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The modified background image shows LNCaP cells, a line of prostate adenocarcinoma cells that are frequently used in cancer research, including in the lab of Beth Tran, associate professor of biochemistry.
Our Surprising Strength: Cancer Research
Friday, April 27th, 2018 Brian Wallheimer
Andy Tao tempered his expectations when his lab started an experiment to see whether they could identify phosphorylated proteins in blood.
Phosphorylation — the addition of a phosphate group to a protein — is often a precursor to cancer cell formation, but detecting the process would only be half the battle. They needed to correctly identify the phosphorylated proteins in the blood of patients known to have cancer.
“My student, Blair Chen, got the data and immediately came to my office,” Tao says. “She detected over a thousand phosphorylated proteins from 1 milliliter of plasma in a single experiment. She was shocked, and I was totally overwhelmed.”
For years, scientists have searched for biomarkers, measurable substances in the body that correlate with the presence of disease or infection. The promise is the ability to detect cancer, viruses, heart disease and other maladies through a simple blood draw or urine analysis. But success has been elusive.
Tao’s potentially transformative result is one of many success stories in the Department of Biochemistry, which boasts more than half its faculty — 13 of 23 — as members of the Purdue Center for Cancer Research (PCCR). Their work explores many of the complex mechanisms that control cell function and how those can go wrong, with sometimes devastating consequences.
“We have a lot of research going on in cancer,” says Andrew Mesecar, head of the department. “Our degree in biochemistry is broader in scope than many other biochemistry programs at Purdue or elsewhere. Our students come out with a better, in-depth exposure to a wide range of our science.”
As faculty in the College of Agriculture, researchers work with a variety of model organisms — algae, yeast, zebrafish, fruit flies and mice, among others — to understand the basic pathways that lead perfectly normal cells to become cancerous, or cancerous cells that were vulnerable to drug therapies to become hopelessly resistant ones.
“It allows us the opportunity to think more broadly about the basic science of life and all life forms,” Mesecar says. “Here, our scientists are free to explore the commonalities of different organisms. We can identify genes involved in cancer faster in simple systems, identify human gene analogs and apply our understanding to humans quickly.”
More than half the faculty of the Department of Biochemistry (13 of 23) are members of the Purdue Center for Cancer Research.
Researchers work with model organisms such as algae, yeast, zebrafish, fruit flies and mice to understand the basic pathways that lead normal cells to become cancerous or cancerous cells to become drug-resistant.
Several biochemistry faculty members conduct cancer research by studying epigenetic processes, inherited or environmental factors outside of our genetic code that modify how our genes are expressed. This work can help us understand what leads to stable, healthy cells or those that rapidly divide and become cancerous.
Others examine the enzymes that play a role in cancer, working to inhibit enzymes found at abnormally high levels in cancer, or to help develop drug treatments that bind to enzymes, activating them or shutting them down as desired.
Professor Andy Tao received Purdue’s 2017 Outstanding Commercialization Award for development of tests that can detect breast cancer in blood and bladder cancer in urine. He is working to develop technology to make the test faster and feasible in standard laboratories.
Shape-shifting RNA
For many years, most scientists have been focused on the role DNA plays in cancer cell formation. But there is growing emphasis on RNA, a chemical messenger that takes instructions from DNA to encode proteins.
The shape of DNA can determine how and when genes are turned on or off in the cell. RNA also changes shape, but since it simply carries DNA’s messages to proteins, few believed RNA’s shape had anything to do with how genes are expressed.
Elizabeth Tran, associate professor of biochemistry, wasn’t convinced. She thought that if RNA could have different shapes and structures, those differences must play a role in the message it delivered to proteins and the resulting gene expression.
Graduate student Zheng (Cindy) Xing, Associate Professor Beth Tran, and associate researcher Sara Cloutier examine lab results.
Tran decided to examine the role of RNA structure on gene expression by studying a class of enzymes called DEAD-box RNA helicases. These enzymes, found in all life forms from bacteria to humans, bind to and rearrange RNA structures. She used baker’s yeast as a model since it is far simpler than larger organisms and has genes that often correspond to those in humans.
The DEAD-box RNA helicase Tran studied, when present, kick-starts glycolysis, the process by which glucose is broken down and converted to energy.
“Glycolysis is one of the first steps in metabolism that converts glucose to ATP (adenosine triphosphate), giving cells energy. This process also provides carbon building blocks for the cell to allow it to grow and divide,” Tran says.
Unchecked and overactive growth is a clear sign of cancer. And what Tran was seeing in yeast was that a DEAD-box RNA helicase, in rearranging the structure of RNA, was changing the message that encodes proteins needed to break down glucose. Glycolysis and glucose transport into the cell increased, creating the energy needed to induce cancer cell formation.
Having determined what the helicase does in yeast, Tran showed that its function is the same in mammals. Her lab is now looking for novel molecules that can inhibit DEAD-box RNA helicase functions, leading to normal rates of glycolysis. She’s specifically interested in difficult-to-treat cancers such as small-cell lung cancer, which has a five-year survival rate of less than 5 percent, and metastatic prostate cancer.
Professor Xiaoqi Liu studies a form of prostate cancer that’s resistant to treatment.
Treating the most intractable cancers
In 1975, a man diagnosed with local or regional prostate cancer, meaning the cancer was in the prostate or had spread to only nearby areas, had a 66 percent chance of living another five years. The odds of beating prostate cancer were far better than the alternative, but the chance of death was still one in three.
Today, cancer treatment progress has pushed the prostate cancer survival rate to 99 percent. Still, that’s not 100 percent, and Xiaoqi Liu, professor of biochemistry, is focused on a group of men with prostate cancer who don’t have great chances.
Fewer than 2 percent of men diagnosed with prostate cancer have contracted a variation of the disease deemed castration-resistant. Many forms of prostate cancer need normal levels of testosterone to grow, but in castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), even when the hormone is reduced to low levels, cells continue to multiply and become drug resistant.
At that point, the only thing doctors can do is buy a little time.
“We have several approaches to try to slow this down, but we don’t have a way to cure it,” Liu says. “Chemotherapy and targeted therapies delay the progression for a while, but only for a year or two at most.”
Liu is focused on an enzyme, polo-like kinase 1 (PLK1), and its role in CRPC and other cancers that are resistant to therapies. PLK1 is known to play a role in cell division and is found at abnormally high levels in human cancers.
His research has found that elevated levels of PLK1 activate androgen receptor, which is a hallmark of CRPC. Inhibiting PLK1 led to a reduction of androgen receptor, and that could be a method for getting these forms of prostate cancer to once again respond to cancer therapies.
“We’ve found PLK1 elevation leads to chemotherapy and drug treatment resistance,” Liu says. “Now, we’re developing PLK1 inhibitors and working with medical school colleagues to start clinical trials to make therapies more effective.”
Leaving the key in the door
Humaira Gowher, assistant professor of biochemistry, is interested in the epigenetic processes — changes outside the genetic code that modify how genes are expressed — that play out as cells differentiate. She wants to understand how enzymes toggle genes off and on, starting cascades that can lead to stable, healthy cells or others that divide out of control and become cancerous.
“Several genes that are expressed in cancer are the same genes usually involved in development during early embryogenesis and the early development of a mammal,” Gowher says. “In cancer, these genes are turned back on. I want to know about the mechanisms that control that process.”
Assistant professor Humaira Gowher reviews the protocol for an experiment with graduate student Allison Norvil.
To understand the research in Gowher’s lab, you have to be familiar with stem cells. They are pluripotent: blank slates that can become any cell type in the human body. They multiply rapidly and are eventually assigned a task, becoming muscle cells, blood cells or some other cell type.
This differentiation occurs as enzymes add and remove methyl groups from DNA and histones — methylation and demethylation — changing the accessibility of the information in genes. This process locks down the cells in a differentiated state and regulates their proliferation. Conversely, loss of the normal enzymatic activity that maintains this stable state can reverse the process and allow those cells to rapidly multiply again, leading to cancer.
Gowher’s work has shown that some cells are ticking time bombs, waiting for the right conditions to turn cancerous because the original cascade of methylation and demethylation hasn’t occurred properly. Instead of completely shutting the genes down, the enzymes only do part of the job, resulting in a gene that’s ready to be activated and primed to transform normal cells into cancerous ones.
It’s like locking the door to the house, but leaving the key in the hole. And it’s a major shift in understanding, because it occurs in a way that hadn’t been seen before: from partial enzyme activity rather than complete loss of enzymatic function.
“It’s not that it’s broken, but it’s only doing half its job,” Gowher says. “It’s leaving it in a state more poised to cause cancer later.”
Gowher will continue to examine molecular mechanisms that cause partial loss of enzymatic activities leading to new or enhanced activity in cancer cells. Her lab has recently received three major grants from the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation and American Heart Association to study these mechanisms. Her overarching goal in all of these projects is to understand the role of epigenetic mechanisms, particularly DNA methylation, in development and disease.
Modeling drug discoveries
While leading the Department of Biochemistry, Andrew Mesecar maintains an active research program and serves as deputy director of the Purdue Center for Cancer Research. Since enzymes play such an important role in kick-starting the processes that lead to cancer and other degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Mesecar studies the 3-D structures of enzymes. This helps reveal how to strengthen the binding of drug molecules to the enzyme, shutting down enzyme activity or ramping it up as needed.
“These enzymes promote the disease process,” Mesecar says. “If we can understand the structures and functions of these enzymes, we can develop therapeutics that can target them and either knock them out or activate them.”
Andy Mesecar, head of the Department of Biochemistry and deputy director of the Purdue Center for Cancer Research, and postdoctoral researcher Renata Everett analyze protein expression levels from cells.
Mesecar is working to develop a small molecule therapy for an enzyme called cholesterol sulfotransferase, which was discovered by Timothy Ratliff , the Robert Wallace Miller Director of the PCCR and distinguished professor of comparative pathobiology, and Graham Cooks, Henry B. Hass Distinguished Professor of Analytical Chemistry. The enzyme promotes proliferation of prostate cancer cells in castration-resistant prostate cancer.
Mesecar developed a novel biochemical assay that allows him to test the enzyme’s activity. From there, his lab tested more than 20,000 small molecules using robots to discover those with potential to disrupt the cholesterol sulfotransferase enzyme.
From those initial tests, a handful might show potential. Using the 3-D models of the enzyme, Mesecar and his colleagues can then synthetically improve the small molecules to make them more effective cancer therapeutics.
“If you know how the molecule interacts with the enzyme, and it isn’t fitting in just right, the 3-D structure allows us to design better compounds to make one work effectively,” Mesecar says. “It allows us to be molecular architects in a way.”
Mesecar is doing similar work with another enzyme, USP7, which is active in multiple myeloma, breast cancer, glioblastoma (a type of brain cancer), and other forms of cancer. He’s in the process of patenting compounds that have shown potential and moving them to animal trials.
Mesecar’s work in drug discovery is at one end of a long cancer research spectrum. Purdue biochemistry faculty touch on points all along the way, from uncovering the complex cellular processes that lead to cancer cell development, to novel methods for detection and therapeutics that promise to give hope to those who once had none.
The quest for easy detection
Doctors can test for a lot of things from a blood draw during an annual physical — diabetes, anemia, and kidney and liver function, along with levels of cholesterol, calcium and other substances. Such testing offers a good look into a person’s health.
One day, cancer might be on that list.
Andy Tao, professor of biochemistry and member of the Purdue University Center for Cancer Research, received Purdue’s 2017 Outstanding Commercialization Award for development of tests that can detect breast cancer in blood and bladder cancer in urine.
Tao and his colleagues identified phosphoproteins in blood plasma that are significantly elevated in cancer patients. These proteins have been phosphorylated, or had a phosphate group added to them, something that often happens during cancer cell formation.
The liver releases phosphatase, which removes the phosphate group from phosphoproteins, making them difficult to find in blood. But Tao used high-speed centrifuges to separate microvesicles and exosomes, which encapsulate and protect the phosphoprotein structure. It’s believed that microvesicles and exosomes, which cells release into the bloodstream, are involved in intracellular communication and metastasis of cancer.
“Our work is the first to demonstrate that many important disease-related molecules can be detected from blood. This can open a new direction for how we achieve early detection of devastating diseases such as cancer,” Tao says. “The technology can also potentially benefit patients who are undergoing treatment by evaluating therapeutic effectiveness of treatment without waiting for long periods of time to monitor whether cancer might come back.”
Tao’s test employed breast cancer cells and bladder cancer cells, but he believes it would transfer well to most types of cancer. His company, Tymora Analytical, is working to develop technology to make the test faster and feasible in standard laboratories.
Photos provided by Charles Jischke.
Category: Feature, Spring 2018
As our climate shifts, so do trees
The Big Idea: Epigenetics
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Bookheathen Scribblings
Love Reading – Love Writing
Magda Green Books
Drew Greenfield
On October 21, 2018 By Andrew G LockhartIn Books, Science fiction and fantasy, Women in History
A look back at the life of a famous child –
Alice Pleasance Liddell by Charles Dodgson
I haven’t done any blogging for a week or two because I’ve been on holiday, first in the New Forest, then in Belgium and the Netherlands. Wherever I go, I can’t help looking for literary connections. A few years ago, at Winchester, it was Jane Austen [she is buried there]. This year, in the small country town of Lyndhurst, I found the connection to another writer, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better know by his pen name Lewis Carroll.
Lewis Carroll spent almost his entire adult life in Oxford, teaching mathematics, writing poems and stories and taking photographs. He published his most famous work, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, in 1865. The sequel, Through the Looking Glass, followed in 1871.
Carroll’s connection with Lyndhurst is indirect, but not without literary interest. At Oxford in 1856, he became friends with the Liddell family. Henry Liddell, formerly the head of Westminster School had recently been appointed Dean of Christ Church College. Liddell and his wife, Lorina, had ten children of whom the fourth, a daughter, was named Alice Pleasance Liddell.
Born in 1852, Alice was to become the inspiration (though this is disputed by some scholars! **) for Lewis Carroll’s young heroine. This was how I introduced the story in my 2016 book, It’s A Fantasy World:
“On St Aldate’s, a picturesque road in the centre of Oxford, England, and across from Christchurch meadow lies a very special shop. Here, according to the story, a little girl called Alice Liddell, daughter of the Dean of Christchurch, used to shop for sweets with her younger siblings. The building in which the shop is housed is five centuries old and today sells gifts and memorabilia of a literary phenomenon that first appeared in 1865 and has enthralled children of all ages ever since.
“[Dodgson] used to go on outings with the Liddell children. He photographed them – he was a talented photographer – and told them stories which he made up for their amusement. In 1862, Alice enjoyed one story so much that she persuaded Dodgson to write it down. He did so, took the name Lewis Carroll, and the rest is history.
“Even without the benefits of modern marketing techniques, Alice was a sensation and for 150 years it has never been out of print…. Through the Looking Glass has been almost equally popular. And it is Chapter 5 of that novel which takes us finally into the shop in St Aldate’s:
” ‘Alice rubbed her eyes, and looked again . . . she was in a little dark shop, leaning with her elbows on the counter, and opposite to her was an old Sheep, sitting in an arm-chair knitting . . .’ “
Alice Liddell lived a long life and would become the inspiration for other books. In 1880, at Westminster Abbey, she married Hampshire and MCC cricketer Reginald Hargreaves and settled down with him at Cuffnells, a country house at Lyndhurst. They had three sons. Sadly, the two elder boys were killed in World War I.
There are many photographs of Alice, in childhood, youth and old age, to be found in books and on the internet. Two (one of them is reproduced above) taken by Lewis Carroll himself, are among the best.
Alice Hargreaves at 80 by W Coulbourn Brown
Alice Pleasance Liddell Hargreaves died in 1934. Her ashes are buried in a grave in Lyndhurst churchyard which attracts many visitors.
** Now - about those scholars ...
I always like to make up my own mind and, in this case,
I have no doubts about Carroll's intentions. If you are
familiar with Through The Looking Glass, you will know that
it ends with a poem --
A boat beneath a sunny sky,
Lingering onward dreamily
In an evening of July -
Children three that nestle near,
Eager eye and willing ear,
Pleased a simple tale to hear -
Long had paled that sunny sky:
Echoes fade and memories die.
Autumn frosts have slain July.
Still she haunts me, phantomwise,
Alice moving under skies
Never seen by waking eyes.
Children yet, the tale to hear
Lovingly shall settle near.
In a Wonderland they lie,
Dreaming as the days go by,
Dreaming as the summers die
Ever drifting down the stream
Lingering in the golden gleam
Life, what is it but a dream?’
Scanning downwards, you will notice that the first letters
of the lines spell the name 'Alice Pleasance Liddell'.
[Photographs courtesy of Wikipedia Commons]
Alice in WonderlandAlice LiddellcricketersLewis CarrollLyndhurstOxfordReginald Hargreaves
Norse Mythology
Farewell to Barcelona
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HANSARD 1803–2005 → 1970s → 1972 → October 1972 → 26 October 1972 → Commons Sitting → PROROGATION
HER MAJESTY'S MOST GRACIOUS SPEECH
I have further to acquaint the House that the Lord High Chancellor delivered Her Majesty's Most Gracious Speech to both Houses of Parliament, in pursuance of Her Majesty's Commands, as follows:
§ My Lords and Members of the House of Commons:
§ My Husband and I recall with pleasure our visits to Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Maldives, the Seychelles, Mauritius and Kenya, to France, and to Yugoslavia. We also had the pleasure of welcoming to this country Queen Juliana and Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, the Grand Duke and Duchess of Luxembourg and the President of the Federal Republic of Germany and Frau Heinemann.
§ Negotiations for British membership of the European Communities were successfully concluded by My Ministers. Following the passage of legislation making the requisite changes in United Kingdom law an Instrument of Ratification of the Treaty of Accession has been deposited to provide for accession to the Communities on 1st January, 1973. At the European Summit My Government joined with the other Governments in formulating constructive policies for the future development of the Communities.
§ My Ministers have played a full part in the North Atlantic Alliance and have striven to improve relations between East and West. Ambassadors have been exchanged with the People's Republic of China. My Government have continued their efforts to achieve international agreement on arms control and disarmament and have signed the Biological Weapons Convention.
§ My Government regret the decision of Pakistan to withdraw from the Commonwealth. They welcome as a Commonwealth partner the People's Republic of Bangladesh and are making a substantial contribution to relief and rehabilitation in Bangladesh.
§ My Ministers welcomed the opportunity for discussions with the Shah of Iran during his private visit to this country in June. My Government reaffirmed their support for the Central Treaty Organisation at the Ministerial Meeting in London in June.
§ My Government deplore the action of the Government of Uganda in expelling residents of Asian descent. They have made strong representations to the Ugandan Government and have sought the support of many Commonwealth and foreign Governments in offering to those expelled a choice of countries in which to live. My Ministers accept the responsibility to admit to this country any citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies who are expelled from Uganda and wish to make their homes here. The Uganda Resettlement Board has been established to ensure the orderly reception and resettlement of these unfortunate people.
§ I have been deeply grieved at the loss of innocent lives in Northern Ireland as a result of terrorism.
§ The Parliament of Northern Ireland has been prorogued and provision made for direct rule for one year. My Ministers and striven for peace and understanding in the Province and a just share in its government for all its citizens. A conference has been held as part of the process of consulting people and organisations on the future constitutional framework for Northern Ireland.
§ My Armed Forces are carrying out with skill and determination their difficult and dangerous duties in Northern Ireland. Their courage deserves the greatest admiration and they will continue to act with vigour against lawlessness from any quarter.
§ Members of the House of Commons:
§ I thank you for the provision which you have made for the honour and dignity of the Crown and for the public services.
§ My Government have taken vigorous steps to encourage economic growth and industrial modernisation and to 1336 increase employment. Special attention has been paid to the problems of the assisted areas. Legislation has been passed to make regional development grants, to give selective financial assistance to industry and to provide special help for shipbuilding.
§ All remaining short and medium-term official overseas debt has been repaid. The reserves are at a satisfactory level. In June My Government decided that for the time being the sterling exchange rate should not be maintained within the normal dealing margins. My Government welcome the establishment of a new Committee of Twenty in the International Monetary Fund which will meet at Ministerial level to press forward the study of international monetary reform.
§ The burden of taxation has again been significantly reduced. Tax reform has been carried forward by providing for a new system of company taxation, for the abolition of purchase tax and selective employment tax, and for the introduction of a value-added tax. My Ministers have published Green Papers containing proposals for a new tax credit system and for a different death duty system.
§ Under the Industrial Relations Act. 1971, a code of industrial relations practice containing guidance for management and trade unions has been approved. Training opportunities for individuals have been greatly improved. My Government have announced proposals for the reform of industrial training arrangements.
§ Acts have been passed to strengthen the finances of the British Steel Corporation and to reorganise the gas industry.
§ My Government have taken active steps to promote a strong agricultural industry which will be competitive within the enlarged European Economic Community. Support is being given to the British fishing fleet in the exercise of their right to fish on the high seas off Iceland.
§ New arrangements covering Government-financed research and development, the Research Councils and the use of scientific manpower in the Civil Service have been announced.
§ My Government have continued their policies of protecting and improving the quality of the environment. Legislation has been passed to prevent the irresponsible disposal of poisonous wastes on land. My Government played a leading part in the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment.
§ Legislation has been passed to reform the finance of rented housing, to give help to tenants who need it, and to make improved financial arrangements for slum clearance.
§ Legislation has been passed for the reorganisation of local government in England (outside Greater London) and Wales.
§ An Act has been passed to reorganise the health services in Scotland and to establish a Health Commissioner to deal with complaints.
§ Substantial increases have been made in national insurance retirement pensions and related benefits under the first of the annual reviews introduced by My Government.
§ Provision has been made for substantial extension of the attendance allowance for the disabled; and family income supplements have been increased.
§ Proposals have been published for the future development of State and occupational pensions.
§ Pension schemes of the public services have been reformed. An Act has been passed to improve and widen the scope of the parliamentary pension scheme.
§ The school-leaving age has been raised to 16.
§ Grants to direct grant schools have been increased.
§ An Independent Broadcasting Authority has been established.
§ An Act has been passed to widen the powers of the courts to deal with offenders, strengthen the administration of criminal justice and reform the qualifications for jury service.
§ Legislation has feen passed to improve the facilities for giving legal advice and assistance to persons of moderate means.
§ My Lords and Members of the House
of Commons:
§ I pray that the blessing of Almighty God may attend you.
§ Then a Commission for Proroguing this Parliament was read; after which the Lord High Chancellor said: My Lords and Members of the House of Commons: By virtue of Her Majesty's Commission under the Great Seal, to us and other Lords directed, we do, in Her Majesty's Name and in obedience to Her Majesty's Commands, prorogue this Parliament to Tuesday, the thirty-first day of October, one thousand nine hundred and seventy-two, to be then here holden; and this Parliament is accordingly prorogued until Tuesday, the thirty-first day of October, one thousand nine hundred and severity-two. End of the Second Session (opened on 2nd November, 1971) of the Forty-fifth Parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, in the Twenty-first Year of the Reign of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second.
Back to PROROGATION
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To the Letter
When we think of lettering, fonts, text, and color, we don’t always think about marketing, or poetry, or decorative painting. But the truth is, all of these things can and do work together to tell a story, communicate a brand, and create a mood. For all of these things are more inter-related then we may think.
Cathedral School for Boys, an independent Episcopal school Founded in 1957 , located on the grounds of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco enrolls approximately 267 boys in kindergarten through eighth grade. When their Development Director engaged me to hand paint the school’s motto and other signage, we had to think about the size and style of lettering, font, and color that would best reflect its essence.
The Development Director wanted to identify “Alumni Hall”, which holds commemorative plaques listing the names of the student body dating back to the 19560’s. The lettering of the words had to command the wall on which they were placed, and the dates, to clearly identify each decade of pictured. A deep, rich custom blue was designed, reflected in the existing visual identity of the School, and the font “Perpetua” was chosen, appropriately enough. (Was that a fluke? A “meant to be”…? A so-called, “Freudian slip” ?)
The school’s motto, “Minds Hearts Hands Voices” was lettered across the front of the architectural detail directly facing the front glass window, creating a potent and effective message. Key was planning the spacing between the words, as the Headmaster wanted the look to be clean, simple and streamlined, and thus elegant. No muss, no fuss. It was just to be those four words, after all. Let the words do the talking, supported by their size, spacing, color and font. The space between each word serves as a visual and aural “beat”, or resting point of space and silence, which becomes part of the motto’s overall rhythm and poetry. Aural, because the words “speak” to us the viewer. As we read them, we hear them inside our heads, and as we are moved to speak, recite, or chant them. This process again supports and enhances the messaging of The School, and perhaps, the adjacent related Grace Cathedral as well.
Without being overpowering, the power of the words which embody the intent, spirit and brand, of The School communicate, while integrating perfectly into its presentation, its lobby, its front office, and its formal signage.
The architecture of the building, its purpose, where it is situated geographically, its urban and natural surroundings, and its spiritual identity and associations are also an inspiration for the aesthetic choices relating to it.
Seeking grace and maybe sometimes finding it. The elements of visual and literary art, architecture, design, urban planning, education, the natural world, our creative, quirky and infinitely original imagination, these gifts are always at our disposal to feed our hungry souls, and those around us. Here’s wishing you grace, and the ability to offer it to others, through the powers of our own perception.
Have YOU found a moment of grace through the powers of Your own perception?
If You feel so inclined, please share about it with us here.
Remember, we are all finding our own manner of grace in this thing called Life, together.
Art Biz Life
on March 14, 2012 at 2:30 pm Comments (2)
Tags: Aesethics, Architecture, Aural, Branding, Cathedral School for Boys, Color, Communication, creativity, Decorative painting, Design. Signage, Essence, Fonts, Grace, Grace Cathedral, Hand Lettered, Hand Painted, lettering, Marketing, Messaging, Perception, Perpetua, poetry, Presentation, San Francisco, Spiritual, Text, Visual, Visual Identity
Brand New 2
What is a “brand“? I added a link to the term, because I think Wikipedia describes the concept better than I can, at least at this stage. One of the salient words used in the definition is “identity”. Specifically: “A brand is the identity of a specific product, service, or business.” My colleague Elka Eastly Vera, transformative coach and brand consultant, defines it such: “A brand is like soul DNA. It’s what people recognize you for. It’s where the “you of you” meets the world. It’s the essence of your business. “
Jim Moran, founder and manager of Co-Op, a NYC-based branding firm, says, “Brand is really the DNA that defines your company. Branding is about storytelling. it’s about bringing the DNA to life and creating perceptions.”
When Frank Mahnke, of the International Association of Colour Consultants/Designers says that color is a form of communication and information, he is talking the language of branding. How do colors, patterns, textures, shapes, forms and images create ‘soul DNA’, and story?
It took me awhile to realize how much like graphic design and marketing decorative painting could be. When I worked with the talented graphic designer Dianna Jacobsen, of Jacobsen Design, on the creation of my website, business cards, brochure, and postcard, I went through an in-depth process of determining how I wanted to beam my business, my work, my self, out into the world.
“It’s not just about making things beautiful, but creating an experience for people.” says Dianna, about bringing the “brand” into physical spaces.
When I found myself working with clients ranging from businesses and organizations to non-profits and institutions, I discovered that I was helping them do just that through visual, and often verbal elements as well.
Let’s take a look at a few of them who employed the painter’s brush as a tool for communicating their message.
921 Front Street is a historic building dating from 1859, located in the North Waterfront area of San Francisco. Originally a warehouse, it is now a commercial building providing office space. The signage in the lobby is based on the building’s logo, so there is an immediate tie-in to the brand. The metallic copper and steely silver colors used in the lettering reflect the natural and industrial materials used in the lobby.
Maitri Compassionate Care provides exemplary, innovative, and compassionate hospice care. The Maitri Mover Campaign Donor Recognition Arch above was designed to honor the donors who participated in the capital campaign supporting its present facility. Names of donors are hand-painted onto the glazed surface of the industrial arch which supports the one-time parking garage. Like 921 Front Street, the lettering is done in metallic paints to draw the eye to the words, and make them stand out from the background. Whether said background be black or white, and the words words sparse or abundant, all visual and verbal elements support the branding.
“On the Fly” is a specialty men’s store designed by Martinkovic Milford Architects. The broken stripe design suggests stitching, as well as the classic men’s pin-striped suit sold inside. The stripe patten reflects the visual branding image used in the brand’s marketing materials. The “hands on” stripe application both communicates and enhances the store’s established visual message, and is “tailor-made” for the venue!
Also communicating directly out onto the “street”, but in a whole other way, the mural above depicts an imagined “Land of Oshun”, where a host of interacting Oshun figures express the colors, symbols, and attributes of this beneficent and inspirational goddess figure. Oshun Center, a drop-in center for women and their families, is a program of the Haight Ashbury Free Clinics. “Oshun“ is the name of an “Orisha” or goddess in the Yoruban (an ethno-linguistic group of West Africa), Brazilian, and Cuban religious pantheons. Oshun’s color is yellow, and her metals are gold and copper. Other symbols depicted in the mural include peacocks and mirrors, reflective of vanity and physical beauty. Oshun represents life’s joys, and all that makes it worth living, and this is the “soul DNA”, message, story, brand, of Oshun Center, supported in turn, by the visual language of the mural.
When we think about how everything we see, indeed everything we experience through any of our senses, transmits something, carries and provides associations, and potentially stirs our emotions, we can see just how powerful visual and verbal elements can be in telling the story of our soul, and communicating the soul of our story.
How have You communicated the essence of your own work or business, or that of another, through the elements of color, pattern, texture and imagery? What about words, text, or as the brand editor Abby Kerr would say, “phraseologie”?
Please share about the richness of your experience with us here. We love to hear from You.
Remember, we are all branding through this thing called Life, together.
on June 8, 2011 at 4:16 pm Comments (2)
Tags: 921 Front Street, Abby Kerr Ink, art, Arte Styling, artists, Bio, Brand, business, Client, Color, commercial, Communication, Consultant, Customer, Decorative Painter, Dianna Jacobsen, DNA, Elka Eastley Vera, Entrepreneur magazine, Experineces, E\lement, Frank Mahnke, Graphic Artist, Graphic Design, Hue, Identity, Image, Information, Institutional, Jacobsen Design, Jim Moran, Kelly Berg, Maitri Hospice, Marketing, Martinkovic Milford Architects, Message, muralists, Murals, Non-Profit, On the Fly, Organizations, Oshun Center, Patter, Perceptions, soul, Story, Storytelling, Textual, The Haight Ashbury Free Clinics, The International Association of Colour Consultants'Designers, Top One Oil, Transformation, Visual, Visual Language
If we look at the idea of a “brand” this way, then it could even be used to describe how we present ourselves in the world. But that is a subject for another post….
The visual elements of color and design, pattern and image, texture, shape and composition can all be brought to bear upon the process of developing and communicating a brand identity. Graphic designers, like the talented Dianna Jacobsen, of Jacobsen Design, do this all the time.
As an artist, muralist, decorative painter, and colorist (not mutually exclusive terms by any means), I am always intrigued with how this works, and fascinated to participate. We may tend to think of “brands” as purely commercial (cereal, dog food and shoes come to mind), but devoted non-profits and noble institutions also have theirs, and in my experience, a similar approach is taken to communicate them.
Let’s look at a number of businesses and organizations who employed the painter’s brush as a tool for communicating their message, how color plays a starring role in their brand identity, and why.
When Benihana Restaurant in Cupertino, Ca. underwent extensive remodeling, a mural consisting of a branded graphical design was specified to be painted on the “corrugated” concrete surface approximately 10 to 80′ in the air. Benjamin Moore Creative Paint in San Francisco matched the colors of the restaurant’s branded interior wall covering in paint. Master color mixer and matcher Norman Chinn chose Ben Moore Aura exterior paint colors by eye. He was so precise that without knowing it, he chose the very strawberry red used as a stock color in the Benihana Restaurant brand, which is heavy on warm reds, punctuated by creams, darker reds, and red-blacks. Red tends to be associated with heat fire and blood…can we read, appetite?
Red is used in a different way in the new Dress for Success San Francisco headquarters, designed by local architectural firm, Martinkovic Milford Architects. Dress for Success provides business attire and training for women, and key to the design is the theme of butterflies, expressing the idea of transformation. Tone on tone reds provide warmth, accent, and a sense of womb-like support for the women getting ready to launch out into the business world. Red’s association with life and love doesn’t hurt either.
Blush Organic Frozen Yogurt venue in San Francisco’s South of Market District is painted is apple green and crisp white, communicating a sense of freshness appropriate to a dairy-orientated ‘snackery”. However, this hue of green also provides other tasty associations: the sharp and pungent flavors of limes and sour apples, as well as the sweetness of kiwis and honeydew melons. All cool and refreshing, and fruity ingredients that could be used in their delicious yogurt!
Although also used to evoke connotations of the natural world, the greens in the mural below, designed and executed for San Francisco’s Planning for Elders in the Central City organization serve quite a different function. “PECC”, which works to “improve the quality of life of seniors, adults with disabilities, and their caregivers in San Francisco and beyond….” wanted to use the tree as a central image to express life, giving, renewal, community and support. Associations with the Tree of Life, and the Giving Tree are amplified by using the color of leaves, which also represents life. Green is also one of the colors associated with the heart chakra, standing for love, sympathy, and harmony.
Embarking on this post, I see how rich, expansive, and complex the subject of visual branding and the way artists can support it, is. A sister post may be in order to further elaborate on the subject.
When we think about how everything we see, indeed everything we experience through any of our senses, communicates something, carries and provides associations, and potentially stirs our emotions, it boggles the mind, (no pun intended.) We see, and experience first-hand just how powerful the element of color is, and how many different ways it can be used.
We can perhaps understand in a new way, the expression, “…coloring perception…”
What experiences have You had with color branding? Have you used color as part of a brand consultation? Color consulted with businesses, organizations, or even individuals on the how of hue for their “soul DNA“, as Elka Eastly Vera, would say?
If so, please share it with us here. We love to hear from You.
Remember, we are all bounding and branding through this thing called Life, together.
Tags: Artist, Association, Benjamin Moore, Blush Organic Frozen Yogurt, Brand, business, Chacra, Color, Colorist, Communication, composition, Creative paint, Decorative painting, design, Dianna Jacobsen, Dress for Success, Elka Eastly Vera, Hue, Identity, Image, International Association of Colour Consultants and Designers, Jacobsen Design, lettering, Martinkovic Milford Arcitects, Muralist, Murals, Painter, painting, pattern, Planning for Elders in the Central City, Presentation, Product, Service, Shapes, Soulo DNA, Symbol, texture, Visual, Visual Communication
Synesthesia: Sense and Sensibility Part Two
Our February 13th “Color Muze” segment on Artistically Speaking Talk Show, focused on the fascinating concept and phenomenon of “Synesthesia”, or “Unity of the Senses. I learned about Synesthesia through my color seminars at the IACC-NA (The International Association of Colour Consultants and Designers North America) from Mr. Frank Mahnke, President of the IACC-NA and the Director of the IACC Education/Accreditation Programs conducted worldwide. Mr. Mahnke lectures on the psycho-physiological effects of color, light and the human reaction to the built environment, as well as the role of color as information and communication in the field of marketing. In other words… Color Rocks the Big One…our Perception.
In my first Seminar with the IACC-NA, I learned about how colors (the visual) can provoke associations with our other senses, (smell, touch/the tactile, hearing and taste), as well as affect our perception of weight, volume, size and texture. In the words of Mr. Mahnke , “It seems that the centers for processing sensory information are linked with each other, leading to crosstalk between the senses.” If this is true, and it would seem from the evidence of our senses that it is, then the concept of Synesthesia is an important consideration in any and every color decision we make, with potentially profound consequences emotionally, physically, aesthetically, and even spiritually. How does our perception of Color make us Feel?
We tend to talk about color in terms of the visual; “Oh, that red bedroom is so bright!”, or “That’s a very pale shade of lilac.” But, if we tune into our own phraseology, we may just as often hear ourselves speaking about color in terms of our other four senses, the auditory, (hearing), olfactory, (smell), gustatory, (taste), and the tactile (touch). “Oh, that red is just so loud!” “What a sour green!”, “Such a sweet pink room!“, “I love that soft blue.”
Let’s awaken all our senses by taking a closer look, and tuning into what we feel, and how we respond to color.
What do colors sound like?
Warm colors such as yellows and oranges tend to feel loud to us, and can potentially make a space feel “noisy”. According toHeinrich Frieling, Director of the Institute of Color Psychology, we associate gold-yellow with major keys, and orange with loudness and major keys. Cooler colors such as blue on the other hand, tend to feel quieter and more distant, with darker-hued spaces seeming to further muffle sounds.
What do colors feel like?
What texture does a particular color “feel” like it has? It’s not surprising that yellow tends to “feel” smooth. When we consider yellow’s associations, this makes sense. Have we ever felt a ray of rough or scratchy sunlight? Looking at yellow’s opposite or complement, purple, we can get a sense of velvet. Would this have anything to do with our association of purple with royalty, and the images of purple velvet which we may associate with royal robes?
What do colors smell like?
The chroma, saturation, lightness, and brightness of a particular color can affect its sensory associations. Under Frieling, the Institute of Color Psychology has asserted that the color brown is associated with a musky, or roast taste. We may even use the word “browning” in lieu of the word “roasting”, or to describe part of the roasting process. However, green-blue may elicit fresh to salty associations, while the hue “blue” is essentially odorless. Add to this the nature associations we have to brown in all its aspects (think “earthy”), green-blue (sea) and just “blue” (sky), and the sensory meanings can become clear. Different blue and brown combinations will give different effects, making us think with our noses, as well as our eyes.
What do colors Taste like?
Taste and smell are closely related, and tend to hold the same or similar color associations. Red is sweet and strong, as long as it contains no yellow, and doesn’t cross over into the realm of orange, which may not be so sweet, despite our associations with the fruit. Perhaps the holiday of Valentine’s Day has played upon this “red as sweet” association, with its emphasis on red-wrapped boxes of chocolate, and other sweets. I would add the term “rich” into the mix, my association with Valentine’s Day chocolate, if its worth its salt- er, sugar. Green, and yellow-green by contrast (red and green being complementary colors, and opposite each other on the color wheel) associate with sour, with yellow-green veering to the tangy, and green, to the juicy. Consider green apples, kiwis, limes, fried green tomatoes (well, maybe not fried…tomatoes ARE fruits though!) Green to yellow-green hues can make our mouths water and our lips pucker just by thinking about them!
Thinking about it. In a way, that is the point.. isn’t it? Because, as we know, as scientists, colorists, designers and artists know, however subliminally, that color IS a matter of perception. Color exists in our brains. As Frank Mahnke says, “There is no doubt that a unity exists from one sense to another. Perception is not just a mosaic of separate sense stimulations. In certain aspects of psychology…the entire organism is looked upon as a whole.”
All of our senses play into the impressions we receive, the internal images we carry, and the ideas we form. resulting in how we feel. How we feel affects how we behave, and vice versa. When we understand, or perceive of color that way, we realize how amazingly, incredibly important and powerful it is. Color really does Rocks the Big One…our Perception. And as some would say, “perception is reality”. What do You think?
If you feel so inspired, share YOUR sense and sensibility with us here. We love to hear from you. Remember, we are all experiencing this thing called Life, together.
Newsflash: for another yummy look at the phenomenon of Synesthesia, please check out Elizabeth Brown’s Colorific blog post on the same subject.
on February 24, 2011 at 7:40 pm Comments (8)
Tags: Artistically Speaking Talk Show, Auditory, Color, color muze, Cool colors, cre8tive compass, Frank Mahnke, Gustatory, Hearing, Hue, IACC-NA, Intensity, International Association of Colour Consultants/Designers, Olfactory, Perception, Reality, Satruration, Seeing, Sense and Sensibility, Sight, Smell, synesthesia, Tactile, Taste, Tasting, The FIve Sense, Touch, value, Visual, Warm colors
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All posts tagged Under Cover
Under Cover: A Secret History Of Cross-Dressers @ the Photographers’ Gallery
The Photographer’s Gallery is a tall, narrow building on a corner of Ramillies Street (numbers 16-18, to be precise) just behind Oxford Street, a hundred yards east of Oxford Circus. It’s an enjoyable maze, with exhibition spaces on the 5th, 4th and 3rd floors, a café on the ground floor and a shop of photography books and film cameras in the basement.
Under Cover: A Secret History Of Cross-Dressers
I came to see the large exhibition of rare vintage photos of men and women cross-dressing, entitled Under Cover.
The exhibition is drawn from the personal archives of French film-maker and photograph collector Sébastien Lifshitz. For over 20 years he’s been building up an extensive collection of amateur photographs from Europe and the US documenting the surprisingly widespread practice of adult cross-dressing. The very earliest photos are from the 1860s and the collection goes on through to the 1960s.
Man in makeup wearing a ring. Photograph from a photo booth, with highlights of color. United States, circa 1920.© Sébastien Lifshitz Collection courtesy of Sébastien Lifshitz and The Photographers’ Gallery
The photos are all ‘found’ – meaning none were commissioned or taken by Lifshitz, but are largely anonymous photos of unnamed and unknown figures which he has picked up at flea markets, garage sales, junk shops and on Ebay, among other non-specialist sources. As the exhibition introduction puts it:
These photographs of men and women posing for the camera, using the clothes and gestures traditionally assigned to the ‘opposite sex’ offer a moving and candid view into the hidden worlds of countless individuals and groups who chose to ‘defy gender conventions.’
Lifshitz’s initial impulse was simply to document the act of cross-dressing, limiting his aim to accumulating photographs which showed men dressing as women and vice versa.
But as the collection grew, he began to detect different themes among the images, themes which began to suggest more interesting ways of categorising and explaining cross-dressing culture.
A group of twelve cross-dressing women in America, 1912
The historical prevalence of cross-dressing
I’m not all that surprised that lots of men have enjoyed dressing up as women because I was raised on the TV sitcoms It Ain’t Half Hot, Mum, The Dick Emery Show and the Kenny Everett Show in which men routinely dressed up as women, albeit for comedic purposes.
Drag queen Danny La Rue was all over the telly in my boyhood. He was awarded an OBE. Later on came the popular success of Lily Savage and the ongoing career of her creator, Paul O’Grady, who was awarded an MBE in 2008. Somewhere in between was Julian Clary who dresses fairly modestly now but was on TV throughout the 1980s wearing in the most outrageous outfits.
As a teenager I read biographies of Oscar Wilde and his gay circle which included cross-dressers. Also accounts of the ‘decadent’ Paris of the Second Empire or the ‘decadent’ Germany of the Weimar Republic, where men dressed as woman, wore lipstick and so on, and women wore men’s clothes, smoked cigarettes. And so on and so on.
In fact it’s a strange thing about the present generation of art curators that they sometimes give the impression of thinking that they’ve invented ‘deviant’ sex – homosexuality, bisexuality and all manner of other sexual practices – as if all these things are somehow new or can ‘only now’ be brought to public attention. This ‘now it can be told’ tone was also apparent in the recent exhibitions of Queer Art at Tate Britain and Outsider Art (featuring plenty of transvestites and transsexuals) at the Barbican.
As if there aren’t records of this kind of thing happening among the ancient Greeks or among the Romans, as if we don’t have records of it in Hindu and Moghul societies, as if Shakespeare’s comedies aren’t packed with cross-dressing gender ambivalence, or as if playing with gender roles hasn’t even been recorded among tribal societies. My point is that there is good evidence for so-called ‘deviant’ sexuality having been a permanent feature of the human race for as long as we have records.
From Sappho to Sand: Historical Perspective on Crossdressing and Cross Gender (1981) This paper reviews the history of cross-dressing, commencing with the Great Mother Cult through the Greco-Roman period and Judeo-Christian times, followed by the Renaissance period up to the 19th century to illustrate that cross-gender behaviour and cross-dressing are not new phenomena but have been present since the beginning of recorded history.
What, I suppose, is new about this treasure trove of material which Sébastien Lifshitz has collected is not the fact of extensive cross-dressing – it is that it has been so extensively documented in photographs.
The photographs provide a treasure trove of incontrovertible visual evidence, as opposed to all previous accounts which are based on the more slender and unreliable evidence of written records, anecdote, autobiography etc.
What photography does that written journalism or history or ethnography can’t is to say Here we are: we were real people, we had lives like you, we were short and tall and fat and thin and had freckles and spots and imperfections, we were flesh and blood like you and this is what we liked to do. You can’t deny or block or repress us. We were here and this world is our world, too.
Themes and chapters
The most interesting thing about the exhibition is not the news that for hundreds of years men have liked dressing up as women and women dressing up as men. That in itself is boring. What I found fascinating was the themes or areas into which Lifshitz divides his material.
There are about a dozen of them, each introduced by a lengthy wall label and they are as well-ordered and thoughtful as the chapters of a book. They include ‘the New Woman’, cross-dressing in prison camps, cross-dressing in cabarets and vaudeville, the phenomenon of ‘drag queens’, cross-dressing in turn-of-the-century in American universities, in circus and travelling shows, and many more.
Cross-dressing prisoners of war
It’s the specificity of many of these sub-sets which grabs the attention. Thus anyone who didn’t realise there is a great deal of homosexual activity in any army is naive, but a wall of photos here demonstrate the existence of cross-dressing cabarets in prisoner of war camps during both the First and Second World Wars, surely a very specialised category of activity and image. It is extraordinary that prisoners were allowed to take photos of each other dressed up, and that so many of these images have survived.
French prisoners of war in the German prisoner of war camp Königsbrück circa 1915 © Sébastien Lifshitz Collection. Courtesy of Sébastien Lifshitz and The Photographers’ Gallery
Not a job for a woman
A section deals with the backlash against the ‘New Woman’, a term coined to describe a new vogue for independent and assertive (generally upper-class) women in the 1890s.
The usual type of panic-stricken cultural conservative predicted that if women started taking up masculine habits and activities they would soon stop menstruating, become infertile and Western civilisation would grind to a halt. You can read this kind of thing in any number of histories of feminism.
Lifshitz has found various photos which are designed as a satire on this fashion. They show women posing in the costumes of traditionally ‘male’ roles (the army etc) and are designed to show how ridiculous it is for women to do the work of men – but done in a comically stylish way which suggests the photographer was taking the mickey out of the conservative critics as much as the women. The sequence is titled ‘Women of the Future’.
Women of the Future © Sébastien Lifshitz Collection. Courtesy of Sébastien Lifshitz Collection and The Photographers’ Gallery
It’s a tiny window on the past and its popular prejudices, but also shows photographers and their audience quite capable of joking about the subject, about traditional gender roles and their ‘subversion’.
Cross-dressing weddings
Apparently, cross dressing was fairly common on women-only university campuses in America in the last decades of the nineteenth century. There were clubs in which women could openly wear mannish dress. What I’d never heard of before is that there was a fashion for carrying out wedding ceremonies with an all-female cast, many of whom – well, at least the groom – were dressed as men.
Mock wedding, United States, circa 1900 © Sébastien Lifshitz Collection. Courtesy of Sébastien Lifshitz Collection and The Photographers’ Gallery
Were these a preparation for ‘adult’ life and marriage, or an odd fashion, or a satire on heterosexual norms?
The more of these sub-sets or sub-types of cross-dressing which Lifshitz presents, the more you realise that this apparently simple topic in fact covers or brings together a surprisingly diverse range of activities, attitudes and motives.
The nineteenth century growth of bourgeois conformity
Just to step back and remind ourselves of a little social history. The mid- and later-19th century saw a hardening of gender roles and stereotypes, and a concomitant a loss of psychological and sexual flexibility.
The flamboyant costumes which men commonly wore in the 16th, 17th and 18th century and which had endured into the Regency society which young princess Victoria grew up in – all those silks, ribbons, ruffs and bows – were steadily dropped as the century progressed in favour of increasingly plain, black, stiff and constricting clothes for men, and absurdly big, complex skirts with baffles and corsets, for women.
One of the complaints against Tory Party leader and Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli was that he dressed, oiled his hair and perfumed himself like the fashionable dandy which he’d been in the 1830s, long into the 1870s when such looks and behaviour had become frowned upon.
It is only in this particular historical context, in the setting of an increasingly ‘bourgeois’ concern for strict conformity to repressive social appearances, that all manner of previous types of ‘dressing up’ increasingly came to be seen as unfashionable, then undesirable, and then began to be perceived as a threat to social norms and conventions.
Why did all this happen? The conventional explanation is that the industrial revolution made life harder, more embattled and more intense for everyone, and that this was reflected in increasingly repressive cultural and social norms.
In the 18th century there had been the landowner who occasionally came up to Town and saw a small circle of bankers or courtiers, but mostly lived in reasonable agreement with the labourers who worked his land.
All this changed and kept on changing relentlessly throughout the 19th century as the new system of factories and industrialisation swept across the country. This turned rural labourers into an embittered and impoverished urban proletariat living in hastily thrown up terraced hovels, who periodically threatened to march on London or overthrow the entire political order.
In parallel was created a new class of arriviste factory owners who took advantage of their new-found wealth to try to and compete with the land-owning aristocracy in terms of lifestyle and attitude, but nervously aware of the fragility of their wealth and status.
All the classes of Britain felt more threatened and insecure. Britain had more wealth than ever before, but for many (many businessmen, factory owners and the bankers who served them) their wealth was more precarious that the wealth generated from land – as demonstrated by successive economic depressions and banking crashes through the later 19th century. These periodic economic depressions led to the steady sequence of violent socialist revolutions on continental Europe (for example, in France in 1848 and 1870) which put the fear of God into the English bourgeoisie.
In this socio-economic context, culture was permeated by a permanent anxiety, a dread that the existing state of affairs could easily collapse, from any number of causes. (I haven’t mentioned the dark cloud of anxiety created by the writings of Thomas Malthus who speculated that, if unchecked, the poorest of the poor would breed like rabbits and swamp society in illiterate thugs – yet another source for the widespread conviction that the uncontrollable sex instinct must be bridled, restricted and channelled into only the most strict, state-endorsed practices.)
And so the upper sections of society policed their own behaviour with ever-increasing anxiety that any lapse from the impeccably high standards of behaviour they set themselves might be it, the crack, the first tremor of the great social apocalypse they all feared.
The stress and anxiety about sexual deviation which had built up throughout the century into a permanent neurosis helps to explain the viciousness of the gaol sentence given to Oscar Wilde for homosexual behaviour (two years hard labour) since the judge and his class felt that an example must be made to terrify all other homosexuals into abandoning a practice which, according to their history books, had accompanied the decline and fall of the Roman Empire.
Imperial dressing up
Speaking of empires, it might be illuminating to take a detour to the big exhibition about the British Empire and Artists which Tate Britain held a few years ago.
This had a section about imperialists dressing up. It made the point that throughout the 18th century and the first half of the nineteenth century, British men, in particular, had a fancy for ‘going native’ and dressing up in the costumes of their colonial subjects. Take, for example, this image of Captain Colin Mackenzie of the Madras Army, wearing traditional Afghan Dress, by the painter James Sant (1842).
Captain Colin Mackenzie of the Madras Army, lately a hostage in Caubool, in his Afghan Dress (1842) by James Sant (Tate Britain)
But the Indian Mutiny (or the First War of Independence as Indian historians call it) of 1857 changed all this. It introduced a new note of bitterness between ruler and ruled. After the British Government took over direct rule of India from the East India Company it enforced far more strict divisions between ‘natives’ and their colonial masters, divisions which, within a generation, had hardened into unbreakable taboos.
My point is that it wasn’t only in the realm of ‘sexuality’ that people (generally well-off, well-educated people) who had once felt free to dress up as natives or women or generally amuse themselves in fancy costumes, felt themselves, in the second half of the nineteenth century, increasingly constricted in all aspects of their behaviour. It became wise to keep quiet about their little hobby or fetish.
The strictness of the taboo reflected the profundity of the anxiety – the anxiety widespread among the ruling, law-making and judging classes that one millimetre of flexibility around these issues of ‘correct’ behaviour would open cracks and fissures, which would quickly see all the ‘civilised’ values of society snap and unravel, the natives throw off their imperial masters, the great mass of impoverished proles rise up and overthrow their frock-coated masters – just as the barbarians had overthrown Rome once it abandoned the high moral principles of the republic and declined into the Tiberius-Caligula-Nero decadence of the empire.
Dressing up, wearing lipstick – isn’t that precisely what the Emperor Nero had done!
More cross-dressing
Back to the exhibition, which continues to entertain and provoke by demonstrating the wide variety of meanings cross dressing can have.
Transvestite entertainers
Take the enormous subject of cross-dressing entertainers. The wall label usefully distinguishes between men dressing as women to entertain and the far more flamboyant tradition of burlesque, which is characterised not just by women dressing as men, but by the outrageous exaggeration of ‘female’ qualities of grandstanding, elaborate dress, vamped-up make-up and so on.
The exhibition has several sets of photos of entertainers from way back at the start of the 20th century, showing how simple, naive and innocent an activity men dressing as women can seem.
Five performers on a platform. Albumen print, Hungary, circa 1900 © Sébastien Lifshitz Collection. Courtesy of Sébastien Lifshitz Collection and The Photographers’ Gallery
It describes the different forms these entertainments took in different countries, from vaudeville, burlesque and music hall at the turn of the century, on to nightclubs and revue bars between the wars.
But the sweet innocence of the turn-of-the-century is a world away, in style, glamour and bombast, from the really outrageously flamboyant cross-dressing entertainers of the 1950s onwards, a hugely popular form of entertainment in post-War Germany and France, which in England was named ‘drag’ – hence ‘drag queens’ – which continued in English popular entertainment down to my day.
Straight or gay?
Not all these men need have been gay. Many cross-dressers have been happily heterosexual but just enjoyed dressing up as women. There is, quite obviously and supported by the evidence here, a spectrum of cross-dressing behaviours and motivations, from essentially straight men who just liked slipping into a comfortable floral dress and putting on a bit of lippy – all the way to the experience of transgender men who feel from puberty or even earlier that they are inhabiting a body of the wrong gender, and so have gone to various lengths to try and transition to the other gender.
On this theme of tansgender – the story of Marie-Pierre Pruvot (born Jean-Pierre Pruvot, 11 November 1935) takes up a couple of walls but is well worth it.
Born a male in Algeria, Marie-Pierre became a French transsexual woman who performed under the stage name ‘Bambi’. Bambi was famous enough by 1959 to be the subject of a TV documentary. When her performing days were over she studied for a degree from the Sorbonne and became a teacher of literature in 1974.
There are several walls full of photos of her here because Lifshitz made an award-winning documentary about her in 2013. There’s no doubting that in her prime she was gorgeous, in that glamorous late 50s, early 60s way.
Bambi (Marie-Pierre Pruvot) in the early 1960s
Bambi undertook her own gender reassignment in an amateur way, buying over the counter hormones, until she had enough money to arrange an operation and help from medical professionals. There are several photos of her nude showing well-formed ‘female’ breasts. She didn’t just want to dress as a woman; she wanted to become a woman.
My point is that the transgender experience of wanting to become another sex is completely different:
from the heterosexual who likes dressing up as the opposite sex, for a while, as a hobby or fetish
from the homosexual who is likewise happy in his or her own skin, but as part of their character or as occasional role-playing likes dressing mannishly or femininely
from the homosexual who makes a living as a flamboyant drag queen
The Washington cross-dressers
Off to one side is a room which exhibits what seem to be the photos taken and shared among a network of rather boring, homely men who lived in 1950s Washington D.C., and who liked to dress up as rather boring, homely women and meet up at each other’s houses for parties – as recorded in a trove of photos Lifshitz has come into possession of and puts on display here.
Nothing loud or garish about it. The opposite. Rather humdrum. ‘Hello Mr Peters’, ‘Hello Mr Philips’ – except that the men passing the time of the day are wearing tasteful 1950s dresses with matching handbags.
Washington cross-dressers © Sébastien Lifshitz Collection. Courtesy of Sébastien Lifshitz Collection and The Photographers’ Gallery
This sequence immediately reminded me of the section at the Barbican exhibition about the Casa Susanna, a retreat in the Catskill Mountains of New York state, created solely for cross-dressing men.
Casa Susanna explained in a Guardian article.
The more you look, the more you see.
Women dressing as men
As to women dressing as men, some were famous lesbians who made a point of their mannish attire – I can think of a number of Weimar portraits of such aggressively masculine women who cultivated a louche bohemian image.
Portrait of the journalist Sylvia von Harden by Otto Dix (1926)
But for everyone one of these ‘notorious’ literary or artistic figures, there must have been thousands of essentially ‘straight’ women at American campuses who enjoyed dressing up as men (apparently). And then millions and millions of women who were in no way homosexual but just rebelled against wearing the ridiculously encumbering outfits society had assigned to their gender at the turn of the twentieth century, and so – without ceasing to be heterosexual women – just wore more practical, less ‘feminine’ clothes.
What I’m struggling to say is that, the more you look at these photos and the more you study Lifshitz’s fascinating wall labels which draw distinctions and categories and types and flavours of cross-dressing, the more you realise that this apparently ‘simple’ activity has in fact been carried out by a staggeringly wide variety of people, over a long period of time, and for all kinds of reasons, from trivial game-playing to profound identity crisis, from student high jinks to being the basis for a prime-time television career.
The photos
The long section on Bambi is a bit of a spoiler, really, because not many of the other people on display here are quite as drop-dead gorgeous as her.
In this respect the photos serve as a reminder (like most other collections of historic photos) of the way in which sitters for photographs (and the photographers themselves) have become steadily more savvy, more stylish, more self-aware, from the embarrassing lumpishness of 1900 –
Burlesque comedian Crun-Crun in Avignon, France, 1900, courtesy of Sebastien Lifshitz and The Photographers’ Gallery
to the knowing, rebel fagginess of the 1960s.
Man dressed as a woman, Mannheim, Germany, c.1960, courtesy of Sebastien Lifshitz and The Photographers’ Gallery
This latter photograph could have been taken today, a reminder that the world changed out of all recognition in the 60 years from 1900 to 1960, from the Boer War to the Beatles, whereas in the sixty years since then most aspects of culture – sex and drugs and rock and roll, package holidays, blockbuster movies and the ‘rebel’ look – have remained surprisingly static.
Interview with Sébastien Lifshitz
P.S. Size isn’t everything
Contrary to the impression given by the reproductions above, all of the images are quite small, certainly none of them are poster-size or painting size. The biggest ones are postcard-size being themselves old prints made from photographic film in the old-fashioned way.
Some are even smaller than that – there are whole walls of images no more than a few inches wide: for example, the iconic image of the man wearing lipstick at the top of this review is in reality only a few inches across and you have to lean right in to see it properly.
Installation view of Under Cover at the Photographers’ Gallery (photo by the author)
Somehow this makes the images seem all the more rare and precious. Not commercially-made images capable of being blown up and sensationalised, but hundreds of small, often intimate, snapshots of secret lives, secret pleasures, secret wishes and secret fantasies, preserved in this fragile format to come back and haunt our brasher, more loudmouth age.
P.S. Floof yourself
A room to one side of the exhibition contains a big fabric blob covered in felt stick-on glasses, beards, moustaches and so on. To quote the instructions:
“Soof the Floof is a genderless, gelatinous, hairy little blob. This installation invites visitors to question ideas of gender, how wear gender, how we can subvert, deconstruct and reimagine gender. Soof the Floof is large felt Floof with felt props you can mix and match and playfully challenge ideas of gender.”
The room was empty. Shame. I’d have liked to watch some gender subversion in action.
Instructions on how to floof yourself
Under Cover: A Secret History Of Cross-Dressers continues at the Photographers’ Gallery until 3 June 2018
Review in the Guardian
Other photography reviews
Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize @ the Photographers’ Gallery (May 2018)
The Great British Seaside @ National Maritime Museum (May 2018)
Another Kind of Life: Photography on the Margins @ the Barbican (April 2018)
Andreas Gursky @ the Hayward Gallery (April 2018)
Post-Soviet Visions @ Calvert 22 Foundation (March 2018)
Illuminating India @ the Science Museum (February 2018)
Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2017 @ the National Portrait Gallery (January 2018)
Syria: A Conflict Explored @ the Imperial War Museum (May 2017)
Malick Sidibé @ Somerset House (January 2017)
Don McCullin (March 2017)
Shaped by War by Don McCullin (2010)
Unreasonable Behaviour by Don McCullin (2015)
Paul Strand: Photography and Film for the 20th Century @ the V and A (June 2016)
Beard @ Somerset House (March 2015)
Unseen City: Photos by Martin Parr @ Guildhall Art Gallery (March 2016)
Peter Kennard @ Imperial War Museum London (May 2015)
Everything Was Moving: Photography from the 60s and 70s @ the Barbican (November 2012)
by Simon on June 1, 2018 • Permalink
Posted in Exhibition, Photography
Tagged 1857, ancient Rome, Bambi, bisexuality, British Empire and Artists, burlesque, Caligula, Captain Colin Mackenzie, Casa Susanna, Crun-Crun, Danny La Rue, Disraeli, drag, drag queen, East India Company, Feminism, First World War, gay, homosexuality, It Ain't Half Hot, James Sant, Jean-Pierre Pruvot, Julian Clary, Kenny Everett Show, lesbian, Lily Savage, Marie-Pierre Pruvot, Mum, Nero, Oscar Wilde, Otto Dix, Outsider Art, Oxford Street, Paul O'Grady, photography, Queen Victoria, Queer Art at Tate Britain, Regency, Sébastien Lifshitz, Second World War, Sylvia von Harden, Tate Britain, The Dick Emery Show, the Indian Mutiny, the new Woman, The Photographers' Gallery, Thomas Malthus, Tiberius, transgender, transsexual, Under Cover, Under Cover: A Secret History Of Cross-Dressers, Washington D.C., Weimar Republic
Posted by Simon on June 1, 2018
https://astrofella.wordpress.com/2018/06/01/under-cover-a-secret-history-of-cross-dressers-the-photographers-gallery/
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Analysis & Top Story 19 Oct 2017 29 Nov 2017
Merkel’s Answer to Populist Challenge: Shift to the Left
Germany’s conservative party leader calls for a focus on pay, pensions and housing.
German chancellor Angela Merkel delivers a news conference in Brussels, March 15, 2016 (Bundesregierung/Guido Bergmann)
Angela Merkel’s answer to the defection of right-wing voters is — counterintuitively — to shift further to the left.
Der Spiegel reports that the German chancellor recently told members of her Christian Democratic party (CDU) they need to do better on pay, pensions and housing.
They were expecting a harder line on immigration, which is the issue that galvanized the Alternative for Germany’s voters.
This new far-right party placed third in last month’s election with nearly 13 percent support.
Merkel’s Christian Democrats still won, but with only 33 percent support — their lowest vote share in over half a century.
Bavarian support
Merkel’s otherwise more reactionary Bavarian allies have endorsed the soft line.
According to Der Spiegel , Horst Seehofer, whose Christian Social Union suffered an even worse setback than the CDU, has concluded that reviving his dispute with Merkel over refugees could only boost the Alternative.
He cautioned parliamentarians last week that voters must not get the impression their politicians are so preoccupied with refugees that there is no time left for them.
Seehofer made it obvious which demographic he is thinking of — families with children, elderly people with modest pensions and normal working people who can’t afford the high rents in cities like Munich. These people felt overlooked by politicians, he argued, and that needs to change.
Concretely, the conservatives are hoping to achieve €15 billion in tax relief for middle incomes in the new parliament. They want additional benefits for families with children, billions in new housing subsidies and higher spending on retirement homes.
Critics point out that the Christian Democrats didn’t only lose support to the Alternative, whose voters tend to feel left behind. They lost just as many, if not more, voters to the liberal Free Democrats, whose attitudes are in many ways the opposite: entrepreneurial, individualistic and optimistic about the future.
These voters didn’t switch because of Merkel’s open-door immigration policy or her austerity program. They were disappointed when, in concessions of the Social Democrats, she introduced a national minimum wage, cut the retirement age to 63 for blue-collar workers and tightened regulations for the self-employed.
Merkel’s challenge — and her successor’s — will be to find a balance between the Germanies of the Alternative and the Free Democrats: those parts of the country, especially in the former East, where voters are struggling to get by and susceptible to the false promises of nationalism and those in the West, especially the cities, where life is good and voters see no reason for sweeping change.
Christian Democrats (Germany)
New deal for the middle class
The center can hold
Spain to Suspend Catalan Home Rule After Independence Vote
Without Brexit Deal, United Kingdom Would Be Thrown into Chaos
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Stoner – John Williams
The Buried Giant – Kazuo Ishiguro
Always Books
Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights – Salman Rushdie
Posted by Zachary (AlwaysBooks.co.uk) | Apr 20, 2015 | Blog, Books | 0 |
Salman Rushdie’s new novel is being released this September…
A mouthful of a title, and quite an inventive way of saying ‘1001 nights’, this will be Rushdie’s eleventh novel – and his first directed at adults for seven years.
His previous release was the non-fiction Joseph Anton: A Memoir (2012), written about the time which he spent in hiding due to the now infamous fatwa which was issued against him thanks to the publication of The Satanic Verses (1988) and the reaction of the fundamental Islamic leader of Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini.
The following is what we know about the book already:
“In the near future, after a storm strikes New York City, the strangenesses begin. A down-to-earth gardener finds that his feet no longer touch the ground. A graphic novelist awakens in his bedroom to a mysterious entity that resembles his own sub–Stan Lee creation. Abandoned at the mayor’s office, a baby identifies corruption with her mere presence, marking the guilty with blemishes and boils. A seductive gold digger is soon tapped to combat forces beyond imagining.
Unbeknownst to them, they are all descended from the whimsical, capricious, wanton creatures known as the jinn, who live in a world separated from ours by a veil. Centuries ago, Dunia, a princess of the jinn, fell in love with a mortal man of reason. Together they produced an astonishing number of children, unaware of their fantastical powers, who spread across generations in the human world.
Once the line between worlds is breached on a grand scale, Dunia’s children and others will play a role in an epic war between light and dark spanning a thousand and one nights—or two years, eight months, and twenty-eight nights. It is a time of enormous upheaval, where beliefs are challenged, words act like poison, silence is a disease, and a noise may contain a hidden curse.”
Does anybody know if “strangeness-es” is actually a word? Anyhow, that word, and this blurb, point to the vibrant and colourful writing which readers can expect from an upcoming Rushdie novel!
Speaking of vibrancy, Rushdie has also announced via Twitter that the more minimalist cover above (which is likely to be the hardcover) won’t be the only cover available…
Another day, another cover. Here’s the UK cover, following the brilliantly lively design style of the UK paperbacks. pic.twitter.com/qTF1XuzlPj
— Salman Rushdie (@SalmanRushdie) April 18, 2015
And it’s also since been revealed that the cover artist (Sroop Sunar) has also completely re-designed all of Rushdie’s previous covers too!
What do you think of these new covers? And are you excited for Rushdie’s new novel to be released, or not really bothered?
Let me know in the comments….
PreviousThe Buried Giant – Kazuo Ishiguro
NextStoner – John Williams
Zachary (AlwaysBooks.co.uk)
Always Books began as an Instagram profile to document the books which I had read during my Comparative Literature degree. The photos were all of the books I had read, or I was currently reading - I decided to also find a place to get down some of my thoughts about each of these books too, and so this blog was born...
Percy Shelley – Hellas (1822)
The Old Man and the Sea – Ernest Hemingway
Rabbit, Run – John Updike
Always Books began as an Instagram profile to document the books which I had read during my Comparative Literature degree. The photos were all of the books I had read, or I was currently reading - I decided to also find a place to get down some of my thoughts about some of these books too, and so this blog was born...
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Corporate, Multi-Use & Developer
Health Engagement
Wellbeing & Lifestyle
NASA, Aquila Launch Employee Fitness & Wellness Program
Washington, DC USA – November 1, 2018
Aquila is pleased to announce a partnership with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to focus on employees’ health and fitness. NASA has awarded a multi-year contract to Aquila to implement a health and wellness program for its employees. Aquila President & CEO Yvan Miklin said he’s honored to serve NASA employees. “We are looking forward to supporting the women and men behind the space exploration program,” Miklin said. “Good health is about fitness, but it’s also about positive lifestyle change and building a support system. The leaders at NASA recognize that Aquila’s unique approach addresses the whole person and has a history of measurable results.”
The Aquila-NASA employee wellbeing partnership will be supported by the guidelines from the NASA’s Office of the Chief Health and Medical Officer. The OCHMO oversees the health of astronauts participating in manned space travel, as well as health and wellness offerings for the space program’s more than 18,000 employees. While space travel tests the limits of human endurance, Miklin said Aquila’s primary focus will be the everyday health and wellbeing of the NASA employee population.
“The way Aquila approaches fitness and health is different because it’s customized to the individual,” Miklin said. “Our goal is to start a different kind of conversation with employees about their health – one that honors where they are on their unique journey and uses proven techniques and data to help them achieve their goals.”
© Aquila 2019 - All Rights Reserved Privacy Policy | Terms of Use
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Making Metal, Casting Society at The Cairns, Orkney
March 8, 2018 May 6, 2019 seanlisle1
Ring headed pin moulds with cast pin
New radiocarbon dates from The Cairns archaeological excavation shed light on the possible structure of society in the 3rd and 4th Centuries AD in Orkney.
Martin Carruthers, Site Director at The University of the Highlands and Islands Archaeology Institute research excavation at The Cairns, Orkney, talks about the latest research findings from the site.
“We have been very lucky at The Cairns over the years of the excavations to find a substantial set of remains and residues that relate to Iron Age metalworking. This includes at least two iron-working furnaces, and many other features and artefacts, but there is one particularly big and concentrated event that took place beyond the broch in the northern part of the site, in the area we call Trench M. The remains of this episode include furnaces, bronze waste; bronze splashes and droplets, crucibles, and very significantly: moulds for casting fine bronze objects. Over sixty moulds and mould fragments have been recovered. These were used to cast a variety of objects ranging from simple bronze rings, to distinctive decorated dress pins, called ‘projecting ring-headed pins’, and penannular brooches, which are the lovely open-ring, cloak brooches that are sometimes referred to as ‘Celtic’ brooches.
The remains of structure K where the jewellery-making occurred
The volume and nature of the items being produced suggests that this was a socially significant collection of prestigious items aimed at denoting the identity, and status of those who were to wear the items; badges of their belonging and importance within the community. Importantly, it is the entire suite of materials found together, as well as their precise distribution pattern within the trench, that indicates strongly that this material relates to an in situ metalworking event, rather than a secondary event, such as merely the refuse disposal of old moulds, or even their ritual deposition. This is important because the closer we can get to the actual context of the metalworking events the clearer and more direct our picture of the process becomes.
The moulds for casting the bronze jewellery were found in an area several metres in diameter, scattered within and across the remains of an Iron Age building (Structure K) that was already ruinous and unroofed by the time the metalworking was happening. That building was itself found to overly the partially in-filled remains of a large enclosure ditch that had originally surrounded the broch period settlement. We therefore knew from the assessment of the layers (the stratigraphy) on site that the metalworking episode did not occur very early on in the sequence of events and buildings on site but it remained to be seen if it was going on towards the end of the monumental broch period on site, or if it was actually occurring after the broch was put out of use, which we know occurred around the mid-Second Century AD based on previously obtained radiocarbon dates. The calendar date of the metalworking was therefore of great interest. Did the jewellery-making episode date to the period late in the life of the broch, or was it happening after the broch itself was decommissioned and put out of use?
Two moulds for casting penannular brooches
Craft and Chronology
Newly obtained radiocarbon dates make it clear which of these scenarios is correct. The new dates show that the jewellery-making occurred sometime between the AD240’s and the mid AD300’s. This places the metalworking very definitively after the end of the broch. Now, with this enhanced understanding of the chronological and structural context of the metalworking we can begin to consider the social context of this episode of metalworking. It is happening at a period of quite dramatic change in the material circumstances of Northern Iron Age communities in Scotland, at the end of the conventional Middle Iron Age and the beginning of the Later Iron Age periods, and contemporary with the mid to later Roman period further South.
It is very interesting that this episode therefore occurred after the culmination of the monumental phase of the site; after the demise of the massive broch at the heart of the community. One prominent British Iron Age scholar (Professor Niall Sharples from Cardiff University) has previously suggested that across Atlantic Scotland a pattern can be observed in which, around the time of the end of the brochs, when monumental domestic architecture is on the wane, there is a very substantial rise in the volume of items that reflect the presentation of the individual through personal adornment. This phenomenon seems to be reflected at The Cairns also.
Jewellery as social currency: Feasting, and gift-giving?
At the end of the bronze-casting event a fairly thick, very rich animal bone midden was laid down in the vicinity and slightly overlying the metalworking area. The close relationship between the metalworking and the animal bone is shown by the presence of a few of the crucibles and mould fragments amongst the midden also. What’s in this midden?
Well lots of domesticated animals, including cattle, sheep and pig, especially large cattle long bones. In addition, there were other mammal bones such as red deer, otter, and even a small quantity of horse. The midden also contained carbonised soils, ash and broken fragments of pottery. Many fire-cracked beach cobbles were also excavated, and these represent the exploded remains of ‘pot-boilers’, heated cobbles that were immersed in vessels to heat up water and cook some of the food. It seems that the people gathered at our feast were consuming beef on the bone, boiled pork, and roasted mutton and venison, some of which may have been washed down by beverages drunk from many pottery vessels.
The close stratigraphic association between the fine metalworking and the feasting raises the question of what exactly was going on here. One possibility that I like very much is that the feasting could be the spectacular social event at which the products of the jewellery-making were handed out, or gifted, to their intended recipients by those who had sponsored the metalworking in the first place. We may therefore be peering into the social circumstances of the jewellery-making and the distribution of its products amongst the community at The Cairns. If this is so, then it is a fascinating insight into the moment at which objects like the pins, brooches and rings started off on their biographies, their journey through people’s lives.
This is a very rare opportunity to see more clearly the initial nature of the social and political significance of these objects from their start-point. It would mean that the sharing or gifting of the jewellery was surrounded in the circumstances of a big social occasion, a massive party, if you like. We are seeing their birth and the important role they played in the power-play and social strategies of Iron Age groups and individuals. With the circumstances of the jewellery-making we are able, for once, to investigate the intended status and significance of these items within the context of their birth, rather than depending on the information we usually get, which is based on the discovery of these objects much later in their lives, in fact at the end of their lives, when they went in the ground, perhaps many decades, or more, after they were originally made and worn. Most theories about the brooches and pins and their role in society have been based on what we glean from them in this end-state, but the assemblage of metalworking evidence from The Cairns; the moulds, crucibles, and other items, together with the massive remains of the feasting allows us to grasp what was going on at the point in time when these jewellery items were instigated.
Jewellery, Society and the wider Northern Scottish Iron Age
It is highly intriguing that the birth of these prestigious pieces of jewellery appears to have been accompanied by communal, outdoor feasting and judging by the volume of animal bone it involved a large part, if not all, of the community. In the absence of the big spacious monumental buildings, such as the brochs, which may have previously served to gather large numbers of people under one roof at important times in the life of the community, we can ponder whether feasting events like this were the new arena for expressing the identity and solidarity of the community.
If we now recall Professor Sharples’ aforementioned thesis that the changes at the end of the Middle Iron Age to late Iron Age involved a major transformation of the way people expressed their social identity, from the communal to the individual then this evidence for big community feasting in the early part of the Later Iron Age is very interesting. Perhaps this serves to somewhat modify that concept, because in the post-broch era at The Cairns, for one, the community appears to have retained ways of expressing their greater collective identity. Nevertheless, it seems unlikely that everyone was singled-out and gifted one of the pieces of fine jewellery that were produced.
At one level, perhaps, everyone in the community was involved in the feasting, but only some were ennobled by receiving a pin; a ring, or a brooch. So it may well be that we are looking at the strategies for creating and maintaining the concept of the entire community at the same time as signalling social difference, and hierarchy within the community of this post-broch period. If so, the excavations are really coming up trumps in terms of allowing us to peer into the social circumstances of Iron Age communities.
New dates for Structure B1: Have we found the elite sponsors of the metalworking?
The period of the jewellery-making is after the end of the broch and we were previously unclear which buildings amongst the many post-broch structures were occupied at the time of the bronze-working. The new dates also allow us to pin-point whereabouts on site, at least some of, the community were living at the time the jewellery-making was taking place. Armed with the new radiocarbon dates, it turns out, that one of the large rectangular post-broch buildings (perhaps a Wag-like building of the type found in Caithness and at The Howe in Orkney) known to us as Structure B1, located about 30 metres to the south-west of the jewellery-making area was first constructed and occupied between the Mid-3rd to 4th Centuries AD, and therefore at the same time as the metalworking.
The large formal hearth in Structure B under excavation
Structure B1 lies directly over the reduced and in-filled remains of the broch. One of the most remarkable aspects of this building is its very large, formal and complex central hearth, which was over 3 metres in length in its fully developed form. This hearth and the central location of the building directly juxtaposed with the remains of the abandoned broch almost co-opting its former position and grandeur have always made us wonder if it was one of the key buildings in the immediate post-broch period at The Cairns, quite possibly the highest status building on site at that time, and may be the successor to the central broch in socio-political terms.
It is intriguing therefore to now know unambiguously that Structure B1 was contemporary with whoever was managing the wealth required to sponsor the lavish jewellery-making on site. Pushing this further, it is tempting to speculate that it was the important and powerful household resident in Structure B1 who instigated and organised the production of the jewellery, and the feasting, with all the capacity that those remarkable objects and events had for the creation and maintenance of the post-broch Iron Age community at The Cairns.”
Martin Carruthers, Site Director at The Cairns and Programme Leader for MSc Archaeological Practice, University of the Highlands and Islands Archaeology Institute.
Martin would like to thank Professor Dave Barclay, Forensic Consultant, and Professor Emeritus, Robert Gordon University Aberdeen for the very kind and helpful donation, which made it possible to fund the most recent radiocarbon dates discussed in this piece.
If you would like to explore the possibility of studying and contributing to the research undertaken at the UHI Archaeology Institute at undergraduate or postgraduate level then please either e-mail us at studyarchaeology@uhi.ac.uk or see our website.
Archaeology, The CairnsIron Age, landscape, research, teaching
Previous Article Archaeology in a Day – Open Day @UHI Archaeology Institute, Orkney
Next Article Celebrating Young People in Archaeology – Work Placement at UHI Archaeology Institute
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Opponents of the teacher walkout speak out
The vote for a teacher walkout received a 75 percent approval rating, but those who opposed the decision weren’t quiet about their reasons.
A counter-movement against Red for Ed called Purple for Parents was created on April 30 and gained thousands of online followers in a matter of days. Founder Forest Moriarty says he created Purple for Parents as a space for people who disagreed with the walkout to talk about it.
“I started this group to give a voice to parents who felt that the Red for Ed movement was not really aligned with their own personal belief,” Moriarty says. “There was no place to talk about it. If you disagreed with them, you would be shouted out… There were also kids, support staff and teachers who didn’t agree with the walkout. The Red for Ed people have made their coworkers, parents and kids uncomfortable by doing this.”
Jennifer Hill is a former teacher and current substitute, and she says she was okay with teachers getting raises but she disagreed with the methods that were being used. She says “as soon as they decided to abandon our children and leave them and leave their classrooms,” she was unable to support them anymore.
The teachers continued to get paid salary while they were on the walkout, but support staff like Hill missed five days of pay. That resulted in Hill losing hundreds of dollars, she says. Parents were negatively affected as well. Moriarty says he was fortunate because he works from home so he could look after his two sons, but many parents aren’t so lucky.
Moriarty says he has always seen teaching as a job of passion and not money. He says he originally supported the Red for Ed movement because he wanted to see teachers receive more money. However, he doesn’t want that to happen irresponsibly.
“They rushed into a walkout. They were going to get most of what they wanted, and they still walked out,” Moriarty says. “What changed in that time frame? Virtually nothing. They walked out and caused all of this harm to our community. Our demand is that they do get a pay raise, but it has to be financially responsible.”
Hill says while she agree with pay raises for teachers, she doesn’t believe in blanket raises. She says the raises should be based on merit because there are some teachers that have degrees beyond a bachelor’s who are getting paid just as much as teachers who barely put in any work.
The teacher walkout lasted for five school days, and ended on Thursday, May 3. It ended with Governor Doug Ducey signing a budget that plans on giving teachers a 20 percent raise by 2020.
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Horizonte main page
"The Great British Baking Show": Amateur bakers rise to the top
All the decadent breads, cakes, pastries and pies take center stage for an encore of "The Great British Baking Show" each Friday night at 9 p.m. on Arizona PBS.
'American Masters' showcases great chefs
This month, "American Masters" showcases three iconic chefs Sundays at 2 p.m. Explore their life stories, their love of cooking and what they brought to the world.
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Front-loaded home schedule gives UVA chance to build momentum
Published Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014, 11:11 pm
Front Page » Sports » Front-loaded home schedule gives UVA chance to build momentum
The focus of UVA football fans on their team’s 2014 schedule has been on how tough it is, with games against two preseason Top 10 teams, #1 Florida State and #7 UCLA, plus road games at BYU and Virginia Tech, and Louisville, Duke, Georgia Tech, Miami …
But the schedule-makers did do Virginia one favor: five of the first six games are in Charlottesville. Two of them involve UCLA and Louisville, but with Richmond, Kent State and Pitt wrapped around the one road contest, at BYU on Sept. 20, you could argue that the ‘Hoos have a shot to pull out a couple of early, confidence-building wins in that front-loaded first-half schedule that could go a long way to defining how 2014 goes.
“We love it here in Charlottesville. It’s our home. We love coming out of the tunnel. If we can get some momentum going, who knows what the ceiling can be for this season?” junior defensive tackle David Dean said.
It will be an advantage for Virginia that the team only has to leave the Commonwealth one time between now and Oct. 18, when the Cavs head down to Durham to face Duke.
“We always love playing in Scott Stadium, just having our fans there to support us and to cheer us on,” senior wide receiver darius jennings said. “That’s always a great feeling, just to have that advantage. We need to build on that advantage and take some momentum into the second half of the season.”
Junior defensive end Eli Harold said the run of home games will give coaches a chance to acclimate young players like consensus national Top 10 recruits Andrew Brown and Quin Blanding to the college game.
“Having young guys on the team that aren’t used to losing, the Andrew Browns and the Quin Blandings, they’re going to play, and they’re going to have to produce,” Harold said. “Having them come into a system that hasn’t been doing well, and to start out losing, would really affect this team in a negative way. You want to start out the season 2-0, 3-0, 2-1, not 1-2 or 0-3. With the schedule that we have, we can’t afford to be there. The UCLA game is really going to set the tone for us.”
That’s the other side of the front-loaded home schedule. If the season does get off to a bad start, there are a glut of road games in the second half of the season that could feel like a death march for coach Mike London and his staff, which enters 2014 on the hottest of hot seats.
“We want to win every game, obviously. That’s the plan going into it,” said senior defensive back Demetrious Nicholson. “Winning the home games, winning the games we’re supposed to win, will let us set the tone early, and give us a chance to get some momentum and carry us on later into the season, rather than trying to dig ourselves out of a hole.”
– Column by Chris Graham
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Professor Robert Langdon gazed up at the forty-foot-tall dog sitting in the plaza. The animal's fur was a living carpet… - Dan Brown, Origin.
Borders Unveils First Concept Store Digital Features Abound
February 21 – February 28, 2008 Edition
Borders Unveils
First Concept Store;
Digital Features Abound
ANN ARBOR, MI/02/21/08—Borders will unveil the first of its highly anticipated new concept stores February 22 with the grand opening of its Ann Arbor, Mich store in the company’s hometown. The 28,900-square-foot concept store—the first of 14 the company expects to open nationwide this year—represents a significant enhancement over existing Borders stores inside and out and fulfills the company’s mission to be a headquarters for knowledge and entertainment. The store concept has been in development for more than 18 months.
"This is a completely new shopping experience that sets Borders apart from every other store," said Borders Group Chief Executive Officer George Jones. "We’ve stayed true to what our customers have always loved about Borders—deep and intelligent selection, knowledgeable staff, and a comfortable, welcoming atmosphere. Yet, we’ve brought a fresh new look and an exciting interactive dimension to the store with a Digital Center where customers can do everything from mix and make their own custom CDs, download books and music, publish their own books, explore their family history, and create photo books—all without being computer experts because we have trained people there to help every step of the way," he said.
"In addition, we’ve put a strong focus on popular categories—including Travel, Cooking, Wellness, Graphic Novels and Children’s—by incorporating digital options and the online world, making these sections of the store interactive destinations where customers can not only shop our vast selection of books, but also take advantage of computer kiosks featuring recommendations from our expert buyers, related video content including interviews with experts and authors, and much more. In addition, in select destinations, there are large in-section LCD screens broadcasting a depth of content featuring some highly recognizable names in these subject areas, as well as Borders’ own exclusive programs," Jones continued.
"Overall, this new concept store is a key part of our long-term strategic plan. We set out to differentiate Borders and give customers a reason to choose us over other retailers and we’ve achieved that goal spectacularly with this new concept store. And, once we’ve launched the new Borders.com, we’ll be able to truly deliver on our cross-channel retail strategy including the option for customers to access the site in our stores to view wish lists and conveniently order from millions of titles for delivery to their homes within two days. I’m proud of what we’ve created and am confident that customers will really embrace it."
Beginning with the exterior of the concept store, shoppers will see that this new Borders is a bit bolder with a modern fascia featuring enormous windows, a large illuminated and underlined red Borders logo, and a louvered construction that evokes images of the pages of a book. There is a cafe with an adjoining outdoor seating area for warm weather and dramatic up-lighting and exterior fixtures that make the store stand out against the evening sky, providing a welcoming glow.
Inside, curved feature tables highlight the latest book titles front and center and a special illuminated stand spotlights noteworthy items. A large round rotunda with three skylights fills the space with light, and the warm, neutral color scheme, cozy seating, and walnut- and ash-stained fixtures suggest comfort and an invitation for shoppers to stay as long as they like. Throughout the store, there are large, illuminated drums suspended from the ceiling that feature dazzling graphics and guide customers to destinations within the store. Overall, the layout remains conducive to exploration while also being extremely intuitive for customers to navigate with ease.
Digital Center
A new Digital Center marked by a three-dimensional, 15-foot illuminated fixture and sign package. Within the Digital Center there are multiple computer kiosks and stations dedicated to unique new services including music and book downloading as well as mixing and making custom CDs through "Borders Digital Music," which features millions of titles to choose from.
Customers interested in tracing their roots can access "Borders Genealogy Services" provided by Ancestry.com, and because many Borders customers are authors looking to publish their own work, the Digital Center also includes "Borders Personal Publishing" powered by Lulu.com. Some customer-written books may eventually be sold in Borders stores and select customer authors could even host in-store signings. Photos are important to many Borders customers who can use "Borders Custom Photo Books" for special projects featuring family and friends, and they can print their photos in the store via "Borders Digital Photo Printing."
Throughout the Digital Center, there are seats at the various computer stations where customers are encouraged to sit and take their time working on their projects. Importantly, Borders knows that not all customers are computer experts, so the company is staffing the Digital Center with trained, dedicated personnel ready to guide customers of any technical level through the process to achieve their project goals.
In addition to the Digital Center, Borders has retained its popular computer information stations—"Borders Search"—to help customers locate titles within the store and outside of the store and learn about in-store events, among other services. As in existing Borders stores, the stations are located throughout the concept store allowing customers to help themselves.
Destinations: Travel, Cooking, Wellness, Graphic Novels and Children’s
Certain categories within the new Borders concept store—Travel, Cooking, Wellness, Graphic Novels and Children’s—have been designated as "destinations" within the new concept store—giving these categories their own "shop within a shop" look and feel. For example, in the Travel Destination, customers can not only choose from more than 3,200 book titles, but will also find related items such as maps, GPS navigation systems, the Reader Digital Book from Sony®, and portable DVD players that customers can use on their travels. Within the section, there is an interactive computer kiosk where customers can research, plan, and even book a trip in the store. On the kiosk, there is a "Borders Featured Destination" highlighting various U.S. and international locations and customers can use the feature to learn everything about the locale they plan to visit, including Frommer’s favorite experiences and upcoming events. For featured destinations, Borders also makes available on the kiosk an article written by travel expert Pauline Frommer who offers additional advice and tips for planning a trip to the destination.
In addition, the kiosk within the Travel Destination also features a "Borders Trip Recommender," teamed with Whatsonwhen and Frommer’s, to provide customers with a list of suggested travel destinations based on preferences and criteria set by the shopper using a brief questionnaire regarding the type of trip desired and other parameters. The "Borders Trip Recommender" suggests potential destinations, and by clicking on recommended locations, customers will access related book, DVD and other resources selected by Borders’ expert buyers to enrich the travel experience. Using the "Search and Book" feature on the kiosk from Sidestep.com, recently acquired by Kayak.com, customers can even book an entire trip online from the in-store kiosk. Within the Travel Destination, the new concept store also offers customers travel programming on a large LCD screen that features a mix of travel tips, guided visual tours, author interviews, and nature programming from locations around the world.
Similar deep selection and various interactive opportunities are available in the Cooking and Wellness Destinations, where customers can watch topical programming on the large in-section LCD screens and use the computer kiosks to learn about recommended titles and receive advice from the experts. In the Graphic Novels Destination, there is an amazing selection of titles as well as related gift items and even software that customers can purchase to create their own comic books.
In Children’s—the largest destination with over 9,000 book titles as well as music CDs, DVDs, toys, games and puzzles—kids and their families will be impressed that Borders has divided the section into sub-categories including infants/toddlers/preschoolers, beginning readers (age 4-8), and early readers (age 7-9), which cater specifically to the very different interests and developmental levels of those age groups. In addition, in the new concept store, Borders has relocated the independent reader (age 10-12) section from Children’s and given it its own separate area to appeal to older children.
"Overall, customers need to know that there is something you offer as a retailer that they cannot find anywhere else," Jones said. "That’s just what we are doing with these unique destinations within our concept store. We are putting a stake in the ground when it comes to these categories by making the assortment and the experience so interactive and compelling, that customers will bypass competitors to come to us to shop within these key categories as well as the rest of the store."
LongPen
The new Borders concept store in Ann Arbor is the first retail location in the nation to feature a revolutionary new technology called LongPen™. The remote-controlled Long Pen was invented in 2006 by Canadian author Margaret Atwood. LongPen makes it possible for Borders to host book discussions and signings with authors, as well as music events and appearances by celebrities who are not physically present in the store. Video conferencing allows the authors and performers to connect personally with their in-store fans; seeing and speaking with each other in real time as they would in person. Yet, LongPen also allows the authors and performers—who may be at home or at another location—to personalize and autograph their books, CDs and DVDs with an authentic signature for customers in the store. It is made possible using an electronic signing implement used by the authors and performers that sends an Internet signal to another signing implement in the Borders store to precisely duplicate what the author or performer is writing.
Some fear Atwood’s LongPen could end the personal contact between writers and readers. Atwood said at the launch of the device in 2006 that it will enhance the relationship.
"I think of this as a democratizing device," said Atwood, whose appearances draw hundreds of fans willing to stand in long lines for a word and an autograph. "You cannot be in five countries at the same time. But you can be in five countries at the same time with the LongPen." Early uses of the device suggest that fans feel even more connected to Atwood with the use of LongPen.
Borders is a subsidiary of Borders Group, Inc., (NYSE: BGP) a $4.1 billion global retailer of books, music, movies, periodicals and gift and stationery items with over 30,000 employees and more than 1,100 stores worldwide primarily operating under the Borders® and Waldenbooks® brand names. For more information, visit www.bordersgroupinc.com.
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Tag Archives: AMCX
Posted on March 15, 2014 by Tyler Cunningham
By Tyler Cunningham
courtesy of [1] hitstate.com
AMC Network Entertainment LLC
11 Penn Plaza – New York, NY 10001 – (646)-273-7105
HISTORY + ABOUT:
Upon its launch in 1980, AMC Networks was originally known as Rainbow Media Holdings LLC, a subsidiary of Cablevision. After 25 years of successful programming and mergers, Cablevision executives took Rainbow Media public on July 1st, 2011 under its new name, AMC Network Entertainment. [2]
courtesy of [3] imgl.wikia.nocookie.net
Now in its third year as a publicly traded company, AMC Networks owns and operates some of today’s most popular cable channels including AMC, Sundance TV, WE tv and IFC. Additionally, the company owns the independent film distributor, IFC Films, as well as the IFC Center cinema in Greenwich Village. [4] AMC Networks has a commitment to producing only the most distinctive and compelling content that engages many different audiences.
Joshua W. Sapan – President & CEO
Edward A. Carroll – COO
Sean E. Sullivan – Executive VP & CFO
FINANCIALS AS OF SPRING 2014:
AMC Networks has not yet reported its First Quarter earnings for 2014, however it recently reported its Fourth Quarter & Full-Year Earnings for 2013.
The Fourth Quarter saw a net revenue increase of 18.7% to $435 million, up from $395 million in the company’s Third Quarter report. [6] And what’s more is that 2013 saw an annual net revenue increase of 17.7% to $1.592 billion, up from $1.353 billion in 2012.These increases, according to CEO Joshua Sapan, can be entirely attributed to the company’s “ability to produce content that is valuable and monetizeable.” [7]
courtesy of [8] nasdaq.com
The company is publicly traded as AMCX on NASDAQ and has seen an especially successful Spring 2014. As seen in this graph that documents AMCX’s share price since going public in 2011, the price has been at an all-time high since the beginning of 2014, hitting $78.39 per share on March 7th. This is up from $59.18 on the same day in 2013.
RECENT HAPPENINGS:
AMC’s The Walking Dead Continues its Ratings Reign –
courtesy of [9] beyondhollywood.com
Even in the face of the XXII Winter Olympics, The Walking Dead‘s mid-season premiere on February 9th still garnered 16 million viewers and maintained its position as the highest-rated program on all of television in the key 18-49 demographic. [10] The zombie apocalypse drama’s popularity is commonly attributed to its incredibly tense storytelling and excellent character development. The Walking Dead will return for its fifth season this October.
Chellomedia is Offically Acquried for $1 Billion –
courtesy of [11] chellomediapaytv.com
After a lengthy courting process, AMC Networks purchased the London-based Chellomedia for $1 billion this spring. Chellomedia is a European television content distributor that owns and operates a massive collection of channels that reach an estimated 390 million homes across Europe. AMC Networks reportedly made the acquisition to broaden their European audience. [12] With net earnings of $465 million in 2013, Chellomedia is expected to now make up 20% of AMC Networks’ earnings. [13]
Final Season of Mad Men Opens to Lackluster Ratings –
courtesy of [16]
There’s no denying that Mad Men is one of the most critically-acclaimed shows in recent history, but when it comes to ratings, AMC wins some and they lose some. The seventh and final season of Mad Men premiered on April 13th to just 2.3 million viewers – their lowest premiere rating since the show’s second season in 2008. [14] Media analysts suspect that recycled, overused plot lines in season six (Don was predictably unfaithful, etc.) are to blame for the loss of public interest. [15]
New Drama, Turn, Premieres to Lukewarm Reviews –
AMC was hoping to add to its collection of hit dramas with the new Revolutionary War espionage thriller, Turn. However, it is looking unlikely that they will be able to do so. The series premiere on April 6th opened to a modest 2.1 million viewers (only .5 of them in the 18-49 demographic) and a bag of mixed reviews. [17] While some publications celebrated its arresting cinematography and stellar performances [18], most have labeled the show as “hollow,” with very little suspense or excitement to be found in its storytelling. [19] Turn – Trailer (YouTube)
UPCOMING PROJECTS:
Tech Drama, Halt and Catch Fire, to Premiere June 1st –
With Breaking Bad put to rest and Mad Men not far behind, “the question of ‘what’s next’ looms large for AMC.” [20] And many who attended the SXSW sneak peak of Halt and Catch Fire argue that the new series has what it takes to be the network’s next big smash. [21] The 1980s period drama tells the story of three techies with dreams of creating a more perfect personal computer that has the potential of replacing the most popular IBM model. The show’s riveting storytelling explores the multiple motives, burned bridges and egos involved in the fight to weaken IBM as the dominant player in the marketplace. The aptly titled series is slated for a June 1st premiere. Halt and Catch Fire – Trailer (YouTube)
courtesy of [25] amctv.com
Breaking Bad spinoff, Better Call Saul, to Premiere in November –
Diehard Breaking Bad fans were given reason to live again after a spinoff series, Better Call Saul, was announced following the show’s wrap. The show will center around Bob Odenkirk’s character, Saul Goodman, Albuquerque’s favorite crooked lawyer, and is named after the character’s hopelessly corny business slogan. The show will not be “Breaking Bad 2.0,” but rather a dive into the smattering of trouble and hilarity that ensues as a result of Saul’s shady business practices. [22] Better Call Saul – Webisode (YouTube)
courtesy of [26] leviathyn.com
Dark Comic Series, Preacher, to be Adapted for Television –
After many failed starts with other production companies, the 1990s comic book series, Preacher, will receive its first major television treatment from AMC. Preacher tells the story of Jesse Custer, a Texas preacher who becomes possessed by a supernatural entity that is half-angel, half-demon, making Custer the most powerful creature on Earth. Through his possession, he discovers that God has abandoned his responsibilities in Heaven and is now roaming freely on Earth. A preacher to his core, Custer sets out on a journey to track down God and send him back to his post. However, there are many demonic forces that will stop at nothing to keep this preacher from reaching God. The Seth Rogan-produced religious thriller is hoped to bring success similar to that of The Walking Dead. [23] A release date has not yet been set.
courtesy of [24] empireonline.com
[1] – HitState, RT: 4/16/2014
[2] – Deadline, RT: 4/16/2014
[3] – imgl.wikia.nocookie, RT: 4/16/2014
[4] – AMC Networks, RT: 4/16/2014
[5] – AMC Networks – Investors, RT: 4/17/2014
[7] – Seeking Alpha, RT: 4/17/2014
[8] – NASDAQ, RT: 4/17/2014
[9] – Beyond Hollywood, RT: 4/17/2014
[10] – Seeking Alpha, RT: 4/18/2014
[11] – Chellomedia, RT: 4/18/2014
[12] – The Hollywood Reporter, RT: 4/18/2014
[14] – E! Online, RT: 4/18/2014
[15] – Indiewire, RT: 4/18/2014
[16] – SquareSpace, RT: 4/18/2014
[17] – Vulture, RT: 4/18/2014
[18] – The Daily Beast, RT: 4/19/2014
[19] – Variety, RT: 4/19/2014
[20] – Forbes, RT: 4/19/2014
[22] – Screenrant, RT: 4/19/2014
[24] – Empire, RT: 4/19/2014
[25] – AMC TV, RT: 4/19/2014
[26] – Leviathyn, RT: 4/19/2014
Posted in TRF 235 Spring 2014, TV Programming (Cable) | Tagged AMC, AMC Networks, AMCX, Annual, Better Call Saul, Bob Odenkirk, Breaking Bad, Cable, Cablevision, Charles Dolan, Edward Carroll, espionage, First Quarter, Halt and Catch Fire, IBM, IFC, IFC Center, Jesse Custer, Joshua Sapan, Mad Men, NASDAQ, Net Earnings, Preacher, Rainbow Media Holdings, Sean Sullivan, Seth Rogan, Sundance, Television, the Walking Dead, Third Quarter, Turn, Vertigo Comics, WE tv
Posted on April 4, 2013 by Elliott Brannon
by Elliott Brannon
11 Penn Plaza
Website: http://www.amcnetworks.com
About the Company: [3] [4]
AMC Networks (NASDAQ: AMCX) is an American entertainment company founded in 1980 whose brands include the cable networks AMC, IFC, Sundance Channel, and WE tv. The company also controls IFC Films, a United States distributor of indie film.
In 2012, the company’s revenues increased from $1.188 billion in 2011 to $1.353 billion, a growth of 13.9%. AMC Network’s overall income also increased 11.1%, maturing from $327 million in 2011 to nearly $463 million in 2012. Company stock prices have also increased about 18% since January (as of April 3, 2013).
Brands: [5]
AMC was first launched in 1984. Since then, the network has gone on to become the only cable network in history to receive the Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series four years in a row and the only cable network to win the Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series – Drama for three years in a row. AMC’s popular original series include Mad Men, Breaking Bad, and The Walking Dead.
IFC is the Independent Film Channel and was initially launched in 1994. The channel airs original series such as Onion News Network and Portlandia as well as numerous indie films and other syndicated television shows.
Sundance Channel was founded by Robert Redford in 1996. Its original series include Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys and All On The Line.
WE tv is a network targeted at women and was first launched in 1997. Popular original series include Braxton Family Values and Bridezillas.
IFC Films distributes independent films throughout the U.S. This division also controls the feature film production company, IFC Productions.
Key Executives: [1]
Josh Sapan, President & Chief Executive Officer of AMC Networks
Charles Dolan Executive Chairman
Josh Sapan President & Chief Executive Officer
Charlie CollierPresident & General Manager, AMC
Jennifer Caserta Priore President & General Manager, IFC
Sarah Barnett Executive Vice President & General Manager, Sundance Channel
Kim Martin President & General Manager, WE tv
Recent News (January-April 2013):
April 1: The season three finale of AMC‘s The Walking Dead on March 31st delivered 12.4 million viewers total and 8.1 million viewers age 18 to 49 with a 7.4 HH rating, making it the #1 TV program for the week and #1 television show for the overall season amongst adults age 18-49 [6].
AMC’s new logo and tagline
During the airing of the finale, AMC debuted its brand new logo and tagline, replacing its old tagline, “Story Matters Here,” with “Something More.” Linda Schupack, AMC’s executive vice president of marketing explained that, “AMC: Something More further refines our focus on- and off-air and speaks to our promise to viewers to provide an experience that is unexpected, unconventional and uncompromising” [7].
March 21: AMC released a trailer for its newest original series, Low Winter Sun, a police drama set in Detroit based on a 2006 British miniseries.
The show is being co-produced by AMC Studios and Endemol Studios. Its credits include executive producer Chris Mundy, who has previously worked on CBS’s Criminal Minds [8].
March 13: James Maiella was appointed as the new senior vice president of corporate communications at AMC Networks. Maiella will overlook business and trade relations for all of the companies cable networks as well as IFC Films. He will work alongside the company’s other current senior vice president of corporate communications, Georgia Juvelis [9].
March 12: AMC Networks launched YEAH!, a movie streaming service. Movies are currently available on www.YEAHTV.com, which carries classic films with added bonus features, such as interviews with filmmakers and story notes, only available exclusively through the service. Users must pay $5 to watch a movie and its additional bonus features or can pay $2 to watch a movie without the added content. The service is only available online through a computer for now, but an iPad app is set for release this summer [10].
March 5: Anchor Bay Entertainment and AMC Networks completed a home entertainment distribution deal, giving Anchor Bay the rights to distribute DVD and Blu-ray releases of AMC, IFC, and Sundance original series throughout the United States and Canada. Some specific digital distribution deals are also included in the agreement.
Sundance’s Rectify and AMC’s Low Winter Sun, which have both not debuted yet, will be the first series distributed under the new deal. Anchor Bay has worked closely with AMC Networks in the past, serving as the home entertainment distributor for AMC’s The Walking Dead [11].
February 25: Sundance Channel and AMC reached an agreement giving Sundance Channel syndication rights to the off network premiere of AMC’s Breaking Bad.
Breaking Bad’s Walter White
This agreement comes in lieu of the upcoming premiere of Sundance Channel’s first ever scripted series, Rectify, which is produced by the same group behind Breaking Bad [12].
Rectify is set to premiere on April 22, 2013 at 10:100pm et/pt [13].
February 21: WE tv greenlighted a new unscripted reality series, Glam & Gold, starring olympic gold medalist Sanya Richards-Ross and two-time Super Bowl champion Aaron Ross. Filming is already underway in Austin and Jacksonville. Glam & Gold joins a host of other WE tv shows starring African-Americans including Mary Tary and Braxton Family Values [17].
February 15: IFC Films secured North American rights to the indie neo-noir thriller, The Canyons, starring Lindsay Lohan and James Deen and directed by Paul Schrader. The film will premiere in early summer at a Special Presentation at the Film Society of Lincoln Center in conjunction with a day-and-date release. Schrader’s film will also be simultaneously released on a variety of other digital platforms [18].
February 11: The Walking Dead’s February 10th airing of its season 3B premiere on AMC delivered 12.3 million viewers. With 7.7 million viewers age 18-49, the episode delivered the highest rating for a television series in basic cable history for that demographic.
The series’ average viewership in season 3 for adults 18-49 was 6.8 million, making it the #1 program of the season amongst that age range [14].
February 5: Joel Stillerman, executive vice president of programming, production, and digital content for AMC, announced a two-year first look deal with Stacey Sher and Michael Shamberg of Double Feature Films. Shamberg and Sher are both two-time Academy Award nominees and have worked on a variety of films together including Django Unchained, Erin Brokovich, and Garden State [15].
January 15: AMC and Fox Television Studios announced a new agreement that will bring AMC’s The Killing back to the network for a third season. The agreement brings Veena Sud back as the series’ executive producer and showrunner and also brings back lead actors Mireille Enos and Joel Kinnaman. Production of the show’s new season began on February 25 in Vancouver [16].
http://www.amcnetworks.com/about_leader
http://www.amcnetworks.com/about_leader_Sapan
http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=AMCX
http://www.amcnetworks.com/release_release_press.jsp?nodeid=6622
http://www.amcnetworks.com/about_story
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/amc-rebrands-new-logo-tagline-431997
http://www.freep.com/article/20130321/ENT03/130321105/AMC-Low-Winter-Sun-trailer-Detroit
http://www.deadline.com/2013/03/james-maiella-amc-networks
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57573917-93/amc-networks-launches-yeah-movie-streaming-network
http://variety.com/2013/tv/news/amc-anchor-bay-set-homevid-pact-1200003747/
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/walking-dead-season-3-premiere-ratings-378945
http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2013/02/05/amc-and-double-feature-films-lock-first-look-deal/168224/
http://www.deadline.com/2013/02/we-tv-orders-reality-series-starring-olympic-champion-sanya-richards-ross/
Posted in TRF235.1, TV Business, TV Programming (Cable) | Tagged AMC, AMC Networks, AMC Studios, AMCX, Anchor Bay Entertainment, brands, Braxton Family Values, Breaking Bad, Bridezillas, Cable, CBS, channels, Charles Dolan, Criminal Minds, distribution, Drama, Elliott Brannon, Emmy, finale, Golden Globe, IFC, IFC Films, IFC Productions, James Maiella, Josh Sapan, Low Winter Sun, Mad Men, Networks, Onion News Network, Portlandia, premiere, Rectify, Redford, Robert, Story, Sundance, The Killing, the Walking Dead, WE tv, YEAH!
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Tag Archives: Thomas E. Dooley
by Timothy Chew
[1] Viacom Logo
About Viacom
Viacom is an American mass media company that specialises in entertainment content in over 160 countries across television, film, mobile and online platforms. Viacom is the parent company to many of the world’s most elite entertainment brands including MTV Networks, Nickelodeon, VH1, BET Networks, Comedy Central, SPIKE, TV Land, CMT, Paramount Pictures and many more [2].
Reaching approximately 700 million global subscribers, Viacom’s media networks have become one of the largest media conglomerates in the world [3].
Television Networks
[4] Viacom’s Media Network Brands
Viacom is home to a wide variety of television networks and has successfully developed original entertainment content that has reached a diverse audience [4]. MTV is best known for producing the MTV Video Music Awards, Nickelodeon is one of the most influential television channels in children’s entertainment and Comedy Central is America’s number one comedy channel. Viacom has produced many popular television shows including MTV’s Awkward and Teen Wolf, Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, Nickelodeon’s SpongeBob SquarePants and many more [4].
[5] Paramount Pictures Logo
Paramount Pictures Corporation is a film production and distribution studio that is also a subsidiary of Viacom. Paramount is the distributor for DreamWorks Animation, Marvel, MTV Films, Nickelodeon Movies, Paramount Pictures, Paramount Classics and Paramount Vantage [4]. In 2014, Paramount grossed $953.6 million, becoming the sixth highest grossing film studio in the box office [6]. Paramount has produced many major blockbusters films including “Titanic“, “Transformers“, “Forrest Gump“, “Shrek” and “Iron Man” [7].
Viacom has remained well positioned financially this year. In the fourth quarter of 2014, Viacom’s revenue has increased 9% from $3.6 billion to $3.9 billion [8]. Viacom’s Media Networks annual year-end revenue has rose significantly from $9.6 billion to 10.1 billion [8]. However, Viacom’s film entertainment’s suffered a decrease in annual year-end revenue dropping from $4.2 billion to $3.7 billion [8]. Viacom’s year-end operating income has rose to 5% to a record breaking $4.13 billion from $3.9 billion in 2013 [8].
[9] Philippe Dauman, President and Chief Executive Officer
[10] Thomas E. Dooley, Chief Operating Officer
[11] Wade Davis, Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President, Strategy & Corporate Development
[12] Viacom Acquires Channel 5
Viacom Closes Acquisition of UK’s Channel 5
After announcing a deal on May 1st, Viacom has closed acquisition of British’s broadcaster Channel 5 for $725 million on September 10th [12]. This deal was made to expand Viacom’s investment in its entertainment content produced in the UK. In addition, Nickelodeon will be partnering with Channel 5’s pre-school program, Milkshake. Viacom and Channel 5 will collaborate to produce a new animated series called “Nella the Knight“, their first co-production which is under Viacom’s wing [12]. Viacom and Channel 5 will co-fund “Nella the Knight“, which will be produced in the UK. Channel 5 will also air episodes of SpongeBob SquarePants and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles [12]. Besides that, MTV UK and Channel 5 are partnering to commission a new series called 10,000 BC. In 10,000 BC, 20 participants leave the comforts of their modern life and travel back to the Stone Age. This 10 episode series is set to premiere on Channel 5 in 2015 [12].
[13] Viacom and Sony Partnership
Viacom and Sony Inks Internet Distribution Deal
Viacom announced a major programming deal with Sony to license live and on demand programming for at least 22 Viacom cable networks including Comedy Central, MTV, Nickelodeon, SPIKE, and VH1 for Sony’s cloud-based TV service [13]. This agreement marks Viacom’s first deal to provide its networks for an Internet based live TV and Video On Demand service. Sony’s new cloud-based TV service will integrate live TV content with a dynamic experience people are accustomed to look for form their network. This new service will provide access to hundreds of hours of Viacom programming to over 75 million Internet-enabled Sony devices in the U.S [14].
[15] Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, directed by Jonathan Liebasman
“Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” is an action comedy film that made tremendous success in the box office this summer. The film was produced by highly acclaimed “Transformers” producer Michael Bay and directed by Jonathan Liebasman. “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” was a recreation of the original comic series. On its opening weekend, this summer blockbuster locked in a staggering $65 million [16]. Since its release, “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” has made $191 million in the US and $286 million in the international market. This film surprisingly remained number 1 in the box office on its first two weeks of release [16].Unlike many films released this summer, this film managed to surpass its budget within 3 weeks of its release, proving to be a major success [16].
[17] Interstellar, directed by Christopher Nolan
“Interstellar” is a Sci-Fi thriller starring Matthew McConaughey and Anne Hathaway. The film is based on a team of explorers who travel to space on an adventure to search for a habitable planet that could potentially save the human race [17 . The film was director by Christopher Nolan. Unfortunately, “Interstellar” failed to reach its predicted $50 million on its opening weekend, and only made $47.5 million instead [18]. Although, “Interstellar” has not done quite as well domestically by only making $138 million since its premiere, it has been a major success in the foreign market making a whopping $331 million, surpassing its $165 million budget. Since its opening weekend, the film has made over $468 million worldwide proving to be a global success [19].
[20] Eye Candy, MTV’s New Thriller
MTV Announces New Scripted Thriller
MTV announced a new scripted thriller series called “Eye Candy.” The new series is based on R.L Stine’s popular novel “Eye Candy.” The series is produced by Jason Blum and Catherine Hardwicke. “Eye Candy” revolves around tech genius, Lindy who is played by Victoria Justice [21]. Lindy begins online dating and suspects one of her strange suitors to be a potential serial killer. Lindy then partners with a team of hackers to solve these mysterious murders on the streets of New York. “Eye Candy” is an 10-episode, hour-long thriller that is set to premiere on January 12, 2015 [21].
Trailer [22].
[23] Mission Impossible 5, directed by Christopher McQuarrie
Mission Impossible To Release Fifth Film
The fifth instalment of the Mission Impossible franchise is hitting theatres next winter. The film is directed by Christopher McQuarrie and written by Drew Pearce. “Mission Impossible 5” is produced by Paramount and J.J Abrams’ Production Company, Bad Robot. In “Mission Impossible 5“, Tom Cruise will be returning to his role of Ethan Hunt. The previous film, “Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol” set the record very high after grossing a staggering $695 million globally [24]. Mission Impossible 5 is set to release on December 25th, 2015. The film’s trailer has not been released [25].
[1] Viacom’s Logo, Variety.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[2] About Viacom, Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[3] “Advertising Revenue Drive Media Networks Business“, Marketrealist.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[4] Viacom Brands, Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[5] Paramount Pictures’s Logo, Paramountguilds.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[6] Studio Market Share, Boxofficemojo.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[7] Paramount’s All Time Box Office Results, Boxofficemojo.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[8] Viacom’s Fiscal Report 2014, Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[9] Philippe Dauman, Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[10] Thomas E. Dooley, Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[11] Wade Davis,Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[12] Viacom Closes Acquisition of Channel 5, Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[13] Viacom and Sony Partnership,Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[14] Viacom Inks Pact with Sony, Variety.com, 9/10/2014, RT: 11/30/2014
[15] Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Poster, Teenagemutantninjaturtlesmovie.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[16] Box Office Results, Boxofficemojo.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[17] Interstellar Poster, Interstellar-movie.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[18] “Interstellar Final Box Office Fails to Hit $50 Million Estimates”, Variety.com, 11/10/2014, RT: 11/30/2014
[20] Eye Candy Poster, Hollywoordreporter.com, 11/02/2014, RT: 11/30/2014
[21] MTV’s New Scripted Thriller, Viacom.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[22] Eye Candy Trailer, Youtube.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[23] Mission Impossible 5 Poster, Screenrant.com, RT: 11/30/2014
[25] “Mission: Impossible 5 to Hit Theaters in December 2015”, Hollywoodreporter.com, 11/13/2014, RT: 11/30/2014
Posted in TRF235 Fall 2014, TRF235.1 | Tagged 10000 B.C, 2014, Anne Hathaway, Awkward, Bad Robot, BET Networks, Catherine Hardwicke, Channel 5, Christopher McQuarrie, Christopher Nolan, CMT, Comedy Central, DreamWorks Animation, Drew Pearce, Eye Candy, Forrest Gump, Interstellar, Iron Man, J.J. Abrams, Jason Blum, Jonathan Liebasman, Marvel, Matthew McConaughey, Michael Bay, Milkshake, Mission Impossible, Mission Impossible 5, Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocal, MTV, MTV Films, MTV UK, MTV Video Music Awards, Nella the Knight, Nickelodeon, Nickelodeon Movies, Paramount Classics, Paramount Pictures, Paramount Pictures Coporation, Paramount Vantage, Philippe Dauman, R.L Stine, Shrek, Sony, SPIKE, Spongebob Squarepants, Teen Wolf, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, The Daily Show, Thomas E. Dooley, Titanic, Tom Cruise, Transformers, TV Land, VH1, Viacom, Victoria Justice, Wade Davis
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Tag Archives: Verizon FiOS
Posted on October 5, 2014 by lashaw01
by Lauren Shaw
Verizon Communications
Company Logo, click to go to website.
www.verizon.com
Executives [1]
Courtesy of verizon.com
Lowell C. McAdam, Chairman & CEO
Roy H. Chestnutt, Executive Vice President & Chief Strategy Officer
James J. Gerace, Chief Communications Officer
Roger Gurnani, Executive Vice President & Chief Information Officer
Courtesy of wikimedia.org
Verizon Communications is a major media conglomerate that provides broadband and other communication services to consumer, business, government, and wholesale customers. The company is known for its wireless services, providing a reliable wireless network for its 98 million customers nationwide.
Courtesy of fool.com
Verizon FIOS is one of the company’s major departments that provides a telephone service, digital TV, and high speed Internet over a single fiber optic cable. Fios customers gain access to over 575 digital TV channels, with over 160 channels being High Definition. FiOS also offers over 18,000 movies on demand.
History [3]
Launching in 2005, Verizon FiOS was originally just available to 9,000 customers in Keller, Texas. With the addition of DVR in 2006 and High Definition in 2008, Verizon grew to eventually becoming a leading television distribution company, with around five million customers and availability in 18 million homes in 16 states, as of May 2013. Their top markets are New York, Washington, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Boston, with New York having 1,305,440 subscribers and Boston having 343,535 subscribers. (As of 2013)
Courtesy of creoleindc.typepad.com
On October 21, the company released their third quarter earnings report. Although more customers were added, Verizon Communications saw a decline in profit. Third quarter net income was $3,794 million, which is a drop from the $5,578 million in 2013’s third quarter. [4] More specifically, the companies Wireline segment had a total revenue of $9.576 million, which is a 0.8% decrease from last year. [6] However, FiOS video subscriber base went up 7% from last year to 5.533 million (adding a net 114,000 subscribers). In addition, broadband connections increased 1.7% from last year to 9.146 million.[5] Although the company is falling short of profit expectations, it seems as though they can detest their revenue drive to FiOS, as FiOS represented 74% of the company’s total revenue during the first quarter of 2014, and is continuing to do so. [7]
FiOS TV Interactive Media Guide
There are many changes being brought to FiOS that may explain its success for the company. Verizon has revamped its FiOS TV Interactive Media Guide for TV and mobile, improving the personalization, management abilities, and user interface for customers.[8] Customers will now receive search results and recommendations for shows and movies based on their viewing behavior. Rotten Tomatoes Movie Reviews and FiOS TV star ratings will also appear when customers are viewing specific content via their guide, with cast and crew biographies as well. [8] The new changes also come with a “My FiOS TV” feature that connects users to social media. [9]
Customers can see what’s being discussed about their favorite shows via Twitter.[9] These new changes are one of many incentives from the company to try and meet the demands of consumers and their reliance on media. These changes offer a comparison to one of Verizon’s competitors Comcast, and its recently upgraded mobile user interface with similar user-friendly personalization updates.[9]
Courtesy of bidnessetc.com
The company is not only updating its guide to keep up with consumer’s growing reliance on media and need for entertainment on multiple platforms. In October, the company renewed its carriage agreement with Viacom. [10] These new agreements seem to meet the demands of people’s need for ‘TV Everywhere.” Soon, Verizon customers will be able to stream Viacom programming in and out of their homes. [10] Viacom content such as music and entertainment programming will be available 24/7 on multiple platforms and will include 25 Viacom networks such as MTV, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central. [11] This agreement not only allows customers to gain access to live and on-demand content through the FiOS mobile App, but gain access to Video On-Demand content through various Viacom TV Everywhere websites and Apps as well. [11]As the industry is moving toward more content on mobile, the company is trying to keep up and avoid loosing subscribers by providing opportunities such as these to provide more TV Everywhere options.
Courtesy of digitalhollywood.com
“People want to watch TV anywhere, not just in their living rooms. Disruption in the TV marketplace is happening and Verizon wants to reach agreements with content providers like Viacom that reflect that reality and give people what they want. We are thrilled to extend our long-term distribution partnership with Viacom Media Networks, delivering some of the most recognizable and popular kids, music and entertainment programming available to our customers anytime, anywhere on a variety of platforms from TV to wireless. “-Ben Grad, Verizon’s executive director of content strategy & acquisition [12]
FiOS Quantum Gateway
In addition to consumer’s need for entertainment in a variety of platforms, consumers also want their content as fast as possible. After complaints of slow download speeds over the summer, specifically when streaming Netflix, it seems as though the company is approaching these problems with the launch of FiOS Quantum Gateway.[13] (released in November 2014)
For customers with multiple devices in their homes who frequently stream videos, the Quantum Gateway, which was released at the beginning of the month, should improve speeds and cut down download time for its subscribers. [13] This goes along with Verizon’s “speed match” campaign, which promises to match all customers upload speeds to its download speeds by the end of the year for free. [14] These new features will hopefully improve user experiences for all FiOS customers and create an advantage over its competitors, as other distribution companies are attempting to improve speeds as well.[14]
Stopping the Cord-Cutters from Cutting this Holiday Season
With more and more ways to view content online, Verizon needs to promote competitive advantages to prevent the cord-cutters from actually cutting, and thus loosing customers for Verizon. Just in time for the holiday season, from now until January 17th, customers can purchase FiOS Triple Play package (high-speed internet, phone, and TV) for only $59.99 a month, and get a full year of Netflix free. [15] Not only does this provide a popular package for a much cheaper price, but includes Showtime, HBO, and free Netflix, all of which are usually the reason for cord-cutters to begin with.[16] This bold move of including competitive companies in a much cheaper package should attract millennials who would have previously been turned off to paying for an expensive cable package.[16] 2015’s first quarter earnings report will provide an answer as to whether this unique package paid off for Verizon as a whole.
Looking Towards The Future
As 2014 comes to an end, consumers should prepare for more TV Everywhere opportunities from Verizon, as well as more user-interface and personalization changes to FiOS. [17] Verizon customers should look out for the possibility of a wireless internet pay TV service and FiOS Custom Channels, both which would be released sometime in 2015. [17]
[1] “Executive Bios” .verizon.com RT: 11/28/14
[2] “Verizon At a Glance” .verizon.com RT:11/28/14
[3] “History & Timeline” .verizon.com RT: 11/28/14
[4] “Verizon Misses on Q3 Earnings, Revenues” .zacks.com October 21, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[5] “Verizon adds 1.5 Million Customers, But Misses on Profit Expectations” .dailytech.com October 22, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[6] “Verizon Reports Strong Customer Additions” .prnewswire.com RT: 11/29/14
[7] “FiOS Drives Revenue Up, But Earnings Fall Short of Expectations” .forbes.com April 24, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[8] “Verizon Revamps FiOS TV Guide” .bidnessetc.com October 1, 2014 RT: 11/28/14
[9] “Verizon Freshens Up FiOS TV Guide” .multichannelnews.com September 30, 2014 RT: 11/28/14
[10] “Verizon FiOS and Viacom Renew Carriage Agreement” .marketwatch.com October 1, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[11] “Verizon FiOS, Viacom Strike New Carriage Deal” .broadcastingcable.com October 1, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[12] “Verizon, Viacom Strike New Carriage Deal” .multichannelnews.com October 1, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[13] “Verizon FiOS Launches Souped-Up Broadband Gateway” .multichannelnews.com October 3, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[14] “Verizon’s Pitch: Upload Speeds to Match Download” .wallstreetjournal.com August 25, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[15] “Verizon Trial: 1 Year Free Netflix to FiOS Triple Play Users” dslreports.com October 27, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[16] “Verizon FiOS Bows Cord-Cutter Plan with Netflix, HBO, Showtime” .homemediamagazine.com November 19, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
[17] “Verizon CEO Says He’s Weighing A Wireless Internet Pay TV Service” .deadline.com March 4, 2014 RT: 11/29/14
Posted in TRF235 Fall 2014, TRF235.1 | Tagged "Speed Match", Cable, Comcast, Cord-Cutters, Custom Channels, FiOS Triple Play, Lowell C. McAdam, Media Guide, Movies, Quantum Gateway, Quantum TV, Rotten Tomatoes, subscribers, Television, TV Everywhere, twitter, Verizon Communications, Verizon FiOS, Viacom, Wireline
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Minutes and Blessings, 28 February–1 March 1835
Minutes and Blessings,
Kirtland Township
, Geauga Co., OH, 28 Feb.–1 Mar. 1835. Featured version copied [not before 25 Feb. 1836] in Minute Book 1, pp. 164–171; handwriting of
; CHL. For more complete source information, see the source note for Minute Book 1.
On 28 February and 1 March 1835, “the Church in council assembled” in
, Ohio, and forty-three individuals were designated as members of the
A priesthood office with the responsibility to travel and preach and assist the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, similar to the seventy in the New Testament. In February and March 1835, the first members of the Seventy were selected and ordained. All of those...
View Glossary
, an office responsible for preaching the gospel to the world and seemingly patterned after the New Testament account of Jesus Christ selecting seventy men to preach.
JS History, vol. B-1, 577; Luke 10:1–17.
JS History / Smith, Joseph, et al. History, 1838–1856. Vols. A-1–F-1 (original), A-2–E-2 (fair copy). Historian’s Office, History of the Church, 1839–ca. 1882. CHL. CR 100 102, boxes 1–7. The history for the period after 5 Aug. 1838 was composed after the death of Joseph Smith.
This meeting was held over two days, with much of the time being dedicated to blessings. It appears that the meeting convened as a continuation of two previous meetings: the 14–15 February 1835 meeting at which
Camp of Israel
A group of approximately 205 men and about 20 women and children led by JS to Missouri, May–July 1834, to redeem Zion by helping the Saints who had been driven from Jackson County, Missouri, regain their lands; later referred to as “Zion’s Camp.” A 24 February...
participants were recognized and nine men were
The conferral of power and authority; to appoint, decree, or set apart. Church members, primarily adults, were ordained to ecclesiastical offices and other responsibilities by the laying on of hands by those with the proper authority. Ordinations to priesthood...
A title indicating one sent forth to preach; later designated as a specific ecclesiastical and priesthood office. By 1830, JS and Oliver Cowdery were designated as apostles. The “Articles and Covenants” of the church explained that an “apostle is an elder...
, and the 21 February 1835 meeting at which
Parley P. Pratt
12 Apr. 1807–13 May 1857. Farmer, editor, publisher, teacher, school administrator, legislator, explorer, author. Born at Burlington, Otsego Co., New York. Son of Jared Pratt and Charity Dickinson. Traveled west with brother William to acquire land, 1823....
was ordained an apostle.
Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 14–15 Feb. 1835; Minutes and Blessings, 21 Feb. 1835.
The minutes of those meetings do not indicate that church members were soon to be designated as members of the Seventy, but at the 14–15 February meeting, JS did declare that “it was the Will of God” that individuals who had gone on the Camp of Israel expedition “with a determination to lay down their lives, if necessary” should “be ordained to the ministry” and sent “to prune the vineyard for the last time.”
Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 14–15 Feb. 1835. After the 14–15 February meeting, gatherings were held every Saturday and Sunday for at least the next few weeks “to bless and ordain such as had been called.” (Burgess, Autobiography, 4; Cahoon, Autobiography, 44; Baldwin, Account of Zion’s Camp, 20.)
Burgess, Harrison. Autobiography, ca. 1883. Photocopy. CHL. MS 893. Also available as “Sketch of a Well-Spent Life,” in Labors in the Vineyard, Faith-Promoting Series 12 (Salt Lake City: Juvenile Instructor Office, 1884), 65–74.
Cahoon, William F. Autobiography, 1878. Microfilm. CHL. MS 8433.
Baldwin, Nathan Bennett. Account of Zion’s Camp, 1882. Typescript. CHL. MS 499.
In addition, a June 1834 revelation had explained that Camp of Israel participants would receive a “blessing and an
Bestowal of spiritual blessings, power, or knowledge. Beginning in 1831, multiple revelations promised an endowment of “power from on high” in association with the command to gather. Some believed this promise was fulfilled when individuals were first ordained...
” and some would be chosen to receive power “to accomplish all things partaining to
A specific location in Missouri; also a literal or figurative gathering of believers in Jesus Christ, characterized by adherence to ideals of harmony, equality, and purity. In JS’s earliest revelations “the cause of Zion” was used to broadly describe the ...
Revelation, 22 June 1834 [D&C 105:12, 18, 35–37]; see also Historical Introduction to Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 14–15 Feb. 1835.
Once most of the men designated as apostles had been ordained,
By 21 February 1835, ten of the twelve had been ordained. (Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 14–15 Feb. 1835; Minutes and Blessings, 21 Feb. 1835.)
those chosen as seventies received their ordination blessings. At this 28 February–1 March 1835 meeting, forty-nine individuals were blessed, forty-three of whom were also ordained members of the Seventy. Of the forty-nine blessed, forty-four were among the fifty-six Camp of Israel participants recognized at the 14–15 February meeting. Seven men—
Sylvester Smith
25 Mar. 1806–22 Feb. 1880. Farmer, carpenter, lawyer, realtor. Born at Tyringham, Berkshire Co., Massachusetts. Son of Chileab Smith and Nancy Marshall. Moved to Amherst, Lorain Co., Ohio, ca. 1815. Married Elizabeth Frank, 27 Dec. 1827, likely in Chautauque...
Joseph Young
7 Apr. 1797–16 July 1881. Farmer, painter, glazier. Born at Hopkinton, Middlesex Co., Massachusetts. Son of John Young and Abigail (Nabby) Howe. Moved to Auburn, Cayuga Co., New York, before 1830. Joined Methodist church, before Apr. 1832. Baptized into Church...
Hazen Aldrich
10 Jan. 1797–after 1876. Carpenter, farmer, newspaper publisher, day laborer. Born in Lebanon, Grafton Co., New Hampshire. Son of Andrew Hazen Aldrich and Annes. Moved to Dorchester, Grafton Co., by 1810. Married first Betsey Manchester, 28 Oct. 1819, in ...
Levi W. Hancock
7 Apr. 1803–10 June 1882. Born at Springfield, Hampden Co., Massachusetts. Son of Thomas Hancock III and Amy Ward. Baptized into Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 16 Nov. 1830, at Kirtland, Geauga Co., Ohio. Married Clarissa Reed, 20 Mar. 1831....
Leonard Rich
1800–1868. Farmer. Born in New York. Married first Keziah. Lived at Warsaw, Genesee Co., New York, 1830. Participated in Camp of Israel expedition to Missouri, 1834. Served as a president of First Quorum of the Seventy, 1835–1837. Stockholder in Kirtland ...
Lyman Sherman
22 May 1804–ca. 15 Feb. 1839. Born at Monkton, Addison Co., Vermont. Son of Elkanah Sherman and Asenath Hurlbut. Married Delcena Didamia Johnson, 16 Jan. 1829, at Pomfret, Chautauque Co., New York. Baptized into Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints...
—were appointed presidents over the Seventy, although only the blessings to Smith and Young, given on 1 March, reflect that appointment.
Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 14–15 Feb. 1835. Young states that Levi Hancock was not present at this meeting and received his ordination later, but his blessing, the only one presented in the third person, is recorded in the minutes of the 1 March 1835 morning session. Zebedee Coltrin later remembered that his ordination as a president of the Seventy did not come until “a few days after” his ordination as a seventy. (Young, History of the Organization of the Seventies, 4; Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 1 Mar. 1835; Coltrin, Autobiographical Sketch, [2].)
Young, Joseph, Sr. History of the Organization of the Seventies: Names of First and Second Quorums. Items in Relation to the First Presidency of the Seventies. Also, a Brief Glance at Enoch and His City. Embellished with a Likeness of Joseph Smith, the Prophet, and a View of the Kirtland Temple. Salt Lake City: Deseret News Steam Printing Establishment, 1878.
Coltrin, Zebedee. Autobiographical Sketch, 1880. Typescript. CHL. MS 2793.
There were apparently three sessions of this 28 February–1 March meeting: one session on 28 February and morning and afternoon sessions on 1 March. The 28 February session and the 1 March afternoon session were recorded in Minute Book 1 as one session, while the 1 March morning session was presented as a separate meeting. It appears, however, that all three sessions were considered part of the same meeting. JS is not explicitly mentioned in the minutes of the 28 February session or in the minutes of the 1 March afternoon session, but he is listed as present and participating in the 1 March morning session. It seems likely that he was present for the other two sessions as well, since several individuals later stated that JS organized the Seventy and participated in their ordinations.
Burgess, Autobiography, 4; Coltrin, Autobiographical Sketch, [2]; Hutchings, Journal, 15 Feb. 1835; “Biographies of the Seventies of the Second Quorum,” 22; George A. Smith, Autobiography, 59.
Hutchings, Elias. Journal, Dec. 1834–Sept. 1836. CHL. MS 1445.
“Biographies of the Seventies of the Second Quorum,” 1845–1855. In Seventies Quorum Records, 1844–1975. CHL. CR 499.
Smith, George A. Autobiography, ca. 1860–1882. George Albert Smith, Papers, 1834–1877. CHL. MS 1322, box 1, fd. 2.
Indeed, although the minutes themselves are silent as to who performed the ordinations, some individuals recalled that JS,
Joseph Smith Sr.
—all of whom were members of the
presidency of the high priesthood
An organized body of leaders over priesthood quorums and other ecclesiastical organizations. A November 1831 revelation first described the office of president over the high priesthood and the church as a whole. By 1832, JS and two counselors constituted ...
—participated. As
later recalled, “the first quorum of Seventies were appointed and ordained, under the hands of the Prophet, his Counselors, and others.”
Burgess, Autobiography, 4; “Biographies of the Seventies of the Second Quorum,” 22; Coltrin, Autobiographical Sketch, [2]; Amos Gustin, Moroni, Utah Territory, to George A. Smith, 19 Mar. 1860, Obituary Notices and Biographies, CHL; Young, History of the Organization of the Seventies, 2.
Obituary Notices and Biographies, 1854–1877. CHL. MS 4760.
Some recalled Sidney Rigdon serving as the voice for the ordinations, while others stated that it was JS.
George A. Smith, Autobiography, 59; Coltrin, Autobiographical Sketch, [2].
, who received his ordination blessing on 1 March, later recalled that JS had planned as early as 8 February 1835 to designate men as members of the Seventy. On that date, JS told him and his brother
1 June 1801–29 Aug. 1877. Carpenter, painter, glazier, colonizer. Born at Whitingham, Windham Co., Vermont. Son of John Young and Abigail (Nabby) Howe. Brought up in Methodist household; later joined Methodist church. Moved to Sherburne, Chenango Co., New...
that he had received a revelation to appoint
Members of a governing body in the church, with special administrative and proselytizing responsibilities. A June 1829 revelation commanded Oliver Cowdery and David Whitmer to call twelve disciples, similar to the twelve apostles in the New Testament and ...
and that Brigham would be one of the twelve. JS then turned to Joseph “with quite an earnestness, as though the vision of his mind was extended still further,” and told him that he would be “president of the Seventies.” Joseph Young regarded this as a “strange saying,” as he “had heard of Moses and seventy
A male leader in the church generally; an ecclesiastical and priesthood office or one holding that office; a proselytizing missionary. The Book of Mormon explained that elders ordained priests and teachers and administered “the flesh and blood of Christ unto...
of Israel, and of Jesus appointing other Seventies, but had never heard of Twelve Apostles and of Seventies being called in this Church before.”
Young, History of the Organization of the Seventies, 1–2.
noted, selecting seventy men for a special purpose had biblical precedent.
For an overview of ideas about the Seventy in nineteenth-century Christian churches, see Bray, “The Seventy Disciples in Early 19th-Century Christian Thought.”
Bray, Justin. “ The Seventy Disciples in Early 19th-Century Christian Thought, 1800–1844.” Unpublished paper. Draper, UT, 7 Mar. 2013. Copy in editors’ possession.
The Old Testament recounts Moses calling “seventy men of the elders of Israel” to assist him in leading the children of Israel, while in the New Testament, Jesus Christ appointed “other seventy” besides the Twelve Apostles to preach in “every city and place, whither he himself would come.”
Numbers 11:16–17, 24–25; Luke 10:1–17.
The concept of the Seventy also existed in the broader religious culture of the time. Some biblical commentators in the early 1800s argued that the office of Seventy ceased to exist upon Christ’s death and was not meant to be part of “the permanent ministry.”
Olds, Substance of Several Sermons, 118; Miller, Letters Concerning the Constitution and Order of the Christian Ministry, 80–81.
Olds, Gamaliel S. The Substance of Several Sermons, upon the Subjects of Episcopacy and Presbyterian Parity. Greenfield, MA: Denio and Phelps, 1815.
Miller, Samuel. Letters concerning the Constitution and Order of the Christian Ministry, as Deduced from Scripture and Primitive Usage; Addressed to the Members of the United Presbyterian Churches in the City of New-York. New York: Hopkins and Seymour, 1807.
Others disagreed. For example, in 1830, Dirck C. Lansing of the Presbyterian church appointed “seventy disciples” for his congregation “to visit every house and family, ascertain their names, ages, habits of thinking, occupations, &c. and particularly what meetings they attend, whether the first, second, third, &c. or whether any of them attend heretical meetings, and if so, to warn them against such heineous sins.”
“Queries,” Evangelical Magazine and Gospel Advocate, 1 Jan. 1831, 4; Bray, “The Seventy Disciples in Early 19th-Century Christian Thought.”
Evangelical Magazine and Gospel Advocate. Utica, NY. 1830–1850.
The minutes of this meeting do not clearly explain the role of the Seventy, nor do they make clear whether JS intended at this point to select exactly seventy men for preaching or whether he considered “Seventy” more of a title than a precise number. Those designated as seventies who did not already hold the office of
An ecclesiastical and priesthood office. Christ and many ancient prophets, including Abraham, were described as being high priests. The Book of Mormon used the term high priest to denote one appointed to lead the church. However, the Book of Mormon also discussed...
were ordained both elders and seventies in their ordination blessings.
See, for example, the ordination blessings of Wilkins Jenkins Salisbury, Peter Buchanan, and Alexander Badlam Sr. in Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 1 Mar. 1835.
Although both elders and high priests had proselytizing responsibilities as part of their normal duties,
Articles and Covenants, ca. Apr. 1830 [D&C 20:38–43]; Revelation, 1 Nov. 1831–A [D&C 68:1–2, 7–8].
the Seventy appear to have had a special assignment to preach to the entire world. The minutes state that the seventies were “to be sent forth,” and many of the ordination blessings focus on proselytizing, indicating that many would preach outside the
North American constitutional republic. Constitution ratified, 17 Sept. 1787. Population in 1805 about 6,000,000; in 1830 about 13,000,000; and in 1844 about 20,000,000. Louisiana Purchase, 1803, doubled size of U.S. Consisted of seventeen states at time ...
and some in perilous circumstances.
For more information on the kinds of promises made in these blessings, see Historical Introduction to Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 14–15 Feb. 1835.
Many of these blessings are similar to the blessings given to those ordained as apostles, implying that, at least in terms of preaching, the Seventy may have been seen as similar to the apostles. In fact, the minutes of the 1 March 1835 morning meeting refer to the Seventy and the apostles as “brother ministers.”
Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 1 Mar. 1835.
Instructions given by JS later in spring 1835 called the Seventy “especial witnesses unto the Gentiles and in all the world” and stated that those holding the office “form a quorum equal in authority to that of the twelve especial witnesses or apostles.” However, the Seventy were also subordinate to the Twelve; they were to “act in the name of the Lord, under the direction of the twelve.”
Instruction on Priesthood, between ca. 1 Mar. and ca. 4 May 1835 [D&C 107:25–26, 34].
JS also noted at a 2 May 1835 conference that as many as 144,000 seventies could be called, if the need arose, to be selected by their seven presidents.
Minutes and Discourse, 2 May 1835.
Nathan Baldwin
27 Jan. 1812–1 Nov. 1891. Born in Augusta, Grenville Co., Upper Canada. Farmer. Son of Aaron M. Baldwin and Julia Bishop. Moved to Jefferson and St. Lawrence counties, New York. Moved to Chautauque Co., New York, Oct. 1831. Baptized into Church of Jesus Christ...
, who was designated a seventy, the seventies were supposed to “travel two together” after their ordinations, and many of them departed
to preach not long after they were given these blessings.
Baldwin, Account of Zion’s Camp, 20. For examples of the Seventy preaching in 1835, see Hazen Aldrich, Report, 28 Dec. 1835, Missionary Reports, 1831–1900, CHL; and Willard Snow, Autobiographical Sketch, [1]–[2], Obituary Notices and Biographies, CHL.
Missionary Reports, 1831–1900. CHL. MS 6104.
Others were instructed in a May 1835 meeting to “hold” themselves “ready to go when called upon,” while still others were informed that they would “be called upon” when their “circumstances will permit.”
By the end of 1835, many of the Seventy had served brief missions and “preached the fulness of the everlasting gospel in various States and generally with good success.”
Minutes, LDS Messenger and Advocate, Jan. 1836, 2:253.
Latter Day Saints’ Messenger and Advocate. Kirtland, OH. Oct. 1834–Sept. 1837.
According to one account, 175 individuals were baptized in 1835 because of the efforts of the Seventy, who were described as “worthy young men, strong, active, energetic, determined in the name of the Lord to go forward and persevere to the end.”
Minutes, LDS Messenger and Advocate, Jan. 1836, 2:253–254; see also JS, Journal, 28 Dec. 1835.
The blessings given on 28 February and 1 March were not given only to those ordained as seventies, although the vast majority served that purpose. Other individuals, including eleven-year-old Bradford Elliott, seventeen-year-old
Benjamin Winchester
6 Aug. 1817–25 Jan. 1901. Farmer, author, merchant, brick maker. Born near Elk Creek, Erie Co., Pennsylvania. Son of Stephen Winchester and Mary Case. Baptized into Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, early 1833, in Elk Creek. Moved to Kirtland, ...
were also blessed, presumably because they too were participants in the Camp of Israel expedition. Solomon Denton, who went on the Camp of Israel expedition, was ordained an elder but was apparently not ordained a seventy.
Minutes, Discourse, and Blessings, 1 Mar. 1835. Joseph Young later compiled a list of those who were ordained as members of the Seventy on 28 February and 1 March 1835. Denton does not appear on that list. (Young, History of the Organization of the Seventies, 2–4.)
Blessings to these individuals provided similar promises of great spiritual gifts and success in converting others to the church.
It is not clear from the minutes who recorded the blessings at the time they were given.
later copied the minutes and the ordination texts into Minute Book 1.
Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation *Minutes and Blessings, 28 February–1 March 1835 Minute Book 1 History, 1838–1856, volume B-1 [1 September 1834–2 November 1838]
The hour for meeting having arrived
The highest presiding body of the church. An 11 November 1831 revelation stated that the president of the high priesthood was to preside over the church. JS was ordained as president of the high priesthood on 25 January 1832. In March 1832, JS appointed two...
S[idney] Rigdon
arose and made some observations, relative to the business before the meeting,
According to a later JS history, the meeting was called for the purpose of “selecting certain individuals from the number of those who went up to Zion” as members of the Seventy. (JS History, vol. B-1, 577.)
then proceeded to open by prayer. The following are some of the names and
blessings of the
who were called and to be sent forth— [p. 164]
JSP, D4:255–264
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Jennifer Laam: With Natalya, research was often like detective work
Great films in Hollywood are made from books like this.
The plots of books like this are usually based on fiction,
but this life can only have been taken straight out of an exciting film or great literature!
The Lost Season of Love and Snow tells the story of Alexander Pushkin and Natalia Goncharova – their lives as literature. A first person narrative, this novel focuses not on the life of the Russian genius himself, but that of one of the most beautiful women in Moscow in the 19th century and one of the most hated wives in all Russian history. The denouement of their passionate and promising love is known to anyone who has ever heard of Pushkin. Had Natalia imagined that after their brief marriage, she would be the cause of his unfortunate death in a duel?
Narrated in easily readable, touching and candid language, the novel presents the complex image of an intelligent, charming and ambitious young lady who often finds herself in the centre of intrigue. The Lost Season of Love and Snow is not the story most readers expect. It is a story set in the shadows; her truth about events. The plot unfolds so smoothly and elegantly that you are left with the authentic sense of every image the author draws. With its wonderful descriptions of settings and emotions and extremely well-researched details, The Lost Season of Love and Snow is one of the most powerful and inspiring historical books you will ever read.
Jennifer Laam writes historical prose. Historian by education and traveller by vocation, she has travelled in Europe and Russia and currently lives in California. She has written three novels: The Secret Daughter of the Tsar (2013), The Tsarina’s Legacy (2016) and The Lost Season of Love and Snow (2018). In honor of the release of her most recent book, we talked about inspirational personalities, historical research and her skills in creating historical prose.
Jennifer Laam: While Pushkin, as I portray him, isn’t perfect, I believe he is sympathetic and I hope I’ve done him justice
An interview by Valentina Miziiska
Photo: Precious Depictions
How did you become interested in Russian history?
I was in college around the same time the Soviet Union collapsed. I was fascinated with the changes happening in that area of the world at that time, and grew fascinated with the history.
What inspired you to write the story of The Lost Season of Love and Snow?
Before I started to write this book, I knew very little about Natalya Goncharova Pushkina, only that she was beautiful and supposedly caused the duel that cost her husband, Alexander Pushkin, his life. Then I read the Martin Cruz Smith novel Tatiana, set in modern-day Russia. In that book several characters reference Natalya in an unflattering way. I started to research her life and grew invested in telling her side of the story.
Russians are very sensitive about their national heroes. And who isn’t? Didn’t you worry about writing a historical novel on the most famous Russian poet?
Alexander Pushkin is a towering figure in Russia and of course that is intimidating. At the same time, he is such an intriguing character that I wanted to create my own fictionalized version of him. While Pushkin, as I portray him, isn’t perfect, I believe he is sympathetic and I hope I’ve done him justice.
Aspiring writers grow up being told to write what they know, but history is unknown. You have to learn everything about the period you describe before writing a single setting/dialogue. How can you write about a period that is long time past? How did you become comfortable with it? Where did you examine the aspects of daily life that helped in creating an authentic backdrop for your novel?
I’m fortunate to live near one of the University of California campuses and its amazing library, including an entire wall of books about Alexander Pushkin’s life and his world. I relied heavily on those resources to research nineteenth-century Russia.
Did you use internet archives or experts?
I utilized the internet and library resources, including T.J. Binyon’s magnificent biography of Pushkin which consolidates much of the recent research and also takes a sympathetic view of Natalya. The biggest challenge was also the part of the process I enjoyed the most: the relative lack of information on Natalya’s life compared to that of her husband. With Natalya, research was often like detective work, using what we do know to make educated guesses about what we don’t.
How did you know when to stop researching?
I needed the first three chapters to be in excellent shape before I could submit the novel to my editor, so I spent at least a month working to get the details right. Once the book was under contract, I had to balance the remainder of my research with my deadline. At a certain point, my gut just says „stop“. I love research, but writing the story must become the primary focus to finish a book.
Do you research and then write or do you sometimes do it in parallel?
I need to do some research in advance to get a sense of the themes, the characters, and the timeline of any given project. Once I feel like I „know“ the story, I write my first draft quickly and try not to research at all so I can just focus on the narrative. After that first draft is done, I know exactly what I need to research further, and then the research and revision occurs in parallel.
How did you decide where to keep the story historically accurate and where to proceed with fiction?
Historical timelines don’t tend to lend themselves to compelling narratives, so like many historical writers, I take liberties with the timing of events. I also make educated guesses about what characters think, say, and interpret the events around them. In other words, I create a fictionalized version of an actual world. I always add an author’s note at the end of my novels so that readers know what is fact, what was fictionalized or changed, and why I made the choices I did.
How did you decide what details to present to the reader directly as narrative and which to show through your character interactions in order to reflect this period of time?
They say great fiction shows the reader what is happening, rather than telling, so I try to make as many historical details as possible flow from the dialogue, thoughts, and actions of my characters. I want to find ways in which the event had an impact on the characters and re-telling focus on how they interpreted the event.
How did you make sure the dialogue reflects its time?
I immerse myself in letters. I try to catch words and phrases historical figures like to use. If historical dialogue was completely accurate, a modern reader would soon be lost. Yet it always strikes me how letters from the eighteenth and nineteenth can sound contemporary in their casual tone and irreverence. For example, I remember writing a scene for The Lost Season of Love and Snow where Pushkin uses the term „arse“ and Natalya is happily scandalized. Later, I read a letter from Pushkin to Natalya where he actually uses that term. That is when I knew I was on the right track in capturing both the language and the playfulness of their relationship.
How much of you is Natalya?
Natalya and I definitely share a romantic outlook on life that can sometimes cloud our decision making. I relate to her interest in literature. And I understand why she found the imperial court so alluring. When I read about the costumes she had worn to balls, I had to elaborate and make her someone we might call a „cos-player“. I’ve gone to Comic-Con in San Diego for the past three years and love dressing up as different characters!
I believe writers sometimes need to slightly change the story or add additional details/dialogues/intrigue to make it more attractive as literature. What do you think about that? Is it possible to achieve total historical accuracy while still telling a great story?
Honestly, I think it is almost impossible to be completely accurate. Even primary sources will differ on interpretations of events. Even facts can differ depending on the person telling the story. I think the historical novelist’s responsibility is to capture the time period and the people involved to the best of their ability and then be straightforward with the readers about what is still unknown.
If Natalya was just a fictional character what would you skip and what would you add to her character traits?
I would have made her more of a proto-feminist. I would have liked to see her open a school for girls or something of that nature. I think she was subversive in her own way, but it was subtle.
How did you decide the structure of the novel – starting with the end of the great poet and then going back in time to follow the events that caused it? Do you plot your novels?
I wanted to set the stage for the conflict between what I think could be described as an older, more conservative view of Natalya as this uncaring woman who was careless with her husband’s feelings and the way more contemporary historians have viewed Natalya. I don’t tend to plot fully in advance of writing, but this theme guided how I approached the novel and Natalya’s version of the events that led to Pushkin’s death.
Any feedback from Russia about The Lost Season of Love and Snow?
Not yet, but I’ll be curious to hear it.
How long did it take to write this novel?
This was actually the fastest I’ve ever written a novel. I think that’s because it is told entirely from Natalya’s point of view. It took about two years from the time I began writing to the time I had finished my last edits with St. Martins.
Tell us more about your writing process. Do you have a routine?
I try to write most days and first thing in the morning if at all possible. Ideally, I like to review my notes at night before bed and then write when I wake up.
When do you realize that you need to stop revising and your manuscript is final?
It’s a gut instinct. I think there’s a point where a writer knows this is the best work they can do. Personally, I reach a stage where I know that at this moment, revisions will end up hurting not improving and it’s time to let go.
Do you use any beta readers or a critique partner? Which opinion do you count on most?
I have been fortunate to find wonderful readers and critique partners locally, who helped me get through my first published novel and continue to give amazing insight on my works in progress.
What does the editing process with a professional editor of a historical book look like? The editor probably doesn’t have your knowledge. How does he/she know where are the research gaps?
The burden of research and accuracy definitely falls on me, but I was also very fortunate to have a wonderful copy editor for this novel who double-checked for accuracy.
What part of your daily life is writing?
I go back and forth between fitting writing in with a day job and taking a few months away between jobs to focus on writing. At the moment, I’m about to embark on a few months where I will likely not be working full time and can make writing the main focus of my day. Realistically, I will need to return to a day job, but I want one with less stress.
Do you ever experience writer’s block?
All the time!
What do you do to overcome it?
I’m most prone to writer’s block when I’m under stress, so I try to overcome it by taking better care of myself and „refilling the well“ by reading, seeing a movie, going to a museum, or just taking a long walk.
Do you have enough time for reading? What kind of books do you like?
I always wish I had more time for reading, but I try to read at least a little every day. I love historical (of course!), but I also really love a good contemporary thriller with a strong female voice.
Which writers helped you finding your writer’s voice?
This is a tricky one because I can’t point to one writer who influenced me in that way. I do think Barbara Kingsolver’s The Poisonwood Bible does voice exceptionally well with multiple characters.
What is the worst writing advice you’ve ever received?
I don’t know that I remember specifics, but whenever someone gives advice on writing and claims it’s the only way, I’m skeptical. There are many paths in this life. If you write, you’re a writer.
What is your current project?
I can’t talk about it too much yet because it isn’t under contract, but it’s a historical set in the late eighteenth century with an American protagonist. I am excited to tell her story in ways that are reminiscent of my experience with Natalya.
What is your advice for the aspiring Bulgarian writers who read bgstoryteller?
Keep at it! Seek out fellow writers who will read your work and give you honest but tactful feedback. Writing is wonderful work but you will want friends and allies who understand what you are going through. Creating art is the most honorable profession in my opinion, but it can also be the most difficult and isolating. Find companions for your journey and treasure them.
Here are some links where you can find more about Jennifer:
https://jenniferlaam.com/
https://www.facebook.com/jenniferlaam.writer/
interview, Jennifer Laam, The Lost Season of Love and Snow
„Обичаш ли чуждестранни филми?“
„Да расте тревичка върху някого – какво зелено облекчение!“
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Roland St. Amour | MVH South Paris Veteran Stories | U.S. Army
Author: MVH South Paris
Roland St. Amour was drafted to the U.S. Army at the age of 19 in January 1943. He attended basic training at the Army Mobilization Training Camp in Texas. He later was sent to a training camp in North Carolina for commando training. Following training Roland was sent to Georgia to await departure on the ship Queen Mary heading to England for pre-invasion training.
Roland was being prepared for the Normandy Invasion. He was trained as a gunner for the 3rd Armored "Spearhead" division which was attached to the 486th Armored Anti-Aircraft Battalion. Roland recalls being on a boat heading to Omaha beach and a sailor
Roland St. Amour, US Army, 1943
giving him a bunk and gun. He said "you will need it when you get down there. Get a good night’s sleep." The battalion landed on Omaha beach in June 1944. Roland recollects lots of rifle fire and shooting down quite a few German airplanes. He recalls their anti-aircraft tanks came in and opened up the hedgerow. From here they moved on to Cologne where all night you could hear the planes dropping bombs. They were heading to relieve the infantry at the Siege of Bastogne in Belgium.
The main objective of the 3rd Armored "Spearhead" division was to always be in front of the infantry which they did all the way to Berlin. In April 1945, the 3rd armored division discovered the Dora-Mittelbau concentration camp and liberated 250 ill and starving prisoners. Roland can still picture the big ovens and visualizes the people being skin and bones and the dead bodies strewn about. By the time Roland was honorably discharged from the Army in December 1945, he had spent two years in active combat, having fought in five campaigns in Normandy, Northern France, Rhineland, Ardennes-Alsace and Central Europe. Roland feels very lucky to have made it through the war with only some loss of hearing in his right ear from where he use to fire his rifle. He feels he is one of the lucky ones. He lost a lot of friends and most of the guys he was with got killed. Roland was able to return to Germany in 1995 to visit with some of the people they had liberated from the concentration camp. He is proud that he was still receiving mail from them even though he can't read them because they are written in German.
Following the military, Roland was employed at the Bates Mill in Lewiston as a dyer during the day and in the evenings he worked as a door to door salesman for W.T. Rawleigh Company selling health products. Roland enjoyed meeting people and at times some had large families and he knew they couldn't afford the medicine, so he wouldn't ask them to pay. Usually in the spring, they would pick up nickels and dimes and pay me. Roland retired at 65 but enjoyed being around people so much he went to work at Shaw's Supermarket. He worked there for 15 years until he needed to care for his wife who was diagnosed with dementia. He took care of her at home for five years until it was no longer safe to.
Roland met his wife Rena at a dance. In July 2019 it will be 73 years they have been married. They have four children; 3 boys and 1 girl in addition to 5 grandchildren. Roland has worked all his life and never had time to play games or travel. He is now enjoying life at the Maine Veterans' Home in South Paris playing bingo, going out to eat, attending religious programs in addition to other social functions that he enjoys. His biggest enjoyment is socializing. He will tell you "I like to talk." He especially enjoys the time he spends with his wife who now resides at MVH.
Roland came to the Maine Veterans’ Home in September 2018. He now resides on our C unit and was recently honored in Augusta at the Remember Me Ceremony which has been hosted by the Maine Health Care Association for the last seventeen years and is a photography tribute and recognition ceremony for residents of nursing homes and assisted living facilities statewide.
Thank you for your service Roland!
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Cats to return to the Palladium at the end of this year?
According to Baz in the Daily Mail, Andrew Lloyd Webber is in early negotiations for his very successful revival of Cats the musical to return to the London Palladium next December before it heads back to Broadway in 2016 (if he can find a theatre) - hopefully starring Nicole Scherzinger.
Kerry Ellis takes over the role of Grizabella on Monday until the show closes on 25th April, after which it is again going out on a short tour.
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New cast for Les Miserables London from 11th June
From Monday 11 June 2018, there are some major cast changes at the West End production of LES MISÉRABLES at the Queen’s Theatre, which is now in its record breaking 33rd year.
Cameron Mackintosh has announced that Dean Chisnall will star as ‘Jean Valjean’; Toby Miles as ‘Marius’; Elena Skye as ‘Eponine’; Vivien Parry as ‘Madame Thénardier’ and Amara Okereke as ‘Cosette’. Continuing in their roles are Steven Meo as ‘Thénardier’ and Carley Stenson as ‘Fantine’.
David Thaxton continues to play the role of ‘Javert’ until Saturday 21 July, with Bradley Jaden takinbg over the role from Monday 23rd July.
From Monday 11 June 2018 the company will be: Tegan Bannister; Emma Barr; Adam Bayjou; Ciarán Bowling; Oliver Brenin; Dean Chisnall; Grace Farrell; Sophie-May Feek; Adam Filipe; Antony Hanson; Sam Harrison; Barnaby Hughes; James Hume; Ciaran Joyce; Katie Kerr; Rebecca Lafferty; Sarah Lark, Hannah Grace Lawson; Jessica Lee; Jo Loxton; Anna McGarahan; Steven Meo; Toby Miles; James Nicholson; Amara Okereke; Vivien Parry; Carley Stenson; Elena Skye; David Thaxton; Ben Tyler; Joe Vetch; Raymond Walsh and Andrew York. Further casting to be announced soon.
Dean Chisnall’s most recent theatre credits include the UK tour of “Blood Brothers” “The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 ¾ The Musical” at the Menier Chocolate Factory; “Working” at the Southwark Playhouse; “Shrek” at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane and UK tour; “Love Never Dies” at the Adelphi Theatre; “La Cage Aux Folles” at the Playhouse Theatre and “Never Forget” at the Savoy Theatre.
Bradley Jaden is currently appearing as ‘Fiyero’ in “Wicked” at the Victoria Apollo Theatre. He returns to “Les Misérables” at the Queen’s Theatre having originally played ‘Enjolras’ in the 30th Anniversary cast. His other theatre credits include: the UK tour of “Ghost The Musical”; “Shrek The Musical” at Theatre Royal, Drury Lane; “The Blues Brothers” at the Edinburgh Festival and Stiles and Drewe’s “Peter Pan” at the West Yorkshire Playhouse. His TV credits include “Emmerdale” on ITV and “Sugar Rush” on Channel 4.
Toby Miles has recently graduated from Arts Educational Schools, London and will be making his professional and West End debut in the role of ‘Marius’.
Elena Skye has just finished playing the role of ‘Lauren’ in “Kinky Boots” at the Adelphi Theatre having made her West End debut in the production in 2016.
Vivien Parry’s most recent theatre credits include: “Half A Sixpence” at the Noël Coward Theatre, “A Christmas Carol”, “Twelfth Night”, A Midsummer Night’s Dream”, and “The Shoemaker’s Holiday” for the Royal Shakespeare Company; “The Girls” UK tour and “Top Hat” at the Aldwych Theatre. Other previous West End credits include: “Mamma Mia!” at the Prince of Wales Theatre; “Fame” at the Cambridge Theatre and “Blood Brothers” at the Phoenix Theatre. Her film credits include Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” in 2017.
Amara Okereke trained at Arts Educational Schools, London and The National Youth Music Theatre. Her theatre credits for the National Youth Music Theatre include: “The Hired Man” at The Other Palace; “West Side Story” at Manchester Warehouse and “13 The Musical” at the Apollo Theatre.
Carley Stenson’s West End credits include 'Elle Woods' in “Legally Blonde”, 'Princess Fiona' in “Shrek The Musical” and 'Lady of the Lake' in “Spamalot”. Carley also starred as 'Christine Colgate' in the tour of “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”. She is probably best known for playing the regular role of 'Steph Cunningham' in Channel 4’s Hollyoaks, for which she was nominated for several awards during her 10 years with the show.
Steven Meo’s previous theatre credits include “Pride & Prejudice” at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre and on UK tour; “The Taming of the Shrew”, “Boeing Boeing”, “Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog” all for Theatre Clwyd; “The Distance” for Sheffield Crucible/Orange Tree Theatre and “Flesh and Blood” for Hampstead Theatre and on tour.
David Thaxton previously played ‘Javert’ in 2014, and has also played the role of ‘Enjolras’ in “Les Misérables” at the Queen’s Theatre. His additional theatre credits include ‘Giorgio’ in “Passion” at the Donmar Warehouse, for which he won an Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Musical, ‘Pilate’ in “Jesus Christ Superstar” at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre, ‘Raoul’ in “Love Never Dies” at the Adelphi and ‘Major John Howard’ in “Only The Brave” at Wales Millennium Centre.
Labels: Les
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Nan Shepherd on the new five pound note
29th April 2016 29th April 2016 Andrew Martin 20th-century items
Good news this week for Scottish literature. Nan Shepherd, one of our best and most interesting 20th century writers will feature on a new £5 note from the Royal Bank of Scotland. Who exactly was the commanding figure on the new note?
Nan Shepherd (1893-1981) lived in Aberdeenshire all her life, and published only three novels, a collection of poetry, and a single non-fiction work. Nevertheless, as this year’s honour from the Royal Bank of Scotland underlines, she is a writer who deserves to be remembered – and read.
The Quarry Wood, The Weatherhouse, and A Pass in the Grampians are Nan Shepherd’s novels, published between 1928 and 1933– all set in rural communities in the North East of Scotland and featuring lively young heroines. Readers who know their Scottish literature may immediately also think of Sunset Song, Lewis Grassic Gibbon’s classic novel, first published in 1932, but Nan Shepherd proves that there is more than one rural novel to read from that period.
Shepherd worked at Aberdeen Training Centre for Teachers, later Aberdeen College of Education, as a much admired lecturer in English from 1919 till her retirement in 1956. Although closely connected with other Scottish writers, she became in some ways a forgotten name, still living in the home she had moved to as a baby.
In 1977 a thirty year old non-fiction manuscript was published as The Living Mountain and this celebration of her beloved Grampians has had enduring appeal – and a quotation from that book will feature on the new £5 note.
In recent years Shepherd’s work has been re-discovered and re-published. Enthusiastic supporters have included Robert Macfarlane, who provided the introduction for a new edition of The Living Mountain, and led a fascinating BBC television documentary.
Here at the National Library of Scotland we have – available to all our readers of course- all of Nan Shepherd’s published works in the different editions, as well as original correspondence and notebooks, recording a long and interesting life
It is great news indeed that Nan’s face and words will be in pockets and cash registers all over the country soon, encouraging us to re-read or discover her work.
Aberdeenshire Grampians mountains nan shepherd nature novelist novels Robert Macfarlane scotland Scottish authors women
Iolaire ….continued
The Making of a Manuscript
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Subscribe To Jumanji 3 Raises The Stakes For A More 'Risky' Adventure, Kevin Hart Says Updates
Jumanji 3 Raises The Stakes For A More 'Risky' Adventure, Kevin Hart Says
In the world of Jumanji, one thing is certain: when you play the game, chaos and pandemonium will ensue. 2017’s Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle saw the classic board game from the 1995 original being turned into a video game, with four teenagers being drawn in and turned into game avatars. That formula will be repeated for Jumanji 3 later this year, but returning star Kevin Hart says the threequel will raise the stakes even higher, resulting in a riskier adventure for the protagonists. In his words:
Back in the world of Jumanji, but the beautiful thing about the way we set it is through the video game atmosphere. In this particular case, we go back into the game and we’re in a new level. And the way we got back into the game is the way we didn’t want to get back into the game. The same people are there. Our same band is back together with this adventure on a much more risky adventure. The stakes have been elevated and raised. For a fan base, you want to give them the same family action adventure they fell in love with. So we just wanted to make sure we delivered. Jake Kasdan, our director and writer, he does just that.
As Kevin Hart alluded to, a good sequel retains the elements that made its predecessor(s) popular, while also giving audiences plenty of new material to chew on. We already knew Jumanji 3 would be delving back into the video game world, and while Hart can’t divulge any specific plot details just yet, evidently what the teenagers went through in Welcome to the Jungle will pale in comparison to what’s in store for them this time around.
Kevin Hart’s comment about a “new level” to Collider is particularly interesting, as it means that the main characters won’t have to deal with the same challenges they faced last time. Still, with rampaging animals, mercenaries on their tail and an assortment of other obstacles and problems, it’s not like the events of Welcome to the Jungle were a cakewalk. Fingers crossed we get a Jumanji 3 trailer soon so that we can learn what dangers lurk around the corner.
One thing that isn’t changing in Jumanji 3 is the avatars within the video game, as along with Kevin Hart reprising Moose Finbar, Dwayne Johnson’s Dr. Smolder Bravestone, Jack Black’s Professor Shelly Oberon, Karen Gillan’s Ruby Roundhouse and even Nick Jonas’ Seaplane McDonough will all be back, as will Rhys Darby’s Nigel Billingsley, the NPC who guided them in Welcome to the Jungle. As mentioned earlier, the same teenagers will also be playing the game again: Alex Wolff’s Spencer Gilpin, Madison Iseman’s Bethany Waler, Ser’Darius Blain’s Fridge Johnson and Morgan Turner’s Martha Haply.
As for new faces, Awkwafina, Danny DeVito, Danny Glover and Dania Ramirez have all joined Jumanji 3’s cast, although their characters haven’t been identified yet. Filming on the threequel began in January in both Atlanta, Georgia and Hawaii, and is expected to finish at the end of the month.
Welcome to the Jungle was definitely one of the surprise cinematic successes of 2017, receiving many positive reviews taking in over $962 million worldwide during its theatrical run. We’ll have to wait and see if Jumanji 3 comes close to reaching that same level of critical and commercial reception, but going off of Kevin Hart’s comments, director and writer Jake Kasdan has done his best to deliver a fresh story that will ideally put a lot of butts in seats again.
Jumanji 3 heads into theaters on December 13, so stay tuned to CinemaBlend for continuing coverage. In the meantime, look through our 2019 release schedule to learn what other movies are coming out later this year.
Ruby Roundhouse Will Get Some Changes In Jumanji: The Next Level, Despite First Trailer
Jumanji 3: What We Know So Far About The Next Level
I Really Hope The Jumanji: The Next Level Trailer Is Hiding A Twist For Karen Gillan's Character
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12 Hours to Fall in Love in Face of Cultural Obstacles
By Joanna Poncavage|2019-05-28T11:06:41-04:00May 15th, 2019|Pop Culture|
Ah, young love! So sudden, so unexpected, so bittersweet.
“The Sun is Also a Star” is a movie based on the 2016 best-selling young adult novel of the same name (Delacorte Press) by Nicola Yoon. In spite of its YA listing, the book found fans of all ages. What’s not timeless about romance? Romeo and Juliet were only teenagers, but their love is eternal.
The novel begins on a perfect fall day in New York when young quantum physics student, Natasha Kingsley, meets Korean student Daniel Bae on his way to an interview for Yale. Natasha is played by Yara Shahidi, known for her role as Zoey Johnson on the sitcom “Black-ish.” Charles Melton (Reggie Mantle in the television series “Riverdale”) portrays Daniel.
After the teens meet (in a classic meet-cute, he saves her from being hit by a car), sparks fly, although both are preoccupied with external concerns. Natasha is on her way to immigration services in a desperate last-minute attempt to stop her family’s deportation to Jamaica. Daniel has resolved to begin living up to his parent’s expectations and stop doubting himself.
Natasha is the practical one, with a NASA star map on the wall above her bed (a sofa bed, really, in the living room that every night becomes a bedroom she shares with her younger brother). She only wants to stay in New York and continue college.
Daniel is a secret poet who refuses to try for Harvard because that’s where his older brother Charles went, at least until he was suspended for two semesters. His parents’ hopes for Daniel’s brother dashed, they are now concentrating on Daniel to fulfill their dream by becoming a doctor.
The novel is narrated by alternating voices, even the security guard at Citizenship and Immigration Services, and the driver of the car that almost hit Natasha. Natasha’s chapters are filled with science notes (and explanations of these notes for the uninitiated). If she is the “left brain,” Daniel is the right, as his chapters are driven by emotion. In one poignant passage, he muses that his parents would not approve of him dating a black girl.
The young actors have much to recommend them. Shahidi won an NAACP Image Award for best supporting actress in a comedy (“Black-ish”) in 2014. For her activism in encouraging young people to vote, Michelle Obama wrote her a letter of recommendation to Harvard University. She also was chosen to interview Hilary Clinton for Teen Vogue in 2017. Bae also starred in “American Horror Story” and “Glee.” Independent filmmaker Rene Russo-Young, whose 2014 film, “Nobody Walks” won a special jury prize at Sundance, directs the movie.
Nicola Yoon, born in Jamaica, is also the author of the bestselling young adult debut novel, Everything, Everything, which became a 2017 movie. The Sun is Also a Star was a National Book Award finalist.
In an interview with Writer’s Digest, Yoon described her book in one sentence: “A poetic boy named Daniel tries to convince a scientific girl name Natasha to fall in love with him in twelve hours.”
Will love conquer all? Only the universe knows.
“The Sun is Also a Star” opens May 17.
About the Author: Joanna Poncavage
Joanna Poncavage had a 30-year career as an editor and writer for Rodale’s Organic Gardening magazine and The (Allentown, Pennsylvania) Morning Call newspaper. Author of several gardening books, she’s now a freelance journalist.
Make Downton Abbey Dishes to Rival Mrs. Patmore
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From TV to Reality: “Marriage Vacation”
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Business Booming Again At Lancaster Turkey Farm Months After Devastating Fire
By Paula Ebben November 17, 2016 at 6:01 pm
Filed Under:Bob's Turkey Farm, Paula Ebben
LANCASTER (CBS) – It’s turkey time and a 60-year-old Massachusetts farm is back in business.
For a while it looked like Bob’s Turkey Farm in Lancaster wouldn’t survive. That’s because of a devastating fire last summer.
But thanks to hard work and a lot of help, the family farm is booming again.
It’s the busiest time of the year at Bob’s, getting about 6,000 turkeys ready for Thanksgiving tables, leaving about 1,000 birds left with a reprieve until Christmas.
“We’ve been buying turkey here forever. We love it,” says Angela Mackie, a longtime customer.
The family-owned farm opened in 1954, and today the refrigerators are stuffed with crates of fresh turkeys, waiting for next week’s rush.
But after last summer’s barn fire, the Thanksgiving season was in serious jeopardy.
“We lost 7,000 birds in the fire, and most of them were Thanksgiving turkey’s,” says Richard Van Hoof, one of the owners.
A fire destroyed a barn at Bob’s Turkey Farm in Lancaster (Image from Lancaster PD)
He and his sister Sue Miner run the farm that their father built from scratch. The fire changed everything.
“Oh, it was devastating. We didn’t know what was going to happen,” says Miner.
What happened surprised both of them.
“If our community didn’t surround us and give us the support they did give us, I’m not sure what we would have done,” Miner said.
“A lot of people came to clean up the mess, and some people came to help rebuild,” Van Hoof added.
A bird from Bob’s Turkey Farm. (WBZ-TV)
Money was donated and so was equipment.
“A lot of people, you wouldn’t think they’d do that, but they did,” Van Hood said.
You can still see the charred posts of the old barn, but it’s mostly rebuilt and the turkey stock is growing. That means happy customers.
“It’s honestly the freshest turkey we’ve ever had, so everyone is pleased,” says Carrie Leblanc, who placed her Thanksgiving order today.
Selling 6,000 turkeys sounds like a lot, but usually that number would be 8,000 or 9,000. So this has been a rebuilding year for the farm, and next year they hope to be back to normal.
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Harley-Davison invests in electric vehicle company
MILWAUKEE — Harley-Davidson says it will collaborate with Alta Motors on the motorcycle maker’s plans for an electric bike.
The Milwaukee company said Thursday that it has made an equity investment in Alta Motors, an innovator in lightweight electric vehicles. Harley-Davidson wasn’t specific on the investment.
The company has previously said it’s committed to aggressively investing in electric vehicle technology and has announced the planned release of its first electric motorcycle in 2019. Alta Motors’ manufacturing operation is headquartered in Brisbane, California.
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Macquarie to shut down Canadian equities sales, trading business: Globe and Mail
FILE PHOTO: A pedestrian walks past the logo of Australia's biggest investment bank Macquarie Group Ltd which adorns a wall on the outside of their Sydney office headquarters in central Sydney, Australia, July 18, 2017. REUTERS/David Gray
SYDNEY (Reuters) - Macquarie Group is shutting down its Canadian institutional equities business due to a prolonged slump in resource-related deals, The Globe and Mail newspaper reported on Monday, citing anonymous sources.
A spokeswoman for the Sydney-headquartered investment bank declined to comment on Tuesday on the closure of the equities business when contacted by Reuters. But, she said in a statement Macquarie would continue to operate a commodities hedging and trading business in Canada.
“Macquarie remains committed to Canada, with more than 100 staff working across commodities trading and hedging, corporate finance and advisory ... in a range of sectors,” the spokeswoman said.
The Canadian newspaper reported the bank would shut its institutional equity sales, trading and research units in that country, adding that between 50 to 80 staff were likely to be affected.
The job cuts would mainly occur in Toronto and some in Calgary, but total job losses depended on how many back-office roles could be eliminated by the move, the newspaper said.
Macquarie’s spokeswoman said the bank would “continue to provide domestic cash equities execution services and access to our global execution platform.”
According to its February operational briefing, Macquarie operates in Toronto, Calgary, Montreal, and Vancouver.
It has ranked well below the top 20 banks in equity capital markets league tables Canada in recent years, Refinitiv data shows, well below local rivals Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, RBC Capital Markets, Bank of Montreal and Toronto-Dominion Bank.
Reporting by Paulina Duran; Editing by Christian Schmollinger
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Yedlin: Canadian Natural Resources continues to bulk up
Cenovus president and CEO Brian Ferguson, who'll step down at the end of October, has orchestrated the sale of the company's Pelican Lake properties to Canadian Natural Resources for almost $1 billion. Ted Rhodes / Calgary Herald
When Cenovus Energy acquired the western Canadian assets of ConocoPhillips in March, and then announced it would sell its own assets to pay down debt and de-leverage its balance sheet, oilpatch analysts cited Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. as the most logical buyer of the Pelican Lake properties.
On Tuesday, Canadian Natural made it official, forking out $975 million to buy those properties and production of almost 20,000 barrels a day. The deal follows its purchase of the oilsands assets of Shell and Marathon Oil for $12.74 billion last March and further consolidates its position in the oilsands.
But this latest transaction is more important for Cenovus, which has been under pressure to announce an asset sale ever since the $17.7-billion ConocoPhillips agreement was announced.
“This is the first significant delivery on the de-leveraging plan and it occurred in line with their target for timing. It’s a delivery that is consistent with what they promised,” said Mike Dunn, director of institutional research at GMP FirstEnergy, who expected a price of $800 million to $1 billion for the Pelican Lake properties.
In aggregate, the Canadian Natural deal works out to about $50,000 per flowing barrel of production, which drops to $43,000 with certain adjustments, including backing out the value of a net profit interest on the Primrose East property valued at $72 million. For context, it paid $61,000 per flowing barrel for the Shell assets, a price much lower than what it cost to build its Horizon operation.
Cenovus has said it wants to net as much as $5 billion in asset sales by the end of 2017. Tuesday’s transaction means it can pay off the first tranche of the $3.6 billion in bridge financing it put in place, pending completion of the divestitures.
Expected next — by the end of September — is an announcement on its Suffield assets, which could net another $500 million to $600 million. That property, said Dunn, doesn’t have the logical buyer as Pelican Lake did.
Unlike Pelican Lake, which gives Canadian Natural full ownership of the play, along with the Pelican Lake pipeline system, Suffield lacks the attractiveness of a stacked Montney play as a combination of dry gas and heavy oil. Not exactly high on the must-have list these days. And, since it’s near the Canadian Forces base, it’s a more complex part of the province in which to be operating because of the permits required.
Decisions on two other Cenovus assets on the block — Weyburn and Palliser — should be announced by the end of the year, with Weyburn valued at $1 billion to $1.2 billion.
The four properties are expected to fetch about $3.8 billion. The additional $1.2 billion Cenovus has talked about in terms of total dispositions could come from selling the infrastructure assets that came with the ConocoPhillips Deep Basin properties.
This is all happening as the clock continues to tick for Cenovus chief executive Brian Ferguson, who will step down at the end of October. While Ferguson intends to stay on as an adviser through next March, in the best of all worlds he would like to be leaving with the asset sales firmly in process by year end.
Tuesday’s announcement sent the company’s shares up 41 cents in early trading, before ending the day ahead 33 cents, or 3.3 per cent, at $10.28. That’s still way off where the stock was a year ago and well below half its 52-week high of $22.06.
As has been said many times in recent months, scale in the oilsands is critical long term. That’s why gaining control of the Pelican Lake properties is significant for Canadian Natural. The two companies use the same extraction process — a polymer flood method — which means there are cost synergies to be captured. In addition, Canadian Natural’s operating costs are lower than those of Cenovus and expectations are the same extraction methods will be carried over into the newly acquired assets.
The asset package also comes with regulatory approval for Cenovus’ Grand Rapids project in the Greater Pelican Lakes Region, capable of producing 180,000 barrels a day, which Canadian Natural now has the option to develop.
The market also offered Canadian Natural a thumbs up for the deal, which only modestly raises its net debt to cash flow from 3.4 times to 3.5 times by the end of 2018. Its shares rose 56 cents to close at $39.30.
Dunn said the company remains in the running for further acquisitions. Other deals could be structured using a combination of cash and equity — or just equity.
Unlike the Shell and Marathon deals, the sale of the Pelican Lake properties took place between two Canadian companies. The fact consolidation continues within the oilsands is positive from the standpoint that bigger is harder to take over, economies of scale can be captured and the development of the resource is under local watch. It is not a line item on the balance sheet of a company based a long distance from where the assets are situated.
It’s also another positive sign in what continues to be a long road to recovery for Canada’s energy sector.
dyedlin@postmedia.com
Check before you buy: a new homebuyer’s guide to energy efficiency Cenovus selling Pelican Lake operations to Canadian Natural for $975 million
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The Challenge Coin
A military tradition with a rich history
Originally designed to recognize and reward soldiers, the tradition of the Challenge Coin within the U.S. military first began 100 years ago. Challenge coins are prized by their owners, and other non-military organizations such as the NFL and NASCAR now issue their own versions.
Caliber Home Loans is proud of their own custom Challenge Coin. Here’s a history of these unique symbols of honor, loyalty and commitment.
An early challenge coin saves an airman’s life
During World War I, volunteers from all parts of the United States filled the newly-formed flying squadrons of the Aviation Section of the Signal Corps (a predecessor to today’s Air Force). One squadron lieutenant ordered a set of bronze medallions illustrated with the squadron’s insignia, presenting one to each member of his unit as a memento of their service together. One young pilot placed his medallion in a small leather pouch that he wore around his neck for safekeeping – and perhaps for luck, too.
Shortly after acquiring the medallions, the pilot’s aircraft was severely damaged by ground fire, forcing him to land behind enemy lines where he was immediately captured by a German patrol. To discourage his escape, the Germans confiscated his military identification, but did not take the medallion. A short time later, he was taken to a small town in France near the front battle line. Eventually the pilot escaped his captors and headed to France.
He avoided arrest by German patrols by changing from military to civilian attire. Eventually he reached the front lines and survived crossing “no man’s land”, when he stumbled into a French outpost.
German saboteurs had plagued the French by dressing as civilians, so the pilot was immediately suspected of being another saboteur. Not recognizing his American accent, and with no military or personal identification available, the French made arrangements for his execution by firing squad.
Searching for a way to survive, the pilot showed his bronze medallion to his captors. One recognized the squadron’s American insignia – and this recognition saved his life. And since American pilots had volunteered to fly in France’s own air force, Armée de l'Air, the medallion earned the pilot respect and gratitude as well.
The challenge behind the medallion
Eventually, it became a WWI tradition that all members of a military unit carry their medallion or coin at all times. This was supported by the challenge coin tradition. Any soldier could ask to see another’s coin. If the challenged soldier wasn’t carrying his, he was required to buy the challenger a drink – but if he presented his coin, the challenger had to foot the bar bill. This tradition continued throughout the war and for many years afterwards.
Introducing the Caliber Custom Challenge Coin
In keeping with military tradition, Caliber presents every VA Loan borrower with a custom Challenge Coin after their home loan is finalized. It represents more than our commitment to providing our military borrowers with the best possible service … each Challenge Coin is a reflection of our lasting appreciation for your service to our country.
Special consumers, special leaders
Learn about Caliber's National Director of Military & VA Lending, a uniquely qualified leader who brings active duty experience to the table to best serve the needs of our military & VA communities.
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You are here: Home / 2012 / February / Archives for 14th
Archives for February 14, 2012
Chief Judge C. Dennis Maes to Retire from Tenth Judicial District Bench
February 14, 2012 By Zachary Willis 2 Comments
The Tenth Judicial District Nominating Commission will meet April 3, 2012 to interview and select nominees for appointment by Governor Hickenlooper to the office of District Judge for the Tenth Judicial District, which covers Pueblo County. The vacancy will be created by the retirement of the Honorable C. Dennis Maes on June 1, 2012.
Judge Maes has been a Pueblo District Court Judge since 1988 and became Chief Judge in 1995. Before being appointed to he bench, Judge Maes spent time in private practice and was also a public defender in the Pueblo Public Defender’s Office and a past director of Pueblo County Legal Services.
Eligible applicants for appointment to fill the vacancy must be qualified electors of the Tenth Judicial District and must be admitted to the practice of law in Colorado for five years. Applications must be received by Tuesday, March 13. The appointed district court judge will serve an initial provisional term of two years before facing a retention election. Retained judges serve six-year terms.
Further information about applying for the vacancy is available here from the Colorado Judicial Branch.
Filed Under: Updates Tagged With: 10th Judicial District, court appointments, courts, judicial appointments, Pueblo County
Colorado Supreme Court: Person with Successfully Completed and Deferred Judgment for Unlawful Sexual Behavior Is Not Eligible to Seal Records
February 14, 2012 By CBA-CLE Staff Leave a Comment
The Colorado Supreme Court issued its opinion in M.T. v. People on February 13, 2012.
Statutory Construction—Sealing of Criminal Records—Unlawful Sexual Behavior—Deferred Judgments.
Colorado’s sealing statute, CRS § 24-72-308(1), allows for the sealing of arrest and criminal records in certain circumstances. The Supreme Court held that CRS § 24-72-308(3)(c), which prohibits the sealing of records pertaining to a conviction involving unlawful sexual behavior, applies to a successfully completed and dismissed deferred judgment. Thus, a person with a successfully completed and dismissed deferred judgment for an offense involving unlawful sexual behavior is not eligible to petition to seal records under the sealing statute.
Filed Under: Case Law Tagged With: Colorado Revised Statutes, Colorado Supreme Court, criminal law, criminal procedure
Colorado Supreme Court: To Present Affirmative Defense of Abandonment for Jury Consideration, Must Present “Some Credible Evidence”; Injuring Victim Does Not Necessarily Foreclose the Defense
The Colorado Supreme Court issued its opinion in O’Shaughnessy v. People on February 13, 2012.
Criminal Trials—Jury Instructions—Affirmative Defenses—Abandonment and Renunciation.
The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review whether the court of appeals imposed an unauthorized restriction on the affirmative defense of abandonment when it held that a defendant is not entitled to a jury instruction on abandonment when charged with attempted first-degree murder with a deadly weapon, or with attempted aggravated robbery, once he or she has injured the victim. The court of appeals’ judgment was affirmed.
The Supreme Court first held that to present an affirmative defense of abandonment of an attempted crime for jury consideration, a defendant must present “some credible evidence” on the issue. The Court also held that having injured the victim does not necessarily foreclose the affirmative defense of abandonment. Nonetheless, defendant was not entitled to a jury instruction on the affirmative defense of abandonment, because he failed to present sufficient credible evidence to support that defense.
Filed Under: Case Law Tagged With: Colorado Supreme Court, criminal law, criminal procedure, evidence, jury instructions
Colorado Supreme Court: Facts and Circumstances Officer Knew at Time of Intrusion Did Not Amount of Reasonable Suspicion Sufficient for Investigatory Stop; Marijuana Evidence Properly Suppressed
The Colorado Supreme Court issued its opinion in People v. Revoal on February 13, 2012.
U.S. Constitution—Fourth Amendment—Suppression of Evidence—Reasonable Suspicion—Investigatory Stop.
The prosecution charged Anthony Michael Revoal with one count of possession with intent to manufacture or distribute marijuana in an amount less than five pounds after an investigatory stop and subsequent frisk revealed marijuana and a scale containing marijuana residue. At the time of the stop, the police were aware of the following facts and circumstances: (1) it was 11:30 p.m.; (2) robberies had recently occurred in the area; (3) Revoal was standing on the side of a closed Subway restaurant, looking left to right; (4) Revoal walked to the side of an open liquor store, continued looking left to right, and then walked toward the back of the liquor store, where it was dark; and (5) Revoal turned and walked away from the investigating officer when he observed the patrol vehicle. The trial court suppressed the marijuana evidence on the basis that these facts did not give the investigating officer reasonable suspicion to conduct the stop.
The Supreme Court affirmed the trial court’s judgment. The Court held that the facts and circumstances the officer knew at the time of the intrusion, viewed either individually or collectively, did not amount under the totality of the circumstances to reasonable suspicion sufficient to justify the officer’s investigatory stop.
Filed Under: Case Law Tagged With: constitutional law, criminal law, criminal procedure, evidence
Colorado Supreme Court: Statute in Effect at Time of Acts Provided that Multiple Thefts by Same Person within Six Months Should Be Joined and Prosecuted as Single Theft
The Colorado Supreme Court issued its opinion in Lucero v. People on February 13, 2012.
Thefts Committed by Single Person Within a Six-Month Period—First-Degree Burglary—Firearm Not Per Se Deadly Weapon—Burglar’s Use or Intent to Use Firearm.
Joseph Lucero was convicted of crimes connected to several break-ins in August and September 2000, including three counts of theft and one count of first-degree burglary. Applying its earlier decisions, the Supreme Court merged the three theft convictions into a single theft conviction and vacated the first-degree burglary conviction.
The Court first held that Lucero cannot be punished for all three alleged thefts. The statute in effect at the time of Lucero’s acts provided that multiple thefts committed by the same person within a six-month period should be joined and prosecuted as a single theft. [See Roberts v. People, 203 P.3d 513 (Colo. 2009).] Accordingly, the Court corrected his illegal sentence.
The Supreme Court also applied its holding in Montez v. People, 2012 CO 6. In Montez, the Court held that a firearm is not a deadly weapon per se for the purposes of the first-degree burglary statute. As in Montez, the prosecution in this case conceded that if firearms are not per se deadly weapons, Lucero’s conviction cannot stand. Thus, the Court vacated Lucero’s first-degree burglary conviction.
Filed Under: Case Law Tagged With: Colorado Revised Statutes, Colorado Supreme Court, criminal law, sentencing
Colorado Supreme Court: Legislature Has Not Classified Firearms as Per Se Deadly Weapons for Purposes of First-Degree Burglary Statute
The Colorado Supreme Court issued its opinion in Montez v. People on February 13, 2012.
First-Degree Burglary—Firearm Not Per Se Deadly Weapon—Burglar’s Use or Intent to Use Firearm.
The Supreme Court held that the General Assembly has not classified firearms as per se deadly weapons for purposes of the first-degree burglary statute. The legislature did not intend theft of a firearm from a building to constitute first-degree burglary, regardless of the manner the burglar used or intended to use the firearm.
The General Assembly superseded earlier decisions of the Court, which held that firearms were per se deadly weapons. In 1981, it amended the language of the deadly weapon definition, providing that a firearm is a deadly weapon only when used or intended to be used in a manner capable of producing death or serious bodily injury. This refers to the manner in which the burglar used or intended to use the weapon, and does not refer to the intent of the manufacturer of the weapon.
The prosecution conceded that, if its argument that a firearm is per se a deadly weapon did not prevail, Montez’s conviction for first-degree burglary could not stand. Accordingly, the Court vacated the first-degree burglary conviction.
Filed Under: Case Law Tagged With: Colorado Legislature, Colorado Revised Statutes, Colorado Supreme Court, criminal law
Colorado Supreme Court: Fraud Claim Against Trustee’s Attorney Not Pleaded with Particularity and Futile; Probate Court Abused Discretion in Permitting Joinder of the Attorney
The Colorado Supreme Court issued its opinion in In re Vinton v. Virzi on February 13, 2012.
Trust Administration—C.R.C.P. 9(b) —Client Suing Opposing Attorney.
Amanda Vinton petitioned for relief pursuant to C.A.R. 21 from orders of the probate court permitting Sharon Virzi to amend her challenge to a trust administration by adding a claim of fraud against Vinton, the attorney for the trustee. Over Vinton’s objection, the probate court summarily granted Virzi’s motion to amend, forcing Vinton to withdraw as counsel for the trustee. The probate court summarily denied two motions by Vinton to dismiss the claim against her and ordered her to pay Virzi’s attorney fees for having to defend against a substantially frivolous and groundless motion. The Supreme Court issued a rule to show cause.
The Court held that because Virzi’s fraud claim was not pleaded with sufficient particularity to withstand a motion to dismiss, it was futile, and the probate court abused its discretion in permitting the joinder of her opponent’s attorney. The Court also held that regardless of whether Vinton’s motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction over the separate fraud claim was meritorious, the record was inadequate to support an award of attorney fees. The rule was made absolute and the matter was remanded to the probate court with directions to dismiss Virzi’s claim of fraud against Vinton and to vacate its award of attorney fees.
Filed Under: Case Law Tagged With: appellate law, civil procedure, Colorado Appellate Rules, Colorado Rules of Civil Procedure, Colorado Supreme Court, probate, trust & estate law
Tenth Circuit: Unpublished Opinions, 2/13/12
February 14, 2012 By Zachary Willis Leave a Comment
On Monday, February 13, 2012, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals issued no published opinions and two unpublished opinions.
Valdez v. McGill
United States v. Bedolla-Izazaga
No case summaries are available for unpublished opinions. However, published opinions are summarized and provided by Legal Connection.
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- CCHR Australia - https://cchr.org.au -
New Federal ADHD Guidelines Halted due to Undisclosed Drug Company Connections of US Psychiatrist
Call for Full Disclosure of Australian Committee Members Vested Interests.
The Royal Australasian College of Physicians Draft ADHD Guidelines have been halted under a cloud of controversy as it was revealed that US psychiatrist, Dr. Joseph Biederman, is currently under U.S. Congressional investigation for his undisclosed financial ties to the pharmaceutical industry. Dr. Biederman, whose studies are cited more than 70 times in the draft ADHD guidelines, has confessed to receiving up to US$1.6 million to research and promote specific drugs, clearly a conflict of interest.
The Guidelines were being developed by a committee with financial ties to drug companies that produce the very drugs that appeared as the first line of treatment for ADHD in the draft guidelines. Full disclosure to the public of any vested interests of the Committee members drafting the Guidelines has never been made.
A Freedom of Information request by Australian Office of the Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR) for the Vested Interest Disclosure Documents partially revealed the extent of drug company connections by Committee Members in attendance at the first meeting of the draft guidelines. Along with additional research it was found:
Dr. Daryl Effron was Chair of the Committee until his conflicts were exposed in 2007 in The Daily Telegraph. He has been on the advisory boards of Novartis that makes Ritalin and Eli Lilly that manufactures Straterra – both drugs prescribed to treat ADHD. While standing down as Chair, he remained a Committee member.
Dr. Patrick Concannon, has served on advisory committees for Novartis and Janssen-Cilag that makes the ADHD drug Concerta. See page 64.
Professor David Hay is a Professor of Psychology at Curtain University of Technology West Australia and Janssen-Cilag the makers of the ADHD drug Concerta, has funded his presentation at educational seminars.
Committee member, Ms. Michelle Pearce who is on the Education Group of the Committee, helped write a booklet, “Teenagers with ADHD” for Novartis.
Professor Loretta Giorcelli from NSW, who is also on the Education Group of the Committee appealed against the release of the disclosure documents and when they were released she disclosed at the first meeting that she had received expenses plus accommodation to attend a meeting as an educational advisor paid for by Janssen Cilag who make the ADHD drug Concerta.
Consumer Advocate, Geraldine Moore from Victoria wrote a book on ADHD and the catering at the launch of this book was funded by Eli Lilly who make the ADHD drug Strattera.
Professor Philip Hazel, Clinical Director of the Centre for Mental Health Studies in the Hunter NSW attended the first meeting for the drafting of the ADHD Guidelines and according to his disclosure documents he has been on advisory boards of Eli Lilly who make the ADHD drug Strattera, Novartis who make Ritalin, Shire, Jansen and Pfizer.
Michelle Toner from Learning and Attentional Deficit Society in WA also attended the first meeting and disclosed that her organisation had received limited and unrestricted grants from Eli Lilly, Janssen-Cilag and Novartis.
Jude Foster the director of the Wraparound Kids Program attended the first meeting and she also appealed against release of her documents. When they were released her document dated 1/03/07 stated she was a member of the Advisory Board for Novartis and Janssen Cilag- both drug companies who make ADHD drugs. Despite this her Wraparound Kids Program is listed as a “Resource” for Teachers in the Draft Guidelines.
The Committee reported that it analysed 265 studies in the Draft Systematic Review document which was then used to write the Guidelines. A total of 89 or 31% of these “studies” were industry funded. By way of example, Russell Barkley, Ph.D., a renowned proponent of “ADHD” and stimulant treatment, has more than 30 studies referenced. In 2007, almost a quarter (24%) of his income was from drug companies. He is a key advisor to the U.S. Children and Adults with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (CHADD) that U.S. media in 2006 exposed for its conflicts of interest with the pharmaceutical industry and the fact that it does not publish critical information about ADHD drugs, including an FDA warning in 2005 that the ADHD drug, Straterra, caused suicide. Eli Lilly, the maker of Straterra is one of CHADD’s biggest donors.
A key point still not disclosed, is the names of pharmaceutical companies or amounts of money paid, nor does it reflect the personal money industry researchers like Dr. Biederman received as paid advocates of the pharmaceutical industry – essentially marketing of mental disorders to sell drugs.
The studies picked by the Committee were clearly biased towards proposing drug treatment as the first line treatment activity and do not reflect contrary findings, including:
In 2005, researchers at the Evidence-based Practice Center of Oregon Health & Science University reviewed 2,287 studies of 16 ADHD drugs, representing virtually every study ever conducted on ADHD drugs, and determined that no trials had shown the effectiveness of current ADHD drugs. They also found a lack of evidence that these drugs could affect academic performance, risky behaviors, social achievements, etc. The Draft Guideline left this vital document out of its recommendations.
“There must be full disclosure and total transparency of any vested interests of the Committee drafting the Guidelines otherwise the public will have absolutely no faith in them. Already they are a cesspit of vested interests. What other vested interests have not been disclosed?” asks Shelley Wilkins, Executive Director of the Australian National Office of CCHR.
Australia has the third highest rate of Ritalin consumption in the world behind Canada and the United States. Ritalin is a pharmacologically similar to cocaine.
“With Australian ADHD drug prescriptions increasing at an annual rate of nearly 12% and the vested interests of the Committee responsible for drafting these ADHD Guidelines, Australian children are set to suffer even more harmful side-effects form these drugs,” stated Ms Wilkins.
The Therapeutic Goods Administration has already reported 863 suspected adverse reactions to ADHD drugs. These include the sudden death of a 7 year old and a 5 year old that suffered a stroke after taking Ritalin.
For further information please contact CCHR, which was co-founded by the Church of Scientology & Professor of Psychiatry, Dr Thomas Szasz in 1969 to investigate psychiatric violations against human rights.
Clinical Excellence Commission Report: “Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder in Children and adolescents in New South Wales- 2007. Final Report of the Special Review, December 2007,” page 64.
Neilson Martin, Megan McDougall and David A Hay, “What are the key directions in the genetics of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder,” Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 2008 in press.
Freedom of Information Request done by Citizens Committee on Human Rights to the Australian Department of Health and Ageing. Documents released to CCHR on 12 December 2008.
Freedom of Information Request done by Citizens Committee on Human Rights to the Australian Department of Health and Ageing. Documents released to CCHR on 15 September 2008.
Freedom of Information Request done by Citizens Committee on Human Rights to the Australian Department of Health and Ageing. Documents released to CCHR on 8 January 2009
Royal and Australasian College of Physicians Guidelines on Attention Deficit Disorder Draft for Public Consultation 2008, page 130.
Russell A. Barkle, Ph.D., Official Site, http://www.russellbarkley.org/about-dr-barkley.html
Thomas Ginsberg, “Donations tie drug firms and non-profits; Many patient groups reveal few, if any, details on relationships with pharmaceutical donors,” The Philadelphia Enquirer, 28 May 2006.
“Drug Class Review on Pharmacologic Treatments for ADHD,” Final Report, Evidence-based Practice Center of Oregon Health & Science University, Sept. 2005; M. Alexander Otto, “Are ADHD Drugs Safe? Report Finds Little Proof,” The News Tribune, 26 Sept. 2005.
Clara Pirani, “Children on ADHD drugs hit by heart attacks and stroke,” Weekend Australian, 27 Mar. 2006.
Article printed from CCHR Australia: https://cchr.org.au
URL to article: https://cchr.org.au/articles/new-federal-adhd-guidelines-halted-due-to-undisclosed-drug-company-connections-of-us-psychiatrist
Copyright © 2017 CCHR Australia. All rights reserved.
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Posts Tagged ‘ OI ’
Seeing a country through inspiring eyes
I arrived home from Panama late last night, touching down in a sparse and quiet terminal at RDU with shops closed and staff off-duty. Already I miss Panama’s scenery, its warm weather, its delicious food, diverse culture, unique history and collage of breathtaking sights.
But most of all, I miss its people.
That’s highly unusual for the typical trip. Most travelers only interact with service workers when abroad. But this trip was special, one defined not by what places were visited but by who was met along the way.
I’ll never forget the compelling stories of the children, adults and families who didn’t give up on life even when faced with the enormous physical setbacks of OI. They have a disease where the most basic structure of the body is prone to break, living in a country that barely recognizes the problem and provides almost no medical support network. Yet their attitudes remained upbeat when we came to their homes for an interview. In some cases they had scraped together funds for expensive surgeries in the United States, and thus felt privileged just because they could walk.
My entire group of Elon grad students was equally touched by the encounters. We laughed with these Panamanians, cried with them, played games and told jokes. Literally and figuratively, they took our pictures just as we took theirs.
The effect was profound enough that on the plane rides home there was frequent chatter on what we need to do for the next week building the interactive website for OI in Panama. We weren’t just longing to go back to Panama. We were actively looking forward to the coming week of work ahead in Elon, where the technical resources will make it possible to bring to life all the compelling footage we captured on location. It’s hard to think of a project I’ve ever felt more motivated to complete than this website.
It may not stop there. The foundation invited us back for spring break, when a special event will be held to launch the site and build buzz among the non-profit and medical communities in Panama on what can be done to help. There are still other deliverables beyond the website that our group has discussed as ways to make the campaign stronger.
But first comes the process of sifting through the hours of video and thousands of photos to tell just the right set of stories. I’m in charge along with Karen Hartshorn with designing and developing the site itself, including its animated elements, so all the multimedia components work seamlessly.
At the end of the trip the two of us along with translator Mari Vicky Langman presented the digital mock-up of the site to the heads of the foundation. The director teared up with joy, exclaiming how this project will change the lives of the children we met. Given the talent and dedication in our group, I know it can.
It has certainly left a permanent imprint on mine.
OI Panama
Finding a nation off the beaten path
Beyond its namesake canal, Panama isn’t a country that typically generates much interest among the American public. It doesn’t have the glamor tourist destinations and cultural touchstones of western Europe, nor the branded image of adventure associated with Africa and parts of Asia.
But those who overlook this gem of a country are missing out. Among the many great lessons I’ve learned on this service/education trip is that you don’t have to follow the tourist template to of name-brand destinations to have a truly memorable international experience.
The nature of the project raising awareness and support for treating OI has allowed for an immersive tour of the country without sacrificing any work time. At this point we’ve interviewed more than a dozen OI patients, doctors and volunteers on location where they live and work. Those interview sites have stretched from the pacific beaches and resort-like settings of Panama’s western half to the highly modern metropolis of Panama City to the jungles of eastern Panama to the colorful Caribbean coast.
Along the way we’ve passed through historical districts, sandy beaches, impoverished slums, thick forests, majestic mountains and sweeping farmland. We’ve sampled several types of authentic cuisine for breakfast, lunch and dinner. We’ve learned of Panama’s history as a nation and its altogether unique mix of American, French and Spanish cultural influences. We’ve seen rainbows over the jungle, sunrises over the Pacific (yes, it’s geographically possible, check out a map if you don’t believe me) and skyscrapers over the harbor.
It all adds up to a country that can’t be defined by just a few of its parts. Outside of the canal, there are no internationally recognized landmarks, yet drive 30 minutes in any direction and a new discovery invokes surprise. Even the canal never fails to impress despite its well-known status. The engineering marvel changes elevation multiple times, requiring a complex system of locks that make navigation a tight squeeze — so tight, in fact, that ships going through must surrender the wheel to a Panamanian captain for the duration of the trip. That doesn’t stop the ships from coming and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to pass through the channel. Drive through the city on any given moment and there’s a parade of giant tankers and cargo ships lined up along the ocean awaiting passage.
This trip is by no means a vacation, with 12-hour work days the norm. But I can think of few better ways to authentically experience a country than by interacting with its natives in an open-ended format. The foundation we’re working with has been our guide through areas often too remote or unfamiliar for the average tourist to enjoy. It’s unnerving at times, a bit awkward at others. But after the initial culture shocks comes a deep appreciation for a country I hope to return to again some day, and one that deserves a greater profile
among the international community.
Bones that break. Spirits that don’t
Kenneth is 10 years old. He loves soccer, video games and math, with a goal of one day becoming an accountant. He can break out into song on request, or juggle a ball with his feet.
What Kenneth can’t do is count on his bones to cooperate. The only near certainty is that they will break, as they have 172 times since he was born.
This is what Osteogenesis Imperfecta can do to a body. By dramatically changing the way collagen is produced, bone structure is fragile and fractures can take place during everyday tasks. Without specialized treatment and physical therapy to repair those fractures, the setbacks only get worse.
Kenneth is but one of seven courageous individuals with the disease we’ve interviewed in their homes during these first few days in Panama. Like Kenneth, they all have resilient, upbeat attitudes despite their condition. Yet they all have their own unique medical setbacks that prevent them from getting the help they deserve.
Eventually that help will need to take the form of trained doctors inside the country. By telling the amazing stories of those in Panama with the disease in an engaging multimedia format, my group hopes to do more than just get people to donate money or even volunteer their own time. Ultimately the word will have to get out to the medical community to move American doctors into taking their services to Panama or Panamanian doctors into learning the specifics of OI.
There is no cure for the disease, but with the right support network it can be managed. This trip isn’t all about documenting sad stories, but also highlighting the way some semblance of a normal life can and has been achieved even in the face of extreme medical adversity. We’ve heard about amazing ambitions, dreams and success in not letting brittle bones break the spirit.
Such hope will play a centerpiece in our project’s website, which my classmate Karen Hartshorn and I sketched out yesterday and will start building in the next few days. There is no challenge in having content, only in finding the right way to present and navigate through so much compelling footage. Done right, I hope our audience will be moved not so much by the tragedy of this disease, but by the resolve shown to persevere through its pain.
The farthest I’ve ever traveled to visit a home
Parking can prove rough in Panama.
Forget the congested spaces crammed into the streets of the Panama City’s urban jungle. The 1.5 million-plus municipality has more than its fair share of tight spots for transportation, but they pale in comparison to a short drive into the countryside … where convenient parking is often non-existent.
My graduate school group of eight students (plus an Elon undergraduate serving as our translator) got a full taste of both extremes during our first day in the country. We’ve come for 8 days to get footage and information on those suffering from a rare genetic disease that makes bones as brittle as glass. The goal is to help The Crystal Children Foundation raise awareness of this disease and the gaping lack of treatment options available for those in Panama that live under the threat of a bone fracture at every moment.
We came in knowing the medical plight would prove severe, with patients having heartbreaking stories to tell. What blew us all away on that first day was the sheer effort it takes many just to reach the city to receive the most basic of medical care. The journey can take hours, with multiple modes of transportation, just to traverse 50 or so miles.
Case in point was the first subject we met, a young woman named Zuleika Goday who heads into the city regularly for treatment of her baby Yazmin. We interviewed her at the foundation’s office in the morning, than took what we thought would be a moderate drive to her home on the outskirts of the city. As we drove away from the high rises and modern amenities of the municipality, the road and the degree of development alongside it scaled back dramatically. Within the hour there was only rural countryside in all directions. We kept driving the ever narrowing road waiting for the parking space to arrive.
It came into view eventually. But there was still a river, a 3-mile dirt road and a 2-mile hike separating Zuleika and Yazmin from their house.
It proved perhaps the longest I’ve ever traveled to reach a home, but one filled with exhilaration. After crossing the river in an old motorized canoe, we watched in disbelief as a covered pick-up truck came down the road and the driver motioned for us to pile in. At the jerky moment of take-off, the atmosphere filled with sheer giddiness. In a few hours we would be sweating and sunburned on the return trip and ready for a break. But at this second, there was only childlike laughter and wonder on repeat as we entered a jungle we never expected to see once on this trip, let alone the first day.
The scenery of the hike looked like something out of the TV show Lost: unchecked vegetation in every direction, a curving landscape of hills, and absolute quiet all around. Eventually we reached the thatched hut Zuleika called home, starting an interview where we learned of her weekly struggle to keep the Yazmin’s bones in place with treatment hours away. The thing is, she’s not the only one in such remote conditions facing such a journey for necessary medical care. There are many others, some of whom we have met these last few days, who live in isolated, poverty-stricken regions where getting help, even on the rare occasions when it’s available, requires a journey. To truly have their major bone fractures fixed, a trip to a U.S. hospital is required in order to find the right medical expertise.
What can we do by sharing in this experience? Hopefully find a way to let the greater Panamanian and American public know of the issue, building momentum and funds for a clinic in the country. It will take just the right mix of multimedia storytelling and web-based graphics calling people to action. I hope we can pull it off, but I know we’ll have all the footage and the experience necessary to make it happen, and I couldn’t ask for a more talented and engaging group of students to work with on the project.
By car we’re seeing a new world. But it’s after we park that the real work, and the real eye-opening experience, comes into focus.
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2020 BMW 7 Series Will Cost You At Least $87,445
by Noah Joseph Pricing
The Bavarians have priced their flagship sedan handsomely.
As the flagship sedan in BMW's lineup, the 7 Series was never going to be cheap. But just how much will the new one set you back, now that it's been updated with that gaping maw?
At least $87,445, according to the new US-market price sheet released by the Bavarian automaker. The base 740i carries a sticker of $86,450, plus the requisite $995 destination charge. That's already nearly $3k more than the outgoing version, and that's just the starting point for the "entry-level” version with the 3.0-liter turbocharged straight-six and rear-wheel drive.
Opt fo all-wheel traction in the 740i xDrive and you'll be looking at $90,445 (delivered), with the same 335 horsepower and 330 lb-ft of torque channeled to each corner. Go for the 745e xDrive iPerformance plug-in hybrid and you'll get 389 hp and 442 lb-ft, but it'll cost you at least $96,545 (before options).
Next up the list is the 750i, which packs a 4.4-liter twin-turbo V8 good for 523 hp and 553 lb-ft. It comes with xDrive traction as standard, but will set you back $103,645. And at the top of the heap is the M760i xDrive performance model.
With the 6.6-liter twin-turbo V12 rated at 600 hp and 627 lb-ft of torque, the M760i goes for $158,695 – including delivery, but before the $1,700 gas-guzzler tax.
BMW has priced the revised 7 Series competitively against its key rivals. At $84,795 (delivered), Audi charges slightly less for the A8 L, which offers the same power but more torque in 55 TFSI spec (currently the only one available). And at $92,245, Mercedes gets a bit more for the S450 (which packs a stronger punch). Priced from $150,545, the AMG S63 costs slightly less than the M760i (with similar output), but the twelve-cylinder S65 costs much more at $230,495.
Tags: #BMW #Luxury #Pricing #Sedan
2016 BMW 7 Series Review: The Driver's Car For People Who Can Afford Drivers
Just make sure you get some time behind the wheel as well.
BMW Alpina B7
2017 BMW 7 Series Review
Though not perhaps the outright class leader, the BMW 7 Series is a hugely impressive and capable luxury sedan.
2020 BMW 7 Series First Drive Review: German Executive Gets A Grilling
We drove the updated BMW 7 Series in Portugal and found a true executive behind that monumental grille.
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You are currently browsing the daily archive for February 16, 2013.
Forbidden Bible Verses — Mark 14:10-11
February 16, 2013 in Catholic, Protestant | Tags: Bible, Catholic, Christianity, Jesus, Judas, Protestant, St Mark | Comments closed
Continuing with a study of passages from Mark’s Gospel which have been omitted from the three-year Lectionary for public worship, we come to another set of verses from Jesus’s last few days before His Crucifixion.
These verses become part of my ongoing series Forbidden Bible Verses, also essential to understanding Scripture.
Today’s reading is from the English Standard Version with commentary by Matthew Henry and John MacArthur.
Judas to Betray Jesus
10 Then Judas Iscariot, who was one of the twelve, went to the chief priests in order to betray him to them. 11And when they heard it, they were glad and promised to give him money. And he sought an opportunity to betray him.
These two verses about Judas are a cautionary tale for us about the dangers of sin.
Our parents, Sunday School teachers or nuns warned us that small sins lead to greater sins. And so it is with Judas, the worst person in the Bible. Why? Because he betrayed our Lord for money. Judas spent three years — day and night — with Jesus and yet turned Him in to the Jewish leaders in exchange for a few weeks’ worth of income.
Being placed in charge of the money for Jesus and the Apostles’ ministry led to betrayal. Matthew Henry warned in his commentary (emphases mine):
Covetousness was Judas’s master-lust, his own iniquity, and that betrayed him to the sin of betraying his Master; the devil suited his temptation to that, and so conquered him. It is not said, They promised him preferment (he was not ambitious of that), but, they promised him money. See what need we have to double our guard against the sin that most easily besets us. Perhaps it was Judas’s covetousness that brought him at first to follow Christ, having a promise that he should be cash-keeper, or purser, to the society, and he loved in his heart to be fingering money; and now that there was money to be got on the other side, he was as ready to betray him as ever he had been to follow him. Note, Where the principle of men’s profession of religion is carnal and worldly, and the serving of a secular interest, the very same principle, whenever the wind turns, will be the bitter root of a vile and scandalous apostasy.
This sinful yearning is also present among some of our clergy who will do everything to please the world in order to earn money — and fame: warped preaching, books, lecture circuits and worldwide ministries leading the unaware away from the truth of the Cross and Resurrection. Some of these pastors fall away from the Church altogether only to embrace agnosticism or atheism.
Henry encapsulated why it is so important for us, from our childhood onward, to avoid the near occasion of sin:
See how the way of sin is down-hill — when men are in, they must be on; and what wicked contrivances many have in their sinful pursuits, to compass their designs conveniently; but such conveniences will prove mischiefs in the end.
To show you how materialistic Judas was, let’s look at the story immediately preceding the two verses above.
Before we look at those verses, however, John MacArthur explains that Mark 14:3-11 is a flashback to the preceding Saturday when Jesus raised His good friend Lazarus — Mary and Martha’s brother — from the dead. It is interesting that Matthew also uses this same ordering of events whereas John takes a chronological approach.
The passage of Mark 14:3-9 relates the story of Lazarus’s sister Mary anointing Jesus’s head and feet with nard, or spikenard (as the King James Version calls it) — the purest and most fragrant natural perfume ingredient:
Jesus Anointed at Bethany
3 And while he was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, as he was reclining at table, a woman came with an alabaster flask of ointment of pure nard, very costly, and she broke the flask and poured it over his head. 4There were some who said to themselves indignantly, “Why was the ointment wasted like that? 5For this ointment could have been sold for more than three hundred denarii and given to the poor.” And they scolded her. 6But Jesus said, “Leave her alone. Why do you trouble her? She has done a beautiful thing to me. 7For you always have the poor with you, and whenever you want, you can do good for them. But you will not always have me. 8 She has done what she could; she has anointed my body beforehand for burial. 9And truly, I say to you, wherever the gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her.”
Here is Matthew’s account (Matthew 26:6-13):
6 Now when Jesus was at Bethany in the house of Simon the leper, 7a woman came up to him with an alabaster flask of very expensive ointment, and she poured it on his head as he reclined at table. 8And when the disciples saw it, they were indignant, saying, “Why this waste? 9For this could have been sold for a large sum and given to the poor.” 10But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, “Why do you trouble the woman? For she has done a beautiful thing to me. 11For you always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me. 12In pouring this ointment on my body, she has done it to prepare me for burial. 13Truly, I say to you, wherever this gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.”
What follows is John 12:1-8. John’s Gospel tells us that the woman is Mary, sister of Martha and Lazarus:
Mary Anoints Jesus at Bethany
1Six days before the Passover, Jesus therefore came to Bethany, where Lazarus was, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. 2So they gave a dinner for him there. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those reclining with him at table. 3 Mary therefore took a pound of expensive ointment made from pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped his feet with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. 4But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (he who was about to betray him), said, 5“Why was this ointment not sold for three hundred denarii and given to the poor?” 6He said this, not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief, and having charge of the moneybag he used to help himself to what was put into it. 7Jesus said, “Leave her alone, so that she may keep it for the day of my burial. 8For the poor you always have with you, but you do not always have me.”
Luke, however, related another anointing story in similar circumstances but involving a sinful woman and at an earlier time in Jesus’s ministry. Luke 7:36-50 describes a different woman. She is not Mary of Martha and Lazarus’s family.
Now to the accounts from Mark, Matthew and John. All describe the disgust, if not anger, of Judas — and, in Mark and Matthew, the disciples.
My left-leaning readers might object, but this is what I wrote about Judas when looking at John 12:
Judas takes offence, saying the costly balm could have been cashed in and the money given to the poor. Judas would have made an excellent Socialist. Always a materialist, note that his job is to mind the money bag, which seems to have instilled in him a love of money, which as we know from Scripture is the root of all evil (1 Timothy 6:10, Proverbs 15:27, Matthew 6:19). It is unlikely that he would have given the money to the poor, but most probably hoarded some for himself. Judas, the great materialist of the New Testament.
However, there is a larger issue — that Judas takes offence at Mary’s anointing of our Redeemer’s feet. Why should he begrudge Jesus such a humble yet beautiful act?
John 12:6 tells us Judas criticised Mary:
not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief, and having charge of the moneybag he used to help himself to what was put into it.
You can read more about Judas in my post on John 6. Also see here, here and here.
Back to Mark 14:10-11, however. John MacArthur says that it was then amidst the joyful commotion after Lazarus’s resurrection — with the increased belief in Bethany that Jesus was indeed the Messiah — that heartless Judas decided to act. MacArthur says that it would have taken him time from that Saturday night to what we consider Maundy Thursday to effect the betrayal.
MacArthur sheds light on other aspects of this initial part of Mark 14:
– The identity of Simon and more about the dinner:
This occurs, we are told, in verse 3 at the home of Simon the leper. He would be a former leper or he wouldn’t be having a dinner party. You do understand that. Lepers were outcasts, right? They were outcasts. They didn’t interact with people at all. They were societal rejects, they were put out of society in every way and people kept as far from them as possible, fearing the contagion of such a disease. Likely then, this is a man who has been healed by Jesus and that was something Jesus did all over the land of Israel during His ministry. It is not a stretch to assume that this man named Simon who had been healed by Jesus, planned this meal knowing that Jesus was coming to Bethany to be with His friends and to be there for the Passover to say thanks. It would have been him, Mrs. Simon, if there was such a woman, and all the little Simons. There would have been the Twelve and it would have been Mary, Martha and Lazarus, so anywhere from 15 up, not including his family of 15 and other friends and his family would swell the number.
It is a typical meal in that it is an evening meal, reclining is the posture. You lounge, in a sense, in a reclining position. That means you’re going to be there a while, that’s how meals were taken in those days. They were really prolonged conversations…prolonged conversations. This is a normal posture for the prolonged conversational meal. This would be the antithesis of drive-through fast food.
– A possible reason why Mark and Matthew do not say the woman was Mary:
Matthew and Mark were written very early in the life of the church. Mark may be very early. Matthew may be the earliest. But they’re written very early in the 50’s and 60’s. John’s gospel isn’t written until the 90’s. And maybe Matthew and Mark were just being sensitive not to mention the names to protect the family. John would have no need of protecting the family. They, very likely, were not an issue, maybe even gone 30, 40 years later. But John does give us the name and that’s very, very helpful.
– The hygienic and aesthetic importance of cleanliness at meals:
It was a common custom at a meal to wash feet. If you were in a reclining position, that would be of great benefit because as you recline your feet necessarily appear in some way. And so, anointing feet, washing feet, we see that, didn’t we, in John 13 where Jesus washed the disciples’ feet. So this was a normal thing, even putting perfume on feet was somewhat of a tradition or custom. It was a courtesy.
– More about nard and its scent:
Matthew says, “A very precious perfume.” This marble bottle typically would have a long neck…a long neck and perhaps some kind of small plug from which small drops of this perfume could be poured out, sprinkled. This kind of bottle would contain this perfume and the perfume might last a long time. It is said here that the value of it was three hundred denarii. That’s a year’s wages. Can you imagine spending a year’s salary on a bottle of perfume? First of all, you say, “Who would do that?” People would do that who needed to do that because even though it cost that much, it could be stretched out and used a very long period of time because a small drop would satisfy the social need. But she has an alabaster vial of very costly perfume of pure nard. Nard is a plant from India. Pure nard means its undiluted … But the perfume is the undiluted, pure form.
By the way … nard from India is still used for perfume. She does something that never would be done. She doesn’t drop a drop out, she breaks the neck of this vial and it says poured it over His head. And John adds, “Then anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped His feet with her hair.” She has dumped a year’s value of perfume on His head and on His feet. And John adds, this would be obvious, “The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.” You can understand that. You spray a little on you and you can smell it through the house. This dousing of a year’s worth of perfume all over Jesus would have dominated the environment. This is lavish love. This is profound, sacrificial affection.
Although we cannot say for certain, it seems as if Mary was so moved by Jesus — the time He spent with her and her siblings, His raising of Lazarus from the dead — that her affection for Him culminated in what could well have been a spontaneous act of love. Mary treasured Jesus.
However, the hand of Providence could also have directed her. Whilst Jesus’s friends did not grasp that her anointing of Jesus was a precursor to His burial a few days later, He, and possibly Mary, understood it as such. Jesus made it known to those in Simon’s household.
Now for another brief note from MacArthur about Passover in Jesus’s day:
There actually were two different evenings when the Passover was celebrated. I’ll just leave it at this. The northern people in Galilee celebrated it on Thursday evening while the Judeans, the Sadducees and the people in the south celebrated it on Friday evening. This is perfect, so that Jesus could celebrate the Passover with His friends in Galilee when they celebrated it on Thursday and still die as the Passover lamb on Friday at the time when the southern Judeans were slaughtering their lambs for their Passover. So there are actually two times; on Thursday for those in the north, and on Friday for those in the south. And that’s an important reckoning because there are texts in John’s gospel, in particular, that make it necessary to understand that.
In closing, MacArthur puts Jesus’s words in opposition to our present-day love of the social gospel. This is important to read and digest, because the social gospel is a false one and Jesus’s words are often misused:
Adoring worship of Christ is the ultimate priority. Did you get that? Giving to the poor has a place. Deuteronomy 15:11 says, “Give to the poor.” You always have the poor of the land and make sure you care for the poor and give to the poor. That’s a priority. But the ultimate priority is to worship Christ, isn’t it? The ultimate priority is to worship Christ. Care for the poor is important, worship of the Lord is more important. And Jesus wasn’t going to be there very long.
We should give for needs. We should minister to the poor. But far more, we should worship our Lord sacrificially. You give to the poor doesn’t really have a lasting value. But when you worship the Lord, that has an eternal impact. She had her priorities right. Poor people will always be around, Jesus said, but I will not always be around.
Charity is good. Charity is necessary. Worship is always better. And true worship will lead to charity.
Next time: Mark 14:12-21
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Classic RPG Realms
What Part of the OSR is Old School?
Ask a dozen old school gamers what old school is and you'll get two dozen answers. Because much of the time they aren't even sure themselves. Perhaps for that reason alone the OSR is not what we think it is--I mean, we can't even decide on a consensus definition. But there are some other realities lurking out there in plain site which we often don't openly address.
The genesis of the OSR movement was a confluence of events spurred by WotC buying TSR and the D&D IP; the looming advent of 3rd edition under an entirely new system (d20); the subsequent OGL for 3.5; and finally came to a head with the release, and subsequent failure, of 4e.
The mission of the OSR, however, is a lot more complicated than the tracing of it's history. Generally speaking, we could say it was a desire to have the older versions of the game in print. But, if I were honest, the OSR was also spawned by the OGL of 3rd edition D&D. 3rd edition was hugely popular, the open market it created was massive. Yes, that created a problem for WotC. There was so much material out there for 3e that WotC was likely having a hard time keeping up with, let alone competing with, all the new material. I wonder if they truly worried that they'd sold the goods down river. Certainly their market share was falling and supplements were being supplied at least as much if not more from 3rd party publishers as they were from Wizards. They needed a new big revenue generator and 4th was the ticket.
Sure, 3rd was broken in parts, and certainly couldn't all be used at the same table--there was just too damn much of it. But that is not what led them to create 4e. Make no mistake, even Mearls came out about how the 3e glut was the reason they were witholding a similar OGL for 4e. And that, dear readers, is as much a linchpin in the rise of the OSR as any yearning for the past.
For you see, all those disaffected gamers and amateur designers just had the creative rugs pulled out from under them. They were no longer going to be able to produce D&D product for the current edition. 4e was a closed chest. Closed and locked. Closed and locked and trapped. It was at this time that we get the Rise of the Clones. Wizards announces 4e in 2007, about a year after OSRIC had hit the sites for downloads. Now, to be fair, all the 3.5 OGL publications that were flooding the market had some gamers wondering about bringing back an environment that could support out of print editions via the OGL before the official announcement of 4e, but let's look back even earlier.
As a mistake of happy circumstance Hackmaster ended up in creation at the very end of TSR's life. Two events coincided synchronistically to make this possible: 1) the pressure of KODT fans to see the Hackmaster game become a reality and 2) TSR and D&D is sold to Wizards and 2e dies. It looked like AD&D was headed out of print and what a better time to arrive on the scene as a nostalgic, if humorous, look at AD&D in all of its arcane and chaotic glory? As a result, Hackmaster ended up being the first retro clone long before the OSR ever saw the light of day. Shortly after this, Troll Lords comes on the scene with the Gygax-approved Castles & Crusades, the first "true" clone if you like. The whole intent of Hackmaster was to create Hackmaster, and thus it needed to be almost identical to AD&D, just taken to 11. C&C was designed as a clone from the start. C&C came out in 2004, and I believe began the gaming world really talking about possibly using the OGL, not just for creating 3.5 material, but possibly for resurrecting the games of the past.
However ... something changed. With the production of OSRIC what you get is not a game designed to be used as a game in and of itself (as C&C was), though it certainly could be; but to create a legal platform to start producing 1e material again. Amateur writers and designers were looking for a venue in which to produce their own material for their favorite games. They really didn't want to create a new game, they were looking to produce material. The 3.5 camp followers were eagerly participating in the PF playtest (an industry first and a process that would become a standard of the industry) and planning on creating OGL material for their new 3.5: Pathfinder.
But something curious lurks in shadows as the OSR begins to develop. With C&C one could argue that it was an alternative game to D&D that gave you an old school experience with some new school speed. There was really no hope in the early 2000's that someone could resurrect 1e, and so C&C would fit the bill. At least that was the hope. In fact C&C was truly a monumentally well designed effort to bring AD&D into the new age. It married the best of the old and the new into a fast and flexible game. But, if it was so good, why did OSRIC arrive? It's my belief that OSRIC tapped a different crowd. I think this crowd was actually flying under two banners: the flag of the creators who were looking to create new material much like 3.5 had done; and the second flag, the traditionalists. Sometimes the two overlapped, but traditionalists had no desire to play a new game--they simply wanted their game back in print again. Creating material wasn't enough, it needed to be almost identical to AD&D.
What the OSR gave us in terms of OSRIC is not quite either or. For awhile at least, the supplements for AD&D via OSRIC took off and OSRIC itself looked almost like a technical manual clone of the original AD&D rules. So we have the new wavers playing with C&C, but then some shift to the more accurate clone, OSRIC. But what OSRIC stole from C&C, is stolen from OSRIC when we get a flood of designers seeking to fill the void of 0e/Basic/Expert/etc. Labyrinth Lord and Basic Fantasy Role Playing Game come out in '07, Swords & Wizardry in '08 and something very different is occurring.
Labyrinth Lord, a beautifully done piece by the way, comes out looking like something from a Black Metal Album, Swords & Wizardry, also a work of art, like a Call of Cthulhu Weird Fantasy Mash-Up. People fall in love with them left and right. They are hard core old school--at least that's what we call them. But, this new ethos of old school takes its inspiration from a genre that Gary Gygax admitted was seminal to the D&D thematic tone but had never quite been done like these new retro-clones managed. The swords & sorcery, weird fiction, science fantasy and strange horror of the pulp fiction era is not only relegated to an appendix at the back of the book, but the heart of the hobby. Now, the exception was BFRPG, which managed to pull off a look somewhere between the presentation of the LBBs and the Holmes-Moldvay-Cook sets. Well put together and logical, though leaving out some pieces.
The critical point here, is that these 0e/B/X clones are the first productions in a new vein or expression of D&D gaming that heretofore had not been considered a part of the published sector of the game. By this time discussion about what was old school and what defined something as old school was rampant among blogs and forums. The culmination of these influence was in games like Lamentations of the Flame Princess, Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG, Crypts and Things, and Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea. A dark, swords and sorcery, heavy metal, Lovecraftian feel descended over the games of this period. Many drew their inspiration from Gary's own Appendix N and claimed their territory to be what they considered the "true" spirit of the OSR, regardless of the fact that they were beginning to resemble something very different from the original games themselves.
Now, while some of this quest for old school spirit is certainly valid, and it is true much of the early D&D production for the day was also a bit racy, edgy and dark. But it was truly nothing like the extended version albums of "old school demon" being summoned by most of the OSR material today. Now, don't get me wrong, I love most of this stuff. They are works of fine weird fantasy art. But I have begun to feel slightly uncomfortable calling such work strictly "old school". The new production market the OSR has generated has become a beast unto itself, not necessarily connected to old time gaming.
In which case, you might ask, what the hell is old school then, if the OSR aint? Ya know, it's funny, but there is less and less production occurring that looks and plays like the games that were played in yesteryear. Good or bad, it simply is the way it is. We still have some die hard traditionalist producing material in line with old school values on Dragonsfoot and to a degree on the BFRPG site. Generally though, the OSR has taken off in a wild new direction from what we "think" old school was like. The OSR has about as much in common with true old school as the later Star Wars movies do with the original three from the 70's and 80's. Or J.J. Abrams Star Trek does with the TOS or even STNG. Now don't get me wrong. I loved some of the other Star Wars and Star Trek movies. They just didn't seem like Star wars or Star Trek to me. And I think the same can be said for a lot of the OSR today--it just doesn't seem like the old games any more.
Now, I know it's hard to make wholesale statements about something as big and amorphous as the OSR. And nothing I say here should be taken in a vacuum. The relationships are complex at best. But I do wonder a bit if we shouldn't ask ourselves what we are about in the OSR, and maybe call a shovel a shovel. I mean there is literally so much stuff on the indie sites now that I can't even tell what I'm looking at half the time, and it certainly doesn't "look" old school to me. OSR, OSR everywhere and not an old school game in sight.This may be the great new age of gaming liberalization, and that's fine. But I think we should be honest with ourselves about what our aim really is, about what we are doing.
Is the point to just get your stuff out there? Do we really need a new game just so you don't have to be compatible with LL, OSRIC, S&W, or PF or 5e whatever? Or so you can produce your own, stuff for your own game, instead of someone's else's that is almost 94% the same? We had a name for that in the old days--house rules. Or would your rather be compatible with all of the above to get the greatest market saturation? Frankly I see some cool little ditty on RPGNow come up on my email and I have to read and look to see--is it compatible with LL? LL+AEC? OSRIC? S&W WB? S&W Core? S&W Complete? DCC RPG? LotFP? 5e? PF? C&T? BFRPG? AS&SoH? ACK? DD? ADD? System Neutral? or some little known game I've never heard of that might or might not be compatible with any of the above. You get the picture? Yes, in one way this is all great, and in another it is really, really tiresome. Maybe I'm just too Lawful, or not Chaotic enough, but it is enough to give me headache.
The OSR, 5e D&D and Broadway Theater
Criticism, Philosophy and Gaming
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Are the Gospels considered anonymous by historians only or by the Catholic Church also?
I have read that the Gospels were anonymous, and much later they were named Mark, Mathew, Luke and John (and Luke, Mark and Mathew very similar compared with John).
Now is this more of from a historical perspective, or is this something the Catholic Church will also agree too?
Is it a heretical belief?
Is that stated in each of the Gospels themselves that the authors were inspired by God, or is this a belief that the Catholic Church has stated?
catholicism gospels authorship
curiousdannii
The priest in my parish subtly hints at this not too infrequently, not saying it's not heretical, but it's not unheard of no matter how irksome it might sound. – Peter Turner♦ Dec 9 '13 at 19:43
Mark and Matthew are not 90% the same. There is significant overlap between Mark and Matthew and between Mark and Luke and (separately) between Matthew and Luke, but there are also distinctive features particular to each Gospel. – lonesomeday Dec 9 '13 at 19:48
Related: Are the gospel authors who we believe them to be? – Ryan Frame Dec 10 '13 at 3:27
Related: When and how did the names Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John get attached to the gospels? – metal Dec 10 '13 at 14:43
Possible duplicate of Are the gospel authors who we believe them to be? – Flimzy May 16 '17 at 7:25
I can't speak for Catholicism in general, but I can say with confidence that they agree that the traditional titles were a later addition. For instance, the Catholic Encyclopedia says, "The first four historical books of the New Testament are supplied with titles..., which, however ancient, do not go back to the respective authors of those sacred writings."
Michael Kruger argues that "we have little reason to doubt the titles of these gospels and thus little reason to doubt the authorship of these books."
I won't duplicate his full reasoning here, but in essence, he argues that the titles for the books are very early (though not original) and that there is no extant disagreement about them. Also, if one were trying to bolster a book's credibility with a famous name, one wouldn't choose a lesser known character like Mark or Luke (a Gentile!) to do it.
Why would they have written anonymously? He suggests it parallels the OT practice in historical books, which were likewise anonymous, and places them in the tradition of OT historiographical practice. "Such a stylistic device allowed the authors of the gospels 'to disappear' and to give 'highest priority to their subject matter.'"
As for material covered, yes Matthew, Mark, and Luke have some considerable overlap, though the exact figure of how much depends on how you count. This is commonly called the synoptic problem. It has been known from ancient times and is not a heresy, though it can be taken in an unbelieving direction, as with most anything. In the second century, Tatian produced his Diatessaron, a harmony of the four gospels that cleaned it all up, but the church stuck with the "redundancy" of the four originals.
As for how the authors viewed their task, Kruger has a general answer for the NT and an answer for the book of Matthew in particular. The latter argues from the text itself (esp. the first chapter) that Matthew clearly saw himself as continuing the biblical history from the OT with the story of Jesus.
The other gospels show some additional hints of their purpose, as in John 20:30f (emphasis mine): "The disciples saw Jesus do many other miraculous signs in addition to the ones recorded in this book. But these are written so that you may continue to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing in him you will have life by the power of his name." The author's understanding of inspiration and accuracy is touched on within the gospel itself, as when Jesus says in John 14:25f, "All this I have spoken while still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, ... will remind you of everything I have said to you." Compare also Luke 1:1-5 and Acts 1:1-3 on Luke's stated purpose and method of composition.
The doctrine of inspiration starts in passages like 2 Timothy 3:16 and 2 Peter 1:20 and proceeds from there.
metalmetal
Nice point ....never thought about it in that way....."Also, if one were trying to bolster a book's credibility with a famous name, one wouldn't choose a lesser known character like Mark or Luke (a Gentile!) to do it". – user5197 Dec 11 '13 at 6:31
To the best of my knowledge, the only Gospel that explicitly identifies the author is John (John 21:24).
Some liberal Christians and non-Christians question the authorship of the Gospels, but most conservative Christians and many non-Christians accept them. The main evidence for this authorship is simply that these people were routinely accepted as the authors by early Christian writers and that no other authors were suggested until many centuries later.
Can we prove that, for example, Matthew wrote the book attributed to him? How would you prove who wrote any book? Suppose someone said that he didn't believe that Jules Verne really wrote "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea". How would you prove he did? You might get a copy and point to the title page where it says "by Jules Verne". You might find references to the book in other books or letters that mention that it was written by Verne. And you might point out that no one else had come along claiming to have written the book. If you apply these same tests to the Gospels, you have to conclude that the traditional authors wrote the books. They were routinely acknowledge as the authors by people who lived at the time and there is no record of any claim that they DIDN'T write them until fairly recent times.
Occasionally someone will challenge the authorship of a book on technical grounds. Like if you can prove that an event described in a book didn't happen until after the supposed author died, that would be strong evidence. Sometimes people will argue that the supposed writer didn't have the necessary knowledge or skill to write a certain book, like the folks who say that Shakespeare could not have written the plays that bear his name because they demonstrate such in-depth knowledge of law and medicine that they must have been written by a team of doctors and lawyers. I -- and many others -- find such arguments very weak, because they assume that a non-doctor could not read up on medicine or ask a doctor friend for help when writing a play, etc. Similar arguments have been made against the traditional authors of the Gospels, and they are weak for the same reason. One of the lamest arguments I have heard, and I have heard it many times, is that the disciple John could not have written the Gospel of John because he was illiterate. But how do they know he was illiterate? Just because most people from his time and social class were illiterate? So what? This argument is like saying that Mr Obama cannot possibly be the president because only a tiny percentage of Americans ever become president. But of course the obvious reply is: Yes, and he's one of the few. We have a book and three letters that are said to be written by John. What more evidence could you give that someone is literate than to produce things that he has written?
An extra note, somewhat in response to Ryan's comment:
Questions like this are almost never a matter of "the Catholic Church" says X but "historians" or "scientists" say Y. There are pretty much always historians and/or scientists who agree with the Christian theory and historians and/or scientists who disagree with the Christian theory. And yes, at this point someone will always say, "Well, yeah, that great scientist took the Christian view, but that's just because he's a Catholic". I could just as well reply that some great scientist took an anti-Christian view just because he is an atheist. It is a circular argument to say, "Anyone who takes the Christian view on this controversial issue is by definition a Christian, and the opinion of anyone who is a Christian doesn't count because he's biased."
I wouldn't say that the gospel of John explicitly names its author as John. It is the "beloved disciple" who wrote the book. Conservative scholar Ben Witherington argues that it was more likely Lazarus who is identified as the substantial author of the gospel (he's called the "beloved" in John 11:3). It may bear the name of John because after his exile, "[o]ne of the things he did was edit and promulgate the Fourth Gospel on behalf of the Beloved Disciple." – metal Dec 10 '13 at 13:56
Also compare the frenzy among a certain group of political devotees who are intent on proving that Mr. Obama did not write Dreams From My Father by similar methods and computer analysis. I don't think the hyper-speculative arguments hold much water for Paul, Shakespeare, or Obama. – metal Dec 10 '13 at 14:49
RE John: Okay, the writer never calls himself "John", always (?) "the disciple whom Jesus loved". But comparing incidents in the book of John to parallel incidents in the other Gospels would seem to indicate that the "beloved disciple" is John. I'd never heard the theory that it was Lazarus before. Frankly that doesn't seem very likely. There's no indication from the other Gospels that Lazarus was in any of the places that the "beloved disciple" was. I'll have to read the article you link, but I'm skeptical. – Jay Dec 10 '13 at 15:51
RE Dreams: I can't say I care whether Mr Obama wrote this book himself or not. :-) I wouldn't be shocked to learn that he had a professional writer help him with the actual writing, that's pretty common for famous people writing books today. I would be very surprised if someone managed to prove that he had absolutely nothing to do with it. – Jay Dec 10 '13 at 15:59
And yeah, I find these "computer style analyses" very unconvincing. I'm a software geek by profession, and I can assure you, it's just as easy to type absurd things in Microsoft Word as it is to hand-write them on a piece of paper. Just because someone used a computer in his analysis doesn't make it "scientific". Before I gave any credence to such analysis, I'd like to see a demonstration that it gives accurate results when applied to text by known authors. Like, if you ran it against my database book, and you ran it against my posts here about the Bible, and you ran it against my letters ... – Jay Dec 10 '13 at 16:01
It is true that there is a lot of overlap between three of the four Gospels. The only way I see to get your 90% number is to take the shortest book, Mark, and ask what percentage of verses in that book are similar to verses in other books. That is, about 90% of the material in Mark is also found in Matthew and Luke. But Mark is the shortest, so only about 50% of the Material in Matthew is also found in Mark.
Anyway, what does this prove? The most common theory today is that Mark was written first, and then Matthew and Luke consulted Mark and used some of his material when writing their own books. This is hardly shocking. When someone is writing a book, it is common to do research and to make use of materials written by others. The idea of footnotes hadn't been invented yet when these books were written, so it is not surprising that there is no specific attribution.
By the way, there is also a fair amount of material that is found in both Matthew and Luke but that is not found in Mark. This has led some scholars to theorize that there was once another biography of Jesus that is now lost and that Matthew and Luke referenced. Scholars call this book "Q". (By an amusing coincidence, two scholars came up with this name independently: one called it "Q" as an abbreviation of the German word for "source", "quelle"; the other called it "Q" because he had identified some material as coming from Peter, and he called that "P", and so he just took the next letter of the alphabet for the unknown source.)
I often hear non-Christians bring this up like it's some kind of criticism of the authenticity or accuracy of the Bible, and I often hear Christians try to explain it away. I don't understand this at all. Only when it comes to the Bible is the idea that an author did research before writing a book considered a criticism.
And by the way: Matthew and John were both disciples of Jesus, so they would have known about his life first-hand. Mark worked as a translator for Peter, so he probably got his information from Peter. Luke was a well-educated Greek and a friend of the apostle Paul, so it appears that his book is more scholarly research than first-hand account. Note that Luke also wrote the book of Acts, and if you watch the pronouns in Acts, you'll see that it continually shifts from "we" to "they" as he describes events where he was present and events where he wasn't.
Why two answers? If there are two unrelated questions we should get them split a.s.a.p. Otherwise two answers would only be proper in the event you were giving different views where they conflict and potentially one is right and the other wrong. – Caleb♦ Dec 10 '13 at 14:46
I gave two answers because my comments about authorship in general were quite distinct from my comments about the "synoptic issue" and it seemed cleaner to separate them. – Jay Dec 10 '13 at 16:05
That is a a strong indicator that the question needs splitting! – Caleb♦ Dec 10 '13 at 16:16
Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged catholicism gospels authorship or ask your own question.
Why are Matthew, Mark, and Luke called the synoptic gospels?
When and how did the names Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John get attached to the gospels?
Are the gospel authors who we believe them to be?
Do Christians believe the gospels were written by some of 12 apostles?
Were the Gospels considered Scripture when the rest of the New Testament was written?
Did the Catholic Church have evidence to discredit the Gospel of Judas?
What is a gospel, and how many gospels are there in the Catholic Bible?
Was Bible Revealed to Jesus? (Christian Perspective)
Among modern critics who believe in the attributed authorship of the Gospels, what are their arguments?
What, according to Catholic Church, does the name “Son of Man” signify?
Do we have or know of additional writings from the four Gospel Evangelists?
Is there historical evidence for an atheist argument about the New Testament?
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2015 Autism Highlights
The Gut-Brain Interaction and Autism Spectrum Disorder
Joel Bornstein, Ph.D., Elisa Hill, Ph.D., and Heather Young, Ph.D., University of Melbourne;
Emma Allen-Vercoe, Ph.D., University of Guelph;
Sarkis Mazmanian, Ph.D., California Institute of Technology
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a complex neurodevelopmental disorder, affecting over 1% of children in the United States. In addition to the social, cognitive, and behavioral impairments that are characteristic of ASD, gastrointestinal (GI) abnormalities including constipation, diarrhea, and bloating affect a significant portion of individuals with ASD. The study of microbiota, which is defined as the community of commensal, symbiotic, and pathogenic microorganisms within the body, has emerged as an important field with various health implications. Microbial imbalance in the GI, or dysbiosis, has been found in many disorders including ASD, although much remains unknown about the connection between microbial dysbiosis, GI abnormalities, and ASD. Several Autism Research Program (ARP) awardees are currently pursuing research to answer these knowledge gaps.
Co-investigators Drs. Elisa Hill, Joel Bornstein, and Heather Young (1-4) of the University of Melbourne sought to understand why individuals with ASD experience GI co-morbidities. With support of a Fiscal Year 2011 ARP Idea Development Award, they are studying the "mini-brain"; the enteric neurons that control gut motility and secretion. They want to determine if the enteric neurons are altered in mice that express certain gene mutations. In particular, they are studying mice with a mutation in the neuroligin 3 (NL3) gene. NL3 has been shown to be important for brain function and cell adhesion. Mutations of this gene have been found in individuals with ASD. Using various imaging techniques, they have discovered that these mice also show altered colonic function, providing the first evidence that a gene mutation associated with ASD produces GI dysfunction.
Dr. Emma Allen-Vercoe and her research team at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada are interested in determining if GI-comorbidities of ASD correlate with differences in gut microbiota. With funding from a Fiscal Year 2012 ARP Pilot Award, she analyzed fecal samples from ASD children with concurrent GI co-morbidity, as well as samples from neurotypical controls, using a technique called nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) to measure different metabolites from these samples. She found that microbes residing in the gut of the ASD children produced microbial metabolites that differed from the control samples. Specifically, she discovered differences in the levels of short chain fatty acids that many gut bacteria produce in response to ingested food. Furthermore, Dr. Allen-Vercoe developed a novel system called the "Robogut" to better study these microbes in the laboratory. This system allows for the study of the microbes in the context of the entire microbial community, rather than on an individual basis. Using this new system, Dr. Allen-Vercoe and her team hope to gain insight as to why the gut microbes in children with ASD behave differently from neurotypical children.
Dr. Sarkis Mazmanian (5-8) and his team at the California Institute of Technology are continuing the work of the late Paul Patterson, who was a pioneer in autism research. The team sought to examine whether treatment with a specific probiotic microbe may be able to improve behavioral symptoms and GI abnormalities in an ASD mouse model. Through support of a Fiscal Year 2010 ARP Idea Development Award, they studied the maternal immune activation (MIA) mouse model of ASD. They found that offspring of the MIA mothers exhibited increased intestinal permeability or "leaky gut," a phenomenon commonly seen in ASD individuals. These mice also displayed dysbiosis of the gut microbiota similar to what has been seen in humans. The Mazmanian laboratory showed that probiotic treatment of these mice with the human gut symbiont, Bacteroides fragilis (B. fragilis), corrected the intestinal permeability in the mice and restored imbalances in their microbiota. Remarkably, B. fragilis treatment also ameliorated ASD-related behavioral abnormalities in MIA mice. These findings suggest that microbiome-based therapies may be potential treatments for individuals with ASD.
Taken together, the work of these ARP-funded investigators helps answer gaps in knowledge about the growing link between the GI system and ASD. Ultimately, the researchers hope their work will translate into new treatments for both GI dysfunction and behavioral abnormalities associated with ASD.
Figure courtesy of Dr. Mazmanian's laboratory suggesting that the gut microbiota impacts ASD-like behaviors though modulation of brain activity.
1) Argyropoulos A, Gilby KL, and Hill-Yardin EL. 2013. Studying autism in rodent models: Reconciling endophenotypes with comorbidities. Front Hum Neurosci 7:417.
2) Hao MM, Bornstein JC, Vanden BP, et al. 2013. The emergence of neural activity and its role in the development of the enteric nervous system. Dev Biol 382(1):365-374.
3) Hao MM, Bornstein JC, and Young HM. 2013. Development of myenteric cholinergic neurons in ChAT-Cre;R26R-YFP mice. J Comp Neurol 521(14):3358-3370. doi: 10.1002/cne.23354. PMID:23649862.
4) Hill-Yardin EL and Hannan AJ. 2013. Translating preclinical environmental enrichment studies for the treatment of autism and other brain disorders: Behav Neurosci 127(4):606-609.
5) Bauman MD, Losif AM, Smith SEP, et al. 2013. Activation of the maternal immune system during pregnancy alters behavioral development of rhesus monkey offspring. Bio Psychiat 15:75(4):332-341.
6) Garay PA, Hsiao EY, Patterson PH, et al. 2013. Maternal immune activation causes age- and region-specific changes in brain cytokines in the off-spring throughout development. Brain Behav Immun 31:54-68.
7) Hsiao EY, McBride SW, Hsien S, et al. 2013. Microbiota modulate behavioral and physiological abnormalities associated with neurodevelopmental disorders. Cell 155(7):1451-1463.
8) Hsiao EY, McBride S, Chow J, et al. 2012. Modeling an autism risk factor in mice leads to permanent immune dysregulation. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 109:12776-12781.
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France Abandons Plans For A Carbon Tax
(Shutterstock/V_Lisovoy)
Andrew Follett Energy and Science Reporter
France’s socialist government is dropping plans for a carbon tax over concerns it’s too complicated to implement and unconstitutional.
France won’t include a carbon tax in its next budget update, going back on a pledge the country’s energy minister made in May. The primary opposition to the tax was due to “concerns about employment, legal difficulties and security of supply,” an anonymous source close to the French government told Reuters.
Only four nations — Ireland, Sweden, Chile, and Finland — actually have carbon taxation today. Australia repealed its carbon tax in 2014 over concerns it was harming the economy. No country taxes CO2 emissions at the levels deemed necessary to substantially mitigate global warming as defined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Studies have found that even the most well regarded carbon taxes haven’t done much to actually reduce CO2 emissions.
Researchers found that carbon taxes cause considerably more economic damage than generic taxes do and disproportionately target the poor, so even a revenue-neutral carbon tax would probably reduce economic growth while doing little to fix global warming.
Critics have said carbon taxation disproportionately harms the poorest members of society. A 2009 study by the National Bureau of Economic Research found that a carbon tax would double the tax burden of the poorest households, making it effectively impossible to have both a carbon tax and a living wage.
A tax on all man-made greenhouse gas emissions would make the tax burden of the poorest households three times greater than that of the richest households, according to the study. A non-revenue neutral carbon tax in the U.S. would impose a net tax hike of at least $695 billion in its first 20 years.
The amount spent globally to meet global CO2 emissions reduction goals could be as high as $16.5 trillion between now and 2030, when energy efficiency measures are included, according to projections from the International Energy Agency. To put these numbers in perspective, the U.S. government is just over $19 trillion in debt and only produced $17.4 trillion in gross domestic product in 2014.
Send tips to andrew@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
Tags : france international energy agency national bureau of economic research reuters
Andrew Follett
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Weiner Out: Disgraced Ex-Pol Leaves Jail For Halfway House
Eduardo Munoz Alvarez/Getty Images
Kevin Daley Supreme Court correspondent
February 17, 2019 12:33 PM ET
Former Democratic U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner was transferred from a federal detention facility in Devens, Massachusetts, to a residential re-entry center in Brooklyn, New York, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
Weiner will register as a sex offender as a condition of his release from custody, which is currently scheduled for May 14. His sentence was lessened by several months due to good behavior.
Inmates confined to residential re-entry centers — sometimes known as halfway houses — receive employment and health care services and may only leave the facility for approved activities, the Bureau of Prisons advises.
Before now, the ex-congressman has been confined at Federal Medical Center, Devens, a facility that specializes in the rehabilitation of sex offenders.
U.S. District Judge Denise Cote gave Weiner a 21-month sentence in September 2017 after he pleaded guilty to transferring obscene material to a minor. Weiner transmitted lewd messages and photos of himself to a 15-year-old girl from North Carolina who has not been publicly identified. Those revelations first appeared in the Daily Mail.
A tearful Weiner told the judge that he was “a very sick man” during sentencing.
“The crime I committed was my rock bottom,” he said. (RELATED: Trump Was Sued Over His National Emergency Declaration In Less Than Six Hours)
The ensuing investigation may well have altered the trajectory of American history: Former FBI Director James Comey reopened an investigation of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton after a cache of emails from her private, unauthorized server were discovered on a laptop Weiner used to communicate with the minor in October 2016.
Hillary Clinton, accompanied by her husband former President Bill Clinton and running mate Tim Kaine, concedes the presidential election at the New Yorker Hotel on Nov. 9, 2016 in New York City. (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
Weiner was married to Huma Abedin, a senior Clinton aide. She has since filed for divorce.
Just 11 days after Comey reopened the inquiry, President Donald Trump prevailed in the 2016 election.
Weiner’s fall from grace — he was once seen as a rising figure in the Democratic Party — is chronicled in the documentary “Weiner” from directors Josh Kriegman and Elyse Steinberg.
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Tags : anthony weiner hillary clinton new york city
Kevin Daley
Follow Kevin on Twitter Send tips to kevin@dailycallernewsfoundation.org
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Celebrity Interviews News
the Elizabeth Hurley interview
It’s hard to believe it has been more than 20 years since Estee Lauder first signed British actress Elizabeth Hurley to her first modeling job at the age of 29. She remains as beautiful and statuesque as ever as she travels the globe in her role as Global Ambassador for the Breast Cancer Awareness Campaign. “When I started with Estee Lauder, I was the only model. Today, they have six or seven models who represent different products. But when, I started, I was the face of everything: every fragrance, skincare and makeup launch. I even did all the voice over’s,” she laughs while making a quick visit to Toronto to mark Breast Cancer Awareness Month and support The Breast Cancer Research Foundation. “It’s a very different time now than when I started. But what I love is that my role within the company has constantly evolved.”
When asked to pinpoint the highlight of her career so far, she pauses, then says, “It is my role in the fight against breast cancer. It is the toughest, most humbling, disturbing and rewarding thing I’ve ever done. This afternoon, I have to go down and spend time with some survivors. It is going to be tough to listen to their stories. It is a horrible disease.”
That truth hit close to home when she lost longtime friend Evelyn Lauder to cancer having spent years working tirelessly with the philanthropist across every continent. “My favourite memory of Evelyn is watching her dance late into the night at my wedding in India. She was so lively and really loved to laugh. You know, she had a naughty sense of humour. She could really tell a risqué joke. But she had this ability to bring people together in the most diplomatic way as well.” The pair along with the foundation Evelyn founded has raised an astounding $53 million to support global research, education and educational services. The BCA Campaign is active in more than 70 countries and has helped fund more than 166 BCRF research projects worldwide in the past 20 years.
“The most important message I can share with everyone is that breast cancer is 95% curable if treated early,” she says. “And it rarely reoccurs. We are making amazing strides in fighting this disease. For example, scientists have made an important discovery recently: breast cancer is actually four different types of cancer – not one. This now allows doctors to omit unnecessary chemo or treatment once they know the type.” She says there is hope. And the key is self-examinations to spot problems early so they can be treated. “I also encourage women and men to raise as much money as they can to fund more research.” Hurley’s own grandmother died of the disease.
It’s a wonder that Hurley can juggle a global tour in support of this charity while caring for her son Damian and acting in E! Network’s scripted series, “The Royals” that revolves around a fictional British Royal Family and set in modern London. She plays the matriarch Queen Helena. It’s set to air in 2015.
“I believe hydration is the key to life,” she says rubbing a dab of Clinique’s Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion into her hands. “Well, of course it is life, but it is the secret to great skin. I am constantly patting on Advanced Night Repair Serum under my eyes. I keep one in my downstairs bath. Every time I walk by, I stop and just pat some on. It keeps my skin so hydrated.” She says you can’t start too young taking care of your skin. She remembers saving up money when she was 18 or 19 to buy her first bottle of DDML moisturizer. “I still love it and use it as hand cream.”
When it comes to beauty, Elizabeth has one clear love. “I personally love pinky-nude glosses. I put them on all day. I particularly like this Bobbi Brown formula. I tend to lick my lips all day so I’m always reapplying. For the TV show I’m shooting, I have a MAC lip pencil that I line my lips with then fill in with gloss.”
“For evening, I like a dark smoky eye and a nude lip. It’s something I feel comfortable wearing. But it all depends on your colouring. You have to do what is right for you.” Having spent two decades working with Estee Lauder’s top makeup artists at photo shoots, she’s clearly picked up a few pro tricks. “I’ll tell you a secret,” she laughs. “I’m addicted to little travel sizes of products. Whenever I go into the Estee Lauder offices, I beg them to give me little travel sizes. I love just throwing them in my bag when I travel.”
She’ll soon be jetting back to London to resume shooting The Royals. So where does she like to unwind after a hectic workweek? “In London, the hottest restaurant right now is The Firehouse. It’s trendy and fun and delicious. That is, if you can get a table. I sometimes go to Lucio for the best Italian food. But more often than not, I’ll go to my favourite little café. It’s called Café Colbert in Sloan Square, a little French bistro that serves chic breakfast food all day. It’s rare to find a true French bistro in London. It’s my little secret place.” And with that, Elizabeth is whisked downstairs for her next appointment. She’s as lovely inside as she is beautiful. (Visit BCAcampaign.com for more info on the charity.)
Elizabeth Hurley Bio
born June 10, 1965, in Basingstoke, United Kingdom
has a son named Damian Charles Hurley
once wanted to pursue a career in ballet
studied dance and theatre at the London Studio Centre
dabbled in punk culture by dying her hair pink and piercing her nose
she’s modeled for Jordache, Patrick Cox and Lancel
she’s appeared three times on the cover of British Vogue
Elizabeth has her own line of beachwear
Her most memorable acting role was as Vanessa Kensington in Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery. She’s appeared on Gossip Girl, Project Catwalk and EDtv.
Dated Hugh Grant for more than a decade
Her most recent acting job is playing Queen Helena in a fictional British Royal Family series for E!
breast cancer awarenesscitylinedave lackieelizabeth hurleyestee lauder
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Ben Page
Ipsos MORI Ltd
Ben Page is Chief Executive of Ipsos MORI. He joined MORI in 1987 after graduating from Oxford University, and was one of the leaders of its first management buyout in 2000.
A frequent writer and speaker on leadership and performance management, he has directed hundreds of surveys examining service delivery, customer care and communications.
From 1987 to 1992, Ben worked in the private sector business on corporate reputation and consumer research, working for companies like Shell, BAE Systems, Sky TV and IBM.
Since 1992, he has worked closely with both Conservative and Labour ministers and senior policy makers across government, leading on work for Downing Street, the Cabinet Office, the Home Office and the Department of Health, as well as a wide range of local authorities and NHS Trusts.
Ben is currently on advisory groups at the CBI, Kings Fund, Institute of Public Policy Research (IPPR), and is a Trustee at the Centre for London. He was named in GQ’s 100 Most Connected Men of 2015.
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Women in Politics: Much Yet to Be Done
News from Cuba | Tuesday, 6 March 2012
from Prensa Latina
Though the presence of women in governments and parliaments leaves a lot to be desired, Latin America is showing notable advances, mainly in countries like Cuba and Nicaragua.
The area covering Latin America and the Caribbean plus the United States and Canada ranks first in female representation in legislative bodies (22.7 percent), leading Europe (22.3 percent).
However, a particular area grouping Nordic states is at the top, with 42 percent of seats with female legislators, according to the report Women in Politics 2012, drafted by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IU).
Cuba and Nicaragua are the only Latin American countries among the world's top 10 with greater presence of female legislators, even leading Iceland and Norway, two of the four leading Nordic states (along with Finland and Sweden).
The figures show Cuba in third place among all countries worldwide with the highest rate of female legislators in its National Assembly, with 45.2 percent in December, 2011.
The report also highlights the case of Nicaragua, where that index increased from 18.5 percent to 40.2 percent in the elections held last year.
The top ten are Ruanda (56.3 percent), Andorra (50 percent), Cuba, Sweden (44.7 percent both), Seychelles (43.8 percent), Finland (42.5 percnet), South Africa (42.3 percent), Holland (40.7 percent), Nicaragua and Iceland (39.7 percent).
The United States ranks 78th, with 16.8 percent of women in the Lower Chamber and 17 percent in the Senate.
All these figures mean that less than one in every five parliamentary seats worldwide is held by women, which is "worrying, impossible to justify at this level of human development, " according to IU Secretary General Anders B. Johnsson, who spoke at a press conference in the UN
headquarters in New York on the occasion of the annual session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women.
Original Story from Prensa Latina
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Court Rules Against ICC Parent
MA Supreme Judicial Court
NOTICE: The slip opinions and orders posted here are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports. This preliminary material will be removed from the Bulletin Board once it is printed in the Official Reports advance sheets. If you find a typographical error or other formal error, please notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Judicial Court, Room 1407, Boston, MA 02108; (617) 557-1030.
SJC-07427
BARBARA ZEITLER KENDALL
JEFFREY P. KENDALL
Norfolk. October 7, 1997. - December 9, 1997.
Present: Wilkins, C.J., Abrams, Lynch, Greaney, Marshall, & Ireland, JJ.
Religion. Constitutional Law, Freedom of religion, Establishment of religion. Divorce and Separation, Child custody, Division of property, Attorney's fees.
Complaint for divorce filed in the Norfolk Division of the Probate and Family Court Department on November 25, 1994.
The case was heard by Christina L. Harms, J., and posttrial motions were heard by her.
The Supreme Judicial Court granted an application for direct appellate review.
Michael S. Greco (Melissa J. Solomon with him) for Jeffrey P. Kendall.
David E. Cherny (Jacob M. Atwood with him) for Barbara Zeitler Kendall.
LYNCH, J. This appeal arises out of a judgment of divorce nisi issued on August 20, 1996. [1] Jeffrey P. Kendall, the defendant, appeals from provisions of the divorce judgment and a temporary order issued after Barbara Zeitler Kendall, the plaintiff, filed a complaint against him in the Probate Court for contempt of the divorce judgment. [2] The plaintiff also filed a cross appeal, requesting an award of attorney's fees and reversal of the joint custody order and disposition of the marital home. We granted the defendant's application for direct appellate review.
1. Factual background. We summarize the facts found by the judge. The parties professed to hold different religious beliefs when they were married in 1988, the plaintiff being Jewish, and the defendant, Catholic. [3] The parties' fundamental religious differences would be unremarkable but for their controversial effect on their three minor children [4] caught in the crossfire generated by their parents. Before the parties were married, they discussed the religious upbringing of any children, and agreed that children would be raised in the Jewish faith. [5]
In 1991, the defendant became a member of the Boston Church of Christ, a fundamentalist Christian faith. The defendant believes in Jesus Christ and that those who do not accept the Boston Church of Christ faith are "damned to go to hell" where there will be "weeping and gnashing of teeth." The defendant testified that he would like his children to accept Jesus Christ and that he "will never stop trying to save his children."
The parties' divergent views polarized in 1994 when the plaintiff adopted Orthodox Judaism. [6] Ariel also began studying and adhering to principles of Orthodox Judaism. Soon after the parties' beliefs drifted to opposite doctrinal extremes, the plaintiff filed for divorce in November, 1994, based on an irretrievable breakdown of the marriage, pursuant to G. L. c. 208, § 1B.
2. The court proceedings. At the outset the plaintiff sought to limit the children's exposure to the defendant's religion, and the defendant objected to any limitation on his ability to share his religious beliefs with the children. [7] On October 18, 1995, the judge granted the plaintiff's request for the appointment of a guardian ad litem (GAL) to "address the inter-religious conflict between the parties in particular." [8]
In Felton v. Felton, 383 Mass. 232, 233 (1981), this court addressed the question of accommodating diverse religious practices of parents, living apart, in the upbringing of minor children. The court held that the overriding goal in any such inquiry is to serve the best interests of the children even where "the attainment of that purpose . . . involve[s] some limitation of the liberties of one or other of the parents." Id. at 233.
The judge found it substantially damaging to the children to leave each parent free to expose the children, as he or she wishes, to his or her religion. The resulting judgment of divorce contained the following paragraphs: [9]
"5. RESTRICTIONS UPON RELIGIOUS EXPOSURE: Each parent shall be entitled to share his/her religious beliefs with the children with restrictions as follows: neither may indoctrinate the children in a manner which substantially promotes their . . . alienation from either parent or their rejection of either parent. The [defendant] shall not take the children to his church (whether to church services or Sunday School or church educational programs); nor engage them in prayer or bible study if it promotes rejection rather than acceptance, of their mother or their own Jewish self-identity. The [defendant] shall not share his religious beliefs with the children if those beliefs cause the children significant emotional distress or worry about their mother or about themselves. Thus, for example, [the defendant] may have pictures of Jesus Christ hanging on the walls of his residence, and that will not serve as any basis for restricting his visitation with his children. But, [the defendant] may not take the children to religious services where they receive the message that adults or children who do not accept Jesus Christ as their lord and savior are destined to burn in hell. By way of further example, [the defendant] may not shave off [Ariel's] payes. This provision shall not be construed so as to prevent [the defendant] from having the children with him at events involving family traditions at Christmas and Easter.
"In the event that there is a disagreement between the parents as to whether one or more of the children could be exposed to the religious belief(s) of [the defendant] without substantial negative impact upon their emotional health, the parents shall engage the services of Michael Goldberg, Ph.D., to act as G.A.L./investigator/evaluator on such issues and disputes. The fee of Dr. Goldberg shall be shared equally by the parties. In the event that Dr. Goldberg is unable to serve in this capacity, then the parties shall agree upon an alternate child psychologist, or an alternate shall be selected by the Court. . . .
"6. EXPLANATION TO CHILDREN. Neither party shall initially discuss with the children the terms and conditions of this Judgment. Within two (2) days of the date of receipt of this Judgment, the Plaintiff shall contact the Court-appointed Guardian Ad Litem, Dr. Michael Goldberg, to arrange for a meeting with the children. Dr. Goldberg shall explain to the children, in a developmentally appropriate manner, the Court's decision, with the goal being to help the children understand that they are being raised in the way they are because the Court believes that it is in their best interest. It is intended by the Court that this intervention may help the children avoid blaming themselves."
The defendant argues in this appeal that the judge's findings did not demonstrate "substantial harm" to the children so as to warrant the limitations imposed on his liberty interest in educating his children in the tenets of his religion. He challenges both the judge's factual findings of harm and the legal conclusions based on that evidence. [10]
3. Standard of review. We scrutinize without deference the legal standard which the judge applied to the facts to ensure the ultimate findings and conclusions are consistent with the law. Williams v. Resolution GGF Oy, 417 Mass. 377, 382 (1994), citing Marlow v. New Bedford, 369 Mass. 501, 508 (1976). The plaintiff was required to demonstrate "in detail" that exposure to the defendant's religion caused the children "substantial injury, physical or emotional, and [would] have a like harmful tendency for the future." Felton v. Felton, supra at 234, 235. We uphold the judge's factual findings unless they are clearly erroneous [11]; we review her legal conclusions to ensure they are based on correct legal standards. Williams v. Resolution GGF Oy, supra at 382 n.6.
4. Analysis. "[P]arents together have freedom of religious expression and practice which enters into their liberty to manage the familial relationships." Felton v. Felton, supra at 233, citing Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205 (1972). Those individual liberties may be restricted where there is a compelling interest. Felton v. Felton, supra. A parent's right to practice religion may be restricted only where limited exposure to that parent's beliefs is necessary to further a child's best interests. Felton v. Felton, supra. To do so, there must be an affirmative showing of harm caused by exposure to the conflicting religious teachings. Id. at 233-234.
The determinative issue is whether the harm found to exist in this case is demonstrated to be so substantial so as to warrant a limitation on the defendant's religious freedom. In Felton v. Felton, this court suggested that a "likely source[]" of proof of substantial harm "by implication" could be derived from testimony as to the child's general demeanor, attitude, school work, appetite, health or outlook. Id. at 242, citing Pope v. Pope, 267 S.W.2d 340, 343 (Mo. Ct. App. 1954). The court also opined that the "wholly uncorroborated testimony" of a parent was insufficient to demonstrate harm. Felton v. Felton, supra. By implication, the court suggested that a plaintiff should consult "church, school, medical or psychiatric authorities" to support a charge that a child has been harmed by exposure to the parent's religious beliefs. Id. Moreover, the court specifically recommended the appointment of "a qualified investigator (whether called a guardian or some other title) who would look into the facts, render a report, and be subject to examination by the parties." Id.
Other States have struggled to define what constitutes substantial harm. [12] Very few have actually ruled that substantial harm had been demonstrated. [13] [14]
We adhere to the line of cases requiring clear evidence of substantial harm. [15] See note 12, supra. Application of the strict requirements in those cases comports with the protections of religious freedoms historically preserved under the Massachusetts Constitution. See Society of Jesus of New England v. Boston Landmarks Comm'n, 409 Mass. 38 (1990), S.C., 411 Mass. 754 (1992) (citing authorities documenting historical protection of religious freedoms).
The harm found to exist in this case presents more than the generalized fears criticized in Felton v. Felton, supra. The judge afforded substantial weight to the GAL's report. [16] The judge considered the report so "comprehensive" that it should be considered in its entirety on any appellate review. [17] Among the factors the judge cited to support her conclusion that substantial harm to the children had been demonstrated are the following findings:
"20. I find that, in early 1995, the [defendant] threatened to cut the fringe off Ariel's tzitzitz if he did not tuck it inside his pants. This greatly upset Ariel and the [plaintiff], and the [defendant] later apologized.
"21. I also find that, in the summer of 1995, the [defendant] cut off Ariel's payes. I do not find credible the [defendant's] explanation that he did so at Ariel's request.
" . . .
"24. I find that the Boston Church of Christ services to which [the defendant] has taken his children have included teachings that those who do not accept the Boston Church of Christ faith are damned to go to hell where there will be 'weeping and gnashing of teeth.'
"25. I find that the oldest child, Ari, has drawn from the above teaching the conclusion that [the plaintiff] may go to hell, and that this causes him substantial worry and upset.". . .
"56. [The defendant's] behavior toward his children fosters negative and distorted images of the Jewish culture. [The defendant] insists that all individuals who do not accept his beliefs about life and existence are sinners who are destined to tortuous punishment. [The defendant] opposes his children being taught the history of the Holocaust. Further, [the defendant's] cutting off of Ari's religiously meaningful side burns (payes), and his threats to cut off his clothing fringes (tzitzitz) show that he does not refrain from inducing guilt in the child for having the beliefs that he does.
"57. I find that Ari has a strong Jewish self-identity. I am persuaded by the report of the G.A.L. that Ari 'clearly identified himself and his siblings as being Jewish and provided a rationale based on Jewish law for his belief that he is Jewish,' and that the child's 'behavior in which he ascribes his Jewish identity to Jewish law and theology is indicative of his attainment of a formal self-identification of himself as a Jew.' Indeed, [the defendant] himself reluctantly concedes that if asked, Ari would unquestionably say he is Jewish.
"58. [The defendant] understands that Ari perceives himself as Jewish, and that having a Jewish identity is akin to having an ethnic identity. But the matter goes further. Ari perceives his Jewishness as being part of his 'soul.' For Ari, efforts to convince him that his religion is wrong are logically equated with convincing him that his 'soul' is damaged or inadequate. . . .
"59. I credit the G.A.L.'s report and testimony that Ari 'may experience choosing a religion as choosing between his parents, a task that is likely to cause him significant emotional distress.' In fact, the G.A.L. specifically concludes, and I credit his conclusion, that the children are now in a position where they are perilously close to being forced to choose between their parents, and to reject one.
"60. I find, based upon the G.A.L.'s report as well as his testimony, that the oldest child Ari '. . . is emotionally distressed by the conflict between his strong desire for affection and approval from [the defendant] and his desire to maintain his Jewish religious practice,' and that as a direct result '. . . there has been a decline in his motivation and academic performance.'" . . .
"62. I find that Ari is understandably uncomfortable and unhappy when he 'has to do the stuff [he's] not supposed to do on Shabbas', and that precisely as the G.A.L. indicates, Ari then has the no-win dilemma of pleasing and obeying [the defendant] (while displeasing and disobeying [the plaintiff] and his own internalized beliefs about how the world is 'supposed' to function on the Sabbath) or the reverse. Poor Ari: he told [the defendant] that he 'wants to celebrate the Sabbath and not do stuff that I'm not supposed to do', and [the defendant's] response was 'we'll discuss that with the lawyers.'". . .
"64. I credit the G.A.L.'s report that 'Moriah is experiencing emotional distress related to the parental conflict . . .' I find that Moriah has a very solid understanding of who she is and who her family is: 'I'm not Christian. I'm Jewish. Mom is Jewish. My dad is Christian. My brother is Jewish and my sister is Jewish.' Moriah's straightforward description is comfortable and age-appropriate. More importantly, it is accurate. And most important of all, it shows that she can tolerate the knowledge of her parents' religious differences.". . .
"66. I find, based upon the G.A.L.'s report that Rebekah is likely to experience '. . . a sense of not belonging in her own home' by '. . . anything that serves to promote her identity as fundamentally different from that of her mother and siblings.' I find this would be substantially to her detriment.
"67. I credit the report of the G.A.L. that 'should the children come to accept the religious beliefs that [the defendant] reports he wants them to accept, they are likely to come to view their mother negatively and as a person who will be punished for her sins . . .' resulting in a '. . . negative impact on their relationship with their mother . . . and difficulty accepting guidance and nurturance from her.' I find this would be to the children's substantial detriment.
"68. For children of tender years (and it seems to me that this likely means at least up to age 12), I find directly contradictory messages from trusted adults to be solidly contrary to their best interests."
Whether the harm found to exist amounts to the "substantial harm" required to justify interference with the defendant's liberty interest is a close question, especially because there is considerable value in "frequent and continuing contact" between the child and both parents, and "contact with the parents' separate religious preferences." Felton v. Felton, supra at 234. In this regard the judge ruled:
"There is surface appeal to the [defendant's] argument that the [plaintiff] has not met her burden of establishing substantial present harm to the children from exposure to [the defendant's] religious beliefs and practices, for the G.A.L. found only a few instances of concrete present harm to the children. I am mindful that the G.A.L. has not found current damage to the children so severe that it has caused them to suffer a psychotic break, or to have a 'formal psychiatric diagnosis'. . . . The case law does not require the court to wait for formal psychiatric breakdown and the evidence paints a strong picture of the reasonably projected course if the children continue to be caught in the cross-fire of their parents' religious difference: [the defendant's] religion may alienate the children from their custodial parent (she is bad, she will burn in hell), and may diminish their own sense of self-worth and self-identity (Jews are bad, Jews will burn in hell). At minimum they will be called upon to 'choose' between their parents, in itself a detrimental result. The G.A.L. predicts damaging consequences of the children's exposure to two vastly different, and on some points directly contradictory religious views. 'Sometimes . . . a diversity of religious experience is itself a sound stimulant for a child . . . the question that comes to the courts is whether, in particular circumstances, such exposures are disturbing a child to its substantial injury, physical or emotional, and will have a like harmful tendency for the future.' (Felton, [supra] at 234-235). Applying that standard to the facts of this particular case, I see substantial evidence of current and imminent harm, to these 7, 5, and 3-year-old children."
In balancing these conflicting interests, fully aware of the complexities and nuances involved, we conclude that the judge's findings support her order in paragraph 5 of the judgment.
Where, as here, the judge has found demonstrable evidence of substantial harm to the children, we reject the defendant's arguments that the divorce judgment burdens his right to practice religion under the free exercise clauses of the Massachusetts and United States Constitution. [18] Both the Massachusetts and the United States Constitutions permit limitations on individual liberties where there exists a compelling interest. See Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205, 230 (1972) (deferring to parental rights with respect to religious upbringing of children absent harm to their physical or mental health); Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158, 166-167 (1944) (recognizing parents' rights to practice religion and rights to family decision-making are not beyond limitation); Felton v. Felton, supra, at 233 (stating limitations on individual liberties permissible where best interests of child must be promoted); Custody of a Minor, 375 Mass. 733, 748 (1978) (emphasizing that parental rights "do not clothe parents with life and death authority over their children"). Promoting the best interests of the children is an interest sufficiently compelling to impose a burden on the defendant's right to practice religion and his parental right to determine the religious upbringing of his children. Felton, supra at 233. Paragraph 5 of the divorce judgment is limited in scope and imposes a minimal burden on the defendant's right to practice religion by requiring only that he limit sharing certain aspects of his beliefs with his children. The divorce judgment imposes no additional limitations on the defendant's individual ability to practice his religion. Thus, we believe paragraph 5 of the divorce judgment is a constitutional limitation on the defendant's individual liberties as it is necessary to ensure the best interests of the children.
The defendant's claim that the divorce judgment violates art. 11 of the Amendments to the Massachusetts Constitution and the establishment clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution must also be rejected. In making establishment clause assessments in the past we have applied the test set out by the United States Supreme Court in Lemon v. Kurtzman, 403 U.S. 602, 612 (1971). Attorney Gen. v. Bailey, 386 Mass. 367, 378, cert. denied sub nom. Bailey v. Bellotti, 459 U.S. 970 (1982). In so doing we determine whether the divorce judgment has a secular purpose, that neither advances nor inhibits religion, and does not "foster 'an excessive government entanglement with religion.'" Attorney Gen. v. Bailey, supra, quoting Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra at 612-613. Although there is considerable doubt about the continued vitality of the test in Lemon v. Kurtzman, supra, in light of recent decisions of the Supreme Court, [19] we reach this conclusion if we apply that more stringent test.
We reject the defendant's claim that the divorce judgment "established Judaism" as the religion to govern his children's upbringing. In limiting the children's exposure to the defendant's religion, the judge merely recognized the preference that the parties allowed to develop and one that the defendant, until recently, encouraged. Moreover, paragraph 5 was intended for a wholly secular purpose -- to limit the emotional harm to the children caused by exposure to negative messages presented by the defendant's religion. [20] Although the judgment contemplates continued court involvement, it does not foster excessive government entanglement because the focus of any judicial inquiry will center on the emotional or physical harm to the children rather than the merit-worthiness of the parties' respective religious teachings.
5. Joint custody. The plaintiff argues on cross appeal that it was an abuse of discretion to award joint legal custody to the parties. The determination of custody rests within the discretion of the judge. Vilakazi v. Maxie, 371 Mass. 406, 409 (1976). The material facts found and reported must support the judge's action in awarding joint legal custody to the parties. Id. We are mindful of the importance of a trial judge's opportunity to observe and appraise both parents in custody matters. Stevens v. Stevens, 337 Mass. 625, 627 (1958). The plaintiff argues that joint legal custody is inappropriate because she and the defendant are unable to agree on "major decisions regarding the [children's] . . . moral and religious development." G. L. c. 208, § 31. See Rolde v. Rolde, 12 Mass. App. Ct. 398, 404-405 (1981) (suggesting joint custody is appropriate where parents are "relatively stable" and "amicable" and agree on basic issues). Because the plaintiff points to no conflict other than the parties' inability to reconcile their views as to the children's religious upbringing, we conclude that she has not established that the judge abused her discretion in granting joint custody. [21]
6. Property disposition and attorney's fees. The plaintiff also argues the judge erred in granting the defendant twenty-five per cent of the proceeds on the sale of the jointly owned marital home because her family provided the funds for its purchase. We will not set aside the trial judge's division of marital assets unless an award is "plainly wrong and excessive." Heins v. Ledis, 422 Mass. 477, 481 (1996). The judge found that the purchase of the marital home was a completed gift to the parties from the plaintiff's parents. The award was well within the proper exercise of her discretion.
The plaintiff also claims that she should have been awarded attorney's fees pursuant to G. L. c. 208, § 38, because the defendant proceeded in a dilatory and vexatious manner. The judge's decision not to award attorney's fees is within her discretion. Brash v. Brash, 407 Mass. 101, 106 (1990). Furthermore, she was in a position to observe first hand the defendant's conduct; therefore, we shall not disturb her assessment on the basis of a printed record.
----------NOTES----------
[1] On September 26, 1996, the Probate and Family Court judge issued a clarified judgment of divorce nisi, nunc pro tunc, to August 20, 1996. The clarified judgment effectuated minor changes to provisions of the initial judgment. These changes are unrelated to the issues raised in this appeal. Except for the minor revisions, the initial judgment and the clarified judgment are essentially the same.
[2] The judge issued the challenged temporary order on October 22, 1996 "[i]n the interim" and "until the matter could be heard at trial" (emphasis added). We reject the defendant's argument that the order is reviewable by this court. Despite the defendant's present position, he treated these orders as temporary when he appealed on November 27, 1996, pursuant to G. L. c. 231, § 118, first par. We note that, were we to conclude that the temporary orders were properly before us, we would scrutinize very carefully any order requiring an individual to audiotape religious services unless there was general acquiescence to the order's mandates. We would look more favorably on an order defining neutral solutions so as to minimize the court's involvement in sectarian issues. For instance, requiring a neutral observer to determine whether the content of religious services was violative of the court's judgment and to report any detrimental effect on the children would allow the court to maintain its focus on the legal issues rather than engage in an interpretation of the intricacies of the parties' respective beliefs.
[3] We note the judge's determination that "[b]oth parents share this view: that Jews do not believe that Jesus [Christ] was the son of God, while Christians do believe that Jesus was the son of God." While noting the divergent beliefs, we do not imply that this seeming "[i]rreconcilability" inevitably signifies conflict and hostility. See Zummo v. Zummo, 394 Pa. Super. 30, 76 (1990) (refusing to weigh reconcilability of Christianity and Judaism).
[4] The children are Ariel (born October 10, 1988), Moriah (born May 19, 1991), and Rebekah (born April 21, 1993).
[5] The majority of courts adhere to the view that predivorce agreements are unconstitutionally unenforceable. See C.P. Kindregan & M.L. Inker, Family Law and Practice § 20.5, at 647 (2d ed. 1996) ("unimaginable that a court would specifically enforce a contract governing . . . the religious education of any children born of the marriage"); Zummo v. Zummo, supra at 58-67 (collecting cases). We note, however, that the judge found the children had primary familiarity with the Jewish faith. The judge concluded the children had a "Jewish identity" based on evidence that: the parties were married in a traditional Jewish wedding ceremony; Ariel was circumcised in accordance with Jewish tradition; both Moriah and Rebekah had traditional Jewish naming ceremonies; the parties agreed the children would attend a Jewish school; and all three children are so enrolled.
[6] Orthodox Judaism is considered the most strictly doctrinal of the three Jewish movements (Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox).
[7] After the plaintiff filed her complaint for divorce, a probate judge entered a temporary order according to a stipulation of the parties dated December 9, 1994. That "agreement" demonstrated that the parties considered their divergent religious views an issue throughout the divorce. The stipulation contained a provision stating, "Neither party shall make negative or derogatory comments to the children about the other parent or his/her religion." As soon as the order issued, both parties challenged the order's visitation schedule as interfering with planned weekend religious events with the children.
[8] The judge appointed Dr. Michael A. Goldberg as the guardian ad litem (GAL). The defendant initially expressed concern that the GAL would be biased because he perceived him as being Jewish. However, when the GAL indicated his willingness to withdraw, the defendant told him he wished to proceed and stated he was comfortable with his ability to conduct the investigation without bias.
[9] The judgment also ordered that the plaintiff retain sole physical custody of the children, and awarded the parties joint legal custody. The plaintiff's challenge to the award of joint custody is discussed in a subsequent section.
[10] As in Felton v. Felton, 383 Mass. 232, 239 (1981), this appeal brings questions of law, fact, and discretion.
[11] We reject the defendant's argument that the judge improperly relied on Dr. Steven Hassan's testimony regarding cults, mind control, and the Boston Church of Christ. The defendant contends Dr. Hassan was not a qualified expert and his testimony was highly prejudicial. Even assuming the testimony was inadmissible, the judge specifically stated that she did not rely on Dr. Hassan's testimony in making her ruling; therefore, there can be no prejudicial effect. See Berlandi v. Commonwealth, 314 Mass. 424, 452 (1943); Commonwealth v. Darby, 37 Mass. App. Ct. 650, 655 (1994).
[12] See Khalsa v. Khalsa, 107 N.M. 31, 36 (Ct. App. 1988) (general testimony regarding parents' divergent religious beliefs causing child to be upset or confused insufficient to justify restriction of exposure to noncustodial parent's religion); Munoz v. Munoz, 79 Wash. 2d 810, 815 (1971) (duality of religious beliefs does not per se create conflict in child's mind); Robertson v. Robertson, 19 Wash. App. 425, 427 (1978) (child's alarm at religious beliefs insufficient); Zummo v. Zummo, 394 Pa. Super. 30, 74-76 & n.39 (1990) (rejecting speculation by parents and experts as to potential future emotional harm to child based on assumption that exposure is generally harmful); In re Marriage of Weiss, 42 Cal. App. 4th 106, 116-117 (1996) (rejected notion that contradictory messages caused harm, no evidence child had disciplinary problems, nor bruises); In re Marriage of Mentry, 142 Cal. App. 3d 260, 266 (1983) (held that evidence of child's social adjustment problems in school and periodic stomach aches were not attributable to conflict over religion); Kirchner v. Caughey, 326 Md. 567, 577, 579 (1992) (child psychiatrist determined that child suffered from anxiety was not conclusive where problems could just as easily have been attributed to parental conflicts); Levitsky v. Levitsky, 231 Md. 388, 398 (1963) (requiring serious danger to life or health of child before determining protection necessary from exposure to parent's religious beliefs).
[13] In Morris v. Morris, 271 Pa. Super. 19, 35 (1979), the court prohibited the child's father, a Jehovah's Witness, from bringing the child, a baptized Catholic, with him on door-to-door proselytetic endeavors. Kirchner v. Caughey, supra at 581, similarly cautioned against prohibiting parents' ability to share their religious beliefs with their children unless the beliefs involved proselytizing. See Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158 (1944) (limiting guardian's ability to expose minor child to religious proselytizing). In Ledoux v. Ledoux, 234 Neb. 479, 486 (1990), the court upheld a prohibition of a child's exposure to the noncustodial parent's religion where a child psychologist found the child suffered from "serious" stress evidenced by bed wetting. In Ledoux, however, the Nebraska court followed its precedent that the custodial parent usually determines the child's religious upbringing. Id.
[14] One State court seemed to recognize the broad range of available case law, stating, "As the threat to the child diminishes, the balancing of interests becomes more difficult." Kirchner v. Caughey, supra at 576.
[15] The case of Morris v. Morris, supra, cautioned against an overly strict requirement of substantial harm. In Morris, supra at 34, the court noted that, in a given case, the court should not have to wait until a showing of present psychological harm "progress[es] to a mentally crippling point before action could be taken."
[16] The GAL's report was based on interviews with the parents, the children, and the children's teachers, psychological tests, and observations of the children interacting with both parents.
[17] We reject the defendant's argument that the judge erred in refusing to allow him to review the GAL's file notes. The defendant was not denied an opportunity to rebut the GAL's report or cross-examine the GAL. See Gilmore v. Gilmore, 369 Mass. 598, 605 (1976) (finding error where judge refused to allow GAL to testify at trial). The defendant had a copy of the GAL's report and took advantage of his opportunity to cross-examine the GAL at trial. There was no error.
[18] We note that the defendant has raised a constitutional claim under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000bb-1 et seq. (1994). Even if properly raised, this claim cannot succeed where the Supreme Court declared the Religious Freedom Restoration Act unconstitutional in Boerne v. Flores, 117 S. Ct. 2157 (1997).
[19] See The Supreme Court, 1996 Term, Fallon, Foreword: Implementing the Constitution, 111 Harv. L. Rev. 56, 85 (1997); The Supreme Court, 1994 Term, Fried, Foreword: Revolutions?, 109 Harv. L. Rev. 13, 68 (1995).
[20] For similar reasons, we reject the defendant's argument that paragraph 6 of the divorce judgment, which requires the guardian ad litem to explain the court's judgment to the children, is an unconstitutional establishment of religion.
[21] The judge heard considerable testimony over the course of a five-day trial and apparently did not consider the parties unable to cooperate on other child care issues.
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Why Conscious Leaders Must Take Care of Their Bodies: Neil Grimmer of Habit and Plum Organics13 min read
Aaron Kahlow and Rachel Zurer May 1, 2017
Food & AgricultureGetting StartedPersonal DevelopmentSelf CareSocial EntrepreneurshipSuccess StoriesThe New Economy0 Comments
After selling Plum Organics to Campbell Soup, social entrepreneur Neil Grimmer launched a personalized nutrition startup. We spoke with him about the connection between leadership and health.
First, Neil Grimmer upended the world of baby food. The company he co-founded in 2007, Plum Organics, brought organic, healthy food in pouches to masses of children while simultaneously working to expose millions of disadvantage kids to food experiences that would help them become healthier eaters later in life. After selling the brand to Campbell Soup for $249 million in 2013, Grimmer’s next project is reinventing food for grownups, via his new personalized nutrition business, Habit.
Habit, which Grimmer launched with a $32 investment from Campbell, offers eating plans informed by individual nutrition test data, plus optional coaching and customized meal delivery. “We need to start taking a more nuanced, personal, and — dare I say — intimate look at each individual and what they to thrive,” he explains.
We spoke with Grimmer, a presenter at our upcoming Conscious Company Global Leaders Forum, about why he chose this second act, the connection between health and leadership, and the role of values in business.
Tell us the story of starting your new company, Habit.
Neil Grimmer: After co-founding and running Plum for six years, we sold the company to Campbell Soup. I stayed on because I wanted to make sure that we got through that transition; that’s always a very fragile period. We wanted to make sure that the mission, the values were evergreen. Campbell was very supportive and excited about that, but there was work to be done still. So I stayed on. But my wife in all her infinite wisdom was like, “You’ve taken care of this company for six-plus years. Now you’ve got to start taking care of yourself.”
Prior to starting Plum, I was an Ironman triathlete doing races all over the world — New Zealand, Germany, Florida. I hung up those sneakers to run a different race: running a company. Fast-forward six-plus years, and I was 50 pounds heavier than I was when I was racing. That wasn’t a byproduct of anything other than just not putting the time in to work out, skipping meals and then eating bad meals, drinking too much coffee, all the kinds of things you do when you’re working too much. Grab-and-go convenience food as opposed to real, whole, fresh foods all the time.
I found out I was pre-diabetic, at high risk for a heart attack, and the three cups of coffee I was drinking every day just to get through was increasing that risk by tenfold. It was a huge wakeup call for me. I stepped back and I met with a functional medicine doctor. She said, “Okay, you can fix it with pharma, or you could probably fix it with food if you have the inclination.” And I said, “Well I’d like to fix this with food.”
We talked through a lot of different ideas on how to get that done and how to personalize a nutrition plan. Three months after that, I felt amazing. After six months, I had lost 25 pounds and I had more energy than I’d had in years. I was like, “Wow, this is powerful stuff. This should be available to everyone.” That was the genesis of Habit.
Grimmer’s latest startup, Habit, offers customized meals based on biological testing.
What’s your philosophy on how important it is to have your body-health correct as a leader?
NG: All of us leading companies get overwhelmed by the work, get too much on our plate. Our health and wellbeing maybe takes a backseat to some of the other priorities in the company. It’s a constant challenge to say, “No.” Investing in your health and wellbeing — physically, mentally, emotionally, and even spiritually, for whatever that means to each individual — needs to be up there at the same level as all the other elements, so that you can really be your best in the moment.
It’s an investment leaders tend not to make, but I think it’s one of the most important. The most grounded leaders are the ones who have taken inventory of their lives, and have taken proactive steps to get healthy across all of those different levels. You can see it. You can feel it in their leadership. It becomes plain as day. That’s what I aspire to as a leader.
As I was working up to starting this new company, I actually took the mindset that I was training for a race. Because I know what starting a company takes, and running a company at those early stages is hard. It’s difficult work and it’s all-consuming and it’s long hours. It’s some of the most exciting work I’ve ever experienced, but it also takes its toll.
You really have to train for this, like you would a marathon, like you would an Ironman triathlon. You have to train your mind and your body, and you have to make sure you’re ready for the race you’re about to run.
How do you manage to stay healthy on a day-to-day basis?
NG: Entrepreneurs, they’ve got a lot on their plates, they’ve got a lot on their shoulders. You can’t approach working out, eating healthy like putting another ‘to-do’ on your list that has some guilt associated with it, because that just becomes another burden, along with taking care of your team, your customers, your business, all these things. You have to start making it into daily rituals. You have to recognize that there’s time.
For me, first thing in the morning, 6 am, the first hour is just totally dedicated to my health. It usually consists of a workout followed by some stretching, then a healthy breakfast or a smoothie. When I do that, I feel amazing. I don’t always get to it, but that’s the ritual that I go back to every time. What usually happens is when I set it off right in the beginning of the day, good choices and healthy choices follow.
I encourage people to find that moment in the day just for them. You’ve just got to carve it out and make it a ritual. You’ve got to put the work in every day to be a healthy individual, to be a great conscious leader.
What does “conscious leadership” mean to you? How do you apply it to your everyday life?
NG: The way I’ve always approached it, it’s making a business personal. How do you become a good neighbor, a good friend, a good citizen? Then extrapolate that through an organization. How do you embody the same characteristics you would hold yourself to as an individual?
When we started Plum, it was a small group of parents who had a mission to get the best food to kids from the very first bite. We were coming up with ideas and solutions that would work in our lives, and hopefully in the lives of other people. The same value system we would have about how we want to raise our kids, we applied to the business. There’s something elegant about that approach. When you put your parent hat on, all of a sudden, you’re like, “Oh, I know what doing the right thing looks like.”
Is being parent very akin to being a business leader?
NG: Raising a family and raising a business have a lot of similarities. Both need to be nurtured. It’s centered on love. They’re a byproduct of the everyday practice you put into their care and feeding. My wife and I make sure that a core set of values are present in our kids’ lives: they treat people fairly and they live their life with an understanding of their footprint on the world. The same kinds of ideas start to play out within the business.
What are your personal values, and how do you make sure you live those out intentionally?
NG: Three of them are on the walls of Plum. They are my personal values that are part of the company values as well. The first is: “lead with heart.” In every decision you make, whether it’s a business decision or a personal decision, lead with heart. Have that be the first thing you touch base on.
The second one is: “BYOS,” or “bring your own self.” Nobody wants you to show up as anything other than who you are. Be true to you, be an individual, and celebrate it in all ways and at all times. Not that everyone is always going to love that version of you, but it’s the only version of you, so you better embrace and love it and bring it to everything you do.
The third one is: “fight the good fight.” I believe in being a soldier for good. The work that we do out there, it takes energy, it takes commitment, it takes a perseverance, and it takes a fight to change some of the things, environmentally and in our broader society. It’s showing up with that intent every day.
The last one is esoteric, but it’s something I wrote down a long time ago. The way I characterize it is: “be forever.” Act as though those actions will be with you for the rest of your life, because they will be. So be forever. Be committed. Be all in. It’s like the premise of Seventh Generation: the actions you take in the company will be there for seven generations.
One of Habit’s at-home nutrition test kits
How do you frame all that for your two children, without all of this leadership structure or even business structure around values?
NG: I think it’s simple. “Be good to others.” Not “treat others as you treat yourself” because I don’t know if people necessarily treat themselves well. Be generous. Be kind. Be creative.
Also, “enjoy the ride.” Have fun with your life. It’s the one life you have. Wake up every day inspired to figure out what’s next.
When you think about community, how does that play into your mindset, both in building a company and your own personal life?
NG: Community is essential. We’re social beings. While we have strong individuality, where we thrive is with a connection with others. It’s important as a leader to learn how to cultivate communities around central ideas that bring people together. I look at the teams that we built at both Plum and Habit as a core community.
At Plum, it was young parents who wanted to have their work focused on their kids and all kids in the country. That is a very binding idea for a lot of people, and that built community.
Or in the case of Habit, we’re a personalized nutrition company, so in one sense it’s highly individual. But within the 50 people we have at Habit —crossfit junkies, marathon runners, yogis, foodies — what glues everyone together is we all want to be better versions of ourselves. We want to do the work to unlock our physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual wellbeing. It’s a strong community and now that’s now rippling out to create a strong community of people who are opting into the brand. The same applies to Plum. I think community is everything.
Talk to me, if you can, about a failure that was personal in terms of the suffering it caused. What was that like? What happened and how did you recover from that?
NG: A few months after we sold Plum, my wife was diagnosed with breast cancer. As a family, we went through one of our highest highs to hit one of our lowest lows. It floored me, honestly. She recovered, and it made us tighter. It showed us that above all else, family is absolutely the most important thing, hands down. No company is more important. No nothing.
Looking back, when she was diagnosed, the regret I felt that we hadn’t spent more time together…I write that up as one of my biggest failures recently. There were many nights and days and even, quite frankly, years where Plum was more of a priority in some ways than family. We all were just all-in. Even though it was a family-centered business, I would regularly miss meals.
We’ve changed since then. Because you learn from it. I’m a very driven person, so I’ve always got a project. But I now keep that in check. My family’s the most important thing.
Between getting your own conscious leadership journey correct, building a purpose-driven workplace culture, or being an advocate for good causes in the world, what’s most important?
NG: They’re all interrelated. Part of your personal journey is to think through your core capabilities, your skills, your talents, all these kinds of things. And then the second bit of inventory is: how do you want to use those to change the world for good? It’s as simple as that.
We’re all given unique gifts, and then the question is, how do you take those gifts and how do you make the world a better place through the gifts?
Where do you stand on business’s role in the world and in society? Is it business to the rescue?
NG: We know business is a very powerful force in the world. And if you believe that to be true, take it one step further: business is a very powerful force in the world for good. There are more societal and environmental problems than any one agency has the ability to tackle and change, whether it’s public, private, business, non-profit. We all need to come to the rescue — people, businesses, governments. There is no shortage of issues in the world that need addressing.
What’s your advice for early-stage entrepreneurs trying to make it work, stick it out, persevere?
NG: First off, don’t give up. With Plum, there were many, many hard days, many hard weeks, many hard months, many hard years to get there. If you have perseverance and endurance, you can get through some of that stuff. Stick it out. Fight the good fight. Keep the work going.
Secondly, own the moment. It’s not just enough to stick it out, like, “I’m just hanging on.” You’ve got to lean in. You’ve got to take every opportunity. You’ve got to think about it as an opportunity that makes or breaks your career, makes or breaks the company. Even to this day, I have opportunities and I’m like, “Whoa, it seems really big and I don’t know if I can step up to that.” Step in. Show up and shine.
Anything else you’re planning to say to the leaders you’ll be addressing at the Conscious Company Global Leaders Forum in June?
NG: This is a journey, not an end. There’s not a destination. The idea that any of us have any of this figured out in absolute terms is just false. It’s a set of experiments, it’s a set of actions and rituals and practices to get it right, and it’s life’s journey.
In the pursuit of that journey we can do great things in the world, but it’s important not to get overwhelmed by the idea that you’re not there and other people are. Or lulled into a sense of accomplishment that’s like, “Oh, I’ve got this all figured out now. I don’t have more work to do.” As I get older, I realize more and more work that I need to do on all kinds of fronts. Because I’m more aware. It’s that process you’ve got to tap into.
Aaron Kahlow
Aaron Kahlow has built five companies over two decades and is now putting his entrepreneurial skills to work for the greater consciousness movement. His teachings, advising, and the space he creates is paving the way toward a more accessible, modern mindfulness approach to life, one that leads to our greatest human need: a connection that grounds our being, aligns our energy, and gives a greater sense of meaning and purpose.
In his role at ConsciousCircles.org, Kahlow is creating “conscious circles” around the world for leaders, entrepreneurs, and others trying to find their way through life’s big transitions. His circles focus on getting clarity of true self by cultivating a trusted space for our souls to be revealed and human wholeness to be found.
Many know Kahlow for his leadership roles at Conscious Company Media, the Conscious Company Leaders Forum, the Conscious Business World Summit, the Mindful Order of Being, and the Conscious Directory Project. He is also a syndicated columnist, passionate motivator, and globally renowned speaker. In addition to his articles published by Conscious Company, you can find more interviews and thought leadership pieces here.
In-depth Interview
Social Enterprises Need Impact Projections Alongside Their Financial Projections
Scott Saslow July 17, 2019
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Rockets With Spy US Satellites Launches In Space
Less than a week after reaching its milestone 100th launch, United Launch Alliance sent an Atlas V rocket roaring into the sky early Thursday morning from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Four of the CubeSats are NASA-sponsored and nine are NRO-sponsored, one of which was developed with NASA funding. Not much can be said about the secretive NROL-55 mission, which is classified.
NASA is exploring if the small satellites, which typically weigh about 2.2 pounds (1 kg) and can be outfitted with cameras, sensors and other instruments, are suited for interplanetary missions and other space operations. (1 kg) each, will perform calibration measurements in the ionosphere, a region of Earth’s upper atmosphere.
Small satellites, including CubeSats, are playing an increasingly larger role in exploration, technology demonstration, scientific research and educational investigations at NASA.
The amateur radio FM transponder CubeSat, AMSAT Fox-1A, will be among 13 CubeSats flying as secondary payloads on the NROL-55 mission. NROL-55 is the 58th Atlas V mission since the vehicle’s inaugural launch in 2002. The mission is ULA’s 10th of 2015 and the 101st since the company was founded in December 2006.
The launch should take place at 1249 UT on Thursday, October 8 on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. NASA TV is expected to cover the launch starting at 1229 UT .
Filed Under: SCIENCE Tagged With: California, News, Rocket Launch, Science news, Space News
Amazon Launches Handmade Today; A marketplace For Hand Crafted Items
Back in May, it was touted that Amazon was dipping its toes into yet another marketplace venture, this one centered on handcrafted goods. At the time, the e-commerce behemoth was prepping for a showdown with the top site in the craft world, Etsy, by attempting to lure away its vendors. Fast-forward four months, and the launch of “Handmade at Amazon” is upon us.
The new marketplace, which features items crafted and sold directly from artisans, was designed to provide customers and artisans a tailored store filled with unique, one-of-a-kind handcrafted products, Amazon said in an announcement Thursday.
A craft market will extend Amazon’s role as a middleman for third-party vendors, which accounts for about 40% of its sales.
It recently launched a platform allowing customers to buy 700 home services such as car maintenance, TV wall-mounting and house cleaning.
Over 600 handmade products will be eligible for shipping under Amazon’s Prime shipping service.
At launch, Handmade at Amazon will include about 5,000 sellers from 50 states and 60 countries offering 80,000 items. Amazon takes a 12 percent fee from overall sales made by Handmade at Amazon sellers and includes payment processing, discounted shipping and access to other Amazon services. There’s no listing fee or monthly fee to start.
In contrast, New York-based Etsy has 1.5 million sellers and 21.7 million buyers as of June 30. It takes a 3.5 percent fee on overall sales and a 20 cent listing fee per item listed.
They also differ in terms of manufacturing policy. Amazon says sellers have to fill out an online application to be approved to sell on the site and all items sold on the site must be “factory-free” and not made by manufacturers.
New York-based Etsy, on the other hand, started letting some merchants apply to use manufacturers for some products in 2013. In September, Etsy said it was creating a new Etsy manufacturing marketplace to make it easier for its sellers to find “responsible production assistance.” Manufacturers can apply to be part of the program and Etsy approves them based on certain criteria.
The divide on manufacturing highlights the challenge that platforms for handmade craft sellers face: They want to preserve the personal nature of handmade goods but also help their sellers (and themselves) grow and make more money.
Etsy CEO Chad Dickerson said Etsy Manufacturing grew out of trying to help sellers that have reached a point where they need outside help to grow.
“It’s really about providing access to values-aligned producers, often in the sellers’ own community,” he said.
When Amazon began exploring its foray into handcrafted goods, the company sent many Etsy sellers invitations to sign up for the forthcoming marketplace and asked them to participate in a survey regarding the types of products they specialize in.
“We’re offering artisans like you a first peek at Handmade, a new marketplace for handcrafted goods,” the Amazon email stated.
At the time, several vendors said their interests were piqued after receiving the email, but they remained skeptical on whether or not they could produce personalized and made-on-demand products that would fit Amazon’s shipping guidelines.
While shopping on Handmade, customers will find small location icons on listings, identifying where the artisan is based and linking to their profile.
It’s unclear how many of the vendors featuring products on Amazon’s site came from Etsy or continue to sell on that site, as well.
Filed Under: BUSINESS Tagged With: Amazon, Amazon Handmade, Business, Business News, News, Technology
Study Reveals Fossils Could Solve The Mystery Whether Early Birds Could Fly Or Not
We have a slight idea that some dinosaurs had feathers but there remains plenty of debate over whether prehistoric birds such as Archaeopteryx could actually take to the air and fly.
An international team of Spanish paleontologists and NHM’s Director of the Dinosaur Institute, Dr. Luis M. Chiappe, studied the exceptionally preserved wing of a 125-million-year-old bird from central Spain. Beyond the bones preserved in the fossil, the tiny wing of this ancient bird reveals details of a complex network of muscles that in modern birds controls the fine adjustments of the wing’s main feathers, allowing birds to master the sky.
A new study in Scientific Reports goes some ways to answering that question with the discovery of new, 125-million-year-old bird from central Spain. The exceptionally well preserved fossil found in limestone from the Lower Cretaceous period has an intricate arrangement of the muscles and ligaments that controlled the main feathers of the wing of an ancient bird – the oldest occurrence of connective tissue in association with flight feathers of birds.
A new fossil of a tiny bird has been discovered in Spain. It was likely able to fly. Something that can’t be said about other ancient bird fossils like the famous Archaeopteryx.
Birds have been around for a long time. The most famous is the 150 million year old Archaeopteryx found in Bavaria, Germany. Nobody knows if that bird could fly, most likely not. Some scientists even go as far as saying that the Archaeopteryx is not a bird and is just another dinosaur.
Now a new fossil of a small bird found in Spain was most likely able to fly. It was likely zipping over the heads of the big dinosaurs trying to catch insects.
That would support the notion that at least some of the most ancient birds performed aerodynamic feats in a fashion similar to living birds. The study has been published in the journal Scientific Reports.
“The anatomical match between the muscle network preserved in the fossil and those that characterize the wings of living birds strongly indicates that some of the earliest birds were capable of aerodynamic prowess like many present-day birds,” said Luis Chiappe, one of the authors of the study, who is with the National History Museum of Los Angeles County, in a press release.
Guillermo Navalon, a doctorate candidate at the University of Bristol in the U.K. and lead author of the report, said he was so surprised how this ancient bird looked so similar to what we might find in our backyards.
“It is very surprising that despite being skeletally quite different from their modern counterparts, these primitive birds show striking similarities in their soft anatomy,” he said, in the press release.
The characteristic features of birds are believed to have evolved slowly about 150 million years ago, and such things as wings and feathers developed over tens of millions of years. Since the 1990s, hundreds, if not thousands, of dinosaurs with feathers have been unearthed in China – helping firm up the theory that birds evolved from dinosaurs.
While the latest find pushes the theory that birds did fly, it remains up in the air as to whether they flew close to the ground or soared over the heads of dinosaurs.
“The new fossil provides us with a unique glimpse into the anatomy of the wing of the birds that lived amongst some of the largest dinosaurs,” Chiappe said. “Fossils such as this are allowing scientists to dissect the most intricate aspects of the early evolution of the flight of birds.”
“Despite being skeletally quite different from their modern counterparts, these primitive birds show striking similarities in their soft anatomy,” added Guillermo Navalon, a doctoral candidate at the University of Bristol in the U.K. and lead author of the report.
So ancient birds may have flown over the heads of dinosaurs, but some aspects of the precise flight modes of these early fliers still remain unclear, the authors added.
Filed Under: SCIENCE Tagged With: Adaptations, Birds, Early Birds, Evolution Of Flight, Flight Adaptation, Nature News, News, Science, Science news
Jobless Claims In US Fell Low On Record Level
Very few Americans sought unemployment benefits last week, as employers hold onto workers despite a recent slowdown in hiring because of global pressures weighing on the U.S. economy.
The Labor Department said Thursday that weekly applications for jobless aid fell 13,000 to a seasonally adjusted 263,000. The four-week average, a less volatile figure, has fallen 8.2 percent over the past year to 267,500. Jobless claims averaging less than 300,000 a week have traditionally corresponded with net monthly job gains of roughly 200,000.
Indiana The large number of Americans registering new functions for without a work place positive factors reduced a little over anticipated to a near 42-year low just last week, leading to continuing lessening within the toil segment even though recent brake in recruiting.
The statistics unveil on Thursday presents a more cheery assessment of the condition of the effort trade after last week’s once a month occupation results enhanced uncertainties the Federal Reserve could improve interest at the end in this 12 months.
Initial claims for place jobless advantages fell 13,000 to a seasonally adapted 263,000 regarding the seven days stopped Oct. a minimum of three, the Labor Department said.
Applications are a proxy for layoffs. Recent lows had pointed to greater confidence among employers. The drop in weekly applications has reduced the total number of people receiving benefits. There are 2.2 million Americans collecting jobless aid, close to the lowest total since November 2000.
“While last week’s employment report showed a notable slowdown in payrolls (through September), the jobless claims data continue to send an upbeat signal regarding conditions in the labor market,” said Daniel Silver, an economist at JPMorgan Chase.
Yet the recent decline in hiring points to increased caution. Growth has slowed in China and stalled in Europe. Emerging economies such as Brazil and Turkey are also struggling, hurting the appetite for oil and U.S. exports.
That was at the very least taking into consideration that mid-July whenever the wide range of claims reluctantly visited its most affordable because of the fact that 1973. Hitting this sort of antique low is exceptional thinking about the Simply.S. employed pool has increased much because 1970s.
It was the 31street instantly 7 days that is actually claims continued to be under the 300,000 verge, that is of a developing work trade; the Labour Department.
The Labor Departments Employment and Training Administration estimated last weeks claims for South Carolina, which was paralyzed by heavy rains and flooding. Estimates were also provided by Nevada, where officials are updating reporting systems, a U.S. Labor Department spokesman said as the report was released to the press.
The four-week average of claims, a less-volatile measure than the weekly figure, dropped to 267,500, the lowest since first week of August, from 270,500. The global setbacks hit job gains in September.
The number of people continuing to receive jobless benefits rose by 9,000 to 2.2 million in the week ended Sept. 26. The unemployment rate among people eligible for benefits held at 1.6 percent. These data are reported with a one-week lag.
Claims, since the beginning of March, have held below the 300,000 level that economists say is consistent with strength in the job market.
While applications for jobless benefits point to limited dismissals, weakness in the global economy is starting to give some companies reason to pause their hiring efforts. Payrolls rose by 142,000 in September and revisions to prior reports cut a total of 59,000 jobs from the previous two months, Labor Department data showed last week. Wages stagnated and the jobless rate held at a seven-year-low 5.1 percent as Americans left the labor force.
Federal Reserve officials held off on raising the benchmark interest rate in September, citing a murkier global growth picture and lack of confidence in the trajectory for inflation. The policy makers next meet Oct. 27-28 in Washington.
Filed Under: BUSINESS, U.S Tagged With: Business News, Jobless, Jobless Claims, News, Unemployment In US, US
Samsung Along With Barnes & Noble; You can Grab Yours Now!
Barnes & Noble and Samsung on Wednesday announced the latest in a collaborative electronic book reader efforts. Priced at $249, the idea is to bring a large screen tablet device to the masses for enjoying all of B&N’s content.
The Galaxy Tab E Nook features a 9.6″ AMOLED HD display, Qualcomm APQ 8016 Processor, 16GB of onboard storage, microSD slot for up to 128GB of storage, and 5MP rear-facing camera. There’s Global Positioning System + GLONASS, dual stereo speakers, WiFi, and Microsoft Office pre-loaded. But instead of completely throwing in the towel on their Nook tablets, they made a decision to work with Samsung and rebrand a few of their Galaxy Tabs as Nook tablets.
Not only will you find B&N’s readable and playable content, Samsung is bringing a Multi Window UI for users to enjoy, and the tablet also comes preloaded with a suite of Microsoft applications.
The new reader-focused tablet features an LCD TFT 9.6-inch display with 12800 x 800 resolution. The Galaxy Tab E Nook follows its predecessors with a larger display and a lower price.
Underneath, the device is powered by a 1.3GHz quad-core CPU, 1.5GB of RAM, 16GB of onboard storage, expandable to up to 128GB with a MicroSD card, and 5,000mAh battery that the companies boast can stream up to 12 hours of video playback. Other features include Nook Profiles, so you can share it with family members and everyone can access their own content and recommendations with a tap of the screen, and Samsung’s Multi-Window for running two apps simultaneously.
The Nook store also contain kid-friendly content, offering more than 110,000 titles for children, including a few 1,000 interactive picture books.
Consumers can also trade in their older Nook devices to get $50 discount. iPads, Kindles, and other Samsung tablets are also included to receive a credit of up to $200, depending on the exact model. The tablet is purchasable right now on the Barnes & Noble website, as well as in-store at $249.99.
Filed Under: TECHNOLOGY Tagged With: Barnes & Noble, E-reader, ebook reader, Galaxy Tab, News, Nook, Technology, Technology News
NASA Scientists Discovered Liquid Water On Mars
We might be getting closer to finding life on Mars. On Sept. 28, NASA released a statement saying that it had discovered water on Mars. NASA calls the water “potentially life giving.”
According to CNN, the discovery itself does not offer evidence of life on Mars, but it does boost hopes that the harsh landscape still offers a chance for microbes to cling to existence.
Scientists have known about existing water on the planet, but it was all frozen solid in the planet’s polar ice caps. Flowing, salty water has been discovered on Mars during the planet’s warmest season, NASA confirms.
In a picture, that was released in 2011, portions of the Martian surface shot by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter show many channels from 1 meter to 10 meters wide on a scarp in the Hellas impact basin. They are hypothesized to be formed by flow of briny liquid water on Mars.
As we continue to ponder the potential for life in the solar system following the first evidence of water found on Mars, today’s Google Doodle suggests the anthropomorphic Red Planet might be as pleased as us. Mars is the favorite planet for space scientists across the globe because it has certain factors that make it the most vulnerable to be explored.The scientists discovered the streaks descending along the slope and they identified water in the form of hydrated salts.
“These are dark streaks that form in late spring, grow through the summer, and then disappear by fall”, said Michael Meyer, the lead scientists for NASA’s Mars Exploration program. But now, we know that one thing might just be able to live on Mars: Man. NASA, start the countdown.
The existence of liquid water, even if it is super salty, briny water, gives the possibility that if there’s life on Mars, that we have a way to describe how it might survive,” Associate Administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA, John Grunsfeld said.
Many experts have given their input on what the discoveries could mean even an expert at Northwest. Northwest has classes on astronomy which cover topics and discoveries exactly like this. Many of the classes are taught by Associate Professor John Shaw, Ph.D., who is an astronomy expert. He offered some inside knowledge on the recent discoveries.
“We have known for a long time that there were rivers on Mars in its past because of partial riverbeds observed on Mars. We also know water is on Mars now in the polar ice cap which also contains dry ice, which is solid carbon dioxide. However, we thought that any water left on Mars, if in liquid form, would have to be underground since it is about 10 below zero on the surface of Mars,” Shaw said.
All these discoveries lead researchers to believe that it could be plausible for life to be sustained on Mars. This is actually not the first time speculations like this have been discussed in the science community.
McEwen believes microbes could have survived the trip from Earth to Mars “making it very likely life could be found in the crust of Mars”.
Nasa scientists say the newly-announced discovery of flowing water on Mars has a few profound implications for manned missions to the red planet, and whether life on its surface is a possibility.
“The fact that it could be flowing water is what’s really what’s exciting”, said Dr. David Alexander, director of the Space Institute at Rice University.
“They thought they observed liquid water on the surface in 2010, but no one was willing to commit to that until better observations were made. These observations show that liquid water is flowing on the surface of Mars. It is not flowing in large rivers, but in extremely small streams down the side of hills on Mars. For there to be liquid water on the surface, the water would have to be very briny (full of salt) so that it would not freeze at the cold temperature on Mars,” Shaw said.
These discoveries do not provide conclusive evidence that aliens live on Mars. It just provides proof that something could be there.
“The significance of this is that there might be life on Mars if there is water on the surface. This life would be in some bacterial form (not little green men). Future Mars missions will be focused on this” Shaw said.
These discoveries could mean that we are getting closer to answering the age old question of could there possibly be life on another planet.
Filed Under: SCIENCE Tagged With: Life on Mars, Mars Mission, NASA, News, Science, Science news, Space, Water On Mars
Study Finds The Way To Make Ovarian Cancer Survivors Women Fertile
For cancer survivors, ovarian tissue transplants are safe and effective and pose little risk of cancer recurrence, according to a report published online Oct. 6 in Human Reproduction. Women who have ovarian tissue removed and then transplanted back to them at a later date have a good chance of falling pregnant, a study has found.
A team of researchers, including Dr. Annette Jensen, Ph.D. student in the Laboratory of Reproductive Biology at the Rigshospitalet in Denmark, and colleagues from Odense University Hospital and Aarhus University Hospital, conducted a review of Danish women who had undergone transplants, in order to determine negative effects.
However, they found encouraging results for women who had suffered from cancer and want to have children, a goal highly difficult to achieve, since cancer treatment can harm the ovaries.
Many girls and young women who have been diagnosed with a disease such as cancer now have a realistic hope of recovery and living a normal life, but the treatment for their disease can cause infertility by damaging the functioning of their ovaries”, Jensen noted. Scientists typically remove one ovary and cut it into strips before freezing them.
“This procedure is an option for patients who require immediate gonadotoxic treatment of aggressive malignancies when there is insufficient time to allow the woman to undergo ovulation induction, oocyte retrieval, and cryopreservation of oocytes and/or embryos”, the ASRM guidelines stated.
Of the 32 women who had ovarian transplants and said they wanted to get pregnant, 10 gave birth to at least one child, giving a result of 31% being able to have a child.
Dr Annette Jensen, from the Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen, Denmark, who worked on the study, said preserving fertility was increasingly become part of the treatment plan for young cancer patients.
Although three women had recurrences of their cancer, in no case was this thought to be because of the ovarian transplants. Eight children were conceived naturally, and six with the help of in vitro fertilization, the researchers reported. These women were followed with regular clinical visits after transplantation. However, there have been concerns that the transplanted tissue could contain cancer cells that might prompt a recurrence of the cancer.
There were also two abortions during the study – one because the woman was separating from her partner and the other because of recurrent breast cancer.
Dr Jensen said: “As far as we know this is the largest series of ovarian tissue transplantation performed worldwide, and these findings show that grafted ovarian tissue is effective in restoring ovarian function in a safe manner”.
Dr Jensen said she hoped the study would “enable this procedure to be regarded as an established method in other parts of the world”.
The researchers stress the importance of following up women after such transplants.
The length of time the ovarian tissue remained active varied a lot, from less than a year for four women to more than 10 years for two women. A few women might have changed their minds about wanting to get pregnant.
These factors could be the reason that the numbers are still less.
The study gives us useful information about a type of fertility treatment not often used in the United Kingdom, but leaves the above questions unanswered.
Filed Under: HEALTH Tagged With: cancer, fertility, Health, Health News, IVF, News, ovarian cancer, Women Fertility
Facebook Introduces Emojis As A Reply To The Demand Of Dislike Button
World’s largest social networking website, Facebook, has finally released a solution to public’s demand of ‘dislike’ button, in the form of six new emoji which represent six different feelings.
In the latest release the website has started rolling out emoji that represent “Love”, “Haha”, “Yay”, “Wow”, “Sad” and “Angry”. The set of emoji is expected to compensate the people who did not want to ‘like’ a depressing or sad post on Facebook.
Previously a ‘Sympathise’ button had been touted but now Facebook seems to have decided upon a range of six emoticon based buttons to complement the well known ‘Like’ thumbs up icon.
The emojis will allow users to express themselves using “Like”, “Love”, “Wow”, “Haha”, “Yeah”, “Angry” and “Sad”. If successful, we can see the social network bringing more emotions as time goes on – but hopefully not too many.
Beginning tomorrow, users in Ireland and Spain will be able to access six other “Reactions” beyond the standard “Like” button. Recently, rumors surfaced that a Dislike button was on its way (although this was not only untrue, but also the source of numerous scams), but Mark Zuckerberg said that users would be given new ways to express empathy.
Mark Zuckerberg, the Chief Executive of Facebook, had previously announced that the company is working on much demanded ‘dislike’ button.
Speaking at a question-answer session Facebook founder said “People have asked about the dislike button for many years. We’ve finally heard you and we’re working on this and we will deliver something that meets the needs of the larger community.”
“What they really want is the ability to express empathy. Not every moment is a good moment,” Zuckerberg said.
Moreover Zuckerberg also cited the ongoing Syrian Refugee crisis saying that people cannot ‘like’ the death of their loved ones. “The like button doesn’t always convey true thoughts,” he said.
Earlier Zuckerberg had for years dismissed calls for such a button to accompany its “like”, to avoid a Reddit-style voting system.
Previously Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg had shied away from a ‘Dislike’ button as it could be open to abuse, easily causing a negative atmosphere on the social network. We will have to see how the Irish and Spanish users get on during the trial period, to see if the new range of ‘reactions’ causes any inflammatory argy-bargy, or worse.
As per the statement of Gareth Lambe; head of Facebook in Ireland, “With over two million Irish people actively logging onto Facebook every day, they’ll now have more ways to show how they feel – whether that’s happy, sad, funny or thought-provoking”. He was exited that Ireland’s Facebook community had been chosen as one of the first to test Facebook Reactions.
Facebook’s “Like” button was introduced back in 2009 and changed the way we interacted with other people on the social network – and it’s about to change again. You see a post about something going on in a part of the world, you’re upset and you want to acknowledge that so you “Like” it. It does seem like the “Like” feature in Facebook is rather limited in terms of what it can convey.
Neither partners nor individual users will be able to disable the Reactions feature, according to Facebook — which means marketers must steel themselves for “angry” or “sad” reactions, alongside “likes,” “loves” and “wows,” to material they share on the world’s biggest social network. The emojis will be available on Facebook web and mobile clients, across all News Feed and Pages posts.
Interestingly, Facebook’s move comes after summer smash hit Disney-Pixar’s “Inside Out,” which featured multi-hued characters personifying such emotions as joy, anger, fear and sadness. For mobile text messages, the Unicode standard has long included a range of gestures, including a thumbs-up, thumbs-down, an “OK” sign and a pair of hands clapping.
Filed Under: TECHNOLOGY Tagged With: Facebook, Facebook Dislike button, News, Technology, Technology News
Sony To Reduce PS 4 Price ; New Price Similar To Price Tag of Xbox One
Sony’s home console is ahead in total sales and the company wants to strangle the competition a bit more. Sony Computer Entertainment America has just revealed that they will cut the price of PlayStation 4 tomorrow. A $50 reduction is planned, so the new recommended price for a basic console is $349.99. This matches the recent price slash experienced in Japan, when 5000 yen was chopped off from the retail price of the console.
Currently, the Xbox One is available for $349 in some bundles, while Nintendo’s WiiU is the most affordable of this generation, coming in at $299.
Does this mean that Europe is next in line? We certainly hope so.
The $50 USD cut isn’t hugely surprising, seeing as retailer Target accidentally leaked it earlier this week. Just last month, Sony announced a PS4 price drop for those in Japan at Tokyo Game Show, leading one to believe a similar discount for other territories was on the horizon.
In fact, Head of Xbox Phil Spencer said he fully expected Sony to cut the price, suggesting a formal announcement would be made later this month during Sony’s press conference at Paris Games Week.
According to Sony, PlayStation 4 will now be available for $350:
“If you haven’t made the jump yet, and you’re starting early on your holiday wish list, I have good news – we’re dropping the price of the PlayStation 4 system in the U.S. and Canada. Starting tomorrow, October 9, you’ll be able to pick up PS4 starting at the new price of $349.99 USD / $429.99 CAD (MSRP). Our goal at PlayStation has always been to provide the best gameplay experiences at the best value, and we feel this new compelling price will open the doors to even more gamers that have yet to purchase a system.”
Price drop is only for U.S and Canada, as mentioned in this post. Along with this announcement, Sony shared new prices for upcoming bundles for PlayStation 4:
UNCHARTED: The Nathan Drake Collection PS4 Bundle – $349.99 USD /$429.99 CAD
Limited Edition Call of Duty: Black Ops III 1TB PS4 Bundle – $429.99 USD / $499.99 CAD
Limited Edition Disney Infinity 3.0: Star Wars PS4 Bundle – $399.99 USD / $469.99 CAD
Limited Edition Star Wars Battlefront PS4 Bundle – $399.99 USD / $469.99 CAD
Star Wars Battlefront PS4 Bundle – $349.99 USD / $429.99 CAD
NHL 16 PS4 Bundle(Available now, Canada only) – $429.99 CAD
Sony is doing well in the market around the world and is able to sell loads of PS4 units across the globe. This price drop will only further boost PS4 sales this holiday season.
Many systems came bundled with a game. The hotly-anticipated Star Wars: Battlefront game will come with the system for no additional cost in November.
Filed Under: TECHNOLOGY Tagged With: News, Play Station, PS4, PS4 Price, Sony, Technology, Technology News
VolksWagen Boss Admitted And Apologized For Diesel Scandal
According to both the US Environmental Protection Agency and one of its former officials, the well known diesel engine management program supplied by Bosch and used by a myriad of global automakers, including VW AG, has not been preprogrammed to cheat.
The EPA said that instead German carmaker VW AG decided to modify the engine software to power up all the vehicle’s emission control systems when it detected it was undergoing laboratory emissions testing, usually done on the dynamometer – a rolling test bed. The software then turned off the system when the vehicle was rolling under real-world conditions.
German supplier Robert Bosch GmbH – the biggest in the world – also supplies for example the same engine management system to luxury brand Mercedes-Benz, which declared its diesel models “are not fitted with software that can tell that the vehicle is on a test rig.” BMW Ag, the largest luxury carmaker on the planet, also using the Bosch provided engine software, declared its emissions control systems are always active.
Last month Volkswagen Ag admitted it rigged the engine software to cheat on diesel emissions testing in the United States and later acknowledged it installed the illegal software in 11 million autos around the world. Since Bosch delivers the engine control module, called EDC17, and basic software for most four-cylinder diesel cars sold in North America, authorities investigating the cheat also wondered if other carmakers using it decided to circumvent state and federal emissions standards.
The boss of Volkswagen US has admitted he was told in early 2014 about a “possible emissions non-compliance” at the company.
Michael Horn, the CEO of Volkswagen Group of America, has also apologised for the German carmaker’s actions, describing them as “deeply troubling”.
The apology and details about what Mr Horn knew of the emissions cheating are revealed in testimony he will present later today to a US House Committee investigating the scandal.
“I did not think something like this was possible at the Volkswagen Group,” he says in the written testimony.
“We have broken the trust of our customers, dealerships, and employees, as well as the public and regulators”.
Mr Horn said he was made aware of the “possible emissions non-compliance” following the publication of a West Virginia University study in spring 2014.
He said: “I was informed that EPA regulations included various penalties for non-compliance with the emissions standards and that the agencies can conduct engineering tests which could include ‘defeat device’ testing or analysis”.
“I was also informed that the company engineers would work with the agencies to resolve the issue”.
“Later in 2014, I was informed that the technical teams had a specific plan for remedies to bring the vehicles into compliance and that they were engaged with specific agencies about the process”.
This means that many people have bought cars which are less environmentally friendly than they were led to believe.
VW says 11 million cars are affected worldwide, including five million from its own brand, 2.1 million Audis and 1.2 million Skoda vehicles.
Meanwhile analysts at Investment advisers UBS say the full cost of the crisis for VW could amount to €35bn – it has set aside €6.5bn to date.
Filed Under: TECHNOLOGY Tagged With: News, Technology, Technology News, Volkswagen, VW Diesel Scandal
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/Horror
'Overlord' Featurette Goes Behind the Scenes of Horrifying Monster Makeup
By Patrick Cavanaugh - February 5, 2019 04:33 pm EST
In the sci-fi horror film Overlord, a group of soldiers encounters all manner of abominations when they uncover a plot by the Nazis to bring the dead back to life. Check out an exclusive look at a featurette from the film's home video release above, which is out now on Digital HD and hits 4K Ultra, Blu-ray, and DVD on February 19th.
In the film, with only hours until D-Day, a team of American paratroopers drop into Nazi-occupied France to carry out a mission that’s crucial to the invasion’s success. Tasked with destroying a radio transmitter atop a fortified church, the desperate soldiers join forces with a young French villager to penetrate the walls and take down the tower. But, in a mysterious Nazi lab beneath the church, the G.I.s come face-to-face with enemies unlike any the world has ever seen.
Per press release, "Fans can go even further behind enemy lines with nearly an hour of explosive bonus material on 4K Ultra HD Combo Pack, Blu-ray Combo Pack, or Digital. The 4K Ultra HD disc and 4K Ultra HD Digital release feature Dolby Vision HDR, which brings entertainment to life through ultra-vivid picture quality. When compared to a standard picture, Dolby Vision can deliver spectacular colors, highlights that are up to 40 times brighter, and blacks that are 10 times darker. The film also boasts Dolby Atmos audio mixed specifically for the home to place and move audio anywhere in the room, including overhead. In addition, both the 4K Ultra HD and Blu-ray Combo Packs include access to a Digital copy of the film.
"Nothing can prepare you for the mind-blowing mayhem that is Overlord, an insanely twisted thrill ride about a team of American paratroopers who come face-to-face with Nazi super-soldiers unlike the world has ever seen. Overlord stars Jovan Adepo, Wyatt Russell, Pilou Asbaek, John Magaro, Bokeem Woodbine and Mathilde Ollivier."
The film's special features are as follows:
The Horrors of War
Death Above
Death on the Ground
Death Below
Death No More
We at ComicBook.com claimed the film was one of the year's best horror outings, but we weren't the only ones, as Stephen King also praised the film following its release.
"Don't miss OVERLORD, coming November 9th. I've seen it, and it's as good--as scary-fun--as the early Spielberg," he posted on Twitter.
Overlord is out now on Digital HD and hits 4K Ultra, Blu-ray, and DVD on February 19th.
Will you be adding the film to your collection? Let us know in the comments below or hit up @TheWolfman on Twitter to talk all things horror and Star Wars!
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Category:Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet
James Fergusson
Governor of South Australia (1869-1873), and New Zealand (1873-1874)
United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
Governor-General of New Zealand (14 June 1873 – 3 December 1874)
Governor of South Australia (16 February 1869 – 18 April 1873)
Member of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1 October 1900 – 8 January 1906)
Member of the 26th Parliament of the United Kingdom (13 July 1895 – 17 September 1900)
Member of the 25th Parliament of the United Kingdom (4 July 1892 – 8 July 1895)
Member of the 24th Parliament of the United Kingdom (1 July 1886 – 28 June 1892)
Member of the 23rd Parliament of the United Kingdom (24 November 1885 – 26 June 1886)
Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom (11 July 1865 – 11 November 1868)
Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom (31 October 1859 – 6 July 1865)
Member of the 16th Parliament of the United Kingdom (30 December 1854 – 21 March 1857)
baronet
Sir Charles Fergusson, 7th Baronet
Work location
Library of Congress authority ID: no2011047925
Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet (es); ジェームズ・ファーガソン (第6代准男爵) (ja); James Fergusson (fr); James Fergusson (sv); ג'יימס פרגוסון (he); James Fergusson (nl); James Fergusson (ca); सर जेम्स फर्गसन (mr); James Fergusson, 6. Baronet (de); James Fergusson (en); James Fergusson, 6. baronet (sl); Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet (hu); Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet (it) político británico (es); ব্রিটিশ রাজনীতিবিদ (bn); politicien britannique (fr); Suurbritannia poliitik (et); polític britànic (ca); britischer Gouverneur von South Australia, Neuseeland und Bombay (de); politikan britanik (sq); سیاستمدار بریتانیایی (fa); britisk politiker (da); politician britanic (ro); brittisk politiker (sv); britisk politikar (nn); פוליטיקאי בריטי (he); Brits politicus (1832-1907) (nl); britisk politiker (nb); brittiläinen poliitikko (fi); Governor of South Australia (1869-1873), and New Zealand (1873-1874) (en); British politician (en-ca); político británico (gl); سياسي بريطاني (ar) Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet (en); サー・ジェームズ・ファーガソン (第6代準男爵) (ja)
Media in category "Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet"
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The World’s Most Popular Personality Test Is Total BS
Archit Tripathi
Are you an INTJ, or an ESFP? ISTP, or ENFJ?
Those are just some of the 16 possible results of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), one of the world’s most popular personality tests. You might have even taken it in the past, either just for fun online or at school/work as part of an evaluation. The MBTI has been around since 1942, and is regularly used by Fortune 100 companies, the federal government, and even the military to evaluate incoming candidates and assign them responsibilities and training based on what would be best for that “type.”
Taking the MBTI can cost you anywhere from $15-$40, and for $1,700 you can become a certified test administrator. With nearly 2 million people taking the test annually, it’s estimated that CPP – the company that produces and markets the test – makes close to $20 million off it per year.
Wow, it sure sounds legit, right? Too bad the MBTI is essentially meaningless.
According to Adam Grant, an organizational psychologist at Wharton, “The characteristics measured by the test have almost no predictive power on how happy you’ll be in a situation, how you’ll perform at your job, or how happy you’ll be in your marriage.”
A lot of this has to do with the way the test was created in the first place. The MBTI is based on ideas about personality that had been put forth by psychologist Carl Jung during the 1920s.
Carl Jung, Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Among these ideas was the notion that humans tend to either be “Perceivers” or “Judgers.” Each of these categories could be further split in two – Perceivers might prefer to either sense or intuit, and Judgers could be divided into thinkers or feelers. All of these types could then be divided one last time into being either generally introverted or generally extroverted. Even Jung, however, was careful to note that “Every individual is an exception to the rule,” and that these categories were mere approximations, not absolutes.
In the 1940s, housewife Isabel Briggs Myers and her mother, Katherine Briggs, adapted Jung’s ideas into a personality test. Troublingly, neither had any formal training in psychology and learned statistical analysis and test-making techniques from an HR manager at a Philadelphia bank.
Their test was devised such that people would get a single possibility in each of the four categories, based on answers to a series of two-choice questions. As a finishing touch, they gave colorful titles like “The Executive,” “The Caregiver,” “The Scientist,” and so on, to each of the 16 possibilities.
The problem with all this is that most human traits tend to be somewhere along a spectrum. In fact, Jung himself stated that while binaries are a useful tool to think about people, it’d be silly to assume that someone is entirely one way or the other. “There is no such thing as a pure extrovert or a pure introvert,” he wrote. “Such a man would be in the lunatic asylum.”
It’s reported that nearly 50% of people who take the MBTI get completely different results if they take the test again a few weeks later.
Sadly, the MBTI doesn’t make this distinction and is built on the basis that people must either be one thing or the other, with very little room for gray areas. For example, it asks questions like “Do you tend to sympathize with other people?” and gives only “yes” or “no” as choices. It’s not hard to see how a person’s answer to a question like that could change depending on how their day might have been going. As another example, imagine being forced to choose exclusively between thinking or feeling – do you know any sane person who only does one and not the other?
All of the results of the MBTI are intentionally flattering (and often vaguely applicable to anyone) because it sells more tests.
Most damningly, data from the MBTI itself shows that people tend to be more in the middle for any given category, but get pigeonholed into being one or the other exclusively because of the way the test is designed.
Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons (Click here for full size)
All of this ambiguity has led to a lot of inconsistency as well. It’s reported that nearly 50% of people who take the MBTI get completely different results if they take the test again a few weeks later. That’s certainly not encouraging for a test that’s marketed by CPP as being reliable and scientifically valid. While there are technically plenty of studies confirming this assertion, it’s important to note that they’ve all been published in journals with dubious standing in the scientific community, and the majority of the research was funded by CPP itself.
It’s also interesting to consider that of all the possible results you can get from the MBTI, not one of them mentions common traits like being lazy, selfish, or just plain mean. It’s not that these kinds of negative personality traits don’t exist, but if you’d just paid $40 to learn about yourself, you wouldn’t exactly be thrilled by the negativity. All of the results of the MBTI are intentionally flattering (and often vaguely applicable to anyone) because it sells more tests.
Within the psychological community, the MBTI is almost completely disregarded for research purposes. Mentions of it tend to come mostly in a historical context, and current personality tests administered by psychologists are a far cry from the test created by Myers and Briggs. In fact, Stanford psychologist Carl Thoresen, who is a CPP board member, even admitted to the Washington Post that using the MBTI in actual research “would be questioned by my academic colleagues.”
While the Myers-Briggs test was certainly a significant innovation in the early days of psychology, the fact of the matter is that in 2018, we can do a lot better. There are several, much more scientifically valid tests out there, including the “Big Five” personality model which has produced consistent results in testing and has even shown promise predicting job success. At this point in time, the MBTI should be considered in the same light as a horoscope: fun to think about, but hardly valid enough to live by.
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You Can Now Spend a Night At Kurt Cobain’s Los Angeles Apartment
Michael Haskoor
With Brett Morgen's highly anticipated documentary on Kurt Cobain: Montage of Heck, approaching its May 4 release date, fans have been taking a much closer look into the life and times of the departed grunge rocker. Now, thanks to apartment rental site Airbnb, you can get even closer to the Nirvana frontman's past by spending a night (or a few) in his former Los Angeles residence.
The fully renovated one bedroom apartment, which is located in Fairfax/Melrose, was supposedly a place of residence for Cobain and Courtney Love between 1991 to 1992. A one-night stay will run you only $150 a night, and if you're looking to stay for a while, you can splurge on $798 per week and $3,800 per month. Check out all of the listing's details here, or check out the renovated pictures below. We'd say it's kept a bit nicer than Kurt kept it in the '90s (pictured above).
The owner of the unit wrote about the listing: “At the time, Kurt was focused on songwriting and his artwork, much of which was created in the apartment. He was particularly into painting during this time and even decorated the walls in the living room and bedroom. His favorite spot in the house: the bathtub. In it, he wrote the song 'Heart-Shaped Box.'”
Next: Hole's 'Live Through This' Legacy 21 Years Later
Filed Under: Courtney Love, Kurt Cobain, Nirvana
Categories: Music, News
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Listen to Imagine Dragons’ New Song, ‘I Bet My Life’
Tim Karan
Christopher Polk, Getty Images
If you're a fan of Imagine Dragons and you're ready to hear something brand new, today is a good day.
The Las Vegas modern rockers have unveiled 'I Bet My Life,' the first song from their eagerly anticipated sophomore album. The song was produced by the band themselves and will appear on the album -- the title of which has not yet been revealed -- expected to drop next year.
Check out the single artwork:
KIDinaKORNER/Interscope
Frontman Dan Reynolds said in a press release that the new track is a personal one for him. "This song is about the relationship I've had with my parents throughout the years," he said. "At times it's been strained and difficult, but in the end, 'I Bet My Life' celebrates the bond that we still hold on to."
Listen to the song below or download it here:
Next: Imagine Dragons Release New Song, 'Warriors'
Filed Under: Imagine Dragons
Categories: Music, News, Songs
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Mission Blog #4 ~ Choose Your Own Adventure
Recently a publishing company I had inquired about 2 years ago called me and asked if I’d be interested in signing with them. Little did I know, that one phone call would make me think about the choices I had made in publishing the way I did. Self-publishing, that is.
To those wondering which avenue to go in, it’s really a personal choice. A ‘choose your own adventure’ kind of choice if you will.
When it came to the first “Ultimate Agent”, everything was leading to the ‘for fun’ category. Just the fact that it would be published, in the flesh… ahem, paper! No doubt once you’ve got that hard earned wonder of words in your hands, it’ll be an exciting day!
When it comes to self-publishing though, then there’s the learning curve of social media, marketing, advertising, platforms… do you really want the hassle of looking after all of that? You’ve already spent so much time slaving away at that novel.
The company that called said that marketing was part of the lowest priced package. I will say, I almost jumped at it. But the humble-living carpenter in me kept me in my seat. Would it really be worth it to get a package worth $800? Is it crazy to invest that kind of money in something that may never even leave the shelf of bookstores?
It’s true though, marketing isn’t easy. Especially when you’ve never done anything like it before. You need the website, Facebook page, Twitter account, Instagram, Pinterest… when does it end? Is it all worth it?
Sometimes it can get to the point of “why bother?” and you can lose your joy in doing something you once loved. Lately, that thought has entered my mind a few times. Do I want to be a NY Times Bestseller? It’d be nice! How would I feel about getting a movie deal? Hey, I can dream! But I don’t see myself getting there.
That’s when you have to look around and realize good aspects of being an author. No doubt family and friends have been the biggest support, as is the case with myself. Thanks to them and other sales, the 2 UA novels so far have combined to sell almost 80 copies. Not too shabby at all! Huge thanks continues to go out to all that have shown their awesome support!
Some say they liked it, some say they loved it. There’s even a friend younger than myself that can’t wait for the 3rd novel to be released next year.
It’s those things that make it worthwhile. You have to focus on those aspects, the support, the true fans. These good things far outweigh the bad. You just have to keep on writing, and enjoy the ride.
Please leave a comment on the ‘adventure’ you chose, and the good things that you’ve enjoyed on the way and now.
D. R. J. Borne
Mission Blog Complete
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Home>Water>Groundwater>Aquifers>Fractured Rock Aquifer
Confined & Unconfined Aquifers
Dual Porosity Aquifers
Fractured Rock Aquifer
Intergranular Aquifer
Karst Aquifers
In fractured rock aquifers, groundwater is stored in the fractures, joints, bedding planes and cavities of the rock mass. Water availability is largely dependent on the nature of the fractures and their interconnection.
In Tasmania, most fractured rocks are of pre-Tertiary age (> 65 million years old) and include a wide range of sedimentary, igneous and metamorphic rocks where there are essentially no primary pore spaces.
The wide distribution of fractured rock aquifers in Tasmania makes them a valuable source of water for livestock and domestic requirements, and in some areas irrigation supplies.
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Pakatan turns to Federal Court to nullify GE13 results
Posted on November 18, 2014 by Dr. Dzul
BY V. ANBALAGAN, ASSISTANT NEWS EDITOR (TMI)
Pakatan Rakyat alleges that the 2013 general election was not free and fair because of the indelible ink fiasco. – The Malaysian Insider file pic, November 18, 2014.
More than 18 months after GE13, Pakatan Rakyat (PR) will make another attempt to nullify the results at the Federal Court to argue that the general election in 2013 was not free and fair because of the indelible ink fiasco.
Lawyer Americk Sidhu said the litigants have given instruction to go to the Federal Court despite the decision of two lower courts to allow the Election Commission (EC) to strike out their suit without a trial being held.
Americk said the plaintiffs, among whom were those who lost in the May 5 general election in 2013, had planned to call witnesses to give evidence during the hearing.
“The clients now want us to apply for leave in the Federal Court to appeal against the majority Court of Appeal,” he told The Malaysian Insider.
The Court of Appeal on November 7 affirmed the ruling of the High Court that the litigants could only challenge election results by filing petitions before an election court.
The majority ruling said this was the only option for the aggrieved parties as it was provided under Article 118 of the Federal Constitution.
“A civil court has no jurisdiction to hear the matter and the application to remove election commissioners,” said Court of Appeal judge Datuk Alizatul Khair Osman, who delivered the majority ruling with Datuk Rohana Yusof.
However, the dissenting judge, Dr Prasad Sandosham Abraham, said a trial should be held to determine whether the EC had breached its constitutional duty.
“I believe that the split decision in the Court of Appeal is also an inspiration to obtain leave from the apex court to hear the appeal,” Americk said.
The litigants have until December 5 to file their court papers which must include framing legal questions of public importance for the Federal Court’s approval.
“That should not be a problem because the suit has definitely brought about novel issues to be argued,” Americk added.
On February 7 this year, High Court judge Rosnaini Saub ruled that it was wrong for the opposition and several defeated candidates to challenge the election results in a civil court.
The EC had taken the stand that the High Court had no civil jurisdiction to declare the election results as illegal.
PR first filed the suit last year, asking the court to set aside the results of all parliamentary seats, as well as to disband the current EC leadership and to conduct fresh polls.
In its statement of claim, PR said the unprecedented move was necessary because of the indelible ink fiasco, which it said caused massive cheating in the polls.
Apart from PKR, DAP and PAS, the other plaintiffs are opposition candidates Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad, M. Manogaran, Saifuddin Nasution Ismail and voters Arifin Rahman and R. Rajoo.
Rosnaini said the suit in essence was to challenge the election results because of the EC’s failure to carry out its duties to conduct properly the GE13.
“The power to declare an election void is in the exclusive jurisdiction of an election judge, not with the High Court,” she had said.
She said the suit was also flawed because the plaintiffs did not name as parties all the candidates who won their parliamentary seats.
In the last general election, Barisan Nasional returned to power after winning 133 seats while the remaining 89 seats went to PR.
Rosnaini said the High Court also has no jurisdiction to remove EC members from office. “The EC members can only be removed from office just like a judge of the Federal Court, that is, following recommendations by a tribunal appointed by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong.”
Lawyer Tommy Thomas, who argued for the plaintiffs, had submitted that the EC committed fraud on the Malaysian public as the indelible ink could be washed away for it did not remain on the fingers for five days after voting.
Thomas said the EC’s argument that election results could only be challenged through a petition was tantamount to denying the plaintiff access to justice through other civil actions.
Before filing the suit, PKR vice-president Nurul Izzah Anwar had accused EC chairman Tan Sri Abdul Aziz Mohd Yusuf and his then deputy chairman, Datuk Wan Ahmad Wan Omar, of lying about the indelible ink and making contradictory statements regarding its silver nitrate content.
“We have necessary documents and evidence against the EC. You cannot keep changing your statements regarding the silver nitrate from 5% to 7% to only 1% and later, it is akin to food colouring,” she had told an electoral forum organised by the Malaysian Bar Council.
The report of the People’s Tribunal on the election stated that it was not conducted in a free and fair manner, with many violations to electoral laws.
The tribunal, made up of local and foreign experts, was formed to probe into electoral fraud in GE13.
Bersih 2.0 chairperson Maria Chin Abdullah said the tribunal’s verdict concluded that the EC failed to deliver a free and fair election, and “we do not know whether that has been the case in previous elections”.
She said the election results had been determined because of malapportionment and gerrymandering where a simple majority was guaranteed for BN.
“This can’t continue. We have the evidence and if it continues in the next general election, we will fight back.” – November 18, 2014
– See more at: http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/pakatan-turns-to-federal-court-to-nullify-ge13-results#sthash.czVbgGXL.dpuf
Lest you missed it…Emerging Discourse..on ‘How Islamist Democrats would mitigate Extremism and Bigotry’.
1-MDB: Kemuncak Keculasan Tadbir-Urus Kewangan Najib!
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Place of birth: : San Bernardino, California, USA
Also Known as : LaKeith Stanfield
Lakeith Lee "Keith" Stanfield (born August 12, 1991) is an American actor and rapper. He made his feature film debut in Short Term 12 (2013), for which he was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award. In 2014, he co-starred in the horror film The Purge: Anarchy and in the Martin Luther King biopic Selma, as civil right activist Jimmie Lee Jackson. Stanfield appeared in the film Dope (2015). He played rapper Snoop Dogg in the biopic about the hip-hop group N.W.A, Straight Outta Compton (2015), and will appear in the upcoming Oliver Stone biopic Snowden (2015). Stanfield was born in San Bernardino, California and grew up in Riverside and Victorville, California. He has said that he "grew up very poor in a fractured family that was dysfunctional on both sides". He decided to become an actor when he was 14 years old, when he joined his high school's drama club. He attended the John Casablancas Modeling and Career Center in Los Angeles, where he was signed by an agency manager and began to audition for commercials. Stanfield's first role was in the short film Short Term 12 (2009), which was filmmaker Destin Daniel Cretton's thesis project at San Diego State University, and won the Jury Award for U.S. Short Filmmaking at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. A year later, he appeared in the short film Gimme Grace (2010), before he gave up acting for several years. He went on to work a number of different jobs—roof work, gardening, at AT&T, and at a legal marijuana factory—before he was contacted by Cretton to reappear in a feature-length adaptation of Short Term 12, his first feature film. For the duration of the film's production, Stanfield practiced method acting, distancing himself from the other cast members like his character, Marcus. He was the only actor to appear in both the short and feature films. Short Term 12 won the Grand Jury Prize for Best Narrative Feature at the 2013 South by Southwest film festival, and Stanfield was nominated for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male. The film featured "Vicious", a rap song co-written with Milgaten, and "So You Know What It's Like", a rap song co-written with Cretton, which a number of Oscar pundits predicted would be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song, although it did not ultimately receive a nomination. In 2014, Stanfield co-starred in The Purge: Anarchy and Selma, in the latter playing civil rights activist Jimmie Lee Jackson. He is set to appear in James Franco's upcoming film Memoria and in Don Cheadle's Miles Ahead. Stanfield will also star in the fantasy horror thriller film King Ripple, by the Michigan filmmaker Luke Jaden, and the music video for the Run the Jewels song "Close Your Eyes (And Count to Fuck)". In 2015, he portrayed rapper Snoop Dogg in the biopic Straight Outta Compton. Description above from the Wikipedia article Keith Stanfield, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.
The Girl in the Spider's Web (2018)
Death Note (2017)
Sorry to Bother You (2018)
War Machine (2017)
Someone Great (2019)
Dope (2015)
Short Term 12 (2013)
The Incredible Jessica James (2017)
Miles Ahead (2015)
Izzy Gets the F*ck Across Town (2018)
Come Sunday (2018)
Knives Out (2019)
Memoria (2016)
Crown Heights (2017)
Quest (2017)
LaZercism (2017)
Let's Dance (2018)
Live Cargo (2016)
Uncut Gems
Candyman (2020)
Time of Day (2018)
Tracks (2015)
King Ripple (2015)
The Fires, Howling (2014)
Waves (2014)
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Dornsife School of Public Health
A.J. Drexel Autism Institute
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About Dornsife
The Dornsife School of Public Health at Drexel University was founded on the principle of health as a human right and the recognition of the importance of social justice as a means to achieve health for all. We define health broadly to encompass physical, mental and social well-being and not merely as the absence of disease or infirmity. We view the focus on the health of populations as a distinguishing feature of the field of public health.
Our focus on population health requires us to consider not only the characteristics of individuals but also the broader social, economic, and policy contexts of health. It also implies that a broad range of actions and policies beyond those of the health care system can substantially impact health.
Improving population health requires a fundamental commitment to social justice and the elimination of inequities in health. The goal of improving population health also cannot be achieved without meaningful and sustained partnerships. Our School is committed to providing rigorous evidence and training, to building equitable partnerships, and to translating knowledge into actions that improve population health and reduce health inequities.
Our mission is to provide education, conduct research, and partner with communities and organizations to improve the health of populations. We view health as a human right and have a special commitment to improving health in cities, eliminating health disparities, and promoting health in all policies.
Dornsife SPH faculty, staff and students are committed to the following:
Health as a human right and the importance of social justice to health
Integrity, rigor, critical thinking, and self-reflection in research, scholarship, and education
Translation of knowledge into actions to improve population health and eliminate health disparities
Sustainable and equitable community partnerships
Inclusiveness, diversity, empathy and respect for others regardless of position or status
Human dignity and open and honest dialogue
Service to local communities while recognizing the value of a global perspective
The Dornsife School of Public Health is located in Nesbitt Hall at the corner of 33rd and Market Streets, at the heart of University City in Philadelphia, within easy access to Center City and blocks from 30th Street Station.
About Drexel
The 16th largest private university in the nation with more than 8,000 employees and 22,000 students, Drexel University comprises 10 colleges and 3 schools offering professional degrees in engineering, architecture, media arts design, business, law, medicine, nursing, and public health, among others. Drexel University is known for its historic commitment to experiential learning. The University's goal to become "the most civically engaged university in America" drives its work with the City of Philadelphia and diverse community partners. The Drexel campus is located within a short walk of the Amtrak and regional rail stations in the University City section of Philadelphia, a vibrant city with a rich array of health care, educational, and arts institutions.
Dornsife Strategic Plan
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Read the Dornsife School of Public Health's Winter 2018 Research Issue.
Read or download (pdf)
Sign up to receive our monthly e-newsletter, full of research, policy, news and event information from the Dornsife School of Public Health.
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Drexel Dornsife School of Public Health, Nesbitt Hall, 3215 Market St., Philadelphia, PA, 19104, 267.359.6000, © All Rights Reserved
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Tag Archive for: Quality
You are here: Home / News / Quality
What is Contract Manufacturing?
February 5, 2019 /in Business Matters /by Dure Foods
Contract manufacturing is often called private label manufacturing and refers to an agreement where a firm hires a third-party contract manufacturer to produce products components or a final product.
The Purpose of Contract Manufacturing
Contract manufacturing is a form of outsourcing that allows firms to have their products produced by specialist manufacturers. Third-party contract manufacturers typically specialize in one of the following:
Product assembly
Product component manufacturing
Contract marketing is a business model that is implemented by many industries over the world, including the technology, medical, pharmaceutical, food, and cosmetics industry.
Benefits of Contract Manufacturing
There are several benefits to contract manufacturing including:
Lower Input Costs per Unit
Since the hiring firm doesn’t produce their products, they don’t need factories and the necessary production equipment. Labour costs are also typically lower, especially if the contract manufacturer operates in a low-cost country like China.
Contract manufacturers are also better suited to benefit from economies of scale, especially if they purchase large quantities of raw materials for several clients. As a rule, the cost per unit decreases as the number of units in once shipment increases.
Mutual Long-term Benefits
Contracts between hiring companies and contract manufacturers that last for years are beneficial to contract manufacturers in that they represent a steady flow of business.
Long-term benefits are also beneficial to the hiring company since the contract manufacturers eventually gain extensive knowledge about the hiring company’s product requirements.
Established contract manufacturers have extensive quality control policies in place to detect defects or poor quality at an early stage.
The hiring company may not necessarily have the skills and equipment to produce high-quality products from raw materials in a cost-effective manner. One of the most prominent benefits of a relationship with a contract manufacturer is that it allows the hiring firm to take advantage of these skills.
Emphasis on Core Competencies
By leaving production to specialists, hiring firms free their resources to focus on their core competencies and strengths.
Risks of Contract Manufacturing
By entering into a contract manufacturing agreement, the hiring company forgoes a high degree of control over the production process. High-end contract manufacturers will, however, work with the hiring company to meet their requirements.
Inherent Risks
Outsourcing production or assembly can be risky, especially if the contract manufacturer is in another country. Working with local contract manufacturers may mitigate risks such as long lead times, language barriers, and cultural differences.
Lacking Flexibility
If a hiring company outsources the production of their goods, responding to fluctuations in demand can be a challenge. Lacking flexibility can be particularly problematic if the hiring firm does not constitute a large portion of the contract manufacturer’s business.
Contract manufacturing is a valuable model for role players in the food industry. If you’re in the food industry, and you want to build on the strengths of your business and need a partner to take care of the production end, head over to Dure Foods to learn more.
https://durefoods.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/What-is-Contract-Manufacturing.jpg 720 1280 Dure Foods https://durefoods.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logo-2.png Dure Foods2019-02-05 15:15:362019-02-05 15:15:36What is Contract Manufacturing?
The Growth Journey of Our Family Business
October 16, 2017 /in Trends, Facts and Fun! /by Dure Foods
As a family company, Dure Foods Ltd. started out small and still remains small enough to truly care for each and every product and customer. Over it’s almost 40-year life span, Dure Foods has been building a family company based on our original values to create a trustworthy brand that creates quality food products.
Despite the setbacks and challenges that growing a family business poses, Dure Foods has successfully scaled while maintaining strong commitment to our community, our standards, and our core mission.
The idea for Dure Foods was conceived by Scott Malcolm in 1978 and began operating under this one-man team. He rented a corner space in a dilapidated Brantford, Ontario, warehouse to begin filling orders for liquid dish soap, Dure’s first product.
Malcolm hired his first employee to help him at the warehouse, and they grew such a strong bond that the two still work together today.
Initial Stages of Growth
By the end of the first five years of operation, Malcolm was able to hire a staff of five to help him pack soap, sugar, and coffee whiteners. Building off the specialty coffee trend of the 90s, Dure Foods began developing products within this niche. Our company found success with flavoured cappuccino mixes and began growing exponentially.
Soon after, Malcolm was able to construct a brand new packaging facility and even added on additional square footage a few years later to add more loading docks and rooms for production.
The Family Business
Scott Malcolm’s two sons later joined him in the family business, flanking him to help direct and guide the company through the many stages of growth, learning, and success. The three of them faced the same challenges large corporations must deal with, but as a smaller team with fewer resources, it proved to be a bit more testing.
They needed to remain ahead of the competition, constantly innovating and finding something unique they could add to the market. Eventually they found a successful and comfortable niche in fine blended powders such as coffee drinks, soup bases, teas, mousses, gravies and creamers.
Another challenge came in building relationships with both suppliers and with customers in order to provide the best products and receive the best reactions. For a small company like Dure Foods, there are fewer connections already built-in, and these relationships must be forged from the ground up through our own dedication to networking and pitching.
While this was a large challenge to the Malcolms, it also provided an opportunity for Dure Foods to create authentic relationships formed out of genuine alignment of values and goals, rather than out of corporate loyalty or industrial red tape.
Maintenance of Quality and Values
Even after building up a large team of production staff and executive members, Dure Foods has still been able to maintain the closeness and care that the original one-man operation began with.
Despite the extra complications that a family-operated business must take on compared to corporations, Dure Foods has been able to remain in a period of growth and success since its founding due to its primary goal of producing incredibly high-quality food products to each and every customer.
Support family businesses and trustworthy products by ordering, or contacting us today!
https://durefoods.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Growth.jpg 720 1280 Dure Foods https://durefoods.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logo-2.png Dure Foods2017-10-16 11:48:232019-01-22 17:22:54The Growth Journey of Our Family Business
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You are here: Home / News / General News / Trends, Facts and Fun! / The Origins of the Vending Machine and Its Continued Use Today
The Origins of the Vending Machine and Its Continued Use Today
February 8, 2018 /in Trends, Facts and Fun! /by Dure Foods
There is one appliance that just about anyone will benefit from, whether it’s located in your school, hotel, or office building: a vending machine. Vending machines are man’s gift to humankind, automatic 24/7 food machines. You never have to wonder if they will be closed or open for business.
Vending machines give the assurance that there will always be food available. Not to mention, they always offer some all-time favourite snacks. In our nearly cashless society, vending machines also provide a convenient and rewarding way to get rid of some loose pocket change. Vending machines represent one of the most innovative inventions. Learn more about the origins of vending machines and how it used today:
How They Came To Be
We can all thank the genius man behind this invention, Heron of Alexandria. He actually invented many important things that set the stage for our modern society. Long ago as early as 10 AD to 70 AD, Heron was motivated to create the first “dispenser” when people were taking too much holy water from the temples where they worshipped.
It became a frustrating problem, so Heron created a clever solution. He invented a holy water dispenser, where people had to drop a token inside the machine, then the token would push down a lever that opened a small door to release an exact amount of holy water. This ensured that no one was taking more than their fair share of holy water.
Modern society didn’t even embrace his invention for almost 1,800 years. In 1883, an inventor named Percival Everett took the idea and created a vending machine for postcards and notepaper.
Outburst of Vending Machines
Nowadays, of course, the vending machine has been adapted for everyday convenience, serving snacks, drinks, coffee. Today the vending machine industry has earned about $20 billion dollars in revenue each year in the U.S. They became increasingly popular throughout schools, office buildings, hotels, and hospitals.
There are now about 8 million vending machines in America alone. It is almost impossible to find a building of any type that does not have some sort of vending machine.
Innovative minds are also coming up with new uses for vending machines. Depending on where you are in the world, there are vending machines that now serve books, phones and tablets, alcohol, ramen and soup, cupcakes, and other wild items.
Different Types of Vending Machines:
There are a plethora of different vending machine options for food and drinks available today:
Some vending machines contain only candy. You definitely won’t be finding one of these in a school, however they are common in large crowded buildings. Candy machines often offer chocolate bars, chewy candy, hard candy, and more.
Soda/Drinks
Drink vending machines are the most popular kind. Drink machines often stick to a theme such as soda beverages, sports and health drinks, water, teas, energy drinks, and more.
Coffee vending machines are still fairly new and are often seen in office buildings.
Other forms of vending machines today:
Toiletries and Feminine Products
The innovative developments in vending machines offers an exciting moment for food manufacturers. For powdered food such as creamers, dry blends for coffee vending machines, and much more, contact Dure Foods today!
Tags: Vending Machine Products
https://durefoods.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Vending-Machine.jpg 720 1280 Dure Foods https://durefoods.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/logo-2.png Dure Foods2018-02-08 13:18:442019-01-22 17:22:54The Origins of the Vending Machine and Its Continued Use Today
Of Men and Mousse What Is a Private Label, and How Do You Set One Up?
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SNP Deputy Leader backs ‘Shoot-to-kill’
Stewart Hosie. Photo courtesy of Cicero Group/Flickr
The SNP Deputy Leader has given his backing to a ‘shoot-to-kill’ policy.
Stewart Hosie has said that he stands by the right of the police to ‘shoot-to-kill’ if someone was posing a “real and immediate risk” to life.
As news filtered through that at least two people had died during a police raid in the Paris suburb of Saint Denis, Mr Hosie told the Good Morning Scotland programme:
“If a terrorist runs down Sauchiehall Street, God forbid, or Whitehall with a Kalashnikov and a police officer has a split-second decision to make, then the choice in terms of public safety is very clear.
“I think if someone is posing a real and immediate risk to the lives of many hundreds or thousands of people then of course one has to trust the police to take the necessary action.”
“We have seen the news reports from Saint Denis this morning. These people won’t be arrested. One of the people who was subject to the police investigations this morning blew herself up with a suicide belt apparently.
“There is no negotiating with someone who has a suicide belt strapped to them, who is prepared to fire hundreds of rounds at civilians with a machine gun.
“Split second decisions require to be made and we all hope they are the right ones but I certainly would trust the police in those circumstances.”
This morning police raided a flat in Saint Denis leaving two people dead after a woman detonated a suicide belt. The raid involved gunfire and explosions as armed police searched for the suspects of Friday’s attacks.
Callum Steele of the Scottish Police Federation condemned such discussion saying that it “raises tensions and brings additional and unnecessary emotion into what is by any measure a difficult topic.
“Fewer than 2% of the police service in Scotland is routinely armed. They are highly skilled, highly trained and we should allow them to use their professional judgement without interference from politicians.”
This week Jeremy Corbyn announced that he would not be happy with a ‘shoot-to-kill’ policy if terrorists threatened the UK. The Labour leader has since been criticised by his own MPs.
These comments follow the Paris terrorist attack which claimed the lives of almost 130 people. Earlier today French President Francois Hollande repeated his claim that his country’s at war with Islamic State which is also know as Daesh.
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Filed Under: Local, News, Top Five, Top Story Tagged With: Paris, Police, shoot-to-kill, SNP, Stewart Hosie
« Concerns over ‘unprecedented’ rise in cyber crime
Saint Denis raid- update »
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DJ Ara bags international award
Aravinda Lokuge (DJ Ara) has won the Most Admired RJ with the International Fame Gold Award at the eighth Global Customer Engagement Awards under the individual category.
The awards ceremony is organized by the ACEF Global Customer Engagement Forum and was held at the Westin Hotel in Mumbai on the 25th of last month.
Johar, a renowned Indian cinema director, star actress Karina Kapur and star actor Ranbir Kapoor also received awards and for the first time a Sri Lankan radio announcer received this award at the event.
However, due to the current situation in the country he did not go to India to receive the award, and he had sent a special video clip to the organizers.
The video of the award ceremony and Aravinda's message can be viewed below.
Last modified on Friday, 03 May 2019 10:36
More in this category: « Rami Malek to play James Bond villain Delay saved my family's lives - Dinesh »
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Vol. 5, No. 2, BOOK REVIEWS, Krisna UK
The Barefoot Anthropologist: The Highlands of Champa and Vietnam in the Words of Jacques Dournes
Andrew Hardy
Chiang Mai: Silkworm Books, 2015, 160p.
The Barefoot Anthropologist follows the footprints left by the unconventional priest-turned-anthropologist Jacques Dournes. This is an excellent book about this unusual scholar haut en couleurs who spent a large part—indeed, the best part—of his life in the highlands of central Vietnam.
The first section of the book is an exploration of Pötao, une théorie du pouvoir chez les Indochinois jörai written by Dournes in 1977. This is a seminal text in our understanding of the ways the Jarai organized themselves politically, but it also gives a greater insight into how the political is enmeshed with the cultural, the social, and the religious, without which the Pötao would have no raison d’être. The text is complex in its form because Dournes’s writing style in some ways is a mimicry of how the Jarai world is configured. As Hardy notes, Dournes’s writing is “circular” and for good reason, since the Jarai world is made up of multiple spheres. The economic, the political, the judiciary, the religious, the profane, and the social create a sophisticated system that overlaps and intersects in the middle where the anthropologist stands barefoot in the mud. This point of intersection is also where he can best make sense of all these interconnections that define the Jarai’s way of thinking. As Dournes explains in Florilège jörai (1987), the Jarai world and its myths work like a piece of interwoven fabric, made of “repetitions, redundancies, rhythms and symbolisms” that explain one another in a vastly rich system of associations (ibid., 168). However, Dournes also warns us, sometimes it is better not to try to interpret (as with dreams): “you just take them the way they are” (p. 131).
Hardy’s rereading of Dournes brings in interesting new analyses of the meanings, roles, and responsibilities of the Pötao. As explained on page 41, Pötao, evoking the “Cham word for lord and master,” has been translated by various scholars such as Charles Meyer as “king” and “prince.” The word is also interpreted by Grégory Mikaelian as “nephews” of the Khmer king, who at the end of the nineteenth century used them to consolidate his political power. With their complex yet complementary powers, the Pötao of fire, the Pötao of wind, and the Pötao of water harmonized the relationships linking man with man, and man with nature (p. 40). Yet this harmonizing power extended well beyond the frontiers of the Jarai territory in Vietnam and Cambodia and served to maintain peace, stability, and the viability of commerce along specific trade routes that wound their way through the highlands.
Hardy’s exploration of the Jarai-Cham connection raises important lines of inquiry about the historicity, physical borders, and cultural exchanges between the two groups. The argument is not forcefully made so as to leave enough room for the reader to ponder the limits of such powerful interactions and undertake his/her own investigation on the subject.
The second section is an attempt to portray Dournes through his own words by means of English translation. No professional translator would say that this is an easy task, especially for such a person who was not only answering questions but was also “performing.” This is where the limits of the English translation are in the lack of rendition of “Dournes the comedian,” who is more forcefully visible and audible in the appendix. For those who can read French, the original text is worth trying. It enlightens the reader by giving unique insights into Dournes’s exceptional personality and way of thinking.
The afterword by the anthropologist Oscar Salemink takes a few steps back so as to effectively recontextualize Jacques Dournes. The descriptions of key moments in his life, his attachment to the highlands of Vietnam, the richness of the work produced while “exiled in France,” the criticisms he received from his peers, as well as his vitriolic responses to them help create yet another dimension in our attempt to comprehend the barefoot anthropologist.
This section also emphasizes how Dournes never felt that he belonged to France, hence his urge to leave the country after being ordained at a relatively young age and the enduring feeling of déracinement (being uprooted) toward the end of his life as a scholar in Paris. This hybrid identity blossomed in the fertile ground of the highlands under the green fingers of his friends: “They are the ones who cultivated me” (p. 121); “I’ve learnt everything over there” (p. 124).
His belonging to different worlds, or none at the same time, as in Giorgio Agamben’s Homo sacer, is better illustrated in the ways Jarai women would come to him in the morning to “get rid of their dreams” and for him to “set them free” (p. 131). This is, as Dournes pointed out, a privileged situation for an anthropologist whose informants (especially female ones) allowed him into the deepest recesses of their consciousness, whether motivated by trust or anxiety. For Dournes, “theoretically I was stronger” (p. 131), but for the women he was also endowed with the power to take over their burden. This is even more significant given the most beautiful and poetic book he dedicated to the Jarai woman in 1993: Forêt, femme, folie: Une traversée de l’imaginaire joraï. In this, she is the one with the magical power to transcend both the world of the living and the abode of the spirits.
The appendix is a series of original conversations between the author and Dournes. It is probably the best section of the book, and it fully brings Dournes to life. Again, French speakers will agree that it is difficult to properly render the verve of Dournes’s discourse. It is full of humor, sarcasm, and poetry at the same time. This unique snippet of conversation enables us to witness Dournes not only as an anthropologist but also as a magnificent comedian and Jarai storyteller. Dournes himself repeats it many times during his conversation with Hardy: “I am a comedian” (pp. 103, 120, 123–124); “It comes back to me and I could say it again but differently, in another way, in other circumstances” (p. 125); “I’ve learnt how to tell stories” (pp. 135–136).
It is most interesting to see how Dournes brushes off topics he is not interested in talking about. As he mentions, his main interest lies in “the culture, the techniques, the oral literature” (p. 118) and “the poetic” (p. 119). This is where meanings come from. The various short conversations about the war between 1946 and 1954, which pitted the Vietnamese against the French, are barely touched upon and considered mere “comedy” (p. 101). The word “comedy” here may not only be understood literally, that is, as a performance that intends to be humorous, but also in the sense that there is something profoundly absurd in it since there are more important things to care about such as the Jarai culture, techniques, oral literature, and poetic legends.
In the same way, Dournes teases out what is important and what is less important when pondering the Jarai economy. This is less about money than about storytellers, artists, and musicians for whom money has no place (p. 123). Some of the logic and beauty of the reasoning may strike one as overtly ideological and full of romanticism. But Dournes would probably argue that this is an ontological part of the Jarai world and Drit, its Jarai hero, is the epitome of eternal hope and romance. As a result, the economy of the local practice of slash and burn is remarkable in the simplicity of its logic and rationale (p. 125).
In unique ways some of Dournes’s arguments demonstrate his anarchic views on politics and economics, even while they simultaneously show how his way of reasoning is also deeply anarchic. As the anthropologist puts it when referring to the Quête du Saint Graale, the Chanson de Roland, and Tristan and Iseult, “It is pure creation and creation is free by definition” (p. 119) and “I am anti-economist the same way as I am an anarchist” (p. 120). (It should be noted that the sentence at the bottom of page 121 has a verb missing; the sentence should read: “on est libre.”)
This book brings together different vistas that help us comprehend the complex personality of Jacques Dournes, from his seminal text Pötao, une théorie du pouvoir chez les Indochinois jörai to his scholarly place within the more mainstream ethnographic milieu in France, and to a live performance showcasing his comedic skills and the extent of his creative, improvising, and lyrical mind. Dournes was a man deeply charmed by Jarai culture. His vast and prolific corpus, ranging from the linguistic to the botanical, remains unique in the anthropology of the highlands. His books reveal a mind that is rigorous yet imaginative, rational yet poetic, possessing a writing style that makes him one of the best storytellers, poets, and linguistic musicians of the Jarai. There is no other way to better understand Dournes and the people he worked with than to roll up one’s trousers and follow him on the muddy trail of this ethnographic journey.
Krisna Uk
Center for Khmer Studies
Dournes, Jacques. 1987. Florilège jörai. Paris: Sudestasie.
« Vol. 5, No. 2, BOOK REVIEWS, Sean FEAR
Vol. 5, No. 2, BOOK REVIEWS, T. F. RHODEN »
Philippines Buddhism Indonesia democratization Singapore Islam Vietnam Thailand monarchy religion technocracy democracy Southeast Asia Cambodia Malaysia
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Home What we do Population matters
In the East and Southern Africa region, a population growth rate of 2.58 per cent will mean a population of 1.1 billion by 2050, representing 47 per cent of Africa’s population.
This is the result of a substantial decrease in mortality rates, which preceded a decrease in fertility rates. Fertility rates in the ESA region remain, however, high with an average of 4.8 children per woman of reproductive age.
These trends have implications for development in the region. This is because there is a strong link between population dynamics and development issues such as sexual and reproductive health (including maternal health, family planning and HIV), young people’s needs, gender equality and poverty reduction. Lack of data and relatively weak national capacity to analyze and utilize statistical data undermine the integration of population and development issues into national policies.
Challenges in the region
The region faces significant challenges in the area of population dynamics, quality data availability and utilization for development:
The national civil registration and vital statistics (CR&VS) system is inadequate in most of the countries, particularly in Eastern Africa, despite its importance to and relevance in the measurement of mortality.
Three countries in Southern Africa (Eritrea, Democratic Republic of Congo and Madagascar) have not conducted a census in more than two decades.
Only five countries have established a functional integrated management Information system (IMIS) that is web-based, allowing remote access to the databases.
Most countries have not carried out a household income and expenditure survey to allow poverty mapping and analysis, for better targeting of interventions and resources.
Although civil registration, including registration of the cause of death and vital statistics, remains critical for producing and disseminating data, there is still low coverage in the ESA region. Resource mobilization, which strongly depends on national commitment and leadership, has proved a major obstacle to the successful implementation of the 2010 round of census and other statistical operations within the national statistical systems. For the 2020 round of censuses, all the rollout countries seek to embark on the use of new technologies for census data collection, analysis and dissemination during the period 2015-2024.
Addressing these challenges will require more evidence-based advocacy, communication and policy dialogue to accompany the political changes in the region for political commitment and support to data for development initiatives, and youth involvement and effective participation in the countries.
UNFPA’s response
UNFPA will respond to the call for the data revolution by closing key gaps in access and use of data, in order to enable data to play their full role in the realization of Sustainable Development.
UNFPA sees the data revolution as a revolution in support of equality and rights.
UNFPA will exercise its leadership and long-standing engagement with governments, the private sector, NGOs, the media and academic institutions in order to ensure the data revolution serves people-centred and sustainable development.
UNFPA will play a key advocacy and facilitation role to foster South-South cooperation for excellence in ICT-enabled data production and management, and to support the platform of the national statistical systems (NSSs) to consolidate the continent’s statistical rejuvenation and development efforts and create platforms for the exchange of information, skills and best practices.
28 May 2019 A revolutionary idea for women and girls that UNFPA has taken forward for 25 years
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia—UNFPA has carried forward the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) agenda over the past quarter of a...
24 May 2019 People-centered development is critical for Africa's future to ensure the Africa We Want
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia—UNFPA, the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency, recommitted to the revolutionary decision taken at the 1994...
21 May 2019 Young people advocate for sexual and reproductive health and rights interventions and Universal Health Coverage
UTHUKELA DISTRICT, South Africa—Young people face many obstacles to their sexual and reproductive health and rights, and they must work with...
One Vision Three Zeros
In 2018, we at UNFPA set in motion a strategic effort, based on quality data, to achieve...
Looking back on our work in 2018, we made great strides in fulfilling our promise to...
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EUR-Lex - C:2003:279:TOC - EN
Document C:2003:279:TOC
Official Journal of the European Union, C 279, 20 November 2003
English edition Information and Notices
Notice No Contents
I Information
2003/C 279/01 Euro exchange rates 1
2003/C 279/02 Amendment by France of public service obligations in respect of scheduled air services within France (1) 2
2003/C 279/03 Imposition by France of a public service obligation on scheduled air services within France (1) 3
2003/C 279/04 Prior notification of a concentration (Case COMP/M.3311 — Van Oord/BHD/Bagger Holding JV) (1) 4
European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions
2003/C 279/05 Summary of accounts for the year 2002 5
II Preparatory Acts
III Notices
2003/C 279/06 Minutes of the session from 9 and 10 October 2002 published in the Official Journal of the European Union C 279 E 8
Official Journal of the European Communities C 279 E
2003/C 279/07 Outcome of the invitations to tender of (Community food aid) 9
2003/C 279/08 Operation of scheduled air services — Invitation to tender issued by the United Kingdom under Article 4(1)(d) Council Regulation (EEC) No 2408/92 in respect of the operation of scheduled air services between Glasgow-Campbeltown and Glasgow-Tiree (Scotland) (1) 10
2003/C 279/09 Operation of scheduled air service — Invitation to tender issued by the United Kingdom under Article 4(1)(d) Council Regulation (EEC) No 2408/92 in respect of the operation of a scheduled air service between Glasgow and Barra (Scotland) (1) 12
2003/C 279/10 Notice of call for proposals — EuropeAid/117489/C/G — Action against antipersonnel landmines 14
Notice to readers S3
EN (1) Text with EEA relevance
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DuPage County (/ˌduːˈpeɪdʒ/) is a county in the U.S. state of Illinois, and one of the collar counties of the Chicago metropolitan area. As of the 2010 census, the population was 916,924,[2] making it Illinois' second-most populous county. Its county seat is Wheaton.[3] DuPage County has become mostly developed and suburbanized, although some pockets of farmland remain in the county's western and northern parts. The county has a high socioeconomic profile and residents of Hinsdale, Naperville and Oak Brook include some of the wealthiest people in the Midwest. On the whole, the county enjoys above average median household income levels and low overall poverty levels when compared to the national average.[4] In 2018 Niche ranked two DuPage municipalities (Clarendon Hills #3 and Naperville #16) amongst the top 20 best places to live in America.[5]
County of DuPage
Warrenville Grove Forest Preserve on the West Branch of the DuPage River
Motto: The Magnificent Miles West of Chicago
Location within the U.S. state of Illinois
Illinois's location within the U.S.
DuPage River
Naperville (area) Aurora (population)
336 sq mi (870 km2)
Population (est.)
2,800/sq mi (1,100/km2)
3rd, 5th, 6th, 8th, 11th, 14th
Central: UTC−6/−5
www.dupageco.org
Footnotes: [1]
DuPage County at the time of its creation in 1839
DuPage County was formed on February 9, 1839 out of Cook County.[6] The county took its name from the DuPage River, which was, in turn, named after a French fur trapper, DuPage.[7] The first written history to address the name, the 1882 History of DuPage County, Illinois, by Rufus Blanchard, relates:[8]
The DuPage River had, from time immemorial, been a stream well known. It took its name from a French trader who settled on this stream below the fork previous to 1800. Hon. H. W. Blodgett, of Waukegan, informs the writer that J. B. Beaubien had often spoken to him of the old Frenchman, Du Page, whose station was on the bank of the river, down toward its mouth, and stated that the river took its name from him. The county name must have the same origin. Col Gurden S. Hubbard, who came into the country in 1818, informs the writer that the name DuPage, as applied to the river then, was universally known, but the trader for whom it was named lived there before his time. Mr. Beaubien says it is pronounced Du Pazhe (a having the sound of ah, and that the P should be a capital). This was in reply to Mr. Blodgett’s inquiry of him concerning the matter.
The first white settler in DuPage County was Bailey Hobson, who, with Lewis Stewart, built a house in 1831 for the Hobson family at a site about 2 miles south of present-day downtown Naperville.[9][10] Hobson later built a mill to serve surrounding farmers. Today, the Hobson house still stands on Hobson Road in Naperville, and the location of the mill is commemorated with a millstone and monument in today’s Pioneer Park.[11]
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 336 square miles (870 km2), of which 327 square miles (850 km2) is land and 8.9 square miles (23 km2) (2.6%) is water.[12] The DuPage River and the Salt Creek flow through DuPage County. According to the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County, the highest point in the county is located at the Mallard Lake Landfill, which at its highest point is 982 feet (299 m) above mean sea level.[13]
Climate chart (explanation)
Average max. and min. temperatures in °F
Precipitation totals in inches
Source: The Weather Channel[14]
Metric conversion
Average max. and min. temperatures in °C
Precipitation totals in mm
In recent years, average temperatures in the county seat of Wheaton have ranged from a low of 14 °F (−10 °C) in January to a high of 87 °F (31 °C) in July, although a record low of −26 °F (−32 °C) was recorded in January 1985 and a record high of 105 °F (41 °C) was recorded in July 1995. Average monthly precipitation ranged from 1.56 inches (40 mm) in February to 4.60 inches (117 mm) in August.[14]
Counties that are adjacent to DuPage include:
Cook County (east and north)
Will County (south)
Kendall County (southwest; counties meet at a corner)
Kane County (west)
Major HighwaysEdit
1930 91,998 118.4%
1940 103,480 12.5%
1960 313,459 102.8%
2010 916,924 1.4%
Est. 2018 928,589 [15] 1.3%
1790-1960[17] 1900-1990[18]
DuPage County's population's distribution by race and ethnicity in the 2010 census was as follows:[20]
Percentage of
White 77.9 %
Asian 10.1 %
Black or African American 4.6 %
American Indian and Alaska Native 0.3 %
Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander 0.0 %
Two or more races 2.2 %
Hispanic or Latino 13.3 %
White, not Hispanic or Latino 70.5 %
DuPage County has become more diverse. The population of foreign-born residents increased from about 71,300 in 1990 to 171,000 by 2009 estimates.[21]
There were 325,601 households, out of which 37.00% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 60.90% were married couples living together, 7.90% had a female householder with no husband present and 28.00% were non-families. 22.90% of all households were made up of individuals and 6.80% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.73 and the average family size was 3.27.
In the county, the population was spread out with 26.70% under the age of 18, 8.20% from 18 to 24, 32.40% from 25 to 44, 22.80% from 45 to 64 and 9.80% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 35 years. For every 100 females, there were 97.20 males. For every 100 females, age 18 and over, there were 94.20 males.
The median income for a household in the county was $98,441 and the median income for a family was $113,086.[22] Males had a median income of $60,909 versus $41,346 for females. The mean or average income for a family in DuPage County is $121,009, according to the 2005 census. The per capita income for the county was $38,458. About 2.40% of families and 3.60% of the population were below the poverty line, including 3.90% of those under age 18 and 4.30% of those age 65 or over.[22]
The First Church of Lombard is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
DuPage County has several hundred Christian churches. Well-known churches include Community Christian Church of Naperville, College Church of Wheaton, Wheaton Bible Church, and First Baptist Church of Wheaton. There is also a large Catholic contingency, part of the Diocese of Joliet, and a Ukrainian Orthodox Church in Glendale Heights.
The Theosophical Society in America in Wheaton, the North American headquarters of the Theosophical Society Adyar, provides lectures and classes on theosophy, meditation, yoga, Eastern and New Age spirituality. Islamic mosques are located in Villa Park, Naperville (two mosques), Glendale Heights, Willowbrook, Westmont, Lombard, Bolingbrook, Addison, Woodale, West Chicago, and unincorporated Glen Ellyn.[23] There are Hindu temples in Bartlett, Bensenville, Bloomingdale, Carol Stream, Itasca and Medinah, and an Arya Samaj center in West Chicago. There is a Nichiren Shōshū Zen Buddhist temple in West Chicago[24] and a Theravada Buddhist Temple, called the Buddha-Dharma Meditation Center, in Willowbrook.[25] There is also a Reform synagogue, Congregation Etz Chaim, in Lombard and an unaffiliated one in Naperville.
DuPage County is the primary location of the Illinois Technology and Research Corridor. It is home to many large corporations, including:
Ace Hardware (Oak Brook)
Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. (Itasca) (Fortune 1000)
BP (formerly British Petroleum) (Warrenville)
DeVry Inc. (Oakbrook Terrace) (NYSE)
Dover Corporation (Downers Grove) (Fortune 500)
Eby-Brown (Naperville)
Hub Group (Oak Brook) (Fortune 1000)
Molex (Lisle) (Fortune 1000)
Nalco Holding Company (Naperville) (Fortune 1000)
Namco Cybertainment (Bensenville)
Navistar International (Warrenville) (Fortune Global 500)
Nicor (Naperville) (Fortune 1000)
OfficeMax (Naperville) (Fortune 500)
Sara Lee Corporation (Downers Grove) (Fortune 500)
Tellabs (Naperville) (Fortune 1000)
Ty Warner (Beanie Babies) (Westmont)
Shopping malls in DuPage County include Oakbrook Center, which is the largest open-air mall in the nation, Westfield Fox Valley, Yorktown Center, Town Square Wheaton, and Stratford Square Mall. In addition, many of DuPage County's towns have prosperous and quaint downtown areas, especially in Naperville, Glen Ellyn, Elmhurst, Wheaton, Downers Grove and Hinsdale, which are mixed with boutiques, upscale chain stores and restaurants.
National LaboratoriesEdit
Aerial view of the Tevatron particle accelerator at the Fermilab site.
Fermilab, which has the world's second-highest-energy particle accelerator,[26] is in Batavia, where it straddles the border between Kane and DuPage counties.[27] Argonne National Laboratory, one of the United States government's oldest and largest science and engineering research laboratories,[28] is in unincorporated, southeast DuPage County.[29] Both laboratories conduct tours of their facilities.
Arts and cultureEdit
ArchitectureEdit
The 31-story Oakbrook Terrace Tower in Oakbrook Terrace, designed by Helmut Jahn, is the tallest building in Illinois outside of Chicago.[30] The Elmhurst Art Museum is housed in a Mies Van Der Rohe building. There is a Frank Lloyd Wright house in Elmhurst. Bochasanwasi Shri Akshar Purushottam Swaminarayan Sanstha, a conservative Hindu sect, has built BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir Chicago, a large, intricately carved, marble temple in Bartlett. There are some Sears Catalog Homes in Downers Grove and Villa Park. The Byzantine-style clubhouse of the Medinah Country Club is also an architectural highlight of the county. Lombard is home to over thirty Lustron prefabricated steel homes.[31]
Museums and historical sitesEdit
Historical museums in DuPage County include:
Naper Settlement (Naperville)
Cantigny Estate and First Division Museum, on the former estate of Chicago Tribune magnate Robert R. McCormick (Wheaton)
DuPage County Historical Museum (Wheaton)
Mayslake Peabody Estate (Oak Brook)
Graue Mill (Oak Brook)
Downers Grove Museum (Downers Grove)
West Chicago's City Museum (West Chicago)
Kline Creek Farm (West Chicago)
Gregg House Museum (Westmont)
Villa Park Historical Society Museum (Villa Park)
The Museums at Lisle Station Park (Lisle)
Itasca Historical Depot Museum (Itasca)
Specialty museums in DuPage County include:
DuPage Children's Museum (Naperville)
Wheaton College's Billy Graham Center (Wheaton)
Museum of Lapidary Art (Elmhurst)
Elmhurst Art Museum, which includes Mies Van Der Rohe's McCormick House[32] (Elmhurst)
Joe Naper's General Store in Naperville
Historical sites include:
The DuPage County Court House (Wheaton)[33]
The DuPage County State's Attorney (Wheaton)[34]
Stacy's Tavern (Glen Ellyn)
Pioneer Park, monument to white settlers of DuPage County and site of Bailey Hobson's mill (Naperville) [35]
Joe Naper's General Store (Naperville)[36]
Old Nichols Library (Naperville)[37]
Music and theaterEdit
DuPage also plays host to a rich, local music scene. Some of the better-known bands to come out of the area include The Hush Sound, Lucky Boys Confusion, and Plain White T's.
Oakbrook Terrace's Drury Lane Theatre is an important live theatre in DuPage County. The Tivoli Theatre, one of the first theaters in the United States to be equipped with sound, is still in use in Downers Grove.[38] In addition to showing movies, the Tivoli is home to several local performing arts groups.[39]
Parks and recreationEdit
Main article: Forest Preserve District of DuPage County
A woodland ecosystem in the Morton Arboretum
The Forest Preserve District of DuPage County owns and manages 25,000 acres (10,000 ha) of prairies, woodlands and wetlands. More than 4 million visitors each year enjoy 60 forest preserves, 145 miles of trails, and five education centers.[40]
Local urban parks include Lombard's Lilacia Park, Naperville's Centennial Beach, Woodridge's Cypress Cove Family Aquatic Park and Wheaton's Cosley Zoo. Privately funded attractions include Lisle's Morton Arboretum.
In the 1980s, DuPage County also had another major attraction, Ebenezer Floppen Slopper's Wonderful Water slides in Oakbrook Terrace, which today, stands abandoned and neglected.
The Illinois Prairie Path, a 61-mile (98 km) rail-to-trail multi-use path, runs through Cook, DuPage and Kane Counties. It intersects with the Great Western Trail at several points, as well as the Fox River Trail at a few points.
DuPage golf courses include: Wheaton's Chicago Golf Club, Arrowhead Golf Club and Cantigny Golf courses; the Medinah Country Club; the Village Links and Glen Oak Country Club of Glen Ellyn; Addison's Oak Meadows; Oak Brook's Oak Brook Golf Club, Butler National Golf Club, and Butterfield Country Club; Wood Dale's Maple Meadows; Westmont's Green Meadows; Lisle's River Bend (9 holes); West Chicago's St. Andrews Golf & Country Club and Winfield's Klein Creek Golf Club, among others.
Government and politicsEdit
GovernmentEdit
The powers of the County Board include managing county funds and business, levying taxes, and appropriating funds. The County Board exercises powers not assigned to other elected officials or other boards.[41]
The county is divided into six districts. Each district elects three members to the County Board in staggered two-year and four-year terms. The Chairman of the County Board is the chief executive officer of DuPage County, and is elected countywide every four years.
The County Board is controlled by the Republican Party by an 11 to 7 margin.[42]
Chairman Daniel Cronin Republican
1 Ashley Selmon Democratic
1 Donald Puchalski Republican
1 Sam Tornatore Republican
2 Elizabeth Chaplin Democratic
2 Pete DiCianni Republican
2 Sean Noonan Republican
3 Julie Renehan Democratic
3 Greg Hart Republican
3 Brian Krajewski Republican
4 Grant Eckhoff Republican
4 Mary FitzGerald Ozog Democratic
4 Tim Elliott Republican
5 James Healy Republican
5 Sadia Covert Democratic
5 Dawn DeSart Democratic
6 Robert Larsen Republican
6 Sheila Rutledge Democratic
6 James Zay Republican
Historically, DuPage County was a stronghold of the Republican Party, and was reckoned as a classic bastion of suburban conservatism. However, like many suburban counties outside large cities, it has trended Democratic in presidential years since the 1990s. The county continues to lean Republican in state and local politics.
National politicsEdit
Presidential election results
Presidential election results[43]
2016 38.6% 166,415 53.1% 228,622 8.3% 35,637
2012 48.6% 195,046 49.7% 199,460 1.6% 6,575
1992 48.1% 178,271 30.9% 114,564 21.1% 78,152
1988 69.4% 217,907 30.0% 94,285 0.6% 1,862
1980 64.0% 182,308 24.2% 68,991 11.8% 33,450
1972 75.0% 172,341 24.8% 57,043 0.2% 355
1968 66.6% 124,893 25.9% 48,492 7.5% 14,111
1964 59.9% 98,871 40.1% 66,229
1956 79.8% 91,834 20.1% 23,103 0.2% 207
1936 55.0% 28,380 42.0% 21,684 3.0% 1,568
1924 72.8% 16,917 8.2% 1,893 19.0% 4,423
The county supported Barack Obama, a Chicago resident, in 2008 and 2012 (albeit narrowly in 2012). Obama was the first Democratic presidential nominee to win the county since Franklin Pierce in 1852. The only time prior to 2008 that a Republican had failed to win the county was in 1912, when the GOP was mortally divided and former President and Progressive Party nominee Theodore Roosevelt won over half the county’s vote.
In 2016, the county supported Hillary Clinton, a native of Park Ridge, by almost the same margin that Obama garnered in 2008. At 38%, Donald Trump's performance in the county was lower than that of any Republican Presidential nominee since 1912, likely due to its large college-educated, foreign-born, and minority populations.
In the U.S. House of Representatives, DuPage County is in the 5th, 6th, 8th, 11th and 14th districts. In the 2018 general election, despite the county's historical Republican dominance, Democrats won every congressional district within the county, likely due to many Republicans not supporting Trump.[44]
Local politicsEdit
Republicans historically controlled local politics in DuPage County from the nineteenth century until modern times. Democrats have only held countywide office twice. In 1934 William Robinson was elected Circuit Clerk and Arthur Hellyer was elected Treasurer. That year also saw the only Democratic majority county board in DuPage history.[45][46] Robinson and Hellyer each served one term; Robinson lost his bid for a full term in 1936 and Hellyer left the Treasurer’s office to make a failed bid for probate judge in 1938.[47] In 2018, as part of a larger suburban realignment, Democratic candidate Jean Kaczmarek won the election for County Clerk and Daniel Hebreard won the President of the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County.[44][48][49]
During that same period Democrats were sporadically elected at the county board township levels. In 1972, Don Carroll was elected to the County Board. In the Democratic wave of 1974, Jane Spirgel, Mary Eleanor Wall, and Elaine Libovicz were elected. All four were from the northeastern portion of DuPage, which at that time was the most Democratic.[50] Republicans regained all seats on the board when Jane Spirgel ran for Illinois Secretary of State with Adlai Stevenson III under the Solidarity Party banner.[51] In 2000, Linda J. Bourke Hilbert was elected. Like her 1970s counterparts, she was from the northeastern portion of the county.[52] During the 2008 Democratic wave, three Democrats were elected to the board.[53] After the initial Obama wave, Republicans reasserted themselves on the board and by 2017 Democrats held only one of the eighteen board seats. In the 2018 general election, Democrats won seven seats as well as the offices of County Clerk and Forest Preserve District President.[44]
In 1973, a slate of Democrats took eight of nine offices in Addison Township. This feat would not be replicated until 2017 when Democratic candidates won a majority of offices in Naperville and Lisle townships.[54] Between these two victories, Democrats only held two township offices. Mark Starkovich served as York Township Supervisor from 1989-1993 and Martin McManamon has served as Wayne Township Highway Commissioner since 2013.[55][56]
Colleges and universitiesEdit
Blanchard Hall at Wheaton College is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The College of DuPage, in Glen Ellyn, is one of the largest community colleges in the United States. Wheaton College is one of the most well-known and respected evangelical Christian colleges in the country. Benedictine University, Elmhurst College and North Central College also have long and respected histories in their communities.
Other prominent colleges and universities include: Midwestern University in Downers Grove; National University of Health Sciences and Northern Baptist Theological Seminary in Lombard; the Addison, Naperville and Oak Brook campuses of DeVry University; the Aurora campus of Robert Morris University; the Lisle campus of National–Louis University; the Naperville campus of Northern Illinois University; the Wheaton campus of Illinois Institute of Technology; and the DuPage campus of Westwood College in Woodridge. Hamburger University, McDonald's global training facility, is located at its corporate headquarters in Oak Brook, on an 80-acre (32 ha) campus.
Secondary schoolsEdit
Dupage County is home to many academically and athletically successful public high schools, such as:
Addison Trail High School
Downers Grove North High School
Downers Grove South High School
Glenbard East High School
Glenbard North High School
Glenbard South High School
Glenbard West High School
Hinsdale Central High School
Hinsdale South High School
Lake Park High School
Lisle High School
Metea Valley High School
Naperville North High School
Naperville Central High School
Waubonsie Valley High School
West Chicago Community High School
Westmont High School
Wheaton North High School
Wheaton Warrenville South High School
Willowbrook High School
York Community High School
Additionally, DuPage County is home to several private high schools, including:
Benet Academy
Clapham School
College Preparatory School of America[57]
Driscoll Catholic High School (closed 2009)
Immaculate Conception High School
Islamic Foundation School
Montini Catholic High School
St. Francis High School
Timothy Christian School
Wheaton Academy
School districtsEdit
Main article: List of school districts in DuPage County, Illinois
The DuPage County Regional Office of Education provides regulatory and compliance oversight, quality services and support, and a variety of other services and information to the public schools within the forty-two school districts of the county that provide education to over 161,000 students in 245 schools.[58]
InfrastructureEdit
Health careEdit
DuPage hospitals include: Central DuPage Hospital in Winfield; Edward Hospital in Naperville; Elmhurst Memorial Hospital in Elmhurst; Adventist Hinsdale Hospital in Hinsdale; Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital in Downers Grove; Adventist GlenOaks Hospital in Glendale Heights; and Marianjoy Rehabilitation Hospital and Clinics in Wheaton.
TransportationEdit
For a more comprehensive list, see List of County Highways in DuPage County, Illinois.
Aside from the part of O'Hare International Airport that is located inside the county, DuPage also has many railroads and several small airports, including DuPage Airport. DuPage is served by the Pace bus system.
DuPage County is served by four Interstate Highways, three US Highways, and nine Illinois Routes.
North–south roads (from west to east) include: IL 59 (Sutton Road), IL 53 (Rohlwing Road), I-355 (Veterans Memorial Tollway) and IL 83 (Kingery Highway). East–west roads (from south to north) include: I-55 (Stevenson Expressway) I-88 (Ronald Reagan Memorial Tollway), US 34 (Ogden Avenue), IL 56 (Butterfield Road), IL 38 (Roosevelt Road), IL 64 (North Avenue), Army Trail Road, US 20 (Lake Street), IL 19 (Irving Park Road) and IL 390 (Elgin–O'Hare Expressway), which begins at the Thorndale Avenue exit on I-290 and ends on Lake Street, in Hanover Park. I-294 partially enters DuPage County on its eastern border between Westchester, in Cook County, and Oak Brook, in DuPage County. Only the southbound lanes enter the county though.
CitiesEdit
Aurora (mostly)
Batavia (part)
Chicago (part)
Elmhurst (mostly)
Naperville (mostly)
St. Charles (part)
Bartlett (mostly)
Bensenville (mostly)
Bolingbrook (part)
Burr Ridge (part)
Elk Grove Village (part)
Hanover Park (Part)
Hinsdale (mostly)
Lemont (part)
Oak Brook (mostly)
Roselle (mostly)
Schaumburg (part)
Wayne (part)
Woodridge (mostly)
Flowerfield
Fullersburg
Keeneyville
North Glen Ellyn
South Elmhurst
York Center
DuPage County has nine townships:
Addison Township
Bloomingdale Township
Downers Grove Township
Milton Township
Naperville Township
Wayne Township
Winfield Township
York Township
Ghost towns/NeighborhoodsEdit
Gostyn
Ontarioville
Tedens
Chicago portal
Illinois portal
Kane-DuPage Regional Museum Association
List of counties in Illinois
List of Illinois townships
National Register of Historic Places listings in DuPage County, Illinois
^ "DuPage County". Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey.
^ a b "State & County QuickFacts". United States Census Bureau. Archived from the original on June 6, 2011. Retrieved July 4, 2014.
^ "Find a County". National Association of Counties. Archived from the original on May 31, 2011. Retrieved June 7, 2011.
^ "DuPage County, IL". Data USA. Retrieved October 22, 2018.
^ "2018 Best Places to Live in America". Niche. Retrieved October 22, 2018.
^ White, Jesse (March 2010). "1837-1839 — Twenty-one New Counties" (PDF). Origin and Evolution of Illinois Counties. Illinois Secretary of State. p. 10. Archived (PDF) from the original on August 6, 2012. Retrieved September 26, 2012.
^ Thompson, Richard A. "The French Connection". History of DuPage County: DuPage Roots. DuPageHistory.org. Archived from the original on 13 March 2009. Retrieved 3 January 2009.
^ Blanchard, Rufus (1882). "History of DuPage County, Illinois". Illinois Digital Archives. Illinois Secretary of State and State Librarian. Retrieved January 3, 2009.
^ Blanchard, Rufus (1882). History of Du Page County, Illinois. Chicago: O.L. Baskin & Co. Historical Publishers. p. 26.
^ Richmond, C.W. (1877). History of Du Page County, Illinois. Aurora, Illinois: Knickerbocker & Hodder. pp. 11–12.
^ "Bailey Hobson: Naperville Heritage Society Stories". Naper Settlement. Archived from the original on May 8, 2018. Retrieved January 7, 2018.
^ "Population, Housing Units, Area, and Density: 2010 - County". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved July 11, 2015.
^ Forest Preserve District of DuPage County (2008). "Frequently Asked Questions about Environmental Services". Archived from the original on September 27, 2007. Retrieved January 9, 2008.
^ a b "Monthly Averages for Wheaton, Illinois". The Weather Channel. Archived from the original on 13 May 2011. Retrieved 27 January 2011.
^ "Population and Housing Unit Estimates". Archived from the original on May 4, 2018. Retrieved April 18, 2019.
^ "U.S. Decennial Census". United States Census Bureau. Archived from the original on April 26, 2015. Retrieved July 4, 2014.
^ "Historical Census Browser". University of Virginia Library. Archived from the original on August 11, 2012. Retrieved July 4, 2014.
^ "Population of Counties by Decennial Census: 1900 to 1990". United States Census Bureau. Archived from the original on April 24, 2014. Retrieved July 4, 2014.
^ "Census 2000 PHC-T-4. Ranking Tables for Counties: 1990 and 2000" (PDF). United States Census Bureau. Archived (PDF) from the original on December 18, 2014. Retrieved July 4, 2014.
^ "DuPage County, Illinois". United States Census Bureau. Retrieved December 31, 2016.
^ Born, Molly (February 17, 2011). "Diversity in DuPage is like a shift from vanilla to caramel fudge swirl, official says". Medill Reports Chicago. Northwestern University. Medill News Service. Archived from the original on January 2, 2017. Retrieved January 1, 2017.
^ a b "American FactFinder". United States Census Bureau. Archived from the original on May 1, 2009. Retrieved April 2, 2009.
^ "Home". islamiccenterofnaperville.org. Archived from the original on March 9, 2018. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
^ "Buddhists". www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org. Archived from the original on October 21, 2017. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on December 5, 2006. Retrieved November 24, 2006. CS1 maint: Archived copy as title (link)
^ "About Fermilab". Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. March 18, 2004. Archived from the original on February 4, 2010. Retrieved February 19, 2010.
^ "County Board District 6 map". DuPage County. 2010. Archived from the original on June 12, 2010. Retrieved February 19, 2010.
^ "About Argonne". Argonne National Laboratory. 2010. Archived from the original on May 14, 2011. Retrieved February 19, 2010.
^ GmbH, Emporis. "Oakbrook Terrace Tower, Oakbrook Terrace - 126138 - EMPORIS". www.emporis.com. Archived from the original on September 30, 2007. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
^ "Lombard Lustrons". Scott Vargo. Archived from the original on October 22, 2007. Retrieved October 27, 2007.
^ "About the McCormick House". Elmhurst Art Museum. Archived from the original on October 5, 2013. Retrieved October 3, 2013.
^ "DuPage County IL Official Website - Home". www.dupageco.org. Retrieved August 26, 2018.
^ "DuPage County IL Official Website - State's Attorney Home". www.dupageco.org. Retrieved August 26, 2018.
^ "A Brief History: The Pioneers of Pioneer Park". A Brief History. August 22, 2011. Retrieved August 11, 2018.
^ "Layout 1". Naper Settlement. Retrieved November 8, 2018.
^ "Historic District | The City of Naperville". www.naperville.il.us. Retrieved August 11, 2018.
^ Max Grinnell, "Going to the Movies" Archived September 23, 2008, at the Wayback Machine The Electronic Encyclopedia of Chicago, 2005, Chicago Historical Society
^ Tivoli Theatre history Archived April 2, 2008, at the Wayback Machine
^ "Forest Preserve District Budget Approved for 2013-2014". Forest Preserve District of DuPage County. Archived from the original on October 3, 2013. Retrieved October 3, 2013.
^ "County Board Overview". DuPage County. Archived from the original on December 29, 2016. Retrieved December 29, 2016.
^ "County Board Members". DuPage County. Retrieved December 30, 2018.
^ Leip, David. "Dave Leip's Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections". uselectionatlas.org. Archived from the original on March 23, 2018. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
^ a b c Rakow, Bob (November 14, 2018). "Blue Wave hits DuPage County". My Suburban Life. Retrieved November 21, 2018.
^ "Democrats Hold Jubilee as New Officials Go In". Chicago Tribune. December 4, 1934.
^ "Democrats Win Two DuPage Offices". Daily Herald. November 9, 1934. p. 15. Archived from the original on April 19, 2017. Retrieved April 17, 2017.
^ "G.O.P. Banners Wave Over Five Nearby Counties: Democratic Office Holders Ousted by Voters". Chicago Tribune. November 9, 1938.
^ Miller, Rich (November 20, 2018). "The Democrats' vote-by-mail juggernaut". Capitol Fax. Retrieved November 21, 2018.
^ The Forest Preserve District of DuPage County is a countywide special district coterminous with DuPage County, Illinois
^ Sherlock, Barbara; Shallwani, Pervaiz (November 8, 2002). "DuPage Democrats hope board exile short-lived". Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Illinois.
^ Schmeltzer, John (May 6, 1986). "Spirgel one of a kind in Du Page". Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Illinois.
^ Trebe, Patricia (May 6, 1986). "Linda J. Bourke Hilbert, 63 ; DuPage County Board's 1st Democrat since '80s". Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Illinois.
^ Napolitano, Jo (November 5, 2008). "Democrats gaining a foothold". Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Illinois.
^ Erin, Hegarty (April 5, 2017). "Dems unseat several incumbents in Naperville, Lisle township races". Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Illinois. Archived from the original on April 16, 2017. Retrieved April 17, 2017.
^ Young, Linda (April 22, 1993). "Democrats lose toehold and confidence in future". Chicago Tribune. Chicago, Illinois.
^ Fleming, Tabitha (April 5, 2017). "Dust settles, Wayne Township highways chief emerges among DuPage victors". DuPage Policy Journal. Chicago, Illinois: Local Government Information Services. Missing or empty |url= (help); |access-date= requires |url= (help)
^ "Contact Us". Lombard, Illinois: College Preparatory School of America. Archived from the original on October 5, 2013. Retrieved October 3, 2013.
^ "2008-2009 Annual Report" (PDF). DuPage Regional Office of Education. Archived from the original (PDF) on October 9, 2010. Retrieved October 18, 2010.
DuPage County, Illinoisat Wikipedia's sister projects
DuPage Convention & Visitors Bureau
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Author:Matthías Jochumsson
←Author Index: Ma Matthías Jochumsson
sister projects: Wikipedia article, Commons category, Wikidata item.
Matthias Jochumsson was an Icelandic poet, playwrite, and translator. The father of modern drama, he is most well known for his lyrical poetry and for writing the national anthem of Iceland, Lofsöngur, in 1874. He was born into a poor family and traveled to the continent to further his education. Intending to become a business man, Matthias discovered his passion for languages and literature.
Matthías Jochumsson
31880Q380925Matthías JochumssonMatthías JochumssonMatthías Jochumsson
Lofsöngur (1874)
Some or all works by this author are in the public domain in the United States because they were published before January 1, 1924.
The author died in 1920, so works by this author are also in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 80 years or less. Works by this author may also be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
Freebase: /m/03bdt9
English Wikisource: 31880
Retrieved from "https://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=Author:Matthías_Jochumsson&oldid=7314349"
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Popular Science Monthly/Volume 2/March 1873/Earthquake-Phenomena
< Popular Science Monthly | Volume 2 | March 1873
←Notes
Popular Science Monthly Volume 2 March 1873 (1873)
Earthquake-Phenomena by Elias Lewis Jr.
Electricity and Life→
582780Popular Science Monthly Volume 2 March 1873 — Earthquake-Phenomena1873
MONTHLY.
EARTHQUAKE-PHENOMENA.
By ELIAS LEWIS, Esq.
IN the afternoon of the 1st day of June, 1638, 18 years after the landing of the pilgrims, there occurred the first earthquake in New England, of which we have an authentic record.
It is 234 years since that event, and, according to a catalogue prepared by W. T. Brigham, published in the Memoirs of the Boston Society of Natural History, it appears that, down to October 20, 1870, 231 earthquakes are recorded as having taken place in New England. From this able paper we learn that, in 1663, portions of Canada, New England, and New York, were convulsed by earthquake-shocks.
In 1727, at Newbury, and near the mouth of the Merrimac River, an earthquake took place during the evening when the atmosphere was perfectly calm and clear. The sound preceded the shock. The earth opened, and a sulphurous blast threw up mounds of calcined dust. Several days previous to the earthquake, water in the wells became fetid, and of a pale brimstone color. In 1755, on the 18th day of November, a hollow, roaring noise was heard in various parts of New England. In a minute the earth seemed to undulate as if a wave were passing. This was followed by a vibratory and jerking motion, familiar in earthquake countries. The first shock of this earthquake occurred 17 days after the terrible one at Lisbon, the vibrations of which had not yet ceased.
The great earthquake at New Madrid, in Missouri, took place in 1811-'12. The shocks here were vertical, proving, as we shall see hereafter, that the centre of energy was directly underneath. At other times, the shocks, which continued many months, were undulatory. The ground rose in huge waves, which burst, and volumes of water, sand, and pit-coal, were thrown high as the tops of the trees. The forests waved like standing corn in a gale of wind, and an area 70 miles long by 30 miles wide was submerged, and became a swampy lake.
On the 13th of August, 1868, a fearful earthquake took place in Peru, which laid waste much of the country lying between the Andes and the Pacific. The shocks were felt through a distance of 1,400 miles north and south, and three important cities were destroyed. At Arequipa, in Peru, 40 miles from the sea, a slight undulatory shock was felt, followed by others so violent that in five minutes not a house was standing in that city of 44,000 inhabitants. A subterranean rumbling, like the rush of an avalanche, was heard above the crash, and a cloud of dust rose in the still air over the city. On the sea-coast were situated Iquique and Arica—both were destroyed by the shocks, and overwhelmed by a tremendous wave. The ocean thus took up the vibrations of the land, and waves of tremendous volume were put in motion, which rolled, not only upon the coast, but away from it with a velocity in the deep ocean of not less than 400 miles an hour. The great wave—for one was of much greater volume than the others—has been estimated at upward of 200 miles breadth, with a length along its curved crest of 8,000 miles. This rolled into the harbor of Yokohama, in Japan, 10,500 miles distant, and was felt at Port Fairy, in South Victoria, distant nearly one-half of the earth's circumference.
In 1797, a province of Ecuador, about 100 miles south of Quito, was visited by what is described by Humboldt as "one of the most fearful phenomena recorded in the physical history of our planet." The shocks were vertical, and occurred as "mine-like explosions." The town of Riobamba was over the central area, and many of its inhabitants were thrown 100 feet into the air.
The shocks, in this instance, were not announced by any subterranean thunder, but, just 18 minutes after, a terrific roar was heard beneath Quito. It thus appears that shocks are not always preceded by sounds, nor do the sounds increase with the violence of the shock.
Sometimes, says Humboldt, there is a "ringing noise, as if vitrified masses were struck; again, a continuous rumbling and hollow roar; at others, a rattling and clanking as of chains or near thunder." With the lightning's flash we know that the danger is over, and await the coming thunder without alarm; but thunder, rolling deep in the earth, announces possible if not certain calamity.
Throughout the region of the Andes a connection between volcanic and earthquake action has been recognized by the people. It was supposed by Strabo that volcanoes are safety-valves, and scientific observation suggests that they may relieve the pressure and tension which would otherwise lay the earth in ruins.
For two years previous to 1538 earthquakes had been violent and frequent at Pozzuoli on the Bay of Baise, and elsewhere in the vicinity of Naples. On the 27th and 28th of September they did not cease day or night. On the night of the 29th, flames issued from the ground near the baths of Nero, the earth rose and burst at the top with tremendous roar, and discharged steam, gas, pumice, mud, and ashes. A mountain 1,000 feet high was formed, known as Monte Nuovo, which, at the present time, is 8,000 feet in circumference, and 440 feet above
Monte Nuovo.
the bay. The present aspect of Monte Nuovo is represented in Fig. 1, and the region around is shown in the frontispiece, from the last edition of Lyell's "Principles of Geology."
The Phlegræan Fields, of which Monte Nuovo now forms a part, have, in the opinion of Sir Charles Lyell, a "mutual relation with Vesuvius—a violent disturbance in one district serving as a safety-valve to the other—both never being in full activity at once."
In the Sandwich Islands, in 1868, Mauna Loa and the craters of Kilhauea on its flank were in active eruption. The valleys of the mountains were filled with rivers of fire, and a cloud of smoke and vapor arose, it is said, over the mountain, to a height of eight miles. During these fearful phenomena, which continued more than a month, 1,500 earthquake-shocks occurred, 300 of which were counted in five days. But whether shocks occur in the immediate vicinity of volcanoes during eruptions, or whether activity of the one diminishes the violence of the other, it is certain that they have a mutual relation, and probably a common origin.
The opening and closing of fissures and chasms in the ground during earthquakes is a common phenomenon. Men, animals, and dwellings, are sometimes swallowed in them, and forever disappear. In 1848 an earthquake shook a large portion of New Zealand, and a fissure of great depth opened along a chain of mountains from 1,000 to 4,000 feet high, extending 60 miles, but of not more than 18 inches in average width.
During the Calabrian earthquake of 1783 the surface of the ground opened and closed in immense fissures, by means of which new lakes were formed and others drained or were dried up.
At Jerocarne the earth is described, by Sir Charles Lyell, as lacerated in an extraordinary manner. "Fissures ran in every direction, like cracks in a broken pane of glass."
Fissures near Jerocarne, in Calabria.
In another instance, several dwellings were engulfed in a fissure, and were found to be jammed with their contents into a compact mass. Chasms of immense length and depth were formed. Some were crescent-shaped, and a mile in length.
The plains of Calabria were covered in many places with circular hollows from one foot to three or four feet in diameter. Some of these were filled with water, others with dry sand.
Fig. 4 is a section of one of these circular holes, which appears to be funnel-shaped.
But changes in the earth's crust occur during earthquakes, on a still grander scale. Evidences of local disturbance, however disastrous it may have been, are often effaced if not forgotten in a few centuries frequently in a few years. But the slow upheaval of mountain-chains and the dislocation of strata through profound depths are results which alter at last the physical aspect and contour of the surface of the globe. It would not be proper, however, to say that these changes are caused by earthquakes, but rather that the earthquake vibration is a concomitant of the displacement by which they are produced.
Humboldt, Lyell, Dana, and other authorities, consider earth quakes to be the dynamic result of action of the earth's heated interior upon its cooled exterior. Whether the central portions of the earth be fluid or not, it is quite certain that heat increases as we descend; and it is estimated by Sir Charles Lyell that the heat at a depth of 25 miles would be sufficient to melt granite, and at 34 miles to render fluid or incandescent every known substance. We have no means of knowing the condition of matter under the enormous pressure which prevails at a depth of 34 miles, and are most concerned with the fact that the heat of fusion exists at no very great depth beneath the surface. The earth's crust is, therefore, its cooled exterior.
Circular Hollows in the Plain of Rosarno.
It is found that nearly all rocks contract by cooling and expand by heat. Lyell estimates that sandstone a mile in thickness, and heated to 200° Fahr., would expand so as to lift a mass of rock upon it 10 feet above its former level; and if a mass of the earth's crust equally expansible, 50 miles in thickness, be heated to 800°, it would rise 1,500 feet. From cooling we have the reverse effect—shrinkage, contraction, lateral pressure, and ultimately bending of the strata.
The strain thus produced will at last cause fracture, and the vibration that results is an earthquake. In Fig. 5 we have an illustration of fracture and displacement.
This form of tension is being continually and everywhere produced in the earth's crust, and there is probably no instant of time when that crust is entirely free from vibrations.
"There is nothing," observes Darwin, "not even the wind that blows, so unstable as the level of the crust of the globe."
Prof. Tyndall observes that, "where the acting force is small and the time great, the result is a slow and almost inappreciable change." Thus, great areas of land may be elevated or depressed. "But where the intensity is great and the time small, sudden convulsion must ensue." Thus, in an instant, mountains may undergo a change of elevation, or be shaken to fragments, or tracks of land sunken and over-flowed. In the delta of the Indus are extensive areas of level ground, over which native villages were scattered, with fortifications and other defences. Of these, the fort at Sindree is shown in Fig. 7 as it was
Section of one of the Circular Hollows.
before the disastrous earthquake of 1819. 2,000 square miles of the delta sank from six to 12 feet, and was thus overflowed by the sea. The village of Sindree and its fortifications were upon the sunken area.
Northward, about 5½ miles from Sindree, a range of very low hills was elevated during the earthquake. It was seen over the expanse of waters, and extended about 50 miles, with a breadth in places of 16 miles, and was called by the natives, "Ulla Bund, or the Mound of God."
In 1822, just half a century ago, an earthquake occurred in Chili, of terrific violence, even for that region of convulsions. It was estimated that 100,000 square miles of land were elevated from two to seven feet, the rise being greatest inland, and probably included a portion of the Chilian Andes. The location of the force must have been at great depth, perhaps not less than 20 miles below the base of the Andes; and it is probable that the entire superincumbent mass underwent a change of level of from two to seven feet of perpendicular elevation.
The earthquake at Lisbon, in 1755, has impressed the public mind more than any other in modern times. The shocks, one of which exceeded all the others in violence, continued six minutes. The mountains near were shaken to their foundations, and everywhere split and rent. No part of the city was seriously injured which was built on the limestone or basaltic formations; but the shocks were most violent and disastrous in the tertiary and blue clay on which the ruined portion of the city stood.
The sea-wave put in motion by this earthquake exceeded in volume all others of which we have a record, except the one already noticed, which traversed the Pacific Ocean in 1868. It was observed, during this convulsion, that the sea retired from the shore before the great wave rolled in.
Curved Strata, as seen in the Swiss Jura.
It was Darwin who first suggested that waves first draw the waters from the shore on which they are advancing to break. He calls attention to the familiar fact that waves thrown up by the paddles of a steamer, as they approach the shore, are alway preceded by a receding of the water. An under-draught seems to first suck the water back, and such actually is the fact. Now, in the sea-wave raised by the earthquake, what takes place? We have remarked that an
Strata broken and displaced.
earthquake is a vibration of the earth's elastic crust, and moves with tremendous velocity. When it occurs beneath the sea, or when the undulations reach the surface beneath the sea, the motion is communicated to the water, which it elevates in a wave. Simultaneously with this lifting of the water, an under-draught toward that point takes place. Were it not so, the elevation of the wave could not be sustained. Directly the great wave moves from the area of disturbance at the rate before stated, of 400 miles an hour, or about 6½ miles in a minute, in the deep ocean. It is described by Mallet as "a low, broad swell of the sea. It might pass beneath the vessel unobserved." Approaching the shore, the front becomes elevated. The under-draught has continually preceded it, and has withdrawn the water from the shore, so that vessels at anchor are frequently grounded, and the wave seems to stand upon the bottom like a gigantic wall. At Arica it was unbroken by a ripple, and "shone in the sun like burnished silver."
A notion prevails that earthquakes are always preceded by unusual conditions of the atmosphere, but careful observations have shown that they occur during all kinds of weather. The Lisbon earthquake,
Fort of Sindree, on the Eastern Branch of the Indus, before it was submerged by the earthquake of 1819.
which took place in the morning of the 1st of November, was preceded by a "period of clear autumnal weather," but the morning was calm, foggy, and warm. At Arica, as we have learned, the sky was serene and the atmosphere tranquil. Some of the greatest convulsions have been preceded by a close, hazy sky. Sir Charles Lyell observes that "irregularities in the seasons frequently precede and follow shocks. Sudden gusts of wind interrupted by dead calms, violent rains at unusual seasons, or in countries where they seldom occur, are phenomena often attending earthquakes."
The number of important earthquakes up to the year 1881, of which we have a reliable account, is, according to Prof. Ansted, 7,000. So meagre are early records that only 787 of these are spoken of previous to the year 1500. There is a catalogue of 3,340 which occurred from 1800 to 1850, or one in about five days. The means of detecting and recording shocks are now so perfected, that, when applied in all parts of the globe, they will, doubtless, fully justify our statement that in no instant of time is the earth's crust free from vibrations. The seismograph is an instrument for the "automatic registration of earthquake-shocks."
An interesting account of this instrument, by George Forbes, was published in the September number of The Popular Science Monthly.
Earthquakes have been defined to be a "travelling zone of vibration." The movement is in every direction from the area of disturbance, and the velocity depends on the substance and structure of the material through which it is transmitted. In New Zealand, in 1848, people on the shore witnessed the disastrous progress of the earthquake along the mountains before they felt the shocks. At Messina, during the Calabrian earthquake, the terrified inhabitants saw villas overthrown upon the coast by shocks which they had not felt, but which in a moment laid in ruins a portion of their own city. The velocity with
View of the Fort of Sindree from the West, in March, 1838.
which the vibrations travel has been a subject of careful investigation. The Lisbon earthquake moved about 20 miles in a minute; that which occurred in 1819, in the delta of the Indus, appears to have moved at the rate of 53 miles in a minute, or nearly 5,000 feet in a second. Other observations show that the movement may be from 1,000 to 5,000 feet per second. It has been ascertained that in blasting rocks the vibrations move in a second from 1,000 to 1,700 feet. The sound-waves move more rapidly, and, for this reason, shocks are usually preceded by subterranean rumbling. The velocity of sound through uniform strata is ascertained to be from 8,000 to 10,000 feet in a second. Tyndall found that sound-waves moved through burnt clay nearly ten times more rapidly than through air at a temperature of 32° Fahr. From this the phenomena of earthquake movement might occur in the following order: Supposing the centre of the disturbance to be beneath the ocean, as at Lisbon, an observer on the shore might expect to experience—
1. The underground rumble, moving at the rate of 8,000 to 10,000 feet per second.
2. The shock, moving from 1,000 to 5,000 feet per second.
3. The sea-wave, moving about 528 feet per second.
4. Sound, through the air moving at the rate of 1,090 feet per second. It should be noted, however, that the velocity of the sea-wave depends on depth of water.
The vibrations of an earthquake, it is evident, differ in no respect from those produced by other causes, excepting in intensity. The jar arising from a discharge of artillery, by a carriage rolling over pavements, or slamming of heavy doors, puts in motion a series of moving waves just as truly as does the rending of rocks, or an explosion of steam or gas in a fracture thus produced. But, a question arises, What moves when the earthquake is progressing. The phenomena may be explained thus: Around the source of disturbance the rock is pressed outward in every direction as air is pressed outward around a vibrating bell, forming what is called a zone or shell of compressed rock. The extent of this compression is the width of the earthquake-wave, and depends on the force exerted and the elasticity of the rock. In each zone or shell there is always a point of maximum density—and that is where the energy of compression and the rock's elastic force are equal.
As the wave passes, another zone is formed, and the particles behind return by their elasticity to their former position. From this it is obvious that, as the wave is passing, the individual particles of the rock have first a forward and then a backward motion—a swing or excursion to and fro. The extent of this motion is the amplitude of vibration, and may be very small compared with the breadth of the wave.
Mallet found by computation that, given a certain depth of fissure, and a certain heat of steam, the expansive force would produce a wave of nine inches amplitude at the surface. His observations of the Neapolitan earthquake of 1857 show that the maximum amplitude at the surface was only 2.5 inches. In his elaborate and beautiful volume on the eruption of Vesuvius, in 1872, just published, Mr. Mallet reaffirms a statement previously made by him, that "it is the vibration of the wave itself, i. e., the motion of the wave-particles, that does the mischief, not the transit of the wave from place to place on the surface."
We understand, then, that there is motion of particles as well as a transit-wave; that the "travelling zone or shell of vibration" is a zone or shell of "elastic compression."
Fig. 9 illustrates the "shells" as they move away from B, the focus of disturbance. The transit-wave, with its interstitial vibrations, reaches the surface in the manner shown in the diagram Fig. 10.
The diagram shows the waves radiating from the earthquake focus A to c d e f and g successively, and reaching the surface at B, where the shocks would be vertical. At 1 2 3 they become more and more oblique, and at greater distances appear almost horizontal.
Continuous Waves from a Single Shock.
Now, while the movement of the transit-wave may be very rapid, that of the particles of matter is surprisingly small. At Lisbon the velocity of the wave was 20 miles a minute, or 1,200 miles an hour. According to Mallet, where the velocity of the transit wave was 1,000
Diagram showing the Movement of Waves from the center or Focus.
B, point where the shocks would be vertical. 1 2 3 and 1' 2' 3' are points where the waves would reach the surface.
feet per second, the movement of the particles was only 12 feet per second, or eight miles an hour, and he states that three columns of the Temple of Serapis, on the shore of the Bay of Baiæ (see frontispiece), a region subject to earthquake-shocks, would be overthrown by a shock "whose wave-particles had an horizontal velocity of 3½ feet per second." The shock which threw human beings 100 feet in the air, at Riobamba, must have had a velocity of 80 feet per second. The theory of Mr. Hopkins, published in 1847, was that the disastrous results of earthquakes were caused by the velocity of the wave of translation, and that theory is probably accepted by many who will distrust the conclusions of Mr. Mallet. But it is obvious to every observer that the enormous velocity of 1,200 miles an hour is not communicated to objects on the surface as the wave passes. They are rarely thrown to any considerable distance. Buildings are overthrown, but they fall where they stood.
We have already remarked that objects standing directly on the uniform strata are seldom injured by earthquake-shocks. Such was the case, as we have seen, with that portion of Lisbon which was built on the limestone and basalt. But where the surface, perhaps hundreds of feet deep, is of loose unelastic material, the transit-wave, with its vibrations, in passing through it, becomes broken into oscillations, its force is dissipated and motion reduced, but the vibratory swing which it communicates is sufficient to fissure the earth's surface and strew it with ruins.
On the coast of Dublin Bay, Mallet exploded gunpowder buried several feet beneath the surface, in the sand, and ascertained the intensity and velocity of the shock by a delicate seisometer. Other experiments gave the rate and intensity of movement in more compact formations with the following results: In sand, 824.9 feet in a second; in divided granite, 1,306.4 feet; in compact granite, 1,664.6 feet. It is found by observation that objects, as walls and chimneys, fall backward or forward, but generally in a line with the direction in which the wave travels, while fractures of walls occur in a line transverse to the direction of the wave. And by diagram, Fig. 10, it will be obvious that, given the position of the ruins over an extended area, not only the centre but depth of disturbance may be ascertained. If the focus be C, as shown in the diagram, the wave would reach the surface at an angle other than if the focus be at A, and the result would appear in the manner of displacement on the surface. By the principle here indicated, Mallet was able to locate the central area and depth of the Neapolitan earthquake of 1857, and states that the great fissure, the forming of which caused the first shock, was 7½ miles in length, and 5¾ miles in average depth.
The filling of the fissure with water, and its conversion into superheated steam, may have produced the subsequent shocks. By calculation, the same author shows the enormous pressure and rending power of steam if admitted without limit into such a fissure. "If the temperature increase 1° Fahr. for 60 feet depth, then, at the focal centre of the fissure, the temperature would be 883.4° Fahr., and the pressure on the walls of the cavity not less than 640,528,000,000 tons. But the pressure would be vastly increased if the temperature be near that of melted rock." That this may be the case is rendered probable from recent investigations of Mallet, by which he shows that the heat
bay of bale near naples. a scene of remarkable terrestrial convulsions.
1. Puzzuoli, where the relative level of land and sea has changed, twice since the Christian era, from 20 to 30 feet. 2. Temple of Serapis, built long before Christ; three columns still standing. 3. Caligula's Bridge, 1,800 years old; several piers and arches still standing. 5. Monte Nuovo thrown up by an earthquake (see page 515).
which melts the great lava-beds, and fills cavities in the earth's crust with steam and gases, may not arise directly from the earth's central heat, but from the crushing of strata as it contracts and settles upon the cooling interior.
By a series of experiments and observations made by Mr. Mallet, it is shown that the "annual loss of heat into space of our globe at present is equal to that which would liquefy, at 32° Fahr., about 777 cubic miles of ice; and this is the measuring unit for the amount of contraction of our globe now going on."
The amount of shrinking depends, therefore, on the amount of heat lost—a view long since insisted on by Prof. Dana; and this, according to Mallet, is sufficient to account for all the phenomena. To this cause, then, we refer the never-ending oscillations of the earth's cooled exterior, and the enormous lateral strain by which it is bent and fractured, and its broken ridges made to grind and crush with terrific vibrations.
In many areas the earthquake energies of former times have been long at rest, but, according to Sir Charles Lyell, the total energy may not have diminished.
He finds evidence of convulsions as great and obvious in recent as in earlier time. Mallet, however, remarks that "seismic energy may be considered as possibly constant during historic time, but is probably a decaying energy viewed in reference to much longer periods."
Everywhere we see, in exposed portions, crevices open or filled—ejections of trap and basalt; and wall-like dikes stand out upon the slopes of mountains. These are legible and significant chapters in the earth's dynamic history.
Do earthquakes occur with any order or system, so that their coming may be foretold?
Prof. Palmieri, in his observatory on Mount Vesuvius, is able, says George Forbes, "to predict eruptions." "This is a small eruption," remarked the professor, "but there is going to be a greater one; it may be a year hence, but it will come." "In almost exactly a year," continues Mr. Forbes, "the great eruption did come."
From Mallet's catalogue of European earthquakes it appears that, during 15½ centuries, 1,157 took place during the winter, against 875 in the summer months.
Although science has cleared up some of the mystery which hung over earthquakes in less enlightened times, it has not divested them of their sublimity and terrible reality.
Their work of destruction is done in a moment. The great battles of the world have scarcely been so destructive of human life.
We read that 250,000 persons perished during the earthquake at Antioch in 526. At Lisbon 60,000 people were destroyed. During one of the Calabrian earthquakes 35,000; and during the one at Arequipa in 1868. 40,000 persons perished. Pestilence, famine, and fire, add to the fatality. Visitations so severe and disastrous permanently affect the inhabitants of earthquake regions. Their minds lose their calm equipoise—they become nervous, and the first considerable shock sends them to the street or cathedral for safety.
Humboldt remarks that, when "we feel the ground move beneath us, our deceptive faith in the repose of Nature vanishes, and we feel ourselves transferred into a realm of unknown and destructive forces. Every sound, the faintest motion of the air, arrests attention. To man, the earthquake conveys the idea of unlimited danger." And Von Tschudi adds his testimony, that "no familiarity with earthquakes can blunt this feeling of insecurity. The traveller from the north of Europe waits with impatience to feel the movement of the earth, and with his own ear to listen to the subterranean sounds, but, soon as his wish is gratified, he is terror-stricken, and is prompted to seek safety in flight." Thus it is that physical phenomena aid in moulding the mental and moral character of a people. The earthquake records itself, not only on the inorganic world, but in man's spiritual nature.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikisource.org/w/index.php?title=Popular_Science_Monthly/Volume_2/March_1873/Earthquake-Phenomena&oldid=8852749"
Popular Science Monthly Volume 2
Seismology articles in Popular Science Monthly
Pages with contributor
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Custom «Immigration Reform in the United States» Essay Paper
Custom «Immigration Reform in the United States» Essay Paper essay
The United States of America has been termed as a land of opportunities by people from different nations of the world. Most of these people believe that when one lands in America, he will be rich instantly as there are a lot of opportunities that can enable one to earn a living. As a result, there is a high turn over of people who have sought to gain entry into the United States using different means such as applying for Green Cards, as illegal immigrants while others have sought to gain entry into the United States as asylum seekers. While the United States has been considered as a place of prosperity by immigrants, there are many reforms that have to be formulated by the United States to empower it to have control over the overall movement of immigrants into its areas of jurisdiction.
Buy Immigration Reform in the United States essay paper online
The United States of America has been able to align itself in such a way that its leadership and the policies they have formulated have focused on presenting it as a land that is full of opportunities. If a survey was carried out throughout the world on the country that one would love to live in, the United States of America would emerge as the most desired country in the world. While holding a superpower status, the United States has not fallen short in its mandate to focus on maintaining the image that it has presented on the global scene as the best country in the world. More so, the championing of the American Dream is one of the factors that have induced in the hearts of many that desire to live and work in the United States. Therefore, every year, this nation has to deal with thousands upon thousands of both legal and illegal immigrant who have come seeking for these opportunities.
While these perceptions have induced an urge in many immigrants to seek entry points into the United States, there are different reforms that have been made on immigration laws and regulations or are in the process of being formulated that have been a stumbling block to easy immigration into the United States. According to Newton (2008), the United States of America has been able to formulate policies that are aimed at restricting certain groups of people who have the desire to immigrate to the United States (137). While there are policies that prohibit discrimination of immigrants based on their race, country of origin and other factors, policymakers have argued out their case that the research that has been carried out reveals that immigrants from certain nation or with a particular racial background need to restricted from gaining entry into the United States. For example, Teixeira (2010) argues that the research that was carried out among the US citizens reveals that 89% supported the increase of security measures on the US-Mexico border to cub the movement of immigrants from this nation to the US. Therefore, reforms would go a long way in guaranteeing the border security of the United States and ensuring that the number of illegal immigrants into its territories is minimal.
There are also laws and regulations that have made it difficult for any immigrant to get the United States citizenship even after living in this nation for some time. This is based on the fact that, for any immigrant to be granted the United States citizenship, one has to prove that he is worth it by meeting certain conditions that are in most cases very challenging. Borjas (2001) asserts that there have been restrictions of non-US citizens to access social benefit and welfare programs. Similarly, subscribing to welfare programs expose immigrants as a liability to the United States rather than assets thus reducing completely the chances of a person being granted this citizenship. As a result, many immigrants have suffered in the United States without stating their problems to the relevant authorities to seek for help, since this would reduce their chances of getting citizenship. As a result, there has been a reduced spending of public funds on people who are not citizens of the United States thus reducing government expenditure responsibilities (Lawrence).
Immigration reforms are important in that they aid in curtailing the continuation of illegal business and activities in the United States and bordering countries. There has been an increase in drug trafficking and terrorist activities, most of it being done by immigrants since there are no clear records that can be used to help in tracing their lifestyle records. As a result, some of these immigrants have used their status as a way of engaging in unlawful activities. However, Immigration reforms can be able to reduce the effects of these activities (Thompson and Lacey 2009). There are also workers who have violated the human rights of their employees by paying out wages that are below the minimum amount of wage which is stated in the labor laws because they are immigrants. Therefore, these reforms would play a critical role in ensuring that such firms do not employ immigrants without legal documents to stay and work in the United States and that those that are employed are paid fairly according to the work they do (Culbreath 2010).
The transfer of knowledge and skills also play an important part in any economy of the world. Different economies need different knowledge and skills that would enable them to expand and forge forward, thus enhancing the lifestyles of their citizen. The immigration reforms in the United States of America are aimed at reducing the number of unskilled workers who immigrate into the US (Briggs 180). This is because, most jobs can be done by the citizens of the United States and there is no need to increase competition for these jobs by US citizens and immigrants by being lenient on immigration labor rules and regulations. Therefore, one will need to meet certain standards of skills and knowledge to be able to be absorbed as a citizen of the United States (Scherer 2009).
There are benefits that the United States as a nation would gain by carrying out intensive immigration reforms. It is important to note that as a nation, immigration reforms can enable this nation to import low-skilled workers who can fill low vacant positions that have been left by American citizens after being promoted due to new knowledge and skills that they have been able to gain. In so doing, the United States labor body can be able to control the labor market through supply and demand factors (Beck 1996). For example, by allowing unskilled workers from outside the United States to gain access to employment opportunities has been found to encourage the native employees to enhance their knowledge and skills and to specialize in certain fields that grant them an opportunity to raise their productivity (Borjas 20).
While the United States has been considered as a place of prosperity by immigrants, there are many reforms that have to be formulated by the United States to empower it to have control over the overall movement of immigrants into its areas of jurisdiction. As a result, the United States has to align its immigration reform laws and regulation in such a way that while it will able to prevent unnecessary immigration into its boundaries, yet refrain from limiting this nation from economic and social gain that results from immigrants.
Classification of Spina Bifida
Tragedy on the Titanic
Home to Harlem
Rhetoric and Stereotypes
Initiatives of Healthcare Reform
Commute in Everyday Life
Alternative Energy Sources
Types of Human Body Tissues
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S A Khanmohamadi
In Light of Another´s Word: European Ethnography in the Middle Ages, Philadelphia, PA: The University of Pennsylvania Press (The Middle Ages Series), 2014. Reviewed in TMR.
"Worldly Unease in Late Medieval Travel Reports," in Cosmopolitanism and the Middle Ages, eds. John Ganim and Shayne Legassie, New York: Palgrave New Middle Ages Series, 2013, pp. 105-120.
“Salvage Anthropology and Displaced Mourning in the Lais of Marie de France,” Arthuriana21.3 (Fall, 2011): 49-69.
"Casting a 'Sideways Glance' at the Crusades: the Voice of the Other in Joinville´s Vie de Saint Louis," Exemplaria: a Journal of Theory in Medieval and Renaissance Studies 22.3 (2010): 177-99.
"The Look of Medieval Ethnography: William of Rubruck´s Mission to Mongolia," New Medieval Literatures 10 (2008): 87-114.
Review of Rethinking the New Medievalism, ed. Howard Bloch, Alison Calhoun, Jacqueline Cerquiglini-Toulet, Joachim Küpper, and Jeanette Patterson, (Hopkins University Press, 2014), Comparative Literature Studies, forthcoming, 2015.
Review of Kim M. Phillips, Before Orientalism: Asian Peoples and Cultures in European Travel Writing 1245-1510 (University of Pennsylvania, 2014), Philological Quarterly, forthcoming, Fall, 2014.
Review of The New Concise History of the Crusades: Updated Student Edition by Thomas F. Madden, The Medieval Review 07.10.31, October, 2007.
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Sala Colonia is an ancient city situated on the outskirts of Rabat, the present-day capital of Morocco. Its Roman remains were later incorporated into a medieval necropolis called Chellah. Built on a trading post used by the Phoenicians, Sala sits on a hill above the fertile plain of the Bou Regreg river which flows into the Atlantic Ocean. The site contains the ruins of an ancient port city referred to as Sala by the renowned Greek geographer Ptolemy. The first excavations undertaken on the site (1929-1930) unearthed the remains of several buildings from the time of Trajan (98-117 AD) including a forum, a monumental fountain, a capitol, a triumphal arch as well as the decumanus maximus (the main east-west-oriented street).
Coordinates: 34° 0′ 24″ N, 6° 49′ 13″ W
Phoenicians traders were the first to settle on the northern Moroccan coast as early as the 8th century BC. They founded several colonies including the settlement they called Sala on the banks of the Bou Regreg river. Under Punic influence, Sala became a city-state with diverse commercial relations with the Iberian peninsula as well as the Mediterranean and issued its own currency. The Phoenicians were later followed by the Carthaginians from the 3rd century BC onwards. The Romans took control of the area in about 40 AD during the reign of Emperor Claudius, and Sala became part of the province of Mauretania Tingitana. It was the most southwestern outpost of the Roman Empire in Africa. The Romans brought Sala to the status of a significant port and thriving economic hub. The city witnessed an important urban development, as evidenced by the layout of the forum, the capitolium and the curia, the octagonal nymphaeum, the triumphal arch and the thermal baths. An inscription confirms the status of the city as a Roman municipium and it was enclosed by a wall in 144 AD.
In about 250 AD the Romans lost control of the site to native Berber tribesmen, but Sala remained a trading centre and was still linked to the Roman Empire. Archaeological objects of Visigothic and Byzantine origin found in the area attest to the continuing commercial relations between Sala and Roman Europe.
What remained of the ancient city was abandoned in 1154 in favour of nearby Salé. The site of Sala lay deserted until the 13th century when the Merinids built a holy necropolis (or chellah), a mosque and a minaret on top of the Roman site, enclosed by a wall which still marks its boundaries today. The site, as part of the metropolitan Rabat, was granted World Heritage Status in 2012. If you visit Chellah in winter or spring, you will get additional wildlife as a large colony of storks inhabits the ruins.
The foundations of the three-bay triumphal arch which stood south of the capitolium and faced the forum. It was build during the reign of Antoninus Pius (138-161 AD).
The foundations of the triumphal arch.
The Capitolium, the official temple of the Capitoline Triad: Jupiter, Juno and Minerva. It was built in opus africanum on two terraces.
The Capitolium of Sala was paid for by Claudius Hosidius Severus, prefect of a Syrian cavalry squadron of Roman citizens. The main building phase of this complex is dated to between the end of the 1st century AD to the beginning of the 2nd century AD. It was probably inaugurated at the beginning of Hadrian’s reign in 120 AD.
The Capitolium was subdivided into several spaces including a peribolos (a court enclosed by a wall), a covered Corinthian portico, a paved courtyard of blue limestone, an altar, three adjoining rooms preceded by a pronaos with a staircase and a room reserved for the treasury temple.
The Capitoliun was supported by nine vaulted chambers (tabernae?) opening on the decumanus maximus.
The decumanus maximus, bordered on its eastern end by the Forum.
View of the Forum with bases of honorary inscriptions dedicated to the emperors and the great magistrates of the city.
The lower level of the forum with six shops served by a secondary road.
The forum was a trapezoidal structure paved with large blue limestone slabs. Built during the works carried out during the reign of Trajan, this public square was closed by two monumental gates which foundations still remain.
Pseudo-lotus capital outside the forum.
Roman mosaic in one of the workshops in the artisan quarter.
An apotropaic phallus as a symbol to avert the evil eye inside a workshop.
The ruins of the Curia Ulpia adjoining the basilica. The epithet Ulpia recalls the solicitude of Emperor Trajan, who undoubtedly granted financial aid to the local senate to erect the building.
The public baths of Sala located at the intersection of the decumanus maximus and the cardo maximus.
The octagonal Nymphaeum. It formed a water tower and was supplied by an aqueduct.
Roman ruins of Sala with 13th century minaret.
Storks nesting on the 13th century minaret built of stone and zellige tilework.
Unesco: Rabat, Modern Capital and Historic City: a Shared Heritage
February 20, 2017 February 7, 2019 by followinghadrian Categories: MoroccoTags: Morocco 1 Comment
One thought on “Sala Colonia”
Salah Eddine EL MAGHRAOUI says:
very beatuful pictures and interesting informations
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Tag: Milecastle
Milecastle 48 (Poltross Burn) is one of the best-preserved milecastles (a small, walled fortlet) along Hadrian’s Wall. It is located just outside the village of Gilsland in Cumbria, 3km east of Birdoswald Roman Fort (Banna). Milecastle 48 was built to a standard plan but is substantially larger than many other milecastles. It contains the remains of the north and south gates, two barrack blocks, enclosing walls and short sections of Wall on either side. Unusual features include an oven and a set of stairs giving access to the rampart walk. The two turrets associated with this milecastle (48a and 48b) have also survived as above-ground masonry. English Heritage currently manages the monument.
Coordinates: 54° 59′ 20.37″ N, 2° 34′ 24.67″ W
Built on a steep slope overlooking a tributary stream of the River Irthing, Milecastle 48 is one of the most significant and most informative of all milecastles. Internally, it measured 21.5m north to south by 18.7m across and had a broad wall (2.90m thick) built of large masonry, indicating that the milecastle was built before the decision to narrow the Wall. The wing walls (short lengths of curtain wall) extended 4m either side of the milecastle and connected with the Narrow Wall curtain of Hadrian’s Wall.
Inside were a pair of small barrack blocks flanking the central space of the milecastle. Each barrack had four rooms, large enough to accommodate a garrison of around 64 auxiliary troops, the largest number possible in a single milecastle. As the whole structure was built on a slope, the internal buildings had to be terraced and stepped. The north-west corner of the milecastle contained a cooking area, with a round oven. In the north east corner, the lower courses of a flight of steps were found, suggesting that the parapet walk stood 3.66 metres above ground.
Theoretical structural model plan of Milecastle 48.
This milecastle was of Type III, generally thought to have been built by the Sixth Legion (Legio VI Victrix). It was occupied from the AD 120s into the 4th century, and several alterations were made inside the building. Both gates were narrowed, and the barracks were redesigned to make three larger rooms. Milecastle 48 was first excavated in 1886, and subsequently between 1909 and 1911. Further excavations were undertaken between 1965 and 1966.
An reconstruction drawing of the Poltross Burn Milecastle at around AD 170.
Each milecastle on Hadrian’s Wall had two associated turret structures. The turrets associated with Milecastle 48 are known as Turret 48a and Turret 48b. The site of Turret 48a is situated on a river terrace on the south bank of the River Irthing. Turret 48a is one of the best-preserved turrets on the Wall. It measures 4.15 metres across, and the north wall stands 1.85 metres high. Turret 48b is situated 150m west of Turret 48a. It too survives as an upstanding stone feature but has lost its south wall. Built into the wall is a building stone inscribed with the name of the centurion Gellius Philippus (RIB 3407). Three other inscriptions (now in Tullie House Museum) were found close to Turret 48a (RIB 1859, 1860,1861). Both turrets were completed with wing walls on either side before the Wall was narrowed.
Poltross Burn Milecastle and its turrets are just two miles away from Birdoswald Roman Fort, where visitors can explore the longest continuous stretch of Hadrian’s Wall. It is part of the Birdoswald Roman Trail, which starts at Lanercost Priory and finishes at Willowford Roman Wall and Bridge Abutment.
Poltross Burn Milecastle.
The north side of Milecastle 48.
One of the barrack blocks on the west side of the milecastle.
The north side of Milecastle 48 with the remains of a flight of stairs on the right.
The foundations of Milecastle 48, looking north east.
Turret 48a. Both this and turret 48b before the Wall was narrowed ca. AD 125.
Turret 48a. Several hearths and evidence of bronze and iron working were found in the interior.
Turret 48b (Willowford West). The line of ditch and rampart can be seen in front of the wall.
From geograph.org.uk by John M (CC BY-SA 2.0).
Building inscription (RIB 3407) found east of Turret 48b, now built into a farm outbuilding at Willowford Farm.
c(o)ho(rtis) V / c(enturia) G(elli) P(h)ilippi
Fifth Cohort, the century of Gellius Philippus (built this)
Part of Hadrian’s Wall at Willowford, showing the lower courses of the Broad Wall (AD c.122) , with its narrower successor sitting on top (AD c.125).
English Heritage: Poltross Burn Milecastle
English Heritage: Description of Willowford Wall, Turrets and Bridge
February 3, 2019 by followinghadrian Categories: Hadrian's WallTags: Britain, Britannia, Cumbria, Gilsland, Hadrian's Wall, Milecastle, Roman Britain, Turret, Vallum Aelium Leave a comment
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Iran Accuses Saudi Arabia Of Supporting Terrorism After Shi'ite Cleric's Execution
The executions were reportedly held in 12 parts of the country. (file photo)
Iran has accused regional rival Saudi Arabia of supporting terrorism after the kingdom said it had executed a top Shi'ite cleric on terrorism charges.
Nimr al-Nimr, 56, was among 47 people executed in Saudi Arabia on January 2, the kingdom's Interior Ministry said.
"The Saudi government supports terrorists and [radical Sunni] extremists, while executing and suppressing critics inside the country," Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman Hossein Jaber Ansari was quoted as saying by Iranian state media.
Ansari warned Saudi Arabia "will pay a high price for following these policies." The Foreign Ministry also summoned Saudi Arabia's charge d'affaires in Tehran to protest al-Nimr’s execution, Iranian state television said.
The 47 were convicted of involvement in terrorist acts and inciting violence, the ministry said in a statement.
Al-Nimr was a central figure in Shi'ite protests that erupted in 2011 as part of the Arab Spring in the Sunni-ruled kingdom's east, where the Shi'ite minority complains of marginalization.
Iran previously warned that executing the cleric would "cost Saudi Arabia dearly."
Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami, a member of the Assembly of Experts and a Friday prayer leader, denounced the execution as a "crime" by Saudi Arabia's "infamous regime."
"This…blood will stain the collar of the House of Saud and wipe them from the pages of history," Khatami was quoted as saying on January 2.
Iran’s powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) said in a statement that the Saudi government will pay for “this shameful act,” which it said was a sign of decay of Saudi rulers.
The Twitter account of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei paid tribute to al-Nimr calling him a “martyr.”
"Awakening is not suppressible," read the tweet on Khamenei's English-language Twitter account, next to a photograph of Nimr.
A small group of seminary students protested the cleric's execution in front of the Saudi embassy in Tehran on January 2, Iranian domestic media reported.
'Foreign Meddling'
The cleric's execution also prompted angry reactions in other countries in the region, including in Shi'ite majority Iraq and in Bahrain.
Iraqi lawmaker Mohammed al-Sayhud warned that Nimr's execution was intended to fuel sectarian strife in the region.
"This measure taken by the ruling family [of Saudi Arabia] aims at reigniting the region, provoking sectarian fighting between Sunnis and Shi'ites," he told Al-Sumaria TV.
Prominent Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr called for demonstrations in Persian Gulf countries and in Iraq to protest the execution of al-Nimr.
"I ask that the Shi'ites of Saudi Arabia...show courage in responding even through peaceful demonstrations, and the same for the Shi'ites in the Gulf, so as to deter injustice and government terrorism in the future," al-Sadr said on his website.
In Bahrain, police used teargas against several dozen people protesting al-Nimr’s execution while carrying his pictures.
Meanwhile, Nimr's brother said the family was shocked by news of the execution but hoped that any reaction would be peaceful.
"We hope that any reactions would be confined to a peaceful framework. No one should have any reaction outside this peaceful framework. Enough bloodshed," Mohammed al-Nimr told Reuters.
He said the cleric was found guilty of seeking "foreign meddling" in the kingdom, "disobeying" the country's rulers, and taking up arms against the security forces.
Hundreds of members of its Shi'ite minority were arrested after the protests during which several policemen were killed in shooting and petrol bomb attacks.
The kingdom also detained thousands of militant Islamists after a series of Al-Qaeda attacks from 2003-06 that killed hundreds, and has convicted hundreds of them.
The ministry said the executions were carried out on January 2 in 12 different areas of the kingdom.
The executions are Saudi Arabia's first in 2016. At least 157 people were put to death last year, a big increase from the 90 people killed in 2014.
With reporting by Reuters, dpa, AFP, AP, and the BBC
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10 TV/Movie Highlights of 2017
by Katie Burnside 2 years ago in entertainment
2017 has been a great year for TV and movies, but what are the best moments that stand out from the rest?
Credit: Netflix
There have been so many incredible moments this year, but I have cut it down to just 10 of the best. In no particular order, here are the best moments we have had the pleasure of witnessing on our TV screens, this year.
1. 'Stranger Things 2' - When Mrs. Wheeler Meets Billy
Probably my favourite scene from the second Stranger Things. Billy turns up at the Wheelers looking for his sister. As the audience knows, he really doesn't care about her but he's forced into finding her. When he shows up at the house, he sweet talks Will's mum and she falls for it. The best part, her husband is fast asleep on the sofa, not a clue what's happening under his nose.
2. 'Mindhunter'
Many magazines and newspapers, like Time, Vanity Fair, Vogue and The Guardian, are stating that Mindhunter is among the best TV shows of 2017 and I have to agree. This show makes it onto my list as a whole, not just a particular scene. Every aspect is meticulous, from the visuals to the character development. If you haven't seen this show yet, then you need to get on that and fast because you're missing a treat.
3. 'Thor: Ragnarok' - Korg
Thor: Ragnarok was undeniably a huge hit, definitely the best of the trilogy. Some even say it's the best Marvel film to date. Chris Hemsworth was great, as usual, but for me, Korg stole the show. Check out the clip above to see how cute he is. He's my favourite character from Thor now. He was voiced by Taika Waititi, the director of the film. I really hope we get to see him again in another Marvel film. I think him and Groot would get on really well.
4. What 'mother!' actually meant
Did you finish watching mother! and think what the hell was that? Are you wondering what it all means? Well, you've come to the right place. It's a tough film and if you manage to get through it all, then well done to you.
It's all about the bible. Darren Aronofsky uses biblical themes and transforms them into a film about a house and a couple. Picture the house and its grounds, as the Garden of Eden. Jennifer Lawrence's character is mother nature. Javier Bardem represents a form of God, as he is a poet, a creator. Michelle Pfeiffer and Ed Harris represent Adam and Eve.
5. Richie's Dick Jokes In 'It'
Credit: Courtesy
Finn Wolfhard, who plays beloved Will Wheeler in Stranger Things, starred as Richie Tozier in this year's adaptation of Stephen King's It. The best part about his character was his one-liners and quick comebacks, a lot of them sexual. Here are some of his best quotes:
"Wait, can only virgins see this stuff? Is that why I'm not seeing this shit?"
"How did I draw the short straw? You're lucky this wasn’t a dick measuring contest."
"I hear the list is longer than my wang."
6. Saying Goodbye to 'Orphan Black'
Probably one of the best TV shows to ever be made and yet it's so underrated. You wouldn't expect to find this on my list, with it being the highlights of 2017, but it was a lovely ending that complimented the show perfectly. It's one of the few shows that ends at the right time, instead of dragging it out for 10 seasons or more. It's an intellectual show with one of the best performances, by Tatiana Maslany, to ever feature on a TV show. She plays several different characters and she plays them so well that you know who's who. It was the perfect ending to what has been one of the best rides.
7. Sherlock's Sister Reveals Her True Identity in 'Sherlock'
Probably the most shocking moment to come out of all four seasons of Sherlock was the reveal of Sherlock's sister. She played many different characters, so well in fact, that people failed to pick up on the fact that it was the same person. When she delivers the line to John, revealing who she really is, it's one of those moments where you have to peel your jaw up off the floor.
8. 'Big Little Lies' - The Last 15 Minutes
Credit: HBO
The last 15 minutes of Big Little Lies, in the season finale, is some of the finest pieces of work on television. Very few words are spoken and three burning questions are finally answered. Who was murdered? Who killed that person? And who is the man who brutally assaulted Jane Chapman and fathered her son, Ziggy?
It's a great representation of strong independent women and the lengths they will go to, to protect their children. This is what happens when women stick together.
9. 'Logan' Saying Goodbye to Two Beloved Characters
Saying goodbye to any beloved character is difficult, but saying goodbye to two in one film is just evil and brutal. If you're wondering why this is on my list of highlights, it's because it is the end of two very famous characters and that should be celebrated. Their deaths were justified and complimented what the characters went through. It was the right time. The film is pure genius.
10. Baby Groot Becomes a Teenager in 'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2'
Groot continued to melt our hearts in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2, as a baby. However, a post-credits scene revealed Groot to be a teenager and he's your typical teenager. He's got a messy room and refuses to do as he is told. If he remains a teenager in the next Guardians installment then we could be in for a laugh.
It's been an entertaining, funny, emotional and shocking year for films and TV. Let's see what the new year has in store for us!
Read next: The Top 10 Worst Movies of 2017
Katie Burnside
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Will The Shi'ar And The Starjammers Appear In 'X-Men: Dark Phoenix'?
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Home Deep Dive A Status Check on the War in Syria
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A Status Check on the War in Syria
GPF Team
A great deal of military activity is taking place in Syria, which warrants a closer examination of the country’s battlespace. The regime of President Bashar al-Assad continues to be resilient. While under pressure, the Islamic State retains control of its critical territories. Meanwhile, the rebels are losing ground.
The war can be divided into four theaters: the Islamic State, the Battle of Aleppo, the rebel stronghold of Idlib and the southern front.
Much of the fighting is in the north because of, among other reasons, the border with Turkey, which provides sanctuary for the various opposition forces.
The south sees less activity because of its sparse population, the regime’s strong hold on the capital and surrounding areas, and the borders with Lebanon, Jordan and Israel – countries that do not want to see the regime toppled.
While the regime, the Islamic State and the Kurds are each unified entities, the rebels remain utterly divided.
Civil war in Syria has been raging for five years. In our 2016 annual forecast, the Islamic State was the center of gravity for the conflict in Syria, and our projections for the year revolved around them. So far those projections are on track. However, there has been a flurry of activity in the last two months that has necessitated re-examining the Syrian battlespace.
Before we can map out the conflict, we must lay out the players. The proliferation of participants is one of the reasons this war is so opaque. There are scores of militias operating in Syria. Included in these are the small and relatively ineffectual U.S.-trained and supplied fighters.
The Syrian Kurds – under the leadership of the Democratic Party of Syria (PYD) and its armed wing, the People’s Protection Units (YPG) – are the most unified. But they have committed to joining the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a U.S.-backed hodgepodge of groups containing Kurds, Christian Arabs and a small number of Sunni Arabs.
The SDF has anywhere between 30,000 and 50,000 fighters. This coalition operates mostly in western Syria, dominating Hasakah province and putting pressure on the Islamic State (IS) from the north. It recently forced IS to withdraw from Manbij.
The Syrian rebels have a sizable number of fighters. Cobbling together various estimates from open source documents, a conservative figure would be about 100,000 rebel fighters. Some of these factions have access to tanks or to U.S.-supplied weapons, but they are still at a disadvantage to the Syrian regulars, who are backed by both Syrian and Russian air support.
The main problem, however, is that the opposition remains hopelessly divided. Even in the areas where the most rebel cooperation is happening – in the opposition’s territorial core of Idlib and Aleppo provinces – there are still tribal, political, ideological and religious differences limiting these groups’ effectiveness.
On the other side, the Syrian military has seen better days but still counts 150,000 soldiers in its ranks. Besides this, there are various pro-regime militias, the largest of which is the National Defense Forces, which is estimated to have between 35,000 and 90,000 fighters. Various Iran-mobilized militias and Hezbollah fighters also number in the low thousands and help the Syrian forces maintain relative supremacy on the battlefield. The combination of greater numbers and better equipment also allows Assad loyalists to fight on multiple fronts rather than concentrate resources on a single battlefield.
Lurking behind all of this is the Islamic State. Our assessment of the Islamic State remains that it is bent but not broken, and that both its capabilities and the number of its fighters have been woefully underestimated by the U.S. government and by the mainstream media. A U.S. congressional panel said as much on Aug. 11 when it claimed that U.S. Central Command had manipulated its intelligence reports to present a “rosy” assessment of the fight against IS.
We estimated in December 2015 that IS forces numbered close to 100,000 fighters. Various losses and attrition must be taken into account, but still, IS has shown consistently that it is willing to retreat rather than sustain too many casualties. We think it is still reasonable to posit that IS’ fighting force is somewhere between 50,000 and 80,000 strong.
The Main Centers of Gravity
The Islamic State Front in Syria
In our net assessment of the Islamic State, we identified IS’ core territory as the narrow band of land between Raqqa and Deir el-Zour in eastern Syria. This remains the case. Much has been made of the fact that Manbij was recently liberated from IS. This was a major PR victory for the SDF but a minor strategic victory.
IS, as it has so many times before when finding itself in a weak position, withdrew from Manbij. Reuters reported on Aug. 13 that as many as 500 trucks were seen leaving the city with IS fighters and supplies before the SDF forces arrived. Already, Turkey is demanding that the Kurdish fighters in the SDF withdraw east of the Euphrates. This is a combined force of perhaps 5,000 to 10,000 mixed fighters; it is not a force that is about to march on Raqqa.
Various reports have said that the seizure of Manbij means IS is cut off from the Turkish border, which it has used to smuggle fighters and supplies. However, as can be seen above, IS still holds a corridor of land on the border that is connected to Raqqa. And IS still holds the now-strategic small city of al-Bab. IS has also been aggressive in Aleppo province, engaging in various attacks meant to prevent any power from establishing dominance in the area.
Meanwhile, the SDF has stopped its approach toward Deir el-Zour from Hasakah. And despite its rhetoric, it has not shown any practical signs of preparation for a frontal assault on Raqqa, either by going down the Euphrates town by town or attempting an assault from Ayn Issa directly north.
The SDF has slowed for three reasons. First, it has a limited number of fighters. Second, the further it goes, the longer its supply lines and the easier it is for IS to attack them. Third, the SDF is dominated by Kurds. Further advances for the SDF mean Kurdish fighters seizing Arab-majority areas. Many Arabs don’t trust the Kurds any more than they trust IS, and the Kurds don’t necessarily want to take over areas so far from their base of support.
The main challenge to the Islamic State right now actually appears to be from the less discussed but no less strategic city of Deir el-Zour. Raqqa is the IS capital in Syria, while Mosul is its stronghold in Iraq. If IS loses Deir el-Zour, it is effectively cut in half and loses the ability to move supplies and fighters across the Syrian and Iraqi deserts.
Russian airstrikes against Deir el-Zour have increased recently, and there have been reports of Syrian loyalists amassing in Palmyra and Homs. From Palmyra and Homs, they can both beat back IS around those cities and also eventually march on Deir el-Zour to free up two brigades that have been surrounded by IS for more than two years. IS is taking this threat seriously enough that on Aug. 2 it transferred a “large number” of fighters from Raqqa to Deir el-Zour, according to the Institute for the Study of War.
Despite the fact that it has the upper hand, IS has not been able to break the spirit or defenses of these two Syrian brigades, which have had constant Russian and Syrian air support. Every time IS tries to advance, it is pushed back.
Deir el-Zour is not under imminent threat from any one source, but the Syrian regime looks resilient. The SDF is crowding in from the north. Russian and Syrian airstrikes are accelerating. And small U.S.-backed Syrian rebel groups are attempting (albeit unsuccessfully so far) to attack near Deir el-Zour. It is clear why IS is particularly worried about this front.
The other battles in Syria are important, and we will be addressing some of them in depth, particularly the Battle for Aleppo. But the Islamic State remains the main focal point of this conflict. It affects everyone else involved and has prevented any one power from dominating. IS will continue to face pressure both on Raqqa and Deir el-Zour, but we also expect that as its attackers begin to encroach upon its most important strategic territory, IS will fight tenaciously. It has been preparing for the defense of Raqqa and Deir el-Zour for years now and has nowhere to retreat.
The Battle of Aleppo
Aleppo is the center of gravity in the conflict between the Assad loyalists and Syrian rebels. Aleppo is Syria’s largest city and pre-war commercial capital. It is located in the wider province of the same name, which has a long border with Turkey – the rebels’ main staging ground. Many different battles are raging in the province of Aleppo. They involve regime forces, different rebel factions, al-Qaida’s Syrian affiliate, the Islamic State and separatist Kurds.
Syrian regime forces now surround rebel positions in Aleppo. But despite laying siege to the rebel territories, the regime isn’t in a position to celebrate just yet.
On July 31, a rebel coalition force launched a counteroffensive from the southwest. The jihadist-led force consists of fighters from the rural areas southwest of Aleppo as well as from the Islamist rebel stronghold in neighboring Idlib province. They hail from the secular nationalist Free Syrian Army, Ahrar al-Sham (the biggest Syrian rebel group) and the Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (known as Jabhat al-Nusra before it severed its ties with al-Qaida). The latter two are operating under the banner of the Islamist alliance known as Jaish al-Fateh, which also includes other smaller Islamist factions.
While the situation on the ground is fluid, for the time being the rebels have been able to connect two separate enclaves under their control by piercing a hole through the thin artery of government-held territory in the Ramouseh area. But the rebels’ advance is ephemeral. Their positions are already under counterattack, and it is still difficult for supplies to reach them.
The supplies they are able to get come from Idlib, which can still be resupplied from Turkey. But that means a much longer supply line that can be interdicted well before the supplies arrive anywhere near the forces amassed in Aleppo’s southwest. There is a small rebel enclave in the northwestern periphery of Aleppo province, along the border with Turkey. However, it is under dual pressure from IS, which controls territory to the east, and the Kurdish enclave of Afrin to the west.
The rebels, motivated in part by desperation, have demonstrated unusual unity in their efforts to pierce into the Ramouseh area, but it will be very difficult for them to team up with their comrades in eastern Aleppo to push outward against regime forces, especially since the eastern rebel-controlled districts have been battered by the regime’s attacks. Also, Kurds control the large area known as Sheikh Maqsoud, not far from the Castello Road. The PYD and YPG forces have tended to either remain neutral or they have clashed with rebel forces.
There is also the matter of Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, which is indeed a force multiplier for the rebels, but it is also a source of contention. More importantly, the United States remains completely opposed to the group, even after its separation from al-Qaida. Meanwhile, Russia continues to bomb the group and its rebel allies. Turkey, the rebels’ main ally, has also shifted gears in the wake of the attempted coup and appears to be warming up to Russia, which also spells bad news for the rebels.
Therefore, the rebels will not be able to revive themselves in the Aleppo theater. However, this does not mean that the regime will be able to flush them out of the city anytime soon. What we have for the time being is an uneasy stalemate.
The Rebel Stronghold
The battle for Aleppo is far from over, as the recent weeks’ advances and countermoves have made clear. Even so, the Assad regime has the upper hand in Aleppo, and if Aleppo falls, the rebels have only one place to retreat to – Idlib province. The Syrian regime has slowly hemmed in the rebels in Idlib, advancing from Latakia at the end of 2015 with Russian air support. Now the regime is pushing on rebel positions from Aleppo.
Idlib is also subject to air attacks from both Syrian and Russian forces, and even the Islamic State has been able to conduct terrorist attacks in the city. Even so, Idlib is not a major battle zone yet. Idlib is important for political reasons – it is the place where the bulk of the rebel forces intermingle and either cooperate with each other or compete for influence.
Reports surfaced earlier this month that Jabhat Fatah al-Sham pulled its fighters from the south in order to embed more deeply into opposition groups in Idlib and also to be at the front of the charge for Aleppo. This has boosted the group’s credibility among those who are suspicious of it because of its al-Qaida connections.
Idlib, then, is important for political reasons. It is also important because it is the last real rebel stronghold and is a lifeline to supplies and material from Turkey. If the Battle for Aleppo should go south for the rebels, the Battle for Idlib will come next, and there is not much the rebels will be able to do once it gets to that point.
The Southern Front
The forgotten front of the Syrian war is in the southwest. Damascus is not the core of the Alawite Assad regime – the Alawites are concentrated mostly in Latakia on the coast. Even so, Assad has made maintaining control over Damascus a priority. The fact that he has been able to do so is a testament to how many Sunni Arabs benefited from Assad’s rule and identify with the regime over the rebels.
Initially, it seemed the rebels might succeed in threatening Damascus, but after the July 2012 suicide bombing that targeted the National Security Council headquarters and killed several top officials, Damascus has not been seriously threatened by rebel forces. In fact, the initial uprising against the regime in different parts of the capital was put down in a week. Since then, a loose rebel alliance has been based in the eastern Ghouta region (the largest rebel enclave near the capital) but has not been able to mount any serious challenge to the regime in the past four years.
The most potent rebel forces in the south are based in Deraa and Quneitra provinces along the Jordanian and Israeli borders, respectively. Here again we see several different rebel groups that both compete and cooperate. Since 2014, the main force has been the Southern Front, which consists of 54 different secularist and moderate Islamist factions. The Jaish al-Fateh alliance operates a southern command in the area as well.
IS maintains a small presence in the south through various proxy groups, but these fighters only number in the low thousands. Still, this again goes to show how IS affects the entire situation, as the rebels have had to expend a considerable amount of their limited resources fighting IS at the same time that they are attempting to push their campaign against Assad.
The land from the eastern half of Suwayda province northeast to al-Bukamal and north to Palmyra is inhospitable desert and sparsely inhabited. Then, in sharp contrast with Turkey, Jordan and Israel do not provide sanctuary to the rebels. And a good chunk of Lebanon, the third country bordering southern Syria, either actively supports the Syrian regime or does not want to see its demise.
This report is the result of abandoning our assumptions and looking at the conflict in Syria with fresh eyes. We found that there are four key centers of gravity shaping this conflict. The Islamic State remains the ultimate variable, affecting everything around it. IS is under pressure but is still formidable, and neither the Kurds nor the regime seem poised to deal it a decisive blow in the near future.
In Aleppo, the Syrian regime continues to make slow and steady progress against the fragmented opposition. Loyalist success in Aleppo will eventually put pressure on the last remaining rebel stronghold, Idlib, where the various opposition groups continue to fight as much among themselves as with Assad. The southern front is still active, but stable relative to the other fronts, with the regime in a strong position. The war is progressing, but it is far from over.
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Our Research Network
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STANHOPE CENTRE
The Stanhope Centre for Communications Policy Research, launched in London in 2002, serves as a hub for researchers, activists, and policymakers and provides a forum for open dialogue and scholarship related to media law and policy around the world.
Ongoing activities include:
The Stanhope Werkstatte–a group of young academics working to understand the general problem of Internet technology and policy;
Research on media in conflict and post-conflict zones and their relationship to crisis;
Hosting media and communications scholars in residence; and
Offering student research internships for MA and PhD students working in the field of media policy research.
The Stanhope Centre works closely with CGCS and offers opportunities to collaborate with academics in the London area, as well as internship options for American and other non-British scholars. Five Annenberg PhD students have conducted internships with Stanhope.
Stanhope Centre highlights:
Working with MA/PhD students across London. Numerous internship opportunities have brought a constant flow of graduate students from the LSE, the School of Oriental and African Studies, Cardozo Law School, Oxford University, Cambridge University and the Annenberg School. While some of the students have had internships during the summer, others have complemented their MA programmes and have received supervision from Stanhope staff on their dissertations.
A long-term research project on flows of information in Somaliland. This research project uses an innovative set of methods to understand the role of particular types of information in the state and nationbuilding process.
The East African programme is also in its final stages as two Stanhope Associates are working on a publication of Oral Histories of Eastern African Editors.
Working with the Annenberg School and Albany Associates on public opinion research in Darfur.
Past projects have included:
A UK government-funded East African Journalist Fellowship, run jointly with the LSE’s Crisis States Research Centre.
MetaLogo ICT project, which is funded by the EU and led by GTZ.
In conjunction with Annenberg, Stanhope prepared a study of the Iraqi media landscape for the National Commission for Media and Communications in Iraq. This study was featured at a conference on media development in Iraq held under UNESCO auspices in Paris in November 2006.
Stanhope Centre was a member of an Internews Europe-led consortium which was selected to implement a media regulation project in Russia.
In 2006, Stanhope hosted a group of TV Managers from Hunan Province, China, who were enrolled in a training programme by the University of Westminster’s China Media Programme.
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Sport Clips Haircuts of Moon Valley
610 East Bell Road Ste. A-104 Phoenix, Arizona 85022
Sport Clips Haircuts of Moon Valley IS A Proud Sponsor of NASCAR'S Joe Gibbs Racing with Drivers erik jones and Denny Hamlin
Sport Clips Racing enters its 10th season in 2018 as a partner with Joe Gibbs Racing.
Erik Jones finished his freshman season in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series as the 2017 Sunoco Rookie of the Year, making his mark in the history books as the first driver to capture the honor in all three of NASCAR’s top level of competition. Jones completed the season with five top-five finishes, 14 top-10 finishes, one pole and 310 laps led. In addition to his Cup Series season, Jones competed in 18 NASCAR XFINITY Series races earning three wins, nine top-five finishes, 10 top-10 finishes, three poles and led 751 laps. For his sophomore season in the Cup Series, Jones returns to Joe Gibbs Racing taking over the driver’s seat of the No. 20 Toyota Camry. Joining Jones will be crew chief Chris Gayle, who called the shots for Jones during his rookie season.
Denny Hamlin enters his 13th season with Joe Gibbs Racing, driving the No. 11 Sport Clips Toyota Camry in the NASCAR Xfinity Series at Darlington Raceway in 2018. After an incredible 2017 season that left him contending in his 11th-career Chase for the NASCAR Cup, Hamlin wrapped up 2017 with two Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series and two Xfinity Series victories. Hamlin has scored wins for Sport Clips on five different occasions starting in 2011 at his home track of Richmond International Raceway in the Xfinity Series, 2012 at Atlanta Motor Speedway in the Cup Series, Darlington Raceway in 2015 in the Xfinity Series, and sweeping the Throwback Weekend at Darlington Raceway in 2017 in both the Cup and Xfinity Series races.
Proud Sponsor of JGR MX
Sport Clips enjoys its Official Sponsor relationship with the JGRMX Professional Motocross Racing Team. Founded by Coy Gibbs, the son of NFL Hall of Fame Head Coach Joe Gibbs, the team debuted Jan. 5, 2008 in Anaheim, Calif., at the opening round of the AMA Supercross Championship.
Coy Gibbs knows that building a motocross team from the ground up is no easy task, and having the right people will make all the difference in the success of the effort. Understanding that success in NASCAR will not directly translate into success in motocross, Coy has hired a team with extensive backgrounds in the sport. Jeremy Albrecht manages the team, with Dean Baker handling the engine development. Jonny Oler takes care of suspension, and Spencer Bloomer heads up the testing and settings refinement duties. Patrick Barker provides the tuning duties for Justin Brayton, while Ben Schiermeyer wrenches for Josh Grant. The team is based in Huntersville, North Carolina.
2019 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series:
February 10 Advance Auto Parts Clash at Daytona Motor Speedway
February 14 Duel 1 & Duel 2 at Daytona Motor Speedway
February 17 Daytona Motor Speedway
March 3 Las Vegas Motor Speedway
May 5 – Dover Speedway
September 1 Darlington Raceway
November 3 – Texas Motor Speedway
2019 NASCAR Xfinity Series:
August 31 Darlington
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History Graduate Program
Students will be admitted to the doctoral program only if they have first earned an M.A. degree in history at UK or at another institution.
Upon admission to the program, each student is assigned a faculty advisor in the student’s general field of study. Students, however, may change advisors with the approval of the Director of Graduate Studies. It is essential that students work with the advisor to develop a plan of study and to consider post-doctoral career plans. They should meet regularly with their advisors to discuss matters such as the guidelines and rules specified in the Graduate Handbook, course selections, the scope of the qualifying exam fields, and the dissertation project. Advisors are expected to meet regularly with their students to review progress to the degree.
Credit Hours and Course Requirements
Doctoral students must meet three sets of course and credit-hour requirements. One of these is the Graduate School’s requirement that a student have eighteen-hours of graduate coursework before sitting for the qualifying exams. A second is the department’s requirement that all Ph.D. students take eight 600- and 700-level History seminars before they may sit for the qualifying exams. (Students who have earned the M.A. degree in History at UK may apply seminars taken as an M.A. student toward this requirement.) Finally, specializations within the department have established specific course requirements for their students. These are explained in the Graduate Handbook.
Students are required to demonstrate a reading knowledge of at least one foreign language and in many cases two or more languages. If the M.A. degree has been earned at UK, language proficiencies achieved as part of the M.A. program apply to the Ph.D. program.
Doctoral Degree Progress Expectations
Ph.D. students contend with two timelines. One of these is to prepare for the qualifying examinations by completing coursework, meeting language proficiencies, establishing an advisory committee, and assembling reading lists for the exams. When a student will sit for the exams will vary depending on whether the student has earned the M.A. at UK and whether the student’s field of concentration requires additional language training. The Graduate Handbook discusses these expectations in more detail. Students who do not sit for the exams within four years of entering the doctoral program, however, may be dropped from the program.
The second important timeline commences after a student has passed the qualifying examinations and begins to research and write the doctoral dissertation. At this point, students who are A.B.D., or “all but dissertation” or “dissertators,” must first defend a dissertation prospectus. This should be done within sixty days of the completion of the qualifying exams. The Graduate School, meanwhile, requires a student to defend the doctoral dissertation within five years following the qualifying exams. The History Department requires its dissertators to submit an annual report about the progress toward completing the research and writing of the dissertation.
The Qualifying Examination
At the end of a student’s formal coursework and before commencing full-time work on the dissertation, doctoral students sit for the qualifying examination. This consists of written exams in three or four broadly defined fields and then an oral examination by the faculty advisory committee. (Some fields within the department also require a major historiographical paper as part of the qualifying examination.) “Quals,” as they are called, are intended to assess student learning and to test a student’s capacity to think historically, that is, to use the knowledge they have mastered to fashion historical arguments.
To sit for the exams, a candidate must complete all field, departmental, and Graduate School course and language requirements. In addition, either by the end of the second semester of the doctoral program or early in the third semester, the candidate must assemble an advisory committee and prepare a “qualifying examination contract with the committee members. The contract will define the scope of the written examination fields.
There are two qualifying exam periods-August 15 to September 15 and January 5-31. The written exams should be completed over a ten-day period. The oral exam should follow within five days of the last written exam.
Students finish doctoral study by researching and writing a dissertation. This is done under the supervision of the dissertation advisor and the advisory committee. Work on the dissertation begins with a dissertation prospectus, which must be presented to the advisory committee for its approval within sixty days of the qualifying exam. The prospectus should define the topic, explain the contribution of the dissertation to historical knowledge, and propose a strategy for research.
The dissertation should be an original contribution to a larger debate or field of study and demonstrate the student’s ability to carry out historical research and analysis.
‹ The M.A. Degree up Funding ›
HGSA Officers
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Has the US Congress ever repealed a law?
Has the United States Congress ever repealed legislation, rather than amend the legislation or let the legislation be annulled by the Supreme Court?
It seems to me that once a law is passed it becomes very difficult to remove such law even if it becomes evident the law is absurd or detrimental. Even the most notorious laws in the US only get amended so to remove the most sharp edges, or get repelled by the courts as unconstitutional.
But, are there any counter-examples where the US Congress opted to repeal a law?
united-states law us-congress
MichaelF
AnixxAnixx
What about the 21st Amendment? It repealed the 18th. – George Stocker May 30 '12 at 1:28
See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/… – Opt May 30 '12 at 1:46
The only way to repeal an amendment is with another [new] Amendment, Anixx. – George Stocker May 30 '12 at 2:16
@Anixx: I think in the US too a law can be passed declaring the provisions of a previous law null & void. In fact, if you read the text of laws, a lot of them have language changing previous laws by saying stuff like this and this line should be struck or this and this line should be changed to this other line. I don't know of a law however whose sole purpose was to strike out a previous law except for the 21st amendement. Also the US constitution has changed over the past 300 years so it's not like it's the exact same constitution as in the beginning – Opt May 30 '12 at 3:03
@Sid, as far as I understand OP asks for an example of law that was completely (full-text) declared null by the consequent law. – default locale May 30 '12 at 7:08
The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850
http://www.nationalcenter.org/FugitiveSlaveAct.html
It was the law of the land. It was repealed June 28, 1864...14 years and a Civil War later. The ACA may have a similar affect on our country.
edited Nov 2 '13 at 1:32
D WheelerD Wheeler
This formally fits the criteria, but it seems the repealation was linked to the results of the civil war: the winning side was changing the laws according to their new ideology. – Anixx May 17 '17 at 19:52
There are several types of repeals.
First, there are partial repeals where a poorly crafted portion of a law causes problems. For example, the onerous 1099 reporting section of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) was repealed. The rest of the law remains intact so far but that portion was repealed. Another recent example would be how the Patriot Act (2001), the Terrorist Surveillance Act (2006) and the Protect America Act (2007) effectively gutted provisions of the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
Next, there are repeal and replace laws. In some cases, a previous law is explicitly repealed and replaced with another law. In other cases, the law is implicitly replaced and rendered moot without it being formally repealed. This has been done many times. One recent example would be how the Great Depression era Glass–Steagall banking acts were implicitly and explicitly repealed by various acts, most notably the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999.
And, there have been outright repeals without a replacement. In this situation, a law or regulation is repealed and the act does not contain any replacement law or regulatory authority. One recent example would be the Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010. Another example would be the repeal of laws prohibiting private ownership of gold bullion by US citizens. Sodomy and 'blue' laws have been another common area where laws have been repealed without replacement.
jfrankcarrjfrankcarr
As far as I understand you can use Food and Fuel Control Act of August 10, 1917 as a counter-example.
It was an independent public act approved by 65th Congress. (not a list of changes to previous acts)
It was repealed entirely by the Joint Resolution of 66th Congress at March 3, 1921 (with other wartime acts)
Certain sections of Act were amended in between the two dates.
Thanks. I also would like to know where there similar cases in peace time. – Anixx May 30 '12 at 8:21
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1964 outlawed various forms of discrimation, although what they outlawed were mostly State laws it's hard to say if this is what you are looking for; since you don't make a distinction on what laws Congress has repealed. Most notably, around the same time in 1973 Congress passed the War Powers Resolution, this measure replaced the 1964 Tonkin Gulf Resolution which in effect repealed it. As noted by jfrankcarr many existing Acts were repealed by further acts, in general Congress amends laws, it's rare for them to be repealed, but in many cases as well the Executive Branch (the President) just doesn't enforce laws that either it doesn't agree with or doesn't think are effective any more.
As an aside Anti-Miscenigation laws were repealed, on a State level, but on a Federal level were never able to be enacted - although this was attempted these attempts were for Amendments to be added so that Anti-Miscenigation laws would be law of the land. Never happened though.
You can find out more here: how to repeal a law
Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged united-states law us-congress or ask your own question.
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The Time For Dreaming Is Over
Hector Luis Alamo
On August 28, 1955, a black boy was dragged from his great-uncle’s home near the Mississippi Delta, tortured, beaten and shot through the head. His body was dumped in the Tallahatchie River. The boy was Emmett Till, a 14-year-old visiting from Chicago. His heinous crime was the rumor that he whistled at a white lady.
He was pulled up from the riverbed three days later, the rusty old cotton gin fan still wrapped around his neck. Badly decomposed, the body was identified as young Emmett’s by the initials on the ring of one of his fingers — “L.T.,” the initials of Emmett’s father, killed while fighting in World War II. Back in Chicago, Emmett’s mother demanded an open-casket funeral, forcing the world to witness the inhuman brutality of racism.
On Wednesday, August 28, 1963 — exactly eight years after Emmett Till’s murder, and 50 years ago today — Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke to hundreds of thousands of Americans gathered at the Lincoln Memorial calling for “jobs and freedom.”
“I have a dream,” Dr. King spoke, “that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'”
Now, on the 50th anniversary of King’s ringing words, I guess it’s appropriate that we should look around and assess how far we’ve come. That Americans have elected a black man as their President presents a major milestone in our evolution toward a more equal and just society.
Our having a black President isn’t really that big a deal, and we should’ve expected no less from a country as supposedly dedicated to justice and equality as America. All we did in 2008 was fulfill the prediction Atty. Gen. Robert Kennedy made in 1968, when he said that “in the next 40 years a Negro can achieve the same position that my brother has.” There was a time, however, when America surpassed all predictions.
Yet, the greatest prophesy made in the last 100 years, Dr. King’s dream, remains unfulfilled. And there’s nothing more dangerous than a dream ignored and forgotten:
“What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore–
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over–
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?”
Maybe it explodes. Maybe it’s already exploded.
Perhaps better than any place in America, Chicago knows how unfulfilled the dream is. Chicagoans know where our poor live and what color their skin is. We know who’s dying of hunger, disease, addiction and gun violence, and who’s not. We know which segment of the population is seeing their schools closed and their jobs sent somewhere else. We know which Chicagoans live in the land of opportunity and which ones live in the land of shuttered doors.
Chicago sits on the ruins of an exploded dream.
Now the time for dreaming is over. Now is the time for planning and doing. We can’t wait for reforms that might never come. Now is the time to tear down every pillar and brick of America’s racist past, and begin building on the foundations set by our forebears — those who gave their sweat and blood to the Civil Rights Movement, the Women’s Liberation Movement, the Chicano Movement and the Gay Rights Movement. We can’t wear our conviction on our pins, t-shirts and Facebook walls. Now is the time to let our conviction permeate our muscles and bones.
The dream of a more just and equal America will be realized when enough Americans wake up and decide they no longer want to live in the kind of country that Emmett, Malcolm, Martin and Trayvon died in. The promise of America will be achieved when Latinos, blacks, whites, Asians, Native Americans, Arabs and Jews in the United States drop the very notion of “other” entirely. There is no “other” in America. There is no “them and us.” Whatever happens to blacks or Latinos, happens to all Americans. Whatever affects the poor or Puerto Ricans, affects everyone else. Just one oppressed and disenfranchised American means the oppression and the disenfranchisement of America itself.
We truly are one nation, maybe not “under God,” but under something. Under a singular idea, that the whole of humanity can come together in one land and live in common brotherhood and sisterhood, “with liberty and justice for all,” equally.
I don’t live in such a country. Neither do you. But I await the day when I can finally set foot in it and breathe its air. If that place doesn’t exist, then let’s build it.
Where, you ask?
Right here, in the rubble and debris of an exploded dream.
[Photo: Ron Cogswell via Flickr]
Gozamos Open House 8/30
Video Interview: Lila Downs
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You’re Conscious, but Can’t Move: Sleep Paralysis, is it Harmful to Your Body?
Have you ever woken up from sleeping, and found yourself unable to move? This horrific phenomenon has been happening to human beings since we’ve been conscious enough to talk about it, but it’s only been in the last century that we’ve been able to give it a name and start to analyze why it happens to us. This phenomenon is now known as sleep paralysis, but to people in the past, it was thought to have something to do with the Devil, or evil spirits that sought to torture people while they slept.
Today, we’ll talk about what causes sleep paralysis, and how getting into healthier habits can help you ease this terrifying experience.
What is sleep paralysis?
When we sleep, our body essentially paralyses itself in a process called REM atonia to prevent us from waking ourselves up during a dream. Most of the time, it’s what stops people from sleepwalking, or acting out their dreams.
Sleep paralysis is what you experience when your mind wakes up from sleep, but your body remains dormant. Most of the time, people who have experienced episodes of sleep paralysis find themselves unable to move or talk, and it may feel as if you’re unable to breathe deeply. This is because the diaphragm is usually the only part of the body to awaken with the mind, so we’re able to take in air, but our chest muscles refuse to expand, so we’re only able to take shallow breaths.
Africa Studio / Shutterstock.com
What are some other sensations I may experience during sleep paralysis?
Many reported cases of sleep paralysis include intense feelings of panic or fear, possibly due to our inability to breathe deeply. Some people have also reported hearing noises that were later confirmed to be imaginary — buzzing, humming, and even specific sounds like other voices whispering or animal noises such as roars. Many people also feel sensations like vibrations or hallucinate the feeling of other hands on their body. These reported sensations often overlap between patients, but researchers have determined that this is likely because most people hallucinate that which they fear the most, and these fears are often common within the local population.
What causes sleep paralysis?
Many researchers think that sleep paralysis is caused because of a disruption or dysfunction in our REM sleep. It most often occurs right as we’re waking up or falling asleep, which is the time when our body is moving from REM sleep into non-REM sleep. The ideal way for our bodies to leave REM sleep is for our physical body and mind to leave the pattern at the same time. Sleep paralysis is what happens when our mind leaves REM sleep faster than the rest of our body.
Research has also found that the way our body regulates melatonin could have something to do with whether we’re predisposed to experience sleep paralysis.
bmf-foto.de / Shutterstock.com
When does it first start happening?
It’s thought that eight percent to 50 percent of the global population will suffer at least one episode of sleep paralysis in their lifetime. Generally, most people will suffer their first episode of sleep paralysis in their teens, and episodes are most common among young people in their 20s and 30s. Afterwards, episodes are generally not as common. Only about five percent of the population suffers from regular episodes of sleep paralysis.
How is sleep paralysis diagnosed?
Sleep paralysis is diagnosed through a clinical interview with your physician or a sleep specialist. There is no way to test for sleep paralysis. Only the patient explaining their experience will reveal to the doctor whether or not they’ve experience this phenomenon.
If you go to your doctor and they confirm that you’ve suffered an episode of sleep paralysis, they’ll probably want to test you for other sleep disorders, including narcolepsy. Your doctor will check for narcolepsy with a round of genetic testing. Roughly 2/3 of all people with narcolepsy also suffer from regular episodes of sleep paralysis.
megaflopp / Shutterstock.com
Are there different types of sleep paralysis?
While there’s only one type of sleep paralysis, the number of times that you experience an episode will tell your doctor whether you have isolated sleep paralysis (ISP), or recurrent isolated sleep paralysis (RISP). Both of these types classify you as someone who experiences sleep paralysis either during one isolated incident, or rarely. If you’re diagnosed with RISP, it’s likely that you’ll also experience mental distress and strain related to the frequency of your episodes.
sezer66 / Shutterstock.com
Is this detrimental to my body or my health?
While sleep paralysis is extremely uncomfortable and stressful in the moment, there’s no evidence that it affects our overall physical health in any way. However, the mental feelings of distress that occur during and after one of these episodes cannot be overstated. Sleep paralysis leads many people to feel panicked about going to sleep, and they may experience fear related to whether or not they’ll be able to wake up after an episode. If you suffer from recurrent isolated sleep paralysis, you may want to talk to a therapist, who will be able to help you work through some of these feelings.
What determines whether I’ll be susceptible to sleep paralysis?
Recent studies have confirmed that sleep paralysis may have a genetic component, and studies on twins have shown definitively that if one monozygotic twin experiences an episode of sleep paralysis, it’s likely that their identical twin is on track to experience the same.
The only other commonality is between people who have narcolepsy. 75 percent of people with narcolepsy also suffer from sleep paralysis. Males and female experience sleep paralysis at exactly the same rates, so there’s no known gender component at this time.
fizkes / Shutterstock.com
Is there anything that can bring me out of an episode of sleep paralysis?
In some cases, there’s nothing you can do to stop an episode of sleep paralysis once it’s started. Some people find that the physical touch of another person or just hearing their voice will help to wake up their body. Others claim to have had success by willing themselves to wake up or concentrating hard on wiggling their fingers and toes.
Alan Poulson Photography / Shutterstock.com
What are some bad sleep habits to avoid?
There are tons of things that you can do to help avoid episodes of sleep paralysis. Episodes tend to happen more frequently when we’re stressed out, physically tired, or have bad sleep hygiene. This means that in order to avoid sleep paralysis, it’s helpful to focus on improving bad sleep habits like staying up late, using screens too close to bedtime, and drinking alcohol or using other stimulation right before bed.
It’s important to try and get at least six to eight hours of sleep a night. It’s also thought that sleeping on your side or stomach may help prevent sleep paralysis.
Ocskay Bence / Shutterstock.com
Meditation is thought to be extremely helpful in improving sleep hygiene and can also help us feel less frightened and stressed out during or immediately after an episode. The more we practice meditation, the better we become at deliberately slowing down our heart rate and deepening our breaths. Our meditation practice can also help us feel more at ease with the uncomfortable feelings associated with sleep paralysis like anxiety, stress, and panic.
Kite_rin / Shutterstock.com
How else can a doctor help me with my sleep paralysis?
There are some types of anti-depressant medication that can be prescribed to help regulate our sleep cycles, and a doctor may prescribe these if you suffer from recurring episodes of sleep paralysis. They may also suggest that you refrain from the consumption of alcohol and can recommend a therapist who specializes in dealing with issues of trauma related to these stressful experiences.
Stokkete / Shutterstock.com
Sleep paralysis in pop culture
Even though it’s frightening, there are tons of different ways that sleep paralysis has impacted our culture today. Many people believe that stories about alien abductions and evil spirits like the Jinn or the Pandafeche were dreamed up because people were struggling to come up with a way to describe their experiences with sleep paralysis. Authors like J.M. Barrie (Peter Pan), and Charles Dickens (A Christmas Carol) have passages in their books that describe the experience of sleep paralysis perfectly.
For a more modern interpretation of this nighttime phenomenon, check out the 2015 documentary The Nightmare, which features interviews with tons of different people around the world describing their experiences with sleep paralysis.
Everett Historical / Shutterstock.com
Purchasing a brand-new mattress is an important investment for the overall health of you and your significant other. Though they can run you a pretty penny, researching and investing in the right...
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A Tale Of Two Wildies
Posted on March 31, 2014 by heatherclemenceau
Family Picnic, by Melody Perez – http://www.runninghorses.org
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”
These famous lines, which open “A Tale of Two Cities,” hint at the novel’s central tension between love and hatred. Indeed, the subject of opposite “pairs” is one of the major themes of Charles Dickens’ novel.
I’m reminded of both the similarities and differences between the wild horses of Sable Island off the coast of Nova Scotia and those of western Canada. How unequally treated they are in the eyes of the government! On the one hand, the Sable Island horses are romanticized as being the descendants of shipwrecked horses, while the wild horses residing in Alberta and British Columbia however, not treated with such sentimentality. They are considered to be feral, inbred, and worthless, while spreading parasites and disease to other ungulates in the area. Both groups of present-day horses, however, are descendants of animals brought to these areas in the 1700s. When horses galloped across what would become the US border onto Alberta’s prairies, it was a bit of an overdue homecoming, having been perhaps 10,000 years since the province’s grasslands shuddered under equine hooves. Despite geography, all these horses share a common ancestry, as fossils indicate that North America is the original home of the horse where it first appeared millions of years ago. Yet both groups of horses are viewed in decidedly different fashions, primarily because up to this point, unlike Alberta, there have been no resources of interest that can be easily extracted from Sable Island.
The 42 km long, 1 km wide crescent-shaped island, really a large sandbar, is a remnant of the Wisconsin glacial deposit made between 10,000 and 45,000 years ago. The present population of 350-400 horses are the ancestors of horses used in a government operation established to assist ship-wrecked seafarers. The island, located about 290 km off the coast of Nova Scotia, Canada, became Canada’s 43rd National Park in June 2013 – the first national park in the middle of a petroleum field. Perhaps because of this, the Bill to designate Sable Island a national park reserve was very nearly derailed in the House of Commons.
The possible pedigrees of these horses, who generally fall between 13 – 15 hh and range in colour from chestnuts to bays and blacks, with some horses bearing light coloured manes and tales, is unknown, but could consist of a number of breeds popular at the time, including ponies and drafts. Unlike the Alberta and BC wildies who are exposed to interference by people – fertility control, culling, round-ups, etc. the Sable Island horses are among the few wild horse populations that are entirely unmanaged.
It’s important to note that the Sable Island horses themselves are not directly protected, but rather the island itself is, historically under the “Canada Shipping Act,” not surprisingly, since the island is a hazard to marine vessels and the area nearby is a graveyard to about 350 ships and thousands of sailors. This protection is tenuous and exists only as long as the Canadian Coast Guard operates a station there. Since 1801, when the life-saving stations were established, there has been a continuous government presence on the island. In 2008, the Nova Scotia government designated the horses one of the official provincial symbols and they are also the official horse of Nova Scotia. The horses have the same status as other wildlife on the island, such as grey seals, roseate terns and the Ipswich savannah sparrow – undisturbed except where research permits are provided by Parks Canada. Biological samples are only taken from animals that have died of natural causes. Based on meticulous records of which horses have gone missing and how many carcasses have been found, it’s estimated that remains have been found for the majority of the horses that have been on the island for about the past 30 years.
Up to this point there have been no resources of interest to extract from the island itself, although that could change in the future. Because of the reserve status, there is a legal ban on surface drilling on the island, out to one nautical mile. The designation as a national park reserve still allows for horizontal drilling underneath the island and low-level seismic testing on top of the island. The Sable Offshore Energy Project produces between 400 and 500 million cubic feet (14,000,000 m3) of natural gas and 20,000 barrels (3,200 m3) of natural gas liquids every day. But the government estimates there is $2.4 billion worth of natural gas and oil directly underneath Sable Island. However, it is too expensive to extract those resources with current technology. ExxonMobil, Shell Canada, Imperial Oil and other consortium partners have the exploration rights in the area. Environmental groups say the Bill designating the island as protected is not perfect because it allows for potential future development in and around the island.
In stark contrast to the status of the Sable Island horses, Alberta’s government announced in January it would give out licences to capture 200 of the free-roaming wild horses. There are no restrictions on what may be done with them either – while some could be domesticated, trained and sold to private homes, any others, including pregnant mares, older horses, and infirm horses, can be sold to slaughter.
According to the Ministry of Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development, there are too many horses in the area, and they are competing for resources with cattle (a non-native species) and wildlife. These wild horses inhabit crown land territory of 23,000 km2. That is one horse for every 23 km2. This is very low density. The committee that made this decision included groups with a conflict of interest such as cattle ranchers (one of whom was issued a permit to capture horses), OHV (off-highway vehicle users) and the forestry industry. In addition to pressure by industry, there is also an historical sense of entitlement by certain groups, including hunters, trappers, rodeo suppliers, and outfitters. These groups all claim that roughly 900 or fewer horses have somehow decreased the population of deer and elk. All claim these “feral” horses threaten their use/exploitation of the land and its resources. The Conservative government of Alberta, formerly under Alison Redford, has close ties to the most powerful stake holders, oil and gas, the beef industry and forestry.
Stake holder list:
Alberta Equestrian Foundation & Alberta Horse Welfare Alliance of Canada
Alberta Farm Animal Care Association
Alberta Fish and Game Association
Alberta Professional Outfitters Society
Alberta Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA has withdrawn from the committee, even though they state that they did not know about it at the beginning, they also had not attended any of the previous meetings)
Alberta Veterinary Medical Association
Alberta Wilderness Association
Capture License Holder
Livestock Identification Services Ltd.
Rangeland Expert at the University of Alberta
RCMP Livestock Investigator
Rocky Mountain Forest Range Association
Spray Lake Sawmills
Sundre Forest Products
Wild Horses of Alberta Society
Photography by Ken Mcleod
A scientifically valid headcount of the horses has not been done since March 2013, before the flooding last June, and before the heavy snowfall this winter, both of which are believed by horse advocacy groups in the area to have taken a toll on the herd’s numbers. Despite not possessing an accurate count of the horses, the PC government insisted on moving ahead with the cull without a clear objective or enough scientific data to support it. Therefore, the government has operated blindly using misinformation to justify their actions. Various talking heads in government capacities also bizarrely claim that the wild horses have no known predators. There is absolutely no science behind any of their claims of rangeland degradation by the horses. It is a fact that domestic livestock grazing reduces wildlife populations by competing for food, water, and space, and degrading habitat. Habitat degradation caused by grazing also exposes prey species to increased predation (due to lost vegetative cover for concealment and escape), resulting in further declines in those populations. The vast majority of forage and water resources in the West are devoted to domestic livestock grazing.
Ultimately, only 15 horses were captured, despite the covert behaviour of the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Resource Development (ESRD) leading up to the 2014 capture season. By no means did ESRD demonstrate any commitment to the recommendations of a clear and transparent, honest communication amongst all stakeholders, which was tabled at the Feral Horse Advisory Committee. In fact, ESRD repeatedly denied capture permits were issued when numerous inquiries were put to them in the weeks preceding the announcement. Jason Bradley (one of two individuals to whom the original permit for 200 horses was ultimately issued – Brynn Thiessen is the second. Two other former permit owners declined to participate this year), is on the Steering Committee and was therefore provided with advance information about the issuance of his capture permit so that he could prepare his site in advance, while withholding that information from other members of the Steering Committee and members of the general public. This is a clear conflict-of-interest. Of these captured horses, three mares, possibly heavily in foal, were removed, sold to a third party and apparently slaughtered within a scant few days, despite Alberta Horse Industry (and therefore Canadian Food Inspection Agency) regulations that state that “at least six continuous months of documented acceptable history is required for an equine presented for processing in an establishment inspected by CFIA.”
So, by an accident of geography, the Sable Island horses are left alone to enjoy their days free from human interference. It’s not that the government values the horses themselves, but unlike the Alberta wildies, they have no reason at this time
to disturb them. Now the future of Sable Island and the Station is in question, and the Canadian government is considering various options – one of which is to close the Station, thus ending 200 years of full-time human presence and stewardship. This option, combined with the encroachment of companies who are interested in oil and natural gas exploration would put not only the horses, but all the island’s flora and fauna at serious risk.
You can be sure if gas or oil could be easily extracted from Sable Island, or the grass growing on the island was found to be of benefit to cattle grazing, then all of a sudden there would be too many horses on the island and a “management” plan would have to be implemented.
Please register your complaints about the handling of the Alberta free-roaming horses with the following individuals/agencies:
Livingston, Don
Land Management / Planning Forester
Land and Range Management
Environment and Sustainable Resource Development
2nd fl Provincial Building
Rocky Mountain House, AB
T4T 1B3
E-mail: don.livingston@gov.ab.ca
Kesseler, Rob
Unit Lead, Integrated Operations
Rangeland Integration Section
4th fl Great West Life Building
E-mail: rob.kesseler@gov.ab.ca
Newsham, Helen
Section Head
E-mail: helen.newsham@gov.ab.ca
Campbell, Robin, Honourable
Minister of Environment and Sustainable Resource
Development, Government House Leader
Members of Executive Council
323 Legislature Building
10800 – 97 Avenue
T5K 2B6
Hancock, Dave, Honourable
E-mail: premier@gov.ab.ca
Booth, Nikki
Issues Manager
12th fl Petroleum Plaza ST
T5K 2G8
E-mail: nikki.booth@gov.ab.ca
Sancartier, Carrie
Public Affairs Officer
E-mail: carrie.sancartier@gov.ab.ca
Legends of the Dance by Melody Perez – http://www.runninghorses.org
Filed under Horsemeat, Horses, Hunting, Uncategorized, Wild Animals and tagged "Alberta Equestrian Foundation", "Alberta Farm Animal Care Association", "Alberta Fish and Game Association", "Alberta Horse Welfare Alliance of Canada", "Alberta Professional Outfitters Society", "Alberta Veterinary Medical Association", "Alberta Wilderness Association", "animal abuse", "animal welfare", "Canadian Food Inspection Agency", "Jason Bradley", "Livestock Identification Services Ltd.", "ministry of Alberta Environment and Sustainable Resource Development", "RCMP Livestock Investigator", "Rocky Mountain Forest Range Association", "Sable Island", "Sable Offshore Energy Project", "Spray Lake Sawmills", "Sundre Forest Products", "Wild Horses of Alberta Society", ASPCA, ESRD, horsemeat | 9 Comments
Pingback: A Tale Of Two Wildies | Canadian Horse Defence Coalition's Blog
catherine ritlaw on March 31, 2014 at 6:54 pm said:
Thank you, great writing, as always
Nanette schieron on March 31, 2014 at 7:54 pm said:
Very informative article,as usual.I so agree with you, Heather, that the Sable Island horses are safe only until the money men enter the equasion. I followed the decision and implementation of the Alberta wild horse capture .I was heartened by the action oriented citizens who fought valiantly to stop it, hoping for a more positive outcome, but your government is similar to mine here in the US: namely they NEVER listen to their citizens,instead, they cater to the those who put money into politicians’ pockets. It’s hard to see a more humane solution when the odds are always against those that have no monatery value or power. I find here in the US there are many people who care about our wild horses, but it seems to me that what is needed is one large umbrella organization that has 100,000 plus members who will act as one entity to advocate for preserving our wild horses as was spelled out in the original wild and free roaming horse and burro act of 1971. After all, that is what Wild Horse Annie managed to pull off to get that law passed, even though it took her 20 years!
Nancy on March 31, 2014 at 8:27 pm said:
Reblogged this on "OUR WORLD".
Barbara Griffith on March 31, 2014 at 8:29 pm said:
This is the same thing that is happening to the wild horses here in the US. The BLM, Bureau of Land Management , have rounded up so many horses and stuck them in holding pens that there is only about 18,000 if that many, left across 10 states, but you never see the number of cattle dropping at all. One horse to 50 or more cows. Cows destroy any grazing they are turned loose on that does not even count the thousands of sheep, that like cows they don’t have upper teeth to cut the grass off above the root like horses do. Horses bite off the grass which leaves it for deer and other grazers. Cows and sheep pull up the grass root and all.
Letty grayson on April 1, 2014 at 2:02 am said:
Thank you Heather for taking the time to write about all wild horses — I know that your writing results in saving some of their lives.
M. Gail Wieterman on April 4, 2014 at 1:33 am said:
Very good story, hopefully someone hears us!!!
littleironhorse1 on April 11, 2014 at 1:33 pm said:
Reblogged this on Littleironhorse1's Blog.
Craig Downer on April 13, 2014 at 3:44 am said:
Excellent article. Heather! Happy Horse Spring. Sure hope we can turn the situation around in the rest of Canada for the horses and counter the dishonest and selfishly motivated disinformation campaign against them!
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Filipino Driver Pronounced Dead After Passing Out in Hong Kong
For those who decide to work overseas, most of the time, it’s not only until you’re there that you realize how high the stakes are.
This is especially true for those living (and working) alone in a country like Hong Kong. And while it’s good to know that there are organizations such as the church and other NGOs who are willing and open to lend a helping hand to those who may need support in coping with life overseas. However, the tricky part is when the inevitable happens, such as an illness or accident.
Credits: Wikimedia Commons
Filipino Man Passes Out While at Work, Dies in Hong Kong
This has been the case of a 57-year old Filipino man who died after passing out in Happy Valley on Hong Kong island last Tuesday (April 30), as shared in a report by the Asia Times.
According to the report, at around 8:45 in the morning, a security guard called the police to report that a man had been found unconscious in an open area opposite Amber Lodge on 40 Mount Butler Road in Happy Valley.
The police and paramedics immediately responded and rushed the man to the hospital, but he was later pronounced dead by medical staff and doctors. The Filipino man had been identified as a driver employed by a family living in Amber Lodge. He was cleaning a car and suddenly fell down before passing out.
After conducting initial investigations, the police ruled out foul play in the cause of death, but suspected that the man had an unknown illness. At present, experts are still conducting an autopsy to determine the man’s real cause of death.
In this case, while there has been no form of abuse or foul play reported, the police suspect that the man had a pre-existing medical condition. As earlier proposed by a Philippine official in Hong Kong, OFWs need to undergo regular medical check-ups in order to avoid these kinds of situations.
In actuality, Hong Kong offers great medical coverage especially for domestic workers, whom we know, most of the time, work to the bone even late in the night.
They say knowing is already half the battle, and while this may practically hurt the pockets of workers initially, the benefits far outweigh the cost of a healthy lifestyle practice, which includes regularly seeing a doctor for a health check.
ALSO READ: Filipina DH in Hong Kong Fired Over Cancer Diagnosis, Now Fights for her Life
Next post: [VIDEO] ‘Unstable’ Man Draws Flak on Social Media for Kicking MTR Door
Previous post: Labour Group Calls on Gov’t to Help Abused Migrant Workers in HK
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The Curious Case of the Philadelphia Sports Fan
Updated on June 11, 2016
Matt Weeks
The early exit of the Philadelphia Phillies from the 2011 playoffs, along with the dismal 1-4 start of a Philadelphia Eagles team that everyone in the sports media had pegged as a Super Bowl contender, has got me feeling a little bit down. Things had been going uncharacteristically well for a while. In the past five years, we've seen the Phillies win 5 straight NL East titles and a World Series, we've seen the Eagles win two NFC East titles and make it to an NFC Championship game from the wild card slot, and we've seen the Flyers make the Stanley Cup Finals. On paper, it's been a pretty good time to be a Philadelphia sports fan in the past couple of years.
Get well soon, Ryan.
Still, if my own personal feelings and those being overwhelmingly expressed on the sports talk radio stations in the Philadelphia market are anything to go by, it's been an extremely disappointing Fall. The frustrating sentiment was best expressed in a visual medium in the last game of the NLDS, in which Ryan Howard came up to bat with two outs in the bottom of the ninth and hit a sharp grounder to the right side of the infield, only to collapse on the field as he was getting himself out of the batter's box thanks to a ruptured Achilles tendon. The image captured perfectly the crumpled spirit of the Philly faithful who had been so pumped throughout the season watching the best team in baseball make mincemeat out of everyone they came across, only to completely collapse in the last month of the season as the bulk of the position players on the team simply ran out of gas. And yes, the fans in attendance and many watching at home made that sense of disappointment loud and clear.
Couple that with the Philadelphia Eagles, who made a blitzkrieg of personnel moves after the NFL lockout ended to shore up what is arguably the best offense in football and address the many holes that were present in their defense last year, leading to their first round exit from the playoffs after a year that began 10-4 and had all the promise in the world. Unfortunately, many of the new defensive pickups have been considerably less than stellar, leading to three weeks in a row in which the Eagles took leads into the 4th quarter, only to lose the game in the end. The atmosphere of disappointment in the two major sports teams among the fandom is palatable, and harkens back to an era of sports with which most of the fans are infinitely more familiar.
I was born in 1982. When I was just under a year old, the Philadelphia 76ers won the NBA Title. I had no conscious memory of it. In fact, up until 2008, when the Phillies finally won a World Series, I and anyone else who was born after me had no conscious memory of anything but disappointment in our sports teams. We had a 25-year drought in championships among the four major sports, the longest of any city that had been consistently represented by teams in all four for that amount of time. Sure, we had a lot of good sports to watch during that drought. Throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s, along with the early 2000s, the Philadelphia Eagles were a consistently good football team. The Flyers dominated the mid-1980s and mid-1990s in the Wales (and later Eastern) Conference. The 76ers did fairly well during the Larry Brown/Allen Iverson years. But all of those teams fell short of that elusive World Title, and as a result, the Philadelphia fandom began to adopt the concept of perennially falling short into their own unique culture.
Philadelphia sports fans (and really, Philadelphia anything fans) have gotten a terrible rap from the national media for as long as I’ve been alive. Bring up a conversation about the culture here with anyone who isn’t from here and you’ll hear the same thing. We booed Santa Claus. We cheered Michael Irvin’s career-ending injury. We get down on our own teams when they underperform. We’re loud, vulgar, rude, demanding, unforgiving louts with incredibly high standards who don’t appreciate the effort that athletes or performers make to perform for us, especially when they’re our hometown people
Let me, as a lifelong resident of the Philly sports nation and fan of all things Philadelphia, call immediate B.S. on most of the above. Are we loud, vulgar, demanding, and occasionally asses? You bet! We are passionate fans of our sports and entertainment. I defy you to find anywhere in the United States (outside Texas) that has a greater love for and pride in the people and things that it identifies with as part of the cultural identity.
Yes, we boo, loudly and often, and many times directed more at our own team than the opponents. But what should that tell you about us? That we’re unappreciative? Or that we care? Go to any college or pro football game where a normally good team does more poorly than expected and you’ll hear boos. Go to any game where a normally bad team plays poorly and you’ll hear dead silence. The faithful crowd’s probably been beaten down all season and sees no reason to give voice to any kind of sensation unless something good happens. They just don’t care.
Not the case in Philadelphia. You can be atop your division or in dead last place and this city and its people will come out to the games and get behind your effort. We’re the home of Rocky Fragging Balboa, for crying out loud. You will never find a louder crowd when a home team needs to come from behind, or a more celebratory crowd when said comeback actually succeeds. But the other side of that is that, because we invest so much of our passion and emotional energy (not to mention money) in our sports and entertainment, we do indeed boo when people that we support and that we give that special Philly flavor of love to don’t seem to care.
Case in point, when Guns N’ Roses comes to the First Union Center for their infamous concert in 2002 and cancels TWO HOURS AFTER THE OPENING ACT HAS LEFT THE STAGE, yeah, we’re going to hit the roof a little bit. And we’re going to get even more ticked off when every national media outlet (along with the band, the management, and the label) characterize what happened as a “riot” when there were no arrests made and no major injuries!
We get this treatment every single time there’s an incident of bad behavior at one of our events. “Well, there go those Philadelphia fans again. Worst fans in the world, they are. Heh, did you know they’re the only city in the country that keeps a JAIL in its stadium?” Heh, did you know that the rest of you need one?
People, there are badly behaved fans in every single city. We certainly don’t hold Disco Demolition Night against Chicago fans. Or the fan who threw a helmet at Reggie Smith against San Francisco. Or the fan who attacked Billy Spiers against Milwaukee. Or the fan who took a swing at Gary Sheffield against Boston. Or the fans who bombarded Dodger Stadium with promotional giveaway baseballs against Los Angeles. Or the fans who destroyed an entire section of Cleveland Municipal Stadium during the last home game of the original Cleveland Browns against Cleveland.
Pictured: Actual sports hooligan epicenter of the United States
Or, for that matter, the Rangers fans who attacked players on the Boston Bruins bench against New York. Or the Rangers fans who doused the Canucks bench with beer against New York. Or the Islanders fans who showered the ice with beer and garbage during the Game 6 of the 1993 Patrick Division semifinals against New York. Or the fan who threw a FRAGGING HUNTING KNIFE at Wally Joyner against New York. Or the 200 Giants fans who pelted the San Diego Chargers bench with chunks of ice against New York. Or the fans who poured beer and spit on the visitors families’ section at Yankees Stadium during the 2010 ALCS against New York.
A casual observer might observe the decades-old national media fixation on the character of Philadelphia spectators and wonder if maybe it might have something to do with almost every national media outlet being headquartered in and populated by people from New York. Or maybe that’s just my paranoia running a little high lately.
Yes, our passion is very noticeable when it turns ugly. But no one seems to report the other side of the coin, and that is our unparalleled respect, admiration, and love for the people who come here and excel, and show us the same love we show them.
I was at Jim Thome’s first game back in Philadelphia after he left for Chicago. He was the White Sox’s regular DH, but for some reason, they gave him that game off. The game was a blowout; I think the Phillies were up 9-2 or something like that in the top of the 9th, when the entire stadium starts chanting “We want Thome”. Now that the game was pretty much a foregone conclusion, all of Philly wanted to see the guy who spent so many great years in a Phillies uniform come up to bat against them. When he came back to town to face us with the Twins in 2010, the crowd gave him a standing ovation when he hit a two-run home run off of a Phillies reliever.
The people like Thome, Brian Dawkins, Randall Cunningham, and Cliff Lee, who come to Philadelphia, give us their best, and leave the city on good terms, will ALWAYS have a home here no matter where they wind up. Just the same, people like Axl Rose, J.D. Drew, and Terrell Owens will always have major heat here, either because of what their relationship was with the city while they were here or the manner in which they crapped all over it after they left.
Philadelphia is unique among American metropolitan areas. It takes a special kind of mentality to live here your entire life. It takes a very special kind of athlete or entertainer to ply their craft here. Disappointment is so ingrained into our collective consciousness that we are simultaneously steeled against it and very sensitive to the expectation of more of it. Show the fans who plopped down their money love and respect and you will be showered with it in return. Disrespect the fans with a half-assed attempt at a performance and you're going to quickly find yourself in the doghouse. That's the Philadelphia way: equally demanding and rewarding.
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I love this article! I am sk sick and tired of hearing that we are the worst fans! We are just really passionate about our teams. And like the article says, EVERY team has some bad fans. Just because we are a little louder and a little more aggressive doesn't make us the worst fans ever. I personally think we are the greatest! :)
Julio E Olmo Sr
4 years ago from Florida, USA
Growing up in Philly at one time during the 1980s all four of our sport team were champions or runner-up's and were just a subway ride away for us. Great Times!
Had to read this article for a Anth Class. Being a Philly fan I loved this. Awesome work!
Philadelphia have unique Fans
Sports Fans visit http://www.DFANSbook.com First fans social network
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Jan 27, 2014 | 01:40
Egypt calls early presidential election as violence spreads
Jan. 26 - Families wait to identify some of the 49 people killed during the third anniversary of Egypt's 2011 uprising as interim President Mansour calls for early presidential elections. Gavino Garay reports.
Caskets carry some of the at least 49 people killed on the third anniversary of the 2011 Egypt uprising. The victim's families gather outside this Cairo morgue to collect their remains. Egypt's political violence continued on Sunday, as gunmen reportedly killed three soldiers in the Sinai. That prompted a warning from the army saying it will eliminate the Muslim Brotherhood movement, which it blames for much of the political turmoil. Amid the violence, interim President Adly Mansour is also calling for early elections. Parliamentary elections were supposed to be held before a presidential vote. Sunday's decision paves the way for the quick election of army chief General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, who is expected to win in a landslide election. Egyptians had mixed reactions. EGYPTIAN MAN WHO DID NOT GIVE HIS NAME, SAYING: "Our candidate is Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. The decision (to have presidential elections first) is correct so that the country stabilizes and because of the people who are killing themselves. We want stability and not explosions every day." (SOUNDBITE) (Arabic) EGYPTIAN MAN, MOHAMED SALAMA, SAYING: "It is not acceptable to move the elections forward. So why did we have a revolution? Parliament should come first and then after that Presidential elections. It is not acceptable for us to return to dictatorship and the heartache that we are in now." The decision to revise the order of elections will likely deepen tensions in Egypt, which is struggling to cope with waves of political violence.
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Annual Gala and Awards Ceremony
View Brochure Read More View Photos Watch Video Award Winners Tickets 2019
There are 60 million girls out of school in the world
1 in 2 girls in Sub-saharian Africa gives birth to her first child before she’s 19
One in four women in the UK will experience domestic violence in her life
There are currently 800,000+ young people between 18 and 24 years old who are Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET) in the UK. They represent 12% of their age group.
ONS, 2016
Girls as young as 5 are worrying about their weight and by the age of 14, half of the girls have been on a diet to change their shape.
(APPG, 2012)1
20% of children in the UK have been exposed to domestic abuse. That’s 750,000 kids a year.
(Radford et al. NSPCC, 2011)
[postlist id=469]
The Inspiring Leadership Trust’s is an international campaign to inspire and empower vulnerable women and their families to achieve their full potential.
We do this by mobilising inspiring business leaders and leadership experts to work together, leveraging their diverse skills and talents to make a personal difference to the lives of others.
We select targeted projects and areas of greatest need, where we can build greater economic empowerment and social mobility for a sustainable difference.
“To mobilise influential and inspiring leaders for the positive empowerment of vulnerable women and young people in the most deprived areas of the world, for the advancement of all.”
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Brenda Holloway – 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection – The Best of Brenda Holloway
ARTIST: Brenda Holloway
TITLE: 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection: The Best of Brenda Holloway
YEAR RELEASED: Compilation
SINGLES: Charting: Every Little Bit Hurts (#13), I’ll Always Love You (#60), When I’m Gone (#25, #12 R&B), Operator (#78, #36 R&B), Just Look What You’ve Done (#69, #21 R&B), You Made Me So Very Happy (#39, #40 R&B)
OTHER SONGS YOU MAY KNOW: Not really
LINEUP: Brenda Holloway and the Motown session dudes
WHAT’S IT ALL ABOUT: Motown’s replacement for Mary Wells didn’t have the career she should have, as she was seen as temperamental and ‘difficult’.
SOME WORDS, PHRASES AND CLAUSES ABOUT THIS RECORD: One of the first West Coast Motown signings, Holloway’s first single was a big hit and quite memorable. But soon, the label stopped the ‘star making’ machine for her and she seemed to be forgotten for a few years.
Holloway recorded some perfectly fine tracks that went unreleased, or not pushed by Motown so they languished in the charts. She was popular with musicians such as the Beatles, and was good on TV. Still, the last recording success she had was from her own song (“You Made Me So Very Happy”) before she left the Motown circus.
There’s not a lot of Holloway material out there, so this is a good representation. She could have been a big star had Motown let her be as independent as she wanted to be.
NOTES & MINUTIAE: She had to sue Motown and Berry Gordy for royalties resulting from the Blood, Sweat, and Tears cover of “You Made Me So Very Happy”.
GRADE: B: A short but pleasant compilation that makes you wish Motown treated her better.
Seals & Crofts – Seals & Crofts’ Greatest Hits
Arson Garden – Under Towers
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ALL YOU DON´T WANT TO KNOW ABOUT GEORGE SOROS
GEORGE SOROS: THE MONEY AND MASTERMIND BEHIND THE PROGRESSIVE MADNESS
MARCH 25, 2019 | DISCOVER THE NETWORKS
George Soros. A name that elicits either a boogeyman-type of creepiness, or to some, just an inconceivable character that is fictional in their minds. But George Soros is very much real, and indeed is far creepier than the boogeyman. To the left, he is a hero; a benevolent open wallet to fund the groups, causes, and agenda of the progressive elites. To the right, he is the evil puppetmaster, funding organizations, causes and events that creep into the fabric of our current culture, destructive and evil. George Soros isn’t just an old guy with lots of money and a left-leaning viewpoint. He has an entire life story made up of evil choices, instruction, beliefs, and actions. And he has a son, Alexander, who is carrying on his legacy and tradition. Find out more about George Soros–this evil man, his cohorts, his agenda, and his methods. Knowing these things makes us more apt to pray strategically against the enemy–and for release of our nation from the grip of this man’s grand plan and the spirits behind it all. The battle is spititual–we need to be praying! Read this compiled exhaustive report on George Soros, masterfully researched, written and exposed by David Horowitz’s brave website Discover the Networks. It is more than you will ever want to know about George Soros, but it casts a wide lens on the man whose money is everywhere there is evil.
A Deep Dive into the Background and Tentacles of George Soros.
New York hedge fund manager George Soros is one of the most politically powerful individuals on earth. Since the mid-1980s in particular, he has used his immense influence to help reconfigure the political landscapes of several countries around the world—in some cases playing a key role in toppling regimes that had held the reins of government for years, even decades. Vis à vis the United States, a strong case can be made for the claim that Soros today affects American politics and culture more profoundly that any other living person.
Much of Soros’s influence derives from his $13 billion personal fortune,1 which is further leveraged by at least another $25 billion in investor assets controlled by his firm, Soros Fund Management.2 An equally significant source of Soros’s power, however, is his passionate messianic zeal. Soros views himself as a missionary with something of a divine mandate to transform the world and its institutions into something better—as he sees it.
Over the years, Soros has given voice to this sense of grandiosity many times and in a variety of different ways. In his 1987 book The Alchemy of Finance, for instance, he wrote: “I admit that I have always harbored an exaggerated view of self-importance—to put it bluntly, I fancied myself as some kind of god or an economic reformer like Keynes or, even better, a scientist like Einstein.”3Expanding on this theme in his 1991 book Underwriting Democracy, Soros said: “If truth be known, I carried some rather potent messianic fantasies with me from childhood,” fantasies which “I wanted to indulge … to the extent that I could afford.”4 In a June 1993 interview with The Independent, Soros, who is an atheist,5 said he saw himself as “some kind of god, the creator of everything.”6 In an interview two years later, he portrayed himself as someone who shared numerous attributes with “God in the Old Testament” — “[Y]ou know, like invisible. I was pretty invisible. Benevolent. I was pretty benevolent. All-seeing. I tried to be all-seeing.”7 Soros told his biographer Michael Kaufman that his “goal” was nothing less ambitious than “to become the conscience of the world” by using his charitable foundations,8 which will be discussed at length in this pamphlet, to bankroll organizations and causes that he deems worthwhile.
“I realized [as a young man] that it’s money that makes the world go round,” says Soros, “so I might as well make money.… But having made it, I could then indulge my social concerns.”9 Invariably, those concerns center around a desire to change the world generally—and America particularly—into something new, something consistent with his vision of “social justice.” Claiming to be “driven” by “illusions, or perhaps delusions, of grandeur,”10Soros has humorously described himself as “a kind of nut who wants to have an impact” on the workings of the world.11 The billionaire’s longtime friend Byron Wien, currently the vice chairman of Blackstone Advisory Services, offers this insight: “You must understand [Soros] thinks he’s been anointed by God to solve insoluble problems. The proof is that he has been so successful at making so much [money]. He therefore thinks he has a responsibility to give money away”—to causes that are consistent with his values and agendas.12
GEORGE SOROS’S ROOTS AND DEVELOPMENT
George Soros was born to Tividar and Erzebat Schwartz, non-practicing Jews, in Budapest, Hungary on August 12, 1930. Tivadar was an attorney by profession, but the consuming passion of his life was the promotion of Esperanto—an artificial, “universal” language created during the 1880s in hopes that people worldwide might be persuaded to drop their native tongues and speak Esperanto instead—thereby, in theory at least, minimizing their nationalist impulses while advancing intercultural harmony. In 1936, Tivadar changed his family surname to Soros—a future-tense Esperanto verb meaning “will soar.”13
When the Nazis occupied Budapest in 1944, Tivadar decided to split up his family so as to minimize the chance that all its members would be killed together. For each of them—his wife and two sons—he purchased forged papers identifying them as Christians; paid government officials to conceal his family’s Jewish heritage from the German and Hungarian fascists; and bribed Gentile families to take them into their homes. As for George in particular, the father paid a Hungarian government official named Baumbach to claim George as his Christian godson, “Sandor Kiss,” and to let the boy live with him in Budapest. One of Baumbach’s duties was to deliver deportation notices to Hungary’s Jews, confiscating their property and turning it over to Germany. Young George Soros sometimes accompanied the official on his rounds.14 Many years later, in December 1998, a CBS interviewer would ask Soros whether he had ever felt any guilt about his association with Baumbach during that period. Soros replied: “… I was only a spectator … I had no role in taking away that property. So I had no sense of guilt.”15
Soros today recalls the German occupation of Hungary as “probably the happiest year of my life.” “For me,” he elaborates, “it was a very positive experience. It’s a strange thing because you see incredible suffering around you and the fact you are in considerable danger yourself. But you’re fourteen years old and you don’t believe that it can actually touch you. You have a belief in yourself. You have a belief in your father. It’s a very happy-making, exhilarating experience.”16
In 1947 the Soros family relocated from Hungary to England, where George attended the London School of Economics (LSE). There, he was exposed to the works of the Viennese-born philosopher Karl Popper, who taught at LSE and whom Soros would later call his “spiritual mentor.”17 Though Soros never studied directly under Popper, he read the latter’s works and submitted some essays to him for review and comment. Most notably, Popper’s 1945 book The Open Society and Its Enemies introduced Soros to the concept of an “open society,” a theme that would play a central role in Soros’s thought and activities for the rest of his life.18
The term “open society” was originally coined in 1932 by the French philosopher Henri Louis Bergson, to describe societies whose moral codes were founded upon “universal” principles seeking to enhance the welfare of all mankind—as opposed to “closed” societies that placed self-interest above any concern for other nations and cultures.19 Popper readily embraced this concept and expanded upon it. In his view, the open society was a place that permitted its citizens the right to criticize and change its institutions as they saw fit; he rejected the imposed intellectual conformity, central planning, and historical determinism of Marxist doctrine.20 By Popper’s reckoning, a society was “closed”—and thus undesirable—if it assumed that it was in any way superior to other societies. Likewise, any belief system or individual claiming to be in possession of “ultimate truth” was an “enemy” of the open society as well. Popper viewed all knowledge as conjectural rather than certain, as evolving rather than fixed.
Thus, by logical extension, Popper did not share the American founders’ confident assertion that certain truths were “self-evident,” and that certain rights—such as the right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” as referenced in the Declaration of Independence—were “unalienable” and thus not subject to doubt, because they had been granted to mankind by the ultimate authority, the “Creator.”21 We shall see that George Soros, as he grew to maturity, would likewise reject the founders’ premise. Indeed Soros would harbor great disdain for modern-day American political figures who displayed unshakable confidence in their own culture’s nobility, and who embraced the tenets of the Declaration and the U.S. Constitution as timeless, immutable truths. To Soros, “Popper’s greatest contribution to philosophy” was his teaching that “the ultimate truth remains permanently beyond our reach.”22
After graduating in 1952 from LSE, Soros joined the London brokerage firm Singer and Friedlander, where he became proficient in international arbitrage, which he defines as “buying securities in one country and selling them in another.”23 Four years later, he relocated to New York to work as a stock trader on Wall Street. Because Soros “did not particularly care for” the “commercial, crass” United States, he had no intention of settling permanently in America. Rather, he had devised a “five-year plan” to save some $500,000 and then return to Europe.24 His plan changed, however, when he found work as a portfolio manager at the investment bank Arnhold and S. Bleichroeder Inc., where his career—as if to fulfill the prophecy embedded in the family surname his father had adopted two decades earlier—soared to new heights.
In 1959 Soros moved to Greenwich Village, New York, where early stirrings of the Sixties counterculture were already being felt. In September 1960 he married Annaliese Witschak, who would be his wife until the couple divorced 23 years later.25 In 1961 Soros became a U.S. citizen, and two years later he and Annaliese had their first child, a son. In the Village, it is likely that Soros was exposed to the ideas of the prominent socialist Michael Harrington, who mingled with fellow radicals and socialists almost nightly at a tavern situated barely a stone’s throw from Soros’s residence.26 In 1962 Harrington wrote The Other America, a book lamenting the fact that a substantial “invisible” underclass continued to exist even as the country at large prospered, and suggesting that a “war on poverty” was needed to rectify this. President Lyndon Johnson read and admired the book, and its ideas greatly influenced his Great Society policies of government-imposed redistribution of wealth.
Another prominent Village personality of the era—the poet, New Left radical, and psychedelic-drug guru Allen Ginsberg—would eventually become a “lifelong friend” of Soros. Though Soros may not have formally met Ginsberg until around 1980—long after his years in the Village—the billionaire today credits Ginsberg for having opened his eyes to the benefits of drug legalization, which has been one of Soros’s pet projects throughout his philanthropic career.27
In 1969 Soros established the “Double Eagle Fund” for Bleichroeder with $4 million in capital, including $250,000 of his own money. Four years later, Soros and his assistant at Bleichroeder, Jim Rogers, set up a private partnership called Soros Fund Management. They subsequently changed the Double Eagle Fund’s name to The Soros Fund. In 1979 they renamed it again—The Quantum Fund; its value grew to $381 million by 1980, and more than $1 billion by 1985.28
SOROS THE PHILANTHROPIST
It was in 1979 that Soros began testing the proverbial waters of philanthropy. Five years later he launched, in the country of his birth, the first of his many Open Society Foundations—named after the concept advanced by Karl Popper—to help “build vibrant and tolerant democracies whose governments are accountable to their citizens.”29 But it was not until 1987, the year he opened his Moscow office, that Soros began to disseminate truly large amounts of money to various groups and causes. “My spending rose from $3 million in 1987 to more than $300 million a year by 1992,” he said.30 During this period, Soros established a series of foundations throughout Eastern Europe and Central Asia.31 He happily observed that because of his extraordinary wealth, major political figures “suddenly became very interested in seeing me…. [M]y influence increased.”32 Today Soros’s Open Society Foundations are active in more than 70 countries around the world.33
In 1993 Soros established the flagship of the Soros foundation network—the New York City-based Open Society Foundations (OSF), which went by the name of the Open Society Institute until 2010. While OSF’s philanthropy extends to a number of nations around the world, it is chiefly devoted to injecting capital into American groups and causes. In his book Open Society: Reforming Global Capitalism, Soros explains that the “open society” which he seeks to advance by means of philanthropy, “stands for freedom, democracy, rule of law, human rights, social justice, and social responsibility as a universal idea.”34 But of course, abstract concepts like these, draped in vestments of lofty rhetoric, can mean radically different things to different people.
Entrusted with the task of defining the foregoing terms for the OSF, and for articulating OSF’s agendas from the outset, was Aryeh Neier, whom Soros appointed to serve as president not only of OSF, but of the entire Soros Foundation Network. Thirty-four years earlier, Neier had created the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), which became the largest and most important radical group of the 1960s. SDS aspired to overthrow America’s democratic institutions, remake its government in a Marxist image, and undermine the nation’s war efforts in Vietnam. (A particularly militant faction of SDS would later break away to form the Weather Underground, a notorious domestic terror organization with a Marxist-Leninist agenda.) Following his stint with SDS, Neier worked fifteen years for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)—including eight years as its national executive director. After that, he spent twelve years as executive director of Human Rights Watch (HRW), an organization he founded in 1978.35
THE SOROS AGENDAS
Both the ACLU and HRW have long promoted one of the central contentions of Soros’s Open Society Foundations: the notion that America is institutionally an oppressive nation and a habitual violator of human rights both at home and abroad—indeed, the very antithesis of the type of “open society” Soros reveres. Consider first the ACLU, whose advisory board once included the former Weather Underground terrorist Bernardine Dohrn.36 The ACLU has opposed virtually all post-9/11 national security measures enacted by the U.S. government, depicting those measures not only as excessively harsh and invasive generally, but also as discriminatory against Muslims in particular.37Moreover, the organization has filed numerous lawsuits seeking to limit the government’s ability to locate, monitor, and apprehend terrorist operatives. It consistently depicts American society as one that is rife with intractable racial injustice. And it works tirelessly to protect illegal immigrants against “governmental abuse and discrimination.”38These (and many other) ACLU activities and policy positions are entirely consistent with those of Aryeh Neier and George Soros, as evidenced by the fact that between 1999 and 2008, OSF awarded $8.69 million in grants to the ACLU Foundation.39
Neier’s other training ground, Human Rights Watch, has a long history of pointing an accusatory finger at America’s allegedly numerous transgressions. Most notably, HRW has derided the U.S. war on terror as a foolhardy endeavor rooted in blindness to the realization that terrorism stems, in large measure, from America’s failure “to promote fundamental rights around the world.”40 In a March 2007 speech, HRW executive director Kenneth Rothcharged that the United States, by routinely “using torture and inhumane treatment” to deal with its foes, had “severely damaged its credibility when it comes to promoting human rights” in other nations.41 Between 2000 and 2008, the Open Society Foundations awarded grants and other contributions to HRW that collectively totaled $6,386,477.42 Then, in September 2010, Soros announced that he would soon be giving HRW another $100 million.43Notably, Soros himself once served on HRW’s Europe and Central Asia Advisory Committee.44
OSF’s total assets today exceed $1.9 billion. Each year, the Foundations award scores of millions of dollars in grants to organizations that—like the ACLU and HRW—promote worldviews and objectives accordant with those of George Soros.45 Following is a sampling of the major agendas advanced by groups that Soros and OSF support financially. Listed under each category heading are a few OSF donees fitting that description.
Organizations that accuse America of violating the civil rights and liberties of many of its residents:
The Arab American Institute impugns many of the “sweeping” and “unreasonable” post-9/11 counterterrorism measures that have unfairly “targeted Arab Americans.”46
The Bill of Rights Defense Committee has persuaded the political leadership in more than 400 American cities and counties to pledge noncompliance with the anti-terrorism measure known as the Patriot Act, on grounds that the legislation tramples on people’s civil liberties.47
Organizations that depict America as a nation whose enduring racism must be counterbalanced by racial and ethnic preferences in favor of nonwhites:
The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund calls itself “the nation’s leading Latino legal civil rights organization.”48
The Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law provides “legal services to address racial discrimination.”49
The NAACP and its Legal Defense and Educational Fund uses “litigation, advocacy, and public education” to promote “structural changes” and “achieve racial justice in the United States”50
The National Council of La Raza charges that “discrimination severely limits the economic and social opportunities available to Hispanic Americans.”51
Organizations that specifically portray the American criminal-justice system as racist and inequitable:
The Sentencing Project asserts that prison-sentencing patterns discriminate against nonwhites, and seeks “to reduce the reliance on incarceration.”52
Critical Resistance contends that crime stems from “inequality and powerlessness,” which can be rectified through wholesale redistribution of wealth.53
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights charges that criminal laws “are enforced in a manner that is massively and pervasively biased.”54
Organizations that call for massive social change, and for the recruitment and training of activist leaders to help foment that change:
The Center for Community Change is “dedicated to finding the [progressive] stars of tomorrow and preparing them to lead.”55
The Gamaliel Foundation teaches social-change “techniques and methodologies.”56
The Ruckus Society promotes “nonviolent direct action against unjust institutions and policies.”57
The American Institute for Social Justice aims to “transform poor communities” by agitating for increased government spending on social-welfare programs.58
The Institute for America’s Future “regularly convenes and educates progressive leaders, organizations, candidates, opinion makers, and activists.”59
People for the American Way, founded by television producer Norman Lear to oppose the allegedly growing influence of the “religious right,” seeks “to cultivate new generations of leaders and activists” who will promote “progressive values.”60
Democracy For America operates an academy that has taught more than 10,000 recruits nationwide how to “focus, network, and train grassroots activists in the skills and strategies to take back our country.”61
The Midwest Academy trains radical activists in the tactics of direct action, confrontation, and intimidation. Author Stanley Kurtz has described this academy as a “crypto-socialist organization” that was “arguably the most influential force in community organizing from the seventies through the nineties.”62
Organizations that disparage capitalism while promoting a dramatic expansion of social-welfare programs funded by ever-escalating taxes:
The Center for Economic and Policy Research asserts that “the welfare state has softened the impact” of “the worst excesses and irrationalities of a market system” and its “injustices.”63
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities advocates greater tax expenditures on such assistance programs as Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, food stamps, and low-income housing initiatives.64
The Ella Baker Center for Human Rights was founded by the revolutionary communist Van Jones. This anti-poverty organization claims that “decades of disinvestment in our cities,” coupled with America’s allegedly imperishable racism, have “led to despair and homelessness.”65
The Emma Lazarus Fund: In 1996 George Soros said he was “appalled” by the recently signed welfare-reform law that empowered states to limit legal immigrants’ access to public assistance. In response to this “mean-spirited attack on immigrants,” he launched an Open Society Foundations project known as the Emma Lazarus Fund and endowed it with $50 million.66
Organizations that support socialized medicine in the United States:
Health Care for America Now (HCAN) is a vast network of organizations supporting, ideally, a “single-payer” model where the federal government would be in charge of financing and administering the entire U.S. healthcare system.67 During the political debate over “Obamacare” in 2009 and 2010, HCAN’s strategy was to try to achieve such a system incrementally, first by implementing a “public option”—i.e., a government insurance agency to “compete” with private insurers, so that Americans would be “no longer at the mercy of the private insurance industry.”68 Because such an agency would not need to show a profit in order to remain in business, and because it could tax and regulate its private competitors in whatever fashion it pleased, this “public option” would inevitably force private insurers out of the industry. In August 2009, Soros pledged to give HCAN $5 million to promote its campaign for reform.69
Organizations that strive to move American politics to the left by promoting the election of progressive political candidates:
Project Vote is the voter-mobilization arm of the notoriously corrupt ACORN, whose voter-registration drives and get-out-the-vote initiatives have been marred by massive levels of fraud and corruption.70
Catalist seeks “to help progressive organizations realize … electoral success by building and operating a robust national voter database.”71
The Brennan Center for Justice aims to “fully restore voting rights following criminal conviction”72—significant because research shows that ex-felons are far likelier to vote for Democratic political candidates than for Republicans.73
The Progressive States Network seeks to “pass progressive legislation in all fifty states by providing coordinated research and strategic advocacy tools to forward-thinking state legislators.”74
The Progressive Change Campaign Committee, to which George Soros personally donated $8,000 in 2010, works “to elect bold progressive candidates to federal office … more often.”75
Organizations that promote leftist ideals and worldviews in the media and the arts:
In May 2011, the Media Research Center reported that from 2003-2011, Soros had spent more than $48 million “funding media properties, including the infrastructure of news — journalism schools, investigative journalism and even industry organizations.” Among the beneficiaries of Soros’s money were such entities as: ABC, The American Prospect Inc. (the owner and publisher of The American Prospect magazine), the Center for Public Integrity, the Center for Investigative Reporting, the Columbia Journalism Review, the Columbia School of Journalism, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Free Press, the Independent Media Center, the Independent Media Institute, The Lens, the Media Fund, Media Matters For America, the Nation Institute, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, the National Federation of Community Broadcasters, National Public Radio, NBC, the Organization of News Ombudsmen, the New York Times, the Pacifica Foundation, ProPublica, and the Washington Post, . Below are some brief descriptions of a few of these organizations:
The American Prospect, Inc. is the owner and publisher of The American Prospect magazine, which tries to “counteract the growing influence of conservative media.”76
Free Press is a “media reform” organization co-founded by Robert McChesney, who calls for “a revolutionary program to overthrow the capitalist system” and to “rebuil[d] the entire society on socialist principles.”77
The Independent Media Institute aims to “change the world”78 via projects like AlterNet, an online news magazine calling itself “a key player in the echo chamber of progressive ideas and vision.”79
The Nation Institute operates synergistically with the far-left Nation magazine, which works “to extend the reach of progressive ideas” into the American mainstream.80
The Pacifica Foundation owns and operates Pacifica Radio, awash from its birth with the socialist-Marxist rhetoric of class warfare and anti-capitalism.
Media Matters For America: For a number of years, the Open Society Foundations gave indirect funding—filtering its grants first through other Soros-backed operations81—to this “progressive research and information center” which “monitor[s]” and “correct[s] conservative misinformation in the U.S. media.”82 In October 2010, Soros announced that he would soon donate $1 million directly to Media Matters.83
Sundance Institute: In 1996, Soros launched his Soros Documentary Fund to produce “social justice” films that would “spur awareness, action and social change.” In 2001, this Fund became part of actor-director Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute. Between 1996 and 2008, OSF earmarked at least $5.2 million for the production of several hundred documentaries, many of which were highly critical of capitalism, American society, or Western culture generally.84 In 2009, Soros pledged another $5 million to the Sundance Institute.85
Organizations that seek to inject the American judicial system with leftist values:
The Alliance for Justice consistently depicts Republican judicial nominees as “radical right-wing[ers]” and “extremists” whose views range far outside the boundaries of mainstream public opinion.86
The American Constitution Society for Law and Policy seeks to indoctrinate young law students to view the Constitution as an evolving or “living” document,87 and to reject “conservative buzzwords such as ‘originalism‘ and ‘strict construction.’”88
Justice at Stake89 promotes legislation that would replace judicial elections with a “merit-selection” system where a small committee of legal elites, unaccountable to the public, would pick those most “qualified” to serve as judges. OSF has spent at least $45.4 million on efforts to change the way judges are chosen in many American states.90
Organizations that advance leftist agendas by infiltrating churches and religious congregations:
Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good advocates a brand of “social justice” that would counteract the “greed, materialism, and excessive individualism” that are allegedly inherent in capitalism.91
Sojourners characterizes wealth redistribution as the fulfillment of a biblical mandate.92 Jim Wallis, the founder of this evangelical Christian ministry, has expressed his hope that “more Christians will come to view the world through Marxist eyes.”93
People Improving Communities through Organizing uses “people of faith” as foot soldiers in its crusade for the “transformation” of “people, institutions, and … our larger culture.”94
Catholics for Choice—formerly known as Catholics for a Free Choice—is a nominally Catholic organization that “believes in a world where everyone has equal access to … safe and legal abortion services.”95
Think tanks that promote leftist policies:
The Institute for Policy Studies has long supported Communist and anti-American causes around the world. It seeks to provide a corrective to the “unrestrained greed” of “markets and individualism.”96
The New America Foundation tries to influence public opinion on such topics as healthcare, environmentalism, energy policy, and global governance.97
The Urban Institute favors socialized medicine, expansion of the federal welfare bureaucracy, and tax hikes for higher income-earners.98
Organizations that promote open borders, mass immigration, a watering down of current immigration laws, increased rights and benefits for illegal aliens, and ultimately amnesty:
The American Immigration Council—formerly known as the the American Immigration Law Foundation—supports “birthright citizenship” for children born to illegal immigrants in the U.S.99
Casa de Maryland periodically sponsors “know your rights” training sessions to teach illegals how to evade punishment in the event that they are apprehended in an immigration raid.100
The Immigrant Legal Resource Center belongs to the sanctuary movement that tries to shield illegal aliens from the law.101
The Migration Policy Institute advocates a more permissive U.S. refugee admissions and resettlement policy, as well as more social-welfare benefits for illegals residing in the U.S.102
LatinoJustice PRLDF is a legal advocacy group that “protects opportunities for all Latinos … especially the most vulnerable—new immigrants and the poor.”103
The Immigration Policy Center states that “[r]equiring the 10-11 million unauthorized immigrants residing in the U.S. to register with the government and meet eligibility criteria in order to gain legal status is a key element of comprehensive immigration reform.”104
The National Immigration Forum opposes the enhancement of the U.S. Border Patrol and the construction of a border fence to prevent illegal immigration.105
The National Immigration Law Center works to help low-income immigrants gain access to government-funded welfare programs on the same basis as legal American citizens.106
Organizations that oppose virtually all post-9/11 national-security measures enacted by the U.S. government:
The Center for Constitutional Rights, founded by four longtime supporters of communist causes,107 has condemned the “immigration sweeps, ghost detentions, extraordinary rendition, and every other illegal program the government has devised” in response to “the so-called War on Terror.”108
The National Security Archive Fund collects and publishes declassified documents (obtained through the Freedom of Information Act) to a degree that compromises American national security and the safety of intelligence agents.109
Organizations that defend suspected anti-American terrorists and their abetters:
The Constitution Project has supported such notorious figures as Salim Ahmed Hamdan (Osama bin Laden‘s bodyguard and chauffeur) and Jose Padilla (an American Islamic convert and terrorist plotter). Moreover, the Project contends that it is illegal for the U.S. government to detain terror suspects if the evidence against them was obtained through “torture.”110
The Lynne Stewart Defense Committee was established to support Lynne Stewart, who is a criminal-defense attorney and an America-hating Maoist. Stewart was convicted of illegally helping her incarcerated client, the “blind sheik” Omar Abdel Rahman, pass messages to an Egypt-based Islamic terrorist organization. In September 2002, the Open Society Foundations gave $20,000 111 to this committee; OSF vice president Gara LaMarche characterized Ms. Stewart as a “human rights defender.”112
Organizations that depict virtually all American military actions as unwarranted and immoral:
Amnesty International: In 2005, this group’s then-executive director William Schulzalleged that the United States had become “a leading purveyor and practitioner” of torture.113 Schulz’s remarks were echoed by Amnesty’s then-secretary general Irene Khan, who charged that the Guantanamo Bay detention center, where the U.S. was housing several hundred captured terror suspects, “has become the gulag of our time.”114
Global Exchange was founded by Medea Benjamin, a pro-Castro radical who helped establish a project known as Iraq Occupation Watch for the purpose of encouraging widespread desertion by “conscientious objectors” in the U.S. military.115 In December 2004, Benjamin announced that Global Exchange would be sending aid to the families of terrorist insurgents who were fighting American troops in Iraq.116
Organizations that advocate America’s unilateral disarmament and/or a steep reduction in its military spending:
The American Friends Service Committee, which views America as the world’s chief source of international strife, has long had a friendly relationship with the Communist Party USA.117 Lamenting that “the United States spends 59% of the discretionary federal budget on military-related expenses,” the Committee seeks to “realig[n] national spending priorities and to increase the portion of the budget that is spent on housing, quality education for all, medical care, and fair wages.”118 In 2000, George Soros himself was a signatory to a letter titled “Appeal for Responsible Security” that appeared in The New York Times. The letter called upon the U.S. government “to commit itself unequivocally to negotiate the worldwide reduction and elimination of nuclear weapons,” and to participate in “the global de-alerting of nuclear weapons and deep reduction of nuclear stockpiles.”119(NOTE: OSF is a member of the Peace and Security Funders Group.)
Organizations that promote radical environmentalism:
Groups in this category typically oppose mining and logging initiatives, commercial fishing enterprises, development and construction in wilderness areas, the use of coal, the use of pesticides, and oil and gas exploration in “environmentally sensitive” locations. Moreover, they claim that human industrial activity leads to excessive carbon-dioxide emissions which, in turn, cause a potentially cataclysmic phenomenon called “global warming.” Examples of such Soros donees include the Alliance for Climate Protection, Earthjustice, the Earth Island Institute, Friends of the Earth, Green For All, and the Natural Resources Defense Council.
Another major recipient of Soros money is the Tides Foundation, which receives cash from all manner of donors—individuals, groups, and other foundations—and then funnels it to designated left-wing recipients. Having given more than $400 million to “progressive nonprofit organizations” since 2000,120 Tides is a heavy backer of environmental organizations, though its philanthropy extends also into many other areas.
George Soros presents himself as an environmentalist of the first order and is quick to condemn industrial corporations for allegedly trampling recklessly over the earth’s ecosystems in pursuit of the almighty dollar. But in fact, Soros himself has proven to be quite willing to despoil Mother Nature in exchange for profits of his own. Consider, for example, his involvement in the Argentine beef industry, which environmentalists claim is responsible for massive levels of water pollution and deforestation. Argentina’s biggest landowner is none other than George Soros, with some 500,000 hectares of land and 150,000 head of cattle to his name.121 Moreover, Soros is a part owner of Apex Silver Mines, which operates in a remote and ecologically sensitive region of Bolivia.122
Organizations that oppose the death penalty in all circumstances:
In 2000 George Soros co-signed a letter to President Bill Clinton asking for a moratorium on the death penalty, on grounds that it tended to be implemented disproportionately against black and Hispanic offenders.123
Consistent with the billionaire’s opposition to capital punishment, his Open Society Foundations have given millions of dollars to anti-death penalty organizations such as New Yorkers Against the Death Penalty, Witness to Innocence, Equal Justice USA, the Death Penalty Information Center, People of Faith against the Death Penalty, and the Fair Trial Initiative.
Organizations that promote modern-day feminism’s core tenet—that America is fundamentally a sexist society where discrimination and violence against women have reached epidemic proportions:
The Feminist Majority Foundation “focus[es] on advancing the legal, social and political equality of women with men, countering the backlash to women’s advancement, and recruiting and training young feminists…”124
The Ms. Foundation for Women laments that although “women are more than half the [U.S.] population … they don’t have equal opportunity, voice or power.”125
The National Partnership for Women and Families asserts that “women today are still paid only $0.77 to a man’s dollar”126—an assertion that is grossly misleading and substantively untrue.127
Organizations that promote not only women’s right to taxpayer-funded abortion on demand,128 but also political candidates who take that same position:
Soros donees in this category include the Center for Reproductive Rights, Choice USA, NARAL Pro-Choice America, the National Abortion Federation, and Planned Parenthood.
Organizations that favor global government which would bring American foreign policy under the control of the United Nations or other international bodies:
According to George Soros, “[W]e need some global system of political decision-making. In short, we need a global society to support our global economy.”129Consistent with this perspective, the Open Society Foundations in 2008 gave $150,000 to the United Nations Foundation, which “works to broaden support for the UN through advocacy and public outreach.”130 Moreover, OSF is considered a “major” funder of the Coalition for an International Criminal Court,131 which aims to subordinate American criminal-justice procedures in certain cases to an international prosecutor who could initiate capricious or politically motivated prosecutions of U.S. officials and military officers.132
Organizations that support drug legalization:
Dismissing the notion of “a drug-free America” as nothing more than “a utopian dream,” George Soros says that “the war on drugs” is “insane” and, “like the Vietnam War,” simply “cannot be won.”133 “I’ll tell you what I would do if it were up to me,” says Soros. “I would establish a strictly controlled distribution network through which I would make most drugs, excluding the most dangerous ones like crack, legally available.”134 In 1998 Soros was a signatory to a public letter addressed to United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, declaring that “the global war on drugs is now causing more harm than drug abuse itself.”135 The letter blamed the war on drugs for impeding such public health efforts as stemming the spread of HIV, hepatitis, and other infectious diseases, as well as human rights violations and the perpetration of environmental assaults. Other notable signers included Tammy Baldwin, Rev. William Sloan Coffin, Jr., Walter Cronkite, Morton H. Halperin, Peter Lewis, Kweisi Mfume, and Cornel West.
Soros and his Open Society Foundations have given many millions of dollars to groups supporting drug-legalization and needle-exchange programs. In 1996, former Carter administration official Joseph Califano called Soros “the Daddy Warbucks of drug legalization.”136 According to a Capital Research Center publication, “It’s no exaggeration to say that without Soros there would be no serious lobby against the drug war.”137
A leading recipient of Soros funding is the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA), which seeks to loosen narcotics laws, promotes “treatment-not-incarceration” policies for non-violent drug offenders, and advocates syringe-access programs “to help prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS.”138 Soros himself formerly sat on the DPA board of directors.139 As recently as 2010, Soros contributed $1 million to support a California ballot measure known as Proposition 19, which would have legalized personal marijuana use in the state; the measure, however, was rejected by voters on election day.140
Peter Schweizer, author of Do As I Say (Not As I Do), speculates on the possible reasons underlying Soros’s support for drug legalization:
“One very possible answer is that he hopes to profit from them [drugs] once they become legal. He has been particularly active in South America, buying up large tracts of land and forging alliances with those in a position to mass-produce narcotics should they become legalized in the United States. He has also helped fund the Andean Council of Coca Leaf producers. Needless to say, this organization would stand to benefit enormously from the legalization of cocaine. He has also taken a 9 percent stake in Banco de Colombia, located in the Colombian drug capital of Cali. The Drug Enforcement Administration has speculated that the bank is being used to launder money and that Soros’s fellow shareholders may be members of a major drug cartel.”141
Organizations that support euthanasia for the terminally ill:
Soros has long promoted the cause of physician-assisted suicide in an effort to change public attitudes about death. Toward that end, in 1994 he began giving money to the (now defunct) Project on Death in America (PDA), whose purpose was to provide “end-of-life” assistance for ailing people and to enact public policy that will “transform the culture and experience of dying and bereavement.”142 Over a 9-year period, the Open Society Foundations gave $45 million to PDA.143
Notably, PDA’s mission was congruent with the goals of those who support government-run health care, which invariably features bureaucracies tasked with allocating scarce resources and thus determining who will, and who will not, be eligible for particular medications and treatments. Such bureaucracies generally make their calculations based upon cost-benefit analyses of a variety of possible treatments. Ultimately these decisions tend to disfavor the very old and the very sick, because whatever benefits they might gain from expensive interventions are likely to be of short duration, and thus are not judged to be worth the costs. Soros himself has suggested that “[a]ggressive, life-prolonging interventions, which may at times go against the patient’s wishes, are much more expensive than proper care for the dying.”144 Additional pro-euthanasia groups funded by Soros and OSF are the following:
The Death with Dignity National Center seeks to allow “terminally ill individuals meeting stringent safeguards to hasten their own deaths” by way of lethal drug prescriptions.145
The Compassion in Dying Federation of America advocates “aid-in-dying for terminally ill, mentally competent adults.”146
Organizations that have pressured mortgage lenders to make loans to undercapitalized borrowers, a practice that helped spark the subprime mortgage crisis and housing-market collapse of 2008:
The Greenlining Institute 147—by threatening to publicly accuse banks of racially discriminatory lending practices—has successfully negotiated loan commitments of more than $2.4 trillion from America’s financial institutions.148
The Center for Responsible Lending, according to Americans for Prosperity vice president Phil Kerpen, has “shak[en] down and harass[ed] banks into making bad loans to unqualified borrowers.”149
Organizations that exhort the U.S. and Israel to negotiate with, and to make concessions to, Arab terrorist groups and regimes that have pledged to destroy America and Israel alike:
The International Crisis Group‘s (ICG) Mideast director, Robert Malley, has penned numerous articles and op-eds condemning Israel, exonerating Palestinians, urging the U.S. to disengage from Israel to some degree, and recommending that America reach out to negotiate with its traditional Arab enemies such as Syria, Hezbollah, and Hamas. Soros himself is a member of ICG’s executive committee.
J Street has cautioned Israel not to be too combative against Hamas, on grounds that the latter “has been the government, law and order, and service provider since it won the [Palestinian] elections in January 2006 and especially since June 2007 when it took complete control.” In the final analysis, J Street traces the Mideast conflict chiefly to the notion that “Israel’s settlements in the occupied territories have, for over forty years, been an obstacle to peace.”
SOROS’S POLITICAL CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS
Apart from the more than $5 billion that Soros’ foundation network has donated to leftist groups like those cited above, Soros personally has made campaign contributions to such notable political candidates as Joe Biden, Barbara Boxer, Sherrod Brown, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Jon Corzine, Howard Dean, Richard Durbin, Lane Evans, Al Franken, Al Gore, Tom Harkin, Maurice Hinchey, John Kerry, Dennis Kucinich, Patrick Leahy, Barack Obama, Charles Rangel, Harry Reid, Ken Salazar, Charles Schumer, Joe Sestak, and Tom Udall. He also has given large sums of money to the DemocraticCongressional Campaign Committee, the Democratic National Committee Services Corporation, and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
SOROS MEETS THE CLINTONS
Around the time that George Soros initially launched his Manhattan-based Open Society Foundations, he established what would prove to be a warm and enduring relationship with Bill and Hillary Clinton, the new American President and First Lady. When the Clintons took office in early 1993, they faced the daunting task of helping the collapsed Soviet empire rise from its ruins and cultivate a harmonious relationship with the United States. To lead this endeavor, President Clinton appointed three men: Treasury Department official Lawrence Summers, Vice President Al Gore, and soon-to-be State Department official Strobe Talbott. Talbott in particular was given a large degree of authority, prompting some observers to dub him as Clinton’s “Russian policy czar.”150 It so happened that Talbot had an exceptionally high regard for the financial expertise of George Soros—describing him as “a national resource, indeed, a national treasure”—and thus he recruited the billionaire to serve as a key advisor on U.S.-Russian matters.151
Soros, in turn, had connections with a young economist whom he had been funding—Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Harvard Institute for International Development. The U.S. Agency for International Development assigned Sachs’ Institute to oversee Russia’s transformation to a market economy after more than seven decades of communism. As a consequence of this assignment, Sachs and his team essentially represented the United States as official economic advisors to Russian President Boris Yeltsin. Soros worked closely with Sachs on this project, and the pair held enormous sway over Yeltsin.152 So great was their influence, in fact, that on one occasion Soros quipped that “the former Soviet Empire is now called the Soros Empire.”153But before long, members of Sachs’s team became involved in massive corruption, exploiting for personal gain their access to Russia’s political and economic leaders. Their actions contributed to the collapse of the Russian economy and to the diversion of some $100 billion out of the country.154Though Sachs himself was not accused of profiting personally from these activities, he resigned as director of the Harvard Institute in May 1999, under a dark cloud of scandal.155 The U.S. House Banking Committee investigated the matter and called Soros to testify. The billionaire denied culpability but admitted that he had used insider access in an illegal deal to acquire a large portion of Sidanko Oil.156 Soros further acknowledged in Congressional testimony that some of the missing Russian assets had made their way into his personal investment portfolio.157 House Banking Committee chairman Jim Leach characterized the entire sordid affair as “one of the greatest social robberies in human history.”158
As the Nineties progressed, it became increasingly evident that Bill and Hillary Clinton embraced virtually all of the values and agendas that George Soros was funding through his Open Society Foundations. “I do now have great access in [the Clinton] administration,” said Soros in 1995. “There is no question about this. We actually work together as a team.”159
Soros and Mrs. Clinton in particular held one another in the highest esteem. In November 1997, when Hillary was in Central Asia for a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the newly built American University of Kyrgyzstan, she delivered a speech in which she lavished praise on Soros’s Open Society Foundations, which had financed the school’s construction.160 According to Center for American Democracy director Rachel Ehrenfeld, one source close to Mrs. Clinton’s inner circle reports that Soros visited Hillary at the White House during the Bill Clinton impeachment proceedings of 1998-99, when the First Lady was receiving only her most trusted confidantes.161 A few years later, at a June 2004 “Take Back America” conference in Washington, Mrs. Clinton introduced Soros as a courageous man who loved his country deeply. “[W]e need people like George Soros,” she said, “who is fearless, and willing to step up when it counts.” Soros, in turn, indicated that he was “very, very proud to be introduced” by someone for whom he had such “great, great admiration.” He described Hillary as someone who had been “more effective than most of our statesmen in propagating democracy, freedom, and open society.”162
9/11, AND SOROS’S DEEPER IMMERSION INTO AMERICAN POLITICS
September 11, 2001 was a watershed moment not only in American history but also in George Soros’s philanthropic career. Soros viewed the 9/11 terrorist attacks as confirmation that U.S. foreign policy—particularly under President George W. Bush, who had taken office eight months earlier—was moving in a dangerous direction, giving rise to anti-American hatred in the hearts of people all across the globe. By Soros’s reckoning, Bush embodied the very antithesis of the “open society” ideal. Specifically, the billionaire detested what he viewed as the arrogance the President displayed when he publicly branded America’s enemies as “evil”; when he unapologetically expressed his faith in the exceptionalism of his own culture; and when he seemed disinclined to consider the possibility that the terrorists may have had something valuable to teach Americans about how the rest of the world perceived the United States. Moreover, Soros considered terrorism to be, in large measure, a consequence of economic inequity and the exploitation of poor countries by their wealthier counterparts.
Reasoning from these premises, Soros—while conceding that the retaliatory U.S. invasion of Afghanistan was justifiable163—maintained that the proper long-term response to 9/11 would be for America to launch a global war on poverty. Such an undertaking would be modeled on the Great Society programs which the Johnson administration had instituted in the 1960s—on the theory that by pouring rivers of taxpayer dollars into the nation’s violence-torn ghettos, the presumably justified rage of the rioters could be quelled. In a similar vein, Soros now held that the best way to fight international terrorism would be for the affluent USA to send massive amounts of aid to impoverished regions around the world where the phenomenon tended to originate. Indeed, he had long maintained that the “root causes” of terrorism were “poverty” and “ignorance.”164 Just eight days after 9/11, Soros gave a speech where he said that the “cornerstone” of his “plan” was to “address the social conditions that provide a fertile ground from which [terrorist] volunteers who are willing to sacrifice their lives can be recruited.” This plan would call on “rich countries” to boost their levels of “international assistance,” which—while unlikely to “prevent people like bin Laden from exercising their evil genius”—would “help to alleviate the grievances on which extremism of all kinds feeds.”165
On subsequent occasions, Soros would reiterate his belief that terrorism was caused by a dearth of “international income redistribution” and a “growing inequality between rich and poor, both within countries and among countries.”166 “A global open society,” Soros stressed, “requires affirmative action on a global scale.”167 By contrast, Soros was largely silent on the issue of Islam’s longstanding tradition of jihad, which predated by many hundreds of years any potentially objectionable U.S. foreign-policy initiatives. Rather, he called for a “radical reordering” of American “priorities,” where “[i]nstead of devoting the bulk of the budget to military expenditures to implement the Bush doctrine, we would engage in preventive actions of a constructive nature.”168“The United States cannot do whatever it wants,” he scolded. “… Our nation must concern itself with the well-being of the world.”169
In Soros’s calculus, 9/11 represented “an unusual opportunity to rethink and reshape the world.” Observing that the recent attacks had “shocked” Americans “into realizing that others may regard them very differently from the way they see themselves,” Soros posited that his fellow countrymen were “more ready to reassess the world and the role the United States plays in it than in normal times.”170 And acknowledging that “[t]his awareness may not last long,” he said: “I am determined not to let the moment pass.”171
The urgency which Soros felt with regard to seizing the moment was further heightened on the night of January 29, 2002, when George W. Bush delivered his State of the Union address. In that speech, the President made his first controversial reference to Iraq as part of an “axis of evil” that posed a potentially deadly threat to America. Bush intimated that he would soon turn his foreign-policy attention toward Saddam Hussein‘s regime, which continued to “flaunt its hostility toward America,” “support terror,” and violate its international agreements. As the President pledged not to “wait on events while dangers gather,” nor to “stand by as peril draws closer and closer,” speculation about a possible U.S. invasion of Iraq began to coalesce.172 In Soros’s view, such an invasion would be yet another misguided and senseless endeavor, and he was determined to do whatever he could to prevent it.
The very next month, Soros appointed former Clinton administration official Morton Halperin to the post of Open Society Foundations director. Halperin, whom some State Department officials suspected of being a communist agent,173 had been instrumental in derailing America’s war effort during the Vietnam era, when President Johnson put him in charge of compiling a classified history of U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia. Halperin’s labor ultimately bore fruit—in June 1971—with the publication of the notorious “Pentagon Papers.”174 Thereafter, Halperin went on to serve (from 1975-1992) as director of an ACLU project called the Center for National Security Studies, which sought to slash U.S. defense expenditures and undermine the nation’s intelligence capabilities.175 In Target America—James L. Tyson’s 1981 exposé of the Soviet Union’s elaborate “propaganda campaign designed to weaken and demoralize America from the inside”—the author stated:
“Halperin … and his organizations have had a constant record of advocating the weakening of U.S. intelligence capabilities. His organizations are also notable for ignoring the activities of the KGB or any other foreign intelligence organization…. A balance sheet analysis of Halperin’s writings and testimonies … gives Halperin a score of 100% on the side of output favorable to the Communist line and 0% on any output opposed to the Communist line.”176
Like Halperin, George Soros stridently counseled against military intervention in Iraq, warning that an invasion “would actually be a victory for the terrorists”—because the inevitable killing of “innocent civilians” would give groups like al Qaeda “the kind of radicalization that they are looking for” in order to justify “a vicious cycle of escalating violence.”177 “War is a false and misleading metaphor in the context of combating terrorism,” said Soros. “Treating the attacks of September 11 as crimes against humanity would have been more appropriate. Crimes require police work, not military action.”178 Moreover, Soros characterized the so-called “Bush doctrine” of preemptive military action against those who may pose a threat to the U.S. an “atrocious proposition.”179
By the time the U.S. invaded Iraq in early 2003, Soros’s contempt for President Bush’s “imperialist vision” had reached a fever pitch.180 Accusing Bush of “deliberately foster[ing] fear because it helps to keep the nation lined up behind the president,” Soros added cynically: “Terrorism is the ideal enemy. It is invisible and therefore never disappears. An enemy that poses a genuine and recognized threat can effectively hold a nation together.”181 In August, Soros warned that the very “fate of the world depends on the United States, and President Bush is leading us in the wrong direction” with his “false and dangerous” doctrine.182 In the fall, Soros referred to Bush administration officials and Republicans generally as “extremists” who “don’t believe in the system of democracy as we know it”; and who embraced “a very dangerous ideology” which held that “the United States … should impose its power, impose its will and its interests on the world.”183
Soros routinely condemned Bush for his “unabashed pursuit of self-interest”;184 for “equat[ing] freedom with American values”; for holding the “simplistic view” that “[w]e are right and they are wrong”;185 and for harboring a “false sense of certitude” that Americans had “right on our side.”186Each of these transgressions, Soros explained, violated the “principles of open society, which recognize that we may be wrong.”187 “The supremacist ideology of the Bush administration,” he added, “is in contradiction with the principles of an open society because it claims possession of an ultimate truth.”188
As the Iraq War took an increasing toll in terms of both American and Iraqi lives, Soros wrote that the U.S. military response to 9/11 had actually turned out to be a greater moral atrocity than the original “crime” that prompted it, because the war “has claimed more innocent civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq than have the attacks on the World Trade Center.” In short, Soros characterized the Bush administration’s “pursuit of American supremacy” as more dangerous than Islamist terror.189
Not only did Soros believe that Bush was following a mindless and perilous policy, but he saw the President’s motives as wholly dishonorable. Soros repeatedly accused Bush of using intelligence that had been “exposed as exaggerated or even false” to justify the invasion of Iraq under “false pretenses.”190 He denounced “the exploitation of September 11 by the Bush administration to pursue its policy of dominating the world in the guise of fighting terrorism.”191 He expanded on this theme by accusing Bush of seeking “to justify repressive measures” on the home front while “establish[ing] a secure alternative to Saudi oil” in the Mideast.192 “The other important consideration,” Soros added, “was Israel.” He intimated that Bush, by flexing U.S. muscle in the Middle East, was signaling his readiness to intervene in affairs that could potentially affect America’s closest ally in the region. By so doing, said Soros, the President was catering to “the traditional pro-Israel lobby” which included “the evangelical right—and that is the core of the president’s constituency.”193
As Soros saw things, the President’s arrogance and corruption had filtered down perceptibly into the ranks of the military personnel who were carrying out Bush’s mission. Thus Soros likened the conduct of American troops to that of communist and fascist thugs, asserting that “the picture of torture in Abu Ghraib” was proof that “the way President Bush conducted the war on terror converted us from victims into perpetrators.”194 Soros charged that not only had America “violated international law” by “invading Iraq … without a second UN Resolution,” but that it had “violated the Geneva Conventions” by “mistreating and even torturing prisoners.”195
On numerous occasions, Soros drew parallels between the Bush administration and some of history’s most infamous totalitarian regimes. Bush’s view that “there is only one model of democracy,” said Soros, was “as false, and potentially as dangerous, as that of the Communists’ belief that there is only one way to organize society.”196 Soros further likened Bush’s “Orwellian” assertion that “[y]ou can have freedom as long as you do what we tell you to do,” to Soviet rhetoric about “people’s democracies.”197 “When I hear President Bush say, ‘You’re either with us or against us,’ it reminds me of the Germans,” Soros stated. “My experiences under Nazi and Soviet rule have sensitized me.”198 “Who would have thought sixty years ago,” asked Soros, “when Karl Popper wrote The Open Society and Its Enemies, that the United States itself could pose a threat to open society? Yet that is what is happening, both internally and internationally.”199
In a September 29, 2003 interview with BBC radio, Soros said it was imperative that there be “a regime change in the United States”—meaning that President Bush must be “voted out of power.”200In November, Soros said that because “America, under Bush, is a danger to the world,” the outcome of the forthcoming year’s presidential race had become “the central focus of my life.” “And I’m willing to put my money where my mouth is,” Soros added, declaring that he would willingly trade his entire multi-billion-dollar fortune if doing so could be “guaranteed” to unseat Bush.201 To his litany of grievances against the President, Soros now added the infamous Florida recount debacle of 2000 and called into question the very legitimacy of Bush’s election victory. “President Bush came to office without a clear mandate,” said Soros. “He was elected president by a single vote on the Supreme Court.”202
The types of changes America needed were crystal clear to Soros. Above all else, he wished to steer the country, politically and ideologically, in a direction that was consistent with the agendas of the groups that he had been funding for a decade through his Open Society Foundations. Those agendas could essentially be distilled down to three overriding themes: the diminution of American power, the subjugation of American sovereignty in favor of global governance, and the implementation of redistributive economic policies—both within the U.S. and across national borders. Toward these ends, Soros saw “the forthcoming elections” as “an excellent opportunity to deflate the bubble of American supremacy.”203 He would employ his wealth and his ideological fervor to capitalize on this opportunity, knowing that the best time to implement radical change is during times of upheaval and crisis—i.e., times like the aftermath of 9/11. “Usually it takes a crisis to prompt a meaningful change in direction,” Soros himself had written in his 2000 book Open Society: Reforming Global Capitalism.204
SOROS’S PREVIOUS POLITICAL INTERVENTIONS AROUND THE WORLD
By no means was this the first time that Soros had aimed to engineer the fall of a government which he deemed oppressive. On several previous occasions, he had used his extraordinary wealth to bankroll popular movements seeking to undermine communist and authoritarian regimes in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Specifically, Soros had funded the training, organization and mobilization of many millions of demonstrators who took part in a series of bloodless political revolutions—commonly known as “velvet revolutions” or “color revolutions”205—that ultimately brought down governments in those regions. Typically, these mobilizations consisted of massive street rallies (sometimes with hundreds of thousands of participants) and carefully coordinated acts of civil disobedience such as sit-ins and general strikes. In several instances, such Soros-funded protesters challenged the results of popular elections and accused incumbent leaders of election fraud—charges which were then echoed by Soros-funded exit pollsters and Soros-funded media outlets, thereby greatly amplifying the effect of the accusations. A brief survey of Soros’s most noteworthy foreign interventions will be useful at this point.
Soros helped bankroll “Charter 77,” a 1976 document demanding that the Czech government recognize some basic human rights—most notably the freedom to express religious beliefs or political opinions without fear of retributive discrimination—that were already guaranteed by the nation’s constitution. This Charter and the political movement that grew from it ultimately culminated in the velvet revolution that brought down Czechoslovakia’s Communist regime in late 1989.206
Soros funding played a critical role in promoting other upheavals in the former Soviet bloc as well. “My foundations,” boasts Soros, “contributed to Democratic regime change in Slovakia in 1998, Croatia in 1999, and Yugoslavia in 2000, mobilizing civil society to get rid of Vladimir Meciar, Franjo Tudjman, and Slobodan Milosevic, respectively.”207
Meciar, for his part, was a hardline nationalist whose authoritarian government—characterized by demagoguery, corruption, and hostility toward the Hungarian minority—brought instability and isolation to Slovakia in the mid-1990s.208 Croatian president Tudjman was likewise an autocrat infamous for his brutality, extreme nationalism, indifference to civil rights, and manipulation of electoral processes.209 And Milosevic, who served as president of Serbia and Yugoslavia in the 1990s, was an infamous architect of military aggression, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing.210 British journalist Neil Clark reports that from 1991 to 2000, Soros and his Open Society Foundations methodically laid the groundwork for the movement that ultimately led to Milosevic’s resignation, “channel[ing] more than $100m to the coffers of the anti-Milosevic opposition, funding political parties, publishing houses and ‘independent’ media…”211 In a 1996 speech, Croatian President Franjo Tudjman offered a profound insight into how Soros typically injected his influence into the political workings of a given nation by patiently and systematically infiltrating strategic organizations and governmental agencies:
“[Soros and his allies] have spread their tentacles throughout the whole of our society. Soros … had approval to … gather and distribute humanitarian aid.… However, we … allowed them to do almost whatever they wanted.… They have involved in their network … people of all ages and classes … trying to win them over by financial aid.… [Their aim is] control of all spheres of life … setting up a state within a state.…”212
Soros also funded Soviet Georgia’s “Rose Revolution,”213 a popular movement that forced Georgian president Eduard Shevardnadze to resign in November 2003.214 According to Canada’s Globe and Mail, in February of that year Soros “began laying the brick work for the toppling” of Shevardnadze. “That month, funds from his Open Society Foundations sent a … [Georgian] activist … to Serbia to meet with members of the [resistance] movement and learn how they used street demonstrations to topple dictator Slobodan Milosevic.”215 That summer, Soros brought some of those Serbian activists to Georgia to train student activists there. Meanwhile, a Soros-funded television station aired weekly broadcasts of the documentary Bringing Down a Dictator, which presented a step-by-step account of the overthrow of Milosevic and played a crucial role in training Georgian insurgents.216
In the autumn months, Soros spent some $42 million preparing the overthrow movement to mobilize. Then, in mid-November, large-scale anti-government demonstrations spread like wildfire in most of Georgia’s major cities. Shevardnadze, able to read the proverbial writing on the wall, resigned within a matter of days.217 Soros later told the Los Angeles Times, “I’m delighted by what happened in Georgia, and I take great pride in having contributed to it.”218 In November 2003, the editor of an English-language daily based in Georgia said, “It’s generally accepted public opinion here that Mr. Soros is the person who planned Shevardnadze’s overthrow.”219 Notably, some people who worked for Soros’ organizations—including two of the Open Society Georgia Foundation’s former executive directors—later assumed influential positions in the new Georgian government.220
Soros thereafter would go on to fund the “Orange Revolution,” a series of protests and political events that took place in Ukraine from late November 2004 to January 2005, ultimately forcing Moscow’s favored candidate, Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, to lose a controversial and hotly contested presidential election.221 Also in early 2005, Soros helped finance the “Tulip Revolution”—a massive protest movement that led to the overthrow of President Askar Akayev and his government in the Central Asian republic of Kyrgyzstan.222
NEW TARGET FOR “REGIME CHANGE”: AMERICA
But right now, in 2003-04, Soros’s primary focus was on the United States, whose government he considered to be at least as dangerous and oppressive as those of the aforementioned communist and authoritarian regimes. “I believe deeply in the values of an open society,” Soros said. “For the past 15 years I have focused my energies on fighting for these values abroad. Now I am doing it in the United States.”223 Asserting that he could “do a lot more about the issues I care about by changing the government than by pushing the issues,”224 Soros set out to “puncture the bubble of American supremacy.”225 To accomplish this, he would create a political apparatus of extraordinary influence.
Soros had quietly laid the groundwork for this apparatus during the preceding eight years. Between 1994 and 2002, the billionaire had spent millions of dollars promoting the passage of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act—better known as the McCain-Feingold Act 226—which was signed into law in November 2002 by President Bush. Soros began working on this issue shortly after the 1994 midterm elections, when for the first time in nearly half a century, Republicans won strong majorities in both houses of Congress. Political analysts at the time attributed the huge Republican gains in large part to the effectiveness of television advertising—most notably the “Harry and Louise” series (which cost $14 million to produce and air) where a fictional suburban couple exposed the many hidden, and distasteful, details of Hillary Clinton’s proposals for a more socialized national health-care system.
Indeed the 1994 election became, to a considerable degree, a referendum on this attempted government takeover of one-sixth of the U.S. economy—and on the Democratic President who had tacitly endorsed it. George Soros was angry that such advertisements were capable of overriding the influence of the major print and broadcast news media, which, because they were overwhelmingly sympathetic to Democrat agendas, had given Hillary’s plan a great deal of free, positive publicity for months. Three weeks after the 1994 elections, Soros announced that he intended to “do something” about “the distortion of our electoral process by the excessive use of TV advertising.”227 That “something” would be campaign-finance reform.
Starting in 1994, Soros’s Open Society Foundations and a few other leftist foundations began bankrolling front groups and so-called “experts” whose aim was to persuade Congress to swallow the fiction that millions of Americans were clamoring for “campaign-finance reform.” This deceptive strategy was the brainchild of Sean Treglia, a former program officer with the Pew Charitable Trusts.228 Between 1994 and 2004, some $140 million of foundation cash was used to promote campaign-finance reform. Nearly 90 percent of this amount derived from just eight foundations, one of which was the Open Society Foundations, which contributed $12.6 million to the cause.229Among the major recipients of these OSF funds were such pro-reform organizations as the Alliance For Better Campaigns ($650,000); the Brennan Center for Justice (more than $3.3 million); the Center For Public Integrity ($1.7 million); the Center For Responsive Politics ($75,000); Common Cause ($625,000); Democracy 21 ($300,000); Public Campaign ($1.3 million); and Public Citizen ($275,000).230
The “research” which these groups produced in order to make a case on behalf of campaign-finance reform was largely bogus and contrived. For instance, Brennan Center political scientist Jonathan Krasno had clearly admitted in his February 19, 1999 grant proposal to the Pew Charitable Trusts that the purpose of the proposed study was political, not scholarly, and that the project would be axed if it failed to yield the desired results:
“The purpose of our acquiring the data set is not simply to advance knowledge for its own sake, but to fuel a continuous multi-faceted campaign to propel campaign reform forward. Whether we proceed to phase two will depend on the judgment of whether the data provide a sufficiently powerful boost to the reform movement.”
The stated purpose of McCain-Feingold was to purge politics of corruption by: (a) putting restrictions on paid advertising during the weeks just prior to political elections, and (b) tightly regulating the amount of money that political parties and candidates could accept from donors. Vis à vis the former of those two provisions, the new legislation barred private organizations—including unions, corporations, and citizen activist groups—from advertising for or against any candidate for federal office on television or radio during the 60 days preceding an election, and during the 30 days preceding a primary. During these blackout periods, only official political parties would be permitted to engage in “express advocacy” advertising—i.e., political ads that expressly urged voters to “vote for” or “vote against” a specified candidate. Equally important, major media networks were exempted from McCain-Feingold’s constraints; thus they were free to speak about candidates in any manner they wished during their regular programming and news broadcasts. This would inevitably be a positive development for Democrats, who enjoyed the near-universal support of America’s leading media outlets.231
In addition to its limits on pre-election political advertising, McCain-Feingold also placed onerous new restrictions on the types of donations which candidates, parties, and political action committees (PACs) could now accept. Previously, they had been permitted to take two types of contributions. One of these was “hard money,” which referred to funds earmarked for the purpose of express advocacy. Federal Election Commission (FEC) regulations stipulated that in a single calendar year, no hard-money donor could give more than $1,000 to any particular candidate, no more than $5,000 to a PAC, and no more than $20,000 to any political party.232
The other category of pre-McCain-Feingold donations was “soft-money,” which donors were permitted to give directly to a political party in amounts unlimited by law. But to qualify for designation as “soft money,” a donation could not be used to fund “express advocacy” ads on behalf of any particular candidate. Rather, it had to be used to pay for such things as “voter-education” ads or “issue-oriented” ads—political messages that carefully refrained from making explicit calls to “vote for” or “vote against” any specific candidate. So long as an ad steered clear of uttering such forbidden instructions, there was no limit as to how much soft money could be spent on its production and dissemination.
McCain-Feingold raised the per-donor maximum for certain hard-money donations: A donor could now give up to $2,000 to a candidate, $5,000 to a PAC, and $25,000 to a political party.233 But the new law banned soft-money contributions to political parties altogether.
Historically, Republicans had enjoyed a 2-1 advantage over Democrats in raising hard money from individual donors. Democrats had relied much more heavily on soft money from large institutions such as labor unions.234 Thus it seems counter-intuitive that Soros, who clearly favored Democrats over Republicans, would seek to push legislation whose net effect—the removal of soft money—would be unfavorable to Democratic Party fundraising efforts.
But Soros’s motive becomes clear when we look at the types of organizations whose fundraising activities were left unaffected by McCain-Feingold. These were “527 committees”—nonprofits named after Section 527 of the IRS code—which, unlike ordinary PACS, were not required to register with the FEC. Run mostly by special-interest groups, these 527s were technically supposed to be independent of, and unaffiliated with, any party or candidate. As such, they were permitted to raise soft money—in amounts unbound by any legal limits—for all manner of political activities other than express advocacy. That is, so long as a 527’s soft money was not being used to pay for ads explicitly urging people to cast their ballots either for or against any particular candidate, the letter of the McCain-Feingold law technically was being followed. Practically speaking, of course, such things as “issue-oriented ads” and “voter-education” ads can easily be tailored to favor one party or candidate over another, while carefully steering clear of “express advocacy.”
Once McCain-Feingold was in place, Soros and his political allies collaborated to set up a network of “527 committees” ready to receive the soft money that individual donors and big labor unions normally would have given directly to the Democratic Party. These 527s could then use that money to fund issue-oriented ads, voter-education initiatives, get-out-the-vote drives, and other “party-building” activities—not only to help elect Democratic candidates in 2004, but more broadly to guide the Democratic Party ever-further leftward and to reject the “closed” society that Bush and the Republicans presumably favored. By helping to push McCain-Feingold through Congress, Soros had effectively cut off the Democrats’ soft-money supply and diverted it to the coffers of an alternative network of beneficiaries—which he personally controlled.235 As Byron York observed, “[T]he new campaign finance rules had actually increased the influence of big money in politics. By giving directly to ‘independent’ groups rather than to the party itself, big-ticket donors could influence campaign strategy and tactics more directly than they ever had previously…. And the power was concentrated in very few hands”—most notably Soros’s.236
SOROS’S “SHADOW PARTY” TAKES SHAPE
While Soros’s 527s were clearly devoted to Democratic Party agendas and values, they publicly professed to be independent of any party affiliations. Their partisanship was somewhat shrouded in proverbial shadows. Gradually, a number of journalists began to make reference to the emergence of certain pro-Democrat “shadow organizations” that seemed geared toward circumventing McCain-Feingold’s soft-money ban. In time, the term “Shadow Party” came into use.237
George Soros set in motion the wheels of this Shadow Party when he gathered a team of political strategists, activists, and Democrat donors at his Long Island beach house on July 17, 2003, to discuss how President Bush could be defeated in the 2004 election. Attendees included such luminaries as OSF director Morton Halperin; EMILY’s List founder and abortion-rights activist Ellen Malcolm; former Clinton chief of staff John Podesta; Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope; labor leader and former Clinton advisor Steve Rosenthal; former Clinton speechwriters Jeremy Rosner and Robert Boorstin; and major Democrat donors such as Lewis and Dorothy Cullman, Robert Glaser, Peter Lewis, and Robert McKay.238
The consensus was that voter turnout—particularly in 17 “swing” or “battleground” states239—would be the key to unseating President Bush. Steve Rosenthal and Ellen Malcolm—CEO and president, respectively, of a newly formed but poorly funded voter-registration group called America Coming Together (ACT)240—suggested that voters in those swing states should be recruited and mobilized as soon as possible. Agreeing, Soros told the pair that he personally would give ACT $10 million to help maximize its effectiveness. A few other attendees also pledged to give the fledgling group large sums of money: Soros’s billionaire friend Peter Lewis, chairman of the Progressive Corporation, promised to give $10 million; Robert Glaser, founder and CEO of RealNetworks, promised $2 million; Rob McKay, president of the McKay Family Foundation, committed $1 million; and benefactors Lewis and Dorothy Cullman pledged $500,000.241
By early 2004, the administrative core of George Soros’s Shadow Party was in place. It consisted of seven ostensibly “independent” nonprofit groups—all but one of which were headquartered in Washington, DC. In a number of cases, these groups shared one another’s finances, directors, and corporate officers; occasionally they even shared office space.242 The seven groups were:
1) America Coming Together (ACT): Jump-started by Soros’s $10 million grant, ACT in 2004 ran what it called “the largest voter-contact program in history,” with more than 1,400 full-time paid canvassers contacting potential voters door-to-door and by phone.243
2) Center For American Progress (CAP): This entity was established to serve as a think tank promoting leftist ideas and policy initiatives. Soros, enthusiastic about the Center’s potential, pledged in July 2003 to donate up to $3 million to help get the project off the ground.244 From the outset, CAP’s leadership featured a host of former high-ranking officials from the Clinton administration.245Hillary Clinton predicted that the organization would provide “some new intellectual capital” with which to “build the 21st-century policies that reflect the Democrat Party’s values.”246 George Soros and Morton Halperin together selected former Clinton chief of staff John Podesta to serve as president of CAP. Podesta said his goal was to develop CAP as a “think tank on steroids,” featuring “a message-oriented war room” that “will send out a daily briefing to refute the positions and arguments of the right.”247
3) America Votes: This national coalition coordinated the efforts of many get-out-the-vote organizations and their thousands of contributing activists.248 Soros’s support for America Votes would continue well past 2004. Indeed he would donate $2.15 million to this coalition in the 2006 election cycle,249 another $1.25 million in advance of the 2008 elections,250 and yet another $1.25 million in 2010.251
4) Media Fund: Describing itself as “the largest media-buying organization supporting a progressive message” in the United States, this group produced and strategically placed political ads in the print, broadcast, and electronic media.252
5) Joint Victory Campaign 2004 (JVC): This fundraising entity focused on collecting contributions and then disbursing them chiefly to America Coming Together and the Media Fund. In 2004 alone, JVC channeled $19.4 million to the former, and $38.4 million to the latter.253 Soros personally gave JVC more than $12 million that year.254
6) Thunder Road Group (TRG): This political consultancy coordinated strategy for the Media Fund, America Coming Together, and America Votes. Its duties included strategic planning, polling, opposition research, covert operations, and public relations.255
7) MoveOn.org: This California-based entity was the only one of the Shadow Party’s core groups that was not a new startup operation. Launched in September 1998, MoveOn is a Web-based political network that organizes online activists around specific issues, raises money for Democratic candidates, generates political ads, and is very effective at recruiting young people to support Democrats.256 In November 2003, Soros pledged to give MoveOn $5 million to help its cause.257
According to Ellen Malcolm of America Coming Together (ACT), the financial commitment which Soros made to these Shadow Party groups in 2003 “was a signal to potential donors that he had looked at what was going on and that this was pretty exciting, and that he was going to stand behind it, and it was the real deal.”258 As Byron York observed, “After Soros signed on, contributions started pouring in.” ACT and the Media Fund alone took in some $200 million—including $20 million from Soros alone. This type of money was unprecedented in American politics.259
Harold Ickes, who served as White House deputy chief of staff in the Clinton White House, had a hand in creating every Shadow Party core group except MoveOn. He was also entrusted with the vital task of making these organizations function as a cohesive entity. In 2004, Democratic strategist Harold Wolfson suggested that outside of the official campaign of presidential candidate John Kerry, Ickes “is the most important person in the Democratic Party today.”260
In addition to its seven core members, the Shadow Party also came to include at least another 30 well-established leftwing activist groups and labor unions that participated in the America Votes coalition. Among the better-known of these were ACORN; the AFL-CIO; the AFSCME; the American Federation of Teachers; the Association of Trial Lawyers of America; the Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund; EMILY’s List; the Human Rights Campaign; the League of Conservation Voters; the NAACP; NARAL Pro-Choice America; the National Education Association; People for the American Way; Planned Parenthood; the Service Employees International Union; and the Sierra Club.261
New Mexico’s then-governor, Democrat Bill Richardson, observed that “these groups” were “crucial” to the anti-Bush effort. “Now that campaign-finance reform is law,” he said, “organizations like these have become the replacement for the national Democratic Party.”262 And no donor was more heavily invested in these organizations—or in defeating President Bush—than George Soros, who contributed $27,080,105 to pro-Democrat 527s during the 2004 election cycle. The second leading donor was the billionaire insurance entrepreneur Peter Lewis ($23,997,220), followed by Hollywood producer Stephen Bing ($13,952,682) and Golden West Financial Corporation founders Herbert and Marion Sandler ($13,007,959).263
FAILURE AND RESILIENCY: BIRTH OF THE DEMOCRACY ALLIANCE
When President Bush won re-election in 2004, George Soros was devastated; his massive financial investments and herculean organizing efforts had all gone for naught. Adding insult to injury, the hated Republicans had retained control of both houses of Congress. As Soros contemplated what course of action he ought to pursue next, the answer came to him—somewhat unexpectedly—in the form of Democrat political operative Rob Stein, former chief of staff to Commerce Secretary Ron Brown during the Clinton administration. For the preceding two years, Stein had been busy devising a strategy by which Democrats might reclaim supremacy in the executive and legislative branches of government.
He began working on this strategy shortly after the Republicans had gained eight House seats and two Senate seats in the 2002 midterm elections. Lamenting that he was “living in a one-party [Republican] country,”264 Stein at that point resolved to study the conservative movement and determine why it was winning the political battle. After a year of analysis, he concluded that a few influential, wealthy family foundations—most notably Scaife, Bradley, Olin, and Coors—had spearheaded the creation of a $300 million network of politically influential organizations. Stein featured these facts in a comprehensive PowerPoint presentation—titled “The Conservative Message Machine Money Matrix”—which mapped out, in painstaking detail, the conservative movement’s networking strategies and funding sources.265
Next, Stein set out to show his presentation—mostly in private meetings—to political leaders, activists, and prospective big-money donors of the left. He hoped to inspire them to join his crusade to build a new organization—a financial clearinghouse to be called the Democracy Alliance (DA)—dedicated to offsetting the efforts of conservative funders and injecting new life into the progressive movement. At each presentation, Stein asked the viewer to pledge that he or she would keep confidential the substance of the proceedings, so as to give the project a chance to coalesce and gain some momentum without excessive public scrutiny.266
Stein officially filed DA’s corporate registration in the District of Columbia in January 2005.267 By that point, he had shown his PowerPoint presentation to several hundred people.268 Stein recalls that during those sessions, he consistently observed “an unbelievable frustration” by big Democrat donors who felt hopelessly unconnected to one another even as they longed to be part of a strategic coalition that could work collaboratively and cohesively.269 This was particularly true of George Soros, thus it was most significant that Soros quickly and enthusiastically embraced Stein’s concept. In April 2005, Soros brought together 70 likeminded, carefully vetted, fellow millionaires and billionaires in Phoenix, Arizona, to discuss Stein’s ideas and expeditiously implement a plan of action.270 Most of those in attendance agreed that the conservative movement represented “a fundamental threat to the American way of life.”271 And, like Soros, a considerable number of them looked favorably on Stein’s analysis and concept. Thus was born the Democracy Alliance.
DA members, called “partners,” include individuals and organizations alike. Partnership in the Alliance is by invitation-only.272 These partners pay an initial $25,000 fee, and $30,000 in yearly dues thereafter. They also must give at least $200,000 annually to groups which the Alliance endorses. Donors metaphorically “pour” these requisite donations into one or more of what Rob Stein refers to as DA’s “four buckets” of fundraising: ideas, media, leadership training, and civic engagement. The money is then apportioned to approved left-wing groups from each respective category.273
The Democracy Alliance is known to consist of at least 100 donor-partners but historically has been quite secretive regarding their identities. Nevertheless, the Capital Research Center has managed to compile the names of some of the more significant current and former DA partners (in addition to George Soros and Rob Stein).274 A large percentage of them have significant ties to Soros that extend well beyond their shared membership in the Democracy Alliance. Among these partners are the following:
AFL-CIO: This institutional DA partner is the largest labor federation in America and was a member of Soros’s Shadow Party in 2004.
Bauman Foundation co-director Patricia Bauman serves as a board member of the Soros-funded Natural Resources Defense Council.
Property-development CEO Albert Dwoskin is the chairman of Catalist, a Soros-funded political consultancy.275
Manhattan-based child psychologist Gail Furman belongs to the Council on Foreign Relations and is a board member of Human Rights First and the Brennan Center for Justice—all organizations that receive funding from George Soros and OSF.276
Software entrepreneur Tim Gill is a major funder of gay-rights groups such as the Gay, Lesbian, and Straight Education Network, which is also supported by Soros.277
Technology entrepreneur Davidi Gilo has given at least $17,600 to J Street, an organization that is consistently critical of Israel and has close ties to Soros.278
Media-software mogul Rob Glaser was an early backer of the Soros-funded America Coming Together.279
“Racial justice organizer” Connie Cagampang Heller works closely with the Soros-funded Tides Foundation.280
Hyatt Hotel luminary Rachel Pritzker Hunter has served as treasurer of the Soros-funded Media Matters For America.281
Economist and former banking executive Rob Johnson once served as a portfolio manager for George Soros’s Quantum Fund.282
Michael Kieschnick founded Working Assets, a long-distance telephone/credit card company that donates a percentage of its profits to leftist groups and causes.283 He is also a board member of the Soros-funded evangelical group Sojourners.284
Longtime technology executive John Luongo is a former board member of Planned Parenthood and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington—both Soros-funded enterprises.285
Atlantic Philanthropies president and CEO Gara LaMarche was formerly vice president of Soros’s Open Society Foundations. He also served a stint as associate director of Human Rights Watch and held a variety of positions with the ACLU—both organizations that are heavily funded by Soros.286
Television producer Norman Lear created the Soros-backed group, People for the American Way.
Progressive Insurance Company chairman Peter Lewis has many close ties to Soros and was a major funder of the Shadow Party during the 2004 election cycle.287
Taco Bell heir Robert McKay has been a founding board member of America Coming Together, a board member of the Ms. Foundation for Women, and a director of the Fund for America288—all of which are beneficiaries of Soros money.
Tides Foundation founder and longtime CEO Drummond Pike has close ties to Soros, who is a major funder of Tides.
Democrat activist Simon Rosenberg founded the New Policy Institute, a project of the Tides Foundation. He also sits on the board of the Soros-funded publication Democracy: A Journal of Ideas. And in 1996 he created the New Democrat Network, a Soros-financed organization committed to pushing the Democratic Party further leftward.289
Golden West Financial Corporation founders Herb and Marion Sandler are philanthropic allies of George Soros and were heavy funders of Shadow Partyorganizations in 2004—giving some $13 million to anti-Bush “527 committees.”290
Trial lawyer Guy Saperstein formerly served as president of the Soros-funded Sierra Club.291
Service Employees International Union: The longtime former president of this union, Andrew Stern, sat on the executive committee of the Soros-funded America Coming Together.292
George Soros’s son Jonathan is president and co-deputy chairman of Soros Fund Management.
DA board member Michael Vachon is the director of communications at Soros Fund Management and the overseer of Soros’s political contributions.293
No grants were pledged at the Democracy Alliance’s April 2005 gathering in Phoenix, but at an Atlanta meeting three months later, DA partners pledged $39 million—about a third of which came directly from George Soros and Peter Lewis.294 Because the Alliance has largely refrained from providing information about its giving, only a small percentage of its donees are known to the public.295 Thus it is impossible to determine precisely how much money DA has disbursed since its inception. Most estimates, though, place the figure at more than $100 million.296 One source—Alliance member Simon Rosenberg—claimed in August 2008 that DA had already “channeled hundreds of millions of dollars into progressive organizations.”297Below are the names of a number of DA’s known donees 298—and in certain cases the sums they have received from the Alliance.
Again, the Capital Research Center was instrumental in identifying these donees, many of whom have financial and ideological ties to Soros and the Open Society Foundations that long predate their connections to the Democracy Alliance.299
ACORN: DA founder Rob Stein has called this pro-socialist, notoriously corrupt “community organization” a “tough-minded” and “very responsible” group.300
Air America Radio: When this left-leaning radio station was on the verge of bankruptcy in early 2006, it received a funding commitment of $8 million from DA.301
America Votes: This voter-mobilization coalition has received at least $6 million in DA-approved funding commitments from George Soros.
Center for American Progress: By January 2008, DA grants to this leftist think tank totaled at least $9 million—most of which came from George Soros, Peter Lewis, and the Sandlers.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington: This Soros-funded group brings ethics charges against (mostly conservative) “government officials who … betray the public trust.”302
Election Administration Fund: Housed at the Tides Foundation in San Francisco, this entity has received at least $2.5 million in DA money for its voter-registration and get-out-the-vote efforts—plus some $1 million from Soros’s Open Society Foundations.
EMILY’s List: This group raises money for Democratic, pro-choice, female candidates.303
Media Matters For America: By January 2008, DA-approve grants to Media Matters totaled at least $7 million.
Mi Familia Vota: This group seeks to naturalize new citizens and register them to vote.304
New Organizing Fund: This group, which “train[s] prospective progressive campaign workers in online campaign and organizing techniques,” has accepted donations directly from DA members George Soros and Deborah Rappaport.305
Progressive Majority: Working to help “promising progressive candidates” get elected to state and political offices, this group has received at least $5 million in DA grants.306
United States Student Association: This group is “dedicated to training, organizing, and developing a base of student leaders” who will become “social justice” activists.307
USAction: This group favors increased government spending on social-welfare programs and public education.308
Additional DA grant recipients include such previously cited Soros donees as Catalist, the Center for Community Change, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Democracy: A Journal of Ideas, the Drum Major Institute for Public Policy, the New Democrat Network, People for the American Way, and the Progressive States Network.309
Since approximately 2006, Democracy Alliance members and staff have been working to establish subchapters of their organization in all 50 states. Their most successful effort to date has been in Colorado, where the local DA has funded such varied enterprises as liberal think tanks, media “watchdog” groups, ethics groups that bring forth so-called public-interest litigation, voter-mobilization groups, media outlets that attack conservatives, and liberal leadership-training centers. The results have been striking: Whereas in 1998 Colorado had a Republican governor, two Republican U.S. senators, and four Republican House members (out of six), by 2009 the state had a Democratic governor, two Democratic U.S. Senators, and five Democratic House members (out of seven).310
RADICALIZING AMERICA, ONE STATE AT A TIME: “PLAN” AND THE SECRETARY OF STATE PROJECT
In August 2005, when the Democracy Alliance was just getting off the ground, George Soros’s Open Society Foundations helped establish yet another new organization—the Progressive Legislative Action Network, or PLAN. Furnishing state legislatures with prewritten “model” legislation reflecting leftist agendas, this group was part and parcel of Soros’s methodical campaign to shift American politics and public attitudes toward the left—by gaining a foothold inside the corridors of power on a state-by-state basis.311
Then, in July 2006, Democracy Alliance partner Michael Kieschnick collaborated with Becky Bond (who also had affiliations with the New Organizing Institute and Working Assets) and James Rucker (who co-founded Color of Change and formerly served as director of grassroots mobilization for MoveOn.org Political Action and Moveon.org Civic Action) to launch a major new initiative called the Secretary of State Project (SoSP). This “527 committee” was devoted to helping Democrats win secretary-of-state elections in crucial “swing” states—i.e., states where the margin of victory in the 2004 presidential election had been 120,000 votes or less.312 One of the principal duties of the secretary of state is to serve as the chief election officer who certifies candidates as well as election results in his or her state.313 The holder of this office, then, can potentially play a key role in determining the winner of a close election. Numerous Democracy Alliance partners became funders of SoSP. Soros was one of them. In 2008, for instance, he personally gave $10,000 to the Project.314
SOROS HELPS CREATE TWO NEW PRO-DEMOCRAT GROUPS
Just two months after the Democratic Party had won control of both houses of Congress in the November 2006 elections, George Soros and then-SEIU president Andrew Stern created Working For Us (WFU), a pro-Democrat PAC. This group does not, however, look favorably upon Democratic centrists. Rather, it aims “to elect lawmakers who support a progressive political agenda.” Originally proposed by Stern as a way to prevent moderate Democrats from gaining too much influence over the party, WFU publishes the names of what it calls the “Top Offenders” among congressional Democrats who fail to support such leftist priorities as “living wage” legislation, the proliferation of public-sector labor unions, and the provision of government-funded healthcare for all Americans. Targeting congressional Democrats whose “voting records are more conservative than their districts,” WFU warns that “no bad vote will be overlooked or unpunished.”315
In an effort to promote large-scale income redistribution by means of tax hikes for higher earners, WFU advocates policies that would narrow the economic gulf between the rich and poor. The group’s executive director is Steven Rosenthal, a longtime Democrat operative with close ties to the Clinton administration and a co-founder of Soros’s America Coming Together. According to Rosenthal, WFU “will encourage Democrats to act like Democrats—and if they don’t—they better get out of the way.”316
In November 2007, Soros joined fellow Democracy Alliance members Anna Burger and Rob McKay, as well as John Podesta of the Center for American Progress, to help form the Fund for America (FFA), a “527 committee” designed to work on what Roll Call characterized as “media buys and voter outreach in the run-up to the 2008 elections.” The leading early donors to FFA were Soros ($3.5 million), the SEIU ($2.5 million), Hollywood producer Stephen Bing ($2.5 million), and hedge fund executive Donald Sussman ($1 million). But when FFA failed to meet its overall fundraising goals by early 2008, DA donors cut off their contributions and the group was disbanded in June. Among the organizations it had bankrolled before shutting its doors were America Votes, Americans United for Change, ACORN, and the Center for American Progress Action Fund.317
Meanwhile, Soros’s regard for President Bush remained as low as ever. “Indeed,” wrote Soros in 2006, “the Bush administration has been able to improve on the techniques used by the Nazi and Communist propaganda machines by drawing on the innovations of the advertising and marketing industries.”318 Soros would elaborate on this theme at the January 2007 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where he told reporters: “America needs to … go through a certain de-Nazification process.”319
SOROS AND OBAMA: QUIET PARTNERSHIP AND SHARED AGENDAS
While George Soros was busy bankrolling his battalion of established activist groups and launching a few new ones of his own, he quite naturally looked toward the upcoming presidential election of 2008 with great anticipation, eagerly awaiting the day when George W. Bush would finally leave office. The question was, who would replace him? In recent years, all indications had been that Soros favored Hillary Clinton above most, if not all, other potential Democratic candidates for President. But now there was a new face on the scene—a young, charismatic U.S. senator from Illinois named Barack Obama—who seemed not only to share virtually all of Soros’s values and agendas, but also appeared to be a highly skilled politician who stood a good chance of getting elected to the nation’s highest office.
In December of 2006, Soros, who had previously hosted a fundraiser for Obama during the latter’s 2004 Senate campaign, met with Obama in Soros’s New York office. Just a few weeks later—on January 16, 2007—Obama announced that he would form a presidential exploratory committee and was contemplating a run for the White House. Within hours, Soros sent the senator a contribution of $2,100, the maximum amount allowable under campaign-finance laws. Later that week, the New York Daily News reported that Soros would support Obama rather than Hillary Clinton for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination, though Soros pledged to back the New York senator were she to emerge as the nominee.320 But it was clear that Soros considered Obama to be the more electable candidate of the two. Most importantly, Obama’s economic and political prescriptions for America were wholly accordant with those of Soros.
For an in-depth look at the shared agendas of Soros and Obama, click here.
SOROS PURSUES A NEW ‘ECONOMIC PARADIGM”
In January 2009, Anatole Kaletsky—a Times of London economics writer who opposed the “noninterventionist model of capitalism” and favored deficit spending and “stimulus packages” as bulwarks against economic depression—discussed with George Soros “the unique opportunity to reshape economics in the wake of the financial crisis.” Eight months later, Soros assembled 25 economists, financiers, and journalists in Bedford, New York to brainstorm the idea. This “Bedford Summit” resulted in a “unanimous agreement that our economic paradigm must change,” and a “recognition of the importance of empowering the young generation of economists to rethink” the field of economics. Toward that end, the Institute for New Economic Thinking (INET) was created as a nonprofit foundation in October 2009; its initial funding came from a $50 million pledge by Soros’s Open Society Foundations.
SOROS AND THE ARAB SPRING
The so-called “Arab Spring,” which began in late 2010, was a momentous series of popular uprisings that swept—in rapid succession and with varying degrees of intensity and effect—through a host of countries in the Middle East and North Africa: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen. By February 2011, Tunisian president Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali had stepped down after 22 years in power, and Egyptian president Hosni Mubarek had abdicated after 30 years. For the most part, the Western media—and the American left in particular—promoted the notion that the events in the Arab world were organic eruptions of rebellion launched spontaneously by oppressed populations who would no longer tolerate political tyranny and economic deprivation, and who longed to quench their own thirst for freedom and democracy.
Over time, it would become apparent that however strong the popular support for the Arab uprisings may have been, the hidden hand of an Islamist movement was also at work in fomenting and sustaining the revolts. This reality was driven home dramatically in the political events that took place where regimes had fallen. In post-Mubarak Egypt, this meant the rising influence of the Muslim Brotherhood—the ideological forebear of both al Qaeda and Hamas, and the spearhead of a movement aiming to establish a worldwide Islamic caliphate (or kingdom) ruled by strict Islamic Law (Sharia). And in Tunisia, the first free elections following the longstanding regime of President Zine al-Abedine Ben Ali resulted in the triumph of the al-Nahda party, an Islamist movement which had opposed, sometimes violently, the existing regime. In short, the Arab Spring evolved into a Muslim Winter.
Notwithstanding these developments, Soros in late 2011 said: “A lot of positive things are happening. I see Africa together with the Arab Spring as areas of progress. The Arab Spring was a revolutionary development.”
SOROS AND OCCUPY WALL STREET
In the fall of 2011, Soros denied any connection to the anti-capitalist Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement which was then in high gear, though he said: “I can understand their sentiment.” An October 2011 Reuters report noted that from 2007-09, Soros’ Open Society Foundations had given grants totaling $3.5 million to the Tides Center, which in turn gave more than $309,000 to the Adbusters Media Foundation — a key organizer of OWS — between 2001 and 2011. Aides to Soros, however, claimed that the billionaire had never before heard of Adbusters.
SOROS SEEKS TO UNSEAT REP. ALLEN WEST (FLORIDA)
In July 2012, it was reported that Soros was among a group of donors who had already pledged their financial support for “Dump West,” a Democratic Super-PAC that planned to raise at least $5 million for the purpose of defeating conservative black Republican Allen West‘s bid for reelection to the House of Representatives. A key player in”Dump West” was national Democratic operative Charles Halloran, a former aide to President Bill Clinton. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi asked lobbyist Larry Smith (a former U.S. congressman) to help line up initial funding for the Super-PAC.
SOROS GIVES MONEY TO HELP NAACP FIGHT VOTER ID LAWS
In March 2013, Soros pledged to give, through his Open Society Foundations, $1 million to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. This was the largest grant that organization had received from a named donor in recent decades. The purpose of the grant was to help the NAACP fight challenges to the Voting Rights Act and oppose the implementation of Voter ID laws. In a statement, Soros said: “We need bold and courageous civil rights strategies if we are to achieve racial equality in this country.”
SUPPORTING HILLARY CLINTON
In October 2013, Soros signed on to co-chair the national finance council of Ready For Hillary, a political action committee established nine months earlier to lead a nationwide grassroots movement encouraging Hillary Clinton to run for U.S. President in 2016. “George Soros is delighted to join more than one million Americans in supporting Ready For Hillary,” said Soros’s political director, Michael Vachon. “His support for Ready For Hillary is an extension of his long-held belief in the power of grassroots organizing.”
SUPPORTING BILL DE BLASIO
In August 2013 Soros endorsed Bill de Blasio for Mayor of New York City, and he contributed the legal limit of $4,950 to de Blasio’s campaign. Soros also gave financial support to Talking Transition, a two-week project launched in early November 2013—immediately after de Blasio’s election victory—to “help shape” the latter’s “transition” to City Hall. Soros’ relationship with the mayor-elect actually dated back to 2011, when the billionaire had given $400,000 to de Blasio’s Coalition for Accountability in Political Spending.
SUPPORTING GROUPS THAT HELPED LEAD & PROMOTE THE ANTI-POLICE PROTESTS OF 2014 (IN FERGUSON, MISSOURI, ETC.)
In 2014, two separate white-police-vs.-black-suspect altercations that resulted in the deaths of the blacks involved became the focal points of a massive, nationwide protest movement alleging that white officers were routinely targeting African Americans with racial profiling and the unjustified use of force:
(a) On July 17, 2014, a 43-year-old African American named Eric Garner died in Staten Island, New York, after having resisted several white police officers’ efforts to arrest him for illegally selling “loosies,” single cigarettes from packs without tax stamps. One of the officers at the scene put his arms around the much taller Garner’s neck and took him down to the ground with a headlock/chokehold. While he was being subdued, Garner reportedly told the officers a number of times, “I can’t breathe.” A black NYPD sergeant supervised the entire altercation and never ordered that officer to release the hold. Garner subsequently suffered cardiac arrest in an ambulance that was taking him to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead approximately an hour after the initial altercation. City medical examiners later concluded that he had died as a result of an interplay between the police officer’s hold and Garner’s multiple chronic infirmities, which included bronchial asthma, heart disease, obesity, and hypertensive cardiovascular disease. “I Can’t Breathe” became a popular slogan of demonstrators who later protested Garner’s death in rallies across the United States.
(b) On August 9, 2014, a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri shot and killed an 18-year-old black male named Michael Brown in an altercation that occurred just minutes after Brown had perpetrated a strong-armed robbery of a local convenience store. Brown’s death set off a massive wave of protests and riots in Ferguson, and eventually grew into a national movement denouncing an alleged epidemic of police brutality against African Americans. The protesters claimed, falsely: (a) that Brown had been shot in the back while fleeing from the officer, and (b) that Brown at one point had raised his hands in the air submissively in an attempt to surrender but was shot anyway. Thus, “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” became a popular slogan of the demonstrators who later protested Brown’s death. When compelling ballistic, eyewitness, and forensic evidence eventually (in late October 2014) indicated that Brown in fact had assaulted the officer and had tried to steal his gun just prior to the fatal shooting, the protesters’ outrage over the incident was undiminished. A grand jury announced on November 24, 2014 that it would not indict the officer who had shot Brown — because of overwhelming evidence indicating that the shooting was done in self-defense. This announcement, too, touched off protests and riots.
Through his Open Society Foundations, Soros in 2014 gave at least $33 million to support already-established groups that, as The Washington Timesputs it, “emboldened the grass-roots, on-the-ground activists in Ferguson” and helped lead the anti-polce protests. “The financial tether from Mr. Soros to the activist groups gave rise to a combustible protest movement that transformed a one-day criminal event in Missouri into a 24-hour-a-day national cause celebre,” says the Times.
Among these activist organizations funded by Soros were the Advancement Project, the Center for Community Change, Colorlines, the Don’t Shoot Coalition, the Dream Defenders, the Drug Policy Alliance, Equal Justice USA, the Gamaliel Foundation, the Hands Up Coalition, Make the Road New York, Millennial Activists United, Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment (the rebranded Missouri branch of ACORN), the Organization for Black Struggle, PICO, and the Samuel Dewitt Proctor Conference (where Jeremiah Wright was a trustee), the SEIU, national LGBT organizations, climate environmentalists, amnesty groups, pro-Palestinian organizations, and Christian social justice groups.
“The plethora of organizations involved,” explains The Washington Times, not only shared Mr. Soros’ funding, but they also fed off each other, using content and buzzwords developed by one organization on another’s website, referencing each other’s news columns and by creating a social media echo chamber of Facebook ‘likes’ and Twitter hashtags that dominated the mainstream media and personal online newsfeeds.”
SOROS AGAIN FIGHTS VOTER ID LAWS
In June 2015, the New York Times reported that “a Democratic legal fight against restrictive voting laws enacted in recent years [since 2010] by Republican-controlled state governments is being largely paid for by a single liberal benefactor: the billionaire philanthropist George Soros.” Indeed, Soros had already agreed to contribute as much as $5 million to that litigation effort, whose major objectives were to: (a) discredit and overturn Voter ID laws in as many states as possible; (b) eliminate or loosen time restrictions imposed on early voting (prior to Election Day); and (c) change election rules that could nullify ballots cast in the wrong precinct. The attorney spearheading this initiative was Marc Elias, who also served as a lawyer for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. Describing himself as “proud” to be part of the legal battles, Soros said: “We hope to see these unfair laws, which often disproportionately affect the most vulnerable in our society, repealed.” At the time, Soros was supporting a lawsuit that had been filed the previous year in North Carolina, as well as suits that had been filed in Ohio and in Wisconsin in May 2015.
SOROS SUPPORTS MASS MIGRATION OF MIDDLE EASTERNERS INTO EUROPE
In October 2015—while hundreds of thousands of Middle Easterners were flooding into Europe as “refugees”—Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban warned that this mass influx of foreign Muslims was endangering Europe’s “Christian roots” and creating “parallel societies.” Asserting that Europeans should “stick to our Christian values,” he stated that “Europe can be saved” only if its leaders “take seriously the traditions, the Christian roots and all the values that are the basis of the civilization of Europe.” Moreover, Orban accused Soros—whose charitable foundations support numerous pro-immigration non-governmental organizations (NGOs)—of deliberately encouraging the migrant crisis. “This invasion is driven, on the one hand, by people smugglers, and on the other by those (human rights) activists who support everything that weakens the nation-state,” Orban said. “This Western mindset and this activist network is perhaps best represented by George Soros.”
In response, Soros issued an email statement to Bloomberg Business, claiming that his foundations helped “uphold European values” while Orban (according to Soros) aimed to “undermine those values.” “His [Orban’s] plan treats the protection of national borders as the objective and the refugees as an obstacle,” said Soros. “Our plan treats the protection of refugees as the objective and national borders as the obstacle.”
EMAIL LEAK REVEALS SOROS’S SUPPORT FOR ANTI-ISRAEL, PRO-ISLAMIST GROUPS
On August 13, 2016, an anonymously-run website (dcleaks.com) released more than 2,500 confidential files from Soros’s Open Society Foundations (OSF), containing evidence of funding that OSF had given to anti-Israel and pro-Islamist organizations. Among the leaked files was an OSF internal memo from 2011 titled “Extreme Polarization and Breakdown in Civic Discourse,” which lamented America’s rising “xenophobia and intolerance,” and discussed a $200,000 grant that OSF had awarded to the Center for American Progress (CAP) to “research and track the activities” of groups (like the Middle East Forum) which contend that radical Islam poses a grave threat to America. Later in 2011, CAP published a 138-page report, Fear, Inc.: The Roots of the Islamophobia Network in America, whose stated objective was to “expose—and marginalize—the influence of” the “sinister,” “hateful,” “purposively deceptive,” “bigoted,” and “racist” individuals and groups that, according to CAP, are part of an “Islamophobia network in America.” These include what CAP describes as “misinformation experts,” “anti-Muslim bigots,” “political players,” “right-wing media,” “religious right” zealots, and “radical ideologues” who intentionally “mischaracteriz[e] Islam,” “peddl[e] hate and fear of Muslims,” and “rav[e]” about the “overhyped dangers” of Sharia Law, so as to “fan the flames of Islamophobia.”
EMAIL LEAK REVEALS SOROS’S SUPPORT FOR OPEN BORDERS AND HIS DESIRE TO INFLUENCE FOREIGN POLITICS
Another OSF email made public (in August 2016) by dcleaks.com asserted that the refugee crisis which was causing countless thousands of people from war- and terrorism-ravaged nations in the Middle East and North Africa to relocate to Europe and the United States, should be accepted as “the new normal.” Entitled “Migration Governance and Enforcement Portfolio Review,” this memo was written by Anna Crowley, the Program Officer of OSF’s International Migration Initiative, and Kate Rosin, a Program Specialist for the same initiative. These authors wrote how the refugee crisis was not only “opening new opportunities” for “coordination and collaboration” with other wealthy donors, and they praised efforts to “take advantage of momentum created by the current crisis to shape conversations about rethinking migration governance.” They had in mind “institutional reforms to global migration governance.”
To that end, their International Migration Initiative helped fund the work of the Columbia Global Policy Initiative, host of the secretariat for Peter Sutherland, the UN Secretary General’s Special Representative on International Migration. (Sutherland is an open-borders fundamentalist who, at a reception held on October 22, 2015 to honor the 70th anniversary of the United Nations, claimed that caps on refugees enforced by certain countries in Europe were “directly reminiscent of the type of caps that took place under the Reich [against] the Jewish population.” In an October 2015 interview with UN News Centre, Sutherland derided the very notion of national sovereignty, saying that governments must “recognize that sovereignty is an illusion … that has to be put behind us,” and that “the days of hiding behind borders and fences are long gone.”) Crowley and Rosin praised the “elite-level behind-the-scenes advocacy through Peter Sutherland,” which they believed would influence the outcome of the September 2016 summits on migrants and refugees at the United Nations, one of which was to be led by President Obama.
Yet another leaked memo made it clear that Soros’s group was considering using journalists to push out the narrative on Ukraine that Soros wanted in support of the Kiev regime. It discussed the pros and cons of offering selected journalists “long stay reporting trips in Ukraine” while retaining “a veto on stories we think are counterproductive.” Other leaked documents revealed that Soros, behind the scenes, was simultaneously pushing for the U.S. to provide more lethal weapons to the Kiev government while offering to use his influence to help prop up the country’s finances.
In one draft memo, which Soros signed “George Soros–A self-appointed advocate of the new Ukraine, March 12, 2015,” Soros advocated that “Ukraine’s allies should treat Ukraine as a defense priority.” He also pushed for a “radical reform program,” offering very specific political and economic prescriptions, backed by “the Ukrainian branch of the Soros Foundations.” This Ukrainian branch, known as the Renaissance Foundation, was reportedly paying headhunters to find suitable individuals to work in the Ukrainian government, even if they came from Ukrainian communities as far away as the U.S. and Canada. Soros’s foundation may also have been helping to pay the salaries of some Ukrainian ministers.
Soros was also looking for the U.S. and the European Union to help bail out Ukraine’s financial system. In a letter dated December 23, 2014 to Ukraine’s president and prime minister, Soros discussed the need to pull together a multibillion dollar commitment from the European Council, which could then be used to persuade the Federal Reserve to extend a three-month swap arrangement with the National Bank of Ukraine. “I am ready to call Jack Lew of the US Treasury to sound him out about the swap agreement,” Soros wrote.
In the meantime, Soros was making sure that he would be in a position to profit from a more stabilized Ukraine. In November 2015, it was announced that Soros’s Ukrainian Redevelopment Fund would be investing in a fund sponsored by Dragon Capital to invest in Ukraine. Through that vehicle, Soros’s Ukrainian Redevelopment Fund invested in Ukrainian software developer Ciklum Holding Ltd. It acquired the stake from Horizon Capital, an investment firm founded by Natalie Jaresko, who was serving at the time as Ukraine’s finance minister. Jaresko was a U.S. citizen of Ukrainian descent who had once worked in the U.S. State Department. She became a Ukrainian citizen in December 2014, the same time she became finance minister.
Finally, to bring things around full circle, some leaked emails revealed that Soros saw an opportunity for Ukraine to help the European Union alleviate its refugee crisis by taking in some of the refugees in return for financial aid.
EMAIL LEAK REVEALS SOROS’S DESIRE TO REGULATE THE INTERNET IN A MANNER THAT FAVORED HIS POLITICAL AGENDAS
On August 29, 2016, the The Daily Caller reported: “An internal proposed strategy from George Soros’s Open Society Justice Initiative calls for international regulation of private actors’ decisions on ‘what information is taken off the Internet and what may remain.’ Those regulations, the document notes, should favor ‘those most supportive of open society.'” According to the OSF website, “The Open Society Justice Initiative uses law to protect and empower people around the world, supporting the values and work of the Open Society Foundations.” The proposal cited by The Daily Caller was part of a 34-page document titled “2014 Proposed strategy,” which spelled out the Initiative’s goals for 2014-17.
SOROS PLAYS KEY ROLE IN SUPPORTING “WOMEN’S MARCH ON WASHINGTON”
Soros played a significant role in funding the “Women’s March on Washington” which was held on January 21, 2017 to protest the agendas and policies of the newly elected president, Donald Trump. News outlets like the Guardian characterized the event as a “spontaneous” action for women’s rights, while Vox spoke of a “huge, spontaneous groundswell” behind the demonstration. But in fact, the Women’s March was organized and led by a large coalition of leftist groups, many of which have, at various times, received funding from Soros. Former Georgetown University journalism professor and Wall Street Journal reporter Asra Q. Nomani calculated that some 420+ groups were identifiable as “partners” of the Women’s March, and that Soros has funded, or had cultivated “close relationships” with, at least 64 of them. The Women’s March “partners” that had previously received grants through Soros’s Open Society Foundations and its related philanthropies — or that were otherwise allied with Soros and his foundations — included the following:
9 to 5 National Asociation of Working Women; A. Philip Randolph Institute; ACCESS Michigan; Advancement Project; AFL-CIO; American Civil Liberties Union; American Constitution Society; American Federation of Teachers; American Jewish World Services; America’s Voice; Amnesty International; Arab American Association of New York; Asian Americans Advancing Justice; Bend The Arc; Breakthrough; Catholics for Choice; Center for American Progress; Center for Constitutional Rights; Center for Reproductive Rights; Color of Change; Communities United for Police Reform; Connecticut Juvenile Justice Alliance; Demos; Economic Policy Institute; EMILY’s List; Every Voice; Gathering for Justice; Green for All; Human Rights Campaign; Human Rights Watch; Interfaith Center of New York; International Women’s Health Coalition; Leadership Conference on Civil & Human Rights; League of Women Voters; Make the Road New York; MoveOn; MPower Change; NAACP; NARAL Pro-Choice America Fund; National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum; National Council of Jewish Women; National Council of La Raza; National Domestic Workers Alliance; National Education Association; National Network for Arab American Communities; National Partnership for Women and Families; Natural Resources Defense Council; PEN America; Planned Parenthood; Presente.org; Psychologists for Social Responsibility; Public Citizen; SEIU; South Asian Americans Leading Together; Southern Poverty Law Center; United We Dream; Voter Participation Center; and Women for Afghan Women.
(Original posted at Discover the Networks)
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"Eurosion": Muslim Majority in Thirty Years?
by Giulio Meotti - December 12, 2017 at 4:30 am (Norwegian translation below)Even if all current 28 EU members, plus Norway and Switzerland, closed their borders to migrants, the Islamic population
Alexandr Dugin and Olavo Carvalho Discussion on aspects of the NWO
(The video near the end must be watched in it´s full lenght. HORRIFYING. What the Illuminati, Freemasons and US Banks have been the cause of. They both created and funded communism through
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Leave a comment Posted on May 18, 2016 June 2, 2016 Books, Coming Soon
So around this time last year, I was staring at this manuscript I had written, having no idea what I was going to do with it.
I had originally put off even writing it. I’d loved the story idea, had the whole thing planned out on paper, and was totally in love with the character and world. But it was YA. I wrote adult romance. What was I even going to do with it if I did write it? But the story and the characters wouldn’t leave me alone, so eventually, and after a few false starts, I settled down to write it. It was probably the easiest time and most fun I’ve ever had writing a book. I wrote steadily for about three months, and at the end of it, I had a manuscript that I was sure was the best book I’d ever written. And it was absolutely and definitely a YA.
And then, kind of like fate, a press I’d been wanting to publish with for ages, Riptide Publishing announced the release of their new YA line, Triton. A line of books about queer kids, for queer kids. How could I pass that up?
I read a lot growing up, but for whatever reason, the books I remember reading the most, the ones that really stuck with me, were about lgbt characters. So maybe I’ve always wanted to add to that collection of books, and maybe help a young person come to accept themselves, even subconsciously, the way those books helped me.
I’m still going to keep writing romance, of course. But I’m excited about this new direction as well. And I don’t think JUNIOR HERO BLUES will be my last queer YA.
So, with no further rambling, I present:
Last year, Javier Medina was your average socially awkward gay high schooler with a chip on his shoulder. This year, he’s . . . well, pretty much the same, but with bonus superpowers, a costume with an ab window to show off his new goods, and a secret identity as the high-flying, wise-cracking superhero Blue Spark.
But being a Junior Hero means that Javier gets all the responsibility and none of the cool gadgets. It’s hard enough working for the Legion of Liberty and fighting against the evil Organization, all while trying to keep on top of school work and suspicious parents. Add in a hunky boyfriend who’s way out of Javier’s league, and an even hunkier villain who keeps appearing every time said boyfriend mysteriously disappears, and Blue Spark is in for one big dollop of teenage angst. All while engaging in some epic superhero action and, oh yeah, an all-out battle to protect Liberty City from the forces of evil.
Welcome to the 100% true and totally unbiased account of life as a teenage superhero.
book books contemporary romance gay gay ya j. k. pendragon lgbt lgbt lit lgbt ya m/m novel riptide publishing superhero triton ya ya
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Joshua Mark Nickel
“From a Historical to a Cosmical Significance”- James Denney on the Grand Vision of Ephesians and Colossians
Joshua Nickel Biblical Studies, Ephesians November 14, 2017 November 12, 2017 2 Minutes
In The Death of Christ (1902), James Denney examined everything the New Testament says about the theological significance of that death.
Working through the letters of Paul, he was struck by the new perspective that appears in Colossians and Ephesians.
As far as these two letters speak of the death of Christ, Denney saw in them an “extension of its virtue into regions where we cannot speak of it from experience.”
When we come to the epistles of the Imprisonment a new range seems to be given to Christ’s death, and to the work of reconciliation which is accomplished in it. This holds, at least, of the Epistles to the Colossians and Ephesians; so far as Philippians is concerned, we find ourselves in the same circle of ideas as in Galatians and Romans. The close parallel, indeed, of Philippians 3 9f. with the exposition of the apostolic gospel in these earlier letters is a striking proof of the tenacity and consistency of St. Paul’s thought.
But in Colossians we are confronted with a new situation. ‘The world’ which is the object of reconciliation is no longer as in 2 Corinthians 5: 19, or Romans 3 19, the world of sinful men; it is a world on a grander scale. ‘God has been pleased through Him to reconcile all things to Himself, having made peace through the blood of His cross, through Him, whether they be things on earth or things in heaven’ (Colossians 1: 20).
The reconciliation of sinful men is represented as though it were only a part of this vaster work. ‘And you, ’ it is added, ‘who were once estranged, and enemies in mind by wicked works, He has now reconciled in the body of His flesh through death’ (5: 21f.).
The same ideas are found in the Epistle to the Ephesians (1: 7ff.). Here we start with the historical Christ, ‘in whom we have our redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of our trespasses’; but when the mystery of Christ’s work is revealed to the Christian intelligence, it is seen to have as its end ‘the gathering together in one of all things in Him, both things in (or above) the heavens and things on the earth’ (5: 10).
This enlargement of the scope of Christ’s death, or, if we prefer to call it so, this extension of its virtue into regions where we cannot speak of it from experience, has sometimes had a disconcerting effect, and the bearings of it are not quite clear.
Although he found its bearings unclear, Denney seemed to see this new scope as a development in Paul’s thought, rather than something that was part of Paul’s vision from the beginning.
Denny is certainly right when he says, below, that Christ has become “a person so great that St. Paul is obliged to reconstruct His whole world around Him.” The question is: When did this reconstruction happen?
The enlarged scope of the work of reconciliation is part of that expansion, so to speak, of Christ’s person from a historical to a cosmical significance which is characteristic of these epistles as a whole.
Christ is no longer a second Adam, the head of a new humanity, as in the earlier letters (Romans 5: 12ff. and 1 Corinthians 15: 45ff.); He is the center of the universe. He is a person so great that St. Paul is obliged to reconstruct His whole world around Him. He is the primary source of all creation, its principle of unity, its goal (Colossians 1: 15ff.).
James Denney
Previous Post “Of Such a Second Paul Early Christian History Has No Knowledge”- F. F. Bruce on Who Wrote Ephesians
Next Post “The Apostle Is Too Full for Words” – T. Austin-Sparks on the Background of Ephesians
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New existence results for nonlinear delayed differential systems at resonance
Ruipeng Chen1Email authorView ORCID ID profile and
Xiaoya Li1
This paper deals with the first-order delayed differential systems
$$\textstyle\begin{cases} u'+a(t)u=h(t)v+f(t,u(t-\tau (t))), \\ v'+b(t)v=g(t,u(t-\tau (t))), \end{cases} $$
where a, b, τ, h are continuous ω-periodic functions with \(\int_{0}^{\omega }a(t)\,dt=0\) and \(\int_{0}^{\omega }b(t)\,dt>0\); \(f\in C(\mathbb{R}\times [0,\infty ),\mathbb{R})\) and \(g\in C( \mathbb{R}\times [0,\infty ),[0,\infty ))\) are ω-periodic with respect to t. By means of the fixed point theorem in cones, several new existence theorems on positive periodic solutions are established. Our main results enrich and complement those available in the literature.
Positive periodic solution
Fixed point
In the past few decades, there has been considerable interest in the existence of positive periodic solutions of the first-order delayed equation
$$ u'+a(t)u=\lambda b(t)f\bigl(u\bigl(t-\tau (t)\bigr) \bigr), $$
where \(a, b\in C(\mathbb{R},[0,\infty ))\) are ω-periodic with
$$\int_{0}^{\omega }a(t)\,dt>0,\quad\quad \int_{0}^{\omega }b(t)\,dt>0, $$
and τ is a continuous ω-periodic function. Note that when \(\lambda =0\), equation (1.1) reduces to \(u'=-a(t)u\), which is well known in Malthusian population models. In real world applications, (1.1) has also been viewed as a model for a variety of physiological processes and conditions including production of blood cells, respiration and cardiac arrhythmias. We refer the reader to [1–10] for some research work on this topic. Meanwhile, many authors have paid attention to the corresponding differential systems of (1.1), namely,
$$u'_{i}+a_{i}(t)u_{i}=\lambda b_{i}(t)f_{i}(u_{1},u_{2}, \ldots,u_{n}), \quad i=1,2,\ldots,n, $$
where \(a_{i}, b_{i}\in C(\mathbb{R},[0,\infty ))\) are ω-periodic functions, and also supposed to satisfy
$$\int_{0}^{\omega }a_{i}(t)\,dt>0,\quad\quad \int_{0}^{\omega }b_{i}(t)\,dt>0, \quad i=1,2, \ldots,n. $$
See, for instance, Wang [11, 12], Chen et al. [13] and the references therein.
Obviously, the basic assumption \(\int_{0}^{\omega }a(t)\,dt>0\) or \(\int_{0}^{\omega }a_{i}(t)\,dt>0\) (\(i=1,2,\ldots,n\)), employed usually to guarantee the linear boundary value problem
$$ u'+a(t)u=0,\quad\quad u(0)=u(\omega ) $$
is non-resonant, has played a key role in the arguments of the above-mentioned papers. Indeed, it ensures a number of tools, such as fixed point theory, bifurcation theory and so on, could be applied to study the corresponding problems and establish desired existence results. Here (1.2) is called non-resonant if the unique solution of it is the trivial one. Moreover, if (1.2) is non-resonant then, provided that h is a \(L^{1}\)-function, the Fredholm alternative theorem implies the nonhomogeneous problem
$$u'+a(t)u=h(t),\quad\quad u(0)=u(\omega ) $$
always admits a unique solution, which can be written as
$$x(t)= \int_{0}^{\omega }G(t,s)h(s)\,ds, $$
where \(G(t,s)\) is the Green’s function associated to (1.2), see [7–13] for more details.
Compared with the non-resonant problems, the research of the resonant problems proceeds very slowly and the related results are relatively little. Therefore inspired by the existing literature, we study the existence of positive periodic solutions of the following first-order delayed differential system:
$$ \textstyle\begin{cases} u'+a(t)u=h(t)v+f(t,u(t-\tau (t))), \\ v'+b(t)v=g(t,u(t-\tau (t))). \end{cases} $$
A natural and interesting question is whether or not (1.3) possesses a positive periodic solution provided that
$$ \int_{0}^{\omega }a(t)\,dt=0,\quad\quad \int_{0}^{\omega }b(t)\,dt>0, $$
which means a may change its sign on \(\mathbb{R}\) and the linear differential operator \(L_{a}u:=u'+a(t)u\) is resonant, \(L_{b}u:=u'+b(t)u\) is non-resonant.
Recently, Domoshnitsky et al. [14] studied the following system of periodic functional differential equations:
$$\begin{aligned}& (M_{i}x) (t)\equiv x'_{i}(t)+\sum _{j=1}^{n}(B_{ij}x_{j}) (t)=f_{i}(t), \quad t\in [0,\omega ], i=1,2,\ldots,n, \end{aligned}$$
$$\begin{aligned}& x_{i}(0)=x_{i}(\omega )+c_{i}, \quad i=1,2, \ldots,n, \end{aligned}$$
where \(x=\operatorname{col}(x_{1},\ldots,x_{n})\), \(B_{ij}: C[0,\omega ] \to L[0,\omega ]\) are linear bounded operator for \(i,j=1,\ldots,n\), \(f_{i}\in L[0,\omega ]\) and \(c_{i}\in \mathbb{R}\) for \(i=1,\ldots,n\). Note that if the corresponding homogeneous problem
$$\begin{aligned}& (M_{i}x) (t)=0, \quad t\in [0,\omega ], i=1,2,\ldots,n, \end{aligned}$$
$$\begin{aligned}& x_{i}(0)=x_{i}(\omega ), \quad i=1,2,\ldots,n \end{aligned}$$
has only trivial solution, then, for any \(f=\operatorname{col}(f_{1},\ldots,f _{n})\) and \(c=\operatorname{col}(c_{1},\ldots,c_{n})\), system (1.5), (1.6) admits a unique solution x defined as [15]
$$ x(t)= \int_{0}^{\omega }G(t,s)f(s)\,ds+X(t)c, \quad t\in [0, \omega ]. $$
Here \(G(t,s)\) is a \(n\times n\) matrix and is called Green’s matrix of (1.5), the \(n\times n\) matrix \(X(t)\) is the fundamental matrix of (1.7) satisfying \(X(0)-X(\omega )=E\), where E denotes the unit \(n\times n\) matrix. By an inspection of (1.9), It is not difficult to see all properties of solutions are determined by \(G(t,s)\) and \(X(t)\). Hence a series of excellent results on positivity and negativity of \(G(t,s)\) have been established in [14]. For instance, there are results on positivity (negativity) of \(G(t,s)\) when all nondiagonal operators \(B_{ij}\) (\(i\neq j\), \(i,j=1,\ldots,n\)) are negative (positive), and results about positivity or negativity of the elements in the nth row of \(G(t,s)\). To prove these results, the main idea and approach adopted by Domoshnitsky is to construct a corresponding first-order scalar functional equation
$$x'_{n}(t)+(Bx_{n}) (t)=f^{\ast }(t),\quad t\in [0,\omega ], $$
for nth component of a solution vector, here \(B: C[0,\omega ]\to L[0, \omega ]\) is a linear continuous operator and \(f^{\ast }\in L[0, \omega ]\). This idea has also been applied by Domoshnitsky to a study of the Cauchy problem [16] and some two-point boundary value problems [17].
In Sects. 2 and 3 of the present paper, the key idea of [14] to use non-resonant second scalar equation to obtain the assertion of \(v(t)\), and then to set its representation in the first equation, will be employed to establish new existence theorems for system (1.3). To the best of our knowledge, the above-mentioned problem has not been studied so far and our results shall fill this gap. For the simplicity of statement, let E be the Banach space composed of continuous ω-periodic functions with the norm \(\Vert u\Vert =\max_{t\in [0,\omega ]}\vert u(t)\vert \). For \(q\in E\), we say \(q\gg 0\) if it is strictly positive on \([0,\omega ]\), and \(q\succ 0\) if q is nonnegative and \(\int_{0}^{\omega }g(t)\,dt>0\). We denote by q̄ and \(\underline{q}\) the maximum and minimum of \(q\gg 0\) on \([0,\omega ]\). By a positive ω-periodic solution of (1.3), we mean a vector function \((u,v)\), such that \(u, v\gg 0\) are continuously differentiable everywhere and satisfy (1.3). Hence for the above question, if we choose \(\chi \gg 0\) such that \(p:=a+\chi \succ 0\), then \(\int_{0}^{\omega }p(t)\,dt>0\), so the linear differential operator \(Lu:=u'+p(t)u\) is invertible. In the following, we always assume \(\tau \in C(\mathbb{R},\mathbb{R})\) is ω-periodic, and:
(H1)
\(a\in C(\mathbb{R},\mathbb{R})\) is ω-periodic with \(\int_{0}^{\omega }a(t)\,dt=0\) and \(b\succ 0\), \(h\succ 0\);
there exists \(\chi \gg 0\) such that \(p=a+\chi \succ 0\);
\(f\in C(\mathbb{R}\times [0,\infty ),\mathbb{R})\) is ω-periodic with respect to t and \(f(t,u)\geq -\chi (t)u\);
\(g\in C(\mathbb{R}\times [0,\infty ),[0,\infty ))\) is ω-periodic with respect to t.
Remark 1.1
Note that a and f are assumed to be sign-changing, and therefore system (1.3) is more general than corresponding ones studied in the existing literature. For other research work on nonlinear differential equations at resonance, we refer the reader to [18–21] and the references listed therein.
The rest of the paper is arranged as follows. In Sect. 2, we introduce some preliminaries. And finally in Sect. 3, we state and prove our main results. In addition, several remarks will be given to demonstrate the feasibility of our main results.
2 Preliminaries
Let \(\tilde{G}(t,s)\) be the Green’s function of the linear boundary value problem
$$v'+b(t)v=0, \quad\quad v(0)=v(\omega ). $$
Then simple calculation gives the following.
Lemma 2.1
Let (H1) hold and \(\tilde{\delta }=e^{-\int _{0}^{\omega }b(t)\,dt}\). Then
$$\tilde{G}(t,s)=\frac{e^{\int_{t}^{s} b(\theta )\,d\theta }}{ \tilde{\delta }^{-1}-1},\quad t\leq s\leq t+\omega , $$
$$\tilde{m}:=\frac{1}{\tilde{\delta }^{-1}-1}\leq \tilde{G}(t,s)\leq \frac{ \tilde{\delta }^{-1}}{\tilde{\delta }^{-1}-1}=: \tilde{M}, \quad t \leq s\leq t+\omega . $$
By Lemma 2.1 and (H4), it is not difficult to verify
$$\textstyle\begin{cases} v'+b(t)v=g(t,u(t-\tau (t))), \quad t\in (0,\omega ), \\ u(0)=u(\omega ), \end{cases} $$
is equivalent to the equation
$$ v(t)= \int_{t}^{t+\omega }\tilde{G}(t,s)g\bigl(s,u\bigl(s-\tau (s) \bigr)\bigr)\,ds=:Au(t), $$
and \(A:E\to E\) is completely continuous. Then system (1.3) can be equivalently written as the following integral-differential equation:
$$u'+a(t)u=h(t)Au(t)+f\bigl(t,u\bigl(t-\tau (t)\bigr)\bigr). $$
Moreover, by (H2) we get
$$ u'+p(t)u=\chi (t)u+h(t)Au(t)+f\bigl(t,u\bigl(t-\tau (t)\bigr) \bigr). $$
Clearly, if u is a positive ω-periodic solution of (2.2), then the original system (1.3) admits a positive ω-periodic solution \((u, v)\). In the following, we shall focus on studying (2.2).
Recall that (H2) ensures the linear differential operator \(Lu:=u'+p(t)u\) is invertible. Therefore, by an argument similar to obtain Lemma 2.1, the Green’s function of
$$u'+p(t)u=0, \quad\quad u(0)=u(\omega ), $$
can be expressed as
$$K(t,s)=\frac{e^{\int_{t}^{s} p(\theta )\,d\theta }}{\delta^{-1}-1},\quad t\leq s\leq t+\omega , $$
where \(\delta =e^{-\int_{0}^{\omega }p(t)\,dt}\), and accordingly,
$$m:=\frac{1}{\delta^{-1}-1}\leq K(t,s)\leq \frac{\delta^{-1}}{\delta ^{-1}-1}=:M, \quad t\leq s\leq t+ \omega . $$
Consequently, (2.2) can be written as the equivalent operator equation
$$u(t)= \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s) \bigl(\chi (s)u(s)+h(s)Au(s)+f \bigl(s,u\bigl(s- \tau (s)\bigr)\bigr) \bigr)\,ds=:Tu(t). $$
Setting \(\sigma :=\frac{m}{M}\) and define
$$\mathcal{P}= \bigl\{ u\in E: u(t)\geq \sigma \Vert u \Vert , t\in [0,\omega ] \bigr\} . $$
Then \(\sigma <1\) and \(\mathcal{P}\) is a positive cone in E.
Let (H1)–(H4) hold. Then \(T(\mathcal{P}) \subseteq \mathcal{P}\) and \(T:\mathcal{P}\to \mathcal{P}\) is compact and continuous.
Using (H3), and similarly to the proof of [12, Lemmas 2.2, 2.3] with obvious changes, we can easily get the conclusion. □
The following lemma is crucial to prove our main results.
(Guo–Krasnoselskii’s fixed point theorem [22, 23])
Let E be a Banach space, and let \(\mathcal{P}\subseteq E\) a cone. Assume \(\varOmega_{1}\), \(\varOmega_{2}\) are two open bounded subsets of E with \(0\in \varOmega_{1}\), \(\bar{\varOmega }_{1}\subseteq \varOmega_{2}\), and let \(T:\mathcal{P}\cap (\bar{\varOmega }_{2}\setminus \varOmega_{1})\to \mathcal{P}\) be a completely continuous operator such that
\(\Vert Tu\Vert \leq \Vert u\Vert \), \(u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega _{1}\), and \(\Vert Tu\Vert \geq \Vert u\Vert \), \(u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega _{2}\); or
\(\Vert Tu\Vert \geq \Vert u\Vert \), \(u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega _{1}\), and \(\Vert Tu\Vert \leq \Vert u\Vert \), \(u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega _{2}\).
Then T has a fixed point in \(\mathcal{P}\cap (\bar{\varOmega } _{2}\setminus \varOmega_{1})\).
3 Main results
In this section, we shall state and prove our main findings. First we give the following notations:
$$\begin{aligned}& f_{0}=\lim_{u\to 0+}\frac{f(t,u)}{u}, \quad\quad f_{\infty }= \lim_{u\to \infty }\frac{f(t,u)}{u},\quad \text{uniformly for } t \in [0,\omega ]; \\& g_{0}=\lim_{u\to 0+}\frac{g(t,u)}{u}, \quad\quad g_{\infty }= \lim_{u\to \infty }\frac{g(t,u)}{u}, \quad \text{uniformly for } t \in [0,\omega ]. \end{aligned}$$
Theorem 3.1
Let (H1)–(H4) hold. If \(g_{0}=0\), \(f_{\infty }=\infty \) and
$$ \lim_{u\to 0+}\frac{f(t,u)}{u}=-\chi (t), $$
then (1.3) admits at least one positive ω-periodic solution.
For \(0< r< R<\infty \), setting
$$\varOmega_{1}=\bigl\{ u\in E: \Vert u \Vert < r\bigr\} , \quad\quad \varOmega_{2}=\bigl\{ u\in E: \Vert u \Vert < R\bigr\} , $$
then we have \(0\in \varOmega_{1}\), \(\bar{\varOmega }_{1}\subseteq \varOmega_{2}\).
It follows from (3.1) that there exists \(r_{1}>0\), such that, for any \(0< u\leq r_{1}\),
$$f(t,u)\leq cu-\chi (t)u, $$
where c is a positive constant small such that \(cM\omega \leq \frac{1}{2}\). Therefore, for \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\Vert u\Vert \leq r_{1}\), we can obtain
$$f(t,u)+\chi (t)u\leq cu, \quad t\in [0,\omega ]. $$
Moreover, since \(g_{0}=0\), there exists \(r_{2}>0\) so that \(g(t,u) \leq du\) for any \(0< u\leq r_{2}\). Thus, for \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\Vert u\Vert \leq r_{2}\), simple estimation gives
$$Au(t)= \int_{t}^{t+\omega }\tilde{G}(t,s)g\bigl(s,u\bigl(s-\tau (s) \bigr)\bigr)\,ds\leq \omega \tilde{M}\,d \Vert u \Vert , $$
where d is a positive constant small enough such that \(\omega \,dM \tilde{M}h_{0}\leq \frac{1}{2}\) and \(h_{0}=\int_{0}^{\omega }h(t)\,dt\). Let \(r=\min \{r_{1}, r_{2}\}\). Then, for \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\Vert u\Vert =r\), we get
$$\begin{aligned} Tu(t) & = \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s) \bigl(\chi (s)u(s)+f\bigl(s,u \bigl(s-\tau (s)\bigr)\bigr) \bigr)\,ds+ \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s)h(s)Au(s)\,ds \\ &\leq cM\omega \Vert u \Vert + \omega \,dM\tilde{M}h_{0} \Vert u \Vert \leq \Vert u \Vert , \end{aligned} $$
which implies \(\Vert Tu\Vert \leq \Vert u\Vert \), \(\forall u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega_{1}\).
On the other hand, \(f_{\infty }=\infty \) shows there exists \(\tilde{R}>0\) such that, for any \(u\geq \tilde{R}\),
$$f(t,u)\geq \eta u, $$
where \(\eta >0\) is a constant large enough such that \(\sigma m\omega (\eta +\underline{\chi })\geq 1\) and \(\underline{\chi }=\min_{t\in [0,\omega ]}\chi (t)\). Fixing \(R>\max \{r, \frac{ \tilde{R}}{\sigma }\}\) and let \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\Vert u\Vert =R\), then
$$u(t)\geq \sigma \Vert u \Vert =\sigma R>\tilde{R} $$
$$f(t,u)+\chi (t)u\geq \eta u+\chi (t)u\geq \sigma (\eta +\underline{ \chi }) \Vert u \Vert ,\quad t\in [0,\omega ]. $$
Consequently, for \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\Vert u\Vert =R\), by (H4) we can obtain
$$\begin{aligned} Tu(t) & = \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s) \bigl(\chi (s)u(s)+f\bigl(s,u \bigl(s-\tau (s)\bigr)\bigr) \bigr)\,ds+ \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s)h(s)Au(s)\,ds \\ &\geq \sigma m\omega (\eta +\underline{\chi }) \Vert u \Vert \geq \Vert u \Vert . \end{aligned} $$
Hence \(\Vert Tu\Vert \geq \Vert u\Vert \), \(\forall u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega _{2}\).
By Lemma 2.3(i), T has a fixed point \(u^{\ast }\in \mathcal{P} \cap (\bar{\varOmega }_{2}\setminus \varOmega_{1})\), which is just a positive ω-periodic solution of (2.2). Subsequently, (1.3) admits at least one positive ω-periodic solution. □
Let (H1)–(H4) hold. If \(f_{0}=\infty \), \(g_{\infty }=0\) and
$$ \lim_{u\to +\infty }\frac{f(t,u)}{u}=-\chi (t), $$
We follow the same strategy and notations as in the proof of Theorem 3.1. Firstly, we show for \(r>0\) sufficiently small,
$$ \Vert Tu \Vert \geq \Vert u \Vert , \quad \forall u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega_{1}. $$
It follows from \(f_{0}=\infty \) that there exists \(\tilde{r}>0\) such that \(f(t,u)\geq \beta u\) for any \(0< u\leq \tilde{r}\), where \(\beta >0\) is a constant large enough such that \(\sigma m\omega ( \beta +\underline{\chi })\geq 1\). Therefore, for \(0< r\leq \tilde{r}\), if \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) and \(\Vert u\Vert =r\), then
$$f(t,u)+\chi (t)u\geq \beta u+\chi (t)u\geq \sigma (\beta +\underline{ \chi }) \Vert u \Vert , \quad t\in [0,\omega ], $$
$$\begin{aligned} Tu(t) & = \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s) \bigl(\chi (s)u(s)+f\bigl(s,u \bigl(s-\tau (s)\bigr)\bigr) \bigr)\,ds+ \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s)h(s)Au(s)\,ds \\ &\geq \sigma m\omega (\beta +\underline{\chi }) \Vert u \Vert \geq \Vert u \Vert . \end{aligned} $$
Thus, (3.3) is true.
Secondly, we show for \(R>0\) sufficiently large,
$$ \Vert Tu \Vert \leq \Vert u \Vert ,\quad \forall u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega_{2}. $$
It follows from (3.2) that there exists \(\tilde{R}>0\) so that
$$f(t,u)\leq \mu u-\chi (t)u $$
for any \(u\geq \tilde{R}\), where \(\mu >0\) satisfies \(\mu M\omega \leq \frac{1}{2}\). Let \(R_{1}>\max \{\tilde{r}, \frac{\tilde{R}}{ \sigma }\}\), then if \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) and \(\Vert u\Vert \geq R_{1}\), we get
$$u(t)\geq \sigma \Vert u \Vert \geq \sigma R_{1}>\tilde{R}, $$
$$f(t,u)+\chi (t)u\leq \mu u\leq \mu \Vert u \Vert , \quad t\in [0,\omega ]. $$
Moreover, \(g_{\infty }=0\) implies there exists \(R_{2}>0\) so that \(g(t,u)\leq \gamma u\) for any \(u\geq R_{2}\) and \(t\in [0,\omega ]\). Therefore, for \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\Vert u\Vert \geq R_{2}\), we have
$$Au(t)= \int_{t}^{t+\omega }\tilde{G}(t,s)g\bigl(s,u\bigl(s-\tau (s) \bigr)\bigr)\,ds\leq \omega \tilde{M}\gamma \Vert u \Vert , $$
where γ is a positive constant small enough such that \(\omega \gamma M\tilde{M}h_{0}\leq \frac{1}{2}\). Let \(R=\max \{R_{1}, R_{2}\}\). Then, for \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) with \(\Vert u\Vert =R\), we can obtain
$$\begin{aligned} Tu(t) & = \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s) \bigl(\chi (s)u(s)+f\bigl(s,u \bigl(s-\tau (s)\bigr)\bigr) \bigr)\,ds+ \int_{t}^{t+\omega }K(t,s)h(s)Au(s)\,ds \\ &\leq \mu M\omega \Vert u \Vert +\omega \gamma M\tilde{M}h_{0} \Vert u \Vert \leq \Vert u \Vert , \end{aligned} $$
which implies (3.4) is true.
Consequently, it follows from Lemma 2.3(ii) that T has a fixed point \(u^{\ast }\) in \(\mathcal{P}\cap (\bar{\varOmega }_{2}\setminus \varOmega _{1})\), which is just a positive ω-periodic solution of (2.2), Subsequently, (1.3) admits at least one positive ω-periodic solution. □
In the following, we investigate the multiplicity of positive ω-periodic solutions of system (1.3). To the end, we suppose:
\(g_{0}=0=g_{\infty }\), and (3.1) and (3.2) hold. In addition, there exists \(\alpha >0\), such that
$$\min \bigl\{ f(t,u): \sigma \alpha \leq u\leq \alpha , t\in [0,\omega ]\bigr\} > \bigl( \mu -\sigma \chi (t)\bigr)\alpha , $$
where \(\mu >0\) satisfies \(m\omega \mu \geq 1\).
Let (H1)–(H5) hold. Then (1.3) admits at least two positive ω-periodic solutions.
$$\varOmega_{3}=\bigl\{ u\in E: \Vert u \Vert < \alpha \bigr\} . $$
Let \(\varOmega_{1}\) and \(\varOmega_{2}\) be the same as in the proofs of Theorems 3.1 and 3.2. Then, for \(0< r<\alpha <R\), we have \(\bar{\varOmega }_{1}\subseteq \varOmega_{3}\), \(\bar{\varOmega }_{3}\subseteq \varOmega_{2}\).
Applying \(g_{0}=0\) and (3.1), and by an argument similar to the first part of the proof of Theorem 3.1, we can obtain
$$\Vert Tu \Vert \leq \Vert u \Vert , \quad \forall u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega_{1}. $$
Similarly, combining \(g_{\infty }=0\) and (3.2), we conclude
Obviously, the proof is finished if we prove
$$ \Vert Tu \Vert \geq \Vert u \Vert ,\quad \forall u\in \mathcal{P}\cap \partial \varOmega_{3}. $$
Suppose \(u\in \mathcal{P}\) and \(\Vert u\Vert =\alpha \), then \(\sigma \alpha \leq \sigma \Vert u\Vert \leq u(t)\leq \Vert u\Vert =\alpha \), which together with (H5) yields
$$f(t,u)>\bigl(\mu -\sigma \chi (t)\bigr)\alpha , \quad t\in [0,\omega ], $$
$$f(t,u)+\chi (t)u\geq f(t,u)+\sigma \chi (t)\alpha >\mu \alpha , \quad t \in [0, \omega ]. $$
Thus, similar to the first part of the proof of Theorem 3.2, we get
$$Tu(t)\geq m\omega \mu \alpha =m\omega \mu \Vert u \Vert \geq \Vert u \Vert , $$
and (3.5) is true. By Lemma 2.3, T has two fixed points \(u_{1}\) and \(u_{2}\), located in \(\mathcal{P}\cap (\bar{\varOmega }_{3}\setminus \varOmega_{1})\) and \(\mathcal{P}\cap (\bar{\varOmega }_{2}\setminus \varOmega _{3})\), respectively. Hence, (1.3) admits at least two positive ω-periodic solutions. □
Conversely, if (H5) is replaced with:
\((\mathrm{H}5)'\) :
\(f_{0}=\infty =f_{\infty }\), and there exists \(\alpha >0\) such that
$$\begin{aligned}& \max \bigl\{ f(t,u): \sigma \alpha \leq u\leq \alpha , t\in [0,\omega ]\bigr\} < \bigl( \epsilon -\chi (t)\bigr)\alpha , \\& \max \bigl\{ g(t,u): \sigma \alpha \leq u\leq \alpha , t\in [0,\omega ]\bigr\} < \varepsilon \alpha , \end{aligned}$$
where \(\epsilon >0\), \(\varepsilon >0\) satisfies \(\epsilon M\omega \leq \frac{1}{2}\) and \(\omega \varepsilon \tilde{M}Mh_{0}\leq \frac{1}{2}\), respectively, then similar to the proof of Theorems 3.1–3.3, we can prove the following.
Let (H1)–(H4) and \((\mathrm{H}5)'\) hold. Then (1.3) admits at least two positive ω-periodic solutions.
We would like to point out that the results of Theorems 3.1–3.4 remain true for the special case \(a(\cdot )\equiv 0\), i.e., for system
$$\textstyle\begin{cases} u'=h(t)v+f(t,u(t-\tau (t))), \\ v'+b(t)v=g(t,u(t-\tau (t))). \end{cases} $$
It is worth remarking Theorems 3.1–3.4 apply to some equations which cannot be treated by the results of [7–10], and thus our main results are novel.
We establish several novel existence theorems on positive periodic solutions for delayed differential systems (1.3), via fixed point theorem in cones. Our main findings Theorems 3.1–3.4 not only enrich and complement those available in the literature, but they also apply to some systems (equations) which cannot be dealt with by the results appeared in the existing literature.
The first author is supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 11761004; No. 61761002), the Scientific Research Funds of North Minzu University (No. 2018XYZSX03), and First-Class Disciplines Foundation of Ningxia (Grant No. NXYLXK2017B09).
RC analyzed and proved the main results, and was a major contributor in writing the manuscript. XL checked the English grammar and typing errors in the full text. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
Department of Mathematics, North Minzu University, Yinchuan, P.R. China
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Women Who Inspire
Tech Gender Gap
Stacey Jenkins
Seattle is a U.S. tech capital, yet it has one of the widest tech gender gaps in the country. Producer Stacey Jenkins takes a look at the city's computer programming industry, and efforts being made to increase its dismal participation rates among women.
Seattle – Seattle is at the center of a new tech boom. Glossy new office buildings and digital start-up companies are everywhere. Geekwire Magazine has dubbed the city the new “Cloud Capital of the World.”
The economic growth is positive, but who’s benefitting from the growth is a little concerning. According to the National Partnership for Women & Families, Seattle has the widest pay gender gap of the top 50 metro cities in the US. The study reports that women in the Seattle area are paid 73 cents for every dollar paid to men in the area, amounting to a yearly gap of $16,346 between men and women who work full-time.
Participation rates leave a wide gap as well. The nation’s leading tech companies are required to release their diversity reports each year. The reports disclose participation rates among men and women in the industry. These companies include Google, Facebook, Amazon, Twitter, Microsoft and Apple.
Gender Breakdown of Leading Tech Companies
Non-Tech Jobs
* Amazon did not release a gender breakdown for tech jobs.
When you look at the participation rates in non-tech jobs, women represent around 45% of all employees in the companies above.
But when you look at female participation rates in tech-specific jobs at these companies, those numbers dip to an average of 15% (see above graph).
Heather Wade is a technical product manager at Tune, a mobile marketing tech company in Seattle. “I have to say I feel that things are better now than they were 8 or 10 years ago, but that doesn’t mean we’re there – we still have progress we can make."
Heather has worked as a computer programmer for over a decade. Computer programming has one of the lowest participation rates among women in the tech industry. Heather says that in past jobs, she was often the only female in her department and sexism was rampant. Inappropriate internet searches, sexist jokes and demeaning statements were the norm. When she was promoted, she experienced backlash for her efforts in management as well.
“I think there’s a tendency to perceive women in leadership as bossy, “ she said. “In a previous role when I was firm with the engineering team, I was taken aside and told that I was managing like a field marshal and maybe I could tone it down and be a little gentler with people – but all I was doing was trying to get people to meet deadlines,” she said laughing.
Computer programming is one of the highest paid industries in the tech world. It also has one of the highest growth rates. The late nineties to the early 2000's saw a significant increase in tech jobs during the "dot-com bubble", however, it was primarily men that filled these jobs (see graph below). The national growth rate for software developers, for example, is projected at over 200,000 new jobs in the next decade. Experts say that tech companies would be wise to reduce the gender gap in pay, and in participation rates.
Trish Millines Dziko was the first Senior Diversity Administrator at Microsoft, where she worked from 1988 to 1996 as a computer programmer.
Dziko says that in order to truly close the gender gap, leadership and managers need to change a culture that they helped create, as demonstrated by Microsoft’s CEO Satya Nadella, and his recent blunder when asked about women seeking raises.
“Really, it’s about getting them to see a different way they can push from the top and listen from the bottom,” said Dziko. “Listen to what women and people of color are saying about what it’s like to work in that company and figure out what are the things that you can change today”.
“Listen to what women and people of color are saying about what it’s like to work in that company and figure out what are the things that you can change today”.
Dziko made a change in 1996 when she left Microsoft to create TAF, which stands for Technology Access Foundation. TAF is dedicated to STEM education for underserved populations. Dziko says in addition to changing leadership attitudes, getting girls interested in technology at an early age is key to helping them stay with it later in life.
“If you look at studies, it shows girls are interested in math and science all the way up through 3rd or 4th grade, so catching that and showing kids that STEM and programming...you can still do that stuff and you can still be interested in that stuff,” she said. “Nobody’s going to treat you differently, and by the way it’s going to get you a much better career in the long run”.
The news of getting girls to code has spread, and after-school coding classes for kids has become a big trend in just the past couple of years. Eric Fredrickson teaches elementary kids to code in his after school program called Creative Coding for Kids.
“Eighteen months ago it was just me and one assistant and now we have 21 teachers, and we’re in 16 schools. The demand and response from the parents has been so positive,” said Fredrickson.
Fredrickson has been a coder himself since the 1990’s. He founded Creative Coding for Kids after his daughter became interested in coding and wanted to take a class.
“At the elementary age, there isn’t a lot of bullying, and boys and girls aren’t out to prove anything to each other as much,” he said. “It's a much more comfortable and supportive environment, which is why it’s so important to start them young.”
11-year-old Nyah Curcuruto is one of only two girls in Fredrickson’s class at Queen Anne Elementary. She loves the class and said the absence of girls doesn’t bother her at all. “To be honest, I feel like I just fit in with the guys, because I’m in a whole room with them and they’re making me feel so welcome, like I’m not just a girl doing coding that’s different from everyone else,” she said. “They’re making me feel like I’m part of a family.”
The culture shift in coding is not just limited to grade school. Heather Wade credits the young cofounders of Tune, Lee and Lucas Brown, for changes in her workplace.
“I think at Tune I don’t feel like there’s a differentiation if you’re a female or a male – we’re all just Tune employees,” said Wade. “I think that having new blood in the industry is what’s going to change the game. They (leadership) don’t have a lot of the perceptions that people 10 or 20 years older than them would have. So when they address women in the workplace they address them as equals and I think that does drip down through the ranks.” She said.
Wade is also doing her part to entice more women to enter the world of computer programming. She runs the Seattle chapter of “Girl Develop It”, an organization that offers affordable classes and weekend study groups.
Wade says she enjoys seeing more women entering the field, and hopes more younger girls consider it as a future opportunity as well.
“I think the best way to sell technology to girls right now is to point out that they interact with technology every day," says Wade. “The games that they play, their mobile devices, Instagram, Pinterest - all these things that girls are consumers of - if you can show them how they interact with technology on a day-to-day basis and what the potential is, and they start creating that themselves, it opens up new doors for them.”
Stacey Jenkins is the managing producer of Spark Public. She is an Emmy-award winning producer who is passionate about pushing the boundaries of digital media and training the next generation of multimedia journalists. Stacey has been a Digital Content Producer at KCTS 9 for the past four years; her stories have been showcased locally on IN Close as well as nationally on SciTech Now and the PBS NewsHour's Art Beat. Stacey’s experience also includes working as a senior producer for KPTS, as an assistant media instructor and producer for Portland Community College and a TV news reporter for the CBC in Canada.
Fun Fact: Stacey’s guilty pleasures include over-the-top Halloween decor, eating sweetened condensed milk straight from the can and Maroon 5’s “Sugar” video.
More stories by Stacey Jenkins
Jean maeda January 28, 2015 - 9:22pm
I'm glad to see young girls, women code! They need early support in all fields to excel.
AP January 30, 2015 - 9:44am
These lines in the article struck me: “Really, it’s about getting them to see a different way they can push from the top and listen from the bottom,” said Dziko. “Listen to what women and people of color are saying about what it’s like to work in that company and figure out what are the things that you can change today”. Its hard for employees to speak honestly to their managers if their managers are the ones that are making them feel uncomfortable. That's why there's a company that allows women to talk about their companies' culture honestly and share what they know with each other: www.fairygodboss.com
Jenn Mathews February 5, 2015 - 8:52pm
I signed up, and really like the site. Kudos!
Having lived in Seattle, WA for over 35 years - 3 years ago I was offered a position in San Francisco by a major corporation to manage their SEO, SEM, Social Media, and analytics - and took it. I worked in the San Francisco area and lived there for 2 years. I was one of the highest paid employees and the only female on my team. No one treated me differently, and there was complete respect for one another.
Due to some corporate restructuring the entire team was laid off, and I was very well cared for as a result. I immediately found a position in the area - again, paid very well and in a position of respect.
I have recently moved back to Seattle and have been looking for work in the area for several months now. I make it all the way through to the final in-person interview with the decision being between myself and one other candidate. In the past 3 months on 4 separate occasions with 4 different companies, the other candidate was chose because "he just has..." whatever it is they say he has more of than myself. Funniest part is they want me to stand by just in case the other candidate doesn't work out. It is always that close of a decision.
I have since stopped looking for employment and am starting my own agency only because I have gotten more work being out of work in consulting, teaching, and connecting.
Now that I have experienced living and working out of the Seattle area and back I do see first hand the gender gap - not only in pay, but in the choice to hire men over women. It is frustrating, however, I am happy with my choice to work for myself, and with my team of male partners.
Daryl Scott February 10, 2015 - 1:05am
@Jenn I think it’s not just in Seattle, but everywhere, there’s always equality between race, gender and religions. Some of them don’t know how to respect people in the worst case.
John Nelson August 31, 2015 - 5:26am
I've been part of the web industry since 1995. I started off as designer and illustrator, and had NO desire to learn anything technical. Well, it pulls you in. I was forced to learn HTML by 1996...And guess who taught me hand coded HTML? Women. The industry started off on a progressive foot, I gotta say. There was a mix bag of races, ages and some equality between men and women. While most companies were owned by men, the main mangers or project leaders were women. However, around 2002-2003 (after the bubble bursted, and started to rebuild it's self)...it all began to get creepy. Suddenly, I didn't see too much diversity. Less women for sure. As the technology required to build web applications grew in advancement (making things closer to software development than in the past), I grew my skills along side it. I became a full on .NET developer, and ditched the designer thing for a while. During that time I saw NO women developers. None. Not even doing HTML (even though HTML was mostly for template design, and not for the final web pages them selves) I hardly even saw women designers. It became one big homogenized bro-fest full of entitled white male man-children. Occasionally you would have team members from India working in the states. But rarely. I worked with one database admin who was female and from India, but she didn't do anything beyond queries in Access databases. So I'm not even going to qualify that. The final bit of my story is that I am so disgusted by the industry (from both a developer and consumer level), that I am no longer pursuing a career in the web field. I'm more focused on community/ecological issue. I would love to find some organization participating in growing equality in gender, race and age in the tech fields. But util then, I'm full embraced in my Luddite roots
Judge Orders More Water Releases From Klamath River Dams
The Birthplace of Seattle Karaoke Is Closing Its Doors
West Coast Lawmakers Seek Ban on Offshore Drilling
Predicting Toxic Algae Blooms Just Got Easier
See all Current Affairs
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Inaugural President's Cup in Korea highlights strength of ROK-US alliance
by Tim Oberle
Eighth Army Public Affairs
YONGSAN GARRISON, South Korea -- Sixty-two years ago as the dust settled from the ashes of the Korean War, an alliance between the Republic of Korea and the U.S. was born that has developed into one of the strongest partnerships in the world. The mutual commitment of both nations to the security of South Korea since the close of the war has opened the door for the ingenuity and blue-collar work ethic of the Korean people to flourish.
Today South Korea is a vibrant, modern nation steeped in its cultural history and traditions. The impact that the ROK-US Alliance has had over the last six decades can be seen throughout the country from Busan to Seoul.
The peace and stability that the ROK-US Alliance has helped to establish over the last 65 years was recently highlighted during the 2015 President's Cup Golf Tournament at the Jack Nicholas Golf Club in Incheon, South Korea from Oct. 8-11. This was the first President's Cup held in the land of the morning calm and the enduring partnership between both countries was a determining factor when the P.G.A. chose South Korea as this year's host.
"One of our primary goals of hosting the event here was to tell the story of the (ROK-US) Alliance and the story of rebuilding Korea since the war," said Matt Kamienski, Vice President of the P.G.A. Tour and Executive Director of the President's Cup. "(Just think) how much the U.S. and Korea collaborated to make this event possible."
"Where we are sitting right now here in Seongdo, Incheon is basically where (General Douglas) MacArthur landed 65 years ago in mid-September. I think the story lines along those are great and hopefully we will be able to (express) that throughout the (tournament)."
Another reason behind the P.G.A's decision to host this year's tournament in South Korea was to better inform American audience members about the enduring commitment of the Servicemembers who have proudly served here on Freedom's Frontier for the last 65 years.
"The (ROK-US) Alliance is not well known especially to our viewers back in the U.S.," Kamienski explained. "Even I didn't really know until I started working on this project that there are over 28,000 military still (stationed) here protecting and supporting our freedom."
"It is amazing how the military comes together to protect freedom here in this part of the world. I admire what you guys do and we will do anything we can to help support you."
As a way to give back to troops stationed here, the P.G.A. donated over 1,000 tickets to the tournament so they could experience a P.G.A. event in person.
"You do so much for us, it's a way of saying thanks," Kamienski said humbly. "We wouldn't be able to enjoy the liberties that we have and host an event like this in Korea if it wasn't for the job that our service men and women do every day. We just wish we could do more."
In support of the tournament, the Eighth Army Band and Color Guard participated in the Opening Ceremony and over 100 Servicemembers volunteered to serve as laser operators, escorts and assist crew members.
For Staff Sgt. Ricky Carter, stationed here with the 517th Movement Control Team, the opportunity to help out during the tournament was a surreal experience and much better than watching golf on the couch at home.
"When you see it on TV it's one thing, but to be here in person…and possibly meet one of your favorite players, it's a great experience."
Sgt. Ronald Griffith, also from the 517th Movement Control Team, couldn't agree more with Carter's impression.
"I've played golf for three years, but never had the chance to attend a professional event. It's an amazing opportunity to be a part of the atmosphere here."
Over the course of the tournament the servicemembers who volunteered left a good impression on Kamienski and he was happy to continue the long history of P.G.A. support to the military.
"The PGA tour has a long history of supporting the military, and it is something I am proud to be able to carry on with the President's Cup while we are here in Korea."
USO stars visit DMZ in Korea
AKA sorority brings Alzheimer's awareness to the Daegu community
Seoul’s Unique Cafes - Blüte Cafe
U.S., ROK civil engineers strengthen alliance during PACUNITY
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That's Dr. Marijuana Pepsi to You: Marijuana Pepsi Earns Ph.D.
Jacquie Cadorette
© Milwaukee Journal Sentinel-USA TODAY NETWORK
It was a dream of freshman year Marijuana Pepsi Vandyck to one day get her doctorate and add the title to her name. Now, Dr. Marijuana Pepsi, Ph.D. is ready to take on her next challenge.
After completing her undergraduate degree and going on to earn her masters in higher education administration, Vandyck has just defended her dissertation and received her Ph.D. from Cardinal Stritch University, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.
Her biggest accomplishment? She preaches proving yourself despite obstacles – even if the obstacle is what many would consider to be an unfortunate name. But overcoming the jeers from colleagues is far from her only feat.
Vandyck is a mother of three and grandmother of one. She is currently working full-time at Beloit College as a director of a program that aids first-generation students who come from low-income households – many of whom also have physical or mental disabilities.
Vandyck is the owner of Action as Empowerment, which aims to help people reach their full potential in a time when they feel they need to make a serious change in their lives.
So what’s the next step for Vandyck? She hopes to write a book, expanding on her dissertation, “Black names in white classrooms: Teacher behaviors and student perceptions.” She’s also trying to start up the Marijuana Pepsi Scholarship, which will give $500 annually to an African American student at University of Wisconsin at Whitewater.
She’s embraced her name, using it as an attention-grabber for her students and urging people not to let menial things tear down their accomplishments.
Her siblings’ names? Kimberly and Robin.
Marijuana Pepsi Vandyck
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David Bowie’s Audio Engineer: ‘The Girls Are Taking Over’
Meg Skaff / Erin Tonkon Productions
When a professor at NYU's Clive Davis Institute introduced Erin Tonkon to one of her heroes, music producer and David Bowie collaborator Tony Visconti, she thought it would turn into an internship. But five years later, she's still working with the legend, and can put "audio engineer" for Bowie's final album Blackstar on her resume.
And while she calls Bowie "brilliant," and describes her time working with him with love and admiration, these days she's interested in working with more female rockers: Frankie Cosomos, Jay Som, Palehound, Molly Burch, Japanese Breakfast, Esperanza Spalding and Fiona Silver.
To her, it makes sense. "First white people stole rock music, and now the girls are taking it (laughs)," she told Forbes. "After all, rock music was started by a black woman named Sister Rosetta Tharpe" - who will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame next month.
The women are taking over, she says, but it hasn't been easy and their path still isn't clear. "Growing up I never thought, 'No, I can't do that because I'm a girl,'" Tonkon says. "But it was hard to see no other women in the studio. I felt like I had to be extra competitive and work a lot harder to be taken seriously. Even today walking into a room, no one ever assumes that I’m the engineer. I have to constantly prove my technological savvy.
"At first, people might think that it's a cool novelty to have a female engineer, but when it comes down to it, they’ll hire the less-qualified male to do the same job. It's a boys club. You feel constantly judged and left out, but I've learned how to carry myself."
Of course, there are ways to combat that attitude and unbalanced gender split on the technical side of the music industry and beyond. "My rule of thumb in any line of work is that you're always better off hiring the minority — whether it's a woman, trans, or person of color. I guarantee they had to work a lot harder because there were more obstacles in the way."
Though many other women in the music industry have experienced #metoo moments, she's been shielded from much of it working with Visconti. But that doesn't mean she hasn't she received more than her fair share of sexist comments and inappropriate behavior.
"But even Tony has had to step in and say things on my behalf. I've also gotten a few nasty internet comments — this guy wrote me the equivalent of six pages ranting about the way I look, and how I shouldn't dress feminine because I'm asking for things," she said. "I've had that happen a few times completely unsolicited. I also have to triple-check job references because I've had people turn creepy real fast. This is my work, don't mess with me here. If you just want to hit on someone, do it somewhere else."
Top 10 David Bowie Songs
Source: David Bowie’s Audio Engineer: ‘The Girls Are Taking Over’
Filed Under: David Bowie
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Transformative Latino Leadership Lecture: A Conversation with Luís Alberto Urrea
Time: Tue Oct 2, 2018, 4:30PM - 6:30PM
Location: McKenna Hall Auditorium
Luis Alberto Urrea is a prolific and award-winning writer, a master storyteller who uses his dual-culture life experiences to explore greater themes of love, loss and triumph.
Born in Tijuana to a Mexican father and an American mother, Luis grew up in San Diego. Like so many great writers, Luis got his start in literature writing poems to impress girls in junior high. His early heroes were all rock stars, but not being especially musically gifted Luis chose to follow in the steps of his literary role models. “What I really wanted to be was Jim Morrison,” he has said “however, if I weren’t a writer, I’d be dead.”
As a young man Luis served as a missionary in the Tijuana dumps prior to receiving a teaching Fellowship to Harvard University. The author of sixteen books, he has published extensively in many genres and has received many prestigious awards. The Devil’s Highway, his non-fiction account of a group of Mexican immigrants lost in the Arizona desert, won the Lannan Literary Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. His highly acclaimed historical novels; The Hummingbird’s Daughter and Queen of America together tell the epic story of Teresita Urrea, a great aunt who was a healer and Mexican folk hero. Collectively The Devil’s Highway, The Humming Bird’s Daughter and his novel Into the Beautiful North have been chosen by nearly one hundred different cities and colleges across the country for community-wide reading programs. In 2017, Into the Beautiful North was adapted into a production and was shown at theaters across the country.
This event is part of the Institute's Hispanic Heritage Month Celebration.
This event is co-sponsored by the The Institute for Scholarship in the Liberal Arts, American Studies, Center for Social Concerns, Department of English, Department of Flim, Television, and Theatre, Hesburgh Program in Public Service, Department of Political Science, Department of Sociology
A light pre-reception at 4:00 PM. The Hammes Notre Dame Bookstore will be onsite for book sales and a signing after the lecture.
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Justice Department Cuts Language About Need for Free Press from U.S. Attorneys’ Manual
by Alberto Luperon | 11:37 pm, April 29th, 2018
The Department of Justice recently issued a major revision of its manual for prosecutors, and well, some of the changes were quite noticeable.
These edits were highlighted in a profile by Buzzfeed, which compared the current version of the United States Attorneys’ Manual with versions in the Internet Archives’ Wayback Machine. It’s a considerable change to how the DOJ frames its approach to the law, if not in practice, then in the language it uses to describe its practices. The manual is used by both federal prosecutors and other lawyers in the department.
Here’s a quick hit of some the more notable changes after the review ordered by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein.
The subsection “Need for Free Press and Public Trial,” which has been around since 1988, has been removed. When it comes to releasing information, the language was replaced with text about balancing “the right of the public to have access to information about the Department of Justice” against other factors.
In the section about voting rights, there are no more references to redistricting or racial gerrymandering. That said, there are still references regarding bans on practices such as literacy tests, poll taxes, and measures that deny voting rights based on race.
The manual revision also cut language discouraging unnecessary charges, as well as Alford pleas, a plea in which the defendant admits innocence but accepts punishment by the state.
In what way will these changes affect behavior by U.S. Attorneys and other federal prosecutors? That remains to be seen, but it’s a notable change in keeping with some of the more controversial aspects of this administration. The possible optics on this are multifaceted and fraught, with the revisions coming from an administration that has been critical of the media and that has been accused of racism.
[Image via Scott Olson/Getty Images]
department of justice, US Attorneys Manual
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Kirsten Bradbury Received UT's 2015-16 President’s Associates Teaching Excellence Award
Psychology lecturer Kirsten Bradbury has received UT's President’s Associates Teaching Excellence Award for the 2015–16 academic year. The prestigious award is one of nine university-wide teaching awards administered by the Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost. (12/11/2015)
Dr. James Pennebaker Awarded 2016 APA Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award
Professor James W. Pennebaker was selected as the 2016 recipient of the American Psychological Association (APA) Distinguished Scientific Award for the Applications of Psychology. The Award is among the highest honors for scientific achievement by psychologists, honoring those who have made distinguished theoretical or empirical advances in psychology leading to the understanding or amelioration of important practical problems. (11/16/2015) Read more>
Dr. Cristine Legare Receives 2015 LIFE Outstanding Alumni Award
Professor Cristine Legare was awarded the 2015 LIFE Outstanding Alumni Award from the International Doctoral Training Program of the International Max Planck Research School on the Life Course (LIFE), whose goal it is to study the systematic changes in human behavior over evolutionary and ontogenetic time. The program has a coalition of partners: Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität of Berlin, University of Michigan, University of Virginia, and University of Zurich. (10/20/2015)
Prof. Cindy Meston Awarded 2015 Wulf H. Utian Endowed Lecture and Award by the North American Menopause Society
Dr. Cindy Meston was awarded the 2015 Wulf H. Utian Endowed Lecture and Award by the North American Menopause Society (NAMS) in recognition of her outstanding research and lectures on women's sexual health. She received the award at the NAMS Annual Meeting. (10/5/2015)
Prof. Emeritus John Loehlin Awarded the International Society for Intelligence Research (ISIR) 2015 Lifetime Achievement Award
Psychology Professor Emeritus Dr. John Loehlin was awarded the 2015 Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Society for Intelligence Research (ISIR). The award is ISIR’s highest honor, reserved for individuals who have, over their professional lifetime, substantially advanced the field of intelligence. (9/25/2015) Read more>
Prof. David Yeager Awarded Society for Personality and Social Psychology's Robert B. Cialdini Award
Dr. David Yeager was awarded SPSP's Robert B. Cialdini Award for his paper, “Breaking the Cycle of Mistrust: Wise Interventions to Provide Critical Feedback Across the Racial Divide,” which was published in the Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 2014, vol. 143. The award recognizes the publication that best explicates social psychological phenomena principally through the use of field research methods and settings and that thereby demonstrates the relevance of the discipline to communities outside of academic social psychology. (8/27/2015) Read more>
Prof. William B. Swann Winner of the International Society for Self and Identity's 2015 Distinguished Lifetime Career Award
Dr. William Swann was honored with the 2015 Distinguished Lifetime Career Award by the International Society for Self and Identity (ISSI) for his "many outstanding theoretical, empirical, and applied contributions over more than three decades, which have included truly seminal advances in understanding the nature and consequences of self-verification, identity negotiation, and identity fusion." (8/17/2015)
Dr. Bharath Chandrasekaran Selected for Best Paper in Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research
Dr. Bharath Chandrasekaran's article, "Enhancing Speech Intelligibility: Interactions Among Context, Modality, Speech Style, and Masker," was selected as the winner of the 2014 Editor’s Award by the editor and associate editors of the Hearing section of the Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research. The Editor’s Award is a high honor, with selection limited to the most impactful works that meet the highest quality standards in research design and presentation. (8/11/2015)
Dr. Bharath Chandrasekaran Receives UT System 2015 Regents' Outstanding Teaching Award
Dr. Bharath Chandrasekaran was one of 11 faculty members from UT Austin chosen to receive 2015 Regents' Outstanding Teaching Awards by the Board of Regents of The University of Texas System. The awards program honors outstanding performance in the classroom and dedication to innovation in undergraduate instruction. (7/13/2015) Read more>
Prof. Cristine Legare Awarded Prestigious 2016 Boyd McCandless Early Career Award
Dr. Cristine Legare received the American Psychological Association's 2016 Boyd McCandless Award, given to only one early career scientist per year. The award recognizes a distinguished theoretical contribution to developmental psychology, programmatic research of distinction or a distinguished contribution to the dissemination of developmental science. (7/3/2015) Read more>
Drs. Paige Harden and Elliot Tucker-Drob Receive Fuller and Scott Early Career Award
Professors Paige Harden and Elliot Tucker-Drob were awarded the Fuller and Scott Early Career Award from the Behavior Genetics Association. The award is given for outstanding scientific accomplishments to members of the Behavior Genetics Association who are early in their careers. (6/24/2015)
Prof. Yeager Article on Anti-Bullying Programs Selected for 2015 Division 7 Early Career Outstanding Paper Award
Professor David Yeager's article, "Declines in efficacy of anti-bullying programs among older adolescents," was selected for the American Psychological Association's Division 7 Early Career Outstanding Paper Award for 2015. The article was published in the March–April 2015 edition of the Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology. (6/1/2015)
Dr. David Schnyer Awarded Raymond Dickson Centennial Endowed Teaching Fellowship
Prof. David Schnyer was awarded the Raymond Dickson Centennial Endowed Teaching Fellowship for the 2014–15 academic year by the UT College of Liberal Arts. The award recognizes faculty who exemplify outstanding teaching and a commitment to excellence. They demonstrate high academic standards, not only to instruct, but to inspire. (5/8/2015)
Dr. Greg Hixon Awarded Arnold H. Buss Teaching Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching
Dr. John G (Greg) Hixon has been awarded the Psychology Department's Arnold H. Buss Teaching Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. The award, created in honor of Dr. Arnold Buss, Professor Emeritus of Psychology, was created in 2008 to be given annually to an outstanding lecturer who has demonstrated a high level of excellence in undergraduate teaching. (5/1/2015)
Dr. Jessica Church-Lang Receives UT's Josefina Paredes Endowed Teaching Award for 2014-15
Professor Jessica Church-Lang was awarded the UT College of Liberal Arts' prestigious Josefina Paredes Endowed Teaching Award for the 2014-15 academic year. The award recognizes junior faculty in the College of Liberal Arts who exemplify outstanding teaching. Dr. Church-Lang was noted for her commitment to excellence and outstanding performance in teaching, as well as her high academic standards, which "not only instruct, but also inspire." (5/1/2015)
Dr. Yeager Wins Early Career Award for Contributions to Social and Emotional Learning Research
Professor David Yeager has been awarded The Joseph E. Zins Early Career Award for Contributions to Social and Emotional Learning Research. The award is presented to one researcher each year who has made substantial contributions to the field of social and emotional learning and kindred fields in schools or school districts. (4/6/2015)
Psychology Alumnus Dr. Robert Plomin Receives Outstanding Alumnus Award
Robert Joseph Plomin, an alumnus of the Department of Psychology, has been named a 2015 Outstanding Alumnus by the Graduate School at UT Austin. The annual award recognizes an alumnus/a of the Graduate School for academic or professional achievements since graduating from the university.
Dr. Plomin received his doctorate from UT Austin in 1974 and is considered one the Department of Psychology's most distinguished alumni, one who has truly achieved preeminence in his academic and professional career. His work has had great impact on medicine and psychology. (3/13/2015)
Read more information about Dr. Plomin's work and this year's awardees.
Dr. Juan Dominguez Appointed Provost's Teaching Fellow
Professor Juan Dominguez was one of 20 faculty members from across UT to be appointed as Provost's Teaching Fellows, becoming the second group of Fellows in the program to help ensure UT Austin remains a leader in higher education.
The Provost's Teaching Fellows program, established in 2013, strengthens faculty participation and governance in the Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL), enhances faculty collaboration across disciplinary and institutional boundaries, and supports faculty-led projects to improve teaching and learning. (3/2/2015)
Dr. Francisco Gonzalez-Lima Selected as 2015 Texas Distinguished Scientist by Texas Academy of Sciences
Professor Francisco Gonzalez-Lima has been awarded the 2015 Texas Distinguished Scientist award of the Texas Academy of Sciences for his "outstanding contributions to the neurosciences and education in the state of Texas."
Dr. Gonzalez-Lima is the George I. Sanchez Centennial Professor at UT, and is an internationally recognized neuroscience leader who investigates the relationship between brain energy metabolism, memory and neurobehavioral disorders.
The award will be given to Dr. Gonzalez-Lima in a dinner ceremony at the 118th Annual Meeting of the Texas Academy of Science in San Antonio, March 7, 2015. (1/15/2015)
Dr. Cristine Legare Awarded APS Award for Transformative Early Career Contributions
Dr. Cristine Legare has been recognized as a 2015 winner of the Association for Psychological Science's Spence Award for Transformative Early Career Contributions. The award, named for APS’s first elected president, who passed away in March, recognizes six psychological scientists who cross traditional sub-disciplinary lines in psychological science and honors contributions that reveal the organization underlying complex behavior by drawing upon multiple fields of psychological science.
The award places Dr. Legare "among (the) brightest minds in our field, setting an impressively high standard for the award in years to come." (1/9/2015)
More on the 2015 Spence awards, including an interview with Dr. Legare, can be read here.
Professor Gawronski Named Recipient of SPSP's Daniel M. Wegner Theoretical Innovation Prize
Dr. Bertram Gawronski has been named the recipient of the The Daniel M. Wegner Theoretical Innovation Prize, given annually by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology.
The Daniel M. Wegner Theoretical Innovation Prize recognizes an article or book chapter judged to provide the most innovative theoretical contribution to social/personality psychology within a given year. It recognizes theoretical articles that are especially likely to generate the discovery of new hypotheses, new phenomena, or new ways of thinking about the discipline of social/personality psychology. The emphasis of the prize is on a contribution's conceptual innovation and potential to motivate new research and further conceptual investigation, rather than on its current level of empirical support. (1/9/2015)
Read more about the prize on the SPSP website here.
Undergraduate Students Aurora Brinkman and Monika Pyarali Awarded David Ivey Scholarships
The recipients of the $600 David Ivey Scholarship for the 2015–2016 academic year are Aurora Brinkman and Monika Pyarali. The David Ivey Scholarship is a memorial endowed scholarship designed to reward Psychology undergraduate students who spend time doing community service while enrolled at UT. Every fall, two Psychology undergraduate students are selected from an applicant pool to receive an award (the amount of the award varies depending on income generated by the endowment). (11/23/2015)
IMHR Graduate Student Santiago Papini Wins 2015 International Society of Traumatic Stress Studies Student Poster Award
IMHR grad student Santiago Papini received the 2015 International Society of Traumatic Stress Studies (ISTSS) Student Poster Award at ISTSS' Annual Meeting. His poster title was "Trajectories Of Early Response to Treatment Predict Post-Treatment Outcomes among Women with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder". The award is presented annually to recognize excellent work in a poster submission to the ISTSS Annual Meeting. The winner is selected by a panel of judges among a pool of finalists. (11/9/2015)
Graduate Student Stephanie Sherman Awarded APA's Dissertation Research Award
Stephanie Sherman, a graduate student in the Learning and Memory Laboratory, has been selected for the prestigious 2015 American Psychological Association Dissertation Research Award. The Award Program seeks to encourage excellence in dissertation research in psychological science by assisting science-oriented doctoral students of psychology with research costs. Ms. Sherman's dissertation will focus on Sleep and Memory in Aging. (11/4/2015)
Eight Psychology Students Awarded Undergraduate Research Fellowships for Fall 2015
Undergraduate Research Fellowships (URF) are sponsored by UT's Office of the Vice President for Research and have long been a valuable tool for undergraduate students in all disciplines across campus for developing original research ideas and projects. The Fellowships provide support for scholarly investigative projects conducted by UT Austin undergraduates, and are intended to cover costs associated with academic research projects proposed and written by student applicants and undertaken with the supervision of a University faculty member or lecturer. (10/23/2015)
The awardees, their supervisors and their topics are:
Jiazhou Chen (David Schnyer, Supervisor), “The effects of atypical sleep-wake cycle on core executive functioning in student night shift workers with sleep quality and fragmentation as mediator”;
Abigail Hanna (Todd Maddox, Supervisor), “The Effect of Childhood Trauma on Explicit and Implicit Category Learning”;
Alyssa Hernandez (Jessica Church-Lang, Supervisor), “Task Control Development and Variability in Children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder”;
Vanessa Hernandez (Todd Maddox, Supervisor), “The Effects of Hybrid Learning Schedules on Hierarchical Categorization”;
Sarrah Ratcliff (Cristine Legare, Supervisor), “Ritual's effect on tool use”;
Jacie Richardson (Jennifer Beer, Supervisor), “The Role of Medial Prefrontal Cortex in Social Evaluation: A Marker of Socioemotional Relation or Informational Advantage?”;
Francis Shue (Michael Drew (NEU), Supervisor), “Effect of Embryonic Fetal Cells on Maternal Progenitor Brain Cells”; and
Michael Viacheslavov (Stephen Phelps (BIO), Supervisor), “The retrosplenial cortex and the ability for male prairie voles (Microtus ochragaster) to form pair bonds with mates”.
Three Psychology Students Awarded Intellectual Entrepreneurship (IE) Pre-Graduate Internship Program Kuhn Awards for Fall 2015
Psychology students Anisha Mehra, Shama Momin and Karen Rojas were awarded Fall 2015 Intellectual Entrepreneurship Kuhn Awards, which are intended to support and encourage first-generation and/or economically-disadvantaged college students to pursue opportunities that further enrich the pre-graduate school internship experience (e.g., traveling to conferences, potential graduate school visits, research endeavors, supplies, books etc.). (10/12/2015) Read more>
Psychology Doctoral Student Carey Pulverman Awarded Frances Fowler Wallace Dissertation Award
Carey S. Pulverman, a doctoral student in the Psychology Department, was selected to receive the 2015 Frances Fowler Wallace Memorial for Mental Health Dissertation Award by the Hogg Foundation. The award will go to support research expenses for her dissertation on the relationship between childhood sexual abuse, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder in women. (4/29/2015) More information>
Graduate Student Stevie Schein Wins 2015 APS Annual Student Research Award
Graduate student Stevie Schein was awarded the Association for Psychological Science's Student Research Award for 2015. Her submission, "Longer exposure duration to unattractive infants elicits negative responses from adults," was one of four winners from applicants nationwide.
Ms. Schein is a graduate student in the Langlois Social Development Lab, which as part of the Children’s Research Lab, focuses on children's social development, with particular emphasis on the origins of social stereotypes. (4/8/2015)
More information on the APS Student Research Award can be found here.
2015 Dean's Distinguished Graduates List Includes Psychology Students Courtney Crosby & Michelle Jackson
Two Psychology students—Courtney Crosby and Michelle Jackson—were included in the Dean's Distinguished Graduates Honorable Mention list for 2015.
Courtney Crosby is a student working in Dr. Cristine Legare's lab, as well as in Dr. Cindy Meston’s lab. Michelle Jackson is a Psychology Special Honors student. (3/11/2015)
See the complete list of awardees here.
Applying to Graduate School...
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Track IDs »
1996 TV Special Library Music
Author Topic: 1996 TV Special Library Music (Read 545 times)
enburtam
Anyone know what the cue starting from here is called?
https://youtu.be/B2dFrd-d9as?t=33
According to the producer of this 1996 Thanksgiving special who passed away more than 15 years ago, it came from the now defunct "Audio Action" library. As far as I know, the following labels belonged to the latter:
Kosinus
AVF/Sound Stage
Moments Music Library
JW Media Music
No Boyfriend Music
We've combed through every single album available from the above 6 libraries, but no dice. Suspect there's a 7th library which was part of "Audio Action" before they were acquired by Killer Tracks in 1997. Anyone has any info?
I tried uploading it to Youtube and letting it get tagged, but the result is a track from Sonoton Virtual (2011) which contains additional sound effects on top of the original cue. Obviously they just added them on 15 years later.
« Last Edit: December 10, 2018, 02:03:39 AM by enburtam »
Re: 1996 TV Special Library Music
An update: Just realized the same track has been used recently in the following videos:
hxxps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6VHBWDqLsc
hxxps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBvY4EHJKMI
hxxps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0d7ZQQ2Na0
Even MS used it in their XBox One promo vid! But I'm pretty sure it's production music as the 1996 special which it came from didn't have the funds to do commercial or custom composed pieces. And the rest of the cues from said special were library music.
Craig-UK
The track is "Starlight" from Off The Shelf Music Library (OTSM017 - Elements)
joakim95
Quote from: enburtam on April 13, 2019, 11:49:53 PM
The soundtrack is "Big Scene C by Hermann Langschwert" from Sonoton
Quote from: joakim95 on April 15, 2019, 10:37:23 AM
He has stated that it is not the track from Sonoton for a couple reasons; 1 it has additional sound effects; 2. It came out 15 years after it was used in TV. The original track is "Starlight" from Off The Shelf Music. The part he will recognise starts about 30 seconds in.
Moleoman
The track was also used (as menus theme) in a Polish video game by Aidem Media "Bolek i Lolek: Olimpiada letnia" from 2004:
It is, apparently, so far, one of the few (if not the only) instances of Aidem Media using stock music (although, from what I found out the company in years 2000-2005 used some sound effects from Sound Ideas library, including the Hanna-Barbera ones). What makes the matter strange is that the only name credited under the "Music and Sound Effects" heading in the credits (see 37:56 in the video) is neither the original composer (Hakamoto/H. Langschwert/another person?) or any music library distributor in Poland (at the time of the game's release were Paris Music, Vivart, Sony Music Poland (previously Sound-Pol), Agencja Muzyczna Globo and Koch Music Poland) but Robert Krzywicki, who has been composing for Aidem Media since early 2004.
Quote from: Craig-UK on April 15, 2019, 01:58:18 PM
It's also not Starlight, which contains lots of extra effects on top of the original.
Then, I wouldn't be surprised if the mysterious piece may come from a... sound effects library.
Quote from: enburtam on December 10, 2018, 02:00:01 AM
Suspect there's a 7th library which was part of "Audio Action" before they were acquired by Killer Tracks in 1997. Anyone has any info?
Or 8th if you don't include Cezame as part of Koka Media. The former split off from the latter somewhere in Autumn 2007: http://web.archive.org/web/20071204093246/http://www.sakuranotes.jp:80/musicsearch/
I'll also add that later the US distribution rights to the remaining five "Audio Action" libraries you listed (Kosinus, JW Media, Moments, No Boyfriend Music and AVF/Sound Stage) end up with Opus1 Music Library: http://web.archive.org/web/20011026005814/http://www.opus1pml.com/libraries.html
Sorry for double post, but I have discovered a list of library music labels distributed by Audio Action in 1991 (I'm not actually sure whether it would improve or rather worsen the situation):
Josef Weinberger (JW Media Music)
Soundstage (Amphonic Music)
Primrose Music (in 1992 the US rights shifted to Network Music (https://rapmag.com/a/261-92/sep92/942-production-news-september-1992) and some years later to Promusic (http://web.archive.org/web/20010709073842/http://www.primrosemusic.com/catalogo/agenti.html)
DI Music (DJ Music?)
Beat/Fronitcetra
Image Music (the US rights to the library went to Who Did That Music (now part of Warner/Chappel Production Music) in 2002: http://web.archive.org/web/20020627210348/http://www.whodidthatmusic.com:80/search/tracksearch.asp?action=searchform)
K-Vox
Source: https://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Broadcast-Engineering/BE/90s/BE-1991-03.pdf (page 204 (PDF file)/212)
Many thanks for your time researching, Mole. I've had a look and unfortunately, only about half of them are accessible online for sampling and the others are long gone. For those that are still available, there are lots of holes in the albums available for previewing online.
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Wireless Personal Communications
February 2005 , Volume 32, Issue 3–4, pp 195–213 | Cite as
The Role of HAPs in Supporting Multimedia Broadcast and Multicast Services in Terrestrial-Satellite Integrated Systems
Giuseppe Araniti
Antonio Iera
Antonella Molinaro
New-generation telecommunications systems are expected to meet the rising user exigencies of mobility and ubiquitous access to multimedia services. As a consequence, 3GPP consortium has introduced the Multimedia Broadcast and Multicast Service (MBMS) concept into 3G/beyond-3G networks. Supporting MBMS in next generation hybrid wireless platforms becomes a challenging issue due to high traffic load deriving from both signaling message exchange and data transmission between multicast sources (BM-SC) and end users. Therefore, in this context, key research issues are surely: effective exploitation of the limited radio spectrums available, coordination of users accessing radio resources, as well as provisioning of desired QoS guarantees. Given the high mobility profiles typical of UMTS users, it clearly appears that the cited target performance can only be achieved through networking solutions based on an overlapped terrestrial-HAP-satellite coverage. An inter-working scenario where HAPs operate in synergy with the UMTS terrestrial and satellite segments seems to be the most promising solution to provide mobile users with MBMS services. Our work, dealing with architectural design options, takes into account many metrics relevant to aspects, such as: frequency allocation, costs in terms of resource utilization, signaling traffic load, number and location of customers, reliability, possible retransmission paths, user mobility, and QoS.
MBMS HAPs UMTS terrestrial-satellite integrated platforms
Giuseppe Araniti received a degree in Electronic Engineering from the University of Reggio Calabria, Italy, in 2000. He received the Ph.D. in Electronic Engineering from the same University, in March 2004. He is currently a junior researcher at the D.I.M.E.T., of the University of Reggio Calabria, Italy. His major area of research is the traffic and resource management in third and fourth generation mobile radio systems.
Antonio Iera graduated in Computer Engineering at the University of Calabria, Italy, in 1991 and received a Master Diploma in Information Technology from CEFRIEL, Italy, in 1992 and a Ph.D. degree from the University of Calabria, Italy, in 1996.
Since 1997 he has been with the University of Reggio Calabria, Italy, first as an Assistant Professor and then as an Associate Professor. Currently, he is Professor at the same University. His research interests include Personal Communications Systems, Enhanced Wireless and Satellite Systems.
Antonella Molinaro received a degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Calabria, Italy, in 1991, a Master degree in Information Technology from CEFRIEL, Italy, in 1992, and a Ph.D. degree from the University of Calabria, Italy, in 1996. Since 1998 she has been an Assistent Professor first at the University of Messina and then at the University of Calabria. She is currently an Associate Professor at the University Mediterranea of Reggio Calabria, Italy. Her interests include mobile radio systems and inter-working wireless-wired networks.
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© Springer Science + Business Media, Inc. 2005
1.Department of D.I.M.E.T.University “Mediterranea” of Reggio CalabriaReggio CalabriaItaly
Araniti, G., Iera, A. & Molinaro, A. Wireless Pers Commun (2005) 32: 195. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11277-005-0742-3
Publisher Name Kluwer Academic Publishers
Online ISSN 1572-834X
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Spatial Cognition III
International Conference on Spatial Cognition
Spatial Cognition 2002: Spatial Cognition III pp 321-347 | Cite as
Use of Reference Directions in Spatial Encoding
Constanze Vorwerg
First Online: 24 June 2003
Evidence is presented for the use of reference directions in verbal encoding and memory encoding. It is argued that reference directions (in linguistic spatial categorization as well as in memory encoding) are based on perceptually salient and distinguished orientations. A newly found spatial tilt effect for the sagittal in 3D visual space, that is reflected in different kinds of language processing, confirms a perceptual foundation of spatial language. It is proposed that direction is a qualitative attribute dimension, whose prototype values are not mean values or other characteristics of an empirical distribution but instead perceptually salient cognitive reference values. An account for angular bias effects in reporting location from memory is put forward and experimental results on the angular bias with and without physically present lines are presented.
Reference Line Angular Deviation Visual Space Reference Object Reference Direction
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© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2003
1.Situated Artificial CommunicatorsUniversität BielefeldBielefeldGermany
Vorwerg C. (2003) Use of Reference Directions in Spatial Encoding. In: Freksa C., Brauer W., Habel C., Wender K.F. (eds) Spatial Cognition III. Spatial Cognition 2002. Lecture Notes in Computer Science (Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence), vol 2685. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
First Online 24 June 2003
DOI https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-45004-1_19
eBook Packages Springer Book Archive
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Greening in the Red Zone
Greening in the Red Zone pp 445-449 | Cite as
The Berlin Wall Trail: A Cycling and Hiking Route on the Traces of Berlin’s East–West Division During the Cold War
Michael Cramer
1 Mentions
In this final short chapter, European Parliament Member Michael Cramer describes the greening of the Berlin Wall. Working together, citizen volunteers, NGOs, and governments have transformed the former ‘death strip’, a dramatic and enduring symbol of the divisions brought about by the Cold War, into a site of natural beauty and reconciliation. The Berlin Wall may well be one of the most emotion-charged structures built in the twentieth century. Not only did it cleave one of Europe’s great capitals in two – the Wall stood as a concrete symbol of the world’s division into two opposing blocs. Today its remnants remain a memorial against violence, tyranny and the abuse of power, and as a warning to future generations never to forget the price Europe paid for its Cold War division. The Berlin Wall Trail, a cycle trail running along the former division line, presents an excellent combination of history workshop and bicycle tourism, green urbanism, recreation and culture. The trail serves as a reminder of the city’s division, and its reunification, stressing the importance of sustainable (urban) mobility and community involvement in greening.
Sustainable mobility Active memorial Berlin wall Green urbanism Recreation and culture
© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014
1.European ParliamentGreens/European Free AllianceBrusselsBelgium
Cramer M. (2014) The Berlin Wall Trail: A Cycling and Hiking Route on the Traces of Berlin’s East–West Division During the Cold War. In: Tidball K., Krasny M. (eds) Greening in the Red Zone. Springer, Dordrecht
DOI https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-9947-1_34
Publisher Name Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN 978-90-481-9946-4
Online ISBN 978-90-481-9947-1
eBook Packages Earth and Environmental Science
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School-based Partnerships in Teacher Education
School-based Partnerships in Teacher Education pp 219-229 | Cite as
The Case of the Catholic Teacher Education Consortium: Using the STEPS Framework to Analyse a School–University Partnership
Sarah Nailer
Josephine Ryan
The following case study investigates the STEPS Interpretive Framework for its value in illuminating a long-standing and evolving university–school partnership, the Catholic Teacher Education Consortium (CTEC). The presentation of a model of key features for “successful” teacher education partnerships, as proposed in the STEPS Interpretive Framework (Jones et al. in Teaching and Teacher Education 60:108–120, 2016, p. 109), challenges us as participants in a partnership to reflect on what has been achieved, to consider what we have not accomplished and to plan future action based on these insights.
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© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2018
1.Australian Catholic UniversityMelbourneAustralia
Nailer S., Ryan J. (2018) The Case of the Catholic Teacher Education Consortium: Using the STEPS Framework to Analyse a School–University Partnership. In: Hobbs L., Campbell C., Jones M. (eds) School-based Partnerships in Teacher Education. Springer, Singapore
First Online 15 August 2018
DOI https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-1795-8_12
Publisher Name Springer, Singapore
Print ISBN 978-981-13-1794-1
Online ISBN 978-981-13-1795-8
eBook Packages Education
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cc/2019-30/en_head_0024.json.gz/line809
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