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Finding the On-Ramp to Your Spiritual Path: A Road Map to Joy and Rejuvenation ~ Jan Phillips
by wsmystic in Book Reviews/Interview, Divinity, Spirituality, Surrender / Letting Go, Transformation /Transformative practices
True to the title, this guidebook directs beginners on the spiritual journey. Author Jan Phillips, reared Catholic, has traveled through Buddhist, Hindu, and Muslim cultures merging dualities of East and West. A popular workshop leader for decades, she is a dynamic, upbeat, straight-talking, wise old woman in her own right, and her prose reflects her character. In warm, engaging language, she presents basic spiritual concepts and practices for the multitudes of Americans who have left traditional religion and are searching for a full-bodied, mind-expanding, convincing spirituality.
The book consists of short essays and personal anecdotes. Each story incorporates the wisdom of various traditions, all suggesting the immanence of the Divine in our lives. Each chapter reframes the meaning of a typical road sign-such as YIELD for surrender, STOP for taking time for balance, LANE ENDS for giving up old notions. All in all, this lively book maps an adventurous trek from illusion to reality, fear to fulfillment, isolation to community. It invites us to go deeper and further, finding, at the end, that the journey is everything.
Jan Phillips is known internationally as a visionary thought leader, award-winning author and speaker. She has spoken and presented multimedia works at the National Organization for Women convention and at dozens of universities and spent three years as a contributing artist and co-editor of the annual Women Artists Datebook In Praise of the Muse. She is also the co-founder and executive director of the Livingkindness Foundation.
Her own quest has led her into and out of a religious community, across the U.S. on a Honda motorcycle, and around the world on a one-woman peace pilgrimage. Her workshops cover many facets of creativity, some sponsored by the International Women’s Writing Guild, and her award-winning photographs and feature articles appear in national publications such as the New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, Utne Reader, and many other national and regional publications.
Jan is the author of many books on spirituality and creativity, including The Art of Original Thinking: The Making of a Thought Leader (9th Element Press, 2006), God Is at Eye Level: Photography as a Healing Art (Quest Books, 2000) and Marry Your Muse: Making a Lasting Commitment to Your Creativity (Quest Books, 1997). She lives in San Diego. For more information visit http://www.janphillips.com. Available titles by Jan Phillips:
Finding the On-Ramp to Your Spiritual Path: A Road Map to Joy and Rejuvenation
God Is at Eye-Level: Photography as a Healing Art
Marry Your Muse: Making a Lasting Commitment to Your Creativity
Alyce Smith Cooper Interviews Jan Phillips
Executive Producer Alyce Smith Cooper Interviews Jan Phillips on Community Issues: A Tapestry of Concerns.
The Rebirth of the Hero: Mythology as a Guide to Spiritual Transformation ~ Kieron Le Grice
by wsmystic in Archetypes, Book Reviews/Interview, Ego, God, Mythology, Spirituality, Transcendance, Transformation /Transformative practices, Uncategorized
The portrayal of the hero in classical myths and modern films continues to exert a compelling influence on the collective imagination, entertaining and inspiring audiences the world over. On a deeper level, the myth of the hero’s adventure is recognized as a fundamental pattern of human experience itself, a symbolic expression of the individual’s struggle for greater consciousness, psychological wholeness, and spiritual realization.
In The Rebirth of the Hero, Keiron Le Grice draws on the ideas and life experiences of C. G. Jung, Joseph Campbell, and Friedrich Nietzsche to explore the spiritual journey of the modern self, from existential crisis and the “awakening of the self” to the dramatic encounter with the underworld of the psyche and the arduous labor of spiritual transformation. In a work of wide-ranging scope and penetrating insight, Le Grice analyzes scenes from a number of popular films—Jason and the Argonauts, Star Wars, The Lord of the Rings, Pan’s Labyrinth, and more—to illuminate the themes and stages of psychospiritual rebirth and individuation, helping to make the deepest of transformative experiences more readily accessible and intelligible to us all.
Drawing interchangeably on classical Greek myths, Christianity, alchemy, Romanticism, and depth psychology, the author also relates the individual’s personal journey of transformation to the relationship in Western civilization between spirit and nature, reason and instinct, and masculine and feminine. In so doing, The Rebirth of the Hero demonstrates the critical significance of the archetypal pattern of the hero not only for the individual, but also for cultural renewal and the wider spiritual transformation of our time.
Keiron Le Grice, Ph.D., is a guest lecturer in Jungian and Archetypal Studies at the Pacifica Graduate Institute, California, and adjunct faculty in the Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness program at the California Institute of Integral Studies. He is the author of The Archetypal Cosmos and Discovering Eris, and the founding editor of Archai: The Journal of Archetypal Cosmology. Keiron was educated at the University of Leeds (B.A. honors Philosophy and Psychology) and the California Institute of Integral Studies (M.A. and Ph.D. Philosophy and Religion). In 2006, he was awarded the inaugural Joseph Campbell Research Grant from the Opus Archives at Pacifica Graduate Institute (in association with the Joseph Campbell Foundation) for furthering the work of Campbell, C. G. Jung, and James Hillman. Keiron currently lives in Wales with his wife and son.
Click here to browse inside.
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Andrew Douglas Miller graduated cum laude from The University of Florida, Levin College of Law in May 2008 with certificates in Pro Bono Work, Community Service, International Law, and Environmental and Land Use Law.
He began his legal career as the Executive Director and Legal Counsel of The Public Trust Environmental Legal Institute of Florida, an environmental non-profit in Jacksonville Beach, Florida. He began practicing personal injury law in 2010 and quickly gained litigation and trial experience. From 2010 to 2015 he practiced both personal injury and environmental law until he was named a partner at Anderson & Miller, P.A in January 2016. In January 2018, Andrew moved to Farah & Farah, P.A. where he now practices plaintiff’s personal injury law exclusively.
About Andrew Miller
Personal injury law is important to Andrew because it helps those that are injured recover the money they need in order to pay for their medical bills, lost wages, and time away from their family. Andrew prides himself on meeting personally with each client, returning phone calls and emails in a prompt manner, and guiding his clients through each step of the legal process. Knowing that time is important to those in need of help, Andrew focuses on giving each client the individual attention they deserve and is thus able to provide his clients with the best results in an efficient manner. One recent case that had a lot of meaning to Andrew involved a woman who suffered blunt trauma to her face and lost the ability to smile due to nerve damage. She was set to get married shortly after the incident and Andrew was happy that they were able to resolve the matter and get her the money she needed in order to get the medical treatment that helped her regain her smile in time for her wedding.
Andrew has always liked John Lennon’s quotation,
“If only people realized the power of people,”
and believes it encapsulates what he can do for his clients, give them the power to fight for what is right and just.
Andrew came to Florida after graduating from The University of Illinois. He grew up in Naperville, Illinois the youngest of four children. Since childhood Andrew has enjoyed the outdoors, be it camping, hiking, surfing, even mowing the lawn. He continues to enjoy the outdoors by working to protect Northeast Florida’s special places. He serves as the Treasurer for The Public Trust Environmental Legal Institute of Florida, an environmental non-profit organization.
But the most important thing to Andrew remains his family. He met his wife, Wendi, while at The University of Florida and they were married on the beach in 2010. In 2015 they welcomed their daughter, Alexandria, and Wendi and Andrew look forward to sharing their love of Jacksonville with her as she grows up in their adopted hometown.
The University of Florida, Levin College of Law
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Douglas Shanteau
Attorney Douglas Shanteau received a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Connecticut and a Juris Doctorate from Florida Coastal School of Law. While in law school he received a “Book” award and “Best Brief” award in the research and writing class Lawyering Process I.
He also received a “Best Civil Team” award in the class Trial Practice. He graduated from Florida Coastal School of Law in the top 15% of the class in 2012 and received the Pro Bono award. Mr. Shanteau was admitted to the Florida Bar in 2012 and devotes his practice to personal injury litigation.
More About Douglas Shanteau
Mr. Shanteau enjoys mountain biking, fishing, golfing and spending time with his family in his free time. He is admitted to practice in the State of Florida and the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida.
University of Connecticut (B.A.)
Florida Coastal School of Law (J.D.)
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Battle of Thymbra
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Find sources: "Battle of Thymbra" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (October 2015) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)
The Battle of Thymbra was the decisive battle in the war between Croesus of the Lydian Kingdom and Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid Empire. Cyrus, having pursued Croesus into Lydia following the drawn Battle of Pteria, met the remains of Croesus' partly disbanded army in battle on the plain north of Sardis in December, 547 BC. Even though Croesus' army was reinforced with many new men, Cyrus utterly defeated it, despite being outnumbered more or less 2:1. This proved decisive, and after the 14-day Siege of Sardis, the city and possibly its king fell, and Lydia was conquered by the Persians.
Part of the Campaigns of Cyrus the Great
Defeat of Croesus at the Battle of Thymbra, 546 BCE.
December, 547 BC
Thymbra (Modern day Hanaï Tepeh), Lydia
38°40′00″N 27°50′00″E / 38.66667°N 27.83333°E / 38.66667; 27.83333Coordinates: 38°40′00″N 27°50′00″E / 38.66667°N 27.83333°E / 38.66667; 27.83333
Decisive Persian victory.
Anatolia annexed by Persia.
Belligerents
Lydian Kingdom,
Arabian mercenaries,
Babylonian mercenaries,
Egyptian mercenaries Achaemenid Empire
Commanders and leaders
Croesus of Lydia,
Artacamas of Phrygia,
Aribaeus of Cappadocia,
Aragdus of Arabia,
Gabaedus of Hellespont,
unknown others Cyrus the Great,
Harpagus
Abradatas
unknown others
420,000 (Xenophon)
300 chariots
(Xenophon) 200,000 (Xenophon) but probably between 20000 and 50000[1]
(300 engaged),
5-6 siege towers
(Xenophon)
Casualties and losses
Heavy Light
Approximate location of the Battle of Thymbra
SituationEdit
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Cyrus conquered the Kingdom of Media in 550 BCE, which created conflict with the neighboring Kingdom of Lydia[2]. Cyrus's plan was to catch the Lydian king unprepared for battle, but at Thymbra Croesus had more than twice as many men as Cyrus. The Lydians marched out to meet Cyrus and quickly armed all the reserves there, before their allies were to arrive, which they never did. According to Xenophon, Cyrus had 196,000 men in total,[3][page needed] [4] which was composed of 31,000 to ~70,000 Persians. This consisted of 20,000 infantry which may have included archers and slingers, 10,000 elite infantry/ cavalry, which may have been the Persian Immortals, plus 20,000 peltasts and 20,000 pikemen. All except the archers and slingers are known to have carried small to large shields. The others were: 42,000 Arabians; Armenians; and Medians, which amounted to 126,000 infantry. There were also 300 camel cavalry, 300 chariots, and 5-6 siege towers, which were known to hold 20 men each. It all amounted to 1,000+ men, partly because there was one citizen, and one soldier on each chariot.
Xenophon tells us that Croesus had an army of 420,000 men,[5][page needed] which was composed of 60,000 Babylonians, Lydians, and Phrygians, also Cappadocians, plus nations of the Hellespont. This amounted to 300,000 men which included 60,000 cavalry. There were also 120,000 Egyptians, plus 300 chariots, which may have been at least 500 men. The numbers of the battle given by Xenophon, even if untrue, are considered within the realm of possibility, but less than half may have engaged in the actual battle.
The battleEdit
This section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (October 2015) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)
Strategies used in the battle
Cyrus deployed his troops with flanks withdrawn in a square formation[6]. The flanks were covered by chariots, cavalry, and infantry. Cyrus also used baggage camels to create a barrier around his archers. The smell of the camels disrupted the Lydian horses and scattered their cavalry charge as the archers fired upon Lydian forces.[7]
As Cyrus expected, the wings of the Lydian army wheeled inward to envelop this novel formation. As the Lydian flanks swung in, gaps appeared at the hinges of the wheeling wings. Disorder was increased by the effective overhead fire of the Persian archers and mobile towers, stationed within the square. Cyrus then gave the order to attack, his flank units smashing into Croesus' disorganized wings. Not long after, the Lydian cavalry lost many soldiers and were forced to retreat. With most of Cryrus' army intact, and the loss of most of the Lydian cavalry, Cyrus orders all cavalry and infantry to attack what remained of Croesus' forces. Most of the infantry soon surrender but Croesus and a small part of the infantry retreated and headed for the Lydian capital of Sardis, thus a decisive victory for the Persians. Herodotus gives an account of the battle but does not give any numbers. His account of the battle's progress and outcome, however, confirms that which Xenophon gives later.
AftermathEdit
The Battle of Thymbra took place below the citadel of Sardis (center), in which the lydian then retreated for the Siege of Sardis (547 BC).
After the battle the Lydians were driven within the walls of Sardis and put to siege by the victorious Cyrus. The City fell after a fourteen-day siege of Sardis, reportedly due to the Lydian failure to garrison a part of the wall which they thought unsusceptible to attack from the steepness of the adjacent declivity of the ground.[8] Croesus was captured, and his territory, including the Greek cities of Ionia and Aeolis, was incorporated into Cyrus' already powerful empire: a development which brought Greece and Persia into conflict, culminating in the celebrated Persian wars of Cyrus' successors. Along with acquiring Ionia and Aeolis, Cyrus also had the Egyptian soldiers, who fought on behalf of the Lydians, voluntarily surrender and join Cyrus' army.[9] According to the Greek author Herodotus, Cyrus treated Croesus well and with respect after the battle.[10] The Babylonian Nabonidus Chronicle apparently contradicts that, reporting that Cyrus defeated and killed the king, however, the identity of the Lydian king is unclear.[11]
Siege of Sardis (546 BC)
^ Davis, Paul K. (2001). 100 Decisive Battles: From Ancient Times to the Present. Oxford University Press. p. 7. ISBN 9780195143669.
^ Grant, R.G. (2005). Battle: a Visual Journey Through 5000 Years of Combat, DK Publishing London, ISBN 9780756645014
^ Campbell (1830), p. UNK.[page needed]
^ Grant (2005), p. 19
^ Davis (1999), p. UNK.[page needed]
^ Herodotus, The Histories, (Penguin Books, 1983), I., p. 75
^ Campbell, Alexander (1830). The Millennial Harbinger, Vol. I, No. IX
^ Herodotus, Ibid. pp. 76-79
^ "The End of Lydia: 547?". Livius.org. Retrieved 2019-03-02.
Davis, Paul K. (1999). 100 Decisive Battles: From Ancient Times to the Present, Santa Barbara, CA, USA:PUBLISHER, ISBN 1576070751, URL.[full citation needed]
Campbell, Alexander (1830). The Millennial Harbinger, Vol. I, No. IX.[full citation needed]
Grant, R.G. (2005). Battle: a Visual Journey Through 5000 Years of Combat, DK Publishing London, ISBN 9780756645014,
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Cathode-ray tube
(Redirected from Cathode Ray Tube)
Cathode-ray tube as found in an oscilloscope
Cutaway rendering of a color CRT:
1. Three electron emitters (for red, green, and blue phosphor dots)
2. Electron beams
3. Focusing coils
4. Deflection coils
5. Connection for final anodes (referred to as the "ultor" in some receiving tube manuals)
6. Mask for separating beams for red, green, and blue part of displayed image
7. Phosphor layer (screen)with red, green, and blue zones
8. Close-up of the phosphor-coated inner side of the screen
The cathode-ray tube (CRT) is a vacuum tube that contains one or more electron guns and a phosphorescent screen, and is used to display images.[1] It modulates, accelerates, and deflects electron beam(s) onto the screen to create the images. The images may represent electrical waveforms (oscilloscope), pictures (television, computer monitor), radar targets, or other phenomena. CRTs have also been used as memory devices, in which case the visible light emitted from the fluorescent material (if any) is not intended to have significant meaning to a visual observer (though the visible pattern on the tube face may cryptically represent the stored data).
In television sets and computer monitors, the entire front area of the tube is scanned repetitively and systematically in a fixed pattern called a raster. An image is produced by controlling the intensity of each of the three electron beams, one for each additive primary color (red, green, and blue) with a video signal as a reference.[2] In all modern CRT monitors and televisions, the beams are bent by magnetic deflection, a varying magnetic field generated by coils and driven by electronic circuits around the neck of the tube, although electrostatic deflection is commonly used in oscilloscopes, a type of electronic test instrument.[2]
A 14-inch cathode-ray tube showing its deflection coils and electron guns
Typical 1950s United States monochrome television set
A CRT television filmed in slow motion. The line of light is being drawn from left to right in a raster pattern
A flat CRT assembly inside a 1984 Sinclair FTV1 pocket TV
Electron gun
A CRT is constructed from a glass envelope which is large, deep (i.e., long from front screen face to rear end), fairly heavy, and relatively fragile. The interior of a CRT is evacuated to approximately 0.01 pascals (9.9×10−8 atm)[3] to 133 nanopascals (1.31×10−12 atm),[4] evacuation being necessary to facilitate the free flight of electrons from the gun(s) to the tube's face. The fact that it is evacuated makes handling an intact CRT potentially dangerous due to the risk of breaking the tube and causing a violent implosion that can hurl shards of glass at great velocity. As a matter of safety, the face is typically made of thick lead glass so as to be highly shatter-resistant and to block most X-ray emissions, particularly if the CRT is used in a consumer product.
Since the late 2000s, CRTs have been largely superseded by newer "flat panel" display technologies such as LCD, plasma display, and OLED displays, which in the case of LCD and OLED displays have lower manufacturing costs and power consumption, as well as significantly less weight and bulk. Flat panel displays can also be made in very large sizes; whereas 38 to 40 in (97 to 102 cm) was about the largest size of a CRT television, flat panels are available in 82 in (210 cm) and even larger sizes.
Braun's original cold-cathode CRT, 1897
Cathode rays were discovered by Julius Plücker and Johann Wilhelm Hittorf.[5] Hittorf observed that some unknown rays were emitted from the cathode (negative electrode) which could cast shadows on the glowing wall of the tube, indicating the rays were traveling in straight lines. In 1890, Arthur Schuster demonstrated cathode rays could be deflected by electric fields, and William Crookes showed they could be deflected by magnetic fields. In 1897, J. J. Thomson succeeded in measuring the mass of cathode rays, showing that they consisted of negatively charged particles smaller than atoms, the first "subatomic particles", which were later named electrons. The earliest version of the CRT was known as the "Braun tube", invented by the German physicist Ferdinand Braun in 1897.[6][7] It was a cold-cathode diode, a modification of the Crookes tube with a phosphor-coated screen.
The first cathode-ray tube to use a hot cathode was developed by John B. Johnson (who gave his name to the term Johnson noise) and Harry Weiner Weinhart of Western Electric, and became a commercial product in 1922.[8]
In 1925, Kenjiro Takayanagi demonstrated a CRT television that received images with a 40-line resolution.[9] By 1927, he improved the resolution to 100 lines, which was unrivaled until 1931.[10] By 1928, he was the first to transmit human faces in half-tones on a CRT display.[11] By 1935, he had invented an early all-electronic CRT television.[12]
It was named in 1929 by inventor Vladimir K. Zworykin,[13] who was influenced by Takayanagi's earlier work.[11] RCA was granted a trademark for the term (for its cathode-ray tube) in 1932; it voluntarily released the term to the public domain in 1950.[14]
The first commercially made electronic television sets with cathode-ray tubes were manufactured by Telefunken in Germany in 1934.[15][16]
Flat panel displays dropped in price and started significantly displacing cathode-ray tubes in the 2000s, with LCD screens exceeding CRTs in 2008.[17] The last known manufacturer of (in this case, recycled) CRTs ceased in 2015.[18]
Oscilloscope CRTsEdit
An oscilloscope showing a Lissajous curve
In oscilloscope CRTs, electrostatic deflection is used, rather than the magnetic deflection commonly used with television and other large CRTs. The beam is deflected horizontally by applying an electric field between a pair of plates to its left and right, and vertically by applying an electric field to plates above and below. Televisions use magnetic rather than electrostatic deflection because the deflection plates obstruct the beam when the deflection angle is as large as is required for tubes that are relatively short for their size.
Phosphor persistenceEdit
Various phosphors are available depending upon the needs of the measurement or display application. The brightness, color, and persistence of the illumination depends upon the type of phosphor used on the CRT screen. Phosphors are available with persistences ranging from less than one microsecond to several seconds.[19] For visual observation of brief transient events, a long persistence phosphor may be desirable. For events which are fast and repetitive, or high frequency, a short-persistence phosphor is generally preferable.[20]
Microchannel plateEdit
When displaying fast one-shot events, the electron beam must deflect very quickly, with few electrons impinging on the screen, leading to a faint or invisible image on the display. Oscilloscope CRTs designed for very fast signals can give a brighter display by passing the electron beam through a micro-channel plate just before it reaches the screen. Through the phenomenon of secondary emission, this plate multiplies the number of electrons reaching the phosphor screen, giving a significant improvement in writing rate (brightness) and improved sensitivity and spot size as well.[21][22]
GraticulesEdit
Most oscilloscopes have a graticule as part of the visual display, to facilitate measurements. The graticule may be permanently marked inside the face of the CRT, or it may be a transparent external plate made of glass or acrylic plastic. An internal graticule eliminates parallax error, but cannot be changed to accommodate different types of measurements.[23] Oscilloscopes commonly provide a means for the graticule to be illuminated from the side, which improves its visibility.[24]
Image storage tubesEdit
The Tektronix Type 564: First Mass Produced Analog Phosphor Storage Oscilloscope
These are found in analog phosphor storage oscilloscopes. These are distinct from digital storage oscilloscopes which rely on solid state digital memory to store the image.
Where a single brief event is monitored by an oscilloscope, such an event will be displayed by a conventional tube only while it actually occurs. The use of a long persistence phosphor may allow the image to be observed after the event, but only for a few seconds at best. This limitation can be overcome by the use of a direct view storage cathode-ray tube (storage tube). A storage tube will continue to display the event after it has occurred until such time as it is erased. A storage tube is similar to a conventional tube except that it is equipped with a metal grid coated with a dielectric layer located immediately behind the phosphor screen. An externally applied voltage to the mesh initially ensures that the whole mesh is at a constant potential. This mesh is constantly exposed to a low velocity electron beam from a 'flood gun' which operates independently of the main gun. This flood gun is not deflected like the main gun but constantly 'illuminates' the whole of the storage mesh. The initial charge on the storage mesh is such as to repel the electrons from the flood gun which are prevented from striking the phosphor screen.
When the main electron gun writes an image to the screen, the energy in the main beam is sufficient to create a 'potential relief' on the storage mesh. The areas where this relief is created no longer repel the electrons from the flood gun which now pass through the mesh and illuminate the phosphor screen. Consequently, the image that was briefly traced out by the main gun continues to be displayed after it has occurred. The image can be 'erased' by resupplying the external voltage to the mesh restoring its constant potential. The time for which the image can be displayed was limited because, in practice, the flood gun slowly neutralises the charge on the storage mesh. One way of allowing the image to be retained for longer is temporarily to turn off the flood gun. It is then possible for the image to be retained for several days. The majority of storage tubes allow for a lower voltage to be applied to the storage mesh which slowly restores the initial charge state. By varying this voltage a variable persistence is obtained. Turning off the flood gun and the voltage supply to the storage mesh allows such a tube to operate as a conventional oscilloscope tube.[25]
Color CRTsEdit
Magnified view of a delta-gun shadow mask color CRT
Magnified view of a Trinitron color CRT
Spectra of constituent blue, green and red phosphors in a common CRT
Color tubes use three different phosphors which emit red, green, and blue light respectively. They are packed together in stripes (as in aperture grille designs) or clusters called "triads" (as in shadow mask CRTs).[26] Color CRTs have three electron guns, one for each primary color, arranged either in a straight line or in an equilateral triangular configuration (the guns are usually constructed as a single unit). (The triangular configuration is often called "delta-gun", based on its relation to the shape of the Greek letter delta Δ.) A grille or mask absorbs the electrons that would otherwise hit the wrong phosphor.[27] A shadow mask tube uses a metal plate with tiny holes, placed so that the electron beam only illuminates the correct phosphors on the face of the tube;[26] the holes are tapered so that the electrons that strike the inside of any hole will be reflected back, if they are not absorbed (e.g. due to local charge accumulation), instead of bouncing through the hole to strike a random (wrong) spot on the screen. Another type of color CRT uses an aperture grille of tensioned vertical wires to achieve the same result.[27]
Convergence and purity in color CRTsEdit
Due to limitations in the dimensional precision with which CRTs can be manufactured economically, it has not been practically possible to build color CRTs in which three electron beams could be aligned to hit phosphors of respective color in acceptable coordination, solely on the basis of the geometric configuration of the electron gun axes and gun aperture positions, shadow mask apertures, etc. The shadow mask ensures that one beam will only hit spots of certain colors of phosphors, but minute variations in physical alignment of the internal parts among individual CRTs will cause variations in the exact alignment of the beams through the shadow mask, allowing some electrons from, for example, the red beam to hit, say, blue phosphors, unless some individual compensation is made for the variance among individual tubes.
Color convergence and color purity are two aspects of this single problem. Firstly, for correct color rendering it is necessary that regardless of where the beams are deflected on the screen, all three hit the same spot (and nominally pass through the same hole or slot) on the shadow mask. This is called convergence.[28] More specifically, the convergence at the center of the screen (with no deflection field applied by the yoke) is called static convergence, and the convergence over the rest of the screen area is called dynamic convergence. The beams may converge at the center of the screen and yet stray from each other as they are deflected toward the edges; such a CRT would be said to have good static convergence but poor dynamic convergence. Secondly, each beam must only strike the phosphors of the color it is intended to strike and no others. This is called purity. Like convergence, there is static purity and dynamic purity, with the same meanings of "static" and "dynamic" as for convergence. Convergence and purity are distinct parameters; a CRT could have good purity but poor convergence, or vice versa. Poor convergence causes color "shadows" or "ghosts" along displayed edges and contours, as if the image on the screen were intaglio printed with poor registration. Poor purity causes objects on the screen to appear off-color while their edges remain sharp. Purity and convergence problems can occur at the same time, in the same or different areas of the screen or both over the whole screen, and either uniformly or to greater or lesser degrees over different parts of the screen.
A magnet used on a CRT TV. Note the distortion of the image.
The solution to the static convergence and purity problems is a set of color alignment magnets installed around the neck of the CRT. These movable weak permanent magnets are usually mounted on the back end of the deflection yoke assembly and are set at the factory to compensate for any static purity and convergence errors that are intrinsic to the unadjusted tube. Typically there are two or three pairs of two magnets in the form of rings made of plastic impregnated with a magnetic material, with their magnetic fields parallel to the planes of the magnets, which are perpendicular to the electron gun axes. Each pair of magnetic rings forms a single effective magnet whose field vector can be fully and freely adjusted (in both direction and magnitude). By rotating a pair of magnets relative to each other, their relative field alignment can be varied, adjusting the effective field strength of the pair. (As they rotate relative to each other, each magnet's field can be considered to have two opposing components at right angles, and these four components [two each for two magnets] form two pairs, one pair reinforcing each other and the other pair opposing and canceling each other. Rotating away from alignment, the magnets' mutually reinforcing field components decrease as they are traded for increasing opposed, mutually cancelling components.) By rotating a pair of magnets together, preserving the relative angle between them, the direction of their collective magnetic field can be varied. Overall, adjusting all of the convergence/purity magnets allows a finely tuned slight electron beam deflection or lateral offset to be applied, which compensates for minor static convergence and purity errors intrinsic to the uncalibrated tube. Once set, these magnets are usually glued in place, but normally they can be freed and readjusted in the field (e.g. by a TV repair shop) if necessary.
On some CRTs, additional fixed adjustable magnets are added for dynamic convergence or dynamic purity at specific points on the screen, typically near the corners or edges. Further adjustment of dynamic convergence and purity typically cannot be done passively, but requires active compensation circuits.
Dynamic color convergence and purity are one of the main reasons why until late in their history, CRTs were long-necked (deep) and had biaxially curved faces; these geometric design characteristics are necessary for intrinsic passive dynamic color convergence and purity. Only starting around the 1990s did sophisticated active dynamic convergence compensation circuits become available that made short-necked and flat-faced CRTs workable. These active compensation circuits use the deflection yoke to finely adjust beam deflection according to the beam target location. The same techniques (and major circuit components) also make possible the adjustment of display image rotation, skew, and other complex raster geometry parameters through electronics under user control.
DegaussingEdit
A degaussing in progress.
If the shadow mask or aperture grille becomes magnetized, its magnetic field alters the paths of the electron beams. This causes errors of "color purity" as the electrons no longer follow only their intended paths, and some will hit some phosphors of colors other than the one intended. For example, some electrons from the red beam may hit blue or green phosphors, imposing a magenta or yellow tint to parts of the image that are supposed to be pure red. (This effect is localized to a specific area of the screen if the magnetization is localized.) Therefore, it is important that the shadow mask or aperture grille not be magnetized.
Most color CRT displays, i.e. television sets and computer monitors, each have a built-in degaussing (demagnetizing) circuit, the primary component of which is a degaussing coil which is mounted around the perimeter of the CRT face inside the bezel. Upon power-up of the CRT display, the degaussing circuit produces a brief, alternating current through the degaussing coil which smoothly decays in strength (fades out) to zero over a period of a few seconds, producing a decaying alternating magnetic field from the coil. This degaussing field is strong enough to remove shadow mask magnetization in most cases.[29] In unusual cases of strong magnetization where the internal degaussing field is not sufficient, the shadow mask may be degaussed externally with a stronger portable degausser or demagnetizer. However, an excessively strong magnetic field, whether alternating or constant, may mechanically deform (bend) the shadow mask, causing a permanent color distortion on the display which looks very similar to a magnetization effect.
The degaussing circuit is often built of a thermo-electric (not electronic) device containing a small ceramic heating element and a positive thermal coefficient (PTC) resistor, connected directly to the switched AC power line with the resistor in series with the degaussing coil. When the power is switched on, the heating element heats the PTC resistor, increasing its resistance to a point where degaussing current is minimal, but not actually zero. In older CRT displays, this low-level current (which produces no significant degaussing field) is sustained along with the action of the heating element as long as the display remains switched on. To repeat a degaussing cycle, the CRT display must be switched off and left off for at least several seconds to reset the degaussing circuit by allowing the PTC resistor to cool to the ambient temperature; switching the display-off and immediately back on will result in a weak degaussing cycle or effectively no degaussing cycle.
This simple design is effective and cheap to build, but it wastes some power continuously. Later models, especially Energy Star rated ones, use a relay to switch the entire degaussing circuit on and off, so that the degaussing circuit uses energy only when it is functionally active and needed. The relay design also enables degaussing on user demand through the unit's front panel controls, without switching the unit off and on again. This relay can often be heard clicking off at the end of the degaussing cycle a few seconds after the monitor is turned on, and on and off during a manually initiated degaussing cycle.
Vector monitorsEdit
Main article: Vector monitor
Vector monitors were used in early computer aided design systems and are in some late-1970s to mid-1980s arcade games such as Asteroids.[30] They draw graphics point-to-point, rather than scanning a raster. Either monochrome or color CRTs can be used in vector displays, and the essential principles of CRT design and operation are the same for either type of display; the main difference is in the beam deflection patterns and circuits.
CRT resolutionEdit
Dot pitch defines the maximum resolution of the display, assuming delta-gun CRTs. In these, as the scanned resolution approaches the dot pitch resolution, moiré appears, as the detail being displayed is finer than what the shadow mask can render.[31] Aperture grille monitors do not suffer from vertical moiré; however, because their phosphor stripes have no vertical detail. In smaller CRTs, these strips maintain position by themselves, but larger aperture-grille CRTs require one or two crosswise (horizontal) support strips.[32]
GammaEdit
CRTs have a pronounced triode characteristic, which results in significant gamma (a nonlinear relationship in an electron gun between applied video voltage and beam intensity).[33]
Other typesEdit
Data storage tubesEdit
Main article: Williams tube
The Williams tube or Williams-Kilburn tube was a cathode-ray tube used to electronically store binary data. It was used in computers of the 1940s as a random-access digital storage device. In contrast to other CRTs in this article, the Williams tube was not a display device, and in fact could not be viewed since a metal plate covered its screen.
Cat's eyeEdit
Main article: Magic eye tube
In some vacuum tube radio sets, a "Magic Eye" or "Tuning Eye" tube was provided to assist in tuning the receiver. Tuning would be adjusted until the width of a radial shadow was minimized. This was used instead of a more expensive electromechanical meter, which later came to be used on higher-end tuners when transistor sets lacked the high voltage required to drive the device.[34] The same type of device was used with tape recorders as a recording level meter, and for various other applications including electrical test equipment.
CharactronsEdit
Main article: Charactron
Some displays for early computers (those that needed to display more text than was practical using vectors, or that required high speed for photographic output) used Charactron CRTs. These incorporate a perforated metal character mask (stencil), which shapes a wide electron beam to form a character on the screen. The system selects a character on the mask using one set of deflection circuits, but that causes the extruded beam to be aimed off-axis, so a second set of deflection plates has to re-aim the beam so it is headed toward the center of the screen. A third set of plates places the character wherever required. The beam is unblanked (turned on) briefly to draw the character at that position. Graphics could be drawn by selecting the position on the mask corresponding to the code for a space (in practice, they were simply not drawn), which had a small round hole in the center; this effectively disabled the character mask, and the system reverted to regular vector behavior. Charactrons had exceptionally long necks, because of the need for three deflection systems.[35][36]
NimoEdit
Main article: Nimo tube
Nimo tube BA0000-P31
Nimo was the trademark of a family of small specialised CRTs manufactured by Industrial Electronics Engineers. These had 10 electron guns which produced electron beams in the form of digits in a manner similar to that of the charactron. The tubes were either simple single-digit displays or more complex 4- or 6- digit displays produced by means of a suitable magnetic deflection system. Having little of the complexities of a standard CRT, the tube required a relatively simple driving circuit, and as the image was projected on the glass face, it provided a much wider viewing angle than competitive types (e.g., nixie tubes).[37]
Flood beam CRTEdit
Main article: Electron-stimulated luminescence
Flood beam CRTs are small tubes that are arranged as pixels for large screens like Jumbotrons. The first screen using this technology was introduced by Mitsubishi Electric for the 1980 Major League Baseball All-Star Game. It differs from a normal CRT in that the electron gun within does not produce a focused controllable beam. Instead, electrons are sprayed in a wide cone across the entire front of the phosphor screen, basically making each unit act as a single light bulb.[38] Each one is coated with a red, green or blue phosphor, to make up the color sub-pixels. This technology has largely been replaced with light emitting diode displays. Unfocused and undeflected CRTs were used as grid-controlled stroboscope lamps since 1958.[39]
Print head CRTEdit
CRTs with an unphosphored front glass but with fine wires embedded in it were used as electrostatic print heads in the 1960s. The wires would pass the electron beam current through the glass onto a sheet of paper where the desired content was therefore deposited as an electrical charge pattern. The paper was then passed near a pool of liquid ink with the opposite charge. The charged areas of the paper attract the ink and thus form the image.[40][41]
Zeus thin CRT displayEdit
In the late 1990s and early 2000s Philips Research Laboratories experimented with a type of thin CRT known as the Zeus display which contained CRT-like functionality in a flat panel display.[42][43][44][45][46] The devices were demonstrated but never marketed.
Slimmer CRTEdit
A comparison between 21-inch Superslim and Ultraslim CRT
Some CRT manufacturers, both LG Display and Samsung Display, innovated CRT technology by creating a slimmer tube. Slimmer CRT has a trade name Superslim and Ultraslim. A 21-inch (53 cm) flat CRT has a 447.2-millimetre (17.61 in) depth. The depth of Superslim was 352 millimetres (13.86 in) and Ultraslim was 295.7 millimetres (11.64 in).
21st century usageEdit
DemiseEdit
This article needs to be updated. Please update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (May 2017)
Despite being a mainstay of display technology for decades, CRT-based computer monitors and televisions are now virtually a dead technology. Demand for CRT screens dropped in the late 2000s. The rapid advances and falling prices of LCD flat panel technology -- first for computer monitors, and then for televisions -- spelled doom for competing display technologies such as CRT, rear-projection, and plasma display.[47]
Most high-end CRT production had ceased by around 2010,[48] including high-end Sony and Panasonic product lines.[49][50] In Canada and the United States, the sale and production of high-end CRT TVs (30-inch (76 cm) screens) in these markets had all but ended by 2007. Just a couple of years later, inexpensive "combo" CRT TVs (20-inch (51 cm) screens with an integrated VHS player) disappeared from discount stores.
Electronics retailers such as Best Buy steadily reduced store spaces for CRTs. In 2005, Sony announced that they would stop the production of CRT computer displays. Samsung did not introduce any CRT models for the 2008 model year at the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show; on 4 February 2008, they removed their 30" wide screen CRTs from their North American website and did not replace them with new models.[51]
In the United Kingdom, DSG (Dixons), the largest retailer of domestic electronic equipment, reported that CRT models made up 80–90% of the volume of televisions sold at Christmas 2004 and 15–20% a year later, and that they were expected to be less than 5% at the end of 2006. Dixons ceased selling CRT televisions in 2006.[52]
However, the demise of CRTs has been happening more slowly in the developing world. According to iSupply, production in units of CRTs was not surpassed by LCDs production until 4Q 2007, owing largely to CRT production at factories in China.[citation needed]
This section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (December 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)
CRTs, despite advances, remained relatively heavy and cumbersome in comparison to other display technologies. CRT screens had much deeper cabinets compared to flat panels and rear-projection displays for a given screen size; it was largely impractical to build or use CRTs larger than 40 inches (102 cm). The CRT disadvantages became especially significant in light of rapid technological advancements in LCD and plasma flat-panels, which allowed them to easily surpass these size limitations while also being thin and wall-mountable (two key features that were increasingly being preferred by customers).
Health concernsEdit
Ionizing radiationEdit
CRTs can emit a small amount of X-ray radiation as a result of the electron beam's bombardment of the shadow mask/aperture grille and phosphors. The amount of radiation escaping the front of the monitor is widely considered not to be harmful. The Food and Drug Administration regulations in 21 C.F.R. 1020.10 are used to strictly limit, for instance, television receivers to 0.5 milliroentgens per hour (mR/h) (0.13 µC/(kg·h) or 36 pA/kg) at a distance of 5 cm (2 in) from any external surface; since 2007, most CRTs have emissions that fall well below this limit.[53]
ToxicityEdit
Older color and monochrome CRTs may have been manufactured with toxic substances, such as cadmium, in the phosphors.[54][55][56] The rear glass tube of modern CRTs may be made from leaded glass, which represent an environmental hazard if disposed of improperly.[57] By the time personal computers were produced, glass in the front panel (the viewable portion of the CRT) used barium rather than lead,[citation needed] though the rear of the CRT was still produced from leaded glass. Monochrome CRTs typically do not contain enough leaded glass to fail EPA TCLP tests. While the TCLP process grinds the glass into fine particles in order to expose them to weak acids to test for leachate, intact CRT glass does not leach (The lead is vitrified, contained inside the glass itself, similar to leaded glass crystalware).
RecyclingEdit
Due to the toxins contained in CRT monitors the United States Environmental Protection Agency created rules (in October 2001) stating that CRTs must be brought to special e-waste recycling facilities. In November 2002, the EPA began fining companies that disposed of CRTs through landfills or incineration. Regulatory agencies, local and statewide, monitor the disposal of CRTs and other computer equipment.[58]
Various states participate in the recycling of CRTs, each with their reporting requirements for collectors and recycling facilities. For example, in California the recycling of CRTs is governed by CALRecycle, the California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery through their Payment System. [59]. Recycling facilities that accept CRT devices from business and residential sector must obtain contact information such as address and phone number to ensure the CRTs come from a California source in order to participate in the CRT Recycling Payment System.
In Europe, disposal of CRT televisions and monitors is covered by the WEEE Directive.[60]
FlickerEdit
Main article: Flicker (screen)
At low refresh rates (60 Hz and below), the periodic scanning of the display may produce a flicker that some people perceive more easily than others, especially when viewed with peripheral vision. Flicker is commonly associated with CRT as most televisions run at 50 Hz (PAL) or 60 Hz (NTSC), although there are some 100 Hz PAL televisions that are flicker-free. Typically only low-end monitors run at such low frequencies, with most computer monitors supporting at least 75 Hz and high-end monitors capable of 100 Hz or more to eliminate any perception of flicker.[61] Though the 100 Hz PAL was often achieved using interleaved scanning, dividing the circuit and scan into two beams of 50 Hz. Non-computer CRTs or CRT for sonar or radar may have long persistence phosphor and are thus flicker free. If the persistence is too long on a video display, moving images will be blurred.
High-frequency audible noiseEdit
50 Hz/60 Hz CRTs used for television operate with horizontal scanning frequencies of 15,750 Hz (for NTSC systems) or 15,625 Hz (for PAL systems).[62] These frequencies are at the upper range of human hearing and are inaudible to many people; however, some people (especially children) will perceive a high-pitched tone near an operating television CRT.[63] The sound is due to magnetostriction in the magnetic core and periodic movement of windings of the flyback transformer.[64]
This problem does not occur on 100/120 Hz TVs and on non-CGA (Color Graphics Adapter) computer displays, because they use much higher horizontal scanning frequencies (22 kHz to over 100 kHz).
ImplosionEdit
High vacuum inside glass-walled cathode-ray tubes permits electron beams to fly freely—without colliding into molecules of air or other gas. If the glass is damaged, atmospheric pressure can collapse the vacuum tube into dangerous fragments which accelerate inward and then spray at high speed in all directions. The implosion energy is proportional to the evacuated volume of the CRT.[citation needed] Although modern cathode-ray tubes used in televisions and computer displays have epoxy-bonded face-plates or other measures to prevent shattering of the envelope, CRTs must be handled carefully to avoid personal injury.[65]
Electric shockEdit
To accelerate the electrons from the cathode to the screen with sufficient velocity, a very high voltage (EHT or Extra High Tension) is required,[66] from a few thousand volts for a small oscilloscope CRT to tens of kV for a larger screen color TV. This is many times greater than household power supply voltage. Even after the power supply is turned off, some associated capacitors and the CRT itself may retain a charge for some time and therefore dissipate that charge suddenly through a ground such as an inattentive human grounding a capacitor discharge lead.
Security concernsEdit
Under some circumstances, the signal radiated from the electron guns, scanning circuitry, and associated wiring of a CRT can be captured remotely and used to reconstruct what is shown on the CRT using a process called Van Eck phreaking.[67] Special TEMPEST shielding can mitigate this effect. Such radiation of a potentially exploitable signal, however, occurs also with other display technologies[68] and with electronics in general.[citation needed]
As electronic waste, CRTs are considered one of the hardest types to recycle.[69] CRTs have relatively high concentration of lead and phosphors (not phosphorus), both of which are necessary for the display. There are several companies in the United States that charge a small fee to collect CRTs, then subsidize their labor by selling the harvested copper, wire, and printed circuit boards. The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) includes discarded CRT monitors in its category of "hazardous household waste"[70] but considers CRTs that have been set aside for testing to be commodities if they are not discarded, speculatively accumulated, or left unprotected from weather and other damage.[citation needed]
Leaded CRT glass was sold to be remelted into other CRTs, or even broken down and used in road construction.[71]
Electronics portal
Basics of cathode rays and discharge in low-pressure gas:
Cathode ray
Light production by cathode rays:
Cathodoluminescence
Crookes tube
Scintillation (physics)
Manipulating the electron beam:
Blanking (video)
Horizontal blanking interval
Vertical blanking interval
Deflection yoke
Electron beam processing
Electrostatic deflection
Magnetic deflection
Magnetic lens
Applying CRT in different display-purpose:
Analog television
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Comparison of CRT, LCD, plasma, and OLED
Comparison of display technology
CRT projector
Image dissector
Monochrome monitor
Cathode-ray oscilloscope
Overscan
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Miscellaneous phenomena:
Noise (video)
Historical aspects:
Direct-view bistable storage tube
Flat panel display
History of display technology
LCD television, LED-backlit LCD, LED display
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Surface-conduction electron-emitter display
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Monitor filter
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Selected patentsEdit
U.S. Patent 1,691,324: Zworykin Television System
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Cathode ray tube.
The Cathode Ray Tube site
PCTechGuide: Cathode Ray Tubes
CRTs at the Virtual Valve Museum
Samuel M. Goldwasser TV and Monitor CRT (Picture Tube) Information
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Grant, Joseph (DNB00)
←Grant, Johnson
Grant, Joseph
by Charles Lethbridge Kingsford
Grant, Ludovick→
Grant, JosephCharles Lethbridge Kingsford1890
GRANT, JOSEPH (1805–1835), Scottish poet, was born 26 May 1805 at his father's farm of Affrusk in Kincardineshire. As a child he was employed on the farm in the summer, and during the winter picked up what learning he could at a village school. When only fourteen he began to write verses. In 1831 he was engaged as assistant to a shopkeeper at Stonehaven, and afterwards was employed as a clerk at Dundee, first in the office of the 'Guardian' newspaper, and then in that of a writer to the signet. He died 14 April 1835 at Affrusk. Grant's poems, often, like his prose tales, of much merit, were mainly written in Scots, but some are in English. Besides tales and sketches contributed to 'Chambers's Journal' between 1830 and 1835, he published: 1. 'Juvenile Lays,'; 1828. 2. 'Kincardineshire Traditions,' 1830, in verse. At the time of his death he was preparing 3. 'Tales of the Glens: with Ballads and Songs.' This collection was published in 1836, 'with a memoir of the author by R. Nicoll.'
[Memoir by R. Nicoll; Anderson's Scottish Nation, ii. 370.]
C. L. K.
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Harbin, George (DNB00)
←Harbert, William
Harbin, George
by James McMullen Rigg
Harbord, Edward→
Harbin, GeorgeJames McMullen Rigg1890
HARBIN, GEORGE (fl. 1713), nonjuring divine, graduated B.A. at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, in 1686, took holy orders, and became chaplain to Francis Turner [q. v.], bishop of Ely, whose example he followed at the revolution by refusing to take the oaths. After Turner's death he became chaplain and librarian to Viscount Weymouth. He was an intimate friend of Bishop Ken, and the author of the following works: 1. 'The English Constitution fully stated, with some Animadversions on Mr. Higden's Mistakes about it. In a Letter to a Friend,' London, 1710, 8vo. 2. 'The Hereditary Right of the Crown of England Asserted: The History of the Succession since the Conquest Clear'd: And the True English Constitution Vindicated from the Misrepresentations of Dr. Higden's "View and Defence,"' &c., London, 1713, fol., wrongly attributed to Hilkiah Bedford [q. v.] Harbin also wrote an epitaph on Sir Isaac Newton, and assisted Michael Maittaire [q. v.] in his 'Commentary on the Oxford Marbles' (1732). Two letters written by Harbin to Arthur Charlett [q. v.] on various literary subjects are preserved in the Bodleian Library (Tanner MSS. 24, f. 33, and 25, f. 287).
[Grad. Cant.; Nichols's Lit. Anecd. i. 167-8, 202; Lathbury's Hist. of the Nonjurors, pp. 233-4; Plumptre's Life of Ken; Hickes's Memoirs of John Kettlewell, App. xviii.; Birch's Life of Tillotson, ed. 1753, p. 317; Notes and Queries, 2nd ser. i. 489; Hist. MSS. Comm. 5th Rep. App. 319, 320.]
J. M. R.
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Page:EB1911 - Volume 14.djvu/38
HYADES—HYBRIDISM
in the majesty of Apollo, the god of light and warmth, and giver of the ripe fruits of the earth (see a passage from Polycrates, Laconica, quoted by Athenaeus 139 d; criticized by L. R. Farnell, Cults of the Greek States, iv. 266 foll.). This festival is clearly connected with vegetation, and marks the passage from the youthful verdure of spring to the dry heat of summer and the ripening of the corn.
The precise relation which Apollo bears to Hyacinthus is obscure. The fact that at Tarentum a Hyacinthus tomb is ascribed by Polybius to Apollo Hyacinthus (not Hyacinthius) has led some to think that the personalities are one, and that the hero is merely an emanation from the god; confirmation is sought in the Apolline appellation τετράχειρ, alleged by Hesychius to have been used in Laconia, and assumed to describe a composite figure of Apollo-Hyacinthus. Against this theory is the essential difference between the two figures. Hyacinthus is a chthonian vegetation god whose worshippers are afflicted and sorrowful; Apollo, though interested in vegetation, is never regarded as inhabiting the lower world, his death is not celebrated in any ritual, his worship is joyous and triumphant, and finally the Amyclean Apollo is specifically the god of war and song. Moreover, Pausanias describes the monument at Amyclae as consisting of a rude figure of Apollo standing on an altar-shaped base which formed the tomb of Hyacinthus. Into the latter offerings were put for the hero before gifts were made to the god.
On the whole it is probable that Hyacinthus belongs originally to the pre-Dorian period, and that his story was appropriated and woven into their own Apollo myth by the conquering Dorians. Possibly he may be the apotheosis of a pre-Dorian king of Amyclae. J. G. Frazer further suggests that he may have been regarded as spending the winter months in the underworld and returning to earth in the spring when the “hyacinth” blooms. In this case his festival represents perhaps both the Dorian conquest of Amyclae and the death of spring before the ardent heat of the summer sun, typified as usual by the discus (quoit) with which Apollo is said to have slain him. With the growth of the hyacinth from his blood should be compared the oriental stories of violets springing from the blood of Attis, and roses and anemones from that of Adonis. As a youthful vegetation god, Hyacinthus may be compared with Linus and Scephrus, both of whom are connected with Apollo Agyieus.
See L. R. Farnell, Cults of the Greek States, vol. iv. (1907), pp. 125 foll., 264 foll.; J. G. Frazer, Adonis, Attis, Osiris (1906), bk. ii. ch. 7; S. Wide, Lakonische Kulte, p. 290; E. Rhode, Psyche, 3rd ed. i. 137 foll.; Roscher, Lexikon d. griech. u. röm. Myth., s.v. “Hyakinthos” (Greve); L. Preller, Griechische Mythol. 4th ed. i. 248 foll.
(J. M. M.)
HYADES (“the rainy ones”), in Greek mythology, the daughters of Atlas and Aethra; their number varies between two and seven. As a reward for having brought up Zeus at Dodona and taken care of the infant Dionysus Hyes, whom they conveyed to Ino (sister of his mother Semele) at Thebes when his life was threatened by Lycurgus, they were translated to heaven and placed among the stars (Hyginus, Poët. astron. ii. 21). Another form of the story combines them with the Pleiades. According to this they were twelve (or fifteen) sisters, whose brother Hyas was killed by a snake while hunting in Libya (Ovid, Fasti, v. 165; Hyginus, Fab. 192). They lamented him so bitterly that Zeus, out of compassion, changed them into stars—five into the Hyades, at the head of the constellation of the Bull, the remainder into the Pleiades. Their name is derived from the fact that the rainy season commenced when they rose at the same time as the sun (May 7-21); the original conception of them is that of the fertilizing principle of moisture. The Romans derived the name from ὗς (pig), and translated it by Suculae (Cicero, De nat. deorum, ii. 43).
HYATT, ALPHEUS (1838-1902), American naturalist, was born at Washington, D.C., on the 5th of April 1838. From 1858 to 1862 he studied at Harvard, where he had Louis Agassiz for his master, and in 1863 he served as a volunteer in the Civil War, attaining the rank of captain. In 1867 he was appointed curator of the Essex Institute at Salem, and in 1870 became professor of zoology and palaeontology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (resigned 1888), and custodian of the Boston Society of Natural History (curator in 1881). In 1886 he was appointed assistant for palaeontology in the Cambridge museum of comparative anatomy, and in 1889 was attached to the United States Geological Survey as palaeontologist for the Trias and Jura. He was the chief founder of the American Society of Naturalists, of which he acted as first president in 1883, and he also took a leading part in establishing the marine biological laboratories at Annisquam and Woods Hole, Mass. He died at Cambridge on the 15th of January 1902.
His works include Observations on Fresh-water Polyzoa (1866); Fossil Cephalopods of the Museum of Comparative Zoology (1872); Revision of North American Porifera (1875-1877); Genera of Fossil Cephalopoda (1883); Larval Theory of the Origin of Cellular Tissue (1884); Genesis of the Arietidae (1889); and Phylogeny of an acquired characteristic (1894). He wrote the section on Cephalopoda in Karl von Zittel’s Paläontologie (1900), and his well-known study on the fossil pond snails of Steinheim (“The Genesis of the Tertiary Species of Planorbis at Steinheim”) appeared in the Memoirs of the Boston Natural History Society in 1880. He was one of the founders and editors of the American Naturalist.
HYBLA, the name of several cities In Sicily. The best known historically, though its exact site is uncertain, is Hybla Major, near (or by some supposed to be identical with) Megara Hyblaea (q.v.): another Hybla, known as Hybla Minor or Galeatis, is represented by the modern Paternò; while the site of Hybla Heraea is to be sought near Ragusa.
HYBRIDISM. The Latin word hybrida, hibrida or ibrida has been assumed to be derived from the Greek ὕβρις, an insult or outrage, and a hybrid or mongrel has been supposed to be an outrage on nature, an unnatural product. As a general rule animals and plants belonging to distinct species do not produce offspring when crossed with each other, and the term hybrid has been employed for the result of a fertile cross between individuals of different species, the word mongrel for the more common result of the crossing of distinct varieties. A closer scrutiny of the facts, however, makes the term hybridism less isolated and more vague. The words species and genus, and still more subspecies and variety, do not correspond with clearly marked and sharply defined zoological categories, and no exact line can be drawn between the various kinds of crossings from those between individuals apparently identical to those belonging to genera universally recognized as distinct. Hybridism therefore grades into mongrelism, mongrelism into cross-breeding, and cross-breeding into normal pairing, and we can say little more than that the success of the union is the more unlikely or more unnatural the further apart the parents are in natural affinity.
The interest in hybridism was for a long time chiefly of a practical nature, and was due to the fact that hybrids are often found to present characters somewhat different from those of either parent. The leading facts have been known in the case of the horse and ass from time immemorial. The earliest recorded observation of a hybrid plant is by J. G. Gmelin towards the end of the 17th century; the next is that of Thomas Fairchild, who in the second decade of the 18th century, produced the cross which is still grown in gardens under the name of “Fairchild’s Sweet William.” Linnaeus made many experiments in the cross-fertilization of plants and produced several hybrids, but Joseph Gottlieb Kölreuter (1733-1806) laid the first real foundation of our scientific knowledge of the subject. Later on Thomas Andrew Knight, a celebrated English horticulturist, devoted much successful labour to the improvement of fruit trees and vegetables by crossing. In the second quarter of the 19th century C. F. Gärtner made and published the results of a number of experiments that had not been equalled by any earlier worker. Next came Charles Darwin, who first in the Origin of Species, and later in Cross and Self-Fertilization of Plants, subjected the whole question to a critical examination, reviewed the known facts and added many to them.
Darwin’s conclusions were summed up by G. J. Romanes in the 9th edition of this Encyclopaedia as follows:—
1. The laws governing the production of hybrids are identical, or nearly identical, in the animal and vegetable kingdoms.
2. The sterility which so generally attends the crossing of two specific forms is to be distinguished as of two kinds, which, although
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Weekly List, National Register of Historic Places (January 18, 1985)
←January 11
by the United States National Park Service
January 25→
related portals: United States National Park Service.
2669419Weekly List, National Register of Historic Places (January 18, 1985)by the United States National Park Service1985
IN REPLY REFER TO:
United States Department of the Interior
The Director of the National Park Service is pleased to inform you that the following properties have been entered in the National Register of Historic Places beginning January 6, 1985 and ending January 12, 1985. For further information call (202) 343-9552.
STATE, County, Vicinity, Property, Address, (Date Listed)
ARIZONA, Maricopa County, Tempe, Bankhead Highway (Tempe MRA), Rural Rd. to Hayden Rd. (01/07/85)
ARIZONA, Maricopa County, Tempe, Main Building, Tempe Normal School (Tempe MRA), ASU campus (01/07/85)
ARIZONA, Maricopa County, Tempe, Matthews Hall (Tempe MRA), ASU Campus (Bldg. 172) (01/11/85)
ARIZONA, Maricopa County, Tempe, President's House (Tempe MRA), ASU campus (01/07/85)
ARIZONA, Maricopa County, Tempe, Tempe Beach Stadium (Tempe MRA), Ash at First St. (01/07/85)
ARIZONA, Yavapai County, Prescott, Gardner, James I., Store (Prescott Territorial Buildings MRA), 201 N Cortez (01/09/85)
IDAHO, Bannock County, Pocatello, Quinn Apartments, 580 W. Clark St. (01/11/85)
MARYLAND, Baltimore County, Pikesville vicinity, Wester Ogle, 8948-8950 Reisterstown Rd. (01/11/85)
MARYLAND, Garrett County, Accident vicinity, Drane, James, House, Accident-Bittinger Rd. (01/11/85)
MARYLAND, Montgomery County, Rockville, Dawson Farm, 1070 and 1080 Copperstone Ct. (01/11/85)
MICHIGAN, Gogebic County, Ironwood, Ironwood Theatre Complex, Aurora St. (01/11/85)
MICHIGAN, Oakland County, Milford, Foote, Dr. Henry K., House, 213 W. Huron St. (01/11/85)
MICHIGAN, Ottawa County, Holland, Holland Old City Hall and Fire Station, 108 E. 8th St. (01/11/85)
MICHIGAN, Sanilac County, Lexington, Moore, Charles H./Sleeper, Albert E., House, 7277 Simons St. (01/11/85)
MONTANA, Cascade County, Fort Shaw, Fort Shaw Historic District and Cemetery, One Mile NW of town of Fort Shaw (01/11/85)
NEBRASKA, Douglas County, Omaha, Bemis Omaha Bag Company Building, 614-624 S. 11th St. and 1102-1118 Jones St. (01/11/85)
NEBRASKA, Douglas County, Omaha, Blackstone Hotel, 302 S. 36th St. (01/11/85)
OHIO, Hamilton County, Cincinnati, Phoenix Building/Cincinnati Club, 30 Garfield Pl. and 812 Race St. (01/11/85)
OHIO, Miami County, Piqua, Piqua-Caldwell Historic District, N. Main, Wayne, Downing, Caldwell Sts; W. Ash to Camp Sts. (01/11/85)
PENNSYLVANIA, Berks County, Stouchsburg, Stouchsburg Historic District, 12 to 153 Main St., and Water St. (01/08/85)
PENNSYLVANIA, Bucks County, Penn's Park, Penn's Park General Store Complex, 2310—2324 Second St. Pike (01/08/85)
PENNSYLVANIA, Cumberland County, Shippensburg, Cumberland Valley State Normal School Historic District, Roughly bounded by N. Prince St., Stewart, Old Main, Gilbert and Henderson Drives (01/11/85)
PENNSYLVANIA, Dauphin County, Harrisburg, Mount Pleasant Historic District, Sylvan Terr. to 19th St., Market to Brookwood Sts. (01/11/85)
PENNSYLVANIA, Pike County, Dingman Township, Shanna House, U.S. 209 (01/08/85)
TENNESSEE, Moore County, Tullahoma vicinity, Ledfords Mill, Ledford Mill Rd. (01/10/85)
TENNESSEE, Shelby County, Memphis, Evergreen Historic District, Roughly bounded by N. Parkway, Kenilworth/McLean, Poplar and Watkins; plus an adjacent area bounded by Poplar, Willett, Court and Stonewall (01/11/85)
TEXAS, Kaufman County, Terrell, First National Bank Building, 101 E. Moore (01/11/85)
TEXAS, Tarrant County, Ft. Worth, St. Patrick Cathedral Complex, 1206 Throckmorton (01/07/85)
WISCONSIN, Walworth County, Whitewater, Halverson Log Cabin, University of Wisconsin-Whitewater Campus (01/08/85)
The following property was removed from the National Register of Historic Places:
WISCONSIN, Kewaunee County, Casco vicinity, Massart Farmstead, N. of Casco on SR C (12/30/84)
The following properties listed below were entered as National Historic Landmarks:
CALIFORNIA, Los Angeles County, Los Angeles, Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, 3911 S. Figueroa St. (07/27/84)
WASHINGTON, King County, Seattle, Seattle Electric Company Georgetown Steam Plant, King County Airport (07/05/84)
Multiple Resource Areas are identified by MRA
Thematic Resources are identified by TR
NHL designates a National Historic Landmark
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Klemperer in 1971
December 6, 2000(2000-12-06) (aged 80)
Manhattan, New York City, U.S.
Susan Dempsay (m. 1959–1968; divorced)
Louise Troy (m. 1969–1975; divorced)
Kim Hamilton (m. 1997–2000; his death)
Parent(s)
Johanna Geisler [de]
Werner Klemperer (March 22, 1920 – December 6, 2000)[1] was a German-American stage entertainer, actor, and singer. He was best known for the role of Colonel Wilhelm Klink on the CBS television sitcom Hogan's Heroes, for which he won the award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series at the Primetime Emmy Awards in 1968 and 1969.
After serving in the United States Army during World War II, he began performing on the Broadway stage in 1947. Klemperer then appeared in several films during his early acting career such as The Wrong Man (1956), Judgment at Nuremberg (1956), and Houseboat (1958), and numerous roles in television shows such as Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1956), Perry Mason (1956), "(Maverick) (1957):"Comstock Conspiracy"Gunsmoke (1958), The Untouchables (1960), and Have Gun Will Travel (1961), prior to his Hogan's Heroes
3 Later career
Klemperer was born in Cologne, Germany, to a musical family, but he said that he had little musical aptitude.[2] His father was renowned conductor Otto Klemperer and his mother was soprano Johanna Geisler. He had a younger sister named Lotte (1923–2003). His father was Jewish by birth; he converted to Catholicism, but later returned to Judaism. His mother was Lutheran. Otto Klemperer was a first cousin of Victor Klemperer.[3]
The Klemperer family emigrated to the United States in 1935, settling in Los Angeles, where Otto Klemperer became conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Werner Klemperer began acting in high school and enrolled in acting courses at the Pasadena Playhouse[1] before joining the United States Army to serve in World War II. While stationed in Hawaii, he joined the Army's Special Services unit, spending the next years touring the Pacific entertaining the troops. At the war's end, he performed on Broadway before moving into television acting.
He broadened his acting career by performing as an operatic baritone and a singer in Broadway musicals. He can also be heard as the Speaker in Arnold Schoenberg's Gurre-Lieder, in a 1979 live performance with the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
Klemperer's first major film role was as a psychiatrist in Alfred Hitchcock's The Wrong Man (1956). He played a German government officer in the 1959 episode, "The Haunted U-Boat", of the series One Step Beyond. Also in 1959, he appeared as a Frenchman in the episode "Fragile" of the Western TV series Have Gun – Will Travel.[4] He received significant notice for his role in the award-winning 1961 film Judgment at Nuremberg. The film presents a fictionalized account of the post-World War II Nuremberg trials, with Klemperer portraying Emil Hahn, a Nazi prosecutor and one of the defendants at the trial. Prior to this, he had a small role in the 1957 Errol Flynn film Istanbul and a pivotal part in the "Comstock Conspiracy" episode of Maverick that same year. He played the title role in the 1961 film Operation Eichmann. He guest-starred in the first Brian Keith television series, Crusader, a Cold War drama that aired on CBS. During this time, he made three guest appearances on Perry Mason: he played East German murder victim Stefan Riker in the 1958 episode "The Case of the Desperate Daughter"; the East European character Ulrik Zenas in the 1963 episode "The Case of the Two-Faced Turn-a-bout"; and German Swiss Police Inspector Hurt in 1964 in "The Case of a Place Called Midnight". In 1963, Klemperer also portrayed a professor of psychology in "The Dream Book", an episode on the sitcom My Three Sons.[5]
Prior to Hogan's Heroes, Klemperer appeared in the 1956 episode 'Safe Conduct' of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, along with future co-star John Banner; twice appeared as Hugo on the syndicated romantic comedy series, How to Marry a Millionaire (1957–1959), with Barbara Eden and Merry Anders; and appeared on the "Purple Gang" episode of The Untouchables.
Werner Klemperer with Bob Crane during an episode of Hogan's Heroes
He is best known, however, as Colonel Wilhelm Klink: the bumbling, cowardly, arrogant, and self-serving Kommandant of Stalag 13 on Hogan's Heroes, which aired from 1965–1971. Klemperer, conscious that he would be playing the role of a German officer during the Nazi regime, agreed to the part only on the condition that Klink would be portrayed as a fool who never succeeded. According to co-star, Richard Dawson, Klemperer supplied his own uniforms. When Klemperer's father, the famous conductor, saw his first episode of Hogan's Heroes, he said to his son, "Your work is good, but who is the author of this material?" In addition to the character's bumblings, Klink was also remembered for his excruciating violin playing. For his performance as Klink, Klemperer received six Emmy Award nominations for best supporting actor, winning in 1968 and 1969.
He appeared in character and costume as Klink in the Batman episode "It's How You Play the Game" and as Officer Bolix in the Lost in Space episode "All That Glitters" in 1966. He played a bumbling East German official in the 1968 American comedy film The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz, directed by George Marshall and starring Elke Sommer and several of his costars from Hogan's Heroes, including Bob Crane. Klemperer later starred in Wake Me When the War Is Over in 1969 playing the role of a German major, Erich Mueller, alongside Eva Gabor. He also played a villain in an episode of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea titled "The Blizzard Makers".
After Hogan's Heroes ended in 1971, Klemperer continued his career in stage and film roles and guest-starring roles on television. In 1987, he portrayed Herr Schultz in the Broadway revival of Cabaret. The role earned Klemperer a Best Featured Actor Tony Award nomination.
Later career[edit]
After his father's death in 1973, Klemperer expanded his acting career with musical roles in opera and Broadway musicals. He earned a Tony Award nomination for his performance in Cabaret in its 1987 Broadway revival. A member of the board of directors of the New York Chamber Symphony, Klemperer served as a narrator with many other American symphony orchestras including the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra. He also made occasional guest appearances on television dramas, and took part in a few studio recordings, notably a version of Arnold Schoenberg's Gurre-Lieder with the Boston Symphony and Seiji Ozawa, in 1979. From 1979 to 1982, he appeared as Bassa Selim in 18 performances of Mozart's Singspiel Die Entführung aus dem Serail at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.[6] In 1981, he appeared, to critical and audience raves, as Prince Orlofsky in Seattle Opera's production of Die Fledermaus. In 1990, he narrated the children's story "Gerald McBoing Boing" (music by Gail Kubik) for a CD of classical music for children. In 1992, he made a guest appearance in an episode of Law & Order, "Starstruck", as the father of an attempted murder suspect.
In 1993, Klemperer reprised the role of Klink in an episode of The Simpsons as Homer's guardian angel and spirit guide in the episode "The Last Temptation of Homer". According to the episode's DVD commentary, when Klemperer appeared, he had to be given a quick reminder of how to play Colonel Klink. He declined other offers to reprise the character, including one from talk-show host Conan O'Brien.
Klemperer appeared in several episodes of the news/talk show Politically Incorrect.[7]
For many years, Klemperer was an elected member of the council of Actors' Equity Association, and was a vice president of the union at the time of his death.[8]
Klemperer was the father of two children, Mark and Erika, with his first wife, Susan Dempsay.[9][10] On the set of Hogan's Heroes, he met his second wife, actress Louise Troy, who was making a guest appearance. They married in 1969, and divorced in 1975.
In 1997, Klemperer married his third wife, television actress Kim Hamilton, after dating her for 21 years.[11] They remained married until Klemperer's death. Hamilton died 13 years later at age 81 on September 16, 2013.
Klemperer died of cancer at his home in Manhattan on December 6, 2000, at the age of 80, according to his manager John A. Anderson. He was cremated and his ashes were scattered at sea.[12]
1956 Flight to Hong Kong Bendesh
1956 Death of a Scoundrel Herbert Bauman (Clementi's lawyer)
1956 The Wrong Man Dr. Bannay Uncredited
1957 Istanbul Paul Renkov
1957 5 Steps to Danger Dr. Simmons
1957 Kiss Them for Me Lt. Walter Wallace
1958 The High Cost of Loving Joseph Jessup
1958 The Goddess Joe Wilsey
1958 Houseboat Harold Messner
1961 Operation Eichmann Adolf Eichmann
1961 Judgment at Nuremberg Emil Hahn
1962 Escape from East Berlin Walter Brunner
1964 Youngblood Hawke Mr. Leffer
1965 Dark Intruder Prof. Malaki
1965 Ship of Fools Lt. Huebner
1968 The Wicked Dreams of Paula Schultz Klaus
1991 The Cabinet of Dr. Ramirez Fat Man Looking for a Tax Break
1992 Queen Esther Haman Voice, direct-to-video release
1951-1952 Goodyear Television Playhouse Various roles 2 episodes
1953 The Secret Files of Captain Video Meister Episode: "The Box"
1955 Studio 57 Dubrov Segment: "Win a Cigar"
1955 Crusader Wilhelm Leichner Episode: "The Bargain"
1955 Climax! 2 episodes
1956 Alfred Hitchcock Presents Professor/Captain Greisham Episode: "Safe Conduct"
1957 Navy Log Ludwig Episode: " After You, Ludwig"
1957 Wire Service Krylov Episode: "The Washington Stars"
1957 General Electric Theater Muller Episode: "The Questioning Note"
1957 M Squad Heinrich Ronn Episode: "Face of Evil"
1957 Maverick Alex Jennings Episode: "Comstock Conspiracy"
1958 Perry Mason Stefan Riker Episode: "The Case of the Desperate Daughter"
1958 Studio One Dorfmann Episode: "Balance of Terror"
1958 The Thin Man Albert Episode: "The Pre-Incan Caper"
1958 Gunsmoke Clifton Bunker Episode: "Sunday Supplement"
1958 The Court of Last Resort Malone Episode: "The Allen Cutler Case"
1958 The Silent Service Captain Lieutenant Prien Episode: "U-47 in Scapa Flow"
1959 Behind Closed Doors Slavko Episode: "Crypto 40"
1959 Steve Canyon Linz Episode: "Iron Curtain"
1959 The Third Man Holz Donner Episode: "The Third Medaillon"
1959 Have Gun – Will Travel Etienne Episode: "Fragile"
1959 Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond Herr Bautmann Episode: "The Haunted U-Boat"
1959 How to Marry a Millionaire Mr. Obermeyer Episode: "Gwen's Secret"
1960 The Alaskans Baron Episode: "Gold Fever"
1960 Overland Trail Arnold Braun Episode: "Vigilantes of Montana"
1960 Alcoa Theatre Colonel Hanning Episode: "The Observer"
1960 Rawhide Kessel Episode: "Incident of the Music Maker"
1960 Men into Space Major Kralenko Episode: "Flare Up"
1960 The Untouchables Jan Tornek Episode: "Purple Gang"
1960 Thriller Mr. Clark Episode: "Man in the Middle"
1961 The Islanders Michel Serati Episode: "The Pearls of Ratu"
1961 Have Gun – Will Travel Leander Johnson Episode: "The Uneasy Grave"
1961 Adventures in Paradise Kuberli Episode: "Survival"
1962 Checkmate Franz Leder Episode: "An Assassin Arrives, Andante"
1963 Perry Mason Ulric Zenas Episode: "The Case of the Two-Faced Turn-a-bout"
1963 The Lloyd Bridges Show Gustavsen Episode: "The Wonder of Wanda"
1963 77 Sunset Strip Schtiekel Episode: "Escape to Freedom"
1963 The Dakotas Col. von Bleist Episode: "Trial at Grand Forks"
1963 My Three Sons Professor Engel 2 episodes
1963 GE True K. H. Frank 2 episodes
1964 Perry Mason Hurt Episode: "The Case of a Place Called Midnight"
1964 The Man from U.N.C.L.E. Laslo Kurasov Episode: "The Project Strigas Affair"
1964 Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea Cregar Episode: "The Blizzard Maker"
1965 Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea Brainwasher (voice) Episode: "The Saboteur"
1965 Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre Colonel Wertha Episode: "Escape into Jeopardy"
1965–1971 Hogan's Heroes Colonel Wilhelm Klink 168 episodes
1966 Lost in Space Bolix Episode: "All That Glitters"
1966 Batman Colonel Klink (uncredited cameo) Episode: "It's How You Play the Game"
1968 Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In Colonel Wilhelm Klink Episode #2.6
1969 Wake Me When the War Is Over Mayor Erich Mueller Television film
1972 Night Gallery Ludwig Asper Episode: "Green Fingers/The Funeral/The Tune in Dan's Cafe"
1972 The Doris Day Show Jacques Moreau Episode: "Gowns by Louis"
1972 Assignment Vienna Insp. Hoffman Television film
1972 Love, American Style Harold Baxter Segment: "Love and the Unbearable Fiance"
1973 McMillan & Wife Dr. Ernest Bleeker Episode: "The Devil You Say"
1977 The Rhinemann Exchange Franz Altmuller Miniseries
1978 Tabitha Henry Hastings Episode: "Tabitha's Party"
1979 The Love Boat Mr. Perkins Episode: "The Grass Is Always Greener..."
1980 Steve Martin: Comedy Is Not Pretty Plato Television special
1981 Vega$ Siegfried Klaus Episode: "Heist"
1981 Return of the Beverly Hillbillies C.D. Medford Television film
1983 Matt Houston Felix Randolph Episode: "The Purrfect Crime"
1986 Mr. Sunshine Dean 2 episodes
1988 American Experience Prince Maximilian of Bavaria Episode: "Views of a Vanishing Frontier"
1992 Law & Order William Unger Episode: "Star Struck"
1993 The Simpsons Homer's Guardian Angel as Colonel Klink Voice, Episode: "The Last Temptation of Homer", (final appearance)
^ a b Weinraub, Bernard "Werner Klemperer, Klink in Hogan's Heroes, Dies at 80" The New York Times (December 8, 2000)
^ Wigler, Stephen (May 7, 1985). "Col. Klink Goes Classical Seriously Talented Werner Klemperer On Fso Program". Orlando Sentinel. Retrieved May 22, 2018. I studied piano and violin, but I made noises a dog shouldn't hear
^ Captain Spaulding (December 2000). "Hooray for Me". Hogan's Heroes Fan Club. Archived from the original on June 7, 2016.
^ Have Gun – Will Travel (S03E07) on IMDb
^ "The Dream Book", S03E20, My Three Sons, originally broadcast January 31, 1963. TV Guide Retrieved August 4, 2017.
^ "Werner Klemperer", Metropolitan Opera Archives
^ "Politically Incorrect With Bill Maher: Episode Guide". MSN. Retrieved June 26, 2011. [dead link]
^ Woo, Elaine "Werner Klemperer; Played Col. Klink in Hogan's Heroes", Los Angeles Times (December 8, 2008)
^ Lipton, Michael A. (January 8, 2001). "Camp Clown". People. Retrieved March 12, 2019.
^ "Klemperer Likes Trend in Which Heroes Have Faults". St. Joseph News-Press. May 29, 1966. p. 6C. Retrieved January 14, 2013.
^ Rode, Alan K. (April 13, 2007). "Kim Hamilton interview with Alan K. Rode – Pt 1 and Pt 2". Film Noir Foundation. Retrieved October 13, 2013.
^ "Werner Klemperer; portrayed Col. Klink". Reading Eagle. December 8, 2000. p. B6. Retrieved January 14, 2013.
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New Documents Show Acting Attorney General Failed to Pay Back Funds After Company Charged with Bilking Consumers
Washington, D.C. – Reps. Elijah E. Cummings, Jerrold Nadler, Frank Pallone Jr., and Adam Schiff, the Chairmen of the Committees on Oversight and Reform, the Judiciary, Energy and Commerce, and Intelligence, sent a letter to Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker seeking full compliance with their prior request regarding his involvement with World Patent Marketing, after new records indicated he failed to return thousands of dollars that would have been distributed to the victims of the company’s alleged scam.
“On November 14, 2018, as the incoming Chairmen of the four House Committees of jurisdiction, we sent a letter requesting that you produce eight categories of documents relating to your work on behalf of World Patent Marketing and your communications with Scott Cooper, the company’s CEO and founder,” the Chairmen wrote. “To date, you have failed to respond to that letter or provide a single document that we requested. Since that time, we have obtained new documents showing that you failed to return thousands of dollars that were supposed to be distributed to the victims of World Patent Marketing’s alleged fraud, despite your involvement with Mr. Cooper in handling complaints from individuals of the company’s actions.”
New records obtained by the Committees show:
DESA Industries, Inc. (d/b/a World Patent Marketing) paid Mr. Whitaker $9,375 from October 2014 through February 2016 for his services as a World Patent Marketing Advisory Board member.
Despite the World Patent Marketing Receiver’s demand that Mr. Whitaker returns these funds so that they could be distributed to consumers as part of the action enjoining the alleged fraud, he has not repaid the funds.
The Chairmen also sent a letter to the Justice Department’s Designated Agency Ethics Officer, Lee Lofthus, requesting documents regarding Acting Attorney General Whitaker’s participation in reversing the position of the Department on online gambling, given unusual campaign donations Mr. Whitaker’s campaign received from casino executives more than three years after his senatorial campaign had concluded.
Click here to see the letter to Acting Attorney General Whitaker.
Click here to see the letter to Designated Agency Ethics Officer Lofthus.
Click here to see the wire transfers from DESA Industries Inc. to Matthew Whitaker PC Account.
Click here to see the letter from Counsel for the Receiver to Acting Attorney General Whitaker.
Click here to see the email from Counsel for the Receiver to Staff, Committee on Oversight and Reform.
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Subcommittee on Communications and Technology Approves Bipartisan Proposals to Boost Broadband Infrastructure Deployment and Increase Spectrum Availability
Members Advance ‘Dig-Once’ and Other Measures Aimed at Expanding Access to Wired and Mobile Broadband
WASHINGTON, DC – The Communications and Technology Subcommittee, chaired by Rep. Greg Walden (R-OR), today approved two bipartisan proposals aimed at improving access to wired and wireless broadband for all Americans. The subcommittee today advanced a legislative package to improve broadband infrastructure deployment and H.R. 1641, the Federal Spectrum Incentive Act.
The subcommittee first approved the legislative package to promote broadband infrastructure deployment, authored by full committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI), Ranking Member Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), Walden, and subcommittee Ranking Member Anna Eshoo (D-CA), which includes ‘dig-once’ legislation and other provisions to reduce barriers to deployment.
“Southwest Michigan needs broadband investment just like communities across the country. It is imperative that we make it easier for development in small towns like Dowagiac in my district so that our rural communities can continue to compete in the 21st Century global marketplace,” said Upton. “The broadband economy is our nation’s job creation engine, and we should be working to support it, not enacting laws and regulatory policies that hinder it. I hope that we can continue this bipartisan effort to help our nation’s communications networks thrive and lead our global economy.”
“My top priority is to make sure that this committee always puts consumers first. Today we are doing just that—we are working to upgrade America’s broadband. Because of these bills, more people will have more access at faster speeds,” added Pallone.
“The United States is a world leader in broadband – both fixed and mobile. These two bills are commonsense legislation that will remove unnecessary barriers to increasing broadband deployment and improving Internet access in the home and on the go,” said Walden. “I am proud of this subcommittee’s work on these issues and the bipartisan cooperation we have enjoyed working together to improve broadband Internet access for all Americans.”
The subcommittee also advanced H.R. 1641, the Federal Spectrum Incentive Act, authored by Reps. Brett Guthrie (R-KY) and Doris Matsui (D-CA), which aims to incentivize federal agencies to free up additional spectrum for commercial use by relocating and consolidating spectrum holdings in return for a portion of the auction revenues.
“Spectrum is an important and limited resource,” said Guthrie. “By encouraging federal agencies to make additional spectrum available, we can invest in innovation and ensure spectrum is available to meet the high demand for it in the marketplace. The results of the AWS-3 auction were unprecedented and give me confidence that the Federal Spectrum Incentive Act can build on this success to spur further economic growth. I applaud the passage of this bill today.”
“Spectrum is the invisible infrastructure of the 21st century economy,” said Matsui. “As we look to the deployment of next generation 5G wireless networks, we need an aggressive spectrum strategy so that the United States continues to lead the world in innovation. The Federal Spectrum Incentive Act is a creative approach to putting more spectrum in the pipeline, and its passage is an important step in the growth of our wireless economy.”
Both proposals were approved by voice votes. Additional information about the bills can be found here.
To watch a webcast of the markup, click here.
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What's the deal with “thank you kindly”?
Other questions on this site have established that kindly can be used as a sort of please. This usage was in my mind when someone said "Thank you kindly" to me, but "thank you please" doesn't make sense. However, characterizing one's own thanks as kind also sounds unlikely. The actual usage appears to be the sixth definition by Dictionary.com:
6. cordially or heartily: We thank you kindly.
However, I still have questions. Is this usage of kindly only used with thank you? How did this usage occur?
adverbs politeness
DanielDaniel
It is an adverb meaning "in a kind manner," the first sense of the word. As such, it is asking someone to be kind and do something. Similar to "Be a dear and fetch me a beer out of the fridge." Also as such it's pretty much general reference. – Robusto Jan 24 '12 at 1:46
But thank you kindly is said after the favor is discharged. Why would you ask them to be kind again? I've always heard thank you kindly used as a replacement for thank you. – Daniel Jan 24 '12 at 1:51
Thank you kindly is one of those expressions that I associate with correspondence from people in South and Southeast Asia -- areas where proper British English was taught to them due their colonial history, but the expressions aren't even used by British people any more. – Paul Richter Jan 24 '12 at 1:57
I'm just responding to your conjecture about the meaning. Obviously the word can have different meanings for different situations. Why is it hard to accept that you can thank someone kindly for a favor, but ask someone else kindly to do something? – Robusto Jan 24 '12 at 1:58
@Robusto: There's a significant difference there. The person doing the thanking isn't doing it in a generous and indulgent fashion - which is the more normal sense of "kindly", and the one used when you ask someone to "kindly do something" for you. – FumbleFingers Jan 24 '12 at 2:24
Where I live (SE USA), kindly still is very much in use, but mainly as a way to exaggerate politeness, sometimes tongue in cheek. The word does not literally mean the same thing in thank you kindly as it does in would you kindly?, but in both cases it carries the connotation of being so polite that it sounds a bit silly, which makes it polite again. I realize that makes no sense whatsoever but I suppose it's a Southern thing and ask that you kindly make allowances.
JeffSaholJeffSahol
I agree. Thank you kindly is definitely a southernism in my mind, and one used more often facetiously than not. – user13141 Jan 24 '12 at 14:29
The usage has been around a long time, but it's been tailing off over the past century. Many might consider it dated or even archaic today. As OP has noted, the word kindly in "Thank you kindly" has the sense of "with goodwill and enthusiasm; very much", which has all but disappeared today outside of a few stock phrases.
For example, He kindly embraced him, is an old citation which IMHO has that meaning. And Wilkie Collins in The Woman in White (1861) has "[his lordship] was most kindly anxious to know what had become of her", which I read more as "very much" rather than "generously". In modern parlance the only other surviving usage with this meaning that I can think of is in constructions like "I didn't take kindly to being ignored", where it's in the negative.
But you could (erroneously, IMHO) parse it as "I thank you, kindly sir", so that "kindly" modifies the person being thanked (for having been kind to you). I wouldn't promote this idea too strongly, but as a subtext it might help the usage stick around. Certainly some of the comments against the question suggest this interpretation does at least occur to people, though I don't think it's central to the history of the usage.
FumbleFingersFumbleFingers
Don't you mean to put the comma after kindly instead of in front of it? – Robusto Jan 24 '12 at 2:30
@Robusto: Definitely not! The whole point of my example is that the normal form is "I thank you kindly, sir". I moved the comma to show how an alternative parsing can make "sir" the "kindly" one. Which you should agree with, since that's what's going on in your example "Would you kindly..." in the question comment. – FumbleFingers Jan 24 '12 at 2:36
Well, all I can say is it sounds very strange to use that in direct address. Calling someone "a kindly man" is one thing; addressing him as "kindly sir" is quite something else again. – Robusto Jan 24 '12 at 2:42
It was you who attached "kindly" to the person who will (or did) do the favour in the first place. I said I don't endorse that strongly - I just put it forward as something that might have affected some people's decision to keep the usage alive, and you clearly felt something in that area was relevant. Bear in mind this usage is dated, formal, and part of established "set phrasing". It's rooted in pre-Victorian style, so it would hardly be surprising if my example sounds strange to you today - all these usages obviously sound strange to OP, which is why he's asking why we say them. – FumbleFingers Jan 24 '12 at 3:03
I attached it? You're the one who wrote "I thank you, kindly sir." – Robusto Jan 24 '12 at 16:57
"Thank you kindly" is a very warm, humble, and appreciative form of thanks. It may be over-the-top, but if so it's in the same manner as "thanks a million!" As @JeffSahol noted, it is quite common in the southern USA, and I have a particular association with it being said by performers thanking their applauding audiences.
overslackedoverslacked
The 'thanks a million' comparison is good. Of course, 'thank you :-) ' wasn't around then (and isn't easy to put into speech in a darkened room). – Edwin Ashworth Jun 5 '14 at 16:01
"If you'll kindly give me a chance to explain" seems to capture the essence of the use you have in mind. It's got a bit of attitude. The particular gem you cite, which sounds ever so Southern, is used in ways both innocuous and not, but more generally the latter, but, when the former, represents an assertion more so than an expression of thanks. In that case it's a way of saying [to the person being thanked] that they're right on the edge of behaving in a way that's objectionable, and, as such, it really is a form of "Please". In its more aggressive form it's rendered "I'll thank you to kindly ..." and then, of course, finished off with whatever's being objected to. And bypassed altogether it's certain to yield something akin to Herman Cain's now famous assertion, "Excuse me!", when plagued by the press of journalists.
[And then, next day]
To properly respond to the author-of-the-question’s comments:
Taking into consideration the context in which I've always heard this, if you'll kindly give me a chance to explain does not capture the essence of thank you kindly. Also, "right on the edge of behaving in a way that's objectionable" does not relate to thank you kindly at all; it's a completely different sentiment. I've always heard thank you kindly as a replacement for thank you after someone does a favor. – Daniel δ
Fully in keeping with the terms of use here, I, just as you, Daniel δ, am merely conveying my experience as it pertains to the topic you introduced. So while there is no assumption on my part that my experience will match that of every other party, nor should there be, I should also expect you capable of approaching these interactions knowing that the experience of others will at times stand at variance with your own. I cannot account for your experience, nor you mine. So what are you saying, really? Are you suggesting that the things I outlined are not things grounded in personal experience? That can’t be very productive.
You stated, Daniel δ, that from your perspective the reported parallel between the word kindly and the word please “doesn’t make sense” within, that is, the particular phrase you introduced. I offered you my experience of how the word kindly is used in, mind you, a transparently good faith attempt to provide you a clear means by which to understand that yes, indeed, it is intended to mean please in something of a qualified sense. The clause I started with, “If you’ll kindly give me a chance to explain,” is virtually indistinguishable from the alternate clause “If you’ll please give me a chance to explain”. (You seem to be saying you don’t see that.) Furthermore, I never said it captured the essence of “thank you kindly”, as is your claim here. But I did say that it “seems to capture the essence of the use you have in mind”, to wit, the parallel between the word kindly and the word please. If you’ll simply consider the following extraction from your own original query, “...that kindly can be used as a sort of please. This usage was in my mind when ...,” there’s no question but that I was speaking directly to what you deemed central to your question.
And finally, by stating from the outset that you couldn't quite grasp the legitimacy of replacing please for kindly in the phrase “thank you kindly”, by any reasonable measure you were stating that your experience of the use of the term has yet to provide you the means by which to bridge that gap. So by asking the question you asked, you offered up of a tacit acknowledgement that others had necessarily/likely/possibly experienced the use of that phrase in a way that does bridge that gap. My experience certainly falls within that category, as reported. You have responded by saying that, well, yours does not. We already knew that? We believed you from the door? WTH?
For my part, I must admit, room does exist which allows for confusion to follow from one particular aspect of my contribution. I’ll go in and clean that up. The combination
“and, when the latter, represents …”
should read
“…but, when the former, represents …”,
because from that point forward my focus is on that of [what I deem] the innocuous use of the “thank you kindly” rather than the more common use. Your attention to that failing would have offered of some value. But literally no part of your comment contributes anything in the way of that which is useful or appropriate.
If I’ve incidentally offended you somewhere along the line, I do not know it and did not intend to do so.
Tom RaywoodTom Raywood
It doesn't have to be snarky, even though it's sometimes often that way. – Robusto Jan 24 '12 at 1:51
Taking into consideration the context in which I've always heard this, if you'll kindly give me a chance to explain does not capture the essence of thank you kindly. Also, "right on the edge of behaving in a way that's objectionable" does not relate to thank you kindly at all; it's a completely different sentiment. I've always heard thank you kindly as a replacement for thank you after someone does a favor. – Daniel Jan 24 '12 at 1:53
@Robusto — to be fair, which I hope you intend, the relevant construction I provided “is used in ways both innocuous and not” is explicitly synonymous with the construction you provided “It doesn't have to be snarky”, while the very next construction I provided “but more generally the latter” appears at least loosely synonymous (Who can really tell?) with your very next construction “even though it’s often sometimes that way”, ( … as the combination ‘often sometimes’ carries with it no natural force of meaning); how odd to find my experience deemed objectionable by one who shares it. – Tom Raywood Jan 24 '12 at 13:50
Just because you can toggle "please" and "kindly" in something like "Will you kindly shut up" doesn't mean they're equivalent in any way! "Please" ultimately derives from the Latin for "approve" - in requests like "May it please you to shut up", it means something akin to "I hope you will approve of shutting up". Whereas "kindly" in these constructions means "I hope you will act beneficently (out of kindness/generosity towards me) and shut up." Also, answer text is not an appropriate place to engage in lengthy "dialogue" with the OP - that's what we have comments for. – FumbleFingers Jan 25 '12 at 4:43
Metadiscussion, such as what how one plans to edit one's answer, Q&A with the OP or another contributor, apologies, rationalizations of behavior, etc., are off topic in the answer itself. – MetaEd♦ Jan 25 '12 at 6:15
protected by tchrist♦ Aug 13 '14 at 19:49
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EBay income up as PayPal split looms
EBay says it is working to stabilise its marketplaces business as it moves to spin off its PayPal division later this year.
The company on Wednesday reported first-quarter net income that beat expectations as continued strong growth in its PayPal payments unit offset the impact of the stronger dollar. A stronger dollar cuts into revenue generated overseas when it's translated back into dollars.
The results sent eBay's stock up five per cent in aftermarket trading.
The e-commerce company is seeking to reinvigorate its marketplace business, which includes the e-commerce arm of eBay.
It stumbled last year when it had to deal with a change in Google's algorithms that made eBay products come up in search results less often. It was also hit by a data breach that led to all its users being required to change their password.
For the quarter ending March 31, marketplaces revenue fell four per cent to $2.07 billion, hurt by the stronger dollar.
But the company says it sees signs of stabilisation in active buyers and gross merchandise volume, or the total amount of goods sold, excluding the impact of the stronger dollar.
Overall, on a per-share basis, net income totaled 51 cents per share. Earnings, adjusted for restructuring costs and stock option expense, came to 77 cents per share.
The results surpassed Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of 20 analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of 71 cents per share.
Revenue totaled $4.45 billion in the period, also exceeding Street forecasts. Sixteen analysts surveyed by Zacks expected $4.44 billion.
EBay has also been charting a path toward a separation of its eBay and PayPal units. The company said the split is due in the third quarter but did not give exact timing.
In an SEC filing earlier this month, eBay and PayPal said the companies agreed that PayPal will still process at least 80 per cent of transactions, even though both can work with new partners.
The agreement lasts five years with a one-year transition period. The companies will continue to share data and will not build competing products during the agreement period.
"We are deeply committed to setting up eBay and PayPal to succeed and to deliver sustainable value to our shareholders," CEO John Donahoe said in a statement.
For the current quarter ending in June, eBay expects its per-share adjusted earnings to range from 71 cents to 73 cents. Analysts expect 72 cents per share.
The company said it expects revenue in the range of $4.4 billion to $4.5 billion for the fiscal second quarter. Analysts surveyed by Zacks had expected revenue of $4.6 billion.
EBay expects full-year earnings in the range of $3.05 to $3.15 per share, with revenue ranging from $18.35 billion to $18.85 billion. Analysts expect net income of $3.09 on revenue of $18.96 billion, according to FactSet.
Its stock rose $2.90 to $59.65 in aftermarket trading. The stock had been up about 1 per cent since the beginning of the year.
NZ dollar falls on UK rate speculation
Roche sales up 3% amid increased demand
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Mass Extinction, Pt. 2 of 3 – Not An Impact
August 6, 2014 BJ Deming Ad Astra Leave a comment
We looked at asteroid impacts and mass extinctions last week, focusing on the K/T “dinosaur-killing” extinction.
In this second of a three-part series, we’ll try to look more closely at other mass extinctions. It isn’t easy. Except for the K/T, none of the major events seems to have involved impacts.
Why should we care about them, if they didn’t involve sudden death from the skies?
Well, the Permian extinction wiped out over 90% of the species living on Earth . We really need to know why such a large die-off happened.
And, too, in the aftermath of all extinctions (including the K/T), life has rebounded. How does it find a way?
Another very good reason involves dollars and cents.
Mass extinction is an expensive topic
Through taxes, university fees, business transactions, and private donations, we fund most scientific research. Among the conflicting, often very dramatic claims about how mass extinctions work, how can we judge the worth of what we’re paying for?
There is no easy way to answer that question.
However, mass extinction is everybody’s business. And, fortunately, a lot of it involves basic geology, especially fossils.
Fossils!
How do we know about mass extinctions?
Earth’s fossil record is the key to understanding the geological record and how it all fits together.
In the 19th century, scientists knew that sometimes fossils change dramatically between rock layers that were deposited at different times. In between those layers are zones, representing many thousands or even millions of years, when little or no sign of life can be found.
Geology is a lot more complicated in the field. Image source
To explain these changes and the rather lifeless zones, French naturalist Georges Cuvier reasoned that Earth is very old and has always been pretty much the same as it is now. There have been what he termed “revolutions” to account for those zones.
During these “revolutions,” great numbers of species are wiped out through natural causes – perhaps a succession of worldwide floods like Noah’s. Certain species die off, and new ones are introduced or created.
A few earth scientists, among them Charles Darwin, suggested instead that little things, like weathering and the gradual rise and fall of the land, have big geologic consequences, given enough time.
As more and more field evidence was found to support it, the theory of gradualism (sometimes called uniformitarianism) gained widespread acceptance among scientists.
Uniformitarians could explain the zones of little or no life by some long-term process like changing climate. The dinosaurs, for example, died out because they couldn’t adapt to a changing world.
Here is a modern video, from the lay viewpoint, that nicely sums up the gist of that conflict between catastrophism and gradualism.
If you feel a little tense watching that (I did), you might now start to understand why it is so difficult to write about mass extinction today – well, considering that we now believe an impact was involved in the K/T extinction but not the other major die-offs, more difficult to write about.
There are a variety of competing interests invested in non-impact-related causes for mass extinction, even though there isn’t much that can be undeniably proven one way or the other.
Human nature being what it is, when we’re not sure, we argue.
I like what the guy in that video says: Whatever you think, that’s beautiful.
Science Kittens say it’s a game, not a fight, until undeniable proof is found one way or the other. Then we’ll all move on. (morguefile.com/gracey)
How many extinctions were there?
Five mass extinctions are definitely known to have happened. In each one, over 70% of the world’s species may have vanished:
The Ordovician (Ash., in the graph below), some 440 million years ago
The Devonian (F/F in the graph below), about 375-360 million years ago
The Permian (P/T), about 250 million years ago
The Triassic (T/J), 200 million years ago
The Cretaceous (K/T), some about 66 million years ago
Here is a list of things that one group of scientists believes might have caused each of the Big Five. Note that there are other explanations out there, and no particular explanation has gained credence over any others.
There have probably been many other extinctions besides those five, for example, all the smaller ones shown on that graph by Keller et al. that we saw last week:
However, no one can agree on definitions for these lesser mass extinctions, so I’m not going to go into detail on them here.
There does seem to be a consensus on a few general points regarding mass extinction:
Whatever the cause, extinction seems to be a thing only among complex organisms. Blue-green algae, for example, have been around for over 3 billion years.
It seems to come in pulses, though no clear-cut periodicity has been identified.
Species diversity increases after each event. Right now we are living in the most diverse age ever for life on Earth.
So, are we all going to die?
The UK’s Natural History Museum quite nicely sums up what I have also found written about the Earth’s extinctions:
The evidence suggests there was no single cause for any of the mass extinctions in Earth’s history. Instead, a combination of factors created environmental changes that were so extreme they spelt disaster for all but a small number of lucky survivors.
Massive volcanic eruptions, shifting tectonic plates and asteroid impacts are leading culprits for many of the mass extinctions. They can create huge changes to climate, sea levels and the amount of oxygen in the oceans.
That’s wonderfully vague. Extinction after an asteroid impact happens quickly, for example, while tectonic plates move incredibly slowly and the effects of these motions also take time.
However, I also think that is as precise a description of mankind’s understanding of mass extinction as we’re going to get today.
When you get right down to it, apart from the evidence of impact associated with the K/T extinction, the only information we have about any of these events is just a collection of indirect data that can be interpreted in many ways.
The why of it may be up in the air, but what answers are there to the other questions we laypeople have:
What do we need to do, if anything?
How will the next extinction happen?
Is it happening now?
Which species are most vulnerable?
Where should we focus our research?
As Mark Twain might say, there is a whole lot of conjecture about those matters, but very few known facts.
On Friday, we’ll try to get a useful perspective on all this.
Fossils. Wikipedia.
Barnosky et al., Table 1: The ‘Big Five’ mass extinction events. Nature 471, 51–57 (03 March 2011). doi:10.1038/nature09678
Surviving Mass Extinction. Natural History Museum.
Georges Cuvier. University of California Museum of Paleontology.
Peter Ward. Under a Green Sky. HarperCollins. New York, 2007
Previous Post: Zeolites
Next Post: Mass extinction, Pt 3 of 3: Fashion, Chaos and Healthy Skepticism
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Changezi, Naseem Mirza, 1910-1
Parashar, Jayant1
Popli, Ritika1
Delhi (India : Union Territory)[remove]1
You searched for: Place created Delhi (India : Union Territory) Remove constraint Place created: Delhi (India : Union Territory) Date Created 2016 Remove constraint Date Created: 2016
1. Oral history with Naseem Mirza Changezi, 2016 October 23
Oral history with Naseem Mirza Changezi, 2016 October 23.
Changezi, Naseem Mirza, 1910-, Popli, Ritika, and Parashar, Jayant
Changezi, Naseem Mirza, 1910-, Popli, Ritika, Popli, Ritika, and Parashar, Jayant
Naseem Mirza Changezi was born in the year 1910 in his ancestral home at Pahari Imli, near Churi Walan in Jama Masjid, in Old Delhi and was a freedom fighter, and fought alongside the likes of Bhagat Singh and Rajguru for Independence from colonial powers. He has been profiled and documented numerous times, by leading scholars and academics of history owing to his deep knowledge and memory bandwidth about his Persian roots and the Mughal history of Northern India. He says, “The study of my genealogy tells me that successively 23 generations of mine hail from the family of Genghis Khan, the founder of the great Mongolian empire. My ancestors travelled from Mongol to Iran, and then to Afghanistan. By that time Babur, who lay the stone of Mughal empire in India, asked his ancestors to leave Afghanistan within two or three months. The two clans were both Mughals but Babur’s side was Timuri Mughals and we were Changezi Mughals, so Babur did not want a fight and loss of soldiers, hence, he asked my ancestors to peacefully leave."He then adds that, his family left Afghanistan and moved to the area of Sindh and as they settled there, the forces of Mirza Jaani Beg Khan and Mirza Ghazi Beg Khan attacked the region of Sindh, which was being ruled by Jam Feroze, who was the last ruler of Samma dynasty. Simultaneously the region of India and neighbouring states (Hindustan) had just started to be ruled by the Mughal ruler Humayun. Then, by the time Akbar’s rule came about and he asked his ancestors to become equal stakeholders in ruling Hindustan, but his ancestors refused. Then Akbar preceded to send an army of two lakh personnel under the leadership of Abdul Rahim Khan-i-Khana and they fought for almost a year, and his ancestors lost the war. His ancestors were then brought to Akbar and he dismissed them to stay in Agra. He recalls, “When Shahjahan, in the early 17th century decided to shift his capital from Agra to Delhi, my ancestors also came along. They built a palatial palace right in front of the Delhi Gate of the majestic Red Fort (Lal Quila). And since then, we have lived in Delhi.”He says with utmost pride, “My family fought for the Independence of this country and has been doing so for the last 150 years.” His great-grandfather was the deputy collector working for the British crown, but, he participated in the first revolt of Independence in 1857, and in turn was awarded life imprisonment. He says, “There had been various wars for Independence prior to 1857, within the kingdoms, but the reason it is known as the First War of Independence is because this was the first time that the masses at large took part in it.” He also adds that, today the Hindu dominated area like Sitaram Baazar in Old Delhi, was earlier a Muslim area with many old palaces that were of the Muslim feudal landlords, which was later vacated. His mother passed away when he was just 2 years old, but his father decided to never remarry. He recalls an interesting a very interesting incident about the religious relations between the two communities prior to the Partition through the motif of parrots. He says that keeping parrots as domestic pets was a very widely accepted norm during those times, and the Hindu women would teach Urdu poetry and couplets to the their parrots, whereas the Muslim women would teach poetry and couplets from Hindu literary texts to their parrots. When he was four years old, he remembers going to the Ganges river with Hindu families and would also celebrate Holi and Diwali with them, and would be done so respectful of each other’s boundaries.He remembers the Indian lawyer, and philanthropist Rash Behari Bose, who was the key person in organising the Indian National Army. His work was to organises and agitate the young revolutionaries against the colonial power. He says that, “In those times, the young men of the historic Anglo-Arabic school of Ajmeri Gate would participate heavily in this movement initiated by the Indian National Army (INA). May father was one of them and I clearly recall that he would tell me how he was taught to make explosives and bombs that could be used for revolts. My father along with Rash Behari Bose would be on the forefront of such activities, and I grew up amongst all their idealism and members.” He recalls the interesting Delhi Conspiracy Case which also involved his father, “When Lord Hardinge’s howdah, the then governor-general of India, was passing through the streets of Chandni Chowk, Bose was dressed in the garb of a woman, and my father had put his ladder on the backside of Company Bagh. Bose then took out a homemade bomb and threw it on Lord and Lady Hardinge but it only ended up injuring them through splinters.” He says that they were told not to come under the scanner of the police, and he and his contemporaries all hailed from Anglo-Arabic school, who participated actively in the freedom movement. He says they worked under the leadership of Jugal Kishore Khanna, who lived in Dariba Kalan, and was associated with the Congress and later the INA. He says, “We would work as secret messengers and would take old cloth bags and tie it around us with some pieces of silver and gold and then walk on the streets pretending to be sellers, and shout out aloud if anybody had silver to sell. The person would then come down and take away the message from us, and that is how we would not get caught.” He recalls that the Congress workers who were under the leadership of Asif Ali, later came under Brahma Prakash who went onto become the first Chief Minister of Independent India.He has continued to live in his ancestral home for 106 years now, and was in that same house when the Partition took place. At the time of the Partition, he was 37 years old, and had an illegal pass by a Hindu name ‘Ram Kishan’ which helped him to travel around the city and not be contained by the curfew that would be put on the Muslims in Delhi. He says, “Many killings took place during that time. My work would be to make a daily trip to Nizammudin station where the trains would be leaving for Pakistan, and people would travel from Delhi, and they would get injured during those travels so I would escort them till the camp at Jama Masjid so that they could be quickly treated. The trains would leave from Old Delhi railway station, and the Muslims were treated very badly. The wagons that were provided by the Corporation to transport cattle, were used by the Muslim refugees to load their own belongings and they would pull it themselves and go to camps at Purana Qila.” He says that Partition was solely a result of various political forces, and stresses on the love both the religious communities had for each other before the Partition took place.Post Partition, he says that in Old Delhi the refugees who came later put up their own businesses on the pavement right in front of the shops, and started selling the same products at a lesser cost which affected their business. This was one of the major points of discord. He says, “The decision to stay on in India, and not migrate to Pakistan was very simple for me and my family because my ancestors had through the generations fought on this land. My father fought for the Independence of this country, so there was no question of leaving our own home. Although, my father did receive many persuasive letters from authorities in the newly formed Pakistan to come there. However, his father sat him down and asked him to write a reply, in which he clearly recalls that he wrote, ‘Do rivers like the Ganges or Yamuna flow in Karachi? Does Lal Quila stand on that land? Is there my beloved Jama Masjid there? If yes, then I will come in a jiffy. If no, then don’t ever write to me again.’ Although, his father never stopped him or any of his siblings from migrating but none of them did. But today he is pained at the current state of affairs, and completely opposite to what they had hoped for when fighting for Independence. He angrily adds, “The nation today might be independent, but it is not even close to what we had dreamed of as young revolutionaries.”He completed his matriculation from Punjab University. He was an ace hockey player and was selected by Delhi Hockey Association in 1942, played with Dhyanchand and participated in various tournaments, and visited Karachi and Lahore before the Partition took place. One of his friends named Qayyum, who was also a great hockey player migrated to Pakistan after the Partition. He says that all his friends and contemporaries who passed away and today, he is the only now left who saw all the incidents unfolding in front of him. Today, he lives with his son and wife.He relays a very important and historical memory of his life wherein he was given the task of providing food and shelter to Sardar Bhagat Singh for two months, when he had in the process of planning to explode bombs in the Central Legislative Assembly. He says, “There are many who laid down their lives for the country, but there are few like who had the grit and determination of Bhagat Singh. He always wanted to be a martyr for the country and was ready to lay down his life in a matter of minutes if it would get freedom from the colonial rulers.” He then pauses to sadly reflect and says, “But this is definitely not the freedom which any of us wanted. I never wanted to die, because I wanted to live and work for Independent India.” He says that Partition shouldn’t have taken place as both the countries would have been stronger united in all spheres of development.
4 video files
Delhi (India : Union Territory)
Delhi (India : Union Territory), June 5, 2016
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Miami Doctor Apologizes for Viral Uber Attack
On Wednesday morning, Florida doctor Anjali Ramkissoon appeared on “Good Morning America,” where she apologized for attacking an Uber driver last week.
She told George Stephanopoulos, "I see a person that is not me. I’m ashamed. I still can’t watch the entire video. Every time someone brings it up or tries to ask me, 'What was happening at this point?,' I just, I can’t.” Watch!
Last week, Ramkissoon was caught on video hitting an Uber driver and throwing items out of his car in Miami. She said about the incident, "In the moment, I was just so angry I wasn’t really thinking, and if I could take it back I would. There is absolutely no excuse for my actions. I am ashamed. I am so sorry. I've hurt so many people with this."
Before the attack, Ramkissoon revealed that she had just split from her boyfriend on the same day that she learned her father had been admitted to the hospital. She shared, "I was extremely stressed out that day. It was probably one of the worst days of my life, and I was caught at my lowest moment. Nothing like this has ever happened. I made a huge mistake, the biggest mistake of my life, and that person is not me.”
Ramkissoon is facing the consequences of her actions. “Yes, I’m on administrative leave from my job right now, but at the same time, this has not just affected my career, it’s also affected my family. It’s affected my personal life. I get it. I did something extremely horrible, and I'm also extremely sorry for it.”
"I did it and I’m ashamed of what I did, and this would never happen again. At the same time, I think that I should also speak out to send a message out to people and the public to be careful and use my story as a lesson to be careful what you do in public, because the things that we do can be taped and we can have to suffer severe ramifications for these things,” she reiterated.
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The University of British Columbia Vancouver campus
Laboratory of Behavioural Neuroendocrinology
Dr. Liisa Galea
Current Lab Members
Estrogens and Cognition
Estrogens, Androgens, and Neurogenesis
Sex Differences in Response to Stress: Relation to Depressive Phenotypes
Maternal Brain
Research Images
Join the Lab
» Home » Publications
Here are some of our featured publications. You can find a complete list on PubMed or Google.
Sheppard PAS, Choleris E, Galea LAM (2019). Structural plasticity of the hippocampus in response to estrogens in female rodents. Molecular Brain, (IF 4.008)
Duarte-Guterman P, Leuner B, Galea LAM (2019). Long and Short term effects of Motherhood on brain and behavior. Frontiers in Neuroendocrinology. (IF 6.875)
Galea LAM, Frokjaer VG (2019). Perinatal Depression: Embracing variability towards better treatment and outcomes. Neuron (IF=14.318)
Eid, R.S., Gobinath, A., Galea, LAM (2019).Sex Differences in Depression: Insights from Clinical and Preclinical Studies. Progress in Neurobiology. (IF=14.192)
Eid, R.S., Chaiton, J, Lieblich, SE, Bodnar, T, Weinberg, J., Galea, LAM (2019). Early and Late Effects of Maternal Experience on Hippocampal Neurogenesis, Microglia, and the Circulating Cytokine Milieu. Neurobiology of Aging (IF=5.153).
Yagi, S., Galea, L.A.M. (2019). Sex Differences in Hippocampal Cognition and Neurogenesis. Neuropsychopharmacology (6.399).
Galea, L.A.M., Roes, M.M., Dimech C.J., Chow, C, Mahmoud, R., Lieblich, S.E., Duarte-Guterman, P. (2018). Premarin has opposing effects on spatial learning, neural activation, and serum cytokines in middle aged female rats depending on reproductive history. Neurobiology of Aging (IF=5.153).
Galea, L.A.M., Qiu, W, Duarte-Guterman, P. (2018). Beyond Sex Differences: Short and Long-Term Implications of Motherhood on Women’s Health. Current Opinion in Physiology (IF=4.010).
Swift-Gallant, A., Duarte-Guterman, P, Hamson, DK, Ibrahim, M., Monks, DA, Galea, LAM (2018). Neural androgen receptors affect the number of surviving new neurons in the adult dentate gyrus of male mice. Journal of Neuroendocrinology (IF=3.392).
Gobinath, A.R., Richardson, R., Chow, C, Workman, J.L., Lieblich, S.E., Barr, A.M., Galea, L.A.M. (2018) Voluntary running influences the efficacy of fluoxetine treatment in a model of postpartum depression. Neuropharmacology, 128:106-118 (IF=5.106).
Choleris E Galea, L.A.M., Sohrabji F, Frick KM, (2018) Sex differences in the brain: implications for behavioral and biomedical research Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews (IF: 8.802).
Commentary: Barha, C.K., and Galea, L.A.M. (2017). News and Views: The maternal ‘baby brain’ revisited. Nature Neuroscience (IF=19.912).
Galea, L.A.M., Frick KM, Hampson, E., Sohrabji F, Choleris E (invited review; 2017) Why estrogens matter for behavior and brain health. Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews (IF: 8.802).
Mahmoud R, Wainwright SR., Galea, L.A.M. (special issue editor; 2016). Sex Hormones and Adult Hippocampal Neurogenesis: Regulation, Implications, and Potential Mechanisms. Frontiers in Neuroendocrinology 41:129-52 (IF: 9.425).
Mahmoud R, Wainwright SR, Chaiton J, Lieblich SE, Galea LAM. (2016). Ovarian hormones impart resilience against chronic unpredictable stress and modulate the effects of fluoxetine on hippocampal plasticity in middle-aged female rats. Neuropharmacology (IF=5.106).
Wainwright, S.R., Barha, CK, Hamson DK, Epp, JR, Rutishauser U., Galea, L.A.M. (2016). Enzymatic depletion of the polysialic acid moiety associated with the neural cell adhesion molecule inhibits antidepressant efficacy. Neuropsychopharmacology (IF: 7.048).
Workman, J.L., Gobinath, A.R., Brummelte, S, Galea, LAM (2016) Parity modifies the effects of fluoxetine and corticosterone on HPA axis responses and hippocampal neurogenesis. Neuropharmacology 105:443-453 (IF=5.106).
Brummelte, S., Galea, L.A.M. (2016). Postpartum depression: etiology, treatment, and effects on maternal care. Hormones and Behavior, 77:153-66. (IF=4.632).
Yagi, S., Chow C, Lieblich, SE, Galea, L.A.M. (2016) Sex and strategy use matters for pattern separation, adult neurogenesis and immediate early gene expression in the hippocampus. Hippocampus, 26, 87-101 (IF=4.162).
Workman, J.L, Raineki, C., Weinberg, J, Galea, L.A.M (2015) Alcohol and pregnancy: effects on maternal care, HPA axis function, and hippocampal neurogenesis in adult females. Psychoneurendocrinology (IF=5.591).
Workman, J.L., Chan, M. Galea, L.A.M. (2015). Prior high corticosterone exposure reduces activation of immature neurons in the ventral hippocampus in response to spatial and non-spatial memory. Hippocampus 25(3):329-44 (IF=4.302).
Hamson D.K., Wainwright S.R., Taylor J.R., Jones B.A., Watson N.V., Galea L.A.M. (2013) Androgens Increase Survival of Adult Born Neurons in the Dentate Gyrus by an Androgen Receptor Dependent but Cell Non-Autonomous Mechanism. Endocrinology (IF:4.469).
Epp,JR., Beasley, C.L.,Galea, L.A.M. (2013). Increased Hippocampal Neurogenesis and p21 Expression in Depression: Dependent on Antidepressants, Sex, Age, and Antipsychotic Exposure. Neuropsychopharmacology (IF=8.67).
Chow C, Epp, JR, Lieblich SE, Barha,C.K., Galea, L.A.M. (2013) Sex differences in neurogenesis and activation of new neurons in response to spatial learning. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 38, 1236-1250. (IF:5.809).
Brummelte, S., Galea, LAM, Devlin, A.M., Oberlander, T.F. (2013) Antidepressant Use during Pregnancy and Serotonin Transporter Genotype (SLC6A4) Affect Newborn Serum Reelin Levels Developmental Psychobiology, 55: 518-29 (IF:2.062).
McClure, RE,+ Barha,C.K.+, Galea, L.A.M. (2013) 17β-Estradiol, but not estrone, increases the survival and activation of new neurons in the hippocampus in response to spatial memory in adult female rats. Hormones and Behavior, 63: 144-157. (IF=3.865) (+ both authors contributed equally).
Barha,C.K., Galea, L.A.M. (2013). The hormone therapy, Premarin, impairs hippocampus-dependent spatial learning and memory and reduces activation of new dentate gyrus neurons in response to memory in female rats. Neurobiology of Aging, 34(3):986-1004. (IF=6.189).
Uban, K.A. Rummel, J., Floresco, S.B, Galea, L.A.M. (2012). Estradiol Modulates Effort-Based Decision Making in Female Rats. Neuropsychopharmacology, 37(2):390-401. (IF:6.813).
Barha,C.K., Galea, L.A.M. (2011) Motherhood alters the cellular response to estrogens in the hippocampus later in life. Neurobiology of Aging, 32:2091-2095. (IF:6.239).
Barha, C.K., Dalton G.L., and Galea, L.A.M. (2010). Low doses of 17α-estradiol and 17β-estradiol facilitate, while higher doses of estrone and 17α- and 17β-estradiol impair, contextual fear conditioning in adult female rats. Neuropsychopharmacology, 35, 547-559. (IF:6.813).
Vancouver Campus
Djavad Mowafaghian Centre for Brain Health
2215 Wesbrook Mall
Website galealab.psych.ubc.ca
Email liisa.galea@ubc.ca
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Nobel Prize in Physics Hits Close to Home
Posted on October 5, 2011 by Helene McLaughlin • 0 Comments
The Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded yesterday. I have to tell you that I was shocked and thrilled when I heard the announcement on the radio. You see, when I was working at Space Telescope Science Institute, one of my absolute favorite programs that I worked on was a high-z supernova search lead by Adam Riess. I actually discovered a couple of supernovae during that program, and while it was meticulous work, it was incredibly rewarding. The search that I was part of was follow-up to the work for which he earned the Nobel Prize for yesterday. Congratulations to all of the Nobel Prize winners, especially my former boss, Adam Riess!
Yesterday morning’s press release was short, but changed three lives forever.
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2011
with one half to
Saul Perlmutter
The Supernova Cosmology Project
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and University of California,
Berkeley, CA, USA
and the other half jointly to
Brian P. Schmidt
The High-z Supernova Search Team
Australian National University,
Weston Creek, Australia
Adam G. Riess
Johns Hopkins University and Space Telescope Science Institute,
“for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe through observations of distant supernovae”
In 1998, the field of cosmology was rocked by the findings of two different research teams, one led by Perlmutter and another led by Schmidt and Riess. These teams simultaneously mapped extremely distant Type Ia supernova in an effort to map the Universe. A Type Ia supernova is an explosion of an old compact star that is as heavy as the Sun but as small as the Earth. These supernova can emit as much light as a whole galaxy.
Combined, the two research teams found over 50 distant supernovae whose light was weaker than expected — a sign that the expansion of the Universe is accelerating. The fact that both teams came to the same conclusion at about the same time was confirmation that both teams had overcome the numerous obstacles to observing extremely distant supernovae. It had been widely accepted for nearly 100 years that the Universe has been steadily expanding since the Big Bang. This discovery stated that the expansion is accelerating over time, implying that at some point in the extremely distant future the Universe will end in ice.
It is theorized that this acceleration of expansion is due to dark energy. Of course, defining dark energy is one of the driving forces in physics today. However, it is widely accepted that nearly 75% of the known universe is filled with dark energy. What does that mean? That we have so much more to learn about our Universe.
One of the most famous Type 1a Supernova: Eta Carina
Liked it? Take a second to support Helene McLaughlin on Patreon!
Filed Under: Experiments, GeekMom
Helene McLaughlin
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The Feminist Theory and Gender Studies section has long been cognisant of the role taken by scholars in activism, advocacy and community engagement. In 2016 the section established an Early Career Award for Community Engagement to recognize those efforts to build communities and forge conversations about issues that are relevant to the FTGS but which often go unacknowledged or unrewarded by academic institutions.
The 2017 FTGS Early Career Award for Community Engagement was awarded to Dr Melanie Richter-Montpetit, Lecturer in Politics and International Relations at the University of Sheffield, UK. The Awards Committee recognised the commitment that Dr Richter-Montpetit has shown to promoting queer, anti-racist and de-colonial approaches in all aspects of her work and the dedication she has shown in raising awareness of these issues.
Some key examples include her work with the ISA-LGBTQA Caucus, in particular efforts to supporting struggles around stigmatized sexualities and gender expression beyond LGBT rights narrowly understood. As a result, the LGBTQA Courage Award 2014 went to No More Silence, a community group working to break the silence around the hundreds of missing and murdered Indigenous women and Two-Spirit people across Canada/Turtle Island. This included organizing a fundraiser to finance a community-run database documenting premature and violent deaths, and honouring the victims. Together with Dr Alison Howell, she co-organized a similar fundraiser along with a special panel for the recipient of the 2015 LGBTQA Courage Award, the New Orleans-based group BreakOUT, an organization of and for queer and trans youth that works to stop the criminalization of LGBTQ youth.
To help promote more diversity in the discipline, Dr Richter-Montpetit has taken an active role in the mentoring of junior colleagues, and has been vocal in her support of colleagues facing sexual harassment. At ISA 2015, her social media criticism of the All-White line-up at the high profile ‘Sapphire Series’ prompted much debate about diversity and equity within the discipline. Most recently, Dr Richter-Montpetit co-organized a set of Special Panels at ISA 2017 on challenging oppression in the discipline. At her home institution, she has been involved in two major cross-departmental teaching and learning projects on equity and diversity. Dr. Richter-Montpetit currently serves as the Chair of the LGBTQA Caucus as well as the LGBTQA Caucus Program Chair for ISA 2018.
Honorable mention for the 2017 was given to Dr Zoe Marks of the University of Edinburgh.
The 2018 award will be announced in advance of the International Studies Association annual conference in San Francisco, USA.
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Tag Archives: Coke
February 4, 2014 by genxatmidlife
I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing All Over Again
Courtesy of keen.com
Remember that Coca-Cola ad from the early 70s featuring the song, “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing”? This latest one from the Super Bowl captures that same spirit, and I find myself both skeptical and touched by it.
When I saw the ad during the Super Bowl, I didn’t register what was really happening. The song starts off in English, and I was at a party where people were talking, so I didn’t actually hear that there were parts sung in foreign languages. And why would I take special note of the various cultures represented visually? We are, thankfully, well past the point when seeing people with different skin color, hair and clothes draws attention.
So when I viewed the commercial yesterday as a result of all of the buzz, my initial reaction was to dismiss it as a ploy. But then I remembered the old commercial from my childhood — the one with “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing” — and I thought about what might have been behind this idea.
We live in a time that seems less conformist but also more polarized than that of my childhood and the preceding decades. Although we hope that it’s because people are more open-minded about differences now, I think that what is considered acceptable behavior has shifted. Previously, a racist comment uttered at the office or in line at the grocery store might have been met with tentative uncommitted nods or obligatory silence by people who disagreed. Now, those making the comments are outing themselves as ignorant — even if their intended audience only thinks so because of how inappropriate such remarks are. Prejudice will always exist, unfortunately, though not necessarily along lines of race or nationality. There seems to be plenty of prejudice today about political parties and religion, among other things.
What struck me about the Coca-Cola commercial is how they motivated themselves to do something so bold. Obviously, they know that their money will come from a more diverse population from here on out. Those who complained on social media that “America The Beautiful” is our national anthem and that Coca-Cola blasphemed by having it sung in different languages are in the minority. (Let’s not be prejudiced against their intelligence, though. Chances are that their initial outrage got the best of them, and they really do know what our national anthem is.)
Still, it was a risky move — people who support the old status quo are very loud. Perhaps Coke’s execs were inspired by the Cheerios ad from earlier this year that featured a bi-racial family. Maybe they just wanted to be talked about… after all, they paid good money for that spot.
I’d like to think that there was a creative type sitting in his or her office several months back who had this idea… to extend the brand’s history of unity vs. division and bring it into the present in a way that is obvious and unafraid. It’s not enough to teach the world to sing anymore. We need and want unity on a different level. It would be wonderful if someday acceptance could go beyond race, nationality and culture to include those who feel more intensely, struggle in ways that can’t be defined by our narrow definition of disability and just happen to think differently.
We’re not there yet. In our schools, conformity is a sought-after quality in many ways, from test scores to fashions. The Disney Channel may feature ethnically diverse casts, but they are funneling kids in one direction (no pun intended) when it comes to things like behavior, respect (for self and others) and personal choices. Any parent raising a child who “marches to their own beat” knows what it feels like to walk the tightrope of supporting their need to be who they are and the desire to protect them from others’ opinions.
The irony is that while we want our pop culture to celebrate differences, we aren’t entirely ready to bring them into our day-to-day world… even we GenXers whose legacy of skepticism is strong.
The lyrics from Rush’s “Subdivisions” — conform or be cast out — remain relevant, but maybe less so than they used to be, which would be a very good thing. I hope a company like Coca-Cola knows that to the rest of us, acceptance is about more than selling soft drinks.
Posted in Totally Random
Tagged Coca-Cola, Coke, generation X, GenX, I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing, Super Bowl commercials
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US Economy shrinks at 6.2%
By JEANNINE AVERSA • Associated Press • February 28, 2009
Excerpts as reported in Courier Post
The economy contracted at a staggering 6.2 percent pace at the end of 2008, the worst showing in a quarter-century, as consumers and businesses ratcheted back spending, plunging the country deeper into recession.
The Commerce Department report released Friday showed the economy sinking much faster than the 3.8 percent annualized drop for the October-December quarter first estimated last month. It also was considerably weaker than the 5.4 percent annualized decline economists expected.
A much sharper cutback in consumer spending — which accounts for about 70 percent of economic activity — along with a bigger drop in U.S. exports sales, and reductions in business spending and inventories all contributed to the largest revision on records dating to 1976.
Looking ahead, economists predict consumers and businesses will keep cutting back spending, making the first six months of this year especially rocky.
“Right now we’re in the period of maximum recession stress, where the big cuts are being made,” said economist Ken Mayland, president of ClearView Economics.
The new report offered grim proof that the economy’s economic tailspin accelerated in the fourth quarter under a slew of negative forces feeding on each other. The economy started off 2008 on feeble footing, picked up a bit of speed in the spring and then contracted at an annualized rate of 0.5 percent in the third quarter.
The faster downhill slide in the final quarter of last year came as the financial crisis — the worst since the 1930s — intensified.
Consumers at the end of the year slashed spending by the most in 28 years. They chopped spending on cars, furniture, appliances, clothes and other things. Businesses retrenched sharply, too, dropping the ax on equipment and software, home building and commercial construction.
Before Friday’s report was released, many economists were projecting an annualized drop of 5 percent in the current January-March quarter. However, given the fourth quarter’s showing and the dismal state of the jobs market, Mayland believes a decline of closer to 6 percent in the current quarter is possible.
The nation’s unemployment rate is now at 7.6 percent, the highest in more than 16 years. The Federal Reserve expects the jobless rate to rise to close to 9 percent this year, and probably remain above normal levels of around 5 percent into 2011.
A smaller decline in the economy is expected for the second quarter of this year. But the new GDP figure — like the old one — marked the weakest quarterly showing since an annualized drop of 6.4 percent in the first quarter of 1982, when the country was suffering through an intense recession.
“It’s going to be a challenging 2009,” Scott Davis, chief executive officer of global shipping giant UPS, said Thursday while speaking to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Washington.
American consumers — spooked by vanishing jobs, sinking home values and shrinking investment portfolios have cut back. In turn, companies are slashing production and payrolls. Rising foreclosures are aggravating the already stricken housing market, hard-to-get credit has stymied business investment and is crimping the ability of some consumers to make big-ticket purchases.
It’s creating a self-perpetuating vicious cycle that Washington policymakers are finding hard to break.
To jolt life back into the economy, President Barack Obama recently signed a $787 billion recovery package of increased government spending and tax cuts. The president also unveiled a $75 billion plan to stem home foreclosures and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said as much as $2 trillion could be plowed into the financial system to jump-start lending.
For all of 2008, the economy grew by just 1.1 percent, weaker than the government initially estimated. That was down from a 2 percent gain in 2007 and marked the slowest growth since the last recession in 2001.
With Friday’s figures, Mayland lowered his forecast for this year to show a deeper contraction of just over 2 percent.
In the fourth quarter, consumers cut spending at a 4.3 percent pace. That was deeper than the initial 3.5 percent annualized drop and marked the biggest decline since the second quarter of 1980.
Businesses slashed spending on equipment and software at an annualized pace of 28.8 percent in the final quarter of last year. That also was deeper than first reported and was the worst showing since the first quarter of 1958.
Fallout from the housing collapse spread to other areas. Builders cut spending on commercial construction projects by 21.1 percent, the most since the first quarter of 1975. Home builders slashed spending at a 22.2 percent pace, the most since the start of 2008.
A sharper drop in U.S. exports also factored into the weaker fourth-quarter performance. Economic troubles overseas are sapping demand for domestic goods and services.
Businesses also cut investments in inventories — as they scrambled to reduce stocks in the face of dwindling customer demand — another factor contributing to the weaker fourth-quarter reading. The government last month thought businesses had boosted inventories, which added to gross domestic product, or GDP.
GDP is the value of all goods and services produced in the United States and is the best barometer of the country’s economic health.
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke earlier this week told Congress that the economy is suffering a “severe contraction” and is likely to keep shrinking in the first six months of this year. But he planted a seed of hope that the recession might end his year if the government managed to prop up the shaky banking system.
Even in the best-case scenario that the recession ends this year and an economic recovery happens next year, unemployment is likely to keep rising.
That’s partly because many analysts don’t think the early stages of any recovery will be vigorous, and because companies won’t be inclined to ramp up hiring until they feel confident that any economic rebound will have staying power.
More job losses were announced this week. JPMorgan Chase & Co. on Thursday said it would eliminate about 12,000 jobs as it absorbs the operations of failed savings and loan Washington Mutual Inc. That figure includes 9,200 cuts announced previously and 2,800 jobs expected to be lost through attrition.
The NFL said Wednesday that the league dropped 169 jobs through buyouts, layoffs and other reductions. Textile maker Milliken & Co. said it would cut 650 jobs at facilities worldwide, while jeweler Zale Corp. said it will close 115 stores and eliminate 245 positions.
The news keeps getting gloomier! I guess there is no easy way t0 say it. We took our eye off the ball. We elected officals to represent our interest and take care of our welfare. We can try to point fingers but we are all responsible. We all drank the kool-aid.
We thought this could never happen to us. We’re educated, life is good. We became complacient and did not plan for our future. I know President Obama is throwing a lot against the wall, hoping something will stick.
Roosevelt introduced the NewDeal. If something didn’t work, he said let’s tweak it, what else can we do. Obama is following this lead. It may not be pretty, but we are not left with many alternatives. We can see what happens when we do nothing or we are caught up in our own self interest.
We are all one and we are here to help one another. We must approach this dilemna with the hopes of picking everyone up, not just a few. There will be difficult decisions. We are resilient and we will rebuild and prevail You may leave a comment or email george@hbsadvantage.com .
Let us know your thoughs?
Filed in business, Control Government Spending, corporate finance, finance, Fiscal Responsibility, job losses, Unemployment / Payroll Tax ·Tags: American Economy, economy, Obama, obama economic plan, politics, recession, stimulus, unemployment
Preparing for a Flood of Energy Efficiency Spending
By KATE GALBRAITH Published: February 25, 2009
As reported in Huffington Post Green
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — To the casual eye, the basement of this city’s Firehouse 9 looks like a jumble of old hydrants, Dr Pepper cartons, rakes and random gear. To specialists in energy efficiency, the 1960s-era building is a mess of a different sort: wasteful hot water heaters for the firefighters’ showers, ancient refrigerators and outdated lights.
Shawn Poynter for The New York Times
Mike Saylor, left, and John Plack, Jr. look at bulbs in Knoxville’s Fire House 9. The city is about to find out which buildings are wasting the most energy.
Wrapping up an elaborate energy audit, Knoxville is about to find out which of 99 city buildings are wasting the most energy. It hopes to begin repairs this summer, just in time to catch a tsunami of federal stimulus money earmarked for such unglamorous tasks as replacing light bulbs and fixing leaky insulation.
Knoxville’s timing is excellent. The city began the arduous work of cataloging deficiencies before the stimulus bill passed, and it is well along in planning its next steps. But experts worry that other beneficiaries, especially cities, are not ready to oversee the huge sums of energy-efficiency money about to come their way.
The money in the bill is enough to pay for a tremendous expansion of efficiency efforts across the country. But as with other parts of the stimulus package, the efficiency plan is creating tension between spending the money quickly, to get rapid economic stimulus, and spending it well, to do the most good over the long run.
“There’s enormous opportunity here for expansion of energy efficiency in this country,” said Lowell Ungar, the policy director for the Alliance to Save Energy, an advocacy group. “But there is certainly the potential for waste.”
President Obama signed the stimulus package into law on Feb. 17, hailing it as a shot of money big enough to help shake the economy from its lethargy while advancing many of his campaign priorities. Accelerating the country’s energy transition is at the top of his list. Many experts in the field agree with him that carefully chosen investments in efficiency will ultimately save more than they cost, by cutting energy bills.
At least $20 billion in the stimulus bill was earmarked for programs like improving the efficiency of government buildings and the homes of poor people, and trying to find better ways to save energy. That is far more, advocates say, than any bill in history. Within a few months, the money is likely to start landing in the bank accounts of thinly staffed state and city agencies that are accustomed to scraping for a dime here, a dollar there.
Utah expects that its state energy office will receive $40 million for energy efficiency, renewable energy and related programs — 123 times the size of the office’s current budget, said Jason Berry, who manages the four-person unit. He is about to go on a hiring spree.
The package contains $5 billion to weatherize low-income homes through the Department of Energy, enough to give the state programs that manage that work 10 to 30 times the money they received last year, said Christina Kielich, a department spokeswoman.
For advocates of this relatively obscure program, “it’s like they finally got to the other side of the desert and it’s pouring rain,” said Seth Kaplan, a vice president of the Conservation Law Foundation, an environmental group.
The stimulus package also contains $4.5 billion to modernize federal buildings and $2.5 billion for research into energy efficiency and renewable energy. The biggest chunk, $6.3 billion, will be distributed by the Energy Department in grants to state and local governments, which can spend the money on things as diverse as thicker window panes for state capitols and rebates for homeowners who change their light bulbs.
Homes and commercial buildings account for 39 percent of national energy consumption. Experts say that improving their efficiency is not only cost-effective but also a good way to reduce the nation’s emissions of the greenhouse gases that cause global warming.
But figuring out how to spend the money effectively — learning which university buildings need their doors caulked, for example, or which firehouse walls have insulation that is too thin — can involve time-consuming, tricky analysis by skilled technicians.
“People are very conservative about their buildings,” said Donald Gilligan, the president of the National Association of Energy Service Companies, a trade group. “Nobody wants to put a failed technology into the school buildings or have the lights not work.”
In Knoxville, a team of auditors hired by the city is spending six months peering into the grimy nooks of fire and police stations and even the convention center, where one employee referred to the downstairs boiler area as a “money-eating room.”
Knoxville — which says the stimulus money may help accelerate or expand its program — hopes to reduce the city’s energy bills as much as 25 percent, and the city is “definitely on the front end of the wave as far as efficiency and municipalities addressing efficiency,” said John Plack Jr., a director of project development for Ameresco, which is conducting the Knoxville energy audit.
In the Southeastern region of the country, where Mr. Plack works, low electricity prices have often made saving energy an afterthought, unlike in California and much of the Northeast. For example, Nashville, nearly 200 miles west of Knoxville, has not conducted an energy audit of its city buildings, though it hopes to use stimulus money to look through its own stock of fire stations and libraries.
“There’s a lot of municipalities out there who are completely unaware this is moving forward,” Mr. Kaplan said, referring especially to smaller cities. “They just don’t have the infrastructure in place to deal with this.”
The Energy Department, which is doling out most of the grants, has been assailed on Capitol Hill for delays in disbursing other types of assistance for clean energy. Ms. Kielich said in an e-mail message that the department hoped efficiency grants would begin flowing to city and state energy offices within 120 days, and that it planned to begin disbursing weatherization money “expeditiously and responsibly.”
On the receiving end, absorbing the huge increase in money for weatherization could be particularly challenging, said Ian Bowles, the secretary of energy and environmental affairs for Massachusetts. Though he contends it can be done, “the weatherization folks are going to have to quintuple their effort in order to put that money out,” he said.
In some cases, the managers of efficiency programs may not need to look far to find ways to spend the money.
In Knoxville, the Community Action Committee, whose operations include helping poor people weatherize their homes, works from a building with a $14,000 monthly utility bill — some of it because of an enormous skylight that lets in too much blistering Tennessee sunshine in the summer.
“It’s embarrassing,” said Barbara Kelly, executive director of the committee. “We do better for our clients than we do for us.”
I applaud the stimulus but I am always nervous when large sums of money is out into the government’s hands. Responsible spending is the key to this stimulus spending. Investing in the infrastructure ( roads, bridges, rails and energy), is an investment in our future. This will only make us a stronger nation.
Irresponsible spending and earmarks will only tarnish our efforts and be counterproductive. The United States is poised to lead the next great energy evolution.
Let’s be sure to hold our elected officials accountable!
Filed in alternative energy, Control Government Spending, corporate finance, DE Solar, economy, energy, energy independence, Fiscal Responsibility, Government Spending, green economy, NJ Solar, PA Solar, solar, stimulus ·Tags: alternative energy, economy, energy, energy alternatives, energy independence, finance, green energy, NJ Alternative Energy, PA Alternative Energy, solar, stimulus, stimulus package
Will Obama Put Real Money on the Table for Clean Energy?
Written by Jesse Jenkins
Jesse is an energy and climate policy analyst, activist and blogger.
Posted February 24, 2009 | 02:49 PM (EST)
Originally posted at the Breakthrough Institute
For those paying close attention, there was a nugget of critical energy and climate policy news buried at the tail end of a Saturday New York Times story focused on President Obama’s budget plans:
On energy policy, Mr. Obama’s budget will show new revenues by 2012 from his proposal to require companies to buy permits from the government for greenhouse gas emissions above a certain cap. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that would rise to $300 billion a year by 2020.
Since companies would pass their costs on to customers, Mr. Obama would have the government use most of the revenues for relief to families to offset higher utility bills and related expenses. The remaining revenues would cover his proposals for $15 billion a year in spending and tax incentives to develop alternative energy.
Many climate advocates will no doubt read this with excitement at Obama’s apparent commitment to move forward with a cap and trade proposal, even during these tough economic times. But if you’re looking closely at the public investments Obama plans to pair with his carbon pricing proposal, you’ve got to start worrying: if Obama remains committed to spending just $15 billion per year to spur a new energy economy, America will fail in that endeavor. Cap or no cap, I’m not sure you can find one energy expert that thinks the public investments required to build a new energy economy will cost that little.
I know I may be chastised for criticizing Obama so soon after he delivered an unprecedented clean energy investment in the stimulus. But let’s be clear: those investments were just the beginning, and Obama needs to articulate a clear and viable plan to make the sustained commitment and ongoing public investments necessary to truly build a new energy economy.
The public is overwhelmingly behind President Obama right now, and if he was elected with a mandate to do anything beyond stem the economic crisis, it was a mandate to build a new, clean energy economy that finally secures America’s energy independence and averts potentially catastrophic climate change.
Yet once you start looking at the critical areas where public investment in a clean energy economy is necessary – research, development and demonstration, or RD&D; critical infrastructure, like a modernized electrical grid; deployment incentives to spur emerging technologies; and efficiency incentives, financing and other investments to retrofit American homes, businesses and factories – it’s not hard to see why the $15 billion per year Obama has pledged is simply not up to the task.
RD&D: There’s widespread consensus – including among Obama advisers like White House science adviser John Holdren, Sec. of Energy Steven Chu, and Obama campaign energy adviser Dan Kammen – that public investments in clean energy RD&D alone need to rise to $15-30 billion annually, putting them on the same scale as other national innovation priorities (e.g. health research at NIH, military R&D, etc.) and past R&D initiatives (e.g. Apollo, Manhattan, Project Independence, etc.).
Building a 21st century electrical grid: building a modern electrical grid, including long-distance transmission expansion and the integration of smart grid (and probably utility-scale energy storage) technologies will cost on the scale of hundreds of billions over the coming decade or two. Not all of that will have to come from the public sector, but a sizable chunk will, maybe $5-15 billion annually. Breakthrough proposes creating a National Electricity Modernization Authority to facilitate and finance grid modernization activities across the country, investing $50 billion in public seed money to get the Authority started. More on what it will take to build a 21st Century Grid in an upcoming post…
Driving clean energy deployment: Incentives to spur the deployment of emerging clean energy technologies and drive down their cost are also necessary, even with a cap and trade program in place. Denmark provides a perfect case study of the necessity of pairing carbon pricing with direct investments in clean energy technology deployment. Looking elsewhere in Europe, it’s also not hard to see that the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme doesn’t preclude Germany’s sizable investment in solar deployment, a roughly 50 cents/kWh feed-in tariff, for example, nor does it stop nations across the EU from putting in place more modest deployment incentives for wind, solar, biomass and other renewables. Here in the United States, the three-year PTC expansion in the stimulus is projected to cost $13 billion over the next ten years, and the cost of supporting emerging renewable energy technologies will only increase as the scale of their deployment ramps up.
If the United States launched a cohesive strategy to support a whole portfolio of emerging clean energy technologies (for both electricity and transportation), aimed at achieving economies of scale and improving price and performance, it could cost on the scale of $30 billion annually before long. Those are smart investments though to make clean energy cheap over time (in real, unsubsidized terms), especially when compared to the total expected cost of cap and trade ($100-300 billion/year). Since deployment incentives can be targeted strategically at specific technologies, they will cost our economy and taxpayers far less than the blunt instrument that is carbon pricing; why make all energy more expensive than solar (a three-to-five-fold increase in the price of energy) in order make solar competitive when you can design a deployment incentive specifically for solar that accomplishes the same goal at a fraction of the cost?
Rebuilding an efficient economy: Spurring widespread and ongoing energy efficiency retrofits and upgrades across multiple sectors of the US economy will require major public investments as well, particularly in the form of low-cost financing to bring down the high capital costs of efficiency retrofits – what I call the “Capital Barrier.” On the higher end, Architecture 2030 recently called for a $171 billion, two-year stimulus investment to bring down the Capital Barrier for efficiency, predominantly through low-interest mortgages and loans. Green for All, the Center on Wisconsin Strategies, and Center for American Progress have called for a much more modest investment of $15 billion over five years to underwrite the establishment of a $50 billion public revolving loan fund to bring down the Capital Barrier for efficiency retrofits. The stimulus bill, with at least $8.5 billion in annual investments in efficiency gives us another scale reference. And of course, those investments merely begin the task of building a more efficient American economy.
In summary, it’s no wonder the Breakthrough Institute is joined by the the Apollo Alliance, and the Center for American Progress in proposing public investments in clean energy on the scale of $50 billion annually. Obama’s plans to spend just $15 billion a year simply falls far short of what is needed (even after the good start he’s made in the stimulus).
So what will it take to get Obama to double, triple or even quadruple his commitment to the strategic public investments necessary to spark a clean energy economy?
Now, I’m not wedded to financing these investments entirely (or even at all) with money from carbon price revenue (especially since I’m not confident cap and trade will pass soon enough to provide a near-term revenue stream). But if the money doesn’t come from carbon auctions, it’s gotta come from elsewhere (and soon). Does Obama have a plan to finance the scale and type of clean energy investments on the scale we need?
Obama says that sparking a clean energy economy is his top priority (after getting the economy out of crisis). It’s time for him to put (real) money on the table.
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Obama signs stimulus plan
Written by Martin Lamonica
Martin LaMonica is a senior writer for CNET’s Green Tech blog.
President Obama signed into law a government stimulus package Tuesday and said the energy provisions will pave the path for doubling the amount of renewable energy in the next three years.
Energy is a major piece of the massive $787 billion package, totaling about $38 billion in government spending and about $20 billion in tax incentives over the next 10 years, according to estimates.
President Barack Obama signs the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in Denver.
(Credit: Screen capture by Martin LaMonica/CNET Networks)
Obama signed the bill, called the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, into law at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science where he later took a tour of the museum’s solar-panel installation.
The energy portions of the law are intended to promote rapid development of renewable energy sources and increase energy efficiency in buildings, appliances, and other sectors of the economy.
The president said he hoped that the clean-energy-related portions of the bill will inspire Americans the same way that President Kennedy’s goal to put a man on the moon did in the 1960s.
“I hope this investment will ignite our imagination once more in science, medicine, energy and make our economy stronger, our nation more secure, and our planet safer for our children,” Obama said before signing the bill.
The major energy-related portions of the law were largely left intact after Congressional debate. Overall, the plan will more than triple the amount of spending on clean-energy programs, said Daniel Weiss, a fellow at the Center for American Progress.
Major energy portions include:
A three-year extension to the tax credit for wind, which would have expired at the end of this year, and an extension until the end of 2013 for geothermal and biomass renewable-energy projects. The credit has been increased to 30 percent of the investment.
$4.5 billion in direct spending to modernize the electricity grid with smart-grid technologies.
$6.3 billion in state energy-efficient and clean-energy grants and $4.5 billion to make federal buildings more energy efficient.
$6 billion in loan guarantees for renewable energy systems, biofuel projects, and electric-power transmission facilities.
$2 billion in loans to manufacture advanced batteries and components for applications such as plug-in electric cars.
$5 billion to weatherize homes of up to 1 million low-income people.
$3.4 billion appropriated to the Department of Energy for fossil energy research and development, such as storing carbon dioxide underground at coal power plants.
A tax credit of between $2,500 and $5,000 for purchase of plug-in electric vehicles, available for the first 200,000 placed into service.
(Click here for full summary from the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE) and from law firm Dewey & LeBoeuf.)
Measuring the impact
In general, companies in the green-technology field have welcomed the focus on energy efficiency and renewable energy production in the law.
The law gives renewable-energy project developers an alternative to the existing federal subsidy. Many renewable-energy projects have been stalled, or scrapped, because many investors don’t have enough income to take advantage of a 30 percent federal tax credit. The bill now allows renewable-energy project developers to effectively get the same credit by applying for a loan from the Department of Energy for 30 percent of the project, explained Rhone Resch, the president of the Solar Energy Industry Association (SEIA).
The loan guarantees are designed to help companies to commercialize new energy technologies, by providing money for a manufacturing facility, for example. A number of green-tech companies, including flywheel storage company Beacon Power, electric-car company Tesla Motors, and battery maker A123 Systems have applied
More generally, investors and analysts said that the significance of the law is that it’s a step toward crafting a more comprehensive energy policy, based on sustained commitment to renewable energy and efficiency.
“For years, U.S. policymakers’ support for clean energy has been uneven,” said Michael Liebreich, the CEO of research firm New Energy Finance, in a statement. “No longer…the U.S. will have a great chance to be the growth engine for our industry over the next several years.
The spending on the bill on things like smart grid technologies and energy efficiency should have a rapid impact, said Dennis Costello, a venture capitalist at Braemar Energy Ventures. But he said that even with the economic stimulus of the government spending, the conditions for energy technology firms remains very difficult.
Specifically, he said the drop in the cost of oil over the past year makes it harder for a firm that is seeking to develop a replacement, such as biofuels. Also, the overall recession continues to dampen demand for products and financing remains challenging.
“It’s kind of refreshing to see at least beginnings of a real energy policy, some sort of unified approach to our energy problems,” Costello said. “But it isn’t going to solve our energy problems. There are a lot of countervailing factors to give pause to being overexuberant on the future of energy sector and clean tech.”
Analysts noted there are other challenges to a rapid change in the slow-moving energy sector.
The stimulus act gives the Department of Energy control over billions of dollars in loans and spending on research and development projects–more than the department’s annual budget. But the Energy Department has not dispersed money in the past few years because of its slow approval process, which Secretary Steven Chu said he intends to speed up.
Also, a sharp increase in renewable energy from wind and solar power requires building new power lines to bring electricity from windy and sunny areas to more populated regions.
Bramaer’s Costello said an industry association estimated that the stimulus act spending could lead to 3,000 new miles of transmission lines. However, siting these new lines is a contentious process and likely to meet local and state opposition.
“Siting of transmission lines is this going to be the Achilles’ heel of renewables,” said Elgie Holstein, a senior energy policy adviser in the Obama administration.
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Energy Plays a Big Part in the State of the Union
Last night’s State of the Union speech held no real surprises for environmentally-minded watchers. The president sounds like he’s ready for, well, change — and a cap-and-trade bill.
Joe Romm recapped the energy-related portions of the speech at ClimateProgress:
Yet he made clear that even in these darkest of times — indeed, especially in these darkest of times — we must make clean energy a top priority, we must address our dependence on oil, and we must “save our planet from the ravages of climate change” if we are to remain a great nation….
“But to truly transform our economy, protect our security, and save our planet from the ravages of climate change, we need to ultimately make clean, renewable energy the profitable kind of energy. So I ask this Congress to send me legislation that places a market-based cap on carbon pollution and drives the production of more renewable energy in America. And to support that innovation, we will invest fifteen billion dollars a year to develop technologies like wind power and solar power; advanced biofuels, clean coal, and more fuel-efficient cars and trucks built right here in America….
“I think about Greensburg, Kansas, a town that was completely destroyed by a tornado, but is being rebuilt by its residents as a global example of how clean energy can power an entire community — how it can bring jobs and businesses to a place where piles of bricks and rubble once lay. “The tragedy was terrible,” said one of the men who helped them rebuild. “But the folks here know that it also provided an incredible opportunity.”
We applaud President Obama, he has the courage to look into the future and define the direction needed to provide for our security and build a stronger America.
Too much has been spent, putting band aids on and providing short term fixes. It is because of that mindset that we are now in this crisis.
There is no easy fix. But America has always shown the strength to pick itself up and make the difficult decisions when it is needed. We should not always be operating on crisis mode, maybe this time we will learn a lesson.
Energy will play a huge part in securing our future. As demand continues to grow, we will not be able to meet our growing demand for energy with our existing facilities. We must invest now in alternative energy to reduce the demand off the grid and at the same time update the infrastructure to be able to handle the growing demand.
America is poised to lead this effort. The public supports it. We must not let politics play a role.
It is our responsibility to provide a better future for our children and grand children.
Let us know your thoughts? You may leave a comment or emil george@hbsadvantage.com
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The full text of President Obama’s address to Congress Feb 24th, 2009:
Madame Speaker, Mr. Vice President, Members of Congress, and the First Lady of the United States:
I’ve come here tonight not only to address the distinguished men and women in this great chamber, but to speak frankly and directly to the men and women who sent us here.
I know that for many Americans watching right now, the state of our economy is a concern that rises above all others. And rightly so. If you haven’t been personally affected by this recession, you probably know someone who has – a friend; a neighbor; a member of your family. You don’t need to hear another list of statistics to know that our economy is in crisis, because you live it every day. It’s the worry you wake up with and the source of sleepless nights. It’s the job you thought you’d retire from but now have lost; the business you built your dreams upon that’s now hanging by a thread; the college acceptance letter your child had to put back in the envelope. The impact of this recession is real, and it is everywhere.
But while our economy may be weakened and our confidence shaken; though we are living through difficult and uncertain times, tonight I want every American to know this:
We will rebuild, we will recover, and the United States of America will emerge stronger than before.
The weight of this crisis will not determine the destiny of this nation. The answers to our problems don’t lie beyond our reach. They exist in our laboratories and universities; in our fields and our factories; in the imaginations of our entrepreneurs and the pride of the hardest-working people on Earth. Those qualities that have made America the greatest force of progress and prosperity in human history we still possess in ample measure. What is required now is for this country to pull together, confront boldly the challenges we face, and take responsibility for our future once more.
Now, if we’re honest with ourselves, we’ll admit that for too long, we have not always met these responsibilities – as a government or as a people. I say this not to lay blame or look backwards, but because it is only by understanding how we arrived at this moment that we’ll be able to lift ourselves out of this predicament.
The fact is, our economy did not fall into decline overnight. Nor did all of our problems begin when the housing market collapsed or the stock market sank. We have known for decades that our survival depends on finding new sources of energy. Yet we import more oil today than ever before. The cost of health care eats up more and more of our savings each year, yet we keep delaying reform. Our children will compete for jobs in a global economy that too many of our schools do not prepare them for. And though all these challenges went unsolved, we still managed to spend more money and pile up more debt, both as individuals and through our government, than ever before.
In other words, we have lived through an era where too often, short-term gains were prized over long-term prosperity; where we failed to look beyond the next payment, the next quarter, or the next election. A surplus became an excuse to transfer wealth to the wealthy instead of an opportunity to invest in our future. Regulations were gutted for the sake of a quick profit at the expense of a healthy market. People bought homes they knew they couldn’t afford from banks and lenders who pushed those bad loans anyway. And all the while, critical debates and difficult decisions were put off for some other time on some other day.
Well that day of reckoning has arrived, and the time to take charge of our future is here.
Now is the time to act boldly and wisely – to not only revive this economy, but to build a new foundation for lasting prosperity. Now is the time to jumpstart job creation, re-start lending, and invest in areas like energy, health care, and education that will grow our economy, even as we make hard choices to bring our deficit down. That is what my economic agenda is designed to do, and that’s what I’d like to talk to you about tonight.
It’s an agenda that begins with jobs.
As soon as I took office, I asked this Congress to send me a recovery plan by President’s Day that would put people back to work and put money in their pockets. Not because I believe in bigger government – I don’t. Not because I’m not mindful of the massive debt we’ve inherited – I am. I called for action because the failure to do so would have cost more jobs and caused more hardships. In fact, a failure to act would have worsened our long-term deficit by assuring weak economic growth for years. That’s why I pushed for quick action. And tonight, I am grateful that this Congress delivered, and pleased to say that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is now law.
Over the next two years, this plan will save or create 3.5 million jobs. More than 90% of these jobs will be in the private sector – jobs rebuilding our roads and bridges; constructing wind turbines and solar panels; laying broadband and expanding mass transit.
Because of this plan, there are teachers who can now keep their jobs and educate our kids. Health care professionals can continue caring for our sick. There are 57 police officers who are still on the streets of Minneapolis tonight because this plan prevented the layoffs their department was about to make.
Because of this plan, 95% of the working households in America will receive a tax cut – a tax cut that you will see in your paychecks beginning on April 1st.
Because of this plan, families who are struggling to pay tuition costs will receive a $2,500 tax credit for all four years of college. And Americans who have lost their jobs in this recession will be able to receive extended unemployment benefits and continued health care coverage to help them weather this storm.
I know there are some in this chamber and watching at home who are skeptical of whether this plan will work. I understand that skepticism. Here in Washington, we’ve all seen how quickly good intentions can turn into broken promises and wasteful spending. And with a plan of this scale comes enormous responsibility to get it right.
That is why I have asked Vice President Biden to lead a tough, unprecedented oversight effort – because nobody messes with Joe. I have told each member of my Cabinet as well as mayors and governors across the country that they will be held accountable by me and the American people for every dollar they spend. I have appointed a proven and aggressive Inspector General to ferret out any and all cases of waste and fraud. And we have created a new website called recovery.gov so that every American can find out how and where their money is being spent.
So the recovery plan we passed is the first step in getting our economy back on track. But it is just the first step. Because even if we manage this plan flawlessly, there will be no real recovery unless we clean up the credit crisis that has severely weakened our financial system.
I want to speak plainly and candidly about this issue tonight, because every American should know that it directly affects you and your family’s well-being. You should also know that the money you’ve deposited in banks across the country is safe; your insurance is secure; and you can rely on the continued operation of our financial system. That is not the source of concern.
The concern is that if we do not re-start lending in this country, our recovery will be choked off before it even begins.
You see, the flow of credit is the lifeblood of our economy. The ability to get a loan is how you finance the purchase of everything from a home to a car to a college education; how stores stock their shelves, farms buy equipment, and businesses make payroll.
But credit has stopped flowing the way it should. Too many bad loans from the housing crisis have made their way onto the books of too many banks. With so much debt and so little confidence, these banks are now fearful of lending out any more money to households, to businesses, or to each other. When there is no lending, families can’t afford to buy homes or cars. So businesses are forced to make layoffs. Our economy suffers even more, and credit dries up even further.
That is why this administration is moving swiftly and aggressively to break this destructive cycle, restore confidence, and re-start lending.
We will do so in several ways. First, we are creating a new lending fund that represents the largest effort ever to help provide auto loans, college loans, and small business loans to the consumers and entrepreneurs who keep this economy running.
Second, we have launched a housing plan that will help responsible families facing the threat of foreclosure lower their monthly payments and re-finance their mortgages. It’s a plan that won’t help speculators or that neighbor down the street who bought a house he could never hope to afford, but it will help millions of Americans who are struggling with declining home values – Americans who will now be able to take advantage of the lower interest rates that this plan has already helped bring about. In fact, the average family who re-finances today can save nearly $2000 per year on their mortgage.
Third, we will act with the full force of the federal government to ensure that the major banks that Americans depend on have enough confidence and enough money to lend even in more difficult times. And when we learn that a major bank has serious problems, we will hold accountable those responsible, force the necessary adjustments, provide the support to clean up their balance sheets, and assure the continuity of a strong, viable institution that can serve our people and our economy.
I understand that on any given day, Wall Street may be more comforted by an approach that gives banks bailouts with no strings attached, and that holds nobody accountable for their reckless decisions. But such an approach won’t solve the problem. And our goal is to quicken the day when we re-start lending to the American people and American business and end this crisis once and for all.
I intend to hold these banks fully accountable for the assistance they receive, and this time, they will have to clearly demonstrate how taxpayer dollars result in more lending for the American taxpayer. This time, CEOs won’t be able to use taxpayer money to pad their paychecks or buy fancy drapes or disappear on a private jet. Those days are over.
Still, this plan will require significant resources from the federal government – and yes, probably more than we’ve already set aside. But while the cost of action will be great, I can assure you that the cost of inaction will be far greater, for it could result in an economy that sputters along for not months or years, but perhaps a decade. That would be worse for our deficit, worse for business, worse for you, and worse for the next generation. And I refuse to let that happen.
I understand that when the last administration asked this Congress to provide assistance for struggling banks, Democrats and Republicans alike were infuriated by the mismanagement and results that followed. So were the American taxpayers. So was I.
So I know how unpopular it is to be seen as helping banks right now, especially when everyone is suffering in part from their bad decisions. I promise you – I get it.
But I also know that in a time of crisis, we cannot afford to govern out of anger, or yield to the politics of the moment. My job – our job – is to solve the problem. Our job is to govern with a sense of responsibility. I will not spend a single penny for the purpose of rewarding a single Wall Street executive, but I will do whatever it takes to help the small business that can’t pay its workers or the family that has saved and still can’t get a mortgage.
That’s what this is about. It’s not about helping banks – it’s about helping people. Because when credit is available again, that young family can finally buy a new home. And then some company will hire workers to build it. And then those workers will have money to spend, and if they can get a loan too, maybe they’ll finally buy that car, or open their own business. Investors will return to the market, and American families will see their retirement secured once more. Slowly, but surely, confidence will return, and our economy will recover.
So I ask this Congress to join me in doing whatever proves necessary. Because we cannot consign our nation to an open-ended recession. And to ensure that a crisis of this magnitude never happens again, I ask Congress to move quickly on legislation that will finally reform our outdated regulatory system. It is time to put in place tough, new common-sense rules of the road so that our financial market rewards drive and innovation, and punishes short-cuts and abuse.
The recovery plan and the financial stability plan are the immediate steps we’re taking to revive our economy in the short-term. But the only way to fully restore America’s economic strength is to make the long-term investments that will lead to new jobs, new industries, and a renewed ability to compete with the rest of the world. The only way this century will be another American century is if we confront at last the price of our dependence on oil and the high cost of health care; the schools that aren’t preparing our children and the mountain of debt they stand to inherit. That is our responsibility.
In the next few days, I will submit a budget to Congress. So often, we have come to view these documents as simply numbers on a page or laundry lists of programs. I see this document differently. I see it as a vision for America – as a blueprint for our future.
My budget does not attempt to solve every problem or address every issue. It reflects the stark reality of what we’ve inherited – a trillion dollar deficit, a financial crisis, and a costly recession.
Given these realities, everyone in this chamber – Democrats and Republicans – will have to sacrifice some worthy priorities for which there are no dollars. And that includes me.
But that does not mean we can afford to ignore our long-term challenges. I reject the view that says our problems will simply take care of themselves; that says government has no role in laying the foundation for our common prosperity.
For history tells a different story. History reminds us that at every moment of economic upheaval and transformation, this nation has responded with bold action and big ideas. In the midst of civil war, we laid railroad tracks from one coast to another that spurred commerce and industry. From the turmoil of the Industrial Revolution came a system of public high schools that prepared our citizens for a new age. In the wake of war and depression, the GI Bill sent a generation to college and created the largest middle-class in history. And a twilight struggle for freedom led to a nation of highways, an American on the moon, and an explosion of technology that still shapes our world.
In each case, government didn’t supplant private enterprise; it catalyzed private enterprise. It created the conditions for thousands of entrepreneurs and new businesses to adapt and to thrive.
We are a nation that has seen promise amid peril, and claimed opportunity from ordeal. Now we must be that nation again. That is why, even as it cuts back on the programs we don’t need, the budget I submit will invest in the three areas that are absolutely critical to our economic future: energy, health care, and education.
It begins with energy.
We know the country that harnesses the power of clean, renewable energy will lead the 21st century. And yet, it is China that has launched the largest effort in history to make their economy energy efficient. We invented solar technology, but we’ve fallen behind countries like Germany and Japan in producing it. New plug-in hybrids roll off our assembly lines, but they will run on batteries made in Korea.
Well I do not accept a future where the jobs and industries of tomorrow take root beyond our borders – and I know you don’t either. It is time for America to lead again.
Thanks to our recovery plan, we will double this nation’s supply of renewable energy in the next three years. We have also made the largest investment in basic research funding in American history – an investment that will spur not only new discoveries in energy, but breakthroughs in medicine, science, and technology.
We will soon lay down thousands of miles of power lines that can carry new energy to cities and towns across this country. And we will put Americans to work making our homes and buildings more efficient so that we can save billions of dollars on our energy bills.
As for our auto industry, everyone recognizes that years of bad decision-making and a global recession have pushed our automakers to the brink. We should not, and will not, protect them from their own bad practices. But we are committed to the goal of a re-tooled, re-imagined auto industry that can compete and win. Millions of jobs depend on it. Scores of communities depend on it. And I believe the nation that invented the automobile cannot walk away from it.
None of this will come without cost, nor will it be easy. But this is America. We don’t do what’s easy. We do what is necessary to move this country forward.
For that same reason, we must also address the crushing cost of health care.
This is a cost that now causes a bankruptcy in America every thirty seconds. By the end of the year, it could cause 1.5 million Americans to lose their homes. In the last eight years, premiums have grown four times faster than wages. And in each of these years, one million more Americans have lost their health insurance. It is one of the major reasons why small businesses close their doors and corporations ship jobs overseas. And it’s one of the largest and fastest-growing parts of our budget.
Given these facts, we can no longer afford to put health care reform on hold.
Already, we have done more to advance the cause of health care reform in the last thirty days than we have in the last decade. When it was days old, this Congress passed a law to provide and protect health insurance for eleven million American children whose parents work full-time. Our recovery plan will invest in electronic health records and new technology that will reduce errors, bring down costs, ensure privacy, and save lives. It will launch a new effort to conquer a disease that has touched the life of nearly every American by seeking a cure for cancer in our time. And it makes the largest investment ever in preventive care, because that is one of the best ways to keep our people healthy and our costs under control.
This budget builds on these reforms. It includes an historic commitment to comprehensive health care reform – a down-payment on the principle that we must have quality, affordable health care for every American. It’s a commitment that’s paid for in part by efficiencies in our system that are long overdue. And it’s a step we must take if we hope to bring down our deficit in the years to come.
Now, there will be many different opinions and ideas about how to achieve reform, and that is why I’m bringing together businesses and workers, doctors and health care providers, Democrats and Republicans to begin work on this issue next week.
I suffer no illusions that this will be an easy process. It will be hard. But I also know that nearly a century after Teddy Roosevelt first called for reform, the cost of our health care has weighed down our economy and the conscience of our nation long enough. So let there be no doubt: health care reform cannot wait, it must not wait, and it will not wait another year.
The third challenge we must address is the urgent need to expand the promise of education in America.
In a global economy where the most valuable skill you can sell is your knowledge, a good education is no longer just a pathway to opportunity – it is a pre-requisite.
Right now, three-quarters of the fastest-growing occupations require more than a high school diploma. And yet, just over half of our citizens have that level of education. We have one of the highest high school dropout rates of any industrialized nation. And half of the students who begin college never finish.
This is a prescription for economic decline, because we know the countries that out-teach us today will out-compete us tomorrow. That is why it will be the goal of this administration to ensure that every child has access to a complete and competitive education – from the day they are born to the day they begin a career.
Already, we have made an historic investment in education through the economic recovery plan. We have dramatically expanded early childhood education and will continue to improve its quality, because we know that the most formative learning comes in those first years of life. We have made college affordable for nearly seven million more students. And we have provided the resources necessary to prevent painful cuts and teacher layoffs that would set back our children’s progress.
But we know that our schools don’t just need more resources. They need more reform. That is why this budget creates new incentives for teacher performance; pathways for advancement, and rewards for success. We’ll invest in innovative programs that are already helping schools meet high standards and close achievement gaps. And we will expand our commitment to charter schools.
It is our responsibility as lawmakers and educators to make this system work. But it is the responsibility of every citizen to participate in it. And so tonight, I ask every American to commit to at least one year or more of higher education or career training. This can be community college or a four-year school; vocational training or an apprenticeship. But whatever the training may be, every American will need to get more than a high school diploma. And dropping out of high school is no longer an option. It’s not just quitting on yourself, it’s quitting on your country – and this country needs and values the talents of every American. That is why we will provide the support necessary for you to complete college and meet a new goal: by 2020, America will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.
I know that the price of tuition is higher than ever, which is why if you are willing to volunteer in your neighborhood or give back to your community or serve your country, we will make sure that you can afford a higher education. And to encourage a renewed spirit of national service for this and future generations, I ask this Congress to send me the bipartisan legislation that bears the name of Senator Orrin Hatch as well as an American who has never stopped asking what he can do for his country – Senator Edward Kennedy.
These education policies will open the doors of opportunity for our children. But it is up to us to ensure they walk through them. In the end, there is no program or policy that can substitute for a mother or father who will attend those parent/teacher conferences, or help with homework after dinner, or turn off the TV, put away the video games, and read to their child. I speak to you not just as a President, but as a father when I say that responsibility for our children’s education must begin at home.
There is, of course, another responsibility we have to our children. And that is the responsibility to ensure that we do not pass on to them a debt they cannot pay. With the deficit we inherited, the cost of the crisis we face, and the long-term challenges we must meet, it has never been more important to ensure that as our economy recovers, we do what it takes to bring this deficit down.
I’m proud that we passed the recovery plan free of earmarks, and I want to pass a budget next year that ensures that each dollar we spend reflects only our most important national priorities.
Yesterday, I held a fiscal summit where I pledged to cut the deficit in half by the end of my first term in office. My administration has also begun to go line by line through the federal budget in order to eliminate wasteful and ineffective programs. As you can imagine, this is a process that will take some time. But we’re starting with the biggest lines. We have already identified two trillion dollars in savings over the next decade.
In this budget, we will end education programs that don’t work and end direct payments to large agribusinesses that don’t need them. We’ll eliminate the no-bid contracts that have wasted billions in Iraq, and reform our defense budget so that we’re not paying for Cold War-era weapons systems we don’t use. We will root out the waste, fraud, and abuse in our Medicare program that doesn’t make our seniors any healthier, and we will restore a sense of fairness and balance to our tax code by finally ending the tax breaks for corporations that ship our jobs overseas.
In order to save our children from a future of debt, we will also end the tax breaks for the wealthiest 2% of Americans. But let me perfectly clear, because I know you’ll hear the same old claims that rolling back these tax breaks means a massive tax increase on the American people: if your family earns less than $250,000 a year, you will not see your taxes increased a single dime. I repeat: not one single dime. In fact, the recovery plan provides a tax cut – that’s right, a tax cut – for 95% of working families. And these checks are on the way.
To preserve our long-term fiscal health, we must also address the growing costs in Medicare and Social Security. Comprehensive health care reform is the best way to strengthen Medicare for years to come. And we must also begin a conversation on how to do the same for Social Security, while creating tax-free universal savings accounts for all Americans.
Finally, because we’re also suffering from a deficit of trust, I am committed to restoring a sense of honesty and accountability to our budget. That is why this budget looks ahead ten years and accounts for spending that was left out under the old rules – and for the first time, that includes the full cost of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. For seven years, we have been a nation at war. No longer will we hide its price.
We are now carefully reviewing our policies in both wars, and I will soon announce a way forward in Iraq that leaves Iraq to its people and responsibly ends this war.
And with our friends and allies, we will forge a new and comprehensive strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan to defeat al Qaeda and combat extremism. Because I will not allow terrorists to plot against the American people from safe havens half a world away.
As we meet here tonight, our men and women in uniform stand watch abroad and more are readying to deploy. To each and every one of them, and to the families who bear the quiet burden of their absence, Americans are united in sending one message: we honor your service, we are inspired by your sacrifice, and you have our unyielding support. To relieve the strain on our forces, my budget increases the number of our soldiers and Marines. And to keep our sacred trust with those who serve, we will raise their pay, and give our veterans the expanded health care and benefits that they have earned.
To overcome extremism, we must also be vigilant in upholding the values our troops defend – because there is no force in the world more powerful than the example of America. That is why I have ordered the closing of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, and will seek swift and certain justice for captured terrorists – because living our values doesn’t make us weaker, it makes us safer and it makes us stronger. And that is why I can stand here tonight and say without exception or equivocation that the United States of America does not torture.
In words and deeds, we are showing the world that a new era of engagement has begun. For we know that America cannot meet the threats of this century alone, but the world cannot meet them without America. We cannot shun the negotiating table, nor ignore the foes or forces that could do us harm. We are instead called to move forward with the sense of confidence and candor that serious times demand.
To seek progress toward a secure and lasting peace between Israel and her neighbors, we have appointed an envoy to sustain our effort. To meet the challenges of the 21st century – from terrorism to nuclear proliferation; from pandemic disease to cyber threats to crushing poverty – we will strengthen old alliances, forge new ones, and use all elements of our national power.
And to respond to an economic crisis that is global in scope, we are working with the nations of the G-20 to restore confidence in our financial system, avoid the possibility of escalating protectionism, and spur demand for American goods in markets across the globe. For the world depends on us to have a strong economy, just as our economy depends on the strength of the world’s.
As we stand at this crossroads of history, the eyes of all people in all nations are once again upon us – watching to see what we do with this moment; waiting for us to lead.
Those of us gathered here tonight have been called to govern in extraordinary times. It is a tremendous burden, but also a great privilege – one that has been entrusted to few generations of Americans. For in our hands lies the ability to shape our world for good or for ill.
I know that it is easy to lose sight of this truth – to become cynical and doubtful; consumed with the petty and the trivial.
But in my life, I have also learned that hope is found in unlikely places; that inspiration often comes not from those with the most power or celebrity, but from the dreams and aspirations of Americans who are anything but ordinary.
I think about Leonard Abess, the bank president from Miami who reportedly cashed out of his company, took a $60 million bonus, and gave it out to all 399 people who worked for him, plus another 72 who used to work for him. He didn’t tell anyone, but when the local newspaper found out, he simply said, ”I knew some of these people since I was 7 years old. I didn’t feel right getting the money myself.”
And I think about Ty’Sheoma Bethea, the young girl from that school I visited in Dillon, South Carolina – a place where the ceilings leak, the paint peels off the walls, and they have to stop teaching six times a day because the train barrels by their classroom. She has been told that her school is hopeless, but the other day after class she went to the public library and typed up a letter to the people sitting in this room. She even asked her principal for the money to buy a stamp. The letter asks us for help, and says, “We are just students trying to become lawyers, doctors, congressmen like yourself and one day president, so we can make a change to not just the state of South Carolina but also the world. We are not quitters.”
We are not quitters.
These words and these stories tell us something about the spirit of the people who sent us here. They tell us that even in the most trying times, amid the most difficult circumstances, there is a generosity, a resilience, a decency, and a determination that perseveres; a willingness to take responsibility for our future and for posterity.
Their resolve must be our inspiration. Their concerns must be our cause. And we must show them and all our people that we are equal to the task before us.
I know that we haven’t agreed on every issue thus far, and there are surely times in the future when we will part ways. But I also know that every American who is sitting here tonight loves this country and wants it to succeed. That must be the starting point for every debate we have in the coming months, and where we return after those debates are done. That is the foundation on which the American people expect us to build common ground.
And if we do – if we come together and lift this nation from the depths of this crisis; if we put our people back to work and restart the engine of our prosperity; if we confront without fear the challenges of our time and summon that enduring spirit of an America that does not quit, then someday years from now our children can tell their children that this was the time when we performed, in the words that are carved into this very chamber, “something worthy to be remembered.” Thank you, God Bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.
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Yes, They Could. So They Did.
Written by Thomas Friedman
Op-Ed Columnist New York Times
So I am attending the Energy and Resources Institute climate conference in New Delhi, and during the afternoon session two young American women — along with one of their mothers — proposition me.
“Hey, Mr. Friedman,” they say, “would you like to take a little spin around New Delhi in our car?”
Oh, I say, I’ve heard that line before. Ah, they say, but you haven’t seen this car before. It’s a plug-in electric car that is also powered by rooftop solar panels — and the two young women, recent Yale grads, had just driven it all over India in a “climate caravan” to highlight the solutions to global warming being developed by Indian companies, communities, campuses and innovators, as well as to inspire others to take action.
They ask me if I want to drive, but I have visions of being stopped by the cops and ending up in a New Delhi jail. Not to worry, they tell me. Indian cops have been stopping them all across India. First, they ask to see driver’s licenses, then they inquire about how the green car’s solar roof manages to provide 10 percent of its mileage — and then they try to buy the car.
We head off down Panchsheel Marg, one of New Delhi’s main streets. The ladies want to show me something. The U.S. Embassy and the Chinese Embassy are both located on Panchsheel, directly across from each other. They asked me to check out the rooftops of each embassy. What do I notice? Let’s see … The U.S. Embassy’s roof is loaded with antennae and listening gear. The Chinese Embassy’s roof is loaded with … new Chinese-made solar hot-water heaters.
You couldn’t make this up.
But trying to do something about it was just one of many reasons my hosts, Caroline Howe, 23, a mechanical engineer on leave from the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, and Alexis Ringwald, a Fulbright scholar in India and now a solar entrepreneur, joined with Kartikeya Singh, who was starting the Indian Youth Climate Network, or IYCN, to connect young climate leaders in India, a country coming under increasing global pressure to manage its carbon footprint.
“India is full of climate innovators, so spread out across this huge country that many people don’t get to see that these solutions are working right now,” said Howe. “We wanted to find a way to bring people together around existing solutions to inspire more action and more innovation. There’s no time left to just talk about the problem.”
Howe and Ringwald thought the best way to do that might be a climate solutions road tour, using modified electric cars from India’s Reva Electric Car Company, whose C.E.O. Ringwald knew. They persuaded him to donate three of his cars and to retrofit them with longer-life batteries that could travel 90 miles on a single six-hour charge — and to lay on a solar roof that would extend them farther.
Between Jan. 1 and Feb. 5, they drove the cars on a 2,100-mile trip from Chennai to New Delhi, stopping in 15 cities and dozens of villages, training Indian students to start their own climate action programs and filming 20 videos of India’s top home-grown energy innovations. They also brought along a solar-powered band, plus a luggage truck that ran on plant oil extracted from jatropha and pongamia, plants locally grown on wasteland. A Bollywood dance group joined at different stops and a Czech who learned about their trip on YouTube hopped on with his truck that ran on vegetable-oil waste.
Deepa Gupta, 21, a co-founder of IYCN, told The Hindustan Times that the trip opened her eyes to just how many indigenous energy solutions were budding in India — “like organic farming in Andhra Pradesh, or using neem and garlic as pesticides, or the kind of recycling in slums, such as Dharavi. We saw things already in place, like the Gadhia solar plant in Valsad, Gujarat, where steam is used for cooking and you can feed almost 50,000 people in one go.” (See: www.indiaclimatesolutions.com.)
At Rajpipla, in Gujarat, when they stopped at a local prince’s palace to recharge their cars, they discovered that his business was cultivating worms and selling them as eco-friendly alternatives to chemical fertilizers.
I met Howe and Ringwald after a tiring day, but I have to admit that as soon as they started telling me their story it really made me smile. After a year of watching adults engage in devastating recklessness in the financial markets and depressing fecklessness in the global climate talks, it’s refreshing to know that the world keeps minting idealistic young people who are not waiting for governments to act, but are starting their own projects and driving innovation.
“Why did this tour happen?” asked Ringwald. “Why this mad, insane plan to travel across India in a caravan of solar electric cars and jatropha trucks with solar music, art, dance and a potent message for climate solutions? Well … the world needs crazy ideas to change things, because the conventional way of thinking is not working anymore.”
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Fed May Take Control Of Smart Grid Plans
H. JOSEF HEBERT | February 24, 2009 04:02 AM EST |
WASHINGTON — Across the Great Plains the wind blows incessantly, while in the remote Nevada desert the sun bears down without relief. Each holds the potential of a vast new energy resource.
While wind turbine and solar projects are ready to capture this new, eco-friendly energy source, where are the transmission lines to get the power to where it is needed?
Democratic congressional leaders, a former president and his one-time vice president, several Obama Cabinet members, energy executives and business leaders thrashed out that very predicament at a high-profile clean energy conference on Monday.
After two hours, a consensus seemed to emerge: The outdated electricity grid must be modernized and expanded if President Barack Obama’s vision of dramatically increasing the country’s renewable energy resources is to be accomplished. And the federal government will have to play a bigger role in locating high-voltage power lines to overcome local and regional resistance.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., a leading participant in the gathering, said he will soon introduce legislation to give federal regulators authority to override states when it comes to locating long-distance power lines.
“We cannot let 231 state regulators hold up progress,” Reid said, referring to the members of state public utility commissions that decide on transmission locations.
While states should be given every opportunity to participate, “there may come a time when the federal government will have to step in,” said Reid, whose state is a prime target for entrepreneurs building solar energy projects.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., also called for expansion and modernization of the nation’s power transmission system, saying these improvements are “essential to all that we do” to promote renewable energy.
The clean energy conference _ which included former Vice President Al Gore, who won a Nobel Peace Prize for his work on global warming, and former President Bill Clinton _ focused at length on the need for a national “smart” grid to transport electricity, and the need for grid expansion.
Gore said modernizing the transmission grid will allow for new ways to generate and distribute electricity.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said he’s ready to open federal land to renewable energy projects, including wind farms in the waters off the U.S. coast, and map out energy corridors. But, he warned, the power grid of today won’t get the new energy to the markets that need it.
“In the end, unless we are able to solve this juggernaut and deal with the transmission issue we’re simply going to be standing in place,” Salazar told the conference, which was organized by the Center for American Progress.
Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., who chairs the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee that will craft energy legislation, said that while he has not seen Reid’s proposal, he agreed the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission should have more authority for planning and locating high-voltage power lines.
Bingaman said he hopes to have a bill in four to six weeks that will address the grid issue and establish a requirement for utilities nationwide to generate a certain percentage of electricity _ as much as 20 percent by 2020 _ from renewable sources such as wind, solar and biomass.
States have fought to maintain jurisdiction over locating the power grid.
Fred Butler, a New Jersey regulator who is chairman of National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners, said state officials are willing to work with the federal government on placement issues but oppose a federal takeover of the authority.
Former New York Gov. George Pataki, one of the few Republicans at the conference, said the federal government must get more involved in establishing power transmission lines.
“If you try to run a wire through someone’s community, that becomes about as contentious as you get,” said Pataki. If that power is going through a state, he said, “you don’t have to take a poll _ no one is going to be for it.”
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N.J. solar panels start soaking up the sun
By VICTOR EPSTEIN Associated Press • February 23, 2009
As reported in the Courier Post
SECAUCUS – With a flip of the switch, one of New Jersey’s largest and newest solar panel projects began soaking up the sun Monday.
The 65,000-square-foot roof of the Meadowlands Exposition Center in Secaucus became a solar generator, capable of producing 412 kilowatts of electricity without the environmental concerns posed by oil tankers, nuclear waste, coal mine runoff and natural gas pipelines.
That’s enough juice to power about 50 single-family homes, according to Alfredo Matos, PSE&G’s vice president for renewables and energy solutions, or about 40 percent of the Exposition Center’s needs.
New Jersey’s largest utility is helping finance the $3 million project with a $1.6 million loan. It’s the first solar array to become operational under a PSE&G program to loan $105 million for solar projects over the next two years.
“This isn’t PR,” Matos said. “Solar systems are still out of the market – meaning they still cost more than traditional systems that rely on fossil fuel generation – but with the incentives available today, including our loan program, you can have a system that pays for itself in three or four years.”
Recipients of PSE&G solar loans will repay the utility in energy credits, not dollars. The utility will sell those credits to fossil fuel power plants seeking to offset their carbon emissions, Matos said.
The federal government covers another 30 percent of the cost of building a solar system through an investment tax credit, he said. That leaves pioneers like Hartz Mountain Industries Inc., the Secaucus commercial real estate firm that owns the Exposition Center, with only 20 percent of the cost.
Emanuel Stern, president of Hartz, said the decision to install the Exposition Center’s rooftop array was a solid financial move for the privately held company.
“I’d rather invest in my roofs than in the stock market right now,” Stern said. “It just seems like a no-brainer to me.”
If the Exposition Center array performs as expected over the next six months, Hartz intends to begin retrofitting four or five buildings a year with solar panels, Stern said.
Hartz has a portfolio of 39 million square feet of space in 200 buildings, many of which are warehouses with large roofs that are ideal for solar arrays. As the roofs reach the end of their useful lives, Hartz will look to install solar arrays while they’re being replaced.
Stern estimates that it will take about 10 years for the solar array on the Exposition Center to pay for itself. After that, Hartz will be getting 40 percent of the Exposition Center’s power from the roof, virtually for free.
New Jersey ranks second behind California among states generating electricity from solar panels, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association.
As manufacturers of solar systems make more equipment, they’ll become more efficient and prices will come down, said Thomas Leyden, a managing director of Sunpower Corp., the San Jose, Calif.-based company that installed the Exposition Center array. Right now, the cost of retrofitting a typical single-family home is nearly $40,000, he said.
The PSE&G loan program and the federal incentives help bridge the gap between how much solar systems cost and how much people can afford, said Leyden. He estimates that the solar industry is probably only six or seven years away from grid parity with fossil fuel generation because of such programs.
“Solar is not only good for the environment and the country, it’s good business,” Leyden said
It is good to see New Jersey and the community make a commitment to alternative energy development. In the coming year, we hope to see more projects of this magnitude. As the demand for energy continues to grow, we need these types of projects to help us reduce the demand off the grid.
Filed in alternative energy, DE Solar, economy, energy, energy independence, green economy, NJ Solar, PA Solar, saving energy, solar, stimulus ·Tags: alternative energy, clean energy, economy, electric, energy, energy alternatives, green energy, NJ Alternative Energy, NJ Solar, PA Alternative Energy, PA Solar, solar
Electric Cars get Charrge from Stimulus
As reported in Huffington Green
By Peter Valdes-Dapena, CNNMoney.com senior writer
Thanks to President Obama’s stimulus package, Americans can now get big tax breaks on more types of electric vehicles.
The credits originally would have stopped after they had been claimed on 250,000 vehicles across the whole industry. Now the credits will apply on up to 200,000 vehicles from any single manufacturer.
The old rules, passed in the fall of 2008, applied only to cars in the traditional sense, i.e., four-wheeled vehicles. Now three-wheeled and even two-wheeled electric vehicles are also eligible. Tax credits for these vehicles are calculated differently.
The changes also removed really big vehicles from eligibility. Given the environmental impact of heavy-duty trucks, some electric vehicle advocates call that a really big mistake.
The Internal Revenue Service still has to pass its own rules clarifying exactly how this new law will be implemented and what the tax credits will be. The ones shown here are our estimates, based on the legislation. The IRS declined to comment for this story.
So, if you plan to buy a plug-in vehicle, check with a tax accountant before you do anything, and carefully check out any vehicle manufacturer or seller before committing your money.
Filed in alternative energy, economy, energy, energy independence, green economy, stimulus ·Tags: economy, electric, electric cars, energy, politics, stimulus
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December 17, 2012 PaulLeave a Comment on Pokemon Soul Silver: I’ve known you all your life, tell me your name.
Pokemon Soul Silver: I’ve known you all your life, tell me your name.
So after 10 years Nintendo decided it was high time they remade what many consider to be the best Pokémon games gold and silver. These games were originally released on the game boy colour and have now been updated for the Ds this involves a graphics overhaul and generally some game tweaks but is this a re-imagining or shameless money making scheme? Here are my thoughts on it.
I remember these games being released on the game boy colour all those years ago and me being a huge Pokémon fan but I was unable to play them due to my being poor. I never played them originally as by the time I had a steady job and was able to afford them the next games in the series came along so these games for me aren’t about nostalgia they are about visiting a region of the Pokémon world that I never visited or Nintendo has visited since.
The graphics on this games are colourful and quirky but you get the sense that they aren’t really trying very hard. This is the best looking Pokémon game to date but I really don’t think the ds is being pushed that much. Many of the animations have been seen on previous games and while there is some new detail there isn’t really much here to attract the eye. A lot of the art in this game is also very old, I mean it feels like I’ve been looking at the same grass and same building since the gameboy’s day and no matter how much they improve it or gimmicks they inject into the game (3D anyone) this is still just a re-skinned game boy game.
Despite the problems I have graphically with this title lets be honest, when was Pokémon ever about the graphics? Pokémon is about the gameplay and the Pokémon themselves and here the makers of this game have done a Stella job of writing a story and by write I mean copy and paste from Pokémon blue/red. This is almost identical to the previous games in the series: boy leaves town, battles many people, get 8 gym badges, go to poke league and defeats an evil organisation hell bent on world domination along the way. I understand that this is the world that it’s set in but could you at least offer me some variety please? Something different, something I’ve never done before. That while the story made be old hat there is still something comforting about it, it’s like that security blanket that you had when you were young that you’d wrap yourself up in; it makes you feel safe, you know exactly what’s going to happen but you’re ok with it and that for some reason is strangely compelling.
The other most notable feature of Pokémon has got to be the Pokémon themselves. At this present moment in time there are close to 500 hundred Pokémon and I for one think this is about 250 too many. They’ve used the idea of more Pokémon to hide the shallowness of their games and the fact that we’ve been playing the same game over and over again for almost 15 years now. The fun of these games is in exploring the land and the different Pokémon but when you have so many it becomes more of a chore and one long grind to reach that mythical limit.
The number of Pokémon is not the only place they have indulged in a bit of over complication they seem to have done this is the sheer number of HM’s. I now this is properly unique to me but enough is enough! They are annoying and you need them to go anywhere of any importance in the world and this over use of them just adds to my frustration levels. This is not my only annoyance with the game, the lack of environments present in the game really shows how old it actually is. The later Pokémon games have incorporated show, volcanoes and marshland while this game has the same three territories: sea grass and rocks. Oh joy! Another rock and another tree! Lastly in my list of annoyances is the sound design, it’s annoying and I have to leave the game on mute and it’s not just this game, it’s all Pokémon, this can’t be the best that the DS can do, can it?
Despite this game’s many faults and, I’ve listed just a few of them, I still can’t stop playing it. Pokémon is Pokémon and they say love is blind and I love Pokémon. This is a absolutely must have for any Pokémon and although it is a lot like being punished trying to get to 500 Pokémon I will get there and I’ll be so happy when I do. Despite my undying love for Pokémon and all the games so far I can’t help but look at the next one with a little fear. They’re going to add more Pokémon, more areas and more challenges and at what point does Pokémon become too complicated for non-hardcores to play?
Categories blue, ds, gamecube, gold, nintendo, pikachu, pokemon, red, silver
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Faces of the Foundation: Ruby Lai
Bennett McIntosh
listed in Faces of the Foundation
When Hertz Fellow Ruby Lai graduates this June, she’ll be armed with a PhD in physics, years of physics and materials engineering experience, and a drive to change the world.
How she’ll go about changing it is an open question.
Her first stop is an internship at the Gates Foundation’s Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene program to improve wastewater treatment technology in the developing world. “Growing up, I would visit my grandmother’s house in a very poor and rural area of China, and there were no toilets there, so I have a very personal experience with that,” she says
At Gates, Ruby will be helping develop a request for proposals to bring new technology into making wastewater treatment cheaper and more easily deployable. “They’re hoping to inject innovations from other fields more quickly than might otherwise have happened”
Just as many first-year PhD students go through several rotations in different labs to help decide what research direction they want to take for their dissertation, Ruby hopes to use the first year or so after her PhD to “rotate” through a series of internships, looking for areas where breakthroughs in materials science can make a big difference in how the world works.
This isn’t the first time Ruby has sought experience outside the lab to direct her research. In the lab of Yi Cui at Stanford, she is working to make the manufacture of extremely thin silicon cheap enough that it’s economical to deploy in flexible solar panels – ideally thin enough to roll over roofs or other surfaces like a rug. This, too, is something Ruby has personal experience with – after a few of weekends spent installing solar panels with the nonprofit SunWork, Ruby became all-too-familiar with the difficulty and expense of maneuvering 50-pound rigid panels on slanted roofs.
In the last four decades, there has been a 100-fold reduction in the cost of solar power hardware an installation – remarkable progress towards making renewable energy more economical. But, says Ruby, this progress has largely been thanks to incremental improvements in efficiency and scale. “So we can do even better,” she says. “This is an area where scientific breakthroughs could really make an impact.”
Ruby started at Stanford working in a different lab, researching ways to use ultracold fluids to sense the most minute details of objects’ surfaces. But as cool (literally!) as the work was, she says, “I was more interested in working on more applied science, in making a difference.”
Thanks to her Hertz Fellowship, Ruby was free to switch labs, and even to take time in the middle of her PhD to explore different her options. “It supported my ability to take a step back and learn more without having to worry about paying my rent.”
But the part of the Hertz Fellowship that Ruby is most grateful for isn’t just the unrestricted funding; The important “fellowship” is the one she sees between the many other fellows she interacts with on a daily basis, whether at Stanford, at the Hertz retreats and workshops, or in her search for a meaningful career. “I’ve met many great friends, great colleagues, who support me and who inspire me,” she says. “Any time I go to a workshop or meeting I come away invigorated and inspired to do research that makes a difference.”
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Read about the background of ANTz, Afghanistan's first Blues Rock band
By GMA's Afghanistan correspondent Abdul Basir Shakeri
"From the underground up to the street’s concerts"
You were hearing the sounds of music from the seams between the walls in Herat in 2005. Yeah! It was ANTz who are the first Blues Rock band and one of the real underground bands in Afghanistan.
Antz, are a group of musicians who were recording their music and vocals inside their car and a small studio inside in a house in Herat, they started out by deciding to establish a band in order to play new music for the new generation. They are Antz, because they are hard-workers, honest and always doing the heavy stuff like the real ants..
Antz removed their skins like snakes twice from 2005 and up to 2013, some changes are good but as Masoud Hassanzada (one of the band's founders, song write and guitarist) states: "I discovered my love of art during the Taliban rule, when music was forbidden" he confesses. His texts deal with issues like dreams and problems facing the Afghan youth. "There is a whole generation that has never known peace".
"Minority Report" the first album by Antz with 8 tracks was released in 2007. It was called "Minority Report" because the album is spoken from the viewpoint of a minority, it talks about the socio-political situation in Afghanistan. It means most of the songs were critical and the content was based around social problems such as war, corruption, elections, social chaos, lack of memories, history, foreign troops, the Taliban, mullahs, liberals and assorted bribery, etc.
Shekib Mosadiq is the vocalist and founder of the band alongside Masoud Hassanzada. The reception of releasing the album in the first few days was unprecedented. We could make about $300 USD by CD from our online eBay store per week and in all local radios our songs were aired, meaning we became known and famous amongst the Persian-Iranian singers Hassanzada said.
Performing in different Cafés, festivals, events and thrice at the Sound Central Festival in Afghanistan is just a part of their achievements, but the latest performance was at Orange Café, a street concert for public people which was stopped by police.
Antz are still playing, performing and working on a new album "Militarism" with 9 tracks poised to be on it, the album will be released in around 2 months time.
The music is very diverse and different on this album, like some of the tracks are quite rocky, some more blues-orientated and a few others are "Gypsy Blues". In terms of content, the lyrics are more radical than the first album. In terms of regulation, it will be unprecedented in the history of country music. This album has a couple of other musical instruments (an accordion for example) which were added. This album is more critical in terms of content viewing and features a more spirited critique of the war in Afghanistan and the failure of Western democratization in Afghanistan. Simply put the atmosphere of the songs are totally satirical.
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Antz-Band/121837017850499
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Home » Infectious Disease » Biology of Infectious Diseases Training Program
Biology of Infectious Diseases Training Program
Investigator: Henry Chambers, MD
Sponsor: NIH National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease
Infectious diseases are the third most common cause of death in the United States, despite availability of antibiotics, vaccines, and high standards of public health, and the leading cause of death worldwide. Our program supports training of infectious diseases specialists in laboratory and clinical sciences to prepare them for careers in academia, industry, and the public health sector in the treatment, control, and prevention of infectious diseases.
This proposal requests funding for years 16-20 of the UCSF Biology of Infectious Diseases Training Program to train physician-scientists in infectious diseases translational research, both clinical and laboratory-based, for research-intensive or research-related careers in academia, industry, and the public health sector. Funding is requested for four postdoctoral trainees per year, MDs or MDs with dual degrees, recruited from the UCSF Adult Infectious Diseases and the Pediatrics Infectious Diseases Fellowship Programs. This training program is designed to provide flexible but rigorous protected research training in relevant laboratory-based, translational, and clinical research in the areas of epidemiology, public health, global health, HIV/AIDS, genomics, antimicrobial resistance, microbial pathogenesis and host response, and immunology. The 31 faculty are drawn from 6 participating departments from the UCSF School of Medicine (Adult Infectious Diseases, Biochemistry and Biophysics, Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Experimental Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology, Pediatric Infectious Diseases) and the University of California, Berkeley School of Public Health Division of Infectious Diseases and Vaccinology. Participating faculty have been selected on the basis of research area and expertise, funding, productivity, and proven success in training and mentoring post- doctoral fellows. Each fellow will undertake an in-depth research project supervised by one or more of the participating faculty. Emphasis is placed on personalized training and instruction. The educational program provides for special courses, small group conferences, research conferences and seminars, coursework in immunology, microbial pathogenesis, biostatistics, epidemiology, study design, scientific writing, and responsible conduct of research. The quality and effectiveness of the program is measured by the success of trainees in completion of fellowship training, the number and quality of publications in peer-reviewed journals and research presentations, obtaining research funding (e.g., independent research awards, K-awards or equivalent career-development awards, R01-level or equivalent awards), and attainment of a research-oriented career as medical school faculty, in industry, or in the public health sector. The career development component continues to be strengthened through a process of regular and rigorous review and feedback of progress and performance to assure that trainees achieve their career goals. Of the 42 fellows supported by the training program since 2000, 35 (83%) are still in health-related careers, underscoring the extraordinary success of our training program. Funding is requested to continue this highly successful program.
Topics: Infectious Disease, Training and Capacity Building
Organizations: Division of Infectious Disease
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Home » HIV/AIDS » R24 for the CFAR-Network for the Integrated Clinical Science, CNICS
R24 for the CFAR-Network for the Integrated Clinical Science, CNICS
Investigator: Elvin Geng, MD, MPH
Sponsor: University of Alabama System
The clinical treatment of HIV/AIDS in the era of Highly Active Anti-Retroviral Therapy (HAART) is extremely dynamic with unprecedented combinations of therapies and a myriad of patient and virologic responses to therapy. Long-term outcomes research is necessary to provide clinicians with up-to-date information on the best strategies to employ in their patients' individual situations. Historically, evidence for clinical care decisions has been generated through the conduct of randomized controlled clinical trials, epidemiology-based prospective clinical cohorts, and anecdotal reports. A new approach that will synergize with these methods is outcomes research based on the utilization of data derived directly from newly developed electronic medical record (EMR) systems and compiling such data into novel research networks. Such EMR systems are already in existence at several Centers for AIDS Research (CFAR) sites in the United States. The CFAR Network of Integrated Clinical Systems (CNICS) project is the first such resource network that can substantially contribute to the contemporary HIV research agenda. As a clinic-based research network, CNICS directly reflects the outcomes of clinical decisions and management options used daily in the care of HIV infected individuals. Unlike data collected in structured interviews or through retrospective medical record review, CNICS assures a broader range of information associated with the rapidly changing course of HIV disease management through collection of data at the point of care. The CNICS project supports a data system that is a central repository of verified and quality-controlled data from the EMRs at seven CFAR sites. The EMR data recorded for individual patient care are made available through CNICS for population-based outcomes research, which facilitates networking and contributes to the standardization of data contained in the CNICS data system. CNICS is also developing a specimen repository linked with clinical data from the sites' EMRs. CNICS is a unique resource for HIV clinical, translational, and basic research and will provide the infrastructure and data to address the challenging and rapidly evolving issues in HIV care and research. The principle goals of this proposal are to build and support the CNICS infrastructure, to address the challenging research agenda of the evolving HIV epidemic, to prepare for the expansion of CNICS by developing standard operating procedures and software tools to facilitate data quality control and transmission, to expand CNICS by 8 to 10 sites within 5 years, and to serve as a resource for the development of similar research networks.
Topics: HIV/AIDS, Epidemiology and Surveillance
Organizations: IGHS Faculty Affiliate, Center for AIDS Research (CFAR), Division of HIV, ID and Global Medicine, AIDS Research Institute
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Protests in Italy Save Hundreds of Ancient Trees on the Chopping Block for Gas Pipeline Construction
Posted 14 April 2017 11:07 GMT
Century-old olive groves. Photo: Alessandra Tommasi
This article is based on a piece written by Rachel Hubbard for 350.org, an organisation building a global climate movement, and is republished here as part of a partnership with Global Voices.
Communities in Salento, in the southern ‘heel’ of Italy, recently won a small, but important victory in their campaign against the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), which would carry gas from Azerbaijan to Italy.
Planned construction would have seen the removal of ancient olive trees to make way for the pipeline, but following fierce protests, the work was suspended in early April.
TAP and the Southern Gas Corridor are the largest fossil fuel projects that the European Union is pursuing. They are meant to bring billions of cubic metres of gas to Europe — making them incompatible with Europe’s climate commitments. According to a report by Oil Change International, existing fossil fuel operations already hold more carbon than can be released to keep global temperature rise to the limits that Europe and governments around the world agreed to under the Paris Climate Accord. That means that there is no space for any new fossil fuel projects, and certainly not for infrastructure of this scale, which aims to massively expand the gas market in Europe.
The pipeline would come onshore in the beautiful seaside town of San Foca. Some fear the construction of the pipeline and a gas-receiving terminal would cause significant damage to the local landscape and coastline.
Despite the predicted climate impacts of the project and the objections of the local people and local politicians, the Italian government wants to push it through.
Public meeting next to the construction site in San Foca. Photo: Alessandra Tommasi
On 20 March, the stakes were raised when the pipeline company – without having permits for the work, as local mayors and the president of the Apulia region criticised – moved in to remove hundreds of ancient olive trees near the rural town of Melendugno. These trees are essential to many people's livelihoods. Not only that, but they are beloved by the local people and are centuries (some apparently more than a millennium) old.
Local organising stepped up a gear and each day since then, hundreds of people have gathered at the site to peacefully resist the construction. The local mayor managed to get the region's prefect to ask the company to stop the works for three days, whilst the permits were investigated.
People in Melendugno protecting olive trees from the Trans Adriatic Pipeline. Photo: Alessandra Tommasi
After the three-day break, the question of permits remained unresolved, and works continued. The national government sent in police to defend the interests of the pipeline company, pushing the crowds back with shields and batons to allow the company to continue to explant trees. A number of injuries to local people were reported.
Over the course of these few days, many trees were uprooted and removed from the area, a heartbreaking sight for many locals.
The trees in this picture have in the meantime all been removed. Photo: Alessandra Tommasi
But they didn’t give in. Public meetings were held regularly, drawing crowds of 500-1,000 people. The campaign has made the headlines in the Italian press, and solidarity actions and messages have been sent by groups in Milan, Bologna and Rome.
The protests started to hit national and international news, daily gatherings at the site got bigger and bigger, and one night, people built stone barricades to stop vehicles from accessing the site.
Local residents built barricades to block the pipeline works. Photo: Alessandra Tommasi
In early April, the removal of the trees was suspended because of the barricades and sheer size of the protests. There is just a small window now for the remaining trees to be removed. In a few weeks the growing season starts and the trees must remain for the summer.
Daily gatherings and public meetings continue. No one knows what will happen next, but the local No TAP Committee is determined to stop the pipeline altogether. They maintain it is an unnecessary project, especially since demand for gas is dropping in Europe, and that it is undemocratic and being imposed by the government against the will of local people. They also argue that it will cause vast economic and irreparable environmental damage to the area.
Their message is “né qui né altrove” – “No TAP, not here or anywhere”.
You can follow their campaign on Twitter under the hashtag #NoTAP. The local organising committee is on Twitter @no_tap and on Facebook @MovimentoNoTAP. To learn more about the TAP, which is also called the Euro-Caspian Mega Pipeline, take a look at the webdocumentary Walking the Line by campaigning groups Counter Balance, Platform London and Re:Common.
Written by350.org
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The Privacy Advisor | The DPO role: A quick survey Related reading: Thinking through ACL-aware data processing
The DPO role: A quick survey
schedule May 9, 2017
Thomas Shaw, CIPP/E, CIPP/US Thomas Shaw, CIPP/E, CIPP/US
In my recent Privacy Advisor articles on the essential job skills and the appropriate professions of Data Protection Officers (DPOs) under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), I discussed the statutory language of the GDPR and my interpretation of it.
I also wanted to understand how others are viewing the DPO role under the GDPR, especially those who are currently in the roles responsible for compliance with this upcoming law. To achieve this, I reached out to a national association of DPOs in a leading EU country (Ireland's Association of Data Protection Officers) by surveying the membership. This survey asked people to answer questions about their organization in regards to the DPO role, both current and planned. Although probably not statistically meaningful, as the total responses were less than two dozen, the answers may shed some light on EU organizations’ current thinking. This article shares the results of that outreach effort.
The survey asked 10 questions, variously posed as Yes/No, multiple choice, and fill-in-the-box answers. The final two questions dealt with the respondent organization’s industry and their roles under the GDPR as either a data controller or processor. The industries that the organizations represented were broadly across the spectrum, including health, education, finance, IT, human resources, hospitality, transportation, and national and local government. The data protection roles undertaken by the organizations under the GDPR were as a data controller, data processor, or both.
The other eight substantive questions and their responses were:
Will your organization require a different skillset for the DPO role under the GDPR than it does for its current DPO? The majority of the responses answered “Yes” that a different skillset will be required in the future, while only a few believed “No” that a different skillset will not be required. However, the second most common answer was that the organization does not currently have someone in a DPO role.
How will your DPO meet the strict requirements for independence under the GDPR (art. 37.1)? The responses were varied, which included meeting the independence requirement through a separation of duties, by the DPO reporting directly to the CEO of the organization, or by the DPO role being outsourced. Other responses found organizations will achieve independence through the use of an independent contractor, already viewed their DPO role as independent, were not sure if the DPO would be independent, or were still trying to determine how to answer this requirement. Access to independent legal counsel and a separate budget were cited as techniques to ensure independence.
How will your DPO avoid conflict of interests as specified by the GDPR (art. 38.6)? Some respondents found that potential conflicts of interest were addressed through outsourcing the DPO role, while others thought that there were already sufficient conflict of interest rules in place within their organization. Other responses looked to the DPO function being the sole role this person would engage in as being a sufficient control to avoid conflicts of interest, were not yet sure how the DPO would avoid conflicts of interest, or felt it was up to the personal and professional qualities of the DPO themselves. Even when avoiding conflicts of interests, concerns were cited for possible conflicts with the DPO’s attention and resources.
Will your DPO report directly to the board as specified by the GDPR (art. 38.3)? The vast majority of the respondents agreed that the DPO in their organization would report to the highest level in their organization, with only a small percent not having this type of reporting line.
Will your DPO, required by the GDPR to have expert knowledge of data protection law (arts 37.1 and 37.5), be a privacy lawyer, an auditor, a compliance specialist, an IT specialist, a non-technical manager, or from some other profession? The variety of professions specified in the responses were broad. The question choices presented as possible answers included an auditor, compliance specialist, IT specialist, privacy lawyer, non-technical manager, and other (fill in the box). The largest number of professions listed (the question allowed for multiple answers) were for compliance specialist, IT specialist, and non-technical manager. Professions specified in the other category included records manager, administrative person, and business manager.
How many years of professional experience will your DPO have? The respondents to this question, unlike many of the DPO hiring advertisements being posted online, looked to a very experienced professional. The number of years of the DPO ranged from five and seven years to 30 years of experience. Only a few responses thought that the DPO role could be filled with an inexperienced resource.
Will your DPO role be filled by one person or more than one person? Three-fourths of the respondents believed that a single person would fulfil the DPO role, while the other one-quarter believed that the role should be filled with more than one person.
Will your DPO role be filled internally, hired externally, or outsourced? About two-thirds of the respondents believed that the DPO role would be filled internally, with about another one-third looking to outsource the role. None of these respondents were looking to hire this resource externally and bring them on in the DPO role.
This survey was targeted at organizations that have already become members of a DPO association, so their understanding of the GDPR’s requirements is likely further developed than that of the average firm subject to the GDPR. It was also not a statistically rigorous survey with a limited number of respondents, yet there may be some useful takeaways. One takeaway is that there seems to be a recognition that an additional skillset may be required of existing DPOs who continue in this role under the GDPR, as well as for new DPOs.
A second takeaway provides some insight in how organizations are looking at dealing with what may be the most difficult criteria for the DPO role, ensuring the DPO’s independence and avoidance of conflicts of interest. Various techniques of outsourcing, separation of duties, reporting chains, independent contractors, conflict rules, lack of other duties, and professional and personal qualities were among solutions suggested, along with access to independent legal counsel for non-lawyer DPOs and an independent budget. I expect this requirement to evolve the most over time, as organizations work to make the role truly independent of those responsible for designing, operating, and overseeing the privacy and security functions in the organization.
It was heartening that these organizations understand the requirement for the DPO’s reporting structure to the highest levels of the organization and the need for a vastly experienced resource to fill the DPO role. It was a bit surprising that the majority of these organizations are viewing the DPO role as being filled by a single person instead of a team, but that could be merely a snapshot of who answered this survey (it did not ask the size of the organization). Organizations clearly have many ideas about the right type of professional ideally suited to fit the DPO role and seem to consider outsourcing a viable alternative for filling the DPO role if internal resources are not available.
As this brief snapshot of the DPO role was an initial effort, it would further increase the validity and usefulness of the survey for IAPP members to also respond to these ten questions. You can confidentially take the survey in just a few minutes or can alternatively email me directly.
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Free Thoughts by Ranjit Singh
This blog is about observations around and thoughts which come to the mind.
Calories or calories??
December 15, 2012 December 15, 2012 Ranjit SinghBasal metabolic rate, Calorie, Conditions and Diseases, diet, Dietary fiber, Food, Food energy, Health, Nutrition, Physical exercise1 Comment
There are millions of people for whom it is almost impossible to arrange two square meals for the families. So they don’t have any choice of what they eat. On the other hand, there are affluent people for whom what to eat or what not to eat is a big problem. They are grappling with obesity problems which are the precursor of so many lethal ailments like heart attack, blood pressure, backache and diabetes. They are always conscious of the calorific value of the foods they consume.
Any student of science or health conscious person is aware that calorie is unit of energy. Our bodies continuously require energy to properly perform normal functions of the body. Even while doing nothing, our body consumes energy called basal metabolic rate.
Calorie and calorie are slightly different. In nutrition science, Calorie with capital C is equal to 1000 calories. Sometimes, Calorie is also called kilo calorie. 1 Calorie is the amount of energy it takes to raise 1 kilogram of water 1 degree centigrade at sea level.
The calorie content of foods consumed by a human being was determined in the late 1800s by Wilbur O. Atwater, an agricultural chemist. He built a device called a “Respiration Calorimeter” to make direct measurements of heat released by humans from the food they consumed. At 4 feet by 8 feet, Atwater’s calorimeter was big enough to allow a person to step into it. The device measured the amount of heat released by that person, along with the amount of oxygen consumed and carbon dioxide given off.
Wilbur Olin Atwater (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Using this device, Atwater was able to measure the precise amount of energy contained in thousands of food items. He found that carbohydrates and proteins are worth 4 Calories per gram and fats about 9 Calories per gram. This 4-9-4 system is how labels are determined today. In some cases, dietary fiber is subtracted from the total carbohydrate count because it is assumed that it provides no nutritional calories. Also, alcohol, if present, is accounted for as 7 Calories per gram.
Basal metabolism reactions occurring inside our bodies consume 70% of the calories. Rest 30% if not consumed shall be deposited in the body mostly in the form of fat.
Wasabi: The Real Stuff is in short supply
October 20, 2012 August 3, 2013 Ranjit SinghFood, Horseradish, Japan, Japanese cuisine, Raymond Blanc, Shopping, Sushi, Wasabi1 Comment
There is a Wasabi restaurant in Taj Hotel in Bombay. We can never afford to go to such hotels but heard the name in context of the terrorist attack on the hotel. Actually Wasabi is root stem like ginger and its name is Wasabia Japonica. All this indicates that the whole thing is about Japanese food especially Sushi. Wasabi is used as one of the ingredients in the form of paste of pistachio-green color. It adds the zing to the food.
The real thing is in the short supply even in Japan its home itself. So at most places what is served as wasabi paste is most likely just a mix of European horseradish, mustard, and food coloring.
As a member of the Cruciferae family, it is related to such plants as cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, and mustard. Its distant cousin European horseradish (Armoracia rusticana) often substitutes for it.
Wasabi grows naturally in mountain streambeds, and the Japanese have cultivated it for more than a millennium. Wasabi grown in semiaquatic conditions is known as sawa, whereas wasabi grown in fields is called oka. The stream-grown wasabi produces larger rhizomes and is generally considered to be of higher quality.
The heat of real Wasabi lasts at the most for 15 minutes after grating. But its imitations like horseradish stays for long periods. The components of both wasabi and horseradish can be stabilized by acids, such as vinegar or lemon juice.
The key chemicals that give wasabi its characteristic heat and flavor aren’t present until the wasabi is macerated. When the cell wall is disrupted, it releases the enzyme myrosinase, which hydrolyzes glucosinolates, a group of sulfur-containing glucose derivatives, to produce isothiocyanates that provide wasabi’s spicy zing. The most abundant of these is allyl isothiocyanate. Horseradish has a different profile of isothiocyanates. One of the by-products of the myrosinase reaction is glucose.
The flavor is affected by how finely the wasabi is grated. The traditional way to grate wasabi is with a sharkskin grater, called an oroshi, which resembles fine sandpaper. Because the flavor and heat dissipate so rapidly, it’s best to grate it as you need it.
Scientific studies carried out by Savage and his coworkers show comparison of seven isothiocyanates in wasabi and horseradish. The horseradish contained 1.9 g total isothiocyanate/kg, whereas wasabi contained nearly 10% more (2.1 g/kg). Allyl isothiocyanate was the major component in both. The second most abundant isothiocyanate was 2-phenylethyl isothiocyanate, but it was found only in the horseradish. It, therefore, probably plays a major role in the flavor differences between the two plants. Every other isothiocyanate was present at higher concentrations in wasabi than in horseradish.
Honey: A Food fit for Gods
October 7, 2012 Ranjit SinghBee, Enzyme, Food, Honey, Mohawk Valley, Nectar, Sugar, Sweeteners2 Comments
Honey is thought to be very healthy sweetener. It is produced by bees as their food source and made from nectar sucked from the flowers with the help of enzymes. The final product is made of roughly 80% sugar, 17% water and a number of trace compounds. It is these trace compounds that are responsible for honey’s varied flavors and colors. The most abundant sugars in honey are fructose and glucose. Among the myriad minor complex sugars in the honey are maltose, sucrose, and other disaccharides, as well as trisaccharides such as erlose.
The nectar is mixed with enzymes, Invertase being the most critical, in their stomach-like honey sacs. Invertase splits the sucrose in the nectar into fructose and glucose and also produces some erlose. Back at the hive, the bees pass the digested material to house bees who reduce the moisture content of the mixture by ingesting and regurgitating it. They then deposit concentrated drops into honeycomb cells. Over the next few days, bees fan the fluid with their wings to further concentrate it, and finally, they cap the cells with wax. At the same time, enzyme-mediated changes produce a range of sugars and acids in the honey. Bee enzymes also show up in the finished product. Another enzyme, glucose oxidase, converts glucose to gluconolactone, which is then hydrolyzed to give gluconic acid, the principal acid in honey. Formic, acetic, butyric, and lactic acids are also found in honey, which explains why its pH typically measures 3.8-4.0 which is quite acidic and inhibits the growth of any bacteria in it.
Honey also contains small amounts of minerals and proteins. About 0.2% of honey is ash, probably originating in the flower nectar. Potassium accounts for about one-third of the ash. Other trace elements in honey include iron, manganese, copper, and silicon. The sweetener also contains up to 1% nitrogen, which comes principally from proteins. These proteins can cause honey to foam and form tiny air bubbles.
Of the more than 100 compounds found in honey, many are volatile organic compounds, such as phenylethyl alcohol, that contribute to flavor. The honey flavor is dependent on the flavor compounds and aroma compounds that come from a flower.
Because weather and geography affect flowers, each batch of honey can have a slightly different makeup of flavor chemicals.
Plants are very Smart Indeed
February 23, 2012 June 7, 2012 Ranjit SinghBiology, Botany, Carbon dioxide, Chlorophyll, Environment, Food, Plant, Sun1 Comment
Plants are very smart, efficient and unforgiving in the energy management. Unlike the animals, who cannot regrow their limbs, plants see to it that inefficient leaves are cast off and replaced by new efficient one’s so that the food making machine continue to run smoothly. The leaves make the food by combining carbon dioxide and water in the presence of chlorophyll which shepherds the energy from sun and store it in the plant. Animals make use of this energy by eating the plant parts. This pigment imparts green color to the leaves and masks the faint colors of other chemicals like caroteneoids.
As soon as, the plant know that the a given leaf is under performing, it gradually decrease the supply of chlorophyll and also reclaims whatever it can of the other components. Gradually the color of leaf begins to become yellowish and it looses it strength and fall off the branch. Older leaves are constantly replenished and plant continues to make its food.
When the winter comes, the Sun is hardly visible because sky is mostly overcast. So the plants plan to shut down the food making factories. They withdraw the chlorophyll from the leaves and like polar bears go into a state of hibernation. Leaves acquire beautiful brown, reddish and yellowish hues due to the waning of the effect of chlorophyll. As the winter recedes, Sun comes out, the food making is resumed.
Hummingbirds: The extraordinary birds
May 9, 2011 August 29, 2013 Ranjit SinghBackyard Birding, Bird, Food, Hummingbird, Nectar, Recreation, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, United States1 Comment
Hummingbirds are most beautiful birds endowed with dazzling colors and hues. But these birds seem to be consigned to the extreme life because at the end of the day, they are so exhausted that it is not sure whether or not they will live to see the another day. Their humming near the flowers in which they insert their specialized beaks to suck the nectar while steadying themselves by constantly flapping their wings, seems like a fluid motion poetry. It is sight to behold. They can fly forward and backward, up and down manoeuvrings come as easily to them.
So they are not the ordinary birds but take the definition of extraordinary to a whole new level. They are the smallest warm-blooded creatures on the planet, but they are also among the fastest. They measure on the average 4-5 centimeters. They can With wings that beat up to 200 times every second, they are among nature’s most accomplished athletes, the only birds able to hover, fly backwards, and even upside down.
Hummingbird metabolisms are set in permanent overdrive, requiring them to consume more than half their body weight in nectar every day. Some researchers say that nectar consumption for providing energy to fuel the furious activity during the day time, may be equal to their own weights. Since nectar provides them only sugars for energy, they have to supplement it with insects for getting proteins and other nutrients.
To survive the night, they fluff up their feathers and adjust their body thermostats, and reduce their body temperatures by half and reduce their heart rate from 600 beats per minute to a mere 36 to save the energy for survival and begin their struggle for life next morning.
Due to their small size and dizzying speeds, human beings know only the crude facets of their sizes. PBS has sponsored a study to peer closely into their lives. By using state of the art technology and high definiton cameras, they have been able to delve deep into the private lives of hummingbirds. With cameras able to capture over 500 images a second, the hummingbirds’ magical world can finally be seen and appreciated. Amazing footage shows these little powerhouses are far more than delicate nectar gatherers — they are also deadly predators. And watch as the birds display their elaborate mating rituals, showing off with nose dives that subject them to over ten G’s of force — enough to cause an experienced fighter pilot to black out!
These tiny marvels dazzle and delight bird watchers all over the world, and NATURE reveals their stunning abilities as they have never been seen before. The whole story is available at the PBS website page. Please go through and if you can watch the video you are lucky because video is blocked in our region, God knows for whatever reasons.
Slow Food Movement & Navdanya
November 15, 2010 September 22, 2012 Ranjit SinghAgriculture, Carlo Petrini, Dehradun, Food, India, Navdanya, Slow Food, Vandana ShivaLeave a comment
The world, especially in the cities, is becoming a busy place. The system of joint families exist now largely in the villages. As more and more people are becoming qualified, they migrate towards the cities where their education can earn them a good living. As the cities are becoming overcrowded, the cost of living increases and ultimately migrants are not in much better condition than they were at the native places.
The life has become so much hectic in the cities that the food for which we all are toiling day and night has taken a back seat in the list of preferences of human beings. The people are always in a rush. You can easily figure out children munching pieces of bread, apple or chocolates on their way to school. In India, food is linked with pious and religious feelings and is partaken after thanksgiving. Hands and face are washed before taking the food. Members present in the house prefer to sit on the mats on cleaned floor and see to it that they eat together. All this is changing rapidly due to the fact that more and more members of the family are employed somewhere and their schedules are different. People don’t enjoy their food. Some eat it while walking or doing office work.
Due to this, it has become a world of fast food. The foods which are available within a few minutes after ordering. These are generally addictive type of foods because they appeal to taste buds. They are very high in fat and other harmful ingredients and contribute a great deal in the problem of obesity. The concept of fast food also means eating out. Eating out the bad food at a very cost. Results of all this become apparent when health problems like stress, obesity, blood problem and diabetes occur at an early age.
Many groups of people are making efforts to reverse this pernicious trend. One such movement is Slow Food movement. It was started by Carlo Petrini in 1986 in Italy. This movement strives to preserve tradition and regional cuisine of a region. It encourages the residents to preserve and grow the local varieties of seeds. The movement has since expanded globally to over 100,000 members in 132 countries. Its goals of sustainable foods and promotion of local small businesses are paralleled by a political agenda directed against globalization of agricultural products.
In India, efforts are on to hark back to good old days and traditions followed in those days. One such movement is Navdanya (nine seeds) movement. It has been started by Dr. Vandana Shiva, in Dehradun. Dr.Shiva has analyzed in depth the green revolution in Punjab which ushered the country into self dependence in foodgrains. She has concluded that examined in the broader and long time context, it has done more harm to the land of state than the benefit. Results are indicating it to be true. Green revolution crops used single strains of seeds which necessiated the need of using very high quantities of insecticides. They also high amounts of fertilizers and water.
Results are not a happy augury. Water table has gone down. High amount of dangerous contaminants have seeped into the earth and underground water causing high instances of diseases like cancer. Even the vegetables and grains contain high amount of banned insecticides and pesticides. Ultimate cost the nation is going to pay is very high. It is another matter that whatever our elders sowed has to be eaten by the coming generations. The biggest culprit in this fiasco is the government which has closed their eyes to the use of dangerous pesticides. The others are agriculture Universities because it is these universities which teach the illiterate farmers.
Navdanya movement strives to preserve and multiply the local seed varieties. In fact, it has successfully saved the many varieties from extinction. In nutshell, the strategy is to sow mixed crops. Such crops are less prone to be affected en-masse and in fact grow successfully utilizing the different nutrients from the soil. The fertilizers are dung manure and pesticides are prepared from the leaves of trees like neem. The movement has revived the organic farming in the region.
Pavlovian Conditioning
January 8, 2009 September 14, 2012 Ranjit SinghAmylase, Classical conditioning, Dog, Food, Ivan Pavlov, Learning, Saliva, Stimulus (physiology)Leave a comment
Sometimes, a discovery seems too simple to believe its applications. This is the case with Pavlovian conditioning named after the doctor Ivan Pavlov. He was a doctor and besides his research on the secrets of digestive system, he was interested in knowing what signals triggered the related phenomena such as secretion of saliva.
We know that saliva is secreted whenever food is presented before animals. This is called drooling. In us humans, an enzyme called Amylase is present in the saliva which breaks down the starch we eat into lower sugars which are sources of energy for sustaining our bodies. Similarly, dogs begin to drool whenever food is presented before them. But what strange thing he observed was that dog also began to drool whenever it saw the doctor’s coat. He concluded that dog formed an association with lab coat and associated it with food. He did more experiment of different kind. He will ring a bell and immediately present food to dog. After some days, he observed that dog began to secret saliva on ringing the bell even if he was not presented with food. This time dog has formed an association between ringing of bell and presentation of food. Pavlov’s discovery was that the environmental events that previously had no relation to a given reflex (such as a bell sound) could, through experience, can be made to trigger a reflex (salivation). This kind of learnt response is called conditioned reflex, and the process whereby dogs or humans learn to connect a stimulus to a reflex is called conditioning.
Animals generally learn to associate stimuli that are relevant to their survival. Food aversion is an example of a natural conditioned reflex. If an animal eats something with a distinctive vanilla taste and then eats a tasteless poison that leads to nausea, the animal will not be particularly eager to eat vanilla-flavoured food the next time. Linking nausea to taste is an evolutionarily successful strategy, since animals that failed to learn their lesson did not last very long.
This work has great spin off studies and changing of behavior. An important principle in conditioned learning is that an established conditioned response (salivating in the case of the dogs) decreases in intensity if the conditioned stimulus (bell) is repeatedly presented without the unconditioned stimulus (food). This process is called extinction.
In order to treat phobias evoked by certain environmental situations, such as heights or crowds, this phenomenon can be used. The patient is first taught a muscle relaxation technique. Then he or she is told , over a period of days, to imagine the fear-producing situation while trying to inhibit the anxiety by relaxation. At the end of the series, the strongest anxiety-provoking situation may be brought to mind without anxiety. This process is called systematic desensitization.
Pavlovian conditioning is used in effective commercial advertising. An effective commercial should be able to manipulate the response to a stimulus (like seeing a product’s name) which initially does not provoke any feeling. The objective is to train people to make the “false” connection between positive emotions (e.g. happiness or feeling attractive) and the particular brand of consumer goods being advertised.
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Recording Britain, an exhibition at the Towner Gallery Eastbourne
By Chris Sharville on June 17, 2016 in Art exhibitions in the UK
Recording Britain is an exhibition at the Towner Gallery, Eastbourne, Sussex, England, organised by the Victoria & Albert Museum, London. It closes on 26th June 2016. The exhibition shows the work of a range of artists in a scheme set up at the outbreak of the Second World War to employ artists on the home front to record the changing landscape of Britain. The exhibition features work by artists such as John Piper, Kenneth Rowntree and Barbara Jones alongside a selection of contemporary works including paintings and photographs by Conrad Atkinson, Richard Long, David Nash and Laura Oldfield Ford. Visit the Towner Gallery website.
Art galleries to visit in the UK
One of the best galleries in the UK to see the work of Eric Ravilious.
Lumiere Press publishers of limited edition books on photography
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Markets & Economy
India's Cash Crackdown
The Indian people are reeling from a government-instigated curb on their cash economy, but what should investors make of the situation? Aninda Mitra, emerging market analyst at Standish Mellon Asset Management, discusses this topic.
AN INFORMAL ECONOMY
One factor that distinguishes India from other emerging market powers, such as China, is that a large portion of its economic activity takes place in cash and often under the table. India’s currency in circulation represents 12% of the country’s GDP, nearly twice the 7% average for all emerging market countries.1 Despite the country’s image abroad as a technology hub with a burgeoning middle class of consumers, much of India’s population does not use banks and the “informal economy” generates around 45% of GDP and a whopping 80% of all jobs.2
A significant portion of this informal economy is untaxed activity conducted using cash. According to the World Bank, this illegal “black economy” accounts for roughly 23% of India’s GDP and the campaign currently being waged by Prime Minister Narendra Modi against this “black money” has attracted widespread attention from around the world.
The government’s program to compel its citizens to exchange 86% of the cash in circulation for new bank notes and register themselves as potential taxpayers in the process is not just a huge political gamble for Modi, but, it also represents a profound monetary shock for what has been one of the brightest stars among emerging markets in recent years, and also shows the government’s determination to make tough, market-friendly reforms.
Cash transactions ranging from shopping at mom-and-pop stores to purchases of luxury goods and real estate have dropped sharply amid the cash crackdown. India’s long and creaky supply chains, including those connecting farmers to urban wholesalers, have also been hurt. As Mitra puts it, “It is clearly regressive in nature as it hurts the poor and smaller businesses who are more cash-dependent and has resulted in considerable hardship.”
SHOCK TACTICS
Mitra says India’s initiative to root out black money is certain to shock near-term growth and likely to bring about a patch of disinflation over the medium term. “We expect a sharp but short hit to activity in Q1 2017 and a fall in annual GDP growth in the fiscal year which ends March 31, 2017 to between 6% and 6.5% (down from around 7.5%). Over the medium term, around three-quarters out and beyond—alongside ongoing social and political stability—we are now becoming more constructive about the fiscal and growth implications from less “black money” and a significant increase in formal economic activity.”
A return to financial normality will take a few more weeks while old bank notes are exchanged for new ones, with the process likely to be completed by the end of January, says Mitra. Industrial production data is likely to remain weak through that time, but downside risks should also be somewhat offset by a jump in financial services activity, with all the deposits and exchanges of old notes at bank branches.
THREAT OF DEFLATION
Of more immediate concern for investors, the bond market is pricing in disinflation for India, with 5-year and 10-year yields having dropped while most other sovereign emerging market (EM) yields have risen since the U.S. election. The swap market is pricing in nearly 50 basis points worth of rate cuts by the central bank in the year ahead even as markets elsewhere in Asia are pricing in monetary tightening, says Mitra. But the central bank belied these expectations by keeping its policy rate on hold at its December 7 meeting. In its press release, the bank highlighted India’s “sticky” core inflation and emphasized that the downturn in activity was only temporary.
The stock market has also come off noticeably, but it is not signaling a collapse. This underscores some of the medium-term optimism that this downturn is temporary.
Says Mitra, “The fiscal situation seems likely to improve with more individuals and businesses registered as taxpayers and a new goods and services tax due to kick in by mid-2017. But a sharply disinflationary environment, and near-term drop in activity, will also lower near-term tax buoyancy. A broadening tax net encompassing more businesses could, however, have mixed consequences. In certain parts of the economy, with strong underlying demand, firms will simply pass on the higher tax burden by charging higher prices. In other areas, businesses could be forced to shed workers or find other ways of remaining cost-competitive. That makes it less clear how long some of these shocks will take to pass.”
Modi has run a huge political gamble with his campaign against cash. By adversely impacting smaller businesses, he has hurt a key constituency of his party, the Bharatiya Janata Party. But Modi wants to be seen as decisively moving against corruption, sharply contrasting his coalition with the Congress Party, which has endured a slew of corruption scandals involving government officials and coalition allies. For global investors, the benefit may lie in the reassurance provided by an essential emerging market nation demonstrating it can undertake difficult reforms to lower corruption, reduce rent-seeking and increase tax collection. That should amount to a cultural revolution, if not a great leap forward.
“The fiscal situation seems likely to improve with more individuals and businesses registered as taxpayers and a new goods and services tax due to kick in by mid-2017."
1The Economic Times: ‘Going Cashless: Rising Currency-GDP Ratio Key Impediment,’ November 27, 2016.
2The Wire: ‘Modi’s Demonetization Move May Have Permanently Damaged India’s Informal Sector,’ November 16, 2016.
Main risks: Investing in foreign denominated and/or domiciled securities involves special risks, including changes in currency exchange rates, political, economic, and social instability, limited company information, differing auditing and legal standards, and less market liquidity. These risks generally are greater with emerging market countries. Equities are subject to market, market sector, market liquidity, issuer, and investment style risks to varying degrees.
This material has been distributed for informational purposes only and should not be considered as investment advice or a recommendation of any particular investment. Information contained herein has been obtained from sources believed to be reliable, but not guaranteed. No part of this material may be reproduced in any form, or referred to in any other publication, without express written permission. In Canada, securities are offered through BNY Mellon Asset Management Canada Ltd., registered as a Portfolio Manager and Exempt Market Dealer in all provinces and territories of Canada, and as an Investment Fund Manager and Commodity Trading Manager in Ontario. The Dreyfus Corporation, Standish Mellon Asset Management Company, LLC and MBSC Securities Corporation are subsidiaries of BNY Mellon.
© 2017 MBSC Securities Corporation, 225 Liberty St, 19th Fl., New York, NY 10286
MARK-2016-12-19-0896
© 2019 MBSC Securities Corporation, Distributor, 240 Greenwich St., 9th Fl., New York, NY 10286
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Landscape architecture - history, ideas, theories, jobs and careers > London Landscape Architecture > Landscape Architecture in London - Visitor's Guide UK > Wimbledon Common
York House was built in the mid-seventeenth century and a plan showing the present extent of the gardens was drawn in 1784. The riverside gardens were commissioned by Sir Ratan Tata, a Parsee from Mumbai who bought the house from the Duc d’Orleans in 1906. Tata, whose family continues to run one of the largest industrial companies in India, had the gardens re-designed and installed the Carrara marble statues. They came from Lea Park (aka Witley Park) near Godalming and are thought to have been made in Italy. After Tata's death York House was sold to the council and used for offices. The statues were allowed to rot away quietly, until their restoration in 1988. It was said that "Every one of the marble maidens (is) covered with graffiti, mostly obscene, and they have been daubed with paint in unmentionable places. The pond is full of cans and take-away boxes".
A pond in the former Bluegate Gravel Pit
The notice reads: "Caution. Golf is played on the common & pedestrians should take care when crossing the fairway"
The War Memorial was designed by Madeline Agar with Brenda Colvin as her site assistant. It is on Richardson Evans Memorial Playing Fields - part of Wimbledon Common since 1922.
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Tag Archives: Brotherhood of Mutants
Why Jennifer Lawrence’s Mystique Is The Best Version Of The Character
Everybody has at least one unpopular opinion that draws ire from the vast majority of people. I’m not referring to extreme political stances, though. Those who identify as full-fledged communists, anarchists, or theocrats are more defined by an ideology than an opinion. I’ve shared plenty of opinions in the past, some of which I’m sure qualify as unpopular.
Regardless of what those opinions entail, I’ve tried to make my point and most of the time, I can find a substantial group of people who share my views. It’s part of why I enjoy doing what I do. However, there’s one particular opinion I have that might be the most unpopular position I’ve ever held.
It has nothing to do with politics or ideology. It has to do with comics and superhero movies, another popular topic I’ve discussed many times before. I’ve shared it before in other forums and in almost every case, I have a hard time finding anyone who agrees with me. Knowing how dangerous it can be to share unpopular opinions on the internet these days, I’m going to take a chance and share it here.
I believe that Jennifer Lawrence’s take on Mystique is one of the best version of the character in any medium.
I’ll give X-men fans, comic book fans, and fans of superhero movies a moment to stop fuming. Take all the time you need. Believe me, I’ve heard and read all the vile insults you want to throw at me. Before you flood the comments section with a fresh batch of frothing hate, please hear me out because I feel like there’s a point worth making here.
If not, please take this stunning image as a consolation prize.
Before I get into the details of the comics and movies, I freely acknowledge that Jennifer Lawrence is one of those high-profile celebrities for which many have mixed opinion. Ever since she rose to fame, she has been a polarizing figure. People either love her or hate her with very little in between.
Regardless of how you might feel about her, as an actress, there’s no denying that she played an instrumental role in revitalizing the X-Men movies, beginning with “X-Men: First Class.” As Mystique, she succeeded a very popular version in Rebecca Romijn, who set the precedent for blue-skinned shape-shifters who favored nudity. However, there was one important distinction with Ms. Lawrence’s version.
Unlike Ms. Romijn, and every other version for that matter, Ms. Lawrence’s take on Mystique included a backstory that provided unprecedented depth for the character. That story, and the depth that came with it, proved critical in the role that this Mystique would play in “X-Men: Days Of Future Past.” I would go so far as to argue that both movies work largely because of how Ms. Lawrence carried this character.
I can probably find more than a few people who agree that Ms. Lawrence’s Mystique was important in making her first two movies in the role work. Where I probably lose those people is when I go a step further and claim that this version of Mystique is superior to most other versions.
Some might call that hyperbole and maybe it is, to some extent. I still contend that there is an argument to be made and anyone familiar with Mystique’s history in the comics can appreciate it. I doubt I’ll change anyone’s mind, but it’s that very history, or lack thereof, that helped make Ms. Lawrence’s take on the character so compelling.
Mystique, like many other comic book characters, has a history that is more convoluted than most. She’s been around since 1978, but in all that time, her character has never been developed beyond a certain point. In fact, in the grand scheme of Marvel’s vast universe, it’s remarkable that she has managed as well as she has with so little backstory.
There’s no canonical information about where she was born, who her parents are, or even how old she is. She has never appeared as a child or a teenager. She’s always been an adult who goes by the name, Raven Darkholme. It’s not even clear that’s her actual name. Being a shape-shifter, it’s impossible to tell.
Beyond her unexplored history, Mystique’s personality has been pretty flat over the years. She’s a villain. That much is made clear. However, her brand of villainy is not nearly as refined as others. She’s basically a sociopath whose only purpose in life revolves around tormenting the X-Men, especially Wolverine.
How she goes about it varies, but why she does it rarely gets explored. Granted, there have been times when she has joined the X-men, but it never lasts and often ends with her betraying them. It has happened so often that it’s somewhat predictable. Even when it seems like she has undergone some major growth, she always ends up regressing back to her psychotic ways.
She still looks sexy every step of the way.
That’s not to say she has no depth. Being the biological mother of Nightcrawler and the adopted mother of Rogue has been a major source of drama over the years. Her romantic and sexual entanglements have also been colorful to say the least, albeit not always in a good way. However, this drama rarely ever adds depth to her villainy.
While Rebecca Romijn’s version had some nuance, especially in the second movie, she didn’t deviate much from her comic book counterpart. For three movies, she was one of Magneto’s top henchmen and little else. Jennifer Lawrence’s version of Mystique dared to be more than that.
The first minutes of “X-Men: First Class” did more for Mystique’s backstory than three movies and four decades of comics had done to that point. It established her as a mutant who’d run away and had nowhere to go, something that has real-life parallels for certain minorities. From there, she develops a close sibling bond with James McAvoy’s Charles Xavier, which does plenty to develop his character as well.
However, what truly makes this version of Mystique special is how she grows over the course of several movies. Like her comic version, she shifts her allegiances repeatedly. She starts off as an ally of Charles Xavier. Then, she leaves and follows Magneto. Eventually, she returns to Xavier’s side, but not without undergoing major personal upheavals.
In both “X-Men: First Class” and “X-Men: Days Of Future Past,” she finds herself at a crossroads on multiple occasions. Sometimes, she walks a more villainous path. Other times, she’s more virtuous. They’re all contingent on difficult choices and, regardless of where they take her, there’s an underlying sentiment to those choices.
In “X-Men: First Class,” she chooses Magneto because she believes Charles wants her to hide her true form. In “X-Men: Days Of Future Past,” she choose Charles because she realizes the consequences of her actions. Friends and enemies alike try to influence her. When she finally makes a choice, it feels like something a real character would make.
In the comics, you can always assume Mystique will make villainous choices and be right most of the time. With Ms. Romijn’s, you can assume she’ll choose whatever Magneto chooses and be right, as well. The choices of Ms. Lawrence’s Mystique are truly uncertain and for a character defined by her shape-shifting traits, that’s more than fitting.
It wouldn’t be accurate to call Ms. Lawrence’s Mystique a hero. In “X-Men: Apocalypse,” she resents that label. It wouldn’t be accurate to call her a villain either, even though she doesn’t always side with the X-Men. She adapts to whatever her situation requires, like anyone would expect of a skilled shape-shifter. It’s an understandable, and even admirable, take for a character in a superhero movie.
While her ultimate fate was tragic, as revealed in “Dark Phoenix,” her journey has been remarkable. Regardless of how the events of “Dark Phoenix” played out for everyone else involved, it’s still the most complete story that Mystique has ever had. That’s why I feel Jennifer Lawrence’s take on Mystique is the best we’ve seen to date.
That’s not to say she’s without flaws. I don’t doubt that her diminished role in “X-Men: Apocalypse” undercut her development. Even with those flaws, she’s still more balanced than anything the comics or previous X-Men movies have given us. Whatever happens with the X-Men as they joint he MCU, I hope Ms. Lawrence’s Mystique inspires the future of the character for years to come.
To all those who disagree with me, and I’m sure there are many, I welcome your comments and thoughts. I only ask that you keep it civil.
Filed under Comic Books, Jack Fisher, Superheroes, Marvel, movies, superhero comics, superhero movies, X-men
Tagged as 20th Century Fox, Astonishing X-men, Brotherhood of Mutants, Charles Xavier, Dark Phoenix, Dark Phoenix Trailer, Fox, Jennifer Lawrence, Magneto, Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Marvel Comics, Marvel Universe, MCU, Nightcrawler, Raven Darkholme, Rebecca Romijn, Rogue, superhero comics, Superheroes, Uncanny X-men, Wolverine, X-men, X-men Apocalypse, X-men comics, X-men Dark Phoenix, X-men Days of Future Past, X-men First Class, X-men movies, X-men The Last Stand, X2, X3
Jack Fisher’s Weekly Quick Pick Comic: Uncanny X-Men #16
Every Wednesday, this crazy world of ours gets a little less intolerable thanks to a fresh batch of comics. At a time when most of our heroes are in movies and too many villains run free in the real world, we need a little something to remind us of all things good, upstanding, and awesome. As such, I make it a point to select one comic from this batch that’s a better reminder than most.
While the world of superhero comics goes through cycles of hope and despair as often as the Hulk goes through cheap pants, the state of affairs for the X-Men have been more dire than usual. Since the reality-warping events of “Uncanny X-Men #10,” the state of mutant affairs in the Marvel universe hasn’t just been tenuous. Mutants are essentially fighting for the right to be more than an afterthought.
As much of the mutant population is exploring the dystopian utopia that is “Age of X-Man,” the remaining X-Men have been trying to find their place in a world that seems all too happy to be rid of mutants. It has not been an easy endeavor, but “Uncanny X-Men #16” reminds us why it’s worth doing.
The X-Men have been beaten, demoralized, wounded, and marginalized. They’ve had to battle old enemies, attack old allies, and even clash with close family. To say they’re at a low point would be like saying John Wick likes his dog. This is one of the most dire situations the X-Men have ever had to endure, including everything ever written by Chuck Austin.
Despite all that, “Uncanny X-Men #16” finds a way to bring out the best in the X-Men’s most ardent champions.
If you’re a Cyclops fan, you’ll find something to love about this issue. If you’re a Wolverine fan, you’ll find something to love about it too. Hell, if you’re a fan of mutant ninjas fighting alongside magic-wielding Russian teenagers, you’ll find something love about it. That last one is not a metaphor, by the way.
“Uncanny X-Men #16” continues a story that has wounded the X-Men in so many ways. A lot of it is mental. Some of it is physical, as Cyclops’ lingering head injury shows. Even as the X-Men fight on, this issue finally shows all the struggle getting to the team. It’s not the first time these characters have expressed doubts, but in the context of the story, it does something important with respect to the past, present, and future of the X-Men.
Everyone on Cyclops’ team knows that mutants are in an existential crisis. They know their numbers are dwindling and that humanity is doing everything possible to make them an afterthought. How does anyone even go about being X-Men in a world like that? Thus far, that has been an unanswered question.
Cyclops and Wolverine tried to answer it by creating a new team out of what remained of the mutant population. They’re actually setting aside their differences and attempting to keep the spirit of the X-Men going. Keep in mind, these are two people who don’t like each other. One of them kept trying to sleep with the other’s wife and the other has shot him through a wall on more than one occasion.
Just putting the team together and fighting what’s left of the X-Men battles has been a struggle over the past several issues. However, “Uncanny X-Men #16” dares to step back and question what they’re fighting for and why they’re even fighting.
Writer, Matthew Rosenberg, explores some overdue discussion among the team. He also puts Cyclops in a unique position that somehow makes him more awesome. For much of his history, as well as his ill-fated roles in the movies, Cyclops has always been the uptight leader who barks orders and expects others to follow them. While we’ve seen hints of that Cyclops here and there, he finds himself in a more uncertain position.
Cyclops no longer trusts himself to be the leader he once was. Even his own brother, Havok, isn’t sold on his leadership at times. While it’s hard to be much of a leader when your entire species is on the brink of extinction, the criticisms aren’t without merit.
Essentially, Cyclops gives the X-Men a chance to show that they can be X-Men without him barking orders. He goes so far as to temper his own leadership in order to give the X-Men a chance to prove their causes is bigger than one person. I won’t say it’s Cyclops’ greatest tactical decision, but the results speak for themselves.
The criticisms and difficult discussions are relevant, giving “Uncanny X-Men #16” much more depth than a typical X-Men comic. It still has plenty of standard superhero action that artist, Salvador Larroca, renders beautifully with his skills. It’s not the flashiest battle, but it has a few twists and complications that require more than just better leadership.
Some of the choices made over the course of the story are questionable. Many of the wounds they’ve suffered haven’t entirely healed. These X-Men are still a far cry from the X-Men that hang out in mansions, fly around in high-speed jets, and fight killer robots. They’re not just struggling to find their place in a world where mutants are almost extinct. They’re trying to find a better way to do what they’ve always done.
The events of “Uncanny X-Men #16” prove that the X-Men still have plenty to offer. They’re still in a tenuous state, but they’re still intact. They’re still finding their way. They’re still learning overdue lessons that bring out the best in each character while not overlooking the worst.
These are exciting times for the X-Men and not just because the movie rights have returned to Marvel. Rosenberg and Larroca have broken the X-Men down in their darkest hour. Now, it feels like they’re becoming the superheroes they have to be. There’s bound to be setbacks, mistakes, and tragedies. However, that’s often when heroes like the X-Men are at their best.
Filed under Jack's Quick Pick Comic, X-men
Tagged as #NCBD, Alex Summers, Astonishing X-men, Brotherhood of Mutants, Comic Book, comic book reviews, comic books, Cyclops, Havok, Hope Summers, Juggernaut, Logan, Magneto, Marvel, Marvel Comics, Matthew Rosenberg, Mirage, mutants, New Comic Day, Psylocke, Salvador Larroca, Scott Summers, superhero comics, Uncanny X-men, Uncanny X-men 16, Wolfsbane, Wolverine, X-men, X-men comics
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Staff Host Account / Monday, May 27, 2019
US in 'weakest' regional presence in history: IRGC commander
"The Americans have been present in the region since 1833 and they are currently at the weakest state throughout the history of their presence in West Asia, and have the minimum number of warships in the Persian Gulf," Rear Admiral Ali Fadavi, the second-in-command of the IRGC, said in an interview with Fars news agency on Sunday. He added that the Americans have even stopped the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier, which had been scheduled to move towards the region, in the Indian Ocean, and have avoided bringing it to the Persian Gulf due to "the fear they feel" of Iran's power in the region. The United States remarkably stoked tensions with Iran in May 2018 when US President Donald Trump pulled his country out of the nuclear accord, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), and re-imposed harsh sanctions against the Islamic Republic in defiance of global criticisms. The tensions saw a sharp rise on the first anniversary of Washington’s exit from the deal as the US moved to ratchet up the pressure on Iran by tightening its oil sanctions and building up its military presence in the region. Washington has since then ratcheted up the pressure on Iran, sending military reinforcements, including the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group, a squadron of B-52 bombers, and a battery of patriot missiles, to the Middle East. On Friday, the Pentagon announced that 1,500 additional troops would be sent to the Middle East in what officials described as a “force protection” measure against alleged Iranian threats. Trump also claimed the deployment is "mostly protective." Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Saturday dismissed the US claims against Iran as "fabricated allegations to justify beefed up US military presence in the region, " saying Washington’s decision to deploy additional troops to the Middle East is "extremely dangerous" and threatens international peace and security. Tehran has repeatedly announced that it would not be the initiator of any war, but reserves the right to self defense and will give a crushing response to any act of aggression. Elsewhere in his remarks, Fadavi lashed out at the US for conducting psychological operations against Iran, describing them as an act of evil. Refuting US claims about having defeated terrorist groups, including Daesh, in the Middle East, the IRGC commander emphasized that it was the Islamic Revolution and fighters loyal to the Islamic Revolution that put an end to the activities to terrorist groups, which were affiliated with the global arrogance, in the region. He emphasized that the fighters loyal to the Islamic Revolution routed terrorists in various parts of the Middle East, “and today, there is no sign of self-proclaimed terrorist states in the region.”
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Home ▶ Vol 25, No 4 (1991) ▶ Helberg
’n Toets vir Gereformeerde Ekumene
J. L. Helberg
In die Skriflig/In Luce Verbi | Vol 25, No 4 | a1392 | DOI: https://doi.org/10.4102/ids.v25i4.1392 | © 1991 J. L. Helberg | This work is licensed under CC Attribution 4.0
J. L. Helberg,, South Africa
While there is a universal interest for ecumenical involvement, the Reformed Churches in South Africa (GKSA) suspended relations with the Reformed Ecumenical Council, the only ecumenical movement in which the GKSA has ever been involved. Criticism has been directed at the GKSA for isolating itself and for not being concerned in the relevant problematics of the day. This article indicates what the official relations of the GKSA are, how the GKSA approaches the ecumenical calling in the present situation, what problems exist in this regard, and with what test the GKSA is confronted. In order to do this an attempt is made in this article to determine what the norms for ecumenicity according to the Scriptures are. This approach will be undertaken by examining the central revelation-historical lines which occur in the Old Testament and extend to the New Testament, and by outlining the resulting data about the character and the organisation of the church. It will be demonstrated that the church is essentially concerned with the proclamation of the word and the embodiment of the requirements of the Word: not with impersonal, organisational, technical or other structures but with the personal relation with God, the Creator, Ruler and Saviour of mankind as embodied in his (covenant) people. This is a relation with God in Christ and with the neighbour, in an existential, local context and in universal perspective The test for the GKSA will be whether justice is done to the universal character as well as the confessional character and the personal character of its calling. This threefold relation will especially become clear in the GKSA's handling o f the ecclesiastical set-up in the relation with the other National Synods, from the local level up to the synodical level, because it is especially on the level of these National Synods that a lack in the personal relations or the character of these relations is apparent.
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Jerusalem Syndrome: How to Psychoanalyze a Messiah
Esther Inglis-Arkell
Filed to: PsychologyFiled to: Psychology
Jerusalem Syndrome
What do you do when someone suddenly decides that they're the next messiah? Jerusalem Syndrome is a fairly well-known phenomenon. It happens when otherwise normal people suddenly become sure they're the chosen one — often while they're visiting Jerusalem. And there are actual specialists in this particular medical area. Find out how they treat the many Jesuses (Jesi?) they encounter.
Top image: More Good Foundation/Flickr.
In Jerusalem, it isn't terribly unusual to be approached by someone with a long beard and a beatific smile who claims to be your personal lord and savior. In fact, it happens about a hundred times a year, so often that some hostel owners know exactly who to contact when it does happen. Jerusalem is a host and a namesake to an unusual syndrome. People who come there, sometimes at moments of crisis in their lives, but other times as a relatively normal travel destination, become convinced that that they are being contacted by God. Some people believe that they are messengers for the messiah. Others, on the other hand, are convinced that they themselves are the second coming of Jesus.
This mindset starts out relatively small. People stand in the street and preach, or they pray for hours at a time without stopping. While these activities are strenuous for the person, and often aggravating for the people around them, they don't pose much of a threat. Things start getting more worrisome when the people hear the voice of God telling them to do things that are destructive. These destructive things are done, for the most part, only to the sufferer him or herself. There was one case of arson committed by someone with Jerusalem syndrome, but that was in the 1960s. Officials were concerned, as the year 2000 drew close, that misguided chosen ones might try to usher in the end of the world. The millennium passed with no danger from Jerusalem Syndrome sufferers, and only a slight uptick in the rate of the affliction. When the authorities get involved, it's to protect the person with the syndrome, not those around them. People in the grip of Jerusalem syndrome often stop bathing, preach or pray until they physically exhaust themselves, or fast for so long that they starve. When this happens, they are taken to one of several institutions set up to treat people with this syndrome. But how do you treat a messiah?
Not surprisingly, some of the treatments for this condition have turned out to be very bad ideas indeed. On isolated occasions, psychiatrists have tried outright telling the person that they aren't who they say they are — or even putting two of them together to see them yell at each other. Since then, more useful strategies have been found. Some people who come down with this syndrome have a previous history of mental illness, and treating that causes the syndrome to subside. Other times, mild tranquilizers or antipsychotics are given to the patient until they get the rest and mental stability they need.
More often though, the patient just needs some time away from Jerusalem. Some patients need a month of treatment away from the city in a hospital. Some need a week in treatment. And some cases simply need to be put on a plane home, where they can interact with their family. Once they are surrounded by their normal life, they'll naturally slip back into their normal mindset. Plenty of people revert to mental health, as if none of it had ever happened.
This gives us an understanding of why the condition is called Jerusalem syndrome. Religious mania can happen anywhere. The city itself does not cause delusions. Instead it constantly reinforces them. We get a glimpse of similar things in museums, clubs, and theme parks. Each of these places attempts to encourage a certain mindset in the people who visit. They are separated from their normal routine, and given all kinds of coordinated sensory cues - music, art, food, smells - that reinforce the desired mindset. The result is a person temporarily slipping into a different mode of being.
Jerusalem functions as one of these spaces writ large. It's an entire city with a history, architecture, and culture that reinforces religious experience, particularly for someone who doesn't live there and so doesn't have a safety net of normality. The city, and the significance of it, feeds the feelings of the would-be messiah every moment they're there. Take them out of that feedback loop, and put them back into a situation in which every cue they get tells them to behave normally again, and they behave normally. All they need is the right stimulus.
Via Wired, How Stuff Works, and Jewish Virtual Library.
Recent from Esther Inglis-Arkell
Behold the Best-Designed Cat House Any Cat Will Still Completely Ignore
Biologists Have Discovered Underground, Burrowing Tadpoles
This Company is Making an Epi-Pen That Fits in a Wallet
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Tag Archives: Final Fantasy X HD PS Vita
The Hunt for Playstation Vita Games, Part 1 (I also picked up Disney Infinity and Lightning Returns Final Fantasy XIII)
Before I got my Playstation Vita system, for the longest time, there were only three PS Vita games that were must haves for me. Those three games are Uncharted: Golden Abyss, Persona 4: Golden, and Killzone: Mercenary. One of these … Continue reading →
Posted in Best Buy, Videogames, Walmart | Tagged Disney, Disney Infinity, Disney Infinity Playstation 3, Disney Infinity PS3, Disney Infinity Starter Pack, Disney Infinity Starter Pack Playstation 3, Disney Infinity Starter Pack PS3, Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy X HD, Final Fantasy X HD Playstation Vita, Final Fantasy X HD PS Vita, Final Fantasy X Playstation Vita, Final Fantasy X PS Vita, Final Fantasy X-2, Final Fantasy X-2 HD, Final Fantasy X-2 HD Playstation Vita, Final Fantasy X-2 HD PS Vita, Final Fantasy X-2 Playstation Vita, Final Fantasy X-2 PS Vita, Freedom Wars, Freedom Wars Playstation Vita, Freedom Wars PS Vita, Lightning Returns, Lightning Returns Final Fantasy XIII, Lightning Returns Final Fantasy XIII PS3, Lightning Returns PS3, Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo 3DS games, Playstation 3, Playstation 3 Games, Playstation Vita, Playstation Vita Games, PS3, PS3 Games, Sly Cooper, Sly Cooper Playstation Vita, Sly Cooper PS Vita, Sly Cooper Thieves in Time, Sly Cooper Thieves in Time Playstation Vita, Sly Cooper Thieves in Time PS Vita, SSX, SSX PS3, The Legend of Zelda, The Legend of Zelda 3DS, The Legend of Zelda Nintendo 3DS, The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time, The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time 3D, The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time 3D 3DS, The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time 3D Nintendo 3DS, The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time 3DS, The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time Nintendo 3DS, video game, Video Games, Videogame, Videogames, Zelda, Zelda Ocarina of Time | Leave a comment
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You are here: HomenextBranch findernextBranches I-NnextKingstonnextIntroduction
The front cover of the Gazette gives readers a sketch impression of a new proposed development at Sutton
A new London department store
John Lewis Kingston was a product of the Partnership’s long held desire to have a branch in prosperous, populous South West London. Central London had been mastered years ago: both John Lewis Peter Jones and John Lewis Oxford Street had made sure of this. But as of the late 1960s, presence in the South of the capital continued to evade the Partnership. In the early 1970’s, the Partnership expressed interest in building upon the Horsefair site in Kingston. Alas, there were considerable problems that thwarted the buying process. One of the biggest issues was Kingston’s reputation for horrific traffic congestion. At that particular time, the Partnership was not prepared to take such a risk and start building, and talks were put on hold. They would remain this way until 1979.
Attentions elsewhere
In the meantime, the Partnership also expressed an interest in building a department store in the London Borough of Sutton, at one end of the High Street. The front cover of the Gazette dated 4th August 1973 proudly donned a sketch of the proposed new branch.
JL Kingston Opticians
Obstructions to construction
Since Opening
The Construction of John Lewis Kingston
The Grand Opening of John Lewis Kingston, 1990
Unearthing history at Kingston
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The socialisation of economists (crosspost from Crooked Timber)
December 10, 2014 John Quiggin74 Comments
I’m following up Henry Farrell’s post on the superiority or otherwise of economists, and Krugman’s piece, also bouncing off Fourcade et al, with a few observations of my own, that don’t amount to anything systematic. My perspective is a bit unusual, at least for the profession as it exists today. I didn’t go to graduate school, and I started out in an Australian civil service job in the low-status[^1] field of agricultural economics.
So, I have long experience as an outsider to the US-dominated global profession. But, largely due to one big piece of good luck early on (as well as the obligatory hard work and general ability), I’ve done pretty well and am now, in most respects, an insider, at least in the Australian context.
I’ve also followed an approach, strongly deprecated in US academia, of writing lots of papers on many different topics. has exposed me to a lot of different subfields of economics, each with their own status hierarchy and criteria for what counts as good work.
My conclusion from this experience is that the obvious problems of academic macroeconomics aren’t unique to that field (in fact, as Krugman points out, the sharp divisions within the field make it unusually open in some ways). In many parts of economics, the status rankings and evaluation criteria are driven much more by internal and aesthetic factors than by empirical validity or policy relevance.
There’s a big arbitrary element to all this. If the seminal (sic) paper by the recognised smartest guy (sic) in the field formulated the core problem in a particular way, his (sic) grad students will learn and propagate that way of doing things, and will vigorously resist any alternative approach, even a purely technical reformulation. They have, after all, a lot invested in the idea that they have learned something valuable that no one else really understands.
If you want to see the mentality at first hand, and have a strong stomach, take a dive into the cesspool that is Economics Job Market Rumors. I should mention that my distaste for EJMR is fully reciprocated. The idea that an understanding of economics combined with attention to actual events is more useful than mastery of a highly specialised bag of tricks is totally antithetical to the ethos of the site (unsurprisingly, they hate Krugman even more than they hate me). In a less extreme form, that’s true of the econ profession in general, as the Fourcade et al piece shows.
[^1]: At least in the international profession, dominated by US norms and values. Until recently in Australia, a large proportion of policy-oriented economists got their start in this field, and policy work, in turn has a status it lacks in the US.
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74 thoughts on “The socialisation of economists (crosspost from Crooked Timber)”
Ivor says:
@Ikonoclast
Please, please, please, do not use the banner of Nobel Laureate when it comes to economics (or peace for that matter).
This is just a self-serving publicity stunt by the ruling class.
@Ivor
I wasn’t quoting those two Nobel Laureate prize winners in a laudatory fashion. In fact, I equated them to used car salesmen who sell rustbuckets with a new coat of paint and sawdust in the sump.
My final quote was from another thinker who pointed out the completely unempirical position of the two said N L winners.
You needed to read all I posted but I can see in retrospect how you could lose patience early and not see where I was headed.
Ernestine Gross says:
Newtonian @15 p 1
The article by Fourcade, Ollion, Algan, “The Superiority of Economists” is published as a discussion paper by the Max Planck Sciences Po Center on Coping with Instability in Market Societies.
After reading the article several times, I could not find even a tangential link to the purpose of the Center. I am happy to be educated in this regard.
Consider the following premise in the said article: “First, the theory of action that comes with economists’ analytical style is hardly compatible with the basic premise of much of the human sciences, namely that social processes shape individual preferences (rather than the other way round). In economics, by contrast, “de gustibus non est disputandum” (Stigler/Becker 1977): the action begins mainly when preferences are set. [1]
How is one to interact with the social scientists, represented by the authors of the said article, without having to learn a new language, which, to tease the mind unnecessarily, bears the same name as the old one, namely English, or, alternatively, pretend each individual’s only “action” is to influence others’ (undefined) preferences and to be influenced by others’ (undefined) preferences – 24 hrs a day, 365 days per year??
Obviously, it would seem to me, the question how are preferences (over?) formed is a different question to how people act, given their preferences for alternative physical objects and state contingent future payoffs (a primaty research area in economics).
One of their ‘findings’ is that economists are more insulated than any others in their sample. Interestingly, they ‘find’ that there is more interrelationship between Finance and other ‘disciplines’ than between Economics and other ‘disciplines’. Nothing makes sense to me. Firstly, how do we get from “economists” to “Economics”? Second, if the said authors would realise that Finance is a sub-field of Economics, then one of their conclusions evaporates.
To the best of my knowledge, Max Planck is a big name in scientific research. I am not sure Max Planck would be pleased to have his name associated with the said article.
The said paper relates to the U.S.A. [1] Lets look a little further, for example to the 2014 (Bank of Sweden) Nobel Prize winner in Economics, Professor Jean Tirole (France). I suggest the said author’s presumptions about ‘economists’ is inconsistent with the content of Prof Tirole’s CV, linked to below:
http://idei.fr/doc/cv/tirole_en_2014.pdf
[1] I do not accept that all academic economists in the USA or even the majority would fit into the said author’s model.
Wylie Bradford says:
But Ernestine, whether preferences are treated as endogenous, or not, is clearly potentially of great significance to welfare economics, without which economics loses much of its point.
Wylie, presumably the potentially great significance of treating preferences (defined over?) as endogenous (instead of treating them as given at a point in time) depends on the philosophical foundation of ‘the economy’ to be considered.
@Ernestine Gross
How so? So long as you base policy choice on net welfare comparisons, and you define welfare gains at the individual level in terms of preference satisfaction (i.e. ‘better off’ means an enlargement of the feasible consumption set) – which is what economic theory does, after all – then the question of whether or not enactment of a given policy (i.e. the reallocation that it implies) will *alter* preferences is highly germane. Economic analyses tend to choose an arbitrary and restricted set of arguments for the objective function, and assume that the preferences that function represents are both given and independent of allocations. It is by no means clear that the Fundamental Theorems of Welfare Economics hold in general when preferences are endogenous. Theoretically speaking, that’s rather a big deal.
@Wylie Bradford
It is not clear to me whether you are addressing social welfare functions or the first and second fundamental welfare theorems or both at the same time.
My point was that at a theoretical level, economics is not independent of the philosophical base of ‘the economy’. For example, if you wish to have a theoretical model of a non-dictatorial society, then taking preferences as given is appropriate. Taking preferences as given does not mean individuals’ preferences are constant over time and it does not mean that the time profile of preference relations of each individual is not influenced by say new information, or at least partially interdependent. It just means the theoretician is not imposing prior restrictions on how these preference relations are formed on the individual level. Changing the set of feasible consumptions, say through a policy measure such as income redistribution, may well change the observable choices but not the preferences. Enlarging the set of feasible consumptions (technologically possible and budget feasible) may or may not have any effect on actual choices of any one or all individuals (eg if preferenes relations have a satiation point in the interior of the enlarged feasible consumption set(s).)
In this context, I don’t understand your statement: “Economic analyses tend to choose an arbitrary and restricted set of arguments for the objective function, and assume that the preferences that function represents are both given and independent of allocations.”
Now, suppose you wish to have a theoretical model of an economy where sociologists specify what preferences are (on, say the basis of consumer surveys, or whatever). (This would be a society where some people are allowed to impose their methodology of reaching conclusions on others). Call this endogneous (it is treated as part of the social norm). Obviously, the criterion for what consititutes a ‘welfare improvement’ would be different.
Recently I’ve come across some work by neuro-scientists who study risk taking behaviour (an aspect of preferences) of individuals over their life span. Suppose, and this is really speculating as to what might come out of this, the output of this research program is then treated as endogenous to the society of interest. New theoretical research results might emerge (or not, given there very general notion of preferences). Would you not agree that following such a program presumes a society that accepts scientific methods on the philosophical level?
Ernestine,
First of all I’m an economist, so the snide references to sociologists are otiose in my case 🙂
Second, I rarely waste time talking about social welfare functions. After all, as economists we know that there has been a fairly robust argument to the effect that they are invalid constructions for 64 years now. Too bad that comparisons in those terms are at the heart of the theoretical basis of cost-benefit analysis, but, as we know, economists have a high tolerance level for incoherence.
The link you attempt to draw between the assumption of given preferences and a non-dictatorial stance on the part of the theoretician is simply spurious. The assumption of given preferences, fixed with regard to the problem under consideration, just makes things easier. A change increases an agent’s welfare if it moves him/her to a more preferred combination. That is the definition of being ‘better off’. The comparison between the before and after in this case must obviously be made with regard to one set of preferences. If the preferences were to change in response to the alteration in the agent’s circumstances, then clearly the judgement as to whether welfare had improved would be greatly complicated. Hence my reference to the Fundamental Theorems. In the case of the Second, preferences must be independent of the lump-sum transfers if we are to be sure that the result will hold. Note I don’t say that it definitely won’t hold if preferences are endogenous (the correct interpretation of that term being that they change in response to other variables in the problem) but that we can’t be sure that it will. That’s a fair summary of much of the literature on preference endogeneity IMO. That’s a messy result, raising the possibility of economists not being able to evaluate and compare outcomes. Hence, they respond by maintaining an assumption of preference exogeneity in order to yield clear results, despite the fairly obvious fact that preferences of actual agents are not exogenous in this way. You can call that being scientific if you like, but last time I checked the scientific method wasn’t based on expediency.
As for the question of arguments in objective functions, economists routinely assume, for example, that preferences are defined over commodities only, and not at all over the organisation of work. Once again, this is expediency. If agents are treated as caring how things are produced as well as production is distributed in allocations then efficient allocations cannot be defined in isolation from the organisation of the labour process. Messy. Assuming away preferences over work means that consumption and production can be treated independently and clear results can be obtained. Of course, people do care very much about the organisation of work, so the restriction on utility functions is both arbitrary and false. And, yes, I am aware of the Arrow & Hahn type dodge of having agents demand occupation-specific leisure hours e.g baker-leisure, butcher-leisure etc. Since ‘occupations’ are not defined in the theory that is just another case of ordinary-language sleight of hand being used to deal with theoretical limitations. It does nothing to address the fundamental point.
Newtownian says:
Thanks for the comments.
Apologies if my comments are to some extent stream of consciousness and I seem grumpy at economics/finance. 2008 has prejudiced me I think but I am still trying to put myself in the alternative shoes.
On the matter of whether economics is a science of not I just stumbled on the following which may be of interest that relates to Bayes Nets where economists and scientists may find common ground.:
CARTWRIGHT’S HUNTING CAUSES AND USING THEM CAUSAL PLURALISM AND THE LIMITS OF CAUSAL ANALYSIS$
Kevin D. Hoover
Review essay on Cartwright, N. (2007), Hunting Causes and Using Them:
Approaches in Philosophy and Economics. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press. xþ270pp. IBSN 978-0-521-86081-9 $85.
I dont have Cartrights book but I do have some of her other papers and this review is consistent with the picture that emerges. It is fascinating here to see the subtleties here.
Reading between the lines she is very respected philosopher of science and gives economists more credit that scientists might so is likely worth reading. But she also hates Bayes net related cause and effect development (I was looking for examples running counter to the Pearl narrative which seems to be better suited to hard science and engineering and medicine (human engineering?) where its adoption is going gangbusters.
Wylie,
I assumed you are an economist currently at the MQ.
Who made what snide reference to sociologist?
“The link you attempt to draw between the assumption of given preferences and a non-dictatorial stance on the part of the theoretician is simply spurious.”
Why? Please note, I did not talk about “the assumption of given preferences”. Furthermore, I didn’t talk about a non-dictatorial “stance on part of the theoretician”.
“A change increases an agent’s welfare if it moves him/her to a more preferred combination.”
A change in what? Combination of what?
Your explanation as to why you refer to the 2 theorems, known as fundamental welfare theorems makes no sense to me. Would you please provide a reference of your source literature for the 2 fundamental welfare theorems as well as for ‘endogenous preferences’.
No brownie points for stating that the theoretical models for which the 2 fundamental welfare theorems are characterisations of the solution exclude ‘the organisation of work’ or that they do not include the term ‘occupation’. Firstly, Debreu’s 1959 ‘Theory of Value’ contains the 1st and 2nd fundamental welfare theorems. Debreu explicitly states that the theoretical model in this book excludes ‘industrial organisation’ (and it does not deal with the formation of prices). Second, I’d be very careful if I were you in criticising Arrow and Hahn for not having used the term ‘occupation’, you may end up being surprised as to how general the concept of a commodity is in the said models. Lately, we don’t hear much about ‘occupation’. Instead we hear about ‘jobs’. (The everyday language does not always correspond to concepts defined by suitable choice of mathematical objects.)
I am surprised you are not mentioning the difficulty in getting people to reveal their preferences (see mechanism design).
Strange, isn’t it, that the generic Pareto inefficiency result for competitive private ownership economies with incomplete markets is not (as yet) labelled the 3rd fundamental welfare theorem.
To return to my point. Why is there a need to restrict oneself to a philosophical beliefs underlying theoretical models of a competitive private ownership economy? Isn’t it the case that by you ignoring my sentence of considering an society where people classified as sociologist provide input into ‘how the economy should work’, the link to the topic of this thread is lost, IMHO.
@Newtownian
Thank you for the reference.
I don’t know how large the subset of all economists is who are frustrated with the institutional changes that resulted in the 2008 event, but I am pretty sure it is a non-trivial set. Incidentally, the joint work I most enjoyed was with an acoustics engineer and someone with an IT background. Communication was easy.
Ernestine Gross :
That would be me 🙂
I guess I took the reference to ” a theoretical model of an economy where sociologists specify what preferences are” as snide, following on from your snippy attitude to the Planck Institute paper.
Leaving aside the fairly pointless diversionary squibbing about the precise words you used, you stated: “For example, if you wish to have a theoretical model of a non-dictatorial society, then taking preferences as given is appropriate”, and “the theoretician is not imposing prior restrictions on how these preference relations are formed on the individual level”. Furthermore, you characterised your ‘sociologists’ example as ” a society where some people are allowed to impose their methodology of reaching conclusions on others”. Putting all that together paints a pretty clear picture of a link being drawn between taking preferences as given and being (piously) non-dictatorial. As I said, a spurious link. An assumption that preferences are exogenous can be modified by treating them as a function of (or at least affected by) the other variables in the problem at hand. The alternative to assuming given preferences is not imposing a preference ordering from outside (i.e. abandoning a subjective theory of value). This is what you seem to be fixating on. Of course, economists do impose a lot from the outside. They have no idea what the preferences of actual agents are, and yet they assume functional forms for utility functions that imply properties for those underlying orderings. Naturally they do this, as with everything else, for tractability purposes.
I don’t know whether this is a stylistic trope of yours but I find it hard to believe that you don’t understand precisely what I mean. Imagine an agent with a utility function defined over whatever – a subset of commodities, all commodities, all commodities plus sundry other things – and the size of the feasible consumption set changes for some reason (e.g. a change in some prices). The agent is better off if after the change they are consuming a combination of whatever it is their utility function is defined over with a higher utility number than before the change. That is the definition of being ‘better off’. Clearly that requires comparison of combinations using the same utility function. Utility numbers from different functions being non-comparable, if then preferences change in response to whatever caused the change in the size of the consumption set, that particular definition of ‘better off’ is no longer applicable. That is why the issue of pereference endogeneity is important.
It follows pretty straightforwardly from the above. Try thinking about it using the way we teach this stuff to undergrads (e.g. 2 agents, 2 commodities, Edgeworth Box). If the indifference curves of the agents went wandering all over the place any time the endowment point was shifted it would complicate the demonstration of the point that any desired Pareto-efficient allocation can be supported as a price equilibrium (or quasi-eq) by making the appropriate transfers.
No brownie points for stating that the theoretical models for which the 2 fundamental welfare theorems are characterisations of the solution exclude ‘the organisation of work’ or that they do not include the term ‘occupation’. Firstly, Debreu’s 1959 ‘Theory of Value’ contains the 1st and 2nd fundamental welfare theorems. Debreu explicitly states that the theoretical model in this book excludes ‘industrial organisation’ (and it does not deal with the formation of prices).
Ah, the Debreu defence – ‘You can’t criticise Debreu for ignoring X – he explicitly leaves X out!’ It is a key contender for the most pointless work in the history of economics. Of course, even if he did include the organisation of work or industrial organisation (two different things btw) it would be beside the point given his explicit adherence to formalism as a mathematical philosophy means that Theory of Value isn’t *about* anything at all. It’s just a bunch of strings.
Second, I’d be very careful if I were you in criticising Arrow and Hahn for not having used the term ‘occupation’, you may end up being surprised as to how general the concept of a commodity is in the said models. Lately, we don’t hear much about ‘occupation’. Instead we hear about ‘jobs’. (The everyday language does not always correspond to concepts defined by suitable choice of mathematical objects.)
Again beside the point. Having agents demanding job-specific leisure does not address the question of the relationship between work organisation and welfare (and the implications for the meaning of ‘efficiency’).
Why? Such problems would only be compounded in the presence of preference endogeneity.
Outcomes like that are not popular with a lot of economists.
You’re barking up the wrong tree. The question is not how do agents come to have the preferences that they do (which I agree is too hard), but what are the implications for economic analysis of preferences that *change* in response to changes in variables in economic problems (i.e. preferences that cease to be data).
Whoops! Messed up the quoting. Sorry 🙂
Mr MIT says:
Quiggin:
Two words: Stephen Williamson
1. Thank you for spelling out how you reached the conclusion of one of my statement being spurios. Your conclusion follows from your perceptions.
2. You didn’t give a reference to the original source literature on which your understanding of the two so-called fundamental welfare theorems is based. Instead you refer to the Edgeworth-Box diagram. In your example, you confuse the case of two individuals being unable to make a decision at all (like the woman in the comedy Open All Hours) or they don’t know even for an stance of time their endowments (this is what you describe) with the case you are allegedly interested in, namely, when their preferences change as a consequence of the cause of a change in their feasible consumption set. (How about you consider a finite but multiperiod economy to at least clarify this issue.)
3. I asked for a reference on endogenous preferences. This is a sincere request.
4. I ignore your paragraph about Debreu.
5. What exactly is your point – a movable goal post?
6. EG: “I am surprised you are not mentioning the difficulty in getting people to reveal their preferences (see mechanism design).”
WB: “Why? Such problems would only be compounded in the presence of preference endogeneity.”
Yes it would. This is why I mentioned it. Since you have been so strong on criticising others for “expendiency”, it was surely interesting to get your answer to my question. And what do we get?
7. EG: “Strange, isn’t it, that the generic Pareto inefficiency result for competitive private ownership economies with incomplete markets is not (as yet) labelled the 3rd fundamental welfare theorem.”
WB: “Outcomes like that are not popular with a lot of economists.”
The “outcome”, as you so appropriately label it, is the outcome of a research program which takes its origin in the theoretical work of Arrow-Debreu-Hahn-Radner- ………. …….. all of whom you have no time for. I assume you are providing your impression or perception on what other economists think of the said result rather than some data.
8. Have you read the article by Fourcade et al to which I initially responded?
Mr MIT :
Looks like the forces of the Lollipop Guild are on the march…
I think we’ve exhausted the seam here.
1. No comment.
2. Really, it’s verging on silly to characterise my remarks as confusion over whether agents know their preferences or their endowments. My point relates to my earlier comment (unremarked on by you), to wit: ” Imagine an agent with a utility function defined over whatever – a subset of commodities, all commodities, all commodities plus sundry other things – and the size of the feasible consumption set changes for some reason (e.g. a change in some prices). The agent is better off if after the change they are consuming a combination of whatever it is their utility function is defined over with a higher utility number than before the change. That is the definition of being ‘better off’. Clearly that requires comparison of combinations using the same utility function. Utility numbers from different functions being non-comparable, if then preferences change in response to whatever caused the change in the size of the consumption set, that particular definition of ‘better off’ is no longer applicable. That is why the issue of preference endogeneity is important.”
Clearly such considerations are to the fore when considering lump-sum changes in endowments, as per the second fundamental theorem. Handwaving about the type of economy involved is beside the point as the issue at stake is what is to be meant by ‘better off’ when doing comparative statics – it is a definitional issue. Since the definition of Pareto efficiency is inextricably bound up with the notion of ‘better off’ the significance of the potential implications of preference endogeneity (properly understood) is, and should be obvious.
3. I could dig some up, I suppose. It has been some time. Then again, there’s always ECONLIT 😉
4. I’m not surprised. Kind of like the way the economics profession at large has effectively ignored Debreu. Sure he’s famous and all, but what exactly would be different about economics in general today (and what substantive gains would have been lost) if the development of the Walrasian program petered out with Wald? I know the answers that GE devotees give – the GE literature wouldn’t exist. In their minds that’s all that counts. In reality though (and especially for applied work) the demonstration that certain axioms and certain string manipulation rules produce certain strings (theorems) is about as relevant as doing sudoku. Especially when these strings aren’t about anything.
5. No. Just reiterating that the choice of arguments in objective functions by economists is typically arbitrary and leaves out some things that are evidently of great importance to actual agents. You effectively acknowledged that in invoking what I called the ‘Debreu defence’.
6. I don’t get your point here. It wasn’t necessary for me to mention it. In any situation in which welfare gains/losses are defined in relation to preference satisfaction, and the evaluation of policy alternatives based on the consideration of such welfare changes (e.g. as in economics), the question of preference revelation arises and is potentially problematic. It doesn’t matter whether those preferences are regarded as exogenous and fixed or endogenous and variable. The latter case may be more complicated (given the existence of two interfering factors) but the issues are not directly linked.
7. I wasn’t dissing the outcome, I was alluding to those economists who reflexively reject any suggestion whatever that calls into question the optimality of competition. Unfortunately, there’s quite a lot of them out there. That’s data BTW, based on observation of people and literature . over a number of years. I’m aware of the literature and it isn’t true that I have no time for anyone involved. I’m a big fan of Arrow, and I spruik him to students at every opportunity (undergrads today having no idea who he is, sadly. Samuelson either).
8. Yes. I found it an interesting piece, actually. I think your criticisms were well wide of the mark, frankly.
Anyway, enjoy Christmas and have a happy New Year.
The seam (your term) was exhausted with your first post to me, although I couldn’t be sure until 2 rounds later. Repetition does not constitute an argument and certainly not a proof. I shall now focus on the crucial points only.
a) The so called second fundamental welfare theorem has nothing to do with comparative static or with cost/benefit analysis. (At best, the latter are dealing only with a projection on a sub-space of the space on which preferences and technolgies are defined.)
b) My point about your description of the problem, using the 2-dimensional Edgworth Box diagram stands. It should be obvious that you cannot treat what you allude to , namely a change in preferences as a function of a change in some parameter value somewhere in the decision problem, because you need more than two dimensions (see definition of a commodity in Arrow or Debreu or both).
c). The first and second fundamental welfare theorems are more than 50 years old. They are still useful. For example, the current policy proposal of setting the unemployment benefit for young people (age range is defined in the policy proposal) to zero without offering government employment and given empirical evidence that there is excess supply in the so-called ‘labour market’, strongly violates the minimum wealth condition of the theoretical models of so-called ‘market economies’. All those whose parents cannot make a private wealth transfer are ‘moved to’ (to use your hand-waving language) to a no-survival point. Their set of ‘feasible consumptions’ is a zero (for all dimensions). No cost/benefit analysis is required to reach this conclusion and no comparative static is required. The policy proposal is fundamentally inconsistent with the philosophical base of the theoretical model for which the said welfare theorems constitute a property of the solution to the model.
d) Whether or not the question of how work is organised is a separate one from ‘Industrial Organisation’ or merely one question which belongs to I.O. is moot. I don’t care one way or the other. But, I agree that the question of how work is organised (‘managed’) is of importance to people. (If you teach management students, you could set an assignment asking how they would apply the notion of Pareto efficiency when allocating tasks in their particular area. From experience, such an assignment throws light on who manages for the sake of excercising power and who is interested in achieving ‘productivity’ which is, as far as possible, consistent with the preferences of ‘labour’.)
d) Now you talk about empirical relevance. Fine. It should be obvious that if you want to empirically investigate whether preferences change in response to a change in a parameter value somewhere in the ‘system’, then you first have to tackle the problem of eliciting the true preferences of the subjects in question regarding their next period preferences (ie after, say a policy change). Things have moved on during the past 50 years. No wonder you couldn’t find a reference to substantiate your assertions or allusions or whatever.
Anyway, your provocations provided a nice diversion from the Christmas preparations.
With best wishes for the holiday season and the New Year.
Collin Street says:
The first and second fundamental welfare theorems are more than 50 years old. They are still useful. For example, the current policy proposal of setting the unemployment benefit for young people […] Their set of ‘feasible consumptions’ is a zero (for all dimensions). No cost/benefit analysis is required to reach this conclusion and no comparative static is required.
I’m not certain you need the first and second fundamental welfare theorems to come to this conclusion; I mean, I don’t really have the faintest clue what these theorems say and I still managed to come to this conclusion fairly quickly; I don’t think that this is unusual.
If they are useful, what do you use them for?
Well, may be one more. Ignoring points made doesn’t make an argument either. If you can show that the notion of ‘better off’ used in welfare economics doesn’t require constancy of preferences (not forever, but certainly in the context of the change in the agent’s environment that is being contemplated) then feel fee to do so. I have no interests in proofs, per se, as they have zero empirical content so far as economics is concerned.
a) I didn’t say that the second fundamental theorem is related to cost-benefit analysis. I said that cost-benefit analysis is ultimately based, theoretically, on social welfare functions (which are invalid constructions).
b) Fine. Let it be more than 2 dimensions. What stands is that the definition of Pareto efficiency depends on the notion of ‘better off’ which in turn is defined with reference to constant preferences. Although, it isn’t immediately clear why agents need to be aware that they have preferences, or what they are. We assume that agents’ choice behaviour conforms to a certain pattern, which is consistent with stability of preferences. Kagel, Battalio and Green (1995) claimed to show that rats behaved in a manner consistent with consumer choice theory in an experimental setting. Presumably we can agree that rats don’t have awareness of their preferences.
c) This is really the corker. The minimum wealth conditions (whether they be expressed as assumptions of interiority, desirable commodities/productive labour, irreducibility, resource-relatedness etc) are there to support the proof of existence of a competitive equilibrium i.e. that certain strings are derivable from certain axioms using certain manipulation rules. They, like your beloved A-D framework, have no empirical content. To argue against a policy proposal on the grounds that it is inconsistent with these conditions is bizarre. Firstly, it is question-begging on a cosmic scale – what argument do you have to back up the implicit premise here that the A-D framework is empirically descriptive? I can’t see much evidence that Debreu thought it was (given his explicit commitment to Formalism). Replace ‘price’ throughout Theory of Value with ‘bunyip’ and ‘commodity’ with ‘jabberwocky’ and all the strings are still derivable and no more meaningful. If it has no empirical content, why should we care at all whether existence proofs are jeopardised? Have we been in a competitive equilibrium up until now, and this policy will mean that one will no longer exist? So what? If we haven’t been in a competitive equilibrium up until now, then who cares? You can see the effect on unbiased observers of this conflation of purely logical exercises with empirical policy assessment in Collin’s reaction. His closing question is certainly to the point.
As for the idea that the minimum wealth conditions represent a philosophical base of the model (i.e. that equality of some kind is fundamentally important), that brings to mind J.B. Clark’s justly derided ethical interpretation of marginal productivity theory. The conditions are there purely for technical reasons, they are not a political manifesto. Koopmans, in his Three Essays, discusses the starvation problem, and reports a conversation with Debreu in which the latter pointed out that the life plan formed by Arrow-Debreu consumers in response to the price system includes a specification of longevity based on resource holdings and the ability to work. Thus, survival need only be guaranteed into the first period. Subsequently, in Koopmans’s words, “the amount and initial distribution of resources and skills in the population [will] determine the pace and extent, if any, of starvation” (p63). So, yeah, all those assumptions are there because they really care about people.
d) You agree that work organisation is important to actual agents. You pointed out that Debreu explicitly excludes such considerations. So where does that leave the welfare conclusions, and how do you accommodate this obvious lacuna in your beloved framework?
e) Now you’re just conflating the determination of whether preferences have actually changed in a given instance with the issue of whether they should be *assumed* to be constant for theoretical purposes.
@Collin Street
1. You reaching the same conclusion, without knowledge of the theoretical models to which the first and second fundamental welfare theorems are characterisations of the solution to the model, as I have, using this knowledge, is, I suggest akin to a relative of a deceased having reached the same conclusion as that of a medical practitioner, namely the person is dead, even though the said relative does not have knowledge of medicine.
2. It would be a great worry if a theoretical model of an economy, modelled as economic aspects a social system, would lead to all implications making no sense to the people in the economy. Your comment clearly shows that this is not the case.
3. Another example of usefulness is that those who argue for ‘freedom of choice’ and ignoring the minimum wealth constraint are people who either doen’t know what they are talking about or they want to pull the wool over others’ eyes.
Best wishes for Christmas and the New Year.
If, of course, what doctors did was scrabble together some axioms about the human body and then start generating theorems, all the while maintaining that, in Debreu’s words, “the theory is…logically entirely disconnected from its interpretations”.
That you would invite comparison between a pretty effective inductive empirical discipline such as medicine and the otiose logical scribblings of the Neo-Walrasians is a pretty good example of the self-regarding faux superiority of economists which prompted this thread in the first place.
You are so far the only self-declared “economist” among those who commend on this thread and you are doing an excellent job in portraying yourself as a self-regarding faux superior.
Lol. Yes, because I was the one taking MaxPo to task for besmirching their good name by deviating from the scientific method and publishing a paper by a sociologist commenting on economics. No, wait, that wasn’t me, was it? This thread concerned economists’ tendency to regard themselves as superior to other disciplines in the social sciences/humanities. I haven’t referred to any other disciplines at all, nor do I consider myself superior to anyone else on the basis of my educational background alone.
I merely disagreed with you on some matters to do with economics. If that (and my mean comments about the Neo-Walrasian program) upsets you so, then perhaps you should invest in acquiring some coping skills.
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United Nations Human Rights Council
UN Marks International Safe Abortion Day
United Nations Human Rights experts issued a formal statement on Friday, September 28, in honor of International Safe Abortion Day. The UN Human Rights Council Working Group fights discrimination against women in both law and in practice, and the group opened its statement by acknowledging the central link between a women’s access to reproductive agency and her access to justice, equality, financial security and all aspects of public life.
A woman’s ability to make her own reproductive decisions lies “at the very core of [her] fundamental right to equality, privacy and physical and mental integrity and is a precondition for the enjoyment of other rights and freedoms”.
And yet, 47,000 women die each year due to unsafe abortions. An additional five million suffer temporary or permanent disability. And an estimated 225 million women worldwide don’t have access to basic modern contraception, with girls under fifteen experiencing five times the risk of limited access and resulting unplanned pregnancy. If 225 million women could gain this access and prevent unwanted pregnancy, human health and human rights around the globe would experience a sharp increase.
As stated by the group, “legal frameworks for abortion have been typically been designed to control women’s decision making through the use of criminal law.”
The World Health organization has demonstrated that criminalizing abortion does not prevent the procedure; instead, it pushes women to resort to unsafe and unregulated medical provision. In addition, in many cultures, women who have received abortions are mistreated by health professionals, denied emergency care, or are otherwise subject to forms of societal punishment that in many cases violate national and international law.
It is essential that governments reclaim this essential cornerstone of women’s reproductive rights through referendum, legislative and judicial action.
It’s also essential that concerns about unsafe abortion be addressed through public health policies and changes to relevant civil law including medical malpractice laws.
Discrimination against women is a thread that winds through public and private life in times of both peace and war. It transcends national and cultural boundaries and is often fueled by power imbalances between women and men that are formally mirrored in laws, policy, and cultural practice. Many of these laws and practices are long-standing and deeply entrenched. But these laws can be removed with the systematic application of legal pressure and education; these are among the primary goals of the Working Group by the Human Rights Council. To learn more about the Working Group, click here. The next session of will take place in Geneva from October 22-26.
Tagged: International Safe Abortion Day, Safe Abortion Day, UN News, Working Group Human Rights Council, Human Rights Council, United Nations Human Rights Council, Abortion
Report on Myanmar Released After a UN Fact Finding Mission
One year ago today, the marginalized and essentially stateless Rohingya people in Myanmar (denied full citizenship but also denied the right the leave the country legally), were subject to a brutal campaign unleashed by Myanmar’s Buddhist-majority state security forces.
In response to alleged attacks by Rohingya militants against government forces, security members and allied civilian mobs launched an all-out attack on defenseless Rohingya villagers, cutting off their efforts to escape to safety on foot and firing on them from helicopters and from the ground. The unofficial death toll quickly climbed into the hundreds, taking several decades of brutal and systematic oppression to the next murderous level. By mid-August of 2017, over 76,000 people had attempted a dangerous escape across the border to Bangladesh, through rain swollen areas that left more bodies washed up on riverbanks.
Many of those who eventually reached refugee camps described villages surrounded and families shot systematically and stabbed to death, including children.
A year later, six generals have been named as priority subjects for investigation and prosecution by a United Nations Fact Finding Mission on Myanmar. In a newly released report describing the campaign and its atrocities, their actions have been called “undoubtedly…the gravest crimes under international law.” Here’s the report.
The government of Myanmar has rejected the allegations, claiming that the attacks were warranted. But the three-member panel responsible for the report has attached the most serious allegation, genocide, to the list of charges against the military leaders. The panel finds enough evidence to support accusations of genocidal intent, and members have cited an organized plan for destruction and evidence of an extreme scale of brutality and violence. The panel cites over 10,000 deaths, harrowing witness accounts and over 700,000 refugees by the end of the 2017 actions in Rakhine.
Despite Myanmar’s refusal to allow access or cooperate with the investigation, the report contains hundreds of pages of witness accounts, interviews, satellite data and other information that will be submitted to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva next month.
The United Nations human rights chief, Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein, has previously condemned the army’s actions, but this newly released report will likely increase pressure for immediate international action. After reviewing the report, the UN Security Council may refer Myanmar to the International Criminal Court or set up an international tribunal. The Council may also impose an arms embargo on Myanmar and penalize those most responsible with travel bans or asset freezes.
But the path toward justice, if one exists, will not be clear. Since Myanmar’s civilian authorities have proven unable and unwilling to investigate or deliver justice on their own, any form of accountability will need to come from the international community. And since international criminal law is a nascent entity at this point, the outcome of any form of condemnation remains uncertain.
A year after the fact, the generals responsible for high crimes and human rights violations and the civilian authorities who enabled them remain both unpunished and unrepentant. Read more here and please join us as we follow the developments surrounding the newly released report.
Tagged: Rohingya, Myanmar, United Nations, United Nations Human Rights Council, UN Human Rights, Human Rights Geneva, International Criminal Court
Just Atonement in Geneva
We are thrilled to be participating in the 37th Human Rights Council Session in Geneva!
Specifically, we are presenting our work on the need for accountability over the Iraq War.
March 20, 2018 marks the 15th year anniversary of the Iraq War.
Along with our colleagues and supporters in Geneva, Just Atonement will be calling for the creation of an international tribunal with jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute crimes committed by the United States and the United Kingdom related to the Iraq War, including the crime of aggression, crimes against humanity, and war crimes.
Check out our concept note about the presentation.
Tagged: the Iraq War, Crime of Aggression, United Nations Human Rights Council
Our Recommendations to the UN Human Rights Council Regarding the Case of Saleh v. Bush
In February of 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit made a decision in the case of Saleh v. Bush, holding that high-ranking leaders from the Bush Administration--including George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and others--were protected from allegations that they had committed the crime of aggression and violated international treaties by invading Iraq in 2003. This case holds important implications for Just Atonement and its mission, and it also holds implications for the future of human rights legislation and the strength and legitimacy of international law.
Our short paper, available here, provides a background on the details of the case, followed by a list of official recommendations for the United Nations Human Rights Council. We submitted the paper earlier this year and these recommendations were included as an agenda item at the 36th session of the Human Rights Council, held in late September 2017.
How did the Court Rule in Saleh v. Bush?
Despite evidence that the Bush Administration presented false evidence in order to generate support for the invasion of Iraq, and despite an apparent intent to overthrow the government of Iraq dating back to 1997, the Ninth Circuit found George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell and Paul Wolfowitz -- the named defendants -- immune from civil liability in the U.S., due to a federal law called Westfall Act.
The Westfall Act protects former government officials from civil lawsuits if their actions can be considered “official”, or taking place within the legitimate scope of their authority. The plaintiff, Sundus Shaker Saleh, an Iraqi single mother who had fled Iraq as a refugee, could not proceed with her claims since she could not identify any personal gain, financial or otherwise, linking the members of the administration to their actions while in office, no matter how heinous those actions may have been.
What are the Human Rights Implications of Saleh v. Bush?
1. Unfortunately, the ruling shows a U.S. court giving precedence to domestic law over international law, part of an ongoing trend.
2. The ruling reveals another trend as well: the movement of U.S. courts to limit opportunities for redress available to victims of U.S. foreign policy. Federal courts appear to be closing their doors to victims of international crimes conducted by U.S. officials.
3. This ruling may weaken the strength of the Nuremberg Judgement and release the United States from international norms and laws regarding acts of aggression.
In light of these implications, we’ve submitted a list of specific recommendations to the Human Rights Council. Feel free to review the list here.
Tagged: Saleh V Bush, International Law, Bush Administration, Human Rights Council, Crime of Aggression, United Nations Human Rights Council, United Nations, War Crimes
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Facts & Resources
Plant Status & FAQ
The Johnston Water Deal Stinks! -It’s not just what they did, but how they did it.
Posted on January 20, 2017 by Keep Rhode Island Beautiful
Why is everyone so concerned about the Johnston sale of water to Invenergy? (AKA: The Johnston water sale to Invenergy stinks.)
Hint: It’s not only what they did, but also how they did it.
Last week, Invenergy was up against the ropes with no water source for their proposed Burrillville Power Plant in time for their deadline to respond to the Energy Facility Siting Board. In an open, transparent process, Woonsocket voted not to supply Invenergy with water. On the same night, Johnston, through a much less transparent and open “process”, voted to supply Invenergy water. Water they don’t own. Water they will be getting through their agreement with Providence Water Supply Board for an unlimited supply of water.
Note: Tonight the Mayor of Johnston will be on the Dan York @ 7:30 PM to explain his deal. We thought it would be nice for everyone to have the full story ahead of that broadcast.
Why are people so concerned about Johnston selling water?
People are concerned about using large amounts of Rhode Island’s drinking water for a fossil fuel power plant. A plant which has been now opposed by thousands of citizens, 20 cities and towns, every major Environmental Advocacy group in Rhode Island (including Audubon Society of Rhode Island, Save The Bay, and The Nature Conservancy, Sierra Club of RI), as well as the Blackstone Valley Tourism Council, the John H. Chaffee Blackstone Heritage Corridor, and the Blackstone Valley Watershed.
Over 60% of Rhode Islander’s get their water from the Scituate Reservoir. As a wholesale customer of Providence Water, Johnston is in fact selling water they get from Providence Water Supply and the Scituate Reservoir. The following 13 towns all get their water from Providence Water Supply Board and will be affected; Barrington, Bristol, Coventry, Cranston, E. Greenwich, E. Providence, Johnston, Lincoln, No. Providence, Smithfield, Warren, Warwick, West Greenwich, West Warwick.
Much of New England has been in an extreme drought this year with water restrictions, wells going dry, and many reservoirs at their lowest levels. There is an unprecedented level of focus and concern on conserving our important water resources. The latest design of the plant uses less water but now is not the time to be selling our drinking water for power plants.
The two water entities in the town of Burrillville (Pascoag Utility District and Harrisville Fire District) were the first sources approached and had extended time to review Invenergy’s proposal. They both declined to sell Invenergy Water. In addition to PUD’s concerns about the MTBE well, they both had similar concerns about water availability and the large amounts of water projected to be used.
Then there is Woonsocket, who also voted NOT sell them water. Woonsocket didn’t just “miss the boat” or suffer from a lack of communication as some suggested. They did not make the deal for good reasons. The reasons are outlined here by one of their council members directly and should not be taken lightly.
Providence Mayor Elorza also proactively said he was against using Providence Water Supply Resources and would direct the Board, if asked, not to provide their drinking water supply to Invenergy. Then, Johnston essentially turned on the spigot to Providence Water.
Contrary to what some have indicated, the plant is not a “done deal” and was not going to happen “with or without Johnston water.” Securing water resources was a major issue for Invenergy. This is evidenced by the fact that their first three options fell through, Providence proactively signaled they would not sell water, and Johnston who was approached late in the game as a backup source had to be moved to a primary source.
In the end, in addition to using millions of gallons of water a year, this latest plan does not involve a pipeline but rather hundreds of 18-Wheeler tanker trucks a year thundering down our streets. The route is up Rt. 295, up Rt. 44 through congested Greenville and charming Chepachet, and then along the small country roads of Rt. 100 to the plant. Note: No less than 3 elementary schools are located directly on the route.
Why are people so concerned about how Johnston did it?
The deal smacks of old school Rhode Island back room deals.
No Public Hearing was held about the decision to sell water or on the details of the PILOT/Tax agreement.
Even though the discussions between Johnston and Invenergy were being held since late December the meeting was posted with bare minimum notice and ONLY on the RI Secretary of State Website. It was NOT posted on the Johnston website or in any local papers.
Once alerted to the scheduled meeting Johnston residents attempted to contact the officials the day of the meeting to obtain information and were unable to. Based on the calls and inquiries that began that day, Johnston officials should have been well aware that there was a large amount of interest and had ample time to move the meeting to a more suitable location.
Residents of Johnston and other Rhode Island citizens arrived early to find the meeting room was already packed, primarily with union members. Johnston residents were not able to get into the meeting.
As more and more people gathered and were unable to get in, requests to move the meeting to a larger venue were ignored. In the end, about 100 people were not able to get in. Many were stuck outside in the rain waiting to find out if they would move the meeting.
In the end, the cheers and chants from the those inside told everyone stuck outside all they needed to hear, Johnston had just sold Rhode Island’s water to Invenergy.
According to multiple reports (and video footage), those stuck outside of the meeting pleading with officials to be able to get in, for the meeting to be moved, and for them not sell the water, were subjected to chants, insults, and sexual references.
There have now been no less than 10 Open Meeting Violations filed with the State Attorney General’s office and the ACLU is bringing forth a lawsuit against the City of Johnston. The issue also generated numerous letters to the media including the Providence Journal, Johnston Sunrise, RI Future, and ECORI all linked below.
Juxtapose the Johnston situation against the Woonsocket situation. There was a public hearing. Meetings were advertised everywhere including websites, radio, and newspaper. The mayor and town council members went on talk radio multiple times to explain the deal and worked hard to get the best deal for their city while gathering resident input. Details of the offer were then provided to the city ahead of time.
In the end it could not be clearer. Woonsocket worked hard to get citizen input and the deal did not hold up in the light of day whereas Johnston did not. Johnston rushed through a backroom deal with strong labor support. Time will tell if it was a good deal for Johnston, but it certainly doesn’t seem like good deal for Rhode Island. It’s time to put people above profits and protect our resources from those who seek to exploit them for their own gain.
The only good news is that between the State Attorney General Open Meeting Investigations, pending lawsuits, and attempts to oppose Providence Water being supplied to Johnston for this purpose, Johnston may not end up having the final say after all. The more eyes on this deal and way it happened the better it is for all of Rhode Island.
-Keep Rhode Island Beautiful-
Want to learn more? Visit these references.
Woonsocket Call Opinion peiece ‘The Call’s water editorial is all wet.” explaining the Woonsocket no vote. https://www.pressreader.com/search?query=JAMES%20COURNOYER&languages=en&hideSimilar=0
RI Future Article, A tale of two cities: Democracy triumphed in Woonsocket, trumped in Johnston. http://www.rifuture.org/democracy-trumped-democracy-triumphed/
ECORI Piece, “The Art of the Deal: Power-Plant Water Agreement Nothing But a Rhode Island Con” http://www.ecori.org/green-opinions/2017/1/11/the-art-of-the-deal-power-plant-water-agreement-nothing-but-a-con
Johnston Sunrise Article “Power plant would need 16k gallons of water a day.” http://johnstonsunrise.net/stories/invenergys-need-for-water-is-15840-to-18720-gallons-a-day,121229
Providence Journal Article, “Johnston mayor insists surprise water deal with power plant completely legal” http://www.providencejournal.com/news/20170111/johnston-mayor-insists-surprise-water-deal-with-power-plant-completely-legal
Four Providence Journal letters summarizing the onsite experience:
“Public Excluded from Monumental Power Plant Vote” http://www.providencejournal.com/opinion/20170117/judith-a-byrnes-public-excluded-from-monumental-power-plant-vote
“Johnston Council meeting on power plant was shameful” http://www.providencejournal.com/opinion/20170117/paula-carmichael-johnston-council-meeting-on-power-plant-was-shameful
“Opposition to Burrillville Plant will continue” http://www.providencejournal.com/opinion/20170115/sandy-pliskin-opposition-to-burrillville-plant-will-continue
“It’s not just what happened but how”
http://www.providencejournal.com/opinion/20170115/claudia-gorman-its-not-just-what-happened-but-how
Three Johnston Sunrise letters summarizing a Johnston resident’s onsite experience
“Shocked at the agreement” http://johnstonsunrise.net/stories/shocked-at-agreement,121276
“Citizens were stonewalled” http://johnstonsunrise.net/stories/citizens-were-stonewalled,121263
“Trust the process” http://johnstonsunrise.net/stories/trust-the-process,121277
Keep Rhode Island Beautiful
“It’s a Matter of Trust” and we don’t trust the process.
Where are the missing State Guide Plan Elements?
Rhode Island Has The Highest CO2 Emission Rate In New England
Happy Independence Day – Rhode Island Revolutionaries
Keep Rhode Island Beautiful North-South Trail Hike
Happy Arbor Day!
Announcement: The Proposed Power Plant has been denied!
info@keeprhodeislandbeautiful.com
© 2019 Keep Rhode Island Beautiful. All rights reserved.
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Danger on the Roads? States with the Most Repeat Driving Offenses
For some drivers, perhaps the third chance is the charm. It’s no secret that American states differ in their driving behavior. But which have the most re-offenders and what kind of charges are they racking up?
For many, causing an accident or being pulled over serves as a wake-up call—a signal to metaphorically change lanes and get back on the high road. However, for others, some of these bad habits are harder to break, and they find themselves committing the same offenses once again. While repeat traffic offenses are a nationwide problem, states are afflicted to different degrees and in different capacities. Some see greater than their expected share of DUI re-offenses, while others face higher repeat license suspensions.
The data scientists at Insurify, an auto insurance quotes comparison site, crunched the numbers to see both the overall breakdown of repeat driving offenses and the statistics on re-offending for specific incidents (namely, license suspension, at-fault accident, DUI, and speeding). So which states are stuck on repeat?
Regional factions. Though the top re-offending states in aggregate (i.e. considering all incident types) are distributed around the country, when one breaks down the repeat offenses by category, rivaling regions begin to emerge.
DUI in the North. The top five states for re-offending DUI (in descending order: Wyoming, North Dakota, Wisconsin, Montana, and Alaska) are all northern states with low populations and long, dark winters.
Accidents in the East. High population density and even higher rates of traffic are hallmarks of the top five locations for repeated at-fault accidents (Maryland; Washington, D.C.; Rhode Island; Connecticut; and Massachusetts), all of which are located on the East Coast.
Suspended licenses in the Midwest. Drivers in the American heartland (North Dakota, Indiana, Ohio, Nebraska, and Wisconsin) are the most likely to face recurring license suspensions.
Panamerican speeding. Re-offending speeders are the only drivers to defy these regional trends, as the top states (Iowa, South Carolina, North Dakota, Virginia, and Ohio) for this repeat violation are spread across the country.
Speeding and accident heavyweights. Over 80 percent of repeat offenses come from speeding and at-fault accidents alone. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the United States sees more than six million traffic accidents annually, with one fatality occurring roughly every six seconds. Moreover, speeding was a contributing factor in a third of those fatalities, suggesting that these offenses are not entirely independent. Therefore, it’s unsurprising that the re-offending rates in these two categories are so similar. Conversely, only one in seven repeat offenses are license suspensions, and less than 2.5 percent come from DUI.
Some bad habits are harder to break than others. Though speeding and accidents make up the largest share of repeat offenses, they are not the violation to which drivers are most likely to succumb more than once. Drivers who have had their licenses suspended are the most likely to re-offend compared to all other categories; with close to two in five drivers losing their license again in the future. DUI—arguably the charge with the most severe consequences—is the offense where drivers are least likely to return to their prior ways. Only eight percent go on to commit the crime a second time. Drivers with a history of speeding or accidents are more moderate with around one in five going on to re-offend.
To determine rates of repeat offenses by state, the data team at Insurify, a car insurance quotes comparison website, analyzed its database of over 1.6 million applicants. Users answer questions on vehicle type, driver history, and personal information to receive free, real-time auto insurance quotes. Insurify’s data science team identified drivers with two or more violations of the same incident-type, indexed them by state of residence, and ranked them by prevalence. They then repeated this process for incident-specific rankings.
Without further ado, here are the top ten states for repeat driving offenses.
10. Idaho
#6 for Repeat Suspended Licenses
#34 for Repeat Accidents
#10 for Repeat DUI
#15 for Repeat Speeding
While it ranks in the bottom half for repeat accidents, Idaho sits in the top 15 for license suspension, DUI, and speeding. The lead recurrent offense in Idaho is license suspension, which can be provoked by violations such as DUI, hit-and-run, driving uninsured, or unpaid child support. Point accumulation for minor driving infractions can also trigger a license suspension. Given that DUI is one of the triggers for license suspension, it may come as no surprise that Idaho ranks similarly in these categories.
#14 for Repeat Suspended Licenses
#1 for Repeat DUI
#7 for Repeat Speeding
Though its low ranking for repeat accidents excludes Wyoming from the top half of this top 10 list, it is the #1 state in the nation for recurrent DUI infractions as well as the NHTSA’s top state for DUI fatalities. While urban states tend to report the highest number of accidents, states with lower population densities see the highest share of fatalities. This is in part due to elevated rates of DUI offenses, such as those in Wyoming.
Despite being a beautiful natural paradise, Hawaii is no paragon for traffic safety. The island state ranks in the top 10 for both repeat accidents and speeding, which are the two heavyweights for recurrent driving offenses. As many as one in seven drivers report a speeding ticket, with four percent having multiple on their record. With statewide speed limits maxing out at 60 mph, it may be unsurprising that many drivers continue to push their luck when they should instead pump the breaks.
#7 for Repeat Accidents
Despite low numbers of DUI and modest rates of license suspension, South Carolina sits in the top 10 for recurrent speeding and accidents nationwide. One reason that the state may see such bold rates of repeat speeding is that tickets are comparatively easy to fight. While most states have the fine set on the speeding ticket, in South Carolina, the amount is left to the discretion of each judge. Therefore, a savvy, speedy driver can more easily appeal that penalty on the basis that another judge may have given them a lighter fine. With their high number of repeat speeders, South Carolinians are not one-and-done with their need for speed.
6. Wisconsin
#5 Repeat Suspended License
#25 Repeat Accidents
#3 Repeat DUI
#9 Repeat Speeding
Wisconsin is a heavy-hitter for repeat offenses in three of the four incident types—license suspension, DUI, and speeding. A staggering 60+ percent of drivers who lose their licenses once will lose them again. Similarly to Idaho, DUI is once again one of the triggers for license suspension. Given the association between these offenses, it’s little wonder that the state cracks the top five for each.
#13 Repeat Suspended License
#23 Repeat DUI
Old Dominion is not home to the United States’ most speed-conscious drivers. Over 16 percent of Virginians possess a speeding ticket, and one in three of them will go on to speed again. Out-of-state drivers won’t catch a break just because they’re passing through—all are required to return to Virginia to appear in court in person.
#10 Repeat Speeding
Nebraska, though located in the middle of the American Heartland, has no soft spot when it comes to license suspension. In fact, while many states revoke licenses primarily for vehicular infractions, there are many violations that can trigger a suspension in Nebraska even if the holder has only ever driven lawfully. These include failure to comply with alimony or child support, most juvenile charges, noncompliance with a drug test, drug addiction, or alcoholism (which is not, in and of itself, even a crime). This wide array of eligible offenses likely contributes to Nebraska’s position as one of America’s leading states in license suspension.
Ohio, the number three state for re-offending drivers, sees high rankings for repeat suspended licenses and speeding. However, the punishment for these incidents can vary significantly. Even recurrent speeding typically only warrants fines, while more severe violations, such as vehicular homicide, can result in permanent license suspension.
2. Iowa
The Hawkeye state claims the runner-up position of this ranking, placing in the top 10 for license suspension, DUI, and speeding. With almost five percent of drivers having multiple tickets on their record, Iowa leads the country in repeat speeding. Over one in 10 of those come from Polk County—the district surrounding Des Moines—making Polk one of, if not the, speediest counties in the nation.
North Dakota claims the title as the state with the most repeat diving offenses in America, with an over eight percent higher re-offending rate than the next leading state. Given its low density of drivers on the road, North Dakota was likely never destined to rank high in repeat accidents, but it places in the top three for all other categories. In the Roughrider State, 57 percent of drivers with a suspended license, 16 percent with an at-fault accident, 10 percent with a DUI, and 29 percent with a speeding ticket will go on to commit a second offense of the same type. These high rates of repeat offenses push North Dakota to the front of the pack when it comes to states with the most re-offending drivers.
If you have questions or comments about this article, please contact insights@insurify.com.
Categories: National & Global News
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Is Your Job a Bunch of B.S.?
By John Schneider
ANTHROPOLOGIST AND POLITICAL ACTIVIST David Graeber wrote a 2013 essay for Strike! Magazine that got more attention than an essay in a niche radical magazine typically gets. The piece, called “On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs,” inspired responses in outlets from The Economist to Jacobin; the Guardian insisted that the essay would “change your life.”
Much of the attention could be attributed to the essay’s simple but relatable title — everyone seemed to intuitively understand what it meant to call a job “bullshit.” The image of a modern workplace filled with people pretending to look busy while secretly checking Facebook was immediately recognizable. But, more substantively, the piece’s premise struck at one of the core tenets of capitalism. It suggested that many jobs created in the modern economy do not actually need to exist at all.
This is not how we’re taught it works. We’re taught that, to stay viable in a free and competitive marketplace, businesses need to maximize efficiency. Instead, Graeber wrote, “It’s as if someone were out there making up pointless jobs just for the sake of keeping us all working.” The essay was refreshing because it didn’t presume this was an illusion. Maybe so many jobs feel pointless because they are.
Now Graeber has expanded that essay into a book, Bullshit Jobs: A Theory, drawing on research conducted in the aftermath of his essay. But 2018 is not 2013, and the political context of a discussion of “bullshit jobs” is very different now. The five years since the essay first came out have seen news that bears on Graeber’s argument: a continuously falling unemployment rate (without corresponding wage growth); a stunningly successful socialist presidential campaign premised on inequality; an even more stunningly successful presidential campaign attributed largely to grievances of the “working class”; and leftist pressure that has pulled prominent Democrats toward support of a federal jobs guarantee.
All of which make the new book especially relevant. What was presented as mostly a provocative premise in the essay is now a full-fledged argument. Instead of relying on a shared intuition about what a “bullshit job” is, Graeber offers a detailed description. Instead of a few anecdotal examples, he now has a taxonomy. And instead of just alluding to the moral questions they raise, he tries to answer them, and situates them in a historical context. None of his claims will be all that surprising to readers familiar with the original essay, but the book feels less like a thought experiment and more like an overdue diagnosis of a fundamental social ill.
Overall, then, this book resonates in a different way than the essay did five years ago. The book is noteworthy not simply for saying something new, but for advancing arguments that have been hinted at elsewhere. For instance, it’s difficult to read Bullshit Jobs and not think of Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century, which appeared in English just eight months after Graeber’s original essay. In that book, Piketty examined sources of inequality and argued that, absent outside interference, economic growth will lag behind the rate of return on capital. In other words, wage growth on its own cannot actually reduce inequality, since it will always be outpaced by returns on investment.
If this is true, then Graeber’s contention that a capitalist system might pay wages for pointless jobs doesn’t seem so shocking. These jobs might actually work as tools for propagating this inequality. As he put it in his initial essay, “If someone had designed a work regime perfectly suited to maintaining the power of finance capital, it’s hard to see how they could have done a better job” than a system in which so many people are trapped in bullshit jobs. Instead of treating that like a conspiracy theory, though, the book presents it as a political answer to a question that had previously been dismissed as merely economic.
The biggest difference between now and 2013 might simply be that it no longer seems heretical to analyze capitalist institutions through a non-economic lens. In fact, Graeber’s book reads more like an anthropological analysis of the modern economy than anything else. Drawing on hundreds of testimonials from people who responded to his original essay, Graeber presents a typology of bullshit jobs, which he defines as “a form of paid employment that is so completely pointless, unnecessary, or pernicious that even the employee cannot justify its existence, even though as part of the conditions of employment, the employee feels obliged to pretend that this is not the case.”
Since these testimonials, though copious, cannot be exhaustive, Graeber does not pretend that this typology is complete. Indeed, there are many times that the obvious limitations on people’s ability to be honest about their jobs make it hard to draw comprehensive conclusions (a few times in the book, Graeber imagines a study that could illustrate his point before conceding that such a study would obviously be impossible). Still, there is value in the categories presented, even if it’s not always clear where one ends and the other begins.
One premise of the original essay is that “bullshit jobs” stand in contrast to those done by “real, productive workers.” Graeber retains this framing in the book, at least in part so as to avoid sounding judgmental — if you feel that your job is not bullshit, then he is not here to tell you otherwise — but it seems misguided. A more persuasive case could likely be made that all jobs in the modern economy are at least a little bit bullshit. For example, when discussing the category of “box tickers,” or roles that are filled so that institutions can claim they are addressing a problem without actually addressing it, the book quotes someone whose main job was preparing reports that looked very nice, but were never actually read.
According to Graeber, this is a recurring feature of such jobs: “The meetings in which such emblems are displayed might be considered the high rituals of the corporate world.” It is not always easy to identify what jobs fall into this classification, or to know if a report you made was actually read. But recognizing that some jobs are meant to perform “high rituals,” instead of actually productive tasks, certainly illuminates much about modern workplaces.
Similarly, another one of the book’s testimonials comes from a receptionist at a small office that rarely receives more than one call a day. Another employee could easily add this task to their remit, but to do so would seem, as Graeber puts it, “shocking and bizarre.” An economist might insist that whatever this receptionist is earning must be worth less to the employer than the risk of appearing unprofessional to potential callers. In other words, what is done must be rational, because if it weren’t rational, then it wouldn’t be done. But it certainly seems more like a ritual than anything else, and Graeber’s book takes that possibility seriously.
Economists also like to point out that wage labor is a relatively modern invention, but the book traces the structural similarities of most jobs back to feudalism. Perhaps its most audacious argument is that modern corporations are not just similar to feudalism — they are basically the same thing: “Managerialism has become the pretext for creating a new covert form of feudalism.” The proliferation of unnecessary employees doesn’t make sense if you’re a capitalist trying to keep costs down, but it does make sense if you’re a feudal lord trying to flaunt your importance and buy the loyalty of underlings.
Of course, it’s worth cautioning against such a bold claim, and Graeber’s logic sometimes displays less caution than a reader might like. His prose moves quickly, bouncing from specific example to historical detail to sociological observation. But occasionally it slips in some more contestable claim without justification — there’s a lot of “there is every reason to believe” and “for all we know” and similar hedging of the just-go-with-this-for-a-minute-I’m-on-to-something variety. Even those sympathetic to his perspective are likely to catch him begging some questions as he goes.
This brings us to the book’s most glaring problem — there’s selection bias all over the place. Graeber’s main sources for research and testimonials were people who reached out to him, either privately or publicly, to talk about their experiences. In other words, he’s drawing from people who read his essay and were already predisposed to agree with it. So not only do his testimonials represent a mere drop in the ocean of modern employment, but it’s a particularly skewed sample. The lack of specifics in the testimonials makes it more or less impossible to verify the facts provided, even though people are notoriously unreliable about much of what they’re talking about here (office politics, interpersonal feuds, comparative productivity, et cetera).
Graeber doesn’t pretend otherwise, and he does not claim to be presenting a random or statistically significant sample. It’s clear that he is more interested in his subjects as illustrative examples than as a dataset. Nevertheless, he is using them to make broad social observations, and he occasionally seems to forget that the subjects he is quoting are not necessarily representative of the industries they speak for. Bullshit Jobs is at its least persuasive when it makes these generalizations, or tries to rank and categorize types of work by relative amounts of bullshit.
On the other hand, the book is at its most persuasive when recontextualizing observations that feel familiar. For example, Graeber’s discussion of why bullshit jobs are so unpleasant is eye opening. They have few of the features that usually mark a bad job: they tend to pay reasonably well; they’re rarely physically demanding or unsafe; they often come with reasonable job security and enviable social status. But people still hate them, largely because they drain any sense of autonomy or value from an employee’s life. They also necessitate a level of deception, since employees have to constantly lie to their bosses and clients about the value of their labor, that makes people cynical and distrustful.
This has important implications, not just psychologically, but socially. Bullshit Jobs contrasts two young men, Eric and Rufus, who had similar bullshit jobs that they hated while they had them. Eric, from a working-class background, was so startled by the pointlessness of his job that he tried to get fired, arranging fake business trips on which he “spent three days taking MDMA at an anarcho-syndicalist house party” before eventually quitting and moving to a squat to grow his own vegetables for six months. Rufus, who got a sinecure at a company where his dad was a vice president, says that “[t]hinking back on it, it was kind of a dream job.”
In other words, even though they both hated their jobs, Rufus knew what to expect, and so was able to endure and profit from it. He was there not for work experience, but “work experience” — a line on a resume that would look impressive to outsiders despite signifying nothing. On the other hand, someone from a working-class background, who expects work to be perhaps unpleasant but at least productive, is unprepared for this charade. This does not seem like a trivial factor in social mobility or class identity.
Again, what makes Bullshit Jobs so refreshing is how it exposes that none of this is really about economics. At one point, Graeber refers to work as “a kind of secular hair-shirt” because of the way we have been conditioned to view a job as something that is necessarily unpleasant. It can be physically unpleasant, or low-paying, but increasingly, work is unpleasant because it is devoid of meaning or social value. A bullshit job, like any job, is a test of character, and so “anyone who is not slaving away harder than he’d like at something he doesn’t especially enjoy is a bad person.”
The connection between capitalism and the moral value of work has been examined for a long time — at least since the Protestant Reformation, and Graeber takes it even further into the past. Once again, though, his argument sounds fresh because of its bearing on questions that have emerged since his original essay. For example: What makes someone a member of the “working class”?
If the moral worth of a job comes from its lack of obvious value, then anyone who is tangibly helping people — like a home health aide caring for a patient, or a waiter bringing someone food, or a maid making someone’s bed — should not qualify, while a regional compliance associate living in the suburbs still might. This doesn’t have to crowd out the questions of race and gender that complicate this answer, in part because they are so closely connected — “care work” of various types having for so long been the domain of women and people of color.
Of course, it’s not usually bullshit jobs that are considered “working class” — the oft-mentioned, rarely seen coal miner does not have a bullshit job — which is why the term is less successful as a classification than as a prism to understand all jobs. But this makes the book perhaps all the more fundamental: bullshit is an unavoidable part of modern employment. Even that coal miner might have to fill out a requisition form to get a new belt. Yet, until recently, the only people discussing this phenomenon were the employees who complained about it.
Graeber’s original essay was one of the first signs that these employees weren’t just whining, but were actually interrogating a major internal contradiction of capitalism. Now, those signs are more common. It is not uncommon to hear calls for a universal basic income, to separate work from livelihood, or to suggest that a job’s economic value and social value might be fundamentally at odds, and not just slightly misaligned. So while this book might seem slightly less audacious, it is all the more valuable. Hopefully, it is only an opening salvo — Graeber’s skewed data and broad argument probably won’t pull the reader quite as far as he would like them to — but it is a crucial one nonetheless. The idea that jobs are inherently valuable has gone without serious challenge for too long. It’s about time someone called bullshit.
John Schneider is a writer living in Brooklyn, New York.
Bullshit Jobs
A Theory
By David Graeber
Stepping into the Void: A New Agenda for Global Labor
By Pranab Bardhan
From Occupy to Standing Rock: Paths Forward
By Molly Larkey
A New Golden Age Part III: The Basic Income Guarantee
By Tom Streithorst
Democracy – What Is It Good For?: David Graeber and Gar Alperovitz
By Adam Morris
The Cliff and the Jubilee: On David Graeber's 'Debt'
By Jeffery Atik
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Live Through This: A Pioneering Rock Critic Looks Back with Love and Sorrow on the 1960s
Evelyn McDonnell interviews Richard Goldstein
IN 1966, A 23-YEAR-OLD son of a Bronx postal worker began writing a column for The Village Voice about the music that was bursting out of downtown clubs and radio. With “Pop Eye,” Richard Goldstein essentially created the rock criticism beat. Before then, popular music was considered too déclassé for serious consideration — such was the ongoing influence of Adorno and the Frankfurt School. But Goldstein used the writings of Walter Benjamin and Herbert Marcuse to embrace the explosion of culture and activism that was being driven by rock ’n’ roll. As he explains in his intimate and evocative new memoir, Another Little Piece of My Heart: My Life of Rock and Revolution in the ’60s, he covered not just the musicians who inspired him, but “everything from the counterculture to the revolution it spawned.”
Piece of My Heart hit bookstores hot on the heels of Going Into the City, a memoir by another pioneering rock critic, Goldstein’s friend Robert Christgau. Both books show how the genre was forged in the crucible of that age of intense tumult and passions. But Goldstein limits his account to that era, giving it a powerful narrative focus. For him, the stuff that surrounded rock overtook the music. The five-foot-four, rotund Jewish nerd went from being a confidant of rock stars to a frontline observer of social struggle, narrowly avoiding calamity at police riots at Columbia University and the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
As he watched the culture and its beloved warriors — including his friend Janis Joplin — crash and burn, he gave up his beat, but not his convictions. He then went on to become one of the leading journalists of the gay liberation movement and the executive editor of The Voice. Richard was there in the early 1990s when I first began making my own inroads into the field he forged. We ran into each other again this spring at the Experience Music Project Pop Conference in Seattle, an annual gathering of music scholars, then caught up a month later by phone.
EVELYN MCDONNELL: Was that your first Pop Conference? What did you think?
RICHARD GOLDSTEIN: Yes, and I loved it. I was really impressed with the breadth of styles and ideologies — various schools and all of that. I had no idea before I went how diverse the profession of rock criticism had become. I feel like this entire universe has opened up since the years I was writing about music. It was astonishing to see. There are many more women, which is impressive and important. I always thought of rock criticism as a masculine venture, with all of its hierarchical implications of being male-centric — the competitiveness, the pissing contests, and all the rest. The obsession with detail, the over-reverential approach … all of these things I think of as masculine values, and there’s definitely a place for all that, but it shouldn’t be the whole. At this conference I was able to see — with the addition of many more women — that there’s a much broader sense of what pop music is.
You know you’re reiterating the argument that Ann Powers and I made with our 1995 anthology Rock She Wrote: Women Write about Rock, Pop, and Rap.
It’s not the reason I stopped, but when I started to write about gender and gender relations, and looked back on my years as a rock critic, it occurred to me that it was really part of masculine culture. It had to do with the claiming of turf. Somehow these things become like temples after a while — you’re guarding the gates — and I find that to be kind of repugnant, actually. It’s not like I don’t like male rock critics, it’s that they shouldn’t be claiming the whole territory; theirs is just one approach. The whole Hunter Thompson, Charles Bukowski style of rock criticism is really great, but it shouldn’t be the dominant voice. And it isn’t anymore. That’s what I noticed at that conference — how diverse the personae were. For me, the persona of the critic is as interesting as the expertise. So it was a genuinely wonderful, healing experience in that way — it reduced my level of alienation.
I had the exact same response. I felt comfortable at that conference in a way I had not before.
I don’t think that any woman rock critic — this is just my projection I suppose — but I don’t think that any woman rock critic can ever think of herself as the whole, whereas with male rock critics there’s always a temptation to assume that you speak for everyone. That’s the difference between, for example, Ellen Willis’s approach to first-person journalism, and Norman Mailer’s. Ellen was my editor at The Voice for a long time, and every time I would write the word “we” — “we” think this or “we” feel this — she always wrote on the page “who is ‘we’?” It was something I never thought about until she interrogated me. So I learned that there is no “we” when it comes to works of music; no such thing as an objective truth about the work. So much of it depends on perception — on when the music was written and how it feels in the present. I think that’s a major shift, and an important one: to open up the terrain of rock criticism to everyone, all sorts of different people, and thereby get a fuller sense of what rock really is. In terms of the music itself, it’s extremely diverse and immensely syncretic, whereas rock criticism hasn’t always been either one or the other — even though it has often been very good.
This is exactly what Ann and I argued in our book. You were a big influence on us, of course, since we were all at The Voice.
The Voice was my homeland and always will be. With The Voice we were starting with the premises of Walter Benjamin, and trying to apply that kind of reasoning to music and other forms of pop culture. I think that’s why we were able to pick up on hip-hop so quickly, for instance. In my case, probably the writing I’m most proud of is on graffiti. I called it “visual doo-wop.” I related to it exactly as I related to doo-wop as a teenager, because the kids who were doing it were just like me — different ethnicities but the same class background. Working-class New Yorkers — most of them were from Washington Heights. I went to their homes, I visited their parents, I saw the trophies that lined the living room wall — they were definitely the center of their families. I went with them into the yards, and I saw this as a kind of genuinely New York art form. I wrote about that at a time when the entire armamentarium of the middle class was arrayed against it […] In a lot of New York working class culture you have a crew — and that makes the art. It’s all about the individual within the crew […] The group rises together. The group is there for survival purposes, it can be a family or a gang. In middle class life it’s much more atomized, much more about the isolated individual. You can see how forms like doo-wop and graffiti rise out of working-class culture. There’s really a materialistic basis for why these forms take shape as they do.
That’s the influence of Benjamin you’re talking about?
Well no, that’s just my vulgar Marxism, or what’s left of it anyway. With Walter Benjamin the idea was that mechanical reproduction — or mass reproduction — changes perception and creates its own aesthetic experience and values. That was his great insight. We were applying that principle and other principles of the Frankfurt School, but without the racism and conservatism of Adorno. Adorno is really bad on jazz and other popular forms. At The Voice, we embraced the popular in a kind of traditional, left-wing way. The popular has its own integrity. Then, we tried to discern what the unique aesthetic of the popular form was, and how it was changing the way we perceive reality. To borrow from Marcuse, art has the capacity to alter reality because it imagines another reality. Therefore, it’s a potentially revolutionary force.
Where were you studying Benjamin and Marcuse?
In my bedroom. These people were not taught in my college, I just was a voracious reader. As a result of my alienation from my neighborhood as a kid, I read everything I could get my hands on. I was a “philo” minor, as we said. I got this grounding in philosophy from college, but we read the classic philosophers. We didn’t delve into 20th century Marxist cultural criticism — not at city universities. But I did start out with Hegel, and Kant, and the existentialists — who I really loved — so it was a natural thing to move on from them to the other modern philosophers. And I did. To this day I really enjoy reading philosophy. I read it in French, if I can. I find that it opens me up intellectually — the level of abstraction and concreteness combined are very liberating for me. At this point, I read more philosophy than criticism.
My favorite living European philosopher is a guy named Alain Badiou. He’s 82 years old — a Marxist mystic just like Benjamin. You get the synthesis of Catholic tradition, Marxist tradition, and bourgeois humanism in the same writer. I recently read his Elegy to Love — it gives you this materialist reason to be romantic, which I love. That’s very much how I approached rock when I was a young man, and is still how I approach popular culture. I want to know the material reasons why it exists, and then to give myself a justification to be romantically in love with it. Why do I love Disney, for instance? What are the material reasons why Disney is the way it is? I feel like I’m free to love it, because there actually is a kind of complexity to it. This I get also from the Frankfurt school, but via Sontag — who is more indebted to the Frankfurt school than she ever really acknowledged.
In your criticism in the ’60s, you seem much more immersed in the culture than your peers; you were out there interviewing the artists, whereas Bob or Ellen or Greil Marcus were really more removed.
They had different agendas as writers. What they do, they do extremely well — much better than I could have done it, tried to do it, and did do it. They’re better synthesists and better critics than I ever was, but I was interested in the flesh. I was interested in exploring the ecstatic emotions that the music brought out in me — to find out what really went on in the lives of the people who made it. I had a journalistic agenda that mixed with very personal issues. I genuinely idolized these people — I felt true awe in their presence and even just listening to them. Just getting close to the stage and seeing them up close — the modern usage of “awesome” really applies. When I met them I was often tongue-tied, for instance. There they were, actual human beings. I was sometimes disappointed, often moved and touched by the stories and reality of their lives, which was often very complex and fraught with similar ambivalence to what I felt. Similar insecurities, borderline personalities, and psychological distress, mixed with artistic ambition and a hunger for fame. When you put artistic ambition and hunger for fame together you get a very conflicted individual. Certainly in mass culture they don’t necessarily go together — you can’t pursue both with equal fervor unless you have an extremely strong ego (such as Bob Dylan’s). But they were people who really projected themselves on stage. We see these YouTube clips of them and we get chills just watching. Those people were close to the edge, emotionally.
Right, as you tragically found out.
Once you get to know them, and you’re actually aware of them, their doom has a much more personal quality.
Your writing — for all your awe-struckness — doesn’t seem like you were a sycophant, unlike today’s celebrity journalists.
It’s just so tropistic today. I see all of these tropes that originally came out of real emotion, feeling, and struggle to create a form — which is not so easy when you’re dealing with a human being, because human beings are not characters. Getting them to behave in ways that are formulaic enough, so you can have a beginning, middle, and end — and so that you could make a statement based on real quotes about their personalities — that’s very hard. I don’t think I always succeeded, especially at the beginning, before I really got to know the artists or thought about the ethics of how to convey someone’s reality. I had one night. I’d come into the office at maybe eight o’clock — the desks belonged to the ad-takers during the day and to the writers after hours — and we’d just stay there all night with a pile of pastries. At six in the morning the editor of the paper would come in, grab your copy, and proofread it on the tubes out to the printer — it would appear pretty much as you had written it. You had that one-night window to create a form, and sometimes that required tremendous energy and stylization.
This is The Village Voice you’re talking about, right?
Yes. No money was involved. About $20. I lived on collectively purchased tuna fish and various casseroles that we gave colorful names to (that were mostly noodles). That’s what we lived on. I didn’t care, of course. I would have paid the paper to meet The Rolling Stones — I would have given the editor money. It was also the era — it was a time when you just assumed that money would be there, that somehow you would eat. You didn’t have to worry about your future.
The economic conditions of the time enabled this culture.
Right, it was the time of the greatest economic expansion of the 20th century. The entire working class, especially the white working class, was elevated. Incomes rose by thousands of dollars — I think around 10 thousand dollars — over the decade. And college enrollment — because of the whole construction boom after the war, and the education boom — expanded enormously. So, this entire generation of working class kids was college-educated all of a sudden, thereby creating the matrix of rock, and what distinguished it from rock and roll: it’s class mobility that makes rock what it is.
Let me get back to the idea of rock criticism being a masculine culture. Since you were there pretty much at the beginning, was it always that way, or did it evolve to become that way?
There were women but they were subordinate. That was clear. They didn’t have a style that broke in any way from the conventional. I wasn’t aware until Ellen that there were certain stylistic elements that might have had something to do with gender. Before that it was just women “writing copy like a man.” The Village Voice had a female sports writer, but she wrote like a man. My teacher in journalism school — Judith Crist, a film critic — wrote like a male critic. There wasn’t any attempt to actually create a sensibility that was distinctive.
That was probably the only way they could get published.
Yes, of course. Unless they were going into the “Women’s Pages” of a newspaper, where they could be flowery — which was the other possibility. I’m not denying that there aren’t elements in Ellen Sander’s work that you can argue are gender-based, but I didn’t see Lillian [Roxon, writer of the Rock Encyclopedia] as having a distinctly female style. There are other Lillian Roxon stories that I took out of the book because she’s dead and they couldn’t be verified, but they involved her life as a groupie. She was a very unlikely groupie, if you’ve seen pictures of her — but she did have a life as a groupie, in addition to being a journalist. Therefore, she was involved in the music on a very visceral level. I use that term “groupie’ in a positive way, of course. It’s just sexual expressiveness to me. Groupies were never paid — it’s not prostitution, it’s fandom. I think Lillian was once abandoned on the road by a band who grew tired of her. They just threw her off the bus. There she was in the middle of the Midwest — an asthmatic, overweight, Australian-Jewish woman with very little money. She had to make her way back to New York, and she did.
Were you friends with her?
She and I and Linda Eastman-McCartney were part of this very tight-knit group. We were all smart kids who liked rock. We hung out in New York the first year I did my column. I met these people very quickly, very early on. There weren’t many of us, and we weren’t embedded in the genre. Nobody knew what to make of us. We weren’t traditional fan writers, and we also weren’t traditional intellectuals. So what were we? We had only each other […] Lillian was tenacious, genuinely committed to the music, deeply embedded in the milieu — she loved these musicians corporeally and intellectually. She was an immensely energetic and dedicated person. But with a lot of self-esteem issues, like a lot a people who are into rock. Your early rock critics are nerds with misguided principles. They are in some ways hypermasculine, but under that, nerds. Why else would you write about music instead of make it?
Obviously you’re putting yourself in there.
God, I was like a hyper-nerd. A hyperreal nerd. I was definitely a nerd. All I lacked was the pimples, but I had every other facet of nerdiness.
You have so many amazing stories in the book. Why did you decide to write this book now, and how did you choose what to include?
The short answer is … I read Patti Smith’s book [Just Kids] and was impressed. I found its combination of the tragic and the humane to be very compelling. I was a part of the same scene as she was, but on the periphery. Instead of actually moving among the artists, I was on the outskirts looking in. So it made me think, wow, you can actually do a memoir that has this complexity of tone. I love the idea that she had a genuine love affair with Robert Mapplethorpe, because he’s such a reflexively gay icon but … below the level of category we see this enormous amount of complexity. I think the book, in a way, exemplified that — by just being real. And I thought I had a complex identity in the ’60s too — you can actually get this on paper in a way that adds up to a real human being. I thought I could do that.
I teach a course on the ’60s at Hunter College. Year after year I teach this material and watch how my students react. I always tell them: some things are not appropriate for classroom discussion. But they are for a memoir, so I decided to go for it. I started writing in Paris — I go there several months a year. The city has this strange effect on me, simultaneously stimulating and calming. New York is just stimulating, and other places are just calming, but Paris stimulates you intellectually all the time, and also calms you because the pace of the city is really rather slow. That’s a very, very good environment for creativity, for me. There’s no other city in the world that has as many streets named for writers. I discovered magic cafés; I go inside and can immediately be creative. They never throw you out because they can see that you’re working. They ask if you’re a writer, and I say yes. I say that I’m writing a memoir, and they go “oh!” and they bring you little cakes. Makes you feel very pampered. There are all these plaques everywhere that tell you about other writers: “Here is where Rimbaud launched The Drunken Boat!” Suddenly you see the bar where he first read it. To me it’s galvanic. It’s not rational, but to be in the presence of those plaques and that treatment from café owners, and the ambiance of the city … It all adds up to a very creative environment for me. I wrote a lot of the book in cafés in Paris. It sounds like such a cliché, but you fall in love.
What about your relationship to California? You write about it a fair amount in your book.
It represented an escape from New York, to quote the movie title. The Hollywood fantasy of getting away from a deranged New York … New York was this media world I couldn’t cope with — the level of artifice was beyond me. I just couldn’t handle it at all. I withdrew behind yellow granny glasses and professions of “oh wow” that I copied from Andy Warhol. That was New York — the whole Warhol milieu, which I moved into in a state of horror and fascination, only because Warhol himself was a very welcoming figure to me. He, too, was working class. He reacted very differently to working class people than he did to rich people or people in the media. He had none of the attitude that you saw in interviews. He was very casual and approachable. I could approach him very easily to talk about what he was working on and how much he loved working, period. I think he just loved making things — especially as a way of escaping from the world he had created socially. I understood these things very well. That’s what New York represented to me; the back room at Max’s Kansas City, and the ordeal of the back room, trying to feel like you belong there somehow, even as you feel like you’re a snob for even showing up.
But California has this egalitarian vibe where none of this mattered. There was no equivalent of Nico or Viva in Ashbury. The idea of an Andy Warhol superstar walking down 8th Street trying to seem distinctive would never work in L.A. I loved that. It was totally liberating: going to the park, meeting people, eating food, sleeping on couches, hooking up with someone, having nice sex and it’s over … this was all a revelation to me. I did drugs there, too, and always with musicians, only psychedelics. I melted even more, relaxed even more, really felt like I had basically loosened the belt on my pants and let my belly be what it is.
This is a very important experience for me. People I met, I have very tender feelings for them. The hippies, they were truly ridiculous. I felt immensely protective toward them, which is why it was so painful to watch them collapse so quickly — overwhelmed by commerce, brutality, and the anxieties of straight people, who found them to be such a threat that they felt a need to prove their insanity. Straight people tried to show that you couldn’t really live that way — you’d get hurt if you did. The system conspired not knowingly, but essentially, to prove that the consumer society — the competitive society — was the only safe place.
This is the orthodoxy that my students inherited. They have a lot of trouble seeing alternatives to their way of being. This to me, possibly in my own subjective arrogance, is the tragedy of their generation. They cannot really grasp an alternative to fitting into the present, but that’s what the ’60s was all about. What is the alternative, how can we construct it, how can we make it happen, how can we change reality? Young people set out to do that with all the confidence of people who were raised on an expansive economy. Of course there was madness, and failure, and absurdity, but in the process, an enormous amount of what exists in the present was created — except that there were all these unintended consequences, as there always are.
As much as this book is an ode to the ’60s, it’s also a critique.
Yes, that was essential. I couldn’t really pretend that it was this glorious Arcadian time because there was too much pain involved. I had to really delve into that pain — the conflict between my rational side and my romantic side, which was so close to the surface as the ’60s dissolved. It isn’t that things fell apart, it’s that we were defeated. We were defeated by all the temptations of commerce, by the brutality of the government, and by aging — by processes beyond our control.
You had been making yourself vulnerable, and then were defeated.
Somebody who tries to wage a revolution — violent or not — is always making him or herself vulnerable, because you don’t know what the result will be or what will happen to you. There was a whole culture of vulnerability, that’s a lot of what the ’60s was — it’s obvious in the music. It partly failed because of its excess and madness, but mostly because of external forces. Where it failed, specifically, is in the items on the agenda, which were very central, that involved equality: racial justice, economic equality, building a class-free society. Those were the things that failed, and very badly.
The things that succeeded were all things that someone made a profit on: the lifestyle stuff, and even feminism, which is probably the most important movement in all of human history, because it’s so fundamental. On the other hand it creates a cheap labor force — somebody profits from it. Obviously I’m not saying it’s a good thing that women earn less than men — of course it’s horrible — but it is profitable. So you can see why the corporate embrace of feminism abetted profit. The same with gay rights — it creates a whole new category, a whole new identity, a whole new set of industries. And now we’re seeing the same with transgenderism. If it succeeds, it’s going to be a major industry of surgeries and products. If you’re going to be a minority, and you can’t figure out how someone can make money off of you, you’re going to have a very rough time in this country.
The thing about racial oppression is that, in order to alleviate it, you have to give people money, in the form of programs. You have to actually tax the wealthy to redress economic inequality. But the things that involve redistribution of money as opposed to making money are much harder to achieve in this country. That’s why that part of the ’60s agenda failed so decisively, whereas vegetarianism, choices of personal style … all that stuff, all of those signifiers of individuality that are around us, are very profitable. Multiculturalism, to the extent that it’s a middle-class phenomenon, is very profitable. The proliferation of TV networks really emanates from tribes —the concept of tribalism became very profitable, because it became niche marketing. So all these things all succeeded dramatically in changing the country. But other issues involving equality failed. And this is a contradiction that is very painful for me. The equality agenda was extremely important in the ’60s. People say “the decade that changed America,” but they’re not coming to terms with what didn’t change. This is another struggle for another generation.
Evelyn McDonnell’s most recent book is Queens of Noise: The Real Story of the Runaways. She is assistant professor of journalism and new media at Loyola Marymount University.
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Pacific Overture: An Interview with Kim Stanley Robinson
Istvan Csicsery-Ronay interviews Kim Stanley Robinson
KIM STANLEY ROBINSON IS BEST KNOWN for his monumental science fiction trilogies about the terraforming of Mars (1992-95) and reversing the global climate crisis (2004-07), and his most recent, Galileo’s Dream (2009). Yet back before the mainstream culturati granted science fiction their seal of approval, Robinson produced one of the great achievements not only of the genre, but of modern California writing. In Three Californias, science fiction, adventure, ecofiction, utopian dreaming, and social realism mesh in a Zen-inflected political vision distinctively Californian. Each novel tells a different version of the future of Orange County. In The Wild Shore (1984), historical development has been reversed by a massive neutron-bomb attack on the U.S. The Gold Coast (1988) depicts a barely displaced extrapolation of 80s development. Most of the region has undergone hyperdevelopment, freeways are built in complex stacks, and only the rich have access to open undeveloped land; the local economy depends on defense industries and drug trafficking. In the final piece of the triptych, Pacific Edge (1990), citizen action has produced laws limiting the growth and influence of corporations; localities establish codes and customs to reclaim previously developed land and to manage natural systems with rational, democratic trade and governance. Utopian social arrangements are in place, a ceiling is placed on income and exploitation, work and politics are based in face-to-face relationships, and daily life revolves around mundane, un-heroic activities like community softball. Each book involves subtle echoes of the others — some characters and events appear in each — but each future has its own sharply distinctive style.
— Istvan Csicsery-Ronay
Out the window is the single stretch of California’s coast left undeveloped: the center of U.S. Marine Camp Joseph H. Pendleton. Dark hills, a narrow coastal plain cut by dry ravines, covered with dark brush. Grass gray in the moonlight. Something about it is so quiet, so empty, so pure…. My God, he thinks… The land. A pang of loss pierces him: this land that they live on, under its caking of concrete and steel and light — it was a beautiful place once. And now there’s no way back.
— from The Gold Coast
Kim Stanley Robinson: It began with a single notion: I was driving from UC San Diego to Orange County in 1971, having recently discovered science fiction. As I drove through Camp Pendleton I was struck by how empty the land there remained, and then when I hit the border of Orange County, San Clemente suddenly surrounded me, and I saw that different histories do different things to the land. It occurred to me that if I set three science fiction novels in Orange County, I could show how the land was different as a result. Three obvious future history forms were the utopian, the dystopian, and the after-the-fall (I had just read Earth Abides, A Canticle For Leibowitz, etc.). Then it occurred to me that one character could live in all three futures, and have three completely different lives, visible to the reader but not to the character.
That design was the beginning. It took many years for me to learn enough to write the novels. The one I felt capable of first was after-the-fall. Its narrator was younger, thus more within my ken. Indeed, I could write the mistake I had made in my childhood, between the ages of about seven and ten, when I read Huckleberry Finn and started to dress up as Huck and convince my friends to be Tom Sawyer and the other boys. I thought then that I was in a similar space to Huck and Tom on the Mississippi in the nineteenth century. This was a childish mistake, but the orange groves of Orange County were then so extensive that it was possible to make this mistake or enact this wish. So, in The Wild Shore I could write that childhood feeling. Thus I had my Henry Fletcher and his own Tom Sawyer in his friend Steve. The rest of the novel grappled with the problems that the initial situation gave me. Old Tom, I knew, would be the one who would live different lives in the other novels, though I had no idea what the content of those other lives would be, as the other books themselves were still completely vague to me. I started with the digging scene to point to the early scene in Huckleberry Finn when Huck joins Tom on an expedition to dig up a grave. In the struggle to make The Wild Shore work, I had no thoughts at all about the two books to follow.
Later, in the writing of The Gold Coast and Pacific Edge, I discovered echoes of The Wild Shore appearing almost automatically, in ways that seemed to work without distorting the later books. The digging scene could be repeated with alterations; so could the romantic tryst at Swing Canyon. These were welcome discoveries. As I wrote the books I found that many kinds of echoes became possible, but I could only see them when writing. By the time I wrote Pacific Edge I felt a little overdetermined by my overall plan, but the various echoes were always a pleasure to find and amplify. The main problem at that point was writing any kind of utopian novel.
The street made some awkward switchbacks at the head of the valley, and once we got up those, we were on the canyon-cut plateau that once made up the top of San Clemente. Up here were houses, big ones, all set in rows by the street like fish out to dry, as if there had been so many people that there wasn’t room to give each family a decent garden. A lot of the houses were busted and overgrown, and some were gone entirely — just floors, with pipes sticking out of them like arms sticking up out of a grave. Scavengers had lived here, and had used the houses one by one for firewood, moving on when their nest was burned; it was a practice I had heard about, but I’d never seen the results first hand, the destruction and waste.
— from The Wild Shore
Before discovering New Wave SF, I had loved locked room detective stories, the plays of Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe, and adventure fiction, such as Haggard, Sabatini, and the historical novels of Kenneth Roberts and others; the Civil War centennial spawned a great number of boys-in-the-Civil-War novels. So I suppose all this shows a certain youthful preference for the romance as opposed to the novel.
Then my discovery of the New Wave in about 1971 (Delany, Zelazny, Ellison’s Dangerous Visions, Le Guin, Disch, Lem, Russ, the Strugatskis, Brunner, Lafferty — the New Wave not as a style but as a period) transformed me. It turned me into a science fiction person. I think this was because during my childhood I had seen Orange County’s agricultural landscape torn out and replaced by freeways and buildings. Science fiction was the first literature I had read that spoke to that feeling of “future shock” or “landscape PTSD.” It was a powerful response, and I think that science fiction is my realist fiction about life in southern California. The actual experience of that time and place was a science fictional experience, and thus best captured by science fiction.
Because I have always loved fiction so much, to the point of making it a kind of religion, writing nonfiction never occurred to me as an option. Someday I would like to write directly about the Sierra Nevada, but mostly ideas come to me as stories.
“Listen, Jim, the rule is, when you have the money and have the land, you build! … Our only problem is to make sure everything moves along as fast as possible.”
Much more than The Wild Shore, The Gold Coast felt like I was writing my life and times. I took events and people from my life and incorporated them into the novel, sometimes very directly, as in the case of my father’s work. It’s one of the few times I’ve done that, and I don’t think it is the best method for writing novels; it can become a trap if you believe it is the only method, as Kerouac or Hemingway seemed to think it was. Only a few times in all my books have I used my own experiences to any great degree. But in The Gold Coast I did. That created huge problems for me in keeping distance, and making distinctions between what was important to the novel and what was simply a strong memory. To help in making those distinctions I waited a long time before starting it; I wrote it in Switzerland, in 1986, more than ten years after the real life events I was using. The physical distance from California was also helpful. But in the end, family, friends, my own life, my father’s work: all were thrown into the mix. I also picked up and used the things I could echo from The Wild Shore. Because Henry had written his novel, it seemed okay to have Jim writing poems and historical sketches telling the story of Orange County. Tom could easily reappear, in sadly reduced circumstances. It made sense to return to Swing Canyon. And so on. Echoing aspects of The Wild Shore proved easy, and did not seem to distort the new book, which was a nice discovery.
Other parts of The Gold Coast were hard and even painful to write. I could see at the time that it was the most likely of the three futures in my plan to occur — that really it was my version of a realist domestic novel — and that was depressing. It also scared me to give the novel to my dad to read, but he was great; I think he was pleased to have his work experience memorialized, and he only corrected a few technical mistakes and remarked, “That’s a sad book.” It’s true, it is. But it also has a very neat train wreck of a plot, and it tells the story of that time and place, Orange County in the 1970s, in a way I don’t think any other novel has.
…[E]ach time he walked to the plate, that night or any other, and stood there half-swinging his bat, and the pitcher lofted up the ball, big and white and round against the black and the skittering moths, like a full moon falling out of the sky — then all thought would fly from his mind, he became an utter blank; and would come to standing on first or second or third, grinning and feeling the hit in his hands and wrists. He couldn’t stop it even if he wanted to.
— from Pacific Edge
I think of myself as a California writer, and the other California writers have meant a lot to me, some more than others, a few a great deal, especially Snyder, Rexroth, Le Guin, and Muir. The Zen realism you speak of comes from Snyder principally, who showed me how you could write modern literature with an emphasis on clarity, the foregrounding of the world as opposed to the personality of the writer, and so on. A description of John Muir as “athlete philosopher” struck me, and I think California as a Mediterranean climate naturally calls out the Greek ideal: the world of action, of ocean and mountain. Eventually the Sierra Nevada as the spine of Californian culture became very important to me: in The Wild Shore they couldn’t get there, but in The Gold Coast and Pacific Edge they do, and those mountains are important in almost all my work, as they are in my life. My Mars books are Sierra books, for instance.
As for Zen: when I was young, at about the same time that the New Wave converted me to science fiction, I was reading Gary Snyder and discovering the Sierra Nevada. D.T. Suzuki, the book Zen Flesh, Zen Bones. These and other texts joined Snyder and Muir and the Sierra itself to make a combined impact on me. I saw that there was a California culture in which Zen made more sense than European religions and philosophies, and this culture suited me. Also, and this was important, I could write in that style. It was a paradigm or aesthetic in which clarity and directness did not constitute some kind of old-fashioned disability, but was rather a viable alternative way. And I found by practice that in this plain style one can still create quite complex novels. So, Zen realism, sure. Over time I’ve gotten interested in other forms of Buddhism, but Zen’s focus on daily practice is always helpful. It is a very useful novelist’s philosophy.
I’ll tell you what I do know: the tide is out, and the waves roll up the rivermouth. At first it looks like each wave is pushing the whole flow of the river inland, because all the visible movement is in that direction. Little trailers of the wave roll up the bank, break over the hard sand and add their bit to the flat’s stippled crosshatching. For a time it looks like the wave will push upriver all the way around the first bend. But underneath its white jumble the river has been flowing out to sea all the while, and finally the wave stops on top of this surge, breaks into a confused chop, and suddenly the entire disturbance is being borne out to sea – until it’s swept under the next incoming wave, and the movement turns upriver again. Each wave is a different size, and as a result, there is an infinite variety of rippling, breaking, chopping, gliding… The pattern is never once the same. Do you see what I mean?
I just now went to Google Earth and had a look at the current situation. “Rattlesnake Hill” is still clear of development; it is called “El Modena Open Space” when you click on a green tree symbol. I think that hill must still belong to the Orange County Water District, and is part of their Santiago Creek watershed management, but I am not sure. Development all around it has been extensive, and a few years ago I went to the Orange Hill restaurant on the next hill over, and had a look around, and it was amazing to see all the mansions studding the surrounding hills and overlooking the coastal plain, still often very smoggy. It had a very Gold Coast look.
On the other hand, Camp Pendleton is mostly still empty. Onofre Valley has been built up quite a bit, the Marines have located a whole village in there, but I imagine it could return to the state I describe in The Wild Shore pretty quickly.
There are also Pacific Edge pockets all over Orange County, like a shattered habitat or something enduring that could reemerge. Newport Beach’s back bay is still a little wetlands, and the Laguna Coast wilderness park is a fairly big set of open hills, stupidly divided by a tollway, but large considering how completely development has covered south O.C.
The Santa Ana mountains are still mostly intact and somewhat wild. Despite the 2-3 million people living below, you can still drive up Santiago Canyon, hike over a ridge into Harding Canyon, and climb the canyon to the ridge, horribly steep where it becomes a box canyon. Here one can imagine Swing Canyons all over. So in a way the landscapes of all three alternatives can still be seen. But The Gold Coast dominates. As with the books, it is the center of the triptych. It will take hundreds of years to restore that landscape to something decently livable. The Pacific Edge project is a long-term effort.
Concerning method, I simply visited the places in question, or I had known them all my life, and I pushed them in the direction my scenarios demanded, and it was simple enough. I had the Thomas Brothers map book for the county and often referred to it. I drew the map in The Wild Shore, and people at Tor Books helped me with the map in The Gold Coast. I could have mapped every moment in Pacific Edge, but it didn’t seem necessary at that point. The house that Oscar moves into, for instance, and hires Kevin to renovate, is my childhood home, and the ghosts that Oscar glimpses one night in the house are my parents and our cat. At that degree of engagement it takes no great effort to imagine a place and the changes that might happen to it. These were hometown novels.
Utopia is when our lives matter.
I think it’s been about twenty years since I finished Pacific Edge, but forty years since I first thought of the trilogy. The thing that occurs to me from time to time is that with very few changes I could make The Gold Coast completely contemporary. What I want most to do is to remove the references to the Soviet Union. That we would stay on a permanent war economy, and concoct a bunch of little wars, the book got right. But featuring the USSR heavily in a novel published in 1988 was not the best predictive move. Some kindly readers have joked to me that I have cannily predicted a recoalescence of the USSR, but no. It would be better if I could take those few references out.
That’s about as far as it goes when it comes to any desire to rewrite those books. They are books of their time. For years I thought the basic premise of The Wild Shore was crazy, then after 9/11, it did not look so unlikely, unfortunately. I’m always on the look-out for Pacific Edge moments, and people often send me Gold Coast news clippings or now links: the double-decker freeways are still mentioned by planners, and so on.
I would like to see more Californian utopian novels join Pacific Edge, Ecotopia, and the many real-world utopian efforts that were made in California in the nineteenth century. The potential exists, both locally and globally, for huge improvements in human life and our fit to the planet. They involve not just technologies but laws and economic systems; they need to go beyond capitalism and its disconnect from ecology, and that next step has to be imagined and envisioned repeatedly, no matter the literary and conceptual difficulties, to give us a better sense of how it might feel and how we might take the first steps. So I’d like to see more of those.
Now I know this is the part of the story where the author winds it all up in a fine flourish that tells what it all meant, but luckily there are only a couple of pages left in this here book, so there isn’t room. I’m glad of it.
I have read a bit of revisionist American West history, pointed out to me by Carl Abbott and others, which in the aggregate suggests to me that my Three Californias are part of a larger re-imagining of American West history. I don’t read enough of that material to have a sharp sense of what they are up to. The work of Mike Davis, and the fine book Holy Land by D.J. Waldie, have given me glimpses of this new paradigm, but I haven’t delved deeper.
I haven’t lived in southern California for almost thirty years. I visit San Diego often, but not Orange County. So my interest in the area, and in all the issues it brings up, is like one of the echoes in the three books: news from a previous reincarnation, or an alternative reality. But we are all part of one world, and southern California is in some ways a precursor or limit case. The land there has been destroyed for the sake of money and cars. What we built so fast is not a sustainable infrastructure or social structure, so it’s going to have to be extensively rebuilt in the centuries to come. It may remain a kind of test tube for experimenting, and if so I hope my Three Californias helps a little in terms of cognitive mapping. Anyway, they are my testament to what happened and what could happen.
A Functional Form Has Its Own Beauty: An Interview with Kim Stanley Robinson
By McKenzie Wark
The Exegete
By Rob Latham
Tales From The Platinum Triangle
By Jeffrey Burbank
Alternative Californias
The Ghost of Wrath
By Mike Davis
Advertising Degree Zero: William Gibson's "Zero History"
By Sherryl Vint
By Roger Luckhurst
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This article appears in the November 30, 2001 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.
PROFILE: BERNARD LEWIS
British Svengali Behind
by Scott Thompson and Jeffrey Steinberg
[PDF version of this article]
On Nov. 19, octogenarian British Orientalist spook Bernard Lewis wrote an elaborate apologia for Osama bin Laden, a fervent pitch for the inevitability of the "Clash of Civilizations," in the pages of New Yorker magazine. Under the headline "The Revolt of Islam," Lewis lied that the emergence of "Islamic terrorism" in the recent decades, is completely consistent with mainstream Islam, which is committed to the subjugation of the infidels to Islamic law. He went through 14 pages of a fractured fairy-tale history of Islam, quoting bin Laden's Oct. 7, 2001 videotape, where the Saudi expatriate spoke of Islam's "humiliation and disgrace ... for more than 80 years"—a reference to the crushing of the Ottoman Empire by Britain and France in 1918. Lewis invented a tradition of jihad, "bequeathed to Muslims by the Prophet":
"In principle," Lewis explained, "the world was divided into two houses: the House of Islam, in which a Muslim government ruled and Muslim law prevailed, and the House of War, the rest of the world, still inhabited and, more important, ruled by infidels. Between the two, there was to be a perpetual state of war until the entire world either embraced Islam or submitted to the rule of the Muslim state." Among all the different "infidels" ruling the House of War, Lewis asserted, Christianity was singled out as "their primary rival in the struggle for world domination." Lewis cited slogans painted on the walls of Jerusalem's Dome of the Rock from the Seventh Century, assailing Christianity.
Lewis then claimed that the evolution of modern Islamic terrorism, specifically the al-Qaeda terrorism, had a long proud history within Islam, dating to the Assassins cult of the 11th-13th Centuries. (Lewis wrote a 1967 book, The Assassins, extolling the virtues of this secret society.) He also identified Saudi Arabia and Egypt as two regimes legitimately singled out by the Islamic jihadists, for their corruption by "modernism."
He concluded, ominously: "For Osama bin Laden, 2001 marks the resumption of the war for the religious dominance of the world, that began in the Seventh Century.... If bin Laden can persuade the world of Islam to accept his views and his leadership, then a long and bitter struggle lies ahead, and not only for America. Sooner or later, al-Qaeda and related groups will clash with the other neighbors of Islam—Russia, China, India—who may prove less squeamish than the Americans in using their power against Muslims and their sanctities. If bin Laden is correct in his calculations and succeeds in his war, then a dark future awaits the world, especially the part of it that embraces Islam."
Bernard Lewis Plan, Take II
Since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Lewis has, not surprisingly, resurfaced in numerous locations. After all, the 85-year old British Arab Bureau mandarin has been London's point-man in the United States since 1974, when he was posted to H.G. Wells' outpost at Princeton University's Center for Advanced Studies, to secure American compliance with British geopolitical manipulations in the Middle East, the Caucasus, the Caspian Basin, and Central Asia.
To put it bluntly: British intelligence senior operator Lewis is the guiding hand behind the ongoing U.S. neo-conservative drive for a new "Thirty Years War" in Eurasia. This drive is at the heart of the ongoing coup d'état attempt against the George W. Bush Administration, which began with the Sept. 11 irregular warfare attacks on New York City and Washington.
Lewis' arrival at Princeton, after serving on the faculty of the University of London's Middle East and Africa faculty (the repository of the original India House files, long officially referred to as the Colonial Department), coincided with then-Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger's fomenting of the civil war in Lebanon. That persists to the present day, and served as a laboratory for the later "Islamic revolution" in Iran.
Lewis is no mere British quackademic. After obtaining his doctorate in the history of Islam from the University of London School of Oriental and African Studies, he joined the university faculty in 1938. From 1940-45, Lewis was, in his own understated words, "otherwise engaged," as a wartime British Military Intelligence officer, later seconded to the British Foreign Office. To this day, Lewis remains mum about his wartime "engagements."
Since arriving at Princeton, Lewis has been demonstrably responsible for every piece of strategic folly and insanity into which the United States has been suckered in Asia Minor. The Wellsian "method to his madness" has been the persistent push to eliminate the nation-state system, and launch murderous wars stretching across the Eurasian region.
* During the Carter Administration, Lewis was the architect of madman Zbigniew Brzezinski's "Arc of Crisis" policy of fomenting Muslim Brotherhood fundamentalist insurrections all along the southern tier of the Soviet Union. The planned fostering of radical Islamist war provocations was known, at the time, as "the Bernard Lewis Plan." Among the fruits of this Lewis-Brzezinski collusion: the February 1979 Ayatollah Khomeini "Islamic Revolution" in Iran, which overthrew the Shah, and sent the once-proud center of the Islamic Renaissance back into a 20-year dark age; and the 1979-1988 Afghanistan War, provoked by Brzezinski's July 1979 launching of covert support for Afghan mujahideen "Contras" inside Afghanistan—six months prior to the Soviet Red Army's Christmas Eve invasion.
As early as 1960, in a book-length study he prepared for the Royal Institute for International Affairs, under the title The Emergence of Modern Turkey, Lewis polemicized against the modernizing, nation-building legacy of Turkey's Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. He argued instead for the revival of an Ottoman Empire that could be used as a British geopolitical battering ram against Russia and against the Arab states of the Persian Gulf—in alliance with Israel.
* It was Bernard Lewis who launched the hoax of the "Clash of Civilizations"—in a September 1990 Atlantic Monthly article on "The Roots of Muslim Rage," which appeared three years before Brzezinski clone Samuel Huntington's publication of his Foreign Affairs diatribe, "The Clash Of Civilizations." Huntington's article, and his subsequent book-length treatment of the same subject, were caricatures of Lewis' more sophisticated British Orientalist historical fraud, which painted Islam as engaged in a 14-century-long war against Christianity. Huntington acknowledged that Lewis' 1990 piece coined the term "Clash of Civilizations."
* In 1992, in the aftermath of the Persian Gulf War, Lewis celebrated in the pages of the New York Council on Foreign Relations' Foreign Affairs that the era of the nation-state in the Middle East had come to an inglorious end, and the entire region should expect to go through a prolonged period of "Lebanonization"—i.e., degeneration into fratricidal, parochialist violence and chaos.
"The eclipse of pan-Arabism," he wrote, "has left Islamic fundamentalism as the most attractive alternative to all those who feel that there has to be something better, truer, and more hopeful than the inept tyrannies of their rulers and the bankrupt ideologies foisted on them from outside." The Islamists represent "a network outside the control of the state.... The more oppressive the regime, the greater the help it gives to fundamentalists by eliminating competing oppositionists."
He concluded the Foreign Affairs piece by forecasting the "Lebanonization" of the entire region, save Israel: "Most of the states of the Middle East ... are of recent and artificial construction and are vulnerable to such a process. If the central power is sufficiently weakened, there is no real civil society to hold the polity together, no real sense of common national identity or overriding allegiance to the nation-state. The state then disintegrates—as happened in Lebanon—into a chaos of squabbling, feuding, fighting sects, tribes, regions and parties."
* In 1998, it was Lewis who catapulted Osama bin Laden into prominence with a November/December Foreign Affairs article, legitimizing the Saudi black sheep as a serious proponent of mainstream, militant Islam. Lewis' piece, "License To Kill: Osama bin Laden's Declaration Of Jihad," showered praise on bin Laden, pronouncing his "Declaration of Jihad Versus Jews and Crusaders" "a magnificent piece of eloquent, at times even poetic Arabic prose ... which reveals a version of history that most Westerners will find unfamiliar."
Osama bin Laden released his 1998 jihad call on Feb. 23, 1998, six months before the truck bombing attacks against the U.S. embassies in Tanzania and Kenya. The very next day, Bernard Lewis' signature appeared on a widely circulated Open Letter To President Bill Clinton, released by a previously unheard-of entity called the Committee for Peace and Security in the Gulf, demanding that the U.S. government throw its full support behind a military campaign to overthrow Saddam Hussein. The Open Letter called for carpet bombing Iraq, and for the United States to aggressively give financial and military support for the Iraqi National Congress, yet another corrupt and inept "Contra" pseudo-gang, created by U.S. and British intelligence elements, and based in London.
In addition to Bernard Lewis, the Open Letter was endorsed by former U.S. Rep. Steven Solarz (D-N.Y.), notorious Anglo-Israeli propagandist and spy Richard Perle, convicted Iran-Contra criminal Elliott Abrams, Jonathan Pollard fellow-traveller Steven Bryen, Frank Gaffney, New Republic publisher and Al Gore mentor Martin Peretz, Paul Wolfowitz, Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP) research director David Wurmser, and Dov Zakheim.
Lewis' public alliance at that time with the leading lights of the "Mega" apparatus—now waging all-out war against the Bush Administration's efforts to box in Israeli madman Ariel Sharon—is noteworthy, but not surprising. Lewis is lionized inside Israel, and by the Israeli Lobby in America as a geopolitical giant. On Feb. 19, 1996, Lewis was feted in Jerusalem, where he delivered the ninth annual B'nai B'rith World Center "Jerusalem Address" on "The Middle East Towards the Year 2000." His son, Michael Lewis, is the director of the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee's super-secret "opposition research section." This is one of the most important wellsprings of propaganda and disinformation, presently saturating the U.S. Congress and American media with war-cries for precisely the Clash of Civilizations Bernard Lewis has been promoting for decades.
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Investigators search for clues in fatal Brookings plane crash
Local News Top Stories April 19, 2019 Amanda Rose Brookings, faa, investigation, NTSB, Plane Crash
BROOKINGS, Ore. — Two people lost their lives when the plane they were in crashed just shy of the Brookings airport.
It happened just after 4 pm on Thursday afternoon.
Sheriff John Ward of the Curry County Sheriff’s Office says multiple agencies responded and helicopters searched from the skies.
He says the plane went down just a mile north of the Brookings airport.
Later that afternoon, Sheriff Ward says they located the plane by air and ground search crews.
Unfortunately, both the passenger and the pilot did not survive.
NTSB and FAA investigators are now in charge of the investigation. Friday, they say they’re at the crash site just trying to piece together what happened.
“There may have been a problem with the airplane, there could have been a physiological problem with the pilot, the weather might have been bad. Those are just some basic, general types of things we start looking at and then… we go from there,” said Thomas Little, air safety investigator for NTSB.
Little says investigations like these typically take around 6 months to a year.
He says the plane was also “experimental” meaning a pilot or someone else constructed it themselves.
The names of the two who died are not being released until the investigation is over, but we are told they were both from Del Norte County, California.
Stay with NBC5 News for updates on this developing story.
Amanda Rose is a multimedia journalist for NBC5 News. Amanda graduated from Columbia University earning a Master’s degree in Journalism. She also received a Bachelor’s degree in English with a specialization in literature from the University of British Columbia. She’s a Los Angeles native, but is thrilled to return to the beautiful Pacific Northwest and is passionate about reporting on the criminal justice system.
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Paul Krugman | Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies
New York Times Blog
Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies, Lies
October 14, 2017 4:23 pm October 14, 2017 4:23 pm
Modern conservatives have been lying about taxes pretty much from the beginning of their movement. Made-up sob stories about family farms broken up to pay inheritance taxes, magical claims about self-financing tax cuts, and so on go all the way back to the 1970s. But the selling of tax cuts under Trump has taken things to a whole new level, both in terms of the brazenness of the lies and their sheer number. Both the depth and the breadth of the dishonesty make it hard even for those of us who do this for a living to keep track.
In fact, when I set out to make a list of the bigger lies, I thought there would be six or seven, and was surprised to come up with ten.
So I thought it might be useful, both for myself and for others, to put together a crib sheet: a fairly long-form description of ten big lies Trump and allies are telling, what they’ve said, and how we know that they are lies. I’m probably missing some stuff, and for all I know some new big lie will have been tweeted out by the time this is posted. But we do what we can. So here we go.
Lie #1: America is the most highly-taxed country in the world
This is a Trump special: he’s said it many, many times, most recently just this past week. Each time, fact-checkers have piled on to point out that it’s false. Here’s taxes as a percentage of GDP, from the OECD:
Taxes as % of GDPCredit OECD
The blue bar is the US; the red bar the average for advanced countries.
Why does Trump keep repeating what even he has to know by now is a flat lie? I suspect it’s a power thing: he enjoys showing that he can lie repeatedly through his teeth, be caught red-handed in his lie again and again, and his followers will still believe him rather than the “fake news” media.
Lie #2: The estate tax is destroying farmers and truckers
Tales of struggling family farms disbanded because they can’t afford the taxes when the patriarch dies have flourished for decades, despite the absence of any examples. I don’t mean examples are rare: I mean that advocates of estate tax repeal haven’t been able to come up with a single example at least since the late 1970s, when exemption levels were raised to the equivalent of around $2 million in today’s dollars.
Lately Trump has added a new twist, portraying the estate tax as a terrible burden on hard-working truckers. For who among us doesn’t own an $11 million fleet of trucks?
The reality, as this graphic from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities shows, is that only a small number of very large estates pay any tax at all, and only a tiny fraction of those tax-paying estates are small businesses or family farms:
In fact, since transportation and warehousing are only 3 percent of GDP and farming less than 1 percent, it seems quite possible that this year only 2 or 3 truckers and not a single farmer will pay any estate tax.
Lie #3: Taxation of pass-through entities is a burden on small business
Most businesses in the United States, at least for tax purposes, aren’t what we normally think of as corporations subject to profits taxes. Instead, they’re partnerships, sole proprietorships, and S corporations whose earnings are simply “passed through”: counted as part of their owners’ personal income and taxed accordingly.
Trump wants to change that, and let owners simply pay a 1525 percent tax on the earnings of pass-through entities, with no further taxes owed. This is being billed as a reduction in the burden on hard-working small business owners.
But as the Tax Policy Center explains, many middle-income households who own pass-through entities aren’t running businesses; they generally derive only a small fraction of their income from these entities:
Rather, they may receive occasional income from the rental of a vacation home, or from the sale of odds and ends on eBay, that they report as business income.
High-income owners of such entities, by contrast, get a lot of money from them – but they’re not struggling small business people:
This high-income group is made up of doctors, lawyers, consultants, other professionals, and, at the very highest end, partners in hedge funds or other investment firms.
And these are, of course, the people who would gain massively from the Trump proposal. The vast majority of Americans are in a tax bracket of 15 percent or less, so even if they control a pass-through entity, the Trump tax break is worth nothing to them:
High-income individuals, however, would gain a lot by paying 1525 percent instead of the much higher rates they pay at the margin – 39.6 percent right now. And they’d also have a strong incentive to rearrange their affairs so that more of their income pops up in their pass-throughs. This wouldn’t be small-business creation; it wouldn’t add jobs; it would just be tax avoidance. That’s what happened when Kansas tried something similar, and played a big role in the state’s fiscal disaster.
So this isn’t a tax break for small business, it’s a tax break for, surprise, wealthy individuals.
Lie #4: Cutting profits taxes really benefits workers
Tax incidence is a headache-inducing subject at best, and my sense is that even the tax policy experts have gotten behind the curve in thinking through the implications of global capital markets for the subject. But I think there’s a way to cut through at least some of the confusion.
Think about what happens if you cut the taxes on corporate profits. The immediate impact is that (duh) corporations have more money. Why would they spend that extra money on hiring more workers or increasing their wages?
Not, surely, out of the goodness of their hearts – and not in response to worker demands, because these days nobody cares what workers think.
Now, they might be inclined to invest more, increasing the demand for labor and therefore raising wages indirectly while competing pre-tax profits down. But there are a couple of major slippages in this story.
First, a lot of corporate profits aren’t a return on physical capital and won’t be competed down if capital gets cheaper. Apple, Google, Microsoft, and others derive their profits from technological advantages, brand name, and market power; cutting the taxes on those profits just leaves their owners with more money.
Second, to raise wages a tax cut must raise the overall stock of capital, which means it must lead to higher total investment spending. Where does the money for that increase in investment come from? The tax cuts are unlikely to raise national saving.
The money might come from abroad, via capital inflows. But the flip side of those capital inflows would be a bigger trade deficit – hardly what the proponents of tax cuts are advertising – and in any case running trade deficits on the required scale is a much more problematic thing than people seem to realize. The dollar would have to rise sharply – and the strength of the dollar would itself deter foreign investment, very much slowing the process of wage rise.
So for an extended period – at least 5 years, probably much more — cutting profits taxes is good for owners of corporations. Workers, not so much.
Lie #5: Repatriating overseas profits will create jobs
For tax reasons, corporations hold a lot of money in overseas tax shelters. Tax cutters always claim that lower rates and/or an amnesty will bring that money home and create a lot of jobs.
So, first of all, there isn’t really a Scrooge McDuck-type pile of cash hidden overseas, ready to be put to work if the taxman will let it. Those overseas accounts are just an accounting device, which have very little real effect. Many of the companies with big overseas hoards also have plenty of idle cash at home; what’s holding them back is a lack of perceived opportunities, not cash flow. And even those who don’t have surplus cash can easily borrow at near-record low interest rates; remember, they can always use the overseas cash to secure their loans.
And we have solid empirical evidence here. In 2004 the U.S. enacted the Homeland Investment Act, which offered a tax holiday for repatriation of foreign earnings by U.S. multinationals. Careful study of its effects tells us that
Repatriations did not lead to an increase in domestic investment, employment or R&D — even for the firms that lobbied for the tax holiday stating these intentions and for firms that appeared to be financially constrained. Instead, a $1 increase in repatriations was associated with an increase of almost $1 in payouts to shareholders.
Lie #6: This is not a tax cut for the rich
Trump says it isn’t, so that’s that, right? Oh, wait.
Actually, if you look at the major provisions of the Unified Framework, the big items are (i) Cuts in corporate taxes (ii) Pass-through tax cut (iii) elimination of the estate tax (iv) cut in top marginal rate. All these strongly favor very high incomes – and everything else is small change. Hence the Tax Policy Center estimate:
Administration flacks and defenders are accusing TPC of reaching conclusions without adequate information; but the administration is making lots of assertions about what its plan will do, with apparently no more information than the center. Furthermore, given the general shape of the plan there’s no way it can fail to be very much a gift to the already very rich.
Lie #7: It’s a big tax cut for the middle class
See Lie #6 above. All the big provisions benefit the rich, not the middle class. What’s left is mostly small change – and some of it, like ending deductibility of state and local taxes and other deductions, actually raises taxes on a substantial number of middle-class Americans.
In total, by 2027, according to TPC, 80 percent of the tax cut goes to the top 1 percent; only 12 percent to the middle three quintiles.
Lie #8: It won’t increase the deficit
OK, we’re looking at big cuts in corporate taxes, elimination of the estate tax, lower rates on high-income individuals, and a massive new tax-avoidance loophole. How can this not increase the budget deficit?
The only answer would be if the tax proposal eliminated vast swathes of the existing set of tax deductions, massively broadening the tax base. It doesn’t. The only even halfway biggish thing here is the state and local deductibility end – and that is already in very big political trouble. This is a multi-trillion-dollar budget buster, unless it summons up deep voodoo. But …
Lie #9: Cutting taxes will jump-start rapid growth
Insistence in the magical power of tax cuts is the ultimate zombie lie of U.S. policy discussion; nothing can kill it. And we know why: there’s a lot of money behind the proposition that great things will happen if you cut the donors’ taxes. It’s difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.
Still, for the record: Reagan cut taxes, and although his administration began with a terrible recession, there was a fast recovery thereafter. Some of us think Paul Volcker had more to do with both the recession and the recovery than anything coming from the White House; but in any case we have more evidence.
For Bill Clinton raised taxes, amid cries from the right that he would destroy the economy. Instead he presided over a boom that surpassed Reagan in every dimension. For what it’s worth, I don’t think this boom was Clinton’s doing. But it certainly refuted the proposition that cutting taxes is both necessary and sufficient for prosperity.
Then Bush the younger cut taxes, and there were many hosannahs about the “Bush boom.” What he actually got was a lackluster recovery, followed by an epic crash.
Finally, Obama inherited the aftermath of that crash, and despite scorched-earth opposition from Republicans the economy gradually clawed its way back. Then in 2013 Obama first raised taxes substantially, then implemented the Affordable Care Act, again amid cries of disaster from the right. The economy did fine.
Oh, and there were the recent state-level experiments. Sam Brownback slashed taxes in Kansas, promising an economic miracle; all he got was a fiscal crisis. Jerry Brown raised taxes in California, amid predictions of – you guessed it – disaster; the economy boomed, and the main problem is a housing shortage.
There is nothing, nothing at all, in this history that would make any open-minded person believe that the Trump tax plan will cause dramatically accelerated growth.
Lie #10: Tax cuts will pay for themselves
If tax cuts don’t generate an economic miracle, it’s hard for them to generate a revenue surge that makes up for lower rates. True, some hidden money may come out of the woodwork and show up as taxable income, even if GDP doesn’t rise. But this effect hasn’t historically been anywhere big enough to offset the direct losses from lower taxes. Reagan’s tax cuts led to deficits, Clinton’s tax hike to surpluses; Jerry Brown presided over California’s fiscal revitalization, Sam Brownback over a fiscal crisis that eventually prompted the legislature to overrule him and raise taxes again.
So there we are: ten big tax-cut lies. That was pretty exhausting, actually – and as I said, I’ve probably missed a few, and/or Trump will invent some new ones. But I hope this ends up being a useful reference.
Friday Night Music: Moron Edition
Subsidies, Spite, and Supply Chains
Biography and Columns »
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Brexit won't fix Britain's burning issues
Two and a half years ago, on the steps of Downing Street, the Prime Minister promised to tackle society's burning injustices.
My constituents elected me to fight for a People's Vote and to keep our Union together.
I was glad to hear it. We could argue all day why people voted to Leave. But at the heart of it for many was a loss of faith in the basic promise that if you work hard and play by the rules, you'll get on in life.
But nothing has changed for those the Prime Minister vowed to help. The government's been far too busy making a mess of Brexit while Jeremy Corbyn has sat back and let it happen. And what are we left with?
An under-funded Universal Credit bringing misery to thousands.
The NHS once again in the midst of a winter crisis.
Vulnerable people sleeping on our streets and dying on our doorstep.
We can't resolve any of this by leaving the EU.
The Leave campaign told us we were taking back control - but my constituents don't feel that way.
The mother of two worried about her family's security after the Prime Minister called her husband a 'queue jumper'.
The scientist concerned about jobs in Glasgow once the life sciences industry loses its European funding.
The businesses who don't know on what terms they will be able to sell to our biggest trading partner in three months' time.
Theresa May has returned from Brussels with a bad deal. Brexit has become a national embarrassment.
Five years ago I fought to keep Scotland in the United Kingdom, certain in the knowledge we are better off together. It's for the same reasons that I believe Scotland's best future is in the UK, as a proud member of our family of nations.
The Liberal Democrats have led the fight for a People's Vote. And in 2017 my constituents elected me on a promise to fight for a People's Vote on the Brexit deal and to keep our precious Union together.
I'm delighted that so many MPs from all parties are now saying that the public should have a final say.
It'll make us poorer, dragging us out of the single market and out of the customs union.
It'll bring our NHS to its knees, leaving our most vulnerable in dear need of hard-working doctors and nurses.
It will weaken our union after we fought so hard to keep it together.
In one respect, I actually agree with the Government. I believe them and the EU when they say this is the best Brexit on offer. I even agree with the Brexiteers when they say that the Prime Minister's deal is worse than staying in Europe. But I despair at the arrogance of Conservatives and Labour MPs alike who claim they can get a better deal. They live in the land of make-believe.
But here, in the real world, there aren't any magic beans to put food on the table or pots of gold at the end of the rainbow. Even my five year old could tell them that unicorns aren't real!
And I'm horrified by those who suggest that leaving with no deal is the way out of this mess.
How nice it must be for them, claiming for their French residency or setting up investment funds in Dublin! Meanwhile, the poorest in our society pay the price for their ideological Brexit.
It's time for the people to choose what future they want for their children.
We need a People's Vote.
Two and a half years on, we can see that leaving the European Union won't make us richer. It won't bring £350m a week for the NHS and it won't be the easiest trade deal in human history.
The Brexiteers claim that Brexit is about our sovereignty and that a People's Vote would be a betrayal of democracy.
But how can they claim with a straight face that losing our seat at the table is taking back control?
How can they claim that turning our back on our closest neighbours is the dawn of a new global Britain?
How can Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn look people in the eye and say that a public vote on the deal is undemocratic?
There's no deal that will ever be as good as our membership of the European Union.
There's no Brexit that works for the whole of the UK. It's time for the people to choose, knowing the Brexit deal on offer, what future they want for their children.
So let's do the right thing. Let's get this dreadful deal voted down and have a People's Vote.
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This article is about the word "shit". For the bodily waste, see feces. For the egestion of bodily wastes, see defecation. For other uses, see Shit (disambiguation).
Shit is a word considered vulgar and profane in Modern English. As a noun it refers to fecal matter, and as a verb it means to defecate; in the plural ("the shits") it means diarrhea. Shite is a common variant in British and Irish English.[1] As a slang term, it has many meanings, including: nonsense, foolishness, something of little value or quality, trivial and usually boastful or inaccurate talk, or a contemptible person. It may also be used as an expression of annoyance, surprise, or anger.
The word is likely derived from Old English, having the nouns scite (dung, attested only in place names) and scitte (diarrhoea), and the verb scītan (to defecate, attested only in bescītan, to cover with excrement); eventually it morphed into Middle English schītte (excrement), schyt (diarrhoea) and shiten (to defecate), and it is virtually certain that it was used in some form by preliterate Germanic tribes at the time of the Roman Empire. The word may be further traced to Proto-Germanic *skit-, and ultimately to Proto-Indo-European *skheid- "cut, separate", the same root believed to have become the word shed. The word has several cognates in modern Germanic languages, such as German Scheiße, Dutch schijt, Swedish skit, Icelandic skítur, Norwegian skitt etc. Ancient Greek had 'skōr' (gen. 'skatos' hence 'scato-'), from Proto-Indo-European *sker-, which is likely unrelated.[2]
The word shit (also shite in British and Hiberno-English) is usually avoided in formal speech. Minced oath substitutes for the word shit in English include shoot, shucks, and "sugar".
In the word's literal sense, it has a rather small range of common usages. An unspecified or collective occurrence of feces is generally shit or some shit; a single deposit of feces is sometimes a shit or a piece of shit; and to defecate is to shit or to take a shit. While it is common to speak of shit as existing in a pile, a load, a hunk, and other quantities and configurations, such expressions flourish most strongly in the figurative. For practical purposes, when actual defecation and excreta are spoken of, it is either through creative euphemism or with a vague and fairly rigid literalism.
Piece of shit may also be used figuratively to describe a particularly loathsome individual.
Vague noun
Shit can be used as a generic mass noun similar to stuff; for instance, This show is funny shit or This test is hard shit, or That was stupid shit. These three usages (with funny, hard, and stupid or another synonym of stupid) are heard most commonly in the United States.
In the expression Get your shit together! the word shit may refer to some set of personal belongings or tools, or to one's wits, composure, or attention to the task at hand. He doesn't have his shit together suggests he is failing rather broadly, with the onus laid to multiple personal shortcomings, rather than bad luck or outside forces.
To shoot the shit is to have a friendly but pointless conversation, as in "Come by my place some time and we'll shoot the shit."
A shithole is any unpleasant place to be, much like a hellhole. This usage originates from a reference to a pit toilet.
The phrase built like a brick shithouse is used to compliment a person, or sometimes a thing, by suggesting it is well-built or aesthetically attractive. In English-speaking countries other than the U.S. it is used to compliment men with athletic physiques; in the U.S. it is used to compliment particularly shapely women.[3] This meaning originates from the observation that most shithouses are rather ramshackle affairs constructed of plywood or scrap sheets of steel. For those in need, and in inclement weather, certainly a brick shithouse would be a welcome sight.
The shitter is a slang term for a toilet, and can be used akin to the phrase ...down the toilet to suggest that something has been wasted. Example: "This CD player quit working one friggin' week after I bought it, and I lost the receipt! Twenty bucks right down the shitter!"
Shit on a shingle is a U.S. military slang term for creamed chipped beef on toast. In polite company this can be abbreviated as SOS.[4][5]
To shit oneself or to be scared shitless can be used to refer to surprise or fear, usually figuratively. The variation to shit bricks can be commonly seen in a form of Internet meme which goes by the phrase when you see it, you will shit bricks, used in connection with an image of a busy scene with an often unnoticed laughing face or disturbing object which is hard to see until you study the picture.
The word can also be used to represent anger, as in Jim is totally going to flip his shit when he sees that we wrecked his marriage.
Shit can be used to denote trouble, by saying one is in a lot of shit or deep shit (a common euphemism is deep doo-doo). It's common for someone to refer to an unpleasant thing as hard shit (You got a speeding ticket? Man, that's some hard shit), but the phrase tough shit is used as an unsympathetic way of saying too bad to whoever is having problems (You got arrested? Tough shit, man!) or as a way of expressing to someone that they need to stop complaining about something and cope with it instead (Billy: I got arrested because of you! Tommy: Tough shit, dude, you knew you might get arrested when you chose to come with me.) Note that in this case, as in many cases with the term, tough shit is often said as a way of pointing out someone's fault in his/her own current problem. It's also common to express annoyance by simply saying Shit.
Up shit creek or especially Up shit creek without a paddle describes a situation in which one is in severe difficulties with no apparent means of solution.
Shit happens means that bad happenings in life are inevitable. This is usually spoken with a sigh or a shrug, but can be spoken derisively to someone who complains too often about his ill fortunes, or in an irritating manner.
When the shit hits the fan is usually used to refer to a specific time of confrontation or trouble, which requires decisive action. This is often used in reference to combat situations and the action scenes in movies, but can also be used for everyday instances that one might be apprehensive about. I don't want to be here when the shit hits the fan! indicates that the speaker is dreading this moment (which can be anything from an enemy attack to confronting an angry parent or friend). He's the one to turn to when the shit hits the fan is an indication that the person being talked about is dependable and will not run from trouble or abandon their allies in tough situations. The concept of this phrase is simple enough, as the actual substance striking the rotating blades of a fan would cause a messy and unpleasant situation (much like being in the presence of a manure spreader). Whether or not this has actually happened, or if the concept is simply feasible enough for most people to imagine the result without needing it to be demonstrated, is unknown. Another example might be the saying shit rolls downhill, a metaphor suggesting that trouble for a manager may be transferred to the subordinates. There are a number of anecdotes and jokes about such situations, as the imagery of these situations is considered to be funny. This is generally tied-in with the concept that disgusting and messy substances spilled onto someone else are humorous.
Shit can comfortably stand in for the terms bad and anything in many instances (Dinner was good, but the movie was shit. You're all mad at me, but I didn't do shit!). A comparison can also be used, as in Those pants look like shit, or This stuff tastes like shit. Many usages are idiomatic. I'm shit out of luck usually refers to someone who is at the end of their wits or who has no remaining viable options. That little shit shot me in the ass, suggests a mischievous or contemptuous person. Euphemisms such as crap are not usually used in this context.
The term piece of shit is generally used to classify a product or service as being sufficiently below the writer's understanding of generally accepted quality standards to be of negligible and perhaps even negative value. The term piece of shit has greater precision than shit or shitty in that piece of shit identifies the low quality of a specific component or output of a process without applying a derogatory slant to the entire process. For example, if one said "The inner city youth orchestra has been a remarkably successful initiative in that it has kept young people off the streets after school and exposed them to culture and discipline, thereby improving their self esteem and future prospects. The fact that the orchestra's recent rendition of Tchaikovsky's Manfred Symphony in B minor was pretty much a piece of shit should not in any way detract from this." The substitution of shit or shitty for pretty much a piece of shit would imply irony and would therefore undermine the strength of the statement.
The term "I don't/doesn't give a shit" can be used when one does not care about something, or has a passive attitude toward said thing, as it denotes indifference. In context, one can say: "You're offended? Well, I don't give a shit!"
“You can’t polish shit” is a popular aphorism roughly equivalent to "putting Lipstick on a pig".
Shit can also be used to establish superiority over another being. The most common phrase is eat shit! expressing hatred of the addressee. Some other personal word may be added such as eat my shit implying truly personal connotations. As an aside, the above is actually a contraction of the phrase eat shit and die!. It is often said without commas as a curse; they command the other party to perform exactly those actions in that order. However, the term was originally Eat, Shit, and Die naming the three most basic things humans have to do, and it is common among soldiers.
The phrase You ain't shit, expresses an air of intimidation over the addressee, expressing that they mean nothing or are worthless.
Hot shit can be a reference to a matter or thing of supreme importance or urgency ("This report is really hot shit!"). It can be used in adjectival form: "This memo's shit-hot!". Hot shit can also refer to a person who either overestimates his own worth or ability, or is highly estimated by others ("He thinks he's some hot shit!" or "He's one hot shit!"). In polite company the euphemism hotshot may be substituted when referring to a person.
A speaker may indicate dominance through arrogance using the phrase His shit don't stink (though ungrammatical, this is the accepted diction). This conveys that the referent considers himself beyond reproach. For example: "Those pompous assholes in Finance are the ones who laid low the company -- their shit don't even stink!"
In North American slang, prefixing the article the to shit gives it a completely opposite definition, meaning the best, as in Altered Beast is the shit, or The Oregon Trail is the shit. Other slang words of the same meaning, such as crap, are not used in such locutions.
Shortening of bullshit
Main article: bullshit
The expression no shit? (a contraction of no bullshit?) is used in response to a statement that is extraordinary or hard to believe. Alternatively the maker of the hard-to-believe statement may add no shit to reinforce the sincerity or truthfulness of their statement, particularly in response to someone expressing disbelief at their statement. No shit is also used sarcastically in response to a statement of the obvious, as in no shit, Sherlock.
In this form the word can also be used in phrases such as don't give me that shit or you're full of shit. The term full of shit is often used as an exclamation to charge someone who is believed to be prone to dishonesty, exaggeration or is thought to be "phoney" with an accusation. For example:
"Oh, I'm sorry I forgot to invite you to the party, it was a complete accident... But you really didn't miss anything anyway."
"You're full of shit! You had dozens of opportunities to invite me. If you have a problem with me, why not just say it!"
The word bullshit also denotes false or insincere discourse. (Horseshit is roughly equivalent, while chickenshit means cowardly, batshit indicates a person is crazy, and going apeshit indicates a person is entering a state of high excitement or unbridled rage.) Are you shitting me?! is a question sometimes given in response to an incredible assertion. An answer that reasserts the veracity of the claim is, I shit you not.
Perhaps the only constant connotation that shit reliably carries is that its referent holds some degree of emotional intensity for the speaker. Whether offense is taken at hearing the word varies greatly according to listener and situation, and is related to age and social class: elderly speakers and those of (or aspiring to) higher socioeconomic strata tend to use it more privately and selectively than younger and more blue-collar speakers.
Like the word fuck, shit is often used to add emphasis more than to add meaning, for example, shit! I was so shit-scared of that shithead that I shit-talked him into dropping out of the karate match! The term to shit-talk connotes bragging or exaggeration (whereas to talk shit primarily means to gossip [about someone in a damaging way] or to talk in a boastful way about things which are erroneous in nature), but in such constructions as the above, the word shit often functions as an interjection.
Unlike the word fuck, shit is not used emphatically with -ing or as an infix. For example; I lost the shitting karate match would be replaced with ...the fucking karate match. Similarly, while in-fucking-credible is generally acceptable, in-shitting-credible is not.
The verb "to shit"
The preterite and past participle of shit are attested as shat, shit, or shitted, depending on dialect and, sometimes, the rhythm of the sentence. In the prologue of The Canterbury Tales, shitten is used as the past participle; however this form is not used in modern English. In American English shit as a past participle is often correct, while shat is generally acceptable and shitted is uncommon and missing from the Random House and American Heritage dictionaries.[6]
Backronyms
The backronym form "S.H.I.T." often figures into jokes, like Special High Intensity Training (a well-known joke used in job applications), Special Hot Interdiction Team (a mockery on SWAT), Super Hackers Invitational Tournament, and any college name that begins with an S-H (like Sam Houston Institute of Technology or South Harmon Institute of Technology in the 2006 film Accepted or Store High In Transit in the 2006 film Kenny). South Hudson Institute of Technology has sometimes been used to describe the United States Military Academy at West Point.[7] The Simpsons' Apu was a graduate student at Springfield Heights Institute of Technology.
In polite company, sometimes backronyms such as Sugar Honey in Tea or Sugar Honey Iced Tea are used.
"Merde" for "good luck"
In the ballet world, as in theater more generally, a superstition holds that it is bad luck to wish a performer "good luck" before a show (see break a leg). Instead, it is traditional to say "merde", which is French for "shit". The origin of this tradition is unknown, but may refer to the droppings left by the horses of the numerous carriages attending a popular performance, or alternatively may be derived from a warning to avoid stepping in manure from the days when dancers would often share a stage with performing animals.[8]
Usage on television
In Canada, "shit" is one of the words considered by the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council to be "coarse, offensive language intended for adults", acceptable for broadcast only after 9:00pm.[9]
On the Canadian Showcase television show characters Trailer Park Boys frequently use the term "shit". For example, the fictional trailer park supervisor James "Jim" Lahey employs many metaphors with the negative slang "shit" bizarrely worked in; in one episode, Mr. Lahey likens Ricky's growing ignorance to that of a "shit tsunami", while in another episode, Mr. Lahey tells Bubbles the "shit hawks are swooping in low" due to his deplorable behavior and company. The term "shit" is also used in the titles of that show's episodes, themselves, e.g., "The Winds of Shit",[10] "A Shit Leopard Can't Change Its Spots",[11] and "Never Cry Shitwolf".
On Japanese TV, such as anime, that is aired on American television the words "shit"and "bullshit" are uncensored. This is probably because of the ambiguity of the Japanese word "kuso", which may also mean milder swear words like "crap", "crud", "damn", or "darn". It appears in subtitles from inaccurate translations or unsureness of its meaning.
The first person to say "shit" on British TV was John Cleese of the Monty Python comedy troupe, in the late 1960s, according to his own eulogy[12] for Graham Chapman. Also, in the 1969 film The Big Flame, a union delegate uses the phrase "thick as pigshit".
The word has become increasingly acceptable on American cable television and satellite radio, which are not subject to FCC regulation. In other English-speaking countries, such as Canada, the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, Australia, and New Zealand, the word is allowed to be used in broadcast television by the regulative councils of each area, as long as it is used in late hours when young people are not expected to be watching. It has appeared on ABC News' 20/20.
"Shit" was one of the original "Seven Words You Can Never Say On TV", a comedy routine by the American comedian George Carlin. In the United States, although the use of the word is censored on broadcast network television (while its synonym crap is not usually subject to censorship), the FCC permitted some exceptions. For example:
The 14 October 1999 episode of Chicago Hope is the first show (excluding documentaries) on U.S. network television to contain the word shit in uncensored form.
The word also is used in a later ER episode "On the Beach" by Dr. Mark Greene, while experiencing the final stages of a deadly brain tumor. Although the episode was originally aired uncensored, the "shit" utterance has since been edited out in syndicated reruns.
An episode of South Park, "It Hits the Fan" (original airdate 20 June 2001), parodied the hype over the Chicago Hope episode. In it, "shit" is used 162 times, and a counter in the corner of the screen tallies the repetitions (excluding the 38 instances of the word's use in written forms, the raising the total to an even 200). South Park airs on American cable networks, which are outside the FCC's regulatory jurisdiction and whose censorship of vulgar dialogue is at the discretion of the cable operators.[13]
Since that episode, the word has become a mainstay of South Park, along with programming on other cable networks including FX and as of March 2014, Adult Swim. Episodes of Graceland, on the USA Network, also use "shit" regularly.
Usage in radio
Unlike satellite radio, American terrestrial radio stations must abide by FCC guidelines on obscenity to avoid punitive fines. These guidelines do not define exactly what constitutes obscenity, but it has been interpreted by some commissioners as including any form of words like shit and fuck, for whatever use.
Despite this, the word has been featured in popular songs that have appeared on broadcast radio in cases where the usage of the word is not audibly clear to the casual listener, or on live television. For example:
In the song "Man in the Box" by Alice in Chains, the line "Buried in my shit" was played unedited over most rock radio stations.
The 1973 Pink Floyd song "Money" from the album The Dark Side of the Moon contains the line "Don't give me that do goody good bullshit," and has frequently been broadcast unedited on US radio.
The 1980 hit album Hi Infidelity by REO Speedwagon contained the song "Tough Guys" which had the line "she thinks they're full of shit," that was played on broadcast radio.
On 3 December 1994, Green Day performed "Geek Stink Breath", on Saturday Night Live, shit was not edited from tape delay live broadcast. The band did not appear on the show again until 9 April 2005.
Some notable instances of censorship of the word from broadcast television and radio include:
Steve Miller's "Jet Airliner." Although radio stations have sometimes played an unedited version containing the line "funky shit going down in the city." The songs was also released with a "radio edit" version, replacing the "funky shit" with "funky kicks". Another version of "Jet Airliner" exists in which the word "shit" is faded out.
Likewise, the Bob Dylan song "Hurricane" has a line about having no idea "what kind of shit was about to go down," and has a radio edit version without the word.
Gwen Stefani's "Hollaback Girl" video had the original album's use of the word censored in its video.
The music video title "...on the Radio (Remember the Days)" by Nelly Furtado replaced by the original title "Shit on the Radio (Remember the Days)."
This also happened to "That's That Shit" by Snoop Dogg featuring R. Kelly, which became "That's That".
In Avril Lavigne's song "My Happy Ending," the Radio Disney edit of the song replaces "all the shit that you do" with "all the stuff that you do."
Likewise, in the song "London Bridge" by the Black Eyed Peas member Fergie, the phrase "Oh Shit" is repeatedly used as a background line. A radio edit of this song replaced "Oh Shit" with "Oh Snap."
Usage in campaigns
Sanitation promotion
Using the term "shit" (or other locally used crude words) - rather than feces or excreta - during campaigns and triggering events is a deliberate aspect of the community-led total sanitation approach which aims to stop open defecation, a massive public health problem in developing countries.[14][15]
Seven dirty words
Talking shit
↑ "Shite". Cambridge Dictionary Online. Retrieved 22 April 2010.
↑ Harper, Douglas. "shit". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved 6 September 2008.
↑ "How Did "Built Like..."-get-to-be-a-compliment". The Straight Dope. Retrieved June 2, 2016.
↑ Herbst, Sharon (August 1995). New Food Lover's Companion (3 ed.). Barron's. p. 123. ISBN 978-0812015201.
↑ Herbst, Sharon. "Barron's New Food Lover's Companion". Amazon.com. Retrieved June 6, 2016.
↑ "Shit". dictionary.reference.com.
↑ "The Origin of the S-Word". About.com. Retrieved 4 December 2010.
↑ Hopgood, J. (2015). Dance Production: Design and Technology. Taylor & Francis. p. 488. ISBN 978-1-317-63540-6.
↑ "CBSC - Media Release". cbsc.ca.
↑ "Trailer Park Boys homepage". Retrieved 4 December 2010.
↑ Trailer Park Boys – Complete Third Season, Alliance Atlantis, 2003 TPB III Productions. Disc 2
↑ "Graham Chapman's funeral" (Video). YouTube. 1999.
↑ "South Park Libertarians". Reason Magazine.
↑ Galvin, M (2015). "Talking shit: is Community-Led Total Sanitation a radical and revolutionary approach to sanitation?". Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Water. doi:10.1002/wat2.1055.
↑ Kal, K and Chambers, R (2008) Handbook on Community-led Total Sanitation, Plan UK Accessed 2015-2-26
Look up shit in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Feces.
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The Science Behind the Attorney Mental Health Crisis
Anne Brafford talks about going from big law to psychology, her book, “Positive Professionals,” and discusses the various aspects of lawyer health and well-being.
The Florida Bar Podcast
Anne Brafford
Anne Brafford (JD, MAPP, PhD in progress) is a former equity partner at Morgan, Lewis, & Bockius LLP and...
Christine Bilbrey
Christine Bilbrey is a Senior Practice Management Advisor at The Florida Bar’s Practice Resource Center. She holds a master’s...
Karla Eckardt
Karla Eckardt, a Miami native, moved to Tallahassee to pursue a bachelor’s degree in international affairs and criminology from...
We are all well-aware of the mental health crisis in the legal profession, but how much do you know about the work being done to improve attorney well-being? In this episode from The Florida Bar Podcast, hosts Christine Bilbrey and Karla Eckardt talk to Anne Brafford about her shift from big law to the study of positive organizational psychology. They talk about Anne’s book, “Positive Professionals,” and delve into many studies on various aspects of lawyer health and well-being. The findings show that firms that cultivate more support for their employees have better outcomes and greater profitability. Later, they discuss the ABA’s Well-Being Pledge, and Anne explains how its different elements are meant to inspire cultural changes in the profession.
Anne Brafford (JD, MAPP, PhD in progress) is a former equity partner at Morgan, Lewis, & Bockius LLP and the founder of Aspire, an educational and consultancy firm for the legal profession.
Check out Anne’s book discussed in this podcast–Positive Professionals, the report she co-authored–The Path to Lawyer Well-Being: Practical Recommendations for Positive Change, and the resource she created with the ABA Presidential Working Group–ABA Well-Being Toolkit for Lawyers and Legal Employers.
Intro: Welcome to The Florida Bar Podcast, where we highlight the latest trends in law office and law practice management to help you run your law firm, brought to you by The Florida Bar’s Practice Resource Institute. You are listening to Legal Talk Network.
Christine Bilbrey: Hello and welcome to The Florida Bar Podcast, brought to you by LegalFuel: The Practice Resource Center of The Florida Bar on Legal Talk Network. We are so glad you are joining us. This is Christine Bilbrey. I am a Senior Practice Management Advisor at the Bar and one of the hosts for today’s show, which is being recorded from our offices in Tallahassee, Florida.
Karla Eckardt: Hello. I am Karla Eckardt. I am a Practice Management Advisor at The Florida Bar and co-host of today’s podcast.
Our goal at The Practice Resource Center is to assist Florida attorneys with running the business side of their law practices. We focus on a different topic each month and carry the theme through our website with related tips, videos and articles.
Christine Bilbrey: By now most people are well aware of the mental health crisis that has been occurring in the legal profession, along with the startling statistics on lawyer anxiety, depression and substance abuse. But we want to talk about the work that’s being done to better understand and improve attorney well-being, so we are going straight to the expert, and today we are speaking with an attorney who has made this her life’s work.
Joining us is Anne Brafford. Anne Brafford is a former equity partner at Morgan, Lewis, & Bockius LLP and the Founder of Aspire, an educational and consultancy firm for the legal profession. Anne earned a Master’s degree in Applied Positive Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and has completed her doctoral coursework in positive organizational psychology from Claremont Graduate University. Her focus is on the many aspects of law firm culture that boost engagement and well-being and avoid burnout, such as meaningful work, positive leadership, high-quality motivation, advancement of women lawyers, and more.
Anne is also the author of the ABA-published book ‘Positive Professionals’. She is the co-chair of the ABA Law Practice Division’s Attorney Well-Being Committee, and was Editor in Chief and co-author of the National Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being’s recent report: The Path to Lawyer Well-Being: Practical Recommendations for Positive Change.
Anne also has been appointed by the two most recent ABA Presidents to the Presidential Working Group formed to investigate how legal employers can support healthy work environments. In her work with that group, Anne created the freely-available ABA Well-Being Toolkit for Lawyers and Legal Employers. Anne is also a Trusted Advisor to the legal profession’s Professional Development Consortium.
Welcome to the show Anne.
Anne Brafford: Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Christine Bilbrey: So Anne, tell our listeners a little bit about yourself and your journey from big law to the study of positive organizational psychology.
Anne Brafford: Sure, it’s one of my favorite stories. So I wanted to be a lawyer since I was 11 years old, and it was sort of strange because no one in my family had even gone to college, so why an 11 year old started saying she wanted to go to law school was sort of a puzzle to my parents. And for me, it was just feeling that I wanted to do something that made a positive impact in the world and that’s what I really thought of the legal profession.
And strangely, I mean so many childhood dreams don’t come true, but I continued to pursue it, and the day that I graduated from law school was one of the proudest days of my life, I still have vivid memories of it. And I was really proud of the achievements I was able to accomplish while there. I ended up clerking for a federal judge, I got into a great law firm, and was able to practice employment law, which I really love.
And I gradually advanced, I made partner, I made equity partner, I held a number of leadership positions in the firm. But as I got more and more senior I started having just more questions about, is this enough in my one short life? It was really a loss of sense of meaningfulness.
And I had had my own challenges with depression and anxiety for most of my adult life and probably even younger than that, and so those things together started really making me question, was this the right thing for me, although I felt that it had been for all the years before, I really was questioning what to do about my future, and so that was when I discovered positive psychology and was very excited about it.
The basic foundation of positive psychology that differentiates it from other areas is that it focuses on thriving. So the more traditional approach to psychology had been curing illness, detecting and treating illness, which was really important, but then just because you are not ill doesn’t mean that you are fully well.
And so this idea of excellence and what is the best life and thriving really attracted me, and so I began studying more thinking that if I could learn more about this area, kind of a more scientific approach, I could either change myself or change my environment so that I could stay.
I really didn’t want to leave law. I had worked so hard for the achievements that I had and wanted to do it for so long, but as I got more and more into it I just felt a real tug that although law had been very important to me, I thought potentially I could have more of a positive impact if I left. And really it delved into the science and learned what I could so that I could then come back to the legal profession with some great science-based tools and to help shape the cultures in ways that where there was a broader value system, where a whole range of people could stay within the profession and feel like they are thriving.
I feel like in many areas of law it has gotten very narrow in the kind of people that stay and it’s losing a lot of good lawyers. And so while I was still in my master’s program, the Master of Applied Positive Psychology, I decided to take the big leap and leave my law practice and study full-time.
And so now I continue to be — I am a PhD student still and my entire focus is on the legal profession, especially law firms, because that was my background, but the legal profession as a whole to find scientific-based ways to help the profession and individual lawyers really live up to their best selves.
That’s sort of a long way — kind of a long story.
Christine Bilbrey: It’s impressive Anne.
Anne Brafford: But it really came from my own personal challenges, and then what I found to be a love for the area and a real desire to give back to the profession that I still adore.
Christine Bilbrey: And I really feel like you just went for it, you embraced this. And I have to say, I am the Bar Liaison for the Mental Health Committee on — The Florida Bar Committee on Mental Health & Wellness of Florida Lawyers, so I see a lot of research on this topic and we have done CLEs, there has been a lot of stuff.
But Karla and I were so impressed with your book; it keeps coming up in conversation, like I tell people these things because it’s fascinating. But I want to jump right into the part that just grabbed me at the beginning. Some of the studies that you cite reference common personality traits of attorneys and the psychological changes that occur when individuals focus on analytics, profit and power are really depressing.
But can you tell our listeners some of those things that you found in those studies.
Anne Brafford: Yeah, I think it’s fascinating. You actually pinpoint one of my favorite pieces of research in my book as well. It’s the research on the analytical pathway versus the benevolent pathway. And what the research has found, and this is a fairly new area of research, but also very well supported, like there is not a lot of studies showing that we have separate neural pathways for analytical thinking and materialism. So things like power, profit, competition is a different neural pathway than things like benevolence, kindness, love, other oriented types of values.
And if you think about values sort of in a circumplex, what the study suggests is that the competition, power, materialism is on the opposite side of the circumplex than values like benevolence. So that when an environment continues to trigger competition, power and those types of things, it actually turns off the pathway for benevolence, kindness, other oriented values.
And so like the parts of our brain, you separate neural pathways, they do not operate together, they operate separately. So when one is continuously activated, the other one is continuously shut down. And so what some experimental studies have shown, for example, is if you do exercises that make people think about calculations, money, logic, analysis, things that use that particular side of the brain, it makes them more selfish, more likely to lie, more likely to cheat.
Or your prime people to think about love, like there was one study that said, think about a baby’s face, something like that, where it primes this idea of care and love, that those people are more generous and kind.
So when you are in organizations, which large law firms tend to be, and all law firms tend to be, if you get overly focused on profitability, for example, and competition and power, you are going to continually turn off benevolence within that group. And so you are going to get selfish, competitive behavior, and it’s not only calculated — like calculations, money calculations, the materialism has the strongest effect, but even logic, like analysis, which is the lawyer’s primary mode of thinking, also dampens the benevolence value.
So what this means is it doesn’t suggest that we shouldn’t care about money and competition and those types of values, those are important for successful organizations, but the idea is to expand our values, realize that this effect occurs.
And so our messaging, our mission statement, the values that we talk about and also walk the talk are also emphasizing care, that law in all of its forms is basically a service-oriented profession, and so it shouldn’t be that big of a jump that we talk about caring for our clients, for each other, and our communities as much as we talk about profitability. And if we do, we are more likely to have better functioning organizations and also better mental health.
Research also suggests that when you get stuck in the mode, analysis, power, competition, like that side, that neural pathway, it’s related to depression. And so the idea is to expand our value systems in our organizations as to what we talk about and what we focus on is one additional way that we can promote mental health within our organization.
Christine Bilbrey: I think that that’s something that people don’t realize that as they are — you are so focused on profit, and maybe that’s your responsibility, you are a senior partner at the firm, so you want to be super profitable, but then you start to lose some empathy. But then the next leap that I don’t think a lot of people realize is that when you lose that empathy and connection to other people, it’s going to harm you, then the next step is depression.
I feel like that was such a — like it just really connected for me at that point, a lot of what was going on.
Anne Brafford: It is. It’s fascinating and scary at the same time.
Christine Bilbrey: Right, right.
Anne Brafford: Like saying, oh my gosh, like this is such an interesting area of research and it seems to explain at least part of what’s going on, that when we are — it’s just like it can create our own depression by getting us stuck in this neural pathway, but also it harms the culture you are living in. And so it means that everyone — it’s promoting everyone around you to be selfish as well, which is going to — and prone to lying and cheating, all of those things, like these are just not psychologically healthy organizations that have those kinds of culture.
Karla Eckardt: And in your book you discuss the false dichotomy that many law firm leaders have drawn between financial success and lawyer well-being. It was just kind of in line with what we just talked about, it’s either one or the other, and most people choose the financial success path.
What does caring about employees and their engagement at work do for a firm’s bottom line? Are these two ideas mutually exclusive?
Anne Brafford: They are not, and that’s a great question. It’s the question that I feel like I have to lead with in most of my conversations with the organizations, because they automatically think I am telling them they need to make less money. And while I think sometimes there is an overemphasis on profitability, I am not saying that organizations shouldn’t care about making money, that we can do both.
And I would add caring about our clients and our communities as well, of just having this whole stakeholder approach of really caring more about everyone that we impact. And with the research on engagement, job satisfaction, job embeddedness, there is all sorts of concepts used in science that study sort of work-related well-being and there is now just piles of studies showing that, not surprisingly, that workers who are more psychologically healthy at work and engaged and energized are more profitable.
They provide higher client service and so better client satisfaction. There is more productivity, better profitability. Like all the things that organizations care about, there is science showing that these more psychologically healthy work-related well-being states are related to these things.
And so we don’t need to choose just profitability, that we would be supporting profitability by cultivating cultures in which lawyers can really drive.
Christine Bilbrey: The other thing that affects profitability that you talk about in the book is the high rate of turnover inside a lot of law firms and some of the statistics that you cite are within three years 50% of newly employed grads may head for the exits, within five years 81% are gone. And then a 2016 study found that over 40% of lawyers reported that they were likely or very likely to leave their current firm in the next year.
So all this high turnover often is because the burnout, that’s so common, so the turnover is very expensive, but traditionally firms are not prioritizing or even factoring in lawyer well-being into their bottom line. So your book talks about how disengagement leads to burnout and that the opposite of burnout is engagement, but what does that look like? How do you define engagement for an attorney?
Anne Brafford: So engagement has — there is a scientific definition that I use in the book, but the basic idea of it is that, do I feel energized when I go to work, do I feel like I have positive challenge in my work, so that I am always developing and do I have a sense of meaningfulness in my work.
And people who have this sense are — they are more resilient, they are more energized, they are more likely to be operating at their optimal level. And so it’s like thinking about — getting a sense of what engagement feels like would be to think about an example at work where you felt like you were really at your best, a particular situation where you felt well supported, where you were performing well, where you were being stretched, but not overmatched.
Like one of the examples, that’s one of my favorite examples in actually my book was my first appellate argument, that it was an example where I just felt so proud of my performance and it was such an important event for my client and for me. I was well supported by everyone in my firm and by my clients. And so there were all these factors that came together that made that like a really peak experience at work. And that would be full engagement, and we can’t have those experiences all the time, that would wear us out.
So we need a time where it’s like this balance between these feeling of peak performance and rest, but always feeling challenged, always feeling like you are contributing. In my book I talk about feeling that I matter and that my work matters really are kind of at the heart of what engagement is.
Karla Eckardt: And speaking of meaningful work and finding meaning, in your book you talk about its effects on health and well-being and it being sort of one of the biggest contributors to engagement and a key ingredient of well-being. What are some of — what have the studies found that people have experienced when they find meaning in their work?
Anne Brafford: So meaningfulness and work, let me describe that just really quickly, because I think it’s an area where people can get confused, especially like people in big law firms think well, I am not legal aid, so meaningfulness doesn’t apply to me.
And meaningfulness in the literature really is about feeling, primarily, about feeling that we are helping others, so either our colleagues or our clients and that we have a sense of we are growing and we are able to contribute a lot of who we are. So whatever our authentic selves are, we are able to use that to our full extent at work.
So it’s not only the idea of like this big idea of purpose and meaning that I am a legal aid, I am serving something that so many people define as meaningfulness, but there is also this more local meaningfulness that’s really important.
And what the research shows is, you mentioned one of them, is that multiple studies have showed that this sense of meaningfulness is the biggest driver of engagement, and then engagement has all these wonderful effects, the good positive outcomes that firms care about that we talked about earlier.
And then meaning in life, there are also many, many studies of meaningfulness in life and one way that people get meaningfulness in life is through their work. And the research there shows that this sense of meaningfulness in life is highly related to both physical and psychological well-being. So things like, it’s inversely related to anxiety and depression, cardiovascular health, it’s related to folks who have purpose in life are less likely to have cognitive decline and dementia. They have better sleep quality. There are just many, many factors that are affected by the sense of meaningfulness.
When you think of the opposite of it, it is like — it would be a sense of uselessness, that what you are doing is futile or that you don’t have control, those are like the opposite of meaningfulness and those are highly related to depression and other mental health disorders.
So I think this area of meaningfulness is one of my favorite areas, because I think it was one of the main drivers of why I finally left and I think it’s such an important area that is being largely overlooked by organizations as something that needs to be focused on in this area of well-being. People just don’t — what I found is people don’t tend to think about it as an issue of well-being and it really is.
Christine Bilbrey: And I love that you cite the work of Florida State College of Law Professor Larry Krieger on Lawyer Happiness, because his studies support a lot of what you’re talking about, so I have seen his presentations, and some of his students shared that when they had him as a professor he actually warned them about looking for happiness to arrive suddenly because of a particular event in their career like.
Anne Brafford: Right.
Christine Bilbrey: I finally made partner, that’s when I’ll be happy, but because Professor Krieger warned his students about this, they felt like they were almost vaccinated from these traps so because that so often leads to just crushing disappointment not only did it not make you happy you were just left feeling empty because you kept like if you threw yourself into your work and you didn’t really have any relationships going on, but can you talk about how happiness is affected by things that like intrinsic motivation, autonomy and what you recall and there are studies on Self-Determination Theory.
Anne Brafford: Yes, yes. So first of all let me say Larry Krieger is one of my favorite people. I emailed him recently telling him that the world is a better place because he’s in it.
Christine Bilbrey: Oh! It is beautiful.
Anne Brafford: So I have environment like him. And so, most of his work has been with law students but he’s also responsible for a really large study of practicing lawyers. I’m forgetting that, it might have been like 3,000 lawyers I feel bad that I don’t remember off the top of my head but he and Kennon Sheldon who was a really well-known and reputable researcher in the Social Sciences, got together and did this big study on practicing lawyers, and the basis of their studies is a thing called Self-Determination Theory. And so it’s kind of an awkward sounding theory I wish I had a different name but basically it’s a theory of optimal motivation. In optimal well-being really it’s like, what does an optimal life look like and it applies to work and non-work areas as well.
And the basics of the theory are that individuals have basic psychological needs that if they are satisfied they are going to be able to function at their optimal level and this means performance as well as well-being. And the initial needs that were found by the researchers, the Creativity and Self-Determination Theory were three. They were the idea of connection and relationships of feeling that you have someone that you care about and they care for you, for this sort of individual relationship as well but sense of belonging that I belong to a group that matters to me.
And the second need is autonomy, and autonomy is both the idea of I feel that I’m acting volitionally that I get to make choices free from other people’s control and coercion as well as an idea of authenticity also works into the autonomy needs. So do I get to be, am I supported in being who I really am, am I making choices aligned with my values and my skills and my talents and who I am?
And then the third need is confidence or mastery; so this continual sense of growth that I feel effective in my environment and that what I do, makes a difference in my environment. And so those were the three original needs, there’s now research suggesting that there’s a fourth need which is called benevolence, which is the idea of am I contributing to other people to the good of other people with helping others. And so this research is just a couple of years old that’s now developing that this may be a fourth need as well.
And this particular motivational theory has been around for decades. There’s now piles and piles of research showing both within organizations and outside of organization and non-work context like education that when the social surroundings, when the people and activities around you help support these needs that’s when you are able to be your best self, perform your best and have high well-being.
It also contributes to the highest quality motivation which you mentioned a minute ago, which is intrinsic motivation or autonomous motivation. And motivation operates on a continuum, it’s not like we’re motivated or we’re unmotivated. There is the lowest level of motivation, it’s basically when we’re being bossed around, coerced or controlled. We’ll do it but we’re not going to put our whole heart into it and we probably won’t do it as soon as the coercing force goes away.
And then we go up as we move up on the continuum quality, quality of motivation gets better. So the next step would be sort of like internal pressure. So we feel guilt it into something. It’s still not really high quality motivation but it’s better than being coerced.
There would be things like guilt or feeling that you’re trying to live up to other people’s standards or you’re comparing yourself to others. And then if you move up the continuum, your motivation becomes more-and-more autonomous. So the next step would be I do it because I value it, because the thing is consistent with my own values. I might not enjoy it but I value it and so I am committed to it.
And then the highest quality motivation is that the highest level of autonomous motivation, it’s intrinsic motivation which is I do it because I enjoy it and it’s consistent with my values. And so what that looks like in organizations is for example if we’re thinking about a partnering associate for example that if when talking about assignments that we really talk about how this will help our clients or how it will help our colleagues or why it’s important to the growth of the individual associate, rather than just bossing people around, giving them deadlines, telling them it needs to be done over the weekend because I said so, like that’s very coercive and it’s likely not to produce the best motivation, like they’ll do it, it’ll work for a while but over the long term their well-being and motivation will decline and they’re likely to have both, low well-being and they are likely to leave.
And so what Professor Krieger’s research showed with a really large sample of lawyers is that these needs, these self-determination theory needs that have been established in this really well-known motivational theory have the highest relationship to happiness or well-being of all the things that they studied. And the way that Larry’s study defined happiness was a sense of satisfaction, life satisfaction that you think that your life is very much in alignment, that’s how you would want it and also more positive emotions and negative emotions. We have a lot of negative emotions in our life that contributes to mental health disorders.
And so what he found as they studied things like income and GPA from when you graduated from law school, what your law school rank was like these things that lawyers pay a lot of attention to had a very low to no relationship with happiness or well-being. But the self-determination theory needs these ideas of relationships, autonomy and confidence or mastery had really mind-boggling, large relationship with happiness.
And so I’ve talked with law students about this research because they understandably get very wrapped up in the law school culture, if I don’t get a job in a big firm I’m a failure. And so if you define success as happiness then you don’t have much to worry about that what the research showed was that income level which is why most think they need to get a big firm job. Income level had a very low relationship with happiness.
And so I think this is a very important message to both our law students and our organizations that what is it that we are after? It’s what we’re after in our lives is a sense of happiness and well-being in contribution then we’re making some mistakes in our cultures about what we’re focusing on.
Christine Bilbrey: Right, and finally, I think people are starting to realize it’s not like everyone arrived within the legal profession with all these issues, it’s that something is going on that’s creating them, and I think that we have had law firm leaders say, well, it’s not my responsibility to make you happy or they say this topic is so big and I’m so busy practicing law. I just don’t have time to deal with it. And I mentioned at the beginning that you had created the ABA Well-Being Toolkit for Lawyers and Legal Employers. And I want to mention that lawyers can find that on the floridabar.org website under the Health and Wellness page.
What are some of the tools that you have in there and how difficult is it for a firm leader to implement them to if they are serious about creating a positive work environment and they want to create a foundation for employees to become engaged and feel like they’re doing work that matters, what’s something they could grab out of that Toolkit?
Anne Brafford: There is a lot of different ideas. I think wherever you start, I would just highly recommend that they need to walk the talk. So if firms make an Express – many have signed the American Bar Association Pledge, Lawyer Well-Being Pledge that they are going to commit to Lawyer Being just like they need to do something because if they don’t, there’s going to be a greater sense of cynicism and backlash that you really don’t care. You say you do, but you don’t.
So I just want to say like for all the organizations that are starting to talk more about well-being initiative, that’s fantastic, but they need to be sure to be consistent, even if they’re small things, being consistent in making progress.
And as far as the Toolkit goes, the first thing that the Toolkit actually recommends is that a firm do needs analysis, because there’s no one-size-fits-all approach. So figuring out within their own organization where are their issues? And they can do it internally. With their own folks they can hire outside experts if they want in order to do it, which is start to detect what are the sources of lack of well-being within their organization that they can start with?
Where a lot of the firms are starting with now, if we say they are launching well-being initiatives that have things like a website with informational resources for lawyers and they’re starting to have regular sort of sessions where they have outside speakers come in on well-being issues. And I think that’s low-hanging fruit, I think that is a great and easy way to start, like most organizations can do that.
And if there are smaller organizations that can’t afford outside speakers there’s even things like go grab an article, grab an article on well-being and have everyone talk about it or find a great TED talk that you play over lunch and have folks talk about it.
And so this at least gets people starting to talk about the issues and in air what’s going on within their organizations that I think any organization at any level can start there. Then of course, it’s just a matter of like not stopping there, that I think this is a really — this is a long-term effort that the legal profession has undertaken. I’m so excited that they are starting anywhere. I just hope that it continues over the long term because it really is kind of wide scale culture change, that’s going to be required to really eliminate the substance abuse and mental health issues that we’re seeing, and to really allow lawyers to thrive the long term process but there are these smaller things that firms can do to get started.
Christine Bilbrey: Okay, so you mentioned the Pledge and I’ve seen that out there, I’ve even seen a website where there were different big law firms who their names were on this website saying we have taken the Pledge, but can you give us an idea of what a law firm is agreeing to when they sign the Pledge?
Anne Brafford: Sure, yeah, the Pledge was established by the same ABA Task Force that published the Toolkit; and so, the Toolkit came first and then after that was the Pledge in which legal employers, they are especially law firms, but anyone who is employing lawyers agreed to take steps toward improving well-being in our organization.
So there’s seven things that the organizations agree to. The first is providing education. So both on mental health and well-being and the Pledge also suggests that firms don’t try to just do this on their own, that they also recruit experts.
I think in the past law firms have tried to do things internally where maybe they don’t have the expertise to do so and so in some areas that’s fine, but in some of the areas when you get into like an alcohol use disorders and mental health disorders, you should really be recruiting folks from outside to help provide those educational programs.
The second thing that they agree to is to reduce the expectation of alcohol so that in law firms and in the legal profession generally alcohol is always at social events. It is just our — it’s one way that lawyers socialize and it’s their drug of choice. And so trying to decrease that reliance on alcohol at social events is the second part of the Pledge.
Third is to partner with outside providers, which I just mentioned with respect to education of not trying to do this all on your own.
Fourth is to provide confidential access to experts in addiction and health, mental health-type therapies so that folks know how to get help when they need it and don’t feel potentially uncomfortable by having to go through a firm program where it feels that it’s not confidential.
The fifth aspect of the Pledge is to develop proactive policies so that firms are trying to like assess mental health where the issues might be and to take action, so it’s not just reactive, it’s not just detecting and treating but it’s also figuring out what are proactive things that can be done to prevent mental health issues from developing to begin with.
The sixth element of the Pledge is to show that the firm’s core values include self-care that lawyers care for themselves. So, for example, if they have a vacation policy, which is important to well-being that people do not feel deterred from actually using it or any other type of policy or practice that affects well-being.
It’s so important that they walk the talk, that leaders are modeling it, that partners are modeling it, because you’re going to have all the written mission statements in the world but if people feel like they are going to be negatively impacted by using it, they won’t, then we’re not going to make any progress.
And then the last element is to use the Pledge to attract and retain the best lawyers and so that’s trying to add like this positive, affirmative element that we want to use it when we are recruiting lawyers and trying to retain lawyers, so that we’re kind of creating the expectation that this is what our firm is going to support and if you don’t support this, then maybe this isn’t the right place for you.
So those are the basic elements of the Pledge and the last time I counted just last month, I think it was a 105 legal organizations have signed the Pledge and most of them are large law firms, but there’s also some — a few law schools and some in-house legal departments that have signed it as well, and they’ll be asked by the Task Force that created the Pledge to have sort of yearly check-ins to say what have they done. For each of these elements how is it that they have made progress on these elements, so it doesn’t just become this kind of superficial look we find the Pledge, but they don’t necessarily do anything.
In my experience so far is that the law firms which I have the most contact with are really getting involved, like this is having a meaningful impact, they are trying to figure out what it means in our organization. There are some firms that even hire like well-being directors and so created new positions to help them figure out what this Pledge will mean in their firm. So again, it’s just starting, but I think it’s an exciting development that law firms and other legal employers seem to be really enthusiastically accepting.
Christine Bilbrey: That’s really encouraging, so I feel like by breaking it down people can start nibbling at this to have — so if your Employee Assistance Program isn’t just, yeah, we have a gym down the hall —
Christine Bilbrey: — you’re telling them things that are actually going to change the culture, so that’s really positive.
Karla Eckardt: I think her whole book, ‘Positive Professionals’ really moves, even though it starts out with sort of grim statistics. It really moves towards a positive future for them.
Christine Bilbrey: Yeah, actionable things, which is what we are always looking for in the podcast.
Karla Eckardt: Right, so that’s fantastic. And earlier we mentioned that you were co-author of the National Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being’s recent report, ‘The Path to Lawyer Well-Being: Practical Recommendations for Positive Change’, and that you were also appointed to the Presidential Working Group formed to investigate how legal employers can support healthy work environments, can you talk about these groups’ work going forward?
Anne Brafford: Sure, it was the ABA Presidential Working Group that created the Toolkit and that organization was created by Hilarie Bass who was the ABA President a couple of years ago and then extended by the next ABA President. That organization now is likely to go out of existence. It was created as a temporary task force that was a special interest of those ABA presidents, so it’s not expected to continue to exist, but that its work will be taken over most likely by the National Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being. There’s a lot of overlap in the folks who belong to both of those organizations and so the National Task Force now is still we have regular meetings and are talking about this very issue like we’ve been writing sort of outlines of what are the things that we want to do going forward.
And one of the things that I’m involved with doing is trying to find a permanent place for the committee, like where will it be housed and is there an organization that will host like a website, for example, because right now there are many lawyer well-being initiatives that are not connected, not interacting and so the idea of an overarching structure that could help coordinate and provide content so that everyone isn’t recreating the wheel, and potentially organize different activities provide recommendations, that type of thing, some kind of an organizing force I think would be really beneficial.
And I’ve been advocating that for a couple of years and I think the ABA is the right place but that might not fit. So there are some other organizations that we’re talking about now within the legal profession that potentially will house the Lawyer Well-Being Committee.
And then going forward of kind of thinking about the idea of continuing the idea with the Toolkit of making more tools available, having regular content available, organizing conferences which the committee has already done of getting organizations together to talk about what they are doing, so all of these things are likely to continue in the future. Right now it’s just in a — it’s in a state of flux of figuring out which organizations are going to continue and how will they work with other existing organizations. But I think it’s going to — I think that organization in particular, The National Task Force will continue into the future and will hopefully continue to have a big impact.
Karla Eckardt: And before we get to the closing of our show here I just wanted to say something that really resonated with me from your book on creating sort of a more positive environment and it’s something really small that we can all do every day and it’s signaling to others that they belong and matter and you explained how it could be something as simple as stopping what you’re doing when someone is coming in the door and smiling or acknowledging them. So it’s really you explained how we should frame the information we give to people, how we should sort of take notice of our day-to-day interactions with people because they matter. And I thought that was really important because I think I heard on another podcast somewhere, it’s hard to be positive and it’s really easy to be negative.
So much like the legal profession takes some study and practice, I think being positive, being a good leader is going to take a lot of work, but in the end like you’ve shown in your book it pays off. So I thought that was really important than something that we could all do every day, just smiling, being more positive and just not showing up to work grumpy and ignoring people, I think that’s really important. So thank you for that.
Anne Brafford: Yeah, right, and it doesn’t cost anything, like these things that are in the book like it’s not like they are expensive, it’s just remembering to do them in a rush of your busy day of paying attention to people.
Karla Eckardt: Yeah, it’ll become second nature I think so; again, it takes practice to be positive because it’s really easy to be a Debbie Downer but it’s just — it’s important, I don’t know.
Christine Bilbrey: Yeah, and being seen I almost feel like we need like a positive buddy at the law firm, but in your book like you mentioned earlier in the podcast where you had that your first big appellate win —
Karla Eckardt: The rockstar.
Christine Bilbrey: Yeah, and you interned and your coworker who would watch you go through this, the fact that she was there to like high-five you and tell you that you are a rockstar, it was like it made it twice as good because you’re sharing it with somebody. So I think that like if somebody in your firm they had a win, you don’t even know them very well, send them an email that says Congratulations.
Karla Eckardt: We got a card recently from a podcast guest here At The Bar, Adrienette, hi, shout out. She sent us a little card and we were both so touched by this simple, simple gesture.
Christine Bilbrey: Yeah.
Anne Brafford: Right, yeah.
Karla Eckardt: So little things like that I think go a long way to creating a positive environment and it’s just — I don’t know how we oversee these things but it’s so important.
Christine Bilbrey: Okay, I thought this was going to be depressing but I feel uplifted at the end, good job.
Anne Brafford: That’s great to hear.
Christine Bilbrey: Well, it looks like we’ve reached the end of our program. Thank you Anne Brafford for joining us today.
Anne Brafford: It was my pleasure. Thanks for having me.
Christine Bilbrey: And because this work is continuing and there’s going to be so much more and if our listeners have questions how can they find you, where can they see these resources?
Anne Brafford: So, all of the ABA resources are available online. So if they go on the ABA website for — if they’re interested in the Pledge or the Toolkit, putting in like ABA Well-Being Toolkit by typing that into Google that should get you to the right site. The National Task Force on Lawyer Well-Being also has its own website. So typing in — googling “The National Task Force on Lawyer Well-being” should get them to that website. And then I have my own website that talks about my book and the work that I do and my website is www.aspire.legal.
Christine Bilbrey: Perfect, thank you. If you like what you heard today please rate us in Apple Podcasts. Join us next time for another episode of The Florida Bar Podcast brought to you by LegalFuel: The Practice Resource Center of The Florida Bar on Legal Talk Network.
I am Christine Bilbrey.
Karla Eckardt: And I am Karla Eckardt until next time thank you for listening.
Outro: Thanks for listening to The Florida Bar Podcast, brought to you by The Florida Bar’s Practice Resource Institute and produced by the broadcast professionals at Legal Talk Network.
If you would like more information about today’s show, please visit legaltalknetwork.com. Subscribe via iTunes and RSS. Find The Florida Bar, The Florida Bar Practice Resource Institute and Legal Talk Network on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, or download the free app from Legal Talk Network in Google Play and iTunes.
The views expressed by the participants of this program are their own and do not represent the views of, nor are they endorsed by Legal Talk Network, its officers, directors, employees, agents, representatives, shareholders, and subsidiaries. None of the content should be considered legal advice. As always, consult a lawyer.
Podcast: The Florida Bar Podcast
Category: Legal Support , Medical Law
The official podcast of the State Bar of Florida.
Florida Bar Annual Convention 2019: Victim’s Rights with Stephanie Cagnet Myron
Stephanie Cagnet Myron discusses the dangers we and our children face in this connected world, as well as some guidance on how to protect...
Florida Bar Annual Convention 2019: Blockchain and its Role in Litigation Today and Tomorrow
Zachary Catanzano, Daniel Maland, and Darren Spielman discuss blockchain and other developing technologies in the context of current and future litigation.
Florida Bar Annual Convention 2019: Data Breach Update with Chris Dix and Ryan Bilbrey
Chris Dix and Ryan Bilbrey provide a fresh look at data breaches, exploring their causes, effects, and costs, as well as how to respond...
Florida Bar Annual Convention 2019: Jason Silver on Student Education and Admissions to the Bar
Jason Silver of the Student Education and Admissions to the Bar committee talks about what his committee is doing to serve the Florida law...
Florida Bar Annual Convention 2019: A Conversation with Chief Justice Charles T. Canady
Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Canady takes time out of his busy schedule to talk about the newest members of the Supreme Court, their...
Florida Bar Annual Convention 2019: A Year in Review with Past President Michelle Suskauer
Michelle Suskauer, departing president of the Florida Bar, reflects on her path to the presidency and highlights her favorite accomplishments.
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State Bar of Texas Annual Meeting 2019: Bench Bar Breakfast with Wil Haygood
Wil Haygood, award winning author, explores his book, Showdown, to give listeners an in depth perspective about why he wrote it.
State Bar of Texas Podcast
Wil Haygood
Best-selling author, prize-winning journalist, acclaimed biographer and cultural historian Wil Haygood tells the story of America through the lens...
Laurence Colletti
Laurence Colletti serves as the producer at Legal Talk Network where he combines his passion for web-based media with...
At the State Bar of Texas’ 2019 Annual Meeting, host Laurence Colletti sits down with award winning American author Wil Haygood to hear about everything going on in his life and his writing. They take a journey down memory lane through the books he wrote, but dive deepest into Showdown, a book about famed lawyer and Supreme Court Justice, Thurgood Marshall and his impact on America. Wil gives an in depth look at key parts of his book, why he chose it for his presentation, and shares anecdotes about the good fortune he’s received since writing it.
Wil Haygood is the broadway distinguished scholar-in-residence in the department of media, journalism & film at Miami University.
Special thanks to our sponsor, LawPay.
Showdown: Thurgood Marshall and the Supreme Court Nomination That Changed America by Wil Haygood
Intro: Welcome to the State Bar of Texas Podcast, your monthly source for conversations and curated content to improve your law practice, with your host Rocky Dhir.
Laurence Colletti: Hello and welcome to the State Bar of Texas Podcast recorded from the Annual Meeting in Austin, Texas. This is Laurence Colletti and I am the host for today’s show, which is being sponsored by LawPay, trusted by more than 35,000 law firms to accept legal payments online. It’s the only payment solution offered as a member benefit by the State Bar of Texas.
Joining me now it’s my special privilege to welcome Mr. Wil Haygood, he’s an award-winning author and reporter. Welcome to the show, Sir.
Wil Haygood: Thank you. Good to be here.
Laurence Colletti: Excellent, excellent. Well, I enjoyed your presentation. I don’t often get to attend them before an interview just the way everything works in our production schedule, but I really enjoyed yours and you presented at the Bench Bar Breakfast Presentation. But before we get into that, I want to learn a little bit more about you, tell us about your work and tell us more about yourself.
Wil Haygood: Well, I grew up in Columbus, Ohio, went to Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, which is where I teach now in the Department of Film, Media & Journalism in college, major in City Planning, minored in English Literature and then started a career in journalism. I worked on newspapers in West Virginia, in Pennsylvania, and then I went to The Boston Globe where I became a foreign correspondent.
It was also at The Boston Globe where I started writing books and then spent 12 years at the Washington Post and so now, it’s mostly teaching and writing books.
Laurence Colletti: Well that’s a — that’s a great jumping-off point for what I’m about to ask you. So, you’re an author, you’ve written many books, you’ve written ‘Tigerland, Showdown, In Black and White’, which is about Sammy Davis Jr.
Wil Haygood: Yeah.
Laurence Colletti: And you’ve written ‘Sweet Thunder’ and that was about a boxer and what was the boxer’s name?
Wil Haygood: Sugar Ray Robinson.
Laurence Colletti: Sugar Ray, a little before my time but that’s wonderful. And then you wrote, I think this is sort of an autobiography about your family ‘The Haygoods of Columbus’?
Wil Haygood: Yes, yes, it was about growing up in this Midwestern city in the 1960s, how this sort of magical music loving street Mount Vernon Avenue changed and morph over time. So it really was a book about a city in the middle of the middle of America.
Laurence Colletti: The middle of the middle of America?
Wil Haygood: Yep, yep.
Laurence Colletti: And then you also wrote ‘King of the Cats’, so that’s the one I had the least amount of information.
Laurence Colletti: And what was ‘King of the Cats’ about?
Wil Haygood: Yeah, Adam Clayton Powell was an architect of Lyndon Johnson’s war on poverty legislation. That book came out in 1993, but I started doing research for it in the late 80s, which was when I made my first trip to Austin, Texas to the LBJ Library, because I had to research the political relationship between Adam Clayton Powell and Lyndon Johnson.
So that’s what that book was about.
Laurence Colletti: Okay, and that gets us to ‘The Butler: A Witness to History’, which is probably arguably the one that you’re most well-known for. And so this eventually got turned into a movie by Oprah in 2013 called The Butler. And so I just, I found it interesting with all of this — all these books, you had a wealth of knowledge you pulled upon, a lot of biographies you picked, you picked the ‘Showdown’ to present today at the State Bar of Texas Annual Meeting.
So what was the reasoning behind that? Walk me through it.
Wil Haygood: Well, because ‘Showdown’ is about Thurgood Marshall and his Supreme Court nomination that changed America. In 1967, he became the first African-American nominated to the Supreme Court, and he was nominated by Texas’ own Lyndon Johnson, who was the President at the time.
So I really think that it still stands is the most intimate close relationship between a white President and a Black man up to that time down through history. I just couldn’t find any other relationship that had been as meaningful and as close as those to me and Thurgood Marshall had met Lyndon Johnson back in the 1930s, here in Texas.
And you know, they became friends through the years and they both had a big epic love for the country, for where the country needed to go and how they each in their own way could help the country to get there.
Laurence Colletti: And that explains a little bit of the affection you have for the great state of Texas.
Wil Haygood: Yeah, yeah and goodness, one looks at Lyndon Johnson and all of his genius in his willpower was poured into passing three astonishing laws in this country, the 1964 Civil Rights Bill, the 1965 Civil Rights Bill and the 1968 Housing Bill. And so, he was responsible for this nation really growing out of the dark ages and he dependent on the legal roadmap that Thurgood Marshall as a NAACP lawyer had laid down 30 years prior to those 1960s era bills.
Laurence Colletti: There was a special connection between your mother and Justice Marshall that you shared on stage and I was wondering if you could re-share that with our audience as well.
Wil Haygood: Yeah, my mother was born and raised in that civil rights soaked City of Selma, Alabama and her parents like so many Black parents bought her North on the train and she became pregnant in 1954 and that was exactly the same year when Thurgood Marshall was fighting to desegregate the public schools in this country.
And so nine months later in September 1954, my mother has twin children and one of the reasons I wrote this book, I spent five years on this book because it was such a moment, it had to be such a moment for her when the 1954 Supreme Court Brown desegregation of the public schools ruling came out.
She can now look over at her two newborns and she could say there’s a new day in America right now, and I’m one of those twins who was in the bassinet in 1954, me and my twin sister were born that year. And so that must have lifted my mother into heights that she never knew could be possible that her kids would be afforded the same opportunities to go to good public schools as White children.
Laurence Colletti: It seemed that there was a little bit of divine intervention that went into your authorship of this book, and you expressed a little bit of that on stage, you said, you started digging into it and these unexpected revelations just came out of the woodwork and then it was very clear that she needed to write about the topic.
And so, share with us a little bit of those anecdotes and some of the – I guess the good fortunes that you found along the way.
Wil Haygood: Yeah there are two things that stand out. One is that there was no Supreme Court they can see in 1967 and Lyndon Johnson had to convince in a very sly way his Texas friend, who was Associate Justice Tom Clark, Lyndon Johnson had to convince him to step down from the court, and he did that because he told him he wanted to appoint Tom Clark’s son Ramsey Clark as his Attorney General and he wouldn’t do that with Tom Clark still on the bench, because it would just create new stories, favoritism, etc.
And so, I was able to track down a member of Tom Clark’s family who told me that story. It’s just a wonderful story of how Lyndon Johnson used his smarts to create an opening on the Supreme Court to integrate the previously all-white Supreme Court.
And the second thing which stands out to me is that in 2008, I tracked down Eugene Allen, who had been a White House Butler and that was the story that later got turned into a movie. Well, what is very amazing to me, kind of magical is that, on the day that Thurgood Marshall was summoned to the White House to meet with the President, he was served cookies and tea by one of the White House Butlers.
The butler who served him those cookies and tea was none other than Eugene Allen, and so you had one man Mr. Allen who had been harmed and hurt that the law did not rise to give him full equal rights.
And then you had another man Thurgood Marshall sitting down near him, who had worked his whole life to bring those very rights to Mr. Allen, and that to me is shows the mighty strength of the nation when it is at its best.
Laurence Colletti: So you said this was the book that President, the late President Lyndon Johnson never got a chance to write, and so you picked up the mantle and you were telling the story of the nomination process for Justice Marshall, and initially there was definitely some pushback.
And so obviously, there were some people that were concerned back in those days and one of them was Senator John McClellan, and so in response to that, there was a letter that was sent. I found this to be just — probably the best part of your speech that it’s hard not to be drawn into it, but a certain young woman wrote a letter to Senator John McClellan and this became an integral part of your book. So please tell us a story of how that all came to be.
Wil Haygood: Yes, I wanted to go look at the archives of Senator John McClellan and they were at a small Baptist College in Arkansas, and nobody had ever really looked in depth at his papers. They had just recently opened, just recently been made available to the public, and I’m looking through thousands and thousands of pages of letters, and bills that he helped pass and hearings, but I’m out there to do my best to research the link between Senator McClellan and Thurgood Marshall’s nomination.
And always when somebody has nominated to the Supreme Court, there are letters from all around the country pro and con, and I came across this letter from one that Senator John McClellan’s area constituents, from one of his people who lived in his district. And they wrote him a letter that where the person said to the senator that he was going to be on the wrong side of history; that Marshall had wonderful qualifications and that the senator who was a known segregationist was not doing right in his effort to stop Marshall from making it on to the Supreme Court.
And nobody knew about this letter and when I came across this letter written by this lady named Barbara Ross, I was stunned, I couldn’t speak almost, because it really showed me why the literary gods had chosen me to write this letter in a way that letter became the metaphor you might say of the book.
Somebody who was disrespected, her letter wasn’t taken seriously, and yet Wil Haygood, this writer who comes along all these years later and out of millions and millions of pieces of paper, I find this letter. And so —
Laurence Colletti: Some more of that good fortune?
Wil Haygood: Yeah that was — yes, that was just good fortune, and I was able to — through a series of circumstances to track Ms. Ross down, Barbara Ross down to tell her that I had found this letter, that she never got a response to and I told her my letter was going to be in her book and she practically cried on the telephone.
She is a retired schoolteacher, she was very young, only 19 years old when she wrote that letter, which is why she wrote it and still had very vivid memories of the day she wrote the letter. Her father didn’t want her to write the letter, but she wrote it and she never got a response, but now the letter is in a book, so that’s really beyond sweet.
Laurence Colletti: So decades later, she, after writing this letter never gets a response, it ends up in a book. She gets a phone call from you, but there’s one other historic figure that read this letter.
Wil Haygood: Yes, she had put at the end of her letter, she said Senator McClellan, someday, someday, there will be a Negro President, Sincerely Yours Barbara Ross. And that’s the part of the letter when I was reading it at the library that stunned me. I mean she had predicted that this nation would have an African-American President in lo and behold all these years later we did.
And so, a Federal judge in Chicago who knows the president was at one of my events, and heard my letter and asked me to make a copy of it because he was going over to the White House, and I didn’t think anything else of it or that I would ever hear from him again.
And this Judge, out of Chicago, called me a short while later and said, I want to tell you something. He said, there was a dinner at the White House two nights ago and I was there, and I gave the President your Barbara Ross letter that you found in Arkansas and there were about 17-20 people around his dinner table, and first he read the letter in silence and he was so touched by it, that he asked for everybody’s attention and he read the letter aloud, and that has to be one of the most moving things that I as a writer have ever heard about my own work.
Laurence Colletti: Read by President Obama?
Wil Haygood: Read by President Obama, yes.
Laurence Colletti: That’s fantastic. So just when I thought I couldn’t get any better, you went into it, and this is my last question for you, I know you got to get going but at the very end of your presentation you read out the yeas and the nays.
Wil Haygood: Yes.
Laurence Colletti: So I’d be in addition to great theater very well, very well presented, I just — I was listening to that and you hear some of these historic figures to read about in history and some of the answers actually surprised me, which way I —
Laurence Colletti: What was the thought behind that? That was in your book?
Wil Haygood: Yep.
Laurence Colletti: And then you shared it on stage, but what was the thought process about including that in the book and also showing on stage?
Wil Haygood: Yeah, I wanted to show how in a very hard time, in this nation’s history, how Democrats and Republicans came together, because it took members from both parties to get Thurgood Marshall on to the Supreme Court. And so it shows really who was on the right side of history and then is the most I think telling moment in this book when I can visualize that for people just what the stakes were and who rose up and did the right thing, because Thurgood Marshall changed the country not only for Blacks, not only for poor people, but for White people, for everybody.
He changed the direction of the country. He saved the soul of the country. I mean and there is no doubt about that. We would be a very different nation, we are not for the interactions between President Lyndon Johnson and Thurgood Marshall. Both of those men made each other much better man.
Laurence Colletti: Well, we’ve reached the end of our program. I know you got to go, but Mr. Haygood, I want to thank you so much for sharing a piece of our nation’s history with us.
Wil Haygood: It was wonderful to be here and thank you very much.
Laurence Colletti: But I’d also be remiss in my duties if I didn’t give a little shout out from our listeners. If they want to follow up and learn more about some of the works that you do, your authorship, your book, about Thurgood Marshall, how can they find you?
Wil Haygood: Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, that’s where I teach and I have a whole webpage there. And then they can look at that webpage and there is information there how to communicate with me.
Laurence Colletti: Excellent. Excellent. Well, that’s all the time we have for this episode of the State Bar of Texas podcast, brought to you by LawPay. Thank you once again LawPay.
Also thank you to our listeners for tuning in.
If you like what you heard, please rate and review us in Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify or best yet your favorite podcasting app.
I’m Laurence Colletti, until next time, thank you for listening.
Outro: If you would like more information about today’s show, please visit legaltalknetwork.com. Go to texasbar.com/podcast. Subscribe via Apple Podcasts and RSS. Find both the State Bar of Texas and Legal Talk Network on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn or download the free app from Legal Talk Network in Google Play and iTunes.
The views expressed by the participants of this program are their own and do not represent the views of, nor are they endorsed by the State Bar of Texas, Legal Talk Network, or their respective officers, directors, employees, agents, representatives, shareholders, or subsidiaries. None of the content should be considered legal advice. As always, consult a lawyer.
Podcast: State Bar of Texas Podcast
Category: Legal News
The State Bar of Texas Podcast invites thought leaders and innovators to share their insight and knowledge on what matters to legal professionals.
State Bar of Texas Annual Meeting 2019: Forms of Address with Judge Roy Ferguson
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State Bar of Texas Annual Meeting 2019: Josh Team and the Adaptable Lawyer
Josh Team, president of Keller Williams, addresses how lawyers can play an integral role in helping companies keep pace with the rapid pace of...
State Bar of Texas Annual Meeting 2019: Bar Presidents Randy Sorrels and Benny Agosto, Jr.
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State Bar of Texas Annual Meeting 2019: Conversation with Keynote Speaker Asha Rangappa
Asha Rangappa discusses the history, current status, and a possible solution to our country’s problems with disinformation and “fake news”.
State Bar of Texas Annual Meeting 2019: Fooding in Austin
Amy Starnes, Hannah Allison, Jennifer Dunham, and Eric Quitugua recommend their favorite places to eat in Austin.
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Columns from 2007
Columns from 2007 also include:
-Goals. Then Strategy. Then Tactics.
Wherefore Art Thou Supervisor?
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J.Pierce talks about the time they refused a supervisor position at a recycling center.
One Friday afternoon, the bosses called a big meeting in the recycling yard where I work. It was cool because I used it to count 40 workers and 10 boss types. I took the opportunity to see how many names I knew. It gave me a premonition of a large strike meeting--only the bosses wouldn’t be wearing those stupid grins.
At this meeting the bosses handed out memos that, among various threats and pomp, told everybody that I was the new supervisor for the warehouse. I laughed out loud when I read it. Meanwhile the whole place was silent as everybody read the Spanish version of the memo. The whole meeting was in Spanish so I barely knew what they were saying. Most of the supervisors (more properly called foremen) stood with their guys in the crowd instead of up by the bosses.
The various supervisors in the crowd appeared, to me, to be asking controversial questions. The bosses looked nervous. (I asked my fellow workers later but they said these comments were crap.) I couldn’t understand what they were saying so I took it for what it looked like. It seemed like people were challenging the bosses! So at the end of the meeting, the new head guy asked, “Any last questions.” I shot up my hand. “I have a question!” I shouted in English, as all eyes turned to me. “When are the bathrooms gonna be finished?” Pointing to the abandoned-construction-site-looking building behind us. Eyes lit up and everyone started smiling and chattering. Most of my co-workers have heard me complain about the locker room/bathroom situation so they knew what I was up to. One of the supervisors laughed really loud and said “When? When?” meaning “Don’t Ask!” The bosses squirmed saying “Um, we’re working on that. They’ll be done soon.” Everybody was talking and grinning. In between being called “Jefe,” I got some good pats on the back as we all went to clock out.
That weekend I fixed up a plan to give the bosses a letter saying that I was declining the promotion. My roommate translated this letter into Spanish so that I could show it to all my co-workers. I finally gave it to the bosses that Wednesday after telling all my co-workers (that were saluting me and calling me Jefe and Patron) that this whole supervisor nonsense was “Mentira, Huey!” I went around showing the letter to my co-workers and they, or I, read the Spanish translation. If the bosses inferred that I had it translated for the benefit of my companeros--Good. So be it. The conversations we had strengthened me because people inevitably ask, “Why don’t you want to be a supervisor?” That’s the perfect place to talk about how the bosses are racist and how they want you to work harder and longer for nothing. They want you to take responsibility for their incompetence and the list goes on. All my co-workers understood my reasoning and had the same thoughts themselves. The whole thing turned out to be a very solidifying and educational process.
But don't get too excited just yet. It took them two months to do it but they finally canned me. There was plenty of reason for them to want to get rid of me but you can bet that the supervisor stunt was a big factor. Is it all a loss? Not quite: There are lights in the locker room and plumbers in the soon-to-be-bathroom. But beyond that, for two months we were the only department with no one looking over our shoulder. Any new supervisor that comes in will face a situation where the workers know they don't need one.
What Kind Of Solidarity Forever?
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A piece exploring how organizing on the shopfloor and activism outside the shopfloor are different and how they compliment each other.
There are two versions of solidarity activity: solidarity unionism and solidarity activism. Solidarity unionism means exercising our power on the job. We organize as much as possible so we don't give our power away to lawyers, outside organizers, union staff, or anyone else. If we have to give away some power--like when we file Unfair Labor Practice charges--it's for tactical reasons only. By getting more and more coworkers to take action based on our collective self-interests as workers we create big changes--changes in our lives on the job and changes in our coworkers by showing them our ideas in practice instead of just telling them. Solidarity unionism makes more power for ourselves, more members of our union, and more members with experience, commitment, and a vision of what the One Big Union is and should be.
Solidarity activism means showing up outside of our own jobs to help other people’s struggles to defend existing conditions or defend their attempt to build something. We hand out flyers and picket outside someone else’s workplace or some other place. This kind solidarity has helped the Starbucks organizing continue and grow. There is a long and proud tradition of this kind of solidarity in our class and in our union. If solidarity activism wins better conditions for any worker anywhere then it’s a good thing, morally and as a tactic. But it's not good strategy.
Without power on the shopfloor, a union will not be a fighting organization that can win gains, and it’s much harder to maintain union democracy. Workers are more likely to exercise our power for something we run and control than something undemocratic and unaccountable. If power is outside the shopfloor, then the workers in the shop can be replaced. If their organization breaks down, the officials don’t lose anything. This is why many of the business unions love media heavy corporate style campaigns: they put the power in the hands of staff, officers, lawyers, journalists, politicians, and the well-intentioned solidarity activists who mobilize from the outside. While solidarity activism can build the skills and experience of the individuals who take part in it, it doesn’t build power in the activists' workplaces. It also doesn’t build the power of the workers in the shop being supported. If a campaign is won by solidarity activism, that means the power to make change does not rest on the shop floor. Solidarity activism doesn't build shopfloor power because it doesn't exercise shopfloor power.
Workers’ power is like a muscle. My muscles have (pretty flabby) limits. By using my muscles within their limits, I get stronger. Solidarity unionism means exercising our power. We figure out what power we have and we increase it by exercising it. We exercise our power to build an organized shop--and eventually an organized industry and an organized working class--which increases the power we have to exercise. The point isn't just to lift this weight (improving the job in the short term, a fair day's wages for a fair day's work), the point is also how the weights get lifted and by who (improving the job by our own action, in a way that builds organization and builds the IWW to abolish the wage system). We need strategy, a plan to keep on lifting until we become able to dump the bosses off our backs.
We can only lift so much at a time, though. Every time I move I realize how there's too many boxes for me alone, so I call my friends. That’s solidarity activism. Sometimes it’s tactically necessary. But our strategy should not be based on someone else constantly lifting things for us.
Imagine if my friends who helped me move stuck around forever and I never lifted anything ever again. I would get weaker and less healthy from lack of exercise. This is what the NLRB and the business unions do. They say “don’t try to lift that, just watch me.” They don’t encourage us to exercise our own power, so they don’t encourage us to increase our power. Sometimes they actively fight us when we try to exercise our power.
There are some fellow workers who prefer to be part of solidarity activism instead of solidarity unionism. That’s their right. But solidarity unionism is the direction this union should continue to move in. Solidarity activism has a place, but a secondary one. In fact, the more we focus on exercising our power in solidarity unionism--getting more members, getting more members organizing in more shops, increasing our ability to organize successfully--the more power we'll have when we need to do solidarity activism for our fellow workers in the union and out.
Originally appeared in the June 2007 Industrial Worker
Confidence and Solidarity
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A follow-up to 'What kind of solidarity forever?' which claims that activism wins out over workplace organizing due to lack of confidence.
In my last Workers Power submission in June I talked about what I called solidarity unionism and solidarity activism. Solidarity activism is when we show up to demonstrations and picket lines for others, to lend our power to support them in their struggles. That's a good thing, of course. But it doesn't build our power. Solidarity unionism is what builds our power. But it's easy to emphasize solidarity activism over solidarity unionism.
One reason it's easy to overemphasize solidarity activism is lack of confidence in our organization. Sometimes we don’t believe that the IWW can be or is a real union or a real step toward forming the cooperative commonwealth. We want to be active, we want the union to matter, so we push for the union to be part of something we think of as real: a real strike, a real rank and file democracy committee or movement, real revolutionaries somewhere else.
This motivation is good intentioned, but it’s not good for the union. Lack of confidence gets in the way of the most important work of the union: organizing to make us bigger and more experienced. Lack of confidence is also disrespectful to people who are organizing in shops right now, who know the union is real and are putting a lot on the line to improve their lives as part of the IWW.
Being realistic about the fact that we need to get our house in order is good. Our union has difficulties that we need to work through. But we're not going to resolve any of those problems by prioritizing solidarity activism over solidarity unionism. That won’t lead to our house being put in order. It will lead to our house turning into a squat with all kinds of random stuff going on.
This feeling of lack of confidence is a real feeling, an emotion. That means we’re not going to get rid of it via ideas. Changing that feeling can be done in part through conversation, just like the emotional experiences we have with people when we agitate them in our organizing. And just like in organizing, these conversations happen in the context of relationships. Any conversations that will be effective in changing our confidence will be conversations that are part of building and maintaining a relationship, rather than just debate with other members on ideas. Organizing definitely involves ideas, but it takes more than that. We also need experiences. To build the union we need experiences of what a union is, of what this union is and can be.
The best way to get that experience is for the union to keep organizing and organize more. Unfortunately, lack of confidence makes us less likely to be active in organizing. We need to deal with lack of confidence by inviting and pushing people - others and ourselves - to be more active. More specifically, we need to be more active in things that are likely to give us the experiences we need. People need to be offered concrete actions, like attending a one on one with a more experienced organizer, or a good shop committee meeting. We also need to share our experiences by swapping stories - just like when we agitate - and to discuss experiences with each other to find the elements that will motivate us further.
Existing lack of confidence in the union is partially due to people not having had these experiences, and not having heard about experiences they can imagine having. That means that lack of confidence indicates a failure of mentoring in the union. Doing solidarity unionism is hard. One part of it is encouraging more people to get involved, so they get the experience and gain confidence. This is a lot of work, but it's do-able and we have to do it.
Originally appeared in the July 2007 Industrial Worker
Potentials for Solidarity Unionism
Todd Hamilton elaborates on the IWW's usual mode of organizing, 'solidarity unionism'.
Simply put solidarity unionism is organizing collectively (or as a group of workers) to directly implement our desires whether that’s in the workplace, industry, or economy. It is simple, but the practice has never really been fleshed out systematically either in practice or in theory. We have a body of experiences, thoughts, and discussions and as our practice matures it leads us to look deeper into solidarity unionism. Solidarity unionism leads us to change our understanding of what the 'union’ means for us, as well as where we intervene and put our emphasis in struggle.
There is no blue print for how to organize in general, but that doesn't mean we can't develop strategic ways of pursuing our goals. Previous authors (Alexis Buss, Staughton Lynd, etc) have focused on how we can organize in the without falling back on some of the familiar features of union organizing as we’ve known it. Some of the things they take on are comprehensive contracts, election based campaigns requiring a majority of workers, and the mediating bureaucracies and institutions (the courts, union bureaucracies, lawyers, politicians and parties) that alienate workers' power. They have argued for organizing even if there is only a minority of workers who are members of the union, organizing whether or not the boss and/or state recognize the union, organizing where workers’ power is the greatest (in the workplace and community), and remaining strategic about how to avoid and selectively utilize (the generally alienating and debilitating environments of) the courts, the state and parties, and hierarchical union bureaucracy that acts for and instead of workers (often against).
These are some of the walls we have hit. Contracts have helped kill job actions through forcing workplace gripes into a mediating bureaucracy that is hostile to workers. The hierarchical institutions put struggle into realms where worker power is weakest, and where workers play a secondary role. Beyond the power of the boss, the union bureaucracy has all the power and knowledge creating a hierarchy between the workers and the means of struggle. Elections and membership-based drives have sunk huge amounts of efforts into organizing where there is often little benefit for workers privileges bureaucracies with huge resources, and reproduces hierarchical relationships between workers and the union.
Solidarity unionism is about organizing whether we're recognized or not, whether there's a contract or not, and most of all settling direct worker issues by the workers. That doesn’t mean we don’t use things like contracts, lawsuits, arbitration, but they are tactics we use not our strategy. Likewise we understand them and hold them to their strategic value, and don’t mistake them for what they aren’t.
Once we begin to think in these terms though, and begin to organize with these issues in mind, we gain a deeper perspective on strategy. For instance it is no longer necessary to fly the union flag as a hallmark in every campaign. It might be more tactical to keep the boss in the dark about union activity at a shop, or in an industry until we have already won enough gains and a wide enough base of support that announcing our presence would be strategic. Thus going another route than majority-based elections allows us to be strategic about when and how we give knowledge about the union's presence in organizing.
We can also be strategic about who and when we sign members up. Rather than having the goal of organizing being to just get people to take out cards whether they want to participate or not, membership can be an actions itself and a positive step a worker can take in further the struggle and consciousness building. We can keep dues and membership for workers who want to be a part of the organization, who are ready to join, and who have experienced class struggle and organization together with the union (this of course is a positive feature, rather than a restrictive). This can draw a line in the sand between unions that are paper tigers, and unions (like us) that exist in our actions, education, and struggle.
Solidarity Unionism presents its own challenges, and poses new questions to us. The rough model I am working off is one in which experienced workers assist in workplace struggles where demands are won through direct action. Workers are brought into the organization and developed through these struggles and move towards revolutionary understanding and practice. At a certain level of strength and roots through these worker organizers can apply deeper pressure in their industry. That is, we seek to build a foundation to respond and deepen struggle that otherwise might emerge but deflate through familiar mechanisms.
Originally appeared in the August 2007 Industrial Worker
Informal Workgroups
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A brief look at informal work groups, which the author sees "as the seeds, and the tiny cells within a larger muscle of organization."
In every workplace throughout all of history, workers have come together and worked together for their common interests. This takes many forms. Sometimes its at the level of two workers next to each other in cubicles who support each other and make work less miserable by being able to laugh with one another; other times it forms into a group that encompasses enough people that they can informally control the speed of production and the work conditions that surround them; and sometimes it grows into a union a group of workers within a shop, ideally across and industry who can directly exercise power in relation to the boss. In whichever form it takes it is significant. In each form it challenges the isolation that exists in other aspects of our lives as workers. In these relationships we begin to see the possibilities of what it means to take collective action and what it means to control the means of production. We are empowered by these relationships, and where we can build on them we can have success and begin to make changes.
These bonds we form with our fellow workers are the basis of our organization, the basis of Industrial Unionism and the basis of a working class movement. Where these bonds originate and where they are most intense is in our workplaces, where they come out of our day-to-day interactions and struggles.
The first two forms mentioned are incomplete. Little can be done if our work group remains isolated in a group of two or three; and if we begin to informally control production we still may be isolated within a larger company or industry. These have to be expanded through organization. But look at these small groups as the seeds, and the tiny cells within a larger muscle of organization (a muscle that must be constantly exercised).
Through organization these small work groups branch out, around an issue or as part of a campaign. They encompass other workers, get further defined through this organization, and identify workplace or industrial issues to struggle against. Again this often happens informally and we should not overlook it or believe that workers are not capable of acting outside of formal organization. Small informal actions are happening all over the place, and even in this context workers begin to see their power, but in small ways. It has to grow and it has to become formal in order to grow to a position of strength and push forward demands.
As the struggle grows it becomes more formal, the definition it gets is one of class. It moves from a group of friends or acquaintances that want to make things better on the job, to a group of workers making a demand on the boss and having an action to follow this demand up. In this action we must come together and confront things directly ourselves. This means not relying on a third party, on the government, a lawyer, or the press to enforce our demands, but doing it ourselves, with other workers inside our workplace and outside of it. This is direct action and is present in informal struggle and in formal struggle.
In this struggle we as a group are defined by our relationship to the boss and to production, in a way that is not possible when we act as individuals. This is when we become the working class, a group acting in its own interests.
We all identify ourselves as part of this group, the issue we have been organizing around now becomes one of the working class verse the employing class. And though these actions we begin to see what is possible, not just for ourselves and our families but also for our fellow workers, for our organization and for our union. Out of these small seeds, informal work groups, organization, direct action, our class is defined. We cease to be individuals, left to the whims of the bosses and become a force that can push our own issues and agenda.
Originally appeared in the December 2007 Industrial Worker
Recently I received a call from Seth, someone I have been advising on how to organize a union for his workplace. Seth has been diligently slogging away for months, reaching out to his co-workers and organizing them to improve their working conditions. Over the course of the past few months he and his co-workers have had some small victories-they forced management to replace unsafe equipment after someone was injured, to staff shifts appropriately and to give them an unpaid holiday for Christmas. However, when I received a call from Seth he was depressed. His efforts to bring his co-workers together were not going well. The company had brought in a new manager to break the union by bribing the workers. The tactic seemed to be working and previously staunch supporters were telling Seth that they weren't interested in the union anymore.
We spent a few moments talking about Seth’s feeling of hopelessness. I shared with him how hard and depressing I found my own organizing at times. I also told him that in organizing it is always difficult to know what people are thinking or what they will do next. The most important thing, I suggested, was to be persistent. When workers try to form a union employers almost always try to break their spirits. If you don’t let them break your spirit you’ll probably win in the end, I said. And then, I offered him a story from the Taoist tradition to illustrate my point about not knowing what will happen next.
I said: “Long ago in China there was a peasant whose horse had run away. His neighbor commiserated with him. He replied “Who can know if it’s good or bad?’ The very next day the horse returned bringing with him a herd of wild horses. The peasant was suddenly very rich. When his neighbor commented on his good fortune he replied “Who can know if it’s good or bad?’ The next day the peasant’s son tried mounting one of the wild horses. He fell off and broke both his legs. Again the neighbor offered the peasant his sympathy and again the peasant replied “˜Who can know if it’s good or bad?’ The very next day the army came to the village to draft soldiers into service for a far away war. The peasant’s son was exempted from military service because of his injuries. So you see you can’t always know in the midst of things what is helpful and what isn’t.”
Seth told me that he found the story helpful and that it improved his spirits. A few days later he called me to tell me that he’d gotten five of his co-workers to join the union. A few of his co-workers had been talking things over without Seth and realized that all of the bribes--the better shifts and safer working conditions--management was giving them were because of the union, not despite it. He felt that things were going well and thanked me for the story I had shared with him.
Originally appeared in the Industrial Worker (September 2007)
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Table of Contents » Middleburg
Middleburg, Town of
County of Loudoun
History of incorporation
Established 1787, Chapter 68, Hening's Statutes at Large.
Incorporated by an 1871 Act of Assembly.
Charter, 1871, c. 160 (to be governed per Chapter 428, 1870 Acts of Assembly).
Charter, 1944, c. 129; repealed 1983, c. 423.
Current charter
Charter, 1983, c. 423.
Amendments to current charter
1986, c. 204 (§ 1.2)
2010, c. 325 (§§ 1.2, 2.2, 3.2, 3.6, 4.1, 5.2 [repealed])
2012, cc. 224, 843 (§§ 2.3 [added], 4.1)
2018, cc. 336, 414 (§ 2.4 [added])
Chapter 1. Incorporation and Boundaries.
§ 1.1. Incorporation.
The inhabitants of the territory comprised within the present limits of the Town of Middleburg in Loudoun County, as such limits are now or may hereafter be altered and established by law, shall constitute and continue to be a body politic and corporate, to be known and designated as the Town of Middleburg, and as such shall have perpetual succession, may sue and be sued, implead and be impleaded, contract and be contracted with and may have a corporate seal which it may amend at its pleasure. (1983, c. 423)
§ 1.2. Boundaries.
The boundaries of the Town until altered, shall be as shown on that certain order and plat recorded in the land records of Loudoun County as instruments No. 20060828-0073346 and 20060828-0073347, respectively, in accordance with a boundary line adjustment entered into between the Town of Middleburg and the County of Loudoun, subject of proceedings in "In Re Change of Boundary Between the Town of Middleburg, Virginia and Loudoun County, Virginia", At Law No. 42304, approved August 22, 2006. (1983, c. 423; 1986, c. 204; 2010, c. 325)
Chapter 2. Powers.
§ 2.1. General grant of powers.
The Town of Middleburg shall have and may exercise all powers which are now or hereafter may be conferred upon or delegated to towns under the Constitution and laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia, as fully and completely as though such powers were specifically enumerated herein, and no enumeration of particular powers by this chapter shall be held to be exclusive, and the town shall have, exercise and enjoy all the rights, immunities, powers and privileges and be subject to all the duties and obligations now appertaining to and incumbent on the town as a municipal corporation. (1983, c. 423)
§ 2.2. Adoption of powers granted by Code of Virginia.
The powers granted in § 2.1 of this charter include specifically, but are not limited to, all powers set forth in Chapter 11 of Title 15.2 of the Code of Virginia, as amended. (1983, c. 423; 2010, c. 325)
§ 2.3. Architectural control districts.
A. Authority of town council to designate. In order to protect and promote the general welfare, and to prevent deterioration of the appearance of the established historic character of the town, which would tend to create hazards to public health, safety, and morals and adversely affect property values within the community, the town council may, by ordinance, designate architectural control districts. Within such architectural control districts, no structure shall be erected, reconstructed, altered, or restored without compliance with the adopted design standards.
B. Design standards.
1. The design standards of an architectural control district shall be adopted by the town council. The design standards shall address the following issues of importance to the architectural control district:
(a) Whether or not the proposed architectural design is suitable for Middleburg's character in terms of external architectural features, including signs, subject to public view; general design and arrangement; texture; color; line; massing; size; scale; dimension; material; and lighting.
(b) Whether or not the proposed structure, building, or improvement is compatible with existing well-designed structures in the vicinity and in the town as a whole.
(c) Whether or not, and to what extent, the proposed structure, building, or improvement would promote the general welfare and protect the public health, safety, and morals by tending to maintain or augment the town's tax base as a whole, preserve historical sites and structures, and make the town a more attractive and desirable place to live.
(d) Whether or not proposed freestanding buildings use the same or architecturally harmonious materials, color, texture, and treatment for all exterior walls, and, in the case of partially freestanding buildings, whether or not the same or architecturally harmonious materials, color, texture, and treatment are used on all portions of all exterior walls exposed to public view.
(e) Whether or not the combination of architectural elements proposed for a structure, building, or improvement, in terms of design, line, massing, size, scale, proportion, dimension, color, material, texture, lighting, landscaping, roofline, and height conform to accepted architectural principles for permanent buildings, as contrasted with engineering standards designed to satisfy safety requirements only, and exhibit external characteristics of demonstrated architectural and aesthetic durability and quality.
(f) Whether or not, in terms of design, material, texture, color, lighting, landscaping, dimension, line, massing, size, scale, proportion, roofline, and height, the proposed structure, building, or improvement exhibits exterior characteristics likely to deteriorate rapidly, to be of temporary or short-term architectural or aesthetic acceptability, or to otherwise constitute a reasonably foreseeable detriment to the community.
2. Compliance with the design standards shall be determined either by an administrative process or an architectural control commission or board as determined by the town council.
C. Alteration of boundaries of districts. The town council, by ordinance, may enlarge, contract, or alter the boundaries of the architectural control district at such time as the council deems such action to be in the public interest as promoting the general welfare of the community. (2012, cc. 224, 843)
§ 2.4. Personal property taxes.
The town council may, notwithstanding any other provision of law, levy a tax on business personal property, as described in subdivision A 26 of § 58.1-3506 of the Code of Virginia, without regard to the existence of, or rate of, tax on motor vehicles or any other classification of tangible personal property. (2018, cc. 336, 414)
Chapter 3. Mayor and Council.
§ 3.1. Election, qualification and term of office for mayor and council.
The Town of Middleburg shall be governed by a town council composed of seven councilmen and a mayor, all of whom shall be qualified voters in the town and shall be elected by the qualified voters of the town in the manner provided by law from the town at large. The councilmen and mayor in office at the time of adoption of this charter shall continue in office until the expiration of the terms for which they were elected or until their successors are duly elected and qualified. An election for three councilmen and mayor shall be held on the first Tuesday in May, nineteen hundred eighty-four, and for four councilmen and mayor on the first Tuesday in May, nineteen hundred eighty-six. Elections shall be held on the first Tuesday in May every two years thereafter. The councilmen and mayor so elected shall take office on the first day of the following July. The councilmen shall serve for a term of four years, and the mayor shall serve for a term of two years or until their successors are elected and qualified. (1983, c. 423)
§ 3.2. Vacancies.
Vacancies on the council shall be filled for the unexpired term from among the qualified voters of the town by a majority vote of the remaining members of council. A vacancy in the office of mayor shall be filled for the unexpired term from among the qualified voters of the town by a majority vote of the council. For the purposes of this section, no distinction shall be made between a member elected to the council and a member who has been appointed to the council except as to voting on those matters set forth in Article VII, Section 7 of the Constitution of Virginia. Upon any matter except those matters set forth in Article VII, Section 7 of the Constitution of Virginia coming before the council, the votes of all members shall be of the same dignity, whether a member has been elected or appointed. (1983, c. 423; 2010, c. 325)
§ 3.3. Council a continuing body.
The council shall be a continuing body, and no measure pending before such body nor any contract or obligation incurred shall abate or be discontinued because of the expiration of the term of office or removal of any council members. (1983, c. 423)
§ 3.4. Mayor.
The mayor shall be the chief executive officer of the town. He shall have and exercise all the privileges and authority conferred by general law not inconsistent with this charter. He shall preside over the meetings of the town council and shall have the right to speak therein as a member of the council but shall not vote except in the case of a tie vote. He shall be the head of the town government for all ceremonial purposes and shall perform such other duties consistent with his office as may be imposed by the town council. He shall see that the duties of the various town officers are faithfully performed and shall authenticate his signature on such documents or instruments as the council, this charter or the laws of the Commonwealth shall require. (1983, c. 423)
§ 3.5. Vice mayor.
The town council shall, by a majority of all of its members, elect a vice mayor from its membership at its first meeting to serve for a term of two years in the absence of or during the disability of the mayor; and the vice mayor shall possess the powers and discharge the duties of the mayor when serving as mayor. (1983, c. 423)
§ 3.6. Meetings of council.
The council shall fix the time of its regular meetings, which shall be at least six times per year, and, except as herein provided, the council shall establish its own rules of procedure and such rules as are necessary for the orderly conduct of its business not inconsistent with the laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia. A journal shall be kept of its official proceedings, and its meetings shall be opened to the public in accordance with Chapter 37 of Title 2.2 of the Code of Virginia. Four members of the council in the absence of the mayor, or four members of the council in addition to the mayor, as applicable, shall constitute a quorum for the transaction of business at any meeting. Special meetings may be called at any time by the mayor or by any four members of the council, provided that the members of the council are given reasonable notice of such meetings, and no business shall be transacted at a special meeting except that for which it shall be called. If the mayor and all members of the council are present, this provision requiring prior notice for special meetings is waived. (1983, c. 423; 2010, c. 325)
§ 3.7. Salaries.
The salaries of the mayor, councilmen, members of boards and commissions and all appointed officers and employees of the town shall be authorized and fixed by the council at a sum not to exceed any limitations placed thereon by the laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia. Increases in the salaries of the mayor and members of the council shall not be effective until the first day of July following the next local election after the council approves such increase. (1983, c. 423)
Chapter 4. Appointive Officers.
§ 4.1. Appointments.
The council may appoint: a town administrator, who shall be responsible to the council for the proper administration of all affairs of the town, for the control and supervision of all town departments, employees, and property, for the preparation and implementation of an annual budget, and for any other duties as prescribed by the council; a town attorney, who shall be an attorney-at-law licensed to practice in the Commonwealth of Virginia; a chief of police; a town clerk; a town treasurer, who may also be the town clerk; and any other officers that shall be deemed necessary and proper. (1983, c. 423; 2010, c. 325; 2012, cc. 224, 843)
§ 4.2. Term of office.
Appointees under this chapter shall serve at the pleasure of the council. (1983, c. 423)
§ 4.3. Bonds.
Appointees may be required to execute such bonds as the council may deem necessary. (1983, c. 423)
§ 4.4. Boards and commissions.
The council may, in its discretion, appoint such boards and commissions as it deems necessary and as may be authorized by the laws of the Commonwealth of Virginia. (1983, c. 423)
Chapter 5. Miscellaneous.
§ 5.1. Ordinances continued.
All ordinances now in force in the town and not inconsistent with this charter shall be and remain in force until altered, amended or repealed by the council. (1983, c. 423)
§ 5.2. (1983, c. 423; repealed 2010, c. 325)
§ 5.3. Severability.
If any clause, sentence, paragraph or part of this charter shall for any reason be adjudged by any court of competent jurisdiction to be invalid, such judgment shall not affect, impair or invalidate the remainder of the charter. (1983, c. 423)
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Provincial politics
Rider Rumblings
QC Magazine
If you see one Express game this season, club hopes you can make it Saturday
Jim Parker, Windsor Star
If you go to just one Windsor Express game this season, Jim Walls wants it to be Saturday.
A season-ticket holder for all seven seasons that the club has been in Windsor, Walls has helped to organize the club’s Project Support initiative for Saturday’s game against the London Lightning at the WFCU Centre. Game time is 7 p.m.
“I love the team,” said the 73-year-old Walls, who is a retired school principal. “I would hate to lose the team and know how hard they work. I offered my help and I had this idea.”
Attendance has been an issue for the club ever since the NBL of Canada granted Windsor a franchise.
“I remember the days when Windsor was basketball,” Walls said. “All the best players came through here or they were from here.”
The Express has produced two league titles in seven years, but that has not translated to fans at the gate. The club averages about 1,000 fans per game, which included 960 on hand Friday to see the club win for the fifth time in six games with a 102-86 win over the Saint John Riptide.
“It’s about the same as last year, but its worse in some case,” Express president and CEO Dartis Willis said of attendance. “Discounts don’t work. Promotions don’t work.”
And Saturday’s game won’t come with any ticket discounts, which range from $20 for adults to $13 for youths age 13 and under.
“You know what, sometimes you just need to know you’ve got the support and show it and I think that’s what Jim is after,” Willis said. “We don’t want to make it a discount this or a discount that. Come out and just say you support. I think the players will appreciate even more than I would. We want to get the most fans we can get in the building.”
Walls has been out trying to pump up support for the event, but honestly doesn’t know what will come of the project.
“Hopefully, from this point, we can continue to push for support and grow the fan base,” Walls said. “Show up, buy a ticket and bring a friend.
“It’s hard to know for me. I know I’ve contacted many of my friends. They’re all thinking the same thing. I’ll have no idea until the game on Saturday, but everyone says it’s a good idea. You just do what you can. I’m just a loyal fan, who wants to see them do well and want to see them succeed.”
Bill Jones, who has served as head coach of the Express for all seven seasons, would love to see the WFCU Centre filled for one night.
“It’s my seventh year and I love Windsor and I love coming over here every day,” Jones said. “I wish the fans would jump on board and support us a little bit, but, you know, one fan at a time. Hopefully, this initiative will go and we’ll be able to fill this place up.”
The Express (7-8), rallied from a double-digit deficit in the second quarter to get the win with DeAndre Thomas and Horace Wormely each scoring 18 points. Juan Pattillo had 17 points against Saint John (4-12) while Tyrrel Tate and Ryan Anderson finished with 12 points and Chris Jones with 11 points off the bench.
jpparker@postmedia.com
twitter.com/winstarparker
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Tag: best of
The 10 Best Apple Commercial Songs
Editor’s Note: With the release of the new Steve Jobs biopic, we thought we would revisit one of our favorite lists, the 10 Best Apple Commercial Songs.
Without any text, logo, or even a direct picture of the actual product in question, almost anyone in the world would be able to tell you what product the above advertisement is for. At the very least, they could tell you which company is behind it. This is a direct result of the genius of Apple marketing. Whether it is a silhouette of someone dancing in front of a bright background, a simple product/hand shot in front of a white background, or a “geek” talking to a “hipster” side-by-side in front of a white background, most every one of Apple’s major marketing campaigns is simple, clean, instantly recognizable, and often imitated/parodied. One thing that is also synonymous with these marketing campaigns is the use of pop music. Apple’s use of pop music in each of its ads is almost poetic. Many artist could even credit Apple for helping launch their careers. Now before the momentous release of the Steve Jobs biopic Jobs led by none other the great Ashton Kutcher (what?), we went ahead and listed our favorite songs used/use of songs in Apple commercials. As a qualifying factor of this list we decided we must first: love the song. Second: the use of song. And third: the song in consideration must be a popular song. No originals allowed! Which is unfortunate for songs/ads like this one that have a cripplingly brilliant effect to them …
Onto the list:
Continue reading “The 10 Best Apple Commercial Songs”
Author ToddPosted on October 22, 2015 Categories Top Ten Thursday, Top TensTags 1 2 3 4, Apple, best of, commercials, favorite, Feist, greatest, iPhone, ipod, mac, new soul, songs3 Comments on The 10 Best Apple Commercial Songs
Top Ten Acts of Bonnaroo 2014
Looking back at my experience at this year’s Bonnaroo, there was a lot more that I could have seen, and wish that I would have seen. Generally I do a lot of bouncing back in forth from stage to stage. This year, I found myself planting at stages for a few acts in a row, staying for a lot of the full length of sets. But when I would bounce, the abundance of scheduling conflicts only allowed me to really see a few songs by some of my more favorite acts. For instance, had I seen the entire Flaming Lips or Nick Cave shows, or ANY of Frank Ocean, CHVRCHES, The Orwells, or Diarrhea Planet in all their glory, I am sure that some of them could have easily made this list. Unfortunately though, there just isn’t enough hours in the day. So instead I decided to include only acts in which I saw the entire set, from opener to closer. So apologies to all the more deserving bands whom I did not see in their entirety, but here is a list my favorite full sets that I saw at Bonnaroo this year.
10. Elton John
After playing “Bennie and the Jets”, “Levon”, “Tiny Dancer”, “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road”, “Rocket Man” all within the first 7 songs of his set, it’s hard to care too much about what else you get from the man. I had always heard great things about Elton live, and despite the extremely dated visual show he used on his backdrop, the man still knows how to perform.
Continue reading “Top Ten Acts of Bonnaroo 2014”
Author ToddPosted on June 19, 2014 Categories Top Ten Thursday, Top TensTags 2014, best of, bonnaroo, favorite acts, jack white, Janelle Monáe, Kanye West, the orwells, Vampire Weekend2 Comments on Top Ten Acts of Bonnaroo 2014
Top Ten Thursday: Duets to Die For
We decided it was finally time to make a list concerning the combination of kindred vocals. Duets that is. A guy and a girl is the most popular concoction, but there is certainly room to wiggle with that formula on this list. For frame of reference, we attempted to stay away from two very specific types tracks that may be considered duets. The first area is hip hop tracks. R&B tracks are fine, as long as they don’t interfere with the next criteria, but it seems every hip-hop song has multiple rappers, or at the least one rapper and someone else for the hook. Just seemed a little too muddled. The second criteria we aimed to stay away from were artists that have two vocalists, where almost every one of their tracks might be able to be considered duets. Sorry, but we were looking for duets where the source recording is at most part of a one-off album. As always, I think we crafted a solid list, but am certain we missed something along the way. Feel free to offer suggestions, and enjoy.
10. The Postal Service & Jenny Lewis – “Nothing Better”
Ben Gibbard & Jenny Lewis combine for an electonic-infused back and forth on The Postal Service’s 2003 track “Nothing Better”. The conversational tone of Gibbard and Lewis vocals is about as fun as it gets, and makes us thirst for more than just a Postal Service tour reunion. Record a new album!
Continue reading “Top Ten Thursday: Duets to Die For”
Author AustinPosted on May 9, 2013 Categories Top Ten Thursday, Top TensTags Allison Krauss, Ben Gibbard, best of, Bonnie & Clyde, Brad Paisley, Brandy, Brigitte Bardot, Chris Brown, Conor Oberst, david bowie, Dolly Parton, Duets, Emmylou Harris, Freddie Mercury, Islands in the Stream, Jenny Lewis, Joe Strummer, johnny cash, Jordin Sparks, Kenny Rogers, Killing the Blues, Kylie Minogue, Land Locked Blues, Monica, Nick Cave, No Air, Nothing Better, PJ Harvey, Queen, Redemption Song, Robert Plant, Serge Gainsbourg, stevie nicks, Stop Draggin' My Heart Around, The Boy Is Mine, The Postal Service, This Mess We're In, Thom Yorke, tom petty, Top Ten, Under Pressure, Where the Wild Roses Grow, Whiskey LullabyLeave a comment on Top Ten Thursday: Duets to Die For
Weak List Wednesday: Top 5 Best Songs of 2012 (Thus Far)
July is almost upon us, which we thought was the perfect time to release our mid-year song list. Between the songs and the albums, there were quite a few split decisions, but below are the best we came up with for our favorite tracks that have been released so far this year. Hopefully you enjoy them as much as we do.
Continue reading “Weak List Wednesday: Top 5 Best Songs of 2012 (Thus Far)”
Author ToddPosted on June 27, 2012 June 27, 2012 Categories Top Tens, Weak List WednesdayTags $ vic, 2012, Alabama Shakes, Beach House, best of, best songs of 2012, best songs of the year, cancer for the cure, Comeback Kid, crush, El-P, favorite songs of the year, Fiona Apple, greatest, Grimes, jack white, listen to, me. gnome live, mr gnome, music video, Myth, oblivion, Sleigh Bells, so far, the way, thus far, track of 2012, Trash Tongue Talker, Werewolf, you ain't alone8 Comments on Weak List Wednesday: Top 5 Best Songs of 2012 (Thus Far)
Top Ten Thursday: Brilliant Babes of Song (Our Favorite Female Singer-Songwriters)
There is nothing that turns me on more than a hot female musician, and in turn, there is nothing better than writing an entire article dedicated to these women of music. This list is partially in honor to the brilliant new efforts put forth by Fiona Apple, as well as inspiration from recently seeing acts such as Feist and St. Vincent, and topped off by the new Cat Power track that served as an announcement for her forthcoming album that will be released later in the year. This was one of our toughest lists we have compiled yet, and we all felt very strongly about the artists chosen. Unfortunately acts like St. Vincent, and Karen O were not able to be taken into consideration due to the fact that a majority of there compositions are collaborative efforts. Nonetheless, we feel very strongly that the ladies listed below are worthy of the praise they have received, and in some cases, worthy of more.
Continue reading “Top Ten Thursday: Brilliant Babes of Song (Our Favorite Female Singer-Songwriters)”
Author ToddPosted on June 21, 2012 June 21, 2012 Categories Top Ten Thursday, Top TensTags best of, Bob Dylan, bob dylan cover, carole king, Cat Power, Chan Marshall, Dolly Parton, Erykah Badu, Feist, females, Fiona Apple, Girls, Jenny Lewis, Joanna Newsom, joni mitchell, Kate Bush, ke$sh, kesha, lauren hill, Lauryn Hill, leslie feist, list of, mr. belvedere, patti smith, paul thomas anderson, singer songwriter, singer-songwriters, singers, the mis, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, Top Ten13 Comments on Top Ten Thursday: Brilliant Babes of Song (Our Favorite Female Singer-Songwriters)
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Jack W. Haye
Jack W. Haye, chairman of the board of Patrick Henry College, is "Senior Vice President and National Manager of the Treasury Management Consulting Practice for Wells Fargo Bank. He joined the bank in 1993 as Group Manager in the Cable and Telecommunications Division. Prior to his tenure at Wells Fargo, Mr. Haye was a Senior Relationship Manager and Global Account Executive for Bank of America. He is a graduate of Baylor University and holds a masters degree from The American Graduate School of International Management. Before serving as a trustee for Patrick Henry College, Mr. Haye was a member of the Board of Visitors at Baylor University. Jack and his wife, Carol, reside in Celina, Texas and have seven children. The Hayes are members of First Baptist Church in McKinney, Texas." [1]
Retrieved from "https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Jack_W._Haye&oldid=140054"
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Lyrics for A Dollar & A Kiss
Matt Borrello
Second Sight 2:50
Tied Up and Knocked Out Blues 3:29
Steady Rollin' 2:39
Glimpse of God 3:01
Impulse and Obsession 3:24
When You Lose a Friend 2:42
Talking songs at Wachusett Recording.
Guitars used on the new record: Martin HD35 Johnny Cash signature, 1963 Gibson LGO, Taylor Jumbo 12 String.
More guitars used recording Matt's new "Lonesome Valley" album: 2001 Gibson AJ, 1978 Guild F50, 1931 Martin 00-18
Free download of 2 tracks from Matt's new album "Lonesome Valley"
Matt Borrello's third studio album, "Lonesome Valley" is nearing completion. His first since 2015's "A Dollar & A Kiss", this album is more acoustic and was recorded in two sessions with members of Boston based bluegrass/americana band Grain Thief at Wachusett Recording. Some of the original songs date back more than 10 years and some are brand new. Half of the tracks recorded so far have full drums and electric bass, but these two preview tracks have more of a jug band feel with upright bass…
Returning to the Studio for New Album Release this Fall
More soon...
A Dollar & A Kiss - 2015
"A Dollar & A Kiss", Matt's new studio album is officially available and ready to order on the web (paypal button to the right) or purchase at a show. It features 11 original songs ranging from solo acoustic folk to full band electric blues and rock. He will be touring extensively in the coming year in support of the album, which was recorded at Fox Run Studios in Sudbury, MA in 2014. The tracks are well arranged and expertly recorded by producer Neale Eckstein and co-producer/percussionist, Steve Jagoda.…
April 2015 - New Album, "A Dollar & A Kiss" in final stages of production
The second studio album of original music from Matt Borrello is almost ready for release. Recording sessions at Fox Run Studio started in September 2014 and wrapped up in March 2015. The mixing and mastering is almost complete. A few of the songs were written way back in 2008-2009 and have been part of Matt's live shows for a while. Two tracks ("A Change is Coming" and "Head to Toe") were written and demoed with Andy Kostek, a noted producer, guitarist, and lyricist from the UK. The "Preview" EP, which…Read more
Lakeville Country Club, 44 Clear Pond Rd, Lakeville, MA
Matt Borrello @ The Burren w/ Torn & Frayed
Saturday, July 20 @ 5:00PM Sat, Jul 20 @ 5:00PM
The Burren, 247 Elm St., Somerville, MA
Atlantica Restaurant, 44 Border St, Cohasset, MA
Matt Borrello @ Hull's Kitchen 2
HK Too, 276 Nantasket Ave, Hull, Ma
Matt Borrello and Quality Dogs Outdoor Dinner Show
Thursday, August 8 @ 5:30PM Thu, Aug 8 @ 5:30PM
Weatherlow Farms, 845 Sodom Rd, Westport, MA
Purchase A Dollar & A Kiss
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Home Affairs, Policies
I know that Ministers are committed to making government more transparent, so taxpayers can hold the state to account both on how their money is being spent and how decisions are made which affect their lives.
The Freedom of Information Act is one of the pillars on which open government operates, so both I and the Government are committed to supporting it. Yet after more than a decade in operation, I believe it was appropriate to review, in the whole, how it has operated in practice, and establish how its mechanisms could be improved.
This is why the Government established an independent, cross-party Commission on Freedom of Information. I am pleased that the Commission has now published its report, and the Government has given its preliminary views on some of the most salient recommendations. The Government will carefully consider the Commission’s other recommendations, and I will follow the matter with interest.
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You are here: Home / “The Sopranos: The Complete Series” Blu-ray with Digital HD arrives on November 4th / Movies / Film Headlines / “The Sopranos: The Complete Series” Blu-ray with Digital HD arrives on November 4th
“The Sopranos: The Complete Series” Blu-ray with Digital HD arrives on November 4th
June 4, 2014 by Mike Gencarelli Leave a Comment
THE SOPRANOS®: THE COMPLETE SERIES BLU-RAY WITH DIGITAL HD
Collectible Box Set Featuring All Six Seasons of the Groundbreaking Series Available for the First Time on Blu-ray with Digital HD, November 4, 2014. Just in Time for Holiday Gift Giving
Complete Series Blu-ray Set is Packed with More Than Five Hours of Bonus Content, Including a Never-Before-Seen Feature Exploring the Legacy and Impact of the Game-Changing Series
New York, NY (June 4, 2014) – Fifteen years after making its revolutionary debut and radically altering the TV landscape, fans of the legendary HBO® series The Sopranos can now experience the show like never before. This fall, all 86 episodes of the beloved Emmy®, Golden Globe® and Peabody Award-winning series are available for the first time in a Blu-ray with Digital HD collector set in 1080p high definition. With 28 Blu-ray discs packaged in an elegant box set featuring iconic artwork from the series, The Sopranos: The Complete Series Blu-ray ($279.98) is an essential addition to any home entertainment collection. Featuring all six seasons plus bonus materials, this must-have set will be out in stores exclusively from HBO Home Entertainment on November 4, 2014 – just in time for the holidays.
Blu-ray with Digital HD Set Special Features
The Sopranos: The Complete Series Blu-ray comes with a free Digital HD copy of all 86 episodes, and the set is also loaded with more than five hours of bonus material including a new and exclusive feature exploring how The Sopranos came to be and how it transformed the television landscape. “Defining a Television Landmark,” which runs approximately 45 minutes, features all-new interviews with cast, crew, celebrities, filmmakers and academics — including series creator David Chase, star James Gandolfini, Academy Award® winning director Steven Soderbergh, Emmy® Award winner Jeff Daniels and Golden Globe winner Steve Buscemi — discussing the impact and influence of the groundbreaking series, with brand new archival footage. Additional bonus material includes lost scenes, two round table dinners with cast and crew, 25 audio commentaries and much more.
About The Sopranos
For six seasons, millions of viewers loyally tuned in to HBO to watch the drama unfold as modern-day mob boss Tony Soprano juggled responsibilities between his family and his other “family.” Hailed as “a remarkable achievement” by the Wall Street Journal and “the greatest show in TV history” by Vanity Fair, David Chase’s drama series The Sopranos stars three-time Emmy® winners James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano and Edie Falco as Tony’s wife Carmela, plus Lorraine Bracco as therapist Dr. Jennifer Melfi, Emmy® winner Michael Imperioli as Tony’s nephew Christopher Moltisanti and Dominic Chianese as Uncle Junior. Other series regulars include Robert Iler as Anthony Soprano, Jr., Jamie-Lynn Sigler as Meadow Soprano, Tony Sirico as Paulie Walnuts, Steven Van Zandt as Silvio Dante, Aida Turturro as Tony’s sister Janice, Steven R. Schirripa as Bobby “Bacala” Baccalieri, John Ventimiglia as Artie Bucco, Vincent Curatola as Johnny Sack, Frank Vincent as Phil Leotardo and Ray Abruzzo as Little Carmine.
The Sopranos: The Complete Series
Exclusively on Blu-ray with Digital HD
Street Date: November 4, 2014
Order Date: July 22, 2014
Rating: TV MA
Runtime: Approx. 83 Hours
Filed Under: Film Headlines Tagged With: 4th, arrives, bluray, complete, digital, hd, ...
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Articles Posted in Delaware Supreme Court
Verrastro v. Bayhospitalists, LLC
April 8, 2019 by Justia Inc
The issue this medical negligence case presented for the Delaware Supreme Court’s review centered on the dismissal of claims against two physicians on statute-of-limitations grounds, and whether that dismissal barred the prosecution of a timely filed claim based on the same underlying facts against the physicians’ employer under the doctrine of respondeat superior. The Superior Court, relying on the Supreme Court’s decision in Greco v. University of Delaware, 619 A.2d 900 (Del. 1993), ruled that the dismissal of the physicians effectively extinguished the claims against the physicians’ employer and therefore entered summary judgment in the employer’s favor. The Supreme Court found the Superior Court correctly read Greco, and under Greco’s teaching, the Superior Court’s dismissal was proper. In this en banc decision, however, the Supreme Court concluded Greco had to be overruled to the extent that it held that, if a plaintiff failed to sue the employee whose malpractice allegedly injured her within the statute of limitations, she was for that reason alone barred from suing the employer under principles of respondeat superior. Because in this case plaintiff sued the employer in a timely manner, settled principles of law authorized the plaintiff to proceed against that employer. “Although the plaintiff must of course prove her claim against the employer, including that the employee was negligent, the fact that she failed to sue the employee in a timely manner does not act to immunize the employer. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the Superior Court.” View "Verrastro v. Bayhospitalists, LLC" on Justia Law
Posted in: Civil Procedure, Delaware Supreme Court, Medical Malpractice
Wong v. Broughton
February 4, 2019 by Justia Inc
A jury returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff Monica Broughton, in a medical negligence suit she brought in the amount of $3 million. The case was brought by Ms. Broughton individually and as parent and natural guardian of her nine-year-old son, Amari Broughton-Fleming. The injury involved was a permanent injury to Amari’s right brachial plexus that occurred during birth. Defendants are Dr. Peter J. Wong and his medical practice, Dedicated To Women, OB-GYN, P.A. argued on appeal the superior court erred: (1) when it denied their motion in limine to exclude the opinion of plaintiff’s standard of care expert, which allowed an impermissible res ipsa loquitur opinion that resulting in the jury improperly presuming negligence from the fact that an injury occurred; (2) when it denied their motion in limine to exclude plaintiff’s causation expert, which they contended lacked a proper factual foundation, and constituted an impermissible res ipsa loquitur opinion; (3) when it permitted plaintiff to elicit statistical evidence from Dr. Wong and his experts to establish the rarity of brachial plexus injuries; and (4) when it refused to instruct the jury on “Actions Taken in Emergency.” The Delaware Supreme Court concluded the first and third contentions were directly addressed by the superior court in a ruling on post-trial motions; the second and fourth contentions, which were initially raised and denied before trial, were not reargued in the post-trial motions. Therefore, the Supreme Court affirmed as to defendants' four arguments on appeal. View "Wong v. Broughton" on Justia Law
Posted in: Delaware Supreme Court, Medical Malpractice, Personal Injury
Norman v. All About Women, P.A., et al.
Plaintiff Amanda Norman appealed after a superior court granted summary judgment in favor of defendants All About Women, P.A. and Christine W. Maynard, M.D. in a medical negligence case. The grant of summary judgment followed an earlier ruling that the testimony of plaintiff's medical expert was inadmissible under the rules of evidence. In that ruling, the court excluded the expert’s testimony because the plaintiff failed to show that his opinions were “‘based on information reasonably relied upon by experts’ in his field.” Taking plaintiff's expert's deposition testimony as a whole, the Delaware Supreme Court found it sufficient to establish the applicable standards of care, Dr. Maynard's deviations from those standards, and injury to plaintiff caused by those deviations. As such, the Court ruled the expert's testimony admissible, reversed the superior court ruling, and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "Norman v. All About Women, P.A., et al." on Justia Law
Turner v. Delaware Surgical Group, P.A., et al.
Plaintiff-Appellant Heather Turner appealed a superior court judgment that ruled in favor of Defendants-Appellees Michael Conway, M.D., Eric Kalish, M.D. and their practice, Delaware Surgical Group. Plaintiff sued defendants over what was initially an appendectomy, but ended with a "mass" on her liver from "something that had spilled out from prior surgeries" performed by the two doctor defendants. Plaintiff argued that the trial court abused its discretion in improperly admitting defendants' expert evidence . Upon review, the Supreme Court agreed and remanded the case for a new trial. View "Turner v. Delaware Surgical Group, P.A., et al." on Justia Law
Posted in: Constitutional Law, Delaware Supreme Court, Injury Law, Medical Malpractice
Hill v. DuShuttle
January 3, 2013 by Justia Inc
The issue before the Supreme Court in this case was whether the Superior Court abused its discretion by dismissing a “trip and fall” case because appellant failed to file an expert report. Appellant’s counsel did provide medical records, but insisted that a formal expert report was unnecessary because such a report would provide no additional information. "Counsel’s stubborn refusal to appreciate that an expert report had to be filed is difficult to understand." But the Supreme Court concluded that the sanction of dismissal was inappropriate under the circumstances. "The claim appeared to have merit; there was time to submit the report without impacting the trial date; and the trial court had not imposed lesser sanctions that were ignored." Accordingly, the Court reversed. View "Hill v. DuShuttle" on Justia Law
Christian v. Counseling Resource Associates, Inc., et al.
The trial court precluded appellants’ experts from testifying at trial because they failed to provide the experts’ reports in accordance with the trial scheduling order. Without any expert testimony, appellants’ claims failed as a matter of law, and judgment was entered for appellees. But appellants had requested a conference with the trial court six months before the trial date to discuss the need to revise the scheduling order. The trial court refused to meet with counsel or change the trial date. Appellants appealed the trial court's refusal to confer, and the Supreme Court held that was an abuse of discretion: "A conference held at that point would have allowed the trial court to determine whether the circumstances justified a new trial date. If not, the trial court could have set new discovery deadlines that would have maintained the original trial date. . . . Because experience has shown that sanctions are not always effective [when counsel fails to abide by set deadlines, and to address crowded, high volume docket problems of the courts]," the Court has determined that it is necessary to refine the "Drejka" analysis. "Henceforth, parties who ignore or extend scheduling deadlines without promptly consulting the trial court, will do so at their own risk." View "Christian v. Counseling Resource Associates, Inc., et al." on Justia Law
Spicer, et al. v. Osunkoya, M.D.
November 15, 2011 by Justia Inc
In an interlocutory appeal of a medical malpractice action, the court considered whether a doctor owed a duty of care to a patient after the doctor referred the patient to a specialist. The patient allegedly suffered serious injuries as a result of the specialist's negligence. The court held that the referring doctor had no duty to the patient at the time of her injury and that the referring doctor's alleged negligence was not the proximate cause of the patient's injury. Accordingly, the Superior Court correctly granted summary judgment in the referring doctor's favor. View "Spicer, et al. v. Osunkoya, M.D." on Justia Law
Posted in: Delaware Supreme Court, Injury Law, Medical Malpractice
Dishmon, et al. v. Fucci, et al.
Plaintiff filed suit against nursing home staff members alleging that defendants committed medical negligence that resulted in his father's death. A Superior Court judge dismissed the suit, stating that plaintiff's Affidavit of Merit failed to comply with 18 Del. C. 6853 because plaintiff failed to enclose a copy of the testifying expert's curriculum vitae. The court held that, since this error was procedural, a proper exercise of the trial judge's discretion would have permitted the later submission of the curriculum vitae. Therefore, the Superior Court judge erroneously dismissed the complaint. View "Dishmon, et al. v. Fucci, et al." on Justia Law
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Posts Tagged ‘Green Arrow’
That Girl with the Curls – Episode 67 – General Miscellany
Posted: June 5, 2016 by Sam in Comics, Movies, Podcasts, Television, That Girl with the Curls
Tags: Agents of SHIELD, Arrow, Black Canary, Dan Didio, DC Comics, Flash, Geoff Johns, Green Arrow, Greg Berlanti, Legends of Tomorrow, Marvel, Rebirth, shared cinematic universe, Supergirl
That Girl with the Curls – Episode 52 – Superhero TV
Posted: December 29, 2015 by Sam in Comics, Podcasts, Television, That Girl with the Curls
Tags: Agent Coulson, Arrow, Barry Allen, Black Canary, Brett Dalton, Bruce Wayne, Callista Flockhart, Captain Cold, Cat Grant, Central City, Constantine, crossover, Cyborg Superman, Daisy Johnson, DC Comics, FitzSimmons, Gorilla Grodd, Gotham, Grant Gustin, Green Arrow, Hank Henshaw, Harrison Wells, J'onn J'onzz, Jay Garrick, Jemm Son of Saturn, Jim Gordon, Legends of Tomorrow, Livewire, Mark Hamill, Martian Manhunter, Marvel Comics, Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Oliver Queen, Quake, Silver Age, Silver St. Cloud, speedsters, Star City, Stephen Amell, Supergirl, superhero, The Flash, The Trickster, Vibe, Wally West
That Girl with the Curls – Episode 42 – DC Comics All Access Ramblings
Posted: July 18, 2015 by Sam in Animation, Comics, Movies, News, Podcasts, That Girl with the Curls
Tags: Arrow, Babs Tarr, Batgirl, Batman, Batman: Arkham Knight, Brenden Fletcher, Bruce Timm, Cameron Stewart, controversy, DC Comics, Dick Grayson, Earth 2, female readers, Gotham, Green Arrow, jason todd, Jay Garrick, Mr. Terrific, Nightwing, Oracle, Robin, Rocksteady, San Diego Comic-Con, SDCC, Stephen Amell, The Flash, The Joker, The Killing Joke, The Walking Dead, True Detective, video games, Wally West
James Rowe of Roman on the Rocks joins Sam for a session mostly dedicated to all things DC Comics and their properties including Batman: Arkham Knight, Batman v Superman, Arrow, The Flash, and Batgirl.
Vixen: The Animated Series Joins the CW/DC Universe
Posted: January 13, 2015 by Sam in Animation, Comics, News, Television
Tags: Arrow, Batman: The Brave and the Bold, cameo, cartoon, crossover, CW, CW Seed, DC Animated Universe, DC Comics, DCAU, digital platform, Gina Torres, Grant Gustin, Green Arrow, Justice League Unlimited, Legend of Korra, live action, magic, Marc Guggenheim, Mari Jiwe McCabe, mature content, meta humans, New 52, Ray Palmer, shared universe, spinoff, Stephen Amell, Teen Titans, television universe, The Atom, The Flash, Vixen
During the Television Critic’s Association (TCA) event that took place on Sunday it was announced that Mari Jiwe McCabe, aka Vixen, would be the next DC hero to join the CW alongside Arrow and The Flash. Expected to debut in the fall, Vixen will be the first animated series produced through the CW’s digital platform, CW Seed, which is probably most well-known for featuring Jane Espenson’s web series Husbands. Marc Guggenheim, one of Arrow‘s executive producers and co-showrunner, will oversee the project as well as the Supergirl television show for CBS. At the TCA, the CW provided promotional material for the animated series featuring Vixen staring down from the rooftops with Flash and Green Arrow flanking her as well as some character background:
Originally from Africa, Mari McCabe’s parents were killed by local greed, corruption, and wanton violence. But the orphaned Mari refuses to succumb to the terrors surrounding her. Inheriting her family’s Tantu Totem, Mari can access the powers of animals — anything from the super-strength of a gorilla to the speed of a cheetah. As Vixen, she fights valiantly to protect the world from the threats like those that claimed her family.
The dossier neglected to mention Mari’s day job as a model or that she can only use the power of one animal at a time, but it’s not exactly the job of a flyer to delve into all the little details, though Guggenheim did provide some additional information about the direction of the series:
It’s a six-part origin story, but characters from “Flash” and “Arrow” are prominently involved. It’s in the continuity and the world…The other thing is, it’s a strong African-American hero who’s, like I said, a former Justice Leaguer. It’s set in Detroit, as a nod towards those Justice League [Detroit] stories. It’s done with the same love of the source material that we bring to everything.
There are, however, a couple of things worth noting. One, the art style of the promotional material is the same as the animation used for Warner Bros. most recent DC Animated features, Justice League: War and Batman and Son, as well as Justice League’s forthcoming sequel, Throne of Atlantis. I’ll be honest, I’m not the biggest fan of what appears to be WB’s new signature style for the DC Animated movies mostly adapted from the New 52. It’s just not my cup of tea, especially since I wasn’t all that into Justice League: War or the book from which it was adapted. I’d ask if that means Vixen, Arrow, and The Flash all take place in the same universe as the current DCAU, but then we’re getting into Cool World/Who Framed Roger Rabbit? levels of continuity. Probably best to just keep it all separate for now.
Secondly, if Vixen is supposedly in the same universe as Arrow and The Flash, as evidenced by the characters on the promotional materials, then why is Vixen – arguably DC’s most well-known black female superhero – being introduced in animation instead of live action? Assuming Grant Gustin and Stephen Amell will lend their voices when their characters eventually show up, can we also expect Mari to make her live action debut on either Arrow or The Flash? Guggenheim has apparently been fielding this question as well, saying:
We always say “never say never,” and if the character resonates with people, that would be wonderful. I would love to be in a position where CW said to us, “Hey, we want a ‘Vixen’ live-action show.” That’d be wonderful. We’ll have to sort of see how things play out.
It’s not exactly the most definitive answer and it still raises the question of why Mari can’t go the way of Barry Allen or even Supergirl? It’s not like we’re lacking for superhero content in media, so I’m pretty sure the viewing audience will accept anything at this point. I mean, people are still watching Gotham, right? Animation, however. has been woefully underutilized by Warner Bros. considering it used to be their bread and butter. I’ve seen other websites speculating that Vixen could be the CW’s version of The Legend of Korra, which dealt with far more mature storytelling than anyone expected for what was deemed children’s programming. Vixen wouldn’t necessarily have the same hang-ups since the viewing audience siphoned off from Arrow and The Flash would already have an expectation for more mature content. How far do they intend to push those boundaries? Hard to say. There’s still a brand to maintain with the DC properties, but, then again, this is the CW so we shouldn’t rule out anything that could potentially draw in the 18-35 demographic.
Vixen will serve the secondary purpose of introducing magic into the CW/DC television universe, but again, why not bring that into the fold on a live action show? Meta humans seemed like a stretch during the first season of Arrow, but by season two we were itching for The Flash spinoff. Why not do the same for Vixen? Normally, I wouldn’t push this since the news is so fresh, but with rumors also circulating that Brandon Routh’s Ray Palmer, soon-to-be the Atom, may get a spinoff show as well, bringing Vixen in as an animated series feels like a very sluggish step forward.
Hopefully Guggenheim and the team working on Vixen prove me wrong. Really, I want them to succeed. Mari’s been sorely missed in the DCU. It’s been a couple years since she was last seen in the Justice League book and, aside from some guest spots and cameos on Batman: The Brave and the Bold and Teen Titans, it’s been over a decade since her last major appearance on television in Justice League: Unlimited (voiced by Gina friggin’ Torres!)
So, for now, let’s say I’m cautiously optimistic.
That Girl with the Curls – Episode 24 – Susan Eisenberg
Posted: December 24, 2014 by Sam in Animation, Comics, Podcasts, That Girl with the Curls
Tags: Amazon Fury, Amazons, Andrea Romano, anniversary, Batman, Bruce Timm, cartoons, comic-con, cons, conventions, Destiny, Diana of Themyscira, fan interaction, GeekGirlCon, General Hospital, George Newbern, Green Arrow, Green Lantern, Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, Kevin Conroy, Kin Shriner, live tweet, Michael Rosenbaum, panels, Phil LaMarr, shipping, soap operas, Superman, Susan Eisenberg, The Flash, video games, voice over, Wonder Woman
In this episode, Sam and Cara chat with Susan Eisenberg, the voice of Wonder Woman! The three talk about fan interaction through cons and twitter as well as the ins and outs of voice over work. Soap operas also come up!
P.S. The answer is Jodie Dallas.
Follow Susan @susaneisenberg1
Intro music: “French Kiss” by Mrs. Howl
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masculine luxuries
The Gubelin Grand Prix of St. Moritz–on “White Turf”–The world’s most glamorous horserace
White Turf
Each year, in the ether regions of Earth, there takes place the world’s most ritzy horserace: the Gübelin Grand Prix of St. Moritz. Founded in 1939 and quickly establishing itself as the marquee equine event in St. Moritz, where organized horseracing dates back to 1907, the one-and-a-quarter-mile-long Gübelin unfolds at 1,800 meters above sea level, atop snow-covered, frozen, Lake St. Moritz. The gallop race, featuring some of Europe’s most esteemed Thoroughbreds, is arguably the highlight of “White Turf,” a series of winter sports—from polo to skikjoering to tobogganing—held on three consecutive Sundays in February.
Each winter, when the lake freezes—as determined by sonar devices—to about 60 centimeters (2 feet) thick, thereby assuring safety for the approximately 15,000 spectators and scores of horses, a racetrack, dubbed “the world’s flattest,” is constructed on the frozen surface. And there, at “the top of the world,” the “sport of kings” plays out more like the “sport of gods.” There, Europe’s best racehorses temporarily abandon their familiar racing surfaces of grass and dirt for a more enchanting one of glimmering snow where the notorious horserace “kick-back” is ice particles, not dust, mud, or herbaceous cuttings.
Getting to St. Moritz, “The Top of the World.”
But if the race on “white turf” is spectacular, then the dramatically beautiful journey to St. Moritz is a most fitting prelude. St. Moritz is situated on the southern side of the Swiss Alps, in the Engadin Valley, within relatively easy reach from Milan, Zurich, and Munich. The nearest major airport to St. Moritz is Balzano Airport in Balzano, Italy, located 167 kilometers (104 miles) from the famous city. Another major airport is St. Gallen-Altenrhein, (located 172 kilometers from St. Moritz), which has international flights from Altenrhein, Switzerland.
.But for jetsetters—who tend to frequent St. Moritz—those options are simply too remote. After all, one of the appeals of St. Moritz is to arrive early and stay late. Thus, open only to private and charter jets, planes, and helicopters, the Engadin Airport, located a mere seven kilometers from the resort town, is the preferred option for the “glitterazzi.” Upon request, Engadin Airport offers flights to any European destination (See www.engadin-airport.ch ). And upon arrival, elite-types are transported by limousine service from the airport to their respective hotels, the city boasting five 5-star accommodations, the oldest of which is the Kulm Hotel.
For “normal” rich-and-famous types, however, there are options that are as glamorous as the White Turf itself. Arriving by railway is widely regarded as the most storied and memorable. There are two heritage railway lines: the Glacier Express and the Bernina Express, both of which are world-famous. The 1930s restaurant car of the Rhaetian Railways is also a highly recommended option. Departing from either Chur, Switzerland, via the Albula Pass, or Tirano, Italy, via the Bernina Pass, the route is regarded as one of Europe’s most stunning. From Landquart, one may journey to St. Moritz via Klosters and the Vereina Tunnel. From Zurich’s main train station, the trip to St. Moritz takes three hours. Train tickets and schedules are available at www.rhb.ch or www.sbb.ch .
By car or bus, one takes any of the picturesque mountain passes: from the northern parts of Switzerland; Ticino, Italy (Switzerland’s Italian region); and from Austria. Arriving from the south, vehicles travel along Lake Como, the Valchiavenna, and the Val Bregaglia. (Driving from Milan or Zurich takes approximately three hours, four from Munich.) [One who wishes to avoid driving through the breathtakingly gorgeous mountain passes can take the car-train in Klosters/Selfranga. See www.vereina.ch . The website www.strassen.gr.ch provides regular updates on road conditions in the Canton of Grisons.] Another option is the famed Swiss postal car, which has regular service running between Chiavenna (Italy) and St. Moritz. Then, of course, there is the Palm Express, from Lugano (Italy) all the way to the Engadin.
But how remote St. Moritz became the site for one of the world’s most celebrated and celebrity-attended horseraces begins not in 1907, but in the middle of the 1800s when, in 1856, Johannes Badrutt (1819-1889) acquires a guesthouse situated at the site of the present-day Kulm Hotel. Cognizant of St. Moritz’s crisp, cold, sunny weather—even in the throes of winter—Badrutt thought that the area would be an excellent site for a then-novel concept: winter tourism. So, in 1864, he made an often-recounted wager with a Brit: that the Brit would love St. Moritz’s winter weather; and if not, Badrutt would pay for the Brit’s trip and accommodations. And the rest, as it is said, is history: The Brit so liked the sunny Alpine weather—today referred to as “Champagne climate” on account of the lake’s cold, sun-sparkling atmosphere—that he extended his stay. And other Brits soon followed suit, what would become “the season” at St. Moritz extending from Christmas to Easter.
“When the sun is out, the Brits will play…,” or so they say. So, winter tourists began organizing winter sports to amuse themselves while at St. Moritz. And by the early 1900s, horseracing was one such amusement.
But winter at St. Moritz is not only about sports: It is estimated that between Christmas and Easter, winter tourists spend one-half a billion dollars each year. At St. Moritz, all the playthings of the über-wealthy can be found: luxury cars; private aircraft; fine furs; enviable jewelry. Every major fashion brand is represented there. Fine Champagne flows seemingly uninterrupted in the “Champagne weather.” And there is, of course, fine dining, meals at the world-famous restaurant “La Marmite” being almost obligatory.
Certainly, there are other exclusive, extravagant, elegant destinations on the planet. But if one wants to experience what is widely considered the most intriguing horserace on the planet—a race that feels like a hybrid of the Cannes Film Festival and the Kentucky Derby—one must venture to the top of the world to find it at “White Turf St. Moritz.”
June 14, 2018 waynejames2014 famous horseraces, former senator Wayne James, glamorous horserace on frozen lake, glamorous horserace on snow, Gubelin Grand Prix of St. Moritz, horseracing, Kulm Hotel, Luxuries, Manly Manners, masculine luxuries, senator Wayne James, St. Moritz, Wayne James Leave a comment
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2008 on the Web: The 20 Key Events
By Sean P. Aune 2008-12-06 23:16:39 UTC
While 2008 has turned out to be quite an eventful year in tech, there were 20 key events that stood out and got people talking for days if not weeks after the moment had passed.
From the rise of major products and services to history making events, take a walk with us down memory lane as we revisit the moments, some better than others, that got all of us talking throughout the year.
Have more to add? Tell us in the comments!
Presidential Election - The Internet played a large part in the 2008 US Presidential election. From President Elect Barack Obama's fund raising to his decision to post his weekly address on YouTube, you can easily call this the first election that the Internet played more than a passing roll in.
Data Portability - Users of social networks have been in a minor war with their social overlords over who really owns their data. Slowly the users are winning; MySpace Data Availability came about in May, and one day later we learned about Facebook Connect. Not to be outdone, Google came out a few days after that with Friend Connect, which works with any website via just a couple lines of code. We went from lots of walled gardens to suddenly everyone sharing the love.
Application Platforms - Applications, applications, applications. Just about everywhere you turned this year there was some new "application platform" launching or growing. Though Facebook got the jump by launching its platform in May of 2007, it was almost like they set off a whole new frenzy with "application" as the new buzz word. MySpace Applications came about in March, the Apple App Store was in July, and who knows what else will be coming down the pike in 2009.
Apple App Store - Apple launched the App Store in July for the iPhone and iPod Touch, and the race was on as everyone tried to port their sites and services onto the popular gadgets. Just five months later and they have served millions of applications and have surpassed over 10,000 available applications, it looks like there is no sign of them slowing down.
Citizen Journalism - While citizen journalism has been around for a while now, it really took off with the introduction of services such as CNN's iReport and CBS EyeMobile showing up on the iPhone. Even Twitter turned into a bit of an ad hoc citizen journalism network as users broke stories the second they happened.
Android - Google was all over the board this year, and launching their own mobile phone OS was no different. The T-Mobile G1 was the first phone out of the gate to feature the new system, and an Android app store wasn't far behind. It may not be as exciting as the Apple App Store, but it is sure to grow with time.
Facebook Redesign - On July 20th of this year, Facebook launched their user profile redesign that had been rumored for ages, in limited release. In September they went wide with the new design, and within five minutes the first user group to demand a reversal to the old design was started. It seems to be settling in with people that this new design is here to stay, but you do still see the occasional rekindling of the redesign hatred.
Economic Downturn - While it's difficult to pin down when everything went wrong, there is no denying the affect the economic downturn has had on the Internet and the companies that inhabit it. We are sure to be feeling this throughout 2009 as venture capitalists pull back on their funding to companies, and everyone looks for ways to survive the economic downturn.
Streaming Television Shows - Hulu had a lot of awesome shows to watch in 2007, but really took off in 2008, and a lot of it was thanks to Saturday Night Live Presidential election sketches. Throughout the rest of the year, online viewership of television shows continued to grow to the point that the BBC extended how long shows would be on iPlayer, and they even recently said that shows would stream at the same time the show aired on regular television.
Rick Rolling - Every time someone declared Rick Rolling to be dead, it seemed to rise up like the mythical Phoenix. No matter how hard you tried, you just couldn't kill off this Internet meme, and when Rick Astley ended up in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on the Cartoon Network float to Rick Roll the entire country, you had to wonder if that was truly the end of it. Something seems to be saying that, no, it's still here for a while yet.
Google Chrome - Coming somewhat out of the blue, Google launched the Chrome browser via a comic book announcement. Despite the German security office warning their citizens away from using the browser, Google has still been able to get some people to switch full-time to their program, and it seems to be going nowhere but up.
Video - With services like Qik becoming more readily available, everyone is turning into a video producer. Whether it be video for budding citizen journalists, posting endless streams of videos to YouTube, or streaming video because you're stuck in an airport, it feels like everyone has hopped on board.
Twitter - Twitter felt like it came into its own in 2008. Despite being around for a few years, this year showed explosive growth. More celebrities joined Twitter, members of Motrinmoms got a company to change their advertising and on the flip side, members started advertising with Twittad and the like. In short, what started as a niche way to pass time turned into a major social media tool for just about everyone.
Convergence - Online video is all well and good, but users no longer want to be tied to watching their favorite videos on just the computer itself. Netflix brought their streaming video to devices like the Roku box and the Xbox 360. DivX made it possible to stream files in their codec to your TV via a media streamer, and Joost released an application for the iPhone and iPod Touch that allows you to watch any of their 46,000+ videos anywhere you have access to Wi-Fi. Online videos crave to be free, and convergence with other devices is how it is happening.
Podcasting - More and more people are getting into podcasting as services like Talkshoe make it as easy as picking up your phone to make one. Companies such as Wizzard Media are showing continued growth each quarter, and seeing as their life blood is podcast distribution, it means it must be growing in some way.
Microhoo - At the end of 2007 we heard the first mutterings of the proposed purchase of Yahoo by Microsoft, and those mutterings quickly turned into a thunderous roar that continued throughout the year. Even when Microsoft said they were officially done with the idea of this purchase, people have continued to bring up rumors of the possibility.
Justin.tv suicide - 19-year-old Abraham K. Biggs committed suicide live on Justin.tv. Though not enough time has passed for us to be able to tell its lasting effects yet, it is almost impossible to think that we won't someday look back at this as a turning point of some kind for the Internet culture.
Old Media/Death of Print Media - Just about everyone and their horse is saying that old media is in its death throes. Mashable contributor Alana Taylor dared to take on NYU's journalism program and ended up becoming part of a larger story on the web. Add in stories like the Christian Science Monitor going online only, and there's no doubt that old media and new media are most certainly on a collision course, and it isn't looking good for the old printed format.
Firefox 3 - After what seemed like an endless wait, on June 17th Mozilla released Firefox 3 final on the world. They were so determined to break the record for the number of downloads in one day that there were multiple tools to track the progress of the Firefox downloads. They did meet their goal despite having site problems throughout the day due to traffic.
Sarah Lacy - Sarah Lacy was mainly known for her work at Businessweek until that fateful day at SXSW where her interview of Mark Zuckerberg turned into a revolt. Twitter turned into a virtual lynch mob, and Ms. Lacy was quick to blame a lack of innovation at SXSW for the attitudes. Whatever the cause was, it was fascinating to watch the sea of hate on Twitter grow into a virtual tsunami in a matter of moments.
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, Rellas
Topics: 2008, Abraham Biggs, Android, app store (iOS) , Apple, citizen journalism, Current Events Lists, data portability, economic downturn, Firefox, Google Chrome, hulu, Microhoo, motrinmoms, rick rolling, sarah lacy, Tech, Twitter, web
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Tennis birthdays - April 10, 2010
Manon Bollegraf (NED), 46.
She was a top-30 player in singles in her day, and reached No. 4 in doubles, with 26 titles. She won four Grand Slam mixed doubles titles.
She still plays some senior events. In the Open Court photo at right from Wimbledon 2008, she playing in the legends’ event with partner Carling Bassett of Canada.
Andy Ram (ISR), 30.
Ram, born in Uruguay, moved to Israel when he was 5. He and partner Jonathan Erlich won both the Australian Open and the big event at Indian Wells in 2008, but an injury to Erlich cut short their season.
Erlich missed a fair amount of time, and that was pretty much it for their very successful partnership, other than Davis Cup.
Ram played with Max Mirnyi in 2009 (they won the big event in Miami together), but Mirnyi has scaled back his play and is teaming up with Mahesh Bhupathi this season.
He has hooked up with the astonishing Michael Llodra this season.
A year ago, Ram was in the middle of a lot of controversy when, in the wake of the refusal by Dubai to allow Israeli Shahar Peer into the country, Ram was allowed in the following week to play in the men’s event.
Oscar Hernandez (ESP), 32
One of the legions of Spanish clay-courters just a notch below the top players, Hernandez is currently No. 84 and was winless on the ATP Tour this season before beating No. 5 seed Paul-Henri Mathieu in the first round of Casablanca this week (he lost in the second round to Potito Starace).
His peak was No. 48 in 2007.
Rui Machado (POR), 26
The journeyman is currently at a career-high No. 102, a late bloomer who finally made his first Grand Slam main draw at the 2008 U.S. Open, at age 24.
ATP Tour - April 10, 2010 (results) WTA Tour - April 10, 2010 (final results)
NY Mets 14 Final
Seattle 2 Bot
Tampa Bay 4:05 PT5:05 MT6:05 CT7:05 ET19:05 ET23:05 GMT7:05 4:05 MST6:05 EST5:05 CST6:35 VEN3:05 UAE (+1)6:05 CT
Cincinnati 2 Bot
San Francisco 6 Top
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Culture, Relationships Steven Blum March 29, 2018
The Straight Men Who Strip at Gay Bars
Derek Nelson, a spiky-haired beefcake from rural Pennsylvania, had just lost his job at the Hollywood Wax Museum when he was approached by a Hollywood producer with an intriguing proposition: Go-go dancing for gay guys.
“Literally the next night, I’m on stage dancing in my underwear,” Nelson remembers. “The casting agent says, ‘You have a huge dick; you’re hired.’ That was the entire audition.”
Nelson wasn’t super well-acquainted with the LGBT community at the time. “I knew almost nothing,” he says. “I was pretty open as a teen, though. When gay marriage was proposed, I was like, ‘Yeah, gay people should have the right to be as miserable as the rest of us.’ But if you would’ve told me in high school that I’d grow up to strip for gay guys, I’d have said you were crazy.”
Today, he’s part of a large contingent of strippers in gay bars who like women. As chronicled in the reality TV show What Happens at the Abbey, Nelson and others are proof that L.A.’s queer nightlife runs on the sex appeal of beautiful men with no interest in other men. “On any given night, I’d say anywhere from 30 to 50 percent of the go-go dancers at the gay bars in L.A. are straight,” says Nelson. A web series he created, called Down with David, is also about the trials and tribulations of a totally straight dancer who works in gay bars.
The question is: Why are straight men taking these jobs? Surely, the gay community has the abs to staff a fleet of go-go dancers for every occasion. But you’re forgetting the way the straight man views the gay bar in 2018: as an ideal venue for picking up women.
In forums like Bodybuilding.com, shredded men talk about their experiences dancing for gay clientele. “It’s really not that gay,” insists one user from California. Instead, he characterizes the job as self-affirming. “You’re not only making money off your looks, but you also feel you are more confident than most men because you’re comfortable enough in your sexuality to pull it off,” he writes. “Plus, girls love the idea too — they ask so many questions about it and get semi-jealous and horny when you tell them you gotta go dance that night.”
In What Happens at the Abbey, which focuses on the travails of the famed gay club’s bartenders and dancers (think Vanderpump Rules, minus the self-aware editing), much of the melodrama revolves around the straight leads, who use their “sexually-progressive” jobs to get laid. “I bartend at the Abbey because the Abbey is the best place to pick up girls,” says one bartender. “They’re pretty slutty. When I add their numbers to my phone, I put a slice of pizza by their names. It’s pizza: It’s not going to be the greatest thing you’ve ever eaten, but if you want it, you can probably get it in about 30 minutes or less.” The show was so rife with straight-on-straight action that The Advocate ran an article asking “Is the Abbey Still a Gay Bar?”
This isn’t to say that straight bartenders have been universally accepted by gay establishments. A widely covered lawsuit in 2013 alleged that Micky’s bar in West Hollywood was discriminating against straight bartenders and dancers, forcing them out of their jobs because “management didn’t like having heterosexual employees.” (They’d only be allowed to continue dancing if they kept their straight identities secret.) According to Matthew Paul Krupnick, who represented the straight dancers, the case was eventually settled for an undisclosed sum.
Nelson, though, says he feels accepted by the LGBT community. He’s stripped in both famous bars and holes-in-the-wall: In Texas, he danced at a gay bar with a changing room so small that he couldn’t even eat his lunch in peace. “One time, a guy next to me was rubbing one out so he could put on a cock ring and he got his lube all over my salad.”
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdoBalseBQOagcVtQtQXz2y9II4ac7Or4
The only local gay establishment where he refuses to dance is Fubar. The dark club, which draws an eclectic crowd of teens and the occasional homeless drunk, has a certain lawless feel. “The only time I danced there I made $2 and was scared for my life,” he says.
In general, the gay guys he encounters are respectful, but if anyone gets too grabby, he’ll slap their hand or give them a very gentle kick. He puts up with the constant EDM remixes of Britney songs for two important reasons: the money and the girls. “Girls in L.A. are approached by dudes a million times a day,” he says. “Gay bars are the only places where they can really let their guards down.”
Dancing for gays is also what led Ivan, another straight dancer, to meet his wife, who introduced herself after one of his performances. “She might not like that I have this job but she also accepts it because it’s how we met,” he says. Ivan is a swole man with a nose ring and massive tattoo across his right shoulder. He was born in Moscow and moved to L.A. three years ago in the hopes of furthering his acting career. On Instagram, where he’s attracted a healthy 30,000 followers, he describes himself as a dancer, actor, parkour athlete and samurai. (He declines, though, to give me his real name — i.e., Ivan is a pseudonym.)
Ivan’s introduction to queer nightlife came early — before he moved to the U.S., he performed as part of a variety act in one of Moscow’s underground gay bars. “It was more of a theatrical show with women, like Vegas-style,” he says.
On weeknights and weekends, patrons ogle and stare as he humps the air, slides down poles and swings from the rafters at a gay bar along the tony Boystown stretch of West Hollywood. On the night I watched him perform, he stopped undulating his abs just long enough for a group of middle-aged women to stuff dollar bills down his crotch. “I fucking love these gay people,” he tells me later. “Everyone is really sweet and friendly. I feel blessed to have found this community.”
Naturally, the transformation of gay bars into straight hookup spots has inspired plenty of hand-wringing in the queer community. Henry Hank Scott, who edits West Hollywood’s local blog, Wehoville, sees a correlation between hiring straight men in gay bars and the creeping gentrification of the gay community. “There’s a lot of talk about the homogenization of gay culture in Boystown and where we’re headed,” he says. “When you see a straight sports bar moving into the center of town, and women in Gold Coast, which was once the ultimate gay bar for older guys, it isn’t surprising to learn that a lot of the bartenders are straight.”
In general, gay culture has been shameless about using hetero men to sell things. Out Magazine, for one, has long adorned their covers with hunky straight allies, eschewing queer people of color. It’s easy to feel cynical about these ploys for our dollars and attention. But it isn’t just the orientations of the dancers that bothers Scott, it’s also the sameness of body types on display — i.e., each and every dancer is a similarly buff 20-something.
Of course, no matter the shape or size, it’s all still a mirage — and ultimately, a frustrating one at that. Or as one bargoer tells me, “I feel like the bar is playing this not-so-subtle trick on us. You can look, and you can even touch, but you sure as hell can’t have.”
Steven Blum
The Trans Men Who Get Abortions
Why Kevin Smith’s Infamous Wife Tweet Is Still Breaking Brains — 10 Years Later
Ryan O’Connell Dares You to Ignore Him
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Deepening in Alaska indigenous languages
July 26, 2008 at 2:38 pm | Posted in Language, Naming | Leave a comment
Tags: ahtna, Alaska, aleut, alutiiq, center, central yup'ik, definition, deg hit'an, dena'ina, eyak, fairbanks, gwich'in, haida, hän, holikachuk, iñupiaq, iingit, koyukon, Language, languages, map, Naming, Research, siberian yupik, tanacross, tanana, Terminology, tsimshian, university, upper kuskokwim, upper tanana
Few months ago I promised to deepen in the Alaska Native Languages Center of the University of Alaska Fairbanks. So did I, and I listed all the languages they describe ont heir site:
Aleut: Unangax^ (Aleut) is one branch of the Eskimo-Aleut language family. Its territory in Alaska encompasses the Aleutian Islands, the Pribilof Islands, and the Alaska Peninsula west of Stepovak Bay. Unangax^ is a single language divided at Atka Island into the Eastern and the Western dialects. Of a population of about 2,200 Unangax^, about 300 speak the language. This language was formerly called Aleut, a general term for introduced by Russian explorers and fur traders to refer to Native Alaskan of the Aleutian Islands, the Alaska Peninsula, Kodiak Island, and Prince William Sound (see the section on the Alutiiq language). The term Unangax^ means ‘person’ and probably derives from the root una, which refers to the seaside. The plural form ‘people’ is pronounced Unangas in the western dialect and Unangan in the eastern dialect, and these terms are also sometimes used to refer to the language. The indigenous term for the language is Unangam
Alutiiq: Alutiiq (Sugpiaq) is a Pacific Gulf variety of Yupik Eskimo spoken in two dialects from the Alaska Peninsula to Prince William Sound, including Kodiak Island. Of a total population of about 3,000 Alutiiq people, about 400 still speak the language. Although traditionally the people called themselves Sugpiaq (suk ‘person’ plus -piaq ‘real’), the name Alutiiq was adopted from a Russian plural form of Aleut, which Russian invaders applied to the Native people they encountered from Attu to Kodiak. Closely related to Central Alaskan Yup’ik, the Alutiiq language is divided into the Koniag and the Chugach dialects. Koniag Alutiiq is spoken on the upper part of the Alaska Peninsula and Kodiak Island (and Afognak Island before it was deserted following the 1964 earthquake). Chugach Alutiiq is spoken on the Kenai Peninsula from English Bay and Port Graham to Prince William Sound where it meets Eyak. The first work on Alutiiq literacy was done by Russian Orthodox monks Herman and Gideon and the talented student Chumovitski, although their progress continued only until about 1807 and almost none of their work survives. After that, a few others – notably Tyzhnov, Uchilishchev, and Zyrianov – worked on the language during the Russian period, producing a translation of Matthew, a Catechism, and primer, but they achieved less success than those who worked in Aleut. The first modern linguistic work on Alutiiq was done by Irene Reed in the early 1960s and by Jeff Leer beginning in 1973. Leer has produced both a grammar and a dictionary of Koniag Alutiiq for classroom use.
Ahtna: Ahtna Athabascan is the language of the Copper River and the upper Susitna and Nenana drainages in eight communities. The total population is about is about 500 with perhaps 80 speakers. The first extensive linguistic work on Ahtna was begun in 1973 by James Kari, who published a comprehensive dictionary of the language in 1990.
Central Alaskan Yup’ik: Central Alaskan Yup’ik lies geographically and linguistically between Alutiiq and Siberian Yupik. The use of the apostrophe in Central Alaskan Yup’ik, as opposed to Siberian Yupik, denotes a long p. The word Yup’ik represents not only the language but also the name for the people themselves (yuk ‘person’ plus pik ‘real’.) Central Alaskan Yup’ik is the largest of the state’s Native languages, both in the size of its population and the number of speakers. Of a total population of about 21,000 people, about 10,000 are speakers of the language. Children still grow up speaking Yup’ik as their first language in 17 of 68 Yup’ik villages, those mainly located on the lower Kuskokwim River, on Nelson Island, and along the coast between the Kuskokwim River and Nelson Island. The main dialect is General Central Yup’ik, and the other four dialects are Norton Sound, Hooper Bay-Chevak, Nunivak, and Egegik. In the Hooper Bay-Chevak and Nunivak dialects, the name for the language and the people is “Cup’ik” (pronounced Chup-pik). Early linguistic work in Central Yup’ik was done primarily by Russian Orthodox, then Jesuit Catholic and Moravian missionaries, leading to a modest tradition of literacy used in letter writing. In the 1960s, Irene Reed and others at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks developed a modern writing system for the language, and their work led to the establishment of the state’s first school bilingual programs in four Yup’ik villages in the early 1970s. Since then a wide variety of bilingual materials has been published, as well as Steven Jacobson’s comprehensive dictionary of the language and his complete practical classroom grammar, and story collections and narratives by many others including a full novel by Anna Jacobson.
Deg Xinag: Deg Xinag (also Deg Hit’an; formerly known by the pejorative Ingalik) is the Athabascan language of Shageluk and Anvik and of the Athabascans at Holy Cross below Grayling on the lower Yukon River. Of a total population of about 275 Ingalik people, about 40 speak the language. A collection of traditional folk tales by the elder Belle Deacon was published in 1987, and a literacy manual in 1993.
Dena’ina: Dena’ina (Tanaina) is the Athabascan language of the Cook Inlet area with four dialects on the Kenai Peninsula, Upper Inlet area above Anchorage, and coastal and inland areas of the west side of Cook Inlet. Of the total population of about 900 people, about 75 speak the language. James Kari has done extensive work on the language since 1972, including his edition with Alan Boraas of the collected writings of Peter Kalifornsky in 1991.
Eyak: Eyak is not an Athabascan language, but a coordinate sub-branch to Athabascan as a whole in the Athabascan-Eyak branch of the Athabascan-Eyak-Tlingit language family. Eyak was spoken in the 19th century from Yakutat along the southcentral Alaska coast to Eyak at the Copper River delta, but by the 20th century only at Eyak. It is now represented by about 50 people but no surviving fluent speakers.only one remaining speaker, born in 1920 and living in Anchorage. Comprehensive documentation of Eyak has been carried out since the 1960s by Michael Krauss, including his edition of traditional stories, historic accounts, and poetic compositions by Anna Nelson Harry. The name Eyak itself is not an Eyak word but instead derives from the Chugach Eskimo name (Igya’aq) of the Eyak village site near the mouth of Eyak River (Krauss 2006:199). The Chugach word Igya’aq is a general term referring to ‘the outlet of a lake into a river.’
With the passing of Marie Smith Jones (pictured above with linguist Michael Krauss) on January 21, 2008 Eyak became the first Alaska Native language to become extinct in recent history.
Gwich’in: Gwich’in (Kutchin) is the Athabascan language spoken in the northeastern Alaska villages of Arctic Village, Venetie, Fort Yukon, Chalkyitsik, Circle, and Birch Creek, as well as in a wide adjacent area of the Northwest Territories and the Yukon Territory. The Gwich’in population of Alaska is about 1,100, and of that number about 300 are speakers of the language. Gwich’in has had a written literature since the 1870s, when Episcopalian missionaries began extensive work on the language. A modern writing system was designed in the 1960s by Richard Mueller, and many books, including story collections and linguistic material, have been published by Katherine Peter, Jeff Leer, Lillian Garnett, Kathy Sikorski, and others.
Haida: Haida (Xa’ida) is the language of the southern half of Prince of Wales Island in the villages of Hyadaburg, Kasaan, and Craig, as well as a portion of the city of Ketchikan. About 600 Haida people live in Alaska, and about 15 of the most elderly of those speak the language. Haida is considered a linguistic isolate with no proven genetic relationship to any language family. A modern writing system was developed in 1972.
Han: Hän is the Athabascan language spoken in Alaska at the village of Eagle and in the Yukon Territory at Dawson. Of the total Alaskan Hän population of about 50 people, perhaps 12 speak the language. A writing system was established in the 1970s, and considerable documentation has been carried out at the Alaska Native Language Center as well as at the Yukon Native Language Centre in Whitehorse.
Holikachuk: Holikachuk is the Athabascan language of the Innoko River, formerly spoken at the village of Holikachuk, which has moved to Grayling on the lower Yukon River. Holikachuk, which is intermediate between Ingalik and Koyukon, was identified as a separate language in the 1970s. The total population is about 200, and of those perhaps 12 speak the language.
Inupiaq:Inupiaq is spoken throughout much of northern Alaska and is closely related to the Canadian Inuit dialects and the Greenlandic dialects, which may collectively be called “Inuit” or Eastern Eskimo, distinct from Yupik or Western Eskimo. Alaskan Inupiaq includes two major dialect groups ? North Alaskan Inupiaq and Seward Peninsula Inupiaq. North Alaskan Inupiaq comprises the North Slope dialect spoken along the Arctic Coast from Barter Island to Kivalina, and the Malimiut dialect found primarily around Kotzebue Sound and the Kobuk River. Seward Peninsula Inupiaq comprises the Qawiaraq dialect found principally in Teller and in the southern Seward Peninsula and Norton Sound area, and the Bering Strait dialect spoken in the villages surrounding Bering Strait and on the Diomede Islands. Dialect differences involve vocabulary and suffixes (lexicon) as well as sounds (phonology). North Slope and Malimiut are easily mutually intelligible, although there are vocabulary differences (tupiq means ?tent? in North Slope and ?house? in Malimiut; iglu is ?house? in North Slope) and sound differences (?dog? is qimmiq in North Slope and qipmiq in Malimiut). Seward Peninsula and North Alaskan dialects differ significantly from each other, and a fair amount of experience is required for a speaker of one to understand the dialect of the other. The name “Inupiaq,” meaning “real or genuine person” (inuk ?person? plus -piaq ?real, genuine?), is often spelled “Iñupiaq,” particularly in the northern dialects. It can refer to a person of this group (“He is an Inupiaq”) and can also be used as an adjective (“She is an Inupiaq woman”). The plural form of the noun is “Inupiat,” referring to the people collectively (“the Inupiat of the North Slope”). Alaska is home to about 13,500 Inupiat, of whom about 3,000, mostly over age 40, speak the language. The Canadian Inuit population of 31,000 includes about 24,000 speakers. In Greenland, a population of 46,400 includes 46,000 speakers.
Koyukon: Koyukon occupies the largest territory of any Alaskan Athabascan language. It is spoken in three dialects – Upper, Central, and Lower – in 11 villages along the Koyukuk and middle Yukon rivers. The total current population is about 2,300, of whom about 300 speak the language. The Jesuit Catholic missionary Jules Jette did extensive work on the language from 1899-1927. Since the early 1970s, native Koyukon speaker Eliza Jones has produced much linguistic material for use in schools and by the general public.
Siberian Yupik / St. Lawrence Island Yupik: Siberian Yupik (also St. Lawrence Island Yupik) is spoken in the two St. Lawrence Island villages of Gambell and Savoonga. The language of St. Lawrence Island is nearly identical to the language spoken across the Bering Strait on the tip of the Siberian Chukchi Peninsula. The total Siberian Yupik population in Alaska is about 1,100, and of that number about 1,050 speak the language. Children in both Gambell and Savoonga still learn Siberian Yupik as the first language of the home. Of a population of about 900 Siberian Yupik people in Siberia, there are about 300 speakers, although no children learn it as their first language. Although much linguistic and pedagogical work had been published in Cyrillic on the Siberian side, very little was written for St. Lawrence Island until the 1960s when linguists devised a modern orthography. Researchers at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks revised that orthography in 1971, and since then a wide variety of curriculum materials, including a preliminary dictionary and a practical grammar, have become available for the schools. Siberian Yupik is a distinct language from Central Alaskan Yup’ik. Notice that the former is spelled without an apostrophe.
(Lower) Tanana: Tanana Athabascan is now spoken only at Nenana and Minto on the Tanana River below Fairbanks. The Athabascan population of those two villages is about 380, of whom about 30, the youngest approaching age 60, speak the language. Michael Krauss did the first major linguistic fieldwork on this language beginning in 1961, and this was continued by James Kari. Recent publications in the language include the 1992 edition of stories told by Teddy Charlie as recorded by Krauss in 1961, and a preliminary dictionary compiled by Kari in 1994.
Tanacross Athabascan: Tanacross is the ancestral language of the Mansfield-Ketchumstock and Healy Lake-Jospeph Village bands. It is spoken today at Healy Lake, Dot Lake, and Tanacross on the middle Tanana River. The total population is about 220, of whom about 65 speak the language. A practical alphabet was established in 1973 and a few booklets have been published at the Alaska Native Language Center, but Tanacross remains one of the least documented of Alaska Native languages.
(Upper) Tanana: Upper Tanana Athabascan is spoken mainly in the Alaska villages of Northway, Tetlin, and Tok, but has a small population also across the border in Canada. The Alaskan population is about 300, of whom perhaps 105 speak the language. During the 1960s, Paul Milanowski established a writing system, and he worked with Alfred John to produce several booklets and a school dictionary for use in bilingual programs.
Tlingit: Tlingit (Łingít) is the language of coastal Southeastern Alaska from Yakutat south to Ketchikan. The total Tlingit population in Alaska is about 10,000 in 16 communities with about 500 speakers of the language. Tlingit is one branch of the Athabascan-Eyak-Tlingit language family. A practical writing system was developed in the 1960s, and linguists such as Constance Naish, Gillian Story, Richard and Nora Dauenhauer, and Jeff Leer have documented the language through a number of publications, including a verb dictionary, a noun dictionary, and a collection of ancient legends and traditional stories by Tlingit elder Elizabeth Nyman.
Tsimshian: Tsimshian has been spoken at Metlakatla on Annette Island in the far southeastern corner of Alaska since the people moved there from Canada in 1887 under the leadership of missionary William Duncan. Currently, of the 1,300 Tsimshian people living in Alaska, not more than 70 of the most elderly speak the language. Franz Boas did extensive research on the language in the early 1900s, and in 1977 the Metlakatlans adopted a standard practical orthography for use also by the Canadian Coast Tsimshians.
Tunuu: although the early Russian fur trade was exploitative and detrimental to the Aleut population as a whole, linguists working through the Russian Orthodox Church made great advances in literacy and helped foster a society that grew to be remarkably bilingual in Russian and Unangax^. The greatest of these Russian Orthodox linguists was Ivan Veniaminov who, beginning in 1824, worked with Aleut speakers to develop a writing system and translate religious and educational material into the native language. In modern times the outstanding academic contributor to Unangax^ linguistics is Knut Bergsland who from 1950 until his death in 1998 worked with Unangax^ speakers such as William Dirks Sr. and Moses Dirks – now himself a leading Unangax^ linguist – to design a modern writing system for the language and develop bilingual curriculum materials including school dictionaries for both dialects. In 1994 Bergsland produced a comprehensive Unangax^ dictionary, and in 1997 a detailed reference grammar.
Upper Kuskokwim: Upper Kuskokwim Athabascan is spoken in the villages of Nikolai, Telida, and McGrath in the Upper Kuskokwim River drainage. Of a total population of about 160 people, about 40 still speak the language. Raymond Collins began linguistic work at Nikolai in 1964, when he established a practical orthography. Since then he has worked with Betty Petruska to produce many small booklets and a school dictionary for use in the bilingual program.
I have to compare this list of languages with the one provided by Ethnologue, but in case of non-coincidence I think that the ANLC is more reliable, as they work shoulder to shoulder with them.
March 31, 2008 at 10:23 pm | Posted in Alaska, Language, Research | 1 Comment
Tags: ahtna, Alaska, aleut, alutiiq, center, central yup'ik, deg hit'an, dena'ina, eyak, fairbanks, gwich'in, haida, hän, holikachuk, iñupiaq, iingit, koyukon, Language, languages, map, Research, siberian yupik, tanacross, tanana, tsimshian, university, upper kuskokwim, upper tanana
As I told you in another post, I’m a linguist, a philologist to be accurate. So one of the main guidelines of my trip will be the study languages, probably. I suppose it is impossible not to be a bit influenced by that, and it is usually an interesting approach when traveling, as it offers a way of approaching people on the way. So, when on my last post I found out about language research concerning Arctic languages I decided to follow the thread. And it leads to Alaska Native Language Center:
The Alaska Native Language Center was established by state legislation in 1972 as a center for research and documentation of the twenty Native languages of Alaska. It is internationally known and recognized as the major center in the United States for the study of Eskimo and Northern Athabascan languages. ANLC publishes its research in story collections, dictionaries, grammars, and research papers. The center houses an archival collection of more than 10,000 items, virtually everything written in or about Alaska Native languages, including copies of most of the earliest linguistic documentation, along with significant collections about related languages outside Alaska. Staff members provide materials for bilingual teachers and other language workers throughout the state, assist social scientists and others who work with Native languages, and provide consulting and training services to teachers, school districts, and state agencies involved in bilingual education. The ANLC staff also participates in teaching through the Alaska Native Language Program which offers major and minor degrees in Central Yup’ik and Inupiaq Eskimo at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. An AAS degree or a Certificate in Native Language Education is also available. The center continues to strive to raise public awareness of the gravity of language loss worldwide but particularly in the North. Of the state’s twenty Native languages, only two (Siberian Yupik in two villages on St. Lawrence Island, and Central Yup’ik in seventeen villages in southwestern Alaska) are spoken by children as the first language of the home. Like every language in the world, each of those twenty is of inestimable human value and is worthy of preservation. ANLC, therefore, continues to document, cultivate, and promote those languages as much as possible and thus contribute to their future and to the heritage of all Alaskans.
Alaska Native Languages
Aleut | Alutiiq | Iñupiaq | Central Yup’ik | Siberian Yupik | Tsimshian | Haida | lingit | Eyak | Ahtna | Dena’ina | Deg Hit’an | Holikachuk | Upper Kuskokwim | Koyukon | Tanana | Tanacross | Upper Tanana | Gwich’in | Hän
Classes and Degree Programs
There are 20 different Alaska Native languages: Aleut, Alutiiq (also called Aleut or Sugpiaq), Central Yup’ik Eskimo, St. Lawrence Island Eskimo, Inupiaq Eskimo, Tsimshian, Haida, Tlingit and Eyak and 11 Athabascan languages. These languages are becoming recognized as the priceless heritage they truly are.
Since the passage of the Alaska Bilingual Education Law in 1972 there has been a demand for teachers who can speak and teach these languages in the schools throughout the state where there are Native children. Professional opportunities for those skilled in these languages exist in teaching, research and cultural, educational and political development.
Central Yup’ik Eskimo is spoken by the largest number of people, and Inupiaq by the next largest. In these two languages major and minor curricula are now offered. Courses are also regularly offered in Kutchin (Gwich’in) Athabascan. For work in all other languages, individual or small-group instruction is offered under special topics. Thus there have frequently been instruction, seminars, and workshops also in Tlingit, Haida, St. Lawrence Island Eskimo, Aleut and Koyukon, comparative Eskimo and comparative Athabascan.
UAF is unique in offering this curriculum, which benefits also from the research staff and library of the Alaska Native Language Center.
Degree Programs Offered: Minor in Alaska Native Languages, B.A. or Minor in Iñupiaq or Yup’ik Eskimo, A.A.S. or Certificate in Native Language Education, M.A. in Applied Linguistics.
You can also check out their staff and publications. They also have an interesting “Resources” page, I will deal with it later.
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U.S. TRADEMARK PROTECTION, JAY Z, JAYBO- NEGRO SIMIAN HOMINOID CARICATURE, SATANIC MONKEY GODS & TRIBES
JAY Z, SATANISTS, THE MONKEY & 4:44
I didn’t know about Jay Z and the Jaybo Monkey Caricature for mass global exploitation and consumption until just a couple of days ago. On his recent high profile international corporate mass media appearance on CNN’s Van Jones Show just before the 2018 Primetime Emmy Awards ceremony, they didn’t discuss Jaybo, the Simian Hominoid Caricature. However, Jay Z’s album “4:44” featuring Jaybo leads all artists with 8 (eight) nods (nominations).
Jay Z’s soul was up for sale long ago.
Jay Z is a Satanist, a Crowleyite- follower of Aleister Crowley. The Great BEAST 666 Aleister Crowley was a vicious racist. The Equinox (subtitle: “The Review of Scientific Illuminism“) is a series of publications in book form that serves as the official organ of the magical order A.A. founded by Crowley. In texts, Crowley makes two very startling direct occult associations of simian and hominoid with black people.
“The servant of Hermes, a negro uglier than an ape.” (Adonis, published in The Equinox, Vol. 1, No. 7)
“HERMES. Bring the old Chian. Hanuman! [The negro goes to obey. This joke- Is the accepted way of scaring folks …. ” (Adonis, published in The Equinox, Vol. No. 7)
Hermes, the God of Wisdom, known in Egypt, Syria, and Canaan as THOTH. The commonest symbolic forms of Thoth’s attendant, the dog-headed (hominid) APE. In the Judgment Scene of the Book of the Dead the dog-headed APE (Āān) is seated on the top of the beam of the Balance in which the heart of the deceased is weighed; his duty apparently is to watch the pointer and tell his master Thoth when the beam is level. Elsewhere, it symbolizes the equinoxes; but this does not explain the APE.
Part human-part monkey, Hanuman is a central character in the Hindu epic Ramayana. He is generally depicted as a man with the face of a (simian) monkey and a long tail. The Ramayana describes him as an ideal devotee of Lord Ram. According to the epic, Hanuman and his vaanar sena – an army of monkeys – help Ram in his battle against Ravana, the Sri Lankan demon king who kidnaps his wife Sita.
Jaybo, the Simian Hominoid Caricature is very similar to both Hanuman, and the Ape of Thoth.
Black Satanic Cult Brotherhood 666- Van Jones, Beyonce & Jay Z
Beyonce and Jay Z are extremely scary advanced high level and elite Satanists. Vann Jones is a fellow at The Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS)- a secret high level affiliate and front of the CIA Occult Bureau. According to Jack Sarfatti, a “very, very sophisticated and successful covert psychological warfare operation run by the late Brendan O Regan of the Institute of Noetic Sciences and the late Harold Chipman who was the CIA station chief responsible for all mind-control research in the Bay Area in the 70s.”
Former NASA astronaut Edgar Mitchell, founder of IONS, revealed that he had briefed then CIA director George Bush on the activities and results of the IONS mind control (MK ULTRA/MONARCH) experiments. (Mitchell, Edgar, The Way of the Explorer, GP Putnam’s Sons, 1996, pg 91). Russell Targ, “How I was a Psychic Spy for the CIA and found God,” INSTITUTE FOR NOETIC SCIENCE (IONS), November 2003. (See Alex Constantine, Virtual Government: CIA Mind Control Operations in America, Feral House, Port Townsend, WA (1997), pg. 139)
Tonight, Jay Z is up for 8 (eight) nods for Emmy Awards for his “Jay: Z 4:44″ album. It is not per se a musical album. Many have wondered what the numeral title really means. Beyonce says Jay: Z 4:44 represents the number 4 in significant events of their lives. However, they are Satanists. The numbers represents events alright, but mystic and occult phenomenon.
It reads Jay (:-medium-length breath) Z, Four (:-medium-length breath)- Forty-Four. The colon punctuation is traced back to Ancient Kemet. Jay: Z 4:44 reads like an expression of a spell, inclination or enchantment.
In Kemet, 4 (four) is the number of totality and completeness. We see: four sides of pyramids, the four sons of Horus, four magical bricks, four pillars of the sky, four elder spirits, four cardinal points (directions: north, south, east, west). The ritual of the king’s coronation used the four directions: four arrows were shot to the four cardinal points and four birds released. The symbolic use of the number four is frequently the one of completeness, the completeness of a square.
Z is the Canaanite Zeyin adopted as Zeta of the Greeks. Ancient sages and kabbalists see the Hebrew Z- zayin as signifying power: It’s seventh and is shaped like a weapon (sword or Axe). It is the most important symbol of the ancient nomads and barbarians that sweep across the land of milk and honey, Heliopolis- ON (Baalbek), Canaan, and subsequently Kemet. In the 21st century, it remains the symbol of the Luciferians that seek to destroy Christianity.
There is a legend about all the letters presenting themselves before God and asking him to start creating the world with them (according to the idea that the letters are Gods bricks of creation, pieces of his eternal Lego). Zayin wants to be the cornerstone by virtue of being seventh, like the day on which the Sabbath is observed. God refuses: it’s unfit to be the basis of creation, as it denotes fighting and war. The Greeks internalized the Z in Zeus. Zeus is the sky and thunder god in ancient Greek religion, who ruled as king of the gods of Mount Olympus.
Modern Hebrew accepted zayin’s same connotations. References to arms in revitalized Hebrew is klei zayin, literally instruments of war.” The arms race was merutz ziyun and so forth. The Greek Zeta is also related to Zeus and the lightning bolt.
Crowley, 44, is the number of the Hebrew word for “BLOOD,” spelled with the Hebrew letters DM. (see Colin D. Campbell, Thelema, An Introduction to the Life, Works & Philosophy of Aleister Crowley, Colin Campbell % Llewellyn Worldwide, Woodbury, MN (2018))
The bottom line is Jay: Z 4:44 represents the Luciferian Blood Sacrifice; and War against Christianity.
JAY Z & THE SATANIC MONKEY TRADEMARK
Trademark Serial Number: 87517427
Word Mark: JAYBO
Status: 681 – Publication/Issue Review Complete
Status Date: 2018-01-05
Filing Date: 2017-07-06
Mark Drawing: 4000 – Standard character mark Typeset
Published for Opposition Date: 2018-02-13
Attorney Name: Brad D. Rose, Esq. 7 Times Square
212.326.0875 direct
Board Director, Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) [1] The RJC is a right–wing “pro-Israel” lobbying organization. Rose is a racist Donald J. Drumpf Republican Kabbalah- Zohar Zionist neocon. [2]
If JAYBO is so O.K., let him sport his JAYBO Caricature wear on the street in the presence of people of color; work and synagogue.
Law Office Assigned Location Code: L70
Employee Name: U.S. Attorney General, BUTLER, MIDGE FAE
THE RACIST MONKEY CARICATURES
A Caricature can be defined as: “A picture, description, or imitation of a person in which certain striking characteristics are exaggerated in order to create a comic or grotesque effect.”[3] Since at least the 18th century, grotesque (or grottoesque) has come to be used as a general adjective for the strange, hideous, ugly, incongruous, unpleasant, or disgusting. In art, performance, and literature, however, grotesque may also refer to something that simultaneously invokes in an audience a feeling of uncomfortable bizarreness as well as sympathetic pity.[4]
BOSKO & MONKEY RELATIVE
There is no doubt that JAYBO was created as a likeness of a Looney Tunes’s grandfather, BOSKO. Bosko was a classic example of a simian racial caricature deliberately manufactured in mass corporate media to marginalize, humiliate, denigrate black people. Bosko was copyrighted on January 3, 1928 as a less than human “NEGRO BOY”.
In his book, Of Mice and Magic, Leonard Maltin states that this early version of Bosko,
“was in fact a cartoonized version of a young black boy… he spoke in a Southern Negro dialect …”
REMEMBER THE TIME- THE SPLENDOR OF KEMET
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeiFF0gvqcc
With the exception of a bunch of sellout HollyWeird Satanic Black Cult members …
the overall Kemetic background imagery and theme in my opinion is incredibly stunning, beautiful and POWERFUL. Nevertheless, The idea that the various human “races” were created independently by God or evolved from separate ape/monkey ancestors, has its origins with 18th Century French intellectuals, e.g. Voltaire and Cuvier, who divided humanity into “civilized” Caucasians (= whites) created by God and “barbaric’ Negros (= blacks) derived from the “MONKEY TRIBE”. This tradition was continued by paleontologists, e.g. Louis Agassiz in the U.S. and in Europe by Karl Vogt. Despite Darwin’s detailed refutation of polygenism (theory of human origins) in his The Descent of Man (1871), polygenism was supported, in various guises; by eminent evolutionists (e.g. Alfred Russell Wallace and Ernst Haeckel compared Negroes to “four-handed” apes).[5]
Africa, Queen Ma’atkare (“Truth is the Soul of Ra) & the Divine Birth
The story of the “Divine Birth” goes back most demonstratively at least 5000 years ago to Africa (Kemet) and the most remarkable Pharaoh Queen “Ma’atkare” (“truth is the soul of Ra) better known as Hatshepsut (“Foremost of Noble Ladies”) 5th Pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty (1507–1458 BC), the ancient splendor of the Land of Kemet in AFRICA.[6]
Queen Ma’atkare’s Divine Birth and Coronation can be found at the Temple of Deir el Bahari, Egypt. In this, God Amun calls upon a meeting of gods to announce the coming of a great and powerful queen. Amun asks the gods to bestow upon her protection and riches. As for Amun, he promises to grant her power, “I will join for her the two lands in peace… I will give her all lands and all countries.” Amun is told by the God Thoth that Queen Ahmose is to have the divine child and introduces him to her. Upon this meeting, Amun causes Ahmose to “inhale the breath of life”.
QUEEN AHMOSE & THUTMOSE I
Thoth leads Amun to Ahmose’s chamber where he has taken the form of her husband, Thutmose I. Amun in disguise, presents to her the ankh of life in her hand and nostrils. They both sit on a couch supported by two goddesses, Neith and Selk. Afterwards, Amun informs Ahmose that she is to give birth to a powerful queen and she is to rule both lands of Upper and Lower Kemet.
QUEEN MA’ATKARE’S DIVINE BIRTH
After the encounter, Amun instructs Khnum, the potter, to construct Ma’atkare’s body and ka out of clay. Khnum bestows onto her “with life, health, and strength, and all gifts, I will make her appearance above the gods, because of her dignity of king of Upper and Lower Kemet.” Once finished, Khnum offers Ma’atkare and her ka to the god Heket, who presents them the ankh of life. After, Khnum again bestows more gifts of “offerings, all abundance.” as he praises the new queen with given divine power. Thoth relays the message to Ahmose that Ma’atkare is given “all the dignities which will be bestowed upon her, all title which will be added to her name, since she is to be the mother of such an illustrious offspring.” She is also given an important royal title of “the friend and consort of Horus”. Queen Ahmose is led into a chamber by Khnum and Heket, along with 12 gods and goddesses to help the birth and to protect Hatshepsut. Hatshepsut is born and held by her mother Queen Ahmose, and is shown suckling from the other gods, giving her life and divinity.[7]
It is the Africans that claim “Divine Descent” from the beginning of recorded history. According to Kemetic mythology, the gods descended from the belt of Orion and Sirius– the brightest star in the sky. The ancient Kemetic civilization firmly believed that from Sirius and Orion beings came in the form of humans– Ashur (Osiris) and Aset (Isis) and they instigated the human race.[8]
Queen Ma’atkare’s Nephew 6th Pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty- The Great Thutmose III
Furthermore, mass televised corporate and entertainment IMPLANTED false broad sweeping images of the people of the Land of Kemet …
Queen Ma’atkare …
Queen Hatshepsut
Queen Ahmose, Thutmose I and Thutmose III as non-blacks and “all white Europeans” ORIGINATORS …
while Africans have been turned into global trained master obedient “Monkey Tribes” [MONKEY SEE- MONKEY DO] creatures of the rain forests, wind and rain, thru collaborations with Satanic Prince Hall Freemasons like Jay-Z. It is a violation of our human rights.
RACISM: FROM THE STARS TO MONKEY TRIBES
In any case, while they argued about where to draw the race-monkey line, intellectuals of the day believed that apes and blacks were very similar. In this picture, from a book by Robert Knox called The Races of Men (1851), the slant of the brow is used to draw connections between the “Negro” and the “Oran Outan” and differences between those two and the “European.”[9]
The image above appeared in the The Evolution of Man (1874 edition) as part of an argument that blacks are evolutionarily close to APES.[10]
Adolf Hitler, autobiography Mein Kampf:
“It does not dawn upon this depraved bourgeois world that here one has actually to do with a sin against all reason; that it is a criminal absurdity to train a born half-ape [MONKEY SEE- MONKEY DO] until one believes a lawyer has been made of him, while millions of members of the highest culture race have to remain in entirely unworthy positions; that it is a sin against the will of the eternal Creator to let hundreds and hundreds of thousands of His most talented beings degenerate in the proletarian swamp of today, while Hottentots and Zulu Kafirs [Africans] are trained for intellectual vocations. For it is training, exactly as that of the poodle, and not a scientific ‘education’.”[11]
The Encyclopedia of the Jewish Religion refers to Moses Maimonides as “the symbol of the pure and orthodox faith.” His Guide to the Perplexed is considered the greatest work of Jewish religious philosophy, but his view of Blacks was Hitlerian:
“[T]he Negroes found in the remote South, and those who resemble them from among them that are with us in these climes. The status of those is like that of irrational animals. To my mind they do not have the rank of men, but have among the beings a rank lower than the rank of man but higher than the rank of apes. For they have the external shape and lineaments of a man and a faculty of discernment that is superior to that of the apes.”[12]
“STILL NIGGA”
In fact, a Kabbalah- Zohar Jew, Mark Romanek, partnered with Jay Z to create the black half human hominoid figure to globally implant and apply to traditional Black Culture across the board as a “MONKEY TRIBE”.
If JAYBO is so O.K., let him ALSO wear his “Still Nigga” JAYBO Caricature wear on the street in the presence of people of color; school, work and synagogue.
Da Story of OJ & Monkey Tribes
Jay Z explained that JAYBO warped up in the “Da Story of OJ” was about the nature of success and seeing the bigger picture.
“The Story of OJ is really a song about WE AS A [MONKEY TRIBE] CULTURE, having a plan, how we’re gonna push this forward (sic),” the rapper explained in an interview on iHeart Radio last year (17). “We all make money, and then we all lose money, as artists especially. But how, when you have some type of success, to transform that into something bigger.”[13]
Jay-Z, Shawn Corey Carter, does not have any credentials whatsoever to define or transform Black Culture on a widespread basis. He does not even possess a high school diploma.[14] He sold crack cocaine, poison, to the people. JAYBO is yet another form of mental psychological poison that he seeks to peddle to the masses. JAYBO, the half man, (higher primates) half simian monkey or Great Ape Homoinoidea orangutan has been deliberately created by Jay-Z and Romanek to depict Black People as an ethnic group and race as a “MONKEY TRIBE”.
Furthermore, an infamous beloved Black cultural, political and social heroic and revolutionary figure, Huey P. Newton, former Minister of Defense of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense (BPP), is depicted as a grotesque exaggerated dark big eyed- big lipped half-human hominoid figure. The Black Panther Party for Self Defense was a historical Black Institution.
As a former member of the BPP, I am personally offended by Jay Z and his collaborator’s direct association of simian and hominoid creatures with the Black Liberation Struggle implanting suggestions of “monkey see, monkey do”.
The platform of the BPP wasn’t socialist or communist. It was the Black Nationalism that Malcolm X taught. The BPP was no band of trained monkey see, monkey do half human simians and hominoids. We sought to define and determine our own destiny. When Bros. Huey and Bobby said that [BLACK] POWER GROWS OUT OF THE BARREL OF THE GUN, they meant military, political, and economic power. We had been very clear on that point. Jay Z is the 21st century JUDAS of the masses that has and will continue to sell them out for only a few pieces of silver.
The half-human hominoid figure JAYBO has also been deliberately connected with the image of the infamous black cultural- political civil rights, musical genius icon that we love, Shemayet (user-Maat-ra-setp-en-ra Monthu-in-the-two-lands) Nina Simone.
The half-human hominoid figure JAYBO has also been deliberately connected with the image of a living infamous cultural sport’s icon, O.J. Simpson. I have not watched Jay Z’s “Da Story of O.J.” and I do not intend to, but that is not the issue at this time. Manufacturing Less than Human Black Caricatures that deliberately humiliate and harass black people for global mass consumption are the issues.
THE HYPOCRISY: MEXICO & THE MEMIN PINGUIN CARICATURE CONTROVERSY
La caricatura BOSKO, MEMIN PINGUIN & La caricatura JAYBO
Mexico’s Memin Pinguin Postage Stamp
In 2005, the comic book character Memin Pinguin a black Mexican who is portrayed as a monkey looking boy set a spark in the racial debate after the Government of Mexico issued a series of five postage stamps commemorating and celebrating Pinguin.
Memin Pinguin is a comic book character created in the 1940s that is depicted as a dark skinned Jim Crow-era cartoon. He has exaggerated eyes and lips similar to Jim Crow memorabilia “pickaninny” caricatures and his mother resembles a “Mammy” caricature.
In the comic book series, Memin Pinguin is humiliated, assaulted, battered, taunted and harassed by Mexican society for his bizarre less than human appearance, speech, and mannerisms invoking in an audience a feeling of uncomfortable bizarreness as well as sympathetic pity and racial hatred.
People were outraged with the national celebration of the half human simian caricature of a black youth. The Government of Mexico was condemned for its celebration of its simian “pickaninny” and “mammy” caricatures of black people on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives (H.Res.347 — 109th Congress (2005-2006))
Resolved, That the House of Representatives—
(1) condemns the Government of Mexico for issuing a blatantly racist series of postage stamps;
(2) calls on Mexican President Vincente Fox to immediately cease printing and distributing the postage stamps and recall from circulation those postage stamps currently on the market;
(3) calls on President Fox to apologize to the citizens of Mexico and the citizens of the United States for the decision to circulate the stamp series; and
(4) declares that the decision of the Government of Mexico to issue the postage stamps is inconsistent with United States policy to eliminate the vestiges of government sanctioned racial or ethnic discrimination and intolerance.[15]
Scott McClellan, speaking for the George W. Bush presidential administration, declared the minting of a postage stamp in Mexico, which celebrated the black caricatures, to be “offensive, and I would say racial stereotypes are offensive no matter what their origin. The Mexican government needs to take this into account. Images such as these have no place in today’s world.”[16]
Throughout the last at least 4 (four) centuries, whites have historically defined Blacks—as “caricatures”, as objects, as less than human as justification for African Human Bondage, Genocide, Racial Hatred, Exploitation, Segregation, Discrimination, Mis-Education and Mass Incarceration, etc.
What happens if a nonwhite sports the JAYBO caricature image of black people to school or the workplace to affirm the statement calling Blacks Nigga, Niggers, and that they are a less than human– “MONKEY TRIBES”? “NIGGER” represents a classic case of the use of “fighting words” tending to incite an immediate breach of the peace which are not protected by either the Constitution of the United States (In re Spivey, 345 N.C. 404, 480 S.E.2d 693 (1997)).
Once a Nigga, STILL A NIGGA (Dr. Nigga, Nigga Lawyer, Nigga Teacher, Rich Nigga, Poor Nigga, Mr. Nigga, Mrs. Nigga, Young Nigga, Baby Nigga, Big Nigga, Little Nigga, So Forth and So On) like trained and untrained uncivilized MONKEYS. It is tantamount to “FIGHTING WORDS.”
Lanham Act prohibited the registration of any mark that “may disparage persons, institutions, beliefs, or national symbols, or bring them into contempt, or disrepute.”
15 U.S. Code § 1052 – Trademarks registrable on principal register; concurrent registration
No trademark by which the goods of the applicant may be distinguished from the goods of others shall be refused registration on the principal register on account of its nature unless it—
Consists of or comprises immoral, deceptive, or scandalous matter; or matter which may disparage or falsely suggest a connection with persons, living or dead, institutions, beliefs, or national symbols, or bring them into contempt, or disrepute; or a geographical indication which, when used on or in connection with wines or spirits, identifies a place other than the origin of the goods and is first used on or in connection with wines or spirits by the applicant on or after one year after the date on which the WTO Agreement (as defined in section 3501 (9) of title 19) enters into force with respect to the United States.
JAYBO is not registrable for U.S. patent right protection because it is a grotesque exaggerated dark big eyed- big lipped half-human hominoid figure that has been globally recognized since the 18th century as an African and Negro Caricature. The Black Caricature was a central tool in justifying efforts to colonize, enslave, and even exterminate people of people. They established by outrageous pseudo race science that Africans were less than human– “MONKEY TRIBES”, then it was acceptable to treat, educate and train them as such.[17]
JAYBO and MONKEY GOD
Jay Z unquestionable calls JAYBO a NIGGA not a JIGGA. Don’t get that twisted as Rolling Stone attempts to deceive the masses. Both Jay Z and Beyonce are advanced Master Masonic Occultists. Their first and only duty and love is dedicated to Lucifer. We should always acknowledge that and treat them, accordingly. There is no local, state or U.S. law that I am aware of prohibiting mass publication of covert occult and overt racist Black Caricatures that tend to violate our human rights. If there is such laws, please let me know immediately. However if a corporate mass media publication like Rolling Stone choose to spread racial images that are designed to globally dehumanize black people then it is incumbent upon us to protect ourselves and children from vicious racial attack and human rights abuse. In the meanwhile, on February 18, 2018 or soon thereafter, I will file an official and formal OBJECTION to JAYBO receiving U.S. Trademark protection in violation of our human rights.
[1] http://www.rjchq.org/leadership
[2] http://rightweb.irc-online.org/profile/republican_jewish_coalition/
[3] https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/caricature
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grotesque#Pop_culture
[5] https://theconversation.com/comparing-black-people-to-monkeys-has-a-long-dark-simian-history-55102
[6] http://www.ancientegyptonline.co.uk/hatshepsut.html
[7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stories_of_divine_birth_in_the_eighteenth_dynasty
[8] https://ancient-code.com/orion-constellation/
[9] https://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2012/07/12/whites-blacks-apes-in-the-great-chain-of-being/
[10] https://www.huffingtonpost.com/the-conversation-africa/comparing-black-people-to_b_9345322.html
[11] https://selfuni.wordpress.com/tag/hitlers-attitudes-towards-blacks/
[12] http://noirg.org/news/blacks-jews-facts-quotes/
[13] http://sandrarose.com/2018/01/jay-z-moves-trademark-racist-symbol-jaybo-t-shirts-hoodies-etc/
[14] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay-Z
[15] https://www.congress.gov/bill/109th-congress/house-resolution/347/text
[16] https://mongrel4u.wordpress.com/tag/vicente-fox/
[17] Id.
Tags: 18th dynasty, Adolf Hitler, africa, Aleister Crowley, amun, ape of thoth, apes, aset, ashur, black caricatures, Black Panther Party for Self Defense, black satanic cabal, black satanic cults, bosko, brad d. rose, Brendan O Regan, caricatures, CHURCH OF SATAN, CIA MK ULTRA/MONARCH, cia occult bureau, cnn, crime against humanity, da story of oj, Declaration of Human Rights, devil, devil horns, egypt, emmys, freemasonry, freemasons, H.Res.347 — 109th Congress, half-human hominoids, Hanuman, Harold Chipman, Hatshepsut, heka, heket, hermes, hip hop satanic cult, hollyweird, hominoid, Huey P. Newton, human rights, Illuminati, iman, Institute of Noetic Sciences, jack sarfatti, jay z, Jay: Z 4:44, jaybo, jews, jim crow, kabbalah, kemet, Khnum, knights templar, looney tunes, Lucifer, luciferians, mammy caricatures, mark romanek, masons, Memin Pinguin, mexico, michael jackson, mind control, monkey caricatures, monkey tribes, monkeys, negro caricatures, niggas, nina simone, oj simpson, Orion, Osiris, pharaoh thutmose, pickaninnies, pickaninny caricatures, President George W. Bush, psychological warfare, queen ahmose, queen maatkera, racism, Republican Jewish Coalition, rolling stone, satan, Satanism, Scott McClellan, Shawn Corey Carter, shemayet, simian, simian racial caricature, Sirius, thoth, trademark, u.s. trademark, vann jones, z, zayin, zeta, zeyin
Categories : African Liberation, Aryan Supremacy, aset, ashur, black institutions, Black Panther Party for Self Defense, devil, devil's horns, divine one, egypt, evil, freemason, freemasons, genocide, Hip Hop, HIP HOP false prophets, hip hop satanic cult, hollywood satanic cult, huey p. newton, jay z, jay-z, kemet, luciferians, satan, Satanic Global High Cabal, Satanism, Walt Disney, ZIONIST
Part I, BIRMINGHAM GODDAM, ELIZABETH W. MCELROY, THE QUEEN BEE, POPE FRANCIS, MATLESE CROSS SYMBOL & THE ORDER OF THE BEES, EYES WIDE SHUT
Our so called civilized societies today function much like that of a BEEHIVE, unfortunately mostly unbeknown to masses. We too have QUEENS and royals who represent an ultimate authority over all, or in areas where there is no royal family, powerful groups or figures of control that represent only a tiny percentage of the overall population, yet indirectly control and dictate to the majority how they should live in order to ultimately SERVE THEM.[1]
POPE FRANCIS of The Ninth Satanic Circle is the top story (GLOBAL DIVERSION and SMOKESCREEN) in America. I suspect by the time he leaves, the Dragon Lady, Hilary Clinton, will be the top democratic party presidential candidate in the country.
Maltese Cross, Pope Francis & Nazi Fuhrer Adolph Hitler
In a BBC interview, Pope Francis took the highly unusual step of actually admitting that there are thousands of pedophile priests in the Catholic Church worldwide. By their estimates about 8,000.[2] That’s just the tip of an iceberg.
The Maltese Cross was also the Favorite of Hitler’s General SS-Obersturmbannführer Otto Skorzeny. In an exclusive interview with Kevin Annett of the International Tribunal into Crimes of Church and State from the Common Law Court of Justice in Brussels, Belgium, he said that five judges and 27 jury members from six countries including the USA, considered evidence on over 50,000 missing Canadian, US, Argentine and European children who were suspected victims of an international Luciferian child sacrificial cult referred to as the Ninth Circle.[3]
Pope Francis giving communion to Argentine dictator General Jorge Rafael Videla, the leader of the fascist generals who ruled Argentina in the late 1970s and disappeared more than 20,000 people.
Two adolescent women claimed that Pope Francis raped them while participating in child sacrifices. Eight eyewitnesses confirmed the allegations according to evidence presented at the Brussels’ Common Law Court of Justice.[4] Pope Francis was also a perpetrator in satanic child sacrifice rites while acting as an Argentine priest and Bishop according to records obtained from the Vatican archives. Another witness was set to testify that they were present during Pope Francis’ meetings with the military Junta during Argentine’s 1970’s Dirty War. According to the witness, Pope Francis helped traffic children of missing political prisoners into an international child exploitation ring run by an office at the Vatican.[5]
Evidence of a Catholic Jesuit Order document called the “Magisterial Privilege” was presented in court by the chief prosecutor. The record dated Dec. 25 1967 was said to show that every new Pope was required to participate in Ninth Circle Satanic ritual sacrifices of newborn children, including drinking their blood.[6]
Pope Francis’ trip to America also comes at the start of the trial of Joey Patterson in South Dakota for the murder of Minnesota Vikings Running Back Adrian Peterson’s 2 year old son, Tyrese Robert Ruffin. I believe that Little Tyrese was raised within the Ninth Satanic Circle to be sacrificed.
Even though the child was a murder victim, all of his organs was taken (harvested ) within days of the homicide and pending criminal investigation.[7]
Little Tyrese died from 4 (four) blunt force injuries to the brain. He was bludgeoned to death.[8] Little Tyr-ese’s name is peculiar for a reason. In Norse Mythology, there is TYR, the god of justice. “His name derives from Tiw or Tiwas, and Tacitus and other Roman writers described him the recipient of human sacrifice and equated him with Mars… Tyr is stamped as an exceedingly ancient god of the sky and day. In either case he must have occupied a high position in the hierarchy, although he is not clearly described in our records.”[9]
Like most of us, VIKING Adrian Peterson doesn’t have a clue about what’s really going on. He doesn’t have any idea or understand the pagan Norse-Viking Symbolism that led to the slaughter of his child. Peterson has to be afraid for himself and his children. He has stayed away from Joey, death of Little Tyrese and the murder trial like it was the plague.
Keep in mind as you read further, every morning, the gates in the East open up, and Shamash, the Sumerian Sun God, appears. He travels across the sky during the day, and enters the gate in the West. He travels through the Underworld at night in order to begin in the East the next day.[10]
The Maltese Four-Armed Cross is based on a very mysterious ancient symbol that now represents secrecy and the OCCULT. Its origins date as far back as the Eight Pointed Star of the Sumerian Goddess Inanna. She was the Sumerian Goddess of Love, Fertility, and Warfare, and Goddess of the E-Anna Temple at the city of Uruk (modern day Warka, Iraq), her main centre from about 4000–3100 BC.[11] In Kemetic Cosmology, she was known as the age-less Goddesses Neith and Isis. Goddess NEITH (Nit), nobody knows her age.[12] Inanna’s symbol is of great mystery and antiquity. It is believed that it locks secret esoteric holdings that brings light to the uninitiated. It is a symbol linked to divine majesty and immortality.
The above is known as the stone Tablet of Shamash recovered from the ancient Babylonian city of Sippar in southern Iraq in 1881 dated around 888-855 B.C.[13] Shamash was a deity and the Sun god in the Akkadian, Assyrian, Babylonian, and Hebrew pantheons. Shamash was the god of justice in Babylonia and Assyria, corresponding to the Sumerian Utu.[14] This tablet is important because it clearly symbolize the divine-sacred knowledge and light of God(s) being passed down by Angelic Beings in the symbol of the Eight Pointed Star of Goddess Inanna to a king, a symbolic representative of sacred forces.[15] The Babylonian King Nabu-apla-iddina, between HEAVEN and EARTH, is believed to be standing between two interceding deities at the left base of Shamash’s monument, leading him back to DIVINE ORDER.[16]
Khnum (Predynastic Water God- the Creator, the Fashioner of the Bodies of Men) fashioning Pharaoh Hatshepsut (Ma-Ka-Re) and her Ka on the Potter’s Wheel. Queen Ma-Ka-Re was born in the Divine Order and Light of the Gods. [17] God Shamash (associated with water by garment) holds two instruments, a measuring rod and a coil of rope, symbols of divine authority. Both of these instruments represent mastery and an ability to discriminate. It maybe ritually similar to the Crook and the Flail held by Kemetic Kings.[18]
In the tablet, God Shamash sits under planetary genius symbols, those from a lower level (the Moon), those from a higher level (the Sun), and those from the planetary or astral level (Venus.)[19]
During the Roman Empire, Shamash became associated with the Roman Sun God Mithra and Baal. The emperor Hadrian (117-138 A.D.) “forbade human sacrifices to Mithra and Baal.” And Porphyry says: “Pallas declares that under the emperor Hadrian human sacrifices were almost entirely abolished; and he is the best exponent of the mysteries of Mithra.”[20] Human sacrifices in the ancient mysteries of Baal (Moloch) Shamash went underground and became secret. The Vatican was built upon the grounds previously devoted to the worship of Mithra (also known as Mithras) (600 B.C.). The Orthodox Christian hierarchy is nearly identical to the Mithraic version. Virtually all of the elements of Orthodox Christian rituals, from miter, wafer, water baptism, alter, and doxology, were adopted from the Mithra.
The Vatican’s Mithraic version of rituals and the Human Sacrifice are the secret mysteries of the Ninth Satanic Circle.
To the Knights Templar and Freemasons, God Shamash represents the MASTER. The King, measured by the Measuring Rod or Crook and Frail (Righteousness) is replaced by secret “Initiates“.
The Divine Light of Heaven (Sacred Knowledge of Inanna unlocking Divine Majesty and Immortality) is conjured up by them through the DEVIL, ANGELIC BEINGS– Seraphs- Fallen Angels and Demonic Monsters (BAPHOMET) by Satanic rituals, rites, ceremonials and human sacrifices.
The above is the Maltese Cross seal and banner of Alpha Tau Omega, The Order of 1865 founded at the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) in Lexington, VA.[21] Undoubtedly, their seal with the crossed swords (X Symbol) and Teutonic Knight Battle Ax show that they also claim to be worthy (Righteous) and knighted of the Sacred Knowledge of the Inanna (Ages).
There is pyramid and Angelic Beings appear passing down sacred knowledge for them from heaven in three of their panels on their Maltese Cross.
In this early Alpha Tau Omega Seal based on medieval alchemy, the Crow represents death– putrefaction, decomposition.[22] When the skull appears, it is skull symbolism. In Nazi SS insignia, the death’s-head (Totenkopf) represents loyalty unto death.[23] The rose is central to the occult teachings and secret societies as a symbol of silence and secrecy. It is the national flower of England. The rose is one of the most important images used in the Ancient Brotherhood and by Alchemists from the East. Various secret societies use the rose as one of their main symbols such as the Freemasons, Order of the Rosy Cross, or the Rosicrucians.[24]
The Order’s defining moment, it says, was the Battle of New Market that was fought on May 15, 1864 in defense of Richmond, Virginia. Sixteen of the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) cadets that fought at the battle went on to become the founders of Alpha Tau Omega.[25] Their defining moment was significant in another way, because Black Union Troops spearheaded the attack on the Confederate defensive positions at the battle.[26] “Word raced through the Confederate ranks that black troops were attacking. Pickets shouted, ‘Niggers, boys, niggers,’ as they tumbled into the earthworks.”[27]
James H. Harris f the 38th Colored Infantry Unit won the Medal of Honor for his Gallantry in the Battle of New Market Heights
On April 6, 1865, the U.S. War Department bestowed the Medal of Honor on 14 black veterans of New Market Heights, because the Black troops overran the Confederate defensive forces at New Market with outstanding gallantry and bravery. They were victorious. The sixteen VMI cadets of Alpha Tau Omega ran for their lives. They went back to VMI to instigate a second civil war in secret under the DIVINE light of their own folly by the sacred knowledge bestowed upon them by the DEVIL, Seraphs- Fallen Angels and Demonic Monsters (the BAPHOMET).[28]
The above is an ancient Babylonian boundary stone. It connects the Eight Pointed Star of Inanna with the BEEHIVE. At the very least, it was a warning that you were entering into a SOCIETY OF THE BEES. In May 1776, Adam Weishaupt and his cohorts of the ILLUMINATI intended to call themselves “Bienenorden” (ORDER OF BEES).[29]
The “tower masoned” on the Order of 1865’s official crest is based on one of the first “tower masoned” in history, the Tower of Babel. The first Mason, Nimrod of the Bible, built the tower.[30] The Tower of Babel is based on the hexagon geometry of the cells of a BEEHIVE HONEYCOMB.[31]
I will link the Maltese Cross, Alpha Tau Omega and the Beehive Honeycomb directly to Elizabeth McElroy toward the end. For almost a decade, I worked inside two of Lucifer’s unspoken BEEHIVE HONEYCOMBS and had absolutely no idea or concept of what I had fallen into. For me, it has been the subject of NIGHTMARES that have haunted me to this very day. NIGHTMARES that I clearly didn’t understand the nature of until now when I became faced with the reality of QUEEN BEE, BETH MCELROY.
During the 1980s, I busted a major federal corruption ring at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management and Department of Education in San Francisco involving the illicit immigration of foreign nationals out of the Philippines. They were bringing them into the United States to take federal jobs based on fraudulent employment applications and immigration papers. It involved the immigrants paying off their sponsors for jobs and a place in the U.S., a MORMON/Mafia Combination, out of the U.S. Treasury.
The MORMON BEEHIVE HONEYCOMB
Many early Mormons were MASONS, including Joseph Smith. The Book of Ether in the Book of Mormon tells the story of the Jaredites, a tribe that lived at the time of the Tower of Babel in the Old Testament. According to the Book of Mormon, the Jaredites made a miraculous 344-day voyage across the ocean to North America. They brought with them the “deseret” which means “HONEY BEE” in the language of the BOOK OF THE MORMON.[32] The culture of corruption had gotten so out of hand at the U.S. Department of Education that I was part of an influx of new employees brought into the department on a 2 (two) year contract to help try to clean up the mess and massive backload in the federal student loan section, but it was far worst then I could have imagined. I didn’t know how bad it was or what I was falling into.
UNBEKNOWN, Inside Lucifer’s Beehive
The Mob & U.S. Department of Education
“Forget Las Vegas and Chicago — for most of the 20th century Kansas City was a gangster’s paradise.” Frank Hayde, The Mafia and the Machine: The Story of the Kansas City Mob [33]
The Department of Education in San Francisco was an old regime of silence, patronage, fraud, corruption and racketeering linked to the Kansas City Mob. The department’s regional office in Kansas City, Missouri was closed down, but the mob still maintained a number of lucrative private contracts with the department. They had the private money contract to train the department’s new employees in San Francisco.
Of course, I clashed with one of their goons immediately during an employee training seminar over an overt and ugly racial incident that he instigated against a young black lady right in the middle of the training session. We almost came to blows, but it wasn’t going to be much of a fight because I had a bead on him to knock him out at the podium if he just slipped a breath. I closed down that training session for the day. After the incident, some of the senior employees informed me that he was really a small time mobster out of Kansas City.
Freaking for a Job: The Wild, Wild West & U.S. Department of Education
If that wasn’t enough, there was also a Federal Government Homosexual Mafia being ran out of the department at 50 UN Plaza in San Francisco where I worked. It was like the Wild, Wild West. Within a week, I ran into one of their goons, a wild white haired sodomite, that was allowed to patrol the hallways and stalk the men’s bathroom.
Protest Not Allowed
One morning, he followed me up to my desk from the men’s room in the basement. He went directly over to my supervisor and told her that I had to go with him for a “special assignment”. He didn’t run any unit in the building. He was the same grade I was. Special Assignment! He intended to take part of my ASS right there at 50 UN Plaza. He may as well roamed the building in his silk pajamas and fluffy bedroom slippers.
At that time, the AIDS virus crisis among healthy young gay men was just breaking out. There was fear even working in San Francisco. At the time, nobody understood how the virus was being transferred from person to person. At 50 UN Plaza, the AIDS crisis was real. While I was there, at least a half dozen young healthy gays dropped dead within days or weeks of being infected.
My supervisor had the backbone of a jelly fish. With the white haired sodomite predator sitting at the front of her desk, she was visibly shaken, nervous and insisted that I follow him. Either it was my ASS or her job. As far as she was concerned, I had to SERVE up that BOOTY. She and most of the other employees in the building were afraid of the unspoken power and influence of the Government Gay Mafia. Of course, I didn’t move. I subsequently discovered that if you join the Federal Gay Mafia and Freak with or for Them that you could get a permanent good paying government job. Well, I wasn’t interested. I wanted to do my work and be LEFT ALONE.
Within the next couple of days, I found this goon alone, one on one, patrolling the men’s room in the basement again. By the time it was over as I reached my desk- the FBI had sealed off the entire building. My supervisor, in a state of panic, asked what I did to the sanctioned government Sodomite. She identified him as Vernon. I told her, “I didn’t beat him up or touch him.” She said that he called the FBI and reported that he had been attacked and beaten by a Black Panther in the basement. She said that we were on lockdown while the FBI combed the building searching for the attacker. Vernon, indeed, had influence, power and protection in high places in the government.
From senior employees, I had discovered that Vernon had a serious weakness. He was a hapless psychotic. I didn’t have to touch him- all it took was a little old fashioned Mo-Jo workings to break him down and put the Fear of God in him. From that day on, I didn’t have any further trouble out of Vernon or the Gay Mafia, but I was concerned just how fast that they identified me as a former member of the Black Panther Party for Self Defense. I had been a Panther, but my criminal record and work history was clean. At that time, I desperately needed a job and the income. All I wanted to do was exercise the right to work, do my job and go home. I certainty didn’t want to become a target for FBI COINTELPRO harassment on the job.
However, I knew management had called the U.S. Secret Service for advice how to handle me. I know because the agent called from Washington D.C. stopped off to chat with me before he left. The agent was a tall blond male. I never seen him before, but he was quite amused. He was very much aware of the nature of the BEEHIVE that I had fallen into.
He laughed and said, “Ray, I told them that a man with your education and experience would be an asset and model employee to the department.” He said that he told them that the agency couldn’t do anything because I always followed the book. He told me that his advice to them was just leave me alone. I was a temporary federal employee working out a 2 (two) year contract and that’s it. He advised them to just allow me to work out my contract. Then he chuckled and said, “you know what? They wouldn’t listen.” It was tantamount to- do what you got to do to do your job, he had warned them. We laughed for a brief moment and he took off back to Washington D.C.. The FBI and NSA had always been a different story. They would have gladly joined any plot to hurt me because I was still living in the spirit of a BLACK PANTHER.
“Whites Only” & U.S. Department of Education
Within the agency, I sought a permanent job opening in the legal department that I subsequently found out had been reserved for white people of the old regime– Mormons within the agency. I also subsequently discovered that an unqualified prime candidate for the job, a Mormon by the name of Mike Bible in the legal department wanted more money off the backs of the taxpayers to take care of his growing family. So, they wrote up a higher ladder grade (GS 9-11) position for him within the legal group, but the job had to be posted to all qualifying candidates within the department. Each time, I failed to make the best qualified list each time they posted the job, I challenged the selection that resulted in the job being withdrawn and the job description rewritten. However, no matter how many times the job description was rewritten to try to avoid my qualifying education and experience- it failed.
So, the top brass of the old regime came up with a plan to lay everyone off, reorganize the entire department and bring everyone back with the exception of myself with new job descriptions developed in combination with the U.S. Personnel Office. The secret husband (Martinez of the Philippines) of the head of the personnel in the Education Department was planted inside U.S. Office of Personnel Management.
In fact, the older gentleman that I sat next to was fresh out of the Philippines. He could barely speak English. He said that he had been allowed to migrate to America to work for the federal government with the basic job qualification requirements waived, because he fought for the U.S. Army in the Philippines during WWII.
That dog didn’t hunt, because I had a number of uncles and cousins that fought in WWII, Korean and Vietnam Aggressions and qualifying educational and experience had never been waived for any of them to work professional graded positions within the U.S. Government. In fact, my friend Joe was a Black Vietnam Veteran that suffered Post Traumatic Stress (PTS) during his time in Nam. He still had to have that minimal qualifying BA or BS degree and financial experience to get a job in the Federal Student Loan Department where I worked.
Subsequently, we discovered that the old guy was actually working under a false and alias name. He was the natural father of our department’s head personnel officer, and the father in law of Martinez in the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. They brought him into the U.S. to live and work at the expense of the U.S. Treasury.
Under their clandestine reorganization plan, everyone that they wanted to return to the department most likely at higher grade money positions got a secret package with a new job description that they were to apply for along with a prior highly scored completed confidential U.S. Personnel Management employment application for that job. Those applications were to be copied and returned exclusively to Martinez. I knew what they were up to from the beginning. The entire department was rotten to its core. I was right in the middle of a Beehive in the Wild, Wild West. So, I waited and watched every move they made. Finally, I observed one of the packages being exchanged between my department head Roger Lentz and Vince, one of the black male members of the department’s Gay Mafia Group. Roger was one of the secret leaders behind the Gay Mafia.
During the lunch hour, I intercepted Vince’s package, copied it and returned it in place before he returned from lunch. The package was loaded. It had the complete reorganization plan and all the new proposed jobs to be offered to the old regime and new/old members of the Gay Mafia Group. After that, every week I wrote a letter to Roger (a Mormon), asking if the reorganization plan had been completed and new jobs determined, and each time he would respond so proudly in writing saying that the reorganization plan was still in process, and the jobs had not been determined. About a week or two before the reorganization plan was announced- I went for the BUST.
David Paul Jeremiah, conservative evangelical Christian author, televangelist and U.S. Congressman Ron Dellums. This unnatural arm-hand position, with the right or left hand strangely ‘hidden‘, is repeated regularly. It is a modified ILLUMINATI hidden-hand symbol, so as to presumably avoid detection. I first exposed the entire scheme to Dellums. After his office deliberately tried to shelve and ditch the matter, I went to U.S. Senators Diane Feinstein and Barbara Boxer that also ignored the matter. Finally, I went to the U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) to at least get the package time stamped by a U.S. Government agency before the reorganization was publicly announced.
The MSPB is an independent, quasi-judicial agency in the Executive branch that serves as the guardian of Federal merit systems. The mission of the MSPB is to “Protect the Merit System Principles and promote an effective Federal workforce free of Prohibited Personnel Practices.”[34] To my surprise, the MSPB actually took the lead to investigate the matter, and their findings nearly closed down the entire U.S. Department of Education of the Northern Region.
The scandal had widespread and massive implications not only within the compromised U.S. Education and Personnel departments, but it had the potential to rock the State Department from the inside regarding the widespread entry of Filipino migrants into the country under false premises. It was just the tip of an iceberg. It was a potential embarrassment to the so-called Law and Order State of Republican President Ronald Reagan.
Some heads at the top of the Department of Education had to roll as a diversion and distraction. As I understand it, the scandal led to the resignation, suicide or assassination of a department fall guy, the old regime deputy director and Mormon, 62 year old, BILLIE JEAN WADDAMS (died 9/20/88).[35]
During the Cold War, Waddams on Naval Business on Rosarita Beach in Mexico
They, for whatever reasons, called him General and “Wild Bill.” He was a WWII Veteran that served in the U.S. Navy for 18 years. I couldn’t locate any record that he had been a general or too much other information at all on his background. However, he was the bulldog and heavy that had been assigned to deal with me personally in the department. Whenever he tried to individually bully, intimidate and harass me, I just ignored the old man and went about my job. I often told them, whatever problem that they had with me- please put it in WRITING.
I came very close to destroying the entire BEEHIVE and didn’t realize it. While studying the situation inside the education department, I was involved in a serious auto accident that disabled and put me down on my back. While recovering, I was edged out of the entire investigation and eased out of federal government service.
Unbeknown, I had a Negro ILLUMINATI Consultant, a former friend from Merritt Jr. College, Harold Maurice Logwood, Sr., who worked with Stanford Research Institute (SRI) assigned to misdirect, distract and divert my attention from the BEEHIVE while I was recovering. By chance around 1998, I got a rare opportunity to review his private resume while he was hawking Oakland Unified School District for a job. He was connected to Ron Dellums, and worked for the federal government (IRS).[36]
Harold even volunteered his help in my personal auto injury case. He took me directly to one of his associates, UC Berkeley Boalt Hall Attorney, Louis Emile Duvernay, in Oakland.[37] They assured me that I had nothing to worry about but a speedy recovery. They would handle everything. Well, just weeks before the statute of limitations ran out on the case, I discovered that they had not done anything but hope to run out the statute to sabotage my personal injury recovery. By the time I filed the lawsuit, the primary parties that were most civically responsible for causing the accident and my injuries were DEAD and their estates had been CLOSED.
President Ronald Reagan’s New World Order Bulldogs, Ed Meese and D. Lowell Jensen
Unbeknown, during the 1960s, Harold also worked with the Right-Wing/Nazi Republican Alameda County Mafia District Attorneys Edwin “Ed” Meese, III and Federal Judge D. Lowell Jensen under the ultra secret operational “Panther Squad” to destroy the Black Panther Party in Oakland.[38]
Harold told me directly that he had worked with these people in 1976 investigating, prosecuting and covering up William and Emily Harris who participated in the kidnap of Patricia Hearst, as part of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA), the CIA. During a conversation with Harold, he vehemently defended Meese and Jensen, and denied that the SLA was the CIA.[39] I knew the rest of the story and who he really was- a cell within the BEEHIVE HONEYCOMB. I didn’t try to hurt him or Louis Duvenay– if I did- I was JUSTIFIED.
Unbeknown, my two co-plaintiffs in a class action through the U.S. Justice Department was paid-off with about $50,000 each and good paying government jobs for abandoning and destroying the class. As I understand it, they were planted undercover- sell out Handkerchief Head Negroes from the beginning.
Unbeknown, Claudia and Ben of the class action were part of a witting black cell within the BEEHIVE HONEYCOMB. Ben was another sick Sodomite– a secret freak– part of the secret government gay mafia. Claudia was pure EVIL. She had sold her soul to the DEVIL. I wasn’t informed of anything regarding the class action lawsuit, investigation and the resulting prosecution of the Martinez Family.
After the Department of Education/Office of Personnel Management Scandal died down, I was primarily “white listed” from obtaining any other gainful employment in the public sector in the future. The FBI made sure of that by deliberately delaying most of my basic public employment background clearances.
UNBEKNOWN, Back Inside a BEEHIVE- Another NIGHTMARE
After falling in a BEEHIVE in San Francisco and being locked out of future public employment, I needed an independent source of income. I decided to enter the field of small business administration. I entered a 2 (two) year small business administration certificate program offered by a local college. It was one of the best SBA model business programs in the nation. When I completed the program, I had planned to implement a independent business plan to distribute and sell educational matters for children.
However instead, I decided to help my uncle upstart his used car business in San Leandro, CA. It would have made my late mother extremely happy that I could be in a position to help her beloved baby brother. I soon discovered it was yet another BEEHIVE and Wild, Wild West of racketeering, mobsters and secret societies.
I first learned about the real world secret society QUEEN BEE and MASONS in white society from Jack Hamson, Jr.. As far as I knew, Jack was predominately Irish, but also claimed to have Italian roots. Jack did time in prison for manslaughter. He killed a man of his society with a knife, he said, in self defense. For that homicide, Jack was somewhat of an outcast from the mob society in which he had been reared.
However, they still looked after and took care of him. At that time, my uncle, a black MASON, took primary care of Jack on the used car lot that we ran in San Leandro, CA. My uncle even bought him a trailer to live with his cat rent free in the back of the lot. Jack was of the best auto detail men in the community. I spent a lot of time listening to Jack.
From early family folklore, my uncle was known as a MASON. I had always associated particularly black Freemasonry with a necessary benevolent and charitable association. During my formative years, black Freemasonry was always mentioned in association with dealing with and fighting racism in the South. My family legend record that my father’s first cousin was a Mason. For some reason, he offended the Ku Klux Klan in Louisiana. They were going to kill him. He secretly evaded death (lynching) by the Klan by being taken out of the state of Louisiana by the Masons in a screaming emergency ambulance will full sirens blasting and flashing lights.
I really didn’t know what was going on with Jack’s dad. It was my understanding that Big Jack Hamson was once connected directly with the mob. Big Jack along with a man from the Jewish Mafia, Al Michaels, was always hanging around the lot acting as my uncle’s business advisors. I didn’t trust any of them. They were small time con men and most likely white MASONS that taught my uncle how to cook/crook the books that got him in a world of trouble with the IRS that I had to bail him out of. Little Jack told me that Big Jack was always trying to convince my uncle to get rid of me to move the business into big money and the big time.
I worked the business 10 to 14 hours a day, sometimes 7 (seven) days a week. I had taken uncle’s at most a 10 (ten) car unit lot and built it into one of the fastest growing small business industries in Northern California with at least a three block frontage on main street with over 150 car units in daily inventory. I managed sales, the credit and finance section bringing in about $15- 20,000 in cash receipts each week. They somehow believed that they could maintain, duplicate and expand my business model without me. They wanted access to and control of the MONEY– all of it. When I finally left the business, I was on the countdown to cerebrate a million dollars in sales by August/September of that year.
Over 60% of my customers had been repeat satisfied buyers and referrals. My approach to the business was that “good will” was worth more than capital. Behind the veil, the Mob said that I was pushing too many of them in the area out of business. Their reasoning was that Black People were sticking together by doing most of their primary business with us to deliberately harm their long time business interests and monopoly over the used car industry. In fact, they thought my uncle was conspiring with me, a PANTHER, to run them out of the business in the area until the New York/New Jersey Mob bailed him out.
Uncle was married to a daughter of an old world Sicilian Mob boss in New York. She was a well respected and educated geologist from I believe Stanford University most likely connected to the CIA. During the Cold War, she had free run in and out of Soviet Union and Eastern Europe under the shroud of an international earth scientist. She was also receiving a lot of inside government money to run fronts for educating inner-city public school children in geology and earth sciences. Of course, I had absolutely nothing to do with the woman, her programs or my uncle’s crooked so-called business advisors. I told them nothing about our business, contacts or the money we were actually making, but my uncle was telling them everything about the business and me. They brought in an Anti-Castro Cuban female operative to learn the business and take over my finance section and cash receivable accounts.
My uncle’s wife was a bloodline Sicilian from the island of Sicily. She through that she was better and more intelligent than most Italians and any black person. She took the inside heavy assignment to push me directly out of the business by hook or crook. However, I left on my own terms. Plus, I didn’t like becoming the focus of the FBI and CIA, again. However, I left them with my calling card. I slapped the business with a state claim for back wages and overtime that amounted to well over three quarters of a million dollars based on the most minimal value of an employee with my education, experience and background.
I didn’t pursue the claim against my mother’s beloved baby brother. She would’ve turned over in her grave. I just wanted to make a statement to my new aunt. She was a racist that constantly told whoever would listen that Niggers aren’t Worth Nothing and Couldn’t Do Shit for Themselves.
Within 3 to 6 months of my departure, my uncle’s car business lost almost everything under the counsel/corporalship of the Sicilians, Big Jack, and Al Michaels of the Jewish Mafia. They reduced one of fastest growing small business in Northern California to a back alley Ma and Pop operation. That’s really the way that they may have wanted it all along eventhough my uncle belonged to the BEEHIVE.
Little Jack often referred to our car lot land lady as the QUEEN BEE. It was an old European tradition and hidden power structure the I wasn’t in privy to. The QUEEN BEE Sovereignty may date back to the early Etruscan Earth Mother Cults in ancient Italy. Jack also talked about her and the MASONIC Order of the Eastern Star that I also knew nothing or very little about. In the back of our lot, the QUEEN BEE quietly maintained a shadow of her father’s once prominent, influential and dominant California oil industry. That property is now the Ashland Place, and the Village Apartment Development in San Leandro, CA.[40]
She was the heir to an infamous, powerful and notorious local oilman connected to the Mob that had been busted down by the Feds during the late 1950s or early 1960s. Jack said that even though her father had been busted decades ago, she held a reservoir of ultimate secret and hidden POWER, CONTROL and AUTHORITY in Northern California.
Among Jack’s society, she was respected and feared. I had always maintained a respectful relationship with her. My Eyes Weren’t Wide Shut, but I just didn’t know anything about what Jack was talking about in regards to their secret societies, the Order of the Eastern Star or the sacred order of the QUEEN BEE. In the PRIVATE SECTOR, my uncle’s BEEHIVE ORDER wasn’t subsidized and underwritten by U.S. Taxpayers. The BEEHIVE didn’t operate clandestinely hidden under federal sovereignty, U.S. Constitution, the 14th Amendment, and the CLOAK OF THE GOVERNMENT. In the PRIVATE SECTOR, I could do little alone about the industry’s culture of corruption, racketeering and racism without bloodshed or becoming corrupted. I walked away from this NIGHTMARE, and didn’t look back.
Napoleon in BEE Coronation Robe and BEE Room
In European societies, the BEE remains one of the most important and ancient symbols of the sovereignty, secret power and prestige. The BEE was the symbol of the Merovingian Kings. 300 Golden Bees were found in the tomb of King Childeric I (Clovis’ father) in Tournai, Belgium. Napoleon Bonaparte was well aware of this and considering the eagle was the symbol of the Holy Roman Empire, he opted for the eagle to represent his empire and integrated golden bees on the imperial coat.[41] In 1804, the Italian-born Napoleon Bonaparte was crowned Emperor of France in a coronation robe decorated with 300 Gold Bees.[42] In 1776, Johann Adam Weishaupt considered naming his order ‘BEES’ – not ‘Order of the ILLUMINATI’.[43]
Even among the founding founders of America, Freemasonry were among the secret ORDER OF THE BEES.
Constitution of Alabama 1901
Article iii Declaration of Rights.
section 2. People source of power. That all political power is inherent in the people, and all free governments are founded on their authority, and instituted for their benefit; and that, therefore, they have at all times an inalienable and indefeasible right to change their form of government in such manner as they may deem expedient.
In 2013, the Highest Court in the State of Alabama, the Supreme Court accepted the description that Attorney Elizabeth McElroy is a “county administrator for Jefferson County.” (Rodgers v. McElroy, 153 So.3rd 814 (2014), 141 So.3rd 1030 (2012), 141 So.3rd 1046; Ex parte Rodgers, 141 So.3rd 1038, 1040 (2013))
Jefferson County is the most populous county in the State of Alabama. As of the 2010 census, the population was 658,466, making it the most populous county in Alabama. Its county seat is Birmingham the most populous city in the state. Jefferson County was established on December 13, 1819, by the Alabama Legislative. It was named in honor of Thomas Jefferson.[44]
According to the Highest Court in Alabama, Beth McElroy is a public county officer versus employee that works for about 658,466 people in Jefferson County. The key characteristic of each is that an officer, public or state, is invested with some portion of the sovereign power of the state, to be exercised by him for the benefit of the public. See, e.g., State ex rel. Gray v. King, 395 So.2d 395 (Ala. 1981).
By its very secretive nature, the QUEEN BEE does not represent the public or the masses but a small percentage of people, a select group or Satanic Cabal that dictate to the majority how they should live in order to ultimately SERVE THEM.
The QUEEN BEE BETH MCELROY has held the Estate of WWII Veteran John Gregory, Jr. hostage under the cloak of the “county administrator for Jefferson County” for almost 3 (three) years until she receives a substantial amount of money to SERVE HER.
The man that appointed the heirs of John Gregory, Jr. to SERVE the QUEEN BEE is associated with the Lightning Bolt and the “the mighty strength of the war god” explained by various Masonic sources as a reference to the Roman God VULCAN, the son of Jupiter and Juno, a sun deity associated with lightning and volcanic fire to which Human Sacrifices were made.[45],[46]
VULCAN’S connection is with “the seething energies of Lucifer.” The myth of VULCAN closely resembles the Fall of Lucifer and his subsequent position on earth. Various works have provided evidence that VULCAN is actually identical with or related to the biblical SATAN. “According to Diel, he bears a family relationship to the Christian DEVIL,” writes J.C. Cirlot in the Dictionary of Symbols.[47]
Jefferson County Probate Court Judge Alan King was supervisor of payroll operations for VULCAN Materials Company in Birmingham. In 1956, Birmingham Slag Company merged with Vulcan Detinning Company of Sewaren, New Jersey to form Vulcan Materials Company in Birmingham. Vulcan Detinning Company carried an angelic figure on its common stock, below. It is VULCAN in the form of the Fallen Angel, LUCIFER-the Masonic, Let there be Light.
SATAN/LUCIFER is often seen as the leader of the fallen angels.[48] “I beheld Satan as lightning fall from heaven” (Luke 10:18). The name “Lucifer,” which means “Lightbearer,” is consistent with Paul’s description of Satan as an angel who can appear to be bright: “Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14).
General Robert E. Lee, Maltese Cross (X Symbol) of the Confederacy
Probate Court Alan King was the President, Alpha Tau Omega Fraternity, Interfraternity Council. From its inception, the fraternity has always been a clandestine Luciferian Masonic Front of the Old South. King is without doubt a LUCIFERIAN hidden and shielded under the Cloak of the Government. He remains a major player, mover and shaker of the clandestine Masonic Satanic BEEHIVE HONEYCOMB – the Order of 1865.[49] Without a doubt, Alpha Tau Omega, is certainty a secret BEEHIVE HONEYCOMB still fighting the Civil War led by “Lightbearer” Angelic Figures fallen from Heaven.
Founding Maltese Cross Seal of Alpha Tau Omega
On Wednesday, November 21, 1917, the Gamma Theta Fraternity of New Hampshire State College was installed as the New Hampshire Delta Delta Chapter of Alpha Tau Omega at Durham, New Hampshire … We immediately went to the chapter house, which is a fine large old-fashioned building … The sudden arrival of some fifty or sixty men, besides the members of the new chapter, made the old house assume the appearance of a BEEHIVE.[50]The early fraternities were likened onto a “BEEHIVE, full to the eaves“- “busy as BEES.”[51] Behind the veil, since ancient times Alpha Tau Omega represented BEEHIVE and HUM activity that took place beyond the eyes of the citizenry.[52]
Some are suggesting that John Gregory, Jr.’s family call, beg and pled with the QUEEN BEE or her assistant to carry out her duties mandated for the BENEFIT of the People of Jefferson County and the Estate of John Gregory, Jr..To this, I say that as a public officer of the State of Alabama, Elizabeth McElroy, works for the BENEFIT of the over 600,000 residents of Jefferson County, and the people of the state. She works for the PEOPLE. Let her call the heirs, but foremost fulfill your fiduciary duties and obligations as a public administrator mandated by the probate code and the State Constitution, better than that- RESIGN from the Estate of John Gregory, Jr..
The Power of the State is inherent in the PEOPLE. To protect our form of government from Secret Combinations, Tyranny and Corruption, the people have the obligation to tear down and destroy the false tabernacles and towers of Luciferian power and influence- the ORDER OF THE BEES and their NIGHTMARE BEEHIVE HONEYCOMBS hidden behind the CLOAK OF GOVERNMENT- NOT BOW DOWN TO THEM. In Part II, we will into the Alabama State Bar and the powerful people and state governmental involved in protecting and covering up the ORDER OF THE BEES.
[1] http://www.illuminatiagenda.com/illuminati-hive-mind/
[2] http://www.nowtheendbegins.com/blog/?p=23381
[3] http://humansarefree.com/2014/04/eyewitnesses-testify-pope-francis-raped.html
[7] http://bringmethenews.com/2014/03/19/lawyer-for-man-accused-of-killing-adrian-petersons-son-seeks-boys-medical-records/
[8] http://www.ksfy.com/home/headlines/Autopsy-results-presented-during-Patterson-trial-328302281.html
[9] Crossley-Holland, Kevin, The Norse Myths, Pantheon Books, NY, NY (1980), pg. 192
[10] http://www.windows2universe.org/mythology/shamash_sun.html
[11] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inanna
[12] http://www.halexandria.org/dward384.htm
[13] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tablet_of_Shamash
[14] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shamash
[15] http://zenyogagurdjieff.blogspot.com/2013/08/esoteric-symbolism-in-tablet-of-shamash.html
[17] http://kemetichistoryofafrikabluelotus.blogspot.com/2008/11/khnum-potter-god-of-inundation-silt-and.html
[18] Id. at Footnote 7
[20] http://www.4angelspublications.com/Books/SiRP/CHAPTER%2010.pdf
[21] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_Tau_Omega
[22] http://www.soul-guidance.com/houseofthesun/alchemy%202.htm
[23] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_skull_symbolism
[24] http://gnosticwarrior.com/rose.html
[25] http://ato150.ato.org/timeline
[26] http://www.civilwar.org/battlefields/new-market-heights/new-market-heights-/battle-of-new-market-heights.html?referrer=https://www.google.com/
[29] http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/signscorpion/signscorpion02.htm
[30] http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/sociopolitica/atlantean_conspiracy/atlantean_conspiracy06.htm
[31] http://www.theguardian.com/science/1999/aug/26/technology
[32] http://www.saltlakemagazine.com/blog/2010/07/14/behind-the-beehive/
[33] http://www.thechicagosyndicate.com/2007/12/story-of-kansas-city-mob.html
[34] http://www.mspb.gov/about/about.htm
[35] http://death-records.mooseroots.com/d/n/Billie-Waddams
[36] http://content.postnewsgroup.com/2010/08/harold-logwood-sr-66-responded-in-times-of-crisis/#more-8033
[37] http://members.calbar.ca.gov/fal/Member/Detail/61010
[38] http://www.trialinsider.com/?p=5282
[39] http://www.whale.to/b/brussell12.html
[40] http://www.edenhousing.org/property/ashland-village-apartments
[41] http://mysteryoftheiniquity.com/2011/11/28/the-sirius-connections/
[42] http://www.hartforth.com/bees.html
[43] http://rennesgroupblog.com/2012/08/08/the-bee-in-rennes-le-chateau-mythology/
[44]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_County,_Alabama
[45] https://www.linkedin.com/pub/alan-king/100/a4a/419
[46] http://www.newswithviews.com/Horn/thomas106.htm
[48] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucifer
[50] https://archive.org/stream/palmofalphatauom3719alph/palmofalphatauom3719alph_djvu.txt
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Mises Daily Articles
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Home | Mises Library | Freakonomics
Tags EducationMedia and Culture
06/21/2005Doug French
It is rare that an economics book makes the New York Times non-fiction bestseller list. The masses are more likely to be interested in reading about getting rich quick or flattening their stomachs; not supply, demand and other purposeful human action.
But, Steven D, Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner have struck publishing gold with their book, Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. It is Levitt's curiosity about the world and his work on topical issues concerning public policy written about with the skill of best selling author Dubner, that makes this a collaboration that brings a new way of thinking to the average reader.
Freakonomics is not unique in its concept. While reading it, I couldn't help notice the similarities to David (son of Milton) Friedman's Hidden Order: The Economics of Everyday Life, and The Economics of Life: From Baseball to Affirmative Action to Immigration, How Real-World Issues Affect Our Everyday Life, written by another Chicago school economist, Gary Becker. And, Levitt's chapters on parenting bring to mind Richard Herrnstein's and Charles Murray's The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life. For sure, these books are more intellectually rigorous, but none were bestsellers.
Levitt and Dubner name their chapters provocatively to reel the reader in: for instance, Chapter 1 is entitled, "What Do Schoolteachers and Sumo Wrestlers Have in Common?"
Levitt's work examining test scores in Chicago schools has provided proof that mandating test scores give teachers incentive to cheat. And what of Sumo wrestlers? Those who finish tournaments with records under .500 are forced to wait hand and foot on participants who finish over .500. A review of the data of final tournament matches between 7-7 wrestlers and 8-6 opponents reveal that 7-7 wrestlers win nearly 80 percent of the time, far more than the predicated win percentage of less than 49 percent.
The book's chapter comparing the Ku Klux Klan and real estate agents is about information. The KKK had power until they were exposed over the radio and real estate agents hold pricing power if market prices are not widely known and accessible to the public. The authors also delve into internet dating sites. No surprise, women tend to lie about their weight, and men about their height. Women are most interested in men's incomes while men are most interested in a woman's looks.
Professor Levitt spent months in a Chicago ghetto gathering data on the drug trade. From this he learned of the extensive business network that was developed to sell drugs. Although most people assume drug dealers make bundles of money and drive big fancy cars, what Levitt learned was that like any other profession that holds out the potential for fame and riches (entertainers, athletes) most dealers make less than minimum wage and live with their moms while they keep working, hoping to make it to the top and earn millions.
The book's most controversial section is on crime, where the authors contend that legalizing abortions in the 1970's paved the way for lower crime rates in the 1990's. The theory being that with abortion legal, the price of the procedure fell, and more poor, unmarried women would abort unwanted children that would more likely grow up to be criminals.
Levitt and Dubner spend a quarter of the book on parenting and kids. The authors come to some interesting conclusions about what really matters in parenting. Kids tend to get higher test scores if their parents are highly educated: because these parents have higher IQs and IQ is strongly hereditary. Children of mothers over thirty tend to do better in school. These women tend to be better educated or career oriented. Children whose parents speak English at home have better test scores. Conversely, adopted children do worse on tests, because adopted kids are most influenced by their biological parents' IQs; that are likely low. Reading to children doesn't improve test scores. However, children growing up in a house full of books do well in testing. Lots of books, mean high IQ parents.
The final chapter on naming children is the most fun. What's in a name? Nothing really. But, the speed at which children's names change and why is interesting and funny.
Freakonomics has been criticized for its controversial content, its lack of scholarly rigor, trivial subject matter and conclusions, and failure to expose the real economic damage done by government regulations and government granted monopolies. But, despite the flaws, I'm happy that a book of this subject matter is a bestseller.
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Home > SEU Baseball Secures First NAIA National Championship
SEU Baseball Secures First NAIA National Championship
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{1B5BFDF3-40DA-4B56-839C-CDB06EDAD4D3}
by Donnie Smith on June 1, 2018
LEWISTON, Idaho — A team that started the 2018 season red hot finished it in the same manner.
Southeastern University (SEU) of Lakeland, Florida, won its first 21 contests of the year as well as its last eight, concluding the year with a 6-3 victory over Freed-Hardeman University Thursday evening to win the Avista-NAIA World Series held at Lewis-Clark State College’s Harris Field.
The national championship is the first NAIA title by an SEU Fire squad since joining the association in the fall of 2009.
"This is what we set up to do back in the fall. A lot of work by the coaching staff went into recruiting. These guys put in a lot of work on the field, in the weight room, and in the classroom. To have it all come to fruition is a simply unbelievable feeling," shared head coach Adrian Dinkel.
The Fire went a perfect 8-0 in its NAIA National Tournament stay, defeating four former national champions along the way.
Southeastern (59-7) was making its first World Series appearance, and needed to shake off some early nerves as fellow first-timer Freed-Hardeman took a 1-0 lead in the first.
The Fire bats finally broke through in the top of the fourth, plating five runs, taking advantage of a pair of defensive miscues and two walks.
Freed-Hardeman (47-16) picked up two runs in the bottom of the sixth to cut the deficit to two (5-3).
In the top of the eighth inning, Ivan Nunez's seventh homer and 50th RBI of the season gave the Fire a three-run advantage, and resulted in the game’s final score.
SEU centerfielder Manuel Mesa was named Most Valuable Player of the World Series, leading the tournament in hits with 13, runs scored (8), doubles (6), and total bases (21). He was also selected as the Charles Berry Hustle Award winner.
"I've never gotten something like this before but I did it and I worked hard for my team. I feel like I'm a part of a family here and I've never felt that way anywhere," commented Mesa.
Marvin Malone, Jonathan Bermudez, and Nunez all joined Mesa on the NAIA World Series All-Tournament Team.
Tags: Southeastern University Fire Lakeland Florida NAIA World Series Baseball National Championship Lewiston Idaho Adrian Dinkel Freed-Hardeman University Manuel Mesa
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BYU marriage and family therapy program honored nationally for research
Writer: Grace BarrusThe BYU marriage and family therapy program was recently named the No. 1 program of its kind for research productivity.
That means the faculty does more research than any other group of marriage and family therapy professors in the United States.
The ranking, published in the leading Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, names four BYU faculty members in the top ten most prolific researchers: Jonathan Sandberg (#2), Russell Crane (#4), Jeff Larson (#5) and Rick Miller (#6). Larson, Crane and Miller were also ranked in the top ten for most-cited research. Professor Shayne Anderson was also listed as the most prolific author for faculty who have been in the field for less than 15 years.
“We are delighted but not surprised by this recognition of the quality of research by our faculty,” said Alan Hawkins, BYU School of Family Life director. “I think our trajectory for the next 20 years looks even brighter.”
The research from BYU’s program helps develop both the academic and practical approaches to marriage and family therapy. Students in the program work with faculty on research as they go through school, preparing them to recognize and implement evidence-based best practices in their careers.
“More important than the number of articles read or cited is the number of students who were influenced by the process of participating in research and learned how to think critically, theorize about change, analyze data and draw conclusions,” said Sandberg, who also serves as the marriage and family therapy program's director.
The BYU marriage and family therapy program was founded in 1967 and became fully accredited by the American Association of Marriage and Family Counselors in 1972. The program seeks to be a healing influence in a world struggling to create safe and meaningful relationships by combining ground-breaking research with faith-centered family values.
The No. 1 ranking for the program is based on findings from a study that examined scholarly works published between 1999–2008 and 2008–2015 by faculty in accredited doctoral programs through the US.
School Of Family Life Family Home And Social Sciences
How you feel about your home is more important than the size
Although home environments affect the way many feel which, in turn, has the potential to influence family relationships, researchers at BYU recently found that how individuals perceive the space (too crowded or too spread out) in their homes has more of an effect on family functioning than actual characteristics, such as the size of the house or number of bedrooms.
Helicopter parenting: Control vs. support makes all the difference
By Jayne Edwards
BYU researchers identify three different kinds of helicopter parents
Study: Couples thrive in relationship quality and stability when both partners are involved in financial processes
Researchers examine feminism in finance
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Law school dean plans ambitious recruiting trip
CARBONDALE, Ill. -- Dean Peter C. Alexander spares no effort in recruiting prospective students to Southern Illinois University's School of Law.
Later this month, Alexander will fly more than 3,000 miles to visit potential law school students at the University of Alaska-Anchorage and the University of Alaska Fairbanks. While recruiting is an important piece of the journey, Alexander also emphasizes that it provides a chance to strengthen ties with alumni and meet potential employers for current law school students.
Alaska is the only state in the nation that has no law school, and this is an opportunity to present SIUC to interested pre-law students, he said. Alexander graduated from Northeastern University School of Law in Boston in 1983, and worked in spring 1982 as a law clerk for the Anchorage-based Birch, Horton, Bittner and Cherot.
Many law school students from Northeastern spend part of their law school career as a law clerk in Alaska, and in turn, many undergraduate students in Alaska think of Northeastern as a place to go to law school, Alexander said.
For students who are looking for a public interest education, "to go to a school where tuition is reasonable makes a lot of sense, and I think it's important to give students some options as they think about where they might want to go to law school," he said.
Alexander is looking forward to returning to Alaska for several reasons.
"I loved the time I lived in Alaska and look forward to visiting with some of the people at the firm who are still there. I am looking forward to getting to know our alums and really looking forward to having the opportunity to talk with students at the University of Alaska campuses," he said.
There are currently four SIUC law school alumni in Anchorage; the law school has alumni in each state except North Dakota. The alumni remain in contact with the law school and Alexander wants to personally thank them for their support.
"It's important for me to visit with our alumni wherever they happen to be," Alexander said. "Since we have four alumna in Anchorage and we have the opportunity to talk to the University of Alaska students, it made sense to combine efforts and go up there and do that."
Alexander will present a power point presentation about choosing a law school, discuss SIU School of Law, and help students understand what SIUC looks for in students, he said.
There are "potentially dozens of prospective law students who have never thought about our law school as a place to go and I want to have the opportunity to bring our message to them," Alexander said.
Diversity at the law school is also an important consideration, Alexander said. Last year's minority class was 16 percent, compared with about 3.5 percent when he arrived in June 2003.
Recruiting is becoming more difficult as the number of law schools increases and the potential applicant pools shrink. That means law schools "have to be more creative to market themselves and to make connections with prospective students," said Alexander, whose previous recruiting visits included Dallas, Atlanta, Nashville, Indianapolis, Chicago and St. Louis.
"We try to multitask when the dean goes out because funds are limited and we want to make the best use of the people's money," Alexander said. "To meet with students, alumni and prospective employers all in one trip is a very efficient way to get our message out and interact with a lot of different constituencies."
Offering a progressive graduate and professional education that attracts high-quality graduate and professional students and faculty is among the goals of Southern at 150: Building Excellence Through Commitment, the blueprint the University is following as it approaches its 150th anniversary in 2019.
Dean Peter C. Alexander
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The Castro era just officially ended in Cuba
By Emma Fidel Apr 19, 2018
For the first time in more than 40 years, Cuba's president isn't a Castro.
Raúl Castro stepped down Thursday after 10 years as Cuba’s president, but whether the change ends there is still anyone's guess. The National Assembly has announced as his replacement First Vice President Miguel Díaz-Canel, who is 57, and has served alongside Castro since 2013. He's also known as a Communist Party loyalist who's unlikely to enact change quickly.
Plus, Castro isn't really going anywhere. He's remaining the head of the country's single party, and Díaz-Canel said Thursday that Castro will also stay involved in major decision-making.
Raúl's brother Fidel Castro came to power as prime minister in 1959 after the two led a revolution against Cuba's dictator. Fidel became president in 1976 and stayed in the role until Raúl took the title in 2008.
Experts say this presidential transition is a pivotal moment for the country's Communist system to prove it has staying power beyond the Castros' rule.
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Megadeth’s David Ellefson Was ‘Not a Big Fan of the Ozzy Years’ of Black Sabbath
Gonzales Photo, Getty Images/PYMCA
Megadeth's David Ellefson revealed he "was not a big fan of the Ozzy years" of Black Sabbath as he recalled his early heavy metal tastes on an episode of Do You Know Jack: The Podcast last week (June 25).
But that's no diss on Ozzy Osbourne, it would seem. It's only because the bassist and Megadeth co-founder preferred another period of Black Sabbath entirely, mostly determined by the era in which it was released. Asked at what age he first heard Sabbath bassist Geezer Butler, Ellefson got down to brass tacks about his favorite albums from the influential rockers. Listen to the interview down towards the bottom of this post.
"You know, I didn't hear Geezer until I was quite a bit older," Ellefson responded. "I mean, I guess I probably heard 'Paranoid' 'cause I played it in one of my bands when I was probably 13, 14 years old. But honestly, I was not a big fan of the Ozzy years of Sabbath."
What Black Sabbath lineup does the Megadeth member prefer? The answer aligns with the musician's own introduction to metal, which came at a time when Sabbath was fronted by the late Ronnie James Dio.
"Paranoid is my favorite Sabbath record from the Ozzy era, but when I really got tuned into Sabbath was when Ronnie James Dio joined the band on the Heaven and Hell album," Ellefson said. "That was really my era of Sabbath. In particular, that album and Mob Rules. Those were the two."
He continued, "It's because that's the age I was at when I was being introduced to the current heavy metal that was going on around me. Sabbath was cool with Ozzy, but it was kind of more of a throwback into Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin…and quite honestly, that was kind of a generation before me. My music I grew up on was KISS, Styx, Cheap Trick and Van Halen, Boston. And then as I started to heavier stuff, you know, began that Ronnie Dio era of Rainbow, Sabbath, Scorpions, Iron Maiden, Motorhead. That was really more my generation."
Megadeth is currently at work on their sixteenth studio album, despite frontman Dave Mustaine's recent cancer diagnosis. Ellefson's own "Basstory" tour sets out this summer behind his upcoming book More Life With Deth (out July 16) and accompanying solo album Sleeping Giants (out July 19).
See David Ellefson in the Top 66 Hard Rock + Metal Bassists of All Time
Source: Megadeth’s David Ellefson Was ‘Not a Big Fan of the Ozzy Years’ of Black Sabbath
Filed Under: Black Sabbath, David Ellefson, Megadeth
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Dylan Lupton joins DGR-Crosley for six Truck Series races
By Daniel McFadinJun 13, 2019, 11:30 AM EDT
Former Xfinity Series driver Dylan Lupton will compete in at least six Gander Outdoors Truck Series races for DGR-Crosley, the team announced Thursday.
Lupton will drive the No. 5 Toyota for the team co-owned by David Gilliland and will make his first start June 28 at Chicagoland Speedway.
Lupton will return at Kentucky Speedway (July 11), Bristol Motor Speedway (Aug. 15), Las Vegas Motor Speedway (Sept. 13), ISM Raceway (Nov. 8) and the season-finale in Miami (Nov. 15).
“I am excited to finally announce my 2019 plans and join DGR-Crosley in the NASCAR Gander Outdoor Truck Series,” Lupton said in a press release. “DGR-Crosley has proven to be a very competitive team in the series in a short amount of time, and I believe we will be contending for wins throughout my schedule.”
Lupton last saw NASCAR action in 2018 driving for JGL Racing in the Xfinity Series. He started in the first 12 races of the season before the team closed due to a lack of sponsorship, a result of owner James Whitener’s health problems. Lupton has just two Truck Series starts. Those came in 2016 at Talladega and Phoenix.
Tags: David Gilliland, DGR-Crosley, Dylan Lupton, Gander Outdoors Truck Series, James Whitener, nascar
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Tag: Janet Flanner
Germany’s Anti-Decor
The annual Salon of the Société des Artistes Décorateurs in Paris reflected the growing importance of design as a profession, although it was primarily attuned to an affluent urban elite. Then along came the Germans.
June 14, 1930 cover by Helen Hokinson.
A radical new wind blew through Paris in 1930 when Bauhaus designers were invited to exhibit in their own special section at the Salon. According to the New Yorker’s Paris correspondent Janet Flanner, the Germans put on a display in their Section Allemande that left some French designers scratching their heads.
KEEPING IT CLEAN…Members of the Bauhaus Werkbund displayed their wares in the Section Allemande (German section) of the annual Salon of the Société des Artistes Décorateurs in Paris. Clockwise, from top left, examples of reception areas and workspaces by Walter Gropius; bottom left, inside pages of the exhibition catalogue for the Section Allemande. (journal.eahn.org)
STAIRWAY TO THE FUTURE…A staircase fashioned from galvanized chicken wire, by Walter Gropius, on display in Section Allemande of the 1930 Salon of the Société des Artistes Décorateurs. (journal.eahn.org)
UNKNOWN THEN, COMMON NOW…The Section Allemande also featured building models, including this multi-story apartment with communal facilities, designed by Walter Gropius. (Journal of Design History, 2004)
HOW IT STACKED UP…Rather than dazzle audiences with the latest in posh decor, the Germans confronted Salon audiences with their radical approaches to furniture and interior spaces. At left, chairs by Marcel Breuer and others; at right, Light Prop for an Electric Stage by László Moholy-Nagy. (journal.eahn.org/Artists rights Society)
Many critics and commentators at the time characterized the Salon as a nationalistic showdown between French luxury decor and German efficiency and standardization. Flanner suggested that while the Germans seemed to be throwing out the rule book, the French were accepting modernity at a much slower pace:
MODE DE VIE…Salon entries by French designers had a more art deco bent. Clockwise, from top left, vestibule of a boudoir by Jean Dunand; cover of the Salon’s catalogue; Petit Salon by André Groult; a living room by Jules Leleu. (Pinterest/art-utile.blogspot.com)
Of course we know how this story in turns out. In just three years the Nazis would shut down the Bauhaus, scattering its faculty and students abroad, including many to America, where they would find fertile soil to continue their work and eventually spread their design philosophy and aesthetic (for better or worse) across the U.S. and to every corner of the world.
A Gay Old Time
New Yorkers could escape the summer heat by taking in the latest incarnation of the Garrick Gaities at Broadway’s Guild Theatre. Character and voice actor Sterling Holloway Jr., (1905-1992) best known today as the voice of Disney’s Winnie the Pooh, appeared in all three Garrick Gaiety revues (1925, 1926, 1930), which were staged as benefits for New York’s Theatre Guild. Robert Benchley offered this review:
Sterling Holloway, left, with June Cochran in Garrick Gaieties.
Another familiar face in the Garrick Gaieties was Imogene Coca (1908-2001), a pioneer of early television (with Sid Caesar on Your Show of Shows) who is best known today for her role as Aunt Edna in National Lampoon’s Vacation (1983).
KEEP ‘EM LAUGHING…Clockwise, from top left, Scene from the 1930 Garrick Gaieties revue, with Philip Loeb in the high hat and Thelma Tipson standing behind him. Also from left are Ruth Chorpenning, Donald Stewart and Ted Fetter; cover of the program for the 1930 revue; publicity photo from 1983’s National Lampoon’s Vacation, with Imogene Coca as Aunt Edna at right; Coca, far left, in the chorus line for the 1930 Garrick Gaieties. (New York Public Library/IBDB/ifccenter.com/Pinterest)
Ahh-Choo
A child of New York City’s suburbs, E.B. White developed a love of the natural world thanks to a severe bout of hay fever he had as a child — on the advice of a doctor, he was sent to Maine for the summer. White’s allergies, and his love of country living, would prompt him to buy a summer residence on the Maine Coast in 1933. He and his wife, New Yorker writer and fiction editor Katherine Angell White, would make it their permanent home four years later. In 1930, however, White was still putting up with the bad summer air of the city:
THANK GOD I’M A COUNTRY BOY…E.B. White on the beach with his dog Minnie, circa 1940s. (Wikipedia)
It Didn’t Work Then, Either
Some things never change. The Hawley–Smoot Tariff Act, sponsored by Representative Willis C. Hawley and Senator Reed Smoot and approved June 17, 1930, raised tariffs on more than 20,000 imported goods. Promoted as a way to protect American businesses and farmers, it put additional strain on international markets already reeling from the effects of the Depression. A resulting trade war severely reduced imports and exports. Writing for “The Wayward Press,” Robert Benchley (under the pen name Guy Fawkes) shared these observations:
How Dry I Ain’t
Despite his sober demeanor, Henry Hastings Curran (1877-1966) was a champion for those seeking the repeal of Prohibition laws. A longtime city manager in several roles, in 1930 he was president of the Association Against Prohibition Amendment. According to profile writer Henry Pringle, Curran predicted the end of Prohibition in five years. Happily for the wet side, they would get their wish in just three. A brief excerpt from the profile, titled “The Wet Hope.”
Henry H. Curran (Underwood and Underwood)
The Hotel Algonquin ran a series of ads in the back pages of the New Yorker that capitalized on its reputation as a place where stars and other notables gather. And although the Algonquin Round Table was a thing of the past, the hotel made sure to showcase names forever associated with the famed table, including Robert Benchley and the hotel’s manager, Frank Case…
…hoping for some crossover interest from New Yorker readers, William Randolph Hearst’s Cosmopolitan (then a publisher of fiction, not sex tips) promoted this fictionalized autobiography of a famous tap dancer in this full page ad…
…introduced in 1924, Kleenex was originally marketed as a cold cream remover, and not as something you would blow your nose into, for goodness sake…
…however, after 1930 Kleenex was being marketed with the slogan “Don’t Carry a Cold in Your Pocket”…
DON’T BLOW IT…Kleenex boxes circa 1925. (Kleenex.com)
…and artist Carl Erickson remained busy making Camel cigarettes look so darn appealing…
…from Macy’s we have a jolly ad illustrated by Helen Hokinson…
…and for our cartoons, Peter Arno, and an awkward moment in a parking lot…
…Reginald Marsh visited Coney Island…
…fresh off his first “Little King” strip for the New Yorker, Otto Soglow returned with this wry observation…
...Garrett Price looked in on a clash of cultures at a golf course (an image that seems quite relevant today)…
…Barbara Shermund found a bit of trouble at home…
…while Art Young offered this woman a choice of her daily mayhem…
Next Time: Robeson’s Othello…
Posted on June 25, 2019 July 2, 2019 Categories advertising, arts, Broadway, Great Depression, New Yorker cartoons, prohibition, The New Yorker Magazine, TheatreTags 1930s advertising, 1930s New York, Algonquin Round Table, Art Young, Barbara Shermund, Bauhaus, Broadway, E.B. White, Garrett Price, Hawley-Smoot Tariff, Helen Hokinson, Henry Hastings Curran, Imogene Coca, Janet Flanner, Peter Arno, prohibition, Reginald Marsh, Robert Benchley, Salon of the Société des Artistes Décorateurs, Section Allemande, Sterling Holloway Jr., The New Yorker, Walter GropiusLeave a comment on Germany’s Anti-Decor
Tens of thousands of commuters daily cross the George Washington Bridge, but in the din of modern commuting few give nary a thought to a span that was once considered a modern marvel.
May 3, 1930 cover by Rose Silver.
Twice as long as any previous suspension bridge when it opened in 1931, the George Washington Bridge’s main span of 3,500 feet (1,100 m) would be the world’s longest until it was surpassed by San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge in 1937. The New Yorker’s “Talk of the Town” (entry most likely by E.B. White) checked on the bridge’s progress for the May 3 issue:
MEN OF STEEL…Some 107,000 miles of wire were used in cables made by John A. Roebling’s Sons Company for the George Washington Bridge — the same firm also supplied wire for the Brooklyn Bridge 60 years earlier (John Roebling and his son, Washington, also designed and built the Brooklyn Bridge). Clockwise, from top, employees of John A. Roebling’s Sons pose atop cable bundles; bottom right, the bridge’s four main cables were each composed of a single strand carried back and forth across the river 61 times. Each strand itself is a bundle of 434 individual wires; bottom left, worker poses atop completed cable. (Flickr/Pinterest)
BY ANY OTHER NAME…Known as the Hudson River Bridge during its construction, the George Washington Bridge opened to traffic in 1931. During the first full year of operation in 1932 more than 5.5 million vehicles used the original six-lane roadway — today it is the world’s busiest motor vehicle bridge, carrying more than 100 million vehicles per year. Although the steel towers are iconic today, the original plan called for them to be clad in stone. (Wikipedia)
A Cabin in the Sky
Other signs of modern life were being seen in Midtown, where an “Aircraft Salon” hosted by the Aeronautical Chamber of Commerce was taking place at Madison Square Garden.
Nicholas Trott was on hand to take in the exhibits, noting that advances in aviation included the use of metal bodies (instead of fortified cloth) and greater attention to interior decoration:
SIGNED, SEALED, DELIVERED…An attendee of the New York Aircraft Salon received a special postal stamp, and an autograph from aviator Cy Caldwell, at the Madison Square Garden show. (Joe Krantz)
Trott noted that designs of passenger compartments, still in their infancy, suggested something between automobile and nautical motifs:
SORRY, NO HEADPHONES…Clockwise, from top left, a Curtiss Condor 18 and its interior appointments; a Fokker Trimotor featured dining in its cabin. As peaceful as the scene appears, the noise from the motors must have been unbearable. (Wikipedia/dutch-aviation.nl)
Trott also commented on the debate surrounding metal vs. fabric in the construction of airplanes. Before 1930 most planes were constructed of wood covered with fabric (which were much lighter than metal craft). Although as early as 1920 the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics declared metal to be superior to wood, only five percent of aircraft in 1930 were of all-metal construction.
DON’T CALL ME WOODY…This eight-passenger Consolidated Fleetster was a rare example of metal construction in early 1930. The wings, however, were still fashioned from wood. (Aeronautical Chamber of Commerce 1931 Aircraft Yearbook)
The New Yorker’s enthusiasm for modern marvels did not extend to the West Side Highway, a project that would extend from the late 1920s to the early 1950s. Here is E.B. White’s take on the opening of the highway’s first section:
White’s observations were somewhat prescient — constructed in tight confines, the road’s on-ramps proved too narrow and the turns too tight for use by large trucks. The roadway also lacked proper maintenance, and just two decades after it was completed a section of the highway collapsed under the weight of an asphalt-laden truck. The roadway was demolished between 1977 and 1989. Read more here about the West Side Highway’s surprising history at the Museum of the City of New York.
THE ROAD NOT TAKEN, TAKEN…Left, West Side Express Highway and Piers 95-98, photographed by Berenice Abbott from 619 West 54th Street on Nov. 10, 1977; West Side Highway Ramp at 23rd Street reveals Art Deco ornamentation. Detail of photo by Jan Staller, 1978. (Museum of the City of New York)
Our latest installment of James Thurber’s “Our Pet Department” column…
Hate Couture
The New Yorker’s Paris correspondent, Janet Flanner, using the pen name “Hippolyta,” contributed this profile of François Coty (1874-1934), a French perfumer and businessman. Flanner’s profile (the introduction included below) described Coty’s rags-to-riches rise in the perfume industry, and touched on his life as a sometime journalist and politician.
What doesn’t come across in the profile is Coty’s extreme right-wing stance on politics and his virulent anti-Semitism, which was often expressed in his newspaper, Figaro. Three years after Flanner’s profile Coty would co-found Solidarité Française, a fascist, paramilitary organization, and a year after that he would be dead of an aneurysm.
François Coty circa 1930. (aperfumeblog.com)
The New Yorker’s bottom line reaped benefits from the big aviation show at Madison Square Garden…
…and even if you weren’t selling airplanes or flying lessons, you could still get in on the action…
…also from the fashion world, this colorful entry from Onyx Hosiery…
…and this weird ad from Saks, advertising shoes and a party dress but dominated by a caricature of designer Joseph Hergesheimer…
…on to our cartoons…Helen Hokinson paid a visit to the aviation show…
…on the domestic front, Garrett Price examined the challenges of home decor…
…Al Frueh offered an ironic twist on a room with a view…
…Peter Arno once again found humor in the partying life…
…as did Gardner Rea…
Next Time: All Quiet on the Western Front…
Posted on May 28, 2019 May 28, 2019 Categories advertising, air travel, architecture & buildings, automobiles, fashion, Great Depression, New Yorker cartoons, The New Yorker MagazineTags 1930s advertising, 1930s air travel, 1930s aviation, 1930s New York, Al Frueh, E.B. White, François Coty, Gardner Rea, Garrett Price, George Washington Bridge, Helen Hokinson, James Thurber, Janet Flanner, Joseph Hergesheimer, Madison Square Garden, Nicholas Trott, Peter Arno, The New Yorker, West Side HighwayLeave a comment on Minding the Gap
The So-So Soprano
Although its founding editor, Harold Ross, was raised in the rude surroundings of a Colorado mining town and often displayed the manners of a backwoodsman, the New Yorker nevertheless looked down its sophisticated nose at most anything west of the Hudson, and the middle west was reserved for particular ridicule in its homespun piety and small city boosterism.
April 20, 1929 cover by Adolph K. Kronengold.
Enter one Marion Talley, a child prodigy from the tiny town of Nevada, Missouri. After appearing in a lead role at age 15 for the Kansas City Grand Opera, excited civic leaders raised enough money to send Talley to New York to study voice. Four years later (February 1926) she made her Metropolitan Opera debut as Gilda in Rigoletto — at that time the youngest prima donna to appear on the Met stage. A delegation of Kansas City’s two hundred leading citizens (including the mayor) travelled to New York via special train to attend the performance. Adding to the spectacle, a noisy telegraph machine was set up backstage so Talley’s father could send dispatches back home during the performance. Writing in his “A Reporter at Large” column for the New Yorker’s Feb. 27, 1926 issue, Morris Markey scoffed at the hype and Babbitry on display:
THE MANY PHASES OF MARION…Clockwise, from top left, 18-year-old Marion Talley in 1925 in a detail of an image that appeared on the cover of Time; Talley in 1927 (detail of a portrait by Edward Steichen); an autographed portrait dated May 1936; with co-star Michael Bartlett in her only movie, Follow Your Heart (1936); promoting Ry-Krisp crackers, sponsor of her NBC radio show, 1937. (Getty/famousfix.com/imdb.com/mnopedia.org)
The New Yorker (via E.B. White in “Notes & Comment”) caught up with Talley more than three years later in the April 20, 1929 issue, her short career seemingly over, her voice perhaps destined for nothing more than “hog-calling”…
When Talley’s Met contract was not renewed for the 1929 season, she announced her plans to retire to a wheat farm in Kansas (hence the hog calling reference). She did, however, try to revive her career on concert tours and then on her own NBC Radio program (1936-1938), sponsored by Ry-Krisp. She made one film, the 1936 musical Follow Your Heart, but after its tepid reception the 30-year-old Talley decided to retire from show business.
ONE MORE TRY…Testimonial ads promoting weight reduction usually signal the end of a career, and for Marion Talley her Ry-Krisp diet endorsement was no exception. (imdb)
How good a singer was Marion Talley? We will never really know, but you can get some sense of her style and range from this 1927 Vitaphone short (the Vitaphone sound method synchronized the film with what was essentially a record player):
Talley married twice — to pianist Michael Rauchelsen (1932–1934) and to music critic Adolph Eckstein (1935–1942), the latter with whom she had a daughter, Susan. Talley died in 1983 in Beverly Hills, California.
Dark Clouds on the Horizon
The April 20, 1929 “Talk of the Town” made passing mention of a man who would be instrumental in the stock market crash later that year—National City Bank President Charles E. Mitchell:
The “Talk” item references a $25 million advance Mitchell offered to stock market traders who were getting the yips in an overheated market. This happened after a “mini crash” on March 25, 1929, when the Federal Reserve told its banks to withhold all loans to finance securities. Mitchell’s announcement apparently reassured the public enough to stop the panic, but in reality it only delayed the inevitable—a major market crash brought on in large part by the over-selling of securities by Mitchell’s bank.
RUNAWAY BULL…Charles E. Mitchell’s reckless overselling of securities played a large role in the October 1929 stock market crash. Arrested and indicted for tax evasion in 1933, Mitchell would be acquitted of criminal charges but would end up paying a million dollars to the U.S. government in a civil settlement. At right, Walker’s stately townhouse on Fifth Avenue, now home to the French consulate. (geni.com/daytonian in manhattan)
The “Talk” item continued with this observation on the Panic of 1907, and how banker J.P. Morgan had also offered $25 million to bring the market back to earth:
PANIC ATTACK…banker J.P. Morgan (left) used a pile of money to calm the stock market during the Panic of 1907. His son, J.P. Morgan Jr., (right) would try to do the same following the October 1929 crash, when he and other bankers attempted to prevent a depression by purchasing some overpriced blue chip stock. As we know, their actions had little effect. (Library of Congress)
One of Broadway’s biggest stars in the 1920s, Fanny Brice (1891-1951) was profiled by Niven Busch Jr. in the April 20 issue. In addition to her work with the Ziegfeld Follies and other stage productions, by 1929 the comedian, singer and actress had recorded two-dozen songs and appeared in the 1928 film, My Man. Brice’s star would continue to rise in the 1930s and 40s, especially on the radio portraying the bratty toddler “Baby Snooks.” Here are the opening lines of the profile, which included a caricature of Brice by Miguel Covarrubias:
Top right, caricature of Fanny Brice that accompanied the New Yorker profile, drawn by Miguel Covarrubias. Below, publicity photo of Brice as Baby Snooks, 1938. (Photofest)
From its very beginnings comic verse played an important role in the pages of the New Yorker. The subjects of my previous blog post (Generation of Vipers), sisters Elinor Wylie and Nancy Hoyt, both contributed comic poems to the magazine, as did Clarence Knapp, a former mayor of Saratoga, New York, who also wrote prose pieces on that city’s famed horse racing scene. According to Judith Yaross Lee (Defining New Yorker Humor, p. 354), Knapp was a New Yorker insider who penned a total of 14 mock-melodramatic “sob ballads” between 1927 and 1930. Lee observes that Knapp’s ballads followed a fixed formula, two 16-line stanzas followed by eight-line refrains, that “joked about present social values by invoking past forms.”
They Loved a Parade
After the passing of literary giant Victor Hugo in 1885 (his funeral attracted two million mourners), Paris became known for its spectacular funeral processions. So when famed French general and (WWI) Supreme Allied Commander Marshal Ferdinand Foch died on March 20, 1929, the City of Light turned out in droves to say goodbye. On hand to report the scene was the New Yorker’s Paris correspondent, Janet Flanner, aka Genêt:
A PARIS FAREWELL…The Tricolor-draped coffin of Marshal Ferdinand Foch is escorted by the Allied Commanders from the Great War (WWI) during the funeral procession. The American General John J. Pershing can be seen marching alongside the catafalque in the center of the photo. (Associated Press)
By Flanner’s account, Foch’s send-off easily matched Hugo’s in terms of crowd size:
The Art of Smoking
Cigarette manufacturers used a variety of marketing techniques to promote their tobacco products. During the late 1920s and early 30s R.J. Reynolds sought to attract more women smokers through a series of stylish ads for its Camel brand that evoked a softly elegant world. These ads were illustrated by Carl Erickson (1891–1958), a fashion artist whose work was widely seen in Vogue and in promotions for Coty cosmetics. This ad appeared in the April 20 issue of the New Yorker:
While studying at Chicago’s Academy of Fine Arts, Erickson was nicknamed “Eric,” a name he later used to sign his works. Also a successful portrait artist, Erickson lived part of his professional life in France (1920 to 1940) with his wife, the fashion illustrator Lee Creelman. Below are several examples of Erickson’s Camel work, including two back page illustrations from Delineator, a women’s fashion magazine that featured Butterick sewing patterns.
Clockwise from top, left, ad from Delineator, July 1930; 1929 ad from unknown source; unknown date and source; Carl “Eric” Erickson at work circa 1950; ad from the Delineator, July 1929. (Delineator/fashionising.com/periodpaper.com)
And From Our Other Advertisers…
With our Cuba relations once again eroding, let’s look back 89 years to a time when affordable, care-free living could be yours in sunny Havana…
…or in the days before foam rubber, “ozonized” animal hair gave bounce to your rugs…
…or the modestly well-off could contemplate an apartment on Park Avenue…
View from a 16th floor condo at 784 Park Avenue, yours today for a cool $8 million. (triumphproperty.com/stribling.com)
Our cartoons come courtesy of Garrett Price (1895-1979), who would contribute hundreds of cartoons as well as 100 covers during his more than 50 years with the New Yorker. An excellent look at Price’s life and work can be found in The Comics Journal…
Garrett Price, circa 1918, and one of his New Yorker covers from May 21, 1949. (The Comics Journal)
…Denys Wortman (1887-1958) looked in on a bookseller with a “spoiler” problem. From 1924 to 1954 Wortman drew the nationally syndicated comic strip Metropolitan Movies for the New York World. The beautifully drawn strip offered a naturalistic portrayal of daily life in New York City…
Denys Wortman at work in an undated photo. At left, an example from his Metropolitan Movies comic strip, dated May 11, 1932. (New York World/New York Times)
…and John Reynolds looked in on the challenges of the architecture profession. Reynolds contributed 34 drawings to the New Yorker from 1928 to 1930.
Next Time: Hello Molly…
Posted on May 1, 2018 May 1, 2018 Categories advertising, architecture & buildings, Broadway, celebrities, cinema, Jazz Age, music, New Yorker cartoons, Roaring Twenties, The New Yorker Magazine, vaudevilleTags 1920s advertising, 1920s cigarette ads, 1920s New York, Camel cigarettes, Carl "Eric" Erickson, Carl Erickson, Charles E. Mitchell, Clarence Knapp, Denys Wortman, Fanny Brice, Follow Your Heart, Garrett Price, J.P. Morgan, Janet Flanner, Jazz Age, John Reynolds, Marion Talley, Marshal Ferdinand Foch, Miguel Covarrubias, Morris Markey, Panic of 1907, Roaring Twenties, Ry-Krisp, Stock market crash, The New YorkerLeave a comment on The So-So Soprano
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Austin Plans Test of Driverless Electric Shuttles
A model of the EZ10 shuttle used in other cities. (Credit: Wikimedia)
Austin is considering a pilot program to run “pod-like” autonomous shuttles through downtown, the Austin American-Statesman reports. Testing of these driverless electric vehicles could start in a month, a press release from Capital Metro, the city’s transit agency, said.
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“Capital Metro wants to lead the charge — to be among the first transit agencies in the United States to showcase this technology to our ‘smart’ city. I believe this will be the largest public AV bus pilot in the country.” said Randy Clarke, Capital Metro’s President/CEO, in a statement.
The first phase of testing will “evaluate the performance of different autonomous bus vehicles from a few manufacturers,” the release said. Capital Metro will then select one manufacturer to lease six vehicles for an in-service pilot, in which autonomous electric vehicles — supported by a human operator — will pick up and drop off people for 12 months. Riders won’t pay any fees during the pilot; RATP Dev, a France-based global transportation provider, is picking up the tab.
Capital Metro, RATP Dev and the University of Texas-Austin trialed an autonomous shuttle, the EZ10, made by French manufacturer EasyMile, during SXSW 2017. At the time, Cap Metro told the Austin American-Statesman that it had no plans to purchase any of the vehicles.
The EZ10 has been trialed at small scales in other cities around the U.S. as well, including an office park outside of San Francisco and a stretch of road in Denver. Minneapolis held a short pilot for the shuttles on the city’s Midtown Greenway bike trail earlier this year. In a news release at the time, the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) said that these vehicles have the potential to reduce crashes by minimizing human factors during driving. The shuttles typically travel no faster than 12mph (but can reach up to 25mph), according to a press release from Hennepin County, which partnered with MnDOT on the trial.
Capital Metro says the agency will test vehicles from multiple manufacturers, but also includes a description of “the vehicles” that matches that of the EZ10. EasyMile’s website says that the EZ10 is fully electric, carries up to 15 passengers, and has an “in-built access ramp for mobility challenged passengers.” It is unclear which other manufacturers, if any, will be testing their vehicles on Austin streets, but a presentation given to the Capital Metro board included a photo of a shuttle from Navya, another France-based company that operates autonomous shuttles and cabs around the world, the Statesman said. A Navya spokesman told the Statesman that he wasn’t aware that the company had any agreements to operate in Texas.
In Austin, the route for the shuttles is still being determined, but officials foresee a premapped plan that serves City Hall, the Central Library and at least one MetroRail station, according to the press release. Cap Metro officials are planning for five- to seven-minute headways.
Tags: cars, austin
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Denver’s New Local Rental Voucher Program Filling in Gaps — and Apartments
Oscar Perry Abello February 8, 2018
Every month, city officials say, another thousand people move to Denver. Believe it or not, in recent years the city’s housing production numbers have just about kept up, at least on the rental side. Basic economics says that means rental prices should level off, and they practically have. But the real world is much more complicated than basic economics.
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“There’s been tremendous development, but the majority of the units that have come online, because they are planned and construction begins two or three years out, cater to higher income brackets,” says Erik Soliván, inaugural director of Denver’s newly created Office of Housing and Opportunities for People Everywhere, or HOPE. “The population coming in and what the market was developing…weren’t aligned.”
According to Soliván, around two or three hundred of each month’s new Denver residents can afford the housing stock that’s available—some 3,000 estimated vacant units, he says. “The rest coming into Denver are coming into our core workforce, working at bars, restaurants, construction sites, hotels, helping to provide medical services,” says Soliván—and they can’t afford the housing that’s available. But, according to Soliván, they’re also mostly ineligible for federal rental assistance. The city estimates there are around 52,000 households earning between 40 and 80 percent of Denver’s area median income, but only those earning less than 50 percent of Denver’s area median income, or $41,950 for a family of four, are eligible for federal rental assistance.
The first major initiative from the Office of HOPE, the Lower Income Voucher Equity program is a public-private partnership designed to address the gaps. In its pilot phase, it will provide two years of rental assistance for 400 families earning between 40 and 80 percent of Denver’s area median income. The program is already in motion, with some families moving into units last month, and a pipeline of existing or future units voluntarily committed from Denver landlords and developers.
Because the program is targeting units already under construction, which are very nearly all luxury units originally built for rent or sale to higher-income households, Soliván notes that the voucher program can eventually help the city understand how to achieve other goals like helping lower-income families move into neighborhoods with better access to quality schools and quality jobs.
“Ninety-five percent or more of units we expect to have coming in are going to be in what we call neighborhoods of opportunity,” he says.
Landlord and developer buy-in has been crucial. Soliván says his team along with the Denver Housing Authority and others from the city met with nearly 50 developers, landlords, and property management companies before they put out a public request for units to be part of the voucher program. They did a lot of listening, he says.
One of the ongoing challenges will be matching families that apply to be part of the program with units that meet their needs in terms of number of bedrooms or physical accessibility needs. Families will pay up to 35 percent of their incomes in rent, with the subsidy from the voucher program making up the difference between that and the full rent using federal fair market rent standards. The Denver Housing Authority is administering the program.
Funding for the rental subsidies comes from a combination of local public and private dollars. Denver created the Office of HOPE to administer the $150 million it committed to raise to support affordable housing, in a controversial vote in September 2016. While much of the Lower Income Voucher Equity funding will come out of that, Soliván’s office also went to local foundations and businesses to contribute, giving businesses in particular the option to support housing units targeted at the income levels of their own key employees.
“Say a hospital wants to provide housing options for medical technicians who make $42,000 a year,” Soliván explains. “The hospital provides $100,000, city and foundations can match that at a rate of about 95 cents to every dollar, and the funds combine to provide subsidy to families coming in.”
In that situation, ideally, the housing units receiving support would also be located within walking or convenient transit distance to-and-from the employer who helped subsidize those units. “Instead of them traveling in from outside the city, which creates mobility problems because traffic isn’t the best, they’ll be in the city,” Soliván says.
Oscar is Next City's senior economics correspondent. He previously served as Next City’s editor from 2018-2019, and was a Next City Equitable Cities Fellow from 2015-2016. Since 2011, Oscar has covered community development finance, community banking, impact investing, economic development, housing and more for media outlets such as Shelterforce, B Magazine, Impact Alpha, and Fast Company.
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Tags: affordable housing, jobs, denver
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Check out this nice coffee package simulation
24 July, 2018 0 Comments
Coffee is a brewed drink prepared from roasted coffee beans, the seeds of berries from certain Coffea species.
The genus Coffea is native to tropical Africa (specifically having its origin in Ethiopia and Sudan) and Madagascar, the Comoros, Mauritius, and Réunion in the Indian Ocean.
Coffee plants are now cultivated in over 70 countries, primarily in the equatorial regions of the Americas, Southeast Asia, India, and Africa. The two most commonly grown are C. arabica and C. robusta.
Once ripe, coffee berries are picked, processed, and dried.
Dried coffee seeds (referred to as “beans”) are roasted to varying degrees, depending on the desired flavor. Roasted beans are ground and then brewed with near-boiling water to produce the beverage known as coffee.
Coffee is darkly colored, bitter, slightly acidic and has a stimulating effect in humans, primarily due to its caffeine content.[medical citation needed] It is one of the most popular drinks in the world, and it can be prepared and presented in a variety of ways (e.g., espresso, French press, café latte).
It is usually served hot, although iced coffee is a popular alternative.
Clinical studies indicate that moderate coffee consumption is benign or mildly beneficial in healthy adults, with continuing research on whether long-term consumption lowers the risk of some diseases, although those long-term studies are of generally poor quality.
The word “coffee” entered the English language in 1582 via the Dutch koffie, borrowed from the Ottoman Turkish kahve, borrowed in turn from the Arabic qahwah.
The Arabic word qahwah was traditionally held to refer to a type of wine whose etymology is given by Arab lexicographers as deriving from the verb qahiya (قَهِيَ), “to lack hunger”, in reference to the drink’s reputation as an appetite suppressant.
It has also been proposed that the source may be the Proto-Central Semitic root q-h-h meaning “dark”
Legendary accounts
According to legend, ancestors of today’s Oromo people in a region of Kaffa in Ethiopia were believed to have been the first to recognize the energizing effect of the coffee plant, though no direct evidence has been found indicating where in Africa coffee grew or who among the native populations might have used it as a stimulant or even known about it, earlier than the 17th century.
The story of Kaldi, the 9th-century Ethiopian goatherd who discovered coffee when he noticed how excited his goats became after eating the beans from a coffee plant, did not appear in writing until 1671 and is probably apocryphal.
Historical transmission
The earliest credible evidence of coffee-drinking or knowledge of the coffee tree appears in the middle of the 15th century in the accounts of Ahmed al-Ghaffar in Yemen.
It was here in Arabia that coffee seeds were first roasted and brewed, in a similar way to how it is now prepared. Coffee was used by Sufi circles to stay awake for their religious rituals.
Accounts differ on the origin of coffee (seeds) prior to its appearance in Yemen. One account credits Muhammad Ibn Sa’d for bringing the beverage to Aden from the African coast.
Design of ID card mockup for free editing
Mockup (4)
Polygon (4)
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John Tavares and Taylor Hall Named Mentorship Cup Coaches
NHLPA Staff
Taylor HallJohn TavaresAll-Canadians
Spezza, Seguin, Skinner and Biron are among NHLPA stars to mentor 42 of Canada’s top bantam-aged players during the five-day camp and culminating game.
JOHN TAVARES AND TAYLOR HALL NAMED COACHES FOR SECOND ANNUAL ALLSTATE ALL-CANADIANS MENTORSHIP CUP
TORONTO, ON, July 11, 2012 – The National Hockey League Players’ Association (NHLPA) is pleased to announce NHL stars John Tavares and Taylor Hall have been named the coaches of the second annual Allstate All-Canadians Mentorship Cup. Fellow NHL players Jason Spezza, Tyler Seguin, Jeff Skinner, and Martin Biron will also participate in the intensive five-day camp that welcomes 42 of the top bantam-aged players from across the country. The camp will conclude with the Allstate All-Canadians Mentorship Cup, an inter-squad exhibition game, on Saturday, July 21 at 1:00 p.m. ET, which will air on TSN.
The Allstate All-Canadians Mentorship Camp will take place at the Hershey Centre in Mississauga, ON, from July 17 to 21, 2012. Led by 21-year NHL veteran Gary Roberts, the camp aims to provide young athletes with the exclusive opportunity to learn from the pros about the importance of on- and off-ice skills including fitness, nutrition, and mental conditioning.
“I’m looking forward to making my coaching debut against Taylor Hall at the upcoming Allstate All-Canadians Mentorship Cup,” said John Tavares, NHLPA Member and New York Islanders forward. “This program is a great way to teach the next generation of young hockey players about all the hard work and sacrifice it takes to perform at an elite level. It will be fun to participate behind the bench for a change and I’m excited to be a part of it.”
Taylor Hall, NHLPA Member and Edmonton Oilers forward echoes his sentiments. “It’s been six years since my bantam hockey year, and the Allstate All-Canadians program reminds me of all the things I’ve learned since then about taking care of my body and being mentally strong. I hope that I’ll be able to pass a few of those helpful lessons I’ve learned to this group of young hockey players. Last year’s Mentorship Cup was an exciting game, and I’m looking forward to taking on John Tavares this year in what should be a fun coaching matchup.”
The Allstate All-Canadians Mentorship Program aims to engage all levels of the hockey community at the grassroots level by providing players, coaches, parents and fans important resources through the program website, www.allcanadians.com. The website is quickly becoming a highly valuable hockey reference to Canadian players, parents and coaches at all levels. This year, the Canada-wide program was supplemented by the widely successful Allstate All-Canadians Regional Mentorship Camps, led by NHLPA Executive, and 20-year NHL veteran, Mathieu Schneider, along with present NHL players and supporting off-ice topic experts. The one-day regional camps were held in Calgary, Toronto and Halifax, and brought together more than 350 boys and girls ages eight to 15 at all skills levels selected randomly through an application process on www.allcanadians.com.
“Our passion and commitment to ‘give back’ to Canada’s hockey youth is encapsulated through the Allstate All-Canadians program,” said Mike Ouellet, NHLPA Chief of Business Affairs. “We are incredibly excited to engage these young players with the unique opportunity of five full days to develop as athletes by learning from the people who know the game best – NHL hockey players. Our end goal is to not only educate these players on what it takes to be great hockey players, but to provide them with the skills to be better individuals off the ice as well.”
“After coaching in last year’s Mentorship Cup and defeating Team Schenn in a big comeback, I was eager to once again be involved with the Allstate All-Canadians program this year,” said Jason Spezza, NHLPA Member and Ottawa Senators forward. “These young hockey players are tremendously focused and driven to improve, and it was inspiring to be a part of the camp last year. I look forward to attending this year’s camp as a Mentor and continuing my involvement with the program.”
Fans are invited to watch Team Hall take on Team Tavares live, beginning at 1:00 p.m. ET on Saturday, July 21. Pre-game and intermission autograph sessions with NHL players will take place. Tickets are free and available at www.allcanadians.com, and on game day at the Hershey Centre, located at 5500 Rose Cherry Place, Mississauga, ON, beginning at 12:00 p.m. ET. Fans can also watch the game on TSN.
For the latest news and updates regarding the Allstate All-Canadians Mentorship Camp and Allstate All-Canadians Mentorship Cup, please visit www.allcanadians.com
There will be media availability during the camp with further details forthcoming.
About Allstate Insurance Company of Canada
Allstate Insurance Company of Canada is one of Canada’s leading producers and distributors of home and auto insurance products. ""The Good Hands Network®"" enables consumers to contact Allstate Canada through one of 92 community-based Agencies, directly online at www.allstate.ca and through the Customer Contact Centre at 1-800-Allstate. Allstate Canada is committed to making a positive difference in the communities in which it operates and has partnered with organizations such as Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD Canada), Crime Stoppers, United Way and Junior Achievement. In 2010, Allstate Canada, in partnership with the National Hockey League Players’ Association (NHLPA), created the Allstate All-Canadians program, a mentorship program designed to guide the next generation of Canada’s hockey youth. Learn more about this program at www.allcanadians.com. To learn more about Allstate Canada, visit www.goodhandsadvice.ca or www.allstate.ca.
About the National Hockey League Players’ Association
The National Hockey League Players' Association (NHLPA), established in 1967, is a labour organization whose members are the players in the National Hockey League (NHL). The NHLPA works on behalf of the players in varied disciplines such as labour relations, product licensing, marketing, international hockey and community relations, all in furtherance of its efforts to promote its members and the game of hockey. In 1999, the NHLPA launched the Goals & Dreams fund as a way for the players to give something back to the game they love. Over the past 12 years, more than 60,000 deserving children in 25 countries have benefited from the players' donations of hockey equipment. NHLPA Goals & Dreams has donated more than $20-million to grassroots hockey programs, making it the largest program of its kind. For more information on the NHLPA, please visit www.nhlpa.com.
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"Meet the Press"
Americus 1
Dougherty County 1
Wayne County 1
Mosnier, Joseph 1
United States Navy 1
William G. Anderson, D.O. Oral History Interview
Anderson, William G. D.O., American, born 1927
Mosnier, Joseph Ph. D.
United States Navy, American, founded 1775
Albany Movement, American, 1961 - 1962
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, American, 1960 - 1970s
Meet the Press, American, founded 1947
Pritchett, Laurie, American, 1926 - 2000
Detroit, Wayne County, Michigan, United States, North and Central America
Albany, Dougherty County, Georgia, United States, North and Central America
The oral history consists of six digital files: 2011.174.41.1a, 2011.174.41.1b, 2011.174.41.1c, 2011.174.41.1d, 2011.174.41.1e, and 2011.174.41.1f.
William Anderson, D.O. recalls growing up in Americus, Georgia, serving in the navy during World War II, and his friendships with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Rev. Ralph D. Abernathy. He remembers opening his osteopath practice in Albany, Georgia, becoming a leader of the Albany Movement, and supporting protesters from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). He discusses his several arrests with King and Abernathy, appearing on Meet the Press, the closing of all public facilities in Albany, and his later friendship with Sheriff Laurie Pritchett.
2011.174.41.1a-f
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Bass Player Magazine Honors Legendary Reggae Bassist ASTON “FAMILY MAN” BARRETT
Aston "Family Man" Barrett, driving force of the Wailers for more than 40 years and Bob Marley’s Music Director and First Lieutenant, receives Lifetime Achievement Award from Bass Player Magazine
Online PR News – 26-October-2012 – Los Angeles, CA – Bass Player Magazine honored Bob Marley’s Music Director and First Lieutenant, Aston “Family Man” Barrett, with a Lifetime Achievement Award this past Saturday, October 20, 2012 at a special presentation at The Key Club in Los Angeles.
Brian Fox, editor of Bass Player Magazine enthused, “It was an honor and a thrill to present Aston ‘Family Man’ Barrett with Bass Player’s Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his profound contributions to the art, craft, and profession of bass playing. With Bob Marley & the Wailers—and many, many others—‘Fams’ created the blueprint for reggae bass. On literally thousands of studio and live performances, he embodies groove perfection and champions the bass as more than merely a background instrument; his melodic sub-hooks create the connective tissue holding the music together. Thanks to ‘Family Man’ for everything he has done for the bass. One good thing about his music: When it hits, we feel no pain!”
Aston “Family Man” Barrett has been the driving force of the Wailers for more than 40 years, and is known internationally for his signature bass-patterns that have come to define contemporary reggae music. As he continues his year-round touring with his Wailers, “Family Man’s” commitment to the mission he started with Bob Marley more than four decades ago is firmly in place. His promise to spread the message of peace, love and equality to all people of the world is now stronger than ever before. In his own words, “Reggae is for all people, all ages, and all times- past, present, and future. It is the language of the people, and we are chosen for the mission of spreading the message of reggae music to the world.”
Fifty years ago, with the liberation from British control in 1962, Jamaica realized a new potential for expressive freedom. On the journey to construct their own national identity, two movements emerged as the leading forces of Jamaican culture- ska music and the Rastafarian religion. Bob Marley famously combined these two movements and became the voice that spread them both to an international audience. As Jamaica’s toughest singer/songwriter, it wasn’t until his talents were combined with the renowned musical abilities of the Barrett brothers (Family Man and Carly) that Jamaican music was catapulted onto the worldwide musical stage. Through the incorporation of Rastafarian beliefs into ska music and the use of unique bass patterns specific to the Barrett brothers’ rhythm section, Marley and Barrett together defined reggae as a genre and Jamaican culture in a way that no one, before or since, has been able to accomplish.
Aston “Family Man” Barrett said of the award, “This is the first award I have ever received in America, and it was such a great honor because it means the message of reggae music from Jamaica is reaching all the people of the world. The opportunity to speak to other musicians is always an honor, and I was so thrilled the hour had come for me to be able to speak to other bass players and musicians about reggae music. Reggae is the music of the people, and this [Bass Player Awards ceremony] allowed me to speak to the people. I’ve been on the road from 1969 until 2012, and this reminds me why it is my mission to spread the message of reggae music to the world.”
For all press inquiries, please contact:
Versa Manos
Gorgeous Media Group
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Prayers, Poems, and Piyyutim ☞ Collective Welfare ☞ Government ☞ Opening Prayers for Legislative Bodies ☞ Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Arnold E. Resnicoff on 18 July 2016
Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Arnold E. Resnicoff on 18 July 2016
United States Congressional Record and Arnold E. Resnicoff
Shared on:
2018-06-23 – 10 Tammuz 5778 via the Public Domain (17 U.S. Code §105 - Subject matter of copyright: United States Government works)
Opening Prayers for Legislative Bodies
pluralism, תחינות teḥinot, 21st century C.E., 58th century A.M., English vernacular prayer, United States of America, House of Representatives, Prayers of Guest Chaplains, 114th Congress, interfaith tolerance
Guest Chaplain: Rabbi Arnold E. Resnicoff, Retired Chaplain, U.S. Navy, Washington, DC
Date of Prayer: 07/18/2016
Contribute a translation
English (source)
Opening Prayer Given by the Guest Chaplain:
O Lord who said “Let there be light,”
we have reason still to fear the dark,
the dark of senseless death,
of murder, terror, fear, and strife,
testing faith in a future warm and bright.
This day, 18 July,
almost 250 years ago,
the Gazette in Boston published a patriotic hymn,
“The Liberty Song”:
Join hand in hand,
brave Americans all;
By uniting, we stand;
by dividing, we fall.
I was in a Beirut foxhole,
religious war,
but U.S. foxholes were unique:
interfaith.
Side by side,
some sought You
through different religious faith traditions;
others––not religious––
found faith and common cause in freedom’s call,
in freedom’s holy light.
Help us, we pray,
learn the truth I learned that day
that if more foxholes,
if more people made room for others’ faiths,
we would need far fewer foxholes
and have more cause for faith.
So give us strength to pray:
brave Americans all.
אָמֵן׃
114th Congress, 2nd Session
Issue: Vol. 162, No. 116 — Daily Edition (July 18, 2016)
Link: https://chaplain.house.gov/chaplaincy/display_gc.html?id=2426
Disseminate!
Related liturgy and liturgy-related work:
✍ Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Shea Hecht on 30 November 2016
✍ Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Jay Weinstein on 17 May 2016
✍ Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi John Linder on 22 March 2016
✍ Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Claudio Kogan on 10 June 2015
✍ Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Michael Siegel on 30 April 2015
✍ Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Mara Nathan on 19 January 2018
✍ Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Sanford Akselrad on 28 March 2017
“Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Arnold E. Resnicoff on 18 July 2016” is shared by United States Congressional Record with a Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication 1.0 Universal license.
United States Congressional Record
The Congressional Record is the official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress, published by the United States Government Printing Office and issued when Congress is in session. Indexes are issued approximately every two weeks. At the end of a session of Congress, the daily editions are compiled in bound volumes constituting the permanent edition. Statutory authorization for the Congressional Record is found in Chapter 9 of Title 44 of the United States Code. (wikipedia)
Arnold E. Resnicoff
Arnold E. Resnicoff (born 1946) is an American Conservative rabbi who served as a military officer and military chaplain. He served in Vietnam and Europe before attending rabbinical school. He then served as a U.S. Navy Chaplain for almost 25 years. He promoted the creation of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and delivered the closing prayer at its 1982 dedication. In 1984 the President of the United States spoke on his eyewitness account of the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing. After retiring from the military he was National Director of Interreligious Affairs for the American Jewish Committee and served as Special Assistant (for Values and Vision) to the Secretary and Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force, serving at the equivalent military rank of Brigadier General. Resnicoff holds several degrees, including an honorary doctorate. His awards include the Defense Superior Service Medal, the Department of the Air Force Decoration for Exceptional Civilian Service, and the Chapel of Four Chaplains Hall of Heroes Gold Medallion. (via his entry in Wikipedia)
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ויהי נעם אדני אלהינו עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננה עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננהו "May the pleasantness of אדֹני our elo’ah be upon us; may our handiwork be established for us — our handiwork, may it be established."–Psalms 90:17
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« Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Shea Hecht on 30 November 2016
Prayer of the Guest Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives: Rabbi Jay Weinstein on 17 May 2016 »
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Timothy Leo Andrews
October 12, 1938 - May 23, 2012
Obituary for Timothy Leo Andrews
Timothy L. Andrews, lifelong resident of Lewiston, passed away Wednesday morning, May 23, 2012, after a long battle with liver disease.
Tim was born Oct. 12, 1938 to Leo and Hilma Andrews in Lewiston. He graduated from Lewiston High School in 1957 and was involved in various athletics including baseball, basketball, and football. Following graduation, he attended both LCSC and University of Idaho. He also spent many summers working the harvest. On August 4, 1962, Tim married Louise Dykes in Clarkston; one year later their son Derek was born, followed by Andrea Kim in 1965 and Stacey in 1969. Tim contributed over 30 years of service in the National Guard and retired from Potlatch Corporation in 1998 after over 40 years of service.
Tim was an avid fisherman, outdoorsman and sports fan. He spent most of his summers enjoying the outdoors and camping with family and friends. He also enjoyed traveling with his family. Tim volunteered much of his time to the Idaho Veteran’s Home and was given a commemorative brick by his wife and children in honor of his contribution to service. He was a longtime member of the Kelly Creek Fly Casters fishing club where he served as President for a term. He was also a longtime member of the Moose Lodge #751 in Clarkston. He was very proud to be an LHS alum and never missed a class of ‘57 reunion or festivity. He was known by friends as “Lucky Tim” due to his various raffle and gambling winnings.
He is survived by his wife, Louise; son Derek (Tana) Andrews of Richland; daughters Andrea Kim of Lewiston and Stacey (Brent) Boudreaux of Aurora, Colorado; one grandchild, Paige M. Boudreaux; mother Hilma Andrews; brother Mike (Sandy) Andrews; sisters Bonnie Jean Richards, Anna Rae Semler, Judy Andrews, Linda (Frank) Bauer, and Terry Fetner; and numerous nieces and nephews. Tim was preceded in death by his father Leo Andrews and brother Tom (Carole) Andrews.
Funeral services have been made with Malcom’s Funeral home. Services are scheduled for Sunday, May 27th at 3pm at Orchards United Methodist Church. Those wishing to leave the family condolences may do so at www.malcomsfuneralhome.com, under the web memorials tab.
To send flowers to the family of Timothy Leo Andrews, please visit our Heartfelt Sympathies Store.
Malcoms Brower Wann Funeral Home
1711 8th St.
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Origin Story | by Topaz Winters
Topaz Winters is a poet, essayist, editor, creative director, speaker, actress, & multidisciplinary artist. Among her internationally award-winning & critically-acclaimed creative credits include working as the author of three books (most recently poems for the sound of the sky before thunder, Math Paper Press, 2017), writer & star of the short film SUPERNOVA (dir. Ishan Modi, 2017), creative director & editor-in-chief of Half Mystic Press (est. 2015), speaker of the TEDx talk Healing Is a Verb (2017), & creator of the digital art installation Love Lives Bot (est. 2018). Her work has been published in Cosmonauts Avenue & DIALOGIST, profiled in The Straits Times & The Business Times, & commended by Button Poetry & the National YoungArts Foundation, among others. She is the youngest Singaporean ever to be nominated for the Pushcart Prize. She was born in 1999, resides at topazwinters.com, & studies literature & film at Princeton University. She enjoys chai lattes, classic films, wildflowers, & the colour of the sky when nothing is dreaming of it.
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Berlin and the Arms-Control Debate
June 27, 2013 Topic: Arms ControlSecurity Region: United States
The president's speech on nuclear weapons and new guidance materials were a sensible step forward for U.S. policy.
by Frank Klotz
Public debate on nuclear-weapons policy is relatively rare these days. Two developments nevertheless pushed the topic back into the limelight last week. On June 19th, President Obama delivered a wide-ranging foreign-policy speech in Berlin that touched briefly on nuclear-arms control. Later that same day, the White House released a summary of new presidential guidance resulting from a lengthy interagency review of what’s needed for nuclear deterrence. Criticism quickly followed from both ends of the political spectrum—but for very different reasons.
Arms-control advocates, on the one hand, felt that the president had passed up an opportunity to aggressively advance his nuclear agenda. They had anticipated that he would use the Berlin speech to rekindle interest in steps he had proposed four years earlier in Prague to eventually bring about “a world without nuclear weapons.” They had also hoped that new presidential guidance would direct the Pentagon to take actions that would more dramatically reduce the role of nuclear weapons in national security policy. They were disappointed on both counts. The New York Times editorial board reflected this mood, describing Obama’s proposals as “a disappointing example of what happens when soaring vision collides with the reality of obstructive Republican senators, a recalcitrant Russia and a convergence of regional crises.”
Conservative critics, on the other hand, lambasted the president’s call for further reductions in the U.S. and Russian nuclear arsenals. The GOP chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, “Buck" McKeon, stated that “desire to negotiate a new round of arms control with the Russians, while Russia is cheating on a major existing nuclear arms control treaty, strains credulity.” The ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Bob Corker of Tennessee, asserted that additional limitations of the U.S. nuclear arsenal without first modernizing existing forces could amount to “unilateral disarmament.” Twenty-four Republican senators signed a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry arguing that “any further reductions in the U.S. nuclear arsenal should only be conducted through a treaty subject to the advice and consent of the Senate.”
Despite these sharply contrasting reactions, the approach taken by President Obama and his administration actually represents a relatively moderate and measured effort to reconcile two dominant, but different themes in current American thinking about nuclear weapons. The first is the belief that the United States should continue to lead international efforts to limit and reduce nuclear arsenals, prevent nuclear proliferation, and secure nuclear materials. The second is the belief that appropriately sized nuclear forces still play an essential role in protecting U.S. and allied security interests.
The Berlin speech addressed the first; the summary of the new guidance largely spoke to the second. Taken together, they represent a pragmatic and workable basis for forging a sustainable, bipartisan consensus on nuclear weapons and arms-control policy.
What the President Said
The biggest news from the Berlin speech was President Obama’s announcement that the United States could reduce its “deployed strategic nuclear weapons by up to one-third” and still maintain a strong and credible deterrent. (Given that the 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, or New START, sets a limit of 1550 deployed strategic nuclear weapons, a one-third reduction translates to 1000-1100 weapons.) He also stated that he intended to “seek bold reductions in U.S. and Russian tactical nuclear weapons in Europe.”
Other than defining the magnitude of possible cuts, the president said little else that was fundamentally new. Following the completion of the New START in 2010, senior American officials had hoped to pursue even further reductions in long-range nuclear forces and, for the first time, to set limits on tactical and nondeployed weapons. However, profound differences between Washington and Moscow on missile defense—and a host of other bilateral issues—essentially blocked further negotiations. At the same time, the highly partisan atmosphere inside the beltway left little space or appetite for seriously debating arms-control matters.
Not much has changed on both accounts in recent months, and the prospects for renewed arms control talks in the immediate future are far from bright. Thus, it is not surprising that the president’s language on nuclear issues in Berlin was decidedly more tempered and subdued than the soaring rhetoric of his 2009 Prague speech. Arms-control advocates were clearly disappointed; they had expected more.
The new presidential guidance also indicated that reductions up to one-third could also be made in strategic nuclear forces. In many other respects, it exhibits a fair degree of continuity with the approach taken by previous administrations. For example, the publicly-released summary states that the United States will continue to maintain a “triad” of long-range nuclear forces, consisting of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), ballistic-missile submarines, and nuclear-capable, long-range bombers. It also states that the United States will continue to base nuclear forces in Europe, “until such time as NATO has agreed the conditions are right to change the Alliance’s nuclear posture.”
While many in the defense community no doubt took heart with these particular conclusions, some arms-control advocates were critical, arguing that the new guidance reflects a “Cold War mindset” and a continuing failure to adjust to the new security environment.
It Really Isn’t About the Cold War Any More
Recent history, however, belies this oft-repeated assertion. The United States has in fact made rather dramatic changes to its nuclear forces since the early 1990s, both in numbers and composition. In 1967, the United States had more than 31,000 nuclear weapons. By 2009, it had just over 5,000.
The composition of nuclear forces has also changed. As the Soviet Union was in the final stages of collapse in the fall of 1991, George H. W. Bush unilaterally ordered all U.S. ground-force tactical nuclear weapons be returned from overseas bases and dismantled. Nuclear-armed bombers were taken off alert in the United States. Several nuclear-modernization programs were cancelled.
Similarly, long-range nuclear forces have been dramatically reduced in number by successive U.S.-Russian arms-control treaties. When this author first performed missile duties in the early 1980s, the United States had 1,054 ICBMs located at nine major bases. Today, there are 450 ICBMs at three bases. Additionally, the huge Titan II missile and the multiwarhead Peacekeeper missile have both been deactivated. The Obama administration’s 2010 Nuclear Posture Review further mandated that all remaining Minuteman ICBMs be armed with a single, rather than multiple, nuclear warheads.
To suggest that a “Cold War mentality” prevails in the formulation of American nuclear policy is to turn a blind eye toward the significant steps successive administrations have already made to adjust to new security realities. By the same token, to take President Obama to task for pursuing further nuclear reductions ignores the fact that that he is following a well-established precedent set by his predecessors. It is worth remembering that George W. Bush negotiated a treaty with Russia that would reduce the number of operationally deployed U.S. strategic nuclear weapons by nearly two-thirds—and he was initially prepared to make those cuts unilaterally.
The Basis of a Nuclear Consensus
Nuclear weapons are not going away anytime soon. The other nuclear-armed states show little inclination to engage in multilateral arms control, much less to reduce their stockpiles to zero. Several countries—China, France, India, Pakistan and Russia—are in fact pursuing substantial efforts to modernize, diversify and, in some cases, expand their existing nuclear forces. North Korea and Iran seek to develop both nuclear weapons and delivery systems.
Given this sobering reality, the United States still needs to maintain modern, survivable and effective nuclear forces to deter the use or threatened use of nuclear weapons against the United States and its allies, however improbable that may now appear.
While President Obama's Berlin speech and new guidance for U.S. nuclear forces have been criticized for not breaking new ground or, alternatively, pushing too fast on further reductions, they represent a reasonable and measured approach to the realities of being a major nuclear power. They also provide the basic elements of a broad consensus on what needs to be done to sustain our nuclear forces in an uncertain world populated by other nuclear powers. They can and should be used to advance an agenda that combines necessary modernization and reductions tailored to serve American and allied security interests.
Lt Gen Frank G. Klotz, USAF (Ret.) is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, DC, and the former commander of Air Force Global Strike Command, which has responsibility for all U.S. nuclear-capable bombers and land-based missiles.
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Petroleum Powerhouse: Why America No Longer 'Needs' the Middle East
April 29, 2019 Topic: Security Region: Americas Tags: PetroleumOPECSaudi ArabiaForeign PolicyNational Security
Washington's foreign policy should be based on the realities of the world today, rather than decades ago.
by Willis L Krumholz
Energy is vital to America’s security and prosperity. During the Cold War, the United States had strong interests in ensuring the Middle East was not dominated by the Soviet Union—we couldn’t risk a major disruption to the global oil market, which was once dominated by the Persian Gulf. But today, there is no threat to the region from any hegemon. Not only that, but also the world energy balance of power has shifted dramatically. With a vastly different geopolitical reality, U.S. foreign policy should modernize and recalibrate, starting in the Middle East.
Saudi Arabia’s massive state-owned oil company, Saudi Aramco, just issued debt—about $10 billion worth—in the form of bonds sold to investors. But before investors lined up to buy, they had to kick the tires, and the documentation banks have provided offers a rare look at the state of oil production in Saudi Arabia.
The “stand out” of the bond prospectus is that the Ghawar oil field, once the world’s most productive, is dwindling. Today, it produces only a quarter of its capacity from fifteen years ago. This means that Saudi Arabia’s overall capacity to produce crude oil is likely declining.
Meanwhile, America’s Permian shale oil reservoir has officially become the world’s biggest, producing more than four million barrels per day. The Permian’s dominance is emblematic of the massive shift in world energy production over the last decade: America is now the world’s top oil producer. This, along with the massive shift in geopolitical reality that was the end of the Cold War—where it was essential to keep the Soviets from dominating global oil production—has drastically reduced the importance of the Middle East. U.S. foreign policy has yet to adjust accordingly.
Once, much of the United States’ oil was inaccessible because it was trapped in shale rock, deep under the earth’s surface. But about a decade ago American energy producers began applying the new technology of hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling—previously only used to access natural gas—to access oil trapped in shale rock formations like those in the Permian reservoir.
Aided by private property rights and the rule of law, production boomed. U.S. crude output more than doubled, and America now has more recoverable oil reserves than any other country in the world—including Saudi Arabia and Russia, which hold the number two and number three spots, respectively. In the next five years, American oil exports should also surpass Saudi and Russian exports, even though we domestically consume far more energy than either of these nations.
Meanwhile, U.S. natural gas production, which isn’t easily exported, has likewise flourished in recent years, further decreasing America’s dependence on imports and lowering energy prices for American industry. Because of these huge shifts, The Economist coined the term “Saudi America.” And continued investment means the American energy industry will become even more disproportionately productive in years to come.
This U.S. energy revolution should profoundly impact our foreign policy, but because of intransigence and groupthink in Washington, it hasn’t—yet.
Today, because policymakers overvalue the strategic importance of the Middle East, there is an irrational fixation on Iran. That has led us to effectively take sides in a 1,400-year-old religious war between Sunnis—led by Saudi Arabia—and Shias—led by Iran.
Policymakers in Washington have gone so far as to turn a blind eye when Sunni countries like Saudi Arabia fund and export the extreme form of Islam responsible for 9/11, and fund terror groups who continue to commit atrocities in places like Syria’s civil war. For their part, U.S. policymakers have (accidentally) armed Sunni terror groups that are affiliated with Al Qaeda, such as the Nusra Front, because these groups are fighting allies of Iran.
America also continues to support the Saudi war effort in Yemen’s civil war, where the Saudis and Yemen’s Sunnis are fighting the Iran-backed Houthi rebels (who are Shias). America arms Saudi forces and facilitates their air war, despite the Saudi record of indiscriminately bombing civilians and aiding Al Qaeda in Yemen.
As a result, tens of thousands of Yemeni civilians—woman and children included—have been killed and maimed, while hundreds of thousands starve—all to prevent a return to the mostly Shia-Sunni split of Yemen into two countries, which existed only a few decades ago. In other words, to fight nationalist Houthis who want their own country.
Enough already. It is not in America’s interest to be picking sides between Saudi Arabia and Iran. The status quo leaves us with less leverage over either side and has consistently placed us in morally dubious situations that run counter to short and long-term American interests. Overall, the Middle East is of diminishing strategic importance, and it’s time to properly order America’s global defense priorities. We must reassess what matters—and what doesn’t.
Yes, America needs the capability to protect the global commons, which includes the choke points through which much of the world’s crude supply flows. It is perfectly reasonable, for example, to help negotiate a settlement in Yemen’s civil war to ensure Sunni control of the land directly adjacent to the Bab-el-Mandeb strait, a choke point for Saudi oil shipments. It is likewise reasonable for the United States to keep Iran, or any other power, from mining the Strait of Hormuz, another choke point through which much of the world’s oil supply flows.
The rationale for our tight relationship with Saudi Arabia, warts and all, was based on Cold War realities. But the Cold War is over, and the United States is the world’s new petroleum powerhouse. Our foreign policy should be based on the realities of the world today, rather than decades ago. Things have changed, and they should change in Washington, too.
Willis L Krumholz is a fellow at Defense Priorities. He holds a JD and MBA degree from the University of St. Thomas, and works in the financial services industry.
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Is the United States Baiting Iran into a War?
June 1, 2019 Topic: Iran Region: Middle East Tags: Donald TrumpJCPOAMiddle EastWarIRGC
The Trump team appears to have laid a trap for Iran, attempting to provoke it into an action that crosses an administration red line.
by Jeffrey Stacey
The Middle East region and the American foreign-policy establishment are breathing a collective sigh of relief, as President Donald Trump has dialed back U.S. threats to Iran and undercut his administration's top hawks, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and National Security Advisor John Bolton. But while tensions in the Persian Gulf may appear to be getting lower as a result, the likelihood of military exchanges between the United States and Iran are actually increasing.
In fact, this simmering crisis is entering a new, more dangerous phase. With armed forces on both sides on high alert, additional American naval and aerial hardware newly arrived in theater, and Saudi Arabia having pounded the Iranian-backed Houthi rebel force in Yemen for its attack on a major Saudi oil pipeline, there remains not only the potential for an unintended clash or misfire, but also a worrying threat that misperception may lead to conflict.
Iran prides itself on being able to ascertain what American intentions are, with Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and numerous other high ranking Iranian officials having studied in the United States as undergraduates or postgraduates—although their overconfidence in this regard hurt them in the eleventh hour of the negotiations between Zarif and former Secretary of State John Kerry, which in the end led to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA, or more commonly known as the Iran Nuclear Deal).
The Costs of Misperception
Back in 2015, Iran incorrectly believed it had the United States over a barrel in the final phase of the JCPOA negotiations. The Obama administration had made a mistake, publicly describing the ongoing negotiations with Iran as a “foreign-policy success”—causing Iran to believe that American preferences for a deal were even stronger than they were.
This resulted in Iran failing to have a plan B when Kerry walked out of negotiations due to Iranian stalling on the strength of surveillance measures. Zarif, mistakenly believing that Washington wanted the deal even more than Tehran did, stonewalled. This led Kerry to announce (after he conferred with Obama directly) that he would walk away and return to Washington. With no backup plan in place, and having strong preferences in favor of the deal itself, Iran caved.
Fast-forward to the present crisis in the Gulf, the specter of Iran misperceiving American intentions has once again arisen—and this time with potentially more dangerous consequences. Consider, for example, that Iran is the likeliest culprit behind two recent, notable events in the region: the sabotage of four oil tankers in UAE and an armed drone attack on a Saudi pipeline (the latter was carried out by the Houthi rebel force in Yemen, who are a known client of Tehran).
Iran is likely to seek to push the ante even further, for it now perceives that it got away with these two hostile actions with no American military repercussions. Meanwhile, Trump is now openly criticizing his own forward-leaning national security advisor on how to handle Iran. This scenario is ripe for misperception on the part of the Iranians, who feel emboldened, based on the latest statements made by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other top officials.
Iran and the Houthis attacked American allies (the UAE and Saudi Arabia) on a small scale in order to send them a message: if a war were to break out between Iran and the United States, then these allies would be undefendable targets of Iranian forces. Saudi Arabia itself has already taken revenge for the Houthi pipeline attack with a fresh wave of intense bombing of Houthi positions in Yemen, including in the capital of Sanaa.
With hardliners in Tehran on the ascendency, the Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps is highly motivated to lash out at American forces in the region. Such moves might include lower-level actions, such as firing in the vicinity of patrolling American aircraft or swarming larger U.S. naval ships with armed speedboats in the Gulf.
It is only somewhat less likely that Quds Force commander Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani may decide to target U.S. forces directly with the intention of inflicting real damage or unleash Iranian-backed militias in Iraq on the U.S. forces in there—falsely believing that the United States will not respond in kind. In fact, the United States would respond without question—and likely in a sustained and withering fashion.
Iran thus appears to be underestimating American propensity for attacking it at this stage, incentivizing it to raise the military stakes. With opposition to Bolton’s drive for regime change in Congress, America’s closest allies, the State and Defense Departments, and now even the president himself, Iran may step right across a U.S. red line with highly costly consequences almost certain to transpire.
Wagging the Dog?
While Bolton issued the full throttle threat to Iran, it was Pompeo who let it slip that “it’s something we’ve been working on for a little while.” In Washington, it is language of this sort that conjures up fear that the administration may be engaged in a “wag the dog” operation—preparing to attack Iran not for military reasons, but political ones instead.
With talk of impeaching Trump in the air and Democrats in the House of Representatives firing a battery of subpoenas at the administration, not to mention Trump being behind the top seven Democratic presidential candidates in head-to-head polling, on some level there may be a temptation for Trump to order an attack on Iran and kill two birds with one stone. There may be, however, more than meets the eye involved here.
The more likely explanation of what may be a fifty percent chance the Trump team will launch strikes on Iran appears to have more to do with the long-held animosity that both Bolton and Pompeo have harbored toward Iran. With this pair of high-placed hawks and their strong intent to “take care” of the Iran problem, as they see it, persuading their boss—with his close ties to the rulers of Saudi Arabia and two years of harsh rhetoric—appears to be almost a foregone conclusion.
Last month the United States designated Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization against the advice of U.S. defense and intelligence officials, who had warned of a backlash threat to American troops in the region. They were overruled by principals, including Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan. This constituted a first, deeming part of an actual foreign government to be a terrorist entity.
In fact, therein lies what may have appealed to the principal decisionmakers: hope that Iran might take the bait. No doubt the Trump team knows it needs to build legitimacy for its intended action. Subsequently, almost on cue, Iranian president Hassan Rouhani approved a law declaring all U.S. troops in the region as terrorists, with the regime going even further in labeling the U.S. government a state sponsor of terrorism.
The Trump team appears to have laid a trap for Iran, attempting to provoke it into an action that crosses an administration red line. Although a high-ranking British commander of allied forces in the Middle East publicly stated that there has not been an increased threat with Iran, either in Syria or the Persian Gulf, Shanahan briefed U.S. foreign-policy principals on a military plan for decapitating the Iranian regime with 120,000 troops and a major naval assault—one of the military options ordered by Bolton.
Thus, Iran may be playing with fire more than it realizes, and appears to truly be under threat from the United States despite being in full compliance with the JCPOA. In addition, it actually is in sync with European signatories to the deal, who recently reiterated their support of it in conjunction with Washington's increasing economic pressure on Iran by canceling waivers for other countries to purchase Iranian oil.
Now We Know
In fact, even if it doesn’t go through with the military attack on Iran, the United States is risking that Iran will at long last either begin cheating on the JCPOA or initiate an actual departure from it in full, having just announced intentions along these lines. This may, in fact, be the red line the administration has in mind. But although the administration may “welcome” such a move, the bipartisan U.S. foreign-policy establishment in Washington views this as antithetical to core U.S. national-security interests.
For what we now know—after years of debate and dissension among observers of Iran—contrary to conventional wisdom, the Iranian regime not only has a strong preference in favor of the JCPOA, but it has had this preference all along. After all, it has withstood immense diplomatic and economic pressure from the Trump administration for over two years without cheating on the deal and remaining in full compliance.
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Home / Others / Bitcoin Inheritance: 2 ways to deviate from the legacy crypto
Bitcoin Inheritance: 2 ways to deviate from the legacy crypto
Just thinking about it, a surname means that the memory reproduces the images, which are connected to this genius blockchain. Vitalik Buterin She is only 24 years old and is one of the most influential people in the cryptography industry, who will forever be remembered not only for creating Ethereum.
With the growing popularity of Vitalik, the number of interviews with its participation is increasing, the quotes from which they immediately spread throughout the network. Therefore, The shark of the coin have collected the 10 best exciting statements of Vitalik Buterin, which explains the hype about cryptocurrency and blockchain.
1. In interaction with Forbes, Vitalik shared his opinion on the importance of understanding the blockchain:
"Talking to people, including authorities, is useful, the more they understand technology, the more chance they have of working with them, which ensures they will not be an enemy in technology."
2. At the "Blockchain: New Russian Oil" conference, the publication RBK-Tatarstan, asked Vitalik Buterin: "How will the global economy change under the influence of blockchain?" – on which the genius blockchain gave the following answer, which became the iconic quote in the cryptography industry:
"Business opportunities will be increased – for countries where the economy is not developed at the moment, it will be easier to join the global financial system – it will be easier for anyone to interact with banks and financial institutions. , there will be more transparency, including the development of all kinds of products.There will be many benefits.Finally, everything will work faster and more effectively.The house can be sold within 3 hours instead of 3 weeks.And there will be more than these little examples, whatever, one it is often hindered by bureaucracy will be simplified ".
3. Here is another quote from Vitalik, on the integration of the business and the blockchain, as was said at the conference:
"… Small businesses have even more opportunities to use blockchain for large companies. The smarter the technology, the more it reduces the barriers between people to trust each other, they can build a common business , organize contracts, exchange information ".
4. Buterin said to Financial Times, what do you think of most ICO projects:
"There are projects in which a heart has never been put, which are just like "Ta daa, the price goes up, vrooom. Buy now!".
5. In an exclusive interview with Cointelegraph, shared your opinion on ICO:
"ICO as a model has a number of enormous advantages, for example, through ICO, we can democratize participation in projects right from the start.This model is a perfect way to give everyone the opportunity to to contribute to the development of the project from the early stages.We absolutely have to work hard to improve this space.It is sometimes very difficult to see the scams among the ICOs. "
6. On smart contracts in an interview with Forbes, commented like this:
"The concept with intelligent contacts is so complex, that understanding, how to make them safer comes only with the experience … We can only wait and allow people to make plans, some of which are successful. cars and airplanes were becoming safer with time, through experience we will also realize how to create smart contacts with an acceptable level of risk ".
7. In the same interview, Buterin made a statement, which became a favorite statement among the crypto community:
"Google is the best library".
8. During the interview for the Israeli newspaper TheMarker, which has been translated by Finance Magnates from Hebrew, Buterin shared his opinion on the situation of the cryptocurrency market:
"I really think we are in a bubble because all the cryptocurrencies are increasing and people have the feeling that they will continue to grow in. Many projects are collecting more money than they would be able to do in the normal VC market, and sometimes not # 39 is correspondence between the need and the utility of the project and its ability to raise funds.In addition, this market is still young and people still do not know how to distinguish between projects that will exist in the long run and those that do not This thing is growing at a rate that makes it difficult to control, for example, I do not participate in most ICOs because I think they are made with too high ratings. "
9. At the open meeting in the "Skolkovo" technopark, a correspondent of PLUSworld.ru highlighted the following statement by Buterin on cryptocurrency in Russia:
"The Russian crypto community is different from the other countries in its vast world.In Russia, there are many projects, programmers, banks and even government agencies, which are using or testing cryptocurrencies.We have every prospect to believe that the Russian cryptic community will take a position of leadership in the world ".
10. Also the following statement on the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, declared at the meeting mentioned above, has not remained unattended:
"So far, I have not met anyone taller than Putin." The president knows about the blockchain, if you ask me, this is the pinnacle of the uproar. "
* The publication contains citations translated from the original language.
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Tags Bitcoin crypto deviate inheritance legacy ways
Crypto Exchange asks users to return 5.3 million dollars to Bitcoin, Ethereum and Altcoin after an accidental air crash
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Tag Archives: Military Collection
D-Day Veterans Oral History Additions
In commemoration of World War II’s D-Day 75th anniversary, the State Archives of North Carolina has digitized 25 military veterans’ oral histories and made them available through Internet Archive. Access to the oral histories is also available through North Carolina Digital Collections Veterans Oral History collection.
The veterans listed below all participated in D-Day, whether through land, sea, or logistics. For more information on each veteran, check out NC Stories of Service, where Military Archivist Matthew Peek has been providing in-depth histories of the D-Day veterans.
Walter G. Atkinson Jr., Interview, 2000-02-24 [MilColl OH 32]
Duncan C. Blue Interview, 2009-08-12 [MilColl OH 85]
Heath H. Carriker Interview, 2009-11 [MilColl OH 152]
Thomas E. Carson Jr. Interview, 1999-10-12 [MilColl OH 157]
Hugh B. Cherry Interview, 2006-11-14 [MilColl OH 171]
John C. Clark Interview, 1997-12-04 [MilColl OH 178]
Douglas F. Dickerson Interview, 1999-12-20 [MilColl OH 228]
Willie R. Etheridge Jr. Interview, 2001-10-20 [MilColl OH 268]
James E. Ferrell Interview, 2001-09-08 [MilColl OH 281]
Aaron E. Fussell Sr. Interview, 2010-07-07 [MilColl OH 301]
Grady R. Galloway Interview, 1998-03-25 [MilColl OH 304]
Herman T. Harden Jr. Interview, 1998-11 [MilColl OH 358]
Willie J. King Interview, 2010-01-29 [MilColl OH 470]
James O. Lawson Interview, 2002-06-13 [MilColl OH 502]
Charles H. Outlaw Interview, 2013-08-07 [MilColl OH 646]
Ward R. Robinson Interview, 2003-08-23 [MilColl OH 724]
Robert W. Ryals Sr. Interview, 2010-01-27 [MilColl OH 738]
Ralph R. Todd Interview, 2008-04-08 [MilColl OH 873]
Earl H. Tyndall Jr. Interview, 1999-12-10 [MilColl OH 886]
Earl R. Weatherly Interview, 2006-07-06 [MilColl OH 910]
Ellis W. Williamson Interview, 1999-08-06 [MilColl OH 940]
Jeremiah Wolfe Interview, 2009-08-15 [MilColl OH 948]
Harold L. Frank Interview, 2006-12 [MilColl OH 975]
Howard B. Greene Interview, 2014-08-09 [MilColl OH 1015]
Clarence A. Call Interview, 2006-12-04 [MilColl OH 977]
This entry was posted in Digital Collections, News, Special Collections and tagged Military Collection, military history, oral histories, World War II on June 6, 2019 by Olivia.
Announcing the Veterans Oral History Project!
The State Archives of North Carolina & North Carolina Government & Heritage Library are proud to present the Veterans Oral History Transcription Project featuring 12 remarkable women.
The LSTA grant-funded and crowdsourced audio transcription project is one of the first of its kind! We have 12 audio format interviews with military veterans who served in the U.S. Armed Forces for any military service, engagement, or war, and who were born and/or raised in the state of North Carolina; were stationed for extended time in North Carolina military installations; or have lived in the state for an extended time.
We invite you to be a part of history by helping us transcribe.
Together, we can make women’s military history more accessible!
This entry was posted in Digital Projects, News and tagged crowdsourcing, Military Collection, military history, oral histories on November 30, 2018 by randonncarchives.
Rare Irving Berlin WWII Play Photographs Online
[This blog post was written by Matthew Peek, Military Collection Archivist for the State Archives of North Carolina.]
Photograph of songwriter Irving Berlin, wearing his U.S. Army uniform, standing against a wall next to a poster advertising the only civilian performance of Berlin’s traveling U.S. military play This Is The Army at the Teatro Reale dell’Opera in Rome, Italy, in June 1944. The play was in Rome performing for U.S. military personnel during an international tour in World War II (June 1944) [Photograph by: Zinn Arthur].
The State Archives of North Carolina’s Military Collection is excited to announce the availability online of 416 original photographs documenting the international tour of American songwriter Irving Berlin’s traveling U.S. Army play This Is The Army was performed from October 1943 through October 1945 during World War II. Developed from the 1942 Broadway musical play and the 1943 Hollywood film of the same name, This Is The Army (abbreviated by the cast and crew as “TITA”) was initially designed to raise money for the war effort in the United States, and featured one of the most famous wartime songs of the 1940s “This Is The Army, Mister Jones.” TITA became the biggest and best-known morale-boosting show of World War II in the U.S.
Beginning in October 1943, TITA left the U.S. for England, where it remained through February 1944. From there, they traveled to North Africa, Italy, Egypt, Iran, India, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Guam, Mogmog Island, Okinawa, Iwo Jima, Hawaii, and numerous other locations in the Pacific Theater. The play traveled with makeshift stages that they set up on numerous locations and U.S. military installations/camps. The play’s cast played to hundreds of thousands of U.S. service individuals, including women’s bases and camps such as the Women’s Army Corps (WAC) camps in the Pacific. They traveled by troop transport ships, rented cargo ships, and landing crafts.
View of African-American dancer, soloist, and comedian James “Stumpy” Cross introducing the song “Shoo Shoo Baby” during a performance by cast members of Irving Berlin’s traveling U.S. military play This Is The Army the hospital at Camp Huckstep in Cairo, Egypt, in August 1944. Part of the play’s “jam band” is pictured playing in the background. Photograph taken while the cast was stationed at Camp Huckstep to perform for U.S. military personnel in Cairo, Egypt, during an international tour (August 1944) [Photograph by: Zinn Arthur].
This Is The Army was the only full-integrated military unit in the U.S. Armed Forces during WWII, with African American men eating, performing, and traveling with their fellow white cast and crew members. Many of the men were not just performers before the war, but also recruited to perform in the cast from the U.S. Army ranks in 1943. The cast was all-male, which required the men to dress as women in drag for the women sketches in the play. In all, the play would prove to be the beginning of the eventual desegregation of the U.S. Armed Forces under President Harry S. Truman’s 1948 Executive Order 9981.
This particular collection of photographs was mostly taken by singer and later celebrity photographer Zinn Arthur. Arthur would select and send these photographs to fellow cast member and singer Robert Summerlin of Tarboro, N.C. Both men would add identifications to the images over the years, resulting in the collection currently held at the State Archives. This collection of the This Is The Army photographs is the only known, publicly-available collection of these images in the United States.
The complete set of photographs is available online in an album through the State Archives’ Flickr page. Original programs and tickets for the play are available for viewing in-house in the State Archives’ public Search Room.
Photograph of singer Robert Summerlin from the cast of Irving Berlin’s traveling U.S. military play This Is The Army, standing in front of a lifeboat on the deck of the small freighter El Libertador, which carried the cast and crew of the play around the South Pacific in May 1945 during World War II. The ship was in Manila, the Philippines, when the photograph was taken. Photograph taken while the play was traveling throughout the South Pacific to perform for U.S. military personnel during their international tour [May 1945] [Photograph by: Zinn Arthur].
This entry was posted in Special Collections and tagged Flickr, Military Collection, military history, World War II on August 2, 2018 by Ashley.
Help Preserve and Protect N.C. Military History
The Military Collection at the State Archives of North Carolina has launched, through the institution’s nonprofit support organization, the “Preserve N.C. Military History” fundraising effort. The goal is to raise $9,500 to hire a contract archivist for 6 months or longer to help the Military Collection Archivist process, organize, describe, and make available a selection of over 75 feet of original military records and papers documenting North Carolina’s military history.
The materials selected for this work document the home front in every North Carolina county during WWI and WWII, and cover a range of enlisted military personnel from the state in all military branches for multiple wars. These are the records needing the most archival work, and containing valuable historical information touching everyone in North Carolina.
Only the most basic descriptions exist for some collections, and in many cases no descriptions exist yet at all for new collections awaiting to be used by the public. The papers have not yet been indexed in any detail. The collections hold artwork, letters, home front materials, photographs, and posters—all created by or documenting North Carolinians from all over the state. Children’s WWII home front posters, photographs of Red Cross activities, and letters from a U.S. Navy sailor in the Pacific Theater, are just a sampling of what is included. The work will benefit the general public, scholars, teachers, schoolchildren, and anyone interested in the state’s military history.
We need your help to ensure that this work can be completed. Getting someone who has the training and experience needed to do this type of work is difficult unless he or she can be financially compensated, and we need the funds in order to do so. All of the money raised will go to pay for this contract archivist position.
Selected materials from this project will be digitized and made available to the public online in the North Carolina Digital Collections. Photographs from the collections will be put online through the State Archives’ Flickr page. Updates on the work will be posted regularly to the State Archives’ social media.
To support this fundraising effort, we ask you to spread the word about this through your social media, sharing it with anyone you think would be interested in supporting this significant work. You can donate money to the “Preserve N.C. Military History” GoFundMe page. Every little bit helps! Invest in the state’s proud military heritage, and ensure that future generations will learn of the sacrifices of its citizens in times of war.
This entry was posted in News, Special Collections and tagged Military Collection, military history, World War I on May 4, 2018 by Francesca.
[By Matthew M. Peek, Military Collection Archivist]
Help the Military Collection Identify WWII
CBI Theater Photos
The Military Collection at the State Archives of North Carolina needs the public’s help in identifying a set of photographs from World War II that have no identifications or descriptions. The photographs are from the papers of Raleigh native, William C. Cutts, who served in the Pacific Theater in WWII as an aircraft fabric and dope mechanic with the 69th Depot Replacement Squadron, 301st Air Depot Group, U.S. Army Air Forces. Cutts worked as a civilian at Seymour Johnson Field in Goldsboro before being inducted into military service in 1944. As a civilian and later as an Air Force mechanic, Cutts was listed as an aircraft fabric and dope worker, which involved laying out, cutting and sewing, and treating airplane fabric to cover damaged control surfaces and airplane fuselages. He would cover and patch airplanes’ surfaces with fabric, applying paint and dope to the fabric [dope is a type of lacquer applied to fabric-covered aircraft, that tightens and stiffens fabric stretched over airframes, rendering them airtight and weatherproof].
It is unclear as to where Cutts was stationed in the Pacific Theater during the war. The photographs in Cutts’ papers are a set of original reproduction photographs of scenes in Asia made during or just after WWII. The photographs all appear to have been taken in the China-Burma-India (CBI) Theater of WWII, in southern and eastern Asia. However, it is not readily evident from his service papers that he ever served in the CBI Theater—just in the Pacific. It is also not known if Cutts took or—more commonly as WWII servicemen did then—collected the photographic prints. Even so, the photographs show rare scenes of the CBI Theater.
Towards that end, we need the public’s help in identifying the images. All of the photographs have been uploaded into the State Archives’ Flickr page in the album “William C. Cutts WWII Images” [insert link: https://www.flickr.com/photos/north-carolina-state-archives/albums/72157694493198435]. We are asking for members of the public to help with the descriptions of the photographs. You can create a free Flickr account and add comments to these photographs with any information you may have on them. We need to create image descriptions that are reliable and historically accurate for researchers and the public who are relying on our historical materials for research, exhibits, school assignments, and public programs.
Because of this, we need to know the information you have on the image, how you know it (if from a website, please include a link to the page), and your name. If you personally recognize an area or scene from experience or family knowledge, please share the information through the image comments. Not all of the information will be used for the descriptions—as some of it may contradict what others have given. Also, we need reliable sources of information, so Wikipedia and Pinterest are not accepted as sources of information. If there is a comparable photograph online through another archives, museum, military veteran, or even the Library of Congress, please share that link in the comments on the images in the Flickr album.
The Military Collection Archivist will research the images using all of the provided information, comparing and contrasting what has been provided from the public for the most reliably-accurate image descriptions. The photograph descriptions on Flickr will be updated after they are completed, and the collection finding aid will have the descriptions added. We will be adding the names of people who assisted with the image descriptions to the William C. Cutts Papers finding aid, so you all will be credited for the effort.
WWII 112.F1.1: Small contact print of a studio portrait of the Cutts family of Raleigh, N.C., during World War II. Pictured are (left to right): Mary Jeanette Champion Cutts; Mary Jeannette Cutts; and William C. Cutts (wearing his U.S. Army Air Forces uniform) (1940s) [from William C. Cutts Papers, WWII 112, WWII Papers, Military Collection].
WWII 112.F2.9: Unidentified scene during World War II, believed to be in the CBI Theater [from William C. Cutts Papers, WWII 112, WWII Papers, Military Collection].
Help the Military Collection Identify WWII CBI Theater Photos
See World War I Materials at Alamance Community College on March 29
[This blog post comes from Sarah Koonts, Director of Archives and Records for the State Archives of North Carolina.]
Isham B. Hudson’s war diary contains short entries covering his military unit’s movements throughout France in the fall of 1918 (Call number: WWI 49). Learn more about this item in the North Carolina Digital Collections.
One of the most rewarding experiences as State Archivist is the development of special exhibits utilizing a few unique original materials from our collections. We develop these special exhibits on occasion to partner with a local historical society, museum, or historic site, often to promote a specific anniversary or event. This year we are thrilled to offer a special exhibit with one of our favorite partners, Alamance Community College. We invite you to join us March 29 for a full slate of programming around the centennial of World War I.
Held at the main building on the Carrington-Scott Campus of Alamance Community College (1247 Jimmie Kerr Road in Graham), the special exhibit will be held from 9 a.m.—5 p.m. on March 29. Due to the number of school groups scheduled for the morning, the public is encouraged to consider an afternoon visit, if possible. During the event, you can see some World War I materials from our military collections, a traveling exhibit about North Carolina and the Great War, and speak with costumed living- history specialists interpreting military service from the period.In addition, there will be soldier, nurse, and Red Cross uniforms on display from the Haw River Museum, Alamance County Historical Association, and the Women Veterans Historical Project from UNC, Greensboro. Kids can join in the fun by coloring their own WWI poster and participating in other activities throughout the building.
A group of five young women wearing work overalls and caps, standing outside in front of a building at the Wiscassett Mills in Albemarle, N.C. These women replaced male mill workers sent to fight in World War I. (Call number: WWI 2.B11.F7.1)
We enjoy taking our treasures out to locations outside of Raleigh. It is fun to share our collections and explain a little more about what we do at the State Archives. North Carolina has a rich military history and our World Ward I materials are among the most prized. Come visit Alamance Community College on March 29 to learn more about that history from 100 years ago.
This entry was posted in Events, News, Special Collections and tagged Alamance Community College, events, Military Collection, military history, World War I on March 15, 2018 by Ashley.
New Collection of a U.S. Army Comic Books Series Available
The Military Collection at the State Archives of North Carolina would like to announce the recent donation of the PS: Preventive Maintenance Monthly Collection. The PS Collection is composed currently of 69 issues of the U.S. Army technical bulletin PS: The Preventive Maintenance Monthly, ranging from 1953 to 1993 (with gaps).
PS: Preventive Maintenance Monthly, Issue 203, 1969
The bulletin uses cartoon characters and graphics in a comic-book style to add humor to maintenance challenges and equipment repair processes for Army soldiers, Army civilians, and contractors that own, operate, and maintain the Army’s equipment—particularly vehicles and tanks. PS is filled with cartoons detailing technical, safety, and policy information, with artwork from leading cartoons and comic-book artists. The PS: Preventive Maintenance Monthly Collection is available for use in the Search Room at the State Archives, with a finding aid consisting of an inventory of the bulletin’s issues available.
As the U.S. Army ramped up for its involvement in the Korean War between 1950 and 1951, it realized that its soldiers were encountering problems with their Army equipment—particularly vehicles and tanks. The Army had experienced some degree of acceptance and success during World War II in utilizing cartoons for educational purposes through the publication Army Motors. Army Motors utilized the cartoon drawings of then Cpl. Will Eisner, who was already famous for his work on the comic book The Spirit when he was drafted for duty during WWII. An established comic-book writer, artist, and editor, Eisner had been appropriated to draw such characters for WWII publications (including Army Motors) as Private Joe Dope, Connie Rodd, and Master Sergeant Half-Mast McCanick. In 1951, the U.S. Army hired Eisner to create similar instructional material for its new publication to address equipment issues, called PS: The Preventive Maintenance Monthly. PS is an official Army technical bulletin.
Eisner founded the American Visuals Corporation in the late 1940s as a commercial cartoon artwork company. The company produced educational cartoons and illustrations and giveaway comics for a variety of clients and industries. As part of AVC’s contracts, PS was created by Eisner and his contract artists, with him serving as the publication’s artistic director from its inception in 1951 through the end of 1971. In the case of PS, Eisner created the continuity section and the art of each issue, based upon the technical manuscripts provided to him by the Army’s PS staff. As part of his contract with the magazine, Eisner was sent on location to places like Japan, Korea, and Vietnam, in order to meet soldiers and better understand the situations they and their equipment experienced.
Each issue of the PS magazine consisted of a color comic-book-style cover, often designed and drawn by Eisner; eight full pages of a four-color comic continuity story in the middle; and the rest of the publication filled with technical, safety, and policy information printed in two colors to save money. The continuity story starred Eisner’s earlier character, and was called “Joe’s Dope Sheet.” Each episode offers the same cautionary tale: a soldier who ignores preventive maintenance learns of its importance in the end.
The Military Collection could use your help in building the collection’s holdings of issues of PS. There are over 750 issues as of 2017. If you or someone you know has any issues of PS: Preventive Maintenance Monthly and are willing to donate them, please contact Military Collection Archivist Matthew Peek by phone at 919-807-7314 or by email at matthew.peek@ncdcr.gov. Any new issues will be added to the collection. We hope to build it into one of the largest collections of PS in the United States.
This entry was posted in News, Special Collections and tagged Comic books, Korean War, Military Collection on January 25, 2018 by Ashley.
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DDT: Lies, Lies, Lies
Filed under: Donald Trump,Uncategorized — trp2011 @ 8:56 PM
Tags: Affordable Care Act, Andrii Artemenko, CPAC, deconstruction, enemies, Gabby Giffords, gun safety, Muhammad Ali Jr., Muslim ban, Steve Bannon, terrorism, town hall meetings, Ukraine, Wayne LaPierre
Conservatives celebrated at CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) Dictator Donald Trump (DDT) and his minions this year—a change from last year when he wasn’t even wanted at the conference. DDT’s speech could have been the one he wanted to give last year as he quoted Hillary Clinton’s term “deplorable” and encouraged the crowd to shout “Lock her up!” Another last election message was the conspiracy against Bernie Sanders with “super-delegates.” Numbers also plagued him when he claimed that they would not read about CPAC “lines that go back six blocks.” The speech is probably for his 2020 run, but the lies are the same. Even the ballroom at CPAC was not full for DDT’s speech.
Other false claims from DDT: “Obamacare covers very few people,” and “[the wall is] way, way, way ahead of schedule.” The Affordable Care Act reduced the number of uninsured by 20 million people, and there is no schedule for the wall that may never be built.” The rate of people in the United States who lack health insurance has hit a record low with only 8.6 percent of people, about 27.3 million, being uninsured. That’s 20.4 million fewer people than when the program started in 2010, and the number would be lower if the Supreme Court had maintained the states’ mandatory Medicaid expansion. Red states showed the greatest decline in the number of uninsured, and those without Medicaid expansion had the highest percentage of uninsured with Texas and Mississippi at the top.
Throwing red meat to his CPAC base, DDT defined his enemies: “radical Islamic terrorists”; immigrants who he described as “the gang members, the drug dealers, and the criminal aliens”; and, of course, the “dishonest media.” Also the Constitution as he whined about the “Fiii-rrrst Amendment!” After he talked about keeping “the bad ones” out, he excluded several media outlets from his Friday briefing session.
DDT’s new National Security Advisor, Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, negated the use of the term “racial Islamic terrorists.” Speaking to his staff, he said that the label was not helpful because terrorists are “un-Islamic.”
With so much news flooding the air waves about DDT, this one may have slipped through the cracks. One week before Michael Flynn left his position as National Security Advisor on February 13, 2017, he received a proposal for the way that DDT could lift sanctions against Russia. DDT’s personal Mafia-linked lawyer Michael D. Cohen, business associate plus convicted felon and government informant Felix Salter who helped DDT scout deals in Russia, and Ukrainian lawmaker Andrii Artemenko are pushing the plan of releasing evidence of corruption to allow Artemenko to take over the government and negotiate a long term Russian “lease” of Crimea.
The goal is to replace the current Ukrainian government with the Russia-tolerant faction allowing DDT to lift the sanctions against Russia’s military invasion and capture of Russia and give Secretary of State Rex Tillerson the $500 billion deal for Exxon Mobil. Flynn has disappeared, but the plan surely remains, most likely with a payoff for DDT. And it’s on paper. Artemenko is currently under treason investigation, and Cohen denied delivering any plan.
DDT’s assertion that his Muslim ban is to protect the country was soundly debunked by a report from his own Department of Homeland Security that concluded citizenship is an “unreliable” threat indicator and that people from the seven countries have rarely been implicated in U.S.-based terrorism. People from the dangerous seven countries identified by DDT, the same ones where he doesn’t do personal profit-making business—Iraq, Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Yemen and Libya—are “rarely implicated in U.S.-based terrorism,” according to the report.
Although terror groups in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen pose a threat of attacks in the United States, the other four countries are “regionally focused.” Of the 82 people “who died in the pursuit of or were convicted of any terrorism-related federal offense,” over half were U.S.-born citizens. Eight of them convicted or died in pursuit of terrorism were from Somalia, Iraq, Iran, Sudan, and Yemen. People are more likely to be killed by guns, trains, a railway vehicle, their own clothes melting or lighting on fire, lightning, falling furniture–the list goes on and on about the dangers of life outside terrorism. Of the 3,252,493 refugees admitted to the United States from 1975 to the end of 2015, 20 were terrorists, 0.00062 percent of the total. Only three of them were successful in their attacks, killing a total of three people.
At the same time DHS released its report refuting DDT’s claim about Muslims and terrorism, Secretary John Kelly released a memo creating a new DDT-ordered federal office to work with victims of undocumented immigrants. He wrote that “criminal aliens routinely victimize Americans and other legal residents.” Once again, the government is “misrepresenting,” a polite word for lying. Undocumented immigrants are no more likely to commit crimes and U.S. citizens and are less likely to be criminals in some cases.
The Secure Communities (S-COMM) immigration enforcement program failed to reduce crime. A study of 159 cities shows no correlation between crime rates and levels of immigration, and other research showed that levels of recent immigration had a negative affect on homicide rates and no affect on property crime rates. Another study found that immigrant influx was correlated with decreases in homicide and robbery rates.
The only people who need to be afraid are those with brown skin who might be accused of being Hispanic or Muslim. For example, Muhammad Ali Jr., son of one of the greatest boxers and civil rights activists in the nation, was detained two hours on February 7 at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood (FL) airport on his return from Jamaica. He had gone there with his mother, Khalilah Camacho-Ali, who gave a speech about black history. He was asked twice about his religion and “where he got his name,” a common question for Muslims. Agents released Ali’s mother when she showed him a photo of herself with her ex-husband, but Ali had no picture of himself and his father who died last year. DDT’s Muslim ban was overturned three days prior to Ali’s detention, but agents reportedly did not respect the court’s judgment.
NRA executive vice president and CEO Wayne LaPierre is using the DDT system of lying. Before Election Day, he told gun lovers that they had to vote for NRA Republicans because every one of his predictions about Obama taking guns and sabotaging the Second Amendment had come true. The reverse was actually true as federal gun safety laws and those in most states were weakened. At CPAC, LaPierre ranted about how the “Anarchists, Marxists, communists, and the left of—the rest of the left-wing socialist parade” are coming for the guns.
Anti-Trump protesters “spit in the face of Gold Star families,” a revision of history when progressives defended these families and DDT excoriated them unless they were white. LaPierre said these leftists want “to tear down our system.” At the same time, White House and white supremacist Steve Bannon declared that “deconstruction [aka destruction] of the administration” is its goal. The crowning claim from LaPierre was that progressive activists get paid $1,500 a week, $78,000 a year. Watch for the letters of your newspaper because these lies are sure to appear there.
“I was shot on a Saturday morning. By Monday morning, my offices were open to the public. Ron Barber—at my side that Saturday, who was shot multiple times, then elected to Congress in my stead—held town halls. It’s what the people deserve in a representative.”
That was the response from Gabby Giffords to Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) who used her as an excuse for not facing his constituents. Gohmert won his last election by more than 49 points, and his district is one of the reddest in the country—but he’s afraid of “the threat of violence at town hall meetings.” And he used the 2011 shooting at former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) where she was severely injured and six people were killed. With her customary bravery, Giffords responded:
“To the politicians who have abandoned their civic obligations, I say this: Have some courage. Face your constituents. Hold town halls. [During my congressional career] listening to my constituents was the most basic and core tenet of the job I was hired to do.”
Giffords’ husband, former astronaut Mark Kelly said that Gohmert shouldn’t “hide behind” his wife to avoid town halls:
“If he doesn’t want to do town halls, he should just say he doesn’t want to face his constituents. He shouldn’t hide behind Gabby.”
Town hall complaints from tens of thousands of people included the repeal of health care, Scott Pruitt’s confirmation to head the EPA, and legislators refusal to investigate DDT’s links to Russia. Many crowds chanted, “Do your job!” Terrified of this response, a vast majority of GOP legislators simply avoided their constituents in any way they could.
Gohmert also repeated lies that “paid” groups were disrupting the Republican town halls. No town hall meetings this year have been violent, even if some members of Congress have called the police instead of facing a group of people. There’s no evidence of paid protesters, and progressive activists haven’t “threatened public safety.” It was the violent Tea Party members who protested Barack Obama’s election and gathered with their guns to threaten and spit on legislators who supported the ACA.
If Gohmert—and his GOP colleagues—are so terrified of vilence from guns, it’s time for them to enact gun safety laws. And it’s time for “these people” to stop lying.
Senate Gun Vote: NRA – 2, U.S. Residents – 0
Filed under: Guns — trp2011 @ 8:56 PM
Tags: AMA, Gabby Giffords, gun research, NRA, Senate, Susan Collins
NRA scored more victories yesterday as Republicans turned down two measures that might have made the United States safer for everyone except killers with guns.
A 15-hour filibuster led by Chris Murphy (D-CT)—a real filibuster with his standing in front of the Senate and not the wimpy “I don’t like the bill” one—“inspired” Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to put out four gun “control” measures for a vote. Just eight days after 50 people died in Orlando because a mass shooting, almost all Senate GOP members protected the NRA. Democrats wanted background checks for almost everyone and the prevention of gun sales to people on the terror watch list. Republicans wanted a 72-hour check for people on the watch list and more funding for a background check that didn’t check any more purchasers.
Democratic proposals followed by GOP versions:
Murphy Amendment #4750 on background checks: The filibuster’s measure requires a background check for all gun sales, including at gun shows and online, with some reasonable exceptions such as transfers by law enforcement, private security professionals, armed forces, loans or gifts to close family members; temporary transfer to prevent imminent bodily harm; temporary transfer for hunting trips or firing ranges. [Lost 44-56; Democratic senators Heidi Heitkamp (ND), Joe Manchin (WV) and Jon Tester (MT) voted no with GOP; Mark Kirk (IL) yes with the Dems. ]
Grassley Amendment # 4751 on background checks: Chuck Grassley’s (R-IA) amendment fails to close the private sale loophole but adds funding for background checks. It would allow an individual to regain the ability to buy a gun immediately upon release from a period of involuntary psychiatric treatment and let veterans who suffer from mental illness to legally buy guns. [Lost 47-53; all GOP except Kirk voted no.]
Feinstein Amendment #4720 on terror gap: Dianne Feinstein’s (D-CA) bill gives the Attorney General the discretion to block gun sales to a known terror suspect based on a reasonable suspicion that the individual is engaging in, preparing for, or providing material support to an act of terrorism. This amendment provides a process for individuals erroneously denied a gun on this basis to seek to have that determination reversed and their gun rights restored. [Lost 47-53; Heitkamp again votes with the Republicans and GOP Kirk and Kelly Ayotte (NH) vote with the Democrats.]
Cornyn Amendment #4749 on terror gap: John Cornyn (R-TX) would permit people on the terror watch list to buy guns unless the Attorney General can prove in court that the suspect will actually commit an act of terrorism. If the procedure is not complete within three days, the person is welcome to buy as many guns as they wish. [Lost 47-53; same as Grassley amendment.]
Gabby Giffords, the former representative shot in the 2011 mass shooting in Tucson (AZ), said the Senate “chose to do the unimaginable: nothing at all.” Giffords wrote:
“Five years ago, I was shot point blank in the head, and the Senate did nothing. When 20 young children and six educators lost their lives in Newtown, Connecticut, the Senate did nothing. San Bernardino, Roseburg, Navy Yard, Charleston, Isla Vista — nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing.”
Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) is searching for a “moderate compromise” to let the GOP off the hook for voting to sell guns to people on the terror watch list. Her proposal allows the attorney general to prevent people on two specific lists–the “no-fly” list and selectee list requiring additional screening–from buying a weapon. No one knows how many other lists there are. People denied the right to purchase a gun can challenge the decision. Those who win are to have their legal costs paid by the government. Collins also suggested requiring the FBI to notify law enforcement if someone on the list any time during the past five years if they try to buy a gun. It still doesn’t mean that they can’t buy a gun.
At this time only three Republicans support Collins idea—not enough to get the 60 necessary votes. Democrats aren’t happy with the proposal. As Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) said, “Her alternative is not enough to close the loophole that creates this terror gap.” On the House side, Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) has indicated opposition to gun purchase restrictions for anyone on the terror watch list—and he’s the gatekeeper for bills to get to the floor of that chamber.
Even knowing his reluctance, House Democrats are calling on Ryan to hold a vote on an assault weapons ban before Congress adjourns for the summer recess, according to a letter from 75 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. The seven-week recess begins on July 15. Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (CA) and other Democrats are focusing on the “no fly, no buy” gun provision connected to the terror watch list, and expanded background checks for gun sales, but they also want a vote on Rep. David Cicilline’s (D-RI) Assault Weapons Ban of 2015, a bill with 139 co-sponsors. The Orlando shooter used an assault weapon—a Sig Sauer MCX rifle—that folds up for concealment.
The Terror Watch List: Between 2004 and 2014, people on this list passed background checks and could to legally buy guns 2,043 times. With lax gun laws permitting loopholes for millions of people, many more people on the list most likely bought firearms through unregulated private purchases. The terrorists in the Middle East are right: they can easily access guns from the United States. An overwhelming majority of Americans, including 82 percent of gun owners and 77 percent of Republicans, supports closing the terror gap.
Background Checks: Only 60 percent of gun sales happen through federally licensed firearm dealers; the other 40 percent of gun sales happen without any background check. They usually occur online—Craigslist is a big gun clearinghouse—or through newspaper classified ads or at gun shows. The GOP continues its excuse of trying to prevent a federal gun owner registry. The 55 senators who voted for either Cornyn’s or Feinstein’s measures, but not Murphy’s background checks, said that it is bad for suspected terrorists to buy firearms. Yet they want background checks for that population to be voluntary—sort of like making airport screening procedures optional.
Gun deaths: Between 2001 and 2013 (the last year the CDC has records for), 406,496 people died from being shot, whether by homicide, suicide, or accident. During the same time, 2,96 people died of terrorism on U.S. soil–2,902 on the 9/11 attacks in 2001.
Donald Trump’s solution for mass shooting is racial profiling. CNN Van Jones suggested that to do so would require demographics of shooters. Far more mass shootings in the United States are caused by white, mostly young Christian men. Fitting this profile is the 19-year-old man arrested at a Trump event for trying to take a gun from a law enforcement office to use it on Trump. Jones said, “You are seven times more likely to be killed by a right wing extremist — a racist or an anti-government nutjob—seven times more likely than a Muslim.”
The Orlando shooting finally pushed the American Medical Association over the edge. The AMA, composed of some very smart people, is now calling gun violence a “public health crisis” and urges Congress fund research into the problem. The group will press Congress to overturn the 20-year-old, NRA-pushed legislation that blocks the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from conducting research on gun violence. At its annual meeting in Chicago, the AMA called US gun violence a crisis that requires a comprehensive response and solution.
Steven Stack, AMA president, said:
“With approximately 30,000 men, women and children dying each year at the barrel of a gun in elementary schools, movie theaters, workplaces, houses of worship and on live television, the United States faces a public health crisis of gun violence.
“Even as America faces a crisis unrivalled in any other developed country, the Congress prohibits the CDC from conducting the very research that would help us understand the problems associated with gun violence and determine how to reduce the high rate of firearm-related deaths and injuries.”
In 1993, the NRA complained that research was biased toward gun control because CDC found that people in homes with firearms were at an increased risk for homicide in the home. By 1996, Congress almost totally eradicated funding for research into gun violence. Between 1996 and 2013, CDC funding for firearm injury prevention fell 96 percent, down to $100,000 in the CDC $5.6 billion budget.
Although NRA claims that the purpose of CDC research was to do away with unlimited gun rights, some research has sneaked through the restrictions. The ten states with the worst gun violence: Alaska, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Montana, Arkansas, New Mexico, Wyoming, South Carolina, and Oklahoma. These states have at least four criteria in common: fewer gun restrictions, more guns, more gun sellers, and a higher incidence of violent crime than in most of the United States. No wonder the NRA tries to quell the evidence that this nation has far more violence from guns because it has far more guns and unfettered ownership and use of them.
Dueling Gun Bills in Congress
Filed under: Guns — trp2011 @ 10:44 PM
Tags: Gabby Giffords, gun background checks, gun reciprocity law, open carry, Second Amendment
Proposed gun laws have been mostly flying under the radar with the wild debacles of the new GOP-controlled Congress, but congressional members on both sides of the issue are proposing gun laws. Former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), whose career took a radical shift after she was seriously wounded by a shooter four years ago, went Capital Hill to support reintroduction of legislation in the House to strengthen background checks for gun buyers. Co-sponsor Peter King of New York has been joined by three other Republicans.
The federal bill would require background checks on private sales at gun shows, over the Internet, and through classified ads, transactions during which a check is not usually run through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System. It would also strengthen the National Instant Criminal Background Check System by providing states with incentives to improve reporting of criminals and people with dangerous mental illnesses to be included in the system’s database. Giving exceptions to transfers between family and friends, the bill would make misuse of gun-sale records a felony.
The NRA hit a new low when it tweeted its ridicule of the disabled woman, “Gabby Giffords: Everyone Should Have to Pass Background Check My Attacker Passed.” The gunman who massacred Giffords and others in Arizona had passed a background check, but Giffords was not supporting the law because it would have stopped that shooter. Law enforcement and criminal justice experts think background checks would reduce gun violence. Congress couldn’t pass sensible gun laws with a majority of Democrats, and it certainly won’t do it with a GOP majority. The NRA stupidity was a meaningless cheap shot.
Meanwhile Giffords’ home state has passed a bill removing bans on sawed-off shotguns and gun silencers. The new governor has not signed the bill yet but is expected to do so. Because of the state’s loose laws, Guns & Ammo magazine has awarded Arizona “best state for gun owners” during the last two years. Arizona plans to get the award for the coming year with pending laws such as preventing cities and towns from enforcing federal gun laws and allowing guns into such public buildings such as libraries so that people can protect themselves.
On the other side, GOP members in Congress, some of them the same people who thought that it was a good idea to undermine the president by communicating directly with the Iranian ayatollah, have again brought up the gun reciprocity bill allowing concealed carry in any state of the nation with a permit from just one state. Co-sponsor Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) compared gun permits to driver’s licenses. He is a strong states-rights legislator—until a federal law gives him what he wants.
After Cornyn justified the law with a comparison between driver’s licenses and gun permits, columnist Gail Collins pointed out the difference. She wrote that people can probably exhibit “a certain level of accomplishment when it comes to the basics of stopping, starting and steering.” On the other hand, those in Mississippi with gun permits have exhibited only proof that they can fill out applications. Virginia has only an online course, and Florida gives permits to people who live anywhere in the U.S. if they contribute $112 to the Florida economy. In 2007, the Sun Sentinel discovered that over 1,400 of these contributors had pled guilty or no contest to felonies and still received permits. In the same six-month period, Florida gun permits were given to 216 people with outstanding warrants, 28 people with active domestic violence injunctions against them, and six registered sex offenders. States with lax gun laws have given the NRA almost everything they want. The NRA will use a potential federal law to raise more money.
Even staunch NRA member Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) is opposing a NRA-backed bill in his state that would eliminate any permits or training for carrying concealed guns. The bill passed both the state House and Senate. These are the people who would be carrying guns in any state if the reciprocity law passes.
In Ann Arbor (MI), 22-year-old Joshua Wade thought it was a good idea to open carry his revolver and ammunition to his younger sister’s choir performance. Although a teacher called the police, they couldn’t do anything because Michigan permits open carry everywhere. Ann Arbor Public Schools reviewed their gun policies and issued a state of concern about what had happened. At the next meeting, Wade and 25 of his friends came to openly display their loaded guns. Most of the 200 teachers, parents, and other residents, didn’t want guns in their schools, and 40 of them spoke out against open carry in schools. Wade told the crowd that carrying guns in schools “just makes sense.” They laughed at him. After he quit spouting nonsense, Ann Arbor’s school board passed a resolution demanding that Michigan’s legislature let them to ban guns in schools.
Wade’s cause isn’t helped by another incident in Michigan when Shawn Nixon of the Hell’s Saints Open Carry Group carried his gun around a school in Madison Heights and started a confrontation with police. Terrified teachers, students, and administrators went on lockdown. Proud of his behavior, Nixon posted a YouTube of his actions. One of his statements was “I don’t have to answer your questions, I’m not under arrest, but you do have to answer my questions, you’re public servants and my tax dollars pay you.” Mom’s Demand Action For Gun Sense In America and Everytown For Gun Safety are using clips from Nixon’s YouTube to show the need for stronger and common sense gun laws.
The far-right NRA is now being attacked by farther-right group Glenn Beck who demanded that anti-tax Grover Norquist not be allowed on the NRA board. According to Beck, Norquist is a front man for the Muslim Brotherhood and is therefore “a very bad man.” NRA’s Wayne LaPierre said that thousands of members are threatening to cancel, causing LaPierre to investigate Norquist and publish the results on the NRA website.
U.S. Air Force Sharpshooter Michael Wimberly has a message for the people who want unlimited rights to carry a gun anywhere with no training. As a child in Texas, he was trained that the only reason for a gun is to kill.
“The mentality of many gun owners today is a far cry from what I knew growing up. What is heard from open-carry fans seems to be a fascination with guns — a swagger-inspired fascination that possessing a pistol in a public forum will make everyone safe. The chutzpah of open-carry advocates: We will be the protectors against the bad guy!
“But I wonder: When the bullets fly, will police know who is the good guy? Maybe one will be a hero and then again maybe not when others pull their guns and begin to fire. Hero-seekers are a danger to themselves and others.”
If the reciprocity law passes Congress with a veto-proof vote, more and more people like George Zimmerman will wander the country causing millions of dollars in protecting those who don’t know if it’s the “good guy” or the “bad guy with a gun.”
Wimberly described his concern when he sees someone with a firearm in public: “Something tells me you fail to appreciate the wisdom of the 1890 Texas Legislature, which passed the no-carry law that served us well for 125 years. Lawmakers of the day had the keen understanding about what they were doing and why.” Texas wasn’t the only place with gun sense. During the 19th century, Dodge City, Wichita, Tombstone–indeed all of Wyoming–had gun ordinances that prohibited carrying guns in town.
The Second Amendment: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”
The meaning of the Second Amendment: you can bear your arms, but you need to be trained, and carrying those arms is to be regulated by the government.
Gun Deaths – The Loss of Life and Happiness, Part 2
Tags: Gabby Giffords, gun control, Mark Kelly, mass shootings, Stephen Davis, Tucson shooting
“Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The NRA would deprive you of the first and third, by redefining the second.”—Douglas Anthony Cooper
Four women were found killed in a Tulsa (OK) apartment yesterday. That makes at least 165 gun deaths in the first seven days of 2013, averaging approximately one per hour.
Today is the second anniversary of the mass shooting in Tucson (AZ) when six people, including U.S. District Judge John Roll, were killed and another 13, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, were wounded. At that time the NRA said that this tragedy should not be politicized. They just merely want to continue their control over the people in the United States.
Today Giffords and her husband, Mark Kelly, announced the launch of a new gun safety group, Americans for Responsible Solutions, and called on Congress to finally take action that they have failed to do, despite 11 mass shootings and over 60,000 other gun deaths in the last two years. In their op-ed for USA Today, Giffords and Kelly point out that people in the United States are less, not more, safe because of this inaction. On Morning Joe, Ret. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, former top commander in Afghanistan, called for a ban on assault weapons, saying, “I personally don’t think there’s any need for that kind of weaponry on the streets and particularly around the schools in America.”
After each mass shootings, at least the ones large enough to draw media notice, people come up with solutions. Last Friday I wrote about some of the insane ones, including arming teachers to protect students. Since then, Stephen Davis, a popular math and science teacher in a Bennington (VT) high school teacher was taken to a psychiatric hospital after he posted criticisms of the administrators and union on the Internet, including the statement that he had “plans for retribution.” When police came to check into the situation, they found him with a Bushmaster rifle, two high-capacity clips, and about 500 rounds of ammunition. This is someone who the NRA might arm to protect the children at school because he has experience with the weapon.
There are, however, reasonable solutions for reducing gun deaths in the United States.
It should be noted that the NRA opposes all them.
Keep people on the terrorist watch list from legally acquiring guns. In 2010 alone, at least 247 people suspected of involvement with terrorism bought guns legally.
Require background checks on every gun sale. Because federal law does not mandate these checks for “private” gun sales at places like gun shows, 40 percent of all legal gun sales lack any checks on the purchasers. Eighty percent of gun crimes involve guns purchased in this fashion. If the GOP wants photo ID for voting, they shouldn’t mind background checks for gun purchases.
Keep warlords from getting arms on the international market. A small step toward this action, the U.N. Arms Trade Treaty aims at keeping guns out of the hands of murderous insurgents and terrorists while having no restrictions on domestic gun markets.
Allow the public to access information about where guns are. Despite opposition from federal and local law enforcement, the Tiahrt Amendments prevent the public, journalists, academic researchers, some police officers, and people suing the gun industry from knowing what is on a federal database.
Keep guns out of bars. This should be a no-brainer: guns and alcohol don’t mix well. Only five states prevent concealed weapons in places that serve alcohol.
The NRA even supports forcing all business owners to allow guns on their property. The more guns, the more shootings, especially when people don’t know how to use them.
Following are others that would make mass shootings more difficult:
Restore the Assault Weapons Ban. This ban on manufacturers prevented the category of weapons not designed for recreational use.
Ban High-capacity Magazines. Because the shooter in the Aurora theater had a clip with 100 rounds of ammunition, he would kill or injure 71 people in the 90 seconds before police arrived.
Regulate Sniper Rifles. The .50 caliber bullet developed for the Browning Automatic Rifle for anti-aircraft and anti-tank use has no civilian use. The National Firearms Act of 1934 bans bullets over .50, but the .50 caliber bullet, actually .51 in diameter, can be squeezed by the rifle barrel to technically fit the law.
Tax and/or Regulate Cartridges. Because these have varying amounts and kinds of propellant, a regulation could prevent the highest performing propellant in the biggest cartridges. An option would be to tax cartridges with higher performing propellant at a higher rate.
One blog discussed reversing the culture of violence in the United States and provided these four ideas:
Change Gun Culture. Decades ago, smokers, supported by wealthy tobacco corporations ruled the country. You couldn’t go anyplace with choking on second-hand smoke and having your clothes smell like an ashtray. If we can stand up to the tobacco industry, we can do the same with gun manufacturers. At this time, owning guns is “cool”; a rebranding campaign can change this. After NFL player Jovan Belcher killed himself at his stadium, seven other players turned in their guns to team security personnel with at least one player surrendering multiple guns. Celebrities, athletes, and other influential people can refuse to bow down before the NRA.
Give People Incentives to Give Up Guns. Buy guns back or award tax and tuition credits for turning them in. Give bonuses for semi-automatic assault rifles with large magazines. L.A. [find info] People kill other people with guns that they buy or steal from others. Stop them from having guns to steal. Children also die from guns in their home or in their friends’ homes.
Make It Harder for People to Get Guns. Safety on planes means extensive screening at airports; safety from terrorists means that your email can be read without your permission. Since 2001, people in the United States have gone to great lengths to feel safe—except with gun ownership. Longer waiting periods, greater taxation, and ideas listed above will make it more difficult to own arsenals.
Hold Gun Makers Accountable. Tobacco corporations are now sometimes held liable to the deaths that their products cause. Making gun manufacturers liable for damages might put economic pressure on the gun industry to act more responsibly. At this time, 32 states grant the gun industry immunity from lawsuits, and Congress is considering the same thing. Stop legislators from doing this. Gun makers should be required to fund gun-control efforts, such as paying for public service announcements and free treatment services for mental illness and anger-management.
Gun-lovers always claim that it is their constitutional right to own as many and as powerful guns as they want without registering them and with no training. Gun-lovers would rather people die than restrict guns so that criminals do not have access to them.
An example of the culture of violence in the United States comes from Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) in the aftermath of the killings at Sandy Hook Elementary School: Put automatic weapons in the hands of all the first grade teachers, he says, so they can “. . . take[s] his [the gunman’s] head off before he can kill those precious kids.” Gohmert’s fantasy of murderous violence is the same as that of the Sandy Hook shooter.
The solution for gun ownership should be the same as for people who own motor vehicles: register them, test the drivers, make laws to control their use, and require liability insurance for all owners. It’s simple. People opposing gun-control laws claim that they feel safer without them. Why should that 47 percent feel safer than the rest of us?
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Rubens House presents David Bowie’s Tintoretto
Friday, June 23, 2017 — The Rubens House has the privilege today of unveiling David Bowie’s Tintoretto. The British rock star owned St Catherine by the Venetian painter Jacopo Tintoretto (1518–1594) for over 30 years. Following Bowie’s death in 2016, his exceptional art collection was auctioned on 10 November that same year at Sotheby’s in London. There was one noteworthy old master amongst the modern and contemporary works by the likes of Frank Auerbach, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Damien Hirst: Jacopo Tintoretto.
Bowie, like Rubens, was an immense admirer of the Venetian artist. Rubens not only drew inspiration from Tintoretto for his own work, he also had seven of his fellow artist’s paintings in his own collection. The monumental St Catherine altarpiece, painted in the 1560s, was purchased by a private collector who announced to the world’s press within minutes of the sale that he would be loaning the painting long term to the Rubens House – ‘a museum Bowie loved’. What David Bowie never knew is that a brilliant underdrawing lies hidden beneath the layers of painting, as discovered recently during technical examination of the altarpiece at the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage (KIK-IRPA) in Brussels. The underdrawing suggests that the work can be dated to roughly a decade earlier than previously thought and shows how Tintoretto developed the painting in his own hand, continually adjusting the composition as he worked. The Colnaghi Foundation, in collaboration with the Rubens House, will present a scholarly publication in October devoted to Tintoretto, Rubens and Bowie, with contributions from several international specialists. The Flemish Minister of Tourism, Ben Weyts, was so impressed by the whole story recently that he promptly gave his backing to a tentative plan to return the painting temporarily to Venice, where Tintoretto’s altarpiece will now be exhibited at the 2019 Biennale, accompanied by a raft of Flemish old masters who were amongst the Venetian artist’s admirers.
‘The gift that a great painting gives you: it’s just there for you to marvel at, it lifts your spirits, instils you with hope and beauty, but it doesn’t expect anything in return.’ As a painter and an accomplished collector, it might easily have been Peter Paul Rubens who made this striking statement. The words are, however, those of the late David Bowie almost four centuries later. The world-famous rock star, enthusiastic collector and huge admirer of Rubens was asked, ‘if you could invent a drug, what would it be, what effect should it have?’ Bowie replied, ‘A shot of hug. Preferably from a three-year-old like my daughter, that age, that brief window of time when a child hugs you with all its might and conviction and pure, undiluted love, without it expecting a reward. The kind of gift that a great painting gives you: it’s just there for you to marvel at, it lifts your spirits, instils you with hope and beauty, but it doesn’t expect anything in return.[1] It would be hard to express the kinship between Rubens and Bowie any more clearly – two versatile, brilliant men, driven by a love of art and of their families.
Tintoretto, seen by Rubens and Van Dyck and bought by Bowie
Tintoretto painted St Catherine around 1560–70 for San Geminiano on St Mark’s Square in Venice, a small but prestigious church designed by the architect Jacopo Sansovino, which was already famous in the Renaissance period for its exceptional interior with works by Giovanni Bellini, Paolo Veronese and Tintoretto. Rubens almost certainly saw the altarpiece there and his celebrated pupil Anthony van Dyck even sketched it in situ. Their Venetian counterpart was an important source of inspiration for both Rubens and Van Dyck, and Rubens continued to be influenced by Tintoretto’s inventions until the end of his career.
St Catherine remained in the church until it was demolished in 1807 during the Napoleonic period. It was briefly placed in the Galleria dell’Accademia, before disappearing into private ownership. David Bowie purchased the work 30 years ago from the London art dealer Colnaghi. The musician was so fascinated by the Venetian painter that he named his record label after him.
From Venice, via London, to ‘distinguished visitors’ in Antwerp.
As of today, the Rubens House is presenting the painting as a long-term loan – a policy the museum has been developing for some time now. The approach is not a new one elsewhere, but the Rubens House is playing a pioneering role in this regard in Belgium. Art donations are on the rise. The museum will use this long-term loan to supplement the story of its own collection, which is why its loans – its distinguished visitors – have been integrated in the permanent display. After almost ten years intensively pursuing this loan policy, the strategy is starting to bear fruit.
Underdrawing
Until a few days ago, Bowie’s Tintoretto was located at the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage (KIK-IRPA) in Brussels, where the altarpiece underwent technical examination on behalf of its owner, the Rubens House and the Colnaghi Foundation. Christina Currie’s expert team used radiography and infrared reflectography to reveal an exceptionally spontaneous and brilliantly executed underdrawing beneath the layers of paint. Not only does the research show how the painter developed his composition, its results help determine the attribution and date of the work. Comparison of the underdrawing with other examples from Tintoretto’s oeuvre allows the painting to be dated to a decade earlier than originally believed. The altarpiece’s underdrawing is almost identical to that of the princess in St George and the Dragon – a work by the same artist in the National Gallery in London. Another pleasing discovery was the way Tintoretto continued to adjust his composition throughout the painting process, as witnessed by the many pentimenti or painted corrections that were discovered. The study shows that the work was done entirely by the Venetian artist in person. The research will be resumed later this year, to investigate the passages of sky and architecture in more detail. The findings of the research will be published in the Bulletin of the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage and the Colnaghi Studies Journal.
The Colnaghi Foundation is presenting a scholarly publication this October on David Bowie’s Tintoretto. The book – David Bowie’s Tintoretto: Angel Foretelling Saint Catherine of Alexandria of her Martyrdom – includes contributions by Dr Stijn Alsteens, Matt Collings, Dr Christina Currie, Nicholas Hall, Dr Jeremy Howard, Dr Riccardo Lattuada, Maja Neerman, John Julius Norwich, Dr Xavier Salomon, Serge Simonart and Ben van Beneden. It focuses not only on Tintoretto and 15th-century Venice, but also on the turbulent history of the little church on St Mark’s Square, Maerten de Vos, Rubens, Van Dyck and Bowie as a collector.
The independent Colnaghi Foundation promotes the work of old masters to a wide audience in a contemporary manner. The Foundation works with international researchers and experts, museums and collectors to show through a variety of media and channels how inspiring and exciting early art can be. The fact that the painting belonged for many years to the personal art collection of one of the biggest pop icons of all time demonstrates that the great innovators of our own time are more than happy to seek inspiration in historical art.
Back to Venice
Tintoretto painted St Catherine for the altar of the Scuola di Santa Caterina in the Church of San Geminiano on St Mark’s Square in Venice, where it could be admired until the building was demolished in 1807. The altarpiece then disappeared into private ownership.
Since the announcement in November 2016 that the painting would be loaned long term to the Rubens House, Ben van Beneden has worked closely with the Colnaghi Foundation on a plan to return the altarpiece temporarily to Venice during the 2019 Biennale. When the Flemish Minister of Tourism, Ben Weyts, learned of the plan, he immediately decided to support it through Tourism Flanders. The painting will be the centrepiece of an exhibition in 2019 on the demolished Church of San Geminiano and the artworks it once housed. The show will also feature works containing famous views of the city by Antonio Canaletto and Francesco Guardi, in which the church can be seen on St Mark’s Square. Flemish masters too, such as Rubens, Van Dyck and Maerten de Vos, will be represented through temporary loans by our museums. It is hard to overstate the affinity between Flemish painters and Venetian art. The Flemings absorbed and assimilated the Italian legacy during their visits to the country and through the dissemination of Italian art in the form of prints. Several Venetian works from Flemish museums, including the Royal Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp, will also return to the city of the Doges for the exhibition in 2019. Minister Weyts is enthusiastic about the temporary return to Venice of Tintoretto’s altarpiece: ‘This project is not only an excellent reason to share Tintoretto’s work with the people of Venice during the 2019 Biennale, it is also a unique opportunity to show our Flemish masters to the world in the place where –more than any other – they drew inspiration from their Italian colleagues and from the classical legacy. I sincerely hope that the project will raise awareness of the unbelievable artistic quality of our heritage and will inspire an international public to come and admire it in Flanders.’
David Bowie’s Tintoretto
From 27 June 2017
Rubens House
Wapper 9–11
www.rubenshuis.be – www.facebook.com/rubenshuis
€ 8 / € 6 / free
Open Tuesday to Sunday/10 am–5 pm
You will find this story in the ‘Distinguished Guests’ tour in the free Antwerp Museum app.
Discover David Bowie’s Tintoretto and the other loans with their surprising stories during a tour for groups and/or individuals.
Price: € 75 + € 5 administrative costs, not including museum entry
Maximum 15 persons per guide
Reservation: Visit Antwerp – Booking and Ticketing, tel. +32 (0)3 232 01 03 (working days 9 a.m.–4 p.m.), tickets@visitantwerpen.be
Price: € 10 (including museum entry)
Maximum 15 persons per group
Location: Rubens House, Wapper 9–11, 2000 Antwerp
Dates: Saturday 8 July 2017 10.30 a.m.–noon, Sunday 16 July 2017 2–3.30 p.m., Saturday 12 August 2017 10.30 a.m.–noon, Sunday 20 August 2017 2–3.30 p.m., Sunday 17 September 2017 2.30–4 p.m., Sunday 24 September 2017 10.30 a.m.–noon, Sunday 8 October 2017 10.30 a.m.–12 noon, Sunday 22 October 2017 10.30 a.m.–noon
Booking required: +32 (0)3 201 15 50 (during museum opening hours) or rubenshuis@stad.antwerpen.be
Museum Night at the Rubens House on Saturday 5 August will be David Bowie all the way, with lots of great music! Info at www.rubenshuis.be – tickets at www.museumnacht.be
David Bowie’s Tintoretto: Angel Foretelling Saint Catherine of Alexandria of her Martyrdom (Colnaghi Foundation) will be presented at Frieze London (5–8 October 2017). The publication will also be presented later that month at the Rubens House in Antwerp. Further information will be provided to the press in due course.
[1] S. Simonart, ‘Lust for Life, Lust for Art: The Rubens House: a Museum Bowie Loved’, in David Bowie’s Tintoretto: Angel foretelling Saint Catherine of Alexandria of her Martyrdom, London: Colnaghi Foundation, 2017, p. 154.
Nadia De Vree Press coordinator Museums of Antwerp
nadia.devree@stad.antwerpen.be
The Rubens House 2017-2021 19 KB docx
About Rubenshuis
The master lived here in this house with his family for years and painted with his colleagues and assistants in a studio that he designed himself. He created many of his paintings in this house, in the centre of Antwerp.
www.rubenshuis.be
rubenshuis@stad.antwerpen.be
Rubenshuis
Wapper 9-11
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Tag Archives: Palme d’Or
Pras on WorldFilms: Michael Moore’s WHERE TO INVADE NEXT
Posted on January 26, 2016 by Praas on World Films
Sarcastic, Hilarious, Educational And As Always, (Almost) Guaranteed To Make You Feel Shitty About The System That Exists In United States. “WHERE TO INVADE NEXT” finds Moore traveling to foreign countries, mainly in Europe, to claim their best civic ideas for America.
Michael Moore spent the first decade of the twenty-first century chronicling modern America at its worst: School shootings; a broken healthcare system; a berserk economy built on unregulated greed; and, most controversially, the Bush administration’s response to 9/11. It has been six years since Moore’s last big-screen documentary, “Capitalism: A Love Story,” and violence, injustice, and political cowardice are still everyday staples of American life.
As I walked in at this evening’s screening, I wondered if the new Michael Moore film was an anti-war message, or whether it was an indictment of America’s defense policies. Michael Moore had taken them on already in the Cannes Palme d’Or winning Fahrenheit 9/11 back in 2004. He also took on the American healthcare system with his Oscar nominated film Sicko in 2007. He even took on gun violence and America’s obsession with guns back in 2002 with the Oscar & Cannes Palme d’Or winning film Bowling For Columbine.
His groundbreaking film ofcourse was the 1990 film Roger & Me, a statement on corporate greed targeting General Motors and how it bankrupted and destroyed his beloved home town of Flint, Michigan, a town in the news again about its suffering a massive drinking water contamination crisis (the film was now used as subject material for many business school courses, including mine).
This time around in the new film WHERE TO INVADE NEXT, Michael Moore trains his inimitable style of sarcasm and hilarious storytelling on the American education system, the American penal system, the deep social inequality and how America created a system built on white-washing our past history to showcase itself as the model system of national governance and economic management to the world, all at once. Now in his 60s, Moore has, in fact, transformed into a self-described “crazy optimist.”
To learn what the USA can learn from other nations, this time Michael Moore assumes the role of a self-appointed globetrotting “invader” on behalf of a much-troubled America to see what they have to offer. All that was missing was a cameo appearance by Bernie Sanders.
Moore visits Italy to learn about how Italian companies allow their workers enjoys vacation days and worker pay that would unimaginable here, yet enjoys higher worker morale, productivity and prosperity that their American counterparts. Interesting visits to Ducati’s factory and interviews assembly line workers, and those at a high-fashion apparel house.
This image provided by Dog Eat Dog Films shows director Michael Moore, left, and Claudio Domenicali, CEO of Ducati, in a scene from his documentary, “Where to Invade Next.” The movie opens in U.S. theaters on Feb. 12, 2016. (Dog Eat Dog Films via AP)
In France Moore takes us on a visit to the public school system, the teaching system, the healthier school lunches served in French schools and best of their no-homework policy.
In Slovenia, where a college education is free, he talks with American students and teachers who left America and moved here. They highlight why this system works better than America’s college system designed to load students with a lifelong burden of debt. He even gets a 45-minute private meeting with Borut Pahor, the sitting President of Slovenia.
In Germany we visit Faber-Castell, the famed maker of specialized pencils and drawing tools for schools and design work. In a digital age where use of paper is fast being replaced by the computer screen, Faber Castell has had its best year ever in productivity and worker morale.
Next we visit Portugal and meet with their head of drugs enforcement agency to understand why the country has the lowest incidence of drug-related offenses in a society that has decriminalized every kind of drug well beyond marijuana.
It’s the prison part of the film that proves to be especially insightful, with Moore learning that most developed countries outside of North America view prison as a means of rehabilitation rather than pure punishment. Norway becomes his argument about a model penal system works and how its humane treatment of prisoners focus on human dignity and reformation and brings social benefits. He takes us inside two different prisons and chats with prisoners who live like free people, and administrative staff carries no weapons. Dehumanization is something that’s simply not acceptable in places like a Norweigian super-max prison where inmates start their sentence by watching a pop sing-along music video cover of “We Are the World” made by the guards
As for Tunisia, the country that touched off the Arab Spring, Moore finds democratic passion not only still thriving there but actually achieving worthwhile results. On his only non-European stopover, Moore also takes time to interview a Tunisian activist who cannot understand why Americans know so little about the rest of the world, when the rest of the world knows so much about them. Tunisia where government funded healthcare services for women works better than most advanced countries. It was amazing to observe how women power and public opinion brought down a dictatorship and replaced with a deeply conservative Islamic government which also was forced to give in to changes in its anti-women policies.
Perhaps the most incisive and insightful segment was his visit Iceland where he shows how a country that was almost destroyed by the economic fallout from the 2008 mortgage crisis clawed its way back to health and became prosperous again.We also discover an educational system that not only turned itself around from being one of the worst in the world to being quite possibly the best, but also one that includes such foreign-to-the-U.S. novelties as shorter school days, minimal homework, and no private schools, thus forcing rich and poor to inhabit the same spaces. Its also a country that has served a s a model for women-led politics and business. In feminist Iceland, even more fascinating than the fact that the nation elected one of the world’s first female president, Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, in 1980, is that the one bank that didn’t fall during their recent financial crisis had three women as part of its board of directors, thus leading to a discussion on how having more women in power led to diversity in views and leading to less risky business behaviour.
Whether it’s serving tasty and nutritious school lunches or offering quality college education for free, these countries have found a way to do something meaningful. There are hilarious shot of the Italian couple’s astonishment when they’re told that Americans have no legally required paid vacation, or a quote from the French chef about how he’s never eaten a hamburger. The results might seem Utopian but in fact are based on practical realities.
Many of the ideas on display here seem relatively easy for the U.S. to implement, as Moore states earlier on, with the catch being that income taxes would have to increase for the wealthy. However, he makes the point that with things like medicare, free tuition, more vacation-time and more, citizens would actually wind-up wasting far less of their income on things that are considered a human right in places like Italy, Norway, France and more.
The final message of the film highlights the irony that most of the ideas he had been searching for Moore’s films have originally been American ideas. All the game-changing notions of other nations, the film notes in a wry postscript, began in the U.S. His big reveal is that Americans used to be much more caring toward one another, and that was reflected in the values we championed and the politics we practiced. How Did We Lose Ourselves? How Do We Get The Magic Back?
Michael Moore’s been among the most lucrative documentaries at the box office. His “Fahrenheit 9/11” earned $119.2 million in 2004; his last film, 2009’s “Capitalism: A Love Story,” made $14.4 million.
Posted in World Films | Tagged Bowling For Columbine, Cannes, civic, Ducati, Faber-Castell, Fahrenheit 9/11, France, Germany, Iceland, income equality, Italy, Michael Moore, Norway, oscar, Palme d'Or, penal system, Portugal, prison system, racism, Roger & Me, school system, Sicko, tunisia, vacation days, WHERE TO INVADE NEXT | Leave a reply
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Maintenance of spatial gene expression by Polycomb-mediated repression after formation of a vertebrate body plan
Julien Rougot, Naomi D Chrispijn, Marco Aben, Dei M Elurbe, Karolina M Andralojc, Patrick J Murphy, Pascal WTC Jansen, Michiel Vermeulen, Bradley R Cairns, Leonie M Kamminga
Preprint posted on November 12, 2018 https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2018/11/12/468769
Though ezh2-mutant zebrafish form grossly normal body plans, key developmental factors are dysregulated early on, which dooms the embryo to later failure of organogenesis and lethality.
Selected by Yen-Chung Chen
Categories: cell biology, developmental biology, genomics
Background and context
Polycomb repressive complex 2 (PRC2) mediates methylation of lysine 27 on histone 3 (H3K27me3). H3K27me3 is a chromatin mark associated with gene repression, and the disruption of PRC2 results in grave disruption of development. In flies, body segments are organized wrongly when H3K27me3 is disrupted, and mouse embryos die before gastrulation, presumably as a result of failed differentiation. These severe consequences have made H3K27me3 one of the best studied histone modifications in development, and several critical genes governing segmentation or fate specification have been shown to be under the control of PRC2 via H3K27me3 [Reviewed in 1 and 2].
Because mammalian embryos fail to gastrulate without PRC2, the function of PRC2 in development is mostly studied by differentiating stem cells in vitro. Although the in vivo functions of PRC2 are well characterized in flies, the mode of action of Drosophila PRC2 is starkly different from vertebrate PRC2. In a previous study from the Kamminga lab, they used a germ cell transplantation technique in zebrafish to generate a PRC2 loss-of-function model by mutating ezh2, a core component of PRC2. They found out that even without ezh2, the fish remains grossly normal through segmentation until organogenesis [3]. The power of this model enables Rougot et al. to investigate the consequences of the absence of H3K27me3 in gene regulation in vivo in the current preprint.
Zebra fish provides a novel and versatile model to study the consequences of the loss of H3K27me3 (Figures are adapted from the manuscript under a CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license).
(A) ezh2-mutant embryo develops largely normal up to 48 hours post-fertilization (from Figure 1A)
(B) ezh2-mutants are steadily deprived of ezh2 during early embryogenesis (from Figure 1B).
(C) The landscape of histone marks and the binding of writers are perturbed (from Figure 1G).
(D) Spatial expression of histone mark-regulated genes is altered in the absence of ezh2 (from Figure 6A).
Rougot et al. showed that in maternal-zygotic ezh2mutant zebrafish, the level of H3K27me3 decreases to a level barely detectable with ChIP-seq. Interestingly, besides the absence of H3K27me3, rnf2, the core component of PRC1, failed to find its normal targets in ezh2 mutants, though the subunits of PRC1 are present in ezh2mutants. It has been unclear whether the action of PRC1 is dependent on the disposition of H3K27me3, and the current study provides a new line of evidence that in the early stages of zebrafish development, PRC1 requires functional PRC2 to work properly.
In the absence of H3K27me3, H3K4me3, a histone modification associated with transcriptionally active state, is enriched in otherwise H3K27me3-occupied gene loci. Consistent with the important role H3K27me3 plays in developmental gene regulation, genes regulating developmental processes gain H3K4me3 and are upregulated in the absence of H3K27me3. The authors further performed mass spectrometry to check if these epigenetic and transcriptomic changes resulted in altered proteome. Indeed, the proteomic study shows an up-regulation of both a subset of genes occupied by H3K27me3 in the wildtype and the genes gaining H3K4me3 in the ezh2 mutant.
To further examine segment-specific effects of H3K27me3 disruption, the authors first performed RT-qPCR for different body segments to evaluate the expression pattern of hox genes, which are expressed with a clear segmental pattern and govern the head-to-tail body plane. In ezh2 mutants, thoracic hox genes (e.g. hoxa9a and hoxa9b) are up-regulated in the rostral part of body. More caudal hox genes (e.g. hoxa11b and hoxa13b) are also up-regulated but to a lesser extent. These caudal hoxgenes might be repressed by other mechanisms in addition to H3K27me3. Then, the authors performed in situhybridization of several transcription factors with known spatial expression patterns, including the tbx family, isl1, and gsc. Ectopic expression of every transcription factor examined in mutants. The most extreme change is observed in gsc. The normal expression pattern for gsc is confined in telencephalon and diencephalon, branchial arches, and otic vesicle, while in ezh2 mutants, the expression becomes ubiquitous despite being weak.
In short, Rougot et al. used ezh2 mutant zebrafish to show that the early developmental process is robust against the absence of H3K27me3 and proceeds in a grossly normal pattern without H3K27me3. Nonetheless, dysregulation of expression of developmental regulators is detected at the RNA and protein level at 24 hpf, and the spatial patterns of these developmental regulators are perturbed to various extent without H3K27me3.
Why I like this preprint
Histone modifications have long been proposed as an important factor in development to ensure precise coordination of differentiation processes. Indeed, mechanistic studies corroborate the roles of histone modifications in gene regulation and identify many processes they are involved in. Nevertheless, many studies on histone modification-mediated regulation in mammals are performed in vitro, and phenotypic and mechanistic discrepancies between in vivo and in vitromodels are not uncommon. Besides, although the well-defined and scalable nature of cell models enables detailed characterization of the mechanism and a great variety of manipulations, the lack of higher order organization and interactions between different cell types in cell models poses a great challenge for researchers hoping to assess the crosstalk between different regulatory mechanisms. For example, it is common that a striking mutant phenotype in cell models is less severe and presumably compensated in vivobecause environmental cues might provide information that compensates the dysfunction. Thus, it is an invaluable resource to have a vertebrate model of PRC2 loss of function, and this study shows the degree of erosion of spatial expression pattern differs a lot among the genes examined, which might suggest H3K27me3 contributes differently to the repression of H3K27me3-marked genes.
H3K27me3 is reported to safeguard cell identities. Different cell identities are often controlled by antagonizing developmental cues and undergo transcriptomic changes in opposite direction. Would it be possible to examine each germ layer individually to see if the cells gain more plasticity or dual identity in the absence of H3K27me3? This could also rule out the possibility that the transcriptomic changes in different germ layers of ezh2mutant cancel out each other when an embryo is profiled as a whole.
It is still unclear how PRC2 finds its target loci to tri-methylate. Would it be feasible to re-introduce ezh2 later in development in an ezh2mutant zebrafish to see if H3K27me3 at certain loci could be established properly to see whether the guiding signal that leads PRC2 to its target loci is transient or not?
Kassis, J. A., Kennison, J. A. & Tamkun, J. W. Polycomb and Trithorax Group Genes in Drosophila. Genetics. 206,1699–1725 (2017).
Aloia, L., Di Stefano, B. & Di Croce, L. Polycomb complexes in stem cells and embryonic development. Development 140, 2525 LP-2534 (2013).
San, B. et al.Normal formation of a vertebrate body plan and loss of tissue maintenance in the absence of ezh2. Rep. 6,24658 (2016).
Tags: epigenetics, h3k27me3, prc2, zebra fish
Posted on: 7th January 2019 , updated on: 18th January 2019
Author's response to the question raised in this highlight
Leonie M Kamminga shared
This is an interesting thought. We performed our analysis on whole embryo lysates at 24hpf, a stage when many different cell types are already present. By using germ layer specific transgenes or markers it would be possible to study the individual germ layers. However, in case the identity of cells changed because of loss of Ezh2, these cells might have lost the germ layer specific identity and will therefore not be picked up. In addition, and the same goes for single cell techniques, in case cell identity has changed, it will be difficult to reconstruct the embryo based on expression profiles. A good alternative, in this case, would be an approach using tomo-seq. This technique ensures the spatial information of gene expression will be maintained and changes between wildtype and mutant embryos will be better and easier to compare.
The way PRC2 finds its target loci is still under debate. A recent study shows Mtf2 is involved in recruitment of PRC2. The authors of the paper describing this work, propose that recruitment of PRC2 is dependent on the helical shape of the DNA. There are different methods to reintroduce Ezh2 later during development in MZezh2mutants to get insight into recruitment of PRC2. One of the approaches would be to cross a germ line mutant female with a heterozygous male, which results in having only zygotic expression of ezh2. However, with this method it is difficult to control when ezh2starts to express. Another method, which allows control of timing of ezh2expression involves a transgene with an inducible promoter, for instance a heat shock promoter.
Also in the developmental biology category:
Receptor-specific interactome as a hub for rapid cue-induced selective translation in axons
Max Koppers, Roberta Cagnetta, Toshiaki Shigeoka, et al.
Selected by Andreas van Impel
Identification of a master regulator of differentiation in Toxoplasma
Benjamin S. Waldman, Dominic Schwarz, Marc H. Wadsworth II, et al.
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NEUROD2 represses Reelin expression and controls dendrite orientation during cortical radial migration
Gizem Guzelsoy, Cansu Akkaya, Dila Atak, et al.
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Also in the genomics category:
Local rewiring of genome - nuclear lamina interactions by transcription
Laura Brueckner, Peiyao A Zhao, Tom van Schaik, et al.
Selected by Sergio Menchero
Single Cell Analysis Reveals Immune Cell-Adipocyte Crosstalk Regulating the Transcription of Thermogenic Adipocytes
Prashant Rajbhandari, Douglas Arneson, An-Chieh Feng, et al.
Selected by Matthew Sinton
Dynamics of Meiotic Sex Chromosome Inactivation and Pachytene Activation in Mice Spermatogenesis
Ábel Vértesy, Javier Frias-Aldeguer, Zeliha Sahin, et al.
preLists in the cell biology category:
Pattern formation during development
The aim of this preList is to integrate results about the mechanisms that govern patterning during development, from genes implicated in the processes to theoritical models of pattern formation in nature.
List by Alexa Sadier
Zebrafish immunology
A compilation of cutting-edge research that uses the zebrafish as a model system to elucidate novel immunological mechanisms in health and disease.
List by Shikha Nayar
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The connected tenant in the new real estate community How your tenant interacts with your property, whether that...
Business Development Manager Our mission: People love vibrant places. We create them. Spaceflow...
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What’s the Big Data idea?
Prologis | Delivering intelligently connected buildings
Automation Data Energy Efficiency Software Wellbeing
Prologis, the largest industrial developer in the world, has produced a report on how it’s beginning to deliver intelligently connected buildings in the UK. The company predicts that through the use of tech, including Tesla batteries and intelligent building energy management systems (BEMS), energy use in buildings has the potential to be 30-40% lower than required under building regulations. Read the report below.
Due to rising costs and heightened environmental awareness, energy is a key focus in today’s world, not least in the commercial property sector where building owners, operators and tenants are seeking increasingly intelligent and flexible energy management solutions.
While saving energy is an obvious goal, clever use of energy and techniques such as ‘load balancing’ can deliver significant cost savings, without changing the amount of energy that is used.
Until recently, building energy management systems have been localised, and accessible only at the building level, giving little benefit to those who need to ‘see the big picture’. One key aspect of improving building efficiency is to understand how, when and where energy is being used. Not only does this allow energy to be used more efficiently but also allows the monitoring of occupancy and work patterns.
As one of the world’s largest owners and operators of advanced warehousing, Prologis see intelligent building management as a way of delivering a competitive advantage. Buildings that operate at maximum efficiency provide advantages for tenants and demand for such buildings provides benefit to landlords.
The rise of renewable energy in the UK
In common with many countries, renewable energy is growing rapidly as a source of power generation. According to government statistics, gas remains the most popular fuel for electricity generation, representing about 39% of the total. However, this percentage is decreasing year-on-year. Coal and oil combined are now a very small percentage (6.5%) and nuclear power represents about a quarter of all energy generation (24.4%) and this figure is broadly stable.
The only sector showing appreciable growth is the renewable sector, which now represents 30% of all UK electricity generation. As an island nation, it should be no surprise that wind power (13.8%) is the largest form of renewable energy, although this is closely followed by bioenergy (10.2%) – and the two combined now produce more energy than nuclear power.
Solar energy is relatively small (4.2%) but putting this in context, it is almost 50% more than is generated by coal. Overall, government statistics show that in 2016, around 340 TWh of electricity in the UK came from renewable sources.
As of October 2017, there were just under 8,000 wind turbines deployed in the UK, both onshore and offshore and this number is growing, driven by the fact that onshore wind power is the cheapest form of energy in the UK and, in 2016, more electricity was generated from wind than coal for the first time.
In the UK, wind power is the largest form of renewable energy at 13.8%
The statistics show that wind power capacity in the UK is around 15,000 GWh with new capacity being added regularly. However, wind power is susceptible to weather conditions, if the wind is too low (<2.5 m/s) then turbines cannot produce electricity and if it is too high (>25m/s) then the turbines have to be shut down to prevent damage.
One of the greatest challenges in electricity generation today is balancing supply and demand and this is especially important as currently, renewable energy capacity struggles to bridge the gap between base loads and peak time demands. One way in which energy suppliers are trying to address this is through structured pricing where peak time energy is significantly more expensive than off-peak.
As energy costs continue to rise, a lot of focus is being put on reducing energy usage to reduce costs and, while this is somewhat obvious and a laudable goal to protect natural resources, many people – including commercial building operators – are understanding that there are also cost savings to be had through using the same amount of energy more intelligently – over and above any savings due to reduced usage.
Intelligent buildings – from the office to the logistics area
One of the key goals for operators of large buildings, such as warehouse facilities is now to maximise their time ‘off the grid’, especially during times when electricity charges are at their highest. There are two key elements to meeting this goal; the ability to create and store electric energy, and the ability to monitor the building and its systems to ensure that energy is used intelligently, at the most economically beneficial time.
Modern warehouses are very energy efficient and therefore require little, if any, heating – other than for frost protection. As a result, the primary energy use within the building is for lighting, often accounting for 90% of all electricity usage.
The roofs of warehouses are increasingly being fitted with solar panels to provide photovoltaic (PV) energy for the building. Prologis has been a leader in this area, recognising the benefits of sustainable low carbon energy for their tenants, and adding value to the buildings themselves.
As PV is integral to Prologis’ energy strategy, their buildings are designed and built in such a way that the roofs support up to 25 kg/m2 of loading which is considerably more capacity than is needed for a full PV installation. As an example, a 151,000 sqft Prologis warehouse in Marston Gate, Milton Keynes has a 100 kWp grid-connected solar PV array that generates around 92,300 kWh of electricity for the tenant.
However, as solar PV electricity is generated during the day and the demand for the highest energy use (for lighting) is during the evening / night there is a mismatch and some form of storage is needed to allow more electricity to be retained on site so that it can be used at a later time.
In order to address this need, Prologis is installing multiple small scale battery storage systems in their buildings to allow electrical energy to be stored during the day and then released at night.
Battery systems allow building users to deploy energy at the optimum time
Tenants are able to use this locally stored energy at times when demand at both building and grid level is high, leading to higher electricity tariffs. By releasing stored energy at these peak times, tenants are able to reduce operating costs without necessarily reducing the amount of electricity used
With lighting being the biggest consumer of electricity within the building by far, then it comes as no surprise that this is at the heart of the intelligent connected building concept.
In modern warehouse lighting installations the light fittings themselves are highly efficient using technologies such as LED that convert far more of the electricity to usable light than traditional incandescent bulbs or fluorescent tubes. Manufacturers are now also providing light fittings with inbuilt radio frequency (RF) ICs that allow them to communicate as part of a mesh network.
Mesh networks can be wired or wireless and have the ability to connect dozens or even hundreds of nodes to a network allowing for control and collection of data. One good example of a mesh network is the Internet itself, that allows for millions of computers and other devices to be connected together.
In general, wireless mesh networks are becoming more popular as without the need for wires, installation is easier and the costs are lower – especially for networks that cover a large area, such as a warehouse. Using their on-board RF, each node communicates with other nodes via one of several protocols – some are proprietary and others are based on common standards such as wireless Ethernet (Wi-Fi).
Each node is programmed with software that tells that node how to interact with the wider network. Information flows across the network by hopping wirelessly from one mesh node to the next. The nodes choose the routing automatically and intelligently using a process known as dynamic routing.
There are a number of benefits of mesh networks. For example, their dynamic nature allows them to be self-configuring and self-healing, meaning that the whole network does not fail if just a single node fails. They also become faster as they become bigger and do not impose high data loads on the main network.
Sensors can be included in the lighting mesh network to enhance functionality. A simple daylight sensor can prevent lights being used when ambient light levels are high, and switch the lights on automatically when light levels diminish. This can be improved through the addition of dimming controls, so that individual fittings will constantly adjust their light ouput to make use of available daylight.
Adding movement sensors to the network, such as passive infrared (PIR) sensors can further control the lights so that they only operate when there is one or more people in the vicinity thereby saving energy while maintaining effective (and safe) lighting conditions.
With a mesh network that contains lighting and PIR sensors, tenants and building operators are able to gather valuable data. For example vehicle and pedestrian movements within a warehouse can be captured and analysed allowing the efficiency of the racking layout to be understood and potentially improved.
Advanced software can take the data gathered over a period of time and product ‘heat maps’ showing the most and least frequently accessed areas of the warehouse. This data allows tenants to confirm that goods are organised in the most efficient layout for the building and their type of business. The data can be continuously monitored to allow changes to be made for new products, or even seasonal variations to product lines.
Automatically generated heat maps give a useful insight into movement in buildings
Building owners / developers can use this information to better understand the way different businesses operate and improve the design of future buildings, tailoring them to the specific needs of target occupiers. This may include things such as the placement of the dock, or the form factor of the building footprint, making buildings wider or longer to suit different types of operation.
Beyond efficiency – connected buildings
While monitoring and controlling energy producing systems (such as solar PV and batteries) and energy consuming systems (such as lighting) is a logical starting point for intelligent buildings, there are many more opportunities to integrate other systems to produce a truly connected building environment.
For example, the health of employees is a key concern of all businesses. Network-connected air quality monitors can be placed at strategic locations (identified with the assistance of the building heat map) to monitor temperature, humidity and CO2 levels. By connecting the HVAC into this system (or by using remotely-actuated windows in naturally ventilated spaces), any air quality issues can be automatically addressed. Logging the data, can provide employers with a permanent record of long term air quality throughout the building.
The opportunity to make buildings more intelligent extends to any system that can be ‘connected’. ANPR-equipped security cameras can record every vehicle entering or leaving the premises providing added security, or simply booking in a vehicle automatically as it arrives.
Initially, heat maps have been two-dimensional, but sensors are also able to differentiate within the vertical plane. This will help tenants understand how often picking from higher locations is required adding another dimension to efficiency planning for warehouses.
Connected access control systems can maintain records of the number of people in the building, including when they arrived and when they left. This is invaluable in tracking hourly-paid employees, but could also be life saving in the event of an emergency such as a major fire.
An intelligent BEMS: EnergyDeck
Bringing together many different types of system within a building into a single cohesive system brings many benefits, but also has challenges. As there is relatively little standardisation then integrating all of the data to ‘see the big picture’ is often where connected buildings can struggle. However, London-based EnergyDeck provides a software platform for remote monitoring that promises to ‘reduce building operating costs, increase efficiency, and enhance occupant well-being and productivity’.
The software is web-based and includes all building metrics and data into a single platform, whether they are manual or automatic feeds. The ability to connect any type of sensor means that anything that can be network connected can be monitored by EnergyDeck. While the system was originally developed for energy management, it is suitable to become the central hub of any intelligent connected building.
EnergyDeck provides a comprehensive and highly configurable platform for users of Prologis buildings
EnergyDeck software allows unlimited users, meaning that information about the operation of the building can be disseminated widely throughout the organisation, empowering all building users to manage energy usage and other important aspects carefully.
The reporting features of EnergyDeck are highly customisable, allowing users to establish dashboards to suit the different functions and user groups, both within the equipped building and at central monitoring locations (such as the company headquarters).
EnergyDeck is able to provide customised reports covering all aspects of energy usage
EnergyDeck’s ability to both ‘drill down’ and ‘roll up’ data allows visualisations to be created showing information from a single device all the way up to a portfolio of buildings, and everywhere in between.
The software also includes the ability to configure alerts in the event that a parameter (for example air quality) exceeds pre-set limits, or if a reporting device fails.
While users with multiple locations / buildings are able to benchmark across their portfolio, EnergyDeck provides the ability to benchmark across the entire EnergyDeck user base using anonymously crowd-sourced data.
Figure 5: Confidential crowd-sourced data allows EnergyDeck users to benchmark their performance
This gives building operators and tenants a unique insight into how their buildings are performing across a broad range of other buildings within the same industry sector and, therefore, the ability to make improvements where any aspect of the facility lags behind the industry ‘norm’.
The business world is becoming ever more competitive and every competitive advantage has the potential to deliver significant business benefits. Connected buildings can contribute to this by making operations more efficient, ensuring an optimum working environment and controlling energy usage.
While a high degree of building automation is already available in advanced buildings, such as those managed by Prologis, we are at an early stage in the evolution of intelligent buildings. As more sensing technology is integrated, so the opportunities increase, allowing tenants to make better use of their buildings and helping developers to design and build facilities that are flexible yet specifically targeted towards the particular needs of tenants.
This report was produced by Simon Cox, project management and UK sustainability officer, and Maurice Dalton, head of project management at Prologis.
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Home»Deerfield Beach»LOCAL RABBI & CONGRESSMAN RESPOND TO HOLOCAUST DENIAL
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LOCAL RABBI & CONGRESSMAN RESPOND TO HOLOCAUST DENIAL
LOCAL NEWS 2019-07-11
LOCAL NEWS / July 11, 2019 / 631
Boca Raton made national headlines this past week when news came to light that in 2018, then principal of Spanish River Community High School, William Latson, said in an email exchange with a parent that he could not “force” Holocaust lessons on children because some people don’t believe the Holocaust happened. In a follow-up email with the parent, Latson wrote: “I can’t say the Holocaust is a factual, historical event because I am not in a position to do so as a school district employee.”
The string of emails, which were exposed in the Palm Beach Post July 5, outraged many. Then, after a public outcry for Latson’s removal from his position as Principal, Latson was reassigned to an administrative position at the Palm Beach County School District. His reassignment further enraged community members who have deemed his denial of the Holocaust unacceptable, especially for a public educator.
The story has spurred public responses from political, religious and business leaders. Two such responses include one from U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch from Florida’s District 22 (which includes Boca Raton), and one from local Rabbi Dan Levin of Temple Beth El of Boca Raton. Read their responses below. Or, for more background on the story…
>> READ THE SUN SENTINEL’S MOST RECENT STORY HERE
>> READ THE PALM BEACH POST’S MOST RECENT STORY HERE
RESPONSE FROM RABBI DAN LEVIN, TEMPLE BETH EL OF BOCA RATON
The following is a response from Rabbi Den Levin from the Temple Beth El of Boca Raton. Since 1967, Temple Beth El has grown to be one of the largest temples in South Florida.
“There are facts, there are opinions, and there are lies.” – Dr. Deborah Lipstadt, professor of History and Holocaust Studies at Emory University
This week it came to light that in a private email exchange, a local principal implied that it was not his duty to “force” but to “introduce” students to information about the Holocaust because “we all have the same rights but not all the same beliefs.”
While he said that he personally believes the Holocaust to be fact, he also said it was not his place to push or advocate for that truth, but to let people decide for themselves.
The outrage these revelations provoked is understandable and justified. The Holocaust is not something which one can choose to deny, any more than we can deny the truths of slavery or other truths of human brutality. People may choose to live in ignorance, but when confronted with ignorance, an educator must be willing to stand for the truth.
This is the lesson I think we ought to learn from this week’s events. What’s important is not that this particular principal was reassigned from the high school he led for many years. What is important is what we teach about truth.
The history of the Holocaust is undeniable and verifiable truth. The proof of this tragedy is to be found in the physical evidence and voluminous records of the atrocities, and the thousands of eyewitness testimonies of survivors, bystanders, and perpetrators.
It is important that we constantly learn these truths and that we teach them to our children and our children’s children, not simply because they represent one of the darkest chapters in human history, but because the Holocaust teaches us what happens when we diminish the value of standing up for truth.
Dr. Lipstadt teaches that oppression and violence begin with words. Nazi Germany deliberately obfuscated the truth at every possible turn. They made up facts about genetic superiority, they spread propaganda insinuating that Jews were disloyal German citizens and parasites, they lied to their people about their intentions and they lied to their victims, often until their final moments.
Every act of discrimination and violence begins with lies we tell ourselves and others, and an unwillingness to see or hear the truth.
It is not always easy to assert the truth. It can be difficult to hear it. We often don’t want to believe it. But if we sacrifice our commitment to the truth, we remove the keystone responsible for supporting our very society.
It is our ethical and moral duty to be champions of truth. We have to be truth-tellers and truth-learners. We have to be willing to tell uncomfortable truths, even to people who don’t want to hear it. And we have to be willing to hear uncomfortable truths, even if we don’t want to believe what we are hearing.
These are the lessons we need to teach our young people, not just in high school, but everywhere. These are the lessons we need to learn for ourselves.
In Pirke Avot 1:18, Rabban Shimon ben Gamaliel said: “The world stands on three things: on justice, on truth, and on peace.” May our quest for what is right and just lead us all to be champions of truth and pursuers of peace.
Rabbi Dan Levin
Temple Beth El of Boca Raton
RESPONSE FROM U.S. REPRESENTATIVE TED DEUTCH, D-Fla.
(Washington) Congressman Ted Deutch (FL-22) issued this statement following reports that Spanish River High School Principal William Latson told a parent that he “can’t say the Holocaust is a factual, historical event” and “not everyone believes the Holocaust happened” and the principal’s reassignment by the Palm Beach County School District:
“I really don’t understand how the principal of Spanish River Community High School in Boca Raton, Palm Beach County, Florida, could question the historical fact that is Hitler’s slaughter of six million Jews.
“My children attended Spanish River, and they participated in Holocaust education programs with some of the many Holocaust survivors who live in our community. Palm Beach County, Broward County, and the entire State of Florida teach the Holocaust as historical fact, a fact that is immensely personal for so many residents of South Florida.
“As a member of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council and a founder of the Bipartisan Task Force for Combating Anti-Semitism, I am immensely troubled that 2/3 of young Americans could not identify Auschwitz and over 40% believe less than two million Jews were killed.
“I am just shocked that the Spanish River principal couldn’t say the Holocaust is a factual, historical event. And I cannot believe the school district labeled this incident and the principal’s leadership a ‘distraction.’
“I am grateful to the parent who kept pressing for more than a year. But it shouldn’t have required a Herculean effort to effect a positive outcome – an apology and a recommitment by the County to offer more Holocaust education.
“My Task Force, together with Senator Jackie Rosen and her colleagues in the Senate, and Elan Carr, the Administration’s Special Envoy for Monitoring and Combating anti-Semitism, will make Holocaust education a national priority. Holocaust denial feeds anti-Semitism, which leads too often to violence and death, here in America and around the world. Bold steps are required – by all of us – to ensure the history of the Holocaust and the Nazis’ efforts to eradicate the Jewish people are never questioned – anywhere.”
Author: LOCAL NEWS
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Community Leaders speak out after a principal from Spanish River Community High School in Boca Raton is reassigned after emails express denial of holocaust.
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The Case of Morse v. Frederick Essay
The case of Morse v. Frederick took place in 2002. Deborah Morse imposed a penalty upon Joseph Frederick and she suspended him. He was eighteen years old and he displayed the banner “BONG HiTS 4 JESUS”. This case was near the school. The court suspended him because he held up a sign that the principal interpreted as a pro-drug message. It was the period of Olympic Torch Relay in 2002. In his turn, Frederick sued, saying that his rights to free speech and thoughts were violated. However, his suit was declined (Sutton 2006).
This case was considered by the Chief Justice Roberts. He claimed that the First Amendment was not violated. He explained that the first part of the banner, bong hits, meant to smoke marijuana or to use illegal drugs. However, Frederick said that the word “hits” was used in another way, like “HiTS.” That is why it had another meaning. This case was very great and the Supreme Court pled the case (Sutton 2006).
The First Amendment protects the right of students to free speech and thoughts for forty years. Nevertheless, the court said that because of the closeness of the school the mission of discouraging drug use was filed. The main problem was that school censored student’s speech because they disliked it (Morse v. Frederick, 2007).
Deborah More won this case by a vote of 5 to 4. The most telling argument was that the incident has happened at a school-sponsored event and during the school day. That is why the Supreme Court applied the ‘school speech’ doctrine (Morse v. Frederick, 2007).
In my opinion, the Supreme Court was right. If I were the judge of the Supreme Court, I would be in the majority. I think that the propagation of drug use is the crime against the young population. Their consciousness is not fully formed and they will not perceive the word “hits” like abbreviation “HiTS”, but like the word “hits.” That is why I am totally on the side of the majority.
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Q&A with art star and kidlit up-and-comer Cybèle Young
Cybèle Young may have seemed like an overnight kidlit success when her most recent picture book, Ten Birds (Kids Can Press), won a Governor General’s Literary Award last fall, but the Toronto-based artist actually began working on it more than 15 years ago. Young first made her name in the art world, where her miniature paper sculptures have attracted galleries and collectors in Vancouver, London, and New York, and landed her a recent residency in Paris. In the March 2012 issue of Q&Q, she discusses how her art informs her literary work, the transporting power of story, and what readers can expect next.
It might surprise some to learn that you trained as a sculptor. How did you get into publishing?
From a very young age, there was no question in my mind that I was an artist. At the Ontario College of Art, I did all sculpture courses. But in my final year of school, when I was pregnant with my daughter, everything shifted. I took a book-arts class and discovered that books were sculptural, too, on a private yet accessible level. I found myself going to kids’ book sections a lot more than I would go to galleries. And I still do.
You started Ten Birds in 1996. How did it finally come to fruition?
I drew most of the pictures for Ten Birds right after my daughter was born. I went to Groundwood Books with it 15 years ago because co-publisher Patsy Aldana is a friend’s mother. Then I illustrated a bit for Groundwood while focusing mainly on art “ I felt I could only have one focus in addition to parenting.
Three years ago, after Groundwood had agreed to publish another picture book of mine, A Few Blocks (2011), I thought, Well, I already showed this to Patsy, and we’re working together on something else, so I showed it to Kids Can publisher Karen Boersma, whom I’d met at Groundwood. It clicked. We added one or two pages at the beginning and one or two at the end, but other than that, we used only the original drawings.
Some of your illustrations look like your sculptures. How does your art affect your books, and vice versa?
They definitely inform each other “ I’m really half a person without one or the other. I had to find my voice in art first, but one of the things I love about books is being able to reach a wide audience. My sculptures imply stories, and in my books there are definitely themes I explore in my art, like my interest in small day-to-day experiences. Another thing I learned in sculpture that I apply to everything else: if I don’t enjoy it, it’s going to suck.
Has being a mom affected your publishing career?
Certainly I fell in love with children’s books when I was pregnant. And as a parent, there’s nothing more heavenly than knowing your kid, who could be climbing the walls, will sit happily in your lap if you offer them a book, and you can both be transported to another world.
Click on the thumbnails to see examples of Young’s fine art and illustration work.
Cybèle Young's children's illustrations (left, from <i>Ten Birds</i>) are earning acclaim
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Young's paper sculptures made her name in the art world (<i>photo: Cybèle Young</i>)
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By Leah Sandals
Tagged with: CES, CLA, Cybèle Young, from the print edition, Groundwood Books, Kids Can Press, kids' publishing, London, Ontario, Pages Books & Magazines, pictures, sports, Ten Birds, Toronto, voice
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