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Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita is one of the most beloved and argued-about novels in the Western canon, and settling on a design aesthetic for the book has always been as challenging as its content. This week, however, Venus febriculosa pointed us to this wonderful project by Sanja Planinic, a graphic design student at the Academy of Fine Arts Sarajevo, who has created a gorgeous series of silkscreened prints portraying the relationship between Humbert Humbert and Lolita with images and text selections from the novel. The images are certainly arresting, and to our minds in many cases reflect the feel of the novel, but it’s a little bit more complicated than that. As Planinic explains, the overpowering black elements stand in for Humbert Humbert, their largeness “a way of presenting his monstrous side,” whereas the “little red childlike interventions are Lolita, only silently present as is her voice in the novel.” Click through to see some of our favorite pages, and then be sure to head here to see larger images and here to check out the project in full.
Credit: Sanja Planinic |
Cameroon's Military Says It Has Freed 900 Hostages From Boko Haram
Enlarge this image toggle caption Edwin Kindzeka Moki/AP Edwin Kindzeka Moki/AP
Cameroon's military says it has killed more than 100 members of Boko Haram and freed more than 900 people who had been held hostage by the militant Islamists.
The news, which is difficult to independently verify, came in a statement from Cameroon's defense minister, Joseph Beti Assomo.
"The statement says during the sweep last week, from Nov. 26 to 28, Cameroonian troops also ... recovered a large stock of weaponry and black and white Islamic State flags," NPR's Ofeibea Quist-Arcton tells our Newscast unit. "Few details were forthcoming about those reportedly freed."
The military gains reportedly came during a special cleanup operation in Cameroon's north, near the border with Nigeria, Ofeibea says. The militant group is based in Nigeria, and Cameroon has been working to prevent incursions across that border.
Cameroonian troops are also part of a regional force — 8,700 strong, according to Reuters, with troops from Chad, Niger, Nigeria and Benin — trying to defeat Boko Haram.
It's unclear whether last week's reported success was the result of a coordinated strike, according to Reuters.
"Cameroon's army spokesman said its forces acted with the backing of the regional task force, which became operational in August but has yet to launch joint raids," the wire service reports. "However, an army officer in Nigeria, which is leading the force, denied knowledge of the operation."
It's also not clear whether any of the 200 schoolgirls seized last year in Nigeria were among the freed hostages, Reuters notes. |
In this economy everyone’s looking to save a buck. For gun people this concept tends to manifest itself more prominently when it comes to accessories we strap on our toys. Optics tend to be the priciest of all and can subtract money from our bank accounts faster than Eric Holder can say, “I only learned of it a few weeks ago.” For those of us that don’t have the cash flow to go out and buy a $1400 ACOG or a $560 EoTech, the land of quality optics tends to be just out of reach. Because of this, the allure of cheaper alternatives becomes greater with the passing of every Magpul fanboy and his rifle at the range. Nick has shown us that cheap optics isn’t always synonymous with crappy optics, but it’s still hard to find something that can give you the features of an EoTech at the price point of a Bushnell. Or is it?
Lucid was started by Jason Wilson, a former Brunton Optics employee. Jason had he idea that a manufacturer could provide an innovative product with all of the features a shooter needed at an affordable price. Enter the Lucid HD7 Red Dot Sight. The HD7 boasts everything you’d find in a high end optic at an MSRP under three bills.
The ACOGesque HD7 is made of cast aluminum with ruby coated lenses. The frame is covered in a rubberized “armor” which give it admirable shock- and waterproof properties. Powered by a single triple-A battery located at the front of the optic, the HD7 claims a 1000 hour battery life with an auto shut off feature that kills the sight after 2 hours.
Your four crosshair choices can have their brightness toyed with manually or automatically by a tiny sensor that rides atop the unit. Adjustments of 1/2” MOA are made utilizing the large turrets and once you’re dialed in you should be parallax free in whatever direction you may (safely) choose to shoot.
Jason very kindly sent me an HD7 to try out on my M&P-15A. When I first got a hold of it I was impressed by its quality build. Holding the rubberized sight in your hand, you immediately feel that it’s a solid piece of equipment. Every dial and button reacted with a positive click when manipulated and felt far from flimsy. Even the battery compartment exudes ruggedness and the cap comes with a leash attached to the base of the optic, guaranteeing you’d have to try to lose it.
Aesthetically, it’s a good looking optic, too. It’s design and rubberized coating screams “tacticool,” but not to an extreme. The HD7 achieves a near perfect blend of tactical and practical that even the most die hard walnut and blued steel guys can appreciate.
As a man who enjoys “ugly” polymer guns, I honestly couldn’t care less how the damned thing looks as long as it performs. So I attached it to my top rail via the built in picatinny mount and leaned the rifle up against the garage wall while I packed up the car. 2 seconds later I heard a crash and found my rifle on the ground, optic side down. I picked it up, brushed off the dirt and looked for any damage. Nary a scratch was found on the HD7 and the ‘on’ button confirmed it was still functioning properly. Shockproof? Check.
At the range, sight-in was a breeze. I selected my preferred 2 MOA dot within a circle reticle and proceeded to get dead on target with just a few minor adjustments of the easy to use turrets. Flipping up my rear sight, I confirmed that the optic was co-witnessing beautifully with my iron sights, just as promised.
Parallax was non-existent and the optic was quick to get on target. Moving around and taking headshots at 25 yards was a breeze – so easy, in fact, that I found I was honestly shooting a little better with this sight than I did with an EoTech. At longer ranges, taking “precision” shots with one eye closed, I did notice that I could see the led emitter off to the left of my field of vision. While it was a tad bit distracting at first, I eventually learned to ignore it. At closer ranges with both eyes open I never once noticed it at all.
The reticle remained very easy to see throughout all types of outdoor lighting situations. The auto brightness function kept it at a perfect level whether the sun was blazing down on me or when the sky threatened rain. Following my initial test, I’ve run hundreds of 5.56 and .22lr through my AR with the HD7 on it without a single hiccup. The integrated mount has stayed strong without a hint of loosening and all the electronics have continued to run without a hint of trouble.
All in all, the Lucid is a phenomenal value and well worth saving up little extra for. With an MSRP of $250 and a real world price of about $200 you really can’t go wrong with an HD7. You get all the features you expect from a higher end optic at a price that won’t put too big a dent in your play money. My other sights have been collecting dust since the HD7 first graced my AR and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. |
His retirement has not only marked the end of an era in batting, it marks for some of us the snapping of the final link to childhood
Ever found yourself doing this? © Associated Press
Chanderpaul. Even the name has a slight ungainliness about its three syllables. It does not have the flowing seductiveness of "Lara". You can try and smooth it by softening the ch- to the sh of champagne, of shimmy, of chassé. But within my head it is Tony Cozier's distinctive tch- that marks its ground, that hunches slightly, that frowns and knuckles down: this name means to stay. The ch- of chisel. Of charge. Of champion.
Wait: champion? Too brash a word for Shiv, surely, but he was just that: indeed, he was the highest scorer for West Indies in their triumphant 2004 Champions Trophy final, and averaged 63.50 across their four matches in that competition.
To state the obvious, with Chanderpaul it was always the stance rather than the shots that stuck in the memory. Yet his stance, the development of which Christian Ryan has done a superb job of chronicling, would have remained a mere quirk, destined to be only occasionally recalled and derided, had it not been allied to such consistent, near-phenomenal success.
Such was his consistency that, in the end, my mental impression of Chanderpaul's simple presence eclipsed the memory of his technical specifics. He was just there - resolute, uncompromising, grimly watching another batting collapse - but always there. If a marine metaphor must be used to describe him - and Chanderpaul always attracted one particular comparison - it has to be barnacle. A barnacle that opposition captains must have often wished they could blister.
Batting, it has been observed ad nauseam, captures the melancholic essence of life. It can be viewed as an existential tragedy in miniature, a lifetime's story writ small, as the batsman walks to the crease, does what he may, and finally succumbs (in most instances) to the inevitable sentence of time. Chanderpaul did better than any other West Indian (save, bizarrely, for Courtney Walsh) when it came to dodging bullets, with 49 not-outs. One short of a fifty: it seems another fitting near miss, to go with the all-time West Indian run record, for the apparently indomitable Shiv.
For many, Chanderpaul will have been the final cricketer among their contemporaries, as Alex Massie observed in his tribute. For me, though, Chanderpaul was not of my generation, but of my generation's preceding generation. He was the last player who had seemed to have always been playing to me, the last player that I could not consciously remember a time before. Cricket, according to my history, was divided into BC and CE - Before Chanderpaul and the Chanderpaul Era. As his career went on, and on and on, Shivnarine Chanderpaul became a link to my youngest self, a means by which I could trick myself that I had a measure of control over the passage of time.
Anyone in range ran the risk of being forced to discuss the "elder statesmen" of the game, the longest-serving players. Kumar Sangakkara, Misbah-ul-Haq, Ricky Ponting, the usual suspects. Then I'd point out that Chanderpaul predated them all, some not even debuting in the same decade, and relapse once more into marvelling at his longevity.
Shivnarine Chanderpaul became a link to my youngest self, a means by which I could trick myself that I had a measure of control over the passage of time
Certainly his batting belonged to a different era. In a world of "positive cricket", there appears to be little prospect of another Chanderpaul appearing. Perhaps even less chance than another Lara, for while the modern opportunities in T20 for a Lara-like genius are clear to see, will any young player feel a 21-year, 164-Test career to be worth the candle? Look around and I - not to mention Jon Hotten - can't easily see who might be the next West Indian batsman to 11,000 Test runs. Or 10,000. Or 9000. Or 8000. Chris Gayle, on 7214, might have a shot, if his back can be held together for long enough. For any of the current team, even 6000 would be a massive achievement - just scraping past the halfway mark of Chanderpaul's 11,867.
It is fitting that his departure, protracted and acrimonious as it was, reflected his characteristic unwillingness to exit, the fairly unambiguous "I AM NOT RETIRING" texted to his coach being a case in point. His refusal to be prised from the crease continued to the last.
In a way, the life-batting metaphor emerged across his career on the macro as well as the micro scale. And because of the aforementioned link to my childhood, as long as Chanderpaul's career continued, I could discount my getting older, if not entirely ignore it. But now his enforced exit from the crease - the "bullet" he could not dodge - brings home the underlying angst of the batsman leaving the crease. At least, it does to me, in a way that no other player is likely to be able to do in future.
Thankfully, of course, we are only describing a retirement, not a passing. The exit from the crease remains only a metaphor, and there is no literal bullet, something that cannot, sadly, be taken for granted in the world climate that cricket now operates in. We have yet to see what field Chanderpaul's second innings will be played in. One imagines, though, that it will be marked by tenacity. The simple method of never knowing when he was beaten is a strategy that seems to have served Chanderpaul well enough over the years.
Having approached the metaphysical, it's time to return to ground level, quite literally. Chanderpaul left his mark on me. Or rather, he left me making his mark. A habit born out of pragmatism rather than tribute, owing to often finding myself with plastic rather than metal spikes: I can't remember exactly when I started using a bail to mark my guard, but I could normally count on some chirpy fielder making reference to Shiv. Not that comparison to a champion could ever count as sledging.
Long may such chatter persist, recalling Chanderpaul to mind, if not to team.
Liam Cromar is a freelance cricket writer based in Herefordshire, UK @LiamCromar
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd. |
Election spending by the four candidates in Powell River-Sunshine Coast mirrors the overall picture for B.C. with the Liberals running a more expensive campaign than the NDP or Greens.
NDP MLA Nicholas Simons, who won his fourth term, reported campaign expenses of $70,551.01, with $58,865 coming through transfers from the local NDP constituency association and the party HQ. The Simons campaign also reported just over $6,000 in in-kind contributions, including $300 from CUPE Local 801, $700 from the Sunshine Coast Labour Council and $1,290 from Unifor Local 1119. Simons’ only reported corporate donation was $750 in-kind from a computer services company.
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Simons’ contributions of $250 or less, which don’t require reporting the donor’s name, totalled $856 from 18 donors.
Liberal Mathew Wilson’s campaign spent $156,548.33, with $119,655.19 in transfers from the BC Liberal Party. Wilson reported $28,787.92 in corporate contributions with the single largest, $21,700, coming from No. 16 Great Projects Limited, a Vancouver company registered to John Lyle Barr and Donald E. Ritchie.
The Wilson campaign received individual donations of over $250 amounting to $2,687.91, most of it from Wilson himself.
There were also six contributors who gave $250 or less for a total of $967.33.
Green candidate Kim Darwin listed $27,924.94 in expenses, with transfers from the Green Party of $14,052.50. The Darwin campaign also reported $3,900 in contributions over $250 from six different donors in amounts ranging from $400 to $1,000. There were also 52 individual donations of $250 or less which added up to $5,642.
The Cascadia Party’s Reuben Richards ran a $375 campaign on $500 in individual contributions.
The biggest line items for the candidates were, not surprisingly, advertising and promotional material. Simons spent $18,745.42 in those categories, Wilson $33,226.20, Darwin $16,513.01 and Richards $125.
Wilson was the only candidate in the riding with expenses for “research and polling.” That came in at $5,053.86.
The expense reports also give an interesting insight into life in a ferry-dependent community. Over the course of the month-long campaign, Wilson racked up $1,036.95 in ferry fares, Simons spent $635.35 and Darwin’s ferry travel costs came in at $1,153.20
Expense reports for all BC candidates, and the party head offices, are available at elections.bc.ca. |
The biggest secret of Driftmoon!
24.01.2013
The biggest secret of Driftmoon is that it's actually 3D! I bet you thought that it was purely a top-down game, right? Maybe you thought that it would be impossible to turn the camera, even a tiny fraction? Actually that was completely true a week ago, when we suddenly started wondering how the game would look from a more angled viewpoint, and in a mad coding frenzy got to work.
The new camera tilt feature in action, coming soon to your Driftmoon (when we get it fully working and tested)
The top-down camera angle is something that often comes up when people see Driftmoon for the first time. I've never seen a feature that divides people more, some people love it, and some people don't even want to try the game because they fear the perspective. I believe it's largely an issue of what you have become accustomed to. I started my gaming life playing games with a top-down perpective like Ultima VII, and grew up with isometric games like Planescape: Torment. The fully top-down camera of Driftmoon has never been an issue to me, but that may just be because I've been playing too many ancient games. And here's the important philosophical point, I'm not here to make games for me, I'm here to make games for other people to play. That's why we're adding controls to change the camera angle!
The tricky part is that we've originally designed the graphics with a pure top-down viewpoint in mind, and changing the camera even slightly would have resulted in everything looking very strange. That's what we've been doing for the last week, making sure things look good from an angled point of view. Having said that, it won't be possible to change the camera all that much, but I think that even this small change does makes a difference in how the game looks - for the better, of course. But the best thing is that in the future, all of our players will have the possibility to choose the viewpoint they themselves prefer.
Same screenshot without the tilt
So, which screenshot do you prefer? The fully top-down, or the slightly tilted one?
Modders: The tilt feature won't be enabled in mods by default, but from the next version onwards, it will be possible for modders to enable it through settings.ini.
Oh, and I was just kidding you, this isn't the biggest secret of Driftmoon. You'll have to play the game to find it out.
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Aisha O'Mally has done a lot in the past 12 years.
"I've gotten my Master's Degree. I'm working on my doctorate right now. I went to Italy, I went to France."
O'Mally thanks her donor for being able to do all of that. After waiting for nine months, she received a heart transplant in February of 2004.
"Because of my donor, I'm able to sit here and do the work that I do, so I try to pay it forward," said O'Mally.
So when she heard about the , stating that one million dollars raised for the Life... Pass It On fund is just sitting in an account, and has been for years, she was disappointed.
The one million dollars came from people making donations when getting their license or purchasing a "Donate Life" license plate.
"For me, it's a very easy issue; it's very black and white, if you have it, do something with it," O'Mally said.
Since her transplant, O'Mally has been making the most of what she calls her "second chance," working with organizations like Finger Lakes Donor Recovery Network, lobbying in Albany, even researching organ donation trends at the University of Buffalo.
She said there are more than 10,000 people in the state waiting for a transplant, and the money sitting in the bank isn't benefiting anyone.
"I think there's a lot of education that can be done, a lot of building awareness," she said. "I think interventions are important, but we can't move forward unless there's better communication."
Organ donors in the area want better communication, too. They also want answers.
"Who holds the account and why?" asked Carolyn Knutzen, a registered nurse. She said working first-hand in an environment that deals with transplants, she was shocked to learn of the money not being used.
"It would be a waste for those that are waiting," said Knutzen.
"A million dollars is big chunk of change for anybody," said Sean Anne. He's been working as a volunteer firefighter and ambulance companies his entire life. "I think it's a great time that we look into education and be at the forefront and do something big with it."
O'Mally said New York State has taken steps to increase low donorship numbers, but they need to act faster.
"Now that we are aware that there is money and there is funding, there needs to be a plan put into order immediately. Time is of the essence, people are dying everyday, right? I could have been one of them," said O'Mally.
The audit also looked at three other organizations that have been raising money for different causes. It gave recommendations to the Department of Health for each.
The Department of Health released the following statement to 13WHAM regarding the Comptroller's findings and recommendations on organ donation:
The State Department of Health selected a private contractor to take over responsibility of the Donate Life Registry in May. The Comptroller’s office knows this because its had the contract since then and has failed to move on it. Instead they chose to issue an outdated audit that, once again, cherry-picks the facts. |
On college campuses across the United Statesa war is being waged on male students. Earlier this year, the US Department of Education issued a “Dear Colleague” letter requiring universities, under Title 9, to render findings in all allegations of sexual misconduct according to a “preponderance of evidence” rather than “clear and convincing” or “beyond reasonable doubt.”
A preponderance of evidence is anything over 50%, meaning that if it is more than likely than not that an incident occurred, the accused must be found guilty and is subject to disciplinary action. This means that a male student’s reputation, life, and future career may be ruined based on an otherwise unprovable allegation where the only evidence is the word of the accuser.
This was already the case at Saint Louis Universitywhere in the fall of 2010, four male basketball players were suspended from the university after a female student accused them of rape. According to news accounts of the police report and interviews with one of the accused, a female student, known to one of the basketball players returned to the house of one of the men and went directly into the man’s bedroom where she and that man proceeded to have sex. Afterwards, another of the group entered the bedroom and attempted to have sex with the woman. The other two men were aware of, and/or watched, some of the sexual activity. While the men’s stories varied slightly, all of the men stated that they believed the sex was consensual.
Not so according to the woman.
Her version is that some of what occurred was consensual, but at some point she stopped consenting. This is where it gets fuzzy. That’s because while she objected the first time he attempted to undress her, after a discussion, she felt more comfortable and remained in bed while he got up and got undressed. She consented to this act and of him returning to the bed. She did not object to, nor communicate any withdrawal of consent when he then removed her pants and underwear. She even helped him put on a condom. However, she states she did not consent to these actions. She merely wanted to be somewhere else and wished it to be over.
Her account of the second man was that she objected several times, but he exposed his penis and inserted it into her mouth. As she did in the first instance, she assisted the man in putting on a condom. She then states that the other two men entered the room and asked for sex, but she declined, dressed, and left.
Saint Louis University went overboard in its reaction.
This is a classic case of “he said – she said” with apparently no physical evidence to support or refute her version of the events. Even under the preponderance of evidence standard, this could account for no more than 50% of the evidence and therefore should not have resulted in disciplinary action against the men. Even moreso this should have been decided in the men’s favor as there were four men stating that she provide consent and only her stating that she had not (80% of the eyewitnesses denied it was rape). The police closed the case and no charges were filed, but the university suspended the four men.
Two of those men were suspended for not intervening to prevent the rape from occurring. But if they believed the sex was consensual, why would they intervene. The woman gave no indication to anyone that she was being raped, did not cry out, and did not ask for help. How were those two men to know? Unless they were mind readers, there was no way to know.
Saint Louis University went overboard in its reaction. Not just in regards to this one incident, but in changing its policy on sexual assault. This policy now states “It is the responsibility of the person initiating the sexual activity to obtain the affirmative consent of the other party throughout the duration of said activity.” However, the policy does not state how to identify “the person initiating the sexual activity.” Nor does it state what constitutes “affirmative consent” or how to prove it was given. Further, it does not clarify how frequently it must be obtained. In other words, the policy is too vague to be practical. The only possible purpose for instituting such a policy is to allow the university to punish as many men as possible (since women are typically the ones who file such complaints).
Under this policy, and many others like it across the country, a man accused of sexual assault stands no chance of being found not guilty. No man enrolled in college should feel safe. Even if he is not sexually active, he can still be accused and found guilty when the word of an accusing woman is given more consideration than that of four accused men. Given the falling percentage of male enrollment in colleges and universities, these institutions should be concerned with becoming more male-friendly. Not running down a path of increasing hostility towards the men they claim to want to educate. |
Axon (the company formerly known as Taser) claims that their stun guns have only directly killed 24 people, and that those deaths were due to falls or fires related to the strikes, not because of shocks to the body. But a new investigative report by Reuters found 1,005 cases in the United States where a person died after police used the weapon on them.
The news outlet also found autopsy reports for 712 of the cases. In 153 of those autopsies, stun guns were cited as a cause of or contributing factor to the death. The majority of the rest of the autopsies “cited a combination of heart and medical conditions, drug use and various forms of trauma,” according to Reuters.
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About a quarter of those killed were suffering from a neurological disorder or mental health issues. Most of the people were unarmed.
Tasers first became popular among police officers in the early 2000s. Around that time, the company claimed the device could help officers take control of people who are intoxicated or in the midst of a mental breakdown, Reuters reported, highlighting a 2007 deposition in which Taser President Rick Smith said,“We did see those as potential uses of the device,” as well as 2004 police-training material calling stun guns the “premier tool” for agencies that work with“emotionally disturbed persons.”
Taser International changed its name to Axon earlier this year, as it began a program to give free body cameras to all police officers in the country for a year. Today, about 90 percent of police agencies use Tasers. The weapons are often promoted as a safer alternative to guns, largely thanks to studies like a 2011 US Department of Justice report showing Tasers lower injury rates when used properly. Last year, the company debuted a small Taser gun for consumers.
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Steve Tuttle, Axon’s vice president of communications, told Gizmodo that since there are hundreds of reports, abstracts, and studies on the Taser, it is the “most-studied less-lethal weapon” available to law enforcement officers. “Tasers are not risk free but they are proven safer than batons, fists, take downs, tackles, and impact munitions,” said Tuttle. “Any loss of life is a tragedy regardless of the circumstance, which is why we remain committed to developing technology and training to protect life in public safety.”
Axon told Reuters that their report is misleading because most of the deaths also involved police force and because the autopsies had not been peer-reviewed, though that is not a standard required by courts of law. More than 400 of the incidents included court documents that had detailed accounts of the incidents. A fourth of those showed that Tasers were the only form of police force.
[Reuters] |
A large majority of Americans — 83 percent — say the U.S. should make an effort to reduce global warming, even if those efforts have economic costs, according to a new report from the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication. As many as 56 percent of Americans would be willing to pay an extra $100 each year if their power company would generate 20 percent of its electricity from renewable sources. Corporations and industry should be doing more to stave off climate change, according to 65 percent of people interviewed in a national survey, and 61 percent believe individual citizens should also be taking a more active role. Many of the survey’s findings are similar across Democratic and Republican party lines. Tax rebates for energy-efficient vehicles and solar panels are popular among people aligned with both parties, for example, as well as funding renewable energy research and regulating carbon dioxide as a pollutant. And people from both parties are generally supportive of ending all fossil fuel subsidies, although Democrats (67 percent) are more supportive of that policy than Republicans (52 percent). |
This Article Comes From the Heart and Discusses an Issue We All Have in Common
The problem is being normal. What is being normal? It’s doing things that an average person does.
An average person for example comes home from their boring 9-5 job to either play video games, watch T.V., or watch porn maybe that person will do all of those things in one day. Many people in today’s society would say “Whats wrong with that, sounds normal?” EXACTLY that’s the issue in today’s society the life with no goals is NORMAL. The man considered normal has no motivation to self improve in life or become better. He might hate his job, be insecure with his body, and pity his mind but he wont do anything about it to the point where one of his most famous phrases is “Ill do something about it later.” The man might have settled with a woman that is either not as attractive or treats him like shit because she was in his reach or easy to get. You can ask this man how he feels about this woman but he will just exaggerate how great she is. This man is in a mental prison.
How Do We Escape This Prison?
By changing your mindset to become a greater you. See yourself as someone worthy to get what you want in life this will lead to success. However keep in mind material objects like money is a byproduct of success if you are only motivated to chase material objects you will always be unhappy because these material objects will only satisfy you for a certain amount of time. In turn if if you chase more freedom and opportunities in life material objects like money can get you there. If you want to be great in life and know what your purpose is chase whatever it is you want to become. Don’t ever say you can’t do something in life, stop blaming others you have control of your life. Use whatever you have in life. Don’t ever blame or pity yourself because your brain is so powerful that this pity can physically affect you and will stop you from doing positive things in life.
I want you to say to yourself that you have control over your life and whatever negative thoughts and words attack you brush them off because you know for a fact you are better than those petty actions. Stop creating fear in your life. I now will always use this famous quote from Franklin D. Roosevelt:
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
Things like fear, pity, depression, shame, and anxiety are locks and things like being normal or in a comfort zone are like the walls of our mental prison. Escape this prison with tools of confidence, happiness, and faith in yourself.
I’m not trying to be poetic these are real and common issues that could be changed with a change of mindset. |
President Trump is dismissing new polls that show his base of support dwindling, his approval rating at a record low and rampant distrust in the information coming out of the White House.
“After 200 days, rarely has any Administration achieved what we have achieved,” Trump tweeted on Tuesday. “Not even close! Don’t believe the Fake News Suppression Polls!”
After 200 days, rarely has any Administration achieved what we have achieved..not even close! Don't believe the Fake News Suppression Polls! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 8, 2017
According to a CNN poll released Tuesday, nearly three-quarters of Americans (73 percent) say they can’t trust all or most of what they hear in official communications from the White House, while less than a quarter (24 percent) say they can. Among Republicans, 50 percent say they can trust most of what the White House says, while 47 percent say they cannot.
When asked whether they are proud to have Trump as their president, 34 percent of Americans said they were, the survey found; 64 percent said they were not.
Related: Trump claims base is bigger ‘than ever before.’ Polls suggest otherwise.
Overall, 38 percent say they approve of Trump’s handling of the presidency, according the CNN poll, while 56 percent disapprove. Recent polls by Quinnipiac University and Gallup show Trump with a similar overall disapproval rating.
CNN noted that just one other newly elected president held an approval rating below 50 percent at this point in his presidency: Bill Clinton, who had a 44 percent approval rating six months into his first term in 1993. Barack Obama, by contrast, had a 56 percent approval rating at this point in his presidency.
Six-Month Approval Ratings:
Kennedy 75%
Eisenhower 73%
Bush 69%
Nixon 65%
Reagan 60%
Carter 60%
Obama 56%
W. Bush 55%
Clinton 44%
Trump 38% — Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) August 8, 2017
On Monday morning, Trump claimed his base is “far bigger” and “stronger than ever before,” offering recent campaign rallies in Pennsylvania, Iowa, Ohio and West Virginia as proof. But an Investor’s Business Daily poll released Monday afternoon showed Trump’s approval rating has dropped to a record low 32 percent — down 5 percent in the past month — as support from his base has begun to slip.
“Trump lost significant support across the board, but saw big declines among areas of core support, including Republicans, Midwesterners, middle-income families, white men and the high school educated,” IBD’s pollsters said.
Meanwhile, a new CBS News poll released Tuesday shows Trump’s approval rating stands at 36 percent. That figure is unchanged from June, despite favorable views of the U.S. economy.
“The president does get better marks on his handling of the economy than for other issues,” CBS noted, “but his overall approval remains where it is partly because Americans say they’re evaluating him more on culture and values than on how they’re faring financially, and partly because his ratings for other domestic issues are negative.”
The CBS survey also showed that Americans lack confidence in Trump’s ability to handle North Korea, whose nuclear and missile-testing programs have sparked an international crisis.
Nearly three-quarters of those surveyed (72 percent) are “uneasy about the possibility of conflict” between Washington and Pyongyang, and most (61 percent) feel that way about Trump’s “approach to the situation.”
The poll was conducted late last week, largely before the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution on Saturday imposing new sanctions on North Korea for its continued tests of an intercontinental ballistic missile.
On Monday, Trump complained on Twitter that the “fake news media” had not properly covered the passage of those sanctions.
Most major news outlets, though, had covered the sanctions, with the story leading newscasts on Saturday afternoon and evening. CNN’s Chris Cuomo said his channel was covering the issue when Trump fired off the tweet.
John Kasich would beat Trump in NH if the primary were held today, new polling shows. #MorningJoe pic.twitter.com/QyA0V7NBIY — Morning Joe (@Morning_Joe) August 8, 2017
And there is yet another poll — released by American Research Group on Tuesday — likely to draw Trump’s ire: If the New Hampshire Republican primary were held today, Ohio Gov. John Kasich would beat Trump (52 percent to 40 percent) in a theoretical matchup.
Trump won the 2016 New Hampshire GOP primary, grabbing 35 percent of the vote. Kasich, who finished second, got just 16 percent.
Read more from Yahoo News: |
'TRON: The Next Day - Flynn Lives Revealed' Video Leaked Online
"Flynn came back… just a little bit younger." Get it while it's hot! We were tipped by @CoreyMPAnderson that the full 10-minute secret "epilogue" to Tron Legacy that's supposed to be on the upcoming DVDs, out in about a month, was uploaded in high def on YouTube. The video is titled TRON: The Next Day - Flynn Lives Revealed and is sort of a viral continuation past the events that occurred in Tron Legacy, which also links into the Flynn Lives viral and the events that occurred in our world as well (so awesome). It's long and goes over a lot of history in the middle, but at the end everything is revealed - with spoilers. Check it out!
Watch the video below (with spoilers) and chat about the special appearance at the end in the comments.
Tron Legacy was released in theaters on December 17th late last year after two years in production and has gone on to make over $395 million worldwide. Did you enjoy the movie? Comment on the Sound Off article.
Tron Legacy was directed by first-time filmmaker Joseph Kosinski. The screenplay was co-written by Adam Horowitz ("Lost"), Richard Jefferies (Blood Tide, Living Hell), Edward Kitsis ("Lost") and the director of the original movie, Steven Lisberger. This was first greenlit because the test teaser played so well at Comic-Con. Disney finally opened Tron Legacy in theaters on December 17th last year in IMAX 3D, the truly optimal viewing experience. The movie will arrive on DVD & Blu-Ray starting April 5th - I've got mine pre-ordered.
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A Texas school district changes its corporal-punishment policy — by expanding rather than limiting teachers' rights to paddle students. Is spanking really the best way to discipline kids?
Peter Dazeley / Getty Images
Spanking is one of the many things about which parents agree — passionately — to disagree. Most American parents swear by the old adage “Spare the rod, spoil the child,” but others are horrified by the very thought of raising a hand to a kid.
And that’s why corporal punishment in schools is an even thornier issue, as highlighted by a Texas school district’s recent decision to change its spanking policy. After two parents complained that their daughters had been beaten hard enough to develop bruises and burnlike redness on their skin, the Springtown school board voted last week to amend its corporal-punishment rules. Rather than abolishing the practice, however, the board members took pains to preserve teachers’ ability to physically discipline students: parents must now opt in with written permission allowing their children to be paddled when teachers feel it’s justified; previously, parents had to opt out of corporal punishment.
The school board also expanded its spanking policy overall by deciding to allow teachers to punish students of the opposite gender. Parents can now designate whether they’re O.K. with a male or female school official doling out the paddling. The initial complaints from the two parents had centered on the fact that their daughters were punished by a male teacher, violating Springtown’s then requirement that same-gender teachers carry out any physical punishment.
(MORE: The First Real-Time Study of Parents Spanking Their Kids)
A bigger question for many is why some states still allow corporal punishment in schools at all. Texas is one of 19 states that permit principals or teachers to put kids under the paddle. (However, 97 of the U.S.’s 100 largest school districts have banned corporal punishment.)
While there isn’t much research specifically on the effects of corporal punishment in schools, the matter has been studied extensively in the home. And the consensus is that spanking isn’t effective in properly disciplining children, at least not if the goal is to control children’s behavior over the long term or help them understand what’s appropriate behavior. “There isn’t a single study that shows kids’ behavior gets better over time,” says Elizabeth Gershoff, an associate professor of human development and family sciences at the University of Texas at Austin. “Every study I’ve looked at that links parent spanking and kids’ aggression found that the more kids are spanked, the more aggressive and problematic their behavior is.”
Gershoff should know. She has conducted the most comprehensive analysis of the existing research on the effects of spanking by parents. In the variety of studies she has reviewed — in which spanking was reported by parents or children themselves, and children’s behavior was measured by a standardized survey that asked parents and teachers how often children acted out, talked back or were disobedient or delinquent in any way — all the results point in one direction: the more children were spanked, the more aggressive they became.
So what of that old adage about sparing the rod? “Dozens of studies now show quite the opposite,” says Dr. Robert Block, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics. “Corporal punishment is a physically stressful situation that is embedded biologically in some kids to the detriment of their health and well-being later on in terms of their own acceptance of aggression and violence.”
(MORE: Why Spanking Doesn’t Work)
The most recent polls show that approval of corporal punishment in general, and in schools in particular, is waning. But the percentage of parents who are in favor of spanking is still surprisingly high: in the 1960s, for example, 94% of adults approved of physical punishment both at home and in schools; by 2004, that proportion had dropped to 71.3%. Mostly, however, that figure appears to represent spanking by parents in the home, since only 23% of adults say it’s O.K. for teachers to spank students in school.
Indeed, there is the possibility that physical punishment delivered by a non–family member may be perceived by children as being different from and more harmful than that meted out by parents. “Any kind of discipline has to be motivated by love and concern,” says Robert Larzelere, a professor of human development and family science at Oklahoma State University. “And in a crowded classroom or school setting, there is more risk of the teacher or principal coming across as rejecting of the child.”
Gershoff says children who are spanked are more likely to develop depression, anxiety and even thoughts of suicide, not to mention antisocial behavior that can lead to difficult relationships as adults. In a 2009 study on the effects of spanking, some researchers even suggested that corporal punishment can lead to problems in kids’ cognitive development and lower IQs.
(MORE: The Long-Term Effects of Spanking)
There’s also the delicate issue of distinguishing between discipline and abuse. It’s a fine line that is difficult to define by any measure, and it’s one that can be easily crossed, especially in schools. Further, there’s a disturbing trend showing a close relationship between abuse and corporal punishment; while not every child who is spanked is physically abused, nearly every abused child has been spanked. About two-thirds of parents in abuse cases say the abuse started out as an attempt to discipline their child but escalated into something more. “It’s a really troubling finding,” says Gershoff. “It means we wouldn’t have as much physical abuse if we weren’t spanking our kids.”
She points out that American society doesn’t allow physical aggression under any circumstances — not between husbands and wives, not between adult strangers and not even against animals. Yet some states allow teachers to hit children, albeit for disciplinary reasons, not as aggression. But as the data increasingly show, young children aren’t able to distinguish the difference, and they interpret any violence, regardless of the reason, in the same way, which explains why they end up incorporating aggression into their own reactions and behavior.
Larzelere says such studies are finding only correlations between punishment and negative outcomes, however, noting that they are biased by the fact that they involve children who have behavior problems to start with. These kids are more likely both to be punished and to continue to exhibit aggression or other behavior issues. Because of this bias, he says, any form of punishment — from spanking to nonphysical forms of discipline such as verbal correction, time-outs and even pharmaceutical interventions like Ritalin for hyperactivity — is correlated with negative behavior outcomes.
(MORE: Kids Behaving Badly? Blame It on Mom)
In a review, Larzelere and his colleagues looked at disobedience and aggression after children were given scoldings or verbal threats, deprived of privileges or sent to time-outs; he says children’s behavior remained unchanged. “If you look at alternatives that parents could use instead, everything else looks just as harmful as routine spanking,” he says.
He argues that what researchers are measuring is really the extent of the child’s misbehavior. In other words, disobedient children are more likely to elicit disciplinary action. Gershoff counters that even after adjusting for the extent of disobedience, corporal punishment is still associated with more negative outcomes for children; those who are spanked are worse off than those who aren’t.
How can the data be applied to school-district policies? Larzelere says more research is needed: it would be worth exploring, for example, whether districts that ban corporal punishment have higher rates of suspensions or expulsions than those that allow the practice; if that’s the case, then alternatives to physical discipline, such as removing problem students from the classroom, may not be so desirable, since they may be associated with greater delinquency.
(MORE: Children Who Hear Swear Words on TV Are More Aggressive)
It’s a difficult line to walk for both parents and teachers, and one solution isn’t likely to fit all needs. Gershoff agrees that spanking, particularly for very young children, can bring a quick end to a tantrum, but she notes that the short-term relief comes at the price of longer-term health. While parents may disagree about whether it’s acceptable to raise their hand against their own children, many governments have decided on one solution to the problem: banning violence of any kind, by anyone, against children. “Societies around the world have decided that violence in general is not O.K.,” says Gershoff. “It violates kids’ right not to be hit. So 31 countries have banned spanking of children by anybody. Then they don’t have to worry about a line, because it’s all or nothing.”
The U.S. hasn’t adopted such a ban; a bill to end corporal punishment in schools was introduced in Congress in 2011 but remains in committee. In the meantime, spanking is likely to continue generating high passions and even higher stakes as individual states and school districts decide how to interpret the available evidence on the effect of corporal punishment on our children’s health.
MORE: A Girl Is Punished to Death in Alabama. Does Running Count as Corporal Punishment?
Alice Park is a writer at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @aliceparkny. You can also continue the discussion on TIME’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME. |
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It’s a marathon. Not a sprint.
That was the mantra echoed on Capitol Hill in Washington on Tuesday when 26 cyclists arrived to bring attention once again to reducing gun violence. They traveled close to 400 miles — riding from Newtown, Conn., all the way to the nation’s capital in four days. Four of the riders are from Newtown; the others from all over the United States.
They call themselves “Team 26.” Twenty-six riders in honor of each person killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.
Team 26 hopes their ride will send a message to Congress to strengthen gun-control laws to prevent more tragedies like the one in Sandy Hook from happening again. But 15 months after Newtown, these advocates say they’re not giving up the fight.
“This movement is no longer just about Newtown. But it’s about how America is uniting and demanding that our children be allowed to grow up and pursue their dreams,” said Monte Frank, Team 26’s leader.
Watch as Team 26 calls on Congress to put gun-control efforts back on the agenda. |
BEIJING/LONDON (Reuters) - China has invited British Prime Minister Theresa May to attend a major summit in May on its “One Belt, One Road” initiative to build a new Silk Road, diplomatic sources told Reuters, as London said she would visit China this year.
FILE PHOTO: Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) shakes hand with British Prime Minister Theresa May before their meeting at the West Lake State House on the sidelines of the G20 Summit, in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, China, September 5, 2016. REUTERS/Etienne Oliveau/Pool/File Photo
“One Belt, One Road” is Chinese President Xi Jinping’s landmark programme to invest billions of dollars in infrastructure projects including railways, ports and power grids across Asia, Africa and Europe.
China has dedicated $40 billion to a Silk Road Fund and the idea was the driving force behind the establishment of the $50 billion China-backed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank.
China has so far given few details about who will attend the summit, to be held in Beijing.
The country’s top diplomat, State Councillor Yang Jiechi, told the official China Daily last week that leaders from about 20 countries have confirmed their participation, representing Asia, Europe, Africa and Latin America, though he did not give names.
One Beijing-based diplomatic source with direct knowledge of the invite list told Reuters that May was among the leaders who had been invited.
“China is choosing the countries it sees as friends and who will be most influential in promoting ‘One Belt, One Road’,” said the source, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Two other diplomatic sources confirmed May was on the invite list.
“It’s China’s most important diplomatic event of the year,” one of the sources told Reuters.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang said plans for the summit are proceeding smoothly, and that details of the participants will be announced at a later date.
“China welcomes Prime Minister May to visit China at the appropriate time,” Lu told a daily news briefing.
Sri Lanka has already confirmed its prime minister is coming, and China says Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte is also attending.
Foreign leaders often combine attendances at important multilateral events China is hosting with official state visits to China.
MAY TO DISCUSS TRADE
Speaking in London, May’s aides confirmed she would visit China this year to discuss trade ties, the latest in a series of foreign trips to cement relations with major powers as she negotiates Britain’s divorce from the European Union.
May’s aides gave few details about the trip, but she is keen to strengthen her hand by securing foreign support before launching Brexit talks, which are set to be among the most complicated Britain has ever undertaken.
“It would be a renewed expression of the close relationship between Britain and China, something that you have seen obviously develop over the past few years,” May’s spokesman told reporters on Tuesday.
“I would imagine that trade would form some part of the discussions that we have.”
The Commerce Ministry has said China has an open attitude towards a free trade deal with Britain once it leaves the EU and was willing to study it, but Chinese officials have otherwise said little publicly about the subject.
May attended a summit in China of the G20 leading economies last September, shortly after she became prime minister following June’s referendum vote to leave the EU, and was invited by Xi to visit again.
With May having made clear she plans for Britain to leave the EU’s single market, trade has dominated her talks with foreign leaders in recent months.
She has secured assurances from U.S. President Donald Trump, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other world powers that they are keen to start talks on boosting links.
British Prime Minister Theresa May attends the European Union leaders summit in Valletta, Malta, February 3, 2017. REUTERS/Yves Herman
But her attempts to up the stakes in talks with the EU, which she is due to launch before the end of March, have also drawn criticism.
Some opposition lawmakers have accused May of ducking difficult issues to win promises for trade - a charge repeated when she became the first foreign leader late last month to meet Trump, who has since been criticized over his immigration curbs.
She also came under fire for strengthening ties with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, who has been criticized by rights groups for jailing tens of thousands of people after a failed coup in July. |
A new research study suggests prejudice based on generalized beliefs about certain social groups could be a personality trait.
Researchers from the University of the Basque Country confirmed the link between two types of discriminatory behavior: sexism and racism. They also urge education in encouraging equality.
Psychologist Dr. Maite Garaigordobil, co-author, said the study explores the link that sexism has with racism and other variables. She said that “people who are highly sexist, whether they be hostile (seeing women as the inferior sex) or benevolent (believing that women are the weaker sex and need to be protected and cared for), also have racist tendencies.”
Researchers said the study show that both processes are closely related and that they are likely to be based on more general beliefs about relationships between different social groups.
Garaigordobil said that “the results even suggest that such prejudiced attitudes could be a personality trait.”
“Sexism is linked to authoritarianism and a leaning towards social dominance,” said the author. “In other words, sexist people accept hierarchies and social inequality, they believe that different social groups have a status that they deserve and they feel that the social class to which they belong is the best.”
Researchers also discovered that sexism is related to low intercultural sensitivity. This implies that sexist people show low levels of involvement when it comes to interacting with immigrants.
Study participants included a sample population of 802 participants from the Basque Country between 18 and 65 years of age.
Researchers sought to determine the relationship between sexism and self-image, racism and intercultural sensitivity.
As a result of the findings, the authors strongly believe in the importance and need for psychoeducation during infancy and adolescence as a way of encouraging equality among both sexes and respect for others.
Garaigordobil said that “one of the variables that foretells sexism is prejudice. This implies that psychological intervention to reduce prejudice in general would help in reducing sexism.”
The study did not discover a relationship between low self-esteem and sexism. This finding was contrary to what was expected.
“Given the important role that self-esteem plays in interpersonal relationships, we were hoping to find a negative correlation, or rather, the lower the self-image, the higher the level of sexism,” she said.
However, sexism does influence on how people see themselves.
“Men with higher levels of hostile sexism describe themselves using adjectives associated with masculinity, i.e. physically strong, brave, sure of themselves, determined, admirable, etc” said Garaigordobil.
“Women who display hostile sexism described themselves using characteristics that go against femininity such as not very cooperative, not very tolerant, not very compassionate and not very sensitive or sentimental.”
Moreover, men who scored highly in benevolent sexism described themselves using adjectives associated with femininity (warm, friendly, good). A similar finding was displayed by women who displayed benevolent sexism.
The link between sexism and self-perception are different for men and women.
Garaigordobil said that “while sexism allows men to continue in a position of superiority, it stops women from developing their full potential.”
Source: Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology
Study Suggests Some Kinds of Prejudice May Be Personality Trait |
Israel plans to deploy the rocket defence system this year
Barack Obama is to ask the US Congress for an extra $200m in military aid to help Israel get a short-range rocket defence system in place.
The system is designed to shoot down mortars and rockets from Gaza or Southern Lebanon with guided missiles.
The system, called Iron Dome, has gone through testing and installation will start later this year.
According to US State Department figures, direct military aid to Israel was $2.55bn in 2009.
This is set to increase to $3.15bn in 2018.
Easing tensions
A White House spokesman reaffirmed what he called the administration's "unshakeable commitment" to Israel's security - adding that Mr Obama recognised the threat posed by missiles and rockets fired by Hamas and Hezbollah.
Iron Dome was conceived and developed in Israel following the Lebanon war of 2006, during which Hezbollah launched about 4,000 rockets into northern Israel.
Southern Israel has also come under fire, with thousands of rockets and mortars fired by Palestinian militants.
Israel completed tests on the system in January. Officials say the next phase in its development is its integration into the Israeli army.
A BBC correspondent in Washington, Steve Kingstone, says Washington may be acting now to ease the recent tensions in its relations with Israel.
In March a diplomatic row erupted when approval was granted for new homes for Jews in occupied east Jerusalem. The decision came during a visit to the city by the US Vice-President Joe Biden.
The announcement on US funding for Iron Dome coincides with the resumption of indirect talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. |
This post goes into the details of how you can add a "save game" feature to your games. Python's built-in shelve module makes this very easy to do, but there are some pitfalls and tips that you might want to learn from this post before trying to code it up yourself.
To give an example of adding a "save game" feature to a game program, I'll be taking the Flippy program (an Othello clone) from Chapter 10 of "Making Games with Python & Pygame" (and Reversi from Chapter 15 of "Invent Your Own Computer Games with Python".)
If you want to skip ahead and see the Flippy version with the "save game" feature added, you can download the source code and image files used by the game. You need Pygame installed to run Flippy (but not Reversi).
The Naïve Ways to Implement "Save Game"
A save game feature works by taking all of the values in the program's variables (which in total called the game state) and writes them out to a file on the hard drive. The game program can be shut down, and when next started again the values can be read from the file and into the program's variables.
If you are familiar with Python's file I/O and the open(), write(), readline(), and close() functions, you might think that you can just open a file in write-mode, and then write out all the data to the hard drive that you want to load the next time the player plays the game. This is doable, but turns out to be a bad way to implement a "save game" feature.
Read the detailed explanation. » What exactly is the format of the text you'll write out? You could write out text like this (if you were making an RPG): name=Hero gold=42 hp=55/60 ... This has several problems. When you read the content in from the file to load a saved game, you'll have to write a lot of code that is specific for your particular game: fp = open('savedGame.txt') name = fp.readline().split('=')[1] gold = int(fp.readline().split('=')[1]) currentHp, maxHp = fp.readline().split('=')[1].split('/') currentHp = int(currentHp) maxHp = int(maxHp) ... Yeesh. That's going to be a lot of code we need to write, test, and debug as the game gets more complicated. Using the open(), read() and write() functions is good for basic file I/O, but not when it comes to a "save game" feature. If you are familiar with JSON or XML, Python comes with built-in json and xml modules that can format your data to the JSON format or XML format. Then you can write this formatted text to a file. This is better, but still not as convenient as the shelve module.
Quick Start: The shelve Built-In Module
The shelve module has a function called shelve.open() that returns a "shelf file object" that can be used to create, read, and write data to shelf files on the hard drive. These shelf files can store any Python value (even complicated values like lists of lists or objects of classes you make).
Say you had a variable with a list of list of strings, like the mainBoard variable in the Flippy program. Here's how you can save the state of all 64 spaces on the board (which are 64 string values) and the other variables (playerTile, computerTile, showHints, and turn):
import shelve shelfFile = shelve.open('saved_game_filename') shelfFile['mainBoardVariable'] = mainBoard shelfFile['playerTileVariable'] = playerTile shelfFile['computerTileVariable'] = computerTile shelfFile['showHintsVariable'] = showHints shelfFile.close()
The shelve.open() function returns a "shelf file object" that you can store values in using the same syntax as a Python dictionary.
You don't have to put the word "Variable" at the end of the key. I just did that to point out that the name doesn't have to be the same as the variable with the value being stored. In fact, just like any dictionary key, it doesn't even need to be a string.
The data stored in the shelf object is written out to the hard drive when shelfFile.close() is called.
Note that the shelf file name is 'saved_game_filename', which doesn't have an extension. An extension isn't needed, but you can add one if you want. This will be explained more in detail.
Here's the code to load the game state from a shelf file:
import shelve shelfFile = shelve.open('saved_game_filename') mainBoard = shelfFile ['mainBoardVariable'] playerTile = shelfFile ['playerTileVariable'] computerTile = shelfFile ['computerTileVariable'] showHints = shelfFile ['showHintsVariable'] shelfFile.close()
That's it for the basics. Think of a shelf object as a single dictionary that you store all of your game state variables in when you save a game, and then read all the game state values out of when you load a game. The shelve module handles all the file I/O details for you.
The shelve.open() Function
There are a few options you might want to pay attention to for the shelve.open() function. There are three optional parameters to the shelve.open() function you might want to pass, but the default values for these are what you want in 99% of the cases, so you can skip the rest of this section.
Show the optional parameter explanations. »
The flag parameter can be the string 'r' (to open the shelf file as read-only), 'w' (to open the shelf file for reading and writing), 'c' (to open for reading and writing, but also creating the shelf file if it doesn't already exist. This is the default.), and 'n' (delete the old shelf file and start with a new, blank shelf file). I don't really find this too handy, but there might be cases where it is useful. The flag parameter can be the string 'r' (to open the shelf file as read-only), 'w' (to open the shelf file for reading and writing), 'c' (to open for reading and writing, but also creating the shelf file if it doesn't already exist. This is the default.), and 'n' (delete the old shelf file and start with a new, blank shelf file). I don't really find this too handy, but there might be cases where it is useful. The protocol parameter is probably the one parameter you want to set. It defines the version that the "pickler" uses to store the data. ("Pickling" is the term used for converting values in your variables to text that are written out to files, which is done when you save a game. "Unpickling" is the reverse. That's what happens when you load a saved game. The shelve module makes use of the code in the more primitive (but more flexible) pickle module.) By default the call to shelve.open() uses the oldest, least efficient version. This is good because it also ensures that it will be the most widely supported no matter what version of Python people are using. However, if you want more efficiency, you can pass the integer 2 for this parameter (the versions are currently 0, 1, and 2). Or if you have "import pickle" in your script, you can pass pickle.HIGHEST_PROTOCOL and this will always use the latest version of the pickling protocol. But be warned, earlier versions of Python may not be able to read the shelf files produced by later versions of Python running your game script. To be safe, just use the default. There's more info about pickle protocol versions at http://docs.python.org/py3k/library/pickle.html The third optional parameter to shelve.open() is the writeback parameter. This is used for a situation like this: import shelve shelfFile = shelve.open('some_file') myList = [1, 2, 3] shelfFile['list'] = myList myList.append(4) shelfFile.close() In the above code, what is stored in the shelf file is the list [1, 2, 3] and not [1, 2, 3, 4]. The data that is stored in the shelf file is not updated even though the list that was placed in the shelfFile was updated. You need to think of the line shelfFile['list'] = myList as "Store the value in myList as it looks right now." If you want the shelf file to update whenever mutable values such as lists or dictionaries are updated, pass True for the writeback parameter. If you use shelve.open('some_file', writeback=True) in the above code, then the list that is stored in the shelf file will be [1, 2, 3, 4]. Having writeback adds some memory costs to your program, and since for saved games we usually open a shelf file, write to it, and close it immediately, it's not a very useful feature. You can ignore it.
You can read the official documentation for shelve.open() and its parameters.
File Formats and Shelf File Extensions
About the file formats that the shelve module uses:
It doesn't matter. The shelve module handles all the details. You can ignore it completely. It's one less thing you need to worry about so you can get back to making your game.
You may notice that when you create shelf files, there are actually three files that are created. If you used 'some_file' in the shelve.open() call, the files that appear on your hard drive after you call the close() method are some_file.bak, some_file.dir, and some_file.dat.
You don't really need to know what these files are used for. In my own experiments, you can delete the .bak file (I guess it's just a backup file, but keep it around anyway) but the .dat and .dir files are needed. The only reason I point this out is because if you want to copy your saved game files to another computer, you need to know that there is more than one file that needs to be copied.
If you pass an extension to shelve.open() like 'some_file.txt', then the files will be some_file.txt.bak, some_file.txt.dat, and some_file.txt.dir.
Security Warning
Just like with any file, your players can modify the values in the shelf file. You can try obfuscated the data in it, but this never works in the long run. What this means in most cases is that people can make saved game hack programs to let players cheat. That's not really a problem.
What can be a problem is if your game executes code depending on the content of the shelf file, than this can have bad security implications. Say as part of the save game file, you include a string that tells your game what program to run. Something like this:
shelfFile['programToRun'] = 'notepad.exe'
A malicious hacker could change the shelf file so that instead of the string 'notepad.exe' it is 'virus.exe' or some other value that could cause your game program to act badly because of a saved game file. In most cases, your games won't store data like this. But it's something that I just wanted to point out.
Examples: flippy_withsavegame.py and reverse_withsavegame.py
The good news is that the shelve module makes it as simple as possible to convert the values in variables to files on the hard drive, and vice versa. Just call shelve.open(), assign the values to the shelf file object, and then call the close() method.
But it also helps to see this used in actual code. I've modified a couple Othello games from "Invent Your Own Computer Games with Python" and "Making Games with Python". Both are written for Python 3.
Reversi is an Othello clone that uses ASCII text for graphics. Flippy is an Othello clone that has real graphics. You will need to download and install Pygame to run it. |
Israel and the US are set to collaborate in cybersecurity, a senior White House official said at a conference in Tel Aviv Monday.
“I announce today the commencement of an Israeli US bilateral cyber working group,” Thomas Bossert, assistant to the US President Donald Trump for Homeland Security and Counter-terrorism said at the Cyber Week 2017 conference in Tel Aviv Monday.
The group will strive to defend critical infrastructure against attackers and to track down perpetrators. It will be led by Rob Joyce, the US White House cybersecurity coordinator, and Israel’s Eviatar Matania, director general of the National Cyber Directorate. It will include US and Israeli representatives from various ministries and defense organizations including foreign affairs and justice, and the secret service.
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The team will convene this week, Bossert said.
“The meetings this week will focus on a range of cyber issues — critical infrastructure, advanced R&D, international cooperation, and workforce,” Bossert said, adding that these will be the first steps in strengthening bilateral ties in cyber issues.
The agencies will be… “focused on finding and stopping cyber adversaries before they enter networks, before they reach critical infrastructure and identifying ways to hold bad actors accountable,” Bossert said. “We believe the agility Israel has in developing solutions will resolve in innovative cyber defenses that we can test here and take back to America.”
Bossert said that increased cyber defense and deterrence are critical today, in a world in which the cyber threat from nations is growing, and an international consensus needs to be built regarding what is “responsible state behavior.” International norms must be set out and implemented, he said. And those who do not comply with these norms should be punished.
“It is time to consider different approaches,” he said, and the US is seeking to set up bilateral agreements with other partners globally who hold the same values. “There should be consequences for destruction,” he said.
The cyber sphere “is one of the biggest strategic challenges since 9/11,” he said, “because while physical borders are important, cyberspace knows no boundaries.”
“Nations have the ability to steal sensitive information and data and destroy systems and the trend is heading in the wrong direction,” Bossert said. Destructive attacks are being executed by belligerent nations – North Korea attacked Sony and Iran attacked Saudi Arabia in cyber attacks – and “neither of theses countries have near the sophistication and resources of China and Russia.”
It was the kind of technology evident in the Iron Dome missile defense system, Bossert said, that the world needs as the threat moves from missiles to malware.
Bossert said he was at the conference to talk about cybersecurity, but he was also there to say that “President Trump understands that the United States cannot lessen our engagement in this region… and cannot lessen our support for Israel.”
When Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu voiced his objection to “appeasing Iran” and enabling its nuclear aspirations, he did so at “great professional risk and took political criticism for stating an unpopular truth,” Bossert said. “He was right, he was courageous, the American people agree with him and now he is a partner with President Trump and the Israeli people have a stronger and deeper relationship with the US.”
At the conference, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israeli technology and its cybersecurity leadership are opening doors to the world, breaking down hostilities and the Arab boycott.
“Once it was a disadvantage to say you are from Israel,” Netanyahu said. “Today when you talk about cyber or advanced technologies, it is an advantage. It is advantage to say I am an Israeli company.”
“There used to be a thing called the Arab boycott; that’s dissipating, for many, many reasons: strategic, and the prominence of Israel in the technological field,” he said.
Israel’s National Cyber Defense Authortity helps its members, who are from government and business organizations, to communicate in a secure way with each other to “not only to respond to attacks but to prevent them,” he said.
Every month Israel experiences dozens of cyber attacks at a national level, and at “every given moment, including right now, there are probably three to five attacks on a national level that emanate from various sources,” he said.
Cooperation between nations is important, Netanyahu said, “because we are better together,” and Israel has become an “attractive target” for cybersecurity investment, garnering about 20 percent of global private cybersecurity investment in 2016. |
Chairman Mao used to say: ''As communists we gain control with the power of the gun and maintain control with the power of the pen.'' You can see propaganda and the control of ideology as an authoritarian society's most important task. Before the internet, all people could do was watch TV or read the People's Daily. They would carefully read between the lines to see what had happened. Now it is different. The papers try to talk about things but even before they appear, everyone has talked about it on the internet.
I still think Gorbachev's revolution in Russia - glasnost - was more important. Openness and transparency are the only way to limit these dark powers. Chinese citizens have never had the right to really express their opinions; in the constitution it says you can but in the real world it is dangerous. In the West people think it's a right they're born with. Here it's a right given by the government, and one that's not really practised.
"As communists we gain control with the power of the gun and maintain control with the power of the pen" ... Chairman Mao. Credit:AP
Even though we had reform and opening, ''opening'' didn't mean ''openness''; it meant opening the door to the West. It was more practical than ideological. At the very beginning, nobody - even in the West - could predict the internet would have so much to do with freedom of speech and that social media would develop in the way it has. They just understood it was a more efficient, fast and powerful means of communication.
But since we got the net and could write blogs - and now microblogs - people have started to share ideas, and a new sense of freedom has arisen. Of course, it varies from silly posts about what you've had for breakfast to serious discussions of the news. But, either way, people are learning to exercise their rights. It is a unique, treasured moment. People have started to feel the breeze. The internet is a wild land with its own games, languages and gestures through which we are starting to share common feelings. |
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One the biggest selling points of the PlayStation 3 is that gamers can use the console to play online at no additional charge. However, evidence has surfaced that the company is planning a two-tiered subscription model for the PlayStation Network similar to--but also fundamentally different from--Xbox Live.
Sony is mulling a premium version of PSN.
Slides accompanying a Thursday presentation by Sony show that the company is planning a "new revenue stream from subscription" on PSN in 2010. [UPDATE] During the presentation, which emphasized Sony's plans to make its game business profitable in the next fiscal year, Sony Computer Entertainment CEO Kaz Hirai confirmed the plans. "We will be building upon our current free [PSN] service offering with premium content and services to start the subscription model," he told attendees.
Perhaps to assuage PS3 owners' fears that they would soon have to pay to play online, Hirai issued a subsequent statement indicating the present level of service would remain gratis.
"SCE will further increase sales by offering users new entertainment through the combination of hardware, software, peripheral, and PlayStation Network," Hirai said in a statement given to British outlets, such as CVG. "Especially in the online area, we are studying the possibility of introducing a subscription model, offering premium content and services, in addition to the current free services." (Emphasis added.)
As of press time, US Sony reps had not offered Hirai's statement or further clarification about its subscription plans for the PlayStation Network. Luckily, though, the "current free services" currently offered on PSN include online play, Facebook integration, and Netflix video streaming. On Xbox Live, both of those features are only accessible at the Gold membership level, which costs at least $50 per year.
[UPDATE] Even without subscriptions, PSN revenue is on the rise. For the current fiscal year, which ends on March 31, 2010, Sony expects ¥50 billion ($563 million) in earnings from the service, a threefold increase from the year prior. In addition to game-related content, the PSN's retail component--the PlayStation Store--offers video offerings, such as television shows and movies for both rental and sale. |
Selfishness is a key asset for success in Formula One, according to McLaren's Fernando Alonso.
In an interview with the official McLaren website, Alonso -- who is considered to be one of the best drivers on the current grid -- said ruthlessness is one of the most important qualities an F1 driver can have.
Editor's Picks Is Fernando Alonso happy? In an exclusive interview with ESPN, Fernando Alonso reveals whether he is truly happy with the decisions he has made during his Formula One career.
"You need to have no heart," he said. "You are not enemies with the other drivers, but you have to focus on yourself to win. If you can 'hurt' someone by getting an advantage over them, that's even better."
The Spanish two-time world champion is currently 13th in the driver standings after struggling for results since he returned to McLaren last year. However, he says the feeling of driving an F1 car keeps him in the sport despite being uncompetitive at the moment.
"I am a competitive person and competition is important in F1, but I don't race in F1 for the competition. I can get that in other areas of my life, like cycling and playing tennis - or racing my mother to the supermarket. The reason I race in F1 is because the cars give me a feeling that I can't get anywhere else. It's unique."
Alonso compares the feeling to driving an extreme go-kart, but single out one big difference.
"It's hard to explain what this feeling is like because nothing else comes close to F1. Your brain has to re-set every time you get in the car because things happen so fast. If you haven't driven an F1 car for a few weeks, the level of performance takes you by surprise.
"I go karting to enjoy the competition; I drive in F1 for this feeling. The driving styles in karting and F1 are quite similar, but nothing unexpected happens in a go-kart. Your brain is never taken by surprise. You can predict everything that the kart is going to do.
"That isn't the case in F1, where you're taken by surprise all the time. When you hit the brakes, your brain takes 0.2s to catch up. That's a very nice feeling; that is the feeling." |
Former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI) on State of the Union -- CNN screencapture
A senior White House official said former Republican congressman Mike Rogers is being considered as a candidate to replace FBI Director James Comey, who was fired late on Tuesday by President Donald Trump.
Rogers briefly served on the Trump transition team and was a national security adviser to the Trump campaign. He is a former chairman of the House of Representatives intelligence committee and was an FBI agent in Chicago for five years before retiring in 1994 to begin a career in Michigan politics.
A spokeswoman for Rogers did not immediately comment on the report.
In 2013, the FBI Agents Association urged then-President Barack Obama to nominate Rogers, but Obama chose Comey instead.
(Reporting By Steve Holland and David Shepardson; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Bernadette Baum) |
Companies love having celebrities and social media gurus in their camp, but it’s the everyday fans and customers who ultimately make or break a brand. Edelman VP and blogger Michael Brito argues that influencers can’t hold a candle to advocates.
Oftentimes, I hear marketers say, “We need an influencer outreach strategy,” and my usual response, either under my breath or out loud, is, “No, you need a customer advocacy strategy.” Many think they are one and the same but they are actually very different.
An influencer is someone with significant social capital. They may have several thousand Twitter followers, RSS subscribers and Facebook “likes” and they are frequently retweeted, quoted, interviewed, invited to speak at conferences and may even have written a book or two.
Influencers have a considerable amount of reach, hence all the attention that big brands give to them by seeding them with products before they hit the market or giving them insight into the product roadmap. The relationship between a brand and influencers is usually built upon incentives.
An advocate is different. They may only have a few hundred followers, may not even blog and many won’t know what an RSS feed is. The main difference is that advocates don’t need or want incentives. They will talk and talk and talk about the brands they care about even if the brand completely ignores them. They are vocal, passionate and always give a brand praise both on and offline.
When comparing the reach of an influencer to an advocate, the influencer clearly has an advantage. But I would argue that if you take the collective reach of all your advocates and compare it to the reach of influencers, the numbers will show that the advocates’ reach is much wider.
Imagine for a second what the impact would be if a brand paid just a little attention to its advocates. Most advocates are very easy to approach. While influencers consider themselves influencers, advocates don’t really care to label themselves. And that makes a brand’s job so much easier.
Identifying advocates is really not that hard to do. If you spend enough time in on Facebook, you will begin to see which fans stand out based on how they interact with your content (share, comment, like, etc.). There are tools like Syncapse that are building this capability into their product roadmap.
Zuberance is a great tool that identifies advocates already living in your brand’s ecosystem and empowers them to share reviews and content about your product with their social circles. RowFeeder is an exceptional tool that pulls data directly from Twitter and Facebook, and allows you to easily see who is referencing your brand and how often.
I have never studied the psychology of a consumer’s purchase behaviour. But what I am confident about is that there is a strong emotional connection between a brand and its advocates. I call it emotional equity. It’s the reason why I only buy one kind of television, Sony. It’s not out of habit, convenience or price because Sony is actually pretty expensive.
I grew up with Sony, from the Walkman, to the Playstation to the television in my house. Sony has always been a part of my family. That equity can stem from just about anything: a personal experience like mine, the value the product brings to someone’s life or the fact that it simply kicks ass.
When a brand actually spends time nurturing its advocates and connecting on a human level, its emotional equity will grow exponentially. And that’s a hard bond to break. |
'New Yorker' cover angers Obama campaign RAW STORY
Published: Sunday July 13, 2008
Print This Email This Update: Magazine defends satirical cover On the cover of the upcoming New Yorker: Satirical portrayal of Obama through the eyes of his opposition, or McCain recruitment poster? Senator Obama shrugged and said he had "no response" when asked about the cover on Sunday by CBS News' Maria Gavrilovic. The Obama campaign, on introspection, was more decisive on the issue; it might have appreciated the humor, if not for the delivery. The cover art, depicting Senator Obama in a turban, while wife Michelle, packing an assault rifle, shares a "fist bump" with him, is described by the New Yorker as artist's Barry Blitt's lampooning of "scare tactics and misinformation in the Presidential election to derail Barack Obama's campaign." "The New Yorker may think, as one of their staff explained to us, that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Senator Obama's right-wing critics have tried to create," countered Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton. "But most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree." "This is as offensive a caricature as any magazine could publish," one high-profile Obama backer told ABC News, "and I suspect that other Obama supporters like me are also thinking about not subscribing to or buying a magazine that trafficks (sic) in such trash." "We completely agree with the Obama campaign," McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds added. "Its tasteless and offensive." Update: Magazine defends satirical cover In a statement Monday, the magazine said the cover "combines a number of fantastical images about the Obamas and shows them for the obvious distortions they are." "The burning flag, the nationalist-radical and Islamic outfits, the fist-bump, the portrait on the wall? All of them echo one attack or another. Satire is part of what we do, and it is meant to bring things out into the open, to hold up a mirror to prejudice, the hateful, and the absurd. And that's the spirit of this cover," the New Yorker statement said. The statement also pointed to the two articles on Obama contained inside the magazine, calling them "very serious." Huffington Post has an interview with editor David Remnick, who talks about the controversy that erupted almost immediately this weekend. "This cover has quickly become very controversial," Huffington's Rachel Sklar asked Remnick. "The Obama campaign has called it 'tasteless and offensive.' Why did you run it?" Remnick responded by email: "Obviously I wouldn't have run a cover just to get attention I ran the cover because I thought it had something to say. What I think it does is hold up a mirror to the prejudice and dark imaginings about Barack Obama's both Obamas' past, and their politics. I can't speak for anyone else's interpretations, all I can say is that it combines a number of images that have been propagated, not by everyone on the right but by some, about Obama's supposed 'lack of patriotism' or his being 'soft on terrorism' or the idiotic notion that somehow Michelle Obama is the second coming of the Weathermen or most violent Black Panthers. That somehow all this is going to come to the Oval Office." "The idea that we would publish a cover saying these things literally, I think, is just not in the vocabulary of what we do and who we are..." Remnick adds. "We've run many many satirical political covers. Ask the Bush administration how many." (with wire reports) |
DBAccess is a new ORM for iOS that promises to improve on Apple's Core Data by providing thread-safety and high performance.
DBAccess claims to provide three key benefits over Core Data:
Thread-safety.
High performance and support for query performance fine tuning.
Event model that enables binding data objects to UI controls and keep them updated with changes made in the database.
DBAccess can be used and distributed freely. Its latest version includes a few improvements such as support for ASYNC queries, better performance with large result sets, and reduction in memory usage in queries with many columns.
DBAccess proposes a very simple usage model. A persistent object declaration is very similar to a Core Data's:
@interface Person : DBObject @property (strong) NSString* forename; @property (strong) NSString* surname; @property int age; @end
Creating, removing objects, or querying the database follow known patterns:
Person* p = [Person new]; p.forename = @"Adrian"; p.surname = @"Herridge"; p.age = 35; [p commit]; // save the object into the table [p remove]; // and now remove it DBResultSet* r = [[[[[Person query] where:@"age > 30"] limit:10] orderBy:@"surname,forename"] fetch];
InfoQ has reached out to DBAccess' author, Adrian Herridge to ask him a few questions.
What were the main reasons to write an alternative ORM to Core Data?
At the time I started the project iPresent was still part of its much larger software house Compsoft plc. Where on average 5 teams of devs would be churning out several apps at a time, some of which used Core Data for its persistence requirements. Being an open and sharing environment, people were not shy about the problems with performance, threading and behaviours that they felt were missing and really should be there (such as joins and aggregation functions). The main benefit for using Core Data was the GUI style of editing table and relationships, but then there were often problems with the editor making changes in the wrong version of the model, which often played havoc with our version control systems and at one point introduced a huge issue to one of our released applications with the addition of a field. From my personal perspective I found it removed some of the core abilities of SQLite which I had been working with for 5 years prior, and had come to love its simple and exceptionally high performance interface. So I felt highly restricted by the inability to use sub queries inline, joining tables to remove the need to nest some queries within loops, which often resulted in some very expensive routines. So at the time, it just felt like there were so many pitfalls to using Core Data with very few real world positives. Given the mixture in abilities of the development teams, we often struggled with people not understating the syntax for the predicate queries and the introduction of extremely subtle bugs and crashes when slight mistakes were introduced with cross thread methods being called. So, in summary, the main reasons for writing DBAccess were to improve on what myself and other developers felt was very poor performance for anything that required nested queries, alleviate frustrations of having to worry about threading issues, implement joins and subqueries.
How would you describe DBAccess strengths so that an iOS developer can make the choice of using it instead of Core Data?
We tried to implement DBAccess so it was as natural to use for developers as possible, sticking with standard SQLite syntax wherever possible. So I guess point 1 would be that it is easy to use (at least people here and the few that have contacted me have thanked us for creating it, some even offering a donation which we had to politely refuse).
The performance of DBAccess is also of great benefit, we have strived to ensure that we have profiled most of the codebase (currently approximately 15k lines), Core Data is fast enough if doing simple retrievals, but tends to suffer when committing data back into the database, and positively dies on it feet when it comes to nested queries., we try to optimise the writes and record caching wherever possible which we found made a huge difference to very “chatty” iOS applications.
Simple, and quick to implement query objects. We hated the fact that in most applications it made it necessary to have a class that dealt with queries for the application. Sometimes this makes absolute sense, where you perform the same query over and over. But just from a readability and time perspective we wanted the FLUENT interface to be compact and easy to read, so being able to pull items out inline, within a for loop was very beneficial to the devs. e.g. for (Person* in [[[[Person query] where:@“age >= 18”] orderBy:@“age”] fetch]) { ... } .
. Implementation of COUNT, SUM, IDs, GROUP functions, which are performed at the SQL level and not after a heavy and memory consuming query.
functions, which are performed at the SQL level and not after a heavy and memory consuming query. Completely thread safe, you can query and commit at any moment from any thread.
DBAccess has an event model that allows you to register blocks of code to run when certain objects are updated anywhere else in the system, and also if any of the underlying tables are modified in anyway. This makes linking the data layer to the GUI simple and we have down all of the heavy lifting with handling threading issues and the async nature of these events.
We implemented the ability for developers to specify which database file an object is stored in, so you could split your data layer across multiple files.
Column based AES256 encryption. 8.A property/column can be any possible NSObject derived class that supports encoding using an NSKeyedArchiver , DBAccess then stores it as a BLOB and wraps it within its own storage type which contains all the information required to re-inflate the original item.
DBAccess is currently closed-source. Don't you think that this could hamper its adoption in the iOS community? Do you have any plans to open-source it? |
Recently by William Norman Grigg: In Florida, You're Presumed Guilty: Drug ‘Crimes’ With No Criminal Intent
Colorado native Abdulrahman al-Awlaki wasn't in a movie theater when his life met a sudden, violent end. He was enjoying a backyard barbeque with his cousin in southeastern Yemen when the home was destroyed by a drone-delivered Hellfire missile.
Abdulrahman was sixteen years old when he was murdered by the United States government. He had run away from home in a desperate attempt to find his father, Anwar, a "radical cleric" who was the well-publicized target of the Obama administration's assassination program.
Despite the fact that Anwar al-Awlaki was never formally charged with a crime — let alone convicted of one — he was assassinated on Obama's orders two weeks before the Regime slaughtered his son and eight other innocent people.
Seeking to justify the murder of a child, the Obama administration circulated the story that the 16-year-old was actually an adult "suspected" of being a "militant."
That story was refined somewhat once it was proven that Abdulrahman was a teenager. However, the administration has never dropped the pretense that the summary execution of that innocent U.S. citizen was, in some sense, a strategic success. Since the Regime killed him — and, in its sovereign wisdom, the Regime never errs — the young man simply couldn’t be innocent.
Within a day of the Movie Theater Massacre, the murderer of Abdulrahman al-Awlaki announced that he would travel to Colorado to bless the traumatized city of Aurora with his healing presence.
"[W]e may never understand what leads anyone to terrorize their fellow human beings," intoned the death-dealing divinity in the Oval Office in his July 21 weekly radio address. "Such evil is senseless — beyond reason."
We're invited to believe that the routine state terrorism committed by Obama and the government over which he presides is both sensible and rational.
Apparently there is something noble and redemptive about commissioning a legion of chair-moistening joystick jockeys who — enthroned in the climate-controlled safety of well-guarded office buildings in Nevada and Virginia — dispatch robot aircraft to annihilate innocent strangers in places like Yemen, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.
When drone-fired missiles wipe out wedding parties and funerals; when drone operators exploit the panic and chaos of an initial strike to stage follow-up attacks targeting emergency personnel — these acts are consecrated by the Dear Leader's approval, and thus cannot be compared to the rampage committed by a private individual responsible for killing a dozen people and wounding scores of others in Aurora.
In order to clarify this vital distinction, it's useful to recall the comments of Dear Leader Emeritus Bill Clinton from an interview published in the December 2009 issue of Foreign Policy. Asked to elucidate this important matter, Clinton helpfully defined terrorism as “killing and robbery and coercion by people who do not have state authority….”(Emphasis added.) By reverse-engineering this definition we learn that “killing and robbery and coercion” carried out in the name of “state authority” isn’t terrorism; it’s public policy.
As it happens, Anwar al-Awlaki — although described as a supporter of al-Qaeda — was a forthright opponent of terrorist attacks against American civilians.
In a typical address he stated that the U.S. government's role in invading and occupying Muslim countries "does not justify the killing of one U.S. civilian in New York City or Washington, D.C.," just as the murder of thousands of civilians in New York and Washington do not "justify the death of one civilian in Afghanistan."
Awlaki believed that all people — including Muslims — have the right to defend themselves against aggressive violence, and was not diffident in expressing that view. By presidential decree, the expression of those views was made a capital offense. The sentence was imposed not by a court of law, but through the deliberations of a secretive, anonymous, unaccountable panel. There was certainly a great deal of "efficiency" in this arrangement — but not so much as a hint or whisper of due process.
In a March 5 address that was an exercise in unalloyed sophistry, Attorney General Eric Holder told an audience at Northwestern University Law School that "due process" doesn't require "judicial process." During congressional testimony two days later, FBI Director Robert Mueller was asked about Eric Holder's position, and whether it applied to the execution of American citizens on presidential orders. He artlessly ducked the question by objecting that he would "have to go back" and check if that was addressed in administration policy. In the intervening months, Mueller has not found the time to report what he has learned.
The rationale for the existence of political government is the belief — as unsupported by empirical evidence as it is impervious to it — that concentrating power in an entity claiming a monopoly on aggressive violence will protect the innocent. The massacre in Aurora, like every other incident in which an armed criminal preys upon a confined audience of unarmed, innocent people, underscored the fact that the police are, at best, useless in such situations.
The police arrived while the rampage was in progress. Police recordings captured the sound of gunfire and screaming while officers waited outside the theater, setting up a "perimeter" and waiting for gas masks to be distributed. The assailant ended the slaughter on his own terms; the police did nothing to stop or minimize the carnage. Their mission was successful, however, since none of them was injured.
Just a few days earlier, a police officer in Columbus, Ohio shot and killed a 21-year-old man named Destin Thomas, who had made the mistake of calling the police to deal with an armed robber. By the time the officers had arrived, the burglars were gone. So the officers — for reasons the department has refused to disclose — killed the victim of the break-in.
As the Columbus Dispatch pointed out, if the police hadn't been on time, Thomas would still be alive. As Thomas's cousin points out, the Columbus Police Department is "trying to justify" the shooting, "no apology or nothing, [just saying] `Oh, we're just doing what we were trained to do" — that is, to put "officer safety" ahead of every other consideration.
The same calculus led to an act of grotesque police over-reaction — what could reasonably be called an incident of state-sponsored terrorism — in Aurora about six months before the Movie Theater Massacre. Following an armed robbery at a local Wells Fargo bank, the Aurora Police Department simply arrested everyone in the vicinity until the suspect was found. This was, in effect, limited-scale martial law.
Believing that the alleged robber was stopped a nearby red light, the police barricaded that section of the street — which could be considered a reasonable tactic.
However, they dragged more than forty people from their vehicles, handcuffed them, and held them for more than four hours — which was not.
Drivers and passengers "were handcuffed, then were told what was going on and were asked for permission to search the car," recalled Officer Frank Fania. "They all granted permission, and once nothing was found in their cars, they were un-handcuffed."
Why was it supposedly necessary to handcuff people before asking permission? If the detention was justified, why did the police bother to ask for permission?
Fania insisted that the mass arrests were necessary and justified because it was a "unique" situation. Actually, this was done not to protect the public, but rather in the interest of "officer safety." This is the same reason why the police force in Colorado Springs, roughly 70 miles south of Aurora, are using military-grade SWAT gear to carry out routine patrol functions.
If you're stopped for a traffic infraction in Colorado Springs, you're likely to be accosted by someone dressed almost exactly like the perpetrator of the Aurora Movie Theater Massacre. That armed stranger has official permission to kill you if in his self-serving judgment you pose a threat to him — and no legally enforceable responsibility to protect you, should a threat to your person or property materialize. And functionaries who serve the same government consider themselves entitled to kill anyone — U.S. citizens included — via remote control on the orders of the individual who has urged the nation to join him in mourning the victims of non-government-licensed murder in Aurora.
Referring to the Movie Theater Massacre, Obama read these potted, insincere phrases from his Teleprompter:
"I'm sure many of you who are parents had the same reaction I did when you first heard this news: what if it had been my daughters at the theater, doing what young children enjoy doing every day? Michelle and I will be fortunate enough to hug our girls a little tighter this weekend, as I'm sure you will do with your children."
There are limits to Obama's gift of empathy. He appears untroubled by the fact that because of his criminal actions, Abdulrahman al-Awlaki's mother has been deprived of both her son and her husband. He is living proof of the fact that the deadliest sociopaths aren't the ones who dye their hair red and identify with comic book nihilists.
The Best of William Norman Grigg |
For most Fallout players, going straight to the New Vegas strip seems impossible—the path there looks like it is gated by cazadores and other baddies. But for speedrunners like rydou, blazing through New Vegas in record speeds is no problem.
In this video, you can watch rydou not only take control of the strip, but also get through the Hoover dam battle in a whopping 24:54. That’s probably how long it takes me to just make a new character! The trick to this “any percentage” run is in the route, and in the technique.
First, rydou quickly creates a character and steals everything from Doc Mitchell. Then rydou answers all of Mitchell’s questions with the first available answer, and takes pretty much the whatever perks and skills the game gives them. And then run really takes off: rydou darts to the Goodsprings Cemetery, and breaks their own leg. This doesn’t seem like a good thing, but the fracture is intentional according to rydou:
When you cripple your leg, you get slower, and then when you heal it, you’re supposed to get your speed back. By quickloading just before getting crippled, you can confuse the game into giving you the speed back without actually ever losing it ( because we don’t actually really get crippled). So you get a huge speedboost, and walk at 165% of your walking speed. This speedboost can appear in two versions : One which is “breakable”, it will last as long as you don’t quickload again. The second one is “unbreakable”, you can quickload or load a game without losing it.
The glitch is pretty hard to get, because it need a precise timing, which can vary with your configuration, framerate, and other thing that we probably don’t know about yet.
With this exploit in hand, rydou runs past all sorts of enemies on the way to the strip without a care. It’s not long before rydou is talking to the different factions at the strip, and eventually levels up enough to get the Black Widow perk. Using this perk, rydou talks to Benny, fucks him, and then kills him in his sleep. Rydou follows that hilarity by going into the Lucky 38, and killing Mr. House—and at this point, he’s only 12 minutes into the run. It’s amazing, if not brutal in its efficiency.
From here, rydou waltzes through the Nellis Air Force Base without blowing up, and quickly speaks to the Boomers. Then, rydou makes their way to the Hidden Valley. Immediately the Brotherhood of Steel aggros on rydou, but rydou manages to crouch before the men in power armor can get to to them—the game considers rydou ‘hidden.’ So rydou manages to steal an important key right from under the murderous Brother of Steel dudes, and uses it to further the story along. This is probably my favorite part of the entire thing.
After this, rydou finds the Khans, and then finally, after getting the low-down on all the factions in the game, talks to Yes Man to get the end game going—rydou opts for the independent strip ending, where the Securitron army keeps the strip in order with Mr. House out of the picture. And so 24 minutes into the run, rydou is at the Hoover Dam final battle. Funnily enough, instead of actually going through and battling everyone, as the game forces everyone else to, rydou simply jumps off the dam and into the water, avoiding pretty much everything. Using this shortcut, rydou gets into the Legate camp and convinces the Legate to leave with some speech checks. Voila: New Vegas beaten absurdly fast.
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The speedrun, which was completed on easy, is one of the most entertaining Fallout-related things I’ve watched recently, so I encourage you to put some time aside to enjoy it. Now seems like a great time, given all the hype around Fallout 4. And in case you’re curious, the previous New Vegas any% was held by Kungkobra, and that run clocked in at 28:17 according to Speedrun.com
You can follow Rydou on Twitch here—sounds like rydou is confident this record can be beaten once more. |
MLBTR will provide a broader view of each club’s winter plans when our annual Offseason Outlook series kicks off at the end of the regular season. Until then, the Brewers are the latest team to be featured in our quick look at this season’s non-contenders. We’ve already covered the Angels.
Milwaukee GM David Stearns has continued to engineer a rebuild that was kicked off by his predecessor, Doug Melvin. The payroll is way down and the high-priced veterans have mostly been cleared out, but it has taken place in a fairly methodical manner thus far with largely positive results (despite the anticipated, subpar record). Here are three needs for the organization as the offseason approaches:
[Brewers Depth Chart]
1. Trade Ryan Braun.
I know, very edgy choice. Braun is the last remaining Brewers player who is promised money past the 2017 season, making him an obvious trade candidate. (Only one other — Matt Garza — has a guaranteed contract next year.) On the one hand, that means, that the club doesn’t need to move Braun just to pare down the costs; even with him this year, the payroll sat at just over $60MM on Opening Day and has receded since.
The key here, though, is timing. Milwaukee has prospered immensely from selling at the right moment on players such as Carlos Gomez (traded before a fall-off) and Jonathan Lucroy (traded after he rebuilt value). You could argue the same, in varying ways, of hurlers Mike Fiers, Jeremy Jeffress, and Will Smith.
With Braun, the question has never been talent or productivity. But he has a sketchy injury history, carries the stain of a PED melodrama, and turns 33 in two months. The $76MM left on his contract over four years remains a bit of a limiting factor, but is a pretty fair price for a player who owns a .306/.371/.537 slash with 27 home runs and 15 steals.
It’s unlikely at this point that Braun’s value will ever be higher, and there’s a chance it could tumble. Whether he goes to the Dodgers or elsewhere, the coming offseason is probably the time to finish clearing the books. (Moving Garza, too, could make sense — either in a winter bereft of open-market pitching talent or after giving him a chance to boost his value in the first half of 2017.)
2. Find the next Junior Guerra …
Or the next Jonathan Villar. Or, really, just the next Chris Carter or even Aaron Hill. Stearns’s first move as a GM — plucking Guerra off the waiver wire — remains his most impressive. But he has proven adept at finding hidden gems from free and cheap talent pools. All the guys he’s tried out haven’t worked, but plenty have. Better still, the most notable success stories thus far have not only been cheap, but have had service time remaining, greatly increasing the upside/expense ratio.
So, who’s the next candidate? If I knew that, I’d probably be peddling the information to a major league team. But while organizations desperate for near-term production will feel compelled to plunk down several million dollars for the best-bet bounceback veterans, odds are that Stearns will be mining the ranks of underappreciated journeymen who have shown a spark and intriguing young players who aren’t going to keep roster spots with their organizations.
These players have plenty of function just by showing up, because they help prop up the quality of the on-field production at virtually no cost. What will be most interesting to see, though, is whether Milwaukee can begin to parlay these bargain finds into real value — either by flipping some of the players in trades or deploying them during a winning season.
3. Chart out an ascension plan.
Call me crazy, but I think things could move fairly quickly for the Brewers. Unlike other recent tear-down situations, Milwaukee has not really had to offload huge and burdensome contracts; the veterans they have dealt have been appealing players who brought good, high-level young talent.
To be sure, I’m not advocating for the club to ramp up spending in anticipation of contending in 2017. But there are some benefits to planning for an optimistic scenario, which might include something in the vicinity of a .500 record next year with some more upward mobility to follow. Doing so in a measured way would allow the club to build toward contention without weighing down the future balance sheet.
With that in mind, perhaps the Brewers don’t need to keep a perfectly pristine balance sheet for the entirety of the near-future. Adding some well-conceived, reasonably youthful talent through free agency or trade isn’t only a strategy for larger-budget rebuilders — at least when a team’s payroll is already low. In Milwaukee’s case, there are a few arb raises to account for in 2017, but none that figure to make much of a dent. Perhaps being willing to pay a bit for one or more mid-level, health-concern/bounceback free agents — Luis Valbuena, Neil Walker, Charlie Morton, Andrew Cashner, or (dare I say it) Carlos Gomez are a few who come to mind — could be a viable strategy. |
Building a CEB project in Midland, Texas in August 2006
A compressed earth block (CEB), also known as a pressed earth block or a compressed soil block, is a building material made primarily from damp soil compressed at high pressure to form blocks. Compressed earth blocks use a mechanical press to form blocks out of an appropriate mix of fairly dry inorganic subsoil, non-expansive clay and aggregate. If the blocks are stabilized with a chemical binder such as Portland cement they are called compressed stabilized earth block (CSEB) or stabilized earth block (SEB). Typically, around 3,000 psi (21 MPa) is applied in compression, and the original soil volume is reduced by about half.
Creating CEBs differs from rammed earth in that the latter uses a larger formwork into which earth is poured and manually tamped down, creating larger forms such as a whole wall or more at one time rather than building blocks. CEBs differ from mud bricks in that the latter are not compressed and solidify through chemical changes that take place as they air dry. The compression strength of properly made CEB can meet or exceed that of typical cement or mud brick. Building standards have been developed for CEB.
CEBs are assembled onto walls using standard bricklaying and masonry techniques. The mortar may be a simple slurry made of the same soil/clay mix without aggregate, spread or brushed very thinly between the blocks for bonding, or cement mortar may also be used for high strength, or when construction during freeze-thaw cycles causes stability issues. Hydraform blocks are shaped to be interlocking.
Development [ edit ]
CEB technology has been developed for low-cost construction, as an alternative to adobe, and with some advantages. A commercial industry has been advanced by eco-friendly contractors, manufacturers of the mechanical presses, and by cultural acceptance of the method. In the United States, most general contractors building with CEB are in the Southwestern states: New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, California, and to a lesser extent in Texas. The methods and presses have been used for many years in Mexico, and in developing countries.
The South African Department of Water Affairs and Forestry considers that CEB, locally called "Dutch brick" is an appropriate technology for a developing country, as are adobe, rammed earth and cob. All use natural building materials.[1] In 2002 the International Institute for Energy Conservation was one of the winners of a World Bank Development Marketplace Award for a project to make an energy-efficient Dutch brick-making machine for home construction in South Africa. By making cheaper bricks that use earth, the project would reduce housing costs while stimulating the building industry.[2] The machine would be mobile, allowing bricks to be made locally from earth.[3]
Various types of CEB production machines exist, from manual to semi-automated and fully automated, with increasing capital-investment and production rates, and decreased labor. Automated machines are more common in the developed world, and manual machines in the developing world.
Advantages [ edit ]
There are many advantages of the CEB system. On-site materials can be used, which reduces cost, minimizes shipping costs for materials, and increases efficiency and sustainability. The wait-time required to obtain materials is minimal, because after the blocks are pressed, materials are available very soon after a short drying period. The uniformity of the blocks simplifies construction, and minimizes or eliminates the need for mortar, thus reducing both the labor and materials costs. The blocks are strong, stable, water-resistant and long-lasting.
CEB can be pressed from damp earth. Because it is not wet, the drying time is much shorter. Some soil conditions permit the blocks to go straight from the press onto the wall. A single mechanical press can produce from 800 to over 5,000 blocks per day, enough to build a 1,200 square feet (110 m 2 ) house in one day. A high performance CEB press, of open source design, named "The Liberator", can produce from 8,000 to 17,000 or more blocks per day. The production rate is limited more by the ability to get material into the machine, than the machine itself.
) house in one day. A high performance CEB press, of open source design, named "The Liberator", can produce from 8,000 to 17,000 or more blocks per day. The production rate is limited more by the ability to get material into the machine, than the machine itself. Shipping cost: Suitable soils are often available at or near the construction site. Adobe and CEB are of similar weight, but distance from a source supply gives CEB an advantage. Also, CEB can be made available in places where adobe manufacturing operations are non-existent.
Uniformity: CEB can be manufactured to a predictable size and has true flat sides and 90-degree angle edges. This makes design and costing easier. This also provides the contractor the option of making the exteriors look like conventional stucco houses.
Presses allow blocks to be consistently made of uniform size, while also obtaining strengths that exceed the ASTM standard for concrete blocks (1900 psi).
Non-toxic: materials are completely natural, non-toxic, and do not out-gas
Sound resistant: an important feature in high-density neighborhoods, residential areas adjacent to industrial zones
Fire resistant: earthen walls do not burn
Insect resistant: Insects are discouraged because the walls are solid and very dense, and have no food value
Mold resistant: there is no cellulose material - such as in wood, Oriented Strand Board or drywall - that can host mold or rot
In India, CSEB's with cement stabilization have shown to be very beneficial. The observed compressive strength, flexural strength at 28 days of aging with 9% cement stabilization has been observed to be 3.2 MPa and 1 MPa respectively.[4]
Presses [ edit ]
CEB had very limited use prior to the 1980s. It was known in the 1950s in South America, where one of the most well-known presses, the Cinva Ram, was developed by Raul Ramirez in the Inter-American Housing Center (CINVA) in Bogota, Colombia. The Cinva Ram is a single-block, manual-press that uses a long, hand-operated lever to drive a cam, generating high pressure.
Industrial manufacturers produce much larger machines that run with diesel or gasoline engines and hydraulic presses that receive the soil/aggregate mixture through a hopper. This is fed into a chamber to create a block that is then ejected onto a conveyor.
During the 1980s, soil-pressing technology became widespread. France, England, Germany, South Africa and Switzerland began to write standards. The Peace Corps, USAID, Habitat for Humanity and other programs began to implement it into housing projects.
Finishing [ edit ]
Completed walls require either a reinforced bond beam or a ring beam on top or between floors and if the blocks are not stabilized, a plaster finish, usually stucco wire/stucco cement and/or lime plaster. Stabilized blocks can be left exposed with no outer plaster finish. In tropical environments, polycarbonate varnish is often used to provide an additional layer of wet-weather protection.[citation needed]
Foundations [ edit ]
Standards for foundations are similar to those for brick walls. A CEB wall is heavy. Footings must be at least 10 inches thick, with a minimum width that is 33 percent greater than the wall width. If a stem wall is used, it shall extend to an elevation not less than eight inches (203 mm) above the exterior finish grade. Rubble-filled foundation trench designs with a reinforced concrete grade beam above are allowed to support CEB construction.
Strength [ edit ]
Using the ASTM D1633-00 stabilization standard, a pressed and cured block must be submerged in water for four hours. It is then pulled from the water and immediately subjected to a compression test. The blocks must score at least a 300 pound-force per square inch (p.s.i) (2 MPa) minimum. This is a higher standard than for adobe, which must score an average of at least 300 p.s.i. (2 MPa) |
Registration prefixes list on map
Every civil aircraft must be marked prominently on its exterior by an alphanumeric string, indicating its country of registration and its unique serial number. This code must also appear in its Certificate of Registration, issued by the relevant National Aviation Authority (NAA). An aircraft can only have one registration, in one jurisdiction.
Legal provisions [ edit ]
In accordance with the Convention on International Civil Aviation (also known as the Chicago Convention), all civil aircraft must be registered with a national aviation authority (NAA) using procedures set by each country. Every country, even those not party to the Chicago Convention, has an NAA whose functions include the registration of civil aircraft. An aircraft can only be registered once, in one jurisdiction, at a time. The NAA allocates a unique alphanumeric string to identify the aircraft, which also indicates the nationality (i.e., country of registration[1]) of the aircraft, and provides a legal document called a Certificate of Registration, one of the documents which must be carried when the aircraft is in operation.[2]
The registration identifier must be displayed prominently on the aircraft.[3] Most countries also require the registration identifier to be imprinted on a permanent fireproof plate mounted on the fuselage in case of a post-fire/post-crash aircraft accident investigation. Military aircraft typically use tail codes and serial numbers.[4]
Although each aircraft registration identifier is unique, some countries allow it to be re-used when the aircraft has been sold, destroyed or retired. For example, N3794N is assigned to a Mooney M20F.[5] It had been previously assigned to a Beechcraft Bonanza (specifically, the aircraft in which Buddy Holly was killed). Also note that an individual aircraft may be assigned different registrations during its existence. This can be because the aircraft changes ownership, jurisdiction of registration, or in some cases for vanity reasons.
Choice of aircraft registry [ edit ]
Most often, aircraft are registered in the jurisdiction in which the carrier is resident or based, and may enjoy preferential rights or privileges as a flag carrier for international operations. However, many aircraft are registered in offshore financial centres which provide open aircraft registrations, notably Aruba, Bermuda and the Cayman Islands.
Carriers in emerging markets may be required to register aircraft in an offshore jurisdiction where they are leased or purchased but financed by banks in major onshore financial centres. The financing institution may be reluctant to allow the aircraft to be registered in the carrier's home country (either because it does not have sufficient regulation governing civil aviation, or because it feels the courts in that country would not cooperate fully if it needed to enforce any security interest over the aircraft), and the carrier is reluctant to have the aircraft registered in the financier's jurisdiction (often the United States or the United Kingdom) either because of personal or political reasons, or because they fear spurious lawsuits and potential arrest of the aircraft.
International standards [ edit ]
The first use of aircraft registrations was based on the radio callsigns allocated at the London International Radiotelegraphic Conference in 1913. The format was a single letter prefix followed by four other letters (like A-BCDE).[6] The major nations operating aircraft were allocated a single letter prefix. Smaller countries had to share a single letter prefix, but were allocated exclusive use of the first letter of the suffix.[6] This was modified by agreement by the International Bureau at Berne and published on April 23, 1913. Although initial allocations were not specifically for aircraft but for any radio user, the International Air Navigation Convention held in Paris in 1919 (Paris Convention of 1919) made allocations specifically for aircraft registrations, based on the 1913 callsign list. The agreement stipulated that the nationality marks were to be followed by a hyphen then a group of four letters that must include a vowel (and for the convention Y was considered to be a vowel). This system operated until the adoption of the revised system in 1928.
The International Radiotelegraph Convention at Washington in 1927 revised the list of markings. These were adopted from 1928 and are the basis of the currently used registrations. The markings have been amended and added to over the years, and the allocations and standards have since 1947 been managed by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
Article 20 of the Convention on International Civil Aviation (Chicago Convention), signed in 1944, requires that all aircraft engaged in international air navigation bears its appropriate nationality and registration marks. Upon registration, the aircraft receives its unique "registration", which must be displayed prominently on the aircraft.
Annex 7 to the Chicago Convention describes the definitions, location, and measurement of nationality and registration marks. The aircraft registration is made up of a prefix selected from the country's callsign prefix allocated by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) (making the registration a quick way of determining the country of origin) and the registration suffix. Depending on the country of registration, this suffix is a numeric or alphanumeric code, and consists of one to five characters. A supplement to Annex 7 provides an updated list of approved nationality and common marks used by various countries.
Country-specific usage [ edit ]
While the Chicago convention sets out the country-specific prefixes used in registration marks, and makes provision for the ways they are used in international civil aviation and displayed on aircraft, individual countries also make further provision for their formats and the use of registration marks for intranational flight.
When painted on the aircraft's fuselage, the prefix and suffix are usually separated by a dash (for example, YR-BMA). When entered in a flight plan, the dash is omitted (for example, YRBMA). In some countries that use a number suffix rather than letters, like the United States (N), South Korea (HL), and Japan (JA), the prefix and suffix are connected without a dash. Aircraft flying privately usually use their registration as their radio callsign, but many aircraft flying in commercial operations (especially charter, cargo, and airlines) use the ICAO airline designator or a company callsign.
Some countries will permit an aircraft that will not be flown into the airspace of another country to display the registration with the country prefix omitted - for example, gliders registered in Australia commonly display only the three-letter unique mark, without the "VH-" national prefix.
Some countries also operate a separate registry system, or use a separate group of unique marks, for gliders, ultralights, and/or other less-common types of aircraft. For example, Germany and Switzerland both use lettered suffixes (in the form D-xxxx and HB-xxx respectively) for most forms of flight-craft but numbers (D-nnnn and HB-nnn) for unpowered gliders. Many other nations register gliders in subgroups beginning with the letter G, such as Norway with LN-Gxx and New Zealand with ZK-Gxx.
United States [ edit ]
In the United States, the registration number is commonly referred to as an "N" number, because all aircraft registered there have a number starting with the letter N. An alphanumeric system is used because of the large numbers of aircraft registered in the United States. An N-number begins with a run of one or more numeric digits, may end with one or two alphabetic letters, may only consist of one to five characters in total, and must start with a digit other than zero. In addition, N-numbers may not contain the letters I or O, due to their similarities with the numerals 1 and 0.[7]
Each alphabetic letter in the suffix can have one of 24 discrete values, while each numeric digit can be one of 10, except the first, which can take on only one of nine values. This yields a total of 915,399 possible registration numbers in the namespace, though certain combinations are reserved either for government use or for other special purposes.[7] With so many possible calls, radio shortcuts are used. Normally when flying entirely within the United States, an aircraft would not identify itself starting with "N", since that is assumed. Also, after initial contact is made with an aircraft control site, only the last two or three characters are typically used.
The following are the combinations that could be used:
N1 to N9 — Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) internal use only [7]
N10 to N99 — Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) internal use only [7]
N100 to N999
N1000 to N9999
N10000 to N99999
N1A to N9Z
N10A to N99Z
N100A to N999Z
N1000A to N9999Z
N1AA to N9ZZ
N10AA to N99ZZ
N100AA to N999ZZ
An older aircraft (registered before 31 December 1948) may have a second letter in its identifier, identifying the category of aircraft. This additional letter is not actually part of the aircraft identification (e.g. NC12345 is the same registration as N12345). Aircraft category letters have not been included on any registration numbers issued since 1 January 1949, but they still appear on antique aircraft for authenticity purposes. The categories were:
C = airline, commercial and private
G = glider
L = limited
R = restricted (such as cropdusters and racing aircraft) [8]
S = state
X = experimental
For example, N-X-211, the Ryan NYP aircraft flown by Charles Lindbergh as the Spirit of St. Louis, was registered in the experimental category.
There is a unique overlap in the United States with aircraft having a single number followed by two letters and radio call signs issued by the Federal Communications Commission to Amateur Radio operators holding the Amateur Extra class license. For example, N4YZ is, on the one hand, a Cessna 206 registered to a private individual in California, while N4YZ is also issued to an Amateur Radio operator in North Carolina.
Decolonisation and independence [ edit ]
The impact of decolonisation and independence on aircraft registration schemes has varied from place to place. Most countries, upon independence, have had a new allocation granted - in most cases this is from the new country's new ITU allocation, but neither is it uncommon for the new country to be allocated a subset of their former colonial power's allocation. For example, after partition in 1947, India retained the VT designation it had received as part of the British Empire's Vx series allocation, while Pakistan adopted the AP designation from the newly allocated ITU callsigns APA-ASZ.
When this happens it is usually the case that aircraft will be re-registered into the new series retaining as much of the suffix as is possible. For example, when in 1929 the British Dominions at the time established their own aircraft registers, marks were reallocated as follows:
Canada: G-Cxxx to CF-xxx, then expanded to C-Fxxx, C-Gxxx, and C-Ixxx in 1974)
Australia: G-AUxx to VH-Uxx, then immediately expanded to all VH-xxx marks.
New Zealand: G-NZxx to ZK-Zxx, then immediately expanded to all ZK-xxx marks.
Newfoundland: G-Cxxx (with Canada) to VO-xxx, then re-merged with the Canadian register in 1949 to CF-xxx.
South Africa: G-UAxx to ZU-Axx, then expanded to all ZU-xxx marks, then again to current ZS-xxx, ZT-Rxx, and ZU-xxx allocations.
Two oddities created by this reallocation process are the current formats used by the Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong and Macau, both of which were returned to PRC control from Britain in 1997 and Portugal in 1999 respectively. Hong Kong's prefix of VR-H and Macau's of CS-M, both subdivisions of their colonial powers' allocations, were replaced by China's B- prefix without the registration mark being extended, leaving aircraft from both SARs with registration marks of only four characters, as opposed to the norm of five.
Registration prefixes and patterns by countries [ edit ]
See also [ edit ] |
There's never an end to the little micro-controversies surrounding the impending launch of the Xbox One (via Microsoft) and the PlayStation 4 (via Sony.) It's actually kind of fun for me to see the level and intensity of consumer interaction with these yet-to-be-released products.
The latest story concerns a batch of Xbox One consoles shipped early by Target to a number of lucky consumers, some of whom have taken to sites like YouTube to post about the system.
One customer, going by the moniker Moonlight Swami, posted a number of pictures and videos of the Xbox One User Interface in action. Microsoft responded with what turned out to be a temporary ban on the system/user, though not permanently.
There have been videos taken down from YouTube, and so forth. The typical response. The response you'd expect. (See Daniel Nye Griffiths' post for more on all that.)
Well Sony users took to Twitter to ask Shuhei Yoshida, President of Worldwide Studios at Sony Computer Entertainment, if they'd be banned for doing something similar.
Yoshida's response was a simple "No."
The interesting thing about this, to me at least, is how Sony continues to capture little bits of momentum by simply not doing whatever Microsoft does. Who knows what Sony's used games policy would have been without Microsoft around to come up with something consumers hated?
The competition and the consumer backlash combined resulted in what is at least perceived to be an overall better situation for consumers, with Microsoft adopting a traditional approach to used games rather than their initial idea.
This is a big reason I hope Microsoft continues to make its video game console (rather than spin it off, as some people in the industry have suggested.)
There are plenty of analysts who argue that the Xbox is a money-sink, but without a viable Xbox console we have nothing to pair off against Sony. That would be bad for video games and for the industry---the same would apply in reverse as well, if a hypothetical future Sony ditched its PlayStation business.
The early Xbox One systems shipped can't tell us that much about the system without corresponding games. The UI itself has gotten a new demo that shows what certainly appears to be a much more functional Kinect than the original version:
It looks impressive. A very next-gen UI. The Skype integration is pretty cool, and the load times seem snappy enough. Microsoft should be confident enough in their product to not ban users who received early consoles.
If anything, these users will provide excellent viral marketing for them at no extra cost.
Banning just leaves a bad taste in peoples' mouths---though perhaps the percentage of people who actually hear about this story is insignificant to the bottom line.
You can see a lot of what Moonlight Swami has posted about the Xbox One over at Kotaku.
Whether we see a batch of early PS4 units ship out in the near future remains to be seen. But if you do get one, post away---at least for the time being, Sony appears confident about their next-gen console.
Follow me on Twitter or Facebook. Read my Forbes blog here. |
With Seth Rollins injured, the WWE world heavyweight championship vacant, and plenty of intrigue surrounding the start of the tournament to crown a new champion, one might think there would be increased interest in this week's episode of Monday Night Raw.
One would be wrong.
Indeed, this week's show garnered just 3.17 million viewers, down from last week's 3.24 million. That's a new low for a non-holiday show in the three hour era and it's coming dangerously close to being a new low including holidays.
The hourly breakdown is even worse:
Hour one: 3.48 million
Hour two: 3.17 million
Hour three: 2.86 million
That is a shockingly low number for the third and final hour, which featured the return of Undertaker and Kane as the Brothers of Destruction to confront The Wyatt Family. It's the lowest it has ever been, actually. The show aired on tape delay with spoilers available beforehand but last year's Raw in the UK did 3.93 million viewers for all three hours and the third hour was at 3.83 million.
Cord cutting is a very real issue right now but these numbers have fallen off to an alarming degree.
For complete results and the live blog from Raw click here. For a recap with reactions to all the night's events click here. To watch highlights of the show click here. |
Music, book and app downloads may jump in price in the UK soon after VAT changes were announced in the annual budget.
Chancellor George Osborn pointed out in his annual budget speech that companies are currently charged tax at source on digital downloads, through foreign countries like Luxembourg where it is as low as 3 per cent. From 1 January 2015 however, downloads will be taxed in the country they are purchased instead, meaning a 20 per cent VAT charge in the UK.
It's pretty likely therefore that companies will pass on those costs to the user. It was found in 2012 that the UK was losing more than £1.6 billion per year in tax because of app under-charging. The taxes lost between 2008 and 2014 would have been enough to pay for the entire Olympic Games in Britain.
High street bosses have complained that current laws give online retailers an unfair advantage in the market. This change should remedy that issue.
The budget document said: "As announced at budget 2013, the government will legislate to change the rules for the taxation of intra-EU business to consumer supplies of telecommunications, broadcasting and e-services. From 1 January 2015 these services will be taxed in the member state in which the consumer is located, ensuring these are taxed fairly and helping to protect revenue."
As download charges rise, the popularity of streaming services like Spotify and Netflix could grow even greater.
READ: Which is the best music streaming service in the UK? Spotify vs Rdio vs Deezer and more |
A misremembered car, uncertainty over a kiss, who was “smitten” with whom, and the mystery of a set of hair extensions dominated the first day of the Jian Ghomeshi sexual assault trial.
The Star's investigations reporter Kevin Donovan gives an update on the Jian Ghomeshi sex assault trial.
Score one point for defence lawyer Marie Henein. Zero for the prosecution. As the afternoon wore on, Henein raised one after another issue with the first complainant’s testimony, nibbling around the edges of her credibility. Tuesday, Henein is expected to tackle the more substantive issue: Does her story of being punched three times in Ghomeshi’s Riverdale home in 2003 hold water? Monday at 10 a.m., at about the time Ghomeshi once would have been interviewing his second guest on CBC's Q, the former media star took his seat at the defence table. Procedural items — yes, the media can access exhibits — were out of the way quickly, thanks to the efficient Justice William B. Horkins. Then the Crown attorney, Michael Callaghan, called the first witness. Ghomeshi is charged with four counts of sexual assault and one count of choking. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
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The woman, a struggling actor and part-time cocktail hostess seven years older than Ghomeshi, told this story of her interactions with Ghomeshi in late 2002 and early 2003. She said she met him while working for the caterer at a CBC Christmas party. “He was flirtatious,” the woman remembered, saying Ghomeshi kept asking her to return with her tray of hors d’oeuvres. “His eyes were bright” when he looked at her, she recalled. Ghomeshi invited her to a taping of his fledgling CBC show >play at the old Movenpik restaurant downtown. “You came!” she recalled him saying, his eyes lighting up. They chatted at the bar after. Former CBC host Evan Solomon was there. Ghomeshi seemed the perfect man. “He’s funny, he’s intelligent, he opens doors, a perfect gentleman,” she said, in response to questions from prosecutor Callaghan. She said he drove her to her car afterward, in a vehicle she described as a 1960s Disney movie car, a yellow Volkswagen Beetle. In the car, she told court he asked her to undo a few buttons of her blouse (she said no) and kissed her.
Then, she said, it was like a switch flipped. “There was almost a rage that wasn’t there a second before.” She told court he grabbed her long hair and pulled it back hard, holding it back for two to three seconds. “It was painful and sudden.” She said he then switched back to being a nice guy, and they chatted and he kissed her goodbye. She wondered if he simply did not know his own strength.
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According to her story in court, she stayed in touch with Ghomeshi and went back to his home after another visit to a taping of his show. A girlfriend accompanied her that time. It was snowing, and though Ghomeshi invited both ladies to his home in Riverdale, she said, only she went. Once there, Ghomeshi put on music. They sat on the couch and kissed, talked, flirted. At one point she said they were standing up kissing and, without warning, “he grabs my hair again” and “pulls my head down and at the same time he is punching me in the head multiple times.” She is wondering: “Can I take this pain? My ears are ringing.” She said she was afraid she was going to pass out. She said it felt like a closed fist, though he was behind her and she did not see the attack. “You better go now,” she said Ghomeshi then told her. “I’ll call you a cab. He threw me out like trash.” The woman was staying at her girlfriend’s that night. She sobbed in the cab all the way home, she testified. She said she never contacted police because “I didn’t think anyone would listen.”
The trial for Jian Ghomeshi (shown in 2014) starts Monday. He faces four counts of sexual assault and one count of choking to overcome resistance. ( Darren Calabrese / THE CANADIAN PRESS file photo ) Jian Ghomeshi arrives at court on Monday for the first day of his trial in Toronto. ( Todd Korol / Toronto Star ) Jian Ghomeshi arrives with his lawyer, Marie Henein, on Monday for the first day of his trial at Old City Hall court. ( Richard Lautens / Toronto Star )
Shortly after the Star published a story with allegations from four victims (immediately after the CBC abruptly fired Ghomeshi, and he wrote a Facebook post in his own defence) she spoke to the Star, then to CBC’s The National and As it Happens. She then made a complaint to police. Her witness interview, or at least a portion of it, will be played in court Tuesday. Before noon, defence lawyer Henein was at the podium asking questions, going over minute details with apparent success. The witness was flustered by the end, and under the rules of cross-examination she is not allowed to speak to the Crown, or anybody, about the case until Henein is finished and the prosecution, if so inclined, questions her again. The car issue. Though Henein provided no evidence Monday, she asked if it was possible Ghomeshi was driving a different car that was not a Beetle since, she indicated, he did not own a Beetle until later in the year (2003). The witness was uncertain. Who was “smitten” with whom? When she told her story in the morning, the woman said Ghomeshi seemed to be quite taken with her. With no evidence presented, Henein suggested that it was actually the woman who was smitten with Ghomeshi. The complainant testified that was incorrect. There were hints in court that a friend, or former friend, of the complainant will be called to speak to that issue. The kissing: Henein noted that in her morning evidence (called “evidence in chief”) the woman said she was kissing Ghomeshi in the car when he suddenly pulled her hair roughly. Henein noted that stories by the Star and CBC, based on interviews with her in the fall of 2014, did not reference kissing. Henein indicated that court will hear that the woman went on to tell police the kissing and hair pulling were “intertwined.” In response, the woman said that she “had the memory,” she just “didn’t put it out” when she gave interviews to the media. She said she was flustered and “high on nerves” when she spoke to CBC. The Star, she said, “twisted” her words. The hair extensions: The court heard that the woman has told different stories to police regarding whether or not she had hair extensions — the implication being that, if hair extensions were yanked roughly, they might come out. At one point between the laying of charges and the trial beginning, the woman emailed a police detective to say she was wearing hair extensions at the time of the incident. “I now know I was not wearing hair extensions,” the complainant told court. As proceedings wound down for the day and court staff fiddled with a video link-up for Tuesday, the scene playing the large monitor in the court was of the woman, seated in a comfortable chair, facing two Toronto police detectives, giving her statement about Ghomeshi on Nov. 1, 2014. Henein will press play on that video when court resumes Tuesday. MORE ON THESTAR.COM: Ghomeshi court spectacle lacked only the cameras: Menon First Ghomeshi witness suffers self-inflicted cuts: DiManno Jian Ghomeshi trial coverage spills beyond Canada
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A peculiar thing has been happening at Southern Evangelical Seminary in North Carolina. This is an institution that values the writings of St. Thomas Aquinas and many other thinkers one would not expect to find on the shelves of an evangelical seminary. While producing a number of successful and popular Protestant pastors, SES has also been the site of a mass exodus across the Tiber.
In the decade from 2004 to 2014, more than two dozen faculty members, students, and alumni of SES have entered into full communion with the Catholic Church. Keeping in mind that only around two dozen students graduate from SES each year, this is rather a significant percentage. The obvious question is: “How can a school co-founded by an Evangelical theologian-apologist known to be critical of Catholicism produce so many Catholics?” In an effort to answer this very question, Douglas M. Beaumont has collected the accounts of nine conversions from SES, including his own, in a new book, Evangelical Exodus: Evangelical Seminarians and Their Paths to Rome, published by Ignatius Press. Beaumont responded to questions from Catholic World Report via email.
CWR: Can you briefly recount your own conversion story?
Douglas M. Beaumont: I became a Christian believer in 1989, and from then to 2009 I was a dedicated Evangelical Christian student, minister, professor, author, and speaker. In 2009 I engaged in a serious, heart-wrenching process of discernment over whether I would remain in Evangelicalism. As I pondered some of the problems I encountered in the movement, I began to consider the historic Church and increasingly found it difficult to defend my anti-Catholic beliefs. At the end of this process, I came to believe that I was not in full communion with the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. So, in 2014, I was received into the Catholic Church.
What I came to realize is that little progress will be made on the major issues (or many secondary issues) of theology until one settles the issue of religious authority. That single concern is related to numerous key facets of the Christian faith, the most impactful of which were the canon of Scripture and its orthodox interpretation.
The canon of Scripture (the books included in the Bible) is a huge issue for anyone who considers the Bible to be the Word of God and the authority for one’s faith. If one thinks the early Church went astray somehow, it becomes a very difficult problem because the biblical collection itself was not settled until centuries after the apostles died. If the Church was in error by then, how can the “Bible-Only Christian” be sure he really has the inspired Word of God? And if the Church was kept from error while it determined the canon, why was it not likewise kept from error during the councils and creeds it produced at the same time? As I looked at the major alternate theories of canonization, I discovered the historical truth that the Church is ultimately the standard.
This was also the case with doctrine. It is well known that there is rampant disagreement among the various sects, denominations, and cults of Christianity—but where is the line drawn? Christians often speak of “orthodoxy,” “heresy,” “essentials,” and “fundamentals”—but by what authority are these words defined, and doctrines labelled? For the Christian who denies that the Church is the standard, there seemed to be no non-circular means of doing so. For the Bible to function as an authoritative standard (i.e., sola Scriptura), it must first be understood—yet there seemed to be insurmountable problems with attaining such an understanding. Regardless of one’s theoretical method, the fact remained that very few Christian traditions agreed—even at the scholarly level.
So if what the Bible was, and how it was to be understood, were not grounded in a God-guided, infallible process—then what else was there to trust?
Although I would eventually come to deal with other issues such as Mary, Purgatory, justification, etc., I saw early on that they all ultimately revolve around one’s positions on the issues above. From there it was just a matter of following the history. And, as Blessed J.H. Newman wrote, “To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant.”
CWR: Were there particular figures or events in the history of Christianity that significantly influenced your journey to the Catholic Church?
Beaumont: Event-wise, I’d say the fact of authoritative Church councils weighed heavily on me. They essentially were the answer to the above issues of canon and orthodoxy, and they also pointed to what the historic Church was—if the Catholic Church was behind the councils that determined the biblical canon and its orthodox interpretation, was it God-guided or not? If not, then why trust the Bible or the creeds? And if so, when did the Church lose that guidance? There seemed to be no non-question-begging answer.
As to persons, St. Thomas Aquinas was an enormous influence on me. Not only was his theology built on the most solid philosophical and biblical foundations, but his application of those truths to how people are to live settled a lot of my disparate theological and moral intuitions. I remember one occasion very vividly; I was reading his section of the Summa on the faith of heretics (ST II-II, 5, 3) and I was surprised to find that Thomas believed that even a heretic’s faith in true things was false. I read his explanation—that faith is, by definition, trust in an authority, and therefore denial of any authoritative teaching is proof that one’s “faith” is really just an accidentally true opinion—and I was stunned. I remember staring at that section and slowly realizing that it perfectly described my faith as it had been taught to me—and as I had taught it to others. By teaching people that faith was one’s personal conviction based on personal study, I was literally helping people to not be faithful! It was an awful moment of clarity, but I truly loved learning it. I knew then I could not remain Protestant.
CWR: This book recounts the tales of conversion from several people associated with the Southern Evangelical Seminary. Considering the enrollment at SES, this is a fairly significant percentage of students and faculty in recent years who have converted to Catholicism. Is there something peculiar to SES that has led to so many converts in recent years?
Beaumont: SES is a peculiar school on a number of fronts. Unlike most seminaries that exist to prepare students for a particular ministry within their church/denomination/communion, SES is a solitary entity, beholden to no particular tradition, communion, or governing body. It is also not attached to any university or college. SES’s draw comes from its focus on Christian apologetics (defending the faith) and, secondarily, on its unusual blend of typical Baptist/Evangelical theology mixed with many tenetsp of classical philosophy. The latter involves the study of the teachings of the über-Catholic Thomas Aquinas, as well as many of his best commentators. SES also regularly invites popular Catholics to speak at various conferences when their expertise places them on the top of the scholarly heap (as it often does).
Now, the school has gone to great pains to point out that accepting certain parts of Thomistic philosophy does not entail Catholic theology (something no knowledgeable Catholic would argue), and that one is free to pick and choose from what Catholics teach (so long as they do not go against the school’s doctrinal statement, of course). This smorgasbord approach to theology is made clear by the structure of the classes—students read Catholics when it comes to metaphysics, epistemology, theology of God, and ethics but then switch to contemporary Evangelicals when it comes to issues surrounding salvation or the end times. For a lot of us, the comparison was unfavorable toward the Evangelical writers, and the theological inconsistency eventually became too great to ignore. Eventually a lot of us realized that the best of Evangelicalism was borrowed capital from the Catholic Church, and the rest was simply sub-par.
CWR: One common obstacle to conversion is the stigma it can carry with it—people can lose their friends and family, their whole social and professional network. Was this something you encountered? Is it a common issue with converts from SES?
Beaumont: I think this is a common experience in conversions of many types. If Aristotle was right, friendship at the highest level is the mutual pursuit of the good. When friends or family begin to disagree on what the good is, it inevitably produces tension—even strife. Moreover, in a system like Evangelicalism, where one’s beliefs are self-determined and the real spiritual authority lies within the mind of the individual, disagreement over doctrine can be seen to equate to a personal attack. Further there is a massive cultural shift that occurs in an Evangelical-to-Catholic transition. It is, as Christian Smith puts it, likened to a paradigm shift in science. The meaning behind certain words and actions changes, and dialogue becomes strained. None of these exactly contribute to healthy relationships. It’s a lot of work to overcome, and you really find out who your true friends are.
Professionally it was rather terrifying as well. Although great thinkers such as Aquinas, Gilson, Maritain, Kreeft, George, etc. were regularly [read or] invited to the school to speak, they would never be allowed to teach there. SES is extremely insular in its hiring practices—the majority of its current faculty got their doctorates from SES, and even the suggestion that one might not be towing the line can result in getting fired (one adjunct professor lost his position at SES simply because he allowed that one verse in the Gospel of Matthew concerning the rising of the saints might have been non-historical). I personally experienced opposition and suspicion just for looking into Anglicanism! Obviously, becoming Catholic would mean losing my job, so I stopped accepting course offers the spring before I even began formally looking into Catholicism. But certainly the transition was tense, and the loss of a decade’s worth of networking and potential employers is a sickening prospect. Praise be to God, I managed to secure a secular job during this time so I could build my new network up.
CWR: As editor of the book, how did you choose which individuals’ stories to include?
Beaumont: When I had the idea, I simply contacted everyone I knew from SES who had become Catholic (or Eastern Orthodox!) over the previous decade (i.e., starting with me and going back 10 years). I only asked if they would be interested in putting their personal stories together in one place; I was not necessarily planning to publish, I just wanted there to be a resource for people who wanted to know the truth about what had happened (and was continuing to happen) in this regard. I reached out to about 15 people, and nearly everyone wanted in. Eventually it began to look like we really had something here, so I had to tailor it for a Catholic publisher. Some people had to drop out for personal reasons, others were added in as I tracked them down. When we got to the final lineup, the book was already too big, so we stopped adding contributors (I joke that I could have had volume two written within a year!) and made some adjustments to the layout (like adding appendices covering common material to minimize redundancy) and it worked out well to limit it to what we had.
CWR: Have you noticed particular themes, or common threads, in the conversion stories of those associated with SES?
Beaumont: Certainly there are strains of similarity—especially with regard to the influence of certain thinkers, or experiences that led to re-thinking certain aspects of the Faith. But I think what is perhaps surprising is how different these stories actually are. The line one hears around SES is that these conversions were the result of a sort of underground movement headed by a few of us (who it is changes depending on what time period one focuses on) who somehow managed to influence all the rest. This is both untrue and insulting to us as individuals. What unites most of us is just that we happened to go to the same evangelical seminary—but many of the contributors did not even know of each other, or did not share their journeys with each other. Each person had particular concerns that were not able to be satisfied by the Evangelical theology they had learned, and they all found the answers in the Catholic Church. That may be an uncomfortable truth for the friends and colleagues who have continued to carry the SES torch, but it is true nonetheless. My hope is that the book will aid those who wish to understand this phenomenon, regardless of which side they eventually choose. |
The new film Amy reminds us that no matter how talented a woman is, or how brilliant her work, her behavior dictates how she is perceived.
Asif Kapadia’s documentary of the life of Amy Winehouse — released nationwide on Friday— depicts her rise to fame from her humble beginnings singing "Happy Birthday" to a friend as a 14-year-old to her performances on the worldwide stage. Watching Amy is a depressing, heart-breaking journey through one woman's descent into addiction, but it's also a brutal reminder of the lens through which we see women in music.
A London-born jazz singer with a towering beehive of hair and a soulful voice, Amy Winehouse is most often remembered for her very public and messy drug addiction and her most popular song — "Rehab." It is almost impossible to separate Amy Winehouse, the creator of two brilliant and innovative albums, from Amy Winehouse, the pop star who drunkenly stumbled through crowds of paparazzi.
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There is a scene in Amy in which Winehouse is in a tiny, closet of a studio recording the final version of "Back to Black," the title song of her second album. The scene is shot from a handheld personal camera within the soundbooth of a studio. Mark Ronson, who produced and co-wrote "Back to Black," makes an off-handed comment off-camera about how everyone told him how difficult Winehouse was to work with and how impossible it was to get her to focus. Ronson didn't have that problem.
Maybe Winehouse was having a good day. Maybe she was struck with a bout of inspiration. She's seen focused and passionate, inside the studio writing lyrics on a notepad and fleshing out the final version of "Back to Black." That song would chart at number 25 and become Winehouse's third-best selling single, and she wrote it herself. In fact, Winehouse wrote all of Back to Black. Only four of the songs on Back to Black have co-writers.
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Compare that to another popular female artist who is credited with writing her own music: Taylor Swift. Most of Taylor Swift's discography has been co-written. In fact, an artist writing all of an album herself is a rarity in modern music, because there is money to be made on sharing credit.
For Winehouse to have written almost all of a hit album — especially after being laden with Sony ATV co-writers on her first album — is an incredible feat of artistry, and one that goes largely unnoticed and unrecognized because of her behavior.
Even Amy, a movie solely about her life and work, contrasts almost every moment of praise for Winehouse's ability with a point about how sad it is that she couldn't control herself. That, of course, is an incredibly gendered viewpoint. For decades men have been outright admired if not praised for use and abuse of substances. Winehouse's usage was an embarrassment, constantly touted as out-of-control, terrible, and bad for her career. While all of these things were true, they weren't critiques that were or are normally waged against male artists of the same or even lesser caliber than Amy Winehouse.
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It was impossible for me to watch this movie without thinking about another film released earlier this year: Brett Morgan's documentary on the life and death of Nirvana front-man Kurt Cobain, Montage of Heck. Their fates were undeniably similar; even in the New York Times obituary for Winehouse, Kurt Cobain is mentioned.
Kurt Cobain's destructive, heroin-filled life with Courtney Love isn't depicted as pitiful in Montage of Heck. There are videos of he and Courtney high out of their minds, dancing around in their living rooms. There are home-videos of Kurt doing drugs and seeming completely out of it. The rise of TMZ and tabloids is partly to blame for the differences in how each of their addictions were portrayed in the media. There are photos of Winehouse at every single stage of her addiction. There are very few of Kurt Cobain.
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But more is to be said in the media's idolization of a blonde boy from Seattle's group effort to change rock-and-roll. Cobain, like Winehouse, was a songwriter. He wrote every single song on Nirvana's hugely popular album Nevermind, but he lacked talent in areas that Winehouse didn't. He was clumsy on guitar — worrrying about his performance on MTV Unplugged — and his voice was distinctive, but lackluster. Cobain was a great artist, and one who revolutionized rock in the '90s. But Amy Winehouse undeniably revolutionized 2000s pop, and that shouldn't matter any less.
When Winehouse released Frank in 2003, there was absolutely nothing like it on the charts. Before Winehouse, the Top 40 was full of R&B and bubblegum pop princesses. She ushered in a new guard. Once Back to Black broke through, record labels knew that they could make money with jazz-inspired crooners, and they lined them up. After Winehouse, we got Lady Gaga, Adele, Sam Smith, Charlie Pugh, and dozens and dozens of Winehouse wannabes who have graced the Top 40 in her absence.
When Winehouse died, Lady Gaga posted on Twitter: "Amy changed pop music forever, I remember knowing there was hope, and feeling not alone because of her. She lived jazz, she lived the blues."
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What Amy Winehouse accomplished — being a woman in the Top 40 with a killer voice and songs about boys — isn't deemed as "art." AS Molly Beaucheim wrote for Pitchfork in June: "We martyr our women because we fear their greatness. We do so because we fear women who are living out of bounds."
In Winehouse's obituary in Rolling Stone, Jenny Eliscu wrote that the genius of Back to Black wasn't Winehouse at all; it "was pairing her with producer Mark Ronson," completely taking the credit for the album away from the artist who created it.
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Amy gives moments of insight into just how talented of an artist Winehouse was. There's an interview with Questlove in which he says that Winehouse taught him more about jazz than his formal education. "She used to assign us homework," he laughs. She idolized Tony Bennett, one of the greatest living jazz singers; in the film, her eyes light up when she sees him on television. She acts incredibly nervous when the two record together. The movie illustrates how Winehouse wasn't just a voice, she was an artist.
A woman's downfall is not the product of her brilliance. In the narrative created for her, Winehouse had a drug problem not because she was a genius struggling to deal with an immense amount of fame, but because she was a weak young girl who was easily manipulated by men. She doesn't get the benefit of the doubt. Her New York Times obituary says nothing about her writing.
Though the documentary tries to recognize Winehouse's writing ability by highlighting the lyrics to her songs on the screen and showing her handwritten notes, it's always in passing that her work is mentioned. The focus, as it has been for female geniuses for generations, is on her behavior and her love life.
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Winehouse didn't just succeed monumentally, she created. She wasn't a little girl with a drug problem. She was one of the greatest songwriters and vocalists of our generation.
Kelsey McKinney is a culture staff writer for Fusion. |
Austin, Texas (CNN) Daytime turns to dusk as Natalie St. Clair's phone lights up with text messages. They come from clients across the vast Lone Star State.
One needs a bus from Texarkana to Shreveport, Louisiana. Another traveling from Corpus Christi to San Antonio has to find a hotel room. A third must get to Fort Worth from a small town in the western part of the state. A fourth reaches out from Lubbock to say she missed her appointment in Dallas.
To the stranger at a party who asks what she does, St. Clair keeps her answer vague: "Just feminist stuff." But the truth is blunt, bold and a sign of the times: "I'm an abortion travel agent."
It's a job that emerged after Texas enacted House Bill 2 in 2013, imposing a new round of restrictions on abortion care and abortion providers. Two key parts of the law have been challenged all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which hears arguments in Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt on Wednesday.
It has been called the biggest abortion case to face the high court in more than two decades and could have far-reaching effects depending on how justices rule.
In Texas, the effects of HB2 have already been felt. Unable or unwilling to meet new requirements, clinics across the state have shut their doors. Before HB2, the state had more than 40 abortion clinics; now there are 13, according to St. Clair's latest count. Among the new rules: Doctors must have hospital privileges, and clinics must function like outpatient surgery centers.
In an enormous state that spans 270,000 square miles -- bigger than many countries -- some women are now living in an abortion desert. In Lubbock, for example, they have to travel nearly 300 miles to reach a provider. And the ripple effects don't stop there.
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The farther a woman lives from a clinic, the more complicated it is to get there. Especially if she works more than one job, needs to secure child care or doesn't have a car or money for a hotel. Add to this the wait time to get an appointment, and another wait time after a legally required sonogram. In some clinics, it has taken as long as 23 days to get on the schedule since the passage of HB2, according to the Texas Policy Evaluation Project at the University of Texas.
The longer the wait to get an abortion, the more expensive -- and potentially more complicated -- the procedure. What could have cost hundreds of dollars easily jumps into the thousands. And if a woman is more than 20 weeks pregnant, she has waited too long to get an abortion in Texas. Under HB2, it's illegal in most cases -- and she'll have to travel out of state.
Enter Fund Texas Choice , where St. Clair, 23, works as the operations manager and is the organization's only full-time employee. While other funds have helped pay for abortions for decades , this one answers a different call necessitated by HB2. It's for anyone who doesn't have a vehicle or must drive two hours or more on their own to reach a clinic.
Working out of an office in Austin, St. Clair often wires women gas money. (PayPal would be easier, but it requires a bank account, something many clients don't have.) In rural parts of Texas, just getting that wired money can require travel across multiple towns to reach a MoneyGram at Walmart. She books flights, taxis, bus tickets and hotel rooms. She regularly studies Greyhound routes and bookmarks airline schedules. Once she drove 3½ hours one-way to hand deliver last-minute financial help.
She tells stories of women who offer to sleep in their cars. Hell will freeze over, she says, before she'll let that happen.
"By far these obstacles are greatest for low-income clients living in rural areas -- which are mostly populations of color," St. Clair says. And if they're not native English speakers, the hurdles are even higher.
She talks about the people who have had to miss appointments because their babysitters flaked or their paychecks didn't clear, and then couldn't afford a later procedure.
There was a woman who flew to Albuquerque, only to be blocked by protesters. By the time she got into the clinic, she'd missed her appointment and had to fly home.
Another young woman stood on a rural West Texas road waiting for a Greyhound bus that never showed. St. Clair scrambled to find a way to get her to her appointment the next day. A taxi would have cost $500, so instead she paid one of the client's friends to do the driving. The two arrived at 3 a.m., five hours before the appointment, only to find out she was further along than expected and couldn't afford the procedure that was required.
I heard similar stories from one of St. Clair's allies in this work.
There was the woman with severe diabetes who knew it was unsafe for her to carry a baby. The first-generation American, the first in her family to go to college, who desperately wants kids someday -- but not now. The one whose abuser took off his condom and said, "Now you belong to me."
St. Clair fields about 60 calls a month and manages about 20 abortion trips. While her focus is logistics, she's often a safe sounding board for clients. They thank her for not judging them. Some say they had no idea they could get pregnant. Others tell her about the men who hurt them. Then there are those who want to be reassured they're still Christian.
Her hours are odd, usually at night, so she can be in touch with clients when they're off work. Most people like to text, in part so no one can hear their words.
She works in a closed-down Whole Woman's Health clinic. Others who share the space are like-minded advocates: educators, counselors, spokeswomen.
Down the hall from St. Clair, a reproductive rights policy wonk keeps a Kevlar vest on her bookshelf. It belonged to her late father, who was an abortion provider in South Texas. An FBI agent was assigned to him to monitor threats. The vest is her "talisman," she says, "a reminder of why I do what I do."
The dangers in this work are real. Over the years and across the country, abortion providers have been killed and clinics bombed. One need only think back to November, when a shooting at a Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood clinic left three dead.
Because of this reality, St. Clair's eyes open wide when -- at night -- someone shows up outside the building and incessantly rings the doorbell. The entrance is hidden, a dark hallway outside provides cover, and there's no telling what, if anything, might have been left outside the door.
She reaches out to colleagues, who tell her to call the police immediately. She does. An hour and a half and four calls later, an officer shows up.
On this night, she has a visitor and officer to escort her to her car. On all other nights, she walks out into the darkness alone, holding a phone to her ear. She keeps a friend on the line, just in case something happens.
'What do I do now?'
Nearly 400 miles to the northwest, Angela Martinez stands in front of the place she once thought would employ her forever. She was the clinic director at the Planned Parenthood Women's Health Center in her hometown of Lubbock.
Now empty and undergoing renovation for new tenants, the facility shut down in October 2013, a casualty of HB2.
"We became an example of the assault on clinics. I was devastated," she says of the closure, which left her depressed for months and led her to move back in with her parents. "I had this great job with amazing purpose, and it was gone."
College students, addicts who don't believe they are fit to be mothers and women who already had children would pull into the parking lot. Martinez remembers them arriving in cabs, old jalopies and fancy SUVs — some even with McCain/Palin bumper stickers. Women who might rail against abortion in their social circles, she says, were happy to accept Planned Parenthood's services once they got pregnant.
They would say things like, "I'm a good Christian or I don't believe in this, but my situation is different," Martinez says.
She never judged. She says she was just glad her clinic could provide them a choice, and a safe legal option to do what they thought was best for themselves and their families.
This overriding purpose drove her. Each week she'd pick up a doctor who flew in from out of town to perform procedures on Thursdays. He would arrive incognito, wearing a hat and sunglasses. He'd step into her car and fully recline his seat so no one could see him.
Martinez could handle the anti-abortion activist who knocked on the door posing as a reporter and wrote down her license plate number. She dismissed the plea from one of her brothers that she get a license for a concealed handgun. She could tune out the screams: "Angela Martinez, you're killing babies!"
When dozens of protesters gathered on the sidewalk and their shouts could be heard inside the clinic, she turned up a dinky radio to drown out the noise for patients -- and herself.
"My attitude was, 'I'm going to be fine.' I wanted my employees to be safe," she says. "And I'd rather have a protester yell at me than at a patient."
She's now working on a graduate degree in social work at nearby Texas Tech University, but in many respects Martinez's heart remains in the past, and she still hopes she can one day return to her previous work.
Also in the past, at times, is Dorothy Boyett.
For two decades, every Thursday without fail, she stationed herself outside this Lubbock clinic. Starting at 6 a.m. and for the next eight hours -- rain or shine, snow, wind or heatwave -- she had a job to do.
She says she quietly prayed and passed out Bible tracts and pamphlets about baby development. It was her ministry to offer another way. A London native, Boyett is sweet, genteel, her English accent charming.
This born-again, 69-year-old grandmother of 15 sits at her kitchen table and says she still sometimes forgets on Wednesday nights that she has nowhere she has to be in the morning.
"We had worked for 20 years with that goal in mind," she says of the clinic's demise. "So when they did close, it was euphoric. And then you think, well, what do I do now?"
It's not that she's not keeping busy. An orthopedic nurse, she still works at a hospital once a week. Between that, her grandchildren, her evangelism on Texas Tech's campus, her Tuesdays passing out fliers on a Lubbock street corner, there's plenty to do.
But it's not the same as her mission outside that clinic, where she says she peacefully prayed for so many years.
She didn't always play by the rules, though, and admits, "I've crossed the line from time to time" -- meaning, she says, the property line.
She joined hands with Operation Rescue in Wichita, Kansas, where Dr. George Tiller -- later shot dead while in church -- was performing second trimester abortions. She helped block doors and says she's been arrested about a dozen times.
From her large white Chevy van in her garage, she offers a brochure and hands over a tiny rubber baby, saying it represents what a baby looks like at 10 weeks in the womb. Leaning against the cargo van's inside wall: an oversized sign, featuring a gruesome image of an aborted fetus.
A place next door
Half of all pregnancies in the United States are unintentional, according to a report in the American Journal of Public Health. And of those unplanned pregnancies, four out of 10 end in abortion.
"Everyone knows someone who's had one, whether they know it or not," says Nan Little Kirkpatrick, the executive director of the Texas Equal Access Fund , which helps women pay for abortions.
While there's no place in Lubbock to get an abortion these days, there are still plenty of places and groups dedicated to talking women out of abortions.
The Nurturing Center , which advertises pregnancy support services and free sonograms, opened next to the now-shuttered abortion clinic by design. On top of ultrasounds, the center offers peer counseling, baby items, referrals to adoption agencies, limited financial assistance -- and lots and lots of warnings about abortions.
"We believe in the sanctity of all life," explains Lawrence D'Souza, the 73-year-old executive director. "Cradle to grave and womb to tomb."
His eyes tear up when he wonders how many scientists have died because they weren't allowed to be born. He reads aloud from a list of scenarios given to women who come to the clinic.
"It's the year 1955, a lady is pregnant with a baby out of wedlock, her family would disown her and so will her community. Should she abort?"
He looks up, to make sure I'm listening, before he reads on: "You would have killed Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, and nobody would have an iPhone."
The idea to open his center at this location came to him during a clinic protest years ago, after he saw abortion seekers mistakenly walk toward the entry of what was then a closed-down dental clinic. If D'Souza, then a steel company controller, set up shop in that old clinic and put up a sign in lights, there was no telling how many lives he could save.
Sometimes, even though the abortion clinic has been closed for more than two years, women still show up at his center next door thinking they're at Planned Parenthood.
"Women are choosing life maybe because they have no other option," says Elizabeth Trevino, the center's director of client services.
She wears a purple T-shirt emblazoned with a cross and a reference to scripture. When she used to protest outside the clinic, she says she preferred to show love rather than scare off women. She passed out rosaries, baby booties and onesies.
She beams after introducing two Texas Tech activists who are involved with the student-led organization Raiders Defending Life. For two years in a row, their school has been named the most politically active campus in the state at a Texas Right to Life student conference.
Trevino describes the information she shares with women about the dangers of abortion. They're the very claims medical professionals dispute and include risks of severe psychological trauma.
"I have yet to meet a woman who has not regretted her abortion," she says.
That means Trevino hasn't met Anne, a Lubbock-area woman who was years beyond middle-of-the-night feedings when she found herself pregnant. A married professional in her late 40s and already the mother of three, including a teenager, this was a life twist she didn't see coming -- and didn't think was possible.
The decision to have an abortion was easy for her and her husband. Never mind that they didn't want more kids, the thought of carrying a baby to term in her body, at this age, felt dangerous.
She was lucky and had the resources to travel. Her husband was able to watch the kids. She could reschedule some meetings and didn't have to craft excuses for a boss or risk losing pay. She could afford to fly to Denver and not waste a day driving hundreds of miles. She was able to foot a hotel bill.
The procedure the next morning took minutes and, she says, felt no different than a pap smear. But the $1,500 journey, which could have been a lunch-break appointment had Lubbock still had a clinic, felt at best ridiculous and at worst like a violation.
"It bothered me so much after I got back. This could have happened to someone else who doesn't have the means I have," says Anne, who asked that I not use her real name. "This is a real issue affecting real women, not just teenagers acting irresponsibly."
A Texas education
Here in this abortion desert, though, it seems there's more than a lack of clinics. There's also a scarcity of knowledge -- the very kind needed to act responsibly.
The Lubbock area is home to a number of colleges, including Lubbock Christian University, Wayland Baptist University and South Plains College. The largest, by far, is Texas Tech University, home of the Red Raiders.
A group of Texas Tech undergrads, hailing from different parts of the state, tell me about the abstinence-only assemblies they were required to attend in public school and the pledges they felt pressured to sign at 13.
"I signed because I wanted to fit in," says Catherine Ragsdale, 20, an officer in the school's Feminist Majority Leadership Alliance. "I didn't know what sex was."
Another student, who learned she was pregnant over winter break, paints the picture of how Texas' anti-abortion culture colored her reaction. She didn't know who she could talk to at school and worried about being judged for scheduling an abortion (which she ended up canceling after she miscarried). One of her best friends had already dropped out of college to have her own baby. Everyone had tried to be happy: "Congrats!" they said. What would they now think of her?
There was no mention of birth control in their Texas schools, or at least there wasn't supposed to be. One student sang the praises of a teacher who broke the law in seventh grade to tell students about safe sex. Health classes generally amounted to being bombarded with horrifying photos of STDs.
It's no wonder, these young women say, that so many of their peers are clueless -- and that "Raider Rash," the school's signature sexually transmitted infection, is so widespread it has a name among students there.
Faculty in the women's studies department offer additional commentary.
Sara White teaches an introduction to women's studies course, which draws 40 students, equal parts men and women. When she asks students to list the forms of birth control they know about, she says, 9 out of 10 can only come up with abstinence and condoms.
She talks about the young man who said he drank bleach believing it would keep him from impregnating a woman. One student who got pregnant wrote an email to White in a panic: "I didn't think his penis was big enough," as if size was linked to fertility. Other women have admitted douching with Mountain Dew to keep from conceiving.
"They say it's something about carbonation," a student nearby explains.
One young woman told her classmates to set a timer when having sex. She explained that guys only last seven minutes, so if you stop before then you're fine.
"This method was flawed, though," White says. "The student had a child."
White shows them what she calls "the birth control website." It's just the Planned Parenthood site , although she doesn't say the name out loud.
In it for the long haul
Outside a Dallas clinic, one of two in the city, the regular protesters assemble and scream. One protester arrives lugging a huge crucifix. Beside her are two small children.
A clinic staffer rushing inside yells back with a broad smile, "I love my job! Free IUDs!"
Since HB2 forced the closure of abortion clinics across Texas, this Dallas facility has nearly doubled in capacity. For a time, the waiting area was standing-room only. The wait for an appointment jumped from five days to about 20. The clinic had to acquire adjacent space, "a hemorrhoid center of all things," one physician says.
The clinic sees about twice as many patients as before HB2; about 200 come through each week. Patients arrive from all over North Texas as well as Oklahoma, Louisiana and Arkansas.
OBGYNs in private practice in Texas may perform abortions on occasion, but they certainly don't advertise this, says Heather Busby, the executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Texas . And if hospitals do elective abortions, they risk losing public and private funding. That makes clinics the overwhelming go-to place, which means women of all backgrounds, ages, races and socioeconomic status walk through these doors.
Four physicians work here, some more days than others. Additional doctors are expected to pitch in soon.
One doctor, who insists on not being identified, keeps what she does quiet for her and her family's protection. She doesn't touch social media and often wears sunglasses, even when there is no sun.
When abortion providers in Texas meet with a new patient, they are legally required to read off a list of risks -- a list the doctor calls "ridiculous." Among the warnings: Abortion may cause breast cancer and infertility.
The doctor says she explains to patients that while she has to say these things, science doesn't back up these statements. Yes, women who carry a baby to term are less likely to get breast cancer, but abortions do not cause breast cancer. And there's no evidence linking infertility to uncomplicated abortions, she says.
Nearly 90% of abortions happen within the first term of pregnancy, when there's a less than 0.05% risk of major complications, according to the American Journal of Public Health . In fact, "the risk of death associated with abortion is about one-tenth that associated with childbirth," the Guttmacher Institute reports.
"It's really frustrating and tiresome to explain this to people over and over again," the doctor says. "They've already gone through so much to get here."
She remembers the young college woman from Lubbock who took a bus for eight hours by herself to get here. She'd been afraid to visit a crisis pregnancy center in Lubbock like the Nurturing Center for fear she'd be judged and shamed for wanting an abortion. The doctor began the exam, only to find that the student had a growing ectopic, or tubal, pregnancy -- a condition that can be life threatening.
"It was extremely dangerous. It could have burst on her bus ride," the doctor says. "She literally could have died."
She told the young woman that she would need to go to the hospital immediately and would likely need surgery. The patient, who was in Dallas all alone and scared, insisted that she needed to first go to the bus station to change her ticket, or else she'd lose her fare back to school.
"My heart just sank," the doctor says.
Another doctor, who also won't be named, walks in mocking what she's wearing. She's in a whole surgical getup -- scrubs, a gown, a bonnet, her booties had just been pulled off -- new requirements since the passage of HB2.
The Texas abortion law says physicians must have hospital admitting privileges and clinics must meet the standards of ambulatory surgical centers, or ASCs.
This language may not sound like a big deal, but these are the matters that will be taken up in front of the nation's highest court on Wednesday.
Texas abortion clinics like this one face new restrictions under a law being challenged at the Supreme Court.
Hospitals that don't provide abortions themselves and are state-funded, faith-based or otherwise politically hogtied won't give admitting privileges to an abortion provider.
Then there are the standards of ASCs -- which include building codes like specified door heights, room sizes and hallway widths to accommodate gurneys abortion clinics don't use -- which amount to construction costs most facilities can't swing.
If the U.S. Supreme Court upholds this Texas law, more clinics may close, and not just in Texas. Some states already have similar laws in place; others are watching with their own versions poised and ready to drop.
Another ASC standard is what has this doctor dressed as if she's about to perform heart surgery.
All this for a procedure she usually completes in about five minutes. Not because she rushes, she says, but because she's good and the procedure is simple.
This doctor flies in once a week from New Mexico to work in this Dallas clinic. She hates that she, too, hides who she is and what she does, but in today's climate she feels she has no choice.
She also remembers a woman who'd traveled by bus from afar. She arrived amid heavy rains. A power outage had closed the clinic. Unable to afford a hotel room, the woman roamed the streets over the weekend and spent her nights in a round-the-clock laundromat.
When the clinic finally reopened and she got in, she was required by Texas law to wait another 24 hours after her sonogram before having one of the doctor's five-minute abortions. The clinic got her a hotel room so she could at least clean up, sleep and stay warm.
Both these doctors were trained in other fields -- one as a family physician, the other as an OBGYN -- before completing fellowships in family planning.
For 43 years, since the passage of Roe v. Wade, women have been entitled to abortions under the law in this country. And no matter the challenges, these doctors insist they're in it for the long haul.
There's still plenty of misinformation in their way, however.
After the passage of HB2, callers to a fund that helps cover abortion costs proved this. They were confused and especially scared, the fund's director tells me. They wanted to know if they'd be arrested for getting an abortion.
So the fund changed its outgoing voice mail message to remind women: "Abortion is still legal in Texas." |
The “IPA shipwreck” is one of many long-lasting myths in the history of India Pale Ale. The story says that IPA became popular in Britain after a ship on its way to India in the 1820s was wrecked in the Irish Sea, and some hogsheads of beer it was carrying out east were salvaged and sold to publicans in Liverpool, after which the city’s drinkers demanded lots more of the same. Colin Owen, author of a history of Bass’s brewery, called the tale “unsubstantiated” more than 20 years ago, and others, including me, being unable to find any reports of any such wreck, nor of any indication that IPA was a big seller in the UK until the 1840s, have dismissed it as completely untrue. Except that it turns out casks of IPA did go on sale in Liverpool after a wreck off the Lancashire coast involving a ship carrying hogsheads of beer to India, a shipwreck that, literally, became a landmark – though not in the 1820s – and the true story is a cracker, involving one of the worst storms to hit the British Isles in centuries, which brought huge destruction and hundreds of deaths from one side of the UK to the other.
The story of the IPA shipwreck first turns up in 1869 in a book called Burton-on-Trent, its History, its Waters and its Breweries, by Walter Molyneaux, who described how the Burton brewers began brewing beer for export to India from 1823. Molyneaux wrote: “India appears to have been the exclusive market for the Burton bitter beer up to about the year 1827, when in consequence of the wreck in the Irish Channel of a vessel containing a cargo of about 300 hogsheads, several casks saved were sold in Liverpool for the benefit of the underwriters, and by this means, in a remarkably rapid manner, the fame of the new India ale spread throughout Great Britain.”
Molyneaux’s story has been regularly repeated in the past century and a half. But no one has been able to find a wreck that matched up with his story. This turns out to be, not because the wreck didn’t happen, but because he was 12 years out with the date.
The year after Molyneaux’s book came out, a different version of the tale appeared in the “notes and queries” section of an obscure publication called English Mechanic and World of Science. The account was written by a man who gave himself the name of “Meunier”, and it said: “Forty years ago [ie about 1830] pale ale was very little known in London, except to those engaged in the India trade. The house with which I was connected shipped large quantities, receiving in return consignments of East Indian produce. About 1839, a ship, the Crusader, bound for one of our Indian ports, foundered, and the salvage, comprising a large quantity of export bitter ale, was sold for the benefit of the underwriters. An enterprising publican or restaurant keeper in Liverpool purchased a portion of the beer and introduced it to his customers; the novelty pleased, and, I believe, laid the foundation of the home trade now so extensively carried on.”
The two clues – the ship’s name and the later date – together with the fact that large numbers of newspapers from the time have now been scanned and made available on the web make it easy to trace the story at last. The Crusader was a 584-tonne East Indiaman, or armed merchantman, described as “a fine large ship with painted ports [that is, gun-ports] and a full-length figurehead”, “newly coppered”, that is, with new copper sheathing on the hull to prevent attacks by wood-boring molluscs, and “a very fast sailer”, under the command of Captain JG Wickman. She had arrived in Liverpool early in November 1838 after a five-month journey from either Calcutta or Bombay (different Liverpool newspapers at the time gave different starting ports) with a cargo including raw cotton, 83 elephants’ tusks, coffee, wool, pepper, ginger – and opium, which did not become illegal in Britain until 1916. Captain Wickman and his crew were due to leave for Bombay again on Saturday December 15, after five weeks of roistering in Liverpool, with a cargo that included finished cotton goods, silk, beef and pork in casks, cases of glass shades, iron ingots, tin plates, Government dispatches – and India ale in hogsheads, brewed by two different Burton brewers, Bass and Allsopp, the whole lot being insured for £100,000, perhaps £8 million today.
However the Crusader did not leave on the 15th, possibly because of adverse winds, which certainly kept increasing numbers of ships in Liverpool from Christmas onwards. Finally, on Sunday January 6, 1839, the wind changed, blowing a south-westerly breeze, and some 60 vessels, including the Crusader, left the port. What none of those sailors on board the fleet sailing out from the mouth of the Mersey knew was that a massive, fast-moving depression was coming in across the North Atlantic, travelling from the west-south-west at around 40 to 50 knots. It was bringing hurricane-strength winds, which would batter towns and cities from the west coast of Ireland to the east coast of England, uproot millions of trees, smash down thousands of chimneys, sink hundreds of boats and kill several hundred people. In Ireland, where estimates have suggested between 200 and 400 people died, that Sunday became known as the Night of the Big Wind. Thousands of houses and cottages were stripped of their roofs from Galway to Armagh, with many left on fire. Limerick resembled “a city on which a park of artillery had played for a fortnight.” In Belfast “not a roof escaped”, while Dublin looked, according to one newspaper report, as if it had been sacked by an army, with houses burning or levelled to the ground, and “the rattling of engines, cries of firemen and labours of the military” presenting “the very aspect and mimicry of real war”.
The winds seem to have struck the west coast of Britain late on the evening of Sunday 6th, and did not finally ease up until Tuesday morning. The lowest air pressure measured was about 922.8mb at Sumburgh Head, Shetland around 2pm on Monday 7th, the third lowest figure ever seen in the British Isles. The effects of the storm were felt in London, with “numerous” chimneys blown down in and around Islington and Camden Town, but were far worse in the North: nowhere from one side of the Pennines to the other seems to have been spared serious damage. In Liverpool, thousands spent a sleepness night listening to slates and bricks crashing down into the streets, as even “the best built houses rocked and shook” with the winds, and at least 20 people were killed by falling masonry. In Manchester, where six people died, so many factory chimneys were blown down, it was reckoned between 12,000 and 15,000 workers would be laid off for weeks before the chimneys could be rebuilt and the steam engines that powered the factories restarted. In Bolton, it was said, “not a house escaped”, in Blackburn alone 11 factory chimneys were felled, and in Newcastle upon Tyne “almost every building suffered, more or less”. In Ayr “the streets are covered with slates and chimney cans”, and in Dumfries “the noise during the entire night was more deafening than the battle field”. Birmingham and Wolverhampton, like many other towns and cities, had scarcely a street where houses had not suffered: much of the roof of Birmingham Town Hall was torn off, with lumps of lead weighing almost half a ton crashing into the street or onto nearby houses. Among the windmills demolished were five at Bridlington: others, such as the water company’s windmill in Newcastle upon Tyne, were set on fire by the friction caused when the fierce winds set their sails rotating far faster than their builders had thought possible. In Barnsley, the lead roof was lifted off the Methodist chapel and more factory chimneys demolished, while Leeds saw at least eight mill and factory chimneys levelled, and a church lose 24 feet off its spire. Hayricks were destroyed, pedestrians blown into the air and innsigns made to fly. One remarkable phenomenon reported by the newspapers after the storm was a covering of what appeared to be seasalt on hedges, trees and houses in districts far inland, such as Huddersfield, more than 50 miles from the coast.
Out at sea, the effects of the storm were terrifying and terrible, with ships in peril from the mouth of the Shannon to the mouth of the Humber. Many of the vessels that had left Liverpool on the Sunday escaped the rage of the winds: but many others did not. Ships on their way home from ports far away, and close to the end of their journeys, were also caught. Between 30 and 40 vessels were either sunk or run aground in the Mersey area alone. Several went down with all their crews drowned. Those ships that ran onto sandbanks were then battered by the high winds and huge waves, and began to break up. Lifeboats could not get out to rescue the passengers and crews until the storm lessened, and when rescuers did arrive, they found many of those they were seeking to save had died of exposure in the preceding hours, on deck or in the rigging. The Lockwood, an emigrant ship bound for New York, which had got as far as Anglesey on the Sunday before being driven back by the storm, had then struck sandbanks and begun to list. Of the 110 passengers and crew, 53 died before they could be taken off by rescuers. One of the Crusader‘s fellow East Indiamen, the Brighton, returning from Bombay, struck a sandbank in the mouth of the Mersey on the morning of Monday 7 January and started breaking up. Some 14 of her crewmen made a raft and launched it into the mountainous waves to try to reach land. They were never seen again. The captain and his remaining crew had to cling to the rigging until Tuesday morning before they could be saved by the Liverpool lifeboat.
What happened to the Crusader while she was out at sea appears to be unrecorded, but like other ships she was driven back by the violence of the storm, or, having failed to get past the tempest, tried unsuccessfully to return to the safety of port. On the morning of Tuesday 8th January, nearly two days after she had left Liverpool, and after a “fearful night of wind, hail, thunder and sleet and forked lightning”, the Crusader was seen just off the coast at Blackpool, more than 25 miles north of the Mersey. She had struck a sandbank that is still, today, named Crusader Bank, in her memory, and suffered “much damage”. The ship’s crew were firing the Crusader’s guns to try to attract attention onshore, but soon after, according to the Blackburn Standard newspaper, “two boats put from her, and after crossing the breakers, landed a crew of 26 seamen, when a loud huzza proclaimed their safety.”
While the crew were safe, however, the ship had broken her back, and with her hull being almost covered by water at half-tide, her cargo began to wash up along a 15-mile stretch of coast from the Ribble in the south to the Wyre in the north. “A great deal” of the cargo, however, was gathered in by customs officers and locked up, including 79 hogsheads of ale that had been driven on shore, along with other goods, on January 16. (There was much cargo from other ships also cast up on the coast, along with dead bodies from ships that had sunk.) The Crusader began properly to break up only on Sunday 17th February, more than five weeks after she had run aground, though she then fell to pieces within four days. However, the first sale of cargo saved from the wreck of the Crusader had already taken place in Liverpool on Thursday 7th February. It included cotton fabrics, woollen cloth, silk scarves and veils, tin plates – and “India ale, Bass and Alsop’s [sic] brands”.
Another two sales of goods saved from the wreck of the Crusader, including more India ale, were held in Liverpool on March 14 and March 28. (There were three more sales of items from the ship, in May, June and July, including broken rigging, chains, pumps and anchors, but no more beer).
The story is true, then, that casks of beer destined for India and rescued from a shipwreck in the Irish Sea did go on sale in Liverpool, though at the end of the 1830s, not the middle of the 1820s. But were these sales in Liverpool of several dozen hogsheads, at least, of India ale brewed by Bass’s brewery and Allsopp’s brewery in Burton upon Trent the foundation on which was built the popularity of IPA in Britain? Alas, there is still no hard evidence for that part of the story: and what evidence there is suggests even Liverpool knew about IPA before the Crusader went aground. Beer brewed for the India market had been available in Liverpool since at least 1825, when the Middlesex brewer Hodgson’s of Bow, one of the earliest suppliers of pale ale to the Far East, had an agency in Liverpool for the sale of “pale bottling ale” to “merchants and others”. The first known use of the expression East India Pale Ale in a British publication actually comes from a Liverpool newspaper, but in 1835, four years before the Crusader shipwreck, when Hodgson’s beer, again, was being offered to “merchants and private families”.
Judging by the surge in adverts for IPA in London newspapers, the real take-off for the beer’s popularity appears to be a couple of years after the Great Storm, in 1841. That was certainly the year when Bass finally opened a store in Liverpool for the sale of “pale India ale”, declaring in a notice in Gore’s Liverpool General Advertiser on April 22nd that announced the new store that “This ale, so long celebrated in India, has now become an article of such great consumption in this country (where it is almost superseding every other sort of malt liquor)”, and at the Burton Ale Stores in Ironmonger Lane “a Stock is kept of an age suitable for immediate consumption”. Was this, two years on from the wreck of the Crusader, a result of that ship’s cargo having gone on sale in Liverpool? The verdict here, I think, has to be “not proven”.
Why Molyneaux got the date of the IPA shipwreck so wrong is a puzzle, when there would have been many alive in 1869 who could still remember the Night of the Big Wind 30 years earlier. But while it is part of Ireland’s folk memory – there are poems, and a novel, written about it – the 1839 storm is pretty much forgotten in Britain, probably because in this island it was only the second-worse storm of the 19th century, beaten in impact by the so-called Royal Charter storm of 1859. This was named for a ship that went down off Anglesey with the loss of 450 lives. Another 350 people also died during that storm, which sank 133 ships.
As a footnote, although large numbers of factories were damaged in the 1839 storm, breweries seem to have got off lightly. Newstead and Walker’s brewery in Bolton saw “considerable” damage. In Borrisokane, Tipperary, “the chief part of the Ormond brewery was blown down”. In Dublin, nine horses belonging to Guinness & Co were killed in their stalls by a falling wall. That, however, appears to be it. |
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Blockchain is more than just a payment method for buying illicit goods via online marketplaces, according to Adam Ryan, CEO of Australian-based e-procurement software-as-a-service provider Think.
Blockchain technology, the underlying system that facilitates bitcoin trading, is considered by Ryan to be one of the most sound and secure transaction avenues. He believes blockchain has a lot more to offer than just finalising a payment -- it has the potential to redefine a banking archetype and enable new business models.
"What you're really doing with blockchain technology is enabling two parties to complete a transaction almost as efficiently as you possibly can because it's automated, processed by someone who doesn't really factor in overheads at the transaction cost, and it's almost infinitely scaled," he said.
"The transaction is like a lolly wrapper, it's used once then you throw it away."
Despite advocating that the transaction itself is secure, Ryan believes the risk lies with the storage of information.
"If you look at the way banks are transacting today, they use a similar concept through tokenisation with credit cards so that only certain organisations have the capability of storing all the credit card information that could be used to complete a transaction," Ryan said.
"We need to find better ways of storing information because encryption is so powerful now; it's very hard to intercept a message and encrypt it without the other party knowing it has happened.
"The weakest link is not generally the technology, it's things like physical access -- the people who are trusted. It comes down to trust."
Ryan believes one cannot dispute the soundness of blockchain technology but said its success lies within the uptake.
"I think that it's now growing up like most things and once it grows, once it gets to a certain size, these value added services that you wrap around it need to come into play," he said.
"I think where innovation really kicks in is that the technology enables new business models, not necessarily the technology itself; it's really the enabler for us to do the same things that we used to do faster, better, smarter, cheaper, all of those things. Otherwise there's no value.
"Obviously we already have really good infrastructure in place in the banking system. What they need to do is probably redefine their business model on how they use this technology because ultimately even if blockchain technology is utilised, but the same business models are held, we haven't really progressed.
"All you've really done there is migrate to a newer technology."
The cryptocurrency bitcoin requires blockchain technology to operate. Ryan believes that while bitcoin will not replace currencies, it will have a place in the market.
He said that micropayments and small trade scenarios where two parties are engaging in a barter-like transaction will be a comfy fit for cryptocurrency, but added that as the bitcoin market evolves, it will start to find further ways to engage that were previously not thought of.
"It's like squeezing a balloon -- when you squeeze it with your hand a little bubble pops up somewhere through your fingers and you squeeze that bit and it pops out somewhere else," he said. "Until you squeeze it, you don't know what shape it's going to form."
Ryan believes that just like with any currency, tangible or not, it is still conceptual.
"It's a promissory note -- the paper or plastic itself is of less value than the trust that we have on the value that's on that note," he said. "It's still conceptual, regardless of whether it's something I can fold up and put in my wallet."
"In some ways you could argue that bitcoin is more liquid because it is value that I have and that you have and no third party really tells me about that liquidity -- we do as a market," Ryan said. "It will be the market that squeezes the balloon that will create a new shape."
The bitcoin cryptocurrency has been tied up in controversy since its involvement with the now-closed online black marketplace Silk Road. Silk Road was shuttered by the FBI in October 2013, with the online drug bazaar's mastermind Ross Ulbricht, also known as Dread Pirate Roberts, sentenced to life in prison for his involvement in the platform that prosecutors said had facilitated at least $180 million in sales of illegal drugs.
Ryan believes that with further uptake bitcoin and blockchain technology will require regulation. Whether that regulation comes from the government, the market, or the community, Ryan said it will be needed to lift it to a certain level for more mature payments rather than just transactional type payments.
The Linux Foundation partnered with financial and tech giants last month in a bid to advance the blockchain technology.
The collaboration, which the foundation said will develop an enterprise grade, open source distributed ledger framework, will include companies such as ANZ Bank, IBM, Cisco, CLS, Credits, Digital Asset, Fujitsu, IC3, Intel, London Stock Exchange Group, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, State Street, SWIFT, VMware, and Wells Fargo.
The foundation expects the initiative to help identify and address important features and requirements that are missing when it comes to having a cross-industry open standard for distributed ledgers. The foundation said it believes such a standard can transform the way business transactions are conducted around the world.
Last year, the bitcoin community published an open letter to its community to share an action plan on reaching a consensus on improving bitcoin security and scalability.
"The bitcoin developer community is dedicated to the future of bitcoin, looks after the health of the network, strives for the highest standards of performance, and works to keep bitcoin secure on behalf of everyone," said the letter.
"We have worked on bitcoin scaling for years while safeguarding the network's core features of decentralisation, security, and permissionless innovation.
"We're committed to ensuring the largest possible number of users benefit from bitcoin, without eroding these fundamental values."
The letter was published ahead of two bitcoin scaling workshops -- one in Montreal and the second in Hong Kong -- that were aimed at collaboratively reaching the best outcome for scaling and securing the cryptocurrency. |
FAB Defense has introduced a Glock 43 magazine extension called 43-10. It adds 4 rounds to the standard G43 magazine capacity thus making it a 10 rounder. As with many other magazine extensions for subcompact pistols, this one also forms a full grip.
The internal design is pretty interesting. The 43-10 extension has a set of two coil springs built into it. This system allows installing the extension using the existing magazine spring. So those two coil springs support (in terms of length and strength) the original magazine spring making it able to reliably feed the ten rounds.
The 43-10 is a two-piece design, so in order to install it, you need to unscrew two Allen screws and disassemble the extension. Then disassemble the G43 magazine and remove the magazine floorplate and insert. And the last step is to clamp the two pieces of the extension on the magazine and reinstall the two Allen screws.
Although the Glock 43 loses its compactness with this 43-10 extension, the advantage is obviously to have a spare magazine with this extension installed. The larger magazine would be no problem to carry separately and to conceal effectively. So you can carry the small gun and have a larger capacity magazine for a reload. It also doesn’t interfere with the holster. So you can use the same holster with the extended magazine in the gun.
Here are a couple of videos about the 43-10 and its installation process:
Right now the 43-10 extension is available only in black color, but more color options will be offered later. The price on Zahal.org is $21.99. |
Caching is hard, draw me a picture–Updated Feb 21 2014 6:01 PM
This is my attempt to make the HTTPbis caching rules more accessible and hopefully shine a light on how powerful HTTP caching can be.
I’ve been working on a Pluralsight course that talks about how to use the Microsoft HttpClient library. One of the areas I cover is how to take advantage of HTTP caching. In the process I have been doing quite a bit of reading of the HTTPbis spec document on caching. It isn’t the easiest of specifications to read as there are many interdependencies between the directives and there are a many different scenarios that are supported.
To help me get a grip, I decided I needed to draw some diagrams to help me get a clearer picture of the rules. The rules break down into two distinct steps:
Is a cache allowed to store a response that is returned from an Origin Server? Can a response be served from the cache for a particular request?
Cacheable Methods
GET and HEAD responses may be cacheable.
POST responses may be cacheable, but will only be served to a subsequent GET request. A POST request will never receive a cached response.
The response to PUT, DELETE, CONNECT, TRACE and OPTIONS are not cacheable.
Is No-store present?
In this test we much check both the response cache-control header that comes back from the server and the equivalent request header. If either contain the no-store directive then response should not be held onto for any longer than it takes to return it to the client.
Is shared cache?
HTTP Caches are classified into two distinct types, shared and private. A shared cache stores responses that are to be reused by more than one user. Shared caches are the ones you find sitting in front of web servers, or at the edge of corporate networks. Private caches are usually pieces of software that are either built into the client OS or the client application.
Probably the most important difference in the behaviour of private caches is that they are allowed to store responses that contain authentication headers. This behaviour which keeps your authentication credentials out of shared caches is probably one of the best arguments for using authorization header instead of some custom header or URI query parameter.
The presence of headers like must-revalidate , public and s-max-age override this limitation on shared caches not being able to store responses with an authorization header. I understand why using public and s-max-age might do that, but I’m puzzled as to why must-revalidate does.
Contains Freshness Information?
If a response contains freshness directives like max-age , Expires , or s-max-age , then we know that the server considers the response cacheable.
Can be cached using heuristics?
If no explicit freshness information is provided, then responses with the following status can still be cached using heuristic based caching: 200,203,204,206,300,301,404,405,410,414,501. The details of the heuristics algorithm are specific to the particular client application. For example Internet Explorer uses a fraction of the difference between the last modified date and the current time as the max-age . This is the suggested algorithm in RFC2616. If the last-modified header is not present, then it falls back to user defined settings for caching that response.
Once a response has been stored, then future requests may reuse that stored response.
Effective URI matches stored response?
The request URI is used as part of the primary cache lookup key. The other part is the request method which we will talk about next. The term “Effective URI” is used because on the server side some processing is needed to reconstruct the URI that the client used to make the request.
Can HTTP request method return cached responses?
The second part of the primary cache lookup key is the the HTTP method. As we mentioned earlier, only GET and HEAD requests can return cached responses. However, because the GET and HEAD request for the same resource return different representations they are treated as distinct cache entries. I wondered if it might be acceptable to generate the HEAD cached response directly from a stored GET response by simply stripping off the body. However, I’m not sure if that is allowed because you can use HEAD requests to freshen stored GET responses. Here is the relevant part of the spec, maybe someone else can do a better job of decoding it than me!
Do selecting header fields match?
This innocuous little question deserves a blog post all of it’s own so please accept that I am only skimming the surface here. This test is used when the stored response contains a vary header. When the header fields identified in the vary header contain matching values in both the new request and the stored response then the stored response can be used to satisfy the request.
Does request or response contain no-cache directive?
A request that contains a no-cache directive in either the cache-control header or the pragma header will not allow a stored response to be used directly even if it is fresh. Before it can be used, the cache must make a conditional request back to the server to confirm that the stored response is still valid. Once that is confirmed, then the stored response can be returned. So, to re-iterate, just because you sent a request with no-cache, doesn’t mean that you won’t get a response served from a cache. However, you will be guaranteed that it is up to date.
The same revalidation process occurs if the stored response contains a no-cache header. Most people are surprised when they find out that no-cache doesn’t mean “don’t cache”. It simply means “must-revalidate even if still fresh”.
You might notice that there is no check for the no-store request header in the diagram. The no-store request header is only tested when determining if a response can be cached. If some other user of a shared cache issues a request to a resource that is cacheable and then you issue a request to the same resource with no-store , you could still return a cached response.
So can we finally serve this response?
If the stored response is still fresh. I.e. the expired date has not passed, or the date retrieved plus max-age has not passed, then the response can be served. If the response is stale and the client sends a max-stale directive then it may also be possible to serve the stale response. And finally, if we have just finished re-validating the response, then we can return it.
That’s a high level overview of the process. There are lots of details I skipped, but that’s why the full caching specification is 40 pages! Hopefully, this overview will make it easier when you want to dig into more details in the spec.
Show me the code!
If you are interested to see what this process might look like in code, I have started building a private cache implementation here. Hopefully, I will get comments working again on this blog soon, but in the meanwhile, come find me on twitter with any questions you might have. @darrel_miller |
An internal review has found that an inmate in Kentucky spent five extra months in jail due to human error and possibly computer system issues.
According to The Courier-Journal , David Reyes originally faced felony charges, but pleaded guilty to lesser misdemeanor charges of sexual misconduct, unlawful imprisonment and assault in October 2015.
He received about a one-year sentence with a Sept. 25, 2016 release date, but remained in jail until Feb. 13 when his attorney told a judge he remained imprisoned.
The Louisville Metro Corrections investigation found jail records showed the original felony charges still pending.
A records coordinator noted computer system issues with saving employees' work.
An employee, Jacora Smith, acknowledged inexperience and lack of attention likely made her miss the issue while processing Reyes' release in September 2016. |
Not all girls grow up to be mothers. Sometimes they choose not to be, and sometimes circumstances take those choices away. A superfluity of cancers and genetic diseases can destroy women's ovaries. Or treatments like radiation—used to save a woman's life—can render those egg-producing organs useless. Ovaries also mediate female hormones. Without them, young patients might never go through puberty; grown women could enter menopause early.
Today, a team of bioengineers reported a possible fix: 3-D printed ovaries. Their proof of concept—published in Nature Communications—only works on mice so far, but they could end up replacing the uterus-flanking, chestnut-sized organs in humans, too.
Ovaries are filled follicles—these are immature eggs surrounded by sacs of estrogen and other essential hormones. "The function of the ovary is to shepherd these follicles through maturity into full grown eggs every month," says Teresa Woodruff, a reproductive scientist at Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine, and co-author of the study.
To re-create an ovary's function, Woodruff and her fellow researchers had to start with the ovary's form. "You tend to think of the skeleton as bones in a body that hold up our flesh," she says. "But interestingly, every type of organ has an extracellular matrix made from stiffer substances that act like scaffolds." Last year, they used chemicals to strip away all the follicles, blood vessels, and assorted tissue from a human ovary, leaving only this collagen superstructure. Under the microscope, the scaffold was patterned like an interweaving lattice.
"The next step was to use ovarian tissue as ink," says Woodruff. Tissue ... as ink ... yeah, it's as difficult as it sounds. Tissue, in this sense, is broken-down collagen called gelatin. It's possible to squirt it out of a printer, but only if it's at the right temperature. Too hot, and the structure sags; too cold, and it clumps. The Goldilocks zone for tissue ink turned out to be about about 30˚C.
Biomedical engineer Alexandra Rutz, who at the time was a grad student at Northwestern, and is now a post-doc at École Des Mines De Saint-Étienne in Gardanne, France, solved the temperature problem. Then she had to figure out the best pattern to deposit the gelatin so it formed a lattice structure similar to the collagen of a real ovary. Trial and error meant seeding various mesh patterns in vitro with follicles and seeing which would develop the blood vessels and tissue necessary to keep the immature eggs alive. Once they found the right match, the team was ready to put the organ inside a body.
A very tiny body. "Microsurgeries are something we do in the lab pretty frequently," says Woodruff. Using magnifying glasses, dissecting scopes, and tiny scalpels, they surgically removed one working ovary each from nine female mice and replaced them with 3-D printed prosthetics. (Two of the nine were controls whose printed ovaries had no follicles, and thus no potential to form embryos.) Once the mice had recovered from surgery, the researchers had them mate with male mice—all of which had proven their fertility by fathering previous litters. Pass out the cigars: Three of the females with prosthetic lady parts had babies.
All this happened pretty quickly—female mice ovulate every four days. Their pregnancies last about 20 days. And those cute little babies are old enough to make babies of their own within four months. Woodruff and her team let those babies make babies, then let those babies make more babies, just to make sure the printed ovaries produced no long-term side effects. The process worked perfectly. Additionally, the mothers with 3-D printed organs could nurse normally, which indicated their hormones were just fine—a good sign for ovary-stricken humans.
They'll have to wait a bit longer. Woodruff says first they have to prove their concept works with larger ovaries. They'll implant these into mini pigs, which have bodies big enough to hold human organs and similar menstrual cycles to human females. Woodruff hopes that step, along with clinical trials to establish the treatment is fully safe and effective, will take less than five years. "Gelatin is already FDA approved, so that makes some of the process pretty straightforward," she says.
Ovaries are complicated organs, with hormonal connections to the brain and ovulation cycles that require new blood vessels to grow every month. But Woodruff says they could be good models for other groups working on printed organs. In the future, all the cool kids will be inked on the inside. |
America's deadly double tap drone attacks are 'killing 49 people for every known terrorist in Pakistan'
Study found war against violent Islamists has become increasingly deadly
Researchers blame common tactic now being used – the 'double-tap' strike
Drone strikes condemned for their ineffectiveness in targeting militants
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Just one in 50 victims of America’s deadly drone strikes in Pakistan are terrorists – while the rest are innocent civilians, a new report claimed today.
The authoritative joint study, by Stanford and New York Universities, concludes that men, women and children are being terrorised by the operations ’24 hours-a-day’.
And the authors lay much of the blame on the use of the ‘double-tap’ strike where a drone fires one missile – and then a second as rescuers try to drag victims from the rubble. One aid agency said they had a six-hour delay before going to the scene.
The tactic has cast such a shadow of fear over strike zones that people often wait for hours before daring to visit the scene of an attack. Investigators also discovered that communities living in fear of the drones were suffering severe stress and related illnesses. Many parents had taken their children out of school because they were so afraid of a missile-strike.
Bombardment: More than 345 strikes have hit Pakistan's tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan in the past eight years
Today campaigners savaged the use of drones, claiming that they were destroying a way of life.
Clive Stafford Smith, director of the charity Reprieve which helped interview people for the report, said: ‘This shows that drone strikes go much further than simply killing innocent civilians. An entire region is being terrorised by the constant threat of death from the skies. ‘
There have been at least 345 strikes in Pakistan’s tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan in the past eight years.
'These strikes are becoming much more common,' Mirza Shahzad Akbar, a Pakistani lawyer who represents victims of drone strikes, told The Independent.
'In the past it used to be a one-off, every now and then. Now almost every other attack is a double tap. There is no justification for it.'
The study is the product of nine months' research and more than 130 interviews, it is one of the most exhaustive attempts by academics to understand – and evaluate – Washington's drone wars.
The site of a missile attack in Tappi, a village 12 miles east of Miranshah, near the Afghan border after a U.S. missile attack by a pilotless drone aircraft in 2008. At least six people were killed Tribesmen gather near a damaged car outside a house after a missile struck in Dandi Darpakheil village on the outskirts of Miranshah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal region
VOICES FROM THE DRONE ZONE
Sadaullah Khan, a 15-year-old who lost both legs in a drone strike, says that before his injury, 'I used to go to school…I thought I would become a doctor. After the drone strikes, I stopped going to school.' Noor Behram, a journalist: ' Once there has been a drone strike, people have gone in for rescue missions, and five or ten minutes after the drone attack, they attack the rescuers who are there.' Taxi driver: 'Whether we are driving a car, or we are working on a farm, or we are sitting at home playing cards – no matter what we are doing we are always thinking the drone will strike us. So we are scared to do anything, no matter what.'
Safdar Dawar, President of the Tribal Union of Journalists: 'If I am walking in the market, I have this fear that maybe the person walking next to me is going to be a target of the drone. If I’m shopping, I’m really careful and scared. If I’m standing on the road and there is a car parked next to me, I never know if that is going to be the target. Maybe they will target the car in front of me or behind me. Even in mosques, if we’re praying, we’re worried that maybe one person who is standing with us praying is wanted. So, wherever we are, we have this fear of drones.'
Resident from the Manzar Khel area: 'Now (they have) even targeted funerals…they have targeted people sitting together, so people are scared of everything'
Despite assurances the attacks are 'surgical', researchers found barely two per cent of their victims are known militants and that the idea that the strikes make the world a safer place for the U.S. is 'ambiguous at best'.
Researchers added that traumatic effects of the strikes go far beyond fatalities, psychologically battering a population which lives under the daily threat of annihilation from the air, and ruining the local economy.
They conclude by calling on Washington completely to reassess its drone-strike programme or risk alienating the very people they hope to win over.
They also observe that the strikes set worrying precedents for extra-judicial killings at a time when many nations are building up their unmanned weapon arsenals.
The Obama administration is unlikely to heed their demands given the zeal with which America has expanded its drone programme over the past two years.
Washington says the drone program is vital to combating militants that threaten the U.S. and who use Pakistan's tribal regions as a safe haven.
The number of attacks have fallen since a Nato strike in 2011 killed 24 Pakistani soldiers and strained U.S.-Pakistan relations.
Pakistan wants the drone strikes stopped - or it wants to control the drones directly - something the U.S. refuses.
Reapers and Predators are now active over the skies of Somalia and Yemen as well as Pakistan and - less covertly - Afghanistan.
But campaigners like Mr Akbar hope the Stanford/New York University research may start to make an impact on the American public.
'It's an important piece of work,' he told The Independent. 'No one in the U.S. wants to listen to a Pakistani lawyer saying these strikes are wrong. But they might listen to American academics.'
Today, Pakistani intelligence officials revealed a pair of missiles fired from an unmanned American spy aircraft slammed into a militant hideout in northwestern Pakistan last night.
The two officials said missiles from the drone aircraft hit the village of Dawar Musaki in the North Waziristan region, which borders Afghanistan to the west.
Some of the dead were believed to be foreign fighters but the officials did not know how many or where they were from.
The Monday strike was the second in three days. On Saturday a U.S. drone fired two missiles at a vehicle in northwest Pakistan, killing four suspected militants.
That attack took place in the village of Mohammed Khel, also in North Waziristan.
North Waziristan is the last tribal region in which the Pakistan military has not launched an operation against militants, although the U.S. has been continually pushing for such a move.
The Pakistanis contend that their military is already overstretched fighting operations in other areas but many in the U.S. believe they are reluctant to carry out an operation because of their longstanding ties to some of the militants operating there such as the Haqqani network. |
Caris LeVert was selected by the Brooklyn Nets with the 20th overall pick in this year’s draft. The internet freaked out when the Pacers “stole” Thad Young for the 20th pick. At the time it was a good trade for the Pacers, but now could be an even better trade for the Nets. Yes, Young is a good player, but he’s a role player who will never be an all-star. Yes, Caris LeVert is coming off a significant injury. LeVert’s injury he suffered last year with Michigan was a lower left leg injury that turned into a fracture. That could be an explanation for why he fell in the draft. However, there’s no reason why he cannot recover and be 100%. He didn’t tear an ACL, MCL, or an Achilles.
Caris “The Green Machine” could be money in the bank in the second half of the season. Let’s be realistic, the Nets probably aren’t making the playoffs. That’s okay, they shouldn’t be expected to. So if you are team out of the playoff race, you should be playing your young guys to see what you have and to build chemistry. Caris’s college tape is fantastic. He looks like he has the athleticism of Tracy McGrady with the shooting ability of Kris Middleton. In no way am I saying he will be either player, but he certainly has all-star upside which cannot be said for many of the players selected in front of him.
Last year in 15 games for Michigan, LeVert averaged 16.5ppg, 5.3apg, 4.9apg, FG 50.6%, FT 79.4%, 3P 44.6%, 1spg, 1.7tpg. Before you cry small size, hear me out. Good shooting has become very valuable in the NBA. Hopefully, he will be able to shoot high 30s from the NBA three-point line, but what if I told you he was 6-7 and could play three positions? Caris is good enough of a playmaker to play point guard and he has the size to play shooting guard and small forward. Yes, defense has been a bit of an issue for him. That might be because he’s only 200lbs. Even if his future is DeMar DeRozan on defense, he can still be a very good player. When you can shoot, create for others, and rebound there is a place for you in the NBA especially when you have length.
Who on the Nets can LeVert play next to?
Caris pairs nice with Rondae Hollis-Jefferson. Caris brings the shooting and Rondae can provide the lockdown defense. What more could you ask for? How about shooting and shooting? That comes when you order the entrée of Bojan Bogdanovic with the side of Caris LeVert. Still hungry? How about the dessert of Jeremy Lin’s penetration with all that shooting?
Bold NBA Projections for Caris LeVert
Rookie Year: 7.3ppg, 3rpg, 2.7apg, 1.0 3pm, FG 39%, FT 76%, 0.8spg, 1.5tpg
Sophomore Year: 12ppg, 4.5rpg, 4apg, 1.5 3pm, FG 42%, FT 78%, 1spg, 2tpg
Junior Year: 14.5ppg, 4.75rpg, 5apg, 1.5 3pm, FG 44%, FT 79%, 1spg, 2tpg
Senior Year: 16ppg, 5rpg, 5apg, 1.75 3pm, FG 46%, FT 80%, 1spg, 2.25tpg
Statistically, I see Caris as a light version of Brandon Roy. If you recall before Roy’s injury woes he was averaging 20+ppg and able to play multiple positions at 6-6 215 lbs. I think LeVert might actually be more athletic than Roy, but not quite as talented. Brandon Roy was morphing into a franchise player whereas I don’t think Caris LeVert will ever be that in the NBA. Brandon Roy was a guy who could take over games late and put the time on his back. It’s hard to imagine Caris ever being that, but that’s okay. Right now, the Nets have Brook Lopez as their franchise player as he’s a pretty good one. Fun fact, Lopez was the only big man in the NBA to average 20+ppg while shooting FT 78+%.
At pick 20, if you are getting a role player in the NBA draft you probably doing well. If you get a guy who can become a second or third option for your team, you are making a case to be executive of the year. Caris LeVert should work his way into being the fourth option on this Nets team this season, but has second option upside in years to come. Don’t sleep on LeVert because he was the 20th pick and coming off injury. Before his injury, many draft experts had him slated for the lottery. I think he’s got a good chance to outperform over half of the lottery selections over the course of his career.
“Your feedback below my article would help improve the quality of future articles” |
Why does Sharia-Arab leaders not take Syrian Sunni-refugees?
Could this be part of Islam´s desire to rule the world?
Distribution of Syrian refugees in the middle East (The Washington Post 4 Sept. 2015).
The Following shocking video report by The Daily News Wire 2012 shows that most European countries will for demographic reasons be Muslim by 2040-2050.
This is in accordance with the commandments of the Koran:
Koran sura 9:33 It is He Who hath sent His Messenger with guidance and the Religion of Truth, to proclaim it over all religion, even though the Pagans may detest (it).
Koran sura 33:27 And He made you heirs of their (unbelievers´) lands, their houses, and their goods, and of a land which ye had not frequented (before). And God has power over all things.
Koran sura 2:218 Those who believed and those who suffered exile and fought (and strove and struggled) in the path of God,- they have the hope of the Mercy of God: And God is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.
4.100 He who forsakes his home in the cause of God, finds in the earth Many a refuge, wide and spacious: Should he die as a refugee from home for God and His Messenger, His reward becomes due and sure with God: And God is Oft-forgiving, Most Merciful.
3.195 And their Lord hath accepted of them, and answered them: “Never will I suffer to be lost the work of any of you, be he male or female: Ye are members, one of another: Those who have left their homes, or been driven out therefrom, or suffered harm in My Cause, or fought or been slain,- verily, I will blot out from them their iniquities, and admit them into Gardens with rivers flowing beneath;- A reward from the presence of God, and from His presence is the best of reward.
9:20 Those who believe, and suffer exile and strive with might and main, in God’s cause, with their goods and their persons, hav e the highest rank in the sight of God: they are the people who will achieve (salvation).
9:21 Their Lord doth give them glad tidings of a Mercy from Himself, of His good pleasure, and of gardens for them, wherein are delights that endure:
9:22 They will dwell therein for ever. Verily in God’s presence is a reward, the greatest (of all).
Comment:
Saudi Arabian leadership are clever: They don´t take Muslim refugees – but let them colonize Europe – financing their mosques with our oil money – and wait for the day when their Muslim religious centre (Mekka) can rule the world. And we tolerate and import Muslims en masse even pay for them – even drive them up here by shattering their homes as part of an ethnic cleansing of white Europeans and the establishment of intolerant Sharia. That is the satanic NWO fulfilling the Coudenhove Kalergi/Sarkozy plan of a Europe of mongrels and without Followers of Christ – as prescribed by Adam Weishaupt and Mayer Amschel Rothschild. Christian churches promote this development and here – Lutheran Churches, too. For they are widely no longer Christian – but Masonic Luciferians. |
Fox News Channel pundits Greta Van Susteren and Erick Erickson have gone to war over Texas state Sen. Wendy Davis (D) and Erickson’s characterization of Davis as “Abortion Barbie.” According to Talking Points Memo, a blog post by Van Susteren calling Erickson a “jerk” goaded Erickson into publishing a gruesome anti-choice rant that described scenes more suited to an abattoir or an installment of the “Saw” movie franchise than a women’s clinic.
“Wendy Davis has staked her career on the right to chop a child to bits, no matter how viable the child is,” Erickson wrote on Monday night at his blog Red State.
Rather than the bullying “jerk” portrayed by Van Susteren, Erickson perceives himself as a courageous truth-teller, saying, “I have helped define Wendy Davis by a moniker that sticks, describes, and makes her the butt of jokes, while drawing out the shrill hysterics of her supporters.”
The erstwhile CNN pundit was responding to a Monday blog post by Van Susteren at her GretaWire website in which she called out Erickson for lobbing sexist insults at Davis via Twitter.
In the post, Van Susteren derided Erickson and Davis’ other attackers as “creeps who take cheap shots because they are too ignorant and small to engage in an important discussion.”
“I don’t care how much you disagree or agree with Texas’ Wendy Davis, you have to agree that this guy, Erick Erickson, is a real jerk and is really lousy at being a spokesperson for his views,” she said.
Further, she asked what kind of example he is setting for his own daughter, writing, “I see he tweets about his daughter. When I read the above tweet I thought, I wonder how proud his daughter would be of him if she knew that he tweeted insults about women. It is one thing to disagree…but he tweets insults.”
Erickson responded by posting “A Very Sincere Thank You” to Van Susteren Monday night.
“Wendy Davis believes it is perfectly acceptable to crack open a child’s skull, inject her cranium with saline, vacuum out her brains, then tear her limb from limb unstitching her from her mother’s womb even though a minute, an hour, a day, a week, or a month later she could survive outside the womb,” he insisted, engaging in a common anti-choice trope of equating any fertilized egg — even a ten-day-old blastocyst — to a fully viable fetus.
“Wendy Davis has staked her career on the right to chop a child to bits, no matter how viable the child is,” he wrote, referring to Davis’ 13-hour filibuster against a draconian Texas anti-choice law that would make abortion illegal de facto by closing the bulk of the state’s clinics.
The act of defiance against the Texas GOP’s hegemony over the state drew thousands of supporters to the state capitol in Austin and has galvanized Texas Democrats. Davis announced in 2013 that she intends to run for governor, a move that has some in the state recalling the leadership of former Gov. Ann Davis (D) and others frantically hurling insults and distortions in an effort to stop Davis’ momentum.
“Wendy Davis is a one issue wonder heralded by the press because she is a high priestess of the secular religion’s sacred sacrament — slaughtering children on the altar of Moloch. That Greta Van Susteren is offended by me, thinks me creepy and a jerk, and thinks I should not be listened to is of no harm or consequence to me,” he wrote.
Now, apparently, Republicans are not only calling Davis a “coke whore,” an unfit mother and a coldly ambitious huntress, Erickson is calling her a baby-sacrificing witch.
Van Susteren and fellow Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly have singled out Erickson in the past for the viciousness of his attacks on women.
Erickson, a Macon, Georgia resident and longtime far-right agitator has been given to rhetorical extremes in the past. He famously called Supreme Court Justice David Souter a “goat-f*cking child molester.”
In 2009, he called Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) a eunuch and an infectious “cancer” on the GOP. He called on fellow conservatives to “collectively rip off his jaw and shovel the crap back down his throat that he’s been serving us.”
[image of Erick Erickson via Gage Skidmore’s Flickr photostream, Creative Commons licensed] |
fyi rip if you are reading this I am not trying to speak for you...
ripster in the past seemed to like that people discuss and share his content.
As long as they give credit to him or any other original author for the work!
The biggest problem I have seen him have with it is when someone reposts one of his pictures or his other content and does not reference that it came from him. This happens all the time and despite some users negative opinion of this... Watermark your photos!
Ripster was right in promoting this idea. I do not know how many times I have seen people repost pics from ripster, reaper, tsangen, jdcarpe, and many more and not reference where the original came from. but we all know because of the watermark. |
When looking for inspiration to set our entrepreneurial journeys on point, we look at different regions of success to guide our way forward. We get inspiration from Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, but we sometimes forget that some of the biggest companies run in the world are being managed by Indian-origin leaders. We have a huge network of hard-working change-leaders in the world and the message is clear – “India is changing the world today”. With these former employees-turned CEOs taking the reins at some of the biggest companies world-wide, here’s a bit more about their inspiring journeys.
Image: Shutterstock
Sundar Pichai
We all know Sundar; he’s been at the helm of Google for many years now and taken over from Larry Page’s well executed ship and turned it into a scalable coherent and integrated offering in the ad-tech and innovation space in the world. He was born in Chennai in the 1972, where even at a young age he was fascinated by tech and hardware. His dad was his greatest inspiration behind his early curiosity, and he attributes that to his success in IIT-K and subsequently Stanford Engineering School. He started working on Google Chrome, and moved on to Google Toolbar and many other innovations that further enhanced the growth of the Chrome browser. He has handed the reigns of Android software in 2013, and then CEO of the company a few years later. What was his secret to success? - Being humble. He was always called the “nice guy” at work and everyone seemed to like him.
Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft since 2014.
After Steve Balmer stepped down from his duties. Satya has been a true company man, having worked in Microsoft since 1992 after he quit Sun Microsystems. Nadella born in Hyderabad, graduated from the University of Mangalore with a BSC in electrical engineering and was selected to study in United States. He earned two masters' degrees: one in Comp Sci, from the University of Wisconsin, and another as an MBA from the University of Chicago. With both universities, not-ivy league status, Satya made is a point to succeed in the corporate world no matter what. His secret to success has always been to learn more every day. He’s quoted as saying - “Always keep learning,” he told the Deccan Chronicle. “You stop doing useful things if you don’t learn.”
Ajit Jain
“Ajit Jain made more money for Berkshire Hathaway than I probably have” said Warren Buffet in his 53rd Annual General Meeting. High praise from the man himself. Getting over the sentiment of being “untested”, Ajit Jain quickly made tens of billions of dollars for the shareholders of Berkshire and made himself one of the go-to guys at Berkshire. “From a standing start in 1985, Ajit has created an insurance business with float of $37 billion and a large cumulative underwriting profit, a feat no other insurance CEO has come close to matching”, Warren mentioned further. Ajit graduated from IIT with a degree in mechanical engineering, after which he moved to the US in the late 1970s receive his MBA from Harvard Business School, and joined Berkshire Hathaway in 1985. He’s speculated to be the next CEO of the company and is set to be one of the most influential people in the world of insurance business, with his humble beginnings emerging from Orissa.
Ajit also established the Jain Foundation in 2005, a non-profit organization to cure limb-girdle muscular dystrophies which was a condition that Jain's son had at the time.
Indra Nooyi
As the second most powerful woman in the world, Indra Nooyi is making Indians proud everywhere. Born in Chennai in 1955 in humble beginnings, Indra knew the value of hard-work. She’s now worth more than $150 Million. She was called a “wild child” according to those that knew her growing up, and she’s now taken that wild streak and converted it into the most successful story of a woman rising to power in the world. She completed her MBA from the Indian Institute of Management in Calcutta, and worked with Johnson & Johnson, then moving to the Yale School of Management to further her education and worked with Boston Consulting Group (BCG) before taking the role at PepsiCo. Her most proud accomplishment was earlier on in her career with Stayfree sanitary napkins. At that time advertising for feminine hygiene products was banned. Nooyi innovated quickly and introduced the products to girls by directly marketing to female students at schools and colleges.
Ajay Banga
As the president and CEO of MasterCard, a member of the U.S. President’s Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations, and the longest-tenured chairman of the board of directors of the U.S.-India Business Council (USIBC), Ajay Banga is a prime example of remarkable talent meeting perseverance. Ajay recounts his early-life and career with a quote he learned from his then mentor and MD at Nestle “Don’t take no for answer. There is always a way to solve that problem if you don’t take it as a challenge it will not work out.” Ajay has followed this advice for his entire career and worked as the CEO of CitiGroup for many years before finally being at the head of MasterCard. In his opinion, one person can make all the difference in a company. That’s his mission and purpose in life.
Here’s a wonderful video where Ajay recounts his life experiences – |
The Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) has made a comeback at the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) on Sunday by winning the joint secretary's post, sources said.
The joint secretary's post was won by ABVP's Saurabh sharma.
The president's post was won by All India Students Federation (AISF)'s Kanhaiya Kumar, while vice-president and general secretary's posts were retained by All India Students Association (AISA). The seats were won by Shehla Rashid Shora and Rama Naga respectively.
The students' union election at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) on Friday recorded 53.3 percent turnout, a marginal dip from last year. Last year, the voters' turnout was 54.58 percent.
A total of 22 candidates had contested for the Jawaharlal Nehru Students Union central panel that has posts of president, vice-president, general secretary and joint secretary. |
New Westminster NDP MLA Judy Darcy spent almost $30,000 more on her reelection campaign for the May 9 provincial election than the riding’s other four candidates combined.
Financial reports, released by Elections B.C. Tuesday, showed Darcy spent $117,793 while the rest of the riding’s candidates expended a total of $88,122 trying to defeat her.
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In seeking her second term, Darcy collected more than she spent. Her total income was $122,393. Most of that, $90,051 came from the New Democratic Party. The former union boss also picked up $22,632 in contributions from three trade unions – CUPE B.C., New Westminster-based Health Sciences Association and the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1518. Han Wang and Victor Wang of City Point Real Estate Development in Vancouver gave her campaign $9,200.
Darcy won the riding with 52 per cent of the votes. The order of finish also reflected the money spent by the candidates.
Jonina Campbell of the Green Party, who finished second, received a lot of financial help from her own community. More than half, $24,042, of her $48,947 income came from individual contributions and another $2,710, in gross income, came from a fundraising function. The party put up $21,945 toward Campbell’s campaign. But she listed her total expenditures at $53,317.
All but $500 of the $35,436 B.C. Liberal candidate Lorraine Brett, the third-place finisher, had to work with came from party coffers, but she ended up only spending $30,540 of it.
Social Credit candidate James Crosty worked with revenue of $4,265 and spent it all. The party contributed $2,970, he put in $771 himself and the rest, $524, came from Gerda Suess, a long-time party supporter and New Westminster resident.
Libertarian candidate Rex Brocki did not report any income or expenditures on the financial report he submitted to Elections B.C.
It was a similar story in the new riding of Richmond-Queensborough where the winner, Jas Johal of the B.C. Liberals, significantly outspent his opposition. But in his case, he barely beat out his NDP counterpart, Aman Singh, (8,219 to 8,084) at the polls.
Johal, a former television journalist who was one of the Liberals’ star recruits, reported $167,227 in income with only $250 coming from campaign contributions, the rest came out of the coffers of the B.C. Liberal Party. He reported spending $173,853 on the campaign.
Singh reported he had only $20,619 to work with, of which only $10,719 came from the NDP. However, he reported he ended up spending $40,446.
Michael Wolfe of the Green Party reported receiving only $650, of which $550 came out of his own pocket. |
Steven Gerrard will miss the LA Galaxy's penultimate match of the season against the Houston Dynamo and his status for the remainder of the season is still up in the air.
Gerrard returned to Liverpool earlier this week to rehab a nagging hamstring injury that sidelined him for much of September. The midfielder returned from the injury late last month and went 68 minutes in the Galaxy's 1-0 defeat to FC Dallas two weeks ago.
“Steven had a re-occurrence of his hamstring injury. He’s obviously out for a bit,” Arena, who confirmed that Gerrard's status is still 'day to day,' told Spectrum SportsNet. “He could do at home what he could do here as well. It was OK for him to depart for a week or two.”
The 36-year-old midfielder is expected to return by early next week and could return by this weekend, but will not participate in Sunday's match against the Houston Dynamo. Arena confirmed that the team will have to "wait and see" when Gerrard, who has made 21 appearances with three goals and 11 assists this season will return to the field. |
Erik "Tabzz" van Helvert has announced in Twitter his departure from Origen. The dutch player has been playing as the marksman of Enrique "xPeke" Cedeño's team during the 2017 spring split. This news comes just a week after Origen's relegation to the Challenger Series. Tabzz is the second player of the roster that has officially announced his departure from the team — the first was Max "Satorius" Günther.
Being only 23 years old, Tabzz is one of the most experienced professional League of Legends players, starting his career in 2011. He has played in several high level teams like Lemondogs, where he disputed his first World Championship in 2013, or Alliance, team with he would play in the 2014 Worlds and that would rebrand to Elements.
After the dismantling of Elements, that sold its spot to Schalke 04, 2016 was probably one of his most turbulent years. He signed for Banditos, a team that he would leave to compete again in the LCS with Team ROCCAT. However, for the summer split he would go back to the Challenger Series with Millenium.
He started 2017 with Origen, where he would end up sharing the botlane with two different supports: Aleksi “Hiiva” Kaikkonen — who would be replaced in the sixth week of the split —, and the owner of the club himself, Enrique "xPeke" Cedeño.
According to David "Carving" Primo, co-founder of Origen, Tabzz would be one of the most hard working players of the team. However, the internal problems of the organization would end up unmotivating him and reverberate on his performance.
After this unfortunate season, that he started with high expectations, the dutch marksman ends his relation with Origen and is looking for opportunities from any league, but he specifies that would prefer playing in the North American or European LCS or Challenger Series.
Regarding Origen, the club has yet to make a public statement. |
Finding a place to rent in Metro Vancouver is tough enough.
But almost half of those who have found a place are straining their finances to keep those roofs over their heads, according to data contained in Wednesday’s Census release.
Coverage of renting in Vancouver on Globalnews.ca:
This week, Statistics Canada released “Housing in Canada: key results from the 2016 Census,” a dataset showing how much the country’s housing landscape has changed over the past decade.
Data contained in the release showed that just over 43 per cent of renters are spending 30 per cent or more of their income on shelter in the Vancouver Census Metropolitan Area (CMA).
The CMA covers an area that includes municipalities such as Vancouver, Richmond, Surrey, North Vancouver and Langley.
The Census release showed that, out of 348,700 renters identified in the Census, 150,505 (43.2 per cent) were spending 30 per cent or more of their income on shelter costs in 2015.
The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CMHC) says housing can be considered affordable if it takes up less than 30 per cent of before-tax household income.
Therefore, more than 43 per cent of residents in the Vancouver CMA were living in housing that can’t necessarily be considered affordable.
READ MORE: North Van developer says the industry needs to do more to help with the housing crisis
Census data compiled by Andy Yan, director of the SFU City Program, shows varying levels of renters living in “unaffordable” housing across Metro Vancouver’s municipalities.
In the City of Vancouver, 44.2 per cent of renters were living in housing that took up 30 per cent or more of their income.
The highest share of renters living in housing they couldn’t afford was observed in Lions Bay, where the share was 66.7 per cent.
The lowest share was witnessed in Anmore, where it was 25 per cent.
But that’s not the only figure suggesting that Metro Vancouverites are spending more than they can technically afford on a place to live.
Data crunched by the B.C. Non-Profit Housing Association (BCNPHA) shows that 22 per cent of renters were spending at least half of their before-tax income on shelter.
Either way, the share of renters paying more than 30 per cent is significant, said Nathanael Lauster, a UBC professor and the author of The Death and Life of the Single-Family House: Lessons from Vancouver on Building a Livable City.
“When it comes to renters in particular, it’s pretty clear that this is a real problem of people not being able to find affordable rental housing,” he told Global News.
Lauster had a few questions about why the CMHC considers 30 per cent as the benchmark for what’s considered “affordable” shelter.
“It is to some extent an arbitrary number,” he said.
READ MORE: Vision Vancouver says it heard people ‘loud and clear’ on housing, but some are skeptical
Nevertheless, he said we “want to make sure people have enough left over.”
“If it’s a world where people are just choosing to spend a little more on rent because they want a really nice place, and other people choose to spend their money differently, that’s not such a bad world,” Lauster said.
“But if they have no choice, which is I think the world we’re in, that’s a real problem.”
Lauster said the sheer number of people putting more than 30 per cent of their income toward shelter across the Vancouver CMA suggests that housing should be treated as a Metro Vancouver issue, rather than a “City of Vancouver” issue.
Yan “absolutely” agreed — but he also said that affordability metrics looking only at the share of income spent on rent don’t capture the whole picture.
“What we’re missing is transportation costs,” he told Global News.
Yan noted that the region isn’t just facing an “affordability” problem; it’s facing an “availability” problem, in which people are having to look for places to rent outside of Vancouver’s urban core.
“As a consequence, that inherently means if your job is in the urban core, right, that it used to be, ‘Hey, I’ll hop on a bus in East Van or I’ll walk over from the West End,'” he said.
Now, people have to look to communities like Burnaby or Langley.
“It might work for certain people,” he said. “But for others, you know, when you don’t live near a public transit line, that means your transportation costs, both in physical, actual costs, but also opportunity costs will suddenly go up.
“The idea of being under pressure for rent is now being under pressure for transportation.”
Yan noted that the nearly 45 per cent of City of Vancouver renters who put more than 30 per cent of their income toward shelter might be better off than someone in Pitt Meadows, where the share is 35 per cent.
“If you’re living in Vancouver, you’re taking the bus or biking,” he said. “But if you live in Pitt Meadows, you’re probably not, so you can see the cost.”
But how to solve the issue of high rents — and transportation costs?
Yan said governments all over the region might want to think about zoning for particular forms of housing around certain areas, like on lots close to transit.
“I think particularly around SkyTrain routes, there’s a fair discussion that since renters take transit more often than owners, that there should be a consideration of tenure for higher-density developments along transit routes,” he said.
Yan said such measures are about realizing that renting is a part of living in Vancouver, “for a lifetime.”
“That isn’t some temporary phase of being on the route to home ownership,” he said. |
With July 1st quickly approaching we here at WingsNation are turning our focus from the Draft to Free Agency and there are a few names that are sure to draw the attention of Red Wings fans.
Yakupov not qualified, UFA July 1st — Dustin Nielson (@nielsonTSN1260) June 26, 2017
This afternoon the St. Louis Blues announced that they did not tender a qualifying offer to former No.1 overall pick Nail Yakupov, which means he will become an unrestricted free agent on Saturday.
Yakupov has fallen a long way since being the first player selected in 2012. That year, the NHL was in a lockout but when they resumed play Yakupov impressed. The rookie posted 17 goals and 14 assists (31 points) in the 48-game shortened season, finishing fourth on the Edmonton Oilers in points. After that expectations were high but Yakupov failed to deliver in the three subsequent seasons and ended up being traded to the Blues last October.
Things didn’t get any better in his new home as he bounced in and out of the lineup with regularity and finished the campaign with just nine points (3G / 6A) in 40 games.
With limited cap space, the moves Ken Holland and the Red Wings’ front office can make are limited, so is it worth taking a chance on the former No.1 pick and hope he can find the game that made him so highly sought after five years ago?
Detroit isn’t expected to be a playoff team in 2017-18, but they also aren’t expected to start a complete overhaul. With a limited number of high-end forward prospects on the horizon, other than Evgeny Svechnikov, maybe Yakupov is worth the gamble. After all, his contract likely won’t be too rich and it could be a low-risk/high-reward type of move.
Last year Yakupov had a 51.68 CorsiFor% and a 1.85 CF% RelTm, which suggests the Blues were more dangerous with him on the ice than on the bench. However, in the same season @MimicoHero’s Hero Chart player evaluation tool suggests that Yakupov performed as a fourth line winger.
I think it would be a reasonable idea to bring Yakupov in on a one-year deal to see what he’s got. If it doesn’t work out, he sits or goes on waivers and we all know that Holland doesn’t mind putting wingers in their mid-20’s on waivers. I don’t think that Yakupov will be the answer or come in here and be a 30-goal scorer, but I think he could help increase scoring and help their beleaguered power play. At just 23-years-old, his best years could very well still be ahead of him.
The game is shifting to a faster, smaller game and Yakupov has that in spades. He has quick feet and an uncanny ability to snipe from all over the ice. Adding him to a roster that has speedsters like Dylan Larkin and Andreas Athanasiou and snipers like Anthony Mantha and Tomas Tatar, Yakupov might be a solid fit in Detroit. I mean, if Riley Sheahan can get a spot in the lineup without scoring a goal for 81 games, Yakupov might as well get a shot. |
Daniel Levy had something for nothing, which is precisely how he likes it. The Tottenham Hotspur chairman had the signature on the pre-contract and he was looking forward to welcoming Schalke's attacking midfielder Lewis Holtby as a Bosman free agent in June.
When the situation altered, it is possible to imagine Levy, the arch ball-breaker, as enduring all manner of agonies. André Villas-Boas, the Tottenham manager, had lost a body in midfield – Sandro was out for the season after knee surgery – and he was keen to bring forward Holtby's transfer to the current window. Whisper it to Levy, it would now cost a small fee.
And yet, Levy's willingness to pay the £1.5m in what, for him, had to be considered as expedient fashion – more than 72 whole hours before Thursday's deadline – revealed everything that you needed to know about the deal. It was put to Villas-Boas on Tuesday lunchtime, ahead of Wednesday night's Premier League fixture at Norwich City, when Holtby will travel as part of the 19-man squad, that this was the deal of the century.
"Yes, I think so," he replied. "The January market is very, very demanding. Transfer fees can be ridiculously high. But on Lewis's case, it was the opposite so we managed to make a good deal and bring him in early."
Tottenham are getting a 22-year-old Germany international, who was central to the offensive ambitions of one of the Bundesliga's leading clubs and had been primed to feature in the Champions League knockout phase; Schalke fancy their chances against Galatasaray in the last 16. Villas-Boas has likened him to Rafael van der Vaart, the No10 he sold to Hamburg last August. And just to repeat: the fee is £1.5m. On a purely business level, Levy would have no shortage of takers at a far higher sell-on price, even if things did not work out.
It is remarkable that one of Germany's brightest young talents has been allowed to run down his contract yet there does not seem to be any sense of recrimination. In his first appearance for Schalke since the original announcement that he would join Tottenham in June, he starred in the thrilling 5-4 home win over Hannover, making goals, scoring one and departing to an ovation upon his substitution. Imagine that happening to a want-away player in the Premier League.
Schalke were happy to salvage the fee for him and it has all felt very German, with the rider being that Holtby is part-English. It is the part, he jokes, that makes him rubbish at taking penalties. His father, Chris, an Everton-supporting Liverpudlian, was in the British army, a veteran of the Falklands conflict, and was posted to Germany where he met his future wife, Heidi. They settled in Mönchengladbach, where the British army had barracks close to Borussia Mönchengladbach's new stadium. Holtby would support the club as a boy.
He was eligible to play for England until he made his full competitive debut for Germany against Azerbaijan in June 2011 – he has three caps – but he admitted that his allegiances had been cast when he played his first match for Germany's Under-18s. He has never lived in England, until now, and he has played only one senior game on English soil –for Schalke in the 2-0 Champions League win at Arsenal last October.
"At first, it did feel a bit strange when I played for Germany with the Under-18s in 2007 but once I played that was probably it," Holtby said. "Nobody from the English FA got in contact and it would probably have been too late. I would have felt a traitor changing shirts."
Holtby has long harboured the ambition to play in England – he lists one of his sporting idols as Manchester United's Ryan Giggs – and there is excitement as he begins his four-and-a-half-year contract at White Hart Lane. Villas-Boas spoke of his creative and goalscoring threat, of his "brilliant left foot" but, above all, he sounded as pleased as punch at a transfer market coup.
"It's difficult to find a 22-year-old full international running down his contract and we were extremely lucky because we faced tough competition for him," Villas-Boas said. "There was competition from all over. He's recognised as an excellent young talent and he was very willing to come to Spurs. He has done extremely well in Germany and we have high expectations for him. It is a major boost that we managed to have him in January."
Villas-Boas spoke to Holtby as Tottenham sought his signature and so did Steffen Freund, the club's assistant manager and former Germany international. Freund knows a thing or two about football in the Ruhr Valley, having played for Schalke and Borussia Dortmund.
"All of us wanted to give Lewis a feeling of the club and what he could expect," Villas-Boas said. "Players settle in differently but I hope his English background can help him a little bit. He knows the culture and the language very well so, hopefully, he can be quicker to adapt."
Holtby's versatility is a strength. He has played as a holding midfielder, and wide right and left, but the creative role behind the striker is where Villas-Boas sees him. As such, Holtby enters competition with the summer signings Gylfi Sigurdsson and Clint Dempsey.
"He will fill the No10 position, although he can play right or left, which he did for Mainz at the beginning of his career," Villas-Boas said. "We have the expectation because of his creativity and we can compare him to Rafa [van der Vaart] to a certain extent because he was a full international coming from a big club. Lewis has all of his career ahead of him." |
Only one of them is kind of in the South.
Matthew Cavanaugh / Getty Images
March 1 is the first Super Tuesday — when Democrats in 11 states will weigh in on the nomination fight between Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton. Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, and Virginia will all hold Democratic primaries or caucuses. Also Democrats in American Samoa will vote, as will a group of American Democrats living overseas called Democrats Abroad.
Overall, it's a good map for Clinton. Even Sanders supporters agree that's true. Justin Sullivan / Getty Images
Southern states with larger populations of black Democratic voters are expected to go her way, and she's had at least some operations on the ground in other states for a while.
But Sanders sees a chance possibly to win five of the Super Tuesday states — Colorado, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Oklahoma, and Vermont. Publicly and privately, aides talk about these five states as places where Sanders could win on Super Tuesday. He's already started his campaigning there in earnest: On Monday, he hosted a big rally in Amherst, Massachusetts. The Sanders campaign points to polling data showing the five as competitive. BuzzFeed News asked Joe Dinkin, a top official at the progressive Working Families Party, to explain a bit about why each state could be in play for Sanders on Tuesday. The WFP backed Sanders early and has been working to bolster his campaign, tapping into its grassroots network of progressives to raise money and organize for Sanders.
Marc Piscotty / Getty Images
Colorado Colorado is a caucus state, which in theory means that only the most rabid Democratic voters will participate. At the start of the nomination season, that was thought to be good news for Sanders, but results for him in caucus states have been mixed — he battled Clinton to a virtual tie in Iowa, but lost in Nevada. His biggest win came from the traditional primary in New Hampshire. Sanders allies say the state's makeup is a good look for Bernie. He hosted a huge rally in Denver on Feb. 13 — 18,000 showed up to hear him speak at a convention center — and allies say he's got momentum there. "Colorado has a big constituency of progressives and a big constituency of Latinos," Dinkin said. "Progressive Democrats are a place where Sen. Sanders can do well and, after Nevada, I think Latino voters are a constituency where you can expect Sen. Sanders to be very, very competitive."
Matthew Cavanaugh / Getty Images Amherst, Feb. 22.
Massachusetts Two words: Elizabeth Warren. The Massachusetts senator and progressive icon has not endorsed in the nomination contest — a result that some Sanders supporters say is a victory in itself for their guy. "In Massachusetts, Elizabeth Warren is extremely popular and I think in a lot of ways Sanders reads from the same playbook as Sen. Warren, talking about the way that the economy is rigged and the political system is rigged for the top 1%," Dinkin said. Sanders' message will resonate in Massachusetts, Dinkin said, "because people have been hearing it from an extremely popular Sen. Elizabeth Warren."
Stephen Maturen / Getty Images Rep. Keith Ellison and Sanders in Minnesota on Feb. 12.
Minnesota It's a very blue state, and it's home to one of Sanders' most prominent endorsers — Minneapolis-area Rep. Keith Ellison, one of the most liberal Democrats on Capitol Hill. Sanders has hosted a number of huge rallies in Minnesota, and allies say the caucuses there are basically a perfect moment for Sanders to do well. "A state with a deep progressive fabric," Dinkin said. "Minnesota's governor [Mark Dayton] is one of the more progressive governors in America, and is somebody who has balanced the budget by raising taxes on the rich, is for raising the minimum wage, expanding public education. It's been one of the biggest progressive success stories."
Saul Loeb / AFP / Getty Images President Obama and Oklahoma's Republican Gov. Mary Fallin in 2015.
Oklahoma It's a deeply red state, but one where Democrats have sought to find common ground with Republicans for a while now. In 2015, President Obama visited a federal prison in Oklahoma — the first such visit by a sitting president — and spoke at length about criminal justice, an area where progressives and conservatives are working together across the country. Sanders allies see Oklahoma as a place where Sanders can make inroads with a working-class primary electorate that may often vote for the GOP in a general election. "An interesting attribute of Sanders' electorate is he tends to do well among lower-income voters," Dinkin said. "Oklahoma is a pretty working-class state where there are large numbers of people who have been feeling very alienated, very left out of an economic recovery that has the economy feeling a lot better in places like D.C., New York, and San Francisco and not feeling a lot better in places like Michigan and Oklahoma."
Win Mcnamee / Getty Images Sanders in Burlington on May 26, 2015. |
John Corrill (September 17, 1794 – September 26, 1842)[1] was an early member and leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and an elected representative in the Missouri State Legislature. He was prominently involved in the Mormon conflicts in Missouri before leaving the church in 1839 and publishing A Brief History of the Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints (Commonly Called Mormons).
Biography [ edit ]
Corrill was born near Barre, Massachusetts. He worked as a carriage builder, surveyor, and architect and married a woman named Margaret, with whom he had at least five children. Historians believe his writing ability and personal library suggest he may have had some formal education.[1][2]
While living in Harpersfield, Ohio in 1830 the town was visited by Oliver Cowdery, Parley P. Pratt, Peter Whitmer, and Ziba Peterson, Mormon missionaries on their way to Missouri. After reading from the Book of Mormon, Corrill decided it was a fraud. He was later surprised to hear of the conversion of Sidney Rigdon, a preacher in nearby Kirtland who was planning a preaching tour with Corrill.[3] While visiting Kirtland, Corrill attended some Mormon meetings and witnessed miraculous speaking in languages unknown to the speakers. After further investigation,[4] he was baptized on January 10, 1831.[5] A few days later he was ordained an Elder.[3]
Church positions [ edit ]
In 1831 Corrill served two short missions in nearby areas. Later that year he was ordained to the High Priesthood and made an assistant to the Latter Day Saint movement's first Bishop of the Church, Edward Partridge, a position he would hold until 1837. In 1833, Corrill was chosen as the third bishop in Zion (Independence, Missouri) where he would later preside over a branch of the church. When Missourians expelled Mormons from the area, Corrill joined in petitioning the governor for militia assistance and settled in Clay County for the winter.[3]
In 1834 he was called back to Kirtland where he helped build the temple and was involved with approving a new book of revelations called the Doctrine and Covenants. After the temple's dedication in 1836[6] he returned to Missouri and was one of the founders and leaders of the Mormon settlement of Far West.[3][7] During this time the residents of Clay County were pushing for the Mormons to move out of their area and settle elsewhere. In late 1836 Corrill represented the Mormons in negotiating with state leaders for the formation of Caldwell County for primarily Mormon settlement. Historian Stephen C. LeSueur wrote that Corrill "was one of the Mormons' most prominent leaders in Missouri and had been intimately involved in nearly every phase of Mormon history there."[8] In 1837 he was released as a counselor to Bishop Partridge and was called to a committee for organizing more stakes in Missouri and was "Keeper of the Lord's Storehouse" in Far West. In April 1838 he and Elias Higbee became the official Church Historians.[3][7]
Missouri Mormon War [ edit ]
Corrill was elected by the primarily Mormon residents of Caldwell County to be the county's first representative to the Missouri State Legislature in August 1838.[6] During this same election, distrust between Missourians and Mormons erupted into an armed conflict, known today as the Missouri Mormon War. Corrill witnessed many key events and was involved in surrendering and turning over Joseph Smith to the state militia, which Smith saw as a betrayal.[3][9] At the Richmond hearings in November, Corrill testified for the state against Smith and the Mormon actions in the conflict.[1][7][10]
Disfavor grew between Corrill and the Mormons. Some Mormons had in the past accused him of opposing priesthood authority and "the Judgment of God" in his preference for autonomy and democracy in the church.[7][11] In his only term in the Missouri House of Representatives,[6] As a state representative after the armed conflict subsided, Corrill presented a petition from the Mormons for relief from their mistreatment.[10][12] However, he continued to distance himself from the church, culminating in his excommunication in 1839 and publication of his account of the church's history and conflicts.[7]
Corrill died in Adams County, Illinois in 1842 at the age of 48.[1]
A Brief History of the Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints [ edit ]
Corrill is remembered for his 50-page booklet published in 1839, entitled A Brief History of the Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints (commonly called Mormons,) including an account of their doctrine and discipline, with the reasons of the author for leaving the Church.[1][7]
Historian Richard L. Bushman's noted 2005 biography, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling, described Corrill as rational, coolheaded, and cautious, illustrating the "clash between Mormonism and republicanism" when he questioned whether he must sacrifice his freewill or autonomy to the Kingdom of God.[13] Bushman's book used Corrill's A Brief History as source material on the early church. Corrill's account has been called "perhaps, the single most important source of information for events surrounding the Mormon War in Missouri."[14] In contrast, historian Susan Easton Black described Corrill as bitter and his published history as a product of his apostasy.[7]
Notes [ edit ] |
Will Roush, the notorious New York Rangers fan-turned-viral fascination who spent "hundreds only" on tickets to Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals this past May is back. No, not in Madison Square Garden. This time, the Connecticut native is on a New York City rooftop blowing money fast (and out of a money gun) with former Brooklyn Nets center Mason Plumlee.
Following a draft day trade, "Plumdog Millionaire" is now a member of the Portland Trail Blazers, but a change of scenery won't keep him from "killin' the game." But did Plumlee hold his own on the track? You be the judge: Listen to Plumlee's verse for yourself, and read through our transcription of it below.
I’m with the waterboy, Bobby Boucher
Evian bottles on replay
No Cuvée, no D’ussé
That agua needs two trays
At the Rangers game
I side with no lames
Already on the bench, give my boy Roush that 10-day
[Benjamin Franklin is killlin’ the game!]
It’s your boy Plums that’s my name
Money gun
What up, I’m Plumdog Millionaire with no aim
[Benjamin Franklin is killin the game!]
I seen Jay at the game
Hey, What up Hovi
Look at my jersey I’m the one and only
Tell the Russians I said: "Hundreds only"
Like Moss said, "Straight cash, homie."
Ben Franklin, we will clone
It was love at first sight with that college loan
I smash on my last song
Look I don’t rap, but when in Rome
Is a collaboration with Dame DOLLA on the way? We can only hope. |
MORE ECS COVERAGE: ECS Season 3 finals event hub
SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE PLAYER INTERVIEWS: Cybersport.com @ YouTube
Yesterday, Cloud9 delivered the first upset of ECS Season 3 finals. Down 10-5 to defending champions and tournament favorites Astralis after the first half, the North Americans weren’t expected to make it to the playoffs, at least not on Friday.
A 19-15 turn-around victory in overtime shocked the audience at Wembley and Jake “Stewie2K” Yip was a large part why Cloud9 snatched the victory.
“For DreamHack I felt we were a bit mentally weak. Everything was going wrong for us, so it’s hard to play a tournament like this,” Stewie2k says regarding Cloud9’s recent disappointing performance at DH Summer 2017. The team finished bottom eight, exiting last in Group B behind CLG, Fnatic and Gambit and watched from the sidelines as SK Gaming took the trophy.
“Our showing against Fnatic was actually pretty good, but we threw the game kind of. But coming the London, we’ve had a few days practice. We’ve been lacking that fire in us. Shroud was the first guy to step up and say ‘We need to win this LAN, this is our LAN.’ Hearing this from a guy who usually doesn’t speak up gets us going.”
It needed more than a vocal player and rekindling the fire for Cloud9 to upset the ECS champions however. A shift in team’s inner structure was also set in place, Stewie2k says.
“Tim [autimatic] was IGLing a few months ago but he didn’t really like it. He thought it affected his gameplay, so he wanted me to go back to leading. It does affect my gameplay, but it seems our success rate with me calling is much better.”
Whatever the outcome of Group A is, Cloud9 will have a difficult opponent in the semi-finals, as the battle wages between FaZe Clan, G2 Esports and OpTic Gaming. |
Paykey
This startup was one of the two winners of BBVA Open Talent Europe 2016. PayKey allows making instant payments within any social network, including Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Twitter, etc. In this regard, Guy Ziv, vice president of the firm, says that this technology enables a new range of transactions in emerging channels and closes the gap between banking users and their social interactions (social media).
Earnix
Earnix Insurance is an insurance platform that allows to develop accurate and robust customer risk models, Understand the impact of pricing decisions, accelerate time-to-market of new offers and prices and Increase growth and profitability. José Monteagudo, regional manager of the company, highlights the visualization options that help out in analyzing these models to choose the best pricing strategy.
Bondit
The BondIT solution is B2B oriented – it was designed to empower financial advisers with algorithmic data-driven recommendations. BondIT’s purpose is to offer a high-performance platform for bond investments.
Communication Ten startups that will make noise in 2017 From an app to tell stories using fiction formats to a car insurance app to pay per mile traveled, startups are not lowering their guard in order to gain a foothold on the tech grid.
I Know First
This startup offers AI-based algorithmic prediction solutions to detect investment opportunities in the capital markets. I Know First’s algorithm development team includes Lipa Roitman, a scientist with more than 20 years of AI and ‘machine learning’ experience. Co-founder Yaron Golgher explains that the company’s proposal “is designed for large financial institutions, banks and hedge funds, as well as smaller investors.”
Scanovate
Scanovate has developed a solution that allows users to pay the printed bills they receive via regular mail, top-up their prepaid plan or verify their identity by simply pointing their mobile phone camera at the document.
Scanovate VP Products Guy Stiebel explains: “The application allows executing tasks much faster, customers can optimize their time, processes are simpler, safer and more user friendly. “
SecuredTouch
SecureTouch is working to make passwords a thing of the past with the goal of making device experience seamless and secure. This technology will allow devices (smartphones, cars, smart homes, watches or any other IoT product) to identify us simply by the way we interact. No passwords, no user IDs, no hassle – just us.
According to SecuredTouch VP Sales Assaf Pilo, “ With SecuredTouch, companies can actively keep customers transacting rather than identifying themselves. The technology provides real-time trust scores between 0-1000. “
Thetaray
ThetaRay is the leading provider of a large data analysis platform and cyber security, operational efficiency and risk detection solutions. This platform protects financial services and critical infrastructure against unknown threats.
Mario Cohen, Sales Director of the company, emphasized: “Our target are organizations whose operations in extremely heterogeneous and complex environments can benefit from risk detection features.” |
Just like humans, companies have life cycles and undergo distinct developmental phases.
While every company is unique, almost all go through certain stages that come with specific challenges and needs. As a result, organizations such as incubators, accelerators, and coworking spaces have been established to help entrepreneurs nurture and scale their companies.
For less capital-intensive organizations — such as software and app startups like Airbnb, Dropbox, and Uber — this incubator-to-accelerator-to coworking space model has proven to be extremely effective. But for “tough tech” startups like those in robotics or biomedical, there are many barriers to entry and stumbling blocks that traditional startup support organizations are not equipped to handle. Over the last few years, we have begun to see a growing need for a similar ecosystem to support robotics, biomedical, energy, and new materials startups.
This has resulted in the emergence of a new type of startup support system: the startup escalator.
So what is a startup escalator?
Startup escalators represent the next generation of innovation spaces. They are unique in that they target “tough tech” companies — that is, companies developing technologies with long learning curves that often require highly specialized and expensive equipment for prototyping and testing, and that have significantly longer time to market than typical VC-funded ventures.
A startup escalator addresses this critical market need by offering a combination of shared, specialized equipment and labs, coworking space, and an extensive virtual network of mentors, investors, and other specialized support structures.
At a high level, startup escalators have the following requirements:
They should be industry-focused
The programs should not have a fixed duration
They should provide specialized equipment and infrastructure
They should employ a rent or membership-based model
They should attract a network of specialized investors, corporate partners, and service providers
Going up, up, up
Like literal escalators, these spaces are always active — you just “step on” whenever you are ready to move from one level to the next. These organizations escalate tough tech startups to move them beyond the product and market validation stage to commercialization, job creation, and revenue generation, helping them attract significant funding and realize solid financial returns.
One of the biggest challenges that these fledgling companies face is the limited availability of highly specialized, expensive equipment. For instance, many robotics companies need access to machining facilities and equipment, 3D printing, electronics labs, and testing tools, but these resources are far too expensive for a startup to procure. Even if such a company is able to raise a substantial amount of funding and has the financial resources to buy the necessary equipment, it is often preferable to invest in attracting the best talent, iterating on product prototypes, and acquiring strategic customers. A startup escalator can help tough tech startups overcome these substantial barriers to entry, adding significant value that other startup support models fail to provide.
Tough technology startups, despite the challenges that accompany their development, are the foundation of some of the most important and impactful products on the market. Technological advances in the fields of robotics, biomedicine, and other key tough tech industries are turning out new products every day, and it is no exaggeration to say that many of them have the potential to improve lives on a global scale (and to provide substantial returns to their investors).
The startup escalator ecosystem
In recognition of this need, a handful of organizations have sprung up that target tough tech startups and help them reach the next level of development. One example of a successful startup escalator is Cambridge, MA-based Lab Central, an organization that focuses on biomedical startups and provides wet labs for experiments and testing, in addition to offering an all-inclusive coworking space. Another example is Greentown Labs in Somerville, MA, which focuses on clean energy companies and provides specialized machine shop and testing facilities. Recently announced MIT-backed organization, The Engine, is another great example of an escalator that realizes the challenges facing capital-intensive startups and addresses the need for a new model of support and investment for these startups.
It is exciting to see these and other organizations developing escalator programs to fill the tough tech gap.
As these startup escalators continue to gain traction, it’s critical that they incorporate positive elements of the existing incubator, accelerator, and coworking space ecosystems that are applicable to tough tech companies while at the same time ensuring that they add the value these startups are unable to get from more traditional organizations.
Fady Saad is the cofounder of MassRobotics, an innovation hub for robotics. |
Department run by former defence secretary Liam Fox accused of being ‘shamelessly cosy’ with manufacturers
Half of the employees seconded to the Department for International Trade have strong links to the defence industry, according to new figures.
The revelation has drawn accusations that Liam Fox’s department, which promotes Britain’s commercial exports, is “shamelessly cosy” with arms traders and ignoring other industries.
The department said its secondees from the private sector provided “valuable business insight and experience”.
Executives from commercial firms have been inserted into the heart of government departments on secondments for many years. The posts usually last a year, and secondees are paid by their companies during their time in Whitehall. Ministers insist that there are strict rules to prevent leaks of sensitive information.
The new figures show that the DIT has taken in 30 secondees since its establishment in July last year after the UK voted for Brexit. Fifteen are from companies involved in the defence industry.
BAE Systems, Britain’s biggest arms company, and Rolls-Royce, which says it is the second largest provider of defence aero-engine products and services in the world, have each provided three secondees.
Both firms have in the past paid bribes to win export orders, but they say safeguards are in place to prevent further legal breaches. .
MBDA, the European missile-maker, has provided two secondees, and the helicopter manufacturer Leonardo, the engineering firm Babcock and the US arms companies Lockheed Martin and Raytheon have provided one each.
Fox, a leading Brexiter and former defence secretary who was brought back to the cabinet table by Theresa May, is personally responsible for securing big arms deals for UK companies around the world. He mounted an unabashed defence of Britain’s arms industry last month, saying it should be celebrated. He was forced to resign as defence secretary in 2011 following Guardian disclosures about giving a friend access to government.
The details of the secondments were disclosed to Friends of the Earth following a freedom of information request.
Alasdair Cameron, an FOE campaigner, said: “At a time when the UK government is trying to sell the idea of “global Britain”, it’s telling that half of all the corporate secondments to Liam Fox’s department are from the arms industry, and gives us a worrying indication of where he sees Brexit Britain going.
“Aside from casting light on the murky nexus of business and government, it’s also telling what industries are not represented. Where are the clean tech companies that will drive the economy for the next 50 years?”
Caroline Lucas, the co-leader of the Green party, said: “The shameless cosy relationship between the Department for International Trade and the arms industry is deeply concerning.”
“Britain already has an appalling record of shipping weapons to dodgy dictators and repressive regimes across the world, and we risk seeing the government using Brexit to further deepen our country’s relationship with these weapons merchants.”
A DIT spokesperson said: “The government supports responsible defence and security industries which contributed £35bn to our economy last year. All secondees to the department provide valuable business insight and experience from a wide range of high value sectors.”
The department houses a team of officials who are tasked with helping British firms sell military equipment around the globe.
• If you would like to pass on information in confidence, you can send a message via the Guardian’s SecureDrop service. See how here.
• This article was amended on 10 October 2017 to remove the words “private sector” from the opening paragraph as it is half of all employees seconded to the Department for International Trade who have strong links to the defence industry, not just those from the private sector. |
Not to be confused with Potter sequence
Doege–Potter syndrome The structure of IGF-2, responsible for the hypoglycemia associated with Doege–Potter syndrome Specialty Oncology
Doege–Potter syndrome (DPS) is a paraneoplastic syndrome[1] in which hypoglycemia is associated with solitary fibrous tumors. The hypoglycemia is the result of the tumors producing insulin-like growth factor 2.[2] The syndrome was first described in 1930, by Karl Walter Doege (1867–1932), a German-American physician[3] and by Roy Pilling Potter (1879–1968), an American radiologist, working independently;[4] the full term Doege–Potter syndrome was infrequently used until the publication of a 2000 article[5] using the eponym.[6]
DPS is rare (as of 1976, less than one hundred cases were described[7]), with a malignancy rate of 12–15%. Actual rates of hypoglycemia associated with a fibrous tumor are quite rare (a 1981 study of 360 solitary fibrous tumors of the lungs found that only 4% caused hypoglycemia[8]), and are linked to large tumors with high rates of mitosis.[9] Removal of the tumor will normally resolve the symptoms.[1][9]
Tumors causing DPS tend to be quite large;[10] in one case a 3 kg (6.6 lb), 23×21×12 cm (9.1×8.3×4.7 in) mass was removed, sufficiently large to cause a collapsed lung.[5] In X-rays, they appear as a single mass with visible, defined borders, appearing at the edges of the lungs or a fissure dividing the lobes of the lungs.[10] Similar hypoglycemic effects have been related to mesenchymal tumors.[6]
References [ edit ] |
So, you’ve officially joined the blockchain revolution? Awesome. Welcome!
Now that you’ve taken the leap and invested in some crypto – let’s get one thing clear, right away… do you control your private keys? If you do, that’s perfect. If you don’t – then you don’t really control your new coins. That’s a big problem.
Whoever controls your private keys controls your crypto. If that’s not YOU, that’s not good.
Don’t be intimidated. If you need a quick refresher on what a public address or private key is, then take a second and read: Crypto 101: What’s an Address? Oh, go on. It’s a very quick read. We’ll continue momentarily…
Crypto Exchanges
If you’re like most new crypto owners, then you bought your coins on an exchange such as Coinbase. That’s the simplest route and the most convenient option for the majority of people. However, the convenience of exchanges can lull you into being irresponsible after your purchase. Let’s examine…
You traded some government-issued money for some crypto. Your exchange then updated your account accordingly in their system to reflect this purchase. You can log on to their exchange at any time and your account reflects your ownership. You know what you own and so does your exchange.
All is well enough, right? NO (emphatically). All is not well – not at all.
If you logged in to your exchange tomorrow and their website didn’t show the correct amount of crypto in your account – what would you do? Sure, you’d call them – referencing screenshots, banks statements, etc etc. “No different from buying anything else,” you might think. Wrong. So wrong.
Imagine your phone call and paperwork couldn’t resolve the problem. Imagine it couldn’t resolve the problem because your exchange couldn’t resolve the problem. Imagine they had been hacked. Maybe it only affected your account, or maybe the entire exchange was compromised.
It could get even worse: imagine your exchange completely vanished. Maybe they closed up shop and took all the valuable crypto that their customers left on their system. Maybe the entire exchange was shut down by the government. Either way, you go log on – and everything is just gone. Maybe you couldn’t even log on. Game over.
Do you see how vulnerable your ownership is when it’s just between you and your exchange? You have to trust, blindly and completely, that your exchange will be forever infallible when it comes to managing technological, financial, and political risks.
This is a very real and highly relevant problem. It is, in fact, the very problem that the blockchain itself solves. The blockchain gives you the power to control your own crypto. If you’re not taking advantage of that option – then you’re not fully participating in the crypto revolution – more importantly, you are putting yourself, unnecessarily, at risk of losing your crypto.
Exchanges have been hacked before. They will be hacked again. They can be hacked anonymously and from anywhere in the world. Their staff could stage a hack and the world could never know that it was an inside job. It’s up to you to protect your assets.
Trust the blockchain. Trust yourself.
Alright, enough with the firm warnings – the good news is that the blockchain eliminates these kinds of risks. You can simply transfer your ownership onto the blockchain where your future control of your crypto is guaranteed. Then, you don’t need to trust anyone but yourself.
Please note: trusting yourself is not as daunting as it sounds. A hardware wallet makes managing your assets very simple and eliminates the possibility for many user mistakes that new crypto owners might make.
I strongly suggest that you get a hardware wallet to protect your crypto. If you are comfortable running an offline computer or can be certain your personal computer will remain uncompromised, then you can use a software wallet instead. I’ll shortly be publishing step-by-step guides for both wallet types. Getting control of your private keys, in any way you are able, is imperative.
If you don’t currently control the signing of your transactions, then you do not currently control your crypto. End of story.
Take control of your wallet, your private keys, and your digital assets.
You can do this. Oh, and, welcome to the point of – the blockchain revolution.
As promised:
Crypto 101: Hardware Wallet Setup Guide / Walkthrough
Software Wallet Setup Coming Soon
I’m passionate about blockchains. I’m excited about decentralization, autonomous organizations, cryptocurrencies, and uncensorable dApps. I’m also overwhelmed – with questions about these cutting edge technologies. I want to understand the tech, the politics, and the implications of the blockchain revolution. Most of all, I want to share what I discover – because broader understanding will lead to greater participation, more rapid adoption, and, subsequently, a better world.
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Please turn on JavaScript. Media requires JavaScript to play. Advertisement World leaders and philanthropistshave pledged nearly $3bn (£1.6bn) to fight malaria at a summit in New York. The meeting, at the UN, is looking at ways of meeting the Millennium Development Goals - targets on reducing global poverty by the year 2015. Donors hope the money will be enough to eradicate malaria by that time. The money includes $1.1bn (£598m) from the World Bank and $1.6bn (£870m) from the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Fighting malaria in southern Sudan
In pictures
The British government and private organisations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have promised the rest. Malaria still kills more than a million people each year, according to the World Health Organization. The funding, will be used to support rapid implementation of the first ever Global Malaria Action Plan (Gmap). Long-term effort World Bank President Robert Zoellick said in a statement that the extra money would help "sharply reduce the numbers of malaria-related deaths and illness" in the next three years. According to Gmap's projections, more than 4.2 million lives can be saved between 2008 and 2015, if its plan is put into action, and the foundation can be laid for a longer-term effort to eradicate the disease. The BBC's Heather Alexander says leaders are focusing on eradicating malaria to counter criticisms that the millennium targets will not be met. If we build on this momentum, we can save million of lives and chart a long-term course for eradication of this disease
Bill Gates British Prime Minister Gordon Brown joined the presidents of Rwanda and Tanzania as well as the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to reassure the world that their goal is achievable. Alongside the offers of money came reassurance from African leaders that efforts are working. President Paul Kagame, of Rwanda, said malaria deaths have fallen by more than 60% in his country. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is to provide $168.7m (£91m) to fund a Malaria Vaccine Initiative for research on a new generation of anti-malaria vaccines. Microsoft founder Mr Gates said: "We need innovation, new drugs, and the most dramatic thing we need is vaccine. "If we build on this momentum, we can save million of lives and chart a long-term course for eradication of this disease." Britain's Department for International Development pledged £40m ($73.5m) to support the Affordable Medicines Facility for Malaria. It also pledged to increase its malaria research funding to at least £5m ($9.1m) a year by 2010 and supply 20 million of the 125 million bed nets still needed in affected areas.
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Ah, the airport – a veritable hell of long lines, frisky officers, expensive meals and bad coffee. But to get to where we want to go, we must overcome. We want to share some helpful airport hacks and tips on how to make flying suck less.
We do a lot of traveling, both to meet with our users and to keep our global team in touch. We’re also rather impatient when it comes to idling and waiting, so it’s safe to say we have quite a lot to say on the subject.
The bottom line is this – airports can be a real hassle, and the quicker we get through them, the better.
We’ve provided some written tips after the jump, but first, take a look at this infographic which in theory should explain all:
(click to enlarge)
Oh and if you think your friends might like this, you can tweet this infographic here!
PRO AIRPORT HACKS
Check-in Hacks
1. Do it online
Most airlines have joined the modern era by now and online check-ins are more and more common. If you’re traveling light, this allows you to skip the check-in queue altogether. Since airports are little else than endless queues, this is a good thing.
Also, when you check in online you might get a better choice of seats (if you’re quick enough).
2. Queue close to the business desk
The business queue is pretty empty most of the time and if it gets too quiet for too long, they’ll start pulling in people from the regular line next to it, potentially making it move along quicker. Picking the line next to the business queue might save you quite a bit of time.
3. Get a private jet
No, seriously.
This option sounds like a fantasy, but private jet operators do offer incredibly cheap seats on their aircraft in situations where the alternative is not to sell seats at all. Keep in mind that these are almost always last minute deals, but if you’re willing to take the chance, you might strike gold.
Security Area Hacks
Mmm yes – everyone’s favorite for sure. It’s your duty as a human being to make this line move along as quickly as possible.
1. Pack strategically
You know they’ll be screening your electronic devices separately, so make sure they are easy to pull out of your baggage. Bottom of the underwear pile is literally the worst place for your laptop in this situation.
Same goes for zip lock bags with liquids – make sure you can get them out of your baggage quickly.
2. Pick the left line
Some studies suggest that since most people are right-handed, they’ll instinctively pick queues on the right-hand side. This means that typically there’s less people in the queues to your left. Unless you queue with too many people that have heard of this tip, you could easily shave off some time at the screening station.
3. Know the rules
It might be a 15th-century ceremonial dagger to you, but to airport security, it’s a sharp metal object. Make sure you’re familiar with rules regarding what can and can’t be brought on board an aircraft. Most of these rules are pretty universal, but it seems people still forget that bigger liquid containers are a no-no.
4. Empty your pockets
Nothing wastes time more than fumbling with change before going through the metal detector. You’re queueing for security, not groceries, so don’t have anything on your person that you don’t absolutely need at that point. Keep your keys and coins in the hand baggage till you’ve cleared security.
Hanging at the Gate
The worst is over, but there’s a lot you can do to be more efficient with your waiting time.
1. Your gate is your castle
For the most up-to-date flight information, head to your gate as soon as they announce it. It’s not that the big information screens are inaccurate, but the gate always has the better information. It’s also easier and quicker to pick up on unexpected delays and changes – and these do happen.
2. Bring a power splitter
It’s always good to fully charge all your devices before heading to the airport, but sometimes you’ll be in for a longer wait and might start running out of juice.
Power outlets can sometimes be scarce. To alleviate this problem, get yourself a power splitter. They’re lightweight, cheap and carry the added benefit of helping you make new friends.
3. Use headphones… for silence
Sure, they’re essential if you want to watch a movie, but consider using them for noise cancellation. Our own Liisa does this a lot – mostly to block out noise while she’s working. Keeping her headphones unplugged, however, prevents her from missing any important announcements.
4. Excersise (sort of)
Our office manager Evelin has an interesting routine – she uses the longer waiting periods to fill in her daily physical activity, walking up and down the long corridors to stay on top her daily step count.
Boarding Hacks
This is it – it’s go time!
Except that’s it’s not. You know full well that once you get to your seat, you’ll easily be spending another 30 minutes sitting in the plane before it goes anywhere.
1. Don’t rush the gate
You have your seat – the plane’s not gonna leave without you. Some people like to queue up the second an attendant appears at the desk, but you should know better than that.
If you stay put until the line starts to clear, you can use the extra time to squeeze in some work.
2. Be the last to board the plane
When you’re the last to board the plane and the aircraft is not full, you might be able to get yourself a better seat. If you have an aisle ticket in the toilet row, see if there’s a better spot somewhere else.
Oh, and if you’re cocky enough and can pull a good poker face, you might even get away with upgrading yourself to first class!
If you have any tips you think would help us at the airport the next time, you’re welcome to drop them in the comments! |
This page in English
Projektet Samnordisk runtextdatabas har som syfte att samla samtliga nordiska runinskrifter digitalt. Inskrifterna återges i translittererad och normaliserad form samt i engelsk översättning. Det ingår också uppgifter om t.ex. tidsperiod, fyndområde, excerperad källa och lägeskoordinater.
Huvudansvarig: Henrik Williams. Start: 1993. Finansiär 1993-7: Axel och Margaret Ax:sons Johnsons stiftelse för allmännyttiga ändamål.
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Du får gärna använda databasen eller en modifierad version av den i dina egna applikationer, men om du gör så måste du meddela Uppsala runforum ([email protected]) att denna lösning finns.
Modifierade versioner av databasen får inte längre kallas "Samnordisk runtextdatabas" eller "Scandinavian runic-text Database". Emellertid måste tydligt framgå att den modifierade databasen bygger på Samnordisk runtextdatabas.
Vid varje tillfälle du citerar eller på annat sätt använder information från databasen måste du hänvisa till den genom att nämna dess namn och länka till dess webbsida (www.nordiska.uu.se/forskn/samnord.htm). Det gäller exempelvis (men inte uteslutande) varje gång information ur databasen exponeras i din applikation, webbplats eller publikation.
Ladda ned Samnordisk runtextdatabas
Samnordisk runtextdatabas levereras i fyra olika paket. Själva databasen är identisk i de fyra. Den senaste uppdateringen skedde 2018-01-19. Läs mer om den aktuella versionen.
1. Installationsfil for Microsoft Windows (.exe)
Ladda ned installationsfilen
Använd installationsfilen om du vill installera Rundata på din personliga dator.
Installationsfilen gör följande:
Installerar Rundata på din dator
Skapar en genväg från skrivbordet till Rundata
Skapar genvägar från startmenyn till Rundata
Skapar ett program med vars hjälp du kan avinstallera Rundata
Ladda ned filen till din dator och dubbelklicka på den. Följ sedan instruktionerna på skärmen.
Som standard installeras Rundata i mappen C:Program, C:Program Files eller motsvarande. Välj en annan katalog om du inte har tillräckliga rättigheter för att installera program i C:Program.
2. Självuppackande filkatalog (.exe)
Ladda ned filkatalogen
Den självuppackande exefilen kopierar Rundata och Samnordisk runtextdatabas till önskat ställe på din dator eller extern enhet. Inga genvägar skapas.
Använd den självuppackande exefilen om du vill lägga Rundata på en minnepinne. Du kan på så sätt ta med dig Rundata i byxfickan och köra programmet på vilken Windowsdator som helst. Det är endast installationsrutinerna som skiljer denna version från installationsfilen; program och databas är identiska i de båda versionerna.
Ladda ned filen till din dator och dubbelklicka på den. Följ sedan instruktionerna på skärmen.
3. Zip-fil
Ladda ned zipfilen
Använd zipfilen om du inte får eller kan packa upp exe-filer på din Windowsdator.
Ladda ned filen till din dator och öppna den med ett uppackningsprogram. Starta programmet genom att klicka på rundata.exe.
4. Endast databas
Ladda ned databasens textfiler
Tyvärr fungerar programmet Rundata bara på Windowsdatorer. Använd databasfilen för att komma åt Samnordisk runtextdatabas i ett annat operativsystem än Windows.
Loggbok (pdf)
Ladda ned loggboken
En pdf-fil med alla ändringar i Samnordisk runtextdatabas 2014. |
One of the details that most surprised me in Scott McClellan’s account of the CIA Leak investigation and aftermath was his description of the White House response to the confirmation–on April 5, 2006–that Libby had testified he had leaked the NIE with the authorization of the President.
Now the fact that he himself had authorized the selective leaking of national security information to reporters made him look hypocritical. [snip] In time, we would learn that the president’s penchant for compartmentalization had played an important role in the declassification story. The only person the president had shared the declassification with personally was Vice President Cheney. Two days after the Fitzgerald disclosure, Cheney’s lawyer told reporters that the president had "declassified the information and authorized and directed the vice president to get it out" but "didn’t get into how it would be done." Then the vice president had directed his top aide, Scooter Libby, to supply the information anonymously to reporters. [my emphasis]
Granted, I was on a business trip in India when this all went down. But this was a detail I missed. "Cheney’s lawyer told reporters"? I was used to Libby’s lawyer prior to the indictment, Joseph Tate, telling reporters all manner of things under the cover of anonymity. Robert Luskin’s anonymous, wild spinning of reporters? Kind of goes without saying. But Cheney’s lawyer, Terry O’Donnell?
But it all made sense when someone pointed me to the one piece of journalism he could find repeating that citation–would you believe it, a Michael Isikoff piece?
A lawyer familiar with the investigation, who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter, told NEWSWEEK that the "president declassified the information and authorized and directed the vice president to get it out." But Bush "didn’t get into how it would be done. He was not involved in selecting Scooter Libby or Judy Miller." Bush made the decision to put out the NIE material in late June, when the press was beginning to raise questions about the WMD but before Wilson published his op-ed piece. [my emphasis]
I double checked with McClellen to make sure that’s the public statement he meant, and he said,
Dan Bartlett volunteered to me that the vice president’s lawyer was telling at least some reporters anonymously what I reference on page 295, which is specifically referring to the Newsweek article …
In other words, yes, Cheney’s lawyer was the one spreading that story to–of all people–Michael Isikoff. Now everything began to make sense.
You see, one of the biggest reasons why few TradMed journalists ever got that the whole NIE story was a cover story, designed to explain away Cheney’s order to leak something else–probably Plame’s identity, is because Michael Isikoff spouted a story that, though still totally illogical, explained away some of the inconsistencies in the NIE story. Here’s what Isikoff wrote in Hubris:
In late June, Cheney discussed with Bush the steady stream of negative news about the administration’s prewar use of the Iraq intelligence, according to a lawyer close to the principals. Cheney and Bush agreed that to refute the criticism they ought to divulge portions of the classified National Intelligence Estimate on weapons of mass destruction that had hastily been prepared prior to the congressional vote on the Iraq War resolution. "The president declassified the information and authorized and directed the vice president to get it out," the lawyer said. How that would be done–who should leak the information and to which reporters–was left entirely up to Cheney, the lawyer noted.
I guess, when Isikoff writes "a lawyer close to the principals," what he really means is "a lawyer retained by one of the principals to keep him out of the pokey."
And when you put the two similar citations together with McClellan’s revelation of the secret source behind those citations, it verifies that Terry O’Donnell, Cheney’s lawyer, is also the one who claimed Bush had declassified the NIE in late June, all handily timed to make Libby’s story more (but not yet) consistent. Now, in case you’re wondering, McClellan told me there were no discussions within the White House (that he was part of) regarding when the NIE was declassified.
I know of no such discussions within the White House about when the declassification happened, including any about what could be said about the timing.
And Patrick Fitzgerald, after having interviewed both Dick Cheney and George Bush, stated clearly that,
Your Honor, I will stipulate that the declassification happened. I don’t know when. [snip] As to the timing, no, I don’t have anything that sets the date other than before, my belief is it is before July 8th. Besides saying July 8 it happened by, I can’t move the date into June or July, a specific date.
And even Ted Wells, who somehow magically discovered what Bush and Cheney had said to Fitzgerald in their interviews without Fitzgerald having turned over the interview reports, admitted that Bush and Cheney said the declassification had happened, but not when.
I believe that maybe that the testimony does not tie it down to a particular day, only that it did take place, [snip] [Fitzgerald] is in possession of material from either the president or the vice president to the effect that it was declassified and that they know they did it but they’re not sure of the particular date
So Libby, Cheney, and Bush–the only three guys who are supposed to have known about this declassification–couldn’t place when it happened in their discussions with Patrick Fitzgerald (aside from Libby’s concession that it could have happened on July 7 or "some time at … the end of the previous week," which would make it July 3 or 4 or maybe July 2 but definitely not late June). But at a time when it was becoming increasingly clear that the whole story was collapsing partly because Libby had leaked the NIE to at least two journalists before–all the evidence suggests–whatever got declassified got declassified, all of a sudden Terry O’Donnell developed a great clarity that the declassification had happened in June, and not July.
And Michael Isikoff believed him.
Isikoff not only believed Terry O’Donnell, the guy Cheney was paying to keep him out of jail but who wouldn’t speak on the record, but he also replicated O’Donnell’s feint about Bush not telling Cheney what details to leak, thereby drawing attention away from whether or not Bush knew what Cheney planned to leak. (FWIW, McClellan told me that Dan Bartlett thought making the distinction was important, I’m guessing because Bartlett realized someone like Michael Isikoff could turn it into a head fake that would distract from the logical contradictions and implications of the larger story.) And so, when Isikoff tells about Libby’s leak to Judy Miller, he writes,
Once again, Cheney had given his chief of staff the green light to disclose information from the classified National Intelligence Estimate. [snip] And now he was going to go further with Miller than he had with Woodward in revealing the contents of the NIE.
Isikoff thereby introduces several more pieces of disinformation into the story. There’s a problem with the suggestion that Cheney "again" gave Libby a green light to leak stuff–particularly since the same filing that confirmed Libby had named Bush in the NIE declassification also states that,
Defendant testified that this July 8th meeting was the only time he recalled in his government experience when he disclosed a document to a reporter that was effectively declassified by virtue of the President’s authorization that it be disclosed. Defendant testified that one of the reasons why he met with Miller at a hotel was the fact that he was sharing this information with Miller exclusively. [my emphasis]
There’s no evidence that Libby leaked more from the NIE to Judy than he did to Woodward (indeed, Judy’s own description of what happened suggests the contrary), and Isikoff’s flaccid "go further" certainly doesn’t provide that evidence. But since Isikoff is still working on the feint of the NIE story, that’s what becomes the central thrust of the story, thereby divorcing the leak of Plame’s identity, the leak of the CIA trip report, and the use of the attribution "former Hill staffer" from Cheney’s order to Libby to leak something to Judy (which, when you think about it, is just what Libby perjury and obstruction did).
Now, to be fair to Isikoff, the contradictions in Libby’s NIE story weren’t as obvious in April 2006, when he first served as a mouthpiece for Cheney’s lawyer, or mid 2006 when he was finishing Hubris, as they became after Fitzgerald pointed to the clouds hanging over the Vice President during the trial. Maybe he’s just not good with logic.
But that doesn’t entirely excuse Isikoff’s actions. He had three choices: credit the word of O’Donnell, serving as an anonymous source and providing information that appears to have gone beyond Cheney’s own testimony in the affair; focus on the contradictions in the story that remained after O’Donnell intervened; or at least balance the two and point out how they cannot both be true. Isikoff chose door number one: the word of an anonymous source over logic.
I have long pointed to this difference in Isikoff’s presentation of the CIA leak and mine as a signal difference between TradMed reporters and bloggers. The former often won’t believe something until they can get a human source to confirm it for them, and may, therefore, dismiss fairly credible documentary evidence. And we bloggers admittedly don’t do enough calling of people to get their version of stories–but we do tend to find stuff in documents that TradMed reporters may not. Both approaches have their weaknesses; the two together hopefully provide a fuller picture.
But I always imagined that the source Isikoff relied on here was someone like Harriet Miers–a "lawyer close to the principals," but not someone whose job it was to keep Cheney’s role in this under wraps. Learning that it was, instead, Cheney’s lawyer, changes things. Much of the reluctance of the press–and the pundit class more generally–to examine the evidence against Cheney in this case was due to Isikoff’s willingness to accept the word of Cheney’s lawyer, speaking anonymously, over logic and sworn testimony. Given Isikoff’s emphasis on Armitage in Hubris over the confirmation of Plame’s role in non-proliferation, given Isikoff’s clinging to his sketchy refutation of the 1X2X6 story, and given Isikoff’s helpfulness in passing evidence to Robert Luskin, this shouldn’t surprise me.
But it does, once again, expose how helpful the press was in covering up the leak of Plame’s identity. |
0 2 Gwinnett officers fired after videos show them hitting suspect
GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. - Two Gwinnett County officers have been fired and could face criminal charges after videos appeared to show them attacking a suspect.
Channel 2’s Tony Thomas broke news of the second firing on Channel 2 Action News at 6 p.m. Thursday.
[READ: Dozens of cases involving officers in brutality case thrown out]
Gwinnett County Police Chief Butch Ayers told Thomas that the second officer, a sergeant, told investigators when asked why he punched a suspect, “It's different out on the streets.”
Now, both former officers could face criminal charges after two cellphone videos captured the alleged attacks.
One alleged kick and punch may have ended the respective careers of Officer Robert McDonald and 19-year veteran Sgt. Michael Bongiavonni, who have been accused in the case.
Gwinnett PD fired officer involved in wednes videotaped arrest. Driver of car kicked in head. Off. Robert McDonald . Criminal Inv. started. — Tony Thomas (@TonyThomasWSB) April 13, 2017
Picture of officer Involved in videotaped incident . Hired in 2013. Fired today. pic.twitter.com/FjyZ18lzui — Tony Thomas (@TonyThomasWSB) April 13, 2017
I'm literally sick about it,” Ayers told Thomas Thursday evening.
The duo faces potential criminal charges after the traffic stop of Demetrius Hollins, 21.
Thomas saw Hollins leaving the Gwinnett County Jail Thursday with a bloodied face.
“All I can say is I wish this never happened,” Hollins told Thomas.
Bongiavonni said he pulled Hollins over on Sugarloaf Parkway Wednesday for traffic violations, but said Hollins resisted arrest.
Picture of now fired Gwinnett PD Sgt. Michael Bongiavonni. Accused of excessive force during stop of driver . 2nd cop fired today too. pic.twitter.com/YCZ0WK0pTl — Tony Thomas (@TonyThomasWSB) April 13, 2017
"I ordered Hollins out of the car. He refused, grabbed his phone and literally started to scream, ‘Help me,’ in the phone," Bongiavonni wrote in a report.
Commanders said Bongiavonni never reported he punched Hollins, but turned in McDonald for kicking the suspect in the head.
Bongiavonni did admit he stunned Hollins with a Taser, authorities said.
Bongiavonni's alleged punch was captured on video by a woman that Thomas spoke with by phone Thursday night.
This how Gwinnett county police getting down now smh pic.twitter.com/FbLUmavbAx — i Just Be Tweeting™ (@CurtFromDaBlock) April 13, 2017
“Did you see the driver do anything before the officer punched him?” Thomas asked the witness.
“The driver exited the car with his hands up, and the officer clocked him real good,” she said.
Another video, which went viral, appeared to show Officer McDonald run up to Hollins and kick him in the face.
“The suspect was screaming, he was screaming, ‘Ahh, ahh,’” Jones said.
Gwinnett's police chief said he's at a loss for words.
“We acknowledge that the actions of the former officers will have long-lasting effects on our community,” Ayers said.
Records show Bongiavonni pulled the same driver over last year. There was a struggle, and officers allegedly found a gun under Hollins's seat in that incident.
What role that stop may have played in the latest incident is unknown.
Gwinnett County Police have terminated MPO Robert McDonald. He stepped outside of our guiding principles and state law. https://t.co/U1yRA6J7tR — Gwinnett Police Dept (@GwinnettPd) April 13, 2017
“I was mad, I was upset and it felt like I had been gut-punched,” Ayers said.
Ayers said commanders were investigating the use of force before the videotape surfaced. He said there's no excuse for what happened, but believes the officer got “tunnel vision.”
“This officer and his actions do not represent the men and women of this police department,” Ayers said.
TRENDING STORIES:
Mugshot of man police confirm arrested and allegedly kicked in head by officer. The video and details at 12. pic.twitter.com/YdIphf6eyS — Tony Thomas (@TonyThomasWSB) April 13, 2017
© 2019 Cox Media Group. |
Matthew Thomas was one of the top high school recruits in the country in 2013. Out of Miami (Fla.) Booker T. Washington High School, Thomas held scholarship offers from every major school in the country. The 6'4, 210-pound Thomas was rated as a five-star recruit by all major services.
And now he wants out of his letter of intent he signed to attend Florida State, as he told the Miami Herald:
"I've told them it's nothing personal. I just didn't make the decision I really wanted to on Signing Day," said Thomas, who picked the Seminoles over USC, Georgia and Miami. "What happened was on Signing Day [was] I wasn't sure who I wanted to sign with. I had issues with different schools. But when I told my mom I didn't want to sign with anybody and wait and give it a few days she said I couldn't do that. She said, ‘FSU is a good school - pick them. It's close to home.' I wasn't agreeing with it. But I felt like I was being disrespectful to her if I didn't sign. So I made her happy."
Now, Thomas feels differently.
For its part, Florida State's staff does not plan to release Thomas, according to the report.
More from SB Nation:
Follow @SBNationCFB Follow @SBNRecruiting
• Tommie Frazier finally makes College Football Hall of Fame
• SB Nation spends NFL Draft night with a first-rounder’s agent
• Everything you should know about the SEC Network
• The state of the spread: SB Nation with Ole Miss and Mississippi State
• National recruiting coverage
• Today’s college football news headlines |
August 27th, 2012
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[Welcome, National Newswatch readers!]
The NDP's communications plan to handle the situation arising from their disagreement with Elections Canada over convention advertising by 8 unions and 7 other organizations is an interesting study in contrasts as against the Conservative Party's approach in the past.
It might be that the former views itself as having a greater interest in maintaining a neutral election arbiter willing to muscularly enforce a common set of rules even-handedly, while the latter has been able to fundraise effectively based on stoking the fear that the election authority was part of a liberal monolith in Ottawa where conservatives felt like outsiders.
Or it could just be that the NDP did a cost-benefit analysis, and learning from the Conservatives' experience, decided that the legal fees and on-going news story would be costlier than just accepting Elections Canada's decision and moving on.
Regardless, one of the difficulties facing both parties is that, notwithstanding the current fascination with tactics and campaign machinery amongst the media and regular inhabiters of Twitter, it is almost impossible to have a lengthy, calm and factual discussion about the facts, timelines, and merits of such cases without descending into spin, finger-pointing, and hyperventilating torque.
Almost impossible, that is, except for here.
I've prepared a briefing note below, starting with a look at the relevant sections of the Elections Act, and how they've changed over the last couple of decades.
[PS, I've also started using the version of the Act published on the Department of Justice's laws-lois.justice.gc.ca site, which is organized a little more compactly than the one at elections.ca, and also contains links to previous versions of the various sections. Check it out. On the other hand, the version at elections.ca lets you link to specific sections, rather than just specific parts, so they both have their uses.]
Elections Act on Political Contributions
The provisions regarding contributions to a political entity are contained in sections 404-405.2 of the Canada Elections Act. In summary they now say:
only citizens or permanent residents of Canada can make contributions, and "no other person or entity shall"
contributions means both monetary and non-monetary contributions, and include contributions made to any of the entities regulated under the Canada Elections Act (a registered party, a registered association [aka "riding association", aka "electoral district association", aka EDA], a candidate, a leadership contestant or a nomination contestant)
contributions from ineligible contributors have to be returned to them, or if that's not possible, have to be paid to the Chief Electoral Officer, who will forward them on to the federal government's general revenues (i.e., the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the government)
various exemptions and clarifications are then outlined: transfers and provisions of goods and services within various arms of a political family are excluded an employer who grants an employee a paid leave of absence to run for office is not considered to be making a contribution to that employee's political party party membership fees of $25 or less in a year are not considered a contribution convention fees (the full amount) *are* considered a contribution by the person who paid them (whether the delegate him- or herself, or someone else on their behalf)
(see more details in the Elections Canada factsheet)
Changes to Elections Act provisions on Contributions over the years
These provisions have undergone a lot of amendment over the years, however*. Regulation of campaign finance started in 1873 after some grubby dealings around the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway, but we'll start with the era before 2000.
Pre-2000 – There was no cap on contributions, though the federal political tax credit limits provided an effective ceiling for all but the most ardent financial supporters (75% of the first $100; 50% of the next tranche, and 33% of a subsequent tranche, up to a fixed ceiling). Publication of the names and amounts over $100 was argued to suffice for accountability. This regime had been in place since the Election Expenses Act of 1974.
– There was no cap on contributions, though the federal political tax credit limits provided an effective ceiling for all but the most ardent financial supporters (75% of the first $100; 50% of the next tranche, and 33% of a subsequent tranche, up to a fixed ceiling). Publication of the names and amounts over $100 was argued to suffice for accountability. This regime had been in place since the Election Expenses Act of 1974. Bill C-2 (2000) – The tax creditable ceiling was raised to 75% of the first $200, and the reportable amount ceiling was also hiked to $200.
– The tax creditable ceiling was raised to 75% of the first $200, and the reportable amount ceiling was also hiked to $200. Bill C-24 (2003) – The so-called "Chrétien reforms", but based on a regime first introduced by the Parti Québécois government of Réné Lévesque in the 1970s. It introduced contribution ceilings of $5,000; and directed that only individuals could donate to registered parties (meaning no donations could be made by businesses, unions, other levels of government, or other organizations). Businesses and unions could still contribute up to $1,000 to local candidates or ridings. The tax creditable ceiling was raised to 75% of the first $400, though the reportable amount ceiling was left at $200.
– The so-called "Chrétien reforms", but based on a regime first introduced by the Parti Québécois government of Réné Lévesque in the 1970s. It introduced contribution ceilings of $5,000; and directed that only individuals could donate to registered parties (meaning no donations could be made by businesses, unions, other levels of government, or other organizations). Businesses and unions could still contribute up to $1,000 to local candidates or ridings. The tax creditable ceiling was raised to 75% of the first $400, though the reportable amount ceiling was left at $200. Bill C-2 aka "Federal Accountability Act" (2006) – This bill ended business and union contributions to local candidates and ridings, and lowered the contribution ceiling to $1,000 (adjusted for inflation, whenever the accumulated annual inflation increments from a 1992 base would raise the ceiling by another $100; thus it hit $1,100 almost right away, and just hit $1,200 this past year). An amendment made by Liberal Senator Rod Zimmer added the provision in s.404.2(7) which clarified that convention delegate fees are fully recognized as political contributions.
All along the way, another principle had been ensconced about the tax treatment of political fundraisers, to the effect that a receipt can only be issued for the portion of the ticket price not covering food, beverages, or other tangible benefits received by the contributor as part of the event. Thus the contribution here is not the full value of the ticket, but the ticket price minus the tangible benefits. All the parties are familiar with and have accepted these rules.
Chronology
With Bill C-24 set to come into effect on January 1, 2004, the NDP wrote to Elections Canada with a series of questions, including this one:
6. Would the purchase of an advertisement on the Party's website or in a convention magazine be considered a contribution or merely a payment for services rendered? Likewise, can the Party continue to sell items such as sweatshirts, baseball caps and buttons to unions, businesses or riding associations? Would the profit be considered a receiptable donation? Answer: Where a person or entity purchases goods or services from a registered party with the intention of economically benefiting the party, the payment for goods and services will not constitute contributions to the extent that the payment reflects the fair market value of the goods and service purchased. Any amount of the payment above the fair market value will constitute a contribution if the person purchasing the good and service intended to benefit the party.
The Toronto Star's Joanna Smith reported that a party insider from the time told her:
An NDP insider familiar with the issue said that in 2003, when the Liberal government under Jean Chrétien moved to limit donations from unions and corporations, the party sought an opinion from Elections Canada as to whether money obtained through selling advertising would be considered a political contribution…. Three years later, the Conservative government banned donations from unions and corporations altogether. The party insider said the NDP also sought legal opinion and hired a third-party company to assess what fair market value for advertising would be in advance of each of the three policy conventions in question and followed those recommendations.
On that basis, former party National Director Brad Lavigne told Smith that:
"We put an emphasis on going to a third-party company to assess market value in order to keep (to) the letter as well as the spirit of the law…. We felt that while it wasn’t legally necessary to seek third-party validation for market value, we felt that it would be appropriate and well worth the investment.".
[The sentence about the Conservative government banning donations from unions and corporations altogether three years later is a red herring, because those new provisions only applied to riding associations and candidates. Union and corporations donations to national parties – the provision which is relevant here – were already outlawed by Bill C-24 as of 2004.]
So after consulting their third party consultant on the fair market value, the party charged:
2006 Québec City Convention – 3 national unions (Steel, CEP, and the UFCW), along with the CLC, Douglas-Coldwell Foundation and NOW Communications $38,500 + GST of $2,360 for a total of $40,860
2009 Halifax Convention – 4 national unions (Steel, CUPE, CEP, and the UFCW) 97,619.04 + GST of $4,880.96 for a total of $102,500
2011 Vancouver Convention – 6 national unions (Steel, the UFCW, CUPE, PSAC, the Firefighters, and the Machinists), along with the CLC, and 5 businesses $179,337.49 + GST of $21,770.51 for a total of $201,108
Two months after the June 2011 convention, the Conservative Party's lawyer, Arthur Hamilton, wrote to the Chief Electoral Officer. He referred to earlier correspondence from the Commissioner of Elections to his own party, over an earlier dispute regarding the treatment of convention fees to their own 2005 annual meeting.
[As a sidebar, the Liberals back then were smarting because the timing of the retroactive coming into force of the Conservatives' Federal Accountability Act undermined their 2006 leadership convention, both from the perspective of the registration fee (at $995 it was going to account for most of their supporters' contribution ceilings that year) and the now well-known change to the contribution limits for leadership candidates. Probably for that reason, they seized on a June 27, 2006 comment made by newly-elected then-Treasury Board President John Baird at a Senate Committee studying Bill C-2 to the effect that he had not received a tax credit for his 2005 convention fees, and after the then-Chief Electoral Officer asked the Conservative Party to open its books on the convention costs, the Liberals wrote to the Commissioner of Elections in July asking for an inquiry. The Conservatives argued that the convention only broke even and thus if treated like any other fundraising event should not result in any political contributions, meanwhile filing a retaliatory complaint about the Liberals' convention fees. But the party wound up having to file revised financial returns for 2005, which they did in late December, 2006, after Senator Zimmer's amendment to their bill was adopted by the House and the law came into effect. Jean-Pierre Kingsley's retirement as Chief Electoral Officer became public a week later.]
Hamilton's August 31, 2011 letter to the CEO about the NDP convention quoted the former Commissioner of Elections as saying:
Our position, simply put, is that under the [Elections Act] any voluntary provision of money, property or service for the Convention purposes described above, minus the fair market value of any tangible benefit one receives in return, constitutes a contribution. Opportunities to view or participate in debates, presentations, votes and so forth pertaining to party policies have significant political value only and cannot be excluded as tangible benefits from the calculation of the contribution.
Hamilton wrote that:
In the circumstances, which include the declarations by the NDP, the various unions identified and at least one corporate identity, it appears that the NDP has received what the Commissioner of Elections Canada has deemed to be contributions in contravention of the Elections Act.
and he asked the CEO to investigate. Conservative M.P. Dean Del Mastro separately filed a complaint to the Ethics Commissioner, but she later referred the issue back to Elections Canada as well.
Reaction from the NDP and the unions was consistent with the provisions of the opinion letter the party had received from Elections Canada: that advertisements and sponsorships were allowed, so long as they were at fair market value. Indeed, the Chief Electoral Officer himself made the same argument before the Procedures and House Affairs Committee a month later.
But according to the Democracy Law Blog, the issue may have been a distinction between sponsorships and advertising, though the blogger also questioned how market value could be determined (not knowing about the third-party consultant hired by the NDP), and further questioned whether political parties should be in the business of advertising at all.
This past June, the Deputy Chief Electoral Officer François Bernier responded to Hamilton's letter as follows:
With reference to the letter of August 31, 2011, from Arthur Hamilton, Counsel to the Conservative Party of Canada, I wish to confirm that it is the position of Elections Canada that sponsorships of political events constitute contributions that are subject to the rules set out in the Canada Elections Act, including the rules regarding the inadmissibility of certain contributors and contribution limits.
Four days later he also wrote to the NDP, enclosing a copy of his letter to the Conservatives, and thanking the party "for the full cooperation it has given to Elections Canada in order to resolve the issue promptly and effectively".
The party appears to have paid the funds back, but rather than including the reports of returned contributions in their 2011 annual return, have been advised to file a revised 2nd quarter 2012 return instead, which will be posted shortly we're told. Evidently it picked a reporter from a paper with a Sunday edition to tell its side of the story long-form, but is otherwise acquiescing to Elections Canada's position.
Analysis
The interpretation of the newly-amended Elections Act leading to the so-called "in-and-out" case (referred to as the "media buys" case by Elections Canada) was vigourously disputed by the Conservative Party, both in court and in the court of public opinion. And there were some valid points worth litigating, in the interests of clarifying how the new Elections Act would be applied. Eventually the party lost, and repaid $230,198 in rebates along with a $52,000 fine, in order to settle the case and have charges dropped against the principals involved. But as a result, the principle that local election expenses can only be "incurred" by the agent for a local candidate was established.
The NDP believes it had a valid case to make legally on the issue of fair market value for advertising and sponsorships, in view of its earlier effort to obtain an opinion on the issue from Elections Canada, and its retaining of a third-party consultant to help establish what such a fair market value would be. Obtaining a legally-tested answer to that question would be not only to their own interest but that of their competitor political parties, but that won't come to pass. The lesson the NDP appears to have learned from watching the Conservatives is that they're better off disposing of the dispute quickly, than dealing with years of spin and torque in the chattering classes while the lawyers settle the issues at hand.
In effect, Elections Canada has ruled that all sponsorships at political conventions by definition have a fair market value of zero, and therefore all sponsorship payments are political contributions, and can't be made by ineligible contributors. Conventions have to be paid for somehow, so the NDP will have to raise the price of its convention fees next time around, or else cut back on some of the production values or content to make up the difference. This might be the right ruling, but it's not going to get any legal review, more out of a fear of needing to explain a complex issue of public policy over and over in the sound-bite era than anything else.
How we got to the point where election law is being made through a series of gotchas is the sadder part. The Chretien government tolerated almost no amendments from the Reform Party to its overhaul of the Elections Act in 2000, so the Conservatives got them back with punitive retroactive amendments to the Act in 2006, which led the Liberals to exploit a slip of John Baird's at a Senate committee to launch a complaint about their convention fees, which led the Conservatives to counter-complain about the Liberals convention fees, and now the NDP's. Meanwhile, civil society groups are trying to get in on the action themselves.
Basic misapprehensions abound, such as the belief that Elections Canada can just make up its own rules (it has to implement and enforce the Elections Act as passed by Parliament, warts and all), that party activists know or could be expected to know everything that's going on in their party across the country, and/or know every nuance of our complex and always-evolving electoral legislation.
Call me old-fashioned, but I'd like to see election law made on the basis of what's good for our electoral system as a whole, and without people on either side of the issue deciding what their position is based on who they want to win, rather than a consideration of the facts and the outcome for the electoral system as a whole. We'll come back to this perspective again soon, when I get a chance to discuss the Etobicoke Centre case.
Thanks to those who provided me with copies of the relevant documents.
————————–
* For a good overview of the legislative developments, see these chapters in the Carleton University election series:
MASSICOTTE, Louis (1997). " Electoral Reform in the Charter Era ", in Frizzell, Alan & Pammett, Jon H. (eds), The Canadian General Election of 1997, Dundurn Press, pp. 167-191.
", in Frizzell, Alan & Pammett, Jon H. (eds), The Canadian General Election of 1997, Dundurn Press, pp. 167-191. MASSICOTTE, Louis (2006). " Electoral Legislation Since 1997: Parliament Regains the Initiative ", in Pammett, Jon H. & Dornan, Christopher (eds), The Canadian General Election of 2006, Dundurn Press, pp. 196-219.
", in Pammett, Jon H. & Dornan, Christopher (eds), The Canadian General Election of 2006, Dundurn Press, pp. 196-219. FLANAGAN, Tom & JANSEN, Harold J. (2009). "Election Campaigns under Canada's Party Finance Laws", in Pammett, Jon H. & Dornan, Christopher (eds), The Canadian General Election of 2008, Dundurn Press, pp. 194-216.
Also, here's a bibliography of news clippings and other online sources on the current case:
and related sources about the Conservatives' convention case: |
Getting Started With PCB
Table of Contents
Getting Started with PCB
This document is a manual for PCB , the interactive printed circuit board layout system.
1 Introduction
PCB includes a stand-alone program (called pcb ) which allows users to create, edit, and process layouts for printed circuit boards, as well as a library of footprint definitions for commonly needed elements. While originally written for the Atari, and later rewritten for Unix-like environments, it has been ported to other operating systems, such as Linux, MacOS/X, and Windows.
While PCB can be used on its own, by adding elements and traces manually, it works best in conjunction with a schematic editor such as gschem from the gEDA project, as gschem will create a netlist, make sure all the elements are correct, etc.
The file in which pcb stores its data ends in .pcb such as myboard.pcb . Additionally, pcb reads individual element footprints from files ending in .fp and netlists from files ending in .net .
There are a couple of different outputs from pcb . If you are having your boards professionally fabricated, you will want to export your board as an RS-247X (aka gerber) file. If you are fabricating your board yourself, you’ll probably want to print it. You can also save it as an encapsulated postscript or image file for use in documentation and/or web pages.
A note about typography: Throughout this document, “ PCB ” refers to the whole package, “ pcb ” refers to that specific program, and “pcb” refers to a generic printed circuit board.
2 Terminology
There is some variation in terminology used by EDA packages. To best understand the PCB documentation, it’s important to read through these definitions so you understand how PCB uses these terms.
3 Installation
3.1 Installing a Pre-Built Package
3.1.1 Debian
apt-get install pcb
3.1.2 Fedora
To automatically download and install the latest version (and dependencies) from one of the (pre-configured) Fedora repositories:
yum install pcb
For the installation with yum you need administrator-privileges.
To install a manually downloaded rpm:
yum localinstall <rpmfilename>
Where <rpmfilename> is the downloaded rpm of your choice. Required dependencies need to be downloaded and installed simultaneously, or beforehand.
"localinstall" is used to install a set of local rpm files. If required the enabled repositories will be used to resolve dependencies. Note that the install command will do a local install, if given a filename. This option is maintained for legacy reasons only.
"localupdate" is used to update the system by specifying local rpm files. Only the specified rpm files of which an older version is already installed will be installed, the remaining specified packages will be ignored. If required the enabled repositories will be used to resolve dependencies. Note that the update command will do a local update, if given a filename. This option is maintained for legacy reasons only.
3.1.3 Gentoo
emerge pcb
3.1.4 NetBSD
See ftp://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/NetBSD/packages/pkgsrc/cad/pcb/README.html.
3.1.5 Ubuntu
3.2 Building From the Source CD
3.3 Building From Source
3.3.1 Unix/Linux
3.3.2 Mac OS/X
3.3.3 Cygwin
4 Your First Board
In this chapter, we’re going to walk you through creating a few very simple boards, just to give you an idea of the way the programs work and how to do the things that are common to all project. Each board will build upon techniques learned from the previous board.
While this manual is not intended to cover the gschem program, we will be instructing you on the minimum you’ll need to know to use gschem with pcb . Please refer to the gschem documentation for further details.
The first board will be a simple LED and resistor. It will show you how to create a board, place elements, and route traces. The second board will be a simple LED blinker, which will involve creating schematics, setting up a project, and creating new symbols and footprints. The third board will be another blinker, this time with surface mount devices and four layers, which will introduce power planes, vias, and thermals.
4.1 LED Board
This first board will show you the basic operation of pcb . Each new command or operation that is introduced will be described in full the first time, but not subsequent times. Many operations can be invoked either by a menu option, like File→Quit Program to select the “Quit” option in the “File” menu, or by a keyboard shortcut, like Ctrl-Q . When we say Ctrl-Q we mean to hold the Ctrl key while pressing the Q key. When we say Shift-Q we mean to hold either Shift key while pressing the Q key.
For example, the first time we describe the Quit command, we’d say, “now exit pcb by using the Quit command (File→Quit or Ctrl-Q )”. Any other time, we’d just say “now Quit.”
The first step in this project is to run pcb . Since pcb defaults to using the current directory for its files, it’s a good idea to create a new subdirectory for this project, cd into it in a terminal window, and then run pcb from there:
Now is a good time to practice that Quit command :-)
Also, if you ever ask for pcb help from someone else, they’ll probably want to know what version and GUI you’re using. To see this, use the About command (Window→About...).
Note that when pcb starts, it creates not only its main window (pictured above), but two additional windows. One is the “PCB Library”, which we’ll talk about later, and the other is the “PCB Log” that contains all the messages - warnings, errors, etc. For now, you can just move these out of the way. If you close these, you can re-open them using Window→Library and Window→Message Log.
For any board you create, one of the first things you need to decide on is how big the board is going to be. If you want it to be “as small as possible”, then you can create it bigger than you need and change the size later. For this simple board, we can guess - we want it to be one inch by one inch. The board size controls are located in the Preferences window (File→Preferences), which contains both board-specific and user-specific preferences. We want the Sizes preferences, so click on the word Sizes. The window should look like this:
We won’t be using the Text Scale or DRC preferences yet. Note that the units are mils, so the default board size is six inches wide and five inches high. Change these numbers to 1000.0 each:
We will next set up our layers, which define how many copper layers we’ll have and what they’ll be called. Select the Layers preferences. You’ll see three tabs along the top; click on the Groups tab to show the layer group preferences. For this project, all we want to do is make sure that the solder layer is on the solder side, and the component layer is on the component side. Click in the boxes to make “component” and “component side” in group 1, and “solder” and “solder side” in group 2, then click on OK:
There’s a couple of settings you’ll want to set up now, as they get saved with the board. First, let’s turn on the grid (View→Enable visible grid if it isn’t already checked) and set it to 0.1" or 100 mil (View→Grid Size→100 mil). The grid is drawn as a field of tiny dots, which may be hard to see on our board but would be easier to see if there were more of them. For example, switch to a 10 mil grid and note the difference (don’t forget to switch back to 100 mil).
Next, we want to make sure any new traces we create won’t automatically connect with any polygons we might add - for example, adding a ground plane or “flood fill”. The Settings menu has many settings in it, but for now, just make sure that New lines, arcs clear polygons and Crosshair snaps to pins and pads are checked, and Auto enforce DRC clearance is not checked.
Now that we’ve set up our board, it’s a good time to save it. Use the Save command (File→Save layout). Since this is the first time, it will ask you for a layout name. We’re going to call this layout fb-led.pcb so type that in where it says Name and click OK. Now that your board has a file associated with it, you can just File→Save layout whenever you want to save your work.
Now we’ll start adding the actual circuit. This circuit will be a simple LED in series with a resistor, and a header for a battery. We won’t need schematics, we’ll just add the parts and connections manually. The first step is to choose a route style for your new traces. The lower left corner lists the four available route styles. Make sure Signal is selected, then click Route Style to bring up the route style window. We’re going to use fairly large traces, which is typical of a simple board. In that window, set the Line width to 20, Via hole to 36, Via size of 76, and Clearance to 20; then click OK:
Next we’ll add the three parts we need. In larger projects, this will be done by gsch2pcb but you’ll need to know the footprint names for that. Find the library window (if you left it open) or open it (if you closed it) with Window→Library. Click on the triangle next to pcblib to open the pcblib library. Scroll down to ~geda and click on it, to open the ~geda library.
When you choose the parts out of the library, notice that there is some text in square brackets - this is the footprint name you’ll need for gsch2pcb . The first we want is the LED. We’ll use RCY100P for the LED, which is a radial cylinder, polarized, 100 mil spacing. Scroll down until you find it, and click on it. When you move the cursor back to the pcb window, you’ll see that it now carries the outline of the part with it:
Press the left mouse button to place a part on your board. We’ll move it later. Do the same for an ACY400 footprint for the resistor, and a HEADER2_1 . Your board should now look something like this:
We will use the selection and rotate tools to position the parts where we want them. The palette of tools is just above the route styles, on the left. The two we want are SEL and ROT:
First click on the ROT (rotate) tool. The cursor should change shape to act as a hint that you’ll rotate whatever you click on. Position the cursor over the square pad on the header and click the left mouse button:
Now click on the SEL (selection) tool, also known as the “arrow tool”. You move parts by pressing the left mouse button while the cursor is over the part, and moving the mouse while holding the mouse button down. The part itself doesn’t move; instead, a wire-frame outline of the part is moved (much like when placing parts). When you release the mouse button, the part is moved.
Move the header so that the square pin is at 200,600 (the crosshair’s coordinates are shown in the upper right corner of the window), the resistor’s square pin at 400,400, and the LED’s square pin at 500,700. Your board should now look like this:
Now is a really good time to save your layout.
Next we’ll start adding the traces that connect the parts. We’ll use the LINE tool to add them. Since this is a simple board, it’s likely to be built as a single-sided board, with the traces on the “back” side, so we want the solder layer to be the drawing layer. On the left side of the window is a collection of buttons named after various layers in your board. One of them is named solder. To the left of that button is a small indicator. Click on it. Don’t click on the button itself - that changes the visibility of the layer. Click on the indicator.
The way the line tool works is that you click on the starting point, move the crosshair to the end point, and click again. By not requiring you to hold the mouse button down, you have the ability to scroll and zoom to find the endpoint. You can also click on intermediate points to make lines with multiple corners. To end the trace, or start a new trace elsewhere, press the Esc key. If you press the Esc key again, you return to the selection tool.
If you attempt to connect two points that aren’t on the same vertical, horizontal, or diagonal line, the line tool will create a pair of traces to connect them. One will be either vertical or horizontal, and the other will be diagonal. The vertical/horizontal segment will be connected to the starting point, and the diagonal segment will follow the crosshair. If you look in the status bar, you’ll see a _/ symbol that indicates this:
Pressing the / key changes this mode. If it says \_ the diagonal will attach to the starting point, and the vertical/horizontal will attach to the crosshair. If it says neither, only one segment at a time will be drawn, instead of two. Also, you can use the Shift key to temporarily toggle between \_ and _/ modes.
So let’s add the three traces we need. Press the / key until _/ is shown (this is the default when you start pcb ) and connect the left resistor pin to the top header pin. Click, move, click, Esc . Connect the left LED pin to the bottom header pin. Connect the right resistor pin to the right LED pin.
Next we’ll make some adjustments to our PCB. Unless you have your own library that you’ve tweaked to be “just right”, it’s likely that you’ll need to adjust some things during the board layout process. For example, you might need to make room for a trace between two pins. In our case, we’re going to make some adjustments that are appropriate for home-made boards. We’re going to make the pads bigger, in case we drill off-center. There is a generic “change size” command that’s tied to the S key. Place the crosshair over one of the pins and type S and the pin gets bigger. Press Shift-S and the pin gets smaller. You can change the size of pins, pads, traces, and even silk this way. However, if you want to change a lot of things at once, there’s a simpler way. Use the Select→Select all visible objects menu entry to select everything. Now you can use the Select→Change size of selected objects menu to change all the selected things at once. In our case, we want the Pins +10 mil option to make our pins a little bigger. After clicking that, see that all the pins are a little bigger. Now you can Select→Unselect all objects to unselect them all.
You can also use the Select tool (SEL) to select and deselect. To select, either click with the left mouse button on the object you want to select, or drag a rectangle around a group of things. To deselect, just click somewhere where there isn’t anything. You can also Shift-click to select something without deselecting anything else, like if you wanted to select two or three things that aren’t grouped nicely.
Next we will label our components. Each element has three text strings it can display; you choose which through a View menu option. The default is to display the reference designator (refdes), which is what we want for now.
Since both pins and elements can have labels, turn off the grid so we can select the elements (View→Grid size→No Grid). Now select the Edit→Edit name of→text on layout menu. Most of the GUI goes “grey” and pcb asks you to Select an Object. Left-click on the resistor (on the body, not on the pins). A dialog box pops up asking you for the new name. Make sure it says “Element” and not “Pin”, and type in R1 :
You can now drag and drop the name to where you want it, being careful to pick up the label and not any traces:
You can also use keyboard shortcuts. Position the crosshair over the LED, but not over the pins, and press the n key (for “name”). Type in D1 . Set the name of the header to J1 and arrange the names so they look like this:
Don’t forget to save your work occasionally. pcb will normally save a copy automatically every once in a while, but it’s a good habit to save it manually when you’re at a good stopping point.
We can also add additional text to the silkscreen and copper layers. Let’s add some text to the header, so we know which way to plug the battery in. We want to use the text tool:
We also want the silkscreen layer to be the default drawing layer:
Now, click below the header’s square pin, and enter + in the dialog that pops up. Use the S key a whole bunch of times to make it bigger, then use the selection tool to move it in place. Do the same for the - label.
Now that we’re done with the labels, set the grid back to 100 mil in case you move any of the traces or parts; once they’re off-grid it’s hard to get them back on to the grid.
We’re done editing the board now, so if you haven’t already, save your work. But now that the board is done, what do we do with it? Well, that depends on how you’re going to make your board. If you want to do it yourself, you probably want to send it to your printer. If you want someone else to make it, they’ll probably want gerber files.
In your File menu, there are three options we’re interested in.
The Print Layout... option prints your layout, but note that it will print 11 pages of board layers! This probably isn’t what you normally want, but let’s do it anyway.
There are a lot of options there, but there’s only a couple you need to worry about right now. Select “fill-page” and “ps-color” and click OK. “Fill-page” zooms your prints to fill the page. “PS-color” causes each layer to be printed in the same color as you see on the screen. If you’re making boards at home using toner transfer, you want these options off, and you want “mirror” on.
In most cases, you don’t want to just print the whole design. Usually you’ll use the Export Layout... option to export your layout in a format that others can use. When you export, a list of possible export types is offered:
Click on gerber so we can create some Gerber (RS-274X) files, which are industry standard file for describing circuit boards.
Click on verbose then OK. You’ll see something like this in your terminal:
Gerber: 5 apertures in fb-led.front.gbr Gerber: 5 apertures in fb-led.back.gbr Gerber: 3 apertures in fb-led.frontmask.gbr Gerber: 3 apertures in fb-led.backmask.gbr Gerber: 2 apertures in fb-led.plated-drill.cnc Gerber: 3 apertures in fb-led.frontsilk.gbr Gerber: 3 apertures in fb-led.fab.gbr
For a single sided board, most fab houses will need the back, backmask, plated-drill, frontsilk, and fab files. pcb always produces “positive” gerbers in case the fab asks.
For home fabrication, you’ll want to print (see above) without the ps-color or fill-page options. For this simple board, printer calibration is not needed. If you’re drilling your own holes, you may want to select the drill helper option, which reduces the diameter of the holes in the copper wherever you’re drilling to help you center the drill properly. If you use the ps exporter, selecting the “multi-file” option puts each layer in a separate file. That way, you can print only the layers you’re interested in.
So let’s see what we’ve produced. Exit from pcb with File→Quit Program and find your terminal again. I use the free programs gv and gerbv to view my exported files; gv is GhostScript, but your desktop probably knows what to do if you double click on a .ps file in your file browser. gerbv is a gerber file viewer that’s part of gEDA:
$ gerbv fb-led.*.gbr fb-led.*.cnc
That’s it! The next step is to actually make board (or have them made), which is beyond the scope of this tutorial.
4.2 Blinker Board
This next board will introduce some additional concepts in pcb that will help you with more complex board. It is assumed that you’ve gone through the previous board, and those concepts will not be re-explained. This board will be another single-sided board, but with additional components. We will use a schematic to describe the circuit, create some custom symbols and footprints, and learn to use the autorouter.
We will begin by creating our custom symbols and footprints. First, we must create local symbols and footprint directories and teach the tools to use them. My preference is to create subdirectories in the project directory called symbols and footprints :
We then create some files to tell gschem and gsch2pcb to look in these directories. The first is called gafrc and contains just this one line:
;; (component-library "./symbols") (component-library ".")
The second is called gschemrc and contains just this one line:
;; (component-library "./symbols") (component-library ".")
The third is project-specific. The gsch2pcb program can read its commands from a project file, and we will use this to tell it about the footprints directory. The file is called fb-blinker.prj and contains:
elements-dir ./footprints schematics fb-blinker-sch.sch output-name fb-blinker
This project file tells gsch2pcb where to get element descriptions, which schematics to read (we only have one), and what base name to use for the various output files.
We must create two custom symbols for this project. The first is for our power jack, and is a purely custom symbol. Creating such symbols is beyond the scope of this tutorial. Please refer to the gschem documentation for that. The second symbol uses the djboxsym utility which you can download from the web (see http://www.gedasymbols.org/user/dj_delorie/tools/djboxsym.html).
The first symbol is called symbols/powerjack.sym and looks like this:
There’s a copy of this symbol in the source distribution for this documentation. The second symbol is built from this 555.symdef file:
[labels] 555 refdes=U? [left] 7 DISCH 6 THRESH 2 TRIG [right] 4 RES 3 OUT 5 CTRL [top] 8 VCC [bottom] 1 GND
and looks like this:
Now, using those symbols, create your schematic, and name it fb-blinker-sch.sch . There’s a copy of the schematic file in the source distribution also. It should look like this:
Using gschem and/or gattrib , set the footprint and value attributes as follows:
refdes footprint value C1 RCY100 1uF J1 pj102.fp PJ102 LED1 RCY100 RED R1 ACY400 100k R2 ACY400 100k R3 ACY400 3.3k U1 DIP8 LM555CN
Now we must create the custom footprint for the power jack. While there are various contributed tools that can be used for large footprints (like BGAs), for small parts like this the easiest way is to create the footprint in pcb itself. This is done by creating a “board” with vias and lines, then converting it to an element and saving it.
Change to the footprints subdirectory and start pcb . It doesn’t matter how big the working area is, or the layer stackup. Looking at the specs for our power jack, we note that measurements are given in tenths of a millimeter, so we’ll use a metric grid. To start, set the grid to 1mm, move the crosshairs to the center of the board, and press Ctrl-M to set the mark. This will be the reference point for all our measurements. By doing this with a large grid value, we ensure that it will be easy to click on the same spot later on if needed.
Now set the grid to 0.1mm, which we’ll use to place all our vias and lines. We’re using vias to create pins, so we need to set the via size and drill diameter. Click on the Route Style button to bring up the route styles dialog, and set Via hole to 1.6mm and Via size to 3.6mm. While we’re here, set Line width to 0.15mm, we’ll need that when we draw the outline later.
Now, zoom in enough to see the grid points. Place one via 3mm to the left of the mark, one 3mm to the right, and one 4.7mm above. Sequence is important! The pins will be numbered in the same order as the via creation. To place a via, select the Via tool, position the crosshair, and press the left mouse button.
Using the line tool, the same tool you used to draw copper traces in the first board, we will draw an outline of the jack on the silk layer. Select the line tool, and make the silk layer active. Draw as much of a box as you can which extends 10.7mm to the right of the mark, 3.7mm to the left, and 4.5mm above and below. Be careful not to draw on top of your pins, or your board will have ink on the pins. It should look something like this:
Now, set the grid back to 1mm so we can easily click on the mark. Select everything by using the Select→Select all visible objects menu button. Position the crosshair on the mark and press Ctrl-C to copy all the objects to the buffer. Use the Buffer→Convert buffer to element menu button to convert the buffer to an element. You can now click somewhere else on the board to paste a copy of your new element for inspection.
The first thing to do is check the pin numbers. Place the crosshair on the mark and press the D key to turn on the pin numbers. Check to make sure they’re correct, then press D to turn them back off again.
Now, we’re going to set the default position of the label. Place the crosshair on the mark and press the N key. Change the element name to J? . By default it shows up at the element’s mark. Use the selection tool and S key to position the label as shown below.
Using the selection tool, position the crosshair on the element’s mark and click on it to select it. Press Ctrl-C to copy it to the buffer, and use Buffer→Save buffer elements to file to save your new footprint to a file. Save it as pj102.fp in the footprints directory. Note that the name of the file must match the footprint attribute you used for the power jack in your schematics.
Congratulations! You’ve created your first custom footprint.
Now that we have our schematics and custom footprint, we need to figure out how to start the board layout. The tool we will use is gsch2pcb , which reads schematics and can create or update a board to match. Since gsch2pcb doesn’t use the same defaults as pcb , we will create the board in pcb and only use gsch2pcb in update mode.
When creating a non-trivial board, it’s a good idea to start with a larger board than your final size. For this project, the final size will be 1.4 inches wide by 0.9 inches high. However, we’ll start with 2 by 2 inch board to give us some room to move things around. Run pcb and create your board, setting up the size, layers, and styles just like in the last project. Make sure you set a 100 mil grid, since the parts we’re using are all designed with 100 mil spacing in mind. Also, make sure Settings→Crosshair snaps to pins and pads is checked. Save this empty board as fb-blinker.pcb and exit.
Now we run gsch2pcb , passing it the name of the project file:
$ gsch2pcb fb-blinker.prj --------------------------------- gEDA/gnetlist pcbpins Backend This backend is EXPERIMENTAL Use at your own risk! --------------------------------- Using the m4 processor for pcb footprints ---------------------------------- Done processing. Work performed: 1 file elements and 6 m4 elements added to fb-blinker.new.pcb. Next steps: 1. Run pcb on your file fb-blinker.pcb. 2. From within PCB, select "File -> Load layout data to paste buffer" and select fb-blinker.new.pcb to load the new footprints into your existing layout. 3. From within PCB, select "File -> Load netlist file" and select fb-blinker.net to load the updated netlist. 4. From within PCB, enter :ExecuteFile(fb-blinker.cmd) to update the pin names of all footprints.
What gsch2pcb does is remove elements from your board that don’t exist in the schematic, provide new elements that need to be added, generate an updated netlist, and create a script that renames all the pins. You don’t need to use all these - for example, I rarely use the pin renaming script - but we will this time, so you can learn how each file is used.
We will do as the hints above tell us to do. Run pcb fb-blinker.pcb to bring up the empty board. Load the new element data, which automatically changes you to the buffer tool. Click on the board to place all those new parts. They’ll all be in the same place, but we’ll fix that later. Load the new netlist, and run the script. After closing any dialogs that may have come up, your board should look like this:
The next step is to separate the elements so we can start laying out our board. Use the Select→Disperse all elements menu option, which spreads apart the elements. Then, use the Connect→Optimize rats nest menu option (or the O key) to draw all the rats on the board. These will help you figure out an optimum layout of your elements. Your board should look something like this (yours may vary depending on how the dispersal worked):
If you position the crosshair over U1 and press the D key, you’ll see that the pins are now labelled with the same labels as in the schematic. You can use the View→Enable Pinout shows number menu checkbox to toggle between the symbolic labels and the original pin numbers.
Now, as before, we want to rearrange the elements to minimise and simplify the connections. This is where the rats come in handy. As you rearrange the elements, the rats follow, so you can see how rotating and moving elements affect the layout. As you move elements around, press the O key to tell pcb to figure out the best way of connecting everything in their new locations.
As you move the elements around, remember to pick up the power jack by its mark, as the power jack’s pins have metric spacing. The other elements should be picked up by their pins, since they have inch spacing. By picking up elements by their pins, you ensure that their pins end up on the grid points when you put them down.
Rearrange your elements so that they look like this, somewhere near the center of your board. Note that the rats nest will tell you when you have the resistors backwards, since they don’t have “polarity” like the LED or IC have.
As before, we want to move the refdes labels around so that they’re both visible and out of the way. To make this easier, use the Settings→Only Names option to keep the tools from accidentally selecting elements or rat lines. Shut off the grid, and use the selection and rotate tools, and the S size key, to make the labels like this:
Now use Settings→Lock Names to keep from accidentally moving our labels later. We’re still using our over-sized board. Now is the time to reduce it to the final size. First, we have to move the elements to the upper left corner of the board. Set the grid back to 100 mil, Select→Select all visible objects, grab one of the pins, and move everything up to the corner, as close as you can get without touching the edges:
Click to de-select and change the board size to 1400 mils wide by 900 mils high. Don’t forget to save often!
Again, we’re planning on hand-soldering this board, so select everything and make all the pins 10 mils bigger than the default.
Rather than route all the traces by hand, for this board we will use the autorouter. There are a few key things you need to keep in mind when using the autorouter. First, the autorouter will use all available layers, so we must disable the layers we don’t want it to route on. To do this, click on the component button to disable that layer:
The autorouter also uses whatever the default style is, so select the Fat style:
The autorouter uses the rats nest to determine what connections will be autorouted, so press O now to make sure all the rats are present and reflect the latest position of the elements. To do the autorouting, simply select the Connects→Autoroute all rats menu option.
In theory, you could consider your board “done” now, but to make it look more professional, we will do two more steps. Use the Connects→Optimize routed tracks→Auto-Optimize menu option twice (or until no further changes happen) to clean up the traces left by the autorouter:
And finally, select Connects→Optimize routed tracks→Miter to miter the sharp corners:
Your board is done. As before, you can print your design or produce Gerber files, according to how you’re going to have your board made.
4.3 SMT Blinker
The third and final board in the “first board” series will teach you about multi-layer boards, vias, and SMT components. Again, we assume you’ve done the other two boards, and will not re-explain concepts taught there. We will be using the same circuit as the last board, but to make things interesting, we will be adding some constraints. The board must be as small as possible, EMI-proof, and able to handle rework. Ok, I’m making this up, but what it means is that we will be using the smallest components a hobbyist can expect to use, a four-layer board, and more vias than would otherwise be needed. We do this to give us the opportunity to learn these techniques, without spending undue time due to an overly large schematic.
We begin with the same schematic as before. To assist us in assigning power planes, we need to name the power rails in the schematic. See the gschem documentation for details, but what you want is to name the ground net GND and the power net Vdd . Set up a new fb-smt.prj project file as before. Use gattrib to set the footprint attributes as follows:
refdes footprint value C1 0402 1uF J1 pj102.fp PJ102 LED1 0402 RED R1 0201 100k R2 0201 100k R3 0201 3.3k U1 MSOP8 LMC555CMM
Run pcb and set up your blank board. Put “component” and “component side” in group 1. Put “GND” in group 2, “power” in group 3, and “solder” and “solder side” in group 4. Switch to the Change tab, select the solder layer in the main window, and move the solder layer down under the power layer.
Set the board size to 50 mm by 50 mm. To set a metric size, use the View→Grid units→mm menu option. Then, the Sizes preference will use millimeters. Set the DRC values to 0.35 mm (about 13.5 mil) for drill and 0.15mm (about 6 mil) for everything else. Save your board, exit pcb , and run gsch2pcb fb-smt.prj . Go back to pcb , import and disperse the new elements, and load the netlist.
As before, move the labels out of the way and size them accordingly. You should end up with something like this:
The final size of our board will be 12.5mm wide by 18 mm high, not much bigger than the power jack. Start by rotating the power jack to face down, and put its mark at 5.5mm by 7mm. The LED goes just above it, with R3 to the right of the LED. The rest of the elements will go on the other side of the board. Here’s how:
For each element that needs to go on the other side of the board, place the crosshair over the element and press the B key
The element shows as a light gray because it’s now on the “far side” of the board (Note that one of the layer buttons says far side on it). You can flip the board over (making the far side the near side, and visa-versa) by pressing the Tab key. Since the elements we need to place are on the far side, now, flip the board over. Note that this is an up-down flip, so the power jack now appears in the lower left corner instead of the upper left. There are other types of flips you can do by using Shift-Tab (left-right flip), Ctrl-Tab (180 degree rotation), or Ctrl-Shift-Tab (nothing moves, sort of an X-Ray view).
Anyway, move the remaining elements around so that they look like this:
When routing a multi-layer board, I find it best to start with the power and ground planes. First, resize the board to be 12.5 mm wide by 18 mm high, and flip it so you’ve viewing the component side (the side with the power jack). If your version of pcb does not permit sizes this small (some versions have a one inch minimum, others 0.6 inch), save the file, exit pcb , and edit fb-smt.pcb in a text editor so that the PCB line looks like this:
PCB["" 49213 70866]
When you run pcb again, the board will have the right size. Set your grid to 0.5 mm and make sure it’s visible. There are two ways to create a “plane layer”, which means a layer that’s mostly copper. Such layers are often used for power and ground planes. The first way is to use the polygon tool; the second is to use the rectangle tool, which is just a shortcut for the polygon tool.
Make the GND layer the current layer and select the POLY tool:
The polygon tool works by clicking on each corner of the polygon, in sequence. You complete the polygon by either clicking on your start point again, or by pressing Shift-P . We will create a polygon that’s 0.5mm away from the board edge. In these images, we start at the lower left corner and work our way around clockwise. When we click on the lower left corner again, the polygon is created:
In this case, we’re just drawing a rectangle, but if you need any other shape, just click on the corners as needed. As a shortcut, you can create a rectangle with the rectangle tool, which creates rectangle-shaped polygons. Make the power layer the current layer and select the RECT tool:
Like the polygon tool, the rectangle tool works by clicking on corners. However, you only have to click on two diagonally opposite corners, like this:
If the color difference is too subtle for you, you can choose other colors through the File→Preferences menu option. We will set the GND layer to green and the power layer to red for the remainder of this tutorial.
To connect the ground and power planes to their respective nets, we’ll use a thermal to connect the power jack’s pins to them. We could also just draw a line from the pin to the polygon, but thermals are better suited to this task. Select the THRM tool:
What the thermal tool does is connect (or disconnect) thermal fingers between pins or vias, and the polygons around them. Each time you click on a pin or via, the thermal fingers are connected to the current layer. We want to find the pin on the power jack that’s connected to ground in the schematic, and connect it to ground on the board. We use the netlist dialog to do so. First, optimize the rats net with O and make the GND layer current. If the netlist dialog isn’t shown, use Window→Netlist to show it. Select the GND net and click on Find:
Notice that one of the pins on the power jack has been highlighted. That’s the one that is supposed to be connected to the ground plane. Click on it to create a thermal:
If you optimize the rats nest again, the rats won’t connect to that pin any more, and the other pins and pads that need to connect to the ground plane are now marked with circles, meaning “these need to be connected to a plane”. Anyway, make the power plane the current plane, find the VDD net in the netlist and create its thermal on the found power jack pin. Note that the green GND thermal fingers on the other pin show through the gap in the red power plane - thermals are created on a specific layer, not on all layers.
If you tried to autoroute the board at this point, it would just connect all those power and ground pins to the power and ground pins on the power jack. So, we will first tie all the power and ground pins to their planes manually, using vias. We’re doing this mostly to demonstrate how to do it, of course. The first step is to place the vias. Select the VIA tool from the left panel:
Click on the Route Style button to bring up the route styles dialog, and set Via hole to 0.4mm and Via size to 0.8mm. Also set Line width to 0.25mm. Create vias near the pins that are connected to the planes, as such:
Note that I’ve shut off the ground and power planes, as well as rat lines, to help you see where the vias should go. Shut off the GND plane and “find” the VDD net again, to highlight which rat circles (and thus their vias) need to connect to the power plane. Like you did with the power jack’s pins, use the thermal tool to connect the relevent vias to the power plane. Repeat for the GND plane.
Now you have to connect the vias to the pins that need them. For the LED it’s easy, that trace goes on the top. Make the component layer the current layer and use the LINE tool like you’ve done before to draw a line from the via next to the LED, to the pad on the LED that’s connected to VDD. For the other connections, you’ll want to flip the board over, so use the Tab key to flip the board over, make the solder layer the current layer, and connect the rest of the power/gnd pins to their vias. If you press O now, you’ll see that all the rat-circles have gone away: |
A Point of View: Is democracy overrated?
Democracy is championed as a universal good by the West, but we over-estimate its power to guarantee personal and political freedom, argues Roger Scruton.
For some time, the leading Western nations have acted upon the assumption that democracy is the solution to political conflict, and that the ultimate goal of foreign policy must be to encourage the emergence of democracy in countries which have not yet enjoyed its benefits. And they continue to adhere to this assumption, even when considering events in the Middle East today. We can easily sympathise with it. For democracies do not, in general, go to war with each other, and do not, in general, experience civil war within their borders. Where the people can choose their government, there is a safety valve that prevents conflicts from over-heating. Unpopular governments are rejected without violence.
The championship of democracy has therefore become a settled feature of Western foreign policy. In retrospect, the Cold War has been seen as a conflict between democracy and totalitarianism, in which democracy finally triumphed. And with democracy came the liberation of the people of the former communist states. Where there had been tyranny and oppression, there was now freedom and human rights. And if we study the words of Western politicians, we will constantly find that the three ideas - democracy, freedom and human rights - are spoken of in one breath, and assumed in all circumstances to coincide. That, for many of our political leaders, is the lesson to be drawn from the Cold War and the final collapse of the Soviet empire.
Continue reading the main story Find out more Roger Scruton is a writer and philosopher
A Point of View is usually broadcast on Fridays on Radio 4 at 20:50 BST and repeated Sundays, 08:50 BST
In my view, the idea that there is a single, one-size-fits-all solution to social and political conflict around the world, and that democracy is the name of it, is based on a disregard of historical and cultural conditions, and a failure to see that democracy is only made possible by other and more deeply hidden institutions. And while we are willing to accept that democracy goes hand in hand with individual freedom and the protection of human rights, we often fail to realise that these three things are three things, not one, and that it is only under certain conditions that they coincide.
Democracy was introduced into Russia without any adequate protection for human rights. And many human rights were protected in 19th Century Britain long before the emergence of anything that we would call democracy. In the Middle East today, we find parties standing for election, like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which regards an electoral victory as the opportunity to crush dissent and impose a way of life that for many citizens is simply unacceptable. In such circumstances democracy is a threat to human rights and not a way of protecting them.
Continue reading the main story “ Start Quote The totalitarian system endures by abolishing the distinction between civil society and the state” End Quote
I had the opportunity to study some of these issues during the 1980s, when visiting friends and colleagues who were attempting to plant the seeds of opposition in the communist countries. These were public-spirited citizens, who ran the risk of arrest and imprisonment for activities which you and I would regard as entirely innocent. They ran classes for young people who had been deprived of an education on account of their parents' political profile. They established support networks for writers, scholars, musicians and artists who were banned from presenting their work. They smuggled medicines, bibles, religious symbols and textbooks. And because charities were illegal under communism and religious institutions were controlled by the Communist Party, all this work had to be conducted in secret.
The totalitarian system, I learned, endures not simply by getting rid of democratic elections and imposing a one-party state. It endures by abolishing the distinction between civil society and the state, and by allowing nothing significant to occur which is not controlled by the Party. By studying the situation in Eastern Europe, I came quickly to see that political freedom depends upon a delicate network of institutions, which my friends were striving to understand and if possible to resuscitate.
So what are these institutions? First among them is judicial independence. In every case where the Communist Party had an interest, the judge was under instructions to deliver the verdict that the Party required. It didn't matter that there was no law that the victim had breached. If necessary, a law could be invented at the last moment. If the Party wanted someone to be in prison, then the judge had to put that person in prison. If he refused, then he would end up in prison himself, if he was lucky. In such circumstances the rule of law was a complete fiction: law was simply a mask worn by the Party, as it dictated its decisions to the people.
Attempts to bring democracy to Egypt have run into trouble
Then there is the institution of property rights. Normal people in the communist state had virtually nothing to their name - nothing legal, that is. Their houses or flats were owned by the state, their few personal possessions could not be freely traded in the market, and their salary and pension depended on their political conformity and could be removed at any time. In these circumstances the entire economy went underground. No court of law would enforce the contracts that people needed if they were to get on with their lives. You might have a deal with your neighbour to exchange vegetables for maths lessons. But if one of you defected and the other took the dispute to law, the only result would be that both of you went to prison for conducting an illegal business. All transactions therefore depended upon personal trust, in a situation in which trust was in shorter and shorter supply. Hence society was riven by conflicts and suspicions, which neither law nor politics could remedy. And the Communist Party rejoiced in this situation, since it prevented people from combining against it.
Continue reading the main story Democracy in a few words George Bernard Shaw: "Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve"
"Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve" Winston Churchill: "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."
"Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time." Clement Atlee: "Democracy means government by discussion, but it is only effective if you can stop people talking"
"Democracy means government by discussion, but it is only effective if you can stop people talking" Tom Stoppard: "It's not the voting that's democracy, it's the counting"
Then there is freedom of speech and opinion. The freedom to entertain and express opinions, however offensive to others, has been regarded since Locke in the 17th Century as the pre-condition of a political society. This freedom was enshrined in the US constitution, defended in the face of the Victorian moralists by John Stuart Mill, and upheld in our time by my dissident friends. We take this freedom so much for granted that we regard it as the default position of humanity - the position to which we return, if all oppressive powers are removed from us. But my experience of communist Europe convinced me of the opposite. Orthodoxy, conformity and the hounding of the dissident define the default position of mankind, and there is no reason to think that democracies are any different in this respect from Islamic theocracies or one-party totalitarian states.
Of course, the opinions that are suppressed change from one form of society to another, as do the methods of suppression. But we should be clear that to guarantee freedom of opinion goes against the grain of social life, and imposes risks that people may be reluctant to take. For in criticising orthodoxy, you are not just questioning a belief - you are threatening the social order that has been built on it. Also, orthodoxies are the more fiercely protected the more vulnerable they are.
Both those principles are surely obvious from the reaction of Islamists to criticisms directed at their religion. Just as it was in the wars of religion that ravaged Europe in the 17th Century, it is precisely what is most absurd that is most protected. And critics are not treated merely as people with an intellectual difficulty. They are a threat, the enemies of society and, for the believer, the enemies of God. So it was too under communism, in which a system of government had been built on theories that may have looked plausible in the early days of the industrial revolution but which in the post-war economy of Europe were palpably ridiculous. For that very reason it was the greatest heresy to criticise them.
Finally, there is legitimate opposition. This was perhaps the greatest casualty of communism as it afflicted Europe. When Lenin imposed the communist system on Russia it was in the form of a top-down dictatorship, in which orders were passed down to the ranks below. It was a kind of military government, and opposition could no more unite against it than soldiers in the ranks can unite against their commanders. In times of emergency this kind of discipline is perhaps necessary. But it is the opposite of civilised government.
It has been assumed in this country from the time of the Anglo-Saxons that political decisions are taken in council, after hearing all sides to the question, and taking note of the many interests that must be reconciled. Long before the advent of democracy, our parliament divided into government and opposition, and except in stressful periods during the 16th and 17th Centuries it was acknowledged that government without opposition is without any corrective when things go wrong. That is what we saw in the Soviet Union and its empire - a system of government without a reverse gear, which continued headlong towards the brick wall of the future.
In the underground universities of communist Europe, my friends and colleagues studied those things, and prepared themselves for the hoped-for day when the Communist Party, having starved itself of every rational input, would finally give up the ghost. And the lessons that they learned need to be learned again today, as our politicians lead us forth under the banner of democracy, without pausing to examine what democracy actually requires.
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Residents of the village of ‘Asira al-Qibliya in Nablus District held a joint demonstration with Israeli activists from Combatants for Peace and Rabbis for Human Rights, protesting takeover of their lands by settlers. During the demonstration, youths from the village went over to a guard tent that settlers had erected near the outpost and took it down. Following their action, soldiers and armed settlers arrived at the scene. The soldiers fired tear gas and rubber-coated metal bullets at the demonstrators, and a settler standing near them opened fire from an M-16 rifle at the demonstrators, who posed no danger as they were running away from the spot. During the event, an Israeli activist went up to a group of soldiers and demanded that they put a stop to the settlers’ firing, but the soldiers did not act accordingly. Later, settlers threw stones and what appear to be firecrackers toward houses in the village, whose inhabitants responded by throwing stones back. |
Maytag recalls 1.7 million dishwashers
(CNN) -- This ought to keep the Maytag repairman busy for a while.
The appliance manufacturer along with the Consumer Product Safety Commission on Thursday announced the recall of about 1.7 million dishwashers made by the company between February 2006 and April of 2010.
"An electrical failure in the dishwasher's heating element can pose a serious fire hazard," said the recall notice issued by the CPSC.
"Maytag has received 12 reports of dishwasher heating element fires that have resulted in fires and dishwasher damage, including one report of extensive kitchen damage from a fire," the CPSC said. There have no reports of injuries.
The recall includes select Maytag, Amana, Jenn-Air, Admiral, Magic Chef, Performa and Crosley brands manufactured by Maytag.
The company has set up a website where customers can check their unit's serial number to see if it is included in the recall -- www.repair.maytag.com. Consumers will be able to choose between having their dishwasher repaired or accepting a rebate toward the purchase of a new dishwasher.
The Maytag repairman has been a staple of the company's corporate image. Since 1967, Maytag has touted its quality by showing a bored repairman with nothing to do. |
Disclaimer: I do not own Hyperdimension Neptunia or any of its material which includes, but is not limited to, characters, setting, and/or items, which are owned by their respective owners.
All preparations were complete. Dimensional tethers were strong and stable. Containment forcefield energy at one-hundred percent. Safety goggles on. Schedule for the next three weeks emptied. Pudding stock for Neptune refilled. Nepgear ensured nothing could possibly interrupt her sensitive experiment, for any lapse in concentration would mean the destruction of not one, but two entire dimensions.
Her goal today was to create a portal between her dimension and another. The conventional method of using magic and share energy took too long and was unreliable, so she searched for another way of creating multidimensional portals using technology. With the help of her own observations of the portal between her and Plutia's worlds and notes she "borrowed" from MAGES. (she would return them later), Nepgear created her prototype portal. Today was the day of its initial test run.
In order to ensure that the experiment will stop before anything unexpected occurs, Nepgear decided to slowly feed power into the portal. As she steadily cranked the power supply on, the conglomeration of wires and metal molded into the shape of a ring began to hum quietly. Sparks began to erupt from the center of the ring, then the dimensional fabric opened into a small, circular rift. Nepgear continued to crank the lever on the generator up, from level 4 to level 5. As the machine received more power, the portal it created began to expand. All was going according to plan.
"Hiya, Nep Jr.! What'cha doin' in your lab!" Neptune suddenly barged in, literally kicking the door off its hinges. "Oopsies! I'll fix that later."
"W-What the goodness!" Nepgear exclaimed, being startled by her older sister. Unknowingly, she also cranked the lever past level 10 onto the hastily scribbled level 11. The portal within the machine suddenly expanded and began acting like a vortex, sucking in the air around and its machine. By the time Nepgear noticed her experiment had gone wrong, the forcefield generator within her laboratory had already been sucked into the vortex.
"Ooo! Nep Jr., are you trying to create a black hole? It would make cleaning the basilicom much faster." Neptune remarked.
"Oh no… Sis, this isn't the time for jokes! You have to get out of here!" Nepgear yelled, shoving Neptune out of the room. However, before Nepgear herself could escape, the vortex sucked the unhinged door right into her face, taking her, the door, and the power generator inside of itself. With no power or machine left to sustain it, the vortex closed with a blinding flash of light, the dimensional fabric repairing itself.
"Nepgear? Nepgear!" Neptune hastily dashed into the lab she was shoved out of, and found Nepgear and a beam saber where the vortex was. She was missing her safety goggles. "Wake up, Nepgear! Speak to me!"
"Ngh… Neptune?" Nepgear came to her senses and looked around. The tile was scorched from what appeared to be an explosion that centered on her. The room appeared to be empty save for her, her beam saber, and Neptune, who was currently holding Nepgear in her arms. "What happened? I remember a portal expanding while I was doing some lab work."
"We'll worry about that later, sis. For now, we need to get you some rest." Neptune helped Nepgear get up, and the two exited the now barren room.
"Thank you, little sis."
Nepgear awoke. Her safety goggles were covered in soot, so she lifted them from her eyes and onto her head. She looked around. She was on her laboratory door, and bits of charred scrap metal and frayed wiring were strewn about in the room she was in. She stood up and dusted herself off. She then heard the sound of desperate knocking from the hinged door.
"Nepgear, open up! I heard a loud noise. What happened in there?" Neptune yelled through the door, her voice getting muffled in the process. She then proceed to kick the door open without tearing it from its hinges.
"Everything was going fine, Neptune, until you barged in," Nepgear replied.
"I didn't do anything this time! Maybe the fumes in the lab and the office are making you hallucinate. You'll be as right as sunshine after a nice bath and a dose of pudding. You've been working two laps around the clock, and Dr. Nep says that is unhealthy," Neptune uttered her rant without taking a breath, and Nepgear was unable to get a single word in.
Nepgear tensed up as Neptune attempted to drag her out of the room, presumably to a bath and pudding. "Relax for once, Nepgear, we can talk about what happened later."
"O-Okay. Thank you, big sis."
Author's Notes:
Phew, first chapter under the belt! A little ambitious for my first fanfic to not be a oneshot, but I could not focus on anything else with this in my head. Feedback would be appreciated! |
In what may have been a NASCAR first, Hendrick Motorsports recently made a hullabaloo on social media regarding the firesuits its four drivers will wear next season. Paint schemes, sure, that’s a common thing where the look of the cars are ever-changing and fans want to see how their favorite drivers’ car will appear. But firesuits?
This year firesuits offered a snapshot into the uncertainty that permeates over the sport. In the upper right corner, near the shoulder, there was an unmistakable void where the patch is supposed to go, representing the premier series sponsor. No one knew with any certainty which entity would fill the role of entitlement sponsor.
That the process for a new sponsor extended two years after Sprint’s announced departure — well beyond anyone’s expectations -- meant teams had to begin 2017 preparations without knowledge of who would become NASCAR’s most important partner. Meaning, such details like series sponsor patches on uniforms and cars would need to be left blank and photoshopped in later.
New @nationwide88 gear for @dalejr! #NW88JR A photo posted by Hendrick Motorsports (@teamhendrick) on Dec 15, 2016 at 11:32am PST
Finally at a seemingly hastily scheduled Dec. 1 press conference in Las Vegas, NASCAR CEO and chairman Brian France introduced Monster Energy as Sprint’s replacement. Still, the actual name for NASCAR’s top division wasn’t unveiled until Dec. 20.
"Though it's December and a bit late in the game, they have the activation tools, the plans, and the people ... so they're ready on day one," France said at the introductory press conference. "They're a fun brand that's going to interact with our core fans in kind of a cool, neat way, actually, and we've seen some of the plans, and they'll get bigger and more robust as we go along."
Monster’s introduction as entitlement sponsor resolved the primary worry many within the industry had heading into the offseason. What it did not do is provide a sense of tranquility, with NASCAR entering 2017 at a crossroads and facing an array of issues.
Despite a captivating Chase playoff featuring Jimmie Johnson’s pursuit of a record-tying seventh championship, largely competitive racing throughout, and Jeff Gordon’s likely final two NASCAR starts, television ratings continued to sag, and in many instances appear to be cratering.
Twenty-two Cup races accumulated fewer total viewers of the 29 that could be compared to the previous year (because of rain delay, postponements, and other factors), according to Sports Media Watch, including 15 that plummeted by double-digits in either total viewership, ratings, or both.
“There have been good conversations about ways to rethink and relook at the competition” — Jon Miller, NBC Sports president of programming
Ratings have fallen to such a level that NASCAR’s television partners have taken notice — and even attempted to take action. Specifically, as ratings plummeted during the schedule’s second half of the season, NBC Sports executives went to NASCAR multiple times offering suggestions on how to better promote the product. One meeting held the week of the Cup Series awards banquet in December was described as “heated” by multiple sources.
“There have been good conversations about ways to rethink and relook at the competition,” NBC Sports president of programming Jon Miller told SB Nation.
Among the numerous ideas NASCAR is considering to enhance its product: Utilizing heat races where drivers earn their starting position in the main event, which would then be shortened from the typical 400- and 500-mile distance, similar to what was rolled out in the Xfinity Series last season. There is also the possibility of splitting a race into two separate events, both of which would award points and earn a driver Chase eligibility were they to win. The thinking is with consumers’ attention spans shrinking, it’s best to present a race with a more palatable distance that a viewer can better digest.
NASCAR has not formally determined if it will modify its race formats in any way. If the sanctioning body does elect to do so, a decision would be announced during the annual preseason media tour later in January.
Another idea pushed by TV executives is staging of midweek night race(s) during the summer to better maximize viewership, thereby allowing for a more condensed schedule with fewer events in the fall that have to go head-to-head against the NFL and Major League Baseball. This concept is well received by those within the industry SB Nation spoke with, though any implementation couldn’t happen until 2018 due to the 2017 schedule having already been solidified. But in all likelihood, the Cup Series will have at least one midweek race on next year’s calendar.
The number of spectators watching in-person has also fallen. The three publicly traded companies that operate all but two of the 23 tracks on the schedule report a decline in admission revenue from 2010-2015. Dover Motorsports Inc. suffered a 51 percent decline, Speedway Motorsports Inc. a 28 percent decline, and International Speedway Corp., a 19 percent decline.
“There once was a period of time where not everyone was trying hard — they didn’t have to try hard, they just opened the gates,” Texas Motor Speedway president Eddie Gossage told SB Nation. “For a while there, it was out of control upward growth. And it’s hard to stay on top. Some can do it, but it’s tough.
“Nowadays I think everybody is really trying hard.”
Not only are fewer people watching and attending Cup Series races, but those that do are primarily older and fall well outside the 18- to 34-year-old demographic coveted by advertisers. Which made NASCAR’s successful courting of Monster a significant triumph, something NASCAR executives have not been shy in touting.
"Obviously, they're an edgy brand," France said. "They're a fun brand. They get at a millennial audience in a different way clearly than we've ever been associated with, particularly at this level, and they know what they're doing. This is their DNA.
"They understand how to reach across and excite our core audience and help us deliver on a new audience, and that was very exciting for us."
In spite of the widespread euphoria that exists within the industry about the potential Monster brings as a series sponsor, many facets of the deal raise concerns. Unlike when Nextel (later absorbed by Sprint) signed a 10-year contract to come on board as entitlement sponsor in 2004, Monster isn’t assured to be a long-term partner, agreeing only to a two-year contract with a two-year option, according to the Sports Business Journal, which sources confirmed to SB Nation as accurate.
Such a lack of commitment sports business experts believe could limit the kind of effective marketing campaign NASCAR is banking on to revitalize itself.
“If you’re thinking of allocating a lot of your marketing dollars as a sponsor to a signature property and it’s going to be big part of your overall corporate marketing strategy going forward, it can be difficult to get that return investment,” David Carter, executive director of the University of Southern California’s Marshall Sports Business Institute, told SB Nation.
Of additional concern is what Monster is putting up to be the Cup Series sponsor, a figure reported at $20 million a year, according to the Sports Business Journal, with the actual number closer to $25 million, sources told SB Nation. Regardless of what the specific terms of the deal entail, there is no denying Monster is committing considerably less than the reported $50 million that Sprint was paying annually.
Those left to foot the bill are wondering if team ownership is untenable for everyone but the upper-class
There is a sense of trepidation within the ownership ranks that, with NASCAR generating less revenue, teams will eventually see a reduction in the payouts they receive annually, according to multiple team executives SB Nation spoke with. Be it this coming year or in 2018, those left to foot the bill are wondering if team ownership — a tenuous proposition even during NASCAR’s robust times of the mid-1990s to the mid-aughts — is untenable for everyone but the upper-class (i.e. Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing and the like).
“I don’t know exactly what NASCAR is getting [from Monster], but I know it’s less than before,” a team executive told SB Nation on the condition of anonymity. “So how will that discrepancy be made up? Is NASCAR going to write a big check to cover the difference, or will they cut costs and expect the teams to figure out the rest for themselves?”
The feeling of unease within the ownership ranks isn’t limited to the possibility of shrunken revenue streams. Although measures have been taken to lower operating costs, ownership remains an expensive venture heavily dependent upon sponsorship to stay solvent.
Attempting to help owners achieve a modicum of financial stability, NASCAR broke away from its longstanding approach that organizations are independent contractors and devised the team charter system last year. Akin to a franchise in stick-and-ball sports, a charter ensures an owner entry into all 36 point races, along with predetermined guaranteed income. Additional money is earned through a three-year weighted performance scale.
But while the charter structure is still in its infancy — with some owners bullishly confident about the solidity it provides in the years to come — there is skepticism whether the smaller teams are actually better off. Also, whether potential new owners are stymied from entering what is now essentially a closed society with limited avenues to startup and field a competitive team.
That charters may not provide the desired security is evident in what’s occurred in the weeks since the 2016 season wrapped on Nov. 20 at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Since then, four teams have downsized or folded, with HScott Motorsports (two cars) and Tommy Baldwin Racing (one car) completely shuttering. Roush Fenway Racing and Richard Petty Motorsports each dropped a car — RFR from three to two, and RPM from two to one. Turnover was offset at least slightly by Furniture Row Racing and JTG Daugherty Racing each expanding from single-car teams to become two-car organizations.
“If the charter system and the economic system of the sport is not given a close look at very soon, then someone is whistling past the graveyard,” Ramsey Poston, president of strategic communication firm Tuckahoe Strategies and a former NASCAR executive, told SB Nation. “The notion that this will work itself out in a few years is a really dangerous situation for the sport to put itself into. There has to be an economic path to work for teams that don’t win on a regular basis.”
“Even if you don’t like what they’re doing as a race fan, at least they’re taking some swings.” — David Carter, director of USC’s Sports Business Institute
Yet, even as it moves further from its turn of the century heyday and with hurdles aplenty in front of it, NASCAR’s situation isn’t unique in the sports landscape nor something it cannot overcome.
An aging fan base is a problem that MLB has encountered for years and it still remains firmly a part of the American consciousness, Carter said. And the NFL’s issues with attendance and diminished television ratings this season is well documented.
“NASCAR isn’t alone, and you have to applaud them for their understanding that they have to refine their product,” Carter said. “Now, with that kind of change comes a lot of pushback, with how they’re structuring the [Chase] system and such.
“But you cannot stand still. So even if you don’t like what they’re doing as a race fan, doing nothing in an environment where the consumption patterns are changing, attention spans are shortening at least they’re taking some swings.”
Similar to the NFL, NASCAR is aided in combating its current ailments with a robust television contract negotiated with NBC Sports in 2013 that will see the network pay the sanctioning body a record $4.4 billion over 10 years. Fox Sports’ deal with NASCAR, an eight-year extension inked in 2012, is for $2.4 billion, a 30 percent increase over the previous terms.
And though its ratings continue to dwindle, NASCAR remains a valuable commodity to its television partners. The Brickyard 400 in July was NBCSN’s most-watched and highest-rated telecast in its history, with an average of 5.2 million viewers and a 3.1 household rating. An average of slightly more than six million viewers watched Johnson win a historic seventh championship in the 2016 season finale. NBCSN also saw a 56 percent growth in its overall streaming numbers for NASCAR-related content from the previous year.
“NASCAR has delivered a lot of benefits to us,” Miller said. “The ratings have been a little bit off, but that’s across the board in sports as you’ve seen in a lot of different places. The good thing about NASCAR is that we work closely with them to innovate and create new opportunities to drive those ratings back to levels we all hope they’re going to be at.”
Still, the continued drop in television ratings and sagging attendance is hard to ignore — particularly because these two metrics are most frequently used to gauge a sport’s popularity.
Tasked with the responsibility of correcting the precarious drop in both figures is France, NASCAR’s much maligned leader.
But in contrast to a public persona that perceives him as aloof and possessing a management style vastly less gregarious than his grandfather, Bill France Sr., NASCAR’s founder, and father, Bill France Jr., who served as head of the sport from 1972-2000, many of those SB Nation spoke with contend Brian France will eventually spearhead NASCAR’s resurgence.
Though prone to public faux pas — most notably endorsing divisive President-elect Donald Trump at a rally last February — France’s vision and behind the scenes leadership is regarded as a valuable asset.
The pieces are in place for a turnaround, but those pieces still need to be correctly put together
It was France who brainstormed in the late 1990s that instead of the sport’s television rights being scattered amongst an alphabet soup of networks, NASCAR should instead bundle and sell to the highest bidder. In 2013, France was at the forefront of negotiations with NBC Universal, resulting in the network paying as much as 50 percent above the second-place bidder to recapture the package to the second half of the season, according to industry analysts.
And while the Chase is derided by many fans as contrived and gimmicky, France’s idea of NASCAR instituting its version of a playoff has paid dividends with the championship now assured of always having a dramatic conclusion. It was also the 54-year-old executive who personally pitched Monster, sensing the value the company could bring the sport he oversees.
“I think Brian is unfairly beat up,” Gossage said. “NASCAR is an 800-pound gorilla and he’s driving it, but you better give him credit for all the good things he’s done. He’s done a very good job in so many ways.”
The juxtaposition to the optimism expressed in France’s favor is that he was also in charge during a downturn now entering its 10th year. Yes, the pieces are in place for a turnaround, except those pieces still need to be correctly put together.
“There are so many things to be positive about, I really believe that,” a team executive told SB Nation on the condition of anonymity. “But all these negatives are biggies, and unless we find some real solutions, I don’t know. I’m concerned.” |
Are Those North Korean Long-Range Missiles For Real?
Enlarge this image toggle caption Ng Han Guan/AP Ng Han Guan/AP
When President Obama met with South Korean President Park Geun-hye on Tuesday, one item was high on the agenda: how to handle North Korea, which has in recent months threatened to strike both countries.
Obama called such threats "a dead end."
"We remain open to North Korea taking a peaceful path of denuclearization," the president told reporters.
But could the North's missiles reach U.S. territory? That question has proved hard to answer.
North Korea has demonstrated its ability to build short- and medium-range missiles, and it has launched a small satellite into space. But neither of these achievements would necessarily allow it to reach the U.S. with a warhead.
At a parade in April 2012, North Korea unveiled a new kind of missile. The so-called KN-08 sat on an enormous military truck, which would allow it to be moved around the country. And it looked like it had been designed to deliver a warhead to a distant target, even as far as the U.S. Everyone knew North Korea was working toward this kind of missile, but nobody knew whether it could actually build one.
"At first I thought, 'Wow, they finally managed it,' " says Markus Schiller, an aerospace engineer working for Schmucker Technologie, a German company that consults on security issues. As soon as he heard about the parade, Schiller started looking for images of the missiles.
"It's unbelievable how much [information] you can actually get out of the Internet," he says.
Looking at videos and still photos online, Schiller started to notice that some things seemed off. Six of the new KN-08 missiles were in the parade, but each looked a little different from the next.
Enlarge this image toggle caption Ng Han Guan/AP Ng Han Guan/AP
"The first stage of missile one was longer than the first stage of missile two, and so on," he says.
Schiller wasn't the only one to see discrepancies. David Wright, a rocket expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists, has spent a lot of time studying North Korea's missile technology. "There were a lot of little details that if you looked carefully not only didn't make sense on each missile but didn't agree between the missiles," he says.
Fuel ports were in weird places, for example. Cables looked like they weren't laid correctly. And the missile's warheads appeared to be made of cheap metal sheeting, or perhaps wood. In fact, there were so many problems that most experts agree: The missiles on parade weren't real.
"The complicating factor is that it is a normal thing to make simulators before you make real missiles," says Jeffrey Lewis, director of the East Asian nonproliferation program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies.
Engineers everywhere routinely use dummy missiles to figure out how to fit the real ones together. Crews can train with them. So the question is, were the missiles on parade pure fiction, or mock-ups built as part of a real weapons program? The U.S. intelligence community believes the latter.
Speaking at a press briefing in March, Admiral James Winnefeld, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the intelligence community does believe this missile program is real, even if the missiles in the parade turn out to be fake. But he wouldn't say how far along he thinks North Korea's program has developed.
"Our assessment of where it exists in its lifetime is something that would remain classified," he said.
Those without access to military data remain divided. Jeffrey Lewis says he believes the missiles are part of a real program, but Schiller, the aerospace engineer who first spotted the problems, is doubtful. If these really were mock-ups, he says, all the missiles would look identical. The fact that they don't makes him think it's a ruse.
These kinds of uncertainties, Wright says, will make it that much more difficult to decide how to respond to North Korea the next time tensions flare. |
Call it irrigation irritation.
Bay Area water watchers have a bad case of it. The expanse of verdant lawn ringing a large vacant construction site in Santa Clara sets off Brian Johns.
For Vickie Chang, it’s the city of Albany’s sprinklers that spray her when they go off each night along her street. And Dave Pearce is peeved by the water he sees gushing straight into San Francisco Bay from the leaky Hetch Hetchy Aqueduct pipeline while he kayaks along the Peninsula.
As California contends with a protracted drought, folks who are dutifully practicing the new mantra of “brown is the new green” are seething at the sight of freshly irrigated sidewalks and lush green lawns.
“That just torques my jaw,” Herb Gomes says of the emerald baseball and softball fields at Ohlone College in Fremont, where he often walks his dog. “I’m doing my part — my lawn has turned brown!”
But those ballfields will be irrigated and stay green until sometime next year, when they are scheduled to be replaced with artificial turf, a college spokeswoman said.
Despite calls from Gov. Jerry Brown for 20 percent cutbacks in water use and the first-ever state mandate to restrict outdoor watering, there is no consensus on how green is too green. Rules on watering are different from community to community, and so is compliance.
But irrigation irritation is rampant — and on the rise. The Santa Clara Valley Water District received almost 240 reports of water waste — mostly sprinklers spraying pavement or running off into the street — in August alone, four times the number of complaints earlier in the year. Calls to the East Bay Municipal Utility District soared in July, when it received 211 complaints.
The new state outdoor water rules, which took effect in August, have empowered water conservers to speak out “now that their concerns are being backed by the state,” said Nelsy Rodriguez, a spokeswoman for EBMUD.
This newspaper tapped into readers’ rage when we asked them to send tips about where they saw water being wasted or misused. Scores wrote in to rant about everything from leaky faucets in public restrooms to liberally watered golf courses, cemeteries, athletic fields and parks. Others are outraged over water companies slow to fix leaks and neighbors intent on keeping their lawns fit enough for a fertilizer commercial.
Johns frequently passes that vacant lot in Santa Clara that’s ringed with grass. “A multi-acre lawn around the site of a building that hasn’t even been built yet takes the cake,” he wrote.
A spokesman for the lot’s owner, the Sobrato Organization, didn’t want to discuss the grass or why it’s irrigated. The head of the city water department said he’d send an inspector to check it out.
Pearce was aghast when he spotted the Hetch Hetchy leaks pouring from a trestle that carries the giant pipes across the bay. “One of the state’s most iconic water systems should be setting a better example for conservation,” he said. “This is more than just a public-image black eye.”
Those leaks cost the region’s largest water provider, the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, more than a quarter-million gallons a week, its spokesman said — enough to supply water for about 360 people in San Francisco for seven days. But they won’t be fixed — or even patched, the spokesman said, before a new water tunnel under the bay opens later this year, taking the old pipes out of service.
Chang just wants to stay dry and not see water dumped in the street. “My car gets pretty wet and so do I,” she said, complaining about the city sprinklers that soaked her street, Key Route Boulevard, “profusely at night.”
The spray recently hit the windshield of a reporter’s parked car so strongly it was like being in a carwash. The pavement got saturated, too — the kind of waste the state’s watering restrictions are designed to combat. A city spokeswoman said the sprinklers were adjusted after the newspaper first called, but the center median would continue to be watered.
A green median is the kind of extravagance that June Boudreau just doesn’t understand.
She got so fed up with her Almaden Valley neighbors’ ill-pointed sprinklers “watering the gutter,” as she put it, that she began stuffing notes in their mailboxes, urging them to stop.
“They are in denial,” she said of people ignoring the state’s water crisis. “They don’t want to be bothered. I don’t think anyone is taking the drought seriously.”
Robb Willer, a Stanford sociology professor who studies public attitude about climate change, isn’t surprised by the growing sense of injustice among water conservers.
Still, some will refuse to curtail their own water use no matter whose jaws get torqued, he said. “Those who do take more than their share, they’re very likely telling themselves that something about their situation is special and different.”
But, you know, there’s this drought. So what should people, even the special ones, be thinking?
That “we have a real problem,” answered John Coleman, president of the Association of California Water Agencies and an EBMUD director. “They need to fix their sprinklers. They need to conserve.”
And there’s good news for those who are willing to do just that. And there’s good news for those who are willing to do just that. Water agencies offer rebates — Santa Clara Valley is even doubling several of its offers — for residents who upgrade their irrigation systems to save water.
Clayton Watkins knows a few places that need to take advantage. On his morning drive for coffee in the affluent Contra Costa town of Moraga, he spotted the wayward sprinklers at the local Jack in the Box restaurant soaking Moraga Way at 6 a.m. — just to keep green a tiny strip of grass between the street and sidewalk.
“They should put in a rock garden. I don’t think anybody cares if there’s a strip of grass when they’re going in for a burger and fries.”
Contact Thomas Peele at [email protected] on Twitter at @thomas_peele. Contact Andie Waterman at [email protected] and on Twitter at @WaterAndie. |
A unanimous Supreme Court ruled Monday that regulations for debt collectors do not extend to companies that purchase debts.
In delivering his first opinion of the court, Justice Neil Gorsuch relied on the plain text of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act in finding that Santander Consumer USA does not qualify as a debt collector because it purchased the $3.5 billion portfolio of auto loan debts it had been hired by CitiFinancial to collect.
Because the law defines debt collectors as “those who regularly seek to collect debts ‘owed ... another,’" Gorsuch said the statute’s plain language seems to focus on third-party collection agents regularly collecting for a debt owner instead of a debt owner seeking to collect debts for itself."
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CitiFinancial had argued if Congress had been aware of defaulted debt purchasers like Santander, it would have treated them like traditional debt collectors because they pose similar risks of abusive collection practices.
But in affirming the lower court rulings, Gorsuch said it is not the court’s job to rewrite a constitutionally valid text under a banner of speculation about what Congress might have done had it faced this question.
“Constant competition between constable and quarry, regulator and regulated, can come as no surprise in our changing world,” he wrote. “But neither should the proper role of the judiciary in that process — to apply, not amend, the work of the People’s representatives.”
The ruling more narrowly defines what constitutes a debt collector, limiting federal regulations that protect consumers from abusive, unfair or deceptive debt collection practices. |
A great sushi chef in another state once complained to me about a health code violation he'd received for making sushi without gloves. "Making sushi with gloves is like making love with a condom," he said. "It just isn't the same." Well, as of Jan. 1, California's law has changed so that there can no longer be any bare-handed contact with foods that won't be cooked. That means baked goods, salads - and yes, even sushi.
According to Nation's Restaurant News, the new law will undergo a "soft rollout" over the next six months, meaning restaurants will receive warnings rather than violations on inspection reports so that owners and operators can become familiar with the new law. NRN describes the specifics of the law:
Under the new rules, such foods must be handled with single-use gloves or utensils like tongs, forks, spoons, bakery or deli wraps, wax paper, scoops, spatulas, or dispensing equipment. As mandated previously, foodservice workers must also thoroughly wash hands with soap and warm water before entering a food preparation area, before putting on clean gloves or between glove changes.
That's a lot of hand washing. |
The lead research economist at the World Bank, Branko Milanovic, will be reporting soon, in the journal Global Policy, the first calculation of global income-inequality, and he has found that the top 8% of global earners are drawing 50% of all of this planet’s income. He notes: “Global inequality is much greater than inequality within any individual country,” because the stark inequality between countries adds to the inequality within any one of them, and because most people live in extremely poor countries, largely the nations within three thousand miles of the Equator, where it’s already too hot, even without the global warming that scientists say will heat the world much more from now on.
For example, the World Bank’s list of “GDP per capita (current US$)” shows that in 2011 this annual-income figure ranged from $231 in Democratic Republic of Congo at the Equator, to $171,465 in Monaco within Europe. The second-poorest and second-richest countries respectively were $271 in Burundi at the Equator, and $114,232 in Luxembourg within Europe. For comparisons, the U.S. was $48,112, and China was $5,445. Those few examples indicate how widely per-capita income ranges between nations, and how more heat means more poverty.
Wealth-inequality is always far higher than income-inequality, and therefore a reasonable estimate of personal wealth throughout the world would probably be somewhere on the order of the wealthiest 1% of people owning roughly half of all personal assets. These individuals might be considered the current aristocracy, insofar as their economic clout is about equal to that of all of the remaining 99% of the world’s population.
Milanovich says: “Among the global top 1 per cent, we find the richest 12 per cent of Americans, … and between 3 and 6 per cent of the richest Britons, Japanese, Germans and French. It is a ‘club’ that is still overwhelmingly composed of the ‘old rich’,” who pass on to their children (tax-free in the many countries that have no estate-taxes) the fortunes that they have accumulated, and who help set them up in businesses of their own – often after having sent them first to the most prestigious universities (many in the United States), where those children meet and make friends of others who are similarly situated as themselves.
For example, on 22 April 2004, The New York Times headlined “As Wealthy Fill Top Colleges, Concerns Grow Over Fairness,” and reported that 55% of freshman students at the nation’s 250 most selective colleges and universities came from parents in the top 25% of this nation’s income. Only 12% of students had parents in the bottom 25% of income. Even at an elite public, state, college, the University of Michigan, “more members of this year’s freshman class … have parents making at least $200,000 a year [then America’s top 2%] than have parents making less than the national median of about $53,000 [America’s bottom 50%].'”
Most of the redistribution that favors more than just the top 1% has occurred in the “developing” countries, such as China. However, a larger proportion of the world’s population live in nations of Central and South America, Africa, etc., where today’s leading families tend overwhelmingly to be the same as in the previous generation. They, too, near the Equator, are members of the “club,” but there are fewer of them.
Milanovic finds that globally, “The top 1 per cent has seen its real income rise by more than 60 per cent over those two decades [1988-2008],” while “the poorest 5 per cent” have received incomes which “have remained the same” – the desperately poor are simply remaining desperately poor. Maybe there’s too much heat where they live.
This article originally appeared on: AlterNet |
Ryan Lizza reports for the New Yorker that on December 15 2008, a few short weeks before his inauguration, president-elect Obama was presented with a 57-page memo on the depth of the economic crisis drafted by Lawrence Summers and other economic advisors.
The memo informed the president that if he enacted his campaign promises in the current environment, he would shoot a gigantic hole into the nation's budget.
"Since January 2007 the medium-term budget deficit has deteriorated by about $250 billion annually," the memo said. "If your campaign promises were enacted then, based on accurate scoring, the deficit would rise by another $100 billion annually. The consequence would be the largest run-up in the debt since World War II."
Lizza's reporting also mentions the huge divide between Peter Orzsag, the budget director who suggested the president scale back his agenda, lest he run up historic deficits, and Christina Romer, the incoming chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers who wanted to suggest stimulus plans as large as the $2 trillion hole in the economy.
But Summers argued against a stimulus that was too large.
He offered the President four illustrative stimulus plans: $550 billion, $665 billion, $810 billion, and $890 billion. Obama was never offered the option of a stimulus package commensurate with the size of the hole in the economy--known by economists as the "output gap"--which was estimated at two trillion dollars during 2009 and 2010. Summers advised the President that a larger stimulus could actually make things worse. "An excessive recovery package could spook markets or the public and be counterproductive," he wrote, and added that none of his recommendations "returns the unemployment rate to its normal, pre-recession level. To accomplish a more significant reduction in the output gap would require stimulus of well over $1 trillion based on purely mechanical assumptions—which would likely not accomplish the goal because of the impact it would have on markets."
Summers specifically warned that there could be a surprised public reaction to the massive spending and new govenrment, debt.
"This could come as a considerable sticker shock to the American public and the American political system, potentially reducing your ability to pass your agenda and undermining economic confidence at a critical time."
The full 57-page memo will be made public by the New Yorker later today. |
A CHICAGO police officer shot and killed a teenager named Laquan McDonald in October of last year, but most of us learned about Mr. McDonald only last week, after a judge ordered the release of police video footage of his death. That is also when prosecutors finally brought first-degree murder charges against the officer. Clearly, such footage has considerable power.
But while protesters have criticized the delayed response to the shooting, no one seems to be asking a more fundamental question: Why were the police in control of the footage in the first place?
Over the past year, as we have seen video after video of police officers killing civilians, many people have argued that greater use of cameras — in particular, police-worn body cameras — could help curb police abuse and mend police-community relations. In May, Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch, in announcing a Justice Department body-camera pilot program, argued that such cameras “hold tremendous promise for enhancing transparency, promoting accountability, and advancing public safety for law enforcement officers and the communities they serve.”
But as currently implemented, body camera programs in the United States too often fail to serve those goals because the police own and control the footage. This is the fox guarding the henhouse. Not only can the police retain footage that they would rather not release; they can also use it for purposes that have nothing to do with transparency and accountability, such as mass surveillance. Until control of this footage is taken away from law enforcement and vested in a neutral third party, with equal access for all interested parties, body cameras will further empower the very party they were designed to check. |
Two parties are at loggerheads but good relations could be crucial in a hung parliament in 2015, expert says in IPPR journal
Ed Miliband has been warned by a leading political scientist that it would be short-sighted not to keep lines of communication open to the Liberal Democrats, because of the strong likelihood of a hung parliament after the next election.
The warning from John Curtice is published in Juncture, the journal of the influential left-of-centre thinktank the IPPR, and reflects views of some of its senior staff.
The issue of Lib Dem-Labour relations is currently rearing its head over Lords reform, and the extent to which Labour's dislike of the Liberal Democrats might motivate opposition MPs to block a measure that is seen as critical to Nick Clegg's credibility. The two parties are also at loggerheads over deficit reduction and party political funding.
The local elections saw Labour make big gains, often at the expense of the Liberal Democrats. The issue of future relations between the two parties is likely to be raised at a Progress conference on Saturday that Miliband is due to be address. The Labour leader, currently enjoying a poll lead, is likely to put forward a broad claim that Labour must become the party of change.
Curtice writes: "While Labour will undoubtedly want to win over and retain the votes of as many former Lib Dem voters as possible, it should not underestimate the potential value to the party of fostering good relations with the Liberal Democrats. The quality of the relationship between the two parties could well prove crucial to Labour's prospects of future power – before or after 2015."
He adds: "At the last three elections, on average, no less than 86 seats, or 13% of the total, were won by parties other than Labour and the Conservatives. In contrast, over the course of the seven elections between 1950 and 1970, the average level of third-party representation was just 11 seats. Meanwhile, at the last three elections rather less than one in five seats has been closely fought between Labour and the Conservatives, compared with well over a quarter in the 50s and 60s."
Citing work by the pollster Anthony Wells, Curtice suggests that the constituency boundary review will not make the position greatly different. His analysis shows that 16% of seats would have been marginal between Labour and the Conservatives, and third parties would still have won 12% of seats.
He also suggests that a collapse in the Lib Dem vote would benefit the Conservatives more than Labour. "A collapse results in no less than a 4.2-point drop in the target the Conservatives require for an overall majority, whereas the target Labour would need to meet falls by only half of that – 2.1 points.
"Although such support is less strongly concentrated in predominantly Conservative territory than it once was, the Conservatives would still be the main beneficiaries of any collapse in Lib Dem support – thereby making it much easier for the Tories in particular to win an overall majority."
Curtice, one of the most respected poll analysts in the UK, concludes: "So as deep as the Liberal Democrats' problems may be, Labour cannot afford simply to ignore them."
Looking at the period before 2015, he suggests that if Labour can win four Tory seats in byelections, it might be possible for Labour and the Lib Dems to form a stable coalition.
He also argues that a close Lib Dem-Labour relationship might constrain Cameron from forcing an early election, "if he felt there was any risk that rather than leading to an early election such a manoeuvre might instead precipitate coalition talks between Labour and the Liberal Democrats".
Curtice says one of the lessons of the coalition negotiations in 2010 is that when the chips are down, preparation and prior contacts matter. "In 2010, the Conservatives were ready and willing to do a deal, while previous contact had given Cameron and Clegg reason to believe they could work together.
"Labour, by contrast, was ill-prepared and internally divided on its willingness to strike a deal with the Liberal Democrats, while personal relations between key personnel in the two parties were poor. So while Labour will doubtless continue to mock and berate the Liberal Democrats in public, in private the party would be wise to keep the potential lines of communication open." |
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A decade after Saddam Hussein was tried, convicted and executed, Iraq is struggling to defeat Islamic State and cope with sectarian strife and other consequences of the US-led invasion.
Saddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti ruled Iraq from July 1979 to April 2003, as leader of the Arab Socialist Ba’ath (“Resurrection”) Party. He was put on trial by a tribunal established by the US-led occupation authorities. On November 5, 2006, Hussein was convicted of crimes against humanity over the 1982 killing of 148 people in the town of Dujail, following an attempt on his life. He was hanged at dawn on December 30, 2006, on the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrifice.
“It is a testament to the Iraqi people’s resolve to move forward after decades of oppression that, despite his terrible crimes against his own people, Saddam Hussein received a fair trial,” US President George W. Bush said in a statement following the execution, adding: “Fair trials were unimaginable under Saddam Hussein’s tyrannical rule.”
Once an ally
The White House was not always so adamant about Hussein. In 1980, the Iraqi president received the keys to the city of Detroit after making a generous donation to the Chaldean Sacred Heart Church.
Washington also approached Hussein as a potential ally against neighboring Iran, where a monarchy allied with the US had been overthrown by Islamic revolutionaries. With US support, Iraq invaded Iran in September 1980, but was quickly forced to go on the defensive. The Iraq-Iran war officially ended in August 1988, having claimed over a million lives and more than $1.2 trillion in combined economic losses, without any change in the borders.
@kateemerson88 Rumsfeld meets Saddam Only a bad guy when not on US side Turns blind eye when suits#FidelCastro #USPolitics #hypocrites pic.twitter.com/cfU6CifgOs — mark batch (@dexcat63) November 27, 2016
Hussein invaded and annexed Kuwait in August 1990, after US Ambassador April Glaspie told him that Washington “does not have an opinion” on that conflict. In response, the US assembled an international coalition to defend Saudi Arabia (Operation Desert Shield) and launched Operation Desert Storm to liberate Kuwait in January 1991. Iraq remained under UN and US sanctions after that, with hawks in Washington unhappy that President George H.W. Bush refused to continue the war until Hussein was deposed.
Ace of spades
In 2003, President George W. Bush invaded Iraq, claiming that Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and was working with terrorists who had attacked the US in September 2001. Neither of those claims was true. The same Donald Rumsfeld who met with Hussein in December 1983 as President Ronald Reagan’s special envoy organized the invasion 20 years later as Bush’s secretary of defense.
While the 1991 war to liberate Kuwait was legal under the UN Resolution 660, there was no such cover for the 2003 invasion. The occupying force disbanded the Iraqi military, banned the Ba’ath Party and offered bounties on the top 52 officials of Hussein’s government via the infamous “Iraq’s most wanted” card deck. Hussein was depicted as the ace of spades.
The former president was captured in December 2003 in Ad-Dawr, some 10 miles (16 km) south of his hometown of Tikrit. Western media described his hideout as a “spider hole.”
‘Not a religious man’
Hussein was tried by the Iraqi Special Tribunal, established by the Coalition Provisional Authority in December 2003 and composed of five Iraqi judges. He was found guilty, and sentenced to death by hanging. His request for a firing squad was denied.
“This dark page has been turned over,” Mowaffak al-Rubaie, national security adviser in the government of Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki, told the Iraqi television after Hussein’s execution. “Saddam is gone.”
Iraqi-Americans celebrated the news by dancing in the streets of Dearborn, Michigan, CNN reported.
In 2008, Rubaie was one of the main authors of the US-Iraq Status of Forces Agreement, under which the Obama administration conducted the US withdrawal from the country.
This week, Rubaie gave an exclusive interview to RT Arabic, which will be aired in full later on Friday. Speaking on Selam Musafir’s program, “In One Word,” he provided some interesting details about Hussein’s behavior at the trial and of those around him.
Rubaie insists that Saddam “was not beaten or humiliated, neither during the trial, nor at the execution.”
As for Hussein, he never asked or prayed for forgiveness, Rubaie noted, citing his near-death slogans as “Long live the nation,” “Long live the people,” “Hail to Palestine” and “Death to America!”
Rubaie said he did not get an impression that was a man who feared God. Indeed, for the leader of the country often painted by the West as being mired in sectarian conflicts, he did not seem religious at all. Rubaie says that they even had to remind Hussein to utter Shahada, the ultimate statement of the Muslim faith, on the verge of his execution. He believes Hussein only used religion “for the purpose of propaganda and to deceive people.”
As for George W. Bush, he was clearly in support of Saddam’s execution, Rubaie recalled.
“Bush asked the Iraqi PM: ‘What are you going to do with this man?’ Al-Maliki replied: ‘We are going to execute him.’ In response, the US president raised his thumb up in approval. It is hard to imagine a more obvious sign of support,” Rubaie said.
US out, ISIS in
As the last convoy of US troops left Iraq on December 14, 2011, President Barack Obama said that they were “leaving behind a sovereign, stable and self-reliant Iraq.”
It was not so, however. By 2013, Al-Qaeda in Iraq – established only after the US invasion and the insurgency against the occupiers – had been transformed into Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS or IS) and exploited the discontent of Iraq’s Sunni Muslims under the Shia-dominated Al-Maliki government to seize much of the north and east of the country.
In June 2014, IS was able to take the city of Mosul after some 30,000 Iraqi troops trained and equipped by the US simply fled the battlefield, leaving their weapons and gear behind. Some 5,000 US troops have returned to Iraq since, to “advise and assist” the reconstituted Iraqi military in its struggle against IS. Currently, the Iraqi military is slowly advancing on Mosul with US air support.
‘Almost comforting in comparison’ to ISIS
In his recently published book, Debriefing the President: The Interrogation of Saddam Hussein, the former CIA officer who interrogated Hussein in 2003 argued that IS could not have arisen under his rule.
“Saddam felt that Islamist extremist groups in Iraq posed the biggest threat to his rule and his security apparatus worked assiduously to root out such threats,” wrote John Nixon. “It is improbable that a group like ISIS would have been able to enjoy the kind of success under his repressive regime that they have had under the Shia-led Baghdad government.”
“In hindsight, the thought of having an ageing and disengaged Saddam in power seems almost comforting in comparison with the wasted effort of our brave men and women in uniform and the rise of Islamic State, not to mention the £2.5 trillion spent to build a new Iraq,” Nixon wrote.
Contributed by RT.com of RT.com
Help Us Be The Change We Wish To See In The World. |
Along with the Xbox One, Microsoft also announced a new Kinect today — and it appears the updated motion-tracking system will be coming to Windows PCs just like its predecessor. Shacknews reports that Scott Evans, Microsoft's Kinect program manager, confirmed that the device will be coming to PCs. While no date was provided, Evans did state that "We will have more information soon." The new Kinect features an array of improvements over the original, including the ability to detect a player's heart rate.
The trickle-down from the Xbox to PCs shouldn't come as a complete surprise. After first making its debut as an Xbox 360 peripheral, Kinect for Windows landed in early 2012. Kinect has been at the forefront of many Windows demos and projects ever since. Microsoft's Craig Mundie said this past March that the company even envisions a future when Kinect cameras are built directly into laptops and tablets themselves, opening up an array of interactive possibilities. Of course, that reality is likely still off in the distance — the new Xbox One and Kinect bundle isn't shipping until later this year, and if Microsoft follows its earlier pattern the Windows version would arrive months after that. Still, we can't help but get excited knowing that Redmond is continuing to push forward on this particular front — both with hardware and software. |
Leading doctors have said they back NHS-funded womb transplants for biological males who identify as women, a procedure which experts say will be possible within 10 years.
It is believed that medical funding and advances will make the procedure possible within a decade, after pioneering operations at the University of Gothenburg on womb-less women have seen at least five children born as a result of a procedure similar to the one doctors are working towards.
Prompted by the Swedish team’s success, activists demanded the NHS make womb transplants available to male-born transgender people, a call doctors and fertility experts told the Mail on Sunday that they back.
Consultant Gynaecologist Dr. Arianna D’Angelo, of the NHS’s Wales Fertility Institute, said it was right from an “ethical point of view”.
She said: “We already have fertility preservation for transgender people, to give them the possibility to have their own genetic child.
“So I don’t see much of a difference between that and actually delivering their own child.”
Dr. Francoise Shelfield, a clinical lecturer in obstetrics and gynaecology at University College London, who has treated infertile NHS patients for 30 years, added her support and pointed to the UK’s equality laws.
“If we are saying we should have equality and we have legislation [defending the rights of transgender people], I do not see why not,” she said.
Director of Liverpool University’s Health Law & Regulation Unit Amel Alghrani is pressing for talks on whether womb transplants for transgender people should be publicly funded.
Making her case in the Journal of Law and the Biosciences, the medical ethics lawyer said such a move would “revolutionise reproduction” and lead to other groups of people demanding womb implants — including homosexual and straight men who wanted to experience the ‘joys’ of carrying a child.
“Homosexual couples may also wish to procreate in this fashion, while single men may opt for it to avoid surrogacy,” she said.
Ghent University Hospital’s Professor Steven Weyers, who is starting a womb transplant programme involving 20 women later this year, said he believed that transplants for people who were born male would happen in “maybe a decade”.
Women’s campaigner and co-editor of the Conservative Woman Laura Perrins slammed the notion of NHS-funded womb transplants for transgender people, asserting that it “will impinge on the meaning of motherhood and womanhood”.
“Most taxpayers will not think this is a good use of resources. It raises profound ethical and moral issues that will have an impact on women’s rights,” she added. |
CALGARY, Alberta -- The Vancouver Canucks wrapped up the best regular season in franchise history and star Daniel Sedin gave them back-to-back scoring champions. The team hopes a Stanley Cup title in next.
Christian Ehrhoff scored at 2:41 of overtime to lift the Canucks to a 3-2 victory over the Calgary Flames on Saturday night.
After rallying from a 2-0 deficit in the third, the Canucks got the victory when Ehrhoff's slap shot from the blue line beat Henrik Karlsson between his pads. Karlsson was furious after the goal, pleading with the referees that he had been interfered with.
"We won the game tonight, but at the end of the day it's not going to mean anything, we've got to start focusing on the playoffs," said Canucks coach Alain Vigneault. "As a player it's challenging, you want to stay on the conservative side, but at the same time it's like a hard practice, the best way to stay sharp and stay healthy is to do things the right way."
Daniel Sedin had a pair of assists to clinch the NHL scoring race with 41 goals and 63 assists. Twin brother Henrik Sedin won the scoring title last season.
Daniel Sedin's 104 points are the fewest for an Art Ross Trophy winner since Tampa Bay's Marty St. Louis won it with 94 in 2003-04.
Ryan Kesler and Alex Burrows also scored for Vancouver (54-19-9), which finishes the season with a team-record 117 points. The playoffs begin on Wednesday, but the Canucks will not know their first-round opponent until Sunday.
Jarome Iginla and Mikael Backlund scored for Calgary, which missed the playoffs for the second season in a row.
"In the last 50 games, I think our record is somewhere close to the top five teams in the league so as tough as this is, there's more optimism than there was at the end of last year," said Iginla.
Since reaching the Stanley Cup final in 2004, Calgary has either lost in the first round or missed the playoffs entirely.
"Certainly tonight, the legs weren't there. It was hard to find the motivation," said Flames winger Alex Tanguay, who had an assist to finish second on the team with 69 points.
It was a battle of backups with Cory Schneider drawing the start for the Canucks against Karlsson, who finished with 36 saves in just his second start since Jan. 21.
Vancouver trailed 2-0 heading to the third and after getting outshot 15-2 in the second.
However, the visitors came out flying in the final period, cutting the deficit to 2-1 on Burrows' goal at 2:02.
The Canucks kept pressing and tied it on the power play at 11:05.
The tying goal came compliments of more wizardry with the puck from the Sedin brothers. Daniel crosses the Flames' blue line and sent a behind-the-back pass to Henrik, who slid it over to Kesler for a one-timer that beat Karlsson over his glove.
Karlsson is one of several Flames who may have played their last game in Calgary. Other pending unrestricted free agents include Tanguay, Curtis Glencross, Anton Babchuk and the injured Brendan Morrison.
Schneider made 34 saves to improve to 16-4-2. He played his 25th game of the season, qualifying the rookie to get his name alongside Roberto Luongo's on the William Jennings trophy, which goes to the team that surrenders the fewest goals. Vancouver clinched the trophy for the first time, allowing just 183 goals.
"You always want to win your last game," Schneider said. "For me, it might be the last one for a while, but I tried to make it feel as if it were a playoff game and to bring that kind of intensity in competition."
After a scoreless opening 20 minutes, Calgary scored twice in the second.
Iginla opened the scoring on a two-man advantage at 2:39. Tanguay neatly stepped around Kevin Bieksa then dished off a pass to Iginla, who scored his 13th goal in 10 games.
Backlund made it 2-0 just past the midway point in the period, again on the power play. The rookie scored his 10th on a set up in the slot from Mark Giordano. |
Berniegate: How Jane Sanders Offers a Window into Liberal Scheming
"The road to hell is paved with good intentions," goes the line so often used to describe hare-brained liberal schemes. That vintage phrase captures perfectly the quagmire in which Bernie and Jane Sanders find themselves rapidly sinking in the saga of Burlington College. But the tale provides so much more than affirming that age-old aphorism. It offers a microcosmic view into the mind and methodology of liberal policymakers everywhere. In short, the scheme concocted by the former Democratic Socialist presidential candidate's wife, Jane Sanders, when she was president of Burlington College serves up everything we've come to expect of modern Democrats: delusional visions of glorious benefits to be realized by the masses if we follow their screwball ideas; a shady real estate deal; phony and fraudulent claims used as the basis for getting other people to part with their money; alleged pressure from a powerful Democratic politician on a government-regulated institution to go along with their idea, or else; and, of course, no modern Democratic scandal is complete without a computer server potentially figuring in – in this case, a stolen one. The only thing missing is the sex. But the investigation is still young.
Anyway, here's the backstory. The board of a tiny New England college in Vermont, Burlington College, in the town where Bernie Sanders used to be mayor before he rose to lofty heights in the Senate and then the socialist precincts of the national Democratic Party, had the notion of hiring Bernie's wife to be their esteemed college's new president in 2004. What qualified her for the job? Who knows, but I'm sure being married to the then-U.S. congressman from Vermont and the town's former mayor didn't hurt. The mayoralty, by the way, was Bernie's first steady job. Before that, he literally couldn't feed his family. The college suffered from low enrollment numbers and dismal donation income. So President Jane (the term "President Sanders" is too shudder-inducing to use) had an idea. The college could buy and relocate to a beautiful 33-acre tract of lakefront land owned by the Catholic Diocese of Burlington on which sat a former orphanage and still housed an active home for the disabled. President Jane somehow convinced the school's board that acquiring this property would incite new students to flock to the college, and gobs of donations would roll in. Why exactly she thought this is a mystery, but it probably burbled up from the same type of thought processes that created Obamacare – you know, that scheme whereby adding millions of people, many poor and unemployed, to a national health care program would somehow lower the cost of health insurance to American families by an average of $2,500. You can keep your doctor and your health plan, too. So President Jane decides to buy this property for her school but needs to finance it with a $6.5-million bank loan. The hitch was that she had to come up with $2.27 million in pledged donations and grants to secure the loan. That's where things get sticky. It turns out that some of the folks whom President Jane told the bank would be donating money didn't actually make such a commitment, or at least not for the amounts of money claimed on the loan documents. President Jane, for example, claimed that 83-year-old donor Corinne Bove Maietta, heiress to a restaurant fortune, had pledged $1 million to the college. However, Ms. Maietta denied making such a commitment, and her accountant told the Daily Caller that the FBI had contacted Ms. Maietta to interview her in connection with the Burlington College matter. The FBI reached out to interview other Burlington College donors as well, like orthopedic surgeon Ron Leavitt, as well as the college's former board members. Rather than the $2.27 million she was supposed to raise, President Jane raised only $676,000. Well, the best laid plans being what they are, Burlington College didn't realize the bounty President Jane had promised from her land deal inspiration. The college's enrollment figures and donations didn't improve significantly, President Jane was forced out in 2011 with a hefty severance, and the school declared bankruptcy and shuttered in 2016, largely from the burden of debt saddled upon it from the land purchase, which chairman of the board Yves Bradley called "crushing." In 2014, intrepid Vermont lawyer and dogged investigator Brady Toensing began digging into Burlington College's finances and unearthing scathing information, which he would provide to the local press. He wrote letters in 2016 to the U.S. attorney for Vermont and the FDIC demanding investigations into the college land deal. They complied, with the FBI launching an investigation, which may now have engulfed Bernie Sanders himself. According to the Associated Press, Toensing alleged that Sanders's Senate office pressured the bank to make the loan, although the FBI wouldn't confirm for the paper that he is being investigated. The plot thickens: as reported by Vermont's journalistic dynamo, VTDigger, Burlington College was burglarized in July 2016, two months after it permanently closed up shop. Among the items stolen were computers, external hard drives, and the college's main computer server. Interestingly, the police reported no sign of forced entry. While the Burlington Police Department conducted an investigation and had a suspect, he was eventually released based on a "lack of evidence," and the investigation was closed. Former school officials suspect that it was an "inside job." I think it's time we gave this thing a name. Since journalists enjoy attaching the suffix "-gate" to political scandals, how about Orphanagegate? Okay, it doesn't exactly roll off the tongue and might be a little too oblique a reference. Burlingtongate? Meh. I think I've got it. Berniegate! After all, as we've seen, Bernie himself may now be tied to the growing conflagration involving Burlington College. There are so many ways to go with this story, as it raises so many ghosts of Democrat scandals past. The wife of the Democrats' new socialist standard-bearer, who demanded free college for all in his presidential campaign, destroyed the college she ran with insurmountable debt. Like Obamacare, her deal promised much but ended up savaging those it was supposed to help. The alleged loan document fraud over a land purchase reminds us of the Clintons' Whitewater land deals. If Bernie did press the bank to issue the loan, one can't help but remember the politicians who pressed banks to issue subprime mortgages to unqualified borrowers, which crashed the market in 2008. And of course, there are the stolen Burlington College computers and server. Does anyone know of Hillary Clinton's whereabouts in July 2016? William F. Marshall has been an intelligence analyst and investigator in the government, private, and non-profit sectors for over 30 years. Presently, he is a senior investigator for Judicial Watch, Inc. (The views expressed are the author's alone and not necessarily those of Judicial Watch.) |
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A regional leader of Winston McKenzie’s party has defended his homophobic comments on Celebrity Big Brother… by claiming a Muslim housemate would actually murder gays.
Outspoken homophobe Winston McKenzie, who was a candidate for the UK Independence Party until last year, entered the Celebrity Big Brother house last night.
McKenzie did not leave it long before making homophobic jokes, saying: “I could cope with a homosexual in the house. I guess I’ll just have to stand with my back against a brick wall all the time.”
However, Steve Uncles of the English Democrats – the party McKenzie is currently a member of – has defended his comments.
He tweeted: “Next year #CBB will have a Muslim house mate actually chucking gays house mates from roof #Culturalenrichment
“Muslim culture to chuck gays from tall buildings, Christian culture to stand against wall … guess which ones gets gays going.”
He added: “The Gay ‘community’ are like NAZIS when it comes to freedom of speech”
“You remain silent when Muslims chuck Gay people from buildings, but get hysterical over ‘tongue in cheek’ comments.
“Just think next year they will have a real Muslim chucking gays off buildings!”
McKenzie has previously claimed that same-sex adoption is child abuse said he was ‘dismayed’ to find out that Kellie Maloney is transgender.
Despite being purportedly ‘sacked’ many times by UKIP, Mr McKenzie was once again UKIP’s PPC in the seat of Croydon North last year.
However, he announced late last year that he had quit the party to join the far-right English Democrats.
Uncles is standing as the party’s candidate for Police and Crime Commissioner in Kent. |
Brent Koster has spent most of his life in Michigan State prisons. Being practically raised on prison food, he has seen the rise and fall of its quality as it’s moved from public to private food services. Koster is one of the roughly 30 kitchen workers, and from behind that food line he watches juvenile delinquents, no younger than he was when he entered the system, stand in uniform cafeteria lines waiting to be served.
“I hate to admit it, but I have a number of years in, 43 years actually,” Koster, who was convicted of murder in 1973, told Medical Daily. “I went through a number of food transitions and it used to be pretty good. But when the state went through the budget cuts, it got progressively worse and worse and worse.”
The meatballs hurt his stomach, the chicken patties are indistinguishable from the fish dishes, and the inmates have come to affectionately call the bologna "cow tongue.”
Prison systems have a lengthy history of poor food quality, raising questions of ethical standards, especially when it comes to the oft-used “re-rack system.” Under the re-rack system, 95 percent of uneaten food is not thrown out, but rather frozen and re-served up to seven days after it was first distributed to the inmates. Meals lack basic dietary necessities, and fruits and vegetables are absent from inmate trays unless otherwise asked for due to budget cuts.
In December 2013, private food corporation Aramark won a bid to take over food services in Michigan State prisons, replacing hundreds of state workers with private employees. The menu is still administered and regulated by the Department of Corrections, but the responsibility to fulfill the daily meal guidelines and policies shifted from the state up to Aramark.
The privatization of prison food services began in 1939, when an Alabama state law handed over the reins to county sheriffs with a food budget of $1.75 a day per prisoner. Budgets largely dictated the food quality served to prisoners, and more than 70 years later the power of financial consideration still holds true. Today, the daily cost to feed a prisoner is between $2 and $3 a day.
There are more than 1.5 million incarcerated in state and federal prisons, according to the Department of Justice, and every single one must be fed according to guidelines. The federally run Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and state departments of health have designed food regulations that are both extensive and explicitly detailed in order to ensure safety and quality for the general public. However, that carefully calibrated system of food distribution and meal balance does not apply to prisons.
There is an ongoing fight for better quality prison food, with proposed theories on how to sustain a healthful diet while behind bars.The national debate involving correctional institutions comes during a time of tight governmental budget cuts and divided sympathy for the incarcerated.
After speaking with Koster about his experience, I decided to try the food for myself. I used the Federal Bureau of Prisons' Certified Menu from 2012 because it is recent and reflective of many meals Koster described to me in our interview. Although Koster would probably argue otherwise, food service in prisons aims to “prepare and serve three daily nutritional, appetizing meals,” according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons. There are three menu options provided for each inmate: regular, heart healthy, and non-flesh diet (vegetarian). Every meal is certified by Religious Services as kosher regardless of individual religious affiliation.
The heart healthy option is supposed to be low in sodium, fat, cholesterol, and sugar. Wheat bread replaces white bread and fruit is given instead of dessert. However, this meal option is provided for “the needs of inmates with special dietary needs,” such as diabetics or those at risk for cardiovascular disease, according to the 2007 Prisoner Law Section of Americans for Effective Law Enforcement (AELE) Law Journal.
But does it really matter if the prison serves the right portion of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and unprocessed proteins each day? Is it inhumane to feed rapists white bread while they’re being punished for unspeakable crimes? By experiencing the day-to-day menu myself, I got a glimpse of what it’s like to eat without options.
My Week of Eating Like A Prisoner:
Photo courtesy of Federal Bureau of Prisons
Monday
Breakfast
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Orange Package of oatmeal (3) slice of white bread (2) cups of skim milk (2) package of jelly (2) margarine
A departure from my typical Greek yogurt, banana, rice cake, or hard-boiled eggs, it was already clear to me this food was going to be a far cry from my normal diet. I ate the oatmeal and orange, then downed three slices of bread plain and chugged my milk.
Lunch
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Beans and franks Potatoes (2) mustard (3) slices of white bread (2) margarine Apple Kosher beverage
The mystery meat that is the hotdog had stripped me of my appetite for it three years ago. However, because prisoners are devoid of choice, I would be too. It was either eat it or go hungry. I had two pieces of hotdog, a few slices of potato, and most of the $0.99 can of beans. And even though I didn’t want any more bread, I found refuge in the plainness, which cleaned my tongue of the hotdog taste. I knew it wasn’t going to be enough food and that I really should eat the hotdog to stave away hunger, but I didn’t have it in me; I’d rather be hungry.
Dinner
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Fish fillet Tomato Sauce White rice Lima beans (2) tartar sauce (3) slices of bread (2) margarine Apple Kosher beverage
I had eaten six pieces of bread today already, and nine would have been nearly a loaf. I turned to my apple for solace and found an old familiar taste. As for the kosher beverages I was supposed to be drinking, I settled for water. Inmates do have that choice and I decided to take it, too. I turned to a registered dietician for expert advice after my first day, who reviewed the Federal Bureau of Prisons' menu I based my meals on for the week.
“Dinner is nicely varied with the protein source,” Amy Shapiro, the founder of Real Nutrition NYC, told Medical Daily. “However, most of the carbs supplied are white from the bread to the rice to the pasta, which is void of fiber and many nutrients.”
Tuesday
Breakfast
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Apple Package of grits (3) slices of white bread (2) cups of skim milk (2) package of jelly (2) margarine
Déjà vu. This morning felt very much like a replay of yesterday morning. Oatmeal and grits are packed with fiber and because it’s a warm meal there’s something comforting in its taste and texture. I ate my apple and skipped the bread again.Why eat all of this bread? It was just filling me up to let me down a couple hours later when I’d feel hungry again. It also comes with its share of health risks.
According to the Harvard School of Public Health, “a diet including a lot of white bread and other high-glycemic foods — like sweets, candy, desserts, and white potatoes — increases your risk for weight gain, type 2 diabetes, and heart disease.”
Lunch
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Package of sardines Package of potato chips Vegetable juice (3) slices of white bread (2) salad dressing (2) mustard Orange Kosher beverage
I’ve never eaten sardines before, but I know I should because they’re packed with healthy omega-3 DHAs, which is a fancy way of saying “brain food.” Today I needed the bread to sandwich the sardines. The fishy smell was difficult to overcome, but I took two bites. Our marketing manager rallied and took a bite of his own for the sake of comradery, only to find out I was telling the truth. It really was difficult to stomach. The potato chips provided a familiarity in the flavorful crunch that any person in or out of prison may be able to relate to. The vegetable juice seemed like a quick and easy way to get veggies into an inmate, but it isn’t without its drawbacks.
“Vegetable juice is void of fiber,” Shapiro said. “I like that the inmates receive three fruits daily and veggies at two meals, but I would like to see more fish that is not fried, whole grains, colorful veggies, and heart healthy fats.”
Dinner
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Turkey cutlet Gravy Mashed potatoes Mixed vegetables (3) slices of white bread Orange Kosher beverage
I couldn’t find a turkey cutlet in the supermarket, so I defaulted to a turkey burger instead, and ate it alongside a defrosted package of frozen veggies (how prisoners normally eat vegetables), mashed potatoes, and gravy. Once again, I passed on the bread.
Wednesday
Breakfast
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Orange Package of bran cereal (3) slices of white bread (2) cups of skim milk (2) package of jelly (2) margarine
This morning, instead of chugging the milk like I normally did, I used it for my cereal. I was basically fed up with bread, so that left me with no use for the jelly or margarine. Bran cereal tastes like how it sounds — bland. But I decided bland was better than bad.
Shapiro shed some light on prisoners’ morning meals: “The menu is pretty carb heavy, especially at breakfast, with the only protein really coming from the milk. Breakfast errs on the high sugar side with sugar coming from the fruit, bread, milk, and jelly. Margarine is also not a healthy sub for butter.”
Lunch
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Beef meatloaf Brown gravy Mashed potatoes Mixed vegetables (3) slices of white bread Banana Kosher beverage
My mom makes delicious turkey meatloaf and that’s exactly why I knew I couldn’t ask her to make me a beef version. Prisoners may fantasize about grandma’s meatballs or the like, but part of the punishment is being deprived of the comforts of home. According to Koster, nearly everything served in prison is prepackaged and frozen, which is why I chose a microwaveable meatloaf dinner instead, which I ate with mashed potatoes, brown gravy, and mixed veggies. I routinely rejected the bread. And the banana was a nice change from the orange-apple alternation.
Dinner
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Chicken cacciatore Tomato sauce Mushrooms Macaroni pasta Carrots (3) slices of white bread (2) margarine Apple Kosher beverage
The chicken mixed with the mushrooms and sauteed carrots tasted nice, but because chicken cacciatore is typically cooked with chicken thighs, it’s not considered a heart-healthy lean meat, according to the American Heart Association.
Later that night, I realized the food was starting to affect me on a mental level when my boyfriend’s normally light tone was laced with concern, “You’ve been really out of it lately. Are you OK?”
I had also been foggy at work for the last couple of days, having a difficult time stringing simple sentences together in my writing. I thought it was all in my head, but I was slowly learning the power food had on my mind and, as I would soon learn, my body.
Thursday
Breakfast
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Banana Package of oatmeal (3) slices of white bread (2) cups of skim milk (2) package of jelly (2) margarine
As soon as I woke up I knew something wasn’t right. I was reluctant to get out of bed and go for my morning run. Everything was slow, like moving through molasses. I looked at my menu. Banana and oatmeal? I left out the bread, jelly, and margarine, stomached half of the oatmeal, drank down my milk, and made my way out the door one day closer to freedom.
But I didn’t make it far before I sat hunched over in the hallway both dizzy and nauseous. Was I getting sick? I put my hand to my forehead and felt a cold but fine layer of sweat coated my skin. I decided to get up and walk. I made it half an hour before I felt strong enough to make it into a slow jog. The run wasn’t just difficult to make it through. It hurt. I had a hard time reconciling with the fact the food was having such a visceral effect on me. Was this food really as bad as my body perceived it to be?
Lunch
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Package of bologna Package of potato chips Vegetable juice (3) slices of white bread (2) salad dressing (2) mustard Orange Kosher beverage
I had never eaten bologna before, which I had learned is a seasoned smoked sausage “made of various meats, especially beef and pork.”
“Bologna and franks are not ideal,” Shapiro said. “They are loaded with nitrates, which have been shown to be carcinogenic.”
According to the American Cancer Society, frequent consumption of processed meats is associated with an increased risk of colon cancer. I took two bites and immediately began having hot dog flashbacks, but managed to clear a third bite. The bologna I ate was different from Koster’s “cow tongue” version, which he said is so bad he doesn’t even eat it.
Dinner
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Vegetable chili White rice Mixed vegetables (3) slices of white bread (2) margarine Orange Kosher beverage
I was hungry after a barely eaten lunch, but my stomach was uncomfortably bloated. I grabbed a fork and ate a few bites of the microwaveable chili, rice, and all of the vegetables. It was mushy, but overall tasty. As I savored the vegetables I remembered Koster said they serve fruits and vegetables only upon request to save money, shaving off pennies per prisoner each meal.
Friday
Breakfast
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Orange Package of grits (3) slices of white bread (2) cups of skim milk (2) package of jelly (2) margarine
Exhaustion. I barely had an appetite, despite having only eaten vegetables and a few bites of rice and chili last night. I had a spoonful of grits with a splash of milk and ate the orange. Before this week, I had always loved eating a big breakfast and rarely turned down a meal in general. This week, nothing was quite right.
Lunch
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Chicken wings Sauce Mashed potatoes Sweet peas (3) slices of white bread (2) margarine Apple Kosher beverage
I had one chicken wing and although the hot sauce was a welcomed palate shift, the mashed potatoes went untouched because of my missing appetite. I ate the steamed sweet peas, my apple, and was soon overcome with a strange sleepiness.
Dinner
Photo courtesy of Medical Daily
Salisbury steak Brown gravy Mashed potatoes Lima beans (3) slices of white bread (2) margarine Apple Kosher beverage
Google Search: “What is a Salisbury steak?” I learned it was some sort of hamburger blend densely cooked into the shape of a steak. Instead of cooking it myself, I relied on another microwaveable meal, with a side of my own mashed potatoes, gravy, and beans. Another foolhardy attempt at eating like an inmate helped me swallow the beans, some mashed potatoes, and two bites of the meat. I calmly placed my fork down. I was done. I wonder how long it will take me to recover from this, I thought.
Food for Afterthought
After analyzing the menu from Monday to Sunday, Shapiro said the diet is missing leafy greens, fiber, whole grains, heart-healthy fats, and other vital nutrients. The inmates could do without the potatoes, potato chips, mashed potatoes, and fiberless vegetable juice.
I am acutely aware of the lamented tone throughout my food journal. Mimicking the diet of incarcerated inmates had taken its toll on both my body and mind. The entire week I gave my food dirty looks, stare downs, and fork pokes. I felt like a snob. The food drastically affected my ability to concentrate, exercise, sleep, and eat. And there was something deeply degrading about my inability to choose. Even the thought of limitation unnerved me. But from what I could ascertain from Koster, this was the way life functioned during incarceration and had been since the prison system was initially introduced nearly 200 years ago.
“I have a problem digesting a lot of this food,” Koster said. “I mean, really. It turns my stool a funny color. There’s no seasoning at all that’s put into anything. Most of the stuff is ready-made mixes or re-racked and re-purposed food. I understand they’re trying to save money, but they go to the extreme with it. Everything’s a numbers game. They could care about anything less than the numbers.” |
You might be surprised to learn that I am not on a first name basis with Peter Zumthor. Everything that I know about myself tells me that he and I would enjoy each others company … at least I would, and that’s 87% of the reason he and I should be hanging out. Interestingly enough, when I find some downtime and I want to randomly search the internet, I start with Peter Zumthor. Most recently, I stumbled upon an article that I enjoyed quite a bit and it ended with a quote that cemented my logic for why he and I should be internet best friends.
The article I read was on Peter Zumthor and his Zinc Mine Museum Project in Norway, and I found it in the digital version of Icon magazine. In this article, Zumthor discusses the project and addresses the numerous delays – some of which can be attributed to Zumthor’s legendary perfectionism. What I really enjoyed was the final two paragraphs that explained Zumthor’s take on the sometimes timely process of creating architecture in a methodical and exacting method.
I don’t want to be slow,” Zumthor explains of his uncompromising method, taking a sip of his cappuccino. “I’m a fast thinker, and I don’t want it to take more time than it takes. But sometimes it takes a while to develop something, you have to make samples and mock-ups, sometimes it takes time to find out what the building really wants to be. I imagine my buildings so completely, I unconsciously live in them. And all of a sudden I feel, hey shit, something’s wrong. “There’s this corner that doesn’t work or whatever. That’s the artistic process. It’s grounded to artists, and it should also be grounded to architects who work like building artists. This is not slowness, this is just working like an architect-artist. This is how I need to work and I need a client who understands it, and wants it, and knows that this can get on your nerves sometimes.” “The finished building,” he adds, with a chuckle, “is your best argument.”
How can you not love that? Despite the process taking a long time, which can quite honestly get on everybody’s nerves, his response is “The finished building is your best argument.”
… that’s going to be my new motto.
Chuckling,
For the entire article, head over to Icon |
For my introductory post I have begun with a list of ten principles which I have found particularly influential on my journey of self development. The ideas here are presented in a list format for the sake of brevity, as I do have a tendency to be a bit verbose. These are thoughts or in some instances quotes which have assisted in shifting my perspective, or which have brought clarity to a situation. It is not however a rigid charter of behavior, or code of ethics. There is a fantastic bit of dialogue from the film “Dogma” in which two characters are discussing the purpose of belief, which I feel is fitting.
“Rufus: Christ said humanity took a good idea and, like always, built a belief structure on it.”
“Bethany: Having beliefs isn’t good?”
“Rufus: I think it’s better to have ideas. You can change an idea. Changing a belief is trickier.”
I think that little bit of conversation holds the essence of what I would like the share with you.You have a code of ethics you live by, and upon discovering that I am living by a different set of values you begin to encounter internal friction or angst. Afterall are we not all the heros of our own story? Everyone you meet believes they are absolutely doing the right things. You may encounter all kinds of interesting reactions within yourself when confronted with differences in belief. Perhaps you become angry and combative. Or maybe you feel fearful and defensive. Perhaps you make an outward gesture of acceptance of this person with the different idea, but within your mind you slap a label on them. All of these things are a reality you have created, your emotions and thoughts coloring in the blank spots.So I ask that you approach this collection of thoughts with an open mind. No one has carved this onto stone tablets. These are not beliefs. These are ideas.
Everyone you meet has something to teach you.
Emerson said it in a slightly different way:
“In my walks, every man I meet is my superior in some way, and in that I learn from him.”
Embrace the opportunities to get to know people. Each person has skills and insights you have not come to just yet on your journey. Clever people tend to fall into a mental trap of believing there are the smartest person in the room and therefore stop engaging with those around them. This leads you to stop absorbing information and pretty soon you will not be the cleverest one in the room.
The “Self” is an Illusion.
It is natural to develop a sense of self. That sense of where “we” end and the universe begins is an important process as we try to navigate through a world with a multitude of stimuli. Unfortunately that process tends to get away from us and we all begin to see ourselves as islands in a vast sea of alone. The idea that there is a “self” is an elaborate story we crafted for ourselves.I had an experience in my early twenties in which I became aware that the capital “I” I perceived myself to be was not true. That which I identified as “me” was simply a collection of belief, assumptions, memories. But none of it was me.After being terrified of what I was experiencing I realized that this moment was an opportunity. This is what non attachment felt like and I was given a few moments of forgetting everything I believed. I refer to this as my ego death. The capital “I” perspective is an illusion, a story in which we cast our self as a hero. Ego death is not some permanent state I have achieved, it is something that comes and goes, and sometimes I am still telling myself stories about myself. But it is a reminder to remain aware. I encourage you to experiment for one day and notice when you begin telling yourself those stories about about yourself. Bring your attention to those moments, let them pass, and carry on to the next moment with awareness.
Live in the moment.
I know, I know it is the most cliché thing one could say here. Everyone seems to say this. At some point I realized that each day, each moment I have the choice about who I am becoming. If I want to become a doctor or a circus clown the only thing standing in my way is myself. Past events may have guided you to this moment but it is NOT the sum of you. I can put down the baggage I have carried with me from that past and leave it right here. That is my choice. Every single moment is an opportunity to create the exactly future I want. Invest in the future version of you; create that kind of authentic and actualized life you want with your actions. Not tomorrow. Not after breakfast. Right now.
You can create the life you want through visualization.
The mind is a powerful thing. There are studies which suggest thoughts we have for extended periods of time rewire the neural pathways of the brain, effectively changing how we perceive things. ( Colotla, Victor A.; Bach-y-Rita, Paul (2002). “Shepherd Ivory Franz: His contributions to neuropsychology and rehabilitation”) Anyone who has experienced a bought with depression can relate to this. When you are in the doldrums of depression it feels as though the world has always been and will always be that way. And there is evidence to suggest if we do not use certain neural pathways they can deteriorate. So if we do not practice awareness, or non judgment or being happy, the brain can forget how. Now I am not talking about “The Secret” or refering to “The 48 Laws of Power”. I am referring to an actual practice of goal setting and follow through. Visualization of the goals you have set your sites on is a fantastic beginning.
Labels Separate Us.
Beliefs and labels are the dividers we shove in between “us” and “them”. Sure labels are an easy way to compartmentalize, and came about as a way to organize the world. But this is another one of the ways our minds warp concepts into something that stifles growth. In order to seek truth and freedom it is important to start taking down these beliefs. Beliefs or assumptions about religion, love, family, and self. Question everything you believe is “supposed” to be a certain way. As you begin to deconstruct the ideas it is easier to see the connection between people who previously seemed vastly different than you. I am not any of the various labels I paste on myself in order to describe my proclivities. I am a human being. And the differences between you and me are very small compared to the similarities.
No matter where you go, there you are.
This is an idea my father suggested to me during a partciularly stressful time in my life. I had an intense desire to pack up my things and leave when a situation became overwhelming. Have you ever noticed yourself repeating the same cycles, dating the same types of people, getting caught up in the same feelings? Your environment may change, your hairstyle and clothing may change, but you are the constant factor in the equation. Unless you practice awareness, and make adjustments to the things that are destructive in your life, you will find much of life to be a rerun of an episode you do not particularly enjoy. If you learn the lesson of a given cycle you don’t have to repeat it, you know the solution and you do not get sucked into the external drama. Be aware of patterns you notice in your behavior and begin to adjust your thoughts and actions to produce a different and desirable outcome.
Everything you need is already inside of you.
There was no fall from paradise, no expulsion from Eden, there is no Magrathea. One of the fallacies I have encountered in my study philosophy is the idea that humanity is on some heroic quest to return home. We take cues from literature such as Homer’s “Odyssey” and Salinger’s “Catcher in the Rye”; the idea that we have been sent away from some great love or understanding and our job is to return home. I must disagree. We are already home. The quest for understanding is an internal one. Every tool you need to create an authentic life is inside of you. There is nothing wrong with seeking advice or assistance in understanding or accessing those tools, but understand that those outside forces are not more powerful than you. You are the authority on your life, I cannot presume to know your life better than you. It is entirely up to you to accept responsibility for your life and make the changes you want to create balance.
The cause of suffering is desire/craving and ignorance.
This is the second of the Four Noble Truths put forward by Buddha in his teachings. He suggests that all things are temporary and clinging to them is what causes the suffering we experience in the world. I have struggled with this concept on and off again, fearing that if I became attached to people or my own existence, or if I desired something it was hindering my progress. But I do not believe that is what this truth is implying. It is a reminder. Suffering is a symptom of these irrational sorts of behaviors, so if you find yourself suffering examine what you are clinging to. This does not mean we should pull away from the world, or not express love for others, or become hermits.I interpret to mean we should take a moment to examine the why behind the feeling.
The opposition of love is not hate, it is apathy.
I am not talking about romantic love. I am talking about compassion. I perceive the currency of the universe to be compassion and understanding, and taking action to see beyond the capital “I”. And the corrosive force in the world isn’t hatred, or ignorance, it is apathy. To do nothing with yourself is a travesty. One of the worst things I have ever heard comes from an episode of the show “Derek” created by Ricky Gervais. A character who shows no real ambition or direction remarks:
“I am not a failure because I failed. I am a failure because I did not try.”
This resonated with me immensely as one who has been paralyzed by fear of failure to the point of non action. This is your life and you have the ability in each moment to change the direction if you want. Do not let apathy eat into your motivation.
“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.” –Albert Einstein
Curiosity is one of the most fascinating parts of the mind. It is this brilliant piece of us which allows us to create, explore and grow exponentially. The most influential people I have encountered in my life seem to have a natural curiosity about the world which encourages them to ask unconventional questions and more importantly come to unconventional conclusions. The practice of finding things which interest you and asking the right questions, of pushing yourself beyond your mental comfort zone is one of the most beneficial skills one can develop. I encourage you to investigate the things you are genuinely curious about, use those curiosities to find that which fills your with purpose. Begin in small ways if this seems intimidating. Dedicate half an hour a day to researching something that tugs at your curiosity and after a week of this practice examine how your perspective is different. As you practice, diversify your research; examine ideas which are contrary to your perspective. Most importantly; enjoy the process. That is the point after all. |
(Reuters) - The United States on Thursday launched a challenge to China’s use of tariff-rate quotas (TRQs) for rice, wheat and corn at the World Trade Organization, charging that Beijing’s administration of the program breached its WTO commitments and hurt U.S. farm exports.
FILE PHOTO - A man loads rice onto a cart for a rice-buying agent in Tay Mo village, outside Hanoi November 27, 2012. REUTERS/Kham
The USTR said global prices for the three commodities were lower than China’s domestic prices, yet the country did not maximize its use of TRQs, which offer lower duties on a certain volume of imported grains every year. The USTR said that limited market access for shipments from the United States, the world’s largest grain exporter, and other countries.
The TRQs for the three commodities were worth more than $7 billion in 2015, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. China would have imported up to $3.5 billion more of the crops last year if the quotas had been fully used, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative said on Thursday.
“The United States will aggressively pursue this challenge on behalf of American rice, wheat, and corn farmers,” U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman said in a statement.
It was the second challenge to China’s agricultural policies by the U.S. Trade Representative since September and the latest in a series of trade disputes between the world’s largest economies.
China on Monday launched a complaint at the WTO against the United States and Europe after they failed to treat China as a market economy and ease their calculations of anti-dumping duties on Chinese goods.
The United States in September charged that China’s domestic grain price supports exceeded agreed upon limits when Beijing joined the WTO in 2001. The USTR has since requested that the WTO launch a dispute settlement panel to investigate the matter.
Industry groups said Thursday’s action would benefit all global grain exporters that have struggled recently with low prices and historically large supplies.
“This troublesome administration of China’s wheat TRQ is restraining export opportunities for U.S. wheat farmers and farmers from Canada, Australia and other wheat exporting countries to the detriment of Chinese consumers,” said Alan Tracy, president of the trade promoting group U.S. Wheat Associates.
China is second largest importer of U.S. agricultural products behind Canada, with $20.3 billion in purchases last year, according to USDA data.
Thursday’s action was the 15th trade enforcement challenge against China by the Obama administration at the WTO since 2009. |
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