest possible place, separated from happiness, from loved ones, and from God’s goodness. It wasn’t until the time of the Maccabees that our tradition developed the idea that those who died valiantly in battle to preserve the Jewish faith and people should be able to share in the glory and reward that they deserved. From that time, the backstory of the holiday of Chanukah, likely came the belief that the souls of those who died in battle would be united with a resurrected body - perhaps physical, perhaps spiritual – and bask in the light of the divine. According to the tradition of the rabbis, whenever the world would come to an end, whether then or in the distant future, every righteous person in any generation and among all peoples would be rewarded with life in the world to come – the OLAM HABA. When people who performed everyday mitzvot, such as study, honoring parents, visiting the sick, supporting their community, and making peace between people, appeared to get little or no reward in this life, the rabbis said that the greater reward would be waiting for them LAOLAM HABA – in the world to come. That is the central theme of one of our early morning prayers, EILU D’VARIM.
During my Reform Jewish upbringing, I often heard the term “Messianic age” to describe a rational view of the world to come, a time of peace and harmony brought about by humanity. Yet, the references to eternity remained in Reform prayerbooks. The Union Prayer Book, created over 110 years ago, ended ATAH GIBOR, the second prayer of the Tefillah, with a phrase that is reminiscent of the second Torah blessing: BARUCH ATAH ADONAI, NOTEI-A B’TOCHEINU CHAYEI OLAM– BLESSED ARE YOU, ADONAI, WHO IMPLANTS ETERNAL LIFE WITHIN US.” The new prayerbook MISHKAN T’FILAH, ends that prayer with the phrase M’CHAYEH HAKOL, “Blessed are You, Adonai, who gives life to all.”
We know the word OLAM in relation to many of the blessings we recite, where it means WORLD or UNIVERSE as in MELECH HA-OLAM, Ruler of the Universe. OLAM also means eternal or immortal. We recite the word OLAM in the second line of the Shema and in other prayers in the phrase L’OLAM VAED, “forever and ever.” L’OLAM expresses the concept of moving “on and on to infinity, to the end of the universe.” One of the names for a cemetery in Hebrew is BAYT OLAMIM – literally, “House of Worlds or universes” or the “abode of eternity.”
One of the prayers that we recite at funerals and at memorial or yizkor services that refers to OLAM – eternity - is EIL MALEI RACHAMIM – God, full of compassion. Through this poignant text, we pray that our loved ones who have died will find perfect rest under the wings of God’s sheltering and shining presence, the SHEKHINAH. We pray for the soul of our loved one who has entered his or her OLAM or eternal existence. This prayer asks of God, “Source of mercy, enfold our loved one L’OLAMIM – forever – in the shadow of Your wings.” We pray that the souls of those who have died will be bound up in the bond of life, BITZROR HACHAYIM, and that they will be at peace in their eternal resting place. EIL MALEI RACHAMIM offers a sense of everlasting protection, connection with all of existence, and rest and peace before God for the souls of those who have died.
We likely would explain what we mean by eternity in many different ways today. Perhaps we believe that our soul goes back to the universe to be a part of the reservoir of creation. Maybe our soul remains intact and returns to God and is reunited with loved ones who died before us. In his book, DOES THE SOUL SURVIVE? Rabbi Elie Kaplan Spitz explained that we don’t really know for a fact what happens after we die. He believes that stories that some people tell from having been unconscious and near death suggest that our soul might very well remain distinct after we die, that we may have an opportunity to look back on every moment of our lives, that we could come into contact with relatives who have died – hopefully unburdened of any pain or despair they knew in life – and that we will rest in peace under the protection of God’s light.
We may see eternity in terms of how our memories and the legacies we create through our words and deeds assure some measure of personal immortality. People can and often do live on in what we remember and in the stories and lessons they have left to us. Our recollections of our loved ones who have died can enable their love, friendship and incomparable wisdom to endure because they are now a part of us.
What can we learn from the many Jewish views of eternity? Remembering the lives of our loved ones who are no longer with us teaches us about how we should, within every moment, follow the command of this morning’s Torah reading to choose life and good. As we wish for the souls of those who have died protection, peace, rest and a feeling of being connected to the entire universe, we can strive to feel bound in every moment to all human beings throughout the world. We can resolve to provide shelter and comfort for people in need. We can take time out of our routines to rest in order to find the inner strength to bring peace to ourselves and to our community. We should take the opportunities now, in what singer Michael Rutherford once called, “the living years,” to reach out in mercy or forgiveness in order to repair broken relationships or to heal the wounds of past hurts, if such reconciliation is at all possible. Finally, we shouldn’t hesitate to learn from the past. Yom Kippur is an annual day of life review, when we look into our souls to see who we have been and who we are. We have the opportunity on this day to decide who we have the potential to be and what we can do to reach for that goal of giving humanity and the world the best of ourselves. We can emerge from Yom Kippur renewed and refreshed, looking forward to the promise of joy, light and blessing here and now.
We read in the 90th chapter of the book of Psalms, “Teach us, Eternal One, to number our days – to count our days in the proper way – that we may obtain a heart of wisdom.” This verse came to mind as I read Mitch Albom’s new book, The Time Keeper. The main characters in this book all face death in some way, and are all concerned about the passing of time. The central character spent his life designing ways to measure time. He became so focused on that task that he almost missed the love that surrounded him. Another character in the book found that life’s challenges and failures can cause us to feel that fairness, affirmation and a heart of wisdom are beyond our earthly reach. We may come to believe that there is never enough time to find the comfort and hope that can enable us move forward with courage and confidence. A third character tried to outwit death itself, only to find that time was not to be measured in quantity but in quality. The Time Keeper reminds us to preserve life’s special moments not only with the most advanced photographic technology but with the camera of the heart and mind. It teaches that we should not let another person’s cruelty and humiliation, intended to destroy our sense of self, prevent us from living the life of goodness that we deserve to live. Mitch Albom infused this fable of his own creation with a heart of wisdom of its own. This tale reminds us that time is not lived only in years, days, hours, minutes and seconds. As one musical so aptly put it, we have the chance to live the time we are given in love, in treasured memories, in nurturing relationships and in bringing light, hope and peace to the world here and now.
And that is the essential and eternal message of Torah. The prayer that we recite just before the Shema in morning and evening services says that we were given the gift of Torah out of love so that we would have a path that would lead us to goodness and integrity. When we walk along that road, we are part of the enduring journey of those who preceded us and those who will follow us in the centuries to come. The prayer after the Torah reading ends with the familiar refrain, BARUCH ATAH ADONAI, NOTEIN HATORAH – BLESSED ARE YOU ETERNAL ONE – GIVER OF THE TORAH. Every time we hear this blessing recited, we join with our ancestors, with Jews all over the world today, with the entire human family, and with those who are not yet here with us this day in an eternal search for new knowledge and greater insight into what it means to choose life and to infuse life with meaning and purpose.
In February, I traveled home to Kansas City to attend a cousin’s Bat Mitzvah. Our son Adam, our niece Samantha, and Samantha’s husband Rob were also there to represent our family. On Shabbat afternoon that weekend, we drove to Rose Hill Cemetery to visit the graves of my parents, Joseph and Ruth Karol. Rob never had the chance to know my parents, but Samantha and Adam have many memories of times that we shared together as a family through the years. As I looked at the three members of our family’s next generation standing together at the cemetery, I thought about the passage of time, wondering how it was possible that Adam and Samantha had grown up so quickly. And I thought about how proud my parents would be of their grandchildren, who practice so many of the values they espoused and lived every day. Here was a scene that demonstrated how Torah can be eternal, how a legacy can continue across three generations, and, hopefully, many more.
May the souls of our loved ones that are now bound up in the bond of eternity inspire us to wholeheartedly choose to live a life of righteousness and compassion, goodness and blessing. And may their lives teach us to number our days so we will gain, as one community, a heart of wisdom. So may it be – and let us say Amen.
Our Words: Prayers, Perspectives and Promises – Kol Nidre/Erev Yom Kippur - September 25, 2012
I looked at their signs almost every day for 15 years. I would drive by the various locations around town where they appeared and marvel at what new message might be added to their repertoire of hateful expressions. GOD HATES AMERICA! THANK GOD FOR IED’S (IMPROVISED EXPLOSIVE DEVICES)! As I drove on the side street that led to Temple Beth Sholom in Topeka on Friday nights, the the gauntlet of picketers from the Westboro Baptist Church would greet me and other congregants with the special sign they made just for us, TEMPLE BETH SODOM. More recently this same group has unveiled signs declaring THE JEWS KILLED JESUS, GOD HATES ISRAEL, and GOD HATES JEWS. People who have witnessed this group organized around Fred Phelps, Sr. and his family wonder when their members will ever get a life. But this is their life – bigotry and hatred that they justify as fire and brimstone preaching that only they can deliver because they are, in their words, God’s elect, God’s chosen few.
I spoke openly and often in that community about standing up to hatred by engendering understanding between people of different faiths and backgrounds. Yes, it did work; yes, it was possible. Yes, I could have a calm discussion about Middle East politics with a local physician who headed the Islamic center in town. Yes, my Christian clergy colleagues and I could find common ground, from the most conservative to the most liberal. That happened after years of working together, talking with each other, and building trust in general, even when our disagreements on certain issues were as wide as the Grand Canyon.
I wonder if Israel’s Sephardic Chief Rabbi Shlomo Amar would have made some of his negative statements about Reform Jews this year if he had engaged in study, at any time, with rabbis and scholars from a wide spectrum of approaches to Judaism. Such ongoing relationships might have prevented him from asserting that Conservative and Reform Rabbis are “uprooters of Torah” who have to answer for the damage they are doing to the Jewish world. He might not have advised that it would be better for a secular Jew who was away from home this year on Rosh Hashanah to pray by himself rather than pray in a Reform congregation. I can’t say that those words don’t hurt, but it is a position I expect. Still, I am not one to give up on developing mutual respect or, at least, sharing a small slice of the truth. During Passover in 1977, I accompanied a college friend on a trip organized by his Yeshiva to a site in the Judean hills. I eventually told one of the American Yeshiva students on that trip that I was a Reform rabbinic student living in Jerusalem that year. He was puzzled, thinking I believed in a different religion than he did. So he asked, “On Yom Kippur, I fast and pray all day in synagogue in order to atone for my sins. What do you do on Yom Kippur?” I replied quickly – “I do the same thing you do.” I would like to think that I brought just a little light of understanding into his world.
I still receive the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle to maintain connections with the community that raised me. This weekly newspaper, during every election cycle, features op-ed articles and letters-to-the-editor that urge people to vote for one candidate – or one party – or another. Sometimes the rhetoric gets testy, so much so that it elicited this letter a few weeks ago: “When members of our Jewish community write a letter to this newspaper to express a political opinion, they should not be subjected to personal attacks. Is a reasoned response, such as ‘I disagree with so and so’s opinion because…” too much to ask, without resorting to name calling? It doesn’t matter what side of the political aisle you’re on; it’s clear as day that some recent letters have lowered the level of civil discourse in this community. Personal attacks by one member of the community should be condemned by people of all political persuasions. I’m not in favor of censorship, but for the sake of peace in the community, this newspaper might want to refrain from publishing such letters in the future.”
I have seen newspapers in the communities in which I have lived print pointed expressions from readers without hesitation. When I would write a letter in response to sentiments with which I disagreed, I made sure that it was about the topic, not the person. I tried to couch my language in such a way that people from a wide range of opinions could hear it and think about it. In one case, I was involved in a series of back-and-forth letters-to-the-editor about the right of a local pastor to pray in a way that was particularly Christian in the state legislature (which I opposed). The other letter writer and I eventually had a face-to-face meeting – he was a deacon at a local Church of God in Christ and came by his view honestly. He spoke intelligently and without hostility to me. At the end of our meeting, we were able to agree to disagree. This man became a regular participant in an interfaith dialogue group where we continued to disagree agreeably and to listen to and reflect on our respective views.
This is a night that is about our actions but it is, especially, about our words. What we say can create or destroy a world, where that world may be a relationship between two people or many people. Words can create expectations that may or may not be met. Words can express the complexities of our thoughts and opinions on crucial issues. They can also give voice to personal passion for a particular perspective. Such passion is well placed as long as it doesn’t prevent a person from hearing crucial information or another opinion that might deserve consideration.
How we say what is on our minds and in our hearts does matter. We do use our words to express our opinions but, also, to promise to give or do something either for ourselves or for the benefit of another person or an entire community. One aspect of human nature that hasn’t changed over the centuries is that, sometimes, we can’t fulfill such promises. Other concerns and tasks may intervene in a way we didn’t expect. The rabbis acknowledged this reality, but as much as they discouraged people from making promises they couldn’t keep, their community members did so anyway. A prayer very similar to KOL NIDREI became popular because people wanted to be unburdened of the guilt of past unfulfilled promises so that they could feel that they were truly forgiven. The original prayer that annulled vows of the previous year was a problem for some rabbis, who felt that we still needed to be bound by the words we spoke in some significant way. About 1000 years ago, Rabbi Meir ben Samuel, the son-in-law of the great sage Rashi, proposed that the KOL NIDREI prayer be modified to annul in advance any vows people might make in the coming 12 months, from this Yom Kippur to the next. That is the wording that we chanted during tonight’s service. Admitting that we might, in the future, make a promise we can’t keep, could make us think before we speak so that others will be able to trust what we say. There is a large dose of forgiveness for our humanity built into this prayer. We make mistakes. We try to use our words wisely, but we don’t always succeed. Sometimes we just need a break. KOL NIDREI takes away the feeling that we have to be perfect. It allows us to be who we are: human beings striving to get as close to perfection as possible.
Rabbi Lawrence Hoffman compiled a wide variety of reflections on the Kol Nidre prayer in his book, ALL THESE VOWS. In one chapter of this anthology, Rabbi and Psychologist Ruth Durchslag specifically addressed the power of words. She began her chapter in the book with this declaration: “In my life as a psychologist I rely on words to heal. In my work as a rabbi I rely on words to inspire. When I write, I rely on words to communicate. As a mediator, I have learned that words mean nothing at all.” She noted that KOL NIDREI, on one level, suggests that words don’t really count. Then she noted that words do count. In the Torah, God used speech – words – to begin creation by saying “LET THERE BE LIGHT!” The Torah says that God didn’t just write the Ten Commandments on stone, God spoke those words. Rabbi Durchslag explained that when we recite a blessing, the words we have spoken change our way of being in the world. She noted how silence, the absence of the spoken word, can also create something new. Silent reflection on a difficult situation can change a “no” to a “yes” once we have deeply pondered our own feelings and values. In our silence, we might hear the words we have spoken in the past as harsh or meaningless. From a place of no words, we may feel a desire to take back some of what we have said. A moment of meditation or introspection may allow us to better understand how to carefully craft our words so that they will be meaningful and affirming. The Kol Nidrei prayer gives us permission to feel regret, even in advance, for words indelicately spoken. It reminds us to speak as though even one phrase or one word can change the state of the universe and the course of history.
At most any time in public life, words are flying in countless directions, whether from leaders or news commentators, or proponents of one ideology or another. Parker Palmer, author of Healing the Heart of Democracy: The Courage to Create a Politics Worthy of the Human Spirit, lamented the state of public discourse in a Huffington Post article with this statement: “Want to undermine American democracy? Start by making citizens so distrustful and dismissive of each other -- especially of those who are "different" in their political/religious/philosophical convictions or their sexual orientation/ethnicity/race -- that the power of "We the People" dissipates as we tear each other apart….Political civility is not about being polite to each other. It's about reclaiming the power of ‘We the People’ to come together, debate the common good and call American democracy back to its highest values amid our differences. The civility we need will come not from watching our tongues, but from valuing our differences and the creativity that can come when we hold them well.”
In his book, The Third Alternative, Stephen Covey suggested a path that can effectively lead individuals or groups in conflict to a peaceful and productive resolution. Covey directs people to seek out those who espouse an opposing position and truly listen to their viewpoint. Listening means to hear clearly what the other person is saying, all the while remembering that he or she is not an enemy, but a human being who deserves respect. The goal of conflict resolution is not victory for one position or another, but transformation for both sides, so that they can ultimately see that they are really on the same side, bound together as members of a community.
For Parker Palmer and Stephen Covey, and for us, words can and do create worlds. The words shared by many of you with me about creating a civil society offer a meaningful guide to how we can say what we need to say in the best way possible. How can we state our perspectives in such a way that they will be heard and understood, as if we are members of the same team? Listen now to your wisdom and counsel:
· Listening and caring matter, being aware that we all make mistakes and can unconsciously hurt others perhaps because we ourselves are hurting...and the words "I'm sorry" should be enough ...it matters that we accept each person for who they are and don't try to mold them into what or who we think they should be, but rather celebrate the fact that we are all individuals.
· Dismissing another’s ideas to promote your own is not a way to discuss issues.
· Before I judge another's words or behavior, I think about myself on the worst day of my life and try to give that person the break that I needed on that particular day.
· To have meaningful, collaborative relationships with others you need to think about what you say in the context of the audience you address. This is true with an audience of thousands or an audience of one.
· Remind yourself: You Want To Continue A Relationship With This Person Beyond This Conversation: think about maintaining ties, not scoring points or dismissing someone with views that differ from your own. It is possible to have respectful, educated disagreement. It's important that we not view a difference of opinion as inherently problematic!
· Within the Jewish community, acknowledge and respect that the Torah and Jewish law are open to many interpretations that affirm a wide range of views on tough subjects.
· Actively listen to what another person has to say. Even if you disagree with it, make sure you understand the meaning before expressing your own ideas, and use that understanding to emphasize common ground.
· Listen carefully to what is being said. Don't argue. Rather, pause before answering and answer softly, sincerely, and succinctly.
· By completely focusing on notions that make a lot of sense to you, making no attempt to see the other person's point-of-view, that's how evil comes about.
· Respect others--their values, viewpoints, and overall importance as human beings. All discussions should be at a conversational, low-decibel auditory level. Ask : What do you think/What is your opinion?", do not interrupt as you listen to the answer, and then say "Thank you".
· Always consider this question when speaking to another person: “How would I feel if you said to me what I'm about to say to you?”
· Message content aside, never engage another person using a mean-spirited, hateful tone or abusive language to which you yourself would not favorably respond.
· Reasoned dialog between disagreeing persons is possible if the discussion is tempered with the realization that unfettered emotions tied to a certain point of view will distort facts and lead to false accusations and name calling, resulting in a shouting match. Perhaps enforce the simple principle of waiting your turn to speak, and speak with respect.
· One person is not superior to another and each deserves equal respect. Where there are ears that truly listen and hearts that truly hear, there is hope for a civil society.
Through what we say and how we say it, we can hold out hope for reaching true understanding. The KOL NIDREI prayer reminds us to make our words count before we even say them. Before the T’FILAH, we pray a verse from PSALM 51, “ADONAI S’FATAI TIF’TACH UFI YAGID T’HILATECHA, Eternal One, open my lips, that my mouth may declare Your praise.” We need to remember that when we speak to any person, he or she is created in the divine image. We are part of the same family. No disagreement or difference can change that, because diversity is built into the human condition.
The Talmud tells of how the schools of the great sages Hillel and Shammai were in regular conflict. In one instance, the debate became so heated that only a heavenly voice could stop their verbal confrontations. The voice declared, “Both of your positions are the words of the living God – both are valid – EILU V’EILU DIVREI ELOHIM CHAYIM – but the law is in agreement with the students of Hillel.” “Why one side and not the other?” the Talmud asked. The passage explained that the students of Hillel were kind and modest, they studied their own rulings and those of their opponents, and they were so humble that they would mention the opinions of Shammai before stating their own views.
And so, in the coming year, from this Yom Kippur to the next, may we speak with humility, with honesty and with respect. May the still small voice inside of us guide our speech so that what we say will bring us closer together, giving meaning not only to the words “We the People,” but also to one simple expression of unity - “WE.” So may it be - and let us say AMEN.
Powerful rituals symbolize High Holy Days -for the Las Cruces Bulletin, September 21, 2012
Powerful rituals symbolize High Holy Days
Jews mark season of forgiveness and repentance
By Rabbi Lawrence Karol For the Las Cruces Bulletin
Forgiveness and repentance are major themes of the Jewish High Holy Day season, which began with Rosh Hashanah, the New Year (this year, it was from sundown Sunday, Sept. 16 to sundown Tuesday, Sept. 18) and ends with Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, a day of communal prayer and fasting, which will be observed from sundown Tuesday, Sept. 25, until sundown Wednesday, Sept. 26.
One of the central rituals of the Rosh Hashanah observance is the sounding of the Shofar, the ram’s horn, during our New Year worship.
The Shofar’s calls remind us to do the work of t’shuvah, repentance or returning to the right path, and s’lichah, seeking forgiveness for what we have done wrong in the past year and resolving to do better.
Another highlight of Rosh Hashanah involves going to a local body of water to perform the ritual of tashlich. This ceremony of casting bread crumbs into water derives its name from Micah 7:19. In that verse, the prophet Micah, speaking to God, said, “You will cast (tashlich) all our sins into the depths of the sea.”
When I teach children about tashlich, we talk about sin (defined as a wrong act) in relation to unwanted habits such as inappropriate expressions of anger, fighting with siblings or not attending to chores. I explain that tashlich reminds us we don’t have to be bound by past mistakes and undesired habits. Throwing bread crumbs into the water visually and physically demonstrates we can truly separate ourselves from our sins of the past and start with a “clean slate” in the New Year.
Tashlich is a powerful ritual because it vividly illustrates the themes of the High Holy Days. It is one step in the process ofrepentance as a return to the right path, because participating in tashlich is an admission that we do make mistakes in action and judgment. It shows our resolve not to repeat past sins.
Throwing the bread crumbs can be an act of self-forgiveness that reflects a sense of hope for improving ourselves in the future. We also gain a sense that we, as fallible human beings, have the possibility and the opportunity to try again to do the right thing when faced with the same situation in the future.
Jewish sages saw repentance as a multistep process. In his book “Minyan: Ten Principles for Living a Life of Integrity,” Rabbi Rami Shapiro explained the path toward repentance outlined by two important Jewish thinkers.
Saadiah Gaon (882-942) was an Egyptian Jew who became a leading Jewish philosopher of the 10th century. He believed that repentance required four steps:
1. Experience regret or remorse over the wrong act.
2. Admit to the act and renounce it as wrong.
3. Request forgiveness from those who were wronged.
4. Refrain from repeating the action in the future.
About 100 years later, Bahya Ibn Pakuda, a Jewish philosopher in Spain, asserted that repentance involved a seven-step process:
1. Be convinced that you are responsible for the action in question.
2. Realize that the act was a wrongful one.
3. Become aware that there is a consequence to your action.
4. Understand that your deed is not being ignored. Remember that even if no one else knows what you have done, you know, and so does God.
5. Realize that repentance alone will return you to the path of righteousness.
6. Realize that the joy you received from doing the wrong thing is not as great as the joy of doing the right thing.
7. Sincerely resolve to break with the habits of evil to which you have grown accustomed.
The 12th century Jewish scholar Moses Maimonides offered a positive view of the healing that repentance can bring: “Repentance suffices for forgiveness of sins against God alone, but sins against human beings, such as violence or cursing or theft, are not forgiven until restitution is made and the injured person is satisfied, and restitution by itself is not enough. One must appease the injured person and ask forgiveness.
“By the same token, an injured person must not be cruel and unforgiving. We should be slow to anger and easily appeased.
And when our forgiveness is requested, we should grant it with a whole heart and a willing spirit. We should not be vengeful or bear grudges even for a grave injury – this is the way of the upright.”
There may be times when repentance is not enough to elicit forgiveness and engender reconciliation. However, it is still important to try to heal the wounds between people, especially when we believe that all human beings are all created in one spiritual image.
Hopefully, repentance and forgiveness can bring us together so that our unity will ultimately reflect the oneness that unites all creation.
Rabbi Lawrence P. Karol is the spiritual leader of the Temple Beth-El Jewish congregation in Las Cruces.
Our Faith: We Will Live - Rosh Hashanah Morning - September 17, 2012
Last Monday was the 10th anniversary, by the Jewish calendar, of the death of my father, Joseph Karol. I try every day to remember and pay tribute to what he taught me about life – striving for excellence and integrity, showing compassion, and demonstrating an unwavering commitment to a community. My dad also taught me about writing, which was a major aspect of his job at the Army Corps of Engineers. That fact, combined with his many years of teaching religious school and volunteering for Temple, may help explain why both children in our family became rabbis. My Dad’s talents live on in my brother and in me, and you see or hear them every time I write a newsletter article or deliver a d’var Torah.
One of my dad’s hobbies was photography. Before the days when video-recording technology was affordable or available in our homes, we only had tape recorders to record television audio and a camera set on a tripod in front to the TV screen to capture an image. On July 20, 1969, my dad and I did our best to preserve on tape and Kodak slide film the first steps of Neil Armstrong on the moon. Armstrong and fellow astronaut Buzz Aldrin seemed larger than life that night. The same could be said of Sally Ride, the first American woman to fly in space on June 18, 1983. Our nation and the world now mourn both of these pioneers of space exploration who died this summer. Even with their fame, each of these astronaut’s families shared memorial messages with the public that were thoughtful and very unassuming. Neil Armstrong’s family offered this statement: “Neil was our loving husband, father, grandfather, brother and friend. Neil Armstrong was also a reluctant American hero who always believed he was just doing his job. He served his Nation proudly, as a navy fighter pilot, test pilot, and astronaut. He also found success back home in his native Ohio in business and academia, and became a community leader in Cincinnati….While we mourn the loss of a very good man, we also celebrate his remarkable life and hope that it serves as an example to young people around the world to work hard to make their dreams come true, to be willing to explore and push the limits, and to selflessly serve a cause greater than themselves. For those who may ask what they can do to honor Neil, we have a simple request. Honor his example of service, accomplishment and modesty, and the next time you walk outside on a clear night and see the moon smiling down at you, think of Neil Armstrong and give him a wink."
Sally Ride’s sister, Bear, said this of the first American woman in space: “Our parents, Joyce and Dale Ride, encouraged us to study hard, to do our best and to be anything we wanted to be.…They encouraged us to be curious, to keep our minds and hearts open and to respect all persons as children of God. Our parents taught us to explore, and we did. Sally studied science and I went to seminary. She became an astronaut and I was ordained as a Presbyterian minister. Sally lived her life to the fullest with boundless energy, curiosity, intelligence, passion, joy, and love. Her integrity was absolute; her spirit was immeasurable; her approach to life was fearless. Sally died the same way she lived: without fear. Sally’s signature statement was ‘Reach for the Stars.’ Surely she did this, and she blazed a trail for all…of us.”
Both families of these world-renowned space explorers found a way to put into words the aspirations and character of their loved ones. It wasn’t greatness that permeated their tribute, but the down-to-earth nature of their lives. Their successes were large, but both families were essentially teaching us that any one of us can achieve our own level of greatness and then share our story so that others can live by our example. And that can be our goal in life: to thrive, the make a difference with our lives, and to symbolically write a new passage every day in the book of our lives about the peaks and the valleys, and everything in between, that we encounter. The Un’taneh Tokef prayer that we recited earlier this morning declares about God: “You write and You seal, You record and recount.” God isn’t the only writer noted in that prayer, because it also proclaims: “You open the book of our days, and what is written there proclaims itself, for it bears the signature of every human being.” This prayer likely imagines that our actions automatically inscribe themselves into an imaginary text, a process that singer Dan Fogelberg once called “burning lines in the book of our lives.” Yet, our additions to that book are not simply a list of what we have done. Our full writing assignment demands that we put our deeds into perspective – that we determine how our words and actions can reflect what we want to be inscribed and remembered. The prayer states, “On Rosh Hashanah it is written, and on Yom Kippur it is sealed.” Right now, on Rosh Hashanah, what lies before us is a rough draft, our initial summary of our lives until now. By Yom Kippur, when the manuscript of our life’s current chapter is due, we can make whatever revisions we consider necessary and adopt new ways of thinking about how we have lived and how we want to live in the months and years that lie ahead.
We do take many opportunities to live our rough drafts, with the possibility of turning them into the finished product. We might find our own “rough drafts” in an email or letter that we write to release anger or disappointment towards someone and then DON’T SEND IT. It could be a conversation that doesn’t go well the first time but that we are able to conduct later with a better result. It could also be a failure or failures that precede success. In an installment for Craig Taubman’s annual Jewels of Elul series, writer and film director Marshall Herskovitz explained, “Robert Bly once wrote that failure is a necessary part of life….I’ve come to see that he was right. Failure is freeing, failure is bracing. Failure makes you alive. I now understand, in fact, that my life and career have followed a distinct pattern: Success. Complacency. Failure. Struggle. Breakthrough. Success. It started in film school, when I landed my first TV writing job -- and wrote the script in a haze of self-congratulation -- only to find that the producers hated it. Failure number one. I then spent several years in despair, hustling for jobs on bad television shows, realizing finally that I was failing because I wasn’t writing in my own voice. That was the first time I felt that sense of unexpected exhilaration when your back is against the wall – and you discover you have courage after all. With nothing to lose, I renounced my career as a TV writer and wrote a screenplay. In my own voice. And everything changed. People loved the script, studios offered deals. I was made. Until I failed again, and had to find the courage – again – to write from my authentic self. And the result this time was [the television show] “thirtysomething”, from whose success I assumed – finally! – I must be immune to failure. Until my first film as a director bombed – and the process had to begin again. And so it has continued, for thirty years. I welcome the rhythm now, the struggle, the renewal, the euphoria, and yes, even the despair – because I understand that this is the rhythm of art, of life. Failure is not the opposite of success – they’re part of the same thing. The opposite of failure…is death.”
Failure, success, learning from mistakes, trying again, succeeding, and failing again, with the hope of another triumph down the road – this is what it means to live. During the 2012 Olympics, there were too many times when commentators characterized a silver or bronze medal as a loss rather than a win. American gymnast McKayla Maroney’s well-publicized facial expression on receiving a silver medal in the Olympic vault competition offered a sharp contrast to Aly Raisman’s joy at being award the bronze medal in the balance beam event. There was the personal story of American Olympic diver Brittany Viola, who gave up gymnastics so that she could compete in a sport that would allow her to stay home in Minnesota with her parents. Oscar Pistorius of South Africa became the first double-leg amputee to participate in the Olympics. Sometimes, the TV commentators at the summer Olympics did declare that competing in the Olympics at all was an achievement that shouldn’t be minimized. In real life, small triumphs or a one-time amazing performance may offer competitors and, perhaps, any one of us, the deepest satisfaction and a sense that greatness and goodness are within our grasp.
In the terms of the Un’taneh Tokef prayer, we are all still in the game. Each of us has the chance to give our best to the various roles we fulfill in our families, schools, workplaces or community. Whatever we do, including, as Marshall Herskovitz noted, our failures as well as our successes, shows that we very much alive, recording in the Book of Life even our smallest achievements and our personal attempts to bring goodness into the world. But what about those who aren’t trying to bring goodness into the world, people who have veered off the path towards reaching their highest potential for decency and integrity? The Un’taneh Tokef prayer, in Gates of Repentance, states: “This is Your glory: You are slow to anger, ready to forgive. It is not the death of sinners You seek, but that they should turn from their ways and live.” We might expect that the Hebrew word for “sinners” in that passage would built upon a root word for sin, like “CHEIT,” so that the word would be “CHATA-IM.” That isn’t what the Hebrew says. The word for sinners in the Hebrew version of the prayer is “MEIT” – literally – “You don’t desire the death of the dead.” That may sound redundant or almost meaningless. When that phrase occurs in the Bible, the word meaning “those who are dead” refers to people whose moral misjudgments have taken them down a path devoid of goodness, well beyond the point of no return….or is that really the case? This prayer says that they can come back at any time. They can retrace their steps and rediscover their true moral and spiritual selves if they do so honestly and wholeheartedly. To add to Marshall Herskovitz’s statement about failure being the opposite of death – taking responsibility for our actions, whether we succeed or fail, clearly demonstrates that we are not morally or spiritually dead. The fact that we care about doing what’s right and making amends when necessary shows that we are very much alive and that striving for goodness is still a reachable goal.
In the book WHO BY FIRE, WHO BY WATER, Rabbi Lawrence Hoffman compiled a wide variety of interpretations of the Un’taneh Tokef prayer. In one chapter, Rabbi Gordon Tucker explained a reference in the prayer about the nature of human beings, where it says that “Each of us is a shattered urn.” How are we like shattered pottery, and how does that image help us at this time of year if we are trying to make ourselves whole, to overcome feeling “broken” or “shattered”? Tucker described a rabbinic interpretation of a bible passage about what needs to be done with an earthenware pot that has become impure in some way. The procedure was to break the pot, bury it, and then unearth the pot and put it back together. Only then could it be considered fit to be used again. The High Holy Days take us through a similar process on a spiritual level. We begin Rosh Hashanah, very much alive and rejoicing in the beginning of a new year. We spend the next 10 days morally dissecting ourselves, trying to determine what we have done well and how we can improve ourselves in the coming year. On Yom Kippur, we don’t eat, we don’t drink – we deprive ourselves of many of the signs that show we are alive. We recite prayers of confession, an end-of-life ritual in which we engage so that we can emerge from the High Holy Days to live and thrive once again, with a fresh perspective on how we can strive for spiritual and moral success on our own terms, with our heritage and our faith as our beacon along the way.
The journey of Abraham and Isaac to Mount Moriah, which will be retold in the Torah reading this morning, took them far away from where we would have expected them to be. Some commentators explain that this trek was meant to teach Abraham, called by many “the first ethical monotheist,” not to do what his neighbors were doing – namely, practicing the sacrifice of human children in order to please the gods in whom they believed. If we are like shattered pots that are disassembled and then renewed during the High Holy Days, we could see Abraham’s and Isaac’s near tragedy as an experience that was meant to remind them that life could take them to the brink, to a point of being “shattered” or “broken,” but that there would always be a sign available to them that could bring them back to where they needed to be morally and spiritually. In the Torah reading, the sign was the call of the Angel, “Abraham! Abraham!” For us, it might be the voice of a friend or family member, pleading with us to step back from the precipice so that we can remember who we are and what we can do to make our lives worthwhile and meaningful. The Un’taneh Tokef prayer tells us that we can make our lives worthwhile by practicing t’shuvah, t’filah and tzedakah” – repentance, prayer, and righteous giving, which can make the harshness of life’s stark challenges seems less overwhelming. Reaching within to make ourselves complete, reaching beyond to connect to all of creation, and reaching towards others can enable us to weather the storms of life, whatever they may be. In the words of Rabbi Brent Spodek and Ruth Messinger of American Jewish World service, when we practice “repentance, prayer and charity” with an open heart, our road may still be bumpy, but we’ll have better shock absorbers.
As I wrote this sermon, I watched weather reports about tropical storm Isaac and noted posts of my facebook friends who live in Louisiana about power outages that would continue for several days. I heard about the deaths of several American solders in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan. I read about opinions across the entire political spectrum regarding which presidential candidate or political party can best take our nation into the future. In the coming year, we will brace ourselves for the winds of unexpected challenges, the storms of sudden disappointments, and a sense of restlessness that makes us feel that our souls are wandering aimlessly without direction. At the same time, we can focus on what we can control - creating a positive attitude within ourselves, preserving a feeling of gratitude for the blessings that we enjoy, and demonstrating our concern for the world and the human community. To live, to love, to learn, to extend a helping hand, to overcome obstacles, to take ourselves apart and then put ourselves back together so that we are even more complete than before –we can achieve these goals both on our own and with the support of our sacred community. May all that we write in the book of our lives – separately and together – bring us hope, strength and peace in this New Year. So may it be –and let us say Amen.
Our Values: Wisdom in Action - Rosh Hashanah Evening - September 16, 2012
Shanah Tovah – Happy New Year to everyone who is here tonight as we begin 5773 together. Whether you are members or guests, we welcome you. Whatever your place among the generations – young in age or young at heart, we welcome you. Whatever your city or town, state or country of birth, we welcome you. You add a richness to who we are just by being present in this sanctuary at this moment.
Temple Beth-El is a congregation that numbers around 150 households. In my 31 years as a rabbi, I have mostly served congregations of this size or even a little smaller. During a year-long study of the book of Proverbs that concluded in the spring, my study partners from the congregation and I came upon this verse that gave me pause. Proverbs Chapter 22, verse 29 declares: “Do you see people who are skilled in their work? They will serve before royalty; they will not serve before obscure people.” That verse points to acts of greatness and significance, but it seems to do so with a tinge of elitism. One could interpret this verse to mean that skilled individuals are doing their work well only if they serve society’s most important celebrities or leaders. The notion may still prevail that only large congregations can be great in any sense of the word. My rabbinate has taught me about the positive impact that a few people, or even one person, can have on the lives of others. Over the years, there have been many fulfilling and spiritual moments in prayer and song and "aha" insights that emerged from "small but mighty" study groups and worship settings. My rabbinic colleagues across the world and I always try to serve with dedication, skill and insight. If that is the case, and we are doing our work well and with skill, then it logically follows that YOU are the royalty of whom Proverbs speaks, and each one of you is significant.
Our tradition teaches us that even royalty and skilled individuals need to remain humble. The one figure in the Torah whom the Rabbis admired for this quality of humility was Moses, who is central to a passage that we add to our Torah services on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
These verses can be found in one of the Torah’s greatest scenes of return and reconciliation. In Chapter 34 of the Book of Exodus, Moses was ready to ascend Mount Sinai a second time. As you may remember, when Moses descended the mountain carrying the first set of tablets bearing the Ten Commandments, he saw the Israelites worshipping the Golden Calf. In a moment of anger and frustration, he shattered the tablets that God had just prepared for him. While God wanted to end the covenant with the Israelites right then and there, Moses successfully pleaded on behalf of his people, and asked if he could see God’s face. God told him, “you can’t see my face, but I will put you in the crevice of a rock so you can see my back.” It is ironic that the Golden Calf episode seems to have brought Moses and God into a closer relationship than ever before. So Moses ascended the mountain a second time with two blank tablets of stone. And, according to Exodus, Chapter 34, verses 6 and 7, this is what God declared to the humble leader of the Israelites;
Adonai, Adonai, a compassionate and gracious God
slow to anger, abundant in mercy and faithfulness,
extending kindness to the thousandth generation,
forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin, and granting pardon.
Chanting that passage from Exodus, Chapter 34 as I stand before the open ark is an awesome and intimate experience. There is already a sense of closeness to our history and our heritage as we remove the Torah from the ark every Shabbat. These words add the elements to the Torah service of humility, honesty, and return. They express humility and honesty, because this passage assumes that we may have done something wrong that calls for mercy, patience or forgiveness. This passage reflects a sense of "return," t'shuvah, because anyone in the congregation, standing before the open ark, may feel a sense of being, once again, in close proximity to a scroll that bears eternal teachings. That moment in the Torah service puts us in the place of Moses, sitting in the cleft of the rock, unable to see God's face, but comprehending a divine presence that not only passes by at a single moment but accompanies us with every step we take.
The recitation of the divine attributes from Exodus, Chapter 34 is viewed as a classic characterization of God’s personality. It can direct us as we shape and enhance our own character and ethical foundation. As God is kind, compassionate, merciful and gracious to us, we need to act towards others with kindness, compassion, mercy and grace. As God is described as "slow to anger," we need to remind ourselves that there are times when it is best to hold back our temper and allow our patience to direct our words and deeds. In community life, there are so many times when we or those around us may not make the right choice. Estrangement and conflict will become inevitable unless we remember that asking and granting forgiveness can heal the hurt, repair the breach, and restore wholeness, respect and unity.
The passage from Exodus, Chapter 34 teaches us that there are second chances for an individual or a community. God wanted to keep Moses and the Israelites close and to have that intimacy pervade the relationships among members of the community. Today, within the human family, this wouldn’t be possible were it not for our capacity to “let go.” We have it in our power to "write in sand" the deeds of others that have caused hurt, which would best be forgiven. And we have the possibility in our hearts and minds to inscribe in stone the positive acts of the people in our lives that would enable true fellowship, acceptance, and even love to endure.
Exodus Chapter 34’s description of God’s character establishes a vision for who we can be and the values that we can espouse together. Author Rachel Naomi Remen once told a meeting of Reform rabbis, “When we serve others, we serve ourselves – our wholeness that we create inside ourselves can evoke a wholeness in others. Community is the most powerful tool for healing. Compassion sustains the world.” In his book, I’M GOD, YOU’RE NOT, Rabbi Lawrence Kushner made the point time and again that we are at our best when we realize that life isn’t always about us individually, but, rather, about seeing ourselves as one member of a team, whether that team is a family, a congregation, a city, a nation or all humanity. This relates to what we might call the “altruistic impulse” that leads us to selflessly serve others, where “what’s in it for me?” isn’t even a consideration. It is also connected to the times when we say the Shema. When we declare that God is one, whether we are alone or at Temple, we become a part of the Oneness that binds the universe together, taking our rightful place in the greater whole.
In his book BEYOND RELIGION, the Dalai Lama lamented the external challenges we face which can cause stress and anxiety in our lives that can take us away from developing our best character and inner values. He explained, “By inner values I mean the qualities that we all appreciate in others, and toward which we all have a natural instinct, bequeathed by our biological nature as animals that survive and thrive only in an environment of concern, affection and warmheartedness -- or in a single word, compassion. The essence of compassion is a desire to alleviate the suffering of others and to promote their well-being. This is the spiritual principle from which all other positive inner values emerge. We all appreciate in others the inner qualities of kindness, patience, tolerance, forgiveness and generosity, and in the same way we are all averse to displays of greed, malice, hatred and bigotry. So actively promoting the positive inner qualities of the human heart that arise from our core disposition toward compassion, and learning to combat our more destructive propensities, will be appreciated by all. And the first beneficiaries of such a strengthening of our inner values will…be ourselves. Our inner lives are something we ignore at our own peril, and many of the greatest problems we face in today’s world are the result of such neglect.”
As part of a program supported by the Kellogg Foundation, government and community leaders in New Mexico have begun a process of identifying the values prized by citizens of our state individually and collectively. CAFÉ, Communities in Action and Faith, has taken up the challenge to initiate a similar process in the faith communities of Southern New Mexico. In July, CAFÉ director Sarah Nolan came to Temple Beth-El to help us identify our values as a congregation and to highlight principles that we share with the culture of our state. We first listed core values of Temple Beth-El: education based on an approach that involves questioning, partnership and discussion; wisdom; tzedakah, righteous giving that supports our Temple and worthy causes in the community and around the world; fairness; humility; survival; and equality that crosses gender and personal background. Echoing the Dalai Lama, Rachel Naomi Remen, and Lawrence Kushner were the tenets of interdependence and the sense that we are all in this together. Our shared New Mexico values included respect of other cultures; spirituality; family, survival in harsh conditions; tradition; a border identity; independence; rugged individualism; regard for our elders; a connection to both history and land; and hope. This was the beginning of a process of discussion that we intend to expand to a greater number of congregants in the coming months. Noting the values that guide us can further enable us to discover who we are and what we can do to make a difference in the world.
On a recent Shabbat morning, I chose to read a Torah passage that I have never before recited, and I am not sure why I had overlooked it for so long because of the values it so clearly contains. We read in Deuteronomy Chapter 10 “And now….what does the Eternal your God demand of you? Only this: to revere the Eternal your God, to walk only in divine paths, to serve the Eternal your God with all your heart and soul…for the Eternal your God is God supreme and Lord supreme, the great, mighty and the awesome God - HAEIL HAGADOL HAGIBOR V’HANORA - who shows no favor and takes no bribe, but upholds the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and befriends the stranger, providing food and clothing. You too must befriend the stranger for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.” And in Deuteronomy Chapter 15, there is this challenge: “If there is a needy person among you…do not harden your heart and shut your hand against your needy kin. Rather you must open your hand and lend whatever is sufficient to meet the need.” Our world cannot be full of people with hardened hearts and closed hands. If we are to be like God, we must be compassionate, impartial, fair and just. We must feel an altruistic responsibility to the most vulnerable members of our society who need our support. We have ongoing opportunities at Temple Beth-El to practice these mitzvot by bringing food to donate to the Casa de Peregrinos food pantry and the El Cadito Soup Kitchen. Beth-El Temple Youth is also asking you to bring non-perishable foods to Temple during these High Holy Days so that we can add a small dose of nourishment and hope to those who would otherwise go hungry.
In his book BEYOND RELIGION, the Dalai Lama asserted that many values found in the world’s religions transcend any one particular faith group. He went as far as defining those values as secular first, and religious second. I tend to agree, but I believe that meaningful teachings from our heritage can steer us on the right path towards integrity and decency. Please turn to Pages 368 and 369 in Gates of Repentance as we join in a reading that expresses the essence of the Jewish moral heritage:
Our rabbis taught: Six hundred and thirteen commandments were given to Moses. Micah reduced them to three Mitzvot: “Do justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God.’’
Isaiah based all the commandments upon two of them: “Keep justice and righteousness.”
Amos saw one guiding principle upon which all the Mitzvot are founded: “Seek Me and live.”
Habbakuk, too, expounded the Torah on the basis of a single thought: “The righteous shall live by their faith.”
Akiba taught: The great principle of the Torah is expressed in the Mitzvah: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” But Ben Azzai found a principle even more fundamental in the words: “This is the story of humanity: when God created us, God made us in the divine likeness.”
Justice, mercy, humility, mutual respect and consideration, righteousness, and seeing and seeking the divine in each other – these are values that can accompany us throughout each year, from one Rosh Hashanah to the next. There is a great deal of time to reach our personal and communal objectives over the months to come – but the resources for doing mitzvot that will enable us to improve our community are always within our grasp. We read in Proverbs Chapter 3, verses 27 and 28: Don’t hold back bounty from one who earned it when it is within your power to give it and share at that moment. When you have something that can be helpful, don’t say to your friend at the moment you are asked, “Go and come back, and tomorrow I’ll give.” Our tradition teaches us that, at any moment, we should be ready to offer both tangible and intangible assistance to one person or to an entire community that could truly benefit from our wisdom and our energy. May 5773 be a year in which we see the urgent needs around us that will move us to act upon the values of compassion, fairness, justice, equality, patience, and generosity to bring greater hope and blessing to a world in need of our special spirit. So may we do – and let us say Amen.
Vistas Past and Yet to Come - September 1, 2012 (from the Temple Beth-El Las Cruces newsletter)
Cantor Barbara Finn and Yours Truly!
Rhonda and I took the opportunity to travel (by car) in August both north and west of Las Cruces. Like the Midwest, and unlike New England, it takes a long time to get from one place to another! However, the vistas that nature offers along I-25 and I-10 offer a great benefit for both driver and passenger. The diverse shapes of the mountains and the variety of desert vegetation are fascinating. On our drive back to Las Cruces from Phoenix, I noted that, given the clouds on that particular day, the Organ Mountains were visible from about 40 miles to the west.
Rhonda and Larry Karol and
the Temple Beth-El contingent at
Camp Oranim
Each of our trips offered communal “vistas” of their own. In Albuquerque, Rhonda and I attended the Shabbat Evening service at Congregation Albert, in which I participated musically along with my fellow Kansas City native, Cantor Barbara Finn. We visited Congregation Albert’s Camp Oranim for Havdalah that weekend, which was attended by three Temple Beth-El students.
I led Havdalah that night with Congregation Albert’s Rabbi Harry Rosenfeld, my classmate at HUC-JIR (and one of the chuppah holders when Rhonda and I were married) and summer rabbinic intern Sydney Henning.
Rabbis Karol and Rosenfeld
On our August trip to Phoenix, we watched our son Adam and his friend Kris Rogers record some of Adam’s original songs at the studio of Scott Leader, who produced my CD of original Jewish music, “A New Beginning” in 2005. It was an honor to see Adam put his music education to work as he brought his songs to life with his own special touch and spirit.
The approach of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur every year presents us with the challenge of putting the preceding year into perspective, evaluating how, in the last 12 months, we were able to grow in character, to practice our values, to learn more about ourselves, and to be loving and compassionate individuals in the context of our family and community. During the High Holy Days, we may view our lives as an ever-expanding landscape with new vistas that we may never have imagined would be set before us. We may think of the last year in terms of our relationships, considering friendships that have developed and deepened, ties to family that we have tried to sustain and nurture, or new connections we have made within an organization, neighborhood, or interest group. We might review 5772 in terms of the choices that we have made, where some decisions reflected our best wisdom, while others may have taken us away from where we wanted to be.
At Brick Road Studio, Scottsdale:
Scott Leader,
Kris Rogers and Adam Karol
In my piece written for Ten Minutes of Torah for the Union for Reform Judaism, “God and Humanity: Getting Closer” (featured on August 16), I focused on the theme of building community through forgiveness and reconciliation, noting the following truth about living with others: “In community life, there are so many times when we or those around us may not make the right choice, so that estrangement and conflict will become inevitable, unless we remember that asking and granting forgiveness can heal the hurt, repair the breach, and restore wholeness, respect and unity.”
Picacho Peak near Tucson, Arizona
Every new year provides us with a chance to heal the hurt and repair the breach, AND to look at life’s amazing vistas with fresh eyes, as if each step of the journey was new, even if we had “passed that way before.” The benefit of the passing of the years is that we have more accumulated experience on which to draw, so that we may realized how to strengthen our own moral GPS, realizing that we can move beyond past hurts and offer forgiveness, losing nothing in the process but emotional baggage that would only slow us down in the long run. This process includes having compassion for ourselves, recognizing our own humanity and giving ourselves a chance to do better in the coming months and years.
So may be begin the year of 5773 with a new outlook on vistas familiar and unexplored, an approach that will lead us towards hope and joy. Shanah Tovah!!
“Our Hope: Judaism and Eternity” - Yom Kippur Morn...
Our Words: Prayers, Perspectives and Promises – Ko...
Powerful rituals symbolize High Holy Days -for the...
Our Faith: We Will Live - Rosh Hashanah Morning - ...
Our Values: Wisdom in Action - Rosh Hashanah Eveni...
Vistas Past and Yet to Come - September 1, 2012 (f...
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Posts Tagged ‘Union Factory’
Dicks’ Mill
[Circa-1960 photo of Dicks Mill from North Randolph Historical Society, http://www.stpaulmuseum.org/exhibit_randleman.htm]
The original name of Randleman was Dicks Mill, after the merchant flour mill shown here, built by Peter Dicks about 1830. The mill was built on Deep River above the modern U.S. 220 Business highway bridge, but about 1900 was moved downstream to stand near the Naomi mill. At one time it included not only wheat and corn stones but an oil mill. It was demolished about 1965. Architecturally the building is too big to be an 18th-century mill, and the many large windows (nine over six sash, unusually large) are early-19th century at best. It is the size of what was called a “merchant mill,” a mill that not only ground corn into meal and wheat into flour, but graded the flour through bolting and sifting machinery to produce a more refined white flour.
Peter Dicks (b.1771 – d.1843), the subject of the last few posts here, was a farmer and a merchant who operated a general store in the then-thriving village of New Salem. He served in many public capacities, including being one of the commissioners of New Salem (incorporated 1816), who sold lots and laid off streets; he was a Justice of the Peace (what we now call a county commissioner); he also served as Clerk of the Court of Equity. He was one of the founders of New Garden Boarding School, now Guilford College; throughout his life remained a trustee of the school and was an active member of the Society of Friends in both Centre and New Salem Monthly Meetings. Peter Dicks and wife Nancy Ann Hodgson tombstones in New Salem Methodist Ch/Cem.
Even though it is historically clear that Peter Dicks’ mill on Deep River was the focal point around which the village of Union Factory and the City of Randleman subsequently coalesced, there is confusion over when that actually happened.
Some sources say 1800 (“Peter Dicks built a grist and oil mill, on Deep River in 1800.” (library http://www.randolphlibrary.org/historicalphotos.htm ; also Randleman city website http://www.randleman.org/History.aspx). Other sources say 1830 (Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randleman,_North_Carolina , no citation). Pioneer local historian J.A. Blair in his “Reminisences of Randolph County” (1890) finesses over the question by saying “Away back in the shadowy past Peter Dicks had a grist and an oil mill at this place.”
I’ll say they’re all wrong, it was even earlier than that. Grandfather Peter Dicks (ca. 1720-1796), brought the family down from York County, PA to Guilford County in 1755, settled in the Polecat Creek area near Centre Meeting. At some point soon thereafter he built a mill on Deep River which became the family business. In the Rowan County Court Minutes, (McCubbins, ed., Book 1: 1753-1772, p. 1), we read:
“On petition of hickory Creek and Russell’s Runn and Poulcatt [Polecat]for a Road to Mill and Market, from Pennington’s Mill through Hickory Creek Settlement the best and nearest way to Peter Dick’s Mill and from thence to the Trading Path, the convenient way to Market on Cap Fair [Cape Fear], and that Peter Dicks, James Green, James Wilson, William Arafield [Armfield], Robert Lamb, George Hodgins, Robert Hodgins, Mathew Osborn, Daniel Osborn, John Osborn, Robert Fields, and William Fields be a jury to lay off the same and make return thereof to our next county court, and that James Green be appointed Overseer for the Lower Part and Abraham Cook for the upper part. Granted.”
Pennington’s Mill and Hickory Creek were in southern Guilford County, with the creek heading on or about the present Sedgefield golf course and running into Deep River below Freeman’s Mill (now under the Randleman Reservoir). “Russell’s Run” or Creek runs into Deep River between Freeman’s Mill and Coletrane’s Mill. Polecat Creek rises in southern Guilford and runs into Deep River below Randleman. So this road ran roughly from Sedgefield to Groometown Road near Jamestown to the Trading Path Ford near modern Randleman. [For more information on this petition and Pennington’s Mill, see http://penningtonresearch.org/resources/articles/Pages%2014-15-PP0602.pdf ). It appears that Peter Dicks either applied for permission to build a mill, or bought an existing mill site, just as soon as he came to North Carolina in the early-to mid-1750s. And if that mill on Deep River wasn’t located at the modern Randleman, I don’t know where else it could have been.
When Union Factory was built just upstream in 1848, it made use of the Dicks Mill dam. James Dicks (1804-1883), owner and operator of the grist mill at that time, became a stockholder of the cotton factory along with a group of fellow Quakers. When the Naomi Manufacturing Company was built in 1879-1880, a new dam was built downstream at the site of the Naomi Falls, and the new dam backed water into the tail race of the grist mill, making it inoperable. Dicks Mill was thereupon disassembled, moved to a site below the Naomi Factory, and reconstructed just beside the new bridge over the ford below the mill. The mill is clearly visible in several photographs of that side of Naomi factory, including one where it is in the background as the steel bridge is being replaced in 1959. The mill remained in business on that spot until it was demolished in the mid-1960s.
The final years of Dicks Mill were chronicled in this article by Ruby K. Marsh, published on Monday, March 28, 1960, in The Greensboro Record. This is one of the last descriptions of an operating grist mill in Randolph County.
Century-Old Mill Still Grinding Corn
Randleman, March 24—
The Old Naomi Roller Mill—grinding corn and wheat for over a century– is still running, using the same machinery re-installed in 1880 when the mill was moved down river for lack of water to operate.
Naomi Manufacturing Company (now J.P. Stevens Co.) built a new plant that year—just below the old grist mill, using up the available water supply to generate power for the cotton mill. The grist mill was torn down and relocated below the Naomi Falls plant where it still stands today- just as it has stood for 80 years.
Hand-hewn beams and rafters from the original mill were used to build this sturdy, three-story plant which is completely furnished with machinery for grinding flour and corn meal as well as other feeds.
The “old corn rock” is still in use with the original boards which were shaped by hand to surround the round rock which grinds corn. The boards were neatly mitred at the four corners, put together with large wedges of wood and look as though they would last another century if needed.
The woods are polished from the passage of corn over the surface over the years. The floor too is polished as slick as though freshly waxed. Here wide pine boards of about two-inch thickness were used, the floor being as solid today as it was when placed there despite vibrations from the heavy machinery.
Just when the mill converted to electricity is not definitely known by present owner W.C. Routh, but he thinks about 40 years ago. The old mill race has been filled in, and boards cover the opening where water flowed underneath.
Six different processes were required before flour could be finished. In the old roller mills section—now idle—elevators carried wheat from one floor to the other, dropping the ground flour down through bins where pure Japanese silk screens bolted the flour—sending any coarse materials back into the elevator to be carried back to the roller where it was reground, then redropped into the screen for sifting. Waste materials went out a separate chute. Some of these old silk screens are still hanging on the wall, though they are now yellowed with age.
Up on the third floor the pan to mill self-rising ingredients is still sitting on top of the scales, just waiting to be used once more. The mixing bins where the flour and self-rising soda baking powder and salt- were added now have dirt-dobbers nests inside. The old wooden barrel which once held three or four bushels of corn is sitting idly by.
Corn was brought up from the wagon outside by a windlass which a man could pull with one hand. About 200 lbs. of corn could be carried up with one hand on the large four-foot wheel with a rope 1 ½ inches thick, being located out under the eave of the roof.
In front of the mill old dutch doors with a long slide wooden latch locks the door at night. The upper half is kept open during the day so people can see the place is open for business.
In the office the old box-type desk was nailed to the wall—right where it was located 80 years ago. The stool, made of two-inch pine, is polished from the millers sitting to tally up the price of a sack of corn meal or flour.
On the wall is a sign telling everyone to beware of the loaded rifle, kept to shoot rats which become troublesome sometimes. Little boys became meddlesome so Mr. Routh put up this sign.
Corn cobs are used to keep the office warn. They are burned in a tiny laundry heater.
On one of the large bins, names of the millers since 1900 are inscribed for posterity. Among them are five names of the seven Routh boys.
Routh and a brother operated a mill down in the borders of Chatham County just outside of Randolph at Bennett before Routh was born at Grays Chapel not far from his present home above the mill.
The mill site has long been a trading center. Indians traded with white settlers long before the Revolutionary War. It is also the site famed for the murder of Naomi Wise by her lover—for whom the mill is named.
Since he is partially retired Routh does not mind the slow pace which his mill now has—selling a little egg mash and other feeds and custom grinding corns for his friends, many of whom delight in going to visit him while he grinds corn on the ‘old corn rock.’
Tags:corn milling, flour milling, grist mills, James Dicks, Naomi Factory, Peter Dicks, roller mills, Union Factory
Posted in Deep River, Industrial History, NC Geography, Quakers, Randolph County | 3 Comments »
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$15 million ad account in cancer treatment was just born
Aug 29, 2017 |
Steve’s breakdown: They are talking about making billions soon and they are going to need a smart agency to help make it happen. Try Ms. Shawn Tomasello at stomasello@kitepharma.com. She’s the Chief Commercial Officer
SANTA MONICA, CA: Gilead Sciences agreed to buy Kite Pharma in a $11.9 billion deal on Monday, as it looks to fuel growth with an emerging class of cancer immunotherapies that are expected to generate billions.
Gilead will pay $180 per share in an all-cash deal, representing a 29.4 percent premium over Kite’s Friday close. Kite’s shares were trading up at $178.15 before the bell.
Santa Monica, California-based Kite is developing a CAR-T, or chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy, which harnesses the body’s own immune cells to recognize and attack malignant cells.
Gilead’s growth has been fueled by its pricey but revolutionary hepatitis C drugs but with fewer eligible patients and rising competition, sales have begun to fall.
Second-quarter sales of its hepatitis C drugs — Sovaldi, Harvoni and Epclusa — totaled $2.9 billion, down from $4 billion a year earlier.
Wall Street and Gilead shareholders have long been expecting Gilead to use its cash pile for a big-ticket acquisition.
The deal for Kite, which has been approved by the boards of both companies, is expected to close in the fourth quarter.
Kite is one of the leading players in the emerging field of CAR-T, and is competing with rivals Novartis, Juno Therapeutics, and Bluebird bio in a race to get the first approved therapy.
If approved, these drugs are expected to cost up to $500,000 and generate billions of dollars. Success would also help advance a cancer-fighting technique that scientists have been trying to perfect for decades.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is expected to decide by Nov. 29 whether to approve Kite’s CAR-T, axi-cel, for treatment of adults with advanced lymphoma.
Gilead has a market value of $96.36 billion, according to Thomson Reuters data. The company was once the world’s largest maker of HIV drugs, and in 2011 agreed to acquire hep C drug developer Pharmasset for $11 billion.
Last year, Gilead generated total sales of $30.39 billion, of which $14.8 billion came from hep C treatments.
Bank of America/Merrill Lynch and Lazard are acting as financial advisers to Gilead, while Centerview Partners is Kite’s exclusive financial adviser.
Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom is the legal counsel to Gilead and Sullivan & Cromwell and Cooley for Kite.
The Wall Street Journal reported first reported the deal.
Gilead’s shares were little changed in premarket trading, while Juno’s shares rose nearly 14 percent and Bluebird’s 2.6 percent.
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10DOCTOR SLEEP
Of the many Stephen King adaptations to be fast-tracked in the wake of It’s scary success back in 2017, this one might be the most intriguing. Doctor Sleep is King’s belated sequel to The Shining, and its plot concerns an adult Danny Torrance contending with a cult that’s been targeting children
with “the shining.” Ewan McGregor is set to play Danny, while the supporting cast includes Rebecca Ferguson and Jacob Tremblay.
The movie will be directed by Mike Flanagan, who previously adapted King’s novella Gerald’s Game into a surprisingly beautiful cinematic gem for Netflix. King was never a fan of Stanley Kubrick’s movie adaptation of The Shining, but he has enjoyed Flanagan’s movies going back to 2016’s Hush, so maybe this will be a different story. The movie was set for release in 2020, but the studio recently moved it up to November 2019.
Next 9 SCARY STORIES TO TELL IN THE DARK
Big Bang Theory: The 10 Worst Things Penny Has Ever Done, Ranked
10 Of The Worst Things That Ever Happened In Hogwarts (Besides Voldemort)
Harry Potter: 10 Times Harry & Ron Were The Worst Friends To Hermione
Breaking Bad: Mike Ehrmantraut’s 10 Most Badass Quotes
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Cruise Marathon Challenge comes to SVG
Wednesday, March 13, St Vincent and the Grenadines will host a leg of the Cruise Marathon Challenge at the ET Joshua runway.
Expected in, are 43 runners from a number of countries, including Germany, Denmark, USA, Hungary, Czech Republic, Trinidad and Tobago, Italy, Taiwan , France, Poland, Canada and Pakistan.
The marathon is set to get going at 10 a.m., and is open to Vincentian athletes.
Ina release, organiser Z Adventures, founder and CEO Ziyad Rahim, said that he is eagerly looking forward to have the event in St Vincent and the Grenadines, granted the field of athletes set to participate.
According to Rahim, “We have a star-studded line-up of marathon globetrotters on this trip… The oldest competitor is 81 years young and the field includes 10 World Record holders in various categories… Runners on the trip have run marathons all over the world… However, these are all new countries for them, and they are eagerly looking forward to this adventure”.
St Vincent and the Grenadines is the sixth stop of the marathon series, where the runners will take part in seven marathons.
Sailor’s Wilderness Tours takes charge of the logistics, when the Cruise Marathon Challenge comes to St Vincent and the Grenadines next Wednesday.
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Tag Archives: transgender
Moviegoers Embark on a Story-Gazing Journey during the Florida Film Festival By Sandra Carr
Films tell tales about personal triumph, deception, challenges, heroes and hilarity. This year’s Florida Film Festival, now in its 27th year, doesn’t disappoint and invites moviegoers to go story gazing while watching 183 films representing 38 countries.
The juried flick fete also features 152 films with premiere status, including 23 world premieres along with celebrity guest appearances, forums and parties at the Enzian Theater in Maitland, Fla. and Regal Cinemas Winter Park Village Stadium 20 Movie Theater in Winter Park, Fla. from April 6-15, 2018.
The 27th Annual Florida Film Festival is April 6-15, 2018.
The Florida Film Festival is accredited as a qualifying festival for the Oscars in the live action short, documentary short and animated short film categories. The winner of the grand jury award in each of these categories will automatically qualify to enter during next year’s Academy Awards.
The opening-night film and party is happening on Friday, April 6 at the Enzian Theater and features American Animals, a true story and dramedy about four young men who attempt to steal priceless Audubon publications and rare books from the Transylvania University’s special collections library. The movie stars Blake Jenner who portrays Chas Allen. He also portrayed Ryder Lynn in Glee and Jake in Everybody Wants Some!! Jenner will be making an appearance and discussing American Animals following the screening.
Actor Blake Jenner will be making an appearance during the Florida Film Festival’s opening-night party.
Clink glasses and say cheers during a champagne reception at 6 p.m. American Animals begins at 7 p.m. and the party follows at 8:30 p.m. The cinematic celebration will include cuisine, cake and craft cocktail and brew samples provided by Eden Bar, Firefly Kitchen and Bar, Hourglass Brewing, Nothing Bundt Cakes, Roque Pub, Ten10 Brewing Company and other local bars and restaurants. The film and party admission is $140 and the party only ticket cost $125.
Hang out with moviegoers during the Festival Block Party on Saturday, April 7 from 3-5 p.m. at the Winter Park Village’s fountain across from the Regal Cinema. The festivities include free drinks and appetizers from select Winter Park Village restaurants and live entertainment. The free event is for Florida Film Festival ticket and pass holders only. Space is limited.
Festival Block Party
Indulge yourself in a film and farm-to-table feast during Locally Fresh! on Sunday, April 8 from 11 a.m.-2:30 p.m. at the Enzian Theater. The foodie function will include cooking demonstrations and scrumptious samples. Admission is $12. Afterwards, shop for fresh-from-the-field produce and products during a free Farmer’s Market from noon-2:30 p.m. on the lawn next to Eden Bar.
If you can’t wait to eat during Locally Fresh!, then enjoy a brunch buffet beforehand from 11 a.m.-2 p.m. at Eden Bar for $13.99 per person. The brunch will also occur during the last day of the film festival on Sunday, April 15.
Soar into the sky and find out how a flight attendant orchestrated a scheme to keep smuggled cash from an arms dealer during the film screening of Jackie Brown, directed by Quentin Tarantino and starring Pam Grier, Robert De Niro, Michael Keaton, Samuel L. Jackson, Robert Forster and Bridget Fonda, on Sunday, April 8 from 7-11 p.m. at the Enzian Theater. The movie is an adaptation of Elmore Leonard’s novel Rum Punch. The event includes a question-and-answer session with Grier following the film screening. General admission is $50 and $125 for a backstage pass, which includes the film screening and meet and greet and photo opportunity afterwards. Please provide your own camera for the photo opportunity.
Take a drug-filled ride during the psychological drama Requiem for a Dream, starring Ellen Burstyn, Jared Leto, Jennifer Connelly and Marlon Wayans, on Friday, April 13 from 7:30-11 p.m. at the Enzian Theater. The film is based on the novel by Hubert Selby Jr. with whom director Darren Aronofsky wrote the screenplay. The event includes a question-and-answer session with Burstyn after the screening. General admission is $50. Producer-pass holders will have an opportunity to meet the actress following the event.
Quench your thirst during the free Sip and Savor: Cocktail Tasting on Wednesday, April 11 from 6-8 p.m. at Eden Bar. Sample flavorful concoctions provided by Diageo.
Tennis, anyone? Watch Björn Borg versus John McEnroe at Wimbledon during the summer of 1980 in the sports drama Borg McEnroe, starring Shia LaBeouf.
Actress Charlize Theron portrays Marlo, a stay-at-home mom who is overwhelmed with taking care of her three children in Tully. Her wealthy brother gifts Marlo with a nanny who she forms a unique bond with that will change both of their lives forever. The screenplay was written by Diablo Cody who also wrote Juno and Young Adult.
A teenage boy becomes attached to a failing racehorse named Lean on Pete. He steals the horse before the owner disposes it and ends up on an unexpected adventure. The film Lean on Pete also touches on poverty and homelessness in the U.S. Actors Steve Buscemi and Charlie Plummer star in the film.
In the mystery thriller Tatterdemalion, Army veteran Fern, who is portrayed by actress Leven Rambin, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and returns home to the Ozarks where she finds an abandoned boy named Cecil in the woods. She searches for clues about the boy’s identity while discovering local folklore of a spirit who appears as a child.
Actor and director Romany Malco (The 40 Year Old Virgin, Weeds) stars in Prison Logic. He portrays Tijuana Jackson, an aspiring world-renowned motivational speaker who is being followed by a documentary film crew before he’s released from prison. The movie has Florida flavor since it was filmed in Fort Lauderdale, Miami and Orlando and features Central Florida local Alkoya Brunson (Atlanta, Hidden Figures) who portrays Jackson’s sidekick Lil’ Eric. The ex-con’s reality-show dream has to overcome obstacles because of his court-mandated probation in the movie. Actress Regina Hall (Girls Trip, the Scary Movie franchise) portrays Jackson’s parole officer and prospective love interest and Tami Roman (Basketball Wives) rounds out the cast as Jackson’s sister Sharea.
King Cohen is a documentary about legendary B-movie film producer, director and screenwriter Larry Cohen.
Watch the RBG documentary about 84-year-old Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, gender equality warrior and pop-culture icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg (a.k.a. Notorious RBG).
Music makes its mark during the Florida Film Festival with documentaries about new wave musician, model and actress Grace Jones (Grace Jones: Blindlight and Bami), jam band Magic Music (40 Years in the Making: The Magic Music Movie) and the hardcore group Agnostic Front (The Godfathers of Hardcore).
Agnostic Front’s lead vocalist Roger Miret and director Ian McFarland will be making an appearance and participating in a question-and-answer session following the The Godfathers of Hardcore screening on Saturday, April 7 at 9 p.m. at the Regal Cinemas Winter Park Village Stadium 20 Movie Theater.
Rollins College alumnus Fred Rogers was the host and star of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood and worked tirelessly for more than three decades to help children understand difficult and complex situations and learn how to deal with their feelings through the use of puppetry. Rogers believed that we were all part of a global neighborhood in which everyone should be valued for being “just the way you are.” The documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor? pays homage to Rogers who was an advocate for children’s TV programming during most of his life.
Local radio personalities and powerhouse podcasters Tom Vann and Daniel Dennis of A Mediocre Time with Tom and Dan, are featured in the Mediocre Documentary with Tom and Dan. The film takes the audience behind the scenes of the duo’s live podcast at the Hard Rock Live Orlando. Vann and Dennis will be making an appearance and participating in a question-and-answer session following the screening on Sunday, April 15 at 4:45 p.m. at the Regal Cinemas Winter Park Village Stadium 20 Movie Theater. The film is on standby.
Eighteen films during this year’s fest feature LBGTQ themes, including The Feels, an amusing romp about a bachelorette party for a lesbian couple.
Another movie, The Cakemaker, features a gay baker who is involved in an unusual love triangle with his deceased lover and his widow.
Scotty and the Secret History of Hollywood is a documentary about former pimp to the stars Scotty Bowers, 94, who organized clandestine encounters with young men for actors Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, Cole Porter and Rock Hudson and the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.
Do I Have Boobs Now? is a documentary short about trans woman and activist Courtney Demone sharing photos of her breast development after undergoing hormone replacement therapy on social media.
TransMilitary features four U.S. transgender military members whom are married to each other and served our country. The documentary showcases their journey since “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was repealed in 2011 and during the current political climate since the 2016 presidential election.
Americana artist Robert Townsend is fascinated with a lady wearing cat-eye glasses in vacation photograph slides and is on a quest to learn more about this happy, mystery woman in the film My Indiana Muse.
Bodacious New York City burlesque dancers strut their stuff in Getting Naked: A Burlesque Story.
Ask the Sexpert is a documentary about 93-year-old Dr. Mahinder Watsa, a sex columnist for the Mumbai Mirror, who responds to readers sexual questions.
Long Time Coming hits a home run during the Florida Film Festival. The film discusses the monumental victory of the State of Florida’s 1955 Little League Championship, featuring the all-black Pensacola Jaycees versus the Orlando Kiwanis, which was one of the first racially-integrated Little League baseball games in the South. The two team captains reunite to discuss for the first time how that historic night felt for both of them more than six decades ago.
City of Orlando’s Mayor Buddy Dyer will be joining city commissioners and the Edward E. Haddock Jr. Family Foundation to celebrate and honor the baseball teams during A Baseball & Civil Rights Reunion on Tuesday, April 10 from 10-11 a.m. at Lake Lorna Doone Park, located at 1519 W. Church St. in Orlando near the Camping World Stadium.
The documentary is directed by Jon Strong and produced by Common Pictures. The film includes Major League Baseball and civil rights icons Hank Aaron, Cal Ripken, Jr. and Andrew Young. The Florida Film Festival will host the film’s world premiere on Monday, April 9 at 6:30 p.m. with an encore screening on Tuesday, April 10 at 3:30 p.m.
Former felon turned law school grad Desmond Meade is on a mission to restore voting rights for Florida’s convicted felons who have served their time in the documentary Let My People Vote.
Soufra chronicles the culinary journey of Mariam Shaar, a Palestinian born and raised in the Burj El Barajnak refugee camp outside of Beirut, who starts her own catering and food truck business with other Syrian, Iraqi, Palestinian and Lebanese women refugees.
Feline films include Samantha’s Amazing Acro Cats, a documentary that follows a traveling cat circus and the animated short Catherine about a girl and her cat named Kitty.
The Florida Film Festival closes by celebrating the 75-year anniversary of Alfred Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt, a film about an uncle who travels from New York to California to visit his family and is wanted for murder. The psychological thriller was Hitchcock’s favorite film, and is considered one of the King of Suspense’s most chilling movies during his career.
Individual film tickets are $11, packages are $50-$180 and passes are $99-$1,500 per person.
Browse the film schedule by downloading the free Florida Film Festival app for iPhones and Android mobile devices. For more information, including the Florida Film Festival schedule, visit floridafilmfestival.com.
Filed under Film Festival, Uncategorized
Tagged as #FFF2018, A Mediocre Time with Tom and Dan, Academy Awards, Agnostic Front, Alfred Hitchcock, app, Blake Jenner, burlesque, Cary Grant, cats, Charlie Plummer, Charlize Theron, cinema, Cole Porter, Courtney Demone, Daniel Dennis, Diablo Cody, Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Ellen Burstyn, Enzian Theater, felines, film, Film Festival, film festival app, Florida Film Festival, Grace Jones, Hard Rock Live Orlando, Katharine Hepburn, King of Suspense, Larry Cohen, Leven Rambin, LGBTQ, military, Movie, Oscar, Pam Grier, podcast, Rock Hudson, Roger Miret, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Samantha's Amazing Acro Cats, Scotty Bowers, Shadow of a Doubt, Spencer Tracy, Steve Buscemi, Tom Vann, transgender, Winter Park Regal Cinema, Winter Park Village
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Arts-focused teacher development fund open for applications
Alix Robertson
Sat 24th Feb 2018, 5.00
Schools can benefit from up to £150,000 in grant funding to boost arts-based teaching through partnerships with cultural organisations using the Teacher Development Fund.
The fund, run by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, an independent grant-making organisation, is accepting applications from schools until March 23. Applications that support disadvantaged pupils and show potential for effective collaboration will be prioritised.
Inspired by the Centre for the Use of Research and Evidence in Education, the fund has so far funded seven pilot projects across the UK.
These include work with the Royal Shakespeare Company to help primary schools teach the bard, a project with the Royal Society of Arts which used theatre to improve literacy and language development, and a Welsh scheme which used music to teach modern foreign languages.
The fund will enable teachers to gain access to high-quality CPD from artist-practitioners
The fund will now focus on providing good continuing professional development (CPD), involving school leaders in planning and delivering activities, helping art practitioners work effectively with schools and evaluating the impact on teaching and learning.
Catherine Sutton, senior grants manager at the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, said the organisation recognises how important CPD and learning is for teachers to deliver the best for their pupils.
“By funding schools to partner with cultural organisations, the fund will enable teachers to gain access to high-quality CPD from artist-practitioners, and allow schools and arts organisations to work collaboratively in order to embed arts-based learning in the primary curriculum,” she said.
The new fund is one of a number of recent schemes focused on supporting teachers’ professional development.
The government’s Teaching and Leadership Innovation Fund was launched by Justine Greening in October 2016, in order to pay for CPD in areas identified as social mobility cold spots.
The first six organisations to receive their share of the £75 million were revealed in October as Ruth Miskin Training, the Teacher Development Trust, STEM Learning Ltd, Teach First, The Institute for Teaching and The Institute for Physics.
The Institute for Teaching will run a new ‘Transforming Teaching Programme’, focused on supporting school leaders to improve their expertise in developing other teachers. Meanwhile the
Teacher Development Trust will identify schools to act as “CPD excellence hubs” in Blackpool, Northumberland, Sheffield, Stoke and West Sussex.
A new National Institute of Education was also established in October, and will offer teaching apprenticeships including a “master teacher” degree apprenticeship and a master’s degree apprenticeship for senior leaders.
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Pendleton Petticoats Facts
In light of a recent review about Aundy in a nation-wide publication that stressed how inappropriate all the historical details were for the time period, I feel the need to set the record straight today.
If any of you read the book and wondered “would there really have been telephones and indoor bathrooms then?” – the answer is YES!
This seems to be something that some reviewers, mired in their Hollywood legends of the West, can’t quite seem to get past. For those reviewers who think I just randomly threw in details, I spent hours researching the history of Pendleton, visiting the county museum, and communicating with the resident history expert to make sure my facts were straight.
One of the reasons I chose Pendleton as the setting for this series (besides the fact I like the way Pendleton Petticoats rolls off the tongue) is because it was such a modern and progressive town in the early 1900s. I didn’t want the typical poor, dusty, struggling-to-survive town that most people assume existed in all “frontier” towns of that time period.
I wanted a town that was thriving, bustling, growing, filled with unique details and excitement.
Pendleton was the perfect choice.
Here are a few of the reasons why:
• In 1890, a geographer (Donald Meinig) noted that Pendleton was “one of the most prosperous and progressive towns in the interior.” It had well-graded streets, a new electric light system, a new water system, eight churches, a good public school system, and twenty fraternal organizations.
• Modern and progressive, Pendleton first saw telephones arrive in the county in 1889. In 1892, a toll line connected people in Umatilla County to other Northwest cities. In 1902, the Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company opened the first telephone office in town.
• As 1899 rolled into the early years of the 1900s, Pendleton was a bustling, booming city. Not only was it the fourth largest city in the state, it was truly an entertainment and commercial hub, serving people for miles around.
• In 1900, someone visiting Pendleton would have found 32 saloons, 18 bordellos, milliners, candy stores, general stores, hardware stores, livery stables, farm implement stores and much, much more.
• Trains traveling both west and east connected Pendleton to the rest of the country.
• In 1904, Pendleton paved the streets in the busy downtown district with asphalt, the second city in Oregon to do so.
•A 1911 photo of downtown shows a busy street with cars crowding in among the buggies and horses for the Pendleton Round-Up. By 1915, Umatilla County had the second most vehicles registered in the state behind Multnomah County (Portland area).
• Houses ranged from small cottage-style homes to an elaborate 28-room mansion.
•Ranching and farming is a huge industry in Pendleton, as it has been since the mid 1800s. In 1900 alone, an estimated 440,000 sheep produced more than two million pounds of wool along with millions of bushels of wheat. Well-off farmers and ranchers would have been able to have all the “modern” conveniences in their homes in 1899.
So for anyone who has questioned the “historic authenticity” of Aundy, there are some historical truths.
Pendleton was, in fact, a very exciting and modern place to live during the time period of the story.
I hope this clears up any question or confusion in regard to the Pendleton Petticoats series. If not, please let me know and I’ll do my best to answer your questions.
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The Humorist
The Criminal Cartel of the Canada Infrastructure Bank Board
March 21, 2019 April 12, 2019 shawnpaulmelville
In this follow up to “BlackRock, SNC & The Infrastructure Bank: Meet the Global Construction Cartel” we continue with The Canada Infrastructure Bank Board and the who’s who of global communist policy makers. The same players transfer from boards of foundations to boards of corporations to ministers of government, not because they are good at what they do, but because they follow the rules of the multilateral (HYBRID) universe of international treaties. It is big business to sell out the tax payers and their sovereignty to the one world government.
Other Members of the Canada Infrastructure Board include (1):
James Cherry: James Cherry served on the Board of Governors and Board of Directors for the United Way Canada (2). Key executives from the president’s office of SNC-Lavalin were also involved with the United Way: Gilles Laramee was on the board (3), Jacques Lamarre was on the council of Governors (4), and Pierre Duhaime was on fundraising committee(4). James Cherry is also on the board for the Foundation of Greater Montreal (FGM)(7). The Foundation of Greater Montreal is a member of the Community Foundations of Canada (CFC), an organization that brings together 191 foundations that operate across Canada and the managed assets of which total over $5.8 billion (8). The FGM had a direct partnership with United Way and SNC-Lavalin (9). Several SNC-Lavalin executives have served on the FGM Board including: Michael Novak (10) and Jacques Bougie (current board member of SNC-Lavalin and mentor to the Trudeau Foundation)(11)(12)(13)(26) and a director of McCain Foods Ltd. (13). Canada’s Finance Minister Bill Morneau is married to McCain Foods heiress Nancy McCain (14). Morneau was instrumental in setting up the Infrastructure Bank.
Tim Brodhead was instrumental in planning the initial workings of the Infrastructure Bank along with Tides Canada Foundation (5). He has served on several boards with James Cherry: Board of Directors for the United Way (4), Board of Directors for FGM (7), and Board of Governors for Concordia University (21). Tim Brodhead is currently the President of the Pierre Elliot Trudeau Foundation and was also interim president of the Trudeau Foundation from 2013-2014 (6). It goes without saying that if Tides Foundation is involved so then is philanthropist George Soros (22)(23), who seems to have his hands in everyone’s cookie jar including our Canadian Infrastructure Bank.
Ms. Poonam Puri was a Trudeau Foundation post-doctoral fellow and award recipient (15). She is also a member of the International association of law schools (IALS) (16)(17). The International Association of Law Schools is a private, non-political, non-profit, collaborative, learned society dedicated to serving the worldwide legal education community. It consists of more than 170 law schools and departments from over 55 countries representing more than 7,500 law faculty members (18). It’s primary mission includes: To foster mutual understanding and respect for the worlds varied and changing legal systems and culture, to prepare lawyers for transnational global practice, to work with entities to develop guidelines and adapt legal education to the needs of changing society regarding international and transnational law (19). Many law schools participating in IALS programs receive funding from the Open Society Foundation (29). It has been proposed that IALS build a database of funding organizations that promote the Rule of Law such as intergovernmental organizations (the United Nations system, the European Union and the Council of Europe) to specific NGOs and foundations (such as the Carnegie Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the Open Society Foundation etc.) that could act to open up funding venues for its member(30).
Ms. Poonam Puri led a research project which investigated the reconfiguration of transnational governance: (20)
“A profound transformation in global regulation has resulted in a shift from a reliance on nation-state-driven treaty and law-making to a highly decentralized set of processes of norm-creation, that involve and are fueled by both public and private, governmental and non-governmental actors, operating in an emerging ‘post-national’ and ‘transnational’ space.”
“This directed research project is situated in this uniquely interdisciplinary and fast-developing field at the intersection of law, governance, finance and globalization…. the project, will focus on the Equator Principles (“EPs”)… to illuminate the reconfiguration of transnational governance.”
“The EPs constitute a voluntary common framework established in 2003, to which 67 global financial institutions have agreed for evaluating and managing social and environmental risk in privately-financed development projects.”
“The EP’s ambitious regulatory framework promises to incorporate corporate social responsibility, environmental responsibility, and human rights into the very core of the decision making process within the participating global banks, in some cases extending to all of a participating banks.”
Canadians must have missed this memo? Are the banks reconfiguring from a “transnational state” into an “international state” of governance”? For the many Canadians that still believe we are a “sovereign state”, just how exactly will these “Equator Principals” impact the regulatory framework of Canada’s Infrastructure Bank? After all Canadian pension funds are being used and it the Canadian taxpayers (not the international community) that will be on the hook for incurred losses?
Janice Fukakusa was Senior VP and chief internal auditor for RBC and chairman of RBC Ventures Fund (31) and now is on the Board of Directors for Canada Infrastructure Bank. Former SNC-Lavalin executives are also directors with Royal Bank Directors (24) and they include: Guy St. Pierre who was former CEO of SNC-Lavalin and mentor to the Trudeau Foundation (25), Jacques Bougie who is currently on the board of directors for SNC-Lavalin and McCain Foods and mentor on the Trudeau Foundation (24)(26)(27). In addition the president of McCain Foods, G. Wallace F. McCain is also director and on the audit committee for RBC (32).
Jane Bird was a senior Engineer from SNC-Lavalin and now sits on the Board of Directors of Canada Infrastructure Bank (28).
Kimberly Baird is a renowned First Nations Chief in BC and founder of Kim Baird Strategic Consulting (33). She helped to negotiate the Tsawwassen First Nations Treaty in BC, a modern urban land development treaty that would act to extinguish aboriginal title and rights to First Nations land whereby all land had to be registered and taxed (34). Chief Baird then helped to spearhead a major retail and commercial development project for two large shopping malls on First Nations land which was tied to a “social economy” community program (35)(36). She is described as a “wealthy retail land baron” by her Tsawwassen First Nations community(33), who fear that poverty and unemployment may drive them off their land. The partners in this land development project were Ivanhoe Cambridge and Property Development Group. Ivanhoe Cambridge is a subsidiary of Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec (CDPQ), the Quebec pension plan (37). Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec is the major stock holder of SNC-Lavalin (38).
Dave Bronconnier was Mayor of Calgary when SNC-Lavalin was awarded the 1 Billion dollar Calgary LRT contract from the city(39). His biography states that he is Director of Interloq Capital Inc. (1), but a thorough internet search for that company could not be found.
Michele Colpron is Vice President of Finance & Investments Administration for CDP Capital which operates as a subsidiary of Caisse de depot et placement du Quebec (CDPQ) and one of their principal construction partners is SNC-Lavalin (40). CDPQ is also the principal shareholder of SNC-Lavalin (38).
Christopher Hickman was the Chairman and CEO of Marco Group, a large construction company (41) that partnered on contracts with SNC-Lavalin (42). He also served on the board of Nalco Energy that also gave contracts to SNC-Lavalin(43).
Stephen Smith was on the board of directors for the CD Howe Institute. SNC-Lavalin is a member of CD Howe Institute (44). Stephen Smith was also on the board METROLINX/Go transit. Metrolix awarded contracts to SNC-Lavalin for Crosslinx Transit Solutions (45).
Patricia Youzwa was CEO of SaskPower that gave SNC-Lavalin millions in contracts (46). Current reports show that SaskPower overpaid 111 million to SNC-Lavalin (47).
The extent to which the foreign criminal syndicate call the shots leave little ability for our elected ministers of parliament to do anything about it. That is, if they are not in on the con to begin with. These people know the agendas, they agree with the agendas, and further the agendas of UN Global Compacts of every sort. SNC is the construction cartel in Canada (48). The amalgamation of the Canada Infrastructure Bank with BlackRock is a non-partisan Red Alert moment for all Canadian Patriots!
https://cib-bic.ca/en/board-of-directors/
http://www.unitedway.ca/about-us/our-team/james-c-cherry/
http://www.altalink.ca/files/pdf/reports/2008-Financial-Report.pdf
http://www.centraide-mtl.org/documents/26141/upload/documents/centraide-mtl_rapport_annuel_2010_ang_2.pdf
https://shawnpaulmelville.com/2019/03/03/soros-trudeau-snc-the-canada-investment-bank/
http://www.fondationtrudeau.ca/en/community/tim-brodhead
https://www.fgmtl.org/en/pdf/AR2013.pdf
https://fgmtl.org/en/fcc.php
https://web.archive.org/web/20080609024250/http:/www.fgmtl.org/en/partners.php
https://www.fgmtl.org/en/nouvelle.php?n=74
https://web.archive.org/web/20080610092431/http:/www.fgmtl.org/en/board_fgm.php
http://www.snclavalin.com/en/about-us/board-directors/
http://www.fondationtrudeau.ca/en/community/jacques-bougie
https://virtualglobetrotting.com/map/bill-morneau-and-nancy-mccains-house-in-bennington-heights/view/google/
https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=http://www.trudeaufoundation.ca/fr/activites/evenements/poonam-puri-et-isabella-bakker-au-tedxvaughanwomen-2016&prev=search
https://docplayer.net/8398485-The-role-of-law-schools-and-human-rights.html
http://www.ialsnet.org/
http://ials.symlaw.ac.in/pdf/Pres-release.pdf
https://web.archive.org/web/20171229103229/http://www.ialsnet.org/charter-bylaws/
https://digitalcommons.osgoode.yorku.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1003&context=syllabi
https://www.concordia.ca/content/dam/concordia/offices/archives/docs/bog-minutes/2011-12-08.pdf
https://sorosfiles.com/soros/2011/10/the-tides-foundation.html
https://canadafreepress.com/article/soros-tides-canada-under-investigation
http://www.rbc.com/investorrelations/pdf/3rbe10.pdf
http://archives.bulletinsoiq.qc.ca/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=446%3Aguy-st-pierre-nouveau-mentor-de-la-fondation-trudeau&catid=304%3Ale-genie-saffiche&Itemid=280&lang=fr
http://www.snclavalin.com/en/about-us/board-directors/jacques-bougie.aspx
http://www.trudeaufoundation.ca/en/community/jacques-bougie
https://probusvancouver.com/probus-meeting-jane-bird-building-the-canada-line/
http://iqac.jgu.edu.in/document/naac_self-study_report_op_jindal_global_university_june_2015.pdf
http://www.ialsnet.org/meetings/role/papers/vandeKasteelenMichiel%28TheNetherlands%29.pdf
https://news.ontario.ca/mof/en/2014/01/economic-advisory-panel-members.html
https://web.archive.org/web/20170709205858/http://kimbaird.ca/611/
http://billtieleman.blogspot.com/2007/07/tsawwassen-first-nations-treaty.html
https://www.ivanhoecambridge.com/en/news-and-media/news/2014/01/tsawwassen-groundbreaking
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/massive-mall-planned-for-tsawwassen-treaty-lands-1.1202844
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivanho%C3%A9_Cambridge
https://montrealgazette.com/business/snc-lavalin-has-made-remarkable-progress-caisse-ceo-says
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/city-awards-west-lrt-contract-1.806639
https://www.cdpq.com/sites/default/files/medias/pdf/en/ra/ra2001_survol_activites_en.pdf
https://www.northernpen.ca/business/three-more-nl-business-leaders-headed-to-ja-hall-of-fame-266488/
http://stjohnsairport.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/News-Release-Grand-Opening-of-Expanded-Terminal-Building_-Departures.pdf
https://www.thetelegram.com/news/myth-nalcor-energy-did-all-engineering-and-procurement-work-252958/
https://www.cdhowe.org/members/S?type=1
https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/04/22/snc-led-group-wins-crossl_n_7120110.html
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/snc-lavalin-carbon-capture-project-saskpower-1.3291554
https://shawnpaulmelville.com/2019/03/07/blackrock-snc-canada-infrastructure-bank-meet-the-global-construction-cartel/
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1 thought on “The Criminal Cartel of the Canada Infrastructure Bank Board”
William Goddu says:
All a part of TPTB UN Agenda 21/UN Sustainable Development of globalist cabal insanity/luciferian plot.
Thank you for you research. Humanity needs to be educated
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Nonviolence and Peace
My Mosque Was Vandalized in the Name of Jesus. Its Name Is 'House of Peace.'
By Saddia Ahmad Khan
It was a Sunday that started off like most — a mad rush to get breakfast on the table, get the kids dressed, and head to our mosque.
Dec. 13 was supposed to be a special day to honor the San Bernardino massacre victims at Baitul Hameed Mosque in Chino, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community’s Los Angeles center since 1987. The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community — Muslims who believe in the messiah, Hazrat Mirza Ghulam Ahmad — is a thriving Muslim organization with roots in America since 1920 and in Southern California since 1970. This mosque hosted a blood drive to honor the victims and their families, with scores of neighbors, members of Congress, and interfaith leaders attending.
But some 40 miles away at our community’s sister mosque in Hawthorne — Baitus Salaam (literally, “House of Peace”) — worshippers awoke to a different reality: a fake hand grenade on the mosque’s driveway, crosses in graffiti on its windows, and the word “Jesus” plastered on its gate. This had been my mosque and sanctuary — for almost a decade when we lived in Los Angeles.
My family and I spent countless hours worshipping in a very modest and plain commercial building on Prairie Avenue amidst a vibrant, diverse, and sprawling neighborhood. My husband and I served on the mosque’s advisory boards, and our son crawled on the carpet and played with his toys in the prayer hall. Though we moved from Los Angeles, we view Baitus Salaam as an extension of our family and home.
Ironies abound.
First, the timing. In Chino, our thoughts and prayers were with the victims and families of the San Bernardino tragedy, and our day of service consisted of a community blood drive at our mosque with a simple message to counter the ideology of Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik: the only blood Muslims should shed is to save lives not take lives. Yet miles away at our sister mosque in Hawthorne at the same time, their day consisted of filing police and FBI reports and securing worshippers in the face of a fake grenade.
Second, the vandalism. It consisted of crosses and the word “Jesus” spray-painted on a mosque with large outdoor signs that bear the phrase “Muslims for Peace” in English and Spanish. There could not have been a more un-Christ-like act committed than spray-painting his name in a hope to illicit fear. After all, one cannot deface a house of peace in the name of a prince of peace. And if the graffiti did not drip with irony, the fake grenade surely did. It was an object of provocation in the name of a prophet who promoted compassion, peace, and turning the other cheek.
Third, the ignorance. Nothing could be less offensive to the congregants of Baitus Salaam than the name of a beloved prophet of God spray painted on a mosque — especially since the Quran reveres Jesus and his mother Mary in countless passages. It is quite possible that the beloved name of Jesus — and expressions of love for him — have been uttered inside this mosque as often as some churches in Southern California. Defacing an Ahmadiyya mosque meant the perpetrator did not know that our spiritual leader, His Holiness Khalifa of Islam Mirza Masroor Ahmad, courageously risks his life by advocating for a total rejection of any and all forms of terrorism and violent extremism.
Yet despite these ironies, there is a wider message that is stronger and more enduring than the brick and mortar of Baitus Salaam — sometimes, the ultimate effect of a hate crime is to propel a message of love. Twenty-four hours after the acts of vandalism, the image of Jesus’ name plastered under “Muslims for Peace” leaves an indelible mark: Christians and Muslims (and indeed, people of all faiths) are bound together not by the acts of a few depraved individuals who claim the mantle of religion for nefarious ends, but by the profound and timeless wisdom of the founders of their faiths.
On Friday, Baitus Salaam once again did what it has done for two decades: It opened its doors to non-Muslims to learn more about Islam and proudly display its official motto: “Love for all; hatred for none.” Said one Christian passerby who attended the open house: “There is a warmth inside these doors, and this brand of Islam needs to be heard.” Indeed, this brand of Islam will be on display at our community’s 30th annual West Coast convention in Chino on Dec. 25-27, were we plan to have 1,500 delegates, neighbors, interfaith leaders, members of law enforcement, and members of Congress to stand in solidarity with the victims and families of the San Bernardino massacre.
After what happened at our mosque, a photograph of the vandalism went viral on social media and the response was thousands of messages of solidarity and comfort. That’s a terrible return on investment for the hatemongers.
Via Religion News Service.
Saddia Ahmad Khan
Saddia Ahmad Khan is deputy spokesperson of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community.
Image via Ahmadiyya Muslim Community / MuslimsForPeace.org / RNS
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Earn Two World Class MBA Degrees While You Work
A 17-month program presented by two of North America's most prestigious business schools.
Introduce Yourself Attend an information session
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"When I started the program, I saw manufacturing as the key challenge, but I came to understand that to be successful your approach has to be holistic. One highlight of the program was our Global Business Project, which took us to Kenya to work on a micro-farming initiative for HIV affected women. I now feel more self-confident to deal with complex business situations."
Daniela Lara, MBA
Vice President, Global Wealth Management
Citigroup Private Bank
"In the financial services industry an MBA is a must in order to remain competitive. As a mother of two young children, the Cornell-Queen’s program was a perfect fit for my busy life. The team-based approach was key to the learning experience and the Team Coaching was essential to the success of our team. The Global Business Project which took our team to Italy, Spain and Portugal, was a highlight."
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Graduates of the Executive MBA Americas program earn a MBA degree from both Queen's and Cornell; credentials that will open doors anywhere in the world. Cornell is one of the eight prestigious U.S. universities collectively known as the Ivy League. Queen’s has long held the reputation of Canada’s Ivy League school and home to one of the world’s premier business schools.
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New York County, New York
Borough and county
Midtown Manhattan facing south towards Lower Manhattan
Location within New York City
Coordinates: Coordinates: 40°46′28″N 073°58′18″W / 40.77444°N 73.97167°W / 40.77444; -73.97167
New York County
• Borough President
Scott Stringer (D)
• District Attorney
(New York County)
Cyrus Vance, Jr.
33.77 sq mi (87.5 km2)
10.81 sq mi (28 km2)
75 ft (23 m)
(1 July 2009)
70,951/sq mi (27,394.3/km2)
UTC-5 (EST)
Official Website of Manhattan's Borough President
Manhattan is one of the five boroughs that make up New York City, and is the center of the New York metropolitan area. It is also located over the same area as a county of New York state called New York County. Although it is the smallest borough, it is the most densely populated borough. Most of the borough of Manhattan is on Manhattan Island, but the Marble Hill neighborhood is part of the mainland United States (by way of the Bronx). Several smaller islands, including Roosevelt Island, are also part of Manhattan.
The Dutch bought it from the Native Americans and called it New Amsterdam, then the English took it over and changed the name to New York. The name Manhattan comes from the Munsi language of the Lenni Lenape meaning island of many hills. Other theories say that it comes from one of three Munsi words. "Manahactanienk" meaning "place of inebriation". Other possibilities are "manahatouh" meaning "a place where wood is available for making bows and arrows" and "menatay" meaning simply "the island." [2]
Manhattan is an important commercial, financial, and cultural center of both the United States and the world.[3][4] Most major radio, television, and telecommunications companies in the United States are based there, as well as many news, magazine, book, and other media publishers. Manhattan has many famous landmarks, tourist attractions, museums, and universities. It also has the headquarters of the United Nations.
1.1 17th century: Colonial times
1.2 18th century: the American Revolution
1.3 19th century: Immigration influx and Gilded Age
1.4 20th century: economic downfall and rise
History[change | change source]
Before colonization, the Lenape Indians lived in the area that is now called Manhattan.[5] In 1524, Lenape people in canoes met Giovanni da Verrazzano, the first European explorer to pass New York Harbor, although he may not have entered the harbor past the Narrows.[6] Henry Hudson, an Englishman who worked for the Dutch East India Company, made the first map of the area.[7]
17th century: Colonial times[change | change source]
Lower Manhattan in 1660, when it was part of New Amsterdam. The large building toward the tip of the island is Fort Amsterdam. North is on the right in this map.
In the 1620s, the first large European colony was started in New Netherland, when the Dutch began trading fur on Governors Island.[5] In 1625, the Dutch chose Manhattan Island to build Fort Amsterdam, a citadel for the protection of the new arrivals. It would later be called New Amsterdam (Dutch: Nieuw Amsterdam). The creation of New Amsterdam was recognized as the birth of New York City.
On May 24, 1626, Manhattan was bought from the Native Americans living on the island. The price was trading goods worth 60 guilders, which was worth about 24 dollars at the time. The currency calculations from the International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam say that 60 guilders in the 1620s cost around $1000 now.[8]
In 1647, Peter Stuyvesant became the last Dutch Director General of the colony. New Amsterdam was considered an official city on 3 February 1653. In 1664, the British conquered New Netherland and renamed it "New York" after the English King James II, then known as Duke of York and Albany. Stuyvesant and his council made a deal with the British where New Netherlanders were promised liberties, including freedom of religion, under British rule. In August 1673, the Dutch took control of the island again, calling the city "New Orange" (Dutch: Nieuwe Oranje). The Dutch lost control of New Netherland forever to the English in November 1674 by treaty.
18th century: the American Revolution[change | change source]
A 1776 illustration by an unknown artist of the fire that destroyed much of the city
Manhattan was the center of many campaigns, battles and meetings during the American Revolution. In 1765, all of the colonies worked together for a unified political aim when the Stamp Act Congress (meeting) of representatives from across the Thirteen Colonies was held in New York City to write The Declaration of Rights and Grievances.[9]
The Sons of Liberty, a Boston based group, were part of a long-term battle with British authorities over liberty poles that were sometimes raised by the Sons of Liberty and cut down by the British. The disputes ended when the revolutionary New York Provincial Congress took power in 1775.[10]
Manhattan was the center of a series of large battles in the early American Revolutionary War.[11] These battles were called the New York Campaign, where British forces and colonists fought for control of New York City and the state of New Jersey. The rebel Continental Army, led by George Washington, had to leave Manhattan after losing the Battle of Fort Washington on 16 November 1776. Shortly after, Manhattan was greatly damaged by the Great Fire of New York in 1776.
Victory gave the British control of the area. They used the city as the center for political and military activities for the rest of the war. Loyalists from elsewhere came to the city as refugees from the Rebels and to join the war.
Years later, Washington came back to Manhattan with his army. On Evacuation Day, the last British occupation forces left the city on 25 November 1783.[12] On 30 April, 1789, Washington was inaugurated (officially became) the first president of the United States and took his oath of office at Federal Hall on Wall Street.[13][14]
19th century: Immigration influx and Gilded Age[change | change source]
Old tenements in Manhattan.
In the early 19th century, Manhattan grew in population and economically. Another great fire in 1835 destroyed much of the city but it was soon rebuilt. Because of the Great Irish Famine, a lot of Irish people emigrated (left their country) to live in New York; they made up for 25% of Manhattan's population at the time.[15] Many of the Irish people lived in a part of the Lower East Side known as the Bowery or in another section called Five Points.
After the Civil War, many immigrants of Italian,[16] Polish[17] and Jewish[18] backgrounds came to Manhattan and lived in tenements in a part of the city called the Lower East Side. Over a million people lived in the area at one point.
An Irish political machine called Tammany Hall was very important to New York City during the Gilded Age.[19] With the support of mostly Irish immigrants, it grew as a political machine.[19] The support helped win the election for the first Tammany mayor, Fernando Wood, in 1854.[19] Central Park, which opened to the public in 1858, became the first landscaped park in any American city and the country's first public park.[20]
The rate of immigration from Europe shot up after the Civil War, and New York became the most popular state for immigrants in the United States. Because of this, the French built and gave New York the Statue of Liberty on October 28, 1886. Soon after, the boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn were combined into one city.
20th century: economic downfall and rise[change | change source]
A political cartoon of the bad service of the Interborough Rapid Transit in 1905, from the New York Herald
In the beginning of the 20th century, many new things were built in the city, like skyscrapers and the New York City Subway. The first subway transit center, the Interborough Rapid Transit or IRT, opened to the public in 1904.[21] The installation of the Subway helped tie the new city together, as did new bridges to Brooklyn. In the 1920s, many African-Americans came to live in Manhattan during the Great Migration from the American South, and the Harlem Renaissance.[22] New York City became the most populous city (city with the most people) in the world in 1925, overtaking London, which had held the title for a century.
Between World War I and World War II, reformist Fiorello La Guardia was elected as the new mayor in 1933 and took office in 1934,[23] marking the fall of Tammany Hall after 80 years of dominating politics in New York City. Once the city's demographics were steadier, labor unionization provided protection and affluence to the working class. Despite the Great Depression, some of the world's tallest skyscrapers of the time were built in Manhattan during the 1930s, including many Art Deco masterpieces that are still part of the city's skyline today. The most well-known structures are Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, and the GE Building.
Following the end of World War II, a lot of veterans came home to the United States. This led to the development of private communities that were intended to be sold or rented out to returning soldiers, resulting in an economic boom. An example of one of the communities built to attract veterans looking for homes is Stuyvesant Town—Peter Cooper Village, which opened in 1947. In 1951, the United Nations relocated from its first headquarters in Queens, to the East Side of Manhattan.
Population and industry began to decline in the 1960s. The Stonewall riots were a series of violent demonstrations by members of the gay community. By the 1970s, the city had gained a reputation as a graffiti-covered, crime-ridden relic of history. In 1975, the city government went bankrupt (ran out of money), and its pleas for financial help were rejected at first. On 30 October 1975, the New York Daily News reported the event with the headline as "Ford to City: Drop Dead".[24] The city received a federal loan and debt restructuring. After the economic downfall and recovery, New York State kept a close watch on New York City's economy.[25]
In the 1980s, Wall Street was revived from its slump, and the city reclaimed its role at the center of the worldwide financial industry. During this time, Manhattan was also at the heart of the AIDS crisis, with Greenwich Village being a major center of the epidemic. Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC) and AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) were organizations that were started because of the crisis.[26][27] Their purpose was to advocate on behalf of those AIDs victims.[26][27]
Crime rates began to drop greatly in the 1990s. Murder rates were 537 in 2008[28] compared to 2,245 in 1990.[29] The crack epidemic and its associated drug-related violence had died down, and was under great control by the city. Many people who had moved out of the city came back because the city once again became the destination of immigrants from around the world, joining with low interest rates and Wall Street bonuses to fuel the growth of the real estate market.
↑ "Borough of Manhattan, New York - Map and Latitude Longitude GPS Coordinates". Retrieved 17 January 2011.
↑ "Letters from New-York". Lydia Maria Francis Child, Bruce Mills. The University of Georgia Press. p. 2 ISBN 9780820320779. Retrieved 29 December 2010. templatestyles stripmarker in |publisher= at position 39 (help)
↑ "New York Times: A Nation Challenged: In New York; New York Carries On, but Test of Its Grit Has Just Begun". Retrieved 26 December 2010.
↑ "New York Times: When He Was Seventeen". Retrieved 26 December 2010.
↑ 5.0 5.1 "Dutch Colonization". National Park Service: U.S. Department of the Interior. Retrieved 8 January 2011.
↑ Sullivan, Dr. James. "The History of New York State: Book I, Chapter III", USGenNet, accessed 2007-05-01. "There is satisfactory evidence that Giovanni da Verrazzano sailed into the outer harbor of New York in 1524.
↑ Rankin, Rebecca B., Cleveland Rodgers (1948). New York: the World's Capital City, Its Development and Contributions to Progress. Harper. CS1 maint: Multiple names: authors list (link)
↑ "Value of the Guilder / Euro: Comparing the purchasing power of the guilder from 1450 to any other year". Retrieved 8 January 2011.
↑ "10a. Stamp Act Congress". Retrieved 9 January 2011.
↑ Hough, Franklin B. "The New York Civil List". Weed Parsons & Co, 1858. p. 46 – 48. Retrieved 7 January 2011.
↑ "11. The American Revolution". Retrieved 9 January 2011.
↑ "History of WaHI: Evacuation Day". March 1997. Retrieved 11 January 2011.
↑ EyeWitness to History "The Inauguration of George Washington, 1789", www.eyewitnesstohistory.com, accessed 11 January 2011. "...on April 30, Washington was escorted to Federal Hall on Wall Street and into the Senate Chamber. Washington, Vice President John Adams, the Senators and Representatives stepped out of the chamber onto a balcony overlooking the street filled with a cheering crowd. As there were as yet no Supreme Court Justices, the Oath of Office was administered by Chancellor Robert R. Livingstone - New York's highest ranking judge. After taking the oath, Washington and the others returned to the Senate Chamber where the new president gave a short speech."
↑ National Archives and Records Administration "Exhibit: President George Washington's Inaugural Address", archives.gov, accessed 11 January 2011. "George Washington, hero of the American Revolution and of the Constitutional Convention, was elected in 1789 to serve as this nation's first President."
↑ Bayor, Ronald H. (1997). The New York Irish. Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 91. ISBN 0801857643.
↑ "Immigration: The Italians". Retrieved 7 January 2011. [dead link]
↑ Cisek, Janusz. Polish refugees and the Polish American Immigration and Relief Committee. McFarland & Company, Inc. p. 2, 2006. p. 12. Retrieved 8 January 2011.
↑ Haberle, Susan E. Jewish Immigrants, 1880–1924. Capstone Press, p. 2. p. 16. Retrieved 7 January 2011.
↑ 19.0 19.1 19.2 "Spartacus Educational: Tammany Society". Retrieved 11 January 2011. Initially a social organisation, it became increasingly political and by the middle of the 19th century had become a significant force in city government. Although controlled by wealthy men, the organization attracted the support of the working classes and the immigrant population.
↑ Blackmar, Elizabeth and Rosenzweig, Roy. "Your Complete Guide to Central Park". Retrieved 11 January 2011. Central Park was the first landscaped public park in the United States. CS1 maint: Multiple names: authors list (link)
↑ "IRT - BMT - IND: A Brief History of the Subway". Retrieved 21 January 2011.
↑ "New York City History - Manhattan, New York, USA". Retrieved 23 January 2011. It was the early 1900's, though, that saw the great migration of African-Americans from the American south and blacks from the West Indies, seeking opportunity and employment in the north.
↑ "NYC 100 -- NYC Mayors -- The First 100 Years". Retrieved 28 January 2011.
↑ "New York City on the Brink". Retrieved 13 February 2011.
↑ Firestone, David (18 May, 1995). "New York Times: This time, New York City is all alone". Retrieved 17 February 2011. Check date values in: |date= (help)
↑ 26.0 26.1 "GMHC - Profile of Gay Men's Health Crisis". Retrieved 18 February 2011. Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC) is a not-for-profit, volunteer-supported and community-based organization dedicated to ending the AIDS epidemic and uplifting the lives of all affected by and living with HIV and AIDS. GMHC began in 1981 just after the Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported an alarming occurrence of a rare cancer (Kaposi's sarcoma) in otherwise healthy gay men. The disease was first coined "gay cancer" and later GRID or "gay-related immune deficiency."
↑ 27.0 27.1 "ACT UP New York City Information". Retrieved 18 February 2011. In March of 1987, ACT UP formed in New York City by a group of people as a diverse, nonpartisan group of individuals united in anger and committed to direct action to end the AIDS Crisis.
↑ Marks, Jonathan (February 17, 2009). "The Crime Rates in New York City in 2008". Criminal Law Blog on Lawyers. Retrieved December 17, 2011.
↑ "New York Times: Low Murder Rate Brings New York Back to '63". Retrieved 18 February 2011. The body count that year reflected the beginnings of what was to be an alarming rise in the city’s murder rate through 1990. In that year, the city’s worst, there were 2,245 homicides and New York City was known as the murder capital of the nation.
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Take-Two Interactive Software Board Rejects Electronic Arts' Offer As Inadequate
Recommends Stockholders Not Tender Shares at $26 a Share
Posted 26 Mar 2008 by Staff
Company to Begin a Review of Strategic Alternatives After Release of Grand Theft Auto IV
Company's Presentation at Bank of America Conference on March 26th at 2:40 pm ET to be Webcast
New York, NY— March 26, 2008 —The Board of Directors of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ:TTWO) today announced that it has thoroughly reviewed Electronic Arts Inc.'s (NASDAQ: ERTS; "EA") unsolicited conditional tender offer with the assistance of its financial and legal advisors and unanimously determined that the $26.00 per share cash offer is inadequate in multiple respects and contrary to the best interests of Take-Two's stockholders. Accordingly, the Board recommends that stockholders not tender any of their shares to EA. The basis for the Board's unanimous decision is set forth in Take-Two's Schedule 14D-9 filed today with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Take-Two also announced today the following actions:
Filed a Solicitation / Recommendation Statement on Schedule 14D-9 with the SEC containing the Board's unanimous recommendation that stockholders reject Electronic Arts Inc.'s offer of $26.00 net per share in cash as being inadequate and not in the best interests of stockholders
Filed a supplement to the proxy statement with the SEC to moot any claims alleged in a class action lawsuit that the proxy statement was misleading and incomplete
Adopted a stockholders rights agreement and a Certificate of Designation for a new class of Series B Preferred Stock. The rights agreement will be outstanding for 180 days
Changed the date and time of the 2008 Annual Meeting to Thursday, April 17, 2008 at 6:30 p.m. (New York City time)
Amended Bylaws to provide for a new extended period of time for stockholders to nominate persons for election to the Board and propose business to be considered at the 2008 Annual Meeting
Amended employment agreements with Lainie Goldstein (CFO), Seth Krauss (EVP and General Counsel) and Gary Dale (EVP)
Participation in investor presentations, including the Bank of America 2008 Smid Cap Conference
Suspended the acceleration of outstanding restricted stock awards under the Company's Incentive Stock Plan until such time that, among other things, payment is accepted for more than 50% of the Company's then outstanding shares in a tender offer
The Board also confirmed that it will explore alternatives to maximize value for stockholders, which may include a business combination with third parties or with EA, remaining independent, or other strategic or financial alternatives that could deliver higher stockholder value than the current EA offer. The Board has commenced a process for considering strategic alternatives in order to be prepared to engage in discussions with any parties, including EA, interested in a strategic business combination following Take-Two's release of Grand Theft Auto IV, scheduled for April 29, 2008. The Board continues to believe that the Company will be best positioned, from the perspective of both value and timing, to conduct such a review at that time. The Company has received indications of interest from third parties with respect to possible business combination transactions involving the Company since EA's announcement, but no substantive discussions have yet occurred. To facilitate its efforts to explore alternatives to maximize stockholder value, the Company has begun to assemble the materials necessary for interested parties to conduct due diligence. Prior to the release of Grand Theft Auto IV, the Company is willing to enter into confidentiality agreements on customary terms and to engage in preliminary conversations with interested parties, including EA.
Strauss Zelnick, Chairman of the Board of Take-Two, commented, "Take-Two's Board of Directors and senior management team were put in place less than one year ago with one mandate: maximize stockholder value. We have maintained a single-minded focus on that goal ever since and it remains the guiding principle in every decision we make with regard to Take-Two. Our Board, after careful review, has unanimously determined that Electronic Arts' offer continues to provide insufficient value and remains opportunistically timed to capture the value of the upcoming Grand Theft Auto IV launch at the expense of our stockholders."
"With one of the strongest portfolios of intellectual property in our business, a superb creative and business team, and a revitalization plan that is beginning to deliver results, Take-Two is uniquely positioned to create stockholder value in an industry that is enjoying the highest growth rates of any entertainment medium. We are effectively working toward a process to review all available options to maximize this value, either as an independent company or in combination with a third party, and are open to beginning informal discussions starting now. Our stockholders' interests would hardly be served by accepting an offer from EA at the wrong price and the wrong time. As a result, the Board recommends that stockholders not tender any of their shares to EA."
Mr. Zelnick will be presenting at the Bank of America 2008 Smid Cap Conference on March 26, 2008 at 2:40 pm Eastern Time. To listen to the audio portion of the presentation live, log onto http://ir.take2games.com. A replay of the presentation will be archived and available following the presentation at the same location.
Reasons for the Board's Recommendation
In arriving at its decision, the Board of Directors considered numerous factors, including but not limited to the following:
· EA's Offer price is inadequate and substantially undervalues the Company. The Board of Directors has determined that the EA Offer price is inadequate and substantially undervalues the Company's established position in the interactive entertainment software market, robust and enviable stable of game franchises, extensive portfolio of owned intellectual property, creative talent, strong consumer loyalty and a growing sports business. In particular, the EA Offer does not adequately compensate stockholders for the Company's valuable franchises, which include more than 20 brands (in addition to Grand Theft Auto) that have sold one million or more units each, of which more than half are internally owned and developed and therefore deliver higher profit margins than licensed products.
· The Company's financial advisors, Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers, have each delivered an opinion stating that, as of the date of such opinion, the EA Offer price was inadequate, from a financial point of view, to the stockholders of the Company.
· The Company's directors and executive officers believe that the EA Offer price is inadequate and do not intend to tender their Shares.
· The Board of Directors is committed to exploring strategic alternatives to maximize stockholder value and may be able to find a better alternative to the EA Offer. After the Company's release of Grand Theft Auto IV, scheduled for April 29, 2008, the Board of Directors is committed to exploring alternatives to maximize stockholder value, which may include a business combination of the Company with third parties or with EA, remaining independent, or other strategic or financial alternatives, that could deliver higher stockholder value than the EA Offer. The Board continues to believe that the Company will be best positioned, from the perspective of both value and timing, to conduct such a review at that time. The Company has received indications of interest from third parties with respect to possible business combination transactions involving the Company since EA's announcement, but no substantive discussions with respect thereto have yet occurred. To facilitate its efforts to explore alternatives to maximize stockholder value, the Company has begun to assemble the materials necessary for interested parties to conduct due diligence. Prior to the release of Grand Theft Auto IV, the Company is willing to enter into confidentiality agreements on customary terms and to engage in preliminary conversations (not in the Company's view amounting to negotiations) with interested parties, including EA. The Board of Directors believes that tendering Shares into the EA Offer before the Board of Directors and its advisors have had the opportunity fully to explore alternatives to the EA Offer could preclude its ability to effect an alternative transaction that could provide superior value to the Company's stockholders.
· The timing of the EA Offer is opportunistic. The EA Offer is opportunistic and has been timed to take advantage of the upcoming release of Grand Theft Auto IV, one of the most valuable and durable franchises in the interactive entertainment software industry and the Company's biggest selling and most profitable franchise. EA launched an unsolicited bid for the Company even though the Company had extended an offer to negotiate with EA immediately following the release of Grand Theft Auto IV and, subject to the fiduciary duties of the Board of Directors, offered not to negotiate with any other third parties in the interim without first contacting EA. The Board of Directors believes the full commercial potential of the game will not be evident until after its release, and that the EA Offer was timed to capture the value of that anticipated commercial success at the expense of the Company's stockholders.
· The EA Offer does not reflect progress in the Company's revitalization efforts. The Offer price does not reflect the significant progress the Company has made in its revitalization efforts since June 2007, including the implementation of a more streamlined and efficient operating structure, a cost cutting initiative that is expected to achieve annualized savings of at least $25 million and a more disciplined product investment review process. Benefits of the revitalization plan have yet to be recognized fully in either the current stock price or in the Offer price.
· The EA Offer does not reflect the Company's potential synergy value that a proposed combination with EA would create. The EA Offer does not compensate the Company for the significant potential synergy value that the proposed combination would create. EA has been unwilling to estimate publicly the synergy potential but has acknowledged that there is significant synergy potential. Potential synergies related to a proposed combination include: realizing a sales uplift as a result of a broader reach of distribution infrastructure; leveraging investments in online, wireless and other evolving platforms; optimizing sports offerings; and reducing sales, general and administrative costs significantly. Certain equity research analysts concur with this point of view and have estimated that EA would realize approximately $50 million to $210 million in synergies per year following completion of a transaction.
· The EA Offer does not properly reflect the Company's business, financial condition, current business strategy and future prospects. The Board of Directors believes that management's and the Board of Directors' understanding of and familiarity with the Company's business, financial condition, current business strategy and future prospects has not been fully reflected in the Company's results of operations or Share price. The Company's management and Board of Directors remain entirely focused on generating the maximum value for stockholders. Stockholders elected new senior management and members of the Board of Directors less than one year ago because of this team's commitment to, and track record of, creating stockholder value, and industry experience. The Board of Directors believes that the Company's senior management will be able to create stockholder value meaningfully in excess of the EA Offer price through the continued execution of the Company's current revitalization plan and business strategy.
· The consideration offered by EA is taxable. The consideration offered by EA would in general be taxable to the Company's stockholders.
· The Offer is highly conditional, which results in significant uncertainty that the Offer will be consummated.
Stockholders Rights Agreement
Take-Two also announced today that its Board of Directors has adopted a Stockholders Rights Agreement to protect stockholders against, among other things, unsolicited attempts to acquire control of the Company at an inadequate price for all stockholders or are otherwise not in the best interests of Take-Two and its stockholders. The Stockholders Rights Agreement has been adopted in response to EA's unsolicited tender offer to acquire all of Take-Two's outstanding shares of common stock for $26.00 per share in cash. The Board of Directors has committed to redeem the Rights distributed pursuant to the Rights Agreement 180 days after adoption of the Agreement.
Under the Stockholders Rights Agreement, the rights will become exercisable if a person becomes an "acquiring person" by acquiring 20% or more of the common stock of Take-Two or if a person commences a tender offer that could result in that person owning 20% or more of the common stock of Take-Two. The Stockholders Rights Agreement will not apply to existing stockholders who own 20% or more of Take-Two's existing common stock, unless and until they acquire an additional 2% of Take-Two's outstanding common stock.
Mr. Zelnick commented, "We have adopted this short-term Stockholders Rights Agreement in order to guard against a takeover by EA at the current, inadequate price. We believe the Rights Agreement will ensure that the Take-Two Board has adequate time to consider all strategic alternatives for maximizing value for Take-Two stockholders. The Agreement will not, and is not intended to, prevent a takeover of the Company on terms that are fair to and in the best interests of all stockholders."
Amendment to the Amended and Restated By-Laws of the Company
Take-Two also filed with the SEC on a Form 8-K dated March 26, 2008 an amendment to the by-laws of the Company. Specifically, the Board of Directors amended the by-laws of the Company to provide for a new period of time for stockholders to be able to nominate persons for election to the Board of Directors or to propose any business to be considered at the upcoming Annual Meeting. The period of time begins with the public announcement of the amendment to the by-laws and ends on April 15, 2008. To extend the period of time, the date of the Annual Meeting has been postponed from April 10, 2008 to April 17, 2008.
Further, in addition to stockholders of record on the record date (who currently are entitled to put forth a nomination or proposal), the Company will accept nominations and proposals from any person who was a stockholder of record or beneficial owner of Shares at any time between the record date and April 15, 2008. Finally, if a stockholder of the Company provides notice that it requires additional time to nominate persons for election to the Board of Directors or to propose business to be considered at the Annual Meeting, the Board of Directors will consider in good faith a request to adjourn the Annual Meeting for a reasonable period of time, not to exceed 30 days. The by-law amendment became effective immediately upon its approval by the Board of Directors.
Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers are acting as financial advisors to Take-Two and Proskauer Rose LLP is acting as legal advisor.
For more information, please visit www.taketwovalue.com.
About Take-Two Interactive Software
Headquartered in New York City, Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. is a global developer, marketer, distributor and publisher of interactive entertainment software games for the PC, PLAYSTATION®3 and PlayStation®2 computer entertainment systems, PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system, Xbox 360® and Xbox® video game and entertainment systems from Microsoft, Wii™, Nintendo GameCube™, Nintendo DS™ and Game Boy® Advance. The Company publishes and develops products through its wholly owned labels Rockstar Games, 2K Games, 2K Sports and 2K Play, and distributes software, hardware and accessories in North America through its Jack of All Games subsidiary. Take-Two's common stock is publicly traded on NASDAQ under the symbol TTWO. For more corporate and product information please visit our website at www.take2games.com.
All trademarks and copyrights contained herein are the property of their respective holders.
In connection with the tender offer commenced by Electronic Arts Inc. ("EA"), the Company has filed with the Securities Exchange Commission a Solicitation/Recommendation Statement on Schedule 14D-9. The Company's stockholders should read carefully the Solicitation/Recommendation Statement on Schedule 14D-9 (including any amendments or supplements thereto) prior to making any decisions with respect to EA's tender offer because it contains important information. Free copies of the Solicitation/Recommendation Statement on Schedule 14D-9 and the related amendments or supplements thereto that the Company has filed with the SEC are available at the SEC's website at www.sec.gov.
This press release contains forward-looking statements made in reliance upon the safe harbor provisions of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. The statements contained herein which are not historical facts are considered forward-looking statements under federal securities laws. Such forward-looking statements are based on the beliefs of our management as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to them. The Company has no obligation to update such forward-looking statements. Actual results may vary significantly from these forward-looking statements based on a variety of factors. These risks and uncertainties include the matters relating to the Special Committee's investigation of the Company's stock option grants and the restatement of our consolidated financial statements. The investigation and conclusions of the Special Committee may result in claims and proceedings relating to such matters, including previously disclosed shareholder and derivative litigation and actions by the Securities and Exchange Commission and/or other governmental agencies and negative tax or other implications for the Company resulting from any accounting adjustments or other factors. Further risks and uncertainties associated with Electronic Arts' tender offer to acquire the Company's outstanding shares: the risk that key employees may pursue other employment opportunities due to concerns as to their employment security with the Company; the risk that the acquisition proposal will make it more difficult for the Company to execute its strategic plan and pursue other strategic opportunities; the risk that the future trading price of our common stock is likely to be volatile and could be subject to wide price fluctuations; and the risk that stockholder litigation in connection with Electronic Arts' tender offer, or otherwise, may result in significant costs of defense, indemnification and liability. Other important factors are described in the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended October 31, 2007, in the section entitled "Risk Factors" as updated in the Company's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the fiscal quarter ended January 31, 2008, in the section entitled "Risk Factors." All forward-looking statements are qualified by these cautionary statements and are made only as of the date they are made.
This site contains forward-looking statements made in reliance upon the safe harbor provisions of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended. The statements contained herein which are not historical facts are considered forward-looking statements under federal securities laws. Such forward-looking statements are based on the beliefs of our management as well as assumptions made by and information currently available to them. The Company has no obligation to update such forward-looking statements. Actual results may vary significantly from these forward-looking statements based on a variety of factors. These risks and uncertainties include the matters relating to the Special Committee's investigation of the Company's stock option grants and the restatement of our consolidated financial statements. The investigation and conclusions of the Special Committee may result in claims and proceedings relating to such matters, including previously disclosed shareholder and derivative litigation and actions by the Securities and Exchange Commission and/or other governmental agencies and negative tax or other implications for the Company resulting from any accounting adjustments or other factors. Further risks and uncertainties associated with Electronic Arts' tender offer to acquire the Company's outstanding shares: the risk that key employees may pursue other employment opportunities due to concerns as to their employment security with the Company; the risk that the acquisition proposal will make it more difficult for the Company to execute its strategic plan and pursue other strategic opportunities; the risk that the future trading price of our common stock is likely to be volatile and could be subject to wide price fluctuations; and the risk that stockholder litigation in connection with Electronic Arts' tender offer, or otherwise, may result in significant costs of defense, indemnification and liability. Other important factors are described in the Company's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended October 31, 2007, in the section entitled "Risk Factors" as updated in the Company's Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the fiscal quarter ended January 31, 2008, in the section entitled "Risk Factors." All forward-looking statements are qualified by these cautionary statements and are made only as of the date they are made.
Companies: Take 2
Aug|'13
XCOM®: Enemy Within Expands Alien Invasion on 11/12/13
Jan|'13
Rockstar Games Announces Grand Theft Auto V Release Date
Oct|'12
Rockstar Games Announces Grand Theft Auto V Coming Spring 2013
Apr|'12
Grand Theft Auto Recognised at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London
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NHL Draft Experience
July 24, 2013 by lieutenantham Leave a comment
About a month ago, a friend and I attended the NHL Draft in Newark, New Jersey at the Prudential Center (home of the New Jersey Devils). I have now been to the NFL and NHL Drafts, and I can say that one must go to a draft to experience it, at least once. Let’s first touch on the Prudential Center, a super nice venue, placed in one of the worst cities in America. Good idea gone bad by the Devils ownership!
Next, let’s touch on the draft and how it is handled by the NHL. The Draft is seven rounds and used to be held over two days, but this year was changed to a one day format starting at 3 PM with an estimated finish time of 10:30 PM … yeah right!!!! This is the mistake the NFL made originally by having the first and second rounds on the same day. Why fix what wasn’t broken? That’s a mere hour per round and, yes it began to pick up in the third round, but it was already 8 PM by the time the third round was basically over and you can bet your ass we weren’t staying. The NHL have the “war” tables set up right in front of the stage. These tables are massive with about 30 people sitting around them including the general managers from each club. Throughout the first round, as each pick is made, about ten of these individuals walk up on stage with their teams jersey and announce the name of the selected player, handing out hugs and handshakes galore. Then come the photo-ops and each player walks to his new team’s table to give gratitude to each individual and heads off for television interviews. All in all its a nice process for the young men who lives have just changed immensely. However, the two day idea should be reinstated next year.
A couple of other aspects I like is the Fan Fest they had outside this year. It makes it more interesting for the fans and more entertaining with the games, shops and the Food Trucks (the prices should definitely be lowered), but all in all it’s good for the kids. Another cool thing I saw happening often was the amount of interaction between the players and the fans. For example, Seth Jones (projected No. 1 pick) was surrounded by fans and was happy to take pictures and sign programs. Something I have mixed feelings on is the movement of the draft each year, I think it’s a great idea, but some of success of the NBA and NFL drafts can definitely be attributed to it’s location on the main stage that is New York City. Last year’s draft was in Pittsburgh and next year will be Philadelphia at the Wells Fargo Center. I think time will tell how this will fare, but to conclude I think the NHL needs to go back to two days to keep the fans from getting too bored and the duration of the draft from getting obnoxious.
I’ll link everyone to the draft results instead of boring you with who’s who and who your team drafted!
http://www.nhl.com/ice/draftsearch.htm?year=2013&team=&position=&round=1
Those are my two cents … cash them in!
Filed under NHL Stories, Uncategorized Tagged with Draft Results, Newark, NHL Draft, NHL Draft 2013, Prudential Center, Wells Fargo Center
Ron Mexico
July 23, 2013 by ronmexico914 Leave a comment
Hide your dogs, Ron Mexico is here!
Filed under Uncategorized Tagged with Ron Mexico
Take on the MLB All-Star Game
July 17, 2013 by lieutenantham 1 Comment
Last night was the MLB All-Star game at Citi Field, and as usual most people didn’t care. The All-Star really started to lose its luster in 2002 when the game was played at Miller Park in Milwaukee. The game had pushed on to the 11th inning and the managers had used up all of their pitchers to this point. Bud Selig thought it smart call the game in a tie, with no MVP being awarded. After this Bud Selig decided it was a good idea to make the All-Star game worth something, disabling his own “ability” to end the game in a tie if need be. The All-Star game winner (National league or American League) would be awarded home field advantage in the World Series. Now, many of you might not know the rules of the All-Star voting. It is made up 50% of fans vote, selecting starters and reserves as well as 50% Manager picks; however, each team must have one representative be “selected” to the game. Consequently, each year the Royals, Tigers, Indians, Blue Jays, Pirates, Astros, Mets, Marlins and so on have been in the cellar, each has had a player go to the All-Star game that would soon mean much more to teams that would actually make the playoffs. Silly isn’t it right? Major League Baseball was saying okay this is the “big boy” game that counts for something because in baseball home field advantage does mean something (the last three World Series have been won by the team with the home field advantage.) Then, they turn around and say, “It’s okay Billy one of you will make the All-Star team. We won’t leave any of you guys out. We promise!” A little contradictory, but I still watch the damn thing, or most of it each year.
This year was a pitcher’s game, ending in a 3-0 victory for the American League. Max Scherzer and Matt Harvey both started, and Harvey dazzled his hometown crowd after letting the first two guys on. He also belted Robinson Cano above the knee with a 96 mph fastball, no biggie. The two runs were manufactured runs. Jose Bautista hit a sac-fly off of Patrick Corbin scoring Miguel Cabrera. The next inning J.J. Hardy grounded into a fielder’s choice scoring Adam Jones. Finally, in the ninth, Jason Kipnis doubled in Prince Fielder, who was standing on third after his hustling triple. However, the most important part of the game happened in the eighth inning when Mariano Rivera entered the game as “Enter Sandman” played behind him. Jim Leyland called on Mariano to pitch the eighth because he didn’t want to chance the National League making a comeback and Mo not being able to reach the field if there was no bottom half of the ninth inning. The most eye-opening occurrence was that nobody took the field with Mo, but by the time he reached the mound both dugouts were on their feet cheering and applauding for him, along with the over 45,000 that were in attendance at Citi Field (a rival’s ballpark.) You could see the emotion in the building, the players as well as in the greatest closer of all time, who will be the last person in baseball to regularly sport the number 42. It may not be the best show on earth, but last night’s game showed the class and respect for greatness that is still instilled within baseball. Now baseball turns their sights to the second half, which will be dominated by the trade deadline, the playoff race, and a crap ton of more A-Rod and Yasiel Puig talk.
The GOAT, Ladies and Gents!
P.S. If you haven’t seen the video of Matt Harvey asking New Yorkers what they think of Matt Harvey you should because its funny and head-scratching watching those people who claim to be Met fans talk about a guy they’ve clearly never even watched. Here’s the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0D8V0dCbf8
Filed under MLB Stories Tagged with 2002 MLB All Star Game, 2013 MLB All Star Game, Adam Jones, Bud Selig, Citi Field, Jason Kipnis, Jim Leyland, Jose Bautista, Mariano Rivera, Matt Harvey, Max Scherzer, Miguel Cabrera, MLB, MLB All Star Game, Patrick Corbin, Prince Fielder
The Dwight-Mare over?
July 8, 2013 by 2lips1comb Leave a comment
Everyone hated on LeBron James for his decision to create … “The Decision”. Was it arrogant and probably a bad PR move? Absolutely, and he has come out and said that he regrets making his decision on national television. However, all of the money raised by that one hour television special, approximately two million dollars was donated to the Boys and Girls Club. Dwight Howard? He just created a huge headache for a few franchises over the past few seasons, while laughing about it and consuming the NBA world in his own “impress me more” campaign. Orlando had chosen yet another franchise center at pick number one and had found success through him, but he refused to change his attitude to match the coach, who had success in the NBA. Where is the hatred for Dwight? Why isn’t he being torn apart for how he handled his situation? He toyed with franchises and left one in shambles, because he didn’t hold an interview to tell the whole world where he decided to go?
Dwight Howard has spoken for years about how he wants to be in a place where you can win a championship, but his team came close in Orlando and then he was traded to a team with championship tradition. However, both weren’t “enough” for him even though both teams were focused on winning and were surrounding him with talent to the best of their abilities to get him his first ring. In my opinion it is as simple as this, Dwight wants to be the loudest voice wherever he goes and he wants to have a lot of fun. The problem is that his coach, Stan Van Gundy and his teammate Kobe Bryant have stronger and more determined voices than he does. Consequently, Dwight saw it fit to leave and he even got Stan Van Gundy fired and now the Magic are a mess and one of the laughing stocks of the Eastern Conference. Dwight has a great personality, but it’s his attitude that needs an adjustment. It’s his desires that needed to be straightened out. We will see how well he does with these young Rockets, but he’s going to have a lot demanded of him under Kevin McHale who knows exactly what it takes to win championships as a big man.
I think it’s time for everyone to stop and look and realize Dwight Howard handled this wrong and should have remained quiet. The guy talks about winning a championship, but really what he wants is to be the center of attention and he wants to be able to goof around without somebody first asking and then telling him to be serious. He doesn’t want his determination questioned. I personally like Dwight’s personality I think he’s funny, but I question his motivation these days. We will have to see where his head is at this upcoming season, but the Rockets will be fun to watch.
Those are my two cents … cash ’em in!
Filed under NBA Stories Tagged with Dwight Howard, free agency, Houston Rockets, Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers, NBA, Orlando Magic, Stan Van Gundy
The Knicks Draft
July 3, 2013 by 2lips1comb 2 Comments
Back again, let’s talk about the Knicks 2013 Draft, it’ll be short considering they had one pick again. The Knicks needed help at the point guard position and the power forward position with the questionable health of Amar’e Stoudemire. At pick number twenty-four the Knicks chose Tim Hardaway Jr. a shooting guard from Michigan. Hardaway Jr. is a good size at 6’6″ and 205 lbs and is a great shooter and a fantastic athlete who works hard to fight himself open. Tim averaged 14.5 PPG on 44% shooting and 4.7 Rebounds per game last season. Hardaway has the athleticism and strength to get to the rim and finish. Reports have said when he is engaged and attempts to play defense he can be a solid defender, but a risk taker. That is something that Mike Woodson can polish-up. The biggest knock on Tim Hardaway Jr. is his ball handling, which is ironic because of who his father is. One would think, pops can help him enhance that aspect of his game.
I would rather the Knicks have gone with an available big man like Tony Mitchell, but I can’t argue with picking the best available player/talent in Tim Hardaway. This might signify the end of the J.R. Smith era in New York. It would be a shame after he just won the Sixth Man of the Year Award, but if the Knicks can’t afford him then it is time to bid him adieu.
The Knicks also signed CJ Leslie who went undrafted out of North Carolina State. I love this signing because he is a combo forward who if he bulks up could be a solid Power Forward in my opinion. In a strong ACC Leslie Averaged 15.1 points and 7.4 rebounds. Leslie measures in at 6’9″ with a 7’2″ wingspan, which is exactly the rebounding build that the Knicks need against the likes of the Pacers, but only weighs in at 209 pounds. This isn’t a concern because of something called the gym. Since he is a combo forward, his range is one of his weaknesses as well as playing with his back to the basket because of his thinner frame. He could be compared to Hakim Warrick, but let’s hope it’s a different result
Filed under NBA Stories Tagged with 2013 NBA Draft, CJ Leslie, New York Knicks, Tim Hardaway Jr.
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Home Exhibitions Crossing the Country to Cross Barriers: The Van Buren Sisters Ride into History
Crossing the Country to Cross Barriers: The Van Buren Sisters Ride into History
Springfield Museums2017-11-07T12:12:54-04:00
June 28, 2016–December 31, 2017 Wood Museum of Springfield History
In 1916 the United States was preparing to enter World War I. Augusta and Adeline Van Buren were, at the time, active members in the National Preparedness Movement, and they wanted to find ways that women could help the military during combat operations. One idea was that women could serve as dispatch riders, freeing up men for front-line service. But many said that women weren’t capable of handling motorcycles. Augusta and Adeline set out to prove them wrong by undertaking a 5,500 mile cross-country ride on Indian Motocycles. On July 4, 1916 they set out from Brooklyn, New York. And after a grueling journey contending with poor roads, being arrested several times for dressing like a man, heavy rain, crossing vast deserts, and climbing the Rocky Mountains, they arrived in Los Angeles on September 8. Although many newspapers published articles criticizing the sisters for leaving their proper roles as housewives this trip gained national attention and helped support the Women’s Suffrage movement active at that time.
This exhibit celebrates the 100th anniversary of this important event with a range of photographs taken on the trip and a variety of memorabilia and news articles.
Photo courtesy of www.vanburensisters.com
Small Worlds: Wassily Kandinsky’s Experiments in Printmaking
Galaxy Dog
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Browsing Category Tuber Talk
By Lukie Pieterse on February 3, 2015
Most commercial potato growers in Canada know that if potato wart is detected in a field where potatoes are grown, the economic consequences can be quite serious. Some experts regard potato wart as the most important worldwide quarantine pathogen of potato. Potato wart also goes by a number of other names, such as black wart of potato, cauliflower disease, potato tumor, potato cancer, potato canker and warty disease. It’s believed the disease…
Boosting Fertility Through Testing
By Lukie Pieterse on March 25, 2014
New advances in tissue analysis of potato crops could give growers an early warning of nutrient deficits that could be impinging on yield potential — as well as allow them sufficient time to take remedial action, according to Jez Wardman, a plant nutrition specialist at fertilizer company Yara UK. “While soil analysis can help identify potential issues and plan fertilizer programs,” he says, “petiole or leaf tissue analysis is a far more…
Promoting Potatoes in New Zealand and South Africa
By Lukie Pieterse on January 29, 2014
In the past two issues of Spud Smart, we focused on potato promotion initiatives developed by industry groups in the United Kingdom and the United States. We conclude our international potato marketing series with a look at some of the inventive promotional activities and strategies rolled out by potato industry organizations in New Zealand and South Africa. New Zealand Potatoes New Zealand is the official organization representing the 200 potato growers in…
Promoting Potatoes — The American Way
By Lukie Pieterse on October 30, 2013
The United States Potato Board was created in 1971, the result of a concerted effort by the American potato industry to spur consumer demand. Currently, the USPB represents more than 2,500 potato growers and handlers in the United States, and nearly 100 members from across the country serve on the board. The initial focus of the organization was to overcome negative public perceptions about the food value of potatoes, while subsequent strategies…
Promoting Potatoes — British Style
Compiled by Staff on July 23, 2013
Canadian-born writer Nathaniel Branden once wrote: “In a world in which the total of human knowledge is doubling about every 10 years, our security can rest only on our ability to learn from others.” These words of wisdom could be considered quite applicable when it comes to potato marketing in these times of stagnant or dwindling potato demand in North America. A look at some of innovative promotional ideas and activities implemented…
Killing Weeds with Less
Compiled by Staff on April 2, 2013
Successful weed management is one of the cornerstones of successful commercial potato production, particularly at the start of each growing season. Controlling weeds in potato crops doesn’t appear to be getting any easier—many Canadian growers and researchers alike agree this seems to be more of a challenge with each passing year. Weeds compete directly with potato plants for the basic natural elements required for growth, namely light, water and nutrients, and can…
Tackling Acrylamide
By Lukie Pieterse on November 1, 2012
The term “acrylamide” has been showing up in mass media reports since 2002. Dietary acrylamide has become an area of concern for consumers, the food industry and regulators due to its carcinogenic potential for humans. What is acrylamide, how did it become such a hot topic of discussion, and are there any solutions for the supposed health risks that it poses? Research The potato industry has reason to be concerned about acrylamide. In…
Chemical Pest Control Products: Resistance Update
Stakeholders in the potato industry, from members of the scientific community to manufacturers of crop protectants and growers, understand that undesirable crop pests can develop resistance to the chemical pest control products used to control them. Resistance is a phenomenon that occurs when pest populations—insects, diseases, weeds and nematodes—are repeatedly exposed to the same active ingredient. As resistance develops in a particular pest population, a chemical pest control product becomes ineffective and…
Viruses Causing Tuber Necrosis, Part II: PMTV and TRV
By Lukie Pieterse on March 7, 2012
Commercial potato growers are aware of the serious threat posed by two well- known pathogens, potato mop-top virus (PMTV) and tobacco rattle virus (TRV). According to Huimin Xu, research scientist with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency in Charlottetown and an expert on PMTV and TRV, these pathogens can cause potato tuber necrosis of sensitive potato varieties (the brown coloured streaking is necrosis of the potato flesh and is generally known as spraing)….
Combined approaches for combating Potato Virus Y
By Lukie Pieterse on December 2, 2011
It would be difficult to find any commercial potato grower in Canada who is not aware that the disease known most commonly as “PVY” is a serious threat to the successful production of an acceptable seed lot. Potato virus Y has a wide host range, and not only does it affect plants in more than nine different families, but the disease can be caused by a great number of different strain types….
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RESPECTED OFFICER HAD FOUGHT DEPRESSION FOR YEARS; Coroner rules on tragedy — (The Free Library)
The Free Library
The devoted husband and dad-of-two suffered multiple fractures, including to his skull, when he jumped to his death in Yarm in March last year. An inquest at Teesside Coroner’s Court was attended by members of Mr Swinson’s family including his wife Susan and members of the police force.
Mr Swinson, from Yarm, described as a “respected and outstanding police officer”, suffered recurring bouts of depression and had already tried to kill himself in 1993, the court heard.
He tried hard to cure himself – taking anti-depressants and looking at different self-help techniques. At the time of his death he was off work due to his depression.
Mrs Swinson, 46, told the inquest that her husband found his job stressful and had been worrying that he may lose his job. However the then Temporary Chief Constable Jacqui Cheer, had visited him and reassured him that his job was safe.
A month before his death Mr Swinson voluntarily went to hospital to receive help.
After treatment he was released to go home with input from the community health nursing team.
Mr Swinson then spoke to Tees, Esk and Wear Valley (TEWV) NHS Foundation Trust mental health nurse Nick Lovett the day before he died. Mr Lovett, who spoke to Mr Swinson for 50 minutes on the phone, then visited him for more than an hour.
Mrs Swinson, a nurse, questioned Mr Lovett about his treatment of her husband. “Why didn’t you take my comments more seriously, knowing I was a nurse? I told you how agitated
and unwell he had been,” Mr Lovett replied: “I did take it seriously.”
A follow-up appointment had been made for nine days later after a planned family break in the Lake District. The night before his death, Mr Swinson had spoken to his father-in-law Laurence Watson about his fears.
Mr Watson, a retired police officer, said he tried to reassure him that everything would be OK. The next morning Mr Watson had driven Mr Swinson into Eaglescliffe and Mr Swinson said he was going to walk into Yarm “to get some exercise”.
Instead he went to the railway bridge over the River Tees where he jumped from a viaduct. The tragic moment was witnessed by a conductor of a train which was passing at the time.
Following the inquest Chief Constable Jacqui Cheer said Mr Swinson was a “well liked and respected officer”. She added: “Our thoughts continue to be with his family and friends.”
A spokesperson for TEWV NHS Foundation Trust said: “We understand how distressing this must be for Mr Swinson’s family and our thoughts are with them at this difficult time.
“We would encourage Mrs Swinson to get in touch with us to discuss any concerns she may still have about the care and treatment of her late husband.”
Coroner Michael Sheffield recorded a verdict of suicide at the hearing yesterday.
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June 25, 2019 / startrekeire / Leave a comment
pressrelease_ds9doc
‘What We Left Behind: Looking Back at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’ Lands in Cinemas Nationwide For One Night Only on June 26th
Documentary Feature by Directors Ira Steven Behr and David Zappone Features Behind-the-Scenes Footage of the Making of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Interviews with Cast and Creators, and More
LONDON 17th May – Due to overwhelming demand, fans will get a special look into Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as the new documentary – “What We Left Behind: Looking Back at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” – arrives in select cinemas across the UK & Ireland for one night on June 26th, 2019. The film presents a fascinating in-depth look at the past, present and future of a series whose dark, edgy take on Gene Roddenberry’s vision was often misunderstood when it premiered but has grown into a beloved mainstay in the Star Trek franchise.
Featuring extensive new interviews with the cast and crew of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as well as newly remastered HD footage from the television series, “What We Left Behind” also focuses on the original writers of the series as they craft a brand-new episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, developing what would be the eighth-season premiere if the show were to return to the air today.
Following the feature presentation, a taped roundtable discussion with directors Ira Steven Behr, David Zappone, and the film’s producers will provide audiences with a comprehensive look at the making of the film, the show’s fans and the series’ ongoing appeal to Trekkers of all ages.
After amazing reviews and reactions in the U.S. from the release on May 13th, the documentary is brought to cinema audiences across the UK & Ireland on June 26th by CinEvents, Fathom Events, Shout! Studios, 455 Films and Tuxedo Productions.
The event is fully supported by Star Trek Eire across Ireland and participating cinemas for “What We Left Behind: Looking Back at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” can be found and tickets can be booked via www.mycineplace.com/ds9
At time of release screenings in Ireland are currently scheduled for Dundrum, Dublin & Cork.
The trailer can be viewed here: https://youtu.be/GEbcYbYWTsg
Ira Steven Behr said, “When Dave Zappone asked me if I wanted to make a documentary about Deep Space Nine, my first reaction was, ‘What is there left to say about Deep Space Nine?’ Well, William Faulkner once wrote, ‘The past is never dead. It’s not even past.’ The cast, crew and fans have a lot to say about Deep Space Nine. What We Left Behind is their story; it’s my story, too. Turns out William Faulkner was a very wise man.”
“We are delighted to bring What We Left Behind: Looking Back at Star Trek: Deep Space Nine to fans across the UK & Ireland. CinEvents aims to create unique and compelling experiences for fans to enjoy in the communal environment of cinema and this documentary couldn’t be a better example of this.” Joe Evea, CinEvents
“A point of pride for Fathom Events is our ability to give fans cinema experiences that enhance their understanding and enjoyment of the original programming they love,” said Fathom Events CEO Ray Nutt. “’What We Left Behind’ will take Trekkers’ passion for the series one step further.”
About CinEvents
CinEvents Ltd is an Event Cinema distributor working with brands and content owners to bring exciting new events to cinema. By harnessing the power of cinema, CinEvents offers passionate fans the opportunity to see content they love, in a communal, local environment. By sourcing new content, connecting content producers with cinemas owners and offering end to end delivery and event support, CinEvents is helping to expand a rapidly growing area of the cinema industry. For more information, please visit www.cinevents.co.uk
About Fathom Events
Fathom Events is the leading event cinema distributor with theater locations in all top 100 DMAs® (Designated Market Areas) and ranks as one of the largest overall theater content distributors. Owned by AMC Entertainment Inc. (NYSE: AMC); Cinemark Holdings, Inc. (NYSE: CNK); and Regal Cinemas, a subsidiary of the Cineworld Group (LSE: CINE.L), Fathom Events offers a variety of unique entertainment events in movie theaters such as live performances of the Metropolitan Opera, top Broadway stage productions, major sporting events, epic concerts, the yearlong TCM Big Screen Classics series, inspirational events and popular anime franchises. Fathom Events takes audiences behind the scenes for unique extras including audience Q&As, backstage footage and interviews with cast and crew, creating the ultimate VIP experience. Fathom Events’ live Digital Broadcast Network (“DBN”) is the largest cinema broadcast network in North America, bringing live and pre-recorded events to 1,010 locations and 1,628 screens in 182 DMAs. The company also provides corporations a compelling national footprint for hosting employee meetings, customer rewards events and new product launches. For more information, visit www.FathomEvents.com.
About 455 Films
455 Films is an award-winning production company based in Hollywood, California, with a focus on the sci-fi fandom and genre series and documentaries. In 2011, 455 Films produced William Shatner’s The Captains, and followed up with Get A Life! and Chaos on the Bridge, both directed by Shatner. Following the death of Leonard Nimoy in 2015, 455 Films partnered with his son Adam to create the tribute film For The Love of Spock, breaking records as the largest successfully-crowdfunded documentary on Kickstarter and premiering in 2016 at the Tribeca Film Festival. In 2017, 455 Films broke their previous crowdfunding record with outpouring of fan support for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and their upcoming documentary, What We Left Behind.
About Shout! Studios
Shout! Studios is the filmed entertainment production and distribution arm of Shout! Factory, specializing in all aspects of distribution, including theatrical, VOD, digital and broadcast. Reflecting Shout! Factory’s ongoing commitment to innovation and excellence, Shout! Studios champions and supports like-minded filmmakers and creators at the forefront of pop culture, driving creative expression and diversity in independent storytelling. Shout! Studios finances, produces, acquires and distributes an eclectic slate of movies, award-winning animated features, specialty films and series from rising and established talent, filmmakers and producers.
Star Trek Eire is a group based in Ireland brining the universe of Star Trek to fans through events and screenings. Contact info@startrekeire.com or follow @startrekeire to hear about more Star Trek events across Ireland.
Michelle Stevens
CinEvents
michelle@cinevents.co.uk
Sarah J. De Bruin
Shout! Studios
sdebruin@shoutfactory.com
Shannon Meehan
smeehan@shoutfactory.com
For artwork/photos related to “What We Left Behind: Star Trek Deep Space 9,” contact nathalie@cinevents.co.uk
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Statutes > Mississippi > Title-49 > 6 > 49-6-1
§ 49-6-1. Definitions.
For the purposes of this chapter, the following words are defined as follows:
(a) "Commission" means the Mississippi Commission on Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks.
(b) "Department" means the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks.
(c) "Executive director" means the chief officer of the department.
(d) "Motor vehicle" means passenger automobiles, trucks, heavy trucks, tractors, graders, other heavy motor-driven equipment, and all-terrain vehicles.
Sources: Laws, 1977, ch. 465, § 1; Laws, 1978, ch. 465, § 15; Laws, 1994, ch. 453, § 1, eff from and after passage (approved March 21, 1994).
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St Bernadette
the grotto at lourdes
St Bernadette Soubirous was born in 1844, the first child of an extremely poor miller in the town of Lourdes in southern France. The family was living in the basement of a dilapidated building when on February 11,1858, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to Bernadette in a cave above the banks of the Gave River near Lourdes. Bernadette, 14 years old, was known as a virtuous girl though a dull student who had not even made her first Holy Communion. In poor health, she had suffered from asthma from an early age.
There were 18 appearances in all, the final one occurring on the feast of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, July 16. Although Bernadette's initial reports provoked skepticism, her daily visions of "the Lady" brought great crowds of the curious. The Lady, Bernadette explained, had instructed her to have a chapel built on the spot of the visions. There the people were to come to wash in and drink of the water of the spring that had welled up from the very spot where Bernadette had been instructed to dig.
According to Bernadette, the Lady of her visions was a girl of 16 or 17 who wore a white robe with a blue sash. Yellow roses covered her feet, a large rosary was on her right arm. In the vision on March 25 she told Bernadette, "I am the Immaculate Conception." It was only when the words were explained to her that Bernadette came to realize who the Lady was.
Few visions have ever undergone the scrutiny that these appearances of the Immaculate Virgin were subject to. Lourdes became one of the most popular Marian shrines in the world, attracting millions of visitors. Miracles were reported at the shrine and in the waters of the spring. After thorough investigation Church authorities confirmed the authenticity of the apparitions in 1862.
During her life Bernadette suffered much. She was hounded by the public as well as by civic officials until at last she was protected in a convent of nuns. Five years later she petitioned to enter the Sisters of Notre Dame. After a period of illness she was able to make the journey from Lourdes and enter the novitiate. But within four months of her arrival she was given the last rites of the Church and allowed to profess her vows. She recovered enough to become infirmarian and then sacristan, but chronic health problems persisted. She died on April 16, 1879, at the age of 35.
She was canonized in 1933
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Teens / Drugs & Health Blog / Announcing the “Teens Make Music” Contest Winners!
Announcing the “Teens Make Music” Contest Winners!
Winners at the MusiCares Person of the Year Rehearsals. L-R: Julie Ratzlaff, Elena Giddins, Steve Van Doren (Vice President of Vans), Caleb McDonald, and Andrew McMains.
We recently mentioned the MusiCares® Teens Make Music contest—musicians between the ages of 14 and 18 submit original pieces of music that celebrate life “above the influence” or that bring attention to the real-life consequences of drug use. The 2018 winners attended the GRAMMY Awards in Los Angeles in February and received tickets to Vans Warped Tour and other prizes.
This time, there were four winning songs:
First Place: “Lost”—Lyrics and Vocals by Andrew McMains, 17 (Salem, OR); and David Bond, 18 (Salem, OR)
Second Place: “Addicted”—Lyrics and Vocals by Elena Giddins, 14 (New York, NY)
Third Place (tie): “Where Did You Go”—Lyrics and Vocals by Julie Ratzlaff, 18 (New York, NY)
Third Place (tie): “Demons”—Lyrics and Vocals by Caleb McDonald, 18 (Salem, OR)
We reached out to the winners recently to talk about their winning songs and their trip to the GRAMMY Awards.
What motivated you to enter the “Teens Make Music” contest?
Andrew: “I didn't need motivation. I was already doing what needed to be done for the contest. So I said, why not? It didn't feel like a chore or homework because I loved doing it.”
Elena: “I really love music. It means everything to me. I also love helping people. It makes me feel great when I can combine these two passions. As a teenager who’s just started high school, I can see how important it is for kids to understand the risks of drugs and alcohol, so I wrote this song to express these feelings.”
Julie: “I entered this contest because I feel very strongly about the topic of drug and alcohol abuse.”
What gave you the idea for your winning song?
Elena: “When you’re a kid, your parents tell you drugs and alcohol are dangerous. They warn you that some people can become addicted very easily. But when you’re with your friends and they’re partying, you want to try…because it looks like it could be fun, or you want to fit in, or it just seems cool. So, you try it. And then you try it again. And suddenly you’re doing it every day. You’re addicted and you can’t stop. And then you have to lie to your family, you lose your parents’ trust and respect, and the world feels scary, sad, and out of control. Everyone is hurt. That was the idea behind my song—the pain of hurting the people you love the most by making bad choices.”
Julie: “I got the idea for my song from the many experiences I’ve had with people struggling with addiction. I hope that this song helps other people feel like they aren’t the only ones torn by their love for someone and that person’s addiction.”
Andrew: “When [David] made the beat for the song, he titled it, ‘Confusing,’ and put it on SoundCloud. It gave me the idea to write the lyrics about how drug addiction made my life confusing: ‘My life’s so confusing ‘cause all these drugs I was using.’ Everything that I say in the lyrics I wrote, in my verse, is legit.”
What did you enjoy most about being at the GRAMMY Awards?
Julie: “The thing I enjoyed most about this experience is being able to meet all the people I’ve been fortunate enough to meet.”
Andrew: "Feeling important and just being a part of it.”
Elena: “I loved meeting the other winners. At the rehearsal, I heard H.E.R. for the first time and I love H.E.R.! The song ‘Hard Place’ is now one of my favorite songs. I also had an opportunity to say hello to Miley Cyrus and Shawn Mendes after watching them rehearse and I got to see Travis Scott. It was all really amazing.”
Healthy Minds and Bodies
Grammy FoundationMusic
The National Institute on Drug Abuse Blog Team. (2019, April 22). Announcing the “Teens Make Music” Contest Winners!. Retrieved from https://teens.drugabuse.gov/blog/post/announcing-teens-make-music-contest-winners on
The National Institute on Drug Abuse Blog Team. "Announcing the “Teens Make Music” Contest Winners!." Drugs & Health Blog, 22 Apr. 2019, National Institute on Drug Abuse, https://teens.drugabuse.gov/blog/post/announcing-teens-make-music-contest-winners.
The National Institute on Drug Abuse Blog Team. Announcing the “Teens Make Music” Contest Winners!. National Institute on Drug Abuse for Teens website. https://teens.drugabuse.gov/blog/post/announcing-teens-make-music-contest-winners. April 22, 2019. Accessed
Addiction For Real
Transforming Tragedy Into Hope
Teen Songwriters Honored for National Drug Facts Week
Finding Your Voice: Using Creativity for Positive Change
Rap Music and Molly
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Minister Lintilä and OECD Secretary General Angel Gurría discussed Finland's AI Program
Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment 14.3.2019 17.14 | Published in English on 14.3.2019 at 17.22
Minister of Economic Affairs Mika Lintilä met with Angel Gurría, Secretary General of the OECD on 14 March. Minister Lintilä presented the final report of the Finnish Artificial Intelligence Program, published earlier that day, to Mr. Gurría as an example of the recent policy actions of the digital economy in Finland.
"During the program, the Artificial Intelligence Accelerator, for example, has been launched, which provides information useful for the Finnish enterprise field. The Finnish Center for AI (FCAI), shared by Aalto University, University of Helsinki and VTT, serves the same purpose: it aims to promote the promotion of artificial intelligence and the use and application of artificial intelligence in companies and society. More than 65 companies joined the ethics challenge launched by the program, in which participants created the principles of ethical application of artificial intelligence", the minister said.
"In addition, we have allocated EUR 160 million of public funding for Business Finland's innovation funding to artificial intelligence, data and platform economy in 2018–2021", the Minister continued.
The Finnish AI Program started in May 2017. The idea of the program was that Finland has the potential to become one of the world's top countries in applying artificial intelligence.
In addition, Mr. Lintilä and Mr. Gurría's delegations also discussed the OECD's assessment of the state of the world economy, future risks and developments, and Finland's innovation policy.
Secretary General Gurría is visiting Finland from 14 to 15 March 2019. During his visit, the Secretary-General will meet with several Ministers and senior officials and will speak at Finlandia Hall at the seminar celebrating the 50th anniversary of Finland's OECD membership.
Ministerial Assistant to the Minister of Economic Affairs Nina Alatalo, tel. +358 29 504
Mika Lintilä
EU OECD confederations of states enterprises innovation policy innovations means of livelihood
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A Brief History of Tempe
September 26, 2011 by Tempe Thoughts Leave a Comment
Curtesy: The Tempe Historical Museum:
Following the establishment of Fort McDowell on the eastern edge of central Arizona’s Salt River Valley in 1865, enterprising farmers moved into the area. They dug out the irrigation canals left by the prehistoric Hohokam people and built new ones to carry Salt River water to their fields. Valley farms soon supplied food to Arizona’s military posts and mining towns.
The first settlers to move to the Tempe area, south of the Salt River and east of Phoenix, were Hispanic families from southern Arizona. They helped construct the first two irrigation canals, the Kirkland-McKinney Ditch and the San Francisco Canal, and started small farms to the east and west of a large butte (Tempe Butte). In 1872, some of these Mexican settlers founded a town called San Pablo east of Tempe Butte.
Another settlement, known as Hayden’s Ferry, developed west of Tempe Butte. Charles Trumbull Hayden, owner of a mercantile and freighting business in Tucson, homesteaded this location in 1870. Within a few years, he had built a store and flourmill, warehouses and blacksmith shops, and a ferry. This community became the trade center for the south side of the Salt River Valley.
Both settlements grew quickly and soon formed one community. The town was named Tempe in 1879. “Lord” Darrell Duppa, an Englishman who helped establish Phoenix, is credited with suggesting the name. The sight of the butte and the wide river, and the nearby expanse of green fields, reminded him of the Vale of Tempe in ancient Greece.
As more farmers came to settle in the Valley and started raising alfalfa and grains for feeding livestock, the Tempe Irrigating Canal Company provided all of necessary water. With a network of canals that extended several miles south of the river, irrigation water was carried to more than 20,000 acres of prime farmland. Crops of wheat, barley, and oats ensured a steady business for the Hayden Mill. The milled flour was hauled to forts and other settlements throughout the territory. By the 1890s, some farmers started growing new cash crops such as dates and citrus fruits.
In 1885, the Arizona legislature selected Tempe as the site for the Territorial Normal School, which trained teachers for Arizona’s schools. Soon, other changes in Tempe promoted the development of the small farming community. The Maricopa and Phoenix Railroad, built in 1887, crossed the Salt River at Tempe, linking the town to the nation’s growing transportation system. The Tempe Land and Improvement Company was formed to sell lots in the booming town. Tempe became one of the most important business and shipping centers for the surrounding agricultural area.
The completion of Roosevelt Dam in 1911 guaranteed enough water to meet the growing needs of Valley farmers. On his way to dedicate the dam, former President Theodore Roosevelt applauded the accomplishments of the people of central Arizona and predicted that their towns would grow to become prosperous cities. Less than a year later, Arizona became the 48th state, and the Salt River Valley was well on its way to becoming the new population center of the Southwest.
Tempe was a small agricultural community through most of its history. After World War II, Tempe began growing at a rapid rate as veterans and others moved to the city. The last of the local farms quickly disappeared. Through annexation, the city reached its current boundaries by 1974. Tempe had grown into a modern city. The town’s small teachers college had also grown, and in 1958, the institution became Arizona State University.
Tempe’s commercial center along Mill Avenue declined during these years. Prompted by Tempe’s centennial in 1971, Mill Avenue was revitalized into an entertainment and shopping district that attracts people from throughout the Valley. Today, Tempe is well known nationally as the home of the Fiesta Bowl and the Arizona Cardinals. It is the seventh largest city in Arizona, with a strong modern economy based on commerce, tourism, and electronics manufacturing.
Filed Under: History, Hot Off The Press Tagged With: salt river, tempe, Tempe History
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2018 BIO
CATEGORY: PROFESSIONAL PLAYER
Election to this category shall be limited to no more than one (1) person per year.
The candidate must have competed and been active as a member of the PGA TOUR, PGA TOUR Champions, the LPGA Tour or the European Tour.
The candidate must have competed on said tour, or tours for a minimum of 10 years during which time the candidate should have won a minimum of four regular PGA TOUR or LPGA Tour events, or one major championship, plus two regular tour events as defined by the PGA TOUR or LPGA Tour.
Candidates who garner victories on the PGA TOUR Champions will be assigned point values at 50% of victories on the PGA TOUR. For example, a candidate with three regular PGA TOUR victories and two PGA TOUR Champions victories, or three regular PGA TOUR victories and one major championship as defined by the PGA TOUR Champions would indeed be eligible for consideration.
Candidates who garner victories on the European Tour will be assigned point values at 25% of victories on the PGA TOUR. For example, a candidate with three regular PGA TOUR victories and four European Tour victories would indeed be eligible for consideration.
The candidate’s playing experience which may include any other honors such as playing experience which may include any other honors such as Rookie Player of the year, the Vardon Trophy or team competition.
An amateur can be nominated for this category even if the amateur was previously a professional based on the amateur’s professional record.
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Space Capitalism: How Humans will Colonize Planets, Moons, and Asteroids
by Block, Walter
Peter Lothian Nelson and Walter Block advocate market-driven, private initiatives in space exploration.
This marvelous book compares and contrasts the motivations, morality, and effectiveness of space exploration when pursued by private entrepreneurs as opposed to government. The authors advocate market-driven, private initiatives to take the lead through competition for the exploration and exploitation of outer space. Space travel and colonization are analyzed through the prism of economic freedom and laissez-faire capitalism, in a unique and accessible book.
Space Capitalism goes boldly where no one has gone before!
Click here to watch Dr. Block make the case for privatizing the final frontier.
Peter Lothian Nelson has masters degrees in engineering and divinity. He has over 40 years of experience in civil engineering and forensics, and is the former president of PL Nelson Engineering Inc, USA.
Walter E. Block is Harold E. Wirth Endowed Chair and Professor of Economics, College of Business, Loyola University New Orleans, and senior fellow at the Mises Institute. He earned his PhD in economics at Columbia University in 1972. He has taught at Rutgers, SUNY Stony Brook, Baruch CUNY, Holy Cross and the University of Central Arkansas. He is the author of more than 500 refereed articles in professional journals, two dozen books, and thousands of op eds. He lectures widely on college campuses, delivers seminars around the world and appears regularly on television and radio shows. He is the Schlarbaum Laureate, Mises Institute, 2011; and has won the Loyola University Research Award (2005, 2008) and the Mises Institute’s Rothbard Medal of Freedom, 2005; and the Dux Academicus award, Loyola University, 2007.
Block on C-Span promoting Space Capitalism
Pages i-xvii
Privatize Space Travel!
Peter Lothian Nelson, Walter E. Block
Man’s Inhumanity to Man
Why Privatize Anything?
Why Privatize Space Travel and Colonization?
Ownership Concepts
The Inner Planets and Extra-Terrestrial Moons
The Gas Giants
Asteroids, Comets, and Other Non-Planetary Objects
Space Boondoggles: NASA, STEM Subsidies
Public Goods: Basic Research and Terraforming
Space Law
Who Are the Libertarians in the Space Initiative?
Space-Oriented Writers
Water Capitalism - Digital Book
Block, Walter
When something is unowned, people have less of an incentive to care for it, preserve it, and protect it, than when they own it.
Water Capitalism The Case for Privatizing Oceans, Rivers, Lakes, and Aquifers
Privatization of Roads and Highways: Human and Economic Factors, The
Take back the streets!
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Hollywood Undead is an American rap rock band from Los Angeles, California.
The band originated in 2005 from a song titled “The Kids” that Jorel Decker (J-Dog) and Aron Erlichman (Deuce) posted on the band’s MySpace profile to positive reviews, leading them to form the group Hollywood Undead with their friends Jeff Philips (Shady), George Ragan (Johnny 3 Tears), Jordon Terrell (Charlie Scene), Dylan Alvarez (Funny Man), and Matthew St. Claire (Da Kurlzz). In an interview with Shave magazine, J-Dog explained that when forming the band “Whoever was in the room at the time and played an instrument was in the band.” Shady Jeff later left the group reasons currently unknown to the public. He currently works as a mechanic and is working on converting diesel cars into vehicles that can run on vegetable oil.
Hollywood Undead’s music features a wide variety of musical styles, generally blending hip hop with alternative rock and dance influence.
However, many would identify them as rap rock. Half of the songs in Swan Songs display a more party-based style, such as the songs “Everywhere I Go” and “No. 5” while the other half show a more serious approach to the album, such as “Young” and “Paradise Lost”. Many critics have stated to be confused due to the record’s constant representation of different sounds.
The band experimented with their sound in their second album American Tragedy, and added in many more musical styles than shown in their first album. American Tragedy continues the band’s original style, however, the album has less of a party-based style than Swan Songs, and instead follows a more serious approach. Out of the total 19 tracks on American Tragedy, there are only 3 songs that are based on partying, whereas Swan Songs had 6 out of its 14 tracks. “There is more rock, heavier sound and more pain in the songs,” Johnny 3 Tears stated in an interview about the album. The band heavily experimented on the album, adding in more mainstream elements and experimenting with certain instruments
that they did not use much in their previous efforts such as synthesizers or acoustic guitars. Many reviewers have compared some of this album to Linkin Park’s first two records, due to the heavier tracks such as “Been to Hell” or “Tendencies”.
Unlike many other musical groups, every member of Hollywood Undead plays a part in the vocals and providing the instruments at the same time. The band is known for their vocal interplay within the songs, usually having 2, 3, and sometimes 4 rappers in a single song, while one member sings the choruses. However, some tracks are left to a single rapper, such as Johnny 3 Tears in “Pour Me”, or Charlie Scene in “Everywhere I Go”. And two of the songs, “Christmas in Hollywood” and “Dove and Grenade”, feature all six of the members. Guitarist Charlie Scene is known for taking part in the party-based songs such as “Everywhere I Go” or “Comin’ in Hot”, while also having roles in some of the more serious songs such as “City” and “Levitate”. Johnny 3 Tears usually takes part in the more serious and heavier tracks, such as “Young” or “S. C. A. V. A.”. Funny Man takes part in mainly the party-based songs such as “Comin’ in Hot” and “No. 5”, usually teaming up with Charlie Scene. J-Dog is known for his roles in the more fast-paced songs, such as “Tendencies” and “Sell Your Soul” and also takes roles in heavier songs, similarly to Johnny 3 Tears. Although Da Kurlzz doesn’t take part in the rapping much, he usually provides screaming for songs like “Been to Hell”. Danny (and formerly Deuce) provides singing vocals for the choruses in every song. However, in a few songs such as “Bullet,” Charlie Scene sings a chorus, sometimes with Danny as a backup voice.
Vinogradov's classification of phraseological units.
Youth problems (3) Youth is a beautiful time. The faces of young people, the young souls and young love – everything is beautiful. We can describe all the amazing attractions of this only...
Computer – Компьютер Computers appeared in people’s life not long ago. In the middle of the 20th century common people had no idea about them. In 1951 the first commercially available computer was...
Margaret Thatcher Margaret Thatcher was the longest Prime Minister of the 20th century. Her style and her views appealed to many British people who had lost confidence in the welfare state and...
Англоговорящие страны There are over 300 million people in the world speaking English. English is used as an official language (along with a few others) in many international organisations, such as UN...
See the world. Traveling abroad A huge number of people all over the world spend their time travelling. There are a lot of reasons why people travel. Some of them go abroad because of business...
Kyiv region – Киевская область The Kyiv Region is an administrative region in northern Ukraine on both banks of the Dnieper River, formed on the 27th of February 1932. In the north it borders on...
“My Mother – Моя мама” на английском языке с переводом My mother’s name is Olga. She is 40. She is not so tall and quite slim. My mother has short chestnut hair. She wears glasses. She has beautiful brown eyes...
Saturn Much like its neighbor Jupiter, the sixth planet from the sun has a rocky core and a gaseous surface. But Saturn is chiefly known for its intricate series of rings...
About My Career – О моей карьере I originally became interested in the law during my 9th form when I realised that my skills as a writer, speaker, and leader – as well as my powers of...
Gerard Depardieu Gerard Depardieu is one of the most popular actors. He was born in 1948 in a poor family of a shoemaker in a little town. When he was 16 he...
Computers – Компьютеры Computer is an electronic device that can receive a set of instructions called program and then carry out them. The modern world of high technology could not be possible without...
Native Americans Native Americans came from Asia. Over 20 000 years ago they traveled across the land between Siberia and Alaska. When English colonists came to the New World on board the...
The Irish Music Ireland is strong and rich in music. The Irish people love to sing, to dance and to make music of all kinds. The harp has always been a very important...
The Best Film I Have Ever Seen – Titanic As you know, the 3-hour-14-minute film “Titanic” is no mere disaster movie. It’s an epic love story about a 17-year-old American aristocrat who is betrothed to a rich and hateful...
About Myself (liana) Let me introduce myself. My name is Liana. I’m thirteen. I was born the seventh of July. I’m study in the seventh grade. I live in Volsk. I have a...
The Earth and the Solar System We, humans, live on the Earth. And our planet Earth is surrounded by space. The sky is what we see of space. There are billions of stars and probobly billions...
My Favourite Room – Моя любимая комната (1) My favourite room is our kitchen. Perhaps the kitchen is the most important room in many houses, but it is particularly so in our house because it’s not only where...
The British Parliament The British Parliament is the oldest in the world. It originatedin the 12th century as Witenagemot, the body of wise councillorsto consult the King in his policy. The BritishParliament consists...
The problems of teenagers (2) There are many young people in our country. Each of them has his own point of view on his life and his future. There are many problems which are common...
British Cuisine – Английская кухня Some people criticize English food. They say it’s unimaginable, boring, tasteless, it’s chips with everything and totally overcooked vegetables. The basic ingredients, when fresh, are so full of flavour that...
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речевые ошибки виды.
развернутый план-конспект урока.
план-конспекты по информатике.
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Hollywood star Jim Carrey has told how he was given training from an expert who advised the CIA on dealing with torture as he coped with a gruelling make-up regime in one of his movies.
The star had to endure a “horrendous” daily ordeal lasting eight-and-a-half hours as he prepared for his performance in children’s film The Grinch.
In an interview for BBC1’s Graham Norton Show, to be screened tomorrow, he said he also listened to hits by The Bee Gees to calm him as he spent long hours being turned green for the role.
It was like being buried alive each day. On the first day I went back to my trailer, put my leg through the wall and told [director] Ron Howard I couldn’t do the movie
He said of the make-up process: “It was like being buried alive each day. On the first day I went back to my trailer, put my leg through the wall and told [director] Ron Howard I couldn’t do the movie.
“So a guy that trained CIA operatives how to endure torture was brought in. That’s how I got through it.
“That, and The Bee Gees - the only thing that worked to calm me through the make-up was everything they had ever done. I’ve no idea why, but they just made me happy. There’d be no Grinch without them.”
Carrey also told how in the early part of his movie career, his drug use meant he cared little about anything other than where to score his next batch.
“I couldn’t really enjoy it because I was stoned. But now I am clear headed and really enjoying myself – I’m having a good time. Back then all I ever cared about was my next fix,” he told chat show presenter Norton.
The interview is being screened on BBC1 tomorrow at 10.35pm.
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A Q&A On The Void with Timothy S. Johnston
Q. THE VOID is set out in deep space. Why?
A. The books in this series are murder mysteries. For each I needed confined, claustrophobic locations. A station around the sun for THE FURNACE, and a station on an ice moon for THE FREEZER. The events in this book occur on a research vessel stranded out in interstellar space.
Q. Tanner is trapped on this ship?
A. Yes. I can’t overstate how important the settings are in this series. Not only for the nature of the mysteries and my desire to write classic murder scenarios and transform them into science fiction thrillers, but also because they are allegorical. The setting of each novel is a metaphor for Kyle Tanner’s own inner journey. Consider this: in THE FURNACE he nearly died around the sun. The mission was a descent into hell. In the next novel an event at the beginning of the mission crushed him emotionally — hence the chilling and icy setting of Europa. It mirrored his emotions. He had lost faith in humanity and all hope for his future. Then in THE VOID he’s out in deep space, confronting potential loneliness and isolation — and death, of course. Also, his journey away from “Home System,” or Earth, is a metaphor for his own feelings toward the military dictatorship of which he’s a part. He’s growing and changing during his journey, and also trying to escape this brutal life of his.
Q. He’s a Homicide Investigator in a military dictorship. He sees pain and gore and suffering all the time?
Q. But he’s a good person.
A. Absolutely. He wants to solve crimes and give families closure. He wants to do what’s right. But the things he experiences on a daily basis torture him. At the same time, however, he sees the fear and hostility in the people around him. They hate him for what he represents — a weapon of dictators. The military in that type of society is meant to create an environment of fear and tension, to prevent uprisings as in any dictatorship. This gnaws at Tanner. He doesn’t want to be seen as a villain, and yet you could say that because he serves a dictatorship, he is one.
Q. I’m sure there are examples of this in history.
A. Without question. Not every German was a Nazi. Not every German soldier worked at concentration camps. And yet there were millions who served in the army and fought the Allies and they were doing it to protect their families and their country. Tanner is in this situation, and he is able to view it objectively. He has to make some very serious decisions in this book.
Q. You did some interesting research for THE VOID.
A. Yes. It was mind-blowing. It changed my life actually.
Q. How?
A. I went to the morgue. I went to the anatomy lab. I saw dead bodies and the facilities where forensic pathologists conduct autopsies. The equipment they use. I interviewed these people as well. What they do every day … it’s just astonishing. I respect them so much. Thankfully the nearby university has been extremely welcoming and accomodating. The Schulich School of Medicine and Dentistry in Southwestern Ontario and The London Health Sciences Centre. I’m grateful to the people there who helped me.
Q. Why did you research that?
A. An important element of THE VOID is that Tanner is stuck with a victim but is unsure of the cause of death. He has rudimentary medical skills only — just enough to determine the obvious method of murder — but there is no one nearby to help him. He’s stranded in deep space with the crew of this other vessel and has to figure out what’s going on. A large portion of the book involves autopsies and I wanted to get things right. The anatomy and the methodology. When it comes to creative writing, however, sometimes liberties are taken, but I did want a level of accuracy and description that paints this picture.
Q. A gory picture?
A. In part. This is the most graphic of the Tanner novels. More blood, more killing, more sex, more everything. But I want to keep things relevant and realistic, hence all the research.
Q. Do you conduct a lot of interviews when preparing for novels?
A. Yes. I want to talk to the people who are on the front lines, basically. Even when I’m not prepping a novel, I am looking for opportunities to learn and experience new things related to my writing. I interview doctors. Visit labs. Visit the morgue, for instance. I just explored a city I’ve never been to for a different project.
Q. What are your dream research locations?
A. I don’t have any one thing that stands out, but I’d love to visit NASA (the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, Mission Control at Houston), USAMRIID (Biosafely Level 4 labs), CERN, or any place where they are conducting cutting-edge research. I enjoy large engineering projects as well. The Hoover Dam was really interesting. I like the military, so facilities like The Pentagon would interest me. For obvious historical reasons as well.
Q. Let’s get back to THE VOID. It is graphic, as you say. Is the villain different from your previous books?
A. The beginning features one of the worst serial killers the Confederacy and Tanner have ever dealt with, yes. But then Tanner gets stuck out in deep space, and other things happen … the sh*t really hits the fan, you could say. It really is the most sustained mystery I’ve written. And the journey Tanner goes through … I have put this man through a brutal hell, but the ending is quite something. I’m really proud of it.
Q. Does he find peace, finally? A way out?
A. You’ll have to read it. I find THE VOID dark and gritty at times, and gory, but also extremely uplifting. People who read early drafts told me that it’s the best of the Tanner novels. That surprised me, because it is graphic. I always want to keep a high level of emotion, so the journey for the reader is a roller coaster. I want it to be experiential — hence the first person perspective — and Tanner’s road to this point was rough but exhilarating. It’s a different type of novel, however. THE FURNACE was a scientific mystery and thriller. THE FREEZER was more thriller and less science. THE VOID is more of a pure mystery. I think readers will be blown away by Tanner’s path in this series, and by the ending of THE VOID.
Q. The ending of THE FREEZER was … stunning, frankly.
A. Thanks. That’s what I was going for. A shock.
Q. And you say this is more powerful?
A. I think so. Emotionally, yes.
Q. What inspired you for this book?
A. Wow. There’s no simple answer to that question. THE FURNACE was clearly an homage to the imposter theme and past iterations of it on screen and page. THE THING, INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and so on. THE FREEZER was a bit of Frankenstein and more claustrophobic mystery. THE VOID is that type of story as well, but medical mysteries also inspired me. COMA by Robin Cook, for instance. I find them so compelling, perhaps because we all face the medical field in some way during our lives. It often involves a lot of pain and anxiety. We have an innate fear of the medical community because of it. I looked deep into Tanner’s soul for this book. The setting was so important for his journey … from the heart of the Confederacy to the vast loneliness of deep space. I took a lot from history — from other dictatorships — and tried to put myself in the minds of those people living within their borders. When you know that evil is going on all around you, but you are absolutely powerless to do anything about it. There are people in that situation right now. If they risk exposing themselves as not supportive of the regime, then they die. It’s a horrible dilemma.
Q. What else influenced or inspired you for this?
A. Movies that took place in deep space, where no one else is around. You’re on your own, help is not coming. Figure it out or die. ALIEN. GRAVITY. I’m also a fan of Agatha Christie.
Q. According to your bio, you’re quite a lover of film. What’s the best movie you’ve seen recently?
A. This year the movie that surprised me most was EDGE OF TOMORROW (read TSJ’s review here.) It was great fun and everything was exceptional up until a slightly flawed ending. I think the best movie I saw was THE IMITATION GAME with Benedict Cumberbatch. I have been building a BluRay library as well: ROBOCOP (1987), ALIENS, TERMINATOR, THE FLY (1958), THE ROAD WARRIOR, PREDATOR, AVATAR, SATURN 3, and the list goes on.
Q. Why Blu? Why not digital download like iTunes?
A. The extras such as director commentary and the making of featurettes make the disks worthwhile. Nowadays you can buy a new release that comes with a BluRay, a DVD, and a digital download for about $23.00. That to me is totally worth the money. Most John Carpenter disks have incredible commentaries. The ones with Carpenter and Kurt Russell are amazing. Just listen to the commentary in BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA. Kurt Russell laughs hysterically about 2 seconds in, and you can tell right there that it’s going to be as fun as the movie.
Q. Any last minute comments about THE VOID?
A. I’m just incredibly proud of the adventure and mystery. The killer was fun to write. There are many twists and turns, and assumptions are shattered. The relationships that Tanner develops strengthen and grow, and the journey that he began in THE FURNACE has culminated in a fascinating conclusion.
Q. “Conclusion?”
A. We’ll see. I love the universe I created here — which was based on totalitarian history and my studies of military dictatorships — and I am interested in setting more stories in it. I’m curious what will become of the Confederacy.
Q. So what’s next for you?
A. I have a few projects on the go. I’ll tell you soon.
Q. Thanks for talking with me today.
A. I love this genre, so it was my pleasure.
*** For further reading, an interview with TSJ on THE VOID at Booklover Book Reviews.
*** For further reading, an interview with TSJ on his quest for authenticity for THE VOID at Western News.
Purchase THE VOID by Timothy S. Johnston wherever eBooks are sold!
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Couple shocked after discovering homophobic graffiti on garage in Little Portugal
Published Friday, April 14, 2017 4:03PM EDT
Last Updated Friday, April 14, 2017 7:00PM EDT
A Little Portugal resident said he was overwhelmed by the love and support he has received after homophobic phrases were spray-painted on his garage.
Daniel Malen discovered the graffiti on Thursday and immediately reported it to police, who conducted interviews and took pictures at the scene.
Malen and his husband Aaron Boros said in a Facebook post they found the words “Toronto Hates Queers” spray-painted on the garage door of their home near Dundas and Dufferin streets. Malen is the co-owner of Make It Proud, a Toronto business that prints inclusive LGBTQ greeting cards.
He told CTV News Toronto on Friday the incident was “incredibly unsettling.”
“Living in Toronto you don't like to think that this city is... the city is a wonderful and inclusive city,” he said.
“I love living here… This was the first time I've ever encountered such…hatred and bigotry."
And he wasn’t the only one shocked by this message. Neighbour Frank Vitale said he was stunned when he saw the graffiti.
"When I first saw it I came out. It shocked me. It shocked me quite a bit," he added.
Malen said he hopes the Facebook post about the incident “shames the people who did it.”
“Even though we've always felt blessed to live in an inclusive city such as Toronto — particularly with the way things have gone downhill in the United States under the Trump administration, not to mention the truly tragic news out of Chechnya — this is an awful reminder that Toronto and Canada is far from perfect,” Malen and Boros said in the post.
“The outpouring of affection from the city, our Facebook, Instagram, everything has been bombarded with support and love," Malen told CTV News Toronto on Friday.
According to Malen, police “took this report very seriously.”
Officers later found other spots with the phrase: “It’s okay for women to cross-dress but if you’re a guy who cross-dresses you live on the street.”
Detectives at 11 Division will investigate the incident as a mischief report, said Const. Caroline de Kloet, a spokesperson for Toronto police, because it is too early to classify it as a hate crime.
Graffiti is seen on the wall of a garage in the Little Portugal neighbourhood on April 14, 2017. (Tom Podolec)
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Deadpool Free Torrent
by Torrents Download · February 27, 2017
Deadpool is a 2016 American superhero film directed by Tim Miller and written by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. It is the eighth installment in the X-Men film series, and stars Ryan Reynolds as the title character, as well as Morena Baccarin, Ed Skrein, T.J. Miller, Gina Carano, Leslie Uggams, Brianna Hildebrand, and Stefan Kapičić. In the film, antihero Deadpool hunts the man who nearly destroyed his life while also trying to reunite with his lost love.
Development began in February 2004 with New Line Cinema, but moved in March 2005 to 20th Century Fox who bought the film rights. In May 2009, after Reynolds portrayed the character in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, to the general disappointment of fans, Fox lent the film to writers, and Miller was hired for his directorial debut in April 2011. Enthusiastic acclaim for leaked CGI test footage by Miller in July 2014 led to Fox greenlighting the film in September. Additional casting began in early 2015, and principal photography commenced in Vancouver from March to May.
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A du Pont Legacy: The Splendor of Longwood Gardens
by Gene Pisasale
Many people assume that highly renowned businessmen focus almost exclusively on one thing – the success of their business. Yet some of our nation’s great industrialists have aggressively pursued hobbies – one being the preservation of scenery near Kennett Square. After the turn of the 20th century, the famous entrepreneur Pierre du Pont purchased a local farm to save an old grove of trees for posterity, spawning a passion for horticulture which evolved into one of our nation’s most beloved floral sanctuaries.
Photo by Gene Pisasale
In 1700, George Peirce emigrated to Philadelphia from England and purchased 402 acres in Chester County, a portion of which was given to his daughter as a marriage gift. The remaining acreage was given to his son Joshua, who built a house and cleared the area to allow a working farm. Joshua’s enterprising Quaker grandsons later decided to start an arboretum covering 15 acres which included trees from North America, Europe and Asia. With wild tulip trees, cucumber magnolias, Kentucky coffee trees and hundreds of other varieties acquired in their travels and from nurseries around the country, the two men nurtured a collection which became well known to visitors in the area. When the farm later passed to George Washington Peirce, the acreage was maintained and amenities like croquet courts, summer houses and a rowing pond were added to increase its attractiveness to the public.
Despite his dedication, George’s heirs demonstrated little interest in maintaining the property and sold it. The acreage was later resold twice and the third buyer had plans to cut down all the trees to produce lumber for his sawmill. The possibility of losing this natural treasure caused 36-year old Pierre du Pont to buy Peirce’s Woods along with additional nearby land totaling 202 acres for roughly $16,000 in 1906 to preserve it forever. This treasure became Longwood Gardens, the name change from Peirce’s Woods coming from its proximity to the Longwood Friends Meetinghouse.
P.S. du Pont, photo courtesy of Hagley Museum & Library
Pierre’s worldwide travels to places like London’s Royal Botanic (Kew) Gardens and the Sydenham Crystal Palace as well as California, Florida, Hawaii, the Caribbean and South America generated ideas to develop this horticultural gem. Stops at dozens of chateaus in France and several Italian villas gave him different concepts for architectural design and development. Pierre actually had hands-on experience with plants- he’d owned a commercial florist business with seven greenhouses by the age of 28. He also knew a bit about landscaping and design, supervising the building of 150 houses and later heading up the team that built the Du Pont building in downtown Wilmington. He used this experience to eventually develop an immense tapestry of buildings, walking paths, fountains and gazebos amidst a huge assortment of plants, trees and shrubs unequaled in the western hemisphere.
Pierre’s initial project was laying out the property’s first true flower garden, a 600-foot long Garden Walk which was filled annuals, biennials and perennials. A 20-foot wide pool with the first fountain was built at the intersection of the main paths. Utilizing his experiences at the Villa d’Este outside Rome and the Villa Gori in Siena, Pierre built the Open Air Theatre and later hosted an elaborate garden party in 1914 that was a huge success. He also had the Longwood greenhouse built to grow vegetables, fruits and flowers. This was later greatly expanded into an enormous classically designed building 181 feet wide and 204 feet long with arched bronze-rimmed windows, the structure reminiscent of 19th century exhibition halls. Alongside were single-story structures connected to pavilions with their own heat, water and power supplied directly on site. Visitors could see a huge assortment of locally grown fruit- apricots, peaches, figs, grapes, melons, pineapples and nectarines. There were even experimental plantings which included coffee, pomegranates and coconut palms maintained by eight full-time gardeners.
Over the ensuing years, Pierre wanted to entertain the public even more – so he had a full-scale concert hall and dozens of fountains constructed nearby. The concert hall and ballroom were perfect for his pipe organ (with 10,010 pipes ranging in size from ¼-inch to 32 feet in length). Later an Italian water garden and an expansion of the Open Air Theatre continued his dream of building a world-class complex which people could enjoy for decades to come. Subsequent improvements included hundreds of additional pools and fountains accompanied by ornate Old World sculptures imported from Italy, as well as an intricate lighting system with glass filters which allowed the fountain displays to take on a surreal look at night. Years later, these would be accompanied by music, creating a spectacular synchronized panorama
The expanded fountain complex was largely completed by the mid-1930’s; this marked the end of major construction during Pierre’s lifetime. He’d clearly succeeded in attaining his goal to create “a place where I could entertain my friends.” Pierre was more than a visionary horticulturalist. He was also a major history buff, collecting and translating hundreds of family documents from French to English and compiling a family genealogy going back almost five centuries. In 1950, he even hosted a 150th anniversary celebration to commemorate his family’s arrival in the U.S. with a gala event which was a huge success including 632 family members and guests from around the world. Pierre’s work was done. On April 2, 1954, Mr. du Pont was recognized by the French government for his lifetime achievement and awarded the Cravate de Commandeur of the French Legion of Honor in a ceremony at Longwood. A few days later, he passed away… but his accomplishments will last forever, a testament to brilliant foresight, unending dedication – and a love of nature which has benefited mankind.
Gene Pisasale
Gene Pisasale is an author and lecturer based in Kennett Square, Pa. He’s authored eight books and conducts an historic lecture series focusing on topics related to the Philadelphia/mid-Atlantic region. His book “Abandoned Address - The Secret of Frick’s Lock” delves into the history of an abandoned ghost town in northeastern Chester County with ties to the Industrial Revolution and some of the greatest inventors of all time. His lecture series “Frick’s Lock to Du Pont- How the Industrial Revolution Saved America” highlights how inventors and companies like DuPont contributed greatly to our economic survival.
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Tag: Black Sabbath
I wish I could convince others to enjoy birds whistling, the tap of a woodpecker, dogs barking. But students prefer Ozzy Osborne’s angsty theatrics, several of them requesting we listen to “War Pigs / Luke’s Wall.” I can hold off, soak in some rays of sunlight, wait until the time is right. Sit beside trees and practice breathing. Expand consciousness into new modes of sensitivity and sensibility. One way I do so is by listening closely to “Fortunate Son” by Creedence Clearwater Revival.
Berkeley-born John Fogerty sings from the standpoint of a critical working-class subject suffering persecution at the hands of hawkish militaristic elites. He calls the latter out, naming them for what they are: hypocrites / phony “patriots” who wave the flag but send others off to fight in their stead. (The rich were able to exercise influence to receive deferment from the draft, while working-class males had no choice but to fight or flee the country. One thinks here, for example, of former US president George W. Bush and other warmongers who themselves never served.) Drums and guitar notes shimmering with reverb, the song kicks into action. It starts marching at you, picket sign aloft, hips swaggering. On the album cover for the band’s fourth studio album Willy and the Poor Boys (1969), they’re seen performing like an old-time jug band on a sidewalk before an audience of African-American children. When Fogerty says, “I ain’t no senator’s son, son,” he’s damning benefactors of nepotism, he’s damning multi-generational elites, he’s damning the entire American anti-democratic system of inherited privilege.
Author trancescriptsPosted on March 14, 2019 March 20, 2019 Categories UncategorizedTags Black Sabbath, Creedence Clearwater Revival, hippie modernism, music, Politics, Vietnam, WarLeave a comment on Wednesday March 6, 2019
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Grey's Anatomy's Kim Raver: Teddy's Grief Fuels 'Intense, Surprising' Changes for Her and Owen
By Matt Webb Mitovich / January 19 2012, 7:49 AM PDT
Step 1 for Grey’s Anatomy‘s Dr. Teddy Altman was learning that her husband, Henry, had died during surgery. Step 2 was realizing that said sad news was kept from her for hours. Step 3, played out last week, saw Teddy finally process her loss, and break down emotionally. So what’s next for the devastated doc as her story continues tonight at 9/8c on ABC? Kim Raver shared with TVLine some insight into Teddy’s mindset, and how a sense of betrayal will steer one Seattle Grace relationship, in particular, in a “surprising” new direction.
TVLINE | When you first got wind of the Henry’s death storyline, did you have any concerns, were you tentative about anything? And if so, how were those feelings alleviated?
I wouldn’t say “concerns” is the right word to describe it. I was excited because I think there are so many layers for Teddy to work through. You know that Teddy is going to have to go to some pretty dark, sad places, but what I think is interesting — and [series creator] Shonda [Rhimes] and the writers and I had a conversation about this — is the way she grieves is played out in a different way. There’s a direction that Teddy is starting to go into, where she sort of becomes a workaholic. She’s in so much pain and not actually going through that grieving process, because she’s kind of in denial. Also, there’s an interesting thing that’s happening between Teddy and Owen; it’s very clever on Shonda’s part to create this tension with the two of them, because they have such a big history. It’s with the deepest friendships that subconsciously she felt the safest, and that’s what we’re sort of playing with.
TVLINE | So if she is hardest on Owen, it’s coming from a place of, “Hey, we’ve been friends for a while, going back to Iraq.”
Yes. There’s some intense stuff that’s coming up with that, and that makes for interesting drama. A lot of surprising things for their friendship will definitely be coming out of Teddy’s grief. I don’t want to give away too much, but…. Teddy feels extremely betrayed, in a way. She was in an OR, fixing someone else’s mistake, and people kept coming in — but especially one person — saying everything [with Henry’s surgery] was fine. So to have that trust be broken, especially by the person she really entrusted her whole life to, cut pretty deep.
TVLINE | What was your interpretation of the scenes where Teddy had Cristina repeatedly recount Henry’s surgery? Was it not so much that she wanted to know Cristina did it right, but that Teddy needed to have it driven into her head that Henry was dead?
I think it’s a combination of things. Those scenes were so interesting to me, again because she’s not grieving like a regular person. She was sort of balancing between surgeon and wife, and that was a high-wire act for her. Having Cristina repeat it over and over again had nothing to do with her wanting to “torture” her, as [April] said. What it really was for her was, “If I had been in that surgery, I need to meticulously go over every single thing that happened, to know if there was anything that I, Teddy, could have done to make the outcome different.” Not knowing that is unbearable for Teddy. It’s almost as if she needed to “replay the video” in her head, to see what she could have done to save Henry. Teddy’s “thing” is about fixing things and making them better — that’s why she’s an incredible surgeon — so her inability to have saved the person that’s he was madly in love with is excruciating for her. That’s that’s why there was that release at the end [of the episode] – it’s her horrific realization that there was nothing that could have been done. And for Teddy, that is kind of incomprehensible.
TVLINE | Some of our readers felt Cristina could have given Teddy a hug during her breakdown. Of course, that’s not typically Sandra Oh’s character, but was there any discussion on the set of trying that out…?
I’m trying to recall….. I don’t know, that’s really a question for Sandra. That’s her domain.
TVLINE | The synopsis for this week’s episode, in which Teddy and Cristina steal a case from Alex and Dr. McQueen, suggests a lighter, more “normal” Teddy. Or is that not quite the case yet?
It’s definitely a lighter Teddy, but she has a lot of anger underneath, so she’s going to be covering. I don’t want her to be like, “Oh, now everything’s fine! She figured out how he died and everything’s cool.”
TVLINE | She’s acting out.
Yeah! That’s a perfect way of putting it. She knows what she’s doing and what she’s not supposed to be doing, so “acting out” is a great way of saying it. She’s angry. She’s angry with Owen, and that anger could be covering sadness. I think she’s extremely sad.
TVLINE | You’re making me somewhat scared for Kevin McKidd. It sounds like Teddy is really going to lean into Owen.
[Laughs] I am tipping you off a bit. I don’t know how much we want to give away, but yeah… It’s going to be difficult between her and Owen. But it’s also exciting what starts coming out of Teddy’s sadness, and it’s pointed toward Kevin McKidd’s character.
TVLINE | And before we go: Will you be tuning into True Blood next season, to catch Scott Foley (who played Henry)?
Yes, absolutely! With some sadness, I will, but with excitement for him!
TAGS: ABC, Grey's Anatomy, Kim Raver
GET MORE: Interviews, Previews, Scoop
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The Israeli Parliamentary Elections & What They Mean For Israel-United States Relations
April 1, 2015 by Ius Gentium 1 Comment
Yasmine Akkad
On March 17, 2015 Israeli parliamentary elections were held, resulting in the re-election of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of the center-right Likud party. Despite Mr. Netanyahu’s eventual victory, the parliamentary race was a close one. A poll from March 13, just a few days before the election, showed the center-left Zionist Union party in the lead. Furthermore, comments made by Netanyahu in the days leading up to the elections, have stirred public debate. Most notably, U.S. officials have publically denounced Netanyahu’s statements, highlighting the changing nature of U.S.-Israeli relations.
Election Breakdown
Israel has a parliamentary system with the 120-seat parliament commonly referred to as the Knesset. This system is based on nation-wide proportional representation, which means that voters elect nationally registered political factions—like Netanyahu’s Likud party—and not local candidates. For Americans, who, unlike Israelis, vote for individual candidates, this type of electoral system is foreign.
Knesset elections must be held once every four years, though many coalitions do not survive a full term due to political instability. Such was the case recently, when in December of 2014, the Israeli government collapsed.
Election turnout this year was 72.3%. Netanyahu’s Likud party gained the most Knesset seats, with the Zionist Union party coming in second. The Joint List, which is an Arab Israeli coalition, came in third.
Prior to the elections, the Netanyahu Administration’s stance concerning Palestine was that a two-state solution was possible. However, in the days leading up to the election, and in the face of unfavorable poll numbers, Netanyahu said he would not allow the creation of a Palestinian state if re-elected. Furthermore, in order to mobilize more supporters, Netanyahu warned, “The Arabs are voting in droves.” Arab Israelis make up about 20 percent of Israel’s population and 15 percent of the country’s eligible voters.
Such remarks by Mr. Netanyahu were met with harsh criticism, particularly from U.S. President Barack Obama. In an interview with the Huffington Post, Obama said Netanyahu’s remarks upended the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and ran counter to the very nature of Israeli democracy. According to Obama, Netanyahu’s statements will discourage people from thinking negotiations are possible. In regards to the comments about Arab voters “coming in droves” Obama said “we indicated that that kind of rhetoric was contrary to what is the best of Israel’s traditions—that although Israel was founded based on the historic Jewish homeland and the need to have a Jewish homeland, Israeli democracy has been premised on everybody in the country being treated equally and fairly.” Obama warned that if people were not treated equally and fairly, democracy in the country would be undermined.
Netanyahu has since apologized for his remarks and said he had not meant to offend Israeli Arab voters. Mr. Netanyahu also softened his stance saying that he wanted a two-state solution, but that “circumstances have to change.”
Some may call Netanyahu’s apology progress, while others may call it back-pedaling. Regardless, such public denouncements by Mr. Obama are not only harsh, but also indicative of the strained relationship between the two world leaders. For example, earlier in the month, Netanyahu addressed Congress in a passionate speech about Iran. The only problem was that U.S. House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner invited Netanyahu without consulting with President Obama first. Ouch.
So, what does this mean? The strained relationship between Obama and Netanyahu is undoubtedly tense. But a lack of support for Netanyahu in the White House is not indicative of a lack of support for Netanyahu—after all, the Israeli leader was invited to address Congress. So, despite what some may call a departure from normal U.S.-Israeli relations, the bond between the two countries will not be broken. The United States has always been, and I think will continue to be, Israel’s biggest ally.
Yasmine Akkad is a second year law student at the University of Baltimore School of Law J.D. Candidate (’16). She holds a Bachelors of Science in Law and American Civilization and a minor in English from Towson University. Her primary interests include international law and international human rights law. In addition to being a CICL Fellow, she competed in the 2014-2015 Jessup International Moot Court Competition, Mid-Atlantic Region.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-31968676
http://www.ibtimes.com/israel-election-results-2015-what-does-future-hold-arab-political-power-1851294
http://www.israelelection2015.org/blog/2015/3/13/march-13-smithreshet-bet-poll
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/22/world/middleeast/obama-says-he-told-netanyahu-that-campaign-talk-hurt-the-peace-process.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-32044016
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/world/middleeast/netanyahu-congress-iran-israel-speech.html
Categories: comparative law, international affairs, Israel | Tags: Benjamin Netayahu, foreign affairs, Foreign Policy, international relations, Israel, Israeli Elections, Knesset, Netanyahu, Obama, President Obama, United States | Permalink.
One thought on “The Israeli Parliamentary Elections & What They Mean For Israel-United States Relations”
Ali Kharraz
Girls are The Half Part of The Society . ali_lama15@yahoo.fr
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Citizenship, Identity and Religion: Migration, Identity, Anxiety
The Ismaili Centre, Vancouver hosted Professor Catherine Dauvergne for the first in a series of three Conversation Series events. Dauvergne, the eighth dean of the Peter A. Allard School of Law at the University of British Columbia, has written several books on refugee, immigration, and citizenship law over the past quarter of a century, and was joined on stage by Dr. Sajoo, who lectures in history and global politics at Simon Fraser University.
Life and Death and Belonging
The Ismaili Centre Toronto and the Ismaili Centre Burnaby are pleased to bring back: The Ismaili Centre Conversation series. Six onstage conversations at the nexus of citizenship, identity & religion addressing "Who are we, where are we headed?" Hosted by the Ismaili Centres in Burnaby and Toronto, and co-sponsored by Simon Fraser University, the conversations will be conducted by Dr. Amyn Sajoo, SFU Centre for Comparative Muslim Studies.
Please get your tickets for the first Ismaili Centre, Toronto event on 22nd of June.
Who Are We, Where Are We Headed? Onstage conversations at the nexus of citizenship, identity & religion
Dr. Amyn Sajoo, Scholar-in-Residence at Simon Fraser University’s Centre for Comparative Muslim Studies, returns to the Ismaili Centre, Toronto for three exciting conversations on June 22, September 7 and October 12 with some inspiring and engaging individuals. These conversations explore the nexus of citizenship, identity, and faith in our contemporary world.
Purchase your tickets for all three events now to enjoy early-bird pricing.
Gallery: Agreement between State of Illinois and the Ismaili Imamat
Mawlana Hazar Imam visited Chicago on 4 November 2011, where he and Illinois State Governor Patrick Quinn signed an Agreement of Cooperation between the State of Illinois and the Ismaili Imamat.
Mawlana Hazar Imam signs agreement between the Ismaili Imamat and the State of Illinois
Chicago, 4 November 2011 – At the invitation of Illinois State Governor Patrick Quinn, Mawlana Hazar Imam travelled to Chicago today to sign an Agreement of Cooperation between the State of Illinois and the Ismaili Imamat. During the visit, Hazar Imam and Governor Quinn also held talks on a range of issues of mutual interest, including early childhood education and media and communications.
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(-) Remove State of Illinois filter State of Illinois
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This Isn’t The America Trump Created. This Is The America Trump Exploited
June 22, 2018 June 22, 2018 by The Chaos Report /
Melania Trump meets with immigration detention center employees in Texas
Our Entire Online World Was Suddenly Shaken By The Jacket Melania Trump Either Threw On Or Carefully Selected, Like An Unexpected Thunderclap…
“Jacketgate” completely took over our Facebook feed (mostly our friends), and our Twitter feed too (mostly journalists we follow). Was Melania trying to send a message with the message emblazoned on the back of her outfit as she boarded a plane to visit detained immigrant children in Texas? And if so, what? And to whom? And if not, why was she wearing a jacket in 80 degree Washington heat?
“I Really Don’t Care, Do U?” it said, as you can see below. As with so many of these kinds of stories it was first reported by the Daily Mail, which also pointed out that particular jacket retails for $39.
The First Lady’s people said there’s “no hidden meaning”. But nobody was buying that. Was it a nod to Trump supporters? Some kind of “sarcasm” to enrage Liberal snowflakes? Even the President seemed to be grasping at straws when he Tweeted this bit of utter nonsense:
So question is: did we miss anything while most of our social media time was hijacked by Melania’s damn jacket?
• For one, the plight of the 2,342 immigrant children already separated from their families and now trying to find their way back with zero assistance from Trump’s folks. (Reconciliation is not part of the Executive Order Trump signed this week). As the Washington Post’s Kevin Sieff points out, much of the information required to accomplish reunification has to come directly from the child. “What kind of information can a toddler provide?” he asks. One of many reasons this part of the story is much harder to cover than the initial story of families getting pulled apart.
• Also, a mountain of new anecdotal evidence of blundering by the White House as it put a dramatic new policy into place without the infrastructure or personnel needed to pull it off. While nothing short of a heartless, unprofessional embarrassment, if mechanisms had been in place to make it go more smoothly, the fact that what was happening was so alarming might not have been as readily noticed.
• And a huge embarrassing moment for Republicans in Congress too as they failed to pass an immigration bill Trump had lukewarmly endorsed. Anyway he said Democrats were the only problem; 100% of Republicans would vote for his tough policies. They didn’t. After the vote, the President still blamed only Democrats:
Nope. The bill got 231 “no” votes. There are only 193 Democrats in the House. You needed some Republican votes too that you didn’t get.
A 2nd bill, described as a “compromise” (it isn’t really: as we’ve said it’s a compromise between Republicans, other Republicans, and the White House) was never brought to a vote by House Speaker Paul Ryan because presumably it wouldn’t have passed either. That could be revisited today.
• Congress did however sneak through a new 5-year farm bill, which had previously failed. It passed by a very narrow margin: 213-211. Most significantly—since food stamps are administered by the Agriculture Department—it paves the way for severe new limits on who can receive food stamps and for how long. Trump Tweeted in celebration of that fact.
• Trump also proposed that food stamps get transferred over to the Department of Health and Human Services, which administers (and also tries to dismantle) Obamacare, Medicaid, etc. He’d then form a new “Council on Public Assistance” to administer all those programs. The White House also announced plans to combine the Education and Labor Departments.
But no one really noticed…
So y’all keep focusing on what Melania wore…
C’mon, people!
(And anyway, we think the message on Melania’s jacket was really directed at her husband…)
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You are here: Home / News / Police bridging differences leading up to RNC
Police bridging differences leading up to RNC
November 16, 2018 by Justin Vick Leave a Comment
CHARLOTTE – The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department has rolled out a series of events designed to increase dialogue among the community leading up to the Republican National Convention in 2020.
CMPD held its first Bridging the Difference seminar, “Police and Community Relations – Support and Accountability,” Nov. 15 at Johnson C Smith University.
Police Chief Kerr Putney said such programs are designed to bring diverse opinions together.
“Make no bones about it,” Putney said. “This is our ground game. This is how we prepare for the RNC in 2020. We know we’re a divided country. In a lot of ways, we know we can be a divided city. We’re trying to show there’s common ground across all perspectives.”
Putney said police accountability is one area the city isn’t as united.
“We want to attack this concept, this conversation head on and find our common ground so that when people do descend upon our city, it’s very easy to see those outliers so we can address them,” Putney said. “When people come from the outside, they can see what we have to celebrate, and we can talk about the behavior we are not going to tolerate.”
Whenever there are issues involving police relations, we find ourselves talking at each other, according to Willie Ratchford, director for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Community Relations Committee.
Bridging the Difference is designed to provide an opportunity to begin talking to one another.
“We are looking at the possibility of using conversation as a way to build trust, support and accountability – not only for police officers, but for citizens, as well,” Ratchford said.
Another Bridging the Difference event, “Immigration and the Charlotte Community,” takes place 6 to 8:30 p.m. Dec. 6 at El Camino Church, 201 Stetson Drive. “Police and Community Relations – Bias and Privilege” is scheduled for 6 p.m. Jan. 17 at a yet to be determined venue. RSVP for either event at www.bridgingthedifferencenc.com.
Pedestrian killed in crash
CHARLOTTE – The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department is investigating a fatal crash involving a Lexus and a pedestrian at Sharon and Rutherford roads.
Lauren Savage was driving her Lexus northeast in the left-hand lane of Sharon Road when she struck a pedestrian trying to cross Sharon Road to the west, police said. There are no crosswalks in the area.
Police don’t see any evidence of speed or impairment being factors in the Nov. 13 crash; however, they said it was dark and raining.
Call 704-432-2169 for any details about this case.
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Colombians displaced by conflict are moving home, but still living in fear
May 23, 2016 11.31am EDT
Sanne Weber, Coventry University
Sanne Weber
PhD Candidate, Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations, Coventry University
Sanne Weber does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Coventry University provides funding as a member of The Conversation UK.
Colombians show their support for the Victims’ Law. EPA/Eduardo Munoz
Colombia is finally close to signing a peace accord to formally end to its decades-long armed conflict, which has claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of its citizens, led to the disappearance and kidnapping of tens of thousands more, and displaced an estimated 6m. The government looks set to strike a deal with the country’s main guerrilla group, the FARC, and it has also started formal peace negotiations with a smaller guerrilla group, the ELN.
All the while, another major human rights violator, the national-level AUC, which began as an array of private armies set up to protect large landowners from guerrilla crimes, has been steadily demobilised over the last decade through the controversial Justice and Peace process, which offers reduced prison sentences for demobilised paramilitary members in return for their contribution to truth-telling and reparations.
Even though peace has not yet been formally established, since 2011 the Santos government has been running an ambitious programme to compensate those affected by the conflict. The adoption of this “Ley de Víctimas” (Victims’ Law) is an unusual move, since this type of transitional justice measure is usually only implemented once conflict has ended; as the name suggests, it’s usually intended to facilitate a transition to full democracy.
But even if it was set up prematurely, the process has helped some victims of the conflict obtain symbolic and material compensation, including physical and psychological healthcare. And crucially, the programme enables “land restitution” – the return of land to those who were displaced after 1991, at least in those places where the security situation allows it.
I have been undertaking fieldwork in two communities where this long and complicated process is playing out. Both are in the municipality of Chibolo in the Magdalena department, once the stronghold of a paramilitary leader known as Jorge 40, who displaced numerous communities to take control of their land, using it as a strategic base for his operations while stealing the people’s cattle.
The people I’ve been working with are small-scale cattle farmers who were displaced in 1997 and returned after paramilitary demobilisation ten years later. They returned without any state accompaniment or protection, but are now part of the land restitution and reparation process. Some of them have been awarded their old land titles back; others are still waiting since opponents are claiming their land too. These cases involving opponents need to be judged by special magistrates, and the process is very long-winded.
In the meantime, many of those who were responsible for these people’s displacement have now been released from custody, their sentences reduced under the Justice and Peace process. Others have received “casa por cárcel” (house arrest) thanks to good behaviour.
Rumours have spread that those responsible for the displacement are now forming new groups, including associations that will use legal means to obtain land once again. There are also rumblings that large-scale cattle farmers have been asked for “generous donations” to create an initiative against the government’s land restitution efforts.
Slipping backwards
The people in the villages where I’ve worked live in fear of renewed violence. They know that there are people forming groups ostensibly to protect their cattle, but they stress that this is how everything started here in the 1990s, when rich landowners hired paramilitary groups to guard their livestock. They feel unprotected by the police and other security forces, who have repeatedly refused to come to the villages when there are problems, sometimes claiming they’re out of gasoline or that no vehicles are available.
Given the area’s history, the fears and rumours they conveyed to me are not implausible – and that much has been demonstrated in recent weeks.
The long way home: Chibolo, in the department of Magdelena. Sanne Weber, Author provided
Colombia’s inspector general, whose function it is to investigate and punish public officials for legal violations, recently attended a meeting in the centre of the notorious Magdalena department. This area used to be one of the centres of paramilitary control, where massive displacement received support by large cattle farmers and local politicians.
The goal of the meeting was to hear the complaints of allegedly “well-intentioned” occupants of land now subject to restitution, who argued that the process is victimising them by seeking to make amends with others. This meeting was allegedly financed by a group of people, including ex-paramilitaries, who are organising actions against the restitution process.
The inspector general was accompanied by the president of the cattle farmers’ federation (FEDEGAN) who said that they wouldn’t hand over a single inch of their fincas, since they considered that the Victims’ Law was designed to benefit the FARC.
In response, President Santos publicly asked the inspector general to stop demonising the land restitution law and revictimising those who suffered the conflict. In spite of this, the inspector general attended another meeting with a group of cattle farmers opposed to land restitution, this time in the department of Cesar, equally characterised by massive displacement and land grabbing.
Fragile trust
The land restitution and reparation process has done little to allay people’s fears of new crimes against them. The situation has not been helped by public figures, such as the inspector general and politicians from ex-president Álvaro Uribe’s party, who have openly questioned the process’s legitimacy. This is compounded by a paucity of government and security services at the local level.
This situation is replete with lessons for the upcoming peace process with the FARC and the ELN. If the root problems of structural inequality are not addressed and the criminal structures that facilitated massive displacement not dismantled, all these efforts at reparation could be in vain.
The people I worked with have a very clear idea of what true reparation would involve: the state would simply need to recognise the truth about who displaced them and who provided backing, ensuring those people paid for what they did.
In the meantime, despite the government’s efforts, those who were previously displaced still feel insufficiently protected. As long as they don’t feel these guarantees have been made, the fragile bonds of trust that have been rebuilt by years of painstaking work will be under terrible strain.
Dale una oportunidad a la paz. Reuters/John Vizcaino
Is Colombia finally on the verge of lasting peace?
After the cameras leave, refugees will still need justice. EPA/Sedat Suna
Can Islamic State be forced to pay victims for their suffering?
Colombians marching for peace. Reuters/John Vizcaino
Colombia’s deal with the FARC could bring peace – or create a power vacuum
Peace at last REUTERS/Cesar Carrion/Colombian Presidency/Handout via Reuters
Why only now – after 51 years – war is ending in Colombia
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7 key Russian victories against terrorism in Syria
Saudi regime claims to have captured 3 Iranians
Russia responded to Syrian requests for military assistance in the affirmative, beginning in September of 2015. Many Syrians and international observers acknowledge that Russian cooperation has helped to gradually turn the tide of war in Syria in favour of the Syrian government in its war against jihadist terrorists.
Here are the key events
1. Russian airstrikes in Hama–October and November 2015
Securing Syria’s North western regions was an early priority of the coordinated military efforts between Damascus and Moscow.
The Syrian Governorate of Hama in particular was an early flash point for fights between terrorists and government forces in populated cities.
The Russian air strikes which aided advances of the Syrian Arab Army helped to start turning the tide against terrorism in Syria’s north west.
2. Russian airstrikes in and around Homs and Latakia Governorate–December 2015- late 2016
If Syria was not able to control, contain and destroy terrorists operating in its westernmost governorates, there was a real danger that the most populous parts of the country could have been overrun.
Russian air sorties in late 2015 and throughout 2016 helped to pummel terrorists in Syria’s main coastal governorates and set the stage for the re-taking of the key city of Homs by Syria.
3. First Liberation of Palmyra–March 2017
Palmyra remains one of the most beautiful treasure troves of Hellenistic architecture in the world although much of it was vandalised and destroyed by ISIS during the group’s first conquest of the city in May 2015.
In March of 2016, Russian Aerospace Forces along with Russian Special Forces re-took the city.
Russia then helped to de-mine the area before Valery Gergiev led a special concert honouring Syrians and Russians who lost their lives during the taking of the city.
4. Battle of Aleppo–Won in December of 2016
It is now fair to say that the Battle of Aleppo was a Stalingrad moment of the Syrian conflict.
For years, the eastern part of Syria’s second city (and for many years its most populous city) was occupied by jihadist forces whose brutality towards civilians was subsequently exposed.
During the last months of the Obama White House, American propaganda against Russia and Syria’s joint liberation efforts of the city went into overdrive.
But Russia continued undeterred and by Christmas of 2016, Aleppo’s Christian and Muslim populations celebrated liberation together as both sides of the city were re-united.
East Aleppo was the last major western Syrian city to be in total control of terrorists.
It’s liberation meant that Russia’s status as Syria’s saviour was assured.
5. 2017 Ceasefire–January 2017
After much debate, a Russian authored and Turkish backed ceasefire came into effect with the backing of the Security Council of the United Nations.
This eventually paved the way for the Astana Peace Talks
6. Astana Memorandum–May 2017
Russia, Iran and Turkey, the members of the Astana Peace Group secured an agreement for the creation and implementation of so-called de-escalation zones in Syria wherein terrorists would be made to lay down their arms and forced to do so if necessary.
Unlike previous US attempts to ground Syrian and allied aircraft, these zones allow for Syria to continue its operations against terrorist targets.
READ MORE: 5 reasons the Astana ‘safe zone’ Memorandum is good for Russia and Syria
7. Deir ez-Zor–Current
With Syria securing virtually all of western Syria, the most valuable and populous parts of the country as well as much of the southern border with Jordan and Iraq, the final frontier in the Syrian war against terroism will likely be in Deir ez-Zor.
While Raqqa to the north is still an important target, in many ways the top brass of ISIS have fled to Deir ez-Zor.
It was during these final battles in Deir ez-Zor and Raqqa that Russian airstrikes were said to have killed so-called ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
Syria is making rapid gains on both Raqqa and Deir ez-Zor thanks in great part to Russian airstrikes clearing a path for the Syrian Arab Army to liberate the last parts of Syria still under terrorist occupation.
Russia’s aid to Syria in her time of need has made a monumental difference in helping doing what many thought was unthinkable: winning the war against terrorists and their western masters simultaneously.
Aleppo Palmyra Deir ez-Zor Astana Hama Homs
CONFIRMED: Australia suspends airstrikes over Syria
Restoration work in Syria
Massive Al-Qaeda Gas Attack On Pro-Government Aleppo Leaves Over 100 Hospitalized
Prospects for Syrian peace are looking up
Senator Richard Black: Trump’s historic opportunity to end the war in Syria (Video)
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‘Mama Deb’ at Outwrite
The Georgia Voice Editors
Debi Lowry is already a bit of a legend in gay Atlanta: a fixture on dance floors and at charitable fundraisers, a surrogate mother to the dozens of gay men who affectionately know her as Mama Deb. As much as Lowry revels in her popularity and being able to offer a compassionate shoulder to those who feel turned away from their biological families, she was unsatisfied by the thought of her legacy being limited to her being a social butterfly.
“When I’m gone, when I die, I want to have had an impact on someone else’s life — I don’t want it to be just, ‘Oh, she was a really nice person’ or ‘She made me laugh,’” Lowry says. “If I can change their lives for the better, I absolutely have to do that.”
Lowry, the heterosexual mother of two adult children, one of whom is gay, is on a crusade to remind other parents about unconditional love, and to challenge the subtle and aggressive ways that they deny their children happiness. She recently published her first book, “Three Grim Fairy Tales and a Happy Ending,” which she hopes will be “a tool to start the dialogue” about parents being more accepting.
“I wanted to talk with parents, I wanted to knock on their doors and say, ‘How come you don’t get it? What do you see as wrong with your child?” Lowry says. “When they were babies, you loved them and you never questioned your love and affection and your loyalty for your child, and so when they become sexual beings, why does that stop?
“What’s important to remember is when they were babies, when they were learning to walk, when they were learning to talk, when they went to elementary school,” Lowry adds. “Those are the milestones you remember and cherish, and then they go, ‘I’m gay.” How do you wipe the slate clean and say that that was all good but now you’re different? No, they’re still the same person.”
All proceeds from “Three Grim Fairytales & a Happy Ending” are being donated to the Atlanta-based For The Kid in All of Us and CHRIS Kids’ Rainbow Program, and the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. The book is divided into two sections, with the first part chronicling heartbreaking stories of some of the gay men who Mama Deb bonded with over the years.
“The first one was someone who lived his entire life pleasing his parents, and in the end was still so unhappy and couldn’t be true to himself and show his parents who he was, and he committed suicide,” she recalls. “The extremes that people go through emotionally to avoid or mask themselves based on what they perceive the expectations are from their family are very painful to me.”
The will be a July 7 book signing at Outwrite for “Three Grim Fairy Tales,” which is aimed not only at openly hostile parents, but also those who take a “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” approach to their children’s sexual orientation, Lowry says.
“Sexuality is only a part of who they are, but it does affect who they give their heart to, and so it’s a major part of who they are,” she says. “If you fall in love with somebody, how do you not tell your mom?”
However, the themes in “Three Grim Fairy Tales” transcend sexual orientation, and “apply to everybody who doesn’t meet their parent’s expectations.”
“Parents need to remember in regards to their children, my ambitions for you are not your ambitions, and that doesn’t change the fact that you’re an amazing person,” Lowry says.
Outwrite Bookstore & Coffeehouse
991 Piedmont Ave., Atlanta, GA 30309
www.outwritebooks.com
atlantaauthorchris kidsdebi lowryfamilygayglaadmothernoveloutwrite bookstore and coffeehouse
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The Franchise Law Review - Edition 6
Philip Colman
MST Lawyers
Franchising is a sophisticated and stable sector of the Australian economy, with an estimated turnover of A$146 billion. In Australia there are an estimated 1,160 franchise brands and 79,000 business-format franchise units. Approximately 4 per cent of small businesses in Australia are franchise units. Franchising is dominated by retailing and this industry segment (particularly non-food retailing) has been faced with intense competition. Food retailing has been more resilient, with consumers responding well to variety and innovation in food concepts.
While about 90 per cent of franchise systems in Australia are 'home-grown', many foreign-based systems are also well established in Australia. They include KFC, McDonald's, Subway, 7-Eleven, Marriott, InterContinental Hotels, Specsavers, Pandora Jewellery, Lift Brands, Europcar, Jani-King, Baskin-Robbins and the Franchise Council of Australia's 'International Franchisor of the Year' for 2018, Anytime Fitness.
Australia's many home-grown successes include Bakers Delight (known as Cobs Bread in Canada and the United States), Boost Juice, Hairhouse Warehouse, Jim's Group, Autobarn, Zambrero, Poolwerx, IGA supermarkets and Priceline Pharmacy. The FCA 'Australian Emerging Franchisor of the Year' for 2018 was Laser Clinics Australia, and the FCA 'Australian Established Franchisor of the Year' for 2018 was Hire A Hubby.
The FCA is the peak body for the franchise sector in Australia, representing franchisees, franchisors and service providers to the sector.
II MARKET ENTRY
i Restrictions
Subject to the foreign investment laws referred to below, foreign business entities are not precluded from operating a franchise system in Australia (including granting master franchise or development rights to local entities) provided they comply with Australian law (particularly laws governing franchising outlined below). A foreign business entity may establish an Australian subsidiary in accordance with the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth).
If the Australian subsidiary is an Australian private company, at least one director of the company must reside in Australia.
Foreign investment is governed by the Foreign Investment Review Board (FIRB). Whether foreign investment approval is required depends upon the type of investment and whether the investment is above a monetary threshold. Most residential real estate acquisitions require prior FIRB approval, as do certain acquisitions of commercial real estate. Acquisitions of shares in or assets of businesses valued at more than the applicable monetary threshold (which as of 1 January 2018 is A$261 million for non-US investors) require FIRB approval. For US investors, the free trade agreement between Australia and the United States has established different criteria and threshold values depending on whether the investment is within a 'prescribed sensitive sector' of industry. In most instances, these scenarios will not apply to a prospective foreign franchisor, unless it proposes to enter the Australian market via an acquisition. Further information can be obtained from the FIRB website at www.firb.gov.au.
ii Foreign exchange and tax
There are several key tax considerations relating to cross-border franchising in Australia. These can apply to both inbound and outbound transactions and to franchisors and franchisees:
Residency and double taxation – in which country or countries are you liable for income tax?
Foreign exchange – how are dealings in foreign currency treated and when are they subject to tax?
Withholding tax – is withholding tax payable, what rate applies and is double taxation an issue?
Goods and Services Tax (GST) – is GST payable and if so, who is liable to pay the GST? Is this a cash-flow issue or does this impact your profitability? GST can be a real cost in relation to international transactions.
Transfer pricing – are dealings between parties in different countries at arm's length and is the documentation adequate?
Some of these are discussed in more detail below. Careful planning and experienced tax advice is essential in dealing with these issues.
III INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY2
i Brand search
IP Australia (the Australian government agency responsible for the administration of Australia's intellectual property) maintains databases of all registered trademarks, designs, patents and plant breeders' rights. These databases can assist in determining whether the use of a new brand name, logo, design or patent could infringe another party's rights. These searchable databases are available at www.ipaustralia.gov.au.
However, IP Australia's databases only contain information if registration of an intellectual property right has been sought. As a result, it may difficult to ascertain whether a third party has any unregistered intellectual property rights, particularly in the case of prior use of unregistered trademarks or copyright. Searches of the Australian Securities and Investment Commission's databases of registered company and business names, domain name searches and general internet searches can assist in locating third parties that may have unregistered intellectual property rights, particularly in relation to trademarks.
ii Brand protection
Applications to register an interest in intellectual property must be made through IP Australia. The registration process differs depending on the particular right you are trying to obtain. Generally, applications will be subject to an examination by IP Australia to determine whether the registration should be accepted. Third parties will have an option to oppose the applications before they are registered.
More detailed information regarding each particular registration process is available at www.ipaustralia.gov.au.
In Australia, there is no system of registration for copyright. If the material satisfies the statute, copyright protection will exist automatically.
iii Enforcement
Australia does not have a regulatory body that enforces a party's intellectual property rights. It is the responsibility of the party with an interest in the intellectual property to enforce its rights, usually by way of court proceedings. A registered intellectual property interest generally gives the registered owner the right to prevent other people from using the intellectual property, or to obtain relief if the intellectual property is infringed. The relief may consist of monetary compensation or the right to seek an injunction whereby the court orders the party to immediately cease its infringing behaviour.
Additionally, both registered and non-registered intellectual property rights may be indirectly enforced with the application of the tort of passing off and the statutory prohibition on corporations engaging in misleading and deceptive conduct.
iv Data protection, cybercrime, social media and e-commerce
In Australia there is no legislation regarding cybercrime, social media and e-commerce that specifically pertains to franchises. However, there is legislation that applies to most organisations in a more general sense.
The Privacy Act 1988 (the Privacy Act) and the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) significantly affect the way organisations collect, store, use, disclose and dispose of personal information about individuals. For example, organisations may be held accountable for sending personal information offshore if the recipient subsequently breaches the APPs. Additionally, the APPs limit the right to use personal information for direct marketing purposes in certain circumstances.3 There is a higher standard of protection afforded to sensitive information, which includes information about a person's racial or ethnic origin, religious or philosophical beliefs, political opinions or membership of a political party or trade association or trade union, sexual practices or preferences, criminal record, health information (including predictive data) and biometric data.
Recent amendments to the Privacy Act4 mean that from February 2018, all entities regulated under the Privacy Act are required to notify affected individuals and the Privacy Commissioner when a data breach is likely to result in serious harm to individuals whose personal information is involved in the breach. In the event of a data breach, entities must conduct an expeditious assessment (within 30 days) to determine the likelihood of serious harm being caused to individuals. Serious harm to an individual may include serious physical, psychological, emotional, financial or reputational harm. If serious harm is found to be likely, entities must notify both the individuals affected and the Privacy Commissioner.
The Privacy Commissioner's powers include additional investigation and audit powers and the power to make enforceable undertakings, develop and register binding privacy codes and commence proceedings in the Federal Court or the Federal Circuit Court. Penalties of up to A$2.1 million can be ordered for serious or repeated breaches of the APPs by corporations and up to A$420,000 for individuals. E-commerce has become a vital component of most businesses in Australia and as a result cybercrime has become a pertinent issue. The APPs require organisations to take reasonable steps to protect data from theft, misuse, interference, loss, unauthorised access, modification or disclosure.5
Currently there is very little legislation that deals directly with e-commerce. However, the Electronic Transactions Act 1999 (Cth) does contain provisions that promote business and community confidence in the use of electronic transactions. The Act states that a transaction is not invalid because it takes place wholly or partly by electronic communications.6 The Act sets out when the requirements for a signature are satisfied in relation to electronic communications.7 Recent cases have applied traditional common law principles to the making of contracts online but have highlighted the need for clear processes to ensure certainty about terms being incorporated into online contracts, and also the need for clear statements given by the accepting party as to their agreement.8 Parties are likely to be bound to terms in online contracts by clicking 'I agree' where such terms were visible and accessible to the accepting party prior to acceptance.
Coupled with the growth of e-commerce trading is organisations' utilisation of social media communication channels. Australian laws will no doubt continue to evolve to govern the commercial use of social media outlets. The courts have recently ruled that companies may be held responsible for third-party comments posted on their social media pages if the comments contravene Australian consumer laws or advertising standards.9 As a result, organisations are required to monitor their social media pages frequently to actively remove any defamatory, misleading or abusive comments posted by third parties.
IV FRANCHISE LAW
i Legislation
On 1 January 2015, the Competition and Consumer (Industry Codes – Franchising) Regulation 2014 entitled 'Franchising Code of Conduct' (the Code) replaced the former Trade Practices (Industry Codes – Franchising) Regulation 1998 (the Old Code). This is the primary franchise-specific law in Australia.
The Code is a prescribed mandatory industry code under the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) and is underpinned by that Act by virtue of that Act providing that a person must not, in trade or commerce, contravene an applicable industry code.10
The stated underlying purpose of the Code is to regulate the conduct of participants in franchising towards other participants in franchising.11
The Code applies to conduct occurring on or after 1 January 2015 (other than to discharge an outstanding obligation that arose under the Old Code) in relation to a franchise agreement entered into on or after 1 October 1998.12 The application of the Code is dependent upon the existence of a franchise agreement. The Code acknowledges that a franchise agreement may be wholly or partly in writing, wholly or partly oral, or wholly or partly implied.
Hence, in determining Code applicability, one must look at the entire relationship between parties and necessarily ignore the title given to any document. When looking at that entire relationship one must positively answer all the following questions for the relationship to be considered a franchise agreement:
Does one person (the franchisor) grant to another person (the franchisee) the right to carry on a business of offering, supplying or distributing goods or services in Australia under a system or marketing plan substantially determined, controlled or suggested by the franchisor or an associate13 of the franchisor?
Is the operation of the business substantially or materially associated with a trademark, advertising or commercial symbol owned, used or licensed by the franchisor or an associate of the franchisor or specified by the franchisor or an associate of the franchisor?
Is the franchisee obliged to pay money to the franchisor under its arrangement with the franchisor?
Then, having received positive answers to the above questions, one must consider whether the relationship falls under any of the exceptions. These are:
where the only money payable by the franchisee to the franchisor under its arrangement with the franchisor is either:
payment for goods and services on a genuine wholesale basis;
repayment of loans from the franchisor to the franchisee;
payment for goods taken on consignment on a genuine wholesale basis; or
payment of market value for purchase or lease of real property, fixtures, equipment or supplies needed to start the business or to continue the business under the franchise agreement; and
employer–employee relationships, partnership relationships, landlord and tenant relationships, mortgagor and mortgagee relationships, lender and borrower relationships, the relationship between members of a cooperative registered and operating under various state and territorial laws and 'fractional franchises'.14
The Code imposes obligations on franchisors:
to act in good faith towards franchisees15 (note that an identical obligation is also imposed on franchisees) – the mutual obligation to act in good faith is dealt with in greater detail below;
to create and update and maintain16 a prescribed disclosure document17 (see below as to content);
to provide the disclosure document to franchisees and prospective franchisees;18
to refrain from entering into a franchise agreement until it has received signed certificates from the franchisee as to the obtaining or non-obtaining of legal, accounting and business advice;19
to provide a prescribed information statement (containing an explanation of franchising and warnings about business risks) as soon as practicable after a prospective franchisee formally applies or expresses an interest in acquiring a franchised business;20
to provide premises lease documents or information to franchisees, including details of any incentive or financial benefit that the franchisor or an associate of the franchisor might receive from a landlord;21
to provide copies of other relevant agreements, such as those relating to intellectual property, security agreements, confidentiality agreements and restraint agreements;22
to prepare annual financial statements of any marketing or other cooperative fund within four months of the end of a financial year and have the statements audited23 and to supply to franchisees a copy of the statements and audit report within 30 days of them being completed;24
to provide a copy of its current disclosure document to existing franchisees upon request;25
to provide ongoing disclosure to franchisees26 in relation to:
any more recently issued statement of solvency, financial statement and audit report relating to the franchisor;
changes in majority ownership or control of the franchisor;
certain proceedings brought by public agencies against the franchisor or a director of the franchisor;
judgments against the franchisor under independent contractor laws;
civil proceedings against the franchisor by more than 10 franchisees or 10 per cent of franchisees;
certain judgments against the franchisor unsatisfied for more than 28 days;
the franchisor becoming externally administered (for example, because of insolvency);
material changes to intellectual property relevant to the franchise; and
undertakings given to the competition regulator (the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC)) or orders relating to such undertakings;
to advise franchisees within six months27 of the end of the term of a franchise agreement whether or not the franchisor will extend the franchise agreement, or enter into a new franchise agreement;28
to keep proper records;29
to refrain from including in franchise agreements general releases of the franchisor from liability to the franchisee or waivers of verbal or written representation;30
not to include in franchise agreements litigation, arbitration or mediation venue provisions that require these processes to take place in venues outside the state or territory in which the franchised business is based;31
not to include in post-1 January 2015 franchise agreements clauses that require the franchisee to pay the franchisor's dispute resolution costs;32
not to unreasonably withhold consent to a request from a franchisee to a transfer of a franchise agreement where the request is accompanied by all information that the franchisor would reasonably require and expect to be given to make an informed decision;33
to specify any conditions upon which consent to a transfer of a franchise agreement is given;34
to specify the reasons why consent to a transfer of a franchise agreement has been refused:
if refused following the initial request;35 or
if revoked under a right of revocation that exists for 14 days after the consent was given;36
to allow a franchisee to terminate the franchise agreement within seven days of signing it and paying non-refundable money;37
subject to limited exceptions,38 not to terminate a franchise agreement because of a breach unless a breach notice has been served on the franchisee, the franchisee has been given reasonable time to remedy the breach39 and the franchisee does not remedy the breach within the reasonable time specified in the breach notice;40
to give reasonable notice to a franchisee of termination of a franchise agreement and the reasons for termination in circumstances where a franchisor exercises a contractual right to terminate where there is no breach by the franchisee;41
not to require a franchisee to undertake 'significant capital expenditure'42 in relation to the franchised business during the term of the franchise agreement;43
to maintain a separate bank account for marketing fees and advertising fees contributed by franchisees;44
to pay marketing and advertising fees in relation to units operated by the franchisor on the same basis as franchisees are required to contribute;45
to expend marketing and advertising fees only for expenses of the type disclosed in the disclosure document or otherwise legitimate marketing or advertising expenses, expenses agreed to by a majority of franchisees or the costs of administering and auditing the marketing fund;46
not to engage in conduct with the intention of influencing a former franchisee to request that his, her or its details be omitted from the disclosure document;47
aa not to induce franchisees not to form or participate in a franchise advisory council or like body;48 and
to include in the franchise agreement a complaint-handling procedure that complies with the Code.49
The Code also requires franchisors (as well as franchisees) to:
act in good faith (see below);
attempt to resolve disputes; and
attend mediation through a duly authorised person.
ii Pre-contractual disclosure
A linchpin of the Code is the requirement for franchisors to:
create (before entering into a franchise agreement) and update (within four months of the end of each financial year) a disclosure document that accords with the Code in terms of content and layout;50 and
to give its disclosure document (and a copy of the Code and the franchise agreement in the form in which it is to be executed) to prospective franchisees (including prospective franchisees who are acquiring an existing franchised business), renewing franchisees and existing franchisees where the term or scope of the franchise agreement is being extended, at least 14 days before the relevant documents are executed by the prospective franchisee or 14 days before a prospective franchisee pays to the franchisor any non-refundable money (whichever is the earlier).
The disclosure document requires franchisors to make disclosure under a number of key topics and subtopics. The key topics cover:
background and relevant business experience of the franchisor, its associates and key personnel;
details of relevant past and current litigation, convictions for serious offences or insolvency relating to or involving the franchisor or its directors;
payments to agents for the introduction or recruitment of franchisees;
details of existing franchisees and key events51 that have occurred in the past three years;
certain prescribed information as to the relationship between the franchisor (if the franchisor is a sub-franchisor) and the master franchisor;
relevant information regarding intellectual property, including how and on what basis the franchisor can pass on rights to use the intellectual property to franchisees;
details of exclusivity or otherwise of sites or any territory;
details of franchisor's requirements for supply of goods or services to a franchisee;
details of franchisor's requirements for supply of goods or services by a franchisee;
rights, if any, of the franchisee to sell goods or services online;
rights, if any, of the franchisor to sell goods or services online;
any profit-sharing arrangement between the franchisor and franchisee in respect of online sales of goods or services;
the franchisor's site or territory selection policy;
circumstances surrounding past franchise businesses ceasing to operate in the territory to be franchised;
payments to be made by a franchisee, including prepayments, establishment costs and other recurring or isolated payments;
details relating to contributions to, expenditure from, administration and auditing, a marketing or other cooperative fund;
details of any financing offered by the franchisor;
details of unilateral variations to the franchise agreement in the past three years and circumstances where the franchise agreement may be unilaterally varied in the future;
details of arrangements to apply at the end of the franchise agreement;
details of whether the franchise agreement will be amended on a transfer or novation;
any earnings information that a franchisor wishes to give and the basis for the information;
a statement of solvency signed by a director of the franchisor;
either financial reports of the franchisor for the past two financial years or an audit report supporting the franchisor's director's statement of solvency; and
any other relevant updates pertaining to key changes that may have occurred since the disclosure document was created.
The disclosure document must have attached to it a copy of the Code and the franchise agreement in the form in which it is to be executed by the franchisee. In addition, it must include a form of receipt for signing and return by the franchisee.
If, after the date the disclosure document is given, the franchise agreement is amended to give effect to a request by the franchisee or otherwise by filling in required particulars or correcting mistakes or to clarify minor matters, there is no need to redisclose.
Violations of the Code can give rise to affected parties seeking a wide range of civil remedies, such as damages, injunctions and orders setting aside or varying the franchise agreement or the regulator (the ACCC) issuing an infringement notice (A$10,500) or issuing legal proceedings seeking a civil pecuniary penalty of up to A$63,000 per offence.
The ACCC has recently made a strong submission to the inquiry by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services into the operation and effectiveness of the Code that these penalties be increased significantly. At the time of writing, the findings of the inquiry had yet to be published.
iii Registration
There are no mandatory requirements for the registration of disclosure documents or franchise agreements in Australia. However, a number of submissions made to the above-mentioned Parliamentary Joint Committee inquiry into the Code, including one from the FCA, support the introduction of a system of registration in Australia. It remains to be seen what recommendations this Committee will make to the government, and whether they will be accepted and result in changes to the law.
iv Mandatory clauses
The only mandatory clauses prescribed by the Code are those relating to complaint handling and dispute resolution. These are more fully described below.
However, in practice, franchisors mirror many of the provisions of the Code in their franchise agreements, particularly those relating to the cooling-off rights of a franchisee, termination and the procedure for considering requests for a transfer or novation of a franchise agreement.
v Guarantees and protection
As a general rule, guarantees given by persons to support the obligations of franchisees to franchisors are enforceable against the guarantors. The guarantee must be properly executed and it must not be procured by the fraud, undue influence or unconscionable conduct of the franchisor. Where guarantees are sought from persons who do not have equity in or a financial interest in the franchisee, prudent franchisors should insist that the guarantors obtain independent legal advice before accepting the guarantee.
V TAX
i Franchisor tax liabilities
Franchisors domiciled in Australia are subject to the following Australian taxes:
income tax: Australian franchisors will be subject to Australian income tax on their Australian income, including income from foreign sources. The current company tax rate for small businesses (businesses with a turnover of less than A$50 million for the year ended 30 June 2019) is 27.5 per cent and for all other companies the current tax rate is 30 per cent. These rates are expected to reduce to 26 per cent for the year ended 30 June 2021 and to 25 per cent for the year ended 30 June 2022; and
GST: GST (currently 10 per cent) must be collected on Australian sales and remitted to the tax office. This is only a timing (cash flow) issue and should have no impact on profits. Exports of goods and services may qualify for a GST exemption if strict conditions are met.
If the franchisor has foreign branch franchisees, they may end up paying double tax even if a taxation treaty exists. Further, payments received from foreign franchisees may be subject to withholding tax in a foreign country.
Foreign franchisors are subject to the following Australian taxes:
income tax: if business is conducted through an Australian subsidiary, the subsidiary is liable for Australian income tax at the same rates specified for franchisors domiciled in Australia. A foreign-owned Australian subsidiary often results in double taxation because the profits are generally also taxable in the head entity's jurisdiction but without credit for any Australian tax paid by the subsidiary, particularly in the absence of a double-taxation treaty. If a foreign entity has a branch in Australia, it is subject to Australian income tax on its Australian business profits. Franchisors will not ordinarily have a branch simply because they have Australian franchisees. Branches can also result in double taxation even if a tax treaty exists. Careful structuring is the key;
withholding tax: a foreign franchisor receiving fees from Australia may lose some of those fees in withholding tax. Contracts and costing need to account for this. Presently, franchise royalties are subject to a 30 per cent withholding tax, although this is subject to the jurisdiction of the franchisor; and
GST: importers of goods into Australia are generally liable for GST on importation. If not properly structured, importation of goods can result in denial of GST credits leaving the franchisor or their agent out of pocket. ATO public ruling GSTR 2003/15 covers importation and GST.
ii Franchisee tax liabilities
Franchisees are subject to the following taxes:
income tax: Australian-owned franchisees are subject to Australian income tax on their worldwide income. Fees paid to a franchisor will generally reduce the Australian taxable income of the franchisee. This may not be the case for payments such as upfront franchise fees and initial training, which may be seen as capital and hence non-deductible expenses;
withholding tax: if withholding tax applies to payments made to foreign residents, the obligation to withhold tax rests with the franchisee. A denial of franchisees deductions will often occur until the withholding tax is paid;
GST: as with foreign franchisors, the franchisee may be the importer of goods and should be aware of structuring issues, which may lead to the loss of GST credits on imported goods; and
foreign exchange: foreign-denominated transactions must be translated into Australian dollars and gains or losses on currency movements are subject to Australian tax. Foreign exchange gains can sometimes be taxed on an accrued basis and not when received.
iii Tax-efficient structures
The key to cross-border franchising is being able to understand the interaction between the two jurisdictions' tax systems to avoid double taxation. This applies for all inbound and outbound transactions, and for both franchisees and franchisors.
There is no single optimal structure and each situation must be evaluated on its facts. Sometimes the use of trusts, partnerships, limited partnerships or hybrid entities can provide a better result by allowing foreign tax credits to pass through, and by avoiding double tax.
VI IMPACT OF GENERAL LAW
Australia is a federation of six states and two territories and has a common law-based legal system. Franchising primarily involves contractual considerations and, hence, the common law and equitable principles of contract developed or adopted by Australian courts play a significant part in franchising. It is not possible in this chapter to even summarise those principles other than to say that they are in many respects similar to those in the United Kingdom and, to a slightly lesser extent, the United States.
i Good faith
The Code mandates that each party or proposed party to a franchise agreement must act towards each other with good faith in accordance with the common law.52 A court, in deciding whether there has been a breach of this obligation, may have regard to whether the party acted honestly and not arbitrarily and whether the party cooperated to achieve the purposes of the franchise agreement. Any clause in a franchise agreement that attempts to limit or exclude this obligation will be void.
Parties who act in their legitimate commercial interests are unlikely to contravene this provision. Likewise the Code expressly provides that a franchisor who does not offer an option to renew or right to extend a franchise agreement will not be deemed to have acted contrary to the good-faith obligation.
The existing common law position in Australia is that:
there is to be implied in every franchise agreement a term of good faith and fair dealing that obliges each party to exercise the powers conferred on it by the agreement in good faith and reasonably and not capriciously or for some extraneous purpose; and
the scope of the duty is fettered in that it cannot operate to deny to a party the right to exercise a power conferred by the contract for the promotion or protection of its legitimate commercial interests.53
The former chief justice of the High Court of Australia (Australia's highest appellate court) Sir Anthony Mason has stated54 that good faith comprises three notions:
an obligation on the parties to cooperate in achieving the contractual objects;
compliance with honest standards of conduct; and
compliance with standards of conduct that are reasonable, having regard to the interests of the parties.55
The consequences of a failure to comply with the good-faith obligation include potential exposure to pecuniary penalties and civil remedies, such as damages, restitutionary orders, injunctions and the like, as well as orders varying the terms of a franchise agreement.
ii Misleading and deceptive conduct
The Australian Consumer Law, which is part of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth), prohibits conduct that is misleading or deceptive or that is likely to mislead or deceive.56 Allegations of breach of this law are very common in lawsuits and pre-litigation demands. They are also the most common type of allegation made by a franchisee against a franchisor. It is often alleged that a franchisee has been induced by pre-contractual conduct or representations to enter into a franchise agreement and that the conduct or representations were misleading or deceptive. The Australian Consumer Law deems representations as to future matters (for example, earnings projections) to be misleading and deceptive, unless the maker of the representation can prove that it had reasonable grounds for the representation.57
The consequences of a finding of misleading and deceptive conduct in a civil suit include awards of damages (assuming a necessary causal link between the impugned conduct and loss can be established), injunctions, orders for refund of money or orders varying or rescinding a contract. If the regulator, the ACCC, brings proceedings, it can, in addition, seek pecuniary penalties, enforceable undertakings, publication orders and orders requiring the offending party to implement a trade practices compliance programme.
These laws are of wide application and also apply to marketing and credence claims in relation to goods and services that are offered for sale. The regulator, the ACCC, has and remains very vigilant in monitoring such activities and, in appropriate cases, seeking pecuniary penalties often in excess of A$1 million for breaches of these laws.
iii Unconscionable conduct
The Australian Consumer Law also prohibits unconscionable conduct.58 The courts have been reluctant to restrict the definition of unconscionable conduct but seem to have settled that it entails conduct that involves:
notions of serious misconduct or something that is clearly unfair or unreasonable where the alleged contravener shows no regard for conscience and has acted in a manner that is irreconcilable with what is right or reasonable;
normally, some moral fault or moral responsibility;
some deliberate (in the sense of intentional) act or at least a reckless act; and
a high level of moral obloquy.59
The potential consequences of a finding of unconscionable conduct are the same as those for a finding of misleading and deceptive conduct outlined above.
iv Unfair contract terms
Laws that allow courts to strike down or not enforce unfair contract terms60 in consumer contracts61 did not apply to franchise agreements until recently.
However, legislation recently passed by the Australian Parliament that amends the Australian Consumer Law has the effect of extending the unfair contract laws to a much wider range of small business contracts, including franchise agreements. This new law applies to a standard-form small-business contract entered into, varied or renewed on or after 12 November 2016 where three criteria are met:
the contract is for the supply of goods or services or the sale or grant of an interest in land;
at least one of the parties is a small business (employs fewer than 20 people, including casual employees employed on a regular and systematic basis); and
the price payable up front is no more than A$300,000 or, if the contract is for more than 12 months, A$1 million.
A court or tribunal can declare that unfair terms are void if the following three tests are satisfied:
it would cause a significant imbalance in the parties' rights and obligations arising under the contract;
it is not reasonably necessary to protect the legitimate interests of the party who would be advantaged by the term; and
it would cause detriment (whether financial or otherwise) to a party if it were to be applied or relied on.
The law presumes that a contract is a standard form contract unless the other person proves otherwise (a reverse onus). A court may take account of the following in determining whether a contract is a standard form contract:
whether one of the parties has all or most of the bargaining power relating to the transaction;
whether the contract was prepared by one party before any discussion relating to the transaction occurred between the parties;
whether another party was, in effect, required to either accept or reject the terms of the contract in the form they were presented;
whether another party was given an effective opportunity to negotiate the terms of the contract; and
whether the terms of the contract take into account the specific characteristics of another party or a particular transaction.
In most instances, franchise agreements would be considered to be standard form contracts.
The new law gives examples of terms that may be unfair such as:
terms that enable one party (but not another) to avoid or limit their obligations under the contract;
terms that enable one party (but not another) to terminate the contract;
terms that penalise one party (but not another) for breaching or terminating the contract; and
terms that enable one party (but not another) to vary the terms of the contract.
Certain terms of contracts are not covered by these laws and, hence, cannot be declared void on the ground of unfairness. They are:
terms that define the main subject matter of the contract;
terms that set the price payable up front; and
terms that are expressly permitted by federal and state legislation (for example, terms permitted under the Code.
v Agency distributor model
In theory, in a given case a franchisee could be subject to the laws of agency, whereby it is said that the franchisee is the agent of the franchisor.
If a franchisee was considered to be an agent of the franchisor, the franchisor would be seen as the party contracting with the customer thereby allowing the customer to exercise contractual rights against the franchisor (for example, if goods are defective or not merchantable). It is also conceivable that the franchisor (as principal) might be liable for some debts incurred by the franchisee (as agent).
It is the prospect of these dire consequences that has resulted in nearly all franchise agreements used in Australia making provision that no agency relationship exists. Courts generally will uphold these provisions.
vi Employment law
At federal and state level workplace relations laws exist that regulate the employment of staff by franchisors and franchisees throughout Australia. The Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) contains a set of employment standards that apply to all workers in Australia.
Franchisees will not be treated as employees of the franchisor unless the relationship is, in reality, an employer–employee relationship but clothed with a sham description such as a franchise agreement or independent contractor arrangement.
On 14 September 2017, the Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Vulnerable Workers) Act 2017 (Cth) was enacted. This law amends the Fair Work Act in a number of respects, but it is the following critical amendments that impact on franchising.
The new law introduces a new civil penalty liability for franchisors. A 'responsible franchisor' will contravene the Fair Work Act if one of its franchisees contravenes a civil remedy provision in the Fair Work Act (see below) and either the franchisor or an officer of the franchisor knew or could reasonably be expected to have known that the contravention by the franchisee would occur or, at the time of the contravention by the franchisee, the franchisor or an officer of the franchisor knew or could reasonably be expected to have known that a contravention by the franchisee of the same or a similar character was likely to occur.
A responsible franchisor is a franchisor that has a significant degree of influence or control over the franchisees' affairs.
The various civil remedy provisions under the Fair Work Act that can be contravened by a franchisee and that can expose a franchisor to the newly proposed statutory liability include:
contraventions of the National Employment Standards;
contraventions of modern awards;
contraventions of enterprise agreements;
contraventions of workplace determinations;
contraventions of national minimum wage orders;
contraventions of equal remuneration orders;
contraventions of provisions dealing with methods and frequency of payment;
contraventions of provisions dealing with methods of payment specified in awards or enterprise agreements;
contraventions of provisions dealing with unreasonable requirements for the employee to spend or pay an amount;
contraventions of provisions dealing with unreasonable requirements for a prospective employee to spend or pay an amount;
contraventions of provisions dealing with employer obligations in relation to guarantees of earnings;
contraventions of provisions dealing with misrepresenting employment as independent contracting;
contraventions of provisions dealing with dismissing an employee to engage as an independent contractor;
contraventions of provisions dealing with misrepresentations to engage an individual as an independent contractor;
contraventions of provisions dealing with employer obligations in relation to employee records; and
contraventions of provisions dealing with employer obligations in relation to payslips.
The new law appropriately limits the franchisor's exposure to liability if at the time of, or prior to, the franchisee's contravention, the franchisor had taken reasonable steps to prevent the contravention. In determining whether a franchisor took reasonable steps to prevent a contravention, a court may have regard to all relevant matters, including:
the size and resources of the franchise;
the extent to which the franchisor had the ability to influence or control the contravening franchisees' conduct in relation to the contravention;
any action the franchisor took to ensure the franchisee had reasonable knowledge and understanding of the requirements under the applicable provisions of the Fair Work Act;
the franchisor's arrangements for assessing the franchisee's compliance with the applicable provisions of the Fair Work Act;
the franchisor's arrangements for receiving and addressing complaints about alleged contraventions within the franchise; and
the extent to which the franchisor's arrangements with the franchisee encourage or require the franchisee to comply with the Fair Work Act or other workplace law.
The new law also provides that where a franchisor has paid to, or on behalf of, an employee, an amount pursuant to an order relating to a contravention by a franchisee, and the franchisor has not been able to recover that amount from the franchisee, the franchisor may commence proceedings against the franchisee.
vii Consumer protection
Franchisees and franchisors who sell goods and services to consumers must comply with the Australian Consumer Law.
The concept of 'consumer' underpins many of the provisions in the Australian Consumer Law. A person can only be considered to have acquired goods or services as a consumer if:
the goods or services were not acquired for resupply or the purpose of transformation in the course of production or manufacture;
the amount paid for the goods or services does not exceed A$40,000; and
c the goods or services were of a kind ordinarily acquired for personal, domestic or household use or consumption.62
Goods or services (including franchise rights) acquired under a franchise agreement will generally not meet these tests.
viii Competition law
Australian competition laws63 are extensive and complex. Penalties for breaches of the 'restrictive-trade-practices' provisions can result in fines of up to A$10 million, or fines calculated at three times the benefit obtained by the infringer from its illegal activities or, if that cannot be determined, up to 10 per cent of the annual turnover from the preceding 12 months.
The most common areas under the restrictive-trade-practices laws that affect franchising are:
the prohibition of cartels and cartel provisions (i.e., contracts, arrangements or understandings between competitors that relate to price-fixing, restricting outputs in the production and supply chain, allocating customers, suppliers or territories or bid-rigging);
the prohibition of third-line forcing that has the effect of substantially lessening competition (for example, where a franchisor compels a franchisee to purchase goods or services from a third-party supplier); and
the prohibition of resale price maintenance (for example, where a franchisor sells goods to a franchisee on the condition that the franchisee will not resell those goods below a certain price).
This list is by no means exhaustive and best-practice franchisors in Australia undertake extensive trade practices training and create and implement compliance programmes.
All the above examples are capable of being effectively sanctioned by the competition regulator (the ACCC) through processes known as 'authorisations' and 'notifications'. A person seeking an authorisation or notification clearly needs to put forward a legitimate case as to why her or she should be allowed to engage in conduct that is otherwise illegal. At a minimum it must be shown that the proposed conduct creates a public benefit that outweighs the detriment associated with the anticompetitive conduct.
ix Restrictive covenants
Non-compete or restrictive covenants contained in a franchise agreement must be carefully drafted. If they are vague, they may not be enforced or, at the very least, be read down to the least restrictive interpretation.
If the non-compete or restrictive covenant goes beyond what is necessary to protect the legitimate business interests of the franchisor (as they were at the time the franchise agreement was executed), it will not be enforceable.
They may also be unenforceable by virtue of Clause 23 of the Code (which only applies to franchise agreements entered into or varied on or after 1 January 2015), which provides that a restraint of trade clause in a franchise agreement or some other associated document will have no effect after the franchise agreement expires if all the following five circumstances exist:
the franchisee has sought in writing to extend the franchise agreement on substantially the same terms as those contained in the franchisor's current franchise agreement and that apply to other franchisees or would apply to prospective franchisees;
the franchisee was not in breach of the franchise agreement or any related agreement;
the franchisee has not infringed the intellectual property of, or a confidentiality agreement with, the franchisor during the term of the franchise agreement;
the franchisor does not extend the franchise agreement; and
the franchisee claimed compensation for goodwill because the agreement was not extended but the compensation given was merely a nominal amount and did not provide genuine compensation for goodwill; or
the agreement did not allow the franchisee to claim compensation for goodwill in the event that it was not extended.
They may also be unenforceable by virtue of the new unfair-contract term laws referred to above.
If a franchisee is in breach of a legitimate and enforceable non-compete or restrictive covenant and refuses to cease that conduct, a franchisor may apply to a court for an injunction restraining the franchisee from continuing with the conduct. An injunction can be obtained fairly quickly (at an interlocutory stage in the proceeding) if the court is satisfied there is a serious question to be tried, the balance of convenience favours the granting of the injunction (which often involves consideration of whether damages can provide an adequate alternative remedy) and the applicant (franchisor) undertakes to the court to compensate the franchisee for any loss it suffers if, at the final hearing, the court holds in favour of the franchisee.
x Termination
Termination of a franchise agreement must be effected according to the franchise agreement, the Code or the common law.
A franchisor who has validly terminated a franchise agreement will be able to enforce provisions in the franchise agreement intended to survive termination, such as non-compete or restrictive covenants (provided they are not too wide – see above), confidentiality obligations, prohibitions on ongoing use of intellectual property, return of confidential information and manuals and de-branding obligations.
The ability of a franchisor to effectively take over the terminated franchisee's business will depend on a number of factors such as:
whether the franchisor has rights to occupy leased premises to the exclusion of the franchisee;
whether the franchisor has the right to use or to acquire the hard assets used by the franchisee in operating the business (well-drafted franchise agreements will contain these rights); and
whether the franchisor has the resources to take over operation of the business.
xi Anti-corruption and anti-terrorism regulation
The laws of Australian States and Territories outlaw what is commonly known as bribery.
The Criminal Code 1995 (Cth), while not applying to bribes in the private sector, creates offences relating to the bribery of local and foreign public officials. A company can be held criminally responsible for the actions of its employees, officers or agents acting within the actual or apparent scope of their employment or authority.
The Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006 (Cth) contains extensive provisions designed to combat money laundering and the financing of terrorism. This legislation imposes various obligations relating to customer identification, transaction monitoring and suspicious transaction reporting. The money laundering offences are quite wide and extend to receiving, possessing or disposing of money or property that is reasonably suspected of being the proceeds of crime.
xii Dispute resolution
Very few franchising disputes reach adjudication in Australian courts.
The major reasons for this are:
alternative dispute resolution, such as mediation, is extensively used;
b litigation is extremely expensive, slow and uncertain; and
it is very difficult to succeed on summary judgment applications.
Although franchise agreements must contain complaint-handling provisions prescribed by the Code,64 the right of a party to commence legal proceedings is not affected by those provisions, unless the franchise agreement says so.65
It is extremely rare for local franchising disputes to be referred to arbitration in Australia. It is extremely rare for local franchise agreements to provide for arbitration as a means of adjudicating disputes. Nearly all civil cases in Australia (and all franchising cases) are decided by a judge; juries are not permitted and, hence, the fear of the runaway jury does not exist.
Properly drafted exclusive forum provisions in franchise agreements entered into prior to 1 January 2015 will generally be upheld by Australian courts. It is wise to highlight in a disclosure document, or some other document provided to the franchisee before it signs the franchise agreement, the disadvantages the franchisee might face if it is required to litigate or arbitrate overseas.66
In respect of franchise agreements entered into on or after 1 January 2015, the Code makes it unlawful to include a clause requiring a party to bring an action or proceeding or conduct mediation in relation to a dispute under the agreement in any state or territory of Australia or any other country other than the state or territory of Australia where the relevant franchised business is located.67 Further, any clause in a franchise agreement entered into on or after 1 January 2015 to this effect will not be enforceable.68
The procedure for instigating mediation involves:
a party serving on another party a notice of dispute;69
attempts then being made to try to resolve the dispute; and
if the dispute is not resolved in 21 days, either party may refer the dispute to mediation; this is done by notifying the Office of the Franchise Mediation Adviser, which will then liaise with the parties and appoint a mediator from its panel of mediators.
Once a mediator is appointed, a mediation agreement will need to be signed by all parties (including any non-parties who may attend mediation). This agreement will set the ground rules, which will include confirmation of the without-prejudice nature of the discussions, the critical confidentiality obligations and the mediator's fees and the sharing of fees.
The Code also imposes some rules. It requires:70
the parties to attend mediation and try to resolve the dispute;
the person attending on behalf of a party having full authority to settle the dispute;
the parties to make clear what they want to achieve from the mediation process; and
the parties not to do things that might damage the reputation of the franchise system.
As stated above, in the absence of a provision in a franchise agreement to the contrary, a party may head straight down the litigation path. This is common if an urgent injunction is required; for example, in circumstances where a terminated franchisee might be continuing to use the franchisor's intellectual property or breaching a valid non-compete provision. Usually, an interlocutory injunction will be sought, which is one that stays in place until the final hearing and determination of the proceeding and at this point no costs orders are made in favour of a successful applicant – rather, they are reserved for later determination.
Subject to this reservation, in most courts in Australia, costs follow the event (the loser is ordered to pay the winner's costs), with the quantum of costs being determined not by what the lawyer charged his client, but by reference to costing scales or concepts of reasonableness.
Enforcement of judgments and arbitral awards in Australia involve court processes, including asset seizure and sale, attachment of debts or earnings and insolvency proceedings.
As a signatory to the United Nations Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (the New York Convention), a foreign award (not an award made in Australia in an international arbitration) may be enforced in the federal, state and territory courts71 as if the award were a judgment or order of that court.72
VII CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
The franchising market in Australia remains reasonably buoyant. However, the reputation of franchising in Australia has been affected by adverse media reports about a number of high-profile brands that had, within their systems, a substantial degree of discontent among franchisees. These reports may well have affected the ability of franchisors to sell new franchise units and the ability of existing franchisees to sell their franchised businesses.
On 22 March 2018, the Senate (the upper house of the Australian Parliament) referred an inquiry into the operation and effectiveness of the Code to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Corporations and Financial Services for report by 30 September 2018. The terms of reference are:
the operation and effectiveness of the Code, including the disclosure document and information statement, and the Oil Code of Conduct (the Oil Code), in ensuring full disclosure to potential franchisees of all information necessary to make a fully informed decision when assessing whether to enter a franchise agreement, including information on:
the likely financial performance of a franchise and worst-case scenarios;
contractual rights and obligations of all parties, including termination rights and geographical exclusivity;
leasing arrangements and any limitations of the franchisee's ability to enforce tenants' rights; and
expected running costs, including cost of goods required to be purchased through prescribed suppliers;
the effectiveness of dispute resolution under the Code and the Oil Code;
the impact of the Australian consumer law unfair-contract provisions on new, renewed and terminated franchise agreements entered into since 12 November 2016, including whether changes to standard franchise agreements have resulted;
whether the provisions of other mandatory industry codes of conduct, such as the Oil Code, contain advantages or disadvantages relevant to franchising relationships in comparison with terms of the Code;
the adequacy and operation of termination provisions in the Code and the Oil Code;
the imposition of restraints of trade on former franchisees following the termination of a franchise agreement;
the enforcement of breaches of the Code and the Oil Code and other applicable laws, such as the Competition and Consumer Act 2010, by franchisors; and
any related matter.
The outcome of this inquiry is likely to be known by the time this chapter is published. However, the inquiry will only make recommendations to government. Thereafter the government will have to consider those recommendations and seek further public consultation before deciding on any legislative changes. This may be delayed by a general election to be held in Australia in or before May 2019. Detailed information regarding any recommended changes to the regulation of franchising in Australia is expected to be published on the website of the FCA.
1 Philip Colman is a partner at MST Lawyers.
2 The writer acknowledges the contribution to this section by Louise Wolf, a senior associate at MST Lawyers who specialises in intellectual property law.
3 For example, organisations must not use personal data for direct marketing purposes unless the individual would reasonably expect the organisation to use the information for that purpose and the organisation provides a simple means by which the individual may easily request not to receive direct marketing.
4 Privacy Amendment (Notifiable Data Breaches) Act 2017.
5 The Privacy Act 1988 (Cth), Schedule 1, Australian Privacy Principle 11.
6 The Electronic Transactions Act 1999 (Cth), Section 8.
7 The Electronic Transactions Act 1999 (Cth), Section 10.
8 eBay International AG v. Creative Festival Entertainment Pty Ltd [2006] FCA 1768; Smythe v. Thomas (2007) 71 NSWLR 537; Goldstein v. Jumbo Corporation Limited [2006] VCAT 2472, Evagora v. eBay Australia & New Zealand Pty Ltd [2001] VCAT 49.
9 Australian Competition and Consumer Commission v. Allergy Pathway Pty Ltd (No. 2) [2011] FCA 74.
10 Section 51AD of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth).
11 Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 2.
13 Defined in the Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 4.
14 Franchises where the goods and services of the franchise are substantially the same as those sold for the previous two years by the franchisee before the franchise agreement was entered into, and sales of those goods and services are unlikely to provide more than 20 per cent of the franchisee's gross revenue in the first year of the term.
16 The obligation to create and update so as to be compliant with the Code did not arise until 31 October 2015 if the franchisor has an existing disclosure document created under the Old Code. Otherwise the obligation to update must be met within four months of the end of the franchisor's financial year; however, the requirement to update does not exist if the franchisor did not enter into more than one franchise agreement in that financial year and the franchisor does not intend to enter into a franchise agreement in the next financial year.
17 This obligation does not exist for master franchisors in relation to sub-franchisees (i.e., where a sub-franchisor or master franchisee is interposed).
19 Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 10.
23 Unless 75 per cent of franchisees agree that it should not be audited.
27 This period is one month if the term of the franchise agreement is six months or less.
31 Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 21; also note that this Clause only applies to franchise agreements entered into or varied on or after 1 January 2015.
33 See the Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 25(2). Clause 25(3) sets out certain circumstances where it would be reasonable to withhold such consent.
34 Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 25(1)(b).
35 Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 25(1)(a).
36 Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 25(5).
38 The exceptions, described in Clause 29, only apply if the franchise agreement gives the franchisor the right to terminate the franchise agreement. They are:
athe franchisee no longer holding a necessary licence to conduct the franchised business;
bfranchisee insolvency;
ca corporate franchisee being deregistered under Australian company law;
dvoluntary abandonment of franchised business or the franchise relationship by the franchisee;
ethe franchisee is convicted of a serious criminal offence;
fthe franchisee operating business in a way that endangers public health or safety; and
gthe franchisee acting fraudulently in connection with the operation of the franchised business.
If one of these exceptions exists, a franchisor may immediately terminate the franchise agreement, unless the agreement provides otherwise.
39 This need not exceed 30 days.
42 The Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 30(2) provides that significant capital expenditure does not include:
aexpenditure disclosed in the disclosure document given on entering into, renewing or extending the term of the franchise agreement;
bif the expenditure is to be incurred by all or a majority of franchisees, expenditure approved by a majority of those franchisees;
cexpenditure incurred by the franchisee to comply with legislative obligations;
dexpenditure agreed by the franchisee; and
eexpenditure that the franchisor considers is necessary as capital investment in the franchised business, justified by a written statement given to each affected franchisee of:
• the rationale for making the investment;
• the amount of capital expenditure required;
• the anticipated outcomes and benefits; and
• the expected risks associated with making the investment.
49 Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 34. As to the nature of the complaint handling procedure, see Clauses 38 and 39.
50 If, as at 1 January 2015, a franchisor has an existing disclosure document created under the Old Code, it will not be required to update its disclosure document so that it complies with the 2015 Code until the earlier of four months from the expiration of the franchisor's financial year or 31 October 2015.
51 Franchise transfers, businesses closing down, terminations, non-renewals and franchisor buy-backs.
53 Far Horizons Pty Ltd v. McDonald's Australia Ltd [2002] VSC 310; JF Keir Pty Ltd v. Priority Management Systems Pty Ltd (administrators appointed) 2007 NSWSC 789.
54 In his article 'Contract, Good Faith and Equitable Standards in Fair Dealing' (2000), 116 Law Quarterly Review 66.
55 This approach has been cited with approval in a number of cases including Burger King Corp v. Hungry Jack's Pty Ltd [2001] NSWCA 187 and Hughes Aircraft Systems International v. Airservices Australia (1997) 76 FCR 151. See also Garry Rogers Motors (Aust) Pty Ltd v. Subaru (Aust) Pty Ltd (1999) ATPR.
56 Section 18 of the Australian Consumer Law.
57 Section 4 of the Australian Consumer Law.
58 Sections 20 to 22 of the Australian Consumer Law.
59 A useful summary is found in Body Bronze International Pty Ltd & Ors v. Fehcorp Pty Ltd [2011] VSCA 196 at paragraphs 86 to 94.
60 Part 2.3 of the Australian Consumer Law.
61 A consumer contract is defined in Section 23 as a contract for the supply of goods or services or the sale or grant of an interest in land to an individual whose acquisition is wholly or predominantly for personal, domestic or household use or consumption.
62 Section 3 of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth).
63 The Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth).
64 Franchising Code of Conduct, Clauses 34, 38 and 39.
66 See Timic v. Hammock [2001] FCA 74, where the Subway forum provision was upheld primarily because of the clear warnings it gave the franchisee before entering into the franchise agreement.
69 Setting out the nature of the dispute, what outcome the complainant wants and what action the complainant thinks will settle the dispute.
70 See the Franchising Code of Conduct, Clause 29.
71 Under Section 8(2) and (3) of the International Arbitration Act 1974 (Cth).
72 See article by Justice Rares of the Federal Court of Australia at www.fedcourt.gov.au/publications/judges-speeches/justice-rares/Rares-J-20110914.rtf.
Editor's Preface
Franchising as Part of an International Multichannel Strategy
The Regulation of Franchising around the World
Sustaining Relationships
Tax Considerations
Trade Secrets and Franchising
Franchisees as Consumers
Resolving International Franchise Disputes
E-Commerce and Franchising
The Competition Law of the European Union
The Impact of Brexit on Franchising
Editor’s Global Overview
Africa Overview
Dispute Resolution Appendix
Other chapters on Australia
The Corporate Tax Planning Law Review
The Mining Law Review - Mining - Australia
The Mining Law Review - Capital Markets - Australia
The Product Regulation and Liability Review
The Shareholder Rights and Activism Review
All titles on Australia
The Shareholder Rights and Activism Review Edition 3
Editor Francis J Aquila
Sullivan & Cromwell LLP
Over the years since the financial crisis, shareholder activism has been on the rise around the world. As both shareholder activists, and the companies they target, become more geographically diverse, it is increasingly important for legal and corporate practitioners to understand the legal framework and emerging trends of shareholder activism in the various international jurisdictions facing activism. The Shareholder Rights and Activism Review is designed as a primer on these aspects of shareholder activism in such jurisdictions.
The Corporate Governance Review Edition 9
Editor Willem J L Calkoen
NautaDutilh
In this ninth edition, we can see that corporate governance is becoming a more vital and all-encompassing topic with each year that passes. We all realise that the modern corporation is one of the most ingenious concepts ever devised. Our lives are dominated by corporations. We eat and breathe through them, we travel with them, we are entertained by them, most of us work for them. Most corporations aim to add value to society, and they very often do. Some, however, are exploiting, polluting, poisoning and impoverishing us…
The Mergers & Acquisitions Review Edition 12
Editor Mark Zerdin
Slaughter and May
Despite a slight decrease in overall activity compared with 2016, 2017 was a strong year for global M&A activity as, for the fourth consecutive year, global deal-making activity exceeded US$3 trillion with announced transaction volumes reaching US$3.7 trillion. Even though 2017 did not replicate the record-breaking number of mega-deals in 2015 nor the high volume seen in 2016, market participants in a number of sectors took advantage of continued access to cheap capital globally to engage in M&A activity.
The Restructuring Review Edition 11
Editor Christopher Mallon
The global economic upswing, which began in 2016, continues to strengthen with global GDP growth reaching 3.9 per cent in the second quarter of 2018 and expected to increase further in the second half of 2018. World trade growth accelerated by 4.7 per cent in 2017, following trade growth of only 1.8 per cent in 2016. This is largely driven by cyclical improvements and an increase in investment growth in developed economies.
The Private Equity Review Edition 8
Editor Stephen L Ritchie
Private equity professionals need practical and informed guidance from local practitioners about how to raise money and close deals in multiple jurisdictions. This review has been prepared with this need in mind. It contains contributions from leading private equity practitioners in 25 different countries, with observations and advice on private equity deal-making and fundraising in their respective jurisdictions.
The Securities Litigation Review Edition 5
Editor William Savitt
Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz
The Securities Litigation Review is a guided introduction to the international varieties of enforcing rights related to the issuance and exchange of publicly traded securities. Unlike most of its sister international surveys, this review focuses on litigation – how rights are created and vindicated against the backdrop of courtroom proceedings.
The Real Estate M&A and Private Equity Review Edition 3
Editors Adam O Emmerich and Robin Panovka
This publication is a multinational guide for understanding and navigating the increasingly complex and dynamic world of liquid real estate and the transactions that mostly produce it. The sea change in the markets, sometimes called the ‘REIT Revolution’, has meant that major real estate transactions have migrated from ‘Main Street’ to ‘Wall Street’. They now often take the form of mergers, acquisitions, takeovers, spin-offs and other corporate transactions conducted in the public markets for both equity and debt.
The Insolvency Review Edition 6
Editor Donald S Bernstein
This volume offers an in-depth review of market conditions and insolvency case developments in key countries around the world. A debt of gratitude is owed to the outstanding professionals the world over who dedicated their time and talents to this book. This book is a significant undertaking because of the current coverage of developments we seek to provide. As always, the hope is that this year’s volume will help all of us, authors and readers alike, reflect on the larger picture, keeping our eye on likely, as well as necessary, developments, both on the near and distant horizons.
The Asset Management Review Edition 7
Editor Paul Dickson
While the global financial crisis of 2007 and 2008 may feel like an increasingly distant memory, its effects continue to be felt across the whole of the financial world. Despite significant improvements in the global economic landscape in the intervening years, global growth has been hampered in recent years by various geopolitical factors, including political uncertainty resulting from the change in administration in the US in 2016 and the rise of populist movements in Europe. The world of asset management is increasingly complex, but it is hoped that this edition will be a useful and practical companion as we face the challenges and opportunities of the coming year.
The Product Regulation and Liability Review Edition 6
Editors Chilton Davis Varner and Madison Kitchens
This edition covers 16 countries and territories and includes a high-level overview of each jurisdiction’s product liability framework, recent changes and developments, and a look forward at expected trends. Whether the reader is a company executive or a private practitioner, we hope that this edition will prove useful in navigating the complex world of product liability and alerting you to important developments that may affect your business.
The Merger Control Review Edition 9
Editor Ilene Knable Gotts
Pre-merger competition review has advanced significantly since its creation in 1976 in the United States. As this book evidences, today almost all competition authorities have a notification process in place – with most requiring pre-merger notification for transactions that meet certain prescribed minimum thresholds.
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North Korea's Kim, Trump agree to push forward talks for denuclearisation - KCNA
U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un stand at the demarcation line in the demilitarized zone separating the two Koreas, in Panmunjom, South Korea, June 30, 2019. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump agreed at their meeting on Sunday to push forward dialogue for making a new breakthrough in the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula, North Korea’ state media said on Monday.
Kim said it was the good personal relationship he had with Trump that such a dramatic meeting possible at just one day’s notice and that the relationship with Trump would continue to produce good results, according to KCNA news agency.
Reporting by Jack Kim and Joyce Lee; Editing by Peter Cooney
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Former U.S. congressman Sestak joins Democratic presidential race
WASHINGTON, June 23 (Reuters) - Former U.S. Representative Joe Sestak said on Sunday that he would seek the Democratic nomination for president, becoming the party’s 25th candidate vying to challenge Republican President Donald Trump in the 2020 election.
In announcing his candidacy, Sestak, 67, a retired three-star U.S. Navy admiral, emphasized his 31-year military career, the need to restore U.S. leadership in the world and challenges from climate change and China’s growing global influence.
“Our country desperately needs a president with a depth of global experience and an understanding of all the elements of our nation’s power, from our economy and our diplomacy to the power of our ideals and our military, including its limitations,” Sestak said in a video released on his campaign website.
Echoing elements of Trump’s trade war with China, he warned of the dangers of China’s influence, from its “virtual monopoly” in high-technology manufacturing supply chains to its Belt-and-Road infrastructure drive and build-out of 5G communications networks.
“This is arguably the greatest threat of all,” Sestak said of China’s 5G efforts. “China’s ownership will give it a police-state capability to surveil everything on the network, both for commercial and intelligence purposes.”
Sestak represented a district in eastern Pennsylvania including the former industrial cities of Allentown and Bethlehem for two terms from 2007 to 2011.
He ran for the U.S. Senate in 2010 and lost to Republican Pat Toomey in a year that saw Republicans take control of the House of Representatives. Sestak sought a rematch with Toomey in 2016 but lost in the Democratic nominating primary.
His announcement came too late for him to join the first Democratic debate featuring 20 presidential candidates on Wednesday and Thursday. (Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Peter Cooney)
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Jenny Allen (center) plays a fictional secretary to disgraced financier Bernard Madoff.
Harold Levine
On Stage With Bernard Madoff, an Innocent's Perspective
Carol Rocamora
Thursday, March 21, 2019 - 10:52am
When it comes to the theatre arts, Jenny Allen is a model of versatility.
Last winter, she played the storyteller in The Snow Queen, an adaptation of the Hans Christian Anderson tale performed at the Martha’s Vineyard Playhouse. Most of her castmates were children.
This winter, she’s in New York city playing disgraced financier Bernard Madoff’s secretary. Mr. Madoff was involved in one of the largest financial Ponzi schemes in history and was sentenced to a life term in prison in 2008.
The play is called Imagining Madoff and is being presented by the New Light Theater Project at 59E59 Theaters. Playwright Deb Margolin imagines Mr. Madoff in prison, talking to an unseen biographer, reminiscing about an all-night conversation he had a few months before his arrest with Solomon Galkin, who has naively invested his synagogue’s money in Madoff’s scheme.
In a series of flashbacks, it is revealed that Mr. Galkin is no ordinary investor — he’s a renowned poet and Talmudic scholar who also happens to be a Holocaust survivor. Mr. Galkin’s character is loosely based on Elie Wiesel, the author and Holocaust survivor whose foundation suffered terrible losses from Mr. Madoff’s swindle.
During their all-night conversation, Mr. Madoff recalls a sudden, overpowering impulse to confess to this “good man.” But he never did.
This could easily have remained a two-character play, but Ms. Margolin has added a third role — that of Madoff’s long-time secretary, played by Ms. Allen. (The character bears no resemblance to Mr. Madoff’s actual secretary; instead she is fashioned to fill a particular purpose in the play.)
Isolated on a platform high above the other characters, the secretary answers questions before an unseen examiner from the SEC, in preparation for her appearance before a grand jury. It’s a modest, self-effacing role, so much so that the playwright doesn’t even give her a name other than “a secretary.” But, as played with touching vulnerability by Ms. Allen, the role of this awkward, diffident woman ascends to a symbolic height.
If the role of Mr. Galkin (played by Jerry Bamman) represents a Father Confessor, then Ms. Allen’s secretary represents the innocents in Mr. Madoff’s world whose lives were destroyed by him. Alone on her perch, she looks terrified, answering her unheard interrogator in a timid voice trembling with fear and uncertainty.
One of the play’s most painful dimensions is the blind faith that both Mr. Galkin and the secretary invest in him.
“Why did I not see this man?” Mr. Galkin cries ultimately, as Mr. Madoff sit alone in the jail with a grim grin on his face (played by Jeremiah Kissel with unapologetic, Satanic relish).
Jerry Heymann skillfully directs the cast in this delicate balance of tragedy, harsh realism, and faint hope that a lone survivor might arise from the ashes of this devastating moral bonfire. At the epicenter, Ms. Allen plays a character with no name and yet one we won’t forget.
“We’re supposed to be hopeful for the secretary,” Ms. Allen said in an interview after a recent performance. “She may be suffering from a kind of PTSD. She’s a true innocent, and the playwright doesn’t want her to hate herself for not seeing what went on. The audience should leave with the hope that she will stop punishing herself.”
Ms. Allen is no stranger to the New York stage. She performed her monologue I Got Sick and Then I Got Better (about her struggle with cancer) at the New York Theater Workshop in 2009, directed by James Lapine.
Meanwhile, she maintains her role as literary manager of the Martha’s Vineyard Playhouse, where she also runs the monthly Jenny’s Drama Salon. A humorist and writer, her collection of humor pieces Would Everyone Please Stop? was recently a finalist for the Thurber Prize in 2018.
Imagining Madoff is presented by the New Light Theater Project, located at 59 East 59th street in New York. The play continues through March 23.
Brooks Robards, Santa Fe, NM
Terrific job, Carol! Jenny's the best.
March 23, 2019 - 12:42am
Stepping Creatively Into the Unknown
Vineyard audiences have two more chances to take part in a daring, international theatre experiment...
Theatrical Time Traveling Knows No Boundaries
From outside, it looked like they were coming for a dinner party — a small group of people arriving...
Inhabit the Garden
This weekend begins Abby Bender's run of Inhabit the Garden an immersive work of music, movement,...
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I’m happy to count among my friends Franciscans, Jesuits, Oblates, Paulists, Marists, and even the rare Camaldolese monk. I also know and love a small army of diocesan priests. I’ve often wondered why each one entered the ministry and, in particular, wound up in the “lifestyle” he currently enjoys. Because I’m curious and also pretty bold, I always ask.
Their candid replies have helped me appreciate the process of discernment, the power of the Spirit, and the beauty of personal testimony. Diocesan priests are characterized primarily by their priestly call to serve a specific community of faith. Their avenue of service is literally a geographic region—a diocese—and within that patch of land they pledge to pastor, preach, teach, and lead. Most diocesan priests talk about feeling called to serve in parishes, to lead the assembly at Mass, to share in the whole cycle of people’s lives from birth to death. They hope to minister in seasons of sorrow and joy to the love of God and the hope we bear in Jesus.
Priests who belong to a religious order may also feel the profound call to lead worship, preach, and teach. But they also speak of being powerfully drawn to a special charism or spiritual gift a particular religious community embodies. For example, Franciscans are noted for their commitment to poverty; Jesuits for their academic excellence; Paulists for their pioneering media-savvy; and monks to a life defined by prayer and silence.
Although diocesan priests may or may not share a residence with other priests, religious order priests are usually dedicated to a communal lifestyle by design. If you spiritually yearn for communal life or to serve in parish ministry, those promptings might be trusted as the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
But nearly every priest I know begins the story of his call with the story of another vocation: the priest he knew whose generous ministry first compelled him to draw more closely to a life of service. So priests of every variety and charism continue to give birth to the next generation of leaders.
Psalm 110:4; 1 Corinthians 12:1-31; 1 Timothy 4:6-16; 2 Timothy 1:6-14; 4:1-5
Look no further! You have arrived! See the many resources on the Vocation Network website for descriptions of religious communities of men and to take advantage of the Vocation Match.
Paths of Love: The Discernment of Vocation According to Aquinas, Ignatius, and Pope John Paul II by Joseph Bolin (CreateSpace)
Diversity of Vocations by Marie Dennis (Orbis Books)
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Read Next: John Ford to Exit as Head of Unscripted Producers Trade Association NPact
Lachlan Murdoch, Bruce Gordon Challenge CBS With Full Bid for Australia’s Ten
CREDIT: Alan Davidson/Silverhub/REX/Shut
Lachlan Murdoch and Bruce Gordon have launched a formal bid for Australia’s troubled Ten Network. The bid is a direct challenge to CBS Corp.’s proposed acquisition of Ten from financial administrators.
The bid by Murdoch’s Illyria investment company and Gordon’s Birketu follows a successful court challenge Tuesday to the CBS proposal, which was put forward last month. The court ruling in Sydney delayed a vote by creditors on the CBS rescue plan. But Murdoch and Gordon’s bid may itself be ruled inadmissible because it missed an Aug. 25 deadline.
Significantly, the Illyria-Birketu bid also follows the passage this week of new media laws that will relax rules on cross-media ownership and media plurality. The Murdoch family-owned News Corp. is already the dominant media group in Australia. Lachlan Murdoch is executive chairman of 21st Century Fox.
According to Australian media, the Illyria-Birketu bid puts more cash on the table for creditors. CBS, which is Ten’s biggest creditor, had offered A$32 million (US$25.5 million). In an earlier informal offer, Illyria-Birketu proposed A$35 million (US$28 million). The new takeover offer ups that to A$55 million (US$44 million).
Unlike CBS’ offer, which would give it outright ownership, the Illyria-Birketu bid proposes returning 25% of Ten’s equity to existing shareholders. Murdoch and Gordon also say that Ten could in time be re-floated on the Australian Stock Exchange.
Ten was forced to go into administration earlier this year after media moguls Murdoch, Gordon and James Packer withdrew their guarantees to provide credit to the company. It is Australia’s third-ranking free-to-air broadcast group.
The CBS bid had been approved by administrators KordaMentha. According to a second report published by the administrators, Illyria and Birketu would renegotiate leases on three of Ten’s studios. Job losses may follow, especially if Ten’s news operations are combined with those of Sky. CBS has promised that jobs will not be cut.
CBS Corp.
Lachlan Murdoch
Ten Network
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John Ford to Exit as Head of Unscripted Producers Trade Association NPact
John Ford has stepped down as general manager of NPact, the trade association that represents unscripted TV producers. Ford is exiting the post he’s held since 2015 because of the potential for conflicts of interest arising from his role as head of programming for digital multicast outlets Justice Network and Quest Network. The channels were [...]
Sally Field, Linda Ronstadt and 'Sesame Street' Among 2019 Kennedy Center Honorees
Sally Field, Linda Ronstadt, “Sesame Street,” conductor Michael Tilson Thomas and R&B veterans Earth, Wind and Fire have been selected as the 2019 Kennedy Center Honorees. The kudos will be handed out Dec. 8 at the Kennedy Center Opera House in Washington, D.C. The award to “Sesame Street” marks the first time the prestigious laurel [...]
Jeffrey Epstein, the high-living financier who partied and traveled with Hollywood stars and world leaders, has been denied bail. The multimillionaire businessman is accused of sexually abusing underage girls as young as 14 years old and collecting child pornography. Prosecutors argued successfully that Epstein’s wealth made him a serious flight risk. He faces up to [...]
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Ventures West Inc.
Ventures West Inc. has a long history in the Retail Business, starting in 1915 in Yellowstone National Park as one of the first concessionaires in the countries first National Park. We have continued this history as a family owned company.
Since 1925, Smith & Chandler has been witness to the spectacular scenery, abundant wildlife and astounding geological history of Yellowstone National Park. Since the beginning it has been an integral part of the town of West Yellowstone’s western and railroad heritage. Located directly across the street from the former Union Pacific Railroad Depot, now the Yellowstone Historic Center Museum, Smith & Chandler was one of the first stops for many visitors to Yellowstone Park in the early years.
It all started when...
Smith & Chandler was established in 1925 by the Smith & Chandler families. In 1971, the store was purchased by Trev and Ellie Povah. Not long after the store was purchased, a fire burned it to the ground. The store was rebuilt and is considered West Yellowstone’s premiere gift shop.
Today, Smith & Chandler remains a destination stop at the gateway to Yellowstone and is West Yellowstone’s premiere general mercantile. We have exciting selections of Yellowstone Park, Montana, wildlife and western related gifts and souvenirs, apparel, cowboy hats, kitchen, home and cabin décor, candy and huckleberry products, jewelry, knives, binoculars, greeting cards, books and DVDs.
Make Smith & Chandler a part of your memorable visit to the Park and West Yellowstone!
Phone: 1 406-646-7841
Email: info@ventureswestinc.com
121 Yellowstone Ave.
Ventures West Inc. bought Firehole Trading in 2014 to provide a completely different shopping experience then Smith & Chandler. Firehole Trading Company was and is a well respected retail location located a few doors down from Smith & Chandler.
Grizzly RV Park
Yellowstone RV Park
Copyright 2019- Ventures West Inc.
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A Review of Snigda Prakash’s All the Justice Money Can Buy, a Book on the Vioxx Tort Litigation
Rodger Citron
Posted in: Book Reviews
Snigda Prakash, All the Justice Money Can Buy (Kaplan Publishing 2011)
Snigda Prakash, a former National Public Radio reporter, has written an interesting book about the litigation against Merck & Co., the manufacturer of Vioxx, a prescription drug used to relieve pain and inflammation. Merck withdrew its heavily-promoted drug from the market in 2004 due to concerns that consumers of Vioxx faced an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes; a deluge of tort lawsuits followed.
In All the Justice Money Can Buy, Prakash traces the history of the litigation, beginning with efforts by plaintiffs’ lawyers to sue the company even before Vioxx had been withdrawn from the market and concluding with the nearly $5 billion settlement agreement announced in late 2007 that covered the claims of most of the plaintiffs.
Much of Prakash’s book provides a detailed account of a trial in New Jersey in early 2007. One of the plaintiff’s lawyers, Mark Lanier, allowed Prakash to go behind the scenes to see how he prepared and presented his case. Wisely, Prakash accepted the opportunity to observe Lanier, a superb trial attorney from Texas, at work.
As discussed below, Prakash took full advantage of the access provided by Lanier and has provided a vivid and thorough reconstruction of a lengthy civil trial involving complicated issues. All the Justice Money Can Buy will be especially interesting to civil litigators who actually try cases instead of resolving them through settlement or pretrial motions.
However, All the Justice Money Can Buy is not without its flaws. Prakash admits that, by the end of the trial, she no longer is a neutral “observer” but wants the “plaintiffs’ lawyers . . . to win.” This leads her, on occasion, to be gratuitously snide in her description of Merck’s lawyers. In addition, in my view, Prakash focused too much of her attention and effort on a single trial. She only briefly discusses the comprehensive settlement of the litigation, which likely will be its enduring legacy.
The Trial in New Jersey
Along with the lawyers and their clients, Prakash spent about six weeks in the frigid courtroom of Judge Carol E. Higbee, in Atlantic City, New Jersey, in the winter of 2007. Lanier represented one plaintiff, the wife of Brian Hermans, who was taking Vioxx when he died of a heart attack at the age of 44 in September 2002.
Lanier already had made a strong impression in the Vioxx litigation by taking the first Vioxx case to trial in Texas. In that case, the jury awarded more than $250 million in damages to the plaintiffs—an amount that was reduced by the trial court, under state law, to about $26 million. (Several years later, the judgment of the Texas trial court was set aside on appeal. The appellate court agreed with Merck’s argument that the plaintiff’s evidence on causation was insufficient. This case is now pending before the Texas Supreme Court.)
Lanier’s co-counsel in New Jersey was Chris Seeger, who represented Mike Humeston. Humeston, a Vietnam veteran often in pain because of shrapnel still in his left knee, was—like Brian Hermans—taking Vioxx when he had a heart attack in September 2001. Seeger had already tried and lost Humeston’s case against Merck before Judge Higbee in 2005. However, the judge subsequently ordered a new trial, in which Seeger again presented Humeston’s claim against Merck and its aggressive trial counsel, Diane Sullivan. Prakash notes that “Seeger despised [Sullivan] because he thought she had bullied and taunted him in the courtroom [in the first case], often within earshot of the jury (and no doubt, also because she’d won).”
All the Justice Money Can Buy succeeds greatly in describing the Hobbesian world of high-stakes civil litigation. Prakash describes the strained relationship between Lanier and Seeger; ego and the prospect of millions of dollars in attorney’s fees led to the attorneys’ sniping about each other before and after the trial. Sullivan, Merck’s lead lawyer in New Jersey, repeatedly violated court orders and was threatened with sanctions as a result. Judge Higbee, with many other Vioxx cases on her docket, did not follow up on her threats to sanction Sullivan, however; it seems that she did not want to appear to be unfair to Merck’s lawyers and thereby risk disqualification. With apologies to John Keats, truth is beauty in civil litigation, and Prakash’s account of the trial rings true.
Given access to Lanier, Prakash provides an especially detailed portrait of a trial attorney at work. Outside of the courtroom, Lanier is hyper-organized and meticulous in his preparation. Inside the courtroom, Lanier is relentless in attempting to communicate his case clearly to the jury, using graphics and props to reinforce the themes introduced in his opening statement. With Lanier, even seemingly spontaneous acts—such as securing a good-luck kiss from his wife in court, right before the start of the trial—appear to have been thought out in advance, strategically. Details of such minor episodes are revealing; however, Prakash’s repeated descriptions of the meals Lanier ate during the trial clutter her account and should have been omitted.
As Prakash takes us through the trial, she describes how the plaintiffs effectively demonstrate that Merck aggressively marketed Vioxx despite being informed of the drug’s risks and that Merck profited greatly from this strategy. In addition, she suggests that the plaintiffs’ lawyers—in particular, Lanier—were more persuasive and effective trial attorneys than Sullivan and her colleagues representing Merck.
It therefore comes as a surprise when the jury enters a verdict in favor of Merck and against Lanier’s client on the most important question of the case—whether Merck had failed to warn that Vioxx carried cardiovascular risks—but nevertheless enters a verdict against Merck and in favor of Seeger’s client on the very same question.
How could the jury arrive at such seemingly inconsistent verdicts? The answer is that Merck amended its label between September 2001 (when Humeston’s heart attack occurred) and September 2002 (when Hermans died from his heart attack), and the jury apparently concluded that the amended label provided an adequate warning to Hermans, whose family was represented by Lanier.
In both cases, the jury found that Merck misrepresented Vioxx’s cardiovascular risks in its marketing to consumers and physicians and that Merck had intentionally not disclosed those risks.
For Lanier and his client, the jury’s answers to these questions would permit recovery only of the “few hundred dollars” that Hermans “had paid for the Vioxx prescriptions,” Prakash explained. (Merck also would have to pay Lanier’s trial expenses.)
The trial continued for Seeger and his clients and the jury awarded them $47.5 million in compensatory and punitive damages. (Ultimately, Seeger persuaded the Humestons to settle for a lower sum.)
The Comprehensive Settlement
The Humeston and Hermans cases in New Jersey were just two of a number of Vioxx cases brought against Merck that were litigated to a verdict. The verdicts in those 20 or so cases were mixed. On the one hand, Merck prevailed more often than it lost, primarily because the plaintiffs often had difficulty proving that, under the governing law, Vioxx caused the injuries claimed by the plaintiffs. On the other hand, in those cases where the plaintiffs did prevail, the juries awarded large sums in compensatory and punitive damages.
Although Merck initially insisted that it would take every Vioxx case to trial, Merck—and the plaintiffs’ lawyers suing the company—could see that continuing to litigate was risky for both sides. In November 2007, both sides announced that they had reached an agreement that would effectively resolve the Vioxx litigation. Merck agreed to pay $4.85 billion to settle about 50,000 claims. The amount of money each claimant would receive depended upon a number of factors.
In the epilogue to All the Justice Money Can Buy, Prakash summarizes the settlement. What was most notable about the agreement was that Merck did not settle directly with the plaintiffs but instead with their lawyers. According to Prakash, “lawyers who wanted any of their clients to participate [were required] to recommend the deal to all their clients, and further, to withdraw from representing clients who rejected their advice and declined to settle.”
Critics of the Vioxx settlement, such as Professors Howard Erichson and Benjamin Zipursky, have argued that the structure of the settlement runs “afoul of several legal ethics rules.” Most importantly, they note, “the decision to settle belongs to the client, not the client’s lawyer,” and “[a] lawyer who tells the client, ‘Settle or you’re fired!’ is hardly abiding by the client’s decision.” However, despite the objections raised by critics of the settlement, it has been implemented.
As compelling as I found Prakash’s account of the trial in New Jersey, I wish she had spent more time discussing the settlement. The issues raised by the structure of the settlement agreement are complicated and significant. It would have been an even greater coup for Prakash if she would have attempted to go behind the scenes and explain how the attorneys for Merck and the plaintiffs suing the company arrived at such an agreement.
Rodger Citron is a Professor of Law and the Associate Dean for Academic Development at Touro Law Center on Long Island, New York. He is a graduate of Yale College and Yale Law School and, among other things, was a trial lawyer in the United States Department of Justice before becoming a law professor.
More Commentary by Rodger Citron
Herman Melville’s Billy Budd: Why this Classic Law and Literature Novel Endures and Is Still Relevant Today
What the FBI Knew: The Case Against the Rosenbergs From the Investigators’ Perspective
Justice Kennedy’s Civil Procedure Legacy
Saint Ethel? A Review of “Ethel Sings: The Unsung Song of Ethel Rosenberg”
The Soda Ban or the Portion Cap Rule? Litigation Over the Size of Sugary Drink Containers as an Exercise in Framing
Walden v. Fiore: The Supreme Court Turns to Personal Jurisdiction Issues
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